#no guys for real i HAD to ABSOLUTELY STRANGLE the animator i me

[darkarfs]

I need to learn to love how I look post-shower. Fucking rained-on St. Bernard. (That's a Drumstick, which I got from my neighbor's freezer. I'm watching her cat this week while she's on vacation, and she said I could have a few.) I'd never been to a show at a college campus before. It was a 4,000 seat venue and it was almost completely full. And the crowd was exactly what you'd expect at that kind of show: the Venn diagram meeting place between anime nerds, stoners and metal nerds. We got there for opener Jason Richardson, a guy who did shred instrumentals with programmed blastbeats. Every song was indistinguishable from the other. He went on for too long. Totally admit going in that I only knew 5 or 6 Babymetal songs, but the ones I knew I more or less liked. I'm not a person who sees them as a novelty act, either, like "oh isn't that interesting, these Japanese pop-idol singers are fronting this riff-heavy metal band." The songs and performances speak for themselves, honestly, and the enthusiasm and energy are absolutely there. They choreograph the shit out of it, and they take it seriously, and yet...it's objectively very silly, and I like that. There's a video vignette at the start about how the infinite universe needs more love and free will and heavy metal in it, and these people want to bring it to us. There's footage of ruins, the desert, the world as seen from space, the Ouroboros, animals chasing one another. It dissolves into this vague "the universe at play, the cosmic ballet" sort of thing, and I take solace in the fact that metal never lets go of that imagery, ever. It shouldn't. Pretend metal is the music of the universe loving and strangling itself, always, because it really is, and I always wanna lose myself in that mess. They didn't do "KARATE," my favorite song of theirs. But they were giving 100% of themselves, and I admire commitment, even if I only knew 5 or 6 songs. Dethklok are currently Brendon Small, a tiny woman in spandex whose name I missed (I think it was Nili?), a bass player, and drumming legend "Atomic Clock" Gene Hoglan. And they are...listen, I've been going to metal shows since 1997, since my freshman year of high school. I've seen Cannibal Corpse, Opeth, Sepultura, Between the Buried and Me, Megadeth, Mastodon, Gojira, Slayer...these are maybe the tightest metal band I have ever seen play. And I think that has everything to do with the fact that they have to play to match the visuals on a giant screen behind them, and it was millisecond-precise, airtight. They're basically playing note-perfect live versions of every Dethklok music video you've ever seen, in real time. You'd need Gene Hoglan for that. FaceBones addressed us twice on the monitor, reminding us to stop being such dickfaces for not showering when going to shows and that we're all friends because we smoke weed. Smalls also took the time to address us as every character he voices on the show. He could do Pickles and Skwisgar, but his Nathan suffered because he had just sung 7 songs beforehand. Not blaming him for that! This is probably the only show I'd ever been to where I knew the words to EVERY song, too, which is weird to think about. Like, even when I saw bands I loved like Motorhead or Gwar, there's always a song I don't know, or a deep cut they do that I'm not familiar with. I knew all the Dethklok stuff.

So much fun. Good to be among the enthusiastic metal dorks, universally the best and most accepting crowds on Earth. Did a shirt count, and other than the two bands performing, the most represented band that I saw, weirdly, was Megadeth. Shout-out to the girl dressed as Dr. Rockso. People being let out to get back to their cars looked like the opening to Gravity's Rainbow. On our way back to the car, I overhear this conversation: Guy behind me: "Those visuals on those two songs were from the movie that just came out." Other guy: "Oh, there's a movie? Where can I watch it?" Me, turning around: "KIMCARTOON DOT ELL-EYE!" GBM: "Well, I'd like to pay them to watch it, yeah?" Me: "Oh, well, in that case, you can rent it on iTunes." Other guy: "Oh, well, fuck that, I'm not going through all of that." Me: "Y'all can't have it both ways, dudes!" An incredibly fun and lovely evening. Glad I did it, glad I had good company for it. I'd do it again.

[titleknown]

You're creating yet another degrowth strawman.

Read some JK Steinberger and maybe you'll calm down.

[Referring to this post]

...Like, how is it a strawman when I point out the things that they've actually said and where I see the implications going?

Like, I'm asking in good faith, because I do not get how people look at the broader Degrowth Movement and not get nervous.

Like, Kallis is not some rando, from my knowlege he's a big name I see brought up a lot. And like, while I don't think this essay I wrote has aged particularly well (I probably would not defend Phillips or The Breakthrough Institute), I do think it's useful to show a lot of the absolute bullshit I've seen Degrowth People say, because I directly linked them. Enough so to give me an idea of a pattern.

And like... to give a further example from something I've personally noticed on why I read the implications I do, in all the talk about degrowth and how much free time their society will provide to pursue your passions, it's always about very analog passions.

Like, they talk about woodworking, playing an instrument, painting. But never about any hobbies that require computing devices, like digital art, video games, game development, programming, robotics, ect-cetera.

Most degrowth-movement-people I've seen have had nothing but spite for the devices that enable those hobbies, because of the very real atrocities that exist in the world-as-we-know it to produce them, but in that I always see the presumption that they could never exist or innovate without that exploitation.

Especially given my conversation wrt the person I mentioned who talked about "emerging technology is a capitalist grift" and how that's reflective of that broader contrarianism I see towards basically any technology that might make the need for mandated-aeceticism less.

One degrowth person on here said was "well, video games are just a substitute for what capitalism took from you," which I think is a grotesque way to treat an entire artform just because you find it inefficient.

Why is it such a strawman to think that, given they talk about the need for those mandated limits on production, means of accessing or iterating upon those devices would be choked off? Especially under the system of soft-pressure Kallis describes.

And like... speaking personally, as a fan of a lot of mediums that're often strangled by the efficiency fetishism of capitalism (Animation being the big one), I do not get how one doesn't get very nervous at the tendency towards efficiency fetishism in the Degrowth Movement.

And that's what I see a lot of from Degrowth People, efficiency fetishism. That contempt I see for computing and those that use it, the framework of "harsh truths" that you might never have an orange again, the quest I keep seeing to define so many things as manufactured interests, in aggregate it's extremely noticeable to me.

I see it concealed through the language of free time, but when I look deeper at what they talk about using free time for and what mediums they shit-talk, it feels very much more like the idea that they simply think their hobbies are "efficient" enough to avoid the axe, and people who's aren't should get fucked.

Like, from all I see of Kallis' work it's not "Does it bring joy?" it's "You need to make its absence bring joy through 'self-mastery'" which like...

...If one's autistic, the idea of altering your interests for the sake of "self-mastery" or "self control" driven by pressures to be "efficient" is an extremely familiar pain, ugly and cruel in a way that a lot of people who never experienced it don't realize.

And again, I see a lot of Degrowth People citing this guy, and a lot of people echoing the worst of his points.

Like, again, I've come around on the idea of degrowth as a technique, a tool in the toolbox, but none of that has been from the works of the actual degrowth movement, but rather through people who don't have that aestheticized efficiency fetishism.

And like... maybe it's just my different reading and my experiences at play, but I fundamentally, genuinely, do not get how my bringing it up is a strawman.

Like... I do not get how y'all don't see it, reading those trends. How?

[razersketches]

Haven’t drawn something for a long while due to The Sad. And then I was like. Okay I am going to draw something for myself and try and do it differently to how I would normally draw and be more sketchy (I had to strangle the animator in me to stop the lines from being super clean). BUT ANYWAY enjoy my baby!

Ko-fi Fanfiction Old Fic: ”Just Like Me” (Tekken ft OC) More On Deviantart

[prorevenge]

Neighbours refused to be quiet, so I played the long game and made them move out

A few years ago I got hired at a job in a big city with expensive rent. I slept on my brother's couch for a few months while I struggled to find a place, but eventually found someone in an old building who wanted to get out of their rental agreement. The apartment was pretty close to work and in a nice area, so I took it, almost too good to be true...

It didn't take long for me to realize I made a big mistake. The building was old, and the walls were made of plaster. Any sound reverberated like crazy, I could hear people cough and sneeze like they were standing in my place. What's worse, I shared one of these thin walls with my neighbours, who were absolutely fucking insane. They just would not shut up. I would hear a man and woman argue constantly, often until 2 or 3 in the morning. And by arguing I mean literally screaming and shouting and throwing things against the wall. When they weren't arguing they were always just LOUD, shouting and whining at each other like little kids constantly. Pretty much the quintessential toxic, obnoxious couple. And the shit they would argue about was so stupid! I remember hearing an argument about who's turn it was to steal shampoo from the drug store. One time the boyfriend decided to yell "THE BIBLE SAYS WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS" over and over again for some reason. Almost every day it would be something different and uniquely annoying.

The first real incident happened when I was woken up by screaming and banging against my wall at 1am. I did what I usually did (blasted Kenny G through my speakers at the wall until they shut up), but this time it didn't work. The banging got louder so I stopped the music, but then it got worse and sounded like a fight. It was hard to describe, but it sounded like the woman was getting beaten up. At this point I was more concerned than mad so I called my superintendent, who told me to call the police (not the US). The police came, the neighbours told them everything was fine, the police left, it was quiet, I went back to bed.

Literally the next night I am woken up again at 1am by my neighbours having another argument. This time I heard a BOOM, then the woman say "oh my god" in an weird voice, and then banging and what sounds like someone being strangled. The noises were freaky and way more concerning than even last time so I called the police again. The police came, the neighbours told them everything was fine again, the police left again, and it was quiet again, but this time the police called me back and basically told me I was an idiot for wasting their time. They said there was no evidence of any fight and both neighbours denied anything even happened. Even the superintendent said that no one else on the floor complained and intimated that I was starting to become a nuisance. I decided from this point forward I was going to go full Spielberg with video evidence.

The noise was bad for the next 6 months, and I would get woken up at least once a week after midnight by yelling and screaming. I made a few written complaints, a few videos as evidence, and sent them to the property manager. There was enough to serve them an eviction notice and go to the landlord/tenant board, but somehow the property manager fucked up the date for the hearing and it never actually took place. Thankfully the noise stopped anyway (for now...), so I assumed the neighbours finally got the message and would be quiet from now on. I didn't fight for another hearing because the eviction notice gave the neighbours an opportunity to be quiet, which they sort of did.

As an aside, the video evidence I gathered during this time was BEAUTIFUL. I was pleasantly surprised that my phone was very good at picking up their voices. It got to the point where I would get excited when I was woken up in the middle of the night, because I would run out into the hallway and film their door and room number as the noise blasted out and echoed down the hall. I gathered some damning, unambiguous evidence, pure gold, and it was all timestamped at around midnight or 1am. But because the hearing got cancelled I didn't get to present my evidence (at least not yet...)

For a few months, everything was reasonably ok. They were still loud as fuck during the day. and there were a few times after 11pm on weeknights where I went to their door and asked them to keep it down, but other than that things were mostly better, and I was starting to be able to relax in my place for once. Yet again it was too good to be true...

One day around 2:30 in the afternoon I start hearing this weird, high-pitched screeching coming from my neighbours place. And it doesn't stop for hours. I'm sitting on my couch trying to figure out what it is. It sounds like a giant fucking tropical bird moved in next door.

Well it turns out, after all the shit we went through a year ago with the noise complaints and eviction notice, my neighbours decided it would be a good idea to get a dog.

And of course these obnoxious assholes couldn't just get a quiet, normal, well-behaved dog. They had to get a completely untrained, 4 month old, tiny, yappy Pomeranian that was INCAPABLE of being quiet. This thing would yap and screech and bark over and over and over EVERY DAY for HOURS.

While I'm still coming to terms with how miserable my life is about to become, I get a note under my door. On it, my neighbour writes that she just got the dog as an emotional support animal for her mental health, and asks the whole hallway to please try to tolerate the noise.

Fuck that shit. I'd already been living next to and listening to these neighbours scream at each other for over a year. They were confirmed fucking morons; two insane, toxic assholes in a mutually abusive relationship. I knew with CERTAINTY that they weren't capable of taking care of this dog properly and the noise situation would go to complete shit.

And regarding the mental health, I was going through my own troubles during this time (in part due to lack of sleep) and was seeing a therapist. The last year of complaints should have made it clear to anyone that noise was a problem for me, especially getting woken up at night. Of all the things this neighbour could have chosen to help their mental health, they chose the most obnoxious thing possible. They knew getting a loud dog was going to be a problem and they did it anyway. It was time for WAR.

I realized if I wanted this noise to stop, or to be even taken seriously, I needed a mountain of evidence against my neighbours. I researched the evictions process and everything that was required. I checked the forms my superintendent would have to send out for an eviction notice. I read threads on reddit about slumlords and neighbour disputes. It became clear to me the only way to win was to be religiously disciplined both in gathering evidence and refusing to retaliate (no more Kenny G). I became a noise-complaint monk, taking a vow of disciplined log taking, and relying on mantras like "shut the fuck up... shut the fuck up...."

Once I submitted my first written complaint, things got bad. My neighbours flipped out when they realized I was complaining again. I heard stuff like "OF ALL THE APARTMENTS IN --- WE HAVE TO LIVE NEXT TO THIS FUCKING GUY?!" for a few days. Then the loud arguments in the middle of the night started all over again. And one of the neighbours got into the new habit of SLAMMING their chest of drawers against my wall at 2am.

The barking also got much worse. The emotional-support-animal letter said that the barking would get better once the dog was trained, but from what I could hear my neighbours methods of training began and ended with screaming at the dog just like they screamed at each other each day. "NO! BAD DOG!", "BE QUIET!", "SHUT THE FUCK UP!" came through my wall in new and varied combinations every day. And every time an argument started between my neighbours the dog would always join in, even in the middle of the night. The constant level of noise was insane.

For over a year, l logged every instance of yelling, shouting, and barking coming from my neighbours apartment. It didn't matter if it was after 11pm or not at this point, I was trying to demonstrate how I can't get peace at any time of day. And when I say every instance, I mean I had minute-to-minute logs of every loud noise and every word I heard from my neighbours wall. If I was woken up in the middle of the night it went in the log. If I heard the dog bark from 12pm-1pm on February 2nd it went in the log. If I heard someone yell "YOU PEED ON THE FLOOR AGAIN, FUCK!" at the dog it went in the log. Honestly it sucked and made me almost lose my fucking mind, but by the time I was done I had pages and pages of notes

Obviously written logs wouldn't be enough. I already had a decently fat stack of video evidence to demonstrate the true character of my neighbours, but I needed current evidence if there was going to be another hearing. Fuck Spielberg, now I was Coppola in the heart of darkness. I got more videos of screaming and shouting coming out of their door. I got videos of banging and barking against my shared wall. I got videos of screaming, shouting, banging, and barking all at the same time, or in any combination. I had amassed a war-chest of video evidence to be deployed at the next available hearing, but I was getting war-weary

At this point I was like 6 or 8 months into the complaints process and I could barely take it anymore. I was getting woken up like 2 nights a week and would be a zombie at work (I complained about my neighbours at work often). I was finding it harder and harder to keep myself from blasting music, or banging on their wall, or kicking their fucking door down. But I managed to stay strong, and I followed the eviction process like it was my religion. I sent in a second written complaint, then a third which resulted in an eviction notice, which gave the neighbours an opportunity to be quiet. This time they didn't give a fuck, if anything they were louder than ever before. I was looking for other places to move into when I finally get good news from the property manager: there's a hearing date!

There was light at the end of the tunnel, but once the neighbours heard about the hearing date they did everything they could to fuck me up. There were no attempts to stop the barking anymore, it was constant. The screaming matches were back in full force, and when they started yelling and screaming the dog would go nuts! It was just an insane amount of noise.

And the drawers were ridiculous! Honestly I never expected the slamming drawers to be that bad but they easily eclipsed the barking and the shouting. They would SLAM and SLAM and SLAM the drawers over and over again against my wall. And because of the plaster it would BOOM BOOM BOOM and echo through my whole place. These assholes were definitely doing it on purpose.

3 days before the hearing date I go to bed at 9:45pm. At 10pm I'm still not asleep but I'm startled by BOOM BOOM of the drawers, I log it and go back to bed. At 11:30pm I wake up to BOOM BOOM BOOM again, and I'm pissed off. It takes me half an hour but I fall asleep again. Then at 12:45am BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM there it is again! I call my superintendent, tell her what's going on, the super calls them and tells them to stop. I fall back asleep. Then at 1:30am BOOM BOOM BOOM I wake up super fucking angry, it's obvious they're doing this on purpose to piss me off before the hearing and get a reaction out of me. I call the super again, and go back to sleep again. Then at 2:45am BOOM BOOM BOOM I can't take it anymore. I scream "DO IT AGAIN!!!! DO IT AGAIN!!!" I lost it, I couldn't help myself. My discipline broke. My superintendent calls me and tells me my neighbours just said I yelled a death threat through the wall (what the fuck?) and that they're calling the police (WHAT THE FUCK?). Everything just feels fucked now, I can't sleep so I just wait until morning. No police show up and I go to work. I realized I couldn't even stay at my place anymore until this hearing was over, so I went back to my brothers couch for the next 3 days.

Finally the big day arrives. I gather my evidence: Over a year of meticulously logged noise complaints, 6 instances of video evidence (I cherry picked the gold out of 20 good ones), the previous eviction notice the neighbours received, 4 written noise complaints (including the 2 from the previous eviction notice), a letter from my co-worker about poor work performance due to lack of sleep, and even a letter from my therapist about how my neighbours' excessive noise was affecting my mental health.

I got there and met the property manager and superintendent, who were there with the owner of the property management company and a slick looking lawyer. I handed the lawyer all my evidence. I gave him a usb stick with the videos. I even handed over my big bluetooth speaker to make sure the videos were loud enough to hear (laptop speakers suck).

I look over to my neighbours and they are wide-eyed. They look scared! Finally!

We all go into the landlord/tenant board room with everybody. The adjudicator first asks if anyone wants to mediate instead of going through with the hearing. My neighbour's hand immediately shoots up. I say in front of everybody "I don't want to mediate!" but apparently it's not up to me and the lawyer takes me aside.

The lawyer tells me if it goes to mediation, the neighbours and the property management create an agreement (e.g. no more noise at x o'clock), and if that agreement is broken once it results in an immediate eviction. He explains if we go in front of the board instead it's a 50/50 chance they either get evicted or get off completely. Obviously mediation is the better way to go, I know these idiots are already incapable of keeping quiet, so I agree with the lawyer. We go out to find the neighbours and they're nowhere to be found. Turns out they opted for the free legal counsel ( I wonder why) and won't be available until the afternoon.

While waiting I explain to the property manager, owner, and lawyer what happened a few days ago with the slamming drawers all night long. When I made my complaints before no one really took them seriously, but today everyone is very interested in everything I have to say.

The afternoon comes, and I'm excluded from the mediation meeting because it's between the neighbours, the lawyer, and the owner. I can't hear what they're saying but I can hear my neighbours yelling and shouting from inside the room so I know it's not going well for them.

Everyone leaves the room and the lawyer comes up to me. He tells me the mediation failed, the neighbours refuse to change their behaviour and won't accept any terms. The lawyer says they have to go in front of the adjudicator again but by now it's almost the end of the day.

I wait another hour or two and everyone comes out. I see my neighbours leave as the lawyer comes by again and explains. Apparently, after the mediation failed, the property management owner offered my neighbours 2 months rent FREE if they agreed to move out in 2 months. The neighbours agreed, but when they all went in front of the adjudicator the neighbours changed their minds and said no! And apparently a second offer was made, which they said yes to, and then no again, all in front of the adjudicator! They ended up running out of time and the adjudicator cut the hearing short and said it would have to be resolved in a second hearing. I was disappointed, but the lawyer assured me that because of how capricious and insane my neighbours behaved in during the hearing, they would almost certainly be evicted during a second hearing. I was dismayed that it wasn't over, but hopeful the end was coming soon. I also felt vindicated, it was finally clear to everyone that my neighbours were actually insane and I wasn't just making this up.

The next two months weren't as bad as before. I continued my long steady march of logs and videos. But the noise definitely let up, especially the drawers. One day near the end of the second month I started to hear insane barking, it would not stop. It went on for hours and hours and hours. I called the superintendent to complain when they told me it was probably because the neighbours were moving out today. YES! HAHAHA! FINALLY! Apparently she couldn't tell me earlier because of privacy reasons. As they were moving out I blasted 'Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye' on loop, put in some earplugs, and took a 2 hour bath.

My apartment is quiet now and I can finally sleep. It wasn't exactly the satisfying crushing blow I wanted but my discipline paid off and now I can live in peace.

(source) story by (/u/ZapoiBoi)

[astrologista]

Kristoph Gavin Character Analysis I

Part 1 of... fucking infinity, I hate this bitch so much lmao.

Well, it's Halloween time and I just thought, why not. So let's answer this question.

What makes Kristoph Gavin a scary character/villain? A soft spoken gentleman with a deadly secret... the Devil, who lives in his hand, that crazy evil scar thing, his creepy music theme... damn, he’s a scary dude. But scariest of all? His psychology, as we all know. (This is mostly gonna be headcanons. but ya know what, I have a license (hands you a piece of paper that says ‘i can do what i want’))

Kristoph seems like a person who is very aloof, particularly when it comes to personal relationships. At first he kind of just seems like the typical anime glasses guy whose main emotion is like whooa he does the glare thing with his glasses sometimes. But... what is he really about?

You know, let me digress for a moment, what's really interesting to me about the AA characters is how much depth they have in their writing. Case in point, Adrian Andrews. There's a character who you assume is just going to be the typical "anime glasses girl" who is a career woman who don't need no man, and is very aloof, cool, and as she says, not concerned with irrelevant topics or things. Later you learn about the true depths to her personality. The fact that she is codependent, that she needs other people telling her what to do in order to survive. Just because she masks these emotions doesn't mean they don't exist. I felt that really gave a lot of depth to her character and added another dimension that stories in this genre don't often address as boldly or fully (especially when it comes to a female character). So the quality of the writing is always really top notch with only a few exceptions. Take this as context...

Now getting back to Kristoph Gavin. Typical anime glasses dude, right? But no, though. One of the reasons why he's so interesting to me is how his emotional understanding of personal relationships really works. Or seems to, anyway. Based on the endgame testimony and his crimes, Kristoph Gavin is extremely dangerous because, should you get involved with him in any way, he will never, ever let go of you, ever. Once you are entangled with him he wants you to stay entangled, not unlike an overbearing parent who refuses to let you go. It's partly that he thinks he knows what's best for you (that is, to stay completely loyal to him). And also partly... because he is pretty dependent on what other people think of him. So he needs to keep them around him closely.

Kristoph's biggest fear was his lying being exposed for what it was. That Phoenix was really the honest, straightforward attorney, and not him. Kristoph would do anything to perpetuate his own false reality. He kept it going for seven years. His absolute worst fear of all was losing his reputation. Being seen for what he truly was in front of others. He could never accept that. That fear drove all of his murders. Fundamentally, he sees himself as benevolent... when nothing could be further from the truth of how he was hurting everyone who had the misfortune of crossing his path.

Kristoph has a need to perpetuate this false identity of himself above all else. A very adjacent second goal to that is to keep all of his personal associates very close and under his control in order to keep the first goal intact.

Reject him and he will stalk you until you are dead. By his hand, or otherwise. Slight him, and he will get you at the first opportunity, case in point, Zak Gramarye. (He only had to get a quick glance at the guy and his fate was sealed. Turnabout Trump is a chilling case.) Replace him, and he will tear your life and livelihood up into little itty bitty pieces. He will then continue to stalk you aggressively for seven years while pretending he is your best friend. Case in point, Phoenix Wright.

Create false evidence for him and you become a loose end. So does your daughter. Like I said, just don't get involved with him. If he feels threatened, Kristoph Gavin will not hesitate to end you. It's definitely an obsession. I mean the first word that comes to people's minds when it comes to Kristoph usually isn't "obsessed", because he gives off the aura of being calm and uninterested. But he is, he's obsessed. You have to be obsessed to do what he did. This shit consumed his every waking hour, and that's what he won't admit. That he was so sick, he completely lost the plot. Phoenix was already living in his head rent free the day he ordered the forgery. And even though Phoenix wasn't physically present at the Misham trial and was only watching everything by video camera, you can bet Kristoph was seeing Phoenix. Hallucinating him, images of him. Probably multiple images of him. That's how obsessive. Imagine letting something or someone control you to that extent. Imagine thinking that you're so important, that Phoenix taking Zak Gramarye's case at all was meant to be a slight against you personally. (It's funny because Phoenix mentions not even knowing Kristoph at all until after the disbarment. So Kristoph's own logic in thinking that Phoenix was just out to shame him absolutely doesn't track. Ob-sessed, dude.)  

It's actually pretty astonishing that someone like Apollo made it out alive. On a side note, I really think Kristoph enjoyed having someone to mentor. He sought someone like Apollo out. Someone naive and new to the field for him to indoctrinate. And maybe I have a post about that later, cuz that's a whole 'nother barrel of monkeys right there. (It kind of involves Apollo’s naivete (also, daddy issues, hello.) being a huge reason why he would gravitate towards having a mentor known for having a “caring” personality. And I think Apollo genuinely liked that about him, which makes the end result so much more awful for Apollo to deal with because to him, that was real.)

But now think of Klavier, right. Being forced to grow up with that. To live with that your entire life. To have a familial relationship that is that smothering, that suffocating, that strangling. That controlling, to criticize every single thing that you do or say right down to the way you say it. And remember... He's never letting you go. I would go on a world tour as a rock star, too. Anything to be anywhere he isn't. This is horror movie tier stuff. (now im imagining a horror movie trailer for aa4 focusing on gavins stuff... eep!)

And Kristoph Gavin markets himself as someone who simply doesn't care. He's the coolest defense in the west and he doesn't care for what you may think about it. Except... he does care. It totally consumes him. Your perception, your opinion, is everything to him. He has shitty self esteem, deep down, because he knows Phoenix is better than him. And tries to mask it with narcissism as the two duke it out. Appearances are everything, evidence is everything. What people think is true is the only thing that matters, truth doesn't. And it makes sense that his closest contacts and associates are the targets for his constant narcissistic abuse and gaslighting. Their opinions matter even more than the common crowd - of course, Kristoph hates them. Which makes it even worse for him when the jury decides unanimously that Vera is innocent (and by implication, he is therefore guilty). The jury verdict was kind of like the ultimate confirmation that guess what, the evidence doesn't matter. The common and boorish masses have passed judgement, no matter how "mindless, emotional and irrational" they are, even they can see behind his crappy little facade. Even a blind woman like Lamiroir can see that insecurity; even a common person can understand it just by looking at the facts. That's what absolutely wrecks him... that his “poker face” couldn’t hold a candle to Phoenix’s. And he loses the “hand” again (because of his “hand”... get it??).

The identity that he needs to maintain is part of how he sees himself in his mind. As Phoenix's protector, not as his stalker. As Klavier's benevolent big brother, not as his abuser. As Apollo's teacher and mentor, not as someone guiding him into ruin. He lives in a false reality.

Try to bring this up in any way, shape, or form and he will write it off. You're just imagining things...

Because at some level, Mr. Black Psyche Locks himself doesn't even realize. (I feel like that might just be basically canonical fact, based on Pearl’s explanation of how black psyche locks are supposed to work.) That’s pretty freaking terrifying.

At the end of the day this is a big part of the reason I think his character is just so interesting. In a very messed up way, Kristoph is one degree away from being such a good person. He could've been obsessively protective of Klavier - the way a big brother is supposed to be - instead of abusive, could've actually been very caring of Phoenix instead of manipulative. Terrible people can have good traits, just as good people can have awful traits. His attention to detail and understanding of psychology (like getting Vera those gifts she would like so much) could've been used for genuine good. He could've been someone who cares deeply about other people because he does care deeply about other people. But only in terms of their relation to himself, what do they think of him, how are they useful to him.

Maybe this is why I kind of like his character. Intelligent, semi-neurotic protective characters are just my ish. But, no, he has to have a narcissistic bent that skews everything into complete abuse. That’s what makes him awful... that he’s devoid of a moral compass or true compassion for other human beings.

So in closing, fuck off, Kristoph Gavin.

Postscript, he's also such a good foil for Phoenix for this reason. Kristoph does everything for himself. Phoenix does everything for Trucy, because he's a dad and he understands the weight of what it means to really care for someone. Kristoph couldn’t understand motives like that. And Phoenix can't help it if he's an order of magnitude smarter and more mature than Kristoph is. He was just born like that. Classy as fuck. You know what, Kristoph Gavin is like the dollar store version of Phoenix Wright as an attorney. Has many of the same functions but actually doesn't have a leg to stand on and will fail you when you need it. And is revealed to just be a cheap knockoff of the real thing.

[everything-media-with-blank]

#11 - Hitoshi Shinsou

Top Ten Favorite (Anime) Characters

#1 - Hitoshi Shinsou (My Hero Academia)

Quote:

"We don't get to choose the things we naturally admire."

Where do I start? I could talk about Hitoshi for weeks, months, years. But you guys have better things to be doing, so I'll spare you.

His first appearance at the Sports Festival had me completely fascinated. I love his character design, motives, aspirations, backstory, everything. Especially his quirk. I love the conflict around his quirk, and I love how well it shows another side of U.A. Academy, as well as My Hero Academia's society as a whole.

His character sparked questions that I never would have thought of before he was introduced. Mainly, how people with quirks similar to Hitoshi's (quirks with no real physical applications on inanimate objects but are still extremely useful to hero work) would even pass U.A.'s physical entrance exam, especially with rules in place that you are not allowed to interfere with other students during the exams.

His quirk is also so overpowered, especially against opponents who have no idea about his quirk and with the addition of his voice-changer. He's intelligent enough to know how to trick others that already know about his quirk (as shown in the joint-training arc) into answering him.

I think that very few people picked up on how intelligent Hitoshi really is. Not only does he acknowledge and know both his strengths and weaknesses as well as how he needs to train his quirk in the future, but for him to even get into U.A. in the first place with such as low physical exam score (as I assume he had), he must have had a very high score in the written exam. I think that's a very nice 'hidden' detail of his character.

Upon seeing him in the joint-training arc, I was over the moon. More Hitoshi! More character development! I just about keeled over dead upon learning of his acceptance into the hero program. He fought to show that general class students have potential, too, and he proved it! His heroic nature is very clear at two certain points during the arc; first when he potentially sacrifices his victory (and what, from his standpoint, is his only chance into the hero department) to save Izuku, despite no prompting from the teachers, and it not benefiting him in any way (in spite of what he says later about it 'only being to benefit himself', which it did not).

The second point was after the final battles had taken place and Hitoshi's performance was being evaluated. Him, being the humble bean he is, spoke about his shortcomings (despite him holding his own against and even defeating students who have had actual experience fighting real villains and many, many months of intense training while he had zero experience). He talked about how he could improve while Aizawa practically strangled him to death (I still laugh at that to this day). And the look of confusion, awe, and wonder as he was informed of his acceptance into the hero class makes many months of waiting absolutely worth it. He definitely deserves to be in Class 1-A (and more screen time wouldn't hurt, either).

These are just a few of the many components of Hitoshi's character that I love, but I'm going to end it here before it becomes a full-fledged character analysis.

[flyingkiki]

Curiosity, Chapter 8

Well, this got interesting. *looks around nervously* 

~

“Mary Johnson, 46, born in Steel City, her family moved to Gotham when she was seven. Her father, Chester Johnson, was a real estate agent who was reassigned to Gotham. He died of cancer when she was 12. Her mother, Francine, eventually remarried a couple of years later to a guy name Carl Tomson. The three of them lived a pretty straightforward life. Mary has been in Gotham ever since, never moved once. She’s a veterinarian, owns a local practice in downtown Gotham and has zero bad reviews on Yelp. She likes animals, enjoys spending her weekends at the park, catching the latest movies at the cinema, and bowling,” Tim paused as he looked at the Batcomputer. Throwing both Raven and Bruce a wry grin he shrugged. “I pulled the last bit out of her Tinder profile.”

Raven crossed her arms and cocked her head to the right, and gave Tim an amused look. Bruce made a dismissive sound at the back of his throat. Switching her gaze to the smiling middle aged woman with ash-blonde hair, green eyes and horn-rimmed glasses, Raven found it hard to believe that this woman was a die-hard follower of the Church of Trigon. She looked more like a mother from a Sunday school.

“Apparently, aside from her interests in animal care and parks, Mary seemed to have a keen interest in the occult. In her junior year of college, she heard of a cult that was gaining popularity among the underground scene in Gotham. Long story short, Mary met Brother Blood, joined the church, and helped him grow the church, and prepared whatever it took to summon Trigon onto earth,”

Raven frowned and stared at the pictures of police reports that appeared on the Batcomputer. “How come she was never caught? We never saw her when the Titans took down Brother Blood,”

Tim’s brows furrowed a bit and his blue eyes swept over the huge screen in front of them. “She somehow escaped capture when the Titans took down the church. When all records were in custody, there was no record of a Mary Johnson anywhere in the church,” Tim replied. He pressed a few more keys on the computer. “Just a Lilith Morningstar.”

“Of course,” Raven pushed herself away from the railing she was leaning against with a loud huff of annoyance. Folding her arms across her chest, she walked up to the computer and looked at the grainy image of a middle aged woman dressed in a black robe looking at something off camera. Leave it to the fanatics to take on aliases related to Satan. “Wife of Lucifer,”

“She used Lilith as her alias all throughout her time with the Church of Trigon,” Bruce said. “Explains why there is no trace of her.”

Tim nodded. Typing on the computer, he pulled up pictures of Mary – Lilith – from different locations throughout Gotham and with varying timestamps throughout the span of 20 years. “I’ve run a face recognition scan through the city’s CCTV network. She’s been frequenting a couple of old bookstores and underground locations that are more popular among occultists,” explained Tim.

Raven stared at the multiple reports and images blown up on screen. She turned to Tim with a surprised look on her face. She knew that Tim was an excellent detective, but she did not know that he was that good. Didn’t he say earlier that he was up at three in the morning? “You pulled up all of this information at three in the morning? How are you even awake?”

Tim waved his coffee mug at her and grinned as he heard Raven snort softly at him. “Sleep is for the weak,”

Bruce frowned, ignoring the banter and keeping his eyes focused on the screen. “Do we know why she is trying to recreate Trigon’s summoning?”

“From what we gathered she wants to finish what Brother Blood has started,” said Raven. “The church promises that Trigon will purge the world and offer them sanctuary. His followers will live in his cleansed world with everlasting life.” She frowned and folded her arms tighter over her chest. “Or so the promise goes,”

“This is the warehouse district Frank mentioned,” said Tim as he pulled up an image of an old rundown warehouse. “I’ve been tracking movements within the district and within the last 48 hours, there’s been only one person who entered one of these warehouses,”

They watched as hooded person appeared of screen and walked up to one of the old warehouses. The figure opened one of the old rusty doors and slipped through them. “Whoever that was stayed there for a 68 minutes before leaving again but this time they got a companion heading out,” Tim sped up the video and they watched as two figures stepped out of the warehouse and walked off screen. Tim paused the video and looked over his shoulder at Raven and Bruce. “That’s one empty church, if you ask me,”

Bruce frowned and stared at the screen. “Pull up the underground layout of the district. Check if there are any underground structures or tunnels under that warehouse,”

Tim hummed and typed in a few commands. “Way ahead of you, B. Oracle and I pulled up the plans up underneath the warehouse. There’s a tunnel system that’s about a 600 meters deep and leads to a bigger hall with a couple of rooms,”

Raven frowned and stared at the blueprint. A chill ran down her spine and her fingers dug into her arms. She suppressed whatever memories that bubbled dangerously under her steely resolve. “Probably one of the older church halls from Brother Blood’s time,” she said.

Switching to the blueprint of the main warehouse, Tim pulled up details of each point of entry. “There’s a couple of windows at the east and west wing of the warehouse, if we enter from the forest side tonight. There are beams and parts of the roof that caved in, that provide good enough coverage for us,” Tim began to play through the structural details of the warehouse. “Entrance to the underground hall is somewhere to the northwest of the warehouse, we’ll have to find it – it should be likely hidden in the flooring or through a door in the back wall,”

Tim continued to pull up a few more plans and live footage of the warehouse. “I’ve programmed the system to send out an alarm for any movement in the area. Oracle is doing another structural scan so we have a better idea of the underground layout.”

Bruce nodded, satisfied with the details presented. “We’ll head out tonight during patrol,” He offered Raven and Tim a brief look. “Good job you two,”

Raven titled her head at Bruce, lips quirking slightly. “Tim was the one who barely slept,”

Tim chuckled and waved his hand absently. “Who needs sleep?”

“Someone who is going head on with a group of people who have a knack at summoning inter-dimensional demons,” Raven rolled her eyes and sent him an amused smile.

“Concerned?” Tim grinned swiveled his chair in her direction. He threw her an amused grin.

Raven made a dismissive sound and turned on her heels. She ignored the brush of his emotions against her. Sending Bruce a quick glance, she stuffed her hands into her (Tim’s) hoodie. “I’m going to do some reading and meditate. I’ll see you later tonight?”

Bruce nodded. He checked his watch and pushed himself away from the railing he was leaning against. “Right. Tim and I have a board meeting. We’ll be back before dinner and we can discuss plans before we leave for the warehouse.” Turning to Tim he eyed him expectantly. “Better get ready, we leave in 10,”

“Board meeting before we take down a church that summons inter-dimensional demons. Bruce Wayne keeps a very interesting social calendar,” Raven sent Bruce an amused smile as she passed him on her way out of the cave.

Not waiting for a reply, she slipped out of the cave and silently walked through the hidden pathway that connected the cave to the manor. Emerging through one of the hidden doors in one of the many sitting rooms in the manor (why Bruce had so many was beyond her), Raven towards the library. After the morning briefing, she didn’t feel particularly hungry for breakfast anymore. She hoped Alfred would understand.

Picking up some of the books she and Tim had been reading over the last few days, she slipped into the deeper corners of the library away from their usual reading space and settled into one of the reading corners at the back of the library. She needed some secluded alone time for herself. Settling into the plush reading chair, Raven pulled her feet under her and comfortably leaned back. Exhaling softly, she tried to release the tension that had settled around her shoulders.

Cracking open the book she had been reading, Raven tried to focus on the text in front of her. However, after rereading the same paragraph five times and still not understanding a single word from the passage, she closed it with a frustrated sigh and closed her eyes. Her head thrummed softly, a whisper of a headache crawling under her skull.

Raven was fairly certain that they’d be able to see this little ragtag church of her father’s at work tonight. From what they gathered so far, they stood a fairly good chance to put an end to this circus by tonight. A few words from the text swam in front of her eyes, sacrifice, death, gem, and she knew that there was absolutely no need for her to read anything more about the Church of Trigon – she already knew everything there was.

Folding her legs into a lotus position and placing the book into her lap, Raven’s fingers curled absently into the old tome. The edged of the book bit into her fingers, grounding her. Her mind reeled briefly as hot, stifling fire consumed her thoughts. Somewhere in the distance she could hear the chanting, Scath, Scath, Scath, and a distant strangled cry. She felt the sickeningly familiar text of Scath dance across her skin and singe her flesh. The curved script pressed into her arms and legs, and slowly burned her torso. Her lungs burned from the heat of fire all but consuming her –

“We need the gem.”

Raven inhaled sharply, allowing cool air to fill her parched lungs, and she quickly opened her eyes, eyeing her surroundings wildly for a brief second. She pushed the tome out of her lap involuntarily and sunk heavily into the plush cushions to calm herself down. A wave of irritation hit her as she thought of how easily the church got under her skin. She should have a better handle over the situation.

Closing her eyes and seeing the fire burn at the back of her eyelids, Raven sore she was going to burn the church to the ground tonight.

Getting into a comfortable lotus position, Raven exhaled softly and slipped into her meditative trance. This should help her ground herself and prepare her for later tonight.

She’ll be fucking damned before Lilith would get the best of her.

“Raven?”

Purple eyes snapped open sharply and quickly focused on Tim as he stood at a safe distance away from her. Feeling like the last dredges of Nevermore slip away from her consciousness, Raven blinked at Tim, who looked like he came fresh from work as he was still dressed in a business suit. How long had she been meditating?

“Alfred says you haven’t had breakfast or lunch,” Tim crossed his arms over his chest and eyed her curiously. “It’s past three in the afternoon,”

“Oh,” Raven breathed softly and unfolded her legs under her. Her leg muscles tingled from being kept in the same position for so long. “I didn’t notice the time,”

Tim tilted his head and watched Raven arrange some of the books in front of her on the table. “Alfred wasn’t sure if he could interrupt you for lunch,”

“Hmm,” Raven hummed softly. She threw him an amused look. “And you could?”

Tim chuckled softly and uncrossed his arms, visibly relaxing. “Well, I can dodge whatever attack you might throw at me a lot faster than Alf,”

Raven eyed Tim in his suit skeptically. It was ridiculous had good he looked in a suit – how come he did not walk around in a suit more often like Bruce did? Seriously. Bruce Wayne’s adult children could fit into a Men’s Health magazine easily – they probably did at one point. “I’m not sure you can in that suit,” she teased.

Tim snorted ungracefully, putting his public image as CEO of Wayne Enterprises to shame. He watched her stand up from the couch and pick up a book from the floor. “You’d be surprised what I can do in this suit,” he said playfully and threw her a grin. Raven released a small bark of laughter and Tim blinked as his brain finally caught up with him. “Okay, that sounded wrong.”

Raven hummed softly, trying to hide her smile as she gathered the books she had been trying to read earlier. Moving around the table with the books in hand, she joined Tim by the end of the bookcase aisle. “I’m a bit hungry. Do you think Alfred would mind if we get something to eat now before dinner?” she asked.

They began walking through the old bookshelves filled with old books. “He asked me to get you to eat something. I want you to eat something,” Tim told her. He shot her a concerned look when she did not respond. “Is everything okay?”

Raven stopped and looked at him curiously. “Everything is okay.”

Tim crossed his arms and stood in front of her, looking down at her with a calculating eye. “You missed breakfast and lunch. You at the very least would have had some tea. You’d rather not make Alfred worry by missing his meals. You walked off right after our morning briefing. And you ignored the messages I sent you today,” He raised an eyebrow at her and titled his head just a fraction of an inch. “Shall I continue?”

“Stalker much?” Raven pressed the books against her chest and raised her eyebrow in challenge.

Tim shrugged his shoulder nonchalantly. “I’m a keen observer.”

Raven rolled her eyes playfully at him. When she saw that Tim’s gaze was unrelenting and he was expecting an answer from her, she sighed softly. “Look, it’s nothing. This whole case has been getting under my skin and it’s just frustrating me,” she replied. She looked away from Tim and purposefully stared at some of the old books a couple of rows down as she felt her skin crawl unconsciously. “I thought I was done dealing with my father and his henchmen. The idea of someone else trying to do what Brother Blood did just throws me off. I told you last night, it just gives me bad memories,”

Tim’s drawn eyebrows relaxed and he looked at her with concern. “Hey,” he said and gently placed his right hand on her tense shoulder. “We’ll get this done tonight, no more Church of Trigon and no more crazy followers trying to summon inter-dimensional demons. We’ll get this done for your mother, I promise,”

Raven looked up at Tim and felt his warm emotions brush against her. She sighed softly and relaxed her shoulders. He was right, they would get everything in order tonight and this would be all over. She threw him a small smile. “Thanks,”

“Excellent,” Tim beamed and he took a small step towards her. “I for one want this over and done with so I can take you out on a date after this. You’ll go on a date with me, right?”  

Tim knew that whatever was going on between him and Raven was still pretty new. And while he knew that Dick was going to beat his ass for starting a relationship with one of his teammates (because getting this close to each other was definitely not part of the mission plans), Tim absolutely knew that he wanted to spend more time with Raven, even if it meant if he had to spend time in Jump once in a while. He could at least take her one date in Gotham before she had to go back to Jump – and then they’d have to figure something out from there. Would she even –

“You think way too loudly, Tim,” Raven raised an amused eyebrow at him. The corner of her lips raised lightly in amusement.

“Oh,” Tim released a breathy chuckle, embarrassed. Of course, Raven was an empath. He chuckled sheepishly and absently ran a hand through his long hair.

“I’m a boring date,” Raven said, tilting her head just a little bit at him. She felt the familiar press of his emotions against her and she silently sought more of it.

Catching her teasing tone and easily feeling the atmosphere shift around them, Tim laughed softly and crowded her personal space. Dropping his gaze to her lips, he ducked his head just a little bit to level her gaze and he watched in satisfaction as her eyes widened a fraction of an inch and her breath caught in her throat. Gently cupping her jaw, he drew her closer and he smiled.

“You’re anything but boring, Raven,” Tim whispered softly to her.

Raven felt that familiar, satisfying purr of emotions inside of her as Tim’s warm emotions practically wrapped themselves around her. Her eyelids dropped softly and she watched as Tim hovered so close to her. “Oh?”

As Tim crowded her space, Raven felt herself get drugged by the delicious press of their emotions. The familiar smell of sandalwood overwhelmed her senses and Raven felt the all too familiar press of lips against her own. Humming softly in satisfaction, she gently leaned into the kiss, silently asking for more.  

Somewhere in the back of her mind Raven wasn’t sure how she’d ever be able to explain to Dick, her team leader who had 100% faith in her that she would not fuck this mission up, that she had somehow completed the mission he had asked her to work on and come back with a potential relationship with his brother. She wasn’t sure if she was overachieving or asking for trouble. She faintly wondered what Batman would think.

But that, like her earlier worries over Lilith and her father’s church, did not seem to matter right now as Tim continued to kiss her. Raven felt the gentle swipe of his thumb against her cheek as he titled her chin to get better access. The kiss was gentle and needy, nothing like this morning’s hot and frenzied kisses. Theses kisses warmed her body and had her seeking for more.

Tim gently pulled back and inhaled softly, relishing her tantalizing scent of lavender. Staying within her personal space, he stroked her cheek once more and smiled as he watched her hooded eyes look up at him. “So?” he whispered gently. “Is that a yes?”

Raven blinked through the haze and gave Tim a confused look, which he thought looked cute. “Hmm?”

Tim chuckled and offered her a smile. “A date. Tomorrow?” Grinning triumphantly, he tucked a few stray strands of purple hair behind her ear and pulled away fully. “I take that as a yes?”

Taking in the twinkle in his blue eyes, Raven teasingly quirked the corner of her lips up at Tim. “Careful, you’re getting cocky,” she teased and slipped out of his arms. Side stepping him, she threw a small smile at him over her shoulder. “Will you wear a suit again?”

Tim’s eyes widened in amusement as he watched her walk towards their reading table and drop off the books she was carrying. Tim was sure he was imagining the light sway of her hips as she walked towards the table. He grinned brightly at her as they resumed walking out of the library. Giving her a sly grin, he leaned into her just as they were about to exit the library. “So you like the suit?” his voice held a playful tone in it.

Raven snorted and nudged him away with her shoulder. “It looks nice,”

Tim threw her another teasing grin. “You said I looked nice, I’ll remember this,” he said with a lilt in his voice.

Raven rolled her eyes at Tim in mock annoyance but secretly enjoyed the attention. “I said the suit looks nice,” she replied as they entered the kitchen. “Don’t put words into my mouth,”

“That’s what she said,” Tim grinned.

Raven narrowed her eyes at Tim in warning as they caught sight of Alfred standing dutifully over two steaming mugs and a plate of, in Raven’s opinion, the most beautiful sandwiches she had ever seen. Cyborg would be jealous. Stopping by the kitchen island, she offered Alfred a small smile.

“Miss Raven, you missed breakfast and lunch. I am glad that Master Tim was able to convince you to finally have something to eat,” Alfred sent her a stern look as he watched the two settle by the kitchen island.

Raven offered Alfred an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry, Alfred. I must have lost track of time,”

Alfred looked unimpressed, obviously having heard the same excuse throughout his lifetime at the Wane Manor. “I’ve prepared some light sandwiches for you, these should tide you over until dinner before you all head out. This family has a tendency to forget the essentials of partaking in meals on time before breaking up deadly crime rings,” blinking at the pair once, Alfred continued. “I expect you all for dinner later before you decide to put an end to a church that summons inter-dimensional demons. It’s a terrible idea to go out on missions on an empty stomach,”

Not waiting for their reply, Alfred stepped away from the kitchen island. After brushing off some imaginary lint from his right sleeve of his suit, he straightened and cast them a long look. “Now if you will excuse me, I will tend to our garden before starting dinner,”

Raven watched Alfred step out of the kitchen before staring at Tim with a surprised look. She watched Tim take one of the beautiful cucumber sandwiches. “Is he always like that?” she asked while watching him take a bit out of a sandwich. “That’s mine,”

“Since I was a teenager,” Tim shrugged and gave her an amused smile, completely ignoring her and picked another small sandwich. “He’s made it a mission to get Bruce and everyone else to eat on time,”

Raven plucked one of the cucumber sandwiches from the tray and took a bite. Her stomach churned painfully after finally getting something into it. She forgot how hungry she really was.

“Where’s Bruce?” she asked Tim, giving him a curious glance. She took a sip of Alfred’s special English tea which Raven had come to enjoy over the past few weeks. She faintly wondered if Alfred would be kind enough to share the recipe with her.

Tim nursed his cup of coffee and picked up another small sandwich from the platter. “Wrapping things up at the office. Our board meeting lasted a bit longer than we planned, I left as soon as I could,” he answered.

“The Wayne’s certainly keep a very interesting social calendar,” commented Raven.

Tim snorted and threw her a wry grin. “You should see us during budget season,”

Raven looked at Tim in amusement before finishing up her sandwich. “I can’t imagine what it’s like juggling crime fighting and managing a multi-million-dollar business,” she said.

Tim hummed loudly into his coffee mug as he finished the last of his coffee. Placing the mug on the kitchen island, he shrugged absently. Balancing his day job and their nightly activities was pretty tiring, especially when reporting to the office after a particularly bloody night out. After years of working with Bruce, both as Red Robin and as Senior Management at WE, Tim had gotten a handle of managing the demands of both jobs. Though, he’d love to get a day (or maybe a week) off. Perhaps Raven would be interested in going on vacation with him? Europe, maybe? He mentally shook his head; he was getting way ahead of himself.

“Scheduling can get a bit messy,” joked Tim. He leaned back in his chair and stared at the curious Raven. “Bruce was able to do it for years. When I joined, I guess I just got engrossed into everything and I haven’t slept since,”

Raven raised an eyebrow at him. “That can’t be healthy,”

Tim laughed and nudged his empty coffee mug away with his fingers. It slid across granite countertop. “Tell that to my obsessive work ethic,”

Pushing her chair back and standing up, Raven eyed him curiously. “Well then, I guess your obsessive work ethic won’t mind we go through tonight’s plans one more time?” she asked.

Chuckling, Tim followed her suit and they made their way out of the kitchen. “I was hoping you’d say that,”

Throwing a teasing look over her shoulder as they approached the old grandfather clock in the living room, one of the many hidden entrances to the cave, Raven’s purple eyes danced. “You sure?” she asked, a teasing lilt in her voice. She felt the curious press of Tim’s emotions against her. “And it’s not me hoping your obsessive work ethic won’t mind a day off tomorrow for a date?”

Reaching over her shoulder to type in the code into the hidden panel of the grandfather clock, Tim threw her a wide smile. He got a soft whiff of her lavender shampoo, and Tim was sure that he could get used to the warm scent around him. “So that’s a yes to tomorrow?”

The door to the cave opened with a soft swish. The noise barely covered Raven’s chuckle. “Let’s put an end to my father’s church, and then we can talk about tomorrow,”

“Gladly,”

~

The evening was muggy and warm as Raven stood hidden in the shadows of one of the warehouses. As a soft breeze hit her, she could smell the impending rain. She just hoped it wouldn’t rain while they were taking down Lilith and the church, it was always such a bother to fight in the rain. Purple eyes scanned their marked warehouse in front of her, trying to catch any movement. Batman and Red Robin were on their way with the Batmobile and Tim’s motorcycle.

Raven watched the trees by the forest rustle as another silent breeze swept past. An uneasy feeling settled in the pit of her stomach as she considered how things may turn out tonight.

“We need the gem.”

Raven released a shuddering breath as the whispers of her dreams brushed against her mind. She had bad feeling about tonight.

She felt Batman and Red Robin approach her position and she looked over her shoulder to see both men jump onto the roof silently from out of nowhere. It always amazed her how for humans, Batman and his team moved with such graceful stealth.

“Anything?” Batman asked when they joined her at the edge of the roof.

“I don’t sense anyone inside right now,” Raven answered, her purple eyes glowing faintly as she stared at the old warehouse in front of them.

“Entrance is northwest of the warehouse. We can go in now,” Red Robin tapped a few buttons on his computer on his arm. Closing the program, he dropped his arm and looked at his companions. “Shall we?”

Raven nodded and they sprang into action, silently taking off from their hiding place on the rooftop and jumping onto the roof of the old warehouse they’ve been staking out. Flying over to the forest side of the warehouse, Raven spotted the windows Tim briefed them on and slipped through the broken window. Batman and Red Robin easily followed her.

From their vantage point on the second floor landing, the warehouse was bare save for some old wooden crates lined up in the far corner. It was dark, except for the yellow light of the lamppost that streamed through the broken windows. Raven scanned the empty warehouse warily, drawing her body into her cloak involuntarily as the silence settled around her uneasily. It smelled musty and the whole warehouse creaked softly in the soft summer evening wind.

She eyed the rusty warehouse doors up ahead of her. She faintly wondered if her mother passed through these doors years ago?

“Here,”

Tim’s voice was soft in the night and Raven turned around, surprised that Batman and Red Robin had slipped down the landing and were crowded over a trap door hidden behind a few crates.

Flying down the landing silently, Raven joined the two men. Red Robin pulled open the trap door and the smell of incense overwhelmed her senses. The uneasy feeling in her stomach churned angrily. Quickly exchanging looks with Batman and Red Robin, she nodded and instantly released her soul self, wrapping the three of them in the dark matter. This would allow some form of protection over them while they slipped through the cavern.

Quietly walking down the stairs of the trap door, Raven kept her eyes trained in front of her. The cavern was empty and sparsely lit by torches that licked the stone walls. She could hear nothing except her own breathing. How could the GCP have missed this place when they first took down Brother Blood?

After a few more minutes of walking and taking turns through the cavern, they eventually found a door up ahead. Light streamed through the cracks of the door. As they approached, Raven quickly cast a glance over her shoulder and caught Batman and Red Robin’s eyes. Nodding silently, she turned back to the door and briefly touched the basic steel door. No one seemed to be behind it.

Gingerly touching the door, Raven took a surprised step back as it slid open with a soft hiss under her fingers. The heady smell of incense assaulted her senses once more as they stepped into the large, warmly lit hall.

The hall was built like a church, several pews lined up and facing a white, marble altar. They tentatively entered the hall, their bodies tense and alert for any movements. Torches lined the stone walls that emanated an ominous glow over the church. Dark wooden beams ran over the walls and arched under the ceiling. Dark red markings ran along the cobblestone floor that lead towards the altar. Above the altar, the mark of Scath was etched into the wall. It glowed darkly down on them as they cautiously approached the large altar.

“Well, shit,” Red Robin breathed next to her.

Raven felt her insides freeze and she drew herself deeper into her cloak as her emotions bubbled under her skin. There, in the middle of the white marble altar, stood a little white picture frame and a bronze dagger next to it.

Staring up at them from the picture frame was a picture of Raven.

[popculturebuffet]

The Jeffersons: Sorry, Wrong Meeting (Comission by WeirdKev27) (Black History Month)

Welcome on up! HAPPY BLACK HISTORY MONTH!  Yup i’m going to spend a good chunk of the month celebrating the best and brightest in black characters in animation, amid valentine’s coverage in the first half and a few bits of the usual stuff throughout. But i’m still throughly dedicated to showing off some of the finest media about black struggles and starring black characters, and going through it the best I can as a white dumbass. If I slip up or misinterpret something, never be afraid to call me on it, but I feel I can still try my best to honor these amazing characters who’ve brought such joy to my life and these wonderful stories.  So starting us off is a commission from Kev that’s been sitting in the queue for far too long. And it’s not due to lack of intrest: While before today I’d never seen an episode of the Jeffersons, I had seen the live performance of an episode done for that live with norman lear thing nbc did in 2019, and it was excellent and piqued my intrest. But with me never thinking to get the dvd’s, and not having Starz nor really wanting starz, there was no real easy way to stream it. But a few episodes were on DailyMotion, so I was fine with reviewing it for Kev and giving this series an honest try and the fact the episode dealt with white supremacy, at a time where we’d JUST gotten rid of a bigoted, white nationalist backing, piece of shit president, I was naturally all for it, I just never thought to clear space on my schedule and by the time I was scheduling things better, I purposfully saved it for this month as while the Klan isn’t as prominent, assholes like them sure are. And given the Captial Riots last month with sedionsits shitheads proudly waving the confederate flag around, I’d say this episode is even MORE relevant than ever. 

But before we can dive into why this one is so good, yeah i’m not going to hide it this is a really fantastic episode of television, we have to talk about the series itself. The Jeffersons was created by Norman Lear, a progressive and prolific television writer and producer who is a legend in the business for damn good reason. He created All in the Family, which shattered norms and standards for the time, and would go on to create Sanford and Son, Maude and Good Times, all to massive sucess. However this show came about because the Black Panthers showed up one day at his office to raise a valid point: While he did have black characters in his tv shows they were mostly poor and barely scraping by, with his two black lead sitcoms dealing with characters in object poverty. And while this was still a worthy subject to tackle.. they were absolutely right there should be a counterbalance to that, to show the obvious truth black people CAN be successful. Norman agreed and set to work. Norman already had the perfect lead for that: George Jefferson, an opinnated dry-cleaner with several sucessful stores. George was, and still is, a fascenating character with lairs: being cranky and curmodgenly as you’d expect with some fairly average sitcom quirks: He loves money, often overspends on flashy stuff to revel in his sucess, snarks at his maid and likes to scheme as a sitcom character can. He’s also in the early seasons a bigot himself, not really fond of white people or interacial marraige, which naturally makes living next to an interacial couple and their daughter marrying his son thorns in his side. But as far as I can tell from looking on wikipedia he does soften with time and grow as a person and by this episode he’s fine putting up with both his neighbor Tom, said guy married to a black woman and his goofy british neighbor, if snarky as hell because hey, that’s who he is. I bring this up for reasons related to the climax, trust me. 

So eventually the Jefferson's moved on up to that deluxe apartment in the sky, hell of a theme song, and got into their own adventures with the aforementioned supporting characters.. and so here we are. And after the cut we’ll take a look at just why this sitcom is awesome, why I desperately want to get some dvds for it at some point now or a starz trial, and how much the klan sucks. 

We open at the Jefferson’s Deluxe Apartment in the Sky. where his wife Wheezy and aforementioned maid Florence are preparing to take a CPR class.. which were that possible I certainly would after this episode, as I feel Florence is right in stating it’s a skill everyone should have. She also remarks that George had every employee at his drycleaners take it, even if it was because he got an insurance writeoff. But hey, doing something that can help your workers and customers in an emergency even if i’ts just to save money is sitll better than MOST businesses these days so props to him. There’s also naturally some banter and it’s really damn funny. As with my Darkwing Duck reviews,, I won’t be going into it bit by bit, but it’s good stuff and holds up REALLY well. To me that’s the mark of a good sitcom, one that can show it’s age.. but still make you laugh, think or cry all the same. So yeah in less than a scene the show had won me over.  So as the ladies depart for CPR class, George’s peace is soon interupted by Harry Bently, british person and wacky neighbor. Aka me if I were british and lived in the 70′s. He returns a tv guide, last weeks hence why he’s done with it, and ther’es some schtick and what not before Tom Willis runs in, upset because he’s been robbed. They took all his stuff, and while he’s thankfull his wife’s gone for the week so she didn’t have to be there for this, he’s obviously worried and suggests forming a building watch to prevent this, with Harry on board. George.. has no time for this nonsense, and after making a joke about Florence in curlers scaring them of, bredguringly agrees to attend if someone else starts it then slams the door on them once their out the door.  At CPR, our heroines volunteer enthusastically and meet the cpr dummy. resuscannie.. I don’t know how to spell that and frankly I don’t wanna because she is FUCKING terrifying. 

She looks like she’s going to come to life and strangle me. She looks like a hollowed out corpse doll a serial killer makes. She looks like something Charles lee ray would rnasfer into. She looks like Micheal Meyers grandmother. She looks like the corpse of Jason’s mom come back for revenge. She looks like sue sylvester transferred herself into an auton. Look I could go on, but the series does make jabs at the thing and most cpr dummies are objectively terrifying, so fair play to them. After some more gags, things.. take a turn. Part of what makes this episode so effective to me is this turn. It starts with, and even goes back to after this for a bit, some sitcom gags and cliches.. but it lulls you into thinking this will be an average episode... so when the instuctor asks two men to go next, an older man and his college age looking son refuse to participate.. and their reason is he refuses to touch anything tha’ts been touched by a ... well he uses a certain word and let’s just say you know what it is, I know what it it is and if I could’ve reached inside my computer and choked the life out of hte man, I fucking would’ve. 

Yeah turns out these two are KKK, with the older asshole leading the local chapter and their about as reasonable or likeable as you’d expect with Wheezy BARELY holding Florence back from giving them a well deserved thrashing, and only doing so because it’d both sink to their level and because they’d just use it as more fuel for their racist bullshit. And that’s WHY this works so well: It seems excactly like a normal episode.. until it suddenly isn’t. Until suddenly things are a lot darker, a lot more tense, but the easing into it means it still feels like the same unvierse. To me the good “very special episodes”, are the ones that use this: that ease into the heavy topic before punching you in the face with it and tackle it with nuance and skill. A Diffrent World has a TON of episodes like this, and it’s why it’s one of my faviorite sitcoms: it tackles a lot of really heavy topics with  a steady brush and while it can be heavy handed, sometimes heavy hands are necesary to carry a heavy topic.  The racists showing up suddenly also fits because Racists hide in plain sight. You don’t know someone you know is prejudice or some stranger is till they reveal themselves. They could show up any time anywhere and you can’t be ready. And I cant possibly claim to know what that’s like, but I’m sad that in this nation of ours this shit has never, and probably will never go away. So it fits that our antagonist shows up out of nowhere, having until now perfectly blended in with the other suited white guys in the class. Naturally, the instructor orders them to fucking leave and naturally klan monster makes some big white suprimacist speil. And being a sitcom he runs into Tom, with Tom mistaking him for talking abotu the crime and White Supremacist mistaking Tom for a fellow racist. Tom decides to invite george.. and while it’s clumsily framed as a wacky sitcom misunderstanding.. it’s very clear things just got VERY dangerous. 

Speaking of George he’s awoken from his nap by the ladies who are both still worried and while he goes into his usual digs on florence, and questions why she needs her bat... he instnatly sides with her and prepares to go kick some racist ass once he finds out what happened. It’s a nice shift, as it once again breaks the tranquil normalcy of this sitcom with the violence of racisim. And while there was no phsyical violence form the asshole.. to me racisim itself is still a form of violence. Thinking you are suprerior to another race just because your skin’s a diffrent color and wanting them gone or not to be near you is in itself violent to me. And while Wheezy again has good reason for holding George back, tihs is just what the fuckers want, Geroge is also right: right NOW it’s talk.. but how long before they start burning stuff on thier balcony or come for htem in the night? there’s.. no easy answer her, no easy solution.. just a man fearing for his life justifably whose probably been through this time, and time, and time again, dealt with his buisnesses being vandalized and his life being threatend and probably been beaten some too JUST for being a black business owner. So it’s understandable he’s fucking fed up and just wants them gone. Tom naturally invites him to the meeting., and harry agrees, botht hinking i’ts just a floor meeting and not a disguised KKK Rally. 

So at the meeting, the KKK Fuck does his spiela nd tries to assure them that “what you’ve heard about us is wrong”. And again this si part of what makes the episode resonate: guys like this try to make themselves seem resonable. THat “Their not racist” their the right ones and your wrong for wanting equality. It’s why these movements gain traction, they tap into people’s inner ugliness and disastifaction with life and give them an easy target for it. It’s what the president did for four years, i’ts what his sycophants at fox news CONTINUE to do: try and present being a racist, homophobic, xenophobic peace of shit as a viable and stable option when all it makes you is a racist , a coward and a dinosaur who can’t accept change or things difffrent than you.  When this guy eventually goes into a rant, as George showing up triggers it and Tom and Harry dont’ take his shit for as econd, with tom proudly mentioning his black wife, and both holding George back for the same reasons Wheezy did with Florence, he talks abotu them “taking our property and destroying our homes”.. and it all sounds EERILY like when Tucker Carlson went on about property damage during the black lives matter protests last year... and as a wise tucan in a suit once said, fuck you tucker. And as John didn’t say but I certainly will, I Hope you choke on your own spray tan you racist seditionist prick. My point is this sort of rhetoric, trying to frame black people as the enemy.. never fucking went away and is on cable news every night. It was in our white house for four long years. It won’t go away and probably never will and everyone of every race has to be on guard to find these pricks and make sure their message is drowned out with love. And that’s what makes this whole thing relevant: that these pricks hide in plain sight and mask their arugments with civlities.. but at the end of day are just hateful monsters who just want a scapegoat for their problems or even may just hate because it’s easy, or because they just wnat to and don’t need an excuse to be the worst human garbage imaginable. 

It makes what happens next all the better: Asshole has a heart attack, HORAY, and no one knows CPR since the kid walked out on the class with his dad before they actually learned it. George relucntantly sighs.. and knows what he has to do. He goes and saves the fuckers life. And that, friends, is why I brought up George’s racist past and i’m glad I knew about it giong in: because it shows how far he’s come. From hating white people.. to saving the WORST of the WORST of white people.  He regrets it of course, saying the guy should’ve died, and that he won’t be greatful and he’ll just keep on hating.. but his friends point out the truth: George was the bigger man. He saved the life of a man who hated him just for existing and who’d gladly have him lynched if he could and was trying to run him out of his rightful place in the building, because it was the right thing to do. Because that fucker sure as hell wouldn’t. Because despite being a monster.. it’s still a life.. and he can waste it however he pleases.. but he’ll now ALWAYS know a black man saved it. George may regret his decison.. in the dark, where no body would blame him for letting the fucker die or even know he could’ve saved him until he got home, and his wife would’ve barely blamed him, he still choose to save the worst of humanity proving depsite his curmodgnley nature, he’s some of the best of it.  It dosen’t change the asshole, he leaves on a gurney telling his son “You should’ve let me die”. George is unsuprised and leaves with his friends. And I do like this: the racist dosen’t MAGICALLY change because he’s saved by a black man, he’s still a fucking monster. And that is what sets him apart from George: Whiel George was a bigot, he not only never went as far as this monster, but he changed. He learned to let go of his hate as it was eating him alive, and while he certailnly and rightfully won’t let go of his resintment for white people, he’s accepted he can’t hate ALL of them for what some did to him. This asshole has no such excuse and no such growth, he probably died being the same miserable piece of shit he was , resenting forever a black man saved him. And that’s hwo it should end.. youc an’t save everyone and you can’t change a person that dosen’t want to. George changed only because he wanted to and he realized he was wrong evne if he’s loath to admit it. This guy wont’ and never will becuse some racist pieces of shit just will never accept the truth that all people were created equal.

His son though clearly has, thanking George before he leaves, and later as the rest of the meeting, realizing what these people are and what they plan on, leave as the assholes right hand man tries to continue said son refuses to acknowlegde him rips up the poster and leaves. See the old man not changing worked.. but so too does this.. showing some simply dont’ know better and some CAN change.. but like George.. they have to WANT to change. Only you can change you. And hopefully it’s for hte better. 

This episode was excellent as i’ve made clear, and I don’t have honestly much to add to it. It was a pleasure and black lives matter. 

[horrorlad]

Horrorlad Reviews: The Dentist (1996)

Or at least, like, talks about it a bunch. 

Boy was I overthinking my first real Horror Lad post! It was going to be Grave Encounters, but that will have to wait, because I got insomnia and decided to rewatch a movie I hadn’t seen seen since I was 14, which wound up being the perfect opportunity to write out a post!

Let’s talk about The Dentist!

So, The Dentist is a 1996 movie starring Corbin Bernsen. It was directed by Brian Yuzna (one of the producers of Re-Animator, he also directed the 1989 body horror film Society which I haven’t seen, though a cursory image search tells me I need to add to my watch list immediately).

Anyway, The Dentist is about a teethsman who catches his wife giving some other guy a BJ and gets so grossed out about it that he has a nervous breakdown about, uh, how dirty mouths are, I guess? He loses his absolute shit (though he didn’t seem to have it all that together to begin with; this guy’s Jack Torrance is way more Kubrick than King), and we the audience get to tag along for all the wacky fun.

Full disclosure: I can’t give an unbiased review of this movie. I watched it several times in high school, then completely forgot about it for ten years, until tonight. There’s too much nostalgia wrapped up in it.

That said, upon rewatching it, I am in LOVE with the structure of it as a film. You know how, some movies, you can tell that the people behind the scenes are having a blast? This is one of those movies. The structure of the shots vary wildly, and I suspect that there was not one tripod or stabilizer on that set. The makeup and effects are fun, every actor has an opportunity to shine at least once, and the pacing is totally bonkers. I will note, however, that for a slasher movie the confirmed death count is pretty low, AND most of the murders are less dentistry-related than you might expect. Still, it’s a good time, and right now it’s available to watch for free (with commercials) on Tubi, which is pretty sweet!

Read on for the content warnings and spoilers. In the meantime, I give The Dentist 3.5 tanks of nitrous oxide (use with caution).

Content warnings and plot synopsis below the cut.

Content Warnings

Also, I don’t really know what to classify this one as, but there is a lot of “ick” factor to this movie — rotting teeth, sludge, etc. If you’re easily squicked out by that sort of stuff, I’d proceed with caution.

Dental torture (and how!) – it’s basically the whole movie, folks.

Sexual assault – multiple instances, including a character having their head forced down while giving oral sex (in a daydream), and another character being assaulted while on nitrous oxide.

Spousal abuse (physical and emotional) – again, there’s a lot of this.

Child abuse – A young child has their gums stabbed by the dentist.

Animal abuse – a dog is shot offscreen.

--------------------------------------

Okay, spoiler time!

Whoo boy, here we go!

I have no idea why I watched this movie so much as a teen. Probably because it was free on FearNet (remember FearNet?) and I would watch just about anything.

Watching it as an adult, my first thought is… man this is weirdly paced. My second thought is that there’s a lot more non-dental-related murders than I would have expected, but we’ll come back to that.

So, our hero(?) is a dentist, and we meet him at the beginning of a framing device, miming dentistry and offering to tell us about his story. The bulk of the movie is then a flashback about how he got to where he is, interspersed with his monologuing or whatever. We meet him and his wife (who are a straight couple in a movie and thus required to completely hate one another) on their anniversary, a fact which becomes clear while he’s in the middle of throwing a fit about his laundry.

Pictured: a totally hinged man. Nothing unhinged going on here, no sir.

At any rate, he gets all suspicious after an interaction with the pool guy, and catches his wife having an affair with the guy. He continues framing-device-monologuing about decay and the world being filthy and all that, daydreams about assaulting his wife and murdering the pool boy, etc. He follows the pool guy to the neighbor’s house, acts all weird, shoots a dog — your basic Tuesday.

Eventually, he winds up at the office, starts hallucinating, assaults a couple of patients, and finally calls an early end to the day (self care is important). We get this delightful (in a heavy-handed sort of way) scene that keeps cutting back and forth between him setting out spooky dental tools and his wife getting dressed for the big anniversary surprise he’s has planned, and that’s when things really start to go haywire.

Okay.

So like.

I get that he’s a dentist.

I get that he’s a dentist whose whole shtick is having the themed exam rooms (though why we have aaaalll these rooms for a bunch of hygienists and one dentist is a little beyond me).

But you mean to tell me that this dude’s special anniversary surprise for his wife was to show her his new, opera-themed dental exam room?

“Oh, honey… you really, really shouldn’t have…”

Like, I know he’s settled on a revenge plot by this point, but I still definitely believe that this guy was legitimately planning the entire time to show his wife his fancy new dental suite as an anniversary surprise. Not to be that guy, but no wonder she was having an affair.

Honestly though, I love this scene. I love the camera PoV shots as he shows off the dental suite, I love the excessive gesturing with his left hand. I love how the scene starts off with his point-of-view of her, and then transitions into her point-of-view of him, cut with those big beautiful teeth-yanking shots. It’s ridiculous.

And then, they get home, he has some monologuing about the pool, etc.

Next scene, it’s the next day, some cops come to ask questions about the murdered dog, his wife is out back on a pool chair with her giant sunhat covering her face (the way normal, totally-not-drugged people hang out by the pool) while the pool guy does his pool guy stuff. Eventually the cops leave, yadda yadda yadda, the pool guy scoops the wife’s tongue out of the pool, he sees how fucked up she is, the dentist murders the shit out of him. It’s beautiful.

Don’t you love it when you finish your to-do list first thing in the morning?

The end.

Wait, no, that’s not right.

Somehow, there’s still almost half a movie left.

This movie starts with this dude fighting with his wife, catching his wife cheating with the pool guy, hallucinating his wife’s nasty mouth on everyone, etc. You’d think that, with his wife tortured all to shit and the pool guy dead, the movie would have wrapped up.

I mentioned before that the pacing of the movie is weird, which it is. I mean, he has his “oop guess I’m evil now” scene on his way to work the next day, which basically means that just over half of this movie is the origin story. It could be longer, with the big climactic nonsense taking up the last quarter or so. It could be shorter, with him freaking out about his wife, losing his shit, and having a proper dental rampage. Instead, The Dentist flies in the face of conventional story structure.

But this man is a busy man. He’s a dentist, damn it.

He has to get back to work!

Things are happening fast now, let’s get condensed.

We go back to work, he pulls some malpractice shit on that lady whose dog he shot yesterday, then strangles Jessica-the-hygienist (I think that’s her job) when she calls him on it. Later, a man from the IRS comes in and uses the dentist’s shady tax junk to get free dental work which is, uh, inadvisable. IRS man, Marvin Goldblum, starts talking about our dentist’s wife (and about how unhinged shiksas are in bed, in case we somehow we didn’t piece together that he’s an awful Jewish caricature), and I’m sure the rest of his appointment goes totally normally.

Get a guy who looks at you like this.

Meanwhile, the cops are definitely onto him regarding the murder of that dog (after all, murdering dogs is THEIR turf). They go to his house, where he left the body of the pool guy he murdered just laying around outside for anyone to find (which they do). Then they go upstairs and find his wife, who is alive but so fucked up.

Back at the office, Karen-the-other-hygienist, looking for her coworker who got murdered earlier, stumbles upon the very fucked up IRS dude. We get to listen to the dentist give a little monologue about how grossed out he is that his wife put some dude’s “dirty, rotten… in her mouth!” before he injects air into a vein in Karen-the-other-hygienist’s neck to kill her.

Next up, this girl who has been waiting for two days to get her braces off gets called back. She’s adorable and chipper, so this, of course, can only go well. When’s the last time you had your dentist pull a gun on you?

Our scrappy youngster runs off, and he gives chase (we find that Mr. Goldblum’s jaw elongation procedure is going well by the way), before eventually letting her go after she promises to take very, very good care of her teeth.

After all, he’s got his next job to get to.

Let’s go teach dental students the importance of pulling out everyone’s teeth!

Yeeep, he’s a teacher! And after he shoots one of his students while hallucinating, the cops show up, resulting in the slowest chase scene any movie has ever had (I mean the dude is literally just briskly walking down the hall and he still gets away from them). Anyway, the dentist winds up in an auditorium where a woman is practicing her opera singing. The dentist is entranced by this (we know he loves opera from that scene with his wife earlier) and reaches out to the singer, but he hallucinates his wife’s hecked up face on her and drops to his knees, presumably to have the rest of his nervous breakdown. The cops… uh… well, they just kinda stand around looking disapprovingly at him while he sits on the floor. And that’s… that’s it, I guess?

“Nah, let him rest, he’s had a big day.” 

 In our final scene, we have some orderlies at his new mental institution drag him down for his regular appointment, where his wife (who I guess is a dentist now) starts drilling at his teeth. This may or may not be a hallucination. It probably doesn’t matter.

Wow. That certainly was a film.

Alright, so, I’ve been typing up my thoughts as I watch, and I think I’ve figured out what I like about this movie, that had me coming back to it over and over as a youngster. There are some movies that just look fun to film, and this is one of them. A number of the shots are really charming, for lack of a better word. There’s the anniversary scene with his wife I mentioned before, but so many others — this movie plays around with point of view, extreme close-ups, some very fun effects used to indicate the hallucinations… there’s even a sideways shot of one of the cops coming down the stairs. I seem to have a real fondness for that sort-of manic, anything-goes approach to filming. Related side note: is there a single steady shot on this whole film? I’m beginning to doubt it.

Corbin Bernsen does a great job. I mean, all the actors do, really, but he is something else. Like, I can’t think offhand of many actors who could successfully take the character “dentist in bad marriage has a nervous breakdown because his wife gives someone else a blow job and it grosses him out; goes on torturemurder spree” without overacting to the point of distraction. “What are you talking about, this dude’s hammier than Easter dinner,” you say. Now, I get the urge here, but I have to disagree; Bernsen plays a fantastic Emasculated White Guy Throwing A Fit.

That picture I posted up there, after the bit about the laundry argument? A dude who makes that face over the idea of wearing the wrong cuff links to work is at most twelve seconds away from completely losing his shit at any given moment. And the dude’s anniversary surprise for his wife was to show off his new, opera-themed dental exam room; none of this behavior seems too off the wall for that character. Granted, I haven’t seen the sequel yet, and the image searches do suggest that our dear dentist is about to use his well-cared-for teeth to chew the hell out of some scenery in The Dentist 2, but in this movie? I’m just saying it’s not an unbelievable portrayal.

Disgruntled white dudes aside, the rest of the cast seems to have a fun time too. Shout out to the receptionist literally sobbing over what a great dentist this guy is (stunning work). If nothing else, stop by for wee baby Mark Ruffalo before he was famous. It’s adorable.

LOOK AT HIM.

ALL THAT SAID, I have to state again how surprised I am by the sheer number of not-dental-related murders! Like, by my count, this guy commits a hefty amount of malpractice, but for a guy on a torturemurder spree, he sure does seem to keep his torture and his murder fairly separate. Let’s tally it:

I’m tired, let’s wrap this up. The Dentist is a fun movie about a dude who loses his shit, does some dental torture, does some murder, does ZERO dental torturemurders, and then just kinda tuckers himself out and sits down. It’s a big silly mess, and I love it.

Tortures: six

The kid at the beginning, the lady he sexually assaults (it counts), his wife (not dead), that lady whose dog he shot, Marvin the IRS guy (alive when last we see him), and the person at the dental school near the end.

Murders: three people, one dog.

The dog (shot), the pool guy (knifed), Jessica-the-hygienist (strangled), Karen-the-other-hygienist (air injected into artery), and that’s… it..? He does shoot that person at the dental school, but it doesn’t appear to be a fatal wound, and Marvin the IRS guy was alive when we saw him last.

Torturemurders: HECKIN’ ZERO.

Zero! None of the tortures are murdered, and nobody he murders is tortured! What the heck kind of slasher dentist doesn’t even kill people via dentistry? No wonder everyone looks down on him at the end.

Alright, first post written. I’m going to bed.

[yourdeepestfathoms]

Fractal Scarring

[Broadway Kids]

FINALLY THIS IS FINISHED. two days to write 12,000 words? that’s so shameful :/ 

also i hate writing in present tense

Word count: 12,029

Prompt: “And just WHERE do you think you’re putting your hands?” “Don’t you hurt a single hair on her head.” “Shh, you’re safe. I won’t let you go.”

Tw: Abuse, waterboarding

--------------

The sound of the doorbell ringing rudely interrupts the heated kiss between Lynn and her girlfriend, Estelle. Lynn pulls back with a growl of frustration, waiting a moment before leaning into Estelle again.

  “You’re not going to get that?” Estelle asks.

  “No need,” Lynn says dismissively. “It’s probably just the Amazon guy.”

  “What did you order this time? More sneakers? Special energy drinks?” Estelle says teasingly.

  “Oh, hush,” Lynn bats at her. “Just because I’m a coach doesn’t mean everything revolves around sports. You, for example.” And then she leans in again, locking her lips with Estelle’s and falling back into the warm, buzzing trance of kissing.

And then the doorbell rings again.

And again.

And again, until it was going off every second in a rapid fire cacophony of chiming.

  “Persistent Amazon guy,” Estelle observes.

  “Oh my god!!” Lynn yells. She rips off the blankets, nearly exposing her girlfriend’s own naked body in the process, snatches her robe from the bathroom door (although she had considered flashing the solicitors to scare them off), and marches to the front door. There was a glass window at the very top, but was too high to see who it was, so she had no idea who was ruining her time with her girlfriend until she yanks open the door with force.

  “Sue?!”

Her student blinks at her from the stoop, trying very hard to not look at the white robe she was swathed in and put the pieces together. The way she clears her throat and then proceeds to say absolutely nothing didn’t help the situation be any less awkward, either. A halo of raindrops from the drizzle falling from the grey-blue sky twinkles on the crown of her head like dozens of silver spider eyes that seemed to stare straight through Lynn’s fluffy covering.

  “What-” Lynn finds her voice, although it came out tight and strangled from embarrassment for a moment. “What are you DOING here?! How do you know where I LIVE?!”

Shrugging nonchalantly, as if this was the most normal thing in the world, Sue says, “Chris knows a guy.”

THAT Lynn didn’t doubt. She wonders if this “guy” was Billy Nolan or her father tracking her or someone else entirely. Feeling like there were several more eyes on her, Lynn shifts uncomfortably and pulls the laces around her stomach even tighter.

  “Why are you here?” She demands with her Coach Voice. It made Sue jump, but then she realized that it wasn’t in fear like she was hoping, but some sort of jolt of remembrance.

  “Oh! Right!” Sue looks over her shoulder. Dismayed, Lynn saw that Tommy was there, too, but he was halfway hunched in his Jeep, fumbling with something. “Miss Gardener, you are the most trusted adult we know. Something happened- something really bad, and we need you.”

Usually, Lynn would instantly mount the problem that one of her students was facing and bring it down, but right now, she really rather be mounting something else and be brought down on a bed, so this was not her top priority at the moment. If none of her loved ones were dead, then she really didn’t want to hear it.

  “What about your PARENTS?” Lynn says, shooing Sue backwards. “Go to them!”

  “No, Miss Gardener, you don’t understand!” Sue cries. “It’s Carrie!”

Lynn froze.

And, at that moment, Tommy pulled out a bloody, beaten Carrie out of the backseat of the Jeep and into sight.

  “Bring her inside.” Lynn says without a shred of resistance. “Sue. Tell me everything.”

------

  “How do I look?” Tommy asked. “Good? Good enough? Christian-like?”

Sue giggled. “You look great, you dork. There’s no need to worry. It’s not that big of a deal.”

  “It absolutely IS a big deal!” Tommy squawked.

It really was, Sue had to admit. It was the first time Carrie White was EVER having people over at her house.

She said she had begged her mother for hours, swearing up and down that she would be the best daughter and never ever complain ever again if she could have her friends over, and her mother had finally relented. So, now Tommy and Sue were parked outside a cottage as old as time itself. It’s swathed by tendrils of ivy climbing their way towards the roof that was missing several shingles and splotched with patches of emerald green moss. The weathered wood is a chalk color, paint peeling and flaking off, and black peppering along its breast. The windows are tinted a deep brown and covered up by drapes, many of them cracked. The yard was a sea of weeds and the walkway leading up to the house was lined with deceased trees; their ebony branches bore no leaves. The very age of the cottage is shown in its deterioration.

This was no place for any child to be raised.

Withered brown leaves rustled in the ghostly wind. The street was almost silent, if not for the wailing gust, the crackle of fronds, and the gentle rumble of the Jeep’s engine. Black tires trampled over the dead blades scattered on the edge of the poorly-kept street, the crunching of their filaments like bones beneath a hammer. A flurry of brown leaves swept across the windshield. 

The couple slid out of Tommy’s car after Tommy checked his neatly-combed hair for the tenth time. He was acting like he did the day he met Sue’s parents for the first time in junior year, which was actually quite polite of him to do so. He was taking this very seriously. 

Above, the sky was awash with low churning clouds. Towering trees with ebony branches reached down far, almost blocking the way. Their naked twigs grabbed like fingers, clawing at their faces as they trekked up the driveway. The brittle limbs snapped and fell as kindling onto the ground when brushed away. They too cracked beneath footfalls as Sue and Tommy made their way up to the stoop, across the cracked sidewalk and through reaching snarls of weeds sprouting from the overgrown yard. The porch creaked beneath their weight, and for a split second they feared it might cave in, but the old wood held together firmly despite its age. Tommy knocked on the door; there were cracks inside the frame and the hinges were green. It looked like it would fall over if the curved door knob was yanked too hard.

There was a shuffling sound from inside and the tumblers of a locking mechanism fell away with a grinding crack. When the front door was pulled open, the hinges protested with a deafening creak, sounding as though the rotten wood was splintering even as the heavy door scraped along the floor. Carrie peered out at them like a lime green macaw in a tunnel of darkness in the overalls she was wearing, beaming.

  “Hello!” She greeted eagerly. “Come in!”

They stepped inside and entered a world that reeked of religion.

Wall-to-wall there were crosses ranging in various sizes and made of many different materials. There were wooden crosses, metal crosses, crosses made of twigs twisted together and crosses created from woven tangles of barbed wire. Among them were pictures of Bible scenes, like The Last Supper and Noah’s Ark and Jesus doing something with a staff and water- or was that Moses? Sue wasn’t very up to speed on Christianity, so she didn’t know exactly what was going on, but the bearded dude was definitely doing /something/ with water.

Aside from the paintings and crosses and some candles, there didn’t appear to be any other decorations. No photos of Carrie as a little girl, no potted plants, no big wooden letters spelling out “WHITE” on the wall- there were only religious adornments.

Carrie led Tommy and Sue through the cramped front room, passing a closet door and a small circular table with a single red candle on it, and into the living room. The smell of baking bread wafted strongly in this room, flowing from the nearby kitchen. A large crucifix was poised menacingly over the ancient fireplace mantle, Jesus’s face frozen in a permanent expression of agony. Each rivulet of blood, every cut opened up on his skull from the Crown of Thorns held so much detail that it almost looked like a real person nailed to the giant wooden cross instead of just precisely carved plastic.

There’s no TV, not that either Sue or Tommy were surprised, so the scuffed, fraying leather sofa taking up a large space in the room was just sitting in front of the fireplace with only a grotesque crucifix to watch. The coffee table in front of it held a Bible that looked like it would crumble into dust if picked up and a well kept nativity set of baby Jesus’s birth. It was probably the nicest thing in the living room, maybe even the entire house, with all the animals shined to perfection and the humans not bearing a single scratch upon their porcelain flesh. There was also a washed out velvet lounge chair with intricate golden designs across the fabric, where a woman sat sewing an article of clothing and watching the new arrivals intently.

Mrs. White was as mangy as her daughter, but not quite as filled out as Carrie was. She was thin and bony, with sunken facial features and spindly fingers like the hands of a skeleton. Tangles of chocolate brown hair were tied up in a messy ponytail, revealing her pale, narrow neck to the light of the several lit candles around the house, and Sue and Tommy both concluded that Carrie must have gotten most of her features from her father because she looked nothing like this banshee of a woman dressed in a grey-blue gown sitting before them. The only noticeable thing they had in common were their brown eyes, which were so dark they were nearly black. Mrs. White’s were piercing, yet tired and haunted, and she was looking at Tommy and Sue like she already hated them.

This woman had done terrible things that tormented her, Sue could tell.

------

  “That definitely sounds like Margaret.”

Sue and Tommy’s head whip around, but Lynn’s whips faster. She stares at her girlfriend, fully dressed, standing in the hallway spitting out into the rest of the house from the master bedroom. Her blonde hair is combed neatly, leaving no evidence of...things...having been going on. Her grey eyes are troubled.

  “You know Margaret White?” Sue asks.

  “Who are you?” Tommy says at the same time.

  “Estelle Horan,” Estelle answers the nosy teenagers. “And, yes, I knew her.”

She strides across the floor and into the living room. Carrie is lying on one of the couches, expression pinched even in unconsciousness. Sweat is beaded on her forehead and she breathes raggedly.

  “How do you know her?” Sue prods further.

Estelle looks at her, then says, “I was their neighbor.”

A beat of silence passes. A pin dropping would be the loudest sound in the room. And then-

  “WHAT?” Lynn yelps.

Estelle gives her an amused look. “Did I never tell you?”

  “No!”

  “Oh.” Estelle shrugs. “There wasn’t ever a good time to bring it up. And I’ve tried to put it out of my mind…” She trails off, a haunted expression flickering in her eyes, like something had shaken her. She looks at Carrie’s frail, bruised body and frowns. “I--never thought she would live this long.”

Lynn gets a terrified look on her face. She didn’t exactly like showing so much fear and weakness around her students, but she couldn’t help it. There’s no way Carrie’s life was as bad as everyone was making it out to be. There’s no way she had suffered so much for so long and she hadn’t done anything to help her.

  “What-- what do you mean?” Tommy asks softly. His expression is a mix of horror and rage and his fists are clenched tightly at his sides.

Estelle reaches out and gently touches Carrie’s head. “Everyone in the neighborhood knew of Carrie’s treatment. But nobody did anything. And then, one day when I was seventeen, Carrie came up to me while I was tanning. She was five? Maybe six? Anyway, she-” She laughs, “-she pointed to my breasts and asked me what they were. I told her and she said she wished she had some and then said how good girls wouldn’t. She said that her mother was ‘bad when she made her.’ Margaret called them ‘dirty pillows’ or something stupid.”

Tommy snorts. Sue elbows him lightly. Estelle shoots him a quick, agreeing smile, then continues.

  “Then her mother came out and snapped at her to come back inside. Margaret called me a whore, I called her a cow- I was a very mature and polite seventeen year old.” Estelle chuckles. Her expression soon darkens, however. “I could hear--her screams--from inside the house. After Margaret dragged her back in. Carrie started screaming and crying so loud that I could hear them from outside. Everyone started coming out, but--” She sighs, looking ashamed. “--we didn’t help. Not after the meteor shower. We all ran.”

  “Wait-” Sue says. “Did you say ‘meteor shower’?”

  “Yeah,” Estelle says. “These rocks just started falling from the sky, but they only hit the White’s house for some reason. It was so weird.”

Tommy and Sue exchange looks. 

  “Carrie mentioned something about stones…” Tommy says.

Estelle furrows her eyebrows. Lynn kneels down next to her and takes one of her hands, not caring about secrecy around her students anymore.

  “Sue,” She says to the girl, “continue the story. What happened next?”

------

  “Mama,” Carrie said, and the sound of her voice startled both Sue and Tommy. They don’t know why they had assumed Carrie would sign at home; her mother didn’t exactly seem like the type to put up with sign language. “These are my friends! Tommy and Sue!” She beamed at them both, radiating with pride. Her voice was so sweet and youthful.

  “Hmm,” Mrs. White merely said. Her hands are still working a needle and thread through the pale purple fabric, and Sue can see muscles rippling beneath the skin.

Tommy stepped forward first, gathering his shoulders up into a straightened position and marching smoothly across the room. Carrie skittered after him and stood beside one side of the chair, and then Sue followed.

  “Tommy Ross,” Tommy extended a hand and flashed a dazzling smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, ma’am.”

Mrs. White looked at Tommy’s hand with visible disgust, but she shook it firmly when Carrie nudged her arm. She did the same with Sue, but with less reluctance. Sue guessed that she probably had something against men, which was something she never had a problem with, there were MANY reasons to hate men, but this woman looked like she wanted to chop off the penis of every male in existence and violently choke them with it. 

Or, perhaps, do something even worse.

  “It’s nice to meet you both, too,” Mrs. White finally said in a voice that could crack an iceberg in two. She sized Tommy and Sue up silently, sneering at Sue’s skirt, which barely reached her knees, but didn’t comment about it. “It’s so...wonderful...to see my precious angel with people she can trust.” She lifted a hand and Carrie eagerly ducked her head beneath it. It was quite cute to see her blissfully get affection, but Sue got a feeling of uneasiness in her stomach when she noticed that the action made Carrie look like a trained dog. And Mrs. White was her owner.

  “Carrie is a lot of fun to have around,” Tommy said, and Carrie grinned brightly at him. “Your daughter is amazing!”

  “Hmm,” Mrs. White said again. She looked at Carrie and a smile tugged on her lips. “She is, isn’t she?” She patted Carrie’s cheek. “Run along, my darling. Go play.”

Carrie nodded and her face scrunched up adorably with giddiness when she got a kiss on the forehead. She jumped up a moment later, darting past Tommy and Sue and to the staircase. She waved to them to follow her eagerly, grinning her head off and doing a little dance on the first step.

  “We’re coming, we’re coming!” Sue laughed as she and Tommy walked over. “Calm down!”

They ascended the stairs, and Sue could feel Margaret’s burning gaze scorch holes into her back with every step she took.

The first thing Sue and Tommy noticed upon entering the bedroom were the bars over the window.

Carrie’s room was plain. Plain cream walls, plain scuffed hardwood floor, plain white bed sheets and blankets (no pillow, as she had once mentioned before). There was a nightstand next to her bed with a lamp and a small Bible on it and a splintering bookshelf with very few books set up neatly. A chest at the end of the bed had ribbons of colorful fabric overflowing from the closed lid and a desk had a current sewing project spread out over its surface. A small table in the corner held a few old stuffed animals stacked neatly in a fuzzy pyramid. 

  “Welcome,” Carrie signed with a grand gesture with outstretched arms. She spun around once, looking around her room, then centered to Tommy and Sue again with a sheepish expression. “I--don’t know what to do now.”

Sue tilted her head, not understanding her hand movements, and Tommy translated. It made her pause in thought- what WAS there to do at Carrie’s house? There was no TV to watch movies on or teach her how to play video games like Tommy usually did. The place was actually quite...boring. Sue couldn’t bear to live in such a bare place.

  “Sorry…” Carrie lowered her head in shame.

  “Hey, no, it’s okay!” Tommy said quickly. “No worries!”

Sue looked around, trying to find something that would hopefully ease Carrie’s tension. She spotted the piece of fabric on the desk, which was a plum color with frills along the breast. She nodded at it.

  “That’s pretty.” She said.

  “Oh!” Carrie skittered over to it. “Thank you. It’s not finished yet, but it’s going to be a dress!”

Tommy translated her signs and Sue smiled. “Do you make all your clothes?”

  “Most of them,” Carrie nodded. 

  “That’s so cool!” Sue said. 

Carrie blushed. “Thank you.” She lightly brushed her project. “I can--teach you how to. If you want.”

------

  “And then we started sewing,” Sue says. She stares into the cup of water Lynn had gotten for her with a deeply troubled look. 

  “I made a scarf.” Tommy states in an attempt to lighten the mood.

  “It was supposed to be a sweater.” Sue manages a giggle, although it was tight and slightly strangled.

Lynn wants to smile, she really does, but as she is pressing a wet rag to a welt on her young student’s stomach, watching blood seep into the white fabric, such an action feels impossible. 

If Carrie had looked worrisome when Lynn first saw her, then the removal of most of her clothes has only increased that concern tenfold. The few injuries that had been visible when she first got there were bad enough, but the skin on her torso and back were splattered with impossibly dark colors that were split open in the center of each mark, like she had been beaten with a thin object. Cuts and scrapes marred her tanned skin, which was now horribly pale.

Carrie is stripped down to the black shorts and white tank top she had been wearing underneath her green overalls, which were stained in her blood (not that it was much of a loss- those things were hideous). Her face is tight with pain and all her muscles were tense as if she wanted to run, but couldn’t. Each breath she took came out shallow and ragged.

There’s too many wounds. There’s too many injuries on her little body. She isn’t going to live. Carrie will die.

A touch on her shoulder brought Lynn out of her morbid thoughts. She looks up to see Estelle, still kneeling next to her, a worried, but “I’m here for you” look on her face. She leans against her and a sick feeling settles into the pit of her stomach. Her mind is a jumbled mess, a tornado of disconnected thoughts and overwhelming stress.

Sue takes a deep breath and all eyes turn to her again. She pries her gaze away from her cup, rests her head against Tommy’s shoulder for support, and begins the story again.

------

  “WHAT is THAT?” Carrie signed.

  “IT is a SCARF!” Tommy declared defensively, holding the long piece of red wool fabric as if it were a live snake. “And it’s very stylish!” He flicked it around his neck and lifted his nose in a very haughty, pompous manner. Carrie flopped backwards, giggling and kicking her legs in the air. Tommy looked delighted at her reaction.

  “I thought we were making sweaters…” Sue said, blinking down at the misshapen purple blob in her hands. Carrie giggled louder. 

She giggled and giggled, such a pleasant, relieving sound.

And then the bedroom door opened.

And a thunderous voice that could shatter a glacier spoke up.

  “What is going on in here?”

Tommy, Sue, and Carrie all jumped and twisted around to see Mrs. White slithering inside, growing bigger and more menacing with every step she took. Tommy and Sue both straightened up, trying to look like model guests, while Carrie scrambled up off of her back and to her feet. She was still beaming, however.

  “Hello, Mama,” She greeted sweetly. “I was just teaching Tommy and Sue how to sew! They’re not very good.”

  “I made a scarf,” Tommy said, holding up the droopy ends of his silly creation for Mrs. White to see. She looked at it as if it were the serpent that had bewitched Eve. “Also, oi! Rude!” He poked Carrie in the leg, then glanced up at Mrs. White again, like he was saying, Look at how good I am with your daughter! Look at how nice I am to her! Please like me!

  “Hmm.” Mrs. White merely said. She looked very suspicious of all three of them, even her own daughter. She looked around the room like she was searching for a shred of impurity that would give her a reason to throw Tommy and Sue out. This process, however, was halted when Carrie hopped forward and latched onto her arm.

  “Mama, I finished the dress,” She said. She bumped her head against her mother’s shoulder and smiled up at her.

She really does love her mom. Sue thought. But does Mrs. White love her back?

  “Did you?” Mrs. White said, half distracted. She was trying to not take her eyes off of the guests, Tommy the most in particular.

  “Mhm!” Carrie ran and grabbed the dress she had finished while she was giving the sewing lessons. She presented it to Mrs. White proudly. “See?”

Mrs. White delicately ran her bony fingers along the stitching and frills. Then, she looked up and smiled at Carrie. “Very good, darling.”

That smile flickered away, however, when she looked back to her daughter’s friends. She frowned at Sue, who was rigid next to Tommy. She wasn’t trying to suck up to her like he was.

  “You.” She said. “What are you making?”

  “Oh, uh--” Sue looked down at the malformed, barely-sewn sweater flopped pathetically in her hands. “A-a sweater.” She wanted to kick herself for stammering. Why was she so nervous around this lady? “I think?”

  “My scarf is better.” Tommy muttered, then flashed a smile at Mrs. White. She blinked at him slowly. Even she was curious about his adamant attempt to get on her good side.

Mrs. White sniffed. The edges of her eyes crinkled in distaste. “Maybe you should try lengthening that skirt. You’ll be burning in hell in no time looking like that.”

Sue stiffened. She suddenly felt like her clothes were paper thin--or maybe not even there at all. Mrs. White was staring at her like she had just finished having sex with every man in the entire world and was currently dripping semen all over her floor. Sue struggled not to squirm as silence descended upon the room.

At her side, Tommy’s mouth was half open in shock that an adult would talk to a kid, especially a guest in their house, like that. He kept looking from Sue, to Mrs. White, and then back to Sue, conflicted on whether he should defend his girlfriend and risk Mrs. White hating him even more or not say anything and have Sue possibly hate him (but she wouldn’t hate him. if it were him essentially being called a man slut, she would probably be too scared to say anything, too).

Mrs. White was stood up straight and she looked like she was trying very hard not to smirk. She may be thin and ragged, but she was alight with disgust, like a flame that would never go out. Beside her, Carrie was rigid, but didn’t seem very surprised by her mother’s comment. Her head was lowered, dark eyes flitting towards Sue with an apologetic look. And then, she moved, slotting herself between Sue and Mrs. White.

  “Mama, Sue is the nicest girl I know.” She said, and Sue felt a flutter of guilt inside her stomach. At one point, she had participated in all the teasing Carrie got. She had been in on schemes to humiliate her and had looked at her like she was the most awful creature to ever walk the earth, and Carrie knew this, she had known it, and yet she still defended her. “If she doesn’t go to heaven, then heaven is wrong.”

Crack, went something in Mrs. White’s head.

Carrie noticed it first, the way her mother’s twisted expression twitched and rippled on her face like a melting wax mask, the way a diseased light flickered behind her eyes, the way her nostrils flared with a silent breath, and then Sue and Tommy followed. They could see it now, too, how Mrs. White still had the same look on her face as she had when she insulted Sue, but just slightly lopsided. It was like a wrinkled photograph cut from a magazine or a blurry movie still. There was something awful swimming behind those beetle-black eyes, and Carrie had accidentally awakened it. 

Sue wondered for a fleeting second if she were infected with the same parasite as her mother.

Carrie was very tense, so much so that Sue could see the muscles in her neck bunching up and popping out painfully. Her knees were shaking and a bead of sweat ran down the side of her face slowly. Sue and Tommy had both seen her scared before, but this was nothing like the fear that came from bullying at school or being called on in class or getting humiliated somehow.

Carrie looked terrified. Genuinely terrified. Like she thought she was going to die.

  “Carrie.” Mrs. White said calmly, but they all still shivered. The weight of the fury in that one simple word--Sue hoped she would never have to hear anyone say her name like that. She might as well have called her daughter ‘Disappointment.’ “Dear. Come here.”

But Carrie didn’t move. Her breathing starts to become more ragged.

  “No, mama,” She whispered, and Sue had never heard so much fear in her voice before.

Twitch, went something on Mrs. White’s expression.

  “M-my friends--” Carrie went on shakily, trying to give a good reason for her to talk back. “Th-they’re here. C-can’t we wait…” But her words trailed off into meaninglessness when she met her mother’s sharp gaze and she fell into helpless silence.

Mrs. White stretched her neck to the left and there was a series of pops that reverberated around the room. She seemed to be swelling up like a venomous snake.

  “Hey--” Tommy leapt to his feet, the tail of his sweater-scarf wagging lazily in front of him. “It’s not Carrie’s fault. She was just being a good friend.”

Mrs. White snapped her smoldering gaze over to Tommy, and that was enough to send him slamming right back to the floor in a rigid sitting position. Sue had never seen him obey so much like a trained dog before. It was horrifying how much this single woman could strike so much terror into all of them.

  “Carietta Nancy White.” Mrs. White hissed, her voice dripping with icicles. “I will not tell you again.”

She knows she could just grab Carrie. Sue realized with a twist in her stomach. She wants the satisfaction of Carrie obeying her.

Carrie moved slowly, dragging her feet as if they were weighed down by chains, head bowed in a submissive way. The moment she was in reach, Mrs. White snatched her by the forearm and dug her nails in so deep tiny jewels of blood bubbled up around her fingers. Tommy twitched at Sue’s side, like he wanted to jump up and tackle Mrs. White, but his nerves were holding him back.

  “I’m sorry…” Carrie whispered, although Sue doesn’t know if it’s directed to her and Tommy or to her mother. She’s briskly guided out of the room a moment later, so fast that she actually clipped her forehead on the doorframe, but Mrs. White doesn’t stop to let her recover. Their footsteps shuffle and stomp down the hallway, down the steps, and then disappear downstairs.

Silence.

Sue and Tommy waited for yelling, crashing, banging, fighting to break out, but there was nothing. They could only hear the distant sound of Mrs. White’s voice, but neither of them dared to move to listen closer. They just sat there in Carrie’s room, surrounded by scraps of colorful fabric and sewing needles, not speaking a word.

Mrs. White came to get them five minutes later. Her eyes were filled with disgust and hatred and her mouth was twisted in a sneer.

  “Get out.” Was all she said in a voice filled with malice.

Sue and Tommy leapt to their feet and scampered out of the house with metaphorical tails tucked between their legs as fast they could. Mrs. White followed close behind them, like the devil on their heels, until they were out on the stoop. She slammed the door so hard Sue was surprised the entire house didn’t come crumbling down and they heard the sound of a lock clicking into place.

Silence.

  “That...was eventful.” Sue said.

Tommy doesn’t answer. He just began to pace up and down the front walkway, crunching gravel and pebbles underneath his shoes. 

  “Tommy?”

  “We have to do something.” Tommy blurted.

Surprised, Sue said, “What?”

  “We can’t just leave her in there!” Tommy said, then quickly quieted his voice. He looked around. “We have to save her.”

Sue knew they had to, even if the thought scared her. She wouldn’t be able to sleep that night knowing Carrie was probably thrashed for the skirt her friend had been wearing.

The two of them wait a moment, then sneak around the side of the house, romping through overgrown weeds and grass and knowing full well that they’ll get hell rained upon them if they’re caught. Tommy peeked in through a back window with a crack in it and saw the fleeting figure of Margaret ascending the staircase, giving him and Sue a chance to slip in through the back door and re-enter the house.

Being inside that place felt wrong, like they were intruding on sacred grounds. But the house was anything but sacred, especially with the muffled sniffles echoing from somewhere they couldn’t see.

Sue and Tommy ducked into a small closet that was cluttered with moth-eaten blankets and boxes. They were at the end of the main downstairs hallway and it was dark enough for them to crack open the door and peek out without being seen. There, they waited, peering out of the barely-open door. Sue’s back was just starting to hurt from hunching over when footsteps stomped down the staircase. She and Tommy watched as Mrs. White unlocked what they thought had just been a coat closet, reached in, and pulled Carrie out.

  “I’m sorry, Mama!” Carrie blurted instantly, as submissive as always.

Mrs. White answered in a low rumbling noise. She dragged Carrie into the den and out of sight.

  “Mama, please talk to me.” Sue and Tommy heard Carrie beg. “Please, I’m sorry! I just-- they’re my friends and I don’t like when people are mean to them. I’m sorry, Mama. I shouldn’t have talked back to you.”

Mrs. White snorted. “Friends.” She repeated the word as if it were a curse. “They aren’t your friends.”

  “They are!” Carrie said. “They are, Mama! And they’re really nice, too, you’ll see!”

Mrs. White huffed out a breath and Sue thought she may be shaking her head. “Nobody is friends with you, Carrie. You don’t have friends. You know why.”

Sue winced. That felt like it was needlessly cruel to the poor girl.

  “No, Mama,” Carrie said, this time much softer.

  “If I told them what you are--what you can do, they’ll run for the hills. Or worse: they’d lock you up and use your gifts. But me? I’ve always accepted and loved you the way you are, my sweet girl.” Mrs. White crooned. “You’re different, Carrie. And you know people love to destroy what is not like them.”

  “I don’t have to be,” Carrie said. “Tommy says I can be whoever I want!”

  “Oh. That BOY.” Mrs. White said with great disgust. “You know how boys are, Carrie. Do I need to remind you of your father?”

  “No, Mama.” Carrie replied with a shudder in her voice.

Sue and Tommy exchanged looks. They had both wondered on their own about Carrie’s father, but neither ever brought it up to her. By the sound of it, whatever happened to him wasn’t very good.

  “They’re good, Mama,” Carrie was saying when focus was brought back to the conversation. “I promise! I’m sorry for talking back, but Tommy and Sue are good people!”

  “They’ve entranced you,” Mrs. White said, not even listening to her daughters. “They are imps sent from the devil!”

  “No, Mama!” There’s a rustle of fabric and the scuffing of feet against the floor- Carrie must have been standing up. “They aren’t! Don’t you dare say that about them! They’re not imps, YOU are!”

The sound of a hand smashing against flesh filled the house; Carrie’s body fell backwards into sight on her stomach. She’s frozen in shock for a moment before pushing herself up on her hands. A second later, one of her legs was grappled and she was dragged backwards into the den, screaming and clawing helplessly at the floor.

It was like a scene ripped straight out of a horror movie.

  “Mama, stop! Stop it, Mama! I’m sorry!”

  “You’re going to repent, you vile little beast--”

Another slap reverberated through the house, followed by a sharp yelp reminiscent of a puppy getting its foot stepped on. 

  “Mama! Mama, no! Please, no! I’m sorry!”

  “You must be washed clean of the filth they put on you.”

There’s the sound of fabric scraping against the floor that traveled into the kitchen. A clatter of a body being thrown into a chair echoed from that room, followed by a stern, “Stay.”

  “Mama, please,” Carrie pleaded. “I don’t want to, Mama, I don’t want to be cleaned--”

Sue heard the sink running in the kitchen. What was going on?

--

A hand yanked her head backwards by the hair. Water hit the over her face cloth- small drips and then a heavy torrent. It flooded into her nose. She instinctively opened her mouth to gasp for a breath, and the water poured in. Her heart was racing, and her whole body was frozen. She could feel the freezing water trickling down her throat. She tried to toss her head to escape the torrent, but she couldn't even twitch. The only part of her that was moving was her chest as her body fought frantically to cough, to escape, to breathe, to survive.

   “Don’t like that, do you?” Mama’s voice was crowing as she lifted the cloth. She smirked at the way her daughter gasped for air, taking in quick, rapid breaths to soothe her lungs. “No, you don’t.” She felt her shake her hand beneath her hand. “Admit it, my darling. Admit that that boy and girl are sent from the devil and dirtied you. Admit it and it will end.”

Desperate to retain at least a shred of her dignity, Carrie said, “No.”

The cloth drops back down over her face with a wet plop.

She felt the moment the water hit her lungs this time around- there was a lot more poured over her. There was a sickening chill, so at odds with the burning pain. And then her arms and legs were tugging against the ropes as sheer panic enveloped her. She wasn't thinking of twisting her wrists to try to free them; her arms moved of their own accord, tearing the skin. She wasn't thinking of kicking out with all her strength; her legs jerked and tugged against the restraints, wrenching their own muscles. She wasn't thinking of trying to get away from whatever was pinning her down; her body writhed and shifted as panic and fear pulsed through it.

When Mama lifted the cloth again, water was spit up from Carrie’s lips. She lowered it, not giving her much room to breathe. She whined sharply, pathetically when she just inhaled a wet rag.

   “Please, please, Mama...” Carrie begged through breathless sobs.

   “Tell me the truth. Admit it. You know you want to. You want to damn their souls to hell for cursing you.”

    “No, Mama, I don’t--”

Carrie cut herself off with a horrid gag and water rushed down her throat, choking her.

Dying. Dying. Dying. She could feel it. Her very bones were vibrating with the knowledge that she couldn't survive. That oxygen, held away from her by nothing more than a piece of fabric, was still too far away for her to reach. That every frantic heave of her chest was drawing the water further and further down, pulling in more and more liquid.

Every fiber of her being wanted to fight, was trying to fight, but it wasn't a fight she could win. There was nothing she could do.

Unless…

   “I--”

Carrie’s squeal ended in an intense dry heave that twisted her stomach so badly she began to feel nauseous. Her head spun and the crying was adding to the extreme pain that infected her chest and abdomen.

   “Mama--”

A whimper, a whine, a keen of helplessness as Carrie’s limbs began to go limp.

   “I do!”

The bowl clattered to the ground. Mama removed the rag from her face, stared deep into her teary eyes.

   “What was that?”

   “I--” A weak sob shook Carrie, “I do. I do want to send them to hell. They made me dirty.”

She thought she’s having to lie to get out alive, but her mind is too fuzzy to know for sure... Maybe she does want them to burn for all eternity in hell.

   “You do?”

   “Yes, Mama. Yes, Mama.” Carrie bobbed her head rapidly. “I’m sorry, Mama. I’m so sorry. I should have listened.”

Mama knelt down beside her and began wiping her face off with a dry cloth. When fresh tears streamed from her eyes, she gently dabbed them away. Carrie couldn’t help but press into his touch.

   “Is this the truth, Carietta? Are you really sorry?”

   “Yes, Mama,” Carrie said with a sob. “Yes, yes, I am. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry...”

   “Good girl,” Mama crooned, continuing to dry off her face.

   “I’m sorry.”

   “Yes, I’m glad you know to tell the truth, but that doesn’t change what you did.”

Ice cold fear shot through Carrie’s veins.

   “I took your gun.” She was desperate now.

   “You still have to be punished, little jade.”

She lets out a whimper.

   “You know what you did.”

The dry cloth is put over her face.

Water sloshed above her.

She wanted to say she was sorry. She was sorry. She was so sorry. She wanted to be a good, obedient daughter. She wanted to make Mama happy. She wanted her to be proud.

Drip-drip-drip

The cloth soaked up the water, slowly this time, to drag out her punishment. Carrie took a shuddering breath of air, fills her lungs as far as they can go, fills them so full she feels like they’re going to burst.

Mama’s voice echoed.

You need to be punished

The water soaked the cloth. The cloth clung to Carrie’s nose as she inhaled, clung when she exhaled, and the panic exploded in her chest. Water slid down her throat, over her neck and into her hair, over her shoulders. So cold it burns.

She’s drowning. She’s dying. She’s suffocating.

Screaming.

Her throat hurts. There’s no air in her mouth, in her lungs. She can feel the water trickling into her nose. Can’t breathe. No air. No air. No air.

The ropes on her arms loosen and then are gone. She wanted to die. She can’t breathe past the panic in her chest. She was shaking. She was dying. She wanted it to end.

Oh god, please keep pouring. Please. Please. Please. You can kill me right now.

But then the faces of Tommy and Sue and Miss Gardener flash in her head and she thought, Do I really want to die?

--

Sue and Tommy didn’t think anything could get worse than Mrs. White waterboarding her own child, but then she raised a wicked-looking switch when Carrie lurched out of the chair she had been punished in. She coughed violently and slipped in the water coating the kitchen floor, falling to her hands and knees, but jolted forward as the switch swung down at her. It just barely missed her left leg.

  “I’ll thrash the devil out of you!!” Mrs. White screeched.

Carrie catapulted herself over the dining room table to get away from her and her switch. Sue and Tommy watched as she clambered over the top, scattering porcelain plates and cups, before tipping over in a very ungraceful landing. After hitting the ground, she scrambled up again to flee, but her mother was already upon her.

   “Ma--!!”

Before she could get the word completely out, the switch connected with her back with a horrible CRACK.

Carrie doesn’t scream, but she does whine sharply at the burning sensation that had to be blazing through her shoulder blades, even with her shirt on. She scampered around like a mouse below Mrs. White, as she had easily been sent to her knees by the blow. She’s fidgeting and fumbling, trying to speak up without sounding pained, as that would make her seem even weaker.

   “Mama, please, I--”

Another lash streaked across her lower back and Carrie gritted her teeth through the pain. Her fingernails claw and catch into the floorboards, but she would have much preferred splinters uprooting her nails than this beating.

   “Worthless girl! When will you learn to obey me?!” Mrs. White roared overhead before cracking the switch against her daughter’s waist.

Carrie’s arms gave in and she toppled over onto her side. She squirmed helplessly, pushing her heels against the ground in an attempt to get away, mouth agape as she watched Mrs. White raised her arm yet again.

   “Mama--”

This time, Carrie does scream.

She does scream because the switch lashed right across her belly. Her head threw itself backwards, knocking her skull against the floorboards, but it’s not enough to lessen the searing sensation burning itself through her midsection. For a moment, she can only choke and cry out, but then the incomprehensible wail turns into words.

  “MOMMY, STOP IT!! PLEASE, MOMMY, STOP!!!”

But Mrs. White doesn’t stop. She just kept on lashing her daughter until blood is soaking through green overalls and Carrie is a shuddering, whimpering ball at her feet. Even then, she does not stop.

Not until a voice cried out.

  “THAT’S ENOUGH!!” Tommy barreled out into the den, absolutely fuming and seeing red. It surprised Sue, who had been recording the abuse on her phone in shocked silence. She followed after him quickly.

  “Don’t you hurt a single hair on her head.” Tommy warned. His fingers were clenched and shaking, teeth bared, eyes alight with rage.

  “Tommy,” Carrie coughed out weakly.

Tommy looked down at Carrie and his eyes softened instantly. He looked anguished about how he wasn’t able to go to her, not with Mrs. White poising the switch over her back. 

  “I’m here, Caz,” He murmured. “I’m here.”

Carrie made a feeble whimpering sound. She tried to look up at him, blinking through tears and water and sweat and blood, but she was exhausted from the beating and her head flopped uselessly to the ground. She panted heavily, trying to curl away from her mother.

  “I thought I threw you both out.” Mrs. White said.

  “We would never leave Carrie.” Tommy said. “Not so devilish now, huh?”

Mrs. White snorted. “You think this proves anything? I know what you people are like.”

  “I got what you did on video,” Sue said, holding up her phone. “Just so you know.”

Mrs. White laughed an awful laugh. “Oh, you empty-headed whore,” She cackled. “You think evidence is going to change anything? Everyone in the neighborhood, new and old, have heard Carrie’s cries for years and they have never done anything. Not even when police are called. Nothing is ever done, and you want to know why?” She smirked wickedly. “It’s because nobody cares.”

Sue felt a sinking feeling of dread. Would really nothing be done to save Carrie even with video evidence?

  “I care.” Tommy said. “Sue cares. So does Miss Gardener.”

------

  “I do,” Lynn murmurs, gently touching one of Carrie’s hands. Tommy and Sue both give her tight smiles, then Sue continues telling the story.

------

Mrs. White rolled her eyes. “No you don’t! You’re lying!” She nudged Carrie with her foot and Carrie moaned weakly in response. Her daughter rolled over slightly, blood squelching beneath her, and gave her her full attention, even after being beaten to a bloody pulp. “I’m the only one who cares about you. No one will ever love you except me. You’ll always be a monster to everyone else.”

Sue shivered. It sounded like some kind of chant or curse, like something Mrs. White had repeated this to Carrie several times before.

Carrie whimpered. She craned her neck slowly, wincing in pain, and looked at Sue and Tommy desperately. Mrs. White nudged her again, prodding her foot against one of the cuts along her lower back and making her look back at her.

  “She’s not a monster.” Sue spoke up, glaring at Mrs. White.

Mrs. White barked a laugh. She looked down at Carrie quivering beneath her. “Is that what you’ve made them think? That you’re just some shy, innocent little mouse?” She laughed again and turned her blistering gaze back to Tommy and Sue. “You have no idea what you’ve gotten yourselves into, children.”

What did she do? Sue thought. What has Carrie done to make her own mother call her a monster? 

And will she do the same thing to us?

  “Don’t you DARE talk about Carrie like that!” Tommy growled. “You have no right!”

  “I have every right,” Mrs. White said airily. “I am her mother.” She spread her arms in a grand gesture. Droplets of sparkling red blood twinkle on the edges of the switch she was still holding. “And I am just trying to cleanse the little devil he put inside of me.”

A tense silence descended upon the den, only broken by Carrie’s soft gasps and sniffles.

  “Who?” Sue asked quietly, reluctantly.

Mrs. White began to pace around the room, swinging the switch at her side and sending blood flying through the air in glittering crimson arcs. “I didn’t want him to put it in me. I tried to fight him.” She said.

  “Mama, please don’t,” Carrie begged weakly. She covered her ears and curled up tighter.

  “But he didn’t listen.” Mrs. White hissed, ignoring her daughter’s pleas. “He made me enjoy it. Satan gave him sin and, in return, he put a devil child inside of me.”

Oh. Sue realized with a jolt. She was raped.

Mrs. White shook her head. “I don’t hate Carrie. Far from it. If I did, she would be long dead.” She looked down at her daughter with a strange look in her eyes. “I just...have to cleanse her. Remove all her sin.” She tilted her head like Carrie was a new plastic body to decorate the crucifixes with. “And then--she will be--perfect.”

There was something very, very wrong with Margaret White. And Sue didn’t feel safe being around her any longer.

How could Carrie live with such a mother?

Mrs. White looked up at Tommy and Sue, scrutinizing them. “Does that make sense?”

Sue nodded a tiny bit and Mrs. White gave her an appraising look. Tommy, however, only fumed even more.

  “What the fuck?” He seethed. “No! Not only no, but HELL NO!” He glared at Mrs. White. “You are fucking psychotic! You can’t treat people like that! Why did I want you to like me? You’re insane!”

Mrs. White glared right back at him. “I should have known you wouldn’t understand. Men.” She nudged Carrie, who tentatively removed her hands from her ears. “Why don’t I show you why purification is necessary? Carrie, my darling little creature, show them.”

Carrie doesn’t move. Mrs. White exasperatedly rolled her eyes and grabbed her by the top of the head, throwing her to Sue and Tommy’s feet. Carrie landed with a heavy thud and a soft grunt. She looked up at the pair with guilty black-brown eyes so eerily like her mother’s. Sue shivered, finding it difficult to look at her anymore.

  “Go on.” Mrs. White waved a hand.

  “No, Mama,” Carrie whispered. She tried to make herself as small as possible.

  “Why not?” Mrs. White smirked. “Is it because you know they’ll hate you for it?”

Carrie whimpered. Fresh tears stream down her cheeks. She began to rock herself back and forth on her knees.

  “Look at that,” Mrs. White mused. “She doesn’t trust either of you at all. How sad. Some great friends you are if she can’t tell secrets to you.”

Sue felt a smudge of betrayal streak through her. What was so important that Carrie couldn’t tell her and Tommy about? Did the best friend's oath she once made them take mean nothing? She looked to Tommy to see his reaction, but there wasn’t a hint of hurt on his face. He squared his shoulders and narrowed his eyes at Mrs. White.

  “It’s her business,” He said. “She can tell us when she’s ready. I wouldn’t admit anything while being pressured, either.”

I should have reacted like that, Sue thought with a twist of guilt. Not immediately assume Carrie is a bad person. She looked at Mrs. White. She’s...so cunning. And convincing. It’s scary.

  “Tommy,” Carrie gasped from below. She gripped tightly to one of his pant legs. “Tommy, it hurts.”

Tommy dropped to his knees in front of Carrie and bundled her protectively in his arms. Blood smeared against his clothes, but he doesn’t seem to care much. Mrs. White watched with a murderous look in her eyes.

  “Shh, you’re safe. I won’t let you go.” Tommy whispered to her soothingly.

  “And just WHERE do you think you’re putting your hands?” She spat.

Tommy glared right back up at her. “I’m protecting her from you.” He said.

  “Foolish boy,” Mrs. White shook her head. “You don’t know what she could do to you.”

  “Carrie would never hurt me.” Tommy said.

Mrs. White laughed. “That’s what you think! But she could! She easily could!”

  “Mama,” Carrie wheedled. 

  “Release my daughter.” Mrs. White said. “This instant.”

Tommy narrowed his eyes at her and said, “No.”

Mrs. White’s face twisted in fury. She gripped the switch in her hands tightly and, for a moment, Sue worried she was going to strike Tommy with it.

But she didn’t.

She didn’t move.

  “Mama, please stop.” Carrie begged. She had her head twisted around to stare at her mother. Most of her wounds have stopped bleeding by now; dried blood clashed horribly with her green overalls.

  “You devil,” Mrs. White hissed lowly. 

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Mama.” Carrie whispered. Her body had gone worryingly cold in Tommy’s arms. Her voice was the sound of dead leaves rustling against pavement. “Please don’t make me hurt you…”

Mrs. White was stiff in her spot, arm half raised. The muscles were contracted tightly beneath her skin. Why wasn’t she moving? Was she scared of Carrie? And if so...why? Carrie was anything but threatening.

The next words Carrie spoke made her mother go deathly pale.

  “I’ll bring the stones again.”

Mrs. White staggered backwards, eyes wide. “You wouldn’t.” She whispered.

Thunder rumbled deeply, then cracked across the darkening sky outside like a warning. Lightning flickered in through the tightly-drawn drapes, illuminating Carrie’s eyes like ebony flames, and Sue realized they weren’t as black as she thought. There were hues of amber and red-brown, and they glowed intensely in her skull. Her gaze was hard and cold.

  “I will, Mama.” Carrie said. Her voice was drained and dry; she sounded so tired. “If you touch them-- If you dare--” She was shaking like a newborn baby goat in Tommy’s arms. She looked up at her mother with the same diseased light that had been in her mother’s eyes. “I will bring the fire down on you.”

Mrs. White dropped to her knees, falling like a bird with broken wings. She clasped her hands together and began to pray loudly, although her words were wavering and slurring together. She rocked back and forth, shaking her head like she was trying to ward off sinful thoughts from worming their way into her brain.

Carrie sucked in a sharp breath, her body shuddering in an awful, bone-shattering way. Her head flopped limply onto one of Tommy’s shoulders, panting heavily. Sweat was soaking her brow and a feverish expression contorted her face.

  “Tommy,” She gasped weakly.

  “Grab her.” Sue ordered. “Grab her, Tommy! Let’s go!”

Tommy scooped Carrie up into his arms and ran for the door, Sue tailing right behind him.

Mrs. White did not stop them.

------

  “And then we got in the car and drove here.” Sue concludes with a frown.

An uncomfortable silence descends upon the house, only broken by the pattering of rain on the window and low rumbles of thunder. Tommy shifts closer to the couch, casting Carrie yet another worried glance. His gaze practically screamed, Wake up. Please wake up.

  “That can’t--that can’t be true,” Lynn whispers. Her breath is caught in her throat in horror. There was just no way. No parent could possibly be that cruel to their own child. She didn’t want to believe it.

  “It is.” Sue says sadly. She slips her phone out of her pocket and hands it to Lynn. Estelle leans over her shoulder to see. A video is displayed on the screen. With a quaking finger, Lynn presses the play button.

And it all fell away.

Hope that the story wasn’t true, hope that Margaret wasn’t as bad as Sue and Tommy made her out to be, hope that Carrie wasn’t getting brutally abused this whole time, right under her nose, and she never did anything to help her.

Because on the screen, clear as day, is Margaret White lashing her young daughter with a whip-thin switch, splattering blood everywhere. And the agonized yowls of Carrie will echo in her ears, haunt her nightmares, for years to come, always reminding her that it was very, very real.

Lynn’s vision blurs and she realizes she is tearing up. She blinks and claws away the tears hopefully before anyone would notice, trying her best to be strong, trying to not let her facade fall and reveal that she was actually horrified. Horrified and sickened and shocked and livid. She would not let her mask fall, and not just because she was supposed to be a tough-as-nails gym coach that would make numerous students vomit during Suicides and never flinch when bones broke savagely during games. But because she has to be strong for Carrie’s sake.

And then she looks up and sees blank onyx eyes peering at her blankly and tears cloud her vision all over again.

  “Carrie!”

Tommy is the first one to react, lunging to his friend’s side in an instant, nearly falling face-first into the rug in the process. He clasps one of her hands with both of his.

  “Carrie,” He says again, this time quieter. “How are you feeling?”

  “Everything hurts,” Carrie replies in a soft, hoarse voice. She sighs. “But what else is new?”

She...doesn’t sound very surprised, Lynn realizes with an awful twist in her stomach. Like this has happened before.

Like she’s gotten used to it. Waking up in pain.

Carrie lifts her head slightly, wincing, and looks around the room. “Where am I? Why is Miss Gardener here?”

  “Hi, sweetheart,” Lynn smiles at her warmly.

  “We brought you here.” Sue says.

  “Oh.” Carrie’s dark eyes dart around again, searching, and then fall on Estelle. Her brow pinches together. “I know you.” She whispers.

Estelle moves closer. “Hello, Carrie. It’s been a long time.”

  “You were my neighbor,” Carrie says. “I asked you what breasts were. Estelle.”

Despite the situation, light laughter ripples through the room. It almost, almost eases the weight pressing on Lynn’s heart.

  “Yes, that’s me,” Estelle chuckles. “It’s good to see you again, Carrie.”

  “You called Mama a cow,” Carrie muses, slightly dazed. Sue gets up to grab the painkillers Lynn left on the kitchen counter.

Lynn gives Estelle a look that says, “You what?” Estelle returns with a crooked smile.

  “Where is she?” Carrie asks. She’s looking around more fervently now and trying to get up. “Where’s my Mama?”

Lynn feels that awful twist in her heart again. Even after what Margaret did to her, Carrie is still so attached to her mother. But after living with such a treatment all her life, she must have gotten used to it. Maybe she even learns to overlook it.

  “She’s at your house, Caz.” Tommy says, brushing back a loose fringe of hair from Carrie’s face.

  “Is she alive?” Carrie asks. Then, more softly, “Did I hurt her?”

The beat of silence and exchange of worried glances is just a bit too long; Carrie begins to whimper and cry. Tommy soothes her quickly, brushing her tears away with gentle hands.

  “She’s okay, Caz. She’s alive, I promise.” He assures her. “Shh… It’s okay.”

Carrie looks up at him and calms slightly. Lynn is impressed- out of everyone in the room, she would have thought Tommy would be the least comforting, but here he was, treating Carrie so tenderly. Perhaps the most awkward one with comfort, at least with Carrie, would be Sue, who was standing listlessly with the bottle of Ibuprofen gripped tightly in her hands. Lynn takes it from her and she and Tommy are able to convince Carrie to swallow two of the pills.

  “They’ll make you feel better,” Tommy tells her, stroking her hair.

  “Do you ever take medicine?” Sue asks curiously.

Carrie shrugs. “Sometimes. Not always. Mama didn’t--believe--in that kind of stuff.” 

With weak arms, she pushes herself up into a sitting position, despite the several arguments for her to stay laying down. She sucks in a sharp breath, the cuts along her belly straining and stinging in the open air, and she stubbornly tugs her shirt back down to shield the expanse of scarred flesh. Lynn makes a clucking noise of disapproval.

  “You shouldn’t have your clothes covering them,” She says. “They could get infected.”

Carrie gives her a wry smile, “I haven’t got any awful infections yet, have I?”

Lynn’s heart wrenched once again, like a claw was dug inside her chest and turning it to mush. Carrie looks so used to this, so used to getting up and shaking off wounds from abuse, and she hates it. She wants to take her away from that kind of lifestyle so badly.

For a long few minutes, the house is silent. Carrie is looking down, her eyes clouded and haunted; Sue is over near the window, hands gripping the sill firmly, peering out at the storm with a deeply troubled expression, like she was considering leaping out into the tempest so the rain could wash away the chill rattling through her body; Tommy has climbed up onto the couch beside Carrie and kept squeezing her hand like he was trying to remind himself that she was still there with him and still alive; Estelle’s arms are crossed over her chest and she’s considering Carrie in thoughtful silence, most likely straining her memories back to the days when she was the White’s neighbor; Lynn is currently getting her heart turned into pulp, emotions tumbling over themselves in the whirlwind that was her mind- anger, guilt, shock, fear, maternal instincts, anger again, then guilt...it was all mixing together. 

Everyone was lost in their individual thoughts, listlessly wandering the winding corridors of their own minds.

The one who speaks first is Sue.

  “Carrie,” She says slowly, turning away from the window, “why do you love your mother?”

  “Sue!” Tommy hisses, then whips his head around to see Carrie’s reaction.

For just a moment, there is a flash of anger, and Lynn so badly wants to see it come out. She wants to see Carrie get mad at her mother for the treatment she got. But it is chased off by deep sadness and confusion, like Carrie herself didn’t know why she was so attached to such a wicked woman.

  “How much do you know about her?” Carrie asks instead of answering. She looks around, including everyone in the question. “Aside from her being an extremist, how much do you know?” 

Looks were exchanged as minds were dug through for any information on Margaret White that weren’t rumors. Carrie waits patiently, a tiny, sad smile ghosting her lips. 

  “You once said,” Estelle starts slowly, “that she was ‘bad when she made you.’”

Carrie nods, her smile twitching up a little more. “My Mama,” She says, “is a delusional, accursed witch.”

Stunned silence. Carrie tilts her head at them, as if to say, “What? I thought you were waiting for me to say something mean about her?” She shakes herself out, like she was getting rid of evil spirits clinging to her, then went on, “She hates everything about the world. Men, most girls, people who follow different religions, even churches. She doesn’t trust them, so we hold our own ceremonies at the house. She’s the preacher, I’m the congregation…” She splays open her hands and looks at them as if they had nails lanced through the palms. “She hates my father the most, I think. Even though I believe she does love him still, despite what happened. And that makes her hate him even more.” She closes her fists and looks up with dark eyes. “She hates me, too. She says she doesn’t but I know. I’ve seen the way she looks at me. I remind her of him.”

  “Have you seen him before?” Sue asks softly. “Your dad?”

  “Only once,” Carrie answers. “In a picture. I look like him.”

There’s a beat of silence. Carrie runs a hand thoughtfully over her bottom jaw, looking horrifyingly calm while speaking of her home life. But there was fear in her eyes. Lynn could see it flickering in her hugely dilated red-brown-black pupils, very much there, but being stamped down. It was honestly quite startling to see her young student, who would flinch when someone simply raised their hand to ask a question, who always tried to make herself seem smaller when teams were picked for games, who had to use sign language to speak to people because she was too anxious to even verbally talk, be so reserved and nonchalant.

That was another thing- Carrie speaking so many words. Lynn doesn’t think she’s ever heard her talk so much before. She’s wanted to hear her talk, yes, but not like this.

  “If a prayer was said just a little wrong,” Carrie begins again, “if a cross was bumped and became crooked, it all fell apart for her.” She leans back, staring out the window. What is that look in her eyes? Disdain, fear, anxiety, relief about finally telling about this? “And she took it out on me over...”

  “…and over…”

  “…and over…”

  “…and over…”

Carrie’s eyes became vacant, darkening until they looked completely black, lost in the abuse that gripped her so tightly. The calm demeanor only then breaks and is replaced by intense terror and anxiety. At her side, Tommy is too stunned to react, so Lynn lunges forward, grabbing the girl by the shoulders. As soon as contact is made, Carrie begins to thrash and cries out, “…AND OVER!” 

Lynn’s grip on Carrie’s shoulders does not break, even when the girl swats fearfully at her arms in a panic. She could only stare as she seized out of control. It was like watching an exorcism happen right in front of her.

  “Carrie, stop!” Tommy pleads.

With a start, Carrie stops breathing and tightens every muscle in her body. Prolonged contact with someone who wouldn’t hurt her is starting to have an effect. Her eyes close and her spasms slow. Silence fell around the group.

Then, Carrie expels her breath and sucks in another. She grasps Lynn’s hands and gently pries them away from her shoulders; her touch is like ice.

Sue beseeches her, “What happened to you?”

And on the inside, Lynn thinks, “Is this the girl I want to take in?”

Carrie didn’t look at anyone. Shame carves deep grooves in her face. 

  “Mama says I’m different,” Carrie smolders. “That I was born from my father’s sin and that’s why--I’m the way I am. And she believes that she has to purify me and remove the devil from inside of me.” 

After a second, Carrie turns her head back ever so slightly and peers at the group around her out of the corner of her vision. There was pain in that bloody ebony eye. 

Her next three words were tight with humiliation.

  “She broke me.”

The pit in Lynn’s stomach dropped until it was a chasm. She can’t speak. Nobody could speak. Carrie looks away again, hiding her disgrace from sight.

  “My Mama damaged me in a way that cannot ever be repaired. No matter how many decades pass, I will always be just as broken as I am now. I can’t become whole again.” Her voice cracked as she mourned. “She passed her sickness onto me.”

Tommy reaches over, slowly bridging the gap between him and his dear little sister figure, but Carrie shrinks away from the hand, shaking her head and whimpering, “It’s like a curse that spreads from people to people.”

Tommy swiftly retracts his hand, and the speed at which he does so causes guilt to bloom all over his face. Carrie looks up at him with an understanding frown.

  “I will never let anyone share in my sickness. I can’t.” She shakes her head miserably. “I have to--stay away--from people. To protect them. That’s what Mama says.” She clenches her fingers into claws and anger, pain, longing, shame all flash in her eyes. 

  “But Carrie, how could you pass that sickness onto other people? Onto us?” Tommy asks. “You wouldn’t hurt us!”

Suddenly, a guilt-ridden sob tears out of Carrie’s throat and she doubles over, face buried in her hands.

Quivering, Tommy whispers, “You wouldn’t hurt me, right?”

Carrie wails. 

Everything is falling to pieces, to ashes. Lynn is frozen, unable to think straight. At her side, Estelle is frowning--like she’s seen this before.

  “You don’t want to hurt us.” Estelle says. “You don’t want to hurt anyone at all.”

Carrie sniffles and looks up from her hands. She looks absolutely miserable.

  “Would it matter if I did?” She shakes her head and looks at her hands with so much hatred. “I’m a monster. Just like Mama always says.” She covers her face again and sobs.

Lynn can see it now: Carrie wasn’t just shy and anxious and socially awkward, she was fragile, too--too fragile for the awful things she’s been through.

  “Oh, Carrie,” Tommy murmurs. Despite what had been said, he pulls Carrie securely into his arms and she lets him, curling into his warmth. “Carrie. Carrie, I love you anyway. I don’t care.”

And Carrie cries.

She cries and cries and cries for a long time. She cries until she’s reduced to weak sniffles and hiccups and can barely lift her head from Tommy’s chest. She looks absolutely exhausted by the end of it, completely drained. She is feeling the full effect of her wounds, now, and whimpers softly.

  “I have a spare bedroom,” Lynn says. “She can sleep there. She’s tired.” She frowns at Carrie’s pale face.

Tommy nods silently and carefully picks Carrie up. Lynn leads him to the guest bedroom and he sets Carrie down beneath the blankets. Her eyelids are fluttering as sleep--or maybe unconsciousness--begins to take hold of her. Tommy kisses her forehead.

  “Sleep well, Caz,” He murmurs.

Silence descends upon the house once again. Lynn, Estelle, Tommy, and Sue all sit at the dining room table with mugs of peppermint tea Estelle had made. They didn’t look at each other for a long time.

  “What are we gonna do?”

Everyone looks up. Like before, it was Sue who spoke first.

  “About Carrie.” Sue states, but it wasn’t really necessary. They all knew who she was referring to.

  “She can’t go back home,” Tommy says. 

  “But she also needs help.” Sue says. “I’m not-- I don’t know if it’s the best idea, but there’s a mental hospital in--”

  “No.” Tommy growled. “Hell no.”

  “Tommy, she needs help!” Sue says.

  “She wouldn’t last a day in a place like that!” Tommy reprimands. “You know that. And mental hospitals aren’t exactly well known for actually helping people. Locking Carrie up with batshit insane people isn’t going to fix her, it’s just going to make her worse.”

  “He’s right,” Estelle nods. “I have a cousin who was in a mental hospital for a few days. He said that both suicidal people and homicidal people were put together. So there would be someone who tries to kill themselves with any object they could get their hands on and then someone who loudly talks about wanting to kill everyone in the place in the same room. Not exactly very comforting.” She shakes her head. “What Carrie needs is a stable place to live with sane people who can take care of her. Does she have any relatives?”

  “Doubt it.” Tommy sighs.

  “She can stay here.”

All eyes turn to Lynn. Her jaw is set and she looks confident in what she said.

  “Really?” Tommy’s eyes lit up slightly in hope.

  “Yes, really,” Lynn says. “As Estelle said, she needs someone who will take care of her. I can. I /will/. And I want to.”

  “That’s a really sweet thing for you to do, Lynnie,” Estelle coos.

  “Ooooo, Lynnie?” Sue and Tommy tease simultaneously. For the first time in hours, they had real, wide smiles on their faces. 

Lynn rolls her eyes. “Watch it, Snell. I’m still your coach. I can make you run until your legs give out.”

  “But you’re not mine.” Tommy says, puffing out his chest.

  “You doubt my ability to make kids run Suicides.” Lynn smirked at him.

For just a moment, things felt good again. And maybe they would continue to be good, because if Lynn had her way, Margaret White was never going to see her daughter ever again.

[consumedkings-archive]

ancient names, pt. viii

A John Seed/Original Female Character Fanfic

Ancient Names, pt viii: the space between us

Masterlink Post

Word Count: ~6.9k (????)

Rating: M for now, rating will change in later chapters as things develop.

Warnings: Language, some “light” religious blasphemy (it’s Far Cry 5). Strong canon deviance from here on out. Some more PTSD symptoms/descriptions, though mild.

Notes: This chapter is like, nearly 2k longer than most others and folks, we got it all: identity crisis, PTSD symptoms, the irritability of being surrounded by Seed brothers, the irritability of perhaps not having eaten or had any real water for like two days, Jacob being a shithead, the "sees love interest in x state of undress" trope, YOU NAME IT. When does the fun stop?? We'll never know. tl;dr Elliot pops off like 6 times and honestly, who’s surprised anymore.

I hope you guys enjoy, it feels a bit like this chapter got away from me and not a lot of exciting stuff happens but it did feel important to have this lull of a chapter between all the action and drama. Thank you, as always, to my angel @starcrier the best proof-reader a girl could ask for an also a remarkably thoughtful and sweet friend who for some reasons decides to bless me with her presence to this day.

Thank you so much to everyone who comments, reads, reblogs, likes--all of it is always cherished by me, and it really does inspire me to keep going. <3

tagging my lover my life my shawty my wife @empirics bc she still wanna go here even when i babble at her nonstop

John had hoped that Elliot would go to sleep, but he knew the chances of that happening were slim to none and he wasn’t surprised when, out of what he could only assume was pure spite and anger, she stayed awake the entire drive to the compound. She stayed awake through John recounting what they had experienced of the cult already, what they knew about Faith; Elliot stayed oddly silent, in the way that swelled with the knowledge that she probably knew more than what she was letting on, but John didn’t push.

Jacob stuck to the side roads, the back roads, keeping them as far from the most populated areas as possible: and John could see that it drove Elliot batty, knowing they could just stop at Fall’s End. The radio’s gospel songs echoed eerily in the cab of the truck. After about five minutes of it playing—and, coincidentally, about two minutes after Elliot had smoked down the entirety of her first cigarette—she blurted out, “Can you turn that shit off?”

“Why?” Jacob asked evenly, and John passed a hand over his face tiredly as he heard Elliot take in a huge breath, as though she needed to make sure she properly had enough oxygen to spit her venom out.

As John began tiredly, “Deputy, mind yourself and close your mouth,” Elliot bulldozed him to say, “Because I’ve got a head wound that seems to get exacerbated by idiotic cultists,” their voices once again overlapping until their words strangled each other, Elliot glaring at John. He really wished she would stop looking so betrayed when he took the side of one of his brothers; it wasn’t as though she and him had ever really felt like a team , anyway.

Except for the ranch, dispatching of those Swedes in tandem. And except for when they’d been driving, and Elliot had actually looked happy for a second, even with their hands cuffed together. And except for—

Knock that shit off, John thought to himself, just in time for Joseph to say, “It seems as though your time together has made an improvement on your temperament, Deputy Honeysett.”

“What gave you that impression?” Elliot prompted, despite John’s not-so-subtle pleading look.

“Well,” Joseph continued, “we always do try to have faith , you know, especially in our brother. But considering the animalistic state you were delivered to him in, I would have expected much more poor behavior out of you.” A gentle smile tugged at his lips, an expression John could see reflected in the rearview mirror. “I like to see the impact he’s had on you.”

John couldn’t quite sort out how he felt about his brother’s words. He wanted to be proud; he wanted to think, yes, see? I’ve tamed her, the hellcat, look at her keeping her hands to herself. He wanted to, but there was a complicated feeling wound up in it, because he saw the way Joseph’s words struck Elliot, the way they collapsed the iron-clad battlements of her expression, the way they folded her up and crushed them in his proverbial fist. It was exactly what Joseph did; disarmed, unwound, pulled each tangling thread until they were so knotted all you could do was cut it out.

So yes, John felt an immediate burst of pride in his chest at Joseph’s words, and that pride was almost instantly wiped away at the look on Elliot’s face. It was as though she couldn’t stand the idea that he had made an impression on her, in any way. Disgust, he thought, fending off the insult of her abhorrence of his influence, hatred. She has always been spiteful and venomous, underneath it all.

“Just wait until you outgrow your usefulness, Seed,” Elliot managed out, her voice crackling with something violent. “You’re the only one I want to see dead before I hand you over to the government.”

Joseph rolled his window down. “I see that your manners still need some polishing, though.”

Elliot looked at John. Her gaze was hard, but he returned it nonetheless, expectantly. She asked, “Proud of yourself, are you?”

“Elliot,” John began, moderating his voice so that he didn’t sound as pleased as he felt (and of course he didn’t know why he was doing that; there was no reason he should work so hard to preserve Elliot’s feelings, and yet… ) so that she wouldn’t be right about him, “it doesn’t…”

“Shut up,” the blonde snapped. Her voice rattled, with anger and with the sick inside of her. She pressed herself back into the corner of the bench seat in the back; she looked like she wanted to melt into the truck’s frame. “I’m fucking tired of your voice.”

“Watch your mouth,” Jacob said from the front seat.

“You shouldn’t be smoking,” John interjected tartly, feeling himself scramble for something—anything—that felt like normal between them again; the normal that had happened with being forced into each other’s company. “Not until you get better. You still sound sick.”

“ You got those cigarettes for me,” Elliot quipped, vitriolic, “and what the fuck isn’t clear about shut up?” 

As soon as the words left her mouth Jacob pushed on the brakes, hard, the movement slamming the back of her head against the window in the back of the truck. The blonde let out a volley of swears, her hand flying to the back of her head instantly.

Jacob said, his voice prickling with hostility, “I told you to watch your mouth.”

“Jacob—” John began, having braced himself against the driver’s seat, but he could already feel Elliot seething. 

“You fuckhead ,” Elliot bit out, spiteful as ever, her fingers coming away sticky and crimson. “You absolute piece of—”

“Jacob,” Joseph murmured, “let’s not waste time on the road.”

“Elliot, stop squirming,” John insisted, his voice more urgent now. “You’re going to get blood everywhere.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, is it inconvenient for you that your brother reopened my fucking head wound ?”

“That isn’t what I meant,” John growled. “Stop squirming.”

His voice came out more authoritative than he had intended, wound up-tight and hard by the antagonizing nature of Elliot and Jacob’s exchange. The blonde’s jaw clenched, but she stilled; his hands went to her face, tilting her head so that he could take a look at the wound. Reopened, yes, but only just.

“Don’t move,” John said firmly. He could feel Joseph’s eyes on him, and he thought he knew what he was thinking—that once again, he had reaffirmed Joseph’s words, that he had made some kind of an impression on her, that had he told Elliot two days ago to stand still so he could look at a wound that she probably would have sunk her teeth into his arm like a wild animal.

“Didn’t grab any bandages when we were at the ranch, huh?” John asked, trying at something closer to civil.

“I wasn’t thinking particularly beyond bare necessities,” Elliot replied dryly, her voice muffled by her chin tucked against her chest. John made a noise of agreement—he hadn’t thought to grab any, either, having anticipated they’d get the fuck out and be at the compound by now—and sighed a little.

“Well, let’s rip your shirt.”

“Why aren’t we ripping your shirt?” Elliot prompted, and John blinked at her incredulously.

“Do you have any idea how much this shirt costs?”

“Oh, you pretentious little manchild —”

“Fine!”

John didn’t rip his shirt. Instead, he peeled the shirt off, shrugging out of it and folding it to press the gathering of fabric to the wound. Elliot straightened back up into a sitting position, reaching up; her fingers fluttered over John’s, almost shyly, replacing the pressure of his hand with her own so that he could pull away and let her hold it herself.

“You should have just ripped it,” Elliot said, her eyes flickering over him before she caught herself and looked away. Were John not convinced she was running a fever, he might have thought he saw her blushing. All the same, he felt the corners of his mouth tick in something close to a smile.

“It’s easier to scrub blood out than it is to stitch it back together.”

“That’s our John,” Joseph acquiesced from the front sagely. “Ever-giving.” He paused, tilting his head to peer at Elliot and John in the back, “All we ask for is a little civility, deputy. After all, it is our sister that’s been kidnapped.”

Elliot replied, “You seem very concerned about that.” And then, “By the way, they have Joey too, which wouldn’t have happened if you didn’t pass her off to this idiot,” and she jerked her thumb at John.

“If they wanted to kill Faith, they would have already,” Jacob replied, hitting the bridge to the island and flipping the cruise control on as he blithely ignored her comment about Hudson. “Since she was alive when the two of you saw her. Isn’t that right?”

Elliot muttered something of an agreement, as though Jacob were not saying the things she had already said, as though she so desperately did not want to agree with him about something that she would rather choke on her own words than say it out loud.

“We have some search parties sent out,” Jacob continued, his steely gaze sweeping across the road as he flicked the turn signal on—certainly, pure habit at this point. “To pin them down. Once we have them located, we can work on getting Faith back and wiping them out.”

The blonde beside him was quiet, now. As Jacob pulled the truck into the compound—which looked nothing short of a ghost town, now—John glanced over at her again, nursing the wound with his shirt. She looked only tired, as though she’d spent all of her energy in just this car ride alone.

Jacob put the truck into park and turned it off; as they filed out of the car, John swept his gaze over the compound; everything seemed peaceful, as if nothing were happening, a low breeze drifting over the houses and church while the early afternoon sun drenched it in a harsh, unforgiving light. Though it was quiet, the stillness of the compound unsettled him, and the knowledge that many of their followers had been tucked away in the bunkers for safekeeping made his skin crawl.

“John.” Joseph’s voice shook him out of his thoughts. “Why don’t you take our dear deputy to one of the guesthouses to get settled in? There’s no reason why she can’t rest while we’re getting the radios set up to contact her...” His voice trailed off as he seemed to search for a word, and then eventually mustered up, “Friends.

“I’m not your dear anything,” Elliot said slamming the truck door behind her. Joseph’s lips quirked in a small, muted smile, his eyes beneath the yellow lenses of his glasses nearly unreadable.

“Not yet,” Joseph relented.

John's hand reached Elliot’s shoulder. “Come on,” he said, shaking the way Joseph’s pinning gaze unsettled him, just a little, like there was nothing that was happening that his brother wasn’t cataloging for later.

“Don’t touch me,” she muttered, shrugging his hand off of her but following him nonetheless. John could hear his brothers exchanging words in low voices on their way into the church, and that little sting in his chest lingered, more firmly: the idea that Joseph was pawning off responsibility to him to make him feel like he was doing something important remained.

Elliot pushed the door to a guest house open. “You really just took your whole shirt off instead of ripping a little piece, huh?” she said. It might have been her attempt at casual conversation, but John couldn’t say for sure. It was always so hard to tell what was going to trip that hairpin trigger into enemy territory again.

“It’s Versace, Elliot.”

“Oh, boo .” She pulled it away from her head. “I think you just wanted a reason to be shirtless in front of me.”

John blinked. He didn’t know what to say to that, the most friendly, nearly flirty thing Elliot Honeysett had said to him in many years—which was saying a lot, considering the last time they had spoken in a friendly manner, she’d hardly said more than a stammer of a sentence to him before Joey Hudson swept her away.

“Wouldn’t you like that?” he managed out after a moment, taking the shirt back from her as he got his mental footing back. “I saw you looking. No need to be shy about it, though—we’ve already established you find me handsome.”

Elliot scoffed, but he saw her face flood with red just before she turned away, pacing to the bathroom at the back of the house. “Found, once, years ago,” she said over her shoulder. “Don’t let it inflate your ego, Seed.”

He called after her, “Too late,” and she slammed the bathroom door; the very definitive sound of the shower running echoed in the empty house, and John exhaled a small breath in relief.

As he inspected the bloodstain that had gathered on the front of the shirt, he felt a pleasant little thrill in his chest; a stain was a small price to pay for having made Elliot squirm her way out of that conversation, he supposed, and he remembered the way Joseph had said, I like to see the impact he’s had on you. 

Not so wild now, John thought, are you, hellcat?  

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The benefits of a hot shower were never to be underestimated.

Though Elliot had gone into her shower feeling bedraggled, worn down, furious, and more than unseated—both by Joseph’s assertion that there was a yet to be had with the friendliness of their relations, but also by John’s casual confidence in her attraction to him.

She wasn’t attracted to him. John had held her under like he was going to drown her, really drown her. He’d wanted to tattoo wrath right on her chest.  

Elliot’s fingers fluttered over the spot where John’s had dragged, just a day or so ago now, as he said, I think it’ll fit nicely right here, don’t you think? Maybe just over her heart. The same place dream-John had touched, the same place her skin had been burning when flower-eyed John, spilling petals from his mouth, had gripped her face in his hands.

They were getting mixed up in her head now, all of these Johns: the John she had spooned for warmth with in the forest, the John that hadn’t complained when she anchored her fingers into his arm for steadiness, the John that held each side of her face while her body and mind split, somewhere in the middle, bringing her back down before she slipped away permanently; they all wove and intermingled themselves with the others that she knew, the Johns that kidnapped her friends or kidnapped her or held her under or leered at her in a bar when she was young.

It was almost— almost —romantic, the kind of ferocious dichotomy she would have read in a book somewhere, sometime, in a place where she still had the leisure to do something like that: read a book, take a nap, browse television channels. 

Almost, but not quite, because there was and could never be something romantic about John Seed.

Elliot startled out of her thoughts when someone knocked on the bathroom door, the sound echoing in the small bathroom much louder than she thought the knocks would have actually been.

“You’re not climbing through the window right now, are you?” John’s voice came through the door. Elliot quickly wiped the amusement she felt creeping into her face and ducked her head under the water, the heat of it stinging her wound in a sort of catharsis.

“If I was,” Elliot called back, “what would you do?”

“Very funny, Elliot.” And then: “I’d probably kick this door down.”

“How very caveman.”

“Well, you know—desperate times. Plus, I hear women like that kind of thing.”

She rubbed her face with both hands to stop the smile tugging at her mouth. She had to keep focused: she had to remember the way John had practically glowed, radioactive with pride at Joseph’s praise that he’d made an impact on her, that he was changing her. For the better, they thought. For them. Elliot had hardly seen John around his brothers, but the short amount of time that she had (and wasn’t drugged out of her mind) it had become very clear to her that the relationship between them wasn’t as easy to swallow as she would have thought.

But it was easy, when she was given the luxury of a hot shower that molded all of her muscles into relaxation, to feel like they were on a team. It was easy—especially when John had handled her so carefully, like his hands hadn’t inflicted pain on numerous other people, like he hadn’t carved sin after sin into flesh as a macabre brand. Easy, Elliot thought, willing herself to turn off the hot water, because she couldn’t stay in a shower forever. Easy to forget. I can’t forget what’s happened.

“Any chance you’ve got some jeans out there?” Elliot said, stepping out of the shower and finding a clean (clean?) towel hanging; she didn’t have much time to be picky, so she wrapped it around herself and squeezed some of the water out of her hair. Outside, she could hear John stomping around, fumbling through things, and once she’d gotten mostly dried off she opened the door.

“Oh,” John said, like he hadn’t been expecting her, standing just a foot away from the door and holding a collection of clothes in his arms. Jeans, it looked like, and a few shirts. His own shirt was back on, the dark bloodstain turning the navy blue nearly black on the front.

“Oh?” Elliot prompted. She held her hand out for the clothes while the other kept the towel in place.

“It’s just that you look...” He paused, and then handed her the clothes, regarding her almost warily. “You look—”

And he stopped again, and Elliot thought, well go on, spit it out, then, her eyebrows arching upward expectantly.

“Nice,” he said after a moment. As though catching himself, he amended, “Normal, I mean.”

Elliot’s expression deadpanned. “I am normal, John. You’re the one that’s part of a cult, remember?”

He squinted his eyes at her. The spell was broken; the clock had struck midnight; he was no longer enchanted with her, numerous days of grime scrubbed off of her body.

Rather than argue the logistics of his family’s venture being a cult or not, John said, “Change quick, it shouldn’t take long for them to get the radio ready.”

“Yes, boss,” Elliot replied demurely, mimicking the words he’d used when she’d told him to shut up and be a good blanket. John’s eyes flashed to her face and then away, but she didn’t spend too long trying to parse out what his expression was; she closed the door and busied herself with shimmying into the clothes, leftovers from Eden’s Gate members, it seemed. Relatively clean, too, considering she usually saw peggies in various states of disarray and neglect.

After she’d pulled the rest of her clothes on, the white shirt—clearly meant for a man—nearly swallowing her up, she kicked the old, dirty clothes out of the way and opened the door.

“Would you have really kicked the door down if I was climbing through the window?” Elliot asked, scrunching her hair. The back of her head throbbed, but in a pleasant way; the wound had been thoroughly rinsed, and though it still ached from Jacob’s foot slamming the brakes, she didn’t think it was concussive. Yet.

John leaned against the door, regarded her with a dry expression. “Why?” he asked. She opened the door from the “guest house”—it was really more a bunkhouse than anything—and shrugged.

“I hear women like that kind of thing.”

A swift, easy breeze drifted through the doorway as Elliot stepped outside, taking one moment—just one moment—to close her eyes, and breathe, and think, I’m so close, Joey, to rescuing you. I’m so close, I swear I’m on my way to you. Please, just hold out for a little longer.

“—than woman.” John’s voice rattled around in her head, and she opened her eyes looking at him over her shoulder.

“What was that?” she asked.

He sidled up behind her, his hands in his pockets, and bent just a little at the waist so he could say into her ear, “I said, it’s a good thing you’re more devil than woman,” and against the wishes of her mind, the skin of her neck prickled with goosebumps.

She scrunched her shoulder up to her ear to fend him off. “That’s right, John,” she replied evenly, “I am a devil, and don’t you forget it.”

Elliot saw movement out of the corner of her eye, her body stiffening a little before she turned her gaze and saw that it was Joseph, standing at the steps of the church.

“Children,” he called, his voice welling with some kind of emotion that Elliot couldn’t quite pin down—perhaps amusement, or something else. “Are you done? The radio is ready for you, deputy.”

“Born done with this one,” Elliot replied, feeling the small smile that had been fighting its way onto her face slip from her features. There was just something about Joseph that put her on edge; every second she spent in her presence reminded her of the way he’d looked at her, that night in the church, when he’d said, God will not let you take me.

Like she was the only person in the room. Like she was the only person that had mattered.

Elliot liked to think that she was not the kind of person that would be so easily won over by a cult—but she also knew that they looked for people like her, people with a history of trauma, people who had fewer parents than a child ought to have, people whose one functioning parent was only barely functioning and only crested the standard when they had a few drinks in them. She was exactly the kind of person that Joseph nurtured, cradled, forgave, and she thought that for a second in that church, that night, she had thought about how nice it would be to feel that. Once.

But she had a family, and people who cared about her and relied on her and would miss her. Like Joey.

With long strides, she crossed the small courtyard to the church and stopped in front of Joseph, waiting for him to move aside so that she could go in.

“Feeling better?” Joseph asked her mildly, and when he didn’t move aside she shouldered past him. “You look like one of us.”

“Peachy,” Elliot replied flatly; she purposefully ignored his last words, rinsing them away by focusing on the task at hand. The inside of the church was dim, with only the Eden’s Gate window at the back. Her stomach dropped unpleasantly; a surge of panic washed through her, and she was suddenly reminded of the feeling of Eden’s Gate members shoving past her, watching her through fringes of dark, dirty hair, and Joseph, hands outstretched, waiting.

And John, prowling in the background, ever a predator waiting for his prey.

Joseph brushed past her, walking down between the rows of seating to where Jacob had set up a table, the radio crackling as he adjusted some settings on it. Elliot pushed her way down as well, hating that her steps faltered, that Jacob’s piercing eyes caught every step that didn’t quite hit the way that she wanted it to. Behind her, she heard the easy, confident cadence of John’s steps, the door to the outside shutting.

For the first time since getting in the truck, Elliot felt like she was in the belly of the beast. If only, a voice inside of her said, if only you had known this then, instead of now.

“Well,” Jacob said, “are you going to call them or not?”

She snatched the radio out of his outstretched hand, her heart hammering in her chest. So close; she was so close. If she wanted to, she could tell Jerome and the others where she was, flush the Seeds out well and good once and for all.

But she couldn’t, because she still needed them. At least, she needed one of them, to get Joey back.

Elliot adjusted the settings on the radio to the proper channels, swallowing thickly, and hit the button on the side. Joseph lingered under the window, a few feet away, his back to her; behind her, she heard John’s steps pacing closer to her.

The radio clicked, static buzzing patiently on the end. Her mouth felt dry. “Jerome?” she asked, tentatively into the static. “Jerome, do you—read? It’s me.” And then, quickly and feeling like an idiot, “Elliot, I mean. It’s me, Elliot.”

Silence stretched on the other side for just a moment. Then, the static crackled, and a familiar voice broke over the radio, “Elliot? It’s so good to hear your voice again. Thank God, we were—” Jerome’s voice broke up a little, and then picked up, “—about you. Where are you? Did you get away from John?”

Relief immediately flooded her system, the sensation almost painful; her heart thudded painfully against her chest, and she gripped the table with her free hand to keep herself steady.

“I—” Elliot paused. Her gaze flickered to John, who now lingered to the right of her; Jacob loomed to the left, and Joseph, ever the pinnacle, ever the point of the pyramid, just in front of her. The closest to heaven.

John’s gaze weighed down on her, pinning her, so that instinctively she wanted to squirm right out of it.

“—I’m okay, don't worry about me," she said after a moment. "I'm on my way to get Joey. Jerome, I need you to listen to me."

“Tell me where you are,” Jerome insisted, his voice crackling through the radio with urgency. “We’ll help you get Hudson back. It’s been quiet, here.”

John rolled his eyes, barely veiling his contempt. Elliot shot him a look and cleared her throat, trying to ignore the way that the pastor’s words clutched and pulled at her heart. Jerome’s voice was like a balm to her nerves; she realized, quite suddenly, how much she actually missed being around people who weren’t the Seeds, or members of Eden’s Gate—someone who actually cared about her.

“Please listen to me,” she tried again. “There’s someone else here. A different group, a new—cult. They’re here and I think they’re going to wipe everyone out. I don’t have a lot of time to explain, but you need to take everyone out of Fall’s End and get them out of here, okay? Everyone, and just evacuate as fast as you can.”

“What? Elliot, what are you talking about? ” Jerome’s voice faltered for a moment, and then he said, “Please don’t try and Atlas this thing, deputy.”

Elliot pressed her hand to her forehead. When she lifted her head, Jacob’s eyes were fixed on her, and he said, “Two minutes, deputy.”

Of course, she thought, both exhausted and infuriated. This fucking Darwinian psycho wouldn’t want to give them a fighting chance.  "There wasn't a fucking time limit on this radio call before."

"You're calling the people that want us dead," Jacob deadpanned. "One minute."

Elliot wanted to say that not even a full minute had passed, but she knew better. She bit down on her cheek until she tasted cooper, trying to refocus her attention.

“There’s no time, Jerome,” she insisted, talking faster now as the proverbial clock ticked down. “Take everyone from Fall’s End and leave, okay? I’m getting Joey and we’ll meet up with you a town over, or further way—just don’t stop driving. I can’t explain anymore. I have to go. Jerome?”

There was no answer on the other end for a minute; she could picture Jerome and Mary May arguing back and forth about what they needed to do for this, for her, and her heart ached a little in her chest. Finally, his voice crackled through: “I hear you, but Elliot—let one of us come and help. We’ll get you and Joey out of here.”

“Give Mary May a hug for me, okay? And get Dutch, and everyone, and get the fuck out of here.”

“Elliot.” Jerome’s voice had changed. Her hand had gone to turn the radio off, but it stilled. “Tell me you’re alright and mean it.”

It wasn’t his Resistance Business voice, anymore, and nor was it his pastor voice. It was his dad voice, firm and unrelenting, but not unkind. It welled with gentle affection.

Elliot felt her vision wobble a little. It was embarrassing, that Jerome could disarm her this far away, without seeing her or knowing what the last two days had been. She swallowed thickly and ducked her head against her chest a little when her breath shuddered in her chest.

“We’re worried about you, kid. All of us.”

“Deputy,” Jacob said, impatient, and Jerome continued, “You can tell me if it’s not okay.”

“I’m alright,” she managed out into the radio, willing the tears back away, back from where they had come from. “I’m alright, Jerome, I promise. Please get everyone out of here.”

She put the radio back down on the table and switched it off; she exhaled sharply, once, through her nose. Her chest felt tight, and her body ached, every muscle and tendon and joint in her body feeling deeply bruised. She thought, for one awful, terrible moment, that she might actually start crying right here in front of all of the men she least wanted to do that in front of.

“I guess we’ll see if they make it out,” Jacob said, his voice painstakingly casual and clipped all at once. Elliot felt something hot and sticky flare in her chest, like all of the oxygen had been sucked right out of the air around her. "And if they don't, well—probably means they weren't ever meant to."

She didn’t want to think about the Resistance not making it out; she didn’t want to think about the slow, oozing creep of the cult sidling up on them, of Ase’s fingers on their faces, lovingly planting their gutted corpses with fresh, vibrant blooms.

“Shut the fuck up,” she managed out, her voice wobbling. Jacob’s mouth curved at the corner into something like a wicked smile; he might have been infuriated by her petulance, she thought, if her voice wasn’t thick and wet with unshed tears. She straightened up, digging her nails into her palms, thinking, I could kill him right now, wrap my hands right around that big neanderthal neck and strangle the life right out of him.

But she couldn’t, even if at that moment she really wanted to, because talking to Jerome for even that short time had reminded her about what it felt like to have people around her that cared about her; it had reminded her about being around people that she trusted, that trusted her, that shared the same beliefs. That wanted to take care of her.

She had almost forgotten that, being handcuffed to John Seed for almost two days straight.

“We’ll pray for their safe departure, of course,” Joseph said. His words echoed, tinny and hollow, in her head. She blinked furiously. Elliot was only vaguely aware of John pacing back across the room and saying something to her, but she couldn’t hear what it was; not really.

I am so tired, she thought, over the sound of John talking to her. I am so tired, and I want to go home.

“When will your peggies be back?” she asked, interrupting the sound of Jacob and John blustering back and forth. Joseph paused, and then cocked his head at Jacob expectantly. She waited for one more beat and then said, louder and with more fervent impatience, “I said, when will your little cockroaches be back from finding Joey and Faith?”

Jacob replied, bitingly, “Within the next few hours. They’re going to pin down a location and get back to us.”

“Great.” Elliot turned on her heel, marching herself down the same hallway that just a little over a week ago, she had been walking down with Burke and Whitehorse. “Fuck off until then, you piece of shit.”

It felt like her lungs might burst, or her heart might beat right out of her chest, before she made it out of the stifling darkness of the church. She pushed the door open and hurried outside to take a lungful of fresh air, air unpopulated and unshared with Seed boys.

I’m just one girl. The thought was a desperate one, one that turned over and over again in her mind. That these things were just happening to her, that she had no agency in her life, that it might always be like this. Forever. I’m just one girl.

Elliot walked to the bunkhouse, pushing each step into the dirt in the hopes of feeling more grounded, each breath of air slowly bringing her back to the earth. When she made it inside, she closed the door quickly behind her and paced, rubbing her face. The bunkhouse no longer felt surprisingly clean. It only served as a reminder of where she was, where she wasn’t, where she might never go again.

She pushed her hands against her face until spiderwebs crawled behind her eyelids. They blistered, red fractals of light swimming in her non-vision. She was only a girl, and she was alone—no family and no friends nearby to help, and that was supposed to be good; if Jerome listened to her, they'd be out of Hope County within a few hours.

There was no more room for error. Fall's End evacuating meant there was no rescue party coming, in spite of her words. It meant that she was really only going to get one shot at getting in and getting out, for good. Get Joey, get Boomer, get out. Period.

The door clicked open. Footsteps echoed against the hollow wooden flooring. It was John; she could tell by the way he walked. “Elliot.”

It wasn’t a question; it was a statement, not a how are you, but something else, something that Elliot didn’t know what he meant and or what he was saying or what he thought to gain from it. Did he ever do anything that didn't have any personal gain for him?

“John,” Elliot said, her hands pressed into her face, “can you just leave? I am so tired of hearing your voice.”

“Elliot,” John said again, “take a breath.”

“I am breathing, you fuckhead,” she snapped viciously, turning to face him—John, in his stupid fucking designer shirt, his head cocked to the side as he watched her, the venom in her voice landing but not hitting the way it should have. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to be alone? Really, truly alone? Like, for fucking good, unless by some godforsaken miracle your insane brothers don’t kill me as soon as I’ve served the purpose of fetching Faith back.”

“I do," John replied angrily, "and they don’t want to—”

“Oh fuck off, John.” She raked her fingers through her hair. There was a nasty, wicked monster, crawling up from through her, fingers sliding between the slats of her ribs to get a good grip. “You should see yourself whenever Joseph says anything. You practically fall over to kiss the ground he fucking walks on, and for what? For him to give you a little pat on the head? You’d do absolutely anything he asked you to. You’re fucking pathetic.”

That hit the way she wanted to. She saw the hurt slide across John’s face, and then the anger, a power-point presentation on How To Make One Man Hate You. 

“You have a lot of nerve, deputy,” John bit out (and she didn’t miss the way he no longer was using her name, like he wanted to distance himself from her), “to talk to me like that, given that you would probably be lying dead in a field with flowers coming out of your eyes without me. Not to mention that you need us to get your little friend Hudson back—”

“It’s your fucking fault!”

She felt the rasp in her throat, the claws of sickness shredding her delicate insides as her voice flexed painfully in volume. John was staring at her, and she thought, I have to stop yelling, I have to stop, this is just what they want, for me to lose control, but she couldn’t, the words welling up inside of her, wrecked and vicious, and she felt like all of the blood had fled from her hands and feet; she was ice, now, frigid and unyielding.

John’s mouth twisted, like he was shaping the words he wanted to say before he said them. He started, less heated this time, “Elliot—”

“It’s your fault,” she interrupted, clenching her fists at her sides until her hands itched and burned with the intense need for circulation. “It’s your fault—I should—I should be leaving with Fall’s End and leaving this absolute fucking nightmare behind, or—or maybe that shouldn’t be happening at all because this is my fucking home and you and your stupid family took that from me, and I fucking hate you, John Seed, John Duncan, whatever the fuck your name is, whoever the fuck you are, I don’t care and I hate you!”

He stepped forward, his hands lifted, like he was going to touch her; perhaps rest his hands on her shoulders, take her face the way he’d grown so accustomed to doing when her breathing shallowed and her eyes unfocused. But she pushed his arms out of her immediate vision, and while infuriatingly he didn’t get out of her space she still bit out, crushing the words on their way past her teeth, “Don’t fucking touch me, John,” and his hands dropped back to his sides. 

She tried to ignore the strange, fleeting disappointment: as though she had been anticipating his grounding touch, as though she had wanted it, her body betraying her words and her head.

No more, she thought through the haze in her mind, no more of that.

He shifted on his feet. “You’re tired,” he said after a moment, which sounded not like the thing that he wanted to say but instead the thing that he decided was safe. “You should rest. The search parties will be back soon, and you’ll need to be at full capacity.”

Elliot stared at the bloodstain on his shirt. It felt like all of her insides had been scooped out, emptying her; her stomach twisted, both with anxiety and hunger.

“Yeah,” she replied numbly. “Alright, John.”

He turned on his heel, walking through the door to the bunkhouse and letting it swing shut behind him. The room felt colder without another human body in there; emptier, lonelier. Elliot sat herself down on the wooden floor and pushed her face into her knees.

This wasn’t supposed to be me. Her ears rang, her heart thudding painfully in her chest, a black stone falling over and over until her ribs bruised and cracked. This wasn’t supposed to be my life.

She closed her eyes tight, arms looped around her knees, pressed against the wall of the bunkhouse, and willed herself to sleep.

[thorne93]

Inside the Criminal Mind (Part 8)

Prompt: You’re married to Dr. Spencer Reid of the BAU, and are a distinguished doctor yourself on the team. You’re sent down to Miami, Florida for teaching and as a side request from the FBI, to investigate a string of missing persons. When you think you’ve figured out who the unsub is, your life becomes more complicated than you ever could’ve imagined.

Word Count: 1241

Warnings: (throughout the fic –>) death, blood, gore, killings, language, disturbing mental notions, mentions of rapes/murder/etc (You know, Dexter and Criminal Minds related business)

Notes: Thank you so much to @arrow-guy​​​​, @carryonmyswansong​​​​, and @mrs-dragneel-stark-solo​​​​ - without each of you, I couldn’t have finished, written, or properly navigated this story. Each of you helped me fish out details that were incredibly important to me. Beta’d by @carryonmyswansong​​​​ and @mrs-dragneel-stark-solo​​​​… Aesthetic by @mrs-dragneel-stark-solo​​​​

This is a crossover of Criminal Minds x Dexter. First time writing Dexter.

Also, the timeline is after Season 1 of Dexter, but during season 14-ish of Criminal minds into Season 15. Enjoy!!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A morning before your classes, your phone rang, the screen indicating it was your husband. A warm smile grew on your face and you answered it.

“Hello?”

“Hey, sweetie,” Spence greeted. “Are you in class?”

“No, not yet. I’ve got about another hour. Everything okay?”

“Yeah, I wanted to let you know I got home last night. I got in late though, so I didn’t want to bother you.”

“So you solved the case?” you said, happily.

“Yep. It was actually the first victim’s brother.”

“Interesting, but that makes sense.”

“Hey, I wanted to let you know, I went ahead and called a place to come paint the bathroom and kitchen. I know you’d picked out the colors. I thought I might as well do it while you’re not here and I’m out on cases.”

This gesture reminded you of one of the many reasons you loved Spence to begin with. He was always thinking ahead and doing incredibly nice things for you. And here you were, about to kill behind his back, embarking on a second life he would know nothing about. 

“That’s great. Thank you. I can’t wait to see it when I get back.”

“Speaking of coming back, Rossi’s wedding is next weekend, can you make it?” 

“Yeah, absolutely. I can leave right after class and be up there.” 

Truth be told, you hadn’t seen Spence at all since you’d gotten down here. You never video chatted and making it up on the weekends just wasn’t an option when it came to Dexter’s teachings. 

But Rossi’s wedding wasn’t something you could get out of, not that you wanted to, but you only had so much time to learn absolutely everything for pulling off the perfect crime. 

“It’ll be so good to see you. I know the team’s missed you.” 

“I miss them too, and I really do miss you. It’s just that packing up to head up and come back would be expensive and exhausting and leaves little time for grading papers--”

In a soft voice, he assured, “It’s fine, Y/N. it’s me, remember. I know how hard it is to juggle being a professor and a profiler. We knew finding time together would be hard when you took this job, but it’s okay. We’ll survive it. It’s just a few more months. I’ll see you during Rossi’s wedding, and we have all of spring break.”

A sigh of relief came from you. “Yeah, you’re right. We’ll have plenty of time together.” 

“Oh, shoot, Garcia just called in case. Got to go. I love you! Have a good day.”

“You too.”

With that, you hung up and got ready for class.

----------------

“So what do you have for me tonight?” you asked when you entered Dexter’s apartment.

“We’re going on our first stake out,” he said with a raise of his eyebrows.

“Sounds exciting,” you stated. “Do I need to wear anything special?” 

“Nope, what you’re in is fine. I’m just going to show you how I get them.” 

“So is this your hunting outfit?” you asked, gesturing to his olive green shirt and matching pants.

“What? Oh, I guess, yeah.”

“Long sleeves, in Miami… That doesn’t stick out,” you retorted with a snide expression.

“Clearly I’ve caught no one’s attention so far,” he remarked.

“Touche.” 

“Okay, let’s go.” 

The two of you walked out and went to Dexter’s car before driving off.

“So who’s the target?” 

 “Local chef. People go to his restaurant and about a week later, they die.” 

“He’s poisoning a whole restaurant and no one is noticing?” you balked. 

“He chooses plates randomly and only does about one dish a week.” 

“That’s awful.” 

“Yes, it is. So, we need to stalk him, figure out his pattern, and strike when he’s vulnerable.”

“Sounds… tedious.”

“It is.” 

After a moment passed between you two, Dexter had found the restaurant he was looking for and parked in the back parking lot.

“So now what?”

“Now, we wait. We clock the time he comes out, how long he takes to pull away, and follow him.” 

“Ugh, even as a criminal, I have to deal with stakeouts.”

Dexter turned to look at you briefly. “Hey, the food can be alright.”

“Ah, yes, the lovely diet of fast food burgers and gas station burritos, what fond memories.” 

“Let me get you some real stakeout food before you knock it,” he encouraged.

You threw up your hands in surrender. “Fine, fine.”

The two of you watched the door in silence for five minutes before Dexter asked, “So, who do you want to be your targets?” 

“Hadn’t thought about it much really. If I do criminals that I arrested and that got off, might throw up a red flag.”

“True. What about criminals other teams have caught?” he offered.

“Still too close to home. Actually, if I’m being honest, animal abusers.”

He broke his focus on the back door to turn to you. “Really?”

Your eyes slid to his. “Yep.”

“Out of everyone in the world, you choose--”

“They don’t have anyone that can fight for them. People come by the droves to speak for kids. People rally together for women. Animals literally have no voice, they’re defenseless things that couldn’t have done or harmed anyone and some fucknut out there wanted to hurt them.” 

He seemed shocked, but didn’t argue with you. “Wow. Okay, so… animal abusers it is. And method?”

“Eye for an eye.”

“You realize that will be tedious, risky?” 

“No more risky than you running around Miami in a Henley and leather gloves,” you pointed out with a coy grin. 

“Haha, very funny. I’m serious though. You’ll have to suffocate, stab, shoot, strangle…”

“I have no problem with that,” you assured.

He bobbed his head. “Fair enough.” 

“I can tweak the cause of death if it’s too obvious but I’d really like to do that.”

“Hey, according to you and your area of expertise your MO can’t be changed.”

At this, it was your turn to roll your eyes. “Okay, I get it, you think my job’s a joke.” 

“I think the theories you blindly put your faith into is a joke, not your job.” 

“Thank you for clarifying that.”

A metal door slammed shut and you jumped. Dexter looked up. “That’s him.”

The two of you sat and watched for a short while, then suddenly, the silent chase was on. 

----------------------------------------

The following morning, you called your work to report back to them. 

“Ah, Special Agent Reid,” Director Robertson said into the phone. “So good to hear from you. I was starting to worry you’d become one of the missing persons.”

You laughed slightly at the thinly veiled acknowledgement of your slacking.

“Right, I apologize. School has kept me rather busy. I’ve just got done interviewing the families.”

“And?” she urged.

“And there isn’t a lot to go on, from them at least. I’m not done though. I’ve still got plenty more leads to follow.”

“Make it work. I’d like a suspect before you return from Miami, if at all possible. If any agent can crack the case, it’s you.”

“Thank you,” you said. You sighed when you hung up. This could be a huge career move for you, if you just gave them Dexter’s name.

But he didn’t deserve that. He deserved to be left alone. Right now, you were the only thing standing between Dexter and prison, and you intended to keep it that way.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tagging:

Forever Tag:

@essie1876​​​​​

@magpiegirl80​​​​​

@letsgetfuckingsuperwholocked​​​​​

@iamwarrenspeace​

@marvel-imagines-yes-please​

@superwholocked527

@missinstantgratification​​

@thejemersoninferno​​​​​

@rda1989​​​​​

@munlis​​​​​

@thefridgeismybestie​​​​​

@bubblyanarocks3​​​​​

@igiveupicantthinkofausername​​​​​

@kaliforniacoastalteens​​​​​

@feelmyroarrrr​​​​​​

@kaeling

@friendlyneighbourhoodweirdo​​​​​

@damalseer​​​​​

@heyitscam99​​​​​

@yknott81​​​​​

@thelittlebigirl​​​​​

@glitterquadricorn​​​​​

@xxqueenofisolationxx

@little-dis-kaalista-pythonissama

@bittersweetunicorm​​​​​

@alyssaj23​​​​​

@sea040561​​​​​

@princess76179​​​​​

@thisismysecrethappyplace​​​​​

@sarahp879​​​​​

@malfoysqueen14​​​​​

@ellallheart​​​​​

@breezy1415​​​​​

@marvelmayo​​​​​

@paintballkid711​​​​​

Spencer Reid

@camigt1999​​​​​

@ultrarebelheart​​​​​

@lenawiinchester​​​​​

@esoltis280​

[iheardarumorxxx]

Midnight Sun, Chapter Ten - Theory

Alright, time to jump back in. Took a couple of days off, refreshed my brain, now I think I can handle more of this asshole.

instead of answering my demand

See that? See how Eddie just goes ahead and tells us that he’s being a demanding little shithead? More shades of that controlling tendency that he has all throughout the series, outright stated. This is literally the first sentence of the chapter, and he’s not even pretending to be subtle about it.

describe it so that she would understand.

Yes, because ‘I can read minds, but only if they’re relatively nearby, and it gets easier to pick out voices as I become familiar with them’ isn’t clear in the slightest. See that, Eddie? I just explained for you with 23 words, instead of going off on some dumbass tangent metaphorthat takes up an entire paragraph  like you do here because you think that the human mind is so small and weak that it can’t possibly comprehend cut and dry explanations.

The fact that Eddie thinks he needs to explain things in analogy for Bella because she won’t get it if he doesn’t really goes against this supposed idea he has about her being smarter and so above the other pitiful hooman folk. Either she’s too human to understand like everyone else, or she’s smarter and more rational and would get it without the metaphor. Pick one, Eddie.

I will say, one thing that I took from the Twilight series that still sticks with me is the phrase ‘Holy crow’. I do, in fact, use it unironically. It’s absolutely stupid, but I like the way it flows off the tongue.

Anyway, Bella just shouted it because Eddie is bending the car to his vampire physics again and going 100MPH, which, I would like to point out, she would have absolutely realized before now if she wasn’t so blatantly unobservent. She would have felt it, it wouldn’t have taken looking at the spedomoter to realize it.

“We’re not going to crash.”

Eddie is absolutely certain of this fact, and I am too only because SM would never let anything like that happen to her little woobie vampire and her SI Mary Sue. However, let’s apply real world logic to this for a sec. Just a sec because this story can’t handle real world logic for too long, but. They are presumably on a highway, going 100MPH at let’s say 930 to 10ish PM. I’ve never lived in Washington, but I’m going to make the presumption that there probably isn’t too much traffic this late, though, perhaps a bit more if it’s a Friday or Saturday night. Perhaps Eddie can keep perfect control of his own car, even going that fast, while most likely paying little to no attention to the road because he is constantly looking over at Bella in the passenger seat. He has his mind-reading power, which he probably uses to help him drive, and maybe there isn’t another car directly behind him based on how fast he’s going. 

He’s still not taking the other drivers on the road into account. What if the car in front of you that you are rapidly coming up on because you’re going so fast sees a turtle or a deer or some other kind of animal in the road and swerves to avoid it. Since this is real world logic, even if you see it coming with your mind reading power, you can’t make your car stop on a dime going 100MPH. You’re going to crash, and since you are going so fast, it’s gonna be a pretty nasty one. Your vampire body can handle that, because you’re a marble adonis god, but Bella over there is squishy and human. You slam those breaks, seatbelt aside, she’s gonna end up through the windshield or strangled to death by that seatbelt. 

He’s assuming that his vampire magic strength and perfectness is gonna be enough to protect him from literally everything. It will, because this book is not realistic in the slightest, but he’s still a dick for not taking into account the other drivers on the road. And not taking into account the fact that Bella is clearly upset and terrified that he’s going so fast.

Two and a half paragraph rant over one line. Check.

Bella spills about how Jacob told her the old story about the Cullens being sparkley, evil vampires who aren’t allowed at La Push because the wolves will eat them. And I have to say, because this story is the entire basis for Bella knowing that Eddie and his ilk are vamps, how the hell does it take her so long to figure out that Jacob is a werewolf in New Moon? Like, I know it’s because she’s stupid, but since she’s supposed to be wise beyond her years and smart and shit, why did it not click that both sides of the story must be true.

Rant for a different book, but.

I supposed this meant I was now free to slaughter a small, defenseless tribe on the coastline, were I so inclined. Ephraim and his pack of protectors were long dead.

This is it. This is the line I’ve been waiting for. I knew it was coming and it STILL pisses me off so damn much reading it. Do you see that? Do you see it? Eddie is talking about straight up genocide. He is literally talking about killing hundreds of people just because some teenage kid told an old folktale to a girl he thinks is cute to try and impress her. I would like to remind you of that line that Alice said earlier: “It helps if you think of them as people.” IT HELPS IF YOU THINK OF THEM AS PEOPLE, EDWARD!!! These people have done literally nothing to you! If you wanted to go, say, beat up Jacob Black for spilling your secret, that’s one thing (A terrible thing that is bullshit, even if Jacob gets a jerkass makeover in a few months) but you are literally la de fucking da over the idea of going down to the reservation and murdering every man, woman, and child there because of some bullshit technicality broken treaty. HOW THE FUCK DOES ANYONE THINK THIS GUY IS THE HERO? HOW DOES ANYTHING SEE HIM AS A GOOD LOVE INTEREST? HOW IS HE A PROTAGONIST? HE’S A FUCKING MURDERER, PLAIN AND SIMPLE SPELLED OUT RIGHT THE FUCK THERE! It was spelled out pretty damn well in that first classroom scene, but here we are reinforcing it, and this is the guy that SM said she was willing to leave her husband for. THIS GUY. 

I hate it. I hate him. I’m not a happy camper.

And I’m gonna move on before I burst a blood vessel from how mad it makes me.

Bella goes on to tell Eddie that she flirted the story out of Jacob, and that she doesn’t care. He replies with “HOW CAN YOU NOT CARE! I’M A MONSTAH!” and she just shrugs and pops her gum. Eddie is just absolutely shocked by this because how could she not care? He even wonders if there’s something wrong with her. The answer is yes, she’s clearly a hybristophile, but that’s beside the point. 

The ‘how old are you’ ‘17′ ‘how long have you been 17′ ‘a while’ exchange is actually kind of cute, on it’s own. Had it been in a better book, it might have made me smile a little. But in Twilight it just felt like forced comedy, and here with Eddie being all Emo about being a monstah and also being condescending and clearly angry about Bella knowing his secret, it comes off a lot darker in tone. It could have come off as a playful exchange between people getting to know one another, and instead, it’s a darker tone and it’s almost uncomfortable. The movie had this problem, too, where they made it all dark and angsty instead of just being a cute little exchange that it should have been.

“I can’t sleep.”

This is more of that thrown away world building that SM does. First it was the Vampires never Change thing and now the can’t sleep thing. It could have been so fascinating to explore what not being able to sleep does to the psyche of these Pires. How different vampires get used to that sensation over different periods of time. Did it unsettle Eddie at first when he was turned and just couldn’t sleep anymore? Was Jasper already a night owl who barely slept, so it wasn’t much of a change for him anyway? What do they do to fill their time? If their hobbies and interests never change, it seems like they wouldn’t be using all that newly acquired time to learn new skills and hobbies, even if that particular ‘never change’ plot point isn’t explored either and never actually seems relevant to them. Has a Pire ever tried to sleep anyway? Just lay down and closed their eyes and waited for eight hours to pass, hoping they would drift off? This is interesting lore. It’s something that could have given depth to the vampires instead of being a throwaway plot point so Eddie could watch Bella sleep at night. I’m disappointed. I want a good idea to actually be used well.

Edward calls Bella observant and to that I can only say ‘Ha.’ 

Eddie finally realizes that Bella has the hots for him too and it’s so UWU and trite, but he has to go and bring up that stupid Hades and Persephone metaphor again and piss me off in the process.

The get to Bella’s house and take forever with their goodbyes, and right at the end Eddie goes on about how he’s got this new hunger in him just looking at Bella and feeling how warm she is and shit and it’s just him being horny again, but nothing happens and Bella heads inside. But don’t worry, Eddie assures us that he’ll be in his usual perch in the rocking chair later that night to stalk her and watch her sleep, so everything is well.

She couldn’t love me the way I loved her

GET IT? BECAUSE VAMPIRES ARE BETTER THAN YOU(tm) AT EVERYTHING INCLUDING HOW HARD THEY LOVE? Seriously, so damn sick of this idea that the vampires in this universe just do everything and see everything and smell everything and feel everything just so much more intensely than the pitiful hoomans. I still have a rant about it. It’s still coming. Don’t worry.

A casual throwaway mention of the Voltouri here, AKA the vampire Mafia that make and enforce the rules. They don’t actually matter or have any real power in this series, and they suck, but nice little nod to the audience as a reminder that there is supposed to be a governing body in the vampire world.

Carlisie and Eddie boy are off to take care of the rapist who almost got Bella, and the entire fucking drive, Carlisle is just sitting there thinking about how wonderful Eddie is and how he deserves happiness and it’s such bullshit for him to be thinking that way when he KNOWS that Eddie can read his thoughts. He’s literally just showering him in compliments for the sake of it just so that Eddie can hear them and puff up his ego. I don’t buy that it’s just passive thoughts. He wants Eddie to hear them.

We all know who Carlisle and Esme’s favorite child is.

We end the chapter with Eddie going back to Bella’s house to watch her sleep, deciding to take it upon himself to wander around her house uninvited, and the rambling on about how Bella clearly doesn’t have a guardian angel because she crossed his path and no guardian angel would allow that. Then he makes some crack about being her guardian vampire, talks about how, oh, it’s actually a good thing that he took it upon himself to break into her house to watch her sleep because he got her another blanket because she seemed cold, and smiles to himself when she mumbles his name in her sleep. 

That’s it, chapter done, I’m tired. I’m gonna try to crank out another one (maybe two) tonight, but no promises because this one really took a lot out of me. These characters just suck. Anyway, as always, feel free to message me or DM me to talk about the book, recommend future projects, etc. And you can always buy me a snack using the CashApp tag in my bio. Until next chapter, good damn bye.

[fsketchart]

A Second Chance - Chapter 3

I'm so sorry for the wait but here's a summary of the sections.

[Advertisement Voice]

WELCOME! Over here to the left we have a heartfelt battle between Evillustrator and a group of rebels. Will Marc's feelings for Nathaniel get in the way, or will he get the job done?

On the right here, we have the latest new Batman vs Superman argument that just came in. It's a limited addition and includes a bonus Wonder Women add on to the set.

Now, we just recently added a new product onto the shelves, including a misunderstanding, panic, and an argument that is an partner set to the previous.

Let's see if first impressions really do stick.

Au Created by @ozmav​

NOTES : 

Thank you so much for the lovely feedback, I truly do appreciate all of the love and support this fic has gotten so far, it absolutely blows my mind that I've gotten so much feedback from this. This chapter in particular is almost 3000 words, sorry if it's a bit long. It was definitely longer than I was intending it to be, but I think it turned out for the best. Also, apologies if there are any errors in here. I'll be going back in later to double check and proofread it. If you catch any errors grammatically, feel free to let me know!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Please...Nathaniel don’t do this.  I know you have to be in there!” Marc cried, hands trembling as his knees felt numb.

“That’s Evillustrator to you.  What we had was nice Marc, but if you truly cared you would want me to be happy.  I finally feel at peace, I can draw to my hearts content and every piece become a reality.  If you truly cared, you wouldn’t be trying to stop me right now,” Evillustrator said.

“I know you, Nathaniel, better than I know myself.  I know that you’ll regret what you’ve done, please come with us and give me your pen.  Then, after ladybug gets here, the damage you’ve caused can be reversed, and we can go back to-”

“Go back to what?  When you and your class gets to be happy while I sit in silence in my class?  While I get harassed and bullied, constantly put in your shadow while you’re basking in attention?  The spotlight will soak you up.  Every creation I make is made with so much passion and time, yet nothing ever competes with yours.  Every word I say means nothing in comparison to people like Marinette!  Lila and Hawkmoth have helped me realize this, and you will pay for what you’ve done,” Evillustrator yelled, grabbing his pen and quickly drawing roughly on his board.

His sketching was rushed and rough, as he quickly drew harsh lines, forming many, many stick figures.  Each stick figure slowly stood up , and soon there was an army, each one immediately charging.

Max quickly slammed his laptop shut and moved it aside on the ground, abandoning his bag.  

Aurore on the other hand, immediately started fighting back, her umbrella dueling as both a shield and a sword.  Marc quickly wore off the shock and started grabbing his keys in his hand and began slashing wildly at the stick figures, but to no avail.  Max, however had a different approach.

“Look, at his tablet.  It’s flashing red, it must be running out of battery so he’s drawing messier and faster,” Max said, pointing to Evillustrator.

“Why is that?  He didn’t have that issue before!” Aurore yelled, as she extended her umbrella to block the overhead stick figures, jumping down upon her.

“Hawkmoth must be running out of energy.  If the tablet is shutting down, then I’m guessing he’s too busy to save the stick figures.  We need to make him use all the rest of the battery without saving the stick figure drawing.  If the tablet shuts down, then hopefully the drawings won’t be saved, and they’ll disappear!” Marc yelled, as he attacked the stick figure jumping behind from Max.

Aurore exchanged a look between the two boys before yelling, “Guys!  It’s okay!  I can handle myself over here!”

Evillustrator immediately began to draw more complicated figures.  Gotcha right where I want you!  If I can just get a few more drawings out, they’ll be right where I want them!  Evillustrator schemed.

Aurore however, quickly dodged all their attacks, and began to run wildly while using her umbrella as a shield in front of her, pushing all the other stick figures in front of her out of the way as she charged on through.

Evillustrator began to get more and more frustrated, as he drew more and more.  Eventually, Marc and Max joined in, causing distractions from all over the place.  As time went on, Evillustrator began to get more and more furious, until one point, he was fed up.  He quickly drew out a sword and soon it formed at the feet of one of his stick figures, as it charged for Aurore.  That’ll teach her, no more Mr.Nice GuyTM.  He thought grimly.

Marc, however, was horrified and immediately ran to Aurore.  Marc began to profusely fight the figure but as time went on, his footing got lazier until eventually Marc was knocked on the ground as Aurore was holding off more stick figures.

The stick figure wasted no time in charging forth, extending their sword and raising it above their head.

Nathaniel’s eyes widened as he tried to scream, yet his voice was silenced.  He began trying to erase the stick figures, but lost track of which stick figure was which and who had the sword.

I’m so sorry I failed you, Nathaniel.  Please forgive me.  Marc said, giving up and welcoming death’s embrace.  He closed his eyes and waited.

Yet it never came.

All at once, all of the stick figures began to glitch out and became distorted, and right before the faceless stick figure’s sword came down, a mere inch away from Marc’s eyes, it too froze.  Soon afterwards, each stick figure disappeared, and so did the sword.

Using Evillustrator’s frozen shock to his advantage, Max leaped up and snatched the pen away from him, and Aurore slammed it into two.  Immediately, Evillustrator’s costume dropped as he de-transformed.  Nathaniel stood there, horrified as he took in the site around him, as saw the smashed pen and dead drawing tablet beside him.  He eyes watered as he began to quietly sob, his nose becoming stuffy and his face becoming red.  His shoulders and hands shook as Marc slowly stepped towards him.

“I-I’m so sorry...I’ve d-done horrible horrible things.  I sw-swear I never meant any of it,” he said, as he hiccuped and sniffled.  He then let out a pained sob as Marc immediately embraced him, resting Nathaniel’s head on his shoulder.  Aurore strangled the butterfly in her hands as Max grabbed his previously empty computer case as they shoved it inside.  Aurore and Max began to laugh and cry out of relief as they collapsed in relief on the ground.

“It’s alright, Nathaniel.  I know that wasn’t you just there, and you’re okay now, you’re safe.  I promise you that,” Marc said, brushing away his tears.

“But I let Hawkmoth take advantage of me!  I let him take control!  The things I’ve done are unforgivable-”

“You were manipulated, taken advantage of, and used.  But dwelling on it won’t fix it.  What will help fix is taking Hawkmoth and Mayura down, along with the other villains that are coming to Paris.  Please, Nathaniel we need you.  I need you,” Marc spoke softly.  For a moment, there was silence until...

“I’ll join you,” Nathaniel spoke at last.

~~~~~~~~~~~~(⌐■_■)~~~~~~~~~~~~

“-we are living in constant fear, and the heroes have been fighting non-stop since the war began.  Please, we are begging you!.......send help.”

Bruce paused before sighing.  “Was that all of them?” he asked, trying to analyze and break down the information.

“Sure is.  As I said, these claims are getting barbaric.  Anyone can hire an animation studio and editor to make these silly edits, but there hasn’t been any documentation of actual property damage, and look at the Eiffel tower!  It’s being destroyed in every one of these and yet it’s ‘magically’ rebuilt in the next video.  Not to mention, some girl on a teenager’s blog is trying to present herself as a Mary Sue, she’s delusional and stuck in a fantasy to claim that she’s best friends with a superheroes and celebrities.  This has got to be some online joke or trend-”

“But where would these teenagers get the budgets from?  What about the news articles written by adults?” Bruce challenged.

“You can’t seriously think these could be real.  Ladybug and Chat Noir?  Really?  No one’s super powers could reverse the broken arms of people, the ill and the sick, and repair city damage in one fell swoop.  Or better yet, destroy the Eiffel tower with one touch.  It’s CGI, probably funded by those adults too,” Clark countered.

“What about super strength, flight, speed, laser vision?” Bruce argued.

“Supposedly all you have to do to beat these villains is break the options, like a photograph.  So threatening, just terrifying right?” Clark challenged.

“Your weakness if a rock.  A rock.  Is it so far fetched that these could maybe be real?  The Miraculous, Ladybug, Chat Noir, they could easily be real or fake.  We need to do more investigation than this,” Bruce concluded.

“Did someone say the miraculous?” Diana said, freezing in her spot by the doorway.

“Oh wow, looks someone uses the door like a normal person...COUGH COUGH BRUCE COUGH COUGH…”

Diana gave him a stern glare.

“We were just going over video feeds of the current condition of Paris.  Villains like the Joker, Harley Quinn, and Ivy have all been spotted in Paris,” Bruce said, tuning out Clark.

“No, before that you said there was a black cat and ladybug Miraculous?” Diana said, with wide eyes.

“Yes, there were supposedly reports of two...young adults I think?  They were dressed up as vigilantes and were supposedly fighting crime, why do you ask?  Have you heard of them?” Bruce asked.

“Heard of them?  Why my mother grew up telling me stories about her days as the super heroine Ladybug!  Her tales were my bedtime stories for years!” she retold, with a fond look in her eyes.

“Your mother?  That girl looked nothing like Hippolyta, are you sure you’re not mixing it up with something else?” Bruce asked.

“I’m quite sure, after all my mother gave up being Ladybug a long time ago.  The Ladybug Miraculous doesn’t just have a sworn duty to one place, but to the rest of the world.  My mother couldn’t travel to the rest of the world while looking after the amazons, and thus entrusted the miraculous to one of the Guardians,” she spoke.

“Who was is this Guardian?  The Black Cat guy?” Clark questioned.

“Oh heavens no, the Guardians were much much older than that boy is.  These superheroes are powered by an object called the Miraculous, granting each user immense power.  The Guardians are meant to protect these Miraculous, but after the incident at one of the temples...only one of them is still left...but anyways, the Ladybug and Chat Noir Miraculous are extremely powerful, the strongest Miraculous actually,” she explained, while walking over to the video files.

“What do these Miraculous do?” asked Bruce.

“And again, how does that explain the damage to the city?” Clark added.

“Each Miraculous has a different ability; time travel, teleportation, complete destruction, and creation, you name it.  Each Miraculous has a unique ability, that they can only use once.  The Ladybug Miraculous represents luck and has the ability to reverse any Miraculous caused damage.  Buildings, broken bones, illness, you name it.  The only thing the Miraculous of creation and luck can’t reverse is death, for death lies in the hands of the counter partner, the Black Cat,” Wonder Woman said, as she sped up the videos and glimpsed through them.

“The Black Cat represents death and misfortune, and with a simple touch of a hand, entire buildings can collapse and fade to nothing within a second.  If you’re unprotected with a Miraculous suit, the Black Cat’s abilities can kill you in less than a second, and Ladybug won’t be able to reverse that damage.  Each Miraculous, when new, can only use their abilities once in a battle, but as they grow more experienced, can get more abilities or quirks for each battle,” Wonder Woman finished.

“So the reason there is undocumented damage is due to the Ladybug woman?” Bruce finally asked, while side glancing at Clark.

“Precisely, meaning these claims may very well be legitimate.  However, there still isn’t much seen with Gotham’s villains, there are barely any sightings,” Diana added.

“Any lead is still good enough for me,” Bruce said, already getting ready to leave for Paris, and booking an appointment on his phone.  However, he stopped when he looked down to see his phone exploding with phone calls and texts from Alfred.  This of course sent Bruce into a panic, Alfred knew he was going to be out in the suit, and to not call unless there were emergencies.

Quickly, Bruce dialed Alfred back while rushing out the window door.  Immediately, Alfred picked up.

“We are going to have a visitor.  I will be preparing the guest bedroom.  Please arrive immediately, it has to do with the condition of Paris.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~(⌐■_■)~~~~~~~~~~~~

“I’ll be right, Marinette.  I must go and prepare your room.  Would you like me to prepare you some tea?” Alfred asked, while grabbing her backpack.  He beckoned to the Miracle Box, but Marinette shook her head.  She shook her head, taking the box and placing it in her lap.

“I’ll be alright, you’ve done so much for me already.  I will never be able to repay you for your kindness,” she responded.  Alfred nodded.  As he was about to leave, he got a phone call from Master Bruce.

“Wait right here, I’ll be back soon.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~(⌐■_■)~~~~~~~~~~~~

Each day was worse than the last.  There were no known leads about the Joker’s whereabouts, and Damian was getting impatient and pent up.  With nowhere else to put his energy, he took Titus out for a run.

Damian knew the Joker was planning something, and it was driving him nuts.  As they strolled around the city, Titus could tell his heart just wasn’t in it and abruptly pulled on his shirt, nearly causing him to fall over.

“What is it, Titus?” Damian asked, before taking notice of the sky.  His father would surely be home by now.  He sighed before changing course, and making his way back home.

When he reached the doorstep, he realized the light was on in the spare bedroom. Strange.  He thought.  Father rarely allows guests over, and always gives them a heads up to be more cautious.

He shrugged as he made his way over to the door.  Suddenly, Titus made a run for it inside and bolted inside towards the living room.

Damian stood up alarmed, ready to attack and dashed around the corner towards the living room.

On the couch, sat a small girl clutching a box.  Her hair was a dreadful mess, and her clothes looked tattered and worn out.  She fidgeting on the couch as she looked around and glanced out the window.

Titus ran over and started barking and trying to grab at and bite the strange box.  He could sense something was strange about the girl, something he wasn’t familiar with and it sent him into a frizzy.  It sent the short girl into a frenzy and she instantly grabbed at the box and made a dash for it.  She leaped over the couch and knocked over the lamp next to it.  She looked panicked but was quickly stopped before she reached the door.

She collided with Damian and fell onto the ground with Titus catching up and barking in her ears as she lie on the ground, shaking in fear.  Her eyes were teary and unfocused, almost lost in the moment.  The Miracle Box shook, and the sounds of jewels and valuables sliding around were heard from inside the box. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had attempted to break into the Wayne Manor to steal its valuables, and Damian was sure it wouldn’t be the last.  Titus’s ears were flattened, his tail between his legs, as his eyes were filled with fear and concern.  Damian’s heart clenched at the sight of Titus looking so scared, before his look hardened into a cold glare at the stranger.

“WHO ARE YOU AND HOW DID YOU GET IN HERE?” Damian demanded, already posed to attack.  When she didn’t respond, he tried to grab the box while Titus was still barking in her ear, fearful of the stranger.

She froze for only a moment before slamming her elbow into his chin and quickly sidestepping him.  Damian charged, startling her enough to drop the box, hearing her call out :

“TIKKI SP-”

Alfred burst into the room stunning the both of them and separated the two immediately.  Damian was about to lunge before Alfred grabbed him from behind and forcefully pulled him off, and then swiftly grabbed the box and placed it into Marinette’s hands.  He grabbed Damian by the shirt and tugged on Titus’s leash, dragging them both outside of the room.

Tag List :

@kceedraws @resignedcatservant @shamefulllove @emotionalsupportginger @ellerahs @littleredrobinhoodlum @graduatedmelon @mooshoon @worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry @mystery-5-5 @kuroko26 

@tazanna-blythe @friedchickening @crazylittlemunchkin @princertain @hauntedfreakdeputyhero @thornangelic727

@constancetruggle < I am so sorry but it’s not letting me tag you, if you see this, am I getting your @ wrong?

Let me know if I missed anyone and let me know if you wanna be added to the tag list, and which tag list you wanna be added on.  (If you want ALL Maribat content, or just this fic updates.)

[gimmethatsweetwhump]

The Underground Arena - Part 1

So. New story! I wrote this one for my super duper amazing friend @whumpthisway, and it’s about fighters and underground rings and big, strong whumpees :3 Hope you enjoy! <3

(This part is mainly buildup, but I’ve already written another 2,000 words so hopefully it won’t be long till we get to the good part ~)

TWs: human trafficking, slavery, dehumanization, forced to fight, death mentions, fear of death

---

Vincent couldn’t stop pacing. Eventually, Greta told him to sit –you can’t run from it, might as well sit down– so he tried to make himself comfortable on one of the sorry stools they keep in the break room, even though his body is too big for it. He’s still sitting down now, as Greta goes on about fighting tactics.

Greta’s advice is always helpful – she has a lot of experience to share, and her cool voice helps ground him when he’s nervous before a fight. But today, it’s really hard to focus on what she’s saying.

He’s not just nervous; he is genuinely afraid. It’s been years since he was last afraid of an opponent. Of course, none of his previous opponents were like The Reaper.

Vincent keeps thinking about the first and only other time Claude arranged for one of his fighters to face The Reaper. The Reaper was relatively new, back then, but he had already made a name for himself – or rather, his owner had. Claude thought it would be good to put out that spark before it turned into a fire, prove that he was better than him. The guy he sent wasn’t anything too special, but he was spry and looked like he could hold his ground against a larger fighter.

Claude’s guy never came back to the fighters’ quarters after the fight. It wasn’t a Death Fight, and as far as Vincent knows, the guy didn’t die in the ring. But he never came back to the fighters’ quarters. (Two days later, nearly everyone who used to share a room with him in the fighters’ quarters was fighting over his stuff.)

Claude then decided that he was not going to lose any more fighters to The Reaper, so he never arranged any fights with his owner again. But now he has to, because his audience wants him to, and The Reaper’s owner –his name is Leonard, Vincent thinks– wants him to, and he can’t afford to let down either.

Claude doesn’t like losing, though. So he’s going to send one of his best – as if it’s going to make any difference. The Reaper is currently the best fighter in the city of Del, and it will be a long, long time before he meets his match, but Claude is too proud to accept that. He thinks it’s worth the risk, if it means he might finally best Leonard.

Not that Vincent doesn’t share Claude’s animosity. Leonard has got money, so much money that even Claude wouldn’t know what to do with it (yeah, right), has somehow gotten his hands on the best fighter in Del, but refuses to join a ring, and doesn’t seem interested in creating his own. Calling it a business is bad enough already, but for this man, it’s just a game. Somehow, that pisses Vincent off even more. (Claude has a wholly different reason, of course – he hates Leonard because he turned him down when Claude asked him to join the Arena.)

Vincent might be large, and fast, and he could kill a man with just a well-aimed punch – but The Reaper is larger, and faster, and deadlier. Vincent has been at the Underground Arena long enough to learn to live with fear, but he hasn’t actually feared for his life in years. Because he’s learned how things work. Because he might dream of strangling Claude in his sleep, but he still knows that he’s lucky it’s Claude who owns him and not somebody else.

Claude has his reputation. His fighting ring, the Underground Arena, is one of the most popular rings in Del. He doesn’t participate in Death Fights, and doesn’t send his fighters out to die in the ring – or, well, he doesn’t do it on purpose. (“Accidents happen.”) He uses corporal punishment only if he deems it absolutely necessary, and doesn’t make his fighters kneel in his presence, or use honorifics when they’re speaking to him. Vincent isn’t lucky he’s here, but he’s definitely lucky he’s not in other rings – like the Playground, or the Onion Ring, or the Beast’s Den, where fighters are treated like animals, or worse, objects.

Vincent has his own mattress. He has books, two of them, which aren’t very pleasant to read in his dimly lit, windowless room in the fighters’ quarters, but at least he has them. And he has Greta, even if he doesn’t get to see her that much. At least he isn’t kept in a cage, and he isn’t tortured when he doesn’t perform well.

Vincent thinks about the guy who never came back to the fighters’ quarters. They both lived in the Underground Arena, in the same room, so naturally Vincent knew the guy, if not that well. He doesn’t remember his name, or most of what he looked like – the only thing he remembers clearly is that he had a mark on his chin, a birthmark or a scar acquired in the streets, Vincent never asked. He had his first actual conversation with the guy only hours before his fight with The Reaper – he remembers thinking about how he was an okay dude, good company for someone found down here, someone he’d like to joke around with again.

At least he didn’t get too attached.

When Greta finally finishes with what she was saying, Vincent has hardly heard a word. “You’re not listening,” Greta says, even though she already knew that. She always talks like this, no matter the subject – casually, like she’s discussing the weather. Although, now that he thinks about it, he can’t really imagine such a discussion would have been particularly casual, what with them being stuck underground and all. If it ever came to that, it would probably be something more along the lines of, so this is what the sky looks like? Well, good to know.

The three years Vincent has spent in this place might feel like a lifetime, but Greta has been here far longer than he has. Five years at the Arena, but eight as a fighter. It’s been all she’s known for a very long time, but it’s a bit comforting to see that she’s still keeping it together. Not exactly the light at the end of the tunnel that would keep someone going, but it’s something.

“Sorry,” Vincent murmurs. “I really appreciate you doing this. I’m just… I’m having trouble keeping a clear head.”

Greta pats him on the shoulder sympathetically. “Claude doesn’t lend his guys out for Death Fights. They’ll stop it if it goes too far.”

Vincent stares down at his hands. “Will they?” he mutters, even though he doesn’t really want to talk about it. Because he knows Greta won’t lie to him.

She shrugs. “Maybe they won’t,” she admits, almost apologetically. “It’s happened before.”

Vincent snorts unhappily. “Wow. Thanks.”

“Shouldn’t have asked if you didn’t wanna hear it, boo. You know I don’t like lying.” She crosses her arms over her chest and stares at Vincent from where she’s towering over him, drumming her fingers on her arm. “I don’t think Claude would let another one of his fighters die in the hands of The Reaper. He doesn’t like losing money.”

“The other guy wasn’t killed. He was damaged beyond repair, so they got rid of him,” Vincent hears himself say. The words leave a bad taste in his mouth – it’s not something he would normally say. “And Claude was compensated for the loss.”

“Finding new fighters ain’t easy,” Greta reminds him. “Most of the guys they get nowadays are from outside Del, and you know how outsiders call what’s happening in here.” Slavery. “Out there, this shit is illegal. It’s hella risky for people like Claude and Jane. And, well,” she continues, “you’re a good fighter, Vince. You might even stand a chance. Or Claude wouldn’t be sending you out there.”

That’s bullshit, Vincent thinks. Greta would kick his ass if he said that to her, though, so instead he settles for, “I’m still worried.”

“Well, of course. It’s The Reaper.” She points at her chest. “I’d be worried.”

Vincent can’t help but smile a little at that. “No way.”

“Truly,” Greta says – she’s smiling now, too. “I’m serious.”

“I used to be a fan, you know?” Vincent says, pretending to be shocked. “Is this what they mean when they say you should never meet your heroes?”

She chuckles and pushes him lightly – or what qualifies as lightly for Greta. “Shut up, Cub.”

“Nobody calls me that anymore,” he protests, laughing. He pushes her, too, knowing full well he is starting a pushing contest that will end with his ass on the floor. It’s a welcome distraction from what he knows is going to happen to him in… probably less than an hour, now.

He doesn’t want to think that it might be the last time he gets to joke around with Greta like this, like they often do before normal fights. Fights where they actually have a chance of winning, and losing only means that they’d have to deal with a few bruises and an empty stomach for a while, perhaps earn them a light beating, if Claude isn’t around to keep his men in line. At least that’s what it’s like for Vincent – he doesn’t know exactly how Jane deals with her fighters’ failure. It’s not like Greta ever loses, anyway.

This is different. He knows he’s not going to win, because he isn’t in a movie. The question is, how much will this failure cost him? He never actually expected to die in the ring, but now he has to consider that very real possibility.

But Greta’s smile is just too welcoming for him to keep thinking about this right now. Can’t run from it, might as well sit down with a friend.

[turtle-steverogers]

Not Guilty- 2

murder mystery’s back! im having too much fun with this story guys

Link to chap 1 in case you need it

warnings: albert being a human disaster, abuse of the word ‘milk’

ship: ralbert, platonic spalbert

word count: 1680

editing: lmaoooo no

Chap 2

When Albert gets to the precinct the next morning, he’s wary to find a wrapped parcel on his desk that looks suspiciously like a sandwich.  He pokes at it, frowning when he sees a singular smiley face drawn on the underside in black sharpie.

 “Hey, uh, Spot?” He calls, looking up when he hears his partner’s chair roll out from his desk and subsequently poke his head around the low wooden wall that separates their cubicles.

“Yes, honeycakes?” Spot’s expression is the face of innocence and Albert’s stomach churns.

“Did you-” He stumbles, gesturing to the presumed sandwich, “Is this for me?”

“It’s on your desk, isn’t it?” Spot smiles, rolling back into his cubicle.

Albert sighs, taking off his messenger bag and jacket and sitting heavily in his desk chair.  He cautiously unwraps the white paper to find a loaded meatball sub sitting in the middle of a napkin.  There’s a sticky note placed delicately on the fluffy white bread and Albert plucks it up, squinting at the words:

Sorry you didn’t finish your sandwich xoxo Spottie

He laughs probably too loud and sticks the sticky note on his desktop, right next to the note from Jack that reads: ‘I’m sorry for stealing your pants, I had brains on mine’ after Jack had taken his extra pair of slacks from his locker when his got spoiled at a crime scene.

He takes a bite of the sandwich, pleased to find that he can still stomach his favorite Gianno’s special after yesterday’s events.  As he chews, careful not to get any tomato sauce on his shirt, he plucks a sticky note from his own pad and scrawls out: Thanks, Pop Spotcket.  Love u, dear xoxo and tosses it over to Spot.

A moment later, Spot snorts indignantly, “‘Pop Spotcket’? Really? Does anyone actually use those anymore?  The only person I know who has one is my niece and she’s eleven.”

Albert rolls his chair so he’s in Spot’s cubicle, sandwich still in hand, “I have one, asshole.  They’re useful.  Anyway, thanks for the sandwich.  How’s it looking at Gianno’s?”

Spot sighs wearily, placing a stack of papers down and turning from his computer to look at Albert, “Eh.  They’re closed today.  I stopped by this morning to pick up some evidence left at the crime scene and one of the waiters asked if I wanted anything and I remembered that you didn’t get to finish your lunch yesterday so…”

“Thanks, man,” Albert says, mouth full.  Spot wrinkles his nose and tells him not to speak with food in his mouth.  Albert rolls his eyes, “Anyway, evidence?  What’s new?”

“Nothing really,” Spot says, “Just Wiesel’s receipt from his last meal.  Wasn’t really much on it, but it gave us a sure timestamp that lines up with our original record, so at least that’s set.”

“Good,” Albert shoves the last bit of sandwich into his mouth, licking his fingers.

“Yeah.  Saw our boy there, though.”

Albert raises his eyebrows, “Higgins?”

“Mhm.”

“How’s he?”

Spot shrugs, “Didn’t talk to him.  Kid looked like shit.  Well, more shitty than yesterday if that’s somehow possible.  Kept sending cute little glares my way, fucking ray of sunshine, that one.”

“Christ,” Albert grimaces, “I’m convinced he’s a player in this debacle somehow.  I mean, he seemed genuinely surprised when he found out the vic was Wiesel, but too many strings lead to connections on his end.”

“Yeah,” Spot agrees, “I dunno, I say we dig a little into Wiesel’s other relations as well.  I feel like there’s a gap here somewhere.”

“Toxicology came back,” Albert says after a pause.

Spot looks at him, eyebrows raised, “And?”

“Sarin poison in the blood.  Stab wounds were post-mortem.  Someone wanted this shit to look messier than it is.”

“Interesting.  I wonder who’d go through the trouble of poisoning, then following up with a physical attack.  ‘Specially in a public place.  S’kinda risky.”

“That’s what I was thinking, but whoever it was, clearly knew what they were doing.”

“Clearly…”

XXX

Albert never understood why there was such a wide variety of milks in the world.  And why, in this moment, he can’t find any simple fucking 2%.  

He scans over the selection again, bypassing the almond and oat milks and skimming over the fritzy lactose free shit.  There’s strawberry milk and chocolate milk on display and even horrifyingly enough, mint milk, but no fucking 2%.  It’s not even like this fucking bodega is big enough to warrant having so many milks. 

He just wants some damn normal person milk!

“Excuse me, detective.” 

Albert doesn’t startle.  He doesn’t.  He’s a trained law enforcement officer and detective.  People like him don’t fucking startle.  But, he is on high, professional alert when he turns around to see Antonio Fucking Higgins standing behind him, eyebrows raised in what’s probably amusement and hands shoved in his pockets.

Albert makes a strangled noise, eyes working on their own accord as they trail down Higgins’ body.  He’s sweaty, looking like he just came from some sort of workout, and a pair of tight adidas running pants hug his legs in all the right places.  He’s in a tank top today, somehow doing his arms more justice than the grey shirt he’d been wearing yesterday.  A hat sits backwards on his head, doing little to tame the curls that are trying to sneak out of the stupid hole where the strap meets the fabric.  He looks hot and it’s unfair and Albert’s never been ashamed of his sexuality, but right now he’s wishing that he could reign in his gay ass a little bit because aside from the fact that Higgins is a bit of a prick, he’s also a suspect and that’s, like, number one in the Book of Nope for cops of any kind.

Higgins is still looking at him, but now there’s a small crease of concern between his eyebrows, “You alright, man?” He asks, “You look kinda like you’re having a heart attack.  Do you have any chest pain?  Your left arm feel numb at all?”

Albert shakes himself, morphing his expression into something he hopes looks less like Gay Panic, “Yeah, sorry, I-” He splutters a bit, then shuts his mouth with a click.  

Higgins scoffs, “I just need milk, man, you mind?”

Albert starts, hastily stepping out from where he was definitely blocking the milk selection and watching as Race grabs a carton of-- fucking 2%.  How did he find it so fast?  How did Albert not see it?  He’s supposed to be the one trained to look for details others don’t see!

Trying not to flush, Albert reaches out and grabs a carton as well and Higgins looks at him again, laughing, “You were standing here for a long time, dude, I thought you were gonna murder the milk for a second.”

“Couldn’t find the 2%.” Albert mumbles, blushing harder when Higgins laughs louder.

“Real good reconnaissance there, detective.”

When Higgins is laughing, his face changes into something a whole lot more pleasant.  Not that it was ever unpleasant (the dude’s got a jawline of a god), but some of the hardness in his eyes and shadows on his face go away and for just a second, he looks like the 25 year old he’s supposed to be.  It’s nice, Albert thinks, ignoring the way alarm bells are going off in his head.

“Shut up, Higgins, I’m tired.  Some of us have to read about murders all day, so excuse me if my milk finding skills aren’t the most refined.”

Higgins’ face softens and the smile in his eyes turns into something else that Albert doesn’t want to dissect, “Race.”

“What?”

“Higgins is my dad, not me.  And I don’t like the name Antonio very much, so if we’re gonna be talking more, be it over murder or milk, call me Race.”

“Race?”

Higgins--Race--winks, “That’s a story for level five amici.”

“Oh, okay.”

They pause for a moment and even though Albert’s not drunk, his inhibitions seem to flutter away from him against his will as he blurts out, “Drinks sometime? Would- uh- would you wanna get drinks sometime?”

And fuck-fuck- SHIT- what are you doing Dasilva? What the fuck?

Race considers him for a moment, “Not that I wouldn’t hit that,” he nods to Albert’s body and Albert flushes.  Damnit with the flushing!  He’s 26, not some flouncy high schooler, “But I don’t think that’s a good idea, detective.”

Albert nods, “No, yeah, honestly I don’t know why I asked- uh-”

“Relax, don’t have an aneurysm, it’s okay.  I just don’t think it’s a good idea right now.”

“No no, you’re right.  Absolutely.”

There’s another pause, then Race smiles apologetically, “I gotta go get the rest of my groceries.  Take care.”

Albert cringes internally at how fucking painfully awkward this exchange has been, “You too,” he says, watching Race retreat to the wine aisle.  He takes another moment to gather himself, then goes to the checkout line.

XXX

Albert turns up the volume on his TV, pleased with the quiet solitude of his apartment for the night.  He doesn’t love living alone, but it’s been a long couple days and he’s been looking forward to a night to himself since he’d woken up that morning.  Just him, some thai, and the Animal Planet playing reruns of ‘It’s Me or the Dog’ all night.  Fucking self care.

He’s just yelling at some dog owner on the TV for feeding his pug 24 eggs a day and watching as Victoria Stilwell chews out the greasy fucker when his phone rings on the coffee table in front of him. 

Groaning, Albert mutes the show and chugs down a few sips of beer, before picking up the phone and answering with an annoyed, “Someone better be dying.”

There’s silence on the other end and Albert pulls the phone away from his ear to check the caller ID.  It’s Spot.  Shit, someone might actually be dying.”

“Spot?  Everything okay?”

Spot sounds sheepish when he says, “Well no one’s dying, technically…”

“But…”

“There was another murder.”

“Shit.”

-

Race went straight home after the bodega, right? RIGHT!??!? stay tuned ;)

thanks saph for ‘pop spotcket’

thanks for reading, chiefs

hmu to be added to my tag

TAG LIST: @getchapapes @we-dont-sell-papes @suddenly-im-respecsable 

@aw-jus-let-em-try @well-the-kids-do-too @spot-conlon-king-of-brooklyn @felix-loves-albert-and-ralbert @technically-whizzy

@andthewoildwillknow @the-newsies-justice-for-zas-blog @localfakeitalian @have-we-got-news-for-you @musical-shitposts @thebroadwayaesthetic

@thomasbeingthomas

@irondad-spiderson-duo

@snakesarenonexistent 

@i-got-no-clue-what-im-doing 

@kpop-kk

@mentallytiredgoat

@yxseminx

@be-more-chill-evan-hansen 

@stopthe-presses

@elmers-half-a-cup

@and-i-lostmy-shoe

@spot-me50-papes

@honeynutpoptarts

@newsies-ensemble

@bennie-badeend 

@auspicioustarantula 

@faithmil 

@hopefully-not-the-ghostbusters

@bxnesof92

@backgroundensemble

@sure-as-a-star

@skybert-daherty 

@eveningpaper

@malex-13

@albert-eats-cookie-cake

@heart-a-n-o-n

@bitching-newsboys

@orollyitsracetrackhiggins

@joshuaburrageenthusiast

@random-superhero-stuff

@awkwardstranger98

@falling-out-trees-101

@modern-race-owns-airpods

@asphodelnerd

@i-dont-do-sadness

@rockyroad236

@sirgrahamcracker

@godhatesjordan

@thats-our-que-boys

@bastille-smedry

@nerdsies

@toss-me-a-pape

@wolfbutterfly42

@revolutioninthesewers

@spot-the-brooklyn-pirate

@aintnosleevesinbrooklyn

@1-800-santa-fe