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docockbrainrot · 3 years

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i think i want you (to leave)

Summary: We’re all running from something. Sometimes, metaphorically. Sometimes, literally. Literally running, from the very strangely hypnotizing supervillain that seems hellbent on ruining every bit of your life he can get all eight of his limbs on.

Pairing: Doc Ock X Reader/ Otto Octavius X Reader

Content: Slow Burn, NSFW eventually, 18+

AO3 link here.

Previous Chapter

Chapter 5

anathema// former vandal

The next several days are an uneventful blur. You barely leave your apartment, except for brief dog walks and grabbing food from the bodega across the street.

It’s 9 pm on Saturday and you’re fresh out of the shower, tucked away in a very fuzzy robe, lounging on the couch and watching YouTube on your television. You almost miss the subtle taptaptaptap sound coming from your window, you're so engrossed in the cooking show you’ve been binging. Gotta fill the void somehow, right?

You can’t see anything outside from where you’re sitting. The lights are on and make it impossible to peer through the reflections on the glass. Maybe it’s a bird. Or a branch is caught on the fire escape. Either way, you certainly can’t be assed to check it out and you take another sip of your chamomile tea- you’ve been trying everything under the sun, just about short of literally snorting lines of melatonin, to try to sleep better at night. Nothing’s been working. But you have been making a very valiant effort.

A few moments go by and you forget all about the window disturbance until,

TAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAP.

It’s jarring. It’s loud. Above all else, it’s annoying. Chekov spares you a look, like you’re the one making a racket. Effectively exasperated, you make an effort to set, not slam, down your mug, feeling decidedly not Calm and Relaxed as the tea promised. Suppose it’s not miracle shit though, is it? You would not be a good candidate for a horror movie because you fearlessly storm over to the window and throw it open (it wasn’t locked in the first place; you’re quite terrible at remembering to). You stick your head out and glower at whatever irritating mischief is happening out here, ready to rip the fire escape off the side of the brick building.

You’re greeted by something cold and hard (and indubiously metal, judging by how it felt against your sternum) shoving you back into your apartment, sending you sprawling unceremoniously to the hardwood floor. A string of profanities ready to leave your tongue, you sit up and adjust your robe in an attempt to preserve a modicum of your modesty. The rant dies in your throat as red eyed claws grip the threshold of your pre-war window and it’s almost comical the way He maneuvers himself in, far too large to be making these sorts of entrances. Standing up to his full height before you while you’re still sitting dumbfounded on the floor reminds you of just how impressively built he is. You manage to pick your jaw up, but your ass remains firmly planted on the wood.

“Uh… you could have just used the buzzer, dude. I have a front door, you know,” you sputter out, brain blitzing in pretty much every way possible. Your thoughts are racing and eventually they settle on the most important thing you can think to ask in that moment: “... Why aren’t you wearing a shirt.” You can't help the way your eyes are drawn to his broad chest, gaze lingering on the vast scarring that spills out from the metal contraption clamped around his midsection.

Otto very graciously closes the window behind himself. Or at least his little robot accomplices do it for him. You still aren’t sure what’s going on with that- the whole AI thing. Not even a blip on your radar of concerns at this point. “Didn’t want anyone to see me come in. Your building has a camera on the front, facing the street.”

“That’s why you’re shirtless?” You ask dumbly. Interesting method of camouflage. “What? No- what? It doesn’t matter- listen to me. I need you to do something for me. A small favor.”

He doesn’t seem to notice the compromised position he put you in. Typical. Gathering up your broken pride, you get up and tighten the tie of your robe a bit. It isn’t until then that he has the decency to look a smidge embarrassed and you hope you didn't just give him a free show on your way to getting to your feet. “You literally just broke into my apartment and now you’re asking for a favor? We barely know each other!”

“Less complicated when there's nothing personal involved yet, plus- you let me in,” he corrects you. You wish he would stop doing that. You wish he would stop meeting with you like this, under weird and mysterious circumstances. Even though it's only been like twice. You're already over it.

“You threw me across the room!”

“Touche.”

Otto does not apologize and you did not sincerely expect him to. The look on his face reads more like the cat that got the canary than regretful. You feel as though you’ve come to recognize that expression on his face and you also feel as though you don’t much like the fact that you’ve enough encounters with this man that you can recognize a damn thing about him. “What… could you possibly need me to do for you? I am not robbing a bank.” You just want to get that out into the open as soon as possible.

“I don’t need your help robbing a bank,” he snorts as if the idea is preposterous and you take a moment to feel insulted. Wow. Okay. You could totally rob a bank if you wanted to. Deciding to not comment on your wounded ego, you let him get to the point. Otto pulls something out of his inner coat pocket. It's some kind of rolled up paper and you think at first maybe it's a newspaper or magazine. He unfurls it onto the coffee table and holds it open with two metal claws on either side so it doesn't ravel itself back up.

You realize it's a blueprint. "This is… Oscorp," you point out stupidly, brow furrowing in confusion. There's levels to what's happening here. Layers upon layers, melding together with rot and decay and you can all but smell it. But there's something missing, something that would tie all of the wackjob shit that's been happening to you and around you together. It feels like when you have a very particular thought and then walking into another room makes it dissolve from your head. You're trying to grasp for it, to fit the puzzle pieces together, but it's just out of reach.

"Yes. It is. I have a small task I need you to do," Otto starts off, metal phalanges pushing his glasses up onto the top of his head as he looks over at you. For the first time, you can see his eyes in the light. The warm amber feels like a mockery- you have seen his cruelty in action.

"Where did you get this?"

"Does it matter?" Of course he'd say that.

Your fingertips brush against the metaphorical wayward chain link. It's right there. You just have to grab it and pull it back to you, like the anchor of a ship before it can set sail.

He's talking. You aren't listening. He's tracing a finger over the schematics. You don't see it. Realization washes over you in a heart-dropping tsunami. The voicemail you got from Oscorp plays like a broken record in your mind. 'Hello, Y/N. We're calling in regards to your employment status here at Oscorp. Unfortunately, due to a breach of security, we are having to make staffing cuts and are going to have to let you go. We appreciate your time and effort and wish you the best of luck in your next endeavor.' It didn't make sense at the time. A lot of things didn't. You replay the scene of poor David, desperately pleading for his life at the hands of the man hunched over here, just in your living room. You mentally re-run it over and over like bad 80s sitcoms on late night television.

"Lab Coat Guy…"

You don't realize you whispered it out loud until Otto goes silent.

"What?"

You slowly look at him and take a single step backwards, shaking your head. The company embroidered on David's lab coat hadn't been clear to you in the moment- but it's crystal in hindsight. Oscorp. "You got me fired." Your tone is flat, until anger flashes through you, like a streak of lightning through a dark, moonless sky, illuminating all of things that didn’t make sense before.

"It doesn't matter. What I need you to do-" He's so nonchalant, so blasé that it only stokes the embers of frustration until there's a roaring blaze burning beneath your skin. It's all about him, what he needs, what he wants. He has the nerve, the audacity, to keep traipsing into your life, kicking you while you're down and then ask for favors? You want to say all of that to him but unfortunately for you, you're an angry crier. Your outburst of bravery at him the last time you saw each other had surprised even you- but now there's so much more emotion roiling around inside you.

"No. No, no. Fuck you. You got me fired! I can't- I can't not have a job, I have to pay rent! You could get me arrested for just talking to you!" Oscorp had you canned to tie up any potential loose ends before anymore Davids could slip through the cracks. You think about how scared the poor dude must have been, threatened into stealing blueprints from the biggest corporation in the city, for one of the most infamous criminals. You don't know how they found out you were even remotely involved and you don't want to know.

Tears are streaming down your cheeks and once the floodgates have opened you're very familiar with how long it's going to take to close them again. After all you've been bottling this up since you found out, too disappointed to even tell any of your friends or family.

Otto appears taken aback, to say the least. He even looks like he's at a loss for words; that's a first. You know he could kill you where you stand in the blink of an eye, but in that moment you don’t even care. You’ve been trying so hard for so long to get on your feet, to do things for yourself and get away from the past. You moved across the country, you left everything behind, you got a damn dog. It seems like every time you manage to take a step forward in life, you’re knocked flat on your ass, apparently literally sometimes. It isn’t fair. Things don’t come easily to you, you’ve always had to work for them. You aren’t wealthy, you aren’t a supergenius, you’re just… you. The job at Oscorp was good money and you really felt like you were getting your shit together for a while.

“They’re not who you think they are,” he says finally, so calmly, with such carefulness about his words, that you sniffle pathetically and look up at him. He doesn’t look nearly as pleased with himself as you thought he might. And here you’ve been, under the impression that he gets off on hurting people. “Oscorp. I’m not… I’m not just doing this for me. You have to understand that.”

The schematics are furled up and tucked away. You make the mistake of meeting his eyes. Maybe it’s just the tears that blur your vision, but you swear you see a softness there before they’re hidden away again by his glasses.

He lingers at the window.

“I hope you’ll reconsider.” And then he was making his exit, even taking care to gently close the window on the way out. But he raps on the glass with his knuckles from where he stands on the fire escape and you know the look of confusion on your tear-streaked face speaks for itself. Otto points to the latches on the window. ‘Lock it.’ He mouths before he’s gone, presumably to wreak havoc and harass other unsuspecting young women that don’t want anything to do with him.

You thought everything had come together- but the more sense you make of it, the less you seem sure of the bigger picture. You aren't even sure exactly what he wanted you to do.

You’re left with an endless bounty of questions, and not enough answers to satisfy any of them.

#otto octavius x reader #doc ock x reader #fanfiction #otto octavius #doc ock

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wiypt-writes · 3 years

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Leave No One Behind

Chapter 16: Endings Beginnings

Co written with @icanfeelastormbrewing

Summary: Ari and Hannah settle into life back home, but it isn’t all as smooth as they’d have hoped…

Warnings: Bad Language words.

Pairings: Ari Levinson x OFC Hannah Horowitz

Word Count- 4.5k

A/N: It was recently brought to our attention that in a few other chapters there have been a couple of things that Ari has said/done that are not technically accurate for someone of Jewish heritage. First up, it was reference to Ari observing a ‘Sunday Roast’ when he visited Mama Navon. We just wanted to remind people that Hannah is of Catholic Christian and Jewish heritage (Spanish Catholic Mother, American Jewish Father) and her and Sammy’s upbringing has always been a combination of the two. So, when Ari visited Mama Navon when he was home from Sudan, clearly this was her tradition he was observing. Secondly, in another chapter Ari was praying to the ‘God and the Saints’. Of course, Judaism does not have saints, so there’s a slip up on our part with that one. As with the third point, when we described Ari rushing Sarah to the alter. He would have rushed her to the hoopa.

Regarding all of the above, we would hasten to add, that Ari grew up in the USA, leaving when he was 18. From what little we learn of him in the film, we know was taken by a British Soldier, who married an American Nurse. From the way he talks about it, we don’t get the impression his ‘adoptive’ parents were Jewish, so that alludes us to suspect he had a largely Christian upbringing, whilst clearly being aware of his heritage. Therefore, we don’t think it is beyond the realms of possibility that he would pick up the odd little thing such as the above three points.

That aside, we hope the above didn’t distract anyone else from the narrative as it did the reader who brought it to our attention.

Now, just a personal plea from myself in general. Myself and Storm do this for free, and not being a person who pays much attention to religion at all (that’s another debate in itself) it is for this reason I was VERY nervous about continuing this storyline beyond the plot of the film. We certainly don’t have the time, nor brain capacity to be researching things into any kind of huge depth. It’s why most of my story lines centre along similar types of things that I have a good background in. This fic was never supposed to focus on the ins and outs of a particular race of people, just the lives of two dumbasses in love. As all writers on here, we do this for free, and the moment it becomes hard work or unenjoyable, we won’t be continuing. So any other little slip ups, please, unless they’re offensive, give us a little leeway and put it down to Ari being exceptionally Westernised as pointed out above.

Sorry if this comes across as being a little harsh, but this has been playing on my mind a lot over the past few days, to the point I was seriously considering if we ended the fic where it currently stood. That said, I think we have a lot left to tell of Hannah and Ari’s story so, I’ll shut up now and let you read it…if you want that is.

Leave No One Behind Masterlist // Main Masterlist

Part 15

“You haven’t forgotten tomorrow?” Hannah heard her mother ask, as the woman stood up from the table while holding the teacup and saucer to place them in the sink. “You do remember you have to pick Sammy up from the airport tomorrow afternoon, right?”

Hannah rolled her eyes at her mother’s back. “No, I haven’t forgotten,” she sighed as she played with the crumbles of the pastry she had been nibbling on, “I mean, it’s not like I’ve got anything else going on, is it? Seeing as Ari is with Maya and according to Sarah’s stupid rules I can’t be there with them…”

At that, Maria Navon turned, giving her daughter a sympathetic look and Hannah snorted in anger.

It had been four months since they arrived back in Tel Aviv, and Hannah had to concede that for the first few weeks it was fine. She and Ari settled nicely in the apartment Mossad rented in Ari’s name once all the paperwork following the end of the mission had been sorted. Ari had asked Isaacs for an upgrade of his living quarters, given he was now having Maya over to stay every other weekend, plus numerous nights of the week. Not to mention the fact Hannah was moving with him. When Isaacs had asked Ari to put a justification forward, he had simply shrugged, “I fucking earned it, Isaacs.”

So he got it. Just like he usually got what he wanted, one way or another.

Hannah was back working at the clinic. Her hands and the experience she had acquired while in Africa were needed more than ever now that it was only her mother and her to run it, although how long it was before her mom decided to retire fully was anyone’s guess. It had been a couple of busy months, what with interviewing for new nurses and locum staff, but Hannah would be lying if she denied having enjoyed every minute of it. She might have Mossad secret agent skills, obviously passed down by her father, but she was a doctor at heart. And that hadn’t changed in the two years she had been away.

The team had split up within a month of arrival back in Tel Aviv. Ari and Max had been working to help the refugees. Many of them had simply melted away post their arrival, still not trusting the mysterious white men who had come to their aid. However, some had stuck round; being housed temporarily in hostels, and was those who Ari and Max were tirelessly working for. They focussed their efforts on obtaining them permanent, legal status along with finding them better places to live and jobs of sorts to help them fit in their new reality.

Jake had headed back overseas to continue work as a diving instructor, this time in Jamaica, whilst Sammy had been in the States with Rachel for almost two and a half months now, and was, as Maria just reminded Hannah, due back the following day. Hannah suspected, however, not for long, fully expecting him to move there permanently to be with Rachel.

“Sammy is lucky, you know? He has none of this shit with Rachel’s ex.” Hannah grumbled, “Sarah is just being a pain in the ass. And I know for a fact it’s because we told her we got engaged. She was fine with me being there when Maya was until that point.” Hannah finished her rant as she placed her teacup and saucer on her mother’s extended hand.

“You can’t be sure about that, sweetheart. Maybe there’s something else."

“No, she’s being a bitch.” Hannah quickly stopped her mother’s attempts at justifying Sarah’s behaviour. “She seems perfectly fine with us having dinner during the week and going out and stuff but won’t let Maya stay when I’m there on a weekend, basically just preventing us from spending those days together, for no reason other than she’s bitter.”

Maria Navon sighed. She knew where her daughter was coming from but, being the gentle and caring woman she was, she couldn’t help but try to put herself in the other woman’s shoes. She saw Hannah bite her lip and twirl her engagement ring round her finger, a rounded blue sapphire as deep as the ocean set against a halo of smaller white diamonds on a white gold band, before she spoke again.

“I wouldn’t mind mama but they’ve been legally separated for years! The terms of their divorce are basically already been agreed. All they need to do is sign the damned papers but recently, well, Ari seems afraid to even raise the issue in case Sarah starts making it all awkward again and stops him seeing Munch.”

“Hey, sweetheart. Listen to me.” Hannah’s mother caught her attention as she pulled out a chair to sit next to her. “Everything is going to be ok, she’ll sign eventually. She knows there isn’t anything she can do about it, she’s just grieving.”

Hannah’s brow creased at her mother’s choice of words. “Grieving for what? She left him, years ago!”

“She left him because she couldn’t cope with his lifestyle anymore, and he wasn’t winning any awards for being husband of the year, Han. That doesn’t mean she didn’t love him,” Maria woman spoke softly as if to appease her daughter’s raging tone.

“So, basically, I’m just stuck here waiting until she gets her head out of her ass?”

“Have a little patience, honey. You two have waited over a decade, one way or another, to be together. You sure can wait a few weeks more.” Maria smiled as she reached out for Hannah’s hands who were fiddling with a teaspoon.

“That’s the thing, Mama.” Hannah sighed as she looked up to meet her mom’s eyes. “I don’t think it’s just going to be weeks.”

“You don’t?” The woman frowned. “Well maybe she’s more stubborn than I thought.”

Hannah shook her head and then noticed her mother’s features had suddenly softened into a smile and she was looking straight over her shoulder. Hannah turned to see Ethan walking into the kitchen in his signature crisp work suit.

“Hi Ethan,” Hannah smiled at him and then looked up at the clock over the fridge before standing up and shrugging. “I should go. Spend the night with my fiancée before I’m banished back to my childhood home for the weekend like a love sick teenager.”

As she left the kitchen dramatically, she heard Ethan ask Maria. “That bad?”

“She’s pissed off,” Hannah heard her mom whisper back, “can’t say I blame her but she needs to make an attempt to see this from the other side, so to speak.”

With an angry growl, Hannah slammed the door and set off walking back to their apartment, in even more of bad mood than she’d been in when she arrived at her mother’s.

Why was anyone treating her like she was the spoiled brat?

****

Ari was getting ready for Hannah’s arrival. He had been cooking, or sort of, making an attempt at dinner for a while and was now setting the table for two. He wanted to make tonight special as he knew this week was going to be the third weekend out of six that he and Hannah would be apart thanks to Sarah and her fucking rules.

He was finding it hard himself. He’d gotten used to sleeping besides his Firefly since they had got together in Sudan, especially at night. But he knew Hannah was finding it harder. He was sacrificing their time together so that he could spend his allotted weekends with his daughter, which lessened the blow a little, but Hannah was basically being banned from living her life as it was for two days every two weeks, and that make his heart ache.

And the worst bit about it all, was that he had seen it coming a mile off, and had been powerless to prevent it.

It was a bright Friday morning when they told Maya about their engagement. The previous evening Ari had proposed to Hannah for a second time after buying her a lavish ring. Thus, they had decided to take Maya for a walk and ice cream to break the news to her. The little girl had been over the moon with the idea of her dad and Hannah getting married, which hadn’t surprised Ari seeing as his daughter had been all over his fiancé ever since they had met at Mossad headquarters the morning they had arrived home.

Now, as he approached Sarah’s apartment to take Maya back, he was about to tell his ex-wife and he was not particularly looking forward to it. But, he was being cautiously optimistic. Sarah had, after all, been amendable since they’d gotten home and seemed okay with Hannah being a part of Maya’s life.

Still, he felt his stomach churn as Maya walked up the apartment they had all shared once upon a time, and rang the doorbell. No sooner had Sarah opened the door, Maya bounced in blurting the news out without hesitation.

“Mom, guess what? Dad and Han are getting married! He asked her yesterday and she said yes!”

Ari groaned internally to himself, “Sarah, I didn’t ask her last night,” he smiled bashfully as he explained himself, “and I certainly didn’t do it in front of Maya.”

Sarah shook her head and brushed it off. “Don’t worry, Ari and … erm, congratulations, I guess.”

“Erm… thanks.” Ari blinked. “I just thought you should hear it from me first… even if you technically did hear it from Munch.”

Despite the civil exchange, Ari could tell that Sarah was hating she didn’t have time nor the privacy to digest the news, and that wasn’t what he’d planned at all. He’d wanted to tell her, quickly, and leave, but Maya had put paid to his plans. Ari could feel coldness of his estranged wife’s stare, along with the tell-tale faint twitch of her nose and upper lip. He knew Sarah well and he, also knew how she deep down felt about him and Hannah.

“She seemed cool about it but I know her, Han. Too cool for Sarah.” Ari told Hannah that night over dinner. “I can’t help feeling this is going to be bad…”

For once, Ari wished to God he’d been proven wrong. But, Sarah ended up doing what he feared, reverting back to being petty and petulant. She called him the next day to announce from that moment on, when Maya stayed with him, be it during the week or on her agreed weekends, Hannah wasn’t to be there overnight because, as Sarah had put it, it wasn’t appropriate for Maya to be around when they were… well, “up to stuff.

Hannah went ballistic, telling Ari his estranged wife was being ridiculous and she could go to hell, but Ari knew Sarah well enough to know she needed to get this out of her system. He tried his best to explain to Hannah that until she did, there was nothing he could do but roll with it, certainly for the time being. Making Sarah angry would not only risk her going back on terms of the divorce they’d set out in their separation degree, but also, he feared, make her get pissy about him seeing Maya. And that simply wasn’t something he was prepared to risk. He’d already missed too much of Maya over the years, admittedly through his own fault, but he didn’t want to miss a single second more than he had to.

Just as Ari was turning down the heat under their dinner, Simon’s ears pricked up and a second later Hannah’s key was heard in the door. Air smiled at the dog, who let out an excited whine, and leaned to give him a scratch behind his ears.

“Mama’s home, buddy.”

The pooch looked up at his master almost like he was pondering his words and Ari scoffed.

Yeah, home. Bar the weekends when she’s banished to her mother's…

Simon trotted off and soon after Ari heard Hannah greeting him. A moment later she walked into the living area and gave him a tired, but genuine smile.

“Hey Lobo.”

Ari beamed at his fiancé as he walked to meet her and without warning, he grabbed her face with both hands and stamped his lips on her plump ones, kissing the hell out of her. Hannah moaned in surprise but melted into his hold, her hands instantly reaching for Ari’s bearded cheeks.

“Hey Firefly.” He whispered when he broke the kiss.

She smiled at him as her hands travelled upwards and tangled in his hair. “Something smells good.”

“Thanks, I just showered.” Ari drawled, a cheeky smile on his face.

“I meant the food, you ass.” Hannah laughed as one of her hands slapped Ari shoulder, but his grin never faded.

“I’m a whole meal, honey.” He continued, playfully. Hannah rolled her eyes and stepped back. “But yeah, I’ve been cooking or rather mixing things in pots and pans.”

“Hmmm should I be worried?” She shrugged off the light jacket she was wearing to shield her from the summer showers.

“Well, Simon tasted everything and he’s still breathing.”

“Simon used to eat jellyfish, Ari. That’s not a bar to measure your cooking with.”

“Hey, I tried, okay? Give me some credit. I’ve never cooked for a woman before.” He grabbed her hips and pressed her to his body, one of his big hands splaying over her back.

At that Hannah smiled at him lovingly. He was right. She suspected he had never cooked for Sarah and he certainly hadn’t cooked for her, not once. Never in the brief amount of time they had been secretly dating, and at the resort it had been Chef Aziz's job to cook for everyone.

“I’m honoured, and I’m sure it’ll be great. Give me five to go wash up okay?”

“Sure, babe. I’ll plate the food and open the wine.” He winked at her and Hannah stood on her toes and gave him another quick peck before she headed into the bedroom, Simon following her.

True to his word Ari had done a pretty good job and thirty minutes later they were both sat at the table after having enjoyed a dammed passable and tasty attempt at a beef stroganoff on Ari’s part that left Hannah pleasantly surprised.

She sighed with satisfaction as she left her fork on her plate and when she looked up she noticed Ari was looking at her intently, his eyes shining under those long eyelashes.

“You trying to seduce me before my carriage turns into a pumpkin tomorrow, Levinson?” Hannah asked before bringing her glass of wine to her lips.

“Hannah...” he sighed.

“What?”

“Please don’t, sweetheart. I don’t want to argue.”

It was her turn to sigh, heavily. Ari’s words were more of a plea than a warning to her, but she couldn’t help the way she was feeling. Granted, she wasn’t quite as pissed as when she had left her mother’s house, but she still had a sour feeling which was nagging at her.

“I don’t want to either, Ari. I just don’t like the prospect of spending my weekend away from you. Again.”

“And you think I do?” He asked, reaching for her hand over the table. “Honey, this won’t be forever. Sarah just needs to get her stupid tantrum out of her system.”

“Yeah, I know and I don’t want you having trouble with Maya because of me, I wouldn’t keep you from Munch, ever. But you’re my fiancé and I just...” she trailed off, shrugging, “I don’t want us to be apart.”

Ari licked his lips and pondered for a moment as he looked at their entwined hands. “Okay, I’ll talk to her when I pick Maya up tomorrow.” He nodded with determination when he looked up at her. “See if I can reason with her and...”

“Don’t Ari. You’ll only set her off.” Hannah rapidly cut him off.

Ari groaned and let go of her hand, his look and voice growing harder. “Well then, what do you want me to do? You literally just said-“

“I know, but I don’t want you to poke the bear! I just want this fucking ridiculous situation to be over.” Hannah shook her head. She knew she was riling Air up, but she was sick of everyone trying to get her to accept the situation they were in without so much as a word of complaint. “I’m not blaming you, it’s just…forget it, can we just pretend we are a normal couple who are having a normal evening dinner?”

“We are a normal couple. Well, as normal as most anyway.” Ari took her hand again, his features softening. “Look, I’m sorry. I really am. I just don’t know what I can do.”

“Love me.” Hannah stated after a while.

Now that puzzled Ari. Was that a request or was she doubting him. She couldn’t be doubting him, right? With concern written all over his face he pushed his chair back to stand up and hurriedly crouched beside Hannah, his hands grabbing her thighs firmly as his eyes searched for something in hers.

“Firefly, I do love you. You know this… I mean, at least, I hope you do.”

“I do.” She nodded as she looked down to him. “Just don’t stop loving me, no matter what crazy ideas Sarah comes up with.”

“Hannah, that’s not gonna happen.” He assured her after swallowing hard. “I promise you. Nothing she says or does is gonna change the way I feel about you.”

****

Ari meant what he said and took it upon himself to make sure his Firefly was left with no doubt as to his feelings for her all through the night. And then again he made sure she hadn’t forgotten the following morning too before she left to pick Sammy up from the airport.

Ari collected Maya, as arranged, from the summer holiday camp run by her school and then, throwing caution to the wind, took her to Maria’s to see not only Hannah, but Sammy and the family. Hannah was surprised, but pleased to see them both and hugged Maya tight as the girl threw herself at her, chatting away about her day. They ate a lovely dinner, courtesy of Maria, and later, retired to the shared garden in the warm, July air.

As Maya sat with Sammy, who was telling her stories about the states and Rachel’s kids, Ari found himself watching Hannah. She was sat with her mom and Ethan, the three of them sipping wine as the dusk drew in. It wasn’t long before the first little twinkles around the tree flashed through the darkness, signalling the fireflies had come out to play.

Ari’s mind quickly travelled back to when he first met Hannah, how those little bugs had been present in the garden, earning her the nickname. His nickname for her, which had stuck and become a term of his love for her, symbolised by the pendant round her neck. It was that pendant, or more specifically how he had given her that pendant, which had fixed the idea on how to present her with the sparkling sapphire and diamond ring on her finger…

It was a Thursday morning, and Hannah walked into the bedroom after her morning shower. Ari looked up from where he was fastening up his short sleeved shirt and smiled as she grinned back at him.

“You really do suit that colour, pretty sure Ethan’s secretary will approve.”

“Ethan’s secretary?” Ari continued, stopping two buttons under the collar.

“Yeah, that’s what I said Lobo.”

“Ethan’s secretary is nearly a hundred years old, Firefly.” Ari rolled his eyes with a chuckle, his hands on his hips as Hannah frowned.

“Well who was the young, blonde girl at her desk the other day when I called in?” She picked up her hairbrush from the top of the chest of drawers that served as her vanity unit.

“Lorraine? She’s an intern, Mrs Goldman is training her.”

“She likes you. I can tell.” Hannah hummed, combing out her locks which had been piled on top of her head to prevent them getting wet.

Ari rolled his eyes as Hannah pulled her hair back into a neat ponytail. “Whatever.”

“You can whatever me all you want,” Hannah sang as she picked up a bottle of lotion and sat on the bed, “I can sense these things.”

Ari snorted, looking down at his girl as she sat on the bed applying lotion to her legs. “You getting all territorial on me?”

“Do I need to?”

“Don’t be an ass!” Ari snorted, leaning down to kiss her.

As they moved around the room, Ari took his time, a lot longer than usual, dragging his morning routine out as long as possible. If Hannah noticed he was making a meal out of tidying his beard up, something he had taken to doing since returning to civilisation, she didn’t notice.

He was stalling for one reason, and one reason only. The surprise that was waiting for her in her underwear drawer.

After what seemed like an age, she crossed the room and pulled it open. Ari held his breath as she reached in for a pair of panties, but instead she gasped, he hand flying to her mouth.

Bingo.

When Hannah spun around, the red, velvet box in her hand, Ari was waiting on one knee, beaming up at her. “Still wanna marry me, Firefly?”

Tears brimmed in her eyes and she nodded, her voice thick with emotion, “yes, you know I do!”

“Had to ask with a ring, sweetheart.”

He watched as she opened it, her mouth dropping open once more as she stared at the ring.

“Lobo, it’s gorgeous… I… I love it!”

As Ari rose to his feet, he sighed with relief, “good, ‘cause I had a hard time finding something worthy of my girl.”

“It reminds me of the ocean,” she smiled up at him, “and your eyes.”

“Kinda why I bought it, the ocean that is.” Ari smiled as he took the ring from the box, slipping it over her knuckle, watching as the sapphire settled at the base of her finger. “Hannah Maria Navon, I love you, baby girl.”

Hannah glanced at the ring before she beamed, her hands cupping his cheeks, “and I love you, Ari David Levinson.”

Ari smirked a little at the memory, they were totally late for work after getting a little ‘distracted’ so to speak celebrating their engagement once more, only this time in a bed and not the back of a shitty jeep in the Sudanese desert.

“Dad?” Maya bounced into his lap, drawing a huff from him as she accidentally elbowed him in the ribs, “Are those fireflies?”

“They are Munch.” He nodded, kissing her head as she watched them zipping around. “Can you see now why I call Hannah my Firefly?”

She grinned, “yip!”

Hannah, who had been watching them, cleared her throat. “Ari, it’s getting late. Shouldn’t you two be heading back to your apartment?”

Ari looked at her pointedly. “Our apartment, sweetheart.”

Hannah was about to shoot a response back but then remembered Maya was there so she merely sighed. “Ari, look, you shouldn’t even be here now anyway. It’s not worth the argument if she finds out.”

“Why can’t we stay here, dad? I wanna stay with Han!” Maya piped up and Hannah groaned a little, shooting Ari a look.

“Because Han needs to stay with Sammy tonight, she’s not seen him for a while. You can stay some other time, okay?”

“I’m not gonna say anything to Mom if that’s what you scared of.”

At that, Ari and Hannah exchanged a look. “Why do you say that? Why would we be scared?” He asked and Maya shrugged.

“I heard Mom say some things.”

“What things, Munchkin?” Ari smoothed her long hair back and waited for her to reply.

“Well, I was upset, because at first I thought Hannah didn’t like me anymore as she always left when I stayed over. But one day last week, I heard Mom tell Grandma on the phone she had made you and Hannah spend the weekends apart because I was with you.” Maya paused and looked at Hannah, “Is that why you don’t stay with us at the apartment?”

Hannah blinked, she was stuck. She didn’t want to lie but also didn’t want to start bad mouthing Sarah in front of Maya, no matter how tempting. “Erm, it’s, well it’s complicated, sweetie. You and your dad need to spend time together. But I promise you it’s absolutely not because I don’t like you. I do, I love you very much.”

At that Maya stood up and launched herself at Hannah. “I love you too, Han.”

Ari and Hannah could do nothing but exchange a look, which Hannah broke as she leaned down to hug Maya, tears visible in her eyes.

And it left Ari feeling even more like shit than he already did.

No, he had to fix this, even if it meant pulling Sarah up on her attitude despite Hannah asking him not to. Whilst he understood Sarah’s anger, and that she had every right to direct it at him, the fact that it was clearly having an impact on Maya was something he couldn’t let slide.

With a sigh, he stood up, instructing Maya to bid everyone good night. Before he left, he pulled Hannah into a kiss, his hands cupping her face.

“I’m gonna fix this,” he whispered against her lips, “trust me, baby.”

“I do.” She sniffed a little, her nose bumping his. “Go, go on. I’ll see you Sunday.”

As they walked the few blocks home, Maya’s hand locked in Ari’s, he was only partially listening to his daughter as she spoke.

“Dad!” Her voice drew him from his thoughts about how exactly he was going to approach the subject with his soon to be ex-wife. He glanced down at her.

“What?”

“We’re you listening to a word I just said?”

“Honestly, no!”

“Daaaaaad!” She whined and Ari chuckled.

“I’m sorry baby, what were you saying?”

“I was saying that I should get Hannah something for luck.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Mom was talking to Auntie Louisa, and she said that Hannah was going to need plenty of luck being married to you so…”

Ari took a deep breath, anger flashing through his system, rolling his eyes. “Oh, did she?”

“Yup.” Maya nodded.

“And, do you think Hannah’s gonna need luck?”

Maya looked at him, and grinned cheekily. “Well, you are an idiot!”

“Rude!” Ari narrowed his eyes playfully, “mind you, technically, you might look more like your mom but you’re half me. Guess that makes you half an idiot, huh?”

Maya went to dig him in the ribs and with a chuckle, Ari swung her up and onto his shoulders. Her hands tangled in his hair as she giggled, before she leaned down, fingers threading into his beard.

“Han’s right, you do look like a wolf.”

Ari laughed, his hands tightening around his daughter’s ankles as her heels lightly bounced against his chest with each step he took.

#leave no one behind #ari levinson x ofc #ari levinson x original female character #Ari Levinson #ari levinson fanfiction #red sea diving resort #red sea diving resort fan fic #chris evans #chris evans characters

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keelywolfe · 4 years

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FIC: Just Swimmingly ch.4 (BAON)

Summary: Jeff doesn't know where they are or where they're going, but he knows one thing. It's probably not good.

Tags: Spicyhoney, Established Relationships, Hurt/Comfort, Additional Tags To Come

Part of the ‘by any other name’ series.

~~*~~

Read it on AO3

Read it here!

~~*~~

By the time the van came to a stop, Stretch still hadn’t woken up. Not that it mattered very much, there wasn’t a thing Jeff could have done to change their situation. At the moment, they were very much outnumbered, overpowered, and even if he’d had a clue where they were, it wouldn’t have done them any good. Before they dragged him out of the van, one of the thugs yanked a bag over his head. Blinded, he struggled to stumble along as two guys pulled him out, trying not to cry out as they led him barefoot across crumbling asphalt into a building with rough carpet.

He kept as quiet as he could, trying to not only listen in case they said anything useful, but also for Stretch, praying to a God he hadn’t spoken to since he was fifteen and his father threw him out that they didn't hurt Stretch. Jeff could survive a few bumps and bruises, but he didn't know how much Stretch could withstand. Intent was key when it came to Monsters, he knew that much, and these guys seemed to have plenty.

At first, he tried to keep track of where he was being led. An impossible effort when the twists and turns of being dragged along left him too disoriented to know his way up or down. They seemed to walk forever until his captors suddenly stopped and Jeff was shoved down into a chair. Rough hands grabbed at him, rope suddenly binding his wrists and ankles. He didn’t struggle as he was tied, only tried to tense his muscles as much as possible, some shitty internet meme he vaguely remembered reading said that it could help slip free later.

Turned out memes weren’t the best source for escape plans. When they were done, Jeff subtly tried to move and the best he could manage was a painful rope burn. The ropes felt like they were wound through the slats in the chair and unless Houdini decided to make good on his possible return from the other side, Jeff was going nowhere fast.

He could hear their captors moving around, muttering too low to be understood and the other sounds might have been more rope. Tying up Stretch, maybe, he hoped that’s what it was; at least if they were together, that was something, hell, that was everything right now.

The bag suddenly getting ripped off his head made him gasp, flinching from the glaring light pointed directly into his face. Squinting, he could barely see the shadowy figures standing behind it, but he was sure he could see a cell phone pointed in his direction.

“Say your name,” a rough voice demanded.

“Andy—” he began automatically. “No, Jeff, I’m sorry, Jeff! My name is Jeff!” There was nothing else and Jeff shifted, grimacing as the ropes dug in. It was on the tip of his tongue to go on, to blurt that he worked in public relations, that he was nobody important and not worth ransoming. He bit the inside of his lip to keep those rambles from pouring out. Partly because it was probably stupid to tell kidnappers your value or lack thereof, and partly because of Edge. He’d always told them to never offer more information than was necessary and yeah, he’d been talking about board games at the time, but Jeff doubted that Clue was where Edge learned that particular rule. If these assholes wanted more info, they could damn well ask.

Either his name was all they wanted or they already had whatever other info they needed. Jeff didn’t even have a chance to try squinting through the too-bright light when one of them came towards him and yanked the bag back over his head. He sat there, sweat beading on his face and his own breath threatening to smother him as he listened to their captors moving around next to him.

“He can’t talk,” one of them said disgustedly. “He’s still wasted.”

Stretch. That meant he was right next to him, thank fucking god.

The rough sound of a slap made Jeff tense, protests bitten off when the same voice cursed and there came the sound of someone rubbing their head, “What the fuck, man!”

“That’s exactly how we want him, dumbass! He doesn’t need to talk, all they need is a good look at him. Come on, they’re waiting.”

Footsteps and then the sound of a door closing. Jeff strained to hear if anyone was still in there with them around his own breathing loud in his ears, his pulse thundering. There was nothing, no shuffle of feet against the floor or the creak of a chair. Jeff waited a little longer, curling his chilly toes against the rough carpet.

Nothing. Jeff took a long, slow breathing, trying to calm his racing pulse. He needed to be cool right now so he could try to think of something. Even if the Embassy was willing to give these assholes whatever they wanted, they sure as hell couldn’t count on that saving their lives. He was no strategist, his degree was in sociology, for fuck’s sake, but. Stretch always called him Handy Andy and it made him feel like someone different, someone braver who could stand up to a violent asshole on a bus and help Stretch with crazy experiments involving swinging bottles of Diet Coke rigged with automatic mentos dispensers. Jeff might not be the best for this situation, but Andy was sure as hell gonna try.

“Stretch,” Jeff said softly. He waited for someone to shout or a slap followed by a demand that he shut up. When none came, he went on, soft and urgent, “I know you can't hear me, but, just in case you can. It's gonna be okay. I know you're big on promises and I'm promising you right now we're getting out of this. I promise you." If he could glean anything of what Jeff was saying, he hoped he could hear that much. At least maybe he wouldn't be afraid.

"i sure hope so, i didn't get this far in life to get dusted by a low rent group of third rate scooby doo level villains. seriously, they tied us up with rope, were they out of packing tape at ‘kidnappers ‘r’ us’ or were they just eager to try the knots they learned in boy scouts before they got kicked out."

Okay, that wasn’t quite the last thing he’d expected, but it was close.

"Stretch?" Jeff gasped out. He couldn’t see a damn thing through the bag, but he could hear a muted popping sound. Suddenly, the bag was gone, far gentler than before and then he was blinking up into Stretch’s smirking face.

Jeff looked around a little wildly and next to him was another chair, the still-tied ropes hanging from the rungs in loose coils.

“yeah, sorry. i woke up back in the van, didn’t want to tip them off. wherever they buy their roofies must not have given them a dosage chart.” Stretch settled his hands on Jeff’s shoulders. “hold still, this is a lot easier than fighting with knots.”

It was the gentlest and shortest teleport he’d ever felt. Only a brief disorientation and when his vision cleared, he was sitting on top of the ropes that had just been binding him.

Jeff scrambled to his feet, swiping his sleeve across his sweaty forehead. Holy shit, maybe he should take up praying again more regularly, this was the fastest service he’d ever gotten. “Can you get us outside?”

His heart sank as Stretch shook his head. “that's gonna be a no. with the bags on our heads, i couldn't see where we are. shortcutting is tricky, it's dangerous to teleport blind. that's how you end up stuck in walls or halfway inside a table or some shit.” Stretch waved a slender hand at the chairs. “dangerous, not impossible. a few inches above where i was sitting was a pretty safe bet to get out of the ropes, but anything else is more likely to get us dead than on the street.” He frowned, glancing around the room thoughtfully. “plus, i'm not going anywhere without a little intel. they’re fucking idiots, but they knew enough to drug me and how to do it. that's not information you can just look up on a wiki-how.”

“Okay,” Jeff took a deep, steadying breath. "So, what do we do, then?” He glanced at the door. “Can you pick locks?"

"sure,” Stretch said absently. He was looking around the room. It was a storage room of some sort, there was more dusty furniture aside from the chairs, including a rickety desk, and metal cabinets lined the walls. “but i can't do much about the door being barred. i heard something get braced against it when they went out.

"Oh. Right."

“yeah,” Stretch agreed, “at least one of them has a brain cell or two rolling around up top, enough to get them this far. but the road trip is over and it’s time to pay the tolls.” Stretch shook his head disgustedly. "first rule of kidnapping is never leave the kidnappees alone. seriously, i'm getting my cues from netflix and even i know that.”

His eye lights paused in their survey of the room, brightening. Jeff followed his gaze and saw in one corner there was an honest to god old-fashioned rotary telephone pushed into the far corner of the desk, nearly buried under the clutter.

"can't be that easy, can it?” Stretch marveled. He picked it up the handset and held to his skull, then sighed unhappily. “nope. no dial tone, no surprise there, no one has a landline anymore. don’t you worry though, little phone.” Stretch gave it a soft pat. “you’re gonna be real useful in just a minute. seriously, this is just embarrassing. my first kidnapping attempt and they locked us in a room with an entire arsenal.”

“I must be missing the vendor in the corner willing to hand over gear if we do a mission for them,” Jeff joked weakly.

“everything is an arsenal if you’ve got the skills.” Stretch rummaged through the desk and came up triumphantly with…a paperclip? He set it on the desk, adding a pencil, some scotch tape, and what looked to Jeff like an old tube of superglue. “kidnapped by the ebott equivalent of the america’s dumbest criminals, fuck me. edge is going to be up my ass for a month.”

“I don’t think you’re giving him enough credit.” It was easier to be calm in the face of Stretch’s ease. “I think six months is the bare minimum.”

“i really wish you weren’t right.” Stretch glanced around the room again, this time directing his gaze upward. “hm, that’ll work.” Tall as he was, the ceiling was still out of reach even for him. Stretch pulled one of the chairs over, ropes trailing behind it like tentacles, and stood on it, reaching for the smoke detector. Jeff could only blink in confusion as he yanked it right off the ceiling.

"You're going to burn down the building?” Jeff asked. Not that he didn’t trust Stretch, but, uh, that seemed extreme for a first escape attempt. “That’d get us out, but I don't think we'll be any more alive."

"nah, just need some parts,” Stretch jerked his head towards the door. “keep an ear on the hallway, will ya, in case they remember that leaving us alone is probably stupid."

“Got it.” Jeff went to the door but before he could press his ear to it, Stretch called his name.

"hey, kiddo, i'm gonna get us out of this." Stretch offered him a familiar, lopsided smile. "i know i don't look like much, but i've been known to keep my head in a bad situation."

"You already saved me once,” Jeff said honestly, "why wouldn't I believe you now?"

Stretch’s pale eye lights flickered with memory, his expression briefly tightening. How did he remember that horrible night in that parking lot, Jeff wondered, what nightmares haunted Stretch’s sleep? He knew something happened after the ambulance took him away, but he’d never heard the entire story. After he’d been released from the hospital, he’d been wrapped up in healing enough to start his new job at the Embassy and as time passed, he hated to ask, didn’t want to dredge it all up again, not when everyone was slowly getting past it. Besides, the others had their own shit to deal with, what with the attack in California and everything happening in Ebott. His trauma was his to handle and that was the end of it.

At the desk, Stretch got to work, humming the ‘mission impossible’ theme under his breath as he dissected the phone and smoke detector with a makeshift screwdriver made from a bent paperclip taped to a pencil. His hands were as deft and easy as any demonstration he’d done for the local kids and Jeff could only marvel at his ease.

“How can you be so calm?” Jeff blurted, wincing even as the words escaped. He hadn’t meant to say it, didn’t want to distract him. Stretch only flicked a glance his way, both browbones raised.

“me?” Stretch snorted, “i am not calm. beneath this gorgeous cookie crust exterior is a honey pie of a person who would start shitting themselves if i could grow the prerequisite equipment. but we're gonna be okay.”

“How do you know?” Jeff hated the faint pleading in his own voice, he shouldn’t be distracting; Stretch was as stuck here as he was and with his HP, it was even worse. He was supposed to be the one helping Stretch, he’d promised, and the best he could do was lookout.

“you seriously think red isn't already on it?” Stretch asked and as terrifying as Red could be, thinking about him right now eased some of the aching fear that was settled in Jeff’s stomach. “all he needs is a clue and we’re gonna get him one. i only hope he can keep edge from razing the city and salting the earth beneath it until then. people might be a little tetchy about that and i’m not even sure you can come up with a press release that’d cover ‘sorry about starting city-wide armageddon, my bad.’”

Before Jeff could think of a reply to that, either an agreement, or a protest that a little chaos could be excused considering the circumstances, he heard footsteps coming from down the hallway. Panicked, he hissed out, “They're coming!”

“fuck, okay, okay.” Stretch scrambled over and set some kind of contraption on the floor near the door that was all waggling wires and circuit boards. He grabbed Jeff by the wrist and dragged him along. “over here, come on, this a harder trick, but you can do it. i need you to hold as still as you can. if you move, they might see you, you get me?"

Jeff managed a hasty nod as Stretch shoved him into a corner, cramming them both in tight, out of the way. "don't move, don't talk,” Stretch reminded him, a low murmur close to his ear. The slim, bony arms around him were comforting and even knowing that Stretch couldn’t physically protect him, having him towering overhead as he caged Jeff against the wall felt oddly safe.

Then something happened. He didn’t know how to describe it. It felt like a heavy curtain fell over the world, everything going distant and muffled, even his vision greying like he was about to faint, only he’d never felt so awake. There was a sudden popping explosion as the door swung open and collided with Stretch’s contraption, but it sounded miles away, the kidnappers’ curses as muffled as if they were speaking from another world.

He didn’t move, held perfectly still even as that curtain slowly grew claustrophobic, nausea starting to churn. Jeff closed his eyes, swallowing convulsively and just went he thought he couldn’t stand it a moment longer, that he either needed to move or he’d start screaming, it was suddenly gone and Stretch was stepping back.

When he opened his eyes, he saw Stretch was pale, sweat showing visibly on his skull. "are you okay?" Stretch asked.

“Me?” Jeff blurted. He caught hold of Stretch’s arms to brace him as he wobbled on his feet. “I’m fine, what about you!”

"i’ll be okay.” Stretch wiped his face on the sleeve of the crummy shirt he’d been forced into with a grimace. “i pulled us halfway into the void. it works, but it burns a lot of juice. the assholes booked it out of here, but more importantly, they left the door open."

The door was opened, they could leave, and yet, Jeff found himself blurting out, “They’ll get away!”

“no,” Stretch said grimly. “they’ll look for us first, thinking we couldn’t have gotten too far. these guys aren’t gonna ditch and run that fast, they know too much. think about it. drugs work on monsters but how do they know what kind and how much? lucky for me, skeleton monsters are different. our systems are finicky, we’re hard to drug. whoever tipped them off about how to roofie me didn’t know that.”

His sockets narrowed suddenly, Stretch turning away to look in the rusty cabinet next to them. “oh, honey,” he said gleefully, “jackpot.”

Jeff joined him, peering into the cabinet as Stretch cautiously wrenched it open. “What did you find?”

He held up a bottle of bleach and said, smugly, “just some nice, normal household chemicals. they can be lots of fun if you know how to mix 'em up and i'm a one hell of a bartender. but first.”

On the desk was another little contraption that was mostly wires and tape. Stretch picked it up and walked over to squat next to a wall outlet. Carefully, he pushed it into the socket. There was a sputtering spark and a tiny red light blinked to life.

“there we go.” Stretch stood, dusting off his hands. “i don’t even want to think about how pants-shittingly angry edge probably is right now, but we can’t let them get the ransom that asgore is probably going to pay and we sure as hell can’t let them get away.”

He grinned then, wickedly sharp for all that his teeth were blunt. “so, how’s about we have some fun, yeah?”

Jeff nodded determinedly. Fuck, yes. If he was going to add to his repertoire of nightmares, he was damn well going to make sure someone else paid for it, in spades.

tbc

#spicyhoney #papcest #keelywolfe #underfell #underswap #underfell papyrus #underswap papyrus #by any other name

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shinjukuspiritcommittee · 4 years

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Top 20 2021

My Favorites (updated)

Hello my readers, it’s been a while since I just posted something not related to a headcanon and I am doing one right now. I just wanted to take a bit of a break to just get SOMETHING on here on my days off work. Plus I’m just trying to find my groove when it comes to writing again so hopefully this helps me just get back into the mood of making a post more often lol. I wanted to revisit this topic for a while just because we’ve had a lot more events and a lot more alts in the game were added. And I know for a fact LifeWonders reads these posts in some capacity because I have meme’d an AR into the game with my top picks from the last list I did for Christmas 2019. No I didn’t. I’m just joking around and I know LifeWonders doesn’t read this.

Anyways rather than just make up a list on the spot like last year I decided to use the Housamo Sortmaker (Link: https://club.housamo.xyz/sortmaker/ ) to try and make a list that’s more revealing to what I was thinking at the time. Since I talked about 20 characters ish last time I’m just gonna read from my 20th place to my 1st place spots and try to justify whatever I was thinking at the time. Anyways-

20: Marchosias and Susan: This one was a surprise for me if I’m being honest but I’m just gonna blame the fact on Shukou’s recent involvement with LifeWonders in the form of Live A Hero and how Ryekie and Mokdai live in my headspace rent free whenever I think about the characters in that game. Maybe we can see about getting some LAH headcanons since that’s a LifeWonders property too). So out of all the characters Shukou drew for Housamo why did I pick Marchosias? Easy, it’s been 4 years and this poor man has yet to receive a proper alt or any kind of skin for that matter and I think that it’s a crime. Sure he’s not my favorite but he’s definitely grown on me because he’s just a gentle dad kind of character and his design has grown on me over the years. I just hope he doesn’t get left behind since he has a lot of really interesting and potential things to look forward to in the future given how the main story has unfolded.

19: Shiva/Algernon: The helmet heads are together because DAI XT quickly became my favorite artist for Fire Emblem Heroes and I really just like their designs. DAI XT just knows how to draw robots, armor and muscles well. Also Chapter 11 with Shiva you can read into some interesting perspectives. I don’t want to spoil any of the untranslated content for anyone who’s waiting for the official english translation. But if you are curious Roureem has a blogspot where he posts summaries of the newly released events.

Link: https://housamosummaries.blogspot.com/

18: Cthugha: I love this goober so much. He’d constantly try to act super sentai just trying say good morning everyday. He may not be very bright but that just adds to his charm and honestly I enjoy how he always tries to play the hero in a lot of scenarios because it’s refreshing when they implement him after a bunch of heavy hitting story stuff. I’m not gonna spoil too much about it but I will say he’s more than welcome after everything Chapter 10 and 11 put the reader through.

17: Mineaki: I’ve made a post about him being one of my least favorites way back when I first started this blog and let me just say how times have changed and I’ve learned the value of not judging a book by it’s cover. I still think there’s something a bit off about Kowmei’s style for his characters, but Mineaki has definitely grown on me. He’s a caring instructor who does watch out for his students even if it’s not always in the most direct way possible. Not to get into too many spoilers he’s got a lot of intrigue around him as well and I am curious to see his role get expanded down the line.

16: Ded: Housamo is the reason I really like christmas. The Christmas stories despite following a similar structure to each other do tend to be my favorite stories. Ded himself is also just another good dad character. He’s also two guys for the price of one, so I mean… you know… you’ve got the forever ask your other dad situation. There wasn’t much thought put into this choice I just like santa as a concept because I think the outfits are cute, it’s always nice to get something for people you care about on Christmas and Ded is the perfect embodiment of both sides to Christmas.

15: Shinya: Everyone we need to manifest buff Shinya for 2021, this is not a drill. This is legitimate. We must make Taromati’s and my wish come true. To be more serious again he’s just a sweet and gentle character. He’s also drawn by my favorite Housamo artist. Their characters always just look so naturally good. I’m just surprised he hasn’t gotten much of an alt given he’s perfect material for Valentine’s day. He’s just a soft boy and I would love for him to be in more things because I just enjoy seeing him.

14: Jacob: I have to be honest Jacob is on here because every time I look at him he just gets more handsome to me. I wasn’t all that impressed with his introduction and we don’t know much about his background but I’ve just been drawn to him more and more. Maybe it’s just because he’s drawn by GomTang? I just like looking at him and I can’t help it. To speak a bit less crass he’s another gentleman kind of guy and those are always nice.

13: Shennong: Yeah I like the doc a lot. Firstly, I’m a huge sucker for big bulls and Shennong fits the bill. The white fur really adds to his appeal visually and the purple horns give off a bit of an unnatural appearance. Shen feels like someone who’s been touch starved and alone for a long time given how he acts as a character and when we actually hug him I just lost it. He always has others well being on his mind so he’s not afraid to jump in and help, or give a much needed lecture about when you need to take better care of yourself. He just comes across as very well balanced overall.

12: Heracles: I won’t lie- at first he didn’t interest me much. He looked incredibly plain when among the rest of the cast and he seemed like the typical “bait” character since the banner had Echo, Barguest, Gyumao and Snow. But after reading the translation for Valentine Time Slip I was taken aback at how much of a gentle giant he turned out to be and I just really liked his interactions with the others in that event. And honestly his special quest from that year was one of the more unique ones given the slower pace and more romantic vibe it had. After the event warmed my heart I did a complete 180 and I just knew I really liked him.

11. Yasuyori: Before I start praising him I feel I have to justify why he didn’t quite make top 10 and it will have some mild Chapter 10 spoilers. To be as vague as possible his resolution just didn’t vibe with me at the end of Chapter 10. Like it wasn’t a bad resolution and it was the right choice to make but in my opinion there really wasn’t a moment I felt was clear where he made a choice for himself. Everything just sort of happened around him and it felt like he didn’t really do much to improve his situation. To an extent I kind of see that being the idea given his origins and the story he’s based on and there is some semblance of him coming to terms with himself alongside his isolation being portrayed pretty well, but I just wasn’t satisfied with it as much as I would like to be. With that out of the way, oh my god I just want this boy to never stop smiling and I just want to give him hugs constantly please he just deserves to be happy!!! Yasuyori is a character who’s got a lot of baggage and he’s just trying to find ways to properly cope with his trauma and not repeat past mistakes and I just really like that idea. His role in Xmas 2020 (sorry I just forgot the name of that event, but its when he gets his alt) was a much better representation for his character in my eyes. I’m not gonna spoil anything like I keep saying but he isn’t one to disappoint in future appearances and I just hope this lovable lug keeps getting the support he deserves.

10: Hephaestus: A spicy way to start the latter half of the list. I just want to give this lad a hug and tell him he is worthy of love. But at the same time he is a little shit… and I love that. I can’t fully explain why I grow a paternal instinct in me seeing this grown man sob about his mother but I just do. I want to keep him safe and give him all the affection he wants. Though I am aware a lot of Hephaestus’s interest in his parental figure is… questionable. I am just gonna say I would accept his love for what it is and he just wants approval.

9. Shuten: I’ll be honest I have no proper reason for why I like Shuten so much. He’s just a cool and reliable guy. He just seems like a go with the flow kind of person most of the time and he’s a bit more direct than most of the characters which I always appreciate. Plus I have an unspoken bias for naop guys in Housamo.

8. Durga: While not number 1 on this list, I still really like Durga. She’s quirky but not to an annoying degree, she’s determined and definitely very confident in her own abilities. Her growing to be more sociable throughout her events is something I enjoy seeing because it really creates this sense of growth.

7. Kyuma: I get a lot of people don’t like Kowmei’s art but I really think we should look past it because Kyuma is one of the sweeter picks. He’s someone who just wants to prove himself for his own worth and not what David can provide, but David is part of him and it just creates the potential for a good arc. Plus this boy is unintentionally smooth and will just take your heart when possible. I honestly want to see Kyuma more in events because he’s honestly the jock that carries 3 of the 4 brain cells. He’s also the last one without an alt so I’m just hoping he gets one in 2021 because he really deserves one in my opinion. (Also fan art makes him really cute).

6. Tomte: Tomte is relatively new but honestly his event in 2019 really endeared me to him. I’m trying to be spoiler free because the best way to enjoy these stories is for yourselves but let me just say his arc in the event was really endearing to me and much more than I was expecting. His fan service is also incredibly hammy and I love it. Visually Tomte is one of my favorites, I love his multi colored hair and starlit pupils cuz it makes his otherwise more generic look have some flare. I knew I liked him out the box and when I read about him in the summaries and can’t wait to read the official translation for him. I was just very endeared.

5. Tetsuya: Tetsuya fucks. Moving on…

Jokes aside this one’s a bit simple. I have no shame in admitting I think he’s attractive and his whole resistance towards wanting a relationship is cute in a weird roundabout way. When he says no I just want it MORE. I just really like duo haired tsunderes.

4. Kengo: Kengo 3rd alt 2021. Please LifeWonders I need my favorite Summoner. He’s a bro and that’s what counts. Kengo has got your back, not afraid to rely on you, a very fun and dynamic guy. Sure he’s not that bright when it comes to making plans or any book smart, but there are times where he’s the best at being able to read the room or just understand what someone needs to hear even if it isn’t always what someone wants to hear. His bullheaded nature is actually one of his redeeming qualities because it’s nice to just not overcomplicate things and just understand what’s actually going on. Yes the early story didn’t do many favors for him but to me the events, especially the later ones, do much more work for his character. To me, at least.

3. Ashigara: Ashigara is best bear, and I will defend that stance in 2021. The main thing that draws me to Ashigara is that I can see a bit of myself in him. He gets very emotional when he gets left alone, he’s very loud when with his friends, has a tendency of speaking his mind- just someone who wears his heart on his sleeve. I also appreciate that in spite of the negative he isn’t someone who backs down when the going gets tough and in a few instances he’s able to hold his ground physically at least.

2. Wakan Tanka: Love at first sight. This ray of sunshine still persists as the number 1 husband, but number 2 character. Firstly I am a huge fan of the partial beast aesthetic. The buffalo ears and the horns are absolutely adorable. Secondly he’s a perfect body type; he’s not too muscular but not exactly flabby. Third he is just so positive and I love that. He’s someone I admire and wanna hug.

1. Taurus Mask: The more things change the more they stay the same. I’m still a big Taurus Mask fan for all the same reasons as last time. I just… relate to this boy. He is an incredibly shy boy who uses his public persona for confidence. Maybe I’m reading too much into it but it’s like we’re soul bros!

So yeah, my tastes haven’t changed in a year and a half.

#tokyo afterschool summoners #housamo #Just Thoughts #qna #sfw

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atlascas · 4 years

Text

DEANCAS FIC REC

(last updated 7/1)

FINALLY. this is like. just a place for me to rec and write excessively abt the fics i've been reading lately. it won't be organized but it WILL be very earnest and i'll keep it updated as i find/remember more. also i have obnoxiously high standards when it comes to fic so these ARE the cream of the crop, if u will. the god tier. the s tier.

very loosely organized into "newer fic" and "classics." these are subjective categories. do what you will

✨ = new fic on the list

💖 = in my brain rent free!

CURRENTLY READING

these are the fics that i’m currently reading! may or may not get recced. usually i read the first couple paragraphs/lines and if i like the writing it gets bookmarked and put on this list.

lazarus needs a robe of scarlet thread by herrosesneverfall, 90k, canonverse au. dean starts getting stigmata. when i was getting back into spn there were a LOT of religious fics flying around bc that was the Hot Topic of Discussion. this was one of them

Three weeks ago, Dean woke up in a pine box. He thought dealing with the nightmares was going to be the most difficult part of his new life after Hell, but at least they were something he could understand. Something he could deal with. Something he deserved.

Then he began having agonizing visions of crucifixion. Wounds appeared on his body out of nowhere. Wounds that refused to heal and coated his skin with the sickly sweet smell of roses.

Stigmata are said to be the marks of saints, but Dean is not a saint and the wounds are only the beginning.

kingdom come by ahurston, 8.7k, coda to 15x18. cas gets to go home. im gathering all the s15 fix-its to my heart and holding them close

Cas wakes up on the coast of Maine. He makes his way home.

hunger by ellispark, 10.8k, s13 au. dean grieves cas, post s12 finale. perfect writing perfect awful heartwrenching characterization so far on dean’s end especially towards jack. nuanced emotional writing

Dean takes his meal and throws it away, plate and all. He's not hungry. How can he even begin to eat, knowing what he kept from Cas — what he kept from both of them?

They could have had something, and now all Dean has is this gaping, empty hole in his stomach, in his chest, and he has to learn to breathe and eat and move around it.

the law of equivalent exchange by awed_frog, 60.8k, canonverse. cas loving dean in all permutations of humanity, throughout time.

“And what’s the point of it?”

“Of love? There isn’t one. Loving is its own purpose.”

NEWER FIC

“newer” just means “i discovered it in 2020/2021 after coming back to spn fandom” so it very well could have been published before 2015 but really who’s checking. not me that’s for sure.

💖 so says the sword by komodobits, 85k, s4 au. cas guards the michael sword in the beautiful room. this is easily the MOST obvious rec on this entire list but it was the first fic i read when i got back into spn this year and jesus christ it set the bar sky fucking high. the way they create a coherent mythology out of the mess that is spn canon is incredible.

The briefing was simple: ‘Stand guard over the Michael Sword until the battle is ready to commence. Await further instructions.’

Castiel doesn’t mind working security duty; he was briefed shortly after the initial salvation of the Sword from the pit, and again before taking up his position. He knows what to do. However, it’s easy to forget that the green room isn’t real. Time moves differently there, the space ever-changing to make a prison of mountains, cathedrals, salt flats, orchards, and whatever Castiel was led to believe about Heaven’s greatest weapon—Dean Winchester is something entirely unexpected.

assimilation by komodobits, 5.6k, coda to 12x01. mary meets dean and cas and they go to find sam. such good character studies of all three of them. the best mary pov fic i’ve read

Mary always thought you were supposed to be able to tell. That you could just look at someone and know they were – you know. One of that sort. It’s not supposed to happen to her son.

cuckoo and nest by komodobits, 10k, ambiguously canonverse. dean and cas navigate relationship anxiety. cute, in character, and their relationship is realistic and the conflict well-written and emotionally nuanced and really really really good.

For a long time, Castiel thought that every earthly possession other than the immediately necessary was excess to requirement. But Dean – Dean who named his car, who keeps a photograph of his mother in his wallet, some thirty-plus years after her death, who still has the crumpled ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign with a sleeping pelican emblazoned on it from the Microtel outside of Roanoke where he first kissed Castiel, clumsy and unsure, under the unsteady fluorescence of an exhausted bathroom bulb – is sentimental.

It puzzles Castiel, where Dean draws the line between what is meaningful and what it is worthless.

💖 one white lie by komodobits, 11k, au. cas panics when trying to ask dean out and has to fake being a jehovah’s witness. it’s adorable and hilarious and it’s been ages since i actually got butterflies at a kiss in a fic but this did it. it did it. it felt like someone swaddled my soul in a cashmere blanket and kissed me on the forehead

Castiel takes a deep breath and rings the doorbell. He doesn’t need to run through what he’s going to say – he’s already planned and edited and rehearsed it a thousand times. He is going to ask Dean Winchester out to dinner. If it’s not too forward, he’ll say, perfectly charming. You see, I’ve seen you around the neighbourhood and you always seem so earnest and I’d really like to get to know you bette— The door swings open, and Castiel panics.

He intends to excuse himself. He means to apologise and come back some other time. However, in a moment of blind fear, what comes out of his mouth instead are the words, “Could you spare a moment for Jesus Christ?”

a crash course in someone else’s history by annie d (scaramouche), 11.5k, set during s6. cas comes to as his s4 self without any memories of the past two years and has to figure out what the fuck is going on. it’s kind of like so says the sword. you’ll know it when you get to it.

Castiel is captured inside a trapping circle of holy oil set by Dean and Sam Winchester. The brothers call him "Cas", claiming that he has amnesia and that he is obligated to help them take down Crowley to atone for his betrayal of them. It's the strangest story Castiel's ever heard, and one he doesn't have time for because he's only just raised Dean from Hell and has work to get back to.

💖 cas and dean’s adventures in gardening by ahurston, 19k, post-canon au. a series featuring dean and cas living in the bunker, human. cas is very into plants. i read this yesterday actually and it made me smile SO much it’s just so lovely and sweet. i’m also a sucker for any fic where cas has a garden. he deserves a fucking garden okay

In this post-God world, everything is different. A little quieter, a little softer. Cas grows a garden, Dean cooks, and they take care of each other.

tall grass by aeli_kindara, 57k, post-s12. dean and cas live in the bunker on their own, and cas grows a garden. i did say i love fics where cas has a garden. plus domesticity, plus some good case fic, PLUS dean and cas’ relationship is so gentle and good

“I think we should have a garden,” Cas says.

Dean looks up from his beer. He hasn’t had that much to drink, but Cas still has a vague look of unreality about him, a splash of living color that doesn’t fit in the bunker’s echoing stillness. Dean didn’t hear him coming. A lot of the time, Cas is so unobtrusive it feels like Dean has the bunker to himself, with Sam away.

Dean shakes his head to clear it. “A — garden?” he repeats.

in a week by renrub, 2.3k, post 15x18. cas is in the empty. dean saves him. this is genuinely the best “dean pulls cas out of the empty” fic i’ve read so far like conceptually this entire thing just fucks. when cas is cycling through the barn scene. god. SO well written

Castiel is outside a barn covered in sigils. He frowns. This isn’t right. This has never been something he repented for.

i won’t even wish for snow by annie d (scaramouche), 5.6k, college au. cas goes to the winchesters’ for christmas. honestly scaramouche fics belong in the classics section bc she’s like an og deancas writer but whatever. mistletoe! banter! good in-character au! this fic’s got it all

It’s the third year that Castiel’s spending Christmas with his best friend’s family, and he expects it to be much like the previous two. Then mistletoe happens.

convenient husbands by annie d (scaramouche), 39k, canonverse au. cas is a phoenix, dean is a hunter. they get married and have a sick psychic bond. unexpectedly fluffy considering how the fic starts and i love the banter so much and dean/cas’ relationship gets fleshed out and organically developed it’s very cute

"It's only temporary, right?" Dean says. "Just until you're healed up, and then we'll never have to see each other again. So what do you say, Castiel, do you want to marry me or not?"

cinderwings by bendingsignpost, 181k, cinderella au. cas goes to a masquerade ball to save his people from an eternity trapped in a void. he meets prince dean. i can’t tell u how much this fic drew me in - thru good worldbuilding, but mostly thru cas’ social awkwardness. like it works PERFECTLY to his advantage in this fic and reading how expertly he manipulates social situations w/o any fucking idea what he’s doing is both hilarious and inspiring

Under the cover of a masquerade ball, Castiel has five nights to recover the key to his people's freedom. The world has changed greatly in the six centuries since their banishment into the void, but the task isn't impossible. Unfortunately for Castiel, this is going to involve talking to people - especially the Knight Prince who has taken an interest in Castiel and his "costume" wings.

as the crow flies by bendingsignpost, 3.4k, au. dean and cas go on a roadtrip. cas has wings! it’s so dreamlike and meandering and the slowburn is so good. honestly it reminds me of stevebucky/stevesam post tws era roadtrip fics if ur hip LMAO

Cross country road trips with Cas are the best.

long-term relationship by bendingsignpost, 2.7k, au. dean and cas have a Serious Conversation about their relationship.

Castiel says, budging over to make room for Dean on the couch, “I thought we should have a serious talk about our relationship.”

Reflexively, Dean laughs.

Castiel does not.

“Uh, Cas... you know we’re not dating, right?”

all this and heaven too by ftmsteverogers, 7k, ambiguously canonverse. dean is trans. dean and cas are fucking and lowkey hiding it from sam. perfect character study PERFECT trans dean fic it’s so fucking well-written

“Hey,” Dean said. “I’m not ashamed of you, okay?”

Cas raised skeptical eyes to meet his.

“I mean it,” Dean insisted.

“I understand you mean it,” Cas said. “But I don’t think it’s any better if you’re only ashamed of yourself.”

💖 the love story of the runner up by margo_kim, 4.7k, ambiguously canonverse. cas tries dating other men. bear with me here. this is an outside pov fic from an oc named miguel who is WONDERFULLY characterized and very endearing like i find outsider/oc pov to be on Thin Fucking Ice bc it always ends up as fandom/author self-insert but miguel is his OWN MAN. he gets his own lil arc and everything. dean and cas are concentrated perfectly crystallized versions of themselves and the little glimpses we get of them are amazing. ALSO i wrote like 9k of an spn vent fic (basically the same premise but w an oc named marcus) back in like. freshman yr of hs. so when i first opened this fic i was like what the fuck someone’s been in my google docs. very weird experience 10/10 regardless

“So you saw a white man in a trench coat pop out in an alley,” Paul says, “and you thought, what, ‘I want to see where this is going’?”

“If you get hung up on details like that,” Miguel says, “it will take a very long time to get through this story.”

For a very weird era in his life, Miguel dates an angel who is in love with another man.

sunshine by northernsparrow, 8k, set during s13. dean and cas have a long conversation about their Profound Bond. the description left me off-balance (it really. really truly says “dean is straight in this fic” like okay bro WEIRD hill to die on) but it pulled through w the relationship study and reassurance and snuggles. a sweet fic

One-shot with a single conversation between Dean and Castiel, set in a late-S13-ish world. Gabriel, Cas, Sam & Dean are all living in the bunker together, Gabe's been cracking certain jokes, Sam's found a certain book, Cas is injured and isn’t healing... and it's all making Dean wonder if his angel friend might have some sort of a "bond" with... somebody? Whatever that means.

Maybe it's time for a talk.

💖 still life by catchclaw, 16.5k, post-s8. cas, newly human, goes to live on his own for a while. he and dean maintain a relationship thru the phone. this is LITERALLY the only first person fic i fucking respect okay like i was skeptical! i really was! but the pov is PERFECT and also my man kevin tran is in this fic and i love him and miss him very much. oh and cas going off to explore humanity on his own..............perfect arc. very much in character we love that for him

Dean'd always thought that falling in love was a capital letter kind of thing, an Important Event you carved into the calendar of your life and never, ever forgot. But with he and Cas, it wasn't that simple.

it’s mostly cowardice, and bad timing by ferritin4, 1.6k, pre-canon. actually this one is just a dean study it’s not deancas but i spent an entire night looking for it and i need someone else to read it too. dean is smart!!! SAY THAT

Dean gets his GED.

a list of reasons the bunker shouldn’t get a sofa by lizbobjones, 5.6k, set during s12. sam and dean and mary and cas haul a sofa back to the bunker. cute domesticity and fluff

Let me count the ways that this is a terrible idea.

no kingdom to come by domesticadventures, 16.8k, canonverse. dean and cas deal with being stuck in quarantine in different ways. this is the one and only quarantine fic i’ve read and it’s really good lmao. dean and cas’ relationship is so organic and tentative in this one

“We should fuck,” Dean says.

Cas looks up from where he sits on his bed, hair still damp from the shower, frowning as he places a finger on the page of his book to mark where he left off.

There are a million things Cas could say here; Dean has rehearsed them. After lunch, his restlessness had given way to a vague panic, a dread that matched his every step and crept along with him from room to room. Eventually, he had returned to his bedroom and spent the rest of the afternoon pacing back and forth, playing out all the possible scenarios. When Cas asks him Why? or Are you being serious? or when he sighs and says, in that way he has, Dean, he knows exactly what he’s going to do. He’s going to shrug casually, like he isn’t invested in the answer, like he isn’t desperate for an outlet, and say, Why not? He’s going to raise an eyebrow and say, What, are you not interested? He’s going to crowd into Cas’ personal space, he’s going to shove himself right up in there and whisper Cas against his ear.

Instead, Cas says, carefully, “Okay.”

till the juice runs by deathbanjo, 8.4k, canonverse. it’s like dean’s being cursed to have bad hookups with men. SUCH a funny fic and the deancas tension is so simple and sweet and GOOD. plus cas is so enjoyably characterized here he’s so human and worn in and experienced in his own unique way. perfect use of rowena too

Apparently whoever drew up the venn diagram of Dean’s sex life decided the circle labelled ‘good sex’ and the one labelled ‘sex with men’ should be kept far apart.

turn of the year by kototyph, 3.9k, canonverse au. sam and dean get stuck out in the middle of nowhere on the winter solstice. what i wouldn’t give for a full 80k of this verse actually. also i went on a kototyph binge after reading shut up put your money where your mouth is and they have a SOLID spn repertoire

Fifteen minutes later, Dean gets back in the car with empty hands and ice in his fucking eyebrows. “Get the map out,” he says through chattering teeth, sticking numb fingers under his arms.

Sam holds up the battered 1995 Rand MacNally they keep in the side pocket, turned to a page of uninterrupted green. “We’re going to die,” he announces.

💖 bullets in the gun by kototyph, 4.9k, canonverse au. cas is a cop (i know. still) who gets kidnapped by dean in an unfortunate turn of events. GOD this fic is SO FUNNY. cas’ canny and strategic escape attempts render him a very active VERY funny pov character plus the hate attraction to dean is PERFECTLY WRITTEN VERY BELIEVABLE. dean’s kindness also shines thru even as he literally holds cas hostage like!!!! PERFECT characterization. both of them are so LIKABLE here. if you read anything on this list read this

“Sorry, sweetheart, but I’m going to need to borrow your car.”

as you will by kototyph, 1.8k, victorian au. cas endures a proposal mishap. it’s cute it’s funny it’s sweet!

"No?" Castiel echoes, dumbly.

and if i was looking too? by kototyph, 2.6k, au. cas is undercover where dean works. this fic is just so cute like. bird angels.................

There are some things Castiel hasn't told Dean, and there are some things he doesn't need to.

the most important thing by northernsparrow, 94.5k, s10 au. amnesiac cas raising claire until he comes across someone familiar. claire is so well characterized here i really loved her arc thruout this fic. she just wants her dad back and u can’t even blame her the author rlly does an amazing job creating realistic and heartbreaking motivations for her. oh and dean and cas (esp cas characterization!) are sweet in this but honestly the highlight IS claire for me

Jimmy Novak remembers nothing of the last six years. Reunited with his troubled daughter Claire, he's struggling to raise her on his own. The most important thing is to make Claire happy. But why does he keep having these dreams of wings, and of two men in a black car? (Canon-divergent from S10E11, when we first met Claire again and Dean was still struggling with the Mark of Cain. Takes places several months later).

there’s only one sure thing that i know by blinkiesays, 20.3k, post-s5. dean goes to help cas out in ohio and they end up building a home together. i love the writing it’s rlly funny and sweet.

Dean doesn't even get halfway through explaining before Bobby starts laughing. When he lets himself think about it for more than five seconds, Dean can almost see Bobby's point: he's faced down demons, witches, vampires, werewolves, ghosts, angels, and Satan himself and now he's been defeated by the God damn Midwest.

💖 to an angel, love and worship are the same thing by geminisage, 10.3k, post s15 fix it. dean grieves cas - and then cas gets brought back back from the empty. i didn’t have this in my bookmarks so i MISSED it the first time around on this list but this was another one of the fics i came back to spn fandom to. it’s so fucking unique?? it actually reads like spn like i think fic tends to soften dean/cas up and makes them more emotional + emotionally intelligent than is ever shown in the show. here the dialogue/characterization adheres RIGOROUSLY to their communication in canon in that dean’s not overtly emotional, and cas is very reserved. they have to negotiate their relationship exactly like they would in the show. it’s all clipped conversation and anger and hurt and (warning btw) LOTS of internalized homophobia on dean’s end but it’s SO worth it. dean navigating his [GESTURES VAGUELY] everything is compellingly written, emotionally true, and PERFECTLY characterized. cas characterization also amazing like u rlly feel the quiet devoted bittersweet love. ok this was long clearly it’s a good fic go read it now

Just as Dean knew they would, the weeks do stretch into months, and then into a year. Grief never gets easier, Dean knows from experience, but you do get better at it. After all, you can get used to anything.

the violin house by teh_helenables, 8.5k, post-s5. dean and cas build a home after stull. so slow and lovely and sweet and gentle. i need to put this here so that i don’t forget it tbh. it’s very much dean as a war wife cas as the husband away on the front

The Apple Pie Life is a slow process, but Dean and Cas are getting there—until Cas is called for battle and Dean is forced to wait.

💖 muscle memory by komodobits, 18.9k, au. amnesiac cas wakes up three years in the future with dean in his kitchen. komodobits DOES NOT FUCKING MISS!!! i CRIED at the end of this i had NO INTENTION OF CRYING the rest of the fic isn’t even SAD i just had to sit there at the end of it w tears dribbling down my face. INSANE work of art

Dear Castiel,

Hello – it’s Castiel. This must all seem very confusing, and I’m sorry for that. Dean says to tell you that this isn’t some kind of ‘time-travel stunt’, although I’m sure that won’t be your first thought. I know it wasn’t mine. I’ve told Dean to leave now, as this is my notebook and I want everything in it to come from me – or rather, from you. I know you think it's the fifteenth of January, 2010, but it isn't. At the time of my writing this, the date is the fourth of October, 2013. Dean Winchester is your boyfriend of a year and a half, and you no longer work at the library, and in early 2010 you were hit by a car and hospitalised. I’m sorry.

a.k.a the 50 First Dates Dean/Cas AU where Castiel wakes up on a day just like any other, except that three years have passed without his knowing, and Dean Winchester is in the kitchen wanting to marry him.

don’t forget the experience points by annie d (scaramouche), 10.8k, au. cas is sam’s work friend, and he and dean get to know each other. genuinely an adorable fic. i adore cas’ characterization in this it’s snarky AND awkward AND confident in a way that i absolutely believe he would be if he had 30 yrs of human life under his belt

It's because Dean was an awesome brother than he took such an interest in Sam's new friend. No, really. What happened afterwards was mostly an accident.

actus fidei by manic_intent, 5.6k, canonverse au. dean’s a priest, cas is still his angel. i was HOOKED from the description alone like That’s Everything I Love in One Sentence. Cool!!!!!!!!!!!!

On the very first time that Castiel manifests in front of Father Dean Winchester, he gets as far as "Rejoice, for you are blessed-" before Dean shoots him with a salt-loaded shotgun.

not with a bang but a yelp by strange_estrangement, 1.4k, canonverse. team free will leave yelp reviews. this isn’t d/c actually it’s just a crack-ish fic but the formatting is cool and the references are SO funny and so well done

What happens when you visit dozens and dozens of motels every year? You leave Yelp reviews.

the courtship of combat by bendingsignpost, 18.2k, medieval a/b/o au. cas is politically coerced into fighting in a courtship melee for prince dean's hand, and he teams up with two unexpected allies to do it. I KNOW HOW THE ABO THING SOUNDS but i swear it's done well - it's by bendingsignpost so ofc he puts his own spin on the premise. im absurdly into it. PLUS jack is in it!!!!!!! it's technically an unfinished series but the first part is so good just on its own

When pressed upon to mate for a political alliance, Commander Castiel dares to refuse his king. As “I do not wish to mate at all” is clearly the wrong thing to say, Castiel takes the other path and lies. “You must know my affections lie elsewhere, my king.”

King Michael studies Castiel’s face long and hard. Then, with a nod, he snaps his fingers, pointing to Castiel. “The Winchester omega.”

“Yes,” Castiel says with no real recollection of who that is.

The ruse of an unavailable omega works well enough, right up until that omega is no longer unavailable. Then, with what seems to be his entire nation cheering him on toward victory, Castiel must enter the melee to win his mate. Backed by allies, training, and his own natural talents, the only question is how well he can contrive to fail.

four letter word for intercourse by bendingsignpost, 194.7k, au. dean calls a sex hotline. OH BOY solid characterization excellent plot/premise like bendingsignpost is so good at turning absurd premises into realistic, believable fiction. also sex hotline fic is usually a BIG turn-off bc of the power dynamics/one-sidedness of a relationship based on sex work but. BUT. bendingsignpost does it well! it’s not weird at ALL i started reading and was immediately reassured abt its intentions and its plot direction

As a grease monkey turned college freshman, Dean's constantly three seconds away from being stressed out of his mind. It hardly helps that he's finally figuring out his sexuality in his thirties.

What might help with that stress is a little phone number (and a big credit card bill). If he can't figure out how to be bisexual in person, he can at least give it a go over the phone, right?

(It's probably a bad idea, but he really can't help himself.)

the tunnel of love by xylodemon, 21.4k, post-canon. case fic! dean and cas have to kiss on a loveboat to solve a case >:)

"We might," Cas starts slowly, pausing like he's choosing his words. "We might have to kiss."

Dean just stares at him.

when you have a future. by firebog, 17.6k, post-s8. dean and sam and cas learning to be human post-apocalypse. reminds me of robotmango’s writing! it’s kind of eccentric and very very sweet and funny.

Sam closes Hell. Castiel closes Heaven. The heroes save the day. There's no Heaven or Hell waiting to cause the next big disaster. There's no more end of the world. There's only a squirmy feeling in his chest that feels a lot like freedom. So, now what?

(Things I promise you in this fic: dog poetry, rabbits, and fluff)

six inch heels by alitneroon, 2.3k, canonverse. dean does drag! excellent fucking character study. prose is fantastic

Dean does drag on a whim, and ends up in way over his head.

sharing is caring by gateskeeper, 2.5k, canonverse. five times dean and cas shared something and one time they didn’t. look. sometimes u just need some saccharine tropey fluff. it’s VERY well written

Sam knows that Dean and Cas have shared a lot together, but ever since Cas became human permanently, it seems like they've been sharing a lot more.

Or: five times Dean and Cas shared something special and one time Dean refused to.

💖 empty spaces by schmerzerling, 60k, au. dean has to take care of his dying father, and takes up running to cope. that’s just the beginning. HEAVY trigger warnings for ED (specifically anorexia) and suicidal thoughts. there is a happy ending, but dean has to fight to make it there. god. okay. this is a dark fic. it’s also one of the most well-characterized fics i’ve ever read. dean’s spiral is excruciatingly accurate and written with the kind of wry compassion that comes from either extensive research or extensive experience. it’s also completely immersed in dean’s perspective - dean’s relationship w his dad, dean’s relationship w food scarcity, etc. it’s incredible. it’s kinda scary. it’s deeply sad. cas is explicitly autistic and it’s ALSO incredibly accurate and loving, and makes cas so true to his canon self. ugh. and i burst into TEARS at some of the accompanying art, which is so sparse and lonely and beautiful. 100/10 experience one of the best fics i’ve read this year

Dean is fine. The way he sees it, things are simple. He had a house and a family and food in his stomach, and now he doesn't. And yeah, that's a downer, but he's not going to let that stop him from being fine, because he's in control of the situation. He definitely doesn't need anyone to save him. And it's not like the weird guy with the nice butt from down the road is the knight-in-shining-armor type, anyway.

broken road by thegeminisage, 109.6k, 14x13 au. dean makes a wish and gets more than he bargained for. a lot of “john comes back” fics are kinda short on nuance, which this author has talked about a lot - and oh MAN does this fic deliver on nuance. john’s abuse is absolutely present, but his pov makes him a complex character instead of a flat caricature for dean to reject. and the way this fic resolves really makes it clear that the priority is dean’s emotional well-being over all else!!! this isn’t about dean taking the path fandom thinks he should take w his abuser (killing john, punching john in the face, etc), this is abt dean coming to terms w his abuse and finding his own emotionally satisfying way of resolving it. also dean and cas are in an established relationship and it’s very slow and sweet.

A 14.13 Lebanon rewrite. When Dean uses a wish-granting pearl to try and kill the archangel Michael before he can escape the cage in Dean's head, they instead wind up with a newly-resurrected John Winchester.

It's been more than a decade since John died, and a lot has changed: Mary is alive, Sam and Dean have what passes for a proper home in the Men of Letters Bunker, and they're living with angels. John doesn't know angels are real, he doesn't know about the fragile new relationship between Dean and Castiel, and most of all, he doesn't know that Dean said yes to Michael, or that Dean's plan to defeat Michael would send him to a fate worse than death.

Now Dean must contend with both his father asking questions he can't answer, and his loved ones learning about the darker truths of his childhood, all while constantly battling the archangel trapped inside him. But Dean coming to terms with his history may be the difference between this being the beginning of a journey—or the end.

home is not a place by imogenbynight, 6.8k, post-s11. human cas struggles with belonging, and dean struggles with their relationship. this reads a lot like komodobits’ cuckoo and nest, but it’s its own sweet little thing. they watch movies!!! very cute

In which Dean is the oblivious one for a change.

love: a retrospective by xylodemon, 40.7k, post-s12. dean tries to deal w cas’ absence after s12 and reflects on their relationship thru the years. this was written before s13 aired, so - no spoilers - but jack plays a different role than he ends up playing in canon. it’s kinda fun seeing ppl’s theories pre-s13 tbh. makes me VERY glad that they took jack in the direction they did in show. anyway this is THEE definitive “they’ve been fucking all along” fic

Pretending Cas is just his friend has been the only thing keeping Dean's head on straight for years. He never realized how much doing that depended on him making himself scarce in the morning ─ not until Cas came back and moved into the bunker.

✨💖 if it all fell to pieces tomorrow by spocklee, 37k, post-s15 fix-it. cas gets broken out of the empty - and he immediately makes a break for it. new fave fix-it!!!! the writing is so understated and so straightforward - SO in character for cas tbh - that every single emotional beat feels like a PUNCH. and there are so many amazing character moments it made my chest seize the fuck up!!!!! perfect characterization perfect relationship moments perfect cas/jack parenting moments. the yearning over the phone is OFF THE CHARTS and spocklee makes the most of that tension!!!! PLUS old canon characters get to make fun appearances!!!!! i cannot recommend this shit enough

After the Empty, Cas has to spend some time alone. Orpheus tries to convince Eurydice over the phone that it’s okay to turn around now.

✨ before and after breakfast by spocklee, 10.5k, post-canon. dean and sam and cas tackle a monster of the week case with unexpected consequences. perfect pov perfect relationship moments SUCH GOOD TENSION. again this writing style just lets the tension dial up to 1000% every word is meaningful and it makes my chest hurt!!! spocklee SHOULD have blown up during the spn renaissance and i STAND by that

The monster of the week is a ghost who hates meat, alcohol, and feeling yourself. Guess who it is during the commercials.

CLASSICS

isn't it cool how every person has diff fics they consider "classics?" anyway these are required fucking reading. if u've been around these will prob be old news.

💖 asunder by rageprufrock, 23k, au. dean and cas go to sam's wedding. i reread this once a year like a religious ritual.

Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. (Matthew 19:6)

💖 the girlfriend experience by rageprufrock, 15k, set during s5. dean teaches cas how to be human. mostly the sex part. literally the gold fucking standard of s4-5 era deancas fic and for deancas fic in general, personally

While it's not like Dean hasn't had a couple of truly regrettable hit-and-runs in his sexual history, this is probably the saddest fucking thing that has ever happened to him.

okay, cupid. by orange_crushed, 4.5k, au. dean tries to sign up for an ok cupid profile and has a revelation. as soon as i put this entry down i realized this entire fic rec was an exercise in futility, because if i could i'd literally just rec everything orange_crushed/robotmango has ever written. still one of THEE best authors in this fandom. go read all her fics. i’ll put the highlights here

"The dating thing?" Dean frowns. "Online dating is for weirdos. Robots. Dudes hanging out in their basements."

"You hang out in your basement."

"I have an air hockey table down there,” Dean says, icily.

💖 pwp: pie without plot by orange_crushed and majorenglishesquire, 82k, post-s8. sam and dean and cas quit hunting for a little bit to open a bakery. this is my comfort fic. i love it so so much.

he is in the kitchen with flour on his hands and an apron and there is flour on his forehead and cas leans across the counter and wipes it off with his thumb and dean says "thank you" and cas says "you’re welcome" very seriously and later dean makes apple turnovers and he only ruins them a little and sam realizes it’s not a real hunt like four days into it and he lets dean stay undercover for like a week and a half or longer maybe way longer because he is such a good everything

💖 la cucina by orange_crushed, 4k, post-s8. dean gets into cooking for a newly human cas. it's so gentle and loving and kind and makes me tear up every time. YES food is a comfort item and expression of love for dean. no i don't want to talk about it

Dean turns around and Castiel is picking through the jars, turning them over carefully to read the labels, totally engrossed. Dean watches him.

"Is there," Dean says, "uh, anything in there you like?" Castiel looks up at him and then back at the apples, sitting in a basket on the counter in their golden skins, ripe and pretty. Castiel smiles up at Dean.

"I don’t know yet," he says.

today, your barista verse by orange_crushed, 13.6k, coffeeshop au. a series of short sweet lovely fics where cas is a barista and dean is a smitten customer. literally the only coffeeshop au i respect

"Is that-"

"My number," says Dean, because he's a fucking champion, he's cool, he's collected, he's Captain Smooth of the USS Smoothtania, that's right. He is definitely not leaning against the counter for moral support. Cas doesn't looked seduced or impressed, though. He does not look like a dude who just met Captain Smooth and wants to ride the loveboat. He looks puzzled.

fata morgana. by orange_crushed, 6.6k, post-s9. dean is the king of hell. bela and cas team up to find him. bela pov. yeah you fucking heard that right BELA POV. BELA AND CAS!!!!!!!!!! makes me lose my mind i love everyone in this stupid desolate fucking hell wasteland.

The endless asphalt and broken road, the empty land and piles of human garbage, the unwanted ends of life, the cracked toys and broken screens and burning cars and gravel. Dean Winchester is the king of hell.

"Oh," says Bela.

That changes certain things.

💖 gran fury. by orange_crushed, 5k, pacific rim au. sam and cas pair up in a last ditch mission to save the world. permanently damaged me at age 15 and i've never recovered. major fucking angst warning.

They sit in silence and Castiel passes him the bottle. There’s not much left to say. Sam takes a gulp and it burns going down, like the cheap shit it is. He holds the bottle up against the light. He can see the Fury through it, distorted like a funhouse mirror. She’s a tomb but Sam loves her. Loves everything that’s left.

"To the end of the world," he says.

"To the end of the world," says Castiel.

💖 shut up (put your money where your mouth is) by kototyph, 24k, au. dean and cas get drunk married in vegas. dean renovates cas' house. this fic is SO MUCH BETTER than i remembered/expected and the entire series is fucking adorable go read it RIGHT now

Dean's done some pretty stupid things, but getting drunk-hitched in Vegas to a colleague he barely knows might just take the cake. His surprise husband, Castiel, is a little weird but likable despite that, and Dean figures they’ll go back to Boston, get a quiet annulment, and go their separate ways. Six weeks later, he’s still married to one of the strangest, most genuine and definitely most dangerously lov-- likable guys he's ever known. Dean doesn't know why or really even how it’s happening, but it’s getting harder and harder to remember that he has divorce papers to file.

not part of the plan by annie d (scaramouche), 338k, arranged marriage au. cas is slated to marry a noble from the winchester house. things spiral out of control. if you’re looking for an extensive well-developed political au, this is fucking it. i love reading about political machinations so this was FASCINATING to me.

Castiel's spent most of his adult life keeping his head down and staying out of trouble. This is a deliberate choice on his part, because as a cousin of the King, he'd rather stay unimportant and forgotten. This changes abruptly when King Michael decides that he has a better use for Castiel: he is to be wed to a noble member of the neighboring Republic, as part of an agreement between their two nations.

Castiel knows he has to obey, but that doesn't mean he won't rebel in what small ways he can. Unexpectedly, his actions end up having far-reaching consequences.

💖 all things shining by askance and standbyme, 142k, au. sam and dean and cas go on a hunt that's not really a hunt, and against all odds good things happen. it's beautifully written and has scenes that literally make my heart leap out of my chest with joy and awe it's just WONDERFUL it's a wonderful fic. incredible mythology too omg i found that the authors actually created the myth the entire story is based on - like they don’t pull a random one from history, they made one up THEMSELVES. they even self-published it on amazon if ur curious

Something in the world is waking up.

It isn’t long before it’s brought to the attention of the Winchesters and Castiel: miracles are spreading across the country, the paranormal seems to be shrinking back on itself—and it all has something to do with the missing prayer book of a traveling preacher who died over a century ago.

Dean is convinced it’s all the lead-up to another Apocalypse; Sam and Castiel aren’t so sure. Regardless, it sends them out on a less-than-typical road-trip, following the Mississippi and remnants of a very old story that seems increasingly to call to them. And along the way the trio learn much more about themselves—and the consequences and origins of love—than they’d ever have anticipated.

💖 broadway musical by griftings, 12.4k, crack. romcom where cas is supposed to play matchmaker to dean and jo and well. you know. it actually made me cackle out loud when i read it again so you know it's still good. absolutely one of the funniest fics i’ve read

This is the day that marked the Holy and Blessed Union of Dean Winchester and Jo Harvelle.

The merging of prominent bloodlines is always a grand occurrence, but breeding pedigree hunter families like Winchester and Harvelle is something to be rejoiced. It is also something to be meticulously planned, which thankfully the Host is very good at.

Or, the romantic comedy where Dean Winchester and Jo Harvelle are destined to get married, Castiel is given the task of playing matchmaker and fails terribly, the entire Heavenly Host becomes a sitcom audience, God warns against male pregnancy, and Jimmy Novak is incredibly unimpressed with angels in general.

the five people you meet in heaven by chevrolangels, 22k, ambiguously canonverse. dean dies and goes to heaven and meets five people from his life. NOT a post-finale fic but still horrifically sad. i remember sobbing hysterically when i first read this so

Heaven is white.

Well. Isn’t that fucking stereotypical.

Dean isn’t really sure how he got here. Or even why he’s here. And hell, for all the times the Winchesters have died, he thinks he ought to know the drill by now. But what he doesn’t know is when most folks go, they find something different.

There’s a system God put in place. That when you’re gone (for good), there are a couple things you gotta do first. There are five people waiting for you.

They are the five people you meet in heaven.

any port in a storm by microcomets, 53k, post-s8. dean and cas go on a haunted cruise for a case. you know what happens next. also the art is by anobviousaside and it's gorgeous

The angels have fallen, leaving Castiel graceless and Dean with, well, more of other people’s problems. When a string of couples goes missing on the east coast, Dean and Cas decide to investigate—and find themselves trapped and hunted on a couples’ counseling cruise. Although battling monsters at sea is dangerous enough, sorting through emotional baggage proves to be far more deadly. (And, in which Cas embarks to find his missing grace and Dean is put out. Not necessarily in that order.)

a turn of the earth by microcomets, 95k, pre-canon au. cas is on the run from the empty and crash lands in dean's life. at one point he punches john in the face. a fucking beautifully written character study of pre-canon dean, honestly.

Dean’s your typical half-orphaned, monster-killing 22-year-old until a trenchcoated stranger crashes into his back windshield one September night, claiming he’s an angel that knows him from the future and that he’s on the run.

Frigging fantastic.

(Or, in which Castiel gets stuck in Dean’s timeline preseries and Dean kind of hates it—until he doesn’t.)

unfinished duet by microcomets, 5.8k, canonverse. sam observes dean and cas throughout the years. i remember this breaking my heart back in 2013!

Sam watches Dean and Cas over the years and notices a few things. (Or, Dean and Cas unscripted.)

💖 ergative/absolutive by glassedplanets, 8k, college au. dean and cas are best friends who meet in an astronomy class. i'm never not thinking about this fic it's so sweet and the friends to lovers is so soft and believable

He really shouldn’t be thinking thoughts like this about his best friend who literally just broke up with his girlfriend, but he knows he’ll blame it on sleepiness in the morning. He always does.

a certain light by flightagain, 24k, au. cas works at the gas n sip. dean is a customer. this author’s writing style is so lonely and heavy but it’s very lovely

Castiel works at the Gas-n-Sip. There are half-price nachos and flickering lights, there are office-workers and werewolves stopping by for snacks. Dean is a frequent customer, and his office might be haunted.

the one thing you can’t lose by majorenglishesquire, 5k, ambiguously canonverse. dean can pull cas around and it’s adorable. character study-ish. very sweet.

You know what I like a lot? The thought that Dean can just tug Cas anywhere at any time and Cas, who can lift tons without effort, who can demolish things with the light of his grace, who has battled and gone to war, has defended and broken, will just let Dean do it.

brother lover by twentysomething, 4k, set during s4/s5. dean’s jealous of sam and cas’ budding relationship. this fic is so tropey but it does it well and it’s funny as fuck

However- and it doesn't happen a lot- they have to invoke 'I saw her first.’

his fucking kids by 8sword, 3k, canonverse au. dean and cas raise claire and emma together. yes, claire novak. yes, emma of 7x13 spice girls fame. this was the first kidfic i read for spn i think. obvs written before jack or claire actually came back into the picture but it was the TEMPLATE of kidfic for me for ages

Jesus, the school should just have a parking spot labeled, “Reserved for the Novak-Winchesters,” because Dean’s getting sick of having to cruise around the parking lot looking for a spot every time he gets a call from the principal about Emma.

💖 what has eight tentacles and isn’t allowed to eat pie? by annie d (scaramouche), 16k, post s8. dean gets turned into an octopus. another fic that was SO MUCH BETTER than i remembered i fucking love when that happens. it isn’t even about dean being an OCTOPUS like NO. NOT EVEN. it’s ACTUALLY about the bunker and building a home and a community and a family and about PHYSICAL COMFORT and you can actually feel the world expanding at the end of this fic like a gusty sigh of relief it’s SO WONDERFUL. kevin is in this fic. ellie is too and i had to look her up but THIS is her!!!! danay garcia u were too hot to stay on this show but i love you and miss u

Dean watched an anime porn about this once, but real life turns out to be way less interesting.

Or, the one where Dean gets turned into an octopus.

💖 a beginner’s guide to communing with the dead by suspiciousflashlight, 77k, canonverse au. dean is a cop who summons a powerful entity to help him solve a cold case. oh my god i can’t believe i didn’t put this on here i love this one so much. the writing bowls me over it’s so confident in its worldbuilding like you’re IMMEDIATELY plunged into dean’s pov (FLAWLESSLY executed throughout the fic btw) and you just learn about the world as you go!! and it’s such a fascinating world!!! i love the magic i love the typical bureaucratic red tape procedures i love normalizing the supernatural. i ESPECIALLY love monsters as normal people in a society. at one point there’s this exchange

“Monsters,” says Cas finally. “Beyond the Wall there are monsters.” “You mean, like, vampires and djinn and stuff?” Cas shakes his head. “Those aren’t monsters, those are just people.”

those lines have stayed with me for years. i think about them every time i rewatch an episode of spn.

Maybe it's the little girl whose disappearance turned into a murder, and whose murder turned into a cold case, and who has now apparently decided to move in with him. Maybe it's the unacceptable hole left in his life when his dumb best friend and partner in (the prevention of) crime decided to go and get himself killed. Maybe it's his brother, whose high-profile career and fantastic girlfriend and first-child-on-the-way are steadily leaving Dean in the dust. Pick one. Pick all of them. The why doesn't matter so much as the what, and the what is this: Dean is pretty sure he's going completely, certifiably insane. Sure, he hasn't started wearing all his clothes inside out, and he still showers on a regular basis (anyways, that's not crazy, just a little eccentric); but there's no getting around the fact that he just threw away his life, his career, and his reputation by dragging out his mom's old necromancy book and summoning a Class A Forbidden Entity to his attic. A cranky one, too. With horrendous bed-head.

dean’s list by almaasi, 3k, canonverse. dean makes a list. short and sweet. i read this so much in 2015 that it literally got engraved into my brain line by line and rereading it caused synapses to fire that havent felt anything in years

Dean writes out a list of men he would go gay for. Sam has a suggestion to make.

💖 the path of fireflies by museaway, 63.7k, post-s8. dean and cas open a charming bed and breakfast in vermont. no, literally. another CLASSIC. i think about the food in this fic all the time...........maple bacon baked french toast......the cinnamon rolls.....it literally sounds so good

After his humanity is restored, Dean wakes up in bed with Castiel, a wedding ring, and no memory of the past twelve years.

long nights in cold months by pyrebi, 2.3k, au. dean’s an insomniac and cas works at walmart. i forgot i had this fic ALSO basically memorized. holy shit. pineapple in the fruit aisle.....................anyway it’s short and sweet and the “plot” resolves in such a satisfying way

When you're an insomniac, you get used to the "what the hell are you doing up, man?" look. Dean just hopes the guy who's stocking the shelves will stop giving it to him long enough to help him find some damn pineapple.

incredibly single & ready to mingle by imogenbynight, 3.6k, au. dean and cas meet on facebook. short cute au!!!!!!

Sam uses Facebook like the social media junkie he is. He's befriended literally every person he's ever had a conversation with since he got an account, which means that approximately—Dean checks—eight hours ago, he shared this horrible photo with something in the vicinity of nine hundred people. The caption below the picture reads “incredibly single & ready to mingle ;)” and roughly half of them have liked it.

Dean has never been so embarrassed in his life.

💖 unknown quantities by xylodemon, 8.5k, post-s8. after a post-case tryst, dean has to figure out his and cas’ relationship. human cas fics hold a special place in my heart. funny AND good dean pov AND a misunderstanding that i actually think works!!!!!

No one ever tells Dean anything.

(or: Dean Winchester and the not-relationship crisis of 2014)

#spn fic #spn #dean x cas #this is horrifically long actually.

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cafeanna · 4 years

Text

An Unorganized List of Fanfic That Lives in My Brain Rent-Free

(chosen based on how immediately I remembered everything and how often I think about them, but again in no order w/ vague descriptions and rambles):

@sephmeadowes So, this part is a bit of a blurb, but I just love everything Seph writes. I recently provoked her into writing Moonshine which is Lauren/Emmett, and of course, I will plug her newest work Impossible the prequel to her breakdown of vampire lore in Twilight, as well as being Jessica/Edward. Jess won’t let Edward live. No Bella. She does the most. We don’t deserve it.

Also, one million invisible lines bc Caroline and Kol is a ship I associate solely with Seph and she wrote them in every situation beautifully. Also, she took my requests and let me annoy her for the next couple years XD

what’s the story, morning glory? @highgaarden. The TVD & Gossip Girl crossover that I never knew I needed. It’s just so much fun to read. Absolutely delightful. So much so, I used the word delightful. Basically, Nate and Elena are getting married and everyone rises up to put a stop to it. Just the sheer amount of times I read this just to giggle at the same jokes over the years is something else. It’s such an interesting and in character take, it’s truly like the shows blended.

Marrow @actuallydeglace – Naruto: Sakura/Kimimaro. Like?? I didn’t know I needed Kimimaro and Sakura to slowly but beautifully fall in love in Orochimaru’s underground bunker, but now I do? Also, (I know you get this a lot) they single-handedly made me ship both KimiSaku AND KabuSaku? I should be making FUN of Kabuto, not shipping him with Sakura?? Who are you?? Inspired me so much and captivated my attention for weeks.

Bloodsport by vioxxin on ff.net – Tokyo Ghoul: Hide/Kaneki. Like, the only Hide/Kaneki fic I need in my cold heart. It’s been unfinished, but I just have such love for this fic and the author’s descriptions and Hide/Kaneki’s relationship when they haven’t gone to school together, but Kaneki is still a ghoul. I’m not giving it justice, just read it. Sometimes I just reread scenes.

Prime Cut @provocative-envy – HP: Hermione/Scabior. I didn’t know I needed Hermione asking Scabior to be her date to her best friend’s wedding, yet here we are. I’ve read this probably ten times. Envy’s mind is big-brain all the time. Best ideas. Best HP crackships. And GoT ships too!

Green Girl @colubrina – HP: Hermione/Draco. But when I say RENT FREE, I mean, Colubrina has written so many wonderful HP fics, but Green Girl is just holds a special place in my heart. I reread it at the beginning of quarantine. I love Slytherin Hermione and her relationship with Draco, the give and take of the other Slytherins, the way events of the story shift and politics. I love wizard politics. I wish Colubrina nothing but perfect happiness for this fic alone.

Cancel On Me by Purrugly on ff.net – Teen Wolf: Erica Reyes-centric. I love Erica Reyes to this day and only wish we could have gotten more time with her character bc this was PEAK, I say PEAK Erica Reyes content for me. It was such a good breakdown for a character that got so little attention.

The Veil Between @ohmoka – BNHA: TogaChako. Hi moka, SO, my very first Togachako! It seemed so obvious, I love Ochako and I love Toga, of course, I should ship them. However, I didn’t want to, but this fic slowly broke me down and I just fell in love with the idea of them together. The slow turn over of their relationship and spending Halloween together in a graveyard. Inspired me to write my own TogaChako.

All the Ashes in My Wake @modernart2012 – BNHA: NatShig. This feels like a classic to me, honestly. It’s that trope of fake identities and romance, Shigaraki pretends to be someone else to date Natsuo for nefarious means, but feelings start to creep in. ALSO, the first Natshig fic I’ve ever read, so ModernArt, I blame you. I do. It’s been stuck in my mind like a staple ever since. I love it.

take heart (you’re all that I can see) @bittermoonswrites – BNHA: NatShig. Sup? Anyway, THIS NatShig just made me so happy. Moon’s writing is so nice and fluid, I don’t know how they do it. Shigaraki as a ballet dancer is a plus and I loved watching the relationship blossom and develop. Also, the ending which I had to read twice before I could possibly review. I can not wax enough about it, just all the subtle nuances caught me completely.

Red Spider Lilies @seiyuna – HXH: KuroKura. Ohmigod, oh-kay. So, didn’t know I would ever ship this, but now I do and I am absolutely in love with seiyuna’s other krkr works. Just . . . this reincarnation au hits me so different; I love the vignettes. I can feel an epic soundtrack in the background every time these characters look at each other. Also, seiyuna’s smut scenes are just phenomenal.

Chlorine @itsillumi – HXH: KuroKura. So, yeah. This stole my teeth. I can’t bite into anything else for a week. Like, these characters speak and it sears my soul. Chapter one is called flatline and I damn near almost did. I laid on my living room carpet with the Cat for an hour after finishing the last update. I choose death.

[if i tagged you and you don’t want to be tagged let me know.]

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anakinthetrashking · 4 years

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yo! you just read the queen's thief series? :0 i am a long-time fan and would LOVE to hear any of your feelings about it (also, have you seen the discord server bc its pretty active and fans always love more fans if discord servers are your thing :)

So, you'll have to forgive how LATE this reply is, it's been a mixture of busy-school-semester-quarantine-social-burnout and tumblr deleting my replies when I tried to save them to continue writing later!! But it's now 3am and my brain won't stop thinking about Queen's Thief, so it's the best time to reply, really! (But I really do appreciate you sending in this ask to let me rant about TQT!!!!! AHFKSISJ replying is just hard sometimes lol)

So because I'm terribly long winded and because spoilers!!! For a few people who follow me who haven't read it/or haven't finished reading it, the rest is under the readmore!

Where to begin. So my blog says I just read it but I realized that's a little bit of a lie now? I read the first five books for the first time at the end of Dec 2019, and the beginning of January 2020! I had seen the name of the series around before, around Tumblr bc of a few people I'm following, in regards to a Batfam fic by lurkinglurkerwholurks, ( this one: Breathing )who is ALSO a longtime TQT fan! I reread her Batfam fic after reading the Queen's Thief series and it hit SOOOOOOOOO much harder. Really brilliant. But that last straw was getting an email saying that one of my other all time fav fic writers was writing a fic for TQT. I saw that email and basically immediately downloaded The Thief on my library app 😂 (i needed to be able to read the fic!!! And I'm soooooo glad I: a) read the series before reading the fic, therefore not spoiling anything and b) was able to read the fic because holy cow does it live rent free in my brain. It's Ere by audreycritter btw)

Anyhow, I absolutely DEVOURED the books. I read one after another and then ended up rereading the first three again more slowly over the course of that spring semester. I started drawing again, listened to a good amount the Attolian Archives podcast, reblogged and MADE!! ART!! and m e m es, died when MWT REBLOGGED ONE OF MY MEMES AND SAID IT MADE HER LAUGH, recommended the series to a bunch of people and got several to at least *start* reading the series! I haven't gotten seratonin from books like this since early high school ten years ago! 🤣

Plus the fandom is SO SWEET!!!! And MWT is so engaging!!!! I love that she lets us play in her sandbox! It's like she made a fully furnished dollhouse complete with dolls but she lets us continue to decorate it and build on it and move the dolls around, and then she comes up and gives us compliments on the little things we've done!!! 🥺😭💞

Oh but the books themselves!!! They dig their spots in my heart deeper everytime I read them!!! I don't think Ive ever read a series that I enjoy more every time I reread it. I'm looking forward to rereading this last book, bc I know that the only one that I was obsessed with the first read through was QoA. All the others I liked the first time I read it, but I wasn't in LOVE with them, you know? But when I went back to read them a second time I LOVED THEM. Its like a riptide that you kick around in the shallows the first time around, and then the next time suddenly you're sucked out to sea???

It feels like the pages hold secrets that need to be teased out. The dialogue is SO FUN. It has suspense but not so much that you're stressed. It's so balanced. It has lines that make you put the book down and have to just, do a lap.around the block because they really said that. THEY REALLY SAID THAT. "Diplomacy, in my own name." SHE REALLY SAID THAT. The symbolism, the foreshadowing, I'm OBSESSED! THE CHARACTERS!!!! THE LOYALTY!!!!! What i wouldn't do to have that sort of loyalty written into some of the other fandoms that I'm in. And the TEnderNESS. The way Gen interacts with others??? The way he loves so.wholly? With his entire self??? The way that it's sorta slowburn found family before tumbling into found family all at once in a way that isn't slowburn at all?? I'm pulled in by Gens tricks every time. The storytwists surprised me but made sense. The writing was enjoyable to get lost in. I think of the way that Gen sits at Irene's feet and looks up at her with eyes full of love, how he sits like a printers apprentice in a chair but sits like a king while sick/hurt in his bed, I think about the way he pushed Relius's hair back and kissed him on the forehead, how Relius said he would still crawl back to his Queen and Gen said me too, the difference between my Queen and my King and your Majesty 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺 the way Helen says that Sophos basically has Gens heart in his hands, the way that all four of them are entwined together. I think about these books and I'm filled with YEARNING

Uh, No thoughts, head empty except for squeeing about TQT. This isn't even like,,,,,, idk a quarter of it??? There's so much more but it's all so hard to put into words, a lot of it is just me yelling incoherently because I'm overwhelmed! And when I string words together it's, well. All over the place! 😂

As for the discord thing, I've seen the link around! I'm uh, Not Great(tm) at being social, and so the discord is a leeeeetle daunting, haha. But I have considered it, especially because I have an... Interesting fic idea that I wanted to drop into the pool of other TQT fans to see their reactions. It's... a little bit evil...

Thanks again for the ask!

#tqt #the queen's thief #queen's thief #i would hand him my heart on a toothpick if he asked 🥺#an appropriate tag for this!#ive been feeling unnecessarily guilty about this unanswered ask for months RIP #ive WANTED to answer it!!! but my brain kept latching onto other things bc ADHD and also anxiety keeps me from doing most things lol #excuses excuses #i did enjoy writing this all out tho!#ive been waiting on like 4 different friends to get further in the books (aka past a CERTAIN POINT) so i could scream about stuff with them #so i totally am for wanting to hear the thoughts of someone new to it and if i think of more later ill add more #uh does that make any sense..? it was trying to be thank you for letting me rant about my new obsession and i get where youre coming from in #wanting to hear someone new rant about your old obsession???#ok maybe i need to sleep now #im so 🥺😭💞🥺😭💞🥺😭💞🥺 about TQT tho #mwt #megan whalen turner

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thaliatimsh · 4 years

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So I saw your meme about the eucharist monologue, which I loved, but the possibility of George Hodgson being autistic has lived in my head rent free ever since I saw it. It fits his behaviors so well, and to this date has been one of the most galaxy brain takes I have ever seen. I was wondering, if you don't mind of course, explaining your take on it some. I would really appreciate it!

of course! I have to say it is.... mostly just a gut instinct based on my own experiences as an autistic person with variously autistic family members (but all falling under the bracket in ASD that used to be called Asperger’s so my view is coloured by that.) and... UH, I just... feel like I recognise.

(opens UnfinishedHodgsonEssayThree.doc)

okay I am once again REALLY BAD at explaining myself, but I guess what I mean is that I can see where every mental leap Hodgson makes comes from - that he is, at his core, a man who is extroverted and friendly, wants more to be *liked* than admired - but for whom social skills don’t come naturally, and other outcomes aren’t imagined.

We catch him time and again exposition/info dumping -

+’the xing mission came aboard’ from the alternate wardroom cut - an event he was PRESENT FOR but still tells like a rote fact

+’they say she talked up a storm until her father died’

+’the word diet -’

+intro to the Comanches Bit= ‘my mother’s cousin had a relation who married Texas man, moved to a territory town there called Victoria in ‘38′... ALL OF THIS UNNECESSARY PREAMBLE

making poorly-timed/not relateable/barely-relevant/professionally inappropriate jokes

+’now she’s ~~all silence~~” @ random AB

+’they must we waltzing with that bear after all’ re: a crisis

+’[frostbite is worse because] I play the clavier back home’ @ random Marine/ship’s boy/AB re: ‘sir there is a monster out here’

+’hear hear’ about the pudding that used up their fruit

+’when the ship sets sail, make sure you’re aboard’ @ a rando caulker’s mate

+’would that be rocks here, then?’ re: caribou tastes of what it eats

+’[the beard] can’t hurt where we’re going’ @ rando caulker’s mate (??) who’s just shown aSTONISHING disrespect

+’dis-moi ce que tu manges’ @ rando NOT-caulker’s mate-turned-Godkin re: man-eating monster

PLUS a few barely-relevant personal anecdotes told more to himself than anyone else (Comanches bit/American Ham/Eucharist Monologue) - and yeah, Ep8 and The Comanches Bit in particular are what cements my opinion, which, I mean, from the top:

Little & Hodgson charge into the tent and give this absolutely confident rundown of what happened, and then we watch the surety in Hodgson’s entire bearing leave as crozier, fitzjames & blanky take him off-script. He'd known what he was doing, because he'd taken the situation at face value -

'those dastardly natives committed unspeakable acts on lt irving and mr farr! I know so because mr hickey saw it! we retaliated!'

and crozier & fitzjames would finally go 'well done george, quick thinking.'

but they don't! There are other questions! questions he's not prepared for - questions that take processing time, questions he doesn't even seem to understand why they're being asked - he hadn't previously asked them because Mr Hickey Saw Dastardly Natives Cut Lt Irving's Cock And Balls Off - when Crozier says 'I want to see the bodies' and leaves Hodgson behind in the tent, he looks utterly baffled. He's missed something, clearly, but he has no clue what it is.

We know what he's asking Little, and we know it's unfair to even pose the question to another officer - I'm getting the sinking feeling that I've fucked up - did I do the right thing? would YOU have done what I did?

and he'd take ANY ANSWER to ANY of those questions, - you've done something terrible, you're going to hell - you were right, those dastardly natives had it coming - I don't know, but I'd probably have done the same thing - but instead gets Edward Little 'If that's what you thought at the time, then that's what you thought!' it's fucking MEANINGLESS and VAGUE, Edward, listen, do you even understand why I thought what I thought? I know all about Dastardly Natives, they'll kill women and children and they'll kill us too, do you understand, do you understand, are you understanding -

And then he understands, from one bit of seal meat, barely digested - you can almost see it happen in his mind’s eye, moving the little markers of the characters around, slotting the real story back together - he must have been alone with Mr Farr - but no-one’s interested in that. all they want to know is if he’ll confirm it, and of course he will. it’s the truth.

I know it’s very funny to say Hodgson’s bad at his job but until that entire debacle... he really wasn’t. Yes, he let EC in, but the fact that he had even the SLIGHTEST inkling that EC and Hickey weren’t the same, after a single meeting of a few minutes with the first, during which time he spent most of his time writing, a month apart from the previous - I???? All that scene does is show that Hodgson has a near-preternatural memory for faces (he greets Morfin by name before getting his papers) and a non-confrontational manner.

I’ve written at length about how I think Hodgson models the social standings between the men as something like school; Crozier’s Headmaster, and Fitzjames is his teacher, and Edward’s Head Boy, and he is a prefect who is going to keep the separation between student body and staff quiet. He isn’t a Captain - he’s a Lieutenant, a prefect, a fellow student who thinks he’s better than a fellow student because the Headmaster gave him power, and when he ends up with the Rowdy Boys Mutiny Crew there’s this explicit Othering that’s... let’s be real, fully schoolyard Weird-Kid Bullying - you sit on a barrel, you get a nice china plate, you get threatened by Des Voeux because Goodsir won’t cut up the dead guy -

I don’t know. I’m totally aware that this whole thing might sound insane and the problem with Readings of Media is that they're subjective... BUT

The show was careful about how it used the names (& therefore lasting immortal images) of the men on the ship’s roster - they were real people, with loved ones and lives, and they were victims of a disaster. The entire message of the show is that W. H. Auden line: We Must Love Each Other And Die. The only character who did Unforgivably Bad Things was swapped out for an OC out of respect for that, so building some bizarro conspiracy of Personal Evil around a character who seems to just be doing their best, though weirdly - is just plain rude, and insulting to the writing, frankly.

SO, as with every character in this show, it behooves you to give the benefit of the doubt - and the benefit of the doubt leads me to “Hodgson is autistic”

#george hodgson #I'm SO SORRY this got so long and doesn't make much sense #he's weird and he looks like a haunted china doll but he's not bad.... the whole point of the show is that no-one's Bad............#hodgson tag:#that's my baby officer!#insane character essay tag

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kvhottie · 5 years

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A love that’s like glowing tinder in a slow-building fire. It isn’t until Yuki and Nico become roommates that they realize that the signs were always there.

Rating: Explicit |Pairing: NicoYuki |Tags: Post-Canon, Living Together, Feelings Realization, Light smut

[Ao3]

________________

“Do you want to live together?”

Nico rushed through the question, not even offering Yuki a greeting when he picked up the phone. It made Yuki pause, mind loading for a brief second. The thought of them living together wasn’t displeasing. Over the last year they’d grown apart because Yuki had been working hard in his yearlong internship at the Legal Research and Training Institute and Nico was determined to actually graduate this time around. But they had shared drinks and dinner every few months in an attempt to keep their friendship as strong as their busy schedules would allow them. Nico was the closest he’s ever had to a true friend. Plus, Yuki was already looking for an apartment since he was done with his internship, and in turn his stay at the Institute’s dormitory. The timing was perfect. “Sure, let’s do it,” he nonchalantly replied, and the deal was sealed.

The first few weeks of living together were rocky—Yuki was particular, detailed-oriented, and pristine. Nico was, well, “clean enough” as he would call it. But with some practice Nico learned to pay a bit more attention to where he put grocery items in the fridge and to properly clean the bathroom sink when he finished shaving. And Yuki practiced not popping a blood vessel over every misaligned mug and the occasional sweater Nico left hanging over the back of the couch. It was all a work in progress. By the sixth month mark they were synchronized and living surprisingly well together. They took turns making dinner (though they scarified their stomachs more than a few times to get to this point of basic culinary skill) and shared each other’s company for early breakfast or very late dinner. With Yuki working as a rookie lawyer in the acclaimed TMI Associates Law Firm and Nico having landed a software development job with Panasonic, they both spent most of their time during the weekday at work. But the little bits of free time they had, like on the weekend and the few blessings of vacation, they spent it together doing a varied mix of activities. Running was one of the activities they did together most often. Though usually initiated by Nico, Yuki easily went along with his suggestion to do a leisurely Saturday and Sunday morning run. Neither had completely lost the fire for running they had gained (or rekindled in Nico’s case) under Haiji’s influence. It had died down to just a small, warm blaze present in their hearts, but it was there nonetheless—sparking a tiny, breathy smile during every run. They also passed their time sitting at their dinner table, chatting about work or anything interesting they’d heard from the news, and twisting those weird metal dolls Nico started making after he quit smoking. Yuki no longer made any profit from selling them online, but he started an Instagram account for them out of respect for the huge collection Nico had accumulated. The account had a loyal fifty-seven followers and was steadily rising. Apart from that, they each had their own pastimes. Nico’s were focused around being indoors with his laptop or TV, and Yuki’s consisted of going to the club or a concert. There was a brief period during the first few months of them living together that Yuki spent every other night giving Nico a sampling of his favorite electronica music. He even dragged Nico along with him to the club once—only for Nico to last a total of forty-five minutes before bailing. After that experience Nico drew the line at listening to Yuki’s music at home whenever he wanted to share it, but absolutely no clubs. And so Yuki continued attending the club alone, as he had always done. But there were nights that he’d return with someone else, mostly women, and a sprinkling of men. Since graduating university he had been introduced to an array of experiences, a majority of them pleasant, and had quickly learned that as long as he found the person attractive, he had no preference as to whom he was sleeping with. There was just one rule: he wanted no attachments and therefore would only sleep with a person once. He had no time or patience to deal with other people’s emotions. He barely had time to put up with his own. “The guy you brought yesterday was a jerk,” Nico commented offhandedly while they ate breakfast. Nico was generally indifferent to Yuki bringing strangers to the apartment. And it was only fair. They were splitting the rent equally and it was in Yuki’s right to do whatever he wanted in his own room. But still, Nico had never even once complained, neither about the frequency nor the mixed gender of his partners. Yet…recently, there was an expression that overcame Nico’s face every time Yuki brought someone home that Yuki couldn’t put his finger on. It was one he had never seen before, and had since burned into his mind. Some nights he’d even purposefully meet eyes with Nico when coming in the door with yet another stranger—just to see if he could catch a glimpse of that expression again. The look on Nico’s face at the moment was awfully similar. “Really?” Yuki replied in between bites of his sausage. “Did he say something rude to you?” Nico sighed and set his empty coffee mug down. “He bragged and babbled a bit too many details about you.” “That piece of shit…” Yuki muttered under his breath, only to shrug a moment after. “Well, I’m not surprised.” “The majority of people you sleep with are jerks.” Nico set his chopsticks down and met Yuki’s eyes. “Shouldn’t you be more wary of who you bring over?” Yuki narrowed his eyes and sucked his teeth, straightening his back. “I’m just fucking them, Nico. And I only see them once. I could care less about their personalities.” He picked up his mug to finish his coffee and took a few sips before continuing. “Anyway, it’s none of your business who I sleep with.” Nico blinked a few times and nodded, eyes and lips curving downward. “Okay, then.” Without another word he got up from their low table, washed his dishes, and headed back to his room to dress for work. Yuki stared down at his plate, half of his brain cells calling himself an asshole and the other half reassuring him that he hadn’t been that harsh. Nico normally took Yuki’s sass and threw it right back at him, but for some reason that didn’t happen this time. It’s not as if he was psychic and could predict when his sass was going to affect Nico or not. So it wasn’t his fault. But regardless of Yuki’s thoughts on the matter, for a week or so after that morning, Nico started mildly avoiding him. He’d still say good morning and respond when Yuki addressed him, but he all of a sudden was rushing out the door in the mornings without having breakfast, falling sleep before Yuki got home, or getting home after Yuki fell asleep. Yuki was fuming—the mere fact that Nico thought he wasn’t being blatantly obvious made his eye twitch. Since he first met Nico, Yuki had the uncanny ability to always tell when something was off with him, and he could never leave it alone. But he was stubborn, and confronting Nico on this matter would be like losing out in some sort of way. So he just let it continue, irritation simmering under his skin. ________________

The waitress brought Yuki and his coworker, Fumi, their second round of drinks. Yuki reached over for his whiskey highball, lips cracking into a smile as Fumi continued his rambling story. “And then the chief practically ate him alive. He was so livid that a senior lawyer would do such a stupid mistake,“ Fumi exclaimed, sitting back on his chair with a satisfied smile. “You’re working on the Tamaki case with the chief, right? He must be a hard-ass about everything.” “He’s not that bad. I actually enjoy how fastidious he is.” Fumi scoffed, “It’s because you’re just as anal. Did you know that the meticulous way you organize your pens has gained notoriety and people pass by your desk just to see it?” “I just like things to be neat.” Yuki shrugged, swirling the ice in his drink. “My life would be easier if more people around me functioned at this level but—“ Yuki’s stopped mid-sentence, eyes darting to his phone that had just buzzed and lit up with a message. He didn’t even have to unlock the phone to read the entirety of the text. From Nico: Do you think we should stop living together? But he unlocked his phone anyhow, wondering if there was more to the text—an explanation of some sort. There was nothing. So Yuki read the text message over a few more times, getting increasingly more upset and self-deprecating with each pass. Of course, it was only a matter of time until Nico got tired of him. He had been nothing but an understanding friend and roommate, and was just worried for him; yet Yuki chewed up his kindness and spit it back out with not even one apology to spare. He didn’t blame Nico. Even he’d get tired of himself. “Hey, Yuki!” Yuki looked up from his phone to Fumi fervently waving his hand at his face. “Oh. Yeah, sorry. I was just reading a text.” “You okay? You got all serious and then zoned out. I’ve been calling you for like a good minute.” “Well, if all of a sudden wanting to get smashed constitutes as fine,” Yuki waved down the waitressed, “then I am excellent.” It took about three more rounds. By the time the waitress hesitantly returned with the 6th round Yuki had demanded, the room was spinning. He had promised Fumi that this one for sure would be the last, but Fumi forced the drink out of his hand and chugged it, just so that it wouldn’t touch Yuki’s babbling lips. “Give me your phone,” he ordered, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “There’s no way you’re getting home alone in this state.” “No. I’ll be fine if I rest a bit,” Yuki slurred as he set his head on the table. “Just give me fifteen minutes…” The next time his eyes creaked open, he was being carried on a firm, wide back. It smelled of shampoo, strong coffee, and home. “Nico?” Yuki croaked, face lifting just enough off of Nico’s shoulder to catch a glimpse of his tussled hair. Nico gave a small chuckle that Yuki could feel against his chest. “We’re almost to the apartment, drunkard. You sound terrible.” “Sorry I’m useless.” Yuki murmured, burying his face into Nico’s neck. “You’re the farthest from that. I actually wish you’d be useless more often, maybe that way you’d rely on me a bit more.” “You’ve never mentioned that before.” “…There’s a lot I don’t tell you.” Yuki slid off Nico’s back the instant they were inside their apartment. He tripped climbing up from the entryway but Nico caught him before he planted face first. He insisted he was fine walking on his own and clumsily made his way to their kitchen to get himself a glass of water. Having forgotten where they stored the cups in his drunkenness, he opened each cabinet in search for one. “It’s your fault I’m drunk, you know,” he sputtered, pointing accusingly at the approaching Nico. ”How is it my fault?” Yuki finally found the right cabinet and grabbed a glass cup, stumbling over to the sink. “Your stupid text!” he yelled. “You sent me that stupid text and I was so angry that I got drunk. So it’s you’re fault.” He tried opening the sink faucet but was turning the nob the wrong way. Nico reached for the faucet nob to turn it on for him, “Here, let me—“ “No.” Yuki said sternly, shoving Nico’s hand away. He set his cup aside and gripped the edge of the sink. “I don’t need your help. So you’re free to move out whenever you want. I know that I’m horrible to live with and I’m always being rude to you. You should have told me much earlier that you’d gotten tired of me.” Nico took Yuki’s arm and swung him around, trapping him against the sink. He turned on the faucet and filled the glass cup halfway. Yuki watched him, eyes following his right hand until it was gently pushing the cup into Yuki’s left one. He held on to it, resting that hand on the sink ledge from fear of letting it fall in his clumsiness. “As if I could get tired of you,” he sighed, face a few centimeters from Yuki’s. Yuki slowly lifted his gaze to meet Nico’s. It was in this close distance that he could see how knitted his eyebrows were, and how much exhaustion and pain hid in his eyes. “Then what are you unhappy about? Out with it, you coward,” spat Yuki, voice a weird mix of agitated and desperate. Nico laughed through his nose, lips twisting up into a dumfounded grin. He leaned even closer until his mouth was by Yuki’s ear and their bodies were completely flush. “You’re lucky I’m a coward or I’d trouble you right about now.” The heat held between them made it hard for Yuki to swallow. He stood completely still, hair rising on end and heart pounding in his chest. “See?” Nico stepped back and turned around, waving a goodbye. “I’m heading to bed. You better hydrate yourself before you wake up with a killer hangover.” And he shuffled into his room. Yuki’s hand went a bit slack but he was now sobered up enough that he was able to catch the cup before it fell. Sure, there was water all over the floor, but that was better than broken glass. And it gave him something to focus his still-hazy thoughts on instead of what just happened with Nico. What had just happened? What was that, exactly? Yuki recalled Nico’s hot breath on his ear and the feeling of his stubble grazing his cheek. He shook his head, hand pushing the paper towel across the wet floor with more force. Nico was just a good friend. He’d never thought of him like this before, and he wasn’t planning on starting now—regardless of what the knots in his stomach were telling him. The next few weeks went by in a confused daze. As the Tamaki case ramped up, Yuki was working long hours on little sleep and too many cups of coffee. Yet, even with so much going on at work, his thoughts would still drift to Nico. Maybe it was because they were barely seeing each other lately, but every time they did get a chance to sit down for breakfast or dinner, Yuki couldn’t sit still. He was ultra-aware of every little thing Nico did. From the way he took his time savoring his food before he swallowed to his new habit of rubbing his stubble when thinking—Yuki’s mind archived it all. “Are you guys close to finishing the defense for the case that’s been keeping you so busy?” Nico asked, passing Yuki a just-washed plate to dry. Yuki’s eyes quickly flickered from Nico’s gaze to the plate he was drying. “Uh, yeah. We’ll be wrapping it up this week so my schedule should return back to normal for a while.” “That’s good. We haven’t been seeing much of each other lately…if I didn't know better I would have thought you were avoiding me.” “As if, “ Yuki choked out a scoff and set the plate to the side. Nico passed him a fork and their fingers grazed in the exchange, sending a shiver up Yuki’s arm. He dropped the fork—feeling utterly like a deer stuck in headlights. “Uh.” Nico chuckled and bent down to pick up the fork, placing it back in Yuki’s hand. “No need to be so jumpy. I haven’t even confessed yet,” he said tenderly. “Confessed…yet?” Yuki repeated, eyes increasingly getting wider as the words registered in his brain. “Wait, what?” Nico turned off the faucet, lips curled up into a smirk. “I said I haven’t even confessed yet. Did the faucet make it hard to hear me?” “I heard you loud and clear. I just don’t get what you’d need to confess,” Yuki stammered. Nico dried his hands with the towel hanging a few inches below their sink and turned his body completely toward Yuki. “I know you know what I mean. There’s no point in trying to act stupid when we both know you’re a genius.” “Yeah, I am, but that’s not the point!” Yuki slapped the fork onto the counter. “Since when? Why?” Nico shrugged, scratching the back of his neck. “If I think about it…it started really slowly, probably some time during your 4th year at Kansei.” “You’re lying.” “There’s no way I’d lie about something like this,” Nico grumbled. “Part of the reason I asked to live with you was because I was becoming aware of these feelings. Yuki folded his arms across his chest and looked down and to the side, voice growing quiet. “But it’s pointless.” Nico’s eyebrows furrowed and he took a step forward. “You may not think much of my feelings, but to me they aren’t pointless,” he growled. “That's—” Yuki hesitantly looked up, “That’s not what I meant. It’s just I don’t do feelings or relationships. You know that.” “Yeah, you’ve been saying that since we first met but here we are.” Nico sighed, “You’re just scared. You don’t want to have a deep relationship because you’re scared of getting hurt. Yet, you call me the coward?” “I don't want to ruin this,” Yuki argued, eyes now narrow and steady on Nico. “We have a very good friendship, one of the best I’ve ever had. I don’t see why that has to change.” “We can have both. You just need to have some faith, Yuki…” “Why? What’s so good about falling in love, anyway?!” Yuki barked, hands balling up into fists by his side. Nico laughed through his nose, not teasingly or out of real humor, but instead with some traces of defeat. He leaned back against the counter and stared straight forward at their fridge on the other side of the kitchen. “You asked me the same thing about running once. You’re asking questions whose answers you already know.” “That it makes you feel ‘clean’? I kind of understood that with running, but what—“ “That it makes me forget all my burdens.” Nico turned to Yuki with an expression full of sincerity—eyebrows knitted, eyes glossy, and lips slightly downturned. “That you make me forget absolutely everything until my thoughts are only of you, that pretty face, and the sound of your voice leaking through your room walls when someone’s making you feel good.” Yuki’s mouth opened and closed like a fish until he found his voice. “Forget that last part, idiot!” Nico’s lips broke into a wicked grin. “Never.”

________________

Nico was persistent in his flirtation: compliments whispered in the morning, sweet nothings said with a smug smile the middle of breakfast, and a burning stare during dinner. The last time Yuki had seen him this determined to succeed was when they were training for Hakone. No matter how much Yuki complained and defiantly ignored attempt after attempt, Nico refused to back down.

It was embarrassing. And it made it hard for Yuki to breathe. So, to get some clarity, Yuki did exactly what he scoffed at Nico that he wouldn’t do—he ran away. It was only for one night! He’d stay at his mother’s house on Friday and go back home sometime Saturday. It had been a while since he saw his mom and adorable little sister, so it’s not like he was visiting just to get some space from Nico.

After dinner, Yuki sat at the end of their living room couch with his little sitter on his lap. Despite having missed her first few years, she quickly grew attached to him and happily latched on whenever he visited. She was precious and sweet. It made him feel guilty for being such a bad brother up till now, but he vowed to make it up by spoiling her for the rest of his days. “You look like something’s on your mind,” his mother said as she sat down next to him with a cup of tea. Yuki sighed and wrapped his arms around his sister’s torso, hugging her closer as if she were a teddy bear. She giggled and continued to play with the doll in her hands. “I need your advice on something.” His mother fought back a smile and scooted closer to him. “Is it love troubles? I’m all ears.” “If, hypothetically, a person I’ve always thought as a friend wanted to have a romantic relationship with me and is chasing me, how do I make them stop?” His mother hummed in understanding, taking a sip of her tea before answering. “And you’re sure you can’t return their feelings?” “Uh, I mean…let’s say no.” “Then in that case, it’s pretty harsh but if it really bothers you, cut off all connection to that person.” “Wait.” Yuki turned his head to face his mother. “But they’re a friend. I still want to be friends with them.” “You can’t have it both ways, Yukihiko,” she said with a sigh. “It’d be stringing them along. If their affection really bothers you that much, then you have to properly reject them and put some space between you two.” “Oh.” He rested his chin on top of his sister’s head solemnly. His mom lightly laughed. “No need to sound so sad. If what I just said sounds harsh to you and makes you feel lonely, then maybe you don't dislike their attention as much as you’re acting like you do.” She reached over and petted his head. “You’ve always been bad at being honest with yourself and others.” He didn’t reply. After all, she was right. Yuki dragged his feet when it was time to leave his mother’s house Saturday evening. He didn’t want to see Nico…yet he did. But as he was pacing back and forth near the door of his mother’s apartment contemplating what to do next, his mother made the choice for him. She gathered his things, shoved them in his hands, and gently pushed him outside with words of encouragement. Yuki sulkily waved her and his sister goodbye and made his way home. To Nico: I’m on my way back From Nico: Good. I’m almost finished making dinner but I made too much To Nico: Too used to making for two people? From Nico: Yeah. So you have to promise to eat the extra amount I make forever. Yuki re-read that text a few times, but decided not to answer, locking his phone and setting it on his lap. Yet after two minutes of bouncing his leg and failing to distract his mind from thinking about it, he unlocked his phone and replied. To Nico: Lol, are you proposing to me? Your cooking is not good enough to do that yet From Nico: Don't worry. I’ll get better ^^ Yuki groaned, receiving weird stares from the train passengers around him, and rested his head against the subway car wall behind him. What was he doing flirting with Nico? He was supposed to be rejecting and putting space between them like his mother had said. Why was it so hard for him to just do that? When he entered their apartment Nico greeted him with a cheery “welcome back” and the table set with one of Yuki’s favorite dinners: hamburger steak. They ate peacefully, and aside from the random times their eyes met and the tension between them spiked, dinner generally went on without a hitch. After they finished eating and washed the dishes, they settled back down at their low table with a few cold beers and turned on the TV to a game show program they both enjoyed. Yuki cracked open the can and sipped on his beer, sometimes sneakily stealing a glance at Nico. If felt like they were tiptoeing around the elephant in the room. Yuki couldn’t sit still. “Did you go to your mom’s house yesterday because you’re running away from me?” Nico cut to the chase. Yuki choked on a bit of his beer, coughing. “As if. I just wanted to see how my cute little sister was doing.” “Okay.” Nico knocked back what was left of his can. “I mean if you were, I wouldn’t blame you. I’ve been a bit much lately.” “Oh, it’s good you’re self aware,” Yuki snickered, setting down his can on the table. He slowly turned it in his hand. “…I asked my mom for advice on our situation.” Nico laughed through his nose and popped open a new can. “I didn’t know it was worrying you that much. What did she say?” Yuki put the can up to his lips and mumbled, “She said if it really bothered me so much I should properly reject you and put some space between us.” “And will you?” Nico questioned, leaning a bit closer from across the table. Yuki gulped down the rest of his can and shook his head, eyes flickering over to Nico’s unrelenting gaze. “No…I don’t want to.” “Then, let’s have a contest,” Nico replied, mouth rounding up at the corners. He crawled over to Yuki’s side of the table and plopped down right in front of him. “If you can sit there without flinching while I kiss you, then you win. I’ll stop chasing you and this relationship will go back to being whatever you want it to be. But if you do flinch, you have to give me a chance.” “O-Okay, it’s not like a little kiss will make me flinch,” Yuki exclaimed with a puffed chest. He set his empty can down and closed his eyes. “Bring it on!” Nico chuckled briefly and then grew very quiet. Yuki could feel his breath ghosting on his lips and a big warm hand smoothing over his cheek. His heart pounded loudly in his ears in anticipating and he wanted to take a deep breath to let out all the tension building up in his chest, but he sat hesitantly still. Nico’s lips were surprisingly soft for a guy who seemed to never care to use lip balm, and they moved slowly against Yuki’s. It felt…right. Nico’s tongue teased Yuki’s lips and Yuki parted them, meeting Nico’s hot tongue with his own. Nico slid his hand to Yuki’s right ear, softly running his fingers from the top to the bottom and caressing the pieced, earring-less lobe between his fingers. Yuki melted into the touch, a shudder running down his spine and he pushed Nico away, face flushed with realization. “You said kiss, touching is not fair,” he hissed. Nico arched his eyebrow and maintained his close distance to Yuki. “I never said I wasn’t going to touch you…and you complain, but you don't actually dislike it.” “Shut up,” Yuki muttered, covering his mouth with the back of his hand. “It’s a shame you rarely put on your earring anymore. Your ear looks lonely.” Yuki quickly covered his right ear, eyebrows furrowed. “Stop looking at me like that.” “Like what?” Nico teased, feigning innocence. “…like you want to eat me.” “If I ask nicely, would you let me?” Nico pulled Yuki’s hand away from his mouth and intertwined their fingers. “After all, I won our bet.” “That hardly counts,” Yuki sneered, pushing his glasses back up with his free hand. He bit his bottom lip as if wanting to stop himself from speaking but not being able to help it. “I’ll give you this chance. If we have good chemistry, then we’ll talk about what comes after.” “Well, I better impress you then,” Nico said cheerfully as he got up and pulled Yuki up along with him. They walked hand in hand to Nico’s room. If it weren’t for Nico’s strong grip on his hand, Yuki would have contemplated running away. But he couldn’t afford spending even a second on that thought because once the room door shut behind them and Nico’s dark, desire-filled eyes absorbed him in their gaze, he was sure he wanted this. Maybe he’d had wanted this for a lot longer than he could admit. Nico took Yuki’s mouth with a rekindled fervor, rough hands cupping his chin and digging fingers into hips as he walked him backward to his bed. They kissed with as much curiosity as there was desperation—fingers tugging at pants and shirts and bated pauses to share hazy gazes. They lowered themselves onto the bed as they flung off their underwear, leaving themselves completely naked in the dim glow of the moonlight trickling in from Nico’s window. Yuki lay on his back, elbows propping him up to fully take in the sight that was the naked Nico towering over him. His tan, muscular body he never took any pride in despite how easily it carried Yuki and how good he looked without clothes. His handsome face, strong jawline, and those eyes, usually so calm and laidback, that were now sharp with wanting and solely focused on Yuki. It all made Yuki tremble with excitement. “Are you just going to kneel there and stare at me for the next hour?” Nico laughed through his nose and slotted himself between Yuki’s legs, bending down to kiss Yuki’s nape and whisper against his jawline. “I just wanted to take in the view. You look really good.” “You look pretty hot yourself,” Yuki replied, hands now measuredly running down Nico’s stomach with a destination in mind. Nico grabbed Yuki’s hand and pinned it above his head, “No you don’t. Knowing you, I bet you’re used to getting your way, aren’t you?” “More or less,” Yuki replied with a smug grin. “Well, not today,” Nico murmured as he sucked hard on the skin right below Yuki’s ear, rough hands smoothing down across Yuki’s chest. He gently pushed him down so he was off his elbows and fully lying on the bed. “I’m going to spoil you so painstakingly slowly you’re going to begging me by the end.” “Oh, as if I’d beg so easily,” Yuki retorted. Though he tried to sound confident, his breath was already a bit labored and he trembled eagerly against Nico’s touch. He wasn’t making a great case for himself. And, unfortunately for Yuki, Nico wasn’t joking when he said slowly, very hard stress on the painstakingly. Though his hands ventured lower, flicking and petting as they traveled, his lips were on a mission to touch every inch of Yuki’s body. They trailed kisses across his shoulder, nipping and sucking his collarbones, and moving down his chest. He gave tender care to Yuki’s nipples, taking each bud into his mouth and rolling them between his fingers repeatedly. He was so agonizingly kind and loving in his touching. It made Yuki ache both in heart and body. Nico trailed kisses and little bites down Yuki’s stomach and to the dip of his inner thigh. He stayed there for a moment, tongue tracing the curve of it, and sucking bright red spots into the tender skin. Nico would kiss closer to where Yuki wanted his attention, only to switch to his other thigh. Yuki’s body quivered from the teasing, legs spreading but at the same time wanting to wrap him closer. “Fucking sadist,” Yuki growled, his voice giving out into a gasp when Nico bit into his inner thigh with particular vigor. “Just a bit. I’m surprised at how much I enjoy seeing you writhing because of me.” Nico came up to give Yuki a chaste kiss on the lips and to reach over into the first drawer of his nightstand, pulling out a small bottle of lube. “Now for even more fun.” Delivering on his promise, Nico played with Yuki until he couldn’t control his trembling. Every inch of his skin had felt Nico’s searing lips and hands, and had been played with mercilessly. Speckled with red hickies from head to toe, head knocked back against the pillow with small groans and whimpers leaking out of his mouth, Yuki rocked against the long fingers that worked into him. They felt so good, filling him up and rubbing the places he loved, but he desperately wanted more. “Nico, fuck,” he moaned, teeth sinking into his bottom lip to preserve some of his pride. He had already lost one time tonight; he didn’t want to lose a second. “All you have to do is say please,” Nico encouraged, his breathing low and heavy. Yuki could tell that he was also on the edge. Yuki opened his eyes, now clouded over with bliss, and met Nico’s gaze as best he could through his fogged up glasses. “Nico, I want to come,” he managed, making it sound like a command through sheer will power. Nico hummed and pulled his fingers out. He grabbed Yuki’s hips and scooted him closer, barely pressing even an inch into him. “That’s not begging.” “Ah,” Yuki gasped, legs wrapping around Nico to bring him in closer. He grabbed onto Nico’s bicep and pulled him down, hands moving to dig fingers into his back. “I swear I’ll murder you in your sleep…Akihiro,” he panted against Nico’s ear. “Yeah,” Nico grunted, hips pushing deep into Yuki in one motion. “That’s definitely worth dying over.” Their pace was hard and quick once Nico started. Yet even while losing themselves completely to the pleasure, Nico still made sure to kiss Yuki’s temple and whisper words he surely knew Yuki would not dare repeat. Somewhere in the daze, Yuki heard him, and like his words had so many times before, they moved something in him. And he hid his burning face further into the crook of Nico’s neck and buried his hand into Nico’s hair until and long after they had climaxed.

The next morning when Yuki’s eyes groggily peeled open, he was still in Nico’s bed. At one point Nico had cleaned them off and taken off his glasses—not that Yuki could remember anything that happened after he’d come down from the sex high. “Good morning,” Nico whispered and carefully placed Yuki’s glasses on him. He was propped up on an elbow, laying on his side and looking down at Yuki with the eyes of a completely satisfied man. “You’re dangerous,” Yuki grumbled as he sat up, voice completely ragged. “You totally mess up my rhythm and do whatever you want with me, but don’t even feel a shred of guilt the next day.” “But we did have chemistry,” Nico pointed out, lips curled up in that irritatingly wicked smile of his. “How was I?” Yuki shot him a glare and shuffled to the edge of the bed, his back to Nico. “You were great.” “Does that mean that you’re willing to try going out with me?” Nico’s voice was devoid of all humor—soft, and sincere. “...” Yuki got up to grab his black briefs from the corner of the room and pulled them on. He turned his body toward Nico, eyes hesitantly coming up to meet his. “I’m not sure…yet. But I’ve been giving it some serious thought.” “I’ll wait, then. Until you’re sure, “ Nico said cheerfully. “You’ll wait? But it could take months.” “It’ll happen.” Nico stated confidently. “If there is one thing Haiji’s persistence with Hakone taught me about you is that no matter how stubborn you are, if I am even more stubborn, you’ll come around.” Yuki dramatically opened his mouth in shock and picked up the pillow closest to him, throwing it at Nico with all his strength. He then marched out of the out of the room yelling, “You owe me a luxurious breakfast. And a massage for my aching back.” Nico slipped out of bed and softly chuckled to himself as he followed behind him.

#kazetsuyo #run with the wind #nicoyuki #fanfic

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momentumgo · 5 years

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Jennifer Schlichting

Animator + Illustrator https://www.jenniferschlichting.com/ Seattle, WA Age 32 She/Her

How did you get your start in motion design, animation, or whatever it is that you do?

I always knew I wanted to do something with computers and art. I've always loved drawing but didn't know how to marry the two. When I was 8, Toy Story came out and it immediately captured my imagination. As I grew older and realized what it took to create something like that I dreamed about working at Pixar one day. Long story short, I went to The Art Institutes of Minnesota and got a Bachelor's in Media Arts & Animation (which is now closed it was such a joke of a school). While I was there from 2007-2009 we had a few classes that dabbled in 3D Studio Max and Maya. I got to dive into 3D which was great, but it was such a painful user experience it put a huge damper on my desire to create 3D animation work of any kind.

After graduating in 2009 I moved back to my hometown in Iowa and had a hard time finding creative work of almost any kind (shocker, it's IOWA haha). I took a job as a bank teller to pay the bills and married my "high school sweetheart." A few years later I landed a job at one of Nordstrom's photo studios as a photo retoucher and lived in Photoshop all day making models and clothes look impossibly perfect. I also took the odd business card or logo design gig that came my way and fed my soul creatively by taking up painting with watercolor.

After six years in an abusive marriage, living paycheck to paycheck, having a toxic work environment, and my creative soul dying more every day I finally got up the guts to put an end to all of it. I divorced my husband, quit my job, and took everything that could fit in my SUV (including my cat) on a three day road trip across the country to move out to Seattle. I only knew a handful of people and had no job lined up, but I had a place to live for free for two months while I figured out what the heck I was going to do with my life next. That was enough for me.

I landed a contract job at Amazon doing basic graphic design work for the next 7 months and the pay was (just barely) enough to land my first studio apartment in Seattle. Knowing my contract would be coming to an end soon I was keeping my eye out for my next gig the entire time. Not knowing many people in Seattle (let alone the motion design community) made it really difficult to get in anywhere at first. I found a local Adobe After Effects and Cinema 4D meetup group and started going every month to meet some of the community and pick their brains on how to break in. I started doing YouTube tutorials in my free time and revamping my portfolio.

One of the art directors at Amazon heard I was looking for my next gig and after she went through my portfolio with me she suggested that I read The 2 Hour Job Search. It gave great advice on how to get out of the black hole of submitting your job application online and never getting anywhere. I started going directly to people. My LinkedIn search began and the emails were flying out the door. I made a spreadsheet of all the studios in the greater Seattle area, what kind of work they did, the contacts I was making, what kind of jobs they were posting for, and got to work creating projects to put into my first reel since 2009.

People were slowly starting to respond to my emails and accepting my offers to buy them coffee. I met so many lovely and helpful people (and a couple oddballs too haha). I asked what kind of work they were doing, how long their contracts usually were, what it was like to do animation work all day every day, what they were getting paid, and how tailoring their reel got them in the door doing the work they want to do.

One guy I met up with in particular (while I didn't know at the beginning of the conversation) was looking for a motion design intern to bring onto their small but mighty agency. By the end of our conversation he offered me the position! He had a passion for teaching and he could tell I was hungry to learn. While it didn't pay much, and was only a couple days a week I was able to put "motion design intern" on my resume while also working part-time doing graphic design work for a shoe and apparel company. I had just turned 30 and accepted an intern position, but was so thankful for company that didn't discriminate against age!

A few months later I heard back from a corporate telecommunications company I had applied to several months prior. They were interested in starting up an internal studio instead of outsourcing out all their work to agencies in town. I would be the first full-time creative on the team and had to be a unicorn. I knew a little video editing, some storyboarding, some motion design, some graphic design, and that was enough for them to offer me the position.

Fast forward two years and the team has grown to 20+ people and I've done everything from t-shirt design, graphic design, motion design, video editing, storyboarding, and deck design for massive conferences. It's not always fun or exciting animation work, but it pays the bills and afforded me a house in the crazy Seattle market.

How do you balance your work with your personal life? How do the two influence each other?

There have definitely been times when there are late nights at work but they seem to be fewer and farther between now that the studio is more established and they are working through better processes. I'm in by 9am and leave by 5pm most days. Weekend work is rare. We get two weeks paid vacation each year (and more the longer you stay with the company) as well. There is definitely more fun animation work in Seattle than what I'm doing currently but it's nice to have a steady paycheck and have time for personal projects on the side.

State your privilege – What circumstances may have helped or hindered you along the way?

I'm a white female born into a Midwest middle class family in the United States. I have a Bachelor's degree which was paid for in-part by my parents but I carried student debt until 2018 (thanks to my abusive first marriage-my ex refused to work for several years and insisted his "business ideas" would make us millions one day). I got out of debt myself by pulling myself up by my own bootstraps. The college I went to was not a great one and have learned so much more on my own since graduating than I ever did in college. I went to college full-time and year-round to graduate faster while also holding down three part-time jobs to help pay for college. It also saved me a ton of money every month after moving in with my now husband and paying only partial rent in Seattle.

I've always had gumption and a stubborn, never-give-up attitude. I was taught at a young age that I had to take responsibility for myself and my future and took that seriously. My parents weren't thrilled I wanted to go to an art college (and they had two more kids to put through college as well) but made a deal if I wanted to go I had to pay my own way. They took out the loan for me, but I paid it all back. I didn't have any scholarships but I made it work. I think it helped that I attended community college for two years before I transferred to The Art Institute and that lowered the tuition bill because of all the general education classes I took beforehand.

If you are a caretaker, how do you arrange your life so that you can achieve your professional goals while being responsible for others, (parents, children, etc.)?

My husband was a package deal and came with twin 9-year-old boys. We have them for a full week every other week. I'm not going to lie – it's a lot, even having them for an entire week haha! My husband and I both work full time but he has more flexibility when it comes to start/end times for his day and working from home. He drops the boys off and picks them up from school/daycare/camps/appointments/swim lessons/ etc.

The weeks we don't have the boys we spend our nights and weekends taking care of housework and building our portfolios (he's a creative as well). We are also trying to be more aware of how we spend our time and shift more of it towards self-care and doing more fun things together vs. the never-ending "to-do" list all the time.

How have you learned to practice self-care? What do you do to take care of yourself?

This is something I'm still working on, haha! My husband does a great job reminding me to take time for myself, and we love to go out to eat, go to the beach, go for a hike, get massages, or paint and draw together. I've also recently swapped my hour+ commute to work where I would drive myself through Seattle traffic with now taking a corporate shuttle in. This has given me so much of my time back where I can read, draw on my iPad, or catch up on my favorite YouTubers.

I also love painting in my downtime (http://www.jenniferelizabethstudios.com/) which gives me a wonderful break from all the screen time and let's my hands do something tactile. There's no undo button with watercolors and I've accepted that and turned it into a more "zen-like experience" where I try not to control everything haha.

Just getting outside and into nature can be so refreshing. Even if it's a ten minute walk outside on my lunch break can do wonders for my mood. That, and getting 7-8 hrs of sleep/night! Oh, and making sure to take lunch breaks AWAY FROM MY DESK.

And snuggling with my purring cat never fails to make me feel better no matter what's going on in my life.

How do you define success? What would success look like for you?

Being happy and fulfilled with the life you're living. I've always liked the quote "Create a life you don't need a vacation from." Which, may be difficult to do but I think it's definitely something to aim towards.

Success isn't all dollar signs, but getting paid what I'm worth is definitely a win for me. Plus it's always nice being able to take people out to dinner and buy them nice Christmas presents. :)

On another note, I always feel successful when other people reach out wanting to chat and hear about my experience thus far. Whether it's people looking to shift gears slightly or change career tracks entirely it always makes me feel happy and successful when I can help someone out with any lessons or things I've learned along the way.

What advice do you have for those just starting out?

Take advantage of all the resources online! There was almost none of that ten years ago when I was starting out.

Don't be afraid to reach out to people. You never know where it'll lead. :)

Leave your ego at the door and don't be a jerk. Nobody wants to work with a jerk.

Never stop learning.

Look for jobs with titles other than "motion designer." Currently my title is "Communication Design Manager". LOL . Read the job descriptions to see if there will be animation work involved! Sometimes companies don't know what to call us.

Some great inspirational and informational resources to check out:

-Design for Motion: Fundamentals and Techniques of Motion Design by Austin Shaw

-The Freelance Manifesto: A Field Guide for the Modern Motion Designer

-The 2-Hour Job Search

-Real Artists Don't Starve by Jeff Goins

-Show Your Work! by Austin Kleon

-Broad Strokes: 15 Women Who Made Art and Made History (in that order) by Bridget Quinn

-The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown

-In the Company of Women by Grace Bonney

-Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert

-Creative Pep Talk by Andy Miller

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welcometothepenumbra · 6 years

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JUNO STEEL AND THE STOLEN CITY (PART ONE)

SOUND: RAIN. TRAIN ARRIVES, CREAKS TO A STOP. DOOR CLANKS OPEN.

CONDUCTOR: Ah, good evening, Traveler. And welcome… to The Penumbra. Take your seat, please, take your seat.

MUSIC: STARTS.

SOUND: DOOR CLANKS SHUT.

The junction lies just ahead, Traveler. If you’ll allow me just a moment.

SOUND: TRAIN WHISTLE.

(CHUCKLES) Well, next stop? Hyperion City.

SOUND: TRAIN MOVING.

A month is a very long time to stake out, but Detective Steel is nothing if not dedicated to his job. And so he sits on a rooftop, day after day, watching the Museum of Colonized History, waiting to see the gangster who is supposed to pay for a killing here, and absolutely nothing has happened.

Until today. Suddenly, the month of quiet has given way, and threats old and new are jumping out of every shadow. But when the metaphorical and literal Martian rain are both 90% acid, Detective Steel had better find cover, and quickly.

SOUND: TRAIN BRAKES. DOOR CLANKS OPEN, RAIN.

Our next stop: Juno Steel and the Stolen City.

ALL SOUNDS: FADE OUT.

***

MUSIC: STARTS.

JUNO (NARRATOR): If you get up early enough and you catch it in just the right light, Hyperion City can be sorta beautiful. The billboards backlit by the early morning light, the dew-spackled trashcans, the sunrise shadows cast by highscrapers and floating mansions… it’s really somethin’. And every time I see it I wish I was dead.

My name’s Juno Steel. I’m a private eye, and I usually don’t see any side of the city that comes earlier than noon, but, lately I’ve been changing things up. Seeing a lot of sunrises. Drinking a lot of coffee. Saying no to old habits like sleep and… no, pretty much just sleep.

SOUND: COMMS BEEP.

RAMSES O’FLAHERTY (FROM COMMS): Juno. Status report.

JUNO: Oh, hey Ramses, it’s… been a big three hours since four AM, got some real exciting stuff to catch you up on.

RAMSES: Glad to hear it. You’ve only been staking out for, what? A month? (CHUCKLES)

JUNO (NARRATOR): I’d been following a lead for weeks on someone who was trying to sabotage Ramses O’Flaherty. And it all pointed here: the Museum of Colonized History, so far on the outskirts of Hyperion City that the building’s roof had to be rounded just to fit on the inside of the Dome. Even here, the buildings were jammed tight enough together you didn’t have room to breathe – and it was at this museum, under the cover of all that sprawl, where I’d supposedly catch a one-eared woman doing some shady business. Which you’d think would be pretty exciting. It sounds exciting, doesn’t it? But what it actually translates to is sitting on a rooftop from early morning to late night, watching a museum all day, every day, until you get so bored you wonder how hard you’d have to pull to take your toes off.

MUSIC: ENDS.

RAMSES: Are you listening? Do I need to get you a cybernetic ear to go along with that eye? I asked if you’d seen any sign of Yasmin Swift’s employer yet.

JUNO: Nope. But my foot fell asleep and I’m bored out of my goddamn mind. That’s the status report. Now entertain me before I take the ‘stir’ out of ‘stir crazy.’

RAMSES: Entertain you? Well, I suppose I’m already the city’s clown. Why not be Juno Steel’s, too?

JUNO: Oh, come on. It’s not that bad.

RAMSES: Not that bad. Would you like me to read this headline to you? Molly Chung, Uptown Bulletin: “Opinion: Ramses O’Flaherty’s Campaign Is As Old And Stale As He Is.”

JUNO: That’s just one—

RAMSES: Hyperion Chronicle: “Study: Pilot Pereyra’s Increased Funding to HCPD Doubles Prison Population, Halves Crime Rate.” That study is just so incredibly inaccurate, by the way. The Beacon: “Treasurer Insists O’Flaherty’s Budget Won’t Balance, Quote, ‘No Matter What Math Says.’” Elysium Times—

JUNO: Okay, okay, so it’s pretty bad. (SIGHS) Explains how Pilot won so many damn elections, anyway. Takes a lot of skill to smear your opponent without getting your hands dirty.

RAMSES: Oh, their strategy is a lot more impressive than that. Everyone knows Pilot’s a crook – but they’ve changed the conversation so that’s a plus. If we’re going to live in a city full of cutthroats, the reasoning goes, we should at least have a cutthroat on our side, too. That’s been their platform for years: the world doesn’t play fair, so why should we?

JUNO: Well, at least nobody’s tried to kill you lately.

RAMSES: Always be grateful for the little things, yes. I wouldn’t rest on those laurels just yet, though – whoever this is, if they’re after my campaign and not just me, their biggest strike will come at the eleventh hour. They still have four days before the election.

JUNO: Guess that means I don’t get to leave this goddamn roof, then. Which is fine, but I guess I just didn’t know doing good would look so much like doing nothing.

RAMSES: Juno…

Nevermind. Your physicals say your knife wound is healing. Are you, ehm… making progress in your physical therapy? They must have given you stretches, or something like that?

JUNO: Yeah, well… doesn’t mean I do ‘em.

RAMSES: You should. It’s not like you have anything better to do up there. You could at least make use of the care I pay for. I have to protect my investment.

JUNO: Yeah, I read about that. The cyber-eye is hooked up to my nervous system, so if my brain function stops, it stops. That’s a lot of creds down the drain.

RAMSES: I didn’t mean the Theia.

We’ve been working together for some time now, Juno. I truly hope that– by which I mean, I hope you don’t think that I merely think of you as… uh, well…

JUNO: Wait, Ramses – hold that thought.

RAMSES: Oh, thank God.

JUNO: I see someone.

SOUND: FOOTSTEPS.

Down in the alley by the museum… the woman with one ear! The Piranha.

JUNO (NARRATOR): She’d gotten away from me once, and I wasn’t gonna forget that. The Piranha, who’d nearly killed Maia King. The Piranha, who was all sharp teeth and a need to bite. If she was behind this, I thought, that would explain the methods used to go after Ramses so far. Roasting roller-coasters and killer criminal consultants seemed like the right kind of over-the-top from the mind that brought you the cat-bomb.

It took everything I had in me not to go down and get her right then. But sometimes you need bait. And sometimes that means leaving a piranha on the line in hopes you’ll catch a whale.

RAMSES: Well? What’s she doing?

JUNO: Just waiting around, it looks like, but… why?

SOUND: CAR DRIVES UP.

Hang on, a car just pulled up. Someone’s leaning out, it’s…

Uh… uh, Ramses?

RAMSES: Juno.

JUNO: You’re not gonna believe this.

RAMSES: You and your buildups. This had better be worth it.

JUNO: It’s Mayor Pereyra.

SOUND: DISTANT CAR DOOR CLOSES, FOOTSTEPS.

Mayor Pilot Pereyra is doing back-alley business with a killer, and I caught them red-handed.

RAMSES: Well. That was worth it.

JUNO (NARRATOR): Pilot Pereyra, Mayor of Hyperion City for four years running, was famous for their stiletto heels. They had a new pair in a new hideous color every week, and Pilot made killings off of ‘em. Both in the literal sense – just ask Sal Barone, found floating in Mars’s orbit with two of Pilot’s heels jammed into his throat – and in the financial sense – like how for a year after, every crime boss in Hyperion paid Pilot hand over fist for a pair like the one that killed Barone. Because Pilot Pereyra didn’t just organize crime: as mayor, they defined it. And if this was the whale the Piranha was gonna bring in… hell, maybe her getting away had been a good thing after all.

RAMSES: You’ve undergone the modifications to the Theia’s Rec Mode, haven’t you?

JUNO: ‘Course I have. I skipped physical therapy last week to do it. Theia, Rec Mode.

THEIA: Rec mode. Activated. Two hours of video storage. Remaining.

JUNO: That’s more like it!

THEIA: Error: Wireless uplink not found. Cannot transmit footage—

JUNO: What kind of low-rent eye did you get me, O’Flaherty?

THEIA: —Please connect to a physical uplink.

RAMSES: One day you’ll think of the Theia like your first car, Juno: all these quirks will just be part of its character. You’ll connect to a physical uplink later.

JUNO: And where the hell does that go?

THEIA: Caution: you don’t want to know.

JUNO: Fine, fine! Just zoom in, already.

THEIA: Zooming in.

SOUND: MECHANICAL WHIR.

JUNO: Damn it, they’re not even looking at each other. It’s like a junior high dance down there. If I could just hear what they’re saying…

THEIA: Suggestion: would you like me to activate. Lip reading protocol?

JUNO: Uhhh… s-sure… if you got a minute.

THEIA: Lip reading protocol. Activated.

SOUND: FUTURISTIC TECH-Y NOISES.

Compiling approximations of voices based on throat movement, infrared analysis, and audio recordings on public record.

SOUND: DING.

Application complete. You’re welcome.

SOUND: BEEP.

PILOT PEREYRA: Interested is definitely one word for it. It’s not every day that an employee tries to become a business partner. So. How much is it going to cost for that information to become my personal property?

PIRANHA: Oh, info’s been free for years, Mayor Pereyra. Information proliferates, see? Doubles, triples, and that don’t cost a dime. So the price ain’t on the info: that’s a gift. The price is on me applying that info for you, and that, well, that’s gonna cost a little more than you got on hand, I’m thinking.

PEREYRA: You’d be surprised how much I can get how quickly.

PIRANHA: (CHUCKLES) This is worth more. Used right, this little legend could be worth more than the whole damn city. And it could fit just right into your next big move. I just want to get in on the ground floor, see? Nothing wrong with that.

PEREYRA: (LAUGHING) Oh, buddy, I think you’re a little confused about what’s going on here.

JUNO: Whoa. Ramses, Mayor Pereyra just pulled a gun on her I– I think. It’s just a bulge in their coat, but… how long has that been there?

Uh-oh.

PEREYRA: What is it now?

JUNO: Theia, zoom in.

SOUND: MECHANICAL WHIR.

Big guy, brown jacket, standing under a lamppost. I think he might be watching me.

RAMSES: Of course. It makes sense that Pilot would have someone covering them.

JUNO: Well, they’ll have to wait. I still don’t have what I need.

RAMSES: Juno…

JUNO: Theia, lip reading again.

SOUND: BEEP.

PEREYRA: The payment’s a gift. Either you’re stepping away from this, or I’m pushing you off. Up to you, really.

PIRANHA: Oh, scary Mayor Pereyra, please don’t. (LAUGHS) I know you like to make inconvenient people disappear. That’s why I’ve made myself as convenient as possible. A luxury you can’t live without, see? Like air conditioning. Or those grocery carts that push themselves. (LAUGHS)

PEREYRA: Just remember who works for who, okay? I’ve got the entire HCPD in my pocket, and that means, I know how often little administrative mistakes happen. Real stupid things, like, uh, putting someone in solitary and losing their papers. Shuffling someone into the life-sentence pile when you meant to put them in the parking-ticket pile. Little stuff.

PIRANHA: I get it. Play nice or get off the court. Easy enough.

So what’s the plan? When do we do the job?

PEREYRA: Preparations are all set. You’ll be in there. Midnight.

JUNO: Midnight tonight?! …Ramses, they’re going to hit the Museum of Colonized history tonight!

…Ramses?

SOUND: COMMS BEEP.

THEIA: Caution: your comms has been. Disconnected.

JUNO: What?!

THEIA: Transmission interference detected.

JUNO: You’ve gotta be—

…kidding me.

JUNO (NARRATOR): There was another person on the roof with me. They were over by the fire escape I’d used to climb up here hours ago. For a second all I could do was wonder how the hell they’d gotten up from the street so fast… until I realized it wasn’t the same person I saw down there. Brown coat, sure, but where the other was broad-shouldered and looked like somebody I might want to buy me a drink or two, this one was thinner, flightier, and more nervous. They were making a big point of not looking at me, scraping something off one shoe with the other, checking their watch, looking at the dome flickering overhead, trying to look… casual? I think? There was a bulge in their coat that might’ve been a comms jammer. Or a gun. Or a whole lot of other unpleasant things.

THEIA: Target is fifty feet away. Recommended course of action: blaster fire.

JUNO: You got real chatty after that update.

THEIA: Target. Approaching.

JUNO: I’m not gonna shoot ‘em, alright? Just keep translating what Pereyra’s saying. They’re getting to the good part and then I can get out of here.

SOUND: BEEP.

PEREYRA: All security in there’s got a panic button for instant lockdown, but, so long as you don’t get seen, there’s nothing wrong with a late-night visit to the museum.

So you’ve got the codex, huh? How many square miles does that thing cover?

PIRANHA: The whole city. (CHUCKLES) That’s a lot of information, Pilot. If we get it.

PEREYRA: When we get it. You have to visualize. You have to believe.

SOUND: FOOTSTEPS.

JUNO (NARRATOR): I couldn’t help it – hearing those footsteps, feeling my heart race: I glanced over my shoulder.

THEIA: Target is fifteen feet away.

JUNO (NARRATOR): The distance was bad – but it wasn’t the distance that made my blood run cold. It was what I saw on their chest as they pulled their lapel back.

THEIA: Firearm detected.

JUNO (NARRATOR): No, wasn’t that either. It was the thing right underneath the gun: a badge, with the letters HCPD shining on it.

And that was bad. Because to the dirty cops in the HCPD – so, most of ‘em – Pilot Pereyra was their ringleader. If I threatened Pilot, the cops wouldn’t bother with a trial. They’d pretty much go straight to the chair. Not the electric one, just one they’d shoot me in.

The cop had stopped pretending not to see me now. They pulled the gun.

VOICE: Freeze!

THEIA: Calculating distance to next rooftop.

VOICE: If you’re waiting for backup, you’re not gonna get it. I have this area checked. You’re alone.

JUNO: Nope, not waiting for backup.

THEIA: Next rooftop is within. Jumping distance.

JUNO: Just stalling on this next part, ‘cause I’m gonna hate it. Bye!

SOUND: RUNNING FOOTSTEPS.

VOICE: Hey! Get back here! I said freeze!

THEIA: For optimal timing, jump in three… two… one…

JUNO: (SCREAMS)

SOUND: THUD.

JUNO (NARRATOR): It was a beautiful flight. It was a beautiful landing. And, just to finish the set: the cop made a beautiful shot.

SOUND: BLASTER SHOT.

JUNO: (GRUNTS)

VOICE: (DISTANT, FADING) Crazy idiot, jumping that far – don’t move! Not that you can! Oh, what a day, what a day, get a call from my landlord, now this…

ALL SOUNDS: FADE OUT.

***

SOUND: SLAP.

VOICE: Wake up.

I said wake up.

SOUND: SLAP. DISTANT MUSIC.

JUNO: Wow, this alarm is annoying. You mind hitting snooze for me?

SOUND: SLAP.

Ow! Ow, okay, I’m up.

VOICE: About time. And if you want to stay awake, you’ll tell me what you know.

JUNO: I… don’t want to stay awake – that’s kind of what I just said.

VOICE: What? Don’t question my threats!

SOUND: SLAP.

JUNO: Wow, you got a lot of slaps in you, huh? This pretty much your whole playbook for interrogations, or can I expect some surprises?

VOICE: You want surprises, huh? Hm, I’ll get you some surprises…

SOUND: FOOTSTEPS DEPARTING.

JUNO (NARRATOR): I wanted them off me for a second so I could get my bearings. I was tied to a chair in a room with concrete walls, cold, damp air, tools hanging from hooks across from me. My first thought was medieval torture chamber. My correct thought, a few seconds later, was suburban basement.

When the cop was on their way back, I got a look at the name on their uniform. “L-T L-O-O,” it said. Lieutenant Loo. Never heard of ‘em.

SOUND: DISTANT, MUFFLED VOICES.

VOICE (LOO): So, now that I’m prepared… do I have to send a laser through your head, or are you going to tell me what I want to hear?

JUNO: You’re a natural-born leader and that eyeshadow looks great on you.

LOO: What?

JUNO: Do you all wear coats like that? Yours looks a little nicer than your buddy’s on the street, but I—

LOO: Coats? My buddy on the str– what are you talking about?

JUNO: If you don’t know? Nothin’.

LOO: But—

JUNO: So what were you doing on that roof, anyway? Funny place to take a walk.

LOO: I was gonna ask you the same thing.

JUNO: Not very original of you.

LOO: It was my plan first!

You’re the one tied to the chair! Why am I answering the questions?

JUNO: I don’t know. Why are you?

LOO: Low self-esteem and a natural tendency to follow orders– oh, damn it! (GROANS) Look. I know you were watching Mayor Pereyra. What did you see?

JUNO: No idea what you’re talking about.

SOUND: SLAP.

Ow! Slaps? Again? You’re holding a gun!

LOO: Shut up! Tell me what you saw!

SOUND: SLAP.

JUNO: Ow, quit it!

LOO: Not til you tell me what you…

That looks like a cybernetic eye. You didn’t record anything, did you?

JUNO (NARRATOR): The hardest part of any interrogation is the balancing of information: figuring out how much the other person knows, how much they want to know, how much you know, how much you can make them think you know, and, most importantly, how little you can make them think you know.

LOO: So? Did you?

JUNO: Yeah, what’s it to you? Since when has recording people without their permission been a crime?

LOO: Send me the footage. Now.

JUNO: Rather not.

LOO: Send me that footage, or I pull the trigger.

SOUND: GUN COCKING.

JUNO: Not gonna help you any. Eye’s worked into my brain – that’s how it does all these weird things like make me shoot faster and speed up my reflexes and give me this one dream over and over again where I’m falling into a giant birthday cake that has my mother’s voice. You kill me, and all the data on it gets scrambled.

LOO: Just send me the footage, then.

JUNO: Love to, once we get to the station. Why didn’t you bring me to the station, anyway? I mean, this is a nice basement, but still. How’re the kids?

LOO: The what?

JUNO: You’ve got half a dozen sand-sleds up against the wall over there. I can tell at least three of your kids are little because one, those mittens are tiny and adorable, and two, all the left ones are missing.

LOO: Those aren’t… I-I’m not…

JUNO: Taking your dirty cop business into your home, huh? Pilot Pereyra covers your boots in mud and you track it all inside?

LOO: Mayor Pereyra? But I wasn’t—

JUNO: The hell are your kids gonna think of you, Loo? Embarrassing. A train wreck.

LOO: Oh! This isn’t my house!

SOUND: DISTANT, MUFFLED CRYING.

Damn it, now look what you made me do!

JUNO: You’re a cop who breaks into people’s basements for interrogations? What’s wrong with you?

SOUND: DISTANT DOOR OPENS. CRYING GETS LOUDER.

CAPTAIN KHAN: (DISTANT) Loo! What the hell is goin’ on down there?

LOO: (YELPS) Captain Khan! I-I-I-I didn’t mean—

SOUND: DOOR SLAMS SHUT. STOMPING FOOTSTEPS.

JUNO: Captain… Khan?

KHAN: You done questioning him yet? You show up at my apartment with someone in a damn duffel bag and then you wake the baby?!

Oh, no. No, no– d-agh, God damn it, it’s you!

JUNO (NARRATOR): Omar Khan was a good guy – and that’s why he’s one of the only cops in Hyperion City that I never wanted to deal with. The other ones you could punch all you wanted and never feel bad about it, but Khan… was clean. And that meant I had to play nice, or else…

Nothing, okay? I’d just feel bad. I liked Khan. He was a good cop. He became the Captain of my old precinct after I left and he’d really turned the place around, or… so I heard. And that meant the world was a better place with him in it. Or whatever. Ugh.

Also probably worth saying that Khan didn’t feel the same way about me.

KHAN: Loo, you moron! You didn’t tell me the Nosy Nanette you brought in was Juno goddamn Steel!

LOO: Am I supposed to know who this is?

KHAN: Oh, right. You’re new.

JUNO: Come on, Loo. Didn’t anybody ever tell you that the first thing you’re supposed to do at a new job is catch up on the old gossip?

KHAN: We can’t trust a goddamn word Steel here says! Didn’t anyone tell you about the Hijikata case?

LOO: The… what? Please?

KHAN: You got spaghetti in those ears, Loo? Don’t they teach you curiosity in diaper-school anymore? Captain Hijikata! Of the one-five-one, our goddamn precinct! It was the case of the damn decade and this walking pile of nitroglycerin decided to—

JUNO: We really don’t need to get into the details, thanks.

KHAN: We can’t trust him. Especially when it comes to taking down someone reeeally big. Steel’s a glory-pig. Honor-hound. Wh-whatever. Anyway, why’s he here? You said this had something to do with our op?

JUNO: ‘Course it does, Captain. I’m gonna help you take down somebody really big.

KHAN: What?!

LOO: Uh… he’s telling the truth, Captain Khan. He— (GULPS) …saw the meeting.

KHAN: And where the hell were you?!

LOO: Seeing him… seeing the meeting.

Traffic was really bad and I got a call I had to take I’m sorry.

KHAN: God damn it! After months we finally get someone on the inside with Pereyra just to get the details on this meeting and you missed it because you were on the comms?! How the hell are we gonna pin them now? You got another sting ready to go, Loo? Do you? In the next four goddamn days?!

JUNO: So that’s what all this is? A sting to catch Pilot?

KHAN: Of course it is! The hell do you think we are, some kinda sneaky-sneak on-the-take-takers? No way. We’re— (COUGHING) We’re the good cops.

JUNO: …There are… only two of you.

KHAN: ‘Course there aren’t only two of us, blockhead! There are– I don’t know, four or five, at least.

LOO: Captain, there are more than five—

KHAN: Well, I’ve never counted, alright? Maybe you don’t give two ding-dongs about doing the right thing, Steel, but some of us are busy trying to make the world a little better! We’ve been tailing Pereyra for months, and I’m not gonna let you get in my way.

JUNO: Not planning on it, Captain.

KHAN: Oh. That’s– nice.

(CLEARS THROAT) So, uh… did you see what they were talking about?

JUNO: Yeah.

KHAN: You wanna tell us?

JUNO: Nah.

KHAN: I knew it! You weasel! You skink! You… momonga!

JUNO: Don’t know what’s got you so upset, Khan. I wasn’t lying. I’m not gonna stand in your way – I’m just not gonna say anything unless I get to come along for the ride.

KHAN: What?!

LOO: There might be one way around it, Captain. He said he recorded it all. On his… eye.

KHAN: On his…!

…on his eye. Hmmmm.

SOUND: FOOTSTEPS.

Hey, look at that. You didn’t have that last time I saw you. Where’d you get it, Steel?

JUNO: Left my real eye under my pillow and the eyeball fairy dropped it off.

KHAN: Doing something illegal is my guess. For one of your usual business partners. Valles Vicky, Clark the Shark, Cecil Kanagawa… something that’d leave a trail, I’ll bet.

JUNO: You’re close enough that your mustache is leaving a trail into my mouth, Khan. Back off.

KHAN: (GROWLS)

SOUND: FOOTSTEPS.

Lieutenant!

LOO: Yes, sir!

KHAN: I want as much data as you can get on everyone Steel’s talked to for the past three weeks. Pull from Security Office databanks, private camera feeds, everything. How long’d that take you?

LOO: About two days, sir.

KHAN: Meanwhile I want you to get Goren to look into that eye: make, model, most importantly, how to pull the data out of the damn thing. Tell her she has a day and a half.

LOO: Yes, sir!

KHAN: Ha-ha! You hear that, Steel? We got you this time. Either you tell us what you saw, or in two days, we’ll know.

JUNO: Y’know, Khan, I got to hand it to you: that’s pretty impressive. Two days is fast.

KHAN: You bet your booper it is.

JUNO: But not fast enough to make it in time for Pereyra’s heist tonight.

KHAN: …What’d he just say?

LOO: I think he said… that Mayor Pereyra’s gang is going to do a heist tonight.

JUNO: At midnight, specifically.

LOO: At midnight, specifically.

KHAN: Yeah, yeah, I heard him.

JUNO (NARRATOR): Poor Khan looked like a balloon with all the air let out. Or, maybe just a balloon that was depressed. And that meant I was playing the interrogation game right. I’d given them just enough info to make them think I knew more – to make them want to work with me. And sure, I didn’t actually know more; but so long as they didn’t ask for anything else, that never had to be a problem.

KHAN: No, no no, wait, you know what – I don’t buy it. You could’ve just made that up. Might not know a damn thing, could’ve just made up some heist tonight to get us going. No. I think we’re gonna wait the two days. But thanks for the intel.

JUNO (NARRATOR): Well, so much for “not a problem.”

But interrogation’s like a high-stakes card game, and that means there are two ways to win. Either you actually get a good hand… or you bluff. Last card game I played like this, I wasn’t the one bluffing.

Wasn’t alone, either.

But no matter what I wanted, I was alone now. So I played my last card… and I bluffed.

JUNO: It’s in the Museum. Pilot told their gang to hit the Museum of Colonized History at midnight tonight and I know what they’re gonna steal.

LOO: Huh?!

KHAN: Huh. That’s… specific.

And if it’s supposedly tonight, it’s not like we’d have to wait long to find out if he’s lying.

LOO: But the Museum of Colonized History is huge, Captain! If it’s just the two of us, how can we be sure we’re going to check the right part? While we’re in the North Wing, the mayor’s gang could be robbing the South Wing.

JUNO: Captain, look. I know you’ve got a million reasons not to trust me on this. I know my reputation’s not exactly sparkling, and one time I tried to steal classified evidence off your desk, and later that same day I handcuffed you to a car, which was very funny, but also very wrong, probably.

KHAN: Steel—!

JUNO: And I know you probably have a million good reasons to take Pilot down and I might only have one but it’s a pretty damn good one, so I just. Need. To be there. Tonight. …Okay?

KHAN: (GROWLS)

LOO: Captain. This close to the election, this might be our last chance. If we could just get one person from Mayor Pereyra’s gang to talk—

KHAN: Alright, alright, fine. I’ll babysit the P.I. You happy?

JUNO: I’m happy.

KHAN: But listen up, Steel. When I’ve got the scent of something big, you’d better not get in my way. You try it, I’ll show you just how scary Omar Khan can get. Got me?

SOUND: DISTANT DOOR OPENS.

VOICE: Omar! We just got another one of those letters from the landlord! Do you want me to open it, or—

KHAN: Damn it, Noor, I told you I’m doing business down here!

VOICE (NOOR): Oh, do you have some friends over? Did you ask them if they want some pasta?

KHAN: I said we’re busy!

NOOR: Omar! What kind of a host are you! You drag them into the basement, let them make all this noise, wake the baby—

KHAN: ALRIGHT, FINE!

Do either of you want pasta?

(SIMULTANEOUSLY) LOO: No thank you. JUNO: I’m good.

KHAN: They don’t want pasta!

NOOR: What?

KHAN: I SAID THEY DON’T WANT PASTA!

Are you sure?

JUNO: Yeah, thanks, I’m all set—

LOO: Actually, I am a little hungry.

KHAN: Nevermind, I’ll come up and get two bowls in a minute, Noor! Thank you! I love you very much and I’m glad we’re working on our communication!

(PANTING) Ah– alright. So, like I said: all business, Steel. You’d better get used to that. First, farfalle; then, you and I take a little trip to the museum.

ALL SOUNDS: FADE OUT.

***

JUNO (NARRATOR): In P.I. work, a real big lie is like a summer rainstorm: it comes on suddenly, it’s really hard to get out from under, and it’ll burn just all your skin off if you don’t get dry quick. Summer’s pretty rough on Mars.

I’d told a whopper of a lie back in Khan’s basement, and I’d gotten soaked before we ever made it to the museum. All it took was nine words, said while Loo was driving us:

KHAN: So where in the museum are they gonna hit?

JUNO: I, uh, told you, Khan, if I say that, you’ve got no reason to bring me.

KHAN: Yeah, whatever, keep your secrets if you want, I don’t care. But the Lieutenant at least needs to know which door to drop us off at.

JUNO (NARRATOR): The Museum of Colonized History is huge: blocks and blocks of dome prototypes and early terraforming pods and the mummified remains of the first space-colonists. If I picked a door at random, we’d miss the heist entirely, and there went my lead.

So what did I know? Not much. The Piranha shared some intel with Pilot, but it wasn’t enough on its own; there was something in here with information on it, and Pilot wouldn’t know how to read it without the Piranha.

One of the last things I’d picked up before Loo zapped me was a word: “codex.” A codex that covers the entire city. I had no idea what that meant, not yet, except for one thing: there was one wing of the Museum dedicated to things that covered the entire city.

KHAN: So? You’d better have something, Steel.

JUNO: The Hall of Maps. West entrance should get us there. Come on, Loo, you better speed this thing up; we don’t want to be late again.

LOO: I know, I know.

JUNO (NARRATOR): Loo dropped us off at the Hall of Maps at 11:30. We crawled through the window and crept past walls covered with old paper and flickering diodes, images of a thousand sprawling Marses measured and cut-up and categorized. There were maps from throughout the ages: before the telescope, before the terraforming pod, before the transgalactic travel engine.

It was beautiful, or whatever. But there was one thing that stuck out to me most of all:

JUNO: God, this place stinks.

KHAN: You get a free pass to the wonders of human progress and all you can think about is the smell?

JUNO: Yeah, basically. I hate that musty old hard drive stink. Just mold and motherboard-termites.

KHAN: It’s history, damn it! These are the maps that invented space colonization, Steel! You wouldn’t be here without ‘em!

JUNO: So that’s a con. Got any pros?

KHAN: (GROWLS) It’s not worth talking to a punk about the unpunkable. You couldn’t see the value of these maps if they reached out and tickled your whiskers.

JUNO: Anyway, why do you care? Aren’t you from Earth?

KHAN: (GROWLS)

JUNO: If you want history, Earth’s got thousands of years on literally anywhere else – you don’t have to travel thirty-four million miles to find history. People leave a mess everywhere they go.

KHAN: Sometimes a place means more than just itself. It’s an idea, or a promise, or… something. And even if that promise doesn’t get kept, it means you can go there and expect them to keep it. Demand they keep it. You know what I mean?

JUNO: I… huh, I-I do, actually, but, what promise—

KHAN: It’s like with my Little Mom. Made this curried lasagna every Tuesday for Big Mom. You do that long enough, it’s like a promise, right? Gotta keep a promise, or it goes bad. We’re all just like egg-noodles in the lasagna, skim milk in the sauce. Never should’ve thrown out that recipe.

JUNO: And hey, just like that, I lost you.

Found someone else, though. Hide!

SOUND: WALKIE-TALKIE BEEP.

VOICE 1: (DISTANT) Hallway B is clear. Moving on target.

SOUND: WALKIE-TALKIE BEEP.

KHAN: You get a good look at ‘em?

JUNO: It’s pitch black in here, Khan, of course I didn’t get a good look at ‘em.

THEIA: May I suggest. Night-vision mode.

JUNO: …Yet. Did not get a good look yet. Will in a second. Come on, follow them.

SOUND: SOFT ELECTRIC HUM.

THEIA: Night-vision mode. Activated.

JUNO: Looks like they’re armed, and… it’s hard to make anything else out from this far away.

KHAN: Gun sounds like a good reason to stay far away to me.

JUNO: Unless they’re one of the gang’s lookouts – then we can’t risk losing ‘em.

KHAN: Muh, alright. Then I guess we’ll just stay far away from close up.

SOUND: WALKIE-TALKIE BEEP.

JUNO: Wait, they stopped!

VOICE 1: Reporting in. Just heard a noise outside the First Light Room. I’m gonna go check it out.

SOUND: WALKIE-TALKIE BEEP.

JUNO: Damn it, damn it, damn it!

KHAN: Don’t get your petticoat in a twist just yet, Steel.

SOUND: DOOR OPENS.

Looks like our burglar oughta burgle some better ears. He’s walking away from us.

JUNO: He’s headed into that exhibit. Follow him.

SOUND: WALKIE-TALKIE BEEP. RUNNING FOOTSTEPS.

VOICE 1: Didn’t find anything. Returning to group.

SOUND: WALKIE-TALKIE BEEP.

JUNO: You hear that? He’s going back!

KHAN: So?

JUNO: So we have to pick ��em off one by one, don’t we? Learn what we can from each one, and then—

KHAN: Hang on. Something’s not right here.

What the hell are they trying to steal, exactly?

JUNO: I told you, I’m not gonna—

KHAN: —because you needed to come along, you said. Well, now you’re along. It sounds like we’re in the room they’re robbing.

JUNO: And while you’re wasting time, he’s gonna get away!

KHAN: So tell me, Steel. What are they stealing?

JUNO (NARRATOR): Sitting there in the dark, with Khan’s hand on my shoulder, all I could think about was that this was our moment and we were letting it pass us by. Because at the tail end of every failure case, there’s always one moment you can look back at and say to yourself, “I should have taken the shot.” A single mistake. A moment that you can beat yourself up about for years. Thinking about how if you’d just done it, if you’d just jumped when the time came to jump, it all would’ve worked out in the end.

Staring at that shadow in the doorway, I knew one thing: I wasn’t going to let this be that moment.

SOUND: FABRIC RUSTLING.

KHAN: Steel, what– what the hell are you doing, Steel? Get back here!

JUNO (NARRATOR): “I’m not gonna look back at this and wish I’d done something,” I thought.

And I was right. Later I’d look back and wish I hadn’t done anything.

JUNO: Hmf!

VOICE 1: Oof!

SOUND: HEAVY THUD. RUSTLING.

JUNO: Alright, buddy, you’re gonna tell me what your gang is after, and you’re gonna tell me now.

KHAN: Steel, he’s reaching for something!

JUNO (NARRATOR): So I panicked.

SOUND: BLASTER SHOT.

VOICE 1: (GRUNTS)

KHAN: …A gun? Where the hell did you get a—

When did you take my gun?!

SOUND: ALARM.

God damn it, what now?

PIRANHA: (DISTANT) Ugh, the alarm! Unless you want a laser through each of your thick skulls, you’re gonna find who hit that god damn alarm, see!

JUNO: Come on, we have to hide. We’ll let the Piranha clean up her own mess.

SOUND: RUNNING FOOTSTEPS.

PIRANHA: Well? You see anybody?

PEREYRA: Hey there, no reason to get all excited. Looks like our party crasher just crashed.

KHAN: That voice… is that Mayor Pereyra?

JUNO (NARRATOR): It was. The Piranha. Two goons. And Pilot Pereyra.

What the hell were they doing here? Why the hell would a crime boss on Pilot’s level show up to their own heist?

It didn’t make sense. It didn’t make any sense.

KHAN: Oh, no. No way, no how.

JUNO: What?

KHAN: That fancy eye of yours make you soft in the cerebellum? Look at that gangster’s face! She doesn’t recognize that poor sucker you just knocked out!

PIRANHA: Well, well. Just who the hell are you?

PEREYRA: Looks like a museum security guard. And it sounds like he flipped quite the alarm.

PIRANHA: Damn it, I thought you said you knew the patrol schedule!

PEREYRA: Hey, Pilot Pereyra makes the trains run on time, but I never promised to make the guards do the same.

PIRANHA: (GROWLS) Alright. If that’s how you wanna play it… plan B. We’ll have to blow our escape plan, but—

PEREYRA: Leave the escape to me. Now. Show us how it’s done.

PIRANHA: Fine. Hey, you. What’s your name?

VOICE 2: His name’s Mike. He doesn’t talk.

PIRANHA: Good for him. Hold this comms, Mike. We’re gonna take a home movie.

JUNO (NARRATOR): The Piranha stepped closer to the guard I’d stunned.

And she pointed her gun right at his head.

SOUND: GUN COCKING.

The Piranha’s flashlight caught his badge and I saw his name and… I’d never unsee it again: Barton Pollock. Barton. Sounded like my brother’s name, if you thought it fast enough, if your mind was spinning around it. Bart to his friends, or Barty? Kids, husband, wife, friends?

I felt so sick that when Pilot stepped forward, hand up, I even let myself get hopeful for a second.

PEREYRA: Hey, hey now… let’s not rush in without thinking, alright?

PIRANHA: You said solve it my way, so I’m solving it my way, see? You have a problem?

PEREYRA: I do, actually.

JUNO (NARRATOR): Maybe they’ve got a soul after all, I thought. Maybe this city isn’t as bad off as I thought it was.

PEREYRA: Your blaster’s on stun. Better set it to kill – you can tell the difference on video.

JUNO (NARRATOR): That thought didn’t last long.

PIRANHA: Thanks, Mx. Mayor. Start rolling, Mikey.

SOUND: ELECTRONIC BEEP.

Dear Museum of Colonized History Security Force, HCPD nightowls, late-night comms scanners and all other busybodies: we know right about now all you got blasted with a hell of an alarm from this exhibit, and we know you’d probably like to do something about it.

Well. Me and my associates invite you to consider a different option, see: we got about a half-dozen hostages here we was hoping to trade for clean getaway, but if any of you flash so much as a siren? Well. We might just have to do something to those good citizens. Something… like… this.

SOUND: BLASTER SHOT.

JUNO: No way. No way, no way, no way…

KHAN: (GRUNTS)

PIRANHA: Your move, coppers. (CACKLES) We’ll call again in fifteen minutes. Cut the feed, Mikey.

SOUND: BEEP.

How’s that for style?

PILOT: Not bad. Just… make sure I don’t end up in frame.

PIRANHA: I’m a professional, ain’t I? Now let’s go check on the hostages – and our map.

SOUND: FOOTSTEPS DEPARTING.

JUNO: I can’t believe… I can’t believe she killed him. While he was out cold. Khan, what do we do?

Captain?

KHAN: Never should’ve listened to you. Damn it, god damn it, I knew I should’ve waited. I knew it!

JUNO: What…?

KHAN: You don’t know a thing about this heist, do you? You didn’t know the guard. You didn’t know Pereyra was gonna be here. You knew a little, sure, enough to dupe me. But this was all just another Juno Steel lie, wasn’t it?

JUNO: The heist was tonight. So what if I didn’t know everything? You were gonna sit back and just let it happen.

KHAN: You think that guard’s kids care which of us was right?

I can’t even blame you. I’m the one who listened. I’m the one you took the gun from. Damn it, I should’ve waited. Damn it!

JUNO: Khan?

KHAN: Just shut up and give me my gun.

JUNO: …Okay.

KHAN: We rushed in, that’s the problem. And now we’re… here.

(CLEARS THROAT) But it’s not gonna happen again, Steel.

MUSIC: STARTS.

You hear me? From here, we do it the way we always shoulda: slow. And nobody dies anymore, you hear me?

JUNO: Slow? But Captain—

SOUND: FABRIC RUSTLING.

JUNO (NARRATOR): Khan grabbed me by the coat and pulled me so close I could smell the pasta on his breath – and see his eyes twitching, wild. Scared.

KHAN: We do this by the book. And the book says nobody. Dies.

JUNO (NARRATOR): Khan was in the kind of mood right then that you don’t argue with, so I didn’t. Didn’t tell him what I thought: that I had no idea what book he was talking about, but any book that tells you nobody’s gonna die is lying. Because you can romanticize the past all you want; put it in a nice case with a tasteful little plaque next to it, but the fact is, that the book of time is written in blood. Elections, colonization, policework… you don’t get the fancy statues and the pretty maps without dropping a few bodies along the way. Which isn’t to say those people deserved to die, or that their killers deserved to live. Just, that history is only written by those who live long enough to write it.

Barton Pollock didn’t deserve to die.

Yasmin Swift didn’t deserve to die.

I can’t even swallow the idea that the Proctor deserved to die, not while there was a way around it. But the fact was that they were dead and I was alive, and that had been the price to get to this moment… for now.

I was sure it would cost more before we were done. It always did. The best I could hope to do was make sure the right person footed the bill… even if that meant paying up myself.

MUSIC: ENDS.

***

SOUND: TRAIN MOVING, MUSIC.

CONDUCTOR: If you’ve enjoyed this tale, please consider donating to The Penumbra on Patreon. Our artists work tirelessly to bring you these stories, and if you have the means, we hope you will support our efforts. Every dollar helps. You can find that page at patreon.com/thepenumbrapodcast. If you support us on Patreon at the $10 level or higher, you’ll receive access to commentary tracks like this one, from actors Kate Jones, Avi Meehan, and Joshua Ilon, and co-creator Sophie Kaner:

SOUND: TRAIN STOPS, DOOR SLIDES OPEN, RAIN.

SOPHIE: …Well I also think that, I’m sure, Joshua and Kate can, um, relate to… playing themselves. (LAUGHS)

KATE: What?

JOSHUA: I have no idea what you’re talkin’ about.

AVI: Oh, can I say one more thing?

SOPHIE: Yeah!

AVI: Can I say one more thing? Can—

SOPHIE: Say two! Say three!

AVI: I think, another thing that was really exciting was, um I’m a non-binary hume [is this a word?], and getting the opportunity to play a non-binary character was sooo gosh-dang exciting for me, just because it’s sort of like, ‘alright, you’re small, you look kind of– you, you’re just a girl!’ And I’m like…

SOUND: DOOR SLIDES SHUT.

CONDUCTOR: You can also support The Penumbra by liking us on Facebook, following us on Twitter @thepenumbrapod, following us on Tumblr @thepenumbrapodcast, telling your friends about us, telling your friends to tell their friends about us, and especially by rating and reviewing our podcast on iTunes. Every rating, comment, and kind word spreads our stories further and inspires us to keep creating more and better tales to come.

We would like to give special thanks to all who support us on Patreon, but especially to Francie Liana, Charlie Spiegel, Minchowski, Lynné Herman, Jaimie Gunter, and the Princess and the Scrivener for their incredibly generous contributions per episode. Thank you.

This tale, Juno Steel and the Stolen City, was told by the following people: Joshua Ilon as Juno Steel, Elliot Sicard as Captain Omar Khan, Avi Meehan as Lieutenant Loo, Simon Moody as Mayor Pilot Pereyra, Sophie Kaner as the Piranha, Matthew Zahnzinger as Ramses O’Flaherty, and Kate Jones as Noor Khan.

On staff at The Penumbra: Kevin Vibert is our lead writer and recording engineer. Sophie Kaner is our director and sound designer. Grahame Turner is our script editor. Noah Simes is our production manager. Alice Chung is our designer and financial manager. Original music by Ryan Vibert. Promotional art by Mikaela Buckley.

The Penumbra is created and produced by Sophie Kaner and Kevin Vibert.

I’m afraid this is the end of the line for today, dear Traveler. We hope you will ride with The Penumbra again soon.

ALL SOUNDS: FADE OUT.

#juno steel

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dpargyle · 7 years

Text

Winter of My Discontents

Alright, moving on –

So this is the first day of shit weather this year where I live. It’s weird – growing up in New York I remember the seasons – but here we only have two – winter and construction. It goes from 80 to 40 (F) in about a week – so yesterday was 75 and sunny and I could read outside and actually talk to people and today it’s 59 and rainy and cloudy and I just wanna set everything on fire.

I fucking hate it.

Kids – I fucking hate winter. It glooms over you – and everything goes from bright and outside to monochrome and “fuck you.” My wheelchair can’t go over the snow and it snows here from like the beginning of November to the middle of April and all of those months here I loathe. Summer’s ok here but you’re still surrounded by religious lunatics.

Nobody plows their fucking sidewalk in winter so I have to literally risk my life by driving my wheelchair in the middle of roads with cars in order to cross my own godsdamn street just to get food and now this year

my Dad wants me to come into the office three times a week.

(So – to explain my work situation – OK – so technically I’m unemployed – and that’s cuz of the stupid fucking government who says like “oh you’re making above this much money as a person in a wheelchair? Well in that case Medicaid isn’t gonna pay for your attendants to help you get up in the morning and go to bed at night (I’d need to make, like, 25k or so a year to afford that basically)” and also if you save literally one dollar more than $2,000 at one time on all your bank accounts combined we’ll also cut your Medicaid funding for the attendants and very expensive medical equipment (my chair costs 36k every 5 years) as well!” so I’m very much hamstrung by bureaucratic bullshit) –

so in order to get around all this nonsense – I (with the help of my family) am officially unemployed but I live in an apartment that’s technically rented by my Dad’s company – and in return I write and edit (and have been for like 6 years now) an e-magazine about the 3D Printing Industry (I don’t put my name on it though because again, government…) – which is kinda interesting and has allowed me to do both that and focus on my creative work as well – and I also do some freelance writing and one time an artistic thing for the company as well – (that money gets funneled to a bank account the government doesn’t know about) but mostly I’m glad I’ve had these jobs but they’re not…I don’t get excited about them. I know other people might, but – I’m not one of them hahaha. I really want to work creatively, but you know…)

In any case, while my Dad does run the main company as CEO he didn’t hire me – it wasn’t his idea – the owner of the company (who has lots of $$$) – after a year of me searching for jobs after college (very unsuccessfully) called me up one day and was like “you’re doing this for us now” and I needed to move out of my folks’ house ASAP so I was like “OK” –

But now my Dad wants me to come in to the office on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays – and I totally understand his reasoning (he’s trying to help me out) – he thinks that if I’m in the office other people there will involve me more in freelance-type work and I’ll be able to earn more $ - and this is probably true – and he also wants me to “get out of your warren” – cuz he knows my brother was basically the only person I interacted with socially in this entire city on any regular basis and now that he’s gone, well….

So my Dad seems to think being social with the other workers or something will be good for me? I mean maybe he’s right but I know everyone in there and they’re all super old and while they’re very nice I don’t have much in common with them and even if I did it’s still super awkward cuz I’m the boss’s son and it’s just awkward – I mean this is part of the reason why my brother left anyway – he worked there for three years but after those three years he was ready to not work at his Dad’s company anymore – and plus he and his wife fuckin hated Utah anyway and I don’t blame them at all I mostly hate it too haahahaha (cries)…

Though if I’m being honest anywhere I’d live I’d probably find all the flaws in real quick…

But maybe somewhere like California where actual things happen and I don’t have to fucking war against winter every year…

Cuz like I’ve tried the work many days a week with a commute in this city – and in summer it’s ok – there’s a very good tram-line system and I’m close to a station (for this purpose) – but in winter…

So for the first year I lived in Salt Lake I was working the magazine job and I was also working at the local Apple Store as well and that winter I literally nearly died commuting cuz I was super tired all the time (my fatigue tolerance level is super low) and dealing with customers and then doing the magazine job and then I was trying to write a book in my free time (it was the first one I wrote and it was complete shit but I’m proud of it cuz it was the first thing I’d ever finished) but I was basically operating at only 15% power and then one night I was on the train platform and there was ice and I slipped off it and half my wheelchair and I fell into the gap between the platform and the train and if that train operator hadn’t seen me he would’ve pulled out of the station and I woulda been warm meat paste…

(I nearly die at least six times a year…)

And that was the night I decided I’d quit that Apple job cuz no job is worth that hellish commute.

Even in subtler ways, though the winter is a killer for me here – there are days when the weather or the pressure changes and my right shoulder (the arm I drive my power wheelchair with) is in so much agony I can hardly move at all – and this lasts 2 or 3 days sometimes 4 –

and then they have these frikken godsforsaken mines here and we’re in this bowl-shaped valley so they mine all this dust into the air and so there’s this inversion here in winter and you can literally visibly see the dust in the air and your throat burns for like four months straight and it’s like the fuckin dust bowl or something god I hate unregulated red states…

And to top it all off, when I travel a lot in the cold my feet rub against my shoes which happened when I commuted to the apple store and by the end of that year I had sores on my heels that took 6 months to heal and in that time one of my best friends from high school died and I couldn’t travel to his funeral because I couldn’t even get out of my door and….I hated myself for that – I’d let him down (again.)

To be honest with you – when I first got offered that job at Apple I was so proud and happy and excited – I’d been looking for a job for a year after college and I looked everywhere – all over the world – in every industry I could think of – and there was just nothing. Nobody even offered me an interview before they did – and I have self-esteem issues anyway so I started thinking – like – is it cuz I’m in a wheelchair? Is that why nobody wants me? (I really have issues dealing with any kind of rejection because of this…)

But then Apple came along and said “Yes!” And I was like OMG this is amazing – I’m doing retail but it’s gonna be in an interesting (kind of) industry and I’m gonna work with young peeps like me and I’m gonna do creative stuff in my free time and slowly work my way up the ladder and I’m still young I got tons of time to do everything and be everywhere I wanna be going…and then the month before I had the job orientation with Apple my old high school friend had the sudden accident which would lead to his passing a few months later – and….nothing mattered like it had anymore…

He was hovering between life and death all the way in New York and I was in Utah doing…what? Selling expensive crap to rich Mormons? Nothing made sense anymore. For six years before that point I’d been an insufferable evangelical Christian zealot – and although for two years my faith had been wavering due to me beginning to question its draconian teachings – at that point I still had it – but then this happened and very quickly what little faith I’d been holding onto died with my friend.

I’m glad I’ve grown in my empathy and inclusiveness since then – but on the other hand, I feel I’ve lost something…

And then a month after my friend’s accident I had to present myself to Apple and be an enthusiastic team player filled with evangelism for the products and I just…I couldn’t do it…I remember that week so vividly too cuz that was the week George Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney and they announced they were doing MORE STAR WARS and I was like holy fuck that’s what I wanna do – maybe not necessarily Star Wars (though !!!) – but telling stories and weaving myths – and making a thing that MATTERED to people – that moved them and shook them and changed them and nourished them and gave them some godsdamned fucking hope in this unjust world…

But I was stuck here in Utah…

So I started writing that book and I pushed myself so incredibly hard cuz literally by that point it was the only thing that mattered to me and made sense – feeling like I’d been put on this Earth to make art and I wasn’t gonna waste anymore time because maybe I didn’t have anymore time, you know?

And like I couldn’t connect with my coworkers – they were my age but many of them were Mormons with whole families they were supporting and most of the rest (save for my good friend @soundscomplicated) – I just…it was hard to connect to. In college I’d been surrounded by interesting people who challenged my brain and soul parts (at least sometimes – though academia drove me nuts) …but now….now I was stuck in the wasteland with no way out…

I finished the book and it was crap but at least I’d done something. Then I made that personal safety decision to quit Apple and for the last four years I’ve been working from home…

And this past year or so I finally began to put it all together again maybe – my drawing skills were improving – I was writing another book that scared the crap outta me (but that was a good thing) – about a group of nerds who lost someone close to them and whose worlds were turned upside down as a result – where the protagonist was a kid in a wheelchair like me and for the first time I felt like I was writing something IMPORTANT that MATTERED that might move people – letting out all my pain and hope and regret and love -

But then I sent it out to potential agents and waited and waited and waited for months and months and literally none of them even sent me a solid rejection. It was all just nothingness into the void. I understand they get so many submissions though so I tried not to take it personally –

And I decided this story and these words that I’d finished were important enough for me to publish on Amazon – so I did – and it was one of the proudest moments of my life (this was back in April or so) but then – nobody bought it. And it’s not like I expected to make out like gangbusters – I don’t know anything about marketing or being social media savvy (I mean just witness the godsdamned length of this friggen post hahaha) – but I thought at least everyone in my extended family would buy it – but nope. It sold like 11 copies. Let’s just say I will love those 11 people forever but I just…

Like I’d killed myself over this fucking book. I went down into the deepest parts of my soul and ripped them out for all the world to see – I didn’t do anything but this book. I did my paying work for the company but hanging out with people other than my brother sometimes? I didn’t have time. I didn’t have the energy.

In the flesh connections are so hard and when you’re working on something you truly believe in – well – you feel compelled to WORK WORK WORK and where was I gonna meet people here anyway?

This story mattered more than my own happiness.

And now that it hasn’t done well? What was it all for? Really? It’s not that I’m not totally effing proud of what came out – I am – probably more than any other art I’ve ever made – but…I dunno I guess I just have delusions of grandeur for myself…sometimes I feel like if I’m not Shakespeare – if I can’t support myself with my art – I’m a failure.

I’ve failed. My life has been a waste!

And then I sit back and I try to remind myself that’s an incredibly toxic and terrible way of thinking but at this point I literally can’t help it…

I don’t know what to work on next creatively. And now I’m having to spend more time away from my creative stuff and I don’t want to – I really don’t give a shit about the meager extra money I’m gonna get by going into the office – I want those hours I’m gonna waste there back! I don’t want to spend more hours not doing what I was born on this earth to do.

That probably sounds super privileged of me and I’m lucky to be where I am and blah blah blah but I just……and when the winter really comes and there’s snow on the ground I literally will not be able to go to the office (or even leave my apartment easily for that matter) and my Dad understands that – but I just…

Maybe I just don’t want to do that stuff anymore? I’m probably coming across as a super lazy and ungrateful person – and I am, but…

I just don’t have many friends here anyway and spending energy on commuting is just not gonna help that at all and I see no way out and I’m literally crying as I type this and I want OUT OUT OUT so bad but I don’t know what that means or what that looks like and I am cold and scared and lonely and tired and

For the past month it’s been warm and sunny and I’ve had Blondie to distract me from all this pain and mounting mediocrity and it’s been nice cuz I haven’t really had a crush in the flesh since college – like literally the last girl I allowed myself to fall for is now married with two kids hahaha and that night I got my head stuck in the fridge and I didn’t say this in the original post but

I was literally kind of sobbing because my brother was leaving (he’s gone now) and I don’t have many good friends (especially here) and my book I cared so much about fucking crashed and burned and I put my fucking soul into that thing and it wasn’t good enough I’M NEVER GOOD ENOUGH and then my chair crapped out and I was about to die and I cried for like an hour (I haven’t cried like that in like seven years – since before my friend died) but then I stopped crying cuz Leia’s Theme came on my shuffle and it gave me some hope so instead of crying I was yelling and then somebody busted open my front door

And she was literally an angel and just sweet and all my everything just washed away and everything was OK but now – it’s just – that distraction is fading away and I am facing my reality and…

As with every winter here, I am growing restless…

#tales from the wasteland

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lady-divine-writes · 7 years

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Klaine fic - “All the Beautiful Pieces” (Rated NC17)

Blaine Anderson is spending the summer after graduation flipping houses with his brother for Cooper's total home renovation show. The show features the worst houses Cooper can buy, with Blaine playing the role of lackey so that Cooper can torture him in front of his viewers. The last house Blaine has to renovate is an original Victorian House in San Diego, CA, which is in terrible condition. But this house turns out to be more than just another job. It was once owned by a famous Vaudeville ventriloquist by the name of Andrew Smythe. It houses a very interesting collection of items - among them, two life-sized puppets. Blaine isn't sure exactly why, but he's drawn to them - especially to the one with the beautiful blue eyes. He convinces Cooper to give him the puppets, and Blaine starts to restore them. In the course of the restoration, Blaine finds out that neither puppet is simply a run-of-the-mill puppet, and Andrew Smythe was hiding a secret that will be the key to saving two lives.

Okay, so, as many of you people know, this was my Reverse Bang story from way too long ago. I had it completed, but as I was uploading it, my computer crashed and obliterated this plus a ton of my other stories, which I have been writing back from memory these many years. I had this one almost down except for the last three chapters, which have been lost in the void of my brain. So, what I’ve done is start over from the beginning. I haven’t been changing the story, just freshening the language, and then I will add those last three chapters. But I’m posting it here one chapter per week so those of you who would like to can get reacquainted with the story. Of course, you could jump ahead to AO3, and cheat, re-read all 17 original chapters at once, but you’ll still have to wait for the ending, and only chapters 1-7 have been redone. Anyway, this story wouldn’t even exist without @freakingpotter who is an amazing artist and an even more amazing friend <3 Give her lots of love <333

(Warning for character death that happens in the past, hoarding, and anxiety.)

Chapter 1 (6515 words)

Blaine stares out the windshield of his rented Honda Odyssey, his jaw dropping open, stunned out of his senses at the sight of the disastrous house in front of him. His hands grip the steering wheel for support. His knees knock together, completely out of his control. A low, pitiful whining noise rattles around in the back of his throat. The house to his right, nestled incongruously behind a manicured lawn, carefully pruned rose bushes, and a well-established Mulberry tree, is so incredibly awful that he can’t stop looking at it. It’s like a horrendous traffic accident – lots of blood and twisted metal, but try as you might, you can’t make yourself look away.

“What’s wrong, squirt?” Cooper, Blaine’s older brother, asks. “Is something wrong with my new investment?”

“Uh, I’m looking at your new investment right now,” Blaine groans, sounding strangled and pathetic, but he couldn’t care less.

“And…” Cooper asks, his voice an annoying, disembodied presence in Blaine’s Bluetooth since there is no way that Cooper Anderson would actually deign to come out to a new project house himself.

He leaves that kind of grunt work to his baby brother, Blaine.

Cooper Anderson’s Complete Home Renovation started as a way for Blaine’s brother to translate his B-list (to put it kindly) celebrity status into a steady paycheck. At first, Blaine thought this show would turn into another fad - a superficial hobby that Coop would get really excited about for a few months and then become bored with when the hard work began. Cooper had a reputation for those – Catamaran racing, model plane building, volunteering at the Greyhound rescue. But this time, Blaine had to give Coop some credit. When he started the show a year or so back, he did research, found a reputable contractor, and learned the ins and outs of foreclosed property auctions. It was the most responsible Cooper had been about something in a long while. He flipped a few houses, got a desirable time slot on a basic cable network, and made a decent amount of money doing it. But the show was dull as dishwater and the ratings tanked. That was until Cooper decided to do things his usual way, which basically meant firing every capable person involved with the production of the show, managing everything himself…and soliciting the help of his younger brother.

Cooper purchased the properties, usually through a third party company, and then turned Blaine loose on whatever disaster he had bought. Blaine would perform a preliminary walkthrough of the various houses, with Cooper accompanying him through the aid of a wireless webcam, while back at command central (Cooper’s fancy name for his breakfast nook), Cooper and his contractor, who remained silent through the walkthrough to make Cooper look like the knowledgeable one, made plans for the renovation. In no time flat, Cooper ended up with a sensational cult following, as well as a membership-only website. Members to the website got the privilege of watching the live webcam feed and witnessing all the hilarious - and embarrassing - pitfalls that Blaine suffered. Later on, the feed would be edited for television. The show became a bigger hit than Blaine could have ever imagined - which was one of the many reasons why Blaine wanted nothing to do with it.

Blaine had a strict policy not to participate in any of Cooper’s harebrained ideas. This one, being a television show, pretty much screamed, “No! Don’t! Turn back!” Blaine had dreams of being on Broadway one day, and he didn’t need his brother destroying his reputation before he even had one. But Cooper never took no for an answer, and in this case, he knew his brother’s Achilles’ heel.

College.

But not just any college.

NYADA.

The premier college for musical theater, located in none other than Blaine’s dream city – New York.

Blaine was desperate to get there, especially now that their parents decided last minute not to pay for it. It was all right for Blaine to say he wanted to go to NYADA, but in the end, his parents were counting on a more practical college choice, like Stanford or Princeton. They would even bend as far as accepting NYU, as long as Blaine majored in business or medicine, but not NYADA. No. They didn’t want another foolish child with dreams of making it big as a performer making a mockery of the Anderson family name.

Not like Cooper.

Sure, Cooper had managed some bit parts in a few movies, and a one-line speaking role on a television series, but before his renovation show took off, his claim to fame as a thespian had been one FreeCreditRatingToday.com commercial.

His parents were less than impressed.

Cooper knew Blaine was trying to find a way to save up for college, and truth be told, he felt guilty. He realized that, in a way, he had caused all these problems for Blaine, but it wasn’t in Cooper’s nature to simply come out and apologize…especially when his idea to have Blaine as a lackey on his show was so much better.

Blaine caved when he realized that Cooper’s offer, no matter how destructive it might be to his future career, was his only real hope, especially considering what Cooper was offering to pay him in comparison to working part time at the Lima Bean, which only paid minimum wage plus the occasional tip. So, Blaine spent most of his free time and all of his school breaks helping Cooper flip houses.

That included his summer vacation.

This summer would be Blaine’s final hoorah on the show until his next big school break, which prompted the idea to bring Blaine out to the West Coast to do a Fun in the Sun edition of Cooper Anderson’s Complete Home Renovation.

Blaine was initially thrilled by the idea. A couple of months at their family’s old beach house (God, they hadn’t been there in years), spending some time lying out on the sand, relaxing, rescuing his upper arms from an unsightly farmer’s tan, and escaping his mom and dad’s constant looks of disapproval every time he entered a room.

The first three vile houses he renovated in San Diego, however, almost made any fun and relaxation Blaine had planned for this trip completely immaterial.

But this house – his last house – takes the cake for sure.

“Blai-ney?” Cooper sings through the earpiece, cutting through Blaine’s thoughts and the dead air.

“Do you ever see these houses before you buy them, Coop?” Blaine asks. He tilts his head from side to side and cranes his neck to peer out the windshield, refusing to move from his seat until he absolutely has to.

“Why? Is it the wrong house?” Cooper asks in a panic. “It’s the Victorian, right? Please tell me it’s the Victorian!”

“It’s the Victorian, all right,” Blaine confirms with a long, heavy sigh. Or it will be a decent Victorian house once they get rid of the hodge-podge of vomit-worthy paint that had been slapped on for God knows how long. The house looks like the whole color scheme was chosen by a drunk toddler. The main body of the house is a bright, fire engine red; the scrolled pillars and the sconces look to be hazard orange; and everything else is either bright blue or deep purple. If the house hadn’t been declared a historical landmark, Blaine is sure that the neighbors would have torn it apart panel by panel.

“Then what’s the problem?” Cooper sounds worried at the reluctance in his brother’s voice, not that Blaine isn’t always reluctant. That’s part of the shtick. Cooper makes it a point to buy the worst houses he’s heard of, sight unseen, because Blaine’s initial reaction is a big part of his TV show’s draw.

Besides, torturing his younger brother has always been one of Cooper Anderson’s favorite past times.

“So, are you inside yet, squirt?” Cooper pipes up over Blaine’s Bluetooth. “Because I’m seeing a serious lack of anything interesting on my computer screen. Of course, I’m not all that tech savvy. Check the feed on your end.”

“I’m not in the house yet, Coop,” Blaine moans.

“Wha--- well, why not?” Cooper sputters. “Time’s a-wasting here, kiddo. We have a show to put on. Chippity-chop-chop, Blaine!”

Blaine sighs and switches on the portable webcam, focusing the lens on his own face so that Cooper can check the feed.

“There’s my handsome little man,” Cooper coos, thrilled to tease his baby brother in front of his slew of dedicated viewers. “Now go and show me the house that’s destined to become my newest masterpiece.”

Blaine’s shoulders slump, weighed down by the inevitable. He opens the minivan door, ready to step out and get the full effect of how awful it truly is, when he is hit with a smell so powerful it forces him back into his seat.

“Ugh! Blech!” He locks the doors and turns on the air conditioner to flush the evil smell out, but that doesn’t work the way he hopes. The conditioned air circulates the smell throughout the car. Immediately, the stench sticks to the upholstery and his clothes.

Blaine doesn’t want to breathe it in any more than he has to, but there’s something curious about the smell. Yes, it’s disgusting to think that the house stinks so badly he can smell it all the way from his minivan with the windows rolled up, but now that time has passed, he realizes it isn’t altogether a bad smell. It’s more odd than bad. Against his better judgment, Blaine takes a deep breath in through his nostrils and holds it, shutting his eyes to get a better idea of what the smell reminds him of.

Melancholy.

Bittersweet.

Like a musty old funeral home parlor, where each grain of wood, each fiber of carpet seems to be infused with the sorrow, pain, and tears of mourners grieving for loved ones lost.

To put it simply, the house smells sad.

Regardless, whatever is causing that smell can’t be healthy.

Even more than the smell, which is disturbing to say the least, it’s the silence that unnerves him.

Blaine had gotten lost on his way here. He had parked in the cul-de-sac on the opposite side of the street and sat for a good twenty minutes checking his GPS before he realized his mistake. Harbor Drive cuts in half with a strip of neighborhood right down its middle. He had ended up on the other side. The side he originally parked in is a lively, typical suburban neighborhood, with kids riding their bikes and people in their yards gardening, watering their lawns, talking and laughing, enjoying this beautiful Southern California afternoon.

The cul-de-sac this Victorian house sits in is much the same – the same identical houses, the same green lawns, the same suburban atmosphere - only there are no children playing here, and no busy neighbors tending to their gardens. Blaine looks up at the sky. For two whole minutes, not a single bird passes overhead, and there isn’t an insect to be seen.

Life seems to avoid this neighborhood, and probably for good reason.

Blaine can’t shake the ominous feeling that he’s being watched…and he probably isn’t the first person who’s felt that way. Blaine had heard that this house got no foot traffic. Even when it was put up for auction, few people came by to take a look at it, which is strange considering how popular real Victorian houses are in this area of the country.

But something as trivial as the possibility of a supernatural threat to his life will not deter Cooper Anderson from ratings and equity. Blaine will eventually have to get out of the Odyssey and go into the house. He reaches into his glove box and pulls out a dust mask, which Cooper must see since he starts yelling into the earpiece.

“No! Blaine! What are you doing?”

“Coop, I can smell your house all the way from the van,” Blaine explains, giving himself permission to be haughty. “I’m protecting myself from whatever lives in the air around this place.”

“No, you can’t cover your face!” Cooper complains. Blaine might find Cooper’s desperation amusing if he wasn’t trying to talk him out of keeping himself safe. “You know my viewers tune in to see my dapper brother’s handsome face. Your face is my money maker!”

“So, you’re going to risk my health, and my future as a singer, for ratings?” Blaine argues, annoyed at his brother’s overwhelming lack of concern. When he doesn’t receive a response, he decides to appeal to one of Cooper’s real loves – money. “You know, one stray mold spore gets into my lungs and your insurance premiums take a hit.”

“Hey,” Cooper says in a sly voice, “it’s a risk I’m willing to take.

But Blaine knows better than to let his brother dictate matters of life and death, and squirrels the mask into his back pocket. He won’t be on camera the whole time, and it’s an easy enough thing to slip on and off without Cooper noticing.

He had to do it for those last three houses.

Blaine grabs the webcam and climbs out of the minivan. He takes extra time to make sure the doors are locked and the windows rolled up, deliberately stalling. Finally, he gives in and walks up to the cartoon-esque fun house that smells like heartbreak and woe.

Blaine stands for a moment to take it all in. Then he trains the webcam on the house, and Cooper laughs like a hyena through Blaine’s Bluetooth.

“Holy crap!” he roars. “Stop, Blainers. Just…just give our audience a moment to appreciate the monstrosity before us.”

Blaine scans the scene, starting from the far left and moving to the right.

“What the hell colors are those?” Cooper chokes the words out between the most unattractive chortles Blaine has ever heard. “It looks like a carnival funhouse.”

“Yeah, well, you sure know how to pick ‘em, Coop,” Blaine recites in a practiced flat and sour tone. It’s one of his many catch phrases that he is required to say through the course of filming. Unoriginal, but it seems to make the viewers happy. Twice in the last six months the phrase ‘Pick a Winner, Coop’ has trended on Twitter.

And Blaine has been a huge part of that.

Yippee.

“You know, this house has a really well-kept lawn to go with that crap paint job.”

“The realtor told me that the ladies from the historical society were taking care of the landscaping,” Blaine remarks as he trots up the walk, not that Cooper actually cares, but because Blaine does his best to fill in the silences with informative little tidbits. If anything, maybe he can use it as a way to showcase his professionalism and dedication to the craft - his ability to improvise.

Blaine Anderson – Master of Finding the Silver Lining.

Blaine takes the keys out of his pocket. He had to pick them up directly from the realtor’s office. For some reason, the severe, dowdy, and unnaturally petite woman wouldn’t meet him at the house.

She said specifically that she never went down there.

That, in itself, is not a reassuring testimonial.

Blaine works to unlock the deadbolt, balancing the webcam beneath his chin and pulling the door toward him when the lock won’t turn.

“Anyone want to take a bet on what it looks like inside?” Cooper asks, filling up the empty air space while Blaine fumbles with the uncooperative lock. Blaine feels his phone buzz in his pocket which means that Cooper also tweeted that question to his viewers. “Op! Blaine’s struggling with the lock! Nobody must have gone in this house in years! This is going to be horrible! I can feel it!”

Cooper chuckles wickedly and Blaine rolls his eyes. He isn’t sure that he likes the strange, sadistic pleasure Cooper gets from tormenting him like this.

Blaine jiggles the doorknob while turning the key, cranking it left and right, but it isn’t just that the lock itself is stuck. It feels like the door is being held closed from the inside. All of Blaine’s inner alarms start going off – in his head where his ears ring with Cooper’s inane laughter, in his chest where his heart races so hard that his ribs hurt, in his feet where he shifts weight from one to the other, as eager to be in the house and done with this as he is to get into his minivan and leave.

At the thought of leaving, the door finally opens, shoving in about a foot and then stopping dead. Blaine pushes and pushes, but the door won’t budge any farther.

“Uh…Blaine?” Cooper’s voice calls through the Bluetooth. “I like your shoes and that lovely sweater vest you’re wearing as much as the next guy, but do you think you could hold the webcam up so we can see what’s going on? All this bouncing around is making me want to hurl. It’s like a scene from Cloverfield or something.”

Blaine pulls the webcam out from beneath his chin and sticks it around the corner of the door. If he can’t make his way into the house, at least Cooper and his audience can see what he’s up against.

“Well…that’s a…dark room you’re showing us there, Blainers,” Cooper teases in a straight voice. “In fact, that’s an incredible shade of grey we’re seeing at the moment. Do you think you could open up a curtain or turn on a light there, squirt?”

“I’m…hmpf…I’m trying…” Blaine grumbles, struggling to keep the webcam aloft while fighting to open the door. After a few backbreaking heaves, he gives up and shimmies through the narrow crack he’s already made, sucking in his stomach to keep from snagging his sweater vest on the edge of the door. He slips through the opening, having to stop a second to maneuver his leg around the bend, and stumbles inside. His right foot comes in contact with the floor, his left foot raised behind him, and the front door slams shut.

The room he’s standing in goes from grey to black, and everything becomes eerily silent.

Even Cooper’s chuckle dies to muffled breaths over Blaine’s Bluetooth.

Blaine stands completely still, praying that nothing runs at him from out of the shadows.

Of course, it doesn’t help in the slightest that he had stayed up late last night streaming Stephen King’s mini-series Rose Red. Whatever possessed him to watch a show about a haunted house hours before coming here, he will never know.

His eyes adjust to the lack of light. They water excessively, clouded by thick layers of dust that he can smell and taste with every breath he takes. He holds his breath, sure that any monsters hiding in the dark will hear even the slightest inhale.

“Blaine?” Cooper whispers harshly. “Do…something…”

“I’m…trying…” Blaine whispers back with an added huff of annoyance.

Blaine finally dares to turn his head, sweeping the webcam around the room. He reaches out his free hand, his arm shaking as he tries to stay balanced on one foot, and feels for a light switch on the wall by the door. His fingers come in contact with one; he flips it up and down madly, but with no results.

“Coop…I thought you called SDG&E and had the power switched on,” Blaine says, continuing to flip the switch rapidly in hopes that a loose wire somewhere will spark after enough tries and the lights will flick on.

“I did,” Cooper responds in an unnecessarily low voice. “Maybe there’s a blown fuse or a busted circuit.”

Blaine whimpers. He’s not looking forward to negotiating this mess without any light. He attempts to put his elevated foot down, his knee sore from tensing to keep it bent up, but everywhere he steps he feels bulky items in his way, disinclined to be pushed aside. He finds a loose…something…and shoves at it, sliding it across the floor about a foot and making a space to take a step.

“Okay…” Blaine says, both triumphant and anxious as he creeps across the room in this manner. He can’t see anything but shapes and silhouettes that change when he relocates some blurry mystery object. He ignores the sounds of shuffling that echo through the room in response to his movements, keeping his eyes fixed on a single ray of light streaming in through a crack in the curtains. Blaine counts his steps, trying to estimate how big the room is by his strides across the floor.

“Can you see anything?” Cooper asks conversationally, keeping the show moving along while Blaine picks his way at a snail’s pace through the unseen clutter.

“Not yet,” Blaine replies, only a hair louder than a whisper because he’s still wary of talking too loudly - a hidden childhood fear of the dark rearing its ugly head. “I’m trying to make it to the curtains on the windows, but this room is large and packed with stuff.” Blaine looks down at his feet, aiming the webcam at the floor. “Do you see anything, Coop?”

“Naah, not yet, squirt…” Blaine smiles when he hears Cooper sound mildly concerned on his behalf, “just a really, really dark blur.”

“Congratulations, Coop,” Blaine chirps, tripping over something that clangs metallically when it comes in contact with his foot. “You purchased a void.”

Nervous laughter follows Blaine’s comment and he smiles wider. It’s nice to know that every so often his big brother actually cares.

“If you come across any television sets, don’t turn them on,” Cooper warns. “I wouldn’t want you getting sucked in and crossing over to the other side.”

Blaine shakes his head.

“Poltergeist? Really?” Blaine groans, hopping a few steps and finally making his way to the window. “You do know you just aged yourself, don’t yo--”

“I see some light there, squirt,” Cooper cuts in, smoothly evading the mention of his age. “Did you finally make it to the window, or do you feel like walking around in the dark for another ten minutes?”

Blaine doesn’t answer, having deftly slipped the dust mask over his mouth and nose, preparing to open the curtain, which he is sure has to be caked with dust.

He’s right.

With his free hand, he pulls open the heavy fabric of the first curtain, watching as dust motes swirl in front of his eyes, dimming the sun’s light as it pierces the grime on the windows. He moves aside the second curtain, stepping over what he can see in this new light are various metal and wooden objects, peculiar faces peering up at him, staring with chipped and empty eyes.

Dirty light is better than no light at all, but Blaine has a hard time making sense of what he’s seeing. He has been in houses before that had rooms piled high with all sorts of trash – food containers, two-liter bottles, dirty plates, newspapers and magazines with yellowing and cracked pages, even one house with rooms stuffed from floor to ceiling with filthy used diapers, but what he is currently looking at is downright bizarre. Everywhere underfoot there are twisted limbs, contorted bodies, orphaned heads, and a mass of brightly colored clothing and costumes. They’re small – child sized. He makes his way to the next set of windows and opens those curtains. Light floods the room, defused through the layer of dried gunge on the glass, giving it a sepia hue, but with better illumination, Blaine can see the room clearly.

Toys. Piles and piles of toys - dolls, puppets, trains, cars, stuffed animals by the pound. Some are stacked along the walls, mint in their boxes, but the majority lay in heaps, overflowing mountains and dunes, filling the room from corner to corner.

“Holy...”

Cooper’s voice cuts off when Blaine turns and focuses the camera on a long hallway, as foreboding as the living room but inconceivably darker. Blaine swallows hard, knowing that’s the next place Cooper will tell him to go.

“Whoa, Blaine…look at that…”

Yeah, yeah, Blaine thinks, taking a step in that direction. I’m going.

“Hold up,” Cooper says. “Go back to the toys on the floor.”

Blaine breathes a sigh of relief at his temporary reprieve. He aims the camera down, trying to get the best view he can in the low light of the toys scattered over the floor.

“Are those made of metal?” Cooper asks.

“Yup,” Blaine says, moving the mask away from his mouth so he can speak. “Well, some of them. Some of them appear to be wood.”

“Get a closer shot, Blaine. I want to look at those.”

Blaine moves from toy to toy, holding the webcam still for a few seconds so his brother can get some decent screenshots. He hears Cooper typing frantically, researching something on his computer.

“Are you seeing this, Blaine?” Cooper asks excitedly over the earpiece. “Those tin banks? That’s some early 1900s shit. And there’re loads of them! The stuff in that room alone could be worth a fortune! Imagine what we might find in the rest of the house?”

We, Blaine thinks, shaking his head. Right.

Blaine hears more frantic typing, quiet cheering, some scribbling and muttering as Cooper takes down notes on his end of the line. “Okay, Blaine,” Cooper continues, not revealing any of the information he uncovered on his web search, “why don’t you head down that hallway and see what else we’re dealing with?”

Blaine lifts the webcam to show the view of the hallway, partially blocked by a mound of what looks like original Care Bears, and columns of stacked board games. Blaine catches sight of a familiar yellow box with the word OPERATION written across the side in red block letters. It immediately brings to mind all those days he spent kneeling at the coffee table in his living room, playing the game over and over…even if he played mostly by himself.

Good times, he thinks. Good times.

At least he has that happy memory to carry with him into the afterlife, because he is fairly certain that he is going to be murdered in this house.

Blaine has never been in a house before that has so much emotion attached to it. In his property searches, Cooper gravitates toward houses previously owned by hoarders since they have the potential to be the most horrendous, but the one thing Blaine has learned by visiting these houses is that hoarders have a tendency to attach importance to the most off-the-wall things.

It’s not the item, of course, but what or who it represents – and the inability to let go.

Maybe he doesn’t always understand the reason behind the hoard, but it breaks his heart to see it every time.

Hoarding toys, though - this he can understand. It’s holding tight to the best part of a person’s life – their childhood.

Blaine makes his way to the hall, opening the last two sets of curtains along the way until the room is nearly, but not quite, cheerful.

Something still troubles him. Something the immense dark wasn’t hiding after all. The feeling of being watched lingers, but it’s joined by a feeling of being called. As insane as it sounds, Blaine feels there’s something in this house that wants him to find it.

When he gets closer to the hallway, he can see that the extreme darkness of this narrow pathway is an illusion. The mountain of toys blocks the living room light head on, and throws shadows along the floor, but as soon as he turns into it, it becomes a tunnel of light. Behind him, the sunlight in the living room extends its way to the hallway. Blaine sees square windows lining the walls, as grimy as the living room windows, but letting in more light as the sun moves across the sky. This space is littered with toys on the floor just like in the living room, but less so because here they also hang from the walls.

“Blaine, is that a puppet?” Cooper asks.

Blaine takes a step back. “I think so.”

“Blaine, turn to the puppet on the wall - the one with the red hair.”

Blaine turns toward the wall, where a row of puppets hang from wires by thumbtacks embedded in the plaster.

“That…that looks like an original Howdy Doody puppet. That’s got to be worth some money. What do you say, Blainers?”

“I imagine so,” Blaine agrees, taking off his mask and stuffing it in his pocket for the time being since the air here doesn’t seem as dusty. He’s getting sweaty with that thing on anyway.

“Don’t you know?” Cooper sounds distracted, and Blaine hears Cooper typing again. “Aren’t you all puppet savvy and whatnot?”

“I make puppets,” Blaine corrects his brother, moving on to the next puppet down the line. “I don’t collect them.”

“Same diff,” Cooper comments. “It’s still creepy as hell. Let’s see the next one.”

The next puppet is an animal puppet, but what kind of animal, Blaine can’t really tell. It might be a horse…or a dog…or a bear. It’s a scruff of brown fur with eyes and a pointy snout. He vaguely recognizes it as being from an old kids’ TV show that he saw mentioned in a documentary about Vaudeville performers on PBS. Blaine looks down the length of the wall ahead of him to where it dips back into the semi-darkness and sees additional animal puppets, most of them from the same show.

The hallway leads straight to the dining room. From where Blaine stands, he sees only two pieces of furniture - a round, wooden table sitting right at the entrance, its top covered in newspapers and photo albums; and a matching China cabinet standing up against a far wall. This room, too, is full of toys, stacked on the floor and along the walls, but the boxes of these toys look better cared for, the colors crisper. These toys are newer, Barbie dolls and G. I. Joes from the last thirty or forty years perhaps. There are so many that Blaine can’t pick out one specific doll or action figure from the lot. But this room has one interesting feature that the living room and hallway don’t have.

There are posters all over the walls, framed beneath glass.

“Jesus H...we can open our own toy store with this much crap,” Cooper mumbles, but Blaine ignores him. He points the webcam at the boxes, but his own focus drifts to the posters. They’re hard to see through the inches of dust obscuring his view, but they look like antique theater posters. He leans in close, careful not to breathe and disturb the micro-organisms snoozing away amidst the crud. He narrows his eyelids and tries to make out the words or the pictures, but the sunlight reflects off the glass and into his eyes. He starts thinking of a way to clean the dust off and examine the poster properly, but a chuckle in his earpiece tips him off that his brother has made a new discovery, and Blaine is going to have to investigate.

“Blaine, I’m looking at the floor plan that the realtor emailed me, and there should be two doors in this room – one with a staircase that goes to the upper level, and one with a staircase that goes down to…” A strain of sinister music plays and Blaine puts a hand to his head, squeezing his eyes shut to banish the headache that’s starting to grow – “the basement.”

Blaine opens his eyes and finds the doors quickly, situated between the China cabinet and a shuttered window. He walks to the window and pulls at the clasp on the shutter. The metal hook has rusted completely into the looped eye it’s been buried in for decades, but Blaine shakes the hook back and forth until it slides free. He pulls open the shutters and smiles. This window isn’t as coated in dirt as the others, and now the room is brightly lit.

“So here’s the question,” Coopers rambles on. “Do we send Blaine upstairs to take a look at the bedrooms, or do we send him downstairs to the basement?”

Blaine hears more tinny, old tyme horror music, with dramatic organ notes playing in a minor chord. He can’t help but laugh. This whole thing is ridiculous, but at least Cooper has found his niche in the world.

Blaine opens the doors one at a time. He knows he’s going to be sent to the basement eventually, so he decides to hurry things along. The staircases are pitch black, but the longer he spends in the house, the less perturbing it seems. He feels like he’s being led along, like a hand is guiding him, and when he opens the door revealing a staircase leading down, he wastes no time.

“Hey, wait!” Cooper objects. “We didn’t finish voting!”

“Too late,” Blaine quips, his feet scuttling down the concrete steps. “You took too long.” He jumps off the last step and is encompassed by another sea of pure inky nothingness, but this time he doesn’t hesitate. He feels around the walls, looking for a fuse box as he makes his way deeper into the room. The air down in the basement is colder, less inviting, and the walls are damp, but that sensation of being called is stronger down here.

It feels urgent, and he actually becomes excited by what he might find down here.

Blaine’s hand crawls across the wall until he hits a covered metal box.

“I think I found the fuse box,” Blaine grunts, pulling at the box, trying to find a way to open it. He tugs it left and right with no success. He considers hitting it with his fist, but the cover suddenly pops off and falls to the floor. Inside the box is a single, long-handled switch. Blaine grabs it and pushes it in an attempt to flip it up. It takes a little shimmying before it flies upward with a loud clack.

Blaine leaps back and waits for the lights to come on.

Nothing happens.

He hears a buzz…then a pop.

A bulb blinks overhead – off…on, off……on – its rhythm punctuated by an unnerving spit. The buzzing gets louder. The popping increases in tempo and becomes a hum. The blinking bulb clicks on and starts crackling. Then it burns. The yellow light from that single bulb lights the entire room. When Blaine can finally see without spots dancing in front of his eyes – a side effect of jumping the terminus between dark and bright – his jaw drops.

Down in this dreary basement is a fully-equipped workshop, with several sturdy work benches lined up in rows, each one running the width of the room and covered in tools – newer shop saws, drills, and lathes sitting alongside older, antique picks and files, along with some handmade metal implements. On a final bench pushed up against the far wall are wooden blanks in all shapes and sizes, and bolts of cloth printed in dated patterns. Above it, more puppets hang from pegs on the wall – bare wooden skeletons, some with porcelain heads, unpainted and unfinished.

“Come on, Blaine,” Cooper says, reminding Blaine that he’s not alone, “pan around and let us get a good look. What’s with all the tools?”

Blaine walks toward a saw that has the partial remains of an unfinished cut piece (an arm, maybe a leg) beneath its blade. The saw looks almost brand new, and the wooden appendage appears freshly cut, with a mound of sawdust collected nearby, as though some craftsman might have been working on it yesterday.

“I think” - Blaine moves down the workbench to examine a lathe - “this is a workshop for making puppets.”

“Geesh. This guy must have had a serious puppet fetish.”

“I don’t usually like to agree with you, Coop,” Blaine says with more fascination than disgust, “but you might be right.”

Blaine’s webcam trails over the many benches, holding saws stopped likewise in the middle of unfinished projects. In the corner sits a squat, oblong kiln, about the size of an average nightstand. He runs his fingers over its surface as he passes by. He stops to peruse the contents of cardboard boxes with their tops hanging open. There are more tools, more wood pieces, more body parts and heads than Blaine has ever seen in his lifetime, definitely more than he had to work with in the arts and crafts class he took at McKinley. Blaine lifts the lens to take in the view of the puppets on the walls, the bolts, and then another door. He comes to a full stop and stares at it. He’s drawn to it, but he doesn’t know why. As Blaine walks toward it, he can hear the rustle of papers and the clattering of computer keys on Cooper’s end of the line.

“Uh, Blaine?”

“Yeah? What is it?” Blaine approaches the door as he speaks. He has a strong feeling that what he’s searching for, what’s calling to him, is somewhere behind this door. He reaches out his hand for the knob when Cooper talks again.

“Be careful when you open that door, Blainers.”

There’s a tone in Cooper’s voice that sends a chill down Blaine’s spine.

“Why is that?” Blaine asks, his fingers resting on the doorknob while he waits for an answer.

“Umm…because that door isn’t on the blueprints.”

Blaine’s brow furrows, but he doesn’t remove his hand.

“What do you mean it’s not on the blueprints?”

“That means there isn’t supposed to be a door there, Blaine. No room, no closet, no staircase. It’s not listed, so just…be careful.”

Blaine breathes in sharply and nods. He understands his brother’s trepidation. Homeowners sometimes do unpermitted renovations on their houses, and a lot of them are unsafe, but Blaine feels very sure that he needs to open the door in front of him.

He grabs the doorknob and holds tight, turning slowly.

The action of the tumblers feels smooth, not sticky or rusted like the other fixtures he’s encountered. He turns the knob till he hears everything unwind, and the door gives. It creaks open, swinging outward easily. The light from the basement breaches the opening, and a shaft of it falls on the floor, filling the room to the left and right of it with shadows. Carpet in a deep crimson color covers the ground. Blaine follows the path of the light with his webcam up from the floor and looks further into the room.

Cooper sees it before Blaine does, and lets out a scream of terror.

“H-holy f-fucking shit, Blaine!” he hears Cooper yell into the earpiece. “Oh my God! Are you seeing this? Go back! Go back down!”

Blaine pans down, following the webcam with his eyes, and his heart leaps into his throat.

Lying on the floor at his feet he sees a partially dismembered body, and a smashed in human head.

#klaine fanfiction #klaine fic #klaine #frankie writes

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