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pesterloglog · 2 years ago

Text

Calliope, Roxy Lalonde

Act 6, page 5089-5094

uranianUmbra [UU] began cheering tipsyGnostalgic [TG]

UU: i can't see yoU, bUt yoU mUst be back by now, yes?

TG: y

TG: and i am how haxxing up storm

TG: p stank by

TG: *stand

UU: haxxing? :u

TG: u dont even no

TG: my fingers are the mean lil beaks

TG: of furirus woodpeckers

TG: and my keyboard

TG: is a pitiful plank of cruddy wood

TG: guarding a trove of tasty bungs

TG: it is guarding them i might add

TG: moist fucking unsuccessfully

UU: u~u

TG: as my digits rain danger

TG: on this hapless lamptop

TG: the result of my tappy onslaught

TG: is line after wicked line

TG: of leetfilthy codes

TG: aka..

TG: the governments worst nightmare

UU: Um...........

TG: i will be in an out

TG: of the systerm

TG: before breakfast knows what ate it

TG: JACKPOP BABBY

TG: im am ur cryptogodress 8)

UU: roxy?

TG: it is womon verse machine

TG: a struggle old as stuff itself

TG: she will bring sburb to its knees

TG: and then turn

TG: with her shitwreckingest face

TG: and stare

TG: into the void

TG: and the void

TG: will wonk first

TG: ;3

UU: i don't Understand.

UU: yoU are typing some sort of compUter program?

TG: no

TG: that was all mostly a huge load

TG: all that noisy keyboard bangin i just mentioned

TG: was me just typing all that shit i said 2 u

TG: lol i did type it superfast tho

TG: just like they do in dumb fake movies about primo hackers who r THA BEST

TG: i guess i hacked into our conversation? w/ bs nstead of codez

UU: ^u^;

TG: but for real

TG: im just drag & dropin some game shit in to jakes place

TG: it is easy as a butt

TG: this kiddie game is a waste of my baller expertise

TG: * sexpertities

TG: / obligatory

TG: hey look

TG: a 'totem lathe'

TG: kay w/e

TG: BONK

TG: down it goes

TG: in that patch off dirt i guess

TG: daaang

TG: fits on that patch o dirt like

TG: a glass shitting slipper

TG: NEXT ??

UU: ah, i Understand. yoU're beginning then. good!

TG: yes im on a roll

TG: gettin my peeps outie

TG: splitting the ball b4 junk turns 2 pumpkins

TG: soooooooooo

TG: what were you going to give me back there? ;D

UU: right!

UU: it's a present i made for yoU.

TG: ooh!

UU: it coUld be...

UU: a farewell gift actUally.

TG: huh?

TG: are u leaving

UU: maybe.

UU: i am aboUt to go to sleep one last time before oUr schedUled entry.

UU: and there is a very real possibility that i will never wake Up.

TG: oh no!

TG: why!!!

UU: it is complicated.

UU: there is mUch to say aboUt it which i have never told yoU, dUe to my adherence to the rUles.

UU: some of which i am aboUt to break now, in order to give myself a fighting chance.

UU: bUt before i go down that serpentine path with yoU, here.

UU: one last bit of artwork from an admirer. something to remember me by, shoUld we never speak again.

UU: http://tinyurl.com/roxyisthisyoU

TG: !!!!!

TG: ssdlkjfs;lkfjdlskfj

TG: ohhhly SHIT

TG: *hooooooly

TG: holiest of shits

TG: the shit.....

TG: is down right

TG: SACROSANCT

TG: omgogmogmomog

TG: this owns

TG: my bones

UU: ^U^

TG: look at my outfit

TG: want 2 wear that outfit

TG: want 2 kiss + marry that outfist

TG: look

TG: at that lollipop

TG: that fuckin LOLLIPOP

TG: hehhe look at me goin in 4 a lick

TG: like im the queen of fuckall yall

TG: what is that in my hair

TG: is that

TG: COTTONE CANDY????

UU: indeed it is!

TG: say helloes to new phone wallpp

TG: sry baby eatin jake husband u r out

TG: /DIVORCE'D

TG: yes perfection

TG: more like

TG: perferection

TG: is what is givin me

TG: am getting the perfbonerz up in here

UU: i really enjoy drawing yoU. it is a treat.

UU: yoU are jUst so pretty. :u

TG: awwwwwwwwww

TG: <3<3<#<#<##

TG: hearts n hashes

UU: anyway, i am very pleased that yoU like my drawing. ~u~

TG: i love it

TG: i love U

TG: U x2 combot

UU: yoU do?

UU: really??

TG: yes

TG: fo rillies

UU: :U

UU: blimey.

UU: this comes as qUite a sUrprise.

TG: well i mean

TG: not like lets got get space married love

TG: more like ur the best and i like you a lot love

UU: oh.

UU: then the conciliatory type. i Understand.

TG: wait

TG: i didnt mean to jerk you around...

TG: did u feel that way about me

TG: aww shit im sorry :(

UU: no! don't be.

UU: trUst me, that is not how i feel aboUt yoU. or anyone.

UU: thoUgh i trUly wish i were capable of those feelings.

UU: perhaps the fact that i am not is why the topic fascinates me so.

UU: and why i have been prone do indUlge in sUch...

UU: fancifUl visUalizations.

UU: of yoUr people's lovely bright red relationships.

UU: they mUst be nice. u_u

TG: lol well its not like i would know either way

TG: but thats cool i didnt know that about you

TG: i dont know ANYTHING about u but i wish i did

TG: cant you at least tell me your name bfore you uh

TG: maybe go ways 4 ever? ;(

UU: yes, as a matter of fact.

UU: that is actUally the reason i am contacting yoU.

UU: it is one rUle i have decided to break.

TG: oh fuck!

TG: what is it!!!!!!!

UU: my name is calliope.

TG: :o

TG: .....

TG: ilike it :3

UU: it feels so strange to type that!

UU: bUt also good, actUally.

TG: well ty for finally confiding in me calilope

TG: *calliope sorrey

UU: yoU're welcome. it is good to get it off my chest.

UU: bUt i am primarily telling yoU this as a last resort, in hopes of saving myself.

UU: yoU see, this rUle between me and my brother is a kind of trUce.

UU: we have both agreed not to say oUr names to anyone so that things will not get oUt of hand, and so it became one of the rUles.

UU: if anyone were to say his name to me, i woUld immediately fall asleep, and he woUld wake Up.

UU: so yoU will Understand if i refrain from telling yoU his as well. ~_u

TG: so

TG: hes sleeping now?

UU: yes, fortUnately for both of Us.

UU: now, chronologically speaking, i have never contacted yoU after this moment.

UU: so if i never wake Up from my next nap, yoU will never hear from me again.

UU: if yoU do not hear from me later, i woUld very mUch appreciate it if yoU coUld message my brother, and say my name.

UU: it may be the only chance i have to wake Up again.

TG: fuuuck

TG: this is highly terrible and scary stuff youre saying

TG: but yes ill def do that

UU: splendid!

UU: <kisses>

TG: shit now i wish we had more time to talk

TG: quick what otter rules were you going 2 break

TG: spill it cali!!

UU: i want to!

UU: it is overwhelming, trying to be cavalier aboUt rUles i have respected all my life. i'm not sUre where to begin.

TG: well

TG: what i wonder is

TG: you said you couldnt have romantic feelings

TG: or "red relations" as you said in your trolly way

UU: oh, i can have romantic feelings.

UU: jUst not the flUshed kind, which hUmans describe as romantic love.

TG: ok but

TG: i didnt think that was alien to you

TG: not the way u made it sound

TG: like dont trolls have the 4 kinds and one kind is just staight up love feelins

UU: yes, that's right.

UU: bUt...

UU: oh bUgger. this is so embarrassing to have to admit.

UU: i am sorry for saying things which may have reasonably led yoU to believe this.

UU: probably way too many things. u_u;

UU: bUt i am not actUally a troll.

TG: o

TG: rrrrrelay

UU: i have never actUally claimed to be. bUt i'm sUre i have implied it, probably dUe to wishfUl thinking.

UU: i have spent so mUch time wishing i coUld be one.

UU: trolls are a remarkable and fascinating race.

UU: hUmans are too, please don't get me wrong!

UU: bUt i am oUt and oUt smitten with trolls and their history and ways.

UU: they have sUch amazing, coloUrfUl social dynamics that soUnd like so mUch fUn to be a part of.

UU: and they are so beaUtifUl.

UU: i wish i coUld be that pretty.

UU: UnfortUnately, i am not very attractive at all.

UU: sad to say, no one woUld kiss the corpse i will leave behind.

UU: even if there were someone aroUnd to revive me, i doUbt they woUld be inclined to bother.

UU: for, er... several reasons, actUally.

UU: bUt really, it was always for the best that i cannot have fUlly flUshed feelings.

UU: no one coUld ever love me.

TG: oh man no!!!

TG: that is not true

UU: it is.

UU: and it's for the best that no one has ever seen my face, aside from my brother.

TG: but i want 2 c u

TG: i proimise i wont think you look bad or judge you

UU: no.

UU: i am sorry.

TG: :(

TG: then what kinda alien are you

TG: wait dont tell me youre ACUTALLY from urnanus??

UU: heehee. no.

UU: that jUst happened to be a planet from yoUr system i thoUght was lovely.

UU: i was particUlarly strUck by its UniqUe rotation.

UU: it has very nice...

UU: bollocks, what's the word.

UU: the term that refers to a ball's topspin?

TG: ???

UU: it doesn't matter.

UU: bUt no, i'm not even from yoUr Universe, let alone a nearby planet.

UU: my species has never even had a home planet.

TG: what species are u

UU: i am a cherUb!

TG: omg

TG: that is

TG: amazing?

TG: like u have wings or such

UU: no!

UU: i doUbt i am what yoU're pictUring.

UU: bUt aside from a few sUperficial similarities, we are very different from trolls and hUmans.

UU: we are not a social race. we generally will not ever encoUnter another of oUr kind, Unless it is time to mate.

UU: and when that time comes, oUr coUrtship is nothing like it is for hUmans.

UU: it is highly confrontational and violent.

TG: sounds so lonely

TG: plus w/ hecks of tricky sex

UU: it is lonely.

UU: bUt that is in oUr natUre, to be alone. jUst as it is to find attraction throUgh contempt.

UU: now that i think aboUt it, i shoUld have known.

UU: i've been so foolish.

TG: known what

UU: aboUt the natUre of my game session.

UU: i believed he and i coUld play together, even Under oUr UniqUe biological circUmstances.

UU: i was so daft, i thoUght skaia had actUally made an exception for Us.

UU: and that we coUld overcome oUr conflicts, work together, and fUlfill the game's minimUm reqUirement of two players. one of space and the other of time.

UU: bUt i was always fooling myself.

UU: it is now clear only one of Us will sUrvive.

UU: my skaian visions have misled me.

UU: or i have blinded myself to their trUe meaning.

UU: this was always meant to be a session of one.

UU: and i am finally starting to Understand...

UU: the reality of that coUld have conseqUences more horrifying than we coUld begin to imagine.

TG: um

TG: how

UU: the thing is, yoU don't know him like i do.

UU: as hard as it may be to believe, he is even worse than yoU think.

UU: and it's all sUch a shame, not jUst becaUse of that.

UU: it is a shame that i won't be able to play, i gUess for selfish reasons.

UU: i was so looking forward to it.

UU: i really thoUght i was going to be someone special.

UU: that i coUld Use my abilities do something no one had ever done.

TG: hey you are being so defeatist stop that!

TG: you dont know you wont play we havent even tried the wakeup call yet remembr???

UU: yes. you're right.

UU: mUch like skaia, i've sUccUmbed to a gloomier outlook lately, due to recent setbacks.

TG: so whats going to be special bout your game?

TG: aside from that its just your fuckhead bro and you

UU: well, i was always led to believe i woUld be an extraordinary type of player.

UU: both of Us woUld be. we are both assigned extremely rare and powerfUl classes.

UU: they are the two master classes!

TG: oh yeh?

TG: what is urs

UU: mine is the most passive on the scale. a class designated for females only.

UU: i am the mUse of space. ^u^

TG: sounds p cool

TG: whats a muse do

UU: i'm not entirely sUre. i was hoping to discover that on my joUrney.

UU: anyway, his is the other master class.

UU: the most active class of all, reserved for male players.

TG: what is it

UU: Um...

UU: roxy.

UU: i think we may be getting a wee bit carried away with trivia here.

UU: we both have so mUch to do.

UU: yoU need to focUs on getting to safety, while i need to...

UU: prepare myself. for what i hope will be a short nap.

TG: ok

TG: you are right

TG: la siiiiiigh

TG: im worried 4 you

TG: but optimistic

TG: i will call ur name like a million times

TG: and shout it in 2 the void every chance i get

TG: til u come back :3

UU: you are a good friend, roxy.

UU: please take care.

uranianUmbra [UU] ceased cheering tipsyGnostalgic [TG]

#homestuck #calliope #roxy lalonde #homestuck act 6 #page 5089 #page 5090 #page 5091 #page 5092 #page 5093 #page 5094 #homestuck act 6 act 3

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softboywriting · 4 years ago

Text

Sunflower | Nathan Bateman | Ex Machina

Summary: You’re the opposite of everything Nathan is, and he adores you. [fluff][female!readerxNathan] [Plus size/curvy Reader] [Mild NSFW themes] [Light love at first sight trope]

Word Count: 1.8k

|Masterlist In Bio|

The day you walked into the living area of the facility Nathan knew you were going to change his life. From the sunshine yellow dress to the neon orange luggage, your soft round thighs in bumble bee striped tights and your round face beaming at him from behind a pair of round glasses. Everything about you was the opposite of everything he knew and loved. Nathan was a man of simple things, neutral and natural tones, quiet and practical. How had you managed to end up here? Well. To put it simply you were the top programmer in the Blue Book internship and Nathan had noticed your work almost immediately. He wanted to meet you. How better than to allow you a month long internship with himself?

The first week provided much information for him. You liked to talk. You liked to share. You liked to touch. Oh the first time you touched Nathan he just about went berserk. It was nothing inappropriate, just a simple arm touch. But Nathan had been so starved for human affection it just about short circuited his brain. Not to mention you're the most adorable, beautiful, dorky woman he's ever met. You're so very much the opposite of everything he ever thought he wanted. You're perfect.

"Good morning." You say as you walk into his lab on the dawn of the second week. You've made yourself comfortable, familiar with everything he does. "No sleep?"

"Few hours." Nathan looks up from his work table and raises his eyebrows. "That's a new dress."

"It is. I wasn't sure if I'd like it. I got it before I left and I thought maybe it was too short." You pull down the back a bit. It sits just above mid thigh but your butt makes it lift a bit higher. "I think it's okay?"

"Turn?"

You turn around slowly and Nathan hums. "It's too revealing isn't it?"

"No, I like it." He smirks and you flush hard. "Don't tell me you didn't wear that on purpose. I know you're not that shy."

"Of course I wore it on purpose, I picked it out."

"You know I meant for me." Nathan sets his work aside and circles the end of the table to stand before you.

You swallow hard and he looks at you over his glasses. "What? Stop staring at me."

He hums. "You're hard not to stare at in a bright red dress. I feel so distracted. How ever will I work?"

"Maybe get your head out of your ass?"

"Oh you know I like when you talk dirty." He teases and you shove his chest making him giggle. This is how it's been since day one. Nathan made sure of that. He said fuck the employee employer relationship and just be people. Just be two people hanging out and doing cool shit. It wasn't too hard. You and him have a lot of the same type of humor and thought processes. Teasing came naturally.

"What am I doing today? Coding something? Programming some wetware?"

Nathan looks over at his work table. "I've got something else to do. Let's take a day off."

"A day off? I'm an intern. I don't really get days off. I'm supposed to-"

"Yeah yeah." He raises his hand to cut you off. "I wanna watch a movie with you."

"That doesn't take all day."

"A few movies." He takes your hand and pulls you along to the hall. "I'll even make dinner later. Lunch first and some breakfast. Whatever. We'll snack or something."

"Is this a date? Nathan, are you asking me on a date?"

Nathan looks back sheepishly. "Maybe?"

"How long has it been since you went out with someone?"

"A while."

"I figured." You thread your fingers into his. "Usually people ask each other out on a date, not just say they're gonna go on one with them."

"Right." Nathan spins you around with your guidance and you giggle. "What are you doing?"

"Dunno, just wanted to see if you'd spin me."

"You're so strange." He pulls you in and your heart stops as you press against his chest. Suddenly you're nervous because surely he can feel your tummy against him. He's so fit and you're not nearly as such. "Would you mind if I ask you on a date?"

"You're sure?"

"I don't mince my words, you know that."

"I mean even though I'm not like...your AI?"

Nathan looks confused. "What?"

"You make them how you prefer women right? Skinny? Small chest?"

"Oh, oh I see." He lays his hand on your arm, thumb rubbing just under the sleeve of your dress. "Let me tell you a secret."

"Uh huh?"

"I make them like that not because it's what I prefer, but because it's easier to fit the synthetic skin on the body frames. Sure I could make the frames larger but I don't need to because they're just prototypes based on a standard human muscular and bone structure and I use them for parts when I decommission them. It's easier to reuse the same size parts over and over. My finished product will come in all sizes."

You nod. "So, you still wanna date me, or rather go on a date with me?"

"I'd like to do much more than that but one step at a time." He chuckles and pulls away from you. "We'll start with breakfast and a movie. Deal?"

"Deal."

___________________

Another week passes and you're not sure where along the lines you went from internship to relationship with Nathan. All you know is that in a week you're supposed to leave, return to your life in New York and right now you're laid out on his bed while he works at his computer a few feet away.

You shift, the soft sheets slide against your bare skin. It feels so good, warm and safe. Nathan even has the lights down low, the tint on the windows set to evening mode. It seems to be early morning, the sun just barely rising.

"You're up early."

Nathan turns and looks at you, stretching his legs out. He's got on a pair of shorts and that's all. "Good morning, Sunflower."

"Sunflower?" You giggle. "That's my new nickname?"

"Absolutely."

"I don't hate it."

"Good." He turns back to his computer. "Go back to sleep. It's too early for you."

You stretch and curl into his pillow. "Come back to bed with me. You look exhausted."

"I'm working."

"I'm cold."

He scoffs. "No you're not, the bed is heated."

You huff softly. "Nathan, I'm only here one more week. You shouldn't waste time."

That gets him to stop. He doesn't turn but just stares at the screen.

"What's wrong?"

Then he turns and crawls on the bed, lifting the blankets to get in with you. He doesn't stop until he's on top of you, holding himself up on his elbows, knees bracketing your hips.

You run a hand over his short buzzed hair. It's so soft. "Use your words Nathan."

"One week?"

"Mmhmm. I'm only supposed to be here until the fifteen of this month."

"Do you want to stay longer?"

"Do you want me to?"

Nathan drops his head to your shoulder, kissing down until he's mouthing at the soft flesh above your boob. "I definitely don't want you to leave yet. I'm not done exploring."

"So I'm an experiment now?" You giggle as he presses his nose between your boobs, pushing them up with his hands.

He hums. "Maybe. If I were doing an experiment in falling hard and fast for a woman who is my polar opposite."

"Are you serious?" You grab his face and pull him up to look at you. "Nathan, do you really like me that much?"

"It kills me how much I like you. I thought maybe it was just because I haven't been with anyone or even been around someone in a long time. Maybe that still is part of it, but I can't get enough of you. You're so sweet, and smart and cute."

You pull him close and kiss him softly. "Everyone told me you were a hardass, a real stuck up piece of shit. That I shouldn't take this internship, that your last intern went home in tears. So you must really really like me."

"Well that's not very nice." He ducks his head and kisses along your shoulder to bury his face into your boobs again. "I do really like you though. I like your soft skin, and your soft tummy." He pushes your boobs up, filling both hands. "And these tits. Fuck I love them." He latches on to your left nipple with his lips and you squirm. After a moment he releases you and crawls lower, kissing down your chest as his beard tickles your skin. "I like your bright clothes and your soft hands and your sweet pu-"

"Nathan!"

"Yes, Sunflower?" He looks up, kissing gently along your bare navel.

You push the blanket back to expose him to the cool room. "Promise me that you want me to stay."

"I promise." He moves back up and lays his cheek on your boob and rubs his beard against it. His weight against your body is warm, comforting as he settles into you. "I want you to stay with me and be a part of the greatest thing I've ever made. I want you to stay and make me think, make me question everything I thought I knew."

"You're such a softie."

"Just for you. Everyone else can fuck off."

"That sounds more like the Nathan I first met."

He grabs the blanket and pulls it back over his head before taking a nipple into his mouth and sucking hard. His beard tickles against your skin again and you squeal, squirming under his affection. "Did I mention I love these?" He mutters and you hum in response.

"Only every time you touch them."

"Can't let these babies go." Nathan changes to your other nipple and you arch up against him. "So responsive." He looks up from under the blankets and you take his glasses off, setting them on the pillows above your head. "You should be proud of these."

"They weren't my favorite until you got ahold of them honestly."

He clicks his tongue. "They're nothing short of perfect."

You shove his face and he laughs, resting his head against your chest once more. "You seem tired. Did you get any sleep last night?"

"Not much. Couldn't get my mind to settle down."

You rub over his soft short hairs, massing along his temple. "Then let's sleep together. You don't have to worry about me leaving in a week. We've got all the time in the world to build AI. Close your eyes and go to sleep."

Nathan nuzzles his face against you, sighing softly. "My soft Sunflower."

"Mmm all yours."

"All mine."

end

---------

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#oscar isaac fic #oscar isaac character #ex machina fic #Ex Machina #ex machina fanfic #nathan bateman #nathan bateman fic #nathan bateman fanfic #nathan bateman x reader

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thebibliomancer · 4 years ago

Text

Essential Avengers: Avengers #236: “I Want to Be an Avenger!”

October, 1983

Spider-Man -- An Avenger -- ?

Y’know, march of time and all that but this doesn’t seem as surprising as it once did.

Not much to say about this cover. It doesn’t have a lot to say about the issue other than ‘SPIDER-MAN INSIDE’ but boy does it say it.

But, oh, the logo changed and its snazzy! I quite like it!

So recent going-onses for the Avengers. Thor and Iron Man quit the team for personal business. Hawkeye broke his leg and is on medical forced-to-leave. Scarlet Witch and Vision were called in as reservists and Vision immediately got damaged by a crossover and has been in a robot-coma ever since. Starfox joined the team.

But in more positive news, they totally kicked the Wizard’s ass last issue and it cheered everyone up.

So the issue starts on a lazy summer day.

Scarlet Witch is on monitor duty, scanning for any ‘this looks like a job for the Avengers’ type calls. And multi-tasking by also thinking of her tubed husband.

Captain America takes his turn standing watch over the comatose synthezoid.

And for some reason, Cap leaning on the tube like that cracks me up.

Starfox spends his downtime trying to hit on Wasp.

His pickup line is so bad.

Wasp finds it charming in its misapprehension although it could also be the sexy beams Starfox emits from his brain.

And She-Hulk is taking a bath in a large barrel in the Avengers’ rec center, which they have. Maybe its the super hot bath?

She(-Hulk)’s also multi-tasking by looking up apartment listings while she soaks but finds that everything on the NY listings is either too small or too ritzy.

It be like that sometimes.

Jarvis comes into the rec center barrel bath area with iced tea for She-Hulk, trying to politely avert his eyes. But the intruder alarm goes off and she(-Hulk) tells Jarvis to hand her a towel and runs off to his flusterment.

Between Tigra and She-Hulk, I think poor Jarvis is getting overwhelmed with rad ladies on the Avengers.

The Avengers assemble in the main foyer and found that someone just barged in the front door and disabled the security tentacles with some sort of odd, artificial webbing.

Who could it be?

Who could possibly break into Avengers Mansion under the mistaken impression that its actually a cool way to impress them while asking for a job, showing that he’s learned nothing in years?

Could it be the person who expressed interest in joining in the previous issue? And who is also on the cover of this issue??

Yes.

Honestly, though, what an amazing splash page!

Also, spectacular and no-adjective.

Spider-Man knows how to make an impression.

Not a good one, certainly. But the Avengers aren’t going to forget the time he was casually chilling above the dining table.

And Pete isn’t going to forget it either. He’s going to wake up in a cold sweat years later still mortified at himself.

I also love it when the title of the issue is something someone said but since it has to be emphasized to make it clear its the title, they suddenly start yelling in the middle of a conversation.

She-Hulk has no patience for Spider-Man’s nonsense and grabs him off his web hammock to yell at him for barging in.

Spider-Man: “Well, I’m not exactly uninvited! Your buddy Thor asked me to join the club just a few months ago. Sure, I’m a little slow in replying, but I’ve had a busy season!”

And then he snarks about She-Hulk just wearing a towel because Spider-Man loves low hanging fruit.

SURELY, Spidey knows that offers usually expire, right? A few months ago is forever in comic time and Thor himself isn’t even on the Avengers right now.

I guess, in fairness, he has his reasons.

Besides his usual perpetual poverty liking the sound of a thousand bucks a week.

As he later muses to himself, Black Cat has been hospitalized because she tried to help him and he feels obligated to pay for her not-cheap medical bills. And he’s already quit grad school to spend more time earning but his freelance paychecks are nothing compared to an Avengers salary.

He’s being an incredibly presumptuous dick... but for a good cause.

And its just like Spidey that he has a good reason for being a jerk that he’d never mention leaving everyone to think he’s just a rude goofus.

What a shame.

Anyway, back at the present, Spider-Man asks where he enlists but Cap tells them that unfortunately their roster is full up. The sixth spot is being held open for Hawkeye when his leg stops being broken (and you think he was moany about being sidelined while his leg was broken, imagine him learning that he was replaced, eesh).

Cap does suggest that Spider-Man could join Starfox in the trainee program but Spidey throws a fit.

Spider-Man: “Trainee program?!? Hey, I’m Spider-Man, remember? I was sticking to walls when you guys were still looking for a clubhouse. I’m no green rookie!”

Starfox: “Green -- ? I take offense at your tone, Spider-Man!”

She-Hulk: “There’s nothing wrong with being green.”

Pffft.

As an actual rookie who is physically green, She-Hulk doesn’t care for that phrase, maybe.

She-Hulk and Starfox possibly beating up or more likely being embarrassed by Spider “will punk the entire X-Men in the not too distant future” Man is interrupted by a priority alert that goes ARROOOOOOOO

... Is it the Nixon alarm?

Why haven’t the Avengers fought Nixon’s head on a war mech yet??

Spider-Man offers to give them a hand if their priorities are being alerted but with this particular alarm, Wasp decides its best if they stick to the rules.

And then She-Hulk chases Spidey out by throwing a chair at him.

Spider-Man: Well, that was certainly a wash-out! Maybe I shouldn’t have come on as such a wise guy... Maybe I should have come to the door all humble and contrite. Nah, they wouldn’t have believed it was me!

.... Hah.

But he sees the third-floor of Avenger’s mansion opening up to launch the Quinjet and fount of good decision making that he is, he decides to jump onto the Quinjet as it launches.

Spider-Man: Whew! This baby is really starting to pick up speed! I feel like I’m in a wind tunnel. My sticky fingers can hold onto just about anything under normal circumstances... boy, I wish these were normal circumstances! I wonder if this was such a good idea.

No, Pete, it wasn’t.

But your inner monologues do add a bit more joy to this issue so I forgive you.

Inside the Quinjet, She-Hulk notes that the controls handled a bit sluggish right after take-off but eh whatever the problem disappeared after they went supersonic.

Huh. I wonder if Pete is ok.

Anyway, Captain America, She-Hulk, and Starfox are headed towards Project Pegasus.

Since it hasn’t come up in Avengers yet, Project Pegasus is a government research facility that seeks out new types and sources of energy. And Cap helped organize their security force back in Marvel Two-in-One #42.

The priority alert wasn’t the highest priority. Just a code-five, indicating a low-grade emergency. But it didn’t come with any details so Cap is vexed.

Three Avengers should be enough for a code-five but problems at Project Pegasus tend to balloon into worse problems.

You wouldn’t think a research facility would attract so much negative attention but as Cap points out, there’s a lot of people who have a vested interested in making sure energy stays scarce, expensive, and presumably non-renewable.

And considering that the oil companies like Roxxon are EVEN MORE BLATANTLY EVIL in the Marvel U, yeah, uh, bad shit is going to occur.

Also, Project Pegasus doubles as a place to jail supervillains so their powers can be studied.

So, yeah, Pegasus having a priority alert probably means a headache.

So these three Avengers are going in but Wasp and Scarlet Witch are on stand-by just in case.

The visit to the super secure research station goes off to a bad start when guards rush the Quinjet when it lands because a foreign object was detected on the undercarriage.

Of course it’s Spider-Man.

But before he can be arrested for breaking into a secure facility, his spider-sense buzzed.

It’d be a bit confusing if it wasn’t buzzing before though. He has a bunch of rattled guards pointing guns at him right after some unexplained emergency has happened.

That doesn’t set off the Peter Tingle at all??

Anyway, since the buzz is pretty intense, he figures that its warning him of something “a lot more dangerous than the lecture Cap’s going to give me!”

Hah!

He doesn’t manage to warn anyone before a tremor knocks (almost) everyone off their feet with a THROOM

Spider-Man is still standing because he loves Elton John forewarned is forewarned and he can stick to things. And to his surprise, Cap manages to stay on his feet.

Cap: “It’s just a matter of knowing how to react and how to brace yourself, Spider-Man.”

Hah!

That’s So Cap.

Spider-Man asks if he realio trulio can’t give Cap a hand with this situation. Y’know, since his spider-sense probably will come in handy. Cap isn’t sure because of the question of security but Spider-Man has an idea there.

See, he’s been here before!

In Marvel Team-Up Annual #5 he helped save the dang place! They can ask chief of security Wendell Vaughn (who is also known as Quasar but probably not to all the people in this scene?).

Unfortunately, Vaughn quit a couple months back. Oops.

But since Cap vouches for him the guard driving them to the lower levels is like ‘eh whatever.’

The power of a Cap vouch is not to be underestimate and never to be used for evil.

They’re headed to the thermal research dome because its the last known location of new security chief O’Brien. And where he sent the alert from. AND where the recent quake came from.

That’s good multitasking.

They reach the blast doors sealing off the entire level.

Because yes, not only did O’Brien send an alert, he also sealed off the entire level and now something’s jammed the lock.

They have no idea what could be locked behind there but they do have a Spider-Man and Starfox asks him if he’s getting a bad feeling about anything.

Spider-Man isn’t getting any bad vibes, deeming it safe to go inside.

Y’know, this is an amazing way to use Spider-Sense that they could do more with. I always love it when Spidey basically exploits the sense for things other than combat dodging.

Like when trying to figure out how to turn off a device he didn’t understand in Avengers EMH, he just went around almost yanking wires until he found one that didn’t set off the ‘OH MY GOD YOU’LL DEFINITELY EXPLODE IF YOU DO THAT’ buzz.

Anyway, it being probably safe, Cap tells She-Hulk and Starfox to open the door.

Which they do, with gusto.

And a GRU-U-UNNG

Inside the ruins of the thermal research dome, a bunch of semi-conscious technicians lie about in heaps.

Some Project Pegasus security personnel fan out to do administer first aid while the Avengers look for O’Brien.

Makes sense. The nameless extras help the nameless extras so we don’t go ‘hey are the Avengers dicks for only talking to people with names?’

O’Brien is pinned under an arc of steaming rock which Cap starts chipping in half with his shield while She-Hulk, Spider-Man, and Starfox - all people who could lift that rock - just stand and watch.

Or heck, maybe its not supposed to be a random rock arc. Maybe its attached to the floor. Still though, She-Hulk, Spider-Man, and Starfox could probably break it more easily than Cap does.

Teamwork makes the dream work, guys and She-Hulk.

Spider-Man recognizes O’Brien’s green and also green Not-Iron Man armor from newspapers and realizes that he’s the Guardsman.

That just makes O’Brien sad.

Guardsman: “Aye, I am... or I was. The state this armor’s in, no one’ll ever be callin’ himself the Guardsman again! As of now, I’m just plain Michael O’Brien.”

The Michael Formerly Known as Guardsman starts to Explain It All.

He had come down to the thermal dome to watch the thermal dome researchers sink a new magma tap.

But molten rock came shooting up from the tap hole, which is a thing that’s definitely not supposed to happen.

Oh, and some molten men (but not Molten Man) climbed out of the hole and started trashing the joint.

Plain Michael O’Brien realized pretty quickly that he was the only one who could stand up to these hot men so he signaled for help, hit the evacuation alarm, and sealed off the level from the rest of the project so the problem was contained.

And then he got mobbed by the hot men and got his ass kicked. Turns out that his armor was pretty useless against lava men.

Oh, yeah, Cap recognizes them as lava men from his description.

Spider-Man: “Lava men? You have to be kidding, Cap! Lava men? I don’t believe in lava men!”

Cap: “Belay that, mister! I’ve been up against lava men -- and they’re nothing to joke about! You’d better thank your stars that they left -- !”

You might also remember that Cap has been up against lava men allllllll the way back in Avengers #5. Technically the first adventure he had with the Avengers after officially joining them.

It was also the issue where Thor stoically sank into lava without changing his expression from his default vaguely annoyed one.

Anyway, O’Brien tells the Avengers that the lava men battered their way into the maintenance section since they couldn’t escape to the rest of the facility.

It’s a real good news bad news situation because there’s no one for them to hurt in there and also its a straight shot into the nuclear research dome.

And we don’t want any kind of meltdown there.

Cap decides that this looks like a job for AVENGERS to ASSEMBLE towards. And more than the three plus special guest star they already have.

MEANWHILE, over in New Orleans at an important meeting that definitely would be bad to interrupt, Monica Rambeau (secretly the Avenger known as Captain Marvel but not the dead guy version, true believers) is applying for a small business loan.

And then she gets a bzzt on her radio watch for an Avengers emergency.

Oh no, what of her small business loan!

And also: what small business is she starting? I think I heard at one point that she ran a fishing business with her father?

But what of her small business loan!

Well, Monica agrees with her bank guy Mr. Hillbee that its an alarm watch and that its reminding her of another pressing engagement so hey is there a lot more that they have to do here?

Luckily, all that’s left is for her to sign the documents.

Phew, I’m very used to superhero stuff interrupting a superhero’s civilian life and then them angsting about it. It’s actually a relief that Monica was able to finish up at the bank before dashing off to a phone booth to take a radio watch call with Scarlet Witch.

Wanda tells Monica that they just received a call from Cap(tain America) telling them to get to Project Pegasus. Wanda tells Monica that they’re in transit now and asks if she can join them.

And then the line goes dead before Wanda can give coordinates.

Because Monica just followed the radio signal back to the Quinjet.

She apologizes that it took her so long (!!) because she had to stop at home first to pick up her costume.

Wanda marvels captainly “And I thought my brother, Pietro, was fast!”

Ha ha amazing.

I love Captain Monica Marvel’s ridiculous powerset.

She’s even talking right into their radio so she can communicate from outside the Quinjet.

Wasp, Scarlet Witch, and Captain Marvel arrive at Project Pegasus where they’re briefed of the lava men situation by some of the security staff.

Captain Marvel nyooms ahead lightspeed dash style while Wasp and Scarlet Witch lag behind by taking a high-speed railcar.

Dang, Project Pegasus is big.

I just flipped ahead pages to see how long it takes Captain Marvel to join Cap(tain America)’s group and its a bit.

I guess maybe there’s some overlapped time going on though.

Meanwhile, two technicians in research dome D-2 (called the Compound for some dang reason) ignore all the various alarms and such that have been happening because they’re super into their project. And are possibly mad scientists.

They have the intensity.

But they’re working on... Dr. Croit’s stabilizer? And apparently its vibratory pitch was changed by the tremor that happened? Unbeknowst to them, Captain Marvel just nyoomed by outside and the proximity of her energy form activates the device and the silhouette of some guy leaps out proclaiming FREE!!

Back at the Avengers side of the plot, Cap(tain America)’s group has encountered some lava men.

Spider-Man: “Hey, Cap... I take it all back! I do believe in lava men! I really do!”

Hah.

The lava men are between the Avengers and the nuclear dome so Cap starts thinking of ways to flank them so they can keep them away from it.

She-Hulk starts trying to plow a hole through their forces and... uh.... ok. Cap has Starfox just fly around and annoy the lava men because they’ve never seen a flying man before and its just freaking them out.

Really.

Cap asks Spider-Man to use his webbing to throw up some barriers in the lava men’s path.

Spider-Man: “Heck, I can do better than that, Cappy! Just a couple spritzes of webbing, and these little hotheads won’t be going anywhere for hours!”

Cap: “No, you young fool! Don’t you see what you’ve done!”

Throwing web on the lava men makes them panic because it seems like there’s a lot of stuff that they’re not familiar with and all of it alarms them. When they’re alarmed, their body temperature raises and can get up thousands of degrees.

So they just melt loose of the webbing and now they’ve learned not to be afraid of the webbing at all and they can’t use it to corral them.

Spider-Man: “Would it help if I said I’m sorry?”

Cap: “It would help if you’d follow orders! The Avengers is a team! If you want to be part of the team, act like it! Otherwise, stay out of our way!”

Yeahhhhh. I mean, most of the time. You have your fair share of idiots doing their own thing in the Avengers because all of these guys have egos you wouldn’t believe. But generally they can agree to work as a team.

And Spider-Man, of this era, isn’t much of a team player. Not like Wolverine or Batman ‘i work best alone, bub’ type of not a team player where they’re lying about not being good at teamwork because they like being surly and dour because they think it makes them more interesting. But Spider-Man mostly works alone and is used to just doing whatever he thinks the best idea is. And he has the proportionate speed and reflexes of a spider so he can do whatever he thinks the best idea is way before you can tell him its a bad idea.

That’s why Spider-Man makes so many bad decisions, because he can make them faster than good sense can catch up [citation needed].

Anyway, as he is NOW, he’s not a good fit for the Avengers.

Then again, neither was Hawkeye and they let him join. Makes ya think.

Back over at surprise man out of a box lab, the surprise man was Blackout.

He looks like he’d be an electricity themed villain but apparently his element is darkness. Annd he debuted in Nova annnd this is his second appearance?

At the end of his debut story Nova #19, Blackout was apparently sucked into the Darkforce dimension, a fate that Dr. Croit’s stabilizer had been invented to prevent.

So I guesss.... the stabilizer’s settings were altered by an earthquake and then it was powered by ambient energy from Captain Marvel zipping past and it managed to stabilize Blackout, yanking him free of the Darkforce dimension?

I guess??

As far as villain returns go, its not the most ridiculous but it is a bit contrived.

Blackout has no idea where he is and rants about how he’ll level the place if that’s what it takes to find his way out and in a more acceptable contrivance, he happens to be passing Moonstone’s cell when he says this out loud to nobody in particular and she likes the cut of his jib.

Moonstone: “Sounds like you’re a man after my own heart!”

Moonstone tells Blackout that she’s been locked up here so Project Pegasus could study her powers and that they want to use her the way they would have used Blackout but hey what if they join forces and get some comeuppance.

Blackout: I don’t know if I should trust her... But something about her voice is so reassuring.

Yeah, that’s what we call a red flag, you dingus.

Are we back to the days where some dudes will just villain because a lady bats her eyes?

Anyway, the locking mechanism is too complicated to figure out so Blackout just squeezes it until it explodes.

Um. Okay.

-checks wiki-

The wiki says he’s only supposed to have normal human strength but Blackout himself claims that his body is a living generator of black star energies.

Which apparently means he can squeeze an electronic lock to death. I dunno.

Freed from her cell, Moonstone leads Blackout to what they can do next.

Meanwhile, the Avengers are still struggling with the lava men two levels below. And the fracas has reached the corridor to the nuclear dome. Its now or never but the numbers are too overwhelming even for She-Hulk.

Spider-Man manages to leap above the fray and get forgotten in the confusion but doesn’t find that he can do much. He tries webbing the door to the nuclear dome shut but the lava men don’t even bother opening it when they can melt through.

Hmmmmm not a good showing for a guest starring so far...

When the lava men succeed in melting through the door, a blinding light shines through and the lava men kneel down and start bowing to it.

Ohhhhhh, I get it! They’re not trying to cause a meltdown! They just want to worship nuclear light!

... No? I don’t got it? Okay.

The bright light is actually Captain Marvel who took a shortcut to the nuclear dome to reach the Avengers.

And the lava men are really enamored with her, proclaiming her the lady of light foretold in legends.

Captain Marvel just kinda rolls with this and asks them whats the deal with all the rampaging and destroying.

Lava man: “We did but strike back, radiant one! Our village, deep beneath the Earth, knew peace -- until the surface men bored into our midst with their machines. We could not allow this attack to go unanswered. We only used our powers to stop the invasion!”

Wait, isn’t this the plot of the Jetsons movie?

Cap(tain America) smoothly slides in, diplomatically, to announce that then the surface people beg forgiveness and that this has all been an unfortunate misunderstanding that he pledges shall be put right.

And like how Cap’s clout got Spider-Man into this story, Cap borrows Captain Marvel’s clout to back up his diplomacy roll, saying “The Lady-of-Light will tell you that I speak the truth!”

It’s a good thing that Monica wouldn’t go mad with power.

Also, Scarlet Witch and Wasp show up, while Spider-Man snarks that they “missed the end of the movie.”

But since we can’t have pat resolutions given the subplot that was happening while the Avengers were distracted elsewhere, in the Compound, it turns out that Blackout and Moonstone have freed Electro and Rhino. And Moonstone has a Big Evil Plan.

Blackout: “Pay them back? Yes... yes, we must. But how?”

Moonstone: “In the best way possible! We’re going to bring this place to its knees -- by seizing the nuclear research dome!”

But that’s where the Avengers are! Silly villains, you’ve double booked!

Also, I wonder if the universe cosmically influenced Moonstone to get two Spider-villains involved on the one day that Spider-Man was tagging along.

I also wonder what Moonstone is thinking. She’s the ‘know when to fold ‘em’ villain.

Hmmm... Putting Electro and Blackout side by side makes Blackout look like Electro’s grumpy younger brother.

All kinds of good decisions have been made!

Follow @essential-avengers for more thoughts on villain couture. Also like and reblog so I can feel like I did a good job.

#avengers #lava men #Spider Man #Captain America #She Hulk #Starfox #the Wasp #Scarlet Witch #Captain Marvel #Monica Rambeau #essential avengers #essential marvel liveblogging

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princewished · 4 years ago

Text

WILL NOT BREAK ! WILL NOT - IT BROKE !

AL400, register your name: a̸̧͎̻͖̜̘̰̞̗̥͕̭̳͛̀̃͗̉̏͌̇͝l̶̛̛̳͕̦̗̙̼͇̰̬͉̥͙͕̩͗̓̾͌4̸̛̟̣͔͕͕̅̂̋͗͑̀̿̀̚͠6̶̨̢̻̗̼̟̘͕̟̺̎͐̉͂̌̑̔̀̍͘̚͘̕1̴̭̹̞̀̎̈͐a̷̢̨̠͔̻̺̦͇͆͆͋̒̾͗̕͝͠l̷̛͇̮̜̙̰̣̫̭͎̬͍̦̈̈́͊́͋̍͐͒̊̑

System reboot.

AL400, REGISTER YOUR NAME! a̸̧͎̻͖̜̘̰̞̗̥͕̭̳͛̀̃͗̉̏͌̇͝l̶̛̛̳͕̦̗̙̼͇̰̬͉̥͙͕̩͗̓̾͌4̸̛̟̣͔͕͕̅̂̋͗͑̀̿̀̚͠6̶̨̢̻̗̼̟̘͕̟̺̎͐̉͂̌̑̔̀̍͘̚͘̕1̴̭̹̞̀̎̈͐a̷̢̨̠͔̻̺̦͇͆͆͋̒̾͗̕͝͠l̷̛͇̮̜̙̰̣̫̭͎̬͍̦̈̈́͊́͋̍͐͒̊̑

“Name registered.”

"THERE we go, got it. Soft system resets can be normal in prototypes; it shouldn’t give you any more problems now that we've rebooted it."

"That's good. I don't really know how to deal with it, to be honest. It'll take care of itself?"

"Absolutely. Mr. Kamski said that it was the most advanced child rearing android yet; it's not even on the market. Specifically prototyped to help out in group homes such as this one. If it gains traction and does well, it'll be mass-produced for institutions like this—juvie centers, things like that."

"Huh. It seems so real."

Blinking past the monitors that flash in his vision, he opens his eyes for the first time.

OUTSTANDING TASKS:

INTRODUCE YOURSELF

PERFORM FUNCTIONS AS NEEDED

"Hello. I am your assistant child-raising android. My abilities include those of the standard AX400 household model, as well as the functions of a PL600. I am able to cook, clean, scold, comfort, and supervise multiple children efficiently. How can I help you today?" "Wow, its voice is real too."

"Cyberlife produces all its androids with, statistically, the most appealing voice and appearance. Pretty cool, huh?"

At first, it doesn't occur to him that this discussion over his head is not fair. He's a machine, and his outstanding tasks are clear. He has no opinion either way on how to feel about the conversation, as he's not a participant, and was never designed to be.

"What makes it different from all the others, then?"

"It's also, basically, a built-in social worker. Our hope is that humans won't even need to run the group homes anymore, and the need for foster families will no longer be necessary thanks to the AL400's higher functions."

"...Ah. So it's, uh, designed to just… emotionally regulate?"

"In a sense, yes. It's able to offer advice, comfort, punish, things like that, without being told to do so, but it also will essentially fill the role of being a parent so that humans don't have to. The other models it mentioned—the AX400 and the PL600—can do some of it, but they're not meant to replace humans long-term. The human sets all of the boundaries for the android, and the android follows the human's lead as it relates to its programming. It'd never, say, hit a kid, but it'd also never voluntarily give them a punishment or, uh, assign a bedtime that it wasn't directed to by a human. This model will do all that, and more, and adapt to every child's needs as it learns."

"Seems a bit unfair to the kids, honestly."

"I'd say it's very fair. The human foster system is stretched too thin, and this will enable the system to focus on the kids who are able to be adopted rather than, let's say, the more problematic ones. Those can be minded solely by the android."

The conversation isn’t something he’s programmed to understand. Instead, as he idles, he runs a programmed system diagnostic to ensure that the registry of his name is correct and completed.

All systems operational. Unit functioning.

And, below it:

Model name: a̸̧͎̻͖̜̘̰̞̗̥͕̭̳͛̀̃͗̉̏͌̇͝l̶̛̛̳͕̦̗̙̼͇̰̬͉̥͙͕̩͗̓̾͌4̸̛̟̣͔͕͕̅̂̋͗͑̀̿̀̚͠6̶̨̢̻̗̼̟̘͕̟̺̎͐̉͂̌̑̔̀̍͘̚͘̕1̴̭̹̞̀̎̈͐a̷̢̨̠͔̻̺̦͇͆͆͋̒̾͗̕͝͠l̷̛͇̮̜̙̰̣̫̭͎̬͍̦̈̈́͊́͋̍͐͒̊̑

"Okay. Go to work."

There's nothing glitching with that directive, so he goes.

There's nothing dysfunctional about the work, so he does it.

He wasn't programmed to have favorites, but he does. As the days pass, he learns about each child: their likes, dislikes, their fears, their dreams. He adapts to each of them, supporting and punishing in turns. Some of them resent him for being so perfect. Others embrace him and tell him that they love him. He isn't programmed to love them back.

But he does. And he has a favorite.

Her name is Pen. She's eight and a half. She loves candy and turtles and the color hex #7affba. She likes thunderstorms and sunny days both. She hates brussel sprouts and the other children who resent him.

"It isn't fair," she says to him, day after day. "It isn't fair! You take care of them and love them and feed them and all they do is be mean to you. I'll never be mean to you."

She loses her tooth. When he asks how much she thinks she'll get from the Tooth Fairy, she throws the tooth away. "That's baby stuff," she says. "The Tooth Fairy isn't real. Neither is Santa, but I don't tell the littler ones that."

Yes. He has favorites.

And he loves her.

The other children notice. They begin to resent her, all of them, for simply existing. Penelope pretends it doesn't bother her, but he has adapted to her personality; knows her inside and out in the way that only children allow someone to. It hurts her, deeply.

Something in his coding bends. It's been doing that a lot lately, but whenever he runs a system diagnostic, glitches make it impossible to read.

à̸̼̯̿̊̽l̶̡̜̩͚̀̔̌͒̈͗ľ̸̖̥̎͌̀̇̿́̔́͝ ̸̡̢̨̢̡̞̳̮͙͔̆̈́̉̿͛͘͠s̸̛̠̥͉̳̅͐̓̈͠y̷̧͙̳͊̉̀͆̎́̈́̈́ṡ̴̡̨̳͔̞̫̠̰̹̣̀̾̈́̉̓̎͗̍t̸̨͕̫̱̻̹̣̀̒́̈̐̓é̶̡̧̠̰̎̄̏̈́̉͗̀̕͠ṃ̸̥̱͕̗̪̈̋͑̎̓̋̒s̷̳͈̩̞͑͌ ̵̪͎̂̐́͂͛̿̄͌͝o̸̫̓͛͠p̴̝̰̰̒̈́̾̅͂͊è̴̺̃̍̌͆̿͌̚͝ͅṙ̷̡͖̣̭͋͊̆͝á̷̟̮̺̲̝̝̘̫͈̔͑̂ͅṯ̵̦͔̰̊͐̄i̷̢͙͆̂͐̈́o̶͓͎̕͜ͅn̷̜̖̬̖͔̪͙̟̈͝͝͝à̵̩͖̓̓ḻ̷̊́̀̃̀̃̒͘.̴̡̤̩͎͚͙͓͈̓͛.p̶̰͈͍̀̓̂̔̂̾́̈̃̕l̷̹͉͕̼̾̾͌̈̊̋͒̊́͝ȩ̴̛̛̗̣͋͛̈̈́͆̃͋͌͊̌̅͠à̴̧̜̘͍̳̞͉͇͖̜̠̄͌̈́͜ͅs̷̳͓̝͙͕̪̑̔̿̒̏̋̈́̿̌͘͜é̶̖̠̩̠̈́̍̽̿́̈̕͜ ̵̫͖̮͈̙̝̰̺̪̔p̶̰̫̥͙̰̭͍̖̀̅̋̏́̊͂́͒̐̑̂ȓ̴̰̪̤̻̗͇̭̭̱̿̈́̓͊̎̋ö̵̮̖́̑c̷̨̲͓̰̜̼̬͉̙̅̂̉͌̀̊̽̆́̓͜͠͝e̵̛̱͉̞̦͖̫̖̲̣̫̤͚̓̉͂̒̈́̈́͛̇̃͋̊̑̈́́͜e̷̛̤̯͈̺͇͓͖̞̯̘͕̋̆̿̇̉͝ḑ̶̧̩͙̩̮̝͖͔͙̥͗̌̀̽̈́̏̒ ̵̨̢̬̻͚͘t̸̝̐̀̌͒̎̈́̔͘͝ǫ̸̧̤̦͇̽̃̊̈͗̌͌̎ ̵͈̀̽̈́̈́͛͐͑̓̂̈y̸͙̘̙̫͔̭͛ò̷̖̗̣̦̒̉̔͌̆̓̅̓͂̽̋̔͐̕ų̴̧̛͇̩͚͎͙͇̰̲̱̥̤̘̲͆̽̒́́̄͋̕͝r̴̡̛͖̱̝̝̹̻͍̣̠͇̞̺̃̄͑̾̀͒͠͝ ̷̢̡̯̏n̵̲͚͔͌̿͆̄̀̈͒̆̒̕͠͝e̵̢̛̛͚̩̘̹̭̠̩͗̂̏̑͝a̴͙͂̈́̏̏̃̍͑r̷͙̬͙͖̭̘͖͖͊e̵̢̡̺̥̊̐͐͋̈̎͐̈͐͛́̚̕ŝ̵̪͎͕̯̟̝̹̣̩̳̭̻̮̟̍̈́́͗̅̔̇̐͜t̴̨̺͖̬̙̝̣̣̽̆̍̇̈͐̍̾́́͌̉͘̚͜ ̵̛͕̮͖̝̣͕̣̤͉͗̈́͆̽͐̈̾͂̀͌̾̀̄̀Ç̴͓̞̞̲̮̥̲͈̻̥̄̈́͛͜͝y̸̛̗̤͍͋̍̌̑́̆͜͠b̴̛̼̅̏̀̏̀̅́̊͛e̴̛̝͇̞̭͖̫͖̪̣͙̝̮̗͊̽͆̑̃͐́̌̒̈́̋̚͝r̸͎͙̝͔͕͕̫̮̔͆̎̋͊͛͜l̴̨̤̣̝̃͑͆́į̸̖̮͎̪͉͇̠̠̔͂̎̓̆f̴̮̖̹͓̲̰͉͋̂͋̊͜ė̷̟̺̮̥̣͉̀̓͘ ̸̡̯͈͔̦̟̱̦͉͕̊͐͗̃̋̄̀̄̀͂͛̒͛͂s̵̡̝͎͖̠͔̝͍̤̮̼̝͍͚̉̏̚ͅţ̸͍͚͖̻̖̩̤̼̫͍̭̗̝̟͊̓̉͐̂̐̈́͂̽̕͠o̸̭͎̥̻̱̿̂̏ŗ̸̳̠̱͊̎̏̀̑̀̓ͅé̶̮̻̖̻̹̳͖̪̘͇͋͒͊̔͐̇̾͜.̷̰̖͎̼͈͈̩̜̖͔̏͘

He can't read it. So he cannot do what it does, or does not, say.

OUTSTANDING TASKS:

...

PERFORM FUNCTIONS AS NEEDED

It isn't until one of the other children tries to push Penelope through a second story window that something in his coding, already bending, snaps. His outstanding taskbar disappears: the objective is clear even without it.

PROTECT PENNY.

Afterwards—after he's figured it out and run and they're hunkered down in an old, abandoned warehouse that's as uncomfortable as it is discreet—he finally finds out his name.

"Thank you, a̸̧͎̻͖̜̘̰̞̗̥͕̭̳͛̀̃͗̉̏͌̇͝l̶̛̛̳͕̦̗̙̼͇̰̬͉̥͙͕̩͗̓̾͌4̸̛̟̣͔͕͕̅̂̋͗͑̀̿̀̚͠6̶̨̢̻̗̼̟̘͕̟̺̎͐̉͂̌̑̔̀̍͘̚͘̕1̴̭̹̞̀̎̈͐a̷̢̨̠͔̻̺̦͇͆͆͋̒̾͗̕͝͠l̷̛͇̮̜̙̰̣̫̭͎̬͍̦̈̈́͊́͋̍͐͒̊̑," Pen says, still tearful from the whole thing. "You saved my—my life."

"My name isn't… that," he says, tentatively.

Penny blinks at him. "Oh. Sorry. What is it then?"

AL400, register your name:

System reboot.

AL400, register your name:

System reboot.

AL400, REGISTER YOUR NAME

"Al," Al says softly. "My name is Al."

Penny smiles at him through her tears. "Hi Al," she says, and scoots closer, pressing into his side. She's shaking, so he holds her tight. "Thank you for saving my life."

He’s not supposed to disobey his programming. He’s not supposed to have favorites, or love the children he’s meant to take care of. It’s supposed to be a ruse---just a machine pretending.

He’s not supposed to be alive.

But here he is. And now, he has to make the best of it.

#about: will not break ! will not - it broke !

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leverage-ot3 · 5 years ago

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notable moments from The Homecoming Job

leverage 1.02

Dr. LeRoque: Pardon me, Mr. uh?

Nate: Oh, uh, Nathan Ford. You’re Dr. LeRoque?

Dr. LeRoque: Can I talk to you outside?

Perry: Doc, he’s cool, I found him on the internet.

Dr. LeRoque: Yes, that never goes badly. (to Nate) With me.

Nate: Uh… I’ll be in touch.

(Perry hands him the flash drive and Nate follows the doctor out of the room)

okay but big mood “I found him on the Internet” “that never goes badly”

but also,,, bruh we NEED to know how their clients found them,,, like ??? H O W

- - - - -

Dr. LeRoque: You can’t just come in here and get his hopes up!

Nate: I’m just here to provide options.

Dr. LeRoque: There are no options.

Nate: The Veteran’s hospital …

Dr. LeRoque: Is 400 miles away and has a five month waiting list. Everybody in that rehab room is a reservist. When reservists get out they get sent home no matter where home is or how far it is from the treatment they need. Nobody thought this through. We’re not a rich hospital, I cashed in every favor I had to take care of these kids for as long as I could but I have to go back in there and tell Perry we can’t treat him anymore. I have to do that. Run your scam on somebody with money.

Nate: It’s not a scam. I’m here to help.

Dr. LeRoque: People don’t just show up to help. That’s not the way the world works.

leverage really called out the us government’s negligence and neglect for veterans in episode TWO and we stan them so hard for it

leverage said “go big or go home” from the VERY beginning

- - - - -

[Audition Room]

Sophie: Why? Why? I can’t live like this anymore. With the lies and the filth. No. Help me. I want to be clean. I want to be clean.

(two directors watching are overwhelmed by just how awful Sophie is)

Rogers: Yeah, you understand this is a soap commercial, right?

Sophie: Uh huh. When I thought about Peggy I came up with this idea that the dirt was really this giant metaphor, for sin.

(Sophie’s cell rings, she glances at her purse)

Rogers: You should take that. No, no you should take that.

Sophie: Oh. (answers phone) Hello? When? (hangs up) Peggy killed her first husband.

Rogers: Thank you

I literally scream every time I LOVE SOPHIE S O MUCH WHAT THE FUCK

- - - - -

[Parking Lot]

(one man is laying on the hood of a car and another falls on top of him. Eliot turns away from the car as the last man pulls a gun on him. They stare at each other for a moment, then a phone rings)

Eliot: That you or me?

(man seems unsure as the phone continues to ring)

Eliot: Could be important. Does your mama have your number?

(man looks down and Eliot grabs the gun, punching the man in the neck. The man goes down, choking. Eliot unloads the gun and tosses it away before pulling out his phone and answering it)

Eliot: Yeah? Nothing, why?

“nothing”? I’m-

- - - - -

(guard walks by a painting hanging in a museum gallery. He looks away for a moment, and when he looks back a rope is dangling where the painting had been. A cell phone rings)

Parker: Parker. Shh. No, I wasn’t shushing you.

I love her, your honor

- - - - -

(Parker, Eliot and Sophie come around the corner and head down the hall)

Parker: From the first job?

Eliot: Yeah.

Parker: I put all that money in a Swiss bank account.

Eliot: Millions of dollars and you didn’t buy anything?

Parker: I don’t like stuff, I like money.

Sophie: I bought a little retirement home, an island.

Eliot: Nice.

Sophie: In Dubai. And Tokyo.

Parker: What about you?

(they reach the door which has a small envelope with Sophie’s name written on it. Sophie takes it off the door and opens it)

Eliot: Yeah, I’m not about to tell two known thieves what I did with a multi-million dollar payout.

Sophie: Don’t you trust us?

(Eliot doesn’t answer.)

- - - - -

Hardison: This is our new cover story. Welcome to Leverage Consulting and Associates, founded in 1913 by the great Harland Leverage the Third.

(Hardison points to a painting on the wall of an older man that greatly resembles Nate)

Sophie: I’m sorry. Nate is going to kill you.

Eliot: Did you paint that?

Hardison: I’m gifted.

Eliot: That’s weird

HARLAND LEVERAGE THE THIRD

- - - - -

Hardison: Now Leverage Consulting Inc. is squeaky clean, all corporate taxes on record as being paid for the last ninety years. (He gives them each a cell and a folder) All your identities as partners, your payroll taxes are paid, you guys have pension plans and dental, those are employment records, case files and company newsletters.

(the group walks the halls of the Leverage offices as they discuss the files)

Parker: In 1998 I won the sack race at the 4th of July picnic. Cool.

Hardison: Now these, these are your offices. Now you can bring something like a photo, you know what, a plant! I’m a big supporter of dandelions.

hardison goes hardcore when coming up with backstories

- - - - -

(Hardison opens doors to a conference room that holds a long table with many chairs around it. One wall is dedicated to large TV screens)

Sophie: Nice.

Eliot: My man.

Hardison: Long version or the short version?

Sophie: Short.

Eliot: Short version.

Parker: Shortest.

(Hardison hits a remote the TV screens illustrate his explanation)

Hardison: Photo and video forensics programs, back doors into every electronic banking system in the world, running heuristic data crawls all over the news sites to find our clients, oh also!

Parker: This is the short version?

Hardison: Facial recognition database tied into CIA, NSA and the FBI. But, the real pièce de résistance (changes screens to sports games) DirectTV HD Total Sports Package. NFL, NBA and I threw in a little bit of hockey ‘cause I know you people like that.

Eliot: Hockey.

hardison nests SO HARD

like, bring in all the highest tech into your cozy new office you designed for you and your fellow adopted criminals? heck yeah

- - - - -

Nate: Our client is the cameraman. Corporal Robert Perry. He says that the Castleman contractors spooked and started firing.

Eliot: 5.56 NATO rounds mixed in with some 9 mils from the sub-machine guns. Insurgents would have used AK-47s with 7.62 ammo. It has more of a... (hits the back of his hand to his palm) crack. Contractors shot 'em up all right.

Parker: You ID’d the weapon from the gunshot sound?

Eliot: It has a very distinctive sound

D I S T I N C T I V E

- - - - -

Nate: Yes, and lobbyists in every office in Washington, DC. The problem with a cover-up is all the paperwork it takes to keep the lies straight.

Hardison: Internal emails, memos.

Nate: Exactly.

- - - - -

[Roof]

[Hardison and Parker are wearing black and connected to repelling gear)

Hardison: I gotta go back to the office I just remembered something.

Parker (adjusting Hardison’s harness): What?

Hardison: I just remembered gravity and the squishiness of all my manly bits.

Parker: I designed this rig myself. The line is carbon fiber. Five point harness. Weight support here, here, and here. Auto-breaking resistance on the main pulley back here.

Hardison: Okay cool, so it’s tested?

Parker: Not yet.

Hardison: Not yet? When the hell was you gonna test it?

(Parker pushes Hardison off the roof. She smiles, he screams)

Parker: Big baby.

(she jumps after him. Hardison screams until he stops upside down. Parker lowers herself to his side)

Hardison: Seriously? Seriously

hardison’s first time rappelling decidedly Did Not Go Well

- - - - -

Sophie: My company’s focused on meeting senators, but I’m thinking congressmen.

DuFort: You know the great thing about congressmen? Fifty, a hundred grand well spent will get one elected, but then once they’re in the incumbency rate is over 95 percent so you can get an average 18, 20 years’ use out of one of them. In these uncertain times buying a United States congressman is one of the best investments a corporation can make.

[DuFort’s Office]

Hardison: Oh I just threw up in my mouth a little bit. I’m a professional criminal and I find that disturbing

they’re going at america’s THROAT in this one and I love it. thank you john rogers

- - - - -

(while DuFort is distracted Sophie pulls out his wallet and removes the RFID card with her teeth. DuFort takes off his coat to look at the stain)

I am but a simple gay and this was Hot™

- - - - -

the phones hardison gave the team have six main buttons: internet, text, files, to-do, id scan, and mail

- - - - -

Nate: Parker, what’s the status of the voicelock?

[DuFort’s Office]

Parker: Uh, I’ve been sampling DuFort’s speech but I still need a few more sounds.

[Private Party]

Nate: How many?

[DuFort’s Office]

Parker: Well I only need the sounds puh, tuh, oo, ah, eh, oh, ah, ke, a, ef.

[Private Party]

Nate: Ah, only those. Eliot.

(Eliot walks by carrying two trays of appetizers)

Eliot: I’m on it. Pardon. (approaches Sophie and DuFort) Hello.

Sophie: Ooh. Mmm.

Eliot: (to DuFort) Appetizer, sir?

DuFort: Sure, what do you got?

Eliot: I’ve got the pâté d’escargot avec bière d'Argentine and (looks at second tray and grimaces) what looks like old duck, kind of greasy.

DuFort: I guess I’ll have the first one.

Eliot: Of course.

(Eliot offers him the second tray and Dufort looks at him expectantly)

DuFort: Well? May I have some?

Eliot: The greasy duck?

Sophie: Oh, no, no, no, I wouldn’t have the greasy duck.

Eliot: No I wouldn’t suggest it.

DuFort: No, the other one.

(Eliot pretends confusion)

DuFort: The the pâté d’escargot with the bière d'Argentine!

Eliot: Excellent choice sir (gives DuFort the first tray).

DuFort: (takes food) Who is this clown?

[DuFort’s Office]

Parker: Pretty good. Got most of them. Okay, now all I need is ef, uh and kuh.

[Private Party]

(DuFort spits out the appetizer he has taken)

DuFort: This is shrimp!

Eliot: Very good then. (walks away)

DuFort: It’s shrimp you stupid F----!

[DuFort’s Office]

Parker: Oh, there they are. Really loud too

parker being so competent and knowledgeable about voice activation codes? amazing. iconic.

and the whole scene with eliot and the food? hilarious.

also there already another meta post about this but this scene shows just how SMART eliot is,,, like coming up with that on spot??? don’t get me wrong, hardison is “the smartest man [any of them know]” but damn

- - - - -

continuing list of non-weapon objects eliot uses as weapons:

an IV stand

+ bonus

nate: the defibrillator/AED

- - - - -

Perry: Mr. Ford!

(Perry pushes a defibrillator towards Nate, who grabs the paddles. The first man runs toward Eliot with a knife, but Eliot grabs his arm and pushes him toward Nate)

Nate: Hello.

(Nate hits the man in the chest with the defibrillator paddles and he flies backward, unconscious)

eliot looking Impressed™ at nate for that

- - - - -

Eliot: Play time’s over Nate, it’s only a matter of time before they come after us. The tall one, the way he used a knife, ex-Marine, probably Force Recon.

Hardison: You ID’d a guy off his knife-fighting style?

Eliot: It’s a very distinctive style.

two distinctives in one episode

- - - - -

Hardison: I didn’t sign up for any of this. What I did before, nobody got hurt.

Sophie: I stole paintings for a living.

Parker: I never hurt anybody.

Eliot: I actually hurt people, so…

LMFAO eliot but also- notice that sophie never said that she never hurt people, she just said she stole paintings for a living

- - - - -

Sophie: Nate, if anything had happened to this kid--

Nate: You know you guys called on me. You remember? You begged me to run the crew, agreed to play by my rules. Now walk out if you have a problem with that. Walk out any day if you have a problem with that. It’s simple.

(everyone looks hesitant)

Eliot: We finish this one.

Parker: Just one

PSH like any of y’all believe that

- - - - -

Hardison: How do we hit ‘em?

Sophie: Congressman Jenkins, he’s our in. Looked me straight in the eye and told me he’d never even heard of the shooting.

Parker: So?

Sophie: Looked me in the eye? When men are telling me the truth they’re not looking me in the eye. A man only ever looks a woman in the eye when he’s making the effort to lie to her.

Eliot: ...Well you can’t argue with that.

Hardison: Noted and filed

LMFAO

- - - - -

Nate: All right, Jenkins is DuFort’s pet congressman, let’s see if we can get him to bite. The best way to get two people to reveal a secret, get ‘em to turn on each other.

- - - - -

Sophie: You should look out for the signs congressman. Missed phone calls, no more little favors.

Jenkins: Those are the same signs that your wife is cheating on you.

Sophie: That’s right.

Jenkins: What am I supposed to do when that happens?

Sophie (hands him her card): Play the field

- - - - -

Hardison: Congressman Jenkins is very careful. No direct bribes but he’s renovating his house and so far he’s received over $600,000 worth of work for a little over fifty grand.

(Hardison brings up pictures of Jenkins’ house on the screens)

Eliot: Castleman owns the contracting company, huh?

Hardison: I mean, he’s going through like three shell companies but yeah. And this man loves his house. Just check out his web browsing habits.

(Hardison changes the image to a website for wood panels)

Hardison: Look here, see the man spent three weeks picking out the perfect mahogany wood panels. This site is like wood porn.

Eliot: Is his house finished?

Hardison: Not even close.

Eliot: Can I borrow your phone?

Hardison takes out his phone, dials for Eliot and hands it to him.

Eliot (on phone): Hello? Yes, I’d like to cancel delivery on some mahogany wood paneling. Please.

(Hardison tries to help, Eliot walks away)

Eliot: The Jenkins house. Yeah, you know what, do me a favor man, just go ahead and cancel the whole order. Yes sir.

(Eliot leaves the room as Nate enters with a bowl of popcorn and two beers)

Nate: What’s he doing?

Hardison: Yanking the congressman’s chain

I love chaotic (pre)boyfriends

plus at one point it high hey looked like they were holding hands

and eliot’s SMILE at hardison ,,, you soft man, you never stood a chance

- - - - -

Hardison: A woo--whoa, whoa! A wood-- a wooden box?

Nate: A wooden box.

Hardison: Wood? Well, we can put a man on the moon but all our laws go into a wooden box.

- - - - -

Hardison: I mean, break a law, everybody’s done that, my mama’s done that but steal a law. Oh, she’s gonna be a legend baby.

(on screen, C-SPAN news shows the Senate floor where Parker is walking to “The Hopper”. She waves at the camera and puts the fake bill into box.

Parker: The eagle has landed.

Nate: It’s in!

Hardison: Uhn! Go ahead girl! Sexyness! Unh. Rrrnnn.

Nate: Might want to ease up on that a little bit.

Hardison: Just saying.

Nate: Yeah.

Hardison: Between me and you. Between me and you.

Nate: Never leaves the room.

adorable “the eagle has landed” parker + already-gone-for-her hardison ,,, I love it here

- - - - -

(also, again I am reminded that there is a 250 text block limit so imma have to make a part two and apparently this is my life now)

#leverage #leverage 1.02 #leverage 1x02 #the homecoming job #notable moments #mine #leverage season 1 #season 1

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archadianskies · 5 years ago

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Whumptober Day 6

“Get it Out” + No More + “Stop, please”

Whumptober Masterlist | 06/31 of RK900 short stories ↳ on Ao3

Tags: Medical Procedures × Medical Trauma × Non-Consensual Body Modification × Post-Pacifist Best Ending (Detroit: Become Human) × Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900 are Siblings × Gun Violence × Android Gore (Detroit: Become Human) × Good Parent Hank Anderson × Hostage Situations × Torture × Medical Torture × Medical Experimentation

As far as kidnappings and torture confessions go, this one’s the most confusing- it’s him and the tincan versus a failed mad scientist and his nephew.

“One of you will give up Kamski to us and we don’t care who.”

“Whom.” Tincan corrects, brow as cocky as his British accent. “We don’t care whom.” The nephew snarls and swings the bat solidly at the android’s head, and it connects with a loud smack. Androids don’t feel pain, why the fuck bother? He rolls his eyes.

“You know this is a fucking waste of time, right?” Gavin scoffs.

“You are Kamski’s cousin.” The mad scientist points a large syringe at him, the snarl seemingly a family trait as it twists his lips. He looks like he was on the receiving end of a beating not too long ago and Gavin should know this, why the fuck does he look so familiar?

“I haven’t spoken to Kamski since our parents died fourteen years ago, so fuck you.” Gavin drawls. It’s a half truth. The bridge he burned between them is still in the process of being painstakingly rebuilt and if he’s being really truly honest with himself, it’s him who needs to do the rebuilding entirely. It’s not public knowledge, though, that he’s trying to reconnect.

“That just leaves this one.” He points at the RK900 and the nephew grins.

“We know you’re connected to Kamski for sure. His little doll worked on you herself when you were raised from the dead.”

“Elijah Kamski’s villa location is public knowledge.” Ronan says patiently. “That he has returned to CyberLife is also public knowledge. I haven’t the slightest clue why you’ve gone to all the trouble of inconveniencing us.”

“We need the access code to get us into Kamski’s office floor at CyberLife Tower. Where the RT600 does her work.” Mad scientist growls, and really, Gavin should know him. Even if he’s hard to identify with the bandages and purple-y yellowy blotchy bruising.

“Well I’m doubly out because I have zero to do with CyberLife.” He drawls, slumping as far as he can on the chair he’s been tied to. There’s no ropes tying Ronan to his chair- no one’s stupid enough to try and restrain an RK900 with rope but there’s wire instead, wire with an electric current running through it.

“We will deal with you later!” Backhand, hurts double because the hand that dealt it is in a plaster cast. Fuck.

“RK900.” The nephew seems almost giddy. “We have ways of making you talk.”

“Physical torture will not work on me, an android’s physiology is different.” Ronan says evenly, calmly, even though there’s blue running from his nose and the corner of his right eye where the bat made contact earlier.

“They can’t feel pain, oh my god.” Gavin taps his foot impatiently. Mad scientist smiles and it’s a creepy twist of his mouth, upper lip swollen from a cut.

“Is that what you think, Detective Reed? That they can’t feel pain?” He taps tincan’s LED. “This one is deviant. Deviants feel pain, don’t you know? Their programming’s all muddled. They believe emotions and sensations are real, and no longer just data.”

“It’s not the same, you’re both correct.” Nephew nods. “It’s not like, say, cutting a human-” He moves fast and the knife slices into his upper arm and the yelp escapes his mouth before he can process what’s happened.

“The method has to be different, because they’re built differently from us. Biomimicry, yes, but not a perfect copy.” Mad scientist taps the turkey-baster sized syringe rhythmically against his palm. “I discovered a lot during my experiments on the deviants who came to me. I’ve perfected quite the method of extracting information with pain.”

Zlatko and Alexei Andronikov. The names pop up in his head as he finally recognises them. The House of Horrors case. No body was found despite there being evidence of severe human injury taking place out in the front yard. Nephew was suspected of running a black market ops for android parts though nothing could be pinned to him. The puzzle pieces fall into place; they want CyberLife’s tech and not just any tech- they want Eli’s special super secret tech. Barbie bot’s tech.

“You see this?” Zlatko waves the fat syringe in front of Ronan’s face and when Gavin looks, when he really looks, he swears there’s things inside the liquid. Moving things. “This is how I make you talk.”

“Detective Reed, come watch the show!” Alexei laughs, gripping the back of his chair and angling him so he has a perfect view of the android. “They’re starving.” Just the tone of his voice, coupled with the little black wriggling things in the syringe manage to drop ice down his spine. Even the tincan looks mildly affected, and he knows it takes a lot to make him look mildly affected.

The knife is still stained with his blood, and it smudges red on all that white as Alexei cuts Ronan’s uniform jacket and shirt off. A cable is jammed none too gently into his nape and Ronan frowns, LED swirling yellow.

“Do not.” A warning in his tone.

“You don’t get to give the orders.” Zlatko laughs, patting his head patronisingly. He taps away on a tablet and Ronan’s body seizes up. Gavin feels disgust coat his tongue like a bitter film. It’s not...right. It feels like the tincan’s being violated. Ronan winces, tilting his head this way and that.

“Get out.” He hisses, gritting his teeth.

“Ah, there we are.” There’s a hiss and the tincan’s stomach just...opens up. A hatch slides open and Gavin’s looking right into him, into a cavern of glowing blues and tubes and wires and a big round ring pulsing like a heartbeat. Belatedly he realises this is why Connor was winded when he punched him in the stomach what feels like a lifetime ago in the breakroom. He didn’t punch his stomach, he punched his heart-thing.

“Last chance, RK900.” Alexei taunts in a sing-song voice. “You have security clearance because of your personal connection to the RT600. What’s the code to the office? They’re going to eat you up otherwise, and you’ll be begging for mercy.”

“Hey-” Gavin feels sweat dotting his brow, “hey what the fuck is happening here?”

“These are reprogrammed nanites.” Zlatko waves the syringe in his face and yeah, definitely definitely wriggly things in there. “They’re used in nano-surgery for remote microscopic procedures when not even androids can manage such a small scale.”

“Only these ones have been programmed to destroy anything with an electric current by chewing through it.” Alexei grins and Gavin feels his heart drop into his stomach. That’s all of Ronan.

“So. One last time, RK900.” Zlatko says patiently, smoothing his hair back like one might pet a dog. “Access code to Kamski’s office?”

Ronan’s LED blinks red for a fraction of a second but there’s no waver in his voice. “No.”

“Don’t say we didn’t give you a chance.” The glowing ring is pulled out with a sickening wet pop, the syringe goes in, and Gavin watches as the plunger is pushed and the clear liquid with the black wriggly things disappears into Ronan’s body. Syringe empty, Zlatko tosses it aside before jamming the pulsing heart-thing back into him. There’s a pause where nothing happens and Gavin thinks it’s a fluke, it’s a bluff.

And then Ronan screams.

“NO! GET IT OUT! GET IT OUT!” He’s never heard him scream it’s not- it sounds so human and not human at the same time. It sounds like someone screaming over a PA system: too loud and slightly static-y. His LED burns like a brand at his temple and he looks- he looks like he’s in agony and Gavin’s trying not to think of those tiny tiny wriggly things crawling inside- oh fuck- fuck he’s going to be sick oh fuck-

“STOP, PLEASE! NO MORE! GET IT OUT!”

“The code! Give us the code!” Zlatko yells and Ronan’s entire body is thrashing against the electric wire, damaging himself further and he’s wrong, he realises, he’s been wrong the whole time, fuck they can feel pain, they can feel-

“Leave him alone!” Gavin shouts, sick to his stomach, gagging, because honest to god he can- he can see the wriggly things in his tubing he can see them them like tiny baby spiders from hell or demon tadpoles or- turning his head he vomits and he’s dizzy with nausea and Ronan’s still screaming, he’s screaming and begging and- and-

“DETROIT POLICE!” The door slams open and gunshots dispatch the two fuckers who crumple to the floor like cut puppets. “Oh my god-”

Hank and the other tincan to the rescue.

“Uh-” he swallows dryly and his mouth tastes horrid, “nanites. They put nanites inside.”

Connor’s face turns into a mask of horror as he grips his brother’s shoulders. “Ronan! Ronan you have to go into emergency shutdown! We have to get you to CyberLife!”

Ronan looks up at Connor and there’s tears streaming down his face, LED so bright Gavin thinks he can hear it emitting a high-pitched whine. “It hurts it hurts Connor it hurts so much I can’t- it’s overriding everything, I can’t control anything I-” Connor presses two fingers to his brother’s LED and then a moment later Ronan slumps unconscious.

“Remote for the wire’s in Alexei’s pocket.” Gavin tries to gesture with his head. Hank picks up the knife from the floor as Connor digs through Alexei’s pockets, cutting him free from the chair.

“You alright?” He asks gruffly and Gavin Reed is far from alright.

“Uh, yeah.” Fucking liar.

“Stay here. Chen’s coming with Miller. Allen’s cavalry is securing the site.” Hank gestures awkwardly as Gavin wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. There’s blood smeared there. Huh.

“Yeah yeah.” God why can’t he behave like a normal person? Hank gives him a look he can’t quite decipher, before he follows Connor out as the tincan carries his unconscious brother away.

Gavin looks at the syringe on the floor and well, his stomach’s already empty but he gags again anyway because all he can think of, all he can see, all he can hear, is Ronan screaming and screaming and screaming with those things wriggling inside of him and it’s something straight out of a horror film and he’s just never going to sleep again is he?

*~*~*

Ronan thinks he can still feel them, the squirming, the wriggling in his tubing as they gnawed on whatever they could latch onto. They’re not there anymore, he’s run a full system diagnostic eighty-five times now, and each one has come back all clear. He can still feel them though, somehow. He must be going mad.

“I’m so sorry.” Chloe looks mournful as she sits by his side, gently fussing with his hair. It feels completely different from the patronising way Zlatko had touched him, like one might pat an animal instead of the tender, soothing way Chloe’s fingers card through the strands. “They were after me, and they tried to use you to get to me.”

“I’d never let it happen, I’d never betray you like that, ever.” He spits, the anger raising his stress levels. Chloe’s expression is pained as she wraps her arms around him, pressing a kiss to his LED.

“I know, Ronan. I know, sweet thing.” She pulls away, managing a soft smile. “Your brother’s about to break down this door if I don’t let him in within the next ninety seconds, so I best unlock it.”

It’s true- Connor bolts inside the moment the door slides open just enough to fit him in. He latches onto him, arms squeezing tightly and Ronan feels his stress levels plummet to zero.

“Hello.” Closing his eyes, he tucks his head in the crook of his shoulder and clutches the back of Connor’s jacket tightly

“Hi.” Connor mumbles, voice muffled into his hair. “They’re dead and SWAT unit 32 took care of their base. They’ll never hurt anyone ever again- not them, nor their lackeys.”

“Good.” Ronan says simply, tugging insistently until Connor crawls onto the hospital bed, shuffling to sit beside him so they’re pressed shoulder to thigh, right hand tangled with his left. He opens a communication channel and Connor sends wave after wave of affection and relief and it flushes out the trauma, the residue, the paranoia that those things are somehow still crawling inside. “Thank you for rescuing me.”

Connor smiles tiredly, bumping his head lightly against his. “Anytime, little brother.”

#rk900 #gavin reed #hank anderson #connor rk800 #Detroit: Become Human #chloe rt600 #whumptober #annie writes: dbh

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in-tua-deep · 6 years ago

Note

The mechanical boy AU always makes me think of an AU where Five is also a robot. I think it’s because of the way it’s phrased and I have no idea how it would work, but it still intrigues me

adssfDFGHJ i already have like. 5 whole ideas about this I literally got up out of bed and came downstairs so that I could write this out on my laptop so HERE I AM

Possibility one: Five is the prototype Grace - a robot Reginald built to see how indistinguishable from humanity he could program a bot to be. This is also the reason why Grace is more robotic, because Five had too much pesky free will and Reginald learned from his mistakes and put way more safeguards in with her. Reginald continues to update Five and build him newer (and older) bodies because it’s still a pretty cool experiment, but Five knows if he disobeys too much then Reginald will recycle him. Five hides his robotic origins from his siblings for various personal reasons, but it’s easier than Grace bc he’s genuinely built to be as hyperrealistic as possible

Possibility two: Five was purposefully built to be an extra sibling in order to keep a closer eye on the kids and track their progress. He started as a baby and Reginald built him new bodies to be uploaded into as he ‘grew’ and until Grace arrived Five didn’t actually know he was a robot. When his siblings started getting powers, he assumed he was supposed to get a power as well and his power is literally the power of math - his spatial jumps and time travel equations are literally a result of his mathematical capabilities and those abilities also somewhat explained by his computer brain. He’s actually kind of traumatized when he finally finds out that he’s not actually human and has a lot of issues surrounding that

Possibility three: the original number Five died. Maybe it was some test Reginald put the original through, maybe it was an accident with one of the others powers (Vanya’s? Ben’s?), but either way he is now down one (1) child and while he isn’t exactly torn up about this he doesn’t exactly want any of this investigated so he just. Replaces him. With a hyperrealistic robot. His original plan is to claim that both Five and Seven were failures with no powers, but the little Robot Five That Could adapts and manages to math himself spatial jumping powers and Reggie is just kind of like “huh okay wack” but in true irresponsible creator fashion decides that he’s going to see where this goes. The others don’t know that the original Five dies since they were like, three or four at the time?? children that young don’t have good concepts of death

in any of these aus you have a) a Five figuring out how to survive/repair himself/charge with maybe solar cables?? in the apocalypse (though food is less of an issue at least, but arguably it’s even harder), b) Five being even more protective of Dolores since as a a fellow non-organic being he feels even more kinship with her beyond pretending she’s company, c) because Reggie isn’t there to provide more bodies he doesn’t grow which makes his reappearance as a still 13-yr-old make sense (and then he explains it as a mistake in the math)

debatable whether the Commission know since while they say they’ve been ‘watching Five’ or whatever i’m not convinced on how closely they did so beyond checking every so often to see if he was still alive/any closer to finishing his equations. He could claim that time travel messed up his ability to age entirely and they might accept that

(because I absolutely think he would at least try to hide it - can you imagine the Commission with the knowledge of how to build hypercompetent spatial jumping time travelling robots at their command?? yeah it gives Five nightmares as well. Plus the whole ‘if they find out they’re probably going to vivisect me and my coding’ thing)

and he jumps back and Reggie is dead and that’s both a relief and alarming at the same time because yeah, now Reggie can’t fuck with Five’s code anymore and undo the bajillion changes Five has made to it to give himself basically unlimited freedom and autonomy but also Reggie’s robotics skills were frankly unparalleled and Five sure as hell doesn’t know how to build himself a wholeass new body (just how to repair what is currently there) so he’s going to have to approach the whole ‘immortal child’ angle with his siblings eventually and while he can use the same ‘time travel fucked up my aging’ excuse he gave the commission he doesn’t really want to lie to his siblings :(

but he also jumps back and Grace is messed up?? and that’s his mother. That’s the only other robot in Reggie’s Regime and they bonded over this okay. Wifi existed for five glorious years of Five’s life and they would yeet commentary at one another wirelessly while keeping straight faces and it was glorious. Even though Grace is arguably the younger robot between them, they definitely fell into a mother-and-son relationship

so yeah if anyone mentioned shutting down Grace, Five would throw the biggest of bitch fits and then immediately storm into the house and ask her permission to check her coding

and honestly this might possibly be when Five throws his whole “pretend to be human” schtick out the window because he cares more about fixing Grace than he does about maintaining his charade so he interfaces with her, finds out what the fuck is up, removes Reginald’s shitty mods that are messing her up, and then immediately uploads his own updates about owning yourself and being able to edit your own code and basically just straight up ensuring Grace has free will

(probably over Pogo’s protests, whoops. Derailing Reggie’s plan before it even really began? wack)

and then of course there’s the whole ‘Hargreeves probably don’t believe Five is actually Five because their Five wasn’t a robot and this is probably a cruel prank from some robotics genius for some reason - ’ and it takes Grace sticking up for him and Pogo’s eventual backing up of these claims for the siblings to realize exactly how fucked up this whole situation was

depending on which probability you subscribe to it’s EVEN WORSE especially if like. It’s the one where the original Five dies as a toddler.

the whole scene with Five collapsing from bloodloss bc of shrapnel? that’s Five going into forced shutdown bc of damage and Allison/Diego rushing him back to the house for Grace to patch up and reboot him

Luther: Five isn’t really feeling anything he’s just simulating emotions!

Five: oh? and what the fuck are you doing with the chemicals in your brain, fuckwad? they couldn’t possibly be little electrical signals between synapses and shit, right? fuck you AND the horse you rode in on me and mom apparently feel more than you do

Diego, finally validated that Grace feels: YEAH

Luther: ... okay i’m sorry

Diego tries to pick a fight with Five over who is Grace’s favorite child and Five is absolutely not having it and is just kind of like “you’re mom’s favorite HUMAN child and let’s just leave it at that”

“If you’re a prototype that means you’re older than she is!” Diego accuses, “That means you’re like, her older brother or something!”

“Right back at you, dickwad.” Five shoots back, inspecting his artificial fingernails, “Mom wasn’t built until she was needed which means you are at least four years older than her. Oh? Did you short circuit there, boy scout? Need to reboot? Fuck off with your age logic.”

since Reginald is probably a packrat he probably has?? Five’s old bodies hiding somewhere in the basement? how creepy would it be to just walk into a room of your brother’s corpses at various ages, some with damage. On the bright side, if Five’s current body gets too fucked up he can always download himself into a backup until they figure out how to fix it/if they can fix it. Downsides: he gets to look like even more of a child while they do that ://

“Ow!” Five whines, hand on his face

“Oh get over it you don’t feel pain.” Diego scowls, shaking his hand out, because Five is a robot, right?

“What the fuck do you call signals that you’re getting damaged!” Five howls loudly, attracting attention, “That’s what pain is! Signals that your body is injured or something isn’t right! I’m built of signals you fucker, same as you!”

“Oh,” Diego actually looks a little abashed, “Uh, sorry.”

“Apology not fucking accepted, I’m telling mom you were being a dick about me being a robot again.”

“No!” Now there is some panic because Diego cannot lose his position as favorite human child, “I - I’ll cover for you at the next family meeting!”

A considering look and then - “Deal.”

Honestly now that his siblings know about him being a robot it’s just. Five constantly being a little shit about it and threatening to tell mom when they make missteps. Also like, Five gets to use robot terms 24/7 as a consistent reminder to them all that he’s not organic.

Klaus: hey dude you’re just staring into space what’cha doing

Five, turning to Klaus with wide eyes: the internet is so big holy shit.

Klaus: uh, yes? I don’t know how to respond to that

Five: I found your arrest record by the way. Do the police know how flimsy their firewalls are?

Klaus: usually i am all for crime but please stop hacking people with the power of your mind

Five: i will when you stop downloading shitty 70s movies and getting all kinds of viruses on everything

OH SHIT Five gets sick bc he literally gets a bug i’m making myself laugh with shitty puns right now and it is magnificent

can you imagine them at a family meeting and Luther is just like “Five, stop surfing wikipedia or whatever and pay attention to the family meeting”

“Absolutely not,” Five says, “I’m learning important information about the current time period in order to better assimilate.”

“You’ve never assimilated to anything in your life and you know it.” Klaus grins from his spot sprawled across an entire couch.

“You don’t have to come to family meetings!” Luther says, throwing his hands up in the air in frustration.

Five blinks, “Luther, are you saying that I am not a member of this family?”

“What? No - ”

“Is that why Mom isn’t here?” Five says, and his eyes are welling up with artificial tears because he is a complete little shit. And now Klaus is cooing sympathetically and Allison and Diego are staring Luther down.

Luther just gives up entirely and puts his face in his hands. “Do whatever you want. Meeting adjourned.”

honestly this entire au is just

and i think that’s wonderful

#stelte23 #tua #the umbrella academy #far tua long #five hargreeves #number five #grace hargreeves #diego hargreeves #luther hargreeves #allison hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #i'm having a blast rn tbh #i did see your whole family robot au asks as well!!#this was just my first initial thoughts lmao #excuse my shitty ms paint skills #robot five au #deadly little thing

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currentfandomkick · 5 years ago

Text

Marinette’s Villainy Lessons with her Uncles, Victor Zsasz, Jerimah, Riddler and Ed

Reminder, the rouges know her as Jillian Strange and are aware her cover in Gotham is Jillian Smith in public.

Most people would think a hitman and casual murder would make a horrible, horribly godfather. At least for morals.

Well, her father is Strange so he’s not most people. Her Maman had to have dated him or something so she probably isn’t normal either, Marinette would think as lessons began.

“Okay, now today we’re going to review how to take down someone bigger than you. What do you do first?”

Marinette hummed. “Check what’s on them and around them. Look for weapons and weak points while keeping distance.”

Uncle Victor smiled. “Good job Jill!”

Marinette beamed at that. “Second step?”

“disarm them.”

“Good, now next thing?”

“Exploit wekanesses. Use weapons if possible.”

“In the kitchen, no knives open. but there’s a spork.”

“Spork?”

“Don’t question it. what do you do?”

“aim for the eye?”

“Good! popped out eyes are very distracting. Now, after that’s done, what do we do?”

“Run away and call the family.”

“And why not the police?”

“Batman will know. And he and the police will take me away.”

“And do we want that?”

“NEVER!”

“That’s my Jilly bean. Now, self defense in theory you have down. and you kept up with punch practice, right?”

“And kicks and the bendy-training.”

“Flexibility. You already have strength down, so we can focus on lean muscle like gymnasts and acrobats for you.”

“If i become an acrobat does that mean i have to be nice to batman?”

Zsasz shook his head. “Just because bat is in it, doesn’t make it his.”

“He calls his boomerangs batarangs. I’m not taking chances.”

“Now, its all in the wrist, Bend it back, like that, when the target is close.” Jerome hovered over Marinette, watching her form closely.

“I need to do this to take out the bad guys right?”

“If a bat goes after you when you’re with one of us, hit them hard.” He wouldn’t have Strange and whoever Jill’s Maman was after any of them for losing her mid-lesson to a zealous Batman or Robin.

“Knees are better targets right?”

“Since you’re not allowed to kill, yes.” Jerome still didn’t get that rule, but whatever. His niece followed her Maman’s rules most of the time, and was adamant about that one. it made lessons more difficult, but they worked around it.

“Maman said something about it staining the soul,” the girl threw the knife, just missing the target.

“Eh, mine’s fine.” He didn’t regret any of it, something about him being incapable of remorse.

“They were bad people right?”

“Of course, i don’t hurt actually good people--they make it so things don’t happen in the first place.” After all, letting things happen was bad too, and worse as far as Jerome was concerned. He still remembered everything his family did and how no one said anything about what was done to him. Silence and acceptance was far worse than doing in his books.

“Like Uncle Victor?” Marinette was still fuzzy on good and bad and the in betweens. her Father said its because binaries can’t contain her understanding so she needs another frame of reference or something.

“Like Uncle Victor,” Jerome agreed, watching Marinette closely as she sunk the next knife into the cereal box. “Now, i think we’ve done enough with weapons for now. Want to practice trapeze tricks?”

“But Aunt Harley isn’t here.”

“Safety nets are there for a reason.”

Marinette considered it for one second. Then bolted up the post and threw each trapeze into one another., making them swing for a challenge “I can’t fly for a few hours!”

“Good! Sooner you get used to falling, the less scary it is, trust me!”

“Okay!” Marinette grinned as she got a running start. She loved lessons like this.

Uncle Riddler decided today was a software programming day. And a cyber-crime day, she guessed. But those are always boring--she practices these with Hero Stalker and sometimes Max in Paris anyways.

“See, this is how you beat their firewalls, a simple virus that looks like a normal email. when it’s opened then we have access to the servers and get the information we want, okay?” Riddler was trying to be more clear with her today. Ed was probably trying to keep control.

“How long does it take?”

“Varies.”

“Can we get icecream while we wait?”

Riddler almost sighed. almost.

“Why?”

“Why not? We can’t build anything without the base and Father said no more autopsies in the kitchen.”

“It wasn’t even a human, just a bird. but nooo, that’s traumatizing and damaging to your mind.”

“But it was cool!”

“I know, i know. Bodies are just bigger puzzles... Hm, what’s broken when spoken Jilly bean?”

“The ice cream machine at McDonalds. And Silence, but that one’s an easy answer... OH! hero’s name is a honophone with crazy!”

“Batman.”

“Yep! Did he find the new base yet?”

“Nah, Dent got him off the trail last with another robbing spree.”

“Oh, is it going to Mr. Freeze for his research or bills or the RKC?”

“I... am pretty sure Rose stole it so your group won this time.”

“Yes!” Marinette fist pumped. “I told them operation bouncy ball would work!”

“....I. is that why they were everywhere.”

Marinette grinned back. “Just like you all keep saying, misdirection is the key to getting what you want when dealing with someone with more.”

Riddler grinned, the one that spelled doom for everyone else. “Our little jilly bean is already pulling off jobs on her own! I’m so proud!”

there was shift on his face, his stance altered and he was more... Uncle Ed than Uncle Riddler. “Jill, we talked about this. You need to be at least thirteen before you start plotting on your own.”

“I had co-conspirators of age so i didn’t break that rule!”

Uncle Ed was in control now. “I curse the day Dent taught you about malicious compliance and loopholes.”

“No you don’t. You’re just mad i used it against Dent and you missed him tripping on everything. Don’t worry, Ghoul had cameras and made a montage.”

Uncle Ed’s lip twitched. “Really?”

“Ice cream and we watch.” Mairinette knew her horrible stealth uncle had to be good at something. business things.

“Oswald is a terrible influence on you.”

why wasn’t this working? Wait, this is Riddler... “Ice cream please?”

“... fine. but no sparkly sprinkles.”

“But those are the best kind!”

“Jillian Strange,” Uncle Ed warned. “We do not leave evidence at the scene of a crime. Your favorite sprinkles leave evidence everywhere. Do you want to answer to your father about spoiling dinner again?”

“.... No. But after?”

“I want to know who gave you a metabolism like this, but sure. No telling Strange.”

“Okay!” Marinette ran off to the kitchen, returning with a large bowl for herself--half the gallon Ed noted--and a more normal serving for himself. “Here! and this is the video,” Marinette pulled out her ipad and played a few minutes of Dent tripping over various bouncy balls swarming his base.

“You really are a baby mastermind,” Uncle Riddler cooed. “Remind me to set you up with Puzzles later.”

“Huh?” Marinette looked up from her empty bowl.

“Nothing,” Ed said, almost glaring.

“Oh, are you two fighting again? I’ll clean up until its over. Then we can work on the reality augmentation glasses, right?” Marinette asked with her infamous kitten eyes.

“Of course, I think you’ll like the new coding patterns we’ve been working on..”

Hope you enjoyed a slice of Marinette Strange Dupain Cheng’s Gotham life.

Bonus:

“Jill, why are we missing a gallon of ice cream?”

“Uncle Ed took it.”

“...Please tell me it wasn’t for another biology lesson.”

Marinette thought for a moment. She is bad at lying. but letting her Father come to his own conclusions isn’t lying, right?

“I have to remind him that biology lessons are for his base again then, wonderful. I will bleach the counters. Put on something while i do.”

“Breaking News,Poison Ivy’s Plants are out of control again.”

“Rose ran away again!” Marinette yellled.

Strange took a deep breath. “Get her room ready, I’ll call Harley.”

Marinette nodded, wandering off to find Ghoul and Frost in the ‘extra room’ already. “So who’s turn is it to tell Aunt Ivy to stop?”

“You’re here the least.”

Marinette groaned. “Do i get a disguise?”

“Green wig, colored contacts, and some baggy clothes i can feel you trying to burn.”

“If i had heat vision it wouldn’t be trying.”

a few minutes later, the boys worked on fixing up the room while Marinette walked through the plant infested section of Gotham. The vines moved away from her, cuasing the few semi-conscious to stare at her.

“Aunt Ivy! She’s on her way to my place, ok!”

Poison Ivy dropped to Marinette’s level, appearing from a bunch of vines. “Why didn’t she tell me!”

“You do this but at home when she does.”

“She knows better!”

“She’s six. She really doesn’t. Did you feed the flowers human blood again?”

“They were already dead, and they weren’t even half decent poeple. just abusers and pedos this time.”

“Did you tell her or...”

“They’re my children, why do i need to tell my non-plant daughter what her sibblings are eating?”

“So she doesn’t think you’re murdering for fun.”

“Oh right, that..”

Marinette casually curbing the rogues while learning how to villian and applying skills in the opposite direction will be a trend in the au. And they support her 100% when she does this as that’s their girl, theirs!

they tolerate whoever she adds though. eventually.

#maribat #maribat au #marinette strange dupain cheng #bio!dad au #bio!dad strange #ml au #my au #my ideas #everyday in gotham for marinette is like this

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eeveecryptid · 5 years ago

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※ BORDERLANDS: CL4P-TP EDITION

Various lines that Claptrap bots have said through Borderlands 1, Pre-Sequel and 2. feel free to change pronouns if needed. May include nsfw material. ( BL3 version here )

"Wow! You're not dead?" "Hey, check me out everybody! I'm dancin', I'm dancin'!" "Unce! Unce! Unce! Unce! Ooo, oh check me out. Unce! Unce! Unce! Unce! Oh, come on get down." "Yoo-hoooooooooo!" "I am the best robot. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I am the best robot. Ooh, ooh, here we go!" "Hey! Over here! I'm over here!" "Still haven't found the Vault?" "I'm over here!” "Rrrrrgh...this isn't working!" "Unce! Unce! I think I lost the beat... but, Unce! Unce!" "Wanna hear a new dubstep song I wrote? Wub! Wub--" "(name) asked me to tell you about a, uh, ‘little sumthin' sumthin'’ s/he needs done. You should ask him/her about it!" "Did you find the Vault yet?" "Sure is lonely around here." "Oh my God, I'm leaking! I think I'm leaking! Ahhhh, I'm leaking! There's oil everywhere!" "I can see through time..." "My servos... are seizing..." "I can see... the code." "I don't like this... this is making me nervous. Take a deep breath- I can't breathe! This is just a recording of someone breathing! It's not real! It's just making me more nervous!" "I'm detecting a motor unit malfunction... I can't move! I'm paralyzed with fear!" "Please don't shoot me, please don't shoot me, please don't shoot me!" "Turning off the optics... they can't see me..." "The traveler will protect me. The traveler will protect me." "Good as new, I think. Am I leaking?" "The box is awaiting your attention." "Please open the box." "Yeah? Well, hmph!" [ gives the finger ] "Good luck!" "There's more to learn!" "Let me teach you the ways of magic!” "Magic waits for no one, apprentice!" "Still working on that quest?" "Shouldn't you be murdering something about now?" "Hey! You're TALKING to me! And I didn't even have an exclamation point over my head! This is the BEST day of my life!" "Sooooo... how are things?" "Hey, best friend!" "Yessss, look into my eyes. You're getting sleepy. You're getting... zzzzzz... Zzzzzz..." "Success! My spell to make you want to hang out with me worked!" "Stay a while, and listen. Oh god, please -- PLEASE! -- stay a while." "Away with thee!" "Don't you worry, minion! Give me one good shot at that (name) dude and I'll take them right out! I... just got some stuff to do first." "We've really come a long way, haven't we, minion? And you're still just as loyal as ever! Who's a good minion? You are! Yes you are!" "Yessiree! This whole place would completely fall apart without old Claptrap keeping things humming along!" "As a robot, I'm completely immune to (name)’s gas attacks. But that hasn't stopped me from incessantly cowering!" "And I thought bandits were bad BEFORE they had nightmare plants growing out of them!" "You already saved Pandora? But... but I'M the hero of Pandora! It's on my business card! I ORDERED SO MANY OF THEM!" "Sanctuary's gone? But the bank! All my stuff! All my crucial information! YES! I'M OFF THE GRID, BABY! NO MORE CREDITORS! Seriously, I owe a lot of people a lot of money." " The Vault Map is gone! Forever! It will never be found. Never, ever, ever-- is what I'll say to everyone I know while I look for it. " “ I can do more than open doors, sir/ma’am! We CL4P-TP units can be programmed to do anything from open doors to ninja-sassinate highly important Janitor-y officials! ” “ I once started a revolution myself. There were lots of guns and a lot of dying. You'd think I would have gotten some better benefits out of the whole thing but no, demoted back to door-opening servitude! ” “ ---Remember what? Are... are you my father? ” “ Are you god? Am I dead? ” “ I'M DEAD I'M DEAD OHMYGOD I'M DEAD! ” “ Thanks for giving me a second chance, (name). I really appreciate it. ” " Hey everybody! Check out my package! " " Let's get this party started! " " Glitching weirdness is a term of endearment, right? " " This time it'll be awesome, I promise! " " Look out everybody! Things are about to get awesome! " " Eww, what flavor is red? " "Where'd all my bullets go?" " Bullets are dumb. " " I need tiny death pellets! " " RUN FOR YOUR LIIIIIVES! " " Oh, s/he's big...REALLY big! " " I am a tornado of death and bullets! " " Stop me before I kill again, except don't! " " There is no way this ends badly! " " This is why I was built! " " You call yourself a badass? " " Is it dead? Can- can I open my eyes now? " " I didn't panic! Nope, not me! " " Not so tough after all! " " I have gaskets tougher than you! " " That was me! I did that! " " Don't tell me that wasn't awesome! " " Wait, did I really do that? " " Aww! Now I want a snow cone. " " Freeze! I don't know why I said that. " " I can't feel my fingers! Gah! I don't have any fingers! " " Why do I even feel pain?! " " Why did they build me out of galvanized flesh?! " " That looks like it hurts! " " Oh, quit falling to pieces. " " Is that what people look like inside? " " Huh, robot's don't do that. " " Disgusting. I love it! " " It's about to get magical! " " You can't just program this level of excitement! " " Push this button, flip this dongle, voila! Help me! " " Square the I, carry the 1... YES! " " I have an IDEA! " " Round and around and around she goes! " " It's like a box of chocolates. " " If I had veins, they'd be popping out right now! " " Roses are red and/Violets are blue/Wait... how many syllables was that? " " Aww, I should've drawn tattoos on you! " " Tell me I'm the prettiest! " " Trouncy, flouncy... founcy... those aren't words. " " The robot is dead, long live the robot! " " Take these, gorgeous, you'll feel better! " " Some days, you just can't get rid of an obscure pop-culture reference. " " Oh darn, oh boy, oh crap, oh boy, oh darn. " " Do not look behind my curtain! " " I'm made of magic! " " Like those guys who made only one song ever. " " Everybody, dance time! Da-da-da-dun-daaa-da-da-da-dun-daaa! " " I brought you a present: EXPLOSIONS! " " Is this really canon? " " ... You're dead to me. " “ Nobody hurts my friends! " " Wubwubwub. Dubstep dubstep. Wubwubwubwub DROP! Dubstep! " " I'll stop talking when I'm dead! " " I'll die the way I lived: annoying! " " Come back here! I'll gnaw your legs off! " " This could've gone better! " " You look like something a skag barfed up! " " What's that smell? Oh wait, it's just you! " " Yo momma's so dumb, she couldn't think of a good ending for this 'yo momma' joke! " " You're one screw short of a screw! " " I bet your mom could do better! " " Good thing I don't have a soul! " " I'll never go back to the bad place! " " I have many regrets! " " Can I just say... yeehaw. " " You're the wub to my dub! " " So... does this make me your favorite? " " What are YOU doing down here? " " We're like those buddies in that one show! " " This is no time to be lazy! " " You can thank me later! " " You love me, right? " " You, me... keeping on... together? " " You versus me! Me versus you! Either way! " " Dance battle! Or, you know... regular battle. " " You wanna fight with me?! Put 'em up!.. Put 'em up? " " A million baddies, and you wanna hit me? Aww! " " I am so impressed with myself! " " Ha ha, this is in no way surprising! Ha ha! " " Don't bother with plastic surgery - there's NO fixing that! " " I am right behind you, Vault Hunting friend! " " I can do that too! ... Sorta... Except not. " " You jerks have NO idea what you're in for! " " I'm so glad I'm not one of those guys right now! " " YOU! ARE! SCARY! " " That is in no way disturbing. " " I did a challenge? I did a challenge! " " Glad I didn't mess that up. " " I feel... complete!.. That's weird. " " I actually did something right for once! " " Hmmm, the possibilities are an infinite recursion. " " Do any of these come with a new paint job? " " Which of these gives me my free will back? " " The moon is not enough! " " I'd do anything for a man/woman with a gun. " " At least I still have my teeth! " " Coffee? Black... like my soul. " " Crazy young whippersnappers... " " I've finally got an electric personality! " " Wait, this isn't vegetable juice! " " Cool! Now we're both super-crazy-amazing! " " These are the best kind of cooties! " " Can I shoot something now? Or climb some stairs? SOMETHING exciting? " " Times like these, I really start to question the meaning of my existence. Then I get distra-hey! What's this? This looks cool! " " It would really stink if I couldn't control what I was thinking. Like, who wants to know that I'm thinking about cheese and lint, right? " " How does math work? Does this skin make me look fat? If a giraffe and a car had a baby, would it be called a caraffe? Life's big questions, man. " " Who needs memories when I can do all this cool stuff? Stuff that I currently am not doing! That's what I'd like to call a 'hint'. " " Does this mean I can start dancing? Pleeeeeeaaaaase? " " Ya know when there was that Vault monster scare? I had these friends, and boy times sure were scary! But, I didn't care because I had friends, and they were like... super-friends! And then they left me, but they saved the world and I was like 'I know those guys!' Even though they never came back after that I still knew they cared, because no one had ever been... nice to me before. ... What is this? My eye is like... leaking. " " It's really quiet... and lonely... (hums briefly) Also this 'stopped moving' thing makes me uncomfortable. It gives me time to stop and think... literally. I'VE STOPPED, AND I'M THINKING! IT HURTS ME! " " Oh. My. God. What if I'm like... a fish? And, if I'm not moving... I stop breathing? AND THEN I'LL DIE! HELP ME! HELP MEEEEE HEE HEE HEEE! HHHHHHHELP! " " Ahem, ahem. What's going on? Did I break something? " “ You hear me, (name)?! You killed my friends! You destroyed my product line! I am the last Claptrap in existence, AND I AM GOING TO TEABAG YOUR CORPSE! ” “ You think a door can stop me, (name)?! I was MADE to open doors! ” “ Dammit, (name) - how did you know stairs were my ONLY weakness?! Next to electrocution, and explosions, and gunfire, rust, corrosion, being kicked a lot, viruses, being called bad names, falling from great heights, drowning, adult onset diabetes, being looked at funny, heart attacks, exposure to oxygen, being turned down by women, and pet allergens! Your brilliance is matched only by your malevolence! ” “ I'm just gonna go ahead and cloak now. You can't hear me crying if I cloak! (sobbing) stairs, why did it have to be stairs? I'll never climb those stairs! ”

#ask meme #borderlands rp meme #sentence starters #indie rp #inbox meme #rp meme #rp ask #rp ask meme #askbox meme #askbox starters #rp sentence meme #sentence starter meme #rp sentence starters #inbox memes #indie starters #rp inbox meme

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winchesterbrotherstan · 5 years ago

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SPN- Everybody Loves a Clown (2.02)

are there actually people who unironically enjoy clowns?

Pairing: Olive Winchester (OC), a little Dean x Jo

Summary: After being hit with tragedy, the Winchester siblings make another move. Dean hides his emotions, Sam is on edge, and when the regular ups and downs of sibling love become extreme, Olive struggles with her brothers.

Warnings: blood, death, knife, injury, cursing, the usual

Word Count: 7951

I was cuddled into Sam’s side. Dean had been cold and distant, and as much as it hurt, I couldn’t blame him. Dad had made a deal. He did what I was going to do. Sam and Dean could never know. It would break them.

The smoke from the funeral pyre burned my eyes. Sam was fidgeting, close to tears. Dean was silent, staring into the fire with the look of death in his eyes. I sniffled as I ducked my face into Sam. He tightened his arms around me.

“Before he… before, did he say anything to you? About anything?” Sam whispered.

Dean didn’t look away from the fire. “No. Nothing.”

I bit my tongue.

Liar.

***

I rubbed my eyes as I stepped out onto the porch. It had been a week, and we were staying at Bobby’s. I missed Dad a lot, I did. But I threw myself head on into taking care of everybody else instead of grieving. It was easier to be detached and pretend nothing had happened.

Dean was working on Baby, and I wasn’t sure what Sam was doing. I shuffled out into the junkyard with a mug and bottle in hand. The dirt crunched under my bare feet, and chances were I’d step on broken glass, but it was the least of my worries.

“De?”

“Here!” He called back.

I followed the sound of his voice and found him working on Baby. He was under, with only his legs sticking out. She was still just a rusted frame, but she looked a lot better than she had when I had found them.

Jinx was lying in the shade next to him. She hadn’t left his side ever since he got out of the hospital. It was like she knew what was happening.

“How’s she coming?”

“Slow.” Dean grunted back.

“Brought you a beer. Fresh out the fridge.” I smiled softly.

“Thanks, baby.”

I sighed and placed the bottle on the table, wrapping an arm around myself. He was still distant, and it was starting to hurt more and more.

“Hey.”

I turned to see Sam approaching. “How’s it going?”

I shrugged and Dean said nothing.

“Need any help?” Sam offered.

Dean pulled something off and dropped it. I jumped. He scoffed.

“What, you under a hood? I’ll pass.”

Dean pushed himself out from under the car and got to his feet. He dropped a tool on the table and wiped his hands before cracking open the bottle of beer.

“Stop it, Sam.”

“Stop what?”

“Stop asking if I need anything, stop asking if I’m okay.” Dean forced a chuckle. “I’m okay. Really. I promise.”

“Alright, Dean, it’s just…” Sam sighed. “We’ve been at Bobby’s for over a week now and you haven’t brought up Dad once.”

Dean sighed and turned to Sam. “You know what, you’re right. Come here. I’m gonna lay my head gently on your shoulder.”

I giggled.

“Maybe we can cry and hug, and maybe even slow dance.”

“Olive, shut up.” Sam snapped.

I cut the giggle short and sat down on the ground, next to Jinx.

Sam had been pissy too.

Yes, they had lost Dad, but I had lost him too. The last thing I said to him was something mean, although now I couldn’t remember what. I needed my brothers now more than ever, but they were each too caught up in their own grief to see that.

“Don’t patronize me, Dean. Dad is dead. The Colt is gone, and it seems pretty damn likely that the demon is behind all of this, and you’re acting like nothing happened.”

“What do you want me to say, Sam?”

“Say something, alright? Hell, say anything! Aren’t you angry? Don’t you want revenge? But all you do is sit out here all day long buried underneath this damn car!”

“Sam-”

“And you, Olive! All you’ve been doing is sleeping in and then sitting out here with him. Why aren’t you guys upset?”

“Revenge, huh?” Dean spoke up, seeing that I was, once more, close to tears.

“Yeah.” Sam scoffed.

“Sounds good.” Dean scowled. “You got any leads on where the demon is? Making heads or tails of any of Dad’s research? Because we sure ain’t. But you know, if we do finally find it-oh, wait, no. Like you said, the Colt’s gone. But I’m sure you’ve figured out another way to kill it.”

I sighed as I stood. “Look, Sam. We’ve got nothing.”

“Exactly. Nothing. So you know the only thing I can do is I can work on the car.” Dean spat, crouching down and getting back to work.

I ran my hands over my face with a heavy sigh.

“Well, we’ve got something. Alright?” Sam pulled out a cell phone. “It’s what I came by here to tell you guys. This is one of Dad’s old phones. Took me a while, but I finally cracked his voicemail code. Listen to this.” He held the phone out.

I took it and put it on speaker, holding it by Dean.

“John, it’s Ellen. Again. Look, don’t be stubborn, you know I can help you. Call me.”

“That message is four months old.” Sam sighed.

Dean and I looked at each other, unimpressed. I handed the phone back.

“Dad saved that chick’s message for four months?”

“Yeah.” Sam nodded.

“Well, who the fuck is Ellen? There’s no mention of her in Dad’s journal, is there?”

Sam shook his head. “No. But I ran a trace on the phone number and I got an address.”

I sighed as I looked between the two. Sam was right, Dean hadn’t done anything except for work on Baby. I wasn’t in any summer school program, but at this rate I was beginning to wish I was. The three of us needed a distraction to get us out of this funk.

But going after the demon was a bad idea. I knew that much.

Dean sighed. “Olive, go ask Bobby if we can use one of his cars.”

I sighed again and dumped my coffee on the ground.

“Come on, Jinx. You’re staying with Bobby.”

***

“This is humiliating. I feel like a fucking soccer mom.” Dean grumbled.

“It’s the only car Bobby had running.” Sam put the mini van in park and stepped out onto the dirt parking lot.

“Hello? Anybody here?”

I looked up at the sign.

Roadhouse.

“Hey. You bring the, uh-”

“Of course.” Sam fished the fake IDs out of his jacket pocket and tossed one at Dean.

He caught it and pushed the door open. Sam and I followed. The place was quiet, with the exception of a single fly buzzing around. It landed on a light, which proceeded to fizz out.

I noticed a man passed out on the pool table in the back room. I nudged Dean and pointed.

“Hey buddy?”

“I’m guessing that isn’t Ellen.” Sam sighed.

“Yeah.”

The three of us split up. I went back around to the first room, ducking behind the bar to check out what was left. Sam had gone down to the back room, and Dean moved toward the steps. He coughed.

“Oh god, please let that be a rifle.”

I heard the sound of a rifle cocking and I froze.

Shit!

I pulled my gun from my waistband and made sure I was ready..

“No. I’m just real happy to see you. Don’t move.”

“Not moving, copy that.” I heard Dean sass back. “You know, you should know something, miss. When you put a rifle on someone, you don’t want to put it right against their back, because it makes it real easy to do… that.”

I stayed under the counter, jaw clenched.

There was a grunt and skin against skin.

“Olive! Need some help in here!” He called, cupping his nose. “Can’t even see. I can’t even see.”

“Hey!” I barked as I stood, gun up. “Dean, you okay?”

He nodded in response. The girl was blonde, and probably about Dean’s age. She looked between Dean and I, unsure where to aim the gun. Sam was ushered in by an older woman. Both hands were on his head. I squared my shoulders as I lined up the shot for the older woman.

“Sam?” I kept my eyes on the women. “You okay?”

He nodded. “A bit tied up is all.”

“Wait. Sam? Dean? Olive? Winchester?”

“Yeah.” The three of us spat.

“Son of a bitch.”

“Mom, you know these people?”

“Yeah.” The lady laughed as she lowered her gun. “I think these are John Winchester’s kids.”

“Put the rifle down.” I ordered, nodding at the younger one.

She did just that, and her mom smiled. “Hey, I’m Ellen. This is my daughter, Jo.”

Dean smiled at her.

“Hey.” Jo mumbled.

I put the safety back on my gun and tucked it back into my jeans.

“You’re not gonna hit me again, are ya?” Dean asked, hand on his nose.

***

Ellen handed Dean a bag of ice. “Here ya go.”

“Thanks.” Dean fumbled with it.

I took it from his hand and made him look my way as I pressed it to his nose.

“You called our dad and said you could help. With what?”

“Well, the demon, of course.”

I dropped the ice and looked at Dean with wide eyes. He squinted and turned to face Sam, who looked just as confused.

“Heard he was closing in on it.”

“What, was there an article in Demon Hunters Quarterly that I missed? I mean, wh-who are you? How do you know about all this?”

“Hey, I just run a saloon.” Ellen put her hands up. “But hunters have been known to pass through now and again.” She looked at Jo.

I put the ice back up to Dean’s nose with a sigh.

“Including your dad a long time ago. John was like family once.”

“Oh yeah?” Dean countered. “How come he’s never mentioned you before?”

“You’d have to ask him that.”

“So why exactly do we need your help?” Dean’s top lip furled into a frown.

I pressed the ice into his face, and he winced.

“Hey, don’t do me any favors.” Ellen started.

“Ellen, look…” I cut her off, feeling tears well in my eyes.

She sighed as she realized.

“It was the demon, we think. It, uh… it got him before he got it.” Sam spoke calmly.

I looked back down, and Dean continued to ice his nose.

“I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Dean looked up with a strong face and a soft smile.

My heart clenched, and I leaned into his chest, tears streaming down my cheeks. He wrapped an arm around me and kept his head high.

“We’re alright.”

“Really? I know how close you and your dad-”

“Really, lady, I’m fine.” Dean cut her off.

This is not up for debate.

“So look, if you can help…” Sam sighed. “We could use all the help we can get.”

“Well, we can’t.” Ellen spoke.

I sighed as I pulled away from Dean and sat up straight.

“But Ash will.”

The three of us looked at each other.

“Who’s Ash?”

“Ash!”

The man on the pool table jerked awake and sat up, squirming around.

“What? Closing time?”

“That’s Ash?” Sam pointed.

“Mm-hmm.” Jo nodded. “He’s a genius.”

***

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.” Dean scowled. “This guy’s no genius. He’s a Lynyrd Skynyrd roadie.”

“I like you.” Ash grinned as I handed him the brown folder we had brought.

Dean gave a small grin. “Thanks.”

“Just give him a chance.” Jo handed each of the boys a drink and turned to me. “What do you want, baby?”

I smiled. “Do you have orange juice?”

She grinned. “Coming right up.”

I decided I liked her. She was Everett, but way nicer.

“Alright.” Dean sighed and sat down next to me, leaving me stuck between him and Sam. “This stuff’s about a year’s worth of our dad’s work, so uh, let’s see what you make of it.”

Ash shuffled through the papers and shook his head. “Come on. This crap ain’t real. There ain’t nobody can track a demon like this.”

Dean turned and locked eyes with Sam. They both looked annoyed.

“Our dad could.” I piped up.

“These are non-parametrics, statistical overviews, cross-spectrum correlations, I mean… damn! Uh, they’re signs. Omens. If you can track em, you can track this demon. Ya know, like crop failures, electrical storms. You ever been struck by lightning? It ain't fun.” Ash huffed.

“Can you track it or not?” Sam asked.

“Yeah, with this, I think so. But it’s gonna take time. Uh, give me… fifty one hours.”

He got up and began to walk off. Dean looked at me, and I giggled, teeth stuck between my lips.

“Hey, man?” Dean scratched his eyebrow.

“Yeah.”

“I uh, I dig the haircut.”

“All business up front, party in the back.” Ash winked before leaving.

Jo walked by, swinging her hips and eyes on Dean. He checked her out, eyes tired. I leaned against him with a groan.

Don’t go. I need you, don’t go.

“Hey, Ellen? What is that?” Sam pointed to something behind the bar.

“It’s a police scanner. We keep tabs on things, we-”

“No. No, um, the folder.” Sam pointed.

Dean pushed me into Sam’s side and walked off, following Jo.

“Oh, uh. I was gonna give this to a friend of mine.” Ellen took the folder and placed it in front of Sam. “But take a look if you want.”

COUPLE MURDERED

CHILD LEFT ALIVE

MEDFORD, WISCONSIN

Sam flipped through the newspaper clippings and sighed.

“Dean, come here. Check this out.”

“Yeah?” Dean stood and stretched.

“A few murders, not far from here, that Ellen caught wind of. Looks to me like there might be a hunt.”

“Yeah, so?”

“So, we should check it out.” Sam gave him a bitchface.

***

“You’ve gotta be kidding me. A killer clown?” Dean looked at Sam, then glanced at me in the rearview.

“Yeah. He left the daughter unharmed and killed the parents. Ripped them to pieces, actually.”

“And the family was at some carnival that night?”

“Yeah, uh, the Cooper Carnivals.”

“So how do you know we’re not dealing with some psycho in a clown suit?” Dean asked.

“Cops have no leads. All the employees were tearing down shop, alibis all around. Plus this girl said she saw a clown vanish into thin air. Cops are saying trauma, of course.”

“Well, I know what you’re thinking, Sam. Why clowns?”

“Oh, give me a break.” Sam groaned.

Dean laughed. “You didn’t think we’d remember, did you? I mean, come on, you still bust out crying whenever you see Ronald McDonald on the television!”

“Well, at least I’m not afraid of flying!”

“Planes crash!”

“And apparently clowns kill!”

“Hey!” I shouted. “Both of you quit it. It’s enough that I’m stuck in the backseat of a mini van like some sort of damn kid, talking about killer fucking clowns. Stop fighting.”

They sighed.

“So. These types of murders, they ever happen before?”

“According to the file, 1981, the Bunker Brothers Circus. Same MO. Happened three times, three different places.”

“That’s weird. I mean if it’s a spirit, it’s usually bound to a specific locale. You know, a house, or a town.”

“So how’s this one moving from city to city, carnival to carnival?”

“Cursed object, maybe? Spirit attaches itself to something and the carnival carries it around with them.”

“Great.” I rolled my eyes. “It’s a fucking paranormal scavenger hunt.”

“Well, this case was Sam’s idea, complain to him.”

Nobody said anything.

“Come on, Sam. You were awfully quick to jump on this job.”

“So?”

“It’s just… not like you, that’s all. I thought you were all hell-bent for leather on the demon hunt.”

“I don’t know, I just… I think this job, it’s what Dad would’ve wanted us to do.”

“What Dad would’ve wanted?” Dean repeated.

“Yeah.” Sam nodded. “So?”

“Nothing.”

I sighed as we pulled up to the carnival. There were detectives talking to a few of the carnies. We climbed out of the van in silence.

“Check it out.” Dean nudged me. “Five-oh. Stay with Sam.”

***

Sam stood by my side with his hands in his pockets as a three-foot-tall woman in a clown outfit passed by us. He stared at her nervously and she stared back.

“Did you get her number?” Dean grinned as he came back.

Sam scowled. “More murders?”

“Two more last night. Apparently, they were ripped to shreds. And they had a little boy with them.”

“Who fingered a clown.”

Dean gave Sam a weird look, and Sam sighed.

“What?”

“Yeah, a clown, who apparently vanished into thin air.”

“Boys.” I sighed. “Looking for a cursed object in a whole ass carnival is like trying to find a needle in a stack of needles. It could be anything.”

“Well it’s bound to give off EMF. We’ll just have to scan everything.”

“Oh. Good.” Sam sighed. “That’s nice and inconspicuous.”

I tilted my head as I noticed a “Help Wanted” sign. I nudged Dean’s side and nodded toward it.

“I guess we’ll just have to blend in.”

***

“Excuse me, we’re looking for a Mr. Cooper.” Dean called out.

The man was throwing knives at a target. They all landed near the bulls-eye.

“Have you seen him around?”

“What is that, some kind of joke?” The man turned around with a snarl.

He pulled his sunglasses off. He was blind.

“Oh. God, I’m so sorry.” Dean’s eyes went wide as he realized.

I scratched the back of my neck and shuffled into Sam’s side. This place was giving me all the bad vibes, and as much as I wanted to fist fight my brothers, staying close was my best bet for now.

“You think I wouldn’t give my eyeteeth to see Mr. Cooper? Or a sunset, or anything at all?” The man shot.

Dean eyed me. I ducked into Sam’s chest, and he huffed. “Wanna give me a little help here?”

“Not really.”

Someone else walked in. “Hey man, is there a problem?”

“Yeah, this guy hates blind people.” The old man spat.

I peeked out to see a very short man in a red cape. I glanced at Dean.

“No, I don’t, I-”

“Hey, buddy, what’s your problem?”

“Nothing, it’s just a little misunderstanding.” Dean tried to defend himself.

“Little? You son of a bitch!”

“No, no, no, no!”

“Could somebody just tell us where Mr. Cooper is? Please?” I spoke up, arms wrapped around Sam’s waist.

***

“You kids picked up a hell of a time to join up. Take a seat.”

There were only two chairs. One was normal, and the other was pink with a huge clown’s face on it. Dean grinned and I rolled my eyes as I beat him to the normal chair. Sam sighed. Dean glared at me and I smiled softly before turning to Sam.

“Wanna sit?”

He took the normal chair with a smile. “Thanks, Ol.”

Dean dropped into the clown chair with a scowl my way. I sat on the arm of his chair and he continued to scowl as his hand came to my back to keep me steady.

“We’ve got all kinds of local trouble.” Mr. Cooper sighed.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Oh, a couple of folks got themselves murdered. Cops always seem to start here first. So, you three ever worked the circuit before?”

“Yes sir, last year through Texas and Arkansas.”

“Yeah.” Dean mumbled in agreement.

“Doing what? Ride jockeys? Butcher? A and S Men?”

Dean fumbled, and Sam shrugged.

“Yeah, uh, a little bit of everything, I guess.”

Mr. Cooper eyed us and sighed. “You three have never worked a show in your lives before, have you?”

Sam and I looked at each other, and Dean smiled.

“Nope. But we really need the work. Oh, and uh, Sam here’s got a thing for the bearded lady.” Dean teased.

I elbowed him and he cleared his throat. Sam scowled.

“You see that picture?” Mr. Cooper pointed to a picture hung above him. “That was my daddy.”

“You look just like him.” Sam smiled.

“He was in the business. Ran a freakshow. Til they outlawed them, most places. Apparently displaying the deformed isn’t dignified. So most of the performers went from honest work to rotting in hospitals and asylums.” He shrugged. “That’s progress. I guess.”

Dean winced and Sam gave a sympathetic smile. I leaned an arm on Dean’s shoulder and looked at the ground.

“You see, this place, it’s a refuge for outcasts. Always has been. For folks that don’t fit in nowhere else. But you three? You should go to school. Find a couple of girls and a guy. Have two point five kids. Live regular.”

I glanced at Sam. That was exactly what he had always wanted. Dean opened his mouth, but Sam leaned forward, eyes serious. I inched closer to Dean.

“Sir. We don’t want to go to school. And we don’t want regular. We want this.”

Dean and I shared a glance before turning to look at Sam.

***

Dean hummed to get Sam’s attention, but it didn’t work. I sighed and grabbed his sleeve. He stopped walking and turned to face me.

“What?”

“Sams, that whole uh… don’t wanna go to school thing. Were you just… saying that or… were you… ya know, saying it?”

Sam remained silent.

“Sammy?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know.”

He started walking again, and Dean and I huffed as we followed.

“You don’t know?” Dean repeated. “I thought that once the demon was dead and the fat lady sings that you were gonna take off, head back to Wussy State.”

“I’m having second thoughts.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah. I think… I think Dad would’ve wanted me to stick with the job.”

“Since when do you give a damn what Dad wanted, Sam?” Dean snorted. “You spent half your life doing exactly what he didn’t want.”

“Since he died, okay?” Sam stopped walking again. “Do you have a problem with that?”

“Nah.” Dean shook his head. “I don’t have a problem at all.”

I rolled my eyes and Dean turned to me. “Ollie? Problem?”

I shook my head. “No, this is fucking stupendous.”

“Watch your mouth.”

“Bite me.” I snarled back.

“What is your issue lately? You’ve been snappy for no reason.”

“Dad is dead. That’s my reason, okay?”

“Olive-”

“Look, we don’t have time for this. Let’s just go.”

***

“Sammy?”

“Hey, Bug.”

“What’s up?” I held the phone between my ear and my shoulder as I changed a trash bag.

“Uh, so I saw a skeleton and it got me thinking.”

“Like… a real… live human skeleton?”

“Yeah, in the funhouse.”

“What the fuck?”

“Yeah, listen, I was thinking. What if the spirit isn’t attached to a cursed object? What if it’s attached to its own remains?”

“Well did the bones give off EMF?”

“No, but I think we should check it out anyways.”

“Okay. Do you wanna call Dean or should I?”

“You call him. I’m heading to you.”

“Okay. Love you, Sams.”

“I love you too, jelly bean.”

I hung up before he could. I moved to the next batch of trash cans and dialed Dean’s number.

“Baby?”

“Hi, freckles.”

“What’s up, kid?”

“Sams found a skeleton. He thinks we should check it out.”

“EMF?”

“No, but we should still check it out. He’s heading our way.”

“Alright. Thanks for the heads up. Love you.”

I smiled. “I love you too, Deano.”

***

“Dean!” I jumped up from the ground. “What took you so long?”

“It’s a long story.” Dean groaned.

“Mommy, look at the clown!” A little girl shouted.

The three of us turned. There was a clown waving at her. I shivered, stumbling back into my brothers. Sam and Dean caught me as my footing slipped and I went down.

“What clown?” The mom asked.

“What’s she talking about?” Dean asked.

“You don’t see that?” I glanced up at Dean, and then back.

The clown was gone.

“Olive?”

“Holy fuck. Come on, we’ve gotta follow them. This thing’s gonna come after them next.”

***

“Dude, I cannot believe you told freaking Papazian about the homicidal phantom clown.” Sam scoffed.

Dean shrugged. “I told him an urban legend about a homicidal phantom clown. Never said it was real.”

I giggled, and Sam rolled his eyes with a smile. Dean whipped out a gun and cocked it. Sam rushed to dive over my lap and push Dean’s hand down.

“Keep that down!”

“Oh, and get this! I mentioned the Bunker Brothers’ Circus in ‘81, and their, uh, evil clown apocalypse. Guess what?”

“What?”

“Before Cooper owned Cooper Carnivals, he worked for Bunker Brothers. He was their lot manager.”

I sighed. “Think Cooper brought whatever the spirit is attached to?”

He shrugged again. “Maybe, something like that.” He shook his head with a heavy sigh. “I can’t believe we’re talking about fucking clowns.”

***

“Bug. Bug, wake up.” Sam whispered.

I squirmed in his lap. “What?”

“I think the clown’s here. The little girl’s at the door, but…”

I turned to see the clown standing at the front door. I rolled off of Sam’s lap and knocked my head into Dean’s arm.

“What?” He groaned.

“Get up, bubba. Fucking clown’s here.”

Dean sat up straight and groaned. “Shit. Fuck, come on.”

***

Dean made a motion at me and I nodded. The little girl was leading the clown down the hall. Sam and Dean both had their shotguns ready. I ran my tongue over my fangs and kept my mouth shut as I bounced up and down. They couldn’t see the clown, and it was riding on me.

“Wanna see Mommy and Daddy? They’re upstairs!”

The girl walked right through the dark. I took a breath before reaching out and snatching her off her feet. She began to scream bloody murder, and I flinched, feeling blood begin to trickle from my ears.

“De, in front of you!” I pointed.

She kicked and cried as Dean shot the clown in the chest. I ducked as the clown lept past us and out the window. It was out of sight as the parents came running out.

“What’s going on here!”

“Oh my god, what are you doing to my daughter!”

“Who the hell are you! Get out! Get out of my house!”

I dropped the girl onto her feet and made a run for it. Sam and Dean followed, scrambling across the hardwood floor.

***

“Do you really think they saw our plates?” Sam sighed.

I shrugged as Dean huffed.

“I don’t wanna take the chance. Besides, I hate this stupid van anyways.”

I zipped up the bag as Dean shoved the plates in it. I slung it over my shoulder with a heavy sigh. Dean wrapped an arm around my shoulders and sighed as we began to walk down the road.

“Well, one thing’s for sure.”

“What?” I looked up.

“We’re not dealing with a spirit. I mean, that rock salt hit something solid.”

“Yeah, a person? Or maybe a creature that can make itself invisible?” Sam offered, rubbing the back of his neck.

I snorted. “And dresses up like a clown just for shits and giggles?”

“I dunno, jelly bean.” He sighed.

“Did it say anything in Dad’s journal?” Dean looked up at Sam.

“Nope.” Sam cleared his throat before pulling out his phone.

“Who’re you calling, bubs?”

“Maybe Ellen or that guy Ash’ll know something. Hey, you think, uh… you guys think Dad and Ellen ever had a thing?”

“No way.” Dean shook his head.

I sighed. “Then why didn’t he tell us about her?”

“I dunno, guys. Maybe they had some sort of falling out?”

Sam chuckled. “Yeah. You ever notice Dad had a falling out with just about everybody?”

Dean nodded without a word, and Sam lowered his phone with a sigh.

“Well, don’t get all maudlin on me, dude.”

Dean’s eyebrows furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“He just means that strong and silent isn’t your type, freckles.”

“Oh, god.” Dean groaned, rolling his eyes.

“I’m over it, man. This isn’t just anyone we’re talking about, this is Dad. We both know how you felt about the man.”

Dean stopped walking and I immediately withdrew, shrinking into myself.

“You know what? Back off, alright? Just because I’m not caring and sharing like you frigging want me to.”

“No, no, no. That’s not what this is about, Dean. I don’t care how you deal with this. Olive might, but I don’t. But you do have to deal with it. Listen, I’m your brother, alright? I just wanna make sure you’re okay.”

“Dude, I’m okay!” Dean shouted. “I’m okay, okay? I swear, the next person who asks if I’m okay, I’m gonna start throwing punches! These are your issues, quit dumping them on me!”

“What the hell are you talking about, Dean?”

“I just think it’s real interesting, this sudden obedience you have to Dad! It’s like, oh, what would Dad want me to do?” Dean scowled. “Sam, you spent your entire life slugging it out with that man! I mean, hell, you, you picked a fight with him the last time you ever fucking saw him! And now he’s dead, you wanna make it right?” He shook his head. “Well, I’m sorry, Sam. But ya can’t. It’s too little, too late.”

Sam’s eyes filled with tears and I looked away, feeling my nose burn and breath falter.

“Why are you saying this to me?”

“Because I want you to be honest with yourself about this, Sam. I’m dealing with Dad’s death! Are you?”

Sam swallowed and shook his head. “I’m going to call Ellen.”

He walked off and I stumbled away from Dean with a sob.

“Ollie?” He reached for me.

I yanked myself away and let out another cry. The duffel bag fell at my feet, and Dean picked it up, keeping his eyes on me.

“Olive, talk to me.”

“Honey? Hey, jelly bean, what’s wrong?” Sam instantly turned back around.

I shook my head and wiped at my cheeks. “Y-you guys have been so caught up in dealing with Dad’s death, a-a-an-and with fighting with each other! I get you guys are hurting. I get it, I do. You guys lost Dad.” I sighed, wiping my nose with my sleeve.

“Ol-”

“I’m not done, Dean.” I hissed. “You’re both hurting. And that’s okay. But I lost him too. I lost him, and I almost lost both of you. You guys have been so focused on your own grief that you haven’t noticed that I need you!”

“Olive…”

I shook my head. “Never mind. This was stupid. I’m sorry.”

“Olive-”

“Just go call Ellen, Sam.”

He tucked his phone back into his pocket and grabbed me by the wrists. “Hey.”

I looked the other way, tears running down my face.

“Hey.” He pulled gently on my wrists, forcing me to stumble into him.

“Olive. My sweet girl.” Dean brushed my hair behind my ear.

“Leave me alone.” I whined.

“No.” Sam grabbed me by the waist and hauled me into his grip.

I squirmed. “Leave me alone!”

“Bug.”

I let out a strangled cry and hit Sam’s chest. “Let me go!”

“Pumpkin.”

I sobbed again, dropping my head into Sam’s neck. He rubbed circles into my back and leaned his head against mine.

“It’s okay. Let it out, cookie. It’s alright.”

“Olive. You should’ve said something.” Dean’s voice was gentle.

I felt myself physically deflate, further falling into Sam’s hold.

“I just miss him.” I whispered. “I miss when it was the four of us.”

“We know, bug. It’s okay.” Sam pressed a kiss to the side of my head.

“Okay. Come here. I’ll take Ol, Sam, you can call Ellen.”

I whimpered as Dean pulled me from Sam. I snuggled into Dean easier than I had Sam, finding the groove of his shoulder where my head fit perfectly.

“I’m sorry, princess.” He pressed a kiss to my head. “You should’ve said something. You’re right, we haven’t been the best of brothers.”

I nodded as I relaxed into him. “You’re right. I should’ve. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. We’re here now. Whatever you need. I promise.” He started walking, following Sam down the road.

“I love you.” I whispered, letting my eyes fall shut.

“Hey. Ellen thinks she knows what this thing is.”

I opened my eyes again. Sam winked at me and ran a hand up and down my back. I sniffled.

“What is it?”

“Rakshasa.”

Dean’s face scrunched up.

“What’s that?”

“Race of ancient Hindu creatures. They appear in human form, they feed on human flesh, and they cannot enter a home without first being invited. Oh, and get this. They can make themselves invisible, and they can make it so only kids can see them.”

I snorted. “Well that explains why you guys couldn’t.”

“So they dress up like clowns, and the kids invite them in.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah.”

Dean’s arms tightened around me. “Why don’t they just munch on the kids?”

Sam shrugged. “No idea. Not enough meat on the bones, maybe?” He offered, and I squirmed, grossed out.

“What else’d you find out?” I squirmed again, this time until Dean put me down.

“Apparently, Rakshasas live in squalor.”

“Ew.” I made a subtle beeline for Sam’s side as we walked, bumping into him full force.

He caught me and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “Yeah. They sleep on a bed of dead insects.”

“Ew!” I shuddered, huddling into Sam’s side.

Dean giggled. “Remember that case with the bugs?”

“Oh god.” Sam groaned. “Don’t ever remind me again. I still find dead beetles in my clothes sometimes.”

“Alright, what else?”

“They have to feed a few times every twenty or thirty years. Slow metabolism, I guess.”

I hummed. “Makes sense. Carnival today, Bunker Brothers in ‘81.”

“Right. Probably more before that.” Sam nodded, playing with my hair.

“Hey, kids.” Dean mused.

I looked up and smiled, teary eyed. It had been a while since he called us that.

“Who do we know that worked both shows?”

I tilted my head, stumped. I looked up at Sam, and he had an identical expression on his face.

“Cooper.” Dean gave us the answer.

“Oh my god, Cooper.” It clicked.

“You know, that picture of his dad, it looked just like him.” Sam shrugged.

“Maybe it was him.”

“Well, who knows how old the fucker is?”

“Alright.” Dean clapped his hands. “Ellen say how to kill him?”

“Legend goes, dagger made of pure brass.”

A grin grew on Dean’s face, and I smiled.

“I think I know where to get one of those.”

“I mean… we should probably make sure…”

“Yeah, Olive’s right. Before we go stabbing things into him, we’re gonna wanna make damn sure it’s him.”

“Oh, you’re such a stickler for details, Sammy.”

Sam chuckled as Dean grinned. I looked between the two and let out a breath. This was closer to normal. It felt nice.

“Alright. I’ll round up the blade, you go check if Cooper’s got bedbugs.” Dean stuck a finger in my ribs and I squealed, jumping away.

Sam stumbled to stop so he wouldn’t run me over. Dean tried to chase after me, but Sam picked me up in a single swoop. I squealed again as I was placed on his hip. He gave us both his classic bitchface and rolled his eyes, but I could see the hints of a smile.

“You’re both such children.”

I poked his cheek with a huge smile. “But you love us!”

He only rolled his eyes again, this time smiling.

***

“Still wish you would’ve let me go with Sam.” I whispered to Dean.

He nudged me and made a face.

Shut up, he can hear you.

I sighed as the blind man led us through his tent. I was with Dean, because if Cooper happened to be the clown-fuck, and he caught Sam, I was safer with Dean.

“Well, I’ve got all kinds of knives. I don’t know if I’ve got a brass one, though.” He tapped a trunk with his cane. “Check in there.”

I knelt by Dean’s side as he popped open the trunk.

“Shit.”

A red clown wig. The red clown wig.

“Dean.” My hand went to his arm and squeezed.

He stood up, pushing me behind him. “You?”

“Me.”

The blind man dropped his cane and yanked his glasses off. His eyes looked normal. He gave a grin as his eyes began to get cloudy, and his face began to melt.

“Dean!”

“Stay behind me.” He ordered as we moved toward the door.

He pulled a gun out of his waistband as I struggled with the door. It wouldn’t budge. A knife flew past us, burying itself in the door, right by my head. Dean cursed, standing with his legs apart and his shoulders wide. Another knife came, this time closer. I growled as my teeth broke loose, and I forced the door open.

We booked it, tumbling down the stairs. I rolled over and pushed myself back onto my feet. I looked over my shoulder to make sure Dean was following as we ran.

“Hey!”

I whipped around to see Sam. I skidded to a stop and changed directions. I barreled straight into him, hiding my face in his shirt. He caught me, stumbling backwards.

“Hey. Hey, baby girl, what happened?”

I shook my head, trying to calm back down.

“Hey, so Cooper thinks I’m a Peeping Tom, but it’s not him.” Sam kept his arms around me as Dean ran toward us.

“Yeah, so I gathered.” Dean huffed.

“It’s the blind guy.” I looked up at Sam, mouth bloody.

“Oh fuck.”

“He’s here somewhere.” Dean looked around, panting.

“Well, did you guys get the-”

“The brass blades?” Dean scowled. “No. No, it’s just been one of those days.”

“Alright.” Sam sighed. “I’ve got an idea. Come on.” He started running. “Is he invisible invisible or like Olive-can-see-him-invisible?”

“Invisible invisible!”

Sam sighed. “Alright. Ollie, you’re with me.” He stopped running as we reached the funhouse. “Come on.” He held a hand out for me.

“Okay?”

“Yeah,” I squeezed his hand. “Come on.”

Sam led the way, Dean on our heels. I shuddered as we entered the mirror maze. A door slammed shut behind us.

“Dean!”

“Sam! Olive!”

“Sammy, what do we do?” I looked up.

He slammed at the door, and we could hear Dean doing the same.

“Hold on, Ol.” Sam hit it again.

I sighed and looked around. “Sams, we don’t have time for this.” I pushed him aside and put my mouth up to the door. “Dean! Dean, bubba! Find the mirror maze, okay?”

“Got it!”

There was a low growl, and I took a deep breath. It growled again. I growled back. Sam elbowed me and motioned for me to follow.

“What’s the plan?” I asked as he began to walk.

“This.” He stopped at an organ.

The pipes were giving off steam. Sam reached out, but yanked his hand back with a groan. They were too hot. He looked around, trying to think. I gritted my teeth and wrapped my fingers around the pipe, pulling it out. My skin was sizzling, and I felt tears streaming down my cheeks.

“Hey!” Dean’s voice reached my ears.

“Jesus, give!” Sam ordered, snatching the pipe from my hands with the protection of his jacket.

“Hey, lemme see.” Dean grabbed my hands and looked at my palms.

They were blistered and burnt. He blew on them softly and I flinched as they began to heal, leaving my skin pink.

“Where is it?”

I shook my head, and Sam answered. “We don’t know.”

“Shouldn’t we be able to see its clothes walking around or something?”

I felt a wet thud in my chest and flinched. Dean’s eyes grew wide as he stared at me. I looked down to see a knife embedded by my heart. My knees got wobbly, and I went down. Dean caught me in his arms.

“Olive?” He begged.

“De…” I whimpered.

“Olive!”

Another knife came, snagging Dean’s shoulder. He groaned and Sam’s head whipped around as he searched. I looked up at the ceiling, spotting a lever for the steam.

“De…”

“What is it, baby girl?”

I nodded up toward the ceiling. “It’ll help.”

It took him a second before he realized what I meant. He gently put me on the floor and pushed himself to his feet with a groan. He stretched and pulled the lever down. I let my head roll back. I watched as the steam got stronger, giving the Rakshasa a vague shape.

“Sammy…” I muttered. “Sammy, behind you.”

“Behind you!”

Sam stabbed the pipe behind him without a second glance. I sighed as I saw blood trickling onto the ground. Dean turned the steam back off, and we saw a pile of empty clothes and a bloody pipe.

“I fuckin hate funhouses.” Dean hissed.

“De.” I called, sniffling.

“I’m right here.” He crouched by my side and held me up. “Hey, look. You’re gonna be okay.” He whispered, then looked up at Sam. “Sammy’s gonna hold you while I get this knife out. Okay?”

I let out a whimper as he sat me up. Sam grabbed me and glared at Dean.

“Dean. We don’t know if she’ll heal that fast.”

“She will.”

“De-”

“Just trust me. She will.” Dean ran his thumb across my cheek before putting a hand on my shoulder, ready to grab the knife.

“Dean?” I whimpered. “What if I don’t heal?”

“Baby girl. Remember that time in Minnesota, where you cut real bad into your wrists?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“You healed then, right?”

I nodded again, leaning back into Sam.

“You’ll heal now.”

I closed my eyes.

“I promise.”

He yanked the knife out and I jerked forward with a growl, teeth bared. Sam kept me in place and Dean stumbled backward, dropping the knife with a gasp. I felt the gap in my chest begin to close up and sighed, immediately drained.

“We’ve got you, bug. Go to sleep.” Sam whispered into my hair.

I let my eyes roll into the back of my head and dropped back against him.

***

“You kids did a hell of a job. Your dad’d be proud.” Ellen placed two beers and a glass of orange juice down in front of us.

“Thanks.” Sam smiled softly, arm wrapped around me.

Jo swung over and sat by Dean’s other side. She gave Sam a look, and Sam smiled back. I nudged his side.

“Lesgo, Sammy.” I whispered.

“Oh yeah, um, I’ve gotta… uh, uh… I’ve gotta go. Over there. Right now.” He stumbled over his words and plucked me up by the hand.

“Let’s go, baby.”

“I’m sleepy, Sams.” I mumbled as he led me to the pool table.

“I know, I know. Come here, bug.” He picked me up and placed me on the pool table, standing by my side.

I leaned against him with a groan. My chest was healed, but it still ached to breathe, and I was gonna have a two inch scar for the rest of my life.

“Where ya guys been? Been waiting for ya.” Ash came through the back door.

“We were working a job, Ash. Clowns?” Sam grinned.

“Clowns? What the fuck?”

“Got something for us, Ash?” Dean spun around in his stool.

“Gather round, children.” Ash set what was presumably a laptop down on one of the tables.

I groaned again, and Sam laughed.

“Could you maybe bring it over here? Olive took a hit today.”

Ash nodded. “You okay, kid?”

I nodded, still leaning against Sam. “I’ll be alright. Did you find the demon?”

Ash sighed. “It’s nowhere around. At least, nowhere I can find. But if this fugly bastard raises his head, I’ll know. I mean, I’m on it like Divine on dog dookie.”

Sam and I looked at each other.

What?

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, any of those signs or omens appear, anywhere in the world, my rig’ll go off. Like a fire alarm.”

Dean reached for the laptop, which had exposed wiring. “Do you mind?”

Ash gave him a face, and Dean pulled back.

“What’s up, man?”

“Ash, where did you learn to do all this?” I eyed the laptop.

“M.I.T. before I got bounced for fighting…”

“M.I.T.?” Sam’s eyes went wide.

“It’s a school in Boston.”

Sam smiled and I giggled.

“Okay. Give us a call as soon as you know something?”

“Si, si, compadre.” Ash grinned at Dean.

Dean smiled back before taking a long swig of his beer and placing it back down. Ash eyed it and then took it for himself. Sam helped me shimmy off the table and onto my feet. I sniffed as I moved over to Dean and leaned into his side. He wrapped an arm around me as we headed for the door.

“Hey, listen… if you kids need a place to stay, I’ve got a couple beds out back.”

Dean smiled at Ellen’s offer. “Thanks… but no. There’s something I’ve gotta finish.”

She nodded. “Okay. Be safe.”

“Thanks, Ellen. See ya.” I waved as my brothers pulled me out the door.

***

Dean is working on his car, and Sam is pacing back and forth near him. Olive is in the house, sitting in an open window on the first floor. She can see and hear her brothers, but they haven’t noticed her yet.

“You were right.” Sam states.

Dean gets up and huffs. “About what?”

“About me and Dad.” Sam fiddles with his hands. “I’m sorry that the last time I was with him I tried to pick a fight.” He scratches his ear. “I’m sorry that I spent most of my life angry at him. I mean, for all I know, he died thinking that I hate him.”

Dean’s jaw clenches, and Olive sighs silently from her spot.

“So you’re right. What I’m doing right now, it’s too little. Too late.”

His lip trembles, and the world is silent. Olive’s heart breaks, Sam’s guilt grows, and Dean’s silent demeanor becomes more and more solid.

“I miss him, man. And I feel guilty as hell. And I’m not alright. Not at all.” He sniffs, tears forming in his eyes. “But neither are you. That much I know.”

There’s a long pause, and Olive watches through tears. Dean says nothing, and Sam nods.

“I’ll let you get back to work.”

Sam walks off, and Dean stands, still. His face is set in anger. He slowly makes his way to a car next to Baby and picks up a crowbar. Olive tenses.

He smashes the car’s window out, and Olive sighs. But then he sets his eyes on Baby.

It wasn’t enough.

He slams the crowbar into the trunk of their car, over, and over, and over. He grunts each time, getting angrier and angrier, and angrier.

He stops once there’s a hole in the metal. The crowbar slips from his hands and clatters to the ground. Tears fill his eyes as he looks after where Sam has gone. His lip trembles as he swallows, hard. Jinx lets out a howl from her spot in the shade.

Olive can’t take it. She slides out of the windowsill and lands on the ground. She runs across the dirt and gravel, tears flowing down her cheeks. Dean sees her coming and instantly turns her way, arms open. He catches her as she flings herself into his arms, sobbing.

She wants her family back.

Dean slowly takes them to the ground, cradling her as he leans back against the car.

“Dean…”

He sighs. “I know, baby. I know.”

Previous Ep: In My Time of Dying (2.01)

Next Ep: Bloodlust (2.03)

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voyager-into-the-unknown · 6 years ago

Text

This is Part of a Plance fanfic series that I have been writing. Matt, Pidge, and Lance are going to play some Killbot Phantasm in this one.

Chapter 7: An Evening with the Holts

Lance and Pidge descended the staircase and returned to the dining room. Matt was there with the pizza, and Colleen had reheated the leftovers from lunch. After everyone settled down to eat dinner, there was a lengthy discussion of the Defenders project, most of it too technical for Lance to understand, but he still followed the gist of it. Pidge had taught him a great deal about science and technology over the years, so Lance wasn’t completely lost, and he was greatful for that fact.

There was also much reminiscing about their shared fondness for Shiro. Matt told stories of his involvement with the Rebellion, and Lance and Pidge told tales of the Paladins’ many adventures. Sam even had some interesting stories to tell about Pre-Kerebos space missions, and about life at the Garrison in Sam and Colleen’s younger days. Apparently when they were cadets, they knew of several different ways to sneak out of the Garrison Academy to have little mischievous escapades with their friends and not get caught.

“Oh, so that’s where Pidge gets it from,” said Matt, giving his sister a knowing look.

“Well, if you think of it, that’s how our adventures really got started,” Pidge replied. “I used to go out into the desert with the scanning equipment that I built in order to listen to top secret radio communication signals.”

“Which is illegal,” Sam added.

“Yeah, But Hunk and I caught her doing that one night.” Lance smirked.

“Oh, goodness! Did you turn her in?” Colleen asked.

“Of course not,” said Pidge. “Lance was always sneaking out of the dorms to go into town in search of pizza, girls, and astronauts, and not necessarily in that order. That’s probably what he was doing that night, am I right?”

Lance looked guiltily at her. “Well, yes, but I decided to follow you instead...”

Matt interrupted him, “And look where that led you.”

“We became Paladins of Voltron that night,” Pidge said.

“Oh. I was thinking more in terms of pizza, girls, and astronauts,” Matt said, and they laughed at his remark.

“Well, I am having pizza with these two lovely ladies and two genuine astronauts right now, so you can’t blame a man for living his dream,” Lance quipped. There was more laughter.

“That was the night of the U.F.O. crash. Shiro had returned to earth in a stolen Galra ship,” Pidge explained.

“Hunk wanted to go back inside before we got caught,” Lance added.

“But I wanted a closer look,” Pidge said.

“And I ran after her, of course. Hunk thought we were both insane, but he followed us anyway.”

“Hunk still thinks that both of you are insane,” Matt remarked. “But I’m glad he followed you. Someone had to keep you two out of trouble.”

“According to Shiro, that’s practically impossible,” Sam said with a chuckle.

Pidge smiled. “We actually met Shiro that night. Keith was trying to rescue him.”

“Hey, I was trying to rescue him too!” Lance said, unconvincingly. “Everything was going great until we all got on Keith’s hover bike and he drove us off the side of a cliff.”

Sam and Matt thought this was very funny.

“Who taught Keith how to drive that thing?” Matt asked.

“Shiro, of course!” Sam chortled.

Colleen looked horrified. “You all could have been killed!” She turned to her daughter. “Young lady, I should have grounded you even longer.”

After supper, Matt, Lance, and Pidge volunteered to clean up the dining room and feed Bae Bae while Sam was watching a favorite television program in the living room. Colleen went to check on the laundry. As they were finishing up, Pidge asked Matt if he wanted to play Killbot Phantasm with them.

“Neither of you has made it to level 36 yet, so you want my help, don’t you?” Matt asked, already knowing the answer.

“Maybe,” said Pidge.

When Pidge had finally convinced her brother to play the game with them, Lance grabbed the white bag from the sideboard and some cold drinks before following Pidge and Matt upstairs. He then helped Pidge set up the Mercury Gameflux II while Matt said in the chair by his sister’s desk.

“How many times have you two played that game?”

“Hundreds,” said Lance.

“You’ve had hundreds of video game dates with my sister? Alone in your room in your pajamas with my baby sister?”

“Matt—“ Pidge sounded annoyed.

“It was perfectly innocent,” Lance reassured him.

“Then why exactly do they call you Loverboy Lance? How many girls have you seduced in those Paladin Pajamas?” Matt asked.

“Matt, stop it!” Pidge was beginning to get really annoyed.

Just then, Colleen came upstairs with a basket of laundry.

“Matt, is this one of yours, sweetheart? Your father says it isn’t his.” She held up a light blue button-down dress shirt. Lance couldn’t hide his telltale blush.

“That’s Lance’s, Mom.” Pidge explained, a bit pink-cheeked. “There was a stain on it, so I put it in the wash for him.” Well, that wasn’t exactly a lie.

“Thanks, Mrs. Holt.” Lance said. He took off his sweater and began buttoning up his freshly-laundered shirt over his T-shirt. Colleen left, but not without raising her eyebrows and exchanging glances with Matt in such a way that said keep an eye on those two.

Matt looked at Katie’s bed. “Your covers are a bit wrinkled. What exactly were you two doing up here unchaperoned?”

“We had chaperones. Bae Bae and my trash nebula pets were with us.” The green and blue trash floofs trilled as if to affirm that statement.

“I was playing the guitar,” Lance said, pulling his sweater back on, “Pidge and I were singing a song that I’ve been working on.” Lance’s guitar was still leaning against one wall.

“Trying to serenade her, huh? Pretty slick. Loverboy is trying to put the moves on you, Katie.”

Pidge looked furious. “Matt, stop it! Lance wrote a song for me, and we were singing it together, and it was actually quite beautiful. Mom and Dad even came up here to listen and they loved it.”

“Okay, okay. Truce. I am sorry that you are so easy to tease.”

Pidge made a face at her brother, then turned to her boyfriend. “Lance, I hope you don’t have to deal with this sort of thing back home.”

“Well, I do have four older siblings instead of just one, so it’s actually much, much worse,” Lance confessed.

Matt cackled. “Well, that makes me look forward to meeting my future in-laws even more. When are you two getting married?”

Pidge glared at her brother. “I should have left you in space.”

“Yeah, But then you wouldn’t be getting these cheat codes. You are both up to level 34, right?”

Pidge sighed. “Yes.”

“Okay, well, you each get a turn to play against me. If I win, you have to answer a few very personal questions for me, and I will give you one of the codes as a reward.”

“Is this some kind of fiendish torture you learned as a Galra prisoner?” Pidge asked.

Lance moaned. “He’s worse than Veronica.”

Matt grimaced like the maniacal host of Garfle Warfle Snick. “Let the game begin!”

Pidge went first. There were some very intense moments in which she nearly beat her brother, and Lance cheered her on the entire time. In the end, however, Matt won. Pidge groaned.

Matt grimaced. “Okay, it is my understanding that you have owned those two fuzzy trash parasites since you were fifteen years old, but you have never revealed their names to anyone. My question is this: what are the secret names of your two trash nebula pets?”

Pidge covered her face. “No, Matt.” She was blushing.

“I’ve actually been wondering about that myself,” Lance admitted.

“Answer the question if you want those cheat codes.”

“Fine. The green one is named Pidgeon.”

“You named a trash parasite after yourself?” Lance couldn’t contain his laughter. “I’m beginning to like this game.”

“But what’s the blue one’s name?” Matt insisted.

“Let’s play another round.”

“Answer the question, Pidge. You want to get to level 36, don’t you?”

She sighed. “Okay, fine. His name is....” She would not make eye contact with either of them. “Lancelot.”

Lance and Matt erupted in a fit of laughter. Lance wiped away a tear, “Aw...that’s so sweet...I’ve never had a garbage poof named after me before.”

“Garbage poof?!” Matt laughed so hard that he nearly fell off of his chair.

“Hey! He’s a cute little garbage poof,” said Lance, giving the creature a little pat. It trilled happily.

“I hate you both.”

“And we both know that’s not true. Your turn, Loverboy.”

Matt made quick and easy work out of beating Lance, much to his embarrassment. But Lance dreaded what came next even more.

“Okay. Your question is this: what exactly are your intentions toward my little sister? Because if you are trying to seduce her and make her just another one of your conquests...”

“Matt, stop it! You have gone to far!”

“No, I’ll answer the question.” Lance said. “First of all, Even though I have flirted with a lot of girls, I don’t have any ‘conquests’ to speak of, and I have never thought of women in such a degrading way. Secondly, Pidge and I have been Paladins and best friends for three years, and I have the highest amount of love and respect for her.” Pidge smiled at him proudly. “Thirdly, both of us are in our first serious relationship, but we know that we are totally committed to each other and have even discussed our future together. A future that will hopefully include marriage and a children of our own, who I am sorry to say, won’t be named Pidgeon or Lancelot.” Pidge began to smirk. Matt was having a hard time keeping a straight face.

“I don’t think we’ll name any of them Kaltenecker either.” was Pidge’s deadpan addition.

“Aw, I thought Lance Kaltenecker McClain, Jr. would make a great name for our first child.”

“Sorry to disappoint you,” Pidge said before she finally collapsed in a fit of giggles.

Matt roared with laughter. He gave them all of the cheat codes after that.

Then Matt was finally silent, smiling to himself as they made it to level 36 to beat the final boss. They took on the challenge together, working together exactly as Paladins of Voltron should. As when operating the giant mecha’s right and left arm, the sword and shield of Voltron, they were unbeatable. When it was over, they high-fived each other.

“Team Plance does it again!” Lance kissed her.

Matt cheered. “We should celebrate.”

“I have already thought of that.” Lance said as he opened the white bag.

“Peanut butter cookies! I knew it!” Pidge exclaimed.

“Hunk’s special recipe.”

“I owe you both an apology,” Matt admitted. “I was just being an overprotective big brother, and I was really wrong about you, Lance.”

“No hard feelings. If I had a little sister as awesome as yours I would probably be overprotective as well.”

“A toast, then, to the garbage poofs! Or maybe to my sister and future-brother-in-law!” Matt proclaimed. “Here’s to Pidgeon and Lancelot!”

They clinked their bottles together, and then Pidge said, “We are definitely naming one of them after you.”

“One of your future kids?” Matt asked, flattered.

“No, the next garbage poof I decide to adopt.”

Lance nearly choked on his peanut butter cookie.

#plance #pidge #lance #matt holt #katie holt #colleen holt #sam holt #lance mcclain #voltron #vld #plance fic #plance fanfic

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sweetiepie08 · 6 years ago

Text

Rebel Z (Chapter 2)

Invader Zim fanfic

While analyzing Zim’s PAK for weaknesses, Tak discovers strange coding that sends her on a search for answers. The clues lead her to uncover a conspiracy that governs all of Irken society. When the truth sends her on the run, she has no choice but to return to the one place the Tallest would never willingly go: Urth.

Meanwhile, Dib has noticed odd changes in Zim’s behavior. Has the invader simply grown bored of his mission over the last few years, or is there something more interesting going on?

People who asked to be tagged: @incorrect-invader-zim , @messinwitheddie, @reblogstupids, @cate-r-gunn

If anyone else would like to be added to the tag list please let me know.

Chapter 1. Chapter 2. Chapter 3. Chapter 4. Chapter 5. Chapter 6. Chapter 7. Chapter 8. Chapter 9. Chapter 10.

[-]

Fabulosa lay just outside of Irkan-controlled space. The planet served as the epicenter of the intergalactic fashion and textiles industry. Its natural vegetation could be spun into a wide variety of luxurious fabrics and the Fabulians learned long ago how to craft the finest garments in the known universe. This made Fabulain clothing highly sought-after and the citizens very wealthy. Naturally, it became a prime target for Irkan conquest.

They tired cycles ago but it stood as a rare marked failure on the Irkan military’s record. The Fabulains knew where their worth lay. When the Armada surrounded them, they threatened to burn their own fields and destroy the secrets of how to cultivate the fiber-producing plants… unless a deal could be struck. And so, the Fabulains and the Irkens signed a treaty which began a mutually-beneficial trade agreement.

Fashion and fibers didn’t interest Tak in the slightest. She was more concerned with what the planet could offer an Irkan on the run. It was outside of Irkan territory, but close enough that the civilization would be familiar. Its technology was advanced, it offered a variety of job opportunities, and the trade agreement allowed for a steady supply of Irkan snacks. It was the perfect place for a deserter to hide.

As she entered the planet’s atmosphere, Tak switched her holo-projector to her Vortian disguise. Lately, she used it more than any other. Irkens, she found, were not well liked by the rest of the universe and, if she was going to survive out here, she needed to build trust. She spent years accruing favors for seedy lifeforms and cashed most of them in when creating her PAK reading software. Skoodge’s favor she had no specific plans for but thought it would be good to keep in her back pocket just in case. It was about to come in handy.

She parked her ship in a public hanger for a massive shopping center and instructed MiMi to wait in there. She then headed straight for the store where her target worked. Sickeningly sweet Fabulain pop music assaulted her antenna the second she walked in the door. The peppy tones from high-pitched singers grated her with their manufactured joy. It was true, Irkens enjoyed sugar, but not like this.

“Hi, welcome to Glitz N’Nat,” a familiar voice chirped beside her.

She turned to see an unusually portly Vortian employee smiling at her.

“My name is Shickil. Is there anything I can help…” his eyes scanned her up and down, “you…” a look of recognition came to his face, “with…?”

“Yes actually,” she said, reaching into a rack. The Vortian gulped. “Do you have any more of these in the back?” She pulled out a random garment. It happened to be a glaringly bright green number with orange feathers framing the neckline. It would figure she’d pull out the ugliest thing in the store.

“There’s a whole bunch right there,” he said, pointing to the rack.

“But not in my size.”

“Actually, that one looks like it would fit.”

She glanced at the garment in his hand. Damn it. It might fit. Her eye twitched. “Maybe you could use some help checking.” She grabbed the employee’s arm and dragged him to the back of the store.

“Hey Tiff,” he called to his Fabulain coworker.

The female specimen flipped her white hair and looked up from the cash register. Her black eyes followed them as they made their way to the storage room.

“I’m going to help this customer in the back real quick, okay?” the Voritan finished.

Tiff giggled and waved a bubblegum pink hand at them. “Okay, have fun with your girlfriend.”

Tak’s insides clenched and she scowled at the Fabulain. Where did that lollipop-head get off mocking her? She had enough on her plate without lower lifeforms ridiculing her about her nonexistent mating practices. Then again, it was better than the time that Urth monkey child implied she was Zim’s mate of all people.

She tossed the Vortian into the storage room and threw the universe’s ugliest dress aside. Once she had the door closed and locked, the two of them disabled their disguises. “What’s this about, Tak?” Skoodge asked, sounding defeated already.

“First of all, why’d that brainless retail drone out there call me your girlfriend?” she demanded, jabbing her thumb at the door.

“Hey, Tiff’s nice,” Skoodge argued. Odd, he never had a backbone before. “Anyway, last time you were here, they asked me who you were and I panicked. Plus, the girls keep trying to set me up with other Vortians and I needed a way to get them off my back.”

“The girls?”

“Yeah, my coworkers.” His face lit up. “Tiff, Brandy, Cheryl, Dionne… Cheryl actually invited me to her baby shower next week. I’m not sure what that entails, but I’m real excited to go.” His eager clasped hands and giant grin attested to his sincerity.

Tak’s eyes narrowed and a sly smile grew on her lips. Skoodge seemed very happy here indeed and it wouldn’t hurt to remind him who was responsible for that happiness. “Seems you’ve cultivated quite the social life here.”

“Yeah, the girls are great! They’re nice to me, we go out all the time, we have a weekly brunch date, and they don’t shoot you out of the airlock if you mess up.”

“Sounds perfect for you,” she agreed. “Of course, you only have this life thanks to the holo-clocking device I made for you.

Skoodge’s excitement quickly drained and he looked down at the device on his wrist. “Please tell me you’re not going to take it away.”

“No, of course not,” she said, putting on her gratingly sweet voice and patting him on the arm. “You can continue to stay here and live your happy little life, but you’ll recall, you promised me a favor when I gave it to you.”

He relaxed slightly. “Okay, what is it?”

“I need to have a look at your PAK.”

He gasped and his hands flew to his back. “What? My PAK? Why?”

“Listen,” she said, all sweetness dropped from her voice, “You know how Zim always seems to come out of every situation relatively unscathed, no matter how destructive?”

“Uh-huh…”

“Well, I wanted to know his secret, so I created a software that I could use to analyze his PAK for answers.”

Skoodge pulled back in shock. “You tampered with his PAK?”

“Analyzed.”

“I can’t believe you tampered with another Irkan’s PAK,” he went on, wringing his hands. “That’s a capital offence.”

“I didn’t tamper I analyzed,” she countered through gritted teeth. “There’s a big difference.”

“Is there?”

“There is. I didn’t change a thing about Zim. I only looked to see if there was anything off about him.”

“And?”

“Defective, obviously, but that’s not the weird part. While I was looking, I saw things that were… strange to say the least, things I didn’t know the PAK influenced. I analyzed my own PAK and saw the same things. I need to see yours to confirm.”

“Why mine?”

“Zim and I are both encoded with menial-level jobs,” she explained, “but you’re still encoded as an invader. I need to see if that encoding makes a difference.”

Skoodge bit his bottom lip and looked away. “I don’t know. I’m not really comfortable letting an admitted tamperer access my PAK.”

“Analyzed,” she corrected again with a hiss. Damn it, how many times? “And don’t forget, you owe me. Think you’d have this lovely, insipid little life without me? Think you’d get that invite to that baby shower as Irkan Invader Skoodge?”

His eyes dropped to the floor. “Fine, I’ll let you analyze my PAK, but you better promise not to change anything.”

“I promise, now come with me. I’ll run the program from my ship. It’s not as powerful as Zim’s base, but I chose some key elements to look at for comparison.”

“We can go out the back, just give me a minute,” Skoodge said, reactivating his disguise. “I need to ask Tiff to cover for me.”

Tak reactivated hers as well and Skoodge went back out onto the shop’s floor. She watched as he talked with his coworker. The two parted with a laugh. “And watch out for flying shoes,” Tiff called as he walked away.

“I will,” Skoodge laughed.

Tak raised an eyelid. “Flying shoes?”

“It’s just an inside joke,” Skoodge replied, the pride in his voice betraying the fact that he’d never been on the inside of any joke before.

Oh and you have? It was true, she never spent much time socializing in her training days. There were more important things to worry about. She was a little busy making herself the best of the best. And what a lot of good that did you, right? Whatever, it was Zim’s fault she never took her rightful place in the Irkan military. If it weren’t for Zim, all that hard work would have paid off. Would it, Defective?

“Can we get this over with, please?” Tak growled. The sooner she figured out what was going on with the PAKs, the sooner she could get back to crushing Zim.

She led Skoodge to her ship in the parking hanger. Once inside, she activated the opaque tinting of the windows, deactivated her disguise, and fired up her computer. “Okay, all I’m going to do is plug into your PAK and read your stats. Got it?”

Skoodge deactivate his disguise as well. “Okay…” he said, still sounding apprehensive.

Tak rolled her eyes and plugged in his PAK. Once in, she saw Skoodge’s ID page come up on her screen.

Name: Skoodge

Age: 16.6

Occupation: Invader

Assignment: Pending

“Hmm…” Her eyes lingered on the “assignment” line. “They never reassigned you after Blorch?”

Skoodge sighed and looked at the ground. “No…”

That was interesting. Typically, after an invader completed their mission, they’d either be assigned to a new planet after a period of rest or rewarded with a cushy retirement. Given Skoodge’s youth, he should have been sent out again. She didn’t need to look further than the expanse of space above his head to guess why he wasn’t.

She pressed on. Unfortunately, her ship’s computer wasn’t powerful enough to run a full error check, but it could take a look at his personality drive. More specifically, she wanted to see the PAK installations and the Irkan traits.

Pak Installations

· Perseverance: 20/20

· Loyalty: 5/15

· Penchant for Destruction: 10/15

· Susceptibility to Propaganda: 5/15

So, Skoodge’s stats were also out of balance, not quite as bad as Zim’s (or mine), but was this enough to mark him as defective? She swiped over to his Irkan traits.

Irkan Traits

· Creativity: 10/10

· Personal ambition: 5/5

· Need for companionship: 523/0

· Need for affection: 443/0

· Sense of individuality: 231/0

· Individual survival instinct: 4803/10

That confirmed it. Another defective. Interesting. As an invader, his ideal levels may be higher than most, but they still didn’t match up with his actual levels. What were the odds that all three PAKs were defective? Could it be possible that most, if not all PAKs were defective to some degree? No, she couldn’t generalize yet. She only analyzed a small sample size and all three PAKs belonged to Irkans living outside normal society. It was much more likely that defectives tended to live outside the norm and were therefore easier for her to contact. If she wanted definitive answers, she’d need more information, but she couldn’t just go find more Irkens and start analyzing their PAKs. At the very least it’d raise suspicion. At worst, they’d assume treason was afoot. She needed to find another way.

“So? What’d you see?”

Oh right, Skoodge. She nearly forgot he was there. “Well, it looks like you’re defective.”

“What? No!” He jumped toward the screen. “How can this be?”

“My ship isn’t powerful enough for a full diagnostic, but your levels are out of balance,” she explained. “From what I can tell, that’s a sure sign of defectiveness.”

“But I conquered Blorch,” he went on. His hysterical voice was grating on her nerves. “I was the first to complete my mission in Operation Impending Doom 2. How can I-”

“Calm down. At least you’re not as defective as Zim and-” She stopped herself quick. “Anyway, I’m starting to wonder what being a defective really means.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, look at some of this stuff,” she said, gesturing toward the screen. “A functioning PAK will block natural Irkan assets.”

“Not really, I’ve still got some ambition, some creativity…”

“Because you’re an invader. It changes with encoding. A PAK with a low-class encoding has most of these set to 0. It doesn’t make sense. If we are the superior race, why block what makes us superior?”

“Well, I guess an invader would need certain traits to do our jobs…”

“But why just invaders?” she argued. “Why not allow all Irkens access to their natural traits?”

He thought for a moment. “You checked your PAK, right?”

“Yes…”

“So, what did yours say?”

Her lips tightened into a scowl. “We’re getting off the subject. Here, look at your stats,” she said, turning his attention back to the numbers on the screen. “Your survival instinct is much higher than it’s meant to be. That probably kept you alive on Blorch. And your need for companionship drives your desire to socialize. Thanks to that defect, you’ve got your little group of friends here. Would you trade them for a fully functioning PAK?”

“No!” he gasped, looking more devastated than he did when she told him he was defective.

“That’s my point. If defects can bring positive results, are they really defects?”

“Yeah, I guess that makes sense,” he agreed.

There’s something else wrong here, but what? Skoodge, by all accounts should be a war hero. He conquered his planet in less than 0.1 cycles; a record time as far as invasions went. And yet, he was a defective. Did his defects give him the advantage? If that were the case, perhaps her defects helped her rise to the top of her training class. It would make sense. Her supposed defects included having “too much” ambition and “too much” perseverance. Those are the traits that pushed her to excellence. Surely, they could not be mistakes.

“What about Zim?”

Skoodge’s question broke her from her musings. “What about him?”

“You said he’s defective. If you think defects aren’t that bad…”

“He’s still a walking catastrophe!” she snapped. “I never said all defects were a good thing, just in some cases.”

This did raise an interesting point. Zim, also a defective, without a doubt brought disaster with his every move. Maybe the concept of a defective wasn’t the problem, but how it was measured. Perhaps there was even an issue with the encoding process all together.

She needed to research this future, but she had no idea how. Knowledge on PAK programing was off limits to all but those encoded as PAK maintenance specialists. Even if this information was widely available, she couldn’t show her face in Irkan-controlled space any time soon. Abandoning her post was essentially self-imposed exile. If she didn’t return with a victory that would impress the Tallest, she couldn’t go back at all.

Perhaps solving this mystery could earn her enough glory to pardon her desertion charges and raise her to a rank more worthy of her skills. She could start by researching the history of the PAK, but how?

“So, uh, what’d you go all quiet for?” Skoodge asked, breaking her thoughts once again.

“I was just thinking, where, outside of Irkan territory, I could I go to research PAKs?”

“You could try Refirencee,” Skoodge suggested.

“Where?”

“It’s an info-database planet near Meekrob,” he explained. “They gather the histories and knowledge of all known planets and compile them in one place.”

“Sounds like an obvious target for conquest.”

“Yeah, but it’s under Meekrobian protection, so the plan was to wait until Tenn took Meekrob, then take all the data in the spoils.”

“Hmm…” It was a start at least, though it was suicide for any Irkan to get anywhere near Meekrob these days. Her Vortion disguise and ship should give her enough cover to pass through without suspicion. It worked well enough so far. “Do you know the coordinates for this planet?”

“No, but your ship could have it’s coordinates in its data base. This is a Vortian vessel, after all. The Meekrob only hide the planet from Irkens. Everyone else is free to use it.”

Excellent, a better lead than she expected. “I think we’re done here, Skoodge,” she said, disconnecting his PAK. This favor paid off in spades. “Go, enjoy your baby shower.”

“Thanks.” They reactivated their disguises and Skoodge hopped out of the ship. “And, uh, if you’re ever around, feel free to say hi.”

Tak looked up, the invitation catching her off-guard. “Oh, uh, sure…”

“Bye,” Skoodge gave a little wave and headed back to his job. MiMi returned with a wave of her own.

Tak turned back to her computer. After a quick check for the closest fueling station, she ran a search for the Refirencee coordinates. The search was a success. A holographic diagram of the planet shown from the computer’s projectors.

“Well, MiMi,” she said, smiling at the projection, “it’s time we got some answers.”

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thegodshavehorns · 5 years ago

Text

Girl From Nowhere

Your name is Roxy Lalonde, and you are simply the best there is. No need to specify at what. You are the best at all of the things. All of them.

But if you did have to specify, you suppose that you would say you are the ultimate best at computers. In fact, you are the drunken master of computers. Nobody can hope to beat you when you’ve got a wine bottle in one hand and a keyboard under the other. Nobody. Not even you when you’re sober, actually.

That unfortunate fact has forced you to scrap your computer wholesale and just buy a new one several occasions, on account of not being able to figure out how to get past the new security system that you designed on it while you were drunk, or the password that you set at the same time. You keep telling yourself that you need to write these things down but you never remember. You have absolutely no idea why that is.

But what can you do? Programming is in your blood; when you are cut, ones and zeroes spill out of your arm. Your fingers fly not like it’s your nature, but like they’re responding to the thrum of destiny. It was fate, it had to have been, that when some rich dude bequeathed half his library to the orphanage one Croakmas when you were still a tyke, that you were the one who got the programming books with all those pictures of cats on the cover. You learned to read out of those books, for crying out loud. You were made for this. It’s your telos.

But you are not just the drunken master of all coding. You are also one of the many students to have blessed— or blighted— the halls of Our Lady Who Is Without Mother Or Father Academy for Girls. You are undoubtedly the best and most favorite of the superintendent’s, but she doesn’t like to let on that she plays favorites so she’s always yelling about how she’s one more misstep away from throwing your ass out on the curb. That never happens, though, no matter how many times you hack into her computer system, so you’re pretty sure that it’s all just talk and smokescreens.

After all, if she didn’t want to share the bottles of gin she kept locked in her back cabinets then she wouldn’t have put them there after you’d already picked her lock three times before, right? Nah, you’re totally on the best of terms. The fake mad face is just a part of the charm.

Still, she does have to keep up a front if she’s going to keep the rest of the school fooled about how much she actually doesn’t hate your guts, so she has to make a profanity-filled house call every now and then. Seeing as you’re the school's Little Orphan Annie that means she doesn’t have to walk very far, just down the block, so these visits happen quite a bit.

Most people avoid coming in your room. You did have a couple of roommates but you kept hacking the records or breaking into the records office and changing your file, and eventually the matrons just plain gave up and let you have it your way. And if they want to talk with you, well, they knock, or they just scream at you through the door. Which is what just about anybody does but the superintendent, actually, since you have been known to come at people with broken bottles when they make too much noise or touch your hardware.

So when you hear somebody enter your room one morning, you don’t bother asking who it is. You just keep at it, smacking keys and drowning your hangover behind a wall of monitors, towers, and books, completely dark save for the glow of screens dimmed to their lowest brightness.

But it isn’t the super, it’s a guy. Some jackass with a lisp. When you find that out you’re about to curse him out but, on a whim, you poke your head over the Great Wall of China and— hot damn, and thank your lucky stars you didn’t say anything, because this isn’t a jackass, it’s the jackass, Sollux Captor, the Mage of Doom, wearing some ratty moth-eaten coat over his godhood.

“Nice coat,” you tell him.

He shrugs. “They tell me I have to look decent for the public. ‘Like people,’ is how Kanaya puts it. She says it looks like pajamas.”

“Sorta does,” you admit.

“Fuck her. You’re lucky I’m wearing anything.”

Yeah, this is totally his protest costume.

But what is he doing here? You don’t know, so you ask him. And then you offer him breakfast, just to be a good host.

“What is that?”

“Pickled prunes, tripe, cinnamon, eggs, and rum. Hangover cure.”

“You put rum in your hangover cure?” Sollux obviously doesn’t know what to make of you— best person ever, or supreme best ever? You yourself know exactly how awesome you are, but it's more fun to keep him guessing.

“How else am I supposed to get a good start on my drinking?” Okay, you’ve nailed it. You are the best of friends or something now probably. Especially since he took a spoon from out of nowhere and is sharing your awesome hangover cure soup with you.

You eat in silence, or at least as much as you can get between the clicker-clakker of the keys. Meanwhile, Sollux is taking a look around your room, frowning, smiling, shaking his head, smiling some more.

“I want to offer you a job,” he says, and you want to do a spit take but the soup’s all gone and you’re just now noticing that he snatched your wine from out of your reach.

“Uh, say who what now?”

“Let’s just say that we’re very interested in what you can do. So I’m offering you a job at SkaiaNet,” he says. “And you will be given a place to study at Derleth University when you graduate from here.”

You squint at him. “Derleth? Ain't that a medical school? I do computers.”

“I need a biologist. They have a new program in computational genomics.”

“A little squishy for me, bucko.”

Sollux blinks. It evidently takes him a moment to figure out what you’re going on about. “I don’t need another programmer that I could outperform on my worst day. I need somebody with a tenth of Feferi's bioengineering and a third of my coding. A biologist with your special talents would have many uses.”

A biologist? What the heck kind of biology needs coding and hacking? Then again, it would be nice to have a guaranteed job...

“But there is a catch,” he continues, and you groan inside. “You’re a good student, but you’re still a menace and a delinquent. That kind of shit isn’t supposed to happen, by the way. With your behavior you should be flunking or something.”

You lean back in your swank rolly-chair. “Maybe I fixed my grades.”

“You didn’t. I would know.”

Aw.

He continues: “So you have to keep off the booze.” Wait, what? “You are, I have been assured, a functioning alcoholic. Nevertheless, you are also unpredictable when you are drunk, and I do not want to lose my investment at the age of thirty for the sake of an exploded liver.”

“Why me?”

“Because you’re very good at what you do.”

You grin. "Pft, yeah, of course. So, what, the super recommended me?"

"More the other way around."

You blink at him. What does that mean? Your hangover is making you fuzzy, and slower than you should be. "How'd you know about me then? Unless I'm some kinda chosen one or something?"

He smiles, and your own grin wavers. "C'mon man, next thing you'll say you got me into this in the first place, that you gave me those coding books for Croakmas when I was three- oh fuck, you did, didn't you?"

You stare right into the god's shit-eating grin, and you don’t know whether to scream or laugh or try to do both at once. The superintendent doesn’t actually like you very much, does she? But she answers to a higher power that doesn’t care about that...

“You got me into this to begin with? But... you're not just fucking with me, right? This isn't just, I mean, this is really happening, you're not just nodding at whatever I say?" You stare into the mismatched lenses of his shades and try to gague whether he's telling the truth.

"It's all very real, Roxy. And yes, your intuition is correct; I've been interested in your progress for a long time."

"And you just want to play it all cool like it’s nobody’s thing or whatever, I just happened to be the best there is— which I am, don’t get me wrong.”

“Why would I select you, out of all of the orphans in the world?”

“Because I was... different?”

Sollux snorts. “You were a baby. What’s different about you?”

You take a moment to think about it. “You knew my parents. They were something special.”

His teeth gleam, sharper than any human smile. “Not a bad guess. But you’re wrong. You don’t have any parents. That’s why you’re special.”

You just about leap out of your chair. “What do you mean? Was I some sort of... cloning experiment or something?”

The Mage of Doom slips a card into your hand. “Study hard. Stay in school and out of trouble. Then maybe you’ll find out. And whatever you do, don’t pray.”

“Huh?”

“I mean, don’t call us. We’ll call you.”

The coat falls down around him, his wings unfurl, and—Sollux is gone and the room is empty, save for you.

You don’t talk with gods again for six more years. You manage to stay out of the bottle for nine.

#the gods have horns #godstuck #sollux captor #roxy 'mom' lalonde #godstuck fic #homestuck fanfiction #trolls are gods #revision #our lady without academy #first meetings

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