#since these pictures i've actually gotten a few more of his cards

[chimerafflesia]

don't think I ever posted this on here, but earlier this year I collected every card bakura uses in the anime + some duel links cards to recreate his deck irl! it was a lot of fun to do <3

[aylacavebear]

Retribution Chapter 11

Summary: You had DID for most of your life, over forty years, since you were two. It wasn't until after you were forty-three that you were finally able to heal it and become a singular. You're a hunter and have been with Dean for a very long time. Once you become singular, you have to face the horrors that your mental illness subjected on those you cared about, loved. Can you get past seeing yourself as worse than any monster you've ever hunted down?

Pairing is Dean Winchester x Reader/You

Warnings: Talk of DID - Dissociation Identity Disorder (AKA MPD), Mental Health Issues, Angst, Healing (yes, this is a warning), DnD (Dungeons & Dragons), Alters being "dead" and grieving, depressed Dean.

Please, if you suffer from any mental illness, seek help. There are people out there who can help you get through it, no matter how alone you feel now or how hard it may seem.

A/N: This is going to be very dark, darker than anything I've written thus far. It will include many triggers - abuse both sexual and physical - in memories and what happens to the reader. I'm hoping it will have a happy ending but right now, I am not sure where this will go. This is your main warning before you begin reading. A/N: Dreams and Memories are indented in italics. Thoughts are in italics only.

----------------------------------------- Chapter 11 - A Peace You Didn’t Know Was Possible

I can’t believe it’s been six months, you thought while sipping a cup of coffee, still wrapped up in a blanket on the couch, watching the fire in the fireplace. The first few months had been hard, especially as the holidays came and went. You’d cried yourself to sleep often, but most of the tears had finally stopped nearly a month ago.

The brothers had even messaged you, Sam, more than Dean. When you and Dean texted back and forth, it usually ended with him upset in one form or another. At first, you blamed yourself for his pain but had learned how to heal that, so you were able to stop blaming yourself for his pain and heartbreak. 

What Dean had said that had hit you hard near the beginning when the two of you spoke, was that even with the forty years he had spent in hell, it was a walk in the park compared to the twenty years he’d been with them. That one stuck with you for months afterward.

On the other hand, Sam had actually begun talking to you, asking you questions, and trying to get to know you. You found it odd in the beginning, the way his curiosity came out in his texts, but you had made the choice just to be yourself now. You had nothing to hide from anyone anymore and always chose honesty, even if it would hurt.

As far as the cabin went, you’d packed away a lot of what had been there. Things like the toys, some of the clothes, decorations that were set about, and anything that reminded you of the relationship between them and Dean. The pictures were the hardest to look at, so those went as well.

All the holidays had been hard, but it was Dean’s birthday that hurt the most. The one thing he’d always wanted from your personalities was to get a blow job the morning of his birthday before ever getting out of bed. It was something that they never did due to the mean ones always taking over.

You’d spent a month working on coupons for him and writing something on the card you’d picked out at the store. These were the things you wanted to do with him, but then you felt stupid again that you loved him when you weren’t them. You even called Cas and asked him to deliver it for you. That way, even the postage of where it came from didn’t give away your location.

In the card, you included two of your favorite pictures of the two of you, from moments that brought happiness when you looked at them. The two of you talked after he’d gotten it, but the call ended with more tears from both of you, and you didn’t speak again for nearly two months.

Today, though, Charlie and Eileen were coming by. They had come by once before, and it was nice to have them over. When they kept your little retreat a secret, and the brothers didn’t show up, you knew you could fully trust them.

“You two turned off your GPS, right?” you asked as they sat down in the living room.

“Yup. Don’t need them finding this place. We promised, remember,” Charlie chuckled, “I brought the DnD stuff, if you’re still interested.”

You got them some water and sat down in the chair adjacent to the couch, “That could be fun. Eileen, are you gonna play too?”

“Sure. Charlie didn’t stop talking about it the whole drive,” Eileen laughed, rolling her eyes playfully.

“I’ll go get the books,” Charlied said excitedly.

That was her thing: games, role-playing, LARPing, and having a fantasy adventure. You wanted to at least try it out, DnD. She’d explained it to you through text, phone calls, and emphatically on her last visit.

Six hours later…

Charlie was laughing too hard to keep up being what she called the Dungeon Master. You and Eileen’s characters had tamed a young dragon, and due to botching rolls, the adolescent male dragon was now in love with both of you.

“Now what do we do with it?” Eileen asked, looking at you.

That only made Charlie lose it in another fit of laughter. This was her element, but you two were the best people she had ever been a DM for, as any and all seriousness had flown completely out the window.

“I don’t know,” you replied, grabbing the book off the floor that had the monster information in it and flipping through it until you found the one about the dragon. That was when your eyes went wide.

“What?” Eileen asked, only making Charlie laugh again.

“Charlie, next time, you could warn us before we do something this stupid,” you grumbled after reading the little warning under its stats.

“What?” Eileen asked again.

“You’re not gonna like it. Either we find it a mate, or, umm…” you trailed off, glancing up at Eileen as Charlie completely lost it in a fit of laughter, falling back on the couch and nearly falling on the floor.

“I’m not mating with a dragon,” Eileen said flatly, glaring at Charlie, who was still laughing so hard she was barely making any noise at this point.

“Charlie, if you don’t take a minute to breathe, you’re going to pass out,” you stated flatly, doing your best not to laugh at how funny she looked. Her laughter was infectious when she got like this.

The more the situation in the game played through your mind, and the more you saw Charlie laughing like she was, the more you couldn’t help laughing. Even Eileen joined in. It took the three of you nearly a half hour to gain any sort of composure. Every time any of you looked down at the DnD stuff on the table, laughter would erupt from one of you, then all of you, all over again.

“Why don’t we pick this up tomorrow,” you told them, still chuckling as you went to the kitchen to get some dinner going.

“It’ll give you two time to figure out what to do about that dragon,” Charlie chuckled as she began cleaning up the DnD stuff with Eileen’s help.

You pulled out the chicken you’d had marinating in the fridge, put it in the oven, and then got the sides ready to cook in a half hour. The girls joined you in the kitchen, with Charlie pulling three beers out of the fridge and handing them out. You leaned against the counter and popped the top while the girls sat at the table.

“Have you spoken to the boys?” Eileen asked.

You looked down at the beer in your hand and sighed, “About two weeks ago, I spoke with Dean through text. Sam messaged me yesterday.”

“Any headway on anything?” Charlie asked.

“Sam seems to be coming around the more we talk. He hasn’t gone off on me in a couple months now, and he’s asking me questions like he’s trying to get to know me,” you answered quietly, not really wanting to talk about Dean.

“What about Dean?” Eileen asked, and you sighed.

“I don’t know. Sometimes, we have great talks, and I feel like we might be getting somewhere, but…” you paused and took a swig of your beer, “...most times, we both cry, and it ends with him seeming more upset than before we started talking. Then, we don’t talk for a while. I probably won’t hear from Dean for at least another week with how our last conversation ended.”

“I wish there was something we could do to help,” Eileen told you sympathetically.

You shrugged, “He’s got to deal with his own stuff in his own way. I don’t know if anyone can help him through it.”

Charlie decided it was time to change the subject, “Any more monsters come through?”

“There was a couple vamps about a month ago. Boy were they surprised when they found out I was a hunter,” you chuckled, thankful for the topic change.

“Have you thought about going back to hunting, even part-time?” Eileen asked curiously.

Again, you shrugged and sipped your beer, “I don’t want to run into the brothers out there. I think that’s really the only thing stopping me from going back.”

“You could come with us, and Cas can let us know whether they know about the case we work or not. We could find a way so that we never crossed paths with them,” Charlie suggested.

“I’ll think about it, but I might need a couple more months before I’m ready,” you answered, letting her offer tickle its way through your mind.

They spent almost a week at your cabin. The three of you laughed a lot playing DnD, and luckily, your characters had found the dragon a mate. They didn’t bring up the brothers again, even when either of them messaged them. It was one of the happiest weeks you’d had around people. It was an emotional goodbye, but the three of you promised to stay in contact with each other.

When Sam’s birthday rolled around, you texted him a ‘Happy Birthday’ but left it at that. Neither of the brothers celebrated holidays or birthdays, but since Sam had been dating Eileen, he’d at least thought more about them. You hadn’t heard from Dean since before the girls had visited and you always refused to ask Sam about him.

It wasn’t until the small pack of werewolves passed through that you decided to go back to hunting. It was hard taking the five of them down on your own, but silver bullets from a distance had been the only thing that saved your life that night. An hour later, you were texting Charlie.

“I’m in. Where are you and Eileen?” 

“Oddly enough, Prison Farm, Montana. Your neck of the woods. We were tracking down some werewolves.”

You laughed so hard you had to take a moment to catch your breath before you returned a text to her.

“lol I just took down five of them outside my cabin.”

“So not fair. That was the pack we were tracking. You want to meet us at the motel, or should we pick you up?”

“Depends. Am I riding with you two or taking my car?”

“Good point. We’ll be there in an hour.”

You chuckled to yourself. “See you shortly.”

While waiting for them to arrive, you retrieved your hunting supplies, packing both your weapons and personal bag. There was some mild anxiety about getting back to hunting, but it was time. You’d done all the healing you could do in your sanctuary. This was the next thing you had to face.

The girls spent the night before the three of you headed out in the morning. The cabin now empty and quiet. Dark windows met your gaze as you looked back one last time before it disappeared behind the sea of trees.

The Brother’s POV

“When was the last time you talked to her?” Sam asked as he went through different newspapers online, looking for another case.

“Couple months, I think,” Dean answered plainly, “Find anything yet?”

“There was something in Montana, but Eileen told me she and Charlie handled it. There might be something in Nevada. Looks like a vengeful spirit,” he replied, scrolling the newspaper article.

“Well, if it turns out it is a case, let me know,” Dean said, then went to his room.

He’d moved your things to your room, and now his room felt empty, even though he’d filled those spaces with other things. He opened the night table drawer and pulled out the two pictures you’d sent him in his birthday card.

Why’d she have to send these? 

They were his favorite pictures, and he had thought they’d been lost in the transition from living out of the Impala and motels to living in the bunker. Tears slipped silently down his cheeks as he stared at them.

I miss them…

Dean knew they were gone, and they’d never come back. He’d wished he had a body to burn, to say goodbye to, but he didn’t. All he had was you now, in the body they’d inhabited since he’d met them. 

You were too much like her and too much not like the mean ones that it broke his heart to talk to you. He wanted to hate you for taking them away from him, for making his life feel empty again. 

I might have chosen to endure the abuse if I knew they’d all be gone like this.

He felt like there was a hole where his heart used to be now. The knock on his door pulled him from his thoughts as he wiped the tears quickly away, “Come in.”

Dean tried to hide the pictures, but Sam saw them and sighed, “It’s a case. We can leave whenever.”

Sam wanted to say something to his brother, but right now, there was nothing he could say that wouldn’t cause another fight. The last one had almost gotten physical, and he wasn’t in the mood to deal with it today.

“I’ll be out in five,” Dean replied as Sam left to get ready.

Sam sighed as he packed his things. He’d already apologized to you for how he’d treated you. The fact that you had forgiven him made his guilt eat at him these days, especially when Dean got like this. He wasn’t sure that taking this case was such a good idea, but Dean needed to get out of the bunker.

Your POV

You and the girls made it to the motel in a small, backwater town in Nevada shortly before sunset. It was hot, and you quickly learned that you weren’t a fan of the desert. When you got out of the car and stretched your legs, you tied your red flannel around your waist, thankful you were wearing a tank top.

“I hope this goes quickly. It’s fucking hot here,” you sighed when the three of you grabbed your bags.

“Should just be a simple salt and burn,” Eileen told you as Charlie went to check the three of you in.

“I hope so,” you remarked, looking around. 

The place looked practically deserted, and most of the buildings looked run down or boarded up. There weren’t even very many trees, and the ones that were there looked pitiful and in desperate need of water. 

“Got us a room,” Charlied piped in as she returned to the car.

“God, I hope the air conditioner works,” you groaned, then followed her to the room.

“Are you gonna complain the whole time we’re here?” Eileen teased you playfully.

“Just when we’re outside and away from the ac,” you chuckled.

The three of you got settled in and hopped on research. So far, no one had died, yet. It was just weird stuff, and it was all surrounding one of the houses on the edge of the small town. People there stayed away from it. It was tourists the locals were worried about.

“That house goes back to the eighteen hundreds. Says here that it was one of the first houses built for a wealthy family that owned the mine before the gold vein dried up,” Charlie told the two of you as she continued reading from her laptop.

“Does it say who died there?” Eileen asked before you could.

“A few people died there. The first one was the wife of the wealthy family. Then, if anyone moved in there, the husband died mysteriously. It’s been empty for over a hundred years,” Charlie answered, her eyes still scanning the screen.

“Sounds like a simple salt and burn. Does it say where she was buried?” you asked, and Eileen gave you a playful glare since you got the question in before she could. It had become a game for the two of you.

Charlie was quiet as she read, then her eyes lit up, “According to this, the cemetery behind the house. Let’s hope her spirit isn’t attached to anything else that we’d have to go looking for.”

“Let’s hope,” you sighed, “We should probably wait till after dark to head over there, though. Plus, we should be safe as long as we don’t go in the house.”

“So, what should we do for the next three hours before it gets dark here?” Eileen asked.

“There’s a bar. We could hang out there,” Charlie piped in with her mischievous smirk.

“You lookin’ to get lucky or something?” you teased her.

“Just because you two-” Charlie began, then quickly stopped herself and looked back at her laptop. “I’m sorry, Y/N. I didn’t mean to.”

“If you wanna go, Eileen and I can always play some pool and have a beer or two. You can have some fun. Remember, that stuff doesn’t bother me. Dean’s gonna do what he’s gonna do. Just because I still see him as my boyfriend doesn’t mean you should stop yourself from having fun,” you told her softly.

You’d come to terms with a lot of things over the last almost year. Dean had never actually broken up with you or told you it was over. So, you conducted yourself as if the two of you were still a couple.

“I’d like to play pool. It would be fun,” Eileen added, giving you and Charlie a mischievous grin.

“The bar it is, then,” Charlie said excitedly, closing her laptop.

There was one bar, and although it was a Friday night, it wasn’t packed, but it was decently busy for a small town. The three of you got beer and then headed over to play pool. The three of you were laughing and having a grand ol’ time. You all even got hit on by a few different men there. 

Charlie had found that hilarious, especially when they hit on her, and she informed them that she was into the waitress. You and Eileen were a little nicer about it than that, simply telling them that you two already had boyfriends.

The Brother’s POV

“This place sucks, Sam,” Dean groaned, sipping whiskey at a table near the back of the bar.

“Why?” Sam asked, enjoying his beer.

“It’s hot, and all they play on the jukebox is country music,” he grumbled.

“You could always hustle some pool. You used to have fun doing that,” Sam suggested, chuckling to himself.

“Pretty sure nobody here is drunk enough to get hustled,” he complained, downing his drink.

“Fine. If you were going to be this grumpy, I could have just given the case to someone else,” Sam teased him. He’d been trying to get Dean in a better mood for months, but it was always the same with him, and Sam was having a hard time dealing with it. 

Dean grumbled again before going to the bar for a refill. Then he glanced over at the pool tables, raising an eyebrow. He noticed the woman bent over the pool table, taking a shot, and he liked what he saw. He hadn’t flirted with anyone since you’d left, and this woman’s ass, in those jeans, reminded him of you, and he couldn’t help himself.

“Hey there, Sweetheart. Need some help handling that stick of yours,” he asked the woman.

He noticed her freeze and not turn to look at him, “I have a boyfriend,” she told him quietly.

“Well, where is this boyfriend of yours?” he asked playfully, not even recognizing your voice.

The woman stiffened as she stood up and slowly turned around, “He’s standing in front of me, but apparently, he thinks differently.” she said coldly before throwing the pool stick on the table and walking out of the bar.

Dean was dumbfounded. The first time, he figured he’d try to perhaps move on, and he ends up flirting with you, of all people. The thing that hit him the hardest was that you said you had a boyfriend. When you had DID, you wouldn’t have given that answer, as some of your personalities had been up for just about anything, with just about anyone. He quickly snapped out of his shock, setting his drink down and running after you, finding you heading toward the only motel in the small town.

“Y/N, wait. It’s not… Damnit!” he grumbled before finally catching up with you and grabbing your arm so you’d stop and look at him.

You spun around, and Dean saw the hurt in your eyes. You didn’t even look angry, just hurt. “Just tell me you don’t want me, and you’ll never have to see me again,” you told him sadly, as the tears had already started falling.

Neither of you noticed Sam, Eileen, and Charlie watching the two of you from a safe, hidden distance, praying that things would go well.

“I can’t,” Dean sighed, letting go of your arm and looking down at the ground.

“Why?” you asked quietly.

“Can we do this somewhere else?” he asked, just as quietly as you had been.

He looked up long enough to see you shrug your shoulders and start walking down the road, “Sure,” you told him sadly.

He watched you pull out your phone and text someone, so he texted his brother to handle the ghost by himself and that if Sam had planned this, he was going to kill him. It was an empty threat, and his brother knew that.

Your POV

Hearing him behind you at the pool table, flirting with you like you were some stranger, had hurt more than the conversations with him had. And now, he said he couldn’t let you go. You texted the group chat you had with Eileen and Charlie and told them that if they set this whole thing up, you’d be hunting alone after this.

You didn’t wait to get a text back before shoving your phone into your back pocket. This wasn’t how you’d wanted things to go if you ever saw him again. You’d hoped he would ask you to come back to the bunker, that he wanted to get to know you now that you were healed. But that hadn’t happened, and now this.

The last thing you wanted to do was end up in a bad conversation in the middle of the street, so you were leading him to an abandoned building you had noticed earlier in the day. He silently followed you, staying a few feet behind you. 

You walked around back, finding a door missing from the hinges, so you went inside that way. You found a mostly clean spot in one of the rooms to sit down and lean against the wall. Dean sat next to you, but not too close.

There was a tense silence between the two of you while Dean collected his thoughts, attempting to figure out how to answer the question you had asked him earlier. 

“You remind me of them. I miss them. If I have to be honest, it’s not fair. They’re gone, but at the same time, they’re not. You’re like them. Hell, it’s the same body,” he finally answered you quietly, barely keeping his emotions in check.

“You’re right. It’s not fair,” you began quietly, staring at the floor, “It’s not fair that I have their memories, that I fell in love with you harder than I even have words for. It’s not fair that all I want to do is love you, but all you see is them, not me.”

There was a lot more you wanted to say. You wanted to remind him how your personalities and he had talked about celebrating if you ever managed to heal from the DID. The plans the two of you had made if that ever happened. 

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly.

There was a long silence again, and it wasn’t helping your thoughts from overthinking. You fidgeted with a piece of paper on the floor, trying to find something to distract you through the deafening silence that had filled the room.

“I don’t know how to do this. See you and not them. I don’t know how to be around you because of how I want to be around them. I just…” he sighed and leaned his head against the wall, staring off at nothing in particular.

You wanted to give him suggestions, but you’d done that through calls and texts, and he hadn’t seemed to like any of them or want to do them. Your mind wandered back to the bar earlier, and if you had to admit it to yourself, you were thankful it went the way it did. The worst case would have been if you’d seen him with another woman, and you knew that.

“I don’t even know how to talk to you,” he finally added quietly.

For a while, you thought about how to help with the situation that you hadn’t suggested already, and that’s when an idea struck you. “What if we treat each other the way we want to?”

You barely glanced over at him, only enough to see him out of the corner of your eye. It had been the only thing you hadn’t suggested before. But this was almost like a compromise. He saw them and you. You wanted to love him, treat him the way they should have from day one.

“Are you really okay with that?” he asked, sounding almost nervous.

A sigh left your lips as your gaze returned to the other side of the room, knowing you had to be completely honest with him. “Dean, if you were okay with it, I’d move back into the bunker. I wouldn’t even argue or complain if you were to kiss me right now. It’s a place to start.”

Even if you weren’t looking at him, you heard him shift where he’d been sitting, “Are you sure you’re okay with that?” he asked again, still sounding unsure of your words.

You rolled your eyes, trying not to look as frustrated as you felt, but the moment you turned to face him so that you could be far blunter with him, you realized just how close he had gotten. The look in his eyes took your breath away and made you speechless as your lips opened to say something, but no words came out.

You quickly closed your mouth, taking a slow, deep breath. 

Why does he have to be so damn handsome? Let alone look at me like he wants to eat me alive.

“Yes, I’m-,” you began, but you couldn’t finish that sentence before Dean’s lips were on yours. 

He’d also cupped your cheek, holding you close so that you couldn’t pull away, but you had no plans of doing that. This wasn’t an intimate, I love you, kind of kiss. No, this was more like, where the hell have you been for the last almost year, kind of kiss. It was needy, hungry, and you matched it with your own.

----------------------------------------- Chapter 12 - Hope

Retribution Master List

Tag List: @jc-winchester @nancymcl @xx-spooky-little-vampire-xx

[fourseasonsfigs]

Summer Together

In celebration of the 4th anniversary of the Hengdian Fanmeet on 7/18, we have this adorable pair!

The inspiration for these figs is of course the photoshoot with Zhehan in his Fendi outfit:

The beautiful rose. Zhehan posted all the shots from the photoshoot on his Weibo account:

And then later deleted it, because some of his fans were fussing about Gong Jun being in his picture, but other fans saved it! The translation (MTL) says,

Goodnight Hengdian It's him, the boy wearing the flower

Of course, in this photoshoot, Gong Jun is not wearing a matching Fendi outfit, he's wearing this black outfit.

However, we do have a picture of him wearing the same type of Fendi outfit, which is what the fig maker used to model his fig:

In order to celebrate the anniversary, lets also have a video from the fanmeet:

They look so happy - I love their smiles.

I got lucky with these figs sailing through their voyage from China to the US - you'll see later how delicate Zhehan's rose is.

Since the boys are wearing white, I decided to take pictures on a tan background for the best contrast.

So cute. This is a nice shot of the similarities and differences in their Fendi outfits. I like that they're not wearing the exact same outfit, but the same style.

You can see here how delicate Zhehan's rose stem here! I was so glad this arrived intact. I didn't even bother trying to see if these two would stand on their own - as soon as I saw that rose I immediately glued Zhehan to the base. No falling down and damaging the rose!

The fig maker did a nice subtle job modeling the different head shapes of the two of them - we get Zhehan's more rounded head and the slight slope of Junjun's. You can see it a little more clearly in this photo of them:

Gong Jun's head is actually not quite this sloped, his hair cut and styling is exaggerating it here, but they definitely have different physiognomy. As two different people would! Interestingly enough, this head shaping is not actually uncommon to see in figs of the two of them together. I don't think I've mentioned it in my posts before, but you'll certainly see this head modeling on Junjun fairly frequently.

Of course, Zhehan's often longer hair tends towards all kinds of different (and fun) fig stylings!

Yeesh that flower stem. Still a miracle it made it through.

Their heads look great! The fig maker really brought out the long shaggy look of Zhehan's hair. I wish we had gotten his little tiny ponytail, only because his ponytails are a favorite of mine, but honestly his ponytail is really only visible for a few seconds in the videos from the fanmeet.

Junjun's pose here is so cute!

I really love their brown and amber eyes, they look beautiful and warm.

Well, you know I was so nervous about Zhehan's delicate rose (keep in mind, I photographed this set right after I accidentally snapped off Gong Jun's feather quill from yesterday's Breaking Dawn fig), that I immediately rushed to glue them to their stands. I completely forgot to take my regular bottoms-up pic before the glue. So, you're unfortunately getting the pics through the prism of China's finest acrylic rounds.

Gosh. Better late and poor quality than never (no one ever said)!

The quality on these figs is stellar - sharp details on the clothing, the beautiful rose, really nice posing, and well rendered faces.

So much care taken, even on the parts of their hair!

So nice to get box cards! We have Zhehan and Gong Jun's name on each of their cards, respectively, and the name of the figs, Summer Together.

Material: Resin and a rose

Fig Count: (+2) 527

Scene Count: 38

Rating: Happy 4th Anniversary!

[link to the Master Post Index]

[bigskydreaming]

I actually can not believe I've never posted this X-Men headcanon that turned into a whole treatment/outline, but for those few followers who know who Dallas Gibson aka Specter is, or Laynia Petrovna aka Darkstar, or just anything about Academy X in general.....enjoy! (You actually don't have to know anything about Dallas or Laynia to follow this, I don't think.)

Anyway, I give you:

THE GREAT MANIFESTO OF WHAT IF DALLAS GIBSON WAS THE SECRET LOVE CHILD ONE NIGHT STAND CHILD OF BOBBY DRAKE AND LAYNIA PETROVNA: A CRACK FIC THEORY OUTLINE SOMETHING IN THREE PARTS

(Like I GENUINELY thought I had posted this before but found this in my drafts so apparently not. Anyway, I feel like this is particularly relevant again after Laynia was just brought out of comic book limbo as the head of a mutant mercenary group in the wake of Krakoa's fall. She's massively OOC in the one issue of X-Factor released so far and I don't like it, but it did reignite this particular headcanon so....there's that I guess).

Anyway! My treatment for revealing Dallas Gibson as actually being Dallas Drake, secret child of Bobby Drake the Iceman and Laynia Petrovna the Darkstar from when they were on the Champions together when they were both only nineteen.....without actually destroying continuity to make it work!

A triptych of linked five issue minis:

ICEMAN AND DARKSTAR: SHADOW GAMES

ICEMAN: A HOUSE OF DRAGONS

DARKSTAR: SONS OF SNOW AND SHADOW

So I have approximately 80 different pitches for what to do with Iceman at any given time, but let's go with one that I know would never in a million years happen purely because the X-Office will never let the 05 be the ages I perceive them as which is mid to late thirties at this point. Like I picture Bobby as around thirty-six or so, though for him it actually makes sense for him to be eternally portrayed as LOOKING like he's in his early 20s, since that was the age he first transmuted to his ice form and so makes sense to be his default template/molecular blueprint his power resets him to every time he has to make a new body from scratch.

Anyway, wildly self-indulgent pitch ahead, which ties into a cracky headcanon I've had since Academy X, a couple OCs, and combines my ideas for giving Bobby an antagonist of his own, more characters to interact with other than major X-Men so his story beats aren't reliant on whatever's going on with other X-Men and who's available,  and gives him concrete reasons to want to level up quickly in terms of how much social influence he wields among mutantkind, take more prominent/proactive stances on things, etc. While still leaving room for him to be goofy and always trying to use humor to seem more relatable, less threatening, etc.

So. I'm picturing this as a triptych like Sabretooth, three interlocked minis of five issues each that form a trilogy by the end.

First mini:

ICEMAN AND DARKSTAR: SHADOW GAMES

ISSUE ONE:

First issue opens with Bobby in his apartment in LA, sometime after he's left the most recent X-Men lineup and is back to living off of Krakoa. He's just gotten in and is going through his mail where he comes across a card with no return address. Opening it, he finds its a condolence card that says "Thinking of you on this anniversary of such a tragic day." His internal monologue, conveyed in caption boxes and a key element of this whole mini, shows he's totally confused by this. He has no idea why this date would hold any special significance, or who would have sent the card or why. (The specific date would just be somewhere around the date of publication, in a world where this actually got published, lol. Let's go with April 27th, for instance).

Deciding to just shrug it off as some weird thing, Bobby's basically just being moody for a page or two of reflection before Scott calls. They're trying to do better about keeping in touch even when they're not on the same team. Some generic catching up, and Bobby eventually mentions he's just been in a weird mood all day, to which Scott says he's not surprised. Turns out Scott's noticed that for as long as he can remember now, Bobby's ALWAYS in a shitty mood every time April 27th rolls around. Yes, Scott being Scott, after years of Bobby being weird around the same time every year, he eventually narrowed it down to its epicenter. This very day. Bobby is both weirded out and touched by Scott's attention to something so specific about Bobby...more attentive than even Bobby himself. When they hang up, he's still clueless about why today would be such a big deal to him, but apparently there's a pattern. That card might not have been so random after all.

Confused & uncomfortable now, Bobby decides to get out of the house & just do hero stuff. That always makes him feel better. He helps put out some fires, divert a tidal wave, gating back and forth across the planet, restless. The whole issue, even as he uses his usual banter to make the people he helps feel at ease in the wake of whatever catastrophe they were just saved from, his internal monologue shows he's second-guessing himself constantly, being his own worst enemy, criticizing every choice he makes about his saves, how he could've done things better, etc. Things come to a head when he intervenes at a protest - I don't have a specific cause in mind but ideally something non mutant related - as a group attacks the protesters until Bobby drops in to protect them.  

The protesters thank him but are pretty cynical about the whole thing. They note that this happens constantly and most of those same people will be back stirring up trouble and violence at another event like this down the line. They hope for change for the better but point out that some people never will, because they're not interested in better. They're happy with their hate. Bobby reflects on what they said, and here's where his thoughts start to take a particularly dark turn. He thinks of some of the ways his powers could be used to ensure those ppl never hurt anyone again, how the full potential of his powers include a lot of lethal options, and why shouldn't he use them when its true most of these ppl will just commit heinous acts in the future, and he might not be around to protect their victims next time. He even reflects on how he's used some of those darker options in the past, so its not like it'd be crossing a line he hasn't already....

Disturbed by the fact that the only reason he can think of not to go there is he's a hero and heroes don't do that, he just wants to be anywhere else in a hurry so he skips heading for a gate and does something he does only rarely....turns himself into mist and starts to disperse, to teleport somewhere far away, but as he does he gets the weirdest feeling, like his spread out consciousness is brushing up against someone else's. He's not alone he realizes. And he stops and recoalesces right there and talking to the empty air he demands that someone show themselves. A man appears out of nowhere, laughing.

Stranger: Your observational skills are a lot sharper than they used to be, Drake. Back in the day, you had no idea when I was around.

Bobby: Who are you and why are you talking like I'm supposed to know who you are? I've never seen you before in my life.

Stranger: Wow, it sucks to realize you left way less of an impression on someone than they left on you. I guess it makes sense though. I mean, when you KILLED me almost twenty years ago, this very day - that was obviously a big deal for me, but hey, I've been out of the loop awhile so what do I know? Maybe it was just another Tuesday for you.

Bobby: Are you the one who sent me that card earlier? Who the hell are you and what kind of game are you playing?

Stranger: Same one we were playing all those years ago, Bob. Before you got all pissy and flipped the board before I got a chance to make my next move. But thanks to the wonders of Krakoan resurrection, now we can pick up right where we left off. It really is a miracle, isn't it?

Bobby: Well maybe you should check with the Five and make sure they didn't bring you back with a few screws loose, because I'm pretty sure I'd remember this if it was actually me you were playing this game with.

Stranger: Maybe you just forgot. Or who knows? Maybe someone made you forget.

Bobby: Okay, yeah, I'm bored now. Time to put you on ice.

He starts icing the area around the stranger, intending to trap him in a block of ice, but the stranger just laughs and turns incorporeal, becoming a transparent outline hovering above the street....so to anyone who hadn't been watching their conversation - like the very protesters Bobby had saved earlier - it looked like Bobby was just furiously creating some kind of ice attack that didn't seem to be aimed at anyone...other than them. The now ghost-like stranger zips over to the crowd and starts weaving among them, seeming to whisper in a bunch of peoples' ears....and before long, the crowd that had just been saved from one attack and were primed not to just sit down and take another, were ready to choose fight over flight...and all of that fight now seemed focused directly on Bobby.

He constructs some ice barriers to just keep them at bay, not really worried they'll hurt him and more concerned about not hurting them, when the stranger's ghost form swirls around Bobby, hovering above his shoulder and now whispering in his ear. But there's no dialogue in the stranger's speech bubble....just caption boxes displaying Bobby's internal monologue....and now calling into question every single box earlier in the issue.

Caption box: Isn't it surreal how the right words whispered in the right ears can dramatically change a person's perception of something....or someone? How easy it is to change peoples' courses....even the course of their entire life?

Caption box: And fear, well, fear's one of the best motivators there is. So much easier to get someone to listen to you when they're afraid of something else.

Caption box: But maybe you can't really relate to that. A guy as powerful as you, you're probably not afraid of much these days.

Caption box: That wasn't always true though, was it? This take you back at all? Remind you of when you were just a kid, and there was a mob gunning for you just for the crime of being mutant and vulnerable? I bet you were scared then.

Caption box: Considering what a guy like you could do if he were scared enough, if the right person used the right words as the spark to ignite all that fear....the world's probably pretty lucky that Saint Xavier was there to be the voice you listened to back then, huh. Y'know, instead of someone like Magneto or Apocalypse being the ones to tell traumatized, impressionable little you what to do with all that fear and anger you felt....

Caption box: Do you ever think about that, Drake? Wonder if all that separates you from the worst of the worst is you had the right voice in your ear at the right time? That maybe there's nothing special about you at all, nothing innately noble, heroic.

Caption box: That you were just....lucky?

Caption box: Food for thought. Anyway, I gotta run for now, but I'll be seeing you, Bob.

Caption box: We have so much to catch up on.

Then its just Bobby left keeping the crowd at bay with his ice structures, him visibly shutting down, trying not to think too much and just running on instinct, until a hand reaches down from above and snatches him up into the air, until the streets are just a speck below them. Bobby looks up and to his shock its Laynia Petrovna aka Darkstar, his old friend and teammate from back when he was on the Champions as a teenager. The issue closes with her saying: "Hello, Bobby. I'd say its nice to see you and all the usual pleasantries, but we don't have much time. And we need to talk about our son."

ISSUE TWO   

This issue switches to Laynia's POV with her internal monologue in caption boxes, and picks up with them having teleported somewhere secluded via Laynia's powers (she's much more practiced using hers to teleport than Bobby is using his that way). This issue goes back and forth between past and present, as during Laynia's narration of past events they're shown as if they're happening in real time.

Bobby's pointing out that they were never together, and considering she was the one who turned him down, you'd think she'd be aware of that. Laynia responds that no, they were never a couple, but they did sleep together once and once only....she'd been feeling particularly down about her ex-boyfriend Yuri after running into him, it was a rebound thing for her and she never hid that but Bobby took it to mean more than it did anyway and acted a fool about it, aligning with their canon interactions at the very end of their Champions run, before getting on the same page and they went back to just being friends.

Except, Laynia says, then she found out she was pregnant, and he flew to Russia to join her and decide what to do together, while everyone else thought he was still at UCLA. He doesn't remember any of this, because blocks were put in their memories, hiding everything related to this. But it did happen, and they do have a son. She'll explain everything, but they need to keep moving around, as she doesn't want the man who just confronted Bobby to overhear any of this and its very hard to detect when he's around. Their best option is to keep on the move, teleporting frequently and not staying anywhere long enough for him to track where they are.

Bobby: Oh crap. HE'S not our son, is he?

Laynia: Hell no.

Bobby: Phew, I was worried we had a Stryfe situation for a second there. I am barely holding it together as is and I am NOT equipped to handle an evil Bobby Jr. from the future.

Laynia reaffirms that he is definitely not their son, but he is the reason for much of what happened back when they were eighteen. They only ever knew him by his moniker, 'Doubting Thomas' and honestly were never sure when exactly he started watching them and messing with their heads. That's his MO. His power lets him turn from flesh and blood into a form made solely of psychic energy...an astral ghost that's invisible, immaterial and can travel via the astral plane. But his only power to affect the material world in that form lies in telepathy. He can project thoughts into someone's mind and its almost impossible to keep him out or tell his intrusions from ordinary thoughts.

She's not sure how he'd fare against other telepaths, but at least with non-psychics, even the best psychic shielding or anti-telepath technology isn't a guarantee against him. Because he doesn't try to break into minds, or even sneak past mental defenses. He just surveils his targets, watching them invisibly, learning all he can about them, and then he looks for cracks in whatever mental shields they have. Tiny gaps here and there that he can just whisper into, slipping a thought in amongst the chaos and chatter generated by someone's own mind.

All of which means they never were sure where their own natural fears and paranoia ended, and his whispering began. They were eighteen, she reminds Bobby, already freaking out about this giant life change neither were sure they were ready for, even if they did keep the baby...and neither of them was an ordinary civilian. They were powerful mutants with lots of enemies....from day one, they were concerned that their child would be born with a target on their back just from that. And then there was the fact that one of the things they'd always bonded over was resentment for how early they felt their childhoods ended.

Laynia and her twin brother Nikolai were taken from their parents at birth, and raised separately with government agents for foster parents. They were always intended to be mutant operatives for their government, their lives scripted out for them, and their training began in their early teens. Laynia didn't even know she had a twin brother until she was in her twenties.

And Bobby had always quietly nursed resentment for being put out into the field at the same time as the rest of the 05, all years older than him and with a lot more focus from the Professor. Scott was his protege, a tactical genius, Jean was his preferred pupil in terms of power development, Hank was a bonafide genius, and Warren was a millionaire playboy, a natural spokesman and inevitable future celebrity. Bobby was just Bobby though, with no awareness of his full potential, and the only one the Professor didn't seem to have any real purpose for or interest in. Like he was tacked on as a spare, his presence more of an afterthought than intentional.

So especially in his late teens, after the 05 went their separate ways, Bobby had always been bothered by the fact that he'd gone through all the same traumas and hardships as the rest on their various missions, but always wondering what he was even doing there when it didn't even seem like there was any reason he was supposed to be. Privately he'd always wanted someone - his parents, the Professor, even the older 05 - to question whether there was really nobody else Xavier could have been sending out to fight Magneto, than a fifteen year old too afraid of being abandoned to say no on his own behalf. After all, the issue was complicated by the fact that when his parents weren't fully on board with Bobby going to the Institute, Xavier mindwiped them into thinking he was just at boarding school, and it was only when Bobby was eighteen that the Professor restored their full awareness of what Bobby had been doing for years.

All of which played into why Bobby and Laynia didn't tell anyone about the pregnancy, even their closest friends. It started out as them just putting it off, wanting to be more sure of their own thoughts on this before someone else tried to make the decision what to do for them, but by the time Laynia gave birth, they'd fully isolated themselves, paranoid that Xavier or the Red Room would take the baby and just make them forget all about it. And problem is, as Laynia put it, they couldn't tell how much of that was Doubting Thomas whispering all the right things to ramp up their anxieties and specific fears.

And obviously someone did mess with their memories anyway, Bobby points out crankily. This all is partly meant to seed two ongoing character arcs for Bobby in the future....the first, his awareness of how often his mind and memories have been messed with over the years, by enemies and allies alike, to the point he's honestly not sure how much of 'him' is really even him, and how much he's just the end result of people just editing his mind whenever he started heading in a direction they didn't want him to. With how long the memories of their time travel trip were hidden, now these missing memories, what other holes could exist in his memories without him ever having a clue?

And the second character arc is his misgivings about Xavier and the role he played in Bobby's childhood. Knowing what he knows now of his omega potential, aware that all the biggest developments and learning curves with his powers happened when Bobby WASN'T Xavier's student, Bobby's increasingly convinced that Xavier never trusted Bobby with his own power, and while he might not have actively stunted his growth, he certainly didn't help or encourage it the way he did his other students. The foundation is there for Bobby to wonder if the only reason Xavier ever even recruited him was to keep him from falling into anyone else's hands and becoming a threat.

As Laynia reminds him of what they were like back then and how they viewed things, things fall into place for Bobby and its very easy for him to see how they could have ended up hiding this from anyone in Xavier's orbit, etc...and this starts to become less abstract for him. It wasn't that he thought she was lying at any point, but its hitting him now....he has a son, and someone made him forget. He's someone who has always yearned for family that won't judge or condemn him, leave him, always been determined to be everything his own father wasn't and nothing like him, and yet he has a son who's grown up without him. Whose name he doesn't even know.

He does know his son though, it turns out. At least somewhat. Its one of Bobby's former students before M-Day. Dallas Gibson aka Specter. He has no idea who he really is, Laynia says, but the parents who died when Dallas was ten were his adoptive parents. But he was born Dallas Drake, as Petrovna wasn't even Laynia's real last name and she had no idea what it originally was. Heir to the merged powersets of both his biological parents, with his father's elemental form but made from his mother's signature Darkforce energies.

As for why Laynia remembers when Bobby doesn't....she didn't originally. But then years ago (during the Morrison run), she was possessed by one of Weapon X's most dangerous creations, the Huntsman. However, thanks to how her powers were designed to let her mind travel through the Darkforce Dimension to do things like teleport, when she was possessed, her mind tried to flee into that dimension. When Fantomex killed her, he only killed her body, and her mental tether to it. The shock and trauma of her physical death broke down the barriers around her memories, and they all came flooding back. Problem was, she only existed as a consciousness drifting aimlessly in the Darkforce Dimension.

But then Dallas started learning more about his powers and growing them during his time at the Academy. And his powerset also includes the ability to make shadow golems similar to the ice golems his father makes. But he didn't realize this as the first time he made one, with Darkforce energy being the clay his golem was sculpted from...Laynia was able to use that as a doorway into the physical world. She inhabited his shadow golem as her vessel, the way a future Iceman's golem once split off from him and became a separate entity. So Dallas never realized his newfound shadow friend started out as something he made unconsciously...he just knew that it seemed to have its own sentience from the jump, was a friend and protector who'd show up whenever he needed them. That friend and protector just happened to be his biological mother, watching over him the only way she could.

Until M-Day. When Dallas was depowered, Laynia lost her connection to the physical world and was stuck again in the Darkforce Dimension....until her brother Nikolai made a bargain with Immortus that led to her full resurrection. Finally she was back, and she remembered everything. But also knew Bobby remembered none of this. And so for the next couple years she just checked in on Dallas periodically but kept her distance, because she not only remembered her son...she also remembered why they were so desperate to hide his connection to them that they covered up their own memories of him ever existing.

At the end of the issue, they arrive at the hideout of the Russian mutant underground, a community of mutants who mistrust Krakoa and its leaders, but aren't on board with Mikhail Rasputin and his faction either. Laynia brought Bobby to the person who originally hid their memories and locked them away - at their own request....Bobby's idea, in fact - Alexi Garnoff aka Blind Faith, a telepath Bobby first met in his X-Factor days. But who was so quick to trust Bobby, because turns out that wasn't actually the first time Alexi remembered meeting him.

As Bobby reels from the reveal that this particular manipulation of his mind had been something he himself asked for, Alexi says he can erase all his work and return his own memories of all this, and Laynia warns him that remembering it all will hurt. Because they have a son, yes, Dallas Gibson aka Dallas Drake aka Specter. But twins run in her family.

And for a brief - too brief - window of time, they had not one son, but two.

ISSUE THREE

This issue returns to Bobby's POV and internal monologue, and takes place almost entirely in the past, or in Bobby's mindscape. He tells Alexi to do his thing, he wants to know, NEEDS to know everything. The walls come down and in his mind, Bobby finds himself standing at the start of a giant labyrinth made of ice. He sees a little boy running through it and gives chase, needing to catch up to him, desperate even as he's aware he's running on autopilot, more instinct than knowledge. He's never seen this boy before - he's not even a real memory himself. But he knows what an older Dallas looks like, at least. And he's sure this is what his mind imagines a Dmitri older than what he actually remembers might look like, and he desperately wants a closer look. But this Dima stays forever just out of range because his mind doesn't actually have a clear image of an older Dmitri to conjure, and up close, the illusion would be too obvious, and the loss all the more real for that.

Following the boy through the labyrinth, he sees memories unveil themselves on the ice walls around them. He remembers Laynia telling him she was pregnant, their agitated debates over the months that followed as they agonized over what to do, how to keep the baby safe - babies, once they found out it was twins. He sees the day the twins were born, relives them deciding to name the elder twin Dallas, after the city where they first met, before Laynia even joined the Champions, and the younger they named Dmitri, or Dima for short....after the only teacher Laynia ever felt actually valued her for herself instead of seeing her as a weapon being honed.

He remembers them leaving the hospital and hiding for a few weeks at a secluded cabin their old teammate the Black Widow found for them....she was the only one they told, figuring nobody could keep a secret better than her, and how they wavered and grew closer to caving and letting their closest friends and teammates help them figure out how to keep the twins safe. Sees flashbacks of him playing with the boys while Laynia watches fondly, and vice versa. Relives as he - still little older than a child himself - puts them in their crib and tells them not to be scared, talks about how his grandfather used to have a saying: "all Drakes are dragons," and making a dragon sculpture that catches the light to act as their nightlight.

And then he relives the day they woke up to find the crib empty and the twins missing. The first time they met Doubting Thomas, who left them an easy trail to follow because he wanted them to find him, wanted a confrontation. Bobby and Laynia had descended on the facility they tracked him to with the full fury of midnight and winter at their most destructive, and once inside they separated as they found the twins had been split up and taken in different directions. Laynia went after Dallas, who she could feel faintly, an early sign of his link to the Darkforce Dimension that she shares - second generation mutants always tend to manifest early - and Bobby went after Dmitri.

Doubting Thomas was waiting though, and the villain backstory reveal unfolded. The Professor, the Hellfire Club, etc....they weren't the only people who went around looking for young mutants to mold, seeing their potential. He grew up under the thumb of a woman even he only knows as Mother Nurture, a sadist with unguessable motivations even to her lackeys that she raised from childhood....to be their worst selves. Apparently she claims to be a precog, who knew what mutant children would grow up to be great heroes or positive influences on the world....which appears to be contrary to her agenda, whatever that is....as she targets kids who COULD grow up to be great forces for change, change for the better, and picks the ones with the brightest potential to stamp out and corrupt, turn to darkness. Her obsession with proving that there are no real heroes, that anyone can be twisted into the villain was apparently a recurring theme of Doubting Thomas' childhood, so when she assigned him the task of abducting the Drake twins when they were still months away from even being born, Thomas fixated on Bobby and Laynia during his surveillance of them, and developed an obsession of his own.

It was the first time he'd ever targeted superhero parents, let alone ones close enough in age to him that he could project onto them, see them as an inverted reflection of his own life. And even as he prepared to take the Drake twins at the earliest opportunity, that was just his assignment. His obsession with Bobby and Laynia was wholly personal, as he clearly became consumed with a need to prove to himself that they weren't better than him, that he could have BEEN them in another life, with better influences....that they would have been no different than he if they'd been in his shoes.

In fact, he was convinced there was such a slim margin of difference between them that he could topple Iceman from his heroic perch with just the slightest push. Bobby refutes this, saying he's nothing like him, but that's when Thomas says he lied. Mother Nurture actually only sent him after one Drake boy. She wasn't expecting two. Apparently, one of them was never destined to live all that long to begin with.

The issue never actually shows Dmitri, just Bobby breaking down, cradling the swaddled figure to his chest. He's dead-eyed when he looks up, frozen tear tracks on his cheeks as one icy drop falls to the ground and shatters.

Bobby: Guess you were right about me. Congrats. You win.

And then over the next two panels, Thomas flash-freezes before he can react, his entire body frozen on a cellular level...and then he shatters.

We only see glimpses of Laynia's horrified reaction when she arrives with Dallas in her arms, as Bobby hurries past those memories, he has them back but he doesn't want to relive those moments at all...and there are more snapshots of barely glimpsed memories of Bobby and Laynia reducing the entire facility to nothing but an empty crater. Bobby arrives at the memory of Laynia and Bobby, fueled by trauma and desperation, panicking about this Mother Nurture sending someone else after Dallas, their original fears reignite, the list of people who might want a baby like Dallas for their own agendas seems endless....culminating in them giving Dallas to Black Widow to place with a family she trusts to raise him safely. But Bobby notes despondently that even with all that, it'd take someone like Xavier or with similar resources all of five minutes to find a powerful mutant that young, if they ever got so much as a hint about him from Bobby or Laynia's minds.

Which is when Bobby decides: "In a world of telepaths, Cerebros and Wolverines, the only foolproof way to keep a secret...is to not even know it yourself.

They both agree, and seek out a telepath unaffiliated with any team or organization: Alexi Garnoff. Which brings us back to the present.

April 27th. The anniversary of the day one son died, and they made the decision to give up the other for his own safety.

ISSUE FOUR

With both of their memories fully restored, they're on the same page about what happens now: They have to find a way to keep the resurrected Doubting Thomas from figuring out who and where Dallas is. If he truly wants revenge, or if he still just feels compelled to fulfill his original assignment, Dallas is his real target. But they're fairly certain the extreme lengths they went to all those years ago at least did their job. Even with Bobby unaware of Thomas' existence, let alone vendetta against him, the latter was able to stalk him ever since his resurrection without finding even a hint of Dallas' location or identity...he would have had better luck stalking Laynia probably, but they assumed his fixation on Bobby for killing him, along with Laynia steering clear of Krakoa (ironically because she was worried about the many telepaths there picking up on her secret), Thomas concentrated his efforts on following Bobby and might not have even realized that unlike him, Laynia DID already know who and where Dallas was.

Thomas must have come out into the open in the way he did specifically to push Bobby to regain his memories, figuring then it would only be a matter of time before Bobby slipped up enough for Thomas to zero in on his target....so now they had to figure out how to keep that from happening, while now having a whole new host of reasons not to want to advertise they had a son. The last thing they want is to keep him out of Thomas' clutches just to put him on Sinister's radar, especially now that they know Bobby's an omega and how 'highly prized' they are as resources....which would no doubt make his offspring of interest to various villains.

Not to mention, Laynia's got her own misgivings about Krakoa. She's FURIOUS about the Crucible - Dallas was among the earliest to sign up and go through it, desperate to get his powers back and return to his place among his former classmates. Not only does she consider it needless trauma of the very sort they sacrificed so much to protect their son from, Laynia is territorial. Dallas' name and powers were pretty much the only thing he got from his biological parents, that they were able to give him as his birthright, the upside to all the downs that came with being their kid, and Laynia's pissed as hell that Bobby's new government had the gall to demand their son EARN BACK what was always his and that losing had ALREADY been a trauma all its own.

This in turn sows the seeds for Bobby's development into a more proactive role in mutant society, as well as future conflict with a lot of the personalities that put the Crucible in place initially, as he's forced to confront why he didn't have more problems with it in the first place, or at least not enough that he wasn't able to justify its existence. Has he gotten so used to assuming others know better than him, that he no longer bothers trying to weigh the morality of things himself? Is he comfortable with what it says about him that it took having a personal stake - his son having gone through it - to make him sit up and think hey, that was fucked up?

Meanwhile, Thomas has not been idle, and is using reports of Bobby seemingly attacking innocent protesters the other day to stir up doubts in him among any influential mutants or X-Men he can whisper suspicions to, without them being aware of his presence/influence. Bobby is 'strongly encouraged' by Xavier to return to Krakoa to clear up the confusion, and when he refuses, that just adds more fuel for Thomas to work with. Plus he uses all the paranoia Beast has drummed up over the past couple years to cast suspicion on Bobby suddenly being inseparable from Laynia, a known Russian operative who has no allegiances to Krakoa, while also stirring mutants in Mikhail's camp to view Laynia's choice of companions as suspicious, which threatens her work with the Russian mutant underground and her efforts to keep them safe and hidden as well.

Finally they decide the best way to deal with Thomas is to lure him in and get Alexi to do to him what he did to Bobby and Laynia years ago. Hide away all Thomas' memories of things related to them and give him a tailored memory of how he died and why.

ISSUE FIVE

Most of this issue is just Thomas, Laynia and Bobby all playing cat and mouse with each other...Thomas having his own schemes even as the other two try to implement theirs, until its hard to tell who is the hunter and who is the hunted. Bobby and Laynia are still teleporting as often as they can, both to keep him from sneaking up on them and poisoning their thoughts or manipulating their plans, as well as to evade various friends and teammates who are now seeking them out, concerned by their behavior and increasingly susceptible to distrusting them as they refuse to give any hints as to what the hell they're doing.

It should be very clear that Bobby and Laynia are NOT acting wholly rationally here, and they're both aware of it. Doubting Thomas is GOOD at what he does, and he's familiar enough with them and their sore spots, from intel he gained long ago still being relevant here and now, particularly with how recently their memories were refocused on those days....that they're sure even the tiniest or briefest amounts of access to them is enough for him to skew their own paranoia in extreme ways. Not to mention.....they're much older now than they were when they made the choice to hide Dallas in the way they did, and they made that decision at the absolute height of their grief, fear and anxiety. They're second-guessing every choice they made back then, as well as the ones they're making now, and they're NOT sure that staying away, doing this on their own, not confiding in anyone or pulling them in....they're not doing all that because they're convinced its the right move.

They're staying the course because they don't have any idea what the right move is, and until they do, doubling down on their previous choices is because there's no take-backs, no undoing things once the secret is out. They can't afford to decide that was the wrong move after they've done it, when that will do them no good.

So they stick to their plan and try to get Thomas in Alexi's range, but with his guard down enough for the other telepath to act. The POV shifts back and forth between Bobby and Laynia's, with a lot of their internal doubts about everything they've done, the thoughts Thomas raised in Bobby back in Issue #1, the ideological battle Thomas imagines exists between him and the heroes he resents so much - this back-and-forth spans most of the issue and keeps these themes front and center, until ultimately Bobby and Thomas face off again.

Bobby surprises Thomas by using his powers in an unexpected way....he makes dozens of golems spread out all over the place and then shuffles his actual consciousness through them one at a time, 'possessing' one golem as his vessel, his ice form before leaping into another one. Thomas can't get a bead on him, keeps chasing his own tail trying to keep up with Bobby's constant shell game in an attempt to find the 'real one,' where Bobby's actually vulnerable.

Finally, Bobby makes it clear he's not going to be playing this game with Thomas anymore, because thing is, the point Thomas is so obsessed with proving, wanting Bobby to know he's no better than him, is capable of terrible things....Bobby flat out just doesn't care.

Bobby: I remember everything now, Thomas. That's what you wanted, right? For me to relive all that, make sure I can't hide from it? That I have to feel every bit of pain I shut away back then because I couldn't deal? Because the truth is, as much as that was to protect my son it was also to protect me from everything I WANTED to forget? I remember. I remember my kids, losing them....I remember killing you. But I also remembered something else, that you probably didn't factor in.

Thomas: And what's that?

Bobby: I remembered that I'm not sorry.

He goes on the attack, just destruction every which way you look so that Thomas is forced to stay on the defensive, keeping himself immaterial and jaunting around because there's no safe space for him to land, so to speak.

Bobby: The Five can bring you back a thousand times and I'll kill you a thousand and one, if that's what it takes to keep my son safe from you. Here's what you never got. The whole hero vs villain, right or wrong, good or evil thing you're so obsessed with? I just don't care, man. That's never been why I do any of this. I know I'm flawed, too flawed to ever be 'truly good' but by the same token, I know there's enough good in me I'm not truly bad either. I've done terrible things before and I'll do them again, because at the end of the day, I'm not trying to be a hero. I'm just trying to save people where I can.

Bobby: Its about priorities, see. Its people that matter to me, if I'm helping or hurting. And I'll hurt someone to help someone I think deserves it more and maybe that's wrong but thing is I'm not making that choice based on if its right or wrong. I'm making it based on who I think needs help and what do I have to do to help them. Let someone else figure out the scorecard, I'm just trying to make sure the person I'm protecting makes it home safe.

Bobby: And you? You don't matter. My son matters to me. That's all that matters here. I choose him, no matter what, every time, and whatever that means, whatever I have to do to choose him, or because I choose him? I'll deal with it. If I make the wrong choices, if they backfire and get him hurt or they're not what he would want - that's the stuff that can keep me up at night. But if choosing him means killing an asshole like you to keep him safe?

Bobby: Don't worry about my virtue. I'll cope.

With that, Thomas makes his retreat, tail between his legs. They weren't able to implement their plan to have Alexi erase his memories, but they don't consider this to be over. He'll be back, they'll have more opportunities to make that happen. At least this time he was the one doing the running.

But as the finale of the issue, Thomas adapts and changes the game. He waits until Bobby's back on Krakoa, meeting with Xavier and other X-Men about recent events and trying to say as little as possible...and then Thomas picks that place and time to make his first public appearance on Krakoa since he was resurrected as just another name on the resurrection queue. Nobody knew who he was then or cared that he didn't seem interested in staying on the island, claiming amnesty and official Krakoan citizenship....but he does that now in the most dramatic way possible....as he turns to Bobby and blatantly advertises they have history.

Thomas: And in the spirit of new beginnings, I just want to say I forgive you for killing me eighteen years ago. Fresh starts for everyone, right?

And with that bombshell - and the fact that one look at Bobby tells everyone present that he's not denying it - he saunters off, leaving Bobby with more questions to answer but no closer to being able to fully disclose what he's keeping hidden....which Thomas can still reveal to anyone at any time. What he did reveal was enough to ensure there was no chance now of changing his memories of their shared past....not after he dragged them both into the spotlight and made sure they were linked so if anything did happen to Thomas or seem awry with him....there'd be no doubt who was Suspect Number One. And that was always going to come with the question of why.

The mini ends with a final page where Bobby's finally done talking w/the QC for now, and he's just standing on the beach far enough away from where a bunch of the Academy X kids are having a bonfire - with Dallas right in the thick of them - that it wouldn't be obvious that his sole reason for being out there was to catch a glimpse of him, even if only from a distance. Elsewhere, Laynia is browsing through a shop and notices a stuffed dragon similar to one flashbacks showed Dmitri cuddling with as a baby. She picks it up, hesitating as if debating whether to purchase it, with the final panel being of her back as she walks out of the shop, the stuffed animal still sitting where she'd found it.

ICEMAN: A HOUSE OF DRAGONS

The second mini of three, this one introduces Dallas as a POV character, still oblivious of everything readers learned in the first mini. It explores his feelings about being depowered on M-Day and his survivor's guilt from having left the Institute and been relatively safe compared to those who stayed, when other depowered mutants like David still stayed and fought for mutants. His best friends, Julian and Brian Cruz, insist that nobody thinks less of him for it and he was a minor, it wasn't like anybody was really consulting him on whether he wanted to stay or go at the time, but he can't shake the feeling he should have done more. Its what drove him to go through the Crucible so early on, and its what drives his determination to make it onto the X-Men team.

Seeds are also planted for later, via some brief scenes that reveal that while depowered and living away from the Institute, Dallas started exploring magic as an alternative to his powers, since there are various arts that access the same Darkforce Dimension his powers connected him to. He's no longer pursuing it as feverishly as he did while depowered, but it remains an interest as he's determined to never be powerless again, whether he has his mutant abilities or not.

He also has several chance encounters with Iceman, who he really only knows as his old math teacher, and no idea they're not so chance encounters at all.

Meanwhile, Bobby and Laynia are meeting more regularly off the island as they argue about whether or not they should tell Dallas the truth - he has a right to know and he's old enough to make his own choices about what he wants or doesn't want done in the name of keeping him safe. Their various rationales are undercut by the underlying awareness that both of them are afraid of his reaction and worried he won't understand why they did it and might even hate them for the choices they made.

At the same time, they're trying to figure out how to even go about resurrecting Dmitri. They know from Joanna Beaubier-Jinadu's example that despite his young age, Dima could still theoretically be resurrected....they just have no idea how to ask the Five or X-Factor to look for him in the Waiting Room without disclosing everything about Dallas at the same time...which brings them back to how do we tell Dallas.

Ultimately, they wait too long and Thomas takes the choice out of their hands. While Dallas is in the Mojoverse along with various other Academy X kids who have been regular presences there while taking advantage of the treaty between Krakoa and Mojo to try and get some Krakoan media entertainment off the ground,

It turns out that while Bobby was worried about Doubting Thomas approaching Sinister, Shaw or one of the other notorious mutants on Krakoa as part of his schemes, he went a different direction entirely. He approached Mojo with his proposal for a must-see show that would have all of Krakoa glued to the nearest TV screen.

And so what was supposed to be just a random trip to the Mojoverse leads to Dallas being trapped as the very confused and unwilling star of what Mojo describes as the ultimate reality show: DALLAS GIBSON, THIS IS YOUR LIFE.

The show proceeds to take viewers - and Dallas - through a recreation of his entire life, including all the parts he didn’t know about. Starting before his birth even, with Krakoans flocking to their TVs just as Thomas promised, as soon the bombshell claim of who his biological parents are drops and word spreads throughout the island. Even X-Men close to Bobby have no idea what to make of this at first and they start trying to figure out how to shut it down and figure things out from there, but it’s a futile effort, honestly.

Even if they could get Mojo to shut it down right away, the damage was already done - and its clear that nobody is more interested in seeing what comes next than Dallas himself. Seemingly having forgotten that everyone is watching this, he’s half in denial, half captivated by what he’s watching. It seems impossible but that doesn’t stop him from having a lot of confused and conflicting feelings as he watches literal surveillance footage Thomas had installed to spy on the much younger Bobby and Laynia as they interacted with their newborn sons.

Much of this is used to flesh out flashback scenes from the first mini, where Bobby and Laynia’s POVs of these early days were shown, stringing together a timeline without reproducing the same scenes exactly. In contrast, some of these scenes do directly recreate scenes seen previously in Bobby and Laynia’s memories….but now reproduced for Dallas’ viewing by objective technology devoid of the emotions layered around his parents’ actual memories of that time.

The video retelling includes footage from security cameras at the facility Thomas had retreated to for their final fateful confrontation years ago, similarly providing a stark and explicit view of Bobby and Laynia’s rampage through the facility and Bobby’s unapologetic killing of Thomas. It’s a side of Bobby few had ever seen before and raises more than a few eyebrows while answering the questions many of them had had ever since Thomas made his dramatic entrance to Krakoan society at the end of the first mini.

Bobby meanwhile started racing for Mojoworld the second Rogue called him and told him to get there fast and laid out what was going on. But it still took long enough for him to navigate Mojoworld’s confusing layout that he only smashed his way onto the ‘set’ Dallas was trapped on in time to see his eighteen year old self hand an infant Dallas over to the Black Widow onscreen.

One look at Bobby, not hiding behind his ice form and with pain and remorse writ large all over his face, told Dallas (and everyone else) everything they needed to know about how true or not all this was.

But before Bobby can even attempt to figure out what to say, Mojo calls everyone’s attention back to the screens, as he announces there’s a plot twist featuring never-before-seen-footage from that first tragic April 27th.

The screen jumps to more security camera footage from Thomas’ facility….but the time stamp puts this at just before Bobby & Laynia’s arrival. Bobby (and Laynia who has arrived on Krakoa for the first time, as soon as she learned what was happening) watch in shock as Thomas hands Dmitri off to a lackey and instructs him to get offsite before the two arrive. Onscreen, Thomas says if he’s there’s one thing he’s figured out about Bobby & Laynia, its that they’ll never stop searching for one of their babies so long as they’re still alive….so if they’re convinced this one is dead and the other one is taken to Mother Nurture as she instructed him, they’ll focus all their efforts on trying to reclaim that one. Let her deal with that Thomas sniffs derisively. I have different plans for this one.

Of course, those plans never came to fruition, Mojo narrates. He underestimated just how….fatally Bobby would react to the simulacrum he believed to be his now dead son. He was never able to follow up with the lackey who took the real Dmitri, and his hired hand - who had not signed up for any of this and was freaking out once he saw what was left of the facility he’d last seen his boss in - well, he basically said fuck this and anonymously dropped Dmitri off at the nearest hospital.

Given the lengths Bobby & Laynia had gone to make sure their kids’ information WASN’T readily available anywhere when they were born, there was no indication of Dmitri’s real identity or where he came from, so he went into the system where he grew up in a series of homes that left him not especially traumatized, but at least distrustful of authority. Then Thomas revealed that when he’d first been resurrected, he’d tracked down Dmitri by finding his lackey and figuring out where he’d left the baby, retracing Dmitri’s path from there. Unlike Dallas, Thomas had always known exactly where to find Dmitri….but felt that particular reveal really needed the RIGHT moment.

And that moment apparently was now. Taking over narrator duties from Mojo, Thomas now speaks into the cameras, directly addressing Bobby and Laynia as he tells them Dmitri too manifested powers early and has had years to learn to make the most of his powerset. He apparently can access a mirror dimension that lets him teleport via reflective surfaces, use them as scrying portals by which he can see anything within visual range of that surface….and there’s one particularly interesting twist to his power. When Dmitri’s in the mirror dimension and watching events play out in the real world via a mirror or other surface….those events don’t just have to be in the present.

Time is wonky in the mirror dimension, as is often true of extradimensional spaces. Dmitri has limited precognitive abilities as he can use the mirror dimension to peer out of mirrors and watch what’ll happen in view of them at some point in various possible future timelines.

Apparently its tricky and unreliable, but its at least effective enough that Dmitri counts as a precog by anyone’s standard. And in the early days of Krakoa, when deciding whether to go there himself, he apparently glimpsed enough clandestine conversations to know that at that point, at least…..Krakoa was not a safe place to be a precog.

Onscreen, Thomas claps his hands energetically and addresses the entire audience now:

Thomas: So, to recap, somewhere out there is the teleporting precog son of an omega level mutant who’s already proven he’s willing to cross just about any line for this son’s sake. Said son is also primed to be extremely distrustful of Krakoa….and anyone who might be seen as an emissary of it. Like, oh say, X-Men. And to top it all off….he has absolutely no idea where he comes from nor does he have any reason to believe anyone who comes out of nowhere claiming to be his longlost parents or friends of theirs.

Thomas: Now I don’t know about all of you, but I think whomever were to find him first, and gain his trust, well - they could probably figure out any number of ways those combined factors could be useful.  

The screen flashes to a generic street camera view of a Dmitri Drake that looks a lot like his brother, just with brown hair instead of blond. There’s little to distinguish either his surroundings or Dmitri himself, but its clearly being presented as a starting point for potential searchers.

The final pages show an array of panels showing notorious mutant villains all leaning forward and studying the screen with interest. Sinister, Shaw, Selene (if she’s back yet), Abigail Brand, MLF members, Stryfe, Mystique and Destiny, the Fenris twins, etc.

The second mini concludes with Doubting Thomas winking into the camera, essentially staring straight at the reader.

Thomas: May the best influence win!

DARKSTAR: SONS OF SNOW AND SHADOW

Subtitled: “Run, Dima, Run!”

The third and final mini of the triptych is a chaotic free for all as basically everyone is hunting for Dmitri Drake, who has absolutely no idea why people are suddenly coming out of the woodwork looking for him but quickly decides he doesn’t want to be found.

Dallas is aggressively putting off dealing with how he feels about any of this and flat out shuts down any attempts Bobby or Laynia make to approach him. He’s totally fixated on being the one to find basically the only person in the universe who could understand how he’s feeling right now, and they can figure it out together then. He’s blatantly underestimating how much his longlost twin actually might NOT be able to relate to his specific perspective here, and vice versa. Something his friends and Academy X classmates try to caution him about while helping him on his search.

Surge: Oh shut up, dumbass. I don’t have to like you for you to be one of us, and any twin of yours is basically a two-for-one deal, so of course we’re going to do whatever it takes to keep your longlost brother from being exploited and used by adults who suck. I would include your parents in that but I actually think them hiding you from that musty bald bitch Xavier was probably the smartest thing any X-parent has done for their kid so I’m fighting down the impulse to be impressed.

Dallas: …thank you? I think?

Thus the Academy X kids actually take one of the most prominent roles in the mini as Dallas and his classmates’ search is heavily prioritized. There’s a strong focus on various kids who have history being exploited by older mutants and are now projecting heavily. Brian and Julian are of course Dallas’ closest confidantes through this, maybe Brian a little more than Julian as the latter flip-flops back and forth between calling Dallas a legacy and a nepo baby at different intervals. He can’t seem to decide if he thinks it’s something to be envied or not. Anole is unrepentant about ranking Dallas’ dad’s most infamous costumes and how hot or not he looked in each of them. He and Dallas never got along in school. Icarus absently notes that he’s pretty sure his brother and Dallas’ dad had a thing going on at one point.

They’re not quite all as helpful as they could be, is the takeaway. But they do feel the stakes and if any generation of mutants is prone to embracing gallows humor to cope, it’s the Academy X kids.

Elsewhere Bobby is conducting his own search with the help of numerous X-Men and friends, who are all trying to process everything they just learned and saw. Most of them are supportive and understanding, though a few are more abrasive about the sheer amount of stuff they didn’t know about him or even suspect.

Xavier tries to lecture Bobby about how they wouldn’t be in this situation if he had trusted them with this at any point in the past. Bobby shuts that down with gusto, emphasizing that Xavier was one of the people they were most concerned about hiding the twins from - and a good thing too, he points out, given what could have happened to Dallas if Onslaught had known about him when Dallas was still just a kid.

But then he gets downright chilly and makes it clear how and why his dynamic with many of them will be at least somewhat different from this point on…..Xavier especially.

He brings attention back to the not so minor detail of Xavier, Moira and Magneto apparently originally declaring Krakoa to be for all mutants….except for precogs.

Bobby: You keep saying this place is the culmination of everything we’ve fought for from the first day we put on an X-Men uniform, so I just wanna know, Professor. Why the HELL did I spend my whole life fighting for you to create your own personal vision of paradise….which apparently was meant to exclude one of my children, just because of what freaking power he was born with?

Xavier: Compromises had to be made in order to -

Bobby: Y’know, you’ve been using that line since I was fifteen and its tired, X. Every time we asked why you couldn’t just use your powers in ways you insisted would ethically compromise you - except for whenever you decided it was okay because it made things more convenient for you specifically.

Bobby: From day one you’ve kept your secrets from us, for a lot shadier reasons than I’ve ever had for keeping one, so you don’t need to be telling me I’m not entitled to my secrets. You have all these contingencies for if any of us go bad, while telling us nobody’s beyond redemption except for those times you decide Magneto is, or the Shadow King is.

Bobby: You know what the real problem with your dream has always been, Professor? It asks for a leap of faith that you’ve never been prepared to make yourself. You’re always asking us to line up and put it all on the line for the chance at a better world, no matter how realistic it is….but you’ve never actually put down your own cynicism or pragmatism or whatever you want to call it….and just….dreamed. How does that even work, huh?

Bobby: Just….what the hell would you have even done, Professor, if I had raised my kids at the mansion all this time? What spin would you have given me when you finally embarked on this grand Krakoan experiment you’ve been planning for years….and needed to tell me one of my sons wasn’t allowed to come with? That if he died, you had no intention of resurrecting him and his politically inconvenient power?

Xavier: *keeps silent*

Bobby: Yeah, y’know what, on second thought I don’t think I actually want to know the answer to that. Stay away from me and my kids, X. You and I are done.

Finally, last but not least, Laynia will be running her own search for Dima with the help of her brother, the Black Widow, and Warren, who wanted to make sure she knew that he’s her friend too, not just Bobby’s. Despite the lack of detail here, she’d actually have the most prominent role in this mini - being associated publicly with Krakoa is actually an obstacle for Bobby gaining Dmitri’s trust. Laynia’s lack of affiliation with it or Russia’s government or any other organization, is what lets her convince Dmitri to give her a chance and hear her out when she does find him.

(Something she’s ultimately able to do by going to Arakko and asking Storm if she can get her an audience with Lactuca, who should know exactly where to find him. In exchange, Lactuca will ask a favor of Laynia at some point in the future, which plants some seeds to bring Laynia more into X-books without just being an extension of Bobby).

There will be a final reckoning between Laynia and Thomas this time, and the mini will end with things still messy as hell, as the newfound family of four (plus Uncle Nikolai, standing awkwardly off to the side) basically stand there staring at each other and wondering what next. But even with them all as relative strangers now, there’s a wealth of possibilities now that everything’s out in the open.

This mysterious Mother Nurture still lingers offscreen as a potential future threat, especially as they still don’t know what they intended with Dallas - if he was even the twin she was after in the first place. Iceman’s poised to be launched in any number of directions as he’s now essentially reinventing himself while everyone is paying more attention to him than ever before, all while he’s trying to fall back on comfortable, familiar habits of joking and pranks to try and bond with the sons who are grown up and don’t really know what - if any - dynamic they even need or want with him. Laynia’s reluctantly taken Krakoan citizenship to be closer to her sons, but finds she prefers staying on Arakko and grows closer to mutants she meets there, with Dima joining her more often than not, as he’ll never be fully comfortable with Krakoa even if precogs are ‘allowed’ now. Dallas is more determined than ever to be an X-Man but he’s worried that now he’ll never make it on his own merits and it’ll always be more about him being a legacy, a founding X-Man’s kid.

Etc, etc.

[genericpuff]

Animaritimes 2023 !!!! (the one I didn't think I was gonna get to do AAAHHH)

Got another convention coming up, this time a big one! Animaritimes is returning for the first time since 2019/2020, and thanks to a few cancellations at the last minute (and the fact that I live in the same city where it's hosted) I'm gonna get to attend as an exhibitor!

This one's a super special one for me. It was the first convention I ever attended, where I fell in love with Artist Alley and decided that someday, I wanted to be that guy running tables, and I wanted Animaritimes to be the place where I would do it.

Unfortunately, due to what life was like for me back in 2015, I always either had the money and not the time or the time and not the money. I was also severely lacking in actual experience in the business side of things. Now that I've finally achieved a healthy-ish balance of time and money, and gained experience from the conventions I've gotten to do these past few months and the projects I've done over the past year, it seems the universe has just decided to drop Animaritimes into my lap, as if to tell me, "it's time." It truly feels like the culmination of a very slow boil, something I didn't think was ever going to happen for me. I'm currently very-

All next week I'll be working hard to get everything ready for this! I've got a rush order of cards and flyers on their way, as well as perler beads so I can add even more to my inventory ~

I am a little nervous to see how the event goes, especially after the failure of ECCE. Considering this is the first time in 3 years Animaritimes has happened (due to the panini) it's either gonna go incredibly well or absolutely awful. On the bright side, this event is happening super close by, so I'm not having to pay for travel or living accommodations, which means the only thing I really have to make back to break even is the table fee (which is literally half the amount I paid to attend ECCE). So really, nothing can go wrong knock on wood (。・ω・。)

I'll be sharing pictures of the stuff I'm putting together as the week goes on! And if you're planning on being at Animaritimes, please, come say hi !!

[gaviicreates]

Journeys in Amigurumi (Bingo Roll 1)

Spoiler: This was a challenge!

For my first roll of the bingo card, I got "make an amigurumi" - and as someone who is most comfortable with flat 2D projects with little sewing, I knew this one would really be taking me out of my comfort zone. I'm not happy when I have to sew, and I am incredibly not happy when I have to attempt embroidery.

I may not do a full blog post for each bingo roll, but as this is so completely new to me and a large part of this bingo is the journey, here we go!

For full disclosure, I've made ONE amigurumi project before this, and I haven't picked up the technique once since. So before we dive in - have a quick picture of where I started 12 years ago.

I had to dig some really old photo archives for this one.

This lil' guy was made to be a warbler for my fandom at the time. I am sure he was based off a pattern, but it's unlikely I'll be able to find it now. I also don't think I know where this lil birb is anymore; he's gotten lost in the shuffle of moving a few times since.

Step 1: Research

Research - Before even choosing a pattern to begin this challenge, I wanted to first understand more about amigurumi, so I took to Youtube, which is my usual place to learn all things.

For my intro to amigurumi, I started with a few channels:

LePetitSaint Crochet, especially this Amigurumi fundamentals playlist; olliehollycrochet, especially this beginner tutorial video; For inspiration, I've also found Skein Spider

There are quite a few amigurumi channels out there - these are just a few that I enjoyed across my youtube dashboard.

The next step of research was finding a pattern, and I feel as though this is the part of the rabbit hole I am going to ADORE continuing to explore.

Step 2: Practice

Before I started "the" project, I wanted to first get a sense of the tension and play around with a project. Just something small. In effort to avoid buying more materials, I took to stash busting some of my scrap cotton. For the test piece, I found the pattern Octobuddy by the blog, Sweet Softies.

As someone with already pretty tight tension, working with a smaller hook took some getting used to, but I liked the way this pattern was written - he's an adorable little Octopus, but it also helped me get used to the shaping and stuffing process. I used household cotton balls since poly-fil isn't the type of thing I just have on hand. I did end up buying some for the final project.

This was a good exercise for me, as I started to feel comfortable with the actual crochet and using a tighter gauge. As I was sewing the eyes, I ended up pulling the cotton up or not being able to push the needle through. He was a bit overstuffed, or maybe I tried to assemble out of order, or maybe it's just my lack of sewing experience striking again.

Beyond that, the hardest part was in fact the the embroidery of the eyes, and his are quite... something. I was not originally going for the wink, but as the two sides became less uniform, I decided to lean into it. They still turned out pretty shoddy, and I can NOT stand doing this. I told myself never again, but for another spoiler... I did it again.

My Octobuddy might still be a bit overstuffed, but he's super squishy and relaxing to squeeze, just like a stress ball, the perfect size for my palm. So he's been hanging with me at my work desk.

Step 3: Do the thing

I won't say I was ready for the next thing, per se, but I also wasn't getting anywhere just looking at the cool things that could be made with this technique. So why not jump right in?

For my actual pattern selection, I chose "Hubble" by Projectarian, available on ravelry. I love me an aquatic creature, and it called to me that not only was this pattern free, it also came with a beginner friendly pdf, quick reference, and an entire selection of written tips for the new-to-amigurumi crafter.

Squid time!

Again, I wanted to use up scraps, so my first challenge with this pattern was adjusting it for the yarn weight I had on hand to use. As a result, the eyes were made with a way too tight tension. The pattern called for some crochet for the sleeping pupil lines, but there was no way I was going to get my hook in there. For the second time, I took up a sewing needle and attempted embroidery. This time turned out a bit better than the Octopus. I adore how soft he looks with the brown cotton yarn I decided to use when I couldn't find black.

At some point in attaching the legs and tentacles, I did lose track of where I was - but that was on me since I got lazy with the stitch markers. It was so close to the end, I was able to wing it to decrease the final row and stitch up the center. Before then, I added a bit more poly-fil.

I chose not to add pom-poms at the end of the legs for the same reason as I didn't add tassels to the blanket I made. Being a mom of three dogs makes you super aware of the types of things the furbabies will get into. You should've seen their faces when I brought home the poly-fil.

But I'm ranting away and you haven't even seen him yet!!

Step 4: Finished Object!

Body: Hobbii Rainbow Cotton 8/4 - Rosewood, 3.5mm Eyes: Hobbii Rainbow Glitter Gold 8/4 - Natural White, Hobbii Rainbow Cotton 8/4 - Light Brown, 2.00mm Legs and Tentacles: Hobbii Rainbow Cotton 8/4 - Rosewood, 3.25mm Pattern: Hubble the Squid by Projectarian I call him Hubblet since I made him so small. Sleeeepy squid baby.

Make an Amigurumi✔️

[spook-e-snail]

help

Okay so!! As of right now the site is down so I can't provide screenshots and I'm going off of memory so please bear with me. Also I don't know what you need help with specifically so I'm just gonna go over the basics and if you have any other questions feel free to ask :))

Just to make sure everyone is on the same page, art fight is a yearly event where you upload your own characters and are assigned a team. You attack people to gain points for your team, and attacking people is basically just drawing their oc.

And just a heads up, while I'm not too sure this will happen this year, almost every year so many new people join art fight and try to upload their attacks on the 1st of July the sites server's get overwhelmed and site goes down alot. It happens. I recommend saving a few refs before the games begin and draw them after July 1st (you aren't allowed to draw anyone's characters before the 1st, keeps things fair). Like I said, it happens. Sometimes the site is only down off and on during the first few days and is fine the rest of the month, sometimes it's down so long they add an extra week to the games. It really just depends lol. Like I said save refs now so you can actually start on the 1st.

You can have up to 100 active characters and as far as I know there isn't a limit to how many characters you can attack. Your artistic media doesn't matter, you can be a traditional artist and still participate, you can be a digital artist and still participate, hell you can be exclusively building physical sculptures of folk's characters and you're still allowed to participate.

You can find other users to attack a variety of ways, ranging from searching through tags or through spamming the random character button until you find one you like, you can also just ask around here on Tumblr and see if anyone is participating this year:))

Not everyone has a little card like this but here's mine! It has my username and my favorite/featured characters on it. Again you do not need to have one of these but if you want to find people on artfight you might wanna be on the lookout for cards like these.

As for uploading your characters, I'm gonna use my boy Smudge as an example.

You can only upload 7 pictures per character. Usually folks don't need many more than 3. I recommend having a full body ref

As nice as this drawing is, if anyone wants to draw him they need to see more.

Something like this is alot better, it shows what he looks like without his costume and again gives the potential attacker a better idea of who they're drawing.

You have the option to upload a description of your oc, alot of folks tend to leave it blank and honestly I don't recommend doing that. You don't need to put your OC's full 129 page google doc backstory in there but you should at least give a basic description of their personality and any important information (it might also be a good idea to put their pronouns, I have on multiple occasions accidentally misgendered a few characters because their pronouns weren't in their description)

Permissions are different than a description. Permissions basically means what you are and aren't okay with. For Smudge here I prefer if he keeps his costume. You generally don't have to specify to not draw gore of a character as I've only gotten gore of a character once since like 2017 (and I put that I would love to see some gore in their character permissions).

Uploading attacks is pretty simple. Like I said before you can attack others regardless of how you make your art. Traditional art tends to get less points than digital art. You get more points depending on what you do (ex. A digital headshot sketch would get less points than a fully lined fully colored and shaded traditional drawing, a colored simple animation gets more points than digital line art, ECT). Obviously don't lie about what you're making to get more points. From what I've seen other folks don't tend to lie so don't be a dick lol. And even if some does lie about what they did, I believe you can flag art and report it. Plus a week after art fight is over a bunch of mods go through the art and make sure everything has been properly marked (if you think you marked something wrong though don't worry!! You aren't gonna get in trouble or anything, worse case scenario you'll just lose a few points for your team).

I know this is a lot and I know I definitely forgot something but again feel free to ask if you have anymore questions :3

[namuneulbo]

week one hundred and twenty

time for a longer entry for once... i think.

i only met l once this week because he was busy studying for his theory- and practical driving tests. bro, i got like makeout abstinence. one makeout sesh a day keeps the sadness away or something. god, i'm insufferable.

monday was a mess. i went thrifting to look for a cd shelf thingy but ended up with five cds instead. i got automatic by the jesus and mary chain for l and zenyatta mondatta and ghost in the machine by the police, faith by the cure and era vulgaris by queens of the stone age for me. i originally got a morrissey dvd too because it had a lot of the smiths songs on it but ended up not buying it BECAUSE... when i went to check out my stuff my card declined? i had money and my limit was high enough but it just wouldn't work. i tried taking away the morrissey dvd in case my limit actually was being pushed but that didn't work either. thankfully they were able to hold the stuff while i went to take out some cash. i did however call both my mom and my sister in distress.

i actually don't remember shit from tuesday.

i dyed my hair on wednesday! black! i also trimmed my bangs and i might've made them VERY short. i like microbangs though, like, that was what i was going for anyways but it's always just as big of shock each time i trim it. i usually trim it once it starts reaching my eyebrows. anyways, microbangs together with the black makes me feel so alt and cool. i mean, i AM alt, but still. i'm just now getting used to the new look but i've been told by three people now that i fit black very well which is a compliment i haven't gotten for any other color ever so...

i lost crazy much hair while dyeing it and washing it out though, it was almost scary. thought i was gonna end up bald.

in my second class on thursday i had my camera on and s dmed me in the zoom chat and told me my hair was pretty :( it made me so happy :( she asked me if i dyed it recently and then complimented it again TT she's always so sweet, love her!

on thursday i received two packages! one was my digital camera. i'm so excited to start bringing it everywhere and take cute y2k:ey pictures. the quality is just as shitty as i wanted it to be. the other package was a copy of turtles all the way down. i've only read two chapters so far but i'm so excited to read more, i love john's books so much. i'm so excited about having the english hard cover too. it's so pretty.

thursday evening i went to l's place. his parents were gone for the weekend so i expected to stay more than one night but ended up just sleeping there one night because he had plans with his friends friday evening. my way there was a mess, i took the wrong train and ended up two stations wrong. the train line splits in three after a few stations and i just realized the names of the stops started sounding unfamiliar. i got off and switched tracks and went one stop and after walking off at that stop i realized i was supposed to go another stop in the same direction before i was able to switch trains so i had to wait like 10 minutes for the next one and got on that one and then wait another 10 minutes to go on the right train.

at his place we listened to some music and exchanged cds. i gave him the the jesus and mary chain cd and he gave me röd by kent. i also brought some popcorn i had bought before being reminded of the fact that we don't have a microwave at home TT i also brought a vegan chocolate bar. it was white chocolate with rasperries and it sounded so good but i didn't really like it so i brought it for him to try but mainly for his younger sister who i thought would like it since she's allergic to milk and eats a lot of vegan stuff anyways. she ended up really liking it which i'm happy about. later we made dinner with her. i didn't really help but i'm like never allowed TT i try to offer help but they always say there's nothing i can do TT i feel so mean TT

after dinner me and l watched scott pilgrim vs. the world. it's way better the second time and it was so nice to just cuddle and stuff and i almost fell asleep by the end :') after the movie things got a little ;) though. very nice!

(still a virgin).

lowkey would wanna go into detail just for the memories for future old me who might have a sucky memory but i am also in fact posting on the worldwide web! maybe time for a physical and private journal?

i had to wait agessssss for him to wake up the day after. he sleeps for so long. it's funny because it's not very different from how long i sleep for but when i sleep at other places than home i always wake up so early with a full energy bar.

on my way home the train was fucking with me again. i literally got onto the right train but it went the wrong direction? like it literally arrived from the right direction but went back the same way? HOW?

saturday was nice. me and my sister went to the plant store and i got two plants for my room and a pot for the bigger one. i was gonna pick up a sellpy package on the way home anyways and i'd get a pot for the smaller one then anyways. on the way back home we accidentally went on such a detour. i actually have no idea how to use that word? just gooogled it. omväg. vi gick en omväg.

the sellpy package was exciting. the shorts fit really well and they were even low waisted!!! so exciting!!! i got four rings: a mustache ring, a black heart ring, a pink heart ring and a small ring with emerald colored dots. i got a dan and phil poster. such a relic. i'm currently trying to press it straight so it'll actually stay on the wall. i got the pots. it was two in one, a big one that i used as a holder for my brush pens and a small one for the tiny plant i bought and it ended up fitting perfectly. i also got a little cow decor thingy that's supposed to hang on the side of a pot and it looked so cute on the pot i got at the plant store. i also got a vase of a swan. i thought it would be way smaller than it was, like... i literally thought it was an egg cup which is why i got it so i could use it as a little cup for trinkets but it was MASSIVE. my sister wanted it though thankfully!

my cousin came over in the evening and we had dinner. my sisters boyfriend had made mashed potatoes and meatballs. that might be my favorite food of all time. with brown sauce and lingonberry jam and peas and fried onion, UGH, so good. afterwards we played cluedo and had some drinks and then we played our little question game we do where we write down silly or deep questions on a piece of paper and then just draw them and everyone answers. it's so simple yet so fun.

today has been really nice so far. i've been in a really good mood. i put up some leftover kpop prints on my wall. even though i don't care too much for it anymore, it's still fun with less empty walls and honestly, putting those prints up and listening to kpop reawakened something within me. it was so nostalgic and i mean... minhyuk is still a gorgeous man.

i'm on my second coffee right now and i've been writing this entry for so long now. my sister and her boyfriend went to town and they had dinner so now i'm contemplating what to eat. they had max and them mentioning that is making me really crave max so i think i'll probably order myself some max.

i've actually been thinking about doing diary stuff more in real life as well because i've been feeling so inspired by life is strange. like, i think the little profiles max makes of people is such a cute idea but getting pictures of people would be difficult. i'd wanna write about everyone! like, just making a really detailed page about anyone, like a classmate or siblings partner or whatever. it seems like so much fun. i'd need a polaroid camera though or a printer of some sort. i wanna get a polaroid camera anyways so might as well start doing that once i have it. i just need to get my bullet journal here, it's still back home and those are way too expensive to just be buying new ones all the time. it's also so empty. polaroid cameras are so expensive too, like buying film all the time too. so much pressure getting good pictures but that's also kind of the charm, you only get one, maybe two, tries.

sotw: kent - saker man ser

[purplesurveys]

1818

Do you put anything besides cheese on grilled cheese sandwiches? I don't have a lot of grilled cheese sandwiches in the first place...so I like to stick by just the standard recipe.

Do you suffer from headaches caused by caffeine-withdrawal? I do, actually. I used to think it was just work-induced headaches, but at some point I realized it was probably the lack of caffeine when my head would ache even when I've barely gotten any work done yet.

When consuming a beverage that comes in a can, do you prefer to drink it directly from the can or do you pour it into a cup?  I have it straight from the can.

Are there times when you think your reflection looks amazing, but you take a picture & it looks like crap?  Not really. I can usually tell from the get-go if my reflection alone already looks like shit and from there I usually wouldn't want to get my photo taken haha.

What do you do to cure a headache? I drink water, take a painkiller, and take a few minutes to stop looking at a screen. If I have time I'll walk around the house first and cuddle with the dogs to calm down.

Have you ever used picnik.com?  I'm pretty sure I did.

Do you still possess any belongings from your childhood? Do they hold some special significance?  I still have most of my childhood books and magazines, especially since a large portion of them came from my dad as gifts/pasalubong from when he'd come home from his work in the States.

Would you rather sit in a recliner or a rocking chair?  Recliner. Rocking chairs make me dizzy hahaha.

Do you have any cards from restaurants that you get stamped every time you visit, & after a certain number of purchases you get a free meal / drink?  I had a few before, but I didn't go to them often enough to make good use of the cards.

When it comes to books, what do you think is the “perfect” amount of pages?  Eh, it depends on the plot and how the story flows and such. I will say I'll probably lose interest from a book that's over 1,000 pages though.

Do you take advantage of calendars being on sale during the end of January, or do you just buy them for their regular price when they first come out?  Neither. I don't get physical calendars.

If you have a Facebook, do you ever set yourself to offline mode just to avoid one particular person?  I've been offline for like the last 10 years, but I also don't even think this matters anymore in this age.

Would you ever be interested in going scuba diving?  Maybe just once, then never again.

Have you ever absent-mindedly [or even intentionally] pulled apart the aglets [plastic at the end] on your shoelaces / hoodie & ruined the lace?  I haven't done this but I did recently ruin an aglet for one of my shoes. I was jumping too hard at the Seventeen concert, never noticed I was stepping on my shoelaces which had come undone by that point, and by the time I got home that's when I saw that my laces had completely lost their tips :(

Out of all of your friends / relatives, who would you say has the best vocabulary? Andi writes exceptionally well, and can write anything from essays to eulogies to poems to reviews.

When you are out of your house, where do you usually store your cell phone? I hold on to it at all times.

Do you ever use natural lighting to light your house [aka open the blinds] rather than use a lamp?  I use a lamp. I don't like natural light for the most part because the sun where I live is way too harsh, and the more light you let in the more hot it feels.

Are any of your fingers or toes deformed? What about the nails?  My left pinky is a little crooked.

When yawning, do you cover your mouth?  Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.

If you had a garden, what would you plant in it? Would you actually tend to it, or would it wind up neglected & withered?  I would not own a garden and just convert the space into something else lol.

What is a hobby / activity that you find relaxing? Is this something you often get the chance to do?  Well there's surveys, but I also like going to museums and painting. Painting I'm trying to go back to more and more these days; as far as museums, I try to go to one at least once every few months.

Are there any eyeshadow shades that simply do not look good on you?  Idk, all of them? Hahaha I'm not a big fan of makeup.

Do you think cable / satellite is worth paying for when things like Netflix & Hulu exist?  Not anymore. We got rid of cable four years ago because we're constantly on our subscription services now.

If you were in a room with no escape for twenty minutes, which of the following smells would you more easily be able to tolerate [& you’re not allowed to cover your mouth / nose or anything!] - bleach, cigarette smoke, heavy perfume, skunk, vomit.  I'll take either the perfume or cigarette.

Do you think greeting cards are a waste of money? For me, yeah. Where I'm from they're not all that common, and we'd much rather talk to the person in person instead of sending them a card lol.

[erwinsvow]

𝐬𝐨𝐥𝐞 𝐬𝐚𝐥𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧.

summary: zeke knows it’s wrong. you know it’s wrong. yet something always brings you back to your step-dad when your mom’s not around.

warnings: step-cest, manipulation, infidelity, mommy issues, zeke is the devil incarnate and reader is an angel (figuratively.. for now), oral sex (f receiving), fingering, dacryphilia, daddy kink, praise kink, rough sex, creampie, you've been warned!

author's note: lord knows how long i've been thinking about this one. zeke fuckers, this one is for you. tagging @colossalnova ! hope everyone likes it!

“It must be so nice to have such a good daughter to take care of you,” Mr. Ksaver comments without a second thought, as you head towards the kitchen to get two cups of coffee for Zeke and his friend. Your lips turn up into a pleased smile as soon as you hear the words, delighted with the praise from someone so close to your step-father.

Zeke makes an effort to hide the smirk that comes to him so naturally, because if only Mr. Ksaver knew just how good of a daughter you were for him. But that’s a conversation for another day, he finally decides, turning back to his guest with a smile.

“Step-daughter,” he corrects with the most genuine look he can muster. He could fool a priest with that aura of ingenuity that he gives off without any effort, because after all, that’s how he had gotten you into this position in the first place.

Mr. Ksaver beams back at him, his close friend still completely in the dark.

“Oh, of course, but you two could fool anyone. Say, where’s your wife? I haven’t seen her in a while..” Tom trails off, and Zeke is glad for it. He doesn’t like talking about your mother, his new wife, if he can help it. Business trips and commitments at the salon kept much of her time occupied, leaving only brief interactions with you two, her so-called family. It didn’t take long for him to realize she had been this way most of your life, an absent parental figure since the departure of your father. As cruel as it was, he could easily see why you were the way you were.

Zeke thought you were a lot of things. Pretty was at the top of the list, along with innocent and insecure, but the biggest quality he could see in you, the one that just screamed out at him ever since that first time he had laid eyes on you, was people-pleaser.

It was so apparent in everything you did, from the modest way you dressed to the try-hard behavior you exhibited with teachers and your friends’ parents. He recognized quickly it was because your mother didn’t acknowledge any of it, not the dinners you made for the three of you or the sweet, thoughtful gifts and flowers on special occasions.

It was actually on Mother’s Day the previous year when he had been able to get you alone for the first time. The then-new Mrs. Yeager had booked a full day at the spa as a treat for herself, even though she barely had an ounce of motherly qualities in her body. She had tossed aside the bouquet you had gifted her with, skimmed the card with your sweet, handwritten note, and rolled her eyes at your own watery ones after seeing just how little she cared about this holiday that was meant for you both to celebrate.

After she had left, Zeke had knocked on your door tentatively. It was wrong of him to be as gleeful as he was on the inside, but he’d been waiting for a moment like this for the last several months. He even let twenty minutes pass before coming up to your room to make sure he would get you teary-eyed and upset, just how he wanted.

Any other girl might have told her new step-father to fuck right off, given that he had done nothing to defend you or ask your mother to be kinder towards you, but not you. Ever the people-pleaser, you wiped away your tears with the sleeves of the cardigan you’d been wearing all day, fixed yourself from the position you had been in while weeping on your bed, and told him to come in.

Zeke was fucked the minute he saw you sitting there, dressed purely like an angel in a sundress that had ridden up in your distress and with tear-lidden eyelashes blinking slowly at him. The redness of your nose and cheeks, mixed with how your hair was just a little messed up and your hiccuping whimpers painted an entirely different picture for him. At first, it had just been a game, just to see how long it would take him to seduce his new wife’s daughter, but now it was something else altogether.

But it’s the first sentence you say to him, alone in the house without your wretched mother for the first time, that breaks him.

“S-Sorry Zeke. I didn’t want to eat after that, but I can go get everything ready again for you.” For him. Your mother’s cold behavior had you crying your eyes out before noon, and yet you were still concerned about the lunch you had prepared and if he wanted to eat.

It made his heart burn in a lecherous way, with thoughts in his head about why he hadn’t married you instead of her.

“That’s okay, honey, don’t worry about me. I came to check up on you.” He’s holding up the facade well, he thinks, closing the door gently behind him and hearing the click of the latch. He’s only been in your room a handful of times, and for most of those occasions, you hadn’t been there, so he couldn’t act too comfortable. His eyes roamed around the space, taking in the sweet scent of your perfume that lingered on every object and shoving his hands into his pockets to seem as unassuming as possible.

You wipe away a stray tear, blinking quickly and looking back at him with big eyes. Damn your eyes, honestly, because he knows he doesn’t stand a chance against them, especially when they’re so watery like that.

“Check up on me?” you let out in a soft voice. It’s adorable, honestly, how you think your new step-father would be just like your mother and not care about you at all. You’re not used to this kind of affection from anyone besides your friends from school, and even they don’t know about the reality of your home life. You don’t know what it’s like to have a parent check up on you, to have them want to make sure you’re okay, and suddenly you can feel your face burning with heat at the realization that you and Zeke are all alone in your bedroom.

Zeke is handsome according to anyone’s standards, but for some reason, you can never tear your eyes away from him when he doesn’t know you’re looking. He’s old enough to be your father—your real father, that is—but that doesn’t stop you. You always find yourself staring at his golden locks that shine especially bright when he’s in the sun after his daily run, when you’re watering your garden and your mother isn’t home from work yet. Or when he’s just left the shower and every part of his body is dripping wet, walking back to his bedroom and you catch a glimpse through your open door.

It’s easy to think of him as off-limits, though, since you would never hurt your mother like that. She doesn’t show you affection, or care about you like how your friends’ mothers care for them, but she’s still your mom. Nothing would ever justify betraying her like this, by having these illicit thoughts about your step-father. So you make sure you stop staring, avoid being alone with him as much as you can and create excuses to get out of spending time with him, but you don’t think any of that is really working.

Because now, with Zeke in your bedroom and the sleeves of your cardigan wet with far too many tears, you don’t really care if this is wrong. All you care about is how Zeke is inching closer to your bed with every step.

“Yeah, sweetheart, I wanted to make sure you were okay after all that. It’s not easy, I know,” he says in such a soothing tone that you feel yourself getting lost in the daze of it.

“You know?” you question again, wondering if Zeke could really relate to you. You had always felt like such an outcast, the poor girl nobody loved or wanted, without any love in her life at all.

“Uh-huh, I know. I really hate that your mother won’t treat you better, but you know her, she’s not gonna change,” he watches your nodding face and resigned expression. “Can I-?” he motions to the space next to you on the bed.

“Oh, sure, please,” you say quickly, moving yourself over a bit and making room for him, dress exposing even more of the soft skin of your legs now. He tries not to stare, and every part of him wants to put a hand on your thigh and stroke softly, but he doesn’t want to scare you off. Not yet. He’ll take his time.

“Thank you for saying that.” Your voice is so quiet he almost doesn’t hear it.

“Of course. I mean, you are my daughter now, aren’t you?” He’s pushing his luck, but oh well. “I guess… it’s sort of my responsibility to take care of you, right?”

He sees your eyes widen a little, probably a million thoughts running through your little head. You’re so used to being alone, not having anyone’s affection, that a few simple words from Zeke have you fucked. Probably feeling the same way he is in this moment, eager and affectionate and ready. You find yourself nodding at his sweet words.

Any other day, you might have doubted the sincerity of what he was feeding you, but your mind was already a little fuzzy from the interaction with your mother. You still don’t know why you had gotten your hopes up so much, when it always led to disappointment in the end. You wish you could go back and warn yourself not to expect so much from your mother, who was almost as absent a parental figure as your father.

In that moment, Zeke’s kind words and welcoming arms didn’t seem so bad. You could only imagine that he felt the same way you did, as you doubted your mother was being a good wife to him from the interactions you observed.

“I…” you begin, but trail off when you notice the way Zeke’s eyes are looking at you. You almost instinctively lean back and away from him, like a lamb avoiding a predator, when you focus on how he’s much too close to you.

You’re entirely overwhelmed by his piercing, concerned gaze and the uncomfortable heat you feel between your thighs—your throat runs dry and you know it’s not from the crying. You think he must notice it too, with the way he leans forward, one more movement from him and you’d be trapped between Zeke’s broad figure and your bed.

He supposes that was the make-or-break moment in this little dalliance between you two. In that moment, had you been uncertain or asked him to leave, he would have listened to you and likely never bothered you again. All the same, he knew you wouldn’t.

You look back fondly on that Mother’s Day, the day you gave yourself over to Zeke without the slightest bit of regret. Your mother had returned home later that night, with nails and hair freshly done, acting as though there could have been no better way to spend Mother’s Day. She walked right past you sitting on the couch with Zeke, ignoring his tousled hair and your swollen lips.

Since then, it had been a fun sort of game. You felt guilty, of course, but nothing could compare to the thrill of the secret you had with Zeke, just for you two and no one else. He was more adventurous than you, always sneaking kisses and lingering touches when your mother was just a room away, fucking you roughly with a hand clasped over your mouth while she was on a conference call in her office down the hall.

Over time, you felt yourself becoming adventurous too. You had never done anything like this before, anything remotely bad or wrong, and it was safe to say that you were sinking further and further into the pit of corruption that Zeke had created.

Which is how you ended up here today.

You brought back two steaming cups of coffee on a platter to the living room, setting them down and mixing in cream and sugar for Zeke’s. You hand the cup to him with a sweet smile, and he takes a sip contentedly.

“Just perfect, like always.” The praise makes you smile widely, cheeks feeling warm despite the fact that you had a guest.

“How do you take your coffee, Mr. Ksaver?” you ask politely, as the elderly man laughs and takes the cup into his hand.

“Just plain black, thank you. I never had a taste for sweet things, like Zeke does.” If only he knew.

You smile again and bid goodbye, taking the tray with you as you leave and heading back to your room. You knew Zeke would be up as soon as he was done, since your mother was still out and you had precious time together, all alone.

As soon as you heard the front door close, and the sound of ignition starting from outside your window, you were alert. You could hear Zeke’s footsteps coming up the staircase, eagerly anticipating him this time.

He doesn’t knock anymore, letting himself in and closing the door gently behind him, as always. You hear the lock click quietly.

“Daddy,” you mumble from your place on your bed. You’re lying against the pillows now, fully on display for him in his favorite dress and already wet at the thought of what he would do to you once he got you alone.

“Yes, honey?” He says, in a tone that’s sincere and mocking at the same time. He’s still by the door, not coming in further like you want him to. He wants you to use your words.

“You said once we were alone..”

“Once we were alone, what? That I’d play with you?” You nod dumbly at his words. He inches closer to you, but still entirely too far away for your liking.

“I want you, Daddy. We only have a little bit before she gets back,” and you know you’re in for it now.

“Oh, is that so? We only have a little time?” Before you can process it, Zeke is hovering above you, a firm hand on your wetness teasing you and making you cry out at the sudden pressure. His hand moves slowly, just barely grazing your clothed clit and you whimper. “Let me tell you something, baby,” he whispers right next to your ear. “I’ll take as much time with you as I want, no matter who else is in this house. You got that?”

You let out a strangled moan at his words, knowing the effect they have on you and the uncomfortable wetness between your legs becoming even more prominent. You could swear that he can see how wet you are, even with your panties still on, and you desperately jerk up onto his hand to get some, any, contact.

“D-daddy, please! I-” you break off into another moan as he rubs your clit firmly. You’re not even sure when he took your panties off, but you can feel two of his fingers prodding at your slit, just waiting as he continues his work.

“Does that feel good, baby? Use your words,” he says, teasing you despite how badly you want him to stop and just be inside you already. Another strange feeling bubbles in your chest, knowing that your mother would be home soon and could be pulling into the driveway right now. You can hardly focus on those thoughts though, letting out a loud squeal when Zeke pushes two fingers into your soaking wetness, stopping at his knuckles.

“Oh god, Daddy, that feels so good, please, please keep going-” the rest of your words disappear as he pushes his thick fingers completely in, marveling at the way you’re so stretched out around them.

“Good girl, baby, you’re doing so well.” You keen at the praise, moaning loudly as he continues fingering you, scissoring his digits inside you and getting you prepared for his cock. He knows he’s on a time limit too, but he’ll be damned if he lets that rush him. No, he needs to take his time with you.

Every time he feels the tightness of your hole, it takes him back to that first time, and he refuses to hurry up.

His thumb rubbing circles on your clit as he pumps his fingers in and out quickly, filling the room with a lewd squelching noise, have you seeing stars before long. Every time Zeke touches you, you wonder how you went so long without it. Your own actions when you touch yourself are nothing compared to his anymore. He’s got you so dependent on him, so reliant that you barely want to cum by yourself anymore.

He slows his actions just for a second, just to pull down the front of your sundress and reveal your tits to him. Zeke increases his speed as he latches his mouth around your hardening nipple, flicking with his tongue and taking the pebbled bud between his teeth, tugging slightly and making you cry out as it suddenly becomes too much to handle.

You’re succumbing to the orgasm before you even know it, waves of pleasure washing over your body as the knot in your stomach finally releases and fills your core with heat.

“Good girl, baby, cum for Daddy now,” he says from his place on your chest.

“Daddy! Daddy, I-! Oh!” You know how pathetic you must sound, screaming and moaning helplessly as Zeke doesn’t let up on his actions. You finally put your hand on top of his and make him look up, into your eyes, and press his lips to yours.

A sloppy, hot kiss in the aftermath of your orgasm has you shaking under his grip, entire body feeling hot and sweaty. He pushes his fingers, slick with your wetness, to your lips and you open without any request for him, sucking and rolling your tongue over the digits until they’re all clean.

“Good girl,” he breathes into your neck, whether he places more sloppy kisses. “You ready for Daddy to fuck you?”

You nod meekly, moaning loudly as you feel Zeke align himself with your slit, and letting out a high-pitched squeal when he pushes himself into you entirely. You choke on your breath at the sudden feeling of fullness, completely ignoring the way Zeke’s focus seems to be on something else.

Perfect timing, he thinks to himself, hearing the car pull into the driveway and knowing his dear wife had arrived home. He was too deep inside of you to care, though.

Zeke pulled his hips back slowly, wanting you to feel every inch of him, and then slammed them down harshly. For every motion of his hips, you released a loud, obscene moan, babbling on without making any sense at all as Zeke fucked you.

All you could process were Zeke’s reassuring praises, calling you a good girl as he continued at a brutal pace, fucking you so hard you couldn’t figure out where you stopped and he began.

He picked up the pace and the angle of his cock stretched you out so perfectly, he was hitting against your clit with every thrust and you could swear you were seeing stars again, so close to the edge and screaming out for him, when he clasps a hand over your mouth quickly.

You reacted with a jolt, unsure of why he suddenly silenced you when he placed a kiss right next to your ear, whispering quietly.

“Looks like she’s home. Be quiet for Daddy, okay, baby?” Your eyes widen in panic, flustered with shame and another feeling you can’t put together when Zeke goes back to his quick pace, fucking you rapidly and giving your clit the contact you so desperately needed. You cum again with a stifled, broken noise leaving your mouth and your body jerking up against his, the hand that wasn’t covering your mouth holding you down in place. You feel yourself clench down on his cock, as he rides you through it, thrusting in and out and doing nothing to stop the vulgar noises that fill the room.

You can hear it now—the steps of your mother coming into the house, and probably up the stairs to her office soon enough. Your heavy breathing coupled with Zeke’s grunts are the only sound left as his hips stutter and you feel hot ropes of cum shoot inside you, filling you up. Zeke finally comes to a halt, pressing a kiss to your lips as you hear your mother walk right outside your door, talking to someone on the phone.

Your panicked eyes meet his perfectly calm ones, a devilish smirk playing at his lips as you hear the steps halt and then continue again, walking by your room as though you didn’t even exist.

You release a sigh, Zeke pressing another kiss to you that you return eagerly.

“Good girl. Now clean up while Daddy goes and deals with her.”

You feel suddenly emptier, lighter as Zeke lifts his weight off of you and adjusts his clothes. You sit back up slowly, careful to not make an even bigger mess and ruin your dress, as Zeke grabs your panties off the floor and hands them to you with a smile. You pull them up, fixing your dress and realizing that you need to run a brush through your hair before you see your mother again.

Zeke unlocks the door and leaves with one last smile gracing his face, as you sit up and feel remnants of your encounter inside you.

Moments later, your mother walks by and glances at your open door, which was locked before. She pushes it open, taking a look at you on the bed. You’re certain you look like a mess, hair disheveled and sweat on your body, with limbs feeling like jelly.

“Hi, mom,” you greet, with the most false enthusiasm you can muster. “What is it?” She looks at you coldly, almost as if she knew something was going on and couldn’t quite place it.

“Clean yourself up, honey, Uncle Eren is coming over for the weekend.”

[half-doomed]

HELLVETICA DAY 1 - AUSTIN

- we got to the venue at 2ish and set up camp

- we were around the 21st in line (dont remember exact #s but it was low 20s because somebody else had started a numbering system)

- we met somebody who we played uno with but we didnt really talk to too many other people that day other than to give the people in front of us an umbrella

- we ended up at the barricade to the far left of the stage

- savannah conley was funny and has a great voice but i wasnt super into her music (I tried listening to her set beforehand but i didnt rly like the vibe)

- joywave was incredible live and daniel has a great stage presence. Their set was so high energy right from the start to the very end

- during tongues dan pointed the mic at somebody in the crowd who shouted the line and his face was priceless (pretty sure this is a fan inside joke but I'm not the expert on them)

- their visuals were also on point

- idkhow time!!!! Their visuals were also super cute and everyone looked like they were having a great time

- lights go down and heaven is a place on earth were not on the set ):

- BUT someone gave dallon a trans flag ((:

- during jw's set dan told us to cheer as loud as possible when dallon did his bit at the end about forgoing the crowd chanting for encore and playing peekaboo so when we heard the word peekaboo the crowd went insane. It was very funny and dallon thought so too

- dan did his own verse for nltob, it was very funny. I had avoided the videos of it til that point

- after the show, we met daniel who had seen my tour bingo card on twitter so he took the card and checked off everything that had happened on tour so far. He also signed the card and tour poster i made

- I almost argued with him about one of the things he checked off because i forgot that a letter is technically an unreleased idkhow song 🤦🏽‍♀️

- I asked him if clibbus could open for dallas and he called beef over who said he would for $3000 but unfortunately he has a job to do so the answer was no 😔

- I also forgot to get a picture with dan bc i blanked but he was wearing an HHM shirt

- then anthony came out and i gave him the gift i made him and he talked about some gross strawberry water he had earlier that day

- he also commented on how me and my friend had matching strawberry shirts but it actually wasnt planned lol

- Ryan had run off as soon as we had gotten to the buses and anthony said he hadnt seen him since he got off stage

- he had said he would get the other guys their gifts but then dallon came out so i asked if i could give him his and he jokingly was like "you dont trust me?"

- dallon was very sweet, he was on vocal rest so couldnt talk but i gave him his gift and his appreciation was very clear through what i could see from his face (he was masked) and body language

- I'm an idiot and didnt even take pics of the completed gifts but trust me they were cute and when he heard how long they took to make his eye went wide (this is bc i only decided to make gifts after tour started and i saw they were meeting fans lol)

- I asked him to write out a lyric for a tattoo and told him that i've been a fan since basically the brobecks days and he made a motion like when i was little which i thought was rly cute

- he also wanted me to wait and think on it for a year before i got the tattoo

- he was incredibly nice and i forgot to ask him for a pic with his gift bc i was frazzled but i did get him to also sign the bingo card/poster

HELLVETICA DAY 2 - SAN ANTONIO

- We got there around 2 again but this time we started talking to more people and made a few friends including some people i knew from the jw discord server and one of my twitter mutuals

- The time went by much quicker when we had started making friends

- We saw ryan and anthony walking across the street at some point and they waved. I'm pretty sure anthony recognized some of us

- I wore glitter dots for this show and then right before doors I got sweat, makeup, dirt, and who knows what else in my eye so i went to the bar next door to use their bathroom and had to rush out bc they started letting ppl in

- We ended up barricade again on the right side this time

- Savannah's outfit was cute, and her music had started to grow on me at this point

- Joywave usually has a car on stage with car wash outfit/uniforms but the stage was too small so they instead played some older stuff from content which was a really special set just for us <3

‐ They also had everyone tweet about them being the best punk show that had ever played the venue

- Also this venue does not have a physical barricade and so we were pressed right up against the stage to the point where my friend got dan's sweat on her

- Overall a very fun silly intimate vibe

- Dan said this was the smallest venue on the tour and we'd be able to reach out to touch dallon's toothpick legs and he ran out on stage to whisper in his ear

- !!! He was in the shorts !!!

- During sound check i asked val if he got his gift and he said it was above his bunker 😭💖 i almost asked him or eddie if they could give me a setlist but didnt wanna bother them while they were working. We also kept making awkward eye contact with beefus lol

- During idkhow's set anthony recognized us and gave us picks (:

- He was also wearing glitter! <3

- I'm pretty sure dallon heard us chanting die die die during choke bc he kept smiling in our direction

- When he said peekaboo a lot of us that were at the previous show cheered

- It was a very intimate show and not just bc dallon was showing off his legs lol

- Dallon was a lot more talkative and silly at this show!! He poked fun at guitar players and anthony's face was great

- Since lgd (and heaven is a place on earth btw) was back on the set he introduced it as they were playing an older song that was on the EP (he misremembered but none of us caught it til we were talking to him in dallas the next day) (more on this later)

- We also brought roses for both bands which will also be important later ! Some beautiful and iconic pictures came out of that, you can thank my roommate and i for getting dallon those flowers <3

- We didnt wait after the show to meet them bc we had a long drive the next day but we should have bc ryan was meeting people 😭

HELLVETICA DAY 3 - DALLAS

- We left late, then got stuck in rly bad traffic on the way in but dallon had a twitter q&a at that time so it made it just slightly more bearable

- We ended up getting there at like 5:30ish, about 30 mins til doors

- We actually still ended up 3rd row back from barriers and saw all our friends we made from the previous day (:

- Savannah's set was very enjoyable and her cousin and some other people were there

- Many ppl from the jw server were there so we went rly hard for their set and made plans to take a group photo with dan after the show

- I cant even remember much about jw's set bc i was going so hard but it was extremely fun. 3 nights in a row seeing them and i was still blown away each time

- We sat down in between sets bc we were all tired as hell and a lot of ppl joined us. I told them dallon would be very supportive of sitting in between sets. Everyone around us was very friendly <3

- Dallon was extremely silly during this show! The vibes were immaculate

- I'm actually gonna skip straight past the show bc i wanna talk about meeting them afterwards and I'm fighting for my life to stay awake rn

- We finally got to meet ryan!! I forgot to take a picture with him but my roomate got to talk with him and i got my cds and poster/card signed. I'm pretty sure he and paul got high after the show bc he completely misheard what i said when i asked if he got my cross stitching gift lol but we were both pretty out of it

- Like it literally took me 5 mins to realize dallon was standing near us bc i was busy talking to daniel

- I brought a the hoodies cd and he told dallon that that was his brobecks and that he would've hated them bc they were emo lol

- He signed my roommate's razzmatazz cd (lol) and i introduced him to my friend who shares his name

- I told him about how a lot of us from the server were there and he agreed to get a group pic with everyone

- Paul came out at some point completely zooted but i didnt get to talk to him bc i thought he was busy meeting other fans but he signed my roommate's hot dog bucket hat (we all had bought matching hats and dan was given one as well for the group photo)

- Dallon signed my pick that i got from anthony bc i didnt get a chance to talk to him again ):

- I did finally get a solo pic with dallon and he wasnt on vocal rest anymore so he stayed for a pretty long time to chat with everyone which was very sweet

- I did have a slightly personal question for him but i completely blanked and freaked out a tiny bit and he told me to wait a few minutes and it finally came back to me. I had wanted to ask him if he ever got my rose/gift card/letter in houston back in february. He said he didnt remember but that if he did it was probably in his house with the other letters he's gotten. He was very reassuring that he remembered faces and that having adhd made it hard to remember names but he always remembered faces. I said smth along the lines of it's great that he's learning more about himself since his diagnosis. Then he told me that he really appreciated the flowers (the ones from san antonio were in the tour bus) and that he enjoyed my presence and i didnt know what to say to that. I dont really know what happened immediately after that because that kind of a compliment coming from him completely scrambled my brain.

- He also talked about how he screwed up the lgd intro again in dallas and my friend mentioned that she thought he was introducing absinthe and that they should put it back on the setlist and he agreed. He talked about how lgd was supposed to be on the ep but they flipped a coin and got diatt i think instead

- He also told us that he was very excired about the idea for the new album and that it just needed to get recorded but he wouldnt give us any hints about the title or anything

- All my friends i had made at the previous show were there as well and we had a group pic taken with him. It was all so special and it was genuinely one of the best weekends of my life and I'm so sad that it's over 💔

And if you read this far thank you and I'm sorry

[spectaclespencer]

Finding Family // Stepdad!Spencer x Child!Reader

A/N; This is my entry for @imagining-in-the-margins ‘s Father’s Day challenge! I may or may not have used inspiration from my own life...however I tried to make this as accessible and relatable as possible. I chose a combination from many of the prompts, but I’d say the most relevant is, “Child gives their Father a meaningful gift.” Happy reading everyone! **Please note this is the first fic I've written in many years so I'm rusty.

Summary; Fem!Reader is upset on father’s day, but her mood is lifted when her mother’s boyfriend moves in.

Category; Fluff, Hurt/Comfort

Content Warnings; Mentions of past death, brief mention of a case

Word Count; 3.7k

Nearly everything about Father’s Day always made ____’s mood to worsen. It was a little awkward, especially at school. Most kids didn’t understand the concept of only having one parent around. Growing up her classes would make fun little gifts each year such as cards, painted mugs, bookmarks...almost anything you could think of. It was fun for the most part, for most students, but there were a few that just didn’t have strong father figures in their life; ____ being one of them. She understood how it was a ‘necessary’ thing to be included in primary school, but couldn’t help but feel excluded from the rest of the class.

It got quite repetitive to hear a teacher instruct the class to share their favourite stories of their father, meanwhile ____ had next to nothing to give. Through the 8 years of it she’d gotten mostly desensitized to it, but alas come every Father’s Day there would be a tinge of sadness in the air. ____ knew it wasn’t her or her mother’s fault, or even her biological father’s. Whoever that may be.

He had passed away when she was young, at around 6 years old. It wasn’t enough time to recall any memories or special occasions between the two. There were a few family photos strung around their apartment but nothing that sparked any real joy or comfort. Not even ____’s mother liked to speak of it. Even though it had been 12 years since his passing, it still felt like a fresh wound on many days. Every Christmas, birthday, graduation, summer holiday, and of course Father’s Day.

A part of her just wanted to fit the standard commonly seen in movies. She would watch The Parent Trap, hoping maybe he was out there and not actually dead. And hey, maybe she’d get a sister out of it too. She would watch Mamma Mia with her mother every few months, having the same sort of bond between Sophie and Donna. One of her all time favourites however, had almost nothing to do with the concept of fathers. She especially loved Finding Nemo. As silly as it may sound, sometimes she just wanted to recline into her younger self and indulge in the magic of Pixar and Disney. Sometimes she just wanted a picture perfect family.

And now, on this fine afternoon of June 19, that was exactly what she was doing. Curled up on the couch with a blanket over her body. It was surprisingly cold around their home, the weather turning to rain. It was odd for this time of year but it seemed to somewhat fit ____’s mood. Watching tv on weekend mornings was a fun enough pastime.

“I think Roger wanted you.”

____ looked up to see her mother’s boyfriend walk into the living room space, holding her cat in his arms.

“Is it okay if I put him down on your legs? I noticed he likes to curl up between them. Did you know that cats typically feel safe when they’re surrounded by objects acting as walls? It’s more comforting for them to know they’re protected while they’re sleeping,” he rambled, taking a seat on the couch near ____’s feet.

“Yeah that’s fine,” she replied, sitting up to make more room for the cat. “Thanks Spencer.”

“You’re welcome. What is it you’re watching?”

“Finding Nemo, have you not ever seen it?” She chuckled, glancing up at him. He lightly shook his head, a small frown appearing on his face.

“No, no I haven’t. I don’t have to go to work for another hour, is it alright if I sit and watch with you? I can leave if I’m being a bother,” he said, looking over to her for approval. It was Saturday which meant he had some paperwork to finish up this afternoon at the office. She was glad he always respected her space. He never crossed a boundary, never came closer unless she specifically asked him to. It was nice to know that he truly did care for her.

“That’s fine.”

With her approval, he settled into the couch to make himself more comfortable. He reached over to pet the cat, who had just fallen asleep on ____’s blanket. His light purrs filled the room, along with the hum of the television.

At the moment, ____’s mother was at her work where she managed a coffee shop. ____ wasn’t much of a sucker for romance, but it was a bit of a cute story on how her mother and Spencer met; one of those classic rom com situations.

He began going to the cafe every morning before work, since the BAU got a new coffee supplier and it wasn’t as good as the old stuff. It was more bitter, meaning he had to use more sugar. Using his better knowledge, he chose to try a new place to get coffee so long as it doesn’t worsen his health too much. The cafe was just across the metro station that he took to work, and one day it caught his eye. It took him almost four months to be able to even speak a word to ____’s mother. He was infatuated with her, only mumbling a few words here and there. He admired from a distance, too afraid to strike up a real conversation. Eventually he did, and they went out a few times. He took her out to film festivals, museums, picnocs, anything you could think of. He learned that her daughter loved to read-one things they have in common-and the three of them’s first meeting was at the local library. They all got along well after that. That was about three years ago now, and they’ve been together ever since.

The both of them sat through the movie for the next hour, sometimes chatting about the plot or whatever marine fact Spencer could offer; such as that there were around 30 species in the clownfish family. They managed to finish the whole thing, with a few minutes left to spare before he had to leave.

“Hey, I have some reading I wanna do and I don’t want to be here alone right now so can I walk with you? I’m gonna go to the cafe and see my mum.”

“Yeah of course. Give me 5 minutes and we’ll leave,” he smiled, nodding his head. He stood up to go into the bedroom to retrieve his work satchel.

When waiting, ____ went into her own room to pull on a sweater and grab her backpack with her book and materials in it.

“I was thinking chinese for dinner if that sounds okay? I’ll check with your mum when we see her but I can pick it up on my way back from work,” Spencer called out.

____ nodded at him when they both emerged from their separate rooms.

They then headed out the door, Spencer locking it behind them.

-----

“Can I ask you something?” ____ questioned, looking up to her left at Spencer.

“Anything, yeah,” he said in confirmation, sending a reassuring smile her way. “Is everything okay?”

“It is, yeah,” she sighed, biting her bottom lip nervously. “Why don’t you live in the apartment with us? I mean, you practically do anyways. A lot of your stuff is there.”

“Oh…” he trailed off, stopping in his tracks. He brought his right hand up to run over his neck, looking down at the ground. “Look, ____-”

“I’m just curious.”

“A-and that’s fine! To be honest your mother and I haven’t talked about it too much. Not for a while, actually. Um, here why don’t we sit down,” he gestured ahead to a bench in the park they’d been crossing through. Once they were both seated, he took a minute to try and collect his thoughts, his brain going a mile a minute. “Last time we discussed it was about a year ago. It seemed like, I dunno, maybe it would be a good idea? But uh, after thinking about it more I declined. I just didn’t want to invade your space. A-and I hope you can tell me if I ever do, I wanna be able to communicate with you both to the fullest extent. It’s important that everyone gets a say in what happens.”

____ nodded in agreement, signalling him to carry on.

“I was scared if we moved too fast you’d become uncomfortable,” he chuckled, shaking his head. “I asked if we could wait until we were sure that you’d be okay. Because as much as I love your mother, it just wouldn’t work unless you were on board. Is that, maybe a conversation that we could start having again?”

She thought for a moment, going over a few possibilities. She honestly had just been afraid to bring it up, in case there was something or a reason she didn’t know about. She knew that she enjoyed Spencer’s company. The days when she would wake up to her mother and Spencer on the couch drinking coffee were peaceful, she could get used to more of that. And their unofficial movie nights that they’d have. Once a month on a Saturday they would order in food and would rotate everyone choosing a film. Tonight happened to be ____’s turn, to her delight. Not so much the adults’ as they have quite a different taste in the media however they never once complained.

“I think… I think that Roger and I would be open to that,” she smiled, looking down at her hands. It did seem nice, considering how much Roger enjoyed Spencer’s company. It’s always been said that cats are good judges of character, right?

“Are you sure? I won’t talk to your mum unless you’re sure. Except if you want to do it yourself, you can go ahead. Whatever you want,” he sent her a tight lipped smile, resembling a frog.

“It would be nice. I wouldn’t mind at all.”

____ then looked up at Spencer, to see him grinning at her. She returned the look, being excited for their future.

“Okay,” he replied softly, practically beaming with joy now. “We should get going, unless you need a minute.”

“I’m good, let’s go.”

The two of them stood back up, dopey smiles on their faces. It took them only 10 more minutes to reach the cafe.

“My favourite customers!” ____’s mother called as soon as she saw them walk in. “How are you both today? Sorry I couldn’t be there when you guys woke up.”

“Good. I just wanted to stop by on my way to work. We decided on Chinese tonight so I’ll pick it up on my way back. I love you but I have to go. I'm already running late,” Spencer breathed, giving his girlfriend a kiss on the cheek and sending a wave to ____.

She returned it, shifting her attention towards her mother. “Can I have a tea please? Do you have some time right now?”

“For my best girl? Absolutely. Go get us a table. I'll be right over,” her mother said with a crinkle of her eyes.

____ followed directions and set up shop at one of the tables near a small fireplace. They were her favourite since they had the most comfortable chairs. She would know, considering she was the one who picked them out. The sewn details reminded her of the couch at the apartment, the one that Roger liked to sit on the most. The cafe was like a second home to the three of them.

“How’s your day been, spend any time with Spencer?” her mother interrupted her thoughts, setting down two cups of tea on the chestnut table in front of them.

“Finding Nemo again,” ____ laughed, taking a sip of her beverage. “We were talking, about uh, about living together. Officially.”

“Oh!” She looked surprised.

“That’s the same reaction he had, actually. He said you were waiting to make sure I’d be okay with it. And I am, really. I appreciate that.”

“I didn’t want to put any pressure or spring it on you or anything. How did this come up? Did he ask you, or…?”

“No, I initiated it. So what do you think? Yes? He said he’d want to.”

“I think that’s a great idea,” she responded, moving from the chair across from ____ to the one directly beside her. She pulled ____ closer to her, kissing her head. “I’m glad you told us. Anything in particular that sparked this up?”

“Not really. I guess it’s just been a thought in the back of my head for a while.”

-----

“I’m home!” Spencer sang, arriving back at around 7pm. He shuffled through the door, careful not to drop the bag of food wedged between his left hand and chin. Sliding his shoes off, he made his way through the place to the kitchen, setting the bag down with a grunt. “Hello?”

“Hi honey, sorry I didn’t hear you come in. How was work?” ____’s mother smiled, coming out of her bedroom. “Get all your paperwork done?”

“I did,” Spencer nodded in response, wrapping her in his arms and sighing deeply. “It was easy, even with Derek trying to mess with me all day. So, normal I guess you could say,” he pulled back, placing his right hand on her cheek and the other on her hip.

“Glad to hear it. ____’s in her room, she’ll probably be out soon. Looking for a movie I presume.”

Spencer hummed at that. “You think it’s gonna be another Legally Blonde night?”

“That’s very possible,” she laughed, wrapping her hands around the back of Spencer’s neck. “She told me you guys talked.”

“Yeah. I hope that was okay,” he paused, trying to read the expression on her face. “What do you think about it?”

“Would I want my lovely boyfriend to move in with us?” She pretended to ponder the thought, cocking her head to the side. Spencer grinned, moving his hand from her cheek to brush away hair from her forehead. “I’d love that. I love you, Spencer.”

“I love you too,” he whispered, leaning in to press a chaste kiss to her lips. It didn’t last long, an interruption coming short thereafter.

“Okay that’s enough of that, please,” ____ spoke, walking into the kitchen.. She watched them break apart, Spencer’s classic blush painting over his cheeks and down his neck. “Not in front of my Chow Mein, thank you very much.”

“What, no kissing?” ____’s mum asked, stepping over to her daughter and placing a big smooch on her cheeks and forehead, making sure to be as dramatic as she could. She puckered her lips as ____ tried to squirm away, but to no avail.

“Okay, fine! Whatever, just stop slobbering over me,” ____ shouted, trying not to laugh. She pushed her mother off, back towards Spencer’s chest. “You both are disgusting.”

“Oh be quiet, you love us,” her mother giggled, pulling Spencer’s arms back over her body. “Why don’t you go set up the movie? We’ll plate everything.”

____ saluted them both before heading through the short hall to the living room. Spencer and her mother could hear her go on to Roger about how ridiculous they were. ‘Can you believe them, cat?’ She was returned with a faint meow. ‘I know, I know.’

“I was thinking, why wait any longer? We should make it official this weekend,” ____’s mum stated, turning her attention back to Spencer.

“Really?” Spencer asks, face lighting up instantly.

“If that’s okay with you, then absolutely. I don’t wanna wait any longer. We can start moving stuff tomorrow. Whad’ya say?”

“I say, definitely. Sounds perfect.”

The night was filled with nothing but laughter and smiles from all parties, feeling at peace with the upcoming change.

-----

The next day, they were all up early and headed over to Spencer’s apartment to start packing. They grabbed boxes on the way to make it easier, and Derek said they could give him a call when it was time to move most things over. It would be easier with his truck, rather than making ten or so different trips.

“I was thinking, we could bring a few pieces of furniture over and then donate the rest,” Spencer suggested, surveying his living room. “So pick stuff that you’d prioritize. Or if you need anything for the cafe, then go ahead.”

“I think it’s mostly clear. Do you want to keep your reading chair? We could keep it in the bedroom or the office.”

“Oh, good idea,” Spencer responds to his girlfriend as he steps over to said chair and places a yellow sticky note on the top.

The system is that the yellow marked pieces are coming with them, and the pink ones stay for now. It was easier to stay organized this way.

The next four hours were filled with frantic movements, trying to get everything ready. Spencer noticed ____ admiring a few books on his shelves, and he offered to let her borrow them. She refused at first, not wanting to possibly wreck them but he insisted, so she eventually accepted. There was a half empty bookshelf in the office, and the two of them decided to fill it with as much as they could. Spencer had a pair of mis-matched chairs, and he thought it’d be a great addition to the space as well.

----

“I’m gonna go down and bring the last bag up from the car. You two, keep working,” ____’s mum exhaled, making her way back out the door and down the stairs. They’ve returned to the main apartment, only having a few things to bring upstairs.

____ took this time to slip into her room, and retrieve a small wooden box.

“Hey, Spencer?”

“Yes?” He acknowledged, not looking up from his task, which happened to be the unwrapping of a box of books. They were currently in the home office, taking care of that room first.

“Here,” she said, lips pulled back into a line. She reached her hand out, offering the box. He looked up at that, eyebrows furrowed. He pulled his bottom lip behind his teeth and took it from her as he stood up from his kneeling position on the ground.

“What’s this?” he asked, marvelling at the object in his hands.

“A moving in gift of sorts. Open it,” ____ breathed, becoming nervous and fidgeting with her fingers.

“Oh, thank you, you didn’t have to get me anything…” he paused, seeing what was placed inside. It was a bookmark that looked handmade out of brown paper, with gold detailing. On one side it read ‘Happy Father’s Day, to the best kind-of dad ever,’ in what he presumed to be ____’s handwriting. The other was her signed name, with a smiley face next to it. He could feel the blood in his heart start to pump faster, and his grin grew even wider.

“Uh, this was the first time since primary school that we were instructed to make something for the holiday. Art class,” she chuckled. “I know it’s silly, since you read so fast so you won’t exactly need a bookmark, but this time I had someone in my life that I could see as a father. So thank you for that. I’m sorry if it’s weird. It was last minute and I wasn’t sure what to make,” she shook her head, starting to doubt herself. “Also, coincidence. The day you’re moving in.”

“No! No it’s not weird. I love it. I don’t even know what to say,” he choked out, eyes starting to glaze over. “It’s so beautiful.”

“Oh, okay good I’m glad you like it,” ____ beamed.

“Look,” he began. “I know I’m not your father, ____. But I still love you as if you were my own daughter. And I don’t mean to act as a replacement. I know your father was a wonderful man, and both you and your mother loved him. I also know that he loved you,” Spencer said softly, rubbing the back of his eyes with his hand.

“Love you too, Spence. You’re the closest thing I have to a real dad, and I’m glad that it’s you,” ____ replied, returning his smile. “I’m happy you’ll be around here more.”

“Me too.”

“Happy Father’s Day, Spencer,” ____ cried, walking over to him and embracing him in a hug. She wrapped her arms around him tightly, and he did the same.

He placed his chin upon her head, letting tears of joy fall free. They held each other for a little while longer, pure happiness radiating off of them both.

The next years of their lives were filled with nothing but delight, with of course a few rocky moments. Spencer let ____ and her mother paint his nails sometimes, and he takes quite a liking to them. It became a tradition after he returned from hard cases. There were ones when the unsub was targeting young girls where he would come home and hug ____ extra hard. He was so proud of her when she graduated high school, and was there when she was dropped off at college. He would take her to Take Your Child To Work days, and the whole team adored her. She would call Spencer in the middle of the night when she was sad and away from home, because she didn’t want to worry too much. Spencer even got to walk ____ down the aisle, as she did the same for her mother at her and Spencer’s wedding. There were photos of the three of them and more of ____’s father hung up around the apartment. Everything was amazing, and they were all so thankful to have each other.

It may not be in blood, but their little found family was perfect.

-----

Please tell me your thoughts on this work here! I'd appreciate any and all feedback.

[genevievemd]

Hello, hello! This week, we are going on a little:

Home Tour!

Notes: Answer the following with pictures (dialogue from your characters is optional!). Collages are highly encouraged if you want to answer a question with multiple pictures because tumblr mobile only allows 10 total pics. Otherwise, tumblr on a desktop lets you add multiple pictures (non-beta)!

For both:

What does the outside of the home look like? (Front/back yard, garden, pool, etc)

Living room and home office (if any)?

Kitchen and dining room?

Bedrooms? (Master, guest, others)

Other rooms?

Do you own your dream home? If not, what does that dream home look like?

What is your favorite room to spend time in with each other?

This one is fun. You're an icon Bree

Genevieve: House Tour! I love showing off the apartment, it's so much better since I moved in. Less dark and scary and more homey. Ethan: Always finding an opportunity to insult my taste. Gen: Babe, this place was a dungeon of solitude. I've brought light and colors. Ethan: *looks at her with heart eyes* I won't deny that.

Floor Plan: {They live in East Boston, on the water, the building you used in your picta series actually lol. Then Den is considered the office)

Gen: We decided to stay in Ethan's apartment, since it's just the two of us, it seems silly to have a bigger place right now. This is perfect for us and our doggy son. Ethan: But we've agreed to move to a bigger apartment in the building once we start having kids. Gen: And then once they're a little older, we'll get a house. It's a good plan for us, and it works out well. We love the city life, and want our future children to be immersed in that. Ethan: But we also want them to be able to have a yard one day, and a tree house like G had as a child. So once they're around 5 or 6 and of school age, we'll move outside the city and into a house.

1. What does the outside of the home look like? (Front/back yard, garden, pool, etc)

Ethan: I picked this place specifically for the views, and the outdoor space it had. Gen: It's super fancy. Jenner loves doing his morning runs with Dad by the water.

2. Living room and home office (if any)?

Gen: When I moved in, he had the worst leather couch. *laughs* Like a classic bachelor pad couch. I convinced him to go furniture shopping after a few weeks after, that was a fun adventure. Dr. Grumpy was very indecisive. Ethan: You wanted a pink accent chair! Gen: I was joking! Ethan: Sure, Rookie. Gen: Anyway... we agreed on a nice gray sectional and a little color in the accents. It's super comfy and homey. Ethan: And my office has remained untouched. Gen: Not true! It's gotten a few new additions! Like my photo on the desk, and the plant!

3. Kitchen and dining room?

Gen: I love the open floor plan. I can see my private chef from my comfy corner of the couch.  Ethan: Did you just refer to me as your private chef? Gen: Am i wrong? Ethan: *opens his mouth to argue but decides not to* Gen: Exactly.  Ethan: Back to the task at hand. Our styles are similar, which worked out well. We love a modern contemporary look.  Gen: Very clean and put together, but still leaves from for some personality. 

4. Bedrooms? (Master, guest, others)

Gen: We have two bedrooms, the master - ours - and a guest room. We both like a relaxing vibe in the bedroom. Because we’re so busy at work and always on the go, we like coming home to a space that’s relaxed and calming.  Ethan: You did make a few changes since you moved in. The comforter is new, and floral. Gen: You literally gave me your credit card and said “Text me photos of options, but choose whatever you think is best, G.”  Ethan: I have to stop doing that. Gen: You act like you hate it. It’s nice. Our room is perfect. And so is the guest room. 

5. Other rooms?

Ethan: The closet is her favorite, I think. Gen: I’ve literally always wanted to be fancy and boujee enough to have a walk in closet, and now I do. But I love the balcony, too. And the master bath has amazing lighting. 

Ethan: The building has some great amenities. The gym is quite nice, especially on mornings when it’s raining, and I can’t go for a run outdoors, or when I want to avoid Lahela at the hospital gym.  Gen: He’s your best friend, don’t even lie. Ethan: He is not. If anyone is my best friend, it’d be you. Followed by Naveen, and then your brother.  Gen: You two get along too well, I hate it sometimes. 

6. Do you own your dream home? If not, what does that dream home look like?

Gen: No? I mean, like, I love our home and it’s perfect for right now. But I don’t like it’s our, or my, dream home. Ethan: Your dream home, love, aside from a home on the beach, is that colonial/tudor in Newton. The one we passed a few months back, that you then dragged me back to when it was for sale.  Gen: *gasps* Yes. I’m in love with it. It was built in ‘37, it makes my history loving heart so happy. 

Gen: I think the interior needs an update. We’d definitely redo the kitchen and dining room area, give the hardwood floors a darker stain, as well. But it’s stunning. It’s a five bedroom, with a pool and a perfect sized yard, and the master suite has a walk-in closet the size of our current guest room. There’s also a finished basement, and a family room and a den. It’s perfect. Ethan: Don’t forget the wine room. You talked about that for hours. Gen: It puts our mini wine fridge to shame.  Ethan: I do love the house, as well. We just need to hope that come the time when we’re in the market for a home, it’s for sale again. Gen: I’ll pray to every god in the universe. 

What is your favorite room to spend time in with each other?

Gen: *snickers* Ethan: PG, answer please. Gen: Fine. The living room, or kitchen. I love cooking with you, or watching a movie and snuggling.  Ethan: I do enjoy that as well. Although, my favorite, is the bedroom.  Gen: You said -- Ethan: Not for that reason, G. But, I do love when we’re laying in bed, and reading together. It’s by far one of my favorite ways we spend time together. Gen: Really? Ethan: Yes. 

And because I’m Extra AF, this is the floor plan for the apartment they move to after Lizzie is born

They live there until Lizzie is 6 and Grayson is 4. And then move to the house mentioned above. And they also get the beach house, one day. Because they’re both super rich and fancy doctors. 

Super loved this weeks round, Bree. A 10/10

[bigskydreaming]

I actually can not believe I've never posted this X-Men headcanon (that turned into a whole treatment/thesis) here on this blog, but for those few followers who know who Dallas Gibson aka Specter is, or Laynia Petrovna aka Darkstar, or just anything about Academy X in general.....enjoy!

(Mostly because I don't trust the random PDF hosting site I've got it stored on and I like to keep stuff backed up online and not just in my files so posting it for posterity here anyway.)

Anyway, I give you:

THE GREAT MANIFESTO OF WHAT IF DALLAS GIBSON WAS THE SECRET LOVE CHILD ONE NIGHT STAND CHILD OF BOBBY DRAKE AND LAYNIA PETROVNA: A CRACK FIC THEORY OUTLINE SOMETHING IN THREE PARTS

(Relax. Its actually only about 10,000 words long. That's like, barely ANYTHING when its me. Its a itty bitty teeny tiny nothing of a thing. Hardly even counts).

So, okay. I have approximately 80 different pitches for what to do with Iceman at any given time, but here's one that I know would never in a million years happen purely because the X-Office will never let the 05 be the ages I perceive them as which is mid to late thirties at this point. Like I picture Bobby as around thirty-six or so, though for him it actually makes sense for him to be eternally portrayed as LOOKING like he's in his early 20s, since that was the age he first transmuted to his ice form and so makes sense to be his default template/molecular blueprint his power resets him to every time he has to make a new body from scratch. BUT I DIGRESS.

Anyway, wildly self-indulgent pitch ahead, which ties into a cracky headcanon I've had since Academy X, includes a couple OCs, and explores his past history with Laynia, long before he was out, as well as his connections to other heroes beyond the X-Men like Laynia and her brother, Black Widow, etc. And then it combines my ideas for giving Bobby an antagonist of his own, more characters to interact with other than major X-Men so his story beats aren't reliant on whatever's going on with other X-Men and who's available, and gives him concrete reasons to want to level up quickly in terms of how much social influence he wields among mutantkind, take more prominent/proactive stances on things, etc. While still leaving room for him to be goofy and always trying to use humor to seem more relatable, less threatening, etc.

So. I'm picturing this as a triptych like Sabretooth, three interlocked minis of five issues each that form a trilogy by the end.

First mini:

ICEMAN AND DARKSTAR: SHADOW GAMES

ISSUE ONE:

First issue opens with Bobby in his apartment in LA, sometime after he's left the most recent X-Men lineup and is back to living off of Krakoa. He's just gotten in and is going through his mail where he comes across a card with no return address. Opening it, he finds its a condolence card that says "Thinking of you on this anniversary of such a tragic day." His internal monologue, conveyed in caption boxes and a key element of this whole mini, shows he's totally confused by this. He has no idea why this date would hold any special significance, or who would have sent the card or why. (The specific date would just be somewhere around the date of publication, in a world where this actually got published, lol. Let's go with April 27th, for instance).

Deciding to just shrug it off as some weird thing, Bobby's basically just being moody for a page or two of reflection before Scott calls. They're trying to do better about keeping in touch even when they're not on the same team. Some generic catching up, and Bobby eventually mentions he's just been in a weird mood all day, to which Scott says he's not surprised. Turns out Scott's noticed that for as long as he can remember now, Bobby's ALWAYS in a shitty mood every time April 27th rolls around. Yes, Scott is anal enough that after years of Bobby being weird around the same time every year, he eventually narrowed it down to its epicenter. This very day. Bobby is both weirded out and touched by Scott's attention to something so specific about Bobby...more attentive than even Bobby himself. When they hang up, he's still clueless about why today would be such a big deal to him, but apparently there's a pattern. That card might not have been so random after all.

Confused & uncomfortable now, Bobby decides to get out of the house & just do hero stuff. That always makes him feel better. He helps put out some fires, divert a tidal wave, gating back and forth across the planet, restless. The whole issue, even as he uses his usual banter to make the people he helps feel at ease in the wake of whatever catastrophe they were just saved from, his internal monologue shows he's second-guessing himself constantly, being his own worst enemy, criticizing every choice he makes about his saves, how he could've done things better, etc. Things come to a head when he intervenes at a protest - I don't have a specific cause in mind but ideally something non mutant related - as a group attacks the protesters until Bobby drops in to protect them.

The protesters thank him but are pretty cynical about the whole thing. They note that this happens constantly and most of those same people will be back stirring up trouble and violence at another event like this down the line. They hope for change for the better but point out that some people never will, because they're not interested in better. They're happy with their hate. Bobby reflects on what they said, and here's where his thoughts start to take a particularly dark turn. He thinks of some of the ways his powers could be used to ensure those ppl never hurt anyone again, how the full potential of his powers include a lot of lethal options, and why shouldn't he use them when its true most of these ppl will just commit heinous acts in the future, and he might not be around to protect their victims next time. He even reflects on how he's used some of those darker options in the past, so its not like it'd be crossing a line he hasn't already....

Disturbed by the fact that the only reason he can think of not to go there is he's a hero and heroes don't do that, he just wants to be anywhere else in a hurry so he skips heading for a gate and does something he does only rarely....turns himself into mist and starts to disperse, to teleport somewhere far away, but as he does he gets the weirdest feeling, like his spread out consciousness is brushing up against someone else's. He's not alone he realizes. And he stops and recoalesces right there and talking to the empty air he demands that someone show themselves. A man appears out of nowhere, laughing.

Stranger: Your observational skills are a lot sharper than they used to be, Drake. Back in the day, you had no idea when I was around.

Bobby: Who are you and why are you talking like I'm supposed to know who you are? I've never seen you before in my life.

Stranger: Wow, it sucks to realize you left way less of an impression on someone than they left on you. I guess it makes sense though. I mean, when you KILLED me almost twenty years ago, this very day - that was obviously a big deal for me, but hey, I've been out of the loop awhile so what do I know? Maybe it was just another Tuesday for you.

Bobby: Are you the one who sent me that card earlier? Who the hell are you and what kind of game are you playing?

Stranger: Same one we were playing all those years ago, Bob. Before you got all pissy and flipped the board before I got a chance to make my next move. But thanks to the wonders of Krakoan resurrection, now we can pick up right where we left off. It really is a miracle, isn't it?

Bobby: Well maybe you should check with the Five and make sure they didn't bring you back with a few screws loose, because I'm pretty sure I'd remember this if it was actually me you were playing this game with.

Stranger: Maybe you just forgot. Or who knows? Maybe someone made you forget.

Bobby: Okay, yeah, I'm bored now. Time to put you on ice.

He starts icing the area around the stranger, intending to trap him in a block of ice, but the stranger just laughs and turns incorporeal, becoming a transparent outline hovering above the street....so to anyone who hadn't been watching their conversation - like the very protesters Bobby had saved earlier - it looked like Bobby was just furiously creating some kind of ice attack that didn't seem to be aimed at anyone...other than them. The now ghost-like stranger zips over to the crowd and starts weaving among them, seeming to whisper in a bunch of peoples' ears....and before long, the crowd that had just been saved from one attack and were primed not to just sit down and take another, were ready to choose fight over flight, becoming a mob headed for Bobby.

He constructs some ice barriers to just keep them at bay, not really worried they'll hurt him and more concerned about not hurting them, when the stranger's ghost form swirls around Bobby, hovering above his shoulder and now whispering in his ear. But there's no dialogue in the stranger's speech bubble....just caption boxes displaying Bobby's internal monologue....and now calling into question every single box earlier in the issue.

Caption box: Isn't it surreal how the right words whispered in the right ears can dramatically change a person's perception of something....or someone? How easy it is to change peoples' courses....even the course of their entire life?

Caption box: And fear, well, fear's one of the best motivators there is. So much easier to get someone to listen to you when they're afraid of something else.

Caption box: But maybe you can't really relate to that. A guy as powerful as you, you're probably not afraid of much these days.

Caption box: That wasn't always true though, was it? This take you back at all? Remind you of when you were just a kid, and there was a mob gunning for you just for the crime of being mutant and vulnerable? I bet you were scared then.

Caption box: Considering what a guy like you could do if he were scared enough, if the right person used the right words as the spark to ignite all that fear....the world's probably pretty lucky that Saint Xavier was there to be the voice you listened to back then, huh. Y'know, instead of someone like Magneto or Apocalypse being the ones to tell traumatized, impressionable little you what to do with all that fear and anger you felt....

Caption box: Do you ever think about that, Drake? Wonder if all that separates you from the worst of the worst is you had the right voice in your ear at the right time? That maybe there's nothing special about you at all, nothing innately noble, heroic.

Caption box: That you were just....lucky?

Caption box: Food for thought. Anyway, I gotta run for now, but I'll be seeing you, Bob.

Caption box: We have so much to catch up on.

Then its just Bobby left keeping the mob at bay with his ice structures, him visibly shutting down, trying not to think too much and just running on instinct, until a hand reaches down from above and snatches him up into the air, until the streets are just a speck below them. Bobby looks up and to his shock its Laynia Petrovna aka Darkstar, his old friend and teammate from back when he was on the Champions as a teenager. The issue closes with her saying: "Hello, Bobby. I'd say its nice to see you and all the usual pleasantries, but we don't have much time. And we need to talk about our son."

ISSUE TWO

This issue switches to Laynia's POV with her internal monologue in caption boxes, and picks up with them having teleported somewhere secluded via Laynia's powers (she's much more practiced using hers to teleport than Bobby is using his that way). This issue goes back and forth between past and present, as during Laynia's narration of past events they're shown as if they're happening in real time.

Bobby's pointing out that they were never together, and considering she was the one who turned him down, you'd think she'd be aware of that. Laynia responds that no, they were never a couple, but they did sleep together once and once only....she'd been feeling particularly down about her ex-boyfriend Yuri after running into him, it was a rebound thing for her and she never hid that but Bobby took it to mean more than it did anyway and acted a fool about it, aligning with their canon interactions at the very end of their Champions run, before getting on the same page and they went back to just being friends.

Except, Laynia says, then she found out she was pregnant, and he flew to Russia to join her and decide what to do together, while everyone else thought he was still at UCLA. He doesn't remember any of this, because blocks were put in their memories, hiding everything related to this. But it did happen, and they do have a son. She'll explain everything, but they need to keep moving around, as she doesn't want the man who just confronted Bobby to overhear any of this and its very hard to detect when he's around. Their best option is to keep on the move, teleporting frequently and not staying anywhere long enough for him to track where they are.

Bobby: Oh crap. HE'S not our son, is he?

Laynia: Hell no.

Bobby: Phew, I was worried we had a Stryfe situation for a second there. I am barely holding it together as is and I am NOT equipped to handle an evil Bobby Jr. from the future.

Laynia reaffirms that he is definitely not their son, but he is the reason for much of what happened back when they were eighteen. They only ever knew him by his moniker, 'Doubting Thomas' and honestly were never sure when exactly he started watching them and messing with their heads. That's his MO. His power lets him turn from flesh and blood into a form made solely of psychic energy...an astral ghost that's invisible, immaterial and can travel via the astral plane. But his only power to affect the material world in that form lies in telepathy. He can project thoughts into someone's mind and its almost impossible to keep him out or tell his intrusions from ordinary thoughts.

She's not sure how he'd fare against other telepaths, but at least with non-psychics, even the best psychic shielding or anti-telepath technology isn't a guarantee against him. Because doesn't try to break into minds, or even sneak past mental defenses. He just surveils his targets, watching them invisibly, learning all he can about them, and then he looks for cracks in whatever mental shields they have. Tiny gaps here and there that he can just whisper into, slipping a thought in amongst the chaos and chatter generated by someone's own mind.

All of which means they never were sure where their own natural fears and paranoia ended, and his whispering began. They were eighteen, she reminds Bobby, already freaking out about this giant life change neither were sure they were ready for, even if they did keep the baby...and neither of them was an ordinary civilian. They were powerful mutants with lots of enemies....from day one, they were concerned that their child would be born with a target on their back just from that. And then there was the fact that one of the things they'd always bonded over was resentment for how early they felt their childhoods ended.

Laynia and her twin brother Nikolai were taken from their parents at birth, and raised separately with government agents for foster parents. They were always intended to be mutant operatives for their government, their lives scripted out for them, and their training began in their early teens. Laynia didn't even know she had a twin brother until she was in her twenties.

And Bobby had always quietly nursed resentment for being put out into the field at the same time as the rest of the 05, all years older than him and with a lot more focus from the Professor. Scott was his protege, a tactical genius, Jean was his preferred pupil in terms of power development, Hank was a bonafide genius, and Warren was a millionaire playboy, a natural spokesman and inevitable future celebrity. Bobby was just Bobby though, with no awareness of his full potential, and the only one the Professor didn't seem to have any real purpose for or interest in. Like he was tacked on as a spare, his presence more of an afterthought than intentional.

So especially in his late teens, after the 05 went their separate ways, Bobby had always been bothered by the fact that he'd gone through all the same traumas and hardships as the rest on their various missions, but always wondering what he was even doing there when it didn't even seem like there was any reason he was supposed to be. Privately he'd always wanted someone - his parents, the Professor, even the older 05 - to question whether there was really nobody else Xavier could have been sending out to fight Magneto, than a fifteen year old too afraid of being abandoned to say no on his own behalf. After all, the issue was complicated by the fact that when his parents weren't fully on board with Bobby going to the Institute, Xavier mindwiped them into thinking he was just at boarding school, and it was only when Bobby was eighteen that the Professor restored their full awareness of what Bobby had been doing for years.

All of which played into why Bobby and Laynia didn't tell anyone about the pregnancy, even their closest friends. It started out as them just putting it off, wanting to be more sure of their own thoughts on this before someone else tried to make the decision what to do for them, but by the time Laynia gave birth, they'd fully isolated themselves, paranoid that Xavier or the Red Room would take the baby and just make them forget all about it. And problem is, as Laynia put it, they couldn't tell how much of that was Doubting Thomas whispering all the right things to ramp up their anxieties and specific fears.

And obviously someone did mess with their memories anyway, Bobby points out crankily. This all is partly meant to seed two ongoing character arcs for Bobby in the future....the first, his awareness of how often his mind and memories have been messed with over the years, by enemies and allies alike, to the point he's honestly not sure how much of 'him' is really even him, and how much he's just the end result of people just editing his mind whenever he started heading in a direction they didn't want him to. With how long the memories of their time travel trip were hidden, now these missing memories, what other holes could exist in his memories without him ever having a clue?

And the second character arc is his misgivings about Xavier and the role he played in Bobby's childhood. Knowing what he knows now of his omega potential, aware that all the biggest developments and learning curves with his powers happened when Bobby WASN'T Xavier's student, Bobby's increasingly convinced that Xavier never trusted Bobby with his own power, and while he might not have actively stunted his growth, he certainly didn't help or encourage it the way he did his other students. The foundation is there for Bobby to wonder if the only reason Xavier ever even recruited him was to keep him from falling into anyone else's hands and becoming a threat.

As Laynia reminds him of what they were like back then and how they viewed things, things fall into place for Bobby and its very easy for him to see how they could have ended up hiding this from anyone in Xavier's orbit, etc...and this starts to become less abstract for him. It wasn't that he thought she was lying at any point, but its hitting him now....he has a son, and someone made him forget. He's someone who has always yearned for family that won't judge or condemn him, leave him, always been determined to be everything his own father wasn't and nothing like him, and yet he has a son who's grown up without him. Whose name he doesn't even know.

He does know his son though, it turns out. At least somewhat. Its one of Bobby's former students before M-Day. Dallas Gibson aka Specter. He has no idea who he really is, Laynia says, but the parents who died when Dallas was ten were his adoptive parents. But he was born Dallas Drake, as Petrovna wasn't even Laynia's real last name and she had no idea what it originally was. Heir to the merged powersets of both his biological parents, with his father's elemental form but made from his mother's signature Darkforce energies.

As for why Laynia remembers when Bobby doesn't....she didn't originally. But then years ago (during the Morrison run), she was possessed by one of Weapon X's most dangerous creations, the Huntsman. However, thanks to how her powers were designed to let her mind travel through the Darkforce Dimension to do things like teleport, when she was possessed, her mind tried to flee into that dimension. When Fantomex killed her, he only killed her body, and her mental tether to it. The shock and trauma of her physical death broke down the barriers around her memories, and they all came flooding back. Problem was, she only existed as a consciousness drifting aimlessly in the Darkforce Dimension.

But then Dallas started learning more about his powers and growing them during his time at the Academy. And his powerset also includes the ability to make shadow golems similar to the ice golems his father makes. But he didn't realize this as the first time he made one, with Darkforce energy being the clay his golem was sculpted from...Laynia was able to use that as a doorway into the physical world. She inhabited his shadow golem as her vessel, the way a future Iceman's golem once split off from him and became a separate entity. So Dallas never realized his newfound shadow friend started out as something he made unconsciously...he just knew that it seemed to have its own sentience from the jump, was a friend and protector who'd show up whenever he needed them. That friend and protector just happened to be his biological mother, watching over him the only way she could.

Until M-Day. When Dallas was depowered, Laynia lost her connection to the physical world and was stuck again in the Darkforce Dimension....until her brother Nikolai made a bargain with Immortus that led to her full resurrection. Finally she was back, and she remembered everything. But also knew Bobby remembered none of this. And so for the next couple years she just checked in on Dallas periodically but kept her distance, because she not only remembered her son...she also remembered why they were so desperate to hide his connection to them that they covered up their own memories of him ever existing.

At the end of the issue, they arrive at the hideout of the Russian mutant underground, a community of mutants who mistrust Krakoa and its leaders, but aren't on board with Mikhail Rasputin and his faction either. Laynia brought Bobby to the person who originally hid their memories and locked them away - at their own request....Bobby's idea, in fact - Alexi Garnoff aka Blind Faith, a telepath Bobby first met in his X-Factor days. But who was so quick to trust Bobby, because turns out that wasn't actually the first time Alexi remembered meeting him.

As Bobby reels from the reveal that this particular manipulation of his mind had been something he himself asked for, Alexi says he can erase all his work and return his own memories of all this, and Laynia warns him that remembering it all will hurt. Because they have a son, yes, Dallas Gibson aka Dallas Drake aka Specter. But twins run in her family.

And for a brief - too brief - window of time, they had not one son, but two.

ISSUE THREE

This issue returns to Bobby's POV and internal monologue, and takes place almost entirely in the past, or in Bobby's mindscape. He tells Alexi to do his thing, he wants to know, NEEDS to know everything. The walls come down and in his mind, Bobby finds himself standing at the start of a giant labyrinth made of ice. He sees a little boy running through it and gives chase, needing to catch up to him, desperate even as he's aware he's running on autopilot, more instinct than knowledge. He's never seen this boy before - he's not even a real memory himself. But he knows what an older Dallas looks like, at least. And he's sure this is what his mind imagines a Dmitri older than what he actually remembers might look like, and he desperately wants a closer look. But this Dima stays forever just out of range because his mind doesn't actually have a clear image of an older Dmitri to conjure, and up close, the illusion would be too obvious, and the loss all the more real for that.

Following the boy through the labyrinth, he sees memories unveil themselves on the ice walls around them. He remembers Laynia telling him she was pregnant, their agitated debates over the months that followed as they agonized over what to do, how to keep the baby safe - babies, once they found out it was twins. He sees the day the twins were born, relives them deciding to name the elder twin Dallas, after the city where they first met, before Laynia even joined the Champions, and the younger they named Dmitri, or Dima for short....after the only teacher Laynia ever felt actually valued her for herself instead of seeing her as a weapon being honed.

He remembers them leaving the hospital and hiding for a few weeks at a secluded cabin their old teammate the Black Widow found for them....she was the only one they told, figuring nobody could keep a secret better than her, and how they wavered and grew closer to caving and letting their closest friends and teammates help them figure out how to keep the twins safe. Sees flashbacks of him playing with the boys while Laynia watches fondly, and vice versa. Relives as he - still little older than a child himself - puts them in their crib and tells them not to be scared, talks about how his grandfather used to have a saying: "all Drakes are dragons," and making a dragon sculpture that catches the light to act as their nightlight.

And then he relives the day they woke up to find the crib empty and the twins missing. The first time they met Doubting Thomas, who left them an easy trail to follow because he wanted them to find him, wanted a confrontation. Bobby and Laynia had descended on the facility they tracked him to with the full fury of midnight and winter at their most destructive, and once inside they separated as they found the twins had been split up and taken in different directions. Laynia went after Dallas, who she could feel faintly, an early sign of his link to the Darkforce Dimension that she shares - second generation mutants always tend to manifest early - and Bobby went after Dmitri.

Doubting Thomas was waiting though, and the villain backstory reveal unfolded. The Professor, the Hellfire Club, etc....they weren't the only people who went around looking for young mutants to mold, seeing their potential. He grew up under the thumb of a woman even he only knows as Mother Nurture, a sadist with unguessable motivations even to her lackeys that she raised from childhood....to be their worst selves. Apparently she claims to be a precog, who knew what mutant children would grow up to be great heroes or positive influences on the world....which appears to be contrary to her agenda, whatever that is....as she targets kids who COULD grow up to be great forces for change, change for the better, and picks the ones with the brightest potential to stamp out and corrupt, turn to darkness. Her obsession with proving that there are no real heroes, that anyone can be twisted into the villain was apparently a recurring theme of Doubting Thomas' childhood, so when she assigned him the task of abducting the Drake twins when they were still months away from even being born, Thomas fixated on Bobby and Laynia during his surveillance of them, and developed an obsession of his own.

It was the first time he'd ever targeted superhero parents, let alone ones close enough in age to him that he could project onto them, see them as an inverted reflection of his own life. And even as he prepared to take the Drake twins at the earliest opportunity, that was just his assignment. His obsession with Bobby and Laynia was wholly personal, as he clearly became consumed with a need to prove to himself that they weren't better than him, that he could have BEEN them in another life, with better influences....that they would have been no different than he if they'd been in his shoes.

In fact, he was convinced there was such a slim margin of difference between them that he could topple Iceman from his heroic perch with just the slightest push. Bobby refutes this, saying he's nothing like him, but that's when Thomas says he lied. Mother Nurture actually only sent him after one Drake boy. She wasn't expecting two. Apparently, one of them was never destined to live all that long to begin with.

The issue never actually shows Dmitri, just Bobby breaking down, cradling the swaddled figure to his chest. He's dead-eyed when he looks up, frozen tear tracks on his cheeks as one icy drop falls to the ground and shatters.

Bobby: Guess you were right about me. Congrats. You win.

And then over the next two panels, Thomas flash-freezes before he can react, his entire body frozen on a cellular level...and then he shatters.

We only see glimpses of Laynia's horrified reaction when she arrives with Dallas in her arms, as Bobby hurries past those memories, he has them back but he doesn't want to relive those moments at all...and there are more snapshots of barely glimpsed memories of Bobby and Laynia reducing the entire facility to nothing but an empty crater. Bobby arrives at the memory of Laynia and Bobby, fueled by trauma and desperation, panicking about this Mother Nurture sending someone else after Dallas, their original fears reignite, the list of people who might want a baby like Dallas for their own agendas seems endless....culminating in them giving Dallas to Black Widow to place with a family she trusts to raise him safely. But Bobby notes despondently that even with all that, it'd take someone like Xavier or with similar resources all of five minutes to find a powerful mutant that young, if they ever got so much as a hint about him from Bobby or Laynia's minds.

Which is when Bobby decides: "In a world of telepaths, Cerebros and Wolverines, the only foolproof way to keep a secret...is to not even know it yourself.

They both agree, and seek out a telepath unaffiliated with any team or organization: Alexi Garnoff. Which brings us back to the present.

April 27th. The anniversary of the day one son died, and they made the decision to give up the other for his own safety.

ISSUE FOUR

With both of their memories fully restored, they're on the same page about what happens now: They have to find a way to keep the resurrected Doubting Thomas from figuring out who and where Dallas is. If he truly wants revenge, or if he still just feels compelled to fulfill his original assignment, Dallas is his real target. But they're fairly certain the extreme lengths they went to all those years ago at least did their job. Even with Bobby unaware of Thomas' existence, let alone vendetta against him, the latter was able to stalk him ever since his resurrection without finding even a hint of Dallas' location or identity...he would have had better luck stalking Laynia probably, but they assumed his fixation on Bobby for killing him, along with Laynia steering clear of Krakoa (ironically because she was worried about the many telepaths there picking up on her secret), Thomas concentrated his efforts on following Bobby and might not have even realized that unlike him, Laynia DID already know who and where Dallas was.

Thomas must have come out into the open in the way he did specifically to push Bobby to regain his memories, figuring then it would only be a matter of time before Bobby slipped up enough for Thomas to zero in on his target....so now they had to figure out how to keep that from happening, while now having a whole new host of reasons not to want to advertise they had a son. The last thing they want is to keep him out of Thomas' clutches just to put him on Sinister's radar, especially now that they know Bobby's an omega and how 'highly prized' they are as resources....which would no doubt make his offspring of interest to various villains.

Not to mention, Laynia's got her own misgivings about Krakoa. She's FURIOUS about the Crucible - Dallas was among the earliest to sign up and go through it, desperate to get his powers back and return to his place among his former classmates. Not only does she consider it needless trauma of the very sort they sacrificed so much to protect their son from, Laynia is territorial. Dallas' name and powers were pretty much the only thing he got from his biological parents, that they were able to give him as his birthright, the upside to all the downs that came with being their kid, and Laynia's pissed as hell that Bobby's new government had the gall to demand their son EARN BACK what was always his and that losing had ALREADY been a trauma all its own.

This in turn sows the seeds for Bobby's development into a more proactive role in mutant society, as well as future conflict with a lot of the personalities that put the Crucible in place initially, as he's forced to confront why he didn't have more problems with it in the first place, or at least not enough that he wasn't able to justify its existence. Has he gotten so used to assuming others know better than him, that he no longer bothers trying to weigh the morality of things himself? Is he comfortable with what it says about him that it took having a personal stake - his son having gone through it - to make him sit up and think hey, that was fucked up?

Meanwhile, Thomas has not been idle, and is using reports of Bobby seemingly attacking innocent protesters the other day to stir up doubts in him among any influential mutants or X-Men he can whisper suspicions to, without them being aware of his presence/influence. Bobby is 'strongly encouraged' by Xavier to return to Krakoa to clear up the confusion, and when he refuses, that just adds more fuel for Thomas to work with. Plus he uses all the paranoia Beast has drummed up over the past couple years to cast suspicion on Bobby suddenly being inseparable from Laynia, a known Russian operative who has no allegiances to Krakoa, while also stirring mutants in Mikhail's camp to view Laynia's choice of companions as suspicious, which threatens her work with the Russian mutant underground and her efforts to keep them safe and hidden as well.

Finally they decide the best way to deal with Thomas is to lure him in and get Alexi to do to him what he did to Bobby and Laynia years ago. Hide away all Thomas' memories of things related to them and give him a tailored memory of how he died and why.

ISSUE FIVE

Most of this issue is just Thomas, Laynia and Bobby all playing cat and mouse with each other...Thomas having his own schemes even as the other two try to implement theirs, until its hard to tell who is the hunter and who is the hunted. Bobby and Laynia are still teleporting as often as they can, both to keep him from sneaking up on them and poisoning their thoughts or manipulating their plans, as well as to evade various friends and teammates who are now seeking them out, concerned by their behavior and increasingly susceptible to distrusting them as they refuse to give any hints as to what the hell they're doing.

It should be very clear that Bobby and Laynia are NOT acting wholly rationally here, and they're both aware of it. Doubting Thomas is GOOD at what he does, and he's familiar enough with them and their sore spots, from intel he gained long ago still being relevant here and now, particularly with how recently their memories were refocused on those days....that they're sure even the tiniest or briefest amounts of access to them is enough for him to skew their own paranoia in extreme ways. Not to mention.....they're much older now than they were when they made the choice to hide Dallas in the way they did, and they made that decision at the absolute height of their grief, fear and anxiety. They're second-guessing every choice they made back then, as well as the ones they're making now, and they're NOT sure that staying away, doing this on their own, not confiding in anyone or pulling them in....they're not doing all that because they're convinced its the right move.

They're staying the course because they don't have any idea what the right move is, and until they do, doubling down on their previous choices is because there's no take-backs, no undoing things once the secret is out. They can't afford to decide that was the wrong move after they've done it, when that will do them no good.

So they stick to their plan and try to get Thomas in Alexi's range, but with his guard down enough for the other telepath to act. The POV shifts back and forth between Bobby and Laynia's, with a lot of their internal doubts about everything they've done, the thoughts Thomas raised in Bobby back in Issue #1, the ideological battle Thomas imagines exists between him and the heroes he resents so much - this back-and-forth spans most of the issue and keeps these themes front and center, until ultimately Bobby and Thomas face off again.

Bobby surprises Thomas by using his powers in an unexpected way....he makes dozens of golems spread out all over the place and then shuffles his actual consciousness through them one at a time, 'possessing' one golem as his vessel, his ice form before leaping into another one. Thomas can't get a bead on him, keeps chasing his own tail trying to keep up with Bobby's constant shell game in an attempt to find the 'real one,' where Bobby's actually vulnerable.

Finally, Bobby makes it clear he's not going to be playing this game with Thomas anymore, because thing is, the point Thomas is so obsessed with proving, wanting Bobby to know he's no better than him, is capable of terrible things....Bobby flat out just doesn't care.

Bobby: I remember everything now, Thomas. That's what you wanted, right? For me to relive all that, make sure I can't hide from it? That I have to feel every bit of pain I shut away back then because I couldn't deal? Because the truth is, as much as that was to protect my son it was also to protect me from everything I WANTED to forget? I remember. I remember my kids, losing them....I remember killing you. But I also remembered something else, that you probably didn't factor in.

Thomas: And what's that?

Bobby: I remembered that I'm not sorry.

He goes on the attack, just destruction every which way you look so that Thomas is forced to stay on the defensive, keeping himself immaterial and jaunting around because there's no safe space for him to land, so to speak.

Bobby: The Five can bring you back a thousand times and I'll kill you a thousand and one, if that's what it takes to keep my son safe from you. Here's what you never got. The whole hero vs villain, right or wrong, good or evil thing you're so obsessed with? I just don't care, man. That's never been why I do any of this. I know I'm flawed, too flawed to ever be 'truly good' but by the same token, I know there's enough good in me I'm not truly bad either. I've done terrible things before and I'll do them again, because at the end of the day, I'm not trying to be a hero. I'm just trying to save people where I can.

Bobby: Its about priorities, see. Its people that matter to me, if I'm helping or hurting. And I'll hurt someone to help someone I think deserves it more and maybe that's wrong but thing is I'm not making that choice based on if its right or wrong. I'm making it based on who I think needs help and what do I have to do to help them. Let someone else figure out the scorecard, I'm just trying to make sure the person I'm protecting makes it home safe.

Bobby: And you? You don't matter. My son matters to me. That's all that matters here. I choose him, no matter what, every time, and whatever that means, whatever I have to do to choose him, or because I choose him? I'll deal with it. If I make the wrong choices, if they backfire and get him hurt or they're not what he would want - that's the stuff that can keep me up at night. But if choosing him means killing an asshole like you to keep him safe?

Bobby: Don't worry about my virtue. I'll cope.

With that, Thomas makes his retreat, tail between his legs. They weren't able to implement their plan to have Alexi erase his memories, but they don't consider this to be over. He'll be back, they'll have more opportunities to make that happen. At least this time he was the one doing the running.

But as the finale of the issue, Thomas adapts and changes the game. He waits until Bobby's back on Krakoa, meeting with Xavier and other X-Men about recent events and trying to say as little as possible...and then Thomas picks that place and time to make his first public appearance on Krakoa since he was resurrected as just another name on the resurrection queue. Nobody knew who he was then or cared that he didn't seem interested in staying on the island, claiming amnesty and official Krakoan citizenship....but he does that now in the most dramatic way possible....as he turns to Bobby and blatantly advertises they have history.

Thomas: And in the spirit of new beginnings, I just want to say I forgive you for killing me eighteen years ago. Fresh starts for everyone, right?

And with that bombshell - and the fact that one look at Bobby tells everyone present that he's not denying it - he saunters off, leaving Bobby with more questions to answer but no closer to being able to fully disclose what he's keeping hidden....which Thomas can still reveal to anyone at any time. What he did reveal was enough to ensure there was no chance now of changing his memories of their shared past....not after he dragged them both into the spotlight and made sure they were linked so if anything did happen to Thomas or seem awry with him....there'd be no doubt who was Suspect Number One. And that was always going to come with the question of why.

The mini ends with a final page where Bobby's finally done talking w/the QC for now, and he's just standing on the beach far enough away from where a bunch of the Academy X kids are having a bonfire - with Dallas right in the thick of them - that it wouldn't be obvious that his sole reason for being out there was to catch a glimpse of him, even if only from a distance. Elsewhere, Laynia is browsing through a shop and notices a stuffed dragon similar to one flashbacks showed Dmitri cuddling with as a baby. She picks it up, hesitating as if debating whether to purchase it, with the final panel being of her back as she walks out of the shop, the stuffed animal still sitting where she'd found it.

ICEMAN: A HOUSE OF DRAGONS

The second mini of three, this one introduces Dallas as a POV character, still oblivious of everything readers learned in the first mini. It explores his feelings about being depowered on M-Day and his survivor's guilt from having left the Institute and been relatively safe compared to those who stayed, when other depowered mutants like David still stayed and fought for mutants. His best friends, Julian and Brian Cruz, insist that nobody thinks less of him for it and he was a minor, it wasn't like anybody was really consulting him on whether he wanted to stay or go at the time, but he can't shake the feeling he should have done more. Its what drove him to go through the Crucible so early on, and its what drives his determination to make it onto the X-Men team.

Seeds are also planted for later, via some brief scenes that reveal that while depowered and living away from the Institute, Dallas started exploring magic as an alternative to his powers, since there are various arts that access the same Darkforce Dimension his powers connected him to. He's no longer pursuing it as feverishly as he did while depowered, but it remains an interest as he's determined to never be powerless again, whether he has his mutant abilities or not.

He also has several chance encounters with Iceman, who he really only knows as his old math teacher, and no idea they're not so chance encounters at all.

Meanwhile, Bobby and Laynia are meeting more regularly off the island as they argue about whether or not they should tell Dallas the truth - he has a right to know and he's old enough to make his own choices about what he wants or doesn't want done in the name of keeping him safe. Their various rationales are undercut by the underlying awareness that both of them are afraid of his reaction and worried he won't understand why they did it and might even hate them for the choices they made.

At the same time, they're trying to figure out how to even go about resurrecting Dmitri. They know from Joanna Beaubier-Jinadu's example that despite his young age, Dima could still theoretically be resurrected....they just have no idea how to ask the Five or X-Factor to look for him in the Waiting Room without disclosing everything about Dallas at the same time...which brings them back to how do we tell Dallas.

Ultimately, they wait too long and Thomas takes the choice out of their hands. While Dallas is in the Mojoverse along with various other Academy X kids who have been regular presences there while taking advantage of the treaty between Krakoa and Mojo to try and get some Krakoan media entertainment off the ground,

It turns out that while Bobby was worried about Doubting Thomas approaching Sinister, Shaw or one of the other notorious mutants on Krakoa as part of his schemes, he went a different direction entirely. He approached Mojo with his proposal for a must-see show that would have all of Krakoa glued to the nearest TV screen.

And so what was supposed to be just a random trip to the Mojoverse leads to Dallas being trapped as the very confused and unwilling star of what Mojo describes as the ultimate reality show: DALLAS GIBSON, THIS IS YOUR LIFE.

The show proceeds to take viewers - and Dallas - through a recreation of his entire life, including all the parts he didn’t know about. Starting before his birth even, with Krakoans flocking to their TVs just as Thomas promised, as soon the bombshell claim of who his biological parents are drops and word spreads throughout the island. Even X-Men close to Bobby have no idea what to make of this at first and they start trying to figure out how to shut it down and figure things out from there, but it’s a futile effort, honestly.

Even if they could get Mojo to shut it down right away, the damage was already done - and its clear that nobody is more interested in seeing what comes next than Dallas himself. Seemingly having forgotten that everyone is watching this, he’s half in denial, half captivated by what he’s watching. It seems impossible but that doesn’t stop him from having a lot of confused and conflicting feelings as he watches literal surveillance footage Thomas had installed to spy on the much younger Bobby and Laynia as they interacted with their newborn sons.

Much of this is used to flesh out flashback scenes from the first mini, where Bobby and Laynia’s POVs of these early days were shown, stringing together a timeline without reproducing the same scenes exactly. In contrast, some of these scenes do directly recreate scenes seen previously in Bobby and Laynia’s memories….but now reproduced for Dallas’ viewing by objective technology devoid of the emotions layered around his parents’ actual memories of that time.

The video retelling includes footage from security cameras at the facility Thomas had retreated to for their final fateful confrontation years ago, similarly providing a stark and explicit view of Bobby and Laynia’s rampage through the facility and Bobby’s unapologetic killing of Thomas. It’s a side of Bobby few had ever seen before and raises more than a few eyebrows while answering the questions many of them had had ever since Thomas made his dramatic entrance to Krakoan society at the end of the first mini.

Bobby meanwhile started racing for Mojoworld the second Rogue called him and told him to get there fast and laid out what was going on. But it still took long enough for him to navigate Mojoworld’s confusing layout that he only smashed his way onto the ‘set’ Dallas was trapped on in time to see his eighteen year old self hand an infant Dallas over to the Black Widow onscreen.

One look at Bobby, not hiding behind his ice form and with pain and remorse writ large all over his face, told Dallas (and everyone else) everything they needed to know about how true or not all this was.

But before Bobby can even attempt to figure out what to say, Mojo calls everyone’s attention back to the screens, as he announces there’s a plot twist featuring never-before-seen-footage from that first tragic April 27th.

The screen jumps to more security camera footage from Thomas’ facility….but the time stamp puts this at just before Bobby & Laynia’s arrival. Bobby (and Laynia who has arrived on Krakoa for the first time, as soon as she learned what was happening) watch in shock as Thomas hands Dmitri off to a lackey and instructs him to get offsite before the two arrive. Onscreen, Thomas says if he’s there’s one thing he’s figured out about Bobby & Laynia, its that they’ll never stop searching for one of their babies so long as they’re still alive….so if they’re convinced this one is dead and the other one is taken to Mother Nurture as she instructed him, they’ll focus all their efforts on trying to reclaim that one. Let her deal with that Thomas sniffs derisively. I have different plans for this one.

Of course, those plans never came to fruition, Mojo narrates. He underestimated just how….fatally Bobby would react to the simulacrum he believed to be his now dead son. He was never able to follow up with the lackey who took the real Dmitri, and his hired hand - who had not signed up for any of this and was freaking out once he saw what was left of the facility he’d last seen his boss in - well, he basically said fuck this and anonymously dropped Dmitri off at the nearest hospital.

Given the lengths Bobby & Laynia had gone to make sure their kids’ information WASN’T readily available anywhere when they were born, there was no indication of Dmitri’s real identity or where he came from, so he went into the system where he grew up in a series of homes that left him not especially traumatized, but at least distrustful of authority. Then Thomas revealed that when he’d first been resurrected, he’d tracked down Dmitri by finding his lackey and figuring out where he’d left the baby, retracing Dmitri’s path from there. Unlike Dallas, Thomas had always known exactly where to find Dmitri….but felt that particular reveal really needed the RIGHT moment.

And that moment apparently was now. Taking over narrator duties from Mojo, Thomas now speaks into the cameras, directly addressing Bobby and Laynia as he tells them Dmitri too manifested powers early and has had years to learn to make the most of his powerset. He apparently can access a mirror dimension that lets him teleport via reflective surfaces, use them as scrying portals by which he can see anything within visual range of that surface….and there’s one particularly interesting twist to his power. When Dmitri’s in the mirror dimension and watching events play out in the real world via a mirror or other surface….those events don’t just have to be in the present.

Time is wonky in the mirror dimension, as is often true of extradimensional spaces. Dmitri has limited precognitive abilities as he can use the mirror dimension to peer out of mirrors and watch what’ll happen in view of them at some point in various possible future timelines.

Apparently its tricky and unreliable, but its at least effective enough that Dmitri counts as a precog by anyone’s standard. And in the early days of Krakoa, when deciding whether to go there himself, he apparently glimpsed enough clandestine conversations to know that at that point, at least…..Krakoa was not a safe place to be a precog.

Onscreen, Thomas claps his hands energetically and addresses the entire audience now:

Thomas: So, to recap, somewhere out there is the teleporting precog son of an omega level mutant who’s already proven he’s willing to cross just about any line for this son’s sake. Said son is also primed to be extremely distrustful of Krakoa….and anyone who might be seen as an emissary of it. Like, oh say, X-Men. And to top it all off….he has absolutely no idea where he comes from nor does he have any reason to believe anyone who comes out of nowhere claiming to be his longlost parents or friends of theirs.

Thomas: Now I don’t know about all of you, but I think whomever were to find him first, and gain his trust, well - they could probably figure out any number of ways those combined factors could be useful.

The screen flashes to a generic street camera view of a Dmitri Drake that looks a lot like his brother, just with brown hair instead of blond. There’s little to distinguish either his surroundings or Dmitri himself, but its clearly being presented as a starting point for potential searchers.

The final pages show an array of panels showing notorious mutant villains all leaning forward and studying the screen with interest. Sinister, Shaw, Selene (if she’s back yet), Abigail Brand, MLF members, Stryfe, Mystique and Destiny, the Fenris twins, etc.

The second mini concludes with Doubting Thomas winking into the camera, essentially staring straight at the reader.

Thomas: May the best influence win!

DARKSTAR: SONS OF SNOW AND SHADOW

Subtitled: “Run, Dima, Run!”

The third and final mini of the triptych is a chaotic free for all as basically everyone is hunting for Dmitri Drake, who has absolutely no idea why people are suddenly coming out of the woodwork looking for him but quickly decides he doesn’t want to be found.

Dallas is aggressively putting off dealing with how he feels about any of this and flat out shuts down any attempts Bobby or Laynia make to approach him. He’s totally fixated on being the one to find basically the only person in the universe who could understand how he’s feeling right now, and they can figure it out together then. He’s blatantly underestimating how much his longlost twin actually might NOT be able to relate to his specific perspective here, and vice versa. Something his friends and Academy X classmates try to caution him about while helping him on his search.

Surge: Oh shut up, dumbass. I don’t have to like you for you to be one of us, and any twin of yours is basically a two-for-one deal, so of course we’re going to do whatever it takes to keep your longlost brother from being exploited and used by adults who suck. I would include your parents in that but I actually think them hiding you from that musty bald bitch Xavier was probably the smartest thing any X-parent has done for their kid so I’m fighting down the impulse to be impressed.

Dallas: …thank you? I think?

Thus the Academy X kids actually take one of the most prominent roles in the mini as Dallas and his classmates’ search is heavily prioritized. There’s a strong focus on various kids who have history being exploited by older mutants and are now projecting heavily. Brian and Julian are of course Dallas’ closest confidantes through this, maybe Brian a little more than Julian as the latter flip-flops back and forth between calling Dallas a legacy and a nepo baby at different intervals. He can’t seem to decide if he thinks it’s something to be envied or not. Anole is unrepentant about ranking Dallas’ dad’s most infamous costumes and how hot or not he looked in each of them. He and Dallas never got along in school. Icarus absently notes that he’s pretty sure his brother and Dallas’ dad had a thing going on at one point.

They’re not quite all as helpful as they could be, is the takeaway. But they do feel the stakes and if any generation of mutants is prone to embracing gallows humor to cope, it’s the Academy X kids.

Elsewhere Bobby is conducting his own search with the help of numerous X-Men and friends, who are all trying to process everything they just learned and saw. Most of them are supportive and understanding, though a few are more abrasive about the sheer amount of stuff they didn’t know about him or even suspect.

Xavier tries to lecture Bobby about how they wouldn’t be in this situation if he had trusted them with this at any point in the past. Bobby shuts that down with gusto, emphasizing that Xavier was one of the people they were most concerned about hiding the twins from - and a good thing too, he points out, given what could have happened to Dallas if Onslaught had known about him when Dallas was still just a kid.

But then he gets downright chilly and makes it clear how and why his dynamic with many of them will be at least somewhat different from this point on…..Xavier especially.

He brings attention back to the not so minor detail of Xavier, Moira and Magneto apparently originally declaring Krakoa to be for all mutants….except for precogs.

Bobby: You keep saying this place is the culmination of everything we’ve fought for from the first day we put on an X-Men uniform, so I just wanna know, Professor. Why the HELL did I spend my whole life fighting for you to create your own personal vision of paradise….which apparently was meant to exclude one of my children, just because of what freaking power he was born with?

Xavier: Compromises had to be made in order to -

Bobby: Y’know, you’ve been using that line since I was fifteen and its tired, X. Every time we asked why you couldn’t just use your powers in ways you insisted would ethically compromise you - except for whenever you decided it was okay because it made things more convenient for you specifically.

Bobby: From day one you’ve kept your secrets from us, for a lot shadier reasons than I’ve ever had for keeping one, so you don’t need to be telling me I’m not entitled to my secrets. You have all these contingencies for if any of us go bad, while telling us nobody’s beyond redemption except for those times you decide Magneto is, or the Shadow King is.

Bobby: You know what the real problem with your dream has always been, Professor? It asks for a leap of faith that you’ve never been prepared to make yourself. You’re always asking us to line up and put it all on the line for the chance at a better world, no matter how realistic it is….but you’ve never actually put down your own cynicism or pragmatism or whatever you want to call it….and just….dreamed. How does that even work, huh?

Bobby: Just….what the hell would you have even done, Professor, if I had raised my kids at the mansion all this time? What spin would you have given me when you finally embarked on this grand Krakoan experiment you’ve been planning for years….and needed to tell me one of my sons wasn’t allowed to come with? That if he died, you had no intention of resurrecting him and his politically inconvenient power?

Xavier: *keeps silent*

Bobby: Yeah, y’know what, on second thought I don’t think I actually want to know the answer to that. Stay away from me and my kids, X. You and I are done.

Finally, last but not least, Laynia will be running her own search for Dima with the help of her brother, the Black Widow, and Warren, who wanted to make sure she knew that he’s her friend too, not just Bobby’s. Despite the lack of detail here, she’d actually have the most prominent role in this mini - being associated publicly with Krakoa is actually an obstacle for Bobby gaining Dmitri’s trust. Laynia’s lack of affiliation with it or Russia’s government or any other organization, is what lets her convince Dmitri to give her a chance and hear her out when she does find him.

(Something she’s ultimately able to do by going to Arakko and asking Storm if she can get her an audience with Lactuca, who should know exactly where to find him. In exchange, Lactuca will ask a favor of Laynia at some point in the future, which plants some seeds to bring Laynia more into X-books without just being an extension of Bobby).

There will be a final reckoning between Laynia and Thomas this time, and the mini will end with things still messy as hell, as the newfound family of four (plus Uncle Nikolai, standing awkwardly off to the side) basically stand there staring at each other and wondering what next. But even with them all as relative strangers now, there’s a wealth of possibilities now that everything’s out in the open.

This mysterious Mother Nurture still lingers offscreen as a potential future threat, especially as they still don’t know what they intended with Dallas - if he was even the twin she was after in the first place. Iceman’s poised to be launched in any number of directions as he’s now essentially reinventing himself while everyone is paying more attention to him than ever before, all while he’s trying to fall back on comfortable, familiar habits of joking and pranks to try and bond with the sons who are grown up and don’t really know what - if any - dynamic they even need or want with him. Laynia’s reluctantly taken Krakoan citizenship to be closer to her sons, but finds she prefers staying on Arakko and grows closer to mutants she meets there, with Dima joining her more often than not, as he’ll never be fully comfortable with Krakoa even if precogs are ‘allowed’ now. Dallas is more determined than ever to be an X-Man but he’s worried that now he’ll never make it on his own merits and it’ll always be more about him being a legacy, a founding X-Man’s kid.

Etc, etc.

[kuronanox]

Bad Dream - Kira Izuru

Kira looks down at the paperwork in defeat as he groans and tried to reorganize them. The wind from the window was gusting everywhere causing them to fall on the floor.

Shuffling noises were in the background as he cursed under his breath.

A small feminine hand had reached over his as Kira eyes looked up to meet (Your Name).

"Need some help Kira Fukutaicho." She asks him as he looks down at the papers again.

"Did you need something?"

"I came to turn in some papers! I've been feeling under the weather."

He props the papers on the desk to even them out and turns to her. "If you don't feel good, get some more rest (Your Name)."

She shakes her head and hands him her work. "I can't let you run the Squad all alone."

Kira slightly smiles at her as he gave his attention back to his work.

She took in his features and noticed how much he didn't smile anymore, during the academy days he was so innocent and cheerful. Growing up they were close but now it seems as she didn't know him anymore.

"Did you want to come over for dinner tonight?" She asks him as he looked up from the papers.

"Who's going?" He asked with curiosity, Kira didn't wanna intrude on her personal life especially when one of the reasons why he was feeling down was because of her relationship with Hisagi.

"Just me and Shuhei! But don't worry he won't mind! I think he kinda misses you." She winks as he wanted to frown.

"Don't you think it's weird?" He says a bit rudely not noticing his tone of language as her eyes widen from disbelief. Noticing her face sadden a bit he cleared his throat. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it in that way. I'm actually behind on the Captains papers so I probably won't have time." He added.

"Well you don't have to do it alone! Shuhei is in the same position so maybe you guys could do it together and we can all drink a bit! I'll even invite Matsumoto Fukutaicho if it lightens the mood!"

Kira didn't want to be in the same room as (Your Name) and Shuhei. He tried to think anyway possible to escape tonight but she seemed on insisting he come out.

"I guess, what time tonight?"

"Around 8! I'll cook dinner!" She says with a smile on her face as she ran out happily.

Knowing it made her happy that he was coming out was okay with Kira even though he wasn't in the mood to socialize.

"Kira?" Shuhei asks with a smile as he got back from work while leaning his zanpakuto on the wall.

"Yes! He's seems down a lot recently so I thought inviting him to dinner would be a good way to have fun, oh Matsumoto is coming too!" (Your Name) said as she pulled out some veggies and protein out from the fridge.

Shuhei wrapped his arms around her body as he kissed her temple as she smiled while cutting the broccoli.

"That was nice of you, I've been worried about him." He tells her letting go and washing his hands to help prep with dinner.

"And I've been worry about you." (Your Name) states to Shuhei as he raises a brow and started to wash the rice.

There was a knock on the door before he could say anything.

"Hey we're here! Open up!" Rangiku cheerful voice rang around from outside as Kira was standing behind her with a tired expression.

"Hey! We just got started on dinner! Come on in!" (Your Name) welcomes them into her and Shuhei shared home.

It was Kira first time here, he took in the view. There was nothing really special that stood out to him except a few decor and a guitar in the living room. There was a few picture frame of the couple as they smiled to each other.

There was jealousy in the blonde lieutenant as he looked away from them and set a bottle of sake down he brought.

"Kira! Finally see you've been out of your own quarantine!" Shuhei greets him and pats him on the back.

"Slightly busy that's all." He tells the older man and smiles.

Rangiku sat down and cracked a sake open while they waited for dinner. She was in a cheerful mood today. "Oi we haven't been able to drink together in a while!" She tells Kira as he chuckles and gets himself a small cup.

"Likewise."

As him and Rangiku took small talk he could see in his peripheral version Shuhei and (Your Name) happily cooking together. There was small kisses stolen from each other as they were in sync.

"Dinner is served!" Shuhei yells placing down the rice, salmon and veggies along with miso soup to wash it down.

"Wow a chef in the house." Rangiku says as they all dug in.

"You guys started without us!" (Your Name) pouts noticing that two bottles of sake were already empty from Kira and the busty women sitting next to him.

"Ooo sorry that means y'all have to catch up!" She says as they poured themselves a cup.

Kira slightly smiles at (Your Name) cuteness as he took a bite of the fresh cooked fish. A part of him was thankful that it wasn't them three alone. He already didn't wanna talk much but the alcohol was kicking in and he was also thankful rangiku was there.

He didn't notice how hungry he was till a pair of chopsticks had put down a new piece of salmon in his bowl nonchalantly. It was (Your Name) as she was conversing with Rangiku about their new beauty routine with Shuhei listening and putting his input.

It felt like he was in the academy again, when he forgot to eat or wasn't eating enough (Your Name) was always feeding him and taking care of his health. The lieutenant knew she brought him out tonight so he could enjoy himself more.

"Thank you." He says as her flushed face smiles at him and went back to her conversation.

He blushed but it wasn't noticeable because of all the alcohol he already consumed.

"Kira you are particularly quiet for being drunk already!" Rangiku chimes in as he was lost for words.

"I- I am not drunk!"

"Sure you are! You finished 3 bottles alone already!" Shuhei laughs as he just groaned.

It was later in the night when it started to get rowdy, they all had a few to many as they were shouting to each other.

They were playing card games and gotten into it. They decided ride the bus because apparently kisuke had showed Rangiku a while back when she was in the human world. He told her it was a drinking game a lot of college students were doing so she wanted to hop on the trend.

"Kira you're on the bus so you have to keep drinking till you get these cards right!" She said as he took sips of the beer they had brought out for back up.

As he was drinking (Your Name) and Shuhei were cleaning a bit since it was getting messy.

Him and Rangiku were having to much fun that Shuhei retired for the because he had an early morning but he insisted on them staying and enjoying themselves.

By the time Kira won the card game he was sauced and couldn't walk in a straight line. He knew drinking with Rangiku was going to be a disaster.

"Did you want me to take him back?" He heard Rangiku ask (Your Name) as he was slumped on the table.

"It's okay, he can stay for the night. We work together anyways so I'll wake him up tomorrow." (Your Name) tells the older lady as she left for the night.

"Okay big boy, help me will ya." She tells Kira as she laid out a futon for him to sleep in comfortably.

He wrapped an arm around her waist as he walked towards the bed made on the floor. Tripping on his foot they fell over as she gasped.

"Kira you are crushing me!" She silently whispers so Shuhei wouldn't wake up from their shenanigans.

"Just let me hug you (Your Name)." He says breathlessly with his eyes closed. Kira wanted to enjoy this moment because he knew she could never be his.

"Kira?"

He looks down to her lips as she looked up to him innocently. A part of him didn't want to be the bad guy but what was so wrong with being bad once in a while.

He knew it was the alcohol bringing out everything he was holding in, he was going to regret his actions the next morning. Cupping her face he kissed her parted lips. It didn't help that she wrapped her legs around his waist as he groaned. Letting his tongue slip into her mouth.

She flipped him over so she sat on top, just when things were beginning to get spicy he opened his eyes and.

"KIRA IZURU! You wake up this instant now!" He heard a voice called out as he jumped out of bed and looked to his side to see a concern (Your Name) next to him. She sighed in relief and pushed his hair out of the way from his face.

"Are you dating Hisagi San?!" He asks quickly out of breath as she tilted her head and slightly smacks his forehead.

"Ow!"

"Hello! What were you dreaming about? I'm dating you stupid." She says as he calmed down a bit and laughs rubbing the back of his neck.

"It was just a dream, thank goodness."

(Your Name) looked confused as she jumped on top of Kira and laid her head on his chest.

"Whatever it was Izuru I'm always going to be yours." She says as he laid back down and rubbed her back. He was cheesing to himself to know (Your Name) wasn't going anywhere.

"I know, it was just a dream." He says as she kissed his lower lip and grinned.

"I love you, you know that."

"Of course, I love you too, always."

(Authors note: just a cute fluff I made! Have y'all seen Kira now! He's making me simp! noooo I already have my bleach bias and he's breaking it!)

[headinthestaticsky]

The Phenomenon of the Immortal Sun: Jasper Hale x Fleur Swan, Chapter 1

Summary: It was time for Fleur Swan to become Fleur Hale/Whitlock. She has started to adjust to the lifestyle of a vegetarian vampire as well as her powers, which she seems to develop a new one once in a while. But what happens when something happens that none of the Cullens are prepared for.

"Nature will get her way Though you took her for a fool Walking on the lake Frozen under you."

Run Cried the Crawling by, Anges Obel

When Bella got home from Vegas with Edward at her side it was the most pissed off my dad had ever been at her. He knew she would throw out the "I'll move away." Card on him but he wasn't fazed by it anymore. She was married, and a adult... he couldn't stop her. It was satisfying to see dad finally stand up to her, letting go of the fear of losing her. Bella eventually developed a guilty look on her face while Edward tensed by her side. She decided that she would have her honeymoon after Jasper and I got married, since dad would know we would both be out of the house. It confused me since she would have to wait 5 months just to go on her honeymoon, it also delayed her changing into a vampire. Since they both agreed to do it on there honeymoon.

Regarding me however my eyes are still a dark red rose color, which completely puzzled the Cullens. It confused me as well...knowing that after a year of transformation my eyes should be golden by now. I had never drunken an once of human blood but, my eyes were just as red as they were when I first turned. My blood lust got a lot better and I was beginning to gain control of my powers. It turns out I am also a shape shifter in a sense... I can transform myself into anyone I wanted to be. Things seemed to have calmed down it was nice to have a moment of serenity.

I stood in my room which was now void of my items being out on display. They were instead all in boxes stacked up on top of each other. Dad helped me out earlier in the day, it was nice to spend so one-on-one time with him while I still lived here. Bella was packing up too, excited to finally leave the house and become a vampire. She wouldn't let dad help her out however and spent her time locked up in her room. Probably waiting for Edward to enter and talk with her. I just sat down on my bed looking at my surroundings when I heard Jasper enter through my window.

"I was waiting for you to show up." I said grabbing him by the collar of his shirt and pulling him in for a kiss.

"Mmm, hello to you too." Jasper said.

"You're not going to believe who accepted my RVSP'd to the wedding..."

"Who is it?"

"My mom, her new husband is coming with her too."

"I hope they won't cause any trouble." Jasper grumbled.

"Well... the last thing I said to her was when I moved back down here when I was 15...I told her that next time I see her would be at my wedding. I then told her that she would enjoy the the open bar and her speech for me would be her barfing all over the place. So umm... be prepared for that to happen." I explained trying to hold in a laugh at the face Jasper made.

"Damn love...you're brutal sometimes."

"Thank you... that is so sweet to say!"

"You better get down to our place... Alice and Rosalie are waiting for you so they can throw you a Bachelorette party."

"Yeah... they'll probably break the house trying to get to me." I said and then began to laugh.

"Have fun darlin." Jasper said softly.

"You too, if Emmett, Edward, and Dean got you a stripper I will murder all of them."

"Don't worry about that darlin, we're merely going out to the woods to hunt bears... maybe a few mountain lions. Besides Edward won't be there anyway"

"Oh fun...wait, Edward won't be there?"

"Yeah... it seems he still holds a grudge after I called him a boy before the battle."

"Only a boy would be offended by that." I said

"I better go love you." Jasper replied and pecked my cheek.

"Love you too." I did the same thing, pecking his cheek. He left a few seconds afterward leaving me alone. I pulled on pair of boots and ran downstairs.

"I'll see you later dad, Rose and Alice are throwing me a little party."

"Alright Petal, love you."

"Love you too!"

I arrived at the Cullen's house in record time, my tracking ability had improved greatly. I zoomed up to the door and before I could open it Rosalie, Esme, Bree, and Alice stood there with excited smiles on their faces.

"The party has arrived." I said jokingly.

They all laughed and ushered me into the lounge room.

Bree had been living with us ever since the end of the battle, she struggled to conform to the diet after living off of human blood so long and she couldn't leave the house much since she was presumed dead. But Jasper has been helping her out a lot.

"I can't wait to see what you did with the venue outside... can I take a look?"

"No, you may not, Rosalie and I all agreed that you shouldn't see it until tomorrow. It'll be great with the pictures."

"Okay okay... is the dress finished?"

"Yes, now that you can see." Rosalie said, dragging me down to her room. A large vanity was set up with hundreds of makeup products. I turned around and saw my dress... it was beautiful.

(I know the dresses aren't exactly the same but just pretend the one showing off the back of the dress has sleeves haha.)

a"Oh my gosh Rose, you know my style so well."

"You're going to look beautiful tomorrow." Esme said, her gracious smile still on her face.

"Thank you guys so much... for everything."

"No problem Fleur, I can't wait for you to officially be a part of the family." Alice replied.

"So, how is everything back at home?" Rosalie said, already playing with my hair.

"It's tense...dad's pissed at Bella, Bella is pissed at dad. I still can't believe she actually eloped."

"Doesn't surprise me any... Bella's priorities have certainly changed." Alice grumbled.

"Yeah... not gonna lie though Alice they've always been like that, she just hid it from you guys pretty well."

"Yeah... I guess so." Alice said disappointment was on her face.

"Let's talk about something else...Fleur, did Jasper tell you where you two were going for your honeymoon?"

"No... he wants it to be a surprise, I can't wait to see where we're going."

"I'm sure it's going to be fun." Alice said, nudging me playfully.

"If I could blush right now, I would." I said.

Timeskip: The next day.

"Rosalie this is like we rehearsed it... smile and don't kill my mother." I reminded her.

"I'll try my best... Why does Bella have to be a bridesmaid again?" She said, brushing back my long black hair.

"Because I don't need my mother talking my ear off saying how selfish I am."

I saw Alice shake her head before going back to steaming my dress in the background.

"Fleur, Rosalie? Where are you guys?" I heard my dad call out.

"In here dad!" I called back.

"Renee get your butt up here your daughter is getting married. Get over this stupid grudge." I heard dad yell. Rosalie, Alice, and I all laughed.

"Aww, you look beautiful Petal." Dad said, smiling at me. I said Renee in the background she had a shocked look on her face.

"Thanks, Dad, you can thank Rosalie and Alice for all of this. Mom? You gonna come over? I'm not infected with anything you know."

She scoffed and walked up to me, we both gave each other fake smiles.

"Did you get plastic surgery? Your face looks... I don't know more sculpted." She said.

"No mother I just aged... the last time you saw me I was 15, I'm 20 now." I lied, everyone knew most vampires' facial features perfected when fully changed. But I couldn't exactly tell her that.

"Okay..." She said in a skeptical voice. I heard Rosalie growl behind me.

"Renee knock it off." Dad said he had a curt look on his face.

"Well since it's your wedding day we thought you needed something blue." Renee started, her face didn't look too happy.

"And something old, besides your mother." Dad joked, Rosalie and Alice let out a chuckle.

"Nice Charlie," Renee said rolling her eyes.

Dad then opened a jewelry box that had a hairpiece in it. I knew it was grandma swans.

"It was Grandma Swans, I added the Sapphires though, I thought it matched your ring pretty well. When the time comes around you can give it to your daughter." Dad said he handed it to Rosalie so she could put it in my hair.

"Aww thank you so much dad." I said I was lucky I didn't have my dress on yet so I could hug him.

"Should've saved this for Bella." Renee grumbled quitely.

"Oh no I forgot her veil, Rose could you come with me?" Alice asked.

Rosalie hesitated before answering.

"Sure..." They walked out a few seconds later.

"So... you stuck true to your guns. I didn't see you until your wedding day." Dad just looked at the two of us and walked out.

"Yep."

"How many men did you date before you got engaged to this one. I know how bored you can get." Renee said, implying I sleep around a lot.

"He's the first and only man I've dated." Renee's reflection was shocked in the mirror.

"Well... I knew my Bella would do that but... not, you." She said in a condescending voice.

"You have no idea what Bella has done."

"So who is he?" Renee said, ignoring my previous statement.

"His name is Jasper and he's an amazing, kind human being." I answered back, pride-filled my voice. I could suddenly feel Bella's presence behind the wall in the other room listening in on us.

"Sure... we all know women like you say that when the men have slept with you."

"You're childish insults do not bother me anymore mother."

"What childish insults? I'm stating facts." Renee said, acting innocent.

"Yeah, facts you convinced yourself are true."

"All I know is if my Bella wouldn't gotten married so young. So let's cut to the chase how far along are you?"

'I'm not pregnant Renee, I need to go help Rose and Alice find that veil." I got up to walk away when I got an idea.

"Oh by the way, Bella got married at nineteen in Vegas."

Renee just stood there in shock. I smiled in satisfaction.

"Enjoy the open bar!"