#someone find me the hunter looses an eye theory I need to make it about Gus

[anguigenus]

So there's a new Dana Promo art and. I'm so not okay I'm vibrating right now LOOK AT MY BOY

[thetombedspirit]

New OWL HOUSE Theory!

Now, the newest episode reveals a bit more lore to the series. It gave us Vee and the backstory of the Basilisks, it gave us the “In-Between” and an insight to the portal. It gave us Luz’s hometown, Gravesfield, and it gave us a little more backstory about Phillip Whittbane, more so about how he had a brother and that they both ended up stuck in the Demon Realm.

Now, these brothers are important. Not just to the story, but to Luz’s hometown, Gravesfield. According to the wiki, Gravesfield was a ‘peaceful’ colony in the 1600s, until the brothers ‘mysteriously disappeared’. I mean, they have a statue of themselves standing in town.

Now, I probably won’t be the first to tell you this, but the statue on the right looks like he could be Phillip Whittbane, the man who looked for a way out of the Demon Realm and documented it in his diary. 

The statue on the left, is his brother, who has yet to be named or touched upon (though I have a theory of what his name is;))

Now, the Phillip statue doesn’t just look like, well, Phillip. But he also looks eerily like someone else. Someone we already now a good bit.

Belos.

I bet if someone were to edit most of his hair and his boils out of the way, he would look a lot like the Phillip Statue.

And in terms of the brother, he also looks like someone we already know.

I mean, the statue basically looks like a Hunter in his early 30s at least. And that’s not all I want to talk about.

Now, theories have been blowing up about who Belos was and who the brothers are to the Demon Realm. And I’m not the first to speculate who Belos and Hunter are.

But in order to touch onto that, I need to draw back and dive into another theory I believe to be canon.

Ever since Eclipse Lake, everyone has been speculating that Hunter could be a Grimwalker.

Now, no-one is particularity sure what a Grimwalker is, but the common theory is that a Grimwalker is a sort of artificial clone that requires a few ingredients that we’ve already seen in season 2.

The Galdorstone = heart and power, Palistrom wood = keratin, Stonesleeper lungs = ?, Selkidomus scales = ?, Bone of ortet = ?

And not only that, but one key detail that the page shows is that the Grimwalker has pinkish-red eyes. Kinda like...

Yeah, like Hunter. And despite looking like a witch (pointed ears) he doesn’t have any magic, and needs a staff in order to perform magic. He struggled teleporting the first few tries when he started using Rascal as his staff, but soon got into the grove of it once his mind was on the fight. Who else can’t do magic without a staff?

Luz needed to use a staff (Owlbert) in order to activate the glyphs on the door without doing it manually like she usually does (tapping the glyph to activate)

Is it coincidence, or is there a reason Hunter can’t perform magic normally like Willow or Amity can?

So here’s the theory.

Belos is Phillip and Hunter is a Grimwalker clone of Phillip’s brother, who I suspect was also named Hunter.

When I first watched ‘Eclipse Lake’, I genuinely felt, through Belos’ gestures and expressions towards Hunter, that he genuinely cared about him and his safety. I was since disabused of this notion and reminded that Belos is an abusive man, through and through, but I do think he cares about Hunter.

But I think he cares more about controlling Hunter and his interests.

Let’s look back at the photo of the picture.

In possession of one brother, the one on the right, you can see that in his left hand he’s holding a piece of paper with a circle drawn in, much like glyphs and in another we can faintly see that he’s holding a weird looking staff. It doesn’t seem to have an animal on it like the typical witch’s staff.

Kinda like Belos and Hunter’s 1st staff.

Now, in ‘Yesterday’s Lie’, we learned that Belos is the experimentive type. I mean, he made the staffs in the first place, right? Claiming them to be pure magic. And he brought the Basilisks back from extinction in order to perform experiments. Mostly, how they draw out and consume magic.

Not only does this show that Belos is capable of creating artificial life, but that he’s also planning something that includes drawing out ones magic and consuming it.

Tell me, when Belos needs a recharge, what does he do?

He draws out and consumes the magic of the Palismen. Just like how Basilisks consume magic from witches.

While his methods are much to be desired, he appears to be a kind of inventor or scientist. I mean, just look at how he’s repairing the door.

Now, Phillip seems to be a philosopher. His writings and diary entries imply he’s a educated man, a thinker.

And now to his brother, who, from now on, I’m calling Hunter Sr.

Hunter Sr. is depicted shaking hands with someone who bares a faint likeness to Principle Bump (possibly a wild witch). This could indicate that he’s rather friendly with the natives of the Demon Realm.

But that’s not the interesting part for me. It’s what’s perched on his shoulder.

A bird. And that bird looks awful familiar.

Yep, Hunter’s Cardinal, Rascal. And remember, Rascal originally belonged to someone else, as he was once one of the many abandoned Palismen in the Bat Queen’s care, and it is implied that he has been with her for a long time.

Now, Hunter Sr is certainly older then the Hunter we know, and based on the body language of the statues, Hunter Sr seems to be more assertive, poised confidently and looking ready to lead, while Phillip seems to be more of a follower then a leader.

From what we’ve gathered here, Grimwalkers seem to be raised from infancy, and if Hunter is 16 like it has been said, then that could tie into why Palismen wood is so hard to come by. And it would make a bit of sense that Hunter couldn’t do magic without a staff if he was a copy of a human man. Human’s don’t have bile sacks like witches and most demons do. Hunter may look like a witch, but he’s not a witch. He’s a human that just looks witch-like.

And Belos hates wild magic with a passion. He won’t even let Hunter mention, despite what an advantage it would be to study Wild Magic would be (know thy enemy, ya know?)

Anyway, here is what I think happened to the brothers and how Phillip became Belos.

So they end up in the demon realm. Not sure how, not sure why. And they try to find a way back home, and as they do, they learn a lot about the demon realm and it’s diverse culture and methods, with Hunter Sr even making a Palismen with the help of a Wild Witch, whilst Phillip makes his own form of magic by studying the glyphs. This may cause the brothers to quarrel as Hunter Sr appears absolutely taken by this world while all Phillip wants to do is return home.

Eventually, they try to find Eclipse Lake, and something happens. Something involving Wild Magic, or maybe not involving it at all, but none the less, Hunter Sr looses his life as a result and maybe leaves Belos cursed. Belos blames wild magic (perhaps the witch betrayed them, perhaps not and Belos is just looking for someone to blame)

Eventually, Phillip rises to power and becomes Emperor Belos. He hasn’t given up his goal of returning to earth, but now he also plans his revenge by outlawing all wild magic and planning to eradicate it once and for all. He plans the Day of Unity, he creates the coven system and silences anyone who calls out his abusive rule.

Eventually, he successfully creates a Grimwalker of his deceased brother. And not only that, but now he has Hunter under his control, has him thinking that Wild Magic is dangerous and savage and can not be trusted. Not only does he have his brother back, so to speak, but he also has him coming around to his way of thinking.

Though that cycle may break, thanks to a return of an old friend, Hunter’s Palismen.

Anyway that’s all I got so far. Belos is Phillip, Hunter is a Grimwalker fashioned to look like Phillip’s deceased brother and Rascal is Hunter Sr’s old palismen. Anyway, let me know what you think.

[theeasternempress]

Little Shadow

Summary - Tech couldn’t help but notice how Omega has been silently watching him work for most of the morning. When he finally asks if she’d like to come help him, she gives him a bright smile that sends a warm feeling straight to his heart.

Word count - 3.3k

AO3

Tech started his morning as he always did: checking the ship to make sure everything was functioning properly. Nothing major jumped out at him, but there were always little things that had to be repaired. After years of fixing this ship, Tech prided himself on the skills he’d learned that would make an ordinary mechanic green with jealousy. 

Still, Tech would dedicate as much of today as possible to repairs of the ship and his inhibitor chip scanner. The cooling system wouldn’t take long to clean and fix since there were only three vents that ran throughout the ship, so Tech started on that. 

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d done this, so he knew he was in for a mess. He was used to keeping a careful schedule of repairs, but the end of the war and rise of the Empire had ruined that. 

Tech had barely gotten two screws off of the first vent when, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Omega silently watching him work. He was used to the ever-inquisitive child watching him do his repairs and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy it a little. 

Tech saw his younger self in her and remembered how he longed to have someone teach him how to do repairs and build things with his hands. He’d still managed to learn just fine on his own, but his younger self craved the bond that would have come from a teacher. 

Omega was whisked away a moment later by Hunter with the promise of breakfast, and Tech found himself missing the small girl’s presence. She’s only been on the ship for a few days, but Tech found that she was quickly becoming part of their team. Tech acknowledged that he was initially apprehensive about having a child on the ship but now, he wouldn’t have it any other way. 

Tech had just finished cleaning the exterior and interior vent when he noticed that his little shadow had returned. Omega was still watching silently, but Tech knew that a thousand questions were on the tip of her tongue. 

Finally deciding to be the teacher he always wished he could have, Tech turned to invite Omega over only for her to get scared by him catching her staring. She gasped and turned away from him as she began to walk away with her gaze down on the ground.

“Omega, if you’d like to come back, I have some things I could teach you,” Tech spoke, stopping the young girl in her tracks. 

“You’re … you’re not upset that I was watching you?” Omega asked with a nervous tone to her voice. 

Tech shook his head and replied, “Of course not. Why would I be upset with you for being curious? It is expected of someone your age.”

Omega quietly padded across the floor until she stood directly below Tech. He was about to move over to give her some space when she said, “Nala Se didn’t like my curiosity. She said that it would only get me into trouble.” 

Tech wasn’t sure how to reply to Omega's words. He’d figured that Nala Se was overprotective of Omega, but he hadn’t thought of how that would have affected Omega’s young mind. 

“While Nala Se is correct in that curiosity can sometimes lead to trouble, it can also lead to new discoveries. As long as you know when to stop and turn around for your safety, curiosity is welcome aboard this ship,” Tech stated. 

“Thanks, Tech, I like how I can be myself around you all,” Omega replied, her gaze moving from Tech to to the air vents he’d been working on. 

“Ah yes, let’s start working on this,” Tech began, “We first have to unscrew all four screws in each corner of the vent before carefully cleaning it of any dust. Then we’ll remove any dust inside of the vent before closing it back up. It should be a simple but repetitive task.” 

Omega eagerly exclaimed, “Okay, let’s get started!” 

All that was left to do on the first vent was to screw the vent back into the wall. Tech showed Omega the four screws and demonstrated how to use the screwdriver. She watched with wide, unblinking brown eyes as she eagerly took in all of the information Tech was giving her. It seemed like such a simple thing to him, but he could tell it meant the world to Omega. 

Almost immediately, Tech noticed a small problem: Omega was far too short to be able to reach the vents. Tech himself was tall enough that he only had to stretch a little bit to unscrew the vent from the wall, but Omega would never be able to reach it. From the sad look on her face, Tech could tell that she noticed as well. 

A brilliant idea popped in his head as he asked, “How about I screw in the first three screws, then I pick you up to let you do the final one? You can also hand me the screws as I need them.”

Omega’s eyes lit up and a smile spread across her face as she replied, “Okay!”

Tech gave a small smile in return and began fixing the vent back in place. He talked her through putting the screws in again, making sure she was watching him as he carefully lined everything up in its correct place. Even though she was just handing him screws for now, he could tell she was happy. 

Tech finished his three screws in less than a minute, finding that he was working faster than usual in order to give Omega her chance. 

He turned to her and spoke, “Alright, I’m going to pick you up now. Remember, use both hands and a good amount of pressure.”

Omega silently took the screwdriver from Tech’s outstretched hand and he picked her up under the arms, holding her eye level with the vent. 

Omega lined the final screw up with the vent and asked, “Is this good?”

“Yes, that should be fine,” was Tech’s reply. Omega had a bit of difficulty with getting the screw to go in straight but after a few careful pointers from Tech, the first vent was fixed. 

Tech set Omega back on the ground with an, “Excellent job, Omega. Let’s continue and see how your skills improve.”

Approaching the second vent, Tech asked, “Would you like to try removing these four screws on your own?”

Omega eagerly nodded her head and replied, “Yes, please!”

Again, Tech lifted the girl up so she would be able to work. Omega struggled with initially getting the screws loose, but she eventually managed to start getting screws off. As Omega finished getting the final screw off, the vent came crashing off of the wall and sent a cloud of dust up with it. 

Tech swung Omega around to try to avoid her inhaling a large amount of dust, but the coughing fit coming from the child in his arms indicated otherwise. He carried her a distance away and set her down on the ground.

“Are you alright, Omega? Tech asked, patting her on the back to help with her coughing. Her clothes and hair had clumps of dust in them, which Tech did his best to remove as Omega’s coughing fit died down. 

“Yeah, I’m okay. I’m sorry that the vent fell,” Omega replied with sadness in her voice. Tech had noticed that every time she made a mistake, she always became sad and overly apologetic about it. He had his theories as to why, but they were yet to be confirmed. 

“It was a simple mistake, Omega. I should have told you to grab onto the vent when you were almost finished. You can use your mistake to learn for the future,” Tech stated, hoping his words would help ease Omega. He knew that patience would be the best aid to her learning and hoped that she would want to continue. 

Omega stayed silent, looking down at the floor and refusing to meet Tech’s eyes. Tech could tell that she was ashamed and embarrassed from her small mishap, but he didn’t want that to ruin her learning. He could tell her as much as he wanted that it was okay to make mistakes, but that didn’t mean she would accept it. 

That’s when Tech remembered how a few days ago, he’d taken Omega for a walk near a lake and they came across an Arsinari dwarf frog. Omega had been instantly fascinated by the bright red creature, quickly declaring it her new favorite animal because it could live on land and in water. Tech had privately researched the animal and found several reports detailing the frog’s evolution. Maybe if Tech related how the Arsinari dwarf frog learned to evolve to Omega learning from her mistakes, it would put her at ease. 

Tech kneeled down in front of Omega and began, “Omega, I know that you're upset, but mistakes do happen. Do you remember when I took you to the lake a few days ago and we came across the Arsinari dwarf frog? It had to learn from its ancestor’s mistakes. They primarily live in the red clay surrounding the lake, so they needed to evolve to have their skin be the color of the clay in order to camouflage with their environment. You can be more like the Arsinari dwarf frog by learning from your mistakes.”   

“So I just have learn to catch the vent before it falls like how the Arsinari dwarf frog learned to evolve?” Omega asked, the sadness in her voice gone and replaced with her usual curiosity.

“Precisely, Omega. You’re a very fast learner,” Tech complimented. A smile spread across Omega’s face, and Tech knew his idea had been a success. 

Most of the dust that would’ve been removed from the vent came free when Omega dropped the covering, so Tech instead showed her how to clean it up and dump it in the trash bin. Tech knew that it wasn’t much, but the smile on Omega’s face told him that it meant so much more to her. Omega was hesitant to put the screws back in due to her earlier accident, so Tech finished the job. 

“Now, the final vent is in the cockpit,” Tech began, “It’s usually the hardest to clean, but you should be able to stand up on a chair to reach it. Are you ready to move on or do you want a minute to rest?”

“Let’s go, Tech! Can I try to do this one by myself? I promise to be careful!” Omega asked, bouncing in place with excitement. He gave her a nod and she squealed with joy, grabbing his hand and pulling him up to the cockpit. Echo and Hunter were there and gave the pair a confused look as they entered. 

Omega ran over to Hunter's chair and said, “Tech is teaching me how to take care of the vents, and it’s the most amazing thing ever!”

Hunter smiled at the girl and replied, “That sounds like fun, just make sure you’re careful.”

Tech smiled at his older brother’s protectiveness of Omega. Almost as soon as Hunter and Omega had met, they’d formed a bond that Tech had not yet observed from his brother. It didn’t take him long to realize that the role his brother had taken in the girl’s life was one of a father-figure. Of course everyone aboard the ship cared for her, but he’d adopted the main role of ensuring her health and safety.

In turn, Tech didn’t miss how Omega was almost instantly drawn to Hunter. She followed him everywhere, mimicked his movements, and did her best to listen to his instructions. For as adventurous of a child she was, Tech knew it was hard for her to be told to stay in one spot, but she did so if Hunter asked her to. 

Tech was broken from his thoughts by Omega tugging on his hand and dragging him under the air vent. She dropped his hand and stepped onto the chair directly under the vent with Tech’s screwdriver clutched tight in her hand.

Echo and Hunter’s expressions turned to shock at the sight in front of them and Hunter moved forward with his hands out to pluck the girl from the chair, but Tech was quick to cut in, “I have everything under control. She will not fall.”

Echo relaxed while Hunter stayed tense, his eyes never leaving Omega. 

“Okay Tech, I’m ready!” Omega exclaimed, “I’ll do a really good job, I promise. I’ll hand you the screws as I go.” 

Tech moved to stand to the side of Omega and lifted his hand out to allow her to drop the screws into his open hand. She had the same difficulty as before with getting the screws loose and Tech could see Hunter move forward to help, but Tech subtly waved him off with his other hand. 

Even though she still struggled a bit, Tech could tell she had improved since her previous turn. She hadn’t let the vent fall from its place in the wall and had used just the right amount of pressure to remove the screws. 

“Excellent job, Omega. Now, use the cleaning cloth to collect the dust like I taught you,” Tech told the girl. She nodded in reply, swiping the dust from the vent cover and removing all the dust she could from the interior. 

Tech kept a careful eye on her as she worked, jiggling the screws around in his hand to pass the time. He knew that there was nothing dangerous about this step, but Tech feared his oldest brother’s wrath if anything happened to Omega under his watch. Tech himself knew that he could never forgive himself if any bodily harm came to Omega while in his care. 

When Omega was finished removing all of the dust, Tech looked over it to ensure that it was properly cleaned before allowing her to put the screws back in. She did much better at replacing the screws than removing them, and Tech made a mental note to let her try that more in the future. 

Tech offered his hand to Omega, who grabbed it and let Tech help her out of the chair.

“How’d I do, Tech?” Omega asked, clearly hoping he would tell her that she did well.

“You did excellent, Omega. With more practice, I’m sure that your skills will vastly improve,” Tech responded.

Omega smiled brightly and ran over to Hunter to say, “Did you hear that, Hunter? Tech said I did excellent!”

Hunter smiled and ruffled her hair with a, “I sure did, kiddo.” 

Omega giggled and ran off, swiping her trooper doll off of the floor before disappearing out of the cockpit. 

While the repair and cleaning of the vents took longer than Tech originally intended due to the addition of Omega, Tech couldn’t find it in himself to care. If it were anyone else, Tech would have likely gotten annoyed at the extra time spent on such a mundane task but with Omega, he found that not a second of time was wasted with her at his side. 

He knew now that he was beginning to form a soft side for Omega. As nervous as he initially was about having a child on board, there was no denying that she fit in with their team. 

Watching Omega run off to grab her trooper doll and start playing with it, Tech realized just how few belongings Omega had and how everything that she owned she’d acquired on their travels. She made no complaint about it, but Tech knew that a child deserved better than that. 

Tech decided to make her a small toy of some kind, even though his knowledge of children’s toys was very limited. There was still plenty of time in the day, and his work on the inhibitor chip scanner could wait until tonight. 

He thought for a moment before a brilliant idea for a toy popped in his head. With Omega distracted by her trooper doll, Tech began building what he hoped would be the perfect gift. 

-

“Thank you for taking me with you on your walk, Hunter!” Omega said, the images of all of the beautiful wildlife she saw still dancing around in her head. Hunter had wanted to take a walk to clear his head and offered to take Omega with him. The sun had set hours ago, but she still enjoyed getting to see this planet’s nocturnal wildlife. She had searched for the Arsinari dwarf frog but to her disappointment, she couldn’t find it anywhere. 

“You’re welcome, Omega. Get yourself ready for bed now, alright?” Hunter responded, noticing how her adrenaline was the only thing keeping her awake. 

Before climbing up to her room, Omega made her nightly rounds to everyone on the ship to say good night. Wrecker ruffled her hair, Echo patted her on the head and wished her good dreams, and Tech gave her a soft smile. Omega thought it seemed like Tech was trying to hide something from her, but she dismissed the thought as she climbed up to her room. 

As Omega made her way up, she saw something small and red resting on top of her pillow. When she picked it up, she found that it was a little red frog with the numbers “99” painted on its back in addition to a crank on its side. Omega immediately recognized it as the Arsinari dwarf frog that she’d seen with Tech.

She laughed and practically launched herself downstairs, clutching her new toy in her hand. The four Bad Batchers were sitting together talking quietly, but all conversation stopped when Omega rushed in. 

She ran over to where Tech was sitting on a crate and threw her arms around him. She squeezed him tight and a moment later, he wrapped his spare arm around her. 

“Thank you for the frog, Tech! It’s perfect, it even looks like it’s a member of our squad!” Omega said happily, her words slightly mumbled against Tech. 

“You’re very welcome, Omega. Have you tried spinning the crank yet?” Tech asked. 

Omega shook her head and pulled away from Tech to see what he was talking about. Tech plucked the toy from her hand and spun the crank a few times before placing it on the ground. To Omega’s bewilderment, the toy frog began hopping around the ship as if it were real. It gave a few big jumps before coming to a stop at Wrecker’s feet, who was completely frozen in fear of breaking Omega’s new toy. 

She giggled and hugged Tech again, mumbling another thank you to him. 

She pulled away a moment later to plead to Hunter, “Hunter, can I please stay up a little late to play with my frog? I promise I’ll go right to sleep when I’m done!” 

Hunter sighed but smiled, “Alright, you can play for fifteen minutes.” 

Omega laughed as she kneeled on the floor and cranked the toy. Wrecker kneeled down a few feet away from her and the two played together, laughing as the little frog hopped between them. Echo leaned himself against the doorway and watched them with a soft smile on his face. 

Tech felt Hunter pat him on the back and whisper, “Good job, brother.”

Tech nodded to his brother, proud of his work. Maybe someday, Tech would be able to teach his little shadow how to make herself toys. For the time being, Tech enjoyed being able to make her smile with his own inventions. 

[annapogorilayas]

here's a bunch of my rambling, incoherent thoughts LoD S6, H, and the show's overall trajectory since S4

under the cut because it's LONG, these are just my personal opinions and feelings

the show's trajectory

i've been disappointed with the show's overall direction since S4 for multiple reasons. to be fair, the show had an uphill battle to maintain the level of quality that S2/S3 had. lindsay denton was this show's most interesting character and keeley hawes was phenomenal, and her storyline tied in perfectly with the conclusion of the caddy storyline. that was always going to be a tough act to follow.

the show has always had shocking twists and explosive action sequences, but when the show moved from bbc2 weeknights to bbc1 the show began to lean more heavily on them. in S1-3 these scenes fit in with the plot. after S4, it began to feel more like the show was a series of shocking twists/action sequences with a plot written around it.

the OCG is way too big and powerful

after S4, the OCG(s) became very big, powerful, and all-knowing, without actually showing us how they were achieving this, making it hard to believe. in S2, we had an ambush, the murder of hunter and trotman in the hospital room, the setup of dryden for blackmail, and lindsay's abduction from custody. these events were carried out/enabled by five characters: prasad, cole, dot, akers, and lindsay. we met them, we spent time with them (except cole), we had at least a rough idea of what motivated them or how they got involved, and how they pulled off what they did.

in S3, two important events (steve's firearm paperwork being forged and Urgent Exit Required) were enabled by one corrupt AFO. we didn't meet him or find out what his motives were, but i don't think we needed to - he was probably just one of dot's lackeys. but it's not that hard to believe that dot could get one corrupt AFO to do his bidding.

in contrast, since S4, it seems like the OCG has an endless supply of corrupt prison officers, AFOs, and balaclava men that they can deploy at a moment's notice, and these people are pretty disposable - how many of these people have been arrested, imprisoned, or murdered since S4? how many balaclava men died in the 6x04 ambush alone? aren't the OCG(s) running out of people to send on suicide missions by now? a story driven by a revolving door of disposable, mostly nameless people is much less compelling than a story that revolves around a small, familiar cast of believably corrupt/bent/blackmailed coppers. i think S4 and S6 could've been better if more of the plot was driven by the other officers on huntley's and davidson's teams, or just... any recognisable named character, rather than these disposable hired guns.

additionally, the OCG just silences/pays off/kills people off so easily the plot has become very predictable

the problem with H

so H wasn't an evil criminal mastermind, just some guy in it for the money. that part i had hoped for and expected - LoD is almost never about criminal masterminds with grand motives who just want to watch the world burn. LoD's antagonists/villains fall into the following categories:

a) people who make decisions that spiral terribly out of control (tony gates, roz huntley)

b) people who do bad things for the right reasons because the system offers no alternative (lindsay denton wanted to save carly; danny waldron killed his abuser; john corbett believed his crimes were the only way to unmask H because peartree was dragging its feet)

c) people who do bad things out of self-preservation because they've been blackmailed or groomed (dot, jo, maneet, ryan, hargreaves, hilton, hari baines)

d) bad people who do bad things out of self-interest, whose behaviour is enabled or incentivised by the system that fails to protect people (hunter, the murphys, fairbanks, prasad, cole, gill). these guys are not geniuses and they don't have grand motives, they do bad things because it benefits them directly and they can get away with it.

i think (?) Buckells falls into this last category. i don't have a problem with him being H in theory. i don't mind that he turned out not to be the "top man" bc i never liked the idea of there being a "top man", it's way too close to "a bad apple". i'm much more intrigued by the idea that there is a loose, semi-transient network of officers who are all acting out of a combination of self-interest (money, power, access to vulnerable people) and self-preservation (they all have an incentive to be loyal to the network because they all know dirt about each other, but if there's a motive and opportunity to take someone down without it coming back on them, they will). for this reason, i don't find it necessarily disappointing or implausible that buckells was the last man standing and that he was motivated by money.

however, the way the reveal was set up throughout S6 and executed in 6x07 was anticlimactic to me. buckells had a laptop in prison? he ordered kate's murder FROM PRISON? of course he did, that whole prison appears to be run by the OCG. this is the same problem i mentioned earlier, the OCG is just too powerful to be interesting. the reveal could've been way more effective if buckells hadn't spent the last half of the season in jail. i also would've liked to hear more from buckells about precisely what motivated him, exactly how he came to be involved, and how the other corrupt officers fit into his story. i would've loved it if, for once, someone just said fuck it and spilled the beans instead of going down the "i'll tell you a bunch of useless nonsense in exchange for WP" route.

that being said, i think this whole clusterfuck could've been avoided entirely by simply not making H into such a big deal. way back in S4, the fixation on H worked as a plot device to get hilton to issue ted with a reg-15 and cast doubt on him, but i was bored of H approximately 1.5 episodes into S5. the idea of this shadowy figure calling all the shots was inconsistent with everything this show had been about, and it dragged on for way too long. i wasn't opposed to the idea that H is a group of people not a single person, but morse code? srsly? you couldn't just have them sit down and say "hey, maybe dot just blinked on H because he'd had his eyes open for a while and also he'd lost a lot of blood so he was probably confused anyway?"

[singledarkshade]

Waiting For A Train

Summary: She sighed, “I missed my train and I’m trying to work out if there is another way to get to Coast City without waiting for the next direct train at one in the morning.” “Well, we close around midnight,” he told her, “But I don’t have anywhere to go so I can stay open a little later to ensure you have somewhere safe to wait.” Author’s Note: For the wonderful @incendiaglacies, whose stories started me writing Timeship and has become my dear friend who is always happy to discuss random story ideas. Happy Birthday, Hope you have a wonderful day.                                ********************************************* The bar was quiet with enough people coming through to keep him busy, but it meant that he didn’t miss her walk through the door. Petite with long luxurious chestnut hair, high cheekbones, and soft pink lips. She was wearing a pair of comfortable looking light blue jeans and a loose green t-shirt with a black jacket under an ankle-length black coat while dragging a small purple case.

Reaching the bar, she climbed onto the stool at the end tucking the case down at her feet. The moment she was settled he moved over to her.

“What can I get you?” he asked.

“Just a diet cola,” she replied softly, in a similar accent to his own which surprised him, “And to let me know when you close?”

Grabbing her drink, he placed it on the bar before replying, “We close around midnight.���

She frowned slightly before nodding and paying for her drink, “Thank you.”

Giving her quick nod, he headed to serve one of the regulars. When he finished, he glanced over and saw she had a frown on her face as she studied the train schedule.

“Can I help with something?” he asked.

She sighed, “I missed my train and I’m trying to work out if there is another way to get to Coast City without waiting for the next direct train at one in the morning.”

“Well, we close around midnight,” he told her, “But I don’t have anywhere to go so I can stay open a little later to ensure you have somewhere safe to wait.”

“I can’t impose,” she protested, “You’ll want to get home.”

“You’re not,” he offered, “And I already am. Michael Xavier,” he introduced himself, “I own this place and live upstairs.”

A small smile touched her lips, and she shook the hand he offered, “Gideon Hunter.”

Michael mused for a moment before asking, “Are you hungry?”

Gideon looked up at him and he was caught by her storm grey eyes, “A little. If you have any crisps that will be great.” “I’m not feeding you crisps,” Michael shook his head, “I serve food at the weekend, and I have the supplies I can make you something quick but filling. If you want me to.”

A smile touched her lips, “Like?”

“Steak and onion baguette,” he suggested.

“That sounds wonderful,” Gideon said, “It has been a while since lunch, and I planned to eat on the train.”

Michael nodded and moved to the fridge pulling out the ingredients that were sitting there. He had intended to make it for his lunch tomorrow, but he could pick something up in the morning. Quickly he cooked the steak, the onions and heated up the baguette before putting it together, adding his special steak sauce before presenting it on a plate for her.

“Enjoy,” Michael smiled.

 Gideon let out a small groan when Michael took the empty plate from in front of her.

“That was amazing,” she told him, “I haven’t eaten much today, and it was just perfect.”

Dipping his head in a slight bow, he smiled, “I’m glad you enjoyed it. Do you want anything else?”

“Just another diet cola,” Gideon told him, “Unless you’re hiding chocolate cake back there.”’

Michael laughed, “Maybe not chocolate cake but…” he ducked away and opened the freezer finding what he was looking for, returning to the bar Michael presented her with a small pot, “I have a frozen chocolate mousse.”

“Sold,” she laughed, her eyes lighting up as Michael handed her a spoon.

Heading to grab her drink, Michael glanced over and watched her take her first spoonful. Unable to tear his gaze from the way her eyes closed in bliss while her lips caressed the spoon, he shook himself trying to focus on what he was doing.

“So,” he said as he placed her fresh drink down, “Can I ask what the trip to Coast City is for?”

Gideon licked the spoon, “Just a business trip.” She rolled her eyes, “Which as you can see is going well so far.”

Michael chuckled.

When she lifted her drink, he caught the gold band on her left hand.

Disappointed he asked, “I take it your husband isn’t going with you.”

She held his gaze for a moment before looking at her ring and shrugging, “I’m not married.”

“Divorced and not used to taking it off at the moment?” he nodded understanding.

“Separated,” Gideon replied softly before adding, “It’s a little complicated. It does stop some men from hitting on me if I’m wearing it, although it doesn’t stop others.”

Michael grimaced, “I’ve thrown a few of those out of here in my time.”

“What about you?” Gideon asked suddenly, “You work here, you live here and you’re not wearing a ring. Is there someone special in your life?”

Shaking his head, Michael shrugged, “I’ve never been married and never met anyone I could see in that way. Maybe one day I’ll meet someone.”

“Then what brought you to Central City?” Gideon asked, “And,” she motioned around the room, “Here.”

Looking around his bar, Michael sighed, “I found my job was just…I felt bored and stuck in a rut. To be honest I had nothing tying me down and I was wandering the internet when I saw the bar for sale. I put in an offer, and it was accepted.”

“How long ago was that?” Gideon placed her elbow on the bar and rested her head on her hand.

“About six months ago now,” he smiled thoughtfully, “I don’t miss my old life, although on occasion I feel that I misplaced something in the move.”

“It’s impressive that you changed your life so drastically on an impulse,” Gideon nodded.

Michael shrugged, “What about you? What do you do?”

“I work with artificial intelligence and robotics,” Gideon told him.

“Sounds impressive,” Michael noted.

Gideon smiled, “It can get tedious sometimes, but my lab partner and I have been working on time travel in our spare time.”

“Seriously?”

“Well, we work on theories of how to do it, and how it would work,” Gideon laughed, “As well as ideas of whether we would use a car, a phone booth or a ship to travel in.”

Laughing Michael mused, “I would go with a ship probably.”

“I change my mind every few days,” Gideon chuckled, “I love the idea of a ship but how much fun would a car be?”

                                 *********************************************

 Michael finally found the cocktail shakers beneath the bar, wincing when he hit his head as he tried to stand. Gideon’s golden laughter surrounded him, and he rolled his eyes when he stood.

“Found them.” They had started talking about cocktails and it turned into him offering to show her how to make a few. Gideon had joined him behind the bar for her lesson, her case tucked away in the corner.

“Okay,” she caught one of the strainers from falling, “Are you sure you know how to do this?”

“Well, not many people have asked for a cocktail since I opened this place,” Michael told her.

“They might if your menu was in plain sight,” she teased, pointing to the board hidden just behind the fake plants.

Sighing Michael handed her the book, “What do you want to start with?”

“Since I’m not drinking,” Gideon noted, “A non-alcoholic one would be best.” “Is there anyone who wants to try a cocktail?” Michael called out to the people around the bar, “No charge, I’m seeing if I can make them.” Several hands went up and Michael turned to Gideon, “We have few brave volunteers.”

“Alright,” she flipped through the pages and decided to go for a classic, “Pina Colada.”

 Michael watched Gideon carefully carry the final cocktail attempt to the woman who had agreed to try if the French Martini he’d made was any good. It had been a fun few hours, making the different drinks with Gideon instructing him, while the rest of the bar made suggestions, drank the results and gave feedback.

“Will you be adding cocktails to the menu that people can see from now on?” Gideon asked as she perched on top of the bar beside him.

Michael laughed, glancing over to see how his final cocktail was and getting a thumbs up, “Maybe after some more practice runs, I’ll add a few to start with.”

“My work here is done,” Gideon beamed.

Michael cleared everything from the bar to the sink area, “I’ll clean up later.”

“No,” Gideon protested, “I’ll help wash everything. You’ve only made the mess because of my suggestion. Not to mention you are staying open to give me a place to wait for my train.”

“I appreciate the help,” Michael told her, “I’ll fill the two sinks and we can take half each.”

Gideon slid her jacket off and laid it on the chair before she grabbed the spare apron hanging there. Looking as though she belonged there, Gideon began to clean the glasses.

Michael smiled as he watched her for a moment before he started his half of the cleaning.

 Gideon was sitting cross-legged on the bar as Michael closed the doors after the final customer left just after midnight.

“I can help,” she said as he began to put the chairs on the table.

“Stay where you are,” Michael assured, “This only takes a few minutes.”

“You know I am very grateful to you for letting me stay here tonight,” Gideon told him, “There is a waiting room in the train station...”

“But this late at night,” Michael shook his head, “It’s not safe. I’m happy for the company. Especially from someone as smart, fun and beautiful as you.”

A soft blush covered her cheeks, “Well, you’re not so bad yourself.”

“So,” Michael said placing the final chair on the table, “We covered jobs, education, favourite drinks. Let’s see what else is there to talk about?”

“Oh, I know,” Gideon beamed, “Let’s go back to time travel. If you could travel anywhere through time, where would you go?”

“The Old West,” he replied instantly.

“Without a moment’s thought,” Gideon chuckled.

Michael shook his head, “I didn’t need one. Don’t get me wrong I know it’s not exactly the ideal place, but it’s always fascinated me.”

Pursing her lips as she looked him up and down, Gideon noted, “I think you would look extremely good in the outfit.”

Feeling the back his neck heat at her gaze, he ducked his head slightly and pretended to fix one of the chairs.

“What about you?” Michael asked.

Gideon bit her lower lip for a moment, looking impossibly adorable, “Atlantis.”

“Really?” Michael grabbed a stool beside her and sat, “Why there? It is a mythical land.”

“Because there is always the possibility it’s real,” Gideon said, “And I would love to find out.”

Michael nodded, “Makes sense.” “What about the future?” Gideon asked, “Would you like to go there?”

“Definitely,” Michael breathed, “Although to just see the stars would be incredible.”

Gideon nodded, “I know what you mean.”

 They chatted for a little longer before Gideon’s watch buzzed, and she sighed.

“To make sure I catch this train,” she told him, “I need to leave now.”

Michael nodded and retrieved her case, as well as grabbing his jacket. At her confused look he rolled his eyes, “I’m not letting you walk alone.”

“You don’t have to,” Gideon told him.

“I want to.”

She smiled, “Thank you.”

Once they were both ready, Michael took her case and they started out. It was cool, but not too cold, as they strolled towards the train station. Michael could see she was surprised when he walked with her to the platform, but he wanted to make sure she got safely on the train.

“Oh,” Gideon gasped suddenly, “I didn’t pay you for my drinks or meal.” “It’s on the house,” Michael told her, “But next time perhaps…” he paused and took a quick breath before continuing, “Perhaps you’ll let me take you out for a proper meal.”

“I might not be back for a few months,” Gideon whispered.

He licked his lips before breathing, “I can wait.”

Without thought he leaned in and pressed a gentle kiss to her lips. The kiss lingered before deepening as the train pulled in.

They parted and Gideon squeezed his hand.

“I will be back as soon as I can,” she whispered before kissing him quickly once more.

Michael watched her get on the train and take a seat at the window, from the corner of his eye he spotted a man get on the train, but it was on the carriage back from her.

As the train pulled away, Michael waved to her hoping she’d be back soon.

                                 *********************************************

 Gideon sat staring out the window as the train moved through the city, turning when the man who had got on at the same time dropped into the seat across from her.

“Well?”                                    

Gideon sighed as she played with her ring, “He didn’t recognise me at all.”

“Are you sure?” John demanded, “I saw the kiss he gave you.”

Gideon shook her head.

“Listen to me, love,” John said, “Rip sacrificed his memory to save you from that curse. He can’t go back on that deal.” “But we can,” Gideon reminded him, “I am going to get Rip back and nothing will get in my way.”

John chuckled as he leaned back, “I know that. And I have a lead for us once we get back to the ship.”

Closing her eyes, Gideon played with her wedding ring remembering the moment Rip had given it to her. He had kept his vows by protecting her no matter what, now it was time to keep hers.

And nothing would stop her.

[sohotthateveryonedied]

When Everyone Who Loves me Has Died

Read here on AO3!

Summary:

"Everything is as it should be, yet here I am, still feeling like I’m missing something.”

“Like what?” Tim can’t remember the last time he saw Harley sit still and listen for so long without getting fidgety. Either she's learning self-control, or Tim's life is just really fucking depressing.

“Like...I don’t know.” Tim scratches his thumbnail against some dried paint, unable to feel the chill of the metal through his glove. “Everyone is back, but that doesn’t erase the fact that they were dead. That part still happened, regardless of whether they came back or not. It’s like—like burning a hole in a piece of paper and covering it with tape. It doesn’t heal anything.”

Whoever came up with the concept of mind over matter should be imprisoned for false advertising. Tim has been trying to get his mind over the matter for months now, and the matters are still very much gripping the steering wheel. If anything, his mind gave in and slid into the passenger seat, going along for the ride. Tim is sitting on a billboard platform, Lex Luthor’s ginormous bald self providing a nauseating backdrop as he advertises whatever world domination kick he’s on at the moment. Tim watches the cars go by on the highway, utterly indifferent to the tiny speck of a vigilante watching from above. His cowl is down, but he isn’t worried. It’s unlikely that anyone will be able to spot him up here, civilian or otherwise. Besides, it gets harder and harder to breathe under the weight of the mask these days. He was supposed to be getting better. The days are coming in at longer intervals, which should be a relief. Days when he gets “dark and twisty” as Jason lovingly calls it, which isn’t too far off, Tim supposes. Something inside of him is definitely twisted, coiled into a furl of darkness where there used to be light. God, he needs therapy. He should be getting better. There is no logical reason to be feeling this way. Not anymore. Not when things are finally back where they should be after years of grief. Maybe something has been knocked loose in his brain, keeps him on this brink he can’t seem to sway to either side of. He’s not happy, but he’s not completely sad either. There’s no logic to it, no reason. No closure. Is this how ghosts feel? Like they’re straddling the in-between, stuck feeling like everything they have is just slightly out of reach? “Why the long face, kiddo?”

Tim is up in an instant, fumbling to pull his cowl back over his face. He raises his bo staff at the prowler, only to find Harley standing at the other end of the platform, her arms packed with reusable grocery bags. She’s wearing civilian clothes: a Nightwing tank top and leather pants that look like she doused them in glue and rolled around in a kiddie pool filled with glitter. Tim relaxes. He lowers his staff. “You shouldn’t do that. I could have knocked your head off.” “Nah, I’m too good to be taken down by a twelve-year-old.” “I’m eighteen.” “You sure? ‘Cause I could have sworn you were still in middle school.” “Hilarious.” “Thanks, I’ve been thinkin’ about doing some comedy on the side to pay the bills. Eddie says I’ve got a real knack for it.” Harley sits on the edge of the platform beside the spot where Tim was before. “I asked you a question, by the way.” “Bruce is going to kill me if he finds out I’m hanging out with you.” Fine, so that’s a minor exaggeration. Bruce will always have beef with Harley regardless of how many good deeds she does. Dick’s theory is that Bruce has some lingering bitterness from his and Harley’s rivalry from med school, and he probably isn’t too far off. The rest of the family is far looser when it comes to trusting Harley; Alfred even sent her a Hanukkah gift last year. “You and I both know Brucie is in Metropolis this week.” At Tim’s inquiring look, she explains, “My mom is friends with him on Facebook. So, are you gonna spill or what? ‘Cause I’ve got ice cream here and I swear to god I’ll fill your nostrils with tapioca if it melts.” Tim rolls his eyes. He lets his cowl fall back against his neck and sits beside Harley. “I’m fine.” “And that’s why you’re hanging out here all angsty-like?” “I’m not angsty.” “You’re the angstiest person on this fuckin’ billboard.” Which, fine, that’s probably true. “I don’t need a PHD to tell that something’s eating ya, kid. Which I do, by the way. Got the certificate and everything.” Tim gestures to her grocery bags. “I thought you had somewhere to be.” “What, these ol’ things? Nah. I just have a date with Pam-a-lamb tonight and had to borrow some supplies.” “Borrow?” “The manager there was a dick, anyways. He’s the one who got all snappy when I ate all the free samples, so trust me. He deserved to get his stuff stolen.” “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that.” “I’ll go back and return the thirty-seven scratch-offs I took if you tell me what’s bothering you.” Tim looks out over the black horizon, the moon barely visible behind the clouds. “It’s nothing.” “Everything is something. Gandhi said that.” “Pretty sure he didn’t.” “What, did you personally know the guy?” She nudges Tim with her elbow. “Well? Spit it out, Timberlake.” Tim lets out a breath. “It’s just...you know when you lose something really important to you? And you miss it, but after a while, when you’ve already accepted that you’ll never see it again, you find it? And you’re happy to have it back, but there’s still...something is missing. Almost like you never found it at all, you know?” “Not really, no.” Tim’s mouth twitches upward. “I’ve spent the past two years in mourning, but now I don’t have to mourn anymore. Everything is perfect again.” Harley arches an eyebrow. “Lemme guess, you don’t know why you still feel like you’re grieving?” Tim nods. “Small fry, that’s not a symptom. That’s normal for someone in your situation.” “No, it isn’t. I should be happy right now. I should—I should be the happiest I’ve ever been. I spent so long trying to make everything right again, and I did it. Conner is back. Bart is back. Bruce is back. Everything is as it should be, yet here I am, still feeling like I’m missing something.” “Like what?” Tim can’t remember the last time he saw Harley sit still and listen for so long without getting fidgety. Either she's learning self-control, or Tim's life is just really fucking depressing. “Like...I don’t know.” Tim scratches his thumbnail against some dried paint, unable to feel the chill of the metal through his glove. “Everyone is back, but that doesn’t erase the fact that they were dead. That part still happened, regardless of whether they came back or not. It’s like—like burning a hole in a piece of paper and covering it with tape. It doesn’t heal anything.” “Well, of course it doesn’t.” Tim looks at her, surprised. Harley’s eyes are serious for once, void of humor. “Having all your folks back doesn’t erase the fact that they were gone. Grief is what makes us human. Still feelin’ bad after everything is fixed just means you’re still working on it.” “That’s it?” Harley’s eyebrows furrow. “What’s it?” “I thought you were going to...I don’t know, crack open some huge revelation and make me realize it’s all in my head or something.” “I mean, it kind of is in your head.” Harley tugs on one pink pigtail. “Grief doesn’t come from your feet, Timantha.” “So...how do I fix it?” Harley shrugs, sitting back and swinging her legs in the air. “Fuck if I know. Go see a therapist or something?” Tim snorts. “I’d rather not.” “What, you got a prior engagement? Too busy for psychoanalysis?” “I can’t exactly go to a normal therapist and explain to them that all of my friends are superheroes and my dad is Batman.” “Hm. Point taken, bird boy.” Harley goes to boop his nose, but Tim swats her away. “Talk to me then. I’m a dandy good listener.” “Thanks, but I’m good.” “I’m serious. Got the license to practice and everything.” “I’m pretty sure psychology licenses expire once you’re imprisoned for terrorism.” “Well, jeez, go and insult me, why don’tcha? And after I offer my help like the good citizen I am.” She stands, picking up her shopping bag. Then she digs around in her pockets and comes out with a small white card. She hands it to Tim. Harley Quinn — hit(wo)man, psychiatrist, bounty hunter, dog walker, mercenary, finder of lost things, life coach. “And that’s just the tip of the iceberg,” she says with a wink. “I’m also considering goin’ into doggie makeovers.” “I don’t know,” Tim says. “I won’t go blabbing your information to Croc or no one, cross my heart. I strictly abide by the doctor/patient confidentiality rules.” A pause. “Most of the time.” Then she looks back at the billboard of Lex, looking for the world like a vengeful Mr. Clean god. “I’m sure he won’t tattle.” “I don’t think the Justice League would think very highly of one of their own getting therapy from an ex-supervillain.” “So? Fuck them, they’re a bunch of crusty old people anyway. Come on, think about it, Timberly. I’ll even give you the friends and family discount so long as you bring doughnuts when you visit. Teen angst makes me hungry.” Tim considers it for a moment, then sighs. “I’m free on Thursday afternoons.” Harley grins. “It’s a date, bird boy.”

[raendown]

@sarcastic-mommy commissioned this as a gift for @bouncyirwin. Merry Christmas everyone!

Pairing: ShikamaruKakashiSakura Word count: 5314 Rated: G Summary: Ever since she could remember Sakura felt drawn to the forest in a way she couldn't explain.

Follow the link or read it under the cut!

KO-FI and commission info in the header!

The Finding

Sometimes the forest called to her, a beckoning in some language she almost knew in the back of her mind, a memory never made and long forgotten. It wasn’t something she ever mentioned to anyone. All things considered Sakura lived a perfectly normal life and she was well aware that feeling a strange pull towards the forest that grew wild behind her sleepy little neighborhood was definitely not normal. Her parents seemed happy to let her while away her early years peeking over the backyard fence with curiosity in her eyes but Sakura, normal and obedient and praised for being a good little girl, never did answer that call. 

Until the year she graduated from university and moved back home to find that the forest, ever changing yet always the same, had grown in to her yard while she was gone. Oh the trees stayed on their side of the fence and the reaching vines remained where her parents liked to believe they had trained them to weave around the wooden slats. But when Sakura looked out her window one morning to see the shadow of something lupine in the dawn fog she knew, somewhere deep down, that the forest was calling again. 

Prising open the wooden frame that always swelled with damp weather, Sakura called out to the figure without knowing exactly why she thought an animal might understand her or what on earth inspired her exact words. 

“Not yet,” she told him. 

Amazingly - and yet somehow unsurprisingly - the figure turned and disappeared as easily as that. Sakura closed the window and told herself that it was probably just one of the neighborhood dogs slipping their leash and wandering around through other peoples’ backyards. Clearly that was more likely than an emissary from the trees. 

Her heart knew different. But her heart lay heavy and hidden in her breast as it had since she was young. 

The next day she woke to a deer very calmly grazing between the flowers her mother had scattered across the lawn for ‘a more natural look’. Sakura narrowed her eyes and vowed not to deviate from the sidewalks when she went out job hunting. Just because she acknowledged that this was almost definitely all a fancy of her own imagination did not mean she wasn’t going to take extra precautions. There was no telling what sort of trouble she might be inviting herself in to if she ever actually answered the strange call that only she could hear. At the very least it would earn her a few questions from her parents. She didn’t want to think about anything worse.

For some time Sakura was able to ignore that strange feeling of desperate yearning in the back of her mind. She pulled the curtains across her window and studiously kept her eyes away from the trees whenever she left home. It worked in the sense that her feet never once strayed for the forest no matter how strong the call. On the other hand her plan failed in the way the yearning built up behind her ribs until her thoughts were so consumed she could think of very little else but the trees, the way shadows danced between them, the branches and how they danced whether or not there was a breeze to lift them. Whether she looked at the forest or not did nothing to change the fact that it had long since been seared in to her mind like a photograph, an image she knew every intimate detail of. 

When she stepped out of the house one morning to find a deer standing placidly on her front lawn that no one else seemed able to see she knew that something had to change. It was more than obvious that ignoring the issue wasn’t making it go away. The only other thing she could think to do was to investigate. Knowing the source of this strange obsession might, by some mercy, help rid her of it entirely. That was her theory, at least. 

Despite no words being spoken the deer seemed to understand her wish for it to follow her in to the backyard where fewer eyes might see her acting so abnormally. Sakura did what she could to keep the animal in her sights at all times as she walked around the side of the house but doing so proved much more difficult than she anticipated. It was almost as though it were flickering about through space and time, there and gone again in both peripherals at random, always in the same place when she turned her head to look at it directly and yet somehow existing somewhere else the moment she looked away. Of all the many impossible things she’d seen come out of the forest this was possibly the most impossible. Sakura clenched her fists and continued walking. Bravery was probably a stupid response but it certainly made her feel a little better. Keeping in mind the classes she’d taken in jiu jitsu over the last few years helped too. 

Although she wasn’t entirely sure what sort of moves she thought would protect her from a deer. 

Only when she was sure no one from the street could see them and she had checked the neighbors’ windows for anyone watching did Sakura finally turn to face this confounding beast head on. Except it wasn’t where she’d left it. A low gasp escaped her to see the backyard entirely empty except for herself. 

Questioning her own sanity, Sakura remained utterly still for several minutes while she tried to go over every single step she’d taken that morning, looking for something - anything - she could use to convince herself there really had been a forest creature here with her. One that ostensibly only she could see. The longer she stood there the crazier she felt until on the verge of giving up she turned and there it was. It was not alone. Neither the deer nor the massive wolf now sitting at its side appeared terribly bothered by the other, both staring directly at her without acknowledging each other at all. 

“What do you want?” Sakura demanded, emboldened by the pique of being made to question her own mind. 

It wasn’t much of a surprise when neither of them answered. They were, after all, mere animals. As far as she could see. For all she knew they could be physical manifestations of whatever it was that made this forest so very different from any other group of boring, prosaic trees. In the handful of years she’d spent away for schooling none of the forests surrounding her dorms had ever made her stop to listen or stare deeply between the shadows like she could spot their patterns and catch them in her hands. Still, after all the worrying she’d done over the past few weeks Sakura found herself growing less afraid, more annoyed. 

“Look, if you don’t want anything then go away!” Neither of the beasts so much as twitched when she began to make shooing motions with one hand. “Let me live my life in peace and go find someone else to drive insane.”

Sakura was nearly startled out of her skin when the wolf abruptly tossed back his head to let loose a long, mournful howl that raised every hair on her body. What should have been nothing more than some animalistic note danced across her senses like a voice she both knew and did not know. Yet the fact that it was an oddly human sound felt less strange to her than why she should feel she knew this wolf as deeply as she knew herself. Or why she should feel injured in some forgotten corner of her heart when both animals turned away to leave as she had asked. 

“Fine! Go! That’s...what I wanted!” 

Neither stopped to look back but although the fog never appeared to shift it almost seemed like the deer and the wolf faded in to it before ever reaching the fence. Between one blink and the next her yard was covered in a thick, muffling blanket of white that left her feeling, contrary to any logic, safer than she had ever been. 

Unsettled with the fact that she didn’t feel even slightly unsettled by what she’d just seen, Sakura turned to go back to the front yard and continue with her day in a light stupor of confusion. 

She made it all the way through a lovely if slightly distant dinner with her parents before the pull in her chest called her out in to the backyard again with a note of finality that she could not have explained with human words. The humanity in her wanted to turn back, to look at the house she had grown up in, but something stopped her. Maybe it was the hypnotic dance of branches like reaching fingers. Or maybe it was the inexplicable sense of detachment from everything around her. Whatever it was, Sakura found she had eyes only for the fog seeping through the trees to dance through the slats of the fence that never did do much to keep it at bay. As soon as the white reached her feet it was like the entire world faded. There wasn’t anything she could think to do but walk forward.

Considering where she had been standing it should have only taken a few steps to run up against the fence. Sakura felt as though she walked and walked and walked before finally it occurred to her that there was no way she could still be within the bounds of her parents’ property and yet she felt no need to look behind herself, gaze trained forward with an anticipation that was rewarded when two other pairs of eyes faded out of the haze. 

“Here I am,” Sakura murmured, knowing they would hear her. “Why? Why do you keep calling me?”

Obviously she wasn’t expecting a verbal answer. Not from animals. Some kind of sign would have been nice though.

“Look, I walked all the way here - wherever the hell here is - so the least you could do is tell me why I had to do that.” Propping both hands on her hips, Sakura waited as patiently as she could. After several long moments one pair of eyes seemed to blink very slowly and then they were both stepping forward, deer and wolf standing majestically together, no long hunter and prey but with the same hungry expression in both their eyes. Sakura frowned. 

After giving them both a long minute to do something, anything, she raised one eyebrow. 

“I could just go home,” she pointed out, privately unsure if she would be able to find the way and uncertain besides that she even wanted to. 

But it did the trick. At those words the wolf seemed to bristle and the deer lowered its head for one moment as if to bow before her. Then as one they turned and began walking away at a matching stately pace. This time they did not disappear. Sakura was bright enough to take the hint and followed after them from a safe distance, chewing sharply on her lip while she tried not to let her eyes be distracted with looking at anything else. Shapes and colors that should not have been there teased at her peripheral vision as though tempting her in to doing some unspeakable wrong. It was hard not to look. Every fiber of her being wanted so badly to know what could be so wrong about a quick and simple glance. Thankfully she was smarter than that. Obviously something was very different about this place and she wasn’t up for finding out the hard way exactly what that difference entailed.

All sense of time had long since been lost by the time they came to a large clearing but for all the natural splendor laid out before her Sakura could think only of the feeling that she had finally come back to the place she belonged. Obviously ridiculous since she had never been in the forest before for all that she’d spent her childhood peering between the trees. Something about this space just felt right in a way she could not have explained with any language known to humankind. 

Rather appropriate, as luck would have, when she realized that she was not in the presence of anything human.

Two figures rose from the far side of the clearing where their forms blended in with the scenery so well she almost mistook them for part of the roots that wove together to make a throne nothing manmade could ever compare to. Both looked male, if she was right in assigning gender to ones so clearly not human, and both moved with a grace that any empress could only dream of. When they walked they did so with the confidence of those who owned everything around then and there was a gravity in those movements that spoke of a deep bond. How she knew that Sakura could not say. It wasn’t until they came to rest between the wolf and the deer that she noticed the animals had stopped moving as well and seemed entirely unbothered to be approached. On the contrary the two of them bowed their heads as if in greeting to their masters. Sakura fought back the same feeling while she observed the alluring creatures watching her in turn. 

One wore silver hair like a crown that lifted and danced with the wind zephyrs, one eye as black as coal and the one a deep jewel red, his face marked with a faint line through the second eye. The second was only slightly shorter with dark hair caught up in a high tail between a pair of antlers that appeared to grow naturally from his temples. Neither of them seemed to have much concern for their lack of shirts despite the autumn chill, clad only in elaborate loincloths and jewelry. Quite a lot of jewelry. Sakura was trying to decide if she wanted to stare at the perfectly sculpted chests or the beautifully carved arm bands one was wearing when the other spoke up. 

“You certainly took your time,” the one with dark hair noted. At his side the other smiled. 

“Not that we can judge you for that, all things considered.” 

“Hn. Still, the waiting was quite troublesome.” 

Sakura blinked rapidly several times. Her mouth opened only to snap shut without saying anything. There wasn’t much she could say to that. From her earliest memories she could remember something calling her to the forest; if that call was from these two before her she could understand a little impatience. 

“Why?” tumbled out from between her lips almost unbidden. “Why have you been calling me?” 

The weight of their gazes felt suddenly so much heavier. Velvety horns dipped in thought but it was the one with silver hair who answered, a yearning in his eyes that pinned her in place more effectively than any shackles could have. 

“I don’t suppose you’d believe me if I said we missed you?”

“No,” Sakura answered honestly with a smile. “You can’t miss someone you’ve never met.”

“Oh?” His words weren’t so much a challenge as they were amusement at her lack of understanding, not quite condescending but also not willing to explain until he’d taken his entertainment from her. It would have been annoying if she weren’t supremely aware that this was clearly their domain she had willingly stepped in to - or if he weren’t so devastatingly attractive. 

Reaching out with one hand, the shorter of them stroked the proud neck of what Sakura assumed was his pet deer. The beast arched in to such freely given affection with its eyes rolling to meet hers as if to gloat over what she was so clearly missing out on. Even more strange was that she agreed. To be the one under those sturdy hands must have been quite the privilege and it made her wonder why she didn’t find that thought more repulsive, the idea of anything so inhuman being so familiar with her. Her tastes had always been a little different.

After it was satisfied that she was appropriately jealous the deer looked away from her and moved across the lush grass to lay down at the wolf’s side. Abandoned by his companion, the man twisted his lips in to a wry expression before looking up at Sakura once more.

“What is your name now?” he asked. 

“Now? I’ve always had the same name.”

“In this body, yes.”

“What?” Sakura frowned, trying to work her way through that, but when she got no answer it felt like too much effort to make a big deal out of it. Answering seemed easier. “My name is Sakura.”

The moment those words had passed her lips the air around them changed, warped, pressed in close to seep under her skin like an embrace she would never be free of again. When Sakura cried out both of the figures watching her lifted their faces in triumph. The one with silver hair tossed his head back, opened his mouth, and howled with a note that struck her down to the very soul at her core. Impossibly, it was the same voice that had howled for her before, the same one that some part of her remembered although she’d never heard it before today. 

“Now you have come home,” the shorter one intoned. 

“Will someone please explain what is going on?” Sakura pleaded in a shaken voice. 

Both men looked at her in a way she didn’t understand, silent for a very long time. As much as she knew the smart thing would be to ready herself to run, to fight, whatever was necessary, Sakura felt all the muscles in her body relaxing almost against her will when finally both of them moved a single step closer. 

Definitely not the smartest reaction. If only she could bring herself to regret it. 

“Names are a powerful thing,” the same one murmured. “Names have a way of binding, searing, twisting until the edges fray and catch to hold you in place - but rest assured, there’s nowhere you could ever be safer than with us.” 

“Well what are your names then?” 

“You may call me Shikamaru.”

“Maa, now that wasn’t very polite,” his companion cut in with a smile that showed too many teeth. “How can you ask her to remember us if we can’t even trust her with ourselves?” 

After a moment of pause the first nodded and straightened his shoulders to look her in the eye. “Let me say instead: my name is Shikamaru.” 

For being nearly the exact same sentence it hit much harder with just that small difference. It felt like the words spiralled down inside of her to make a home, chained to the deepest parts of her soul in a way she instantly understood meant that she had power over this creature. What sort of power that might be she had no idea. She was only a frail human herself, what harm could she really do to a being that controlled the animals of the forest - and even the forest itself to some degree if her suspicions were correct. 

It wasn’t until her eyes opened again that she realized she had closed them in the first place. Shikamaru and the other still unnamed watched her every shift and twitch with rapt expressions that should have made her feel like prey about to be hunted. Instead she was warmed, a sensation of perfect belonging like she’d never felt before settling over her mind. When the second man lifted a hand to point at himself with one too-elegant hand she could only watch with a strange sort of rapturous lassitude. 

“Let’s complete it then. My name is Kakashi.”

Evidently she’d been wrong. If before she had felt belonging what she felt now had no name that she could think of. It was home and settling in and fitting in to the space fate itself had carved for her and coming home to a place she had always been. Sakura rocked under the force of it. 

“What-?” she whispered, unable to finish when she realized she had no idea what the question was going to be. There were too many to ask. 

Kakashi reached towards her and Sakura didn’t bother to stop and think about whether or not it was a good idea, whether or not this made sense, whether or not she should. Taking his hand was the easiest thing she had done in her life. So was being gently pulled to fit between both men, closing her eyes just to feel the pulse of their matching heartbeats on either side of her body. 

“You belonged to us long before you were born,” Kakashi’s voice rumbled above her head. 

“Technically there wasn’t supposed to be a you at all,” Shikamaru added musingly. “Fate has some troublesome twists at times.”

“Oh I wouldn’t call her troublesome. A rather welcome addition, I’d say.”

Sakura swallowed thickly while her mind raced trying to keep up. She felt honorbound to point out, “You don’t even know me.” Then she nearly leapt out of her skin to feel the cold nose of what could only be the wolf that led her here pressing in against one thigh.

“We know you as we know ourselves. One soul shared between three bodies. Haven’t you felt it?” Kakashi mirrored his wolf, nosing against the seam where her neck met her shoulder. “You spoke of a calling, you trusted our avatars to lead you here. Isn’t that proof enough?”

“Proof of what though? I don’t know what you mean by one soul.” 

This time it was Shikamaru who followed the example of his beast. As the deer stepped closer to nuzzle carefully in to her opposite thigh so did Shikamaru bury his face in her hair, angling his head so his own crown of antlers wouldn’t cause her any harm. When he spoke the bass of his voice rumbled just behind her ear in a very pleasant way. 

“Do humans know nothing of us? How bothersome. The fae are always born with a part of their soul shared within another's body - soulmates, as you humans would call it. Kakashi and I found each other centuries ago and we were perfectly happy until the Last Great War when an abomination I will not give name to somehow managed to crack our soul and steal a piece of it.” Shikamaru drew a shuddering breath and it was easy to tell this was hard for him to talk about. As he faltered Kakashi seamlessly picked up the thread. 

“You are that missing piece, the part of our soul that completes us. We’re very happy to have you back in case you didn’t notice.” The smile in his voice was obvious even if she couldn’t see him. 

“Oh. I’m just...something you lost, then? So you called me out here to...take that bit of soul back?”

Not that Sakura would have blamed them if that was their plan. Just the thought of having something like that happen had her mind shivering away from it. She was surprised to feel both sets of arms around her tighten at the same moment the wolf at her left hip began to growl viciously. 

“If anyone ever tries to hurt you-” Shikamary began.

“-we will rend the flesh from their bones and feed them to the After!” Kakashi finished with a snarl. 

Blinking rapidly, Sakura took a few moments to gather any sort of coherent response. “Oh. Okay. I have to admit, this is all just a little hard to believe. Not that I’m calling you both liars or anything! Just, well, I’m not entirely positive this isn’t the most incredibly detailed dream my brain has ever come up with. Everything’s so fantastical and impossible.”

She was hardly surprised when both of them pulled away to give her matching looks of consideration, not an ounce of disappointment or judgment. Their arms fell away and she was left to conceal the sensation of loss that ripped through her like a tidal wave. Sakura cleared her throat and crossed her arms in an effort to feel like she still had some manner of control over this incredibly uncontrollable situation, not convinced this was really happening but not ready yet to dismiss it either. It seemed her indecision had been communicated well, however, as Shikamaru’s face lit up with some sort of idea. 

“If proof is what you want we can do that. You are the other piece of our soul and that means you have dominion over this place as much as we do. Choose your avatar.”

“My avatar?”

“I have my deer. No matter where they are in the forest I will see through their eyes and they will bring me their secrets.”

“And I have my wolves,” Kakashi added with a fond look down at the beast still pressing as close as possible. Sakura nodded slowly and looked around. 

The part of her that still couldn’t accept this was smiling indulgently as she chose the first creature her eyes landed on, whim and nothing more. “I don’t know, that slug on a rock over there. Could that be an avatar? Or should I - oh!” 

It would have been impossible to describe with words the feeling of having her essence attach itself to every slug present in the entire forest - and what a forest it was. Of course she had known the treeline stretched the length of her entire hometown but it's true breadth was something she’d never had to fathom before until this moment. Now suddenly the power was hers to see through the eyes of hundreds upon hundreds of slugs all spread throughout the trees. Not a leaf or bit of loam could pass by her notice. The only thing her poor limited imagination could think to compare it to was that it was like having her own security system all throughout the entire domain. 

Calling the place her own felt real then in a way she couldn’t deny any longer. Her soul pulled her towards the two glorious fae before her and her heart pulled her through the trees to reach in to the darkest and lightest corners like she’d known this place from the beginning of time. She wondered if that was how long both these men had been watching over it. She knew it was.

“I’m home,” she whispered.

“Yes,” Kakashi replied with a deep reverence. 

Shikamaru’s fingers cradled her cheeks and Sakura marveled that she could identify his touch even with her eyes closed. “This time we will protect you all the more fiercely. I don’t know that we could stand to be incomplete again.”

“That sounds wonderful,” Sakura managed to choke out.

Whatever else she might have said was drowned in the rising tide of affections as first Kakashi and then Shikamaru wrapped themselves around her again and Sakura knew what it was to feel complete. Here truly was where she belonged. In all the years she’d spent growing up and choosing a school that could lead her to a good career there had never been a sense of moving forward, never a goal of any sort to give her a yearning for the future. This was why. She’d never really belonged to the human world after all. 

As soon as that acceptance settled in to her soul Sakura could feel herself changing, molding in to who she was always meant to be, sinking in to the forest itself even as the forest sank in to her - but it was nearly impossible to pay attention to the changes taking place when Kakashi slipped two fingers under her chin and brought her lips up to meet with his. She was already reeling from the perfection of their kiss when Shikamaru swooped in to steal one of his own and then - oh and then. She was lost. 

She could only hope to never be found again. 

-A-

Easterly winds carried with them the scent of a new spring, driving Sakura’s legs faster and faster to the chorus of a dozen wolves behind her. It was her first chase of the season but there were countless seasons in her memory to guide her through the twisting pathways in to all her favorite hiding places where she would force Kakashi to sniff her out if he wanted to capture her. Chasing might be his favorite game but winning was hers. One of Shikamaru’s deer watched her fly past but the beast only rolled its eyes with the lazy energy of its master. Reaching out to her own favored avatar, Sakura changed the direction of her flight with the spin of a heel and took off towards the clearing she could see in Katsuyu’s eyes. Something about it seemed familiar and yet different in a way no other part of her forest was. 

It took until she burst out of the trees for her to realize why. 

Sakura came to a graceful halt and all thoughts of a chase left her mind as she took in the sight of a sagging wooden fence and a building of red brick. Ragged bushes were in the midst of attempting to flower up against the rear of the house. In the middle of the small yard there sat a rickety looking contraption that she recognized in the back of her mind as a swing set. 

This was home to her once, she realized slowly. Katsuyu’s energy whispered from nearby, telling tales of the elderly couple that sometimes sat in the backyard holding hands and watched the forest with mournful faces. Her parents. Or at least the humans who created this body, that her fragmented soul might be safely housed until she could return to the place she had always belonged. It was sad, in a way, that she’d had to leave them. Were there a way she could have told them that she was safe and happy it surely would have eased their minds but time flowed differently in the fae realms than it did here on the human plane. Centuries had already passed for her, though she knew she looked no older. To appear before the ones that gave her life would only hurt them now. Not to mention explaining would break several rules that governed the interactions between her kind and theirs. 

Rustling behind her made one ear twitch but she could feel her partners approaching even when she could not see them. Kakashi’s hands encircled her waist to pull her in against his chest, warm and solid. 

“Having regrets?” he murmured in to her ear. Just the sound of his voice chased away any lingering traces of sadness. By the time she turned to face him the memories of her time amongst humanity were already fading again. 

“Never,” she replied honestly.

“Humans are trouble,” Shikamaru called from behind a nearby tree. “Come back to where it's safe. Weren’t the two of you busy with something?” 

Before her other partner could answer Sakura was twisting away and dashing off between the trees again with a laugh that sprinkled the air like fresh snow. “Catch me if you can, wolf boy!” 

She didn’t need to look to know that Kakashi would be following her with eyes as bright as the avatar he had chosen. Just as she’d never needed to look to know that both he and Shikamaru would always be there at her side. They were one. One soul housed within three bodies, perfect in the way their imperfections lined up like puzzle pieces. 

Did she have regrets? No. There had never been anything she believed in more than her place here in a realm beyond. 

[lady-wallace]

Whumptober Day Four: “Running Out of Time” (Supernatural)

Day Four: “Running Out of Time”

Prompts used: collapsing building

Fandom: Supernatural

Read on Ao3

Read on FF.net

~~~~~~~

The sirens were blaring when Dean pulled the Impala to a screeching halt, not even bothering to mutter an apology to his baby this time as he threw open the door and scrambled out of the car, looking toward the looming dust that was hovering over the city block.

Dean's heart was in his throat. Please no, he pleaded. Please…

But as he made it out onto the street, he saw that his worst fears were confirmed.

The building Sam had gone to investigate in had been blown to bits.

Trying to quell his fear for the worst, Dean pushed his way through the horrified onlookers, yanking his FBI badge out—not that it would do much good.

He found the sheriff they had been working with on the case standing off to the side with several other officers and rescue workers.

"Sheriff," Dean called. "Have you seen my bro—partner? He was interviewing people in the building."

The sheriff shook his head. "Sorry, agent, I didn't see him. We don't even really know what happened. The going theory is that it was a gas main, but I don't think we'd be so lucky as to assume that it was just a coincidence."

Yeah, it sure as hell wasn't. Dean gritted his teeth, fury and desperation surging through him. He knew they shouldn't have taken a job with another hunter. It never ended well. He and Sam should have sent him packing as soon as they had realized how many screws he had loose. They had tried, but Jerry Preston was a stubborn bastard and he'd been determined to get the monster that had killed his previous hunting partner, even if he had to use explosives to do it.

Dean could appreciate a little revenge, sure, but he was beginning to think that it had been Preston that had been the cause of his buddy's death. And who the hell thought a bomb was a good way to take out a monster?

A fireman suddenly came running up to the gathered rescue team. "This building isn't going to last much longer, we need to get everyone away."

"Wait, it's collapsing?" Dean demanded. "What about everyone inside?"

"Thankfully, since it was a holiday weekend, only a few people were working today. We got as many out as we can, but I won't risk sending any of my men in now."

"My partner's in there!" Dean shouted.

"You don't know that for sure, agent," the sheriff said, obviously trying to calm him down, but Dean wasn't having it.

"If he wasn't he would be out here. I've already tried calling him and there was no answer!" He was cut off by a loud, rending crash as more of the building fell down, dust billowing up as more people screamed.

"If you won't go in, I will," Dean said with determination.

"Agent!" the sheriff and fire chief both yelled at once but Dean evaded their hands and rushed into the building.

The dust was blinding and he choked on it, lungs spasming as memories of smoke and fire surged up. It hadn't been that long ago when Dean had saved Sam from a fire for a second time. This would be no different. He would find his brother and he would get him out of there. He pulled his t-shirt over his mouth and kept going.

"Sam!" he shouted, hurrying through the building. He had no idea where the hell Sam might be, but he wouldn't stop looking until he found him.

Or until the building fell down, but if Sam couldn't be recovered, then Dean wouldn't care if it took him with it.

He found Preston first. The other hunter's throat had been ripped out. Dean felt his stomach roil, ignoring the sound of girders shifting and rubble clattering on the ground. It looked like Preston hadn't gotten his revenge after all, despite all this. Dean almost wished he was still alive so he could kick his teeth in. If anything had happened to Sammy…

"D-Dean…"

The voice, though faint, was still as loud as a gunshot to Dean filtering through the sounds of the building collapsing.

"Sammy!" he cried, whipping around, trying to find his brother.

"Left…"

Dean spun around and finally found him. Sam was trapped under a desk, that had been smashed by a large piece of ceiling that had come down. Dean raced to his brother's side, crouching down as he looked at him.

"God, Sammy," he whispered, exhaling in relief that was short-lived when he saw what Sam was trapped under. He saw another smear of blood off to one side, and nearly threw up as he realized it was from a smashed figure that had taken the worst of the rubble.

"Don' worry," Sammy said, and coughed. "Jus' the monster."

Dean lowered a hand to Sam's dust-covered hair as he made a quick examination of his brother. "How bad?" he asked, swallowing hard.

Sam wet his lips. "Just my leg stuck. Hurts, but I don't think it's broken. Maybe a couple cracked ribs. Desk stopped stuff from falling on me full-force." He coughed again on the dust and Dean hurriedly pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and tied it across Sam's nose and mouth to filter out the dust.

"Just hold on, Sammy, I'll get you free."

Another horrible rending sound screamed through the building and Dean ducked instinctively, shielding his brother, as more of the building fell in, some debris dusting his back.

"Dean," Sam croaked, one hand clutching his brother's sleeve. "You should…go. Get out. No time…"

"Like hell," Dean snapped. "You know I'm not gonna leave you here."

He began to inspect the rubble, seeing exactly what was trapping Sam and realized it was the edge of the desk that had a large chunk of the ceiling on top of it. He was pretty sure he could move it.

He just wasn't sure if he would be able to do it in time.

But he would be damned if he didn't try to.

Dean put his shoulder into it and shoved as hard as he could, using a piece of rebar as leverage. It shifted, and Sam cried out, causing Dean to grit his teeth. He was choking on the dust, and couldn't breathe very well, making him even more desperate.

But finally, with one last heave and a defiant cry, Dean shifted the debris and after that, it was just shoving some more smaller pieces away before he was able to lift the table off of his brother.

Sam was breathing heavily, wincing at each breath, and Dean hurriedly checked him over for broken bones before he started to pull him upright.

Sam gasped and grabbed on to Dean.

"Easy," Dean said, taking his brother's weight, knowing Sam was probably going to be favoring that left foot and still not sure if it was broken or not.

Another loud, rending crash pealed through the building and the ceiling above them shook, debris raining down on their heads. They were running out of time.

"Need to…go…" Sam breathed heavily, trying to stabilize himself as he limped, and almost collapsed, wrapping an arm around his ribs.

"Yeah, we do," Dean said, and wrapped Sam's other arm around his shoulders, practically hauling him along. Sam bit back a cry, groaning, and Dean bit his lip.

Another crash settled it. Dean simply heaved Sam up onto his shoulders. He knew it wasn't the best thing to do if Sammy had broken ribs, but at the moment they were in more danger of being crushed than they were of a punctured lung.

"Dean!" Sam cried as his older brother adjusted to his weight and hurried toward the entrance of the building.

Another horrible crash sounded behind them, dust encasing them, Dean picked up the pace as Sam's fingers dug into his arm.

"Not…gonna…"

But they did make it. Dean burst out of the building in a plume of dust and the light hit him full in the face. He gasped, coughing up the dust in his lungs, as he started to lower Sam off of his shoulders.

Paramedics were already rushing toward them, ushering them away, and getting Sam on a stretcher.

"Come away! It's going!" Someone shouted and Dean glanced behind him just in time to see the building collapse.

His knees wouldn't support him anymore, and he sank slowly to the ground, breathing heavily as he watched the building completely collapse in on itself.

Another minute, and they would have been caught in it.

Dean gave a shuddering exhalation of breath.

"Hey, are you riding with your partner, agent?" one of the paramedics called to Dean.

"Yeah," he croaked and pushed himself to his feet, climbing into the back of the ambulance where he sat beside Sam's head, reaching out to pat him on the shoulder with a poof of dust before he ran a hand through his brother's filthy hair. This one had been way too close.

Later at the hospital after Sam had been patched up and was lying, finally clean of dust, in a bed, his injured foot propped up, Dean sat by his side, eyeing the jello that had been brought for him.

"Next time, let's not work with crazy hunters," Dean said. "I don't really want to be running into any more collapsing buildings any time soon."

Sam huffed in agreement. "Yeah, no kidding. But…we are crazy hunters, aren't we? I mean, this could be us in a few years. You never know."

"Considering our track record, I doubt we'll live that long," Dean said and snatched the jello after all, getting a frown from Sam.

This one had been way too close of a call, and he wasn't stupid enough to think it would be their last one either. But at the end of the day, they always knew that they had each other to get them out of trouble when they needed it.

[magic-and-moonlit-wings]

Chapter 48: To The Secret Lab!

Becoming The Mask

Stephan's footsteps echoed more loudly than usual in the base's deserted hallways. He was tempted to change his gait, to step lightly so he'd make less noise, but on the other hand it wasn't smart to sneak up on a Changeling you weren't planning to fight. Anyway, the bag of canned goods he was carrying would clank no matter how he carried it.

"Bernie? It's Stephan," he called when he neared the laboratory. The doors were standing open.

"Excellent timing, I need some fresh eyes."

Stephan gulped. He was pretty sure Bernie meant 'a new person to look over things, because fresh perspective can catch something an older, more tired perspective missed', but it was also possible the Alchemist actually needed eyeballs for something.

"There's goggles by the door," Bernie continued.

Stephan put on a set, and after a moment's thought grabbed a hairnet as well.

His hair wasn't long enough to tie back easily but it was long enough to potentially get caught on something. It felt a bit silly to put goggles over his mask, but the lab safety rules were clearly displayed by the goggle rack – goggles and close-toed shoes were mandatory for entrance. There were some modified goggles and plastic booties for use while troll-shaped.

He left the grocery bag on an empty shoe-rack. It would be out of the way there.

"I wasn't sure what your food situation was, so I brought some stuff. Canned tuna, mostly." Cans were shelf-stable and could be eaten in troll or human shape.

"Thanks, Stephan. I'm well supplied, but it was thoughtful of you." Bernie was currently human-shaped, surrounded by neatly sorted rubble and writing something on a clipboard. "Xe/xir at the moment, by the way."

"Is that with an X or with a Z?" asked Stephan, not sure if there was a significant difference, but ready to believe there could be since Bernie was bothering to bring this up.

"An X. You know, you're one of maybe five people who've ever asked me that."

"Okay. Cool. Uh, he/him for me, still."

"Got it." Bernie made a decisive last pen stroke, clicked the pen, and turned to xir guest-slash-assistant. "I've been sorting pieces, checking to see if anything's recognizable. As you can see," gesturing towards on grouping of stones, "the hooves, legs, and loincloth can mostly be identified, as can the claws," indicating another, pointier collection. "But I can't seem to find Bular's horns or face. I keep recounting the skulls from his belt and checking our video footage of him to make sure I didn't mix him up with one of them somehow."

A set of skulls, on the table in front of Bernie beside the probably-legs, were either surprisingly intact or mostly reassembled.

Stephan was suddenly, vividly reminded of his early days on the surface, sorting jigsaw puzzles with his Familiar's family. His youngest sister in particular had had a knack for seeing which edges ought to match up.

"Do I need gloves?"

"Wouldn't hurt. I haven't been using them. They don't switch over properly." Bernie crackled blue, and the tall, hefty human became a tall, hefty troll – still small compared to a Gumm-Gumm, but probably quite respectably sized for whichever group xe'd been taken from – and held up xir hands to demonstrate.

Stephan could see why Bernie might have trouble with gloves. Xir hands were bigger now, for one, which would stretch out the latex if xe carried the gloves over through the transformation rather than having different gloves on as a troll, and then xe would have to change xir gloves once they changed to human – plus, Bernie had four-digit rather than five-digit hands as a troll, so the extra glove finger would either flap loose or need to be taped down, which would also increase the odds of the gloves being damaged after shapeshifting back and forth.

It was a lot of trouble to go through when you weren't working with something caustic or reactive to the oils in human skin.

"Why are you wearing … that, though?" Stephan asked, gesturing up and down.

Bernie's lab coat had carried over between forms. It was loose on xir as a human, and now fit better. The lime green coat, with neon pink and yellow flowers printed around the hem and on the cloth-covered buttons, had looked odd on a human and even stranger on a purplish-blue troll.

"Oh, I keep a bunch of colourful ones in stock, in case I'm ever running tests on someone who's had a bad experience in a lab and doesn't like the white coats. Attempted vivisection, usually. Gets people all mixed up, conflating Mad Scientists and Evil Scientists."

Bernie shook xir head.

"Vivisection is the stupidest starting point for a xenobiological study. Surgery is complicated. Aside from risk of infection and the complications of dosing anesthesia for an unknown organism – since they'll definitely die of traumatic shock if you don't anesthetize – looking at organs only makes sense if you already know what you're supposed to be seeing."

Xe paced around the lab, gesturing with the clipboard.

"At best, you'll set yourself up for confirmation bias about any superficial parallels between the new and the known, and at worst you'll have no idea what you're looking at and kill off your test subject. I mean, I understand if it's just a thinly-veiled excuse to commit torture for the sake of torture, but as a scientist that offends me for other reasons."

"… So, why are you wearing it now?" Stephan looked around, suddenly wary. "Do you have a live test subject down here?" How restrained are they? How vengeful are they?

Bernie seemed startled at the reminder xe was having a conversation rather than talking to xirself.

"Oh – no, I just got bored of how monochromatic the base is. Plus changing how I'm dressed helps keep the days from blurring together."

"Ah."

Stephan made a mental note to visit more often.

He started looking through the shattered remains. He didn't shapeshift. Stephan had a lot of protruding teeth in troll form, not just tusks, and it could be a challenge not to drool on things. His mask would catch some of it if he kept it on, but then he's be stuck in a slimy mask when he changed back.

He picked up each stone, one by one, and turned it this way and that. Sometimes he found an identifiable feature – an elbow spur, a shoulder ridge – and pointed it out to Bernie. That got part of one arm put back together, or maybe a smaller percentage of both arms. If Stephan didn't find anything distinct, he would carefully put the stone back exactly where Bernie'd had it before, and move on to the next one.

"It's weird that his swords aren't here," said Stephan after a while.

"He could've been disarmed in the fight."

"Yeah, but then Stricklander would've brought the swords back along with the body. And if they'd turned to stone with him, there should be – some sheets, or plates, or something. Flat rocks matching up to the blades. Those things were huge."

Unless …

"Unless the Trollhunter took them, after killing him," Stephan said slowly. "You know, battle trophies." His eyes were drawn to the row of skulls Bular had worn to show off his own battle prowess. "Hunting trophies … What if the reason we can't find his head, is because the Trollhunter has it?"

"Well, that would probably narrow down the cause of death to decapitation," said Bernie, in a detached, academic sort of tone. "Although that can also be done post-mortem, it would be more difficult to remove an intact head, since the stone is more brittle once it dies."

"Which could explain the state of the rest of the body." Stephan shuddered. Gunmar was going to be so angry …

+=+

After two searches through Bular's remains, Stephan could barely tell the stones apart anymore. It looked like there should be more than enough to rebuild Bular, but jigsaws always looked bigger than they were when the pieces were all spread out, and Stephan and Bernie still couldn't find Bular's head.

Stephan was leaning on his 'hunting trophy' theory. There had to be a reason their greatest enemy was called the Trollhunter, right?

Something beeped. Stephan, more tightly wound than he'd realized, jumped and turned trollish in a flash of silver.

He was dark grey, as a troll, with a crown of stubby lighter grey horns instead of hair. His mask got pushed away from his face by his overlong teeth. His goggles clattered to the floor. His ears went back at the additional noise.

"It's okay, Stephan," said Bernie, gently, as though to a spooked animal. "That just means it's break time. Come on." Bernie reached out as though to pat Stephan on the arm, though they were on opposite sides of the room. "I'm going to meditate. I'd rather not leave you alone in the lab, no offence."

Stephan blinked a few times and tried breathing slow and deep, to settle his heart rate.

"Okay. Yeah. Let's go."

Both of them changed to human form as they left the laboratory. Bernie sealed the blast doors and herded Stephan to the next floor up, to a small square room with a gramophone in the center and low white benches around the walls.

Stephan picked the bench opposite Bernie's, both Changelings with their sides to the door.

The record was moving slowly, though the needle wasn't touching it and neither Changeling had wound the crank on the side.

Bernie seemed entirely at ease, waiting, listening for the Pale Lady's voice.

Stephan tried to let go of the resentment that kept bubbling up inside him.

For all Bernie had seemed to be lonely and pining for conversation when Stephan first arrived, xe certainly didn't seem to need Stephan around anymore. Stephan had hardly proven his mettle with how he'd overreacted to a harmless alarm. Helping with the 'rebuild Bular' project was the one thing Stephan could do for the Order right now, and he had barely contributed.

He didn't know how to help.

He just wanted to help.

Please … he begged Morgana in his mind. My Queen. Your Ladyship. Mother. Tell me what you need of me. Let me know how I can help you.

A side compartment of the gramophone table opened. A drawer slid out.

Both Changelings got up and leaned in to look without touching anything.

The drawer held an orange crystal, faintly glowing. The room hadn't changed temperature or décor, but somehow felt more comfortable. Bernie got out a pen and touched the crystal with the button end. Nothing happened.

"Is this …" for us? Stephan couldn't quite say out loud. "Are we supposed to take it? Do something with it?"

"I think it's Heartstone." Bernie touched it with a pinkie finger this time. Again, nothing appeared to happen.

Stephan backed off and sat back down. Heartstone? Really? Here? How? That stuff was legendary. He'd only half-believed it was real.

Bernie turned trollish and touched the stone with xir last finger, to no visible effect, and then picked it up. The drawer closed itself and the compartment shut over it.

Bernie held the crystal out to Stephan and urged, "Touch it."

Stephan got up and followed Bernie's lead, transforming and tapping the crystal cautiously with one finger. He staggered back and sat again.

"Whoa."

If Heartstone was a thing, that was definitely what this thing was. Stephan had been overloaded with a sense of safety and contentment. It was actually kind of scary to think about once he wasn't touching it anymore – he would have let his guard down entirely to bask in whatever the stone was radiating.

Maybe it was actually some kind of trap?

Except a trap – if it was a lotus-eater type trap – the trap would logically drain his energy, and Stephan felt invigorated. He wanted to do something. He felt like he could do anything.

"It's supposed to enhance a troll's life force, somehow," said Bernie, waving vaguely with xir free hand. "Possibly like how reptiles need warmth to regulate their metabolism, or how humans need sunlight to produce Vitamin D. Or it could just be a stimulant."

"I heard Lord Gunmar was born from the first one," said Stephan. "Maybe that was a metaphor and trolls need … Heartstone radiation … to be fertile? That would explain why we aren't."

'We' meaning 'Changelings'. Although, if Stephan was right, maybe that meant Changelings could … become fertile? Probably not from a brief touch of a small stone, but, in the future, with regular contact?

Bernie was still holding it.

"If it feeds trolls, maybe it eats them as well," xe speculated. "Feeding troll remains into it could make it grow. Like how plants do best if there's decaying animal matter in the soil."

Stephan nodded. He'd skimmed an article in a gardening magazine a while back about using blood meal to grow better roses.

"There's some connection, I don't know what exactly, but I know it's there." Bernie turned the stone over with a thoughtful expression. "I wish I had more to experiment with. Ideally five. A control group with nothing, of course, one fed with analogous minerals that weren't sourced from a troll, one fed with Changeling dust –"

"You have –? What am I saying, of course you do."

"– one with Grave Sand, and one with Bular's remains."

Wait, what?

"I don't know if Otto would like that."

"That experiment would have to wait until after the autopsy," said Bernie, reminded once more that xe wasn't just talking to xirself.

"… Do you think it could bring him back to life?"

"Unlikely but possible."

Stephan had never encountered the undead, to his knowledge, but he made a point of bringing garlic-rich food into work at the crematorium, and keeping a box of salt in his desk. (He'd read somewhere that, if a zombie tasted salt, they would remember they were dead, go back into their grave, and resist further attempts to summon them.) He probably wouldn't have much to worry about in his troll form, but his coworkers did not share this advantage.

"You know," said Bernie, "if this is emitting anything, I could probably adjust a Geiger counter to pick up on it. Let's get it back to the lab."

+=+

Bernie's first step was to scan the Heartstone with every instrument the Janus Order had and record its exact dimensions. Stephan was more of a witness than an assistant for that part.

He felt much more useful during the Geiger counter modifications. Bernie needed an extra pair of hands for some steps, and neither of them were a troll type with more than two arms. Stephan did have a prehensile tail, but it had broken a few times back in the Darklands and he couldn't flex it very well anymore to deal with things in front of him.

The alterations to the machine were more magic than tech. Bernie opened up a few sections and moved things around, extracting wires and inserting crystals and writing tiny cramped symbols here and there. Stephan held things out of the way that weren't being fully removed, and balanced pieces while Bernie attached them, and moved the Heartstone around the room for Bernie to recalibrate various settings.

Bernie put in something like a compass below the dial, so the holder couldn't only see how strong and close the Heartstone's readings were, but also which direction it was in. The compass was a sphere of rutilated quartz, with the gold-coloured acicular inclusions all going the same way. The sphere's mounting let it indicate directions in three dimensions.

It took four tries and six hours to cobble together a working model. Short-range only. Despite the Heartstone's properties, which did not seem to fade after prolonged contact, Stephan was barely keeping his eyes open.

n a surprising show of trust, Bernie let him nap in the apartment connected to the lab while Bernie typed up a report on today's findings.

Well, maybe it wasn't so surprising. Stephan, asleep, would be in a far more vulnerable position than Bernie would be from allowing another Changeling unsupervised in xir private space. If Stephan tried to leave some sort of trap, or go snooping while tired and set off a trap Bernie had left, well …

Bernie was also the Changeling primarily in charge of making any poisons the local Janus Order branch couldn't get through human channels. Stephan taking advantage of Bernie's trust would end far worse for him then it would for xir.

In any case, Stephan accepted the risk and took the nap, not wanting to drive home while tired. Bernie woke him half an hour later, and they went together to return the Heartstone piece to the gramophone room and to drop off a report in Otto's office.

Stephan carried the Geiger counter so Bernie could get a better idea of its range. It lost track of the Heartstone piece once they were most of the way down the hall. Bernie's hands were occupied with paperwork and a set of lockpicks. It was funny to see lockpicks carried so openly.

"Do you often break into the offices?" asked Stephan.

"I'm nearly certain I've been in every room of this base at least once."

"Recently?"

"I have been living down here. It's in my interests to double-check the security systems."

Stephan kept his eyes from rolling too obviously, but felt his mouth twitch in a small, brief grin.

When Otto's door opened, the Geiger counter – Bernie said xe was going to rename it, xe just hadn't yet – began beeping up a storm. The Changelings looked at each other and followed the compass needle to a bookcase, then a specific shelf, and finally behind a book.

"Well," said Bernie, "now I can double-check all my readings. I'll have to revise my report."

"How many more Heartstones are hidden around the base?" Stephan wondered.

"We should do a sweep. It'll probably take a couple of days. When do you have to leave and when can you next be here?"

"I have this week off. I can stay until," Stephan checked the date on his phone, "nine tomorrow evening before I'm expected anywhere." He and some work friends were planning to go to a bar for trivia night.

"Alright. We'll head back to the lab and you can take another nap while I do the scans and report revisions, and once you're awake we can sort out the order of the sweep."

"I should be good to go for –"

"You can't collect accurate data while sleep deprived."

"When's the last time you slept?"

"I woke up about ten minutes before you got here."

That explained why the laboratory had smelled of coffee.

+=+

Previous Chapter (Shattered King backstory, as commemorated by the Quagawumps)

Table Of Contents

Next Chapter (Jim gets Gunmar's Eye)

[phantomphangphucker]

Ectober Day 18: Whispers - A Strange Kind Of Ferality Chap. 1: Hushed Voices To End Mundane Life

People say a lot of things, and they’ll speak the most about the strange and usual. Sometimes words make living normal impossible for those who are not normal.

For Danny’s own sake he always tried to avoid paying attention to the whispers. Or simply not being around for people to start making them. They always made his paranoia war with itself. If he paid attention their hushed words it would make him paranoid. If he ignored them he’d be paranoid about what they could be saying and wanting to find out. And sometimes he actually did need to know.

So, if he’s honest, sometimes super ghost hearing kind of sucked.

In the beginning they weren’t so bad. Always about simple things or things that didn’t matter all too much. Sure sometimes they hurt or annoyed him, but what did Danny care that everyone thought his parents were weird and crazy? They weren’t really wrong and Sam’s right, weird’s good. Danny considers himself an example of that.

‘I still can’t believe those lunatics were even allowed to keep those kids’.

‘I heard they perform weird experiments, probably only themselves too’.

‘What if they kill someone to prove their theories?’.

But like all young teens, eventually he stepped out of his parents' shadow, the whisperings around town became more about him. But when it came mostly from teachers and judgemental adults, Danny couldn’t even attempt to bring himself to care. Sure he wanted people proud of him as Fenton, but being the hero always came first. If his grades and ‘good kid’ status had to suffer then so be it.

‘He used to be so bright, now he’s just another problem child’.

‘Oh look it’s the little ‘baddie’ thinking he’s cool or whatever for breaking stuff’.

‘I think the weirdo Fenton kid is missing a bladder or something...experiment gone wrong you think?’.

When it really started to bug Danny, is when people started noticing he was seemingly involved in ghosts without being involved in ghosts.

‘Why’s he always around? Does he just like seeing the end results?’.

‘I’m pretty sure I saw Fenton running AT a ghost fight actually’.

‘I overheard some ghosts talking about him. Thought it was about Phantom at first but they mentioned his ‘hunter parents’. Pretty obvious who the town’s hunter parents are’.

But that sort of thing was easy enough to pass off, to explain, and for people to simply shrug off. They were the curious kinds of whispers not the concerned or secretive kinds of whispers. But when his body became the focus, that’s when he knew there was going to be trouble and when he started pulling away from people, from the public. After all, there’s only so much baggy sweaters and loose clothing can cover. And wearing that all the time was suspicious in and of itself. What was worse was that he was actively proud of what all his hero work had earned him in both physique and scars. And sometimes bodies just naturally wanted to show off, even if he pushes it down as best as possible.

‘Dude, did you see Fenton stretching? The Hell has he been doing all summer to look like that?’.

‘I saw Todd throw a pencil at the back of his head, he caught it without even turning around’.

‘I saw down his shirt and there’s this nasty scar. It’s like someone tried to murder him or something. Think he’s in a gang or some shit?’.

And it was obvious at this point, to Danny, that people were only going to notice more. Which they did. People were curious things, they were hooked on his oddness. He always did his best to hide his more ghostly features. Grew his hair out to cover his tapered ears, started a habit of wearing beanies. But hats couldn’t always stay on and hair moved. Made a habit of always covering his mouth when he yawned, only ate small foods in public, drank through straws. The thing his friends found the saddest is that he had to stop laughing so damn much, though he’d often just covered his mouth instead. But people notice when behaviours change like that and people will always be able to catch glimpses. His nails were the easiest, simple trim every morning. But even trimmed they were still just a little too sharp. So he developed the habit of not touching people, but a hero’s fighting instincts and ghost instincts were strong things. Sometimes he really couldn’t help grabbing Dash’s arms when he tried to choke him or drag him somewhere. That didn’t go unnoticed.

‘The little freak scratched me. And look at this shit? It looks like a damn cat scratch. The Hell?’.

‘I managed to get the cafeteria to serve burgers right? Fenton loves those things and, I swear to you, he had FANGS’.

‘So I punched the locker next to his face, yeah? Teach the loser who runs this school. But I think his ear scratched me. HIS EAR. How is that even possible?’.

At least stuff like that, he really could pass off as body modification. People did that. Which his how he quelled his paranoia back then. So long as he had an easy excuse it was easy. But it was inevitable that people would eventually notice his ‘angry eyes’ problem or his ghost sense. It was honestly a miracle they didn’t in the very beginning. Though both him and even his parents, simply passed off those rumours as being because of his strange ecto-contamination. People still whispered. Especially about his eyes.

‘Walked into the bathroom and I swear, the kids' eyes were glowing as he stepped out of a stall’.

‘Half the time I go after him he does that damn eye-trick thing for a split second. It’s like he’s trying to be some scary ghost or something. It’s pathetic really’.

‘Honestly, I just avoid looking at his face now. It’s just so creepy. Especially if you think over how he probably got that. His parents are scientists! He’s probably, like, Frankenstein’s monster or something’.

But when people started whispering about behaviours, pointedly not human behaviours, that’s when Danny’s paranoia really came to a head. He couldn’t just not snarl and growl. It came too easily. And being around Sam and Tucker more than the rest of society came with its down falls. He could be himself around them, he got comfortable being himself around them. But that made it easier to slip up in public. Sometimes they tried to call him on it, but often that just ran the risk of people being more likely to notice. Then there was the compounded problem. Snarls required showing teeth. Sounds made people look. One thing getting noticed leads to other things getting more noticed. Whispers compounding.

‘He holds his hands like claws half the time, pretty sure he actually extended claws once’.

‘He came in this morning snarling and bearing those damn fangs at the floor for, like, two whole periods. Even my dog doesn’t do that’.

‘I bumped into that Fenton kid on the street, you know the one. Short and kind of acts like a feral animal. Yeah, well, pretty sure he growled at me and there’s was this weird glow to his face’.

But at least even those whispers could be passed off. Teens acted weird, that was considered a fact by adults. The fact that there were wolf packers, kids who like to pretend to be werewolves and in a pack, helped. Everyone knew those kids ran around howling and would growl at people. But it didn’t help him that they kept trying to make him ‘one of them’. Sure it would be a nice cover story but it would draw more attention to him. Especially since people already thought his snarls and growls were more ‘real’.

‘Okay dude, look at this. So I recorded Fenton when Dash tried punching him yesterday. And look, I put it next to my dog snarling. Fenton sounds more animalistic, and like, look how Fenton holds his mouth? It’s the same, more aggressive even’.

‘My night was not fun, I got woken up but what I could have sworn was coyotes fighting, but no. It was that creepy Fenton kid and some biker dude getting in each other’s faces’.

‘I’m positive he was just about to bite you. And not like those cringy kids with the weird lunging bit they do’.

But of course, of course, that lead to them really noticing. Noticing things he himself didn’t. Which was far far more worrying. How could he hide something if he wasn’t even the first to notice? Sam and Tucker too used to him to notice the gradual change themselves. And once others picked up on it, even one, it was pretty well too late. It fell into the gossip mill and then everyone was looking for it. About reflexes and senses. Even his paranoia was being noticed.

‘He literally never opens any doors while in-front of them. Like he’s about to be attacked or something’.

‘We need code words for the freak. Pretty sure he can hear us. And look! See! His ears damn twitched! He totally can’.

‘I’m not sure if I’m happy or terrified. I nearly ran over the Fenton boy, should have slammed straight into his back. But he fucking backflipped over my car, the entire damn thing, at the last second. How the Hell’.

But when the whispers became dangerous. Got him fully avoided. Got the G.I.W. to come knocking. He knew he didn’t really have much of a choice anymore. He had to leave. Not fully, no, just a town away. Just hide, a name change here, style change there. Seems people could deal with weird. Didn’t really care about it other than it was good gossip. Until they started putting things together, until they started to feel like you were a wolf and they were sheep. The bad part was, they weren’t wrong. And like all ghosts, Danny has pride. He, by his very nature, wanted fear, to scare, to alarm. And that always got harder to hide, to ignore. But the body and mind have ways of getting around its own barriers. Doing things so subtle you might not notice at all. All it took was slight changes in posture, how his eyes looked, how he moved. And he became a predator amongst prey.

‘Is it just me or does Fenton look like he’s actively stalking people? Like a cat or something? It’s really damn creepy’.

‘He stares, like constantly. He just doesn’t blink enough and he seems to scan rooms. Like there’s some threat, it makes me feel uncomfortable. But what’s worse is how he looks over everyone, scans them over, it’s like he’s picking out prey or something’.  

‘I swear the freak can tell when people are looking at him. Like just watch, his posture will change. Slightly tense like he’s about run off. And you can easily see his face and hands, he’s being threatening. It pisses me off that it works’.

Of course, his friends would never let him skip town on his own. It was only a lucky thing they were off in university by this time and he was perfectly content to keep them in the dark. Besides, if they up and ran off too. People would whisper.

And looking around, that’s one thing he likes about bigger cities. Even more so when you looked all for the world like a battered, easily ignored, poorly dressed, homeless man. When people whispered it wasn’t anything to be alarmed about.

‘Poor man, wonder when the last time he washed was’.

‘Gross, I really wish this damn city would clean up the filth. How can I let my daughter walk around with people like that just sleeping on the sidewalk’.

‘Hmpf, probably just another damn druggie’.

But of course that would change.

‘Wait...he’s not actually sleeping? Weird’.

He’d have to watch himself more.

‘Oh holy shit, that bastards got fangs?!?’.

He’d have to move around more.

‘Don’t go downtown, there’s some creepy predatory guy there. He hasn’t hurt anyone from what I hear, but it’s all in how he moves. In his eyes’.

People would eventually actively start seeking him out, a mystery to solve.

‘Dude, we have to steal his bag. I heard some kids from the park did and he reacted like a feral dog or some shit’.

Connections would be made, people would start to feel unsettled or scared

‘Destruction seems to follow that one. Keep your distance’.

And he’d have to pack, leave in the dead of night.

‘His eyes, you can see them in the dark. Pretty sure they’ll follow you too. Whatever he is, he sure as Hell isn't a human’.

Of course, he made sure he found his way back to Amity, as Fenton, here and there. Especially when his friends got back. But the downfall of leaving, of running off. Is that it was impossible for people to not notice his return. And being alone for so long would make anyone act less human, less socially normal. For someone who wasn’t actually entirely human, you might as well just write normal off as a lost cause.

‘James! James! That Fenton boy’s back! He snarled at someone’s dog. Should we do something?’.

‘How is he more off? He’s so...twitchy. Like he’s constantly on the edge of trying to murder someone or something’.

‘He came into the cafe and he just stared around for a while. Then he drank nothing but espresso shots and I’m sure he ate a spoon. He even clacked his teeth at me after ordering’.

So yeah, the G.I.W. would come. He’d wind up getting tracked. But Amity was his and that wasn’t ever-changing and he was a goddamn force to be recond with. And his friends would come back, they would take him by the arms and all three would slingshot at the future. Like always. Because, after all, Fenton wasn’t the only one people whispered about.

‘Okay, I’m pretty sure that goth is actually a witch. Summoning ghosts and shit. ‘Cause they’re always near her’.

‘She has a pet Venus-flytrap in her purse, it bit me’.

‘I swore she ran through a fire just to throw her boot at someone for insulting that freaky Fenton’.

‘If that technofreak is visiting the bank then no way am I. I heard he got put on a watch list for hacking a plane, twice’.

‘He scaled a thirty-story building just to clean his windows, who does that?’.

‘I walked in on him making out almost aggressively with a PDA...he growled at me’.

Because really? If you spend enough time around the glaringly inhuman, you’ll lose your human aspects too. So Danny’s not exactly surprised when they decide to hit the road with him. They’ll always come back, of course they will, and maybe they’ll find some other towns they love as they go. But at least being able to make portals now will mean they can go as far as they like, without Phantom ever being far away from the town he protects.

[thatsparrow]

(alan grant/ellie sattler • post-fallen kingdom • read on ao3)

"Goddamn Hammond," Alan says when he sees the push alert from the New York Times. Then, "Ellie, wake up." It's somewhere near 2 A.M. but Nublar and Sorna had turned him into a light sleeper and that particular nervous habit has proved harder to kill than a genetically engineered raptor. His glasses are still sitting on the nightstand and so he has to squint a little at the screen to read it properly—Ellie and the kids gave him hell for weeks when he finally caved and increased the font size—but his eyes aren't so bad that he can't recognize the earth-shaking magnitude of the situation spelled out by the headline.  

LIVE: Seven different species of dinosaurs have been spotted in and around the Northern California town of Mendocino. They are believed to have originated from the closed Costa Rican theme park, Jurassic World.

"Alan?" Ellie asks, half asleep and eyes blinking shut against the light off the screen. "What is it?" He offers the phone in lieu of an answer, waits as her vision adjusts enough for her to read it, knows she's finished when her whole body goes fossil-still.

"Goddamn Hammond," Alan says again, pressing his fingers against the bridge of his nose. "I don't care that he's dead. Damn him for his recklessness, damn him for the parks, and damn him for every act of foolishness that's followed." He lets out a slow sigh, rubs at his eyes. "I'd never admit it to the bastard, but Ian was right. It was only a matter of time until something like this happened."

Ellie has the full article open now, but it's no more than a short paragraph, this story is developing at the bottom. "We don't know what this is, yet. Maybe it's just another San Diego."

"A half-dozen people dead plus some kid's labrador?"

"Short term," Ellie says. "Containable. It sounds like whatever species have been seen so far are all herbivorous."

"You trust the people of Mendocino to know the difference?"

"I trust them to recognize sharp teeth." She sighs, pulls her thumb across the screen to refresh the article even though it's been no more than a minute. "What a mess. What an absolute mess." She hands the phone back to him, lets out a tired exhale. "What I wouldn't give to put Hammond's genie back in the bottle."

"What should we do?"

"Sell any remaining stock in InGen?" He raises an eyebrow at her and she smiles a little, but there's no humor in it. "That was a joke. I don't know, Alan—what can we do? We're academics, not dinosaur hunters. Our only relevant experience here is not having died twenty-five years ago. We could offer ourselves up in an advisory capacity, I guess, but even then, there are plenty of people out there who have done hands-on work with them. Whatever insight we may have had is outdated by over a decade at this point. Comparatively, we're like—"

"Dinosaurs?"

"Exactly."

Alan exhales, considering. "You're right, I know that, but I just—" he breaks off, turning over the phone in his hand. There's a video embedded in the article, a grainy thumbnail of what looks like the back of a Stegosaurus. The way the image is frozen, it looks like the Stego's tail is in mid-motion, suspended on an arc that would take it through the wall of a garden shed. With any luck, Ellie is right, and all the theropods were killed by the eruption on Nublar. Then again, if luck was playing any role here, Hammond's experiments should have failed at the start. "It feels like we should be doing something, doesn't it?"

"It does."

"What if we drove up there?"

"To Mendocino?" Ellie asks, and he nods. "Tonight?"

"I was thinking first thing in the morning, maybe. Wait until more reports come in. Who knows—maybe this will all have been cleared up by then, anyway."

"You think?"

"No, but I've never tried being an optimist before."

Alan refreshes the article again and sees a new paragraph of text, bare bones information that mentions three additional species—including a suspected Allosaurus—have been spotted near I-20 heading east. Life finding a way. Goddamn Malcolm. Goddamn Hammond. Goddamn it all.

—

The next day does bring more news, and none of it good. The current theory is that Hammond's former partner, Benjamin Lockwood, funded some sort of rescue operation to Nublar, retrieved an unknown number of species that were brought to his Northern California estate for a black market auction, and at some point during this process—predictably, Alan thinks—the dinosaurs escaped and bedlam ensued. Further details include: Lockwood's body in an upstairs bedroom, his death attributed (surprisingly) to natural causes; correspondence between Lockwood's assistant, Eli Mills, and an auctioneer, both of whom are still missing, though suspected dead (and, Alan presumes, suspected eaten); and an unknown theropod body in Lockwood's front hall, impaled on the horns of an Agujaceratops skull. Most of the servers in the lab below the estate were blown skyward, but of the data that's been recovered, it seems to be another genetic experiment, a cross-breeding of the Indominus with a Velociraptor.

("They never fucking learn," Alan says when he gets to that section of the report, hands white-knuckled around his coffee cup. "This has Wu's fingerprints all over it. Not enough to put raptor and rex DNA in a blender with whatever else they could get their hands on—no, he had to scale it down and make it twice as clever. If this wasn't intended for military application, I'll eat my hat, then buy another one and eat that, too.")

Though the article leaves a good number of questions unanswered, it does make clear that Hammond's follies have again found their way to the mainland, and with a sense of permanency this time. New sightings are reported with alarming frequency as the morning goes on, increasing in both the number of different species and the distance they've traveled from Lockwood's estate. Tracking efforts have been mobilized, but it's all too little, too late—not to mention the public debate that sparks up again over the question of recapturing or killing.

"Okay," Ellie says once they've read through the reports, putting her phone face-down on the kitchen table and burying her face in her hands. "It's a mess. Officially. This makes what happened in San Diego look like an incident at a petting zoo. We've got at least twenty species running loose—including, so far, a T. rex, a Baryonyx, and an Allosaurus—that are all spreading further apart by the moment, and as of now, the best method of tracking them is to wait for someone standing by to post about it to Twitter."  

"I hate Twitter," Alan says, reflexive.

"I know you do." Ellie smiles at him a little, then lets out a slow breath. "So what should we do? We know more than we did last night, but really it's just enough to tell us that this situation is worse than we could have imagined. I'm ready to jump in the car and start driving if you are, but at this point, I'm not sure what good that would do."

"Might feel better than just sitting here," Alan says, lacing his hands behind his neck to keep them from reaching for his phone again. "But no, you're right, I'm not sure what it would actually accomplish."

Ellie's quiet for a moment, fingers drumming an absent rhythm on the table. They weren't exactly young when Hammond first brought them to Nublar, but looking now at the ridged veins on the back of her hands—thinking of the new wrinkles across his own forehead and his hair that's gone grey-white in recent years—it strikes Alan how much older they've both become. Maybe too old to be playing games like this.

"Can I ask you something?" Ellie says.

"Always."

"Imagine that we did have a plan, and we knew exactly what was needed to make a difference here—what side of the debate would we be on?"

"What do you mean?"

Her hands are still restless, index finger tapping lightly against the wood. "Half the world seems to think they should be shot down as they're spotted, and the other wants to see them safely rounded up and brought to some sort of preserve. We never talked about it much when it was a question of the eruption on Nublar, but now I'm curious"

Alan frowns a little, brows pulling together. "They're dangerous, Ellie. That's more true than ever with no fences or open ocean between them and the rest of the world."

"The sauropods aren't."

"They're megafauna that belong to a different age. They can still do damage on a scale that society isn't ready for." He looks at Ellie, a little surprised. "You think they should be kept alive? After everything that's happened?"

"Don't get me wrong, I'll be the first to agree that everyone would be better off if all of the raptors had died before they'd hatched, but—" she breaks off, smiling at him a little helplessly. "I don't know, Alan. I think back to when Hammond first drove us around in that Jeep and you turned my head to look out the window and it—it was all of my childhood dreams come to life. Nothing could compare to seeing the bones that I'd spent my life studying brought to life in front of me and standing sixty feet tall, and I know you felt that, too. Look, say what you will about Hammond—and God knows that I have—but whatever may have been the end result, you can't deny that there was something noble in his intentions."

"I seem to remember another saying that has to do with 'good intentions'."

"Alan—"

"They're not real, Ellie. You know that. They are, at best, distantly removed cousins of the dinosaurs that really lived, and probably more closely resemble whatever amphibian DNA that Wu mixed into the fossilized blood. Whatever you felt—whatever we felt—on Nublar after seeing them for the first time, it was just a fantasy."

Ellie's smile turns a little sad. "It was a pretty spectacular fantasy." She pauses, then reaches out to take one of Alan's hands, both of them weathered and older, palms still a little callused from years spent in the field. Ellie's thumb runs a gentle pattern over his skin. "I'm going to ask you for a favor now, alright? For me, and for the sake of your younger self, I want you to imagine a world where it's not all or nothing. Where kids can grow up learning that raptors actually had feathers, and where they can visit a preserve and see the drawings from their picture books come to life. You don't have to remind me of all the bad that's come from the parks and Hammond's efforts, but you can't lie to me and pretend that there wasn't some good in there, too."

Alan makes a noncommittal sound in the back of his throat—which is as close as he's willing to get to a yes—but then he does let his mouth twitch towards a smile, lifts their joined hands and presses a kiss to her knuckles. As if he could ever say no to anything she asked of him.

Ellie gets up and moves to take their emptied mugs to the sink, and as she starts to run the water, Alan does as she's requested, allowing himself to remember the bright moments among the bad. Weighs the terror he'd felt at seeing the T. rex chewing through the Jeep's roof towards Lex and Tim against the moment of resting his palm against the gentle curve of the Brachiosaur's nose. Watching the Spino's hungry jaws carve through the hull of the Kirbys' chartered plane with all the ease of crushing a soda can. Leaning his body on the belly of the Triceratops and feeling its breath thrumming all the way through his chest.

No, Ellie's not wrong—for all his flaws and his arrogance, Hammond had managed to build something beautiful. Still, it's just as much a lie to pretend that the near-death experiences shouldn't weigh heavier than the rest. Were those brief moments of splendor really worth Muldoon or Arnold or any of the others who'd lost their lives for the sake of Hammond's hubris? Not to mention whatever poor civilians might now stumble into the path of the wandering Allosaurus or Baryonyx or any other not-yet-identified theropods who have found their way to the mainland. It's too much cost with not enough reward. Would it be worth it if the carnivores were gone? You can't play that game when the technology is already there; someone is always going to get ambitious and want something with more teeth.

It's a question that keeps him up at night, even after he and Ellie have decided that there's nothing for them to do at the moment—other than keep an eye on their phones and wait for a call from the government or InGen. So they wait, and Alan wonders, and meanwhile news reports still surface with regular frequency of sightings. It's a disaster with no obvious answer, and he's no closer to coming up with any sort of solution—but at least if there's a decision to be made, it won't be coming from him.

And then the presumed-dead Claire Dearing calls Ellie about a potential rescue mission for the last remaining Velociraptor and the whole question suddenly stops being so theoretical.

Goddamn it.

[angelifylove]

Peach Scone- Sam Winchester

Title: Peach Scone by Hobo Johnson- Sam Winchester x Reader

Song link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MIVvnQHxeM

Summary: Sam finds himself in love with a fellow hunter. She has a hunting partner (the reader), who gains heart eyes for Sam. Sam’s crush turns out to be dating someone close to him... his brother. Will he be able to get over this? Will the reader be able to hide her feelings for the heartbroken man? Word Count: 5480 Warnings: Mentions of alcohol and alcoholism, heartbroken Sam, heartbroken Reader, angst in general, grammar errors (not gonna lie to you there). 

Hobo Johnson Series masterlist

“Ohh, listen up

Young man, there's a there's a young man, he writes stories

He's a writer, a little writer boy

He falls in love with a girl, girl already has a boyfriend

She kinda loves him back, but not really

They're just really good friends, and that's fine

He understands, it's rational”

Sam was flipping the page to the lore book in the library, it was one of the few things that kept his mind to bay. It was her. The girl that drives his mind crazy. The woman is beautiful. Full lips. Bright blonde hair that reminds him too much of the beach, something he rarely did as a kid but always loved. Then those bright blue eyes, they were the sky to him. She’s beautiful and she knows it. 

When Sam first met her, Dean had already known her for months. When Dean went on a solo case he met these two huntresses. They were partners in crime, practically seeing each other as sisters. The two were almost the female versions of the Winchesters… almost. The (h/c) woman was the one who wasn’t afraid to react on impulse and gut feelings. She was the one who knew emotions too well. She drinks often, according to a theory, it’s to keep the nightmares away. Then there’s the woman Sam believes he’s in love with. She’s smart and full of beauty. According to the two women, she’s the brains of the project and Sam loves that. She’s kind but isn’t too in touch with her emotions as well as the woman who drinks possibly too much. 

The long haired man looks up from his book, leaning back in his chair as he continues to think of the two women. Then he remembers the crucial detail to the story, the story of how he met her. She has a boyfriend. Sam doesn’t know who though but it won’t surprise him so much if it is who he thinks it is. After Dean came back from the solo case, he won’t sleep around with women so often. It was weird and out of the blue. Then the two women moved into the bunker suddenly, that was six months after Sam had met the two huntresses. There he watched the stolen glances, the constant flirting, and the way they seem so close. 

Why won’t she tell him? She won’t tell him who this mysterious man is? That was the thing he complained to the woman who has become his best friend in the months she lived in the bunker. The woman whose partner he’s in love with. Her name is (Y/N). She means so much to Sam, to have somebody who’s willing to help him understand the woman he loves. 

“Why won’t she tell me?” “Taylor is a special case… she keeps things hidden until she believes they should be known.” Those were the words Sam keeps telling himself whenever he sees the woman on the phone, laughing at the texts she gets from her boyfriend. He knows that she’s texting him… it’s the way her eyes brighten up at the texts. He wishes for her to look at him like that one of these days. But that means she’s out of love with her boyfriend, something he wished could happen whenever he gets liquor in his system. 

“Hi, what's your name? How are you? How's your life?

Oh, you got a man? Are you in love? If so, what type?

Is it just platonic, strictly just as friends

Or the type that ties you two together 'til tomorrow's end?

If it is, disregard every time I call you pretty

Though it's meant sincerely, it's just my imagination drifting

Brush me off like the dirt on Jay-Z's shoulders

So I fall to ground, collect myself and get ready to take over your heart

Or at least your spare time”

The laughter fills the air, two women in the bunker. They were blaring music from the library, dancing around after they moved the tables and chairs. Sam walks in, seeing the two women dance. His eyes were automatically on Taylor. The blonde dancing with her best friend. She has a wide smile on her face, laughing at her friend’s jokes. She continues to dance around, throwing her arms around practically. Sam’s eyes soon move away from the blonde, to get himself to stop staring. Those hazel eyes land on the woman, the recent best friend of his. The way she dances in rhythm with the song. She makes the jokes and funny dance moves, making Sam join in the laughter. He shakes his head at her before he just watches the two of them. They look so happy, something he hasn’t seen in the longest time. 

Of course, a slow song came on. His eyes light up at the idea to slow dance with the woman he’s been supposedly wanting to be with for awhile. That was until Dean suddenly walked past him, going straight to the two girls waltzing with each other. He was quick to dance with Taylor. Sam notices his brother’s hands, they were low, lower than someone who sees another as a friend. Taylor had a sweet smile on her face, her eyes locked onto Dean’s. Sam could feel his heart clinch at the moment. 

“Let’s dance,” the voice pulls his eyes away from the two dancing. His eyes land on the woman standing in front of him. She has her hand out for him to take and a sweet smile on her face. Sam couldn’t help but smile, gently taking her hand. The two started to dance but held a distance. But something told Sam to pull her closer, so that’s what he did with (Y/N). He finally puts his hands on her waist, high up though. She loosely places her arms around the tall man’s shoulders. She stares into those eyes of his. 

Why is this feeling shocking to her? She’s always felt this way towards Sam but the contact made her melt more for the handsome man in front of her. He was the world to her, she has no clue what would happen if he was never there for her. This man was the reason why she slowed down on her drinking, something she thought she would never overcome. 

(Y/N) fell head over heels for Sam Winchester when she first met him. She remembers the moment her eyes land on the long haired man. He had a small smile. He was polite and kind towards her, usually done towards her to get into her pants but he didn’t. The reason why he didn’t, it was the way he looked at her best friend. She has always acknowledged that it’s easier for her best friend to get the men. Was it (Y/N) the way that she carried herself? Her sense of fashion being more towards the edgier compared to her partner? She thought long and hard to why Sam was so enamored to her best friend. If only he knew of her relationship to his brother. She’s been wanting to tell him since the moment Taylor told her but was forced to not tell. 

The song ends, Dean and Taylor still dancing though. Sam and (Y/N) were quick to pull away though, it was different. Dean and Taylor, there was an evident attraction there. But Sam and (Y/N), they seem to have unrequited feelings for each other. Sam has always told himself they were just best friends, nothing more could happen. For someone so strong headed as her, he isn’t too sure if he would ever really tame her. Does it scare him though? No, it makes him curious. 

“And I love the thought of being with you

Or maybe it's the thought of not being so alone

Hey, the second one's way sadder than the first one

But I don't know

I love the thought of being with you

Maybe it's the thought of not being so alone

The second one's way sadder than the first one

But I don't know”

Sam lays there in his bed, he was unable to sleep. His mind was thinking of the future he could have with Taylor. She was the reason why he couldn’t fall asleep these days. He stood up and was quick to walk out of the bedroom. He walks down the hallway towards the library, maybe he could read himself something during these hours. He gets to the library, there he sees the woman sitting there in the chair. She looks up to him with her (E/C) eyes. Her pajamas consisted of plaid shorts and an old oversized v-neck that he let her borrow. His eyes widened to see the woman there. A worry starts to fill him, seeing her not in bed. 

“(Y/N), what are you doing up?” “Couldn’t sleep”

“But you need your sleep. I can tell you haven’t been sleeping the past couple of days.” Hearing the man say that to her, it made her heart beat faster than ever. She laughs at the man, finding his concern adorable to her. Sam walks over to her and sits in the chair next to her. The woman was quick to notice how close he was, the chair was closer than the others normally are. She leans back, trying to keep her heartbeat down. She doesn’t need this man to know of her love for him. 

“You need to sleep.” (Y/N) looks at her hands that rest on top of the book, fiddling with them. Something in her blood was making her heat up, not able to understand why this man had this affect on her. Her nose was quick to pick up his cologne, making her close her eyes to try to keep focus on the conversation.

“The nightmares are back,” is all she has to say for Sam to understand. He leans back in his chair. He’s known the woman for a while now, he understands what she means when she tells him about the nightmares. They’re of when she watched her friends, except Taylor, die around her from vampires. That was how she got into the hunter life, Taylor and her were the only two living from the bunch of friends. His hand was quick to gently place itself on the hands that were messing with each other. (Y/N) quickly whips her head up to the man staring at her, with those deep hazel eyes. 

“Then let’s stay up to the crack of dawn.” A soft smile appearing on her face, hearing him say those sweet words to her. Her love for him grows in the moment, only making her wish he could see her the same. One of these days, she will tell him. But that’s never going to happen. She’s too insecure and scared to come forward with her feelings for the man. 

“We should go and get a friggin' cup of coffee

And I'll act friendly and I won't pull any stunts

But I'm a little stunt puller from birth

So I don't know what to tell you

If I try to confess my love for

Scones

I just wanna say something real quick, please shh, listen

I love

These scones

Just the diversity between the selection they have here

The blueberry, the raspberry, strawberry, pumpkin

Even which is basically a friggin' squash

How they gonna make a scone out of a freaking squash?

Ohh, wow, wow

That shit blows my mind

That's Elon Musk just in his little lab cooking up, baby

But what were you talking about?

Oh yeah, your boyfriend made you mad the other day?

What was he saying? Oh, what do I think? Hmm

He was being mean at that part, point?

But I'm sure he's gonna turn around at some point, as well and”

Sam has tried so many times to hangout with Taylor alone but (Y/N) always gets brought along. He’s even come forward to (Y/N), begging her to leave the two alone for once but the woman always says she respects her bestie’s wishes. Of course. Those words were the reason how Sam realized she wasn’t so in love with him like he says he is for her. 

“Taylor!” “Yes, Sam?” “I… I love… scones!”

“That’s cool, Sam.” The memories fresh in his mind. Every time he tries to tell her, he quickly chickens out. Why is he like this? He was sitting on his bed when the knock could be heard in the bedroom. He was quick to get off his bed and open the door. There he sees the blonde with her teary blue eyes, looking up at the tall man. Suddenly, she wraps her arms around Sam. He was confused, usually Taylor goes to (Y/N) when she’s really upset. Sam soon puts his arms around her, taking in the hug. He takes a deep breath in, noticing how her perfume smells familiar but not there. Yet the smell was intoxicating to his mind. They soon pull away, Sam letting her in. He closes his door when she sits on the end of his bed. She stares at her hands, tears still running down her face.

“What’s wrong?” “My boyfriend… he’s making me so angry,” she mutters to Sam. He nods his head, he sits in the chair at the desk. He watches her as she stares at her hands. He can tell the fight was recent. Will she tell him who the man is? 

“I’m sure he’s going to turn around.” The woman looks up to the man sitting there, a small smile appearing on her face. She stands up and hugs Sam as he still sits in the chair. She soon pulls away, wiping her own tears away. Why was she so sudden to change her feelings? Maybe the fight wasn’t as big of a deal as she first thought it was? Sam couldn’t exactly understand what goes through her mind compared to her partner. He completely understood (Y/N), it was like he knew everything she was going to do or have already done. While Taylor, he never really reached that yet with her… and he wants to one of these days. 

“Thanks, Sam. Man, why don’t you have a girlfriend?” Sam’s eyes were quick to go wide. He opens his mouth, trying to figure out what he’s going to tell her out of that question. Is it because he believes he’s in love with her? Is it because he won’t give (Y/N) a quick notice of her feelings for him? Or was it the way she looks at his brother and the way he looks at her? 

“I… I don’t know,” Sam finally gets out to tell her. She narrows her blue eyes on him before she shrugs to him. She quickly got out of the room, he watched her exit the room as if nothing happened. He quickly puts his head in his hands, he could’ve confessed to her right then and there. It was perfect. Maybe she would understand. Or better, she would confess she’s in love with him as well. But that’s just a silly dream of his. A silly dream he wants to be real so bad. He would do anything to have that woman in his life more than just a friend. 

(Y/N) arrives back at the bunker, walking down the staircase with the brown bag. There she notices her friend walking towards her. She wipes her eyes, those were her fake tears. Taylor was going to be an actress before she decided to become a hunter. (Y/N) rolls her eyes, unable to believe that Taylor had to use that on someone. (Y/N) walks towards the kitchen, placing the bag on the metal table as her friend follows behind. It looks like the woman has a story to tell the other. 

“Who’s the victim?”

“Sam.” That name made the woman putting the groceries away freeze. She turns and looks at her best friend. Her (E/C) eyes blink for a second, doing her best to digest the new information. She looks away towards the fridge. She continues to stock up the metal box. 

“I think he could have a chance to have feelings for you.” That made the (E/C) get closed, the hand frozen on the six pack of beer. She lets out a soft sigh, she could feel her heart beat faster but what she knows is different. 

Taylor and Dean have been purposely doing their best to get Sam and (Y/N) together. The dancing situation happened because of Taylor and Dean. The recent being (Y/N) confession to Taylor of her feelings. Why did she have to tell the woman? She turns towards her friend.

“I think Dean and I can continue on with our plan. It will go and work smoothly.”

“Taylor, he’s in love with you.” The woman was quick to stop talking. She looks at the heartbroken woman in front of her. Taylor blinks for a second. She tries to understand what (Y/N) just told her. 

“What?”

“He told me a couple of months ago, told me to not tell Dean or you. Apparently, he’s loved you since he’s first set eyes on you.” Taylor’s eyes filled with shock but sorrow was quick to fill up for her best friend. The hunter grabs the hard liquor from the bag, her alcoholism is back. Taylor opened her mouth when her friend was quick to walk towards her bedroom to drink her night away. The blonde now knows it’s time for Sam to know of Dean and her relationship. She can’t continue keeping it secret if she knows for sure Sam is in love with her. 

“Hi, wassup?

Yeah, what's going on?

Oh yeah, she told me a lot about you, yeah, uh-huh

It's so great you're doing all of those things

You should keep doing all of them I think

Oh yeah, my name's Hobo Johnson

People like to say I'm a rapper, I'm actually not

I produced this myself, I'm hella fucking proud of it

But yeah, she like, she's so nice

She was so nice and cared about me, no one else did

Literally, I don't think I've ever felt love before that

She's a peach

Scone

She's a peach scone, yes, and”

Sam walks into the library, there he sees the two kissing. He blinks for a second, his heart goes numb while his mind screams at his brother. Taylor pulls away and looks at Sam. She plasters a fake smile but he doesn’t realize it is fake. 

“Looks like Sam knows Dean.”

“Oh, yeah. We’re dating, Sammy,” Dean says nonchalantly. Sam looks at his brother, right into those green eyes of his. He blinks for a second, forcing a smile to appear on his face. He nods his head to the two of them.

“That’s who the mysterious man is.” Sam couldn’t feel a thing from saying those words. Dean nods his head before he places a quick peck on Taylor’s lips. Sam quickly turns around on his heels, heading straight to the bedroom. The tears start to form as he rushes to get to his hidden world. That was until he ran into the woman, she looked up at him. Her (E/C) eyes were filled with concern once she noticed the tears in his beautiful hazel eyes. She gently takes his hand, knowing he wants to go to his bedroom. She leads him to his bedroom, opening it for him. Once the two were in the room, he closed the door behind him. He gets to the bed and lays down with a huff. Finally, the tears escape his eyes. The woman sits on the edge of the bed as he lays there. She looks at his face, seeing those tears fall down his face in pain. She lets a soft sigh out. 

“What happened?”

“I know who Taylor is dating.” Sam knew she knew. Sam also knew that she wouldn’t tell him since she respected her partner’s privacy. That’s what made him appreciate (Y/N), knowing she’s willing to keep people’s privacy. She nods her head to Sam. Her hand was quick to start playing with his hair. Her playing with his hair. She always knew it could help calm him down. How did she know? It was beyond Sam but the action makes him close his eyes. He feels her hands fiddle with the thick strands. He remembers the time she told him how soft his hair is, of course the moment made him smile wider than he has in the longest time. 

“I wish she would love me… not my brother.” He holds onto the woman. This was the eighth time she caught him crying in the span of a week. (Y/N) was slowly losing her mind over the man crying in her arms. The tears forming in her eyes, why can’t he just see she’s so in love with him? Why is he still hung up with a woman he didn’t truly know? Sam soon pulls away from the hug, leaning against the headboard. (Y/N) was quick to look away from him, she doesn’t need the main heartbroken one there to know her heart was breaking. Sam wipes his tears away, soon looking at her. Finally, he’s noticed how different she looks. Her face looked tired and sad, he didn’t exactly understand. Suddenly, his sadness changed into worry.

“I’m fine,” she mutters to him. She could tell by the way his posture changed that he was worried. Once he was slouching and now he’s sitting straight up. She looks at him when she feels his arms go around her. She closes her eyes. Sam puts his head in the nook of her neck, he takes a breath of her. It was that familiar smell, right on the dime but there was something that was covering it. The smell of liquor. He quickly pulls away, his hands going to her shoulders.

“You’re drinking again?” (Y/N) winced at the question, looking away from those puppy eyes of his to tell her the truth. She puts her head into her hands, she breaks. Sam didn’t understand what was happening. For the first time, he didn’t understand her. His eyes widen, starting to panic for her. He hears her almost silent sobs into her hands. She continues to cry until she lets it all out. She sits up, straightening her posture. She wipes her tears and looks at Sam.

“I’m going to bed,” she tells him. She stands up and walks out of the room. Sam had this gut feeling to not let her go but he doesn’t. Sometimes it was better for her to have her space. 

“Taylor, I need to leave.”

“Why?”

“Because I can’t do it anymore. Sam cries all the time whenever he sees Dean and you. Guess who has to handle the man. Me! I have to handle the man I love with his broken heart! It’s hard, I can’t handle it anymore. I have to get out of here… clear my head,” (Y/N) begs her friend as the tears pour down her face. Taylor hasn’t seen this side of the woman since the incident with their friends. The blue eyes blink, knowing it’s best for the woman to go solo for a while. She nods her head to her, giving the woman her permission to go off on her own. (Y/N) wraps her arms around Taylor, the two hug as if it was their last. It could possibly be their last hug. 

“Thank you.”

“Anything for my sister,” Taylor whispers to the other. The two pull away before (Y/N) runs off to go get packed. The blonde sits down in her bed, the shock hasn’t hit her just yet. 

“I love the thought of being with her

I just really hope that she doesn't get hurt, y'know?

They say it takes two years to come back down to earth

From that lovely place that you've been, I heard it's so nice

Good for you guys, I'm, I'm glad

(Being so alone)

And if you find someone who loves you for who you are

Keep loving 'em, man

'Cause that shit happens like, once in a lifetime, y'know?

And who am I to get in the way of someone living their lifetime y'know?

And I hope you're doing really well, I haven't talked to you in a while.”

Sam wakes up in his bed, he sits up. He looks at the clock, there he sees the note sitting on top of it. He picks it up, there he reads the words written just for him. His eyes widened, he was quick to get out of his bed. He runs to Dean’s room, where he sees Dean holding onto Taylor as they sleep but he didn’t bother. 

“Dean! Taylor! Wake up,” Sam barks at the two to wake up. They were quick to separate and look at the man. He didn’t look so broken hearted but rather in a panic. His breathing was starting to go faster. Dean noticed this, it was Sam’s panicking. He looks at the note Sam holds. He sees the one that lays on the top of his clock. He looks at it, reading the one written for him. He looks at Sam and back at the note.

“We have to find her.”

“No,” Taylor spoke up. Sam and Dean both look at the only woman. Tears were streaming down her face, the pain finally hit her.

“(Y/N), she’s not going to come back… unless it’s over two years.” That’s how long it took (Y/N) to officially “get over” the deaths of her friends. Taylor looks at the two men, shaking her head. Dean quickly wrapped his arms around the woman. Sam reluctantly walks out of the room, heading to his own. He felt broken and alone. He thought he felt alone from Taylor and Dean’s relationship but this… it was different. He actually lost someone he loves. He gets to the bedroom of his, pulling his phone out. He texts her, calls her, begging her to come back. 

Two weeks, that’s how long it took for (Y/N) to respond back to Sam. 

‘Stop’

That’s all the text said. Just a simple stop sign. Sam lays there in his bed. Whenever there was a case, he wouldn’t go with Dean. Instead Dean and Taylor always went on the hunts now. The whole ordeal took Dean a month for him to finally decide it was time to talk to Sam. He forced his brother to go to the library, out of his safe haven that was his bedroom. Sam was in the baggy clothing, sitting there in the chair. There were bags under his eyes. His brown hair looks greasy and messy. His face shined from all the oil. His face paler than the usual tan skin. Dean lets a soft sigh when he looks right into Sam’s puffy and red eyes from crying. 

“Sam, we need to talk.”

“No.”

“Sam, you weren’t even this upset over Jess!” Dean was quick to start on his rant. Sam just sat there, taking it as usual.

“I want you to be happy and if that means I have to point out how you feel and what you should do then I will.” That makes Sam tilt his head in confusion, wondering what his brother could be talking about. Dean lets a sigh out, realizing he really does have to.

“Sam, I need you to listen to me. You weren’t in love with Taylor. You admired her. You found her pretty, smart, and kind so your mind tricked you to think you like her.” Sam rolls his eyes and scoffs hearing Dean but his brother continues on.

“I know this because it’s the way you always looked at (Y/N).” That made Sam’s eyesight slap right back onto Dean. He shakes his head, disagreeing with his brother already.

“Remember that time you found out she felt lonely during Valentine’s Day?” Dean was quick to make the brother remember. Sam nods his head, he remembers. 

Sam found (Y/N) drinking after she said she would go sober in her bedroom on the day. Of course, he was quick to make her stop at her first drink. He soon found out she felt lonely since her partner had a lover on the day for lovers. Sam was quick to decide to take her out for the night. They went to the ice cream store, a stroll through the snowy park, and watched movies. They spent the whole day together, making each other not feel so alone. 

“Oh and that party you try to throw for her on her birthday?”

Sam, of course, had to make the big day special for her. He wanted her to feel loved and it meant the world to him if he got it right. The only problem was, everyone was cancelling the party a couple of days before. It was driving him crazy when he planned for about twenty people to only be about five people to celebrate the day. In the end, (Y/N) cried in happiness at the small party thrown for her. She laughed brightly at the sight of the horrible cake Taylor tried to bake. She got embarrassed by Dean’s embarrassing retelling of stories that he has of her. Then the best part, the way she hugged Sam when she found out he did it all for her. It made him feel warm inside, Sam could still feel it to the day. 

“Do I also have to retell how you got her that fancy ass necklace for Christmas last year?” 

“Stop,” Sam shouts at his brother. Dean looks at his brother, perking up a bit at his brother’s outburst. Sam holds the tears in his eyes, the realization was hitting him. 

“I get it… I’m in love with (Y/N). I was in love with her the entire time and I pushed her away.” Dean was going to smile until he noticed how much pain his brother was in. He watches his brother stand up and head straight to his bedroom. He has to make a phone call to the woman he loves. He hasn’t called her in the longest time it feels to him. 

“But uh, I found someone else who really loves me for who I am

But I don't call them enough, and that's why they moved away

I'm gonna call them right now, she wants me to call her.”

“Sam?” The voice on the other side of the line makes him freeze. (Y/N) actually picked the phone up. This isn’t some dream. He’s sitting there on his bed, staring at the door.

“I’m in love with you,” Sam blurts out. He quickly smacks his forehead for saying that so suddenly.

“Yeah, Taylor got you to say that,” she scoffs at his attempt. Sam shakes his head at the woman on the other side of the line.

“No, (Y/N). I’m in love with you. I was never in love with Taylor.”

“I’m not your fucking rebound, Sam.”

“I never loved Taylor! I never did! My heart doesn’t flutter whenever she’s around like it does for you! Her hugs don’t feel as warm compared to the way you hold me in your arms! I don’t love someone who analyzes everything, no, I’m in love with a woman who goes off of impulse and her gut feeling! And guess what, that’s one of the many beautiful things about you! Just you in general, you have more beauty than I could comprehend!” Sam went on the rant of the woman, he could continue on but he needs to hear her voice. 

“Don’t get me started on your voice,” he mutters to the phone. Taking the back of his hand, wiping the tears away.

“Sam, I’m five minutes away… I never left town cause I love you so much.” His head lifts up, a smile starting to appear on his face from hearing those words. She hung up on him, he looked at his phone. He had hoped she was telling him the truth. Around ten minutes later, he was doubting himself in his room until he saw his door thrown open. There he sees the woman who scans the room before she looks at Sam right into his eyes. His eyes stare into her (E/C). He quickly stands up from his bed and places his hands on her cheeks. There he places the kiss on her soft lips finally. He soon pulls away, seeing the wide smile starting to appear on her face. 

“Okay, bye.”

[dragons-bones]

FFXIV Write #5: Fifth Invocation

Prompt: Vault | Master Post | On AO3

tagging: @sea-wolf-coast-to-coast

“Are you sure we shouldn’t be helping them?”

Synnove examined her nails critically before fishing an emery board from one of her many hip pouches. She smoothed a rough edge only she could see. “Absolutely,” she said, voice icy.

Rereha looked up from shoveling and scowled at her. “Rude.”

“Kunafa,” Synnove hissed.

Rereha yelped and started shoveling faster. Aymeric managed to disguise his laugh as a cough as Synnove muttered about food thieves next to him.

A ‘thunk!’ echoed out of the hole. “Found it,” Alakhai’s voice drifted up.

Synnove and Aymeric stepped back as Heron and Alakhai heaved an ironwood chest over the lip of the hole they’d dug and shoved it onto flat ground. Rereha clambered out, grumbling about needing a manicure, stomping towards the chocobos and dragging all three shovels behind her. As she collapsed the handles and stashed them with their travel packs, Alakhai took out her thieves’ tools and started checking the chest for traps.

Heron dusted herself off and picked up her shield from the boulder she had leaned it up against before starting to dig, slinging it onto her arm loosely. “Twelve, let this one finally give us a portal,” she groused. Alakhai grunted agreement.

Aymeric wrapped an arm around Synnove’s waist, the Highlander leaning into his side automatically. The pair of them both ignored Rereha’s gagging noise behind them. “Where exactly do these chests come from?” Aymeric said. “I recall towards the end of the Dragonsong War, there seemed to be a surprising amount of successful treasure hunters throughout Coerthas and Dravania for such a supposedly rare occurrence.”

“Current working theory in the Adventurers’ Guild is there’s some supposed legendary thief who’s left breadcrumbs to their hoard of unimaginable wealth,” Synnove said, dropping her head onto his travel-leather covered shoulder. “Considering how often we come back to the same spots and find a new chest, someone is either physically reburying chests, or has a very sophisticated teleportation spell system that automatically ‘refills’ a location.”

Aymeric rested his chin on her head and drawled, “And if it’s the later, you want it.”

“I want it baaaaaad.”

“That’s what she said,” Rereha muttered as she rejoined them. She stepped out of the way of the kick Synnove aimed at her. Aymeric snickered into Synnove’s hair despite himself.

Alakhai, meanwhile, stood up and stashed her tools in her belt. “Chest is clear,” she said. “Just one of those scent traps to lure in the local wildlife.”

“All right, let’s be disappointed,” Rereha said.

The Xaela snorted, and popped the lid. Almost immediately, a dark, circular portal ripped into existence above the open lid.

“Finally!” the four woman all shouted. Aymeric laughed.

Alakhai quickly rifled through the chest. “Tomestones, of course. I swear, whoever this thief is, they must be working with—”

“Don’t say the name!”

“—Rowena.”

Rereha, Heron, and Synnove collectively shuddered; Aymeric hugged Synnove a little closer as she muttered about under her breath about how terrifying that woman was.

Alakhai ignored them all, merely adding, “And some gil, just add that to the pile for later.”

Heron whistled, and the chocobos all came over to settle in next to the chest, on guard for any opportunistic looters. Synnove reluctantly pulled free of Aymeric to help gather the potions and empty bags from the packs.

Once they were ready, Alakhai reached towards the portal, channeling her aether into. The group of five vanished…

…with the portal teleporting them to the platform in the middle of a room covered in gaudy Thavnairian iconography and statuary.

“Yes!” Rereha said, raising her fists in victory. “The Shifting Altars!”

Synnove snapped her fingers, and all three of the carbuncles tumbled out of the aether. They sniffed around curiously before settling around the arcane sphere floating gently near the inner circle of the platform, with Heron heading towards the immediate center, sword drawn and shield at the ready.

Rereha clapped her hands excitedly. “All right, explanation for our guest,” she said cheerfully. “You’ll notice this platform is surrounded by what’s basically a roulette ring.”

“Bit hard to miss,” Aymeric said drily.

“You’d be surprised,” Alakhai muttered.

“Touching the arcane sphere over yonder activates the ring,” Rereha continued. “Blue is a lesser summon; green a greater summon; red an elder summon; gold brings some…special friends; purple is an atomos that will throw us out of the Altars, or maybe not; and white… we’ve got no idea. We’ve never seen the wheel land on it. In any event, we do this five times if an atomos doesn’t do terrible, terrible things to us, then we get teleported out of here and whichever madman maintains this setup resets it for the next group of lunatic adventurers.”

“Summons are always some large monster, and they inevitably will bring some of their friends in the middle of the fight,” Heron called out. “Tyr will normally corral them for us, but sometimes it gets hectic; if you could help him on that?”

Aymeric saluted her, unsheathing Naegling from his hip.

“I know it doesn’t need repeating, but it’s a good habit to keep,” Alakhai said in the monotonous drone of someone who has to give the spiel before. “So: today’s attempt at treasure is on behalf of the Arcanists’ Guild scholarship funds, all proceeds and profits from found items sold on the market go to finance the educational opportunities of Eorzea’s finest minds, et cetera, et cetera.”

“The amount of people who don’t read the posted message in full is depressing,” Synnove muttered.

“Alakhai, when you’re ready!”

The Xaela waved to Heron and waded her way through the carbuncles to the sphere. “Going on three!” she called out, lifting her hand to begin channeling aether.

“Three! Two! One!”

The next bell was an exercise in carefully controlled chaos: avoiding spells, ducking tails, dodging claws, tossing potions to one another, and herding smaller monsters out of the way to be dealt with methodically. Aymeric, thankfully, had accompanied them on bounty hunting expeditions before, so while he didn’t possess the Echo, he unhesitatingly moved where directed by Synnove or Heron as their own Echoes alerted them of incoming danger. (He also had the best sense for where to throw Ivar so the ruby carbuncle and his grenade programming could cause the maximum amount of damage.) In between bouts of combat, Synnove and Rereha looted the treasure chests that teleported to the center of the platform, shoving gil into their rapidly-filling bags along with bars of assorted metals, bolts of liquid, and bottles of liquid they identified as components for enhancing specific magical properties on armor.

One particular item they found was a piece of fine linen that had Galette immediately making sad eyes at Synnove.

She sighed. “All right, sweetheart, you can have it. A scarf, maybe?”

Galette yipped excitedly as Synnove folded the bolt up and shoved it into one of her hip pouches. Yes, please!

And the once the loot was dealt with, onto the next round of battle.

(Aymeric stared at the enormous mandragora the gold icon summoned for them. “That,” he said, “is absolutely ridiculous.”

“And annoying,” Synnove said with a sigh. “He brings along a matching crew that have to be brought down in a specific order or it gets…ugly. At least it wasn’t the enormous golden namazu and his damned pitchfork.”

“Oh, now I know you’re having me on, love.”)

Finally, they made it through four invocations. Synnove stared critically as the roulette wheel around them reset to only three types of icons: red, purple, and white. “This is either going to be very disappointing or very ugly,” she said.

Heron said with a shrug, “At least we didn’t get an atomos before this point; if we get one now, it wouldn’t have been all for naught.”

“Spit, not swallow.”

“REREHA!” three voices bellowed. Aymeric choked in surprise, laughing through a cough as Synnove pounded him on the back and scowled at the lalafell as she did. Rereha merely cackled.

Alakhai aimed a kick at Rereha as she headed back for the arcane sphere; Rereha of course danced out of the way with an especially ostentatious twirl. “All right,” the Xaela said, “let’s get this over with, I want a nap.”

The circle of aether light cheerfully clicked around the ring for the last time. It began to slow, before calming to a halt on the purple atomos icon. The group all head their breath.

Then—

It clicked over to the white elephant icon, and activated.

“Oh, my gods, we are gonna die and it’s gonna be ugly,” Rereha said, wide eyed, as black aether began coalescing at the middle of the platform and the entire room lit up with golden light.

The shadowy aether roared upwards, nearly to the high arched ceiling of the Altar, then collapsed downward. The five readied themselves, weapons drawn, with the carbuncles crouching to pounce. And as the aether dissipiated—

—a grey matanga stood in the very middle. He was tiny for a matanga, about Synnove’s height, and his tusks were very short, barely curling upwards on either side of his trunk. His head nearly twice the size of the rest of his body, and his enormous ears twitched as he looked around in bewilderment.

“What?!” he said, then blinked huge black eyes. “Oh, a summoning! I’ve never done this before!” He clapped his hands excitedly, trunk curling in obvious delight.

(Synnove gurgled, grimoire dropping to the ground as she clutched her chest with both hands. “Oh no,” she wheezed, “he’s fucking adorable.”

“Synnove, you will control yourself,” Alakhai hissed back.)

“You’ve come for treasure, yes?” the matanga prince squeaked out, apparently not hearing the exchange. “Then treasure you shall ha—HRK!”

There was now a Highlander attached to the young creature, hugging the life out of him. “You’re so CUTE!”

The matanga blinked. “Thank…you?”

Ivar sat back on his haunches, paws covering his eyes, and chattered out a groan. Mama is so embarrassing. Galette and Tyr nodded agreement.

Aymeric, Naegling sheathed at his side, inched closer, carefully gripping Synnove’s arms. “Now, dear,” he said, as Synnove sniffled back overwhelmed tears, “it’s a bit rude to hug a stranger without permission.”

“Oh, no, it’s fine!” the matanga said. “This feels really nice! You give very good hugs, miss!”

Synnove made that horrible gurgling sound again. Aymeric sighed quietly.

Rereha put her hand in her hands as Heron rubbed her temples. Alakhai merely looked up, mouthing, Why. Why this.

Aymeric patted Synnove gently on the back, and finally tried again. “I’m sure the younger master needs to go,” he said to her. “His parents are likely wondering why this is taking so long.”

“I’m sorry!” the prince said. “I really do to return home.”

She sniffled again, hard, but reluctantly drew back, and let Aymeric shuffle her a few paces away.

The matanga prince waved. “Bye, miss! Thank you for the hug!”

Synnove waved sadly in return, and the little matanga vanished in a pop of aether, leaving behind a large treasure chest Rereha immediately darted towards. She sniffed and turned to drop her head on Aymeric’s chest. “He was so precious,” she said.

Aymeric hugged her. “Yes, he was,” he said, patting her back soothingly.

Another sniff. “Aymeric?”

“No, Synnove.”

“Damnit.”

[roraruu]

wip: wretched and divine

tw: body horror, talking about blood. even more vamp au. i have a problem w this au i wrote like 3k alone today n had an epiphany in second cup over a plot point lmfao

“Relax.”

His voice is melodic and sweet. It would have been calming, had he not been a vampire and she not a hunter. Is it that charm he works ever so magically? That power he has over people?

Perhaps he is like foxglove. She remembers picking some as a child, thinking it would be a good offering to the Earth Mother’s idol. When she came back from the forest with handfuls of it one of the elder priestess’s swatted it out of her tiny hand and scorched it with her fire spell. She was warned that while it looked quite beautiful, it would kill anyone who ate it and that Mila would smite her. Such a tiny thing instilled so much fear into Silque’s feeble heart.

He speaks again, this time lower and sweeter like wine offered at the feet of the idol. Her journal is heavy in her lap, the pen loose between her fingers.

“I’m not going to hurt you.” He says almost touching her elbow but stopping, as if something pulls at his arm. His gaze holds hers again, eyes a dark red. A ring of violet hangs under his eyes; it cannot be bruising for blood doesn’t run through his veins anymore. It must be a longing left over, a lust that his body has for humanly things like sleep and food and warmth.

“Somehow I don’t believe that.” Silque says, turning her gaze back to the ground.

“I can’t touch you at all right now. Even if I wanted to.”

Her brow furrows. Could he read her mind? He must have noticed her heady gaze when he pulled his hands away from her. “Why not?”

He laughs, from the top of the lungs again. “Get writing.” He says with what almost looks like a grin. She lights a lantern that she had taken from the Priory with a fire spell.

She open the journal, flipping through the pages, past sermons and prayers and hymns that she had sat up writing in the night. The spine cracks and she flattens the pages out underneath her thin white fingers. She untwists the cap of the pen, resting it against the page.

“Ready,” She says, glancing to him.

The history is rich like a good meal. Words fall from his mouth like raindrops, heavy but small. She takes down everything in tiny, precise cursive.

“Vampires can’t touch anyone or thing that’s under Mila’s divine protection.” He says. “That thing on your neck has her holy tears in it. You’re safe.”

“And if I wasn’t wearing it?” She asks.

“Still wouldn’t touch you.”

He had touched her before, thrown her around when she had found the bandits that harmed Lady Celica. “Somehow I doubt that.” She says, turning her eyes back to the pages.

“Believe whatever you want, Silque.” He says, getting up. His ruined boots kick against the forest ground. He paces slowly amongst fallen leaves and grains of sand.

The grove is dark tonight. No bright moon or stars to give off much light. For a while they wandered, not sure where to stop and speak. Writing and walking at the same time is not an easy feat.

He throws his tattered cloak to her. “You’re shivering.” He says.

She didn’t realize that she was. Her fingers shy from blood stains and slashes.

“Sir Python is open to your questions.”

“Are you truly a sir?” She asks.

He frowns. “I meant about what I am, not who I am.” He says.

“You said that if I came with you, you would tell me whatever I wanted to.”

“I didn’t say whatever—“

“Then I’m going back to the priory.” She pushes his cloak off of her lap, closes her journal and grabs the lantern.

“Wait, stop.” Python scrambles for words. “Gods, Silque would you just—“

He touches her wrist, hand ice cold. He hisses, pulling back quickly and cussing loudly. Her eyes widen. Did she do that?

“Python?” She says as he holds his wrist tightly to himself.

“Just stops okay.” He winces again.

“Gods I don’t know if my white magic will...”

“You’ve got gauze?” He asks.

She nods. She always carries some, no matter the place or time. An injury can happen whenever. She pulls it from her pocket, cutting a long piece off with her holy dagger. She holds it out to him and watches as he opens his palm. The skin turns gray and dark. He cusses again and wraps it.

Her own hand wound aches. She bites down on her lip. She didn’t mean to hurt him—

Gods what was she saying? He was trying to kill her not even two weeks ago. And now she was concerned that she had hurt him? This was apart of her job as a cleric, to protect the island from the undead be it Terrors is vampires or him.

“Divinity runs deep in you.” He says. “I said it before, when you die, they’re gonna saint you.”

She frowns, looking awkwardly back to her journal as if it will carry her away. If she is divine he must be wretched.

“Sniper in the rebel army.” He says, breaking the silence.

She looks to him. He stares off at the cloak before picking it up again. “I hated it.” He says. “Died in a battle against the main army.”

She frowns. “Did you... have anyone?” She asks.

He glances to her and then laughs bitterly. For the undead, he is too joyful. Terrors can barely make human words, yet he laughs and snarls just like any other being. “Do I look like the sorta guy who has a girl and brats?” He asks.

Take away the bloodstained outfit that makes him look like a destitute beggar, maybe clean him up with a trim of the hair, shave and—nope, he wouldn’t fit that wholesome look or life.

“I didn’t mean a wife and child,” She says. “Parents? Siblings? Comrades?”

His face falls a little. Then he dips his head in a nod. “Yeah I guess I had someone.” He mutters.

“Do they know about you now?”

“No. The poor bastard probably thinks I’m dead. I don’t know what the army forged in their records.” He says, rubbing the back of his neck.

Right, he is technically dead. Gods, she needs a constant reminder of that. She opens her journal again, moving the lantern close to the blanket pages. She drops him personally, although she would love more details on how he became this way, who did this to him...

“So anything that has been blessed by the Mother cannot be touched?” Silque asks.

He looks dazed for a moment, as if pulled from reverie by her voice. “Pretty much. Rivers we can’t cross, they’re her blood. Can’t do anything to anyone in them either.” He explains.

“So when I stood in the river—“

“You were under her protection.” He laughs lightly again. “Seems she hasn’t abandoned the holy at least.”

His gnarled hand points to her neck, the little white ornament that protects her. “You’re wearing her blessing right now.”

She glances down to it before tucking it under the collar of her dress where it nestled into the V of her collarbone. She jots down more notes, trying to focus on the page.

“How is a vampire created?” She asks, glancing up.

“Bite. Bad burial. Curse.” He says.

Her gaze narrows on him. “How were you created?”

He smirks. “You seem a little too interested in me, say, do I occupy all your thoughts, cleric?”

She shakes her head. “I want to know why you were made this way. Compare it to the theories in my texts.” She says. A faint heart washes over her neck and ears.

“I was cursed. Some witch came after me because I apparently broke her heart.” He laughs bitterly.

“You’re incorrigible.”

“And you’re a prude.”

“So this witch cursed you?”

“She compared my way to a vamp’s bloodlust. Didn’t know she dabbled in curse.” He says. “I don’t know what happened to her afterwards.”

She pulls out a provision. An orange taken from the priory pantry. It really begins to get cold and she wraps herself in his cloak. It is thick and worn, both old and young. She notices him smirk when she begins to peel her orange.

“Do you miss food?” She asks, glancing up to him.

“You make it sound like I’m a ghost.” He says.

“I meant actual food, from the earth, from the sea.”

“Oh that.” He mumbles. Then shrugs. “Not really. I guess I miss alcohol a little but, I don’t. Blood can compare to it easily.”

“And how often do you feed? Roughly?”

“Whenever I’m thirsty.”

“My texts say every moon—“

He laughs loud and hard. “Gods, if I could only wait that long.” He says. “I find myself thirsty every couple of days. Those bandits from the other night are keeping me okay for the time being.”

She nods, quickly writing down that thirst depends. She bites her lip. “And... off the record... when we met earlier you said everyone has their own smell.” She says.

His brow raises. His gaze narrows as he comes into the light. “And?”

“And what do I smell like?” she asks.

He stays quiet for a moment, then slides a little into the light. She can see the gauntness in his cheekbones, the harsh curve of his brow, the circles of purple under his eyes. He leans close, almost too close, right to the edge of her hair and takes a deep breath in. Softly, he laughs.

“Good.”

It sends a shiver down her spine, then a nervous shake of her hands. “No I mean, what do I smell like?”

“Like the earth. Soft and...” he stops. “Like spring.”

The heat spreads to her cheeks. She smells like spring, she smells good to him. She—

“I want to tell you something before you ask anything else.” He says lowly.

She nods, closing her journal momentarily. Her fingers curl over the cover and into the pages.

“Don’t ever give your blood away.” He orders, voice serious now. His eyes glint in the light.

“Why?” Silque asks.

“It’s bad behaviour. You should know that as a cleric.” He says, glancing to the grass under his hand. “A vamp could get hooked on your blood and you’d never know peace again.”

“It can’t be only that.” She pushes. “Is this a tactic to corner me?”

“No this is for your own good. Don’t even give it to me, it’s not payment.” He says. “You don’t want this.”

“How are you sure of what I want?”

“You love Mila right?”

She stops. This is a dividing line. Like the gates of the cemetery or the posts of the priory. It is something he or she shouldn’t cross.

Slowly she nods. “Then that should be enough for you.” He says. “Don’t go against her. She loves the living not the dead. The divine, not the wretched.”

“Alright.” Silque says, still a little unconvinced.

“Silque, it’s like a blood bond.” He explains. “It connects one to two and it can’t be undone without consequence.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning you’d die.”

Her hands tighten around the journal. She takes a nervous breath and nods. “I see.”

“Don’t ever give it away. For your sake.”

“Yes. I won’t she says.”

He murmurs a quiet ‘good’ and they slowly begin talking about him again. They listen to calls of nightbirds and the sounds of the rushing river. She takes down notes dutifully, filling pages upon pages until the sun begins to rise, washing the land in red and orange and pink. He gets up from their seat at the grove and she pulls off the cloak handing it to him. With a swift fling, he spreads it over his shoulders and gives her a side glance.

“See you next moon.”

“How can you be certain?” She asks.

He smirks and winks his red eye. “I know how you like a book.”

It sends a flush to her cheeks. “Wait, you didn’t tell me why you want the diadem!” Before the words can escape her lips, he’s gone leaving her alone.

Silque begins back towards the Priory, mulling over what could have happened had he taken her blood. She would have been bound to him and he to her. Could she have hidden in the priory? Hiding like a hierophant or seer to Mila’s vision? Or would his bloodlust found a way to lull her out of the Priory and end her life?

It scares her to think about it. Her feet drag along the dirt ground, the grass thinning along the more trodden areas that connect the Priory to the towns and Greatport. When she is finally on holy ground, she breathes a sigh. Calmness washes over her, although it only lasts a moment.

When she enters the priory, there is chaos.

Lady Celica holds Genny close. Mae and Boey are gone. When the door shuts, the cleric and Priestess look up with wide eyes.

“Silque!” Genny exclaims, pulling herself away from Celica and rushing towards her. Her little arms wrap around Silque’s body, surprising her. She pats Genny’s back and drops her journal. “You’re back!”

“Sister Silque! Where were you?” Celica asks.

Another wave of heat washes over Silque. What could she say? That she was fraternizing with the enemy, the one they are to kill? That the divine was becoming friendly with the wretched?

Celica leans close to her ear, just as Python had done hours ago. Her face washes with red as Celica speaks. “Mae thought you were seeing a gentleman friend—“

“N-No!” Silque exclaims a little too loudly. She apologizes quickly “I just stepped out early this morning. It seems I caused worry, I apologize.”

“Genny wanted to say some rites with you this morning and when she came to your room, you were gone.” She says. “No note or anything. Nomah sent Boey and Mae out to search for you.”

“We thought you had left, your journal was gone too!” Genny exclaims before hugging her tightly again. Silque places a comforting hand on her back, patting twice before shaking her head.

“I’m terribly sorry for the worry. I only went for a walk to clear my thoughts and make some notes by the river.” Silque says as Celica stoops down to pick up her book. She hands it to Silque. “I thought I would only be a few moments, but I suppose I was wrong.”

“Promise you won’t leave without telling us again, Silque.” Genny says, holding out her pinkie. “The Priory wouldn’t be the same without you.”

Silque forces a thin smile and knots her pinkie with Genny’s. Silque wipes away Genny’s tear tracks as Celica touches her shoulder.

“Yes, you have to be more careful Sister Silque.” Celica insists. “Had you been out at sundown, you might’ve run into that horrible vampire. I know you can handle yourself but...”

“I understand, Sister Celica.” Silque says.

“I just thank Mila you’re safe.” Celica says again. “I’ll go find Boey and Mae and tell them that you’re safe.”

Silque nods and Genny takes her hand. “Should we go say our morning rites?” She asks, and Silque can’t say no to such a plead. Hand in hand, they walk to the idol room, and Silque ignores how tired she is.

[thisdiscontentedwinter]

Stella and the Wolf - Chapter 26

You can read it on AO3 or find the Tumblr Chapter Index here. 

Cold air and beeping.

Stiles knows before he even opens his eyes that he’s in the hospital, but he opens his eyes anyway to confirm it. Yep. The hospital. And Dad’s dozing in the chair next to his bed, Stella on his lap, which must be uncomfortable as hell for both of them.

He opens his dry mouth. “Wh…”

Dad’s eyes flash open. He leans forward, wincing, and rubs Stella on the back to wake her. “Stiles? You okay, kiddo?”

“Why’m I here?” he croaks.

“You got shot in the shoulder,” Dad says. “You’ve been in surgery.”

Oh, well that definitely explains why his arm wouldn’t work. Also, hospital-grade painkillers are amazing because Stiles isn’t feeling a damn thing. Not even guilt, which he knows he totally should be with the look Dad is leveling at him.

“I told you to pull over,” Dad says.

“Mmm.”

Stella blinks away. “Stiles?” she mumbles, and then scrambles to her feet. “Stiles!”

“Careful,” Dad says in a warning tone as Stella tries to clamber into the bed with Stiles. “Watch his arm, Stella.”

“I’m gonna…” Stiles says, pressing the button for pain relief. “Just have more of this.”

He passes out again, with Stella cuddled up against his good side.

***

Derek slinks into Stiles’s hospital room early on Thursday morning, carrying enough guilt for both of them. He’s also carrying a banana milkshake from the twenty-four hour diner on Third.

He’s amazing.

(Stiles is on a lot of morphine.)

Stiles makes a grabby hand for him. “You’re okay. Oh, thank Jeebus. You’re okay.”

Derek leans down and kisses him softly on the forehead. Stiles basks in the warmth of that for all of three seconds, then makes a grabby hand for the milkshake.

He slurps on it for a while.

“Did I imagine Peter?” he mumbles. “Is he a zombie now? Big ol’ zombiewolf?”

He dozes off again before Derek can answer him.  

***

Stiles pieces together what happened during his hospital stay. When he’s released on Friday evening—with strict instruction about meds and wound care—he thinks he’s got the full picture. More or less. Gerard Argent is in jail, awaiting trial for shooting Stiles, the other hunters have dropped off the face of the planet, Dad is running yet another misinformation campaign about what really happened and carefully excising the Hales from the narrative, and—oh yeah—Peter Hale came back from the dead and saved everyone’s ass.

That’s kind of the big one.

Stiles keeps coming back to that, and he really hopes that someone explains it to him at some point.

Dad picks him up from the hospital.

“Where’s Stella?” Stiles asks, as Dad clips his seatbelt up for him. Having his arm in a sling is going to be a royal pain in the ass. How’s he supposed to play video games Or do his homework? Or jerk off? He only ever jerks off with his right hand. Jesus. He’s going to have to change his entire routine.

“She’s at home,” Dad says. “She and Derek are making dinner.”

Oh, good, because Stiles was half-worried Dad would throw Derek out of the house for what happened on Wednesday night.

“It wasn’t Derek’s fault,” he says at last, carefully. “I couldn’t let him go alone, you know? And we couldn’t wait for you.”

“Stiles,” Dad says frankly as they wait at a red light. “I know why you did what you did. But as your father, I will never be happy that you chose to put yourself in danger like that. I’m angry as hell, kid, but I’m proud of you too.”

Stiles wrinkles his nose.

“It’s complicated,” Dad says. “I want to hug you and wring your neck at the same time.”

“You should ask Peter for pointers on that,” Stiles suggests.

“Not funny,” Dad says, but his mouth quirks anyway. “You’re grounded, by the way.”

“That’s fair. I’m glad I’m still here so you can ground me, honestly.” The words are meant to sound glib, but they come out too brittle for that, and Stiles’s breath hitches.

“Me too, kiddo,” Dad says, his eyes shining. “Me too.”

They drive the rest of the way home in silence.

When they get there, Stiles sees Derek’s Camaro parked in the driveway, and Jackson’s Porsche out on the street. All the lights are on downstairs and when Dad pulls in, the front door swings wide open and Stella races out to meet them.

“Stiles! We’re having pizza! Derek helped me make them! And Jackson cut the peppers for us!”

“Awesome!” Stiles hugs her with his good arm. “So we’re having a pizza party?”

“Yes!” Stella tugs at Dad’s belt loops. “Dad, did you get balloons? You were supposed to get balloons!”

“And I told you that I wasn’t going to leave your brother in the car while I stopped off for balloons,” Dad says.

Stella huffs, affronted.

“I don’t need balloons,” Stiles says. “Just pizza and you, you little peanut.”

Despite the lack of balloons, there’s still a party atmosphere inside the house. Stiles gets settled in Dad’s easy chair in the living room, careful not to jostle his arm when he sits, and it isn’t long before Derek appears, a cup of soda in his hand for Stiles, and grabs the footstool so he can sit next to him. He curls his fingers loosely around Stiles’s good wrist, and Stiles’s pain drain away.

“Hey,” Stile says.

Derek smiles at him. “Hey.”

Stiles looks up as Lydia steps into the living room, holding a tray of pizza. She sets it down on the coffee table. “Welcome home, Stiles.”

She leans down and kisses his cheek.

Stiles isn’t going to lie. A month ago he would have been fucking ecstatic to have Lydia Martin kiss his cheek. Now it’s…well, it’s about as exciting as when Stella does it. It’s warm and sweet, and sisterly. And Stiles wouldn’t change that for the world at this point.

Lydia fetches him a piece of pizza, and he reluctantly removes his arm from Derek’s loose grasp to take it.

“There another one coming,” Lydia says.

“I’m not really that hungry. But this smells great.” He takes a bite. “Meanwhile, I think you have some explaining to do, don’t you?”

“Do I?” Lydia asks, sitting on the couch and helping herself to a slice.

“Like, what the hell were you and Jackson even doing out there the other night?”

Jackson, speak of the devil, wanders in with the second pizza. “Sup, Stilinski?”

“Sup,” Stiles says. “I’d fist bump you, but, well, pizza takes precedence.”

Jackson sits down next to Lydia.

It doesn’t take long for Dad and Stella to join them—and Peter Hale as well, who is definitely not dead. Definitely, absolutely not dead. Stella would fall over if she was tugging so hard on the hand of a corpse.

“Oh, come on,” Stiles says. “Fill me in here! What the hell even happened on Wednesday night?”

“Actually, you should be asking what happened on Friday night,” Peter Hale says with a smirk.

“Friday?” Stiles wrinkles his nose. “I was there on Friday. I know what happened on Friday.”

Lydia smiles at him. “Well, about that…”

And she tugs the sleeve of her blouse down off her shoulder so that Stiles can see the wound on her pale skin he first noticed at the cemetery that night and then subsequently forgot about: a healing bite mark.  

***

So, Friday.

The dance, then Dad’s call to the Hale house, then the crash, and then every other fucking thing.  

On the way to the cemetery, when Stiles was holding Derek’s hand in the back of Chris’s SUV, apparently a very interesting discussion was taking place in the Porsche. A discussion in which Peter Hale proposed a crazy idea, and Lydia thought it over in that fast-paced brain of hers, and agreed.

***

“Shit,” Stiles says, his heart beating faster. “He must have been incredibly fucking persuasive.”

“Language,” Dad says, at the same time as Stella pipes up, “Swear jar!”

Lydia tilts her head thoughtfully, and flashes a smile at Peter. “Not really.”

“Not really?”

“He told me I stank of magic,” Lydia said, “and asked if I wanted to find out what sort.” She shrugs. “What was I supposed to say?”

“You weren’t worried about turning?” Stiles asks. “Or dying?”

Lydia raises her eyebrows, and smiles slightly. “Against an entire lifetime of not knowing something so fundamental about myself? Really, Stiles?”

No wonder he had a crush on her for so long. She’s fucking fearless.

“So what’s this got to do with how Peter’s here though?” he asks, setting his pizza down on the arm of the chair. “Wait. What sort of magic areyou?”

“I’m a banshee,” Lydia says, as matter-of-fact as if she’s telling him her star sign. “I can feel death coming. I can predict it. And I can do that because I apparently have a foot in both worlds. Or both sides of the veil.” She selects a second slice of pizza. “Is that poetic, or clichéd? Hmm.”

“So if you have a foot in both worlds,” Stiles says slowly, “then you exist in some place where there’s no barrier. You’re…” He wrinkles his nose. “Where you are, there’s a gateway?”

Peter smirks. “That was my theory, certainly.”

“Hell of a theory,” Stiles murmurs.

Peter shrugs. “If I was going to die anyway, and the chances of that were high, I literally had nothing to lose.”

“So that’s what happened,” Lydia says, although Stiles feels she’s explained exactly nothing. “Peter bit me, created a bond even through the veil, and on the night of the worm moon Jackson and I went out to the Hale house to perform the ritual that would bring him back. Which is where Gerard Argent found us.”

“I’m so confused,” Stiles says at last, and picks up his pizza again. “Where did you find this ritual anyway? In your amazing Latin werewolf book?”

“Yes, actually.”

“Where did you find your magic book anyway?”

Lydia exchanges a look with Jackson. “In the Hale vault.”

“Wait.” Stiles screws up his face. “Derek, you said that nobody could get into the Hale vault, unless…” He trails off.

“I told Jackson to look there,” Peter says.

Stiles punches Derek in the shoulder with his good arm. “You said nobody could get in there unless they were a Hale!”

“Right?” Jackson says. “You’d think the werewolf and the banshee thing would have been the biggest reveal I got that night, wouldn’t you? Apparently not.”  

“Holy shit,” Stiles says. “Holy shit.”

“Swear jar!” Stella reminds him through a mouthful of pizza.

“So who—“ Stiles cuts himself off. “Sorry, no, that’s none of my business.”

“Peter,” Jackson says.

Oh,” says Stiles. “That’s super weird.”

Jackson’s pinched expression totally agrees with him on that, but he seems to be rolling with it. And super weird or not, and whatever the story is behind Jackson’s adoption, a part of Stiles is glad that Jackson didn’t just get a name carved into black granite. That, however it works out, it’s someone who’s still here. Someone he can talk his issues out with, or punch them out if he needs, and he’s not just going to get silence in return.

“Okay,” Stiles says, shaking his head. “So you got the book from the vault. But why…” He looks to Derek helplessly.

“We didn’t say anything about trying the ritual because we didn’t know if it would work.” Lydia exhales slowly. “And we’d hoped, that if it did, we’d have Peter back before Gerard even came to town. But that didn’t work out how we’d hoped.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Peter says airily. “I’ve always been a fan of a dramatic entrance.”

“You couldn’t have dramatically entered before I got shot?” Stiles asks.

“Well,” Peter concedes. “Perhaps my timing was a little off.”

“Well,” Stiles says, “next time—”

Derek growls, and flashes his red eyes.

“No,” Dad says. “There will be no next times. You’re grounded until you’re forty, remember?”

“Excuse you, you said thirty!”

“Kiddo, you’re grounded until you reach retirement age,” Dad tells him. “No more werewolf shenanigans for you!”

***

Later, much later, Stiles is laying in bed, his left hand tangled in Derek’s hair as they exchange soft, sweet kisses in the moonlight.

“Hey, Der?” he asks in a whisper. “Do you think this counts as werewolf shenanigans?”  

Derek laughs softly against the line of his jaw. “Shh!”

[krpk-remaking]

on kurapikas further development, the plots general direction and why leorio is on the black whale

this is just kind of a speculation on where kurapikas arc and the general plot is heading right now!

i wrote this with the help of mags @geysers/@butchmeruem  !!<3

First off, i think that, while there is still a possibilty, it seems unlikely that Kurapika will die, as killing him off would be a very easy way to just finish his arc.

It wouldn’t resolve his trauma and it just seems predictable in a way and i want to believe that Togashi is a better writer than that.

Killing off Kurapika simply for shock value would in no way be a satisfying end for him or anyone around him.

I do believe there are about three directions his arc could go in.

(Manga Spoilers, obviously!)

1.1. Kurapika Gives Up His Revenge And Takes In Prince Woble

I believe this is a very likely possibilty, since it’s been shown that Kurapika is naturally calmer and happier around children - during the hunter licence arc hes at his best while hes together with Gon and Killua, and Leorio too and he very obviously feels naturally inclined to nurture kids, much like Leorio as they both are very worried about Gon and Killua during those arcs and now, during the current arc, Kurapika seems to enjoy being around Prince Woble.

If Kurapika were to take in Prince Woble either Leorio or Melody or even both would probably end up helping him take care of her.

Kurapikas arc appears to very much be about him finding the human connection, that he lost when his clan was killed, again, effectively making this found family story a Big Deal thematically.

Him finding a new purpose in life through taking care of Woble would be, in my opinion, a thematically satisfying ending for Kurapikas arc, since its been said by many in-story characters that his search for revenge will only destroy him in the end

Though, for this scenario, Prince Wobles Mother would probably have to die. I’ll discuss how i think it might happen in a bit!

1.2. Kurapika Won’t Rest Until The Phantom Troupe Is Dead And Then Takes In Prince Woble

In my opinion this is less likely, since its been talked about so much how the Revenge will destroy Kurapika.

But it might be a hint towards him finishing his revenge, only to loose his purpose in life, only to find it again bc taking in the baby.

Its basically a slightly darker version of my first theory.

1.3. Prince Woble Is Killed And Kurapika Looses It, Possibly Dying Too

I really dislike this one because it’s perfect, terrible angst fuel. Theres a lot of things going on on that Boat that could kill a baby

The Sucsession War, obviously

The Phantom Troupe

The Mafia

Hisoka

Probably more that I’m forgetting right now

So, if one of those factors ends up killing Woble i think it might be cause for Kurapika to finally, completely break, even more so if combined with the fact that he will most likey have to find Pairos preserved head with the remaining eyes of his clan.

Like i stated earlier, i do believe that this isn’t very likely but it still is very much a possibility, sadly.

2. Possibilities For The Plots General Direction

2.1. Queen Oito Dies

Queen Oitos death is very, very probable at this point.

She might sacrifice herself for Woble and possibly Kurapika to live, which supports Theory 1.1. & 1.2.! Possibly 1.3 too, with her death just being in vain.

But, remember how Kurapika and Queen are still connected through Emperor Time.

When Kurapika passed out because of overusage of his Nen, Queen Oito passed out right with him.

If Queen Oito dies and her and Kurpaika are still connected, I think Kurapika might experience the Sensation of Dying, without actually dying, which would be a huge traumatic experience for anyone.

> possible Leorio Reappearance though, since Kurapika would most definitely need a Doctor after that.

2.2. Pairos Head

I think most HxH fans have accepted/ackknowledged that the head that the Prince has in a Jar is most likey Pairos and that Kurapika will find it and experience extreme Emotional Turmoil, because of course.

Its his dead best friends head in a jar. What do you expect.

This is just wishful thinking but again, possibility that Kurapika will black out and need a doctor. > Leorio Reappearance

3. Why Leorio Is On The Black Whale

First, theres THIS post i made about how Leorios and Kurapikas arcs are connected. Reading it might add onto this specific point!

Now, simply put, from a narrative Perspective, Leorio is on the Black Whale for Kurapika.

I love Leorio but if Togashi wanted this arc to be about him, he would’ve given him more focus early on.

But no, the last time we saw Leorio it was Kurapika thinking about him.

“Though...Reality...Isn’t all that...Simple...!!!” Is literally Kurapika thinking, how always being on his own and alone is not as easy as he thought it would be, while thinking of Leorio, Gon and Killua.

More to this in a bit.

The in-story reason for Leorios presence on the Black Whale is that all the zodiacs are going, though Leorio stated that he wishes he could continue his studies.

This easily could’ve been used as an excuse to make him stay behind but Cheadle really just so happend to be someone who could train him so he could come along anyways.

There is little actual reason for Leorio to come along, except to maybe fight but someone else could easily fill that role.

The Key Difference is that Leorio is part of Kurapikas found family and also very quick to call people out on their bullshit which is exactly what Kurapika needs this arc.

I believe that’s why Togashi put him on the boat.

Now, again about the “Though...Reality...Isn’t all that...Simple...!!!” bit.

This is might really just be wishful interpretation and overthinking but Leorio has his own Panel and is facing closest to the viewpoint in the third one.

Also, the panel that shows him alone has him on the Phone.

I think that this implies, that Kurapika truly appreciates Leorios concern for him but keeps pushing him away for, what i assume is a fear of letting anyone get close to him, which brings us to:

3.1. Pairos Words

Since Pairos head might show up very soon, there will probably be a callback to his words, or atleast when Kurapikas arc ends, hopefully with him being happy, there will be.

I believe, or want to believe that those words will ultimately let Kurapika allow himself to be happy and let people in to actually help him, Re: Leorio and how he might help Kurapika!

If you’ve read this far, thank you so so much!!! I hope you liked what i wrote with Mags help and if you have anymore thoughts on this/any corrections on mistakes please feel free to send me an ask!!!