spazioaether

[bastardsunlight]

Heir, apparently

closed starter with @azurepanther

The Strife Electric Power Company was a megacorporation and no to ways about it. There was no pie into which the company had not stuck its proverbial fingers, no end of the planet where its tentacles did not reach. They were a political force, a military superpower, and the largest generator of—as the name of the company, understated as it was, declared, energy for people’s homes, businesses, and lives in general.

The heir apparent, therefore, would be expected to carry himself with grace and aplomb.

He did not do this. He was so tired of pretending to care about doing that in any capacity. He fought tooth and nail to be everything his mother, Claudia, the president of the corporation and mistress after god—if there was a god, anyway—of every aspect of his life and the lives of the thousands upon thousands of people the SEPC employed.

When she sat him down this evening, therefore, to lecture him about his nightly forays into the lower levels of the city, under the plate, into Wall Market specifically, he was doing his damnedest to tune her out. Until her flat hand made contact with his cheek and sent him sprawling, in fact, he was almost accomplishing it. The tirade which came after was hardly overshadowed by the strike; in fact, they seemed to complement each other rather nicely.

He picked himself up and brushed off.

“Are we done?”

Her hand shot out again and cracked him hard across the face.

“No,” she hissed, “and now, since I know I can’t trust you, until I’m dead and buried,  you’ll have eyes on you.”

“Like I don’t already.”

CRACK

“The best set Tseng could provide,” she informed him, a glint of cold satisfaction in her eyes as Cloud registered what she meant. Gesturing to the doors, which opened at her behest to reveal a blond man in a dark blue suit and gloves, President Claudia continued. “He needs little introduction, I think; you know a Turk when you see one and you’ll be seeing a lot of him. Think of him as an armsman to soothe your pathetic ego, Cloud, but really, he’s a babysitter.”

And with that, she turned on her fine, expensive heels and strode away, confident she had broken her unruly son. Cloud felt the heat of his cheeks where she’d hit him and felt only battered, not broken. When he looked up, therefore, it was with the eyes of a wounded animal. One corner of his pretty, bruised mouth curled upward.

“Mom’s got a hell of a right hook.”  

[devildom-moss]

hello !! happy anniversary to ur blog and so sorry again for not reading ur rules for the flash requests post 💔

may i request sfw + 12 w solomon. just him pining for reader. like doesn't even have to include dialogue w/mc, i just wanna see him being so horrendously down bad for them hehe thank you 🫶🏻

Thank you, and no worries! I hope you don't mind headcanons with this one. Now, did I get too invested in this request? I think so. It's almost double the intended length. Do I regret that? Not in the slightest. I hope you enjoy it!!

1 year anniversary flash request event - SFW

(Solomon x gn!MC)

Prompt 12 – Your choice: Pining

Pining!Solomon, whose hands tremble when you hug him as he slowly brings his arms up to try to hug you back. For his entire life, he had never needed to be held by anyone – not in the way that he needs you. When he’s in your arms, he almost can’t believe it. It feels too good to be true, like some cruel setup designed to bring him a moment of pure joy before ripping you from his grasp. So, his hands tremble with uncertainty and love and hope that he can never speak of. Solomon will snap himself out of his fear, and when he does, his hands will grip your back and pull you in. He never knows when to let go – or rather, he never wants to. If only he could keep you in his arms for a second longer. If only he could hold you every day. If only your warmth would linger on his skin forever.

Pining!Solomon, who will never give up sitting with his legs spread apart now that he knows the feeling of your warmth pressed against him when he refused to give you the space. He knows it’s rude, but he would do anything to keep that prolonged contact. He needs it. Politeness be damned. What does politeness know of the comfort he gets from the physical proof that you are right by his side?

Pining!Solomon, who traces the spines of his books, mapping your name through the topography of every curve or scratch as he waits for you to arrive for your study sessions with him. When you’re running late, your name exists on the spine of every book on his desk. You’ll live on them forever. Now, he can scarcely scan through his personal library without feeling your presence.

Pining!Solomon, who reviews your last sent message when he hasn’t seen you all day. His fingers hover over the screen as he contemplates reaching out. But is one day too soon? He scans his mind for any believable excuse to contact you.

Pining!Solomon, whose mouth is a reflection of his mind, always wandering in your direction. Whether he’s chatting with the demons or angels or in a conference with the Sorcerers’ Society. He can’t resist asking about your well-being or your daily life (the parts of it that he isn’t involved in). He brags about his adorable, talented apprentice to the Sorcerers’ Society and even random demons and witches he’s acquainted with. However, he’s always careful not to brag too much – less someone try to harm you or steal you right from under his watchful eye. If anyone so much as considered it, Solomon would see red until his anger was soothed by disproportionate aggression or the comfort of your voice and touch.

Pining!Solomon, whose body follows after you whenever you pull away. When you break off a kiss, he leans into you, chasing the feeling of your lips on him again. When you let go of his hand, he reaches forward, ever so slightly, trying to recapture your touch. When you let go during a hug, he inches just a bit closer. When you walk ahead of him, he picks up his pace to catch you. When your bonds strengthen with the others, his heart aches, trying to crawl its way back to you.

Pining!Solomon, who doesn’t know how to be alone anymore. His mind has your face and voice memorized. When you aren’t around, sometimes he imagines you calling him from the other room – that if he sat up and walked in there right now, he’d see your precious face, smiling at him. He’ll use technology and magic to preserve these memories with routine frequency – in case the worst should ever happen.

Pining!Solomon, who has never known fear like this. His entire life could collapse in on itself, making him an emotional black hole, from a simple shift in your existence. That is the magnetic strength of his love for you. No change in your presence goes unnoticed. If you got hurt. . . if you died. . . he would pull all realms into his pain.

But, also, Pining!Solomon, who has never known peace like this. If anything could wash over the wreckage of a garden that Solomon has cultivated himself – sick with rot and death that poisons instead of fertilizing, that smells of chemicals and rust, where only the toxic and wretched could bloom – and make it divine, it would be your presence. It would be your laugh when Asmo has pranked Solomon, and the witty sorcerer was none the wiser. It would be the way you danced along to music with Solomon in the kitchen as you prepared dinner – if for no other reason than pointless joy, then to distract him from his desire to help with the cooking. It would be the way you rolled your eyes when Solomon caused you trouble, because your annoyance couldn’t overcome your affection for him. It would be your warmth and the gentle sound of your breathing as you slumped against Solomon’s shoulder – when he longed to trace his fingers along your beloved form, but the fear of waking you stilled his hands. It would be the trusting, understanding smile on your face, when Solomon couldn’t express his feelings in anything more than a whispered “I love you” – even when you needed his praise shouted to the sky for all to understand.

A/N: this will be the last request for the 1 year event - SFW request day. I still have 3 more SFW requests in my inbox though.

Requests are now closed. I will be working on the NSFW requests tomorrow. Don't worry, if you got your flash request in (or if you're waiting on requests from the previous round of general requests), I'll still be working on those. This was a lot of fun so far, so thank you all for participating with me.

[marymary-diva17]

Hi, i was hoping you could write a story about the Bridgeton family having a sister, who is about a year older than Daphne and is absolutely gorgeous, who is brought home by their father, and believing her to be an affair child only Eloise and Benedict treat her nicely. Not like Cinderella bad, but where she is essentially family-adjacent and often excluded and snubbed by the family. Only for it to come out that she is Queen Charlotte and King George's only recognized grandchild. She is presented to the queen by Benedict without the knowledge of the other family members. And it happens to occur right after Daphne, and she immediately steals all of the attention especially if/when it comes to light by the Queen questioning why you haven't seen her since you were younger and and how your life and education has been while you were hidden with, what comes to light as "your late father's dearest friend" meaning that she was sent to the Bridgeton house to be protected, as a child, after her father died and the late Vicount was only aloud to tell 2 people in his family. And the Bridgeton's all try to save face, even trying to force her, in some way, into keeping things quiet and fixing the damages done to their family name.

Sorry for the length... Also, could her name be "Luciana"? Or "Irene"? I've always loved those names.

Life among the ton can be difficult on anyone standing among London high society. Since a new member had joined from birth or marriage their moves were watched closely, and judge by the rest of the society as well. That is not far from the truth for one young lady, in ton society as since she was very young she had been judged, by those outside of the home and majorly inside the home as well.

y/n " ......." you had woken up and made your way through the Bridgeton house, ready to join the your family for breakfast. There are those in the house that don't call you family, and see you as outsider.

Eloise " y/n good morning"

y/n " Eloise good morning"

Eloise " are you planning to join us for breakfast it will be good to have you there, even due Benedict is there morning meal is still so boring"

y/n " I will love to join but if need I will have my meal elsewhere" Eloise had given you a sad look as she knew that you were, never treated fairly in the home.

Eloise " then if you go then I shall come it better then here, about this upcoming season"

y/n " oh yes the season has finally come for me to find a husband"

Eloise " you will do well I know it now come we shall not be late" The pair had soon made their way downstairs, and soon to the room where breakfast had been setup for the family.

Anthony " sister good morning it good you are here"

Eloise " good morning Anthony I have brought y/n as well, do you wish to greet her as well"

Antony " good morning Y/n"

Y/n " good morning Anthony"

Daphne " good morning sister and brother"

Antony " good morning sweet sister"

Eloise " good morning sister come on y/n let take a sit"

Y/n " good morning Daphne"

Daphne " morning" the four members of the home soon sat down at the table. As soon enough there had been footsteps coming down the stairs.

Voilet " Good morning my children it good to see some of my older kids down here, for a family breakfast"

Antony/Daphne/Eloise " Good morning mother"

Y/n " good morning lady Bridgeton"

Voilet " good morning"

Francesca " good morning Daphne are you happy that the season will be starting soon"

Daphne " yes sister I'm happy about this season to marry for love like mama and papa"

Gregory " well I'm looking forward to all the sweet treats that will come"

Hyacinth " always thinking about food Gregory"

Violet " sit down you three please as we wait for your two older brothers" The three younger Bridgeton's had sat by their two older siblings and mother, staying away from you at the moment.

Colin " good morning family sorry we are late"

Benedict " yes good morning we have come to join for breakfast"

Violet " well it good we are all here now we can eat a meal as family"

Colin " kinda of family see that one of us past" Colin had looked at you making you feel worst.

Benedict " brother please be kind and don't ruin this morning for us, so y/n are you ready for this season"

y/n " oh yes I'm Benedict"

Benedict " In days time we will be presenting Daphne and y/n to the queen and rest of society, as they have finally joined the ton"

Daphne " it will be splendid mother and I made sure my dress is perfect and ready"

Anthony " good as this year will be seeking a husband and me a wife as well"

Benedict " don't forget I and Colin might be looking for love as well, let not forget y/n she is a member of the household as well"

Eloise " yes y/n tell me about your dress"

y/n " well I was able to get the dress ready I hope it will be good, when I'm presented"

Benedict " you will be wonderful and so shall Daphne"

Colin " we shall see if any man will have her knowing what, type of women she will be just like her mother"

Benedict " brother I shall not have you speak to her like that she is one of us"

Colin " she is one of father greatest mistake mother had forgiven father, but never her mother no family shall have her"

Eloise " Colin you are being rude"

y/n " it okay I think I will take my breakfast in the garden as I wish, not to ruin your family meal"

Elosie " then I shall come with you Benedict"

Benedict " I will come as well"

Voilet " Elosie and Benedict you both should stay here and have a meal with your family"

Benedict " she is our family as well mother father brought her into the family and she family" The tiro soon left as they went to have breakfast somewhere else. It clear to see your are not well like by the household and some of the staff as well, they along with everyone else saw you as love child of the former viscount. As he had brought to the family home one day, telling his wife they shall be taking you in as one of their own. Everyone had thought you are Edmond love child and that your birth mother was either dead or left you in his care.

Later on that day

Penelope " so y/n are you ready for the present to the queen"

y/n " my nerves and scared of what shall happen that day"

Eloise " well thanks to our cruel family they have made matter worst"

y/n " tell me Eloise and Penelope why do young ladies like you wish, to be in my present"

Eloise " because we care for you and you are dearest to us as well"

Penelope " you always care for anyone even due they don't care for you back, having you as friend has made life grande here"

y/n " thank you"

Eloise " I know you shall do well this season as married women or unmarried"

y/n " thank you and I know you two will do well in society as well, both of you have grown and will do amazing things in the future" the three girls had smiled as they went back to walking, hearing some whispers and glares among the ton. Right now that didn't bother you anymore, as you will let them talk all they want.

Pretension of ladies to society

Benedict " sister may I come inside"

y/n " yes you can come inside Benedict and Eloise as well, I know she is there"

Eloise " good morning sister .... you look beautiful"

y/n " thank you the dress is not to much on me it seem like the dress, had been picked ahead for me"

Eloise " Benedict shall be presenting you to the queen and the ton, as mother and Anthony wish not to"

y/n " I understand"

Benedict " well then now that you are official ready let get going my sister" you had nodded your head the rest of the family are gone, as the trio left for the palace soon arriving there. Eloise went to go wait with the rest of the family.

Announcer " Miss Daphne brigerton present by her mother the right honorable viscountess violet brigerton" the door opened as Violet and Daphne walked into the hall gasping can be heard as Daphne, had entered the hall.

Benedict " you will do well y/n there nothing to hear"

y/n " yes thank you Benedict"

Announcer " Miss Y/n present my lord Benedict bridgerton" you and Benedict had started walking down the towards the queen, as she soon stopped what she was doing. This had gained everyone attention as they looked at you and back at their queen.

queen Charolette " my dear come closer so I may get a better look at you, such a beautiful young lady who might become my second diamond or different gem"

Benedict " your majesty I will like to present to you Y/n my sister"

Queen Charolette " yes I know of her my dear you look so much like your mother"

y/n " thank you your majesty"

brimsley " my majesty I think this best to have this conversation elsewhere at the moment, with a few selected member allowed to come"

Queen Charolette " Edmond had been a friend of your father and took you after his death, your mother had dead years ago and it was not safe for you so he took you in making a promise to care for you and keep you safe as he had done I can see he was a good lord"

y/n " Eloise Benedict did you know of this"

Eloise " yes father had told us many years ago as he could trust us"

lady danbury " I knew as well when your father passed I was going to, have you come live with me but you were close to the other children at the moment"

y/n " I never though this will happen ever I think I might need to sit" you and elosie had sat down as you collected your thoughts about the whole situation.

Benedict " you have rights to be upset with us for keeping this, but we had been doing this for you safety sister my father and yours wanted you to be happy and live a good life"

y/n " I understand where they have come from and I wish they were still here"

Queen Charolette " well all do my granddaughter so do you wish to go back out there and become a diamond of the season, not because of blood but because of who you are your mother daughter a wonderful women I see you and many others have seen as well"

y/n " yes I'm ready to face them" the grouo soon left the room and went back to where everyone is ready.

Anthony " your majesty I'm sorry for what my household has caused you ..."

Queen Charolette "silence I'm have something to say right"

Queen Charolette " many years ago I had a granddaughter born into my family, but she had to go into hiding for her safety after the death of my son it broken my heart along with the rest of our family ... but today she had come home Y/n bridgerton as you all know her is the future duchess and my granddaughter as well" the queen had knew of what had been spoken about her granddaughter, she wasn't a big fan of many of those standing in the room.

brismley " Duchness Y/n of the royal household of queen Charolette and king Gregor and the new gem of the season as well"

Queen Charolette " my decision have been made this season and will not be changed, so let enjoy this season and see what lady whistle down has to say as well" In one day you had become a duchess and didn't even have to marry it your birthright indeed. The once queen who was looked down my many was know, a duchess they all wish to become close with in life but they all will see it shall not be the easy as they think when royals and other important households are involved.

[supermentaleyeliner]

obx s4 e1 🏍️

i just watched the first episode of OUTER BANKS SEASON 4 (part one) so here are some raw thoughts & notes <33

( not proofread, literally just rambled. but hope u enjoy it & if you make it to the end - the real end - ur a real one <3 wtf was that ?? lol )

first of all, how is everyone so gorgeous in this season like thank you <33333 my babes are looking better than ever in the perfect balance between tired to the max and serving (renewed 2024). cleo is hot as fuck like always, mah john duo is looking so damn sharp and good, pope is literally king so i don't need to explain, and sarah just full on pogue life now ugh <3 and KIARA. MA'AM. i'm not a fan of kiara (sue me) but she is GLOWING this season. like, just like the girls of the cast said, they're def putting effort into their looks and boy is it working. kiara's outfits and hair through all the flashbacks and time jumps in this first episode has been heaven. and now that i've got curls i am feeling so inspired by her. and just every piece of her clothes?? the girls as a whole?? man i haven't felt this happy recently like damn. alr moving on (i'm not)

+ the emotional length & setup we got already. all that stuff with 'doesn't mean we're pogues' at the shop from jj & kie, just jj's face all along as they were dealing with the maybank property (wtf happened to luke tho am i forgetting something), his burstout after they made poguelandia 2.0 and his "home" come true, kie looking at him with the new perspective(which i surprisingly don't hate this season, he deserves it), and ofc some peak jj maybank behavior with the auction & enduro, oh god we are so back to what obx is, and we're really getting the jj focus & depth we badly wanted throughout the whole journey. i love my boy.

RAFAEL CAMERON. that man appeared on the screen and shattered my heart. such a big jump between the pogues scenes and him and i was 200% in for both of them. i announced my stance that i would not gaf if rafe and sofia broke up at the end of the season or sofia did shit to him or something (sorry) and barry was just there for him, and i still stand by it, but thank god THANK GOD he had someone to be there with him when he was doing ward's ashes. i was full on tearing my heart out crying screaming when he said those lines to his dad because oh he was the awful-est to you. and that bitterness at the race. but then sofia yelling "you got this baby" or whatever it was. Gah. pls take care of my boy. pls. am i reading a fic because he's finally got someone to love, someone who loves him.

since i didn't see wheezie, sofia, or barry at the premiere (i think) i was sort of worried, and wheezie and barry haven't shown yet (obx has the best side characters like be for real even rose has an interesting role and all the side villain-ish people haunt you forever) -- but it's only the first episode of the first part and i'm willing to have patience !! i was so angry to hear it was coming out in two parts but i'm not gonna be having much time to binge anyways so i won't complain, i'm just way too happy with what i got till now and god i'm so thankful. all that stuff with tua and kaos yeah fuck you netflix but jeez. at least i have this and heartstopper ---- no, no, no, thank motherfucking god they didn't set these on fire. ugh i'm so happy right now. okay. gonna stop talking now. GAHK. so cute so perfect so happy i can't !!!!!!!!!!

...

(seriously tho rafe pulling that move near the end of the race?? i rly didn't know who to cheer for with rafe and jj doing that. i mean for the plot i gotta stand for jayj but i love rafe. don't we all on tumblr. but honestly i love rafe for doing that. bahaha my man like-- how am i supposed to explain this but like-- yeah sucks for the pogues i was really rooting for their life but rafael cameron my man - how i love saying that name - that's my man. that's my bitch that's my spontaneous asshole.)

(oh i'm not done yet -- i'm pretty happy with how the whole story of the first episode led us back to the end of the last season. to see an at-the-time-not-understandable time skip with them in their kooky - beautiful but just kooky for some reason - outfits ;; only to finally see with the release of this season that was actually them at their low after all those stuff. but they still dressin up, like they businesspeople mannnn, i love it. i love where we're finding them for season 4. and then right back where we started with the old adventure 'i'm definitely not going in there' 'pls stop ur tales jj' 'i've been looking for you' 'afternoon, sir' vibe ?? oh god that was so good, that was something ELSE. overwhelmed overemotional to the max. GAH FUCKING POGUE LIFE FUCKING P4L WHAT ELSE CAN I SAY)

(and i fucking love the soundtrack like what is it with this season. i need a playlist asap but since i don't have spotify and can't listen to the official stuff i'll just have to make or find a list of everything in the show and add each song myself--- jesus christ i haven't even finished the one for tua))

[ranticore]

whats a day in the life of the average Kosa falconer? especially what with their Eternal Manchildren . how do they interact with them on a day to day basis. how do the harpies feel about it. cuz its been all they know their entire lives and im curious to know the perspective of a classically obtained falconer’s harpy. sorry if this is like jumbled my brain is mush atm

not exactly for the in-character ama but if you want to answer in character feel free

Cool questions thank you... so for the falconers in the classical style (harpy obtained as an egg), they train for years to first 'earn' the honour of being able to raise one. They start as children and help out around the mews, doing basic drudgery like mucking out the nests and preparing the soaked meat to exacting standards. When they're considered old enough, they can help out with raising chicks and the daily hunts.

an average day in the life depends on rank but for a normal falconer it's entirely devoted to the birds. falconers cannot marry or have children or any obligations outside their harpy because the harpy will get upset - although it is a flock, the social balance is off, and the falconer is expected to be the sole provider for any of the harpy's emotional needs (it's like owning a parrot). the harpies are often extremely anxious and high-strung as a result and this can increase aggression far above normal levels (particularly around food. food aggression is the leading cause of falconer injuries) so the falconers often spend their mornings on low-stress 'warm-up' activities like grooming, language lessons, some weaving, or just sitting and talking.

[cut just for length lol]

if the likelihood of a hunt happening that day is slim, the afternoons and evenings are occupied by flying. for the sake of exercise as well as training; the two have to learn how to work in sync, as the falconer's shoulder and horse will provide the only safe perch during a hunt and it means they need to familiarise themselves with one another, with their horse, with their equipment, etc. The most crucial part of a hunt is the part where a harpy drops the crawling beast onto the bonfire, so they need to get used to flying around fire, the unpredictable air currents and smoke. If there is a hunt, they ride patrols around the walls of their village until the crawling beasts show themselves, with the harpy on the horse as well so they they won't tire before their strength is needed.

how do the harpies feel about it? depends on the individual. some of them do take well to their lives, especially those whose eggs were given willingly - they can derive some degree of satisfaction from knowing that their parents were comfortable enough with the idea to choose that life for them. some enjoy protecting people, some couldn't care less. the hunts are hard work and require a good degree of skill, and yeah it is satisfying to work so perfectly in sync with someone else. but in all cases they are quite attached to their falconers. idk i mean they are people, they're going to have different opinions, and the flock self-selects for those who are eager and willing to do the work - after all, they can just fly away mid-hunt. but it is undeniable that the balance of power in the relationship is not equal, otherwise the natural school of falconry [pact with an established adult] wouldn't have died out. the ethics of this setup are not good. many of them will just assume that this is the way of the world, and in extreme cases where they do choose to fly away, they are ill-suited to life apart from the mews. the integration of wild harpies into the flock due to the presence of a king does shift perspectives a lot, and eventually would birth a new school of falconry which is basically just "what if we just let them raise each other and provided the food and shelter and bonfires". but the likes of Mriya come from just before that time.

Mriya herself is sort of a microcosm case study on their mindset for me. There is a slightly stunted, immature quality to her emotions though she's as smart as anyone else and a grown adult, she just has been completely alienated from her social core to the point where she feels very little, except for the times where bottled up anger explodes out of her. She's so frustrated but doesn't understand the feeling as frustration; it's just a constant background hum. It makes her dangerous to be around, which angers her more. She was raised in a slightly different environment by the falconer Yuriy - constantly on the road between villages to sell their services, just the two of them, no flock at all. Despite being birds of prey (she is based off a gyrfalcon kinda), they're still deeply social people. Yuriy cared for her and all but the basic living situation did a lot of damage. it's sort of a parallel to Thunder Strike's attitudes toward Cuinn, where our pal Thunder was kind and caring and provided for Cuinn, but it wasn't what was needed, and so in this situation Yuriy/Thunder Strike are not blameless, but acting within their own cultural framework and believing that they were doing their best. But yeah again not blameless lol

[the-owl-tree]

regarding various ideas thatve been discussed here, my vision is like 

After the whole “seriously considered murdering him” bit in sunset, Firestar demoted Brambleclaw and made Brackenfur deputy. Cardboard cutout of a man 

Initially Jay is brightheart’s apprentice, Holly is Leafpool’s, lion is brackenfur’s 

In a battle that makes Jay and Holly change their minds (for Jayfeather I feel like I would want him to have some kind of arc about internalised ableism,, like he has to learn a nuanced lesson about how he doesn’t need to be productive by the standards of clan culture and it’s okay for him to acknowledge his limits and choose a different path, but also his clanmates should allow him to define his limits and not treat him like he’s made of glass. I digress) - in the battle where Holly and Jay change their minds, Brackenfur Freaking Dies and only now is bramble deputy. I think I’d want firestar to die earlier too so we can get shitty bramblestar + the most depressed squilf you’ve ever seen

Now we’ve got Jay as Leafpool’s apprentice, Holly as ashfur’s, and lion as brightheart’s because man I always felt bad she never got an apprentice again 

and with this setup I would want basically everything to be significantly more fucked up. Ashfur exacerbates Hollyleaf’s fixation on the code and power (foreshadowing tbc??), I’d want Lionblaze to like, accidentally hurt somebody really badly in training and have to grapple with feeling like a monster more. Maybe instead of Cinderheart falling out of a tree, Lionblaze accidentally injures her 

Speaking of cinderheart I want her to do some of the stuff poppyfrost does I love poppyfrost but having cinderheart narrowly escape death and feel strangely drawn towards the moonpool would be a lot more fun - I think I’d frame her being cinderpelt as something that was either accidental, or intentional but StarClan was in the wrong for not letting cinderpelt rest because I really resent the idea that cinderpelt needed a second chance at life as if the life she lived after becoming disabled wasn’t a good and worthwhile one 

So yeah cinderheart is possessed by a restless ghost, lionblaze can’t stop hurting people no matter how hard he tries, hollyleaf is just regular hollyleaf but more, jayfeather… I dunno maybe make StarClan genuinely scared of him because of how much his power allows him to defy them. Maybe he feels detached from himself and is almost constantly dissociating because he spends so much time walking in dreams and other peoples minds. I don’t know I don’t like jayfeather 

ALL THIS. And then have your thing about dove and ivy being cinderholly kits also be true do you see my vision do you understand . I am so sorry about the length of this I got carried away

I AM EATING ALL OF THIS UP BIG YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i always wished jaypaw's first battle with shadowclan was what got him to change, like it's this big awakening to what clan culture is really like. he gets the shit kicked out of him and he's like "wow. this sucks. why is everyone making this sound so great"

and big big BIG yes with cinderheart, i feel she deserved some better meat than what po3 and oots was throwing her. these are lovely i am LOOKING

[happilylovingchaos]

911 Lone Star Countdown - Disasters Week Questions

Hello and thank you for including me @lonestar-s5countdown! This is a little trickier for me to answer tbh. I think 9-1-1 might stand to have longer-lasting consequences from their natural disasters (no need to skip past tsunami wreckage recovery or months-long rebuilding of the highway collapse, those would make some meaty dramatic narrative arcs), but otherwise it so far edges out Lone Star when it comes to order of experience (like, which state got which disaster first).

1) My favorite disaster… okay, gonna have to divvy btwn the 9-1-1s for this!

The plane crash in 9-1-1 (OG) would probably be my underrated favorite in terms of narrative developments for Buck, Bobby and Abby.

Season 4’s heat wave was more glossed over for plot setup, but I didn’t mind this natural disaster precisely because it was a little smaller in scale and because the plot setups (even the Iris arc tho that definitely needed fine tuning in hindsight) hooked me in already. (I also didn’t mind Brianna and Caleb in this one b/c this time Caleb’s situation was not his own fault.)

2) Since they’ve already done tornadoes (though, there’s always a chance they’ll do those again), a volcanic eruption, wildfires and a winter storm, I would think the only disasters LS hasn’t gotten down yet are freeway collapses, floods (barring how the cast would look while soaking wet, don’t ignore areas like Galveston, writers! There’s WAY more to the state than farmland, Dallas, Austin and El Paso yk! Let’s just say before I digress I kinda wish the showrunners were able to film in actual Texas), a border skirmish (just out of genuine interest— not getting any more political and no Owen’s refugee rescue doesn’t count) or droughts/ water shortages (no, heat waves also don’t count). I also just realized that the domestic terrorist arc could have waited for a later season too! O’Brien and Owen had chaotic good vibes much akin to him and Billy Tyson (if the three of them worked together tho? The 126 should probably move their whole firefighter team out of Travis County b/c they ain’t gonna go through the second-hand pain again).

3) They had and lost me at meteor/ asteroid, so I’m not sure I’d say looking forward to it. It all depends on execution, I suppose? (Sorry for the question mark, I’m just baffled since that usually needs film-length amount of time— I’ve seen the film Deep Impact. Scientific nitpicks aside the investigations, action and future implications in that film were well-paced enough.)

4) My top 3? Judd b/c he’s a great all-around leader whenever shit hits the fan— honest (sometimes to a fault but I can kinda relate), strong integrity and conscientiousness, and so dad-like even before he became a dad. Mateo b/c he’d be like the underrated badass youngest brother of any group— speaking as an only child tho. Third… boy, I can’t break this tie. It’s a draw between Tommy (she’s very composed and professional even during the times she isn’t) and Paul (I’d like to learn memorization-observational skills from him, and he fits the “cool Zen mode” temperament a little better than Carlos, don’t @ me).

5) This is painful… okay I’m so sorry. I don’t think I can answer this one as of now.

Tagging next: @lutavero @reyesstrand @toomanycupsoftea @fitzherbertssmolder @marjansmarwani @trkstrnd

[is-the-snake-video-cute]

hello! you very kindly answered an ask of mine recently, and now that i’ve gone through your ball python tag i have a few burning questions!!

1) i’m having a very hard time keeping humidity up for our BP. she’s been doing fine, but she shed recently and it didn’t go as smoothly as it has before. after reading a few of your tips, i think i’m going to try helping her with the last little bits of skin with some reptile shedding spray and a short soak. do you have any other tips here? i know i should keep the water shallow and not try to force off any skin with my fingers.

2) this wasn’t the worst shed ever, but i’d really like to get ahead of it next time and just go ahead and figure out how to get her humidity right. i’m already using coconut substrate, but misting with a sprayer doesn’t seem to be cutting it. i was planning on buying a fancy reptile humidifier, but i haven’t seen that discussed much here. i saw you say somewhere to add water to the substrate itself, but what exactly does that entail/how much should i use? and about how much substrate should actually be down in the tank?

3) for her enclosure itself we’re using exo terra’s 40 gallon tank, which comes with a screen top. we covered a lot of it with a towel (also serving as a privacy curtain) to keep in humidity but i wasn’t sure if that was a good idea or not?

sorry to ask so many questions!! thank you so much for your time!!

(oh, last note! i know 40 gallons isn’t the right size for an adult BP, but she is currently about the same length as the long side. i haven’t had her long enough to know quite how fast they grow, should i be scrambling for a bigger enclosure now?)

Hello hello - these are all good questions, and I really love the care and love you're putting into giving your snake the best!

A soak sounds like a great idea. Make sure the water is lukewarm but not hot - it should feel the tiniest bit chilly on your fingers. Giving your snake a washcloth during their soak is a great idea because that gives them something to hold onto and they'll often be able to rub stuck shed off themselves with it.

I recommend no less than an inch of substrate. How much water you add to rehydrate depends on how big your enclosure is, but a good general rule for a 40 gal is about a cup of water poured into the corners will do nicely. Especially since you've got a screen-top enclosure (which are very difficult to keep humidity in), if you want to spring for a humidifier, it might be a good idea. I don't personally use them (because I'm old and I prefer to limit the number of devices that could malfunction in my snake enclosures), but it might work well for you in this situation. Another trick for raising humidity levels is to make sure you're keeping a deep water dish on the warm side so it'll evaporate into the air (though, again, with screen-top enclosures that'll only do so much).

A towel can help to retain humidity in screen-top enclosures, but there are a few other tricks that might work better. A sheet of plywood or PVC cut to cover most of the enclosure is what I've found to work best; failing that, covering the top with tinfoil you've taped down securely is another good option. Screen-top enclosures can be a bit of a nightmare with humidity-loving snakes like bps, but there are workarounds!

How fast a snake reaches thier adult size depends on how much they eat and individual variation, but in general you can expect most snakes to reach their adult size between 3 and 5 years old. Some will be faster and some slower. If your snake is comfortable in a 40 gallon now, that's fine! I prefer to get snakes in their adult enclosures at around 2 years old, but there's no need to scramble. Just keep in mind what she'll eventually need (I recommend no smaller than a 4x2x2 enclosure), plan for that eventuality, and prepare to have it when she outgrows her current setup.

All the best!!

[aooni]

hello ^_^ i hope you don’t mind my curiosity but rpgmaker horror games have been a huge Huge interest for me for years since childhood and its nice to see others enjoying and liking them in a non-ironic way LOL… anyway do you have a favorite version of ao oni?! i know there’s a lot of notable differences between them 0__0

Hey you unleashed some kind of demon in me and this is so long and I am sorry in advance about that. I really like being asked about video games, especially the ones I like that don't get a lot of unironic attention. I really just want to get out everything I love about this game.

I am putting this under a cut to not clog up the dashboards of others. Most of my mutuals are actually not into Ao Oni so I will be describing things as if whoever potentially reads it has little to no information about what happens in the first game.

The original public release of Ao Oni, version 1.1, is my favourite. It is mainly distinguished by its shorter length, lack of puzzles, different cast, and unique death count. It was the first version of the game I played in late 2022 and is the one that got me interested in the series.

I think what I like the most about it is actually the different setup and cast. You get a bit more context to the events leading up to the cast going to the mansion. I'd go as far as to say this is the only version that has what is essentially an opening cutscene. It features Hiroshi and his friend Kazuya being bothered by Takuro and his gang of bullies, who drag the two to the mansion. They all bicker for a bit before the game starts and none of it is particularly important but I think it gives the characters a bit more life. Also, important note for later, the names of the other bullies are Megumi, Takeshi, and Ryota.

First things first, a big part of my favouritism of this game comes from just the existence of Hiroshi and Kazuya as friends. I am attached to all of the friendships in Ao Oni but these two hold a special place in my heart because they were the first Ao Oni friendship I ever saw. Going into a more headcanon-y territory, I like to think Hiroshi's motivation to get out of the mansion is a bit different in this version. He likes Kazuya a lot. He stands up for Kazuya against the bullies and when everyone suddenly disappears from the hotel's foyer, his main concern is where the bullies took Kazuya. When Hiroshi finds Takeshi shivering in the closet, he also asks him about Kazuya. The way I see things personally, the big goal of Hiroshi, alongside escaping the mansion, is finding his friend :) !! It sure does suck that Kazuya no longer exists after version 1.1 :( ...

What makes this dynamic so unique is how in the other versions of the first game, the main four characters are all friends. They do butt heads sometimes, especially in version 3.0 where they all have a pretty negative discussion, but I'd consider them all pals. Other pieces of Ao Oni media like the novels bring back certain concepts like Takuro being a school bully but the focus here is the portrayal of characters in the first game, and in the first game, 1.1 is the only place where you're going to get Takeshi, Takuro, and Mika being presented as a kind of antagonistic force, if you don't count Takeshi apparently being the reason everyone went into the mansion in certain other versions of the game.

By the way, who the hell is Mika? I never said that was one of the characters names. Fun fact: Megumi is Mika. She was renamed after version 1.1 but is the same character! I love Mika and she is my favourite of the human characters so she's special. She gets her own paragraph in this dedicated to me explaining they changed her name. Do you want another paragraph about Mika? Well, you're getting one later and I'll be calling her Megumi in it because I need to stay consistent to the names in 1.1.

Oh also I might as well mentioned Ryota. He, like Kazuya was removed from the game entirely in future versions. He dies in a bathtub. That's kind of it. But, there is one more interesting thing about him. His sprite is actually the sprite that would be used for Hiroshi in later versions.

Left is Ryota. Right is Hiroshi.

This is a dead Hiroshi to me.

Moving away from characters, what I find most interesting about this version is actually it lacking something I'd say Ao Oni is known for. In terms of gameplay, I'd say a signature of the original Ao Oni is its puzzles, which often have randomised answers and require you to use lateral thinking. I've always enjoyed this, at least in the first game where the puzzles don't feel too stale. However, 1.1 lacks puzzles. Instead, you just wander around the mansion, evading the Oni and finding keys to new rooms that will hopefully contain Kazuya or a way out. While I do love the puzzles of the later versions, I feel like the vibe of the game completely changes when you're not trying to solve things and the sole elements are exploration and fear of the Oni. The mansion feels a lot more dead without puzzles and, to me, it feels more real in a weird way, even if this is a mansion haunted by a Photoshop demon. It also makes things miles easier. This was the first version I could learn to play without a walkthrough and someone I know who played 1.1 because of me flat out did not need any help beating the game.

There is difficulty to 1.1, though. In my opinion, it has the most difficult chases from the original Oni. I say original Oni because there is Fuwatti in 6.23, an oni who works completely differently and always kicks my ass. In 1.1, the original Oni will chase you for 20 seconds. On top of that, it has buggy AI. It can walk backwards, go sideways on stairs, or straight up get stuck. This has actually thrown me off and gotten me killed before but that's not really intentional difficulty, I think. I don't really blame the developer because RPG Maker is a wild beast that is difficult to tame when it comes to bugs. I have used RPG Maker. Just trust me on this.

The difficulty of the chases are partially made up for with the existence of a safe room. There is one room in the game where Megumi resides and it's the only room the Oni cannot enter at all. When you go in there, any chase will end in a matter of a few seconds. This doesn't negate the difficulty of chases because you have to actually make it to the room without dying (and sometimes you will be really far from it) but it helps a lot. I have a generally positive opinion on this room and Megumi barricading herself in there to protect herself from the Oni spawned my headcanon that she is generally pretty smart and also was the beginning of me becoming interested in her.

Speaking of the chases, they tie into another thing I adore about Ao Oni in general: the atmosphere! The game is relatively silent.

There are two more things to cover before we just get into nothing but headcanons and random info. Death time. In version 3.0 and 6.23, everybody dies except Hiroshi. In version 5.2, either everybody dies or everybody lives since there are two endings. In version 1.1, there is no all or nothing situation. Ryota and Takuro are explicitly seen dead. Takeshi is never seen again and is presumed dead as he never escapes the mansion. Hiroshi, Kazuya, and Megumi get out alive. I think it's neat in comparison to just everyone living or everyone dying.

If you would let me be negative for a moment, I actually dislike the lead up to the ending. The mansion is just suddenly unlocked and Kazuya leaves. Okay. What. I have strongly disliked this specific moment for two years. I even have a snippet of a review I wrote about two years ago of me getting a little heated about this particular moment. I will also include another snippet about my only other issue with the game relating to the lack of clarification on Takeshi's status. I just wish you got something cool like re-opening the closet he's in later and seeing his body fall out of it.

This is a really sudden way to end this but an extremely important emergency has just come up in the middle of me typing this so I cannot finish it and am unsure of when I will be able to. I hope this does provide some context as to how I feel about the game, though. I am posting this as it is for now since I don't know when I'll be able to get the rest of my reasons down. This is also why some paragraphs may seem unfinished.

[gwyns]

“i don't think it'll be announced as a "gwynriel" or "elucien" book or whatever. it'll be announced like acosf was, as the mc's book.”

I didn’t mean Sarah would announce it like that! I should’ve clarified more, I’m sorry! I think when she does release the book title it should give us a good gauge as to who the mc of the book is. I think the novella will be Mor’s and the full length books will definitely be Azriel’s and Elain’s. The ship wars definitely won’t end, they might get more hostile, but I want to hope maybe things will improve and become more positive. I would like the next book to be Azriel’s, and after Silver Flames and HOFAS, I think it’s more than likely his, but who knows. It could very well be the novella (I would actually laugh in amusement & I think I saw somewhere that said Sarah talking about how she wouldn’t mind the releasing a novella after SF I could be wrong tho but I thought I saw it) or Elain’s book.

oh no need to apologize! i wasn't talking about you specifically, more so the fandom as a whole because some seem to think she'll announce the couple with the book and i'm sorry but that's not going to happen lol. it wasn't directed towards you at all <3

but i agree! i do think the title will help us figure it out, honestly i'm scared for the announcement, i just know it'll be chaos no matter what and it makes me anxious just thinking about it 😭

agreed again! i've thought az was next since a couple of weeks after acosf and hofas only reinforced this for me. like yeah elain does have some setup but i find it odd she was hardly present in acosf and not there at all in hofas if she's next. i find sjm shining a spotlight on az and his struggles similar to what she did with nesta in acofas. we know elain isn't well either but she's hiding it for now whereas az is letting it directly affect him. he's getting worse and acting out

of course, i could be totally wrong and elain is next but... idk it just doesn't make sense to me narratively. like why would koschei be killed halfway through the spinoffs when he's seemingly meant to be the big baddie? it makes much more sense to me if gwynriel dealt with the illyrians, ramiel and maybe the remaining queens first. throw in an autumn court subplot and boom, bam! we got a way to setup the elucien book

nobody better get upset at me putting gwynriel in the autumn court or i will go full bitch mode, gwyn has autumn court heritage too, it's not me taking from elucien so shush

honestly her releasing a novella would be the biggest troll ever and i'd laugh so hard. many are frustrated and i get it but acotar is my favorite series so i don't mind waiting since i don't want it to end just yet 😢

[riggedbones]

sorry to be someone who watches ten million reviews of animated movies i havent seen on youtube occasionally but. on one of said ten million reviews of wish someone commented, in response to the fact that people are disappointed that they were considering 2d animating wish and then decided against it, that disney no longer has the infrastructure for feature length 2d animation. and while i do think they have a point with that...

technology has progressed far enough that like, when considering things like them no longer having animation tables? no longer especially relevant tbh. like they probably have all of the tools they need to do 2d animation in terms of just raw materials digitally based on the fact that like. there are still 2d disney cartoons being made. so

i could see the argument being made that they dont have enough 2d animators anymore esp like, seasoned animators who have worked on multiple feature length films (idk maybe they actually have a lot still) but... man if they really wanted to i do not think it'd be especially hard to get experienced animators in. for a large variety of reasons. like as long as you have a good animation director who has experience with 2d i dont think it'd be that big of a challenge to go back if they just shuffled things around.

a lot of the basic animated movie process even in 3d does still start with 2d storyboards etc. etc. so if people are especially worried about like the more pre production work i really doubt it'd be significantly different from a 3d film. it was mentioned by some representative that they didnt go with 2d because it would limit camera movement (valid limitation of the medium but like idk how many drone shots do you need) and expression (no fucking idea what they meant by this one lmao 2d is way more naturally expressive) and like i think that is the only sort of thing they'd have to really make sure they were working around in pre production. I Guess.

so yea basically i think it was something that disney could've absolutely done but like... it would've been a huge risk that would've taken a lot of rearrangement and setup (less than ppl may think, but still a fair bit) so like ofc they aren't doing that. its disney. a decade into live action remakes.

[icyspicy4u]

take their love and make it burn for you instead (chapter three)

heyyyy. chapters one and two up on ao3. ao3 link!

[REVIEW: How La La Land Fails to Make ‘Contact’ With Reality] Posted 12/14/16 by admin katiehomophobia.

Comments: Viewing 1-100 of 3.6k

pinkthingsoterrify: I cannot Jodie Foster this kind of behavior.

katiehomophobia [admin]: @pinkthingsoterrify HOLY MOTHER OF GOD.

Katya invites Trixie motherfucking Mattel into her home and turns her back on her. This is mainly due to the fact that she fears she’ll pop a blood vessel in her eye if she has to feign disinterest directly to the other woman’s face any longer.

“Sorry to interrupt your night,” Trixie says cautiously, followed by the creak of the door opening further—she must have accepted the invitation, then, stepped over the threshold. If Trixie is a vampire, Katya muses idly, she’s fucked.

“Not interrupting much,” Katya replies, still not facing her, electing to stub her cigarette out instead. Trixie Mattel is in Katya’s home. There’s still a fucking movie review with her name peppered throughout it pulled up on Katya’s computer. It occurs to her that she should rectify that, actually. “How can I help you?” she asks as she closes the tab of her broken website.

“Well, my name’s Trixie.” I know. “I’m subletting Kasha Davis’ place for a couple of months. She’s out for the night, so I can’t call her, and, um—” she gives a hissing exhale through her teeth, and Katya finally turns to face her, biting the inside of her cheek to keep herself from saying anything stupid — “my shower is broken, and I really need to fucking shower. She left your number, but I figured I’d just—” She makes a big, sweeping gesture that Katya can only assume is meant to convey come downstairs and knock on your door and absolutely turn your evening upside down because I’m Trixie motherfucking Mattel.

“Oh, the shower’s giving you trouble?” Katya asks, in a voice that sounds completely foreign to her own ears. She doesn’t fucking talk like this, like some extra from Grease. She clears her throat, adjusts her posture. “Sorry. There’s something wrong with your shower?”

“Yeah. Sorry, I know this sounds like an awful porn setup—I just figured I should consult somebody who lives here before I blow a thousand dollars on a plumber or something.” Trixie shrugs, and by god she’s beautiful, standing there in a floor-length gown like it’s nothing.

“I can come up and take a look at it, if you want,” Katya’s mouth says with absolutely no input from her brain. “The pipes can be kind of a bitch in this apartment. I assume that it’s the same story in Kasha’s.”

Trixie’s shoulders sink in relief. “Jesus, really? Thank you, I’ll owe you a meal or something—your name is Yekaterina, right?”

The full name makes Katya blink rapidly like she’s been struck across the face. The butchered pronunciation falling from Trixie’s mouth doesn’t carry quite the same weight as it did when her father yelled it in gruff, fluent Russian at her across the house, but even watered down, it has the same immobilizing effect.

“Katya,” she manages. “It’s Katya.”

Trixie nods, and although the twist of her lips tells Katya that she wants to interrogate that reaction, she doesn’t say a word about it. “Okay,” she says instead. It’s far too gentle for her to handle right now. “Katya.”

Instead of standing there dumbly for one second longer, Katya decides to grab her toolbox. It’s an old gift from her parents that she has never touched before, but by God, she will fake being butch for Trixie Mattel. She shimmies into some gym shorts and tightens her bird’s nest bun into something approximating secure, appraising herself in the mirror.

“Passable,” she says aloud.

When she strides back into the room, trying to project confidence and an intricate knowledge of shoddy California plumbing, Trixie’s standing where she left her in the living room. Her eyes are glued to the John Waters movie that’s still playing.

Katya allows herself a brief second to take it all in: there’s a gorgeous woman in a perfectly-fitted blush-pink gown standing at ease on Katya’s area rug, her mouth moving along absentmindedly to the filthy lines that Divine is spouting up on the screen, and she’s likely going to be nominated for a Golden Globe in a few hours.

“You a John Waters fan?” Katya asks loudly, startling Trixie and effectively shattering the beautiful, pink-edged peace of the moment.

“Oh, he’s my president,” Trixie says emphatically, to her credit seeming unbothered in the wake of Katya’s outburst. “I met him once at a film festival a couple of years ago and lost my mind about it.”

“Oh my god, shut up, oh my god. Shut the hell up. Really?” Katya asks, giddy and disbelieving.

Trixie grins, swipes her phone unlocked, and after a few navigational taps on the screen pulls up a photo of herself and motherfucking John Waters. Trixie looks young, wide-eyed and stunned by the flash but clearly over the moon to be standing next to her hero.

“I’ll be damned,” Katya says, shaking her head, and then grins toothily up at Trixie. “Nice peace sign.”

“Okay, whatever, I was nervous and—”

“You were a very entrepreneurial young woman making her way up in the world through the power of peace and excellent snuff film,” Katya says sagely, shifting the toolbox to the other hand.

Trixie rolls her eyes, which delights Katya to no end. She’s easy to needle, but is just as quick to give it right back, a relatively novel and exciting concept.

A lot of the time, Katya feels like she has to tone herself down when she first meets someone. Ease them in slowly to all of the barbs and the references and the flailing. Trixie is right there with her already—there is something wildly intoxicating about it.

“You got the tools,” Trixie notes, cutting a glance down to the rickety toolbox. “Instead of commenting on who I was meeting five years ago, did you perhaps want to actually do something with them?”

Katya snickers, but turns and lets Trixie lead her up to Kasha’s place, swinging the toolbox casually in her grip as they walk and trying not to objectify the next great star of America’s silver screen.

Because, well, wow. Mathematically speaking, Trixie is all curves. Bhaskara would go nuts if he saw the pink-clothed goddess his theories of sines and cosines had conspired to create. Her ass is at eye level as Katya follows her up the stairs, and she forces her gaze to her feet as her mouth goes dry.

She’s just here to fix a fucking shower (that she doesn’t know how to fix). She will put her metaphorical dick away for five minutes and muddle through this, so help her God, her unintentional months of celibacy and resulting pent-up arousal be damned.

Trixie swings the door open easily, having left it unlocked in her journey down to Katya’s place, and she holds it ajar so that Katya can follow her in.

Katya’s only met Mrs. Davis—Kasha, apparently���once or twice, but the interior decor of the apartment immediately makes sense with the personality she garnered from those brief meetings. It’s all extremely dated, gaudy pieces, once saturated with color but now more muted with age. The aesthetic of Kasha’s space seems like a hand-me-down sweater for Trixie—it doesn’t not fit her, with the blush pinks and ‘60s prints, but you can tell that it doesn’t belong to her.

She looks just a little out of place as she walks in ahead of Katya, sticking herself firmly by the pile of pink suitcases that must be hers. She points a finger over at a door with a big, garish LADIES sign on it, quintessentially middle-aged woman couture.

“That’s the bathroom,” she directs, shrugging. “I don’t know. You can give it your best shot.”

“I surely will,” Katya says, and turns her best, most winning grin on Trixie, just to see what she’ll do. She blushes a very pretty shade of pink and turns around, mumbling something about needing to find something in the myriad of suitcases.

Well. That’s an interesting response Katya doesn’t have the time to address right now.

She salutes and pushes through the door with the terrible sign, setting her toolbox down in the tub and flopping down to take a seat alongside it. She stares up at the showerhead. It doesn’t look like anything’s wrong with it, so that’s Katya’s first plan of action foiled, and when she stands up and taps it with her hand nothing magically starts working, so her second one is shot, too.

After about fifteen minutes of Katya engaging in a one-sided staring match with the faucet, Trixie shows up in the doorway sipping from a glass of wine.

“How’s it going?” she asks, her tone a little too amused for Katya’s comfort.

Fearing the jig is up, Katya purses her lips and decides to sell it even harder. Blaze of glory, and all that. “I’m going to be frank, this is worse than I thought,” she says seriously, pushing her glasses up her nose.

“Really?” Trixie asks, the teasing dropped from her voice as it’s replaced with real concern. “Fuck, did I do something to it?”

She looks genuinely worried, her brown eyes wide and fearful, so Katya gives herself a nice pat on the back for her own theatricality, which is rarely serviceable, and then drops the act to avoid fraying Trixie’s psyche further. “No, not really,” she says. “It’s just not working.”

“Jesus, don’t scare me like that,” Trixie says, grinning. Her tensed shoulders have gone slack in relief, but then she starts working her lip between her teeth as she realizes something. “I’m kind of fucked, then, aren’t I?”

“My shower’s open,” Katya offers, and then cringes a little bit at how that sounds. “I mean, you can borrow my shower tonight and I will make myself scarce when you do. If you want.”

“If I want?” Trixie parrots, mocking her with a wonderful, sly tilt to her mouth.

“I just figured you might want a chance to rinse off this cotton-candy coating,” Katya tells her, grinning at the banter, gesturing to the pink gown and pink earrings and pink detailing in her hair. She looks rosy and sugary-sweet in the lamplight of Kasha’s place. Delectable.

“Mm. You would not be wrong,” Trixie says dryly, cracking her neck to one side. “I… okay. If you’re serious, and you’re sure you don’t mind.”

Katya nods. “Wouldn’t have offered if I did,” she says cheerfully, because it’s true. “I’ll head out to the courtyard while you’re indecent, give you some space. Just stick your head out the window and shout when you’re done. Should be open.”

“I should ask you if you’re a serial killer, but you clearly are,” Trixie says carefully, and sure, Katya’s only known her for a little while, but she likes to think she can hear the edge of a smile in her voice.

She smiles back, the one that shows all her teeth, and cranes her head at a disturbing angle. “I wouldn’t do that to you, Tritzie,” she coos, and Trixie’s face scrunches up in disgust before she barks out a real laugh.

Katya hasn’t heard it before in any of the interviews she’s watched—this laugh is screechy and grating to the ears as it rises and falls like a wave. It’s such a perfectly distilled sound of human joy that all Katya can do is break right along with her, her awful smoker’s wheeze of a laugh folding in to Trixie’s scream.

“You’re a psychopath,” Trixie pants, catching her breath, holding her index fingers under her eyes to catch her tears from laughing. “Jesus Christ, oh my God.”

Katya, a little out of breath from laughing herself, just grins at her before hopping up out of the shower. “Come on, I feel like you might calcify to the floor if you stay in one place too long,” she tells her. “What’s all this for, anyway?” She gestures to the pink opulence Trixie appears to be draped in from head to toe—except her face, which is mysteriously bare.

Trixie was leading the way back out the front door, so when she stops in her tracks at the question it means she bumps into Katya. “Sorry,” she says automatically, reaching out a hand to steady her. It’s unthinkingly sweet. “Um. It was for a photoshoot.”

The walls that Katya could instantly sense when she opened the door and saw Trixie have clearly been thrown back up. She’s disappointed at first, but then a shiver of self-revulsion creeps up and down her spine at the uneven dynamic at work here, one that Trixie isn’t even aware of. Katya spent the whole day researching Trixie Mattel for her article—Trixie met Katya minutes ago, and has no idea who she is.

“Oh, cool,” she says simply, hoping the enthusiasm in her tone doesn’t come across as desperate, and drops it immediately, resuming the walk back to her apartment. Trixie will tell her if she wants to. If she doesn’t, that is none of Katya’s goddamn business. Katya already knows too much.

“Hold on,” Trixie says strongly, and it’s Katya’s turn to pause, keeping her feet rooted where they are as she turns her head around slowly like she’s in a screwball comedy. Her heart pounds. Does Trixie know too much? Did she see Katya’s computer? Does she know who she is? “Slow down. I need to find my shower stuff in these bags.”

“Oh,” Katya replies, more than a little stupidly. “Yeah, duh. Sorry.”

Trixie digs out no less than five different hair care products from one bag, then yanks a towel out from another, and then stands there working her lip between her teeth again until Katya figures out she’s probably trying to remember where her pajamas are.

“I have shirts,” she volunteers easily. “And pants, too, if you ask really nicely.”

Trixie snaps her gaze up, like she’d forgotten Katya was there. She laughs (not the same full-throttle cackle as before, which is extremely disappointing) and then releases a big sigh.

“Yeah, that would probably be easiest,” she says, pressing the heel of her free hand into her eye. “Thanks. I fucking hate moving.”

Katya almost decides to regale her with the tale of the time her mom had to move a sex doll out of her old Boston apartment, but then just as quickly decides against it. Probably not the time.

“Okay, here’s the shower,” she tells Trixie once they’re back in Katya’s apartment, the John Waters movie in the living room paused on a truly excellent expression on Edith Massey’s face. She points to the faucet, points to the showerhead. “It’s exactly like Kasha’s, but it works.”

“Mm,” Trixie says dryly, nods. She’s running out of humor, but so would Katya, if she had come out of a photoshoot of the caliber Trixie’s gown suggests and had to contend with herself to be able to take a shower.

“I’ll leave you be,” she promises, brandishing the pajamas she agonized over selecting for just a few minutes too long in her room.

Trixie snorts at the illustration of the Pan’s Labyrinth hand-eye monster over the front of the shirt Katya chose.

“Comfy,” she snarks, shakes her head, but a smile tugs at her mouth. “Thanks again, Katya. For all of this.”

“Oh, of course,” Katya says, waving a hand. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be in the courtyard.” She jerks a thumb over her shoulder towards the window that looks out onto the pitiful little square of dehydrated grass. “Give a shout out the window when you’re done.”

Trixie nods again, then closes the bathroom door behind her. As Katya heads for the courtyard with her keys and a fresh pack of cigarettes, she hears the water start up, then the screech of Trixie’s voice: “Are you kidding me? It’s that easy?”

Katya smirks, shakes her head, then jogs down the stairs out to the front courtyard.

Sitting in the lone chair out here, lighting up a cigarette in the still of the night, makes it finally set in how fucking bizarre this all is. Katya feels like a witch. A soothsayer. She called out into the universe for Trixie, and now here she is.

She drafts a text to Willow.

So, a newly A-list Hollywood celebrity is using my shower, she types, then deletes it.

Trixie Mattel is in my home. Delete.

My pussy’s summoning powers are getting stronger, Mother… delete. She kind of stares at that one for a while, though.

She shuts off her phone without sending anything and takes an especially long drag on her cigarette. Telling anyone else about this moment feels like it’ll break it, somehow. This feels like a story to be savored, one that she should bring up on her deathbed at the last possible moment, having held it to her chest for decades but needing it to be spoken out into the universe. Once, oh, marvelous once… Trixie Mattel knocked on my door, and I lied about having plumbing expertise because I didn’t know what else to do…

Her first cigarette is dead, so she throws it to the ground, extinguishes it under her heel, and then lights another one.

The strangest part of all of this, really, after her obvious initial shock, is that it honestly doesn’t feel weird having Trixie in the apartment. She fits somehow, an impossibly tall Barbie that wound up among Katya’s матрёшка dolls and carved out a space for herself. She strikes Katya as someone who is used to that. She seems like she’s had a lot of practice carving out space for herself, in this world that doesn’t quite deserve her.

Everyone else in Katya’s life, when she first meets them, always feels a little bit like an invader. She spends so much time in her own head that real people take some adjusting to. But Trixie hopped over that hurdle easily, as if it didn’t exist, and now she’s occupying space in Katya’s head like she’s never not been there.

Is this comfort something to be concerned about? She pulls her legs up to her chest and crosses them at the ankles, puffs around her cigarette.

Addictive personalities are no joke, Mary. It’s something she has to be constantly careful of, lest she pull someone into her orbit and be unable to let them go. To extend the metaphor, it would only end in cosmic disaster—planets colliding, black holes being created, blah blah blah.

There’s a banging sound behind her that interrupts her thoughts, and when she turns instinctively she sees her window fly open to reveal Trixie. She’s lit from behind by the lamps in the living room, so Katya can’t make out her facial expression when she shouts, “Your water pressure sucks.”

“Yeah,” Katya yells back, not arguing. “Sorry.” It seems like the right thing to say, but she sees Trixie’s posture flinch.

“No, you don’t need to—that wasn’t a real complaint,” Trixie says hastily. “I—Jesus. Come up here, I hate yelling like this.”

Obediently, Katya stubs out the cigarette, wasting a couple hundredths of ounces of tobacco, and jogs back up the stairs.

“I was trying to be funny,” Trixie says petulantly as soon as Katya comes in the back door.

If seeing her in the gown, a red carpet glamoured vision, was a mindfuck for Katya, seeing Trixie Mattel in Katya’s Pale Man t-shirt that’s just a little too small and Katya’s flannel pants that are just a little too short is something else entirely. Something that hits her more squarely in the chest.

“Oh,” Katya says, intelligently. “I should’ve laughed.”

Trixie snorts, then. “You’re weird,” she says, uncrosses her arms and then starts to move before pausing where she stands.

Katya would like to kiss her, she thinks. Or ask her if that would be something she would want. She’s old, now, or older, and her methods of beguiling have dwindled to just point-blank requests.

Miss Mattel, care for a fucking?

That’s too much to say to Trixie, though, even for Katya, so instead they both just stand there, each seemingly biting something back.

“Do you like Pink Flamingos? I didn’t, really, the first time I saw it,” Trixie volunteers, still not having moved from where she’s standing by the kitchen table. “Too gross. I think I’ve only seen it the once.”

“Yeah?” Katya says. She feels stuck in a low gear, only able to supply simple one-syllable words. She clears her throat. “Wanna stay till it’s over?”

Trixie’s eyes widen. She smiles a little bit.

“Yeah, all right,” she says.

It goes back to being easy, after that one charged moment in the kitchen. Trixie sits on one end of the couch, both legs tucked under her primly, and Katya sits all splayed out on the other end. Divine stands disgusting and beautiful on the TV and bathes them in a blue-screen glow.

“Kill everyone now. Condone first-degree murder. Advocate cannibalism. Eat shit!”

Trixie mumbles the lines along with Divine from the other end of the couch, her eyes locked and unblinking on the screen. Katya giggles.

“So you said you don’t like this movie?”

“It’s fucking abhorrent,” Trixie tells her, shaking her head. “But you can’t deny that Divine kills.”

“Well, yeah, she condones first-degree murder. I know the line too,” Katya says with a smirk, dodging out of reach of the kick Trixie attempts to land on her. “How did you even find this movie? Film class?”

“No, no, there’s this film critic I love—”

Trixie sits up eagerly, her eyes alight, and hives instantly begin to prickle over Katya’s chest.

“She writes these reviews every week. Sometimes they’re for blockbusters, sometimes they’re completely off-the-wall hidey-hole flicks, and sometimes she just goes on a multi-day rampage where she watches movies by the same director for days at a time. Sometimes even the same movie.”

“What’s her name?” Katya asks, hoping her voice comes out right. She can’t really tell.

“Oh, the site’s called I Like To Watch, but she posts under Katie Homophobia—” Katya’s hives instantly get worse, she can feel it, and her cheeks flame. “Nobody knows her real name, though. It’s crazy. She’s bigger than the New York Times some weeks, and she’s completely anonymous.”

“So she’s, um. She likes John Waters, then?” Katya asks, nodding at the screen.

“Yeah, she loves the original Hairspray. She watched Pink Flamingos, too, but that one she branded as disgusting. Good, too, she gave it a good review, but disgusting—I was intrigued, so I watched it, and I agree with her. Still do,” she adds, flicking a look back up to the screen.

“So do you borrow all your film opinions from, um. From Miss Homophobia?”

Trixie scoffs. “No.” She smiles then, pleased with herself. “Just most of them.”

“I don’t really watch many movies,” Katya says abruptly, some dumbass part of her trying to push herself as far away from I Like To Watch as possible with maybe the stupidest excuse ever fathomed.

“Oh?” Trixie asks, amused, and Katya realizes that she’s looking around at all the vintage theater display posters, the original film reel of Silence of the Lambs, the tall stack of film books on the coffee table.

“New movies,” Katya amends, sort of desperately. “I don’t go to the theater much.”

“Mm,” Trixie replies, apparently satisfied with that. She opens her mouth, but then closes it immediately—something shifts in her expression, and she says nothing.

They settle back into mutual silence for the rest of the movie, Trixie occasionally making retching noises at the dog shit scene and Katya staring blankly at one part of the screen without really blinking.

Trixie Mattel is an avid reader of I Like To Watch. Well. That’s certainly something.

It’s obviously kind of terrible, another card on top of the rapidly growing stack of Things Katya Knows That Trixie Doesn’t Know and Maybe Should Share With Her, but all Katya can find herself thinking of is if Trixie has ever commented on any of her posts. If they’ve ever interacted before today.

I would’ve known, she thinks vehemently to herself. I would have felt—something.

Pink Flamingos ends, and the TV segues right into Hairspray on autoplay after the credits roll. Katya looks over at Trixie, who looks right back and shrugs before settling back into the couch cushions to watch the movie.

After Hairspray’s over, of course it’s Female Trouble up next, and then at some point while Divine is strangling her daughter onscreen over dressing like a nun Katya falls asleep.

When she wakes up, her wall clock reads seven in the morning, barely legible in the low light of dawn, and Trixie’s snoring on the other end of the couch. She looks sweet, Katya thinks drowsily.

A noise is blaring from somewhere. It’s loud enough that it makes Katya clap her hands over her ears once she gains enough consciousness to hear it and figure out where it’s coming from: the pink phone on the coffee table, presumably Trixie’s.

Trixie’s phone is doing that thing that phones do when you get so many texts that your phone can’t possibly make enough noises to notify you of them all. It’s ringing, it’s buzzing, it’s chiming, all at once, and Trixie is sleeping through the whole thing.

Katya glances over at Trixie, snoring like a train, and then it hits her.

The woman sleeping on Katya’s couch has just been nominated for a Golden Globe.

Nominations started just before six, the Best Actress category would be happening around now, it all makes sense.

Katya should wake her up, she should hold the phone to her ear, she should at least plug the phone in before it dies.

All she can get herself to do at this moment, though, is just kind of sit there in the knowledge that everything is about to change. The feeling of standing on a precipice that she had last night when Trixie looked her right in the eyes and told Katya about her own film site returns full force. It makes her dizzy.

She shakes her head in an attempt to physically rid herself of the feeling. It doesn’t work, but it loosens something enough that she reaches over to the other side of the couch and shakes Trixie awake, hard.

“Trix,” she whispers as Trixie’s eyes peel open, the nickname coming far too easy, “Trixie. Your phone’s been ringing.”

Trixie’s eyes fly wide as she scrambles to sit up, and Katya knows she figured it out, too.

“Oh, shit,” says Golden Globe nominee Trixie Mattel.

[crystalninjaphoenix]

To Be a Hero

A JSE Fanfic

SepticHeroes AU: Part 12

Big news in this part :D Also a lot of setup for future events. Also a lot of dialogue. I’m gonna keep this author’s note short and spoiler-free. Jackie has a talk with Leapfrog, who delivers said big news ;) Then later, he and Chase hang out with Schneep and have an interesting conversation. And while that’s happening, JJ gets a familiar visit at his shop. Happy reading!

===============

It was only a matter of time before the peace in the city was broken with another big crime. Jackie just considered himself lucky that it had been one he could take care of while his leg was still healing.

He’d woken up that morning ready to go to work, only to hear on the police radio that there was a bank robbery downtown with super activity. Once he’d heard that, he’d jumped right out the window without even bothering to shower or tell Chase he was leaving, only pausing in his flight to call his day job and tell them he was calling in sick. Once he’d done all that, it only took about thirty minutes to deal with everything.

Now he was standing outside the First Bank of Daindover, watching as the police were pushing the villain known as Titanium into a squad car. “Mark this day, Windstorm!” Titanium shouted. “You’ll rue it!”

“I’ll rue it like I rue’d all the other days you got arrested!” Jackie shouted back. “Maybe next time, you should try robbing somewhere more creative!” Seriously, this bank was robbed by super villains at least once a month. He couldn’t believe they hadn’t upgraded their security.

Titanium shouted some very generic villain insults at Jackie, which got cut off when the car door slammed shut with her inside. “Good work, kid,” a voice said.

Jackie turned around. “Hey, Ace. Thanks. She’s no problem, really. But this is the third time. How does she keep getting out?”

Ace shrugged. “Hard to keep someone who’s invulnerable inside a normal jail. First time she escaped she just ran right through the concrete wall. I hear they’re going to put her in Byrthon Vault for security. I don’t envy her.”

“Finally graduated to the big-boy prison,” Jackie muttered. He was trying to make a joke, but it just sounded grim when he said it out loud.

“Hey, how’re you doing on this case you’re working on?” Ace asked. “Were those files I lent you any help?”

“Some, yeah. Thanks. Oh! I ran into the villain behind all the string nonsense. The Puppeteer.”

Ace raised an eyebrow. “Fitting. Anything the department can use? Identifying traits, powers to look out for?”

“Nothing identifying, no.” Jackie shook his head. He recalled his and Spitfire’s run-in with the Puppeteer last week. That costume had covered everything, and the synthetic voice hadn’t been any help. “But, uh, weird thing. His powers aren’t actually mind control.” He paused for Ace’s reaction, but the detective just gestured for him to continue. “While I was there, he controlled a bunch of these crash test dummies to attack. It was crazy. There were so many of them.”

“Huh.” Ace thought about it. “So, the Puppeteer can control anything that’s human-shaped, then?”

“Yeah. Yeah!” Jackie nodded. “That’s exactly it! I hadn’t put it together. I guess I was too hung up on the type classification. Though... it really shouldn’t be possible for him to control both living and non-living things.”

“Look, kid. The Super Types are useful, but they’re used for people, and people can’t be sorted into boxes so easily. There’ll be exceptions and overlaps with any labels.”

“True,” said another voice. “But sometimes we need shortcuts.”

Jackie spun around in the other direction. “Leapfrog!” he gasped.

Leapfrog smiled at him. He hadn’t seen her in person since she first recruited him, but she looked exactly like he remembered. Same waist-length blond hair. Same yellow suit, green tie, and green mask. Same copper shield-shaped badge, this time pinned on her lapel instead of in her pocket. “Sorry for eavesdropping,” she said. “Couldn’t help it. How have you been, Windstorm?”

“I’ve been good.” His leg, while still slightly injured, had healed to the point where he could stand on it for long periods instead of hovering all the time. “Uh, nothing new since I talked to you on the phone last week.”

“I heard you filling this man in on those events.” Leapfrog nodded at Ace. “Hello. You’re part of the police’s villain division, I assume?”

Ace nodded, and held out his hand. “Detective Alan Ainsworth. Call me Ace, everyone does.”

“Jenna Croakes. Call me Leapfrog, it’s my secret identity.” Leapfrog shook Ace’s hand. “Do you mind if I talk to Windstorm for a bit?”

“Not at all. I need to wrap things up over here, anyway.” Ace jerked his head back towards the various police officers still milling around the bank. “Good luck, kid.” And he turned to go.

Jackie watched him for a moment, then looked at Leapfrog. “Alright, what, uh...what’s up?”

“Let’s talk somewhere a bit more private.” Leapfrog glanced around, then pointed up at a nearby three-story building. “Meet me on the roof.”

“Meet you—? Uh, okay.” Jackie nodded. He backed up a bit, gave a little jump, and flew upwards. The wind carried him over to the building, where he carefully landed. He turned around, looking for a roof entrance that Leapfrog could possibly use, only to see her landing right behind him, legs bending as if catching herself after a fall. “Whatdafuck?!”

“Not a flier, if you’re wondering.” Leapfrog adjusted her suit jacket. “I jumped.”

“Jumped?! Oh.” Jackie hit his forehead. “Leapfrog. Jump. Duh.”

“It’s not all that useful for fighting crime,” Leapfrog said. “Which is why I’m a recruitment liaison and not a Hero. Anyway. How is the search coming? I know you reported your Puppeteer encounter last week, anything new since then? With him or the Specter?”

Jackie shook his head. “Sorry. But I’m keeping an eye out for any potential targets for either of them.”

Leapfrog gestured off the roof towards the ground. “Was that villain down there involved?”

“Titanium? No. I checked her wrists for strings, nothing there. She just wanted to rob a bank, I guess.” Jackie paused. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be, these investigations take time,” Leapfrog reassured him. “I just wanted to check. Now, as to why I’m here. I was going to stop by your flat, but I heard the police call and figured you’d rush to the bank. I have an update for you.”

“Alright.” Jackie nodded. “Thanks for not going to the apartment, my roommate would have lots of questions. What’s, uh...what’s up?” Didn’t he just say that earlier? God, the nerves jumping around his stomach were messing with his words.

“It’s about the neutrinalin,” Leapfrog said.

Jackie’s attention sharpened even further. “Yeah?”

“It turns out, they refuse to give it to anyone who’s not an official Hero, or who doesn’t work in one of the super prisons,” Leapfrog said.

“Oh.” Jackie slumped.

“So, I have a question for you.” Leapfrog paused. “Do you have any plans on Halloween?”

“Huh? Uh, not as of right now.”

“Good. Because the League scheduled your official welcoming ceremony for that day, and it would be really hard to change that.”

“...wait.” Jackie blinked. The nerves in his stomach began leaping around in anticipation. “You mean...the ceremony that would make me...an official Hero?”

“Well, technically, the ceremony is just a formality. What really matters is this.” She reached into her pocket and took out a silver shield-shaped badge with a stylized LoH on it. And as she handed it out to him, she smiled. “Congratulations, Windstorm. You’ve passed the probation period.”

Jackie stared down at the badge in her hand. He could see the word ‘HERO’ on it, along with his super name, ‘Windstorm.’ Slowly, he took it, half-afraid the badge would break at any moment. He stared at it, running a finger along the engravings, then after what was probably too long a moment, he looked back up at Leapfrog. “You’re... serious?”

“Very serious,” Leapfrog confirmed, chuckling a little bit.

He looked back down at the badge. “ I-I’ve only been doing this for about three months.”

“And you’ve been exceptional.”

Jackie laughed. “I haven’t even done that much...”

“Well, you’ve done enough. Honestly, I’ve been recruiting Heroes for ten years now, and you’re among the brightest. You remind me of a Hero I recruited in my early days, name of Light Phoenix. Both so enthusiastic, so dedicated. Both making Hero status in record time.” Leapfrog grinned. “You deserve it, Jackie.”

He lifted his head. And in that moment, he realized that he’d been slowly lifting into the air, as Leapfrog was a lot shorter than she was a few seconds ago. He lowered himself back down. “I...” He started, then stopped, and shook his head with a smile on his face. “I don’t know what to say. This... this is my dream. I-I can’t believe it.”

“Believe it,” Leapfrog said. “The League doesn’t want the press to know about it until the 17th, but everything on our end has been completed.”

“Can I...can I wear the badge?” Jackie asked tentatively.

Leapfrog nodded. “Whenever you want. I do suggest wearing it out while patrolling and stopping crime. Preferably over your heart, either outside your suit or inside. The metal is a lot more bulletproof than the suit fabric, and we’ve had cases of badges saving Heroes’ lives. Oh, and you will have to wear it to League gatherings and stuff.”

“Right. I can...I can go to League gatherings now.” He was half tempted to slap himself, to see if he would wake up. This was so surreal, and yet it was real. The badge was in his hand. It was heavier than he expected, a solid weight in his hand.

He was surprised that becoming a Hero was so...easy. Not that fighting crime and saving people was easy. But the entire process, from him putting in his application to this moment right now, had taken a little less than four months. It was a little strange, but he wasn’t about to question it. After all, he had been doing hero work for two years now. The League probably just saw his track record and decided he had enough experience.

“There are some you’ll have to go to,” Leapfrog said. “Mostly boring things. Part of being a Hero involves communicating with government officials and police and stuff. A lot of meetings. Occasionally a fun ball or something. I’ve seen people get asked to do commercials for products, that sort of stuff is up to you.”

Jackie laughed. “I’ve always wondered how people got Heroes for stuff like that! Wow. Wow.” He turned the badge over, examining the pin. It was designed vaguely like a button’s, but a lot more solid and secure. It would probably puncture a noticeable hole in his super suit, regardless of how tough the material was supposed to be. He started to put it on, then thought better of it and slipped it into his pocket. “Thank you. Thank you so much, I...” He laughed breathlessly. “This is incredible.”

“Well, super Heroes do the incredible every day.” Leapfrog gave him a little salute. “Call me if you need anything. I’ll probably be calling and texting you a lot, since your Red Line now has permission to access more League databases and such. You need to install some things and do some training.”

“Got it.” Jackie nodded. “So, uh...” Another smile crept over his face, this one a bit more impish than the others. “Am I the best recruit you’ve ever recruited?”

Leapfrog blinked, then laughed. “You’re up there. Definitely the best in this city.”

“I’m the only Hero that’s ever been in this city.” Jackie paused. “Oh. Right. I’ve been meaning to ask you this for a while. I noticed Timekeeper wasn’t in the League database of Heroes. Did you guys never recruit him?”

Leapfrog shook her head. “No. Once the higher-ups heard about him, they certainly wanted him to join. But he never applied. We were discussing me going over to ask him to join in person, but he disappeared after that battle with Earth Shaker two and a half years ago.” She sighed. “Always wonder what happened to him. If he’s still out there somewhere.”

“Yeah.” Jackie stood there for a moment, wondering the same thing. Then he raised into a hover. “Well. I’ll see you, then.”

“See you, Windstorm. Good luck.”

He smiled, and flew off, heading no direction in particular.

A Hero.

An official Hero.

Today was the best fucking day of his life.

===============

There was a knock on his bedroom door. Jackie, slouching in his desk chair, quickly sat up straight and closed the notebook he was looking at: the one with all the information about the Specter and the Puppeteer. His eyes darted around the room, making sure nothing super was out in plain view. Suit was in the wardrobe and badge was in the desk drawer... and there was nothing else. Good. “Yeah, come in,” he called.

Chase pulled open the door, glancing around. Frosty stuck his head into the new gap, also looking around. “How do you keep this place so clean?” he muttered.

“Clean? I’m clean? Please tell my mom that, she’s complained about my messiness since I was old enough to do chores.”

Chase laughed. “I’m just saying. At least you have your dirty clothes in a basket. Anyway. Uhhh...” He paused, momentarily forgetting what he was going to say. Quickly, he checked his phone. “Oh yeah! Have you been to Schneep’s place yet?”

Jackie blinked. “No. Why?”

“Well I was thinking about going over and hanging out. It’s been a while since I’ve seen him. Do you want to come?”

“Now?”

“Well, whenever you want.”

“Umm... sure.” Jackie spun his chair around to fully face Chase. “We could go over for dinner or something. It would prevent us from ordering pizza again.”

“I swear, we don’t do that as often as you think we do,” Chase insisted.

“Heh.” Jackie grinned. “What’s Schneep’s place like?”

“Nicer than this,” Chase says. “But not, like, for rich people. Just above average. You’ll see. Oh! Wait, yeah, I should tell you. His apartment building isn’t near a train station. Are you gonna be okay with walking, or should we get a cab or Uber or something?”

“I’ll be fine, thanks. You?”

“Yeah, I know I’m fine. Walked there a lot.” Chase glanced down back at his phone, switching from the notes to the messages. “I’ll tell him we’re coming over around...six? Is that good?”

“Maybe six-thirty,” Jackie suggested.

“Good idea. We’ll need more time for the walk.” Chase typed something out, sending a text. About thirty seconds later, he got a reply. “Great. He says he’ll make food.”

“Great.” Jackie gave a thumbs-up. “I’ll remember. Anything else you need?”

“Thanks for editing my video again,” Chase said. He gave a little laugh. “I don’t know how you had time to do that, since you seem to be working or at the gym all the time.”

“I’m good at multitasking,” Jackie said. “Also, it’s no problem. It’s fun.” He liked seeing Chase’s process for video-making. It was like they were hanging out together, filming something.

Chase raised an eyebrow. “You and I have very different definitions of fun. But alright. We’ll have to catch the green train at around 5:45 to get to Schneep’s place.” He chuckled when he saw Jackie’s surprise. “Yeah, it’s pretty far out on the edge of town. Gotta be an inconvenient commute to the hospital.”

“Got it.” Jackie nodded. “I’ll set an alarm.”

“I will too.” And with that, Chase closed the bedroom door—slowly, so Frosty had time to get his face out of the way.

Jackie picked up his phone and started setting the alarm as promised. He was planning on more patrolling tonight, but it had been slow for crime. Nothing the police couldn’t handle. And Spitfire Cat didn’t have any new leads to follow up on. So time for a free night.

===============

Chase wasn’t kidding when he said Schneep lived on the edge of town. They caught the train at 5:45 like planned, and still barely reached the building by the time 6:30 rolled around. This area was practically a different city. Or, it would be, if Daindover wasn’t a massive urban and suburban area.

These apartment buildings were new. They’d only been built about three or four years ago, which was a hell of a lot newer than the rest of the city. Each building was only three floors high, their outsides painted vivid colors: red, yellow, green, blue. Jackie wondered if it was weird to be surprised that Schneep lived in a place like this. But he did live there. In Building A, Flat 2D, to be specific. Chase and Jackie took the elevator up to the second floor, where Chase knocked on the appropriate door.

“Just one moment!” Schneep’s voice called from inside. Some dishes clinked, and then the door opened, revealing Schneep in a dark blue sweater. “Ah, you two are on time,” he said. “Thank you for not inviting yourselves to dinner and then being late. To the dinner you invited yourselves to.”

“You didn’t have to let us come by, bro,” Chase said. “Don’t be salty.”

“I am not salty, I am the sweetest person I know,” Schneep said, face deadpan.

Jackie couldn’t help but laugh at that.

“Well, come in.” Schneep stood to the side. “Ah, Chase, I actually bought a bed for Frosty, since you kept coming over.”

“Aw, really? That is sweet. I’m touched.” Chase put his hand over his heart. “But, well, Frosty’s working right now.”

“I know, I thought just in case.”

The two of them walked into the apartment, and Jackie looked around. Chase wasn’t kidding. It was nicer than their place. The front door opened into a combination living room and dining room, with an archway on the left leading to a full kitchen that smelled of something cooking. To the right were two doors, one of which was ajar to show a bedroom. Right by the front door, to the left, was another closed door. A curtained window overlooked the street below. The whole thing was probably as big as Jackie and Chase’s apartment, but with one less bedroom, resulting in a lot more space. “You have a lovely place,” Jackie said.

Chase laughed. “Wow, so formal all of a sudden.”

“Well it is!” Jackie said defensively.

Schneep smiled. “Thank you.”

Jackie glanced around. “Um, sorry to ask this, but...I need to use your bathroom.” He reached for the door to the left.

“Do not go there, then!” Schneep braced his arm over the doorway just as Jackie grabbed the doorknob.

“Whoa, okay, sorry!” Jackie backed up. “Why? What’s in there?”

“My closet,” Schneep said. “And nothing. Sorry for being loud.”

Chase chuckled. “The doc is hiding his secret identity from us. He’s been Windstorm this whole time!”

Schneep rolled his eyes. “I am not.”

“Well has anyone ever seen you and him in the same place?” Jackie asked, a smile twitching at his mouth.

“Yeah, you seem to be the right height and build, too.” Chase squinted his eyes, stroking his beard. “Hmmm...”

Schneep reached over and gently shoved him.

“Whoa, be careful!” Chase laughed. “Alright, bit over.”

“Let’s just go in and eat dinner,” Schneep said. “I went to the trouble of making it when you two invited yourselves over. We should not let it go to waste.”

A couple minutes later, the three of them were sitting at the dinner table with plates of food. “You didn’t have to make something so fancy,” Jackie said.

“I worry about your diet if chicken and mashed potatoes are fancy to you,” Schneep said.

“Well you have like...broccoli and shit, too. Green stuff.” Jackie glanced at Chase. “The only time we eat anything green is when Chase asks for pepper on the pizza.”

“That’s twice you’ve mentioned pizza today, I think you have the problem, not me.” Chase cut off a piece of the chicken and held it out to Frosty, sitting on the floor beside him. Frosty sniffed it, seemed to hesitate, then licked it up. “Attaboy.” Chase smiled. “I know I’m not supposed to do that, but you deserve a treat sometimes.” He returned his attention to the others. “Okay, but seriously. You ever notice how all of us kinda have the same look as Windstorm?”

“Uhhh no,” Jackie said carefully. “Why? Do you have something to tell us, Chase?”

Chase laughed. “Bro, I couldn’t be a superhero. Especially him. Have you seen the acrobatics he pulls off in the air? I can’t even stand up. Nah, if he would be any of us, I bet it would be Schneep.”

“Ah, you choose the better of two options, I see,” Schneep said.

“Wha—” Jackie couldn’t help but be a little offended. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well, I am sure Windstorm would not make the mistake of wearing a binder during heavy exercise like he does.” Schneep’s bright blue eyes seemed to bore into Jackie.

“I stopped doing that,” Jackie muttered, shoving a spoon of potatoes in his mouth to avoid continuing this conversation.

“In any case, I am no hero,” Schneep said. “So it is both bad options.”

“Of course you’re a hero, doc,” Chase said sincerely. “You save people, and that’s all a hero does, right? You know, the other day, someone at work thought I was you. She realized I wasn’t the moment I said anything, of course, but I told her I knew you. Her name was, uhh...” He checked the notes on his phone. “Kira Heath. She said you helped cover the fees for her and her kid.”

“Heath? Yes, I remember.” Schneep nodded gravely, and looked down towards the table. “They were both too close to that fight between Windstorm and Hyper Charge in December last year.”

“But they’re okay now, right?!” Jackie blurted out.

Schneep looked up at him. “Yes, they are fine. I made sure. The child, Ben, he almost lost an eye from one of Hyper Charge’s blasts. But he did not.”

Jackie slumped. He remembered that. Hyper Charge was one crazy villain, never caring about how many people were around, only how impressive the explosions looked when he blew things up. There were so many people around that day. Jackie hadn’t been able to check on them all. He let the sense of relief fade away. What was left was a strange, niggling feeling about something Chase said. “What do you mean, ‘cover the fees’?”

“You know,” Chase said. “The fees.”

“No, I don’t.” Jackie slowly shook his head.

Schneep’s grip on his fork tightened. “Every hospital is required, by the Super Laws, to have a SDER Department, to respond to super-related emergencies, and treat power-created injuries. You would think that would mean going there is covered by the government, as healthcare is supposed to be in this country. And, on paper, yes. However, in reality, that is not the case.” He sat up straight. “You see, the League supplies hospitals with the special medicine and equipment sometimes needed to treat super injuries. But not for free. The hospital must pay for it. Even for use of the database. They must pay the League for it all. The government does not give hospitals the money for this, so many of them have fees. When you go in for a super-related injury, you will get a high bill.” Schneep looked at Jackie. “I did not charge you for that time you got hit by Spitfire Cat’s beam. But only because you did not make it an official appointment. If you had, I would be required to do so. Though I would not, anyway.”

“...oh.” Jackie had no idea what to say for this. “I...didn’t know there was special medicine and equipment for super stuff.”

“Oh, very much so.” Schneep nodded. “Super powers are so diverse, sometimes they require specialized solutions. These are created by the League. I am not sure how, but they are. So they can only be...acquired from the League.”

“Well... I guess that makes sense,” Jackie said. “It probably costs a lot to make stuff like that, so the League has to sell it for a lot.” He looked at Chase. “Wait, did you have to pay fees after your whole thing?”

“Uhhh...I don’t remember,” Chase said.

“You did,” Schneep confirmed.

“But he had amnesia!” Jackie protested.

“He still had his ID. And because of that, they were able to link him to an identity, and a bank account.” Schneep reached over and patted Chase’s hand. “Don’t worry, my friend. I helped cover it.”

“Oh. Thanks.” Chase looked baffled, but grateful anyway. He then shook his head. “Well, this has all been very serious. I just wanted to know if you were Windstorm, Schneep.”

Schneep laughed. “No, no. I could never handle being at the center of action. I never could. Not even when I was a child. Could you be a superhero, Chase? If you had the powers?”

Chase shrugged. “I dunno. I’ve never really thought about it. Jackie?”

“Uh...” Jackie cleared his throat. “I think it’d be cool. I’d like to help people.”

“I see,” Schneep said, eyes locked on Jackie’s face.

Again, Jackie had that suspicion. But Schneep couldn’t possibly know. How would he have figured it out? But he couldn’t shake the feeling that Schneep suspected something. Whether or not that something was right, he had no idea.

Eventually, slowly, the previous conversation was forgotten and they moved on to different topics, as people did when they talked. Stuff like work, and books, and video games. After dinner was finished, Jackie took his plate, cup, and utensils back into the kitchen.

“You don’t need to do that, Jackie,” Schneep called after him.

“No, it’s fine,” Jackie called back. “Is just by the sink fine?”

“Alright. While you’re in there, you can help yourself to anything in the fridge, if you are still full.”

Jackie wasn’t, but he checked the fridge anyway. Nothing seemed appealing, but something did catch his eye. He went back to the living room/dining room with it in his hands. “Hey, nice bottle,” he said, holding it up. “Planning for after-dinner drinks? I thought you said this wasn’t fancy.”

“That was a gift,” Schneep said. He was standing now, piling his own utensils onto his plate.

“Whoa, hey.” Chase grinned. “I wouldn’t mind—”

“Stop.” Schneep pointed at him, almost poking him in the chest. “Do not.”

“I wasn’t—”

“You know the problem. Do not.”

“Uh, I don’t know the problem,” Jackie said.

Chase sighed. “It’s nothing, Schneep is just a—”

“Chase cannot have alcohol,” Schneep interrupted, causing Chase to shoot him a dirty look.

“Oh shit, really?” Jackie asked, concerned. “Why? Is it a medical thing?”

“It’s because of my balance problems,” Chase said reluctantly. “You know how they call being buzzed ‘tipsy’? Well, Schneep is concerned that if I get tipsy, I’ll tip over.”

“Chase, as your doctor, I know you will.” Schneep folded his arms.

“Ah.” Jackie slowly backed into the kitchen, putting the wine bottle onto the counter before walking back out. “Soo...if I was to tell you that he’s bought whiskey before—”

“You fucking snitch!” Chase hissed.

“Chase!” Schneep gasped. “You dumb motherfucker!”

Chase put his head on the dining room table. “This is your fault, Jackie,” he said, voice muffled.

“No, it is your fault! It is entirely your fault! I know we are friends, but I started as your doctor! Friendship now gives no excuse to ignore medical orders in the past!” Schneep scolded.

“I don’t even drink that much of it,” Chase protested weakly. “Like...once a month. And not even that much in that one time. Like, one shot glass. I’m not getting drunk. There’s just... something about the taste that’s familiar.”

“That is no excuse!” Schneep leaned over Chase. “You should at the very least be telling me!”

Jackie went and sat down on the sofa. “I can’t believe these are the people I look like,” he muttered.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Chase asked, turning his head to look at Jackie.

“Nothing, nothing.”

“Oh!” Schneep snapped his fingers. “Jackie. That reminds me. Do you know anyone else who looks like you? Besides us two and Jameson, I mean.”

“Uh...no.” Actually, the answer was ‘yes,’ but Jackie knew that if he said that, the other two would ask follow-up questions. And he wasn’t about to tell them that he immediately thought of Spitfire Cat.

“Ah,” Schneep said. “Strange. I think Jamie and I found our fifth clone last week, then.”

“Really?” Chase asked, interested.

“Yes, he came into Jameson’s shop,” Schneep explained. “Said he was lost, despite living in the city for a long time. I thought he was Jackie, at first. But he was not. I don’t remember his name, it started with...an N, I think.”

“...huh.” Jackie wondered what that was all about. It could be just another strange man who shared a resemblance with the others of the group. Or maybe... “What was he wearing?”

Schneep shrugged. “A jacket. Jeans. Sort of dark colors. I remember he had on gloves, even though it was fairly warm that day.”

“Huh,” Jackie repeated. “Weird.”

Gloves...

Spitfire had good reason to wear gloves even as his secret identity...

No, it couldn’t be. Could it?

===============

JJ usually liked to do repairs during business hours. It gave him something to do during the long stretches of time where nothing was happening in the shop. Which there were a lot of. Business was steady, but it was always slow. Right now, the only customer was a neighbor, an older woman named Madeline. She came in every Friday to look at things, and occasionally buy them.

So JJ had enough time to sew up some broken seams in some cloth dolls and fix the joints on some wooden marionettes. Then, since it still wasn’t busy, he went upstairs to take care of some business, and then came back down. He assumed that nothing would change. And nothing much did. Except that now Madeline was talking with a familiar-looking man. He kept glancing towards the shop’s front door, like he wanted to leave this conversation and was regretting coming inside at all.

Well, the two of them were right by the display where he had to put the repaired dolls, anyway. He picked them up and headed on over, listening in on what Madeline was saying. “—the city had Moonstone as its hero at the time, before she joined the League and got promoted to National Threat Team. But she couldn’t be in multiple places at once! And that night, the police were just swamped. I called as soon as I heard the scream, and it still took them ten minutes to get over there! I timed it! Well, not literally, but you get the point.”

Ah. JJ knew what she was talking about. He stopped walking when he was right next to the pair and coughed.

Madeline and the man turned to look at him. “Oh speak of the devil!” Madeline said cheerfully. The man’s expression was a mix of alarm and embarrassment. “How have you been, Jameson?”

His hands were full, so he couldn’t reply, but he smiled and nodded. Then started putting the cloth dolls on the nearest shelf.

“It’s lovely to see you, as always,” Madeline said. “Well, I’d better get going. I’ll see you next week.”

JJ nodded at her again, and she waved as she turned around to leave, causing the bell by the door to chime. The man looked over at him, frozen into inaction. Most likely by the potential awkwardness of the situation. Jameson gave him a small smile, then said, That was Madeline. She owns the cafe next door. Sorry if she was bothering you.

“You’re sorry? It’s not on you,” the man said, confused. 

What was she talking about? Jameson asked, despite knowing full well what the answer would be.

“Um...I think she was talking about your tragic backstory.” The man’s eyes unconsciously flicked downwards to JJ’s neck, then immediately flicked up again, not wanting to stare.

She must have thought you were a relative or something, JJ said. Anyway, I don’t mind people knowing. I just would’ve preferred to be the one to explain it. He tilted his head. You were in here last week. What was your name again? Did it start with S?

“An S? No, uh, not at all.” The man gave a little laugh. “Um, call me Ned.”

Right, that was it. Sorry, I must have been thinking of someone else. Jameson paused for a moment to unload the last of the cloth dolls, leaving him with a pair of marionettes. You don’t look like a Ned.

“Yeah.” The man nodded. “I’ve been told that. I don’t know what a Ned is supposed to look like. But it doesn’t matter. That’s just...what I’m called.” 

I’m Jameson. Friends call me JJ. Nice to meet you.

“Yeah, I remember your name. Nice to meet you, too.” The man glanced around. “So...this is your store.”

If you see anything you like, and want to see more, I can give you the name of the artist who made it, JJ said Though, some of the older pieces were made by my family members. The clocks, mostly. And I make some things. Like these. He held up the marionettes, which he’d been holding in the crook of his arm while he signed.

The man took a step back. “O-oh. Uh...they’re nice.”

Jameson laughed silently. He walked over to a spot on the wall with some hooks, hanging the marionettes on them by the handles so they dangled from the strings. Not a fan of dolls?

“Most dolls are fine, it’s just, uh...” The man gestured at the marionettes. “Puppets. It’s kind of a new thing for me. These really are nice, just...”

Don’t worry, I understand. They’re not for everyone. JJ made sure that the strings were all free and untangled. Can I help you with anything?

“Oh, uh, no. I just remembered this place and thought I’d check it out.” Again, the man glanced around the shop. “Maybe meet the other people I saw here who sort of looked like me.  Guess I’ve done that. Nice Timekeeper poster.”

Jameson glanced back at it, hanging behind the counter. He felt a lump in his chest. Thank you, he signed simply.

“Are all those other pictures your family?”

JJ nodded. My parents, and such. They’re not around anymore.

The man looked at him. “I’m sorry,” he said gently.

Thank you, Jameson signed again, softer this time. He took a deep breath, and then a step back. Wel, if you need anything, let me know. I’d be happy to help.

“Right. No problem.” The man nodded. “I’ll be honest, I’m not going to buy anything. I don’t carry any cash or cards when I’m not intending to shop, and I don’t have any of those money apps or anything.”

Oh, we don’t take any apps, just cash and card, JJ said. So no worries there. And no worries about not buying anything. Sometimes you just need to look around. You can come back any time.

The man stared at him, then nodded. “Yeah. I’ll probably do that.”

The shop was quiet for the next while, as the man browsed and JJ sat at the counter and read a book. Eventually, though, the bell at the door rang again, and the familiar man was gone.

But Jameson knew he would be back again.

[planeoftheeclectic]

Oh, do tell more about "Columbo: Turnabout's Fair Play".

oh geez ok I don't know how much I can say because I have been trying so hard not to spoil the mystery but let's go.

There are a few people who know how it will end/what the twist is, most of whom don't care much about Ace Attorney and were unlikely to ever read it in the first place and one of whom cares negatively about spoilers. This is because I was very anxious that the twist leading to the break in the case was too contrived and I wanted an outside opinion.

This was because I began writing TFP before I finished playing Bridge to the Turnabout. All subsequent worries about "realism" and "physics" and "the laws of science" have since been summarily dismissed.

I am currently working on some things that are very close to what will go in the epilogue and I really can't say more than that or I'm worried you'll figure it out immediately. Suffice to say: I like mirroring.

In the past 24 hours I have discovered two musical themes from AA4 that I will absolutely be using as writing ambiance because they are exactly what I've been looking for. One is Phoenix's theme, one is ostensibly the Gramarye's theme but honestly might as well work for Phoenix, both are embedded below for your convenience.

Honestly, the name of that second one is perfect for Phoenix. Man I can't wait until we get there.

Hmmm...I think the only reason I can get away with writing this fic is because I am very good at mimicking other people's vocal patterns - to the point where I have come home from Shakespeare plays speaking in iambic pentameter. (In fairness, that's less hard than it sounds - English is made for that kind of thing.) But Peter Falk is so integral to the concept of Columbo that if you can't nail his patter, your work is just going to be missing something, imo.

Hmm, what else...I think you in particular will be delighted by the ending, which is why I had to stop talking about it with you the moment I realized what it was going to be lol. Which is infuriating because I love our talks and value your contributions so much but I can't and it's driving me insane ahhhhhhhh!! That said! I relish the look on your face when you finally get there, and that expression (multiplied by the other people who read it, which is way more than I expected when I first posted it tbh) is what keeps me going. It's going to be so good. I can't wait. Why isn't it done yet. What do you mean I have to write it first.

I'm still desperately tempted to write the alternative setup I initially proposed, aka "Maya Fey hires her friend the retired detective to get those idiots together it's been like 20 years guys, geez." I probably will write it as totally separate from TFP but man can you imagine.

If I ever write the jokingly hypothetical Klapollo sequel it will be after we've finished at least aa4 and possibly the whole sequel trilogy. Which is probably for the best, given I have palutena trap to work on. That said, I've grown exceptionally fond of Klavier. Possibly because I keep murdering his brother and making horrible things happen to him. ...Sorry about that, buddy.

I somewhat doubt that Phoenix has an official breakdown sprite (excluding the head-on-desk and nervous sweating varieties) but I need to start picturing it, because that scene is coming up sooner than I can imagine. And also farther away. But at least there's only one more Edgeworth chapter forecast. That should help contain their combined loquacious verbosity to a manageable length.

I may have said this before, but I am trying very hard to write everything from the narrative point of view of the TV camera. That's defining chapter breaks, POV's. information delivered, and general tone. It's very fun, and an excellent writing exercise. I get whiplash whenever I go back to palutena trap, which has a much more standard 3rd person limited view (the character's). I would definitely recommend this sort of thing if you want to experiment with your writing style!

Hmm, now for a fun fact to end it on...well, this isn't TFP specific, but I'd like to imagine that Gumshoe is on vacation at a beach somewhere and brought one of his metal detectors and finds a buried treasure chest that is for once not connected to a murder and so he strikes it rich and can finally retire to live a life of luxury eating slightly fancier instant ramen and that's why we never see him after the 7-year gap.

[cerealmonster15]

hii! alone and nightmare for the oc asks :]

[oc questions]

HIIIIII yay tyty

hmm so the easy thing would be to talk about yale bc he is my most fleshed out and i do have more or less ready answers for him lol. HOWEVER. i reblogged that post when i got up to pee at 2am with the notion of needing to flesh out less developed characters 🤔

so i'll talk about yale AND another character :D sorry in advance i kept getting distracted explaining overall setup lore ;-;

alone: How does your OC deal with loneliness? Have they ever been completely alone before? How do they act when there's no one around to see them?

yale - my pirate elf guy! he generally likes to stay around people if he can help it. part of his backstory was that he had crews come and go over the years, and i'm realizing i'm a little fuzzy on the specifics i had @-@ BUT i THINK the story was before he made his debut into the main universe's plotlines, he had been without a crew for a long while. i wanna say it was like 10 years? and he's an elf, nbd, but still, 10 years is 10 years, and being more or less alone for that long on a boat, save for stopping into docks now and then... ya get a little weird. yale was initially made to be like, a cartoonish villain, and from a lore standpoint, part of that was just his lack of being around people for so long. he was strange and dramatic [and still kinda is tbh lol] but he kinda kept people at arm's length. he was used to being on his own, and had initially started off his pirate days alone, so SURELY he was FINE!!!

but, now that he's found himself a home in the docks of kronneby amongst the others he's bonded to, he really doesn't like being alone. he had a 2week offscreen timeskip where he went off to fight a seamonster alone, and while he was alone on the boat, he was stuck with his thoughts of his new friends, family, lovers... the danger they'd been put in since meeting him, his mistakes that led to problems, the struggles of anxiety that come along with caring for someone... yale really prefers to be with people and keeping his mind and body active, if he can help it. he likes to play little sea shanties to himself to fill the silence when he can.

Scorpius - scorpius is a newer character who's like... a lobster merman in the water, and a scorpion person [like a centaur lol] on land, usually. he's part of the same ~multiverses~ that yale is, though theyre less directly connected. scorpius is much less fleshed out and i'm still constructing a lot of what his deal is. BUT, scorpius is definitely more of a loner. in most universe storyplots he's in, he spends a lot of time by himself and can get a bit cranky and abrasive with people that irritate him. he's not heartless, but he just doesn't like to be bothered.

the initial universe is based loosely off dnd fantasy, which kinda spiraled away from it the more we progressed, but sometimes i steal from there for ideas lol. in the base verse, scorpius lives alone in a cave with the only company being his scorpion army that helps keep out intruders, and his giant space hamster patron. don't worry about it, there's not a lot of lore there yet LOL. he spends a lot of his time researching other planes of existence - he is originally from Mechanus [a lawful neutral dnd plane that's like made of clockwork stuff] but i think i said he was some sort of space pilot that crash landed where he is now and got amnesia 🤷‍♂️ so he spends a lot of time studying interplanar travel and i guess trying to figure out his BACKSTORY LORE. help me out scorp. i'd like to know too.

he's more prominently featured in our ~modern fantasy~ au. he works a lot of part time jobs, so he's around people more, but he's still really moody. he has a roommate and a coworker that he would quietly consider friends, though he still likes to complain about their antics. he doesn't really feel the need for many companions, and likes to practice drink mixing in his spare loner time. being alone gives him time to think and decompress, especially after long days of irritating customers...

nightmare: What does your OC have nightmares about? How do they deal with their nightmares? Do they tell people, or keep it to themself?

yale - with his newest crew and companions, he sometimes has nightmares about them being put in danger. they've been through a lot together, and quite a few times something bad has happened when yale briefly wasn't around to help. it's hard for him not to feel responsible anytime something bad happens, as he's the captain, and it's HIS job to look after the ship and everyone one it. i don't think he always talks about the nightmares, but if one of his partners is around, he likes to sleep with them for that immediate reassurance that they're alright and safe in his arms ;w; it kind of couples with the above alone feeling - he's worried if he leaves people on their own, something bad might happen again. he is perhaps developing a very minor case of separation anxiety, i think.

Scorpius - hmm... DOES he have nightmares...? HMM.... well, in the THIRD of the multiverses lol, he's a demon hunter. don't worry about it. i suppose it would make sense if he has nightmares sometimes of the demons he's hunted, or perhaps ones that got away. regardless of which universe it's in, though, i don't think he'd be one to talk much about nightmares. he's more of a logical practical thinker, so i think he'd just wake up from a nightmare, recognize it was a dream, maybe pace around the room a little, and go back to sleep.

[pesterloglog]

Jade Harley, Karkat Vantas

Act 5, page 2851

-- gardenGnostic [GG] began pestering carcinoGeneticist [CG] --

GG: ok, my robot exploded

GG: now what smart guy!

CG: HOLY SHIT, IT'S HARLEY

CG: COMMUNICATING WITH ME OUT OF NOWHERE OF HER OWN VOLITION

CG: HOLD THAT THOUGHT WHILE I GO INFORM MY DISGRACE OF A CLOWN FRIEND ABOUT THIS TRUE REAL LIFE MIRACLE, IT MIGHT LIFT HIS SPIRITS

CG: I HAVE TO SPREAD THE WICKED WORD LIKE I'M MASSAGING SHITTY SPARKLEDUST AROUND MY NETHER REGIONS TO ASSUAGE A VICIOUS RASH

CG: IT'S LIKE I'M SEASONING A FUCKING STEAK HERE.

GG: i knew i would regret this

GG: talking to you is so terrible

GG: its making my headache worse

CG: OH YEAH, BECAUSE TALKING TO YOU HAS JUST BEEN ABSOLUTE EUPHORIA.

CG: DON'T EVEN TALK TO ME ABOUT HEADACHES.

CG: RIGHT NOW THERE'S A LUMBERJACK SPLITTING WOOD ON MY THINK PAN.

CG: HE'S GOT THE FOREARMS OF A CHOLERBEAR, A MOUNTAIN OF LOGS, AND NOTHING BUT FUCKING TIME.

GG: uuuugh shut uuuuup!

GG: will you just tell me what you wanted?

CG: I DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT.

CG: I DIDN'T TELL YOU TO CONTACT ME, NOT THAT I'M NOT TICKLED BY THE SURPRISE.

CG: LET'S CATCH UP. HOW IS EVERYTHING? HOW WAS YOUR DEATHNAP?? I CAN ONLY HOPE IT WAS AS REFRESHING AS MINE.

CG: WHAT'S THAT? HOW AM I? I'M GREAT, FEEL LIKE A MILLION BOONBANKS EVER SINCE MY LITTLE POWER SNOOZE.

CG: STILL PRETTY TIRED THOUGH. YOU LOOK A LITTLE DROWSY YOURSELF. BUT WE WON'T BE GOING BACK TO SLEEP ANY TIME SOON, WILL WE JADE?

CG: NO WAY. A PAIR OF FEISTY GOGETTERS LIKE YOU AND ME, WE DON'T HAVE TIME FOR DREAMS OF HORRORTERRORS FONDLING EVERY RECESS OF OUR NAKED PSYCHES, PLEASANT THOUGH THEY ARE.

CG: YOU HAVE A LOT OF IMPORTANT USELESS SCAMPERING AND GIGGLING TO DO. WHEREAS I HAVE A CRUCIAL DATE WITH A PNEUMATIC DRILL, TO BORE A HOLE IN THE CENTER OF MY FOREHEAD, DEEP INTO THE PLUMP ANGUISH BLADDER WHICH STORES MY ALIEN DISMAY FLUID. THAT'S A REAL THING WE HAVE, FYI.

CG: I WILL THEN PERFORM A LITTLE SOFT SHOE NUMBER IN THE PUDDLE OF FLUID THAT ACCUMULATES ON THE FLOOR, WHILE MAKING THE BIGGEST SMILE EVER ATTEMPTED BY SOMEONE NOT CLINICALLY RETARDED.

CG: I WILL DO THIS FOR YOUR AMUSEMENT, JADE. TO SAY THANKS FOR EVERYTHING.

GG: i cant believe i fell for this

GG: it was just a setup to troll me some more

GG: why do you go to such lengths to troll me? i just dont understand it

CG: TRY TO BE CULTURALLY SENSITIVE

CG: TROLLING IS AN ACTIVITY THAT SHARES A NAME WITH MY ENTIRE SPECIES

CG: DO I GET ON YOUR CASE FOR ALL THE TERRIBLE HUMANNING YOU DO?

GG: thats ridiculous, humanning isnt a word

GG: and if it was, it would be a nicer thing to do than trolling!

GG: you know what i mean, stop pretending you dont

CG: TELL ME JADE

CG: WHY ARE YOU SUCH A RACIST?

GG: aaaaaaa that is something a troll would say!

CG: YES, EXACTLY.

CG: I AM A TROLL. IT SEEMS WE ARE ON THE SAME PAGE.

GG: i mean you are being patronizing and disingenuous to get a rise out of me

GG: and that is really really shitty!!!!!!

GG: i am so tired of it, and i am done talking to you forever

GG: bye karkat, it was awful knowing you!

CG: WAIT

CG: OK LOOK

CG: I SERIOUSLY, HONESTLY DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT.

CG: YOU SAY YOUR ROBOT BLEW UP, AND THAT WAS SOME SORT OF SIGNAL TO MESSAGE ME?

GG: yes

GG: as if my day needed another reason to get worse

CG: YOU PROBABLY DIDN'T CONTACT THE RIGHT ME.

GG: what does that mean!

CG: I MEAN FUTURE ME IS PROBABLY THE ONE TO TALK TO ABOUT THIS.

CG: SINCE IT'S ALL NEWS TO ME.

GG: is this another prank

GG: you are seriously the worst at pranks

CG: I DON'T PLAY PRANKS, THAT'S JUVENILE NONSENSE.

CG: I DO TWO THINGS AND TWO THINGS ONLY, I DEVASTATE SORRY MOTHERFUCKERS, AND GET SHIT DONE AS AN AWESOME LEADER.

CG: IN THIS CASE, I AM ACCOMPLISHING THE LATTER.

CG: HERE, CLICK THIS AND WE WILL SOLVE THE MYSTERY TOGETHER.

CG:

GG: :|