#squish

[desperrados]

Massive doodle dump. Tagging this will be hell.

[shannendoherty-fans]

September 6, 1991 - Jeffrey Thurnher for Entertainment Weekly.

90210

ADVICE TO the makers of Guess? jeans, the hawkers of Clearasil acne balms, the scholars of A.C. Nielsen ratings-to anyone, in short, who urgently needs to know what teenagers are watching on TV these days: Forget about the dweeby viewer diaries. Skip the fusty focus groups. Just follow the shrieking fans.

Note that Fox's Beverly Hills, 90210, now in its second season, makes young women scream and young men whoop. Study the mail sacks that arrive at Fox daily, bulging with the letters of thousands of teen viewers who urgently need to know what's going to happen next to their favorite 90210 characters ─ characters called Brenda and Dylan, Brandon and Andrea, Kelly and Steve, and David and Donna.

Observe the contagious hysteria brought on by thousands of consumers squished together in shopping malls for hours awaiting the appearance of their favorite 90210 actors ─ actors called Luke Perry and Jennie Garth, Shannen Doherty and Ian Ziering.

Listen to the household silence that reverberates for an hour each Thursday night ─ no phones ring, no Guns N' Roses bloom ─ as millions of sets fix on Fox.

Measure the decibel levels and get with the program: The shriekingest show on the air today is a soapy drama about the lives of eight students at Southern California's fictional West Beverly Hills High, class of Right Now.

The plots of Beverly Hills, 90210 revolve around the lives of teenage twins Brandon and Brenda Walsh (Jason Priestley and Shannen Doherty) ─ recent transplants, along with their down-to-earth parents, from the heartland of Minneapolis. In past weeks, boosted by a savvy programming decision to run all-new episodes in July and August while other shows lounged in repeats, 90210 has become Fox's most popular series, bigger this summer than The Simpsons and Married... With Children. First in the hearts of teen viewers on any network, any month (with a solid 58 percent of the adolescent audience), the show gives NBC ratings buster Cheers a run for its money in the 9 p.m. time slot. When teen viewers go back to school this week, so do the students at West Beverly; the new semester starts on Thursday, Sept. 12. That Priestley is teen-angel hunky and Doherty is pouty-pretty doesn't hurt; these twins are zit-free dreamboats. But 90210 zings heartstrings for deeper reasons, too. To fans, the show is, well, like life. Only cuter. Neater. Cooler. The kids at West Beverly mess up and move on in ways that never made the storyboards for Head of the Class. They drive nice cars and wear great jeans (a 90210 clothing line is on the drawing board; so are authorized and unauthorized books about the cast, and a quarterly magazine). But they also know about sex and AIDS. They know about drunken driving and alcoholic parents. Many are children of divorce. They know about drug abuse and date rape. They struggle with questions about sex: how far, how fast, how scary, how safe? Life is photogenic in this affluent zip code, but that doesn't make things any easier. To the 90210 audience, this is a great relief.

To veteran producer Aaron Spelling, whose company makes Beverly Hills, 90210, this is also a great gig: In July, Spelling took a Fox order for 30 new episodes-seven more than the usual invoice.

"The core audience was always aware of it," says executive producer Charles Rosin. "It's just that in calendar year '91, the network really promoted the show." Which is more than it did when the series debuted last fall. Muffled by its original name, Class of Beverly Hills, and hidden in a flurry of other teen-oriented programs including Fox's Parker Lewis Can't Lose and NBC's Hull High and Ferris Bueller (the latter two now canceled), the series was barely hyped, mildly received. Many saw it as just one more shallow show from the same Spelling glitz factory that gave us Dynasty and The Love Boat ─ a trendy soap starring a bunch of little-knowns (including Spelling's 18-year-old daughter, Tori).

“I like playing Brenda because they always give me challenging things to do and throw heavy drama at me. For some reason, I’m able to cry easily” ─ Shannen Doherty.

But teens were watching, and talking about it in school the next day. Besides, the show was getting better: The characters were becoming less stereotypical. The story lines (many by Steve Wasserman and Jessica Klein, who have also written for CBS' Northern Exposure) got tougher. The acting became more self-assured.

After the third episode, the producers knew the show was working. "But no one knew about it," recalls Rosin, who was most recently Northern Exposure's supervising producer. "So we developed a scenario to promote it."

The strategy paid off big, especially after Fox featured the series in July to launch the network's new "52-week" program plan, which intersperses reruns with a continuing stream of new stories.

"I knew the fans were there," swears creator and coproducer Darren Star. "Teenagers really respond to what they like. And they like to see something that says, 'I'm not alone.' Look, on our show, the dysfunctional family is the norm."

Star inevitably calls his baby "teensomething." And he inevitably says he was probably most like Brandon in high school ─ but wished he were more like broody, sensitive Dylan McKay, played by Luke Perry. Dylan is Brenda's some-time boyfriend. Brenda and Dylan had sex once, at the end of this year's school season. Brenda thought she might be pregnant but wasn't. She decided she wasn't ready for sex. She decided she wasn't ready for Dylan. They're now in romance limbo, pining and unsure. While network types wrestle with just how much controversial sex is enough ─ but not too much ─ in the season to come (now that more advertiser eyes than ever are watching), eight trillion teenagers understand Brenda and Dylan. Totally.

"ONCE DYLAN'S HAD a woman, she stays had." That's Luke Perry talking about the Brenda-Dylan Thing. Perry, a onetime soap actor (Loving, Another World), is in his makeshift dressing room in the anonymous Van Nuys warehouse that serves as the 90210 stage set (suburban Torrance High School substitutes as West Beverly for exterior shots). Perry's probably pushing 30, although, like almost everyone else in the cast, he coys up about his age ─ the better, they each avow, to preserve teenish illusions. He's bare-chested. He's bouncing a basketball. And he's being cool ─ charmingly, full-of-it cool. "We're the show that almost was on the network that isn't yet, and here we are, kickin' a little ass, if I do say so myself," he says himself in his smoky Dylan voice. Bounce. Bounce.

Two days earlier, on Aug. 10, Perry had made headlines when an estimated 10,000 shrieking fans at a Plantation, Fla., mall stampeded at the sight of him. Twenty-one people were injured, and the actor was hustled away by police ─ a promo stunt he says he won't be repeating. Was he upset?

"Feel my pulse," he dares, holding out a cool, bare wrist. "Pretty normal, huh?"

Yes, but what's normal in an industry where little-known young actors become wealthy heartthrobs overnight? Many in the cast smoke, with nervous, grown-up gestures. Some have just bought houses. Big, grown-up houses. All are feeling pretty excited, pretty jazzed, pretty dazed. They goof around a lot, and cut up with the crew. The guys in the cast slap and hug and talk about going skeet shooting together. And to a man they claim to have no girlfriends, that they're free agents. (The message: Female fans, there's hope!) The 90210 girls give and receive back rubs. To a woman, they've got boyfriends. (Hint: Guys, back off!)

They claim no tensions, these fragile egos with soft faces, no competition ─ nothing but comradely exhaustion.

"But I think we're all ready for a break!" That's Shannen Doherty sighing with an edgy giggle. Doherty, a screen veteran (one of the Heathers in the 1989 movie of that name and a graduate of NBC's Our House), is defensive, cautious, upset by recent reports that she is difficult on the set. "That's stupid stuff!" she says. There's a sleep-de-prived pallor beneath her Brenda makeup. She giggles again.

During one break, while director Charles Braverman and his crew of 90210-like techies hug and slap each other and set lights, 18-year-old Brian Austin Green blasts his boom box with friends ─ teen colleagues in a rap-rock band he has just formed. "David Silver," he says of the character he plays, "is the annoying guy nobody wants around, but they can't get rid of him." Jennie Garth, who plays Kelly, the "fast" girl, plops down with Gabrielle Carteris, who plays Andrea Zuckerman, the brain. "I think Andrea's really going through a budding time now," says Carteris.

Tori Spelling hunkers in her dressing room with her teddy bear, Stanley. "My character, Donna Martin, is kind of ditzy," she says in a tiny voice. "Into money. She puts down people who aren't popular. I think she's more sensitive than that, though. I think she's really funny." Ian (that's EYE-An, like it says on his license plate) Ziering wanders out to hug and slap his buddy Luke. "Steve Sanders [his role] thinks he can get away with flashing a smile and buying his way out of trouble." Ziering flashes his own smile; he's in actor heaven. "I feel the writers are so capable and I'm not just blowing sunshine up anybody's tush!"

And then there's Jason Priestley. "Jay-Man, Jay-Bob, Jay-Bird!" raps Luke Perry. "Let me show you my Jason pose!" Perry stands in a hustler's slouch, thumbs hooked into waistband. Priestley hugs and "Hey, man!"s with the best of them. He's hot. He's cool.

"Brandon's going to get into a little bit of trouble this season, which I'm looking forward to," Priestley hints. He drags on a cig.

Trouble?

"Well, I could tell you ─ but then I'd have to kill you. Top secret around here, I'm telling ya." Priestley smiles a Priestley smile. A makeup girl comes over for a hug, or maybe it's a kiss. "This is not a high-pressure show to work on," director Braverman says, dryly. Of course not; he's in the middle of receiving a back rub. High school was never like this.

No, wait, maybe it was: a lot of excitement, a lot of requirements, and tons of pressure to be popular.

"All shows have their peak," sums up Tori Spelling, who probably heard a thing or two about the subject growing up. "Right now we're in our peak. I don't want to think about the future. I just want to enjoy it. After we did the pilot, everybody was, like, 'What show are you on? 902-what?' Nobody heard of us. And now-now our goal is to beat Cheers one day, beat them in the share points. Or something."

The students and fans of Beverly Hills, 90210 are cheering: Go, Team, Go

[benjaminthewolf]

Buster (Brawl Stars) Lol 2

My first ever commission story, written for @luci-voracious-blog

Ah, I’m so happy!

WARNING: DIGESTION, FATAL VORE, CHEWING, BLOOD, BONES IN STOMACH, CRUEL PRED

(And no this isn’t the uniquely difficult writing project I was talking about lol, this was already done when I posted that.)

****

Much like the vast majority of the humongous giant-oriented world you lived in, Starr Park was rather difficult to navigate around as a Borrower. The towering booths that ensured you were practically invisible to anyone attending business there, the game equipment that was many many sizes too large for you to use, the ride seating whose handlebars could not properly hold you, it was rather disheartening yes, but at this point, you’ve for the most part gotten used to it.

Your Borrower claws which allowed you to climb did slightly mitigate for these size disparities, but nonetheless, as it was all but impossible for you to patron this theme park like all of your much larger colleagues, any time you entered the park, your first and foremost priority was, naturally, making sure you weren't going to get accidentally squished, rather than figuring out what attraction you were going to go to next.

Of course, this was slightly less of the case once closing hours came ‘round, but nonetheless, scurrying your way across the cobbled grounds of the park, you still knew you had to be careful.

Thus, the moment that your Borrower ears subconsciously swiveled to attention upon the distant clobbering of oncoming footsteps, you immediately stopped in your tracks, so you may be able to properly survey the circumstances.

Crouching with caution behind a booth, gingerly grasping onto its brightly colored cloth covering, you listen rather intently as the constant, echoing beats of footsteps only continue to grow louder. You could tell there was only one set, and that this person’s gait was rather heavy in nature, but that was just about all you were able to tell. It wasn’t until the mysterious person in question at last entered your gaze were you able to pin an identity to their steps.

You give a vicious shudder as you fiercely suppress an instinctual squeak of terror. You knew this person. You knew this person quite well. As ever since the initial incident, the local Borrower community living around Starr Park had absolutely not shut up about him.

The moment the reports came in that one of your own had entered into the area past closing hours and hadn’t been seen coming out by anyone, (this combined with the fact that this particular Brawler’s car was the only one left in the parking lot at the time, and that the body was ever recovered), had lead the vast majority of Borrowers, you included, to come to the obvious conclusion. Whatever Buster had done to the poor person in question, it had most likely resulted in their death.

“Well hello there, short-stuff!” a voice suddenly called from above you.

Giving a sudden, frantic squeal as you instinctively leap a few inches away, you aren’t even given by Buster the proper time to contemplate what had just happened before he has wrapped all of his fingers tightly around your being, trapping you within his grasp, and leaving you fully at his own mercy as a result.

“Heh, so lost in thought back there that ya couldn’t possibly even notice the danger right in front of ya huh?” he sneers, bringing you closer to his face.

Internally cursing yourself for not paying attention to where Buster was when reciting his probable crime in your head, the considerably larger, sunglasses-donning, sleeveless Brawler proceeds to chuckle at your utterly helpless being for a while before at last speaking again.

“Welp, guess this means there’s only one thing left to do!”

Upon the utterance of this sentence, your heart skipped a beat.

“I am a little hungry after all, so, I suppose that would mean…IT’S TIME FOR ANOTHER SNACK!”

Your blood almost instantly ran cold. “ANOTHER snack”? What could that possibly mean? Buster, of course, could’ve just been talking about food, but…it was still, in fact, rather indeed possible that he was instead referring to…………your heart practically lurched forwards into your throat. No, there was absolutely no way he could be talking about THAT, could he? He couldn’t! He absolutely couldn’t! RIGHT?

Naturally having sensed your sudden terror, Buster gives a smirk. He does not follow up this action with any words, however. Instead, rather cunningly, he opts in an exceedingly calculated fashion for the considerably more explicit and thus more intimidating motion of simply opening his maw. His body seemingly knowing all about his scare tactic as well, decides to compliment the gesture as such with a couple of low growls emulating from the giant Brawler’s middle.

If only your poor brain even had the resources required to label your suspicions as all but confirmed. Casually tossing your limp, unresponsive, yet still definitely awake body straight into his maw, Buster immediately snaps his jaws shut, the resulting crash instantly forcing your being back to attention as you involuntarily spasm from the shock.

Lifting your head up off of the soft, squishy surface of the tongue, you just barely avoid scraping said head against the rough ridges at the roof as the reality of the situation at last begins to settle. Buster swiftly opens back up his jaws, leaving you as such with but a fleeting second of hope where it was indeed a possibility of leaping right out of the area, however rather quickly douses this hope, and thus any chance at all you had of making an escape, as his jaws come falling back down again, however this time, with one of your skittishly reaching arms placed right between them. You aren’t exactly able to feel the impact when it hits, but upon retracting the poor limb back inside the maw, you are able to immediately discern that there was indeed, right upon your skin, a considerable amount of blood.

Not even daring to give your poor body a break, Buster suddenly forces your body back downwards as the front of his tongue folds over onto your being. Now that he has a weight keeping your down, the relatively gigantic Brawler, calmly and cruelly, maneuvers your body back over to his teeth, a poor little leg getting caught between the mollaras, before at last coming down upon your tiny, fragile body once again, tearing up the skin upon said limb, and causing it to start significantly bleeding as well.

It is finally at this point that Buster decides he has had enough of playing with his food, and as a result, carefully lifts his tongue off from the bottom of the maw just slightly, in order to condition your for future caution and gentleness, before instantly and aggressively flinging your poor being straight off the muscle, flying en-route for the gullet, causing you to splat harshly against the plump, dangling uvula, before your lower half slides cleanly into the gullet.

Merley working off of instincts at this point due to having been tricked, the second you are able to take note of the smooth sack of flesh, your body knows what to do.

Buster is just about ready to swallow, thus squeezing you into his esophagus that would escort you all the way down to your doom, before, completely out of nowhere, he fiercely lurches forwards, and is forced to suppress a gag.

Swiftly shaking off the initial shock of the matter within the next few seconds, however, Buster is rather quick to realize that all you have done on the inside of his maw was grab hold of his uvula, holding on firm for quite literally dear life, therefore causing the now considerably more calm Brawler to, in a rather unimpressed manner, give a lengthy sigh.

“That seriously all ya got?” he scoffs out to your being on the inside with a rather dragged-out eye roll.

This little display of mockery is almost immediately followed up with a gulp, that which forces your lower half and midsection down into the esophagus, leaving only your upper half, head, and arms free from its squelching force. As this now reduced your little uvula hang maneuver to to that of a game of time, the clock constantly ticking down on you, all you are able to do at this point is tighten your grip further, although you implicitly knew this was all in vain, as Buster swallows again, causing the uvula to get rather stretched out from how far it was being pulled, as most of your chest is pushed through.

An audible, shuddery breath is suddenly heaved forth from your chest as you are suddenly able to hear the unmistakable squishy sound effect that was Buster swallowing once more. Knowing quite well you couldn’t keep hold on his uvula any longer, you are rather reluctantly forced to finally slide all the way off the thing as a result, your hands slipping off in spite of their firm grasps, causing it to bounce back to its normal hanging position, as your head and arms at last join along with the rest of your body, and are squeezed into the esophagus as such.

Buster on the outside gives a rather satisfied sigh paired with an extremely euphoric grin as he is able to feel your being getting rhythmically squelched down his throat. Placing a couple fingers upon the slight bulge you were making in there, Buster casually flops down and leans up against the stand you had been previously attempting to hide behind, preemptively patting over his continuously rumbling stomach as he does so.

Back on the inside, whilst the thick, goopy walls of the throat only continue on with their squeezing, you are suddenly able to pick up the solid, firm heartbeat resonating out from Buster’s chest, as well as the lower, rumbling growls stirring deeper within. It doesn’t become very long then, before you are able to notice the lower esophageal sphincter, as it at last opens up, and welcomes you into your doom.

The moment the sphincter squeezes you through, however, you are able to sense something instantaneously brush past your face, before it naturally subsides and you are left without it once more. Pretty soon, that mysterious essence is revealed to be that of air, as Buster casually lets out a belch that rings out through the park, and is even able to reach your ears despite your current position.

……………..Reach your ears, that is. Not your brain. Not even close to your brain. From the start, from the mere instant you had entered into this place, it had standed at absolutely no chance whatsoever.

Your assumptions, in the end, that had been conjured within the long, long, long ago of Buster’s clenched fist, had, indeed, ended up as being completely correct.

A barren, intact, lifeless skeleton lay floating aimlessly, without any speakable resistance, along the sloshing waves of the acids. Acids that, as the belch had no chance at reaching your brain, held no similar chance of reaching the organ at all, leaving you only able to sit yourself down against the squishy, slick walls of the churning, gurgling stomach, whilst all sensory aspects, including your rapidly fading eyesight, present around your being were nothing other than null. Nothing to see anymore, nothing to hear anymore, nothing to feel anymore, nothing, nothing at all. And most of all, there was no longer anything to think. Not now, nor ever again. Just as had been the truth for the skeletal Borrower before you, you, yourself, were nothing else, but bound to meet the exact same fate.

Meanwhile, back on the outside of the situation, Buster was…well…enjoying himself rather excessively.

Allowing his tongue to loosely loll out of his mouth while his drool dripped downwards until it splattered into a rapidly growing pool against the floor, Buster leisurely allowed his hands to rub themselves all over his midsection, throwing in the occasional pat, as, for the second time this occasion, he could feel something rising up in his throat.

Spewing out one last reverberating belch as it rings itself about, Buster teasingly smacks his lips, as his heavenly state of euphoria only continues to flow forth. He had been waiting ever so patiently for this moment, so, so patiently! And now, it had finally arrived. That moment being, of course, the moment a Borrower once again entered the park when it in and of itself, as well as all the establishments within were well past closing. And now, just as was promised, you would never, never ever, not within anyone’s wildest dreams, think a single thought again.

Your skull, at long last, has been seared clean. No flesh remains. At last, it is perfect.

The two floating bodies of cruelly striped remnants bob and heave along with the acid levels as they are rumbled and sloshed about. Cordially greeting each other in the way that only dead bodies can, the two skulls embrace each other, for there is nothing more than the other that can keep them company now. No sights, no sounds, no thought. This was their shared reality, and it was one they readily planned to enjoy, just as did Buster, with many, many, many… more to come.

[jgvfhl]

The Number Lads

Part 1/???? 3K words, no warnings :)

 So I’ve created an audience on Tumblr for the Number Lads, and I’ve happened to got 3K words here for them. So! Here are the origins of the Number Lads! More to follow.... eventually....

For future reference:

Sevenset = ARC-7777 = ARCBoiiiii

Do-si-do = CT-2222 = Double Trouble

Trees = CT-3333 = Green Bean

Loops = CT-8888 = Loopy

Sixes = CC-6666

Double Trouble: i meant it as a joke sevens

ARCBoiiiiii: i didn’t

ARCBoiiiii: what you think you can drop that information on me and i wont use it??? how long have you known me

Double Trouble: okay okay but if you die i’m not mourning you

Loopy: ouch

Green Bean: how do you have this much time to comm us when you’re at ARC training, sevenset

Green Bean: who changed my name

Double Trouble: :3c

ARCBoiiiii: what you don’t like it? thought it suited you, trees

Green Bean: why did i let you guys talk me into this club…

ARCBoiiiii: we’re awfully convincing that way

Double Trouble: you felt compelled

Double Trouble: it’s the numbers gang bond

Green Bean: it was not that

ARCBoiiiii: was it loops space buns

ARCBoiiiii: i bet it was loops space buns

Loopy: what

Double Trouble: they are adorable

Loopy: oh kriff you, don’t you have arc stuff to do, sevenset?

ARCBoiiiii: ehhhhh my next training block doesnt start for another 4min, so....

Double Trouble: well i gotta run, we’re going hyperspace in a min or so--remember the meeting next week!!! be there or be square!

ARCBoiiiii: we dont have any perfect squares yet ;-;

Green Bean: Yeah, yeah, i’ll see you weirdos eventually

Loopy: stay alive out there

Double Trouble: especially the guy who wants to recruit Commander Death over there

ARCBoiiiii: I’ll be fiiinnnne whats the worst that can happen

Green Bean: i mean. his name. is DEATH?

ARCBoiiiii: ..... a fair point.... i guess you’ll just have to wait until the next numbers gang meeting huh :)

Loopy: maker help you

----

Sevenset was uncharacteristically quiet that day during second meal, but only because his mouth was continually occupied with food, not talking. He was on the clock today.

“Hey, Sevenset, are you inhaling those rations, or…?”

He looked over at Buster next to him, quickly swallowing his food. “I just got something I wanna do,” he said, taking a glug of water.

“Something so important you’re taking one of the few unscheduled breaks we have to do it? Okay then.”

Sevenset cleaned the rest of his tray, flashing a grin at Buster as he stood up. “Don’t wanna be late. Got a meeting with death.” He really couldn’t resist the pun. Honestly.

Buster’s eyebrow raised skeptically. His friend next to him, Sketch, asked, “Is this about some new way you’ve managed to piss off the trainers? Because yeah, I’m sure Alpha could arrange a meeting with death for you if you… I dunno, painted pink hearts on his armor.”

“Amazing idea,” Sevenset admitted, his brain automatically figuring out where the pink paint was (he’d have to make it), where Alpha-17’s armor lived (not sure on that one), and how possible it would be to sneak in and out to accomplish the task (a challenge). “However, no, not this time. See you guys later!” He deposited his tray and utensils in the proper area to be cleaned, then jogged out of the mess hall.

Kamino’s winding halls and levels really weren’t efficient--but compared to Coruscant… he couldn’t really argue. A healthy stretch of time in the Guard had given him plenty of tools to make his way around inefficient, crowded, twisty places like this. It didn’t take long before he reached where he was going. Aside from the resident Rancor Battalion, there were often troopers on Kamino from various groups throughout the GAR. They stayed out of the way of those training in separate wings of Tipoca City, and right now, Sevenset was very keen to speak to a visiting commander.

He slipped into a lift with two other troopers--visiting, by the looks of their battered armor. Luckily, they were too engrossed in their own conversation to really notice him, despite his rather colorful tattoos that usually made him stick out. But it was for the best this time. He got off at the level above and started down the hall, reading door labels as he went, searching….

Ah. Here. He pushed a button to open the door, but it was locked. Not entirely surprising, but… now what? If his internal clock was still fairly accurate, he had about ten minutes before he needed to be back for the next training block.

“It’s locked for a reason.”

He whirled, his body almost automatically snapping to attention at the low voice behind him.

Commander Sixes (AKA Commander Death, remember) surveyed him with a disturbing lack of expression. He was tall, for a clone. Probably closer in height to some of the Alphas than to Sevenset. His black armor stuck out like green plants on Coruscant in the brightly lit halls of Tipoca City, making him somehow look even bigger. Even more unnerving, he still had his helmet on, the visor lit with a dull green light, and fixed pointedly on him. Sevenset hated not being able to read people...

Sevenset hadn’t planned for this. Come to think of it, a lot of the “plan” he’d concocted relied on a few assumptions, and all of them seemed to be fading. One of them had been that he would have no problem talking to a CO--he never had before. “Sir, hi--hello--I was uhm…” He managed to clamp down on the first coherent thought to float through his head, so instead of blurting, “You’re a lot taller than I thought you’d be,” he stumbled upon, “It’s a nice room you’ve got. From the outside,” and immediately wanted to bash his head in on the wall.

The commander’s helmet never moved, just kept staring him down. “Get out of my way,” he finally growled, taking a step forward.

Against all better judgement, Sevenset stood his ground, although he squished himself a bit closer against the door. “Yessir, of course, just--one thing, really quick thing, I promise.” When the commander didn’t kill him or rip his arms off or something, he went on, finally finding his words were cooperating with him. “So, you’re CC-6666, naturally. I happen to be CT-7777--Sevenset, I’m Sevenset. There’s a group of us, see, sir--with the repeating numbers, and we have little meetings--”

“No.”

“--is what I thought you’d say, but just--” he paused, fumbling a bit to pull a piece of flimsi out of his pocket. “There’s the frequency, there’s the date of the next meeting,” he said, holding out the flimsi scrap. “I’m sure the other boys would love it if you dropped by.” The end of his final sentence shriveled into an undignified squawk when Commander Sixes reached out, grabbed his collar, and shoved him bodily out of the way of the door.

“Get back to training before I have some of my boys drag you there,” he said, entering the door’s access code.

“I’ve got six minutes--”

The door slid shut in his face. Well. He was still alive. So… that counted as a success. Perhaps not a resounding success, but a success. He stood in stunned silence for a moment, still clutching the scrap of flimsi in his hand, wondering if he should stick it in the door so the commander would find it later. However, he had no trouble believing the commander’s threat that his men literally would drag him back to the ARCs if he told them to, so it was probably best not to linger.

Sevenset jumped to attention for the second time that day when the door slid open again. He just stood there, dumb, as Commander Sixes stepped out, plucked the scrap of flimsi from his fingers, then returned to his room with about as much ceremony as befitted dumping pebbles out of a boot.

Oh, yeah. Definitely a success.

---

The first thing Sixes did once back in the privacy of his albeit temporary rooms was remove the top half of his armor, only leaving the gauntlet with his wrist comm. Turning his attention to said wrist comm, he entered Colt’s number. There was a short wait before the other commander answered it.

“Everything alright over there, Sixes, sir?”

“It’s about one of the ARC candidates.”

There was a pause. Understandable. The ARCs weren’t supposed to be in this wing of Tipoca City. “Which one?” His tone suggested he already had his suspicions.

“Calls himself Sevenset.”

He heard inaudible muttering on the other end. “What’d he do this time?” Sixes had suspected as much.

“Quite a pair he’s got on him, hasn’t he?”

Colt laughed dryly. “Yeah, sure. Hopefully, he’s worth the trouble.”

Sixes looked over the scrap of flimsi in his other hand. “Yeah… I think he might be.”

~+~

Leaning back in his pilot’s chair, Do-si-do watched the little light on the ship’s holoprojector, waiting for the others to join the meeting. He always took the calls in his ship. It was more private than his bunk most of the time, and frankly, the audio quality was so much better than on the hand-held devices.

Trees was the first to join, punctual as usual.

“Hey, Trees,” he smiled.

“Have you heard from Sevenset yet?” he asked.

Do-si-do shook his head, combing strands of his bleached curls out of his face. “Nah. Figure he’s been too busy. Graduation was supposed to be a couple days ago, right?”

“Three, yes.”

Loops’ holographic miniature appeared beside Trees’. He looked exhausted, but awake. His long hair was down from his signature twin buns, and he leaned his chin on his hand, fingers resting just over the infinity symbol tattoo on his cheek.

“Loops,” Trees greeted him.

“Mph.”

“What happened to you?” Do-si-do asked.

“Supply shipment,” Loops sighed. “General Koon’s having skeleton crews tonight so we can get some sleep.” After a stifled yawn, he asked, “Is Sevenset dead yet?”

Do-si-do smiled. “Trees asked the same thing, and I have no idea.”

As if on cue, a third hologram popped up on the ship’s control panel. Sevenset beamed at them, his new ARC pauldrons proudly on display. “Guess who’s not dead, fellas!”

“Hey hey! Look at you, ARC-7777,” Do-si-do grinned, leaning forward in his seat. “How’s it feel?”

“I really love the kama, gotta be honest.” He was only visible from the waist up, but they could see him sway his hips back and forth, clearly enjoying his new gear.

“Show us the paint,” Loops demanded, as firmly has he could demand it in his half-asleep state.

Sevenset obliged, setting down his holoprojector--his personal one, now he had graduated--and stepping back so more of his body was visible. The paint job was fairly similar to his previous armor--the sharp edges, the circle on his right shoulder bell holding four stylized sevens--but the new armor on his chest and arms had forced some alterations. They could see just about all of the kama now, the bright red sevens standing out against the dark grey fabric. Predictable, maybe, but still eye-catching. That was Sevenset’s main goal, if it weren’t already clear from the tapestry of tattoos on his bald head that ran down his neck under his blacks, and the several glinting piercings in his ears and nose.

“It’s definitely you.” Trees, bluntly.

“They let you keep the red paint, huh?” Do-si-do said. Sevenset had previously been assigned to the Coruscant Guard. After proving a bit more trouble than the Guard could take, and catching some CO’s eye, he’d been shipped back to Kamino a couple months ago to join Rancor.

“Hey, if Commander Colt can have it, I guess I can too. No one stopped me.”

Without warning, a fourth hologram appeared beside the others in front of Do-si-do’s eyes. A trooper--a big trooper, even in miniature--and in dark armor, helmet included. His brows scrunched together as he studied the person, failing to recognize them.

Sevenset did. “Commander!”

“I see Colt decided against tossing you overboard.”

Oh, no karking way. “Commander Sixes?” Do-si-do blurted.

At the same time, Loops made some unintelligible noise and suddenly disconnected, and Trees froze like a lizard when a hawk flies overhead, his eyes gone wide, one arm half-way to a salute. Frankly, Do-si-do could understand their reactions. Commander Sixes--like many of the CCs--was legendary. His wing of Star Fighters had fought through some of the toughest space battles so far, and always came out of it. As a pilot himself, Do-si-do had heard story after story about their skills. The fighter wing and the commander now wore the nickname Death, thanks to their brutal but effective tactics.

There was a brief and painfully quiet pause before the commander said, “Pride of the GAR, this lot.”

“Eh, they’ll get over it,” Sevenset shrugged, his hologram appearing to zoom in as he came closer again. “Right, Trees?” he added with a grin. Their friend was still in shock, it looked like. “Might have to tell him to relax, sir.”

The commander’s helmet turned towards Trees. “At ease. Take a breath before you pass out.”

Trees blinked, lowering his arm. “Yessir,” he said quietly, throwing a glance over his shoulder.

“I’ll try to get Loops back,” Sevenset said, a datapad appearing in his hands. Damn, ARCs really did get all the good stuff. Do-si-do still had to share a datapad with his squad of pilots.

“Shouldn’t there be more?” Commander Sixes asked.

“Of us? Yeah,” Do-si-do answered. “I guess there should be nine of us, in theory.”

“Nine or ten,” Trees said, his tone still a bit clipped.

“Ten or eleven, actually,” Sevenset corrected, still looking at his datapad. “We don’t know if a CT designation can be all zeroes. Might have been taken out of the system, who knows.”

“It’s hard when we don’t have access to the full GAR database,” Do-si-do went on. “We have to rely on hearsay and brothers from other battalions. Sevenset and I met by chance on Coruscant.” Loops’ hologram reappeared. He looked a bit more awake now, still visibly on edge from the commander’s arrival, and with a glower on his face. “Loopy! Welcome back.”

“I hate you.”

“Whoa, hey, I didn’t know he was coming either,” he defended himself. “Blame Sevenset.”

“I’m blaming both of you,” Loops said. “You told Sevenset about him, and Sevenset was stupid enough to go through with it.”

Sevenset, his attention off his datapad and back on the meeting, put a hand over his heart. “Stupid enough?” he repeated, doing his best to sound utterly wounded. “I think you mean ballsy enough.”

“He meant stupid enough,” the commander replied immediately and without emotion. “And I agree.”

Do-si-do snorted a laugh at the look of utter indignation on Sevenset’s face. Even Trees relaxed a bit more. “Okay, I can get used to having a CC around,” he grinned.

“Finally, someone with the authority to tell him off,” Loops said, expressing Do-si-do’s feelings exactly.

The recipient of their mocking pouted at them, folding his arms as best he could with his new armor. “Now I just feel unloved.”

“Why do I get the feeling Commander Fox was only too happy to get you qualified for ARC training?” the commander asked, his tone remaining impassive.

“For your information,” Sevenset said, then stopped, realizing, as they all had, that the commander had known where Sevenset had previously served. No one had told him this information. “How did you know I was in the Guard?”

They all turned to the commander. “I’m a commander. I can look anyone up. I looked you all up.”

Do-si-do leaned even farther forward in his seat, a huge smile on his face. “You have access to the full database?”

“You can find the others!” Sevenset completed, a similar smile on his face as well.

There was a pause. Do-si-do was starting to think Commander Sixes just liked the drama they created. In fact, judging by how he had yet to show his face and was wearing all black armor, it seemed Commander Death was fond of the dramatic in a few ways. “In theory, sure.”

“Yes! Oh, fantastic,” Sevenset went on, rubbing his hands together. “You can tell us where they’re stationed--”

“If they’re still alive,” Trees added in. He had a point.

“--and then we can find them!”

The commander’s helmet tilted, his expression hidden. “I’m guessing Fox declined membership,” he said.

Do-si-do snorted a gain, and Trees and Loops both smiled. They all remembered Sevenset’s story of trying to recruit Commander Fox to be number ten for their little group.

“If by ‘declined membership’ you mean, ‘shipped me out to Kamino for someone else to deal with,’ then yes,” Sevenset answered. “He declined.”

“Maybe you can ask him,” Loops said.

“Hey, yeah--”

“No.” The commander’s tone didn’t leave much room for argument, but that had never stopped Sevenset a day in his life, and Do-si-do was more than content to sit back and enjoy the show.

“But you’re his big brother, right? You can drag him into things--”

“I’m not a damn recruiter, ARC, now stand down.”

The effect was instantaneous. They all recognized a CO’s “talk back and you’ll be cleaning ‘freshers for the next month” voice. Combined with Commander Sixes’ already awe-inspiring reputation, his order shut them all up. Trees once again straightened to attention, and this time they all joined him, even Sevenset.

“Understood, sir,” he replied. Do-si-do could see the new training in him now. Sevenset wouldn’t be an ARC if he didn’t know when to drop the comic act, but the speed and discipline with which he’d done so just now was different.

The commander waited a second or two, then he nodded once. “At ease.”

They relaxed, mostly. It was hard to ignore the mood shift that had taken place. As cool as it was having a commander in the club… there were some obvious issues that needed addressing if this was going to remain a “just for fun” place.

Do-si-do found himself as the one breaking the uneasy silence. “But… you can help us find where the others are stationed, right, sir?”

The commander’s helmet dipped. “Yeah, I can do that.”

“Can you do that… now?” Sevenset ventured.

The commander’s helmet tilted to one side, and it looked like he sighed. “Fine.” The others perked up. “But, I can only find their assignments, not their current locations.”

“We can work with that,” Do-si-do agreed, and the others nodded along. “Who’s writing this down?”

“I can!” Sevenset volunteered.

Trees reminded him, “Your handwriting is entirely illegible. Even to you.”

“Yes, but now I have a datapad. I can type all my notes.”

“I’m just going to start talking if you boys don’t figure it out,” the commander warned.

“Okay, okay, fine, Trees can copy it.”

Trees’ organization skills would always beat out Sevenset’s anyway. Maybe ARC training had fixed that, though. Trees shifted around, grabbing what he needed, then looked up and nodded when he was ready.

The commander’s helmet tipped down to look at something--presumably a datapad--as he spoke. “CT-4444 is with the Marines under Bacara. Probably has limited contact availability depending on the mission. Infrequent leave.” Do-si-do’s eyebrows raised, and he glanced at Sevenset and Loops. They hadn’t been expecting a tactical rundown of each person. But… they wouldn’t complain. “CT-27-5555 is the only ‘fives’ trooper in the GAR. He’s one of Rex’s freaks, so good luck getting your hands on him.”

“That’s the five-oh-first, right?” Loops asked. “Torrent, or something?”

“Yeah. Rex’s freaks. I’m sure he’ll fit right in.” Do-si-do smirked. He probably would. “And CT-9999 is with Ghost Company in the two-twelfth. Pretty decent chance he and number five have run missions together. Or will in the future, anyway.”

“Is there a CT-0000?” Loops wanted to know.

“What about eleven-eleven?” Sevenset added.

The commander glanced up at them, then back to his materials. “Yeah, the one-eighteenth has a CT-0000. Didn’t find an eleven-eleven, though.”

Do-si-do frowned. “Not even a casualty report?”

“No.”

“But… he could still be on Kamino, right?” Trees said. “Cadets don’t show up in the main database until they graduate and deploy.”

The commander nodded. “He could be a cadet.”

“I could look,” Sevenset offered. “I mean. I live here now, so I should be able to find out if a CT-1111 exists. It’ll just take a bit longer.”

“Yeah, we’ll figure it out,” Do-si-do nodded. “In the meantime,” he continued, leaning forward, “who’re we going after first?”

Ta-daaa!! @blsmjoon @nintendolover13-ts4 (I couldn’t tag your side blog sorry) @alamogirl80 (idk why I can’t tag you either ;-;) @23-bears @theultimatesandwich

[atlafan]

Take it Slow - Part Eighty-Four

a/n: okay this is my first shot at a harry:y/n fic, and it will be multiple parts. y/n had a bad experience with an ex over a year ago, and finally accepts her coworker and good friend Niall’s invitation to go on a blind date with his friend Harry.

Warnings: TW: mention of past abuse. Slight angst, little bit of smut, and a ton of fluff. 

Masterpost (all previous parts can be found in the masterpost)

You had the perfect last morning at the beach. None of you wanted to leave, but it had to be done. You all help to pack up the cars.

“Before we all leave, I just wanna say thanks again for everything. This was the perfect weekend.” You say to everyone. Everyone says how much a good time they had too.

“I’ll see yeh at home, I’m gonna drop Niall off and go pick up Buster.” Harry says to you.

“Alright, baby.” You kiss him and climb into Sarah’s car.

Rachel was driving this time, so Mariah takes the passenger seat. You didn’t mind at all. You were exhausted and ended up falling asleep for most of the drive. Luckily it didn’t take much time at all to get back to the city since a lot of the traffic was going the other way.

You hug the girls goodbye and get all your shit upstairs. You weren’t sure if you wanted to wait to shower with Harry or not…but you felt gross from being at the beach so you opt to take a quick one. You throw on a pair of athletic shorts and a t-shirt and sit on the sofa. You go through a ton of the pictures that were taken over the weekend and post a good chunk of them. You hear the pitter patter of feet and you stand up immediately.

“Buster! Come to mumma!”

He runs over to you and you get on your knees so you can properly hug your fluffy boy.

“Jesus, we need to take him for a hair cut soon, huh?”

“I’ll say.” Harry chuckles. “Isaac said he was an angel, as always.”

“Oh good.” You look back at Buster. “You were a good boy while mummy and daddy were away, hm?” He licks your cheek. “Oh, thank you, so sweet.” You stand up and hug Harry. He wraps his arms around you. “Can we just chill for the rest of the day. M’craving some alone time with my boys.”

“That sounds amazing. Let me just grab a shower. I can see you already took one.”

“I wanted to wait for you, but I felt so gross.”

“It’s alright.” He smiles and goes down the hall.

“Come on Buster, let’s get cozy while we wait for daddy.”

Harry comes out a few minutes later in just a pair of boxers, finally feeling free to do so. He sits down next to you and puts his feet up on the ottoman.

“Sometimes I forget how much I actually hate wearin’ clothes.”

“Look at you, you tanned so well babe.” He looks down at himself.

“Guess I did, huh. You did too. Your burn faded really fast.” He pokes your cheek. “And you’re freckly, so cute.”

“Oh stop it.” You giggle.

He grabs the remote and turns on Netflix to pick up where you left off on Glee.

“I’m sorry, I just need to take a moment to document this. Are you voluntarily watching Glee?”

“I need to know if they win sectionals or not.” He says without looking at you and you burst out laughing. “This show is fuckin’ stupid and unrealistic, I can’t believe they got away with half the shit they’re doin’.”

“Oh honey, and we’re not even done with the first season yet. You’ve got a long way to go.”

“Well I’m strapped in so let’s go.” He hits play and yanks you closer to him.

“Wanna spoon?”

“Duh.”

You laugh and lay on your side in front of him. He lays behind you, keeping a hand on your hip and a leg between yours.

“We have some frozen meals in the freezer we can have for dinner later, I do not have the energy to shop and cook.” You tell him.

“Me neither.” He holds you a little closer as the episode really gets going.

“Woah, woah, woah, Finn’s not goin’!”

“He just found out everyone knew Puck is the father, and that Quinn’s been lying to him. You’d be pissed too.”

“Yeah, but now they don’t have enough people to go! What the fuck?”

A few more minutes pass and you hear Harry suck his teeth.

“Are you kiddin’ me?! That other school stole their routine, and now they have to do a bunch of unrehearsed numbers? This is bullocks.”

“Harry.” You turn to look at him. “Imagine watching this week to week. At least we can watch the next episode right away. This one ends on a cliff hanger.”

“Jesus, no wonder this used to work you up in high school, my fuckin’ heart is racin’.”

You and Harry easily watch four episodes of Glee because he just needed to know what happened next. But you both needed to take a break, and Buster needed to be taken out. You take him for a walk while Harry makes a couple of the frozen meals. You both sit on the sofa as you eat.

“You wanna watch more, don’t you?”

“No.” He scoffs. “Okay, why can’t we just finish the first season? I need to know if they win regionals or not. And if Finn and Rachel are gonna happen, this is very important.”

You nod and turn the TV back to Glee so you can continue watching together. It was a lot of fun to share something you loved so much Harry. Your phone goes off about halfway through the episode and you pause it to answer. It was Seth.

“Hey.” You say brightly.

“Hey! How was your weekend away?”

“Oh it was amazing!”

“What did Harry get you?”

“He’s flying my Nannie in for the Jewish New Year next month.” You say smiling.

“Wow! That’s awesome…so now that you’re back…”

“When are you free?” You giggle.

“Saturday?”

“That’s soon! I’ll have to check with Isaac, and Harry.”

“I know it’s short notice, but you’re making me wait over here.”

“Very true…alright. Let me get back to you tomorrow, I should have an answer. I think we were thinking of going to that adult arcade.”

“Oh that place is fun! Yeah, I’d be up for that.”

“Cool, I’ll text you later.

“Alright, see ya.” You hang up and look at Harry.

“Do we have plans Saturday night?”

“Guess we do now.” He huffs. “Sorry, can we go back to what’s important please?” He presses play so you can continue watching the show. You can’t help but laugh. You love him more and more every day.

//

You and Harry enjoy some nice, soft cuddles, opting in to turn in early for bed. You’re both just laying there, naked and tangled up in each other. His hand lightly dances over your skin, tracing your tan lines.

“It really was the perfect weekend, huh?” You say to him.

“Mhm. I’m so glad you had a good birthday.”

“I had the best birthday, thanks to you.”

“Hey, your friends helped too.”

“Yeah…but you just being you also made it great.”

He leans in and kisses you softly. You give him an Eskimo kiss and giggle. He squishes his nose to yours again and he giggles too.

“Wanna make love to yeh.” He whispers against your lips.

You hum your response and he brings your leg up over his hip. He slowly inserts into your warmth. You moan when you feel him slowly stretch you out. He slowly moves so he’s on his back and you’re on top of him. You dip your head down to kiss him as you move your hips in slow circles on him.

“God, you’re so wet.” He groans and rolls his head back.

His hands slide up your body and cup your breasts. He was being so light and airy with you, it was nice. You roll your hips down on him, and grind back and forth. You put your hands over his and he squeezes your breasts. He thrusts up into you and you fall on him so you’re chest to chest. His hands slide to your back, holding you even tighter to him.

“Want you on top.” You say into his ear.

“Want me on top, baby?”

“Yeah.” You whine.

You both roll over and he smiles at you, caressing your cheek as he rocks in and out of you. He takes one of your hands in his and intertwines your fingers. He rests it next to your head. His other hand snakes between the two of you so he can rub your swollen clit. His thumb rubs slow, precise circles just where you need it. You moan out his name and stick your tongue out so he’ll kiss you. His forehead was sweaty against yours.

“Feel so good baby, I don’t think you’ve ever been this wet before.”

“Just feels so good, you’re so good Harry.”

You start clenching around him, he can tell you’re close. He rubs your clit faster as he thrusts deeper inside you. Your back arches as you release, and Harry’s isn’t too far behind. He kisses you deeply as he fills you up, and you swallow his moans. He pulls out of you and looks down, his eyes growing side.

“What is it?”

“Okay, don’t freak out…”

“Freak out about wh-“ You look down and see him covered in your period blood.

“Guess that’s why you felt so wet.” He smirks. “Did you know you were-“

“Please, I’m going to be sick.”

“Babe, it’s okay, I-“

“Harry, please.” Tears well up in your eyes. “I’m extremely embarrassed, and you’re covered, and oh my god.” You get off the bed and see splotches of blood. Your eyes grow wide. “Oh no.” You start breathing faster.

Your mind fills with flashes of that night, the remnants of your sheets afterwards.

“Oh no, what? Y/N?”

You screw your eyes shut, and see more, feel more. You feel a hand on your back and without thinking or even realizing where you are…

“Don’t touch me!” Smack. Your vision is hazy and you feel yourself lose your balance.

When you come to, you’re dressed in your comfiest pj’s and laying on the bed. It was stripped, you could feel your foam topper. You look over and see Harry sitting up against the headboard. He had an ice-pack pressed to his cheek and had his phone in his other hand, just scrolling.

“Harry?” He looks at you with concern, but a half smile. He sets his phone down on the night table.

“Hey baby…feelin’ alright?”

“What…happened?” You sit up and remember you got your period. You reach into your underwear and feel a bad and sigh.

“I, uh, hope I put it in there right…I read the directions on the box.”

“You put this on me?”

“Sort of had, to you wouldn’t wake up and I didn’t want you bleedin’ out. Sheets are in the wash. I would’ve put the others on, but I wanted you to lay down. You scared me…you wouldn’t wake up. I didn’t know what to do.”

“Why do you have an ice pack on your cheek?” He peels it away and you gasp when you see how red his cheek is, a bruise forming.

“You…well, I think you blacked out and you slapped me.”

“I slapped you?!” Tears prick at your eyes.

“Yeah.” He looks down, and back at you. “But it’s okay!” He grabs one of your hands to try to soothe you. “I know you didn’t do it on purpose. Your eyes glazed over, it was like you were somewhere else, like you thought I was someone else.”

“Harry, I am so sorry. You have to know I would never, I mean, I know I get in people’s faces, but I am not a violent person, I, I, I-“ Your breathing starts to quicken again but he cups your cheek.

“Please, stay with me. You’re okay.” He kisses your hand. “I’m not mad, I was a little shocked, but it’s okay, really.” He gives you a reassuring smile.

“But your poor cheek…”

“It’ll be fine.” He sighs and puts the ice-pack back on. “Can you try to tell me what happened? Although I have an idea.”

“I think when I looked down at the sheets and saw all the blood…” You take a deep breath and you feel tears burn your cheeks. “I haven’t had a flash in a really long time, months…” You look at him and frown. “I’m so sorry, Harry. I feel terrible. I…”

“You were just defending yourself. I put my hand on your back to try to calm you down when I saw you breathin’ heavy, but you were too far gone.”

“What if someone thinks I’m beating on you or something?! You can’t go to work like that.”

“Baby, no one’s gonna think that. I’m keepin’ the ice on it for good measure. I’ll put some makeup on it tomorrow, it’ll be fine.”

The washer goes off and Harry gets up to go flip the load.

“Can I get you anything? Some water? Water’s probably a good idea.” You nod and he goes out to take care of things.

He comes back in with a glass of water and some other sheets. Buster comes trotting in. You pet him while you sip on your water, and Harry makes up the bed.

“All done.” He smiles at you. “Let’s get some sleep, yeah?”

“How are you so calm about all this?”

“Not my first time bein’ slapped by a woman.” He rubs the back of his neck.

“Oh, Harry.” You can’t help but chuckle.

“There we go, gotcha to laugh.” He wraps his arms around you. “It’s okay. You’re okay, we’re okay. You didn’t purposefully try to hurt me.”

“Never.” You kiss him gently on the lips and sigh. “M’just gonna do my thing in the bathroom and then I’ll come to bed.”

You go in and sit down on the toilet. Harry actually did do a decent job of positioning the pad in your underwear. He was a saint, an absolute saint. You clean yourself up and stand to wash your face. You can’t help but cry again. For months you had been fine, more than fine. Now you can’t even see your own blood without freaking out? You take a deep breath and go back out to the bedroom.

“C’mere, angel. Let me holdja.”

You give him a small smile and get into bed. You go right into his arms and lay your head on his chest. He has one hand on your head, playing with your hair, and the other on your arm, rubbing up and down. He knew you were anything but calm.

“Listen, if you don’t wanna go to work tomorrow, you could always come with me…spend the day with Buster…”

“Harry, I’ll be just fine to go to work.”

“But if you’re still…you know…”

“I think after some sleep, I’ll be calmer. I’m more concerned about you.”

“I told you, I’ll just put some makeup on.”

//

You slept, but you felt like a zombie when your alarm went off. Suddenly going to work with Harry didn’t seem like such a bad idea, but you knew you couldn’t do that. You get up and shower. You blow dry your hair and throw a work-appropriate dress on. You put some makeup on and go to take Buster out. Back to your old routine. When you come back you go to the kitchen to make breakfast.

“Y/N?” You hear Harry call for your and go into the bedroom. You see the light on in the bathroom and go in there.

“What is it, doll?”

“Well, first, how are you feelin’?” He turns to look at you and you grimace when you see the bruise on his cheek. “It looks worse, I promise. It doesn’t hurt.”

“I’m okay…” He nods. You look to see he’s holding your liquid foundation. “Need some help?”

“A little…”

You sit up on the counter and he stands between his legs.

“I’ll have to put it all over so it blends more naturally. And then I’ll have to put some bronzer on. Your skin is so much darker than mine.”

“Do whatever you need.”

You can’t help but bite your inner cheek to keep from crying. How could you do this to him?

“I promise I’m alright, honey. Please don’t be upset.”

You nod and dab some of the makeup on him. Once you get it the way you like he looks in the mirror and gives you an approving look.

“Can’t even see it, well done.”

“You wear makeup well, Harry.”

“I do, don’t I?” He puckers his lips and looks away, trying to make a funny modeling face, making you laugh. You hop off the counter. He wraps his arms around you. “You call me if you feel weird at all today, alright?”

“Alright.”

“Bring Buster with yeh. You need him more than I do today.”

“Thanks Harry.”

//

It was one of those mornings where you and Niall weren’t able to carpool. You get up to your office and everyone is happy to see you. You were thankful it was Tuesday. You needed Dr. Mara today. When you get to your office you take a deep breath. You see Niall walk in with your coffee. Your bottom lip quivers and his smile fades immediately. He closes the door behind him.

“Y/N, what’s wrong?”

“Oh, Niall!” You go over to him and wrap your arms around his neck. You sob into his neck.

“Hey! What’s wrong? What happened? Did Harry do somethin’?” You mumble no into his neck. “Y/N, please, calm down, just tell me what happened.” He rubs your back and you step away from him. Your eye makeup was all smeared.

He walks over to your desk to grab you some tissues.

“Thanks.” You blot your eyes. You shouldn’t have even bothered with mascara today. “We were having such a nice night last night. God, he was being so soft with me, it was so sweet.” Niall nods. “But when he pulled out…” You look down. “We realized I had…well…Aunt Flow…”

“Right.”

“I got up, and I looked at the sheets. It had gotten everywhere…and….God, Niall, it was bad it was so bad. I was completely brought back to that night, and I blacked out…I slapped Harry.” You voice cracks.

“What do you mean you slapped him?” He asks softly.

“I slapped him across the cheek and when he tried to calm me down. It was like I didn’t know it was him. I think I passed out too. When I woke up, I was all cleaned up and dressed, laying on the bed. And there he was, cool as a cucumber, with an ice-pack pressed to his cheek.”

“Is he alright?”

“Yeah, he was perfectly fine. He didn’t even wince when I put some makeup on him earlier…I felt terrible. I don’t even really remember doing it.”

“You’re seein’ Dr. Mara tonight?”

“Mhm.”

He nods at you and takes you in for another hug. Buster yips at the two of you.

“Shit, I think he needs to pee again.”

“Let me take him. You go to the bathroom and clean up.” He smiles.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.”

//

“Morning, Harry.” Isaac smiles. “No Buster today?”

“No I sent him along with his mum.” Isaac hands him his coffee. “Thanks.” He squints at him. “What?”

“Your skin just looks…different today.”

“Oh, I’ve put some makeup on, I broke out from wearin’ so much sunscreen over the weekend. Way too much oil in that shit.” He takes a careful sip of the coffee. “So, uh, Seth called Y/N yesterday. We were thinkin’ of gettin’ together Saturday night. What do yeh think of that? Know it’s last minute.”

“I think I’m free actually!”

“Oh, great!”

“I’m really excited, thanks again for being such a good sport.”

Mariah walks in next and her and Isaac run to each other to hug.

“Neither of you should be allowed to leave at the same time again.” He kisses her on the cheek.

Harry and Mariah have back to back clients all day. Everyone was scrambling to get their senior photos in. And there were engagement shoots after engagement shoot. Harry couldn’t wait for it to be his fucking turn.

You text him letting him know you’re bringing Buster to therapy with you. Harry decides to make sure that when you walked through the door, you’d be overwhelmed with all things good. He knew it wasn’t going to be an easy session. He stops off at the drugstore and picks up your favorite kind of face-mask, and then he goes to one of your favorite restaurants to pick up one of your favorite meals.

When he gets home he grabs your nail kit and takes out your favorite colors. He sets everything on the coffee table. Next he fills a bin up with warm water and some soap. He sets that near the sofa on a towel. He was pretty proud of himself.

//

You were drained, spent really. Your session with Dr. Mara was good, but you cried more than you had in a long time. She let you get it all out. She wrote you a prescription that you weren’t sure you were going to fill. This was the first time you had even agreed to take something, but you never wanted to risk hurting the man you love most in the world ever again. You’d talk to Harry about it. Maybe he could go to the pharmacy with you so it wasn’t so scary.

You let Buster pee before getting him upstairs. You open the door and stop short when you see Harry walking out of the kitchen and lighting candles at the dining room table.

“You’re home!” He says brightly. “How’s my girl?”

“Um…okay.” He hugs you and pets Buster. “What’s going on?”

“Nothin’, just wanted to treat yeh.”

“You do enough of that.” You chuckle.

“Come on, I’m lovin’ on yeh, just humor me, hm?”

“Okay.”

He leads you to the table and you smile when you see a plate of raviolis from one of your favorite restaurants. Harry pulls your chair out and you sit down. You take a bite and close your eyes.

“So good, thank you.” You smile at him.

“You’re welcome. And after dinner I want you to go put your robe on and put your hair up.”

“Why, babe?”

“I’m gonna help yeh relax, so just do what I say.”

“Alright.” You giggle.

When you’re done eating you do as he says. You put your hair up into a messy bun and put your robe on. You come out to the living room and gasp when you see the set up.

“It’s like a little salon.” He says. “Sit down and put your feet in.”

“Harry…this is so sweet. I should be doing this for you though, I’m the one that-“

“You didn’t do anything.” He says a little too sternly. “Sit.”

You sit on the edge of the sofa and stick your feet into the warm water. Harry drags over the ottoman and sits in front of you. He takes all of the polish off your fingernails. He stands and grabs a warm cloth and dabs your face, getting all your makeup off, or what was left of it. He takes your small brush that you use for face-masks, and paints the clay on your face.

“You should do one too.” You say.

“Another time.” He smiles.

Once it’s on your face he sits back down and shows you the colors he picked.

“They’re perfect.”

“Want them on every other nail?”

“Mhm, just like yours please.”

He smiles and carefully paints the colors onto your nails. Harry’s never painted your nails before, you usually did his. He does a pretty good job, only has to redo one nail. He wipes the mask off your face when it’s time and dabs you softly to dry your face up. He gets behind you and rubs your face lotion in his hands. He massages it on and your lips part.

“Oh, wow.” You say softly. He smirks and continues rubbing it in.

“Feel nice, hun?”

“Mhm.”

“Good.”

When he sits back down he taps one of your knees to take your foot out of the bucket. He puts a towel on his leg and rests your foot on his thigh. He dries you off and takes the polish off your toes. He grabs some lotion and starts massaging your calf.

“Harry, you really don’t have to-“

“Y/N…” He says warningly, only glancing up at you for a moment. You sit back and let him continue. “Good girl.”

He paints your toes, and then does the exact same thing to your other leg and toes.

“Look at that, so pretty.”

He cleans everything up and plops down next to you when he’s done.

“Thank you, that was amazing. I thought I was going to melt into the couch.” You chuckle. He takes your hand in his and kisses your knuckles. “Harry…there’s something else I need from you.”

“Anything, angel.”

“Dr. Mara gave me a prescription for some medication. Something to help me…not get so freaked out.” You swallow. “I’m scared though. I’m not…strong enough to go to the pharmacy myself, and I’m terrified to see how some pills might change me. I could have mood swings, and who knows if they’ll even help.”

“Do you trust her?”

“Yeah, of course I do.”

“Then…maybe it’ll be good for you.”

“I’ve been fine for months and I’ve been trying to figure out why. She said having Buster around has probably been a greater help than I realized. But after last night…I don’t want to ever put you through something like that again. I wanna be the best I can be, for the both of us.”

“I can go with you before work tomorrow if you want, get it filled out. I’ll be with you when you take the first dose too.”

“I can’t drink alcohol while I take them…”

“Does that make you feel sad?”

“A little…more for the social aspect. But I’d rather be my best than drunk so.” You chuckle. Harry wraps an arm around you.

“We’ll get through this together. You don’t have to deal with any of this alone.” He kisses your hairline.

“Harry…I don’t know what I would do without you sometimes.” You look up at him doe eyed.

He cups your cheek and leans in to kiss you. You kiss him back and put your hand on his cheek, but he winces.

“Shit, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay. Mind takin’ all this gunk offa me?”

“Not at all! In fact, I’ll put a face-mask on you too. And I’ll massage your face like you did mine.”

“Baby, I did all that-“

“It felt so good, I wanna do the same for you, please let me.”

He watches you walk off down the hall to your bedroom. He was nervous about you taking pills too, but if Dr. Mara thought it would help, who was he to tell you not to? You had done just about everything else you could do to help yourself. Now it was time to try another approach, and he’d be by your side every step of the fucking way.

[quatschmachen]

Hitch Work

Follows Fresh Powder

2000′s. Edward finally visits Mac up north.

Master post

XXXX

Whenever he fell into that in-between miasma, where other options no longer seemed to exist, he usually found himself escaping Edmonton. Usually it was to Montreal, but that option was out now.  So he decided to take Mac up on his offer, an offer that he had often apologetically refused, due to being busy with something or other. But this time Mac somehow made going up to where it was colder, less populated, with a sky full of the dancing lights, more appealing than participating in civil society.

As always, before they even left the city, they had to pull into the Costco to get some essentials.

For Fort McMurray might be the place where most of the money was pulled out of the ground through the sweat and tears of the blue collar worker, but the money shifted south faster than a fart. The big city basics, the stuff the city dweller takes for granted, like Costco, Walmart, dipping out for some reasonably priced provisions…

Mac had to make the six hour journey down for that. He had come with a list. There was the usual on the list – toilet paper, essential food items such as potato chips, mustard pretzels, all the items that were hell to get up north – or if you could it would be twice the price for the inconvenience of lugging it up there. Never mind the desperation to get as much reasonably priced alcohol as possible.

It was almost as an afterthought that Mac led Edward to the aisle with dishes, and wordlessly grabbed a single mug. Edward thought nothing of it, other than Mac obviously needed a new mug.

His hockey bag packed with the essentials, Mac’s truck with all his supplies, Edward felt slightly optimistic.

They had to time it just right, but with a few pitstops, and the black ice which even the winter tires had difficulty navigating, the five hours turned into six. The ride interspersed with their conversation, both of them smoking like chimneys, the country radio that dominated rural Alberta, but not enough to not cut in and out sometimes, the flat prairie farms turning into boreal forest, dominated by the tall frames of the lodgepole pines.  A land carefully cultivated for centuries with a respect to nature, a land which now was being cut up to feed the white man’s economy. Brushing that thought aside, Edward let himself contentedly look at the nature around him.  

As they pulled into Fort McMurray, Edward was interested to see how the place had changed, and how it hadn’t. It was an odd mixture, the place where the money flowed from, the place where the money often did not stay. A place of historic transience, where one’s home was contained in the heart, but physically was far away. Something like he was doing – running away, getting to work. The grief heavy within him had settled like rocks in the bottom of his heart and stomach. A manageable pain, a manageable self hatred.

As they drove up to a relatively new house, Mac got visibly nervous.

Almost shyly, Mac announced he had finally bought a house. “Oh ye knows, I was rentin’ but then the owner wanted ta move right? So I figures, it’s a nice place, might as well just buy.”

As far as Edward knew, Mac had bounced around his own town unable to settle, never bothering too much with property, probably because it was so easy to crash at Edward’s between hitches. Why invest in a place you barely spent any time in, right? Or at least that had been his own pet theory. It was a feeling of shock and surprise then, at this announcement. Surprise because the man hadn’t bothered to hold a housewarming party, or even mention much about it.

Edward was too tired to even ask why his friend was renting in his own town. Mac did things his own way, and sometimes you just had to accept that. Edward had not seen this house before, and the build looked relatively new.

Pulling his hockey bag out of the truck, Edward followed Mac inside. Mac’s arms were full of the shopping, the bags dangling from the elbows, as he huffed from the weight of it. Edward offered to take something, but Mac was determined to bring it all into the house in one go. Edward locked the truck, and after careful instruction from Mac, which involved awkwardly reaching into Mac’s jacket pocket to retrieve the keys, opened the door to the house.

Taking his boots off, Edward glanced into the living room and frowned. It was a rather sparse room.

Mac had moved ahead to lazily dump the bags down in the nearest location, rubbing his arms.

“Mac… do you live in the basement or something?”

“No. I rents that out.”

Edward looked again at the living room. A space with bare wood floor where huddled in a corner sat one lamp, a worn-out bean bag chair covered in duct tape, gaming consoles and a very large television.  There was an overflowing ashtray beside the bean bag, and if he looked hard enough he could see some of the foam peanuts leaking out of the bag.

There was nothing else.

“Where’s your furniture?”

“You blind or wha’? It’s all there.” Mac gestured to the bean bag chair.

“Do you ever have guests?”

“Sometimes – but ye knows holdin’ a kitchen party ye jus’ needs takeout and alcohol.”

Edward made a ‘hmm’ing sound as he shifted his bag. “Well, you can show me where I’m supposed to sleep at least.”

“Sure thing, though now I’m realizing maybe should have got you a blanket or something,” Mac laughed. Edward laughed as well, as he was lead to the guest room.

The laughing stopped.

Before his eyes, was a room yes. In the room? For guests?

In the middle of the floor lay the saddest mattress on the ground. No box spring, no pillow. No duvet.

Simply something that looked like it should have been burnt in the last century.

Attempting to keep his shit together (for Edward knew that while Mac was a competent man, he also needed to be handled in the right way), he asked in a high pitched voice,

“So… am I supposed to sleep in here, or?”

Mac frowned, “Guess it’s not ideal, didn’t really think this through eh?”

Looking at the other man’s profile, Edward let out a breath, “We can make this work, though, I think tonight it might be too late to get me a place to sleep.”

Inwardly he screamed, when we went to Costco you could have said I would need to buy fucking pillows! A duvet! An entire bed! Instead you encouraged me to get more mustard pretzels!!

“Hell we can just share my bed, it’s big enough.”

Raising his eyebrow, and not quite looking at the other man, Edward attempted to joke, “You sure? You might get gay cooties.”

In response Mac slung his arm around Edward’s shoulders and firmly squished him into his warm side, “Chuck, if I’s a gay that would have been apparent years ago. I’s not worried ‘bout that.”

“Years ago?” Edward questioned, peering up at Mac’s amused expression. His internal screaming monologue quelled for the moment.

Giving him a reassuring squeeze, Mac let him go and cryptically replied, “This ain’t a place bustling with women in case ye haven’t noticed.”

“Maaaac… are you saying you’ve been experimenting?” Edward slowly asked, feeling somewhat delighted and surprised.

“Chucky, just cuz I ain’t a big city slicker don’t mean I don’t leave the house and sees people and does stuff, and I’ve realized that I am for sure not going to be worrying about turning homo.”

“Alright then buster… we can drop my stuff in your room and make some food.”

Mac was silent on the way to his room - which unsurprisingly smelt like sweat and something else.

This room had more stuff in it at least, Edward thought. He looked at the bed – simply a mattress on top of a box spring on the floor with what he supposed was the head pushed up against the wall. He knew he should probably count himself lucky that the box spring even existed in this scenario. The bed was messy and unmade, and he could just make out the forms of crushed potato chips amongst the black sheets.

Directly above the bed was a poster of a lady in a bikini, and then on the walls were scattered posters of other ladies, Oilers stuff, and the odd truck poster.

Clothes overflowed from the dresser, balled up tissues propagated on the floor, hiding in the green shag carpet. Edward’s gaze returned to linger to the bed.

“Uh, when was the last time you changed your sheets?”

“Ye change ‘em?”

“…Do you have some like, fresh bedsheets, Mac?”

Mac shrugged, “Maybe? I dunno. Maybe in the cupboard.”

Maybe? Maybe? Was Mac’s plan to share the bed all along? Mac? How the hell did he live like this?!

Edward frowned, attempting to figure out if he cared for the night. He was tired, they both were tired. He had slept in worse locations. He knew when there were times to fight, he also knew when it was time to eat.

“Let’s eat.”

Edward attempted to keep his trepidation at bay. It was as if this house wasn’t actually lived in. Simply a place for Mac to play games and pass out. A house – not a home.

Mac had said kitchen parties but… the stove still had plastic wrap on it. He was not sure what to expect when it came to the cupboards. He opened one and saw an open package of cookies, the plastic tray slightly hanging out of the bag, and on further inspection, only one broken cookie left. Squinting at the bag, Edward realized the cookie had expired over a year ago. The cupboard beside that one was empty.

The next cupboard contained one bowl, one mug, and one plate.

His next step had his foot stick to the floor, his hand fumbling on the next cupboard.

“Oh I calls that the fly trap.”

“What?”

Mac gestured to the sticky patch on the floor, “Keeps meaning to clean it up but ye know, easier to just not step in it.”

“Mac…” Edward sighed, as he opened the next cupboard, and was relieved that it contained some packs of ramen.

He opened a drawer and found it crammed with odd bits of silverware, free floating in the drawer, a divider nowhere in sight. He could discern a sharp knife, a wooden spoon, two forks, a butter knife and three spoons. And what possibly might be a cheese grater buried at the bottom of it all. There also happened to be about six different types of novelty beer openers.  The drawer beneath that contained cedar planks, hot dog buns, a long lighter, a metal spatula, and those tiny condiments you get from take out.

“That’s the barbeque drawer.” Mac offered in explanation.

One of the cupboards under the sink was crammed full of fishing supplies. Edward dearly hoped that the locked metal container did not contain fish bait. He did not open to find out.

With slight trepidation Edward opened the refrigerator.

On the top shelf, was an open can of peaches with a fork stuck into it. It stood in the middle of the top shelf like a sculpture – a sculpture that smelled. In the door was some open juice, pickled radishes, mustard, ketchup, relish and hot sauce. Edward could deal with this, indeed he had dealt with far worse before when it came to mysterious refrigerator contents.

Opening the freezer Edward let out a cry of surprise. Neatly stacked, packaged and dated was various cuts of meat that Mac had hunted.

Is this what he spent all his time doing? Edward mentally grumbled, expend all the energy to make sure you ate the meat in the right order?

Beside the meat was an assortment of frozen dinners crammed around a tub of ice cream, one of them nearly bent in half, and Edward did not want to spend too much thought as to how Mac had managed that.

He opened the door of what he supposed was going to be the pantry. He expected to find at least a potato or something, but instead it was full of neatly arranged video games on the shelves, and a few gaming consoles tucked into a corner. On the floor was a half full box of whippets.

His eyes scanned the pantry still searching and not finding.

There was something missing though. Sure there was a bowl and stuff, but what the hell did Mac cook his food in? Ramen existed, the one mug was not large enough to cook it. Did Mac just eat it raw like some moody teenager?

“Mac. Where’s your pots and pans?” Edward turned to ask the other man, who was leaning against the counter simply staring at him with amusement.

In answer he shifted and in the corner of the counter was a small silver pot. By itself.

Edward had no words, as in a dream like state he crossed the room, deliberately ignoring the sticky bits of the floor, and went to examine this battered little pot.

“Mac… why do you have a pot with no handle?”

“Oh you knows it broke a while back haven’t gots the time to jus’ pop down to the store to get a new one, and its not like I needs it.” He shrugged, “It’s like my bowl too – I just make the noodles innit then I moves it to the counter on the little cork pot pad and eats straight outta it.”

Edward was not quite sure how to describe the sensation he was feeling as he looked at the fully grown man in front of him. How… how did Mac survive? How was this even life? Sure he thought himself as screwed up but Mac seemed to be existing on another level.

“Mac… do you just spend all your money on your truck and video games?”

“Beers, cocaine, darts and the prostitutes too.” He gamely added.

“Mac… tomorrow we’re going to the store to uh…” Edward frowned, struggling to find words, “Well, to at least get me my own fucking mug.”

At this Mac brightened, “I got you one! It’s in the pile of crap I brought in from Costco. Chuck – Chuck why are you crying!?”

Edward was laughing as well as crying, as he looked up at the other man, “Mac… I think you’re more fucked up than I am. Shit – you’re supposed to be the epitome of the ideal man—well paying job, a house, passably white, heterosexual – and here you are-” at this Edward’s voice had raised in pitch as he held the pot, “using a pot with no handle! YOU DON’T EVEN HAVE A FRYING PAN.”

“Don’t need it on the barbeque.”

Edward choked slightly at that response.

“Mac… tomorrow we’re going to Canadian Tire and I swear to god, I may be a fucking mess, but I at least know how to get a pot with a handle on it for you.”

A small smile graced the other man’s lips, “So’s did ya decide what ya wanna eat for dinner?”

“A microwave dinner.”

“Why don’t you make yourself comfortable and I’ll get it made then?”

Edward snorted. “Comfortable where? You don’t even have a kitchen table or chair.”

“Uh,” Mac’s ears turned red, his words apparently escaping him, his hands fumbling slightly with the microwave dinner packaging.

Realizing his tone was probably a little too harsh, Edward attempted to settle against the counter, “I’m fine standing here I guess.”

Mac nodded and stuck the meals into the microwave (which Edward pointedly did not look into, he feared for his life and decided that in this case ignorance was his friend.) For a man of money Mac didn’t have a lot of appliances, hell he didn’t even have a kettle or a toaster.

“What do you usually eat?” he asked, his voice slightly louder than necessary to be heard over the hum of the microwave.

Mac looked slightly ashamed, “Oh takeout, or I just go to my favourite restaurant or pub. I mean it’s not like being home is a place I’m at too much – spend most of my time up at the camps. They feed ye well there. Sometimes its just easier being at work. Don’t need to worry about nothing. Just get the job done.”

Breathing deeply, Edward nodded, “That sounds nice. No need to think, just work.”

“Which is why you’re up here.” Mac grabbed the meals out of the microwave, and they ate their respective meals standing in the kitchen in companionable silence.

Together they unpacked the groceries, Edward already attempting to bring some sort of order to the cupboards. Satisfied that there was some sort of start, he grabbed his toiletries and made his way to the washroom. Flicking on the light, his life flashed before his eyes.

He wasn’t sure where to start first. The dried pee puddles by the toilet, of a man who didn’t care if he missed? (Granted, he had been specifically trained by a VERY grouchy Edith to NEVER EVER make a mess like that.) The ragged shower curtain? The suspicious black mold in the bathtub, or the sink? It was as if Mac was simply a boy in a man’s body, with no one around to teach him about the joys of bleach. As he carefully shuffled into the washroom, mentally informing himself that all he needed to focus upon was getting himself suitable for bed, Edward looked at himself in the mirror splotched with water and tooth paste. His mind whirring to who possibly would be the person to take Mac to the side to teach him the basics of cleaning. Johnny B’y? Freddy? While they were capable men in their own rights, Edward wasn’t entirely sure how close they were to Mac to inform him what a mop was. Johnny B’y was rather outspoken, and Edward felt if he had visited there would be loud words… a thought crossed his mind. A rather unpleasant one.

Mac had mentioned kitchen parties, but the place really did feel unlived in. Sure there was empty beer cans, but there wasn’t any signs that the Atlantic coasters had dropped by. No off-brand screech, none of their specialty favourite foods… – hell he had Johnny B’y stop by for a short visit and he was finding random Purity brand items months later. If there was one thing you could count on, it was that a Newfoundlander would bring food from home with them. There was no evidence of that.  Mac was lying, came his conclusion.

Spitting into the sink, and cupping water to his mouth, Edward swished the toothpaste out, and then cleaned his toothbrush.

Not trusting to leave his toiletries overnight in this washroom, Edward packed them up.  As he went to turn off the light he cringed. Like the other light switches in the house, which he suspected were supposed to be white, this was a dark grey of grime. Things he hadn’t thought about cleaning were dirty – such as the edges of corners where one brushed up. He was fairly certain Mac had never thought about washing a wall. Or perhaps not tossing his dirty coveralls on the floor. Like a little boy with free reign of a house and no mother to nag after him.

Oh god, Edward panicked, am I the mother?

He was glad he had had the two to three beers. No one wanted to be sober entering Mac’s bedroom.

Mac had scrubbed his teeth before, and was already in bed, snoring lightly. Edward decided to keep his thought to himself, and try to sleep himself. As his hand brushed against something in the bed, that was not attached to Mac, and which was not a pillow, Edward concluded, maybe acting as the surrogate mother was not a bad thing.

XXXX

Entering Canadian Tire was like entering a holy cathedral, Edward thought, breathing the tire smell in deeply. Wherever you went Canadian Tire had the same smell, the same atmosphere, the same lighting that wasn’t overbearing, but instead felt like entering a sacred space. Directing Mac to the shopping cart, Edward lead the way to the main aisle which held the string of palettes in the middle of the floor, the first one piled up with boxes of sale Christmas decorations.  Ignoring the temptations, he looked around, torn between kitchen appliances and decent fucking bedding.

He was trying to block last night. Or this morning. Time had ceased to mean anything to him. Dinner had been alright, he was aghast that Mac wanted to use the dishwasher for all two forks. He asked where the liquid detergent was and from the shifty look on Mac’s face he realized that it didn’t exist. Unbidden to his mind was the memory of the bed. The foul smell. The fact that he had found a half eaten kubasa amongst the potato chips. There was even some marijuana hidden under the pillow. And then god, Mac’s snoring. Edward too afraid to move in the bed, in fear his foot would strike a crusty cum sock.

He was tired as hell, but simply being in the Canadian Tire was reviving him. His mind began clicking in place, as he headed to the kitchen appliances, it was the closest to them. Pots and pans gleamed on display, like holy implements of cookery. He stared at them hard, calculating the best costs, seeing what was on sale, what would be the easiest for Mac to maintain.

“You’re getting this set.” Edward pointed to a boxset of copper pots and pans. “And that cast iron skillet.” Edward bent down to lift the heavy boxset, grunting in effort. It was heavier than he thought.

“Chuck, stop.”

“Mac! You need pots with handles on them!” Edward grunted as he crab walked the box towards the shopping cart.

The box was suddenly lifted out of his arms, as Mac rolled his eyes, and easily placed it into the cart. “I’ll get the stuff, you point.”

“Oh.” A soft ‘oh’, a look of consideration, then, “Hmm am I supposed to be your…” Edward leant close to Mac to whisper this conspiratorially, “gay makeover?”

Mac snorted, “No, you’re supposed to help me get my shit together because the last time I was in charge of a home it was made out of animal hide.”

“Right.” Edward nibbled his lip as they navigated the maze of the kitchen area away from the pots and pans to the beverage accessories. “So… No one’s actually shown you how to housekeep?”

“Keep a house?”

“I mean all the nonsense like how to clean, and the types of comforts you don’t realize you need but when you have it you wonder how you lived without it before.”

“Like you know – having the double shower curtain, so the water doesn’t get out.”

“The double what now?”

“You’ll understand that particular one soon enough. I mean why didn’t you even bother to hire a cleaner?”

“No need to. Mess doesn’t bother me, not like anyone else comes to visit.” Mac’s words trailed off and he shot Edward a nervous quick glance as if he realized what he had just said.

Sensing the nervousness, Edward decided to let it slide. If Mac wanted to elaborate later, he could. “Well we need to make sure you get a kettle then. If there’s no tea in sight when the rest of the guys come over you know you’ll be in trouble.” They were standing in front of a selection of them, and he pointed towards a cordless kettle which was on sale.

“You’re right there. No need to be microwaving the mug.” Mac laughed as he grabbed the kettle carefully slotting it in beside the box of pots and pans.

They had moved out of the kitchen appliances to the aisle full of various cleaners. Rows upon rows of choices, each cleaner singing out their own praises in order to tempt the customer. Edward had to debate between sale and what he knew worked. He looked over to Mac, who was staring a little too hard at some Pledge, his brow slightly furrowed. Best not try new things, best stick to what he knew would work.

His hands darted out as he grabbed two different types of the same cleaner, “Do you care about smell?”

“Uh,” Mac was broken out of his reverie, looking at the choices before him. “Whatever you like Chuck.”

“Uh huhhh,” Edward decided to get both, handing the cleaners over to Mac, who neatly slid them into the cart, maximizing the space.

They had reached a section with discounted patio furniture, and Edward paused thoughtfully.

“Chuck it’s not the season for patios.”

“I know but… it’s on sale…” he nibbled his lower lip, and then moved towards a wicker chair with a cushion and sat in it. “Come try.”

Frowning slightly but in an action of trust, Mac sat down in an identical chair.

Wriggling, Edward let his head fall back, “I think this at least beats sitting on a beanbag with the beans falling out.”

“Hey! I’ll have ye know I’ve had that bag since like 1990! I’ve drug it around faithfully for over a decade, it’s my favourite chair!”

“It may be your favourite chair, but do you REALLY want to be playing Call of Duty with me snuggled half on your thigh as we try to share it?”

Narrowing his eyes, Mac stuck his tongue out. “Who says I have a second controller?”

“The one I literally saw in a heap on the floor?”

“Aw shit ye got me there.” Mac stretched out his legs, “I guess we could get one.”

“And that.”

“What?”

Edward was pointing to some sort of wicker loveseat. It was a different stain from the chair, not a matching set.

“Why?”

“So other people can sit their assess down somewhere.” Edward simply replied. He was looking around, wondering where the hell an attendant could be.

“Chucky, trying to find a Canadian Tire employee in the actual goddam store is like tryin’ to get a blow job for free from a hooker, not gonna happen.”  

Except that Edward had sprung up from the seat and was halfway down the aisle, talking animatedly with an attendant, who nodded and disappeared.

Mac had no clue what was happening, until the attendant appeared with a flat dolly to load the patio furniture.

“I’ll have it by the front for when you’re ready to go.”

“Thanks, I really appreciate your help.”

Looking pleased as punch, Edward winked at Mac. “And let’s just say I’ve gotten a few freebies in my past.”

Jaw hanging open, Mac sputtered, and then laughed as he stood up. “Geezus.”  His hands were back on the handle of the shopping cart, “Where to next, Chucky?”

“Uh bedding so I can sleep in a bed without half a pantry in it.” Edward teased.

“Hey kubasa is cured, it can keep.”

“Uh not for like a week in a bed!” Edward walked just fast enough to be outside of any chance of Mac jostling him. He hadn’t realized Mac had stopped, until he was about a few aisles down. A small surge of worry filled him as he wondered if he had gone too far.

Mac’s expression was hard to read; as he approached, he followed the man’s gaze. To his surprise it was at the paint chips.

“Mac?”

“Chuck… would it be weird to paint the living room?”

“Huh?” This was not at all what Edward expected.

Flushing slightly, Mac said, “I likes how your house is with the colours, but I don’t know how to goes about it.”

Gathering himself out of his shock, Edward nodded. “Sure… well we go look at paint chips and figure out colours…” he pulled a set of grey to black “Black walls? Express your true bituminous self?” he asked wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

“Holy fuck no, I stare at that shit all day at work, there is no friggin’ way I’m gonna be havin’ my living room be that colour!” Mac exclaimed as he aggressively moved past Edward, paused at the rainbow of colours and then plucked out a couple sheets in the yellow and orange range. “Give me the fucking sun all year round thank you very much.”

“But Mac! Look at these wonderful colours!” Edward managed to get out, stifling his giggles as Mac’s eyes registered the different chips in neon green, baby puke brown, and some sort of blinding hot pink.

“Ye must be nuts,” Mac snorted, a small smile playing on his lips, as if he was considering, “But maybe that shit brown could be a nice accent colour to…” he looked at the paint chips in his hands, concentrating, then nodded, “This soft buttercup yellow.”

“Ohh actually that’s a nice colour, I think we probably shouldn’t match it with shit brown.” Edward placed the rejected colours back, and after a moment, grabbed a sheet of various shades of white, “We could accent it with this eggshell? Unless you want to be bold with some soft light blue?”

“Blue’s getting a little out there but show me anyway.”

Taking a minute, Edward looked at all the light blues, before drawing three different cards, and holding them in turn next to the buttercup yellow. “This one – soft turquoise.”

Mac took the blue paint chip, and held it with the yellow, staring quietly for a long time. Long enough that Edward began to feel awkward standing there, waiting for his reply. Had he gone a little too off the deep end with the blue?

Mac’s gaze shifted from the paint chips to meet Edward’s eyes, and for an excruciating ten seconds simply held it. “Yeah sure, why the fuck not? Sun needs the sky, don’t it?”

The breath he hadn’t even known he was holding was let go, a broad smile breaking across Edward’s face. “Sure as hell does.”

Somehow, even though it was stupid, Edward felt like the stones he had been carrying around were being lifted, somehow being placed into that damned shopping cart between the kettle and the freshly mixed paint. Absolved of all his sins, as he joked with Mac, reminding himself that perhaps not everything had gone to hell since the New Years. That maybe there were other aspects of his life that were worthwhile, worth building. Worth using the stones he carried around to create a new base.

By the time they reach the till, Edward was pushing a second cart full of ‘essentials’, their banter loud and boisterous, their feet moving in a slight competition as to who could reach the till first. The bill is something Edward doesn’t want to know, but Mac doesn’t mind paying it. He jokes with the cashier, that his cousin is helping him get set up in life – help him get the chicks.

In a way he was looking forward to cleaning and painting and making the house a home together with Mac. Spending the time he never seemed to have before, with someone he feels (with some guilt) he may have been neglecting.

As they made their way out to the parking lot, snow crunching under the wheels of the cart, the gun grey sky dark with the weak sun, Edward took a deep breath in, allowing the tensions to release out of him. They loaded the truck together, carefully puzzling the furniture, trying to arrange all the cleaning products and shiny new kitchen items in the back seat. As Edward attempted to balance something, Mac frowned.

“Chuck, no, what the hell are you doing. Step back and let the master work.”

Before his eyes, he watched as Mac re-shifted everything, moving the packages and different shapes together in a nice tight satisfying puzzle. Somehow everything fit. Noticing Edward’s admiring look, Mac’s ears turned slightly red, “Probably spendin’ too much time on Tetris.”

“I’d say just enough time.”

As he returned the carts to the outdoor corral, Edward realized that maybe Mac had done him a favour. His concern and intolerance of the other man’s lifestyle had consumed his worries and fears about the future. It had given him a project, something with tangible goals to accomplish. A purpose in life. Turn Mac’s house into a home, a place that was no longer a place of transience.  But it wasn’t only that. It was Mac shifting his life, wiggling a piece out there, putting a new one there, providing Edward with a fundamental shift in his self-flagellation.

Moving out of the parking lot, Edward in shotgun, the heater on full blast, he chanced a glance at the other man. The strong profile, the crooked nose, with a jaw which could probably be used to break rocks in between swigs of beer. Maybe this year won’t be as shitty as he feared.

[brobi-wanwrites]

Out-Dated Review: Iron Man

A decade ago life was a bit more simple. I was turning 15 and besides finding time to play GTA IV and high school I didn't have a care in the world. My birthday was never a big deal but earlier that year I got my first PS3 and was desperate to start a Blu Ray collection. I told my mother the one thing I wanted for a gift that year was Iron Man. She delivered. That night after reading the case over a dozen times me and my best friend would sit down and watch the movie that jump started the Marvel Cinematic Universe. 

At the time I knew as little as you could about Ironman. I spent most of my time reading Spider-Man, X-men and Batman comics so the only things I really knew about Tony Stark was that he was a rich alcoholic and was really prevalent in 2006s Civil War which was in my backlog of comics. Going into this movie I really had nothing to go on besides the great reviews it was getting and that I was always excited to see a comic book character get their chance on the big screen. After credits rolled like many people my expectations were blown away. I watched it again and again enjoying every minute of it. I then dove into my comic backlog and read Civil War and any other Ironman story I could find. It’s safe to say that the first Ironman reinvigorated my and many others love for comics, all while starting a universe that would have as deep of lore as the comics they adapted from. 

So ten years later, does Ironman hold up?

(SPOILERS)

Lets start things off with the story. 

We’re introduced to Playboy Billionaire Weapons Designer/Manufacturer Tony Stark and he’s just as much as cocky jerk as you would think he’d be. Skipping out on an award presented to him so he could gamble, sleeping with a reporter who’s writing a hit piece on his company and giving little care to the crew of his private plane as he arrives late for its departure. Couple this with how he almost gloats at the amount of death and destruction his weapons bring you would be safe to assume that Tony is unremarkable cliche villain, except he’s not. 

I don’t know if it’s his charm alone, his acting chops or how relatable he is to the character but Robert Downy Jr. makes Tony Stark probably one of the most believable and entertaining personality in the MCU. He brings so much life and fun to Tony even before his good guy turn in this movie. Easily stealing every scene he’s in, RDJ was undoubtedly destined to play Tony Stark.

Speaking of good guy turns.

Things go astray for Tony after a weapon presentation in Afghanistan as he’s fatally injured and kidnapped by a terrorist group known as The Ten Rings (more on them later). He awakes in a cave with a car battery attached to his chest, powering an electromagnet that’s keeping the shrapnel away from his heart and other vital organs. Parties amirite? He’s made aware that The Ten Rings are his “loyal customers” and have been using all his weaponry and is then forced to build them his latest weapon. Tony reluctantly agrees and uses the supplies and resources to build something a bit more powerful, a miniaturized Arch Reactor. An invention of his fathers that’s used to power a factory, Tony designed his to be a little more compact. It has enough power to keep the magnet [in his chest] charged for a thousand lifetimes or something big for ten minutes. 

Thus Ironman is born.

Even for ten years old at this point, the CGI still holds up. The suits in this movie, whether it’s the Mk I, II or III all look fantastic and just completely seamless. I never once even questioned if they built an actual prop suit or not, it looked so good i assumed they did. Coincidentally the first Ironman is the only movie they actually built the full suit, every subsequent movie they used mo-cap primarily. 

After 3 months using only weapon parts and presumably some scrap metal Tony builds the Mk I and kicks some serious ass in his escape. He’s quickly reunited with his friends and coworkers back in the States and damn does he want a burger. Also he announces very publicly he’s done with making and selling weapons. This is Tony’s big turn, he realizes the real cost of him profitting off war with his weapons and decides he is alone responsible for making things right. His business partner and his deceased fathers long time friend Obadiah Stane advises him to lay low for awhile after crashing his companies stock with his big announcement.

The Stark Employee Roster.

RDJ may steal the whole show but Ironman boasts a pretty big and talented cast. Gwenneth Paltrow as the remarkable and composed assistant to Stark Pepper Potts, she’s a joy to have on screen and perfectly bounces dialogue off RDJ. Terrence Howard plays Stark's best friend and military liaison Colonel James “Rhodey” Rhodes, Howard plays this character really cool and I have a hard time seeing Rhodey as much as I see Terrence Howard. His chemistry with RDJ is phenomenal off the bat though, something that takes Cheadle & RDJ about another movie or so to get right. Paul Bettany lends his soothing voice to articulate Siri knock-off known as JARVIS. While his role obviously becomes more expanded upon in later films, Bettany brings a simple yet appealing approached to the A.I. here that pairs well with Tony’s persona. Rounding it out you have the rugged Jeff Bridges playing Tony’s mentor and eventual madman Obadiah Stane. Bridges brings something to this role that I can’t quite put my finger on, he just fully leans into this character and I can feel his presence on screen. He does however have a very sudden change of character entering the third act, he goes from conniving business man to super villain so abruptly I may have whiplash (wink) now. 

Bored and nothing to do.

Stark finds himself in isolation and does the only thing his obsessive brain lets him do, work. He begins designing and testing an updated version of the suit he escaped imprisonment with. The Mk II is a thinner, shinier and more airborne suit than its predecessor. It just isn't up to snuff for Tony though, so after a quick flight test with some icing issues, he completely redesigns the suit. After seeing on TV that someone is throwing a party without him, Tony decides laying low just isn’t for him and crashes the party. Thankfully the party is hosted by Stark Industries so Tony can just walk in with no real problem. It’s here that Tony learns that his mentor and friend Obadiah Stane filed an injunction against him and is trying to force him out of the company and may be dealing weapons under the table. 

Tony decides take the moral high ground and hops in his new suit the MkIII which must be the coolest getting dressed montage I’ve ever seen, then flies for 6 hours back to Afghanistan. He proceeds to just ruin the Ten Rings day by destroying their weapon caches, which include plenty of Tony's own weapons. After surely making the locals think he’s some sort of alien or metal angel he flies back home, only to be intercepted by two fighter jets. What ensues is an entertaining little game of cat and mouse for a minute until Rhodey, whose job is seemingly just to be convenient to Tony shows up and Tony informs him he is in the suit that the fighters are chasing. Rhodes clears everything up as a trainig exorcise and Tony makes it home.

It’s here our big reveal happens, Obadiah is a bad guy and he hired the Ten Rings to kill Tony but they didn’t like the deal, so they altered it like Vader. Now they want to alter it even further and have Obadiah build them Metal Soldiers like the one Tony escaped with.  Obidiah smiles and politely kills this faction of the Ten Rings and figures he might as well build his own suit with his own arch reactor.

Back at the factory while speaking to his team of scientists about their inability to replicate Tony’s miniaturized Arch Reactor, Jeff Bridges delivers the best line in the movie. 

“TONY STARK WAS ABLE TO BUILD THIS IN A CAAAVE, WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS”

After this everything starts to happen real fast. Pepper finds a video that directly incriminates Obadiah, he panics and politely tries to kill tony, Rhodes shows up to try and save a dying Tony but he already saved him self. Once he catches his breath Tony hops in his suit to go find Obadiah. Terrence Howard takes a look at the MkII and decides it’s better that Don Cheadle gets to use it. Pepper while accompanied by some agents finds Obadiah's lab only then to be ambushed by Obadiah in a what can only be described as the offspring on the hulk-buster armour and war machine, Iron Monger. 

Tony flies in with no time to spare and saves Pepper. A street fight ensues between Iron Man and Iron Monger with them chucking cars at one another. This fight seems oddly small scale now, having been spoiled by the massive fights we’ve seen in recent MCU movies. The smaller scale and one on one fight does feel more personal though and given that this is Iron Mans first outing it makes sense.

The fight goes airborne after Tony realizes he’s no match for the strength of the Iron Monger suit. Much to Tony’s surprise Obadiah has upgraded his suit as well and its now able sustain flight but as a call back to earlier in the film, the Iron Monger suit has an icing problem in higher atmosphere. Tony's suit begins to lose power as they fall back to the roof of the Stark factory. Tony sabotages Obadiah's suit so he cant shoot straight and Obadiah squishes Tony's helmet. Rude. The two men begin to fight with there wits and the bare minimum of their suits. Tony tells pepper to overload the Arch Reactor beneath him and Obadiah and after Tony begs she pushes the bug red button. Boom. Obadiah's suit short circuits and he falls to his death into the Arch Reactor causing it to explode.

I am Iron Man

I gotta give credit to this movies ending. Setting itself up like Tony is going to become your average secret identity super hero but in perfect Tony Stark fashion it subverts that by Tony declaring to the world he is Iron Man. It’s easily one the most memorable moments in all of the MCU. We also get our first name drop of SHIELD here, which at the time blew my mind because up until then super hero movies were so self contained. Credits roll and a Marvel tradition is born as the credits finish and we’re given another scene as Tony walks into his house to see a someone standing in his living room. NICK MF FURY.

“Think you’re the only super hero in the world? Mr.Stark you’ve become part of a bigger universe, you just don’t know it yet.” 

One of the single most important lines in all of the MCU. When I saw this my 15 year old brain melted and while at the time I was ignorant to who owned what in regards to film rights my mouth foamed over the idea of all marvel characters existing together in a shared movie universe. It only took ten years and a couple billion dollars but all the marvel are finally gonna share a universe together.

Does it work?   

With full retrospective Iron Man is your cut and paste Phase 1 MCU origin movie where the bad guy is basically just a different color pallet than the good guy, which is totally fine. There’s a reason they use that formula, it establishes characters perspective and personality along with their skill set to the audience. It could be because it was the first or just the combination of Favreau and RDJ and all the other cogs in the machine but no movie uses that formula better than Iron Man. I’m in awe of how much fun I had with this movie, I highly recommend going back and watching it again if you haven't recently. It holds up as it’s own movie but with the added benefit that you can clearly see how the whole MCU evolved from the style of Iron Man.

VERDICT  

You should already own this, go make some pop corn and watch this./10

[pirate-patton]

If your still taking prompts then Patton is living with Virge (human AU) and Virge is terrified at having a having a cat cause he thinks he'll hurt the smol thing so Pat adopts one and helps Verge through his anxiety

//YESS

“Ohhh, Virgil!” Patton sang as he entered the apartment, grin spread widely across his face.  “I’ve got a present!”

“What is it?” Virgil asked as he rounded the corner from the bedroom, eyes full of suspicion.  Last time Patton had a “present” it was a snapping turtle he picked up off the side of the road.

Patton practically vibrated in place as he presented a  tiny calico kitten from behind his back.  “Her name is Reese!”

“Uhhh…” Virgil’s eyes went wide as could be, and he took a cautious step backward to get away from the tiny, tiny kitten.  “Wh-why did you get a cat?” 

“Because you’re always looking at those cute videos of them and pictures and really seem to like cats!” Patton said.  “I thought maybe Reese could help you!”

A shrill meow escaped the kitten as she stared around her new surroundings, eyes landing on Virgil.  She cried out once more and stared at the floor, so Patton put her down.  Reese made a half-jog over to Virgil, who quickly scrambled away from her.

“P-Patton, get her!” Virgil cried, flopping onto the couch.

Patton quickly ran over and scooped the kitten up, confusion written on his face.  “What’s the matter?  I thought you liked cats?”

“I do,” Virgil said, making poor Pat even more confused.  “I’m just…no, it’s stupid.”

“Verge, nothing you can say is stupid,” Patton said, plopping down beside him and restraining Reese gently.  “It’s just…what?”

“Well…” Virgil sighed and reached over to pet the kitten, not even touching her for two seconds before retracting his hand.  “I just don’t, I just - I don’t wanna accidentally hurt her,” he said.  “She’s so small, I-I just don’t want to accidentally, like, squish her or something.”

“Somebody obviously didn’t grow up with cats,” Patton said with a giggle.  “I had three as a kid, and literally all three of them had to have had nine lives.”

Virgil snickered and shook his head, claiming it couldn’t have been that bad.

“Oh?” Patton started, taking that as a challenge.  “Buster got himself stuck in a window sill, all day, four times.  Mittens went through a tumble in the dryer once, not to mention all the times she slept on top of a black car in the middle of summer.  And Ramsey…that poor little guy got a fish hook stuck in his lip, fell through the heating grates, flung himself willingly off the porch, and he fought at least five rattlesnakes.  All three of them survived.”

“That’s crazy,” Virgil laughed.  “Those poor cats!”

“And if you really don’t think cats are magical creatures sent from heaven, look at your lap.”

Virgil furrowed his brow and looked down, jumping when he saw Reese curled up fast asleep.  Hesitantly, Virgil put a finger to the top of her head, and his heart completely melted as she pushed her nose into his palm.

“Give her a few weeks and she’ll be the perfect size to play bowling with!”

“Patton, no!” Virgil protectively curled in on top of Reese, covering her as well as he could.  

Patton bust out laughing, waking the tiny kitten.  “I’m only kidding, promise, promise!”  He hopped to his feet and headed towards the kitchen.  “I’ll fix some lunch since you’re not gonna be able to get up for a while!”

“Why can’t I get up?” Virgil asked.

Patton shot him a glare.  “Don’t you dare move that sweet, precious baby cat!”

Virgil shook his head and snickered, lightly petting Reese with his thumb.  “I promise I’ll protect you from his…ideas.”

[grandpagreymane]

Legion - the good, the bad, the “what the flying fuck were you thinking, Blizzard?”

Let’s kick this off with the good since I’m a pessimist at heart and I like to set things up before I knock them down.

The return of class quests - these were great in my opinion. It was nice to have more long-term goals to work towards this time, and the unique questlines for each class helps make playing alts slightly more bearable since you’re getting a different experience each time.

World Quests - huge improvement over dailies in my opinion, even if it’s ultimately a smaller change. Now you can at least choose which zone you wanna do your dailies in and if you don’t care for them you can just do the four you need for your cache and that’s it. Mixing in PVP quests into the mix is also a nice way to try and get some more world PVP action out there, even if it ultimately didn’t work out that way.

Mythic Plus - Mythic+ was SUCH a good fucking idea. It’s nice to have a smaller group alternative to raiding for gear and the different affixes are actually challenging and require you to change how you play and build your character. Granted, some of the affixes are ball-busters, but that’s the point.

Individual challenge modes - I’ve been loving the challenge modes this expansion. It’s so nice to have an encounter that’s built with your spec in mind and is a test of your mechanics and skill as a player, with a (mostly) cool cosmetic reward tied into it so if you suck you don’t feel like you’re missing too much.

Actual regular content  releases - Everyone who played WoD knows how shitty the content drought was. Thankfully Legion isn’t WoD and we’re actually getting new dungeons, raids and events pretty often. We haven’t had an entire content patch devoted to a fucking selfie camera so far.

The return of Karazhan - The new dungeon revamp of Kara was a neat idea. I liked it more as the “mega dungeon” it was when they debuted it before Blizzard split it into two halves, but it’s still a great dungeon to run and it’s a new twist on an old raid. And now you have TWO Attumen mounts to chase.

All of the little Easter Eggs laid around the game - The amount of care and detail they put into hiding some of these is astonishing. Things like the hidden artifact appearances (especially the Ashbringer one - they literally took every old Ashbringer rumor from vanilla and threw them into one questline), the Kosumoth hidden quest with the orbs, returning to Gnomeregan to fight a 5-man raid boss, and so many more. I’m so glad that they actually put their heart into this expansion and it really shows.

And now the bad, and boy is it bad.

Artifacts - Right off the bat, artifacts were a big mixed bag. Up until 7.2 the grind was absolutely insane and drove a lot of players away from the expansion, especially the altoholics. Artifact knowledge and power punished rolling alts, punished people who wanted to change specs, and even punished people for staying with the same spec because you were never more than one nerf away from all that AP you threw into those swords meaning fuck all. They’ve managed to iron out most of the issues regarding the artifact grind now, but that’s a full year later.

Legendaries - RNG legendaries are already a mistake. RNG legendaries that are core to making your spec work and flow smoothly are an even bigger mistake. RNG legendaries that have effects that were literally ripped out of your talent tree from the previous expansion is just insulting. Ultimately Legion legendaries don’t even feel legendary - I got most of mine from world quest cache boxes and that shit feels like a participation trophy. I didn’t earn it, you just gave it to me, and now I have BiS gear forever. Or worse, you got Sephuz’s Secret, in which case you’re probably considering re-rolling. Like, the fact that BAD LEGENDARIES EXIST is baffling to me.

Number inflation - Sweet fucking lord, I do over a million DPS now. I have six million health as a DPS class. Bosses have billions of health. I’m getting artifact power boosts in the billions. I pop an Execute crit and the damn game’s considering making the numbers continue in a second row the crit is so huge. It’s really not that big a deal all things considered, but once numbers reach a certain threshold they kind of lose all meaning for the observer, and I think WoW’s passed that point a long time ago. I can’t wait for the stat and ilevel squish in Battle for Azeroth.

Pruning and class balance - Did we seriously need another fucking pruning? I didn’t think we had any spells LEFT to prune but Blizzard surprised me yet again. Some classes are down to four-button rotations and it’s fucking stupid. Also their idea of “class fantasy” is a joke and their efforts to make each spec more unique made a lot of them feel more generic and samey. Warriors don’t even have stances anymore for fuck’s sake - tell me how that makes the class more unique? Or DKs with their presences? Why does Shaman have a blue rage bar now instead of mana? Artifacts also played into this since it shoehorned your spec into using only one kind of weapon. Did you like two-handed frost? Too bad, you dual wield now. Did you like single-minded fury? Too bad, two-handers. Give me back my fucking Gladiator Stance, god dammit.

Time gating - Absolutely FUCK time gating. Don’t make me wait literal days to finish your stupid questline due to order hall mission table bullshit. Don’t make me do only one Suramar quest a week before waiting for the next one. If someone is able to play the game all day let them. Don’t sit here and tell people “no you’ve had enough fun for today”, because if you tell them this enough they’ll leave and go to a game that won’t tell them that. I don’t even no-life this game but I see no reason to hinder the people that do. Players shouldn’t be punished for wanting to play your game.

Order Halls and Mission Tables - Please for the love of God, never ever do these again. Nothing takes people out of the game more than sending someone ELSE to do the adventuring for them. This is a fucking MMO, not FarmVille. I don’t want to micro-manage an entire village’s worth of idiots and tell them what to do all day and I wouldn’t if you didn’t make this shit mandatory to finish the class and new content questlines. And then you have the audacity to time gate it so I have to wait days at a time for missions to clear so I can do another one of the FIVE I HAVE LEFT TO DO.

There’s so much more I could have done for both good and bad things about Legion, but this shit’s approaching thesis paper length so I’m just gonna cut it off here. In short, I think that for every one step forward they took with Legion, they took two steps back. The things they added in that make the game more fun get almost immediately offset by the things that either make your playing experience a pain in the ass or just outright tell you you’re not allowed to keep going on the thing you were having fun with. Ultimately Legion is a good expansion that is seriously being held back from being one of the best by this sort of shit and I really do hope they learn from their mistakes here and make Battle for Azeroth a truly great expansion. PS - Suramar and Pathfinder were great, fuck casuals.

[not-so-secret-nerd]

Had a Holtzmann headcanon last night and decided to write it out into a ficlet.

The Class 2 had been bagged and tagged, the clients notified, and payments exchanged via the Square Abby always carried on her person, so then why was it when Holtzmann looked back at the girl practically cowering behind her mother she didn’t feel like this job was done? Worse still, Holtz could feel they weren’t finished, but there was no scientific backing for a feeling. Not like this, anyway. Their instruments wouldn’t pick this up. The haunting was too subtle. Too crafty. Too much in the form of a preteen staring at the four of them with a plea in her eyes only two of the ‘busters recognized.

Erin looked over at Holtzmann. The engineer could see the unspoken question in her eyes. With a nod, Holtz confirmed they were, in fact, not going to be done with this family for a while. Pity crossed Erin’s face, making her lips squish together in a hard line. She knew what this was like. She’d lived it for a year as a child a few years younger than the girl before them.

“I should talk to her,” Erin said quietly in Holtzmann’s direction but was surprised when the blonde shook her head.

“Love you, Er, but kids don’t think like rational adults, and you’re one of them.” Holtzmann hated seeing the pang her words caused, but they both know it was true. Erin was better talking to people well above the age of thirteen. When kids were involved…

“Let me handle this one. I’ve got an idea.” Holtz tapped the side of her head and smiled before peeling away from the group and approaching the relieved-looking father.

“If you don’t mind, I’d like to do one more quick sweep of the second floor just to be sure.”

“Of course,” he nodded almost immediately. Clearly, he was rattled. Most people where when coming face to face with the paranormal for the first time. Tended to shake a person to their foundational core. “Anything you need. We’re so thankful you ladies showed up when you did.”

“Always got your back,” Holtz grinned and saluted before sauntering in the direction the girl had darted off to after being dismissed by her parents. Just to make this look official, Holtzmann unholstered her PKE meter and began to “sweep” the staircase. Behind her, Abby noticed and was about to call out was silenced by a hand on her shoulder from Erin and a shake of her head. Understanding dawned. Abby fell back into conversation with her clients.

As expected, the meter didn’t pick up a damn thing. Not a one. Baseline reading and all that jazz. It made Holtz a little angry because she knew like the girl did there was more here. Sure enough, the engineer found the preteen sitting on the end of her bed in her presumably “ghost-free” room. Her head snapped up when she heard the floorboards creak, brown eyes wide and glassy.

“Hey, squirt,” Holtz softly grinned, leaning her shoulder against the door and holstering her meter.

“I’m twelve,” the girl huffed, clearly not liking the nickname.

“To me, everyone is squirt, but I could call you by your name if you’d like.”

“Becka,” she replied after a brief pause, looking down at her feet and the floor under them.

“Becka,” Holtz repeated with a nod that drew the girls attention back onto her. “Mind if I come in?”

“Why?” Becka frowned, clearly leery.

“I wanted to talk to you about what happened tonight.”

Becka’s dementor shifted from wary to prickly. “Don’t see why. You got the ghost. You’ll leave now and never come back, but they—“ she stopped herself before the words could come out, biting into her cheek.

“They don’t leave you in peace, do they?” Holtzmann’s stare was pointed and it made Becka squirm. Seldom did she ever become truly serious. This was one of those moments, and the world seemed to holds its breath. “They’re always there, aren’t they?”

“You…can come in,” Becka relented, dropping her gaze and fiddling with her thumb cuticle. It wasn’t a confirmation but it definitely cemented some of the blonde’s suspicions.

Holtz made an effort to slowly walk to the side of Becka’s bed and ease herself into a small chair next to it. The girl shifted around so she was facing the buster, still looking wary but also tired. So unbelievably tired.

“I’m going to take a stab in the dark here and say that you’ve seen them all your life.”

Becka’s brown eyes began to mist over and something in Holtz’s chest clenched. “Every day,” she eked out.

“Sometimes, they just pass through, but sometimes they get attached and…want more.”

A shaky nod.

“Sometimes, they talk to you and ask for help, but sometimes the just want someone to listen to them rage and that rage turns into bad things.”

Becka was shaking so badly she had to clasp her hands together, knuckles turning white. “Sometimes they touch. Sometimes they scream. Sometimes…s-sometimes they hurt me.” When she looked up at Holtzmann the plea in her eyes almost pushed the woman out of her chair. “How do you know all this? How do I make it stop?”

“You don’t,” Holtz answered sadly, leaning forward so her elbows were resting on her knees. Her heart snapped in two when a sob worked out of the girl, shaking hands covering her face until she could compose herself.

“I don’t want this!”

“I know you don’t, and I know this is going to sound like the stupidest shit ever, but this isn’t the end. Of you, I mean. You can still be normal. You can still have a normal life with friends and a school and maybe someone special someday. This is just a part of who you are. It’s like a muscle. The more you exercise it the stronger you will become blocking them out.”

“How can you say that?” Becka hissed, wrapping her arms around her torso and almost bending in half. “I just want to be normal! Like my parents! Like my neighbors! Like you! How can you say I can have a normal life when all I see is them?!”

She didn’t want to do this, but she did it anyway. Reaching out, Holtz groped under the hood of the lamp next to her until her fingers found the switch. With a single muscle twitch, the room was plunged into blue-black darkness, illuminated solely by the windows and the light pollution of New York. And in the darkness, in the velvety blue, stood the shapes of at least a dozen bodies. Bodies that only showed themselves in the absence of light. Bodies close to the barrier between worlds. Bodies that would manifest slowly through whispers and screams until they could take corporeal form and touch.

Bodies Holtz saw on a daily basis.

Becka whipped around, hands turning into fists around her bedspread as her breath caught in her chest, but Holtz banished the forms with the light, returning the room to dual occupancy once again.

“I’ve lived my entire life being able to see them, too. It was hard learning how to tune them out, but I learned. Sometimes I’ll go weeks or months without seeing one in my room, but with my job,” Holtz shrugged, a small smile returning to her face, “they’re always there, but by that point, the soul has manifested into a Class haunting, and I can do something about it. Other times, I just need to tell them to knock it off and crossover already. Not all spirits become malevolent ghosts. Sometimes, they just need a push in the right direction for crossing over, and unfortunately, little lady, you and I seem to have that ability.”

Becka’s turn back in Holtzmann’s direction was slow. She was thinking, Holtz could tell, the wheels in her brain spinning at full speed. “You’re…like me.”

“Affirmative,” the engineer nodded.

“And you learned…how to be normal?”

“Well,” Holtz winced, leaning back, goofy demeanor returning like a glove slipping back into place. “I wouldn’t say normal. I mean, I’m a freaking Ghostbuster. That’s kind of out of the normal spectrum, don’t you think?”

Becka smiled for the first time that night. It was small and still weak but definitely a smile.

“Listen,” Holtz leaned forward again, fishing a card out of her jumpsuit pocket and handing it over. “If you ever need to talk or rant or need me to come back and do a sweep, I’m available twenty-four-seven, three-sixty-five. Me and the girls all are. We’ve all had our fair share of hauntings and nasty shit happen to us, so we all understand. If you ever need us for anything, you know who to call.”

“The Ghostbusters,” Becka nodded, clutching the card to her chest like it was a lifeline.

“Damn straight. Now, I’m gonna roll on out of here,” Holtz said, standing and striding to the door, but paused before leaving and looked back. “But if you need us, we’re only a call away. Once they’ve managed to touch you, they’re strong enough to be picked up with our sensors and trapped. You feel a touch, you call me and I’ll boot the green-nasty out of your house.”

“Thank you.”

“Anytime. Be brave, little ‘buster. You’ll get the hang of it.”

[the-winter-warlord]

The Legend **HETALIA MYTH AU**

((Alright, @sufin5ever, I did it. I don't know if this'll meet want you we're thinking with that AU, but I tried ^^ I hope this is good enough)) There was a legend told by many about two mystical beasts that dwelled deep in the Cavri Mountains. These beasts brought with them peace and prosperity, despite all the ill rumours about the species they were. These beasts were magical dragons, able to shift between beast and man as if it were simply nothing. As the years went on, however, the rumours and stories about these mythical, magical dragons began to disappear. Now, in the present day, it is but a legend, a telltale for young children. However, to Tino Väinämöinen and Lukas Bondevik, this was no story. The two men were myth busters and would do anything to find out if the legends they've heard of were true or false. The two men were currently climbing the Cavri Mountains in search of the fabled dragons. They were taking a water break before they would shimmy across the narrow ridge in front of them to continue their climbing. "How long do you think it'll take until we get to the spot they're supposed to be?" Tino, who was taking in the scenery, barely missed Lukas's question. After taking a swig of water from his canteen, he screwed the lid back on and took a moment to think about the question." I don't know. It should be around here somewhere. I think we need to go a little deeper. If these dragons do exist, they'll be well hidden inside the mountain." Tino glanced over at the ridge and pursed his lips. That might be a problem." Lukas, does that look stable enough for us to walk across?" The Norwegian man walked over to it and stomped down on it a few times. It seemed firm and it was probably very unlikely that it would break. Though, he wasn't an expert on rocks and their stability so he couldn't be too sure." Lukas began securing the harnesses they wore and their latches before he nodded over at Tino." We should be good to go. C'mon." Personally, Tino was a little terrified as they made their way across the narrow rock. Below them was foggy so they couldn't even see what they'd be falling into if they fell. Which was rather terrifying. He made sure to take deep breaths, occasionally glancing over at Lukas to see if he was alright. The man only had on an expression of pure concentration, so it was hard to tell if he was fearful too. Suddenly, there was a cracking noise and Tino found himself falling. He managed to hold onto the ledge, but that ended up being a fruitless task as the rock broke apart. "Fuck, Tino!!" Both men were now free-falling to their awaiting grave, which would be whatever was beyond the fog. But as they fell, a dark shadow came upon them and just as Tino tried to figure out what the cause of the shadow was, everything went black. When Tino came to, he found himself staring at the ceiling of what seemed to be a cave. He sat up with a groan, glancing around confusingly. One moment he were falling to his death, the next he was in a cave and laying in a bunch of furs. Lukas was beside him and still unconscious. There was no one else in the cave. Panicking slightly, he began to shake his friend." Lukas... hey, Lukas! Wake up!" It took a moment or two, but the man stirred and opened his eyes groggily." Uh..." He clenched at the furs under him as he sat up." Damn... are we dead? Is this Valhalla?" Tino shook his head." Of course we aren't dead! And we wouldn't have gone to Valhalla... we didn't do anything heroic... but, we're in a cave. Do you think...?" They two met each other's gaze, eyes widening. Before they could say anything, a noise alerted them of something's presence... something gigantic by the sound of its footfalls. The two shared a nervous expression and glanced over to the mouth of the cave. "I'm not saying we should keep them," a voice came. It was deep and gravelly... too deep to be a human's voice. But could that mean..? They made eye contact again and Lukas mouthed "dragon". Tino's eyes widened. Was this really it? Was this really the legends? A massive crimson scaled dragon with sparkling blue eyes made its way into the chamber and huffed out a stream of smoke from its nostrils." Berwald, they're awake." Another dragon came into view after a couple moments. Its scales were a nice deep blue and its eyes were greenish blue, colours swirling together in an interesting manner. It huffed as well, turning its head towards the other beast." Well then we have to switch. Don't want ta squish them." Suddenly, there was a flash of blue and red light and two rather handsomely naked men stood at the foot of the cave. The tallest of the two tossed the other a long fur that was situated at the entrance to the cave, then took one for himself, wrapping it around his shoulders. The two men made their way to Lukas and Tino and sat down on the ground in front of them. Was Tino freaking out? Well, yes. But not externally. He had to keep his cool. "Um... what the fuck?" So much for keeping his cool. Lukas elbowed him in the ribs and shot him a look. Okay, so he was doing all the talking it seemed." Do you two happen to be the dragons of legend?" The two blond men shared a look. The tall one seemed to pull out a pair of glasses from the folds of the furs he wore and slipped them on." If you are referring to the peaceful dragons that used to roam the earth, yes." His voice was deep and heavily accented. But Tino knew that accent anywhere. It was Swedish. The other man smiled widely. He seemed a little too... energetic." Yep! That would be us! I'm Mathias and this is-" "Berwald," the other continued." But we're not here for introductions. Why're you here?" Tino managed to take control of his nervousness and excitement so he could speak." Well, I'm Tino and my friend here is Lukas. We're myth busters and we're looking for the red and blue dragon of an ancient legend. But we found you so... I guess myth busted?" "Can you tell us how you ended up like this," asked Lukas." We want to know the true story." Mathias and Berwald shared another look. This one looked a little more grim than the last. There was a few moments of silence and a nod shared between the two, signalling the end of a silent conversation. Berwald was the next to speak." We will make a deal: we will tell you our story but in return..." He trailed off, taking a breath." You have to kill us." Clearly, Lukas was taking none of this." Kill you? But why would we do that?" "You don't know how tiring it is to have a lifespan this long," Mathias said, energetic voice turned to something much more saddened." We can't die from old age or illness... we could've gone to any humans and asked, but they'd just experiment on us. I'd rather die then go through that." Lukas was about to say something, but then he closed his mouth. It was clear he wasn't going to argue through this. He was sympathizing. He looked at Tino." What do you think?" He shifted uncomfortably." U-Uh... alright. But how do we get out after...?" "There's a cave that leads to a secret entrance by the front of the cave," Mathias replied." It should bring you to the foot of the mountain where you began." Tino nodded. He didn't think he could kill a man, but what if he asked for it? Would that be a different story? Then, Berwald cleared his throat." It started long ago. We were dragon hunters about thousands of years ago. One day, we were hunting this one dragon and it cursed us. It said that we'd be stuck like this for the rest of eternity." Mathias nodded, continuing the story for his friend." We could shift back to this form, but it would only last an hour at a time. Only once every twelve hours. We couldn't stay home, not with how we were, so we moved around. Unfortunately... people kept wanting to get close to us. We would move every time because what's the point of having someone close if you're just going to watch them grow old and pass? Not to mention, we're stuck as dragons twenty two hours a day. Each time we moved, we'd be friendly towards the people leaving there so they wouldn't feel the need to attack us. For awhile, we were fine living like this. After the years passed and the world changed around us... it became rather depressing." "We had to move back into the mountains," Berwald explained." As the technology grew, we figured they'd want to find out why we were like this through experimentation. Now, we want nothing but to go to the halls of Valhalla where we belong." Tino made the thought of "what heroic act did they perform", but then he realized that fighting dragons and bringing peace was pretty heroic, so he didn't mention anything. But their story was over. And that meant... "I guess it's time now," Mathias said with a weak smile." Do you have a knife or something sharp?" Lukas pulled out the two hunting knives they brought. The purpose of the knives were just in case they ran into any wolves or any type of hostile creature. The men didn't know they'd have to use them on the beings they climbed this mountain to see. The Norwegian passed Tino's knife over to him and frowned." Are you ready?" Tino stood and motioned over to the fur bedding." Would you like to lie down or...?" Berwald stood and nodded, muttering a small thank you to him as he passed. Soon, both men were laying in the bed of furs. Both of their eyes were shut and they were both rapidly breathing. They were ready for this, it seemed, but were they scared? Lukas and Tino brandished their weapons and moved over to the men. Tino had decided to pick Berwald. He found himself drawn to the man, but why was beyond him. Taking a shaky breath, he cleared his throat to speak." Are you ready, Berwald?" His eyelids opened and they made eye contact. His eyes were still swirling in a mystical way and they looked so beautiful it made Tino wish that this moment would last forever. But then he remembered why he was here. He positioned the blade over the beast's heart, but he felt his grip become shaky and he couldn't keep the knife straight over where the organ was. He felt warm hands around his own, keeping them steady. They were Berwald's. "Remember that this isn't you killing a person," he whispered, his voice way too calm for what was about to happen." You're killing a curse and setting us free. Just think about that." Tino found himself nodding. He cleared his mind and drew in another breath, this one a little calmer than the last. Closing his eyes, he plunged the knife forward. The warm hands around his removed them from the knife and let their fingers intertwine. "Your hands are warmer than mine," he heard Berwald whisper. His voice sounded a little too ragged. He was dying." Do you mind?" "No," he found himself whispering. If this man wanted to hold his hand until he died, that would be fine. He was dying after all and a man's last wish was an important one. It wasn't long until the hands in his grew lax. He opened his eyes slowly. Berwald was dead. He stood up shakily and tried to get his bearings. When he looked over at Lukas, he found him wrapping a now dead Mathias in furs, the bloody knife laying on the cave floor. Tino decided to go along with that and took the knife out of Berwald's chest and covered his cooling body in furs as well. Lukas patted his shoulder." Let's go. We should get to the car before the sun sets." There was a legend about two mythical beasts that brought peace and prosperity to the lands they travelled to. But along with this legend was the story of two curious men that helped break this legend to a truth and break the curse that plagued these beasts. And no matter how old Tino Väinämöinen and Lukas Bondevik got, they would never forget the day they met and set free those beasts of legends. ~The End~ ((Could've added more of Denmark and Norway but I felt the need to focus more on Sweden and Finland XD There's SuFin if ya squint))

[allcheatscodes]

littlebigplanet 2 ps3

http://allcheatscodes.com/littlebigplanet-2-ps3/

littlebigplanet 2 ps3

LittleBigPlanet 2 cheats & more for PlayStation 3 (PS3)

Cheats

Unlockables

Hints

Easter Eggs

Glitches

Guides

Trophies

Get the updated and latest LittleBigPlanet 2 cheats, unlockables, codes, hints, Easter eggs, glitches, tricks, tips, hacks, downloads, trophies, guides, FAQs, walkthroughs, and more for PlayStation 3 (PS3). AllCheatsCodes.com has all the codes you need to win every game you play!

Use the links above or scroll down to see all the PlayStation 3 cheats we have available for LittleBigPlanet 2.

Genre: Simulation, Miscellaneous Sim Developer: Media Molecule Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment America ESRB Rating: Everyone Release Date: January 18, 2011

Hints

Invinsiblity

(You need 2 players for this) make sure some one dies at the game quickly when your other player gets out of the check point hit them (hold L2/R2 the with the right stick) the one who has been slapped will not die (example: electricity, fire, spikes, and so on but not bombs).

An Easy Gold Trophy

Go to create mode and then leave the game on for 24 hours and you will get a gold trophy.

Cheats

Arcade Machine Cheat Code

Play “Set The Controls For The Heart of the Negativatron” and find the broken arcade machine with a sackbot repairing it. Go to the machine and activate it and then do the KONAMI CODE. The code is: UP UP DOWN DOWN LEFT RIGHT LEFT RIGHT X CIRCLE. It will explode and show you 8 digits.

Unlockables

Secret Pins

Amy’s Birthday Pressie : Play on Amy’s Birthday (July 29th) Awesomesauce : Congratulations! You are more awesome than awesome! Contraption Challenge Winner : You won a Contraption Challenge! Daniel’s Birthday Gift : Play LittleBigPlanet 2 on Daniel’s Birthday. (August2nd) Festive Spirit : Wear a Christmas costume on Christmas Day. Group Hug of 20,000 : Play online at the same time as 20,000 other players Halloween Hauntings : Wear the Pumpkin Head costume on Halloween. I went to a LittleBigPlanet™ Meetup! : Thanks for coming! It’s Tom’s Birthday! : Tom gets one year older and wiser. (Log into LBP.me onJuly 1st) LittleBigLand : A pin awarded by LittleBigLand LittleBigNetwork : A pin awarded by LittleBigNetwork. LittleBigPlanetarium : A pin awarded by LittleBigPlanetarium. LittleBigPlanet™ Central Contest Winner : A pin awarded by LittleBigPlanet™Central Master of the Internets : Run an awesome LBP2 fansite! Mm Picked! : Have one of your levels feature in Mm Picks. Mm’s Birthday : Play LBP2 on Media Molecule’s birthday. (January 4th) Molecule : Get a job at Media Molecule. Good for you. Platinum Club : Own the Platinum trophy for LIttleBigPlanet 2. Royalty : You are awarded a Crown (LBP1 or LBP2). Sackie Award Winner : You’ve won a prestigious Sackie Award! See What I Did There? : Make and distribute an awesome tutorial video orlevel. Spaff Appreciation Day : Today’s the day to appreciate everything Spaff!(September 17th) Special Friends : Be a jolly nice game developer-love from the folks at Mm. Thanksgiving Turkey : Wear the Turkey Head costume on Thanksgiving. Touching Royalty : “High Five” Media Molecule’s Alex Evans. Valentine Roses : Attach the Red rose from the Valentine’s Pack to anotherplayed on Valentine’s Day. Who’s Who : Watch the credits all the way through.

DLC Pins: Move Pack

Ace In the Pack : Ace all of the Move DLC Pack Story Levels. Aquarium : Last until there are 5 fish swimming around in Pond Skater. Art Collector : Save one of your paintings. Art Dealer : Give a painting to a friend. Big Pond Skater, Small Pond : Accumulate a score of 10,000 playing games ofPond Skater. Block Buster : Score at least 300,000 points in Jam Kerblam. Bomb Removal Expert : Drop 100 bombs out of the grid over several games of JamKerblam. Bossa No More : Destroy the Move DLC Pack boss in his secret lab. Brain Crane Pain! : Squish another player using an object you are holding withthe Brain Crane. Community Minded (X) : Play x Community Levels that require the Movecontroller. Cross Fire : Explode 2 cross bombs in one shot in Jam Kerblam. Feel the Earth Move : Publish a Move required level to the Earth Gonna get down on Friday : Play a Move level on a Friday. Great Moves : Use the Move Recorder to record a path in create mode. High Roller : Accumulate a score of 10,000 playing games of Tilt. High Scoring Mouse : Complete Claude the field mouse scoring at least 20,000. Hugely Popular! : Get a multiplier of 70x in Jam Kerblam. Just in Beaver : Get eaten by the hungry beaver in Pond Skater. Learned : Complete all of the Move DLC Pack tutorials. Like a Puppet on a String! : Pick up another player with the Brain Crane powerup. Lily-livered : Last for 90 seconds in Pond Skater without collecting anyLilies. Locksmith : Unlock all the Move DLC Pack minigames by collecting the keyshidden in the Move DLC Pack story levels. Ministry of Defence : Complete Home Invasion without losing any lives andsaving all the sackbots. Move Action Hero : Complete the main story levels in the Move DLC Pack Nice Badge! : Use a painting as a badge for one of your levels. No Balls Lost! : Complete the Tilt Minigame with losing a ball. No Balls! : Complete Claude the field mouse without losing any balls. Now Museum, Now You Don’t : Place a paint sticker in a level. Peaceful Solution : Score 200,000 points in Jam Kerblam without triggering abomb. Pop Till You Drop : Accumulate a score of 300,000 playing games of JamKerblam. Prize Hoarder (%) : Find and collect % of prizes in Move DLC Pack. Prolific (X) : Spend X minutes active in Painting mode Remote Control (X) : Collect X score bubbles remotely using the Brain Crane. Sack Samaritan : Save all the sackbots in the Lost Sackbots. Sacksquatch (X) : Explode X opponents in Brain Crane Pain Game. Self Portrait : Paint yourself a new avatar. Super Saver : Save 500 sackbots in games of Home Invasion. Tilt to the Top : Complete Tilt minigame scoring at least 20,000. Wat-er Slide : Complete Pond Skater with a score of at least 15,000.

Move Pack DLC Pins

Ace In the Pack : Ace all of the Move DLC Pack Story Levels. Aquarium : Last until there are 5 fish swimming around in Pond Skater. Art Collector : Save one of your paintings. Art Dealer : Give a painting to a friend. Big Pond Skater, Small Pond : Accumulate a score of 10,000 playing games of Pond Skater. Block Buster : Score at least 300,000 points in Jam Kerblam. Bomb Removal Expert : Drop 100 bombs out of the grid over several games of Jam Kerblam. Bossa No More : Destroy the Move DLC Pack boss in his secret lab. Brain Crane Pain! : Squish another player using an object you are holding with the Brain Crane. Community Minded (X) : Play x Community Levels that require the Move controller. Cross Fire : Explode 2 cross bombs in one shot in Jam Kerblam. Feel the Earth Move : Publish a Move required level to the Earth Gonna get down on Friday : Play a Move level on a Friday. Great Moves : Use the Move Recorder to record a path in create mode. High Roller : Accumulate a score of 10,000 playing games of Tilt. High Scoring Mouse : Complete Claude the field mouse scoring at least 20,000. Hugely Popular! : Get a multiplier of 70x in Jam Kerblam. Just in Beaver : Get eaten by the hungry beaver in Pond Skater. Learned : Complete all of the Move DLC Pack tutorials. Like a Puppet on a String! : Pick up another player with the Brain Crane power up. Lily-livered : Last for 90 seconds in Pond Skater without collecting any Lilies. Locksmith : Unlock all the Move DLC Pack minigames by collecting the keys hidden in the Move DLC Pack story levels. Ministry of Defence : Complete Home Invasion without losing any lives and saving all the sackbots. Move Action Hero : Complete the main story levels in the Move DLC Pack Nice Badge! : Use a painting as a badge for one of your levels. No Balls Lost! : Complete the Tilt Minigame with losing a ball. No Balls! : Complete Claude the field mouse without losing any balls. Now Museum, Now You Don’t : Place a paint sticker in a level. Peaceful Solution : Score 200,000 points in Jam Kerblam without triggering a bomb. Pop Till You Drop : Accumulate a score of 300,000 playing games of Jam Kerblam. Prize Hoarder (%) : Find and collect % of prizes in Move DLC Pack. Prolific (X) : Spend X minutes active in Painting mode Remote Control (X) : Collect X score bubbles remotely using the Brain Crane. Sack Samaritan : Save all the sackbots in the Lost Sackbots. Sacksquatch (X) : Explode X opponents in Brain Crane Pain Game. Self Portrait : Paint yourself a new avatar. Super Saver : Save 500 sackbots in games of Home Invasion. Tilt to the Top : Complete Tilt minigame scoring at least 20,000. Wat-er Slide : Complete Pond Skater with a score of at least 15,000.

Special Costume Unlockables

Sackbot – Finish Story Mode Larry Da Vinci – Ace the Final Test level Victoria von Bathysphere – Ace the Kling Klong level Clive Handforth – Ace the Fowl Play level Avalon Centrifuge – Ace the Huge Peril for Huge Spaceship Eve Silva Paragorica – Ace the Invasion of the Body Invaders level Dr. Herbert Higginbotham – Ace the Into the Heart of the Negativatron level

More Secret Pins

Daniel’s Birthday Gift – Play LittleBigPlanet 2 on Daniel’s Birthday / August 2nd Master of the Internets – Run and awesome LBP2 fansite Molecule – Get a job at Media Molecule Platinum Club – Get the Platinum Trophy for LittleBigPlanet 2 See What I Did There? – Make and distribute an awesome tutorial video or level Special Friends – Be a jolly nice game developer-love from the folks at Mm Touching Royalty – “High Five” Media Molecule’s Alex Evans Valentine Roses – Attach the Red rose from the Valentine’s Pack to another played on Valentine’s Day Feb. 14

Easter eggs

Currently we have no easter eggs for LittleBigPlanet 2 yet. If you have any unlockables please feel free to submit. We will include them in the next post update and help the fellow gamers. Remeber to mention game name while submiting new codes.

Glitches

The ‘hidden Paintinator’ Glitch

To see the hidden paintinator, simply get out a creatinator. Under the creatinator, you should see a paintinator. That’s all you need to do – it’s not really hidden, but it’s not obvious.

Guides

Currently no guide available.

Currently no guide available.

Trophies

Muppes Premium Level Pack DLC Trophies

Beakers We Can (Silver) – Complete ‘Muppet Labs!’ using no more than 40 Beakers

Big Top! (Bronze) – Achieve a score of 2500 or higher in ‘Gonzo’s Endless Cannon Run Ride!’

Captain Pig-ard (Bronze) – Achieve a score of 4000 or higher in ‘Pigs In Elevators (In Space)!’

Dancing On The Ceiling (Bronze) – Travel 17.5 metres on the walls and ceilings

Muppet Mastery (Bronze) – Complete The Muppet pack’s story

Standing Ovation! (Gold) – Ace all 5 Muppet Story levels

Stick Together (Bronze) – Play 5 community levels containing Attract-O-Gel

Move Pack DLC Trophies

Accomplished Mover (Bronze) – Complete 25 community levels that require the Motion Controller

Ace In The Pack (Silver) – Ace all the Story levels in the LittleBigPlanet 2 – Move Pack

Avid Collector (Silver) – Collect 100% of LittleBigPlanet 2 – Move Pack prize bubbles

Diploma In Creation (Bronze) – Complete all the tutorials in the LittleBigPlanet 2 – Move Pack

Feel The Earth Move (Bronze) – Publish a Motion Controller enabled level to the Earth

Locksmith (Bronze) – Unlock all the LittleBigPlanet 2 – Move Pack minigames

On A Roll (Bronze) – Complete Fast Food without losing a ball

On The Ball (Bronze) – Complete The Tail of Claude The Field Mouse without dropping a ball

Path To Success (Bronze) – Use the Motion Recorder to record your movements

Self Portrait (Bronze) – Use a painting as your avatar

Stick It To The Man (Bronze) – Destroy the boss in Just Desserts

Trophy List

10 Minutes of Create (Bronze) – Spend 10 active minutes in Create mode 10 Story Versus Wins (Bronze) – Win 10 Story mode Versus games against at least one other player offline 100% Complete (Platinum) – Earn all LittleBigPlanet 2 trophies to unlock this platinum trophy 1440 Minutes of Create (Gold) – Spend 24 active hours in Create mode 160 Yays or Boos (Gold) – Give 160 positive or negative votes on community levels 25 Online Versus Wins (Bronze) – Win 25 Versus mode community levels against at least 1 other player 40 Yays or Boos (Bronze) – Give 40 positive or negative votes on community levels 50 Unique Players (Bronze) – A level you published was played by 50 unique players A Dip In The Stream (Bronze) – Play a level from your Recent Activity A Game A Day Keeps The Doctor Away (Silver) – Play LittleBigPlanet 2 on every day of the week A Series of Tubes (Bronze) – Use a Level Link to link two of your published levels together Ace Story Mode (Gold) – Ace every level in the story mode Aces in Spades (Bronze) – Ace 10 different Story levels in a row Actually Quite Good (Bronze) – Place in the top 25% of players in 5 community level scoreboards (with at least 50 other players in them) Community Spirit (Bronze) – Publish a level to the community Complete Story Mode (Silver) – Complete the main path of the story mode Custom Badger (Bronze) – Create a custom badge for your level from a PlayStation Eye photo or an in-game photo Dive In 25 (Bronze) – Dive in and play 25 random levels with other players, and don’t immediately leave! Grapple Hooked (Bronze) – Create a chain of 4 players grappling each other Journalistical (Bronze) – Write a review Just… One… More… Go… (Bronze) – Play LittleBigPlanet 2 after 9pm Long Term Publisher (Bronze) – A level you published has been published for 7 days Monster Masher (Bronze) – Kill 20 monsters in Story levels Mortal Coil Shuffler Extraordinaire (Bronze) – Accumulate 20 deaths in one Story level Multiplier 10x (Bronze) – Score a 10x multiplier in a Story level Multiplier 5x (Bronze) – Score a 5x multiplier in a Story level Paparazzo (Bronze) – Upload a photo Play 25 Community Levels (Bronze) – Play 25 unique cooperative community levels Play 5 Versus Levels (Bronze) – Play 5 unique community Versus levels Play 75 Community Levels (Silver) – Play 75 unique cooperative community levels Prize Collector (Bronze) – Collect 50% of Story prize bubbles Scoreboard 25% (Silver) – Place in the top 25% of players in the online scoreboard for a Story level Scoreboard 50% (Bronze) – Place in the top 50% of players in the online scoreboard for a Story level Snapy Dresser (Bronze) – Change your costume Step into my Arena (Bronze) – Publish a Versus mode level Teacher’s Pet (Bronze) – You watched all the tutorials! Take a gold star, go to the top of the class The Votarator 5 (Bronze) – Rate 5 brand new community levels (less than 10 plays) The Votarator 50 (Silver) – Rate 50 brand new community levels (less than 10 plays) Turbo Slapper (Bronze) – Slap more than one player at once U Know U A Playa (Silver) – Spend 5 hours playing community levels Uber Prize Collector (Silver) – Collect 100% of Story prize bubbles Who Needs Breakfast? (Bronze) – Play LittleBigPlanet 2 before 9am