#the real dragon design put me through all the stages of grief

[kittycouch]

My take on Dragon-type trainer Miku inspired by Project Voltage!

[pkmn-fangamer]

Pokémon Uranium Review

Intro:

Enjoy the region of Tandor, with over 150 new original species of Pokémon, complex characters, and many secrets to discover. Become Champion, complete the Pokédex, and beat the many challenge modes available; it’s time to prove your worth as a trainer! Pokémon Uranium, at its core, is a homage to the original Pokémon games, which have been in the hearts of many of us since childhood. Coupled with a serious storyline and slightly harder gameplay, this fangame is aimed towards a slightly older audience: one that often remembers Pokémon with nostalgia.

How to Play:

Go to Pokemon Uranium’s Reddit here, which gives several download options and further instructions.

Story:

-Light spoilers below-

The story of this game is unique and interesting. For the most part it is strongest at the beginning and the end of the game, though it’s not particularly weak in the middle. There is a cut scene at the beginning of the game in which your mother is working as a scientist at a nuclear power plant, where she disappears during an accidental nuclear meltdown. Your dad, Ranger Kellyn, originally from the Almia region, is struck with grief, and becomes obsessed with his work as a ranger. You, the main character, are forced to live with your elderly Aunt, and later become a Pokemon trainer and assistant to the local professor to financially relieve her.

If you find the above summary of your first fifteen minutes of game play intriguing, you’ll probably enjoy the plot of Pokemon Uranium immensely. I certainly did- the game’s story mostly took itself seriously, getting dark in a few places without getting too edgy.

The biggest difference between main series games’ plot and Uranium is the lack of your average evil team. The enemy in this game is both physical and philosophical. I’ll only get into it partially, so I don’t spoil it too badly. The main enemy are Nuclear-type Pokemon, and whoever/whatever is causing the meltdowns of nuclear plants across the region. But these plants were obviously created by humans, and in turn Nuclear-type Pokemon are also in way man-made. Nuclear Pokemon may be the obvious enemy in this game, but the human perspective is also lightly explored, and for this I was glad.

This is also the first fan game I’ve played through in a while with genuinely interesting characters. Your rival is a bratty child at first but matures and develops as a person by the end, for example. Additionally, your absentee father may seem distant and uninvolved in your life at first, but eventually you grow closer to him too, as you battle Nuclear Pokemon alongside each other. Many of the gym leaders are also interesting past their gimmick, and are encountered not just in their gyms, but are also present in another part of the game that you’ll just have to find out for yourself.

Score: 9/10

Pokemon:

The Pokedex of this game contains exactly 200 Pokemon, about 150 of which are original Fakemon, the rest being Pokemon selected from various regions. At first, I was puzzled as to why some real Pokemon were included, but then I later realized that many of these Pokemon were either given new evolutions or mega evolutions, which in the main series are sorely needed. The best example of this is Dunsparce’s new evolution, Dunseraph, making it a strong Dragon/Flying type Pokemon. However, a there are a few main series Pokemon that are included without any improvements being made to them, so their appearance does confuse me a bit, though I’m not totally against their presence.

The Fakemon in this game are overall likeable. The starters are all well designed, and in my opinion are some of the best Pokemon in the game. They are unique because they’re only two stage Pokemon, with all main series starters being 3 stage Pokemon. I picked Orchynx, which is a Grass/Steel cat Pokemon, and there was never a point where I regretted my choice. The rest of the Fakemon are pretty good- there are some designs I’m not the biggest fan of, but this can be said about many official Pokemon too. The Fakemon range widely in abilities, types, and movepools- which brings me to my next topic.

Undoubtedly, one of the biggest gimmicks of the game is the new Nuclear-type. Nuclear Pokemon are weak against every type except themselves, but their new Nuclear-type moves are super-effective against every type but Nuclear and Steel-types, and doubly so against Pokemon with more than one type. This makes these Pokemon super interesting to use- the strongest of their types can be the ultimate glass cannon in battle if used correctly.

There are both Nuclear versions of main-series Pokemon and some original Nuclear Pokemon present in the game. The former are much more numerous than the latter, and I wish there were a few more original Nuclear types, but I understand coming up with new Pokemon for a new type must be time consuming and difficult.

Score: 9/10

Gameplay:

The gameplay of Uranium is great overall. While the game is contained in a single region, there is an East and West segment that makes it almost seem like there are two different regions in the game. The West half that you begin on is land-based, and the East half is water-based, on an archipelago of islands. The wealth of different cities, areas of interest, and routes are sure to give the player more than enough to take in and explore.

For those of you curious, I would put the difficulty of Uranium at a bit above the average main series game. It’s not horrifically hard, and not much grinding is necessary until towards the end of the game. A balanced team will help you get far, and I’d say it’s rather important to have a Steel-type, Nuclear-type, or both on your team to help you get through battles with Nuclear Pokemon. However, if you’re looking to bump up the difficulty level in playing, having neither of those types will definitely help challenge you.

HMs are present in this game, but there are items that you can receive later to replace them. It is nice that these items become available later in the game, but I wonder why HMs exist at all in the game if the creators were willing to replace the HMs with items. I would have preferred receiving these items rather than HMs from the get-go, but it is pleasant at least that you don’t need HMs eventually. My biggest gripe about HMs is how late you receive HM Fly in the game- not until winning your 8th badge. Luckily, there are various methods of transportation available, like subway and boat, but paying for these services and coordinating which methods work in what town is a little tedious.

In general, the gameplay of Uranium is very polished. There are so many tiny features that make this game more playable than even main series game, still without making the game too easy. One such feature is the Pokepod, your main technological device. In it, there is a Jukebox used to listen to any in-game track, your region map, and a phone to call the regional professor, and store numbers of trainers looking for rematches. A Pokeball is present next to trainers who want rematches, and best of all, your opponent’s rematch team has levels that are scaled to be equivalent to yours. This makes grinding much easier and more enjoyable.

Score: 8.5/10

Art/Music:

The overworld art resembles Gen 4 graphics in a way that is creative and original- I can barely find a tile that was imported directly from Gen 4, aside from some overworld character sprites. The landscapes are varied and nice to look at, many of them being based on the country Brazil. My favorite city is Venesi City, which is a beautiful port city based on Venice, Italy.

The in-battle art and animation are fantastic as well, based on Gen 5, with your Pokemon and your opponent’s actually moving around a bit. There are also many moves with great animations. However, there is also a fair number of moves lacking any animation. This bothered me a little, but perhaps it could have been a glitch? Either way, the battle scene is very polished- almost every new area has new background art accurate to whatever time of day it currently is. With how much time is spent battling in this game, I appreciate the effort put in to make it look as nice as it does.

The music in Uranium is about a 50/50 split of well-composed original OSTs and re-orchestrated versions of tracks from other generations. Since these re-orchestrations are well made and contribute well to the game’s atmosphere, I don’t mind the lack of original music in these spots. I especially enjoyed that the diving theme was a slower, more beautiful version of the in-game surf music.

There is one more important thing of note before I move on, and that is the ability to choose a well-designed, non-binary player character. Gamefreak should really pay attention and implement that feature (but I know they won’t). Fantastic job on inclusivity in this area, and I especially loved the proper usage of pronouns depending on which appearance you choose.

Score: 9.5/10

Misc:

If you play Pokemon fan games, or have even heard of them at all, then you probably know at least a little bit about the incredible rise and forced decline of Pokemon Uranium. I urge you to read about what really happened here, according to one of the creators, @oripoke. I don’t have much more to say about this topic without getting heated about it, so I suggest checking out the provided link here if you’re at all interested.

Because of the cease-and-desist order from Nintendo, the community for this game is a little more hidden than it would be for a famous fan game. However, you can find an extremely helpful wiki here, and the main discord here.

Overall:

I’ll begin my conclusion by saying that this is the third time I’ve attempted to finish Pokemon Uranium, and boy am I upset that I didn’t stick to following through with this gem of a game earlier. Uranium truly does have just about everything fans could want- a game with a slightly deeper storyline than main series games, with nearly all new Pokemon (and even some old ones, if you prefer), a new region to explore, and even a new type to spice things up.

I would gladly recommend this game to Pokemon fans new and old. This is a polished, pretty product, and you won’t find many other fan games as complete and polished as this one. There are almost no glitches- the only one that I experienced was the music cutting out occasionally, but the game can easily be saved and rebooted to fix this.

Usually I have more to say in this ending section, but I think that’s all for my final thoughts. This game really is just a work of art, and because of its interesting plot and gameplay, I can see myself picking Uranium up and playing it through again in a few years, possibly even more than once.

Final Score: 9/10

[eggscelsior]

A Brief History Of Andrew’s Protective Streak

Andrew learned to do stick-and-poke tattoos during juvie. Nothing fancy; he had always been good at sketching, so his line art was crisp, and he could do shading easily enough by filling in the design with less passes of ink. It was amazing how much cooler a pubescent teen thought he looked with a dragon jabbed under his skin in blue ballpoint ink, instead of just doodled on top. That was, in fact, one of the top requests. Andrew considered it distastefully ironic - Dragon, Draco, Drake.

He was amused by the idea of stabbing “Drake” hundreds of times in black and blue. But why would anyone want that permanently etched into their body? Andrew had given himself enough marks to remind himself of the opposite: that Drake was temporary, that he could be outlasted. Andrew’s marks were carved as a distraction, dulling one kind of pain by making a fresher, sharper, controlled version. They were for endurance, not aesthetic. He covered his marks with black armbands, not filled them with ink. They were necessary but nothing to be proud of. Andrew had no urge to give himself a tattoo. But the favors he garnered in trade for his skill were invaluable.

~~~

No one had ever kept a promise to Andrew (Cass had maybe tried), and with a lack of any real thing worth living for, he’d decided to create his own value by keeping promises to others, as long as he gained something from it. Andrew made a business out of promising tattoos and following through. He was good at them. And he was good at protecting his goal, because it got him out of the juvie facility one Friday a month for “away” games.

And he might be good at protecting people, if they were people he decided mattered, and that felt…slightly more worthwhile than anything else. There was something in the concept of being needed that made living a bit more tolerable, a bit less boring. He'd hated the idea of a carbon copy brother that had been needed by the woman that birthed them in a way that she hadn't needed Andrew. He'd wanted no part of that shit. He had Cass. Aaron was not his problem. Aaron did not matter.

But then Drake had gotten interested. "Let him visit." "I want to meet him too." "All three of us will be brothers." "Twins are every man's fantasy, AJ. "You'll look so perfect in my bed together.” And suddenly Aaron needed Andrew, even if he didn't know it. Andrew was shocked how vehemently this hit him, how important a priority it immediately presented itself as. The first person who genuinely needed him. It was up to Andrew to keep the carbon copy cleaner than the original. No one deserved Drake, and this was something only he could be relied upon to protect against.

The only way to prevent Drake from eventually convincing Cass to have Aaron come visit, with or without Andrew’s approval, was to remove himself as well. He was used to being hurt, and to hurting himself, so he could handle this loss. Cass wanted to keep him but she didn't need him, like Aaron. So he did what he had to do and landed himself in juvie.

Then he actually met Aaron. Aaron’s mouth listed off the name of some girlfriend – his identical twin was straight? Huh. – and the name of a high school and a position as backliner on the school Exy team, blah blah blah small talk, but Andrew took one glance at the long sleeves and jeans during California summer – there was the edge of a bruise at the collarbone – and the posture – defeated – and the behavior – jittery, twitchy, he’d seen too many inmates crashing to not know Aaron was on drugs that were both addictive and strong enough to kill – and he decided that this carbon copy needed continued protection, lest he end up as marked up as Andrew after all, just by someone else's hand than Drake's.

“Uncle” Luther wanted to help “save” him from juvie, but wanted to send him back to Cass. He needed to go where Aaron was, so he shared a truth that he’d never wanted to voice out loud. Luther did not believe him, immediately marking himself off Andrew’s list of people who had a chance to matter due to blood proximity. Instead he guilted a promise out of the minister to keep other children out of Drake’s reach “in case they’re as incapable as me at ‘judging brotherly affection’ and would come out just as traumatized” and drummed up a cavalry march in Luther’s meddling missionary heart to bring Andrew “home” to his “mother” and brother.

Then he called in a lot of hoarded favors from his tattoo business: “accidental” conversations held within earshot of wardens that painted him in a good light, or at least, in a bad light with the bad crowds. A staged fight that he broke up peacefully, with sharp words and sharper stares, instead of with the fists the wardens knew he was so good with and the shivs he’d only ever been suspected of having. He even had a couple of recommendations from guards that had been impressed enough with his art to get inked by him themselves.

Pristine behavior, a winning streak for the Exy team, and his list of favors wouldn’t take too long to rattle up a parole hearing.

~~~

He was out of juvie, and he was busy. He had joined Aaron’s high school Exy team to keep an eye on him; it was still difficult to pin down all the times Aaron managed to pop pills, so he required observation. Andrew had made a very pointed promise to Aaron’s mother and was arranging to keep his promise because she wouldn’t fucking listen.

~~~

Tilda was dead, finally. It had been ruled an accident, as planned. Aaron was no longer attempting to speak to him, which was fine. He did not require his brother’s approval, just his dependence, and Andrew had fulfilled the promise to protect him. Aaron’s unexpected grief over his waste-of-oxygen mother was annoying, so Aaron glowering from across the room was better than Aaron grieving loudly.

Now was a good a time as any to get Aaron sober. It wasn’t like his twin could fill any more of Tilda’s prescriptions now that she was dead, and Andrew didn’t intend to let him go questing for more sources. So Andrew locked him in a bathroom with canned food – he tossed in Spaghetti-O’s along with the soups and green beans because he wasn’t a monster – and a pillow and waited for sixteen days.

He met with the lawyer in the meantime and signed off for the life insurance payout - A. Minyard. Not a lie. He bought the cheapest cremation possible and tossed the urn on Luther's front lawn for the bastard to make funeral plans around. He bought a car to replace the one he'd made Tilda wreck and put the car’s insurance policy in his own full name. He left Aaron's off. Aaron could depend on him to drive them.

Aaron emerged silent, sober, and craving grease. Andrew drove them to Sweetie's. His twin said nothing about the car, and Andrew didn't offer the spare key of a ninety grand vehicle to a just-barely-ex-drug-addict. There was no point bolstering temptation with means and opportunity.

Then Nicky showed up from Germany. Interesting, that his brother somehow turned out straight but his newfound cousin had managed to worm a gay gene out of Luther and Maria’s chromosomes. Less interesting was Nicky being a fucking chatterbox, making up for Aaron’s blessed silence in a way that no one asked for, as well as Nicky’s complete inability to defend himself even as he assumed guardianship of the twins.

Andrew did not have time to exchange a promise with Nicky in advance, he was too busy beating these four men who’d dared hurt his cousin like they were every man who had ever laid a hand on Andrew without consent. There were a lot of those. That meant a lot of beating. He nearly lost himself in the all-consuming violence tearing out of his core, and came out of the incident with a string of therapists and a bottle of literal happy pills.

They fractured his emotions from his rationality. He spent days with his eyes opened to how amusing and engaging the world could truly be, and then slowly he started to recognize the sick feeling in his gut and the constant edge of a headache throbbing in the base of his skull to the tune of but why is it funny? It’s not. It’s not funny. Stop it. Stop laughing. Stop laughing. STOP.

He became the dead hollow space rotting out the inside of a laughing shell. Why was he living, again? Oh. Promises. Protection. That was about all his brain could hold onto firmly while he was trying to scrape the corners of his ill-fitting smile off his own face with his fingernails. Weeks of practice tamed the giggles down to silent, hard-edged smiles. He could hear the world around his own laughter again.

God, who wouldn’t he kill to stop taking this medication? His brother. He needed to be needed. His cousin too, apparently. The promise was silent but he’d already paid out, so Nicky was his now. The rest of the world could fucking burn.

Aaron was edging away, though, drowning in the misplaced grief he refused to get over. But then Aaron’s girlfriend slapped him, yelled at him for not paying enough attention to her, grabbed his wrist too hard and bruised it. Aaron’s eyes said he couldn’t hit a woman. Andrew didn’t care if it was moral or a psychological remnant of Aaron’s mother’s abuse. A new promise was forged. Aaron was cemented at Andrew’s side through graduation. Andrew broke the girl’s arm and delivered the same promise he’d made Aaron’s mother. The girl quit school.

There were several other girls. Andrew struck preemptively at each. Aaron was his now, he had promised. His to protect. Something to continue living for. Women were nothing but trouble. They turned Aaron into a useless victim. Aaron hated him for his proactive violence, but Andrew only needed dependence to give him a purpose in life, after all.

~~~

And then the fucking Sons of Exy showed up and delivered a grand invite to join the Ravens after graduation.

First of all, it was laughable that they thought he’d leave the brother he was protecting behind to play a worthless sport.

Second of all, he was solidly unimpressed by Riko and Kevin. They were obsessed with Exy, and Exy to him had started as a literal temporary escape from prison and ended up a babysitting gig for his beat up strung out brother. 

And third, their tattoos were tacky, unstylized computer font numbers, and unreflective of each boy’s potential in their chosen field. He informed Kevin of this quite pointedly, detailing his lack of interest in someone determined to make a career of coming in second, and the flash of fear in Kevin’s eyes at the implication of holding himself back to second place was…not quite amusing, and only vaguely interesting. It was not his problem. Kevin did not matter.

~~~

When graduation approached, Andrew paid attention. Nicky wanted to go back to Germany. Andrew hadn’t met and didn’t trust Erik, and wanted to delay that as long as possible. Worse, Aaron wanted to run off to college and be a doctor. Lofty goals for someone with shit grades after putting the high in high school several dozen times too many. He’d still try, though. He’d end up in a community college God knows where, no longer bound to Andrew’s side via their promise.

Andrew would not survive his medication without someone to protect.

When Wymack came knocking, Andrew seized the chance and reaped profit all around. Wymack agreed to let him bring his not-great-but-at-least-experienced family along on academic scholarship, and quietly agreed to let Andrew off his drugs for games. He’d seen tapes of Andrew before and after being assigned the pills, so he knew it was to his mutual benefit.

Aaron would get into college, shit GPA or no. The promise was reinstated another four years. Hopefully he’d learned his lesson on the last set of girls.

Andrew called in the favor for protecting his cousin and waited to see if Nicky would disappoint. Nicky waffled, he called his boyfriend-fiancé-whatever to get advice, and he finally caved and agreed a business degree would be good for him.

The drugs would wear off in two years. His promises would hold a little longer. Andrew had no fucking clue what he was going to do after that, but thinking about the future was a waste of time when he spent every spare minute keeping the Joker-laugh restricted to his face and out of his sane mind.

~~~

When Kevin showed up at Palmetto at the beginning of the spring semester with a shattered hand, looking as hollow as Andrew’s own chuckling corpse, he became a thing that mattered.

He promised Andrew a love of Exy – not feasible, but if protecting his goal could magically become a worthwhile purpose, then at least he’d have something to live for after his cousin and brother abandoned ship – and Andrew promised to keep him. Kevin’s life story was vaguely interesting, and Andrew wouldn’t mind breaking some parts of Riko permanently. He didn’t like abusers of his possessions. He stole Kevin’s phone, called up the prick, and made him some promises that involved ending up as bruised and bloody as his school colors. He hoped Riko wouldn’t listen.

~~~

When Neil Josten actually showed up at Palmetto after all promises otherwise, Andrew paid attention. Neil very quickly went from something pretty and mouthy that Andrew wanted to break for something akin to fun, to something he wanted to break to keep his protective promise to Kevin, and finally to something Andrew was going to keep for himself.

Neil's lies were aggravating. Trying to pick the truths out of the lies was interesting enough to keep him engaged. They made a game out of it. Neil was cheating; half the truths he said were not 100% truth. Picking those out was even more difficult. The idea of pushing Neil into full honesty – or at least approaching the asymptote, as one could only know another human being so well – was actually…more entertaining than he wanted another person to be. It felt like power over him.

He liked his foibles to be predictable: cigarettes, 20 to a pack, consumed at a speed he dictated. Crackers, consumed per the quantity that he ordered. Not Neil, who he always seemed to want more out of. More what, he didn’t know yet. He just knew that he gave away far too much information and far too much ground to this half-lie and what he got in return was not enough.

~~~

He was starting to understand what he wanted from Neil. He wanted another Roland. Lithe body, quick wit, good for occasional sexual impulses.

Except Neil didn’t swing, so that was out. It was a good thing Neil was holding Kevin anchored in Palmetto, or he wouldn’t be worth keeping, Andrew told himself.

And yet somehow Neil kept working more out of Andrew than he’d rightfully earned. An extra secret, on credit. Allowing Neil within closer-than-typically-acceptable proximity because he liked breathing Andrew’s smoke. Halloween with the upperclassmen. Dinner with Nicky’s worthless parents.

What the fuck was he giving so much away for?

The answer danced between them for a breath at Exites. He smacked a hand over Neil’s mouth and wasn’t quite sure which of them he was censoring, but the result was the same.

~~~

Drake. DRAKE.

He wasn’t even sure he was conscious. Everything was black, but that might have been a pillow? It was hard to breathe?

There, there was the old familiar pain. He was laughing. He watched his body react irrationally from the inside out. His hollow innards were infinite, pushing out against a heaving, giggling shell that was cracking.

~~~

Aaron. He hadn’t protected Aaron. There was blood on Aaron.

Aaron wasn’t hurt? Why was Aaron touching him. Why was he being touched? 

Luther. He made his speech to Luther. Words years in the making. 

The fucking drugs were sucking the vindication out of his voice, replacing it with a kind of sick, casual conversational pitch mixed with inane glee.

Sirens. He took off his knives. He already felt so exposed, and it had been only seconds.

Neil was touching him. Why?

No, the scars were personal. Neil hadn’t shared his, why the fuck should he be touching Andrew’s? A promise was delivered. Neil listened and let go. 

Huh.

People were talking and his head was going to split open. The drugs were winding down and he was retaining snatches of the hospital room that he didn’t want to keep. A rape kit. Why? Drake was caught in the act AND dead. Intrusive. No. He punched the orderly. He was cuffed to the bed.

Outside he grinned at the expressions on the faces of this group of men he’d kept. He wanted to wipe them all off. His. Theirs. Fuck his chemical smile. Fuck their pity. Men didn’t depend on someone they pitied, and that was all Andrew had to live for. Fuck the drugs.

Bee wanted him off the drugs. He knew there was a reason he kept her around. But…he had promises to keep, and that took precedence. He was used to pain.  

Abram. He challenged it just to be sure, but it felt true. He liked truth.

Oh. Neil let Andrew touch his scars, and wow. He’d survived a fair bit, it felt like. Those were true, too. Neil promised to keep Kevin alive, even though he was so prone to running himself, and Andrew thought of the way Neil had actually let go of his arm when Andrew told him to. It was just enough to make him trust, but only barely. Only temporarily. Only in the absence of any other viable solution.

It was time to get clean. Finally.

~~~

He fell back into old survival habits under Proust's hands. In the moments Proust “worked” on him, he distanced himself, like watching something bad happen to a stranger. He couldn't look away, but it wasn't happening to him. Afterward, he reiterated the promises Proust had ignored.

He spent group sessions silent and planning how to keep those promises. He spent individual sessions talking just enough to show them he was making progress towards release. He stole the absurdly heavy tungsten paperweight off the desk of the doctor weaning his drug dosage to aid the exercises he did in his room.

He got clean.

~~~

God. Fuck. The blue eyes were one thing, the hair was criminal. This was going to be a problem. Neil was still here, and he was pretty bruised up, so apparently he’d kept his promise against something without running away. Andrew was content with that. That story would probably be more interesting than a status report on the rest of the outside world, so he put it off till last and commanded Nicky to fill him in on everything else.

~~~

Neil had gone to Evermore. If he hadn’t outright broken his promise to stay by Kevin’s side and protect him, then he’d bent it over backward and fucked it with a rusted fork. Kevin had only been safe from Riko because Riko had been too busy with Neil.

Neil had marks from his past that he’d pressed Andrew’s fingers to, marks Andrew had considered intriguing but dismissed readily enough because it was before his time, before his promise. But this. He smashed the band-aid back against Neil’s cheek, unable to look at the tattoo any longer without needing to punch something, and Neil had been punched enough in the last two weeks to account for several lifetimes.

Andrew hadn’t protected Neil from this tattoo. Andrew couldn’t, because he was getting unfucked in the head and Neil had been a stupid fucking martyr. Proust. Neil had gotten this mark for Andrew, because of Andrew.

Neil had a tattoo that Andrew hadn’t put there. Riko had touched something that belonged to Andrew. Andrew hadn’t protected what was his.

Andrew scaled back the gaping chasm of rage. He wanted to slide out one of his newly-returned knives and carve the fucking tattoo off of Neil’s face. Neil looked like he wouldn’t mind. He scaled further back. He wanted to tattoo over it. Neil probably wouldn’t mind. He scaled further back. He would not do anything to Neil’s face right now because it would cause an adverse reaction from the shitstain roosting in Evermore.

Andrew was a creature that endured. He had patience. He’d kill Riko for this, eventually. For now he needed to focus on what was in front of him. He needed to focus on Neil, on making Neil promise to at least not purposely counteract his own safety.

“If it means losing you, then no.”

Damn the boy. He threw Neil’s keys off the roof and nearly threw himself off two minutes later when Neil wrapped his lips around Andrew’s cigarette filter. Andrew didn’t want a few of his skin cells touching Neil’s mouth, he wanted his tongue between Neil’s lips instead of that cigarette.

Neil’s auburn hair glinted in the sunlight and Andrew was not happy to realize that this was going to be different from Roland, if it was anything at all.

And it wasn't anything. How many times had Neil reinforced that he didn't swing? Neil wasn't flirting with that move. It meant nothing.

~~~

Abram, thought Andrew the first time he felt like touching himself after... everything that had happened in rehab. Abram. Cute old fashioned Christian name. Neil was probably circumcised. He wondered if Neil’s pubic hair had any of that pretty auburn tinge or if it was darker. He thought about Neil's lithe runner’s body and flat stomach and he pictured touching Neil's scars in a way that would make the boy shiver with desire instead of disgust. He wanted to see them.

He wondered how many practices he would get away with sabotaging before someone thought to try sending Neil on court to bargain with him.

Two, it turned out. He didn't hesitate to make his demand. Neil barely hesitated before agreeing.

~~~

He liked touching Neil’s marks of survival, but made sure to keep his touch impersonal. Andrew wondered which of them had more scars in total. Neil’s were obviously larger, and he found himself interested in their stories. The words leaving Neil's mouth were carefully measured and haunted, but they rang true. Andrew didn't feel like he was giving away more than he was getting, this time. He was getting closer to Neil's asymptote and it felt rewarding.

~~~

After admitting his physical attraction to the walking Exy disaster he’d been idiotic enough to keep - the miniature one, to clarify between the two - Andrew went through five cigarettes and spent Roland’s thirty-minute “lunch” break in the back room making out with and then blowing Roland close enough to heaven to yank out one of God’s omnipotent fucking leg hairs, and by the time he was done he had to admit to himself that he was picturing Neil the whole fucking time.

Neil was just a shiny new toy that he was being deprived of blowing. This was nothing.

~~~

It was probably nothing, anyway. At least the one kiss was nice, before Neil had a panic attack.

~~~

The kisses were very nice, actually, and touching Neil’s cock was very nice, and Neil’s orgasm face was actually kind of attractive, and Neil didn’t touch what he wasn’t supposed to. And when Andrew finally got bored, he could always go back to effortless, no-strings Roland.

~~~

This was nothing. This would never be a this.

~~~

“Anything,” Neil promised in return for something as silly as actual effort from Andrew at Exy. He could decide what he’d tattoo over Neil’s number after they won. He had a goal to shut down.

~~~

This would never be a this because Neil was gone, Neil was fucking gone, Neil was a hollow shell saying “thank you” but meaning “goodbye” and then HE WAS FUCKING GONE—

~~~

Neil’s tattoo was gone. Andrew wanted to vomit. Andrew also almost wanted to smile. Riko’s mark was gone from his property, his Neil. Fuck everything, Neil was alive, he could think later. For now, he had to keep the FBI’s filthy hands off his Neil and take him home.

~~~

~~~

~~~

Neil lay on his back in their bed in Columbia almost a year later. Andrew smoked by the window, watching contentedly as Neil drew lazy patterns against his own shirt.

“I’ve been thinking a lot…about getting a tattoo,” Neil said suddenly, but quietly, like it was a confession. It was almost a question. Andrew’s opinion obviously mattered, though Neil should be perfectly aware by now that Andrew’s interest would not be swayed by the quantity or type of marks marring his skin.

Andrew arched an eyebrow to indicate he should continue.

"I thought I'd never want one after Riko's, but the more I’ve considered it, the more I want to memorialize certain things on my skin. Marks I choose for myself, for once."

Memorialize. So help him, if Neil wanted his mother's name they were going to have a fight. Another useless, abusive female, surprise surprise. And people wondered why he didn't trust them as a rule.

“…A pair of crossed keys. The house key and…I haven’t decided which of the car keys yet, actually. The GS was “first” first, but the Maserati was the first one you trusted to me alone.”

Oh. Andrew exhaled a long stream of smoke in Neil’s direction as he considered this, watching it dissipate as it crossed the room. “Cars and houses change. The basic shape of the two key types don’t. Don’t be so specific. How badly do you want this?”

Neil thought about it seriously. “I’d get it today if I didn’t have one major problem: I’m not going to trust some random tattoo artist to look at my chest, and I want it here.” He touched himself to indicate.

Dead over his heart. Fucking romantic. Andrew sat up from where he leaned against the window, stubbed out his cigarette, and grabbed his laptop. He pulled up a YouTube video demonstrating stick-and-poke tattoos so that his skittish boyfriend wouldn’t bolt, and then walked out of the room to gather the supplies.

Neil was wide-eyed when he made it back to the room with a bucket of gathered up equipment and pulled out a new sewing needle, a pencil, thread, tape, and ink, along with sterilizing supplies. "You're not seriously suggesting I get an amateur tattoo with pen ink and a needle."

"Tattoo ink." Andrew shook the bottle at him, and then set it down to swab his desk off with a paper towel soaked in rubbing alcohol. "Much better than ballpoint, and I've done plenty of good tattoos in ballpoint. You're not getting an amateur tattoo."

Neil scooted over to the end of the bed by the desk as Andrew lined up his supplies. “You have no tattoos.” Neil had earned the privilege of seeing Andrew fully naked about seven months after moving into Andrew’s room.

“I did it ‘professionally’ in juvie, and I was good enough that some of the guards even wanted a free tattoo done, so they got me real tattoo ink. This is a sealed bottle,” he assured Neil, tapping the lid.

Neil considered all of this. “You don’t do anything for free.”

“No. But favors go a long way in a prison.”

Neil nodded and obediently took his shirt off when Andrew flicked his fingers. He lay back down again, but tensed when Andrew disinfected the skin with brisk scrubs of an alcohol-soaked cotton ball.

"Relax," Andrew ordered. "I've done hundreds of tattoos." He could feel Neil's pulse thumping rapidly against his fingertips. He uncapped a blue marker and Neil wordlessly dug in his pocket for keys to trace. Andrew shook his head, though, and Neil went still. He'd meant it: they would share more than one car and more than one house in their lives. Neil was memorializing a concept, not specific key teeth. He freehanded a hardware store house key and an unbranded car key in an X over Neil's hammering pulse. “I’m planning black ink with bold lines and some minimal shading. Unless you want something different.”

Neil craned his head up from where he was laying to look. His expression was pleased.

"Any changes?"

Neil thought a moment, then dug in his pocket again. He selected the key to the Foxhole Court and laid it vertically between the other outlines. This one was specific, so Andrew traced the teeth carefully. It was also a hardware store copy like the house key, so he thought a moment, and then drew a fox paw on the head. Neil smiled, wide and soft.

Fuck. He'd had to stop counting months ago. The percentage was getting too ridiculously high. He hated... He hated how Neil made him feel out of control. For years his reason for living had been curating others' dependence on him. Having his own needs and emotions depend so heavily on another person was terrifying, but he'd resigned himself to it. 

And it was Neil. He could trust Neil.

“Can we make the paw orange?”

Andrew shook himself out of his own mind. “I’ll get some orange ink online. We’ll fill that in when it arrives.” He rubbed the design down with another alcohol swab followed by petroleum jelly, and then uncapped the bottle of black ink.

Neil froze again when he picked up the needle and sterilized it. He shot his boyfriend an unimpressed stare as he methodically wrapped thread around the tip, and tipped his chin sharply at a scar two inches north of his design. "You've literally been shot, Neil."

"Once. This is a lot of punctures, okay." Neil took a slow, steadying breath.

"It is not a big deal. I've tattooed twelve year olds that handled this with more grace."

"Then why don't you have any, if it's no big deal?" Neil shot back. "I've never even seen a tattoo artist with no tattoos."

Because I've never had anything worth inking, Andrew wanted to argue. But that wasn't entirely true. He'd had a few passing thoughts about the short list of things important enough to keep with him for the rest of his life. The things he was building his life on. Truth. And Neil.

Neil was actually quaking in their bed. He wanted this so much but was so irrationally afraid.

Andrew silently sat in the desk chair and lifted his left arm, propping his elbow on the desk. He gave his inner wrist a swipe with an alcohol swab, just above the arm band, drew what he wanted carefully, and then dipped his needle in ink and began.

It had been a long time, and it was an eye opening experience, marrying together the familiar resistance and yield of skin under the pressure of the needle with the small, sharp pierces that throbbed with his heartbeat in his wrist. On the whole, pricks hurt less than slices. It hurt, but it didn't bleed or linger beyond a raw throb. Neil would be fine. He saw Neil sit up in his peripheral vision, but Neil wasn’t watching the design, he was watching the angle of the needle. Andrew was done stippling the first layer in about five minutes.

“It’s shallower than I thought,” Neil commented when it was safe to speak without distracting Andrew.

“Deep enough to hold the ink, not deep enough to hit blood vessels or let the ink feather over the muscle.” He went over it again, making it darker.

Eventually Neil piped up again. “How did you learn? I thought tattoo artists generally practiced on themselves to figure it out. Who else would let them?”

Andrew kept his eyes on his work, dipping for fresh ink and falling back into the rhythm. Like riding a bike. He’d always been quite efficient and quick with his work. “You don’t learn on skin. You learn on fruit, like bananas and oranges. The peel has skin-like firmness.”

“And…does it hurt?”

Andrew stopped to wipe off the excess ink again, sending Niel a bored look. “Immensely. I am writhing in pain.” Neil shot him a look in return. “It’s just shallow pinpricks, idiot.”

After a third pass and wipe, he eyed it critically. "Yours will take a good deal longer than fifteen minutes because of the size and shading, but.” He twisted his wrist for Neil to see. “Nothing to it."

Copying was easy for him, with his memory. 'Abram' was written in Neil's handwriting.

There was not 'nothing' on Neil's face. Neil's breath hitched, and the sheer emotion in those pretty blue eyes threatened to drown them both.

Andrew covered Neil's eyes when he couldn't stand it anymore, but he bent forward for a lingering kiss at the same time. "Your turn," he murmured against Neil's lips, pressing his palm to Neil's design. Neil's heart was still pounding, though Andrew didn't think it was due to fear anymore. Good enough.

Neil shuddered under his touch and cupped a hand around his wrist, squeezing gently. Andrew let him, and didn't flinch, but he made a note not to touch Neil's tattoo when it was done.

He kissed Neil one more time, then patted his tattoo down with mild soap water, sealed it over with Neosporin and saran wrap. He re-sterilized and threaded his needle, and Neil let him begin to work.