#the st anger that lives in my head has potential

[heavenknowsffs]

I think if they remastered the entirety of St Anger people would actually love it as much as other albums

[freetobeeyouandme]

A My Little Pony Hypothesis

Wrinkle in Time posting reminding me I never actually posted my own My Little Pony hypothesis because I meant to post it as part of a larger analysis of dragons in ST and then never did. lol. Anyway, I think the thing they're referencing with WiT may be one of the kids in that book letting himself be caught by the hivemind to locate their father and then getting left behind during the rescue mission, forcing the protagonist to come back and save him with the power of love. And the MLP references in the show actually also suggest (and therefore support) this version of events.

So in the MLP episode "Escape from Midnight Castle" the ponies are attacked by the evil centaur Tirek who also kidnaps four ponies to turn them into dragons to pull his chariot so he can subjugate the whole world with his Rainbow of Darkness. His plans are stalled because one of the kidnapped ponies is too small and he can't turn it. Meanwhile the protagonist ponies go to find the Rainbow of Light and then go to Tirek's castle to free their friends. While infiltrating the castle Applejack is captured and turned into a dragon. The ponies manage to stop Tirek last minute by overtaking the Rainbow of Darkness with the Rainbow of Light, which also turns everyone back into what they were. And all the ponies lived happily ever after.

So what's that got to do with Stranger Things? Well, Dustin explicity mentions the episode in S3 when he’s arguing with Erica about her status as a nerd, because Erica is into MLP and since that has nerdy stuff like castles and dragons she is a nerd. Erica then embraces that identity, gets into DnD, and names her character after Applejack. Who then ends up defeating Vecna in the S4 game...which made me wonder whether the MLP reference is actually important foreshadowing -- and who then is represented by Applejack. Personally I think Will is most likely, because while “getting turned into a dragon” does fit Max in S4 I think Max is actually the too small pony from the initial four that get kidnapped: Vecna’s first attempt to kill her didn’t work and even the second one isn’t quite complete, he just separated her consciousness from her body by the looks of it.

This is also why I think it’ll be Will. At the end of S4 we see El trying to find Max to get her to wake up, but she can’t find her. That’s not gonna change by her trying harder in S5, so I think if they want to go find Max they need to go into Vecna/The Mindflayer’s head and find her there (and i think that may be one of the priorities in the first half of S5 because of the heavy Star Wars parallels we got elsewhere). And the only person who was part of it before is Will, so I think she’ll end up piggybacking in through his mind. Plus that would let Will’s promise of “fix it together” from 4.01 come true. It also resembles the way the ponies infiltrate the castle in MLP AND Charles Wallace letting IT control him so he can find his father. In both WiT and MLP this rescue mission doesn’t quite go the way it was intended. Applejack gets kidnapped and turned into a dragon and Charles Wallace is left behind as part of the hivemind while the other kids get out with their father. Both of them are later saved by their friends, Charles Wallace explicitly with love, and Applejack with a very thin metaphor for it. 

These themes are obviously also present in Stranger Things and people have already pointed out this similarity (and this potential plot) in relation to WiT, but I think it’s interesting to note that the DnD game which clearly foreshadows the events of S5 also references a piece of media that also has this type of plot. I also think the whole love vs. hate/anger thematic also points to Will because the topic of (romantic) love is important for his character arc in a way that it isn’t for others. El also wants love but her’s is familial and tbh with the return of Hopper I think her S5 arc will be taking the love she knows she has and turning it on Vecna. Will on the other hand is wanting, and I think vulnerable on that level -- but also a formidable foe once he realizes he can have everything he wants. Which is also a great way of involving their personal arcs and the love triangle in the supernatural plot. 

Tl, dR: I think the theory that the writers posting about WiT means Will is gonna help El find Max and then get stuck in the hivemind, needing to be rescued with (Mike’s) love are very likely because the show references an episode of MLP multiple times, including in the foreshadowing of the DnD game, in which that exact plot also happens. And I’m very excited about it because I have been turning this idea over in my head for weeks now and I love it.

[thebigqueer]

Ok, here we go. Dark!Bianca idea. Shortly after the events in the desert, a severely injured Bianca is found by agents of the Titans who were shadowing the quest party off-page. She is brought back to Titan HQ and is convinced to join their crusade against the gods while her friends and family think she's dead. Jump ahead to BotL, instead of Kelli the Empousa, it is a mysterious masked assassin who attacks Percy and Rachel at Goode. The events mostly play out unchanged until Geryon's (1/8)

ranch, where instead of Bianca, it is the ghost of Maria di Angelo who is revealed to be sending Iris messages to Percy about Nico, while also strongly hinting that Bianca's still alive. Jump ahead to Mt St. Helens, Percy fights the assassin again, and during his stint on Ogygia, Percy begins to put two and two together after the assassin demonstrated skills similar to the Hunters. At Antaeus' Arena, the assassin is finally unmasked to reveal a still-alive but scarred Bianca, replacing (2/8)

Ethan Nakamura as the demigod enforcer. Percy is convinced that Bianca is being mind-controlled and goes to Mt Tam to rescue her as well as stop Kronos. However, when he confronts her, Bianca reveals that she's operating of her own free will, feeling vengeful against the gods for robbing her of her life and having pledged her loyalty to her new Titan master. Kronos intends to make Bianca the prophesy kid, promising her the free will she craves so badly as well as promising not to hurt (3/8)

Nico. Going into the Last Olympian, Percy and Nico are both determined to convince Bianca that she's making a mistake, and this time Nico's duplicity is not to simply learn about his mother but to try and summon her spirit to get through to Bianca. At the same time, Kronos gradually starts treating Bianca as less of an ally and more of a tool, and the Titans' actions cause her to have doubts even though she dosen't know what else to do. It all comes to a head in the final battle.(4/8)

Nico returns from the Underworld by himself early, giving Hades an ultimatum to come and fight or hide. Just before the final attack, Kronos sends Bianca to infiltrate Olympus to disable the magic defenses, but Nico arrives to intercept her and make one last bid to save her. They fight, with both begging the other to stand down even as they slug it out. Finally, just as Percy arrives to chase Kronos, the battered siblings' duel ends when Nico gives another ultimatum. He throws down his (5/8)

sword and gives Bianca, now reduced to fear and frustration-induced tears, the choice between perusing her grudge and allowing herself to continue being Kronos’s slave or doing the right thing. Finally able to make a legitimate choice of her own, Bianca chooses to turn her back on the Titans. She still ends up wounded, but unlike Ethan in canon, Nico manages to save his sister while Percy and Kronos have their final battle. After everything ends, Percy petitions for Bianca’s pardon along (6/8)

with the rest of his list, though Bianca turns it down, realizing the harm she almost caused to the person she loved more than anybody else. She is given a reduced sentence in service to her father, and though she does not properly forgive any of the gods that hurt her, she does recognize that the spite and anger she felt would only lead to more death. Nico gets to visit her occasionally, and she starts a road to redemption that Luke never got the chance to take. In HoO, Bianca is (7/8)

more of a background character, but it is she that finds Hazel in Asphodel and alerts Nico to her. Overall, dark!Bianca is an anti-villain who’s affiliation with Kronos is clearly drawn from her pain and grief over the gods’ interference in her life, but her saving grace is her brother. Nico manages to pull her out of the darkness and save her from becoming the same monster Luke became. What do you think? (bear in mind, this is my rough draft) (8/8)

Okay, WOW. Anon, I am actually going to start a petition to make you the new Percy Jackson author because that was such an interesting plot to read.

First of all, I love that you replaced Bianca with Ethan. As interesting as he was in the series, and as much as I loved his character, after reading through your rough draft, I feel like Bianca would have been a much better character to use throughout PJO. Her arc could have been expanded upon and completed thoroughly, and it could have made a lot of sense. Ethan felt more like a representation of "demigods turned to the other side," which I get is the point, but I loved the way you used Bianca because with your plot, her character could have been used so well to properly show how easily the Titan army manipulated kids.

Furthermore, I feel like your plot with Bianca could have been a much better way to use her character throughout the series. From my interpretation, in canon she seemed more like a stand-in tool just to enhance Nico's own character arc and his motives, but your plot for her would have actually given her some kind of foundation and an actual arc for her to go through. You've given her such an interesting character and I think it really provides more justice to what she could have been.

I also love the way that not only did you give her a better arc, but you also enhanced Nico's own arc and the plot, too. Her death in the books seemed more symbolic to him and a turning point in his character, but with her character in your AU, it's both important to Nico and Bianca. You've given her an actual character, and you've set up such an interesting conflict between Nico and Bianca.

Additionally, I love the divide you've created between them. I think that - based on what we know about her in the books - as much as she loves her brother, Bianca also feels very limited with him because of how she's been forced to grow up and be his savior. She understands that he's only a child, though, which I think could also play into her own hatred for the gods - they've not only destroyed her family, but now they're forcing her to take the role of an adult when she's a mere child, too? She was never angry at Nico - she was only ever mad with the gods.

Maybe that's something that Nico also feels bad about, and maybe he tells her about it when they're standing each other down. Maybe she lets him know that she never hated him or felt that he was bringing her down.

Also, I want to add that I adore the way you put them on opposite sides. It sets up such an interesting dynamic to their relationship because here you have two people who love each other so much, but they're on two different sides of a large war. They're both too stubborn to go onto each other's sides, and Nico knows Bianca's only going to get herself into more danger. I just love the potential that has for both of their characters.

I know Percy had a large fear about Nico being another kid to join Kronos' army, so I bet Bianca being on his team would have left Percy incredibly terrified for Nico, too, because he knew how much Nico loved Bianca. Would he have been nervous for Nico's ability to change his mind? Nico knows he'd never join Kronos, but would Percy have known?

And, knowing that Bianca's now on the Kronos side, how would Percy react? Because he felt pretty guilty about her death in TTC, right? Would he feel guilty that she's on the other side now, too? Would he try to reason with her, only to push her further away? I'd love to see how Percy would deal with knowing that Bianca - an important child of the Big Three - would react to her being there. He was already nervous about Nico joining sides, but having Bianca there would have really scared him.

And the part about Bianca finding Hazel instead of Nico? That was mind-blowing. I love everything about that situation because now that introduces Hazel into the narrative of Nico and Bianca's story. My question for you would be how does Hazel's character change now? How does she fit in with Nico and Bianca? Because in Heroes of Olympus she's clearly very insecure about her relationship with Nico and how he views her, but if she actually knew Bianca, how would she feel? Would she feel more left out (knowing that Bianca and Nico have known each other much longer and have a stronger connection with each other)? Would she be distrustful? And how would the three of them adapt to this additional family member? I have high hopes that by the end they would all love each other very much, but I'm just really curious into how Hazel's addition would influence the dynamic of all three.

And, essentially, it all ends into a somewhat win-win situation. Bianca's still living; Nico's got two new sisters; Hazel now has a new family.

I think this is such an interesting concept, and I'd love to read it. If you ever post it anywhere, please do share the link! This was such an intriguing plot to go through and, again, I think this could have been a much better use of Bianca's character.

Thank you so much for sharing it with me.

[dalekofchaos]

Rey’s lack of motivation and stake in the Sequel Trilogy

I have a question to ask you. What are Rey’s motivations? What are her wants and goals and why is she even drawn to the conflict between The First Order and The Resistance?

Rey’s motivations in the Sequels.

Rey wants to find her parents.

Wants to bring back Luke Skywalker

Rey wants to find her place 

Wants Ben to return to the light

Has no real motivation to be on either side of the conflict, but chooses The Resistance anyway

Says she wants to kill Palpatine in cold blood, was close to giving in

Now she chose to fuck off to Tatooine and we see very little in her motivation to do....ANYTHING

Let’s compare Anakin and Luke’s motivations.

What are Anakin's motivations?

Wants to leave a life of slavery and come back and free his mother

Wants to become a Jedi and become a hero

Wants to protect Padme

Wants to save Obi-Wan

Wants to stop Dooku and end the war before it can begin

Wants to be a good master to Ahsoka

Wants to clear Ahsoka’s name

Wants to stop the war

Wants to save Padme and his children's lives at the cost of the Jedi and doing whatever it takes and becomes Darth Vader

What are Luke’s motivations?

Luke is a farm boy who dreams of leaving his mundane life.

Luke discovers that his father -unlike what his uncle told him, was a heroic Jedi Knight

Luke, is reluctant and refuses the ‘call to adventure’, but after the Empire murders his Aunt and Uncle, he decides to Join Obi-Wan on the quest.

Save the Princess

Luke is angered by Obi-Wan’s death at the hands of Darth Vader, and seeks retribution.

Destroy the Death Star and save the Rebellion

To be trained by Yoda

Save Han and Leia

Luke discovers his father, the heroic Jedi, is none other than Darth Vader. After years of training, he sets out to redeem his father and turn him back to the light.

After the redemption of his father and fall of the Empire, Luke goes on a journey to restore The Jedi Order

Compare Rey and Luke’s journeys in ANH and TFA. Rey wanders around and stuff is handed to her. Luke takes initiative and works for what he has. Let's compare ANH with TFA

Luke screws up on watching R2, then chooses to chase him down. He makes another mistake by spying on the Tusken Raiders instead of getting the hell out of dodge. This leads to him being knocked out, and rescued by Ben Kenobi.

Luke initiates the meeting with Ben Kenobi, and it happens because of his early bad decisions.

His aunt & uncle are killed, but thanks to his screw-up with R2 & the raiders, he and the droids are spared.

He chooses to follow Kenobi to Alderaan instead of staying on Tattooine.

He chooses to accept Kenobi's instruction in the ways of the Force, even though most people think it's a myth and a joke. Even though he's bad at it and doesn't seem to get any results at first.

He makes the decision that they're going to rescue Leia, potentially dooming their escape from the Death Star. This sets off a chain of events that leads to Kenobi's death.

Then he chooses to help fight the Death Star, even though he's not a member of the rebellion. He was offered a job with Han, and he could have ensured his safety by leaving with them. Instead he chose certain death.

Finally, he chooses to trust a literal voice in his head instead of the targeting computer.

Let's contrast that with Rey.

BB-8 runs into her. She tries to send him away, but relents and lets him follow her home.

She chooses not to sell him for food.

Finn wanders into camp on his own initiative.

The camp is attacked because BB-8 is there. The camp would have been attacked no matter what Rey did. The other scavenger was, I'm pretty sure, from the same camp. And if she'd sold him, BB-8 would also have still been in the camp.

She is forced to take the Millennium Falcon when the ship she wanted to use was blown up.

She chooses to go with Finn and bring BB-8 to the Rebellion Resistance.

She stumbles upon Luke's lightsaber, and runs away from it.

She accidentally runs into Kylo Ren while hiding in the forest.

He chooses to kidnap her because he senses something special about her.

After her first exposure to the Force, she learns how to use some of it, successfully, and escapes from Ren. And to her credit, escaping and trying the Force out is a choice she made, rather than something that passively happened to her.

Then she, um, is standing there when Han is killed.

She chooses to fight Kylo Ren, and beats him in her first lightsaber battle after closing her eyes and thinking about the Force.

She sort of chooses to go summon Luke back to civilization - I say sort of because it's not clear why she was picked to go over, say, Leia.

Luke makes mistakes, and he is an active participant in his story. Rey is just kind of there, most of the time. She doesn't make mistakes, but she doesn't really do much else.

Rey has no personal stake in this war or motivations and she’s supposed to be the main protagonist.

Rey has never left Jakku before TFA and she tells Han that ”she never knew so much green existed” when they go to Maz’s castle.

In other words Rey must have had very limited knowledge of the world outside of Jakku and all she has heard from it are stories.

Rey who barely knows anything about the rest of the galaxy, to the point that she didn’t even know that forests existed what exactly is her personal stake in the current galactic conflict?

In TFA we saw The New Republic’s capital systems blown up by Starkiller Base and we never saw a reaction from Rey. We do see Finn and Han’s reactions. Also worth noting about Rey is that if she was unconscious throughout her involuntary travel to the Starkiller Base she was never actually aware of the Starkiller Base until just before Han, Finn and Chewie started planting the explosions in order to sabotage it.

Luke, while he had no personal attachments to Aldeeran did actually get to see the horrible aftermaths of it’s destruction.

But Rey was barely affected by the destruction of the Capital systems. Most characters were not as affected as they should have been in my opinion but we didn’t even get to see her have an emotional reaction to it.

This was probably the greatest genocide in Star Wars history and our main heroine is unaffected by it? Finn has a reaction to it and he’s supposedly NOT the main protagonist?

Rey really has no reason to care about the state of the galaxy. She only seems to care if people she knows are in danger.

The fact that she is supposed to be our main hero of this trilogy when she has next to no personal stakes in the well-being of the rest of the galaxy feels wrong to me.

Finn actually has stakes in this conflict since the FO took his family and childhood away from him and Poe has stakes because he actually lives in the New Republic and doesn’t want it to be under FO’s rule. Yet neither Finn nor Poe are considered the main protagonist? But oh wait, I forgot we can’t have a black or Latino man be the leading protagonist in Star Wars

The more I think about it is Rey has no goals or agency as a protagonist. She’s just whatever the plot demands her to be. Rey doesn’t actively take the initiative and make decisions, and simply react to the world around her. There is never a reason given as to why she wants to be a Jedi. Sure, she’s heard the stories about them, but she doesn’t dream to be one like Anakin, and the writers are so obsessed over her parents that they never develop any other motivation besides that. She has to be strung along the story so she can take part in it, hence she is repeatedly chased and kidnapped throughout TFA to get her to the Resistance where she decides to find Luke because she has nowhere else to go. Part of the reason she doesn’t even train with Luke is because she has no reason to, as she’s just supposed to find him. Rey joins the fight simply in reaction to learning that Luke is responsible for Ben’s fall. She’s only ever a Jedi and a member of the Resistance out of necessity- she has no where left to go and has to fight in self defense- so they try hamfist in some motives that she needs to stop herself from becoming like Palpatine but there is no tension as it’s the final act. By the end of the trilogy it’s not even clear if the Jedi Order will return because Rey never seems to want to be one and we can only assume they will return for meta reasons- because the audience knows the ST is a copypasta of the OT.

What exactly was Rey’s motivation for getting involved in the Galactic conflict before TROS? Luke was told that his father was killed by Darth Vader and later his family gets murdered by the empire so he had personal stakes to get involved in the conflict.

Anakin was a Jedi and had lived in the Republic for ten years by the time of the Clone Wars begun so he had personal reasons to get involved in the conflict.

Rey meanwhile grew up so isolated of Jakku that she had no idea forests existed and she didn’t lose anything and the FO attacked her on Jakku. In fact she wanted to return to Jakku after she had dumped BB-8 with the Resistance. Her primary motivation in TFA was to reunite with her family but the movie never establish that her family’s absence was connected to the galactic conflict in any way.

That connection isn’t established until TROS so what was her motivation until than? The Death of Han? A guy she had known for two hours? Finn? A guy she also had maybe only knew for about two hours total by the time of their hug in TLJ? Also she seemed to have completely forgotten about Finn by the time she want on a quest to redeem the guy that has far as she should have known by that point was still in a coma with his spine permanently damaged because of Kylo.

Rey’s motivation seems to either be finding her family or her dealing with her existential crisis neither had much of a connection with the galactic conflict until TROS

[geshertzarmeod]

Favorite Books of 2020

I wanted to put together a list! I read 74 new books this year, and I keep track of that on Goodreads - feel free to add or follow me if you want to see everything! I’m going to focus on the highlights, and the books that stuck with me personally in one way or another, in approximate order. Also, all but two of them (#5 and #7 on the honorable mention list) are queer/trans in some way. Links are to Goodreads, but if you’re looking to get the books, I suggest your library, the Libby app using your library, your local bookstore, or Bookshop.

The Faggots & Their Friends Between Revolutions by Larry Mitchell, illus. by Ned Asta (originally published 1977). I had a hard beginning of the year and was in a work environment where my queerness was just not welcomed or wanted. I read this in the middle of all of that, and it helped me so much. I took this book with me everywhere. I read it on planes. I read it on the bus, and on trains, and at shul. I showed it to friends... sometimes at shul, or professional development conferences. It healed my soul. Now I can’t find it and might get a new copy. When I reviewed it, in February, I wrote: “I think we all need this book right now, but I really needed this book right now. Wow. This book is magic, and brings back a sense of magic and beauty to my relationship with the world.” Also I bought my copy last July, in a gay bookstore on Castro St. in SF, and that in itself is just beautiful to me. (Here’s a post I made with some excerpts)

Once & Future duology, especially the sequel, Sword in the Stars, by A.R. Capetta and Cory McCarthy. Cis pansexual female King Arthur Ari Helix (she's the 42nd reincarnation and the first female one) in futuristic space with Arab ancestry (but like, from a planet where people from that area of earth migrated to because, futuristic space) works to end Future Evil Amazon.com Space Empire with her found family with a token straight cis man and token white person. Merlin is backwards-aging so he's a gay teenager with a crush and thousands of years of baggage. The book’s entire basis is found family, and it's got King Arthur in space. And the sequel hijacks the original myth and says “fuck you pop culture, it was whitewashed and straightwashed, there were queer and trans people of color and strong women there the whole time.” Which is like, my favorite thing to find in media, and a big part of why I love Xena so much. It’s like revisionist history to make it better except it’s actually probably true in ways. Anyway please read these books but also be prepared for an absolutely absurd and wild ride. Full disclosure though, I didn’t love the first book so much, it’s worth it for the sequel!

The Wicker King by K. Ancrum. This book hurt. It still hurts. But it was so good. It took me on a whole journey, and brought me to my destination just like it intended the whole time. The author’s note at the end made me cry! The sheer NEED from this book, the way the main relationship develops and shifts, and how you PERCEIVE the main relationship develops and shifts. I’m in awe of Ancrum’s writing. If you like your ships feral and needy and desperate and wanting and D/S vibes and lowkey super unhealthy but with the potential, with work, to become healthy and beautiful and right, read this book. This might be another one to check trigger warnings for though.

The Entirety of The Daevabad Trilogy by S.A. Chakraborty. I hadn’t heard of this series until this year, when a good friend recommended it to me. It filled the black hole in me left by Harry Potter. The political and mystical/fantasy world building is just *chef’s kiss* - the complexity! The morally grey, everyone’s-done-awful-things-but-some-people-are-still-trying-to-do-good tapestry! The ROMANCE oh my GOD the romance. If I’m absolutely fully invested in a heterosexual romance you know a book is good, but also this book had background (and then later less background) queer characters! And the DRAMA!!! The third book went in a direction that felt a little out of nowhere but honestly I loved the ride. I stayed up until 6am multiple times reading this series and I’d do it again.

An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon. I loved this book so much that it’s the only book I reviewed on my basically abandoned attempt at a book blog. This book is haunting, horrifying, disturbing, dark, but so, so good. The character's voices were so specific and clear, the relationships so clearly affected by circumstance and yet loving in the ways they could be. This is my favorite portrayal of gender maybe ever, it’s just... I don’t even have the words but I saw a post @audible-smiles​ made about it that’s been rattling in my head since. And, “you gender-malcontent. You otherling,” as tender pillow talk??? Be still my heart. Be ready, though, this book has all the triggers.. it’s a .

Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender. This book called me out on my perspective on love. Also, it made me cry a lot. And it has two different interesting well-written romance storylines. And a realistic coming-into-identity narrative about a Black trans demiboy. And a nuanced discussion of college plans and what one might do after college. And some big beautiful romcom moments. I wish I had it in high school. I’m so glad I have it now! (trigger warning for transphobia & outing, but the people responsible are held accountable by the end, always treated as not okay by the narrative, and the MC’s friends, and like... this is ownvoices and it’s GOOD.)

The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern. My Goodreads review says, “I have no idea what happened, and I loved it.” That’s not wrong, but to delve deeper, this book has an ethereal feeling that you get wrapped up in while reading. Nothing makes sense but that’s just as it should be. You’re hooked. It is so atmospheric, so meta, so fascinating. I’ve seen so many people say they interpreted this character or that part or the ending in all different ways and it all makes sense. And it’s all of this with a gay main character and romance and the central theme, the central pillar being a love of and devotion to stories. Of course I was going to love it.

Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars: A Dangerous Trans Girl’s Confabulous Memoir by Kai Cheng Thom. “Because maybe what really matters isn’t whether something is true, or false. Maybe what matters is the story itself; what kinds of doors it opens, what kinds of dreams it brings.” This book was so good and paradigm shifting. It reminded me of #1 on this list in the way it turns real life experience and hard, tragic ones at that (in this case, of being a trans girl of color who leaves home and tries to make a life for herself in the city, with its violence), into a beautiful, haunting fable. Once upon a time.

I Wish You All the Best by Mason Deaver. I need to reread this book, as I read it during my most tranceful time of 2020 and didn’t write a review, so I forgot a lot. What I do remember is beautiful and important nonbinary representation, a really cute romance, an interesting parental and familial/sibling dynamic that was both heartbreaking and hopeful, and an on-page therapy storyline. Also Mason Deaver just left twitter but was an absolutely hilarious troll on it before leaving and I appreciate that (and they just published a Christmas novella that I have but haven’t read yet!)

The Truth Is by NoNieqa Ramos. It took a long time to trust this book but I’m so glad I did. It’s raw and real and full of grief and trauma (trigger warnings, that I remember, for grief, death (before beginning of book), and gun violence). The protagonist is flawed and gets to grow over the course of the book, and find her own place, and learn from the people around her, while they also learn to understand her and where she’s coming from. It’s got a gritty, harsh, and important portrayal of found family, messy queerness, and some breathtaking quotes. When I was 82% through this book I posted this update: “This book has addressed almost all of my initial hesitations, and managed to complicate itself beautifully.”

Anger is a Gift by Mark Oshiro.  I wasn’t actually in the best mental health place to read this book when I did (didn’t quite understand what it was) but it definitely reminded me of what there is to fight against and to fight for, and broke my heart, and nudged me a bit closer to hope. The naturally diverse cast of characters was one of the best parts of this book. The romance is so sweet and tender and then so painful. This book is important and well-written but read it with caution and trigger warnings - it’s about grief and trauma and racism and police brutality, but also about love and community.

The Prey of Gods by Nicky Drayden.  This is a sci-fi/fantasy/specfic mashup that takes place in near-future South Africa and has world-building myths with gods and demigoddesses and a trip to the world of the dead but also a genetically altered hallucinogenic drug that turns people into giant animals and a robot uprising and a political campaign and a transgender pop star and a m/m couple and all of them are connected. It’s bonkers. Like, so, so absolutely mind-breaking weird. And I loved it.

Crier’s War and Iron Heart by Nina Varela.  I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVED the amount of folktales they told each other with queer romances as integral to those stories, especially in Iron Heart. A conversation between the two leads where Crier says she wants to read Ayla like a book, and Ayla says she’s not a book, and Crier explains all the different ways she wants to know Ayla, like a person, and wants to deserve to know her like a person, made me weak. It lives in my head rent-free.

Queen’s Shadow by E.K. Johnston @ekjohnston . I listened to this book on Libby and then immediately listened to it at least one more time, maybe twice, before my borrow time ran out. I love Padmé, and just always wish that female Star Wars characters got more focus and attention and this book gave me that!! And queer handmaidens! And the implication that Sabé is in love with Padmé and that’s just something that will always be true and she will always be devoted and also will make her own life anyway. And the Star Wars audiobooks being recorded the way they are with background sounds and music means it feels like watching a really long detailed beautiful Star Wars movie just about Padmé and her handmaidens.

Sissy: A Coming of Gender Story by Jacob Tobia. I needed to read this. The way Tobia talks about their experience of gender within the contexts of college, college leadership, and career, hit home. I kept trying to highlight several pages in a row on my kindle so I could go back and read them after it got returned to the library (sadly it didn’t work - it cuts off highlights after a certain number of characters). The way they talk about TOKENISM they way they talk about the responsibilities of the interviewer when an interviewee holds marginalized identities especially when no one else in the room does!!! Ahhhh!!!

Bonds of Brass by Emily Skrutskie. Disclaimer for this one that the author was rightfully criticized for writing a Black main character as a white author (and how the story ended up playing into some fucked up stuff that I can’t really unpack without spoiling). But also, the author has been working to move forward knowing she can’t change the past, has donated her proceeds, and this book is really good? It has all the fanfic tropes, so much delicious tension, a totally unexpected plot twist that had me immediately rereading the book. This book was super fun and also kind of just really really good Star Wars fanfiction.

How To Be a Normal Person by T.J. Klune. This book was so sweet, and cute, and hopeful, and both ridiculous and so real. I had some trouble getting used to Gus’ voice and internal monologue, but I got into it and then loved every bit after. The ace rep is something I’ve never seen like this before (and have barely read any ace books but still this was so fleshed out and well rounded and not just like, ‘they’re obsessed with swords not sex’ - looking at you, Once & Future - and leaving it there.) This all felt like a slice of life and I feel like I learned about people while reading it. Some of the moments are so, so funny, some are vaguely devastating. I have been personally victimized by TJ Klune for how he ends this book (a joke, you will know once you read it) but it also reminds me of the end of the “You Are There” episode of Xena and we all know what the answer to that question was.... and I choose to believe the answer here was similar.

You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson. I wish I had this book when I was in high school. I honestly have complicated feelings about prom and haven’t really been seeking out contemporary YA so I was hesitant to read this but it was so good and so well-written, and had a lot of depth to it. The movie (and Broadway show) “The Prom” wants what this book has.

Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth. I never read horror books, so this was a new thing for me. I loved the feeling of this book, the way I felt fully immersed. I loved how entirely queer it was. I was interested in the characters and the relationships, even though we didn’t have a full chance to go super deep into any one person but rather saw the connections between everyone and the way the stories matched up with each other. I just wanted a bit of a more satisfying ending.

Honorable Mention: reread in 2020 but read for the first time pre-2020

Red White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston. I couldn’t make this post without mentioning this book. It got me through this year. I love this book so much; I think of this book all the time. This book made me want to find love for myself. You’ve all heard about it enough but if you haven’t read this book what are you DOING.

In Other Lands by Sarah Rees Brennan @sarahreesbrennan​ . I reread this one over and over too, both as text and as an audiobook. I went for walks when I had lost my earbuds and had Elliott screaming about an elf brothel loudly playing and got weird looks from someone walking their dog. I love this book so much. It’s just so fun, and so healing to read a book reminiscent of all the fantasies I read as a kid, but with a bi main character and a deconstruction of patriarchy and making fun of the genre a bit. Also, idiots to lovers is a great trope and it’s definitely in this book.

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz. This book is forever so important to me. I am always drawn in by how tenderly Sáenz portrays his characters. These boys. These boys and their parents. I love them. I love them so much. This is another one where I don’t even know what to say. I have more than 30 pages in my tag for this book. I have “arda” set as a keyboard shortcut on my phone and laptop to turn into the full title. This book saved my life.

Last Night I Sang to the Monster by Benjamin Alire Sáenz. This book hurts to read - it’s a story about trauma, about working through that trauma, healing enough to be ready to hold the worst memories, healing enough to move through the pain and start to make a life. It’s about found family and love and pain and I love it. It’s cathartic. And it’s a little bit quietly queer in a beautiful way, but that’s not the focus. Look up trigger warnings (they kind of are spoilery so I won’t say them here but if you have the potential to be triggered please look them up or ask me before reading)

Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine.  When asked what my all time favorite book is, it’s usually this one. Gail Carson Levine has been doing live readings at 11am since the beginning of the pandemic shut down in the US, and the first book she read was Ella Enchanted. I’ve been slowly reading it to @mssarahpearl and am just so glad still that it has the ability to draw me in and calm me down and feels like home after all this time. This book is about agency. I love it.

Radio Silence by Alice Oseman @chronicintrovert . I’ve had this on my all-time-faves list since I read it a few years ago and ended up rereading it this year before sending a gift copy to a friend, so I could write little notes in it. It felt a little different reading it this time - as I get further away from being a teenager myself, the character voice this book is written in takes a little longer to get used to, but it’s so authentic and earnest and I love it. I absolutely adore this book about platonic love and found family and fandom and mental illness and abuse and ace identity and queerness and self-determination, especially around college and career choices. Ahhh. Thank you Alice Oseman!!!

Leia: Princess of Alderaan by Claudia Gray @claudiagray​ . I have this one on audible and reread it several times this year. I love the fleshing out of Leia’s story before the original trilogy, I love her having had a relationship before Han, and the way it would have affected her perspective. I also am intrigued by the way it analyses the choices the early rebellion had to make... I just, I love all the female focused new Star Wars content and the complexity being brought to the rebellion.

[cyhyr]

Whumpmas In July: "Stop"

Fandom: Naruto

Rating: E

Pairing: Hatake Kakashi/Umino Iruka

WC: ~6200

Warnings: Graphic Depictions of Violence, Rape/Non-Con

Notes: Miscommunication, Dissociation, Relationship Problems, Captivity, Kidnapping, Hand Feeding, Master/Pet, Canon-Typical Violence, Hair-Pulling, Defiance, Begging, Asphyxiation, Oral Sex, Rope Bondage, Crying, Scars, Anal Fingering, Non-Consensual Spanking, Anal Sex, Gaslighting, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Hospital Stay

A/N: I think I got everything in the tags. If ANYONE sees anything that I missed that I should add a tag for, PLEASE let me know so I can add it on.

Read After "Warmth"

For @whumpmasinjuly prompt list

Read on The Archive

~

Iruka mops the floors of his apartment, looking desperately for the calm that cleaning usually gives him. He’s already washed all of the windows and reorganized the pantry. If mopping doesn’t work, he’ll have to try deep-cleaning the bathroom again, which he knows won’t work, actually, because he did that last night.

Last night was nice. Last night, he and Kakashi made out for well over an hour in training ground twenty-three, and he even had his back against a tree for much of it. And then…

And then Iruka went and ruined it by asking Kakashi to stop.

It worked! Kakashi is always so careful and perfect, and so stopped exactly when the word slipped out of Iruka’s mouth. But he hadn’t… he hadn’t been happy about it. Especially because Iruka couldn’t tell him what was wrong.

Because nothing’s wrong.

That’s why—

“Hello, Love.” The front door opens and closes, the crinkle of paper bags shifting alerting Iruka to fresh groceries and a potential truce meal. Iruka, in the hallway with the mop still in hand, feels queasy. He’s not ready for this conversation.

He might not ever be.

“I was thinking—oh, Love,” Kakashi cuts himself off, startled. “The apartment is… very clean. Is everything—?”

“I’m going to discuss it with Rikona-sensei in our next session,” Iruka says, finishing the mopping and dropping the dirty mop and bucket just inside the bathroom to take care of later. He comes back out and crosses the living room to Kakashi, still hovering just inside the genkan. “I want to get her opinion first, and then I’ll discuss it with you.”

“Nothing bad, I hope?”

Iruka shrugs. He changes the subject, “What’s for dinner?”

~

Afterwards, they lay side-by-side on the kotatsu and touch and make out like teenagers. Iruka’s enjoying it, he really is. He loves kissing Kakashi, loves touching him, and loves feeling him get worked up. He loves how Kakashi gets chattier the more turned on he gets.

He appreciates how Kakashi asks for every touch, every time he wants to get closer. He keeps their hips apart until Iruka’s ready for it, and is careful and gentle when he does eventually press a thigh between Iruka’s legs. And it’s wonderful feeling the bare skin of Kakashi’s chest against his own, the thrill of being turned on for the first time in so long.

But.

“S-st—oh, Kakashi—I. Oh, please, please. St-stop, stop, stop—”

Kakashi pulls away quickly and sits back. Iruka lays still, chest heaving, staring at the ceiling. He takes a moment, and then closes his eyes in relief.

He did—

“Am I doing something wrong?”

Iruka’s eyes snap back open and he looks up at Kakashi. He’s kneeling back, still between Iruka’s legs but not touching him anymore. His hands are clenched in tight fists on his thighs, and his mouth is a hard line. There’s a love bite on his collarbone, the skin red and irritated—Iruka put that there, just a little while ago.

“What—no, I—”

“Then why do you keep telling me to stop?” Kakashi holds up a hand to keep him from answering.

Oh, he knew this was going to bite him.

“Kakashi, please,” he tries anyway.

Kakashi is already standing up and looking for his clothes. “I don’t like being tugged around. If you don’t want this, just tell me, don’t—fuck, I told you I can’t hurt you like this, but apparently I’ve been getting close every time we’ve been making out for the last week!”

“It’s not like that,” Iruka says, reaching for his own shirt.

“Then what is it?” Kakashi pauses in the middle of pulling up his trousers. He’s clearly trying so hard not to glare, not to growl.

It doesn’t change the frustration in his tone. It doesn’t change that Iruka’s still too fucked up to tell the difference between frustration and anger. He’s too at risk for an episode.

He’s—

“When you get your shit together,” Kakashi, once he’s finished dressing, pulls on his mask. It feels strangely final. He moves to the genkan and slips into his sandals. “Come find me, and we’ll talk.”

Then he leaves.

Iruka lays back on the couch and presses his heels into his eyes. He tries to keep his breathing even, and fails. He tries to calm his pulse—and fails that, too.

The timbre of Kakashi’s frustration/anger/sex voice echoes in his head. Iruka loses feeling in his fingers, first, then his feet and legs; and then the ache settles in his chest and he knows for sure that he lost.

Nononono—

He slips.

~

Iruka tries to find Kakashi the next day, but he’s already gone on a mission. It’s telling enough that he left without saying goodbye to Iruka; that had been a recurring thing between them since before they started dating. Iruka holds himself together until the end of the school day, and then walks to his shift at the Mission Desk.

There’s a C-rank scroll delivery on the books waiting for either a genin team or a solo chūnin to sign for it. The clocking is estimated at a day and a half.

Iruka likely has the weekend to himself. He shrugs, signs for the mission, and tucks the details into his vest to peruse later. Sitting down at the Desk, he starts his shift, calling the next shinobi forward.

Some time away may do him good.

~

Iruka wakes up groggy and limp, and struggles to remember what happened. He attempts to activate his chakra-location technique, but nothing happens. Then, as he tries to lift his head, he feels the paper tag pressed against his neck. He stops moving immediately, not sure if it’s a paper bomb or something else without looking at it.

“You’re awake,” someone says. “That’s good. I was hoping I didn’t hit you too hard.”

Iruka clenches and unclenches his hands. They’re tied up above his head to the pole against his back. He almost lost feeling in them. How long has he been out?

Footsteps—leather on stone—echo around him. Iruka blinks, his eyelids heavy. “I may have to get rid of some identifying marks if I end up keeping you,” the other person, a man, says. A hand grabs his chin and lifts his head for him (very likely not a paper bomb; he’s not being careful enough) and turns him left and right. “Though, I must say, your scar is particularly fetching. It’s what caught my eye in the first place, see.” He drops Iruka’s chin. He doesn’t have enough strength back yet to keep his neck upright. The man fingers his scar from cheek to cheek. “Beautiful.”

“I…” Iruka gasps, swallows hard. “I won’t talk.”

“Oh, that’s alright,” the man chuckles. “I know you’re shinobi, but I’m not here for secrets. I know that’s futile.”

“Then… what do you… why am I—?”

“You’re here because I need a new companion,” the man says. “My last one, hmm, expired, see. And I saw you walking into town just yesterday evening and, well. I had to have you.”

He places a hand on Iruka’s cheek and lifts his face again.

“Oh, you are even more beautiful when you’ve got terror in your eyes,” he grins. “That’s good.”

Iruka growls, shakes his head away, “Stop touching me.”

“You’ll be hungry in a little while,” the man says with a chuckle. “Don’t worry, pretty one, I don’t let my pets starve; unless they’re bad, of course.”

~

Kakashi flickers across the rooftops of Konoha, much more relaxed now that he’s had a few days to cool off. He’s glad he left when he did; he didn’t want to be angry around Iruka, but the pent-up frustration had been getting to him. He still needs to apologize for snapping, and he hopes that Iruka’s ready to talk about whatever’s been bothering him the last week or so.

He stops outside the apartment door and knocks. Iruka had keyed him into the wards last week, but after their fight—he’s hesitant to call it such, but, it really was, wasn’t it?—he wants to give Iruka the chance to open the door and let him in. Or they can go to Ichiraku’s; neutral ground. Or to Kakashi’s place.

He’s not picky. He just needs to…

To…

Hmm.

He knocks again. Waits.

It’s Sunday evening. There are no classes at the Academy, and the Mission Desk is closed by now for mission assignments, too. Iruka should be home.

He flashes around the side of the building, to the kitchen window. There’s no sound, no movement. The next window is the bathroom window, and he glances in—empty. The bedroom window is around another corner, and he checks in there, too. The bed is made and the room is spotless. More importantly, Iruka-less.

Kakashi flickers back to the Tower and lands outside of the Hokage’s open window.

“Iruka’s missing,” he says without preamble.

Tsunade pauses and turns in her chair, narrows her eyes. “Umino’s on a mission,” she says.

“A mission?”

“But,” she holds up a finger, and looks to Shizune, standing beside her, “I do believe the time estimate on that mission stated that he should have returned today.”

“I’ll retrieve his mission details, Tsunade-sama.” Shizune hurries out of the room.

“Come in and wait, brat.”

“I’ll stay here. The breeze is nice”

“He may just have been delayed.”

“But why did he leave anyway?” Kakashi hums, shifts to a more comfortable crouch. “Did you need him for seal-work?”

“No,” Tsunade says. She stops pretending like she’s going to try and get back to work. “I actually sent for him yesterday before realizing that he was out of the village. I had a few scrolls brought up from the archives that need unsealing, and I honestly don’t trust anyone else with them besides Umino or Jiraiya.”

“High praise,” Kakashi smiles behind his mask. Iruka deserves it.

“Kid should be tokujō, but wants to stay at the Academy,” Tsunade sighs.

Shizune comes back, scroll in hand and a thoughtful frown in her brow. “The mission parameters, Tsunade-sama,” she says, handing the scroll to the Hokage. “He should have returned early this afternoon. That it’s past sundown and he’s still not back is… concerning.”

“Umino is a capable shinobi,” Tsunade says. “Standard procedure is three days late before a scouting party is arranged to find out what happened.” She turns to Kakashi, “Can you wait until Wednesday before you lose all sanity?”

“Haven’t got much left to lose, Hokage-sama,” Kakashi says. “I’ll wait, but I demand to be in the scouting party.”

~

Iruka chews the rice the man feeds him. He won’t untie him, and so instead he brings small bites of food to Iruka’s lips every so often. Iruka takes the food and tries to think of how he’s going to get out of here, but with his chakra repressed somehow—Iruka suspects the tag—and his wrists tied as they are, it’s difficult to come up with a way to pull away from the pole at his back.

“What, um,” Iruka clears his throat between bites, “what can I call you?”

The man smiles; it sends a shiver down his spine and makes his throat close up because he knows that smile. Mizuki used to give him that same smile. Before.

“‘Master’ works,” he says. He offers a canteen of water. Iruka drinks slowly, but some liquid still slips out of the side of his mouth.

Iruka swallows; frowns. “I’m. I’m not calling you that.”

“We’ll see, pet.” He packs up the rest of the food and leaves the canteen on the ground, half a meter from Iruka’s knees. “If you’re good tonight, tomorrow I’ll move you to the futon. The canteen stays upright all night. You’ll get to drink more in the morning.”

“You—what?”

“If you’re going to keep talking,” he sighs, “I’ll have to gag you. And I really don’t want to have to gag you, pretty one. I don’t like gagging my pets, see. But I’m going to bed, and so I need you to be silent.”

Iruka ducks his head, snarling, but holding back heated words. He can’t be gagged. He can’t show this man the weakness he has, or he at least needs to hold out as long as possible.

~

Iruka wakes up to his stomach grumbling. The rice and water hadn’t been enough, but he’s been hungry before and he can take the discomfort. The man is already puttering around by a small fire, cooking his own breakfast it seems, and gives Iruka that same slimy smile when he notices that he’s awake.

“You left the canteen alone,” he says. “That’s very good. I had a feeling a pet shinobi would be able to follow instructions well.”

“I’m nobody’s pet,” Iruka seethes without thinking.

The man’s eyes darken. “Well, now that just won’t do,” he says. He stands up and takes the pan off the fire, douses it, and stalks over to Iruka. “See, boy, you are my pet. And every good pet’s gotta learn some manners, I suppose. So here’s your first lesson, see: I’m your Master, and you will address me as such.”

Iruka spits at the man. He gets him on his trouser leg.

“Alright, pretty one, but you asked for this.”

He reaches out and takes a handful of Iruka’s hair, holding the back of his head flush to the pole. The pain in his scalp drags him down, down, oh gods no, please not now stopstopstop!! Then the man’s boot connects with his stomach and the breath is literally kicked out of him.

Again.

And again.

Iruka holds back tears and grapples with his own mind to stay present because he doesn’t want to hurt anymore but he also doesn’t want to slip, please, he doesn’t want to go right now—

“Please,” he gasps.

“You can be good, pretty one,” the man coos. “You know how to make this stop, don’t you now?”

He pulls harder on Iruka’s hair and kicks him again.

The ache in his chest is settling. He can’t—He can’t.

Iruka sobs. “Please, please stop.”

“I don’t hear the magic word,” he sings, and pulls back for another kick.

Iruka cries, “Please, Master, I-I’ll be good!” Tears slip down his face and his stomach throbs—but the ache flutters away and he’s able to breathe.

The man releases his hair, and then cups his cheek.

“There, see. That wasn’t so bad.”

~

The man eventually moves him away from the pole—he’s not sure yet if this is a good thing, because while, yes, he can now at least feel his hands, tied now behind his back, he’s also closer to the futon. And the implications of that…

He was due back in Konoha yesterday—and that’s assuming he was unconscious for less than a day. They won’t send a search party for another two days. He needs to stay strong.

Gods, he hopes Kakashi’s mission is going well. He didn’t even check the rank before he left! What kind of partner is he…

“Pet?”

Iruka looks up begrudgingly.

“Oh, don’t give me that look. How’s your belly?”

“Fine,” he says.

“Fine…?”

“Fine, Master,” Iruka grits.

“Good. I think I’ll feed you again tonight.”

Iruka says nothing.

“Or, you can starve.”

“I prefer to feed myself,” Iruka says cooly.

The man’s eyes narrow dangerously. “I do so enjoy feeding my pets,” he says. “You eat by my hand, or you don’t eat at all.”

Iruka nods. “I understand.”

His lip curls. He crouches down and puts his hand around Iruka’s neck, crinkling the paper seal and squeezing just enough to threaten. “Listen here, pet—”

“You don’t scare me,” Iruka snaps. “I’m a Konoha shinobi. Your torture methods won’t break m—nng—”

“I’m not trying to torture you, pretty one,” the man says, tightening his grip around Iruka’s neck so he chokes. “I simply want the respect I’m owed. Give that to me and I won’t have to hurt you.”

“Fuck… you…”

The man purses his lips and mutters, “Now there’s an idea,” and then lets Iruka go.

He coughs, sputters, heaves deep gulps of air. He barely hears the clink of the man undoing his buckle, or the unmistakable sound of a zipper, but he gasps when his hair is pulled again and—

No, gods please

“Will you be good and keep your teeth to yourself?”

“Please, please, st-stop no I don’t—”

“Oh, you’ve had this done before?” He clicks his tongue and leaves his dick alone to stroke Iruka’s face. “My sweet, pretty pet. No one else is ever going to touch you like this again, see? Now. Open up for me.”

Iruka shakes his head. “I don’t. No. Stop.”

“You said it yourself. You don’t have to be scared of me, pet.” He presses his thumb into Iruka’s mouth and pulls down on his jaw, and then runs the pad along his molars. “Stay,” he says, and then puts his hand hack on his dick.

Iruka whimpers, but leaves his mouth open. He doesn’t want to think of what could happen if he closes his mouth now. His breath comes in stutters, through his nose.

This man smells nothing like Kakashi, thank the gods.

He jerks himself off quickly and efficiently, and is soon ejaculating across Iruka’s face and into the back of his mouth. It’s sour and thin and Iruka coughs—the man immediately grabs his mouth and pinches his nose closed. Iruka flails to the side, but the man grapples with him and gets behind him, keeping a hold on his nose and mouth.

“Swallow, pet.”

Iruka would rather pass out. He thrashes in the man’s grapple.

“Swallow, or you’ll run out of air.”

That’s the plan.

“Pet!”

Iruka slumps in the man’s arms.

~

Wednesday morning arrives and Kakashi is—twitchy. He’s already at the Hokage Tower, sitting outside the window to Tsunade’s office, when she arrives at seven o’clock.

“Kakashi, have you slept at all since Sunday?”

“I dozed here and there,” he shrugs

“The scouting party won’t be put together until after lunch,” she says. “Go get some more sleep until then.”

He turns to go back to the roof—he’ll doze for a bit up there waiting for Tsunade—but then a pigeon flies by his ear into the Hokage’s office and lands on her desk. No one uses pigeons anymore for carrying messages, do they?

Shizune picks the little bird up and says, “It has a message, Tsunade-sama.” She picks the message off of the bird’s leg and hands it to the Hokage, who unrolls it and reads silently.

“Brat.”

“Hokage-sama?”

She turns to him, eyes burning and mouth hard. “We’re going to release this pigeon, and you’ll follow it. The scouting party will be along as soon as I can get it together.”

Kakashi nods. Hesitantly, he asks, “Iruka?”

“Follow. The pigeon. If it doesn’t lead you to him, any means necessary. Bring him home, Kakashi.”

“What condition can I expect him in?”

“I’m sending you ahead, alone, because I believe you’ll be the only one he’ll trust to take him out of the situation he’s in,” she hands Kakashi the letter, rolled back up. Then, she nods to Shizune. “Go.”

The pigeon flies away. Kakashi follows.

~

“Quit struggling; you’re going to hurt yourself.”

Iruka flails and bucks against the ropes tightening around his wrists and neck. He’s naked, light-headed and dizzy but gods he can’t stop fighting.

“Pet, do I need to take your mouth again?”

“You do whatever makes you feel better,” Iruka growls.

“I’ve never had a pet who responded to pleasure as though it were pain,” the man muses behind him. “Though, it does make you that much more fascinating.”

The rope around his neck tightens as he’s lifted by the strand connecting his neck to his wrists along his spine. His back is brought to rest against the man’s chest, and he starts touching Iruka, all over his chest and bruised belly. He winces as the man pinches his nipple and sniffs his hair.

“Stop,” he mutters weakly.

“Hmm. You know how to ask properly, pretty one.”

He bites back a cry as the man pulls and pinches at his chest. Iruka starts losing feeling in his limbs and his breath stutters. It’s. It’s too much like Mizuki. He has to. Gods he has to stop it. He can’t—he must remain present. Even if it means kowtowing to this…

His breath hitches. He forces out, “Please, Master, stop,” and then hiccups on a loose sob.

“Oh, that’s pretty, see,” the man says. He stops pinching and starts caressing and fuck, that’s not what Iruka meant.

“No, no plea—ohh.”

He pulls Iruka’s hair and Iruka falls back on instinct. Mizuki used to like to pull, and he wanted Iruka to like it.

“Yes, that’s it, pet,” the man croons. “Now, bend forward—that’s it, very good. Oh, look at you. Look at this,” he places his palm over the fūma shuriken scar on Iruka’s back.

Iruka breathes heavily. His bare knees are cushioned by the futon mattress and his temple is against the pillow. It’s… it’s more than Mizuki ever gave him, when he tied him up like this. He closes his eyes against the tears.

Gods, he wants Kakashi.

“Your scars are beautiful, pet.” The sound of a jar lid being turned, metal on glass, is loud in the cavern. “Once you're trained, I’ll be the envy of all who see you. Perhaps I’ll lend you out to those I trust.”

Iruka chokes on another cry. Mizuki used to threaten him like this—

“Oh, pet, that’s sweet. You’d rather stay mine and mine alone, wouldn’t you?”

Iruka flinches at the first touch of a cold, slick finger to his hole.

Kakashi hasn’t yet—they haven’t—gods—

“Stay still, pretty one, or this could hurt.”

He loses the battle against his will of holding in his tears. The man’s finger breaches him. Iruka holds himself perfectly still.

“I don’t want this, I don’t want this, I don’t—stop, stop, please, I don’t want it…”

“Shh, pet. It’ll feel good soon.”

I know. That’s what I’m scared of.

~

Kakashi summons the pack three hours out of Konoha. The pigeon had clearly been a summon as well, because once it had gotten a fair distance from civilization it poofed away in a puff of smoke. Frustrated, Kakashi has the pack fan out to search for Iruka’s scent.

Just as he’s been keyed into Iruka’s impenetrable wards, Iruka’s scent has been memorized by every member of the pack. Kakashi imagines civilians would think those actions wouldn’t have much meaning, but to each other it meant everything.

Fuck he was such an idiot. How could he have left for a mission without saying goodbye? He was upset, and frustrated, but he wasn’t… shit, he needs to get his act together.

A howl comes from the north. Akino. He flickers from tree to tree, making the distance in ten minutes.

Akino frowns at him when he settles beside him. “That was stupid quick, Boss,” he says accusingly.

Kakashi ignores the comment. “You have Iruka’s scent?”

Akino nods and points with his nose. “He’d come from that way, a few days ago. There was a struggle. And then he and this other scent—male, middle-age, water chakra-nature—go off east.”

Kakashi nods. “I’m going to release the rest of the pack, for now. Keep on his trail.”

“You got it.”

~

Iruka comes back to himself with an indicative pain in his ass and a headache pounding behind his eyes. He hadn’t even felt himself start to slip; he’d just gone. Not good.

His clothes haven’t been returned to him. That’s… understandable. Easier access.

The man is asleep next to him. His snores are ugly and loud, it’s a wonder Iruka stayed under for as long as he did.

His stomach growls. It’s been days since the last time—first time—only time—the man fed him. He twists his wrists in the ropes and shifts his hips a little. A thin dribble of come slips out and drips down his thigh.

“Are you with me again, pet?”

Iruka gulps and sniffles. “I’m—”

“I don’t appreciate my pets zoning out during our couplings.” The man drapes a hand on Iruka’s ass and then spanks him hard, the slap pushing Iruka forward into the pillow a few inches.

“I didn’t—”

“I really don’t appreciate my pets lying to me,” the man growls, leaning up on his elbow. He spanks Iruka again, this time drawing a hiss of pain. “I know what I saw, and I know what happened.”

His fingers dance around Iruka’s rim, still stretched and slick from before. Iruka shuts his eyes tight and grits his teeth against the cry in his throat.

“Now. I’m going to have you again. And you’re going to enjoy it.”

“Stop touching me,” Iruka sobs through clenched teeth.

“No, I don’t think I will. Although,” he slides two fingers inside and hooks them, pulls so Iruka has to lift his hips more, spread his knees more, “you know how to properly ask for what you want, see.”

He moves to kneel behind Iruka and pulls his fingers out, and then wipes them off on his back. The man presses his dick inside and Iruka—

Iruka whimpers.

“That’s it, oh, very good, pet. So pretty, taking my cock.”

He’s not going to make it out of this without a new trigger word. Pet. Pretty. Hell, this fucker’s reinforcing his old trigger for Good, and he and Kakashi only just got to the point where they can say it under the right circumstances.

“Such pretty hair,” the man takes a handful and pulls, only barely lifting Iruka’s face off of the pillow. “When I found you, you had it tied up. What a crime. You’ll wear your hair down from now on, pretty one, so I can see it.”

He brushes Iruka’s prostate. He groans, bites his lip. No more. No. He can’t. Stop. Stop.

“Please stop,” he murmurs.

The man sighs and thrusts faster, harder.

Kakashi

Kakashi

“K-shi.”

“What’s that, pet?”

Iruka snaps his eyes open. Fuck.

“Nothing,” he says quickly.

“What is ‘k-shi’?” he asks, stilling his hips.

“No one.”

Fuck.

“Is that so?” He slowly starts thrusting again, picking up the pace bit by bit until his hips are slapping unrelentingly against Iruka’s ass. With one hand he holds onto the rope, taut from Iruka’s neck to his wrists at the small of his back, and with the other he presses his fingers into the flesh of his waist and pulls Iruka back onto his dick with each thrust.

“Who—is—k-shi?” he growls.

Iruka cries, “Stop, stop, please!”

The man spits. It lands on the back of his neck. Iruka shivers.

“Whoever it is, you’ll never see them again.” He stills, reaches around and fondles Iruka, and the grin is audible in his voice as he continues, “You’re mine, pretty one. No one’s coming. No one else cares.”

Iruka can’t pull back from the hand on his cock, it only shoves the man’s dick further inside. He can’t push forward, that would only make him think he’s enjoying the touch. His chest aches. His breath comes in fits and starts.

Kakashi… he’ll come… right?

If he can’t get himself out of here, Tsunade-sama will send a scouting party. Kakashi will volunteer to be on that mission, won’t he?

“You have only me, pet. I’m your Master, and I’ll take care of you, see. You just have to let me.”

He jerks Iruka off in the same rhythm as he thrusts into his ass. He braces himself on Iruka’s shoulder, pressing him into the futon. It hurts. It.

Oh he’s gonna—

“STOP, please!” he sobs one more time.

“No. Come for me, pretty one.”

He does. He sobs and comes and it hurts and it’s like the man’s kicked him again. Iruka hardly registers the flood of come in his ass as the man orgasms, too.

The man pulls out and walks away.

To the feeling of more come dribbling out of his hole, Iruka mutters into the pillow, “I’m sorry, love. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Kakashi, I’m so sorry…”

~

Iruka loses count of how many times the man comes inside him. It’s enough that after a while he stops fingering him first, then later stops bothering with oil. Eventually he’s led to the fireside, and then made to kneel again beside a large stone. The man sits upon the stone, above him, and feeds him bites of rice and small morsels of rabbit.

He keeps his head down between bites. Sometimes the man will leave his fingers on Iruka’s lips after he’s placed food on his tongue, and so after he’s finished chewing and swallowing, he lets the man explore his mouth with his fingertips. “Very good, pet,” he praises. Then he’ll give Iruka a sip of water.

It’s been days, hasn’t it? Even the worst trackers Konoha has would have found him by now—and Kakashi is by no means the worst. The pack knows him. If Kakashi was looking…

But he’s not. He’s not, is he?

He’s led back to the futon, laid out on his back, and then his neck is tied up to a stake the man’s placed near the pillows. His wrists, too, are taken and tied up above his head to the same rope, to the same stake.

“I think you’ll be ready to bring home in a few more days, pet,” he says. “You’re almost done.”

Almost broken, you mean

The man lifts Iruka’s legs over his shoulders and thumbs at his hole. “So pretty. I like this much better than taking you from behind. I get to see that beautiful scar, the play of your face. You can’t imagine how beautiful your eyes are, full of fear. But you don’t have to be afraid right now, pet. Your eyes are just as beautiful in the throes of ecstasy.”

At the sound of chirping electricity screeching in the cavern, Iruka snaps his eyes open—he didn’t realize they were closed—and feels his heart begin to race. The man is suddenly gone from his looming position over Iruka; he lowers his legs back down, bending his knees. The grunt and gurgle of death is sweet to his ears, but he holds back his tears for when he is sure this isn’t a hallucination.

Unruly silver hair comes into view first, and then the careful fingertips dipping to pick at the paper tag stuck to his neck. The mask, Konoha hitai-ate, the exposed sharingan and gentle gray eye beside it; Iruka hiccups a sob.

“You came,” he whispers.

~

Kakashi pulls the chakra repression seal off Iruka’s neck and tosses it away.

Iruka whispers something, he doesn’t catch it, but he nods anyway. “Let’s get you home, dear,” he says, and cuts the ropes keeping Iruka’s neck and wrists bound to the stake in the ground.

He looks around the cave, but Iruka’s clothes and gear are missing. Kakashi pops a scroll from his own vest and unseals a spare set of his own clothes; they’ll be a little tight, and a little long, but he can’t—can’t let anyone else…

Gods. Fuck.

What good is he, if he can’t even keep one person safe?!

He helps Iruka into his clothes. His heart warms to see Iruka lift the collar of the shirt and pull it up to his nose and take a deep breath, scenting it. “Can you walk?” he asks once Iruka’s clothed.

Iruka shudders. “Probably not,” he says. His voice is small, like it is when he comes out of a dissociation episode. Shit, how many did he have? “I can try, though,” he continues, and then he stupidly pushes himself up to standing and immediately sways to the side.

Kakashi jumps up to catch him, cradling his partner—will he still trust him after all this, shit, he fucked up so badly they might not make it through this without breaking up, no—and slipping his arms around Iruka’s knees and back. “Please don’t strain yourself, dear,” he grits. “Let me help.”

Iruka nods and wraps his arms around his neck. Kakashi begins flickering out of the cave. He has the rapist’s body in a scroll in his vest, so someone can autopsy it when they get home. Everything else he left. He can’t—

He can’t be in that cave another second.

Iruka burrows into the collar of his flak vest and is muttering again. This time, Kakashi focusses and listens; he wishes he hadn’t.

“You came. You came. You came.”

His heart breaks. Had their fight really unsettled Iruka enough that he thought…

He chokes, presses a kiss to Iruka’s hair and mutters back, “Always, love. Always.”

~

Kakashi doesn’t leave Iruka’s side throughout his admission into the hospital, various check-ups, blood tests, rape-trauma treatments, oral report; he has to leave the room for the standard psych evaluation, and then again when Rikona-sensei arrives for their own session. But he stands sentinel just outside and waits until he’s let back in, and the second he’s allowed he’s asking for Iruka’s hands and pressing kisses to rope-burned wrists.

He finds out that the pigeon had delivered a letter from one Sato Touma, declaring that the shinobi Umino Iruka, registration number 011850, had completed his latest mission, and to not come searching for him as he was now a pet of the Sato family, barring a training and testing period. Tsunade made the right call in sending her strongest shinobi after Touma—if she’d let it go, the Sato family could have assumed that any Konoha shinobi were free for the taking. Sending Kakashi was a show of force.

The Sato family won’t touch Konoha again. Not with Touma dead in their morgue.

This… doesn’t put Kakashi at ease. He can’t sleep. Can’t eat. Iruka’s supposed to be released from the hospital tomorrow. He’ll feel better once they’re behind Iruka’s wards. No one gets past those wards without Iruka’s permission.

“Kakashi?”

He realizes he’s been pacing, and collapses onto the chair beside Iruka. “What do you need?” he asks.

Iruka is… strangely calm. Actually, that’s not so strange if he thinks about it—and Kakashi really doesn’t want to think about why Iruka’s calm about having been brutally raped. Because if he thinks about it, he’ll remember Sato, and Mizuki, and then the Hate will start to fester again and this is not the time nor the place—

“I told him to stop,” he whispers. Louder, he continues, “I-I fought as hard as I could.”

Kakashi takes his hands and holds them between both of his own. “Iruka, dear, I’m sorry. I should have been faster. I—”

“Don’t you get it? I told him to stop. I fought him. Me. I fought him,” there’s a slight hint of hysteria in his voice, but Iruka’s smiling through the tears collecting at the corner of his eyes. “Maybe I wasn’t… I wasn’t strong enough to save myself. But I can do it now, Kakashi.” He sniffs, hiccups, and says, “I can—I can tell someone to stop.”

And suddenly, Kakashi understands. “You. Oh, love,” and Iruka pulls Kakashi into the embrace as Kakashi falls into it. He chuckles, his own brand of hysteria bubbling up out of his chest. “You were never—you—Gods all that before, it was never about me, was it?”

“I needed to know I could do it,” Iruka mutters. “If I’d told you what I was doing, the reaction wouldn’t have been real. I needed. I needed to be able to ask even though I knew it was going to disappoint you. To anger you.”

“I was never angry,” Kakashi assures him quickly. “Frustrated, annoyed; yes. Never angry. Fuck, I thought I’d lost your trust somewhere, somehow.”

“I could never have done it with anyone else,” Iruka nuzzles his hair. “I never doubted your ability to stop. It was never about that.”

“I’m. Still really frustrated about it all.” Iruka nods above him. Kakashi continues, “But I’m so happy for you, love, that you’ve found that strength.”

“I’ve found that strength thanks to you,” Iruka says, carding his fingers through Kakashi’s hair. “If this had happened two years ago, or more, I… I wouldn’t have. Shit, I would have been worse than a doll for him. And, yeah, I had a few dissociation episodes; but I resisted them. Before, I would have just gone down and-and never come back.”

Kakashi picks his head back up and drags his mask down with a finger. “Can I kiss you?”

Iruka’s smile brightens like the dawn. “Yes. Please.”

They keep it chaste—they’re still in the hospital, and Iruka could have new triggers neither of them know about yet. But the simple press of lips on lips is enough to make Kakashi’s chest pound and his fingertips tingle. Gods he almost lost this.

“He had me believing you wouldn’t come,” Iruka reveals into their kiss.

“My love,” Kakashi murmurs back, lips to lips, “I will always come for you.”

[1littleshippergirl1]

Don't you dare get hurt

Summary: Oliver is a natural born daredevil and he just might cause all of Marcus' hair to go gray

@raviliuz here you go! I'll get to working on that other one you wanted soon

--

Oliver was a natural born daredevil. Apparently, according to Mrs. Wood, he'd been like that since he first learned to crawl. Because of his accidental magic, he'd land himself on the top of a bookcase or a countertop and just drop, his magic protecting him from slamming onto the floor.

It didn't get better as he aged, either. He saw no harm in performing dangerous stunts on his broom that would surely lead his mother to an early grave. Once, shortly after he and Marcus purchased a home of their own, he jumped right off the roof to test out if he would land on his broom or not.

Marcus nearly had heart failure watching it, as it caught him by surprise because Oliver had failed to mention what he meant by "afternoon activities" when he grabbed his broom and headed out that day.

Oooh, he wa simply infuriating! He'd marched right out there, demanding an explanation and all his boyfriend could do was shrug and say, "Oops."

Bloody oops.

Marcus partly blamed Oliver's Gryffindor-ish tendencies as a way to explain his rather stupid behavior. Than again, even as reckless as his boyfriend's friends could be, they'd also been exasperated with him and his antics on occasion.

No, Marcus believed that Oliver just really had a death wish and relished in the fact he often caused him unnecessary grief.

He never took his concerns seriously, which only aggravated Marcus further. His eyes would sparkle with amusement, a grin peeking out and lips pressed together to surely suppress the laughing that was bubbling up to the surface at how Marcus' inner mother hen was shining through.

Oliver believed that purely came from Marcus not being sorted into Gryffindor and he was sort of right. He simply wasn't as brave or reckless, didn't find pleasure in risking his life on the daily.

Honestly, with the way his boyfriend lived, Marcus had reasonable fear to believe that Oliver would get himself killed one day, much as his lover brushed him off as overreacting.

He couldn't help it. Oliver was the most precious thing he had (not that he'd ever admit to using the word precious) and he wasn't about to let him drop dead for a stupid reason.

(He already told Oliver that if he dies from one of his stunts, he wasn't going to the funeral).

And speaking of his idiot. Marcus was at the window above the kitchen sink, watching as Oliver jumped off the broom he'd been riding and onto another one that was suspended in mid-air. The roof incident earned him a hefty lecture from Marcus and Oliver's parents.

Mrs. Wood had not been pleased to learn what her son was up to now that he was out on his own. Although, her worry wasn't quite the same level that Marcus' was, beyond that of a concerned mother. After a while, when she became certain that her son would be alright, as she hadn't yet recieved an owl or floo call from Marcus to inform her that Oliver had wound up in St. Mungos, she relaxed.

That meant Marcus' anxiety was more apparent, now that he didn't have someone else to share it with.

Oliver made the jump- Marcus' heart leaped when Oliver momentarily swayed, nearly not making it.

He won't have to worry about dying from that because I'm going to bloody kill him

Marcus marched outside. "Oliver!" He barked, crossing his arms as Oliver came floating down, lazily.

"Yeah?"

"Don't be thick!" Marcus snapped at Oliver's feign of innocence, which did nothing to curb the former Slytherins wrath. "You know what I'm bloody talking about!"

Oliver sighed, knowing that they were about to go down a familiar road. "Marc, I'm alright. Calm down."

"You almost didn't make it," Marcus glared at him.

"But I did."

"But you almost didn't."

"Quit worryin'," Oliver mumbled. "I'm okay."

Marcus despised how nonchalant Oliver was regarding the subject. So careless, nothing seemed to really get through to him. Marcus even tried to use Weasley to get him to see sense and that was after Marcus had to get Weasley to see why it was a bad thing!

Weasley stared at him, puzzled. "I'm afraid I don't understand?"

Marcus wanted to throttle him but Oliver liked his best mate very much alive so he'd have to wait. "He's an idiot, that's what."

"Isn't that what we find endearing about him?" Weasley said, dryly.

"No," Marcus scowled. "He's gonna get himself killed one of these days."

"Well, then I won't have to listen to another one of your pointless arguments."

Marcus growled. "I'm being serious! You need to talk to him!"

Weasley rolled his eyes, apparently unimpressed. "I've known Oliver since we were eleven and I've learned that simply talking to him is not sufficient."

"Then do whatever. Just make him see sense."

There it was again, that peculiar look that Weasley had. "I see."

"What?" Marcus felt uneasy by the way he was being looked at.

"You're afraid," Weasley said, simply. "For Oliver. Has this got anything to do with-"

"No," Marcus said, quickly, scoffing.

Weasley clearly didn't believe him.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of. Shows you've got feelings and believe me, we all doubted such."

"Don't you think you're overreacting just a little?" Oliver had the bloody audacity to chuckle. He reached out to playfully nudge Marcus' shoulder, but the former Slytherin inched away before he could. The easy going smile slid off Oliver's face. "Marc-"

Marcus turned on his heel, storming back into the house and spamming the door. Oliver was left in the air, still on his broom, staring at the door blankly.

He wasn't going to waste his breath. There was no point in discussing it if Oliver wasn't going to take his warning seriously.

He stalked to the bedroom and slammed that door shut, too.

Marcus collapsed on the center of the bed, blowing out a puff of air harshly. This wasn't the first time that it'd happen, his anger getting the best of him. He tried not to let that happen, honest. But sometimes, Oliver's attitude got under his skin and he exploded.

He just wanted his boyfriend to be safe. That was all. He never thought much of Oliver's enthusiasm for danger much when they were attending Hogwarts; he probably would have celebrated with the rest of his dormmates if he heard that he'd fallen off his broom or some other mishap.

But that was before.

Before he knew what Oliver really meant to him and how quickly he'd become the center of Marcus' world.

And then it would be clear.

Marcus sighed, rubbing at his face tiredly. Despite his efforts at keeping his lover safe, ejucj usually were in vain, he never meat to smother Oliver. That was the last thing he wanted to do. He was also fairly independent and wouldn't take too kindly to Oliver doing it to him if the roles were reversed.

He just felt so powerless in those moments of uncertainty. It was a foreign feeling, one that he utterly despised. He didn't like fear washing over him like icy water, stomach flopping to the point that nausea set in. And over what? Oliver being fine.

There was a knock at the door, bringing him back to reality.

"Marc," Oliver called as he opened the door. Marcus craned his neck to see his boyfriend glancing at him with a look of caution. "Erm, figured you'd be in here."

Marcus laid his head back down, not saying anything.

"Look," Oliver came closer, toward the end of the bed, swallowing. "I....I didn't mean to upset you."

Marcus still didn't speak.

"I know it upsets you and all-"

"And yet you continue to do it anyway," Marcus interrupted, shortly.

Oliver shrunk a little. "Well," he started, lamely, "you do things that upset me."

Marcus sat straight up, eyes flashing.

"Nothing that could potentially break my neck!"

Oliver squirmed under the intensity he was receiving from Marcus. He took a seat on the bed after some internal deliberation. "I'm sorry," he said after a touch of hesitation.

"I know."

"But you're still mad...."

"You could have fallen, Oliver! And you don't even care," Marcus scowled.

"Why are you so worried?" Oliver finally asked, rolling his eyes, despite the seriousness of the situation. "Marc, for Merlin's sake, we play quidditch for a living and you're way more aggressive than I am."

"That's different!" Marcus snapped.

"How?"

"It just is," Marcus said, stubbornly.

"That's not an answer."

"That's the answer you're getting."

Oliver groaned, dipping his head downward. "What's the matter with you? Do I have to guess?"

Marcus ignored him.

Oliver sneaked his arms around his boyfriend, his chin resting on Marcus' shoulder. "Marcussss," he drew out the letters purposefully. "Come on, tell me, won't you? I can't fix it if you don't say anything."

A few seconds trickled by.

"I give up!" Oliver exclaimed, jumping to his feet. "I bet there's nothing wrong! You're just being a git like usual!"

Marcus did not appreciate the name calling. He for to his feet as well, shooting his boyfriend a dirty look. "There is!"

"Then tell me!"

"No!"

Oliver huffed, giving Marcus a great shove. "Tell me!"

"No!" Marcus shoved him back.

"Stop being ridiculous!"

"Stop being so bloody reckless!"

"Why can't you just tell me what's the matter?!" Oliver shouted.

"Marcus finally snapped.

"I'm scared, alright!"

Tension hung in the air.

"What?" Oliver said in disbelief. As if the mere notion was something entirely impossible. "You're joking, aren't you?"

Marcus glared.

"Okay," Oliver muttered, "maybe not."

Marcus sat back down with a plop.

Oliver sat down, too. Eyes downcast. Unsure of what to say. "You're really afraid?"

"Wasn't it obvious?" Marcus retorted without much malice. "You don't get it. I'm...I'm bloody terrified of something happening and you don't care. Do you know how it feels, watching you do that stuff?"

Oliver was rendered speechless.

"And I know I sound like a bloody 'puff but I can't help it, Oliver. You mean too much to me not to care. What if you-"

He had to push back the lump in his throat.

"That won't happen," Oliver said, quietly. "You know how careful I am."

"You don't know that."

"No," Oliver had to admit. "But you can't worry like that."

"I can't help it," Marcus grumbled, growing further embarrassed by his behavior. He was never like this before he'd gotten together with Oliver. He'd held a reputation for being a tough brute, but now he hardly felt brutish.

"If it's any consolation," Oliver ran his fingers through Marcus' hair, gently scratching at his lover's scalp. "I'm sorry."

"It's alright," Marcus muttered. "I know I'm being stupid."

"Stop it," Oliver hated it when Marcus got like that. "I didn't mean it like that and you know it. I just... you've got to calm down, Marc. I can't promise that nothing will happen, but you can't worry over me constantly." His voice dropped to a softer tone, his eyes staring at his boyfriend sympathetically.

"I know," Marcus buried his face in his hands. I know. Merlin's Beard, Oliver, I bloody love you."

"I love you, too," Oliver whispered. He leaned his head onto Marcus'. "I'm sorry. I really am. Suppose I've been a bit reckless."

"You suppose?"

"Okay, okay," Oliver said, good-naturedly. "I have been."

Marcus's earlier anger slowly ebbed away. He could never stay mad at Oliver for long. "I've never felt this before," he breathed. "It freaking scares me."

Oliver squeezed him comfortingly.

"I'm sorry, too," Marcus said, surprising Oliver after a minute or two of silence.

"You are?"

"Yes," Marcus admitted. "I suppose I can be a little.....smothering at times."

"You suppose?"

"Funny," Marcus rolled his eyes. "Really witty."

"Thought so," Oliver agreed.

Marcus snorted, then sobered up. "I really am sorry, you know."

"I know."

"I don't know what I'd do if anything happened to you."

"For some reason," Oliver muttered.

"You ought to feel lucky. I don't like anyone this much."

"I do," Oliver smiled, nuzzling him. "Every day I feel lucky that I get to wake up to the most handsome bloke in all of England."

"That was so cheesy, Wood."

"Aye, but it's true."

Marcus closed his eyes, feeling his temple being kissed. "Forgive me?" He murmured.

"There's nothing to forgive," Oliver reassured him. "You were scared-"

"Concerned."

"Terrified."

"Apprehensive."

"Throughly anxiously about my safety," Oliver finished as though he hadn't heard him. "How could I ever be mad at you?"

"You were."

"Yeah," Oliver admitted. "A bit."

"I don't want to you to think I'm trying to control you."

"And I don't want you thinkin that I'm gonna ignore everything you say."

Oliver wrapped his arms around Marcus, pressing his face into his shoulder. "Percy said we'll have to make compromises."

Marcus vaguely recalled Weasley saying such.

"Marc, if it makes ya feel better, I'll ease up a bit," Oliver promised.

Marcus nodded. He didn't say anything else until Oliver nudged him.

"Marc."

"Fine," Marcus sighed. "And I'll stop complaining about it so much."

A minute passed.

"We're both lying aren't we?" Oliver chuckled, raising his head to meet Marcus' eyes.

"Probably," Marcus allowed a smirk to cross his face.

"I love you," Oliver placed his hand on the side of Marcus' face, kissing him.

"Love you, too." They embraced.

Contrary to what they both had said, they did try to keep up their part of the bargain. Oliver tried to practice his mord dangerous stunts when he knew Marcus wouldn't be home and if that wasn't an option, Marcus took to complaining to Adrian, who silently cursed Wood for making that happen.

[punchdrunkdoc]

IOTNBO/PBIO Ep 8 ramblings

As usual, the latest episode of my new favourite show has left me with a head full of jumbled thoughts and a heart full of mushy emotions.

How good was the first part of this episode? Seeing how Kang-tae can’t stop thinking about Moon-Young, wants to constantly see her and touch her, and gets adorably jealous at her (apparent) attention to another man!! So much good stuff!

Just like I suspected after the hair-cutting scene in ep 7 he has now acknowledged to himself that he actually has feelings for her. But he’s still so awkward around her (for instance, on the couch when she was being overly affectionate/flirtatious). He’s so cute when he’s flustered! And MY is actually quite respectful of his boundaries these days - she nudges him out of his comfort zone, but she always backs off in the end. I suspect he’ll have to be the one to make the first ‘proper’ move. So here’s hoping he gets some courage during their ‘trip’.

And how awesome is that? The call back to the ‘when you want to run away’ conversation?! The fact he ran to her after his suspension with that massive smile on his face was amazing. He finally let go and acted with emotion, without thought to the consequences...and he discovered that it felt GOOD! So he wants some more of that. With her. 

My heart stopped when he hit that dude. He was so full of passion and anger and barely contained emotion. MY may think he’s the patient safety pin to her volatile bomb...but now that he’s somewhat ‘off the leash’, I’m starting to see that they’re actually very alike in temperament. He’s also possessive and jealous and has the potential for violence. The two of them together could actually be really explosive. 

I was a little bit scared that she would reject him at the end of the episode. Because MY had her own little epiphany earlier on; her cynical world view was shaken after the Beauty & The Beast conversation with A-Reum when she saw her own situation with KT through the prism of that fairytale. And she realised that it really could be love that saved the Prince...which means she’s now starting to understand that there could be real feelings between her and KT - more than just lust and want. 

But how she would feel about that? Would she try to ignore it and justify it away as a sort of Stockholm Syndrome? She manipulated him into living in the cursed castle, after all, just like the Beast did to Belle...

But no. Thankfully, she smiled at KT and took his hand. And then they did their little staring thing, where I forget to breathe because surely THIS time they’re going to kiss...

Other random thoughts:

- KT’s tears when he tasted his favourite childhood dish. And the fact that she noticed how moved he was

- She covered him with her umbrella!

- The fight between MY and Sang-tae was hilarious. But I’m worried where ST’s possessiveness about KT is going to lead. Especially when KT runs off with MY next episode. This could be the major spanner in the works of their relationship. And lets face it - a spanner is coming. They have been FAR too cute and happy the last couple of episodes and we’re only half way through the show. Pain is coming, and I’m dreading it. 

So for now, I’ll bask in all the gifsets you lovely people will make and enjoy the cuteness while it lasts.  

[nad-zeta]

hey, so your requests are open. I loved your foreign mc and latina mc headcanons! 💗 just wondering if you could do something based on the latina one. Mc is like a strict latina mom. When they get angry at someone, they take off their sandals and start hitting/threatening the person with it in angry Spanish. Or, they just grab anything really. Even the ronins are scared of them but they’re surprisingly good with kids. Sorry if this is too long, love 💕

◉_◉Anon; (Masamune, Hideyoshi, Nobu, Ieyasu and Yuki) and one for the IkeVamp boys (Comte, Leo, Arthur, Theo, and Napo) in which the femMC gets involved in a girl fight and she goes 21st c on them? ❤️

Hi, hi dears! 🦋🌻Thank you so so much for the requests! ❤🥰Also, soooorrrryyyy for taking super long getting to this! I think I might make this headcanon week, and catch up on all the HC piling up in my box lol! 😂🦋Anyways hope yall don’t mind that I combined the two asks! I found they were somewhat similar!❤❤🥰🌻🦋

Headcanon: Angry Latina MC feat; Masamune, Hideyoshi, Nobu, Ieyasu and Yuki

Masamune

Masamune is a pretty playful guy so its no surprise that he gets into trouble with his Latina girlfriend now and again (¬‿¬)

He lives for those moments where he pushes you over the edge ever so slightly, where you start swearing at him in Spanish  (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻

Honestly he absolutely loves it, he finds it super sexy  (¬‿¬)

One day you were out in the markets, buying some fresh ingredients for dinner you planned to surprise Masamune with

Your hands were full of fresh produce when you accidentally bumped into a soldier (╯°□°）╯

He stared down at you, “Hey watch where you are going you, filthy maid,” he said with a snarl ノಠ_ಠノ

You had honestly had it, with disrespectful men and your angry strict lantana mom mode was activated （♯▼皿▼）

You legit threw the man against his head with an apple, ranting at him in Spanish (╯=▃=)╯︵┻━┻

Masamune had been on the hunt for his kitten ( ͡ᵔ ͜ʖ ͡ᵔ )

He strolled through the markets, as the maids had told him that you were out shopping 

And that’s when he spotted you

You were going 21st century on the disrespectful man’s ass, giving him a true Latina smackdown ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ

When you were done with him he was bowing down low to you, in an apology, promising that he would treat people better in the future

That’s when Masamune strode to your side and put an arm around your shoulders, “Having fun kitten,” he asked with a broad smile ~(˘▾˘~)

He looked down with pity at the soldier now fearing for his life, as he has had one too many sandal smacks to the head (｡◕‿‿◕｡)

Masamune simply smiled, as he helped you pick up your fallen ingredients from the floor and helped you carry the stash back home

He was low key thankful that it was not him on the receiving end of the sandal for once (｡◕‿◕｡)

Hideyoshi

You and Hideyoshi had been dating for a while now (｡◕‿◕｡)

Often the two of you would walk around the markets together on the hunt for the best tea house to have some tea and lunch at 

One day as you were peacefully sipping on some tea and enjoying Hideyoshi’s company (◠‿◠✿)

Something caught your attention ⚆ _ ⚆

You turned to see a woman abusing some poor street child, for messing a drop of water on her fancy kimono 

You Latina mom mode was activated

 ლ(ಠ益ಠლ)

Hideyoshi looked over at you and saw the fires being lit in your eyes, he followed your gaze to see the woman hitting the poor child ◉_◉

Before he even had a chance to react, he saw you stomping your way to place yourself between the child and the woman 

You glared angrily at the woman who then started attacking you for interrupting her 

 (　･ω･)っ≡つ

You legit went all out, pulling her hair and punching her in the gut

At some point Hideyoshi even saw you take off your sandal and hit her with it 

（╯°□°）╯︵( .o.)

He ran to your side trying his hardest to break up the fight

Hideyoshi was pulling you away from the woman by your waist as you continued to curse at her angrily in Spanish 

“I’m calm, I’m calm put me down Hideyoshi,” his caramel eyes looked into your to see all traces of anger had disappeared, and he let you go ಠ⌣ಠ

Before the mama bear could even scold you, you crouched down in front of the little girl and in the most tender of voices asked if she was alright

You then asked her if she would like to join you and Hideyoshi for some tea and lunch (｡◕‿◕｡)

Her little eyes lit up in delight, you walked back to the teahouse holding the little girl’s hand leaving a very shook and confused Hideyoshi staring at you (°ロ°)☝

For a scary fighter, you certainly were good with children (ʘ‿ʘ)

Nobunaga

You and your boyfriend had snuck out of the castle to go on a fun trip together ヾ(⌐■_■)ノ♪

The plan was to spend the day in a flower field away from the business of the castle

Finally the two of you had reached your destination(◕‿◕✿)

You set up the blankie and picnic under the shade of a big tree

Your eyes gleamed in delight when you had noticed that Nobunaga even managed to sneak some sugar candies for the two of you to share

Your relaxing picnic, however, was soon interrupted but a group of ronin appearing from the treeline (；一_一)

“Well, what do we have here, a sweet romantic getaway for two.” They looked at you with a dangerous glint in their eyes (¬‿¬)

Nobunaga drew his sword and glared angrily at the people for interrupting his quiet time with his beloved fireball (／‵Д′)／~ ╧╧

You started swearing and threatening them in Spanish, which causes Nobunaga to smirk smugly (ง'̀-'́)ง

He loved how feisty you were, never backing down from any opponent or challenge, you always stood your ground and even though he didn’t have a clue what you were saying, he always found it incredibly sexy  (¬‿¬)

However his smug smile soon turned into a small frown as he spotted a woman ronin among the men ⚆ _ ⚆

You followed his gaze to the woman and grabbed his hand giving it a slight squeeze, “Leave that one to me, this ain’t my first rodeo.” (｡◕‿◕｡)

He looked down at you and smiled, “Well then fireball lets finish this quickly so we can get back to our picnic.” (◠‿◠✿)

Nobunaga charged at the men, as you now calmly walked towards the woman, “surrender now and no one will get hurt.”

The woman simply scoffed and charged at you 

The two of you went hand to hand as you fought (ง ͠° ͟ل͜ ͡°)ง

To say you gave her a true 21st-century smackdown would be an understatement  (*＇Д＇)ﾉｼ)ﾟﾛﾟ)

By the end of the fight you had her tied up and started scolding her in Spanish

Nobunaga couldn’t hold back that proud smirk as he watched his beloved fireball in her element (づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

 Ieyasu

After a long boring council meeting you and Ieyasu decided to take a pleasant, relaxing stroll through the forest (づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ

You were gathering some flowers to make the grumpy porcupine a flower crown when you heard a shuffling coming from one of the bushes (◕‿◕✿)

You were on high alert as you approached the bush, sandal in hand, ready to smack any potential attacker ಠ_ಠ

Ieyasu had to stifle a laugh at the scene of you slowly approaching the bush with your sandal held high above your head

“You silly girl its probably just a rabbit” he said trying to hold back his laughter （≧ｙ≦＊）

You made your way closer and crouched down, to meet big blue eyes

Your eyes widened when you saw a scared little boy hiding in the bush

You carefully reached out and wrapped the child in your arms as you gently lifted him out of the bush ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ

Ieyasu’s eyes widened as he rushed towards you, shrugging off his haori to wrap it around the little boy to keep warm

The boy wore a well known family clans crest

The two of you took the boy back home with you and after cleaning him up, asked him what had happened (◕‿◕✿)

He revealed that he was from one of the clans that allide with Nobunaga and that some assassins had kidnapped him and his mother to use to gain an advantage against Nobunaga  (ಥ_ʖಥ)

That night the kidnappers came to Ieyasu’s palace to kidnap the child and finish the job, but when they saw you, an Oda princess they simply couldn’t resist and kidnapped you as well

Ieyasu had gone to report the news of the discovered boy to Nobunaga

You woke up, bound in a dark shed ಠ╭╮ಠ

You gazed around the room and spotted the boy and his mother, fearful and crying 

｡ﾟ･（>﹏<）･ﾟ｡

The kidnappers filed into the room and smiled when they saw that you were awake, “you will serve us well in the downfall of the Oda forces.”

You lost your temper at that and started swearing at them in Spanish, to buy yourself some time to work on your bounds, to free yourself ( ￣＾￣)

Once you got your hands-free you legit threw the kidnapper’s with any object you could get your hands on, yelling angrily at them in Spanish

(┛◉Д◉)┛彡┻━┻

Imagine Ieyasu’s shock when he burst into the shack to see you on top of the attacker hitting one him over the head with your sandal.

He was even more sister shook when he looked around the room to see that all the other kidnappers had already been bound and taught a lesson they would never forget (=ﾟωﾟ)つ)ﾟ∀ﾟ)

Never mess with a woman from the 21 st century

A shiver went down Yasu’s spine, as he watched you continuing to swear at and hit the man 

For someone so good with children, you were definitely terrifying

Yukimura

You were happily married with the aloof dufus, and lived together with your four beautiful children (◕‿◕✿)

You were a rather a strict Latina mom, thanks to your own mother being a heavily spirited woman

You were feared far and wide by ronin and thugs and no one dared mess with you or your children lest they wanted to face your wrath 

A lesson which Yukimura had not yet learned (¬‿¬)

He had taken your kids out to play in a nearby forest, to give you some well-derived rest from the little gremlins

You honestly loved your children and would dote on them 24/7, they could honestly do nothing wrong in your eyes (◕ᴗ◕✿)

Suddenly missing your small trouble makers, you slowly made your way to the flower field that they were playing 

As you got closer you could hear one of your children crying 

 .·´¯`(>▂<)´¯`·.

You instantly went into mother must protect mode

̿'̿'\̵͇̿̿\з=( ͠° ͟ʖ ͡°)=ε/̵͇̿̿/'̿̿ ̿ ̿ ̿ ̿ ̿

You ran up to your cute little child and overheard the conversation he was having with your dearest husband

“Your okay, little dummy, here look I’ve patched your leg all up, good as new,” Yukimura said in a cheerful tone ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ

“Just don’t tell your mother okay, she will kill me if she found out I let you play with Sasuke’s ground spikes” he said as he scratched the back of his head and chuckled ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Just then a shadow fell over Yukimura, he didn’t need to turn around to know that you had obviously overheard the conversation and that you were furious  ʘ‿ʘ

He braced himself for impact as you whacked him over the head with your sandal, yelling at him in Spanish ｡゜(｀Д´)゜｡

Being married to you for so long and having faced your wrath many a time he was able to pick up the meaning of a few words

He also knew there was only one way to get you to calm down, “Hey you little squirt help me,” your child stared up at his dad, “Nope papa, it’s not my fault you didn’t listen,” he then giggled and ran to play with his siblings

Leaving poor Yukimura to deal with your angry Spanish ranting ¬_¬

I hope you enjoyed this dear and thanks again for the request! ❤🌻🦋

[thiswaycomessomethingwicked]

reading gourgauds personal diary is somewhat vexing because we see several different facets of napoleon, namely him throwing gourgaud under the bus, being inconsiderate, and calling him names such as fool or child- but gourgaud holds him to too high an esteem and is very unreasonable at times (see- him threatening to duel montholon in napoleons face), mostly under the influence of a current situation. at least we get to see napoleon giving out mac n cheese napoleon: hey gourgaud: No

I mean, I like Gourgaud’s diary for precisely that reason. Like Bertrand’s, it does less sugar-coating than the other memoirsts/diarists from St. Helena. Napoleon was a dick to them at times. Because part of Napoleon’s personality was his ability to be absolutely cruel and vicious to those around him. Especially those he did love and care about. 

Napoleon was a multi-faceted person. One who had many, many flaws. (And many good parts as well. Because like us, he’s human. And the same as we all respond to different and people and challening circumstances in not always our best manner, so too did he.) I would argue that it’s nice to see more than one side of Napoleon in the memoirs and diaries instead of either pro-Bonapartist white-washing or anti-Bonapartist He Was The Anti-Christ hate hard-on. It paints a more complete picture. 

With regards to calling Gourgaud a boy and a child, to be fair, Napoleon did that to Dr. O’Meara as well, who would have been around the same age as Gourgaud (circa-30s) compared to Napoleon’s 45+. It was meant in a loving, if teasing, tone. And, for Gourgaud, I think Napoleon always meant it in a way of “you’re young, you’ll see bigger picutres of events with age and experience.” 

(Not unlike how I tease my brother, who is ten years my junior, for being a wee bébé though he obviously isn’t.)

Gourgaud’s love and dedication to Napoleon were extensive. But it has the flavour of a youthful allegiance. How, when you’re young, you throw yourself into the camp of whoever you think is deserving and gun for them full-on. Sometimes age and experience soften this, add more nuanced and realistic views to the situation (e.g. Bertrand, Duroc, Lannes ... many of Napoleon’s mates from early days who unreservedly loved him, and were deeply loyal to him, but also weren’t blind to his faults. Bertrand’s a fun one to follow on his journey at Napoleon’s side because he was so dry-humoured and clear-eyed about things yet boy are there moments of /heart eyes/ NaPoLeOn that happened along the way).

Napoleon was a man who was able to earn, or at least garner, men’s love and loyalty to extremes. He was an intense and extreme person - these sorts of things breed each other. Napoleon also raised Gourgaud up through the ranks. Saw his potential and nurtured it. He was fatherly to the young officer and Gourgaud returned that affection and attention with his intense devotion. 

I  mean, Napoleon clearly viewed Gourgaud as a sort of quasi-son. Even saying: “He was my first orderly officer. He is my work. He is my son.” This is also how Napoleon referred to his brother Louis when they were young. Napoleon taking the very paternal, fatherly role of bringing up his much younger brother and viewing him as a sort of proto-son. Napoleon had a penchant for adopting all the younger men around him and deciding they were now his children. It comes from having to take over as head of the family at fourteen. (And, not to mention, his generally paternal/familial/fatherly approach to people who he felt were under his protection. Like that was just a part of who Napoleon was, I believe, at a fundamental level. That paternal nature can absolutely be grating and annoying, but it is also just who Napoleon was and if he displayed it to you, a sign that you were considered part of his larger found-family sort of thing.) 

And, to my mind, Napoleon’s love for Gourgaud was sincere and his attachment genuine. There’s a reason Gourgaud was present at all the major campaigns from ‘04 to ‘15. 

Now, to be fair to Napoleon, Gourgaud was no walk in the park in terms of companionship. He was intense, high-energy, very high-strung and a bit neurotic, full-on, and smart therefore easily bored (not unlike a certain Emperor). Indeed, I suspect their similarities were a problem. They were too alike in their energy level, oddities, intensity to get along perfectly at all times. Also, Napoleon came from a family whose personal culture was to argue and bicker and make big displays over every little thing. Yet, for Napoleon’s part, he still loved them (Napoleon stop forgiving Caroline after every single betrayal. Napoleon: ... but she’s my sister.)  

Napoleon, I would argue, actually handles Gourgaud fairly well, all things considered. From Gourgaud’s diary: [he’s been called a child by Napoleon who was trying to calm him down from another pique of anger/boredom/frustration.] ‘In short, I am very angry. The Emperor seeks to calm me. I remain silent. We pass into the dining room. He speaks to me gently. “I know you have commanded troops and batteries, but you are after all very young.” I only reply by gloomy silence.’ 

Now please understand: I adore Gourgaud. I love that stupid, brash, childish, headstrong man. I think he’s charming and fun and big-hearted, but I firmly, without a doubt, believe him to be someone you should only be around in small dosages. He was prone to jealousy that bordered on Junot-levels of extremes (which is, possibly, why it really twigged Napoleon off who was like “the last time someone was like this, it DIDN’T GO WELL”), he was irascible, petulant, and susceptible to trouble making. 

It’s as Lord Rosebery said - Gourgaud was out of place on St. Helena. I love Rosebery’s description here: “...His [Gougaurd’s] energy, deprived of its natural outlets, turned it upon himself, on his nerves, and on his relations to others. He himself was in in much the same position as the Emperor. The result was that he was never happy except when grumbling and quarreling. To use Madam de Montholon’s figure when speaking of Napoleon, ‘His fire, for want of fuel, consumed himself and those around him.’ But Napoleon had the command of what luxury and companionship there was at St. Helena; the others in the little colony had their wives and children; Gourgaud had nothing ... he was a brilliant young officer devoted to his master with an unreasonable, petulant jealousy, which made his devotion intolerable; and above all, he was perpetually bored-bored with the islands, bored with the confinement, bored with isolation, bored with celibacy, bored with court life in a shanty, involving all the burdens without the splendor of a palace [my note: and he was born in Versailles and had a penchant for the elegant and extravagant], bored with inaction, and bored with himself for being bored.” 

Napoleon described the living situation on St. Helena as being “like a large, unruly family” and I think that is entirely accurate. They rowed, they had good times, they played pranks on the British, they reminisced, they tried to hold things together despite the world being upside down, they got on each other’s nerves, they bickered, they dueled, they stepped in between the dueling parties and told them to knock it off, and so on. 

St. Helena was one large, neurotic, unruly, opinionated, strong-personalitied family. There’s naturally going to be a lot of fraught moments in that. As well as beautiful ones. 

thank you for the ask! apologies for the three mile long reply. <3 

[lawrenceop]

HOMILY for 5th Sun after Pentecost (Dominican rite)

1 Pt 3:8-15; Matt 5:20-24

“Love the brethren”, or “be lovers of the brotherhood”, says St Peter in today’s epistle. Hence the Gospel today condemns anyone who is angry with a brother, calling him raca, meaning someone who is inferior or stupid. Doing so would violate, it seems to me, the fundamental equality of brothers. Indeed, mindful perhaps of the tense history of brothers in the Old Testament, Jesus points out in the Gospel that at the root of such anger between brothers is a hatred of the other that could potentially lead to murder. For it was between the first pair of brothers that the first murder in history was committed; and the sons of Jacob would gang up in an attempt to kill off their brother Joseph, and they eventually sold him as a slave, an inferior, mere chattel. So, the propensity to hate one’s brother, and to dehumanise him, and to even kill him is as old as sin.

Christ, therefore, comes to redeem this fallen and divided world, and to heal with his grace these wounded and fractured relationships. Indeed, Christ wills not only to heal that which nature provides; to heal not only our blood relationships, but he goes beyond that: his supernatural grace elevates our relationships making us, sinful men, to become spiritual brothers to one another, bound together by his Precious Blood which has been shed for us and freed us from sin; making us, indeed, through baptism, to become his ‘blood brothers’, so to speak, through the adoption of grace into the household of God our common Father. Hence St Paul says: “those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the first-born among many brethren.” (Rom 8:29)

So, when St Peter speaks of the brotherhood, and when Our Lord speaks to his disciples and tells them to be reconciled with their brothers, he is speaking of the Christian family, of all who have been baptised into Christ, and who are thus to become conformed to his image – all who, by grace, are to become sons of God in and through and with the Son of God. The effect of holy baptism, therefore, is to make us truly children of God the Father, and therefore, just as truly make us brothers and sisters to one another. And so we are bound to God and to one another, united through charity.

Thus Jesus teaches us, his disciples, to pray to God and to address him with these words: Πάτερ ἡμῶν, it begins. Or Pater noster, our Father. Much attention is paid to the fact that Christ the Son confers upon us the privilege of adopted sonship so that we have the grace to call God Abba, Father, just as he, by his divine nature, being consubstantial with the Father, is entitled to do. However, Benedict XVI rightly observes that we could benefit from paying more attention to the fact that God is our Father because the Fatherhood of God is not communicated to us individually but only through the Body of Christ, which is his Church. So Benedict XVI says: “The Christian prayer to the Father… is bound to the community of our brothers, together with whom we make up the one Christ”. That phrase ‘one Christ’ is redolent of St Augustine’s beautiful term for the Church, which he called the totus Christus, ie., the entire Christ: Jesus the Head together with us the members. So, the Lord’s Prayer opens by reminding us of our communion with one another which is a principal fruit of holy baptism.

For this is what Christ has come to effect: he has come to heal the wounds of sin, to overcome the divisions and suspicions between men, to calm the murderous hatred that would well up between brothers if they were to live without grace. Hence St Peter says: “have unity of spirit, sympathy, love of the brethren, a tender heart and a humble mind.” For these come from the Holy Spirit, and they build up the brotherhood of Christians, humbly united in love to Christ, under God the Father. However, division, arguments, quarrelling, name-calling, and gossip against a brother all comes from the Devil, the Father of Lies, whom Jesus has called a “murderer from the beginning”. (Jn 8:44)

Therefore, Benedict XVI says that “Christian belief in God the Father… necessarily involves the affirmation of our brothers, the brotherhood of all Christians”, for we have been instructed by Scripture to “love the brethren.” Thus St John says: “He who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.” (1 Jn 4:20). This connection between our love for our fellow Christians and our love for God is intrinsically connected, such that Our Lord tells us in today’s Gospel: “if you are offering your gift at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.” (Mt 5:23-24) Because the Holy Mass, this Eucharistic assembly, is where we gather as brothers and sisters. It is here that our communion with one another is meant to be expressed; here that our love for one another is made manifest to the world, so that non-believers can see that God is our Father. In the 2nd century, Tertullian thus observed that pagans looking at Christians should be able to say: “Look . . . how they love one another (for they themselves [the pagans] hate one another); and how they are ready to die for each other (for they themselves are readier to kill each other).”

My brothers and sisters: Can this be said of us today? Do we actually know one another who come together to this church to gather around God our Father? What more can I do for you to help this Eucharistic assembly become better practitioners of brotherly love? Moreover, I ask: what do people see when they look at our interactions with one another, especially online – on social media when we Christians talk about and with one another? Occasionally I do see the deep care that Catholics have for one another, praying for one another, giving support, encouragement and sound spiritual advice. But very often I see much that saddens me. As Pope Francis says in Fratelli tutti, “Even in Catholic media, limits can be overstepped, defamation and slander can become commonplace, and all ethical standards and respect for the good name of others can be abandoned”. How can this contribute to the fraternity that our common Father asks of us?” (§46)

This year, as you’ll know, the Dominican Order celebrates the 800th anniversary of the heavenly birthday of St Dominic. And one of the things that has been reiterated about St Dominic is that, according to the earliest writings about him, Dominic wished to be known as Brother Dominic. Hence, his Order is called the “Ordo Fratrum Prædicatorum”, an order of preaching brothers, and the earliest stories of the Order are compiled in a book called The Lives of the Brethren. So, you might think that we brothers have something to say to the wider Church about how to live as brothers, how to love the brethren. I don’t say I am an expert in loving my brothers, but I can say from my own experience that we Dominicans suffer as a brotherhood if we don’t talk to one another, if we don’t listen to one another, if we don’t spend time together getting to know and understand our brothers and their viewpoints. If I only talk with those whom I like and whose views I share, then the temptation to call my brother a fool, or even to hate him increases. Now, the Lord has warned us against this.

The current Master of the Order, therefore, reminds us Dominicans that we must make time and space “for mutual listening and learning, as brothers”. And this advice, I think, holds good for all of us as Catholics. Thus the Holy Father Pope Francis warned the Church against “the media’s noisy potpourri of facts and opinions [that] is often an obstacle to dialogue, since it lets everyone cling stubbornly to his or her own ideas, interests and choices, with the excuse that everyone else is wrong. It becomes easier to discredit and insult opponents from the outset than to open a respectful dialogue aimed at achieving agreement on a deeper level.” (Fratelli tutti, 201) This is the way of the world. But Christ has come to redeem the world; his grace elevates Christians so that we can become a light to the nations, showing the pagan world how we can love one another. Thus Pope Francis says: “Together, we can seek the truth in dialogue, in relaxed conversation or in passionate debate. To do so calls for perseverance; it entails moments of silence and suffering, yet it can patiently embrace the broader experience of individuals and peoples.” (Fratelli tutti, 50)

So this is the challenge laid before us today. In a noisy world full of prideful opinions, can we mortify ourselves and keep silent? Can we charitably listen and seek the good in what others say and do? Can we, as St Peter says, have “a tender heart and a humble mind… [And] do not return evil for evil or reviling for reviling; but on the contrary bless”, which means to speak well of the other. (1 Pt 3:8,9)

[mymelodyheart]

Highland Destiny Chapter 11 ~Lock the Door~

Although Joe should have been home hours ago, he had opted to stay in the doctor's mess room. He didn't think he could unwind after the previous night's events, and besides, Gail's shift would be over soon-it was nearly 5 am. 

Wandering through the cafeteria, he was surprised to see Jamie sitting alone and staring into space. He went and bought them both a cup of coffee before approaching him.

"Hey, need some company?"

"Oh! Aye, take a seat." Jamie rubbed his face in rapid motion and sat up and smiled at the sight of coffee. "Thank ye, I was about to get one."

"Out on bail?" Joe knew already he wouldn't stay long in jail.

"Aye. How's Christie?"

"He'll live. That was some punch you threw at Tom. What were you thinking, Jamie?"

"I dinna ken. I saw red, I suppose. The coppers weren't impressed at all," he joked, not feeling guilty about last night's misdemeanour.

There was a moment of silence between the two men as they drank their coffee.

"You need not be here, you know. You should go home and rest. Claire is no longer in danger," Joe said in-between sips of his coffee.

"Ye said she's pregnant. How did that happen?"

Joe looked incredulous. "Seriously, Jamie? You had sex, that's what happened. Don't you guys use any form of protection or birth control? I know she said she couldn't have any babies...but still!"

Jamie ignored his question. "Does she know?"

"I haven't told her yet...she's still unconscious. Anyway, I intended to tell you first because I was unsure of the effects of Ketamine on the fetus. You see, she received quite a high dose. Out there it's often used as a recreational drug, but recently there are a lot of cases of it being used as a date rape drug. Its effect is almost immediate, making it more effective for its sinister use. In the right amount of dosage, it should wear off in an hour, but Claire ingested a substantial amount and to make matters worse, it was mixed in alcohol. It could have been fatal if she had not received medical attention immediately. There is no antidote for its overdoses, but we have given her a drug to counteract the symptoms. So you might find her drugged to her eyeball for a couple of days. As for the fetus, there is no telling...I'm sorry."

"Christ! I thought it would have just been a matter of flushing the drug out of her system...fuck." Jamie slammed his fist on the table, rattling the coffee cups. "So, ye think Christie had some ill intentions towards Claire?" He was about to say rape, but he couldn't bring himself to say the word. Jamie could feel his anger rising again.

"Pure speculations Jamie. But he will remain detained until proven innocent. It is plausible that he put the Ketamine in her drink because we have them here in the hospital, and it is accessible to him. We use them for anaesthetic purposes. Now the thing is, the drug comes in a variety of forms. Pharmaceutical Ketamine is usually liquid. On the street, it is more common to see tablets or white crystalline powder. And Claire ingested the liquid form."

Jamie shut his eyes tight, inhaling deeply through his nostrils. When he finally exhaled, he noticed his hands were clenched tightly. "I'm no sorry now that I punched the daylight outa that prick."

Noticing his anger, Joe quickly changed the subject. "Don't get your hopes up but if the fetus does survive, have you thought what that would mean for you?"

His tactic worked, Jamie's face broke into a grin. "I'm going to be a da. Can ye tell already if it's a boy or girl?" 

Joe coughed, not expecting that reaction. He is now unsure if he made the right choice asking him that question in case there was a disappointment in the end. "No, Jamie...not for another at least 7 weeks. And by the way, I saw on the report that Claire is 5 weeks pregnant...that's around the time when she first arrived here in Inverness. Didn't one of you think of using a condom? It's not just about birth control we're talking about here...there's also sexually transmitted diseases to think about. Oh God, did you have sex on the first day you met? "

"Aye we did," he replied grinning, looking very pleased with himself. "Weel... normally I would have used a condom, it's just that we had a lot to drink and Claire was so beautiful and then..." 

Joe stopped him, not wanting to hear anymore. "You know what? Forget that I asked. I don't want to know what happened before conception!" He rolled his eyes as he let out a frustrated sigh.

"But ye're a doctor. Surely ye hear it all the time..."

He glared at him. "Jamie, for crying out loud! We're talking about Claire here. She's like my sister. I'm not interested in hearing about her or your sexual escapade. Jesus!"

Now it was Jamie's turn to change the subject. "Anyway, can ye picture me being a da?"

"No. Not really."

"What do ye mean, no? If ye think I'm going to leave Claire because of her pregnancy..."

"Jamie, listen. It's not as simple as that. A baby will need a family...a father. Are you ready to have a family of your own? Have you thought about marriage?"

"Aye, of course, I have. Weel, what I mean to say is, I was thinking about it before ye came. And what do ye take me for? Ye think I'll run away because Claire is pregnant?" Jamie looked shocked that Joe would think he would abandon Claire.

"It's not only about what Claire wants Jaime. It's also about what you want. Do you really want this? Baby, Claire and the whole family thing..."

"Joe, I know ye're concerned about yer friend. I want ye to know that I will be doing the right thing for Claire, not because it is the right thing, but because I love her."

"Yeah, that's nice, and all, but both of you have been separated longer than you've been together. Falling in love is not the same as loving someone..."

"You know Joe, once I asked my da how ye knew which was the right woman, weel, he told me when the time came, I'd have no doubt. My da was right. That night when I first laid eyes on her at St. Agnes, I knew she was the one."

"Did you tell Claire how you feel?"

"Aye, but I don't know if she feels the same way. What do ye think? Did she tell ye?"

Joe shifted uncomfortably. "Well Jaime, the only way to find out is to ask her yourself."

..........

Jamie slowly opened the door, careful not to make a noise. He had been explicitly told by Joe that Claire needed a lot of bed rest. So he was surprised to see Claire awake and smiling when he came in. 

"Och, ye're awake..." He had brought her a tray of assorted Danish pastry which he knew she loved and placed them on the table before pulling a chair next to her bed. Before he could sit down, he noticed Claire had an odd look on her face.

He smiled at her as he placed a hand on her cheek. "Are ye alright, Sassenach? How are ye feeling?" 

Claire extended her arms towards him and said dreamily, "Give me a kiss lover boy!"

His eyes widened at the greeting. Finding Claire's response a bit unusual, Jamie hesitantly leaned down to kiss her on the forehead. But before he could raise his head, her strong arms had pulled him down by the neck. She kissed him passionately, her tongue darting daintily to get a taste of him. He responded but pulled away abruptly, thinking she was not herself. "Christ Claire, what are ye doing?"

To his surprise, she unexpectedly sat up and looked at Jamie with twinkling golden eyes and an impish grin. Biting her lower lip, she provocatively looked him over. "Come 'ere Jamie and give me some of your sweet lovin'," Claire slurred. She was staring at him like he was some savoury dish to be devoured.

"Oh, sweet Jesus, Sassenach, ye're still drugged. Ye should lie down!" Jamie tried to gently force her down back to bed, but instead, she threw the covers aside and got onto her knees facing him, her hands reaching for the buckle of his belt. Wearing only a thin hospital gown and the hazy glow of sunlight casting a shadow, he could see the outline of her body and her breasts.  Oh, God!  Disengaging her hands from the front of his jeans, took a mammoth effort. Not because of her strength but more because of his rapidly dwindling self-control. He firmly put her hands away from him and backed away. "Claire, listen to me, ye need to lie down..." he said slowly and deliberate, not quite sure how to deal with the situation.

"I don't need to lie down...I feel good, and you look good. So, come here, love and give me a kiss." She puckered her lips in invitation.

Jamie was beginning to get nervous. "Sassenach, ye're heavily medicated, so ye're not acting yourself. So be a good lass and get under the covers. I'll only come to ye once ye're lying down." he said in an unsteady voice.

She sat back on her heels and pouted prettily, one hand resting on her thigh and the other slowly raising the hem of her gown. "Don't you want me, Jamie love?"  Oh Christ Almighty, of course, I want ye! 

Taking big deep breaths and braving the risk of what could potentially happen if he touched her again, Jamie made another attempt. "Claire, please, ye need rest and all these excitement cannae be good for ye. Well...it's certainly not good for me," he muttered, reaching out to grab her so he can lift her and lay her down. 

Instead of cooperating, Claire dodged Jamie's hands, raised herself on her knees and flung both arms around his neck. "Lock the door..." she whispered huskily into his ears, "...and then kiss me." She ran her tongue on the edge of his ear before biting his earlobe.

His hands having a mind of their own, landed on her round arse, fondling it as Claire rubbed herself against Jamie. "Now, Sassenach, why would I want to lock the door?" he replied hoarsely. He could hear hospital activities happening outside on the corridor, and he was on the verge of committing public indecency. It's been over 3 weeks since they had made love and his restraint is about to snap.

"Because I want to take a peek," she giggled as one hand suddenly grabbed Jamie between his thighs.

Gasping, he seized her wrist away from his growing bulge. "Oh, fuck! Sassenach! For someone who has small hands, ye have some firm grip on ye. And I dinna want ye taking a peek!"

"Why not?! How about I let you see mine first? Then I'll take a peek at yours" she grinned coquettishly, leaning back to take a better look at his face, "After all, fair is fair, right, Jamie?"

He grabbed both her hands and held them behind her back, gripping them in place, making her head tilt to the side. "No, Claire! Naebody is taking a peek at anything..." His words trailed off as his eyes rested on the smooth line of her neck. He could almost see the pulsation of her vein as Claire struggled to set her hands free. On impulse, Jaime kissed the spot, before trailing down to the base of her throat, making her quiver. Then he remembered and backed away. "Christ Sassenach, ye're not making this easy for me are ye?"

She winked as she grinned wickedly, "Well if you won't come here, you can watch me instead. Would you like to watch Jaime?" Her hands were already sliding between her thighs, and he knew anyone can come through the door any minute.

"Fine Sassenach, I'll lock the door and don't ye dare make a sound..." he said, giving her warning look.

Door safely locked, he turned back once more to Claire to find her standing barefoot beside the bed, swaying on her feet. "Go back to bed now!" he growled.  Damn ye woman!  He was amused by how quickly she scrambled under the covers.

Claire settled in, he got into bed with her, lying on his side with his head propped by his elbow. "Jamie..." She was looking expectantly at him, her eyes, although dilated was dark with want. Gone was the giddy, sultry seductress she was moments ago. He knew he wanted to take her there and then, but he couldn't. Not here and not like this even though he was dying inside. Instead...

"Shh Sassenach," he whispered softly as he moved his free hand slowly under the cover and under her gown. There he squeezed the soft, warm flesh before parting her thighs gently. Her golden eyes widened, and her hips began to move, as his forefinger travelled to the moist patch of her panties, tracing the lines of her cleft and her sensitive spot. A faint moan escaped her lips as she closed her eyes in ecstasy, making him dizzy with want. Then he slipped his hand under the waistband, cupping the heat between her legs before dipping his forefinger into her wetness and stroking the silky fold long and slow. She let out a loud gasp as she arched her back, her hand reaching for him to take her.

"I want you inside me..." she whimpered, her breath quickening.

Jamie could see her hard nipples against the thin fabric of her gown, as her chest heaved at every stroke of his finger. "No, Sassenach, I want to watch ye," he murmured as he lightly touched her lips with his, resisting the urge to kiss her thoroughly. He pressed his fingers inside her, thrusting, stroking, dipping and rubbing, her hips lifting to push herself against his hands. She writhed and squirmed with wanton abandonment, her thighs spreading wider apart for deeper penetration. She was so hot and wet, and her throaty moans were making his head swim. He plunged deeper, his thumb grinding the sensitive spot until he felt her clamped around his fingers tightly and her body began to shake uncontrollably. She let out a cry before collapsing next to him, her breaths warm against his neck, and her thighs tightly clamped around his hands. Claire held on to him like that until tiredness took over and her body began to relax.

Claire smiled, drowsily at him as her body eased. "Jamie, I never got to take a peek."

"Sshh sleep now, mo chridhe," he murmured, kissing her on the forehead, before releasing his hands from between her thighs. Then he got up and straightened her gown before pulling the covers to her neck. 

"Jamie?" 

"Aye Sassenach?" He took her hand in his as he watched her eyes began to get heavier, and her head bobbed, as she struggled to stay lucid.

"I love you," she whispered before drifting off to sleep, her hands going limp in his. He smiled a very broad smile. Jamie wanted to hug her but thought better of it. She needed her rest, so he watched her sleep instead, feeling content with the world.

Today's problems can be tomorrow's, he thought.

Then Jaime received a phone text from Finn, the bartender from the Scotch & Rye Pub.

 Jamie, please come ASAP to the bar. I have some footage from our surveillance camera I want you to see.

[walmart-buraiha]

Maybe it means nothing

My name is redacted and I’m just here to have a good time… and im doing a really bad job at it

I’ve sort of had a faint but ever-present screaming in my head for give or take a year and a half, and all that psychic blackboard screeching has been mostly centred around my crisis. ‘What crisis?’, I pretend to hear you ask, well great question actually. For those aforementioned 18 months I’ve had a small, prickly, blatantly unpleasant theory: I hate myself. Yes I know, that’s easy to tell because I say it all the time as a clever little edgy joke; but in reality, I’ve always found it unfairly difficult to appreciate what skills other people are so impossibly sure I have. Whether from teachers, parents, or even the rare peer, I feel as though all these people are under some sort of intense impression that I should be able to wield all my apparently present ‘hidden potential’ like I’m the protagonist in a mediocre shounen manga.

That in mind, I can’t help but wonder how much of my consistent self-directed resentment is derivative from mistakes I’ve actually made or from how much I hate what I’ve become in the last year. Although I appear to simply pass off all this talk of potential, I feel like my rejection of that sentiment could quite likely have formed itself into some self-inflicted disappointment, like I’m annoyed at how ridiculously lazy I am. And from there I start to build all these other reasons I’m so god awful at being alive, like ‘you only got a B on that essay but you got an A on the last 3, you useless trash,’ or ‘you better finish that shitty beer or else you barely even count as a man whatsoever’, or even going so far as ‘you still get angry once every two months, all that therapy was wasted on you’; and from there it’s a simple step of imprinting those negative thoughts into everyone else and just deciding out of nowhere they must all notice those same minuscule details.

I’m not sure why I come up with all these tiny negatives. It’s not like I’ve ever thought of someone else like that, so why would they think that of me? What gives all those non-existent assholes the right to judge me when I’ve never so much as considered anything similar to that about them? What a group of pricks, amiright? But I guess I’m meant to make this all circle back to my thesis statement, I’m bad at having a good time.

But why? What is it about my personality that makes happiness harder to channel than fear, or anger? Well I think I don’t perceive myself as someone that’s happy, or someone that deserves to be happy, and decide every person around me is infinitely more deserving of that same basic human emotion. I don’t know if that emotional deprivation that I force upon myself has some loosely definable connection to my lack of immediately perceivable talents, since I find most of my more innate abilities are ones that hold very little water in the area of sharing ones emotional state. It’s not exactly easy to demonstrate your genuine friendship towards another person via nothing but mediocre dark humour, rage and upper-body strength, so I find myself wondering if there is a way to express emotion. Will those who think they know me fall under the impression that anything genuine I say is nothing more than a failed attempt at dry wit? Or is it me who is to blame? After all, I can barely even convince myself that genuine feelings are worth the effort of maintaining, let alone figuring out how to tell someone about them.

Although is that primal confusion simply what it means to live on this desolate metropolis of 21st century Earth? Is it even the fault of that very same world that has caused my very own emotional breakdown and led me down this ever-peculiar path of self-degradation? Who’s to say I suppose, whether the big bearded guy with the apple or some groovy 80s DJ riding a highway of constant universal synchronicity. For that matter, maybe the only answer we might ever stumble across is that of the great void, and is that the answer we want, one that us puny apes can grasp? Is all we truly desire to finally leave the realm of momentary bliss heartbreak, love languages, and drug addictions, only to receive no meaning at all by the end of it and finally stumble our clumsy asses into the ever-expanding pit that might just be what we expect from the credit role of life.

Then again, is this what I’m meant to think, or is faith a better idea? Does this kind of violent terror come for every one of us, whether we believe in a void or a pearly gate? Probably. But to be fair, we both know this is far too many questions for one idiot in a bedroom with a light-up keyboard. Isn’t it?

[nekomajo]

They all deserved better

My actual review/rant of TROS. Needless to say SPOILERS and this movie pissed me off. They threw in anything and everything in an attempt to please as many people as possible. But this has never worked and I don’t know why they bothered. (Also sorry if this is all over the place) Hux and the FO Out of all the characters that have existed since TFA, I feel Hux was the biggest missed opportunity. He had the potential to be an amazing and formidable villain, without being a powerful Sith Lord. He’s been shown to be clever and underhanded, using any means to get to the top. What we got was a Hux that was just there for a ‘twist’ and then die like a bitch. The First Order as a threat could have created technology to block out the Force and maybe even supress it. They could have gone the way of like witch hunting, searching out Force Sensitives and trying to take their powers away. This could have been their goal after Snoke was killed since Hux never cared for Space Wizard. I personally find that more frightening than some wrinkled old coot in a dark cave. Poe He was never in my top five favourites, but I still enjoyed him and his shenanigans just fine. However, this movie somehow made me not care about him at all. His inspiring speeches and witty quips were hollow and I was just counting the seconds until his scenes were over. Rose I can’t really express my anger in words at how she was side lined. This poor girl who lost he sister, but still pushed through and was determined not to lose anyone else. She was barely there and her importance to other characters was almost none existent. Finn What happened with this character actually hurts me. I always used Finn as an example of why the ST was going to be good. For the first time in these movies and Stormtrooper was shown as a human. They were nothing but faceless canon fodder in the OT and in the PT they were show as mindless tools that only followed orders. Finn being a defected Stormtrooper gave a new point of view and it could have been used to further the story. My ideal outcome for Finn was if he reached out to find other’s like him and perhaps bring down the First Order from within. The message that you are more than what others try and make you believe and that you can always choose your own path. But instead he was reduced to a one-note hero whose backstory means nothing to his goals or character. Skywalkers I didn’t think it was possible for me to ever dislike Leia and Luke, but this movie pulled off a miracle. With the other two movies I could understand that they made mistakes, because everyone does. But the hypocrisy and just down right mean spirited way they treated their own family in favour of someone else makes me sick. Also CGI Leia galore! The Romance There were a few very good bits with Rey and Ben, but they were sort of drowned in unnesesary exposition and bad dialogue. I felt like there scenes were taken from two different scripts, one where they are in love and another where it feels one sided? It was not fun watching Rey flip between being cold and sometimes hateful to Ben and then revealing that she has deep feelings for him. Also, for her to not be shown mourning him, even for a few minutes made me cringe. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad the romance was acknowledged, but I just wish they’d pick a consistent tone. The kiss was sweet but really bad, when Ben just keels over and dies right after. It was shown as a ‘happy we’re together kiss’, but then it’s revealed to be a ‘goodbye kiss’ all along? Like damn, that’s really shitty. I probably could have dealt with him dying if it was done better and his sacrifice was at least acknowledged. But it was like the happy ending was dangled in front of us and snatched away, with no lasting impact on Rey. As I said before pick a friggin’ tone and STICK WITH IT! Giving your audience emotional whiplash isn’t good story telling! Rey Oh boy… I had such high hopes for Rey. A lonely little girl from nowhere who became something amazing on her own, should have been so easy to accomplish. But no, instead we got a girl whose traumas and flaws are glossed over and covered up with bad writing. Sheev Palpatine being Rey’s grandfather takes away any quality to her character. Making her abandonment an act of ‘love’ just allows her to shrug off the years of loneliness with no repercussions. She was only able to defeat the big baddie in the end, because a bunch of ghosts helped her. She only lived in the end because someone gave their life for her. She was only strong because of other people and never on her own. Kylo Ren/Ben Solo By far the most amazing thing in the messed up movie and probably the whole trilogy! If you think that Rose being side lined was bad, the shit put on Ben made my head spin. Apparently, his mother and Uncle knew all along that he was in danger of falling to the dark before he was born and still did nothing to prevent it? Because he was Vader’s grandson, he deserved to be tossed aside? Any remorse from Luke and Leia seem to be minimal at best, while they fawn over pseudo children. The only one who ever seemed to give a crap about him was Han. Ben was twisted and pulled around on a string by Palpatine and his family let it happen. When Ben turns, we see the sassy, light hearted rouge he should have been all along. He literally fights his way to Rey’s side, gets thrown into a pit and crawls back out with broken bones, before restoring a life with the Force. He accomplished all this without anyone’s help, accept the memory of his father. It’s ironic that despite being the heir to the Skywalker line, Ben was more powerful without them, while Rey unfortunately is unable to do anything unless other’s help her. This is why more fans like Ben than Rey in my opinion. Every single character and relationship was done dirty in one way or another. They all deserved so much better. The worst thing about it all is that I could see a potentially good movie and it’s sad it turned out this way. Of course, if you enjoy TROS, please don’t let what I or anyone else thinks diminish that for you. This is just how I feel.

[inmyownlittlecorner5]

Moonlight Chapter 25: Osâmbritul

A fanfic Novel by la-topolina Rated for Mature Audiences Warnings: Language, Violence, Sexual Content Chapter 25/26

Moonlight Masterpost+

<< Chapter Twenty-Four+

Chapter Twenty-six+ >>

Draco Malfoy sat rigidly in the chair across from Severus’s desk, silently glaring at the top of the professor’s head. Severus kept the boy waiting on purpose while he completed his notes from Magick Moste Evile, both to give himself time to control his unwieldy temper, and in the hopes that Draco might be made uncomfortable enough by the pregnant silence to betray something. Draco’s pointed face was paler than usual, punctuated by dark smudges under his eyes. Though he draped himself across the chair in an imitation of his incarcerated father, Severus recognized the all-too-familiar signs of the insomnia that was undoubtedly plaguing his protégée. In spite of his promise to Narcissa that he would do all in his power to protect and aid her son in his impossible mission, he had, since the beginning of term, accomplished nothing on that front. The few forays he had made at gaining Draco’s confidence had been sullenly rebuffed; and even his attempts at investigation had brought nothing to light.

Notes completed, Severus slowly closed the book and slid the brown package that had caused today’s disaster across the top of his desk. With deliberate care he unwrapped it before Draco’s eyes, observing the boy for any minute twitch. He was certain that Draco was responsible for this unforgivably sloppy assassination attempt, but he felt a twinge of pride at the way the boy maintained his impassively angry facade, even when the gleaming opal necklace lay completely exposed before him.

“I believe you know what this is, Draco,” Severus said, searching Draco’s face while the boy scrupulously avoided his eyes.

“An early Christmas present, sir?” Draco retorted.

“Detention. Wednesday night. I will not take cheek from you.”

Draco shrugged. “It’s a cursed necklace from Borgin and Burkes and it almost killed that Gryffindor cow, Katie Bell. Everybody in school knows that by now. What’s it got to do with me?”

“You know very well what it has to do with you. If this is your brilliant plan to assassinate one of the greatest wizards in the world, I have truly failed you as a teacher.”

Draco flushed at the rebuke and glared at his mentor. “Sometimes I think Aunt Bella might be right about you, sir. How can you be on the Dark Lord’s side and still call Dumbledore great?”

“I realize you are far too young to grasp this concept, but only fools underestimate their enemies. Unfortunately, at the rate you are going, I doubt you will will live long enough to gain that wisdom.”

“I had nothing to do with it!” Draco insisted. “I wasn’t even in Hogsmeade today, ask Professor McGonagall. And as for the necklace, why don’t you talk to Cassie Borgin about it? It came from her uncle’s shop. She’s more likely to have planted it than me.”

Severus’s eyes narrowed. “Are you accusing a member of your own house?”

Draco retreated and tried to cover his misstep with more anger. “No. I’m only saying that it could have been anybody.”

“Go back to the common room and stay there for the rest of the night. If I hear of you leaving, you will spend enough time in detention to make any other tasks impossible.”

“Yes, sir,” Draco spat, pushing himself noisily out of the chair.

“And send Miss Borgin here when you see her.”

Draco slammed the office door in answer and Severus pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers. While Draco was firmly on the path to becoming an angry young man, he was still young enough to be a scared boy as well. It was a dangerous combination, and Severus was beginning to doubt that he would uncover Draco’s plans before the boy managed to kill someone—or himself.

The last grain of black sand in the top of the hourglass on his desk trickled down onto the gleaming heap below, and Severus irritably tore his mind away from the innumerable problems plaguing it at the moment. The antidote he was brewing for Miss Bell hissed and foamed on his private workbench. It was the perfect slate blue color when he went to check its progress, and he began adding bits of unicorn horn, stirring laboriously after each addition to ensure complete emulsification. He did not actually expect this potion to revive her; but he believed it would not hurt her either. Avoiding the tedious trouble of transporting her to St. Mungo’s and dealing with her potentially irrational parents was well worth the attempt.

He had just finished adding the unicorn horn when Miss Borgin’s cautious knock announced her.

“Enter,” he said, returning to his desk and flipping the hourglass.

The door opened quietly to admit Cassandra Borgin, a plain slip of a girl with mousey, but neatly plaited, hair and a smattering of freckles across her upturned nose.

“Draco said you wanted to see me sir?” she said meekly, taking the chair that Draco had vacated without any other indication of nerves. The amount of time she’d spent in detention during her fifth year as a result of her daring to be the lone Slytherin to join Dumbledore’s Army had done much to cure her fear of her Head of House. And the gumption she had displayed by her willingness to learn Defense Against the Dark Arts by any means—even those illicitly provided by Harry Potter—had caused Severus to reexamine her overlooked potential.

“Miss Borgin, am I correct in assuming that you, like the rest of the school, are privy to the details of Miss Bell’s injury?”

“Yes sir. Everyone’s saying that she was cursed by a necklace from Uncle Orestes’s shop.” Her eyes flitted over the opals on his desk and she added, “That necklace, in fact.”

“Do you know anything about this?”

“Sir, the last time I was in this office you warned me not to be caught making trouble again. My memory is not so short that I would be taking chances. Besides, what do I have against Katie Bell? I don’t even like Quidditch.”

“But you were in Hogsmeade today, were you not?”

“Yes, sir. I was with Morgana Mulciber and Freya Flint the entire time.”

“Did you see anything?”

“No, sir. We went to Honeydukes and Madam Puddifoot’s today. We missed the whole thing.”

He steepled his fingers and studied her in silence, and she returned his gaze with a calm, open one. Only the constant clasping and unclasping of her hands betrayed her discomfort, but it was enough to prompt him to continue the interrogation.

“I should think that this unfortunate event will put your uncle under some inconvenient scrutiny.”

“He’s dealt with such things before. Luckily the shop can’t be held responsible for damage done by items after they are sold.”

“How fortunate.” Her busy hands were still—that must not have been her worry. Time to try another direction. “But your uncle is a canny man of business.”

“Yes, sir. He is.”

“From all reports, you are keeping pace with your classwork. Do you still make time for your music, or has that become a casualty of the demands of N.E.W.T preparation?”

Her hands started clasping and unclasping again—good. “I…I still play, sir,”

“And when you play, you must be so enraptured by the music that you are oblivious to whatever conversations may be occurring in the Common Room at the same time.”

“I…I don’t know, sir.”

“Because if you were to happen to overhear anything that I might find interesting I would be most disappointed if you failed to share it.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, sir.”

“See that you do. I should hate to see our House pulled down by its own members.”

She was bursting to ask him something—he could see it in her eyes—but he did not attempt to dip into her mind to discover what it was. He would be shocked if she were not at least nominally versed in the arts of Legilimency and Occlumency. Better to have her think she could trust him, and come to him with the information he desired of her own volition.

“I understand, sir.”

“I expect that you do. You may go.”

“Thank you, sir.”

He gave his attention to his book, and he kept his smirk to himself when she paused at the door and turned back to him.

“Sir?”

“Yes, Miss Borgin?”

“I’m not sure if this would at all interest you, but Draco Malfoy has been acting, well, strange since term started.”

“How so?”

“It’s hard to explain…he hasn’t been studying like he used to. I mean, he always used to act like he didn’t have to try to get good marks and like he owned Hogwarts, but he also was always the last one to pack up his books and leave the Common Room at night. I’ve barely seen him open a book this term. At least, not one for class.”

“Miss Borgin, this is exactly the sort of interesting information I wished to hear.”

She nodded once and said firmly, “If I hear anymore, I’ll be sure to pass it on, sir. And I won’t get caught.”

“I would expect no less from you, Miss Borgin. Good night.”

“Good night, sir.”

Cassandra shut the door softly behind her and Severus sat back in his chair, rubbing his aching temples. The worm of conscience turned in the back of his mind, calling into question whether it was justifiable to set a student to spy on her own housemates, but he pushed it away. There were simply too many lives at stake to neglect any possible advantage. He glanced at the hourglass; another twenty minutes before the antidote would be ready. With a sigh of resignation, he pulled his cigarette case out of his pocket, finding the message from Miranda that he had been dreading all day.

WISH ME LUCK the mosaic spelled out. Luck indeed. He wished she’d been free to come back with him after the disaster in the caves, or better, that she had never gone to Romania in the first place.

YOU DO NOT REQUIRE LUCK YOU REQUIRE SKILL WHICH YOU HAVE he sent.

The tiny pieces of cut stone rearranged themselves immediately with a reply; she must have been waiting for him.

I WISH YOU WERE HERE THE FEASTING AND DANCING EARLIER WERE TO DIE FOR AND THERE IS GOING TO BE A PROCESSION TO SEE CATALINA AND ME OFF TO THE LAND OF THE IELE

His stomach twisted uncomfortably and he wondered if he would ever become accustomed to Miranda’s penchant for plunging headlong into danger.

IF I HAD MY WISH YOU WOULD BE HERE RATHER THAN ON A RECKLESSLY DANGEROUS MISSION IN ROMANIA

He could almost hear her roll her eyes in her reply.

BECAUSE THE UK IS SO SAFE AT THE MOMENT DONT FRET I WILL BE BACK THERE WITHIN THE WEEK

SEE THAT YOU ARE OR I WILL COME LOOKING FOR YOU

GOOD

He slid the case back into his pocket and watched the final minutes of sand pouring down through the hourglass. The memory of their parting embrace crashed over him so strongly that he swore he could feel her warm arms wrapped around his neck. And what if that were the last embrace allotted to them?

With an Herculean effort, he pushed this useless sentiment to the back of his mind, to keep his tattered conscience company. He bottled Miss Bell’s potion with a steady hand, and headed to the hospital wing with a heavy heart.

Merlin, he was ready for this whole bloody business to be over.

*****

The midnight procession twisted along the dirt road, stretching through the forest all the way back to the church in the Merry Cemetery from which they had set forth some time ago. Miranda and Catalina were near the front, just behind the icon bearers and the priest, and just before Ileana Lupul, Nicolae Dragnea, and Charlie Weasley. It seemed as though the entire population of magical folk had descended on Săpânța to see the resolution of the long trial. Miranda and Charlie in their dress cloaks were plain in comparison to the sea of colorful embroidery and dyed wool around them. The choir chanted hymns and prayers as they made their way through the chilly autumn night, and Miranda marveled once again at the casual way that the Statute of Secrecy was ignored. The non-magical people of Săpânța had turned out in support of their magical brethren, and Miranda was sure that their good will would do as much as anything else to bring the captive children home safely.

The moon had almost reached her zenith when the clerics and laymen ahead of the champions fanned out around a dusty fork in the road. The trees surrounding them were already naked, and their leafless branches reached out like gnarled fingers towards the little humans below. Doamnă Lupul led Miranda and Catalina forward, and the rest of the procession began to crowd in untidy clusters, whispering and attempting vainly to see the main event.

Miranda and Catalina knelt before the priest, who blessed them both in a voice that rumbled from the depths of the earth. Whether it was from the cold, or the magic, or the excitement; or all of this combined, Miranda shivered deliciously. She had been waiting for this moment since the beginning of the year, and all of her work was about to come to fruition. But no—she was about to step into another world altogether. She had been waiting for this moment for her entire life.

“{The time has come.}” Doamnă Lupul said as the women rose to their feet. “{Remember, you must gather the children and return to us by noon, or you will all be trapped in the Iele’s realm.}”

A ray of moonlight pierced through the trees, so bright and thick Miranda was sure that, if she touched it, she could break a piece of it off to hold in her hands. It shot down into the road, throwing bits of dirt into the air as it plunged into the dry earth. Doamnă Lupul stepped forward, shaking back her wolfskin cloak and rolling up the sleeves of her finely woven blouse. With a manic gleam in her eye, she thrust her hands into the moonbeam, and sucked in her breath through gritted teeth. Her booted feet dug into the ground as she forced her hands apart, tearing open a human-sized gash in the air itself. Task completed, she stepped back with her hands extended, and a thick, black liquid oozed off them, dripping onto the ground with an unappealing plop. Nicolae hurried forward, bearing a bowl of water that the Cezara might cleanse her hands of the primordial glop. The moon continued its celestial arc, and a jagged, pulsating rip remained behind for the adventuresses to pass through.

“{God be with you,}” panted Doamnă Lupul, winded from her effort.

Miranda and Catalina exchanged a glance, gathered their offerings for the Iele, and entered the ragged door together.

*****

The world on the other side of the crossroads was flooded by an unnerving, monotonous steel-blue light that emanated from nowhere that Miranda could ascertain. The usual division of land and sky was likewise absent. The ground upon which they stood blurred into the distance, but no comforting curve denoted the horizon. A tangled mass of brambles covered the covered the ground before them, save for a narrow path that twisted through the uninviting mess to a white castle gleaming in the distance. The air was hot and sticky, and within minutes both Miranda and Catalina had stripped off their cloaks and rolled up their sleeves.

“{That must be the place, yes?}” Miranda said, eyeing the elusive structure that wavered in the heat.

“{It must be,}” Catalina agreed, wiping her forehead with the back of her hand and studying the empty sky above them. “{There are no stars. How will we know the time?}”

“{We’ll just have to go as fast as we can.}”

This was easier said than done. The heat hampered their progress, and they were soon gasping for air even at a walking pace. Miranda’s clothing stuck to her sweaty body, chafing her skin and fraying her temper. As they approached, the castle seemed to recede into the distance rather than become any closer. Miranda wondered if the whole thing were a mirage and they had missed some important point. What if there were some trick or riddle that they needed to understand in order to gain entrance to the Iele’s home? What if it were like in a fairy story where the unappealing bramble actually held the treasure they sought? Would they wonder forever here in this purgatory and never reach either the castle or their home?

All at once, the castle was upon them. Miranda had the wild thought that she and Catalina had been walking in place and the castle had moved instead. Up close, the building was iridescent rather than white. Its walls were formed from dragonfly wings, woven tightly together, and they, like the doorway between the worlds, pulsed like a giant, disembodied organ. As the women approached, the middle of the thing peeled open with a wet, slurping sound, and Miranda was suddenly very thankful that her Papa had insisted she learn to overcome her squeamishness at an early age. Somehow she doubted that the Iele would look favorably on guests that vomited at the sight of their storied home.

The churning in Miranda’s stomach only lasted long enough for she and Catalina to enter the forbidding place. Inside the castle was a lush forest, as cool and green as any earthy paradise. A rainbow of birds played among the branches, and a low, enchanting music washed over the enclosure. The base of each tree was guarded by a burly, jackal-headed man. They stood at silent attention, watching the intruders with dull, disinterested eyes.

“{What do we do now?}” Miranda whispered.

“{We wait. They will come to us,}” Catalina replied.

These words had barely left Catalina’s lips when out of the forest floated a marvel of a woman; so painfully beautiful that it hurt to look at her. Like the Sânziene, her dark hair and her simple white garment flowed out around her as though she were drifting in water. Her feet hovered above the forest floor, and she smiled graciously at the human women with pointed teeth. Miranda’s neck prickled in warning, and she was sure that this creature was far more dangerous than her brawny guards.

When the Iele did not speak, Miranda and Catalina knelt as one, spreading their offerings before the fairy woman; the gilded cage with the sorrowful birds of paradise, the bouquet of flowers from the Sânziene’s mountaintop, and the bottle of water from the river beneath the One Wood Church. The Iele waved her hand indifferently over the treasure, vanishing them with a lack of ceremony that made Miranda bristle. With barely a gesture inviting them to follow, the Iele turned and floated back into the forest, leaving the women to scramble clumsily after her.

The forest was so thick that they had to go single file through it; hurrying after the Iele until Miranda lost all sense of direction. The further they went, the more Miranda’s neck pricked her, and her hands started sweating despite the cool. At last the forest path opened into a wide clearing beneath an undulating dome of dragonfly wings. A little pond sat in the center of the deserted place, ringed with laceflowers and lilies of the valley. The Iele led them up to the edge of the rippling water, and vanished without ever saying a word.

“{I don’t understand,}” Miranda said, frustration creeping into her voice.

“{Look,}” Catalina said grimly, pointing to the pond where twenty silver fish darted beneath the surface of the water. “{The fish are the children.}”

Miranda blew out her breath. “{I take it this is what the Changeover Potion is for?}”

“{No. We will give them that at the doorway between the worlds.}”

“{But how do we change them back into children? I think their parents might object to having them come home in this condition.}”

“{You brought your net, yes?}” Catalina was already pulling her own unicorn hair net from a pocket.

“{I did.}”

“{We will each catch half of them, and pull them out together. Vasile said that should break part of the spell.}”

“{Should break it?}” Miranda circled to the opposite side of the pond, and retrieved her own net from a hook on her belt.

“{Just fish,}” Catalina ordered tersely. “{We’re wasting time.}”

Miranda crouched down amid the beautiful, deadly flowers decorating the shore of the pond and cast her net.

She did not like this. She did not like it at all.

*****

Severus was in a foul temper when he landed at St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries early Sunday morning. Minerva had bestowed him with the unenviable task of escorting the still unconscious Katie Bell thither for further treatment. As they spun into the triage station by way of the portkey from the Hogwarts hospital wing, a tall woman in Healer’s robes and a black headscarf was in place to catch Miss Bell and lay her on a waiting bed. By the time Severus’s head had stopped spinning, the Healer was briskly examining her new patient.

“Peace be upon you, Professor Severus,” she said as she gently probed and prodded.

“That is unlikely to happen anytime soon, Healer A’isha,” he replied in a voice scratchy from lack of sleep.

As usual, she was unfazed by his lack of civility. “Has there been any change in her condition?”

“No. Not since she was brought to the hospital wing yesterday.”

“What have you…”

“Katie!”

A shrill cry interrupted the Healer, and Severus turned to see a bull of a woman barreling into the room with a spindly man on her heels. Severus barely had time to brace himself before Mrs Bell accosted him, baying for blood and explanations.

“Let me see her!” Mrs Bell tried unsuccessfully to push past Severus. “How did this happen? What are you going to do about it? Who is responsible?”

“Mrs Bell,” Severus said, breaking her name into several unappealing syllables in order to gain her attention. “We have no further information than was owled to you this morning. It would be best for you and Mr Bell to wait in the lobby until you are called.”

“Like hell we will,” Mrs Bell growled.

“Breathe, Greta,” Mr Bell said, laying a hand on his wife’s shoulder. “Let the people do their jobs.”

Mrs Bell shook off her husband’s hand “That’s my baby! And why are you here instead of  Professor McGonagall?”

Merlin preserve him from irrational parents. “Professor McGonagall’s duties as deputy headmistress prevent her from leaving school grounds during Headmaster Dumbledore’s absence,” Severus explained tersely.

“Dumbledore’s not even there? With You Know Who gadding about? No wonder students are getting cursed! Do you even care what happens to them? These are our children that we trusted you to protect!”

“I assure you, madam, we are doing everything within our power to protect them.”

“Well it’s not working, is it?”

“Considering your daughter’s devotion to Quidditch, I would think that you are no stranger to her being injured. Fortunately, Miss Bell is possessed of a remarkably thick skull.”

Mrs Bell went white with rage. “You’re head of Slytherin house, aren’t you? I’d bet my broomstick that one of your students knows all about this.”

How dare she? Severus opened his mouth to give the avenging harpy the set down of her life, but Healer A’isha intervened, leaving Katie’s side to slip between the warring pair.

“Good morning, I am Healer A’isha Shafiq. You are Miss Bell’s mother, am I correct?” she said in a stern, but pleasant tone.

“Yes, I am, Healer Shafiq.” Mrs Bell drew herself up to her full height, but her lower lip was quivering dangerously. Severus assumed that fear of sending Mrs Bell into further hysterics was the only thing that kept Healer A’isha from launching into one of her passionate explanations regarding proper forms of address. Or perhaps she had finally mellowed enough to accept British niceties without protest.

“Then you must be eager for answers, as are we all. I requested Professor Snape accompany your daughter himself. He is an expert in curses…”

“I’m sure he is,” Mrs Bell spat.

“Greta!” Mr Bell cajoled.

“…and I wish to speak to him about what he has attempted thus far,” Healer A’isha continued as though the others had not spoken. “Perhaps you would both be so good as to wait in the lobby or the cafeteria while I make my preliminary examination and settle your daughter in a room. Then I will be able to give you more information than I can at the present time.”

Mrs Bell wavered, tears glistening in her eyes. Mr Bell took her by the arm and she allowed him to start to lead her away, but then she yanked her arm out of his grasp again and turned on the potions master.

“You brought her here by portkey, didn’t you?” she demanded.

“Yes, Mrs Bell. We have a portkey in the hospital wing at Hogwarts that comes directly to triage,” Severus said impatiently.

“Traveling by portkey is dangerous for an injured person!” she all but shrieked. “You probably hurt her even worse!”

“Mrs Bell,” Healer A’isha said sharply, “while you are correct that traveling by portkey is unadvised in the case of broken bones or certain internal injuries, it is perfectly harmless in your daughter’s case. She has not been physically injured. Indeed, it is much better that the professor brought her in this way, rather than lose precious time taking her all the way outside the wards at Hogwarts to Apparate her here. Surely you agree that time is of the essence.”

“I…” Mrs Bell’s voice trailed off and tears started rolling over her cheeks.

“It’s not a Quidditch injury, Greta,” Mr Bell said soothingly. “Why don’t we go upstairs and get a cup of tea.”

“I don’t want any tea,” Mrs Bell protested.

“I know, but they’re terribly slow in the cafeteria, and by the time we’ve had a cuppa, the Healer will be able to tell us something about Katie.”

Mrs Bell eyed Healer A’isha suspiciously.

“I will take good care of your daughter, Mrs Bell. I promise.” Healer A’isha said calmly.

Mrs Bell’s face crumbled as she gave way to tears, and she allowed her husband to lead her off in search of tea—or perhaps something more bracing. Healer A’isha turned back to her patient and resumed her examination as though nothing had happened.

“Merlin, Healer A’isha, how do you stand it?” Severus muttered when the Bells were out of sight.

“It happens all the time, Professor Severus. What good does it do to let fly my temper when I am strong enough to curb it?” she replied. “Now tell me everything you can about this child and the curse.”

*****

“Come on, little guy, you’re the last one,” Miranda coaxed. Her net was full save for one shy straggler who kept darting away from his captured brethren. Catalina was sitting on her heels, waiting impatiently on the other shore, and all of Miranda’s limbs were so stiff that she doubted she would be able to stand up, even when she managed to catch the stray fish.

“{Are you finished yet?}” Catalina demanded, her voice tired and sharp.

Miranda ignored her. “Come on….Gotcha!” With a flick of her wrist, the net scooped up the final changeling. “{I am now. Ready?}”

Catalina shook herself and nodded. “{And…pull!}”

The exhausted pair heaved their nets out of the water together. At first, Miranda’s net lay on the shore, a shining, dripping mass of flopping silver fish. Her mind started racing in panic, but in the space of a blink she was granted a minor miracle. Before her eyes, the net pulled itself into a long rope, and each fish morphed into a solemn faced child, ranging from grammar school age to near adulthood. One by one, the children took hold of the rope and stared at her with bland, impassive faces.

When they did not bolt, she picked up the end of the rope and said, “{This way, little ones.}”

They followed her passively around the pond to Catalina and her matching brood. As Miranda reached her rival’s side, she could see that the younger witch’s face was wet with tears.

“{Gabi!}” Catalina breathed, her eyes riveted on the lanky boy at the head of Miranda’s group. He did not give any indication that he recognized his sister, he merely stared straight ahead, lost in a dream-like trance.

“{We’d better get going,}” Miranda said quietly. “{It’s a long way back.}”

*****

By the time they reached the path through the brambles, Miranda had reached the giddy stage of exhaustion. She had no idea how long they had been in this inhospitable place, but she had slept little before she and Catalina had departed on this final quest. She was fairly confident that they were within their time limit, and she wondered if Catalina would insist on a farcical duel when they returned to the crossroads. God willing, they could call the thing a draw. Perhaps, if Vasile backed them, they would stand a chance of settling matters like reasonable adults.

The trek from the castle to the door between the worlds seemed even hotter and longer than before. Miranda was openly panting by the time they reached the ugly rip, but the children tromped along as placidly as Madeline and her schoolmates strolling through the streets of Paris.

“{The potion,}” Catalina wheezed when they came to a halt at last.

“{I think you should do the honors,}” Miranda said with a tired smile.

She pulled a dark bottle and a metal cup from her bag, and handed them both to her comrade. Catalina’s eyes were shining as she poured the first measure of amber liquid from the bottle. She offered the cup to her brother, but he did not seem to notice the libation. With a grunt of frustration, she held the cup to his lips, helping him drink as though he were a small child. The first drops of the potion dribbled over his chin, but then he trembled, grasped the cup, and drank deep.

“{Catina?}” he asked, blinking his soft brown eyes at his sister.

She pulled him into a fierce embrace, nearly dropping the bottle. “{We’re going home.}”

Miranda’s throat was tight as she watched Catalina go down the lines, offering the potion to each enchanted child. One by one they blinked awake and, while they did not all recognize their liberator, one reassuring nod from Gabi was all that was needed to keep them in their docile lines. A haze of goodwill rushed through Miranda’s body, turning her bones to jelly. She let herself sink to the ground to rest and savor the moment.

A howl that would have put the Hound of Baskervilles to shame shattered the peace of the little band. The children who had already received the potion huddled around Gabi, wide-eyed with terror. Miranda shot to her feet, whirling to face the source of the harrowing cry. A pack of the jackel-headed guards was advancing on them, axes drawn.

“{Hold this,}” she said, handing her rope to Gabi and drawing her pistol.

“{What is it?}” Catalina asked as she distributed the potion to the final child. “{My God…}” She drew her wand, but Miranda waved her off.

“{No. You get the children out of here. I’ll hold them off.}”

“{But you’ll be trapped here!}”

“{No I won’t. I’ll take care of these mongrels and be right behind you. I have excellent timing.}”

“{No you don’t!}”

“{It has to be done. Goodbye Catalina.}” Miranda fumbled in a pocket, searching for her vials of Strengthening Solution.

“{But if I go back alone, Doamnă Lupul will back Voldemort!}” Catalina’s bluster ended with a broken crack.

“{I don’t give a shit about that right now. Just get those children home,}” Miranda replied firmly.

She tossed down one more vial than was prudent and started towards their pursuers at as quick a pace as the heat would allow. The potions and the adrenaline blended into a heady cocktail of berserker rage, and she leveled her pistol at the fiends. They fanned out into ranks as they cleared the bramble patch, and the instant the creatures were in range, Miranda started putting bullets between their eyes. Until the ammunition ran out, she brought them down in rapid succession. Apparently the things possessed no more brains than clay pigeons, for the ones behind trod over their fallen brothers with no concern for themselves.

“At least they’re stupid,” she muttered to herself as she spent her last bullet. She whipped out her wand, planted her feet, and started hexing for her life. “Sectumsempra!”

The curses ripped through the lines, and the jackel-men yelped as their flesh exploded. But, though not one of them made a move to protect himself, the unending stream started to gain on her. She backed away slowly, loathe to give up any ground. As sweat stung her eyes, she risked a glance over her shoulder, hoping that Catalina and the others would be gone, and that she might make a break for freedom.

They were gone. As was the jagged door. All that remained was an endless swath of steel-blue wasteland, an infinite army of drones, and her.

She flew at her enemies like a demon. No sense in making the inevitable easy.

*****

Catalina and Gabi emerged from the pathway between the worlds to a crisp, October day under a cloudless sky. Most of the procession was either still intact, or had reformed, waiting in worried, lethargic groups. As the first child came through, they roused themselves from their torpor into a flurry of chaotic motion, engulfing the bewildered foundlings and pulling them away to be petted and marveled at. Catalina was in an agony of anxiety as she watched the door between the worlds pulse, but the mass of humanity had caught her as well. Before she could start screaming, her father’s hand plucked her out of the crush, pulling her into the shelter of a poplar tree where Doamnă Lupul sat, calmly surveying the reunions, and Charlie paced in nervous agitation.

“{My, Catina! You’ve done it!”} Nicolae exalted. His arm was around Gabi’s shoulders, and his son smiled faintly from father to sister, as though he were still half asleep.

“{Where’s Miranda?}” Charlie demanded.

Catalina grabbed Charlie’s arm. “{She stayed behind. We were attacked and she stayed behind so that we could escape. We have to go back for her!}”

She dragged Charlie through the crowd, barely registering her father’s shout of protest. Her hand was inside the gateway as the sun reached the pinnacle of the sky. A blinding ray of light shot down into the earth, singeing her fingers. With a sharp cry, she jerked her hand away, cradling it to her chest. Tears blurred her vision, but she could tell, even before the sunbeam had dissipated, that it was too late. The door was gone.

“{No!}” Catalina’s strangled cry was lost in the riot of joyful conversation around her.

Vasile appeared, moving through the well-wishers and taking Catalina’s throbbing hand in his. He chanted a healing incantation as he rubbed his fingers lightly over her skin.

“{I take it our American friend is lost?}” he said when he finished his work.

Catalina nodded numbly. “{The Iele sent their guard after us and she fought them. We have to go back for her.}”

“{I’m sorry, Catalina, but that is impossible. It will be another year before we could even hope to reach her.}”

In the midst of the joy around her, Catalina felt like she had a millstone around her neck. Her limbs were like lead and she hardly noticed that Charlie now had her by the arm and was leading her to sit on an unoccupied tree stump. The midday sun beat down on her, a silent, accusing witness to her failure. The events in the other world played through her mind in a sick pantomime. She struggled for another answer, but was at a loss to think what else she might have done. If Miranda had not challenged the căpcăuns, they all would have been recaptured or killed.

Merciful God. What was Professor Snape going to say?

“{Catalina, well done,}” Doamnă Lupul said, dragging the young witch out of her mire of regrets.

“{Thank you,}” Catalina replied automatically. “{But Miranda should be here too.}”

“{Yes. We are sorry to have lost her.}” The Cezara’s voice was low and brittle. “{She will be not forgotten.}”

“{It is truly a blow for your cause, Domnul Weasley.}” Nicolae’s tone was just shy of mocking. As he stood before his daughter, with his son at his side, he looked like a conqueror awaiting his laurel wreath.

“{Am I the victor, then?}” Catalina asked, a spark of inspiration igniting in her darkened thoughts.

“{Who else has brought the children home?}” Doamnă Lupul replied.

Catalina licked her dry lips and lifted her eyes to the Cezara’s. “{Miranda and I have been working together since the day on the mountain. If she had not sacrificed herself today, we would not have escaped. Her cause is now mine. We will back the Order.}”

“Hear, hear,” Charlie said, clapping Catalina on the back.

“{How dare you!}” Nicolae growled, taking a step towards the weary champion.

“{Nicú,}” Doamnă Lupul warned. “{Your son is tired. Take him home.}”

The defeated boyar rounded on the Cezara, but he did not dare to argue.

“{You planned this, didn’t you?}” he spat.

“{Domnul Weasley, be so good as to take this letter to Albus and assure him of our support.}” She placed a roll of parchment into Charlie’s waiting hand, and turned to Nicolae with a wolfish smile. "{Nicú, I am very well pleased with your daughter. And I think that Vera would have been pleased, also.}”

The mention of his late wife’s name knocked the wind out of Nicolae, and he sagged like an empty sail. Gabi, suddenly more alert than Catalina had yet seen him, began looking around eagerly, searching for his mother’s face.

“{Father,}” Gabi ventured, when he could not find the one he sought, “{where is mother?}”

Nicolae avoided his son’s question and ordered brokenly, “{Come, Catalina. We’re going home.}”

“{No, father,}” Catalina objected quietly.

“{Catina?}” Gabi’s frightened voice finally roused Catalina. She dragged herself up from her seat, and went to embrace her brother.

“{Don’t worry Gabi, I’ll be back soon, I promise.}”

“{And where do you think you are going?}” Nicolae demanded.

Catalina looked at her father, her heart weighted down with the sorrowful knowledge of all that he had lost, and all that he might never understand.

“{I am going with Domnul Weasley, if he will allow it. There is someone who should hear the news of Miranda’s death from the lips of one who witnessed it.}”

Nicolae made a gesture of helpless frustration. “{Do as you like.}”

“{And I wish to join the Order.}”

Charlie grasped her hand warmly, and she could see Vasile behind him, hiding a smile.

“{Doamnă Dragnea, we would be honored to have you,} Charlie said earnestly. “{Would tomorrow be too soon to leave for Scotland?}”

Nicolae did not wait for any further humiliations. Gabi looked at his sister with a mixture of sadness and confusion, but hurried after their father, eyes still watching hopefully for the mother he would not find. Soon the pair of them were out of sight, concealed by the crowd and the forest beyond.

“{Are we too late for the afternoon portkey?}” Catalina asked. She did not want to witness her her father breaking the news of their mother’s death to Gabi. Not when she had her own horrible tale to tell.

“{If you hurry, I think you will just make it,}” Doamnă Lupul said gently.

“{Then there is no sense in waiting for tomorrow.}”

“{Agreed,}” Charlie said.

As they set off towards the Merry Cemetery, Catalina’s heart beat with a new vigor, strong and bittersweet. She was different now, and she knew, when she returned home, things would be different there as well. Perhaps, in time, her father would change too, and she could hope it would be for the better. But she was at peace with her choice, regardless of whether or not he decided to approve of it.

Soon the village was in sight, and the cross crowning the top of the church spire hovered over it, like a steadfast guardian. Catalina breathed a silent prayer for her fallen friend; begging that Miranda’s end was swift and painless; begging that her sins were forgiven; begging that she was finally at peace.

*****

If anyone dared to hand him one more wretched form to fill out, Severus was going to consign the whole of St. Mungo’s to the flames. Between consulting with Healer A’isha, placating Miss Bell’s hysterical parents, and fulfilling the demands of the hospital’s bureaucracy, the day was more than half spent. The weather was still abysmal, and he appeared outside the wards of Hogwarts in a cold, driving rain that did its damnedest to soak him before he could say Impervius. As he strode towards the castle, he postponed checking his cigarette case for news of his questing lover. She hadn’t bothered to send a message any of the other thousand times he’d looked already that day; why would there be anything now?

As he approached the gates, he saw a stocky wizard and two witches huddling outside them, waiting for admittance. His heart jumped into his throat when he recognized Charlie Weasley’s unattractive red hair and Catalina Dragnea’s dark bob. Breaking into a run, he reached the trio just as Minerva arrived, tapping the chains to allow them entrance. The second witch turned as she heard his footsteps, and he froze in his tracks at Nymphadora Tonks’s frown.

Charlie was saying something to him, but his blood was pounding in his ears so loudly that he could not hear what it was, nor what he said in reply. The Metamorphmagus and the Weasley followed Minerva towards the castle, and Severus became vaguely aware that Catalina had remained behind, watching him with a mixture of sadness and pity that turned his stomach.

“{There is no sense standing in the rain, Doamnă Dragnea,}” he said flatly.

He set off for the dungeons like a man condemned, astonished that he was able to walk so easily considering he could not feel his limbs. Catalina matched his pace and mercifully held her tongue. His fingers pricked uncomfortably as he unlocked the door to his quarters, sensation returning in the form of pain. Catalina sat down stiffly on the edge of the sofa at his curt invitation. Like an automaton, he procured tea from the shelf above his desk, lost in the memory of the first time had led Miranda here. He had barely been able to keep his countenance then, his heart had been beating so erratically, electrified by her presence. Perhaps, if he shut his eyes very tightly, when he opened them and turned around, she would be sitting there on his sofa instead of the Romanian witch.

Merlin, Severus, pull yourself together. You’re not a schoolboy, and this is hardly a surprising ending for the whole misadventure.

Catalina took the tea he offered her, but didn’t drink it. He sat down in the chair opposite her, and stubbornly forced himself to take a bracing sip, even though it was scalding and his throat was twisted into a knot.

“{Miranda is dead,}” he said after the liquid had burned a path down to his bilious stomach.

Catalina shuddered, and for a moment he was terrified that she would start to cry—not so much because he feared her tears—but because he feared, if he saw them, he would no longer be able to contain his own. But the witch rallied and controlled herself, save for the tremor in her voice when she spoke.

“{Yes. I’m so sorry.}”

He nodded, once again astonished at his capacity for absorbing pain without dying. “{How?}”

“{The Iele’s guard attacked us at the door between the worlds. She fought them while the children and I escaped, but the door closed before I could go back to save her.}” Her tale was tired, like story worn out with telling.

Thoughts ground together in his mind and he struggled to make sense of them as they passed. “{You did…you did not actually see her die?}”

“{No,}” she said slowly. “{When I led the children out she was still alive and fighting,}”

“{Then…she may still be alive.}”

“{I’m sorry, professor, but I think that is impossible. I left her hours ago at the mercy of an army of beasts. And even if she were somehow still alive, we cannot reach her. The door is closed.}”

“{This is Miranda we are talking about. She has more lives than a cat. And if you are unwilling to search for answers, I am not.}”

Severus sprang up from the chair, knocking the teacup and saucer to the floor where it shattered on the stones. He trod over the pieces, heedless of the way they crunched under his feet, and attacked his bookshelves with a violent passion. One after another he tore the books from their places, pouring over the pages before casting them aside, unable to comprehend the slightest notion in his whirlpool of grief. The empty shelves mocked him, and he slashed his wand at them, causing an explosion of splintered wood. By the time the shards settled, his humiliation was complete, and he sat on the back of the sofa, weeping tears that were all the more bitter for having been restrained.

The room was filled with a mortifying silence, punctuated at intervals by his ragged breathing. As he gradually regained some measure of control, he wondered how difficult it would be to Obliviate Doamnă Dragnea without her noticing.

“{She was very brave,}” Catalina said when he had stopped his disgraceful sniveling.

“{She was very foolish,}” he countered petulantly.

Catalina did not dignify that with an answer, and he started flicking his wand at the mess of shelving and books. As the chaos slowly succumbed to order, he made a mental list of items requiring his attention in a vain attempt to prevent the overwhelming flood of memories from drowning him again. He had promised Healer A’isha that he would lend her his copy of Luma’at al-nuraniyya that had been glossed by wizard of Tamerlane’s court. He would have to take it to her himself; it was not the sort of thing he wanted to trust to an owl. There was a stack of essays on Boggarts by the dunderheaded third years that required marking. Miranda had smiled when he’d asked her what her Boggart was, and kissed him until he knew she was not going to answer. If he were to venture a guess now, he would say that it was small, enclosed spaces. He would ask her the next time he saw her.

Except that he wouldn’t. Because he would never see her again.

The books marching through the air to the repaired shelving clattered to the floor a second time. He stormed away from them, grabbing his still-wet cloak and flinging it around his shoulders. Catalina rose from the sofa, fetching her cloak as well.

He had to get rid of her. He had to be alone. He had to be anywhere but here.

As though she had read his thoughts, Catalina offered, “{Domnul Weasley asked me to meet him in Professor McGonagall’s office when we were finished. Perhaps there is someone who could show me the way.}”

“{I will take you,}” he said inhospitably, wrenching the door open and flinging himself into the hallway.

A snitch-sized ball of bright blue light darted towards him, and he recoiled from it to prevent a collision.

“What in Hades are you?” he growled, drawing his wand to threaten the devious thing.

“{Stop!}” Catalina ordered, and she had the gall to grab his hand to push his wand away. “{It’s a Spiridus.}”

“{A what?}” he demanded, for some reason resisting the urge to swat the overgrown, flashing mosquito.

“{A Spiridus. They help people who help them.}”

The witch was staring at the thing as though her mind were addled by it.

“{I can’t imagine what it’s doing here then,}” he sneered.

“{Be quiet, professor,}” she snapped.

“So you may commune with the spirit world? I suppose I better had,” he muttered. But he did fall silent, stacking up a score of insults in his brain, ready to launch them at the slightest provocation. The Romanian nodded to the creature, and it darted away, vanishing through a wall at the end of the passage. She watched it to the last, then turned to Severus, her face fixed with such an idiotic expression of hope that his own halfwitted heart lifted in response.

“{Miranda has a home here, yes?}” Catalina asked quickly.

“{Yes.}”

“{Then lead the way. That is where we will find her.}”

He knew it was futile, but he plunged into the downpour with Catalina at his heels. With every step towards the edge of the wards, his heart beat the refrain:

Merlin let her be there; let her be alive; let her be safe.

*****

End Notes:

Many, many thanks to Mr. Zingarella for Beta-ing this chapter. Any remaining mistakes are mine :)

Osâmbritul is a Romanian festival held during September and October that centers around the preparation of sheep for the winter.

You can read the tale of how Cassandra Borgin came to join the D.A. in my story, Rota Fortunæ.

Cezara= Caesar. This is the title of the leader of the witches and wizards of Romania.

Căpcăuns are dog-headed monsters that capture women and children.

Luma’at al-nuraniyya (Bright Lights) is a twelfth century text by the Sufi mathematician Ahmad ibn Ali al-Buni.

*****

Moonlight Masterpost+

<< Chapter Twenty-Four+

Chapter Twenty-Six+ >>

[justmewoo]

Brother Knows Best Part [4/?] Tony Stark x Brother Male Reader.

Enjoy chapter four! Two new chapters in one day! Also let me know if I should add some romance to it.

Pepper and I took a seat in the conference room. She helped me sit down on one of the chairs mouthing a thank you. She made some coffee in two cups with bread in plates for each of us. When I took a look at the bread my mouth got watery at the delicious smell. My stomach growled at the smell feeling embarrassed hoping Pepper didn't hear it. 

"You should eat I supposed you haven't had any meals since you got back." Pepper spoke taking a seat in front of me. 

"Thanks, but I don't have much of an appetite, after all, that's happened, I just can't sit here and act like nothing's changed... I lost my wife against Thanos and all I have left is my son." I said taking a look through the transparent glass seeing Yuki watching television. 

Pepper followed my gazed and smiled at the sight of Yuki. "I'm sorry about what happened to your wife but you need to be strong and recover for your son. He needs you more than ever right now." 

I looked away from my son and turned my attention back to Pepper. " I know but i'm also worried about finding Tony. The only thing I know from Bruce is about him fighting against Thanos henchmen with the help of the wizard called Doctor Strange. We don't know if he survived the snap or if he turned into dust like everyone did. But I have a feeling inside me that Tony is alive. The only problem is how will he get back if they ended up fighting in space." I said taking a sip from my coffee mug avoiding her gaze. 

"Tony wasn't supposed to go and fight he said No more surprises. We’re gonna have a nice dinner tonight. Show off this Harry Winston. Right? And we should have no more surprises. Ever. I should promise you. But, he broke his promise." Pepper said with a sad tone. 

"There's something I need to tell you. Before waking up right now I had a strange dream and in that dream, I saw you with Tony and a little girl that looked a lot like you both." 

"It's funny Tony said the same thing before he went off to fight. About having a kid but he said it was a boy who we named him after my uncle Morgan but I told him it wouldn't happen unless he took off the arc reactor. " 

"Arc reactor what's that?" I asked confused now getting all of my attention. 

"It's a chest piece essential that keeps the shrapnel, or fragments, from killing Tony by entering his heart. Tony was attacked after a military missile presentation and was taken away by terrorist. They wanted him to create weapons for them. But due to the blast near him, he got metal scraps inside his body which could have potential risk his life entering his heart and killing him. Thankfully a doctor who was with him saved his life and put the arc reactor so the pieces of metal wouldn't go to his heart." I slammed my fist on the table in anger. 

"How could I had let something like that happen to him! It's all my fault for walking out on him when he needed me to most. All of it is my fault all, the pain he's gone through every stitch and bruise he's received is all my fault." I ran my hands through my hair pulling it in anger shaking my head. "I should have being there to protect him from harm's way it should have been me who should have gone through all that not him.....How did he tell you about me." I asked her. 

Pepper looked down."One night after a party Tony was drunk enough that he ended up saying nonsense and one of the things he said was how he missed his older brother. I didn't believe him at first especially when he's drunk I didn't think much about it until he took out a picture from inside his room and showed it to me." 

"Did he....... ever tell you the relationship or reason why I left him at such a young age." I asked in a low tone not wanting to know the answer. "Actually don't answer that I don't want to know." I stood up from the chair. "I'm sorry but I'll be in my room thank you for the coffee and bread." I said before walking out of the room. 

_____________________________

After that night Pepper continued to come to visit the team every day in hopes of knowing Tony's whereabouts. She spent time with Yuki knowing that we had become family and should know he has an aunt. Steve was the one in charge of cooking while Thor stayed most of the time in his room I would bring him food and make small talk. I had apologized to him for snapping the day after the battle against Thanos. Thor accepted my apology and became good friends. Rhodey and Bruce spent their days as normal as they could but I knew inside they were just pretending for Yuki's sake. Natasha was always with my son playing with him and teaching him how to speak more english while I also continued to teach him Japanese so he would forget neither language. The bond between the team and I became great despite me not knowing them for too long. We all tried to do normal things but there were days where the sun wouldn't come out and the sky stayed dark and gloomy making the atmosphere feel suffocating. There have been days where Yuki has asked me about Aiko but I tried to change the conversation. It's just too painful for me to talk about her I know someday he's going to grow up and ask more of her frequently but I wasn't ready yet. Every night I would stare at the ultrasound of the baby and the picture of Aiko when Yuki would fall asleep. Pepper and I became close with each other and got along just fine. I would ask her to tell me stories about Tony's adventures and all the robots and inventions he's created. 

Counting today it's been at least twenty-three days since the snap happened and it was going to finally be the day that I got to see someone again. It was already past eight at night when Steve and I were in the bathroom together shaving our beards when suddenly it began to shake. We immediately put our shoes on and I ran for Yuki who was inside the bedroom half awake and feeling scared. The moment I opened the door Yuki came running into my arms. I picked him up planting a kiss on his cheek. "Papa i'm scared." He said on the verge of crying. I ruffled his hair and walked over to get his shoes. 

"Everything is fine we need to go outside with everyone alright." I said putting his shoes on. Afterwards, I grabbed a clean shirt put it on and a pair of shoes before taking him in my arms out of the bedroom. I caught up after Bruce and Rhodey going outside the compound. Pepper and Steve where a few feet away from us and we all watched in awe as a spaceship being carried by a woman with blond hair glowing and slowly landed in front of us. The spaceship soon opened revealing a woman in blue helping out "Tony." I whispered. Steve went over to help Tony walk. "I couldn't stop him." 

"Neither could I." I heard a bit of their conversation walking our way. "I lost the kid." Tony said. I looked confused what kid did they have a son or daughter I thought. "Is ummm...." Pepper ran passed us and embraced each other. "It's okay." Pepper broke the hug then looked my way to Yuki and I. Tony followed Pepper's gaze making contact with each other. 

Seeing his bad appearance with an unshaved face and thin figure he slowly walked our way so I handed Yuki to Rhodey. I took small steps towards him embracing him into a hug. I placed my hand on his head smelling his body scent. Tony hesitate but returned the hug. I had tears coming down my cheeks but the hug didn't last long before something inside Tony snapped pulling away from me sending glares before walking pass me with Pepper's help. Everyone stood silent and followed behind them. Steve looked my way placing a hand on my shoulder before making our way back inside. 

I had taken a sleepy Yuki back to the bedroom and laid him down carefully and slowly on the bed. I pull the blankets over his small body before heading back to the living room. 

"It's been 23 days since Thanos came to Earth." Rhodey informed. 

"World governments are in pieces. The parts that are still working are trying to take a census. And it looks like he did... he did exactly what he said he was gonna do. Thanos wiped out fifty percent, of all living creatures." Natasha answered. 

"Where is he now? Where?" I walked in looking around to see holograms of all the people who disappeared including Sam, T'challa, Shuri and Wanda even Fury. I also saw a raccoon and the blue woman from earlier sitting down. Thor along with the one who brought Tony back was here too. Tony sat down on a chair with a hospital pole that had blood entering his system for healing and wore a robe. And I finally saw the arc reactor in the middle of his chest.

"We don't know. He just opened a portal and walked through." I said walking over. Tony looked my way. "What are you doing here I don't want to see you." Tony began to yell. 

"Tony calm down you need to listen I was crazy looking for you." Tony interrupted me. 

"So the world has to be falling apart to give two shits about me? If this thing with Thanos wouldn't have happened would you had even come here and remembered you had a brother that you abandoned when I most needed you huh?" 

"I know it was a wrong move leaving you at a hard time but you have to understand why I left."  

"Get the hell out of my compound your not wanted here you understand. Take that kid with you and your belongings out of my room." Tony said getting up from his chair. 

"Tony stop he's your brother you can treat him this way after all he's done for the team. Tony we need you to focus." Said Steve defending me from him. 

Tony's attention when back to me. "And I needed you. As in past tense. That trumps what you need. It's too late buddy. Sorry. You know what I need?" Tony threw the things on the table before walking over to Steve. 

"what we needed was a suit of armor around the world! Remember that? Whether it impacted our precious freedom or not- that's what we needed! And you I need you but not anymore." Tony said referring to me. 

"Well, that didn't work out, did it?" Steve answered him back. 

"I said, "we'll lose". You said, "We'll do that together too." And guess what, cap? We lost. You weren't there. But that's what we do, right? Our best work after the fact? We're the Avengers, we're the Avengers. Not the Prevengers, right?" 

"Okay, you made your point. Just sit down, ok?" Rhodey said trying to sit him back on the chair but Tony pushed him away. "I don't care what you did for the team we still lost and your help didn't work. Here's my point, She's great, by the way. We need you. You're new blood." Tony referred to the woman who brought him back. 

"Are you listening to yourself talk right now. " 

"You stay out of it this isn't any of your business." Tony answered me back. "Bunch of tired old mills! I got nothing for you, cap! I got no coordinates, no clues, no plan, no options. Zero. Zip. Nada. No trust. Liar." Steve looks affected by Tony's words. The old friends just gaze at each other. After a moment, Tony rips his Arc Reactor from his chest and shoves it into Steve's hand.

"Here, take this. You find him, and you put that on. You hide." Tony suddenly fell to the ground I rush to his aid with the help of the team before Tony went unconscious. 

"He needs some rest let's take him to a bed." I offered to carry him on my shoulders with Rhodey's help. We took him to an empty room and lay him down on the bed with Pepper never leaving his sight. The next morning Bruce came quickly with medication and treatment for Tony while I left the room and went to the living room where Steve, Natasha and Carol the person who rescued Tony. 

"Bruce gave him a sedative. He's gonna be out for the rest of the day." Rhodey said coming out of the room. I took a glance over to Tony. 

"It's all my fault I shouldn't have stay here." I was sitting down on the couch staring at the ground feeling guilty. Yuki was still sound asleep in the room so I managed to take a shower and change into a pair of clean clothes. 

"Don't say that it's not your fault." Natasha assured me.

"You guys take care of him. And I'll bring Xorrian Elixir when I come back." Carol suddenly said walking away from us. 

"Where are you going?" I asked. 

"To kill Thanos." We all looked at each other then back at her. 

"Hey. You know we usually work as a team here and between you and I we're also a little fragile." Natasha said confronting her. I got up from the couch and stood next to Rhodey by the door frame.

"We realize out there is more of your territory, but this is our fight too." Steve said confronting her too. 

"Do you even know where he is?" Asked Rhodey with his arms crossed in front of his chest. 

"I know people who might." 

"Don't bother I can tell you where Thanos is. Thanos spent a long time trying to perfect me. And when he worked he talked about his great plan. Even disassembled I wanted to please him. I'd ask where would we go once his plan was complete? His answer was always the same." Nebula spoke. "To the garden." 

"That's cute Thanos has a retirement plan." Rhodey joked in a serious tone. I walked over to the round table where they all gathered including Rocket. 

"So where is he?" I asked. Rocket showed a hologram of the planet. "When Thanos snapped his fingers, Earth became ground zero for a power surge of ridiculously cosmic proportions. No one's ever seen anything like it... Until two days ago." Rocket showed the hologram of a different planet showing us. 

"Thanos is there." Said Nebula. 

"He used the stones again." Natasha informed as I took a closer look. 

"Hey, Hey, we'd be going in short-handed, you know." Bruce commented. I nodded my head. 

"Bruce is right but he still has the stones so..." 

"So let's get him. We use them to bring everyone back." Carol looked at us. 

"Just like that?" Bruce asked. 

"Yeah, just like that." Steve spoke reassure. 

"Even if there's a small chance that we can undo this... I mean we owe it to everyone who's not in this room to try." I looked at Natasha. 

"If we do this, how do we know it's gonna end any differently than it did before?" I spoke up.

"Because before you didn't have me." I looked at Carol confused. 

"Hey, new girl, everyone here is about that superhero life. And if you don't mind my asking, where the hell have you been all this time." Rhodey asked. 

"There are a lot of other planets in the universe. And unfortunately, they didn't have you guys." Thor who has been eating a snack behind all this time, stands up and walks over to Carol. He holds his hand up, and catcher Stormbreaker as it flies over to him, missing Carol by inches. But Carol doesn't even flinch, instead of smiling at the God of Thunder. "I like this one." comment thor smiling.

"Let's go get this son of a bitch." Cursed Steve.

_____________________ 

I decided not to go with them to go after Thanos for two reasons. The first reason I had to take care of Yuki. The second reason was that I wanted to stay and take care of Tony. The sedative Bruce gave him won't wake him up till tomorrow morning so I decided to look after him while Pepper did some personal things. After feeding Yuki breakfast and watched some television I decided to come to check on my brother. 

Tony lay asleep the only sounds that could be heard was the machine. I grabbed a chair and took a seat next to the bed. Seeing Tony in this condition only made my remorse grow. "I'm so sorry Tony please forgive me. I never meant to do you any harm. If only I could turn back time then maybe all of the pain you've suffrage through all your adult life wouldn't have happened and you wouldn't be in this mess it should have been me who should be in this bed in this condition. I failed our mother's last promise I fail Tony. Your big brother fail to take care of you and protect you." I put my head down next to his arm on the edge of the bed and cried in silence falling asleep. 

______________________________

Five years have passed since the last time I saw Tony and Pepper. The next day when I had woken up Tony was gone without a word. I called Pepper on her phone and inform me about Tony not wanting anything to do with me. Pepper also apologized for not being able to come to visit Yuki and I anymore. The last thing I heard from her was how they decided to go live in a cabin away from the city. Then a year later or so she send it me a picture of their daughter who they named Morgan. It makes me sad knowing that Tony will never forgive me. That's how much of a big impact I had caused him. After five years the world still looked gloomy and sad. When the team went after Thanos it was too late he had already gotten rid of the stones so Thor took care of him. Things around the compound have changed a bit. Bruce appearance has defiantly changed a lot. He's decided to let Hulk be part of his life now so he's Hulk with glasses but with Bruce same personality. He's made an impact on the people that he's become famous. Steve has made his own group outside of the compound where it's a rehabilitation group where they all talk about how hard it's been losing a loved one and left the compound. Rhodey, Carol, Rocket, and Nebula all went their own ways to help around the country and keep things in check in case of any lead. Natasha was the leader of the group. Yuki has grown over the years now and had just turned seven a few months ago. I have continued to teach him Japanese while he attended a public school here in New York. He definitely has Aiko's characteristics. After all these years he hasn't asked about Aiko but knows about her and has the picture of the three of us together so he wouldn't forget her. Then there was me during these past years I had kept a lot of stuff to myself. For instance,  the old age was catching up to me. My body isn't what it used to be five years ago. But I did continue to train on my own with help from Natasha. Another thing I've been keeping to myself is the lack of sleep and nightmares. It was impossible to get Thanos out of my head. Not to mention the image of Vision and Wanda. Sometimes my right whole arm would go numb dropping things on the floor. I don't want to worry Yuki or anyone for that matter. I have also trained my son some combat defense in case of an emergency. 

My thoughts where interrupted by the sound of a ringtone. I stood up from the chair and took out the phone and looked down at the caller ID. It was Pepper calling. I accepted the phone called. "Hey, Pepper what's up?" I asked. 

The other line stood quiet before Pepper's voice could be heard. "Hey, I'm calling to see if we can meet at the compound while Tony is out." I looked around. 

After a few seconds, I opened my mouth to speak. "Sure, I don't mind plus my son's at school and there's nobody else but me in the compound." 

"Great, I'll see you in a bit." I hang up the phone and took a seat back on the chair. I then proceeded to go over to the kitchen and prepare something to eat. A few minutes later there was a knock on the door. I went over to the front door and opened it. It was Pepper standing there. We hugged each other and let her inside.  

"I made coffee and some sandwiches if you like one." I said offering her as I placed the food on the round wooden table. "Thanks [M/N]." 

"So what brings you here I haven't heard anything from you since sent the picture of Morgan when she was born. Are you guys okay is Tony alright?" I asked concern about taking a seat in front of her. 

"Tony's fine we are all good that's actually one of the reasons why I came to visit because I wanted to see Yuki and wanted to know how you have been this past few years." 

"I mean the kid is alright he's grown up a lot already seven years old. He goes to school not too far from here and has friends which makes me happy because there's no one that he can play with around here. I mean Morgan is his cousin but you know they never met before so.... but yeah, we are doing fine except for a few white hairs popping here and there. But other than that we are fine." I smiled at her. "Do you want to try Japanese food I made some for dinner today." I took a sip of my coffee then placed it back on the table. I got up from the chair and walked over to the kitchen and carried some curry with white rice I grabbed it with my right hand only but when I turned around a few feet away from the table my hand suddenly went numb and the plate ended up falling to the ground. 

Pepper stood up from her chair right away and came to my aid. "Are you alright did you cut yourself here let me clean it up." She insisted and guided me to the sofa. 

"Pepper please i'm fine I can clean it up myself." I stood up but yelled in pain at the sudden cramping on my right hand. 

"What's going on there's something your not telling me [M/N]." I shook my head breathing heavily. "Nothings wrong just a small cramp is all I didn't mean to worried you." I assure her. 

Pepper stood by my side not leaving me alone. "There's something going on with you and you're not telling anyone. Come on be honest I can tell when someone lies to me." She said looking right through my eyes. The sudden pain slowly began to disappear. 

I frown before nodding my head. "I... I've been losing control of my hand it's been a couple of weeks since my right arm has gone numb at random times. There have been times when I drop things that don't weight at all." 

"Why haven't you told anyone about this, what about Bruce or visiting a doctor?" She asked in a concerned tone. I shook my head in disagreement. "I can't tell Bruce he and Yuki have gotten closer and I'm afraid he would tell him about my situation. I don't want to worry him or anyone that's why when this sort of thing happens I go down to the gym and train in private so no one can see how much pain I go through." 

"Tony and everyone else needs to know about your condition. You can't hide this forever think about Yuki." She pleaded with sympathy in her tone. 

"No, i'm sorry Pepper but it's exactly because of them that I don't want anyone to know about it. Please promise you won't tell anyone about this." 

Pepper sigh before nodding her head. "Fine I won't tell anyone but please be careful." 

"I promise. There's actually something I want to ask of you."