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hinagamoizaf · 3 years

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Odaiba Memorial Day 2021

My first Odaiba Memorial Day while being an active part of the fandom, and it’s high time I write an essay about my crackhead obsession with Yakari.

(*There will be some swearing & f-bombs in this post) As a kid, Yamato was like the ‘blue and cooler Taichi’ to me, like he doesn’t exist without being adjacent to the gogglehead. Also my family didn’t have the full Dark Masters arc in our CD collection, so I literally knew nothing about Yams’ emotional meltdown. But now, I adore this overly sensitive dork, and I don’t mean that in a derogatory way. Maybe I’m biased in this reading, but I think Yamato has had to push himself to mature faster than his peers; and he’s very much a mini-adult at a young age. For all these grand monster battles, the main cast are still children; among them Yamato is a kid dealing with a lot of unresolved issues but he’s got a lot of heart, he’s passionate about those he holds dear but he just doesn’t know how to process this. Another thing that goes hand-in-hand with Yamato is the fact he’s a musician. Again, I could be reaching way into my ass here; but there’s this mumbo jumbo real life idea of the ‘depressed creative’, and Yamato works his way out of that dangerously romanticised label. The kid’s got a passion for music, he’s literally been playing the harmonica since Takeru was in diapers .Without spoiling DA:LEK, Yamato still holds onto that flame into adulthood but it’s not something he can actively work on; and that takes its toll. I love Yamato because he’s someone who cares so much about those around him and what he does; and he’s just a kid who’ sorting things out and wanting to better himself and well fuck, if that isn’t relateable. Even with the flaws that the Tri films have, I think it’s a natural progression for Yamato’s character journey. I see people saying how ‘they just turned him into a tsundere’ or ‘he’s so snappish now’. But seeing as most of the Tri cast are in High School and general teenagers are assholes to each other, yeah it’s not unreasonable to see why Yamato’s the way he is now. He didn’t lose his touch with the Crest of Friendship; when the literal world is up in flames, there’s still the same loyal and compassionate Yamato who understands the importance of being there for and with his friends. Yamato’s a big mushy boy who has a hard time conveying what he feels and his needs; Hikari isn’t any better and this was how I grew to love the concept of them being together. She’s not the Chosen Child of Light for nothing, Hikari’s symbiotic partnership with Tailmon is a very shoehorned metaphor of being an angel from Heaven and I absolutely eat that shit up. Fans have pointed out Hikari’s so mysterious with her role and powers as late member of the team, the same can be said for her personality. You see Hikari, you think ‘sweet, little girl’ and in part thanks to the 02 dub, she grows into being this sassy brat.

A brat who has trouble asserting herself and is prone to literally get dragged into an ocean of depression. Like any respectful human, Hikari cares for her friends and family; but a mixture of that and a tendency to devalue herself is Hikari’s fatal flaw. She’s too self-sacrificing to a fault, and this reflects the other extreme end of her crest. In my own overly pretentious words, I think Hikari has self-imposed on herself for ‘being the light of the team’; like she carries herself as a doll whose job is to bring others out of darkness when she’s still stuck in the shadows herself. Hikari doesn’t allow herself to verbalise her wants, let alone her needs because she doesn’t want to inconvenience others; she just goes with the flow and puts on a mask of toxic optimism.

I am aware this analyse could be me scraping the bottom of the barrel, but it’s how I interpreted Yamato and Hikari’s character; and now I’ll articulate my brain rot with how the fuck are these two being shipped.

You have these two people who already have this history and experience of being Chosen Children, but there’s also an underlying sub-connection of them being each other’s brothers’ best friend. As many Yakari fanfics have headcanon, it’s not unreasonable to think that Yamato’s at the Yagamis’ apartment frequently because A) Taichi is his best friend and B) The Ishida apartment is prolly empty ‘cause Hiroaki’s out being a workaholic. The Yagamis become the family that Yamato didn’t have growing up, and they welcome him with open arms. At their apartment, things are warm and rowdy, he doesn’t have to be alone with his thoughts and they treat him as a second son. Listen, I've been a diehard Takari shipper too, but I genuinely think Takeru and Hikari can be platonic soulmates. They know each other like the back of their hand, they’re cosmically entwined and their Digimon are in sync; they’re also legit a pair of best friends too. I know early 2000’s fics depict Yakari as being this big drama; but I have a weak heart and I’m here to say Yakari can be cosy and comforting and they’re just two idiots in love who need to be honest with each other.

I imagine their courtship not to be this grand display of fireworks and ‘the chase’, but a very subtle experience with slow burn. For me, Yakari is very much the first blossom of spring. They represent new beginnings and youth, the gentle lull of Mother Nature tending to the earth, something that’s natural but the routine has existed for centuries. Yakari is very much a gentle love, and with everything I’ve said about their characters; these two learn to embrace and nurture the other until they have a whole garden of spring’s blossoms.

This crackship has the surface-layer appeal of ‘brooding lone wolf’ and ‘sweet angel’, so when you peel the layers to find these two very private characters who just need that one-on-one reassurance/affirmation; this ship is a warm blanket of fluff and yes that’s basically the plot of my fics. It’s the charm of slice-of-life, the endearment of growing and improving yourself with the one you love with the occasional reminder that this is a series founded on puppies evolving into angels.

I’ve had enough of tragedies and melodramatic love affairs. I write about Yakari because as cliche as this sounds, I want more stories about ‘the light of friendship’. Yes that was a god awful line, but it captures why I have brain rot for this pair. To celebrate my first OMD, I have uploaded a special chapter on my AO3 fic titled ‘Mon ange’; it wouldn’t be August 1st if I didn’t half-hazardly work on this leading up to the big day. It couldn’t fit on Instagram, but this rambling piece is part of a bigger essay on my tumblr, so that’s also up and running. I hold Digimon near and dear to my heart, and I go about sharing that love by gushing about Yakari.

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fallingforunrealisticromance · 3 years

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You matter - Aaron Hotchner x fem! reader

A/N: So a lot of you seemed to like my last one about hotch and trust me i have plenty more! I also have some for spencer and am currently writing a mini series for derek so if anyone’s interested in that let me know. Enjoy. Warnings: Mentions of a case, swearing Word count : 1,762 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I sat in the lobby of the hotel; my head held in my hands. This case had taken a toll on all of us. All we wanted to do was to get back to Quantico and get a goodnights rest in our own homes, in our own beds. But apparently mother nature had other plans. A storm had been brewing all night – thunder, lightning, rain – the whole lot. So, we’d been made to stay another night in the local hotel. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad hotel. If anything, it’s one of the nicer ones we’ve stayed in throughout the years, but the frustration from not being able to go home grew in all of us. I was so wrapped in my own thoughts I didn’t notice someone taking a seat next to me.

“You okay?” Hotch’s voice made me jump. I placed my hand over my chest.

“God you scared me.” I said chuckling. Hotch smiled at me.

“Sorry, you just looked like you could use the company.” He replied. I sighed.

“Yeah. I guess I could.” He studied my face for a moment. “

Are you okay?” He seemed hesitant in his words. Mine and Hotch’s friendship is quite a casual one. We occasionally see each other outside of work, I’ve even watched jack for him when Jess wasn’t able to. Hotch had confided in me with some of his deepest secrets. Nightmares, regrets, worry’s about not being a good father. But I listened. We’ve never discussed my thoughts, my feelings. And that’s okay. I don’t want to be a burden to him, or any of the team. So, whenever they had a problem, I would sit and listen. I’d comfort them, try my best to give them advice or simply let them get their feelings out. But when it came to myself, I push all those feelings down. Until my key hits the door.

“Hey.” Hotch nudged my arm. I hadn’t realised I’d been gazing at the wall ahead of me, once again caught up in my own thoughts.

“What’s going on? Talk to me.” He said softly. I ran my fingers through my hair and sighed.

“It’s just this case you know. I get that our job is to get inside the mind of these psychos, but I can never understand why people hurt kids.” I explained.

“We can never truly understand why these people do what they do.” Hotch replied.

“That’s not true. In most of our cases, I do understand. I’m able to see the reasons as to why they kill. I never agree with them before you think I’m insane.” Hotch chuckled stiffly at my words.

“But when it comes to kids, I never understand it. There’s no logic, no sense to it. And this case especially. As if torturing them wasn’t enough, why then display the dead bodies for the family to see? I mean the families have been through enough, the child went through enough. I thought this guy would have some shred of humanity left not to fucking humiliate and scar them all afterwards.” I could feel the anger building up inside of me. There’s something I hadn’t told the team. And now it was about to come bursting out.

“I know they have no emotions. I know they don’t think the right way. I know that biologically that there is something wrong with them. I know the facts. But it still bugs me. And the fact he was fucking laughing when we brought him in. That sick bastard.” I stood up and started pacing. Tears were threatening to spill from my eyes as I ran my shaking hands through my hair trying to cling on to any sense of calm I had left.

“I hate him.” I spat. All hope of remaining collected went out the window. Hotch stood up and came towards me.

“Y/N, listen to me calm down.” He reached out to place his hands on my arms.

“No. This isn’t fair. Abbey didn’t do anything”

“Abbey? The last girl he killed?” Hotch asked but I ignored him.

“She was seven. SEVEN HOTCH. All she wanted to do was go to school, live her life, play with her friends. Instead, she ends up being kidnapped, brutally torched and murdered then get’s her dismembered body presented on her front lawn like she was some kind of abstract art.” I was hysterical at this point. Crying, yelling – I couldn’t stop myself.

“I hate him. I hate him. I hate him.” I pounded my fists against Hotch’s chest with every sentence, until I eventually wore myself out and collapsed into his arms sobbing. He held me, letting me get everything out. I could feel his hands gently rubbing my back, soothing me. We were now crouched down on the floor and at some point Hotch must have moved us to a corner somewhere as his back was resting against a wall. When I eventually stopped crying, I noticed I was half sprawled across his lap. I didn’t have the energy to stand so I just shifted myself, so I was comfortable and able to face him. He gently brushed the hair out of my face. I couldn’t meet his gaze. I was embarrassed to have lost it like that.

“I’m sorry.” I whispered.

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” He replied, softly

“Can I ask you a question?” I nodded at his words.

“Why is this effecting you so much? I understand this case has been a brutal one but it’s not the first time we’ve dealt with this level of torture. It’s certainly not the first child killer we’ve dealt with. So, what’s changed?” He took my hands in his and begun to rub small circles around them, offering me a small sense of comfort. His tone was soft. I could tell he was asking from a place of genuine care for me.

“I knew her.” I confessed. Hotch’s hand stilled on mine. “She was my niece.” Hotch looked slightly puzzled at my words.

“But her parents, they’d never seen you before?” He asked.

“Well, you know how they told you she was adopted when she was a child? And that her birth mother passed away a few months after they took abbey into their care? Her mum was my sister. Making abbey my niece.” I explained in a low tone.

“H-how long have you known?” Hotch questioned.

“I’ve known for a while. I knew before we took the case.” I replied.

“You knew this entire time and you didn’t say anything? Not even when we found her?” Hotch sounded shocked.

“I just couldn’t face it at the time. We needed to find the Unsub and I didn’t have time to let my feelings get in the way. They weren’t important.” I said looking at the ground. Hotch sighed . I felt him placed his finger under my chin and gently guide my eyes up to meet his.

“Listen to me okay, your feelings matter. They will always matter. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for you to have seen that yet continue to work the case and I’m deeply sorry for your loss. But please, never hide your feelings from us. From me. You’ve helped me on countless occasions, and I apologize if I haven’t made you feel like I could return the favour.” I shook my head.

“No this isn’t you Hotch. I know I could’ve mentioned it to you. I just –“ I hesitated before continuing. Hotch continued to stroke my hand softly.

“I’ve spent so long having to just deal with my emotions alone. I’ve never really had anyone who cared enough to listen, so I’ve just learnt to keep it to myself. So now I have you, a-and the team, it’s just hard to open up you know?” I explained. Hotch gently reached up and placed his hand on my cheek. My eyes fluttered closed as I leant into his touch. I didn’t realise how much I craved his touch until now.

“I understand. But I hope you do know that you can talk to me. About anything. Whenever you need me, just come, and find me. Yeah?” I nodded slightly at his words. I could feel tears beginning to slip from my eyes again. Hotch slowly wiped them away with his thumb.

“Thank you. For everything.” I whispered.

“You don’t need to thank me.” He replied in soft tone, smiling at me. “I love you too much to watch you suffer alone.” His voice was low, almost at a whisper. My eyes snapped up to meet his.

“Y-you love me?” Hotch sighed at my words.

“I’m not expecting you to feel the same, but you needed to know that you’re loved. By no one more than me.” He explained. I just starred at him trying to process what he’d just said. I’d had feelings for hotch ever since I met him, but I’d never been 100% sure until now. Slowly, I leant forward and placed a gentle kiss on his lips. It wasn’t long, but enough for him to know I reciprocated his feelings. As I pulled away, he looked at me slightly shocked at my actions. I looked at him nervously. Maybe he didn’t love me. Maybe he was just saying to make me feel better. Shit, what had I done? Before I could regret my choice any longer, Hotch leant forward to reconnect my lips with his but this time it was deeper – with a lot more passion. He cupped my face in his hands softly, as if he was scared to lose me. I shifted on his lap, so I was essentially straddling him. I felt him smile against my lips as he placed his hands just above my hips, holding me close to him. My fingers interwind in his black hair tugging slightly. Eventually we had to pull away for air.

“Hotch I-“

“Aaron. Call me Aaron.” He said cutting me off by placing his finger to my lips. I smiled at him. The smile he returned to me in that moment was brighter and fuller of joy than anything I’d seen in the past. My cheeks flushed red as I suddenly became shy, so I leant forward and buried my head in the crook of his neck. This caused him to chuckle, sending warm vibrations throughout my chest. He wrapped his arms around me and held me flush against him. We stayed like that for a while, just enjoying our newfound love for one another.

#aaron hotchner #thomas gibson #criminal minds #bau #aaron hotch x reader #agent hotchner #hotch x y/n #hotch #derek morgan #spencer reid

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shoichee · 3 years

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hello! may i ask some tips about the instragram acccunts the GoM + kagami could have? like of sort of post, amount of followers, stuff like that THANK U and have a great day !!

THIS IS ACTUALLY HILARIOUS SINCE I BREATHE OFF OF INSTAGRAM LFMAO

[Headcanons]

Kuroko Tetsuya

HELP WHAT IF HE HAS NO PRESENCE ON SOCIAL MEDIA TOO—

professional lurker

never comments on anything unless it’s to congratulate under a friend’s post or something like that

probably started using it because Ogiwara moved from letters and texts to just... instagram (technology advancements, jazz hands)

his account is on private, and he only lets people he knows follow him

all of his posts are pictures to commemorate something or just really wholesome group pictures

DEFINITELY has that picture of the GoMs at his birthday OVA

DEFINITELY also posted the big birthday picture taken at the end of the party

and also had typed very sappy BIG paragraph captions for both of these posts, talking about the journey and him being grateful… y’know, him being him

HIS ENTIRE COMMENT SECTIONS ARE JUST EVERYONE SOBBING AND KEYBOARD SPAMMING??? ONLY LIKE MIDORIMA AND AKASHI POST COHERENT RESPONSES UNDERNEATH

@kiseryouta: kuROKOCCHIIIII!!NEJWIEISK

@momoiowo: TETSUU (ʃƪ˘･ᴗ･˘) YOURE SO SWEET REEEE

@a_daikiii: i stg quit being so corny no one died yet🙄 and @momoiowo relax smh

@shin_chan77: I suppose I can express some form of gratitude for being in my life despite you being a blood type A. (insert a giant paragraph after this)

@4k4shi: This was very touching to read, Kuroko. I’m very glad that our… (insert him going down memory lane)

Murasakibara has no comment LMAO

his entire Seirin team are his hype men under his posts

his profile picture is literally the gray default blank head because he didn’t even set up a profile picture for himself

he has like 20 followers max or something?

8 posts? like, he only posts on special occasions or big events

his occasional stories are always comprised of Nigou and blurry Kagami pictures/videos running away from Nigou UH OH (courtesy of @dust-of-fandoms)

@tetsuya11 for his user handle

@dust-of-fandoms JUST MADE AN INSTAGRAM FOR HIM HERE!!

Kise Ryota

uses his instagram account as a portfolio for his modeling career

majority of his posts are actually pictures he managed to snag from his frequent model shoots

it looks SO professional… but then you look at his IGTVs and his reel videos

his reels are either short clips of mini vlog series he does whenever he visits the GoMs or when he’s recording his Kaijō teammates doing tricks and dunks

his IGTVs are either skincare tutorials, fashion advice… or just… unexplainable, out-of-context shitposts of Kise running away from what fans assumed “a green-haired man” or some “captain”

follower account?? 124k

who wouldn’t resist a hot model?

DEFINITELY HAS A TIKTOK I CAN FEEL IT

@kiseryouta with an official verification next to it

people either love him or hate him

posts a casual selfie from time to time, and people praise him for “being real” LMAODOA AND HE’S JUST STARING AT HIS PHONE LIKE “??? IMIG BUT I JUST FELT CUTE TODAY”

his captions feel fake LMAO like: “Wow! today’s so pretty today!” as he puts a selfie post OR “What’s your favorite game?✨” under a professionally-shot model picture that does not correlate with the caption???

has posted shitposts on his stories and his fans are utterly confused… only the GoMs get it LMAO

Midorima Shintarou

ONLY reason why he has social media is because Takao convinced him that he could let everyone know the daily lucky items for each signs for every post he makes

so for the first 2 months of having instagram he just casually posts a “daily horoscope” report(?) for the day

his content attracted in all the astrology fans and people who are devoted to tarots

and he’s CONFUSED.

… Takao may or may not have played a hand in messing with the algorithms to expose his account to bigger audiences

once Midorima finds out he’s MAD LMAO *insert Takao pain noises*

either goes down two paths: just casually continuing to post the daily Oha Asa predictions without interacting with anyone OR deleting his account and making a new PRIVATE one just for communication/lurking purposes

so he can honestly have 10k followers if he chooses to be a horoscope account or like 3 followers on his private, take it or leave it

maybe he has two accounts if he feels that having instagram has its merits

definitely has a shit ton of random stuff/posts in his saved collections

boomer energy, like… what’s a “reels” feature?? people talk to their phone camera and record that?? he’s squinting really hard and scratching his head

either has 356 horoscope posts on his “main” or like 19 posts on his private

has a rubber duck as a profile picture for BOTH ACCOUNTS HELP HIM

@oha_asa_ for his horoscope account or @shin_chan77 as his personal because he doesn’t know how to change his username (thanks, Takao LMAO)

Aomine Daiki

he doesn’t give a shit about instagram LOL

it’s MOMOI who handles his account because he doesn’t wanna bother with it LMAOO

she would tease him and try to “encourage” him to stop lazing around by taking pictures of him whenever he’s snoozing and posting it

but he’s so damn good-looking that his sleeping pictures got some traction with new fans

Aomine is still sleeping

his account also has pictures of him eating at Maji burger or at a café, and of course Momoi is the one snapping these photos of him

he started caring about it a little more once Momoi told him that he can post videos of himself doing trickshots and one-on-ones to potentially find worthy rivals over the internet and meet up

so now his account (videos, reels, IGTVs) are all riddled with basketball/small parkour footage shot by yours truly, Momoi

so his fanbase is split between thirsty people and people who genuinely admire him for his skills… but I mean there’s also people in both categories, anywho

he’d totally follow his favorite Japanese idols on IG if they had one

also would follow any NBA-related accounts/players he admires

has like 2.7k followers (but growing really fast) with like 176 posts of videos and random pictures of him

his profile picture is literally a picture of him sleeping by Momoi

@a_daikiii

Momoi Satsuki

LOTS OF REALLY cute, playful selfies, and a lot of them are used with cute filters from the Snow app

sometimes would post herself doing a really cute Tiktok dance while in her school uniform

she doesn’t post too much; she’s actually more into posting IG stories and making highlights out of them and then making highlight covers have a coordinating theme together

very aesthetic theme on her feed overall hehe

definitely uses her account to comment on other GoMs posts, often commenting something snarky on Aomine’s and Kise’s

actually has 1-2 IGTVs on the Vorpal Sword’s big game against the Jabberwocks

doesn’t have much of full-body shots/outfit pictures other than mirror selfies because Aomine refuses to take good pictures of her

only when she sees Kise or Kuroko is when she can ask either to be a photographer

she’s definitely gotten a few small collab offers from small businesses, but she usually ignores them because it’s not exactly her thing

her profile picture is just a selfie with a sketch-line cat ear filter

uses a bunch of emoticons on her bio, captions, comments, everything

⌒(ㅇㅅㅇ❀)⌒ or ☆⌒(＞。≪) or .₊̣̇.ෆ˟̑*̑˚̑*̑˟̑ෆ.₊̣̇.ෆ˟̑*̑˚̑*̑˟̑ෆ.₊̣̇.ෆ˟̑*̑˚̑*̑˟̑ෆ.₊̣̇.ෆ˟̑*̑˚̑*̑˟̑ෆ.₊̣̇. you get the picture

967 followers… that looks way too specific, but it’s somewhere around there; a lot of them came from Aomine’s account after they saw who’s been taking his pictures, and they wanna learn more about her??

around 40 posts?

@momoiowo

Murasakibara Atsushi

Himuro showed him how to use the app, but Murasakibara doesn’t find ANY USE FOR THIS LMAOO

he’d probably only get on it to look at food on the explore page and drool about the cuisines

keeps tabs on local places/restaurants/shops on instagram; those are probably the only accounts he’d follow tbh

it’s probably like ONE post and it’s an old picture of a dango on a plate he ate like 2 years ago

I have this image in my head that he has a really cute bento art as his profile picture?? can you imagine a Rilakkuma-shaped rice as his PROFILE PICTURE?

his bio is definitely: “hungry”

and that’s it

27 followers, and it’s literally just his Yōsen teammates, the GoMs and probably some other classmates of his

his captions are literally empty or 1-2 words

@oomaib0

Akashi Seijuro

only uses instagram because it’ll be beneficial for his company and to expand social networks, plus getting those sweet business deals and engagement

he doesn’t mind seeing really wholesome videos on the explore page though

when he wants to relax, a cat video melts his stress away

laughs to himself while he reads all the shenanigans underneath the GoMs’ posts

DEFINITELY loses a few brain cells seeing trolls and idiots on the internet… especially on controversial or political ones LMAO

he at first had to REFRAIN himself and take deep breaths before he just scrolls on, but he eventually got used to them and can now easily ignore them as easy as he breathes air

he actually enjoys shitposts and meme videos?? like he may not completely understand the meme trends sometimes, but he’ll still find it amusing enough for a chuckle

he ends up being the one who uses instagram the most? like Kise posts a shit ton, yeah, but Kise doesn’t really sit down and just scroll endlessly; Kise releases out content, while Akashi consumes the content

he reasons with himself that it’s to study his current demographics for the company, and while that may be true, Akashi just enjoys social media, plain and simple LOL

he does get to study the behaviors of all the generations using the platform, young folks and old folks alike, and it does get him excited in using his analytical skills to try to figure out people BEHIND a screen rather than those in front of him

it makes a really good challenge for him when he wants a good mental exercise

he has a post or two about his horses, his manor, and a video or two on him playing his violin?? but most are business-related, them being advertisements or business contracts/offers… things like that

his highlights are all about Q&As regarding the company, his background, his skillsets, etc. like an actual resumé

actually links current world issue cards/petitions on top of his company website; he’s quite an advocate

he actually doesn’t post about basketball because that’s something very close to his heart since it reminds him of his late mother… having that mixed in with his company-related posts feels wrong to him

27k followers, most of them are business-related accounts AND some are some followers his father bought for him without Akashi’s input to inflate engagement, etc.

@4k4shi… oh he thinks he’s SO CLEVER FOR MAKING THIS USERNAME LOL with the 4 being his jersey number and the 4s looking like As… AKASHI PLEASE—

his profile pic is like a professionally taken picture, nothing less for our king

his grammar and syntax are impeccable on social media; after all, he’s still being judged for how he carries himself even on the media

Kagami Taiga

mukbang guy… DEFINITELY

hot guy eating nine plates of steaks

IGTVs are filled with mukbang videos because Kuroko said he could make a living off of his appetite

HE COULD MAKE MONEY OFF OF JUST EATING? SIGN HIM UP.

on his posts, he posts dishes he makes for the day/is proud of and talks about the dish and ingredients briefly in the caption

that, or he has pictures of his new basketball shoes LMAO

or all of his basketball merch

HE’S DEFINITELY POSTED PICTURES OF LANDMARKS AND OTHER ICONIC PLACES HE’S TRAVELED TO (*cough* in America)

has a generic Jordan brand logo against a dark background as a profile picture

doesn’t have his face anywhere unless it’s in a mukbang video

279 followers or something

why do I have a feeling that he’ll accidentally blow up when Alex takes his phone to do a quick selfie on it?—

@taiga10

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elsewhereuniversity · 3 years

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rescue mission

It’s been five weeks and two days since Fake Dana was kil- disappeared and Real Dana came back. I didn’t know exactly what would happen to me should I complain about it to anyone but the dean, so I was laying low, but… the recent discovery of my roommate’s skin being a bright shade of green changed some of my plans.

When I told him - Threeox - about Real Dana murdering Fake Dana, and now living invisibly on the campus (I’d never seen her again), he sighed, locked the door and windows, before making me sit on the floor between our beds and getting out a small wooden key out of a seemingly lidless box made of shimmery dark brown wood. The box was amazingly carved, so much so that looking at it too long made me dizzy, and I had to close my eyes not to faint as the patterns on the lid started to sway as to a sharp breeze.

“Threeox, what’s that about ?” I asked, a little confused - and a whole lot scared.

That was probably not my smartest move - Threeox doesn’t talk per se, he just… gets his point across in a remarkable way that I had yet to pin down. A series of drawings of a cat with five eyes and a full ten minutes of interpretative dancing later, I kind of gathered that Fake Dana was trapped in the mirrors in the North Dorm, and couldn’t get out because of all the iron.

Naturally, I tried to organise a rescue mission, but gathering partners proved difficult. Real Dana apparently gained quite a reputation among the Student Witches, and everyone kept looking at me weirdly when I asked where Fake Dana was and if we could, like, rescue her maybe ? No one wanted to talk to me for more than two minutes, fidgeting uncomfortably and asking me if I’d packed my suitcase yet. I wasn’t going anywhere without Fake Dana, but hey, who am I to contradict the masses ? I’d just have to lay low a little longer.

It started on rocky grounds but I did gather for this mission a few seniors, all knights that had a history of being kind(er) to the Changelings, even though I’d never heard of them before. Their names were Toll, Bell and Eulogy, which - okay, some of us have weird names, but… It’s not that hard to pick a happy one. I couldn’t quite remember what mine was now but people had no trouble remembering me when I talked to them, so I assumed that was fine.

Add to the knights a freshman, EXO. Freshmen are probably a bit too young and frightened for that, but the fearless EXO wasn’t, uh, exactly a freshman ? Freshperson ? They were at least two metres tall and they had that look in their eyes that told you not to mess with them or they’d do unspeakable things that I, well, couldn’t speak of. Just know they were good for stuff like this. Or so I assumed, since they were the one who brought the knights to my bi-weekly “Where is Fake Dana” search.

We got some supplies: the baseball bat Fake Dana hid under my bed that one night the dean decided to do a room check, a good couple teaspoons of charcoal, some rags, a freaking battleaxe that Toll swooshed around like it weighed nothing, and that one river rock the archivist kindly lent us, and we departed for the wild wild north. Midnight seemed an appropriate time.

The dorm looked fancy, not gonna lie, the iron structure glimmered and almost rippled under the moonlight. I felt EXO shiver as we entered, their eyes losing any life that they might have had, their skin getting that weird greenish hue it didn’t have just moments before. The knights also shivered, but that might have been the cold.

The entrance was deserted, no sign of life save for a calico cat who meowed at us and tried to eat my shoelaces. She promptly departed when I told her they were a gift from the president, though I didn’t specify which president. It was the president of the cross-stitching club I was in in middle school, and she, uh, suffered from a slight eye issue after she looked through my hagstone. I mean, I did warn her about seeing the Nethers through the hole, but she didn’t listen.

Anyways, enough of that. Toll started to hack at the nearest door with his axe, waking up the poor unsuspecting students living there. “Where the fuck is she ?”, I asked, peeking around Toll’s shoulders. The two girls looked at each other, at Toll’s axe, at each other again, and one of them ended up spitting out “Basement. Third door to the left. Hope you die a slow, painful death, girl, you deserve it.”

Eulogy, true to her name, sang a few verses in Tamil, and we all collected our spirits before walking towards the basement. The iron in the walls seemed to sing to the beat of our steps, the doors creaking to the rhythm of our breaths. EXO seemed paler and paler under the dimmed overhead lights, until Eulogy sprayed us all with what I can only assume is water from that Wishing Well we’re not exactly supposed to talk about. That seemed to calm us down a little. I squeezed EXO’s hand when they looked at me questioningly, my smile thin and eyes dulled by fatigue. I couldn’t sleep that well since Fake Dana was gone, so I just wanted this to be over with already.

The third door was cracked open, but no sounds emanated from behind the heavy iron and the weird, Tolkien-inspired words of advice in elvish. I could recognise “The way is shut, and the Dead keep it”, which wasn’t even the full correct quote. The door swayed to an invisible breeze and it opened way too silently for something made of rusty metal. As we went down the stairs, we could hear the stone crackle with contained electricity, so much so that Toll, Bell and Eulogy decided to stay up to guard our backs. EXO grit their teeth but didn’t stop, grabbing Toll’s axe on the way.

“Good luck, bro, and good riddance, you girl,” Eulogy waved, and the three knights were gone as if they were never here. I wondered what she meant by that, but I couldn’t ask in time. EXO gestured to the stairs, mouth shut tight. I was kind of getting tired of everyone telling me I should leave, so I hoped at least Fake Dana would help with that. Hadn’t I been working so hard to rescue her ?

At the bottom of the narrow stairs were two doors, also made out of metal, and what Threeox told me about - the mirror.

Ten feet tall, circled with iron chains, the metal behind the glass pane was reminiscent of clouds, though it was most likely silver. I could see a prostrate silhouette in the bottom right corner, faint tremors running through her whole body, sobs muffled, whimpers of pain spread between fits of coughing.

I yelled something I couldn’t really understand, a guttural sound that made her raise her head, and I saw Fake Dana’s eyes grow wide as she recognised me.

“Missed me ?” She smiled, teeth sharp.

My throat went tight as she started to slam her fists against the glass. “It’ll be okay soon. I promise,” I said, examining the lock keeping the iron chains together.

“Hey, move, I’ll take care of it,” a voice I pinned on EXO whispered in my ear. “Tell her to stand back.”

I did so, and Fake Dana retreated to the far side of the mirrorspace. With three swipes of his axe, EXO managed to hack away most of the chains, and the rest I hastily discarded, fists pounding on the glass as Fake Dana pounded back.

“The key. The lock.”

“Fuck.” I started rummaging through my satchel, finally finding the small piece of wood that has slithered into the bag of crackers I keep for the crows. “Where is that fucking lock ?”

EXO gestured to the back of the mirror and helped me turn it around, their skin starting to sea as they kept pushing the metal. They eventually managed to shift it enough that I could wrestle my arm in and fit the key into an oddly shaped keyhole.

The back of the mirror started glowing a pale green before cracking open, revealing a room barely large enough to fit Fake Dana. Tears welling up in my eyes, I did my best to extract her without causing her too much damage until she finally made it out to the other side.

“Friend,” I said. “I didn’t think I’d ever find you ! Thankfully Threeox helped, and there’s - look,” I continued, turning back to face my rescue team, forgetting it was only me and EXO now.

They were smiling, too, and they gestured at the stairs. I understood what they meant - out.

I turned to Fake Dana again, still somewhat relieved to see her dry her tears and gracefully get up without giving me the time to offer help. She smiled like nothing was wrong. I followed her up the stairs and into the hall, her naked feet sizzling and leaving angry red marks on the floor, probably due to the iron dust covering every inch of the place. EXO swung the the front door open, touching the iron pane with a quickly blistering hand, and as I looked at them more closely, I couldn’t help but mouth “Threeox”.

“Oh shit, right, come here !” Fake Dana grabbed my face with both her hands, her palms wet with leftover tears and blood, the feel of them sending shivers down my spine. She spat in my eyes like she’d done before, and suddenly the night became less bright, her skin less pale, EXO’s features morphing into the face of my roommate, skin going from that red I’d been kinda surprised about, to the vibrant green that the cat warned me about.

Toll, Bell and Eulogy were nowhere to be seen. I started wondering if I’d dreamed about them, if they were ever here at all. Their names had stuck in my mind and once again I wondered what mine was. I know Sizzle, my roommate, was quite upset before shoving me out of the room - which room was that again ? 17 ? 23 ? I forgot.

Fake Dana interrupted my thoughts with a light shove on my arm. “You can leave, now, you’ll remember who you are soon. It’s okay, it’s done.”

“What’s done ?” I tried to ask, but my eyelids suddenly became so heavy I had trouble keeping them open.

The last thing I heard were guttural sounds, so unlike Fake Dana’s voice, and a wet caress on my back.

I woke up on this train a few moments ago. I don’t know where it’s going, except from “Far away” and “Not where I came from”. My suitcase is filled with all my belongings, except the iron jewellery I acquired during my two years as Elsewhere U. And as I look at the landscape we are zapping by, I do not recognise the streets nor the trees.

The only thing keeping me from falling asleep again is the sticky red liquid pouring out of my nose, making me curse out loud as I scramble for a handkerchief. The blood stops flowing after a while, and I catch my reflection in the window across me.

I have several streaks of white hair, the contrast sharp with my otherwise dark brown ponytail. My eyes are bloodshot and I have blood caked on my face in the shape of hands. My skin is pale, my eyes gleam a quickly fading red.

I remember it now. My name is Dana.

#hazblogs #rescue mission #stories #long post #dana #exo #threeox #fake dana #mirrors #submission

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haven-in-writing · 3 years

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Bloodthirsty (2)

Part two of Bloodthirsty catch up Here

Summary: More questions arise as you lie to your teams faces.

____________________________________________

Two Gods and A Vampire

The silence was beyond nerve wrecking, the team of righteous heroes sat unmoving in a judgmental stupor. You were sure their minds were working overtime trying to piece together the many chips being tossed about in the living area by a specific pain in the ass Norse god. You didn’t know what to say but you needed to figure something out, and considering you were sure everything in the compound was being recorded and monitored, it needed to be believable.

“Not that it hasn’t been explained before, but I was used as a stand-in for their mutated super soldier serum remake that was botched. I was practically dead when they took me from that village, no thanks to you,” The venom in your voice made it clear to Loki that he was to blame for leaving you there for the people that were after him. He didn’t know that it wasn’t Hydra, or that they weren’t the ones to revive you but it was close enough to the truth, you had been used by Hydra but that didn’t happen until the 60’s. The partial truth didn’t register in his mind as a lie, he felt genuinely horrible at leaving you to those pests experiments. You hoped it was enough to take the pressure off of you as you asked the team a question, trying to change the topic of conversation.

“Why is Friday offline, and what’s with the no lights? I thought I was walking into a trap or something,” you couldn’t help but wonder what the reasoning behind it was.

“Oh, point break over there “accidentally” shot out our electric box by beaming down too close to the compound. Friday is undergoing some maintenance so this doesn’t happen again,” Stark answers while glaring at Thor for his transgression. That calms your nerves a bit, they weren’t trying to trap you and they didn’t suspect anything.

Yet. Your subconscious held the nagging suspicion that sooner rather than later you were gonna be forced to show them your hand.

You’d leave without a trace before revealing yourself to them, no need to let them in on the darker avenues of the afterlife. That would be a problem for another day though. Shrugging off your leather jacket, you take your leave and head to your room to shower and relax. Not bothering to listen to the continuing conversation taking place between the team and the two gods, you start your after battle self care routine feeling less nervous now that you were away from Loki.

You didn’t know what it was about the god that had you so frazzled. He left you for dead in that small village, not bothering to at the very least bury you properly. The sword had pierced close to your heart, not directly through it, but that didn’t matter. You still bled out on the muddy path that led to the town's hermit who just happened to be a vampire. An extremely old and disciplined vampire that took pity in his cold heart for a young maiden bleeding out next to horse shit. One blood transfer later and you were waking up on a bed of furs, the icy cold venom had flooded your body leaving you frozen in time in your 23 year old body. You could barely remember the actual date but you placed your turning around the early 1800s, losing track and not bothering to care enough to write it down. Besides, the last thing you needed was to have someone snoop and find out you were older than the big bad criminal organization Hydra. Unaware of the conversation taking place across the compound, you settle into your routine.

“Are you certain about this brother? Lady Y/N may be older than she appears but you're saying she's in her 200’s,” Thor whispers to Loki in Asgardian as the team talks amongst themselves.

“240 give or take and I am certain, Thor. There’s something very different about her but I’m quite positive she is the same maiden that helped me escape those wretched trials. Time has not touched her in the slightest,” Loki whispers back in Asgardian as well, so even if one of the mortals hears them speak they won’t understand.

“Should I-,”

“Don’t say a word to Odin, we don’t know what she is for sure but even you know he would gladly collect her like his precious relics and bend her to do his bidding,” Loki cuts Thor off, the hatred for Odin seeping into his voice unwillingly. Thor only nods to convey he understands, not wanting to upset his brother further.

Loki continues after a moment of silence, ”I’ll consult someone that may have the answers we seek if I cannot produce them without help,” Thor looks confused for a moment until Loki speaks again, “I have been missing the scenery in New Orleans of late.”

As the gods continue to speak, Natasha listens very carefully while maintaining conversation with Clint about his and Kate’s escapades the other night while she was on a mission. Truthfully, she had always had a sneaking suspicion that y/n wasn’t telling the full truth about her past but that was her preference and she couldn’t fault her for that. However, if it was true what Loki was saying, the team needed to know who she was, no exemptions.

Looking at her phone while still listening to both conversations, she reserved a hotel room in New Orleans for the following day so she could see what Loki would find out. Secrets got people killed, a lesson Natasha had learned the hard way. She also knew secrets kept people safe but the situations varied. This was one of those times where she wanted to determine the outcome before it became a bigger issue, one that couldn’t be settled with a simple explanation.

“Hey Clint, mind doing me a favor?” Nat asks with a small smile. It was time she cashed in a couple of favors.

#marvel #marvel cinematic universe #marvel fanfic #marvel fanfiction #marvel fanfic writer #avengers #avengers fanfiction #avengers fanfic #slow burn #enemies to friends to lovers #enemies to lovers #vampire!reader #vampire x avengers #loki x vampire!reader #loki x reader #loki fanfic #Loki Laufeyson #loki fanfiction

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vod-ika · 4 years

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Clones; A Sociologic Rant

I’m pretty sure I could base a whole sociologic thesis off of this show I have so many thoughts this is LONG.

So the fascinating thing about clones is that over and over it’s emphasised in show that they are considered property/cannon fodder/disposable, and at the same time it’s shown that they understand that claim, and still go so far out of their way to control some kind of their own independence.

I occasionally have a hard time separating show and fanfiction (fuck canon it’s my world now) but even in show, the allusions to modern militaries, the decorating of armor, the personalisations such as accents, names, and specific groups (Domino Squad) all point to an entirely unmitigated, completely developed culture inside the Republic. So this is basically a list of things I’ve seen, wondered about, or headcanoned in TCW.

- I would just LOVE to sit down with Filoni or Lucas and a sociologist and just Talk about how, if this army was real, what all would the Kaminoan’s have programmed in their heads (mental stability, coping mechanisms, stamina, self-preservation instinct, etc,) and how would it work in real-time, on and off the battlefield. What kind of programming went on in those eight to ten developmental years that ensured that loyalty was innate, the knowledge of property was omnipresent, and that they believed they weren’t allowed to own anything? What did they do to them to make sure that they would never want to form an uprising???

- “We are only as good as our weakest link” is repeated in team events endlessly, something that can extend to both skill and health. How deeply engrained are checkups, both mental and physical? I want you to look me in the eye and tell me that day in and day out clones, regardless of rank, are able to listen to and watch brothers die and Not have that affect them.

- Were they programmed with “protect the Jedi” in mind, or was it just, “bam. here is your CO, they outrank you so you have to respect/protect them?”, and then one of them jumped off a building with no armor and their captain had a heart attack? With the whole “Jedi were peacekeepers now they’re generals” thing I feel like the Senate just took two pieces of a puzzle that don’t actually go together but fit anyways and shoved them together and now they’re just kinda staring at each other like “the fuk u doin here”

- HEALTH. IS SO. IMPORTANT. When you know that any injury severe enough or illness overlooked long enough could result in you being swiftly and carelessly replaced by someone who looks Exactly like you, how much more of an emphasis is put on health, bodily wellbeing, and injury prevention? Clones are human, and while they’re very highly trained, strong humans, they’re still human and skin is skin. (Applying real logic to a cartoon) Seeing clones in things like explosions that they potentially survive, but lose a limb or two always made me sad because, to The Republic/The GAR/ Kamino, what good is a crippled clone? To Kaminoans, their life’s purpose is over and you might as well treat them as a lame horse. Fuck Kamino.

- I just realised something. When most modern soldiers deploy, they deploy with the intent to eventually be replaced because they have served their time wherever they are, and are being replaced by a new wave of soldiers. Clones deploy with the intent to die and be replaced until the battle is won.

- When Marines or Infantrymen or Sailors ship out, they always have duffel bags or those gigantic green laundry bag stuffed with clothes and personal items. Now, we know that clones collect personal items, and assumedly have multiple pairs of blacks (or no sweat glands) but I have yet to see any kind of carrying devices other than crates and small backpacks like for small Hutt babies or explosives. Do they have to leave everything behind when they’re op-hopping to their next planet? Are there barracks left behind that hold the ghosts of personal blankets and magazine clippings? Or is there a mountain of green laundry bags just off-camera?

- Naming culture, good god. So, you’re fresh out of boot, and you’ve got your number still. You’re like, “dope. I’m CT-1234. I’m a GAR mortarman. Go time.” Then, some dickhead is like, nah you’re called Sparkles now lets go prank Gogo and Jazz. Naming is WILD, and I’m mostly drawing from fanfiction for this. Either you’re named for some major or heroic or kickass reason like Tracer or Wolffe or Fireball, or you’re named for the most mundane thing like your number ends with 22, so you’re Twos or there are checkers on your armor so now you’re Check. either way it is a personal choice that Specifically defies the number they were assigned at decanting. Even Dogma had one for fucks sake.

- Painting armor. You know that time had to be taken to sit quietly and detail on that eel, or those lines, or that decal. Did it do anything to better the Republic? Did it win any battles or save any precious Jedi? No, but it happened anyways. People like to discuss why we play video games; there’s no societal, familial, or interpersonal benefit, only benefit to the one playing. There’s no societal, familial, or interpersonal benefit to painting armor, only benefit to the one painting. Fuck Kamino.

- Vocal inflections! The places they’re deployed affecting their speech patterns! I personally have a wild mashup of regional American accents because of the time I’ve spent traipsing, so how does being deployed planet after planet affect clone speech patterns??? Who rolls their r’s and who doesn’t? Are there transfers from other battalions whose accents are indiscernible because of where they were last deployed? Or ones who just have a whole additional vocabulary of local language? I’m three states away and the Louisiana accent blows my mind. Imagine that, but a whole fucking star system away???

- LINGO. Military lingo, planetary lingo (see above), sign language etc. give me different forms of communication outside Basic, used in both the formal and informal settings. (name calling in ASL/BSL during a briefing, talking about shinies in front of their faces in a language they don’t yet understand, talking about Jedi in front of their faces in a language they don’t understand.) Clones are told all that they are is property but damn if that property isn’t going to be able to talk shit about you to your face.

- To add on... Mando’a???? Is it innate? Is it learned? Did Jango Fett personally sit every clone ever down and teach them how to say Cat and Dog and Yes and No? Does every clone know it, or only those who sought it out? Literally it’s the most impersonal personal thing. “You, a thing who was made for combat, who looks exactly like millions of others, know one language of BILLIONS in the galaxy, purely because the man whose hair we based your genetic makeup off of knows it.” like WHAT

- HELMETS. BEING. SO. VERY. PERSONAL. Everything you see, speak, hear, smell is filtered through that bucket on your head. Are HUDs customisable? Is wearing or touching someone else’s bucket a no-no? Who’s watching telenovelas on guard duty?

- Speaking OF helmets: When your waking hours are constantly covered by your bucket, how do bodily “tells” betray what your face can’t? People acclimate. How common is it to be able to read your brother’s emotions like a fucking book based purely on how squared his hip is in parade rest, or which shoulder is higher than the other at attention?

- Or even just armor. Dude, that is literally the only thing between their skin and certain death by laser bolt. You ever talked to an athlete? And how picky they are about what cleats they wear or what goggles they use, or what percentage Gatorade their water is? We’re incorrigible. Imagine that, but the choice made results in how mobile you are, or how much laser to the shoulder you can stand.

- Time is so fucking short and they all must know that. I think I’ve used the line, “the average lifespan of a clone is measured in months, not years,” and boy does that fucking hit. How do you handle life when you were made to be snuffed out by it?

To conclude, I have many thoughts about the minute details of a working army that is comprised of identical people created, raised, and sent off to die for a war they didn’t start. Sounds a little ridiculous when you say it out loud, but between the show itself, fanart, and fucking fanfiction, it’s a little hard not to attribute human nuances to the show that exemplified my childhood. I’m an adult and it is my very highly specifically adult choice to psychoanalyse this show, and you can bet I’ll throw hands with Disney at any time.

“When my creator cares not how I face death, only that it is for them, how do I use the time death allows me? Cruel is my maker to have given me eyes to see and ears to hear the world, but denied me the chance to explore it. I can only hope that those who follow see what I could not, and that eventually a painting of all the world will be born through the eyes of the many.”

#clones #clone wars #star wars #star wars the clone wars #sw:cw #sw:tcw #clone troopers #clone headcanons #I am YELLING #There is so much I could dissect #captain rex #commander cody #ikawrites

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fanmoose12 · 4 years

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Partners

Characters: Petra Ral, Levi, Hanji Zoe x Levi Genre: Action / Mystery / Romance Rating: T

Detective!au

Summary: when Petra was promoted to a detective and partnered up with legendary Levi Ackerman, she felt like the happiest person in the world.

But, as she soon found out, detective Ackerman she used to admire so much was actually a far cry from the ideal policeman Petra thought he was. He was rude, harsh and easily annoyed. And, in addition, he still hadn’t moved on from the death of his previous partner - detective Hange Zoe.

Chapter 1.

“You two make a good team.” “Thank you. His last partner cast a long shadow.”

Daredevil, vol. 4

Petra had been a police technician for long five years. She didn’t hate her job per se, and helping other people was always one of the biggest passions in her life, but… She always strived for something better, something bigger.

However, she hadn’t been promoted for so long that she had lost all hope of rising up in ranks. So when, one day, Captain Erwin called her into his office, she'd feared that he decided to transfer her to another division, or, maybe, he noticed some kind of inconsistencies in one of her reports. Her legs were wobbly, while she was walking through the station’s corridors. And as she opened the door to the Captain's office, her hands were shaking and sweaty.

But as it turned out, there was nothing to be worried about. She wasn't transferred, there was no mistakes in her reports. No, instead, she was promoted. To a detective. And her new partner was none other than detective Levi Ackerman himself.

Even outside of their department, Detective Ackerman was a living legend. In the ten years he had served in the homicide department, he and his partner Hange Zoe solved every single case appointed to them. Together, they were a force to be reckoned with, their unusual investigation tactics bewildered and sometimes shocked civilians, but nevertheless, they were a pride of their department. And there was no one, who was more proud of them than their superior officer, Captain Erwin. Those three trusted each other unconditionally, and were not only close colleagues, but dear friends as well.

Although, all of it had come to an abrupt end two years ago, when Hange Zoe mysteriously disappeared during one of the cases. It was quite unclear, if she had really died, her body was never recovered, and both Levi and Erwin refused to give a statement, regarding that accident. The only thing general public knew that detectives Zoe and Ackerman ventured on a mission to capture a dangerous criminal, Zeke Yeager, but only Levi walked out of that building alive.

And ever since that accident, detective Ackerman became secluded and aloof. His success rate dropped significantly and he refused to accept another partner.

Petra became a policeman, when detectives Zoe and Ackerman were in their prime and the talk of the whole city. Petra saw them a lot, as they hurried in and out of the station. They were a weird pair, and if she didn't know better, wasn't aware of just how successful their partnership was, she would never guess that those two genuinely liked each other. They were so different - Hange's lips were seemingly permanently curled into an excited smile, while Levi's face was always set in scowling expression. They constantly teased and made fun of each other, but there was always an undeniable affection in their words, no matter how biting they were, and in their eyes, as they gazed at each other. And the fact that Levi was taking her death so hard, only further proved that those two were extremely close comrades.

And, of course, from the first time she had laid her eyes on detective Ackerman, Petra couldn’t help, but admire him. He was sharp, collected, hard-working and righteous. He embodied everything a good policeman should be.

And now, she was going to be his partner. Petra couldn't wait to start their new case! As she walked away from Captain Erwin’s office, she kept imagining what her first day of working with legendary Levi Ackerman would be like.

"Good day, I'm detective Petra Ral and this is my partner Levi Ackerman."

Gosh! Just the thought of it made her feel dizzy.

She was so happy! She was ready to do everything to prove herself to Levi. To be an even better partner to him than his previous one.

***

The next day, as soon as Petra woke up, she could barely conceive her excitement. She came to work earlier than usual, and she couldn't keep a smile off her face, as she gathered all of her belongings into a box, so she could bring them to her new workplace. She would be sharing an office with detective Ackerman himself! She didn't dare to even dream about that, but now it was actually happening! Truly, she was the luckiest person in the world.

"What got you in such a good mood?" Oluo, her past co-worker asked. "Have they finally fired you?"

"I'm being promoted, dummy," she couldn't resist the smug grin that appeared on her face. "So show some respect. You're talking to a Detective Petra Ral."

"Detective?" Oluo whistled, sitting back in his chair. "And who is that miserable fool who will become your partner?"

"I don't think you've heard of him," Petra put hands on her hips, looking down at Oluo, a sense of pride nearly overwhelming her. "Does the name Levi Ackerman say something to you?"

"No way," Oluo's eyes widened almost comically. "You're fucking with me."

"I'm not."

"Holy shit, you're detective Ackerman's partner? He refused one for years!"

Petra shrugged, tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "Maybe, he saw something special in me."

"Or, maybe, Captain Erwin pressured him into this."

Petra huffed. "You're just jealous because you'll be stuck here, doing patrol work till your pension."

"Oh, shut up and leave already," Oluo turned to his computer. "I was getting sick of seeing your face anyway."

Petra's gaze lingered on Oluo's back for a moment. Maybe, she was too harsh with him? True, he was oftentimes lazy and enjoyed slacking off, dumping all of his work on Petra, but he was a good man. An honest one, Petra respected him. She liked him, too, even though sometimes that arrogant smirk of his drove her absolutely mad.

Well, she could always apologize to him later. Knowing Oluo, he probably didn't even care about her words. Certainly a cup of coffee would make him forget about any offence.

Besides, she had to forget about him for the time being. Today was important day. She couldn't let herself lose her focus.

***

When Petra came to her new office, Levi was already there.

"G-good morning!" she squealed. "I'm your new partner, Petra—"

"I know," Levi harshly cut her off. "I'm sure you know my name as well, so let's skip the pleasantries. Just put your shit somewhere and get to work."

"Oh... alright."

Trying to hide her disappointment, Petra looked around the office. There were four desks there. She decided to take the one that was across from Levi's.

"No!" instantly, Levi covered the desk with his hands. He looked up, glaring at Petra so fiercely, as though she had done some horrible dead. His voice was quiet and yet so cold, it made shivers run down Petra's spine. "That desk is already taken."

Petra gave it a second look. Now that she stood so close to it, she could see that the table was covered in stacks of papers and empty coffee cups. However, despite its messiness, the desk was pristinely clean.

Petra checked the date on the report that was lying on the top. The report was written almost two years ago. By detective Hange Zoe.

Oh.

So Levi didn't really move on, did he?

"Can I sit here?" Petra pointed to the desk near the window.

Levi looked at her for barely a second.

"That desk is empty," he said, returning to his work.

An uneasy silence fell over the room. At least, it was uneasy for Petra. Levi didn't seem to care in the slightest.

"So..." she tentatively began after a few of excruciatingly long minutes. “What is our first case?"

"Oh, yes," Levi threw a case file on her desk. "A middle-aged man was killed this morning. A rich snob, he was most definitely killed by his wife, because he refused to share his money. I've already run through the possible theory with forensics, all you need to do is to question his wife to see if my theory is legit or not. I'm sure it is, though."

"Ah... okay."

So there won't be any teamwork, huh? Maybe, it was for the best. Levi's attitude left much to be desired.

Still, Petra wasn't going to give up so easily.

So when she returned from detention center, where the wife of the deceased was held (she did kill her husband, Levi was right), Petra brought him a cup of tea.

"I didn't know how you take it," she said sheepishly, putting the cup in front of him. "Tell me what you think."

Levi looked up at her, regarding her carefully. His eyes were sharp, but that was about everything Petra could say about them. They were a beautiful shade of grey, but she could see nothing in them, but boredom and indifference.

Their eye contact didn't last for a second too long. Levi turned to the cup on his desk. He lifted it slowly, staring at the swirling liquid inside. Glancing back at Petra again, be put it to his lips and took a sip.

"It's very good," he said after a moment. "Exactly how I like it."

Petra's heart swelled. Her lips almost curled into a happy smile. But then Levi threw the contents of the cup into the trash can.

"Her tea always tasted like shit," he muttered under his nose, but loud enough for Petra to hear.

She could feel tears gathering in the corner of her eyes.

"I appreciate the effort," his voice didn't sound like he truly did. "But don't bring me tea, or some other kind of food, ever again. You shouldn't waste your time with such useless shit."

And then he turned back to his computer, not sparing another glance in her direction.

Petra felt like the biggest idiot, like a naive little girl, who was scolded by her teacher.

Why did she even bother?

***

"Petra, right?" Levi asked after a while.

"Yeah?"

"You can go home earlier, Petra."

"But I didn't finish my report—"

"I'll do it for you. Go and rest."

Petra narrowed her eyes. It sounded like Levi was trying to make her leave.

"Were you working on the case the whole day?"

Levi had been glued to his computer screen ever since Petra came. He didn't even go on a break.

"...Yes, of course. What else would I be working on?"

He hesitated, for less than a second, but he did. Why? What was he doing? What was so important to her new partner? Oh, how Petra wanted to know! But she knew she couldn't, there was no way that Levi would be willing to tell her about it.

However, she could always find out in some other way.

Not today, though.

"Alright, thank you," she smiled sweetly. That smile always made everyone smile back. However, it seemed to have no effect on Levi. "I'll be going then. Have a nice evening."

"Sure," Levi answered absentmindedly, his attention already back on his screen.

Before walking out of the office, Petra gave him another critical look.

She'd be damned, but she'll find out his secret. She'll prove to him just how good she was as a detective.

Not worse than his dead partner.

#so i finally did it!!!!!!#i've had this idea for a while #and believe it or not!!!! i've been thinking ab before ch 132 djkgslgkjslkgj #but yeah levi is going to be sad in this fic #but!!!!!!!! not for long i promise #someone will come back to cheer him up!!!!!#sooooo tell me what you think about it i guess????#i know that this thing is weird lmao #and yeah i've got this idea while reading daredevil #don't judge pls #levihan #levi ackerman #levi x hange #levihan fanfiction #petra ral #snk fanfiction #snk fic

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kinktae · 5 years

Text

bitchin’ || (M)

↳ PART OF MY REWIND SERIES

The 80s were a time of choices. Which perm was right for you? What color neon would you wear next? None of these choices, however, were more questionable than a certain deal you made with Jeon Jungkook.

pairing: fratboy!jungkook x reader

word count: 4.8k

genre: 1980s au, eventual smut, e2l

warnings: multiple smut scenes, science talk, banter, jealousy, alcohol & LOTS of colorful 80s slang lmao

A/N: Bitchin’ is a multichapter fic, surprise!! This fic was inspired by To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before. Thank you to @junqkook for letting me use her likeness and helping me with Yara’s character overall.

01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 | 07 | 08 | 09 | 10

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PART ONE

12:16 pm.

The time on the clock was glaring at you, a silent caution that today's lab was going to totally suck.

You could feel irritation start to eat away at you. You and your best friend, Yara, had a deal. She would show up to the dissection today and, in exchange, you would gladly do all the work. But given that class would start in four minutes, you had a sneaking suspicion that Yara was going to in fact skip class after all.

You let your chin sink down into the comfort of your open palm, eyes flickering once again towards the black and white clock that was perched up above the classroom's blackboard. Usually, you could hear each small tick of time, but seeing as this lab was more exciting, every student in the room was currently chatting amongst their peers, covering the clock's sound.

You considered for a moment making conversation with your professor. That idea was quickly squashed once you realized that he too was preoccupied – his attention set on the clock as well, allowing the minute hand to make its final journey before beginning the class.

Suddenly, you realized that not only had Yara left you alone, but she had also left you without a partner to do the dissection. You glanced around the room, frowning as you saw that every other table was evenly numbered, meaning you would be forced to join a random pair to make a group of three.

Wicked.

"Good afternoon, everyone." Mr. Kim began, pausing to take a swig from his coffee mug. "I hope everyone read the email I sent out yesterday in regards to proper attire. If anyone isn't wearing actual shoes, then I suggest you beat it unless you're particularly amped at the idea of losing a toe when someone accidentally drops their scalpel."

A few isolated giggles rang out, but no one made any move to leave.

"No one? Radical. Feet are gross anyway–"

The sound of the classroom door suddenly being pushed open stole away everyone's attention. The late boy that walked in froze momentarily, clearly not expecting all eyes to fall onto him, but quickly regained his composure as he flashed a smile.

"Sorry I'm late, Seokjin." He apologized lazily.

"Better late than never, Jeon." Mr. Kim acknowledged briefly, raising an eyebrow. "Although, if you call me Seokjin again then you'll be the next thing I have the class dissect."

The threat was empty and pulled a shared laugh from the students, including the one it was directed at.

You hardly had time to laugh yourself because before you knew it, the boy was headed towards your table.

Not wanting to hold eye contact with the tardy student as he made his way over, you let your stare fall onto your lap. The worn-out denim of your jeans wasn't distraction enough from the sound of the boy taking a seat beside you, his bag being thrown carelessly onto the floor.

Glancing at him from the corner of your eyes, you watched as he began to rummage through it.

Jeon Jungkook.

You had recognized him the moment he had stepped in; the two of you had attended the same high school after all. Not that he knew that. You were reasonably sure that the two of you never crossed paths back then. Well, unless you count the time him and his asshole friends tore down the pep rally banners you and the party planning committee had spent so much time on.

You were well aware of the fact that he was in this class as well, but this was by far the closest you had ever physically come to him.

Jungkook was the kind of guy people noticed– muscular build, dark, messy hair with an attractive smile. Not that any of that interested you, of course. As far as you were concerned, he was still the same disruptive tool that he was in high school

Oh, god. Please don't let him be your partner.

"Take a picture, it'll last longer." Jungkook spoke suddenly, heat rocketing through your body as you realized you had yet to pull your eyes off of him.

"S-Sorry!" You stuttered out, turning in your seat so that he couldn't meet your eyes, horrified that he had caught you staring at him so openly.

Jungkook clearly didn't think much of it your total social faux pas, as a boyish laugh escaped him.

"Don't sweat it." He shrugged, dropping a sheet of paper and a pen in front of him. "I'm Jeon Jungkook, by the way."

"Yep." You nodded absentmindedly.

He seemed taken aback at your response, noticeably confused. A nervous giggle escaped you, realizing how incapable of communicating you had become.

"Uh! I just meant–– I know who you are. We, like, went to high school together." You admitted, leg bouncing anxiously under the table. "I'm Y/N."

Jungkook cocked his head, clearly surprised. "Oh shit, did we?"

You let out a noise of confirmation.

Mr. Seokjin suddenly began speaking to the class, and you turned your attention to your professor as he started to introduce the lab.

"Who was in your circle?" Jungkook asked as if he didn't even hear his professor speaking.

You offered him a sparing glance, "What?"

"Like your friend group. You had friends, right?" Jungkook teased.

"Yes, I had friends." A serious tone on your tongue, trying to somehow still listen to what your professor was saying while Jungkook conversed with you. "I just… don't think you'd know of any of them."

Jungkook seemed unsatisfied with your response, his eyebrows furrowing.

"Did you do something? Like were you on any teams or anything?"

For a moment, you contemplated telling Jungkook to bag his face, that you were actually trying to hear what Mr. Kim was saying as you genuinely cared about passing this class. But seeing as he was sitting beside you, it was probably best not to piss him off.

"Well," You began cautiously, keeping your voice low, "I was a member of mathletes–"

Jungkook cut you off immediately.

"Woah, hold on. Mathletes? Like math?"

You turned towards him, fighting back the urge to roll your eyes. You weren't at all surprised by his reaction. You couldn't imagine someone like Jungkook who spent the majority of high school cracking out jokes from the back of the classroom giving a single shit about academics.

"Yes, like math. I was also in our marching band." You offered as if that would make any difference to him.

"So... you were a loser. Gotcha." He mused, causing you to frown slightly.

Alright, asshole...

"No." You countered calmly, trying not to reveal how offended you were. "We just had different interests."

"Like totally different." He grinned stupidly.

"Yep." You responded dryly, turning away from the dark-haired boy. You were also student body treasurer, but frankly, you no longer cared enough to tell him that. Your self-esteem wasn't fragile enough to be shattered by some asswipe calling you a loser, but it certainly didn't feel good.

"Alright, so with that said, go ahead and pair up. Coats and goggles are in the back of the room. Don't let me catch you doing anything stupid and have fun." Mr. Seokjin's words caught your attention, luring out another sigh from you.

Sliding off your stool, you tried your best to avoid the stare that Jungkook was pressing against your skull, walking into the crowd of chatting students who were making their way over towards the back. Surely he had friends in this class that he could partner up with. You'll just join someone else's group.

You were just beginning to button up your white lab coat when a towering presence made its way over to you.

"So, nerd." Jungkook's voice called out, reaching around you for a lab coat. "Are we doing this thing or what?"

'Or what.' You could feel yourself wanting to answer back almost immediately.

You turned away from Jungkook to glance over the room, feeling your shoulders sink as you realized everyone was partnered and you were undoubtedly stuck with him.

Jungkook stood there, an amused look on his face as you gave him a skeptical one as if measuring him up.

"Fine." You answered begrudgingly, grabbing a pair of goggles of their rack. "But I'm taking the lead on the dissection. You can take notes and observe what we find."

Just because you were agreeing to partner up with him didn't mean you were willing to sacrifice your lab grade. And if Jungkook didn't like that then… well… he could go find someone else to annoy all class.

At your words, Jungkook let out a laugh of surprise, clearly not expecting such an authoritative tone.

"Damn, you got it, Captain. The geek ship is all yours." He joked cheekily, holding a hand to his head as if saluting you.

You sent him a tight-lipped smile, already collecting a few choice words you'd be gifting Yara the second you saw her.

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"God, gag me with a spoon." You grimaced, a foul odor attacking your nose as you bent over to get closer to the preserved frog you had laid out on your tray. You picked up the scalpel, trying to prepare yourself for the first cut mentally.

Jungkook's eyes flicked towards the creature before letting out a noise of awe.

"Oh, gnarly! One of its eyes is stuck open!"

"Don't say tell me that as I'm about to cut into it!" You squeaked out, gripping your blade. "That's not exactly a comforting observation as I'm about to expose its insides. Besides, I need you taking this seriously."

Jungkook raised his hands up by his chest, waving them defensively.

"Sorry, sorry. Happy cutting." He apologized, resting his chin in his palm.

The dissection wasn't particularly hard, in fact, if it had gone as you envisioned it – you cutting and describing what you saw with Jungkook writing down notes – you imagined it would go by rather quickly. Unfortunately for you, Jungkook had a constant need for small talk and very little desire to help get this lab completed quickly.

"Let's give him a name." He called out after maybe two minutes of uninterrupted silence.

"No."

Jungkook tutted in disappointment, "Why not?"

"It's dead, Jungkook." You reasoned.

"Doesn't mean he can't have a name." He pointed out. "I'm gonna call him Bernie."

You shut your eyes, stilling yourself as took in a deep breath.

"Jungkook... please. I'm just trying to do this lab. For the both of us." You responded, pulling away from the dead frog.

"And I'm trying to pass the time. For the both of us." He mocked, an attractive albeit irritating smile on his mouth.

You set down the cutting utensil, letting the metal clang against the tray, your temper finally catching up with you.

"Has anyone ever told you you're kind of insufferable?" You said pointedly.

You weren't usually this outwardly direct to people you hardly knew, but holy cow something about this kid pushed every single damn one of your buttons.

Annoyingly, Jungkook didn't even seem to notice your change in tone, a laugh escaping him.

"Well, you certainly wouldn't be the first. Definitely the first of your social status, though." He smirked. You let out an exasperated huff.

"What the hell is your damage?" You snapped.

"What do you mean?"

"I know a loser like me probably isn't your usual company and that you clearly don't give a shit about the fact that this lab is worth twenty percent of our grade but I do. All I want is to get this lab done so we can get the hell out of each others' hair. So if you have a problem with me or something that you want to get off your chest, speak now."

There were a few silent beats where the two of you just stared at each other, Jungkook looking pensive while your chest rose and fell slowly as you tried to control your angry breaths.

"Okay." He spoke finally, catching you off guard.

"Okay?"

"My girlfriend left me for another guy today. It's why I was late. I'm just trying to get my mind off shit, I guess. I'm sorry I keep calling you names, that's just how I joke around with my friends. It probably doesn't translate well with strangers who don't know me. So, I'm sorry. I'll stop." He explained softly, a foreign expression on his face.

You blinked.

"Oh. Uh, well... Apology accepted." You replied, awkwardly.

When you had gone on your little rant, you had been hoping that it would make Jungkook feel just uneasy enough to shut up and focus on the lab. You weren't expecting anything of substance to leave his mouth, so you really had no idea where to go from here. Especially with the way he was looking at you like you had just kicked him.

"I'm sorry... about your girlfriend."

Jungkook shrugged, "Shit happens."

"Did you, like, know the guy?" You asked cautiously in a weak attempt to comfort him.

"Yeah, he's one of my brothers." He nodded.

"She left you for your brother?!" You exclaimed, your jaw all but dropping. Immediately, Jungkook flinched, eyes flickering across the room where a couple of students had turned towards the two of you in interest.

"Pipe down, okay? I don't need everyone knowing my business, damn." He frowned, throwing you a glare.

"Sorry, I'm just... that's gonna be one awkward family dinner." You scrunched your nose.

"What? Oh no, not my actual brother. He's in the same fraternity as me. Frat brother." Jungkook clarified.

"Ohhh." You nodded.

His... fraternity brother. Of course.

You bit down on your lip.

Jungkook eyed you for a moment before letting out a sigh. "Go ahead."

"What?" You cocked your head in fake confusion.

"I already know what you're thinking."

"What am I thinking?"

"You're thinking that me being in a frat just confirmed the fact that you think I'm some sort of meathead." He continued, rolling his eyes.

A sharp laugh fell through your lips and Jungkook's eyes widened at the sound. It was the first time he had made you laugh, he realized.

"Psshh, not even." You lied through your teeth, trying and failing to suppress your smile.

"Even." He countered, playfulness in his tone. The both of you held each others' eyes for a moment, mutual grins exchanged.

"Anyway, I'm sure she'll be back soon enough." He continued calmly.

"Oh, so you're gonna try and win her back?" You asked.

"Hm? Nah, we've always been on and off, she'll come back eventually."

You frowned, "And you're okay with that?"

You weren't typically one to judge others' love lives given how you currently didn't have one, but you couldn't help but marvel at Jungkook's words. He shrugged in response.

You shifted uncomfortably, "Have you considered moving on? Or at least doing something to get her actually to stay with you?"

"Like what?" Jungkook laughed, clearly not taking you seriously.

Great question. You weren't particularly skilled with knowledge when it came to romantic relationships; you had only ever had one boyfriend, and while it was fairly serious, things had ended amicably enough.

You thought back to your sisters at that moment. The twins were older than you and had both gone through a significant number of breakups. When the three of you were growing up, they usually relied on one another when it came to boy troubles, but that didn't mean you didn't get an earful late at night. Your bedroom shared a wall with theirs and, well, Rosa and Lia had always been loud people after all.

"Give her a reason to regret letting you go... become a better man and whatnot." You responded after some contemplation. "Show her what she's missing."

"Oh, she knows exactly what she's missing." Jungkook smirked, eyes flickering towards the front of his jeans. "Why do you think she keeps coming back?"

You blinked.

"I think I just threw up in my mouth."

"Dick this good doesn't come around that often." He continued seriously, wagging his pointer finger from side to side.

"Incredible. I just did it again." You deadpanned, causing Jungkook to snort.

"Seriously? I'm what's grossing you out in this scenario?" He mused, looking down at the frog you were previously dissecting. You let out a hum, nodding.

"As much as I appreciate the 411 on your dick, I've got a layer of fascia to cut through."

"Fine. Why don't you try and make conversation then, since your baggin' on everything I bring up?"

"I don't have anything to talk about." You shrugged, moving over to the frog, beginning to cut.

Jungkook raised an eyebrow, "Really? Nothing exciting happening in your life?"

"Yes, actually. I just located Bernie's trachea." You revealed. Jungkook walked over to your end of the table, eyes wide with disbelief as he leaned in for a closer look.

Your eyes widened as his shoulder brushed itself against yours, his sudden proximity unexpected.

He smelled like cologne, clearly wearing enough to make itself known past the stench of formaldehyde and you found yourself taking a step back, slightly flustered.

Sure, Jungkook was just a dumb frat boy, but he was an attractive one and it was just a little bit daunting.

You watched his profile as he marveled at the revealed insides of the frog, even reaching for a pair of forceps to pull back the flap of skin to get a better look.

"Actually, there is something I'm excited about."

"If it's his heart, I'm already one step ahead of you." He quipped back, not looking up from the frog. You shook your head.

"I want to throw an event on campus."

Jungkook's eyes flickering towards you was your cue to continue talking.

"It's to encourage more women to pursue careers in science and engineering. I've planned the whole thing and even made flyers."

"Well… it's no frog heart but that's certainly something." Jungkook smiled, causing your heart to pound.

You nodded, suddenly growing excited.

"All I need a sponsor. I can't afford to throw it myself– not to mention the fact that I'm not even sure people would even show up. I just think there are so many opportunities in STEM fields that more girls would thrive in if they were just encouraged enough." You continued, eyebrows furrowing as you began to think.

"Do you know that just a few years ago we made the first-ever artificial heart. A heart, Jungkook; a man got to live an additional one hundred and twelve days even though his original heart was nearly ripped to shreds. And just a few months ago, a child was born through gestational surrogacy. The woman who birthed her was literally just a human surrogate, she didn't pass down any DNA to the child. None! I mean, babies can be born from Petri dishes! We are literally changing the boundaries of fertility and sterility as we know it!"

Jungkook was grinning as he watched you speak. He couldn't help it. Here you were, decked out in your lab coat and goggles, scalpel in hand as you rambled on about science. It was kind of endearing, he noted... in a dorky way, at least.

"So, uh, yeah. Sorry, I just…" You came back down to earth eventually, noting the way he was staring at you with amusement. You hadn't meant to get so caught up in your thoughts. "I realize that probably isn't as exciting to everyone as it is to me. That was my attempt at making conversation."

Jungkook had a dumb look on his face, and you weren't surprised at all with his reply.

"You know... I bet there's someone out there that finds all your science talk really hot."

You let out a deep sigh, shoulders slumping down in defeat.

"Not everything is about sex, you know."

"No, but everything interesting is." He grinned lopsidedly.

Jungkook had this unusually natural composure about him. As if he could shrug off any inconvenience with one stupid smile.

How frustrating. It made it increasingly difficult for you to stay mad at him for very long.

"Come on, meathead. Let's get this over with." You rolled your eyes, nudging your shoulder into his muscular one.

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"Y/N!" Jungkook's voice called out, halting you mid-stride.

You let out a sigh, forcing a smile onto your face as you turned around, watching as an expectant looking Jungkook jogged over to you, his hair bouncing with every step.

"Hey," He breathed out as he reached you, "you left so fast I didn't get a chance to say goodbye."

Yeah, and you thought you had gotten away with it too.

Jungkook wasn't a bad kid; he was funny and didn't take things too seriously– even if those qualities about him were slightly frustrating. No, Jungkook was alright you supposed, but that didn't mean the two of you were suddenly best friends. You didn't care much for formalities, especially when all you wanted to do was go back to your dorm, shower, and take a nap.

"Oh, right. Sorry." You recognized, adjusting the strap of your bag over your shoulder.

Jungkook merely smiled at you, and you wondered if he was gonna say anything else. Realizing that he wasn't, you pressed your lips together awkwardly.

"Well... bye." You nodded stiffly, already moving to turn and make your exit. A warm hand wrapping around your wrist stopped you from getting any further, however.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!"

You stared down at where Jungkook's fingers touched your skin, your eyes wide in surprise. He must have noticed the way your body tensed because he let go of you as quickly as he grabbed you.

"I've, uh, actually got something I want to talk to you about." He grinned sheepishly, the same hand coming up to rub at the back of his neck.

You cleared your throat, pushing down the way your stomach was doing nervous flips, unfortunately, affected by the unexpected skinship. You tilted your chin up silently, urging Jungkook to continue.

"This is gonna sound sudden... and I know you don't really know me..." Jungkook began, causing your stomach to drop in horror.

Oh, God. Was... Was Jeon Jungkook going to ask you out?

"Spit it out, Jeon." You ordered, voice spiked high as your nerves began to rack.

"Would you mind dating me to make my girlfriend jealous?"

You blinked dryly, taking a moment to replay in your head just exactly what Jungkook had asked of you.

Okay... so not quite the love confession you were anticipating...

"Would I mind– What?" You gaped in disbelief.

"It wouldn't be for, like, too long. Probably just for a party or two." Jungkook shrugged as if anything he was saying was making any sense.

You shook your head, "Wait– Seriously, time out. What on earth are you asking me right now?"

Jungkook slipped both his hands into his jacket, which you had only just now taken a moment to admire. It was a brown leather bomber jacket with a few military patches sewn into the sleeves that you assumed must have come with the jacket as Jungkook didn't seem like the crafty type. Most of all, it looked warm and it reminded you that every second you stood here talking to Jungkook was a second you could be spending warm in your dorm under your covers.

"I was thinking about what you said. About showing my ex what she's missing." He explained.

"And you thought that was me auctioning myself off to be your fake girlfriend?" You laughed.

"Look, I know her, okay? If she were to think that you and I were a thing, she'd want to get back together."

You let out a sigh. This relationship of Jungkook's was revealing itself to be suckier and suckier as time went on.

"Why me?" You pressed. "I don't even know who your girlfriend is and I doubt she knows me. Is she in a sorority by chance?"

"Well, yeah–"

"Great! Get with one of her sorority sisters then. Give her a taste of her own medicine." You actually weren't usually one to promote revenge but, hell, if it meant it would get Jungkook off your ass then you were all for it.

"No can do. It's gotta be someone new and that Kiri doesn't know otherwise she won't care." Jungkook tutted.

"I'm not following." You admitted, truly not understanding why Jungkook was asking you of all people. You had only spent two hours with the guy. What about you in a lab coat and reeking of formaldehyde had told him that you were fake girlfriend material?

Jungkook suddenly took a look around and you followed suit, growing even more confused when Jungkook stepped closer and dropped his voice low.

"Kiri... she's president of her sorority; pretty, social, popular, you feel me? If I get someone like her then it just looks like I'm trying to replace her. But if I get–"

"If you say 'someone like you' as in implying I am neither of those things, I'll sock you in the nose." You scoffed, crossing your arms over your chest.

"–someone smart and independent, things that she's not, then she'll think I'm trying to forget her, which is what will get her attention. She'll be pissed, it's perfect." The dark-haired boy concluded, looking smug as if he had said something profound.

"Wow, you really are prince charming." You mused dryly. "Well, sorry to burst your bubble but I have no interest in being used as a pawn in your love game so..."

"You wouldn't be a pawn." Jungkook shook his head. "You'd be rewarded for your services–"

"Isn't that prostitution?" You cut off cheekily, causing Jungkook to roll his eyes.

"–I can help you fund your event." He continued.

At his words, you froze. Your head cocked to the side cautiously as you stared back at him, trying to decipher his sincerity.

"You can?"

Finally. This was the first time Jungkook could tell he had actually piqued your interest enough to really listen to him.

"Beta Tau Sigma. Our frat gets a monetary grant every semester in exchange for helping out in the community and helping fund an event for education sure would make us look damn good. While I'm not on the finance committee, one of my closest brothers is and I can totally pitch hosting your event to him."

"Holy shit..." You breathed out quietly, his words clearly making an impression on you.

If Beta Tau Sigma were to sponsor your event, not only could you afford to throw it but there was a real chance that people would actually come. Greek life was everything to your university and there weren't many significant school events that a frat or sorority wasn't behind.

Hold on. Why were you seriously considering this right now?

"But, I mean, you don't want to get involved in my love life, right? It's cool. See you next class, Y/N."

Jungkook shrugged coolly, spinning on his heel as he began to walk away, dismissing you with a simple gesture of a hand.

Your mind was racing. You had poured so much time into planning this event... Could the solution to finally getting it standing on its own two feet be found in some cocky frat boy? Was your pride that dismissable that you'd pretend to date him just to get what you wanted?

"Jungkook!" Was your inner conflict's final decision.

The boy paused his motions, his knowing smirk hidden as he had his back towards you.

"Hm?" He feigned innocence as he turned to face you.

"If you can seriously get your frat to sponsor my event, then..."

You took a step towards him, words trailing off.

Jungkook took a moment to look you up and down. You were dressed in jeans and a black knit sweater, the outline of a small kitten embroidered on it with white thread. It was an amusing juxtaposition given the nature of your personality.

Your hands were clenched into small fists, a shining, determined gleam in your ardent eyes.

"Then?" He mused smugly.

"Then I'll be the most bitchin' fake girlfriend you've ever had." You declared, a wide grin crawling along the length of your mouth.

Jungkook said nothing at first, just staring at you in silent reverence. He knew he hardly knew you but something about the resolve in your tone had him believing every word.

He extended a hand out towards you, catching you by surprise.

"So, do we have a deal? Partners?" There was mischievous timber to his words, the kind that made you feel as if this would all later come back to bite you in the ass.

Pushing that pestering thought away, you took his hand into yours, holding his eyes as you gave it a firm shake.

"Partners."

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violetnotez · 4 years

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Big Bro Dabi- (PLATONIC) Dabi x Reader

Anonymous: I saw request were opened and i wanted to request a dabi related one. It could be HC or a short story its all up to you, but what about the reader kinda of being a little sister to dabi? (Not by blood ) like she was a villain herself in the league and dabi and her get close and form a close brother sister bond, but after a mission shes left behind and captured by the heros what happens from there is up to you! But i always wanted to see how dabi would be in the role of a big bro

Omg anon this is such a cool idea I read this and I am completely in love with a big brother Dabi!!!

I broke this up into a mini fic, HC, and then the request is at the bottom (cause I may or may not have gone a little overboard with the idea *u*)

Also- this is a completely PLATONIC bother and sister relationship between y/n and Dabi, nothing romantic at all!

(RULES | MASTERLIST| REQUESTS OPEN!!! :))

-----------

How You Met:

“Don't touch me!” the girl pleaded frantically, her hands and face covered in dirt and soot, her clothes tattered.

Dani stared at her terrified face, confusion riddled in his brows.

She didn’t look scared of him, no-she was scared of herself. Her arms were riddled with cuts and bruises from her quirk-she obviously didn’t have control over it.

A memory flitted into his body, making his body cringe from pain-he remembered when he couldn’t control his quirk, the effects of that permanently set into his skin.

He looked at the girl, empathy he hadn’t felt in a very long time filling his stomach. He crouched down, holding out a scarred hand.

The girl stared at him with shocked, tear stained eyes.

“Didn’t you listen to me?!?” you yelled, panic in your voice, “I said don’t touch me-I’m dangerous!”

“What’s so bad about being dangerous?” Dabi questioned, making you go silent.

“Your quirk isn’t a bad thing,” he continued, “it’s just powerful.”

He gave himself a small minute to think-if you could join the League and control that quirk of yours, you could be a good asset to the team. It was powerful, and even though you didnt have a handle on it right now, didnt mean you couldnt learn how to.

“Come with me,” he commanded gently, “I can help you-you won’t hurt yourself anymore.”

You kept staring at his hand, the purple skin becoming a blur in your tears.

“But I’ll hurt you.”

He chuckled darkly, shaking his head.

“You won’t-you see how scarred my skin is? That’s because I couldn’t control my quirk either-the scarred skin doesn’t feel sensations all too well. But I learned though, and I'm fine. And you will too-just take my hand. I promise you’ll be okay.”

You stared at his face, your chest heavily slightly with the comforting thought of being with someone who finally wanted to help you, and who understood what you were going through.

You slowly took his hand, allowing him to help you from the ground.

------------

Big Brother Dabi HC

Nobody knew how overprotective Dabi would be

He’s very good at giving you space, but if he sees any man so much as glance at you

He is going to give them a glare that could kill

It probably can

Pray for the boys that try to flirt or ask you out

You will have to literally restrain Dabi because he will want to char them to a crisp

Is a total dick all the time

Like he will randomly snatch up your phone and hold it up because he is a GIANT and smirk at you as you try and get it back

Will scold you for using cuss words but will use them himself

Hates seeing you cry- he will let you cry in peace first and then come after with your fav food and will listen to what’s wrong

If somebody actually made you cry- Jesus Christ he will find them and hurt them so bad they will have to go to the ER

This man dont play around

You and Toga will most likely be super close like sisters and all three of you will be wrecking havoc

You and Toga have begged Dabi to let you two do his makeup

Always tells you straight up “Hell no”

Doesn’t mean you won’t put it on his face when he sleeps right?

Almost burnt your face off when he woke up and found himself gliterry eyeliner and lipstick

Asks you for help when he dyes his hair and you have to get a step stool to reach his head

He is so TALLLLL

Is constantly forcing you to train

He knows you hate it and he isn’t very fond of it either but it’s good bonding time

But he’s just terrified he’ll lose you in battle one day and he can’t even stand the idea of it

------------

FIC: Getting Taken Hostage By the Heroes

“Holy shit-Dabi!” you gasped, pointing at the bodies coming towards you ,the sound of poilce sirens filling the air.

Dabi followed your outstretched finger, seeing why you were so worried- you two had been cornered in a matter of seconds.

“How the hell did they figure out our plan?” Dabi asked as you both broke out in a run, trying to get hidden in the trees of the forest you were currently in.

Shigaraki had split up the League earlier in order to get a better success of the mission- Him and Black Mist would be giving commands, while Toga and Twice actually went in to do the dirty work of the mission. All you and Dabi had to do was keep watch outside, something you both found insignificant and boring. But you didn't expect the police to show up, let alone the Heroes.

“How the hell- am I supposed to know?!” you panted, trying to keep up with Dabi’s pace. “We just need to get out-”

Footsteps were getting louder behind you, shouts of the Heroes trying to follow your path making your heart beat reverently against your rib cage. You didn't want to think about getting caught by the heroes- you knew they couldn't do anything to harm you, it was against their whole moral basis for their profession, but the thought of going on trial and dealing with not being free to do what you wanted made your spine shiver. You would never let somebody control your life- you’d rather die than do that.

Dabi kept on running, the night making it hard to see in front of him. He secretly felt grateful for having such a tall stature, because he was able to run quickly and get some distance with the heroes. You, though, weren't so lucky- he was hoping that you were holding up and able to follow him, even if you had a hard time keeping up. The heroes sounded to be getting closer, and he couldn't help but feel a small jolt of fear: if they caught him or you, you both would be done for, and he couldn't stand the idea of you getting caught-

A scream filled the night air, making his blood run cold.

“DABI!” you shrieked, feeling a rough hand wrap around your arm. One of the heroes had finally caught up to you, using his powerful strength to pull you from running back to Dabi.

Dabi swiveled around, unable to find you. God damn it- he should have checked to make sure you were right behind him. What the hell was he thinking? Dabi cursed at himself, panic and fury filling in his stomach as he heard his name being screamed again.

He looked at the trees, trying to figure out which opening would lead to you. Why the hell did you have to get caught?

He quickly decided on a direction, going into a sprint as anger began to rise in his stomach. Whoever caught you and was making you that scared was going to fucking pay- nobody hurt the people he loved.

Dabi had begun to regard you like a sister, seeing alot of himself in you: you at first had trouble controlling your quirk, making you feel terrified of yourself and weak. But as he began to train you, he realized he found himself growing to like you: you were snarky, sarcastic as hell, and silly enough to even make him chuckle a little. You were beginning to be something of a little sister to him, and he was willing to do anything to protect you.

“Stop squirming!” the hero commanded, his strength making your arm begin to tingle with pain.

“Go to hell!” you spat back, not caring you were being disrespectful.

“DABI!” you screamed again, continuing to fight against the hero. You felt trapped, like a prey getting caught by a predator.

You heard another pair of feet run behind you, your heart sinking seeing that they were not Dabi’s but yet another Hero.

“You caught one of them?” the new comer asked, making you shoot daggers into their eyes.

“Yes, but she’s not cooperating,” the other struggled to say as you fought against their grip.

The new Hero looked at your with scorn, your desperate attempts to flee making him frown.

“Maybe some time at the station will make them calm down,” they commented, the other nodding in agreement.

You eyes became wide with fear, your stomach feeling heavy.

“Your both fucking hilarious, thinking I’m going to go there! Your asses are going to be dead!” you retorted, making them both a little shocked you would so outright cuss them out.

“I’d watch your mouth-”

“Lets just take her!” the other interrupted his comrade, the latter grunting in distatse as they began to drag you away.

Fear erupted in your stomach as you were unable to get yourself away from the Heroes. You refused to get taken by them- you weren't going without a fight. You began clawing and kicking like an animal, not caring you were most likely hurting the Hero.

“Dabi! DABI!” you screamed out again- he wasnt that far away when you had gotten caught- he was okay right?- he heard you, didnt he?- he couldnt have gotten caught-

The new comer looked back, throwing a confused dirty look at your struggling form. “Who is she even calling to?”

The hero holding onto you stopped abruptly, looking at a figure in front of him.

The other noticed his sudden change, looking over his shoulder to find himself face to face with Dabi, his lazy smirk sending a wave of comfort to envelope your body.

“She’s calling for me,” he answered, his voice steady and strong. “Now, if you let her ago, you two wont get hurt- that bad.”

“You really think we’d give up that easy?! You’re crazy,” the newcomer retorted, taking on a battle stance.

You stared at Dabi, the pain in your arm pulsing as you watched his expression. Fear began to ripple inside you- to anyone who saw Dabi, he looked calm and collected- bored even. But you knew him too well- the clench in his jaw and the fire in his eyes told you he was furious, and when he was furious, he wasnt afraid to kill.

“Alright,” he shrugged, rolling his eyes, “suit yourself.”

Just then, you felt the intense grip on your arm release, the hero cryng out in pain as his arm became painted with his own blood. You looked to your side, hearing the manic giggles of Toga as she hide in the trees, her knives glinting in the moonlight. Twice then tackled the latter Hero, making them curse as they fought with the multitude of clones he created.

A smile enveloped on your face- you were safe. Your friends had your back.

Your vision became to froth with purple and black mist, knowing full well that Kurogiri was close by as your body began to sink into his portal-like quirk. You noticed the others began to do the same, Toga slinking in to her own with a love sink grin with Twice following behind.

Only Dabi didnt step into his own.

Just before you fully submerged, you watched Dabi look at the battered heroes with hatred. He raised his scarred hand, your vision turning a dangerous color of fiery blue as he activated his quirk, painting the night icy white.

-----------------

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himbeaux-on-ice · 3 years

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Who are your top five NHL teams and why?

Ooooo this is fun! Thanks anon!

Short list:

Habs ❤️🤍💙

Pens 🐧

Canucks 🌈🌊

Caps 🦅

Leafs 🟦🍁🟦 (no really! I know I don’t talk about them much but its true!)

Over-wordy explanations/backstory for my relationship to each of these teams below the cut for those interested!

Montreal Canadiens. My dearly beloved Nana, who half-raised me, is a lifelong diehard Habs fan who grew up listening to their games on the radio and then later as an adult watching them duel with the Leafs on Saturday nights on a black-and-white tv (also a BIG Carey Price stan). Needless to say she rubbed off on me immensely, and I remember saying to myself at some point “well, if that’s Nana’s team, that’s gonna be my team too” and it stuck for life. I also had a friend in middle school who was a RELIGIOUS Habs fan who also worshipped at the altar of Jesus Price in those early 2010’s, so I heard a LOT about all of that every lunch break as he argued with friends who were Pens and Bruins fans lol. We went on the Bell Centre tour during the annual 9th grade French class trip to Quebec, and while I was mostly focused on getting to the gift shop to buy Nana a souvenir, I swear my friend’s eyes were the size of quarters the whole time lmao. (Would LOVE to go back now that I care a lot). Basically the Habs are the closest thing to a local NHL team our region has bc we get their broadcasts (though people choose their own team allegiances for various random personal reasons), and I grew up absorbing through osmosis both the legends of yore and the latest updates on whatever Carey and PK and the lads were up to. (Also I’ve been quietly in love with Price myself since at least the 2014 Olympics lol. My first best fav ❤️) Bottom line the Habs are My Team, the “I’m gonna be here even when it sucks, even when players move on, this is attached to me in a way I can’t quite explain” team that every hockey fan has in their heart. GO HABS GO!

Pittsburgh Penguins. If you were an elementary school kid in Nova Scotia when Sidney Crosby was first released and up through the 2010’s, you had two options: love him, or hate him, but you better accept you’re gonna be hearing about him a LOT. I settled on “vague fondness” and followed Sid from a newspaper-scanning distance and vaguely rooted for him because when he brought the Cup home it felt like we all won. And like I said, lots of passionate Pens fans in my grade school classes to hear from (he’s also the only non-Habs player my Nana likes lol). Then I got into hockey properly last year and learned about Geno beyond just knowing his name, and my chronic affection for large loveable Russians got combined with my longstanding vague “I hope the Penguins win” feelings and my “time to get the full story on the Sidney Crosby’s Penguins narrative I only ever watched from a distance” research, in a manner not unlike the creation of the PowerPuff Girls ([chemical X] etc etc lol) to create a potent adoration for this team that rocketed them to second place in my heart. Also the fandom is just so damn fun and makes such great content, and that definitely feeds my level of engagement with the Pens!! Sometimes, when I want an emotional pick-me-up I watch one of their last 3 championship films just to remember what joy and optimism is — I would love to be present as a real-time fan for another adventure like that. With how much I know about them and how much I care, they’re my #2 for sure. I love those flightless fucks!!

Vancouver Canucks. So I started watching live NHL hockey games last summer around I think game 2 of the Habs’ first round series against the Flyers (I saw Price’s “Miracle Save” on twitter while following along bc I was intrigued by the fact that they made it through the play-ins, and was like “OKAY NOW I GOTTA SEE THIS SHIT LIVE”). That was really fun! Riiiight up until the Habs got eliminated. :/ And I was like “well, shit. I’m enjoying this hockey thing too much to stop now. who else is still around I can root for?” And the Canucks were the last Canadian team still in it, and there was buzz about their miraculous first-round win but also uncertainty I believe Markstrom had *just* got injured. So I started watching, ended up witnessing the Bubble Demko Miracle unfold live, had my heart charmed off me by “whatever the hell those two lil blonde bitches have going on” and a delightful underdog story, and here I am. Hitched to the Canuck wagon whether I enjoy it or not. Here for whatever happens! (Doesn’t hurt that I love me some Elton John too 😉)

Washington Capitals. I’m a person who is more likely to be really engaged with a team that has super interesting personalities, characters, and narratives around it — and my GOD are the Capitals good for that. I absolutely definitely started down this road with that mic’d up video from the 2018 final of Ovi telling Nicke “after me, I give it to you baby!” re: the Cup. Like I can pinpoint that there was a day I saw that for the first time in a gifset, squinted at the screen, said “you’re fucking with me...”, went to youtube, watched it be for reals, and was like “well. now I need to know more about ALL this.” After watching games and learning more about the team, I really enjoy the Caps’ “big dumb found family of stone-cold total weirdos” energy, their fun collective chemistry, their Cup story, etc. And oh BOY the fandom is fun during game lb’s! I love all the in-jokes and player nicknames, our delight with the quirks of our colourful wonderful broadcast crew (shoutout Wine Uncles & Co), the way we cheer for record-breaking milestones like they’re a first NHL goal! Being a fan of the Caps AND the Pens can be a bit awkward sometimes, and the team certainly has its blemishes, but my heart is big enough for two Metro teams for sure, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Toronto Maple Leafs. So like, as you can imagine from my previously described upbringing in Hab Land, “haha Leafs suck” is a punchline I have long been familiar with and trained to recite. I got a solid 3 days of laughter and entertainment out of the whole Zamboni Driver Saga last February, oh boy did I ever. But the thing is.... I have the Leafs to thank for the fact that I watch hockey now. See, the entire reason I started paying proper attention to the playoff bubble last summer was because one day, I happened to see the phrase “WHAT IS HAPPENING” trending at 16k tweets on twitter, and clicked on it like “huh?”. Turns out the Leafs were in the middle of their miraculous 3-minute comeback against Columbus and the country was losing its mind. And when they won, I was like “huh... the Zamboni Team is doing THIS??? I may have to start paying attention to this playoffs thing, because if they go All The Way I think that might be the only thing funnier than the Zamboni Incident”. Aaaaand when they immediately lost the next game and were eliminated I was like “lol, sounds about right” and was then immediately distracted by news of the Habs winning the play-in round. So then I spent several months watching playoffs and forgetting about the Leafs. And then one day in early October, looking on YouTube for more hockey to watch after the playoffs ended, I stumbled across something called a Hat Pick, and boy I actually enjoyed this shouty man’s sense of humour and takes on the game... and then when I ran out of Hat Picks and Dangits I watched some Trade Trees, which pulled back the curtain on the business side of the game... and then I discovered LFR’s, which were good background noise for doing tasks... and then I was recommended the episode of the Steve Dangle Podcast about Mitch Marner and The List... and next thing I knew I was listening to more of this podcast, because I found Steve and the guys to be insightful and funny and there was no hockey to watch, and I was trepidatious about accidentally stumbling into the more toxic corners of hockey fandom if I branched out for other content... and, well. If you spend enough hours listening to people passionately analyze every facet of a team, shout and cheer over a team, make fun of that team, nearly cry over that team... it’s really REALLY hard to not start to care about it. Leafs analysis was basically how I learned most of what I’ve learned about hockey this past year! And kudos to Steve and Adam and Jesse, their passionate investment in the Leafs and great content has got ME invested in the Leafs mainly because I want to see things go well for them. I want Charlie Brown to kick the football! I love a triumph over adversity story! Also, I think if the Leafs did Do The Thing it would basically be the combination of “Cubs win the World Series” and “Raptors are the champs” and I wanna watch the city of Toronto go fully apeshit from a safe distance. I don’t adore many their individual players as much as I do some other teams higher on this list, and I still laugh far too much when things go super comically impossibly badly for them, but I am actually pulling for the Leafs!! I want to see it all pay off for them. I want them to go all the way. Gimme that “LEAFS WIN!!!” (Unless it’s against someone above them on this list lol)

#if u get the joke in the Canucks emojis bless u #long post #asks #anon #actually I would root Leafs in a TOR vs WSH playoff series but it would break my heart to do so lol #Washington has a Cup already ya know?

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black-streak · 4 years

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Waiting for the Worms - Run like Hell

Part 21

Turns out, I was so put off by my lack of writing over the last week or so and annoyed at my sickness that I decided to shove through this chapter as well. Took me so much less time to write than usual.

I only have... Two more chapters planned out for this fic and I'm pretty sure that'll be the end of this. Maybe snippets that didn't fit the story line or the likes will come after, but the official end is almost upon us.

CLOSED LIST of the following dedicated readers: @northernbluetongue @thethirdwheelfriend @shizukiryuu @theatreandcomicfreak @michellemagic @karategirl119 @moonlightstar64 @my-name-is-michell @mystery-5-5 @zalladane @queen-of-the-trash-planet-tm @miraculousdisapointment @dorkus-minimus @jardimazul @allthebooksandcrannies @g-arya @worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry @persephonescat @mycupisbroken @luciferge @18-fandoms-unite-08 @dawnwave16 @alwaysreblogneverpost @kris-pines04 @emjrabbitwolf @mysteriouslyswimmingfan-blo-blog @weird-pale-blonde-person @you-will-never-know-how-i-think @kokotaru @naclychilli @slytherinhquinn @clumsy-owl-4178 @ladybug-182 @darkthunder1589 @evil-elf16 @dast218 @lysslovsanime @emilytopaz @naoryllis @iloontjeboontje @thepeacetea @danielslilangel @finallyaniguana @i-like-fairytail-and-stuff @vixen-uchiha @yuulxd @bleeding-heart-romantic @magic-inthe-stars @st0rmy-w1th1n

~---~

Old habits die hard when you try for cold turkey. Jason and the team knew that for a fact. It's why they ended up switching up miraculouses and patrolling random cities on intervals. It also helped in that it made their existence more world surfacing. Random sightings across a global scale of humanesque animal figures prowling the nights, taking out petty crooks and villains alike. Lurking in shadows and watching the nightlife unfold below them. Guardians to all. One miraculous never appeared with the same figure in one city for more than a few nights, not since Paris.

No one needed to know it was just their group becoming restless from inactivity.

For that same reason, it came second nature to switch hands and even travel to collect different kwamis that night for a patrol around the Gotham rooftops. Not a one of them commented on the assassin or little bird that followed them from a mile off. Marinette and Tim had the right to their own restlessness and surely Tim wished to study their team further. To determine how they worked together, their dynamic, their morals.

Damian had pitched a fit until Mari made him promise to stay home so as to keep his existence unknown to the Bat, allowing him to stay watch over the remaining kwamis for the night. The boy had settled down right away and curled up on the couch with his pocket sized pets.

Occasionally the two behind them would stop a little ways off, the assassin pointing out their figures as they made specific choices or movements and explaining how it worked, how they made the decision, and how to replicate it. The sheer trust she instilled in her bird companion threw them all for a loop, but they refused to question her in this, especially in front of him.

Other times, he stopped her to point out different aspects of the city that had changed or ask an opinion of her. They couldn't help but wonder if the boy knew they all had enhanced senses in this form and knew every word that came from their lips. If he did, he made the choice to allow them to hear, obviously trained enough to keep out of even animal hearing ranges if need be. Otherwise, he thought them far away enough or simply didn't care if they could. Jason hoped he knew, hoped Mari informed the bird and allowed him the choice. It was always a toss up on if she felt the need to be open and honest or to deceive those around her. Normally, Jason could tell, but not quite from this distance.

The comm unit Marinette picked up from Babs picked up halfway through their night, "B's in your route," Oracle informed.

"Any chance you can derail him?" Mari asked, as Jason turned to stare back at the twitching form of Robin. Nothing else gave him away, the face emotionless and stance as relaxed as a vigilantes could afford, except the slight twitch at the words being spoke into the two's ears.

"Not a chance. He's caught sight of a curly tailed figure in pink ahead."

Chloe.

"He's likely to run in to the bunch then. We'll split from here and make our way around," Mari responded as the bird took a step closer to her, hand reaching for his own ear.

"He's livid, isn't he?"

"Beyond so."

"Presumptuous over my disappearance?"

"Barely took note until a few nights ago. Now under the impression they stole you to get back at him."

Jason watched as the kid suppressed a flinch and ground his jaw instead, "He thought I went to the titans, didn't he?"

"Yup. Only made his second theory after a check in with them revealed you never came by. You know, for the world's supposed greatest detective, he refuses to use even a quarter of his brain towards people he claims to care about."

"When has he ever claimed to care about me?"

"Touche," the comm went quiet again as the two started in another direction and Jason began to turn towards where he knew Chloe would run into the man soon enough.

"Shit!" He whipped back around at Oracle's curse.

"He's caught sight of you, Robin. Sorry Tim, you've got to make your choice now, he's headed your way," she let off a stream of curses as everyone froze for a moment before everything went into motion once more.

Jason directed his team to intercept as the assassin gestured the bird forward, allowing him to run ahead of her away from Batman as the others took on the Bat, attempting to distract the man from his goal.

He hated the idea of forcing Tim into facing off with Bruce at this point. He deserved the time to make his mind up first. That however seemed to be off the table as the bat evaded them all as best he could, taking advantage of their using miraculous they were less familiar with to escape and continue his pursuit of the red, green, and yellow suit running away from the scene. At his juncture, all he could do was keep on the man's cape, following him leap for leap towards the two getaways.

The two were lithe and agile, keeping pace together as they bounded from rooftop to rooftop, slipping around corners and scurrying up walls with not a moment to spare as the Bat's size prevented him from making the same moves.

Robin would yank her down side alleys and up hidden ramps he left about the city as she guided him through the less savory parts of town that she grew up with Jason in, knowing hidden pathways and spaces too small and unknown for the bulk of the larger pursuants to follow, losing distance while trying to relocate the two without slowing down. Sure, Jason knew those paths as well as she did, but there was no way he would give that away, forcing the man to continue moving to evade him, even without a clear direction of which way they went.

At one point, Batman landed a hair too close, hand snagging into the cape of Robin's uniform. It was sheer luck on all of their parts that his companion noticed a second earlier and unclasped the damned thing a moment before, the cape coming loose in the man's hand right above a hundred foot drop, fueling the anger in Jason's blood at the blatant disregard for the boy's safety. He felt his eyes tilt green, but fought off the urge, forcing his focus on keeping up with the three to ensure the man never caught up with the two.

They swerved off path and Jason wished he could say he realized what was happening, but unfortunately couldn't as they landed directly in the path of the two, cutting them off from their escape.

Robin lurched back into the Assassin's chest, where she steadied him before offering for him to hide behind her despite the similarity in stature not offering much in the way of coverage. Jason gave props for the way Robin shook his head and stood firmly in place, once more emotionless. Not guilty as the first Robin might've been, nor defiant as he would've. Simply closed off in a glacier ice in contrast to Batman's thunderous storm.

"Robin. You look well," the bats eyes narrowed.

"Well thank you, I appreciate your noticing," he responded in the clipped tone of the backhanded socialites he was raised around, knowing how it irritated Bruce when the sarcasm was laced with sincerity.

"With such health, I must wonder why you've yet to return," Batman hedged, starting to put together the pieces.

"Simply observing all my options as I was advised. Would hate to miss out on a better opportunity due to negligence."

The man growled, hearing the accusation for what it was. Jason moved closer behind him, ready to intervene if needed. The figure behind Tim closed in as well, resting a careful hand on the boy's back. The man before them only seemed to tense up at this, lurching forward, only for the way to be blocked.

"Oh hey, Birdy. Looks like you have some interesting company here, mind introducing me?" Nightwing casually strolled over to Robin, draping his arm across smaller shoulders and leading him away, smiling at the assassin, eyes cutting to Batman in a challenge, "I'm sure the Bat won't mind seeing himself out so I can catch up with my baby brothers."

The man tensed up, taking in their figures, three of which he trained himself, another that received the same, if not more training than him. Then glancing up to the four dark figures watching from further up, ready to descend at a moment's notice. Looking back to his eldest, his scowl deepened, but he nodded and took off from the group.

Jason couldn't help but wonder if it were due to the likelihood of his loss or just not thinking Tim worth the effort. As much as the latter pissed him off, he couldn't help but be glad for the lack of a fight. He's not sure how long he could hold off the pit madness had it come to blows.

As soon as the Bat fell out of range, Robin looked up towards Nightwing, "You're here as well?"

"Oracle sent me in. I think we have some catching up to do," he smiled at the boy, then looked up towards Jason as though to include him in his words.

Marinette chose this moment to speak up from under her guise, "Oh hey, Richard. Fancy seeing you here."

#jasonette #maribat #ml x dc #WFTW #part 21 #two chapters left #has it really been two and a half months since i started this?#woah

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livingdeadinsideyourhead · 3 years

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Free Music in a Capitalist Society - Iggy Pop's Keynote Speech Transcript

Hi, I'm Iggy Pop. I've held a steady job at BBC 6 Music now for almost a year, which is a long time in my game. I always hated radio and the jerks who pushed that shit music into my tender mind, with rare exceptions. When I was a boy, I used to sit for hours suffering through the entire US radio top 40 waiting for that one song by The Beatles and the other one by The Kinks. Had there been anything like John Peel available in my Midwestern town I would have been thrilled. So it's an honor to be here. I understand that. I appreciate it.

Some months ago when the idea of this talk came up I thought it might be okay to talk about free music in a Capitalist society. So that's what I'm gonna try to talk about. A society in which the Capitalist system dominates all the others, and seeks their destruction when they get in its way. Since then, the shit has really hit the fan on the subject, thanks to U2 and Apple. I worked half of my life for free. I didn't really think about that one way or the other, until the masters of the record industry kept complaining that I wasn't making them any money. To tell you the truth, when it comes to art, money is an unimportant detail. It just happens to be a huge one unimportant detail. But, a good LP is a being, it's not a product. It has a life-force, a personality, and a history, just like you and me. It can be your friend. Try explaining that to a weasel.

As I learned when I hit 30 +, and realized I was penniless, and almost unable to get my music released, music had become an industrial art and it was the people who excelled at the industry who got to make the art. I had to sell most of my future rights to keep making records to keep going. And now, thanks to digital advances, we have a very large industry, which is laughably maybe almost entirely pirate so nobody can collect shit. Well, it was to be expected. Everybody made a lot of money reselling all of recorded musical history in CD form back in the 90s, but now the cat is out of the bag and the new electronic devices which estrange people from their morals also make it easier to steal music than to pay for it. So there's gonna be a correction.

When I started The Stooges we were organized as a group of Utopian communists. All the money was held communally and we lived together while we shared the pursuit of a radical ideal. We shared all song writing, publishing and royalty credits equally – didn’t matter who wrote it - because we'd seen it on the back of a Doors album and thought it was cool, at least I did. Yeah. I thought songwriting was about the glory, I didn't know you'd get paid for it. We practiced a total immersion to try to forge a new approach which would be something of our own. Something of lasting value. Something that was going to be revealed and created and was not yet known.

We are now in the age of the schemer and the plan is always big, big, big, but it's the nature of the technology created in the service of the various schemes that the pond, while wide, is very shallow. Nobody cares about anything too deeply expect money. Running out of it, getting it. I never sincerely wanted to be rich. There is a, in the US, we have this guy “Do you sincerely wanna be rich? You can do it!” I didn’t sincerely want to be rich. I never sincerely felt like making anyone else that way. That made me a kind of a wild card in the 60's and 70's. I got into the game because it felt good to play and it felt like being free. I'm still hearing today about how my early works with The Stooges were flops. But they're still in print and they sell 45 years later, they sell. Okay, it took 20 or 25 years for the first royalties to roll in. So sue me.

Some of us who couldn't get anywhere for years kept beating our heads against the same wall to no avail. No one did that better than my friends The Ramones. They kept putting out album after album, frustrated that they weren't getting the hit. They even tried Phil Spector and his handgun. After the first couple of records, which made a big impact, they couldn't sustain the quality, but I noticed that every album had at least one great song and I thought, wow if these guys would just stop and give it a rest, society would for sure catch up to them. And that's what's happening now, but they're not around to enjoy it. I used to run into Johnny at a little rehearsal joint in New York and he'd be in a big room all alone with a Marshall stack just going "dum, dum, dum, dum, dum" all my himself. I asked him why and he said if he didn't practice doing that exactly the way he did it live he'd lose it. He was devoted and obsessive, so were Joey and Deedee. I like that. Johnny asked me one day - Iggy don't you hate Offspring and the way they're so popular with that crap they play. That should be us, they stole it from us. I told him look, some guys are born and raised to be the captain of the football team and some guys are just gonna be James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause and that's the way it is. Not everybody is meant to be big. Not everybody big is any good.

I only ever wanted the money because it was symbolic of love and the best thing I ever did was to make a lifetime commitment to continue playing music no matter what, which is what I resolved to do at the age of 18. If who you are is who you are that is really hard to steal, and it can lead you in all sorts of useful directions when the road ahead of you is blocked and it will get blocked. Now I'm older and I need all the dough I can get. So I too am concerned about losing those lovely royalties, now that they've finally arrived, in the maze of the Internet. But I'm also diversifying my income, because a stream will dry up. I'm not here to complain about that, I'm here to survive it.

When I was starting out as a full time musician I was walking down the street one bright afternoon in the seedier part of my Midwestern college town. I passed a dive bar and from it emerged a portly balding pallid middle aged musician in a white tux with a drink in one hand and a guitar in the other. He was blinking in the daylight. I had a strong intuition that this was a fate to be avoided. He seemed cut off from society and resigned to an oblivious obscurity. A bar fly. An accessory to booze. So how do you engage society as an artist and get them to pay you? Well, that's a matter of art. And endurance.

To start with, I cannot stress enough the importance of study. I was lucky to work in a discount record store in Ann Arbor Michigan as a stock boy where I was exposed to a little bit of every form of music imaginable on record at the time. I listened to it all whether I liked it or not. Be curious. And I played in my high school orchestra and I learned the joy of the warm organic instruments working together in the service of a classical piece. That sticks with you forever. If anyone out there can get a chance to put an instrument and some knowledge in some kids hand, you've done a great, great thing.

Comparative information is a key to freedom. I found other people who were smarter than me. To teach me. My first pro band was a blues band called The Prime Movers and the leader Michael Erlewine was a very bright hippy beatnik with a beautifully organized record collection in library form of The Blues. I'd never really heard the Blues. That part of our American heritage was kept off the major media. It was system up, people down. No Big Bill Broonzy on BBC for us. Boy I wish! No money in it. But everything I learned from Michael's beautiful library became the building blocks for anything good I've done since. Guys like this are priceless. If you find one, follow him, or her. Get the knowledge.

Once in secondary school in the 60's some class clowns dressed up the tallest guy in school in a trench coat, shades and a fedora and rushed him in to a school dance with great hubbub proclaiming "Del Shannon is here, Del Shannon is here." And until they got to the stage we all believed them, because nobody knew what Del Shannon looked like. He was just a voice on some great records. He had no social ID. By the early 60's that had really changed with the invasion of The Beatles and The Stones. This time TV was added to the mix and print media too. So you knew who they were, or so you thought anyway. I'm mentioning this because the best way to survive the death or change of an industry is to transcend its form. You're better off with an identity of your own or maybe a few of them. Something special.

It is my own personal view having lived through it that in America The Beatles replaced our assassinated president Kennedy, who represented our hopes for a certain kind of society. Didn’t get there. And The Stones replaced our assassinated folk music which our own leaders suppressed for cultural, racial, and financial reasons. It wasn't okay with everybody to be Kennedy or Muddy Waters, but those messages could be accepted if they came through white entertainers from the parent culture. That's why they’re still around.

Years later I had the impression that Apple, the corporation, had successfully co-opted the good feelings that the average American felt about the culture of the Beatles, by kind of stealing the name of their company so I bought a little stock. Good move. 1992. Woo! But look, everybody is subject to the rip off and has to change affiliations from time to time. Even Superman and Barbie were German before America tempted them to come over. Tough luck, Nietzche.

So who owns what anyway. Or as Bob Dylan said "The relationships of ownership." That’s gates of Eden. Nobody knows for long, especially these days. Apparently when BBC radio was founded, the record companies in England wouldn't allow the BBC to play their master recordings because they thought no one would buy them for their personal use if they could hear them free on the radio. So they were really confused about what they had. They didn’t get it. And how people feel about music. ‘Cause it’s a feel thing, and it resists logic. It’s not binary code. Later when CD's came in, the retail merchants in American all panicked because they were just too damn tiny and they thought that Americans want something that looks big, like a vinyl record. Well they had a point but their solution was a kind of Frankenstein called "The Long Box." It didn't fool anybody because half of it was empty. It had a little CD in the bottom. You’d open it up and it was empty. Now we have people in the Sahara using GPS to bury huge wads of Euros under sand dunes for safe keeping. But GPS was created for military spying from the high ground, not radical banking so any sophisticated system, along with the bounty it brings, is subject to primitive hijacking.

I wanna talk about a type of entrepreneur who functions as a kind of popular music patron of the arts. It’s good to know a patron. I call him El Padron because his relationship to the artist is essentially feudal, though benign. He or she (La Padrona) if you will, is someone, usually the product of successful, enlightened parents, who owns a record company, but has had benefit of a very good education, and can see a bigger picture than a petty business person. If they like an artists’ style and it suits them, they'll support you even if you’re not a big money spinner. I can tell you, some of these powerful guys get so bored that if you are fun in the office, you’ll go places. Their ancestors, the old time record crooks just made it their business to make great, great records, but also to rip off the artist 100%, copyright, publishing, royalty splits, agency fees, you name it. If anyone complained the line was "Pay you? We worship you!" God bless Bo Diddley.

By the time I came along, there was a new brand of Padron. People like this are still around and some can help you. One was named Jack Holzman. Jack had a beautiful label called Elektra Records, they put out Judy Collins, Tim Buckley, the Doors and Love. He'd started working in his family record store, like Brian Epstein. He dressed mod and he treated us very gently. He was a civilized man. He obviously loved the arts, but what he really wanted to do was build his business - and he did. He had his own concerns, and style, and you had to serve them, and of course when he sold out, as all indies do, you were stranded culturally in the hands of a cold clumsy conglomerate. But he put us in the right studios with the right producers and he tried to get us seen in the right venues and it really helped. This is a good example of the industry.

Another good guy I met is Sir Richard Branson. I ended up serving my full term at Virgin Records having been removed from every other label. And he created a superior culture there. People were happier and nicer than the weasels at some other places. The first time he tried to sign me it didn't work out, because I had my sights set on A&M, a company I thought would help make me respectable. After all they had Sting! Richard was secretly starting his own company at the time in the US and he phoned me in my tiny flat with no furniture. He said he'd give me a longer term deal with more dough than the other guys and he was very, very polite and soft spoken. But I had just smoked a joint that day and I couldn't make a decision. So I went with the other guys who soon got sick of me. Virgin picked me up again later on the rebound. And on the cheap. Damn. My own fault.

Another kind of indie legend who is slightly more contemporary is Long Gone John of the label Sympathy for the Record Industry. Good name. John is famous with some artists for his disinterest in paying royalties. He has a very interesting music themed folk art collection – its visible online - which includes my leather jacket. I wish he'd give it back. There are lots of indie people with a gift for organization who just kind of collect freaks and throw them up at the wall to see who sticks. You gotta watch 'em.

When you go a step down creatively from the Padrons who are actually entrepreneurs you get to the executives. You don't wanna know these guys. They usually came over from legal or accounting. They have protégés usually called A&R men to do their dirty work. You can become a favorite with them if your fame or image might reflect limelight on their career. They tend to have no personalities to speak of, which is their strength. Strangely they're never really thinking about the good of their parent company as much as old number one. Avoid them. If you’re an artist, they’ll make you sick or suicidal. The only good thing the conglomerate can do for you – and they’ve done it recently for me - is make you really, really ubiquitous. They do that well. But, when the company is your banker, then you are basically gonna be the Beverly Hill Billies. So it's best not to take their money. Especially when you’re young. These are very tough people, and they can hurt you.

So who are the good guys?! They asked me when they read this thing at BBC 6 Music. Well there are lots of them. If fact, today there are more than ever and they are just about all indies, but first I want to mention Peter Gabriel and WOMAD for everything they've done for what seems like forever to help the greatest musicians in the world, the so called world musicians to gain a foothold and make a living in the modern screwed up cash and carry world. Traditional music was never a for profit enterprise, all the best forms were developed as a kind of you’re job in the community. It was pretty good, it was “Yeah, I’m a musician, I’m gonna skip like doing the dishes or taking the trash out.” It's not surprising that all the greatest singers and players come from parts of the world where everybody is broke and the old ways are getting paved over. So it's crucial for everyone that these treasures not be lost. There are other people of means and intelligence who help others in this way like Philip Glass through Tibet House, David Burn with Luaka Bop, Damon Albarn through Honest John Records. Shout out to Hypnotic Brass Ensemble. Almost all the best music is coming out on indies today like XL Matador, Burger, Anti, Epitaph, Mute, Rough Trade, 4 A D, Sub Pop, etc. etc.

But now YouTube is trying to put the squeeze on these people because it's just easier for a power nerd to negotiate with a couple big labels who own the kind of music that people listen to when they're really not that into music, which of course is most people. So they've got the numbers. But the indies kind of have the guns. I've noticed that indies are showing strength at some of the established streaming services like Spotify and Rhapsody – people are choosing that music. And it's also great that some people are starting their own outlets, like Pledge Music, Band Camp or Drip. As the commercial trade swings more into general show biz the indies will be the only place to go for new talent, outside the Mickey Mouse Club, so I think they were right to band together and sign the Fair Digital Deals Declaration.

There are just so many ways to screw an artist that it's unbelievable. In the old vinyl days they would deduct 10% "breakage fees" for records supposedly broken in shipping, whether that happened or not, and now they have unattributed digital revenue, whatever the **** that means. It means money for some guy’s triple bypass. I actually think that what Thom Yorke has done with Bit Torrent is very good. I was gonna say here: “Sure the guy is a pirate at Bit Torrent” but I was warned legally, so I’ll say: “Sure the guy a Bit Torrent is a pirate’s friend” But all pirates want to go legit, just like I wanted to be respectable. It’s normal. After a while people feel like you’re a crook, it’s too hard to do business. So it’s good in this case that Thom Yorke is encouraging a positive change. The music is good. It’s being offered at a low price direct to people who care.

I want to try to define what I am talking about when I say free. For me in the arts or in the media, there are two kinds of free. One kind of free is when the process is something that people just feel for you. You feel a sense of possibility. You feel a lack of constraint. This leads to powerful, energetic, sometimes kind of loony situations.

Vice Media is an interesting case of this because they started as a free handout, using public funds, and they had open, free-wheeling minds. Originally a free handout was called Voice and these kids were like “Just get rid of the old! I don’t wanna be Vice, yeah!” Okay. By taking an immersive approach with no particular preconceptions to their reporting, they've become a huge success, also through corporate advertising, at attracting big, big money investment hundreds of millions of dollars now pumped into Fox Media and a couple of others bigger than that in the US. And they get it because they attract lots of little boy eyeballs. So they brought us Dennis Rodman in North Korea. And it’s kind of a travesty, but it’s kind of spunky. It's interesting that capital investment, for all its posturing, never really leads, it always follows. They follow the action. So if it's money you're after, be the yourself in a consistent way and you might get it. You’ll at least end up getting what you are worth and feel better. Just follow your nose.

The second kind of freedom to me that is important in the media is the idea of giving freely. When you feel or sense that someone that someone is giving you something not out of profit, but out of self-respect, Christian charity, whatever it is. That has a very powerful energy. The Guardian, in my understanding, was founded by an endowment by a successful man with a social conscience who wanted to help create a voice for what I would call the little guy. So they have a kind of moral mission or imperative. This has given them the latitude to try to be interesting, thoughtful, helpful. And they bring Edward Snowden to the world stage. Something that is not pleasant for a lot of people to hear about, but we need to know.

These two approaches couldn't be more different. To justify their new mega bucks Vice will have to expand and expand in capital terms. Presumably they'll have to titillate a dumb, but energetic audience. Of course all capitalist expansions are subject to the big bang – balloon, bust, poof, and you’re gone. As for the Guardian I would imagine that the task involves gaining the trust and support of a more discerning, less definable reader, without spending the principal. There is usually an antipathy between cultural poles, but these two actually have a lot in common in terms of the energy and nuisance to power that they are willing to generate. I wish red and blue could come together somehow.

Sometimes I'd rather read than listen to music. One of my favourite odd books is Bootleg: The Secret History of the Other Recording Industry by Clinton Heylin. I bought the book in the 90's because a couple of my bootlegs were mentioned. I loved my bootlegs. They did a lot for me. I never really thought about the dough much. I liked the titles, like Suck on This, Stow Away DOA or Metalic KO. The packaging was always way more creative and edgy than most of my official stuff. So I just liked being seen and heard, like anybody else. These bootleggers were creative. Here are two quotes from the dust jacket by veteran industry stalwarts on the subject of bootlegs in 1994.

"Bootleg is the thoroughly researched and highly entertaining tale of those colorful brigands, hapless amateurs, and true believers who have done wonders for my record collection. Rock and roll doesn't get more underground than this." – that was David Fricke, the music editor of Rolling Stone "I think that bootlegs keep the flame of the music alive by keeping it out of not only the industry's conception of the artist, but also the artist's conception of the artist." – that was Lenny Kaye from the Patti Smith group, musician, critic and my friend.

Wow!! Sounds heroic and vital!

I wonder what these guys feel about all of this now, because things have changed, haven't they? We are now talking about Megaupload, Kim Dot Com, big money, political power, and varying definitions of theft that are legally way over my head. But I know a con man when I see one. I want to include a rant from an early bootlegger in this discussion because it's so passionate and I just think it's funny.

This is Lou Cohan "If anybody thinks that if I have purchased every single Rolling Stones album in existence, and I have bought all the Rolling Stones albums that have been released in England, France, Japan, Italy, and Brazil that if I have an extra $100 in my pocket instead of buying a Rolling Stones bootleg I am going to buy a John Denver album or a Sinead O'Conner album, they are retarded."

So the guy is trying to say don't try to force me. And don't steal my choice. And the people who don't want the free U2 download are trying to say, don't try to force me. And they've got a point. Part of the process when you buy something from an artist. It’s a kind of anointing, you are giving people love. It’s your choice to give or withhold. You are giving a lot of yourself, besides the money. But in this particular case, without the convention, maybe some people felt like they were robbed of that chance and they have a point. It’s not the only point. These are not bad guys. But now, everybody's a bootlegger, but not as cute, and there are people out there just stealing the stuff and saying don't try to force me to pay. And that act of thieving will become a habit and that’s bad for everything. So we are exchanging the corporate rip off for the public one. Aided by power nerds. Kind of computer Putins. They just wanna get rich and powerful. And now the biggest bands are charging insane ticket prices or giving away music before it can flop, in an effort to stay huge. And there's something in this huge thing that kind of sucks.

Which brings us to Punk. The most punk thing I ever saw in my life was Malcolm McLaren's cardboard box full of dirty old winkle pinkers. It was the first thing I saw walking in the door of Let It Rock in 1972 which was his shop at Worlds End on the Kings Road. It was a huge ugly cardboard bin full of mismatched unpolished dried out winkle pickers without laces at some crazy price like maybe five pounds each. Another 200 yards up the street was Granny Takes a Trip, where they sold proper Rockstar clothes like scarves, velvet jackets, and snake skin platform boy boots. Malcolm's obviously worthless box of shit was like a fire bomb against the status quo because it was saying that these violent shoes have the right idea and they are worth more than your fashion, which serves a false value. This is right out of the French enlightenment.

So is the thieving that big a deal? Ethically, yes, and it destroys people because it's a bad road you take. But I don't think that's the biggest problem for the music biz. I think people are just a little bit bored, and more than a little bit broke. No money. Especially simple working people who have been totally left out, screwed and abandoned. If I had to depend on what I actually get from sales I’d be tending bars between sets. I mean honestly it’s become a patronage system. There’s a lot of corps involved and I don’t fault any of them but it’s not as much fun as playing at the Music Machine in Camden Town in 1977. There is a general atmosphere of resentment, pressure, kind of strange perpetual war, dripping on all the time. And I think that prosecuting some college kid because she shared a file is a lot like sending somebody to Australia 200 years ago for poaching his lordship's rabbit. That's how it must seem to poor people who just want to watch a crappy movie for free after they’ve been working themselves to death all day at Tesco or whatever, you know.

If I wanna make music, at this point in my life I'd rather do what I want, and do it for free, which I do, or cheap, if I can afford to. I can. And fund through alternative means, like a film budget, or a fashion website, both of which I've done. Those seem to be turning out better for me than the official rock n roll company albums I struggle through. Sorry. If I wanna make money, well how about selling car insurance? At least I'm honest. It's an ad and that's all it is. Every free media platform I've ever known has been a front for advertising or propaganda or both. And it always colors the content. In other words, you hear crap on the commercial radio. The licensing of music by films, corps, and TV has become a flood, because these people know they're not a hell of a lot of fun so they throw in some music that is. I'm all for that, because that's the way the door opened for me. I got heard on tv before radio would take a chance. But then I was ok. Good. And others too. I notice there are a lot of people, younger and younger, getting their exposure that way. But it's a personal choice. I think it’s an aesthetic one, not an ethical one.

Now with the Internet people can choose to hear stuff and investigate it in their own way. If they want to see me jump around the Manchester Apollo with a horse tail instead of trying to be a proper Rockstar, they can look. Good. Personally I don't worry too much about how much I get paid for any given thing, because I never expected much in the first place and the whole industry has become bloated in its expectations. Look, Howling Wolf would work for a sandwich. This whole thing started in Honky Tonk bars. It's more important to do something important or just make people feel something and then just trust in God. If you're an entertainer your God is the public. They'll take care of you somehow. I want them to hear my music any old which way. Period. There is an unseen hand that turns the pages of existence in ways no one can predict. But while you’re waiting for God to show up and try to find a good entertainment lawyer.

It's good to remember that this is a dream job, whether you're performing or working in broadcasting, or writing or the biz. So dream. Dream. Be generous, don’t be stingy. Please. I can't help but note that it always seems to be the pursuit of the money that coincides with the great art, but not its arrival. It's just kind of a death agent. It kills everything that fails to reflect its own image, so your home turns into money, your friends turn into money, and your music turns into money. No fun, binary code – zero one, zero one - no risk, no nothing. What you gotta do you gotta do, life's a hurly-burly, so I would say try hard to diversify your skills and interests. Stay away from drugs and talent judges. Get organized. Big or little, that helps a lot.

I'd like you to do better than I did. Keep your dreams out of the stinky business, or you'll go crazy, and the money won't help you. Be careful to maintain a spiritual EXIT. Don't live by this game because it's not worth dying for. Hang onto your hopes. You know what they are. They’re private. Because that's who you really are and if you can hang around long enough you should get paid. I hope it makes you happy. It's the ending that counts, and the best things in life really are free.

#iggy pop #idk if anyone posted it here already #I'm just too lazy to look up so #here it is!

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mwolf0epsilon · 4 years

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How about a Sammy and Wally teaming up for once to get out of a sticky situation only to never speak of it again as no one would believe they worked well together :3c

Summary: Just like how water and oil didn't mix, there was no way Sammy could ever be openly nice to Wally... Or could there?

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Water and Oil. That was the sort of relationship Sammy Lawrence and Wally Franks had between them.

Under normal circumstances they did not mix, avoided getting involved with each other, and overall preferred to maintain a general distance.

Like both liquids, they were polar opposites of sorts.

Sammy was somewhat anti-social with a rather finicky temper that could be set off easily, while Wally was highly sociable, very easy-going and carefree.

Where the music director was a workaholic by nature (to the point it became quite detrimental to his own health), the janitor was more on the lazy side (only ever becoming invested in certain very particular interests of his).

So really, the hostilities and recurring arguments weren't unexpected whenever they crossed paths.

No one expected anything less from them.

Everyone knew that Wallace Franks was a friendly person. He was born and raised in Brooklyn and had quite a mind-boggling background that often contradicted itself or put in question what sort of upbringing his parents had subjected him and his sisters to.

Questions that were met with a smile, a shrug and an eagerness to follow a routine full of cut corners, cleaning up spills, ignoring Mr. Connor and trying to avoid stepping on both Sammy's and Mr. Drew's toes.

He didn't particularly dislike anyone (although Thomas's pretentious tone made his blood boil quite a bit), and felt a little off put when others found reason to pick fights with him (fights he could in theory win if he felt like getting into a scrap with any of these fancy white boys who never once so much as got a punch to the gut or a kick to the balls).

Avoidance was the best survival tactic, one he stuck to unless personally blighted by anyone that thought he wouldn't retaliate.

He was a friend you could count on, but also a natural trickster, so if he wanted to be a problem he certainly could be.

The two things keeping him in line were sheer laziness and a good disposition. Why make enemies when you could make new pals? And thinking too hard on things wasn't really worthwhile in his humble opinion… Just look at Sammy Lawrence!

Sammy… Wally didn't hate him (like most people thought he should, considering the blond was such an antagonistic asshole towards him). If anything he pitied the guy quite a bit.

The music director was an aggressive bundle of nerves. A ticking time-bomb that was just ready to be triggered, and it often seemed like no one cared enough to keep an eye on his well being.

Wally wasn't a medical professional of course, but even he knew when someone should step back and let themselves play stupid for a while to combat the amounting stress. Sammy was in his early forties (only 5 years older than Wally) and in desperate need of partying and some no-strings-attached sex. You know, the usual stupid adult stuff that got you in trouble if you weren't legal or if you weren't a straight white male.

Either way, all opinions aside, Wally didn't find reason to hate Sammy. He could understand why someone would carry themselves so tightly guarded when the economy was in shambles and you were trying to make something out of yourself. Although the same consideration did not apply to the other...

Because Sammy sure seemed to find reasons to absolutely despise him.

"He's an incompetent brat with no respect for others! He's a petty thief, inept at maintaining the pipes, sloppy with cleaning and absolutely infuriating in how he brags about skills and smarts he clearly lacks!" The Brooklynite winced as he hid behind Norman, who was glowering down at the blond nuisance currently screaming at him.

A leaky pipe in Sammy's office that he'd been trying to fix had gotten displaced and destroyed a nearly completed composition, setting back the band quite a bit. Naturally the head of the department (who'd gotten sprayed in the face as well) had lost his temper.

"Bite your tongue Lawrence, before I rip it out of your mouth myself." The much larger man between them growled in warning. "It was an accident, no need to go spittin' out such poison."

"You can't keep protecting that little… that speckled half-breed!"

"Now yous is really askin' for me to put my foot up your tight little ass!" Norman bodily shoved the belligerent ink coated man, the indignant anger in his voice pointing to the projectionist beginning to lose his patience. Not that Wally could say for sure, he was still very much hiding behind him. "Apologize to the boy before I deck yous in that big beak o' yours!"

"I'd rather die." Sammy hissed between his teeth.

"Why I oughta teach yous a good lesson on havin' some manners, you obnoxious little--"

"N-Norman that's enough…"

Both fell silent as he spoke up, the janitor moving back from the pair and looking down at his feet in defeat.

He had messed up and Sammy had every right to be angry, since he had ruined his work and consequently screwed over the rest of the department.

It wasn't fair if he got off completely scot free, even if he didn't want to face Mr. Drew soul crushing reprimands.

"I made a mess of things… I didn't pay attention and messed up the stinkin' pipe…" Sammy actually looked confused that he was just taking it for once, rather than getting out of dodge. "Now Mr. Drew's gonna be real mad and it shouldn't be the music department to pay for it…"

"Don't mean Mr. Lawrence gets to go havin' a dyin' duck fit! Hollerin' up a storm like that, you'd think yous went and deflowered his sister."

"Polk!" Sammy really did not like the sound of that. If he went any redder with rage Wally feared he might literally explode like a bomb. "How dare you?!"

"Don't feel too good when others go sayin' shit do it? Even if Wally here is takin' the fall, yous still gonna apologize to the kid." Norman stated.

"I will do no such thing."

"Good Lord in heaven, yous really are like water an' oil! You better start cleanin' up your act before I start usin' yous to grease up the projector belts!"

"Why am I the oil in this analogy?!"

"Must be because you're an unpleasant asshole."

The three turned to stare at none other than Thomas Connor who had a displeased look on his face and a toolbox in hand. Wally looked away, already knowing what was coming.

"Franks, get moving back into that office. You're fixing that pipe while I sort the ink pressure." Thomas passed him the toolbox without any second thought. "Mr. Lawrence, I'd suggest you go collect your things to keep them well away from the ink."

"I don't take orders from you, Engineering." Sammy huffed "I was already planning to do so before you decided to show your face around here."

"Then why haven't you?" The older man raised an eyebrow.

Well it turns out Sammy's face could get redder. That probably wasn't normal, but it did seem to amuse Norman quite a bit.

He snorted and shook his head.

"I needs to go downstairs t'get a new reel for the projector. I better not hear no more hollerin' when I get back." He gave Sammy a pointed look before looking at Thomas "And yous better get sortin' that pressure issue. If any more pipes burst in this little ol'department we might get another flood, and we still don't got no pump switch installed yet now do we?"

"At the end of the month that's getting sorted. For now, we do our jobs." Thomas huffed and moved to go check the utility shaft where most of the pressure gauges for the music department were located.

Wally watched quietly as both older men went their separate ways, leaving him alone with Sammy.

"Well,what are you standing there for? Go fix your fuck-up." The blond snapped at him as he went to pick up an empty box from the closet and began to stomp his way back to his messy office.

The Brooklynite gulped and took the toolbox he'd been given, hoping this wouldn't take long.

The thought of being alone in a room with Sammy when he was in a terrible mood wasn't particularly appealing.

Especially when he was pissed at him.

It was just one measly little pipe.

How hard a fix could it be?

Stepping inside, the janitor winced. The floor was absolutely coated in ink and the spill was beginning to spread.

Sammy was dragging his desk away, leaving marks on the wood that were then hidden away by the growing puddle. The bin he'd used to put under the flow was full to the brim and spilling out in rivets.

"Franks! Close the damn door and put that curtain under so it doesn't end up going into the actual band room!" The music director called out, startling him slightly.

"Oh, uh right. Contain the issue an'... Junk." He grabbed the curtain, something Sammy had put up himself to cover his office window because he couldn't be bothered to mess with the rickety shutters, and stuffed it under the crack of the door once he closed it.

There was a loud click but he elected to ignore it since he had his keys. He could just unlock it later.

"You need any help dragging that?" He asked as he began to look through the toolbox for a wrench.

"Just do your job."

"Right…"

They fell into silence, where Wally tried to figure out where exactly along the pipe did he actually have to sort, and where Sammy muttered to himself as he tried to salvage his papers.

The leak wasn't too bad all things considered. There was little to no pressure, which meant there might be a block somewhere else but that was why Thomas was checking in the utility shaft.

He just needed to fix this, tighten that, twist this doodad and turn that knick-knack… He winced when he heard papers crumple and get tossed into a wastebasket.

"Damn it, not one fucking sheet… I swear I had some notes somewhere… where did I put those…" The composer was going about trying to find his stuff, looking through a filing cabinet that looked just as disorganized as Wally's dresser. "Was it in E? Or… L? Do I even use the separators?"

It was amazing really, how easily Sammy seemed to lose track of things.

He often yelled at the janitor for misplacing his keys, yet here he was murmuring and rushing about all scatterbrained.

It was a little ironic.

"What are you staring at, Franks?!"

"Hm?" He hadn't even noticed he'd been looking. "Oh uh, was just gonna say this is almost done."

"Good. I want you out as fast as possible, so get that done and clean this muck so I don't have to see you for the rest of the day."

"Yeah yeah, this whole pipe stuff ain't too bad when the ink aint--" a loud groan interrupted him abruptly, and even Sammy seemed to pause to look up.

Both stood there, slightly alarmed by the sound.

"What was that?" Sammy asked.

"I…" Wally frowned and listened closely. It sounded almost like, like… "Oh crap."

Another much louder groan and then suddenly the Brooklynite was on the floor, ears ringing and mind blank from taking a sudden hit.

The pipe had completely burst now, due to a sudden change in pressure, leaving the two with a rapid cascade of ink.

"What did you do now?!" He heard once his hearing returned, but he didn't respond. Instead he sat up and stared at the pool of ink all around him. Where he sat it was steadily rising to his knees, and it was already covering Sammy's feet completely.

The office was filling up like a tub, and quickly.

"Oh boy…" he got up onto shaky feet and made for the door, wincing when he realized it had indeed locked.

He went for his keys but froze when he found them gone. "Shit, shit shit shit shit!!!"

"What now?!"

"I think we're in a bit of a pickle!"

"Why am I not surprised?" Sammy rolled his eyes, moving over to try the door. "Where are your keys?"

".... Uh…"

"Are you serious?" The blond groaned and began to try pulling the stuffed curtains from under the door to get rid of the flooding problem. The color draining from his face when he realized they wouldn't budge. "No…"

Wally bit his lip as he watched Sammy tug harder and then try the door handle with a little more urgency.

"No, no no no! I'm not drowning in my own office!" The music director let go of the handle and instead began to bash his shoulder against the door to no avail.

It wouldn't budge. "FUCK!"

Thinking quickly (and trying not to stare at the ink slowly raising up to halfway up his legs and nearing knee height), Wally began looking for his keys.

"I just had them!" He'd checked before entering the office. They must have fallen out when the pipe exploded and threw him down, so they had to be somewhere in the pooling mess. "Come on…"

He was practically on his knees searching while Sammy continued to assault the door.

There was no one to hear the noise, and if they didn't find a way out soon… Well… Wally's aunty Tess once told him drowning was a painful and far too long a death.

"This isn't the time to roll around like a pig in mud!" The blond shrieked at him, to which he couldn't help look back with a glare.

"I'm lookin' for my keys! They're somewhere in here!"

"Then move aside!" Sammy joined him and began to frantically palm the floor, trying to find the illusive circular keyring "If we survive I'm getting you a better ring!"

"If we survive you won't have to! Cuzz I'll be outta here!" Drowning was definitely not on the job description. This was good enough a reason to quit right?

"I'll believe it when I see it happen!"

No matter how much they desperately searched however, no keys could be found in a pool that now reached well above their waist.

Realizing just how dire their situation was becoming, both men looked at each other with dawning horror.

It was a matter of minutes… their lives were going to end in minutes.

Wally felt at a loss for what to do, while Sammy… Well the blond was already under enough pressure as it was, so naturally he broke.

"No… I can't die like this!" Fat tears began to run down his face as despair started setting in.

"Hey now, I know this ain't ideal but--"

"Ideal? Ideal?!" Sammy grabbed at his own hair and began to tug while he hiccuped hysterically. "I'll tell you what's not ideal! Drowning in this chemical mishap, with some brat from Brooklyn while my 16 year old sister is none the wiser at home, probably thinking 'Geeh I wonder where Sammy is, he usually calls if he's staying at work', only to then find out on the local paper the next morning that she's absolutely alone with no one to care for her! That! That isn't ideal!"

".... Oh you actually have a sister? I thought Norman was just provokin' you…"

"I WILL STRANGLE YOU WELL BEFORE YOU DROWN YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

"OI DON'T YOU GO CALLING MY MA A BITCH, SHE'S AN ABSOLUTELY SWELL LADY!" He yelled back, ignoring how both of them were now up to their chests (well he was starting to float since Sammy was taller than him) in ink. "HOW WOULD YA LIKE IT IF I CALLED YOUR MA A BITCH?!"

The blond head of the department screeching and lunging for him was all the warning Wally got before the two ended up tumbling in, heads fully submerged and bodies flailing as they attempted to restore their mothers' honors (if anything they probably looked like little kids fighting in a puddle while their parents looked away in embarrassment).

They only came back up to gasp for air and push themselves away from one another.

"Ok that was not my best idea!" Sammy coughed and looked around. "I can barely see the doorframe or the edge of the window… We're going to die in here and it's all Drew's and that infernal machine's fault!"

"... I." Wally paused "Wait, I ain't included in that?"

"No?"

"But the pipe, and what you were tellin' Norman and the fighting just now…"

"I was pissed because you aggravated an issue I already had! You also stole my sister's birthday cake that I spent money on, are a braggart of the worst kind, and a troublemaker, but fuck I'm not gonna blame you for this shitty situation!" Sammy threw his hands up in disbelief, yelping once he lost balance. He righted himself and looked back at Wally. "And the fighting was because you called my dead mother a bitch."

"Oh… My condolences… also that cake was yours? Man good taste! Nice stuff really… I uhm… I donno what to say… I just thought you hated me."

"... Well if we're going to die I might as well be honest." Sammy sighed "I don't hate you Wally. I just find you aggravating. You're an impossible optimistic guy in a world that eats brats like you for breakfast, lunch and dinner. If someone isn't hard on you, how are you meant to learn how to survive out there?"

"... That how you were taught?"

"..."

"Then no worries Sammy. I'm from Brooklyn! We're made of durable stuffs! Like our uh… like… roaches!"

"Durable like roaches… how reassuring…" Sammy held a hand up to reach for the ceiling. They were going to lose air in seconds. "It's the same as saying glass is strong unless it meets with a hammer…"

Wally stared at him before something clicked. The toolbox!

"Glass, hammer, the window!"

"Hm?"

"Sammy you're a genius!" The janitor took a deep breath and dove down to the floor. He blindly groped around for the toolbox and then for the hammer inside it.

He resurfaced to take another big gulp of air before showing his companion the hammer and diving back down.

All it took was a knock on the side of the glass for the whole thing to come down. Thank God for Joey Drew's not so safe work ethic and construction jobs!

Thomas Connor was having a rotten day. He'd gone down to figure out what the pressure issues were all about in the utility shaft connected to the music department and the sewers, and had then rushed to get Joey to bring him down and show him the root of the problem.

He'd become irate when he realized the man had turned on the machine during maintenance, and it took a newly returned Norman and a mildly concerned Jack to talk him out of kicking his employer's ass.

"With how irregular the pressure has been, turning on the machine was grossly negligent on your part! The more fragile pipes could have burst and then we'd be faced with catastrophic failure all around the studio!" He practically roared at the impassive grinning bastard. "Have you any idea how unstable the floors currently under construction are?! The building could collapse!"

"But it didn't."

"But it COULD have!"

"And yet it didn't." Joey's grin widened. "So I don't see what the big deal is, Mr. Connor."

"Sir I really think you should consider what he's trying to say. For uh, for everyone's safety…" Jack tried, only to be shrugged off with a wave.

"Mr. Fain I see no reason to worry. No catastrophic failure has occurred, and no one has gotten hurt." Joey insisted. "It's as they say. No harm no foul."

"No harm no foul?! What kind of business owner doesn't consider their workers's safety?!"

"Mr. Connor…" Joey rolled his eyes but stopped once he heard what sounded like a loud bang, before the band room was suddenly inundated by a massive wave of ink and random junk. Among said junk, lay a coughing and very disoriented Wally Franks (still holding a hammer) and Sammy Lawrence.

The foursome that had been arguing were now coated in almost as much ink as the pair, and looking stunned.

Once the coughing subsided, Wally raised the hammer in triumph.

"We're alive!" He dropped the hammer and flopped his arm back down weakly.

"Huzzah…" Sammy rubbed at his face tiredly before looking over at their audience. Once his eyes locked with Joey's, he seemed to regain all strength. "DREW."

"Shit." Joey turned around swiftly and began limping away at a considerable speed with aid from his cane, while Sammy scrambled onto his feet and began running after him.

"WE NEARLY DROWNED! YOU AREN'T GETTING AWAY SO EASILY! COME BACK HERE!"

"Someone cancel my appointments!"

"DREWWWW!!!!"

Norman clicked his tongue and shook his head while Jack helped Wally onto his feet and asked if he was ok.

"Oh, I'm good!" The Brooklynite smiled "Nearly drowned with Sammy, but peachy!"

"You nearly drowned?!" Thomas stared in disbelief.

"Yeah… but it's good. I broke a window but other than that everything should uh, be repairable I think? Might need a lot o' bleach to clean up… but you know." Wally shrugged.

"Should I ask what abouts happened in that office when yous was both alone in there?" Norman questioned "Besides nearly drownin' in Joey's hubris?"

"Uh… oh, you're asking if Sammy gave me any trouble aren't ya?" Wally shook his head "Not really. He was even nice to me for a little bit!"

"Nice?" Norman and Thomas both exchanged looks "To you?"

"Oh Geeh, I should get him checked, he might have swallowed ink and become delusional…" Jack whispered to himself in concern.

"Ye, nice! Sammy Lawrence was nice to me in a situation where we thought we were gonna die, so it had to have been genuine!" The janitor grinned. "But I'll bet by Monday he'll be back to being a grouch. Probably for the best… saying Sammy is nice is like saying water and oil mix."

Thomas stared at him before snorting.

"They do mix."

"What…?"

"Water and oil mix. It just takes the right conditions." He shrugged "Thought you went to college."

"Oh come on you're yanking my leg!" There was no way those two mixed, just as there was no way Sammy could be openly nice to Wally.

Could there?

The world might never know.

#Eps Writes:#Bendy and the Ink Machine #BATIM #Wally Franks #Sammy Lawrence

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beautifuljetblackheart · 4 years

Text

Fight - Sam Holland

A/N: I am back... I had a BIG writers block and COVID really fucked me up, but hopefully I actually update more stories. This was a request from a while ago, I am sorry that it took a while to get it done Summary: Sam was away for about a month and after a while of not hearing from him you began to worry, especially when a big event was coming up and you wanted him there. Warnings: None, just an argument Words: 1894

I played with my thumbs as I waited until it struck seven. The studio had chosen my pictures to present, I looked around to see if Sam had shown up, but nothing, maybe he would show up late. I really want him to show up since he wasn’t able to attend the last two days and today was the last day. Besides that they will leave the pictures up for another week and take them down.

As I presented each picture and what is the meaning behind it. Every chance I got I would search for Sam but nothing. I kept sending him messages if he was going to be dropping by anytime soon but nothing. He hasn't been texting me for almost two weeks. Maybe he lost his phone and forgot my phone number.

A few friends of mine showed up and congratulated me for being lucky to have my pictures shown in the studio. Nikki showed up with Paddy, Tuwaine showed up with Harrison and Tom, the three guys approached me, “these pictures are amazing!” Tuwaine smiled and hugged me

“Thanks, I’m happy you guys came by for my last introduction”

“Is Sam here?” Tom questioned

“No, has he not returned from the trip?”

“Yeah, he got here two days ago,” my heart sunk down

“What? He- got here two days ago?” I started to feel embarrassed, my own boyfriend not telling me he was already here

“He didn’t tell you,” I shook my head no. I felt water filling up my eyes

“I thought he lost his phone because he hasn’t answered any of my text”

“I can call him,” I shook my head again. Does he have his phone?

“No, it's whatever. He wants to be like that let him,” I walked away and to the back room and started to cry. How can he do this to me? Does he want to finish things? Did he find someone else? Why didn’t he just tell me he wanted to end things. I walked to the bathroom to clean myself up.

I took deep breaths before I could walk out of the bathroom. When I got out I walked towards my pictures, “Y/N,” I turned to the side and saw a guy smiling, I would be lying if I said he wasn’t good looking, “I hope those are tears of happiness”

“I wish I could say that,” I let out a forced chuckle, god I hate myself right now

“I really liked your introduction and what the meaning behind each picture meant to you. The stories were quite interesting”

“Thank you”

“I would like to buy five of your pictures,” I was surprised

“You, would? Sorry, yeah, of course, I’ll bring the papers over, I’ll be right back,” I started to walk away but ran into a person, “sorry,” I walked to the back and grabbed the paperwork and went back out to the guy.

“I’m Ivan Goodsman, these pictures will be a good collection for my wife. She loves pictures. She loves to know what the mood was and why you took it, a picture can tell you a million words,” I gave him a nod

“I can also email you why I took it in case she actually wants to know”

“That will be perfect,” he handed me the papers back and I wrote down on top of each paper

“2B, 7B, 1C, 4C, and 5C”

“Those are actually my favorite, anyways, I’ll have them sent to the address you write down. You can do the payment either when they arrive or pay now”

“I’ll pay now”

“Cool,” the guy pulled out his checkbook and started to write down the amount. He ripped the check out of the book and handed it to me. “Thank you Mr.Goodsman,” I smiled

“Call me Ivan, I hope to see more of your work”

“Thank you for buying,” he smiled and walked away. I can’t wait to tell- no,I can be petty too. I let out a deep breath and continued walking around. By the end of the night I didn’t see Sam. I went back to my apartment, I took my shoes off and sat on the couch. I grabbed my phone and dialed Harry, as he shared the same interest.

“Hello”

“Hey Harry”

“Dude I saw that you sold some pictures that’s amazing! Who bought it?”

“A guy name Ivan Goodsman”

“Goodsman? As in the Ivan Goodsman? Holy shit they are very well known”

“He told me that his wife enjoyed looking at the pictures because they have many different meanings and stuff”

“Their kids are talented. One is in the soccer team, one is a good golf player, the other one is a popular well known photographer and the last one is a designer”

“Wow. Talented people”

“The mother, she’s also a designer, photography pictures help her get inspired. Maybe her next collection will be inspired by you. The father, he’s the manager of a hotel or something, I don’t know much of him”

“Holy crap”

“Lucky you”

“Anyways, Tom mentioned that Sam arrived a few days ago”

“Oh, yeah”

“I just need to talk to him, can I stop by?”

“He is going to hate me for this but at this moment I don’t care. Come on over,” my heart started to race, I was somewhat hoping he would’ve said no but it’s now or never. I grabbed the keys and out the door I went.

I stood in front of the Holland's house, I rang the doorbell hearing Tessa barking. The door went wide open and I saw Nikki, she smiled widely as she stepped aside, “Harry told me that you met Ivan Goodsman, how was that?”

“He’s an attractive man”

“Common Nikki she came to see Sam, stop hogging her, that was a very beautiful collection,” Dom went next to Nikki

“Thank you, is Sam in his room?”

“Yes, go right up,” I excused myself and went upstairs to Sam’s room, I let out a sigh and knocked on the door hearing a faint ‘come in,’ I opened the door and stepped inside. Sam’s back was facing me probably on his computer.

“Hi,” he turned around, finally seeing him after three weeks

“Y/N, what are you doing here?” I looked at him confused

“What am I doing here? Seeing my boyfriend that I haven’t seen in three weeks and Tom told me you arrived two days ago. Why didn’t you tell me? Did you lose your phone?

“I needed time to think”

“Sam, what is going on. You have been avoiding me for almost two weeks, you couldn’t send me a message telling me that you arrived or that you needed time to think. You went awol on me, are you mad at me?” I tried staying calm but I was getting furious towards him.

“I just need time to think and figure things out okay, I don’t need to tell you what I’m doing every single time”

“I’m not asking you to, all I wanted you to do was to tell me that you were doing okay and that you arrived home safely”

“Well I arrived safely home”

“I know. Your brother told me and thanks for coming to my opening. Your family was there, even Tuwaine and Harrison, but you weren’t. I wanted you there, since my parents weren’t able to make it”

“Opening for what?” I scoffed

“My gallery, I texted you two weeks before my presentation and you said that you will make it for the last day, I even texted you if you were on your way, thanks for showing up”

“I needed to think okay, what part do you not understand”

“I understand, I just don’t understand why you couldn’t tell me. Just forget about it. I’m going home,” I opened the door and walked downstairs saying a quick goodbye before leaving. Does this mean that we are done? I went back home. I didn’t know what to do or think.

---

I woke up on the couch, I looked at my phone to check the time and hoping Sam would’ve texted me. The only notification I had was an email on Spotify’s newest music release. I guess this means it is over between us. I grabbed my sweater and saw the check, maybe a trip to the bank will be good for me. I got ready and off I went.

After a walk to the bank I walked to the store to buy ice cream, I grabbed my favorite ice cream and headed to the check out. When I was paying I saw the one person I wasn’t expecting to see, Sam smiling with his ex girlfriend, Erica. I grabbed my ice cream and quickly left, the way back home I felt tears streaming down my face.

I ate my ice cream in silence, the tv was off my phone was on do not disturb mode. Half way through my ice cream there was a knock on the door. I got up and opened the door, it was Sam holding flowers. He had a sad face on. “What do you want Sam”

“Can we talk,” I stepped aside. He handed me the flowers and we walked to the living room and set the flowers on the coffee table.

“Y/N, I am sorry. I know what I did was wrong. I was just stressed out and we didn’t have enough time to be on our phones. I know it’s not an excuse. I saw a picture of you and a guy together and you seemed so happy”

“What guy, I haven’t been out. I’ve been working on my pictures for a month”

“I don’t know, someone sent me a picture of you and a guy,” Sam showed me a picture

“I don’t even know who that guy is, and that dress, I haven’t worn that dress for a year. I would never cheat on you”

“I am sorry. My mom came to my room after you left. She knew something was wrong. She told me how you've been working extra hard to have your pictures up and going over on what you would be saying. This morning I stopped by the studio and saw the pictures. I am proud of you and I am so sorry”

“I saw you and Erica at the store”

“I ran into her, she asked how you were doing and I told her that you were doing great since you presented your pictures and had a well known guy buy a few pictures from you. I was smiling because I was happy that you achieved a goal that you’ve had for so long. I honestly believe she was the one that sent me that photo. Y/N, please forgive me,” I let out a sigh.

“You saw my pictures?”

“Yes, they were amazing. My mom even showed me a video she took and showed it to me”

“Okay, I forgive you, but next time you are gone for a month and don’t text me back we are done. Got it?”

“Loud and clear, can we cuddle because I really missed you,” I kissed him and got up, “are we moving this to your room?”

“I am putting my ice cream in the freezer, but let’s go take a nap in my room”

#samholland1999 #sam holland #sam x you #sam x reader #sam holland fluff #sam holland fanfiction #tom holland #tomholland2013 #harry holland #harryholland64 #harrison osterfield

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