#then say it’s been coloured in and got a cave background

[emuwarum]

my Beast!

[mncxbe]

Jimmy,Jimmy cocoa puff☆

𝑫𝒂𝒛𝒂𝒊 𝒙 𝒇𝒆𝒎!𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒆𝒓

𝑮𝒆𝒏𝒓𝒆: fluff♡/ slice of life/ Dazai in Greece <little warning for mentions of scars> kinktober is here so ofc I serve Dazai fluff

Escapism.

That's how this could be called. On a deserted beach somewhere in Greece, far away from home. With you under a cheap umbrella bought from a store nearby.

Colours seemed to have been sucked out of the world: the jade green and deep blue of the sea and the sky above were replaced by silver grey. Even the golden sand had a muted colour, the shade of oat milk, and rain poured down from the clouds; steadily, never ending.

But you... you were as radiant as always. Even now in this pearly light your face was bathed in glow.

Your features stood out on the dulled background. The mocha brown of your hair and eyes; the latter dotted with specs of gold, your tiger stripe red nail polish (a silly design you picked as a joke after your visit to the Kanazawa Gardens back in Yokohama, two weeks ago) and the charcoal black of your bathing suit were all so vivid.

He watched as you rose a bottle of green tea to your lips and took a sip.

"So... what do we do now?" you asked suddenly, your words muffled by the sound of falling rain.

Dazai only shrugged in response, gaze scanning his suroundings. The sky seemed to melt into the sea before his eyes, lines of droplets connecting the above and below, forming a capsule around the two of you. And behind, the rocky road that went back to town, which seemed to be flooding.

"Leaving certainly isn't an option" he replied, pointing at the swamped road and you turned your head to take a look; letting out a disappointed huff.

"Guess we gotta stay here for a while."

You moved your deckchair closer to his in attempt to shelter yourself from the rain and reached for your bag, checking to see if your belongings were still dry.

Dazai watched your every movement the same way an artist looks at his muse; with adoration, longing and just a shadow of sadness. Still, he couldn't deny how ironic this whole situation was:

"Don't let the rain upset you bella. It'll pass soon" he cooed "Plus. It could've started raining when we were in town or something."

"Oh spare me love" you chuckled in response. "It's cold and my book and clothes got wet"

Despite your complains you didn't seem mad at all. There was a certain aura of peace surrounding you at all times, especially now.

"It is beautiful tho." you added, pointing a manicured finger towards the horizon "It's like the world caved in and now it's just us left."

The brunette reached for your hand and took it in his own, softly running his thumb over your knuckles. "That wouldn't be bad at all actually"

Suddenly you got up from your chair at tip-toed towards the water, pulling Dazai after you. Your boyfriend's lips curled into a playful smile as you stepped into the water.

"Bella... you know I can't-"

"Shut up 'same. Your bandages are gonna get wet from the rain anyway. Come on"

And indeed, the humid air and droplets of rain made his loose shirt stick to his skin and he felt his bandages dampen.

And so he followed you into the grey sea, water rising around the two of you with each step you took. Ankel level, knee high, to your thighs and hips and soon enough waist. Still, you didn't stop until you were almost completely submerged.

Just then you turned to face him, hair moist and sticking up from place to place, a wide smile stretched on your lips. Wrapping your arms around his neck you pulled yourself closer to him as his hands instinctively came to rest on your plush hips.

Before he got a chance to say anything you closed your eyes and tiled your head back, allowing the cold rain to dapple your skin.

And oh how beautiful you looked. In this very moment Dazai stopped paying attention to his slowly loosening bandages, to the cold breeze that made his skin tingle; it was only you and him now.

Soon enough you began humming a tune, a nostalgic melody he recognized but couldn't remember the name of. Lulled by your song he closed his eyes, lowering his forehead to yours.

Sweet minutes have passed like this, the two of you completely absorbed in one another until Dazai finally opened his eyes to meet your own and his heart sank.

Your expression conveyed an image of pure adoration and devotion which made his blood rush to his cheeks, a soft blush tinting his face.

"What you looking at me like that for?" he teased, doing his best to cover up his emotions but failing miserably.

"Like what?" you responded in the same mischevious tone, nails lightly grazing the back of his neck.

Dazai sighed deeply, inching closer to you until his lips were touching yours and he whispered.

"Like you love me"

You smiled against his lips. "Well I do love you Osamu". You spoked those words in a matter of fact way, like it was the most natural and obvious thing in existence. But they meant so much to him. No one had told him they loved him. Ever.

Closing the distance between you your boyfriend pulled you in for a gentle kiss, cold lips lingering against your own as he uttered a hushed "I love you too Y/N"; like a promise made to the Gods.

Just then a loud rumble sounded from somewhere above, causing you to pull away and swiftly swim towards the shore.

"Shit. Maybe we should get out of the water. I heard people got struck by lightning here."

"There's no way that happened." he chuckled but followed you close by.

"I mean technically it could happen. It's an open space"

"Whatever you say bella." he said back, amused by your pointless worries.

When you got back to the beach Dazai wrapped a towel around your bare shoulders and began pulling at the ends of his unraveled bandages.

"Guess that's it for them"

You watch him pull the soaked strings of cloth through the holes of his sleeve and did your best not to look at his skin which was painfully visible through the translucent material of his shirt.

Instead you handed him a towel and reached for the bottle of green tea.

"Want some too?" you asked when he took a seat on his chair, towel draped over his shoulders.

"Sure"

The rain showed no signs of stopping so you simply laid back and made yourself comfortable in the mesh fabric of your chair, gaze lost somewhere in the distance.

Dazai took a sip of the tea, the taste of synthetic sweetener and fresh tea lingering on his tongue.

He watched you watch sea, the horizon, the mass of grey that your world was and wished, for only a split second, that this moment would last forever. That the two of you could spend the rest of eternity on this forgotten beach, far away from your actual life, in this sanctuary of nature.

And by the look in your eyes when you finally turned to face him, he could tell that you wished for the same thing.

[getmeoffwithwords]

The Good Wife

‘Hey Baby!’ His wife smiled from the small screen of his mobile phone. She was positioning herself in shot as she took the short selfie movie. The camera work was wobbly, but he could clearly see it was his wife. She looked pretty, her lips a crimson red with lipstick and her hair neat and tidy as she stared at herself to get the angles right.

Behind her was a pool table and shelves stacked with beer and glasses. ‘The boys invited me back to their man cave… hope you don’t mind?’ She laughed as her eyes met with several other people in the room who were out of shot.

The man was sitting on his sofa, relaxing. He had been hoping his wife would send something - it he wasn’t sure what it might be. He felt a warm, rushing feeling in his groin as he stared at her smiling face and tried to make out where she was.

‘They say they’re going to get me hammered - or hammer me! I can’t remember which!’ She giggled mischievously. Several deeper voices cackled in the background. She panned the camera away from her face to show the room, some sort of converted garage with old sofas and a large television mounted on the wall. There were three, maybe five young men - no older that twenty, trying to avoid her camera, dodging backwards and forwards as she showed the room. The television flickered with the bright colours of a porn movie. A small, blonde starlet, wearing very high heels and a tiny, schoolgirl costume was on her knees as a group of men groped and fondled her tight body.

‘You know what these young guys are like, baby? Filthy buggers - the lot of them!’ She said as she refocused herself in shot, smiling at unseen faces as she dropped to her knees - her head now level with the pool table behind. She held her phone at arm’s length and turned her head in profile, watching the screen from the corner of her eye to make sure she was still the centre of attention. ‘Yes, very dirty boys they are.’ She grinned, winking at someone standing over her. ‘Apparently, they’ve been itching to get their hands on a Cougar.’ She giggled.

The naked, muscular thighs of a young man inched into shot and with them, eight inches of thick, fully erect cock being worked with long strokes.

The woman grinned at her camera as the wanking cock dangled heavily just an inch from her face. ‘Mmmm baby, he’s a big boy isn’t he!’ She cooed as the unseen youth increased his stroking pace, aiming the mushroom head at her mouth. He grunted something unintelligible off screen and the woman opened her mouth suggestively - licking her red lips

Invitingly.

The movie stopped. The man breathed. His cock was throbbing urgently in his pants, straining to escape.

He watched the movie three times, desperately resisting the temptation to take out his cock as his wife got to her knees and opened her mouth. It was so incredibly sexy, watching her ‘perform’.

The next message pinged and he rushed to open it. A damp patch was already spreading across the crotch of his trousers.

The screen shone with life and a closeup of his wife’s eyes. She was mumbling something and being careful to frame herself just right. As she pulled the camera away her whole head came into shot.

The man’s cock reared in his pants like a beast. He felt the warmth of precum flood his groin as he stared at the scene.

His wife was on her hands and knees between the spread thighs of a faceless youth. He was sitting on a sofa, his buttocks resting on its edge, allowing his throbbing cock to rear up like a flagpole. The camera panned out to reveal the woman with her mouth locked around two thirds of its length. She was watching the camera as she pulled her red lips up the veiny shaft and off the engorged head with an audible ‘pop’.

She turned her face to her victim, wanking the slippery shaft with her small hand as she registered the pleasure she was giving on his unseen face.

Mumbled words from a deep voice redirected her attention to the purple, throbbing head and she licked and sucked it like a schoolgirl on a lollipop, smiling wickedly straight into the lens at her husband. ‘This one won’t last long baby….’ She said as an urgent grunt sounded from the young man.

She pulled the tight foreskin back from the twitching head and lashed its taut skin with her merciless tongue. A thick, white jet of spunk erupted from the pumping cock as she held her gaze on the lens, spurt after desperate spurt followed as she maintained her rhythm. The invisible victim grunted in loud, pulsating grunts as he blew his hot load all over her teasing tongue.

The movie stopped.

The man squeezed his huge cock through his trousers. He wasn’t sure how long he could last. He watched the movie again. The expression on his wife’s face as she teased the sperm from the rigid cock was enough to make him cum. Her eyes were triumphant as she milked him for all he had.

His phone jumped again as the third message arrived. He squirmed with delicious discomfort as he pressed play.

She smiled out of the small screen again. Her face streaked with thick lines of spunk. She was facing the camera - on her elbows and knees, the mounds of her round ass behind as she offered herself to the unseen men. ‘Hi baby!’ She greeted him with a wanton look in her eyes. All around her, the strong legs of men stalked as they considered her available body. An unfocused figure squatted behind her and dipped his head behind her upturned ass.

‘This one doesn’t care where he sticks his tongue!’ She gasped as she reached behind and grasped his hair, holding his head still as she worked her wet slit up and down his lapping tongue. ‘Mmm baby, right there…’ she groaned as she found the pleasure she needed.

She looked directly into the lens again as she moaned loudly, ‘They say they’re addicted to Cougars now, baby!’

Strong hands grabbed her tousled hair and pulled her mouth to the side. She craned her neck, making sure she was still in frame, as a muscular figure squatted by her face and offered his large pendulous balls for her to suck. She pushed out her tongue and licked the underside of the impressive shaft as it jutted toward her. Suddenly she was moaning and bucking her hips against the unseen mouth that devoured her holes from behind, ‘Oh my God!’ She moaned through the saliva glistening cock, ‘That dirty boy is going make me cum baby!’ She gasped and moaned as her orgasm rocked her body, entirely forgetting the camera in her lust.

If dropped, recording the carpet as her moans filled the room. In a moment her flushed face filled the frame as she turned and beckoned to the boy behind her to push his cock into her mouth. The figure rose, a huge, oozing dick swaying between his legs as he staggered forward to kneel by her face. Immediately, another figure squatted over her upturned ass and stroked his cock as he aimed it at her slippery, orgasm- wracked pussy.

Without a word of warning, the figure thrust himself into her from behind as she gasped ‘Yes baby, stretch that wet pussy!’

She reached urgently for the cock by her face, determined to repay the pleasure he had given her as the figure behind pounded her mercilessly. His hands reached forward to grab her hips as he drove in deeply with lusty grunts.

The image seared itself into the man’s eyes as he watched his wife take those young cocks. He was desperate to cum… to take his cock out and wank it dry - all over his sexy wife and her filthy exploits.

She clamped her mouth around the boys cock and reached through his legs to grip his firm buttocks while she made sure the camera captured the best angle. She was cumming again as the youth behind her took what he needed. He was pounding her like a sex toy - it made her cum to feel his smooth, hard cock inside her., to hear him grunt for her, to feel his body tremble with lust. The boy in her mouth groaned, he was trying to pull away, to save his cum for her pussy, but she was too strong and held him there, sucking like a vacuum as he unleashed a torrent of spunk into her gulping throat.

The man watched his wife gulp fourteen times as the boy moaned for release, her own orgasmic grunts mingling with his and the pounding figure behind her as he filled her spasming pussy with his flood of hot seed.

The movie stopped abruptly.

The man’s cock twitched violently in his pants - how much more could he take?

A new message came through. The man’s cock swelled uncontrollably, trapped against the fabric of his trousers.

He pressed play and prepared for the delicious climax of the tease.

‘Hi Baby!’ His wife blew a kiss into the lens as she attempted to balance her phone on a shelf at just the right angle. The camera jolted rhythmically as she struggled with the task. She pulled away, moving toward the pool table in the centre of the room - where she could be seen full length by the lens. Attached to her from behind, an anonymous youth clung to her hips as he drove himself in and out of her pussy with urgent strokes. Three more muscular figures followed her, each stroking enormous, shining cocks in their energetic hands. She turned to the camera as the boy bent her over the pool table and began to fuck her like an animal. ‘They want my ass baby… hope you don’t mind?’ She grunted as she gripped the edge of the table. The boy began to moan - deep animal grunts burst from his clenched teeth as he tried to resist cumming. She looked over her shoulder at him and pushed her ass right down to the root of his long cock, ‘fill me up dirty boy…’ she teased. He reached forward, grabbing her hair as he raised on his tiptoes to squirt his virile seed into her tight ass with a howl of release that vibrates the phone speaker.

As the boy pulled his spent cock from her ass, the others took his place. One laid quickly onto the pool table, his erect cock towering like a sharks fin. She clambered onto him, straddling his hardness as she sank onto its full length with a moan of lust. ‘Oh my God, baby! He’s right inside me!’ She began to buck her hips against his pelvis, making his cock touch her deepest spot.

The man unzipped his trousers and let his fabric wrapped cock expand into the new space. ‘Fuck! He grunted as his member began to twitch uncontrollably.

On screen, a second youth clambered onto the table and stood over her gasping face. He was wanking furiously, already grunting as he dipped his engorged head into her urgent, sucking mouth. His hips thrust with each suck, forcing his length into her mouth, or slipping out to rub across her face with a rasp of ecstasy.

The last figure was kneeling behind her upturned ass, stroking hard as he watched her pump his mate with her stretched pussy. He reached forward and spread her ass cheeks - making her stop and turn to watch. ‘Dirty bastard’ she encouraged, ‘stick it in there - make me take it all!’

The youth took aim, nudged his slippery cock against her ass - and pushed.

The man had seen enough… he rushed to stand, his cock expanded beyond all reason as he pulled his pants down around its weight. It sprang from is confines - as taught as a ripe cucumber.

His wife’s moans filled his ears as she took the three throbbing cocks in her holes.

Without warning a slow, heavy spurt of spunk erupted from his rigid member and splashed across his phone screen, the floor, and coffee table. Another followed, and another and another, his cock twitching violently as his orgasm jetted his seed from his body.

When she got home, he’d show her what a hard fuck really was…

[burins]

@timetoboldlygo tagged me in a people I wanna know better tag meme, which was a delightful notification to receive from someone who came to my wedding. also she did tag me a full month ago and i forgot about it until i went into my drafts even though we fully talked about it IN PERSON.

Last song? the last music i listened to was yo-yo ma's version of ennio morricone's main theme from once upon a time in america. his whole ennio morricone album has been on repeat when i've been writing for like... a month or two.

the last non-instrumental track was uhhhh something han had on in the car! i think it was off yukika's new album.

the last THING i listened to was the audiobook of the old ways by robert macfarland, which i got to via raja shehadeh's marvelous palestinian walks (I am about 15 years late on palestinian walks but it is very good as both explanation of the slow creep of occupation via methods both legal - shehadeh's background - and by force; and as love letter to a countryside.)

i very much enjoyed macfarland's more recent book underland, which is all about caves. (cue everyone who read timkon road trip fic saying "we know.") i liked the old ways, which is all about walking, particularly in britain, but i think he gets caught up in his (admittedly very lovely) prose in a way that sometimes detracts from his arguments. he has a tendency not to question the tone/narrative of his sources, or to present them uncritically, which always sends my little ears twitching. (underland feels better-researched.)

i have now turned a music question into a book rec. ANYWAY!

Favourite colour? I always used to say purple but it's orange... honestly i like colors in combination much better than by themselves. a real sucker for green and orange or blue and a nice coral

Currently watching? taskmaster! i am SO bad at narrative TV. every week someone will tell me about a great show i would definitely enjoy and then i continue not to watch it. i did spend four hours yesterday (like everyone else on the internet) watching hbomberguy absolutely destroy about four people's careers though!

Last movie? not counting hbomberguy?? uh. i watched part of mad max fury road over some guy's shoulder on the plane back in october?

Sweet/Spicy/Savoury? savory/salty

Relationship status? married! :)

Current obsessions? batman/dc comics as it's been for the past uh year. and what a year it's been!

Last thing you googled? i'm trying to dig up old forum posts about the reception of birds of prey (particularly among queer fans/shippers) when it came out. this has involved a lot of googling, most of it not particularly successful, so if you know of what fan sites might have been active around 1999-2000.... let me know what to pop into the wayback machine.

tagging @curiositeath @butcherlarry @girderednerve and anyone else who wants to do this!!

[choccy-zefirka]

Well then. I had to take a plane ride with some obnoxiously talkative neighbors that would have prevented me from taking a nap, so instead I decided to put on headphones and watch a movie. The in-flight entertainment catalog was not very varied, so I ended up settling on the live action Aladdin, which I have been blissfully avoiding all these years. And yeah, that sure was a movie.

I'd say that I enjoyed it less than both the Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, particularly the latter, which I actually had genuine fun with, albeit most probably because I watched it with a friend and we were so carried away by pointing at the screen and riffing off each other that it might have created an illusion of a grand old time, softening the flaws of the film. Anyway.

There were a number of things that I kind of liked about live action Aladdin. They almost, just barely, brought the experience to the brink of being fun.

I remember all the Blue Will Smith memes back in the day, but he actually was one of the least meh parts of the movie for me? His performance was charming, when he was being himself rather than emulating Robin Williams. And I really appreciated the idea of this version of Genie turning into a human once he was freed from the lamp. Aside from that, I was rather interested in some of the new additions/character expansions (and I actually laughed out loud at the "I am going to get some bread... To go with all the jams" bit, it aligns perfectly with my sense of humor), but then they sort of... slipped away.

I wanna draw a parallel with the visuals here: in some parts of the movie, like the cave of wonders and the landscapes in A Whole New World, the backdrop was rather muddled. Both in terms of a diluted colour scheme and in terms of overcluttered details that do not pop the same way as the more simplistic yet bold and expressive animated scenes.

The plot buildup feels the same: there were moments that made me mentally go "Ooh, nice", like the backstory of Jasmine's mom, or the hints that Jafar and Aladdin are foils of each other, with similar backgrounds as thieves, or the attempt to make the captain of the guard more three-dimensional than "Grr gotta chase Aladdin with a sword"; but then they were not explored in-depth.

And I get that, I am beset by blorbo concepts that come to me as kernels of potentially intriguing plot and then simmer into nothingness all the time. But I am a small gremlin with a mundane day job, not a big-name creator at a multi-billion business meant to entertain people across the globe.

My biggest disappointment, though, aside from the almost complete loss of Iago's personality (which is also why I felt it made little sense for Jafar to pull Iago into the lamp at the end, as this is now less of a sidekick that you want to take down with you, but a random borb that talks sometimes), was the fact that I fully expected the himbo Fantasy North European Prince to show up when Jafar tossed Aladdin into the middle of the snowy nowhere.

I wanted it to be his kingdom, and for him to come riding in on a sleigh or something, and be like "Hey man, I see you got the princess over me, no hard feelings, let me give you a hand". The story paid way too much attention to him during the first act, turning the original asshole suitor from the animated movie into a dumbass but well-meaning jock that got bitten by Rajah not because he was being a douche to Jasmine but because he could not resist petting the Danger Kitty, which. Valid.

Justice for Himbo Prince.

Oh, and I guess the nostalgia bait of the songs worked on me to some extent, and I am now having flashbacks to my own retelling of Aladdin that I toyed with but obviously shelved because I did not want to come off as culturally insensitive. Overall, not the worst alternative to failing to nap.

[clovercrafted]

I wanna know the lore in your duskwood world, I'm intrigued!!

So Duskwood's original inspiration was from a youtuber I watch, I really liked one of his builds so I was like "oough I wanna build something like that too", so that's the background of how it first started, but I wanted to do more.

Originally Duskwood wasn't going to have lore or an overall story, I wanted to practice using more colours and trying to put a little more life into my builds. I've got the first part of that pretty much nailed now I think, I'm still struggling with the second.

ANYWAYS!! I'm gonna put this under a read more because I tend to waffle on. A lot.

Duskwood is a small Kingdom on the banks of the rivers Dawn and Dusk, with the river Dawn being the eastern one that leads down to the sea, joining with the western river Dusk that divides the farming district from the shopping/storage and villager trading areas. Duskwood was built upon the ruins of not only one old kingdom but two! Hallowhall and the Ancestor Dales. Hallowhall was once a technological marvel but pushed too far, went too beyond what anyone should do and paid the price, being swallowed by the earth and doomed to be slowly consumed by the void (this is my explaination for the ancient city and sculk in the caves below).

Years later, the people of the Ancestor Dales found the lands and settled there, building their kingdom from crystal and ice and materials brought with them from the Nether. The true name of the Ancestor Dales has been lost to time but the people are commonly belived to be the ancestors of the Duskwood royal family. It is unknown what caused the Dales to crumble, some say that the remaining warped people of Hallowhall dragged them down to their city below.

Currently Duskwood resides in these lands, being an open trading kingdom that aims to continue to be neutral land and welcoming to all other people of the world. It is ruled by Prince Clover Darling (thats me, my little minesona boy!!). The old King died many years ago trying to do his duty as bestowed upon him by the Gods of Death and Rebirth. The Queen has recently sailed off to visit a neighbouring kingdom but vanished in a freak storm over the ocean. Prince Clover is not openly accepted as ruler due to his Wither Curse that causes him to destroy things he touches on occassion. As the curse worsens he will destroy more and more. But he's trying!

The Royal family has been tasked with ridding the world of what the gods call Void Rot, which is what we know as sculk. The gods claim it is a disease, or an ailment caused by the meddling of the players, and that they must cleanse it with their own hands. Clover doesn't exactly know what that means but has a shiny ho and he's ready to fight it!

There's also a world hopping travelling tradesman, connections to other worlds I build in such as Rosendale and some of my other survival worlds if I ever decide what to DO with them.

I'm sure there's stuff I'm forgetting but eh, that's the gist of it!!

[syrupspinner]

i beat BIT.TRIP Runner & BIT.TRIP Presents... Runner2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien

even reading those titles makes me winded, let alone all this running

so I've been into indie games since the 3ds. this, cave story, and riskys revenge were foundational games for me to discover. the thing is, this is the only one of those I never beat. yeah, I beat ballos but not... whatever the final boss of this is. if I remember right, I got frustrated at needing to repeat a really long stage because I kept missing one gold (on replay, I can tell you it was before the gauntlet)

revisiting it, it's hard to say that young me was wrong? the stages are designed around being musical, right. it has a shallow and improvisational tone to it, and I feel like the foundation was built on better by future not-rhythm games like geometry dash and harmoknight. the stages here are a bit repetitive, and I recognise the stylistic importance of emulating a looping chorus, but it still feels kinda lame having a level that feels like playing a much shorter level 3 times in a row.

the controls are a bit strange in my opinion too. the steam release tells you to use a controller, but I think that feels worse than kbm. space is jump, and every other action maps really cleanly to the arrow keys. on the controller it gets more spread out... down is still duck, but you can't hit left to kick. you've gotta hit y or... right trigger? since you hit up to spring and A to jump, everything feels weirdly split up. this is a bit of a nitpick, since there's always the keyboard, it just kinda stuck with me.

another minor issue I had was the art style. it's hard to tell what's in the foreground and what's in the background sometimes. it's fine with stationary obsticales, but with stuff like fireballs and blockable beats it's really easy to not register them. the scrolling is what gets me, especially with the obstacles are the same coloured voxels as the backgrounds. at least its tolerable in this one, spoilers

the game wasn't bad, mind you. none of this ruined my enjoyment. first of all, the foundation is solid, y'know? it's a fun little musical autorunner. it's too short for any of the issues to really matter that much anyway, which sounds a bit backhanded, but I appreciate a game that knows it's length. im not sure how easily I'd recommend it to someone, but I didn't have a bad time. if you've got a low spec laptop and need something to kill time on a train ride, it's kinda perfect.

oh yeah, perfection! I like how this game handles collection and death. the game uses gold to show the best way to handle things and reward good reaction time. like, the gold above the springy enemies shows you that bouncing on them is better than trying to jump over them, and the gold paths above springs are missable if you're just holding up, showing you that it's a good habit to try and time things more specifically. it's a great way to bolster player skills and reward good gameplay.

deaths too! indie games in the 10s were great with respecting the players mistakes. it's already bad enough that you didn't win, you don't need to introduce a punishment. to use psychological terms, death in a video game is arguably a negative punishment because the player loses their progress, in addition of not receiving the expected reward of success. additional punishments, like inventory loss, make it really easy to alienate the player with a perceived disproportionate reaction.

(as an aside, there are exceptions. this assumes a linear path that death prevents the player from advancing through, so Minecraft uses inventory loss well because resource collection replaces linear traversal as the players main goal)

but this game uses this in a pretty interesting way. when you die, you watch commander video fly back to the start instead of just respawning. this emphasizes to the player that they have a lot to redo, which turns a negative punishment (which is the removal of something, like keeping a kid from watching tv for a week) into a positive punishment (by introducing a punishment, such as writing lines) by making a show of what the player has to repeat. in my opinion, this transformative approach to punishing mistakes is a great way to avoid making the player feel like punishment isn't disproportionate while making sure death is still a big deal. it's balanced really well!

runner2 is pretty much just the same game, so everything i said applies here too. the only thing is that i think everything that was added to iterate on the previous game ends up exacerbating my problems with the gameplay

there's still no sense of rhythm. in an actual rhythm game, like rhythm heaven, if you know enough about music then you can effectively predict where a song's gonna go and anticipate the proper input. the way the bgm builds up to each buhbum-bum-bum in rhythm rally is a great example of this, where the music builds up to the input the same way every time so it gives your brain a clue to prepare for it. since the backing track and the musical sfx are designed to be interchangeable, where you can swap level tracks and it still works, the entire game ends up being ractive instead of predictive.

this is bad for a rhythm game, but at least manageable in the first game. runner2 does a lot to help that be just incongruent enough to ruin your fun. runner1 starts with more of a chiptune tracks that builds to a more instrumental track throughout the level, but runner2's default is already hi-fi, which makes things feel so samey already. another way this hurts is that foreground and background objects are less distinct, since theyre modeled in the same artstyle, especially considering the parallax scrolling makes the travel at the same speed. the backgrounds are distracting in general too, theres always some weird shit begging to be looked at instead of the threats.

there's also a lot of forced replayability. theres a mechanic where if you wanna unlock extra characters/costumes, you need to play though most of a world, and then unlock a side level that activates key powerups, and then backtrack to previous levels and play them again to take alternate routes. maybe its just cuz i was bit.tripped out by the end of this marathon, but im not willing to do that all again. it sucks because this and the side levels you unlock (with alternate routes that also make you replay the level, cmon guys) make up like 30% of the game. and thats not even getting into shit like those game cartridges.

remember how i said the first game was well balanced with showing you the level you completed when you die? well now its unbalanced by how sick youre gonna be of every level once you play all of them a second time, and thats assuming you never died. by the end, missing gold just made me sigh and think "fuck it, i dont care anymore, i just wanna be done" which never happened with runner1. i guess the lesson here is that you shouldnt make your side content feel like a chore. you dont get to play fun new optional levels, you have to replay old levels if you want 100%.

commandgirlvideo is a baddie though so sequel wins

no but seriously. the sequel is just a longer and more repetitive version of runner1. its just bloated with extra levels and forced repetition if you want 100%, but skipping that makes it feel too short.

im not playing runner3, it seems ever more visually noisy and i do not fuck with those camera angles

[icarusthelunarguard]

This Week’s Horrible-Scopes

It’s time for this week’s Horrible-Scopes! So for those of you that know your Astrological Signs, cool! If not, just pick one, roll a D12, or just make it up as you go along. It really doesn’t matter. Better yet! Check out “Heart of the Game, Fredonia” and see if they can sell you those D12’s with the symbols on them. Tell them “Shujin Tribble” sentcha. And “Hail, Hail, Fredonia!” Home of the Blue Devil!

It’s been a long time since you’ve read any interesting periodicals, hasn’t it? Like, when was the last time you read any “National Geographic”s? Meaning read it for the articles. It’s been a while, we know. BUT, it’s still being made - and it’s still as heavy as you remember it being: 0.3Kg or 0.66 Pounds. So let's give you a bunch of cover titles and see what you get to learn about this week.

Aries 

Your issue is from September 2003 - and across the top of the front page it says, very proudly, “AOL Keyword: NATGEO”. Really aged like fine milk, huh? Anyway, your big, bold, red letters to get your attention says, “zebras!” And since the picture is of one zebra neck-biting another, calling these guys “Oreo Murder Horses” isn’t too far off. So This Week… Go check out “Casual Geographic” on YouTube. Don’t forget to drink water, hug your mother, and give him all the Thumbs Up. He works so hard on those videos and still has no idea what he’s doing. 

Taurus 

Taking us back to the late 20th Century, and all you Gen-X’ers can stay mad about that term, we’re pulling your issue from October 1998. No website information, no AOL headers, but the main topic is “Population”. Sub-tops are about human migration, feeding the planet, and… Uhm… Perfume. Honestly how that ended up in the mix we have no idea. So This Week… Just be glad there are no perfume sampler pages in that magazine for you to curl your nose at. And if you don’t know what a Perfume Sampler Page in a magazine is, then you’re too young. We’ll explain it when you grow up.

Gemini  

Moving up to March 2004, and yes there’s a web address on the top this time, your main topic is all about “Harp Seals - The Hunt for Balance”. They’re normally found in the cold waters of the North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, so why is there a sub-topic called, “A Rain Forest in Rio’s Backyard”? Honestly, it makes so little sense to us too. But the stars always have a reason, right? So This Week… Be on the lookout for various rainforest ants: the Leaf-Cutter and the Bullet Ants are No Joke! Do NOT take them on. You WILL lose! 

Cancer Moon-Child 

Back to October 2003, and yes, that sad AOL Keyword blurb is back. Your topic is “Kingdom On Edge - Saudi Arabia”. And, again, NatGeo just likes to screw with everyone’s minds because another sub-topic is, “Watery Graves of the Maya”! So This Week… take your pick between political turmoil in a country that’s 95% desert, or water-logged caves in the Yucatan with human skulls in it. Neither topic really works for us, so you’re on your own.

Leo 

Skipping ahead to August 2005, you’ve got a great photo on the cover: two OLD, rusted fuel pumps side-by-side. One says “Aviation” the other says “Ethyl”. Because, you know, you used to be able to just BUY Aviation-grade fuel and put it in your gas can for… whatever. The label says, “After Oil - Powering the Future”, and it’s a good topic, really. Lots of ways to make personal transportation more affordable and ecologically cleaner - and I’ll bet they were sure it’d be a total game changer in the next 20 years, right? So This Week… Do NOT look up how to put out an electric car battery fire. (SPOILERS… you almost can’t.)

Virgo 

Dropping back to November 2004 gives us this great close-up picture of some kind of lizard’s profile. It’s got a cute snout, colourful scales, a stark white background, and big red letters asking, “Was Darwin Wrong?” To NatGeo’s credit, I mean… “Yeah”? He was about a lot of nuance. But his overall idea’s been shown to be pretty much right for over 150 years. So if you want to ask, let’s be fair - the guy died before Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture debuted in Moscow. So This Week… You’ll be asked questions intended to throw you off your game. Just accept the premise, concede that there’s missing nuance to the question, and watch your questioner get more frustrated.

Libra

Dropping back to August 2004’s issue gives us something curiously titillating. It’s a picture of a human body, from thigh to chest, nude, curled on itself, showing some rolls of skin and a hand popping out with long, stark-red fingernails. The topic is, “The Heavy Cost of Fat”, and it’s a topic that’s highly controversial for good reason. Lots of stories of people who’ve been blown off by the medical practice with the rubber-stamp of, “just lose weight and you’ll get better” without even caring if that’s where the problem really lies. And yet we’ve seen ancient sculptures of human form where there’s some pudge, some curves, something that resembles “modernly obese” - and they were normal people. So This Week… We know you might be self-conscious about your weight. What we want is for you to be happy in your own body - and if you’d like to make a change just remember, it’ll take time. Be patient. You’re worth it. 

Scorpio 

Another drop back, this time to February 2004, and its headliner, “Great Whites of the North”. If you thought it was about sharks, guess again. The cover has two polar bears fighting each other, so it’s gotta be “interesting” to put it mildly. There are reports that they can track prey for a LONG, long time - like… MILES away, by scent. Nevermind that, they have Murder Mittens larger than your FACE! So This Week… Remember the story of how Brian Freekin’ Blessed punched one outside his tent in the Arctic? Yeah, take that story with a grain of salt since in the same story he supposedly spoke with a Yeti. Oh, and do NOT try punching a polar bear. Even if you are able to succeed, you’ll fail shortly after.

Sagittarius 

It’s not common for us to be jealous of any of you in these, but this time some of us are. January 2005’s cover says, “why we love caffeine”, and a picture of a cup of coffee with a foam heart across the top. The idea that NatGeo was tackling the topic of coffee astounds the mind - and SCREW YOU! Yes, you can get caffeine from sources other than coffee, but you know what? There’s nothing more invigorating than downing cup after cup of flaming hot coffee at 7am while waiting for your breakfast burrito to finish in the microwave. So This Week… Coffee does NOT need butter to taste good. Just stop it! Stop it right now!

Capricorn 

March of 2005 has kind of a freaky picture. It’s someone with lots and lots and LOTS of electronic pickups attached to their head and scalp. A veritable forest of these things all across their skin! The topic title says, “what’s in your mind”. The question itself is just so wrong. What’s in your mind is YOU! YOU are your mind! The Mind is what The Brain does. Look, it’s simple: lungs breathe, legs run, and brains MIND, ok? So This Week… If you’d actually paid attention to your philosophy and neuroscience courses at college you’d already understand this. There’s plenty of brush-up courses on YouTube. Go sit down and take an unofficial Night College Course load. 

Aquarius 

The Summer of 2005, specifically July, asks an interesting medical question. “Stem Cells - How Far Will We Go?” It’s a wild idea - using our own stem cells to rebuild entire organs. There was a story some years back about a 3D Printed Trachea that was covered in the patient’s stem cells so it wouldn’t be rejected by the body - and it worked! So this Week… Just because we CAN grow replacement body parts for you doesn’t mean you can just blow out whatever part you like and expect it to be replaced whenever you like. Stop Binge Drinking - you keep claiming to have been knighted “Sir Ossis of Liver” when you’re drunk!

Pisces  

Finally, back to the winter weather in February 2005. The title is “The Great Gray Owl”, with a photo of exactly that owl, face on, in flight, and it’s just so COOL! But here’s where the pedantry comes up - the bird’s spelled “G - R - A - Y” - meaning the American Version of the word. Now far be it for us to be snobs about anything (Yeah, RIGHT) but this makes no sense. Americans dropping the letter “U” from words like “colour” - ok, that was because it was cheaper for the old printing presses to use fewer letters, but come ON! Why switch it from “E” to “A”? It makes no sense at all. So This Week… Try using British English spellings in exchanges and see what kind of reactions you get. We won’t care what it is, but you might find it interesting.

And THOSE are your Horrible-Scopes for this week! Remember if you liked what you got, we’re obviously not working hard enough at these. BUT! If you want a better or nastier one for your own sign or someone else’s, all you need to do to bribe me is just Let Me Know - or check out the Ko-Fi page ( https://ko-fi.com/icarusthelunarguard )! These will be posted online at the end of each week via Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, Discord, and BLUESKY.

[natehoodreviews]

2023 Year End Compilation

Alphabetical Africa, Walter Abish

I’m not sure how or why, but when I picture the events of this book in my head, I imagine them illustrated by Mœbius. Alva certainly flitters back and forth through its pages like one of Mœbius’ dragon-riding heroines forever skirting distant horizons. Reading this book for more than half an hour at a time made me dizzy, but not in an unsatisfying way. I already can’t wait to read it again.

River Writing: An Eno Journal, James Applewhite

Definitely smacks of my beloved shady, overgrown East Coast rivers. Still, though, a bit too esoteric for my tastes.

Sleep Donation, Karen Russell

Once again, Russell’s talent for worldbuilding exceeds her talent for storytelling. Her inevitable anticlimaxes undercut all the mystery and intrigue she so successfully sets up in the first two-thirds of her books. This one is no exception.

The Chronicles of Amber: 1-3, Roger Zelazny

This may not be where George R. R. Martin got the idea for a fantasy series based on families fighting for a throne, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this is where he gained his nonchalance for said characters being arrogant bastards who use and abuse non-royals as cannon fodder. Ultimately, it’s the story of an amoral man growing a conscience. I love the line from the second book: “I sometime fancy myself an evil which exists to oppose other evils.” The problem, however, is that the cast is too big with not enough personality to go around. I was bored stupid by the third book whenever a new family member would show up and spend an entire chapter narrating their lives up until that point. There may be two more novels in the cycle, but you’d have to pay me to read them.

The Killer Angels, Michael Shaara

“And I am Kilrain of the 20th Maine/And I'd march to hell and back again

For Colonel Joshua Chamberlain/And we're all goin' down to Dixieland!”

The Women Around Jesus, Elisabeth Moltmann-Wendel

Come for the feminist theology, stay for the cornucopia of fascinating, rarely heard Christian legends like Martha Slaying the Dragon.

The Supper of the Lamb: A Culinary Reflection, Robert Farrar Capon

Equal measures prayerful and playful; makes the act of cutting an onion an act of discovery and worship. It reads like something M. F. K. Fisher would’ve written if she’d had a sense of humor and playfulness instead of an occasionally amusing detached snobbishness.

The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen

It’s been a while since I’ve had to grit my teeth and force myself to finish such a long book. When I finally did, I could practically hear Schubert’s “Ave Maria” blasting in the background like I was some survivor of a cave-in witnessing daylight for the first time in days. Suffice to say I did not like this novel. It was an unpleasant chore to spend so much time with such unpleasant people doing such unpleasant things to each other. It didn’t help that so much of it was so damned boring!

Mort, Terry Pratchett

Easily one of the best Discworld novels I’ve read yet. I would happily read an entire spinoff just about Death working as a restaurant short-order cook in Ankh-Morpork.

Reaper Man, Terry Pratchett

Not as good as Mort, but it had its moments. I feel like the sentient, parasitic shopping mall and the Bill Door plots deserved their own separate novels, though.

The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis

I can’t believe this is one of the books we recommend to young people looking to learn more about Christianity. I have a Master’s Degree in Divinity and I feel like I only followed about 65% of what Lewis was talking about here.

The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic, Terry Pratchett

I was led to believe that these two novels which kicked off the Discworld franchise were somehow embarrassing and terrible when compared to the books that came after them. But I don’t know, I enjoyed them!

The Iliad, Homer

The scene where Hector’s son Astyanax recoils in fear from his father’s monstrous battle armor only for Hector to chuckle and take his helmet off to soothe him is one of my new favorite moments in ancient literature. It’s this heartbreaking admission of humanity in the midst of a truly gruesome, truly horrific war. It helps bring this fantastical story of divine warriors and capricious gods down to earth, where it perhaps belongs if the myths and legends are true and the Trojan War truly did happen.

Equal Rites, Terry Pratchett

After the madcap antics of The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic, this book felt like Pratchett tried to tone the humor down in favor of more focused storytelling. My favorite part of this book were the Zoons, a people incapable of lying who elect specially trained Tribal Liars to enact trade agreements on their behalf. I want a book just about this ethnic group!

Johnny Got His Gun, Dalton Trumbo

A sometimes literally breathtaking work of prophetic fury—a fire sermon that's lost none of its flame or relevance in the decades since its publication. The Jesus Christ in Tucson hallucination might be one of the finest, most heartbreaking things I've ever read. And I've read a LOT. The schemers behind the Red Scare were right to fear Trumbo. 

Point Omega, Don DeLillo

I dunno, gang, I still don't think late DeLillo is for me. Feels like he was trying too hard to channel Cormac McCarthy in certain places. Elsewhere his collage of images and ideas fails to coalesce into anything meaningful or compelling.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret., Judy Bloom

Genuinely amazing to me that evangelicals were so pissed off at a book for honestly examining puberty and menstruation that they missed that it’s also a book about a young woman demanding her right to know God despite living in a secular household.

Dimiter, William Peter Blatty 

Forgive the cliche that the story isn’t what you’re here for, but seriously, the story isn’t what you’re here for. Instead, it’s to sink oneself into Blatty’s febrile imagination.

Screwjack, Hunter S. Thompson

The pages detailing Thompson's first mescaline trip are funny, gripping, terrifying. Everything else just...isn't very good. A reminder that just because you CAN posthumously publish a famous writer's assorted scribblings doesn't mean you SHOULD.

Suttree, Cormac McCarthy 

Incredibly, sometimes hilariously over-written. But a version of this book that isn’t over-written wouldn’t be worth reading. Some of the most astonishing English prose the world has seen since Joyce. Harrogate might be my favorite McCarthy character ever—he’s basically Huckleberry Finn by way of Harmony Korine.

[the-rutian-songbird]

The Pieces in Front of Us.

The sub-terranean apartment Dinek and Silais'fenn lived and raised their children in was small. The costumes and dresses that Silais wore in her weekly performances at the Coronet Theatre exploded into the main living areas of the two-bedroom flat. Though windowless, the bright grow lights filled nooks around the kitchen where Rylothian orchids in pots that were painted ages ago by the hands of children. It may have been a comfortable apartment for a family of four, had the Fenn's not been collectors of anything that captured their interest. The walls were covered in holo-images of Twi'lek art, mixed in with snapshots of each of the Fenn's at a younger age. Shelves overflowing with datadisks lined the wall and even found themselves onto the artifact shelves. It was an apartment filled with music, in the background, somewhere, an opera from Onderon, in a language so archaic none of them could understand it played. It was home, obviously so the closer they got to the door of it, the more relieved Daesha seemed to become. There was no need to knock, her fingers knew the code by heart and the Fenn's had no reason to worry, even deep in the heart of Coronet. She entered without a thought, inviting Ade to join her as they walked through the entry hall lined with shelves of various replicas of cultural artefacts intermixed with ancestral artefacts. In the living room, sat Dinek, a pleasant, gentile Tukian of a deep green tone. When he heard the steps, he stood to greet them. Three cups of tea already sitting out on the table surrounded by artfully designed chairs that Silais spent far too many credits on.

He had a slow, easy smile as he rose to his feet to embrace his daughter, and then be introduced to her company. His lekku and smirk spoke clearly to his amusement - and amusement that seemed to truly get under Daesha's skin as her reception was a bit more weary. "I made you tea." Dinek stated simply and motioned for them to sit down, "I heard you were here, Teeubo called my office when you landed, don't worry... he was at the starport and say the both of you, commed me being the mother Gurreck she is... Ryloth Communication Network." He says with a wink.

"I didn't see her at the Starport," Daesha remarked and easily slide onto the couch as she had done a million times before, but this one was different. That much was clear from the perplexed look on her face and the somewhat disapproving look she gave to her father as she righted herself. "She changed the couch, could you have at least talked her into a different colour?" The look Dinek gave Daesha in return was flat and spoke just as clearly as any words. "I had one of my feelings." He smirked and picked up the cup of tea, "I thought so." "Mm." He took a sip of tea, "First, tell me of your vacation." "It's all related, Dad, we instigated the events to put me in this position and that's when the dreams began," She started to explain.

"The dreams maybe, but you've always had my intuition. It's what made and makes you so talented at what you do."

"Yes, but I've never been to Ryloth, yet that's where I'm dreaming of. Almost every night since I went to Talus I dream of coming across massive caverns in the various caves systems but there's nothing in them."

"Isn't there?" He asked with a smirk, "Remember, we are not named for some colours on a chart, we are named after the very aspects of our world, the tears of Kikka'lekki are only representative to the spiritual aspects of the elements we were built upon and cannot live without."

"The Sesk'mahvus cave system interlinks the caverns for a reason, each of the caverns is representative to the clans and how we are connected to Her just as everything in this Galaxy is. And what are we as a people? We are fire, water, earth... we are the spirit, and the hope that inspiration brings, these aren't things for someone to embody."

Dinek's soft smile remained through the various transitions of Daesha's gaze on him as she followed what he was telling her. When she leaned back against the couch and simply sat there - slightly dumbfounded, his smile grew and he looked back to Ademu, "Had I known you would be coming too, I would've informed Silais, my wife."

He motioned to the various racks of costumes that filled the spaces between the shelving of the flat, "Not that she needs to add anything, but she can always think of something. My father always told me that no joy but joy in the eyes comes from loving a Tyrian." He chuckled and shrugged, "A lack of space certainly comes from loving one, but I have had sixty rotations of joy with her."

Ade listened to the explanation that Dinek gave on his theory of the interconnectedness of the people via the Temple cave system. It was certainly a poetic interpretation. The last time Ade had been anywhere near the Temple Caste's holdings, it had been for a far less spiritual reason. Not to bring attention to himself, Ade reached for the cup of tea, cradling it in his hands as Dinek motioned around the small apartment. There was an.. overwhelming amount of costumes and clothing in the living space. It made even Daesha's own show room appear almost comically barren by comparison.

"Your father was a wise man. I appreciate the sage advice, seeing as his grand-daughter may have embodied her mother's love of fashion." He said with a small chuckle. It was the closest he'd come to admitting his... fondness for Daesha's being. "And I'm sure another visit could be arranged if she has a need for something that I could provide." Ade kept his eyes making contact with Dinek when he was spoken to, but couldn't help but occasionally take in Daesha's distracted and sometimes awestruck expressions. Almost as if seeing the woman completely devoid of a barb or cheeky retort was something he didn't want to miss.

She remained quiet as they spoke, pulling her legs up to cross in front of her and cradling her mug of tea in her lap. It was the copper liquid of the spice tea that drew her attention. "We have no statues to her." "No." "No paintings." "No." "No icons." "No." "Yet, she has a name." "Do all things need to be physical to exist?" Dinek pointedly looked at his daughter whose expression fell into a well-trained placid calm mask she so naturally slipped on when her disbelief was too much. "I know a Kiva in the Outer Rim it would interest you to speak with, before you go remind me to give you the information to contact her, yes?" She nodded. Dinek watched his daughter's face with curiosity. The familiar resemblance as they studied people was clear, she was every bit her father's daughter. His smile turned to one loving joy and there was a bit of mischief in his eyes when he nodded towards her, glancing to Ademu. "Watch this." He whispered.

On cue, though too lost in her own thoughts to have caught her father's comment, Daesha leaned over to set her cup of tea back down and rose from the couch. She stood there for a moment, her eyes squinted in thought before she headed into the small kitchen and climbed easily onto the counter top to reach a box on the top of the cabinets there before she returned to her place on the couch.

"Your sister's actual birthday." He told gently, a mere reminder.

With the code entered, the box opened easily. Daesha carefully removed the Kalikori that was inside and pushed the box aside to lay the ancestral artefact against her legs to study it more carefully.

Dinek also moved, to secure the door with an extra data lock and turning up the volume on the music as he passed the holo-player on his way back to the living room. "I have always maintained that we're all connected in our ways. Our histories will sometimes repeat, and we come across recurring characters with different names, and different faces, but the same soul. This is the dynamic of the Galaxy that I teach, that the Goddess represents."

"There was a Twi'lek playwright your mother loves... I can't recall his name, but he had a theory that in the story of our lives, there are only three main players and it's through our spirit we are connected them. I'm sure his theory was influenced by the Council of Kivas, but ah..."

He leaned forward once he settled into his chair again to take the Kalikori from Daesha to hold between his hands. The clan name engraved into it was the name of a long dead Alderaanian family, 'Korinth'.

"You won't find the answers to your own situation in the past, and your heritage is certainly not the reason for your dreams, but there is a precedent in those names."

"You're Sesk'mahvus?" Daesha was puzzled as she looked at her father and he simply laughed, nodding.

"I am."

"Is there a reason you never told us?"

"It wasn't important. I was a teacher on Ryloth, I'm a teacher here on Corellia and we left Ryloth to be free of the system. What do the talents your mother and I possess mean when we would have to sell one of our children to ensure we could raise a family in the first place? That's no religious system, Daesha, you know that." He continued speaking, both his lekku and hands moving with his words. A true professor. "You're not discovering any grand truth here other than putting together the pieces of what you know already. Am I surprised that you started to dream with the time you had? Busy, busy, busy. You run around like your mother. Do you know where she is right now?"

He rolls his eyes, "Doaba Guefal for some festival for the Imperial Arts. It's far too monochromatic for me."

"She said she'd take the weekend off, now look what she's missed?" He scoffed and leaned forward motioning to Daesha. "When is water the most clear?" He asked plainly.

The look she gave to her father was one only a daughter could give to her father. "...when it's still."

"You've always had my intuition, nothing you say here is surprising to me. You're a Korinth spirit in a Fenn body and you are tied to that story as well. Explore it as you learn to be still." Dinek set the Kalikori on the table and sighed sadly, "One day we will have it on display again. Did you hide the Fenn Kalikori like I told you?"

Daesha nodded.

"Good. Now tell me, how's your sister? We haven't gotten a message from her in far too long."

On the subject of Ilar, Daesha took a long, deep breath and relaxed onto the couch, crossing her legs in front of her again. She went into detail without sharing specifics about the trouble Ilar was causing with her firework shows around Talus and the last time they had seen each other, they had argued that Daesha wasn't doing more. Dinek listened, his expression growing grave as her news continued. He didn't dare interrupt, news of his eldest child was rare and exceedingly hard to come by the longer the war progressed.

"If they arrest her..."

She shook her head to interrupt her father, "They won't. There will be no proper funeral. They are cruel." Her lekku shifted over her shoulders to twist and spiral in the silent communication of their people.

Now it was Dinek that took a deep breath and nodded. he understood, and it was a path they had both long accepted Ilar had chosen to walk. After a sip of tea to wash away the distasteful conversation, "Let's go to Nonnu's. I'm hungry and I would appreciate the lightheartedness of a conversation held in the open."

[angstama]

✧. tokrev boys when you ask to paint their body

ft. mikey, draken, mitsuya, chifuyu, hanma <3

genre: fluff!

a/n: should i do for the bonten trio, inui and koko as well?

♡ mikey

the two of you were cuddling when you suddenly asked mikey if you could paint his upper body out of boredom since you had remaining paint left from your arts and crafts project in school

"i don't doubt your painting skills babe but have you ever painted on a human? he quipped, raising a brow at you when you got up to get your paintbrushes and palette.

would literally be the worst canvas ever because he's constantly shaking and complaining at how cold it is without his sweater on, causing you to keep going over the outlines you did on his abs.

"stop moving mikey! you're making this ugly!" you frowned, looking at your almost destroyed sunflowers stemming from his waist line with furrowed brows. man, there goes your attempt in trying to paint your favourite flowers on your favourite human in the entire world.

he doesn't say it but under the constant whining of how freezing cold he is, mikey couldn't stand the fluttering feeling in his stomach whenever you'd go closer to his body to better see the details you're adding and the way your finger tips would lightly dab his skin to blend the colours together.

you were going to finish touching up when mikey ends up caving, pulling you into his chest and staining your white hoodie with the colours of yellow and brown from the wet painting. "mikey!" you squirmed in his grip to which he tightened his grip on you. "ah, now i'm warm again." he mumbled, smiling into the crook of your neck as he slowly drifts to sleep.

♡draken

you were watching draken doing his usual weight training in his room, letting his bare back face you as you could only start wonder how much more majestic his back would look like if he had tattoos behind.

so you being the ever so curious s/o you are, you asked draken if he'd let you paint his back to which he cooly lets you do it without any hesitance.

he'd play soft music in the background and watch you paint his back from the mirror, quietly admiring the way you look, from the little tongue peeking from the corner of your lips to the way your brows would furrow whenever adding in details.

you finally finished painting, a look of triumph on your face as you quickly snapped a picture to show your boyfriend.

"holy fuck now i gotta get this tattooed!" he exclaimed excitedly, amazed at how well it turned out. you had did a full back black outlined painting of a japanese temple with a dragon in the centre, a representation of draken's name.

literally would try to avoid water while showering to save that paint but ends up failing to do so.

♡ mitsuya

mitusya is literally your personal canvas. you had been painting his arms for quite some time now and had always done such a great job so he didn't mind letting you paint his body, specifically his chest, when you asked. besides, he couldn't resist saying no to you too. how could he when you're an aspiring artist? he has to support his s/o right? (literally best boyfriend ever~)

mitusya would hum soft tunes while you start painting his chest. like draken, mitsuya would constantly keep his eyes on you with a soft smile on his face because he loves the sight of you just enjoying what you're doing. he wished he could snap a photo of you but convinced himself that he shouldn't so that it wouldn't cause you to lose your focus.

seriously, mitusya is just the best canvas you could ask for.

luna and mana would end up waddling into the room and joining you to paint their brother's arms while you finished up mitsuya's chest.

" you always do such an amazing job baby." mitusya compliments, planting a soft kiss on your cheek as he continues to check out the colourful hummingbird you had painted on his chest. "but maybe you should teach luna and mana how to do a better job." he scratches the back of his head, looking at the mess his little sisters had did to his arm.

♡ chifuyu

shyest boy ever! would literally get so flustered and explode on the spot.

"w-what? wh-where is this coming from babe?" he asked nervously, internally sweating buckets at the sudden request you made. " i saw f/n doing it to their boyfriend so i wanted to try too!" you beamed excitedly. oh dang it, how could he say no to you? if some other guy can do it, so can he!

would hold peke j in his lap when you begin painting his abdomen area and up to his chest just to keep his racing heart rate down. he would be to embarrassed to look at you but little did you know, he secretly loves it.

you didn't expect chifuyu to be so ticklish when he starts to break into giggles whenever you lightly brush his skin, body shaking slightly which caused you to jerk halfway while painting. but you didn't mind, his giggles are adorable as heck as much as it's ruining your artwork.

you finally finished what you planned to paint, except that with shaky lines and smeared colours on adorning his skin. doesn't matter though, chifuyu still thinks that it's beautiful because it was you who painted it. "my y/n is so talented!" he grinned proudly. would later go over to baji's to show off your work.

body painting would probably become a common thing right now in your relationship.

♡ hanma shuji

hanma was actually the one who asked you to paint his body. he had seen you done countless of paintings on a canvas for your clients and wondered if you'd be just as good painting on people.

"say darling, why don't i be your canvas for today?" he mused, holding your paintbrush with a smug grin before you could begin doing your work on your canvas that's currently sitting on your beloved easel. you supposed that painting on your boyfriend couldn't be much of a difference so you agreed but damn, turns out you're wrong.

hanma would literally stare at you intensely while you're painting him, making it hard for you to focus. hanma is an awfully handsome and charming man, so how are you supposed to remain unfazed when he's literally burning holes in your body with his gaze?

when he noticed you nervously outlining his skin, he'd take your wrist to steady your slightly trembling hands and let you guide his hand around his own body.

would constantly praise you whenever you finished a part of your work or whenever you turn to switch brushes. "you're doing great darling,"

you heave a sigh of relief when you're finally done, letting yourself slump back into your seat to take a look at the work you did on your lover. a double headed snake skeleton wrapped around his upper body with red flowers. it was quite a sight.

"well aren't you an exceptional artist darling?" he grinned, leaning in to kiss you on the lips to acknowledge your effort.

[novaviis]

sick!dick au. Bruce's POV. read in order here.

For most everyone else, it starts at the Gala.

For Bruce, it starts in a grey little office, with a stack of papers and a glitter pen.

Dick will confess after the fact to the fainting spell in the apartment he shares with Wally, and the months of progressively worse migraines, including an incident on patrol with Jason – and Bruce is none-too-pleased with that information being kept silent, but he picks his battles and this isn’t one of them. Still, looking back nearly everyone will unanimously agree that the night it really “began” was the Gala.

For Bruce, it begins when the social worker hands him a creased manila envelope. Inside is a birth certificate, a social security number, and an immunization record. Bruce looks through the contents of the envelope. Is this really it? Yes, he’s never exactly done this before, but he feels like there should be more. Guardianship of a child shouldn’t be reduced to three pieces of flimsy paper in an envelope. There’s a coffee stain on the corner. The social worker doesn’t really know what to say to that; this is just the way it is. She slides the rest of the paperwork across the table. Everything’s already been looked over by his lawyers, all he needs to do is sign. She pats her pockets, muttering to herself before bringing out a red glitter pen and sheepishly offering it to him.

Bruce is in his twenties. He’s impulsive with his compassion and he just witnessed another little boy watching his parents die. He knows he can give this boy what he needs. Or he’s going to try. But between the drive to bring this boy’s family justice and the need to heal a part of himself in the process, he’s somehow skipped over just how huge this is. He’s thought about it, of course, but always with the under current of doing whatever it takes to make it work. He was going to give the boy a home, give him the closure that Bruce never got, and maybe he’d save him from turning out like… well, like Bruce. Only now he’s staring down at Guardianship written in big block letters across the top of the stack, and it’s sinking in now that he’s not just taking the boy in. He’s going to be his family. And it doesn’t change a thing, his resolve doesn’t waver, because he knows he can give him a good life, but it’s that one word. Family. His family is starting out with a coffee stain, a stack of papers, and a glitter pen.

He signs the papers. Dick is already waiting outside with Alfred, who’s taken him to the small cafeteria down the hall. The boy hasn’t spoken much, in the days Bruce has taken to get to know him. Bruce had asked Alfred if he was like that – after. And Alfred had looked at him sympathetically, answered carefully. Yes, he was, in a sense. Bruce had been quiet. Shellshocked. Traumatized. But Bruce needs to remember that he had him, at least one steady presence in his life. Dick has no one. It’s going to take time.

It shouldn’t be so easy, Bruce find himself thinking over and over as they finish up. He tucks everything away into his briefcase, bears with the social worker smiling and shaking his hand and thanking him for doing such a good deed as if this is a charity stunt for publicity and she doesn’t seem to care either way. He asks again, just before he closes his briefcase, if she’s sure that there’s nothing else he needs. Report cards, keepsakes, family medical history, he doesn’t know. She shakes her head, all pleasant smiles. No, that’s all he came with – as if he’s a shelter dog. Bruce latches his suitcase shut.

Back then, it was just a passing thought. He doesn’t spare it another over the years, because he doesn’t need to. Time went on, Dick becomes an inseparable part of his life. Bruce will always silently maintain that Dick was the one to save him in the end. He’s not a perfect guardian, not a perfect father, and he makes more mistakes than he can count. They argue, they have fallings out, and still they always work through it – because they’re family.

And the issue of the family medical history does not resurface until that champagne gold night. Until he catches Selena watching him from across the ballroom, smiling behind the rim of her wine glass and cocking her head to tease him. Until, he’s distracted between secretively searching the crowds for her and forcing himself to smile and laugh with Gotham’s elite, so he doesn’t notice the commotion rising up on the other side of the room. Until his youngest son comes racing toward him through the crowd looking more scared and shaken than Bruce has ever seen him. Until he breaks through the ring of bystanders and sees Dick passed out on the floor, Wally kneeling over him beside himself with panic. Until the ambulance and the fury of the waiting room (making a mental not to raise absolute hell with the Hospital’s board of directors) and the doctor pulling him to a side room, a little grey office, to ask the dreaded question. All at once, it comes back to that moment, and Bruce sighs, scrubs his palm over his tired eyes. No, he doesn’t have Dick’s family medical history. It doesn’t exist. Realistically, it isn’t Bruce’s fault, but that has never stopped him from shouldering blame.

Selena reaches out in the following days it ask in on how Dick’s doing. Bruce is cordial, tells her that her concern is appreciated but Dick seems to be doing fine. And on the other side of the phone, he can hear her moving around her penthouse, maybe standing at the window – she’s glad to hear it. Let her know if he needs anything, if she can do anything to help. It’s early days then, and none of them know just how bad it’s going to get.

It’s a slow progression at first, and then it’s not. It’s months between seizures, a steady increase in migraines – but life goes on. It’s not as if Bruce is hovering every Dick at every second. He’s a grown man now, with a career and a home and a partner. Bruce supports him in any way he can, until it gets to the point that he has to make the hard call. The argument he has with Dick that night, in the study of Wayne Manor, is something he’ll never wash from his memory. He’s used to making the tough decisions. He’ll be the asshole if he has to, he can handle Dick’s anger, but he’s not going to allow him to take this much risk into the field. Benching Nightwing until they have a handle on this is a necessary call, but Dick is stubborn (who on earth did he learn that from), and unwilling to step down so easily. And as the argument reaches its fever pitch, Bruce pacing and ranting, listing off his rational, he hears Dick call his name in a wavering voice and it cuts through the background noise. Dick, the colour drained from his face, eyes unfocused, conceding that he’s about to lose this argument, will haunt him in the same way as the worst things he’s seen in the life he’s chosen. That’s the moment he knows that this isn’t just going to pass, the moment he bolts to catch Dick before he can topple forward and hit his head. This isn’t something they can wait out. He’ll never regret making the call, but he will always regret the way he put the pressure on Dick, as if he’d just made things worse.

The thing is, this lasts years. It becomes a part of all their lives – because it’s Dick. It isn’t all consuming, it doesn’t eat away at their thoughts every minute of the day, but it’s a resurfacing concern that’s rarely spoken about aloud. And Bruce sees how this changes his family. No one can say that the Wayne clan is the most well adjusted and healthy family, but Bruce does his best. He realises and appreciates now more than ever just how much work Dick put into keeping them all functioning. Keeping them together. He never thought he’d taken it for granted until then. It shouldn’t have taken this to bring the family closer together, but it does, and as much as Bruce hates that, he’s not going to fight it.

Time goes on. Still. It’s a slow progression at first, and then it’s not. Bruce is in a meeting with his chief executive officers when his secretary buzzes in over the speaker saying there’s a call for him on the line. He thanks her for letting him know and tells her to take a message. She says the young man is telling her it’s an emergency. One of the CEOs is about to launch into a presentation and Bruce doesn’t spare him a second thought. Picks up the phone, pushes away from the board table, and paces to the window. Wally’s voice comes through saying his name, shaken and urgent, rambling out sentences too fast for Bruce to hear.

Wally. Slow down. What happened?

He stopped breathing. Fuck, Bruce, he called me at work – sounded like a seizure so I ran home, but he – it didn’t stop, he wasn’t breathing.

That first night, after Bruce has sent his reluctant children home with Alfred, it’s just him and Wally left with Dick. The end of visiting hours is fast approaching. Bruce steps out to let Wally have his time with Dick, allows him some privacy. He eventually makes his way up to the terrace balcony on the upper floors, a green space with massive glass walls and an open ceiling. Fresh air for the first time in hours does wonders.

Selena is there. She approaches him from the other side of a low hedge, bundled up in a cashmere sweater and scarf – ones he bought her ages ago. When he asks how she knew, she smiles. She has her ways. Tim called her, didn’t he. Yeah, he did. They stand in silence for a while, staring out at the mosaic of lights against the persistent dark of Gotham, before she puts a hand on his arm. I know you’ve got a lot on your plate, Bruce, she says, and the coy smile fades into sincerity. Come to me when you need to.

Three days after Dick is admitted to the ICU, Bruce calls Damian into the study. It’s late, they just got home from visiting an hour ago. They’ve been arguing a lot lately, before Dick went downhill. Mostly regular thirteen-year-old boy versus father arguing, but a few too many frustrated shouting matches in the Cave. Bruce can’t help but wonder if it’s in part because Dick hasn’t been there to act as a mediator. Still, the past few days have been quiet, if not tense. Damian complies when Bruce calls him down. He’s wearing a sweater he stole from Dick months ago, the bulk of it swallowing his smaller frame like a blanket. He has the sleeves rolled up, his hands in the front pocket, when he pauses in the doorway. Bruce gestures for him to sit across from him at the desk. He can see the way Damian is bracing himself for a lecture, wondering whatever it is he did wrong this time, as he takes his seat. Bruce, in his chair on the other side, watches him for a moment before deciding this won’t do. He stands, and pulls his chair next to Damian’s and pulls a file over from the other side of the desk.

Wayne Men are at a higher risk of Prostate Cancer as they get older. I get tested every few years. He tells him. My Mother’s side of the family, the Kanes, have a history of Crohn’s Disease. It’s prevalent in people of Ashkenazi Jewish decent. I’ve never had it, or had symptoms, so it’s unlikely that I passed it on to you, but not impossible. And when Damian stares back at him, he leans forward, presses his hand to his son’s shoulder. I want you to know these things, Damian. It’s important that you know your history.

And with any other child, it may have not been a good idea to have this conversation right then. Any other child may have been scared. But this is his son, and Damian is as frank and pragmatic about these things as he is, and Bruce knows that he will appreciate the honesty, knows that those questions have likely been rattling around in Damian’s head for a while now. They spend another hour that night talking about their family, beyond just medical history, and Bruce answers any questions Damian has.

Dick gets worse. Wally leaves to find answers. Bruce is doing everything he can; medical bills are nothing to him, he checks in on his children, calls in favours from the league to keep watch of Gotham when he’s needed at the hospital. It’s the most he’s ever relied on others in his entire life.

It’s just him in Dick’s room one night. He’s at the window when he hears Dick rasping his name. It’s been rare lately that he’s been coherent enough to really speak without being prompted, so he has Bruce’s full attention immediately. He crosses over to the bed, braces a hand over Dick’s. And Dick doesn’t say anything for a long while. His eyes are half closed. Bruce is close to assuming he’s fallen asleep, when Dick’s unsteady hand slides out from under his, and rests on top with a barely there squeeze. Dick is staring up at him. His voice his so quiet it’s almost drowned out by the monitors, but Bruce hears it.

Take care of Wally.

Bruce doesn’t waste time on don’t talk like that sentiments. He doesn’t tell Dick that he won’t need to, that he’ll be fine, because Bruce does not make promises he knows he cannot keep. He nods. He will. Dick doesn’t need to ask him to take care of the family, that much is an unspoken understanding, but if this is a piece of mind he can give Dick, it’s without hesitation.

He ends up at Selena’s door after visiting hours. She buzzes him in, and when she opens the penthouse door neither of them say a word. She guides him over to the couch, pours two glasses of good wine, and when she returns, he’s already got his face in his hand – not sobbing, not breaking down, just… exhausted. She isn’t sure Bruce knows how to break down anymore. In the end, she just sits with him. Rubs his back, tentatively at first, not sure if he’ll let her. Bruce not only does, but he shudders under her hand, allows himself to breathe with her, and it’s enough to let the pressure ease and the ache to come in. He allows himself feel to it.

Because that’s his son. That’s his first son. And he’s failed him.

Years from then, when this is all in the past, he’ll let it slip. It’s over a late night coffee with Dick in the Cave as they wrap up a case, near to the anniversary of the Dick’s surgery. Maybe it’s the string of late nights and no sleep wrecking his inhibition, maybe it’s something he needs to get off his chest. But Dick stares at him, goes quiet, sets down his coffee mug.

You did everything for me, Bruce. He says. You never failed me.

And, someday, Bruce will believe it.

[verymuchimmortalcat]

The Chronicles of Marinette Wayne

For Bio dad Bruce Month Day 22: Library/Books

ao3

@maribat-bdbwm ​

Marinette had first come to live with him when she had been five and had just lost her mother. The only reason she was coming to stay with them had been Dick, who was much more excited at the prospect of a younger sister than Bruce was about another child and a grieving one at that.

When Bruce had first been contacted about having a biological daughter who had just lost her mother, he had thought it would be better to send her to someone like the Kents. Someone who would provide her with a stable family where she could lead a happy life. But then Dick had found out when Bruce had gone to Alfred for advice and had convinced him to bring her to the manor. Had convinced him that letting her go now might affect her in the future, and he wasn’t wrong (not that Bruce had considered how it might affect her since it would definitely look like he hadn’t wanted her, he just wasn’t sure if he was the best candidate) but the life they lead wasn’t one he wanted to drag a five-year-old into. When he had voiced that thought Dick had retorted with, “well, you’re not planning to put her in a cape and let her fight the rogues, are you?”

Of course not, he had no intention of doing that. She was five for heaven’s sake, and so the matter had been decided. She would live with them.

 .oOo.

 Marinette had warmed up to both Dick and Alfred almost instantaneously. Bruce spent what time he was at home hovering around her uncertainly. She spoke to him occasionally but not a lot. He had learnt (from her, he’d done an extensive background check and looked into all the details of her upbringing prior to this) that she liked pink, her favourite food was chocolate chip cookies and that she had a favourite soft toy that she always slept with. But even though she spoke to him she was never as open with him as she was with Dick or Alfred. It took her a week before she came to him willingly instead of him talking to her.

It had been shortly after he had returned from patrol. The door to his room had opened and tear-filled blue eyes stared at him, he could see her clinging on to her soft toy. He got up and walked towards her, she was still lingering in the doorway. Kneeling to reach her height he asks softly, “nightmare?”

She nods, tears still streaming down her face.

He looks at her unsure of what to do.

“Would you like to go back to sleep?” he asks quietly.

She shakes her head vehemently.

He still is unsure of what to do. Acting on a random whim he stands and picks her up. She clings to him and he definitely doesn’t marvel over how she fits perfectly in his arms.

He takes her to the library and picks out The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, sitting on his favourite armchair he seats her on his lap and starts to read to her, “Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy…”

 .oOo.

 Alfred finds the two of them passed out in the armchair the next morning. The crick in his neck and the lecture he gets from Alfred about how an armchair is not the proper place for either of them to sleep are worth it when Marinette comes to him that night with the book in hand asking about, “Mr. Tumus”

“Mr. Tumnus,” he corrects her gently.

She nods in agreement and repeats, “Mr. Tumus.”

 .oOo.

 Him reading to her becomes an event. She drags Dick into it too, whenever he isn’t with his Teen Titans in New York that is. Alfred provides them with milk and cookies and he reads to Marinette and Dick every night before patrol. They stop once she falls asleep and either him or Dick take her up to bed before patrol.

About a year after they start this routine, he returns from patrol to find a crying Marinette in his room. She just cries harder once she sees him. He holds her until she falls asleep resolving to talk to her in the morning.

He takes her to the cave the next morning, after breakfast, with Dick and tells her about Batman and Robin. When they head back to the manor she heads to her room and doesn’t come out before sundown (Alfred took her lunch to her room and had somehow talked her into eating). He spends the whole day worrying about if telling her was the wrong thing to do. She had lost her mother mere months before, she shouldn’t have to worry about her other parent too. She comes down for dinner and after dinner she still drags them to the library. She doesn’t fall asleep like she usually does, instead when he completes a chapter Marinette asks the two of them to wait, runs out and returns, panting, a few minutes later with something colourful in her hand. She then hands it to both him and Dick it’s a thread with beads on it. She hands Dick two of these, one has red, green and yellow beads and the other is purple, black and yellow, and his has blue, purple and black.

She grins up at the two of them and says cheerfully, “lucky charms. Dick’s is like Robin and yours is Batman.”

“And the other one?” Dick asks

“Batgirl,” she exclaims cheerfully.

Bruce as always is amazed at her never-ending optimism, kindness and hopefulness. Dick offers her a sunshine smile of his own, hugs her and says, “Thank you Sunshine.”

Once she lets go of Dick she looks at him with her big blue eyes, and Bruce ruffles her hair and gives her a smile and tells her he’ll carry it with him at all times. She smiles wider (something Bruce wasn’t aware was possible) and says goodnight before skipping back to her room.

 .oOo.

 Barbara convinces Dick to bring Marinette to the library after he gives her the lucky charm. The two of them leave the manor dressed in casual clothes and treat it almost like a mission to go and come back without causing any news scandals.

When they return Marinette’s carrying the entire Chronicles of Narnia series and pestering Dick about visiting Barbara again.

He points out that they already have the Chronicles of Narnia in the manor library, Marinette opens the book to a random page shows it to him and says, “but look this one has pretty pictures.”

He reads from the newly acquired illustrated copies that night.

 .oOo.

 As Dick starts to pull away more and Bruce tries to get him back, the tension in the house is high on good days. They don’t spend as often reading in the library anymore. He still reads to Marinette after nightmares, but Marinette no longer pulls them all to read while they have cookies and milk.

And then Dick leaves. He still visits Marinette, takes her out or Barbara will drop by and take her to the library. But he doesn’t spend any time in the manor other than to speak to Alfred. But there’s no longer a Batman and Robin. Gotham has Batman and Blüdhaven, Nightwing.

Marinette no longer comes to him with her copy of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe after nightmares,

 .oOo.

 When he first brings Jason home, Marinette had decided to spend the day with Dick in Blüdhaven. When Alfred brings her back the next morning, she’s shocked but she decides she’s going to be his friend. She takes him on a tour of the manor. Bruce trails behind the two, unsure of what to do, before he’s called away by an emergency at WE.

When he returns the two of them aren’t in either of their rooms, the several sitting rooms or the media room.

Alfred is the one who finds him during his search for the two and says, “I would check the library Master Bruce. It seems the young Master Jason has a love of literature.”

Sure enough, that’s where he finds the two. On the armchair that he had used that very first night, the both of them being tiny enough to fit in one seat, curled up and reading. Not wanting to disturb the two he steps back quietly. The two of them come as soon as Alfred calls them for dinner, and Jason’s certainly more animated than he had been the day before.

 .oOo.

 Marinette talks Dick into visiting, Bruce is simply glad to see his son back temporarily even if Dick refuses to talk to Bruce. He forms a tentative friendship with Jason. Bruce finds the three of them in the library before he leaves for patrol, Marinette’s reading The Magician’s Nephew out loud while the two of them sit next to her with milk and cookies in hand. His heart warms at the sight, he wishes he could take a picture but he doesn’t want to disturb them. Footage from the security cameras will have to do.

 .oOo.

 When Barbara’s shot, Marinette’s there everyday that Barbara’s fine with visitors. The rest of them accompany her as often as they can. Even as things slowly return to some what normal, Marinette spends nearly half her time with Barbara.

And then Jason dies. Marinette spends more time outside than at the Manor, or so Alfred says. And Bruce, well he isn’t really sure anymore.

He sends Marinette to Paris for her own safety. He’d met and befriended a nice couple during his travels and they had agreed to let his daughter stay with them for a while.

Marinette doesn’t care about his reasons, when she leaves for Paris she takes all her things but leaves the illustrated set of the Chronicles of Narnia that he had bought for her as a birthday gift after she and Dick had first visited Barbara.

 .oOo.

 Shortly after Robin hits the streets once again, Tim comes over to the Batcave in a panic one night. Rambling about an unsigned package that was just books and a slip of paper with a number on it. He had wanted to check it for any possible signs of danger. Bruce had agreed, it was definitely a strange thing and with the lives they lead no one could really tell for sure.

And then Bruce sees the books and tells Tim there’s nothing to worry about. It’s a new set of the Chronicles of Narnia. There’s a charm hanging from one of the books. She’s gotten better at making them since she was five.

He sighs and says, “The number’s safe. Call her, she’ll probably explain better than I can.”

He doesn’t join Tim, Marinette hasn’t spoken to him since she was sent to Paris and he doesn’t know what to say to her now.

 .oOo.

 There’s a supervillain in Paris, someone new, something about rock monsters. He takes Clark and Diana to check it out. He sent Marinette there so she could be safe, not so that she ends up in another city infested with villains.

When he gets there, there are two children. The girl feels really familiar, the way she speaks when she talks to the flying butterfly head is really familiar but before Bruce can worry too much about it the fight is done and the two kids are swarmed by the press. Before they can move from where they are, the girl- Ladybug says something to her partner and swings out. The next thing he knows she’s standing in front of him and the anger is visible on her face, “Get out. Get out of Paris right now.”

“We’re here to hel-” Clark starts to say when she cuts him off.

“Not you, I want Batman out of this city right now,” she repeats glaring at him. He knows those eyes. They’re the eyes he looks at every day in the mirror. The eyes he shares with his daughter.

“Marine-”

She doesn’t let him continue, “Uncle Clark and Aunt Diana can stay for a while if they can keep their emotions in check but they’ll have to leave too. I want you to leave now.”

He can see Clark and Diana reeling and slowly figuring out what’s happening. Ignoring the two of them he asks, “how?”

She laughs, not the tinkling cheerful sound that he had heard in the manor but a bitter sound, and Bruce wishes he could fix this.

“I was given the miraculous and now I’ve promised to protect this city. Why, regretting your decision to send me here?”

Yes. Very much so. But the words wouldn’t come out of his mouth, and he watches silently as she turns and leaves.

Bruce can feel the weight of Clark and Diana’s gazes. Shrugging off their questions he heads to the nearest teleporter.

His only child that hadn’t wanted this life had been pushed into it.

 .oOo.

 Tim and Marinette have kept in contact. He’s caught several of their conversations, though he’s never joined one.

It’s been nearly a year since he saw her in Paris. And then Tim’s dad tells him he can’t be Robin and that he can’t contact the hero community anymore. Two days later, Ladybug shows up in Gotham worried out of her mind. Stephanie’s the one who finds her and brings her to the cave. When she first starts talking to him, he’s so relieved to speak to her again that he misses out on a bit but the gist of what she said would be, “did something happen to Tim?”

He can tell she’s annoyed with what happened with Jack Drake. But before she can speak, Nightwing walks into the cave to find a detransformed Marinette. And before Marinette can figure out what’s happening, Dick has engulfed her in a hug and Marinette’s laughing. Bruce smiles as he returns to the Batcomputer, it’s been a really long time since he’s heard her laugh.

 .oOo.

 Marinette stays for the next week. She’d apparently panicked and told everyone she had a family emergency and wouldn’t be back for the week. Bruce was glad that she still considered them family, especially after that disastrous conversation in Paris.

She spends time with Barbara, Stephanie and Cassandra. Apparently, Stephanie and Cass already knw her and have spoken to her a few times. She spends some time with him, speaks more to him than she has in the past two years after he sent her to Paris.

On her last day in Gotham, he finds her and Cass in the library. She’s sitting with Cass on the armchair and she and Cass are reading Prince Caspian. They must’ve been here the whole week if she’s gotten to that far. The idea of reading those books in the wrong order is like sacrilege to Marinette.

She returns to Paris when the week ends, but has now added him to her semi-regularly contacted people.

 .oOo.

 Marinette pulls away again after Stephanie dies. From what Tom and Sabine tell him, she’s spending what time she’s not in school, with Alya. Bruce knows that Alya Cesaire knows that Marinette is Ladybug, realises she’s throwing herself into superheroing. Bruce wishes she’d inherited some of his better habits.

She doesn’t visit again for a while. Not until the attack on Titans Tower, and even then he doesn’t see her. He doesn’t know if anyone did.

But when he’s in the library to check something for a case he realises all of Jason’s favourite books that Marinette had with her were back in place.

He doesn’t mention it to anyone.

 .oOo.

 Darkseid happens. When he returns from the time stream, things are different from how he left them.

The whole family comes to the manor, after he returns. They’re all telling stories over dinner. Stephanie speaks of a little girl who idolises batgirl. Dick carries out an over dramatic reproduction of one of his and Damian’s patrols, while Damian complains about how inaccurate it is. Jason’s laughing at the two of them. Cass and Marinette coax Tim into talking about the whole Mr. Sarcastic mess. Dick looks gleeful as everyone rips into Tim’s momentary lapse in a sense of style, before Tim brings up Dick’s first Nightwing suit as a defence. Barbara points out the lack of pants in the first two robin costumes, and the others laugh (Damian grins) while Dick and Jason splutter in indignance. Marinette (who people tend to forget spent a good chunk of time with Dick when she was younger) describes in an exaggerated manner some of Gabriel’s, he’s missed quite a lot, worst akuma costumes and marvels over how he managed to create them while also being a world-renowned fashion designer.

As all of them continue to talk happily, Bruce slips out of the dining room. They deserve a break, but someone still needs to take care of Gotham.

Gotham has unnaturally less crime today, still takes him time to finish his patrol though. Unnaturally less crime in Gotham is still more crime than what most other cities face.

He heads to the library to grab a book to read before he sleeps. There’s a light on in the far corner of the library. When Bruce heads there he finds a large plate with crumbs on it with a few empty or half-finished glasses of milk next to the plate. His children are scattered around. They’ve pushed back the seats and have mostly spread themselves on the carpet. Marinette curled up between Dick and Jason and still reading from the practically ancient copy of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Jason’s reading one of his classics. Damian’s sitting on Dick’s other side and is animatedly talking about one of his pets while Dick listens to him attentively. Tim and Barbara are going over something on her laptop at the table, and Stephanie and Cass are curled up against each other and talking quietly. Cass is the first to see him and smiles at him and beckons him to join them. Picking a book off the shelf he joins them on the floor.

When Alfred finds them there the next morning, having gotten used to finding them asleep in the library several times over the years, he just sighs and tells them that breakfast is ready and if they’d like hot food, they’d have to get off the floor. All of them scramble up and as they leave the library, he can hear them starting to plot on how to get Alfred to join them the next time.

[shiftynightshade]

“He’s so young. Too young to be in a suit like that.”

Tony glanced at Steve and Natasha’s expressions, faces scrunched up in some mixture of discomfort and anger. It was understandable, really. The kid was on the younger side, though they could not tell much considering under his helmet was a yellow domino mask.

The kid was shifting in his seat, hands cuffed to the metal table in front of him and super-power inhibitor collar clasped around his neck. They had gathered on the other side of the glass, uneasily staring at the child who happened to be decked out in a very high-tech suit. Nat uncrossed her arms to run one hand through her hair. “Why is a kid with superpowers and a suit that advanced doing trapezing around New York?”

Steve shrugged helplessly, eyeing the teen through the glass as if it held all the answers. It kinda did, in a way.

“Fury’s on his way.”

Clint shuffled to stand between Tony and Nat, face drawn with the same discomfort whenever he dealt with kids in bad situations. Steve gave a small huff, setting his shield down and striding through the door into the interrogation room. The kid looked up when Steve entered the room, eyeing him as if he was an unknown variant on a battlefield; an enemy.

Steve settled in the metal chair opposite the kid, leaning forward in his seat to stare directly into his masked eyes. “Hey son, can I get you anything? Water perhaps?” He didn’t respond, opting to stare Steve down. After a small bout of tense silence, he shook his head. “No thanks.”

God this kid was young.

His voice was smoother than expected, but still held the hint of youth to it that Tony often heard from Peter. Tony couldn’t see Steve’s face, but based on Nat’s pinched expression, his was probably similar.

“So, what were you doing running around New York like that?”

The kid smirked. “Like what? Sir.”

Steve sighed and ran a hand through his short hair, clearly caught off guard. “You know,” He waved a hand helplessly in the air. “In armour that very few places make, and I highly doubt someone of your age could afford such equipment.”

The kid mere shrugged with that infuriating smirk still plastered on his face. “But here we are.” He said carelessly. “Cuffed to a table in the Avengers Tower for no discernible reason, one might say that this was a biased arrest.”

Steve spluttered, leaning back in his seat as if the Hulk had slapped him. “I beg your pardon!?”

“Well, I wasn’t disturbing the peace, I wasn’t attacking anyone. So I don’t see the reason for my detainment.”

“We had determined you as a possible threat because of your super powers and the fact that you were participating in vigilante acts, which is illegal son.”

Tony had expected the kids smirk to slip, for him to collapse into a mess of tears and discomfort, which was definitely overdue. The kid hadn’t even looked at them like they had saved the world, no hero worship, no stumbling in his words. It was like he didn’t care that they were heroes!

The kid hummed. “Well you are right about me being a vigilante.”

Steve leaned forward again. “Son, vigilantism and trying to be a hero is extremely dangerous. This is no world for someone as young and inexperienced as you.” He said gently.

The kid snorted. “Look here Mr. Rogers. I don’t think you lot know this, but I know what I’m doing, believe it or not. Frankly, I’ve been doing this whole business longer than you Avengers have been together as a single team.”

Steve stared for a moment before sighing in defeat. He turned slightly in his seat to look at them with a pleading expression. Tony looked at Bruce and the two SHIELD agents before shrugging and walking over to the door, his suit whirring with every movement. He opened the door and stepped into the bright room, eyes immediately locking onto the kids suit; it was such high quality that Tony wanted to steal it and pick it apart until he knew about ever Knut and bolt within the metal.

Tony put on his suavest voice and sauntered over to stand next to Steve.

“Hey kid, this is what’s gonna happen. You are gonna give us your name, age and we will let you go. How about that?”

Tony expected that that would make the kid cave. Whenever he used that voice, he got whatever he wanted. It would obviously work on a wannabe Avenger. Right?

The kid tilted his head to the side for a moment. “Mmm, you can call me Signal.” He settled on, leaning back in his chair ever so slightly. Tony huffed. This was getting old. “One, you didn’t give us your age and two, I really doubt that your real name is Signal.”

‘Signal’ smiled serenely, smugness rolling off him in waves with an air of superiority that pissed Tony off. “Sorry, no names in the field and I’m turning seventeen in a few months.”

Tony blinked. This kid was sixteen. What the fuck.

Steve threw his hands up. “That’s beside the point! You’re not an adult, so you shouldn’t be running around playing hero!”

Signal scowled, his easy-going expression melting into something colder, more dangerous. “Oh? And what is the definition of hero, Mr Rogers? Someone who does everything they can to protect those who cannot protect themselves? Or someone who only saves the world and doesn’t bother with the daily crime that litters the streets?”

He leaned forward in his seat. “Tell me then, what is your definition of hero? Because last time I checked, which was this morning mind you, the Avengers are very diverse when it comes to their backgrounds.” He tilted his head briefly at Tony. “A former weapons manufacturer who now works to better the earth.”

“Maybe a hero is someone like Natasha Romanoff, a redeemed Black Widow from the Red Room, who joined SHIELD after encountering Clint Barton who was sent to kill her for being a Russian spy, only to instead become friends with her. Is that it? Two assassin’s, one from the Red room and one from the circus?”

Signals voice and gaze didn’t waver once.

Tony and Bruce shared a glance before leaving the room, shutting the door behind him firmly. The lock buzzed. Natasha looked pale, her face was blank and she had rested her weight against the wall with Clint beside her. Tony opened his mouth, only for Banner to open the door and motion them out into the hall. “Fury’s here.”

Tony groaned but followed the doctor anyways. Director Pirate himself was exiting the elevator when they followed Bruce, his dark coat fluttering with every movement. “Who the hell did you capture off the streets?” Was his greeting.

Clint shrugged. “No idea, some kind of vigilante with super-powers. He definitely needs to be in SHIELDS systems though.” At Fury’s questioning look, Clint frowned. “He knows about the Red Room and how I met Nat.”

Fury scowled. “How the fuck would they know that!?”

They all piled back into the room, Signal still perched calmly in his seat, staring right back at them through the glass. Fury frowned and looked the the ‘vigilante’, only for his eye to widen and whirl on the spot to glare at them.

“You captured one of the Bats! Are you lot crazy!?”

Tony raised an eyebrow. “Bats?” He asked incredulously.

“Yes! The Bats! His name is Signal isn’t it?”

At Steve’s nod, Fury groaned. “Great…. just great. “You lot managed to nab the Bat’s favourite.”

Tony slapped a hand to his forehead, wincing when the metal hit his skin. “Can you please tell us what the hell you’re yabbering on about Fury?”

Fury planted a hand on his hip. “The Bats are Gotham’s protectors. Simply put they’re a clan of vigilante’s that stop crime and deal with corruption. That person right there. Signal?” He pointed to Signal. “Is Gotham’s daytime guardian. You see Bat’s doesn’t like Meta humans in his city, bar Signal. The other work in the shadows, Signal works in the light.”

Fury pursed his lips. “Signal is considered the Bat clan’s guiding light, he’s the cities beacon of hope.”

The sound of metal clinking against metal drew their attention back to Signal, only to see an empty chair and a set of cuffs next to the repression collar. “What the-“

Then there were alarms blaring, Jarvis’s voice nearly swallowed by the noise. “Sir there are three confirmed intruders in the entertainment room, two unknown, one identified as the prisoner.”

That had them flying from the room, into the common area with their weapons at the ready, only for a sharp ninja star shaped like a god-dammed bat fly past and imbed itself in the wall beside them.

“I wouldn’t take another step if I were you.”

Tony stared at the the figure standing in front of them with a gaping expression. He had a full bodysuit of Kevlar equipped and a bo staff pointed threateningly at them. Another on dressed in traffic light colours of all things was standing protectively in front of Signal with a katana in hand.

“H-how the hell did you guys get here? Who are you guys?”

The small kid scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Amateurs.” He muttered. The kid with the staff narrowed his eyes briefly. “I’m Red Robin.” He said curtly.

“We’ll be taking our leave now. Director Fury.” He nodded at Fury. “Please be careful with your heroes, if something like this happens again Batman will not be pleased.” At Fury’s nod, Red Robin slammed a pellet into the ground causing smoke to erupt and fill the room.

They all coughed when they inhaled the smoke, and when it cleared after a few seconds, the three were nowhere, no evidence indicating they existed.

“Soooooo, guess we’re avoiding Gotham now?”

Extra: Damian kicked his legs back and forth and he sipped his milkshake, the familiar smog of Gotham's nightlife sitting heavily in the air. "So," he began. "How'd you end up tangling with the Avengers?"

Duke snorted from beside him. "They saw me use my powers alone and pegged me for an amateur hero." He made a face that made Tim giggle.

Damian scoffed. "Please, you? an amateur? That's like saying my Grandfather doesn't have a school-girl crush on Drake over there." Tim gagged. "Really Robin? Did you have to make me think of that?" Duke laughed. "If we have to live with that fact so do you."

[shurisneakers]

shut in [2]

Summary: When your high profile mission goes terribly wrong, you’re forced to hide in a safehouse with a man you’ve never met before. With seemingly nowhere else to go, you’re forced to work together to figure out who is trying to have you assassinated before it’s too late. (Sam Wilson x Gender Neutral Reader, Hitman AU)

Warnings: cursing, implied violence, drama kings, and stupid tv show references

Word count: 3.4k

A/N: ayeeee, we’re back for part two. i also appreciate feedback so if you would like to, please consider dropping me an ask or comment ly guys!! also if you want to be on the taglist, it’s mentioned at the bottom of the chapter.

here’s my ko-fi if you’d like to support my writing <333

Previous Part || Shut In Masterlist

Hours were spent on the road in thick silence. 

The both of you had been driving around for a while now. You were a considerable distance away from the mansion and Pierce, but you didn’t dare to stop.

Initially you had only put the pedal to the metal without solid plan. Get the fuck away from there was the only objective you cared about. 

Hours later a signboard registered in your frantic thoughts. Familiarity struck a chord, and all of a sudden you had a vague idea of where you could go. You were unsure if it still existed, but it was a risk you were willing to take.

Darkness still coloured the sky, but the roads were deserted. No cameras along the highway was a welcomed feature. You eased your foot off the accelerator, carefully assessing the path you were taking for your exit. 

You saw a small clearing near the highway, taking a deep breath before pulling the car into a sharp turn off the road and into the woods.

“Where are you going?” your companion jolted up when the car swerved abruptly. 

You didn’t answer; just kept your eyes peeled for the structure. You didn’t have a backup plan if this didn’t go right.

It took much longer than you anticipated before you found it, pulling the car to a stop. You were deeper into the woods than you would have liked. 

You stuck your head out of the window to confirm you were at the right place. It looked like you were.

“Where the hell are we?”

“My summer vacation house,” you murmured, unbuckling your seatbelt. You stepped out of the car to assess the damage. .

Another door opening and closing told you that he had gotten out of the car as well. However, he trudged ahead, leaving you behind. 

The car was pretty beaten up. The metal gates hadn’t done it any favours.The question was whether it would still work if you needed it to.

Probably would, but not for too long.

You looked to the side to see where he went. He was standing in front of the house, arms crossed over his chest as he ran his eyes all over the building.

You trekked past him, walking up the two steps to the door. Pulling at what looked like a doorbell in any other scenario, you tugged off the outer shell to reveal a small scanner underneath.

You pressed your thumb to it, tapping your foot impatiently as it gave a beep of approval. The door gave a soft click. You let out a breath you didn’t realise you were holding, twisting the handle to let yourself in. 

“You’re kidding right?” he asked incredulously from a distance behind you.

“Hey, man, stay outside if you want. Suit yourself.” You were sure he could fashion a bed out of leaves and twigs if he was that desperate.

Fumbling for the light switch, you sigh in relief when the room is illuminated.

“Whose safehouse is this?”

“Ransone’s.” You shrugged nonchalantly, moving ahead to inspect the place.

“I have every single one of his safehouses committed to memory.” His voice was becoming fainter as he planted his feet firmly at the doorway, refusing to move. “This ain’t one of them.”

“He’s sneaky. Once watched the next episode of Desperate Housewives without telling me.” The house wasn’t as dusty as you thought it would be, clearly being maintained once in a while although not regularly. “Broke my whole heart, he did.”

“Whose house is this?” he asked once again, tone hard as steel.

“Best that you don’t ask questions, buddy.” You looked at him wearily, a slo warning in itself, ending the conversation there. “Or else you’re welcome to leave.”

The entrance opened directly into what you assumed was the living room, or a sorry excuse for one. It had a couch facing an old cable television set, mounted on a small cupboard.

In the same space was the kitchen, with a microwave, a sink, and shelves lining the wall. A small mini fridge sat atop the counter.  There was a dining table with six chairs for a family, almost like a sick joke. You found yourself letting out a short exhale at it, moving onto the next room.

It was bare except for a shelf pressed against a well. Opening it, you found yourself looking at multitudes of what looked like burner phones, microphones, cameras, some as small as a button. Regular security cameras and monitors to go with it, trackers, anything you needed was available in those four drawers.

You pocketed a burner cell to use for later, moving to the room on the opposite side of the hall.

However, unlike the rest of the rooms you had seen so far, this one was empty. Not even a shelf decorating it.

The next door you opened was a bathroom, the final being a bedroom with one bed in the centre pushed up against the wall. A wardrobe in the corner contained numerous t-shirts of black and grey of every size, tactical pants and other necessary items of clothing.

You eyed the last door at the end of the hall before finally deciding to pursue it.

It opened to the patio in the back, two steps leading down from the house into the wooded area. Pillars held up the corners of the roof. It all looked picturesque, meant to blend in as a normal house.

You stood there for a second, taking in the silence around you. Nothing could be heard for miles, so if something were to happen-

You shook your head, forcing your imagination to stop running wild. You shut the door behind you, steadily making your way back to where the guy was.

It appeared that he had caved. He had moved from the doorway, instead taking a seat on one of the dining chairs. He was observing you, eyes keen as you took a seat opposite to him.

Dropping the burner phone on the table, you looked at him expectantly. Silence ensued until it dawned on him what you were implying. 

“I’m not calling him,” the guy said, leaning on his palm. Coward. 

“Fine.” You pulled it back, snapping it open to dial the number.

You let it ring all the way until the very last second.

“Hello?” the low voice resonated from the other end.

“Ransone.” You rolled your eyes at his tone, somehow letting your exhaustion tear down any kind of filter you usually had while in conversation with him. 

“Y/N?” His voice jumped two octaves higher to his usual pitch, dropping the facade immediately. 

“Did you set us up?” You ignored the small glance you got from the guy at your name.

“What?”

“Did you set us up?” you repeated brazenly.

“What?”

“Oh, cut the shit Ransone, was this a trap?” The guy next to you exploded impatiently.

“Wilson?” Great. A name to the face.

“Answer the fuckin’ question, Vincent.” The mention of Ranone’s first name had you surprised. No one dared to call him that.

“No, Sam,” came his response almost mockingly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Sam Wilson. It sounded familiar. You’d heard it tossed around a few times at the organisation.

“Why were both of us on the same assignment?”

“I told you, I wasn’t sure if Wilson was going to show up.” You could hear his chair faintly creak in the background. “This was his mission first.”

“The hell is that supposed to mean?” you interjected. Faint memories of a passing comment he made during your briefing were beginning to surface. 

“It means,” Ransone emphasised. “I called him first. He was being a bit… difficult. So I sent you as a backup.”

You looked at Sam. He dismissed you with a wave of his hand, as if to say to ignore what he was saying.

“And you didn’t think it was important to tell me that you were sending someone else?” If Ransone had told you, he should have mentioned it to him too.

“Oh, grow up.” Ransone sounded irritated, a tone that he seemed to reserve for Sam specifically. “You’re not children anymore. You can handle a few miscommunications.”

“Bullshit. You and I both know this isn’t an accident,” Sam retorted, dangerously good at not giving a shit. 

“You better watch yourself, agent.” Ransone snarled. “I don’t like being questioned.”

“Like I give a shit about what you like or not. We were outnumbered 8 to 2. You tellin’ me you had nothing to do with this? That the stars just aligned to royally fuck with us?”

“Yes, I waited until Mercury was in retrograde to plan this hit,” he drawled sarcastically. “Don’t you for a second forget what you owe me, Wilson. You’d be stupid to believe I’d let it go so easily by having you killed.”

His voice was ice by the end. Sam’s eyebrow furrowed as he leaned back, crossing his arm over his chest.

“Then what about me?”

“Y/N,” he sighed, instantly sounding softer. “I didn’t think he would show. That’s it.”

“You’ve never been unsure of anything.”

“Which is why I sent you in. Pierce had to die one way or the other. Don’t care how.” It wasn’t what you were talking about, but it brought up something else. 

You looked at Sam. Should you tell him that Pierce was dead before you got there?

You decided against it, not knowing what his reaction would be and too tired to gauge it over the phone. If someone else had gotten to Pierce before you, it meant that Ransone didn’t get a chance to deliver a dramatic end to his life, which would tick him off endlessly. 

“How do I know you’re telling the truth?” Sam broke the momentary pause.

“You don’t.” He paused. “Distrusting me is the wisest thing you could do.”

You scoffed at his stupid Game of Thrones quote. How he was this obnoxious at a time like this was beyond comprehension. 

“Give me your location.” He couldn’t sound less interested, like a parent forced to pick up their child. “I’ll send someone to come pick you up.”

Sam’s finger tapped at the table, drawing your attention to him.

He slowly shook his head, mentioning to his ear then drawing his finger in a circle indicating his surroundings.

Disclosing confidential information over the phone wasn’t the wisest idea. You had no idea if anyone was tapping into Ransone’s calls, listening for sensitive information. For all you knew that’s how they got to the mansion before you. 

“Forget it. We’ll figure it out,” you told Ransone, eyes still locked on Sam.

“All right, stay low for a while. Keep me updated.”

You cut the call without another word, removing the battery and tossing the phone onto the table.

“What now?”

Neither of you said anything for a while. The silence rested uncomfortably between you as you stewed over what to bring up. 

“Did you kill Pierce?”

“Christ, we still on this?” he scoffed.

“It’s a yes or no question.” 

“No,” he stared at you. “I didn’t.”

“Did Ransone send you to spy on me?” It wouldn’t be the first time it had happened, although you thought he had moved past the need for that years ago. 

“No, I was there for a mission.”

“You got any proof?”

He rolled his eyes. “Scout’s honour.”

He lifted his hand up in a mock-salute. A wince flashed across his face; barely, but enough for you to catch it. His arm dropped back down again.

You examined him silently, searching for any hint of a lie or bluff. You found nothing, only an adamant set of eyes staring right back at you.

Your chair creaked as you pushed yourself away from the table. You could feel his gaze following you as you walked down the hall to the bathroom. Shuffling through the shelves for something you were sure was there, you soon stepped back out.

You had no idea why you were doing this. You didn’t even know the guy.

He had his sleeve pulled up to his shoulder, examining the wound from the bullet graze. Dried blood streaked his forearm, partially covering his tattoo.

You tossed the first aid kit onto the table, watching it slide across to where he was sitting. Sam glanced at the box, then up at you.

You just turned around silently, walking back down the hall and towards the bedroom, shutting the door behind you.

__________

Sleep didn’t come that night, and predictably so.

Whether it was the survival instinct guarding you from the stranger in the house, the adrenaline from the mission or even the anxiety of not knowing what exactly was going on, you were sure that you didn’t catch even a bit of shut eye.

Morning came around after what seemed like days rather than hours. You still stayed in bed well past the sunrise, pulling at the hem of your pillow. Your knife was still strapped to your thigh and your gun found a place on the nightstand, just in case.

When you heard the opening and shut of cabinets down the hall, you finally pulled yourself up, stretching to get rid of the weariness in your muscles. You decided against the gun but left the knife strapped to your thigh as you shifted off the bed.

You paused at the doorway, hand on the knob. Shoving aside your hesitation, you opened the door quietly. You could handle it, easily.

Walking towards the kitchen, the volume of his ruffling and filing through the kitchen only became louder. You stopped at the entrance, watching as Sam slammed a cabinet door shut.

“C’mon man,” he groaned before turning around to lean his body weight against the counter. There was a small bump under the sleeve of his arm, different from the curve of his muscle. You assumed he had bandaged the bullet graze the night before.

He was still wearing the same thing as yesterday. Dust was slightly settled on his shirt and one knee of his pants was ripped slightly.

“Mornin’.” You quickly looked back up at him, not realising when he had seen you. “Get any sleep last night?”

You wordlessly shook your head and he shrugged in understanding. 

“Did you?”

“Oh yeah. Out like a light.” He pushed himself off the counter.

“Really?” You watched as he pulled out a chair for himself, taking a place at the dining table, same place he was sitting the night before.

“Sounded like the reasonable thing to do.” He had an unnatural amount of faith in the fact that you wouldn’t murder him. Although you couldn’t judge if he was simply putting on a show, having stayed awake just as you had. 

“I'm stuck in a safehouse with a stranger, forgive me for being a little careful,” you muttered defensively, crossing your arms over your chest.

“Hey, never said you were wrong.” He lifted his hands up. “But just to make sure; are you going to kill me?”

Your eyebrows furrowed. “No?”

“And I’m not going to kill you. I’d say that’s enough reassurance to get at least a nap in.”

“Give me one good reason to believe you.”

“If you killed me, Ransone would blow the roof of this place with you still in it. I’m one of the best he’s got.”

“Bullshit.” You scoffed, walking around the table to go see what you could find to eat. Ransone wouldn’t do that for anyone, and he knew that.

He didn’t bother responding but you could sense him tracking your movement.

The first cabinet you opened consisted purely of jars of peanut butter, stacked together neatly. The one beside it had jelly arranged in a similar fashion, jar to jar and taking up the entire space. Adjacent cupboard had loaves of bread, probably the most you’d seen together in a house ever.

The next cupboard was... empty.

“You have got to be fuckin’ with me,” you cursed under your breath. “Is there nothing else here?”

Save for a few plates and cutlery, every other shelf was empty. Your frustration only grew with each drawer you opened and shut, finding nothing but the same three components over and over again.

“There’s some soup on the top right, behind the bread.” His voice came from behind you. You checked where he mentioned, finding multiple cans of tomato soup. “I hope PB&J is your favourite, ‘cause that’s really all we got. I checked twice.”

“We won’t be here long anyway. It’s fine.” You walked a few steps towards where the TV was, sitting atop a small cupboard. If you weren’t getting gourmet meals, hopefully it would be compensated with some entertainment.

Rummaging through it didn’t prove to be a major hassle since there were only three DVDs; Die Hard, Notting Hill and Megamind. Beside it sat two books, American Gods, and Pride and Prejudice. That’s all. 

“Really made sure to cover all demographics with those movies. There’s only one local news channel, everything else is static,” Sam informed you, unmoving from his position. You sighed, tossing the DVDs back and shutting the door.

“There’s a room over there with some basic shit. Burners, mics, cameras. Clothes are in the bedroom drawer. Should probably take a shower while you’re at it, I can smell you from a mile away and it’s giving me a migraine.” You pushed yourself off the ground, pointing towards the rooms as you walked down the hall. “Backyard’s all heavily wooded. If we try hard enough, I’m sure there are a few trap doors or crawl spaces or whatever around here.”

You could hear him follow you as you gave him the tour of a place you were sure he already had examined thoroughly before you greeted him this morning.

Pushing open the door to the suspiciously empty room, you stepped to the side, allowing him to observe. The both of you had the same thought process as you split up, sticking close to the walls, running your fingers across the plaster to look for any major differences.

“Got it,” he called out. You spun on your heel to face where he was standing. A small chunk of the wall was missing, a small button in the centre of the cavity he had created.

Pressing it lightly, the mechanical sound of sliding doors filled the air as the entire side of the room gave way to shelves upon shelves of weapons. Guns, knives, ammunition, bulletproof vests; enough material to last you years.

The doors slid shut when you pressed the button again, not until you had a mental note of what was available in case you found yourself in a situation where you required them.

“That about covers it. Don’t think we’ll be here long so just think of it as your three day long staycation.”

“I’ve had a better time at funerals than I’ll ever have in this shithole.”

________

“What do you mean they escaped?” Their voice was booming, dripping with slow rising anger. “Someone explain to me how the fuck that’s possible.”

“They took the car and left.”

“They took the car and left,” they said mockingly in a high pitch. “I know that, you fucking imbecile. I’m asking how they were alive long enough to do it?”

“They teamed up. Took out nearly everyone,” the agent was monotone. His arm was in a sling and his partner stood beside him, thick bandages around his midsection.

“They shouldn’t have been there together. They shouldn’t have been sent together.”

No one said a word, not even daring to breathe loudly.

“This wasn’t supposed to fucking happen. We killed Pierce. Everything was perfect,” their voice dropped as they spat out the last word. “So then how did this fucking happen?”

“Boss, we’ll-”

“I want them dead.” They interrupted, casting silence in the room. “I don’t care how you fucking do it. I want you to find them and rip them to shreds. Both of them.”

“Yes, boss.”

“And if you even fucking think of coming back without a proper update-” they brought their hand down harshly on the table. “-I’ll make you wish you were never born.”

The agents just nodded, faces pale as they shuffled out of the room silently.

“Fucking idiots.” They nursed their forehead on their palm, calming the nerve that was menacingly visible on their temple. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.”

Part 3

[omaano]

End of Year Questions for Writers and Artists

Was tagged by @eredins-a-king-aint-he thank you for that! ❤️ (and I'll finally answer in a timely manner XD)

Tagging @traumschwinge @dazedandinked @do-androids-dream-ao3acc and @rawrkinjd if you want to that is :) Or anyone who wants to look back on their 2021 projects (tag me in that case pls!)

Questions:

1. What project are you most proud of and why?

2. Which project did you have the most fun making?

3. Which project was the most unexpected and/or challenging and why?

4. Which project would you like to receive more attention?

5. Is there a project you intended to work on but couldn’t find the time? If so, what is it?

6. Have you noticed an improvement in your skill this year? Did a specific project help?

7. If you could remake any project you’ve created this year, which one would it be and why?

8. What project would you like to make next year?

Answers under the cut:

And again with the answers:

1. What project are you most proud of and why?

That's difficult to say because there are so many pieces where I'm very proud of certain details or aspects of the creation process. But the one I'm proudest of for carrying through the entire project was the 5+1 collection of Geralt being picked up and carried around. It had so many pieces that I wasn't sure I was going to finish all of them, especially considering how legs are very hard for me ^^;

2. Which project did you have the most fun making?

The one above. I generally suffer and whine a lot during the process of working on a project, because I try to force myself to use colours (and I regularly forget my brush and colour palette settings orz) so technically that's less fun. But the poses were fun to try and figure out and alter for armor and the different body type of the characters (even Geralt went through some changes, especially with Letho lol), and it was ultimately funny to keep squinting at my figures and wonder "when did your legs grow that extra mile, my dude?"

3. Which project was the most unexpected and/or challenging and why?

The Geralt and Duny chilling in the cave by firelight I made for the Witcher BB. I'll be honest, even with my fascination for Emhyr and his curse I did not actually expect that I would end up drawing a hedgehog. Ever. But here I am. I pushed myself on textures and mood and lighting and background, and it was a lot of panicked scrambling in the beginning, but it turned out unexpectedly cool, and I'm real proud of it. Especially for the 3 hours I'd spent on all the furs on Duny's shoulder and in the bg. (and the rock texture, god that was fun!)

4. Which project would you like to receive more attention?

All of my big bang pieces tbh, because I do try to really push myself on them and they get little attention compared to that, I think?, but if I'm being very honest it's this one. I mean, it did one of the best amongst my Geralt/Emhyr pieces, but I love this one so much, I really would have liked if it got a little more attention. We all have our darlings, you know?

5. Is there a project you intended to work on but couldn’t find the time? If so, what is it?

Yeah, plenty. A lot of them are fic illustrations where I have a very rough sketch outline, but something just refuses to work and I just didn't have the time or energy to figure it out (there are 3 of those in the below compilation of wips I really wanted to work on this year). (It's mostly patience that I lack tho.) There is the one with Geralt and Eskel - which I plan to figure out in January, as I'm planning to dedicate that month to him; and further prompt fills for the Witcher Rareship Summer Bingo that I didn't have time for. That includes Geralt and Regis and Dettlaff sharing only one bed (there are so many limbs and pointy elbows there omg); Eskel, Lambert and Geralt howling at the moon for the 'Serenading' prompt that I imagined would have been best in a little comic strip kind of format and would end up a little sappy (I don't have a single line laid out for that one); Geralt and Emhyr cuddling after a nightmare and Geralt still having his toxicity lines showing.... I really had big plans this year. Way too big.

6. Have you noticed an improvement in your skill this year? Did a specific project help?

Yeah, definitely. I've improved a lot this year in many, many aspects. I've learnt a lot of anatomy (it's a big jump from zero to some but it still felt like a lot, even though I only just noticed how little I actually know lol); and while I forgot how portraits work, I think I can finally put the eyes in their right place and right-ish size. Most of the time. It's been a huge issue that still haunts me from previous years. Umm... I did a lot of drawings for the drawer (and Traum), because I'm not willing to go to twitter to post them (so you might guess what those drawings are), and they helped a lot. Lots of limbs and muscles in action, that's all I'm saying. They are very helpful.

7. If you could remake any project you’ve created this year, which one would it be and why?

It would be this one, with Geralt and Emhyr. I still very much like the accidental texture of the armour and cloth folds, and there is a charm to how rough it is, but I'd really love to see it a little more smoothed out (now that I'm familiar with the brush as well) and fix some anatomy issues with Emhyr. His arm is bugging me.

8. What project would you like to make next year?

As I've mentioned above, I would like to draw a lot of Eskel in January. I'll never forgive how TWN did so dirty by him in season 2, and I feel very bad for having pushed him back in this year's project line-up. (I'm open to ideas and proddings ;)) I would also like to work on the rarepair bingo prompts and see where they take me. As well as finally finishing this piece I started back in January for Anomalous Elixirs. It's almost done, only missing the lines and colours for the last panel with Geralt and Dettlaff.... and my courage to look at the other panels to rework some details, because hoo boy, is it obvious that I've been working on it on and off throughout the whole year.

Aside from those, I'd probably set the same goals for myself as I did for 2021. Push my working process so that a piece wouldn't take weeks to complete; learn how to do backgrounds (that's not just a bed); work on simplifying my style into something more illustrative and less semi-realistic, if that makes sense? I feel like that's trapping me a lot. Also I want to do some cute sticker designs, i'm really looking forward to those ^^