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sweater-daddiesdumbdork · 2 years

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Life Is Short So Make It Sweet

Chapter Thirteen: Proceed To The Exit

Summary- 5.9 Curtis Everett x Plus!Sized Reader. Winter Break is swiftly coming, making you busier than ever with getting your drama club ready for its first performance. There is also the aquarium date Curtis invited you to just before Thanksgiving, which is some much needed adult time for you both.

Warnings- Adult sexual activities, oral, some talk about critters like bats.

A/N- Hello hello! I've been waiting for this chapter because personally, I love aquariums and museums. The one I described in this chapter is very reminiscent of the one where I live. I have been going since I was a kid, still, try to make a once a year trip to visit. I was always that kid that pretended dinosaurs still existed, picked up snakes, lizards, and toads, makes sure to catch spiders to release them, and brought home frog eggs to hatch them. Anyways the huge fish like the sturgeon in our Echo Center always fascinated me, like living dinosaurs. The readers' love for this is my love for all this. As always thank you to everyone who reads and shares. Special thank you to @what-is-your-plan-today for the edits. Divider made by @firefly-graphics.

Chapter Twelve / Masterlist

The following days flew by, You and your class were getting ready for winter break and doing evening rehearsals with the drama club after school. Then there was prepping for sending out packages for your sister and her family in Florida as well as a package of gifts to your parents in New York, not to mention Christmas cards to your aunt, uncle, and cousins that you still kept somewhat in touch with. All while trying to keep up with life in general. The first couple weeks December was turning nothing short of hectic.

Curtis remained just as busy himself with the train yard, as well as helping Paulie at the bar during the busier time of year. It put some extra cash in his savings and you had insisted he does it since you were busy most evenings with after school projects. A few days a week he would stop off at the school on his way to Paulie’s, catch sight of you working with the kids on stage finalizing lines. When you would notice him standing in the back watching, you would slip away from them to go do a quick visit.

Curtis never missed the enthusiastic grin that would cross your face when you would weave your way through the cafeteria that doubled as the school auditorium. “I didn't think I would get to see you today.” Your eyes would gleam in relief when he would hold up the to go package of food he picked up on his way over. “Or that you would be bringing me dinner.” You would go to your tiptoes to give a thank you kiss and Curtis would take advantage of you being in his space to draw you in closer.

After all, these were few and far between on weekdays when you both were doing what life required of you, anxiously waiting for the weekend to roll around. “Figured you were probably too busy to make yourself something proper tonight.” Setting the bag down on one of the nearby tables, you would look a tad sheepish as he made an accurate assumption. You hadn't even given a thought to what you would have for dinner and most likely snack on whatever random thing you would find in your apartment before you went to bed exhausted. Your hand slid down his chest to tangle lightly in his chain, not wanting to separate the two of you quite yet.

“Okay, you caught me, I would have remembered eventually.” You confessed and he gave a slight grumbling sigh that he knew he had been right. “But thank you, for looking out for me Curtis.”

“Someone needs to. The kids look good up on stage, they must be excited for opening night?”

You beamed, proud of how hard your students have been working and excited as well for the first big show at Mason Academy you have been a part of. “Tomorrow night, they are so excited and have worked really hard. I just hope the weather holds out so we don’t have to cancel.”

“It will be fine.” Curtis assured you, a frequent weather checker due to working outdoors most of the time. “Save me a seat, I’m coming to watch with Tanya tomorrow. Timmy has been talking non stop about it she said.”

“As director, I get prime seating options.” You promised. One of the students called your name, making you look back. “I should probably get back.” You sighed tiredly.

“I also got to get to Paulie's for a shift,” Curtis stated, cupping your chin and drawing you into a goodbye kiss, bringing his lips to yours with a gentle brush. It made you tingle from the top of your head to the tips of your toes feeling his whiskers tickle you and the press of his plump bottom lip to yours. “Text me before bed?”

“Promise, don’t cause no trouble at the bar.”

“Tell people stop testing me then.” He winked as he gave a quick wave to Timmy who was on stage. “Talk later Honey.”

You gave a little wave goodbye before grabbing your food, and when you looked in the bag you saw he sent enough for you to have for a couple days at least as he always did, and made your way back to the stage. “One last run through guys, then I think we are ready for tomorrow!” The cheer from the kids echoed through the cafeteria.

The night of the play proved to be a success, Curtis showed up with Tanya, finding out that you had reserved some seats for the two of them. Their names were written in sharpie with smiley faces on a piece of paper.

Tanya was the proud mother, taking many pictures and excitedly whispering to Curtis about how hard Timmy had worked at home memorizing his lines. For Curtis’s part, he enjoyed the show. The kids certainly had done a good job and he saw all those costumes you had diligently worked on over at his house. He also caught glimpses of you behind the curtain, helping out. It wasn't till after the show you finally stepped out into the spotlight with the rest of the kids, and very much like every time he sees you, he is caught up in just how beautiful you looked.

Curtis could tell you were enjoying yourself, thanking all the parents who had come to see the play, your energy was open, full of smiles and laughs. You were steadily shaking hands and giving praise to how hard the kids worked. Curtis waited for the stream of parents to start to thin out before he approached you with a small bouquet of carnations to gift to you. When you turned to him, there was no missing the excited relieved look you had at seeing him, your eyes were shining bright and a smile was permanently on your lips. You looked happy.

“What a great show Honey.” He held out the bright yellow and pink flowers. You dipped your head to them, your eyes closing as you inhaled there sweet scent.

“They did all the work Curtis, I just helped. These are beautiful, thank you.”

“Mmmh, I saw a lot of you in the play, even if no one else knows it.” He let his hand rest against your back to tuck you close.

It was infectious, your energy and Curtis deemed himself lucky to get to bask in it.

That Saturday night had you getting ready for the special date. Curtis had invited you before Thanksgiving to attend the adult night at the Aquarium, the function to raise money for the care of the animals living there and you were beyond excited to attend. It required a bit of dressing up, which now you felt much more confident in your choices. You chose a dress that was appropriate for evenings out- a little black dress that shaped around your curves. Your makeup done up a bit more then usual and your hair whisked in a style that pinned it back, allowing the slope of your neck to show off.

Curtis as well was giving it his all, dress shoes were swapped out from his typical boots or sneakers, black dress slacks that accentuated his long legged stature up to a slim waist. A blue button up shirt was tucked into his pants.

He was messing with his shirt in the hallway mirror, scowling at himself as he tried getting the collar to straighten out. His eyes lifted to see you coming down the stairway, and his eyes got wide before turning to face you.

“Honey, you look…” You felt your chest tickle with pride and wanting to downplay what he was saying. “You look incredible Honey.”

You took his compliment to heart instead, not disputing it or trying to brush it off. You licked your lips nervously but gave a smile. “Thank you, do you want some help with that?”

Tilting his chin up to give you plenty of room, he nodded. “Please? I’m no good at this stuff.”

“Oh, I think your pretty damn fine with it Curtis.” You stepped in close to reach him.

He kept the top of his shirt open, choosing not to go with a tie, but when you tucked his collar down, admiring him up close, you couldn’t help but find the entire look and effort very enticing. He had even been sure to trim himself, cutting back the shagginess of his beard and making his hair crisp with a fresh buzz.

“Everything okay?” His blue eyes a tad nervous as he fiddled with the buttons and you covered his hand with yours to stop him from fretting.

“I was just caught up in how damn good you looked Curtis.” You were rewarded with a slight pink tinge to the tops of his ears, well aware the back of his neck would be red as well. “Can you go warm the truck up? I will be out in a minute?”

He patted his pants pockets while glancing around before you handed him his wallet and phone. “Right, lock up on your way out? I got the garage door open, come through there. I already pulled your car in.”

Assuring him that you would, while he went to do that you went through the house one last time making sure everything was off, leaving the light on above the stove for when you two got back, you made your way outside.

This time you two went to dinner before the aquarium at the French restaurant Curtis had taken you two at the start of your first date. This time you both enjoyed yourselves, delving into conversation while eating dinner. There simply wasn’t any awkwardness. Curtis opted for grilled Angus steak in a red wine sauce and you had a piece of snapper, also grilled in its own fresh sauce.

By the time you both finished, there wasn't room for another bite for dessert, and having whatever was left boxed to go, you two proceeded to the museum.

It was high school since Curtis last attended the freshwater aquarium, but his guess had been right that you would enjoy it. When he led you inside to show his online tickets to require the wristbands needed, you were already clutching at his hand excitedly. Ushered through one last set of doors and out of the cold for good, your jackets were checked and a glass of champagne was offered to both of you. Your arm hooked through his as you sipped from your flute, your eyes roving around to take in the different directions that you two could go.

“Where should we go visit first?”

Curtis took a look around himself, getting reacquainted with the space. “Well, I think that way was displays of local habitats you will find on Lake Superior which includes otters…”

“Otters?” You perked up and Curtis nodded to confirm. “I want to see the otters.”

He chuckled and winked. “Anything you wish Honey.” Leading you in the general direction that the crowd was going, the area leading towards the otters was brightly lit, with glass turtle tanks built into the wall where the reptiles swam and lounged on great log displays.

Something under the water caught your eye and carefully you lowered to look at the lower part of the tank, Curtis bent from the waist to look into the display to see small minnows darting in schools from one particular turtle going for the chase. You admired the underwater set up, it did indeed look like a piece of the lake was set up in the tanks.

“Think they catch any of those little bastards? They are quick in the water.” Curtis observed while he moved back to a stand, offering his arm for you to get back up as well. The surface of the display hid the chaos underneath, the row of turtles slowly slipping off one by one.

“That many turtles, I’m sure they don’t stand much of a chance. Turtles are faster then anyone gives them credit for. You ever see one of those race across the road?”

You two wander from the display, glancing in others showing woodland frogs peeping loudly but well hidden so you and Curtis had to search them out, garter snakes lazily stretching under the heated lamps and toads blinking at the two of them before giving a lazy hop in the small enclosure. You paused at some earthy colored newts creeping along damp moss.

“I used to love these guys. Only ours were fiery orange with dots on there backs. Oh… these too.” You shifted to the next tank, the salamander was much longer and black in color, yellow spots dotting its back. “My sister and I used to go out in the springtime at night and go looking for them. They would always cross through our yard.”

Curtis peered into the tank. “I remember my grandfather caught one of these at the freight yard, runs right along the river so we see them there all the time in the spring while they are migrating. Came home with it and sent my grandmother just about through the front door.” Curtis laughed at the memory. “I can still hear her now ‘Wilford you get that thing out of my house.’ She wasn’t too keen on any of them indoors. Especially snakes.”

“What did he do with it?” You asked, having lost focus on the small amphibian in the tank. You were much more keen on watching Curtis’s expressions recalling the memory.

“He loaded me into the truck and we went back to where he found it. He insisted I let it go so I got to hold it for a bit before it scurried away.” His arm loosely fell around your waist, tucking you in close and smiling to himself. A genuine smile, you could see the way it crinkled the corner of his eyes and made his features relaxed.

“I think.. Yup. The otters are next.” He led you along, keeping you closer now since the crowd started filling out more. You made a mental note of the location for when you brought your class down on a field trip. Know where the otters were because they would be the popular exhibit.

The crowd broke to a large glass wall, the bottom half was much like the turtle tank, filled with water that mimicked the bottom a lake bed. More eye level was the otters above ground display, which featured logs and brush, a slide made to look like a hollowed tree, caverns for them to dart into.

There was also a large amount of snow dumped in it, which the otter pair were rolling in and sliding into theirwater tank before rushing out to hop into the pile again. Their handlers stood among the pile, giving the presentation, drawing in the crowd. Curtis let his hand settle on your waist, listening to the display given which he knew would help draw in the funds the aquarium was looking for.

You snapped a few pictures from your phone, listening to the info given while you sent the pictures to your sister with plenty of heart emojis. You inched closer, trying to weave your way through the crowd but you suddenly felt self-conscious, like you were in the way of people. You drew yourself into a corner, glancing over your shoulder to make sure you weren't blocking anyone.

Curtis ended up following you, pulling you to stand in front of him and tucking your head under his chin as he wrapped his arms around you, seemingly knowing that you suddenly were feeling so in the way and to big in your space. He had no problem easing you two to a better spot in front of the tank. His head dropped to whisper in your ear. “Take a couple more pictures, I'm sure your sister would love these shots.”

You eased up, and started to forget about being nervous or anxious as you felt his hands resting on your waist and the firm length of his body behind you. You did just as he said, take more pictures and enjoy the show of the otters playing in the snow. You would occasionally lift your phone to show him your sister's response before you moved away from the display. In the less crowded area, he came back up beside you, his arm lifting to drape over your shoulder, still relaxed as ever. Stepping from the bright light room that featured the otters, you two entered an area with large aquariums featuring some of the different styles of lake habitats and aquatic species.

Curtis let you lead the way the rest of the time, catching a glimpse of who you must be in the classroom as you talked about different species of fish, pointing out the shape of fin patterns for different streams of water, what kind of food they would hunt and what animals would hunt them.

“I didn’t know I was dating a regular outdoors woman.” He arched a curious brow at you and you shrugged a bit, feeling suddenly shy about it.

“If I wasn’t a teacher, I would have been a biologist. I always loved wildlife. Outdoors woman? Yeah, that is stretching it. I really hate mosquitos.” You shuddered in his hold, making him burst out laughing at your confession.

“Really hate them Honey, like a lot?” He teased as he couldn't contain his laughter, his hand falling from your shoulder to slap against his chest. You scowled at him in play, elbowing his stomach in retaliation.

“Okay Mr.Big Shot, you like everything out there?”

He finished off his champagne in a swallow and you both set your emptied glasses on a bypassing host. “Thank you.” He said, both of you declining another glass. “Oh hell no, know what I hate… Bats.”

“Bats? Bats are adorable.” While you two ducked into another section, coming up to a huge large tank casting the room in a soft blue glow. You both paused in front of it, watching huge fish, some as long as your body, swim lazily around.

“They used to scare the shit out of me.” Curtis admitted. “They come swooping down out of nowhere and just barely miss you. I got stuck up in the attic once and there was a whole colony that had set up house. I just about broke down that door to get out.”

You bit your lip at the mental image of big giant Curtis running from a couple of bats. His gaze looked down at you. “I’m sorry, I know its not okay to laugh.” Your voice bubbled while you tried to keep it somber and he nudged you, winking.

“You can laugh, it is funny.”

You let it out, a real genuine laugh, making him join right in while you two watched the lake giants in the tank. Once you two died down, your face lifted up to catch the tanks glow just right, your eyes sparkling in admiration at one in particular.

“That your favorite? The lake sturgeon?” He asked and you nodded, your head tilting as a small smile appeared.

“Always, they are kind of like looking at the past, you know? Like a living dinosaur. They look intimidating and dangerous, but so rarely will hurt anyone. Plus they are just beautiful, something so large and yet elegant in how it moves.” You sighed almost wistfully at your statement and Curtis grasped your chin gently to look at him, away from the tank.

“I see what you mean, but I think the only thing I can actually call beautiful in this room is you Honey.” He firmly reminded you, pressing a kiss to your mouth before you could rebut him. “And I refuse to accept anything else.”

“You are stubborn Curtis, you can’t compare me to fish.”

“I kinda just did and don’t take anything back.” He smirked and you shook your head at him while he took your hand. As more people came into the area, you two retreated, following the flow of the room till you two went into a river display.

You continued to let Curtis lead you along, loosing concentration in what the displays were now. Your attention was focused more on the pull of Curtis’s shoulders under the light blue shirt, shifting just right so you could see the muscles in his back with his movements, the shirt tucked firmly in his black dress pants, that in your opinion made his ass look just as good as a pair of jeans could. Whenever the two of you would pause, he would squint just slightly to read the smaller print once in a while when he was really interested in something he would mouth the words along with what he was reading.

It struck you just how nice this date out was for you, no one would have ever considered taking you to an aquarium. Most certainly not your ex, you had invited him once to something like this and he immediately shot it down. But, not only did Curtis bring you, he fully engaged in it as well, making sure to ask you questions and making his own observations. Even opening up to tell you things about his past. All of it just caught up to you how lucky you were to have met him. It also made you want to show him how much you appreciated him.

You sidled up closer to him, running your hand along the expanse of his back while leaning up to his ear. “Curtis…”

He paused from his reading to turn his attention to you. His gaze narrowed slightly at the way you were biting your lip. “You okay Y/N?”

“Come on, I have another place I want us to check out real quick.” Your hand weaved with his and this time you took the lead, by passing groups of people who were listening to hosts discuss the importance of the display. But you didn’t pause, not till the groups of people started to thin out, leaving behind the more interesting features of an aquarium. As a teacher, you knew the ones people tended to ignore.

Stepping through a curtain under a large sign that said ‘History of The Great Lake.’ Just as you suspected, it was almost empty. A few couples wandered from old grainy photograph to another, reading the history. You turned to Curtis and put a finger to your lips for quiet. You knew what you were looking for, and when you saw the corner enclosed mostly in darkness, a curtain covering a red exit sign.

Pulling him around the curtain, you faced Curtis and cupped his face to bring him in closer, urgently kissing him, drawing him in till his hands grabbed at handfuls of your ass to arch you into him as the kiss turned greedy, both of you going breathless to draw away from each other for gasps of air. This is when you prayed to everything you could think of that there wouldn’t be an alarm on the door. And when you backed into it and it clicked open, the two of you stumbling through, it stayed silent.

Perfect.

Once through, you pushed him lightly against the wall, dropping your hands to his belt with a smirking look before you dropped to your knees in front of him, fingers easing his belt out of the loop.

“Oh, shit. Right here?” He looked down at you with a wide-eyed surprised expression as you popped it open, along with the button holding his pants closed. The tip of your tongue slid along your lips as you glanced up at him through your lashes.

“As long as it is okay with you Curtis.” Your fingers found the hidden away zip, tugging it down with a swipe of the zipper's teeth. You started kissing along his hip through his pants, not yet tugging down, but your fingers curled in the band of pants and boxers. “If you want me to stop, I will stop right now.”

Did he want you to stop? Hell no, his brain was screaming at him while you looked up at him just as sweet as always, the hint of lust in your eyes as you waited for his answer. Your lips kiss swollen red and your tongue just adding to the image of you kneeling right in front of him, inches away from his cock that was now very hard and straining the front of probably the only decent pair of pants he owned. If you didn’t do something now, the likelihood they would be cum stained before this night ended was a real possibility.

Curtis’s hand dropped to cup the side of your face that you leaned into. “I don’t think I will ever want you to stop.” He said seriously and you broke into a grin, leaning forward once more to kiss against the skin showing, sliding your tongue against the vein leading down as you eased his pants down far enough to give you room. His cock strained the front of his boxer briefs and you kissed there too, still staring up at him as you worked those down too till he was free. Very stiff and erect, you took a second to admire just how well-endowed Curtis was before you wrapped your hands around him, stroking upwards.

Curtis did his best to remember this image of you, your eyes were all wide eyed and glancing from his cock to his face continuously checking in with him, hovering so close to his now weeping cock head that when you ran your tongue over him, he didn’t know how he was gonna hold out. He let his hand find a place in your hair, not to lead you but just to hold onto you while you wrapped your lips around him.

Those lips, soft and supple as they stretched around his cock, to see you start to ease him with lots of spit from your mouth and flutters of your tongue teasing his length, he wanted a video. More than anything, he wanted to have this for later when he was alone in bed, horny as fuck picturing you riding his cock.

Somewhere you must have realized, cause you dragged yourself off him, kissing against his swollen tip once more as your hands now worked him. “Feeling good?”

“Fuck, It’s uh-” He stammered for a moment, distracted at the way you nipped the inside of his thighs and pressed your face in close to use your mouth to tease his balls. It cut off his train of thought, his grasp in your hair tightening, now this time to lead you. “-Like that, again Y/N.”

Your mouth wrapped around his sac, sucking and teasing with strokes of your tongue, your nose nuzzled in close to him while you still worked on jerking him off. You started squirming at Curtis’s feet, wrapping your mouth around him again and bopping your head as your hands worked him, humming and moaning the more you took him down. It was turning Curtis into a babbling mess above you. Every time something he liked in particular happened, like your tongue wrapping around him, his hold would twist into your hair and he would break out into praising.

“Pretty Girl, I gotta be in you.” He finally declared, making you pull off him with a panting gasp, nodding that you understood.

He was rougher than usual with you, but you felt that rush in your core at how he hauled you to your feet and twisted you to lean against the stair banister, looking down at the floor below while large hands pushed the back of your dress up over your hips and his fingers stroked your now soaked panties.

“Fuck, you get this wet suckin’ my dick?” A hook of a finger into the fabric slid them aside to feel your pussy welcoming him.

“Yes! Fuck me Curtis, I need it bad.” You wriggled back against him, his chest draped over your back and his whiskers scratching at the side of your neck. You felt him groan so deeply that it made you shiver excitedly, arching your head back so he could kiss and nip at your neck.

“Spread your legs wider.” He plunged fingers into you, finger fucking you with urgency while he grasped your hip with his other hand, holding you in place. You twisted your hands against the banister to steady yourself while doing just as he said, whining out when he moved his hand from between your thighs. But the wide tip of his cock pushed into you and you cried out at the sudden stretch when he filled you. A hand wrapped around your mouth to quiet you.

“You gotta keep quiet Honey.” He grunted.

Curtis waited long enough to see the tiny nod from you before dropping his hand to your throat, not tight enough to cut off air, but enough to see his fingertips press against your softer sides, feel you swallow back your cries as he picked up his thrusting pace, fucking into you hard and quick. Your body jolted against the banister in time to his movements while giving little soft cries you did your best to muffle till your mouth dropped open and you became silent. Squeezing around him so perfectly that his cock throbbed against your velvet walls.

“Curtis” You whined out his name in that needy way that confirmed what he knew; you wanted to come.

“Let me feel you soak my dick Pretty Girl.” he hissed in your ear, tilting himself once more to find your sweet spot and have you break for him.

Curtis felt it, the way you stiffened suddenly and pushed back against him. He was quick to muffle your cry as you came, slowing down enough to ride you through it, but when he felt you sag against the banister, he ran his hand at your hip to your breast, cupping through your dress and pushing you back against his chest.

“One more Honey, and I will come with you.” A kiss at your jawline was his promise to you.

This time his fingers found their way into your mouth, sucking on his digits that he had fingered you with. Feeling your tongue wrap through them and your moan made him groan into your shoulder, biting down slightly as he sped up again. Now the sound of you being fucked loud sounded through the emergency exit of the aquarium, your wet pussy squelching with every slap of his pelvis into your ass, and Curtis fought that heated spiral raging in his gut, resisting the urge to fuck his cum into you till you were ready for him.

He saw your hand loosen its hold on the banister, dropping to between your messy thighs to rub yourself, whining against his hand muffling you. “Come on Pretty Girl, get yourself off.” He hoarsely grunted in your ear while untangling his hand from your mouth back to your throat. You felt so fucking good under his body, soft and giving that he could just keep holding himself in you while you came for him.

“I gotta, please Curtis.” You pleaded with him. “Tell me your close?”

“Just keep squeezing me like that Honey.” The heat in his gut spiraled, rushing for that release. “I’m with you, fuck.”

You came again, moaning out his name once more in relief while he fucked his cum into you, burying his face into your neck to keep himself from giving the two of you away with a yell while you both found your moments of mindless bliss.

You were thankful for the banister holding you up, because Curtis was heavy behind you, holding you around your waist but still leaning into you. He groaned against you, bracing a hand against the banister next to yours to practically peel himself off your back.

“You okay?” he ghosted his lips against your neck before moving fully to a stand and easing his softened cock from you. Immediately followed by his spend, making you squeeze your thighs together briefly while he fixed your panties back in place. Heavy hands settled to your hips while he flushed kisses against any skin showing on your shoulder while you took a deep breath to clear your head of the fuzziness following an orgasm.

You felt so fucking good.

“Never better.” You eased around while he situated himself. You could see the tips of his ears were bright red as well as his neck, you imagined that flush travelled down his chest. He glanced at you and still had that dazed look like his world was just rocked in a good way, making your heart skip a beat and pride filled you that you gave him that.

“I just… fuck Honey.” He immediately reached for you, drawing you into his hold while cupping your face and kissing you with a bit of teeth scraping at your lip. “Thank you.”

“You are welcome.” You giggled as you circled your arms around his neck, accepting his affection. The embrace was cut short, a yell at the bottom of the stairwell making you both jump in surprise. Curtis took a quick glance over the banister and motioned that you two had to go. Slipping back out, he slung an arm over your shoulder and steered you out from behind the black curtain and off to a display. Keeping you tucked into his side, you both gazed at the picture of a lighthouse on Lake Superiors shore when the exit door burst open, two aquarium employees stepping out and glancing around.

“Did anyone come out from here?” One asked Curtis, you turned away, sure not to let them see your face in case your makeup was smudged from giving head.

“You know… a couple came out and headed back towards the animals.” Curtis was sure to point them away from you, sending them off before they figured out it was indeed you two. Once they were gone, Curtis took one look at your face and gave a small grin. “We need to clean you up.”

“Bathrooms should be up here a bit.” You ducked your face from other patrons and the two of you ended up near the giftshop restrooms, Curtis waiting outside while you went to go fix your smudged makeup.

When you came back out, you looked back up at him, a nervous little grin on your lips. “Better?”

“Well, I was pretty fond of the ruined look.” Curtis shrugged with a smug look. “But better. Did you want to go back in the aquarium?”

“No, I think we have gotten into plenty of fun tonight. I do want to stop in the gift shop though. See what they have, I might find something for the classroom.” You suggested and Curtis took your hand, ready to follow you.

Browsing the giftshop proved to be fun. Since most of the other people were still browsing the aquarium, there weren’t many people there. You managed to find a couple books you wanted, one for your classroom about the wildlife and habitats of the lake, the other a personal book for yourself about legends and ghost stories surrounding the lake. Curtis as well found himself a book about the lake's history to add to his expansive collection. Then you two were going through posters when you happened across one of the constellations. Curtis picked up that one too, with a pile of glowing star stickers as a Christmas gift for Sophia.

All in all, probably one of the best dates you have ever had.

#curtis everett x plus sized reader #curtis everett x honey #curtis everett and honey #curtis everett and plus sized reader #curtis everett and reader #curtis everett x reader #curtis everett and you #curtis everett x you #life is short so make it sweet #curtis everett au #snowpiercer au #chris evans characters #amber writes #sweater writes

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ceilingfan5 · 2 years

Note

🥚for the prompty?

“Babe.”

“I’m not listening, I’m busy.” Taako readjusts the cat bed and the blankets piled on top of it. He puts his hands on his hips and sticks his tongue between his teeth in deep thought, which is unfair, because it gives Kravitz the heart pangs but good.

“Babe, we cannot raise a dragon egg.”

“Oh, hang on, I forgot.” Taako clambers over the couch and untangles the heating pad, and adds it to the mess of softness. There’s a glimmer of shining scales in the low light of their shitty lamp that turns off when you bump it, and Kravitz swallows.

“We–Taako, we live in an apartment.”

“Point being?”

“Taako? Taako, are you hearing yourself??” Kravitz starts pacing again. He can’t watch Taako intently rearrange the blankets and old towels and the cat bed and the heating pad and the left socks that Beans stole and hid in that cat bed. He can’t watch Beans watch Taako with indignation and uninvested interest. He can’t watch the news, muted on the TV, about the missing egg and the heaps and heaps of gold the damn thing is worth. Or the hemorrhoid cream commercial that follows, but that’s because the acting is terrible. “How far back do I need to go? Dragons are living creatures. Dragons are famously dangerous living creatures. Dragons are famously dangerous living creatures that grow up to be very, very, very-” his voice almost cracks, “big.”

“Yuh huh,” Taako says, and heads to the kitchen. Beans follows with a hungry jingle of his collar. Kravitz sighs and joins the party. “But, they’re small for a while. And also, how different are dragons from cats, really? And also also, I’m not intending to keep it for like, forever, forever, you know?”

“I don’t know.” Kravitz leans against the doorway and watches Taako open up a can of the good stuff to placate beans over his pilfered real estate. Beans sings the song of his people, as you do. Taako dumps it on a paper plate, fighting Beans off to get that far, and then plops it on the floor. A little bit of Nasty Gravy gets on the cabinet. Kravitz wishes he didn’t notice. “I don’t know what you’re thinking. You haven’t told me what you’re thinking, and I, unfortunately, am not a mind reader, or a mind scanner, or a mind vibe checker, or-”

“Surely you’ve checked some of my vibes, Krav.” Taako takes a break from being serious about the egg thing to grin gap-toothedly at Kravitz, charming fucker that he is. “Surely you’ve palmed the sacks of my vibes like so many dollar store marbles.”

“They’re hefty for sure,” Kravitz woes. He wants this to be less serious. He wants to not have to be the fun police, for multiple reasons, namely fuck’em, and, followup, fuck’em. He wants to be able to play in this space. But the news and also the dictionary fucking definition of the beast in question has him rattled. “Please. Please label these marbles I am palming. What am I missing here? Because I’m seeing you take a stolen dragon egg into our home, with- with intention to let it hatch and become a blood-thirsty lizard of great stature?”

Taako clicks his tongue in thought, and gets a paper towel about the gravy situation. A little bit of love escapes the prison of Kravitz’s heart, and oozes.

“There’s a couple things.”

“I figured.”

Taako wipes the gravy. Beans chows down. Kravitz tries to quell his anxiety, which is rather a lot like telling a tsunami to follow the rules of the road, you rapscallion, can’t you see there’s business to attend to? Harumph.

“They were gonna sell it to a guy who was gonna make a dragon omelet.”

“That, sucks, for sure, but it seems both implausible and also-”

“Are you gonna say not my responsibility? Cause the omelet thing is true, and they were picking from a long list of chefs to do it, and-”

“Oh,” Kravitz says.

“Yeah.”

“How do you make a dragon omelet? Isn’t that not even how it w-”

“I don’t care, okay? I couldn’t let it happen. And- And you gotta tell me you wouldn’t let it happen either, okay? A dragon- I mean, chickens, that’s one thing. Ostriches even, fuck ‘em. But a dragon is a fully intelligent creature, right? And this one has been incubating for a long time, Krav, you know what would happen if we cracked it into a sizzling frying pan? Krav? You know what- you know who would have to smell that??”

Kravitz looks at Taako. Taako very intentionally doesn’t look at Kravitz.

Kravitz pads over in his house slippers and wraps his arms around Taako.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I get it now.”

“Go ahead,” Taako sniffs. “Tell me it’s stupid. Tell me it’s none of my business, and also that it’s illegal, and that the police choppers are talking to the landlord company right now, and they’re double mad because the choppers woke them up, so we’re gonna get double evicted, and-”

“Taako,” Kravitz soothes. He kisses his cheek gently. “I’m not above a little crime. Besides.”

“Besides what.”

“It’s not like it’s going to be apartment sized immediately. We’ve got plenty of time to figure this out.”

They share some calming breaths. It’s dim and quiet in their kitchen, and the only sound is Beans’ collar as he gorges himself on wet food, which is comically familiar and thus relaxing.

“What if I get attached?” Taako whispers.

“Don’t you dare,” Kravitz replies, sweet as honey butter.

#sorry it has been one Million Years #this school year has been nuts #fan5fics #taakitz #taakitz fic #taz #tazb #taz balance #the adventure zone #the adventure zone balance

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pbandjesse · 3 months

Text

I am really sleepy. But it was not a bad day. I just decided I should come home and I'm glad I did. I had such a fun and productive night. And that was after a pretty good day of groups and classes.

I slept all right last night. I went to go look at the stars before bed and had to walk in the woods a little bit. It's funny that I'm not scared at all when I'm out there. Even though it's very very dark and by all counts I should be afraid. But it's not scary you know that it's empty and you are alone.

I would see Callie's light in the distance and so I started walking towards her and she yelled over who's there? That was like oh my God it's me! And we would hang out for the next hour and a half.

She told me all about her day and some of the drama and I told her mine. And we would chat and laugh and have a nice evening. Eventually though we both started to wind down and went to sleep. Did not turn off our desk lamp. But I slept with a sleep mask on so it didn't really matter. And while per alarm did wake me up The only real problem I have is that she's pretty perfume and it got on my head. It was very funny but also the smell was a little overwhelming for a few seconds for me. I would be fine but it was just very funny.

I would get up for real and she asked me to bring her her toothbrush. So I would get washed up and dressed and I felt like I was moving really slow because I was freezing. I was just so cold in my cabin. So I was struggling to get dressed and ready but I would figure it out and collect her toothbrush and then I was off.

I went up the hill behind the lodge instead of the other route because I wanted to stop at the stream site to get the nature skills box to give to Callie But when I got there I was annoying to find the stream box I've been left open and had 3 in of rain in it.

But not just 3 in of rain. It also had two hatched snake eggs. It was crazy. I have never seen that before and I was afraid that maybe there was a snake in the box somewhere so rather than risk it I would let the office know and then let Lindsey who runs nature now. And I was just fascinated that that had happened because those eggs were big. And yesterday morning when I got the camp there was a shed snake skin on my table so the snakes are back for sure.

I would have a really nice day though. We had biscuits and gravy with bacon for breakfast but I don't eat two of those things so I got a biscuit and jelly. It would have been better with butter and then later on I found that there was butter in my backpack and I'm so mad but it was okay. I would eat watermelon and a biscuit and then I walked to the office to check in and then over to the art Jack where I waited for my first group.

This first group struggle. There was a couple very nice boys but they also apparently had to have a behavior conversation meeting with their village director already. It's only Tuesday. But we struggled through and it was fine. Couple of them made snakes couple of them made lizards some of them made bracelets but everybody made something. And they tried hard.

I did have a little trouble with one boy who was being a little bit mean to one of my boys that have been here for forever. And he kept saying that nobody likes him and nobody wants him here and blah blah blah and I'm like stop it even if that's true which it's not that's not very nice and it's not very kind and we don't do that. And it was just disappointing because that's so not what camps about and I don't want to see bullying at all at camping. It's upsetting. I really hope that his counselor is paying attention.

My woodlands group which was second was very funny and kept singing along to very early 2000s women singers. Specifically 1,000 miles and fireworks. And it was very funny hearing them all sing to the song when I put it on Spotify. They were like oh my God www! Which is little boy language for when which is positive. At least it was funny.

Lunch was fine but I didn't really want a veggie burger so I took a couple bites for the protein and then just made a sandwich using french fries a tomato lettuce and ketchup. Would have improved with Mayo but I did not see any. I also think that the chips from yesterday would have been better than the French fries but whatever.

I would eat lunch pretty quickly after being very confused when Aaron said that he did not feed the chickens yesterday? They're not in every other day either so that's weird. But I would text Lindsay about it because she's down there and it's easier for her to keep an eye on things than me. And then I would go to arts and crafts and lay down for a while.

I would be called upon by some of my coworkers. For string. Then for paint brushes. I heard over the walkie that they're going to start painting the teepees and they needed the big brushes and I quickly ran over to grab my walkie and tell them I had it I had it! And they would send someone up later on to get it. Alexi walked by and waved andJeci came up to work on bracelets for a bit. Ouzman(unsure of spelling) that would come as well He kept saying in his accent that he was going to have the best and biggest bracelet at camp. I thought that was very funny.

The afternoon was great. I had day campers I had Yukon and then I had horses. Some people struggled with their lizards. Specifically the little kids but I was pretty proud of my counselors for picking up on how to build them so they could help me and I wasn't the only one troubleshooting everyone's work. I was really proud of all the kids that persevered because it is hard! Hand-eye coordination, following a pattern, these are all skills that they needed I'm glad that we're practicing them. At every level. And even though big kids were making some lizards but others were a metal stamping or making beaded bracelets or string bracelets. And I was just having a really good day hanging out with everyone talking about past years and this year and all of the changes in the world. And it just felt good. That's a really good kids that are new and ones that are returning and I was just having a really good time.

I was also enjoying my counselors and the YLPs. Those teens struggle a little bit but if you give them direction they're good followers. They listen very well even if they're not quite self-starters yet. I was very happy with them and would just have a really nice time talking and showing them how to do different things. Showing my expectations of them. I got to make sure that I get that in quick so that there not in the hammocks right away.

This for some of the counselors as well.

A little before lunch the lights in the art building went out and I called the office and I was the first one to report but the lights had gone out. Because then slowly throughout camp the lights were going off. At the Hacienda and then the nurse's office and then the lodge and everyone kept calling him because no one was listening. And then me Tony and Kieran kept making jokes about Antonio thinking that people were calling the tower ( where he works ) when we were saying the word power. And so then Kieran said does anybody need a shower? And I was like is anyone looking for full hour? And then Elizabeth told us to stop and Kieran was like I got me and then she was like no more jokes and then I said guys at this hour? And it was really bad and we were just having a good time.

The power would only be out for about an hour. Thankfully I had water and I was fine but our bathrooms don't work if we don't have running water so that's always a fear. But thankfully was not too much of an issue today. And it would resolve pretty quickly.

My last group of the day was the worst girls and they actually didn't have me on their schedule officially They had archery tag but they chose to come to me instead and that was just fine. It would just set back me going home and it's all good. I was happy to have them. Some of them make lizards, including the counselors, and then someone was crocheting and other girls were making bracelets and it was just like a really nice calm end of the day. I was really happy and they were really sweet. And once they were gone I cleaned up and grab my backpack and got my car.

I was just about to leave when I saw Cody. He's not working here this year but he was visiting cuz he was in the area and I was joking asking if they had convinced him to come back yet. And I told him about all the new programs and he said that's why so it was nice to see him and I have officially in my mind for giving him for being my mortal enemy after making me cry my second year I can't. It's all good. It was just one of those things that I held onto for a long time but he doesn't work here anymore and honestly he's not a bad person. He tries very hard to be good and I have no animosity towards him anymore. I am letting that joke go.

Probably. I might forget every once in awhile. The bit is hard to drop.

I would leave camp a little after 4:30. And It was not a bad drive. I did forget my charger so I couldn't connect my phone to the car but the Bluetooth has been working pretty well so it wasn't a quiet ride thankfully. And I got back home before James did.

I parked in the front of the house and I would get inside and check on all my animals and hold sweetp for a second before I jumped right in to doing chores. I had mostly come home because I wanted to work on stuff for the market for on Saturday. I am running low on bears and I really need to have some out tomorrow. That's going to be my plan after my last group comes is to cut a whole bunch of bears so that I can start making new stock because I am low. But I packed up some bears and I even made some mystery bags of some of the ones that are a little more ugly than others. And it was a good time. I was having fun. I was starting to get a little overwhelmed by sound so I had to put Ruby in the other room. And sweet pea was outside so I put crab cake out there too and when I went out to do that sweetie was under the lid drinking the turtle water! I keep telling him it's going to make him sick. So I put a bowl of water outside for him so that he would stop drinking the turtle water.

I would also make a frozen pizza and after I finished my market stuff and putting things away I would eat my pizza outside on my swing and I was just very comfortable and having a very good time and then as I was laying there James came home!

When James got home they jumped right into their own list of chores. They had stopped at the grocery store and Charlotte's apartment to check on her cat little boy. But they were home now and they were going to sand our transom window and work on a couple small things in the kitchen. They had made a peach cobbler and they would warm that up for me a little bit later on. While they were doing their stuff I was hanging out and scrolling on my phone and enjoying how nice the weather was. I was also just really enjoying James's company.

Eventually we would sit together in the kitchen and talk and discuss things. And we were just being silly and having a good time talking. Eventually I would come upstairs and soon James are join me and we would hang out for a long time. I took a shower at one point we were laughing and watching videos and being silly and just having a good time. I'm really glad I came home. I really like staying at camp but I also just love being in my house. I spend so much money to live here and I love it here and I want to be home so I can do things. So it's hard being at camp for hours of doing nothing. The relaxing is good because I struggle with relaxing. But also it's hard to be away from home. I think I'm going to strike some kind of balance between staying home and staying at camp but I'm not really sure what that looks like yet.

Now though I feel very dehydrated so I'm going to go get some water and I'm going to get ready to go to sleep. I've had a really fun night with James and I just feel so incredibly close to them right now. I just think it's a little bit of missing them but it's also them just being very sweet.

Now though is bad. I hope that tomorrow is a really good day with really good kids and I have a really good time. I hope that you will have a really good time too. Until next time. Sleep well

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i-rove-rock-n-roll · 1 year

Text

The Day Pa Crow Met Death

Chapter 1

THE MAN IN BLACK

The beginning was Death.

It was not the Beginning: the creation of religion and its variant births, of dust and ashes, of emerging from caverns, godly creations, or ground corn, broken bones, dewdrops or blood rivers, hatching eggs or resurrection. Nor was it that Big Bang, of all things that the scientists believed in, that precise method of atoms changing into matter and light and universes, those tiny strands of DNA forming roughly (yet so beautifully) into worms, then fish, then men.

This was not the beginning.

It was not even the beginning of his life in particular when he, Pa Crow, had been born, baptized appropriately according to his sour-faced parents, then left to his own devices until he was old enough to help with the sowing, growing, and harvesting.

It was, what Pa considered, quite correctly, to be the first day of the rest of his life. Or, more specifically, the last day of his life.

Whichever sounds nicer.

The day started out quite nice itself, in Pa’s opinion. The old man, and he was an old man, woke shortly before the sun cleared the horizon. On the border between hearty and frail, his steps were as heavy as his arms were spotted, his face leathered and his hair white. His clothes were warm and soft, the complete opposite of his limbs. His stride was relatively smooth, though he stopped and started like a baby calf, all jerking movement and long legs. That day in particular he took to carrying a shotgun on a strap, bouncing across his back.

He went by the name Pa, though he was no father to anyone. Neighborhood children would flock to him, eager to hear his him tell stories. Wonderful tales of magic and myth and science and wonder and hope and friends and family and lizards—anything to keep the boredom at bay. When the ice cream truck rolled by he would treat them, and they would listen, enraptured by his slow, warm cadence, and somehow so distracted that the ice creams were mostly melted by the time the children remembered they were holding them. Now Pa’s children were grown and bought him ice cream. They bought him lunch and books and clothes. One even bought him a plant, a beautiful little thing with shining leaves and absolutely zero flowers.

“It doesn’t replace the tree, I know.” One of Pa’s children said, rubbing his arm self-consciously, recalling the behemoth of a botanical specimen that used to dominate Pa’s yard. “But I’d like you to have it anyway.”

“Thank you.” Pa said. He never knew how to say no.

That was years ago. The plant remained just as it always had, green and budding and flowerless. The only thing missing was a name. So, Pa tossed a couple around. A “Good morning, Linda,” or an “Evening, Ricardo,” or even a “You look like you might be blooming soon, Scipio the Steadfast, what do you think?” While he was partial to all of these (and even considered each one seriously for some time), Geraldine, Pa decided, was perfect.

Each summer brought new children, all bright- eyed and waiting for the magic their parents told them of. They always wanted to stay past dinnertime, but even Pa conceded that their parents would like to see them eventually. Each summer seemed hotter than the last, burning the soles of bare feet and torching the once green grass into a not quite flaming yellow.

It was when Pa brought the group their lemonade that he realized, with a jolt, that there were fewer children than before. At first, Pa wondered if they were sick, but then another vanished. And then another. And then another, leaving no sign that they had ever existed at all. It didn’t seem to affect Pa’s older children, the ones who had grown into such lovely adults, but instead took the youngest, stealing away each childish laugh as it pleased.

It wasn’t the weather, he determined, or sickness, or some parallel universe (as far as he could tell); it was just children disappearing, their parents and guardians unworried. Pa was the only one who saw them before they were gone.

The day the last child disappeared was the worst day of all. There was no laughter outside his window, no sticky fingers ringing the bell or rattling his doorknob. Instead, there was silence, only broken by birds in the day and crickets at night. Once in a while, there was a scream, either of thousands of bugs or a lone animal, and though they were gone as soon as they came, he didn’t feel quite so alone anymore.

He made trips to the basement, fetching his stereo and television and then went to the store, collecting the cables and batteries necessary to run such old things in his warm, worn living room. What few of Pa’s adult children still lived in the dying town took him out to eat and offered him an ear. “Maybe next summer there’ll be more kids,” they’d say. Or, “Just give it time, the others will be back before you know it.”

But Pa didn’t have time. He was almost ninety-six and, in his eyes, had very little to show for it. The farm had been his parents’, the produce their legacy. Acres of land long sought after by businessmen, offering amounts Pa could barely conceive of. Pa said no to all of them. It wasn’t his land to sell.

In the end, Pa was glad the children were gone, glad they weren’t there to see what he was doing.

Pa set himself up outside, just as he always had, in his large rocking chair. The gun was cool against his fingertips as he lay it between his knees, loading the chamber with bullets, his hands far steadier than his gait. Pa whistled a tune as he finished, setting the shotgun on his lap, one hand on the butt, his fingers near the trigger as he waited. A very important visitor was supposed to drop by, one Pa hadn’t seen in quite some time.

He was waiting for the Man in Black.

The Man in Black first showed up on a bright and sunny Tuesday morning. Coincidentally, that was the day Pa Crow met Death.

The Man in Black made his way up the porch steps and was about to ring the doorbell when he stopped, turned, and smiled. Sitting in his chair, eyes half- lidded in the summer warmth, was Pa Crow.

“Pa Crow.” The Man in Black said, Pa’s form reflected in his dark sunglasses. There was almost nothing he did not know. Almost. Pa’s eyes fluttered open.

“You know my name,” he said, “could I know yours?”

The Man in Black smiled, teeth remarkably straight, though not remarkably white. “You could.” He said, and left it at that.

“Are you with the government?”

“Shouldn’t I be asking the questions, Pa Crow?”

“Should you?” Pa stretched lazily, one hand above his head, the other reaching behind.

“I wouldn’t reach for your gun if I were you, Pa Crow.” The Man in Black’s smile was implacable.

“I wasn’t.” Pa said, which was true. He had, in fact, been reaching for the crowbar he kept hidden behind his chair. His shotgun was in the house, tucked under his bed, much too far away. If the Man in Black had a gun, Pa didn’t see it.

“We’ve been keeping tabs on you for quite some time, Pa Crow.” The Man in Black stood above, ignoring the perfectly empty chair beside Pa’s. “Do you know why?” Pa wondered if this was a trick question. He didn’t know why the Man in Black was watching him, nor did he know the Man in Black’s reasoning, or why he insisted on using Pa’s full name with each sentence. The Man in Black continued. “Do you?” Pa remained silent.

Then he said, “You want my farm, I assume?”

“You assume?” Something in the Man in Black’s smile sharpened. “One can assume many things, Pa Crow. For example, you assume I am a government agent; I, in turn, can assume you are a farmer. You assume I wish to purchase your farm; I assume you must’ve had offers. What other assumptions can we make?” Pa shrugged. “You could, for instance, assume that crop circles are made by bored teenagers; I could assume the culprits are extraterrestrials.”

“Shouldn’t that be the other way around?”

“That,” said the Man in Black, “is an assumption.”

“So,” Pa thought for a moment, settling more comfortably in his chair. “I can assume you aren’t here on business. I can assume you are telling the truth, though I have yet to meet an alien that prefers hanging out in crop circles rather than at the local arcade. I assume you aren’t actually a government agent, though I must be perfectly frank, Mr. Man in Black, you don’t come across as particularly trustworthy.” The Man in Black was silent.

“You would do better if you listened to me, Pa Crow.”

“But you haven’t said anything.”

“I have.” Said the Man in Black, turning to leave. “You just haven’t been listening.” He looked back, his expression unreadable. “You’ve had ample warning, Pa Crow. Time’s up.” With that, the Man in Black walked down the steps and disappeared. Pa blinked, confused, and went inside.

Where there should be noise, there was silence. The radio, always running a low murmur in the background, had died. The clocks, both on the wall and beside the couch, had ceased ticking. The fan above him, pushing warm, dusty air around the room, had stopped spinning.

“Huh.” Pa Crow said and walked back out the door. He got in his truck, which took a moment to start before turning over with a soft rumble.

The drive to town held empty roads with very few cars out and about. Not even fifteen minutes into the trip, the truck began to shudder and cough in warning. Pa frowned, checking the dash. It had been full last night, since he had filled the tank after giving one of his kids a lift to their PTA meeting. Pa knew he should have more gas than this but focused instead on finding someplace to safely pull over. His surroundings were all fields, ditches, and gravel. The truck died just as he made it to the gas station.

Pa grunted as he dropped from the truck, his knees rolling at the impact. Reaching for the pump, he found a loud, pink note taped to it, scribbled in thick marker. PAY INSIDE.

The bell above the door rang as Pa entered the store. The cashier, buried in a magazine titled, Drought: Is It Aliens or Aardvarks? rung him up for gas, as well as a few candy bars. Following the monotonous “Have a nice day”, Pa stopped, one foot from the threshold. His skin prickled and he looked around. Aside from himself and the cashier, the store was empty. Pa exhaled, pushed the feeling aside, and left the station, the bell dinging a goodbye behind him. He was barely five steps from the door when a shadow blocked his path.

“Do you have a five? I need a pack of cigarettes.” Pa sighed, slipped a bill from his beat-up wallet, and handed it over. The man went inside, bought his cigarettes, and returned, looking at Pa expectantly. “You need to learn to say no.” He said.

Pa blinked. “What business is it of yours?” He hoped he didn’t sound rude. He did just buy the man his cigarettes after all.

“None at all.” The man said amicably. He flicked his lighter once, then twice. The tip glowed against the cigarette before he said, “You didn’t happen to want change back, did you?”

‘Yes.’ Pa thought but decided to try something different. “No.”

The man hummed. “D’you happen to be a Capricorn?”

“No.” Pa said, wondering why he thought of those brown cones bursting with produce that decorated Thanksgiving tables in pictures. “I don’t believe so.”

Pa Crow was born on a certain day of a certain year, under a certain astrological sign that may or may not have fit him personality- wise. He didn’t actually know when he was born, and, in short, didn’t believe in astrology, nor did he much care to learn.

“A Virgo, then.” The man stated.

“No.”

“Leo?”

Pa smiled.

“Want a cigarette?” The man held the pack out to him, inviting. His nails were short, his fingers squat, and Pa figured, by the small yet numerous scars dotting discolored skin, that the man most likely worked with his hands.

“I don’t smoke.”

“Of course, you don’t, Mr. Crow.” The man shoved the box into his pocket. “You are Mr. Crow, aren’t you?”

“Pa.” He replied simply, jamming his hands into his own pockets, feeling for his keys.

“Pa,” the man said with a smile, “Let me treat you to lunch.”

The diner Pa drove them to was very small and very quaint. The vinyl acted much like glue, or perhaps a sort of fly tape, cementing a person to their seat until the meal was done. Their waiter, Chuck, was one of Pa’s earlier children. He greeted them with a curious smile and a comfortable booth.

The man inhaled his burger while Pa had his usual of pancakes, coffee, and fresh fruit. He asked Pa questions about his life, most of which Pa answered, some of which he didn’t. Chuck eventually came by with the check and the man waved him off, sopping up the salty grease on his plate with his last few fries, proclaiming that he needed a slice of pie before any business was to be done, and that he would pay for everything. Pa, grateful he didn’t have to pay, and feeling rather adventurous, decided to spring for a Coke. His companion asked for two slices of banana cream, one for there and one to go. Chuck returned a moment later, bottle in one hand, pie in the other and apologized, saying that they only had one slice of banana cream left and asked if he would perhaps like something else.

The man shrugged. “I’ll take the check.”

“Please,.” Pa added. Chuck nodded.

Trouble returned when the man tried to pay with plastic.

“That’s odd.” The man frowned. “My employer told me that credit—er, debit—whatever cards work almost everywhere.

“Not here, I’m afraid.” Chuck apologized once more. “We only take cash.”

“Damn.” The man looked at Pa, eyes pleading. Pa sighed and pulled out his wallet, which was beginning to feel light.

“I have just enough for the bill, not enough to tip. Can I bring it to you later this week, Chuck?”

“If you were anyone else…” Chuck warned, before a smile split his face. “Nah, you’re good, Pa.” He gave Pa a tight hug and the man beside him a quick wave. “See you soon.”

The ride was silent;, despite the man’s fiddling with Pa’s stereo, all he received was static. His fingers tapped the console, then moved to roll the window down. He flicked ash from his cigarette and rolled the handle back up once he had finished. Pa kept his window down, relishing every bit of fresh air he breathed in.

“I got it!” The man said, snapping his fingers. “You’re a Cancer, you’ve got to be.”

“And why is that?” Pa asked, hand over hand, turning left. What met them was a highway, long and empty, lined with wheat and the occasional tree.

“Er—I dunno. It just feels right.” The man interlocked his fingers, popping them with ease. “You know,” he said conversationally, lighting another cigarette and pulling a bag out from under his seat that Pa never remembered being there, “my boss was right.”

“About what?” Pa smiled. “Not the card. Nowhere here takes them.”

“Truly?” The man sighed, unzipping his bag and pulling out a gun far smaller, sleeker, and nicer than Pa’s gun at home. He then pulled out a small cylinder and began screwing it to the end.

“What’s that?” Pa’s foot didn’t so much as waver from the gas pedal.

“A silencer.” The man said. “Also called a suppressor. My boss suggested I use it, though I doubt anyone can hear us out here anyway.”

“Your boss being the Man in Black, I assume?”

The man smiled. “Yes.” He said. “He said you’d assume too.”

Pa shrugged lightly, flexing his fingers to keep from gripping the wheel too tight. He pressed down on the gas, pushing the needle a bit at a time, moving it ever so slowly past sixty. “What else can I do but assume? I don’t have the answers he thinks I do.” Pa said. “Hey,” he asked suddenly, the needle hitting seventy, “you wouldn’t happen to know his name, would you?”

Now it was the man’s turn to shrug, his silencer-suppressor now connected to his gun. “I don’t get paid to ask questions, Pa. Do you understand?”

‘No.’ Pa thought. “Yes.” He said.

“You want to do any pleading?”

“No.”

“Have any regrets?” Pa wondered but did not answer. The man sighed again. “Might as well get this over with.” He said, unbuckling his seatbelt and lifting his gun. “For what it’s worth, I really did enjoy lunch with you today, Pa Crow.”

Pa swallowed the lump in his throat, eyes flickering to the speedometer, still climbing upward, now touching eighty, soon ninety. “So did I.”

The safety clicked, the silencer a cold forewarning against his temple, slightly warm from the short time ago when the man had screwed it to the end. Pa inhaled, exhaled, and closed his eyes. The needle hit ninety, reaching for one hundred—

He wrenched the wheel to the left.

A twisting.

A crunch.

A gunshot.

A gasp.

Then darkness.

#writing #my wip #the Day Pa Crow Met Death #chapter one

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halothenthehorns · 3 years

Text

All in the Family

Chapter 15: Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback

The walls were painted sky blue, the carpet a faded warm brown hinting at many years passing along leaving a permanent tread. The walls were covered in several posters that James didn't recognize of bands, but also several hand done, and extremely accurate, drawings of dragons that someone had magicked to life for this kid, flying around through each others edges.

It was crowded, the sparse bit of walking space nonexistent with the eight of them all in here at once, hardly much bigger than Harry's cupboard; but the love and care that went into this room was evident.

Lily came forward towards a desk crammed into the back corner and brushed her hand against a greyling snoozing, little blue plums of smoke escaping from its pointed head, the back end of which wasn't quite done. It was clear details were still being added of feathers to the long extended tail.

"Well I officially have no clue where we are," Peter muttered. He'd been the lucky one to land on the bed, but he had automatically moved to the edge and crossed his ankles, swinging his feet uncomfortably like he expected the occupant to appear and tell him to take his shoes off.

"Hey, wasn't one of Ron's brothers a dragon trainer or something?" Alice asked, leaning against the door with the book already in her hands.

"Dragon keeper," the older Black corrected with a look of disgust, clearly unable to grasp the concept of why anyone would want such a thing.

"I'm getting the feeling Harry's going to have some interactions with him then," she returned pleasantly, then read out the chapter title.

Black groaned in disgust and shook his shoulders like he was trying to shake off a nat before slouching over to the window and prodding along the edge like he was going to try and jump out.

"He has a thing against dragons," Potter pleasantly informed all of them needlessly.

Regulus frowned in sympathy, but knowing his brother would only snap his head off if he tried to say anything, he instead went back to investigating the picture. He was sure no one else had even noticed it, but he'd landed right in front of what must be the Weasley family.

It sat proudly against the wall, coupled in with so many other pictures of things it probably went unnoticed despite the red haired family. Regulus couldn't take his eyes off of it. He could easily identify the twins, chasing each other around every inch of available grass and weaving in between their fathers legs who was juggling the infant, whatever that little girls name had been, and who must be Ron hanging off his dad's arm to get his attention. The mother had her arms around the last three all at once, and looked exasperated, but the adoring smile on her face showed she wouldn't be anywhere else.

There was no other context, no telling what was going on before or after it was taken, why the kids were all so rambunctious or who had even taken the photo. It simply captured the moment of the one clear thing Charlie enjoyed in his life, the chaos of his family. It was baffling! All Regulus had ever known was the structure of his family tree, the rules and consequences through watching Sirius break those.

The story wasn't progressing with much interest to anyone even when Hagrid arrived. None knew him that well, so maybe he was always shifty when asked a direct question, though the oddity of him being in the school library when he'd never been known there before was keeping their attention. Ron's discovery just made it all click in a despicable way.

"A dragon! That mad gamekeeper has a dragon in his cabin! A Norwegian Ridgeback on top of everything!"

Remus covered his ears for the volume, but still looked more sympathetic than anything for Sirius' screeching.

"If I ever catch that man doing anything of the sort now I'll add him to my list right after I-"

"Alright Padfoot," James easily roped his arm around him to cut off what three just saw as a tantrum. Those who did know could only wince in sympathy with no real words of comfort for this. James kept trying anyways, "there's no dragons here-"

Then he cut off with a wince at his own stupidity as Sirius snorted in disgust and had to fight back the temptation to burn the walls into real fire.

"What's his problem?" Frank muttered to Alice.

"As if I know," she reminded. She was tempted to ask Regulus who clearly knew, but even though she could see his face he hadn't looked away from the wall this whole time, was still making no attempts to reach out and communicate with any of them, and she wasn't going to force her hand.

Lily, honestly felt a bit of pity for this. She'd never stopped to consider any of them with actual fears, human moments like Black was now showing. All she'd ever seen was their likes, one like to be exact, of their horrid ways against her friend. Now she was watching Potter, all three of them try to comfort their friend in by far the kindest thing she'd ever seen.

His mood only worsened when the kids went to Hagrid's, Hagrid only confirmed what none of them were surprised about. It made sense all of the teachers and not just Quirrell would put up some protection for this thing Dumbledore was protecting. No, it just kept going downhill that there was indeed an egg roasting away in Hagrid's fireplace.

"I actually kind of liked the three headed dog, that was cool once it wasn't trying to eat him anymore! The troll was a menace, but at least manageable! Your kid just couldn't stop there Prongs! A dragon, and it's all Hagrid's fault," Sirius kept up his insistent mutter, trying to push the arm away and get the dang window open that no force of magic or willpower was accomplishing. He was boiling up in here, he could swear those little flickers coming from the end of the dragon's nostrils were coming to life and fixing to leap right off the page towards him-

"Breath Pads," Moony was trying to soothe by instead changing the subject. Which actually made Malfoy feel useful for the first time. "Let's focus instead on plotting ways of getting Malfoy expelled."

"Why do you think he didn't just run off and tell on them?" Peter did ask curiously. "What does he have to gain by sitting on this information?"

"Don't know," James begrudgingly said, "but it's the first actual intelligent thing he's done. Looking for an advantage rather than just jumping around to get them in trouble."

Regulus looked up and around at them in surprise, it was the first kind thing he'd ever heard them say about a Slytherin. Then he just assumed they were saying it to throw Sirius off, which wasn't really working. He frowned in a bit of concern now as his brother just got more silent and still when the dragon had hatched. His brother had never actually told them what had happened when he'd been left down in the Gringotts vault, but his parents hadn't paid it much concern since he couldn't have gotten inside to any of the importance, like the gold or heirlooms. Regulus had tried to ask, just out of curiosity, but Sirius had completely ignored him.

Now he was more irked than anything he'd clearly told his mates something, the obvious sympathy for him made that clear. He and Sirius may not have been getting on in recent years, but when had that amounted to he couldn't be told anything?

Alice had no liking for the beasts in particular, but the idea of a baby one was more charming than fearsome like Black seemed to find it, so she read on with cute little spirits about Hagrid's handling of this, up until it bit Ron.

"Okay, now we have a problem," Frank winced and took an extra step back from one particular orange faced lizard that had its fangs exposed. He overbalanced and fell on the bed next to Pettigrew, who raised a brow at him but otherwise ignored that.

"Norwegian Ridgebacks are poisonous," Lupin agreed in a still rather forced conversational tone, while his back was to everyone. He had poked his head under the desk curiously, and came back with a tiny little spindle chair which he nudge against Black, who seemed resistant to sitting down anymore than getting away from the window. "Hope he went to Madam Pomfrey, she never asks too many questions."

"I like to think even she'd demand where he got a dragon bite," Alice disagreed.

Lily flushed a bit but chose not to say anything, having personal experience with the matron not asking one to many questions from a few experimental potions accidents, so actually agreeing with one of the Marauders for once.

The decision to contact Charlie and his quick response was the best thing Sirius had heard this whole chapter, they were getting rid of that beast toot sweet! His small moment of happiness didn't last long.

Things only got worse for the kids dealing with this mess when Malfoy still managed to make everything worse. Thankfully the kids didn't derail their plan for this, Sirius had never heard of a better use of their cloak than riding that monster from their grounds! He just couldn't stop his imagination going haywire, that thing growing larger by the moment and getting loose on the grounds and then roaring so loud his ears started bleeding all while trying to shoot fire that just missed him from the tiny alcove he'd managed to squeeze himself into by the grace of Padfoot. That cart trundling away without him in it, his Uncle Cygnus, and Aunt Druella apparently deaf to his calls to come back. He could still swear he saw Bellatrix laughing as she slipped the goblin something when they turned the corner-

He'd been sat down in the chair without his noticing, Remus' hand firmly on his shoulder and smiling kindly down at him. He wasn't sure what he'd been saying, but it suddenly occurred to him that the weeks he'd been having his blowout with Moony had actually been the longest stretch of time he hadn't had to think about that. Even the weekly potions classes with its kindling cauldrons or some scaly beast Professor Kettleburn had brought to class had managed to remind him of the incident all year.

So lost in his mind, he'd completely missed the part where Malfoy had been caught by McGonagall, and he forced a laugh as Moony quietly explained it to him until Charlie's friends arrived. He'd kiss them both for taking this thing away, though just as likely never go within arms reach of anyone mad enough to handle these beasts for a living. "That whole incident was entirely pointless!" Sirius kept up his furious mutterings he'd been carrying this whole time. Alice was honestly impressed he hadn't run out of breath. "What was the point of that I ask you? It certainly could have been left out and saved me-"

So invested was he in his own rantings, he nearly missed the ending horror of Filch discovering them without their cloak. They got not a single second to live in their shock before they were once again torn away.

#Harry Potter #fanfiction #Marauders #Wolfstar #James Potter #Remus Lupin #Sirius Black #Regulus Black #Peter Pettigrew #Lily Evans #Alice Smith #Frank Longbottom

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jwslw · 3 years

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An idea for semi-realistic monsters

I’m probably not the first person to think of something like this, but here is my take on a Cockatrice and Wyvern like creatures that evolved from raptors.

Cockatrice and Wyverns

Overview

An odd evolutionary offshoot of the Dromaeosauridae (raptor) family, The Wyvern and Cockatrice are unusual ambush predators, that can produce and spit venom for hunting. Like most other Dromaeosauridae, the Cockatrice and Wyvren have three fingers on each hand, the first and second finger on each hand is surprisingly dexterous and used by the creature to help it climb, the third finger on each hand is elongated, and properly part of the creature's wing structure. Cockatrice and Wyvren are also digitigrade bipeds with a large sickle shaped claw on each foot that can be used to slash or anchor them to larger prey items. At first glance, Cockatrice and Wyvrens do not look that different from modern reconstructions of raptor type dinosaurs, including a large plume/fan of feathers at the tip of the tail. Unlike other raptors, Cockatrice and Wyvrens do not have normal toothy mouths, instead they have heavy beaks, similar in structure to, but not as robust as, the beaks of the Phorusrhacidae (terror birds), a large bright red wattle-like venom sac immediately behind their lower jaws, and a double row of serrated ridges running down either side of the tail starting half way down the tail's length and terminating just ahead of the fan. Because of the rigid nature of their tails, a Cockatrice or Wyvren can employ their tail ridges in combat, but only to a limited degree, employing them as a defense against pursuing enemies, or occasionally, to injure larger prey in hit and run attacks. Cockatrice and Wyvren are not true fliers, but, they glide quite well, with most studies estimating that both species possess a 6 to 1 glide ratio.

Cockatrice and Wyverns mostly live in temperate to sub-tropical regions, Cockatrice prefer to live in forested foothill regions, while Wyvrens live in more mountainous regions or wide open plains. Both species prefer to nest in caves or structures such as barns and basements were they have ready access to food.

History

The origin of the Cockatrice and Wyvern is not yet completely understood, some researchers have assigned them the speculative genus expuens accipiter, (spitting hawk in Latin) within the family Dromaeosauridae to the creatures and assigned them the species names Africanus (Wyvern) and Pacifica (Cockatrice). These names and placing are not accepted by all researchers, with some arguing the creatures simply stem from the same common ancestor as Dromaeosauridae and modern avians. Fragmentary fossil evidence suggests that the oldest ancestors of the modern species evolved in Cretaceous south-west Asia some 78mya. It is still not clear to researchers how the creature's survived the KT extinction event. Researchers are confident however that the two modern lineages, first diverged at the start of the Pleistocene glaciation beginning 2.58mya, with the ancestors of the ea. Africanus (Wyvern), being confined to Africa, while ea. Pacifica (Cockatrice) were confined to the islands of the South Pacific, with their modern forms moving into the Eurasia as the glaciers receded.

In recent times researchers have proposed the existence of three additional species the North American ea. Leedsdiablos (the Jersey Devil), the semi aqutic ea. Amazonas (the Brazillian Boiúna serpent) of South America, and the ea. Oceanis (the Poukai bird of Maori folklore) said to be native to New Zealand and Australia. These claims are however, dismissed out of hand by most researchers, with alleged sightings put down to hoaxes, miss-identification or illegally imported specimens.

Cockatrice

Physical traits

Cockatrice are the smaller, and more social, of the two species. A typical Cockatrices 91-122cm (3-4ft) long from beak tip to tail tip, stands 56-61cm (22-24in) tall at the shoulder, with a tip-to-tip wingspan of 3-3.1meters (roughly 10ft), and weigh 20-28kg (45-60lb), like birds, female Cockatrice are larger than males. Cockatrice have predominately off-white, yellow, or brown feathers, males have dark green, red or blue feathers on their heads and tails for mating display, both male and female cockatrice have brightly colored red, green and blue feathers concealed within their breast and wing feathers for threat displays. Cockatrice produce a potent neurotoxin that can paralyze their prey, that the cockatrice can project upto 4 to 5 meters (approximately 15feet), or inject it directly into the target through a pair of hypodermic fangs near the tip of the creature's beak. A Cockatrice's neurotoxin is designed to cause a victim's joints to seize up, a creature that has been effected by Cockatrice venom will be unable to move for upto, 144 hours (six days). The venom will not absorb through normal epidermal tissue, as such, a Cockatrice will aim for a creature's face, attempting to contaminate the soft tissue of the creature's eyes, mouth or nostrils. The common hunting strategy for a Cockatrice is to climb on to an elevated position, such as a small ledge or particularly thick tree branch to attack its intended prey, first by spitting on it and secondly by leaping onto the target, leading with its heavy foot talons. Cockatrice have powerful legs it can sprint at upto 75kph (55mph) for three minutes, and can leap 7-8meters (roughly 25ft) from a standing start at ground level. A Cockatrice will reach full maturity in three years and can survive upto 20 years in captivity, but, most live only 10 to 15 years in the wild.

Society and Child rearing

While not true pack hunters, as many as 15 mated pairs of Cockatrice can be found living in a single cave or building. Cockatrice mate for life and eggs are lain in clutches of 4 to 6. Breeding season lasts from late spring to early summer and fertilized eggs take 8 weeks to hatch. During this time, the mother will stay with the nest while the father hunts for food to bring back, and will continue to hunt while the mother guards the young for the first 4 weeks after they hatch. At a round 7 weeks old, Cockatrices chicks will begin to accompany their parents on hunting trips. A Cockatrice couple will chase away a current clutch of young when the mother begins to brood again, typically one year after their hatching. While they are unnervingly quiet when hunting, Cockatrice are boisterous creatures when at rest or threatened, with a wide range of calls, similar to sounds made by both predatory and non-predatory birds.

Diet

Cockatrice are obligate carnivores, while they mostly stick to animals they can quickly dispatch and consume whole, such as small rodents, lizards or birds, they can, thanks to their neurotoxin, bring down prey considerably larger than themselves, while their mate is tending to their young, males will frequently pursue goats, beaver and other similar sized animals to bring back to the nest. While single and mated pairs of Cockatrice will usually attempt to drive away other Cockatrice that come to close to their kills, a strange behavior can be observed when a single or mated pair brings down a particularly large prey item such as a cow or elk. When this happens, the successful Cockatrice will begin making a peculiar high pitched wailing, this wail can be heard out to a range of 4-5km (roughly 3 miles) and will draw in other Cockatrice, which will be allowed to share the catch with them. When consuming large prey, Cockatrice have a “puncture and pull” feeding method, and can not crack bone, though, they can digest the bones of smaller animals when consumed whole. To maintain ideal health, a Cockatrice must consume at least its own body weight each week.

Wyvern

Physical Traits

Wyvern are larger and much less social than their smaller cousins. A typical specimen stands 1.8-2 meters (6 to 7 feet) tall at the shoulder, measure 4.5-6.1 meters (15-20feet) long from beak to tail tip, a tip to tip wingspan of 9-10 meters (roughly 30ft) and a weight of 272-296 kg (600-650lb). Like most varieties of bird, female Wyverns are larger than their male counterparts. Wyvern feathers are a mixture of dark gray, rust red, and dull brown, giving the creatures a surprising degree of camouflage in their preferred habitat. Unlike the Cockatrice, Wyvern do not have fangs and do not produce neurotoxin, instead, they produce a potent molecular acid that can cause serious damage to any organic matter it comes into contact with, including sedimentary rock, and is capable of scouring flesh down to the bone on unprotected humans or similar creatures and can even inflicting third degree burns to animals like hippopotamus and rhinoceros, or humans wearing thick winter clothing. When stored in the venom sac, and when initially projected from the Wyvern's mouth, the acid is coated in mucus that prevents it from injuring the Wyvern producing it, the mucus will quickly dissolve once exposed to the air, once this happens the Wyvern is just as vulnerable to the acid as any other creature. The venom sac of a typical adult Wyvern can produce enough venom to cover a 45 to 50 cm² (17-20 in²) area, an adult Wyvren can project acid upto 10-11 meters (roughly 30 to 35 feet). Once a Wyvern has “spit” acid, it takes roughly 85-90 seconds for it to produce enough acid to do so again. Wyvren acid is however virtually ineffective against most refined metals and modern ceramics such as ones used in the production of bullet proof armors. A Wyvern is fast, capable of running upto 68kph (45mph) for upto 3 minutes and can cover a distance of 10 meters (30ft) when jumping from a standing start at ground level. When hunting a Wyvern will spit acid to cripple prey before leaping on to the prey to disembowel it with their talons. A Wyvren reaches full maturity at six years old and can survive for upto 50 years.

Society and Child rearing

Wyvern are mostly solitary creatures, though they do mate for life and will occasionally tolerate Cockatrice or other small predatory animals sharing their hunting ranges. Wyvern breeding season usually begins in late winter and lasts till early spring. After mating a female Wyvern will lay one or two eggs and incubate them for the next twelve weeks. During the entire incubation process and for the first three months after the Wyvern chicks hatch, the mother remains at the nesting site while the father hunts. At two years old, the chick(s) will begin accompanying their parents on hunts. For the first four years after the chick(s) have hatched, the mother Wyvern's body will produce hormones to suppress her reproductive cycle, however, after this period, hormone production ends and the mother will begin brooding again at the start of the next breeding season, at which point she will chase away her adolescent child(ren) as a potential threat to her future chick(s).

Diet

Wyvern are obligate carnivores, when tending chicks that are to young to leave the nest, Wyverns will content themselves with small game that can easily be carried to the den, like goats, gazelle, sheep or young deer. When not tending to young or when the young are old enough to accompany their parents on hunts, Wyvern hunt large game, like cattle, adult deer, and in some cases, even giraffe or hippopotamus, while a Wyvern's beak and jaw muscles are not quite strong enough to bite through bone, they are strong enough to severe the cartilage, allowing them to bite off arms and legs to swallow whole. Wyvern living near rural communities are especially found of domesticated pigs and donkeys. To maintain proper health, a Wyvern must consume roughly twice its body weight each week.

The Boiúna serpent (Speculative)

While still regarded as a hoax or miss-identification of an existing animal by most researchers, a great deal of eyewitness testimony has been gathered on the hypothetical ea. Amazonas has been collected and presented here.

Physical traits

In most regards a Boiúna serpent is reported in one of two ways, either being similar in size to its Cockatrice cousins or to Wyverns, however, their wingspan is described as only 1.5 to 2.2 meters (4-7.5ft) from tip to tip when reported as being Cockatrice sized or 5-6 meters (16-20ft) when reported as Wyvren sized, however, its wing feathers are much longer and seemingly employed to create shade for attracting fish. The legs of a Boiúna are usually described as longer and thinner than either of its two recognized cousins, with less pronounced cutting claws. The beak of a Boiúna serpent is described as being more like the beak of a Cormorant, long and thin with a sharp hook at the end for catching and holding fish. The feathers covering most of a Boiúna serpent are said to be mostly blue-black or purple-black, with a smaller tuft pale gray feathers on their chest and necks, the beak and leg scales are usually a dark brown color. On the matter of their venom, accounts seem to be largely split between two camps. While all accounts say that the Boiúna serpent lacks teeth, and therefore can not inject venom, roughly half of all reported encounters claim that they possess a weakened version of the neurotoxin produced by a Cockatrice, with the effects wearing off in a matter of hours or after only a day or two, while other sources claim that the Boiúna serpent produces not venom, but, a strong natural adhesive that can pin potential threats in place allowing them to escape or bring down the target, Boiúna serpent venom is believed to have the same range as Cockatrice venom when “spit”. It is not known for certain, but, most researchers that believe in the Boiúna serpent, think it is slower than other relate species estimating their top speed at around 59-60kph (40mph).

Society and Child Rearing

Boiúna, do not seem to be sociable creatures, traveling alone or mated pairs. As most researchers believe young have never been observed, arguing that the Boiúna may experience indeterminate growth, it is believed that they are kept sheltered for much longer than with other species of expuens accipiter. However, in recent years, an alternate theory has emerged, suggesting that reports of smaller Boiúna are actually of young/immature members of the species and that the larger adults actually practice significantly less parental care than their cousins.

Diet

Unsurprisingly, the primary diet of the Boiúna serpent is believed to be fish and small reptiles. Boiúna serpents are also speculated to raid the nests of other birds as well as caiman and other reptiles. Some witnesses report seeing Boiúna serpent kick snakes to death in a manner similar to Sagittarius serpentarius (Secretary birds). Others have claimed to witness them feeding on large animals such a Tapir and Pudu deer. If the latter stories are true, it is not known if they actively brought down the animal in question, or merely used threat displays to chase off the animal that actually brought it down.

#monsters #speculative evolution #speculative biology #speculative zoology #creative writing #fiction

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haikyuu-headcanons-n-stuff · 4 years

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Tsukiyama Headcanons

Tsukishima and Yamaguchi are the one Couple everyone hates because they had one fight in all their life and basically communicate via telepathy.

Tsukishima has a boyfriend sense. He will stand up in the middle of a conversation because he feels Yamaguchi is uncomfortable and he is always right.

When Yamaguchi is sick Tsukishima will nurse him back to health and call him 'my little strawberry'.

When Tsukishima is sick he will try to just 'work it off' but is stopped by Yamaguchi who grounds him.

Tsukishima cooks all the time because Yamaguchi cant cook for shit.

The Rest of the time they share the tasks equally.

Tsukishima doesnt open the door if he is expecting no one. His friends either have a key or just Pick the lock.

The two were the First of the Team who moved in together, followed by Daichi and Sugawara.

After 7 years of living together their pet count is: 1 dog (Australian sheperd, 2 years, named Aoi), 2 cats (Maine Coon, 1 year, Ei+Yan) and 2 lizards (Bearded Dragon, 3 years, Ichigo+Kasai), 1 lizard egg (gonna hatch soon)

As soon as they graduated from college (Kei-paleontology and architecure, Tadashi-psychology) they started working and used all of their savings for a nice house for them and their pets.

Kei proposed one day After same sex marriage was legalized, in the garden behind their house.

They are constantly used as retreat for their friends. They always have a room ready and chocolate.

Both drink very rarely and never more than two glasses of wine.

#tsukkiyama #headcanons #relationship #haikyuu!!#ship it #couple goals #Gay

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sheblah · 5 years

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do you think dt has a sad backstory, or just likes chaos in general and was that way all their life?

I don't think anyone is born that way - at least not to that extent. Everyone's life events shape who they become. Ergo, DT's life must have involved a series of experiences that shaped them into a deceptive, mischievous spy with a flair for the dramatic and no regard for right or wrong.

To say they have a sad backstory would be too easy, I think. I admit I kind of want them to have one. Some might call it cliche, but it's not cliche for nonbinary characters. It can't be; there simply haven't been enough of them in our media. All kinds of cis (usually male) villains and antiheroes and morally gray characters have gotten the benefit of a tragic background to make them sympathetic to viewers and eligible for a good ending. I want that for nb characters too. Particularly the one I've fallen in love with.

To be clear, I don't think they'll have a sad backstory in canon. The next season is the final one, and there are frankly bigger things going on than exploring a minor character's background. But as for my headcanons...

Huntara says that everyone in the Crimson Waste is running from something, implying that everyone escaped to the Waste from somewhere else, but I don't believe that. Cutthroat as it is, the Waste is still a society, and that's not generally how societies work. When people settle down somewhere they make connections, form bonds, claim each other as friends and family - and sometimes have babies. DT is one of those babies. Their parents did what some lizards do - went out in the desert, dug a hole, laid their eggs and skedaddled. Like in our world, many animal babies are better equipped to survive alone than human babies. When DT hatched, they lived on their own in the desert for a matter of months or a couple years, blending with their surroundings to avoid danger, before happening upon the Valley of the Lost. It had food and shelter, so they stayed. They mostly stole resources from others until they were old enough to understand money. Then they put their transforming talents to use, entertaining the denizens of the desert for whatever coins they were willing to toss.

I don't picture any specific tragic event. More like... general want, and general hardship. Having to find their own way, selling their morals bit by bit to stay ahead of the curve, knowing they're one bad day away from starving at any given time. It left them with a keen survival instinct, plus an enduring ability to stay in character even in front of a rough audience. They learned to ignore that inner voice that says they're hurting someone else, because sometimes that's just the way it goes when you're trying to stay alive. Eventually, survival didn't even need to be directly on the line; they'd play dirty for just a sack of cash. Every advantage adds up to survival in the long run.

#double trouble #she ra #spop #meta #headcanon #ask

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pjnuzlockes · 4 years

Text

EHED: Prologue

Posted under the cut

Warning for grief and character death (starting strong lmao)

Kanto, 13 years ago

He’d been having strange dreams lately. The kind where you feel like you’re being watched by someone, but when you wake up in a cold sweat you can’t remember by who or what they wanted. Of course, it helped that Oscar was six and his mother’s Wartortle (a harried pokemon by the name of Quinley) would sit with him until he either fell back asleep or it was late enough in the morning for Oscar to get up and play.

Neither Oscar nor Quinley noticed that on the nights these dreams would wake Oscar up, someone was watching from outside. Small, fluffy, and curious about the children she felt drawn too, she would watch for upwards of an hour before finally moving on.

But she always came back.

She stayed around one morning. Mary, Oscar’s mother, had been able to get moving without the boy running around under her feet. Quinley had actually been able to get him to fall back asleep. He only had to tell him seven bedtime stories this time.

Mary was going to wake Oscar up, but she opened the door gently all the same. His room was unusually neat- for once all his toys had actually been put away. She suspected Quinley had something to do with that. Oscar was a good kid, but he was very excitable.

“Oscar,” she said softly as she crouched next to his bed and ran a hand through his curly hair.

Oscar whined.

“Oscar, it’s time to wake up. Do you know what today is?”

Oscar propped himself up and opened his eyes. “Saturday?” he guessed, despite it being a Wednesday.

“No,” Mary laughed. She cupped his face in her hand and he tried to pull away into his nice warm blanket again. “Today’s the day you meet the pokemon the Professor picked for you.”

That sure woke him up. “What?!” he yelled, jumping up and tangling himself up in his blanket for a moment. “That’s today?!”

“Yes! Now, get dressed. Breakfast is almost ready.” A flash of something pink outside caught Mary’s eye, but when she looked out the window, it was gone.

This slight distraction gave Oscar the advantage. He threw himself onto her and hugged her tightly, roaring like a Gyarados.

“Oh no! The beast has got me!” she cried, dramatically throwing herself backwards. “I’m a goner! Bleh!” She threw her head to the side with her eyes closed and her tongue sticking out the side of her mouth in a comical imitation of defeat.

Oscar laughed. He scrambled up, lifted his arms above himself, and roared again.

“The beast better get ready for his day before his cereal gets all soggy!” Mary chided, opening one eye. She took the moment he ran to the closet to make her escape.

“What’s it gonna be?!” Oscar wondered aloud. “Zubat? Buizel? Palkia?!” He paused and considered a shirt that said “Pika Power” on the front. “Okay, maybe not Palkia. But Zubat would be cool!”

---

The walk to the Professor’s lab was short, but Oscar still felt like it took too long. He jumped along the path, startling a few Pidgey here and there and getting odd looks from the Rattata in the tall, green grass. The summer air was warm and energizing. White puffy clouds passed above high in the sky. Oscar started to imagine they were in the shape of potential pokemon he was going to meet, but he tripped over a root in the path and was sent giggling and sprawling to the ground.

Exasperated, Mary made him hold her hand.

The lab itself was pristine and bright. It was several stories, bustling with activity, and was where Mary worked alongside Oak and his granddaughter. They focused primarily on tracking populations of wild pokemon and the impacts urbanization created. This coupled with the fact that Professor Oak was able to approve research licenses made the lab a popular place to work.

Young Gary Oak was already waiting when they got there. He was bouncing in place and all but fell over when he saw Oscar.

“Gary! I’m getting a pokemon!” Oscar shouted despite the fact they had already embraced each other.

“I know! I’m so excited!! You’re gonna love him! Or her, I’m not tellin’!” Gary’s bright blue eyes were glittering with joy. “I helped pick him out! Or her!” He started spinning with his arms outstretched and was quickly joined by Oscar.

“Gary, this is why I never let your sister give you coffee,” Professor Oak teased, emerging from a doorway with a pokeball in one hand.

Oscar stopped flailing around and staggered for a second. “What is it, Professor?!”

The Professor didn’t answer. His arm held out in front of him, he released the pokemon from the ball.

It was a small, young Bulbasaur. He had some round spots on his hips and chest and two circles above his eyes like little eyebrows. On his forehead was a triangle pointing down and to the right. There was a little notch in the middle of the top part of the triangle, making it vaguely heart shaped.

Oscar gasped. He crouched in front of the Bulbasaur. For a moment, the two were calm. They gazed into each other’s eyes. Oscar smiled, revealing one tooth missing from the top row. “Hi! My name’s Oscar and we’re gonna be best buddies!”

The Bulbasaur reached a vine up and touched the dark skin of Oscar’s face. He smiled back. “Bulbasaur!”

“I’m gonna call you Finley!” He patted his new friend on the head.

Gary bounced over. “Isn’t he great?!”

Finley looked quite pleased with the attention and beamed. He certainly seemed to agree with Gary’s assessment.

“Now, he’ll start to learn Kantonian as you two get to know each other. He’s very even tempered and would make an excellent research partner if that’s what you want to do,” Oak explained.

“Gary, Finley and I are gonna help you and your grampa research all the pokemon in the world!” Oscar said. He jumped to his feet and paused a moment to help Finley up as well.

And that sounded like an absolutely wonderful plan to Gary.

---

As the three of them grew, so did their friendship. Gary and Oscar taught Finley Kantonian and started helping out in the Professor’s lab as soon as it was decided they would probably not manage to break something important. They were given their licenses, which allowed them to catch as many pokemon as needed provided that they weren’t all used for battling.

Kanto’s laws stated that only one pokemon per evolutionary line was to be used as a battling pokemon under the normal trainer license except under special circumstances- like type specialization- and the research license acted for them as a trainer’s license with special permissions. But the boys primarily did catch and release. They had no real need to keep the pokemon they studied around. Finley was enough for Oscar.

Several years after Oscar met Finley, Gary was given an egg to hatch. Out of it came a little Charmander that Gary dubbed Brinley.

Finley was quite fond of the little lizard. He helped her take her first few steps and encouraged her as she learned to command fire.

Oscar still had dreams of being watched and soon the dreams started for the other three as well.

This wasn’t the only thing to begin to change for the four friends. A group calling themselves Team Rocket began making themselves known.

Team Rocket started off small. Spray painting an “R” here and breaking some windows there, kicking up a fuss on major holidays and trying to take over parades. But, it escalated. Soon, they were attacking people walking home from work at night and stealing from them. Valuables, money… Pokemon.

They got more and more violent and the police had trouble keeping up.

But they never went further than that. Until…

Kanto, Present Day

Oscar had been just north of town with Finley, taking soil samples for Gary, Brinley, and the Professor back at the lab when the blast hit. Terribly loud. Powerful enough to knock Oscar off his feet. He screamed involuntarily and instinctively felt around for Finley. A vine touched his hand. Finley was there. Finley was okay.

Oscar saw Finley was saying something, but Oscar’s ears were ringing too loudly for him to understand. “Are you okay?” he tried to ask, but his voice was muffled. Finley didn’t look like he could tell what Oscar was saying either.

They stood shakily. “What was that?” Finley asked, not recognizing his own voice. Oscar didn’t react. “Hey, can you hear…?”

Oscar was frozen in place, staring with massive eyes at something.

Finley’s heart dropped into his stomach.

Huge, billowing clouds of smoke in the south edge of town.

Oak’s lab.

---

The once proud building was gutted. Debris still fell, parts were smoldering, and a massive hole had been taken out of the center. Oscar’s heart was racing. There was no sign of his friends.

Mary had beaten them there. She shouted orders to people and had a bandana tied around her face as protection from the dust and smoke.

“Mom!” Oscar called. “Mom, where’s Gary?”

“I don’t know! Finley, start pulling rubble, we need to get people out. Try calling to see if anyone responds.”

“OSCAR!” came a cry from behind. Gary!

“Gary! Oh my god, are you okay? Where were you?” Oscar grabbed him by the shoulders, but Gary was staring at the mess that used to be the lab. His eyes glistened with tears.

“Oh man. Oh god, Gramps and Brinley are in there!”

Before Oscar could respond, Finley shouted for them. He’d found something.

Out from underneath a slab stumbled Brinley. Banged up and bleeding, but alive. “Gary…” she croaked. “I thought you were under there!”

“Oh, sweetie,” Gary knelt down. He hovered his hands over her, afraid to touch somewhere hurt. “I had to go get a test kit from the shed, I’m so sorry, I-”

“No, no, it’s okay. It’s okay. I’m glad you weren’t there.” She lost balance, but Gary caught her. She coughed. “Ow.”

“She needs to see a nurse…” Oscar looked around him, not looking at the smoldering remains of the lab, not looking at the people surrounding a spot and covering their mouths in horror, looking for someone- anyone- that could help.

Thankfully, the Nurse from Viridian City had arrived and Oscar flagged her down.

Brinley would be okay.

First responders got there soon after. But it would still be hours before anyone else was found.

Brinley had been relatively far away from the blast. Oak and four of his aides, including his granddaughter, weren’t so lucky. The bomb had been situated in that old machine Oak never could get running. Just out of view.

They likely didn’t even know what had hit them.

Their funerals were on the same day and blurred together.

Gary and Brinley stayed at Oscar’s house for the next few days.

They all got the news that the Rockets had been behind the attack on the lab while sitting in the living room a week later. Gary thought it was weird what he was aware of. He didn’t remember his grandfather or sister’s funerals, but he was acutely aware of what the carpet felt like on his legs when he found out. A little itchy.

Mary just placed a loving hand on his back.

“We need to stop them,” Oscar said quietly. Not quite a whisper. Not quite a mumble. “It can’t happen again.”

“What’ll we do? Where do we even start?” Brinley asked.

“We can fight them,” Finley suggested. “They’ve got pokemon. We’re pretty tough already, even though we’re both not very battle experienced.”

“We do have our researcher licenses,” Gary said. He rested his chin on his arms, propped up by the table.

Oscar was across from him, in his favorite spot on the couch. Right in the middle, as inconveniently as possible, and right next to Finley. “I don’t think anyone’s just gonna let us blast through and attack the Rockets. We’ll have to prove we’re capable.”

“Quinley and I could go to Alola. Get your dad to help. Samuel’s cousin is there, I bet he’d want to help, too,” Mary added.

Quinley tightened his grip on Gary’s hand.

“We could take on the league,” Finley said.

Brinley tilted her head, considering it. She leaned against Gary. “That would be a nice way of tracking how strong we are.”

“Then you’ll need me,” a new voice suddenly said. Six heads snapped up.

Small and fluffy. Pink. It was Mew, floating above the ground and clearly having just come in through the window.

At first, no one spoke.

“... Huh?” Oscar said finally. A god. A literal god. In their living room.

“You’re right, the Rockets have to be stopped. But you guys can’t do it alone. The Rockets are way too strong, but I can help you,” she said. Her expression was severe, but they got the feeling she wasn’t angry with them.

“You’re Mew,” Oscar said.

“Yes.” Mew took a breath. “I know this is weird. But, we can help each other. The Rockets want to get to someone important to me. He’s incredibly powerful, more powerful than me, even. We can’t let that happen.”

“Do, uh. Do you know where he is?” Gary asked.

“No.”

“Oh.”

Finley lifted a vine “I’m sorry, have we seen you before? Because I swear I’ve seen-”

“Yes, yes, I showed up in your dreams, but that’s not-” the group got loud and she had to raise her voice. “That’s not important right now! Literally trying to stop pure evil! From finding my- friend!”

“You showed up in my son’s dreams?”

“Oh my god, Quinley, you owe me so many apologies.”

“I knew it, I knew it was a god.”

“Can you appear in their dreams and make them stop?”

“I still say we fight the league.”

“Listen.” Mew held up a paw, and managed to get them all to stop their nonsense. “Take on the league. You do need to get strong, you’ll need to be very strong to do this. I’ll help you out when I can, but mostly I’m going to be tracking down my friend. He’s not going to just trust anybody. You’ll have to prove yourselves.” When no one said anything, she added, “Please.”

Mary sighed. “You’ll all be careful, won’t you?”

Oscar smiled at her reassuringly. “Well, we’ll certainly try.”

“I’ll keep them in line, Mrs. Willow,” Brinley added.

Mary laughed. “Yeah, probably wise. Mew? Watch over them. Please.”

Mew smiled. “Yeah. I’ll do my best.”

Gary took a deep breath and, for the first time since the explosion, smiled. “Guess we’re gonna go beat up some Rockets.”

#nuzlocke #ehed nuzlocke #i swear to god tumblr if you blast this as a big ass post for mobile users i'm gonna kick you #storylocke

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duhragonball · 5 years

Text

Dragon Ball Z 288

So between Episodes 287 and 289, you’ve got this ten year gap, spanning the wish to erase the world’s memories of Buu, to the first appearance of Uub, which marks the epilogue to Dragon Ball Z. Over the years, there’s been a lot of material created to fill in that “ten year gap.” The last ten minutes of Episode 287, this episode, Movies 13, 14, and 15, all 131 episodes of Dragon Ball Super and the Dragon Ball Super: Broly movie. Uh, what else? That Yo! Son Goku and his Friends Return special. There was some crossover special with One-Piece and another anime I forget the name of. Also, both of the Xenoverse games, while set in the future, feature Goku pulled from this general time period.

I can’t blame people for trying to fill in this period with new stories. The question is whether there’s really a story worth telling at this point. I like Movies 13 and 14. Movie 15 was okay, but hardly worth the trouble, and Dragon Ball Super didn’t get good until the Tournament of Power, which I wouldn’t call essential viewing. The action was good, but the story doesn’t hold a candle to classic Dragon Ball and DBZ.

In a lot of ways, Episode 288 is sort of a prototype for a lot of what Dragon Ball Super ended up doing: these slice of life, quiet moments in between the big adventures. This is mainly because Super had a really hard time cooking up an antagonist worthy of the franchise. Beerus and Golden Frieza were borrowed from movies, Champa, Hit, and Jiren weren’t really bad guys, and Zamasu was absolutely fucking awful. When I watched Super, it was honestly a relief to see that the next episode would be the gang screwing around at a basebal field or a movie set or whatever. At the same time, it was always frustrating to me. They went out of their way to bring these characters back, and they never seemed to have a plan for what they wanted to do with them. I’ll watch the Tenchi Muyo! gang hang out in a mall or something, that sounds like a good time. But Goku? I expect a little more from him.

In this episode, everyone’s having a party at Bulma’s place, but Goku went off to watch some pterodactyl eggs hatch. So it’s pretty similar to a number of one-shot DBS episodes, except DBZ hasn’t done this sort of thing very often, so it’s a lot more effective.

Here’s the problem: One of the four eggs fell out of the nest and is stuck in this precarious-looking branch. Goku wants to move it back, but the parents won’t let him, and I guess he’s not eager to force the issue with his powers. He’s worried that the baby will fall once it hatches, so he sticks around to keep an eye on the situation.

Anyway, Chi-Chi got all dolled up for this pary, so she’s decided to just go without Goku’s broke-ass and leave him to his nature hike or whatever. There needs to be more fan-art of Chi-Chi in this getup.

If I’m not mistaken, Goten’s outfit in this episode is a callback to the clothes Goku wore in that one episode of the Fortuneteller Baba Saga. Let me just pull that up...

Eh... close, but not quite. Goten’s got the tie and the hat, but he’s wearing suspenders instead of a vest.

Anyway, everyone arrives at Capsule Corp. Yamcha’s got a new car Bulma had made for him at a discount, and Krillin’s thinking of asking for one of his own. The Son family shows up and Chi-Chi gets miffed when anyone asks about Goku. Chi-Chi says he’s waiting for his eggs to hatch.

Anyway, they’ve got a nice spread here. This looks like the place where all of Dr. Brief’s animals run around, but that seems like a bad place to hold a party, so maybe they have more than one indoor park.

Anyway, Tien and Krillin have some pizza, and Master Roshi laughs at a “photo album” (it’s porn).

Buu wants Vegeta’s hot dog, and he’s in a good mood so he gives it to him. I always liked that. It shows that they managed to get along at some point. This is the sort of thing Dragon Ball Super should have done. Buu never got a chance to interact with most of these guys in Z, and they killed him off in GT, so they could have gotten some mileage out of him in Super, but they didn’t.

Chiaotzu drinks exactly half of one soda and leaves.

Piccolo’s just chillin’ out in a flower bed. Character arc, complete.

Oh, you thought this was the smug Goku macro? Tell me again how you didn’t know it was from this scene where Goku reminisces about his grandfather.

I guess the place where his space pod crashed wasn’t too far from this pterodactyl nest. I’m surrprised the crater grew over so fast. Also, this is like the third or fourth time they’ve shown this location in Z, and it never looks the same twice.

Anyway, Grandpa Gohan was strict but also very kind, and I always like how Goku remembers him here, as the series is drawing to a close.

Then a DINOSAUR FIGHT happens, because this show rules! Not sure why the two-legged dinosaur has hippo ears, but okay. It’s like Toei thought the rights holders for actual dinosaurs would sue them or something.

This scene also features the Ginyu Force song from the early portion of DBZ. You know the one.

youtube

Thirty-two seconds into this video. They ran this song into the ground in the Namek Saga, and then slowly weaned themselves off of it in the Frieza Saga, until eventually it fell out of rotation. I think it got used a couple of times in the Androids/Cell arc, and this might be the first time it’s been used since then. And you know, it’s a great song when it’s used sparingly. Once I got used to expecting it in every episode, it got really grating, but here, it works perfectly. I found myself sort of missing it.

Anyway, Goku totally in favor of cool dinosaur fights, but he doesn’t want them near this nest, so he carries these rowdy boys to another spot and tells them to fight there.

But that sort of kills the whole mood, you know?

Never mind that, because it’s TIME TO DANCE.

In the Japanese version, the score uses the rock music Tank Clerk was jamming to in Fusion Reborn. I guess this is the only rock music in all of Dragon Ball, sort of like how Cold Slither’s music is the only rock music in G.I. Joe or Transformers.

We’re tired of words! We’ve heard it before!

We’re not gonna play the game no more!

We’re Cold Slither, heavy metal machine!

Through the eyes of a lizard in you will dream!

When the venom stings, a new order brings our control!

Anyway Chi-Chi rules the disco floor until she throws out her back.

Then Dende mentions Goku and it brings down the mood. This is why no one invites you to these things, Dende. Even Tien thinks you’re a buzzkill and he just spent the last half hour explaining the Haber-Bosch process.

Bulma is worried about Goku, but Chi-Chi playfully suggests that Bulma is sweet on him, but that’s just too bad, because Chi-Chi’s too pretty for her to steal him away. Is she drunk? Maybe, but this is still less awkward than the dub version, where she suggested they trade husbands. “No, I was only kidding about swinging, Bulma.... UNLESS...”

Back at where Goku is, all these other animals show up to watch the nest, because I guess animals do that in this show.

Then it rains, and Goku shores up the nest with a bunch of logs. Not sure how this improves the situation, but okay.

He tries to work on the branch the fourth egg is sitting in, but it falls into the river first.

Goku saves it, but then a fish tries to eat him.

But the egg is okay, so victory for Goku.

Kind of an ominous shot of Capsule Corp. Looks like something out of Revenge of the Sith.

Everyone’s playing cards, and that looks like a lot of fun. Well, not if I have to play with Roshi and Oolong. Take me to the non-sex-offender table, please.

Krillin and his family prepare to head out, but they walk out the door just as Goku shows up.

This part here is great.

Chi-Chi gives him a hard time, but she can’t be too mad, because he does this sort of crap all the time.

So she takes Goku back to where the food is, and Goku gives Gohan the wink like “Yep, life of Riley.”

I almost wonder if they tried to do some sort of Last Supper thing with this, except they couldn’t fit everyone into the shot on a 4:3 TV. Anyway, Goku explains how things turned out with the pterodactyls.

They all hatched. Don’t really know what else to add to that. Weird how some of these animals watching were causing trouble earlier. That snake tried to eat the eggs until Goku tosses it away.

Goten asks if he was cuter than the pterodactyls when he was born, and Goku explains that he was dead when Goten was born, so he doesn’t know. Awkward.

Then he invites Vegeta to come over and join them, because he’s sulking over by the window.

i think Vegeta’s just enjoying this vaporwave sunset outside, but okay,

Then the narrator observes that everyone just has more fun when Goku’s around, which, true, but this is the sort of lionizing of Goku that made GT really irritating.

Then the Looney Tunes thing happens to him and that’s all, folks.

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fetus-cakes · 6 years

Text

Xenomorph biology

A conversation I had with @palavengarden about how the xenomoprhs from the Alien franchise reproduce, any additions are welcome

fair warning, xenomorphs reproduce by injecting their parasitic larva into live human beings and the whole franchise is very unsubtle about this being rape and forced pregnancy, so the discussion is about this topic

charlie: okay but so here is the thing i still dont understand tho even just doing the first 2 movies the queen lays an egg the egg lays penis vagina deepthroat rape crab the penis vagina deepthroat rape crab lays a smaller egg the smaller egg hatches into a tiny screaming snake which hatches AGAIN and then runs away then suddenly there is a 9 foot tall 15 foot long black monster that wants to eat humans then it takes a nap then if its on a planet instead of in space it wakes from its nap and eats everyone on the planet? builds a house in the warmest place available somehow a queen happens in all this fetus: ok think of it as an insect life cycle egg > larva > nymph > full grown adult likewise, xenomorphs only have one egg everything else is metamorphosis of the same body face rape crab BECOMES chest embryo charlie: no, cuz the rape crab dies after throat fucking you fetus: chest embryo leaves host body and BECOMES full grown adult no it doesn't die it's a shell it MOLTS like cicada shells or tarantula shells heck or a snake skin charlie: okay so egg hatch into a crab crab lives for literally 20 seconds then pukes its self down your throat? fetus: face rape crab is a discarded shell think of the embryo as being inside the crab the crab must stay attached to the face for a few hours to complete the transfer of the embryo charlie: i will resentfull accept this but still 2 more questions 1. why is it that the screamign snake inside the chest doesnt seem to eat anything? it just wants to curl up and take a nap while it grows bigger. the person usually keeps walkign around and just gets a little winded when it sits on their lung fetus: GOOD QUESTION charlie: 2. where does the queen happen in all this fetus: I HAVE ANSWER the embryo needs to stay inside because it's EATING this is where alien will get it's food and if it's a drone, all it will ever eat charlie: you would THINK so but no one seems to know they are chest bursted though the only time ive seen that seemed like maybe their insides were being eaten was in the avp book fetus: because they have been injected with what is basically painkillers charlie: everyone else justs seems fine fetus: this is why the transfer from crab to chest is delicate because the embryo is vulnerable it's to the embryos best interest to NOT be removed before it's ready charlie: the face crab is injecting painkillers or the screaming snake? fetus: face crab injects painkillers into HOST there is a period of time between transfer of embryo and embryo being ready to hatch that the host might be walking around it's for the embryos best interest to not be detected charlie: okay so... the face crab throat fucks you, and its just spitting crazy amoutns of pain killer down your gullet and once your insides are all the way numb and youre a little loopy it pukes the screaming snake into you and since your insides are fucked up with painkiller you dont feel it chomping down and can just continue about youre time, no issue walking and no numb tongue or throat until it breaks yoru sternum, which you CAN feel fetus: you got it charlie: dumb but fine fetus: painkillers are probably not strong enough to prevent someone from noticing their ribcage breaking charlie: i wish that it made your tongue and throat numb fetus: ok so; face rape crab grabs victim, sedates them, transfers embryo and pumps the victim's bloodstream full of anesthesia charlie: okay i accept that grumpily, but i accept it fetus: when transfer is finished the crab falls off and the victim might think they survived charlie: makes sense More or Less fetus: lol why so grumpy charlie: i still think the face crab looks like a whole different animal, not a cicada shell fetus: metamorphosis man ok so the QUEEN charlie: QUEENS AND DRONES PLEASE fetus: the queen is modeled after ants, bees and termites, so it's a similar process: certain larva are selected by the drones and given the equivalent of Royal Jelly so they'll grow up being able to reproduce like all larva have the POTENTIAL to become queens but only the ones introduced to royal jelly will all others become drones or warriors charlie: okay BUT i know a LOT about bees basically all bees a female with a small handful of stupid males fetus: xenomorphs are technically all females since they all have the potential to become Queens but I guess you could say drones and warriors are sexless and only queens are true females charlie: okay so in alien 2 the one single xenomorph did the whole facehugger THING and scurried away, as normal living in the vents or whatever why did it become a queen and who fucked it to get it to lay eggs? you need at least 2 and you need something to make a queen fetus: WAIT WHEN DID THAT HAPPEN I don't remember that charlie: so just one egg hatched and attached to the dad on the planet, right? and he got evacc'd to the town (or whatever that was) we know from experience that it probably chest bursted within a few hours and scurried into the vents so we should have had 1 drone just eating people unable to lay additional eggs fetus: drone probably went back to mother ship for more eggs it was within walking (driving) distance charlie: and like... carried them? and put them close to humans? fetus: yeah, why not? drones are ONLY concerned with taking care of eggs and queen charlie: then when that one hatched you have 2 drones hell, I'll bet this drone captured humans but them somewhere they couldn't escape and then put the eggs around them ensuring more births did they just by hand carry a shit ton of eggs to the colony until one of them coincidentally was a queen, or did they have to DO something? fetus: royal jelly charlie: okay where tho fetus: whatever the xenomorph equivalent is charlie: okay so in bees fetus: I dunno how they make xenomorph jelly, maybe it's a hormonal excretion drone #1 went and made more drones, until they had enough to make the royal jelly and made a queen charlie: okay fine i checked with the bee expert i remembered royal jelly wrong fetus: what did you think royal jelly did? charlie: no i know what it DOES but i was remembering ti as 'the queen spits out royal jelly, gives it to every single baby, but if she gives a LOT of it to one then it becomes a queen' but no, its something young bees make charlie: all of them so when a young bee hatches and wanders over to the nursery to take care of its sisters its spits a little royal jelly on all of them so yeah okay fine fetus: oh I was remembering royal jelly wrong too then I thought it was scarce charlie: 1 human gets face hugged, the xenomorph goes back to the eggs which it can probably smell on the wind, carries one close to humans, then when the baby hatches and hides in the vents he vomits a bunch of royal jelly in its mouth and it just doesnt stop growing until its a full queen fetus: there you go :D charlie: only possible if its a female xenomorph, though, because every bee you will ever see is always a female the males literally only exist to fuck yougn queens (and die doign it) the queen still couldnt lay eggs though theyd have to just hope that one of the eggs in that ship was male already fetus: oh? why not? charlie: male bees dont fuck the queen in their own hive, thats their mom they are supposed to go out and find virgin queens fetus: well what's to stop xenomorph from being like clownfish and changing their sex based on environmental factors? charlie: the virgin queen fucks one single time then uses that one single time to lay eggs forever fetus: heck, normally I peg aliens as being like whippet lizards: they have developed an entire reproductive cycle without males charlie: because clownfish dont have HIVES fetus: they have harems if I remember correctly though you're right, they DO something to avoid incest charlie: look i spent like 3 months learnign everything about bees and i came out afraid of bees, okay i wanna know what xenomorphs do fetus: HEY I'M LOVING THIS CONVERSATION MAN charlie: technically anyone from that ship would be part of the same 'hive' so they probably wouldnt fuck them though they may well not CARE fetus: THIS IS LITERALLY MY FAVOURITE TOPIC charlie: ;) lets see... okay so to do yours and it woudl make sense it would just be very alien (ha) egg is born, egg is female egg hatches, is female egg develops inside host, is female hatchest again as female a secondary adutl female spits on it, its a queen lays additional egg no sperm anywhere here but MAYBE maybe if the QUEEN spits on a baby it can become male? because the queen oughtta not be able to have any babies until shes fucked shes a virgin queen so maybe the first helper xenomorph catches a human, brings it to the nest holds the human in place THE QUEEN SPITS IN THE HUMAN then when the egg gets lain in the human it eats both human meat and queen spit the queen spit neutrtalizes the painkillers (hence why people in those weird tar traps always seem in pain, where people walkign aorudn with chest bursters seem fine) but the queen spit makes it be born male it fucks her (incest but whatever, aliens) NOW she can lay a million babies ofrever and they capture more humans to make more males thats why its usually a room with only like a handful of humans stuck in it, because you onyl need a couple males after that i think my only leftover complaint is that the babies grow too fast and also nothign seems to eat, a lot of them seem to just murder for fun rather than food fetus: YOU CRACKED THE CODE well, it's established in the first movie that at the very least, alien embryos inside humans drink their blood like a fetus would it's quote possible they eat their organs too so a gestating embryo will take a LOT of resources from its human host and this is actually true to life too: there are several insect, especially fly, species where the maggots will spend their entire time eating but the adults lack an actual digestive tract so alien embryos spend all the time inside the host eating charlie: i probably need to see 1 again, its been a couple years i think fetus: in Alien one, after John Hurt wakes up, he shows signs of pregnancy: he's hungry and nauseous and Ash says he looks anemic charlie: im just thinking about the guy thta chest bursted in 1, how he was walkign around and laughing and felt fine before he suddenly exploded which means to me that it didnt eat the heart or lungs, since he didnt spit up blood and probably slithered into his intenstines before chewing through and maybe going for his nutrient rich liver first its pretty BIG is the thing every bite could easily be fatal so it cant be biting anythign remotely important or he would just instantly die, or start coughing up blood, or lose the ability to walk oh, so i have to see 1 again fetus: I just made a theory; normally embryos would eat the entire host like wasp larva do but embryos are capable of sensing danger so when the embryo burst from John Hurts chest, it realized that it was surrounded by hostiles so it ran away instead of finishing eating him charlie: oh that could be! it would make sense like in Cubed she had hers in her chest for like... nearly a week fetus: because most chestbursters are born surrounded by drones and their hosts are immobilized but aliens are versatile creatures, so they're able to thrive even in less than ideal conditions heck, Alien 1 is probably the WORST case scenario for a drone: born away from the other eggs and the queen ooooh you're right queens have longer gestation period charlie: my strongest memory from 1 is that she put al lthat effort into blowing up the ship and it was getting hot and screaming and flashign lights and shes desperately running to the escape shuttle with her cat and once the place blows she realizes the xenomorph had curled up to take a nap in the only dark queiet place on the whole ship it didnt even seem that aggressive she put so much effort into killing it and its jsut like.. sleepy and slow moving like 'why you bulyl me' 'i am the baby' fetus: I KNOW!!!! I FUCKING LOVE THE FIRST MOVIE SO MUCH ALL THE PREGNANCY AND BABY IMAGERY USED FOR HORROR Alien 1 does a better job with pregnancy horror than a lot of horror movies featuring actual human babies or demon babies and you're so right little drone in Ripley's ship just wanted to nap btw do you mind if I put our alien biology lesson into one post? charlie: go for it! have all the fun 'please, im trying to psyche myslef up to becomeing a queen or something, im lonely, im the baby, let me nap' fetus: I'm still laughing that you said Ellen is bullying the alien bully the murderous parasite charlie: SHE IS HE WAS TAKIGN A NAP NOT BOTHERIGN NO ONE he wasnt even hungry at that moment! fetus: he was lonely the loneliest xenomorph charlie: partner says that he thinks the baby is a normal parasite and curls itself up in the stomach, eating your food, until its too large to fit, then bursts out the chest maybe the 'dick' that comes out of the facehugger is the 'head' of the xenomorph and it just drops the rest of the body once its ready to and the reason you cant remove a facehugger is the baby latches on with teeth and fucks you up if you try to pull it off fetus: there you go I was thinking it was more of a tongue than a dick but yeah charlie: okay so random though imagine if when the baby hatched otu of that one dudes chest? what if instead of screamign at it they had said 'so cute!' 'welcome little baby!' ''i love you!' let it crawl up their arm put it in a soft warm little baby bubble in the medical ward gave it snacks and head pets it loves them then you have a 200 pound gigantic xenomorph monster within a few horus somehow who loves you and aggressively protects them FROM SPACE PIRATES fetus: ok but that thing just killed warrant officer Ash wait no, Dallas? what was John Hurt's character name KANE ok so warrant officer Kane is dead and the crew just adopts his murder baby? we go from RIP Kane to Kane? don't know her charlie: well the baby didnt MEAN to hatch from his chest its a baby fetus: the chest was just in the way

#alien #xenomorph #long post #fetus talks #fetus talks to Charlie

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apopheniaandeisegesis · 5 years

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Sucker Punch Island: Session 1

Players :

Masari Half-Elf Monk. High Wis + Dex. Low Int + Cha.

First impression : Capable and very ernest, but just not that clever.

Nonamei Elven Wizard. High Int. Very low Str + Cha.

First Impression : Can't sit still. Trigger Shy. Asks the right questions.

"Jinx" (Me) Half-Elf Cleric. Prophecy Domain. High Wis + Cha. Very low Con + Str.

Blind man with a full-size crossbow who can't stop talking. Makes up a new god every five minutes. Still has clerical powers, somehow.

So, we're all on this island populated mainly by Kenku (Crow people). It all starts out pretty standard, We're all answering a "Heroes Wanted" bulletin, right? There are some other hereos at the bulletin board that look pretty badly singed. We try to talk to them to see what happened, but they lose their voices when they try to answer us. One tries to write something, but magically can't do that either. Weird. We figure they must have been cursed by whatever they encountered on their job. We tried a few things, but can't really help them or figure out exactly what's wrong.

So, the person we're meeting for the job shows up, a kenku. Rube. He's nervous. Jinx makes him even more nervous by idly pointing his crossbow in worrisome directions. Blind man with a crossbow raises a few eyebrows.

Rube takes us to city hall. Jinx bullshits about the decor and the statues. Mostly to see which party members are gullible. Surprise, it's the Wizard. So now the Wizard and the Kenku think Jinx knows all sorts of things about the city's founder. Convinced them that the statue in the hall is actually a petrified person. Good fun. Not terribly important. Yet. We'll see.

The mayor himself (or some such official) is called Ergard, and he's the one that actually hired us. Monsters in the sewer attacking the city, and can we go exterminate them please. Good benefits. We promise to resurrect you if you're awful and die. Nominal 10gp fee (a bargain!). Here's some magic rings with extra powers to help make sure you don't die. Here, sign this contract to be employed by the city.

Contract? Really?

I did try to see if we were being duped. Sense motive did show he wasn't really being straight with us, but we all thought he was just withholding some pertinent information about the job. Boy was he. Jinx cast Detect Magic to see what other shenanigans he might be pulling,. Just paper contracts, though. Nothing special. Rings are just cantrip level magic. Big-ass mirror in the guy's office is hella magical, and the mayor himself has some serious equipment, but that's all we know.

The Wiz and Monk sign the contracts. Jinx is blind and can't read and is a complete bastard, so he folds his up into a paper airplane and flies it across the room. Nobody really pays attention to that. The mayor sets out some magic rings for us. Jinx pockets all of them.

We head for the sewer. Wat a mess. Jinx hands out the rings. He's not greedy. And besides, He can't really use more than two. We wander through the sewer. There's slime everywhere and eventually some of it gets annoyed at being walked on and wakes up. We kill of a couple of them. Jinx does a fair bit of damage shooting at them with his crossbow. Blames it on being blind when he rolls low. The slimes are fire resistant. Kinda odd, but whatever. They go down easy. A much bigger one comes out of the pond of sludge down here. Jinx fires of his one big spell at it, but misses. "Did I hit anything?" He does have blindsight in a small rage around him, but it's a good schtick.

Another couple of stabs and bolts and that slime goes down too. The DM is rolling really low. Hits nothing the whole battle.

Next room, there's a Lizard-Taur. Already wounded but still feisty. Dumb as a rock, but not instantly hostile. The Monk speaks Draconic, though so we chat with it for awhile. Of course my compatriots have shitty Charisma, so they go nowhere for a long time. Eventually the Monk upsets the Liz-Taur and gets bit. We run away, but it can't follow us through a particular rusted grate. So we halt there and continue trying to chat with it, from a distance.

Jinx gets bored and sets up camp. Makes an omelette. Figures, this Lizard is only slightly smarter than a puppy. He's speaking in one word sentences. So I throw half my omelette at the lizard. Apparently it's pretty good, because I roll well on the persuasion check and suddenly he likes me enough to let me in the room he's guarding. Alone. No others. I wander around in there for awhile. There’s a pile of gold and a big ol' egg. Some massive scorch marks on the ground. There's some growling noises, but Jinx bombs his perception and investigation. Confused he assumes the gold and egg belong to the Lizard and the noise is coming from the egg. Probably about to hatch?

I figure I should leave the treasure alone. Go back and tell everyone there's not a lot in there. Just a bunch of gold that obviously belongs to the Lizard and an egg that's probably his. Hers? Who knows. They're still trying to be nice enough to get past the Lizard without hurting him, so I give him an herbal poultice for his injured leg. That makes him happy enough to get a real conversation going with the only PC that can actually talk to him. Eventually we figure out that the Liz-Taur is smelling the Kenku on the rings we're wearing. Really hates those guys. So my buddies chuck their rings to gain the Taur's trust. JInx picks them up. Guess they're all mine now. Puts all the rings on one hand.

So, finally we can all go in the room with the gold so that someone with a half-decent Investigate skill can make a roll instead of Jinx with his sad little +1. The roll is bombed by all present. No idea what's in here. The one that should have been successful actually Crit Fails and gets overwhelmed by nausea from the smell of burnt slime.

Jinx is hanging out with Lizard Boy in the back of the cave, so he can't sense what's going on near the treasure pile. Apparently what we all failed to detect was a dropoff at the back of the cave where a colossal dragon was sleeping. It finally wakes up. Jinx heads to that side of the cave to see what the commotion is all about, so we're all in a nice formation when the dragon breaths on all of us and we all die. While the DM plays the theme to 'The Price Is Right' in the background.

Of course, that was the plan all along. We wake up after being resurrected in the Mayor's office. Chained to chairs. Lovely. The Kenku does some magical shenanigans so that our perfectly normal contracts look like they say the Resurrection service has a nominal 10,000,000 gold fee. The usual arguing and threats ensue, but really we don't have any options. Another spell is done sealing the rings (all of which I'm wearing. Sheesh) and manacles to prevent us from leaving the island. And prevent us from talking to anyone about any job we do here or the 'arrangement' we have to work off our 10,000,000 gp debt.

ME :Jinx shrugs "i don't get all the posturing. I mean, if you're going to be thugs, then just be thugs. As the Acolyte of Moodwise, I won't forgive you, though" Masari Monk:"No, no, they have an image to keep." DM :Ehgard (The Kenku Mayor) rubs a hand over his beak."This is what you signed for. Most of you." Wiz Nona:"We signed for 10 Gold." Nona insists ME :Shruggs "I can't read. Never sign anything." DM :"We can take back the services we've done for you, if that's what you desire, sir." ME :"I suspect that would be quite illegal, if you want to play that game. Your option was to not raise me in the first place. But, clearly you're going to do whatever you like. Get on with it." Wiz Nona:"Jinx..." Nona warns nervously Masari Monk:"Yeah, let's cut to the chase. What do you get out of doing this to us? What are you expecting us to do to pay back this forged debt?" DM :"Illegal. No, not me sir." ME :"I am a cleric of Normenglasterpastich. We do not suffer liars lightly." Wiz Nona:what a name Masari Monk:Masari eyes Jinx. DM :"I suppose you'll have to work it off. I can think of a few more missions for you to go on to start earning that money..." His eyes narrow at Jinx, shaking his head."So untrustworthy..." ME :"What a lovely complement. I'm blushing." Masari Monk:"More missions that involve certain death? More missions that put us deeper in the hole through ressurections?" ME :"Sounds like a good plan. Infinite access to decent heroes. It's a nice racket if you can get it. Man's got a dragon to deal with. You do what you can." DM :The Kenku in purple walks around, putting a bracelet on Nona and Masari. "Certain death? No, no. Ambassador's of a sort. For Kiebnis herself (name of the city)." Masari Monk:"What's this now?" ME :Jinks looks straight at him with white eyes, "She's going to eat you, you know. I'm a prophet of Ibnis. I've seen it." Grinning like a madman. Wiz Nona:"Jinx, now isn't really the time to make threats," Nona whispers warily under her voice DM :Ergard tilts his head, eyes narrow as he looks away from Jinx. ME :"That wasn't a threat! That was valuable information. Worth at least 1,000,000 GP. ME :rolling persuasion. just that I'm an actual prophet. I have been playing the part pretty well, i think. (A decent roll. Total 19) DM :xDDDDD ME :No derail or anything. I just wanna unsettle the old bird. DM :Alright. Now I have to figure out this guys religion lol Ergard's feathers pick up a might. "Those are the old ways..." He 'mumbles' under his breath. So, that's why those other adventurers couldn't answer any of our questions. Apparently this crazy Kenku does the same thing to all the nice heroes that visit his island. Kill with dragon. Fake a masive debt. "You belong to me now." Rinse Repeat. At least I got to give the Mayor a good scare, though. I very much intend to make it a true prophecy.

Anybody know what I do with three magic rings cursed to the same hand?

#D&D #dungeons and dragons #sucker punch island sessions

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