#to be clear I love Max and Grace a lot too

[man-down-in-hatchet-town]

"You're Funny"

Steph saying to Pete "I didn't know you were funny" vs. Max telling Grace "you're funny." The parallels and the contrasts in the context and deliveries are so good.

Both scenes happen at the start, feature the characters' first out-of-song interactions in the show, and have the cool, popular kid complimenting their nerdy, unpopular love interest on their sense of humor.

And yet. When Steph calls Pete funny she really means it, she's truly responding to what he said and her interest in him as a person is genuinely piqued. Max, on the other hand, laughs like he didn't find Grace's line actually funny, but rather was primed to laugh at and repeat anything that came out of her mouth. He doesn't really listen to Grace or understand anything she's saying, he's just got the hots for her and is pursuing her...erm..."peach."

And this perfectly sets up the difference in their relationships throughout the show. Steph and Pete develop a soul-deep connection that thrives on multiple levels. Each truly sees and cares about the other, and they never actually objectify each other despite their obvious physical attraction. Meanwhile Grace and Max, though two very fun sides of the same very fun coin, never actually connect on any level but the physical. They each simply see the other as something hot to be used/attained/conquered whilst in the pursuit of larger, more ultimate plans of humiliating/murdering/sending the other straight to hell.

And one little bit of parallel dialogue sets all that up and communicates exactly what we need to know. Fuckin' neat.

[scramblecat]

Something I really love about Nerdy Prudes Must Die is how it completely subverts the ‘uncool kid joins the popular kids’ trope.

Typically with a story that has a similar premise (a friend or a love interest in a higher place on the school hierarchy from the ‘uncool’ character) I feel like a lot of the time we see the same thing happen over and over: the uncool kid finds a place in the popular kids, and starts behaving like them, treating everybody they used to hang out with as below them. If it’s ‘resolved,’ it’s by the main character realizing the popular kids are actually shitty people that they don’t want to hang out with. Even if at the end they go back to the uncool kids, that pipeline and change still happens, and it’s central to the plot.

And that’s certainly what I thought we were going to see in Nerdy Prudes. After Pete’s phone call with Steph (‘just these two fuckin’ nerds who won’t leave me alone!’), I was genuinely, actually starting to dread seeing Pete go through that change and start to treat Richie and Ruth like shit. I can even go so far to say I was expecting him to, given his newfound boost of confidence and thinking he’s impervious to even Max Jägerman!

But Nerdy Prudes doesn’t do that at ALL.

Pete never rises to the status of ‘popular kid’. Instead, Steph is the one to join the other group.

It’s clear that she’s certainly reluctant to do so— she’s been conditioned by the school environment and her popular kid status to think these kids are losers and Weird and uncomfortable to be around. But she’s also reluctant to actually be a shitty person to them, especially after she starts falling for Pete.

Speaking of Pete, he really is her link into the group, just like the role of ‘popular kid’ usually is played in this genre of storyline. But it’s handled a lot differently, and the way it is fits so well into the plot.

The only reason that Steph is willing to join the group of nerds in the first place is, of course, to get revenge on Max. But at the start of the musical, it’s clear that she doesn’t even know the magnitude of what Max does to the nerds— she straight up asks Pete who he’s running from right before Literal Monster, for Pete’s sake (ha do you see what I did there—). I don’t think she’d have to ask if she knew how much of a monster Max really was. Seeing what he did to Pete was what snapped her into that realization of how fucked up Max’s behavior is (and that nobody is going to punish him for it), which is why she joins the group.

‘But Scramble where’s your Evidence that just sounds like a theory?’

Bear with me here while I talk about Bully the Bully.

Bully the Bully (and the scene prior) is actually the single greatest indicator of how Steph’s opinion of the nerds shifts. At first, she looks and sounds like she absolutely does not want to be there. She takes a place standing FAR away from the group—

— and retorts back at things they’re saying multiple times, insulting them a little, and just generally looking down on them. (‘God, you guys are nerds.’).

She comments on how she thinks the things the nerds are doing are weird (such as the way Grace spins around) and seems very resistant to participating. She still looks down on most of them, and she doesn’t even try to hide it.

But as the song goes on, she starts getting a little more into it. Grace swings her into the group, and she starts participating just a little, joining in on the lineup, laughing a little. And while she doesn’t contribute her own solo line on the rest of the ‘fealty, a duty’ bit like everybody else does, she joins in on Pete’s part once she sees that he’s participating, too. And she’s starting to smile a little!

She starts joining in on the antics a little more after that, and this time on her own! She’s genuinely having fun!! All of a sudden she’s alert and a little more enthusiastic about this, starting to match the energy of the nerds, because she’s realizing that it isn’t so bad after all, and actually that they’re fun to be around!

I really like this sequence here— she’s fully involved at this point, but is thrown off when she sees the other nerds all of a sudden improvising with the moves —

—And tries to come up with one of her own the next time around.

Even if she doesn’t get one in, it’s still clear that she wants to be a part of it, too.

My favorite part however is when she joins in on the ‘bean school’ bit, where she seems a little not sure of what they’re doing & hesitant to do it, but tries to go along with it nonetheless, just like the improv poses— no matter how odd and random it seems to her at first.

It’s a sharp contrast to how she’d been at the start of the song, separated from the group and looking down on them for doing these weird little things. But by the end, she’s realizing how enjoyable this group really is! She’s dancing around with them, fully and eagerly joining in on what they’re doing, having fun just being goofy and weird! And she doesn’t see it as a bad thing anymore!

(Okay Scramble note: while making this gif I noticed that Steph is actually the first to initiate the snapping at the end WAAAA… I love the little details in this show. reminder to me to make a post compiling some of my favorites because there are so many I’ve noticed on my rewatches...)

The transition of Steph’s attitude toward the nerds is absolutely delightful. There’s none of that ‘returning to your own position in the heirarchy’ stuff, either. She’s made herself comfortable as a part of the gang, and she enjoys it!

While Steph is the biggest and most relevant, there is actually another (short-lived) example of this— with Max Jägerman, right before his death.

Max is the antagonist of the show. Hell, there’s an entire song at the beginning of the musical dedicated to establishing how much of a terrifying monster he is, and how all the nerds fear him. He even says these things with his own mouth, and he says them with glee. He’s proud to be a bully that people fear, he’s proud that people cower down around him, and he’s absolutely not afraid to be horrible toward those he deems below him.

But after Max is told that the nerds put this together purely to scare him— and that he deserves it— his demeanor towards the nerds changes ENTIRELY. All of a sudden, he’s not the literal monster that he’s explicitly been shown to be up until this point. I’m not saying that ‘he was like this all along’ or whatever— he very much does not regret anything he’s done, and does not regret the person he is, and still is that person. But for a single moment, he sheds the god complex, and for the first time, treats the nerds like equals— and not even in the way Kyle and Jason are ‘equals’.

He’s genuinely excited and happy about all this! He expresses how he really liked how they went about this, and compliments Ruth!

And he’s not bringing them up to his level, either— he is meeting them where they’re at. Similarly to Steph, he’s starting to be okay with some of the aspects of how the nerds behave, and even finding it fun in his own way. Even if the intent was to scare him, he likes the way they executed it, and takes it as something they did to make him happy. Obviously he never gets to have a chance at adjusting to it like Steph did, but hey, I’m counting it as a small example regardless!

(And this all is not to discount the fact that he’d very proudly done— and continued to do— fucked up things. he’s.. not a decent person regardless of this scene AJDHAHRHA im not exactly a max redemption arc truther. but that just kind of showed that he had the Potential to adjust. and then he got killed and turned evil again </3)

Anyway. Really delightful how they executed this trope subversion, and I’m so happy that they did. Not only does it help to emphasize that these characters care about each other/are genuine to each other (especially in the case of Steph and Pete, and Pete and the other nerds) but it really feels a lot neater and nicer to watch than it would’ve been if they’d gone the route with the trope as it’s usually played!

I am notoriously terrible at figuring out how to word a conclusion, so have another little gif and compare it to the first image in the post :]

[askinkiskarma]

Illicit Affairs | Chapter X: Invisible String

Pairing: Neteyam x Human/Avatar!Reader

Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VII Chapter VIII Chapter IX

Synopsis: Back from the dead, you have to heal in order to be able to move on and be forever part of the people. You and Neteyam finally find each other, giving in to desires you've both had for years.

Warnings: SMUT (18+ minors DNI!!!), some angst, fluff, all the feels, so many feels, the end

Word Count: 14,7k words (i need to be stopped)

A/N: The last chapter of Ilicit Affairs is finally here!! It took me a lot longer than I thought to finish this, but that's because this chapter is longer than my first like 5 chapters combined. I don't know what happened hahahah. I'm so excited to share this with you, the conclusion and culmination of this whole story. I hope you find it a satisfying pay-off, and I'd love to hear allll of your thoughts. Honestly, replies and asks make my life and I cry a little bit every time someone interacts with my content. I hope you have enjoyed this journey, and make sure you read til the end for a (hopefully pleasant) surprise ;)

As always, thank you to everyone who asked to be tagged, I love you all sm!! Ok enjoy byeee x

“Isn't it just so pretty to think all along there was some invisible string tying you to me? A string that pulled me out of all the wrong arms right into that dive bar Something wrapped all of my past mistakes in barbed wire Chains around my demons, wool to brave the seasons One single thread of gold tied me to you”

Neteyam stood in the room that he knew so well now, he had memorised its cracks in the white walls, and he was holding your hand, slowly tracing the now-fading yellow bruises along your arm. He looked at the tube that was going into the nook of your elbow and followed his eyes along it, until it reached a little clear pouch with a liquid that was dripping slowly all the way into your body. You were talking animatedly with Kiri, Norm and Max, looking over a bunch of plants displayed on a table in front you. It was incredible to see you, you looked like a completely different person than you were a few days ago. As soon as you woke up, you asked for the treatment you worked on and got working, and your symptoms improved massively. You were still sick, and the virus was still there, not to mention the damage it had already done couldn’t be reversed, it had to be treated on day at a time. Norm said your lungs were getting better and your heart was too, but your kidneys, he thought they were called, still not cleared your blood properly, so you were still stuck in bed with a big tube coming out of your neck where it removed your blood and another tube where it returned it back to your body. Neteyam did not understand how any of this worked, but whatever science it took, he was grateful for. He did not leave your sight in this time, refusing to be parted with you for even more than a few minutes at a time. Jake helped Max and Norm bring in an extra large bed, like the ones made for Avatars and add it to the room next to your own bed, and he slept there, reaching over to hold you hand at all times. 

There was so much between you that was still unsolved, still eating at his insides, but he did not want to overwhelm you or pain you in any way while in this state, so he was satisfied to just be near you and listen to your heavy breathing while you slept, and be comforted by the sound of the ECG machine letting him know you were still there, that your heart was still beating and it wasn’t stopping anytime soon. 

“Ok, I think we need to start with how will we extract the proteins from these plants. I’ve not done protein extraction on plants, but I assume we can do some sort of chloroform or methanol precipitation? You and Grace used to work with plants a lot more than Max or I, so I think you would be the best at figuring it this out, no?” Neteyam looked at you with wide eyes, so perpetually impressed with your intelligence and drive, with how good you seemed to be at tackling any challenge. You were barely breathing properly, but here you were, trying to find a cure for this illness that almost took your life. The first full sentence you said after coming back to life was to Kiri, and he was a little jealous, but overall incredibly proud of you and your strength that felt like it could move mountains if you put all your might into it. Knowing you, he was sure this virus will be dead meat soon.

“Right, I can take care of the protein extraction, you can then run mass spectrometry on it and see what we’re working with. It’s going to be a lot of work, are you sure you don’t want us to take care of it? Until we figure out exactly which active ingredient in which one of these plants gets results, it’s nonstop. I don’t think you’re ready to be back to work yet.” 

“I can’t sit back and do nothing. We’ll see how I feel, worst case scenario I do all the analysis from the comfort of this bed, deal?” 

Norm was happy to hear that you weren’t being stubborn for once. Whatever happened to you when you died, you definitely seemed changed. As if death brought forth epiphanies that made you want to live, to heal. Neteyam was definitely not complaining. 

After a while, everyone cleared, and you and Neteyam were left by yourselves. You turned around to watch him, giving him a little grin. 

“You know you don’t have to stay here every minute of the day, right?”

“I disagree.” 

You laughed heartily, your breath getting caught in your throat when the action made your lungs hurt, and the laughter turned to wincing, much to Neteyam’s dismay. Eventually, the wincing turned to sighing, and you didn’t look at him as you spoke again.

“Shouldn’t you be with your mate?”

It was his turn to wince, and he realised you probably couldn’t avoid talking about your issues forever. 

“Do you really want to talk about this right now?”

“Neteyam… I won’t be the other woman. And I’m also not going to be the woman who steals a man from another, or who endorses whatever the hell this is. I need to make sure you are serious about this, about us. I might still not make the consciousness transfer. I need you to think about this, and if you do and you decide that it is me after all, then you need to talk to her. She deserves that, she deserves better than what she’s been getting. And I don’t want to be part of this until I know she is not being deceived or led on.”

“You are right. I will talk to her today, alright? But I’m not leaving you right now.” 

“Do you want to watch a movie?”

You could feel yourself getting stronger by the day. It was a struggle still, your lungs feeling like they were going to explode any time you took a deep breath in and your heart oscillating between going a million miles a minute to barely functioning in the span of a day, but you were getting there. The combination treatment was definitely doing its job, and your body was no longer on the brink of collapse. Some colour returned to your cheeks in time, and since you have been eating about 15 meals a day because of how worried everyone was, you were gaining weight back, which was further increasing your day-to-day quality of life. You got a lot of sleep in the last few days, probably more combined than in the past few months, and you felt rested, for the first time in a really long time. 

The first two days were the hardest, your body reeling from withdrawal on top of everything else you were experiencing. But you were feeling good today, and were trying to remain optimistic so as to not fall into old patterns. Having Neteyam next to you helped, your light in all the darkness, he refused to leave your sight, even in the face of more pressing matters.

The humans were closing in, you were told. The ships will be landing any day now, which only contributed to your slow recovery, as the anxiety was manifesting itself physically and hurting your progress. You felt stressed at the situation and more so at the thought that Neteyam wasn’t there, in the meetings and in practice, missing it all so he could stay with you. You hated it, worrying constantly and he wouldn’t hear it. 

“It’s only a couple of days, Atan. Stop worrying.” 

Today was the day they were going to remove the dialysis machine, which you were extremely excited about. You felt the need to walk, to stretch out your legs, to be back in the lab. You had a lot to do, a lot you had riding on this. You were trying not to think too hard on how you were doing everything in your power to further procrastinate healing, knowing that at some point you were going to have to deal with the trauma head on and open that damned drawer, that held all of your darkest memories, all of the things you spent your whole life pushing away. If you were going to be ready to heal, ready to move on, you had to do so with a clear conscience and a clean slate. You were adamant that you were going to find the cure for the virus and use it on yourself before you made a decision about the consciousness transfer. You had to be 100% sure of your choice, of your decision to leave this life behind forever, and you couldn’t do that if you viewed it as an escape from your current weak and disease-ridden body.

It took a while to be disconnected to the machine and get the tube out of your neck. From now on til you decide whether to go through with the transfer, you will have to do this for a few hours a day, which was a pain, but better than being bed ridden all day. 

You put your feet on the ground for the first time in days, and you forced yourself to stand slowly, and quickly realised it was a bad idea, and your knees immediately buckled under you. Neteyam caught you with both his hands under your arms, and effortlessly raised you until your feet were a few inches above ground. 

“Put me down! This is so embarrassing.” You groaned at your own impairment, and refused to give up, slowly starting to walk with shaky feeble steps. You felt both Norm and Neteyam hover over you, and although you were grateful for them, you wanted to scream at how upsetting it was making you having to be looked after like you were a baby taking her first steps. You guess, in some ways, you were. 

You eventually got to your room, which looked untouched, if a little dusty. You were happy to see it again, happy to take it all in. It was a bit surreal, the whole experience. You didn’t realise how much it was all going to matter, all the little things, until you were dead on a hospital bed, begging Eywa for another chance. Every wall, every creak on the floor, every book, it all hit you suddenly, and you had to sit down on the ground, your back against the bed frame, so as to not collapse under the weight of this whole endeavour. 

“Atan, are you alright?” Neteyam’s voice was laced with concern, and you tried to stop panting long enough to answer him.

“I’m fine, it’s just a lot.” 

He slowly sat down next to you, struggling to squeeze in the tight space between the bed and the desk. His knee was brushing up against the side of the thigh, and you felt heat spread from the touch through your entire body. He gently raised one hand to the side of your face, removing strands of hair that were falling on it and tucking them behind your ear. 

“Talk to me, Atan. I want to know, I want to help.”

You felt tears pool in your eyes, and you couldn’t look at him, couldn’t look anywhere but the ground as the words got lodged in your throat. This was going to be much harder than you thought. 

“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry, Neteyam. I’m sorry that I almost died, that I did die, and that you had to witness it. I’m sorry for not telling you, I am sorry for not fighting harder, I am sorry for so many things.” Hot tears were falling on your arm laying in your lap and you struggled to find the words to speak. “I am still so mad at you, so mad that you left, so mad that you lied, so mad that you never told me how you felt about me, so mad about so many things,  but I shouldn’t have kept this from you. We’ve been inseparable since birth, and no matter what happened, you deserved to know, you all deserved to know. You deserved to say goodbye. I am sorry I took that from you.” 

You were both crying now, and he picked you up and placed in his lap with little visible effort, it was probably easier for him than carrying Tuk. You wrapped your arms around his neck and slid your legs around him to wrap around his back and you stood there, crying in the crook of his neck while he held you tightly, trying not to hurt you.

“I am sorry for leaving. Sorry for not talking to you about how I felt, sorry about giving up on you. I should have stayed and helped you heal, I should have been there for you to rely on instead of being yet another thing you had to deal with in this life. I am sorry about lying about Tiongli, I am sorry for not telling them all no from the beginning. Even without the Avatar, there was only one woman in this whole world I would ever belong to, and I would have been happy spending my whole life in this lab, if it meant doing it with you. I was scared, and I am sorry.” 

He removed your head slowly from the crook of his neck, and grasped the side of you face with one of his hands, thumb trailing over your lips, tracing them from your cupid’s bow to your lower lips, and you shuddered at the touch, deep desire pooling within you. 

“I love you so much. I have loved you my whole life, from the moment I was born, and I will love you until the moment I die. I am so sorry it took me so long to grow, but I am ready now. Whatever it is, I will brave it with you, and for you. You will never have to do this alone again.” 

You were sobbing now, unmoored at his confession that you have waited for your entire life. You were so overwhelmed by the love and affection you felt for this man, for the appreciation of knowing he was willing to hear the deepest, darkest parts of your soul and share in that pain willingly.

“I love you too. I missed you so much.”  

After crying it out on the crook of his neck, letting your human hands caress the soft blue skin of his back and chest while he held you, fingers running up and down your spine in a comforting motion, you eventually got up from his lap slowly, and crawled on all your fours to your messy old desk. You took a key that was taped to the underside of your chair, and, with a deep sigh and tired eyes, unlocked the bottom drawer of the desk. You took out just one thing. A bracelet. You smiled at the sight, and tightened it around your arm multiple times so it fit on your human form. You looked at Neteyam coyly, giving him a soft smile, and you saw his hand reaching for his own bracelet, with a gummy smile and tears in his eyes. 

Maybe you could do this after all. 

You eventually started working in the lab again, being a lot more careful about striking a balance between work and everything else in your life. You were still struggling to sleep, especially now that Norm and Max flushed every pill you had down the toilet, but you were trying your best. The best was when Neteyam slept over, and you just fell asleep flush against his bare body, whose warmth melted away all your nightmares and replaced them with much better, much lewder ones. You weren’t getting anywhere with your research, as Kiri found a lot of plants in the forest, and to do mass spectrometry and proteomics on so many proteins, and analysing them all was an impossible task in the time you had left. So in an afternoon, as you were hanging out with her, Lo’ak, Spider and Neteyam in the hub, guitar strumming in your hands, you had a lightbulb moment.

“Kiri, if you had to save one plant, just one on this whole planet, which one would it be?” Kiri was special. Whenever the rest of the kids argued over her heritage, making crude jokes about Grace and Norm, trying to figure out who her dad is, you always had a different hypothesis, that you never said out loud. Kiri was Eywa’s child, as much as Grace’s. She was the key to everything. Eywa was flowing through her, guiding her, and you believed she had a lot more up her sleeve than any of you knew, than even she knew. 

“Hmmm, that is a hard question.” She looked deep in thought for a long time, and eventually it’s like a huge epiphany was released from her mind. “Pamtseowll!!”

“The Cat Ear plant? Are you sure?” 

“I think so! I don’t know why that one, but that’s the only thing that came to mind, and when I thought about it, I just knew it was the right one! Why do you ask?”

You raised from the ground, placed the guitar on a bench next to you, and ran (more like walked at slightly increased velocity than normal) to her, kissing her forehead in a loud smooch. 

“I’ll let you know!! Wait here!!” 

You talked to Norm, telling him your hunch and asking him to treat a vial of the infected blood with the liquid extracted from the plant in question, that you already had in stock thanks to Kiri. It would take a while, but you were buzzing in excitement, feeling extremely positively about your idea and your new odds. You made it back to the hub where they were all waiting for you, and sat back on the ground, mischievously ignoring their curious glares. 

“Are you going to tell us what this was all about?” Spider said, rolling your eyes at your antics. 

“Nope.” 

They eventually dropped it, and you sat together, talking about everything and nothing, trying to ignore the looming doom of the ships slowly making their way to Pandora’s atmosphere, and the deadly consequences that would follow them.

You picked up the guitar again, deep in thought. Before you could help yourself, you found yourself speaking.

“I saw my mum.”

Everybody stopped and stared at you in shock. None of them said anything, and you swore you could hear a hairpin drop for sure in this big hall, or your heart pounding in your ears. 

“When I died…” you started cautiously, not even knowing why you started talking in the first place, but knowing it was too late to back off now. “…I woke up in this new place I have never seen before. Eventually, I realised I was on Earth, in my mum’s childhood home. There were pictures of her on the wall, with her parents, she looked young, and happy… and alive.” 

“Her house overlooked the ocean, and I went and sat on the beach and she came. Like it was nothing, she just came to me, and sat me down, and watched me cry on her shoulder until I thought I was running out of tears.”

This bit was easy enough to speak about, now came the real problem. You swallowed the big lump in your throat and continued. “She told me she did the same things I did. That she had been sad, so very sad, ever since my father died, the kind of sad that never goes away, the kind of sad I am.” You couldn’t look at them, preferring the look of your guitar that you were holding on to dear life as you spoke, and saw small tears crashing into the strings, splattering everywhere. “She said she didn’t try… to stay alive, to heal. Just like I didn’t. She said she had a choice, and she chose to die, because the hurt was too much for her to bear. She left me, orphaned me, put me through so much pain I’m still dealing with a decade later.”

You heard small gasps and sharp breath intakes and the new information, but couldn’t stop to acknowledge it, needing it out of your soul as soon as possible. “I was so hurt, so mad at her. That she left, that she didn’t fight harder to be in my life, that she left me with so many scars because of her selfishness. And then it dawned on me… that was me. I did that to you. To all of you. And I am sorry. I am so sorry.” 

They all slowly sat up from where they sat and gathered around you in a circle, and hugged you. 

“We forgive you. We’re just happy you’re still here. We love you, we want you to know that you’ll always be able to talk to us. You’ll always have us. We’re a family. Sullys stick together.” 

You felt each of these words deep within you, the forgiveness something you craved like air, and you realised how much it must have meant to your mum. You were happy you could do that for her. You were happy something good came out of all the misery. 

Later that day, all the Sully kids left, and you went to your room, carrying your guitar in your hands, and found yourself again, sitting on the ground, reaching for the bottom drawer key and unlocking it with shaky hands and muffled cries. It was time. You reached inside it for a photo album, with old school printed photos on it, and opened it. Your heart was hurting so badly you needed to place your hand on your hand to try to settle it, settle the pain and agony you felt. The first photo was a photo of you and your mum in the medical ward, holding you tightly against her chest, looking really tired with the caption “you had just been born a couple hours ago, how crazy is that?”. The second one -  a photo of you, as a tiny baby, only a few days old by the scribbling on it. Countless photos of you, in various stages of growth, in various positions, all captioned by your mother, who loved you more than anything else in this world and whose love was loud and clear in every one of these images. The tears kept falling off the laminated pages and onto your legs, and your anguished cries took over the music playing in the background. An image of you and Neteyam, in a crib, his body much larger than yours even as tiny infants, but you were holding hands, sleeping peacefully next to each other. An image of your mum with Neytiri and Jake, smiling widely for the camera. A photo of your mum in her Avatar body with all the Sully kids, her holding Tuk in her arms when she was just born. An image of her in the lab, mid laugh with a pipette gun in her hand - no one would ever have been able to tell how much hurt she was hiding underneath, how close she was to death. Finally, an image of her and your dad, taken by your dad, of them looking into each other’s eyes lovingly. The caption, blurred and blotched from dried tear stains, read “the love of my life, the light in all the darkness”. You closed the album panting, and brought it close to your heart, just holding on to it while you cried. 

You were spent by the end, but wanted to push through, needing to get this done all in one go. You removed another thing from the drawer, a camera, the gift Jake have you for your birthday. You eventually sat on your desk chair, and plugged it into your laptop. You clicked on the only file on it, and gasped at your mum’s face appearing on the screen, smiling while adjusting the camera to centre her face. She started speaking, and you clung to every word, making sure her voice and words will forever be imprinted on your mind.

“My child,

I know it’s been a while since you have since my face.” she says with a small laugh. 

“I’m making this tape for your 18th birthday, as this should be around the time when your Avatar is ready for you to use. I gave Norm and the rest of them notes and doodles and research and I think they can do it, my love. I think they can build you the ramps new life, one amongst the Na’vi. I am so excited for you, you have no idea. 

Happy birthday, bunny. You will forever be the best and brightest thing I will have ever achieved. I am more sorry than you will ever know that I don’t get to see you grow up, see the beautiful, intelligent, caring and loving person you already are blossom into so much more, but I want you to know, more than anything, that I have no regrets. 

I have lived my life exactly the way I wanted to. I have explored new worlds, I have contributed something good to the world, I have lived and I have loved deeply and unconditionally. I just hope you do, too. I hope this world doesn’t break you, my love. I hope it doesn’t snuff out your light, because in that case, I will have failed you, and I am so sorry. 

I know you are sad, and I know you have probably been sad for a while, and I know this life is emotionally abusive, and it takes and takes and takes until there’s nothing left. But it’s also worth living. Because you can learn to take from it, too. You can learn to heal, and love and live, and replace whatever it took in time with even better fitted pieces. But in order to do that, you have to live, my love. 

Even at 10, you have a tendency to keep sadness in, and don’t let it out. That’s something you got from me, and I’m sorry for that. I love that you got my eyes, and my addiction to music and my love for science and literature, but baby, I don’t want you to be like me in every way. You also have a tendency to isolate, and that, you also got from me. I’m hoping that will change in time, I’m hoping Neteyam, and Spider, and Lo’ak and Kiri, and eventually Tuk will be able to break through and allow their light to shine on the dark walls of this lab. But if not, I’m hoping this Avatar will. 

I want you to know that it’s alright to hurt, and it’s alright to be scared and wonder if the path you’ve taken is the correct one. We all wonder through this life scared and confused and a little alone. But it’s up to us to want to make a change and it’s worth it, baby. I know opening yourself up to hurt is scary and hard, but it will also allow to love, to love fully and deeply, to give yourself to others and have them give themselves to you. There’s beauty in this world and this life, but you need to be brave to experience it. 

Your dad and I love you very much. Enjoy this Avatar, and enjoy all that it can bring to your life. You are the brightest light of my life, and now it’s time for you to become another’s.”

You replayed the video until you were so spent, your eyes were closing painfully from the tiredness and hurt and tears. After that, you went to your bed, still clinging to the photo album, and fell asleep, to a song you hoped one day you’ll be strong enough to play yourself, but for now had to settle for the original. 

I should've asked you questions, I should've asked you how to be Asked you to write it down for me, should've kept every grocery store receipt Cause every scrap of you would be taken from me Watched as you signed your name Marjorie All your closets of backlogged dreams, and how you left them all to me...

Norm came bursting through the door of your bedroom, waking you up in a panic. “What the fuck, Norm??”

“We did it.” He came to your bedroom and took you by the shoulders, shaking you. He screamed and jumped in the air.

“WE FUCKING DID IT, ACE!” 

You jumped from the bed onto your knees, so you were almost face to face.

“WHAT? ARE YOU FOR REAL?” 

“YES, OH MY GOD, YES!” 

You jumped on him and he caught you, and you just spun around in your tiny room, laughing and screaming at the beginning of your new life. 

Thank you, mum. For looking after me even after you’ve gone. Thank you.

You had to toil a bit with details, but by midday, you were ready to get the substance, now purified and diluted in appropriate medium for being inserted in a human body. You watched as Norm prepared, and held your breath as he injected it into your now healed veins. You didn’t know whether it would work, or how many doses you would need, this was all so new, it was kind of crazy you were willing to inject it in your body with so little information, but you trusted your mum, and you trusted Kiri, and you trusted Eywa. 

You felt good. So good, in fact, you knew exactly what you wanted to do. 

Neteyam was in the village, in a deep strategy meeting about how they were going to approach the upcoming threat looming over everybody. His mind was only half listening, the other half too busy with musings of you. What were you doing? Have you eaten? Did you take your treatment? He was worried about you after yesterday, and felt guilty he didn’t stick around for the night in case you needed him. He is pulled out of his train of thought when he hears a loud banshee scream, and everyone’s attention turns to the entrance of the tent, to which everyone rushes. When Neteyam makes his way outside, his mouth drops at the sight of you, beautiful and wild, free on top of your golden white ikran.

You were radiant, smiling widely at him while you removed your queue and your visors and brought your hand to your forehead and greeted everyone at the meeting. 

“Hey, kid.” The Sully patriarch came over and gave you a big hug, a conflicted look on his face. “Are you sure it’s ok for you to use your Avatar?” 

“We did it, Jake. We found the cure.”

His mother and father both gasped loudly at the news and hugged you tightly, and you held on to them with all your might, pouring all of your love and apologies into it. Neteyam was too stunned to say anything, pure bliss escaping his body in the form of silent tears, that he wiped immediately from his face - he was in a meeting with all the warriors, there couldn’t be tears. 

“I’m actually here to steal the future Olo’eyktan, if that’s ok with everyone. I will bring him back in one piece, I promise.”

“Fine, but don’t be too late. I don’t want to have to use the radio, am I making myself clear?”

“Yes, sir.” 

Neteyam saw you click your tongue towards where you were standing, and felt a ping of arousal at your sight, at your confident demeanour. You used to be such a wild girl before life got too much for you to bear. He hoped he’d get to see that in you again, just like he was now. His hands made their way to his mouth and formed a circle around it, and he screamed loudly for his ikran, which appeared quickly and landed next to yours. He connected the queue and both of you took flight at the same time. 

You flew like that for a while, and he was mystified at the experience. He has spent so much of his time riding with other people, flying as much a chore as a delight, but nothing that will ever be able to top this. You were screaming, fiercely and ferociously, doing barrel rolls in midair on your beautiful banshee, laughing loudly and urging her to almost bump into him, to which he gasped in mock annoyance and returned the favour. He followed you to the Hallelujah mountains, all the way to a cave on one of the floating rocks. It was beautiful, and he thought it would probably be breathtaking at night. You both landed, panting from the adventure, and made your ways to each other after petting your ikrans affectionately. 

His hands immediately found your face, holding you tightly to look deep into your eyes. Your eyes softened looking at him, and he could see himself in them, looking intense and troubled. 

“Did you really do it?” 

You raised you own hand and brushed an unwieldy braid from his face, gently tugging it behind his ear. He saw your tail swish enthusiastically. 

“We really did it.” 

Neteyam’s mouth immediately found yours, desperate for your touch, the feeling of relief washing over him and it was so intense this is the only way it could be manifested. He needed you, craved your touch, craved the closeness, craved to make up for all the time you two lost. You moaned into the kiss and deepened it, opening your mouth, inviting his tongue to meet yours and dance in the way that made you both weak in the knees. You put your hand on his chest and pushed him and it caught him off guard, because he tipped backwards and hit the ground with a painful thud. You smirked and raised an eyebrow, and he moaned at the sight. You immediately got on top of him, straddling his lap and pulling him by his chest piece until your lips met his again. Your hands went into his hair and his did the same, and you let out a wail when he pulled on it, making your head tilt backwards, giving him access to your neck that he attacked mercilessly, leaving trails of his presence all over you. You felt him, hard against your core that was dripping in arousal, and you thoughtlessly starting grinding against him, feeling your mind flooded with sensations you never wanted to let go of. 

“Neteyam, we can’t.” It hurt you saying these words, it was taking every ounce of self discipline you had, which at the moment was almost none. 

“Yes, we can. In fact, I think it would be irresponsible of us not to.” 

You laughed, smacking his chest playfully at his words. You brought your hand to his face and caressed it softly, and he closed his eyes in bliss. 

“I want to do this properly. I will be one of you soon, for the rest of my life. I want to do this your way. I want to be mated to you the Na’vi way. Then we can do whatever you want, however you want. Deal?” You raised an eyebrow at him, smiling mischievously.

“Only if you stop raising your eyebrow at me, otherwise I make no promises.” 

You laughed again, and laid next to him with your head on his chest, hoping this moment could last forever. 

“Hey, I have to do something, and it won’t be pleasant. I was going to go alone, but I’ve made a promise to not go about everything alone. So if your offer still stands, would you like to come with me?” 

You felt Neteyam’s hand stop caressing your hair like it had been for a while. He starts getting up, pushing your head off his chest slowly in the process. He looked serious, concerned, but he had a calming smile on, and when he took your hands in his and held them tightly, you knew you were gonna be ok. 

“Let’s go.” 

You got on your ikrans and flew back to the forest, feeling comforted by the knowledge he was there, next to you. You didn’t have to do this alone. You landed in the clearing next to the exo suit that belonged to you dad. Your heart was picking up pace from the sight, but it was time. It was time to work through it. 

You slid off Neyn’s back and made your way to the suit, running your hands over it to remove some of the vines and eventually reaching for the dash cam. It was probably long dead, but you had to try, especially after what your mum said. You fiddled with the screen for a while, and eventually, it turned on, making you jump out of your skin. 

In the view of the camera stood a man, tall and bald, wearing military clothing and reloading the guns that came with the suit. You’ve seen him before, in a photo in one of the jackets you found rummaging for clothes to wear. His name was Lyle Weinfleet. 

“Captain, I think if we go through this clearing, we should be closing in on the tree of souls in about 3 clicks.” 

“You’re right. But I don’t think we should do it.”

Lyle looked stunned, and he stopped whatever he was doing to turn around and look and your dad. “Barlowe, what are you talking about?” 

“This is wrong, Lyle. You know it, I know it, everyone here fucking knows it. And if you don’t, you’re even a bigger psychopath than I thought you were. We have to go back.”

“I’m not fucking going anywhere, Captain. These freaks are going to kill all of us if they get their way. Someone has to stop them.”

Your dad picked up his gun and pointed it at him. “Are you disobeying direct orders, lieutenant?” 

“You’re not my squad leader, Captain. And I have orders from above.” 

A fight ensued which eventually resulted in the destruction of both the exo suits. Your dad got out of the suit, and the last time the camera picked up was Weinfleet running at him with a knife. 

You lowered the screen and sat in silence for a long time. Neteyam’s hands were rubbing up and down your arms, and you felt his chest radiating heat on your back. You were happy to have him here, as the new influx of information was overwhelming enough to make you dizzy. Your dad didn’t attack on that fateful night 19 years ago. Everything you believed your entire life was false. 

“My dad was not a horrible person.” Neteyam said nothing and just stood by your side, allowing you to process everything at your own pace. 

“I hated him my whole life. I felt so much guilt at his actions, the murders I thought he committed plagued my mind for years and years. I was too scared to come to the village because I thought he was responsible for the decimation of your people.” 

“You came from him, you share his blood. There was no way he could have been that bad. Not with you as his daughter.” 

You scoffed lightly at his comment, but were so happy he was here. You took him by the hand and walked him to the body that was now only a pile of bones. You looked further in the clearing, and realised another set of bones was settled in the ground a few meters from your dad’s. Good, you thought. 

“I’d like to bury him, if that’s alright with you?” 

You gathered all the bones and walked to a tree whose roots were hanging partially above the ground, creating a little cove. Rays of light were hitting it, and you knew then it would be the perfect place. You placed his remains there, and gathered flowers and ornate twigs that had fallen on the ground, and decorated the little space as well as you could. 

“Thank you, dad.” You were comforted at the thought that, although he died on this foreign planet alone, he was loved, and now, he will be mourned. 

You made it back to the village together, walking and holding hands, trying to get your mind off all the epiphanies you have had to undergo in the past few days. Healing was hard work, you snickered to yourself. You made it to the tent you knew Jake and the rest of the warriors would be. 

“There you are. Was starting to get worried.”

“Ah, there’s nothing to be worried about, pops.” You laughed at Jake’s shocked expression and the way his eyes softened immediately as a response to your new nickname. 

He had to wipe that expression off his face. He was Olo’eyktan. He was Toruk Makto, this was not inspiring leadership. 

“Right. The humans will be here any day now. I think we will have to move our base of operations in the Hallelujah mountains, somewhere they can’t find us, where the flux is too strong for their equipment. It’s going to be a big ask, and a big adjustment, but it is necessary. You know the first place they will look is at the hub. And it won’t take long for them to find the village either.” 

What he was saying made sense, but it filled you with a sense of grief. This forest, that hub, those labs, this village, is all you’ve ever known. To have to leave it for an undetermined amount of time, maybe forever, was hurting your heart. You knew Neteyam felt the same, you knew they all felt the same. Jake was a marine, strong and adaptable, he was an incredible person to have around in a crisis. But he didn’t quite understand what it means to belong to only one place, to only know one reality that was going to be uprooted and taken from you. That takes time, time you didn’t have. 

“I think we should do the ceremony tonight. You have completed the Iknimaya, you are to be one of us now. It’s time, if you want it.” 

You peered up at him, in shock, but the beating of your heart was so loud because it was excited, it was happy. It’s time. You knew it in your heart it was right, this time. You belonged here. Your mum worked so hard for you to get to do this, she foresaw this 18 years ago. Your dad gave his life for yours, even without knowing it. You owed them this, owed them your life and this new one you were about to get.

“And tomorrow, we can do the transfer, if you are ready.”

By nightfall, you were ready. Your hair was freshly braided, in a pattern different to what the Na’vi wear, but you wanted it to be a mix of Na’vi and human braiding. You had all new clothes, and Kiri was in your tent, painting your body in white lines, as was the tradition. She looked radiant, happy and beautiful, like she always was.

“How are you feeling?

“Nervous.” 

“There’s nothing to be nervous about. You belong here, you always have, even when you were human. This is just formality at this point.”

“Kiri… I want to thank you. You saved my life. Your plants, your mind saved my life. I wouldn’t do this if it wasn’t for you.”

“You saved your life. You asked me, you did the work, you found the cure. The Na’vi will be forever grateful to you, and Max and Norm, I hope you know that.”

“How about we say it was a team effort?” You laughed together and you kissed her forehead. You loved her so much, your sister for life.

Neteyam saw your body, adorning all new garbs, a golden frilly loincloth and green, violet and gold beaded top that hung from your neck to reveal a bare back that made Neteyam’s body beam with desire. Your left arm was decorated with a bracelet, the same bracelet he was wearing, the one that he gave to you when he was ten, that was now proudly shining on your person rather than hiding in a drawer, masking pain. You had bracelets around your ankles as well, that were softly clinking every time you took a step. Your hair was soft and braided in a pattern that was unlike the Na’vi ways, and it was fitting, Neteyam thought. You would never be only Na’vi - you were more, not quite human, not quite one of them, you were the most beautiful aspects of both and Neteyam felt his heart skip a beat at the sight, one which will never cease to take his breath away. You were his, forever. How did he get so lucky?

Almost as if you could hear him, you slowly turned around and he saw your eyes searching the crowd until they found him, and your face immediately broke out into a beaming smile, that slowly changed into a gaze filled with yearning and love….and lust. Neteyam gulped audibly at your expression, so intense it was making him crazed enough to almost consider taking you away right now, ceremony be damned, and coax screams out of you he would be sure anyone else would cower in shame at. But not you. You were his match, his twin flame, and he knew whatever he wanted to take from you, the screams, the pleasured pains, the moans and panted breaths, you would give willingly, and would take his in return, until you were both so spent you collapsed in aching bliss. 

He waited though, despite his progressively harder to ignore twitch, knowing he wouldn’t, couldn’t rob you of this moment, knowing the waiting and anticipation would be worth it in the end.

The ceremony was ethereal, magical, and he couldn’t help reminisce about his own, years and years ago. The people all stood around you, waiting for the Olo’eyktan to say the words that will make it official. Neteyam saw his father approach you, wearing all the garbs worthy of a chief of the Omatikaya, and placed both his arms on your shoulders, smiling proudly. You were a Sully now, for all intents and purposes, and his father looked at you the same way he looked at all his children. Neteyam’s heart swelled at the sight, taking in the familial interaction.

“Ngenga 'ite Omatikayaä luyu set. Na'viyä luyu hapx��. (You are now a daughter of the Omaticaya. You are part of The People.)”

Neteyam made his way by your side, and he watched as the rest of his family did the same. He placed both of his hands on your body, one over your heart, and the other on your back. His family did the same, and he noticed tears in everyone’s eyes, including yours and his own. This was a moment none of them thought they’d get to see, that you never expected to experience, and Neteyam said a silent prayer to Eywa, thanking her for bringing the love of his life back to him, and into the clan. 

After the celebration, you excused yourself from everyone, tired and dazed, as well as too impatient to wait for what you have wanted, needed for days, months, years. You found Neteyam casually talking to some friends, and you touched his back lightly, so lightly it was barely there. He shuddered minutely, and turned his body to face you. He took your breath away, always, but particularly today, in this light, under these circumstances, wearing his ornate clothes and that bracelet, the one that you would both wear for the rest of your lives. That one that meant forever. 

“Come.” He said, and he looked at you like you were a meal that he’s been starved from, that he was going to devour. You bit your lip in excitement and followed him.

You went for a swim in a tiny lake not too far from the village. You swam together like that for hours, kissing and touching each other under the water, just feeling him. The anticipation was building strongly, and as the last of the paint on your body dissipated, you left, with hurried steps, quickly making your way towards the Tree of Souls. 

Your entire body stalled at the sight. You have seen images of it, areal videos taken from drones and helicopters, you saw it all, and yet nothing could have prepared you for the beauty of this place, for its magnitude and significance. The air felt thick, charged with energy, and you could hear whispers all around you, soft, almost imperceptible, but they were there. Eywa was here, just like she was all around you, but here, you felt her stronger, almost palpably so. You made your way through the willow-like branches, seeing the purple hue illuminate your skin, and you just walked, taking it all in, touching it, experiencing it fully. You were so happy, it made you anxious. You’ve never felt happiness like this, and you were scared it wasn’t going to last, scared of knowing that the fall from such a high would break all of your bones, crush you forever. You felt Neteyam’s gaze on you, electrifying every inch of your body its gaze was touching. You could feel him, in your bones, you knew what he was feeling, what he was thinking. You shared a soul, you always have. “He is more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” 

You looked at him and your breath hitched in your throat at the sight; he was the most gorgeous human you have ever seen. He was beautiful and angelic and looking at you like you were prey that he wanted to exert complete control over - and you didn’t mind. You wanted him so badly and you have waited for this for what feels like lifetimes. You knew looking at this man in front of you that you would allow him to ruin you, you would beg him to kill you softly, slowly drive out any ounce of sanity from your body orgasm by orgasm until there was nothing left of you but the echoes of moans you couldn’t help exhale. It was almost desperate, your need for him, and you heard your breath become laboured, panting with craving and ache. You saw him make his way towards you slowly, and stopped only when he was towering over you, and you had to bring your chin up to be able to look into his eyes. His hands immediately found your jaw, that he gripped tightly, making sure you weren’t going to look away from him, from that gaze that drove you mad and made you throb in pain, begging to be filled, craving sweet release. 

“You’re mine. I can’t believe you’re mine. I have waited for so long, I have dreamt about this for years. The one thing I have wanted more than life itself and you are here. You’re mine. Forever.” 

You were fully panting now, not even an ounce of shame on your features. You wanted him, you wanted him to know what he was doing to you. Wanted him to control you, to possess you, to take what was his, what has been his and will be his forever. 

“Say it. I need to hear you say it, Atan.” 

His grip on your jaw tightened, and you moaned, unable to stop yourself, not wanting to stop yourself. 

“I am yours, Neteyam. I have always been yours. I will always be yours. It’s you and me, forever.” 

It was his turn to moan, gaze turning animalistic now, in a way that you felt within you, deep within you, and you knew you were dripping wet now, knew he was going to love it, was going to revel in it, and you smirked at the thought. 

You saw him stop and reach back for his queue. You gasped silently at the sight, but smiled at the thought he wanted this, that after this, you would be his for life. You reached back for yours, and you both held them close to each other, just out of reach, looking deeply in each other’s eyes. 

“Do you trust me?” 

“You know I do. I trust you, Neteyam, do whatever you want to me. I’m yours to take, I’m yours.” 

“Forever?”

“Forever.” You joined the queues and nothing in the world could have ever prepared you for the overwhelming sensations and feelings, for the intense intimacy of feeling Neteyam’s deepest desires and emotions, for how deep his love and care for you actually ran, for how desperate he was to own you, to make you his. You felt his breathing and his heartbeat, and he felt yours and the desire you both felt exploded all around you. 

He aggressively smashed his lips into yours, both of you moaning at the contact, at the need that enveloped both your beings like the rushing water of the river you loved swimming in together. Your fingers immediately made their way into his hair, his beautiful hair that seemed to sometimes have a life of its own, and thinking of how hot you found it made you only more enthusiastic, gripping at it tightly and pulling on it. He smirked in the kiss, parting your lips enough to look at you with a mischievous grin that you loved more than you could put into words. You loved this man - you loved his kindness and compassion and sacrificial streak and patience, but you loved this side of him more, the side only you ever got to experience, that no one else knew about. How passionate and adventurous he was, how masculine and possessive of what was his he was, how wild and untamed a streak he hid under the well-behaved and poised demeanour. How well he matched you. Your twin flame. He placed both of his hands on you thighs, just underneath your ass, and lifted you effortlessly, and you instantly wrapped both your legs around him, never breaking the kiss, that was now just a mess of panted moans, lips and intertwined tongues. You felt your back hit a tree bark and you gasped, breaking the kiss and watching as the action left a trail of spit in between you. His mouth moved to your neck, that he sucked and licked until it was hurting, and he pushed you into the tree, trying to remove whatever space there still was in between you two. As he did so, you felt his chest and pelvis push aggressively into you, and you whined when you felt his dick brush up against you core, hard as a rock and hitting a spot that was making you lose your ability to see around you. He started moving his hips into yours, drawing circles into your pelvis and you matched him, desperate for release, desperate to want to give him your first of many orgasms of the night. You weren’t going to be satisfied until he made you cry in pain, in pleasure, until the line between them was blurred.

Neteyam saw your breathing quickened and he smirked in a way that only made further pleasure pool in your depths. “Coming already, my love? You wanted me that badly, huh?” 

“Dick.”

“You’ll get that later, too.” 

You wanted to laugh, but couldn’t do anything but mewl in agonising ecstasy as he hit a spot that immediately made you see stars and you rode out your first orgasm, crying into the crook of his neck. 

“Good girl.” He didn’t let you come down from you high, as he removed your body from the tree and placed you on the mossy, comfortable ground, and both his hands went on your knees, making sure you were keeping them apart, as soon as he could feel you wanting to close them to accommodate for your post-orgasm sensitivity. 

“No, Atan. You wanted this, remember? You have to keep your pretty legs spread for me.”

The entire world was spinning around you, a mess of purple, pink and white, as he traced his hands slowly, too slowly, painfully slowly up your thighs, until he reached your hips, where you loincloth was tightened, and you felt him make quick work of the knot, inhaling deeply as he took it off from you and saw you for the first time. 

“Fuck, Atan. I feel like I could come just from looking at you. Look at you, a fucking writhing mess and I haven’t done anything yet. Look at this,” he said as he place a hand in between your folds, removing the slick that was so abundant it was now dripping down your ass, “Look at how wet you are for me, and I haven’t even touched you yet. The shit I want to do to you, Atan, will make Eywa regret ever making this tree part of the mating ritual.” 

You saw him slowly lowering his head towards you legs, kissing and biting roughly up your thigh until you were screaming in pain. “Shh, Atan.” He drew circles in your thighs as he continued his onslaught to comfort you to some extent, except it was only lighting your skin on fire, only strengthening your need for that second release. 

“Fuck, Neteyam, please.” 

“Begging so soon, my love? What do you need?” 

“You. Your tongue, your fingers, anything. Fuck, please!” 

“Well, since you said please.” 

He smirked again, the asshole, and you felt him licking your pussy from your entrance to your clit, and at the moan he released as he did so, you convulsed so violently you needed a while to settle, still trying desperately to close your thighs to make the sensation more bearable. 

“Stop that, or I’ll stop. Do you want me to stop, my love?” He looked at you through hooded eyes and giving you a wild look that made you clench around nothing, and your hands found his head and you pushed him back into you, annoyed that he stopped, already upset at the thought that he wasn’t going to be doing this every minute for the rest of your life. If you had your way, he would. That’s all you would do. He laughed, but obliged, and continued his attack on your lips, messily kissing and licking, pushing his tongue deep within you, like your pussy held the potion for eternal life and he wanted to live in you forever.

“Fuck, Atan, you taste so good. So good, how am I ever supposed to stop, huh?” You started grinding your hips around him, moaning loudly and you saw him dry humping the ground, trying to get some of his own release. The primal animalistic action was enough to push you over the edge again, coming all over his tongue, that was still lapping at your insides, without any intention to stop. 

You tried to push him away, the feeling so overwhelming it was bordering painful, your clit so red and sensitive now it was glaring and obvious, but he didn’t relent. 

“Fuck, you are intoxicating. Come on, baby, I’m not nearly done. We’re not nearly done.” He pushed two fingers in you, which was incredibly easy with the amount of slick and cum you were continuously releasing. Although so sensitive, you immediately clenched around him, taking him in, and felt the familiar ache slowly building in you again. He pushed his fingers deeper, until his knuckles made contact with your folds, and you felt his thumb slowly, gently rubbing your throbbing clit as his fingers were hitting your g spot mercilessly. The stimulation was too much, and you felt yourself seeking yet another orgasm, bucking your hips wildly against his fingers. 

“That’s right, Atan. Let me see you come all over my fingers.” That’s all you needed to hear, and almost on command, you felt yourself coating his long digits with your cum. He removed his fingers from inside you and you cried out at the loss, but he didn’t care, too busy staring at his fingers, covered in the clear viscous liquid enveloping them. He brought both fingers to his mouth and he took them both in and sucked on them, and immediately kissed you, messily and forcefully, and you moaned at the vulgarity of it, and the taste of your own orgasms on his tongue, which was exploring your mouth like he had your folds earlier. You loved it, loved all of it, drunk on the feeling, on the connection you felt to this man that knew you, so well, so deeply, knew your body instinctually, like he touched you and had you all his life, and you squirmed when you realised that now you had a whole life to do this, every day, you would never have to live without this feeling again. 

“Do you feel how good you taste, Atan? Fuck. I will never get enough of this.”

With one swift motion, he removed your top from around your neck and took its place, squeezing your throat until you couldn’t breathe anymore, slowly choking you. You threw your head back and arched your back, eyes fluttering shut, just taking in this feeling, of being completely owned, completely in someone else’s control. It was exhilarating. 

“Look at you. Look at how you give in to me, it makes me fucking crazy.” He squeezed harder. “You drive me fucking crazy. I have dreamt about fucking you for so long. So many nights, having to stroke my cock imagining it was your mouth instead, you have no idea how badly I need you. How entirely and completely yours I am. You own me. My soul and my mind. It’s only fair I own your body.”

The hand that wasn’t around your throat went to his loincloth, that he removed skilfully, letting it drop to the ground around him. Your eyes fluttered open to take him in, his glorious body and that magnificent cock, that was even bigger that you ever dreamt, and you struggled to gulp in the position you were currently in. Your pussy clenched fully at the sight, and you were drooling now, saliva pooling around your mouth that you licked off like a kitty looking at her favourite meal. His fist wrapped around the girth of his cock and he started pumping himself, and you were close to being done again just at the sight, never in your life seeing anything more sensual, more erotic. You needed him inside of you now. 

“Fuck, please, Neteyam. I need you in me.”

“I know, Atan. I need to be in you. I need to feel you milking me, like the good girl I know you are.”

With a couple more strokes, he lined himself at your entrance and slowly, deliberately, agonisingly pushing in, one inch at a time, stretching you deliciously, fully until he bottommed out, and you could feel him hitting your cervix, you could see his bulge in your lower abdomen. It drove you to the point of madness. 

Your hand went to his ass, trying to push him even further in, despite not thinking it was actually possible for him to go anywhere else, but it was still not enough, never enough. 

He removed your hand and gathered both of them and pushed them above your head, pining them to the ground with enough force that you couldn’t move them anymore. 

“No, Atan. You don’t get to dictate this. We go at my speed.” And with those words, he started rutting into you brutally, giving you no time to adjust to him or to the pace. It was rough and wild and out of control, everything you have ever desired in your darkest, best fantasies. It was so dirty, so wrong it made your insides squirm in pleasure, in uninhibited bliss. 

He maintained his pace for so long it was enough to steal two more orgasms from you. You were on the verge of tears, now, so overstimulated you didn’t know if you were feeling pleasure or pain anymore, but you didn’t care, you wanted more, always more of this, more of him. 

“Fuck, Atan, I can feel you squeezing me again. You think you can give me one more?” You nodded weekly, trying to match his ruthless pace.

“I want to come in this pretty pussy. You want me to fill you up, Atan?” You could only moan at the words, unable to formulate any coherent thoughts or sentences, anymore. You were way past that. Your breath quickened rapidly and you knew you were really close, and he could feel you too.

“Yeah, that’s right baby, come all over my cock. I want to feel you come undone.” Those words were enough to rip another explosive orgasm out of you, and your clenching milked his cock dry, feeling thick spurts of cum fill you up, painting your pink walls white. 

He collapsed on top of you with a thud, still buried deep in you, and you couldn’t help laugh exhilaratingly at his reaction, at what just happened, at the fact his was all real, not just an out-of-reach fantasy. 

Eventually, he rolled from on top of you and stretched out an arm for you to cuddle up to him, which you did, feeling grateful for every moment, grateful for the intimacy. 

You were both still panting, still recuperating and you lay in his arms in peaceful bliss, trying to catch your breath. 

“Thank you.” You said playfully, drawing circles on his chest. 

“What for?”

“For being an even better lay than I always imagined you to be in my dreams. Although I’ll find it hard ever being a productive member of this clan again going forward.” 

He threw his head back and laughed, and the sound filled the forest and your heart, so relieved to be able to hear it again, so immensely grateful to get to experience these feelings in your life, that didn’t end prematurely no matter how many bad decisions you have made.

“You’re very welcome, Atan.” 

You peered up at him bashfully, and you knew then you did at least one thing right in this life. 

You fell asleep in his arms, and woke up in the link room, wide smile on your face. Max was waiting for you, and he returned your smile when he saw how happy you were.

“You look happy.” 

“It’s just been a good day.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet.” He looked at you playfully. “Do me and Norm have to give you the talk?”

“Shut up, Max. In a completely unrelated subject, though, can I have some birth control from the medical ward, please?” 

Your body was weak, and you needed a while to adjust to being back here after a whole day in your other body, soon to be your only body. You felt weightless, despite the pain, so happy and so in love. Your knees were weak from the memories, and you felt a bit empty at the lack of touch, craving him again, even though he’s taken so many orgasms from you, you knew you were going to be sore walking back to the village. 

You went looking for Norm, who was already waiting for you in the medical ward, ready to give you a new dose of the injection and take some blood to see how everything is looking. 

“It was a beautiful ceremony last night. Did you enjoy yourself?”

“Yeah, definitely did. It was incredible, I have never felt anything like it before.”

“Are you ready for tonight?”

“I think I am. I opened the drawer, little by little, Norm. I think it’s time. I am ready to take my place amongst the people, I am ready for my body to belong, I am ready to not have to worry that this virus will turn around and kill me at any point. My mum and dad both sacrificed so much for me to have a chance at a better life. You guys sacrificed so much. You’re like my guardian angels. I owe you so much, and I am so sorry about how I acted. I hope you can forgive me.”

“Will you still come by and hang out once in a while when you’re not busy riding your ikrans and being an overall badass?”

“Always, Norm. I am still me, I am still a scientist at heart, and I am still human. Maybe my body won’t be, but I will also have my mum and dad, you and Max, a whole history and heritage that I don’t want to rid myself of.” 

“Good. Then all’s forgiven, Ace. I am sorry too, for not telling you about Neteyam. It just didn’t feel like my secret to share.” 

“I understand.” You got up after he injected you with the treatment and hugged him tightly, grateful for this man who is your family just as much as your mum and the Sullys are. 

After resting, eating and taking a nap, you did your dialysis session for the day, and although loopy, you hopped in your Avatar body, still a couple of things you wanted to take care of before the transfer. 

To your surprise, you woke up in your tent, a small blanket covering you. You smiled, realising Neteyam must have carried you back in the morning. He even put your clothes back on. You blushed at the need that immediately overwhelmed your body, and tried to calm yourself as there were more pressing matters at hand. 

You made your way to the Sully tent, and heard Neytiri and Mo’at talking. Good, two of the people you were looking for. 

“Mai’te! How are you feeling?”

“I feel great, sa’nok (mother). Thank you for last night, it was beautiful.” Neytiri brought her hand to her mouth in slight shock at your new name for her. She was so happy, it all felt complete now, after all this time. 

You took her free hand in yours as well as one of Mo’at’s, and looked at them seriously, intently. 

“I want to ask for your permission for the transfer. I realise a lot of talk has happened, done when I was a human, when I was sick. But I am not sick anymore. I don’t want you to do it because you are worried I will die. I want to be sure, I want you to be sure, that you want me as a Na’vi forever. That you are comfortable with me becoming my Avatar for life. I will not do it, if you aren’t. This means so much for me, and I know I have been a coward, for so long, but I am ready now. I am standing here in front of you, and I am finally ready, to be one of the people, to be in this body, to be your daughter. I just hope I’m not too late.” 

They both looked at each other, and smiled, and looked back at you lovingly.

“Mai’te, we have waited for you all of our lives. You are the missing piece in this world, in our world. You brought forth a cure for an illness that has plagued the Na’vi for years and years. There is nothing we would love more than for you to be Na’vi. And there will be no better future Tsa’hik.” 

Your eyes widened at Mo’at’s words, at the consent not only to join the clan, this family, but to do so as Neteyam’s mate, as the future spiritual leader of the Omaticaya. 

“I won’t let you down.” You hugged both of them, tears in your eyes. 

You eventually made your way out of the tent and looked for the only other person you had to talk to before this was all done. Neytiri told you where he could be, so you looked there first. Sure enough, you found Lo’ak deep in thought up a tree, above everyone else, and you climbed easily and joined him. He was startled by you, but he composed himself quickly and gave you a look that you couldn’t quite place. You could tell he had conflicting feelings, happy on one hand to not have lost you in one way, sad that he did lose you in others. 

“Hey.” He was curt, and didn’t look at you, and a twinge of hurt settled in your chest. You had to make this right. 

“Hey, you. Scooch.” He moved slightly so you could fit with him on the branch, which was more than wide enough to accommodate both of you. 

“Lo’ak… please talk to me? I can’t stand the thought that you hate me. You’re my best friend. Please?” 

“Is it true?”

“Is what true?” 

“I saw you leaving with Neteyam last night, after the ceremony.”

You cringed a little, the thought of having this particular conversation with him close to unbearable.

“Yes, it’s true.” 

Pain flashed across his face and you saw a tear, just one small tear, fall down his face. You reached to wipe it off, but he beat you to it, so you awkwardly let your hand drop. 

“I’m sorry, Lo’ak. I’m so so sorry. But I have loved your brother my whole life. My whole life, ever since I was born, he was there. And I love you too, I love you so so much, but we wouldn’t be right together. You are the best guy in the world, and I am not even close to being worthy of you. Neteyam gets me. He gets the darkest side of me, he knows my darkest, worst secrets, he has been with me through some of my most traumatic moments. It’s never been that it’s not you. It’s just that it can’t be anyone else. My whole life, it was always going to be just him.”

“You are my best friend, and I will always be here for you. You will never lose me. You will never get rid of me. I found a season of Friends on my mum’s directory that I’m pretty sure we’ve never seen. I can’t do that with anyone else.”

“I know you are scared, and I think that’s why you asked me. Not because you think I’m the woman you want to grow old with, but because you’re scared that no one else will see you the way I do. And you’re wrong, Lo’ak. Everyone will see in time that you are the best person in the world. You are incredible. And so many girls will be falling at your feet soon, you will be angry at yourself for ever pining over someone like me. I know you are scared, but I am not going anywhere. Can you please forgive me?” 

He turned and looked at you for a long time, intensely searching your face, maybe for a sign that you were lying, or exaggerating, but he couldn’t find any, as he eventually dropped his gaze and smirked playfully. 

“Do you really think girls will be falling at my feet?” 

“Yes, I really really do. You are a catch, mister.” 

He rolled his eyes dramatically and let out an exasperated sigh.

“Well then, I have to forgive you.” You both laughed and your back pressed against the bark of the tree and you stretched your legs to sit in his lap. 

“Now, about that season of Friends…” 

You returned to your human form in the afternoon, and slowly started packing your life away, ready to relinquish this room, once your mothers, with deep sadness in your heart. You will all have to relocate from tomorrow, so you will probably not be back here except to help everyone else evacuate and move all the equipment. You’ll never be back here, you realised with a deep sigh. So many memories, so many bad ones, but so many good ones too, this place was your safe place, your little piece of heaven, despite all the hell you went through in it. As you packed all of your books and trinkets you collected in time, you found yourself tracing your fingers over every surface, trying to commit it to memory. The coffee stain on your desk that was made when Neteyam spilled your mug with his tail without meaning to. The scratches on one of the drawers from all the times you pulled on it with your finger, since the latch was a little broken and hard to open. The wear and tear from your ass print on the chair that you spent inordinate amounts of hours in, be it analysing data or watching shows, or reading with your feet carelessly stretched on the desk. You moved on to your bed, that you sat on, and you sighed at the thought of never being able to sleep on a bed again. You will miss the comfort of the mattress and the sheets, and the space to really spread out however much you wanted, looking like a little starfish every time Norm woke you up in the mornings and his subsequent laughter at your ridiculous poses. 

It took a while, but you were done about an hour before eclipse. Neteyam knocked on your door, with eyes slightly widened at the state of the now empty room. 

“I’ve never seen this place like this. It looks so barren without your touch.” 

You sighed and tugged at the insides of your mouth with your teeth. “Yeah, it does.”

“Any regrets?” You turned around to face him, giving him a small reassuring smile and taking his hand in yours, the size difference always a stark contrast compared to your Avatar body. 

“Never.” You eyed the bed playfully and raised an eyebrow, feigning timidity. “We still have some time… what could we possibly do to fill it, huh?” 

He looked at you, and you could tell he was turned on out of his mind, but also gave you a reserved look. “We can’t… not like this, I will hurt you.”

“I don’t think you realise you’re not making the point you think you are.”

He closed the door behind him with his tail and stalked towards you. “Fuck, you will be the death of me, Atan.” 

You made your way to the village a little after eclipse, and everyone was following you. All the humans, Norm and the other Avatars and Neteyam, who was carrying you on his back like you were his little backpack. You were flushed and a little disheveled from earlier, purple marks all over your body, but it didn’t matter. Your hours in this body were limited. In your back pocket of your shorts you had a box of birth control pills that Norm gave to you as you and Neteyam made it out of the room. You laughed at his reaction and yours, both of you awkward and embarrassed to have to address it whatsoever. You placed your head on Neteyam’s shoulder, peering up at the sky, like you used to do when you were little. The village was busy and roaring, everyone packing their lives up for the move tomorrow. People looked at you as you passed by, unfamiliar with your human form clinging to the future Olo’eyktan’s back. Jake and the rest of the family met you at the big bonfire. 

“Heads up, everyone. It’s time!” You smiled, and looked next to him on the ground, where your Avatar body lay motionless and you had to take a second to take this all thing in, the weight of what you were about to do hitting you full force. You started breathing in deep, shallow breaths, and you felt Neteyam’s hands running up and down your thigh in a calming motion. 

“You’ve got this. We’re all here for you.” You reached over and pecked his neck, in gratitude. 

Everybody in the village, all the Na’vi were making their ways through the forest towards Vitraya Ramunong - they would all partake in the ritual. Neteyam was nervous, out of his mind with worry and fear, although he didn’t want to impart that to you, so he carried you gently, trying to be strong, as he was sure your mind was also laced with concerns. What if you didn’t come back? Neteyam quickly pushed the thought out of his mind and cursed it for making him think about such things, making his heart constrict in his chest in pain at the mere thought. Of course you would make it. A part of him was also excited about the ritual. It would be the first time anyone under 19 would get to see it, to experience it, it was only the third time it would have ever been performed. It was a powerful ritual, hence why they needed everyone. 

The tree was as breathtaking as it always has been, and Neteyam had to inhale deeper to accommodate for the deep charge of the atmosphere, for the thickness of the air. He heard the ancestor’s voices, buzzing quietly all around him. As soon as you reached the natural platform on which the tree resided, Neteyam put you down next to his family and tried to not think of all the images flashing across his mind’s eye of all the unholy things you two did last night right in this spot. His grandma was giving out orders about where to place your Avatar. 

“Are you ready?” Said Mo’at, in her usual no-nonsense fashion.You gulped loudly, and Neteyam couldn’t help wince. Everybody was on the edge. 

“Yes, I think I am.” He saw you turn around to face him and the rest of the family, as well as Spider, Norm and Max. 

“This is it, I guess.” You grabbed his mother and youngest sister’s hands in yours, and squeezed, a small tear falling down your face. 

“I love you, guys. Thank you for everything all of you have done for me. I am so excited to join this clan and your family, forever.”

Neteyam watched as you lay on the ground, naked except for some leaves covering you. He was going to miss you, he realises. This body is the only one he’s known you as for 18 years. He’s spent so may days and nights with you, with this small person who had so much in her, so much beauty and intelligence, so much hurt and pain, so much personality, so much fierceness and grit and so much care and empathy, he didn’t know where it could all fit in such a tiny body. You’ve grown up together, a human and a Na’vi, learning so much from each other, adapting together to the world around you and to each other’s mind and soul. He was going to miss this body, the body he fell in love with, the toothy grin and wild eyes so unlike anything he’s ever seen, your beauty marks that he used to trace with his finger and eyes.. and mouth, as of a few hours ago. You were everything, and have always been regardless of your difference in species, and colour, and height. He mourned a little, he realised, for the you you’re leaving behind, but was also incredibly thrilled to have you as one of the people, as his mate, mother of his children, Tsa’hik, for the rest of his life. 

He hovered over you the whole ritual, unnerved at the way the tendrils were emerging from the ground and slowly enveloping you, until there was almost no bare skin left to see. His skin was covered in goosebumps at the experience, as the chorus of people asking Eywa to grant you life in a new body, undulating their bodies in unison, and his grandma’s words. It was unlike anything he’s every experienced. 

Tìng mikyun ayoheru rutxe, ma Nawma Sa'nok. (Hear us please, Great Mother)

Pori tireati, munge mì nga (Take this spirit into you)

Srung si poeru, ma Eywa (Eywa, help her)

Ulte tìng ayoer nì'eyng hu ngeyä ya (And breathe her back to us)

Srung si poeru, ma Eywa (Eywa, help her)

Tivìran po ayoekip (Let her walk among us)

Na Na'viyä hapxì! (As one of The People!)

Srung si poeru, ma Eywa (Eywa, help her)

Eventually, the ritual came to an end when Mo’at screamed for everybody to stop. Neteyam reached over to your face, and removed your mask, kissing your cheeks and your hands, and saying a quiet “I love you” before he moved on, anxiously waiting to see if you would open your eyes. He let out a panted breath as you did, smiling tiredly at the family who was now jumping on you, making you choke slightly. 

You laughed and his eyes found yours in the manic scene unfolding in front of him. You smiled lovingly and reached out a hand for him to grab. 

“Hi.” 

“Hi, Atan. It’s good to see you.”

You were sad as you were carrying your body, you tiny human body in your arms, and lowering it in the ground next to the Home Tree. You saw your family place a flower each in the little cove where you now lay, and you carefully redirected an Atokirina towards it, and watched as it landed on you, making its home in the little gap made by your foetal position. 

You will miss this body, and all the memories you made in it. You will miss looking in the mirror and seeing your mother’s eyes and hair, you will miss being able to play her guitar. This body, however tiny and weak, was your home for 18 years, and it has stood by you no matter how many times you treated it badly or betrayed it. It kept you alive in a world that could kill you in an instant, and you were sorry to have to leave it behind. 

“Thank you. Thank you, mum and dad, for giving me life and gifting me this body. Thank you for taking care of me, I know it wasn’t easy to keep up with this messy mind. Thank you.” 

You turned around and fixed your gaze on your mate, the love of your life, the one that made it all bearable, and when met with his dazzling warm smile and his touch that set your soul ablaze, you couldn’t help be excited at the adventures that lay ahead of you, that you will always brave together. 

-the end-

EPILOGUE

The man felt weak and dizzy, the entire room spinning and making him well nauseous. He didn’t know what was happening, what any of this was. He saw a bright light flashing across his eyes and he groaned in pain and annoyance at the way it was making his vision spotty. He grasped the hand of whoever it was that was doing this to him, and he was relieved when it stopped. It took him a long time to adjust to his surroundings, and was met with shock when realising he was in some sort of medical ward, surrounded by people in white coats. His gaze fixated on his hand, that was still wrapped around someone’s wrist, and couldn’t understand what he was seeing in front of him. Blue. A blue striped hand, that supposedly belonged to him. 

“Captain, Captain Barlowe, can you hear me? You’re ok, you’re just disorientated. It’s gonna take a while to settle your mind, so take you time.” 

He raised assertively from the bed he was laying on and made his way to the reflective windows all around him. He stood there, still, just taking it all in, finding it hard to understand, to process what was clearly displayed in front of the mirror. His body, in an Avatar. 

“Captain Barlowe, due to your outstanding military record and previous acquiescence with this project, you have been chosen as one of the select few to carry out a special op on Pandora. You will be briefed shortly, but right now we have to make sure everything is in order.” 

“I’ll be damned.” 

For everyone who’s made it this far, I am so excited to announce the sequel series, The Archer, that will tackle all of the events of the Way of Water x coming to you soon 💕💕

Tag list (thank you thank you thank you x): @nuhteyam @eywas-heir @fanboyluvr @mashiromochi @puffb4ll @sassy-persona @simp4ff @mommyneytiri @inomoikawa @jackiehollanderr @jaysarchiv3 @meivap @dakotali @hlhl99 @eskamybeloved @erenjaegerwifee @winchestertitties @mommyneytiri @ultimatebluff @elizarikaallen @yeosxxx @ssc7514 @lolcaca @jackiehollanderr @bunnyrose01 @therealbloom @neteyams-queue @r1dd1kulus @whore4neteyam

@kikookii @iliyoo @velvetskies @rebeccao03 @im-in-a-pansexual-panik

[eggingtontoast]

Hi there! I have not interacted much in the Hatchetfield fandom, but I've talked endlessly about Hatchetfield in the @blinkysrewatchparty discord server. My name is Egg and I have a problem. I'm obsessed with a side character. A side character named Karen Chasity.

Below is most of the contents of what is a five page document about how I interpret her as a character. A lot of it is headcanon, because we simply don't have enough information about her. Again, I have a problem. Enjoy.

My Karen Chasity Problem: How I approach Karen as a character. (SFW EDITION kinda.)

[Disclaimer: Within this document I discuss Karen’s interaction with characters such as Girl Jeri(from now on referred to as Jeri), Detective Shapiro (NPMD), and Doug(Mariah’s cop from TGWDLM). At the time of writing, I’ve written Karen in ships with these three, so there will be mention of each briefly, though it is not the main focus.]

Karen's main theme is first and foremost restraint.

To lesser extent there is also repression and control.

 She is the most uptight/serious of all the Chasity household. (As evidenced in NPMD, she does not make jokes like Mark, nor does she fly off the handle like Grace) 

This is not to say she is completely stone faced, she does have instances where she emotes quite a bit, but (in my opinion) it feels exaggerated for comedic effect (because it's a comedy musical/scene where her dang daughter is breaking apart)

Her conversation with just Mark about her concerns with Grace not acting her usual self says a lot here

She is obviously someone who cares for her loved ones, though she may not bring up those concerns with the person in question. She is caring, in a quiet way. In NPMD there is a time skip between Dirty Girl to Max's death to Grace waking up after Richie's death. We know that Grace has been acting off for at least that amount of time. This gives Karen a time frame to notice that change in behavior.

NPMD is a blip in the rest of their lives, time wise. I’m interested in the Karen Chasity that isn’t worrying over her daughter, the Karen Chasity that isn’t rife with paranoia during a townwide lockdown.

Karen’s secondary theme is devotion.

She is literally religious.

There is an argument for this if we do take into account the dinner scene with the Chasity household and how she nods along with Mark talking about the Holy Ghost, as well as how quick she checks Grace’s temperature. This is all also said by the above section. 

While I choose not to use a character’s… characterization in musical numbers too much, it’s clear that Karen, without her restraint (In Hatchet Town), still cares deeply about her loved ones. Sure, she may be rife with paranoia in that song but she still emphasizes the safety of the children in her part. She still cares, even if in that song it’s far too much.

She gives to others far more than she gets back.

Maybe this entire thing is rendered moot by the above section. This isn’t a formal document, fuck it.

Karen's slight mid-west(?) accent popping out when she talks to Grace

This is more prominent when she tells Grace she's gonna be late to being early for school (emphasis on "oo" noises, elongation and shortening of syllables. Monophthongal [e:] and [o:] present in both minnesota and michigan among other places) 

It’s probably because Hatchetfield is placed in Michigan, but no one else does this in the Hatchetfield universe. It could be another thing played up for comedy? I choose to see this as Karen playing up her maternal role. I could headcanon this as her drawing from her own mother? 

If we go with this, this could reference back to the headcanon/idea of “Karen’s family was a big influence on herself and despite wanting to move away from that connection, Karen is someone very much from her background.”

The accent itself makes her sound different than from the initial Chasity household scene, maybe it’s just nothing idk. 

“...beautiful old house” particularly has her pronouncing the “o” in old and house as more round and wide instead of that tighter “o” later on when she says “school”

Potentially trans-atlantic accent during first Chasity scene in NPMD (the fuck am I saying)

Mark kinda does this too, could be just vocal direction being older film for that more “classic nuclear family” feel

Consistently speaks kind of sing-songy in the show, though I don’t prescribe to that being her natural speaking tone.

(quick aside: you could probably replace Curt and Kim with muppet versions of themselves as the Chasitys and it wouldn’t change anything about the show, it would be funny)

Okay let’s move on from the fucking voice thing

We know very little about the Chasitys aside from Grace, but that’s because she’s appeared the most out of all of them. 

Therefore, I am playing fast and loose with how I characterize Karen.

I write her as a queer woman, who has been closeted for a very long time.

So Karen is restrained. 

An entire theme with the Chasitys is their repression due to religion. It’s not hard to simply write any of them as extremely closeted because of this. 

Therefore, Karen is uptight. 

The stressors of maintaining the image of a heterosexual, pure, Christian woman on a day to day basis would grate on anyone, especially if they are queer. Any singular slip up in a community like a church the Chasitys go to, could mean social death. 

Karen’s humor is subtle.

She doesn’t outwardly make jokes like Mark, or has unhinged, comedic reactions like Grace. If anything, Karen is the straight man in the comedy of the Chasity household. She is the baseline Mark and Grace work off of, stable and secure.

When writing Karen I tend to make her a little more deadpan than canon. She is such an over the top character in NPMD, it’s hard for me to write that in a believable way. I tend to make characters a little more grounded. If a musical is loud and bright, I’m writing them in a stage play, or a movie.

Because of this, I’m taking that one Smokey the Bear line from Abstinence Camp and saying Karen said that in the most deadpan voice that Grace simply did not realize it was a joke.

Karen has body language tells

We see her wringing her hands together as she walks toward Mark in NPMD, expressing her concern for Grace.

Furthermore, she nods quietly and hums when listening to others(Chasity dinner table conversation, Grace bedroom conversation, etc.)

I like to imagine that while she might be “playing a role” as a mother/church woman/pristine Chasity she still exemplifies some of these bodily tells. Just in a more restrained way. She pulls toward her own body instead of gesturing outward. In NPMD she leans and curls in on herself, to present more demure. 

In my own writing, I contrast this with how she acts outside of the context of her church, or with Grace. Because I see her and Mark as mutual beards, as best friends, she is able to drop that facade of a demure housewife and stand straighter(lol) and taller. Her shoulders are not hunched in on themselves, they are pushed back. What we see in NPMD is a role she plays in her day to day, but is not necessarily her authentic self.

Again this is like heavy headcanon and this is also the SFW version of the document sorry guys you have to be at least 18 to get the full context lmao tough shit

Karen is someone who says a lot with her hands(and to an extent, her eyes), Even as someone who may not gesture overtly. She holds them together, points, accents her speech with them. Karen's hands are the way she interacts with the world when she doesn't verbally talk much.

Karen is controlling.

Maybe this feels a little obvious. She is controlling with herself and how she presents herself. She is caught in a web of her own making, and this can extend to who she associates herself with. If this becomes too much it’s horribly unhealthy. It is the fear of her truths coming out that keep her from going too far. 

This manifests with how she approaches Jeri at first, and how she starts making packed lunches for Doug and Shapiro. It’s a sliding scale of when control is acceptable. 

As well as volunteering for church business and around town. Karen is a busy woman because if she is left idle she doesn’t know what else to do. She does not know how to relax.

Karen is afraid.

Her repression and restraint stem from the fear of ostracization. From her church, her community, and her own family. 

While I’m operating on the idea of her and Mark being mutual beards (their marriage being a lavender one) I imagine she is afraid of the way Grace would react if she found out her mother -someone whom Grace obviously looks toward for guidance and help- is queer.

The same goes for her church. She’s presented herself as a heterosexual woman for so long (due to her and Mark’s safety as two queer people coming from conservative families) that she is stuck in that role. She immerses herself in aforementioned church activities and volunteer work to maintain that label, and that level of safety.

[thestobingirlie]

the thing that really gets me w having steve say that he was a shitty bf is the implication that nancy was a good gf when, from everything we saw in s2 and even excluding anything directly to do w jonathan, she absolutely was not. like steve could have been more sensitive to nancy's grief but if we give nancy some level of grace bc of her trauma then that also extends to steve imo - and despite that he still went to dinner every week w barb's parents for nancy, noticed she was upset in the library and took her somewhere private to check on her, tried to keep her safe/thinking rationally when she starts talking about violating the NDA to tell ppl about barb, made sure jonathan would take her home when he was too upset to, and then told her it was okay for her and jonathan to be together w no fighting or bitterness despite how hurt he was. on nancy's side, she was excited about the party (spending time on the costumes, trying to encourage jonathan to come) then once they're there starts lashing out at steve. like he's literally getting harassed by billy and tommy and she just rolls her eyes then walks away, when steve is concerned about how much she's drinking she drinks more to spite him and makes that comment about being normal teenagers like he wanted, tells him that they killed barb, calls him and their relationship bullshit, says she doesn't love him, and then when he's obviously upset the next day and wants some kind of reassurance she just laughs (obv it was an awkward, doesn't know what to say kind of laugh but still) and never ends up apologizing. and all that excluding anything directly related to jonathan/the cheating.

i couldn’t have said it better myself.

people do tend to forgive a lot of nancy’s mistakes with the fact that she is traumatised, and yet barely anyone is willing to do the same for steve.

he is one of the few characters (i think the only other one is lucas, though lucas tells max everything so he’s not that scared lol) we see on screen that are terrified of the government. he is overly aware and paranoid about the fact that the government could literally kill them if they wanted to. i mean, he’s literally seen how willing they are to cover up a death! nancy mentions barb’s death and he’s immediately closing the blinds like he’s worried people are watching them. i think in relation to barb, it is clear that steve is doing as much as he can, he’s just scared.

and yeah, mostly everything about that party pisses me off. nancy doesn’t care that her boyfriend is getting bullied, and gets drunk literally to spite him. and the next day, steve is begging her to tell him she loves him, and she just laughs and said ‘seriously?’ like?? that’s just not good girlfriend material, and it is the trauma, she just doesn’t have the emotional maturity to be in a relationship. but that’s an explanation and not an excuse, which is why i so hope we actually get steve and nancy having a conversation about their relationship next season, with nancy acknowledging her own faults and not just letting steve take all the credit lol

and yeah, don’t even get me started on nancy and jonathan, which, even ignoring the cheating, is not a good relationship

[wench-and-jezebel]

Dark Angel Reaction: 411 on the DL

Jezebel (@typicalopposite) reacts [with occasional asides by Wench (@scripted-downfall)]

I don’t sleep much 🥴🥴 They are human, woman.  They need sleep

Jesus, glad I’m not epileptic [I didn't see a warning, that's for sure]

Le gasp COPS

Asssss hole coppps

["how's a girl supposed to get home?" I get the actually point she was making, but also... Chick, you're a supersoldier.  Figure it out fjsksks] 

I still maintain the twirling baby is odd  [You haven’t come to love the revolving baby yet?]

[TONY! ...Wait :)]

BRUH.  I LOOKED DOWN RIGHT WHEN HE PULLED OUT THE SANDWICH.  IT DIDN’T LOOK LIKE A SANDWICH  [That's called a baguette, dear, but also.  Awkward.  Also, I thought you were "bruh"ing because of the button itself dhsjsk]

Now you can see why seeing him play stoic serious was odd  [‘Tis true.  He's got some snark, but nowhere near the same]

I’m pretty sure Tony has an ex wife too iirc  [Huh]

Not his chi

Oooof.  Marital issues.  I thought she was being rude at first, like "you were the last I was thinking of", but I see it’s not

Gah damn that a lot a money  [Yup. That's a lot now, much less in this universe.  But it does bear mentioning: a motorbike called Nirvana seems awesome]  Those fucking places suck.  I had a car impounded after a wreck  [Damn]

[Wdym, you let everything slide off you like water?  No, you don't, Max; you bitch about everything]  😂😂😂😂

“I hear ya sista but you don’t hear me”

Wait, is herbal gay?  I’m relistening to that lol

No I misheard.  He said my woman; I thought he said my ol’ man.  I was like wooooot

[She sounds so whiny too, just saying.  Like, I get the point, and I'd agree, but also.  "I don't want a used bike, wah"]

Does Normal ever smile before Alec lol  [No.]  ☠️☠️☠️

A SMILE  [Okay, that was a half smile, but like.]  well  [Not the same]  Smilette

Suspicious blonde boy look like suspicious blonde kid.  Watch Sam be Zach or one of them

Can you scan the barcodes?

“It’s like opening up the paper and seeing my panties”  I don’t think that would be the same ma’am

Lintlicker

[Oh, look, this time Max is the jealous one]

[His hair is so spiky]

What did she say?  “Lookey?”  [It was whatever nickname Valerie used on the phone.  Loogey, is my guess]  W-why is that his nickname  [Idk, my dear]

And he can’t turn it off ☠️☠️☠️

Jealous Max ☠️☠️

If I was him I would run over her damn toes

[Why do so many of these episodes have the premise "Max needs x amount of money before y person leaves the state and has to do z bad thing to get it.”]  Right? 😂😂😂  [We’ve got this one, then “Proof of Purchase,” then “Borrowed Time.”  And that’s just off the top of my head.]

So now she needs 18000

Is that Taika?  [I WONDERED THAT!  I've been wondering that for days] That is not taika  Lol  [Djdjsjsksk Good to know]  Boooo I was excited

😂😂☠️☠️ love the speech  [Fjjsksks I love Herbal]  Sameeee

Wait did herbal leave?  Like, leave leave?  [He's allegedly been fired, but idk if it lasts] Ahh, I see  [Max has been fired like 50 times]

[Okay, Normal is being a bit suspicious with.  Sam.]  ☠️☠️☠️☠️

Cheer up!

Oooooop Jealoussss  [Accurate]

[Not quiet, not sweet, etc.  But also, sweeter than Max]  Nice…er than you bitch

“Great body”  😂☠️☠️☠️☠️

["by the grace of God" fjdjksksk]

Oh no she didn’t just pop up on them like that!  Howwwww rudeeeeee

– – –

Here, Wench’s Internet decided to go out, so her responses were done after the fact and blended in subsequently.  Thus, this is also true for anything Jezebel responded to her with.

– – –

Oooooo! Angryyyy Max

Oh nooooo, his womannnnn.  Fuck Winston! 

“Wiiinston!  *shakes head*”  I love Herbal!

A dog!  [Makes sense it’d growl given her feline genes, but not quite clear on how/why it stopped]  ☠️☠️☠️ that’s what I thought

BRUH ☠️ all that and the box only had $2  [I do have to ask a) why tf she thought there’d be much money in the unsecured box there and b) why she didn’t steal the $2, but oh, well.]

Welp, impound man: you have been bamboozled

Clint linklicker ‘sigh’  [That guy working under him looks like Elias from Person of Interest.]

[“We’ll be there” Bro, you’ve been there every time she showed up in the past.  You just can't catch her because you… suck.]  Like.  I just can’t even 😂😂😂

[“That young man is worth the rest of you bums put together” Sir, your worship is showing again.  I swear, he says that exact same sentence about Alec.  I’m noticing a trend.]

So what is this, post apocalyptic Amazon?  I’ve been meaning to ask that this whole show  [You mean Jam Pony?]  Ye  [Yeah, basically.  It's a delivery service. Not really a corporation though.]

Like I get them being angry but they don’t have to be mean to dumb blonde man  Sammy boy is struggling to ride a bike, friend

She stuffed gum in the money hole

“A butterfly farted in India”  ☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️

– – –

An update on Wench’s adventures with Internet:

Google search: "how do you connect to wifi"

Google answer: "go to this link"

Link: "this link won't work in chrome; go to this safari link for help"

The Safari link in question: "sorry, you're not connected to the internet"

Wench: WTAF, HOLY HELL, OH MY FREAKING GOODNESS, JUST- @K$#$*&@(RJ#&$R)(#$*(*@)(*@$)(@$

Jezebel: ☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️

– – –

Long-after-midpoint reaction:

Well, first I felt a little pity for Max cause they stole her bike, and then the guy’s potentially scamming her.  I’m guessing he’s gonna get dead, btw, if he’s going against Lintlicker.  (Which is a saved word in my phone now lol)

But her little hissy fit over Logan’s ex… Hmph.  Like. WOMAN.  Either you want him or you don’t.  (Which is so much like Ziva you will seeee omg).

Also HERBAL! Buddy! Kick Winston and ya woman out! That’s not good!

And then there’s Ken doll. ☠️☠️ who seems like discount Alec even though Alec isn’t even on yet, just because he has Normal drooling over him

– – –

WHY YOU SO MEAN TO THE DUMB BLONDE BOYYYY

“Weeenston”

Oh nooooo, the sunburn  [He looks. Orange.]

Oh nooo x2 the ring mark

Yussssss the double crossing.  She seemed so nice.

They aren’t even really kissing wtf is this ☠️☠️  They are mouthing the air around each other’s mouths  ☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️

Well.  Guy (Vogelsang) got dead

[Ma’am does not understand subtlety; she legit stares, frightened, at the Manticore guys, then suspiciously runs away.  THEY LOOK FOR THAT KINDA THING.]

[“Vogelsang was dead and Lydecker was there; that’s enough for me” Ma’am, wot. Illogic at its finest.]

He’s fine

Have you ever been able to? Lol

Oh shit that’s gonna be a thing (her telling about the ex)

WHATTTTTT DID I SAY?  I CALLED IT 

Now dumb blonde is less dumb ☠️☠️☠️  I love it

Did he know she was her?  [idk, I’ll let you know when I rewatch]

What is that run?  ☠️☠️☠️☠️

Oh he did know [Ah, I see]

He be a mooooordererrrrr

His whole personality is different it’s strange

Bruh who are you ☠️

“That’s an order”  Why are y’all even free if your gonna be ordering people around  [That’s what I’m freaking saying, thank you]

Don’t kiss her

Pls don’t kiss her

[That scene was uncomfortableeeeee.  Even without “Some Assembly Required” as a primer.]

And cue angry Tony.  I mean, Logan.

Why he give her money????  WHY DID HE GIVE HER THE MONEY?!?!?!?!  THROW HER OUT THE WINDOW 

“It wasn’t my idea.  I just executed it.”  Why’d he give her the mooooooney!???!!!

He’s too niceeeee

Oooof  [Buddy angsting at the window, staring out at the rain like a regular Heathcliffe]

Herbal put Weenston out.  I love it

Why is she getting the third degree for being honest?

Buddy, that’s not how you say “you should go give Logan some loving”

HES STILL SITTING AT THE WINDOW, THE POOR BUDDY  😂😂😂😂😂

Did she say she “hooked up” with Zach?  Ma’am, he touched your chin and that was toooo much

THIS IS NOT GIVING LOGAN LOVE, MAAM.  soooo very ruuuuudeeeeee

Okay, now y’all kiss

“In the guest room,” he says.  That’s code for something

This is the.  WEIRDEST.  Talk.  [Well, at least they both talk circuitously.]

AND DONE

– – –

Jezebel: I swear I’m vibing during my midpoint and I’m confused by the end.  Each ep.  I think it’s cause usually the big problem gets solved but opens a new one.  Which I mean yeah that’s how shows go from ep to ep. But idk this feels like too much. Almost like the ending shouldn’t be the ending but like a mid or 3/4 point. Idk.  I still like it, though. Wayyyy more than I intended to

Wench: For what it’s worth, season 2 kinda resolves that, imo.  Or at least to my recollection.  The main episodes I remember reach natural conclusions.  

Jezebel: 🙂 good!

Wench: But they’re also a bit more standalone in general.  s1 is about her quest to find her siblings; s2 is about Manticore folks being out and about in general.  There’s a bit of an arc, but not as much of one.  If that makes sense?

Jezebel: Ahhh it does 🙂

Wench: My favorite eps are pretty standalone, at least.  “The Berrisford Agenda” is one of my beloved episodes (Alec-centric) and it’s very compact.

Jezebel: Wait, is Ben one of the ones that got away or is he her actual brother?

Wench: He’s one of her siblings.  One of the kids who escaped in ‘09.  With Max.  Part of her unit.

Jezebel: Ahhhhhh! See this whole time I thought he was just like another kid her mom had that she finds and, like, gets killed in the crossfire

Wench: Nah, he and Alec got twinned.  Only the twins are at all biologically related, and that’s not them usually them being related, per se; it’s usually cloning or something.  And Ben got out, but Alec didn’t.

Jezebel: WAIT HIS NAME IS BEN.  i just made this connection too ☠️😂

Wench: askfjlksjf I’m so confused

Jezebel: Ben. From spn

Wench: oh.  OH.  Huh.  I thought you were going for Soldier Boy ‘cause his name is Ben 

Jezebel: WAIT WOT

Wench: Yeah, pretty sure

Jezebel: Bruh

Wench: :) 

Jezebel: He plays the Bens; he fathers a Ben (as Dean), he dates a Ben…ny

Wench: !!kjlajsdlfkjasdflkj

Jezebel: Ackles, you got a preference or something?

Wench: LKJASLKDJF;ALKDJSFL;KJASDF

*a moment passes*

Wench: I’m dying waiting for you to get to "Pollo Loco".  It’s my favorite s1 episode.  The filming is stunning.  And Ben is such a tragic character, and is done so well (he’s like if you took MBV!Jackles and smushed in Dean)

Jezebel: Awwww 🥺🥺🥺

Wench: And maybe a bit of SB, though I don’t know for sure.  He’s got a deep and abiding cynicism that makes me think more of what little I know of SB.  And a delight in violence.  Dean likes the hunt, but he doesn’t thrive on the violence to the same degree, imo.  You agree?

Jezebel: Yeah, I get it

– – –

That’s a wrap!  We don’t know when the next episode will be — thus, whether the next reaction is going to be NCIS or Dark Angel — but see you then!

[intothewickedwood]

Tagged by @priscilla9993 via my blog @wicked-storybrooke. Thank you so much!

Three favorite ships: My top 3 pretty much stay the same, so I'll say some newer/more obscure ones.

Holy Ghost from Starkid's Nerdy Prudes Must Die - Grace wants to get rid of Max because she's attracted to him and unmarried, and he called her bath water dirty girl soup in her fantasies. He dies due to her actions (debatable if that was her intention) and becomes a vengeful ghost who wants to kill nerdy prudes- which should include Grace but doesn't because he likes her. A match in only the buck wild things starkid could come up with a.k.a. heaven <3

Claire x William from Stay (2017) - I know, I know. There relationship is messed up. I kinda ship them, I kinda want her to kick his ass. But this is what happens when you watch Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas on repeat as a kid and think it's the main film. I like twisted dynamics in fiction. It's interesting to explore.

Cairo x Riley from We Are the Tigers Musical - I may have mentioned them before in one of these tag games. I am still obsessed with We Are the Tigers and can't stop watching and listening to it. I still wanna do an in-depth analysis of all the characters but omg "Wallflower" is so interesting, especially now I know it's canon that Cairo had a crush on Riley at some point. She took Riley under her wing from a young age. They've been best friends since, but they're totally co-dependent. Cairo feels like she has to protect Riley and her image because she can't mentally handle stress and it's pretty obvious she can't. But she thinks Riley owes everything to her and that Riley would be nothing without her. But Riley equally knows she needs Cairo and kinda hates that, trying to elevate her status so she'll feel less dependent on Cairo. If Riley's plan was to kill everyone disrupting the team then Cairo maybe should have been the first person on her list because she antagonised the most people, but Riley never even entertained that idea until she had completely broken down because she needs Cairo and knows she would do anything for her. She's even seems to be jealous of any partner Cairo has. It's so unhealthy. I love it! *heart eyes* xD. I will never be over the utter heartbreak shown on Cairo's face when she finds out what Riley did.

First ship: I can't remember for sure but I think it was Cinderella x Prince Christopher from Rodger's and Hammerstein's Cinderella 1997. I used to watch that movie a lot as a kid. It was one of my favourite movies growing up and still is. I'm so excited that they'll be returning in Descendents 4. I still can't believe it. Cried happy tears when I found out. And they had a kid!

Last movie: Stay (2017). I just found it 2 weeks ago and I am a little (okay, a lot) obsessed. Highly recommend if you like psychological stuff like me. It's a feature-length indie film about a man holding a woman captive in hopes that in time she will fall in love with him. It has some clear Beauty and the Beast symbolism and is kinda a twisted version. Dude gave me a lot of Jefferson vibes. Things didn't get...umm... explicitly sexual between the characters, which I found refreshing in a movie like this. But yeah, I'm very obsessed and I wish there was a fandom for it.

Currently reading: I pretty much exclusively listen to audiobooks due to reading difficulties, but Charlie Bone and the Hall of Mirrors, Keeper of the Lost Cities: Exile and I just finished Fraternity by Andy Mientus. I've been a fan of his from his musical theatre career and I was pleasantly surprised he was such a fantastic writer. The book is wonderfully queer and supernatural and set in the 90s with an engaging storyline and characters. I couldn't recommend enough. One of the best books I've ever listened too.

Currently watching: Rewatching Let's Play Witches by Hatsy on youtube for the first time in years. It's probably the most engaging sims 4 let's plays I've seen. It has really creative world-building. Agatha is the loml and her speaking voice is indescribably unique and beautiful.

Rewatching That's So Raven with my Mum. We need a laugh right now and this show never fails to get us cackling.

Once Upon a Time season 5 with a rewatch group! Has been very fun watching the show with them. Makes season 5 not as bad as I usually find it.

I've been wanting to watch other things but I've been so fussy lately. Everything that peaks my interest ends up going down the road of horror and/or graphic violence, which is not fun for me at all. So if anyone has any recs lmk! I like psychological, musical, supernatural or superhero (not too keen on Marvel stuff, unless it's X-Men related).

Currently eating: Nothing right now but the last thing I had was a nacho bean veggie burger for breakfast. It was calling to me.

Currently craving: Sleep, lol. Puppy parenting is rewarding but, oh gee, Sarai is a little rebel. Love her, but by golly do miss sleep. RIP to every sock in the house also lol

And freedom from these huge-ass, thick spiders that keep breaking and entering. Please grant this wish, oh tag game gods.

This got long but it was fun to ramble!

Tagging: @darkpoisonouslove @emmaswcns @lizardthelizard @lacebird @emilyrox @believingispowerfulmagic and anyone else who wants to. But no pressure to do it!

[pequenosol]

Alright!! Hi!! It's been a while....again....but this time I actually accomplished quite a bit of stuff!!

So, after beating Tulip, I decided to take on Grusha. I actually postponed doing so for like a day or two because I was so nervous X"D

And when he showed up, he didn't really help with my nerves hffggxxfxgxfxfxfxf- I get it, Grusha!! You're edgy and have a tragic backstory, STOP CALLING ME COCKY DOES THIS SOUND LIKE IT'S COMING FROM SOMEONE WHO'S COCKY?!? 👀💦

Thankfully he was a pushover and I one-shotted all but his last Pokemon with Cinnamon and Osaimhthus c:

After that, I got EXCITED! Not only did I beat the last gym, but the next boss for me to take on was none other than the wonderous, spectacular little boi, ✨Ortega!!!✨ (for context, he's probably my favorite character in the whole of the Pokemon franchise <3<3 He's great...)

My team for the base was Lemon, Mei, and Cinnamon. I took out Ortega's piano teacher and defeated the thirty random Pokemon with ease- then. Then the little boi graced me with his presence ✨✨✨✨~

When he showed up on his Starmobile, I FLIPPED OUT.dtsrdrxtftcgvyvhhhvvvhvhcgcg- Just. God d@mn he's such a good character....I love the small sassy ones <3

ANYWAYS *clears throat* As for the actual battle...well. He definitely was a challenge- at least at first. Ortega sent out his Azumarill first, and OH MY GOD. That THING was a BEAST. It's Aqua Tail was SUPER POWERFUL on its own, BUT. BUT IT WAS RAIN BOOSTED TOO!! And I couldn't switch out to Cinnamon or Mei, because they'd absolutely get destroyed!! So, really the only thing that I could do was spam Max Potions on Lemon until either Azumarill missed an attack or used up all its Aqua Tails, and pray I didn't get critted- To quote Ortega, "Do you realize how out of your league you are now? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)" Yessir. Yes, I do 🥲

Thankfully, my prayers were answered and the Azumarill went down without taking any lives. I switched to Mei because Lemon did her job and did it well and deserved a break <3 Mei outsped everything and all of Ortega's other Pokemon weren't a problem, and so he went down and I could enjoy some cutscenes and lore about him c:

Next on my list was the False Dragon Titan! I trained everyone up and caught a Mimikyu named Sakura (he/they/fae) to use in the fight. Nothing really remarkable about the fight; Lemon took care of the Donozo and Sakura defeated the Tatsugiri without any problem.

After that though...MAN, THE CUTSCENE WITH ARVEN AND MABOSTIFF GOT TO ME HARD 🥺🥺🥺 I was freaking sobbing by the end of it you guys... T~T So beautiful...

Then Professor Turo ruined it and Arven started talking about his daddy issues >:/

Now, the last thing for me to do before all the big conclusions to the three paths happened was to take down the Caph base and fight Eri. And. Um. Can I just say I'm super intimidated by her??? X"D So, to cope with that intimidation, I put Guayusa and Coconut on the Team, and fully evolved them into Dragonite and Salamence, and leveled them (and Cinnamon) up to level 65. Yup. That's how scared I was 🥲

Thankfully, my preparations all payed off!! :D I killed all the Pokemon in the base. All of them. Without any problems c: Heck, I even out-sped and one-shot Eri's Annihilape(which was what I was the most afraid of)!!

Also quick detour I love the aesthetic of the area surrounding the Caph Base...it's so pwetty 🥺🥺

Anyways, I made Eri cry (sorry Eri :c) and then Cassiopia was like, "I'm the Team Star boss!! Meet me in the school parking lot at 2:00 am for a fight!!" And I was like "ok, cool."

So. Yeah! I'm getting pretty close to the end of the game, which is very exciting! :D Here's some art I did while I was gone, and I'll see you guys next time!!

[libra-stellium]

Reflecting on the Gemini New Moon/Full Moon cycle

As a pisces rising this moon graces my 4H and I have a love/hate relationship with it because on the one hand I get so much energy to do chores at home (especially when I use the moon and saturn planetary hours!) but on the other handdddd there’s always family drama! Most likely with my narc mom!

Right now I’m realizing that A LOT can change in 6 months!! I feel like a different person 😭

On the new moon back in June I was 27 in my 4H profection year so every 4H event was maxed out smh and I had a horrible argument with my mother over the phone and she was blaming ME for a job rejecting her 😀 bc they rejected her for not having a drivers license and she didn’t have one bc I didn’t let her stay in my apartment so she could take classes in MY city specifically when she was already staying with someone in the same state! And then she blamed me for making her waste money when she decided to fly to a different state to get the license there ??? 😭😭 I had to look back through texts to put this together bc I literally blocked this out the last few months but I remember just being numb but also pissed off and just feeling like it’s never going to end!!!

And this is why I always tell people that Astro can describe your situation as specific as possible but at the end of the day you’re the one who has to act 🤷🏾‍♀️ the stars are not forcing your hand!

This time with the full moon in Gemini I can’t even believe that I was dealing with shit like this every day for years 😭 I went no contact with my mom August 1 and I have stood by it and will continue to do so! It hasn’t been easy! Mostly bc she signed a lease at the building next to mine 🙃 too fucking close for my liking but at least she’s not in my building with my aunt anymore. My life has been objectively better since I went no contact 😭 and I hate that that’s my truth bc who wants to realize that their mother hates them and they’re a victim of narc abuse?? Insane!

Examples of my life being better

I have energy!! I found enough energy to go through my closet and donate/trash clothes that have been collecting dust for about 10 years! Basically since I moved out for college til now! I ended up donating 17 bags of clothes, a box of shoes, a box with like a dinnerware set and a bunch of purses that are no longer my style

My apartment is like 90% clutter free rn! Back in June??? Most of my floor was covered in some way! I just have to organize my clothes now that my closet is empty and I need to clear my office area

I decorated for Halloween and now I’m decorating for Christmas and I’m doing a grinch theme 😭

I haven’t ordered food and have been cooking for myself from Nov 17-today Nov 27 and yes it’s only 10 days so far but this is a big step for me!

I also came to the realization that for years I was over explaining myself to her trying to “fix our relationship” but….fixing implies that it was good before…and you’re trying to get back to that 😬….and our relationship has always been like this I’m just the one who grew up and started standing up for myself. Hard realization that our relationship wasn’t something to fix just something to let go of!

[bunnidid-reviews]

DID TV Series Review

Facts -

Series name: United States of Tara

Run time: 2009 - 2011

Fiction or Nonfiction: Fiction

Was there a diagnosis of DID? Yes, it’s mentioned several points throughout the show that Tara was diagnosed sometime before the show takes place

Was the person with DID presented as evil for having DID? No

Major Trigger warning list:

-          Suicide mentions and self harm, and a suicide attempt

-          Drug use, smoking, alcohol

-          Sexual scenes, exploration of teenage sexuality, underage sex/fetish work(nomexplicit but pretty gross)

-          Mentions of varios kinds of abuse, mostly sexual abuse

-          Grooming and stalking

-          Minor violent scenes

-          Emotional abuse, neglect from mentally ill parents

-          drowning

-          Ableism

-          Homophobia

-          General dark humor?

-          Some pretty explicit language and swearing

-          (If there are more trigger, please let me know!)

  Subjective Review(this is how I felt about it) -

Personal triggering scale from 1 to 10 (1 being not triggering at all, 10 being a badly overwhelming experience that might cause personal harm): Maybe a 4?

Personal relatability scale from 1 to 10 (1 being unrelatable, 10 being OMG THAT’S ME!): 8

Personal avoidance scale from 1 to 10(1 being eager to get on with it, 10 being impossible to finish): 2, last season is a strong 9(I don’t usually push thru it)

My interpretation of the media(Includes spoilers):

United States of Tara is the trashy DID show and I actually unapologetically love it. If you take it from the perspective that this is a dark comedy with a lot of drama thrown in, I think it’s actually very fun to watch so long as you keep the triggers listed in mind. I know it’s known to be the ~super stigmatizing show~, and maybe it is in some ways we’ll discuss in a moment, but I’m asking you to see it from this perspective: literally everyone in the show sucks. Even the minor characters have some shitty qualities to them, so Tara doesn’t hugely stand out as being evil for having DID. She just happens to have many shitty qualities and her parts reflect that, honestly.

A basic summary: Tara, a mother of two teenagers, struggles through daily life both in normal parent-y ways and in having Dissociative Identity disorder and the effects it has on the people around her. Her husband believes he can fix her. Her son is struggling with discovering his sexuality and complicated attachment, her daughter wants to grow up too quickly and chase after her romanticized dreams. Her sister can’t seem to figure out how to grow up, struggling with her own repressed trauma.

It's a three-season series so I can’t talk too extensively about each episode, so I’ll try to summarize it up by season, mostly focusing on Tara

Season 1 thoughts: On the surface level, right away, it seems like Tara’s alters are used as a gimmick or an excuse. In many ways they are. Heavily stereotyped and a bit ridiculous and as if they don’t have the entire self in mind when they act out. But to me it makes some sense because the amnesiac walls are obviously very high for these alters and they all have opposing views on how they want to live their life. By the people around her, they’re seen as a hassle, a burden, and something everyone wants to get rid of. No one is asking ‘why are you here’(well they are, annoyedly), they’re more asking ‘When are you leaving already?’ The saving grace from this season is probably the proof that suppressing Alters is not how you help them heal, and the therapist makes that very clear as well. The show writers knew what they were doing, I think.

There’s some interesting points of accuracy to my own dissociative experience even in season 1. Buck is ridiculous, but he’s protective in his own right. He has a reason for being the way he is. It especially resonated with me when Tara and Max were setting up to make love, and when Tara lost her nerve, Buck was there to take her place in a protective way.

We see substitute beliefs portrayed in Alice’s episode about wanting to have a baby and believing It to be true. Even the therapist points out what this means and again, Max isn’t listening but the show writers understood what they were doing here.

We see Tara telling people about how DID works time and time again. She has a very up-to-date understanding of her disorder and explains her experiences in such a way that it punches me with accuracy to my own feelings.

What I don’t like about season 1 is all throughout, the characters around her act as if Tara’s disorder isn’t just a burden, but a sacrifice to live around. I think in some part this is due to, yknow.. all the characters being shit. But in the last couple episodes of Season 1, in a DID-specializing psyche ward, the goal of many patients is to fully integrate their alters in a way of ‘getting rid of them’, as if they’re a burden to deal with across the board. I’m warning you on this because while I love United States of Tara, this mindset really snakes its way into my own and plays up a lot of my insecurities about being a burden, especially to my fiancé. : (

Season 2 thoughts:  I believe this season boots off after the confrontation with a past abuser and finding..Deeper truths are still stubbornly hidden. Tara gives up and suppresses the Alters once more. Obviously this doesn’t work, though it is seen as ‘everything’s moving smoothly now that I’m pretending the problem doesn’t exist’. It doesn’t last for very long of course.

I like Season 2 a lot. This is the season that Tara and her sister Charmaine are finally coming together to find out the truth and try to heal together. The way the writers handled the weird sisterly bond of growing up in trauma together with both fierce protection and resentment is.. Extremely accurate to how it’s been for me and my siblings. The way that Charmaine gradually goes from calling the alters an excuse to becoming understanding is.. A weird deep healing thing for me. I recommended my also possibly-probably-most likely multiple sibling to watch the show just for those episodes. I think it’s one of the many things I watch the show for comfort though.

There’s also that last scene in the last episode of season 2 where her husband Max, under the altar, declares that he’ll be what each and every part of her needs him to be for them from here out and I just 🥺 I’m sorry, this isn’t really part of the review, but it was a lot like the many loving binding promises words my fiance’s said to me and it made me tear up a little, okay?

As for the DID handling in this season, I’d say it was a good continuation from the first. They really delved into the topic from a knowledgeable perspective and no longer treated the audience like DID is a New and Special thing. I think the ‘burden feelings’ were less for this season as we moved into an actually healing arc. There was nothing fantastical or dramatized that wasn’t already in the first that I can recall.

Season 3. Oh boy. This is known as the horrible and bad season and I have to unfortunately agree. I believe the show was run by someone else at this point, and since there wasn’t a season 4, they had to cram a lot of finished ends where there wasn’t room for them.

I think Bryce is a bit more intense than other persecutor parts I’ve seen in media. I (sort-of) have an abuser introject and with my experience, even at his most intense down moments, the intent for how he behaves is still protective in nature. Can we make the argument with Bryce? Maybe? But I fail to see his protective motives, even if I pull back the layers of ‘these characters are just shit’ and ‘this is written to be an interesting tv show most of all’.

I think what they needed with season 3 was a season 4. More time to actually peel back their own layers and explore what it really means to be a persecutor part. It’s unfortunate that it got cut off so short and the actual answer to healing herself in the end was.. A suicide attempt and literally killing Bryce off. Which as we know, doesn’t work.

I think to cover up for the cut season, there was a lot of misinformation strewn in to the DID presentation. The alters were stripped back to be stereotypes again.

The only good thing from this season was probably the other character’s developments and one of the first episodes having a scene where all the Alters are coming together in co-consciousness.

Overall, I think United States of Tara takes a bit of unneeded flack. As being The Worst Show For DID. I don’t know yet if that’s true. I think a lot of it is down to it being one of those shows where everyone sucks, a bit like Sunny In Philadelphia. There is a lot of stigmatizing trash, sure, but when I take it with a little bit of salt, I come out really enjoying the show.

 What they got Right in my opinion:

-          No childhood trauma shown explicitly onscreen, no screaming or horror music for switches. You don’t know how much this shit bothers me

-          Multiple counts where misconceptions about DID are corrected and talked about openly. They refer to it as Dissociative Identity Disorder. Even if the characters aren’t getting it right, there are many points where a therapist has a stronger understanding of what’s going on(in the first season at least)

-          The parts relationships as they come together and the amnesia barriers lower. I’m really partial to Buck and Alice and how they’re shown to have some complexities behind being a part of a system. (I think T has some of this merit too, but they really do her dirty)

-          The subtle ways in which trauma effects the characters everyday lives and attachments. Tara struggles to have intimacy, Charmaine struggles to have a stable relationship. All of it is very rooted in trauma responses

-          Suppressing your disorder may look like it works for a little bit but it doesn’t, really.

-          Handling introjects and substitutes beliefs. Though I think Moon Knight did it a little better, it was nice that they went into this too.

-          That the lack of something important from a parent(love, stability, protection, ect) can also cause major trauma

-          -They had Gregory and the Hawk start off one of the episodes and I just hold that close to my heart, haha <3

What they got Wrong in my opinion:

-          Killing Alters off doesn’t mcfuckin work my dude

-          The whole ‘Host is the True Person’ narrative throughout. (Imo, no part is more important than the other, no part is a ‘hassle’ or a ‘burden’.)

-          Integration/fusion ‘gets rid’ of parts

-          Although they may feel like it, introjects of abusers are not actually abusers and shouldn’t be ‘killed off’ as a means of healing.

-          Just…Avoid season 3

Would I recommend this to someone with DID to watch?: Tentatively, yes. There may be more triggers than I listed. I really like the show myself because it’s like the junk food of DID content. Easy to watch and not all that good for you, probably

Just really keep in mind that ‘burdensome’ theme, it might get in your head too.

[toushindai]

Respect and approval in the relationship between Zagreus and Megaera

So, I think a lot of people know that there's a mini storyline between Megaera and Zagreus that proceeds as follows: Megaera brusquely informs Zagreus that his victories against her "don't count" as he couldn't possibly have achieved them without Nyx's help via the mirror. If you respond to this by emptying out the mirror and fighting her, she'll remark on it. This exchange is referenced in an incredible video about Hades' dialogue system that I will link in the comments to this post (since we all know how tumblr is about links) and which I highly recommend if you haven't watched it already.

But I was surprised that the video didn't go on to highlight what is my favorite (and surely relevant to the video?) aspect of this storyline--that once you've beaten Meg like that, the followup conversation at home has three different variants based on how many gifts you've given her!

Spoilers for a lot of late-game, including post-credits, content.

The three variants are low relationship (zero gifts - five gifts); high relationship (six gifts - nine gifts); "became close" relationship (ten gifts).

At low relationship, the conversation is as follows. I apologize but I don't have screenshots for any of these; I'm taking the text from the files.

Megaera: Beaten. By you. Without the help of Nyx's mirror. You humiliated me. And now you've come to rub it in, I guess? Well, go on, then. Not like you can shame me any more. Zagreus: Meg, what is it going to take for you to quit treating me like I'm incompetent? Have I not grown even a little since we met? You were supposed to teach me something; what does that make you? Megaera: Tsch... why don't you raise your voice a little louder so that all the House can hear. Is that what you want? For everyone to know that you're superior to me? Zagreus: You're not hearing me, Meg. I know it sounds a little disingenuous considering we keep fighting to the death and all, but... I never meant to hurt you. Megaera: You give yourself far too much credit, Zagreus. Leave me alone.

At high relationship:

Megaera: Beaten. By you. Without the help of Nyx's mirror. You humiliated me. And now you've come to rub it in, I guess? Well, go on, then. Not like you can shame me any more. Zagreus: Meg, that isn't why I'm here, you know that isn't how I am. Why can't you see it? All I've ever wanted was to prove myself to you. Megaera: Tsch... you think that you can prove yourself to me by winning in a fight? Zagreus: Sometimes I think that I can never really win with you, Meg. If I held back, what would you have thought? Megaera: If you think you know me so well, Zagreus, then you ought to know better than to keep this conversation going with me, now.

(Yeah, that's "high relationship.")

At became close relationship:

Megaera: I can't believe it, Zag. I thought for sure that Nyx's mirror was the only reason you could beat me. I knew you'd changed to some extent, but... not this much. Zagreus: I had to see if I could do it, Meg. I've learned so much from you, I... thought maybe this was a way that I could prove myself to you. And to myself. Megaera: Prove yourself, to me...? You must not be as comfortable in your own skin as you let on. I can't decide if I like that about you. Now leave me alone while I give it some thought.

Which... it's better, right? It's better. It's maybe not great, still. But they are trying.

I mean so let's take this from the top. At low relationship, the conversation is fairly acrimonious on both sides. Feeling humiliated by her loss, Meg lashes out, and Zag snaps in return that if Meg's going to keep treating him like he's incompetent, it's only a reflection on her, who was supposed to teach him something. In this version of their conversation, we see the shadow of the relationship Hades pointedly engineered between the two of them raise its head, and if I were ever asked to textually back up my certainty that Meg, not only Zag, contributed to their breakup, I think I'd cite this. Meg's lack of respect for Zag is clearly a longstanding point of tension. Here, Zag feels like he's done something that ought to earn him her respect, only to be... what? Meg's first line is largely about her own insecurities rather than her opinion of Zag, but at the same time, the assumption that she should be superior, that that's the natural order of things, is baked into it. It's a serious blow to her pride that Zag has upset that natural order, and she's projecting her shame into an assumption that Zagreus is here to pettily gloat. Which is insulting, and Zagreus reacts from that place of insult.

But in his second line, as if he notices her pain, Zag is able to disengage from his anger a little (his portrait shifts from his angry "Defiant" one to his "Empathetic" one), realize that their communication is going a bit awry, and tell Meg that he doesn't mean to hurt her. This does not have the effect he possibly hoped for, and before Meg tells him to hit the bricks she says that he gives himself too much credit--by thinking that he has the capability to hurt her. Now this is a pattern with her, throughout their redeveloping relationship, even at max relationship, even once they're back together: Megaera repeatedly states that Zagreus can't hurt her. Here, it has a clear implication that she thinks Zagreus beneath her, not worth getting hurt over. ...It's absolutely belied by her humiliation in the rest of the conversation, but the scorn with which she makes the assertion is cutting and unkind.

Although... I do wonder. Especially given Zag's statement that he "never meant to hurt [her]"--that doesn't sound like he's just talking about his neat trick of getting past her darkness-free. He's referring to their past, almost certainly, and at 0-5 gifts this is well before he gets around to a proper apology or even his feelingsdump (feelingsdump, er, I'm sorry, "building trust", the "we need to talk" conversation, follows gift#6, the last nectar). What I wonder, sometimes, is--when Megaera says that Zagreus can't hurt her (boy does she love to say that.), if part of what she's saying is that Zagreus is not the only person contributing to the poor relationship between them. This is a thought on a different topic, I guess, and I'm not saying that in this conversation, she suddenly has a flash of insight that she's being kind of shitty and chases him away for that reason. Sincerely, I do think "I'm too good to be hurt by Zagreus" is an emotional habit she has for a sizeable chunk of time--perhaps one she developed as a reaction to their breakup, or as a shield against it as she saw it coming--and is what she means here. But maybe it means something else later. I certainly hope so. Because boy. she really loves to say it.

Let's talk about the variant at high relationship next. You could get this variant anywhere between the last nectar ("We may be immortals, but we're older now") and having given her the second-to-last ambrosia ("I wish I could do over how we started"). Once you give her the last ambrosia (when they drink together), you're in the territory of the final variant.

Meg's still cranky; her first line is the same as in the low relationship variant. It's Zagreus, who is at this time in the process of trying to get back in her good graces, who is less testy in response. I'd say he's clearly still hurt by her response, but he doesn't express that hurt by sniping back at her this time. Instead, he opens up, trying to make his intentions more clear, reminding her that he isn't the type to gloat. He all but says that he wants her respect. And he doesn't get it, here. Frankly, this variant is not much of an improvement on the low relationship one. Meg is less openly insulting, but it's clear that she still doesn't want to be having the conversation.

My thoughts on this variant are similar to my thoughts on some of the ambrosia conversations--and I say this as the most dedicated MegZag shipper you will ever see--in that when I see this, I'm not sure why Zagreus bothers. If, like he says, there's really no action he could take here that wouldn't end in Meg being peeved at him, what is he reaching for? He wants to prove himself to her--why? Is her approval worth having here? When Meg says (to cite the gift nine/third ambrosia conversation) that it's just a question of whether Zag is worth her time, why is it positive that Zagreus's wistful response is to ask her if he is worth her time, then?

Let me start bringing in the became close relationship variant here, starting with the last line of it, because Meg's response to Zagreus outright stating that he wants to prove himself to her is emotionally very similar to her response to Zag asking her if he is worth her time. In both cases, she seems to... not soften, exactly. She seems taken aback. She sees Zagreus's desire for her approval and his vulnerability that he lays bare in front of her, and in both cases, her response is one of uncertainty. She wants time to think about it on her own. She has kept hardening herself in response to the pain of their earlier failure (not every relationship that doesn't work out is a failure but I am quite certain she felt this way about theirs, if only because she was supposed to shape Zagreus a certain way), she hardens herself verbally and defiantly right in front of Zag's damn face, and he answers with wistful vulnerability. She tells him he can't hurt her, and he answers with "OK. But do you care about me? Could you?"

I almost wonder if Zagreus's vulnerability makes Megaera ask herself the same questions that these conversations make me ask myself. That remark she makes, that she's not sure how she feels about Zagreus's insecurity--I wonder if she's seeing how she's contributed to it, and needs time to figure out how to respond more kindly. And not just "more kindly," but in a way that's better for him. In the became close relationship conversation variant, Meg starts off in a much better mood, and offers the approval that--as we've seen in the other variants--Zagreus wants so keenly. However, when he states that as an outright motivation, I think she questions that influence she has on Zagreus, and wavers on whether or not it's a positive one, and wants to withdraw to sort out... everything about that situation. It's not an emotionally vulnerable response, maybe, but I do get the sense that it's a compassionate one.

These two are not perfect. They're coming from a background of a relationship that was arranged for them with the explicit intention of forcing Zagreus to mature--a setup that implicitly (if Hades didn't go ahead and make it explicit which, lbr, he very possibly did) defines Megaera as more mature and therefore superior. That relationship fell apart--and how could it not, with a setup like that--and some time has passed, and now they're stuck in a loop of fighting each other to the death. It's not ideal! But they cared about each other, back during their first relationship. Zagreus outright tells us that he caught feelings. Megaera talks around the same admission--through the rigidness with which she tells Zagreus and herself that they can't return to the way things were, that it isn't possible; through her admission, when Zag says he wishes he could change how they started, that she too "wish[es] for a lot of things." They cared-past-tense and they care-present-tense, but they still have emotional habits from the past, from the imposed hierarchy of their first relationship, and even in the most positive variant of Meg's response to the darkness-free victory, even in some of their biggest steps forward, we see some of those habits rear their head. It's something they have to work on and will continue to work on, I think.

And it's not a hopeless process. One of the best in-game contrasts to this dynamic is (of all things) when Megaera notices that Zagreus has made it onto the Featured Houseservant board. She remarks that never in her wildest fantasies did she imagine that Zagreus would make it up there. Zagreus, I think, doesn't know how to respond to that--he picks up the "wildest fantasies" thread rather than the compliment, bless this horny little man--but Meg is undeterred and points out that he really should be proud of such an achievement. And I think this is the perfect solution to the dilemma that is Zag's desire for Meg's approval, because Meg's uncertainty over that, her sense that it's an insecure concern, is justified. So here, she's showing that she respects his achievement but emphasizing that it's something about him, something he can and should feel intrinsic pride over, rather than just taking pleasure in her extrinsic approval.

This has gotten long (oh god it has gotten long) so I think I'll wrap up here. One of the things I love about Hades is how it doesn't force relationships to be Suddenly Great Now That The Story's Over. Hades and Zagreus are still struggling to figure out a relationship that works. Persephone isn't sure she knows how to be Zagreus's mother. Meg's still not getting along with her sisters (although it has been brought to her attention that she is as culpable in their relationship as they are). I think this point of awkwardness between Zagreus and Megaera--their having to figure out a system of mutual respect where it has not been before--is another example of that pattern. And I think they've got a shot at it. I think they can pull it off.

[aressss1]

Gold and Emeralds Chapter 1

(Technoblade x Reader)

Read me on AO3!

| Next Chapter >

~~~~~~

The snow crunched under his feet. A blue hue shaded the world, as the sun was just starting to peak over the mountains. The winter wonderland around him silent as can be. Techno, as he bobbed and weaved through the thick spruce trees, was tracking down an elk. The tracks in the fresh snow being a great path for him to follow.

 He liked the hunt, even though he never wanted you to see his process of hunting. He was afraid of scaring you. He put his hybrid senses to use. He knew what he looked like during this process... His golden eyes would flood with an inky blackness, his irises turning silver, his body adapting to become the predator in a chase with its prey, and his vision and hearing heightened.

This was a day that he had been eager for, Valentines day. He had never celebrated the holiday, nor did he ever think he would, but this was the first year you and him would celebrate it together. All he wanted was your happiness. So, he asked Phil to take you on a trip for supplies, one that would take the both of you hours to do. Techno had everything in place, the only thing that he was lacking was the meat for the dinner he wanted to prepare for you. It was a recipe that Phil had given him, one that he himself had tried, and loved.

 He held his bow and arrow in his hands ready to fire. The tracks of the hunted animal coming to end. When the giant elk came into view, Techno notches his arrow and lets it fly.

 --

 You were tired, the backpack on your back weighed you down, making it harder for you to trudge through the snow. You had spent the whole day out with Phil, running errands, going mining, you wondered what Techno was up to the whole day. You looked at the lit-up house in the middle of the tundra. It seemed so peaceful in the setting sun.

 “I have some business in the village, I’ll be back a little bit later Y/N.” Phil gave you a half wave before he branched off toward the direction of the nearby village.

 “Don’t take too long Phil,” You called after him, a smile gracing your lips. Today had been fun, but you so dearly wanted to be with Techno. It was Valentines day today and while you figured he didn’t want to celebrate the holiday, just because he didn’t seem like the type to celebrate it, you wanted to have some alone time with him.

 Your feet landed on the wood of the first step on the porch. You kicked at the second step to knock the snow from your boots. Using the rail to gain balance you walk to your front door; you could smell something wonderful, cooking from the inside of the house. Letting a small smile show, your hand turned the knob of the front door, and you pull it open.

 There stood your pink haired man, a look of adoration crossing his features as soon as he saw you. In one fell swoop he wraps you up in his arms, pressing kisses to your forehead.

 “Happy Valentine’s day sweetheart.” His voice comes to you in a whisper, and your heart almost bursts right then and there. You wrap your arms around him, your hands grasping on to the back of his shirt. The hug last for a good few seconds and he sways with you in the hug. You pull away to look up at him.

 “I didn’t think Valentine’s day would be your thing.” You tease, and blush creeps up on his cheeks.

 “It wasn’t,” He admits, “But I didn’t have you before this year.” He presses his lips to your forehead. You let out a content hum, before you wrap your arms around his neck standing on your tip toes to press your lips to his. His hand comes up to cradle the back of your head, you swear you could stay like this forever. When he pulls away, he cocks his head to you. “You want to see the other stuff I have planned for you, darlin’?”  You nodded and he took your hand he led you over to the fireplace. He had set up an area covered in blankets for the both of you to lie down next to the fireplace. He helps you get comfortable taking the backpack off you and throwing it haphazardly across the room.

 As he sat with you, he brought a long wrapped up box with him, he laid it on his lap, his eyes studying your features.

  “Before I have you open this, I have something to say…” He hesitated; a look of fear could briefly be seen in his eyes. “I will protect you with my every being. I know it’s not easy, being with me…” His words were starting to get shaky, but he composed himself almost immediately. Clearing his throat, he continues. “I would lay my life down for yours, in a heartbeat.” When you look down, he gently grabs your chin so you can look him in the eyes. “I… I want to spend the rest of my life with you. If you would have me?” You can see that look of fear in his eyes again. But it quickly vanishes as soon as you lean forward and kiss him.

 His hands bring you close to him, relishing your kisses, and after a few minutes he pulls away.

 “Darlin’,” He fiddles with the box still in his lap. “I know, being with me has its risks, and I can’t always be there to protect you.” He hands you the box, and you tear off the brown wrapping paper. When you remove the lid, you gasp. In the box was a sheathed sword, not just any sword… A netherite sword, with maxed out enchantments… Wrapped around the hilt was a golden chain with a ring attached to it. The ring itself was golden, but the gem that adorned it was an emerald. An emerald to match his and Phil’s emeralds. The thought made your heart soar. You just about tackled him in a hug.

 “I love you so much Techno.” You whispered feeling his chin rest on the top of your head. You didn’t know how long you sat there like that, him just rocking you back and forth in that position. Everything was right in the world. A loud groan from your stomach could be heard and he gave a little chuckle.

 “Come on let’s get you fed,” He pulls you up to your feet. Quickly taking the golden chain from the handle of the sword and he clasped the necklace around your neck. You found yourself fiddling with the ring on the chain when you had nothing else to do.

 The rest of the night was filled with, one of the best meals you’d ever had in your life, stories about his past, and a whole lot of passion.

[hawaii5-0gurl]

Find Her

Characters: Steve X Reader, Danny, Kono, Chin, Lou, Grace, Wo Fat

Word Count: 5409

Warnings: Language, Angst, Character Death? Torture (mildish), Fluff ending

A/N: Request from @coffeewithoutcaffine. I hope you like it.

I loved getting requests if you have one, send it in.

“Can I request Steve X Reader, where she’s on the team and gets kidnapped by Wo Fat and tortured and its pure angst with a happy ending?”

A/N#2: Feedback is always appreciated. Good or Bad. Also I would like to say I’m sorry for part of this. I may have hurt my own heart.

Tumblr Masterlist

“Y/n are you ready to go?” Steve asked as he came into your bedroom.

“Go ahead without me. I have a few things I need to get done before I head into the office.” You looked you from tying your boots. “Should only take an hour max.”

“You sure? I can help.”

“Yeah, I’m sure. Go before you’re late.”

“Ok.” Before leaving he came into the room, gave you a quick kiss and left for work.

You started locking everything up to leave when you get this uneasy feeling in your stomach. You pull your gun out of its holster an keep it at your side as you continue to lock up. Nobody was in the house, but the feeling was still there. After holstering you weapon, you lock the front door and make your way to your truck. Being sure to hold your self-defense rod in-between your fingers.

You walked down the sidewalk to the driveway, and around you truck to the driver side. You went to open the door when you heard footsteps rushing up behind you. You immediately swing your hand behind you. It collided with a person’s side. You whipped around to see a man holding his side. You started fighting, kicking and punching but he was able to block almost every single one of them. He pulled out what looked like a police baton and started swinging. You were able to grab the baton, but he quickly pushed you back against your truck to hold you in place.

“Not so tough now Y/n.” he got cocky as you tried to push him off.

“You sure about that?” leaving a confused look in his face. You used as much force as you could and kneed him in the groin. He fell to the ground, grabbing himself.

You leaned over him. “Dumb-Ass.”

You went to cuff him but before you could you felt a sting on the side of your neck.

“Ouch!” You grabbed where the pain was and looked to the side only to see Wo Fat with a syringe in his hand. Then everything went dark.

- At 5-O HQ hours later-

“This is Y/n, leave a message and I will get back to you soon.” Steve was calling you again to see where you were.

“Has anyone heard from Y/n yet?” Steve started asking the team when you hadn’t showed up.

“No” Kono and Chin said simultaneously.

“I haven’t either,” Danny said. “Did she say when she would be in?”

“She told me that she had a few things to do before work, but it wouldn’t take more than an hour.”

“Maybe they are just taking longer than she thought.”

“I’m sure that’s it. Y/n gets sidetracked sometimes.” Chin said trying to explain why you’re not here.

“Well yeah, but I have called her a few times already and she’s not picking up.”

“Here let’s try this. She has one of those squares to locate her keys, right?” Kono questioned Steve.

“Yeah, I bought a few after she kept losing her keys. I have one on mine too.”

“Let me see yours.” Steve handed over his keys. Kono placed them on the table and started typing to see if she could track down Y/n’s squares.

“Here we go.” She slid the table screen to the big screen. “There’s your keys here at HQ and there are 2 here, which is…  At your house? Y/n’s at home?”

“Why wouldn’t she answer your calls if she was home this whole time?” Chin asked.

“Alright, Danny and I will swing by there and see what’s going on.”

Steve pulled up, out front of his house. Your truck was still in the driveway. Steve went to the front door, while Danny went over to your truck. Steve was about to unlock the door when Danny called out to him.

“Steve, we have a problem.” Danny called out, causing Steve to look over at him. He was holding up your keys and phone.

Seeing him holding your keys and phone caused him to get a sinking feeling in his stomach.

-Abandoned Warehouse-

You were finally waking up. You were still groggy from whatever Wo Fat injected you with. You tried to move your arms and legs but quickly realized that you were tied to a chair. You looked up to see WoFat’s leaning up against a table.

“Look who finally decided to join me.”

“What do you want?” already annoyed with this.

“What? No hello. Straight to business.” He got up and started moving towards you. “Alright, I want to know where Shelburne is.” Coming to a stop right in front of you.

“Who?” You have no idea who that was.

“Shelburne.”

“I have no clue who you are talking about. Who the hell is Shelburne?”

“The person who killed my father! Don’t act dumb, where are they?!?” He was getting mad, he leaned down grabbing your wrists and part of the chair.

“I DON’T KNOW!”

WoFat’s obviously didn’t believe you. Next thing you know, you’re being slapped across the face.

“I know Steve knows. He would have told you about them. So where are they.” He was starring you down. “It only gets worse from here on out Y/n.”

“I DON’T FUCKING KNOW!”

“Fine. We will do this a different way.” He pulled your gun off the table. He pointed it dead center of your forehead. When you didn’t flinch, he moved it off to the side and shot off a round. Again, you didn’t flinch. You just looked more annoyed than before.

“You realize I have to write a report on every bullet fired from my service weapon.”

“I just pointed a gun at your head, and you’re worried about paperwork? You do realize I can just shoot you.”

“I’m not afraid to die. I know what I was getting myself into when I became a cop. Hey if you shoot me, I don’t have to do any paperwork. Just so you know if you do shoot me. 5-0 will be on your ass like white on rice.” At this point you were leaning forward to get as close to his face as you possible could.

“wow, you are a special kind of stupid. Aren’t you?” He raised your gun just enough to shoot you in the leg.

“UGH! Son of a Bitch!”

-McGarrett Residence-

Steve had called the team. They showed up a few minutes later.

“The house is secure, but I found boot prints on the side of the house.” Chin came up to the rest of the group.

“I found a couple of cigarettes over by those trees and bushes.” Kono held up an evidence bag before handing it off to one of the techs for DNA testing.

“Have you checked your security cameras yet?” Danny said as he pointed to the camera above the garage. It looked like it had been shot.

“Kono do you have a laptop?”

“Yea.” She went towards her car, everyone followed close behind.

Steve pulled up his security system up on the laptop. He went back to the time that he left. He looked at the back cameras first. He saw a man looking in the back windows but couldn’t see his face. Then he went to the front cameras. You were coming out of the house and going to your truck. when a man lunged at you, and you fought back. Then a second man came out and stabbed you in the neck. He began yelling at the first man. He got up off the ground and called someone. A car pulled up seconds later. The first man proceeded to pick you up and put you in the trunk of the car. This is when the second man turned to the camera, wave and shoot.

“Wait, is that…” Danny started to talk but Steve cut him off.

“Wo Fat.” Steve looked frustrated and had to walk away. He ran his hands down his face to try and compose himself. Danny was instantly by his side.

“Hey, we are going to find her.”

“Kono is there any way to we can see who the other guy is?” Lou asked to get thing moving along. Kono was instantly on the computer looking for a good image. When she found one, she put it through facial rec.

“Got him. This is Kehlani Koa. He has a wrap-sheet a mile long. Burglary, assault with a deadly weapon, car jackings to name a few.”

“Are you able to get a plate on that car?”

“No, the car wasn’t turned enough for that.”

Steve came back over, “you got an address for this guy?”

“Yea, already sent to your phones.”

“I want this guy alive.” He looked around at the team. He had anger and frustration in his eyes. “Danny let’s go.”

-Warehouse-

“You Son of a Bitch!” Now you were pissed off. “What’s wrong with you!? Were you not held enough as a child? What could have caused you to be so psychotic!?”

“If you would stop with the sarcastic comments and tell me what I want to know…” you cut him off.

“Well since you apparently are hard of hearing let me say it again.” You cleared your throat. “I don’t know who the fuck Shelburne is, You Dumbass! I can’t give you information that I don’t know jack shit about! Then again I wouldn’t give it to you if I did know.” You whispered that last part so he couldn’t hear you.

He pulled out a knife and he stabbed you in the thigh. Lucky for you he missed the femoral artery. You tried so har not to scream and give him the satisfaction. Then WoFat’s phone went off, he pulled it out of his pocket and left the room.

“Holy Shit that hurts!”

You start to move your arms to see if there was any wiggle room with the ropes. There was little, but it was just enough. You know you must get out of here. You slowly start to move your arms around to get the rope over your hand. Eventually getting them free. Then you quickly untied the other hand, before moving to your leg that didn’t have a knife sticking out of it. you worked as fast as you could while being careful to get the second leg free. You know that if you pull out the knife, you will bleed out eventually and risking it would be dangerous.

You slowly got up, trying not to touch the knife and not to jostle the leg with a the gsw. You couldn’t put a lot of weight on either leg. You ended up sitting back down. You ripped strips off your overshirt and tied them around the bullet hole as tight as you could. You start thinking again. You ripped off a few more strips of your shirt. You put them under your leg with the knife, making sure they make an x in the back.

“This is so stupid.” You said to yourself ad you reach for the knife. You pull it out while trying not to make a sound. Then you tie the strips over the knife opening. You have lost quite a bit of blood, but your adrenaline was still going. Not knowing how much longer it was going to be around you knew you must move. You get up again. Knife in hand and slowly start making your way to a different door than the one Wo Fat went out of.

-Koa Residence-

Unfortunately, when Steve and Danny got to the house Kehlani was already dead. They started searching the house. When Danny got to one of the back rooms, he found photos of Steve and Y/n all over the walls. There were maps with different locations that corresponded with some of the photos.

“Hey Steve! I found something!”

Steve came into the room and paused when he saw all the things on the walls. The others were right behind him as he walked into the room.

“He was following you guys.” Danny said as he was looking over all the information on the wall in front of him.

“No. He was following Y/n. Come look at this.” Chin said from a different wall. “This is all her. Driving, shopping, surfing and her just hanging out on the beach.”

“This is so creepy.” Kono said as she walked to a new area. She found papers on imports and exports, various warehouses and random places around the island.

“So what? Wo Fat hires this guy to watch Y/n, kidnap her then what? He ends up dead here. What’s the endgame here?” He turns to everyone to see if anyone has anything that makes any sense. “Why would he want Y/n?”

Everyone just kept going through all the papers in the room. There was so much of it that it was hard to make sense of any of it. Lou went to the closet. When he opened it, he found a large map on the back wall. It had a bunch of “Xs” in different areas. There were also a few circles with addresses as well.

“I got something.” He pulled the map off the wall. He brought it out and places it on the desk in the middle of the room.

“Does anyone know what these are circling?” Everyone started looking closely at the map to try and figure out what they were.

“This one is HQ.” Chin pointed to one of the circles.

“That’s my house.” Steve pointed to another.

Kono was on her phone typing away at the other addresses.

“This one is Y/n’s old apartment complex. This one is a bank, and that one is Kamakonas’.”

“These are probably all the places that she was at the most. This is how he followed her around the island.” Steve was starting to get even more and more uncomfortable the longer they were in the room.

“What about the group of X’s over here?”

“They look like a bunch of old abandoned warehouses.”

“About how many are there?”

“Maybe 10 to 15.”

“That’s too many to search. Call Catherine and see if she can get a drone or satellite footage in the area. I want to know if anything is going on down there now.” Chin went off to the side and called Catherine.

Steve looked over to the window to see a man standing in the backyard. He was on the phone. Once he saw Steve, he took off running. Steve ran over to the window, pulling it open to jump out to run after him. Danny followed close behind.

The man ran through yards and alleyways. Steve was able to catch him when he tried to climb a 6ft fence. Steve grabbed him and slammed him to the ground. Then pulled out his gun and pointing it at him.

“Where is she?!” Steve wasn’t wasting any time.

The man stayed quiet and just stared at Steve.

Steve pulled this guy up by the collar of his shirt and slammed him against the wall. “I don’t make me ask again! Where is Y/n!?” He cocked his gun, that’s when Danny stepped in.

“Steve, you shoot him. We won’t find her. We need him to tell us where she is.” He turned his attention to the suspect. “If you don’t tell him where she is, he’s going to make you regret is. He’s a lunatic and will do what ever it takes to get her back. Now, where is she?”

-Warehouse-

You made it out of the warehouse without being seen. You needed to find out where you were. You start looking around to see if you can recognize anything. All you see is the shoreline, warehouses, shipping containers and the jungle.

Trying to swim is probably the worst idea. Bleeding in the ocean, with sharks is a no go. They would get you before you could get anywhere. Heading towards the warehouses and shipping containers seems like the most logical way to go. Try and find a vehicle, but there are way too many nooks and crannies for people to be hiding. Also, it would be too much noise if you did find a vehicle.

So, at this point your best bet would be the jungle. You could go until you don’t see the buildings anymore. Become Katniss Everdeen and climb a tree to hide out on.

Before you had the chance to really make up you mind, you heard yelling and banging coming from the building behind you. As quickly as you could you start running towards the jungle. You got about 30ft in front of the tree line before you heard a gun going off.

You ducked down and looked back to see Wo Fat coming towards you. You get up and continue running.  He kept shooting at you. After a little bit he had stopped shooting. You stopped running. You decided now you needed to get off the ground, you made sure to look to see if Wo Fat was around. When the coast was clear you found a tree and started climbing. It hurt like a bitch to climb but you had to do it.

You were able to get up into the tree, you made sure that your legs laid along one of the tree branches. Now you had to stay quiet and not move. Which was more difficult that you have anticipated, but you made it work.

After a while, you saw the sun was starting to go down. The adrenaline that you once had was long gone. The pain had come back with a vengeance. Now you were starting to get tired. You had to fight to keep your eyes open. You just needed to wait a little longer. At this point you knew Steve and the rest of the team were looking for you. You just had to hold out until thy got here.

Just as your eyes were closing again. You heard voices and gun shots, coming from behind you, back towards the building.

“This is it.” you said to yourself. You gripped the knife a little tighter. It was your lifeline.

-The Team-

Steve’s phone started going off, Kono’s name popped up on the screen. He quickly answered it.

“Go ahead.”

“Catherine said there are men in the area. There was a gunshot that went off a few minutes ago. Chin is still on the phone with her… What?”

Kono started talking to Chin. She must have pulled her phone away from her ear because Steve couldn’t understand what she was saying.

“Kono what’s going on? Kono!”

“Steve It’s Y/n. Catherine found her. We need to go now.”

“We are coming back now. Kono I need you to take this guy back to the palace. Put him in a cell and meet us there. Send everyone else to the warehouses.”

Steve and Danny got the man back to the house and into Kono’s car, she left quickly. Everyone else was already on their way to the warehouses. Steve and Danny got into Danny’s car and took off. Steve was driving way too fast.

“Steve, I understand that you want to get to Y/n but you can’t do that if you’re dead.”

“We aren’t going to die Danny.”

“Driving like this we might. I want to be able to go home to my daughter. So Slow Down!”

Steve slowed down just enough to please Danny but still fast enough to feel like he would get to you in time.

After arriving at the warehouses, everyone split up, to search all the rooms. Once one building was done they moved on to the next. Steve and Danny showed up when they were down to 5 buildings left. They jumped in and started searching with the rest of the crew.

When they got to the last building there was guards around it and on the 1st floor. One by one they were taken down. Each one of the guys took a room. They were all coming up clear until Chin yelled for Steve.

Steve entered the room Chin was in and saw a table with your empty holster, a knife and your wallet. Then he saw the chair that had rope on the ground next to it in a puddle of blood. He could only assume it was yours. There were shoe prints on the ground leading out one of the doors.

“Chin.” He pointed to the door, before they went to the door. Steve opened the door. He followed the trial of blood until it stopped. Danny and Lou had joined them at this point.

“Which way would she have gone?” Danny asked as they were looking around.

“I don’t know. Its obviously not back towards the buildings. We would have found her during the search.” Lou stated.

“She wouldn’t have tried to swim either. If she’s injured would be the worst thing to do.” Chin added.

“The jungle it is then.” Steve pointed and started walking that way.

The men started heading to the jungle. When they were about 15ft from the tree line, Steve spotted Wo Fat. Wo Fat started shooting and running. The guys quickly ran to the trees to get cover.

Steve ran after Wo Fat. He was able to sneak up on him. they started fighting. Steve was able to get the gun away from him. Steve was also able to pin him to the ground and cuff him. Then he flipped him over. Danny was there, he had his gun pointed at him. Steve stood up and pulled his gun out as well.

“Where is she?”

“I don’t know.” Wo Fat had no emotion on his face or in his voice.

“Where is Y/n!?” Steve was back down on his knees, with one had on Wo Fat’s shirt. Holding him slightly up off the ground.

“I don’t know, but I can’t imagine that she has much longer.” Now he had a sadistic smile on his face.

“Duke!” Steve yelled. Duke came over pretty quick. “Take Wo Fat, put him in one of the squad cars and watch him.” Steve turned back to Wo Fat. “She better be alive when I find her, or your dead.”

“Guys we don’t have much time. We don’t know how bad her injuries are. Everyone spread out. Find her.

---

You started hearing the voices get louder. Then you started seeing the lights of multiple flashlights.

“Damn it, Damn it.”

Then a man was walking past your hiding tree. You moved slightly trying to see who it was. When you did, the knife fell off your lap. It landed right next to him.

“Shit.” You said quietly to yourself.

The man quickly looked up, his gun and flashlight aimed at you.

“Y/n?”

“Chin! Thank God, sorry about the knife.” A sense of relief washed over you. you were finally able to relax.

Chin got on his coms, “I found her. She’s up in a tree.”

“And I will need help getting down.”

“And she’s going to need help getting down.” Chin let out a small chuckle.

The fire department had to bring in special equipment in to get you down. They couldn’t get their truck that far in. The paramedics were on the ground, ready to start working on you the second they got you down.

When you were on the stretcher, you had fallen asleep. The paramedics started working on you as fast as they could. They had to hurry and get iv’s set up to get blood and fluids back into you. they were also rushing to get you back to the truck, going quickly trying not to jostle you around too much.

Steve was by your side the entire time. When you guys were in the ambulance, he was holding your hand. He was also trying not to get in the paramedic’s way. On they way to the hospital your heart started slowing down, and eventually you had flatlined. The paramedic started CPR. Steve was still holding you hand but he had started talking to you.

“Y/n, I love you. Sweetheart please don’t leave me. You are so stubborn and strong, and you always fight back. Please fight. Please… Please…”

He was trying to keep his voice steady, but he was crying too much. His voice was shaky, and his breathing was off. He just kept saying “Please” to you. just before getting out of the ambulance he kissed your hand. When it was time to get out, the paramedic had to climb on the stretcher with you to keep doing compressions. Then you were wheeled into the hospital, Steve stayed with you as long as he could before a nurse stopped him and he had to let go of your hand.

The rest of the team came into the hospital shortly after. Steve immediately came over to them. Danny was the first one in. He brought Steve into a hug, and just held onto him.

“It going to be ok. She’s going to be okay.” Danny tried to calm him down.

“She flatlined Danny. She’s not okay.” He started crying harder.

Everyone was on the verge of tears at this point. Danny let Steve go and got him to sit down. All they could do now is wait.

-Hours Later-

The tears had stopped. Everyone was getting anxious. Steve and Danny had been taking turns going up to the nurses’ desk to ask what was happening or what was taking so long. They had gone up about 10 times in the last hour alone. They got the same answers every time. They didn’t know or you need to wait for the doctor.

Just as Danny was about to go try again, a doctor came out.

“Y/n Y/l/n’s Family?” Steve shot up and out of his seat and was in front of the doctor in a matter of seconds.

“Is she okay? Please tell me she’s okay.” Steve looked like he was on the verge of tears again. Everyone was standing around him waiting to hear what the doctor had to say.

“Yes. She’s going to be okay. We were able to get her heart going again. She’s out of surgery. The surgery went as well as can be, but…” Steve’s heart just about dropped when the doctor said “but”.

“But she may not have 100% function in her legs. Her injuries were extensive, and with her moving walking or running for as long as she did, caused more damage. I have explained all of this to her already. Now she’s resting.”

“Can we see her?” Danny spoke up, Steve was in a state of shock and he wasn’t saying anything.

“Of course, but only for a little while. She needs to rest.”

The doctor walked over to one of the nurses and asked her to take them back to see you. She knocked as she opened the door. “Y/n? You have a few visitors if you’re up for it.”

“okay.” Your voice was a little horse from the surgery.

Steve was the first one through the door and he was by your side. He leaned over and kissed you on the forehead. Then just left his forehead resting on yours. You reached your hand up and put it on the back of his neck, just holding him there. After a few moments just being like this, someone cleared their throat causing you to let go of Steve.

“How are you feeling?” Danny was the first to speak.

“Like I just got hit by a tank. ya’know the usual.” You gave all of them a small smile.

You guys talked for a few hours. You were simply happy to be back with them. You were a little worried about Steve though. He wasn’t talking very much he was just staring at you. You are about to start yawning but you try to hold it in. Kono noticed what you were doing so she decided it was time for them to go.

“Guys I think we should let her rest. She looks like she’s about to pass out.” Kono gave you a small smile before pushing all the boys except Steve out the door.

After they were gone, Steve pulled his chair closer to your bed. He grabbed ahold of your hand. You could tell that he was trying to hold back his emotions.

“Steve.”

“You died.” He was quiet. He wasn’t looking at you, he was staring at your hand. “You left me y/n. you can’t do that to me again. I won’t be able to handle that.” You saw tears starting to come down his cheek. You let go of his hand and he lifted his head up to look at you. when you saw his face, it just broke your heart. You quickly moved over and pulled him onto the bed to lay down next to you. after he laid down, he put his head on your chest. You pulled him as close as you possibly could. You didn’t even care about the small amount of pain going through your legs. He needed you. he may be a big, strong guy but even tough guys have bad days. This was his worst nightmare.

“Never again. I won’t leave you.” You kissed his forehead and started running your fingers through his hair. “I promise.”

You both fell asleep like this.

-A month later-

You had been working really hard to learn to walk again. You did physical therapy four times a week. That’s all the doctors would allow. You were able to walk for the most part but sometimes you needed assistance. The doctors were comfortable with sending you home early because of all of your progress.

You were already to go you were just waiting for Steve. He walked in with one of the nurses, pushing a wheelchair. You didn’t want to sit down but it was hospital policy.

After a quick ride home, you got out of Steve’s truck faster than you normally would have. You had gotten to the door before Steve was even able to get around his truck.

“Wait for me Y/n.” he jogged up to you. “Ya’know just because you can walk again doesn’t mean you have to practically run ahead of me.”

“I’m sorry, I’m just glad to be home, sleep in my own bed, have normal food and not having someone checking on me every two seconds.” You turned to him.

“well at least let me open the door for you.” He smiled at you, then moved in front to open the door.

You walked in and it was unusually dark. You walked to the light switches and flipped them on.

“SURPRISE!!” All of your friends were there.

“oh my gosh!”

“Welcome home!”

There were balloons, streamers and a giant “welcome home” sign. Everyone was blowing party whistles. Then Grace and Danny popped giant confetti cannons. They were all laughing and cheering. You realized Steve hadn’t walked in with you. You turned around and through all the confetti you see Steve down on one knee. Your eyes went wide, and your hands went up to your face.

“oh shit.”

“language y/n.” Danny said holding grace’s ears.

“Sorry.” You turned around briefly to apologize before looking back at Steve.

“Y/n, you have made me the luckiest man alive. As soon as you walked into my life, I understood why it didn’t work with anyone else. I could watch you for a single minute and find a thousand things that I love about you. I’m crazy in love with you. I want to be your protector and your provider, and I love you beyond all measure. I can guarantee if I don’t ask you to be mine, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life because I know in my heart, you’re the only one for me. Y/n Y/m/n Y/l/n will you marry me?”

“Yes!”

Steve stood up, you grabbed his face and kissed him. when you pulled away Steve slipped a ring on your finger. Everyone had started cheering again. They started coming over to you and Steve, to congratulate you. everyone was so happy.

After everyone left, you went up to Steve and wrapped your arms around him.

“I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with you, Mr. McGarrett.”

“I can’t wait either.” He kissed you again. “I love you Y/n.”

“I love you too Steve.”

[digtothecore]

Yellow Rose's and Max 💐

my favorite things is a valentine's fic! the cornley members suddenly find cards and a single flower addressed to them in their coats/bags/etc., all detailing lovely things (with some wingmanning). as it turns out, the culprit is– you guessed it– Max, who just wanted to do something nice for his favorite group of people :]

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

Dear Robert,

(Robert gagged at that.)

You're very scary, but your dedication to the craft is admirable, and it's clear you love acting just as much as the rest of us. I hope to learn more from you! Happy Valentines!

From, Max

(In the privacy of his dressing room, Robert tucked the card into his pocket. He did, unfortunately, throw away the tulip next to it.)

Dear Vanessa,

I know you might not think so, but you're so very brave and graceful, and you handle yourself well on stage! You're very kind and I'm sure we all love your grounding presence. Be proud of yourself, because I am! Happy Valentines!

P.S. Annie told me to ask if you can meet up with her in the back lawn after practice. Good luck :)

From, Max

(Vanessa pressed it and the hydrangea to her chest with a smile before muttering a quiet "Oh!" and rushing out again, heading to the back lawn.)

Dear Annie,

You're incredible! You're so versatile and hardworking, always in character. That takes a lot of effort! Your jokes are very funny and always comforting for the rest of us. Happy Valentines!

P.S. Someone asked if you could meet her in the front lawn :)) The extra flower is for you to bring!

From, Max

(Annie would grab the red rose and proceed to the front lawn, where Vanessa decidedly wasn't, but that's a story for another time.)

Dear Dennis,

Though I know you struggle with it, you always give your all in your roles, and don't linger too long on any slip-ups. You've come such a long way since Haversham! You're a good friend, and I appreciate you. Happy Valentines!

From, Max

(Dennis would soon seek out Max and give him a tight hug, which Max would return happily.)

Dearest Sandra,

(Sandra smiled at the "est" scribbled in-between the words.)

I'm very glad to be your fiancee. Sometimes I still can't believe my luck. You're beautiful, smart, and resourceful, and you are so supportive of our friends. I'm so happy to have you in my life, and I don't regret saying yes. Happy Valentines day <3

(Max earned a kiss for that, and he and Sandra settled in their home, soaking in the comfort and the love all around. And the gossiping from the other members of certain developments.)

[writemarcus]

HITTING NEW HEIGHTS

BY MARCUS SCOTT

ORIGINAL RENT STAR DAPHNE RUBIN-VEGA TAKES YOU INSIDE THE IN THE HEIGHTS FILM

Qué quiere decir sueñito?” The disembodied voice of a girlchild ponders. “It means ‘little dream,’” responds an unseen authoritative figure, his feathery tenor with a soft rasp and tender lilt implying there’s more to the story.

Teal waves crash against the white sand coastal lines of the Dominican Republic and a quartet of children plead with the voice to illuminate and tell a story. Usnavi de la Vega (played by Anthony Ramos), sporting his signature newsboy flat cap and full goatee, begins to narrate and weave a tall-tale from the comforts of his beachside food cart: “This is the story of a block that was disappearing. Once upon a time in a faraway land called Nueva York, en barrio called Washington Heights. Say it, so it doesn’t disappear,” he decrees.

And we’re off, this distant magic kingdom ensnared within the winding urban sprawl of farthest-uptown Manhattan, the music of the neighborhood chiming with infinite possibilities: a door-latch fastening on tempo, a ring of keys sprinkling a sweet embellishment, the splish-splash of a garden hose licking the city streets like a drumstick to a snare fill, a manhole cover rotating like vinyl on a get-down turntable, the hiss of paint cans spraying graffiti like venoms from cobras and roll-up steel doors rumbling, not unlike the ultra-fast subway cars zigzagging underground. So begins the opening moments of In the Heights, the Warner Bros. stage-to-screen adaptation of the Tony Award-winning musical by composer-lyricist Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton) and librettist Quiara Alegría Hudes (Water by the Spoonful) that is set to premiere in movie theatres and on HBO Max on June 11, 2021.

This stunning patchwork of visuals and reverberations combine to create a defiant and instantly memorable collage of inner-city living not seen since Walter Hill’s 1979 cult classic The Warriors or West Side Story, the iconic romantic musical tragedy directed on film by Robert Wise and original Broadway director Jerome Robbins. With Jon M. Chu at the helm, the musical feature has all the trademarks of the director’s opulent signature style: Striking spectacles full of stark colors, va-va-voom visuals, ooh-la-la hyperkinetic showstopping sequences and out-of-this-world destination locations.

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A Kind of Priestess

Joining the fray of proscenium stage vets in the film is Broadway star Daphne Rubin-Vega, who originated the role of Mimi in the Off-Broadway and Broadway original productions of Rent. She returns to major motion pictures after a decade since her last outing in Nancy Savoca’s Union Square, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2011. When we caught up with Rubin-Vega, she was hard at work, in-between rehearsals with her In the Heights co-star Jimmy Smits on Two Sisters and a Piano, the 1999 play by Miami-based playwright Nilo Cruz, a frequent collaborator. Rubin-Vega netted a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her role as the enraptured Conchita in Cruz’s Anna in the Tropics; that same year Cruz was awarded the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, making him the first Latino playwright to receive the honor. Despite significant global, social and economic disruption, especially within the arts community, Rubin-Vega has been working throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

“People around me have [contracted] COVID… My father-in-law just had it. I’m very fortunate,” Rubin-Vega said. “This collective experience, it’s funny because it’s a year now and things seem better. Last year it was, like, ‘Damn, how inconvenient!’ The one comfort was that, you know, it’s happening to every one of us. That clarity that this is a collective experience is much more humbling and tolerable to me.”

The last time Rubin-Vega graced Washington Heights on screen or stage, she acted in the interest of survival and hunger as a probationer released after a 13-year stint in prison and given a new lease on life as an unlicensed amateur masseuse in the basement of an empanada shop in Empanada Loca, The Spalding Gray-style Grand Guignol horror play by Aaron Mark at the LAByrinth Theater Company in 2015. In In the Heights she plays Daniela, an outrageously vivacious belting beautician with a flair for the dramatics, forced to battle a price-gouging real estate bubble in the wake of gentrification.

“She’s like the deputy or the priestess,” Rubin-Vega said. “Owning a salon means that you have a lot of information; you’re in a hub of community, of information, of sharing… it’s also where you go for physical grooming. It’s a place where women were empowered to create their own work and it is a place of closeness, spiritual advice, not-so-spiritual advice. Physical attention.”

She said, “Daniela also being an elder; I think she’s not so much a person that imposes order on other people. She’s there to bring out the best—she leads with love. She tells it like it is. I don’t think she sugar-coats things. What you see is what you get with Daniela. It’s refreshing; she has a candor and sure-footedness that I admire.”

With the film adaptation, Chu and Hudes promised to expand the universe of the Upper Manhattan-based musical, crafting new dimensions and nuances to two characters in particular: Daniela and hairdresser Carla, originally portrayed as business associates and gossip buddies in the stage musical. On the big screen they are reimagined as romantic life partners. Stephanie Beatriz, known to audiences for her hilarious turn as the mysterious and aloof Detective Rosa Diaz in the police procedural sitcom romp “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” co-stars as the fast-talking firecracker, Carla.

It’s been a year waiting, you know. It’s like the lid’s been on it and so we’re just so ready to explode.

Where Is Home?

“Well, Quiara and Jon really expanded on what Lin and Quiara originally created and now they’re partners—and not just work partners, right? But they��re life partners,” Beatriz said at a March press event celebrating the release of the film’s two promo trailers. “What was so gratifying to me as a person who is queer is to see this relationship in the film be part of the fabric of the community, and to be normal, and be happy and functioning, and part of the quilt they’ve all created.”

She continued, “So much of this film is about where home is and who home is to you. And for Carla, Daniela is home. Wherever Daniela is, that’s where Carla feels at home. I thought that they did such a beautiful job of guiding us to this, really, you know, it’s just a happy functioning relationship that happens to be gay and in the movie. And I love that they did that, because it is such a part of our world.”

Rubin-Vega said she had no interest in playing any trope of what one might think a lesbian Latina might look or act like, noting that the queer experience isn’t monolithic, while expressing that the role offered her a newfound freedom, especially with regard to being present in the role and in her everyday life.

“Spoiler alert! I felt like not wearing a bra was going to free me. Did I get it right? Am I saying that gay women don’t wear bras? No, it was just a way for me to be in my body and feel my breasts. To feel my femaleness and celebrate it in a more unapologetic way,” she said, laughing. “To be honest, I was really looking forward to playing a lesbian Latina. It’s something that I hadn’t really explored before. Latinos [can be] very homophobic as a culture, and I wanted to play someone who didn’t care about homophobia; I was gonna live my best life. That’s a bigger thing. It’s also like, maybe I’m bisexual. Who knows? Who cares? If you see that in the film, that’s cool too, you know?”

Stand-out performances abound, especially with regard to the supporting cast; newcomers Melissa Barrera (in a role originated by Tony Award winner Karen Olivo) and Gregory Diaz IV (replacing three-time Tony Award nominee Robin de Jesús) are noteworthy as the aspiring fashion designer Vanessa and budding activist Sonny. Olga Merediz, who earned a Tony Award nomination for originating her role as Abuela Claudia, returns to the silver screen in a captivating performance that will be a contender come award season. However, Rubin-Vega may just be the one to watch. Her performance is incandescent and full of moxie, designed to raise endorphin levels. She leads an ensemble in the rousing “Carnaval del Barrio,” a highlight in the film.

Musical Bootcamp

“We shot in June [2019]. In April, we started musical bootcamp. In May, we started to do the choreography. My big joke was that I would have to get a knee replacement in December; that was in direct relation to all that choreography. I mean, there were hundreds of A-1 dancers in the posse,” Rubin-Vega said. “The family consisted of hundreds of superlative dancers led by Chris[topher] Scott, with an amazing team of dancers like Ebony Williams, Emilio Dosal, Dana Wilson, Eddie Torres Jr. and Princess Serrano. We rehearsed a fair bit. Monday through Friday for maybe five weeks. The first day of rehearsal I met Melissa [Barrera] and Corey [Hawkins], I pretty much hadn’t known everyone yet. I hadn’t met Leslie [Grace] yet. Chris Scott, the choreographer, just went straight into ‘let’s see what you can do.’ It was the first [dance] routine of ‘In The Heights,’ the opening number. He was like, ‘OK, let’s go. Five, six, seven, eight!’”

Rubin-Vega said that she tried to bring her best game, though it had “been a minute” since she had to execute such intricate choreography, noting that they shot the opening number within a day while praising Chu’s work ethic and leadership.

“There was a balance between focus and fun and that’s rare. Everyone was there because they wanted to be there,” she said. “I think back to the day we shot ‘96,000.’ That day it wouldn’t stop raining; [it was] grey and then the sky would clear and we’d get into places and then it would be grey again and so we’d have to wait and just have to endure. But even the bad parts were kind of good, too. Even the hottest days. There were gunshots, there was a fire while we were shooting and we had to shut down, there was traffic and noise and yet every time I looked around me or went into video village and saw the faces in there, I mean…it felt like the only place to be. You want to feel like that in every place you are: The recognition. I could recognize people who look like me. For now on, you cannot say I’ve never seen a Panamanian on film before or a Columbian or a Mexican, you know?”

Another Notion of Beauty

Rubin-Vega’s professional relationship with the playwright Hudes extends to 2015, when she was tapped to [participate in the] workshop [production of]  Daphne’s Dive. Under the direction of Thomas Kail (Hamilton) and starring alongside Samira Wiley (“The Handmaid’s Tale,” “Orange Is the New Black”), the play premiered Off-Broadway at the Pershing Square Signature Center the following year. Rubin-Vega also starred in Miss You Like Hell, the cross-country road musical by Hudes and Erin McKeown, which premiered at La Jolla Playhouse in 2016 before it transferred to The Public Theater in 2018. With her participation in the production of In the Heights, she is among the few to have collaborated with all of the living Latinx playwrights to have won the Pulitzer Prize; Hudes won the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for her play Water by the Spoonful, while Miranda took home the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Hamilton. Speaking on her multiple collaborations over the years, Rubin-Vega also acknowledged having known Miranda years before they would join voices.

“Lin to me is like a little bro or legacy; he’s a direct descent to me from [Rent author] Jonathan Larson, which is a bigger sort of all-encompassing arch,” she said, though she stressed that she auditioned like everyone else, landing the role after two or three callbacks. “Quiara and I have a wonderful working and personal relationship, I think. Which isn’t to say I had dibs by any means because…it’s a business that wants the best for itself, I suppose. […] So, when I walked in, I was determined to really give it my best.”

Life During and After Rent

Rubin-Vega has built an impressive resume over the course of her career, singing along with the likes of rock stars like David Bowie and starring in a multitude of divergent roles on Broadway and off. From a harrowing Fantine in Les Misérables and a co-dependent Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire to a sinister Magenta in The Rocky Horror Show, her evolution into the atypical character actor and leading lady can be traced back 25 years to January 25, 1996, when Larson’s groundbreaking musical Rent, a retelling of Giacomo Puccini’s 19th-century opera La Bohème, premiered at the New York Theatre Workshop. On the morning of the first preview, Larson suffered an aortic dissection, likely from undiagnosed Marfan’s syndrome and died at the age of 35, just ten days shy of what would have been his 36th birthday.

On April 29, 1996, due to overwhelming popularity, Rent transferred to Nederlander Theatre on Broadway, tackling contemporary topics the Great White Way had rarely seen, such as poverty and class warfare during the AIDS epidemic in New York City’s gritty East Village at the turn of the millennium. Rubin-Vega would go on to be nominated for the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical for her role as sex kitten Mimi Márquez, an HIV-positive heroin addict and erotic dancer.

  The show became a cultural phenomenon, receiving several awards including the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and four Tony Awards, including Best Musical. Rubin-Vega and members of the original Broadway cast were suddenly overnight sensations, recording “Seasons of Love” alongside music icon Stevie Wonder, receiving a photo shoot with Vanity Fair and landing the May 13, 1996 cover of Newsweek. Throughout its 12-year Broadway run, many of the show’s original cast members and subsequent replacements would go on to be stars, including Renée Elise Goldsberry, who followed in Rubin-Vega’s footsteps to play the popular character before originating the role of Angelica Schuyler in Hamilton, for which she won the 2016 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical.

When the screen adaptation of Rent hit cinemas in 2005 under the direction of Chris Columbus, Rubin-Vega’s conspicuous absence came as a blow to longtime fans. The confluence of pregnancy with the casting and filming process of Rent hindered her from participating at the time. The role was subsequently given to movie star Rosario Dawson.

“First of all, if you’re meant to be in a film, you’re meant to be in it,” Rubin-Vega said. “That’s just the way it goes. It took a quarter of a century but this [In the Heights] is a film that I wanted to make, that I felt the elements sat right. I always felt that Rent was a little bit darker than all that. Rent to me is Rated R. In The Heights is not. It’s also a testament. Unless it’s sucking your soul and killing you softly or hardly, just stick with it. This is a business and I keep forgetting it’s a business because actors just want to show art. So, it’s really wonderful when you get a chance to say what you mean and mean what you say with your work. It’s a really wonderful gift.”

Rarely-Explored Themes

Like Larson’s award-winning show and the film adapted from it, In The Heights is jam-packed with hard-hitting subject matter, addressing themes of urban blight, immigration, gentrification, cultural identity, assimilation and U.S. political history. When Rubin-Vega’s character Daniela and her partner were priced out of the rent for her salon, most of her clientele moved to the Grand Concourse Historic District in the Bronx. Her salon, a bastion of the community, is met with a polar response when she announces she’s joining the mass exodus with the other victims of gentrification who were pushed out by rising rents. The news is met with negative response from long-time patrons who refuse to take the short commute to the new location. Daniela counters, “Our people survived slave ships, we survived Taino [indigenous Caribbean people] genocide, we survived conquistadores and dictators…you’re telling me we can’t survive the D train to Grand Concourse?”

The question is humorous, but also insinuates a more nuanced understanding of the AfroLatinidad experience in the Western world. The film also looks at the American Dream with a naturalistic approach. Leslie Grace, who plays Nina Rosario, a first-generation college student returning from her freshman year at Stanford University and grappling with finances and the expectations of her community, noted that while her character “finds [herself] at some point at a fork in the road,” she may not have the luxury to be indecisive because of the pressures put on by family, community and country.  

“The struggle of the first-generation Americans in the Latino community is not talked about a lot because it’s almost like a privilege,” Grace asserted. “You feel like it’s a privilege to talk about it. But there is a lot of identity crisis that comes with it and I think we explore that.” Speaking on the character, she elaborated: “Home for her is where her heart is, but also where her purpose is. So, she finds her purpose in doing something outside of herself, greater than herself and going back to Stanford for the people she loves in her community. I really relate to where she’s at, trying to find herself. And I think a lot of other people will, too.”

Worth Singing About

For Miranda, a first-generation Puerto Rican New Yorker that grew up in Inwood at the northernmost tip of Manhattan before attending Wesleyan University where he would develop the musical, this speaks to a larger issue of what defines a home.

“What does ‘home’ even mean? Every character is sort of answering it in a different way,” he said. “For some people, home is somewhere else. For some people, home is like ‘the block’ they’re on. So, that’s worth singing about. It’s worth celebrating in a movie of this size.”

Given the current zeitgeist, it’s no wonder why Chu, Hudes and Miranda decided to pivot with adapting the stage musical for the big screen, leaning in to tackle the plights and predicaments of DREAMers [children of undocumented immigrants seeking citizenship] stateside. In one scene, glimpses of posters at a protest rally read “Immigrant Rights are Human Rights” and “Refugees Are People Too.” Growing up in a multicultural household as a Latina with a Black Latina mother, a white father and a Jewish American stepfather, Rubin-Vega said she was used to being in spaces that were truly multiracial. Nevertheless, there were times when she often felt alien, especially as a du jour rock musical ingenue who looked as she did in the mid-1990s through the 2000s.

“Undocumented people come in different shapes and colors,” she noted. “To be born in a land that doesn’t recognize you, it’s a thing that holds so much horror… so much disgrace happens on the planet because human beings aren’t recognized as such sometimes.”

The film “definitely sheds light on that, but it also talks about having your dream taken away and its human violation—it’s a physical, spiritual, social, cultural violation,” Rubin-Vega said. “There’s a difference between pursuing dreams and being aware of reality. They’re not mutually exclusive. What this film does, it presents a story that is fairly grounded in reality. It’s a musical, it’s over the top… but it reflects a bigger reality, which is like an emotional reality…that people that are challenged on the daily, have incredible resolve, incredible resoluteness and lifeforce.”

She said: “Growing up, looking like me, I got to ingest the same information as everyone else except when it came time to implement my contributions, they weren’t as welcomed or as seen. The dream is to be seen and to be recognized. Maybe I could be an astronaut or an ingenue on Broadway? You can’t achieve stuff that you haven’t imagined. When it talks about DREAMers, it talks about that and it talks about how to not be passive in a culture that would have you think you are passive but to be that change and to dare to be that change.”

Dreams Come True

Dreams are coming true. Alongside the nationwide release of the much-anticipated film, Random House announced it will publish In the Heights: Finding Home, which will give a behind-the-scenes look at the beginnings of Miranda’s 2008 breakout Broadway debut and journey to the soon-to-be-released film adaptation. The table book will chronicle the show’s 20-year voyage from page to stage—from Miranda’s first drawings at the age of 19 to lyric annotations by Miranda and essays written by Hudes to never-before-seen photos from productions around the world and the 2021 movie set. It will be released to the public on June 22, eleven days after the release of the film; an audiobook will be simultaneously released by Penguin Random House Audio.

Hinting at the year-long delay due to the pandemic, Rubin-Vega said, “It’s been a year waiting, you know. It’s like the lid’s been on it and so we’re just so ready to explode.”

Bigger Dreams

“Jon [Chu], I think, dreams bigger than any of us dare to dream in terms of the size and scope of this,” Miranda said. “We spent our summer [in 2018] on 175th Street. You know, he was committed to the authenticity of being in that neighborhood we [all] grew up in, that we love, but then also when it comes to production numbers, dreaming so big. I mean, this is a big movie musical!”

Miranda continued, “We’re so used to asking for less, just to ask to occupy space, you know? As Latinos, we’re, like, ‘Please just let us make our little movie.’ And Jon, every step of the way, said, like, ‘No, these guys have big dreams. We’re allowed to go that big!’ So, I’m just thrilled with what he did ’cause I think it’s bigger than any of us ever dreamed.”

Speaking at the online press conference, Miranda said, “I’m talking to you from Washington Heights right now! I love it here. The whole [movie] is a love letter to this neighborhood. I think it’s such an incredible neighborhood. It’s the first chapter in so many stories. It’s a Latinx neighborhood [today]. It was a Dominican neighborhood when I was growing up there in the ’80s. But before that it was an Irish neighborhood and Italian. It’s always the first chapter in so many American stories.”

[marjansmarwani]

drop what I’m doing and sit beside you

6.4k || ao3

The past few months have been a lot, and Judd is feeling the strain. Ever since the accident, he has devoted every spare moment to making sure Grace was okay until she finally insists that he take some time to himself. So he decides to head to the cabin he used to visit with his old crew, TK in tow and Carlos staying behind with Grace.

But what starts out as a calm and relaxing weekend takes an abrupt turn and Judd is left hurt and TK is left trying to figure out the best way to save them both. ------ Day 2 of @911lonestarweek: "Please, stay awake" + “I’m right here, I’m not leaving, okay.”+ Cauterizing a wound for @badthingshappenbingo

Judd and Grace deserve some love so here is a take on “I’m right here, I’m not leaving, okay” prompt requested by @immortalstrand ages ago. She asked for Judd and TK being brothers, so I also managed to squeeze in some Tarlos and some cauterization, requested by Max for bthb. 

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

The last few weeks had been a lot, to say the least. 

They had careened directly from a pandemic (that was still going on) to a damn volcano straight into a forest fire. They had lost one of their own and hadn’t had a moment to catch their breaths, let alone properly grieve. The universe didn’t seem too keen on them having a moment to process. 

From there it had been smaller things for a while: a minefield, TK switching to medical, whatever it was that was going on with Owen and Gwyn. Small interruptions to their everyday that were just enough to upset their equilibrium and set things off balance. But they were manageable; small stumbling points in their forward momentum. 

Until they weren’t. Until the molehills became mountains and Judd was reminded again what it was like to not be able to breathe in the face of fear. The feeling of the breath being stolen from his lungs was not a new one, but one that he hated. 

But he had hated what he was hearing even more: the paramedic team was missing. Nancy; who was his sole link to the time before, to his old life with his brothers that were no longer here. TK; his cocky, annoying, and big-hearted little brother. Tommy; his friend, a person he relied on and whom he owed the world to for introducing him to Grace and bringing him the greatest happiness he had ever known. They were missing and probably in danger and Judd couldn’t do a damn thing about it. 

But then they were found, and he could breathe again; if a little tensely. Because they were all alive but TK was hurt and it could have been so much worse but it hadn’t and he had to keep reminding himself of that. They were okay, and everything was fine. 

Until the rain and the blaring of a horn and the sensation of falling before the staggering crash of hitting the water and the desperate fear that was so much more real than any of the rest of it because it was Grace this time and nothing he had ever faced could be as bad as that. 

But slowly, they healed. The moment Grace opened her eyes again and smiled at him Judd swore rivaled their wedding day as the happiest moment of his life. As long as Grace was okay everything would be fine. And it was. It wasn’t easy, but it was okay. They were okay. His injuries had been minor, comparatively speaking, but Grace’s had been much more dire, and much more lingering. They had impacted their very way of life and every day was a bit of a struggle, but it was worth it. Any moment he got to spend with his wife safe and whole beside him was worth it, no matter how difficult. 

But eventually, things became something close to normal and Grace was tired of him hovering over her in every spare moment. 

“You need to do something, my love,” she had told him. “Take some time, go somewhere.” When he had protested she had simply shaken her head. “I love you, Judd,” she said evenly, “but if you don’t let me be for a few days, I’m going to lose my mind.” 

And so, in the face of his wife’s unwavering gaze, a plan had formed: there was an old cabin, about an hour outside the city. Judd and some of his teammates used to take a trip there at least once a year, often more. It had been almost two now since Judd had last been there, but he figured now was as good a time as any. He floated the idea to his new team, in the interest of keeping the tradition alive. Paul and Nancy turned him down outright, though they were touched. Marjan had a roller derby bout that weekend and Tommy didn’t want to waste any of her time with her girls. Which left him with TK and Mateo, who both eagerly agreed. 

Judd couldn’t hide his surprise at TK’s ready acceptance, making some comment about the city boy camping which caused the younger man to roll his eyes. 

“You do realize that you can leave New York, right?” he asked sarcastically. “There’s a big state outside the city and plenty of places to camp. My dad and I used to go whenever we had the time when I was growing up. It’s been years, but I doubt camping has changed all that much.” 

Judd didn’t have much to say to that so he settled for mussing up TK’s hair, causing him to give an indignant squawk and Nancy to laugh. The pieces began to fall into place the closer they got to the actual date. Judd had confessed his hesitation of leaving Grace completely alone to TK only to have Carlos offer to stay at the house with her when he wasn’t working. More surprising than the offer was Grace’s ready acceptance of it. 

“You think you boys are going to have fun,” she teased Judd, “but I’d wager that Carlos and I can give you a run for your money.” 

Which didn’t exactly instill much confidence, but if there were two people Judd Ryder trusted in the world, his wife and Carlos Reyes certainly made the list. So Judd thanked Carlos (and TK, who he was certain had something to do with it) and moved forward. 

The day of their excursion dawned bright and clear and found TK and Judd securing the last of their gear in the bed of Judd’s truck. Mateo had come down with a stomach bug the day before, leaving them with just a duo for the weekend. 

“I don’t know,” TK quipped as he deftly caught the bag Judd tossed him before setting it down in the truck bed he was standing in, “think we’ll be able to handle it?” 

“Handle what?”

“So much time together, just the two of us.” 

Judd shrugged, “I don’t see why not. Besides, you get annoying enough there are plenty of places to dump a body.” TK rolled his eyes as he climbed down from the truck but Judd continued contemplatively, “Could easily make it look like an accident too.” 

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” a new voice deadpanned and Judd turned to see Carlos and Grace approaching. The young cop raised an eyebrow and TK smiled at him as he stepped into his boyfriend’s space. 

“Or otherwise you’d have to arrest him on suspicion of murder?” he teased lightly. 

“I don’t know about that,” Carlos countered as he snaked his arms around TK’s waist, “you know what they say: no body, no crime.” 

“So you have to wait until after he murders me? Wow.” 

“Sorry babe, I don’t make the laws.” 

“Rude,” TK exclaimed, but leaned in for a kiss anyway. 

Judd rolled his eyes at them, only to get a swat from his wife. “Don’t pretend that we were any better at that point in our relationship Judd.” 

Judd grinned and leaned down, pressing a soft kiss to the top of her head. “Who says we’re any better now?” he asked, causing Grace to giggle and half-heartedly swat at him again. He leaned even further to pull her into a lingering kiss. When they pulled apart he studied her for a long moment. He wasn’t ready to leave her just yet. What if…

But his spiral was interrupted by her firmly shaking her head. Judd wasn’t surprised that she knew where his thoughts were going: she knew every inch of him and it was all hers. 

“Judson Ryder I will be fine. Which is more than I can say for you if you don’t take some time for yourself. You need to recharge, my love. Go and take that city boy and show him how to rough it. I’ll be here when you get back.” 

Judd swallowed and nodded, forcing a smile in the weight of his wife’s expectant gaze. He leaned down to give her one more kiss before straightening and throwing a glance at TK who was still talking closely with Carlos, still wrapped in his embrace: “You ready to get this show on the road, lover boy?” 

TK leaned in for one last fleeting kiss before turning to face Judd with a smirk: “Ready when you are, Cowboy Judd.” 

Carlos shook his head and came to stand beside Grace, clapping a hand on Judd’s shoulder as he passed him. “Try not to kill him, if you can,” he requested lightly. “I do kind of like him, after all.” 

“I make no promises, Reyes,” Judd shot back. He went to step away, but paused. He looked back at Carlos, needing to say how much he appreciated what the younger man was doing but Carlos shook his head before he even had a chance to form the words. 

“I’m happy to do it, Judd. Besides, I know you’d do the same for me.” 

Carlos flicked his eyes to where TK was checking the bungee cords over the truck bed and Judd nodded. Of course he would, that’s what family does, after all. 

“Alright kid, let’s hit the road,” he said instead, turning back to the truck and TK. “We’re burning daylight.” 

TK sent a wave in the direction of Grace and Carlos before climbing into the passenger side of the truck. Judd walked around to the front and pulled open his door, turning to give Grace one last look. She sent him a warm and reassuring smile and he forced himself to take a calming breath. She would be fine, it would be okay. 

With that he shot her a grin before climbing in himself and pulling away, already counting down the seconds until he would be back by his wife’s side. 

---------

Grace had been right. 

Which shouldn’t surprise him after all these years, but the fact remained. 

It turned out that this had been exactly what he needed. To get away for a while, to spend some time in the fresh and open air. He had been worried, before they came, that being back here would bring up old memories of the family he had lost. And it did, but not in a bad way. He had been struck by it the moment they had arrived, when he had opened the door to the familiar room that even now seemed to echo with the sounds of their laughter. He had paused, overwhelmed by the force of it all when he felt a cautious hand on his arm. He glanced over to see TK looking at him carefully. 

“You okay?” he asked and Judd took a deep breath before nodding. 

“Yeah,” he said lowly, “it’s just been a while, you know? And the last time I was here...things were different.” 

He didn’t expand but he could tell by the look on TK’s face that the young paramedic knew exactly what he wasn’t saying. He nodded, glancing around the room as if he too could see the ghosts. “What to tell me about them?” 

He looked at TK sharply, surprised but the other man just shrugged, “I think I’d like to know more about them, if you feel like talking about it.” 

Judd looked away from his friend to study the empty room again. They had come here so often, every single inch of the space held a memory. More than he could ever forget and, as had happened more and more often with time, he realized he didn’t want to. “You see that part of the ceiling over there that looks cleaner than the rest?”

TK followed his pointed finger and nodded when he saw the ceiling tile that stood out as starkly more white than the others. 

“Let’s just say you are not the worst firehouse cook I have ever seen, kid.” 

TK glances up at the ceiling and then back at Judd, eyebrow raised. “Do I want to know?” 

“Why don’t I tell you and we’ll find out.” 

-----------

The rest of the day passed in a similar way, the two men chatting as they set up camp and Judd filling the space with whatever story of his old crew’s antics he thought of at that moment. 

“I think I would have liked them,” TK noted once he caught his breath after a particularly entertaining story about a wild turkey and a very startled probie who did not know they could fly. 

“Oh, you would have,” Judd agreed. “And you would’ve all gotten along like a house on fire. It’s Austin I’d be worried about.”  

TK rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to their surroundings. They were on their way to a trail Judd said they used to frequent that apparently had some great views from the peak. Judd was in his element now, sharing stories and showing TK around the patch of forest he knew so well. There was apparently fishing in the creek on the agenda for tomorrow and while TK would be lying if he said he was enthused by the idea, he was happy to see Judd happy. The past month or so since the accident had been hard on them all, but none more than Judd. Seeing him standing a little straighter and smiling a little wide brought TK a relief he hadn’t been expecting. 

He was so lost in his thoughts he almost didn’t notice the ground give way underneath his foot until it was too late. He flailed, windmilling his arms in a desperate attempt to catch his balance but it proved to be unnecessary when Judd reached out and caught him, steadying him and pulling him back to even ground. 

“Easy there,” he said firmly, “you good?” 

“Yeah,” TK responded after his heart rate returned to normal. “Yeah, I’m good. I don’t know what happened though. One minute I was walking and then...”

“And then you weren’t,” Judd finished helpfully, looking past TK to the spot he had nearly fallen from. TK followed his gaze to see that the edge of the trail they had been walking had crumbled under his feet. 

“Looks like erosion,” Judd observed with a frown. “I knew they’ve had a lot of rain up this way, but I didn’t realize it would have been enough to affect the land.” 

“That’s global warming for you,” TK retorted wryly, stepping closer to the middle of the trail, “and I don’t think it’s going to be any better as we get further.” 

Judd nodded, “Yeah, we should probably turn back.” 

But even as he said it TK could see the disappointment playing out on his face. This was important to Judd, and this weekend was all about giving him a break from all of the shit he had been dealing with for the past month. If that meant walking a slightly less than stable trail for a few hours, TK could manage that. 

“What?” he teased, stepping around Judd and heading further up the trail, “You don’t think we can handle it? There’s no reason we can’t, we just have to watch our steps.”  

Judd looked as if he were debating for a moment before TK rolled his eyes at him, “C’mon Judd, we’re here. We might as well take the chance while we can. Besides now that we know, we’ll just have to be more careful.” 

Finally, Judd shook his head. “Alright kid, but if you get yourself injured I am not covering for you with your man.” 

TK shook his head but laughed as he turned around. “Then we better not get injured because I’m not covering for you from Grace either. Besides,” he added, “I didn’t bring the full first aid kit so mortal injuries are not allowed.” 

He quickened his pace as he moved further down the trail, causing Judd to curse under his breath as he sped up to catch up with him. He slowed after a minute and the two men continued down the trail in companionable silence. TK may be a city person, born and raised, but there was something comforting about the silence of nature. It offered a silence he had spent years and many pills trying to find in his own head. The only problem with it was that eventually, it ended and he was always right back where he started. 

But this was about Judd and so TK turned to glance at him. He seemed lost in thought. “What’s on your mind?” he asked, startling the other man out of his reverie. He had an almost guilty look on his face and TK rolled his eyes, “Please don’t tell me you were worrying about Grace?” 

The way Judd turned away, avoiding TK’s gaze told him everything he needed to know. 

“Judd,” he sighed, “she’s fine. She’s in no danger and is perfectly capable of taking care of herself. Besides,” he added after a glance at his watch, “Carlos’s shift will be over in an hour and then he’ll be over there and I’m sure they’ll be having a great time making pasta and gossiping over wine.” 

Judd did at least snort at that, causing TK to relax a little. “I know you’re worried,” he continued, voice softer, “and honestly I can’t say I blame you. I don’t think I would be much better if it were Carlos in her place and we had gone through what you have. But you trust her, right?” 

“More than anyone,” Judd replied, without a moment’s hesitation.

“Then trust her,” TK implored. “She told you she would be fine and so she will. And if she’s not she has people to rely on. She’s not alone in this, neither of you are.” 

There was silence between them for several moments and as it stretched on TK began to worry that he had overstepped. He was about to offer an apology and resign himself to a hike filled with awkward silence when Judd finally spoke. 

“That’s actually pretty wise,” he mused, “who would have thought you had that in you?” 

TK rolled his eyes as Judd laughed. “See if I ever give you advice again,” he gripped, staggering as Judd clapped him on the shoulder. 

“I appreciate it kid, really,” he assured him. “And you might just be right.” 

“Only maybe?”

“Well I can’t have you getting a big head, can I?” 

TK rolled his eyes and decided to change the subject, “How much further to this lookout point?” 

“What, you getting tired on me?” 

“No, but it will be getting dark in just over an hour and while an eroding trail in daylight is doable, an eroding trail in the dark is something else entirely.” 

Judd sobered at the reminder, “It’s not too much further, 10 minutes tops. Besides, it’s worth it. Most beautiful view you’ve ever seen. Chuck actually proposed to his wife out here.” 

“Are you planning on proposing to me, Judd? Because I’m flattered but I think your wife and my boyfriend might have something to say about that.” 

Judd shook his head, “Can’t even show you the wonders of nature without you making it weird. What am I going to do with you kid?” 

TK simply laughed and Judd rolled his eyes. They continued forward, reaching an opening in the trees a few minutes later, as promised. TK could feel Judd’s eyes on him as they stepped forward and he meant to make a quip about it, but the sight that sprawled out before them stole the words from him. Open fields spread out as far as they could see, bright spots of blue dotting them and a river winding lazily through. 

“This is the best time to come out here,” Judd was saying. “The bluebonnets are fully in bloom.” 

“It’s gorgeous,” TK agreed. “Why didn’t you bring Grace out here to propose?” 

Judd shrugged, “That was the plan, actually. I figured she deserved the best. But it didn’t quite work out that way.” 

TK studied him for a moment. “You blurted it out without thinking, didn’t you?” 

Judd looked startled for a moment but when TK raised an eyebrow he chuckled ruefully, “Yeah I did. Don’t give me that look,” he protested defensively, “like you’re going to do any better when the time comes for you and Reyes.” 

TK’s laughter petered off and he shook his head. “You’re probably right,” he admitted. “Besides, take it from someone with unfortunate experience in this matter: those overly planned and dramatic proposals aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.” 

Judd sobered at the change in TK’s tone, and though he didn’t push TK was sure he had connected the dots in his mind. 

“Yeah well,” he said instead, “if it’s the right person the ‘how’ doesn’t matter.”  

TK smiled at him before turning his gaze back to the amazing view before them. Judd kept talking beside him, “We used to come out here, from time to time. My old crew and me,” he clarified and TK nodded.

“A bunch of macho firefighters admiring the pretty flowers?” he teased lightly but Judd shook his head. 

“It was just kind of peaceful, you know? We’d come out here and somehow find a way to talk about the serious things. It was nice. It was…” 

He trailed off but TK continued for him, understanding where he was going with it, “A safe place.”

“Yeah,” Judd agreed softly, stepping closer to the edge. “It was.” 

TK smiled sadly at his back, staying quiet as Judd took a moment. He couldn’t begin to imagine what he was thinking about or how much he had suffered. TK had never been as close with any crew before this one, and he couldn’t imagine losing any of them, let alone all of them. He couldn’t imagine what that would feel like. So he was content to offer silent support and to let Judd do whatever it was that he needed to do. 

Or he was, until Judd took another absent minded step forward and TK heard the tell-tale sound of earth crumbling. 

“Judd!” he called out, lunging forward to grab for the other man, just managing to latch on to his arm before the rest of the ground crumbled around him. 

He wasn’t fast enough to prevent it though. All he could do was follow as gravity did its work, pulling Judd over the edge of the overlook, pulling TK with him. 

They tumbled for what felt like ages, each moment a blur of motion and pain. When they finally came to a rest TK took a moment to remember how to breathe, to reacquaint himself with his body once more. And in the next moment he turned, looking for Judd. 

He found him only a few feet from him. He was sprawled and not moving and for a moment, TK forgot how to breathe all over again.

“Judd!” he called as he pushed himself up, collapsing with a sharp gasp as pain shot through his right wrist. He stopped for a moment to examine it; carefully feeling the joint for any signs of a break. He didn’t find any and tried to pull himself up again, more carefully this time. He made his way to Judd’s side, surveying him the best he could without moving him unnecessarily, looking him over for any signs of major injury. He didn’t see any so he gently turned him over, biting his lip against the pain that shot through his wrist at the motion.

“Judd,” he tried again, “are you with me?” 

“Yeah,” came the other man’s response and TK almost collapsed in relief.

“Can you tell me what happened?” he asked, beginning to examine him more closely. 

“Are you going all paramedic on me kid?” he asked drily and TK narrowed his eyes. 

“Humor me.”

Judd sighed, “We were hiking and I stepped too close to the edge of a trail we knew was unstable. I screwed up.” 

“We’re all allowed,” TK reminded him. “God knows I’ve done my fair share. What’s important is that you’re okay. Is there anything that hurts?” 

“What about you? You okay?” 

“I’m fine. Really,” he insisted at Judd’s less than convinced look. “I’m going to be very bruised and I think I sprained a wrist but it’s my right and since I’m left handed, I’ll live. I’m more worried about you at the moment.”

“Don’t need to be,” Judd said weakly, “I’m fine. Help me up and we’ll get out of here.” 

But TK had continued his examination and determined that while Judd Ryder was a lot of things, one of them (at the moment) was a liar. There was a puncture wound on his thigh, and it was bleeding heavily. TK swore and reached around for his backpack, knowing that while he had not brought the full first aid kit he had at least grabbed some bandages. 

It was a moment later that he realized he no longer had it. It must have been lost somewhere along their fall. He glanced back up to see that they had fallen much further than he had thought; nearly 40 feet of steep, overgrown hillside was stretched out between them and the overlook. He swore again. 

“What’s wrong?” Judd asked him. 

TK took a steadying breath before he looked back down at Judd. “What’s wrong is that you have a wound that is bleeding pretty heavily and that I lost my backpack with all our medical supplies and gear somewhere in the fall. I can try to make a pressure bandage maybe, but I don’t know if it’ll be enough to stop it.” 

“And we need to get out of here,” Judd added, “because it’ll be dark soon and the local wildlife might not take too kindly to our being here.” 

“That too,” TK agreed, already pulling off his hoodie and balling it up to compress against the wound. “Overall, this is less than ideal.” 

Judd nodded and reached into his pocket for his phone and turned it to TK after a moment, revealing a picture of him and Grace, and no bars. “Well we’re on our own for getting out,” he told TK, “no service.” 

TK cursed again. Looking back down at the hoodie in his hand, the gray material rapidly being consumed by the bright red of blood. It was bleeding too much. 

“You should go get help.” 

TK looked sharply up at Judd, who seemed to think what he was saying made sense. “No,” TK said incredulously. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m right here, I’m not leaving, okay.”

“You should,” Judd countered, “it might be our best shot.” 

“How exactly do you think you are going to do against that wildlife you mentioned?” TK asked him with a raised eyebrow. “I’m not going anywhere.” 

They lapsed into silence, after that, both their minds spinning with possibilities and solutions. It was Judd that eventually broke the silence.

“What if you cauterized it?” 

TK looked up at him incredulously, “I’m sorry, what?”

“To stop the bleeding. We don’t really have enough equipment with us for you to properly bandage it and it’s bleeding an awful lot. Cauterizing it might be the best way to stop the bleeding with what we have.” 

TK shook his head, “It’s not that simple Judd. Yes, it would stop the bleeding, but it would only stop it from coming through the skin. I have no way of knowing what is torn internally, and cauterizing the outside won’t do anything for that. You could just end up with massive internal bleeding instead, not to mention the risk of infection. And I think you are ignoring the fact that cauterizing it would literally mean I would be melting your skin back together.” 

“What’s another burn scar?” Judd said with a shrug and TK frowned at him. 

“At some point we’re going to have to talk about how casually you said that,” he muttered, “but there are bigger matters at hand right now.” 

TK could feel Judd watching him but his mind was turning; pros and cons and possible courses of action flying through his head. He bit his lip as he looked back down at the compress he was still clutching tightly to the wound, and swallowed. It wasn’t the worst idea in the world, but it also wasn’t a great one. It was a last resort type of idea for sure, and he wasn’t quite sure they were there just yet. 

But they were pretty close.  

“Listen, kid,” Judd said, interrupting his thoughts, “you need to do what you think is best. I trust you and I know you won’t let me down.” 

“It could go wrong though,” TK admitted quietly, “it could make things worse.” 

“Or you could not do it and we could be trapped here, since you refuse to leave for help.” 

TK bit at his lip as he considered. He hated the idea. Not only was it not guaranteed to work, it would also be incredibly painful. But Judd was right; it might be their only shot. 

“We’d need something that could get hot enough,” he finally said, “and something to heat it with.” 

“There’s a hunting knife strapped to my belt and a lighter in my right pocket.” 

TK took a deep breath and nodded, “Okay, but this is going to hurt; a lot.” 

“I trust you.” 

And he did. TK had always known that, but the way he was looking at him now as he bled out on the forest floor made it even more apparent. He took another wavering breath before he nodded, “Then let’s do this.” 

He took the knife from Judd and reached into the indicated pocket for the lighter. He flicked it on and held it under the knife, running the flame back and forth across it, making sure to evenly heat it. When he could feel the heat emanating from it he pulled the hoodie off the wound and did his best to clean it before he met Judd’s eyes.

“Ready?” he asked. 

“As I’ll ever be,” he responded.  

TK nodded again and swallowed, looking back down at the offending wound. He took a deep breath and pressed the hot knife against the puncture, making sure to raise and lower it in short bursts to prevent from killing the healthy tissue surrounding the wound. He could hear Judd’s cries of pain and apologized over and over again, for all the good it did. Then finally, it was done and he tossed the knife down onto the ground beside them as he leaned forward to examine the wound. It wasn’t bleeding anymore, at least, which meant he at least hadn’t tortured his friend for nothing. 

He pulled his eyes off of the wound in search of Judd’s face, feeling fear course through him as he saw his eyes closed. 

“Hey,” he instructed, “I need you to open your eyes, Judd. I need you awake.”

He tapped on the other man’s face and eventually, his eyes blinked open. 

“That’s it,” he said soothingly. “That’s better. I know it hurts but I need you to keep those eyes open. Please, stay awake.” 

“Can’t leave you out here on your own,” Judd quipped weakly, and TK laughed.

“No, you can’t,” he agreed. He settled down on the ground beside Judd, determined to let him relax a bit before they tried to move at all. 

“We should get moving,” Judd said instead, trying to pull himself up. “The road should be that way, unless my head is truly scrambled. We should be able to find someone passing by, or at least get a signal to call for help maybe.”

“And we will,” TK assured him, “but you can take a second to catch your breath first. That can’t have been fun.” 

“Wouldn’t recommend it,” Judd agreed, “but I’m good.” 

“Well I’m not,” TK countered. “I’m going to need a minute to recover from melting my friend’s skin back together so you can just wait a minute or two if you don’t mind.”

Judd's unimpressed look told TK he knew exactly what he was doing, but he settled back down with a sigh.  

“What do you think Grace and Carlos are going to have to say about this?” he asked, and TK chuckled. 

“Nothing good,” he admitted, “but they’ll both just be glad we’re okay. Pretty sure Grace will have something to say about irony though when you were the one we should have all been worried about, in the end.” 

Judd snorted and they lapsed into silence. They waited for a few more minutes until TK glanced up at the sky and the slowly sinking sun with a sigh, “Guess it’s time,” he said, gingerly pulling himself off the ground and brushing himself off. “We’ll have better luck if we can get to the road before dark. You good to go?” 

“As I’ll ever be,” Judd shrugged and allowed TK to help him up. It was a sign of how badly he was feeling, TK thought, that Judd leaned against him without even a hint of protest, allowing TK to support him. He slid one of Judd’s arms around his shoulder. 

“Lead the way, Cowboy Judd,” he instructed once they were settled, “I have no idea where we’re going.” 

“East,” Judd told him, nodding in the direction away from the setting sun. “The road is East from here.” 

“East it is,” he agreed as he took a tentative step forward, allowing Judd a moment to get his feet under him. “Then we just hope it’s rush hour out in the sticks.” 

They made their way to the road, slowly but surely. TK kept stealing glances at Judd, making note of his condition. So far he seemed good. Or as good as could be expected, at least. He was pale and sweating but that was to be expected from exertion and blood loss. Hopefully they would find help soon. TK wasn’t ready to think about what could happen if they didn’t. 

They reached the road without incident and TK could hardly believe his eyes. There were lights in the distance, heading towards them. 

“Judd!” he exclaimed, “there’s a car coming! Come on!”  

Judd followed his gaze and picked up his pace, the sight of the car apparently giving him a second wind. When they reached the side and the car slowed to a stop at the sight of TK’s frantic waves and Judd clinging to him, TK allowed himself a moment to breathe a sigh of relief. It would be okay, they would be fine. 

And that was all he could ask for. 

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

TK was dozing off in the uncomfortable chair at the side of Judd’s bed when he heard frantic footsteps approaching. He sat up as Carlos and Grace entered the room, both wearing anxious expressions that didn’t ease much at the sight of them. 

TK knew he must look like a wreck - covered in cuts and bruises and his wrist wrapped with an ice pack resting on top of it - but he was at least sitting up (for the most part). Judd on the other hand…

Grace went straight for him, a hand covering her mouth as she took in the sight. 

“He’ll be okay,” TK told her softly, “they did a full exam. They just want him to get some fluids and a transfusion to make up for the blood loss and some antibiotics just in case due to the less than sterile conditions. He’ll be up and on his feet in no time.”

“Probably sooner than he should,” Grace snorted, though her voice was thick. TK looked away, allowing her to have her moment, to Carlos who was studying him from the doorway.

“I’m okay too,” he assured him. “Just some superficial cuts and bruises.” 

“So the ice pack and bandage is just for fun?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.

“It’s only a sprain,” TK retorted. “We’re both going to be fine.” 

“Well one thing’s for sure,” Grace noted as she took one of Judd’s hands in hers, “I would say Carlos and I did have more fun than you. Until we got that phone call, that is.” 

“Hey now, I think me and the kid were doing just fine in the fun department before this all happened, isn’t that right TK?” 

All eyes turned to Judd who had apparently woken up at some point during their conversation and was beaming up at Grace. 

“That’s true,” TK agreed, giving Carlos a fond smile as Judd and Grace looked at each other, “and it’s not like we asked the path to erode. That was definitely not the plan.” 

“I would just like to make pasta without someone I care about ending up in the hospital,” Carlos declared, coming up behind TK to put his hands on his shoulders and leaning down to press a kiss to the top of his head. “But that is apparently too much to ask.” 

TK looked over at Judd and Grace to see what they had to say but they were too wrapped up in each other to even know that they had company in the room. Grace had tears in her eyes as she reached out a hand to put a hand on Judd’s face. “And here you were worried about me,” she reminded him. “That is what I call irony, my love.” 

TK did his best to bite back the laugh that came at that and Judd spared him a glance long enough to roll his eyes before turning his gaze back to his wife. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, “I didn’t want to worry you.” 

“I’m afraid you don’t get a say in that Judd,” Grace argued, “it comes with the territory when you love someone.” 

TK looked up at Carlos to see him smiling down at him. He reached his good hand up and placed it on top of one of the hands on his shoulders, giving it a light squeeze. Soon they would work out the logistics and likely leave Judd and Grace to their own devices, giving them the time they needed to savor the existence of each other. They would likely go home and do the same.  But for now TK was content to sit here; the man he loved beside him and two dear friends nearby and just soak it all in. It had been a long day after a long few months, but they were all safe and whole and they were here together. 

And TK knew now just as surely as he had by the side of the road: couldn’t ask for anything more.