#very awful translation attempt pls do not look at me

[jommycham]

Spirit Hunter NG Radio Drama Bonus CD [Ultra Rough Translation]

[Spirit Doctor Yashiki Kazuo's Consultation Room]

An honest attempt at a translation of the bonus drama CD that came with the purchase of NG: Extreme Kaidanchi. Beware of some minor spoilers if you have not played through all the Spirit Hunter games.

Note: Only did this for fun, and I am not fluent in Japanese, so inaccuracies are expected.

Disclaimers:

This bonus CD is an edited version of Yashiki's Consultation Room that was originally broadcasted on the EXP channel. Some questions sent in by viewers have been altered. What occurs in the Consultation Room should be treated as a parallel universe to the main storyline— therefore all comments made in these sessions are NOT canon.

(btw, Yashiki's title here is "Kai Ika" (怪医家)— or literally "Strange Doctor," which is probably where the "Spirit Doctor" came from.)

✄--------------------------------------------

I did my best with my (admittedly) shoddy translation, and cleaned it up a bit to have it sound more coherent. Again, I do not speak or understand much Japanese, so despite my best attempts, portions can be wrong (though most of it should be reasonably correct). I will highlight those unsure sections accordingly. There are also very small parts I've omitted, either due to it being too difficult to understand (for me) or to smooth the flow of the translation. 🙇‍♀️Thank you very much for your understanding and putting up with my impulsive DM brain rot.

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This CD features Yashiki and Mashita answering the audience's concerns/worries. Yashiki receives these burning questions through occult magazines. This time, however, Yashiki specifically calls Mashita in due to a request from OOPArts, much to Mashita's chagrin.

☕︎ Late for School Reader: This question is basically taken from EXP 4th Season #3 Voice Drama (where it's Yashiki, Moe, and Mashita) regarding the viewer who couldn't get up early.

Yashiki: Moe has answered this before, and I suggest rather than buying a cat, to take supplements, don't accumulate stress, go to bed early, get plenty of sleep, and have yourself plenty of coffee and sugar as soon as you wake up.

Mashita: Well, I guess that's the sort of advice you'd give. At my previous job, I'd take a shower or wash my face with cold water.

Yashiki: Even if someone else wakes me up, I still have to put in majority of the effort through the rest of the process.

➥The answers to this question are a lot more fleshed out in the actual livestream VD, such as the cat thing, the supplements being part of Mashita's answer, and Saya mention for the "someone else."

☕︎ Bug Hater Reader: Also a question taken from the above mentioned Voice Drama about a reader asking about how to handle cleaning the house while bugs are roaming during the summer.

Mashita: You're the type of person who doesn't hesitate to pick things up and put it in your bag. You (the reader) can also try hiring someone or contacting a cleaning company.

[Yashiki is concerned that Mashita also doesn't really like touching gross things and asks if he's okay.]

[Mashita explains that both of them are basically in the same line of work, so it's not like he hesitates either to touch things.]

Yashiki: That's true.

☕︎ Summer vacation is almost over, but my eldest daughter hasn't finished her homework. What should I do, Mr. Yashiki? What did you do with your homework during summer vacation?

Yashiki: The Kujo Family already finished their homework early into summer vacation. How about you, Mashita?

Mashita: Well, it's kind of a hassle, so I tried to finish it early. But I always remember not being able to finish my literature essay/book review until the last moment. It was the only part I didn't fully understand.

*TERROR SOUND EFFECT*

Yashiki: I loved reading books and I don't remember having difficulties with them. Shou doesn't do his in the first place. Moe and Tsukasa seem to be the types who get it done first thing. Suzu seems like she'd get it done unexpectedly early. Eita probably does it early, too. Ai seems the type to get it done and put the rest of her energy into her hobbies.

Mashita: If your parents are willing to help you, it might not be a bad idea to plan your hobbies and leisure activities for the latter half of your summer vacation and finish the homework by then.

Yashiki: And if you don't finish your homework...

*dramatic sound effect*

Yashiki: ... you'll die at dawn. Well, if you can imagine a curse like that/wouldn't be surprising if there was a curse like that.

Mashita: Tch, I wouldn't want that.

➥ The term Mashita uses here is "Dokusho Kanshoubun," and I am not familiar with the specifics of what summer homework consists of, so the closest thing I went with was a book review of sorts.

➥ I got kind of lost on his descriptions, so I honestly wasn't sure who was being described, so the details may be mixed up.

☕︎ I'm waking up in the middle of the night with the need to go to the bathroom. But there are times where I get scared and don't want to go. What should I do in times like these? If you have any tips or advice, please let me know!

Yashiki: Actually, come to think of it...

Mashita: Wait. Just turn on the lights, that's the answer.

Yashiki: What's the hurry, Mashita? I was just trying to...

Mashita: I'm trying to keep you from making an ill-advised comment.

Yashiki: Was it going to be that terrible?

Mashita: No doubt. With this, we're done with the question.

Mashita: Tch, who was the one who chose this question? Maybe they were half-asleep at the time. Well, off to the next one.

➥ I could not tell if Yashiki was asking if his answer was going to be that awful or he was saying "that's terrible (coming from Mashita)." I went with the former to be safe.

☕︎ One afternoon, I was taking the bus to the hospital, and the bus stopped at a bus stop. It was on a main street with only cars and a few pedestrians passing by, making it look quite deserted. The bus driver opened the doors and stared outside. I watched from the back seat as the driver repeatedly, with an impatient tone, asked someone if they were getting on or not. The driver gave up on asking and started driving off. As the bus drove away, I kept looking outside, but didn't see anyone at the bus stop or on the sidewalk of the main street. I wondered who the driver was talking to, or if he had talked to anyone in the first place.

I suddenly remembered this recently— what exactly happened, and how would you interpret it, Mr. Yashiki?

There's a section where Mashita goes into a short explanation in regards to this particular question. I am not sure if he is talking about the reader's question or their reply— but basically either this question has been submitted before (didn't make it into the actual Consultation segment) or it has been replied to, but the reply was not published. Therefore, the editorial department has requested this question be submitted/replied to again.

Yashiki: I remember this question. My original reply was that since it was the driver's actions, it's technically not a paranormal phenomenon.

Mashita: Well, if we can't be sure, we still need to interpret it from that angle (?). What do you think about the situation?

Yashiki: I think it might be someone from the future who came to your rescue, and thanks to them delaying the bus' departure, a major accident was avoided.

Mashita: You're still naive as ever, but worse. No matter who that person was, in the end, you're the one who created that anxiety. You shouldn't willingly go with their plans.

Yashiki: By interpreting the situation in a way that doesn't make me anxious, it allows me to avoid getting swallowed up by fear.

➥ The specific phrase Mashita uses is "お花畑," or "ohanabatake," which means a field of flowers. It seems to be used to describe someone who is carefree or blind.

➥ The answer sort of starts leaning into the more philosophical side towards the end? At least on the basis where my interpretation of "that person" is the imagined time traveler of Yashiki's explanation. If not, I'm terribly sorry.

☕︎ At my previous workplace, there was a tree (?) that always made a ringing noise at night. It was close to a residential area, with an apartment building and a small community center in its parking lot. For some reason, it doesn't bother me on my way to work, and I only hear it on the way home. It also doesn't bother me during early shifts, so I assume the noise only occurs at night. The sound is different every time, ranging from the metallic sound like that of gold or a sandstorm. On bad days the ringing in my ears causes headaches and anemia. I had heard from a friend that the place was haunted/visited by spirits; so I started wondering if it was a paranormal experience.

Yashiki: I answered this question at the time it was originally submitted, but it remains the same. I can't deny the possibility [of it being a paranormal event]. I'm pretty sure the advice given to you was to sing a song. There's also the option of keeping an omamori and listening to your favorite music through earphones. I don't know how effective it is, but as I have said previously— try to avoid feeling anxious as much as possible.

☕︎ I'm an idol who loves the occult, and I love reading about them. I want to consult Mr. Yashiki, as there have been many instances of paranormal sightings in H City. There are also rumors of new sightings circulating on message boards as of late. I'm a bit nervous about investigating it by myself, so can you please help me out? I wonder if the rumors are true or not...

Yashiki: I don't recommend investigating it, because there's a chance you could die.

Mashita: But I guess they can't just leave it be.

Yashiki: This is a difficult question...

Mashita: In any case, I would like to have some more information so I can do some research on this.

Yashiki: I'm sorry, but I'd appreciate it if you could send what you know to the editorial department. I recommend you never investigate matters like these alone.

Afterword

Yashiki: Alright.

Mashita: I think this is enough, about 10 minutes.

Yashiki: I’ll hand the audio recording to Moe later today.

Mashita: I'll leave it to you.

Yashiki: I hope this helps someone with their troubles.

Mashita: Perhaps.

Yashiki: Will you be willing to help out next time?

[Pause]

Mashita: ... Tch. Hm.

Yashiki: Please look after me./Thank you in advance.

➥ The phrase is "yoroshiku tanomu yo," which I've seen can be translated into "please look after —" or just used generally for requesting a favor. I was debating using "I'm counting on you" since it sort of made better sense in this context, but Yashiki ended it with "よ" which is much more casual/polite than "ぜ." I ended up opting for a more... gentler way of phrasing this? I genuinely didn’t know how to write it in a way that conveys how he spoke other than this ( ´_ゝ`).

Spirit Doctor Yashiki's Consultation Room: In addition to our regular consultations, we are also accepting everyday troubles. Please contact us here.

Thank you very much for sticking til the end here. ヾ(´ー`)ﾉ゛ I've been going through some pretty severe rot and this helped to alleviate it somewhat (despite how piss poor my efforts are). It's interesting to see different sides to characters even if it's not entirely canon.

As a lil bonus, I want to show those of you who haven't watched Nezuka Ryo's voice over for the entirety of DM1— Kawabata Yoshiaki's (Mashita's VA) introduction! The gap is... actually really cute in a way???

[vagabond-umlaut]

THE LOVE CONFESSION THAT NEVER HAPPENED

▸ TEEN!GOJO SATORU X TEEN!FEM!READER; FLUFF WITH A PINCH OF ANGST; THIS FIC IS NOT CANON TO THE SERIES WE'RE THE SUMMER TO OUR WINTER RAIN!!!!; READER MIGHT BE A BIT OOC!!!! ▸ READER'S CLAN NAME & CURSED TECHNIQUE ARE REVEALED IN THIS. ANY & ALL SIMILARITIES TO ANOTHER'S READER/OC IS PURELY UNINTENTIONAL AND COINCIDENTAL. I SWEAR I DIDN'T PLAGIARIZE IT. ALSO, I'M UTTERLY AWFUL AT FINDING JAPANESE TERMS OF ENDEARMENT, DESPITE GOOGLING. SORRY :((

▸ THIS IS FOR THE AWESOME @heresan WHO NEVER FAILS TO SPOIL ME WITH HER ASK. ILYSM TINA! <333 ▸ WARNING: BRIEF MENTION OF A HIT-AND-RUN CASE & INFIDELITY IN ONE LINE [SATORU & READER ARE NOT INVOLVED, DW] ▸ AS ALWAYS, THE GIF, DIVIDER & CHARACTERS USED AIN'T MINE. PLS DON'T PLAGIARIZE, TRANSLATE OR REPOST THIS. ENJOY READING! ❤️

The stars are but mere fireflies to the sun that is the Kojima household tonight. 

Bedecked in bright lights and a thousand and one paper lanterns, the palatial grounds of the property exude a brilliance, the likes of which the guests claim to have never been seen before, their awestruck voices drawing a polite smile from your grandmother (though the pride in her ancient eyes is unmistakable, you note). 

You move your eyes away from your clan matriarch and let them rove over those around you – and their glowing selves – rendered more luminous by their expensive fabrics, sparkling jewels, and gleaming smiles. 

Oh, what a couple of scraps of paper can do to one’s self, you muse silently, glancing at the woman batting her eyelashes at your cousin – the former the same one who was convicted in a hit-and-run case a year or two back, though now, with a Louis Vuitton dress hanging off her frame, no one, except you, perhaps, remembers on seeing her the innocent blood she wiped off her hands, all thanks to her wealth. 

Not wanting to mar this celebratory evening with such dark thoughts, you shift your gaze to tonight’s centre of attention: the older of your two brothers, Takeshi and his fiancée Sara, your lips turning upwards into a small smile on seeing how dazzling they look beside each other – how beautiful, how well-suited, how happy, how… very artificial they look beside each other. 

As artificial as the thousand and one paper lanterns your grandmother’s so proud of. 

As artificial as your guests’ smiles - too-white, too-wide, too-thin. 

As artificial as the compliments you can hear that woman shower upon the wife of the man she was attempting to seduce not too long ago. 

Your smile disappears to give way to a frown, as you take in the falsity around you. 

And a leaden weight lodges itself in your chest, right where your heart should be, when your eyes again meet the sight of your brother and your childhood friend smiling at the photographer – while your ears hear the wails of anguish, the snarls of contempt and the sighs of wistfulness –a cacophony of abandoned dreams and stifled desires emanating from the two souls soon to be joined in holy matrimony, two weeks from today. 

Your mother says marriage is one of, if not the happiest event in a person’s life. 

Oh Mom! If only you could hear what I can now… 

Placing your empty glass of mojito mocktail on the grass near you, you lean back against a tree and close your eyes to soothe the throbbing pain in your temples – one which always happens after you’ve been amid too many people for too long a time, much to your great discomfort. 

Sighing loudly, you move to lie down on the grass when the sounds of an approaching pair of footsteps reach you, soon joined by a boisterous yell of “Aha! There’s the woman of my dreams I’ve been searching for so long!” 

“Hello to you too, Satoru,” You say, turning to the side and propping yourself up on an elbow, your eyes now open. “Didn’t think you would make it to the party.” 

Gojo flops down beside you with an exaggerated pout. 

“Oh, come on, Momo-chan. Think a bit higher of me, will you? Of course, I would make it to the party. My best friend’s brother’s getting engaged today. How on earth could I ever miss it?” 

“And since when have you and Takeshi been on such good terms, hm? That you’re willing to leave your comfortable life at school to attend a party filled with clan elders for an entire evening?” You ask him, an eyebrow raised, unwilling to buy into his rubbish explanation. 

Gojo chuckles. “Oh, it’s not Takeshi I’m here for today,” He says softly, shuffling closer to you until your sides are almost touching, “It’s you.” 

You open your mouth, ready with a snarky reply, when his expression makes you stop – the words you were planning to say, now lost in your throat, as you look at his unusually earnest face. 

“Satoru?” Your voice comes out as a shaky whisper, reasons behind which you cannot fathom for the love of your life. 

(It’s ’cause he’s so close to you, silly! A part of your brain whispers – the same one which had made you call Gojo handsome, out of all the damned things you could say to him – that day you first saw him in his Jujutsu Tech uniform – much to your utter bewilderment and embarrassment.) 

You clear your throat and repeat yourself loudly, “Hey, Satoru?” 

“Hm?” Gojo moves even closer to you when you call his name and places a hand on your cheek, the warmth of it making a wonderful contrast with your cold skin that chilly autumn night. 

“Do-” You hesitate, as an odd (warm? bubbly?) feeling creeps into your chest, but ultimately your concern for the eerie way his eyes seem to shine at you outweighs that weird feeling, and you ask, “Do you have a fever, Satoru? You don’t really look okay there.” 

Gojo blinks, his unusual expression soon overtaken by a stupefied one as you continue to peer up at him, frowning. 

“Satoru,” You shake him gently, after a few seconds of him staring at you. “Hey! Gojo!” 

That seems to shake him out of his stupor, as he quickly removes his hand away from your cheek and scoots away, his face reddening with each passing moment. 

“N-no, no. I’m okay. Totally okay,” He mumbles, “There’s no need to worry. I’m perfectly fine.” 

But you know the white-haired shaman way better than that. 

You sit up and move closer to him and place your palm on his forehead, the other palm on your own forehead. “Now, lie still and let me check your temperature.” 

“Your skin’s warm… But not so warm for you to have a fever,” You say after a while, still frowning down at your friend whose head you have now placed in your lap, “But your face looks awfully red. And your eyes too seem weird. And,” Pausing, you place your hand on the kimono over his heart, remembering a person’s pulse rate is said to speak volumes about their health, and gasp. 

“My goodness, Toru! What the hell happened to you? Your heart is beating really fast! Are you-” 

A finger to your lips stops your outburst, and within the next moment, you find yourself crushed to his chest, his arms holding you in a vice-like grip and his nose muzzling into your hair. 

“Toru, you’re not really okay, are you?” You ask, tilting your head up at him, the slight tremor in your voice inaudible to all except you – and Gojo too, perhaps, judging by the way you notice him smirk a little at you, before it slips into an indecipherable twitch of his lips. 

“No, I’m not okay,” He answers above you, his arms around you tightening a touch. “I’m really, really not okay.” 

You crane your neck upwards to fully look at him and brush the pads of your thumbs over the skin under his eyes. “Then why did you come here tonight, you idiot? You should have stayed back in your dorms and taken rest,” You scold him, concerned eyes sweeping over his appearance. 

Gently removing your hand from his face to intertwine his fingers with yours, Gojo leans closer to your face and whispers, every breath he exhales hitting your face like a little puff of smoke in the cold, “But I couldn’t stay back in my dorms tonight, Momo-chan – Not when I know the medicine to my treatment is here.” 

It takes a while for his words to register themselves in your brain. 

And when they do, you can’t help but let out a small gasp (the same time as that portion of your brain lets out a small squeal in joy). 

“Are you-” You begin but stop yourself from speaking any further, your trust in your oratory skills having plummeted to an all-time low, and choose instead to focus on his electric blue eyes as the slew of nervous mutterings, which had been lost in the background of your mind until now, slowly turns intelligible. 

Was that too much for her? 

Am I going to get rejected? 

Well, shit, she’s going to reject me. 

Oh wait – did she even understand me? 

My Momo-chan can be really dense at times – though she’s cute too then – like really, really cute! 

But no, seriously – was I too roundabout for her? Or should I have confessed to her directly? 

Oh no, she’s looking at me right now. Is she angry? Is she disappointed? Is she horrified? 

Oh no, that’d be the worst – if she’s horrified. 

Calm down, Satoru. Calm down. Take a breath in and think straight. Panicking won’t help you now. 

But I’m too much in love with Momo-chan to even think straight. 

Damn it, damn it, just damn it. 

I should have just listened to Suguru and written her a love letter or something. 

“Love letters are really beautiful, Toru-chan,” Reaching up a hand, you tuck some of his unkempt hair behind his ear – while a giggle erupts from you at the way his face changes from being lovestruck (and not fever-stricken, you realise, relieved) to horrified to the most apprehensive you’ve ever seen him – and you add with a grin, “But this confession is the most beautiful of them all. I love it.” 

Gojo blinks. “So does that mean…” He trails off, an unsure yet hopeful look in his eyes. 

Sliding your hand down to his cheek and keeping it there, you reply, “Yeah, I guess it does mean so, Toru-chan.” 

A moment passes in pin drop silence between the two – the only sounds being the distant chatter of the party and the occasional wind blowing through the trees – before a wide grin breaks out across Gojo’s face, its absolute natural radiance banishing the darkness around you in a way a billion suns could never do – your grandmother’s flimsy paper lanterns or your vain guests’ mountains of gold and gems nothing but tiny specks of dust to the constellation of stars his joy reveals to you. 

And in that instant, as Gojo presses a sweet kiss to your forehead and wraps his arms around you, excitedly describing the new dessert café he discovered on his last mission and the matcha eclairs you just can’t not try – you swear to yourself that you will do anything to keep that blinding beauty of his smile unharmed – even throw away your life, if that’s what it takes. 

[I'M LOW-KEY ASHAMED OF THIS LMAOOO]

▸ MASTERLIST

[usagiarchive]

as long as you love me — masterlist !

vash the stampede (tristamp) x f!reader

"as long as you love me, we could be starving, we could be homeless, we could be broke,"

⌒⊹˚୨୧ SYPNOSIS — After falling into a PLANT tank, one of the best PLANT engineers on SEEDS Ship 03's life turns upside down (literally), and it only gets even more complicated when she meets their newest crew member in the red jacket. In a favor-for-a-favor predicament, she joins him on his quest to help this new planet's PLANTs.

⌒⊹˚୨୧ CONTENT — PLANT!engineer!reader, slowburn, friends to lovers, fluff/angst/smut/etc, almost all tropes that you usually find in a normal fic are in here idk, when it's very specific i'll put it here.

⌒⊹˚୨୧ STATUS — ongoing ! (08/20/23) updates every sunday

oc character sheet / vash's playlist / wattpad / ao3

⌒⊹˚୨୧ ARCS:

(please excuse my god awful attempt at naming the arcs)

⊹ INTRODUCTION (ongoing!) 01 — the fall 02 — a favor for a favor 03 — SEEDS Ship 06 04 — saloon job 05 — i hate everyone 06 — the melody of a piano 07 — sheryl.

FRIENDSHIP (locked)

BOUNTY (locked)

EXPERIMENT (locked)

LADYKILLER (locked)

EYE OF MICHAEL (locked)

LOVERS (locked)

JUNEORA ROCK (locked)

HOPELAND (locked)

JULAI (locked)

usagi's note: hi, this is my actual first time posting on tumblr (pls tell me if any of the formatting is wrong or if it looks weird on your part) + this is my longest fic lol, but yk, anything for my babygirl ;) thank you to everyone who is planning to read my fic! oh btw this is also cross-posted on ao3 and wattpad :)) credits to all owners of the media used in this whole fic, i own nothing, thank u to the tumblr banner girlies, u make tumblr look so pretty xoxo

taglist is open! send an ask or just comment below! @onixsn @sharkalina666

©usagiarchive 2023. do not copy or paraphrase, repost to other platforms, or translate without permission, thank you.

[azurezra]

man. today has been, something. started off by queuing up some TMR songs. that was. fun. ended up searching for the SEED song lyrics in an attempt to karaoke like the old days. and ended up stumbling upon the name of an old LJ friend in the translation credits, ah,hahahahaa...hah. (;_; )

somehow or other i next decided to check if 平川地一丁目 was on spotify and uh, gee, two separate artist pages. "Hirakawachiitchome" and "Hirakawachi 1Chome"... weird. one had their early stuff, the other was 3 2020's releases... i d k. made a playlist because i still do not fully comprehend HOW TF to use this godawful app. soon enough noticed how tHE ONE. WHOLE. UNAVAILABLE SONG. 「君のくつ」 i immediately recognised the title it was one of the FIRST I EVER HEARD, and thus SURELY the MOST nostalgic and... goddamn.

cue an attempt to listen to it ELSEWHERE? youtube just showed me. a cover. o-ohhh but it WAS, *VERY* nostalgic!!! but NOT THEM. so, i tried another site. it was a *japanese* lyrics site. it actually had a link. to a youtube video. region block. of. course. ........so, my DUMB ASS has just never bothered with a vpn in all these years (used to use proxies on occasion, but...) —so i did not have one handy!! but after NOT TOO MUCH STRUGGLE, i found a jp one (and the site actually seemed familiar? h-huh...) AND GOT IT TO WORK

AND LISTENED TO THE SONG!!! HELL YEAH, NOSTALGIA

....and then the eventual emotional crash. sigh.

i didn't even listen to the pl yet or discover any other songs i used to know, great! and nvm the idea to try to d/l the song cos even tho i HAD it, who knows, now? but ofc MY vpn didn't do jack shit for the mp3 converter websites accessing it from hell knows where. and again. i'm too dumb, to solve, these fucking issues!!

...

so then there was yesterday's shit. the power got shut off by 11am, curtailing my original plans for TMR. unable to even do chores, and lacking ANY offline activities or crafts in this hellhole, i ended up... reading —INITIALLY ONE. and then, ONE BY ONE— ALL, of my, ancient ass, OC writings. the ones i made like a single file each for, thought about in bed for days/weeks until the next ""idée fixe"" took over, but then eventually neglected in favour of my "top 3"...

well there was ACTUALLY some good/cute stuff. a LOT of cringe stuff. shameless asides laughing at my own cringe-but-free writing ability. peppered here & there with many an ancient ass meme phrase i hadn't heard in a decade+

and ofc, far too much, incomplete scenes, suddenly stopped, SOMETIMES NOTED with, "i'll write that later" and then i never. did. (and yet i KNOW there were more scenes??? so it was. thought up in bed. and never typed up....) (;_; )

well that was FUN. ...until the crash. from the high. and the power was still off ofc. *power eventually paid & resolved by 7pm* BUT. the damage was already done.

brain now overloaded with "freshly unearthed" thoughts about ALL of my OCs, not just my top 3 stories.... oh, god.

a-and THEN i started wondering how they looked? i.e. my pathetic maplestory sprites created in bannedstory (rip in pieces)

and so i. eventually dug into my dropbox. o-oh god. SOME ARE. SOOOOOOOOCUTE. SOME ARE. SO ugly. l-lol. cry. "they'll look better when i finally draw them! these are just design drafts!" .......CRYYYYYY.

and NOW i'm plagued by thoughts of posting them, but even MORE tormented by:

a.) not being to edit or adjust any!!! fucking pixels!! on ipad!!

b.) even CROPPING the massive "collages" is a HUGE PAIN on the ipad???

c.) there are multiple versions, across different images, made at different times— and SOME charas look better in one, while others look better in another?!? MORE CUT PASTE CROP EDIT HELL

...nvm all these .bsproj files that can no longer be accessed or loaded up and edited and.... cries. GOD I BET EVEN IF ANY SUCCESSOR APP TRIED TO IMPLEMENT THEM, THEY'D LACK THE ABILITY TO READ THE COLOUR ADJUSTMENTS I TOOK ENTIRELY TOO MUCH ADVANTAGE OF a-and then if i loaded 'em up. HORRID, AWFUL ORANGE HAIR THAT I HAD DESATURATED TO SOME SEMBLANCE OF "SILVER", OR GREEN EYES HUE SHIFTED TO TEAL OR, OR, OR—

[themulberrytree]

character sheet.

full name: Shallan Davar pronunciation: Sha-Lahn Dah-var (fuck IPA i am not doing that shit again)

nicknames: strong one (by hoid), love, dear (by adolin), storming woman (mostly by kaladin)

height: 5′6″ age: 19/20 (rosharan years) / 21-22 (earth years)   zodiac: gemini (donut ask me when her bday is i donut have a date yet) languages: (spoken/written): veden (native), alethi, azish, selay (moderate skill in speaking only) thaylen (reading/writing only).

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS.

hair colour: rich, deep red, only red. eye colour: bright blue skin tone: shallan is very fair, though she spends as much time in the sun as she can, so her face is dusted with freckles. body type: slim and slender. unlike the curvaceous body type often seen on alethi women, shallan is much smaller both in figure and stature. she could be mistaken for delicate, at first glance. as she spends more time training with her blade, her body becomes much more defined and muscular, but she will never achieve any kind of bulky muscles, she simply does not have the body type.

accent: her natural veder accent would be considered low, given shallan’s isolation out in the countryside. she can speak in a more posh (re: acceptable) accent, but she has little reason to do so. dominant hand: right posture: shallan has the posture of a perfect vorin lady, back straight and shoulders back at all times. when sitting, her freehand always covers her safehand, placed delicately in her lap unless she is sketching. when walking, her hands are clasped in front of her. she is rarely animated in her posture when speaking, and depending on her company, she works hard to blend in. when alone, shallan may slouch when studying, or do her work in a very unlady like fashion on her bed. if she trusts her present company, they may witness this lapse in acceptable posture, but only if she trusts them.

CHILDHOOD.

place of birth: jah kaved hometown: some hick town in the middle of the countryside. birth weight / height: 6 pounds, 3 ounces. 18 inches. manner of birth: natural first words: pa siblings: (all elder, all brothers) helaran, balat, twins: wikim and jushu parents: lin davar, and an unnamed mother, malise davar (step mother), all deceased. parental involvement: shallan remembers a somewhat happy childhood (although the likelihood of that being the case is up for debate). her mother taught her how to draw, and was in charge of shallan’s education in the early years. much of her early years have been forgotten due to the trauma of shallan’s witnessing (see: committing) her mother’s murder. she did not speak at all for half a year afterwards. from that point on, her father became overbearing, and with each year he was less of the man shallan had first known. he was violent towards two of her brothers and the servants, often scaring away tutors, so shallan’s education in those critical years was sporadic at best. her father demanded complete obedience, and any deviation on her part meant that a servant got beaten in her place. in order to spare them and placate her father, shallan worked hard to draw little attention to herself and obey. it was her father who also chose her devotary (purity) rather than her having the opportunity to choose for herself.

ADULT LIFE

occupation: she is the ward of jasnah kholin, having managed to convince the woman she was worthy of wardship at seventeen. after being taken in, shallan begins her education in scholarship, fine tuning her skills in making logic based arguments, study, and critical thinking.

on the shattered plains, she secures work with highprince sebarial as a clerk while maintaining the work in finding urithiru that she started with jasnah, and working to infiltrate the secret group known as the ghostbloods.

she latter assumes a more public role as a knight radiant, the first of the order of lightweavers in centuries. while her status as a radiant is known, she works very hard to keep her work covert. she deals in spywork and information, and uses her lightweaving to form disguises for herself and associates. she has also used her abilities to battle unmade, work oathgates, and help run reconnaissance in kholinar.

as highprincess, her duties would include helping manage affairs of the realm and detecting intrigue to better aid her husband.

close friends: lmafo what are those????? jk, her brothers, later adolin, renarin, kaladin, jasnah (sort of, more teacher/student) wit/hoid (when he’s around). relationship status: verse dependent, married to adolin kholin in canon financial status: her family is destitute, and shallan herself has little experience in personally handling money. that being said, she knows how to balance finances and plan expenses. when working for sebarial, she manages to secure a comfortable pay from him, her later marriage secures her financial security, though her status as a radiant could’ve done that too. driver’s license: she could probably drive, but would be terrible at it due to the fact that she’d keep lookin out the window. she has little experience on horseback, but can manage. criminal record: technically none yet, having managed to get away with murder twice. she had also stolen successfully from jasnah kholin.  

SEX & ROMANCE.

sexual orientation: bisexual romantic orientation: biromantic, could be polyromantic preferred emotional role: submissive (someone pls force her to accept comfort i am beggin) | dominant |  switch  |  unsure preferred sexual role: submissive |  dominant  |  switch  |  sex repulsed | libido: she’s basically DTF anytime and anywhere, and yes, i wish i were kidding, but she’s just horny on main. turn ons: she’s into more traditional kinds of attractiveness, people who look put together. but she really enjoys some kind of hint at wildness, hair that won’t quite stay, a kind of subtle ruggedness. post-battle disheveledness  is HOT. allow her to talk about her studies, things she’s working on or wanting to start, she’ll love that. don’t be afraid to talk about your own interests, she goes off on her own a lot, so she’ll want someone with their own hobbies too. be kind, be willing to grow and change and share. be there if she asks. laugh at her absolutely fucking awful jokes. on the more physical side, not being afraid to show affection in public. that spot on the neck below the ear? yeah, kiss it. leave a mark. kiss the inside of her wrist. do not be afraid to be rough with her, she’s not easily hurt and she doesn’t always like being treated like a china doll. go to town. BUT you must also be good at taking your time. tenderness is a good trait to have in every day life, but if you can translate that into the intimacy of the bedroom, give her a slow buildup, ur golden. turn offs: unnecessary rudeness, lack of independence. anyone who treats her like she needs protecting, or thinks she needs to confine herself in some way, for any amount of time. never laughing at her terrible jokes, or indulging her seemingly random curiosities. being a skybreaker. love language: physical touch is primary, but quality time and words of affirmation are also great. relationship tendencies: shallan has a tendency to fall fast. even when she’s telling herself to be careful and take things slow, it’s easy to pull her in and have her grow an attachment on a superficial level fairly early. she’s good about letting the other person lean on her for support, but she’s not so great when it comes to sharing anything deep about herself. she has a habit of trying to mold herself into what she thinks the other person would like, and clinging to that. if confused she might play around with feelings, though she’s not fully aware she’s doing it. she’s big on positive reinforcement, she’ll let you know if she enjoys your company, and when she’s invested in the relationship, she’ll look for fun ways to spend time with that person. she might attempt to appear more serious and mature than she is, but her silliness will slip out. when she loves though, she loves completely, and a distracted heart is settled once she makes a decision about what she wants.

MISCELLANEOUS.

character’s theme song: flowers, from ha.des.town iris, goo goo dolls moth’s wings, passion pit: this is more a general vibe. i picture it when shallan is in a creative spurt. sun, sleeping at last: for the same creation aesthetic. fire drills, dessa (for when she finally Snaps. and also some lines just really Hit)

hobbies to pass the time: drawing is the big one. she’s always got her sketchbook and something to draw with on hand. it’s an art she’s perfected and uses it both for her lightweaving, and to relax. she enjoys scholarship, exploring history is of a special interest, but taking a closer look at the local flora and fauna is just as fun. she’s naturally curious, so if something grabs her attention, she will want to take a look. she also enjoys discussing what she’s working on with other people, sometimes just so she can use them as a sounding board, but also because they might have insights she doesn’t. it’s very fun for her to explore ideas. she likes going on walks, exploring the area around her. just spending quality time with people she enjoys too. mental illnesses: Dissociative Personality Disorder is the big one. ADHD, PTSD, some depression. physical illnesses: None. left or right brained: right fears: CONFINEMENT. she fears vulnerability and relying others, but she also craves it quite a bit. she fears being understood completely because she’s certain there isn’t anything left to love if someone were to see everything. she fears what she can’t understand, and losing the people she loves, more than she already has. self confidence level: extremely low. she projects an air of self confidence, but frequently downplays her talents. she finds it completely astounding that adolin might actually find her attractive in any sense, let alone be interested in her as a person. her trauma and what she precieves as crimes has left her feeling hollowed out, because she is so terrified of someone really Seeing her, she works hard to hide those corners of herself from others and often feels like she’s failing at even that. vulnerabilities: shallan keeps secrets. too many of them. and she can often dig herself into a pit and struggle to get herself out, and even when she’s in that deep, she has difficulty asking for help. she doesn’t always think things through. her dpd can leave her particularly vulnerable depending on which personality is in control (veil in particular has trouble seeing the Big Picture). it’s easy to goad her into a fight (of the verbal variety) and she will stop at nothing to have the last word. if you have members of her family to hold over her, that’s a good tool. and shallan cannot resist a good mystery, that is a surefire way to pull her in.

tagged by: @luck-crowned tagging: @marblecarved (for mary, emma, or horace!), @melnchly (meg or ros), @minastiriiths, @arturiusrex, @gxtenoughnxrve, @ambiidexter, and @arborvitas

[queenmorgawse]

i am in the birds that sing (i am in each lovely thing)

THIS FIC HAS SPOILERS FOR CHAPTERS 123-124 OF TGCF. as a disclaimer, though, i'm only caught up with suika's translation, so i don't know how these two actually end up. pls don't spoil me!! content warnings : suicidal thoughts / ....suicide equivalent? think what mo xuanyu pulled in mdzs canon. nothing graphic, but it's not lightly implied either. please take care! here's some soundtrack, if reading with music is your thing.  read on ao3 + end notes.

He Xuan,

This is a graceless beginning to a graceless letter, isn’t it? Of course, it hardly matters. I wish for you to never read this at all, so you can remain as happy as you can be. I don’t even know if this will survive my endeavor. If it has, and if you’re reading it, I urge you to fold it again and burn it. It will bring you no joy.

Why write the letter at all, then? The truth is, I am awfully lonely, these days, and this is hardly something I can simply tell my neighbour when I invite her over for tea. She’s a sweet young woman. I hope she fares well after this. I’ll have to ask her to leave the pinwheels where they are, and see that they don’t get blown away.

I keep getting lost in thoughts, but again, it doesn’t matter. All I have to waste is paper and time, and though I’ve spent much of one already, I shall not run out of the other before I am done.

I suppose I just want to clear my head and go...wherever I am going serenely, without dragging a heavy heart behind. I am also selfish in that special way humans are, and want to cling to the possibility, as infinitesimal as it is, that someone somewhere will know of me.

To the core of the problem, then ⎯ or, actually, the core of the solution.

I have a little divinity left in me, you see. Oh, not much ; figuratively, barely enough to fill a teacup. It will not keep me immortal, or give me my spiritual devices back. Ultimately, it will not save me, so I thought I might devote it to something that will be worth it.

I’ve been doing an awful ton of research. My brother attempted the impossible and, against all odds, succeeded. I made my best attempt at doing the same. There are many spells forbidden and forgotten to find, if one works with single-minded purpose.

I unearthed the one I wanted, after a while.

-

Shi Wudu’s sixth birthday goes by without a hitch. So does the year that follows it, and the next, and the next. He never presses his ear against his mother’s door, waiting with baited breath for a newborn’s first wail. There is no longer a nursery and no new cradle in the Shi family’s mansion.

When he leaves, stubbornly holding his head high as whispers and gossip surround him, what remains of his belongings tucked in the bag hanging at his shoulder, he leaves alone.

-

I thought of looking for a way to bring your family and fiancée back to life, at first. Then I realized that if they did, they would still be mortal, and your happiness would be fleeting. It was a great shame to lose them once ; it would have been a tragedy to watch them die again. I discarded that idea soon after I came up with it.

-

A group of children wades through the shallow current of the stream that runs like a silver ribbon around the town of Fu Gu. The boys rolled up their pants to their knees, the girls hiked up their skirts as high as they dared. They kick and splash water at each other, and the air rings with startled yelps and breathless laughter.

One of the girls latches onto the shoulders of the boy next to her and bears down with all her weight, dragging them both into the river. She bolts to her feet as fast as she can, expecting him to catch her and pull her back again, giggles and wrings water out of her soaked mess of a dress. Instead, he stares at her like he’s never seen her before, like she caught the sun shining high above them and set it into her smile.

Not for the first time, she is mesmerizing. For the first time, he is charmed.

-

When I found what I was looking for, it took me one year to translate it, then another to check it over again and practice. Aren’t arrays that must be drawn perfectly in a single line so very annoying? I had to make sure it worked.  

These are bold words from me, though. Even as I sit here, writing this, I do not know whether it will succeed. All I know is that I won’t be able to live with myself if I do not try.

-

Red robes rustle as the couple kneel and bow their heads before the family shrine.

There is no gold to line the bride’s veil, and the clothes themselves have been handed down three generations. But the joy ⎯ the joy they radiate changes everything. In that aspect, an emperor couldn’t dream of a lovelier wedding.

As is tradition, the bride and groom bow thrice : once to the heaven and the earth, once to the aging couples looking on with tears in their eyes, and once to each other. They rise to the sound of cheers, their hands still clasped in each other’s. The wedding party wishes them good luck, prosperity, healthy children, their words running together like songs.

Blessings come raining down on them, and the road ahead is endless.

-

Here is how it works : the only person who needs to disappear is me. The rest is all consequences, like ripples in a pond. Without me in the middle, there is no stone to be thrown, and the surface remains peaceful. There will be no newborn baby for a hungry spirit to latch on. My brother will never go to the lengths he did for someone who never existed to begin with.

You will have the life you should have had from the beginning, without knowing you ever suffered.

-

In a beautiful two-storied house, a young woman slumps against the bed frame, her face flushed, breathless but somehow glowing. The midwife hands her a small, wailing bundle. She takes it into her arms with infinite gentleness, cradling it to her chest.

The door opens. A young man in dark robes half runs, half flies into the room, a little girl on his heels. The child climbs onto the bed, babbling at her mother the entire time, while her husband leans over her, his gaze softening.

Three dark heads bend together, cooing at the newborn. The baby opens its eyes and chirps at them, small and soft. The mother starts to cry, while the girl whoops and claps until her father shushes her.

A few minutes later, another woman bursts into the room. Gege! she calls, then gasps. Oh, she’s so cute!

He Chunhua, they call the infant, for the spring flowers blooming outside the mother’s window.

-

It is a simple and elegant solution. The best I could come up with, anyway.

Don’t think I rushed headlong into this. I could have, as I rushed into many other messes ⎯ but I thought this time, neither ge nor you would be here to catch me if I fell, and so I proceeded as carefully as I knew how.

I made a list of everyone my disappearance might affect. Of course, my brother and yourself were the first. I used to be upset at this, but now, I am glad the other heavenly officials were never as fond of me as they claimed to be. Fewer ripples in the pond to mind.

I thought of all the prayers I answered over the years, the little demands and the big. But I trust that you, the version of He Xuan I never knew, are a good person, and that you will attend to your worshipers as I have to mine. Hopefully, you will also help His Highness in his time of need.

I suppose that with all this covered, there is not much more for me to say.

-

Three children tug each other by the hand. One is, to tell the truth, a teenager already ; the second doesn’t appear older than eleven or twelve, and the third is only a small boy, eight years old at most. The eldest leads them up the temple’s steps and into the semi-darkness.

There, the shadows are broken by thousands of candles lit by a steady stream of worshipers. Even now, as the dusky sky stretches into night, many still pray at the god’s feet. They ask for kind winds on their journeys, for good fortune for their businesses, for beneficial matches for their children. A hundred prayers rise into the sky, with the smoke of a hundred merits. All over the land, there are such temples, with such people sending the Lord Wind Master their wishes and hoping for his blessing.

The eldest sister lights an incense stick for each of her younger siblings. Together, they kneel among the other devotees.

Unlike the others, their prayers do not ask for anything. They tell the god about their mother, and how hard she’s been working lately. They talk about their grandmother, whose health has been improving a little with the death of winter, and about their grandfather, whose extraordinary resilience still has him running the family’s shop despite his old age. They talk about themselves, too ; how their education goes, the friends they’ve made, the life ahead of them.

It always ends the same way. Father, I hope you are doing well. We miss you very much.  

They will come back next week.

-

If you’ve read up until here, you have thoroughly disregarded the advice I’ve given in the first lines, and I must scold you for it. I understand, though. There are few things more tempting than the truth, once it has shown even a glimpse of itself. I hope this doesn’t upset you too much. You were in so much pain that first time ; even after all that has happened, I do not want to add to it, even in a lifetime where you will not remember.

Well, now you know. If this letter exists at all, that is. The person who wrote it was never here, so it is unlikely, but I cling to the childish hope that it will make it through somehow.

I don’t know what will happen to me. The ritual says very little, only that it goes against the rules of the world. I don’t know whether I will be able to enter the cycle of reincarnation again, or if it is forever barred to me.

What I said that day is true. I wanted to die then, and even now, I cannot bring myself to mind the idea. What changed since I left the island is that I decided I would rather not die in vain. If the letter survived, then at least one person in the world will remember my name. I’m quite happy with that.

I hope it doesn't hurt. I hope it feels just like falling asleep.

I want to say more, I really do. But, He Xuan, if you have read this to the end, I don’t want to burden you with anything you might feel towards the shadow of a ghost, be it hatred, or guilt, or (dare I hope) gratefulness.

Once again, I am sorry. The wrongs of this lifetime will never appear in yours, but I will remember them all the same. I cannot bring myself to forgive that version of you for what you did, no more than I can forgive myself for what I took part in.

It is all right, though. There will soon be a blank slate, a world in which neither of these things happened, and we are happy ⎯ or at least, at peace.

Just know that even though you might think I have done much for a stranger’s sake, you were the furthest thing from a stranger to me.

With hope once again,

Shi Qingxuan

-

In the middle of a convoluted array stands a forgotten god. Blood drips down their fingertips as they bend down to complete the circle with a swift, decisive stroke.

The dawn explodes into shards of light.

When the dust settles, the field is almost empty. A gentle spring breeze blows across neat rows of pinwheels.

All is quiet, and all is new.

[robininthelabyrinth]

Pls imagine wondercoldwave and their strange courting. Two thieves attempting to woo her with stolen artifacts and good food. Because jewelry is kid of useless but old relics? Or Weapons? Ah yes perfect gifts. (And also a little bit of jewelry.)

I love this pairing. I love this pairing SO MUCH words don’t even. Like, I have a million other things to be writing but I dropped everything to write this. 

ao3

----

It was Lisa’s fault.

Well, okay, that’s a lie. Lisa wasn’t even there.

But she had finally graduated high school, turned eighteen and gone off to college with a handful of scholarships and all the money Len and Mick had stolen for her in a giant fuck-up of a job, which had encouraged them both to head for more forgiving climes for a while. They’d gone to the Caribbean, first, but then Len had played a few too many card games with some Family guys down there and now he might or might not own an island but he certainly wouldn’t last long if he stayed there.

So they go to Europe.

Nice, proper European tour. Why not?

Because Leonard fucking Snart, that’s why not.

“It’s the Louvre,” that’s what he said. “We have to!”

“We won’t be able to fence anything we get,” Mick pointed out.

“But it’s the Louvre!”

And so they’d broken in there. Mostly just for kicks.

Then Len got distracted by some pottery. Mid-heist. This never happened back at Central.

“Look at it,” he enthuses. “Do you even know how old this is? Look at the characteristic neck – and the design – ugh, why isn’t this out on display? Don’t they realize how awesome it is?”

Mick personally thought all pottery looked the same, but he was currently flipping through some watercolor sketches and making happy sounds, so whatever, to each his own.

“Look at the glazing on this one –”

Mick only looks up when Len cuts off mid-sentence, which was most unlike him.

He’s blinking owlishly at a statute.

No, wait.

That’s not a statute, that’s a woman. A statuesque, gorgeous woman, in glasses and a sensible business suit.

With her hands on her hips.

“300,” Len says blankly. “Crane or heavy-backed floor.”

“I beg your pardon?” the woman says. She has a faint accent – something Mediterranean.

“He’s trying to figure out how he would steal you,” Mick translates, since Len’s grip on speech has apparently failed. He’s accustomed to the bizarreness of the Snart mentality; most people are not. “Assuming you were made of marble.”

“Clay would be easier,” Len says, still sounding vaguely dazed. “You’ve got a finer neck than this vase, and that’s saying something.”

The woman abruptly grins, and it’s frankly stunning even to Mick, who takes a good while to warm up to anybody. “You appreciate art,” she says approvingly. “Why do you not come during the day?”

“It’s the Louvre,” Len says, vaguely scandalized. “We had to try to break in.”

“You succeeded,” she says. “Perhaps you will be so kind as to show me the weakness in our security system you exploited; not every thief will be as respectful as you.”

Len clutches the vase he’s holding to his chest, holding it with the delicacy you would expect from a man holding a baby. “That would be awful,” he says, and he means it, too, the moron. He very gently puts it down. “Yeah, we’ll show you.”

Mick makes a little whining sound.

“…after Mick finishes going through the watercolors,” Len amends.

“They are very fine watercolors,” the woman says. “My name is Diana Prince; I am curator here.”

“Leonard Snart,” Len says. He nods at Mick. “Mick Rory.”

“Nice to meet you,” Mick says politely. “Why ain’t there an exhibit of these? They’re amazing.”

“We’re planning one,” Diana says. “But it has been difficult to convince the museum director…”

“Does he have a name?” Mick inquires very seriously. “Or, better, an address?”

She hides a smile. “You should not threaten people over artwork, Mick.”

“I’m not gonna do anything,” he grumbles. “Just a bit of scaring. It’d be good for him.”

“You are welcome to finish perusing the watercolors,” she says. “Leonard – may I call you Leonard?”

“Sure,” Len says. “I mean, I usually go by Len, but, uh, Leonard sounds just fine when you say it.”

She smiles. “Leonard, then. It suits you. Perhaps you could show me the weakness in the security while your friend here finishes up?”

Len nods like a bobble-head doll and she takes his arm and puts it in hers and then they go off.

Mick shakes his head, amused, and dives back into his watercolors.

Diana – and she insists on it being ‘Diana’, not Miss Prince or anything else – is kind enough not to call the police, either.

Len offers her a tour of the local art galleries, after-hours. He’s got a hell of a crush on her already.

He always did like women who looked like they could break him over their knee.

“I couldn’t,” Diana says, but she’s smiling.

“Why not?” Len asks.

“Well,” she says, and then stops, considering.

“You’ve got to have fun sometimes,” Mick tells her, because he’s the best partner ever. “Or else you’ll forget why you do the rest of it.”

“Oh, why not indeed,” she says. “Very well; let us go. I am most intrigued by your unorthodox method of getting around.”

They spend three weeks in Paris, all told. Len teaches her pickpocketing and lockpicking; Mick tells her stories he’d thought he’d forgotten, about being born on a farm so far away from the water he didn’t even know what it looked like until the first time he’d gotten on a plane; she talks of art history and of kindnesses, great and small.

She confides in them that she was raised on an island with a – and here she smiled – unorthodox view of property.

“Now there’s a place I’d like to visit,” Len enthuses.

“Simply because there are no laws against theft?” she laughs.

“That’s the best sort of place! You could try out all sorts of tricks, teach yourself to be better and better, and people wouldn’t throw it in your face when you give something back,” he says.

“Tell me more about how people eat,” Mick requests. He’s really into fresh foods and community gardening back at in Keystone, but he’s run up into a wall of people not believing they can work, or thinking the food will be stolen the second it grows. He doesn’t know how to explain to them that that’s the point.

Diana’s nice, and funny, and smart.

She also, in one memorable instance, throws a truck at someone’s head.

It doesn’t start that way, of course; Diana shows up right when Mick is trying to find his misplaced gun and – upon seeing his panic – asks what the issue is.

“Kids,” Mick says. “Len – the local mafia outlet – he found out – they trade in kids, and that’s kind of a trigger issue for Len so he just jumped in –”

“He has gone to rescue them?”

“Kids,” Mick growls. “If it was anything else, he’d have planned it out first, but not when it comes to kids. I can’t blame him, not really, but I can’t even find my gun -”

“You will not need it,” she says, and it’s almost like she adds an extra foot of height when she straightens her back.

Mick gets his gun anyway. “He’s my partner,” he tells her, because he will be damned to hell before he’s intimidated out of his rightful place at Len’s side, whether into heaven or into hell. “You can help me kick his ass when we find him.”

She blinks, then smiles. She’s still a little too tall, a little too other-worldly, but the smile helps make her a little more human. “Yes,” she says. “After we rescue him, of course.”

“Can’t kick his ass without that,” Mick replies, tranquilly.

“You are a good partner, Mick Rory,” she says. “Leonard is lucky to have you.”

“And me, him,” Mick says, more honestly than he meant to be. “He saved my life.”

“He told me you saved his.”

“He saves mine every day,” Mick tells her, because Diana has a way of looking at you with her old eyes that makes you tell the truth even if you don’t want to. “Just by being who he is. Have some pity on the man and let him down easy when you do, will you?”

Diana arches her eyebrows and presses her lips together thoughtfully.

“Lead the way,” is all she says.

They find Len, who’s having it out with a bunch of assholes, a child clutching at his hip, an even smaller child held under one elbow, gun out in the other. “Don’t make a fucking move,” he’s saying, but there’s more of them than of him and they’re inching closer.

“I’d listen to the man,” Mick says, and Len’s eyes flicker to him, betraying relief.

The little movement is what the local Family assholes were waiting for, guns at ready, and they lunge forward.

So does Diana.

Diana wins.

More people run in.

It would take far too much time to explain the whole sequence of events – Mick honestly doesn’t remember much of it, torn between his surprise at Diana’s surprising strength and protecting Len, and erring to focus on the latter – but it concludes with Diana thrown a truck at the Family guys and their lines breaking and fleeing.

“That was amazing,” Len says, beaming at Diana. “Now, here, hold Lucille while I convince Isabelle to let me go get the others.”

It’s clear to Mick that Diana anticipated many possible reactions to her actions, including how impressed and starry-eyed Len is, but having a small child shoved into her arms wasn’t one of them.

“Petit Izzy,” Len croons, kneeling down. “Tu parles Anglais?”

“Non! N’y va pas!”

Diana kneels and says something in French.

Isabelle just grabs onto Len tighter.

Mick walks over and says, “Okay, brat. Hop on.” He holds out his arms.

Isabelle looks at Len, who nods.

She immediately detaches from Len and flings herself into Mick’s arms.

Mick speaks exactly zero words of French, but he’s got a way with kids.

“I’ll get the others,” Len says. “We’ll take them back home so they can rest. Then we can figure out what to do with them.”

“The police?” Diana asks.

“Probably corrupt,” Len says grimly.

“He always thinks police are corrupt,” Mick interjects.

“Because they usually are. Who the hell operates a child smuggling ring this close to a police station without someone looking the wrong way?”

“I will investigate,” Diana says. “In the meantime, I have connections with several good organizations that will help locate their parents, if possible.”

“And monitor them,” Mick says firmly as Len strides off to find the other children he referenced. “I was in the system for a bit, and there’s risk involved.” He hesitates and glances in the direction Len went. He doesn’t want to mention unpleasant things, but if Diana will be placing the kids… “Len’s got some things to say about blood relatives not being too trustworthy either, if you want to hear it.”

Diana nods, her expression solemn. “They will be guarded. I will confirm it myself.”

“This way,” Len sings out cheerfully, leading the children out of the dark like some sort of Pied Piper. He has a way with kids, too. “Follow me, mon lupins. Hop, hop.”

“Lapins,” the older children, the ones with a big of English, giggle. “Not lupins!”

“What’s the difference?” Len asks innocently.

They take the children to Diana’s friend.

The children are all quite fond of Diana, who is also good with children, especially once little Isabella tells the others about the truck; Diana is apparently called L’Princesse Amazone, or ‘Wonder Woman’, in Paris for her little way of solving issues. They go happily.

Len looks after them wistfully for a few minutes before turning to Diana. “That,” he tells her solemnly, “was wonderful.”

“That,” Mick grunts, “was awful.”

Diana laughs.

They leave shortly thereafter, albeit regretfully. Len wants to avoid any Family recognizing him and Diana is occupied with the placement of the children; there’s really no reason to stay.

Still, it’s hard to tear themselves away. Not just Len, but Mick, too. He’s grown more accustomed to her than he’d have thought.

“You should come visit us in Central,” Len tells her before they go.

“Perhaps I will,” she says with a smile.

Impulsively, Mick steps forward and presses his lips to her cheek. Len blinks in surprise, but when Diana doesn’t object, he steps forward and does the same to her other cheek.

And then they’re off.

Even though Len made the offer, no one is more surprised than he is when a year later, back in Central, the Central City Museum announces a partnership with the Louvre in which a curator will be swapped for three months every year.

Len and Mick are there on opening day.

Diana smiles.

“Perhaps you will show me around here, too,” she says, holding out her hands.

“Absolutely,” Len says.

Mick nods.

“And this time,” she continues, her smile widening, “I will not let you two escape with only a kiss good-bye.”

Len and Mick exchange blinks.

“Uh, we can do that,” Len says.

Mick nods furiously.

"I brought the rope," she adds innocently.

"We can definitely do that," Mick enthuses.

“Oh, and we got you a present,” Len says.

“It was in a museum,” Mick adds. “Sort of.”

“Was it obtained illicitly?” Diana asks with a knowing smile.

“No more illicitly than the museum originally got it?” Len tries.

Diana laughs.

(Fifteen years later, Diana looks down at the Flash, pinned under her boot. “You will not interrupt our dates,” she says sternly.

“I will not interrupt your dates!” he squeaks. “Also, wow! You’re real! And…dating my villains?”

“We were dating first,” she says. “I will discuss their life choices with them another time.”

“…can I have your autograph in the meantime?”)

[actualbird]

(wc: 2.2k. more tagalog! more pining michael! babysitting! baking! part 1. part 2. or read everything on ao3 over here.)

To heerefarwhereveryouare

:(((((((

From heerefarwhereveryouare

??? What’s up?

To heerefarwhereveryouare

dude super sorry but i gotta cancel on the star trek marathon emergency thing came up in the form of Responsibility

From heerefarwhereveryouare

Awww. What do you mean?

To heerefarwhereveryouare

a couple of relatives had a thing that led to a thing and they need somebody to take care of a thing that somebody is me that thing im taking care of is a 7 year old aka im babysitting my gremlin cousin today :((( :(((((((((((

From heerefarwhereveryouare

Oh, okay. Can I come over? We can still hang. Plus, you’re kind of terrible with anything that can be defined as a child, so I’m a little worried.

To heerefarwhereveryouare

im not that bad :(((( but yes pls get over here oh my god

From heerefarwhereveryouare

Alright, I’ll be there in a few. Turn that :( upside down (:

-

Michael admits that he finds kids confusing, but he really isn’t that bad with them. He just doesn’t know how to interact with kids, but that’s him with almost everybody. If it’s a non-Jeremy lifeform, chances are he really has to focus to understand anything that’s going on, or just wing everything completely and hope nobody gets injured.

Nikki is definitely a non-Jeremy lifeform.

Nikki is a tiny seven year old terror with at least five colorful clips in her hair at a time. It took at least three family gatherings for her to tolerate Michael within a three meter radius of her, and two more to actually talk to him. Tita says she’s just naturally shy around new people, so Michael tries to relate to her, but most of his attempts are met with head tilts, suspicious squinting, or, when she gets more comfortable around him, derisive comments.

(“It’s broken,” she tells him in Tagalog, waving the Game Boy Color in Michael’s face. “I can’t see anything.”

“It doesn’t have a backlight, so you have to play it somewhere well lit,” he explains.

She frowns, “That’s lame.”

Michael would rather an axe to the face than anybody dissing his Game Boy Color.)

Suffice to say, he’s thankful that at least he won’t be dealing with her alone today.

“Hey, dude,” Michael greets Jeremy at his front door when he arrives. “Thanks for coming.”

“No problem,” Jeremy says, stepping in. “Where’s your cousin?”

“Living room,” he answers. “Just a heads up, she doesn’t speak much English. She can understand it, yeah, so you can relax, but she only speaks a little..”

“That’s alright,” Jeremy shrugs, walking into the living room.

Nikki is sprawled out on the couch in the living room with the kind of defiant pettiness all kids under ten seem to have, swiping disinterestedly on her ipad.

“Yo, Nikki, my friend is here,” Michael calls out. Immediately, Nikki jolts, whipping her head to Jeremy before shyly ducking behind a throw pillow like a cave goblin seeing light for the first time. “Say hi.”

Nikki, obviously, does not say hi, but Jeremy isn’t deterred.

Jeremy sits on the opposite end of the couch and says in a soft, gentle voice, “Hi, I’m Jeremy. What’s your name?”

Puzzled, Michael says, “I just told yo—”

“Nikki, po,” she says softly, eyeing Jeremy over the pillow.

Michael blinks.

“Nice to meet you, Nikki. I like your clips.” Jeremy says, and Nikki actually smiles, raising the pillow up higher to hide it.

“Salamat po,” she says, fiddling with one of her clips that has a tiny cupcake on it.

“Uh, she said ‘thank you’,” Michael translates when Jeremy glances at him, slightly dazed at whatever is going on here.

“You’re welcome. Do you like baking?” Jeremy asks, and Michael is pretty sure he just ended up in another universe because Nikki shoves the pillow down and grins brightly. “We can make something today, if you want?”

“Yeah!” She says, turning to Michael. It’s almost terrifying seeing her smile in his direction. “Kuya Mikey, can we? Please?”

“Wh—Uh. Okay. Sure.” Michael says off of Jeremy’s meaningful glancing and eyebrow movements. “Let’s go check if there’s stuff in the kitchen.”

“Yay!” Nikki cheers, hopping off of the couch and running to the kitchen.

What.

“What,” Michael says to Jeremy’s smug looking expression. “What did you do? Oh my god? Are you some magic kid whisperer or something?”

“It’s not magic,” Jeremy rolls his eyes. “Kids just like doing what they like. Have you only ever tried to talk about video games with her?”

“Yeah but—”

“Not everybody likes video games,” Jeremy says, which, duh of course Michael knows. It’s weird, and he can’t really process it but he knows. “Some people like baking, Mikey.”

“Shut it,” Michael grumbles. “Keep it up, though. I haven’t seen her look anything other than bored or unimpressed, so as weirded out as I am, this an improvement.” Michael leans dramatically against Jeremy. “What would I ever do without you, Jeremy Heere?”

“Probably crash and burn,” Jeremy laughs. “Dude, get off.”

They walk into the kitchen where Nikki is standing, blinking up at cupboards she can’t reach, probably figuring out that this is not her house and that she has no idea where anything is. She turns to them expectantly.

“Okay so,” Michael opens a cupboard. And another one. And another. Just when he’s about to give up, he hits jackpot. “Bingo! We’ve got some brownie mix leftover from the last time we, uh—” Jeremy elbows him the side. “—the last time we made totally normal regular brownies.”

“Are you okay with making brownies, Nikki?” Jeremy asks in that terrible, horrible, no good, very bad soft voice of his that’s starting to make Michael dumb and fluttery.

“Yeah,” she nods enthusiastically, looking at Jeremy like he hung the stars. Which, okay, he can relate to.

“Okay. Michael can you get uh,” Jeremy reads the instructions on the box. “A bowl, a whisk, and whatever, you know the rest. Nikki, can you fetch me two eggs? I’ll get the other stuff.”

Nikki practically bolts to the fridge, and Michael can’t help but smile at seeing her so excited. When he returns laden with a bowl, a whisk, and a brownie pan, Nikki is jumping up and down next to Jeremy, an egg in each hand.

“Here,” Michael hands Jeremy the bowl and Jeremy pours the mix in.

“Uy, wala akong makita,” Nikki says, tugging at Jeremy’s jacket.

“Sorry, uh,” Jeremy glances at Michael. “What did she say?”

“She can’t see what you’re doing,” Michael tells him, looking at Nikki whose head just barely peeks past the kitchen counter.

“Oh, well,” Jeremy bends down and lifts Nikki up much to her delight, if her delighted squee is anything to go by, before depositing on the counter. Michael’s heart clenches for some reason. “Better?”

“Yes po,” she smiles. “Salamat, Kuya Jeremy.”

Michael is speechless.

Jeremy tasks Michael with greasing the pan while he cracks one egg into the mix, doing it slowly in front of Nikki so that she can crack the next one, which miraculously ends in only a few shells landing in the mix. Jeremy lets Nikki mix everything together.

“Pwede ko pong i-try?” Nikki says, tongue dangerously close to the whisk.

Jeremy may not understand the words but he does understand that mischievous look Nikki has. He swipes the whisk away from her grubby mitts. “Nope, sorry. It’ll be better later when it’s finished.” He says. Nikki crosses her arms and pouts, which causes Jeremy to laugh, which makes her pout falter.

They pour the batter into the pan, expertly greased, if Michael may say so himself, and pop it in the oven.

“The box says it’ll take around twenty minutes.” Michael says. Nikki is crouching by the oven, staring at the brownies.

“Alright,” Jeremy says, patting his pockets. “Hey, I think I left my phone in your living room. I’ll be right back. Watch over the brownies for me?”

Michael raises an eyebrow, “They’re not gonna walk away—”

“I will, Kuya Jeremy,” Nikki says solemnly, face as serious as if she’s a bodyguard and that she’ll guard these brownies with her life.

“Thanks,” Jeremy smiles, and he leaves the kitchen.

There’s a beat of awkward silence.

Then Nikki says in Filipino, “Do you have a crush on Kuya Jeremy?”

Michael is really glad he isn’t eating anything this time.

“I—I’m sorry what?” He stutters. “What are you talking about?

“You’re always looking at him,” she grins.

“Yeah, well, you’re always looking at him too!”

“Because I like him too,” Nikki whispers.

“What? That’s not allowed. You’ve known him for like, forty minutes.” Michael says, an odd, protective feeling washing over him for Jeremy. Which is ridiculous.

“You can’t tell me what to do,” she steps on his foot.

“Ow!”

“And you better not tell him! It’s a secret!”

“I won’t, don’t worry,” Michael sighs. “I haven’t even told him myself.”

Nikki gasps, and fuck. “So you do like him!”

“No, I don’t. Shut up,” he hisses. The glint in Nikki’s eyes should’ve warned him that only trouble was to come, but by the time it dawns on him, she’s running out of the kitchen with her tiny little goblin legs.

“KUYA JEREMY,” Nikki yells, skidding into the living room, fuckity fuck. “Kuya Mikey li—”

Before any traitorous words can be said, Michael does a sick slide on the floor, catches her, and covers her awful demon mouth.

“Shut up, shut up, shut up, please,” Michael hisses to Nikki. “Please, I am not kidding, please.”

“Uh,” Jeremy says from the couch, phone in hand. “What’s happening?”

“Noth—Oh my god, ew, did you lick me?” Michael pulls his hand away from Actual Confirmed Gremlin Nikki Mell.

Nikki sticks his tongue out at him, but she looks like she maybe might have an ounce of mercy for Michael.

Maybe.

She points at Michael, “Torpe si Kuya M—.” and he covers her mouth again.

“What now?” Jeremy asks and, fuckity fucking fuck. He glances over to Michael. “What does torpe mean?”

Michael is just about to pull another lie straight out of his ass but Nikki beats him to the punch by biting him, Jesus.

“Dude, not cool.” Michael holds his hand to his chest, hoping to look sad and pitiful so Nikki won’t do anything else that’ll jeopardize Michael’s soul.

It doesn’t work. Nikki stands proud and says in straight English, “It means somebody who is too shy to say how they feel to their crush.”

Michael never thought he’d one day vividly fantasize about launching a seven year old child out a window, but here he is now.

“Okaaaay,” Jeremy says cautiously, picking up on the tension. “So what were you guys talking abo—”

“You!” Nikki says.

“YEAH, YOU AND CHRISTINE,” Michael all but screams. “Haha! We were talking about how you still haven’t told Christine how you feel yet.”

Nikki scrunches her eyebrows, “Christine? Sino yun?”

“Oh, well, I guess that makes sense.” Jeremy, oh so thankfully oblivious Jeremy just smiles sheepishly and scratches the back of his head. “I really do get shy around her, so yeah, I’m torpe.”

“Yeah, you sure are, dude,” Michael carries a squirming Nikki over to the couch and deposits her next to Jeremy. “Jer, why don’t you tell her more about Christine, yeah? I’ll go check on the brownies.”

Michael goes back to the kitchen and catches his breath. That was a close call. That was several close calls in the span of a very short time. Jeremy and Nikki are still in the living room, so this is not time to have a Jeremy Feelings Crisis. Michael takes a second to rein everything back in, then he goes to fetch an oven mitt.

Once the brownies are safely cooling on the counter, he returns to the living room. Nikki is staring adoringly at Jeremy who seems to be waxing poetic on how great Christine was when she was called to read an excerpt of the book they’re reading in class. Nikki notices Michael, and for a seven year old, she conveys quite a lot of emotion into a slight frown.

It’s a look that he interprets as sorry you like your best friend who likes somebody else. Ugh.

“Yo, the brownies are done,” Michael says, and Nikki is back to her bubbly goblin persona in a second. “But they’re still cooling so—”

Nikki runs past him.

“—so I guess you can just go anyway and burn your mouth on molten fudge, or something.” Michael says to the living room and Jeremy.  “Dude, thanks again.”

“For what?”

“For coming over, for making Nikki happy, for baking brownies with us,” Michael tells him. “I really appreciate it.”

“It’s really no problem. She’s fun, and I get to hang out with you,” Jeremy slings an arm of Michael shoulders. “What are gagos for, right?”

Oh geez, Michael thinks, suppressing his laughter. “Absolutely.”

When they get to the kitchen, Nikki is trying and failing to climb onto the counter to get to the brownies. Jeremy lifts her up onto the counter as he slices the brownies, Nikki excitedly swinging her legs back and forth. Michael watches, eyes trained on Jeremy as he happily prattles on about Christine’s really cool socks or something. Nikki meets his eyes a few times looking way too understanding for a tiny monster, and Michael just shrugs at her.

Yeah, he’s torpe as fuck, but it’s fine. Being Jeremy’s friend is enough, and he wouldn’t trade it for a dumb confession.

He’s okay. Really.

( glossary of stuff not defined in fic: tita = aunt po = it doesnt...mean anything/have an english translation. it's something we add in sentences when speaking to somebody older or with more authority. it's a sign of respect. kuya = older brother, but is also an honorific for dudes who arent actually your older brother “Pwede ko pong i-try?” = can i try it? "Sino yun?" = who is that?)

[tarisilmarwen]

“Through Imperial Eyes” liveblog

*muffled screeching*

Mmmmmfffmmmmmm oh Force I am not prepared for this.

I SWEAR TO X’HAL IF THRAWN HURTS EZRA AT ALL IN THIS EPISODE--

Anyway, here we go.

Ah yes, here’s the preview clip we saw last week.

Kallus does not look like he’s been sleeping well.

Hi Lyste!

Escaping shuttle... wiiiiith Ezra on board?

Oh gosh this looks like it’s leading up to the clip from the midseason trailer it IS EZRA OH FORCE PLEASE BE OKAY BLUEBERRY.

Heh.  Blueberry has gotten better at his acting.

Lol Kallus’ subtle little, “Welp.” expression.

Cue titlecard?  Cue titlecard.

Aaaaaare Kanan and Rex the troopers?

I see Ezra has left his lightsaber at home.  Only armed with the blaster today.

AP AND CHOPPER SQUEEEEEEEEE!

STOP BEING ROUGH WITH EZRA YOU WHORES!

*muffled worried noises*

“I’ll interrogate him myself.”

Lol, I’ll bet as soon as the troopers are gone Kallus is gonna be all, “WTF ARE YOU DOING HERE BOY?!  DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH DANGER YOU ARE PUTTING YOURSELF ME IN?!  DOES KANAN KNOW YOU’RE HERE?  ANSWER ME DAMMIT!”

Aaaand he turns off the cameras of course.

“Most troopers don’t even know what I look like now.”

Translation: I hit puberty.

Kallus does not comprehend people caring about him enough to stage a rescue for him aaaah I love it.

“Well I guess I have no CHOICE now.”  LOL nope.

Can this continue the whole episode?  Just... the Ghost crew being all like, “We gotta get you outta here.” and Kallus being all, “I WAS WORKING DAMMIT!  I WAS VERY HIGHLY INVESTED AND INVOLVED IN THIS ESPIONAGE THING.  CAN’T I STAY A LITTLE LONGER?  I GOT MORE SHIT TO DO.”

And the Ghost crew responding like, “Nope, too dangerous, we’re pulling you.  Whether you like it or not.”

Ezra still not 100% on board with trusting him, but gonna do his best anyway.

“To show the Grand Admiral how effective I am in dealing with the rebel threat.”  Oh no oh no SHIIIIIIIIIIIIT.

DO NOT TAKE EZRA TO THRAWN.  OH FORCE.

Thrawn 100% knows who Ezra is.  This is going to end very badly.

Even Ezra’s getting these quick little flashes of “Oh crap.”

NNHHNNFFNNNMMM please be okay blueberry.

Camera focus on the helmet?

*hears snippets of Thrawn’s theme*

*remembers that Thrawn had hold of it in the trailer*

*genre-savvy starts working overtime*

CRAPSICKLES DON’T TELL ME THRAWN RECOGNIZES SABINE’S HANDIWORK WHEN HE SEES IT.

Mfffffmmffffffffffffffffff-

*STRESSING*

Ezra pls be okay.

(Also, hang on, they left his original binders there?  Did the trooper put new ones on him or...?)

(...It looks like he’s got new ones on.  Okay.)

I SAW THAT LITTLE SMILE THERE, EZRA.

“incident with the Princess” HA HA HA.

POKER FACE... POKER FACE... POKER FACE... “I’m sure you will, Lieutenant.”  Very diplomatic and underhanded way of Kallus telling Lyste that he’s screwed there, lol.

Aaaaah, here’s Kanan and Rex.

...Holy crap they let Ezra go in alone?!

Chopper and AP do not count.

THIS IS NOT THE CADET SCHOOL BACK ON LOTHAL YOU GUYS, THIS IS CONSIDERABLY MORE DANGEROUS.

Aww, Kanan!

WORRIED SPACEDAD IS WORRIED.

Aaaand of course the return of the “Let’s plan on the plan changing and wing it.” running gag.

Now taking bets on it completely not being a coincidence that Thrawn showed up the day the Rebels were going to extract Kallus.

First the factory on Lothal and now this.

The man is either telepathic, ridiculously genre-savvy and good at predicting them, or he knows literally everything already and is just toying with them.

Nnf.

This stress is gonna murder me, yikes.

Ohboy.  There’s Titus... and the commander from “Ghosts of Geonosis”.

...This is another Tarkin-showing-up-to-dress-down-everyone-and-then-murder-some-incompetents meeting... isn’t it?

Show... can... can you like... not stress me out so much right now?

Please?

*checks time*

I AM NOT EVEN SIX MINUTES IN??!!???

HOW???

(Side note, I am learning all sorts of interesting things about Imperial procedures today.  Sweet!)

Hello Thrawn.  Still creepy I see.

Hi Konstantine.  I’m gonna put about $10 down on you getting murdered for incompetence today.

Just to cover my bases.

I see that painting of Lothal back there, which means there’s a high probability of Thrawn shooting that blaster as in the trailer clip in this room in this episode.

Gotta hand it to Kallus.  It takes balls to keep a perfectly stoic poker face up in front of Thrawn.

Okay so I think Thrawn already suspects that Kallus is Fulcrum, but he’s not making a move until he’s confirmed it, hence the pretense of a witch hunt.

Or... he totally does know and is playing off Kallus’s reactions and the Rebels’ attempts to free him to finally pinpoint their base?

Aaaaaaand here’s the map.

This is a ploy.  This is totally a ploy.  He is deliberately showing Kallus the map so that Kallus HAS to let the rebels know, so they HAVE to try to delete it so they reveal themselves and---FHNFNNNNNFFF.

*CONTINUED STRESSING*

This... this knowing that Thrawn has some kind of long game plan in mind but not knowing what that is or how much he already knows and what the endgame is is just AWFUL.

Like, he was creepy enough with the utter stoic calm he displays in all situations.

But add in a crapton of uncertainty over whether or not he can see right through your plans and strategies and just nfsalfknaslfknafnnn.

Please tell me he’s like this in Heir to the Empire too, someone tell me I’m not the only one.

As Kallus and Yularen are talking I am starting to suspect that... maybe Kallus is using Ezra’s tower to transmit?

That would make sense.  Would explain that clip in the trailer.

Ohhhh SHIT AND PRYCE IS HERE TOO.

Sure, let’s just have one big happy Imperial family I HATE THIS I HATE EVERYTHING.

*dread*

Heh.  Kallus pulled a fast one and switched out the code tubes.

Is he gonna frame Lyste as Fulcrum?

Hang on here, let me reach the halfway point and then check on my laundry.

Okay back.

Thrawn has the kalikori, lovely.

IT WAS A PLOY, I CALLED IT.

*Yularen starts talking about the shuttle theft*

No.  No no no no no no no NO.

THRAWN IS GONNA WANDER ON DOWN TO HAVE A TALK WITH EZRA ISN’T HE?

DO NOT.  HURT EZRA.

Thrawn I swear if you hurt Ezra...

Lol Kallus overrides AP and Chopper’s bickering by turning off the cameras and freeing Ezra.

LOLOLOLOL KALLUS’S EXASPERATED, “PLEASE STOP THAT.” @ Ezra hiding on the ceiling.

Ezra bby. <3

Blueberry still having a hard time trusting Kallus.  Don’t blame him.  After Senator Trayvis and Hondo and Maul it’s a wonder the boy has any trust left.

I love all this espionage.  It’s great.

“I liked being a bounty hunter better.”  Aww Ezra.

Precious pouty bb.

Aaaaaaand now I am really certain Kallus is gonna let Lyste take the fall for being Fulcrum.

Nice knowing you, Lyste.

You are 100% dead.

Might be a good idea to delete the WHOLE list.  Not just Atollon.

Buy guys some more time.

Awww, Ezra wanted to take Hera’s kalikori back!

Add another planet as a decoy okay I did not think of that one.  Kallus is infinitely better at this espionage thing than I am.

I bet Thrawn has photographic memory though.  So nice try.

“Oh.  Wait.  I can’t.  He’s at the door.”

SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT.

Dammit dammit dammit oh gosh.

Well I guess now we’ll see where Kallus’s loyalties truly lie.

*BITES NAILS*

NNNGGGGGFFFFFFFF.

*hates this*

*hates everything*

*checks time*

HOW AM I ONLY FIFTEEN MINUTES IN???!!

Kallus turned on the sentries, nice.

And disabled the override code.  Cool, cool.

RUN EZRA RUN!

Heh.  Nice nod to Kanan’s blindness there.

Hi Pryce.  Please stop blocking Ezra and Kallus’s escape route kthanks.

SHIT!

SHITSHITSHITSHITALSFKAHNSFLKJ PRYCE ISN’T WEAKMINDED ENOUGH FOR THE MIND TRICK KANAN NOOOOOOO!

Well I hope that one blogger who was overinvested in Pryce being as competent and smart as Thrawn is happy now.

Cripes that was still an awful post.

Yep.  Lyste is 100% dead now.  Not sure how I feel about Kallus framing him.  It’s not exactly nice.

Then again, Kallus isn’t really one of the nicest people.  Imperial or Rebel, he is ruthlessly effective.

Aaaaaaand Kallus is still gonna stay and continue his work as Fulcrum.  DAMMIT KALLUS YOU PUT ME THROUGH ALL THAT STRESS FOR NOTHING YOU UNGRATEFUL BASTARD.

Ow ow ow ow my heart.

Kallus betraying Lyste.

:(

Aaaaaand Thrawn knows anyway, doesn’t he?

AND THERE’S THE HELMET AND THRAWN IS GONNA KNOW IT’S SABINE’S ART SON OF A BITCH.

SON OF A BIIIIIIIIIIITTTTTTCCCCH.

I KNEW IT.  I KNEW THAT THRAWN ALREADY KNEW.

DAMMIT KALLUS YOU SHOULD’VE GONE WITH EZRA!

MMMMMNNNNNFF--

I HATE EVERYTHING.

Oh gosh, that was so stressful.  SO STRESSFUL.

I hate everything.