#where should quarantines be and for how long?

[hippopotatoe]

transcribing newspapers from the 1853 cholera pandemic and it reminds me of early day covid in allt the worst ways

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

wait, Derin how did your leaving make the hospital shut down?

I used to work as a live-in nanny for a pediatrician.

Now, the thing about hospitals in my country is that they are massively understaffed and massively underfunded. This is especially true outside the major cities. The staff are worked to the bone and receive little to no help in things like finding accommodation or childcare, making working in rural areas a very uninviting prospect; staff come out here, get lumped with the work of three people (because there's nobody else to do it), burn out under the workload and leave, meaning that those remaining have even more work because that person is gone. It's unsustainable and the medical staff are doing their best to sustain it, because people die if they don't, so to the higher-ups it looks like everything's getting done and therefore everything is fine.

My friend (and boss) worked one week on, one week off, swapping out with another pediatrician. This was necessary because it would not be physically possible for one person to handle the workload for longer periods of time. The one single pediatrician had to hold up the entire pediatrics ward, which was not only the only public hospital pediatrics ward in our town, but also the one that served all the towns around us for a few hours' drive in all directions. I regularly saw her go to work sick, aching, tired, or with a debilitating 'I can barely make words or see' level migraine, because if she took a day off, twenty children didn't get healthcare that day, and some of these kids' appointments were scheduled weeks in advance. She'd work long hours in the day and then be called in a couple of times overnight for an hour or two at a time (she was on-call at night too, because somebody had to be), and then go in the next day. Sometimes she would be forced to take a day off because she physically could not stay awake for longer than a few minutes at a time, meaning she couldn't drive to work.

Cue my niece's second birthday coming up in Melbourne. I'd been working for her for about 3 years, and she (and the hospital) had plenty of advance warning that I (and therefore she) needed one (1) Friday off. That's fine, we'll find someone to work that Friday, the hospital said. Right up until the last week where they're like "oh, we can't find a replacement; you can come in, can't you?"

No, she tells them; I don't have anyone to watch my kid that day.

Oh, surely you can hire a babysitter for this one day, they say. Think of the children! We really really need you to work that day. I know we said it'd be fine but we need you now, there's no one else to do it.

There are no other babysitters, she told them. Unless you can find one?

That's not our responsibility, they said.

But I'm not changing my plans, she's got plans by now as well, the hospital knew about this one day weeks in advance, and with absolutely no reserve staff they're forced to reschedule all pediatrics appointments for that Friday. Not a huge deal, it happens on the 'physically too overworked to get out of bed' days too. I go to Melbourne, she goes back to her home in Adelaide for her recovery week, all should be on track.

My niece gives me Covid.

This was way back in the first wave of the pandemic, and there were no Covid vaccines yet. The rules were isolate, mask up, hope. I had Covid in the house, and it would've been madness for my friend and her toddler to come back into the Covid house instead of staying in Adelaide. There was absolutely no way that a pediatrician could live with someone in quarantine due to Covid and go to work in the hospital with sick children every day. And no support existed for finding another babysitter, or temporary accommodation, so the hospital was down a pediatrician.

The other pediatrician wasn't available to do a three-week stint. They were also trapped in Adelaide on their well-earned week off.

Meaning that the only major pediatrics ward within a several-hour radius had no pediatricians. They had to shut down and send all urgent cases to Adelaide for the week. To the complete absence of surprise of any of the doctors or nurses; of course this would happen, this was bound to happen, it presumably keeps happening. But probably to the surprise of the higher-ups. After all, the hospital was doing fine, right? Of course all the staff were complaining of overwork and a lack of resources in every meeting, but they could always be fobbed off with the promise of more help sometime in the future; the work was mostly getting done, so the issue couldn't be too urgent.

It's not like some nanny who doesn't even work for the hospital could go out of town for a weekend for the first time in three years, and get the only public pediatrics ward in the area shut down for a week.

[tiredneutron]

Terrans

Humanity.

Listen well, for this is a tale of warning and of caution.

When humanity was first observed, many of the council thought they should be eradicated. A tumultuous and violent species who revelled in the destruction of their own kind. It was a close thing, but the council voted and humanity was allowed to develop - under the condition that none were to contact them until they were deemed ready.

Humanity never gave us the chance to do so.

They progressed their technology in timeframes yet unseen. They went from discovering electricity to landing on their own moon in a matter of decades - doing so with primitive technology, but it was a feat nonetheless.

From there they developed their own world - the space around their home planet Terra became a field of haphazard signals and messages, a bombardment of signals that interfered with our observational machinery. Due to this we weren’t ready when humanity ventured into the stars truly for the first time. They blasted themselves out of their atmosphere with controlled explosions of all things, their technology was nowhere near discovering antimatter coupling yet. Despite this they reached the edge of the quarantine zone within a matter of years, and we were discovered.

Despite our initial thoughts, humanity reacted very differently to us than expected. They didn’t wage wars on us, didn’t lay claim to our planets. They met us with unrestrained joy at finding others in the universe. They told us of their numerous attempts to reach out to us, and showed us some of their works of fiction that depicted how they imagined us (though they seemed to hide some others for reasons we couldn’t ascertain).

Humanity was welcomed into the stars, and they became commonplace. Their biology was baffling and their behaviour bizarre, but we accommodated them and they taught us how to work with them.

Centuries passed, and though the initial explorers were long gone, humanity had become a part of the council as low ranking members. Their species had become mostly peaceful, lowering their internal wars to less than skirmishes. Humanity’s violent and cruel nature seemed to have been tempered by the stars.

We were wrong.

From beyond the councils borders, beyond the observable space in the void, a threat appeared. They blasted through our sensors and demolished our border colonies in hours. Our intel on them was near zero due to the ferocity they annihilated our kin.

They reached the inner borders of the council, and the elder members prepared for a bitter battle. To our surprise, humanity asked to join the defence. They told us that their kin had settled on some of the border colonies, and that many had lost loved ones. We allowed humanity to join our last fight, even if we didn’t expect them to affect the battle.

We were wrong.

Many of my comrades who survived the battle have sleep terrors to this day. Not of the void settlers, but of the humans. The cruelty and viciousness we thought had disappeared from their culture came back with a vengeance. Who we had seen as scientists and farmers for centuries, comrades we had known for decades - they showed us that monsters don’t come from the void.

The void settlers never stood a chance. The council was barely able to get in formation before the battle was ended. If the void bringers tactics were ferocious, then the Terran’s were monstrous. For every ship they lost, every life they sacrificed, the void settlers lost a battalion, a planet’s worth of lives.

This loss brought the void settlers much shame and anger. They made a mistake that haunts me to this day. They used their speed to reach Terra before the council could relay to the humans the threat. Humanity watched as Terra split, as trillions of their families and non-fighting members were eradicated.

The fighting ceased. Humanity seemed to have frozen. Their fleets stopped dead in space and their communications went silent. Where humanity had been surrounded by wavelengths and frequencies that interfered with some technology still, the space around them became eerily silent, as though the death of the planet had killed even those off world.

The void settlers continued their attack on the council and disregarded Humanity. No need to worry about a broken opponent… Right?

They were wrong.

The Terran’s weren’t dead, or even broken. It was later revealed that the freeze had been due to grief. Humanity had lost its home world, but worse than that it had lost its peaceable citizens. The ones who should have been safe from the conflict.

All of humanity had watched, and all of humanity had grieved. But they were not broken.

The void settlers learnt this very soon.

Humanity descended on them in ways that made the last defence seem like a diplomatic discussion. We though we had seen the worst of humanity in our early observations. WE. WERE. WRONG.

Humanity has a saying “Hell hath no wrath like a woman scorned”, but the council has adapted it: “The void hath no wrath like a Terran without a home”.

The void settlers were routed from every planet they had taken. They retreated to the void leaving behind their technology and supplies, not even taking the time to recover some of their teams. But the humans didn’t stop.

In a move that the council had forbidden for millennia, the humans flew into the void. The entirety of the Terran race disappeared into the blackness beyond space and wasn’t heard from for longer than we had known of them.

The council mourned their losses, but viewed their final act as something done out of the madness of their loss. The Terran’s were remembered as warriors, as fighters, but also as family. They became known to those of us who’d seen them fight as “The angels of Death”.

I never expected to see a Terran again, assumed that the void had devoured them and their destructive grief with them. But one day a vessel I was onboard, tasked with assessing possible colonies to rebuild in the border planets - it detected something.

The frequencies and wavelengths of data that had only ever been human in nature. They were coming from the void.

The council watched as humanity emerged unexpected for the second time.

The flagship docked with our observation vessel, and the leaders came aboard to see us. I vaguely recognised the captain. Their features so slightly similar to the grief driven warrior we’d watched descend into the void. We asked what had happened, and the captain responded with the most chilling visage I had seen since the first footage of the void settlers. Their baring of their teeth was savage and joyous. So similar to the expression we saw at first meeting, yet so distorted. In that moment I saw what could have happened if the Terran’s had waged war on us.

“We won.”

[yeetus-feetus]

Duke is a much smaller Duke one day, he's lost all his memories beyond the young age he is now and he's scared and confused.

He doesn't know where is. But then there's Tim, his Robin! And suddenly everything is ok.

The bats have no idea what's going on, but Duke refuses to go to anyone but Tim. He's also a little ball of energy bouncing off all the walls, and Tim is SO tired. "Robin- Tim, come play tag with me!"

One night Tim ends up passing out at his desk, a sleeping Duke cuddling into him on his lap.

Except when Duke wakes up Tim is small too.

And he doesn't remember who Duke is!!

So Duke reintroduces himself and Tim let's himself be dragged downstairs to the actually Batcave!

Bruce is looking at them in absolute astonishment, they're so small!!

Damian laughs at Tim's smallness and Tim gives a cold glare. Maybe age can't change some things.

"where are Nightwing and the new Robin?" Tim asks.

"I'm Robin."

"no, I meant Jason!" Tim huffs and crosses his arms. Ah, he's so young he still believes Jay is Robin.

Duke is still clinging to him, but Tim can't bring himself to mind all too much.

Bruce doesn't know how to handle these boys, between a hyperactive Duke and an absolute menace Tim.

Dick tries to help, but even he can't keep up with the mischief and shenanigans they get up to together.

"dick pick us up!"

"yeah! Pick us up pick us up! And swing us around until we get dizzy!"

"again!"

"again!"

It's time to bring out the big guns, and by that they mean calling Jason over to the manor.

Tim settles immediately, but Duke remains overly weary around the large man with guns strapped to his thighs. He's kinda scary.

But Tim likes Jason well enough. At some point he ends up cuddled up with Jason who's stretched out on the couch, and Duke is just a little bit jealous.

"hey stop hogging him! Tim is mine," Duke pouts.

Jason raises an eyebrow at the boy, and Tim tilts his head. "You know there's enough room for both of us up here, right? Jason is a lot bigger than he used to be."

Duke considers this. "Mm okay, but only because you're up there". And he climbs up into Jason's lap to cuddle into Tim's side.

It's calm for a moment, until Duke starts to fidget, not able to stay still for too long. Jason let's put an annoyed noise and looks at them over the top of his book. "Would you quit it I'm tryna read here".

"what are you reading?" Duke asks.

"Macbeth."

Tim scrunched his nose up. "Why are you reading that?"

"I like it. Reminds me of school", and Tim catches something in his tone that Duke absolutely doesn't.

"it sounds silly. Will you red it to us?"

Jason looks at the both of them for a very long moment before signing. "Sure, but you've gotta stay still, your knees are already in my ribs."

The three of them all end up falling asleep like that, tucked into the lounge and curled up together.

Except when they wake up in the morning, Jason is scrawny little boy, even smaller than Tim and Duke.

Tim explains what he can to the tiny Jason as Duke sneaks some snacks from the kitchen cupboard for them.

Cass catches them stuffing their faces with junk food and squeals. "Three baby brother's now!" And scoops them all up as the quick and try to squirm away.

"gotta tell B"

"wait who are you exactly?" Jason asks.

"big sister", Cass smiles and pets his curls.

"no way! Really? That's so cool, I've never had a big sister before", he exclaims.

Cass carries all three of them down to the Batcave because she's so strong and awesome! And Jason can't believe he ends up with such a cool sister.

"Batman!!!" Jason shouts in pure excitement, and Bruce turns around and almost cries.

Because look how small!! Oh baby Jay lad!! So precious and smol!

"I think the de-aging syndrome may be contagious", Tim speaks up. "You should have us all properly quarantined until you can find a cure."

quarantine is fun, for Jason and Tim at least (tiny Tim is plotting revenge on whoever caused this, Jason is reading and occasionally shouting at the characters). Duke can't stand having to stay still in the same one room for so long.

idk where this is going, but consider this awesome 3am idea of mine

[coff-in]

Can I request a dynamic where the reader is the youngest Graves sibling (like a year younger than Ashley) and is objectively the most "normal" of the siblings (before Ashley and Andrew kind of ruin it)?

She's still clingy with her big brother and sister, but she's also happy to make friends outside of them and actively cares about them a lot. The thing is that Andrew forbids her from dating and Ashley scares off a lot of her friends and when quarantine rolls around she's stuck with two older siblings who are obsessed with her and she's not too sure what to do about it, because her siblings really are all she has left now.

Bonus details, I think it would be fun if her relationship with Andrew is bordering on romantic/he has romantic feelings he doesn't admit to but shows (sleeping in the same bed, holding hands) and he dotes on her a lot as the youngest. However, this strains her relationship with Ashley, who is used to having Andrew to herself before the youngest sister was born, but also loves reader (platonically, maybe transitioning to romantically) because she's never done anything but love Ashley unconditionally.

So it's a complicated thing where Ashley's possessive of both but also scared they'll get together and abandon her, Andrew is extra possessive and protective of reader but denies it to hell (as he does), and reader is slowly realizing some things about her siblings that she really should've realized much, much earlier...

notes from coff-in: GRRRR IT'S LIKE YOU LIVE IN MY MIND!!!! oh to have two possessive and obsessive older siblings who love you way more than a normal sibling should, not like i'm complaining, hahaha! i'm sorry these asks are taking so long... i just wanna hang on to all your wonderful asks and daydreaming about them indulgently!! even so, i hope this was to your liking and thank you so much for requesting!!

[fem] reader-insert, [reader] is 1 year younger than ashley, talks/mention of incest, brief NSFW

I love you more than I should...

Andrew and Ashley did not know why their mother thought she should have a second child. Maybe this was an accidental pregnancy.

When [reader] was old enough to walk and talk, Mrs. Graves delegated the responsibility of raising her to Andy, who was around maybe four or five years old at the time. He tried his best to keep them both happy and satisfied, but it was obvious to the keen few that he paid extra attention to his baby sister. Leyley wasn’t used to not having Andy’s full attention on her and expressed her hatred of the new status quo by picking on her little sister.

When [reader] would try to make amends with Leyley for whatever crime she committed, it shocked Leyley. She remembers when she was playing in the forest one day, picking on the bugs in the dirt, and having her little sister [reader] walk up clumsily to her with dug-up flowers in her hand.

“I’m sorry I made you upset, Leyley. Please don’t be mad.” Leyley picked on her less after that and a heated argument with Andy. In fact she tried to hang out with [reader] more often and tried her best to be nicer to her sister. She was someone besides Andy that she could call a friend. It wasn’t uncommon to catch [reader] following her older siblings like a lost puppy, eating lunch and studying with Andy or drawing and playing around with Leyley.

The other kids found it strange how [reader] would willingly hang out with Leyley. She was so normal like Andy was. She was sociable and had friends that she hung out with from time to time… until Leyley drew most of them away. The only ones that stuck around were Julia and Nina. Maybe [reader] knew that they were just using her to get closer to Andy or maybe she believed that they genuinely wanted to be her friends.

Once Nina died [reader] stopped putting herself out as much. She clung much closer to her big siblings and they were happy to dote and comfort her. Leyley made it so that [reader] promised with the blood pact she would never love anyone else but her and their bother.

As they got older, in middle and high school [reader] started to come out of her shell again. She tried to make some new friends but Ashley, again, did her hardest to scare most of them off. 

“What do you need other friends for?” She’d ask [reader] when they see each other during the day, “You have me and Andy! You don’t need anyone else!”

It’s not like Andrew was any better himself. His possessiveness was less visible to others but it was still there. “Ashley’s right, sis. You don’t need to worry about making friends right now.” (God, to be the object of affection between these two <3)

He didn’t like the idea of [reader] dating. He knew it was wrong for him to think of his sister like this, but he didn’t want to share her with anyone else. He’d never admit that he got off on the idea of being her first; her first kiss, her first boyfriend… To avoid the jealousy he knew he’d feel if [reader] dated he simply told her that she wasn’t allowed to do so. Any arguments that [reader] had about him or Ashley dating (mostly about him dating Julia) were casually swept aside with the excuse that he’s older than her.

Ashley doesn’t like Andrew dating Julia. He can’t leave her! Does Julia really think that she’s better because Andrew can fuck her and not Ashley or [reader]?! While Ashley leaves 200 violent voicemails for Julia, [reader] calls Andrew a lot during his time in college to ask if he could come home.

“I miss you.” [reader] would say in that low, pouty voice that’ll tug on Andrew’s heart and make his cheeks red. “Could you come back this weekend to visit?”

And he’d say “Of course.” because he could never deny his little sisters.

Once they’re stuck in quarantine, Andrew and Ashley start showing (or at least then [reader] starts noticing) their more possessive and… weirder nature.

They’re always with [reader] except for when [reader] has to use the restroom. Ashley’s making [reader] do some chore with her or Andrew’s subtly holding [reader] close to him when he’s smoking on the balcony. Ashley would make her teasingly suggestive comments about [reader] and Andrew would immediately shut them down while avoiding looking at [reader] because he does think that they have a merit to them.

Andrew sneaks into [reader]’s bed when the nightmares come and cuddles up to his baby sister. He holds her close in his arms and rests his face on top of her head or in the crook of her neck or on her chest with her chip over his head. He relishes in her warmth and takes deep inhales of her scent to comfort himself. 

Whenever [reader] does chores, he pats her on her head and says that she did a good job and that he’s proud. [reader] insists he praises Ashley too and it makes her heart pound a little faster and harder. 

Skip over to Episode 1 when they break into the cultist apartment, Andrew tries to avoid having [reader] see what’s up. [reader] is reasonably freaked out and upset about having to dismember and EAT a dead guy until Ashley proposes that she’d just starve to death. Andrew argues with Ashley about letting their baby sister starve and would probably insist with Ashley that [reader] should eat the dead cultist.

Ah, this is going to be very lazy of me but I’m going to skip over to the Burial vision scene. In the vision, the siblings see themselves (all three of them) post-coitus, naked and marked up by each other. (Very self-indulgent but [reader] would be placed in the middle of them)

Andrew’s an embarrassed mess because holy shit, holy shit, holy shit! 

He fucks his sisters. He fucks his baby sister, [reader]. He’s as elated as he is scared… she’s not like that. She wouldn’t fuck him. She wouldn’t fuck her older siblings and she wouldn’t want them as much as he wants her… would she?

Ashley’s never really considered [reader] in a romantic light like that, but she doesn’t mind it at all. Having [reader] close to her and Andrew like that brings a warm comfort to her.

With the way the trinket works, [reader] probably wouldn’t be able to see the vision since she can’t touch it when Andrew and Ashley are holding it in their hands. She’d be sleeping on the couch, waking up when she heard Andrew and Ashley yelling about the argument.

I wanna write smut about them having a hot incestuous threesome so badly but I’m losing steam right now. They all confess their feelings about each other and kiss tho. By the time Episode 2 ends [reader] has been sort of worn down by Andrew and Ashley’s weird feelings that she’s like “Yeah I’d fuck my siblings because I love them!”

----

coff-in

[seancekitsch]

Can I ask you a Question?: An Adrian Chase x Reader Kinktober fic

here it is! the first fic of kinktober :) all of these are gonna be shorties but smutty

warnings: sex pollen, dub con, rough sex, spitting, slightest degradation, 

Heat spreads along your skin as you stare at the wall, a single focused point in the absolutely unremarkable plain wall of the ARGUS issued motel room, and still managing to fail completely at ignoring the other more than warm body in the room. Anger bubbles as you think about how you were shoved in here kicking and screaming in protest. It's not your fault and you should be allowed to sweat this out at home. Why does Chris even have a pheromone helmet to begin with? Why does that one just activate whenever it wants to like a malfunctioning furby? You wish you could have gotten a good punch in before Emilia shoved you in here claiming a needed quarantine, even though as Adrian pointed out, there are air ducts in the room which means nothing is airtight and if you and the air around you is the issue then the whole building is fucked.

Adrian sits beside you staring at the wall the same as you, but he walked in here willingly. He didn’t have to be in here; he doused himself in solidarity with women or some absolute bullshit that you barely heard over the near immediate effects it had on your body and the intense rush of heat towards your abdomen. You wonder if he’s feeling as hot and squirmy as you at this point, he has to be, unless he wasn't actually lying about being unnaturally fast at healing. If you were alone you’d be ripping your clothes off and hoping the sheets are cool, or maybe taking an ice bath and watching the most ick-inducing hallmark movie your can find. But instead you try to wait it out… however long it lasts. 

“Hey, can I ask you…?” Adrian trails off mid sentence, god, your scowl must be nastier than you think. 

“Ask,” you grit out, teeth bared as you try not to shiver under his gaze. Fuck, he’s so hot. Fucking annoying sometimes, but fucking hot. 

“Are you horny?”

What, like he’s going to do something about it? Heat bubbles and pools between your legs in embarrassment, even though the situation is already clear. How you’d like to just snap and ride his face, knocking those cute dorky glasses askew or— fucking shit dude. This is bad. You make the mistake of shifting how you sit. 

“I was dosed with pheromones,” you snap back, doing everything in your power to hide the the moan in your voice. 

“I know, but is it working?”

You feel yourself clench around nothing, the friction of your tight jeans a blessing and a curse right now. There’s no teasing in his tone, just genuine curiosity. You love that about him, but god does that make this harder.

“Is it working on you?” you sigh, trying to stay as still as possible, trying not to set your own body aflame. 

“Oh yeah!” he confirms, “I’ve been rock hard since before they threw us in here.”

“Please don’t give me that mental image,” you snap, and he immediately apologizes profusely, the hint of a frown on the corners of his lips. Shit, you’ve probably upset him and made him think you’re grossed out. He shifts farther away from you and groans at the movement. He’s got it just as bad as you. 

“I mean— with everything going on right now, I can’t handle that. Not you,” you try to reassure him. 

 “Oh! Well that makes perfect sense. I don’t know what I’d do if you said something like, ‘I’m so wet right now’ I’d probably—“

“You know what Adrian? I’ll answer your question. Yes, I’m horny… and you’re not helping the situation.”

“Should I leave?”

You look at him with pinched brows, incredulous.

“Emilia will probably kill you if you try.”

He grumbles something about being able to handle a stupid little bullet. 

Your eyes follow up and down his body, tracing and following the dips and bulges of his muscles to where they become obscured by armor, biting your lip to suppress a moan. You know he’s a good fighter, and it probably translates well in the bedroom. Christ, what those biceps could do, those arms wrapped around you and— head out of the gutter, you tell yourself, but it’s too damn hard, and you betray yourself and your mind flashes back to imagining his arms wrapped around you while he takes you from behind. An embarrassing little whimper escapes your lips as another wave of heat floods your core. Damn it. 

He flinches at the noise, because of course he heard it, that’s just your luck. His fists clench and unclench, gloves discarded so you can see the whites of his knuckles. He’s holding back, and he’s struggling with it. 

“Hey,” he starts, voice much more shaky than before, “What if we—“

“Yes,” you agree without thinking. Whatever it is. Yes. Whatever he wants. However he wants you. 

“Wait- Really?” he asks, voice rising in shock as he gets up, and then stumbles, clearly thrown off by his own arousal. Fuck. You lean back onto the bed, humming in pleasure as you do, trying to look as appealing as possible despite the sweat on your brow and the state of your dishevelment, even though judging by the bulge in his pants you don’t need to go through these extra steps. You lay against the sheets and throw your head back, showing off your neck and hoping he’ll sink those pearly whites into the side of your neck. 

But then he confuses you by heading towards the bathroom, walking awkwardly.

You pick your head back up, panic shooting through you. Did you get the wrong idea?

“Where are you going?” your voice does nothing to hide your desperation, and maybe you’d be embarrassed if you weren’t so turned on its starting to hurt. 

He has the nerve to look at you like you have three heads, that jerk. 

“I thought you said yes? I was gonna go jerk off in the bathroom while you do whatever you do best in here?” he hovers in the doorway with odd energy (well, odder than normal) and tilts his chin at you as if its a challenge. 

“Where are you going?” your voice does nothing to hide your desperation, and maybe you’d be embarrassed if you weren’t so turned on its starting to hurt. 

He has the nerve to look at you like you have three heads, that jerk. 

“I thought you said yes? I was gonna go jerk off in the bathroom while you do whatever you do best in here?” he hovers in the doorway with odd energy (well, odder than normal) and tilts his chin at you as if its a challenge. 

“Oh!” you exclaim a little too loudly, “Oh, I didn’t know thats what I was agreeing to.”

You smile sheepishly as he walks back into the room proper. 

“What, did you think I was suggesting we should tear each others clothes off and do things to each other?” he scoffs, and even though his face is flushed he still tries to joke as if he’s functioning like normal. Well, Adrian’s version of normal. Yeah, you totally did, and you misread this. But even his condescending tone has you pressing your thighs together and fills your head with the imagery of it all. 

“Well…” you trail off, not really sure where to go from here. You’ve reached an impasse of unbearable arousal, a work colleague, and the distance of about ten feet. Talk about shitting where you eat. 

Adrian blinks twice.

“Is what I just said an option?” he asks, his voice rising half an octave, “Because if it totally is, I change my suggestion. I was just trying not to be sexist because I remember you telling me to watch how I talk sometimes about women after I rated the team on how much I’d like to motorboat them and you were on the top of the list.”

Yeah, you remember that night. You slapped the hell out of Adrian right after that.

“Maybe you should come join me on the bed,” you suggest, and he crosses the room as if zapped with a cattle prod. 

The bed dips as his knees press into the mattress, and your hand involuntarily reaches out along the sheets closer to his heat to share it. 

He flops himself down next to you, grunting as he does so, leaning in close to you, but not touching you. God, you wish he was touching you right now.

“How do you want to do this?” you ask, your lips moving of their own desperate accord.

“Well, this isn’t how I thought I’d woo you,” Adrian admits. Woo you? Was he planning on making a move? Oh, shit. The pressures on now. You don’t exactly have a crush on Adrian but you’d never turn a body like that attached to a genuinely sweet dude like that down. 

“But?” you urge him on, placing your hand closest to him on his, making your move known. 

“But fuck it,” he shrugs and pulls you in for a rough kiss; a little too much teeth and a little too much tongue but you drink it in, pulling him in closer and gripping at his uniform.

He moans loudly into your mouth, only spurring you on to grab him more, pull him flush against you to soothe the heat inside you. It works, sort of. The heat quells for a moment when you feel his hardness press against you; but it’s only replaced by another heat, an arguably worse one. It’s the need to have him inside you, to let him wreck you, destroy you. He shifts his position to trap you beneath him, rolling you onto your back. He cages you in with his arms and legs, presses his hips into yours harshly, the fire is fed, growing stronger. You want out of these jeans and to pull him into you, want to cover him and yourself in bruises by the end of this. He moves from your lips to your mouth and you gasp, gulping at air as his lips and teeth move to your cheek and your chin and your jaw; he’s sloppy and rushed and feverish in his pace, trying to experience all of you as soon as possible.

“How do you want to do this?” Adrian asks, glasses knocked askew against the side of your face.

“Need you,” you pant, already lightheaded from making out like some novice. He rocks his hips up into your absentmindedly as he continues to press kisses into your jawline, himself desperate for friction. He chuckles.

“Need you too,” Adrian sighs, and picks his head up. You almost want to whine because he isn’t kissing you anymore.

“Do you want Adrian?” he asks, and for a moment you don’t understand, “Or do you want Vigilante?”

Fuck, how do you choose? Aren’t they both just him in some capacity? You don’t exactly know what either entails, but your brain is foggy and slow, needing and yearning and making your body writhe under him instead of thinking clearly.

“I want… fuck,” you interrupt yourself, and he pulls back to kneel on his knees above you. He looks like a god under the cheap fluorescents, the god of fumbling upwards.

“Use your words,” he demands, and you can tell he’s made the choice for you. Fuck yeah. 

“I- I want it rough,” you squirm under his gaze, your hands traveling from the sheets to the fly of your jeans, unbuttoning them preemptively. Adrian’s eyes flicker down to your hands and then back up to your face, and he smirks. 

“You think you can handle it?” he asks, newfound confidence as he moves one hand down to palm himself through his uniform pants. You nod weakly, licking your bottom lip. He tilts his head as if to shrug and uses his free hand to pull you up by your shoulder.

“Open?” he asks, as you get your arms under you to sit up. You obey immediately, opening your mouth for him and sticking your tongue out obediently. He smiles, before spitting directly into your open mouth. You swallow gladly, and the fire is stoked momentarily, as if having some of him quelled the hunger within. 

“Good girl,” he says, pushing you back down into the mattress before his hands begin roaming your body, he pushes up your shirt roughly, his warm hands splaying across bare skin, the expanse of your abdomen. His hips roll into yours again, rougher this time. When his lips capture your own, his teeth sink into your bottom lip. Your hands come up around his neck, fingers tangling themselves in his curls and pulling. He groans against your mouth, biting down. You gasp at the first copper taste of blood.

Adrian’s hands dip lower, finishing the job unzipping your jeans and hastily starting to push them down over the curve of your ass. You help him by pushing your hips up into his, giving him more wiggle room while you can rub yourself against him. He shoves the jeans down to your ankles and then stops. 

“Turnin’ you over,” he explains, and pulls your arms away from him. He removes himself from you, but only briefly. Just long enough to maneuver you onto your stomach for him and to pull your panties down to meet where your jeans confine you. 

He presses a hot hand to you, coating his fingers where you already soaked through your panties. He hums in appreciation. 

“Is this from the pheromones or from Vigilante at work?” he asks, and you groan, this time not from pleasure. 

“Ugh, shut the fuck up, Adrian,” you sigh. Of course, it’s a mix of both. The pheromones are actively probably killing you with hormones but Adrian himself is hot even if you haven’t admitted that to him. He responds with a sharp slap to your ass that makes you yelp, loud and actually embarrassing. 

“Call me Vigilante,” he tells you, and then you hear the zipper of his pants release. 

His full length enters you with no warning, but meets no resistance. You’re so slick and wet from everything, but you’ll let him stroke his ego if it means he keeps himself against you. Adrian wraps his arms around your middle, using it as leverage to slam into you harder; your body a tool to get off, but equally his body a tool to stoke the fires and make you feel real again. But fuck, if you don’t actually love this. This is the way you wish dates fucked you, the harshness and care rolled into one. Adrian’s hand wraps around you, shoved between your body and the mattress to your clit, rubbing in tight circles.  Fire ignites more, like a candle to a campfire. Adrian’s weight pushes you into the mattress, one hand pressed to the bare skin of your abdomen and the other between your legs.

“Fuck, Vigilante,” you moan, a particular movement of his middle finger making you buckle even more into the mattress below him. 

“That’s it, baby,” he praises, and presses harder. The fire stokes and spikes and calms and crescendos. Adrian’s hips don’t let up, thrusting hard and hateful, trying to break your frame with every move. Adrian will break you, and you’ll probably let him. You’ll probably let him do anything if he makes you come in the next ten seconds. 

“Are you only this slutty for me?” Adrian asks, and you nod into the pillow eagerly, whining and leaning harder into his thrusts. At this point, they hurt. It’s to the point he’s bruising your entire ass. Yeah, only for him. It’s not like your dating pool is huge here but it’s also not like you’d let anyone else on the team see you like this, but also Adrian has a certain charm to him. 

“I’m gonna- I—“ you pant, and he only speeds up the pace of his fingers and hips.

“That’s right, come for Vigilante,” he coos, and it’s like every fiber of your being releases it’s tension. 

You shout, pressing your face into the pillow as you do to avoid any embarrassing terms of endearment towards the man above you.  The shaking starts in your core, and the spreads outward. Heat spreads and explodes into almost cold in your toes afterwards. Your limbs go rigid under him. 

“That’s it, baby,” he hums, but he holds you through it, his arms holding you in place.

“Fuck!” you shout, and a particularly hard jolt of your nerves punches through you, and Adrian stills behind you. That’s all it took for Adrian to come, and he spills into you, holding you against him and moaning wantonly. 

You both breathe deeply as you try to calm down, not at all separating. You center yourself, trying to say some shit you remember from a college yoga course. You can’t see Adrian’s face, but he keeps kissing you business as usual. 

“Can we do this again?” Adrian asks, and you think for a moment. He’s a fucking psycho, maybe? but you’ve already fucked him.

“Sure,” you say, you voice still muffled by the pillow.

Why not.

[sheisburiedhere]

The GraveRobber

Andrew graves x reader

Warning: cursing

Chapter 2

Chapter 1

Y/n who is tired of her shitty life not knowing it's about to get a lot more interesting

Y/n who had tried breaking down the door multiple times and been flirting and trading money for food from the guards

Y/n who intelligently hidden her food all over the apartment where your stupid boyfriend Jax left for work one day and never came back

Y/n who called that stupid Jax and been told that he can't come home till the quarantine over. He thinks you didn't hear that feminine giggle next to the phone. Your eyes widen as you slam it down with anger and grind your teeth digging your nails into your thighs.

I̸̡̛̳͌̉͋͐͒̍ ȟ̸̨̯̲̝̳͓͎̭͖͊̄̔̽̓̂̋̇̋̀̕̚͜â̸̙͐͑̌̿͛̽t̵̏͛̃̍́̈̚͜͝ẹ̷͓̺̰̽̍͛̉̐̔͋̓̚͜ ȟ̸̨̯̲̝̳͓͎̭͖͊̄̔̽̓̂̋̇̋̀̕̚͜i̵̢̢̡͚̩̞̥͕̜̻̫̩̐̈͘͜m̶̥͇͈̣̏͑̿͑̃̈͛̕͠, I̸̡̛̳͌̉͋͐͒̍'l̷̢̨̨̫̼͙̞͉̗͉̖̲̖̞̿̉l̷̢̨̨̫̼͙̞͉̗͉̖̲̖̞̿̉ ḟ̴̧̧̗͍͉͔̹͎̻͓̇͊̃̒̄̈̓̉̌̈͝͝i̵̢̢̡͚̩̞̥͕̜̻̫̩̐̈͘͜️ṉ̵͓̬͈̞̥̭̥̇̓̔͋d̴̨̢̤̗̦͚̺̭̤͙̹̃̕ ȟ̸̨̯̲̝̳͓͎̭͖͊̄̔̽̓̂̋̇̋̀̕̚͜i̵̢̢̡͚̩̞̥͕̜̻̫̩̐̈͘͜m̶̥͇͈̣̏͑̿͑̃̈͛̕͠ â̸̙͐͑̌̿͛̽️ṉ̵͓̬͈̞̥̭̥̇̓̔͋d̴̨̢̤̗̦͚̺̭̤͙̹̃̕-

Y/n who turns towards the noise at the balcony and see two emo looking ,hot topic intruders*rolls eyes*

The guy holds a cleaver as he looks at you nervously and the girl looks at you with a strange bitch look

Wait. You know that bitch look , you created that bitch look ,but of course yours is much better.

You stand up and cross your arms and turns your mouth up in disgust and stare her down completely ignoring the guy. And give her your branded bitch look.

How can such a pretty person make such and ugly face , who knows.

" Well are you both just gonna stare at me or you come to get something" you scowl only watching the girl while you both have a bitch face off.

Before the guy can speak the barks out "look here we just came for your food but we can kill you if you don't stand still and behave "

(Who the hell does she feel she is huh) you smile and begin to walk up to your kitchen cabinet as you glance at her about to blow a fuse.

"Are you dense didn't you hear me to stand still?!" She yells stomping here foot before being smacked in the face with a slice of American cheese and shutting up from the shock .

She turns to look at you with eyes that can kill . As you hand her a box filled of food ,could last for a week.

( how did she reach Infront of me so fast...) You turn to the guy not smiling but still feeling threatened by the cleaver as he still looks at the cheese on the girl's face and turn back to you nervously.

"You should put her on a leash," you say smiling at her as you realise that she doesn't like you close to guy as her face darkens .

You turn back to her ,"you look beautiful when you smile so you should keep doing that okay"

You feel the guy's eyes on you with a small smile as you glance back at him raising your eyebrows.(The hell is he looking at?)

"Now get the hell out I have things to do." You see the girl leave with a scowl and begins to walk away thinking she out of sight then skipping happily with the box of food across the wooden board that connects your balconies .Well isn't that cute.

"Thank you" the guy says breaking the silence. " It's no problem all of us are suffering" you say softly. "Not just for that...um I'm Andrew and that was my little sister Ashley" he says looking at you smiling showing his teeth. How adorable.

You both walk out to the balcony as he steps onto their balcony. "I'm Y/n" you say making sure he goes over safely.

"Thank you again Y/n , you don't know how much this means to us"

He waves as he enters his apartment. You walk back into yours and realise for the first time in a long time you smiled but here you are...alone again.

Maybe you meet Ashley and Andrew soon maybe you won't be alone again....

[strawberrynightmere]

heyyyy <3 can i request an andrew x virgin insecure reader? i feeln kind of angsty tday :')

if you do smut, id like to request him taking like readers virginity (no ashley, no incest.)

It took me a long while of thinking of whether I should write it or not.

I'm not very good at writing smut, but I hope this is good enough.

Headlock [Decay! Andrew x Fem! Reader]

Warning ⚠️ : dark content, toxic friendship(?) (Ashley), mentioned murder, sexual content/18+/nsft(?), I have no idea how the Decay route goes, but neither do you, so let's half-ass it. It had a plot, but that got dropped halfway. The title? I guess. Again, I'm not good at this.

A/n: it's not exactly as requested

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

How did you get involved in this? It all started when a 'parasite' was found in the buildings' water pipes and the inhabitants got quarantine. Only later did you find out that you were all being starved to death so your organs could be harvested.

Why you were still staying with the Graves siblings is a question you had no answer for. Was it because you three were criminals, or simply because you didn't want to be alone anymore? Maybe the quarantine did its toll on your mental wellbeing?

Who knows?

Andrew was nice, normal-ish, and chill person to be around. Maybe you caught some feelings for the guy, but let's be honest, compared to the crimes you committed with them, your "little" crush is the last thing to come to your mind.

And then there's Ashley...

She tends to be, how would you put it? Brutally honest? Sometimes rude? Wellmeaning... in her own twisted way? Alright, now you're just trying to defend her. She tends to passive-aggressive comments about your body as if she knows about your insecurities. For some god forsaken reason, you just chuck it up and think it's her messed up way of helping, even if her comments did make you cry once you were alone.

Yeah, it's terrible.

But there were times when you two would just interact normally. And by that, I mean you just listened to her talk and complained about Andrew on what he did or who he was with.

You noted not to interact with him when she was around.

But boy, oh boy! Did things drastically change when Andrew came back alone.

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

You jolted when the door of the motel room was busted open. To your relief, it was just Andrew. But where is Ashley?

"Where's Ashley?"

"She's not gonna be a problem anymore."

"What do you mean by..." You end up trailing off as you notice the blood on his hands.

"Exactly what I said." He replied.

What are you going to do now... how are you supposed to react to the news that Andrew just brought?

"Wh- ha?! What are we gonna do now?"

Andrew just rubbed his face, clearly tired.

"I'll think about it tomorrow." What sort of crap answer was that?! He just killed his own sister and the only one who could get visions. now what are you gonna do?

"I took the charm. We can still use it."

Oh... Well, alright.

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

One of Andrew's arms held you in a headlock, and with his free hand, he was rubbing your clit in circles.

You try to keep your moans down, as you were embarrassed by the sound that could get out. Mind you, this was your first time being intimate with someone.

To your unfortunate surprise, Andrew gently bit and licked from the nape of your neck going upwards, which made you gasp loudly. He quickened the pace in with his fingers, making you get out small whimpers as you felt close to cuming. However, Andrew had other things in mind as he removes his fingers from your clit and gets you to to turn around and face him.

For a scrawny-looking guy, he sure had a lot of strength and stamina.

He hooked one of your legs around his waist as you held on to his shoulders, trying to keep yourself balanced. You feel his hand hold your lower back, and you feel the tip of his dick rubbing your clit before moving straight to your hole.

You slapped your hand across your nose and mouth to block out the sound that was gonna abruptly come out of your mouth.

"You're gonna fall like that." The first thing he said since you started this. Andrew guided both of your arms around his neck. "Now hold on tight." He warned before hooking your other leg around his waist. You quietly whine when you feel his member rubbing up and down against your walls as he moves you both to the bed.

Your back hits the soft mattress, your legs loosen up, and your hands go back to holding on to Andrew's shoulders.

Andrew pressed his face onto your shoulder and held your hips with both hands. Once again, you covered your mouth with one hand when he started moving and gripped his hair with the other.

At first, he moved at a slow pace as you had adjusted to his length. He soon picked up the pace, and his tip was hitting a specific spot, which made pressure build up in your lower stomach, which all released and spread warmth through your body when the tip hit that spot againg for the last time making you groan in pleasure.

Feeling numb and tired, you wanted to rest your eyes a bit, which ended up with you falling asleep.

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

"You mortals are really something else."

"Bah!" You jump in surprise only to see that it was Lord Unknown floating beside you. You also noticed you had your clothes on again, which meant you were asleep.

"At ease simple soul. As you are aware that you will receive a vision now." The being indicated to the door standing in front of you.

You nervously approached the door and turned the handle, getting it to open.

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

A/n: This is as best as I can do, and honestly, I'll just leave it at that. Hope you enjoyed it.

[spaceshipellie]

everything’s about you to me

ellie williams x reader

prologue (masterlist for other parts) *✧･ﾟ: wc: 1.7k

summary: in the midst of the apocalypse, you and ellie find each other after you’ve both lost everything. what started out as a mere safety in numbers pairing, turns into something imperishable. however, after some time you get separated, leaving you both to believe the other is dead. four years later you find a commune in wyoming.

warnings: set in tlou universe. reader is 16 in the prologue but is 19+ for the rest of the story, weapons, gunshots, death, violence, no mention of ellie yet but all in due course cuties, is this going to be a slow burn? maybe… 18+ mdni

author’s note: this fic was originally inspired by the song everything by muna. i’m so excited for this, if you want to be added to the tag list lmk! i have no idea how many parts this will be but i expect it’ll be quite long. thanks for reading loves &lt;3

♪ ‘cause the world could be burning, and all i’d be thinking, is “how are you doing, baby?”

˚ · • . ° .

You didn’t know it yet, but your time in the Pittsburgh QZ was wearing thin. You had lived there your entire life, sixteen years to be exact. For people who lived pre-outbreak, a military-controlled quarantine zone probably didn’t seem like much of a home, but it was all you knew. Your dad was a smuggler and whilst for the past few years had managed to keep you and your mom out of it, his current job was proving to be riskier than originally anticipated.

“You said it would be quick,” you heard his seething whisper whilst you backed yourself against the other side of the wall, listening in.

“It was supposed to be! look, man, I’m sorry,” another man’s voice said.

“Just–fuck, just make sure we get the stuff we need before we hand anything over, alright?”

“We’ll try.”

“No,” you could hear shoving, “you will, understand?”

“Yes,” you could tell the man was nervous despite trying to hide it.

“If this goes wrong, they’ll come after us, and my family. I know this is a fucked up situation and I should never have got involved with that fucking Aaron guy in the first place but here we are and I am not letting my wife and daughter die because of me, got it?”

Die? Your blood ran cold wondering what on earth your dad had gotten involved with this time. You heard the man mumble out a “yes” before the door shut and your dad sighed and banged his fist against the table. Not wanting to get caught, you creeped back to your room.

Once inside, you settled into the beat-up armchair that you had pushed against the window and stared out at the night sky. Stars twinkled and the moon shone a bright white. For a moment, you could pretend you were somewhere else. Somewhere where everything looked this beautiful. It was a stark contrast to the withered frame of dust and peeling paint.

You could hear muffled voices coming from your parent’s room. They sounded like they were arguing and said something about talking to this Aaron guy on the radio. They did that a lot these days. argue. You knew they still loved each other but after silently analysing their relationship over the years, you could see that something of a ‘spark’ had gone. Then again, what did you know, it’s not like you had ever been in love. The closest you had ever gotten to a connection with anyone had been with Amy. When her hair would get caught in her mouth as you both stood on a roof laughing at how the wind parachuted your coats, you wanted to reach out and untangle it for her. Sometimes she would give you this look where her eyes would soften and her dimples would make themselves known as she smiled. It would make your heart skip a beat and you would forget what you were supposed to be doing. You guessed that’s just how best friend’s felt about each other. Completely lost in a trance, you didn’t notice the sound of thundering footsteps down the hall until a rough hand grabbed your arm.

“What?”

“We’re leaving,” your dad’s voice was indignant and stern.

“Leaving? where?”

Your mom burst through the door, her face soaked in fear.

“Charlie, please,” she pleaded, grabbing his arm.

“I’m sorry but we have to go.”

“Go where?” you demanded. You could feel the goosebumps raise on your arms. He couldn’t be talking about escaping, could he?

“We’re leaving the QZ. Come on, grab your stuff.” You just froze.

“Come on!” he yelled before running a hand over his face. He collected his anger just enough to look you in the eye and speak clearly.

“I don’t have time to explain, but some guys have fucked me over and it is safer for us to escape and leave.”

“But we’ll be killed!”

“We will be if we stay here. Now please, grab your stuff.”

His last three words came out with a bite and you thought better of arguing further. You looked across the room to your mum and she made a poor attempt at giving you a comforting look. Tears stung against your waterline and you quickly wiped them away with your sleeve before grabbing your things together. Not everything of course. Not the Thelma and Louise poster you found once or the sketch Amy had drawn of the two of you before she died. But the essentials. Torches, jackets, guns, knives.

Your dad looked out the window, making a mental note of military whereabouts, before encouraging you and your mum out the door. You didn’t want to leave. You had never been outside the QZ and had only heard horror stories. Thoughts of where you would go once you got out, if you got out, clouded your mind. It scared you to think of what kind of trouble your dad had gotten himself into that needed such drastic action. You knew he did bad things but you knew he wasn’t the only one and there wasn’t much you could do about it. When he first started smuggling you had been afraid all the time, but over the years you became numb to it. That’s just what he did. But now all of those fears were resurfacing and you weren’t ready to face the high chance that you could die tonight.

The three of you were pressed against the outside wall, your dad in front holding his finger to his lips indicating you needed to be quiet. Your parent’s both held guns whilst you clutched your switchblade. It was dark but blinding lights from patrolling tanks occasionally illuminated the dank alleyways.

“We need to get over there, we move on my signal,” you could barely hear your dad’s whisper as he pointed at a metal fence on the other side of the road. You tried your best to be silent but couldn’t help the way your breath shook as you nodded.

After peering around the corner once more, he lifted his hand up, signalling for you to follow him. You had to be agile in order to make it across safely, which luckily was a strength of yours. You may not have ever been outside of the QZ but you had snuck around with Amy enough times to know how to go unnoticed. This was nothing like that though. Sneaking around and being teenagers didn’t feel like a death sentence.

You bumped into your mom’s back as you all suddenly stopped behind a parked truck. It started to rain and you were thankful that the splatters of water might cover up any sounds of laboured breaths and footsteps from you. A bright light casted over the truck as you strained to keep your head below the window. You were moving again and the fence was in sight. The closer you got the more you could make out a chained padlock on a gate. A menacing sign saying “UNAUTHORISED EXITS FROM A QUARANTINE ZONE ARE PUNISHABLE BY DEATH” was hung up next to your heads. Your palms began to sweat as your dad pulled a key from his pocket. You didn’t even want to know what he must have done to get that. He started to unlock and unwind the chains from the gate. You were so close. Maybe this insane plan would actually work.

“Drop your weapons.”

You all froze and slowly turned, initially to squint as a torch shone directly in your eyes. After a few blinks, your vision cleared to see a guard holding up a gun. You felt like you were choking and if anything the grip on your knife tightened instinctively.

“I said drop your weapons.”

You threw your switchblade to the ground. Your parent’s followed suit with their guns. The guard took a step closer.

“Let me exp–,” your dad attempted to reason but was cut off.

“On your knees and put your hands on your head.”

You glanced at your mom and she hesitantly nodded. You sunk to your knees, the cold, wet gravel soaking through your jeans to your skin. Your hands trembled as you placed them on your head. The guard, still aiming his gun at you, checked you all with the infection scanner before stepping back to his original spot.

“Sir, I’ve got three clean but armed people here by gate three. How would you like me to proceed?” he spoke into his handheld transceiver.

“Uh-huh… yes… yes sir.”

Before you could even think, two deafening gunshots went off in quick succession. Your head snapped round and you saw your dad pointing a gun at the guard, as well as a mass of blood soaking his shirt. You noticed the guard stumble and in a blind rush of adrenaline you snatched your switchblade from the floor. Your mom’s hand grabbed you, pulling you back from where the guard was aiming his gun again.

Another bullet fired. Your mom screamed. You grabbed her arm to support her and looked up at your dad for help.

“Go!” he yelled, firing again. You could hear more guards charging towards you.

“Dad,” your voice came out weak and strangled.

“I said go!” you had never heard his voice be this frightening. Fear carried your legs as you pushed your mom through the open gate. You shoved yourself through it as well, not knowing what lay ahead in the darkness before you. You could only focus on getting away from the constant gunshots. You didn’t stop moving but your movements had slowed as you looked back.

“Dad, please!” you yelled, tears making your cheeks hot.

He was being pushed against the fence by three, maybe four faceless guards. You could hear the struggle in his distant grunts as he fought against them. They were beating and shooting until his body went limp on the ground, next to the guard he shot.

“No,” your voice was a mere whisper to yourself. Shock and disbelief ringing in your ears.

“We have to go,” your mom pulled you away, she was crying too, “before they catch up to us.”

You both frantically ran whilst the adrenaline was still controlling you. Your mom groaned with each step. You didn’t even know where she had been hit but at least she was alive. You had got out and there didn’t seem to be anyone chasing you, but your dad was dead. Escaping seemed so futile now. It had been his idea. his plan. His doing that meant you needed to leave in the first place and yet it had ended like this. And now, to no avail, you had no protection. Nothing except what you carried on your back. You were out in the big wide world. A big, wide, terrifying world.

*✧･���: taglist: @bellasfavelesbo @ximtiredx @abbyily @heartzjules @gold-dustwomxn @sawaagyapong @aouiaa @pinkigirl @nil-eena @ucannotcompare @cherriesxinthespring @blvebanisters

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

my favorite scully and mulder moments from s2

when they aren’t supposed to talk to each other anymore in the first episode because the x files were disbanded, so they came up with a code to know when to meet up

(and mulder at first is very annoyed that she wants to risk being seen with him because she’s deeply concerned about how distant he’s acting… “so what did you want?” “to see if you’re alright”. him trying to grapple with being cared for vs her trying to figure out why he won’t let her in. yeah.)

((and she runs her fingers through his hair at this covert meeting, after he confesses he’s lost all faith))

when she finds him, in the same episode, passed out on the floor of a random puerto rican jungle compound, and he grabs her by the shoulders, saying he saw the same aliens that took his sister

another covert meeting in episode 2, after moody mulder thinks he was moved to a case just to keep him busy: “is this seat taken?” she asks. “no, but I should warn you I am experiencing violent impulses” “well, i’m armed, so I’ll take my chances”

(and right after, when he said he wants to leave the FBI, but working with her is his only reason to stay)

“i’d consider it more than a professional loss if you decided to leave” <- sobbing. for ten thousand years.

episode 3, when she flew 300 miles in the middle of the night to draw his blood. couldn’t anyone else have done that? no. it needed to be Her.

(there’s another, very brief scene towards the end of episode 3, where she peeks over his shoulder and the height difference is incredible)

scully stopping her class because she gets a call from him, then flying up to New York to do an autopsy for him. and when they see each other they both smile SO big it’s adorable, even as she is holding a human stomach. krychek seems confused. he wouldn't understand, would he?

and then flying in AGAIN to try and help mulder during his hostage negotiation with duane barry in episode 5, getting furious when she is told to “calm down” while he is in danger

when she finally wakes up from her coma in episode 8- how she yells at her mom for calling him “fox”, how he brings her a VHS tape of superbowl highlights and she deadpans “i knew there was a reason to live”

(and he finally gives her necklace back- but then he leaves, despite wanting nothing more than to stay by her side, to let her be with family)

in episode 9, when they are finally back together, mulder tries to get her to stay home from this investigation to keep her safe, because he's terrified of her getting hurt again: “scully, i don’t think it’s a good idea for you to go”, he says, but she’s too stubborn to be stopped, and he realizes it’s an impossible fight

(later, they engage in an intense scientific argument over the existence of silicon based life forms, and it feels deeply charged)

another reassurance in episode 9 that she is okay despite what she has gone through: “i’m back and I’m not going anywhere” (shoulder grab!!!!) “i'm counting on you” (lingering eye contact!!!!)

when he returns from his mission to find scully handcuffed, having just saved herself with some quick thinking, and she has to comfort HIM at the sight of her in distress: “i'm okay, i’m okay”, she repeats, while he gently grabs her face, and seems to ignore everything she is saying to ask if she’s alright

(and the month long quarantine that ensued, which we saw none of, but the fact that it happened at all is lovely to me)

sharing an umbrella in episode 10!!!!! it’s really the simple things in life you know!!!

going out on a rib date… he wipes the sauce off of her face, then goes into explaining how a new spirit can take over a body

when mulder’s sense of injustice is going off that episode, so he leaves the restaurant to defend a kid being bullied, and when scully follows the mean kid taunts him by saying “why don’t you run along with the little wife?” and neither of them react (except for a few moments later when he’s staring intently at her, and it looks like he is considering the possibility)

(bursting into her motel room) “scully? you’re not gonna believe this” <- he said the line!!!! (and she could believe it, because she had figured it out on her own)

exchanging theories on murders and repression of memories: “i seem to recall you having some pretty extreme hunches”, she says, and he replies “i never have”. they both smile in the quiet of driving along a small town road.

when mulder narrowly escapes having his throat slit, and after scully nearly shot the woman holding him hostage, she runs to him and carefully cradles his head while he’s still on the floor…. oh the tenderness. i actually might fall apart.

thinking they will have free time on their trip to Minnesota in episode 13, he bought them tickets to a football game <3 and they didn’t get to go but it was SUCH a nice thought

mulder noticing that scully is in extreme distress while looking at the victims of the killings in episode 13,  but trying to give her space to admit that she is terrified; “scully, if you’re having trouble with this case, I want you to tell me” “I’m not having trouble”, she lies, and he answers “i just don’t want you to think you have to hide anything from me” oughhh.... </3

and when the killer who terrified her so awfully kidnaps her, and mulder arrives to find her, she insists that she’s okay despite shaking like a leaf, until he lifts her chin up. only then does she start sobbing into his chest, while he mumbles “it’s alright, it’s alright” to her. ohhh, the vulnerability hits hard here, especially because she had just said she didn’t want him to feel like he had to protect her! as if there was ever going to be any other option; he is the protector and he will protect what he loves, it’s all he knows

taking the little kid they meet at the refugee camp in episode 15 to get lunch, because one thing these two are gonna do is get any youth they encounter some food. and mulder gives him money for extra fries because he WILL spoil any random child.

she cuts her hand on a thorny branch left in their car, and when mulder says “let me see that”, she replies that it is nothing, trying to deny him any chance to be concerned. then when she starts feeling very ill, she keeps telling him its fine, because for some reason the doctor cannot doctor herself.

(he goes off to get the bad guy, and she is in the car hallucinating. when she finally breaks free from the clutches of evil, he’s lying on the ground, having been… like, psychically stabbed? and still. his first question when he sees her is. “you’re okay?” aughhhhhhhhh)

that time mulder was actively dying of alien poison in episode 17, so she barged in and started yelling at the doctor to get his shit together, because she knew what to do and he didn’t. and she manages to save him.

mulder agreeing to trade who he thought was his sister for scully in a hostage deal, then saying he couldn’t have told her it was his sister because he knew scully would never have let him go through with it... the terrible pain of knowing somebody so well, you know they'd endanger themselves for you...

after scully saves his life by figuring out how to treat his alien poison, she stays by his bed and gently strokes his hair. and when he opens his eyes, she was holding his arm. she smiles and says “thanks for ditching me”, to which he replies that he found his faith again (<3)

seasick mulder fumbling for words in episode 19, while she tries to see if he's feeling any better: “you’re lucky you inherited your father’s legs” “what?” “his SEA legs” (scully laughs while he is in ocean-induced misery)

when they take shifts watching the suspicious guy on the boat that makes you old, his alarm goes off to indicate his shift was over. he goes to wake scully up and switch off, she mumbles something about having just fallen asleep, and he offers to give her a little bit longer to rest. so sweet.

exchanging magic tricks while investigating the sideshow performers in florida in episode 20- her making it look like the cricket came from behind his ear, him pretending to make the nail suddenly appear

“we’re exhuming your potato” “may i ask why?” (she goes into a convincing explanation on searching for evidence, he ruins it by interrupting to say “we found out you used to be a dog-faced boy”)

episode 21: “see, this is a helium balloon, and the one thing i did learn in kindergarten is that when you let them go, they float up, up, and away” “did you learn about wind in kindergarten?” (she is funny and she doesn’t get enough credit for that!)

and episode 24: iI just came up with a sick theory, mulder” “ooh, I’m listening”

mulder brushing her hair back, asking if she is okay after nearly getting decapitated

and who can forget episode 25, the season finale, when mulder is collapsing into her arms, delirious with fever and covered in his father’s blood; she lays him down in her bed, placing a cold compress on his forehead. “we’ve got to find out who killed my father” “right now you need to rest. it’s okay” what if i started yelling

him waking up after she had to put him in a coma for damage control: “you shot me >:(” “yes, i did” (patiently explains how she saved his life about 3 times in 72 hours, including by shooting him)

him thanking her for taking care of him; her asking him to find out what the files he's determined to understand say about her disappearance

[finnsbubblegum]

Quarantining Together (Pedro Pascal X Reader)

Pair: pedro pascal x f!reader

Warnings: fluff, pulling pranks (let me know if i missed any)

Summary: Imagine what it’s like quarantining with Pedro Pascal.

Words: 2k

A/N: This is my first pedro fic. I tried my best to imagine how playful and sweet Pedro is in real life. I hope you like it! I’ve been writing Joel Miller fics so I guess I’ll give it a try. I know a lot of you don’t really like a real person fic but this idea came into my mind when I listened to that interview where Pedro talked about the quarantine period during covid 19 pandemic. And when he talked about his friends that supported him during that period, he was holding his cry. I kept thinking what if there was someone there who quarantined with him together so he wouldn't feel alone during the lockdown. 

“Did you hear about the news?” Pedro sat on the edge of the couch sipping on his coffee.

“What news?” You tilted your head.

“We’ll have a lockdown from next week. We have to stay at home. The pandemic is getting out of control.” Pedro put his cup on the coffee table.

“Oh..I should get the groceries then. Stock up. I think you should too. Your fridge has nothing.” You chuckled.

He chuckled and froze for a while. His face was so focused. It seemed like he was thinking about something serious. 

“I was thinking..” He gulped.

“Maybe we could quarantine here together. What do you think?” Pedro looked at you.

“Here? You sure?” You raised your eyebrows.

You and Pedro had been dating for a few months and he hadn’t asked you to move in. But you always came to his place everyday to spend time together, watch movies, eat dinner, and sometimes crash for a few nights.

“I’m sure, hun.” Pedro chuckled.

“Yay!” You jumped and hugged him.

He groaned at your weight and wrapped his arms around you.

“So should I start moving my stuff today?” You pulled back your head to look at him.

Pedro nodded then he drove you back to your apartment and helped you pack your stuff. You packed your essentials and brought 2 big suitcases. Before you left your apartment for God knows how long, you made sure you had turned off all of the lights and unplugged any sockets.

“Done.” You dragged your suitcases near the door.

Pedro lent his hand to drag both of your suitcases. 

“Take this one. This one’s heavy.” You dragged the heavy one closer to you.

“Nuh-uh. I’ll take that one.” Pedro took the bigger suitcase off from your hands.

You chuckled and shook your head. Pedro was always a gentleman and he treated you like a princess. You loved it but sometimes you felt bad.

“Let’s stop by the grocery store before we go to your place.” You suggested Pedro to buy some groceries and stock up.

“Okay.” Pedro nodded and started the car.

You and Pedro bought everything you needed and of course some vegetables, fruits, cereals, milk, and instant food that you could keep for a few more weeks. You went home to Pedro’s house with a lot of paper bags. You and Pedro had to make a few turns to the car to move the groceries. 

“Finally! Last one!” Pedro put the last paper bag on the kitchen table.

“Phew! That’s a lot of work.” You wiped your sweat from your forehead. 

“Why don’t we take a break, hun?” Pedro massaged your shoulder.

“But we still need to organize them..” You were an organized person so you couldn’t stand seeing messy things.

“Come on, just 5 minutes.” Pedro pushed you gently and sat you to the couch.

You sighed as you sat. You suddenly felt all your muscles ache from packing your stuff earlier today and all the groceries stuff. 

“Come here.” Pedro moved closer to you and turned you so your back faced him.

Then he gently massaged your shoulder then your back. He knew you loved back massage so he often gave you massage. 

“That feels good.” You closed your eyes and hummed.

He chuckled and kept massaging every inch of your back. Then he kissed your shoulder as a sign that he finished massaging your back. You turned your head to him and smiled.

“Thank you, P.” You placed a kiss on his lips.

“Your turn.” You asked him to turn so you could massage him.

“Not now. Why don’t you do it for me before we go to bed?” He smirked.

“Yes sir.” You smirked back at him.

You and Pedro spent the day organizing the groceries and your stuff. Then you watched a movie in the living room together, cuddled on the couch, and ordered pizza. After the movie ended, the two of you went to bed. You didn’t forget to give him the back massage you owed him. 

“Good night, hun.” Pedro kissed your head that was resting on his chest.

“Good night, P.” You rubbed his chest.

His warmth gave you comfort and security that made you sleep so well. You hated the pandemic but on the other side you were glad because it was the reason he finally asked you to move in. Now you wouldn’t have to be worried about having sleepless nights and dealing with nightmares all alone. You had him. You had Pedro there next to you to comfort you when you needed it.

You yawned as the sunlight woke you up. You squealed as you stretched your body then you looked next to you. Pedro was already awake. He was sitting with a pillow behind his back, iPad in his hands. He was reading a script for his next project. You loved watching him in work mode. Pedro was a hard worker and you loved a hardworking man.

“Morning.” Pedro saw you had woken up.

“Morning.” You chuckled and rubbed your eyes.

“How was your sleep?” Pedro put away his iPad to the bedside table.

“Best sleep I’ve ever had this month.” You chuckled and snuggled to put your arms around his waist.

“How was your sleep?” You asked him back.

“I slept so well. Thanks to the massage you gave me last night.” Pedro chuckled and stroked your head. 

*TOOT*

Pedro farted. Yes, he farted right when your head was so close to his butt. Then he quickly pulled the sheets and buried you under the sheets. He laughed out loud while you struggled to save yourself from Pedro’s fart bomb. 

“P!” You screamed for your life.

Pedro kept fighting you so you couldn’t get out from the sheets. He kept laughing while you were actually dying. He finally let you out after a few minutes. 

“What was that?!” You panted, gasping for clean air.

“That..is..my love for you.” Pedro giggled and kissed you.

“You definitely have to poop right now! I mean it! It smells so bad!” You hit his chest.

“Okay. Okay.” Pedro chuckled and went to the bathroom.

You groaned as you got out of the bed and opened the window for ventilation. His fart smell was still stuck in your nose and you needed fresh air. While you waited for him doing his business, you went to the kitchen to make breakfast. You toasted some bread, fried some eggs and bacon. 

“Hmm, smells so good, honey.” Pedro suddenly hugged you from behind. 

You chuckled as he swayed you for a moment before he sat. 

“Thank you.” He thanked you for making breakfast for him. 

“You’re welcome.” You smiled and took a bite of your toast.

“What do you want to do today?” Pedro asked you what you had planned for the day.

“I was thinking of reading a book and just chill.” You shrugged.

“That’s a good idea.” Pedro nodded.

“How about you?” You asked him back.

“I have to practice my lines. And I need your help.” He mumbled while munching on the bacon.

“Of course, I’ll help you with that.” You smirked.

After the two of you finished breakfast, Pedro offered to wash the dishes. You took a shower and went to the pool to read under the sun. You read a few pages and dozed off. 

*SPLASH*

You screamed as you fell inside the pool. You tried to find your balance and stood up in the pool. The water was high up to your chest. You heard Pedro laugh while you panted and wiped your face. 

“I HATE YOU!” You yelled at him.

Pedro bursted into laughter. He loved pulling pranks on you because he enjoyed watching your reactions. You knew he was always a prankster and sometimes you pulled a prank on him but his pranks were worse. You could never win from his pranks. It hadn’t been one day yet and he already pranked you twice. You needed to prank him back. 

“Think, think, think.” You kept telling yourself inside your mind.

You decided to act pissed and gave him the silent treatment. He lent you his hand to help you out from the pool but you ignored him. You chose to walk on the stairs and got out yourself. Pedro got you a towel but you pushed him away. You just stayed silent and walked inside the house to get yourself a towel. He started getting worried. He believed your acts. He thought you were really mad at him. 

“Honey, I’m sorry.” Pedro followed you from behind.

You didn’t answer him, not even looked at him. You went to the bathroom and dried yourself while Pedro leaned on the bathroom door and waited for you. His eyes looked sad and he tried talking to you a few times but you kept quiet. You acted like he wasn’t there. 

“I promise I’m not gonna do that again, darling. I’m sorry.” He took your hand. 

You wanted to laugh seeing him following you like a toddler. Especially because you were not mad at him. He pulled you but you walked away, your back facing him holding your laugh. You took a deep breath so you wouldn’t burst into laughter. Then you got into character again and went back to the pool. You hoped he was still following you because you wanted to pay him back. Yes, you were planning to push him to the pool just like he did to you. 

“Is there anything you want? Let me make it up to you, honey. I’ll do anything you want. Just talk to me.” Pedro followed you to the pool.  

“Hit me, honey. If that makes you feel better.” He took your hand and moved it to hit his chest. 

Finally, this was it. It was the right time. You gathered your courage and pushed him with force. 

“Pay back time!” You shouted and pushed him.

*SPLASH*

Pedro fell into the pool. Your plan worked. You were finally able to laugh. Pedro wiped his face and slicked his hair back. 

“You’re not mad at me?” He stood there inside the pool.

“Of course not. I was just trying to get back at you! You naughty!” You stuck your tongue at him.

Pedro laughed. He was relieved that you weren’t mad at him. It was better that you pranked him back rather than you being angry at him. 

“I guess we’re even now?” Pedro shrugged.

“Not yet, mister. One more and then we’re even. So you need to be careful.” You raised your eyebrows and put your hands on your hips.

“Yes, maam.” Pedro slowly walks near the edge of the pool. 

“Help me up?” He extended his hand asking you to help him out of the pool.

You knew this was also one of his ways to pull pranks on you. You were certain he was going to pull you inside the pool with him. But you were okay with that because at least you had pranked him once today. So you put our hand on his. He smirked and pulled you. Just as you had expected, you were now inside the pool with him. 

“I knew you were going to do that.” You wiped your face as you giggled.

“Uh-huh?” He nodded and put his arms around you. 

Pedro pulled you closer and kissed your lips. 

“Salty.” You frowned. 

“Now that..was.. a mix of the pool water aaand..my pee.” Pedro giggled at your face.

He claimed to have peed inside the pool. You gagged and wiped your mouth while Pedro just laughed looking at you. He loved you so much that you were his source of his happiness. He adored you so much and your reactions when he pranked you entertained him. 

“You’re so cute, honey. I’m dying.” He gave you a deep kiss.

“I’m dying too because you pulled too many pranks on me.” You chuckled.

“You should know that is my love language.” Pedro cupped your cheeks.

“I know.” You rolled your eyes.

“I love you so much it hurts.” Pedro gazed through your eyes. His eyes were full of love.

“I love you so much too, P.” You smiled and kissed him.

[silverskye13]

Silver I know next to nothing about the alien franchise and movie, I am giving you full permission to use this ask as an opportunity to spread propaganda to get me (and anyone else) to finally watch it

So it's, so like, the thing is, right. I'm not a movie tech kinda person [though it is technically impressive, the funny little tricks they did, like not having the budget for a Big Space Ship Derelict so they are a scaled down model that the director's kids in space suits walked up to so it would look bigger, and it was shown to the audience on a shitty CCTV because they didn't do a big matte painting of the set they filmed the tiny one, projected it onto a wall, and then filmed that.] So my rant isn't going to be about how technologically cool the movie was for 1979 on a less than optimal budget. But what I do like, what I excel at, is breaking down themes and tropes. And my god. My god. Just. Ugh. [Flails my arms.]

So a basic rundown for the movie, spoilers ahead, and my analysis of how fucking cool it is:

Basic gist of the movie: The crew of the commercial mining vessel Nostromo are awoken halfway through their trip back to earth by a mysterious signal, calling for help on a far away planet. Upon going down to investigate, one of their crew members is attacked by a strange alien parasite which attaches to his face. This kicks off a tale of increasing horror as the new alien kills off the crew one by one, culminating in Ripley [the main character] blowing up the ship and fleeing in an escape pod, not sure if she'll ever be picked up in the vastness of space -- with the ships cat, who miraculously also survives. [We all know Jonesy is the real main character 💜.] Along the way a plot by the Weyland-Utani corporation is revealed, one of the crew is discovered to be an android, and there is a lot of alien screeching.

Now! The themes that I go absolutely feral over can commence.

The horror of the movie, the reason why the alien is scary, and lethal to humans specifically, is it is a creature built for efficient survival, and this is a trait that Ash, the ship's science officer [and resident hiding android] highly praises in the critter. He describes it as beautiful, elegant, pure in its efficiency. The perfect organism. Efficient.

Humans, by comparison, aren't efficient. We are social. And efficiency preys on social needs. For example:

The xenomorph eggs can survive for ages [in the derelict they're found on, the dead alien who drove the ship is described as fossilized. These eggs have been here for thousands of years. But they activate immediately when a curious human pokes around them. It isn't a fast process. Kane is poking around for a few minutes, looking at the movements of the creatures in their eggs, making observations. Curious. Curiosity is an inefficient trait -- he would have survived if he had climbed out of the hole the eggs were in and left, or even waited for the rest of his team to enact quarantine and investigation procedures.

Speaking of quarantine! When Dallas and Lambert bring Kane, newly infected by an alien parasite, back to the ship, Ripley locks them in the airlock. There are quarantine procedures. We can't risk the whole crew. But they are scared for Kane's safety. He might die without help. They break quarantine. If they hadn't broken quarantine, the baby alien would've been born in the airlock, where it would get spaced the moment it was born.

When the face hugger parasite dies and Kane seems to return to normal, what they should have done to attempt to reinstate quarantine was put him in hyper sleep. His body would have been frozen in a stasis which might have frozen the parasite or, if it hadn't, would have left the new baby alien trapped in a stasis pod. But Kane, haggard and scared from his ordeal, asks can we please have one more meal together before I go to sleep? And that one meal is long enough for the new xenomorph to be born, and release terror on the ship.

There is more. Parker would have lived if he hadn't gone to find the cat by himself, leaving the safety of his group. Dallas would have lived if he let Ripley go through the vents, but he was the captain and he didn't want to risk someone else's life so he went instead. Brett would have lived if he'd left Lambert behind when she was being attacked, or if he'd hit the xenomorph with the flamethrower instead of insisting Lambert get out of the way first. And Lambert would have lived if she'd run instead of being paralyzed in fear by the creature killing her friends. And the xenomorph? Wasn't even eating it's kills. No gore. Little blood. It was killing them because it knew they would kill it, and it was neutralizing threats. Efficient.

The xenomorph is very clearly engineered for survival, and it's survival depends on killing the inefficient organisms around it. Even it's acid blood is described as a survival mechanism, not an offensive mechanism.

Okay Skye, we hear you talking about how scary the critter is because it's not a social creature. That's an interesting observation, but it's still just a monster story, right?

Well, let me tell you an alternative story. Just a little to the left of the original, but one I would argue is still very very canon.

You are an android built by Weyland-Utani, a company which is jealously hunting alien tech to use for its many space programs. You are placed on the Nostromo because there is a known anomaly in the area, and they want to find it. Your job is to get a specimen back to the company, all other protocols expended.

You are programmed to be efficient, so you get to work.

You wake the crew when you find the signal. You give them only the information they need to investigate: it is a signal that repeats every 12 seconds. You let them make the conclusion it is an SOS. Humans are social creatures. They want to help other social creatures in need. There is some arguing about whether they should go, but in the end an extra push from you sends them. Ripley, one of the more efficient members of the crew, keeps asking you why you haven't decoded the message.

"Mother [the super computer running the ship] is still working on it." This is true. She has only translated part of the signal. By the time Ripley realizes it's a warning, the crew is already on the way to the derelict. You tell her if she walks out there, they will have already figured out if it's a warning or not by the time she makes it to them. She agrees.

When they return with a specimen, Ripley [efficient, following protocol] doesn't want to let them on. But Ripley doesn't know you're an android, so when you break quarantine, and you tell her you just wanted Kane to be safe, she begrudgingly believes you.

When the alien is loose, it is easy for you to keep them from killing it. Humans are social, inefficient creatures, and you feel no empathy for their deaths. You do pity them though. Between you and the alien, their chances of survival are slim.

If only they were more efficient.

The horror in Alien is not the xenomorph. The horror in Alien is when anything, primal creatures, androids, a particularly greedy corporation, preys on human social needs in order to get what it wants. There is significance in that Ripley, despite everything, chose to save the cat. She needed companionship. All humans do. She needed to save that cat. A cat that was cantankerous and mean, and hissed whenever it was held, was better than the cold efficiency of empty space.

Any system that prioritizes absolute efficiency will be inhospitable to human life.

[yeetus-feetus]

de-aging au

Duke is a much smaller Duke one day, he's lost all his memories beyond the young age he is now and he's scared and confused. He doesn't know where is. But then there's Tim, his Robin! And suddenly everything is

The bats have no idea what's going on, but Duke refuses to go to anyone but Tim. He's also a little ball of energy bouncing off all the walls, and Tim is SO tired. "Robin- Tim, come play tag with me!"

One night Tim ends up passing out at his desk, a sleeping Duke cuddling into him on his lap.

Except when Duke wakes up Tim is small too. And he doesn't remember who Duke is!!

So Duke reintroduces himself and Tim let's himself be dragged downstairs to the actually Batcave!

Bruce is looking at them in absolute astonishment, they're so small!!

Damian laughs at Tim's smallness and Tim gives a cold glare. Maybe age can't change some things.

"where are Nightwing and the new Robin?" Tim asks.

"I'm Robin."

"no, I meant Jason!" Tim huffs and crosses his arms. Ah, he's so young he still believes Jay is Robin.

Duke is still clinging to him, but Tim can't bring himself to mind all too much.

Bruce doesn't know how to handle these boys, between a hyperactive Duke and an absolute menace Tim.

Dick tries to help, but even he can't keep up with the mischief and shenanigans they get up to together.

"dick pick us up!"

"yeah! Pick us up pick us up! And swing us around until we get dizzy!"

"again!"

"again!"

It's time to bring out the big guns, and by that they mean calling Jason over to the manor.

Tim settles immediately, but Duke remains overly weary around the large man with guns strapped to his thighs. He's kinda scary.

But Tim likes Jason well enough. At some point he ends up cuddled up with Jason who's stretched out on the couch, and Duke is just a little bit jealous.

"hey stop hogging him! Tim is mine," Duke pouts.

Jason raises an eyebrow at the boy, and Tim tilts his head. "You know there's enough room for both of us up here, right? Jason is a lot bigger than he used to be."

Duke considers this. "Mm okay, but only because you're up there". And he climbs up into Jason's lap to cuddle into Tim's side.

It's calm for a moment, until Duke starts to fidget, not able to stay still for too long. Jason let's put an annoyed noise and looks at them over the top of his book. "Would you quit it I'm tryna read here".

"what are you reading?" Duke asks.

"Macbeth."

Tim scrunched his nose up. "Why are you reading that?"

"I like it. Reminds me of school", and Tim catches something in his tone that Duke absolutely doesn't.

"it sounds silly. Will you red it to us?"

Jason looks at the both of them for a very long moment before signing. "Sure, but you've gotta stay still, your knees are already in my ribs."

The three of them all end up falling asleep like that, tucked into the lounge and curled up together.

Except when they wake up in the morning, Jason is scrawny little boy, even smaller than Tim and Duke.

Tim explains what he can to the tiny Jason as Duke sneaks some snacks from the kitchen cupboard for them.

Cass catches them stuffing their faces with junk food and squeals. "Three baby brother's now!" And scoops them all up as the quick and try to squirm away.

"gotta tell B"

"wait who are you exactly?" Jason asks.

"big sister", Cass smiles and pets his curls.

"no way! Really? I've never had a big sister before", he exclaims.

Cass carries all three of them down to the Batcave because she's so strong and cool! And Jason can't believe he ends up with such a cool sister.

"Batman!!!" Jason shouts in pure excitement, and Bruce turns around and almost cries.

Because look how small!! Oh baby Jay lad!! So precious and smol!

"I think the de-aging syndrome may be contagious", Tim speaks up. "You should have us all properly quarantined until you can find a cure."

quarantine is fun, for Jason and Tim at least (tiny Tim is plotting revenge on whoever caused this, Jason is reading and occasionally shouting at the characters). Duke can't stand having to stay still in the same one room for so long.

idk where this is going, but consider this awesome 3am idea of mine

[phoebepheebsphibs]

Double-Mutated Mikey

Chapter 19: Pathology

Continued from the short story written by @boots-with-the-fur-club

Prev || Next

Mikey wakes up to the sound of shouting and yelling.

"Oh, no.... oh no... oh no, oh no, oh nonononono...! Why today? This couldn't have happened like, last week, or maybe next month?!"

Mikey wonders what could be so upsetting to Leo. There's the sound of rushing back and forth, people shouting and whining and acting all terrified. He watches from his room as people keep running past his door.

A figure stops in his doorway -- Leo, by the smell and voice -- and flicks on the lights while yelling worriedly. The lights blind him momentarily as his vision switches from heat-seeking to binocular.

"Mikey! We gotta get you somewhere safe, bud..."

"Why?" he croaks.

Mikey doesn't even have to get out of the hammock before Leo scoops him up -- blankets and all -- and starts running with him.

"Dad's sick with rat flu!"

"Huh?"

"You don't remember rat flu?" Leo asks, looking down at Mikey as he runs. "Well, uh... it's this whole thing, it would take too long to explain. Basically, he gets a really bad cold and has weird symptoms. We don't wanna risk you getting infected just yet, so I'm having you bunker down in Dee's lab."

Mikey isn't sure what is going on, but everyone seems frantic. Leo drops him off in the lab, where Casey is also hiding out.

"Are you sure we'll be safe in here?" Casey asks, watching as Mikey is gently set down on the floor, blanket still wrapped around his shoulders.

"Probably... Splinter will be more focused on us than you, so all should be well... Have you ever seen rat flu, Casey?"

"A few times, though I don't remember much," Casey says with a shrug. "It happened mostly when I was a toddler, and before we had to eat Master Splinter."

"Okay, well, there's the seven stages -- wait, what?"

Leo shakes his head and holds up his hands.

"Nevermind, forget I asked, moving past, I don't ever want to know that story..."

"It was the apocalypse, we were running low on food, and his last wishes were--"

"But back to the rat flu!" Leo interrupts loudly, "Splinter will be going through the full seven stages, and those are way too chaotic for Mikey to be caught up in just yet. Besides, we don't know how well he's going to react to the flu if he should get contaminated by the germs. It's safest to just keep him in preemptive quarantine for now..."

"Alright, so what's first?" Casey asks, sitting next to Mikey.

Mikey shuffles just a bit away from him, eyeing Casey's hands nervously as his brother explains.

"First stage is fever, which -- oh man, I totally forgot about that..."

"What?" Mikey asks, concerned for why Leo is getting so bent out of shape. "What wrong?"

"Dad's first symptom is he gets overheated from the fever, so he cranks the AC all the way up," Leo groans, rushing out and shouting to the others. "Raph! I need blankets and a heater, stat!"

"Cold?" Mikey asks nervously.

"Yup, very cold. But we'll be prepared, don't worry," Leo says, as Raph rushes in with a stack of quilts and a heater.

"Will this be enough?" Raphael asks, handing half of the stack to the leader.

"I think so... Casey, there's a hoodie here, you should bundle up too," Leo says, throwing the oversized shirt at the future boy while Raph wraps Mikey up like a burrito.

"Danger?" Mikey asks nervously, watching Raph.

"No, there's no danger, it's just crazy and confusing," Raph reassures him.

Mikey can smell the fear. He can hear the nervous twinge in his voice. He can see the wrinkles on his head forming.

But Mikey trusts them. They may be scared, but they will help.

Mikey snuggles into the quilts and hums. Leo and Casey set up the heater before the two brothers leave the room.

"Casey knows how to work the door, so if anything goes wrong, he'll open it up, okay? But unless you hear one of us say something, keep this door locked for now."

"Leo safe? Raph safe?" Mikey asks.

"Sure! Like I said, it's just a flu."

Leo hands a communicator to Casey before he winks at Mikey, his smile strained and thin. The doors close with a hiss and a click, bolting from the inside out.

Mikey and Casey sit quietly as they wait.

Soon enough the air seems to chill, and their breaths can be seen as fog in the room. Mikey squirms in discomfort, pulling the blankets closer. Casey starts to shiver.

The communicator beeps, and Leo's voice chimes in.

"Stage one is in progress. You guys okay?"

"We're f-f-fine," Casey chatters. "K-k-keep us upd-d-dated."

"Will do."

The line clicks, and the two sit in silence.

Mikey shivers. The blankets help, but he can still feel the frigid chill of the air through the sheets. It doesn't hurt yet, but it is uncomfortable. The floor is ice under him. He tucks the quilts under his feet and legs as he tries to insulate himself better. He looks over to see Casey suffering by the heater. Mikey chirps at him to get his attention.

"Sh-sh-share?" he asks.

Casey looks Mikey up and down before nodding. Mikey hops over and opens his fortress, a gush of icey air whooshing in and stabbing his unprotected legs. He gasps and hisses through his teeth as Casey slides in and helps wrap the blankets around them again.

"The shared body heat will h-help," he says, his shivers shaking him to the core. "Thanks. I-I-I didn't think you l-liked m-m-me anymore..."

Mikey frowns.

"M-Mikey not h-hate Casey..."

He slinks into his shell a bit more.

"...Mikey s-s-scared of Casey..."

"Scared?" Casey stares wide at Mikey. "Why?"

"Mikey... not r-r-rem-member-r Casey. But Cas-s-sey human, humans scare Mikey," he whimpers.

Mikey hides his face under the blanket. Or maybe he's just trying to keep warm.

"Humans mean. Hate Mikey. Hurt Mikey. Mikey scared a lot... Mikey scared."

Casey sighs.

"I guess that makes sense. I-If I'm honest, I'd probably be scared of humans t-t-too..." He wraps his arms around the bundle. "But I'm glad you told me. I thought you just hated me!"

Mikey huffs, a shivering chuckle.

"Mikey th-th-thought C-Casey hate Mikey!"

"What? Why?"

"C-C-Casey-y look s-sad," Mikey explains. "Casey look sad at brothers, too. Casey l-look s-scared of Mikey..." Mikey sighs at the last sentence. "Mikey scares brothers. Mikey see. Mikey scary."

"You're n-not scary!" Casey lies. "We're just... concerned for your health. You went through a lot of injury, and we weren't there to help you. That's what scares us."

Mikey peeks up at him. CJ gently presses his head against Mikey's.

"We... we were so terrified, Mikey. You have no idea how happy I was to see you back... last week without you was a nightmare. I've never seen Leo so scared, and I saw him sacrifice everything to send me--"

He clears his throat.

"Uhm... getting off-topic. What I-I'm trying to say is... we're not scared of you, we're scared for you."

Mikey gives him a shy smile. He knows that Casey is lying. He can smell it. But Casey doesn't want to hurt him. Mikey purrs, nuzzling Casey's shoulder. CJ chuckles and pulls Mikey closer.

A moment later, the communicator beeps again.

"Stage two! Repeat, stage two, wild rat man! Donnie has been compromised!"

Casey pulls his wrist up to his face and leans in.

"What's going on out there?!"

"Donnie got pancaked by Splinter, he's quarantined now."

The boys hear a feral squeal over the comm lines, and both eyes go wide.

"S-S-Splinter-r-r?" Mikey asks.

"RUN!" a shout over the comms comes in. "Raph, this way, this way!!"

"W-w-ait, if Splinter's past the f-f-fever s-stage, then why is-s it still s-s-so c-c-c-cold-d-d???" Casey chatters.

"I told you, Donnie got quarantined! He hasn't rebooted the AC yet, and we're on a whole new system now so-- OH WAIT NO LOOK OUT!!"

There's a scuffle and a shuffle heard over the comms, and the two boys listen in intense silence. After a moment, Leo comes back onto the comms.

"Okay, we're good. Close call. How're you two holding up in there?"

"Cold," Mikey complains.

"We'll get to work on resetting the AC. Raph got Donnie's S.H.E.L.L.D.O.N.2.0 to lead Splinter away for the moment... I think we're in the clear..."

Several minutes pass by. Mikey and Casey sit in the lab, cold and waiting. Ten minutes go by. Fifteen.

Mikey's body starts jerking, seizing, convulsing. The pain starts to set in, his body can't handle the low temperature. He gasps, a sharp stabbing sensation in his chest that aches and spreads across his body. He doubles over, clutching his chest with one hand and gripping the blankets with the other.

Casey pulls him closer. Mikey is pressed against his chest, he can CJ's his heart beating. He focuses on that.

Ba-dump. Ba-dump. Ba-dump.

Casey pulls the comms up again.

"Guys, what's the holdup? Mikey's starting to--"

The lights go out. The heater shuts down. The door hisses and a loud click echoes in the room. Mikey yelps and hugs Casey.

"That's... not good...."

The comms click.

"Ah! Ninja supreme! Stage four!!"

"What happened to stage three?!" Casey shouts. "What have you been doing this whole time?! WHERE ARE YOU GUYS?!"

"He's in the vents!" Raph shouts through the mic.

Mikey hears scratching and scurrying from above. Mikey makes a quick sound, a yelping chirp to warn Casey, before Splinter suddenly descends from the ceiling vents and lands with a smoke bomb on the floor. Mikey and Casey scramble in opposite directions.

The blankets fall off of Mikey's shoulders. He whines in pain, holding himself tight as the cold causes his body to go rigid like he's been frozen solid.

His tail jerks, curling around him in snapping movements, like he's a disc been scratched too many times and it keeps freezing and playing one moment at a time. It's agony, it's killing him, Mikey can't breathe anymore... his lungs feel like they're collapsing inside of him, his bones turn seize up and go stiff in place, his head is buzzing with pins and needles, and his limbs feel like freezer-burn.

Splinter -- in his full ninja garb -- crouches over Mikey and touches his shoulder, inspecting him. Mikey winces, the meager warmth from his father's hand burns against the ice that is his scaly skin. Casey shouts out Mikey's name, and Splinter dashes away into the darkness.

Casey rushes over to Mikey, checking him for injuries.

"Mikey? Mikey!! Michelangelo!! Oh no, oh no... can you hear me?"

Mikey tries to lift his head up to talk to him. He can barely move it, it feels stiff and it hurts to turn his neck. He manages to move his eyes to look up at Casey. He opens his mouth, trying to force out words, a croak, a whimper, anything. All he can manage is a ragged and laboured breath, a gasp for air as he writhes without moving.

"I'm gonna get the guys, I'm gonna get you warm, just stay with me!"

Mikey loses all feeling in his limbs. His tail stops moving. His torso goes numb before it too becomes lost in static. Mikey turns some kind of ghost, and nothing can touch him anymore, and nothing hurts anymore. His ears start ringing, a stuffy distortion that blocks out most sounds. Casey Jr. is two feet away from him, but his voice is far far away. Time slows down, an tormenting eternity that is all of three seconds long.

"Stay with me, Mikey! Stay... stay..."

Everything goes dark. Mikey's eyes slip shut.

He exhales softly.

He doesn't inhale.

.

.

.

"We have to find some way to keep him in line!" Dr. Timothy shouts. "Otherwise, he'll be running rampant throughout the labs!"

"Dr. Chaplin is working on a device that can control--"

"I know what he's working on, Abigail," he interrupts. "But that device won't be ready for quite some time, and we need something now!"

"Then, perhaps we turn to biology?" she offers.

"How do you mean?"

"This specimen has several different species genetic code integrated into his DNA. Perhaps we can find some weakness within the genetics to use against him, should the necessity arise."

"Hm... that could work. Nothing lethal, of course, just uncomfortable for him. Did you have anything specific in mind?"

Mikey watches from his cage as the two scientists look over a series of codes before turning back to look at him.

"Could work..." Timothy mumbles.

"We'll never know unless we try," Abigail replies.

Mikey watches as the two walk out for a moment before coming back in, wearing thick jackets. Timothy turns the air down. Mikey is confused until he starts to jerk slightly. What's... what's happening to him? Why does the air hurt?? Timothy watches him start to shiver and convulse.

"I was right," Dr. Abigail Finn says with a sly smile. "The three reptile DNA mixings have caused a severe reaction to brumation. His system goes into shock."

"Let's see how much he can handle," Timothy chuckles before grabbing a fire extinguisher and soaking Mikey in a cold foam.

"What are you doing?!" Abigail asks, moving away from him.

"Conducting an experiment, of course."

Mikey screams in pain before toppling over. It burns with how cold it is.

"We'll have to weaponize this," Dr. Timothy laughs. "Should be simple enough to concoct a device that can create cold gusts of air... I'll have Honeycutt get to work on the designs..."

Mikey shivers, drowning in the icy cold pain...

.

.

.

Mikey's consciousness slowly thaws. It's still dark... his body is still numb and lost... but there's... sound...

"...Mikey... poor guy... should be getting warmer..."

"...didn't mean to, I tried..."

"...not your fault, Pops, just what happens..."

"...should have done better... it's been hours... is he okay?"

"...brumation...body slows down... he'll be fine..."

"...getting a pulse, he's breathing again...!"

"Mikey? Can you hear us?"

Mikey moans, the first part of his body he can (sort of) control. He hasn't been this tired since... since... some time ago. The first mutation. Not that he really remembers much of it...

Mikey's eyes softly open. Light shines in. His whole family is here. Casey is here. Everyone is watching over him. When did they all get here? Where has Mikey been in this absence of consciousness?

Uggh, he feels awful.

Leo comes into view.

"Heyyyyyy, mi hermano. Can you hear me?"

Mikey nods weakly. At least, he thinks he does. He still can't sense much. The feeling comes in slowly, soft prickling and paresthesia. The first thing he feels is extreme heat and shaking. He's shivering. Still? But it's so hot...

Hot... but... he likes the warmth... so why is this unbearable?

Mikey moans again. His head is swimming. His breathing heavy, it's hard to get the air into his lungs. Mikey squirms, sweat breaking out across his brow and under his arms as he shakes.

"Mmnghh... Mikey no... feel... good..."

Leo presses the back of his hand against Mikey's head. It's not cold, but against the feverish heat emanating from Mikey, it's heavenly chilled. Leo winces, his brow furrows in concern.

"You're burning up... Dad, when you broke into Dee's lab, did you touch Mikey? Do you think you might have infected him?"

Splinter's eyes widen as he realizes.

"Oh... I think I might have..."

"So, is Mikey sick now?" Raph asks. "He's got rat flu, too?"

"Why is it just hitting him now, when he was infected hours ago?" Casey asks.

Hours...? Mikey's been a ghost for hours...?

"I'm guessing the brumation put Mikey's body into a sort of stasis. All body functions stopped until he thawed out," Donnie explains. "Brumation causes reptile like turtles, snakes, and lizards (all of which Mikey has the DNA of) to go into a sort of hibernation when it gets too cold. They slow down to an extreme, and might even stop breathing, but they won't die."

Mikey writhes on the bed. His tail thrashes, almost whipping Leo in the leg. Whatever is happening to him now, whether it's a side effect of brumation or whatever fever he caught from Splinter, he hates it.

Leo watches Mikey in concern.

"So, uh... no problem, no issue. We'll just take care of him while he gets over rat flu..."

"But who's gonna take care of him?" Raph asks.

"Uh...Donnie's the only one who got infected this year, and he already went through the symptoms, so he should be immune now..." Leo looks over to his twin. "Do you think you could play nursemaid?"

"You mean take over your job?" he asks snidely. "Of course. I mean, I've already lost a lot of work time on the anti-mutagen, so I might as well..."

Donnie sighs with exasperation as he taps his wrist tech, creating a checklist for the seven stages and supplies he'll need.

"Okay... so this will be interesting to see unfold. Stage 1 is fever, but Mikey's reaction to the low temperatures prohibits anything cold coming into contact with him. Any suggestions, Leo?"

"Give him lots of water, and ibuprofen. We can try to bring down his fever with warmer waters, but I'm not sure if that would help..."

"Copy that. Next stage is wild rat man... or in this case, wild Mikey. That should be fun," Donnie says, the last sentence a soft grumbling whisper. "With Mikey's animal instincts, everyone needs to be on alert. We don't know how he'll react..."

As Donnie continues to explain the seven stages again, Mikey lets himself crumble into a short-lived sleep while he waits for the rest of his body to wake up.

Stage 1: FEVER

Mikey hates this.

Every part of him aches, a dull but everlasting ache. He is constantly shifting between the heat of the sun and below freezing.

He can never get comfortable, he keeps kicking the blankets off as his fever causes delirium and slight nausea.

Donnie does what he can, having him drink as much water as possible while dabbing his face with a wet cloth. But it's all too cold, even if it's lukewarm. Against the burning inferno of his fever, it's practically glacial.

Mikey weeps at the torment his body is putting itself through. Donnie works in silence until Mikey makes some sort of rambling beg for him to talk so he knows that he's still in the room. Between the aches and the delerium, he can't always tell...

Donnie talks about his latest tech design. He talks about S.H.E.L.L.D.O.N.2.0 and the upgrades he made in Mikey's absence. He talks about some of the studies he's been making into genetic mutations and modifications to the DNA and... he sounds upset. He stops talking about that and moves on to a new subject. He talks about botany or something.

Mikey groans in agony and mumbles something... not even he knows what he's saying... Donnie presses his hand to Mikey's sweat-soaked head. He grimaces at the wetness, but sighs with relief.

"I think your fever is starting to break... that's a good sign--"

"Gggggggrrrhhhh..."

"...Mikey?"

Mikey's eyes squeeze shut as he groans, grumbles, growls...

His eyes snap open, the pupils shrink into thin lines that immediately lock onto Donnie. He snarls, his teeth elongating into sharp fangs.

"...Oh banana pancakes," Donnie says flatly as he starts to get up.

Stage 2: FERAL MIKEY.

Leo and Raph are eating lunch with casey, having ordered a pizza and subs due to the day's earlier havoc. Leo plays with the pineapple and ham toppings as he frets over Mikey.

"Dude," Raph scolds, pointing at the slice going cold. "Just eat it already, or put it back in the box."

"Do you think he's doing okay?" Leo asks. "I mean, I know it's only a flu, but after everything that's happened to him already, I'm just worried what this will do to him, I mean, we have no idea how shot his immune system is already from his captivity and malnutrition, and then coupled with the mutations--"

"Leo," Raph says in between bites of his footlong. "You need to chill. I'm freaking out too, but that's not going to do any good. Donnie's got this for now, if he needs any help then he'll let us know--"

"HELP!!"

"...I think he just let us know."

The trio run out to find Dee being chased by a wild Mikey, his tail spiked and quills raised, his eyes glowing bright yellow with blood red as he chases after Donnie, snarling all along the way. Mikey slithers up the walls and ceiling, perching above them all, his head and neck twisting around as he watches them somewhat creepily.

"Oh dang," Leo says, pointing. "That's terrifying. I'm not alone on this, right? That's some 'The Ring' bone-cracking-bending-in-odd-ways type of scary?"

"Not the time, Nardo," Donnie grumbles.

"What's 'The Ring'?" Casey asks.

Mikey snarls loudly, analyzing who to attack first. His eyes stop on Raph and his sandwich.

"Uh-oh," the eldest whispers.

Mikey jumps down from the ceiling, roaring as he pounces down at his brothers. Raph shrieks in terror as he throws the sandwich at his feral brother. Mikey grabs the sub in his mouth and starts to attack it viciously, ripping it apart with his teeth and fangs, shaking it all around as he kills it dead.

"Uh, we start running now, right?" Casey asks.

"Yes. We run now."

The four make a mad dash down the hall, running into the garage and locking the door behind them.

"That... that was terrifying," Leo gasps. "I didn't know he could be that scary... was he like that when you found him?"

Leo turns to look at Raph and Donnie, who pant as they lean against the shell hogs for balance.

"Uh... more or less," Raph admits. "He was lucid when I found him, but once the other experiments were released he went kinda savage and attacked them to protect me."

"He also bit you."

Raph rubs over the spot on his wrist that Mikey punctured. It's healing fast, thanks to Draxum's genetic-whatever-he-did-to-them when they were babies. But the thought of Mikey's face when he came to and saw what he'd done... that hurt much more than any bite.

He hopes to pizza supreme that Mikey won't remember anything from the fever... poor kid probably couldn't handle it...

There's a pounding against the door.

"Agh!" Leo jumps as the loud noise echoes through the garage. "Don't let him in! The door's going to hold, right?"

"But of course!" Donnie says with a nervous chuckle. "I restructured everything after the invasion. Not even a krang could break down that door. The only thing that could get it open is --"

'Hamato Family Override Accepted,' a computer voice sounds.

"...is if someone with the code unlocks the door," Donnie moans.

The doors open slowly, revealing Splinter, standing in the doorway with an irritated expression on his face.

"Boys," he says in his scolding voice. "would you care to explain to me why you left your brother in the state he's in?"

"We had to!" Leo says, hiding behind Raph. "He was going to rip off an arm or something!"

"What are you talking about?" Splinter asks, stepping aside to reveal a very flushed Mikey with a sad expression on his face, eyes wet and pupils so wide they engulf the majority of his eyes.

Mikey sees his brothers and starts crying with joy as he rushes towards them, sloppily landing on Raph's feet and hugging his legs tightly.

"Rrrrraaaaappphiiieee!" he sings, rubbing his cheek against his big brother's ankles. "Miiikeeeeyyyy loveesss youuu..."

Stage 3: CAPTAIN CUDDLECAKES

Raph stares down in shock, frozen still for fear of what else Mikey might do. But Mikey just looks up and him with grabby hands as he cries for affection.

"Pickkkk me uuuup, Raphhiieee.... hold me, please, Raaaaaaphhie..."

"Uh... okay..." he says with hesitance, kneeling down and gently tucking his hands under Mikey's arms as he hoists him up.

Mikey's body is limp like a noodle, swaying back and forth as Raph holds him at arm's length. Mikey's face is bright red from fever, his smile dopey, his eyes half-opened and unfocused, his head lolls rom side to side. He giggles lazily, holding onto Raph's hands and slowly pulling himself closer to him, sort of crawling-slash-climbing across his arms to get to his chest.

"Raaaaaphieee.... I love Raphie... I loves him sooooooo muchesss..."

"Is... is he okay?" Leo asks, a quick giggle escaping him.

"Delirium," Donnie says knowingly with a nod. "He's delirious."

"Are you sure?" Casey asks.

"I'm an ice cream kitty," Mikey says dopily, giggling as he wraps himself over Raph's shoulders. "I'm a cat called Klunk..."

"Pretty sure," Donnie answers flatly.

"He's really cuddly," Raph chuckles, rubbing his hand over Mikey's burning head.

Mikey hums with contentment as he continues to wrap under Raphael's chin, back over the shoulders, and around his neck again...

"Uh, Mikey?" Raph gasps, as Mikey's torso and tail starting to tighten around his throat and choke him. "Mike-- that's too tight, buddy -- Mikey -- gack!!"

Donnie and Leo rush forward and try to loosen Mikey from around his brother. Mikey whines at them, tiredly slapping them away as he nuzzles Raph's face, which is starting to turn blue.

"Boa instincts," Donnie diagnoses as he tries to get Mikey to let go. "Come on, Michael, let go, let go, let -- nggh -- go!"

"Stahp pullin'!" Raph chokes out. "Gettin' tight--!"

"He won't release!" Donnie grumbles. "I don't think he understands what he's doing! It's his animal traits taking over..."

Leo's eyes brighten as he gets an idea. He starts scritching and scratching around Mikey's neck, looking for a specific spot. Mikey starts to giggle, shoulders hunching up and tail loosening. Leo gets to a spot just under the jaw on his right side and scratches. Mikey's eyes pop as he falls into Leo's hold with a mad cackle, legs kicking as he jerks back and forth from giggles. Raph gasps for air and collapses to his knees as he clutches his throat.

Mikey wiggles out of Leo's hold and onto the floor as he continues to laugh himself silly from the special spot Leo found.

"H-how... cough cough... how'd ya know that would work?" Raph hacks.

"I didn't," Leo confesses with a shrug. "I thought he'd faint like in 'How To Train Your Dragon' or something."

Mikey's laughter starts to calm, and he relaxes against the floor, deep sighs of relief as his brothers talk over him.

"I think it's safe to assume that his flu is causing his animal attributes to take over," Donnie informs. "Which isn't good news for the next stage..."

Stage 4: NINJA HUNTER SUPREME

"It's okay," Casey says, trying to calm the room. "I-I'm sure it will be fine, all we have to do is keep an eye on him aaaaaand we lost him," he groans, looking down to where Mikey had been a second ago.

"Alright, nobody panic! We're fine, we're fine, we're--"

"Achoo!" Raph sneezes.

"Welp, Raph's infected now, we need to quarantine him," Donnie groans. "Who could have seen this coming, he said sarcastically."

"I'm okay, I can just -- Achooie!"

"Yeah no," Leo scolds as he helps lead Raph to the door. "You're getting into bed. We're all sticking together too, so everyone be on the lookout for you-know-who..."

The group slowly but surely trudge towards the traincars on the other side of the lair, stopping at every doorway to inspect the rooms for Mikey. He's nowhere to be seen... and that's terrifying.

Just before they get to Raph's room, Donnie's wrist tech beeps at him. One of the motion sensors has gone off.

"Wait a sec," Donnie whispers, tapping the security footage. "I think Mikey might be in the sewer tunnels..."

"What?" Leo whispers back. "Why would he go all the way out there?"

"I'm not sure, but if he gets lost --"

"I'll go after him," Leo answers. "You guys watch Raph and help quarantine him for now before the fever sets in too bad."

Leon grabs his swords and runs to the exits. Casey watches him nervously as he helps Donnie maneuver the former leader into his bedroom as the fever starts to take effect.

As soon as Leo gets to the tunnels, he gets the eerie feeling he's being watched. He's not sure where the sensation is coming from, but three years of being a ninja vigilante and 16 years of living in secrecy under the surface of the greatest city ever has trained him to hone in on these gut feelings and sixth senses. There is someone... or something watching him.

It's unnerving.

He steps into the tunnels and looks both ways. No sign of Mikey. He takes out his comm and leans into the speaker to whisper.

"Hey Don, which way did he go?"

"*Krrsh* I don't know, I didn't see on the recording. I just saw a notif that something set off the perimeter alert. Over. *Krsh*"

Leo doesn't like this. Maybe Mikey never actually left the lair. Maybe this was all... a trap.

Leo's ninja senses tell him to be careful. He turns around quickly and looks up. Mikey is staring down at him from the ceiling.

He drops down like a spider, crashing down onto Leo, who shouts in terror as he opens a portal just beneath his feet. The two fall through, one after the other. Leo portals them back to the traincars, shouting for backup as he runs away while Mikey regains his footing and inspects the new area.

"FOUND HIM! I FOUND HIM! HELP!"

Casey and Donnie jump into the hall quickly, brandishing weapons on instinct.

Leo frantically scrapes his katanas across the floor as he runs away, creating a series of portals that surround Mikey. The feral mutant boy falls through one and pops out in a random place, three other portals boxing him in.

"There," Leon pants. "That should keep him busy for now..."

Mikey sniffs one of the portals, and his eyes widen. He steps through, following his nose and navigating perfectly through each portal, gaining speed with every step until he arrives from behind the trapped trio.

"Or not..." Leo swallows.

Mikey growls, licking his teeth as he stalks them, getting ready to leap in three... two... one...

Mikey pounces on Leo, gripping the handle of one katana between his set jaws and yanking it out of Leo's grip. He clutches onto his brother's shoulders, pinning him down as he tries to rip the second sword away.

"AAGH!!!" Leo screams, kicking wildly as Mikey snarls and drools all over him and his weapon. "GET IT OFF! GET THIS THING OFF OF ME--!!"

Donnie activates his hover-shell and directs it to attach to Mikey, lifting him up and carrying him away. But Mikey still clings tightly to Leo, who is struggling against his brother's death grip on his shoulders. Mikey's nails dig in tight, making Leo cry out in pain.

Casey jumps up and catches on Leo's feet, pulling him loose from Mikey's hold. Mikey is flown away, screeching in anger as the hover-shell turns a corner and disappears with its passenger.

"Sensei-- Leo, are you okay?" Casey asks, eyeing the claw marks with concern.

"I-I'm f-fine," Leo manages, his breath shaky and eyes wide but lost. "I... I'll be okay... I... achoo!"

"Welp, we've lost another brother," Donnie sighs as he carries Leo to his room. "I estimate that we have at least five more minutes before Mikey comes back in a new stage. Casey, you go to my lab and lock yourself in there. Reboot the security system and put the whole lair on a lockdown. We can't risk Mikey escaping, got it?"

Casey nods nervously before rushing away.

Donnie helps Leo get into bed as the fever already starts to set in.

"H-he... he really got me, huh...? Woof, why is it so hot in here???" Leo mumbles as he topples into the bed. "Why is the room spinning so much?? I don't remember booking tickets to the tilt-n'-whirl..."

"I'll get the fan going for you," Donnie mutters.

"I... I feel bad..."

"You'll feel better in a minute--"

"I called him a thing."

Donnie pauses as he looks back at Leo, who's starting to cry softly as he hugs his pillow.

"I was just scared. I'd never seen him so angry or vicious. Not even against the krang... he looked like he really was gonna kill me..."

"He wouldn't," Donnie reassures him flatly. "Mikey would never do that."

"Do you think he hates me now?" Leo whimpers. "Do you think he heard me? He'll remember that? I don't actually think of him like that, I... I don't think he's a monster, I don't... gawd, why is it so hot in here?!"

Donnie rolls his eyes as he plugs in the high-speed fan and aims it at Leo. He sighs with relief from the cold winds blowing in his face.

"We can talk about it later. Right now I have to find Mikey."

Leo hums as he falls asleep on the bed.

Donnie runs back out, closes the door to the traincar, and rounds the corner into the hallway beyond... where he finds the smashed remains of his hover-shell, and no Mikey.

Fantastic.

Stage 5: KARAOKE LOVE SONGS

Donnie can hear Mikey singing loudly. But not in English. He's howling and yowling and chirping some incoherent animal gibberish in the TV room. Splinter probably left one of his old romance soap operas on, and somebody must've busted out into a love ballad.

Donine steps closer to watch him and surveil. The noise could damage his ears with how loud and high-pitched it gets, but at least Mikey's pacified. For the moment.

Donnie messages Casey from his wrist tech; he doesn't expect that he could hear him if he tried the comms.

D: HOW'S IT GOING IN THERE?

CJ: PRETTY GOOD. ALL EXITS SECURED.

D: GREAT. MIKEY IS... SINGING (QUESTION MARK?)

CJ: LOL DOES IT SOUND THAT BAD?

D: I WOULDN'T KNOW, MY HEARING IS PERMANENTLY DAMAGED NOW.

Dee turns back to smile at Mikey, who's howling has softened and slowed to simple hums. He scratches behind his ears with his foot before getting up and dizzily trotting back to his traincar bedroom. Donnie follows from behind, staying quiet as he can. He's not sure what the next stage will do to Mikey's animal brain...

Michelangelo starts looking around his room, coughing every once in a while and sneezing on occasion before finding a large roll of paper that April dropped off some time ago. Mikey knocks it down and rolls it out, carefully setting the paints out as well. That's when he sees Donnie.

He smiles weakly and ushers him in with a soft yawn turned cough.

Donnie walks in and sits beside his brother, helping to open the jars as Mikey starts to draw images...

Stage 6: STORYTIME

Stage six is fanfiction, Donnie knows this. But for some reason, Mikey isn't making fanart or comics of his favourite characters. Donnie wonders why... he maybe doesn't recall them...? He only just remembered Lou Jitsu a few days ago, so it's not out of the question. Donnie's stomach turns when he considers that Mikey not remember that their father was Lou Jitsu...

But he's definitely drawing something. His hands still shake, and he tears the paper every other stroke, but he's making a story to tell with his art. Mikey uses his tail as a paintbrush, gentle but sloppy strokes. It's easier than finger-painting with claws. Donnie sees images of a green thing with yellow spots in a cage... needles and crude doodles of knives and pink monsters... humans in white that kick and hit and zap and freeze the poor green and yellow figure... It doesn't take long for Donnie to realize what story he's telling.

The poor green and yellow thing is crying in his cage. It almost looks like... he's waiting for something...

Then Donnie sees a purple figure. A blue one. Red.

It's them.

But Mikey omits an orange companion. Donnie points this out.

"Why didn't you draw yourself?" he asks.

Mikey looks up at him with concern, and for a moment he's worried he broke Mikey's oh-so-sensitive concentration. But instead he shakily dips his tail in the orange paint and... stalls...

The paint drips onto the paper while they wait for Mikey to make his artwork. But he doesn't.

"Do you... need some help?"

Mikey nods with a sniffle. Dee chalks that up to a runny and stuffy nose. Same with the gloopy eyes that hold tears in them, that's just some kind of irritation or fever. Not the other, more difficult thing -- emotions.

Donnie reaches over and takes his brother's tail, helping Mikey draw a stick figure with round cheeks and a mask with a bow. Mikey leans down to stare at the drawing, analyzing it with astonishment.

Why does he look at it like that? Why is he so surprised by his own image? Why doesn't he... recognize...

Mikey's eyes glaze over, as he slowly sits back up and exhales. Mikey's vision is far away, lost in thought.

Stage 7: MUST SAY YES

Donnie waves a hand in front of Mikey's face. No reaction. Donnie sighs.

"Mikey?"

Mikey turns his head to look at Donnie with a quiet mew.

"I know you'll say 'yes' to anything I ask for. So, I want you to..."

He wants Mikey to tell him why he didn't draw himself. Why he reacts the way he does when they leave him alone. Why he is so scared of Casey and April, why he didn't remember their names or Lou Jitsu or anything. Why he has a voice in his head, and what the voice tells him. He wants to ask for him to get better and get back to normal as quickly as possible. He wants to ask him to be his same old Mikey self again.

Donnie sighs.

"...I want you to get some rest and heal up. Okay, buddy?"

Mikey gives a weak smile before closing his eyes and flopping against Dee's chest, wheezing with each breath he makes. Donnie rolls his eyes and lifts his congested baby brother up into the hammock bed, tucking him in and making sure that he's nice and warm.

He steps out of the traincar after turning off the lights. He's utterly spent, he might try taking a nap too...

Until Casey runs up to him, a worried expression on his face.

"Donatello! Donatello!"

"Shh!" he shushes quickly, signing that Mikey is fast asleep and resting. "What is it?"

"I was reviewing security footage in the labs, and saw that Mikey never went outside the tunnels..."

"What? But the sensors --"

"Sensed something, yeah, so I went back and looked for what it was. I found this hiding outside the entrance to the lair," he says, reaching into one of his fanny packs.

Casey pulls out a mediocre miniature drone, complete with camera and microphone. The device is no better than scrap metal now, having been partially destroyed by Casey's weaponized hockey stick.

"It may have taken me by surprise..."

Donnie stares down at it. There's a small logo printed on the side with the initials EPF.

"...How long has it been here?"

"We got the alert around... maybe fifteen minutes ago?"

"Are there any more?" Dee asks, his tone low and frightfully serious.

"I don't know," Casey answers. "But I can do a perimeter sweep."

"Good idea," Donnie says, rushing away. "I'm going to create an invisible fence around the lair that knocks out any unrecognized tech. Then, I'm going to see how damaged this scrapheap is. If the receptor and signal output are still intact... maybe I can find out what our friends at the EPF are up to."

.

.

.

Dr. Timothy stares down at the wretched mutated human in a cage, wearing a torn and tattered uniform.

What a disgusting failure.

His face is misshapen and bearing three eyes, his arms (one of which is scarred from talon gashes and bite marks) are covered in fur, his hands are like bear claws and his feet are webbed. He is an amalgamation of random things, and now he's in the cage that belonged previously to 'Mikey'.

Timothy scowls at the mutation. It was a wild test, anyways. Nothing important. Just to see what would happen... Honestly, it was more as a punishment for damaging Mikey's brain than an actual scientific pursuit. And it's not like anyone will miss him; he was nothing important, anyways...

Nothing is important. Nothing matters now. Nothing but finding that one experiment again. The only successful mutation... Mikey.

The man in the cage whines at Dr. Timothy. He cannot speak anymore. Nothing more than a dumb animal. Which, from the intelligence he showed before mutation, is quite possibly an improvement.

Timothy kicks the cage in frustration. The man yipes and backs away, whinging like a dog.

What to do, what to do...

None of the mutations have worked right. None of them show any signs of increased intelligence. It seems the opposite, their minds decrease and their problem-solving skills evaporate. The physical toll on their bodies is heavy, and some never even survive the first round of mutation. None of them can take orders. None of them can fight with complexity and agility. None of them can be trained. None of them can understand basic commands or words or anything of the English language, or any language. They're all just stupid, dumb animals! None of them have had the success rate that Mikey did. Why? What about him was so special??

He was already mutated...

There are a handful of mutated freaks out there now, running amok and wreaking havoc. How were they changed? Why has it worked with them? What could have possibly done it for them, and why can't they recreate this phenomenon?!

Dr. Timothy has always been interested in mutations and enhancements. This reason is why he joined the science division of the EPF. He knows most of the scientists here are working to save the alien-infected citizens. And Tim is all for that! Why not help humanity? But why stop at simple cures, why not go bigger? There are some freaks running amok in the streets, a result of odd glowing bugs released upon the masses almost three years ago. These mutations have made the humans stronger, faster, better. They can withstand almost anything! They are practically indestructible! These idiots think that saving humanity means eradicating the mutants. They couldn't be more wrong.

It's the humans who need to be... shall we say, updated?

What a weak and pathetic species. Slow, soft, squishy and easily injured. Bruisable. Breakable. Like putty.

But add some extra features and a killer instinct... and you've got yourselves a prime class of creatures that can stand tall for centuries!

Why not be better? Why not be stronger?! Why can't they see that?!

Timothy wrings his hands through his hair, growling at the unfairness of the situation. If only he could get his hands on that mutie again... if only he could have Mikey back.

That is the only thing that matters to him now.

Getting that mutant turtle back.

It's all he thinks about. The good news is that they've sent spy drones into the tunnels and seem to have gotten some interesting footage before mysteriously going dead... Timothy is having another wave sent in within the next three days, max.

The others may have seen his passion for the science, but this is different. This is mania. This is an obsession...

Timothy will do whatever it takes to get that mutant turtle back into his possession, and figure out how he survived the mutations.

And then...

He will become the better man. The better, more dominant species.

The better mutant.

Prev || Next

[nemastraea]

Doormat extraordinaire: Andrew Graves is down horrendous for his own sister | Part 1

Or as I like to call it, actual literal word vomit attempting a proper character analysis!

Here's a link to the AO3 version for archive purposes: The doormat extraordinaire has a bit of a romantic streak,

Content warning: This will heavily feature spoilers from Episodes 1 & 2 of The Coffin of Andy and Leyley. Trigger warning: Abuse, cannibalism, child neglect, codependency, harassment, incest, murder, self-harm, and suicide. Disclaimer: I will occasionally reference an extremely normal essay from Sufficient Velocity commenter Leyleyfication (here). It would be a lot easier to read this essay first as Leyleyfication does a pretty good job establishing the following: - Ashley is dependent on Andrew to assure and validate her of her own insecurities, and - The game heavily implies that Andrew wants to fuck his own sister.

Anyway: The Coffin of Andy and Leyley! A game in early access where a pair of siblings are stuck through a seemingly never-ending quarantine together, desperate not to starve to death. When their cultist neighbor dies in a ritual gone wrong, they rationally resort to cannibalism. Fun!

I am definitely going to assume that you read Leyleyfication's extremely normal essay (I am on my knees, begging you to read that). Which is why this essay immediately starts with, "yeah, Andrew definitely wants to fuck his sister" as its baseline.

What I will be adding to that funny little cauldron of fucked up sibling dynamics in a horror visual novel are the following: Andrew's fixation and sexual attraction manifests as his desire to control, dominate, and possess Ashley. And it is framed as a fatalist attraction and the totality of his existence (for worse or even worse).

Because of Tumblr's limit for 30 images per post, though, I'm going to have to split this extremely normal and reasonably lengthy essay into... multiple posts! Yeah! I have no idea how long this will fucking go!

So first things first: how can we tell that Andrew is even attracted to Ashley in the first place?

Nemlei (Devlog 05). Note the hickeys above and below Ashley's choker and her left inner thigh, and Andrew's left hand creeping into her right thigh.

As Leyleyfication points out, the game primes us to believe that Andrew is a pushover and Ashley is his abuser. This occurs in the Steam page as it explicitly says Ashley is "in fact, very bad" and Andrew is a "doormat extraordinaire." Moreover, it's very easy to tell that Ashley is, on some degree, obsessed with Andrew:

She's happy to hear that Julia broke up with Andrew over the phone;

She repeatedly accuses him of finding the Lady from Room 302 attractive and he 'tried anything with her;' and

Her flashback to wanting to punish her friend Nina ("the Bitch in the Box") for crushing on Andrew.

Episode 1, dream and memory. Leyley previously said that Nina should know better than to 'steal from another woman,' referring to herself. The implication that Andy is hers is toyed with after this moment, when she says she'd put Andy back in the box.

The game does prime us to think that Ashley is Andrew's abuser. It also suggests that Ashley projects an unrequited and incestuous love onto Andrew. Before we consider Episode 2's narrative, Episode 1 gives the initial impression that if Andrew comes to reciprocate her feelings, it's more of a reaction and subsuming to her will. That it may not be something he wants for himself and independent of Ashley's manipulation.

But again, I do believe Andrew wants to fuck Ashley. And always has been. He just frequently vacillate between 'subtle' and 'really fucking obvious' tells that completely take advantage of the game's third person limited POV.

Keep in mind that both Andrew and Ashley are extremely unreliable narrators. We aren't going to get information they personally do not care about and that is on top of our own choices as the player.

(A digressive example: you will not learn that the founder and CEO of Toxisoda's company was a former surgeon unless you interact with the television in Andrew's Episode 2 dream and memory of their blood oath. Otherwise, it neatly ties into the surgeon that Mrs. Graves conveniently says she was directed to regarding the siblings' quarantine in the main story.)

When it's really fucking obvious

When you play as Andrew in Episode 2, his post-dinner argument with Ashley carefully frames them both. They are cramped in the foreground and Andrew's left arm is conveniently blocked by Ashley and the kitchen knife, as seen here.

Episode 2, common route. Prior to this, you can interact with Mrs. Graves for her to pointedly comment on the siblings being inseparable.

At this point in the game, their physical closeness is something we're used to by now. After all, we've already seen Ashley on his lap at least twice; Andrew slept in her bed in Episode 1; and Ashley confirmed they've shared the same motel bed multiple times in the one-week interim between Episodes 1 & 2.

But the game abruptly shifts to Mrs. Graves' POV when she enters the scene and not only do we see the two as physically close, but we notice a few more details.

Episode 2, common route. The first picture transitions from Andrew's POV to Mrs. Graves as it introduces us to her entering the scene.

The contrast of how spacious the kitchen is from Mrs. Graves' POV to Andrew's cramped POV is obvious. More importantly, Andrew's fingers loop through Ashley's belt loops when the two are huddled together. When Mrs. Graves clears her throat, the two don't really separate.

Ashley pivots on her left foot so that her body is turned to their mother, not Andrew, but she doesn't step away from him. Andrew, meanwhile, recoils from Ashley and withdraws his hand. But he isn't turning his body to face their mother like Ashley does here. His attention, at least in this moment, is still towards Ashley (and, yanno, the sink).

Episode 2, common route. Two things to consider in the second picture: Andrew hides Ashley's bite mark on his cheek with his left sleeve and he conveniently moves the pillow from behind him to his front.

The 'tell' isn't so much as the two are unusually physically close. Again, we're used to that by now. But it's how the two siblings react whenever Mrs. Graves comes into the picture. Ashley doesn't really give a fuck about whether or not people assume the worst of her or even her intentions regarding Andrew. To Ashley, their proximity is normal and anyone who sees that as a problem is not worth an explanation or reason.

But Andrew is at least subconsciously aware it's 'not normal.' As far as these moments are concerned, Andrew instinctively tries to do damage control by either putting space between them or keeping his hands occupied so they aren't visibly touching Ashley. Still, he either does not mind or actively appreciates his physical closeness with Ashley.

When it's really fucking obvious (but only in hindsight)

In Episode 1, Ashley passes out after trying to clean up after the apartment. Regardless of her passing out in the living room, the bathroom, or their parents' room, she will wake up on the couch with her head pillowed by Andrew's lap.

Episode 1, Ashley's POV. Andrew's hands often hover over Ashley's head, but more than that—

I personally didn't notice this until I replayed Episode 1, when I basically have the hindsight of Andrew's fixation with hair. But yes, his fingers idly twirl through the ends of Ashley's hair as they watch TV. It's implied that Andrew can and will do this when Ashley pillows his lap, awake or asleep. He does not recoil from it when Ashley does wake up and later on, in Episode 2, even continues to brush it from her face.

Episode 2, common route. Ashley fell asleep at the passenger seat, so Andrew had to have transferred her to the back seat to pillow her head again. Though, technically, she's more cramped at the back seat than if he'd just reclined the passenger seat.

So far, we've seen that Andrew has a natural tendency to not only be physically close to Ashley, but to hover over her personal space and be in constant and direct contact with her. Whether it's by having her head on his lap, twirling her hair through his fingers, or even constantly grabbing her by the head in various states of comfort, playfulness, or outright threat (but let's put a pin on that for now).

The weight behind this candid contact shifts when Episode 2 draws a pretty explicit parallel between Julia and Ashley. Assuming that you interacted with Julia's landline and heard Ashley's voicemails, you know (and Andrew knows) that Ashley draws that connection herself:

DO YOU THINK YOU'RE BETTER THAN ME!? Just because you can fuck him and I can't? You think that's love?! Are you fucking delusional?? Cumdumpsters like you are just that. He will never love you. Not like he loves me. I am the only one. I am everything. I am the secrets you'll never hear. When he lies in bed at night, and when he needs someone to hold on to... It's not you he seeks out. It is me.

Episode 2, common route. Andrew's dream and vision implies that Andrew's heard these voicemails before.

That connection extends to the hair contact as well, as Andrew goes in to hug Julia, cards his hand through her hair and requests she tie her hair up.

Episode 2, common route. Andrew's dream and memory of Julia when they're older. From the use of Andrew's present-age portrait, suggests is closer to the timeline of the game's events than his and Ashley's memories as Andy and Leyley.

From this moment, we can have one of two assumptions: either Andrew wants Julia's (black) hair put up like Ashley's, or Ashley caught onto Andrew's hair kink and puts her hair up to imitate it.

Regardless, we infer the following:

Andrew teases affection through touching and even pulling on one's hair.

His fixation on ponytails and pulling on them does not exclude his own sister. It still stands and without reservation, perhaps more explicitly since he can do it so candidly, as we saw before.

The last of that Julia-Ashley parallel is self-contained within Episode 2. But only if you end up in the Burial route regardless of Ashley's platonic or incestuous vision.

Episode 2, common route (first picture) and Burial route (second picture). It's worth pointing out that Andrew is actually disinterested and moody during his conversation with Julia, and only perks up when he mentions Ashley or feigns care for Julia (since he extends his care of Ashley to her as well).

The game ends up drawing parallels on how Andrew treats Ashley, for better or for worse, with his ex (which is definitely worse, poor Julia). In doing so, the game blurs the lines between romantic affection for Julia and 'platonic and familial' affection for Ashley.

Y'all, this isn't even getting into how Andrew respectfully gives his parents space and only crowds them when he threatens them with his cleaver. In his mind, Ashley and Julia are in that same space of physical and romantic displays of affection; something he reserves only for them (only without reservation for Ashley) that does not extend to anyone else. His ex-girlfriend, and his sister. Shit's wild.

When it's obvious BUT it's violent!

That isn't to say that his hair fixation (hair kink?) is completely innocuous, though, as it rears its ugly head (pun unintended) in Decay. Which is what that previous pin was for! Yay!

You end up in the Decay route if Ashley doesn't trust Andrew with keeping an eye on their parents. Here, Ashley sleeps on their parents' bed by herself and has an alarming vision: an unknown party chases after her through the in-between and when they catch up to her, it's Andrew. Ashley has nowhere to run and Andrew eventually grabs her and threatens to kill her.

Whether or not Ashley can defend herself depends on Andrew expending all of her gun's ammo when he deals with the hitman, or not. But that outcome divergence will matter much, much later (so that's another pin for us to come back to).

The sequence of events actually mirrors the way the siblings ambush the Lady from Room 302 back in Episode 1. There, Andrew closes in on her and grabs the Lady by her wrist and uses his front to pin and restrain her. With his cleaver to her throat, the Lady is completely at his mercy.

Episode 1 & 2, common route (first picture) and Decay route (second, third, and fourth pictures). Note that Andrew restrains the Lady from Room 302 by the wrist while with Ashley, by her hair.

Andrew asserts control of the person and the situation through violence. Whether it's by killing them (the wardens) or by threatening physical violence (the Lady from Room 302 and Ashley). It's always on the table for him. As Leyleyfication puts it, "He's so calculated in how he approaches his use of violence [here]."

That violence includes Ashley. It's always on the table where Ashley's concerned. The game even juxtaposes when Andrew threatens violence and physical assault 'playfully' versus when he's seriously out for blood:

When you interact with the wall of call girls' numbers and Ashley jokes about leaving her number on the wall, Andrew 'jokingly' threatens to backhand her for even thinking about it.

When you interact with their parents' latched window for a second time, Andrew 'teases' slapping Ashley if she doesn't find a way to open it. (Ashley jokingly asks if it's on her ass or at her face, and assumes it must be the face when Andrew says she'll have to find out.)

The two other times that Andrew exerts violence against Ashley are both in Episode 1 & 2. We can remember when that happens in Episode 1, when Andrew's had it with Ashley's fits and threatens to kill her:

Episode 1, common route. Y'all, Andrew was choking her hard enough for his grip to bruise.

It happens again in Decay when he confronts Ashley about repeatedly calling him Andy and therefore, breaking the promise he coerced her into from Episode 1.

Episode 2, Decay route. Another thing to keep in mind is that Andrew's outburst is preceded by Ashley prodding him about his current state and insisting that Andrew was fine with 'Andy' during their home invasion.

In Episode 1, Andrew resorts to harming Ashley because he's fucking had it with her accusing him repeatedly of trying anything with the Lady from 302 and, in her eyes, his 'infidelity.' Where she accuses Andrew of not loving her enough that if his eye catches another girl, he'd leave her behind or flip on her. In Episode 2, she's poking and prodding on his boundaries on 'Andy' and whether or not, once again, he's with her on their now-committed life of joint crime.

If I can give another example, it happens in Andrew's common route memory of Nina's death and his blood oath with Leyley.

Episode 2, common route. Prior to this, Andy expresses immense exasperation at Leyley's tantrums over him 'thinking about that bitch again.' When he goes to grab the kitchen knife, cleans it, and returns to Leyley on his bed—he's briefly considering killing her.

Andrew threatens Ashley violently whenever he intends to confront her on her perceived brattiness, for lack of a better word. And keep Leyleyfication's essay segment on Ashley's insecurities and need for Andrew's validation in mind here—when Ashley does this, she wants and even needs Andrew to comfort her. But her aggression treads Andrew's patience and really, his tolerance of her behavior.

When Ashley's anger, clinging behavior, insecurities, and possessiveness of Andrew slips his control and tolerance, he resorts to violence to coerce or even dominate her.

I think (or hope, if it's clear enough) it reinforces what Leyleyfication points out:

The truth of the matter is, Ashley can only make Andrew do anything because he lets her. I don't mean in the sense that I'm saying abuse victims let their abusers emotionally abuse them, I mean in the sense that he is clearly considering his options on the table and choosing to discard those that could stop her, or bring an end to any of this.

It also reflects on another aspect of why Andrew resorts to violence: in all three situations, Andrew remarks on Ashley's behavior and her sake. If she acts up again once they're out of the apartment, it'll cause trouble for him while they're evading authorities. If she's going to call him Andy from hereon out, what's the point of running away with her. If she expects him to leverage keeping 'her secret,' he won't because it's for her sake.

Andrew rationalizes his attempt to control of Ashley's behavior as being for her sake. But really, isn't it him confining her behavior to something he can tolerate and personally handle?

I'd also like to point out that Andrew admits that he noticed Ashley push for calling him 'Andy' during the home invasion, and he did not argue with her on it while they held their parents hostage and readied to sacrifice them. We can infer that when Andrew calculates his use of violence, that can also factor when, where, and how he exerts it.

--

Well, that's where I can reasonably end this half of my word vomit! Now, onwards, to part 2!

[books]

Writer Spotlight: Elise Hu

We recently met with Elise Hu (@elisegoeseast) to discuss her illuminating title, Flawless—Lessons in Looks and Culture from the K-Beauty Capital. Elise is a journalist, podcaster, and media start-up founder. She’s the host of TED Talks Daily and host-at-large at NPR, where she spent nearly a decade as a reporter. As an international correspondent, she has reported stories from more than a dozen countries and opened NPR’s first-ever Seoul bureau in 2015. Previously, Elise helped found The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit digital start-up, after stops at many stations as a television news reporter. Her journalism work has won the national Edward R. Murrow and duPont Columbia awards, among others. An honors graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism, she lives in Los Angeles.

Can you begin by telling us a little bit about how Flawless came to be and what made you want to write about K-beauty?

It’s my unfinished business from my time in Seoul. Especially in the last year I spent living in Korea, I was constantly chasing the latest geopolitical headlines (namely, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s big moves that year). It meant I didn’t get to delve into my nagging frustrations of feeling second-class as an Asian woman in Korea and the under-reported experiences of South Korean women at the time. They were staging record-setting women’s rights rallies during my time abroad in response to a stark gender divide in Korea. It is one of the world’s most influential countries (and the 10th largest economy) and ranks shockingly low on gender equality metrics. That imbalance really shows up in what’s expected of how women should look and behave. Flawless explores the intersection of gender politics and beauty standards.

Flawless punctuates reportage with life writing, anchoring the research within your subjective context as someone who lived in the middle of it but also had an outside eye on it. Was this a conscious decision before you began writing? 

I planned to have fewer of my personal stories in the book, actually. Originally, I wanted to be embedded with South Korean women and girls who would illustrate the social issues I was investigating, but I wound up being the narrative thread because of the pandemic. The lockdowns and two years of long, mandatory quarantines in South Korea meant that traveling there and staying for a while to report and build on-the-ground relationships was nearly impossible. I also have three small children in LA, so the embedding plan was scuttled real fast.

One of the central questions the book asks of globalized society at large, corporations, and various communities is, “What is beauty for?” How has your response to this question changed while producing Flawless? 

I think I’ve gotten simultaneously more optimistic and cynical about it. More cynical in that the more I researched beauty, the more I understood physical beauty as a class performance—humans have long used it to get into rooms—more power in relationships, social communities, economically, or all of the above at once. And, as a class performance, those with the most resources usually have the most access to doing the work it takes (spending the money) to look the part, which is marginalizing for everyone else and keeps lower classes in a cycle of wanting and reaching. On the flip side, I’m more optimistic about what beauty is for, in that I have learned to separate beauty from appearance: I think of beauty in the way I think about love or truth, these universal—and largely spiritual—ideas that we all seek, that feed our souls. And that’s a way to frame beauty that isn’t tied in with overt consumerism or having to modify ourselves at all. 

This is your first book—has anything surprised you in the publishing or publicity process for Flawless?

I was most surprised by how much I enjoyed recording my own audiobook! I felt most in flow and joyful doing that more than anything else. Each sentence I read aloud was exactly the way I heard it in my head when I wrote it, which is such a privilege to have been able to do as an author.

Do you have a favorite reaction from a reader? 

I don’t know if it’s the favorite, but recency bias is a factor—I just got a DM this week from a woman writing about how the book helped put into words so much of what she felt and experienced, despite the fact she is not ethnically Korean, or in Korea, which is the setting of most of the book. It means a lot to me that reporting or art can connect us and illuminate shared experiences…in this case, learning to be more embodied and okay with however we look. 

As a writer, journalist, and mother—how did you practice self-care when juggling work commitments, social life, and the creative processes of writing and editing?

I juggled by relying on my loved ones. I don’t think self-care can exist without caring for one another, and that means asking people in our circles for help. A lot of boba dates, long walks, laughter-filled phone calls, and random weekend trips really got me through the arduous project of book writing (more painful than childbirth, emotionally speaking). 

What is your writing routine like, and how did the process differ from your other reporting work? Did you pick up any habits that you’ve held on to? 

My book writing routine was very meandering, whereas my broadcast reporting and writing are quite linear. I have tight deadlines for news, so it’s wham, bam, and the piece is out. With the book, I had two years to turn in a manuscript. I spent the year of lockdowns in “incubation mode,” where I consumed a lot of books, white papers, articles, and some films and podcasts, just taking in a lot of ideas to see where they might collide with each other and raise questions worth reporting on, letting them swim around in the swamp of my brain. When I was ready to write, I had a freelance editor, the indefatigable Carrie Frye, break my book outline into chunks so I could focus on smaller objectives and specific deadlines. Chunking the book so it didn’t seem like such a massive undertaking helped a lot. As for the writing, I never got to do a writer’s retreat or some idyllic cabin getaway to write. I wrote in the in-between moments—a one or two hour window when I had a break from the TED conference (which I attend every year as a TED host) or in those moments after the kids’ bedtime and before my own. One good habit I got into was getting away from my computer at midday. I’m really good about making lunch dates or going for a run to break up the monotony of staring at my screen all day long.

What’s good advice you’ve received about journalism that you would pass on to anyone just starting out?

All good reporting comes from great questions. Start with a clear question you seek to answer in your story, project, or book, and stay true to it and your quest to answer it. Once you are clear on what the thing is about, you won’t risk wandering too far from your focal point.

Thanks to Elise for answering our questions! You can follow her over at @elisegoeseast and check out her book Flawless here!