#will update if i find more scraps though

[lyril]

compilation (so far)

[felassan]

Cliff notes on the new info on Dragon Age: The Veilguard in today’s issue of Game Informer (magazine hub link):

Edit/update: I tidied up this post. ^^

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In CC you can customize things like shoulder width, chest size, glute size, hip width, how bloodshot your eyes are, nose crookedness, and more

There are hundreds of sliders for body proportions

CC detail: “Features like skin hue, tone, melanin”

There is nudity in DA:TV, “which I learned firsthand while customizing my Rook” in CC

Rook’s backstory also affects “reputation standing”, along with the other previously-known things like in-game dialogue etc

Lords of Fortune are pirate-themed, “piratic”

Rook ascends because of competency, not because of a magical McGuffin, contrasting with the 'destiny-has-chosen you’ angle DA:I has for the Inquisitor

Rook is here because they chose to be, “and that speaks to the kind of character that we’ve built. Someone needs to stop this, and Rook says, ‘I guess that’s me'”

The 4 voices we can choose for Rook each have a pitch shifter in CC

The game starts inside the bar (as previously detailed in other coverage)

In some dialogue wheels there is a “romantically inclined ‘emotional’ response” option. These are the replies that will build relationships with characters, romantic and platonic alike, but you can ignore them if you want to. Giving a companion the cold shoulder might nudge them into another companion’s embrace however

Bellara’s surname is Lutara

In the streets of Minrathous (in the opening segment of the game), there is a wide, winding pathway with a pub which has a dozen NPCs in it (is this The Swan tavern?)

The devs used the DA:TV CC to make each in-world NPC, except for specific characters like companions

There is smart use of verticality, scaling and wayfinding in the gameplay

If you play as e.g. a qunari Rook, the camera adjusts to ensure larger characters like them loom over those below. The camera also adjusts appropriately for dwarves to demonstrate their smaller stature

Neve Gallus is described as being capable

The Venatori Cultists we fight in the opening segment of the game are seizing the chaos caused by the demons unleashed by Solas’ ritual to try and take the opportunity to take over the city

As you traverse deeper and deeper into Solas’ hideout, more of his murals appear on the walls, and things 'get more elven'. Rhodes says “this is because you’re symbolically going back in time, as Minrathous is a city built by mages on the bones of what was originally the home of the elves”

At the heart of Solas’ hideout is his personal eluvian

Demons are fully redesigned in this game, on their original premise as creatures of feeling that live and die off the emotions around them. “As such, they are just a floating nervous system, pushed into this world from the Fade, rapidly assembled into bodies out of whatever scraps they find”

In the opening, we stop Solas’ ritual and save the world. “For now” anyways. Rook passes out moments later and wakes up in a dream-like landscape to the voice of Solas. He explains that a few drops of Rook’s blood interacted with the ritual, connecting them to the Fade forever. (I guess this is why they said in the Discord Q&A on June 14th that Rook has good reasons to want to avoid blood magic)

He also says that he was attempting to move Elgar’nan and Ghilan’nain (confirming who the two Evil Gods are) to a new prison, because the one he had previously constructed was failing. Unfortunately, Solas is trapped in the Fade by our doing, and the two gods are now free. “It’s up to Rook to stop them”, thus setting the stage for our adventure

Rook wakes up after this with Harding and Neve “in the lair of the Dread Wolf himself”, a special magical realm in the Fade called The Lighthouse. It’s a towering structure centered amongst various floating islands. This is where the team bonds, grows, and prepares for its adventures. It becomes more functional and homier as you do. “Already, though, it’s a beautifully distraught headquarters for the Veilguard, although they aren’t quite referring to themselves as that just yet”.

Because it was Solas’ home base, it's gaudy, with his fresco murals adorning various walls, greenery hanging from above, and hues of purple and touches of gold everywhere. Since it’s in the Fade, which is a realm of dreams that responds to your world state and emotion, the Lighthouse “reflects the chaos and disrepair of the Thedas you were in moments ago”

Clock symbols over dialogue icons signal optional dialogue options

At this point you can head over to Neve, engage in dialogue, and try and flirt with her

There is a dining hall in the Lighthouse. A plate, cutlery and a drinking chalice are at the end of a massive table. Matt Rhodes says that this is a funny and sad look at Solas’ isolated existence, and an example of the detail BioWare’s art team has put into DA:TV. “It’s like when you go to a friend’s house and see their bedroom for the first time; you get to learn more about them”

There is also a library, which is the central area of the The Lighthouse. It’s here that the party will often regroup and prepare for what’s next

The team decides that it must reach the ritual site back in Arlathan Forest. Corinne Busche said that the writer was "missing unique dialogue options here because I’m qunari; an elf would have more to say about the Fade due to their connection to it. The same goes for my backstory earlier in Minrathous. If I had picked the Shadow Dragons background, Neve would have recognized me immediately, with unique dialogue”

The team decide their next move. They go to Solas’ eluvian and back through to the ritual site in Arlathan Forest. However, it’s not fully functional without Solas, and while it returns them to the Forest, it’s not exactly where they want to go. Then a demon-infested suit of mechanized armor known as a Sentinel attacks them, and two NPCs appear to save you: the Veil Jumpers Strife and Irelin. Harding recognizes them, which you would expect if you read the comic Dragon Age: The Missing. They are experts in ancient elven magic. A cutscene ensues and we learn that Strife and Irelin need help finding Bellara Lutara. This cutscene is long and has multiple dialogue options.

“There’s a heavy emphasis on storytelling and dialogue, and it feels deep and meaty, like a good fantasy novel. BioWare doesn’t shy away from minutes-long cutscenes”

For Rook, this story is about what does it mean to be a leader? We define their leadership style with our choices. “From the sound of it, my team will react to my chosen leadership style in how my relationships play out.” This is demonstrated within the game’s dialogue and a special relationship meter on each character’s companion screen

Bellara is deep within Arlathan Forest, and following the events of the prologue, something is up here. Three rings of massive rocks fly through the air, protecting what appears to be a central fortress. Demon Sentinels plague the surrounding lands.

In gameplay/combat, players complete every swing in real time. Special care was taken in development for animation swing-through and cancelling. We can dash, parry, charge moves, and a completely revamped healing system that allows us to use potions at our discretion by hitting right on the d-pad. You can combo attacks and even ‘bookmark’ combos with a quick dash, which means that you can pause a combo’s status with a dash to safety and continue the rest of the combo afterward

Abilities can be used to customize your kit. They can be used on the fly as long as you account for cooldowns

When you pause and pull up the ability Wheel, it highlights you and your companions’ skills. There you can choose abilities, queue them, target specific enemies, and strategize with synergies and combos

Each character plays the same in that you execute light and heavy attacks with the same buttons, use abilities with the same buttons, and interact with the combo wheel in the same way, regardless of which class you select

Sword and shield warriors can hip-fire or aim their shield and throw it like Captain America

Warriors can parry incoming attacks which can stagger enemies. Rogues have a larger parry window. The mage the writer played couldn’t parry at all. Instead they throw up a shield that blocks incoming attacks automatically, so long as you have the mana to maintain it

On the start/pause screen: it has the map, journal, character sheets, skill tree, and a library for lore information. You can use it to cross-compare equipment and equip new gear for Rook and their companions, build weapon loadouts for quick change-ups mid-combat, and customize you and your party’s abilities and builds via an easy-to-understand skill tree. There aren’t in-depth minutiae, just "real numbers". For example, an unlocked trait might increase damage by 25 percent against armor, but that’s as in-depth as the numbers get. Passive abilities unlock jump attacks and guarantee critical hit opportunities, while abilities add moves like a Wall of Fire to your arsenal if you’re a mage. As you spec out this skill tree, which is 100 percent bespoke to each class, you’ll work closer to unlocking a spec, complete with a unique ultimate ability

“Sentinels and legions of darkspawn”

Combat is flashy and quick, with different types of health bars. Greenish-blue represents a barrier, which is taken down most effectively with ranged attacks

The game is gorgeous, with sprinkles, droplets, and splashes of magic in each attack a mage unleashes

The game looks amazing on consoles both in fidelity and performance modes

The mission to find Bellara is called “In Entropy’s Grasp”. You find her. She is the first companion you recruit (as Neve auto-joins). If your background is Veil Jumper, you get unique dialogue here with Bellara. She explains that everyone there is all trapped in a Veil Bubble, and there’s no way out once you pass through it. Despite the dire situation, she is bubbly, witty, and charming. She is spunky and effervescent

Companions are the faces of their factions, and in this case with Bellara, their entire area of the world. She is our window into Arlathan Forest. She is described as a sweetheart and a nerd for ancient elven artifacts, which is why she’s dressed more like an academic than a combatant. Her special arm gauntlet is useful both for tinkering with her environment and taking down enemies. While Neve uses ice magic and can slow time with a special ability, Bellara specializes in electricity, and she can also use magic to heal you. Her electric magic is effective against Sentinels. “However, without Bellara, we could also equip a rune that converts my ice magic, for a brief duration, into electricity to counter the Sentinels”

If you don’t direct your companions in combat, they are fully independent and will attack on their own

You progress at this point through the Forest, encountering more and more darkspawn. Bellara says that they have never been this far before because the underground Deep Roads, which they usually escape from, aren’t nearby. However, with “blighted” (BLIGHTED!) elven gods roaming the world, and thanks to the Blight’s radiation-like spread, it’s a much bigger threat in DA:TV than any prior DA game

The Forest has elven ruins, dense greenery and disgusting Blight tentacles and pustules

The style of the game is more high fantasy than anything in the series thus far and almost reminiscent of the whimsy of Fable. Matt Rhodes says that this is the result of the game’s newfound dose of magic: “The use of magic has been an evolution as the series has gone on. It’s something we’ve been planning for a while because Solas has been planning all this for a while. In the past, you could hint at cooler magical things in the corner because you couldn’t actually go there, but now we actually can, and it’s fun to showcase that.” The Forest’s whimsy will starkly contrast to the game’s other areas. The devs promise some grim locations and even grimmer story moments because, without that contrast, everything falls flat. Corinne says it’s like a “thread of optimism” pulled through otherworldly chaos ravaging Thedas. At this point in the game, Bellara’s personality is that thread

We can advance our bonds with our companions on their own personal quests and by including them in our party on main quests. Every Relationship Level you rank up, shown on their character sheet, nets you a skill point to spend on them. “The choices you make, what you say to companions, how you help them, and more all matter to their development as characters and party members”. Each companion has access to 5 abilities.

Each companion has issues, problems, and personal quests to complete. “Bellara has her own story arc that runs parallel to and informs the story path you’re on” (They’ve said that all of the companions have this too in previous promo material)

You progress deeper into the forest and Bellara spots a floating fortress and thinks that the artifact needed to destroy the Veil Bubble is in there. To reach it, we must remove the floating rock rings, and Bellara’s unique ability, Tinker, can do just that by interacting with a piece of ancient elven technology nearby. Rook can acquire abilities like Tinker later to complete such tasks in instances where Bellara, for example, isn’t in the party

Bellara has to activate three of these in the Forest to reach the castle. Each one you activate brings forth a bunch of Sentinels, demons, and darkspawn to defeat

You can create Arcane Bombs on enemies. It does high damage after being hit by a heavy attack

It sounds like mage characters can charge heavy attacks on their magical staffs. “then switch to magical daggers in a second loadout accessed with a quick tap of down on the d-pad to unleash some quick attacks”

Some enemies are “Frenzied”, meaning that they hit harder, move faster, and have more health

After a few more combat sections, including against a Frenzied sentinel, we reach the center of the temple. In there is an artifact called the Nadas Dirthalen. Bellara knows that this means “the inevitability of knowledge”. Before we can progress, a darkspawn ogre boss attacks, hitting hard with unblockable, red-coded attacks and a massive shield that you need to take down first. It is weak to fire

After defeating it (it’s a climactic arena fight), Bellara uses a special crystal to power the artifact and remove it from the pedestal, which destroys the Veil Bubble. Then, the Nadas Dirthalen comes alive as an Archive Spirit, but because the crystal used to power it breaks, we learn little about this spirit before it disappears. Bellara thinks that she can fix it (fixing broken stuff is her thing), so the group heads back to the Veil Jumper camp. The writer’s demo then ended.

The design of the game is not open world. The devs describe it as a “hub-and-spoke” design where the needs of the story are served by the level design. A version of DA:I’s Crossroads return (the network of teleporting eluvians) and this is how players will traverse across northern Thedas. “Instead of a connected open world, players will travel from eluvian to eluvian to different stretches of this part of the continent”. e.g. Minrathous, tropical beaches, Arlathan Forest, “to grim and gothic areas and elsewhere”. Some of these areas are large and full of secrets and treasures. Others are smaller and more focused on linear storytelling. Arlathan Forest is an example of this, but it still has optional paths and offshoots to explore for loot, healing potion refreshes, and other things.

Each location has a minimap, though linear levels like In Entropy’s Grasp won’t have the 'fog of war' that disappears as you explore like in some of the game’s bigger locations

The game has the largest number of diverse biomes in DA history

The Thedas of DA:TV “lives in the uncertainty”. “the mystery of its narrative”, “the implications of its lore”

The writer is surprised by BioWare’s command over the notoriously difficult Frostbite engine, and by how much narrative thought the dev team poured into these characters, even for BioWare.

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[source: the Game Informer pages from Issue 367 - the cover story from June 18th (link), two]

[theduckeminence]

I can’t stop thinking about Eddie Dear y’all.

First off, the probable reason behind what had occurred to him is most likely due to him being scrapped/taken off the script of the show is just both saddening and dreadful on his part. Like he exists within the realm of the Neighborhood, but considering his absence throughout the recent update, aside from him giving the viewers a decoder + clips of him throughout the Home-warming ad compilation, its safe to say that Playfellow Workshop had most likely taken off him of the show, or at the very least, lessening the amount of screen time he receive (in this case being the ads/commercials).

And now onto the actual possible reason why Eddie Dear would be taken off script. Now thinking back to the fact that Eddie & Frank being a couple is canon, it’s also safe to say that because of their connection in the show — even though Playfellow Workshop attempts to have them be distant or lack any sort of significant interaction onscreen — Eddie & Frank’s relationship, or at least Eddie’s love for Frank, could certainly be the reason why the he was taken off script.

After all, if two male characters are shown to be gay for each other in a kids show from the 1970s, chances are Playfellow Workshop would rather scrap the homosexual (derogatory) mailman character than have Welcome Home be taken off the air entirely just because of said mailman character.

Furthermore, what’s more interesting and ironic about Eddie being a prominent character who became intensively aware of his situation is the fact that he first appears to be a character who could be considerably perceived as“insignificant” or “irrelevant.” Of course I don’t actually think he is, but from the way Playfellow Workshop and the Homewarming commercials are framed Eddie, it can be interpreted that Eddie is seen as a rather character of little relevance.

It is partially due to him being taken script, but it’s also the fact that his only thing going on for him is being the mailman for the neighborhood — as well as a bit of a comedic relief. Eddie said himself in the Homewarming video from the secret site — if I’m correct, he feels that nobody appreciates him enough for his work (though correct me if I’m wrong). And that since there’s no one there to ask him to deliver something, or call, or check up on him, he feels as though that — somewhere inside of him — he feels both left out and “irrelevant.”

His one role is to be the neighborhood delivery man, and without that, then what exactly would he be good for?

(this could further be emphasized when Sally told him that they made the deliveries for him to give him a day off — even though no one told him that, and chances are this is perhaps Sally trying to reassure him when in reality, he was just scripted out of Homewarming hence why no one came to talk to him. Getting lil off topic oops—).

Recircling back to the original topic, yada yada yada Eddie just being a mailman and besides that he views himself to be irrelevant so on and so forth.

One thing I would like to mention, relating to Eddie being the probable first of the group to become aware other than Wally, is that I find it surprising that Eddie Dear IS the probable first to become aware like Wally.

To tell y’all the truth, I didn’t think he would play such a significant role in the Narrative (and thus probably doomed by it too). I would have least thought Frank or Julie would have been next to become the more Self Aware.

But Eddie Dear? Our loveable, friendly, and reliable mailman — Eddie Dear? Suddenly depersonalizing right on the spot with a pea plate and becoming aware of both his sentience, the weirdness of his setting overall, and how he could hear Home’s heartbeat? How he knew that the moment he comes to this revelation of self-awareness, he can’t go back? That everything he has ever known is most probably not real and/or all a lie?

It just has me stopping for a second on why and how him, but after thinking about it furthermore, alongside reading analysis posts, it would make sense for him to be next on why he had become Aware.

And I can only assume that from here on out, things are bound to change. And I for one fear these colorful lil puppets — particularly Eddie in this case.

Lets just hope the existential dread doesn’t drive all of them over the edge.

[dollmini]

ㅤ ⊹ ࣪ ˖ never really moved on ⟢ ot5

SYNOPSIS you’ve been told many times before that feelings never go away—specifically romantic ones. that crushes simply go dormant until something rekindles the spark in your heart. unfortunately for you, all five of your prior crushes make their grand return in your life at the same time.

WARNINGS all fics contain sexual content. individual warnings will be placed for each individual fic. each fic is set in present with flashbacks and back story added in.

GENRE nsfw, minors dni, “to all the boys i’ve loved before” au, university au, american au

NOTES i am going to take my time writing these fics, as they will likely be long fics. at the same time, i will also be trying to multitask other projects. please be patient with me and don’t hound me for updates. they will be posted as soon as i finish them. thank you.

FEATURING CAST belle shim, yang jungwon, byun euijoo, oh haewon, keum donghyun

PROLOGUE

TO THE BOY WHO WAS MY SEATMATE

SYNOPSIS first day of tenth grade, high school, english class. that’s where you met taesan. your high school was rather large, and your english class was on the furthest end from your previous class. you were running late that day, and the only empty seat was in the back next to the reserved boy with black hair, who you came to know and love as dongmin—taesan, he preferred. the two of you were one in the same, but he moved away the following year. you never expect to see him again, let alone be as close to him, until your university teams up with another for a summer-long camp for teens, and you both end up being counselors there.

WARNINGS tba

POST DATE tba

TO THE BOY WHO WAS MY FIRST KISS

SYNOPSIS back then it was seventh grade, only just thirteen years old and just now really getting interested in crushes. park sungho was a friend of a friend—one you’d always thought was cute. it was just a quick kiss as a dare at a friends’ birthday party. now, it’s university, twenty-something years old, the group meets up again, and sungho is as beautiful as ever.

WARNINGS tba

POST DATE tba

TO THE BOY WHO WAS MY FIRST DANCE PARTNER

SYNOPSIS your best friend begged you to sign up for a dance class with her, claiming that now that you were transitioning into secondary school, you couldn’t be lame now and not have a hobby. the only problem was that you couldn’t dance and never had an interest in it. that was until you were paired with lee sanghyeok, at least. it was fun, but you and your best friend quickly found out that it wasn’t for you, and ended up quitting. sanghyeok, though, continued and that’s how you find yourself watching his performance years later after being dragged out by your friends.

WARNINGS tba

POST DATE tba

TO THE BOY WHO WAS MY FIRST LOVE

SYNOPSIS donghyun was your everything. the two of you met through mutual friends—namely taesan—and it blossomed into something more. it was your first serious relationship, and you were almost certain he would’ve been the one you married. however, toward the end of your senior year, the both of you grew apart and eventually decided to break up. it was hard, but ultimately it was for the best. you had made peace with it. that is until you run into him again in the fall, much like when your relationship first started.

WARNINGS tba

POST DATE tba

TO THE BOY WHO WAS MY NEIGHBOR

SYNOPSIS most of the people living in your quiet neighborhood were elderly with adult children or new parents with young children. myung jaehyun was the only one close to your age. in turn, he became a close friend—one you often spent most of your time with outside of school. but when your parents divorced in your freshman year of high school, your bond and subsequent crush on jaehyun fizzled out until it was scraps of what it used to be. however, it felt like nothing had changed when you step foot back into the neighborhood when you were on winter break. nothing at all.

WARNINGS tba

POST DATE tba

EPILOGUE

[cosyvelvetorchid]

Fear. (Angsty plz😊)

I’ve combined two prompts here because they both played into an idea I had for a fic.

It’s a little more on the whump side than angsty but I hope you’ll both enjoy them anyway.

Thank you 🩶

****

They knew it would happen eventually. Statistically it was an inevitably. They were born firefighters - men whose purpose in life was to walk into danger to save others.

Every good firefighter has a healthy level of fear doing the job. A fearless firefighter is a dangerous firefighter. A firefighter with no fear doesn’t respect the danger they’re in and can make reckless decisions that put their lives, and others lives, at risk.

Though Tommy and Buck both had that healthy level of fear, they each knew that it was an inevitability that they both, at some point, would get injured. Which is why, when things began to get serious between them - which was quicker than either of them had expected, they’d made sure to have conversations about each of their wishes should something happen.

They made sure to prepare as much as they could for when something did happened to one of them.

However, they’d both assumed they’d get injured on the job.

They were wrong.

*

Athena raced down the street after the suspect vehicle. The car thief was weaving dangerously through traffic; near miss after near miss.

As the vehicle approached a cross section, Athena prayed he would slow down. But he didn’t. He drove through it full speed, T-boning another vehicle with such force it flipped multiple times before somehow landing upright 50 feet away.

Athena hit the brakes and jumped out of her car and ran towards the accident calling into her radio.

“Dispatch this is 727-L30. Suspect vehicle has crashed into another vehicle at the cross section of Main and 7th. We need R.A units this location. I’m approaching the suspect vehicle now.”

She drew her weapon, holding it pointed down as she stepped slowly toward the drivers side. Immediately she could tell that that the man’s injuries were severe. She reached through the open window and placed two fingers on three man’s neck.

“Dispatch, Suspect is deceased. I’m checking on the other vehicle occupants now.” She quickly ran to the other vehicle. Dents and scraps covered the entire car. The windshield and both driver and passenger windows so badly cracked that she couldn’t see through them. She tried to open the drivers door but the roof had bent in too much jamming it in place. She ran around to the passenger side and was able to open that door.

That’s when she saw the occupants of the car.

“Oh my god.”

For a second she was immobilised. How would she tell Bobby? Thankfully she was pulled out of her stupor by a woman running up to her.

“I’m a nurse.” She said.

“Can you get in the back and check the drivers pulse?” The woman ran around the car and thankfully was able to open the back drivers side door. Athena reached for man’s neck in front of her, praying she’d find a pulse. She blew out a breath when she felt it.

“I got a pulse! It’s strong.”

“This guy has a pulse but it’s really weak. He’s in really bad shape, sergeant.” The nurse called out.

“Help is on the way ma’am.” She lifted her radio up to her mouth.

“Dispatch this is 727-L30. Update on the vehicle collision on main and 7th.” She prayed that it wouldn’t be Maddie taking the call and was relieved to hear Josh’s voice.

“Go ahead.”

“We have 2 male occupants ages 33 and 40 with severe injuries… Josh is Maddie anywhere near you right now?”

“No, Sergeant she’s on her lunch break.”

“Good. The victims are.. Evan Buckley and Thomas Kinard.”

There was a beat before Josh responded.

“Copy that sergeant. Can you update on the status of the victims?”

“What’s your name?” She asked the nurse, who was behind Tommy seat with her hands stabilising his head.

“Sarah.”

“Okay Sarah, from what you can assess from where you are now how bad are their injuries?”

“This guys pulse is weak and getting weaker. He’s got lacerations to his face and arms from the glass, a probably broken nose form the air bag, and obvious dislocated right shoulder and I would hazard a guess at some serious internal bleeding from the steering wheel.” Sergeant if you could help stabilise this man’s head I can check the other guy out.” Athena nodded and took over holding Tommys head.

“This guy has the same cuts and the same probable broken nose, and judging by the lump and blood on the leg of his sweat pants im guessing compound fracture of his right leg.”

Athena relayed the information back to Josh and Sarah took over holding Tommys head still.

“Copy that sergeant. And I will inform the.. family member.”

She took out her phone, called the number and took a deep breath and she put the phone to her ear.

“Bobby?”

*

Maddie rushed into the waiting area to find Chim, Hen, Bobby, Eddie and Lucy as She immediately ran to Chim who embraced her in a hug.

“Where’s Jee?” He asked

“She with Mrs Lee. Do we know anything yet?” Tears were already filling her eyes threatening their escape.

“Vehicle thief drove through a cross section and t-boned them. We’re still waiting on an update.”

“What about the person that hit him?” She asked.

“Dead.” Athena’s voice came from behind. “Any news yet?”

Bobby shook his head. “Not yet.”

“Guys..” Lucy pointed to a doctor walking towards them.

“Evan Buckley?”

“That’s us.” Maddie walked over to him with everyone else coming behind.

“Are you family?

“Sister. How is he?” Her voice was trembling. She’d been in this position twice before (his injuries when he was younger not withstanding) and the third time is not any easier.

“Evan sustained a concussion, and the metal rod in his leg snapped and broke through the skin, which we need to go in and replace, probably tomorrow morning. He’s also got a small laceration on his forehead and some minor cuts and bruises.”

“So, he’s gonna be alright? Eddie asked.

“We’ll need to monitor his concussion, and barring any complications with the surgery, he should be able to go home in maybe a week.”

You could feel the tension in the room release a bit at hearing the doctor’s words. But they couldn’t relax just yet.

“Any news on Tommy? Uh, Thomas Kinard?” Lucy asked. “I’m emergency contact if Bu— Evan is unavailable.” The doctor’s face turned more serious.

“Thomas has more serious injuries. A large amount of internal bleeding and a dislocated shoulder are the biggest injures as well as a broken nose and also cuts and bruises. We’re closely monitoring his internal bleeding and we’ll likely have to go in with surgery to fix the bleeding later today.”

“Jesus.” Eddie said running his fingers through his hair.

“Can we see either of them?” Bobby asked.

“Evan can have one visitor at a time and be warned he’s on some heavy meds so if he’s awake he’ll be quite a bit sluggish.” The doctor informed them. “As far as Thomas goes at the moment he’s not up for visitors, right now. Tomorrow perhaps once we have a clearer picture of his health.”

“Doctor, does my brother know about Tommy?”

“Not as yet. He’s been pretty in and out of consciousness because of the meds. It’s probably best if you’re the one to tell him.”

“I will keep you updated on Thomas.” He said to Lucy.

“Thanks.”

“Would you like to see Evan first? I’ll take you too him.”

“Yes, please.” Maddie said and followed him down the corridor.

Maddie was immediately reminded of when his leg was crushed by the engine . Lying on the bed, bandaged up and half asleep. The difference this time is all the cuts and bruises decorated his body.

She pulled a chair over and sat down taking his hand. The sensation of which woke him.

“Tom… Tommy?”

“No, sweetie it’s Maddie.” She rubbed his hand.

“Where’s… Tommy?” His eyes were opening and closing heavily.

“Do you remember what happened?” She asked.

“Sort of… car acc-accident… leg hurts.”

“That’s right. You and Tommy were in a car accident. The metal rod in your leg snapped so the doctors need to go in and replace it.”

“Blood clots.”

“Don’t worry. The doctors are aware of the blood clots from your old screws. They’ll give you different ones.”

“S’good… where’s To-tommy? He turned his face to Maddie but he still couldn’t keep his eyes open for longer than 2 or 3 seconds at a time.

“Buck.. Uh, Tommy.. The doctors are taking really good care of him.” Was all she could think of saying to reassure him.

“How bad?” He mumbled.

“He’s going to be fine, Buck.” She told him but her tone of voice was far too high and Buck knew her well enough to know she was deflecting.

“Maddie.. truth.”

Maddie sighed. “He has pretty bad internal bleeding. They’re taking him to surgery later.”

Bucks heart rate monitor gave away his biggest fear and tears pooled in his eyes. “Can’t..lose him.. mad..”

“I know, I know.” She took his hand in both of hers. “But we’re going to stay positive and we’re going to believe that he is going to make it through, okay.”

*

“How is he?” Bobby asked Maddie

“Physically he’ll be fine, but he’s terrified he’s going to lose Tommy. The doctors won’t let him see him before either of them go in for their surgeries.”

“What? Why?” Eddie asked

“It’s his leg. They have to keep it stable until they can fix it - they can’t risk moving him.” She explained. Eddie nodded, understanding. Then an idea flashed across his mind.

“I’ll be right back.” He quickly walked away.

He knocked on Doctor Salazar’s door and waited to be told to come in.

“Mr Diaz. It’s nice to see you. How are you? No more panic attacks I hope?”

“Uh, no. No, I’m good, thanks. I’m not actually here for me - I have a favour to ask..”

*

“Is he ready?” Eddie asked Maddie on the phone.

“Yeah, but this has to be quick - he’s refused his pain meds so he’s not groggy so he’s in quite a bit of pain.”

“That’s fine Doctor Salazar only managed to get us 5 minutes anyway. Give the phone to Buck.” Maddie handed the phone to him. “Okay bud, I’m putting the phone to Tommys ear now, give me a sec.”

He propped his phone up as close as he could to Tommys ear.

“You’re good to go, Buck. I’ll come back in a couple of minutes.” He left to stand outside Bucks room.

“I’m gonna go get a coffee.” Maddie told Buck and left the room. Buck took a deep breath trying to push past the pain so he could speak.

“Hey, you. I hate that we have to talk over the phone but the doctors won’t let me come see you until they fix my leg. I wish I could be there holding your hand so you could feel me. You’re going into surgery in a few minutes and I just.. I need you to know that..” He sniffed and wiped his eyes “that-that.. the last 7 months with you have been the most incredible of my life. And I’m not ready to give any of that up. I love you so much, Tommy. More than I thought I could ever love a person. You.. you need to come back to me okay? Come back to all of us. You have a home, now. With all of us. With me, with Eddie and Christopher, with Chim and my sister and Jee, With Bobby and Athena, and Hen and Karen and Denny and Mara.. we all need you back here. So-so you get through this surgery, okay. Because I want us both to be there when we tell everyone we’re getting married. I love you sweetheart.” He hung the phone up

Maddie had arrived back and he waved through the window to her. Before she’d made it to his bed he was already breaking down. She leaned over and held him tightly.

“I can’t lose him, Maddie. I can’t.”

“I know, Buck. I know.”

*

3 days later Buck was sat in a wheelchair at Tommys bedside; the rod in his leg having been replaced. Tommy had come through his surgery and the doctors said this prognosis was good. But he still hasn’t woken up yet.

Buck had been insistent that Tommy not be left alone. If he wasn’t being ordered to his own room, he’d be there by Tommys bedside all day.

He’d spent most of the time just talking to Tommy. Updating him on his leg, telling him funny stories of the 118, trying to keep things positive. But the more time went on the more frustrated he was getting that Tommy hasn’t woken up.

“Come on, babe. You have to wake up. I miss you. Everyone mis-“ He felt a delicate squeeze of his hand. “Tommy?”

Tommy breathed heavy and a very light hum sound came from his mouth.

“Tommy, baby I’m here!” He squeezed his hand tight. Tommy swallowed and opened his mouth. It took his a few tries to find his voice.

“Ev..Evan”

“I’m here, baby. I’m here. God you scared me.” He admitted. “How are you feeling?”

“Ouch.” Was all he could muster. Buck let out a tear-filled chuckle as he felt a whoosh of relief flow through him. Tommy managed to open his eyes and turned his head to Buck, his brow furrowing as he saw his injuries.

“You okay? What.. happened?” He sluggishly reached out to touch Bucks face, gently caressing the cuts on his cheek.

“Car accident. Some guy hit us on the drive home from our weekend away. Docs had to replace the rod in my leg but I’m alright. I’ll be back to normal in a month or two.”

“Good.” Tommy said with a relieved sigh. “What about.. me?”

“Uh, you had some pretty serious internal bleeding. They managed to fix it, thankfully. You also dislocated your shoulder. And your face is pretty bruised up.”

“Still think.. I’m handsome?” He asked. Buck was relieved that he still had his sense of humour.

“If it wasn’t for my leg I’d be in that bed showing you how handsome you are.” He teased. Tommy tried to laugh and groaned at the pain. “Oh God I’m sorry. I’ll call a nurse and get you some pain meds.”

“No, wait a minute. I just want.. you for a minute.”

“I’m not going anywhere, babe.” Tommy held Bucks hand tight, his thumb caressed his fingers.

“Where’s your ring? He asked

“Hidden in my room.”

“Hidden?” He asked confused. “Why are.. you hiding it?”

“The docs took it off and I didn’t want to put it back on yet. Not until you’re better and we can tell everyone together.” He lifted Tommys hand up to kiss his knuckles.

“You.. don’t have to.. wait.”

“Yes I do. This is an important moment for both of us. So both of us should be part of it. It’s okay though, we have plenty of time. Just need you to get better first.” Tommy reached up again and cupped Bucks face.

“I can’t wait to marry you, Evan Buckley.”

“I can’t wait to marry you either.”

[just-jordie-things]

[part eleven] to build a home - gojo satoru

word count: 7.4k warnings: !!manga spoilers!! swearing, jjk-verse style fighting series summary: when (y/n) (y/l/n) catches wind that the notorious sorcerer killer, toji fushiguro, has children, she makes it her personal mission to find them. the catch being she couldn't tell a soul about them- the risk of the zen'in clan learning about them was too great. keeping the secret isn't the hard part, it's lying to her friends, shoko ieiri, geto suguru, and of course gojo satoru, that she struggles with. especially when satoru has suddenly become so keen on keeping an eye on her lately.

series masterlist

[part eleven] : “Brazil” ___

(y/n) woke up to six texts the next morning, which was a lot, but not as many as she was expecting after a huge fight with one of her supposed best friends.  A part of her wanted to shut her phone off and keep it that way for the day, knowing that today was going to be stressful enough without the technology keeping anyone updated every second of every day.  The thought was brief, knowing she couldn’t actually ignore the world.  But she could daydream about it.

Three texts from Shoko, two from Tsumiki, and one from Suguru.

Deciding to open the messages from Tsumiki first, she opened the photo attachment.  This proved to be the right first choice, seeing the bunny shaped pancakes that Tsumiki made for herself and Megumi that morning.  She saved the photo to her phone right away.

[tsumiki]: megumi said they’re almost better than yours!

(y/n) smiled at the message, and typed back a quick reply.

[(y/n)]: looks cuter than mine :)

(y/n) got out of bed and finally got to work on her morning routine, partially to distract her from the other messages, and partially to give herself some time to figure out how to respond to them.

It was the right thing, pushing Satoru away, even though she had to be cruel to do so.  To his heart, and hers.  If she didn’t, he would only make it harder for her to keep her secret, and if he got involved… (y/n) could barely stand to think about it.  The Zen’ins were a force to be reckoned with, Shoko’s words came to mind often.  And Satoru had already had a run-in with them, even if it was just Toji.

‘Just Toji’ had done a lot of damage, she recalled the night in the kitchen those few months ago, the scar on Satoru’s throat would be burned in her memory for life.  Even if it was gone now, it almost killed him.  He almost killed him.

So despite her broken heart, and despite the way her entire body ached when she thought about what she’d said to him yesterday, (y/n) had to keep Satoru out of this.

If she played her cards right, she could protect everyone.  Tsumiki, Megumi, and Satoru.  She could keep them all safe and under her protection, she just needed a little more time to figure out just the right steps to take to do so.  If they could all be patient for a little while longer…

Once she was cleaned up and dressed in her neat uniform, (y/n) finally opened the messages from Shoko.

[shoko<3]: are you okay? satoru said you guys had a fight [shoko<3]: he didn’t tell us any details, but he seemed pretty upset. [shoko<3]: it’s not like you guys to fight like that. i just want to make sure you’re ok

(y/n) huffed.  She didn’t want to push Shoko away like she had to with Satoru, and she didn’t think she’d have to.  Her and Suguru had always given her more space than the Six Eyes user, but given the circumstances, she supposed it made sense for Shoko to reach out like this.  Satoru was her friend too.

Although it was odd that he hadn’t jumped at the opportunity to tell them the nasty details of what she’d said to him.

[(y/n)]: just a fight. no big deal.

She winces as she sends the message, knowing it wasn’t going to ease Shoko’s worry in the slightest.  It was barely scraps of what really happened.

[(y/n)]: i’m sorry i worried you, but i’m ok.  see you in class, i got a new assignment to tell you about :)

It was redirection at it’s finest, and surely Shoko would see right through it, but (y/n) hoped it was enough for now to downplay the situation and keep Shoko from having any interest in it.

All this time, and she’d still barely learned how to tell a convincing lie.

With that, she opened the last message.

[suguru]: let’s meet before class.

She paused longer on his single, context-less text than she had with Shoko’s.  Surely he wanted to give her an earful on how she’d treated his best friend, and surely it was going to be just as cruel, if not worse.  But when Suguru wanted information about something, he wasn’t as easy to distract as Shoko was.  He wasn’t going to accept a cigarette as a peace offering and pretend it never happened.  He was bound to be upset.

If Yaga wouldn’t have her ass for it, she’d skip classes altogether and avoid all three of them.  She could use the extra training time before she left tomorrow, or maybe she could check in again with the Fushiguro kids.  Anything would be better than facing any one of them.

She decides Suguru is the lesser of three evils.

[(y/n)]: alright.  coffee in the kitchen? ten min?

Her fingers tremble against the side of her leg as she walks through the halls, hoping not to run into anyone as she beelines for the small kitchen off the common room.  Today’s an odd day that she’s grateful there aren’t many jujutsu sorcerers in the world, and much less at this school.

She’s there five minutes after she’d texted Suguru, and to her surprise, he’s already there too.

“You and I have always been the punctual ones,” He muses when she enters.  He turns away from her to pour a cup of coffee.  “I’ve always appreciated that about you”

“I appreciate that about you, too” (y/n) replies, and even though it’s the truth, she sounds disingenuous.  Even her honest moments started to sound like shitty lies these days.

She hadn’t braced herself for what was to come, but even if she’d tried, no amount of time would have been enough.  This was the part where Suguru tells her everything she already knew- that she was a terrible person, and a terrible friend.  Her fingers tap against her leg without any rhythm.  Just fast.

“I wanted to ask you something,” Suguru says, casting a glance over his shoulder at her as he finishes off the warm drink with cream and sugar.  “You can sit if you want, might be a few minutes”

“I don’t mind standing.  I’m a bit on edge, I’m sure you understand” She tells him honestly.  Suguru nods.

“I do.  I have to admit, I’ve been feeling the same way lately.  Just… off,”

It’s quiet between them for a minute, until he turns to face her, handing her the cup of coffee he’d finished.

“Two creams, two sugars” He tells her with a smile.

(y/n) can’t help a small smile back as she takes it, thanking him quietly.  It was thoughtful of him to remember exactly how she took her coffee, but as nice as the gesture was, the bitter feeling of regret echoes in her chest.

“We can get straight to the point, Suguru,” She sighs, dropping her gaze to the steaming cup in her hands.  “I’m sure you’re… upset”

He doesn’t say anything right away, and the few seconds of thoughtful silence gives her a chance to double down on her metaphorical emotional walls, so hopefully when he lays into her, she won’t cry.

“Do you think it’s a good thing that we protect non-curse users no matter what?”

Her head snaps up, completely taken aback by the question.  Not due to it’s nature, she simply wasn’t expecting a deep look into morals first thing this morning.  Not after what she’d done.

But maybe somehow the two things were connected.  (y/n) proceeded with caution.

“I suppose, yes,” She answers.  “They can’t protect themselves the way we can protect them, right?”

“Right…” Suguru seems to agree, but his eyes glaze over and he seems to go elsewhere, like maybe he didn’t believe completely in her words.  “Even though not all humans are good?”

(y/n) raises a brow as she takes a tentative sip of her coffee.

“We’re humans” She says, like it’s a reminder, like it’s something one could forget about oneself.  That they’re human.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Suguru chuckles, shaking his head.  “But… you know what I mean”

She didn’t.

“You think non-curse users are that much different from us?” (y/n) asks, trying to understand where he was going with this.

“You don’t?” He asks, his head tilting to the side ever so slightly.

Sure, non-curse users lived different lives than those in the Jujutsu Society.  But (y/n) always thought of it as the purest form of ignorant bliss- as they didn’t even know the horrors they were shielded from.  It was actually one of the many reasons she wanted to take the vow to protect them.

She didn't answer his question, but she didn’t have to.  Suguru picked up on just exactly what she was thinking.

“Don’t you think it’s odd?” He asks a different question instead.

(y/n’s) face twists into a confused expression.  How was this leading into her fight with Satoru? This… was about her fight with Satoru, right?

“Think what’s odd?”

“That they’re the cause of the very thing we’re going to dedicate our lives to killing,”

Suddenly, (y/n’s) body feels stiff.  Her hands are clamped tightly around the handle and round edge of her mug, and her feet feel glued in place.  Her eyes feel glued, too, watching his every move and expression, trying to figure out what was going on, or what the hell he was talking about.

Killing, the word rings in her head like it’s explicit, and he just said it so casually.  Briefly, she recalls Megumi using it to describe exorcizing a curse, before she corrected him of the proper terminology.

However Suguru wasn’t an eight year old child who was new to this world.  He was well aware of the proper vocabulary.  He’d chosen to refer to it as killing with purpose.

“And they have no idea…” Suguru continues, but he trails off again.  (y/n) wonders what’s going on his mind that he’s so lost in.

“Suguru,” (y/n) speaks softly, and she tries to keep that tone as she continues.  “I don’t think I’m following you” A short laugh escapes her, but it’s quiet, and nervous.

“Ah, I’m not making sense,” He chuckles, raising a hand to the back of his neck.  “I guess what I really mean to ask is… do you think it’s always worth it?”

Well, that question did nothing to clear up the confusion.

(y/n’s) silence was enough of a tell to Suguru that she didn’t understand where he was coming from, and she wasn’t going to.  This deflates him, but she’d never know it, as his little smile and curious eyes didn’t falter for a second.

“Well,” (y/n) sighs, trying to think of the right thing to say.  

She wasn’t sure where he was coming from, but he seemed… lost.  Like he’d been questioning himself and his path as a jujutsu sorcerer a little too harshly.  She could understand that, at least.

“I know sometimes making the world a better place is… slow work… but for me, it’s my passion,” She shrugs her shoulders lightly.  “And when I start to doubt myself, I just remember who I’m doing it for”

Suguru nods, but something tells (y/n) that it wasn’t the answer he was looking for.

“I see,” He says, and lets out a soft sigh.  “And do you keep that mindset when we’ve just protected a trafficking ring from curses?”

(y/n) blinks, and fights a shiver from swimming down her spine.  Where was this coming from? Why was he being like this?

“Suguru…”

“You remember that day we were sent to retrieve Riko Amanai?” He asks her.

“Yes…” She answers, the cruel memories of that failed mission flooding her mind as soon as she heard the girl’s name.

This conversation made her uneasy enough, but now her stomach was churning and her knuckles were turning white around her mug of forgotten coffee.  She wanted an out, but every word Suguru spoke seemed to keep her frozen in place.

“All of our efforts that day, to protect her, and to make sure no one else got hurt-”

“Why are you bringing this up, Suguru?” (y/n) cut him off.  She didn’t need him to relive everything that happened that day- she did that on her own almost every day.  “You’re really going to rewrite your moral code over one bad mission?”

For the first time during this talk, his face sours.  (y/n) knows she should apologize for snapping at him, but she doesn’t.  Instead, she gives him a piece of her mind.  

“You work me up into thinking you’re upset about what happened with Satoru, and then waste my time by telling me you want to- what, rethink the entirety of your life’s choices?” She scoffs at him, and sets her mostly-full mug of coffee down on the counter, a little more forcefully than she needed to.

Suguru’s face is blank now, and he’s harder to read, but she’s done with this guessing game where she keeps losing.

“If you want out Sugu, I won’t stop you,” She tells him, staring him dead in the eyes without the fear or hesitation like she had before.  He notices this.  “I certainly didn’t stop Nanami.  Your life is your own to control, so stop acting like you were forced into doing something you didn’t want to,”

His eyes narrow at her choice of words, but she ignores it.

“That said, if you left now, it would only prove to be a waste of your talents.  You’re one of the strongest men in the whole world, no force on earth could take you on.  So if you leave, you’re only proving that the world was wrong”

That peaked his interest, and now he was back at his word games.

“That so?” He hums, amused by the thought.

“You’d be proving the world was wrong about you.  And that despite your abilities, you’re not strong enough to handle them,” (y/n’s) voice softens, remembering this was her friend, and despite everything, he was her friend.  “I care about you Suguru, so… if you’re done with this…”

Something in her expression changes, and Sguru can see that her irritation had worn off, melted into something softer.  She looks defeated, almost, but forces a small smile anyways.

She’d changed.  Just like him.  Sometime between the Star Plasma Vessel incident and right now, something had morphed her, aged her, made her look tired.  He could see it in her eyes, and the waver in her half-baked smile.  It was all there before him, begging him to ask her what she’d been up to these last few months.  He understood Satoru’s curiosity now, when he saw her up close.  (y/n) was a different person now.  And this certainly wasn’t because of some romantic affair.

“I won’t stop you” She sighs, finishing her thought.

Curious now, Suguru tilts his head at her.

“I told you once I wasn’t going to interrogate you about what you’ve been up to in town…” He starts, and instantly (y/n’s) stomach is churning again.  “But now I see that whatever it is, it’s changed you, hasn’t it?”

The way he smirks has her blood boiling.  The protective nature that Megumi and Tsumiki had brought out of her had her fingers curling against her palms in tight fists, which didn’t go unnoticed by Suguru.  He eyes her defensive stance with intrigue, before meeting her eyes again.

“There’s not a force on earth that could drill it out of you, is there?” He asks, and her lack of response is answer enough.  He clicks his tongue.  “Interesting”

“You’re right Suguru,” (y/n) admits in a mutter.  The soft, worried tone she’d held for him earlier long gone, now that a part of her felt as though her kids were threatened.  “I have changed”

Her eyes are piercing now, only furthering Suguru’s amusement.  

Whatever this stupid secret is, it must be a good one, he thinks to himself, suddenly wishing that Satoru had the guts to force the damn information out of her.  Surely he was the only one of them who could, but of course his feelings had gotten in the way and the weak part of his heart only resulted in him getting exiled from the girl’s life.  Suguru didn’t care about exile, and if he was honest, he didn’t care about this secret either.  His interest lied in the hold it had on her.

Looking at her now, with her hands balled into fists, her posture rigid, and her eyes piercing into his with a venom he’d never seen before, much less directed at him, he knew it must be worth something to her.  Something big.

“As have I,” He finally tells her, a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

(y/n) looks him up and down, noticing even his aura felt different.

Bad different.

“This secret of yours…” He trails off, narrowing his eyes slightly.  “Is it worth your life?”

Her defensive stance falters, for a brief second, but Suguru doesn’t give her the chance to actually respond to his question.  He didn’t need her response.  She’d made it perfectly clear the lengths she’d go to keep her covert life just that- and while he was a little curious just how much further she could be pushed before she snaps, he leaves.

Suguru doesn’t say a word as he brushes past her, he doesn’t even look at her.  Just walks away with a smug smile, and an aura around him that was strangely… eerie.

(y/n) stayed planted in her spot in the kitchen for a few minutes longer, her mind swarming with paranoia.

Was this all because he was upset about what happened with Satoru?  

Were the mind games meant to throw her off, and throw herself down a rabbit hole?

Or had he actually figured her out? Was he aware of Megumi and Tsumiki? But that couldn’t make sense… he would have had to follow her, and she would have noticed his presence if he had, right?

No, none of that could be it, he was barely making any sense, he must have been prodding at something else completely.

With a sigh, (y/n) shoved her hand through her hair, as if it would provide any relief to her overworked and throbbing brain.  The mental torture Suguru had managed to put her through in the last ten minutes was worse than any curse she’d ever taken on- even that one Special Grade with the tentacle arms who nearly ripped her leg clean off.

He’d never spoken to her like that before.  He’d never acted like that before.  It was completely out of character and it had her completely overthinking about everything that had happened in the last few months.

But she didn’t have time to overthink.  She had to get to class and act like everything was normal, tell Shoko about the assignment she was leaving for- which was tomorrow- and keep up the act that no one needed to be suspicious of her because there was nothing to be suspicious about.

When she finally left the kitchen and hastened her pace to get to class on time, (y/n’s) heart was pounding in her ears so hard, she was sure she was going to get a headache.

She wasn’t sure how much longer she could keep all of this up.

But if it could only be a little longer… ___

Suguru hadn’t gone to class.  Yaga had briefly mentioned something about a last minute assignment that the elders had sent him on, and (y/n) wondered if that had to do with his sudden urgency to talk with her.  She wasn’t sure how long he’d be gone, but with her weekend being taken over by her own assignment in Brazil, they likely wouldn’t have crossed paths otherwise.

Propping her head in her hand as she paid half of her attention to Yaga’s lesson, (y/n) wished he’d just gone on the mission and skipped their conversation altogether.

She’d stopped her notetaking a few minutes ago, her mind wandering off to a million other things that seemed more worth her time.

For starters, how quickly she needed to get through her assignment tomorrow so that she could rush back to Tokyo.  Even with the cursed tool that she’d given Megumi, she didn’t want to be out of the country for longer than she needed to.  A lot could happen over one weekend.  One weekend is all it took for her to get into this mess to begin with.

She scribbles something in her notebook when Yaga’s eyes land on her, feigning interest in his lesson.  What was he talking about? Special grades? A history lesson on early jujustu society?

Peeking over to Shoko on her right, she noticed that she’d managed to take her notes diligently, as usual.  Surely she’d let (y/n) borrow them to brush up on later.

On her left, Satoru did not seem to have the same work ethic as Shoko, but that wasn’t anything out of the ordinary.  She knew that he did his work when he needed to, and he knew the material like the back of his hand, but (y/n) wasn’t sure she’d ever seen him take notes.  He tended to just steal hers whenever he pleased.  

Although he probably wouldn’t be asking for them anytime soon.

He didn’t look any different than usual, his expression bored even hidden behind his sunglasses.  She wasn’t sure how she expected him to look, wasn’t sure if he’d show up to class disheveled, tired, maybe even send her a mean look.  But he looked normal.  And besides not speaking or looking at her, he was acting normal too.

Somehow that felt worse.

(y/n) had her things collected and was out of her seat as soon as class was done for the day.  She was out the door even before Yaga.  Rushing out wasn’t exactly necessary, seeing as she and Shoko were going to meet up for lunch, but the quicker she could be out of a space shared with Satoru, the better.

Besides, a few extra minutes to collect her thoughts was much needed.  Although she didn’t have much time, as Shoko was jogging up to the table just a minute after (y/n) had sat down.

“Alright, you better start explaining yourself,” The short haired brunette said through quiet pants.  “Because Satoru won’t say shit- and you just booked it out of there! What the hell?”

(y/n) hoped that her expression remained neutral, even though she was internally cringing.

“It’s complicated, can we just not talk about it?” She sighed.

“No!” Shoko nearly screeched as she plopped onto the bench across from her.  “No we can’t just not talk about it! That’s crazy!”

(y/n) frowned, but Shoko didn’t seem to mind the uncomfortable tension settling between them, because she continued her rant.

“We don’t just fight and not talk to each other, (y/n).  We’re best friends.  All of us”

“No, you’re my best friend and you come with a matching set that follows you around” (y/n) mumbled.  And now they follow me around too, she thinks bitterly.

“That’s not fair or true,” Shoko rolls her eyes.  “You love them both, too,” She says like it’s a reminder.  “And I know Satoru gets under your skin… but… that’s just what he does, and I know this can’t be about that because you’ve let him get under your skin for three years now.  So fess up already.  What.  Happened?”

(y/n) stared at her, pleading with her eyes that she could just drop it.  She didn’t have a good enough explanation, and she didn’t want to lie to Shoko anymore than she already has.

She really should have thought this through when she cut things off with Satoru.

“Is it… romantic tension?” Shoko asked slowly.

“What!? No!” (y/n’s) voice betrayed her as it raised and cracked, making her sound completely unbelievable.

“Oh really?” Shoko raised a brow.  “Because you know that I know that he’s been sleeping with you since Haibara passed”

There’s a pang in her chest upon hearing his name.  A harsh reminder that no matter how much time would pass, his name, his memory, would forever be surrounded by a haunting cloud of pain.  That was grief, she supposed.  Nonetheless, (y/n) mustered up the will to roll her eyes at Shoko’s insinuation.

“Sleeping sleeping,” She mutters.  “That’s it.  Nothing funny”

“Yeah right,” Shoko scoffed.  “You’ve had funny business between you since day one.  If you didn’t go through some weird non-couple couple fight, why the hell was Satoru in a pissy mood saying you were done with him?”

Now she was toggling the line between mildly annoyed and genuinely pissed off.  The ongoing assumption that Shoko had once made as a joke was no romance between her and Satoru.  And now, there was nothing left between them at all.  It was becoming too much.  Her mistakes were getting on top of her like an overdose, filling her to the brim with melancholy, and anger.

“Because we’re not friends anymore, I guess!” (y/n) exclaimed, throwing her hands up.  “I’m sorry it’s not that juicy, okay? He was just getting too irritating and nosey, and I needed some freaking space, is that so awful?”

“No, but it’s a fucking lie,” Shoko shook her head.  Her words weren’t as malicious as they sounded, but she knew she needed to start calling out bullshit when she smelled it.  And (y/n’s) bullshit was starting to pile up so high that Shoko could barely make out what was real anymore.

(y/n) huffed, crossing her arms over her chest.

“I don’t want to fight before I go away on an assignment,” She sighed, dropping her defensive stance and leaning over the table towards her friend.  “Please, can we not fight about this?”

Shoko frowned, mirroring (y/n’s) position, and reaching for her hands.  She squeezed them gently, and she doesn’t let them go.

“I’m worried about you, (y/n/n),” She admits, quietly, like she was afraid to be vulnerable with her.  “You have to admit you’ve been acting strange, you’ve been missing from campus, like, all the time, you barely answer your phone or even give us any answers when you’re back.  I’m not trying to be nosey, really, but…” She trails off for a minute, chewing on her bottom lip.  “This isn’t like you.  And Satoru… I’ve never seen him hurt like that.  You guys treat each other better than that”

(y/n’s) throat began to sting with the familiar burn of tears, and she prays she thinks of something fast before she has to shut Shoko out the same way she did to Satoru.

“Shoko,” She mumbles, sniffling.  “I can’t explain it, okay?”

Shoko’s shoulders slump, defeated.  But she keeps a hold of (y/n’s) hands.

“I’m sorry.  I really am.  I know it’s not fair but… but you have to trust me, please”

“Are you in trouble?” Shoko asks in a whisper, even though there was no one around them to eavesdrop.  “Does this have to do with the Zen’ins?” She adds in an even quieter voice.

The way (y/n) stiffens and her eyes widen tell Shoko she’d guessed correctly.  Her own eyes blew wide with shock, the fear that had been nagging at the back of her mind finally proving to be true.

“(y/n)-”

“It’s nothing, Shoko, seriously, I’m begging you to leave it and not worry about it-”

“Not worry about it?” She hissed back at her.  “How could I not worry about it? So what is it then, you’re seeing someone? Is that it?”

(y/n) doesn’t say anything, her brain is processing all of this too slowly to figure out what the smartest lie was to go with.  If she agreed that she was dating a Zen’in, surely Shoko would go back to Satoru and Suguru with that information- and their reactions would be less than pleasant but…

What was her other option? Tell her that she was actually harboring a member of the Zen’in Clan and his sister? The children of the famed Sorcerer Killer? The very man that almost killed Satoru? Was she supposed to confess that it was practically the opposite of what she’d been thinking?

That her backup plan if all of this went south was executing the head of the clan and anyone else who tried to harm the Fushiguro children?

(y/n) pulled her hands out of Shoko’s, rubbing them down her face and taking a deep breath.  Think.  There must be a better option.  You’ve made it this far, so think!

“Shoko… you have to promise not to tell-”

“Oh my fucking spirits,” Shoko mimicked (y/n’s) position, covering her face in her hands and shaking her head.  Don’t tell me that it’s fucking true”

(y/n) doesn’t say anything, she didn’t know what to say, but it seemed she was out of time to come up with a better lie than a secret affair with a Zen’in.  

Which left a pretty nasty taste in her mouth.

Shoko gasped, one of her hands falling over her open mouth, completely floored by this information.

Sure, when (y/n) first started sneaking off, she thought maybe she was hooking up with someone, flirting with a cute guy at a cafe or a bookstore, and she would have been totally fine with a secret like that.  It would have been cute, and fun.

“I want to throw up” Shoko grumbles.

“Okay, that’s a little-”

“If you say it’s overdramatic, I don’t want to hear it.  I mean- I mean… seriously? Who is it anyways? Wait- no, don’t tell me, I don’t even want to know because then Satoru is gonna ask and he’s… oh my god, that’s what happened isn’t it?”

She hadn’t even blinked yet.  The pit in (y/n’s) stomach continued to grow, and Shoko’s shock only worsened.

In a small movement, (y/n) nodded her head.

Shoko’s silent for a minute, before she shuffles into her pocket for her cigarettes and a lighter.  She remained silent and staring off at nothing as she sparked up and took an exaggeratedly long drag.  (y/n) eyed the cigarette longingly, and Shoko passed it over after flicking the ash.

“He was pissed, huh?” She asks.

(y/n) nods again.

“Yeah… yeah he was pissed,” She says, avoiding the parts that were actually lies.  After taking her puff, she continues.  “And I… I didn’t handle it well.  I think I… I know I really hurt him, Shoko”

“You did,” Shoko sighs, recalling the way a hollow eyed Satoru had joined her for lunch yesterday.  “I just… why didn’t you tell us sooner? Maybe we.. maybe we could have talked more..?” She’s making weak suggestions, knowing there was nothing to be done of it now.

(y/n) shrugs limply, taking another drag before passing the cigarette back.

“You hate me?” She asks quietly.

Shoko gives a wobbly smile, shaking her head.

“I could never hate you, (y/n/n)” She sighs heavily.

(y/n) mirrors her weak smile.

“Thanks, Shoko,”

The short haired girl nodded back at her.

“I’m really sorry” She adds as an afterthought, but it’s genuine.

She knows she’ll continue to feel sorry for a long time.  Maybe even forever.  The guilt on her shoulders had become so heavy she slouched in her seat.  It spread through her whole body, making her sick to her stomach, her knees weak, and she’d even noticed her hands trembling.

Shoko didn’t deserve this.  She thought she was getting closure, she thought she was finally understanding what (y/n) had been up to.  Even if she was unsettled by the so-called confession, it was something.  And it was still just a lie.

“I know” Shoko replies softly, stumping out the dead cigarette.

When she gets up and leaves, (y/n) watches her pull out and light up another one on her walk back to her dorm.

(y/n) hung her head in her hands in her lonesome, fighting the urge to break down into tears.  She wished that she could tell them all to hold on for just a little while longer.

Just a little longer, she scoffs to herself, her throat burning.  How much longer was just a little longer going to be?

And on top of it all- now she had another lie to maintain.  It was pitiful, but at least Shoko was so disgusted in her that she didn’t ask anymore questions. ___

(y/n) really should have cleared her mind better before going to Brazil.  Taking on major assignments while in a negative headspace wasn’t safe, and it was one of the first things you’re taught when you enroll in Jujutsu High.

(y/n’s) headspace had become a toxic wasteland.

All of her time before she actually arrived in Manaus was spent in her head, diving deeper and deeper into the pits of despair.  She knew she wasn’t doing herself any favors, but once it had started, she couldn’t distract herself from it.

Normally she would turn to her friends to distract her from a bad bout of anxiety.  A smoke break and a walk with Shoko, a movie night with Suguru, a trip to the candy shop with Satoru, any of those things right now could have easily relaxed her nerves and brought her out of her tormented mind.  This realization only worsened her mood.

She overthought every terrible lie she’d told her friends while on the ride to the airport.  While waiting at the gate, she worried about Megumi and Tsumiki being alone while she is not reachable by phone when on the plane.  And the flight was the worst of all.  Even with connecting flights it took up her entire day.  That gave her twenty-four hours to assume the worst was happening.  No in-flight movie, no music, no book could distract her mind and give her even a minute of peace.

But when was the last time she felt any peace, anyways.

When she finally did land in Brazil and got settled in the hotel she’d been set up at- which was probably the nicest hotel she’d ever been sent to on an overseas mission, compliments of Yaga taking pity on her, surely- she couldn’t settle in.

She’d been told to get rest after her day of travel, brush up on the notes of the Grade Two she’d be on the hunt for, but to leave that hunt until the next day.  Yaga had told her clearly the morning she left that her rest was a requirement, and not to jump into the assignment on little to no sleep after an extremely long day.

Of course, as soon as she’d dropped her bag onto the queen sized bed, she realized there was no way she could get a wink of sleep with her sour mood.  She’d certainly lie awake in bed all night, letting it worsen until her entire body ached.

Her eyes landed on the harness that held her swords.  They sat in their sheaths, perfectly cleaned and sharpened from the day before, waiting to slay something.  She’d barely touched them since the Star Plasma Vessel incident, and with all the despair inside her, she knew that a quick rage on a Grade Two would be cathartic.

Cracking a smile, she grabbed the harness and snapped it on before taking off out of the hotel room, eager for the hunt and the release of pent up distress.

Maybe I’ll have to thank Yaga after all, she thought to herself as she took to the streets of Manaus.  Maybe this assignment would be exactly what I need. ___

By the time (y/n) returns to her hotel, she’d decided against thanking her teacher.  It wouldn’t be a priority when she gets home.

She’d exorcized the Grade Two Curse, and while it hadn’t been an impossible task, it had been greatly difficult, and with her standing as a Grade One Sorcerer, it was humiliating to realize how far she’d fallen behind in her training.  But after putting up a good fight, it finally showed it’s weakness and (y/n) dove for it instantly, slicing it’s head clean off with large swings of both of her blades.

She’s still straining to catch her breath even now as she washes the blood from her arms, before stripping off her ruined uniform.  She’d have to change before she headed out again.

Now that the assignment was over, she couldn’t stand to delay her return to Tokyo even one minute longer.  She was set on washing up, packing what little things she had, and heading straight back to the airport.

Her booked flight wasn’t for two more days, as Yaga had given her extra time to travel and explore.  But she was already far ahead of schedule, and she found no excitement in spending time in another country when there were people back home waiting for her.

If I’m able to get on a flight tonight, I’ll make it home by this time tomorrow, she thought to herself, scrolling through the options on her phone, ignoring the hefty prices under each one.  A last minute flight wasn’t ideal, but she’d trade in the ticket she had and save what she could.

Now that her distraction of an assignment was done, her sickeningly anxious thoughts were starting to slip into her mind again.

She made great haste in getting herself to the airport, contacting the manager on duty for her assignment to let them know she was wrapped up, and would be on the first flight to Tokyo. ___

By the time (y/n) gets back to Tokyo, it had been three days.

But while she hadn’t slept longer than a few minutes here and there on the excruciatingly long flights, when she landed back home it was a straight shot for her to go to the Fushiguro house.  She couldn’t possibly make a pitstop to the school to drop her things off- or even take a shower.

It was late into the evening, around the time she would normally put the kids to bed, but she had a feeling they’d be awake, seeing as it wasn’t a day she’d normally visit them.  And to her delight, as she approached the house, she could see the flickering of a tv through the living room window.

When she knocks on the door, she sees two heads spin around over the back of the sofa through the window, at first cautious, but then excited as both kids leapt off their seats to greet her.

Tsumiki throws her arms around (y/n) as soon as the door opens, and the older girl drops to her knees to hug her properly.  Maybe she squeezes a little tighter than she normally would.

Megumi bashfully hangs behind his sister, but the wide smile on his face tells (y/n) he was just as happy about her return as she was.  She ruffles up his hair just because she can, and tells them both how happy she is to be back.

“Was it awesome?” Tsumiki asks.

“Did you exorcize the curse?” Megumi talks over her.

“Head up to bed and I’ll tell you all about it” (y/n) orders, and neither of them seem bothered as they turn off the tv and scramble up the stairs to get ready for bed.

(y/n) lets herself take a moment to sigh and revel in the utter relief to see them both okay.  She’d been convincing herself they must have been fine, since Megumi never used his emergency Cursed Tool, and none of the texts she received from Tsumiki were out of the ordinary.  But nothing would satisfy her nerves until she could see them in person, and assess for herself that they hadn’t been in any harm.

When she ascends the stairs, they’re already waiting for her, with their teeth brushed and their pajamas on.  She grins ear to ear.

“If only you were this good for me all the time,” She teases.  “Maybe I should take assignments more often, huh?”

“We’re always good” Megumi rolls his eyes.

He’s still smiling.

“I suppose that’s true,” (y/n) muses.  “And guess what good kids get?”

“Candy?” Tsumiki asks hopefully.

(y/n) laughs as she reaches into her pocket, pulling out the two small items she’d managed to snag from a shop at the airport.

“Better!” She exclaims, handing a gift to each one of them.  “Gifts!”

Tsumiki squeals as she eyes the pretty bow she’d received.  A large, puffy pink accessory, complete with lace edges and shiny pearls at it’s center.

And when Megumi is handed his gift, a small keychain of a fluffy black dog with starry, anime-like eyes, his mouth makes an ‘o’ and his eyes light up with recognition.

“Just like my Divine Dog” He says as his mouth stretches back into a smile.

“That was the idea,” (y/n) chuckles.  “Sorry they’re small, I didn’t have a lot of shopping time”

“I love it!” Tsumiki grins, holding her accessory to her chest with adoration.

“Thank you” Megumi’s voice is softer as he clutches his own gift carefully.

“You’re very welcome,” (y/n) replies.  “Now you guys head off to bed, because I want to get home to go to bed.  I’ll tell you all about my trip when I come by tomorrow afternoon” She lets out a tired sigh, and the Fushiguro kids follow the instruction.

She bids Tsumiki goodnight first, shutting her door after the girl crawled into her sheets.  When she turns to Megumi’s room, he’s still wide awake, sitting upright on the side of his bed.  He’s still holding his keychain in his lap, admiring it with bright eyes.

“You ready for bed?” (y/n) asks him, leaning against his door frame.

He looks up at her, blinking, before stating the obvious.

“You look tired”

(y/n) chuckles, almost bitterly.  Tired was an understatement.

“A flight from here to Brazil takes an entire day, you know” She tells him, walking into his room.

Megumi crawls into bed and under the covers, giving her the seat on the edge of his bed.  She plops into it with a huff, the simple action of sitting providing a ridiculous amount of relief to her overworked body.

“A whole day?” Megumi repeats in awe.

“Sure does,” (y/n) sighs.  “And on top of that, swords are pretty heavy, and I’m out there alone trying to exorcize this huge curse!”

His eyes light up with excitement, wanting to hear more about her mission.  But (y/n) tucks him in as she always does before she leaves him for the night, and he knows she’s not going to tell him more tonight.

“Don’t worry, I’ll tell you everything you want to know about it tomorrow” She says with a smile, knowing he was on the edge of his seat.

“Fine,” Megumi huffs, and then quietly adds, “Can we get pizza?”

(y/n) laughs, but nods her head in agreement.

“Pizza sounds perfect,” She says, earning a smile from the boy.  She hesitates before leaving just yet, wanting to relish a little more in seeing him perfectly unharmed.

He had no idea how much she worried about him when she was away.  The feeling must be reaching what a mother feels for her own children, an overwhelming need to protect them, no matter what it costs.

Suguru’s menacing words rang in her mind.

This secret of yours, is it worth your life?

After telling Megumi goodnight and wishing him sweet dreams, she’d finally come up with an answer for him.

Yes.

And if I had the chance to do it again, I would.

Tiptoeing down the stairs, (y/n) did a quick lap of the house, making sure there were no chores in desperate need of her attention before she left for the night.  Even though her bones begged her to rest, she wanted to make sure everything was in order after a few days of being absent.  To her pleasure, the house seemed perfectly clean and tidy.

She’d have to treat Tsumiki to more than just a bow, she mused to herself, heading for the pile of mail on the kitchen table.  All she’d do tonight was sort through the junk and the bills, which she’d worry about paying tomorrow.

After tossing the unnecessary mail in the trash and sliding the water bill into the drawer for important papers, that left only one envelope.  It was blank on the front, which puzzled her, wondering how it had gotten mixed into the rest of the lot.  Or how it had even been mailed in the first place  Turning it over curiously, her heart dropped at the only marking on the whole envelope.

A wax seal she recognized instantly.

Her blood ran cold, and her fingers went rigid in their hold on the letter.

The unmistakable seal of the Zen’in Clan.

___

a/n: long chapter of sadness hahahahaha i don’t remember how to sleep.

taglist: @whats-humanity-lol @malinq-ashida @mor-pheus@bekahtaylorgriggs@pookiea@megumimind@thealchemical@pearlstiare@niallerhere@96jnie @purpleguk @peqch-pie@yukinemaroop@makis-girl @sadtoru​ @kamikokii​ @nerdiel-has-no-braincells​ @googlesheetshoe​ @vzleria @hilzup @cole-silas @iam-mia9 @stxrrielle @ezrahour

xoxo ~ jordie 

[fuctacles]

I'm honoured, but why isn't Steve the best man?

After Vecna the party slowly accepted the dullness of monster-free life and went their own ways. They kept in touch and met up every now and then but rarely in the complete assembly.

But a wedding invite creates an opportunity to get everyone together again. Eddie has been touring most of the time, trying to get his band to pop off. Metal off. The point is, he's been a bit behind on what everyone's been up to, Henderson being his only source of updates and exchanged greetings for the better part of last year. In a month he can hug him in person, and he can host a short campaign in lieu of a bachelor party Dustin didn't want. He will ask Buckley about college life and Harrington about his disastrous love life in person.

He will ask why he was Henderson's best man, not Steve. Dustin was weirdly cryptic about it when Eddie asked and briefly wondered if they had a falling out and maybe Harrington wasn't invited at all. But that sounded ridiculous and impossible so Eddie scrapped that thought and curbed his curiosity until he was there himself.

Suzie's maid of honour turned out to be a girl named Eden. And to Eddie's surprise, she recognised him. Her slightly brooding and bored expression brightened a fraction when they got introduced.

"You play in Corroded Coffin, right?"

"Yep! The rest of the band is gonna be here too if you wanna meet them."

They joked about their similarities in the names, and the music taste until it was time to see the venue and do the wedding rehearsal. Eddie was surprised to find out Lucas was the one supervising it.

"I would give my right hand Harrington would be here to fuss over his favourite kid's wedding," he started nonchalantly as soon as he got him out of earshot.

Lucas eyed him with a weird expression.

"Well, the favorite kid isn't here so..." he trailed off pointedly.

"Ah. He's just fussing somewhere else, then. That makes sense."

"Yep," he nodded eagerly like the topic was exhausting him. But that wasn't going to deter Eddie, no sir.

"Why isn't he the best man, though?"

"What, you don't like it?" Lucas raised an eyebrow, his hands dropping to his hips. A stance he certainly learned from the babysitter himself.

"Of course I like it!" Eddie quickly assured him. "I just thought-"

"Listen, Dustin wanted both of you to be here. But for... personal reasons... Harrington had to step down."

Eddie didn't like the way Lucas was measuring his words. And he absolutely hated hearing him use 'Harrington' in place of 'Steve', like all the kids called him. There was something happening here and it didn't sound good. He frowned at his friend.

"Listen, bud, you're not exactly helping my worries here."

Lucas sighed like he was tired and while Eddie could understand that, considering he was helping with the wedding preparations, he had a feeling it was more targeted at him specifically.

"Look, I promise you," and he paused to look Eddie directly in the eyes, his gaze fierce and earnest. "It's not as bad as it sounds, okay?"

Eddie searched his face for a second but he couldn't find anything, any indication of insincerity. So eventually, he nodded.

"Okay," he said. "I trust you."

His friend's shoulders dropped with relief, lips curling into a small smile.

"Cool. Let's wrap it up here, then. Last run, everybody!"

////

Eddie watched the guests gather in the church benches. It was very out of his comfort zone and he couldn't remember the last time he was in any sacred place, but for the sake of his friend, he was gonna suck it up this once. Even if he had to spend even more time there as the best man.

The first rows were for the closest family. On Dustin's side, he could already see the party and teary-eyed Claudia. Next to El sat a tall woman Eddie had not seen before. Or maybe he did? She seemed familiar. Perhaps he saw her recently during wedding preparations or she was an old friend who changed with time. He certainly wouldn't recognise El these days, all grown up and with long hair, if he didn't have Max sitting on her other side to jump-start his memory.

His eyes drifted further, finding Jonathan, Nancy, Hopper, Joyce, and Argyle. The whole squad was here. Or it should be.

He scanned the crowd, skipping through the unfamiliar faces of Suzie's family before returning to the mysterious woman. Was she someone's girlfriend? But Will was gay, he came out to them a couple years ago. Lucas was still dating Max and Mike couldn't pull someone this gorgeous even if he wasn't in a vague situationship with El. Maybe she was waiting for someone? Steve? Or maybe Buckley finally lucked out?

He realised he was staring only when the girl's gaze met his. Her eyes widened, which, rude. For once, Eddie looked like an upstanding citizen, thank you very much. He has been forced into a well-tailored suit and he cleaned up well, got his hair braided on the sides and wore his normalest earrings.

But then she smiled at him, all shy and sweet and holy shit Eddie hoped she wasn't anyone's girlfriend. He doubled his efforts to remember her because he had to know her, the hair was too familiar, and that smile scratched some memories in his brain he just couldn't grasp. After the ceremony, he could get closer, see her features better. Maybe he knew her from high school? Or she's someone he's only seen photos of, or-

Someone sat down next to her, leaning down to kiss her cheek and whisper something. She turned, her smile widening at the sight of one Robin Buckley and Eddie looked around because where was Robin there was Steve too so-

The girl pointed at him with a smile and Robin waved at him excitedly and it all clicked, hitting Eddie like a rogue mine cart at Moria.

She was Steve Harrington.

Steve couldn't be the best man, because Steve wasn't a man anymore.

[Steddie masterpost] [Ao3] [ko-fi]

[missvelvetsstuff]

No Benefits

Bucky x Reader

Summary: Reader and Bucky are best friends until a drunken hook up. Bucky wants a friends with benefits situation because he doesn't feel ready for a relationship but reader knows that will lead to a broken heart.

Then Sharon Carter comes to work with them.

Notes: Steve and Tony are around but retired, everything else is mostly canon

Chapter 11

Warnings: swearing, angst

Notes: this chapter came out shorter than I'd like but this updates only a few days late. Hope y'all enjoy.

Life at the compound went on but with the 'punishments' Fury and Hill assigned everyone was too busy to do much else. Training, chores, therapy and sleep were all Bucky had the time or energy for but he made sure to write to Cookie every day, even though some days there wasn't much to say.

Two weeks after the meeting with Fury, Bucky was eating lunch with Sam, who nagged him more than Steve, so he had learned to tune him out. One of the admins walked by with Avengers mail and Bucky was shocked to get something. He wasn't the most popular Avenger so rarely had any fan mail. He took the envelope from the admin and looked at it with wide eyes. He gasped when he saw who it was from and felt his heart racing. It was kinda lumpy, like there was more than just a letter. His stomach dropped when he assumed she was returning his dog tags and he set it down on the table, afraid to open it.

Sam looked over "You might as well tear off that bandaid and get it over with. How much worse could it be?"

Bucky looked at him with sad eyes. "She could be telling me she never wants anything to do with me. Not that I don't deserve it but right now I still have hope. Like Schroedingers cat, right now our friendship is alive and dead at the same time but once I open it, it'll be one or the other."

Sam chuckled "You're not wrong but you can't pretend forever. Maybe she's asking for something from you but if you don't read it you won't give it to her and she'll think you don't really care."

Bucky nodded "Yeah, I guess. I'll open it tonight."

Bucky spent the rest of the day acutely aware of the envelope in his back pocket, reaching back to touch it and make sure it was still there, like a talisman helping him through the day.

Once the work for the day was done he went to his room, locked the door and stripped down to his t-shirt and boxers to get comfortable on his bed. He picked up the envelope and examined it thoroughly, he could just barely catch the scent of her lavender hand lotion on it.

After 20 minutes he decided he had gleaned all the info he could without opening the envelope and with shaking hands, carefully opened it. He pulled the paper out and when he unfolded it, something fell into his lap. The special dog tags that Sam had given him as a joke and a picture.

He picked up the picture and felt like his heart stopped when he realized it was Cookie, smirking at him with his own dog tags nestled in her cleavage. Not a scrap of clothing in sight. His mouth went dry and he felt hot. He took a drink of water before looking at the paper.

Dear Bucky,

Let me know what you think of the picture. I think the enclosed tags would look good on you, if you want to wear them. I wouldn't mind a picture.

XO,

Cookie

Bucky fumbled to take his shirt off and put the tags on before taking a blurry picture. He looked at his phone, dissatisfied with his selfie skills, or lack of, and spent an hour before he was happy with the results. Now he had to figure out how to print it without asking for help, or find someone who could help and keep a secret from Sam. Steve was worse with tech than he was and he knew Nat or Sharon would make a big deal. As he went down the list in his head he wondered if Cookie would mind if he attached it to an email.

Bucky sighed and opened up his laptop to search for directions on how to print something from his phone and looked at Starks intranet to find the closest color printer to his room.

It took half the night but he finally had a clear, color picture to send to Cookie.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next few weeks rolled by quickly as Cookie whipped the Boston office into shape, much to Dylan's chagrin. She spent the days working closely with Annie, evaluating the rest of the team to see where there were weaknesses so they could work on training them all up to where they needed to be. The fact that Dylan resented her aside, he had enjoyed his "management" of this office by doing nothing but lording over the rest of the team and overusing his expense account, without paying attention to their skills or lack thereof.

Cookie made herself a note to bring up Dylan's uselessness with Nick Fury and recommend cutting him loose or transferring him to a position with less authority and responsibility. She planned to push for Annie to run this office when she left.

She was working on a full report on the office and was very glad she had moved here to see in person how things ran because she never would have known how badly Dylan was slacking off.

In her conclusions she pondered spending the next couple of years hopping from office to office, to do the same. It would take longer to get back to the compound than she wanted but she felt it would be the best for SHIELD/SWORD's intel apparatus, which was her job.

In the evenings she went back to her townhouse to eat alone, watch the news and read Bucky's letters. He was ever so slowly wearing her down. It wasn't hard, she missed her best friend and never stopped loving him.

Dear Cookie,

I hope you are good and haven't gotten tired of hearing from me. I haven't heard anything back so I don't know if you're reading them or just tossing them in the fire.

Life is mostly back to normal. Fury yelled at us for 3 hours about you this morning, he's not happy you're gone. Everyone misses you. Maybe not Nat and Sharon but at least they are finally leaving me alone.

Tony keeps bitching about his favorite cookies but I know he misses you.

Steve is in his element, being the disapproving dad to all us difficult kids. If he doesn't get over himself I might have to kick his ass.

Sam misses you. I know he talks to you on the phone a lot and he's irritating as hell, making sure to let me know it's my fault you left, like I didn't already know that. I wish I knew how to fix things and make you want to come home but I'm not that bright, obviously, so I'll keep writing until you tell me to stop.

Fury is being even more of an impossible prick than usual. He cancelled all leave and has us doing extra training and chores around the compound like we're grounded teenagers. It's exhausting but it keeps me busy between missions. Doesn't stop me from thinking about you every day.

I understand that you might not want to wear my dog tags but if you don't want them could you send them back? They're all I have left of my past.

I hope to hear from you soon.

All my love,

JBB

Like every night since she started reading Bucky's letters, Cookie fell asleep clutching his dog tags and that nights letter to her chest.

@erelierraceala @capswife @ozwriterchick @cjand10 @wintrsoldrluvr @mrsbuckybarnes1917 @browneyedgrli @greatenthusiasttidalwave @hhiggs @dontworryboutitsweetheart-blog @behindmygreyeyes @pattiemac1 @mrsbuckybarnes1917 @calwitch @mrs-bucky-barnes-73 @ordelixx @blackhawkfanatic @casey1-2007 @scott-loki-barnes @selella @hiireadstuff @winterschildren8

[weaselandfriends]

Are ARGs the new avant garde?

There's this unfiction ARG on YouTube about a fake video game called Valle Verde. Here's episode 1, there are three episodes:

Watch this and the other two episodes. This is the most technically impressive thing I've seen on YouTube that was made by a single person, and if you watch this video for 54 seconds you'll start to see why.

Once you've watched Valle Verde, you can read this post.

ARGs, or alternate reality games, were a natural outgrowth of creepypasta (as the great Jenny Nicholson once put it, "campfire stories on a global scale"). With creepypasta, people, usually young people, would hop onto the internet and tell a spooky story about a haunted Sonic cartridge with realistic blood or a super evil serial killer who was never caught or Slenderman or something.

Due to the memetic nature of these stories, though, there became an arms race to make them on increasingly elaborate scales. Soon, people were ROMhacking their favorite old games to actually show the spooky haunted realistic blood. A famous example, Ben Drowned, showed modded/corrupted Majora's Mask footage that was generally effective because Majora's Mask is already sort of a creepy game.

Ben Drowned was also notable for being a story that was continually updated. Originally, most creepypasta would be a single story, usually short, posted once. This is an effective medium for horror, which loses effectiveness the more things get explained, but at the same time, when people like something, they want more.

Okay, so how do you make an ongoing horror series that doesn't outright explain everything, and thus retains its horror aspect? The answer, seemingly independently reached by a wide variety of indie horror creators at the same time (Ben Drowned, Marble Hornets, and the godfather Five Nights at Freddy's) was arcane hidden lore.

That's basically what separates an ARG from creepypasta: the "game" in "alternate reality game" is that sprinkled throughout a series of videos are scraps of hints toward a broader narrative, and the viewer is expected to locate those hints, piece them together, and figure out what's actually happening.

The logic is similar to the appeal of a mystery novel, so it's no wonder this took off. Channels like Game Theory posting lore breakdowns of FNAF or other popular series raked in beaucoup views. Indie horror devs would start putting dumbass lore hints in their goofball games to piggyback off FNAF's memetic success. Pathetic things like this happened:

But ARGs are fundamentally different from a mystery novel. In a mystery novel, the terms of the mystery are overtly made known. Someone has been murdered and a world famous detective has arrived to find out who did it/how they did it. By contrast, ARGs are often abstracted to the point that it is difficult to know whether there actually is a mystery. And besides, the mystery in an ARG isn't "who is the killer," it's "what is even the plot?"

Heavily abstracted, often fragmented storylines, with no clear plot, disjointed organization, and only scattered ambiguously meaningful moments that could be arranged in any number of ways to attempt coherence. What does this remind me of?

They reinvented postmodernism!

This realization came home when Skinamarink received a theatrical release in 2022. Skinamarink was an analog horror (another offshoot branch of creepypasta/ARGs) video blown up to cinema length, created by an analog horror YouTuber based on an original 20 minute video they made. Mainstream critics who saw this film, being completely unaware of what analog horror was, extolled the film for its Lynchian, Kubrickian influences. They were unaware its actual greatest influence was Mandela Catalogue. They were unaware that a thrillingly unique, abstract form of storytelling had organically been created by a group of outsider artists on the internet.

Kubrick would be proud.

I find this especially exciting in a mainstream pop cultural milieu that is trending toward, at least in my appraisal, increasing obviousness and simplicity in how it communicates ideas, which is not only boring but also annihilates the capacity for nuance, interpretation, and even meaning itself.

This also comes alongside ARG creators often pushing themselves to new technical extremes, extremes that are absurdly impressive for individuals. Kane Pixels has created amazing found footage videos using Blender-made labyrinths. The Mandela Catalogue guy was doing some crazy shit with puppets(?) last I checked. And, of course, the act of modding old games has evolved into the act of creating whole video games entirely as a vehicle for an ARG. The first example of this I know of is Petscop, and there have been others like Catastrophe Crow (which splices in an extremely accurate pastiche of a retro gaming video essayist, plus period-accurate game magazine articles), but Valle Verde takes it to a new level.

Since you've all seen Valle Verde by now, I won't waste time explaining the seriously impressive stuff it pulls off.

Instead, I'll let the other shoe drop.

I have a fundamental problem with all these ARGs, one that pains me all the more because I am so thrilled by so many aspects of them. The problem is that once you dig into them, once you piece together the underlying narrative from all the tiny clues, interpret the ambiguities, and see the broader picture -

The picture sort of sucks.

Ben Drowned, FNAF, Petscop, Catastrophe Crow boil down to the same residual dew: Children died. (Either murdered or just tragically.) Their spirits haunt the game cartridge/animatronics. All the scant hints point to the cause. (Ben Drowned spoils it in the title.) It's not only sort of banal but also the story that you could probably guess at without reading into the deep lore, just from the story's general vibe.

It's a fundamentally boring answer to a fascinating puzzle, and worse, it reveals that there was no true value in the puzzle being presented as it was. The abstraction and postmodern technique of the narrative contribute nothing to its overall meaning. They exist with the sole aim to obfuscate, because horror only works when unexplained. Rather than leave the horror unexplained, though, the way Kubrick would in The Shining (which deliberately strips out overt explanations that exist in the book it adapts), or Lynch would in anything, these works are attempting to have their cake and eat it: there's stupid lore that explains everything, but it's just a little hard to find. In that sense, rather than being a rejection of the current cultural milieu toward works that make simple sense, this trend seems more like an attempt to reinject that milieu into one of the few genres of storytelling that had effectively rejected it. (It reads similarly to all the Babadook-inspired indie horror films of the past decade where the monster is some transparent allegory for grief or trauma or something.)

So what's the story of Valle Verde?

I won't go into a Game Theory breakdown of every symbol and detail. As far as I can tell, this is what's going on:

Valle Verde, the fiction within the fiction, is a Japanese video game developed with experimental technology called THBrain that gives it a sophisticated and advanced artificial intelligence capable of making on-the-fly alterations to the game's script. Valle Verde, the series of videos, depicts an investigation into certain malfunctioning elements of the game prior to its release. The player character, self-identified as TEST05, is actually played by two "agents" (of what agency is unclear) named Pablo and Robert testing the game and chronicling anomalous behavior.

The series of glitches and other bizarre things they record seems to depict a theological battle between Valle Verde's freemasonic villagers, led by Foxxo (remember that the next elections), and the Catholic Church, led by Pietro (possibly an avatar for St. Peter, the first pope and guardian of the gates of heaven).

Joseph of Cupertino is the patron saint of aviation. It's a "time flies" pun.

It's unclear how much autonomy either of these factions have, even knowing that there is apparently a super-sophisticated AI capable of injecting novel information. Pietro at times breaks the fourth wall and addresses Pablo directly by name; the villagers don't break the fourth wall, but do all sorts of stuff that is described by the tapes as anomalous. The AI seems like the obvious culprit, but in Valle Verde 2, Pablo actually meets the AI, who claims to have sequestered themselves from the rest of the game because they didn't want to partake in the villagers' rituals, and who has even disabled all their language libraries except Spanish to avoid comprehending the screams of the children trapped inside the game.

Oh yeah. Children are dying.

The THBrain seems to not only enable incredible AI, but is a way to upload humans into the video game (maybe this is unrelated to THBrain? I'm fuzzy on that point). Several children have already been uploaded and are presumed dead; currently, an Argentinian child named Matias is trapped in the game. Matias is the only other character besides Pietro capable of breaking the fourth wall, due to being a real person; he is aware of Pablo as an "agent" and suggests at some sort of conspiracy outside the game, which has not been explicated in much detail in the available videos.

The reason the children are dying is eventually revealed: the freemasonic villagers are sacrificing them to their false god, Moloch.

I'm not kidding about the freemasonry. Note the Argentinian flag.

There are other plot elements that are a bit murkier; Valle Verde seems to be a nexus of several unrelated video games, which can be accessed through an in-game library, and it is within this nexus that Moloch lives, and perhaps where the underlying purpose behind the villagers' actions lurk. There is also a recurring motif of a coming Christian apocalypse, likened to Noah's flood. After the freemasonic sacrifice, a doomsday clock ticks closer to midnight. Are the masons unwittingly provoking God's wrath? The series is framed as footage from 1997 that was unearthed in the modern day, so was this apocalypse averted, or did the apocalypse simply exist within the game, with no bearing on reality? The series remains ongoing; future installments may clarify.

But the underlying issue remains that, for me at least, the basic conflict in its simplicity and lack of ambiguity seems inadequately matched to the unique, impressive, and open-ended presentation. It retroactively makes me wonder what the point is of telling the story the way Valle Verde is told, if its story is in essence the Church versus Satan-worshippers, with clear moral and ideological lines drawn. Doesn't a more conventional narrative make sense for this sort of story?

There's a scene early on when the player character traverses a series of rooms corresponding to the Seven Deadly Sins. The sin of greed is depicted, not simply with stacks of gold, but with works of modern art:

As the player proceeds through the room, they discover a dumpster where Renaissance artwork by Titian and Michelangelo is trashed:

The message here is almost fatuous. It's also deeply ironic. Valle Verde is a work that has far more in common, in terms of its formalistic technique, with Picasso than Titian. Is it a lack of self-awareness that puts this here? Or perhaps something else?

The novel Infinite Jest ends abruptly, with none of its plot points resolved. In this way it's similar to the titan of American postmodern literature, Gravity's Rainbow, which peters out without explaining the conspiracy that has driven its narrative. Infinite Jest plays a trick, though, as devious as it is facile. The final 200 pages of the book have been cut off and moved to the front. The story's beginning is a flash forward that, in its lack of context and confusing abstractions, is difficult to make sense of on first read. Upon rereading after finishing the book, though, it clearly contains the answers to all the unresolved plot threads.

If postmodernism could be described as an artistic period of uncertainty and obscured truth that was a response to the similarly uncertain Cold War era, where the inner machinations of governments may at any time cause the annihilation of the entire world, then what Infinite Jest did, published just a few years after the Cold War's end, could be seen as a reclamation of truth.

Truth itself is a concept deeply interwoven with Christianity. In Valle Verde, Pietro even calls it out with a green highlight to indicate its importance:

La Verdad sounds suspiciously similar to Valle Verde. Coincidence?

The context of this quote comes after the villagers destroy the church; Pietro reassures the player that La Verdad remains unchanging, and that this tribulation shall pass.

Might Valle Verde itself then be an Infinite Jest style reclamation, using the formalistic techniques of postmodernism that are so useful for obscuring truth to obscure what is, at its core, a simple and morally black-and-white tale of Christianity versus wicked idolatry?

There is a real-world allegorical undercurrent to Valle Verde that makes this reading even more appealing. Valle Verde's creator, Alluvium, is Argentinian, and the game is steeped in references to Argentinian history and politics.

That's a map of the Falkland Islands and a picture of former Argentine dictator Juan Peron.

At one point, when the villagers destroy the church (with the unwitting? help of the player character, who seems to have no moral interest in anything happening, and who only does whatever anyone asks him, whether it's Pietro or Foxxo), a highly overt reference is made to the death of Pope John Paul I, who reigned for only 33 days in the late 1970s before he died, officially, of a heart attack. The abruptness of his death, and the failure of the corrupt, Mafia- and freemason-connected Vatican Bank in the years that followed, have led to conspiracy theories that John Paul was actually murdered by freemasons within the Vatican so that they may continue to corrupt the Catholic Church.

Specifically, the conspiracy posits the assassination was done by the freemasonic branch P2, or Propaganda Due, an illegal fascistic secret society that contained many high-ranking members of Italian politics (including Silvio Berlusconi), whose goal was to act as a shadow government that could prevent the rise of communism within Italy. (P2 definitely existed; how much it actually influenced Italian politics is a matter of debate.)

Though primarily an Italian organization, P2 had several influential members from other countries, notably Argentina, where several politicians and military leaders at the highest levels were involved. As a nation, Argentina is something of a tragedy; at one point considered a rising economic powerhouse, its excellent geographic and demographic advantages were squandered by a long succession of corrupt leaders, including those involved in P2. It makes sense, then, why an Argentinian creator like Alluvium might be so interested in critiquing the evils of freemasonic corruption.

Valle Verde satirizes Argentina's leadership via Foxxo, not only through his freemasonic devil rituals, but also in more down-to-earth ways. In his introduction, Foxxo provides the player character 100 coins, telling him to "remember that the next elections" (Foxxo's catchphrase, despite him clearly stating he has been given absolute authority over the area by The Smiling One); moments later, when the player turns to leave, Foxxo mugs him from behind and puts him 99,999 coins in debt.

Through the use of masonic slogans like liberté, égalité, fraternité (which is written over what appears to be a portal to Hell) and masonic symbols such as the Statue of Liberty and Washington Monument, there's an undercurrent that expands this freemasonic secular/Satanic conspiracy beyond Argentinian politics and into the post-Enlightenment secular governments that have come to rule the so-called free world. "Progress is God," the freemasons state during their child sacrifice ritual. (Foxxo is joined in this scene by the village's museum curator, representing knowledge, and its scientist, representing progress.)

It's this kind of framing that makes me wonder about the previous scene depicting Picasso paintings as emblematic of the sin of Greed, compared to Renaissance paintings in the dumpster; is there a general theme here raging against modernity in all its forms, compared to a fundamentally good and absolute Christian religious truth? If so, it makes sense why Valle Verde is presented as it is, so abstractly; it shows a world rendered incomprehensible by modernity, but one that can be sifted and parsed to find incontrovertible religious salvation still shining underneath.

It is a rejection of "progress," using the formal techniques of "progress." In a milieu where the promises of the Enlightenment seem to have hit a dead end, where the freedom secularism once promised has given rise to corruption and abuses akin to those the Catholic Church of the Renaissance once inflicted, perhaps the sense of going back appeals.

The English literary world post-Infinite Jest itself also seems to have returned to the past; the works published today are realistic in style and scope, eschewing most formal techniques pioneered across the preceding century. Though I doubt that was David Foster Wallace's goal, it's what he created. Valle Verde, which is so explicit in its fundamental belief in Christianity, is probably far more deliberate in its rejection of the world as it currently exists.

Though there have always been voices calling for a return to the past, perhaps this is a mindset particularly enticing in the information age, when meaning seems so fragmented as to be ungraspable. Though Valle Verde is conscious of what it is doing formally in a way that, say, Ben Drowned is not, the inner simplicity of these ARG narratives obfuscated by abstraction strikes me as a collective yearning for clearly explicated, graspable truths in a world where such a thing seems increasingly impossible. Almost a fantasy: If only this incomprehensible eldritch horror could be explained by a 10-minute Game Theory video!

(The eldritch itself is a horror rooted in incomprehensibility. Making it explicable banishes it entirely, the way the protagonist of Valle Verde banishes a demon by holding aloft a crucifix. La Verdad triumphs. Couldn't our lives be so simple?)

Not every ARG is like this. Kane Pixels, another creator I would highlight for their exceptional technical talent and avant garde storytelling, has created far more nuanced and ambiguous narratives with works like The Oldest View, which deals with themes of nostalgia and memory without being resolvable into a simple pat sentence synopsis. Overall, I consider this entire collection of web original horror creators to be blessed with both the talent and mindset to create truly innovative works of fiction, even if many of them are outsider artists fumbling around just trying to scare someone; as outsiders, these confused anti-confusions of theme and meaning might be par for the course.

Valle Verde is an impressive work of art, even if it is an avant garde work that paradoxically rejects itself. Perhaps in that paradox more could be said than had it remained fully self-consistent. Either way, I eagerly await what comes next.

[suzukiblu]

who is match?

That . . . is a slightly complicated question, friend, because he keeps getting either retconned or getting given VERY alternate origins, hah. When I'M talking about him, I'm usually talking about specifically this version:

THAT Match is the OG version from the nineties, who was created by the Agenda as a clone of Superboy and meant to be the first draft/test run of a line of metahuman clone soldiers they wanted to produce to, like, sell to the highest bidder. He's an asshole who insists that he has no free will and therefore can't be enslaved while VERY CLEARLY BEING A PERSON WITH FREE WILL WHO IS BEING ENSLAVED, and the Agenda mostly trots him out to pretend to be Superboy and fuck with Project Cadmus or the superhero community in general or just try to murder Superboy/Young Justice/whoever they're annoyed with this week, I guess. His whole thing is he's better-educated than Superboy and knows more about literally everything but especially how their powers work, because he got the full education uploads (AND THE FULL INDOCTRINATION UPLOADS, JUST SAYIN') while Superboy got yanked out of his own cloning tube early and saved from . . . well, at least SOME of the mind control that Cadmus was gonna stuff in his head. SOME of it.

( goddammit, Lex )

This Match considers Superboy obsolete and himself as a better, updated version of their design, and again, is way better-educated and better with their powers. He is also way less creative and self-motivated, however, which tends to bite him in the ass when Superboy decides to get batshit in their fights. Like, that's generally how Superboy beats him, when he does: he just does something absolutely fucking STUPID and it works because Match is thinking "no one would actually be that stupid--oh my GOD how are you THIS STUPID?!?!"

Later on for no apparent reason they decided to have him genetically degrade and go Bizarro in Teen Titans, which annoyed the fuck out of me because it's actually the literal worst possible thing you could do to a character who prides themselves on being an improved design and more intelligent than their rival/enemy/foil, but like . . . the narrative was not really examining that, from what I know of it, the narrative was just "oh Bizarro Superboy is here to upset/freak out everybody while Kon is dead and also now he's being mind-controlled by an asshole and the good guys are . . . fine with that? for some reason??" and just . . . sigh. SIGH. And then he gets fucking murdered and used for scrap parts to make MORE Superboy clones, which oh my god, fucking horrifying TOO and YET . . .

Though apparently in Rebirth, he's alive again and they've semi-redone his origin and made him a clone of Superboy that Amanda Waller has inexplicably managed to produce and even more inexplicably somehow uploaded all of Kon's memories into? Somehow?? And is forcing to work on the Suicide Squad for her, because fuck Amanda Waller, jfc. And for a while in there he thought he WAS Kon, because like, how the fuck would he have known different. So that was fun for him to find out about, I guess! Especially because he ALSO started to Bizarro-degenerate about five seconds into that particular realization.

FYI KON HAS TRIED TO SAVE THIS BOY SO MANY TIMES AND IT HAS NEVER WORKED. NEVER. IT KILLS ME.

Also he seems to have inherited Kon's thing for older women along with his presumable memories, cough cough cough.

And ALSO there's a version of Match in Young Justice Animated who is actually OLDER than Conner, because he was directly cloned from purely Kryptonian DNA and then failed as a weapon because he wasn't controllable, and Project Kr was created as a hybridized clone after he became too unmanageable to use. He's apparently just full-stop psychotically violent due to shitty mental conditioning and instability in his Kryptonian DNA, and very much unbalanced, which is waaaaay different than the more calculating and educated version we first got in the comics.

It actually low-key makes me insane that they apparently just decided to make a character who was all uncontrollable violence and rage and just, like . . . never revisit him or actually HELP him despite the fact that he is EXPLICITLY both mentally AND physically compromised and therefore can't really be considered to be, you know, an informed asshole making informed asshole decisions any more than Conner was when his pod first got cracked. Project Match is a fucking baby who's had a very shit excuse for a "life" and has been CONDITIONED to respond violently AND is effectively suffering from a genetic disorder, but we're just gonna . . . ignore that, I guess . . . and punish him for it? I guess?? For being how he was made and not having the mental capacity to figure out how to be anything else in the, like, thirty fucking seconds of actual consciousness the series allows him??

And I am just not gonna talk about what they did to him in the tie-in comic, hahaha. FUCK that tie-in comic.

( one day I will write fix-it fic for you, YJ Animated Match. one day. I AM COMING FOR YOU. BE STRONG. )

[absurdcosmonaut]

Headcannon to counter the tails/sonic angst going around >;( I SEE YOU @0vergrowngraveyard!!!! YOU STARTED THIS DIDNT YOU!?!?!?

Tails was shot by Metal Sonic with Eggman’s newest weapon using a chaos emerald. Initially Metal thought it would tare recent through the fox, being that on testing it on other living things, the result was just that. However when the light faded the Metal hedgehog was staring right at a baby fox on the ground looking scared.

Metal Sonic had such a hard time processing this that Sonic immediately shattered the bot to nothing but scrap, (Doesn’t kill the inorganic copy due to its memory being remotely updated to the egg-cloud every hour or so) allowing the hedgehog to swipe the emerald out of the newly broken pile lying on the grass.

When Sonic runs over to the crater where the fox was standing the first thing he notices is the socks and shoes of his fox bro lying there, causing him to nearly loose himself and seek out Eggman to kill him. But just as he turns to go on the hunt to avenge his sidekick, he hears an infantile cry and finds a brown fox cub lying under the pair of socks.

Sonic gathers the pairs of shoes and socks for when his brother returns to normal, (they were his favorite hand-me-downs after all. The fox would be devastated if they were lost), but finds the cub is more elusive than he would have thought due to his small size. Realizing the little guy might not fully remember him or be scared, Sonic decides to be patient and allow the fox to come to him instead. This works far better when as soon as the fox calms down some fragment of his memory remembers his brother as the only safe place he knows and quickly attaches to him after some coaxing in the form of the mints he keeps in his quills for the kit.

The big question they have after talking with all their friends and netting professor pickle is why did the emeralds’ power do so much damage but spare the fox when it killed almost everything in it’s path when fired into anything else?

In short, the fox gets chosen by the emeralds to be a chaos user, but because he’s not a male hedgehog like shadow, sonic, or silver has to be given a new body altogether. Thus, the kit can suddenly become super when all the emeralds are near as they are now attracted to him just like Sonic when he’s experiencing strong positive or negative emotions. (See previous fics I made for @0vergrowngraveyard)

This is also where the fox’s new form comes in, being a bright blue with nine Tails (possibly meaning they turned him into a kitsune…? 0_0)while his previous color was yellow like Sonic’s when he had to use his chaos energy to go super. Now though, after the transformation his eyes gradually shift from blue to green when he ages just like Sonic. In fact, now that his friends look at him he could almost be mistaken for being Sonic’s weird kid…

And that’s what ended up happening. The emeralds turned the fox back into a cub with a newly minted chaos user’s body to finally be granted a family at the young age he deserved…

Yes, this was a long winded way of me working Dadnic into actual cannon MWAHAHAHA >;D

[runariya]

I just found your blog and turns out, I like your writings. Infinity is so cool, I miss reading other AU like aliens. Although I'm looking forward for chp 4 of My Beloved Villain, will you ever consider writing Jungkook's POV for Infinity? Just a short drabble on how he find her (lying on the wilderness' floor; maybe a bit extra when he clean and take care of her when she's unconscious) and how he react when she ran from him in the shop. Thank you so much for sharing your writings. I'm still binge reading from your masterlist. Really looking forward to your next update. Take care and stay healthy.

Hey anon 💕

tysm for your kind words and taking the time to explore my blog! I rly feel you with Alien!AUs, it's such a weak spot for me too. And considering the infinity!couple is special to me and your suggestion sparked such a joy to me, I couldn't help but to write 3.5k for your drabble request lol

So, yeah, hope you enjoy and tysm again for your support 🥰 you take care and stay healthy as well!

• (drabble below cut) •

Jungkook had been chasing a ghost ever since the day he came of age, hurtling alone from galaxy to galaxy in the quiet solitude of his spaceship. He was a drifter among the stars, born with markings that no other Nepturian possessed, a curious anomaly. From his first breath, he was set apart, regarded with a mix of reverence and envy—a strange creature in the eyes of his people, a mystery even to himself. The elders spoke of him in hushed tones, their awe thinly veiling their curiosity, while his peers cast sideways glances tinged with bitterness.

For most of his life, he had lived with no understanding of his place in the universe. Then, as his legal age approached, everything shifted. The council of wise men summoned him and his family, revealing at last the truth that had been hidden from him: his destiny was bound to the very essence of his home planet. It was a burden he hadn’t known he was carrying, and when he reached his age of majority, there were no cheers of celebration, no revelry marking the occasion—only solemn farewells. His journey began that day, a lone traveler cast out into the stars with nothing but his ship and his mission.

The years stretched long as he wandered, his search ceaseless, his heart tethered to the elusive promise of saving. Along the way, he consumed every scrap of knowledge he could find about humans, the strange, fragile beings who had once roamed the galaxies. But the more he learned, the heavier his heart became. 

It became clear, with every text, every conversation, that he had arrived too late—the human race had vanished, extinguished like a flame snuffed out in the dark. Yet, despite the overwhelming evidence, a small, stubborn hope clung to him like a shadow he couldn’t get rid off. That hope sparked to life again when, in a seedy starport tavern, he overheard a pair of Stranpy whispering about a human female. They claimed to have seen her in a brothel on a distant planet, a fading relic in a world that no longer recognised her kind.

Jungkook hadn’t hesitated. His ship roared to life, cutting through the void of space as it carried him seven galaxies away to the desolate outpost known only as Morthak. When he landed, the brothel wasn’t the dilapidated hovel he had expected—it was sleek, high-tech, a tower of hollow decadence in the midst of a barren, wild world. Yet something within him shifted, and as he stepped towards the entrance, his body recoiled. His markings, usually dormant, flared with a light of their own, casting a pale, blueish glow over his arms. 

His instincts screamed at him, tugging him away from the gleaming doors, as he could feel it in his bones—a pull, an insistent force driving him away from the path he had set out on. His feet stumbled, then steadied, as he veered off into the tangled underbrush that surrounded the facility. Each step felt lighter, as though the very ground beneath him was trying to push him forwards, his breath fogging and uneven in the cold air. He didn’t understand the compulsion that gripped him, didn’t know why his chest felt tight as he fought through the dense jungle, but he could feel that he was drawing closer to something—to someone.

When the foliage parted into a small clearing, the sensation hit him all at once. His instincts snapped into focus, narrowing his vision until all he could sense was the space in front of him. A scent lingered in the air, sweet and intoxicating, as potent as sugar dissolved in flame. It curled around him, drawing him in like a whisper in the dark, a promise of something precious and everything he searched for. 

And it was at the edge of the clearing, where a small, scaled creature—something wild and feral, with scales and sharp eyes—snuffled around in the dirt. It pawed at the ground as though searching for its next meal, its snout grazing a damp patch of earth. 

Jungkook moved closer, his heart thrumming with an unspoken warning. There was something wrong here, as he could feel it in his marrow, a tension building under his skin. The creature’s intent was clear, but what lay beneath its paws was not prey. He shooed it away gently, his voice low and steady, his hand sweeping the creature aside, and what he found beneath its paws twisted something deep within him.

Lying in the mud, half-buried in filth, was a human. You were small, fragile, your body covered in muck and leaves, as though nature itself had tried to reclaim you. Your skin, pale and bruised, seemed barely capable of sustaining life, your breath shallow and uneven, fogging in the night. It was as though the universe had abandoned you here, forgotten and broken, as if your very value was lost. Jungkook’s heart clenched painfully in his chest at the sight of you, as he knelt beside you, his hands hovering over your frail form as though afraid to touch, afraid to break whatever fragile tether still held you to this world.

“What have they done to you?” he whispered, the words a soft breath of anguish that he barely realised he had spoken. They were more for himself than for you, a bitter question aimed at the universe that had allowed such cruelty to exist. One glance at you, and he could see the scars, the suffering etched into your skin, the shadow of torment that clung to you like a second skin. It didn’t take a word from your lips to tell him the truth—your life had been hell.

Gently, he gathered you into his arms, your body light, almost weightless, as though the burdens you had carried had stripped you down to nothing but bones and breath. His markings, which had been flaring wildly only moments before, began to calm, their soft glow dimming into a shine that seemed to soothe not just him but you as well. 

He didn’t care that the mud and grime smeared his clothes, didn’t care that the non-existent weight of you in his arms made him feel sick. All that mattered was getting you to safety. All that mattered was that you were no longer alone in this unforgiving world. 

He would protect you now, with every breath in his body, with every beat of his heart. And nothing—no force in the galaxies—would take you from him.

Being back on his spaceship, he wasn’t sure where to place you—whether to settle you in the small, shadowed spare room of his ship or to let you rest in the white room, typically reserved for the stray hitchhikers he picked up from time to time. After a moment’s consideration, he decided the spare room, with its deep, dark colors, might overwhelm your frayed nerves too much. So instead, he opted for the white room, its soft, sterile light a break from the suffocating darkness you had surely endured up until now. 

There you lay before him on a smooth surface—a table he had summoned from the blank wall with the brush of his hand. Your chest rose and fell faintly, as though each breath took more from you than it returned, your unconscious form trembling slightly as you fought the cold and exhaustion that gripped you. His movements were careful, tender, as he began to strip away the remnants of the dirty rags clinging to your skin, each piece of fabric came away, falling in a rotten heap beside him. 

The act of undressing you did not stir within him any sense of awkwardness or discomfort, as for Nepturians, the body was something sacred and pure, beyond any shame. It was a vessel of life, and life itself was to be honoured, not hidden. Nudity was no more remarkable than the stars. 

Once you were free of your soiled clothes, he took to washing you, his hands moving with a tenderness that belied his strength in so many ways. Warm water flowed over your body, trickling across skin that bore the stories of suffering in the form of countless scars he already noticed through the mud—pale ridges from poorly handled wounds against your otherwise smooth flesh. 

He touched them lightly, his fingertips tracing their jagged paths with an almost reverent sorrow. Your bones seemed hollow beneath his touch, fragile as a bird’s, and he had to temper his strength, fearful that one wrong move would break you even more. Your skin, cold and pale with the bluish tint of chill, stirred a deep ache within him that nothing had ever managed to provoke.

The sight of you—so broken, so fragile—unraveled him, let him feel as the most powerless creature in existence. He had thought himself immune to such feelings, had survived the burden of the fall of his own planet without much more than a fleeting ache. But now, seeing you like this, something in him splintered like old battered wood. 

The weight of his homeworld’s destruction had been bearable, even trivial, compared to the devastation he felt at your past suffering. The prophecy, the grand destiny he had been given without wanting to, all seemed inconsequential now. None of it mattered, not the council’s words, nor the fate of his people. His sole purpose in the universe had crystallised into one clear, unwavering truth: he had to protect you. Whatever had happened to you, whatever horrors had led you here, they would never touch you again. You were his mate, his responsibility, and the thought of anything or anyone harming you again sent a rage simmering beneath his skin.

Still, he knew his feelings, his protective urges, would not help you right now. As he gently wiped away the last remnants of the grime, revealing more of the soft, delicate flesh beneath, he debated how he would face you once you woke. If your body was this ravaged, this close to collapse, then your mind must be even worse off. Whatever torments had taken root in your spirit would likely outstrip those your body had endured, and the last thing he wanted was to overwhelm you with emotions you couldn’t yet comprehend. He would have to suppress his own instincts, stifle the fierce need to comfort you with touch, to tell you that you were safe now. You needed control more than you needed affection, and he knew it.

He pressed his feelings down, locking them away beneath a cloak of detachment he truly didn’t want but knew, that it was a necessary restraint. He could not afford to show you the depth of his connection, not yet. You needed stability, a sense of distance, of control over your surroundings. Anything less might send you into a panic, and he couldn’t risk you seeing him as a threat. You were so vulnerable now, both in body and mind, and he feared that a rash instinct of selfdefense could shatter whatever fragile connection remained between your soul and this world.

After he had dressed you in his clothes, the oversized black fabric swallowing your petite form, he draped a thick blanket over you, tucking it gently around your body to help coax warmth back into your cold limbs and watching how your shivering gradually eased. 

Jungkook took one last look at you, his expression full of tender longing despite you being near, before stepping away from the room. But even after he left, he didn’t truly leave you, as he retreated to the cockpit, where he kept a watchful eye on you through the CCTV screen, his gaze never wavering as his ship flowed on autopilot through space and time. You lay there so still, so quiet, almost peaceful with the small smile grazing your lips in your slumber, yet every flicker of movement on the screen caught his full attention, every subtle shift in your breathing or twitch of your fingers quickening his pulse with a quiet anxiety he wasn’t familiar with.

He didn’t know how you would react when you woke, didn’t know if you would panic or strike out or collapse back into the depths of your broken mind. He only hoped, with a longing he had never known before, that you would remain calm—that you wouldn’t see him as a danger, hoped you wouldn’t hurt yourself in a desperate attempt to protect yourself from him. Because if you did, if you recoiled from him in fear, it would destroy him far more thoroughly than anything else ever could.

Jungkook stood by your side, as it took weeks for you to begin feeling even the faintest flicker of comfort around him, though the wariness never left your eyes completely. Always on edge, you carried yourself like a creature awaiting the next strike of inevitable doom, poised for a danger he knew would never come. Jungkook understood, though—deeply. It would take time, time measured in baby steps, in small moments where trust could be tested and proved, over and over again, and that was okay. Each small step forward, each moment you chose not to flinch away, filled him with a secret, quiet joy he had never known. Progress, however halting, was a balm to the ache that had taken root in his chest since the day he’d found you.

It was during one of these stretches of fragile peace that he noticed the rash creeping along the lower curve of your back, the angry red patch of skin making him frown with concern. You hadn’t mentioned it—probably hadn’t wanted to out reasons unknown to him—but he’d seen it. So he decided he needed to gather some herbs to help soothe the irritation. That’s when he decided to make stop at Thraxor, a planet known for its medicinal offerings. He suggested you come along, gently persuading you that the change of scenery might do you some good, offer a breath of fresh air to your mind. You hesitated but ultimately agreed, which felt like a surge of quiet triumph. It was another small victory, a moment where you chose to step out of the shadows, if only for a little while.

Jungkook’s instincts prickled the moment you entered the Silvex shop, an unshakable feeling settling low in his gut, as his eyes scanned the room warily, watching every shadow and movement with a sharpened eyes. He tried to keep his tone light as he conversed with the Silvex behind the counter, suppressing the uneasy twist in his chest. He didn’t want his nerves to ripple into you, didn’t want you picking up on his unease when you’ve clearly took a chance. So, he encouraged you to wander the shop, hoping the distraction would keep you occupied while he finished his purchase.

The Silvex, with its slick, slithering voice, made his skin crawl, but Jungkook pushed forward, asking about the herbs he needed, his nerves burning with each passing second. Then, out of nowhere, the Silvex uttered a single sentence that turned the air in the room to ice despite the heat on the planet. 

"She's a nice slave," the Silvex giggled, the words slipping out carelessly amidst the discussion of roots and tonics fitting for your rash. "How much do you want for her? I could use her just perfectly for my other business."

In that instant, a deep, all-consuming red rage flared across Jungkook’s vision. It was as if a switch had been flipped, his blood boiling with an intensity he had never known he was capable of. “She’s not for sale,” he growled through clenched teeth, each word a barely contained explosion. 

But it was too late. In his fury, he hadn’t noticed the shift in your stance, hadn’t seen the widening of your eyes, hadn’t felt the tremor of panic rise in you while hidden behind the shelves. You had already taken off, bolting through the door before he could stop you.

His heart shattered in a sudden vice of terror, panic flooding him as he watched you disappear from sight. "Stop!" His voice rang out loudly as he lunged after you, barely aware of the Silvex scrambling to follow. The suns above beat down mercilessly, its blinding light burning his eyes as he stumbled into the open market. He squinted against the glare, desperation coursing through him as he spun in frantic circles, trying to catch a glimpse of you, but all he could see were the different shapes of strangers, the colours and sounds of the market merging into a dizzying chaos around him.

He began asking anyone he could find, breathless, his voice rising in desperation with every question asked. "Did you see a human? A girl? Where did she go?" Some shook their heads, others pointed vaguely towards the far end of the market, but none of it was fast enough, none of it got him any closer to you. His heart pounded wildly in his chest, each beat hurting more than the other.

Then, piercing through the noise around him clogging his ears, he heard it—your scream. It echoed off the narrow walls of an alley not far from where he stood, a loud short cry that sent a wave of new icy terror crashing over him without him having time to breathe. His heart sank, a sickening dread twisting his insides as he sprinted towards where your scream disappeared.

‘She should know,’ he thought frantically, his mind racing. ‘By now she should know she’s safe with me, that I would never let anything happen to her.’ But clearly, he had been wrong. His chest aching with self-loathing, anger at himself for failing you so completely. 

You clearly didn’t trust him, and it was all his fault.

Jungkook shoved his way through the crowd, desperate to reach you before it was too late. He couldn’t lose you—not like this, not after everything. His breath burned in his lungs as he finally spotted you in the distance, standing there, your terrified eyes locking with his, and for a brief moment, hope surged in his chest. But then you were off again, fleeing before he could even call out. His voice broke, your name a desperate plea on his lips that fell on deaf ears.

He didn’t know what else to do—he had never expected you to be so fast and agile, so desperate in your escape. The Silvex appeared some distance before him, and for a split second, Jungkook cursed the day he had ever set foot in that forsaken shop. His mind raced, his very soul a storm of chaos and regret, until finally, in a move he would never have considered under normal circumstances, he did the unthinkable. "STOP HER!" he shouted into the crowd, the words tearing from his throat, filled with a desperation that scattered his bones. 

For a brief, agonising moment, nothing happened, but to his immense relief—though it was tinged with a bitter taste of shame—a Necrovian stepped forward, his long, spindly arms reaching out to catch you as you passed. You struggled against him, but he held fast, and Jungkook’s legs nearly buckled with relief, but the anger for himself didn’t lessen any less. 

The desperation that had gripped him moments before shifted, almost violently, into a burning anger, that surged through him, only directed at himself and at you. Anger at his own failure to protect you, to make you feel safe enough. And anger at you—for being so reckless, so unbelievably reckless, to run like that. Did you not understand how dangerous it was? How stupid it had been to run when you stood no chance of surviving out here alone? You would have been lost, or worse, if he hadn’t been there to chase after you. 

He clenched his fists as he walked towards you, his jaw ticking with frustration, the heat of his emotions blazing through him even worse than all the suns in existence. He needed to do something, anything, to make you see—to make you finally realise that nothing could hurt you when you were with him. You needed to understand that. He needed you to understand that.

But still, you were safe now, and at the end of the day, it’s all that matters to him. 

He would bring you back to the ship, and there, at last, he could breathe again and make things actually right this time. 

Infinity ML • other work

[theduckeminence]

You guys. Ever think that when Eddie said “I want to go home” at the end of the secret Homewarming video, he is technically homeless?

I remember a post somewhere about how when Eddie was having that staring contest with Home, it was in a sense implicating the idea of how at first, Eddie was feeling at home when he finally got to rest in the chair. But when he and Home started staring at one another, it suddenly became this very unnerving and perturbing moment for Eddie as he began to spiral into this dissociation/depersonalization upon his revelation.

And the fact that when someone is feeling at home, they feel welcomed and comfy within the walls of said home — especially within the confines of their own home. It ofc sounds stupidly obvious and unnecessary for me to mention, but it connects to my original thought (it was far better worded in the post I mentioned before — which I hope to find later).

Moreover, it’s this intimidatingly imposing moment in which Home stares down at Eddie that in a way, it’s as if it’s not only subjecting him to the horrors of the reality they live in, as well as what they are, but it may also be subjecting him to the idea that — since Home is a place to belong and give warmth and comfort to those within it’s confines — unlike everyone else, Eddie may not be welcomed as much as everyone else is.

Could it be something related to the fact that Playfellow Workshop was intending to take him out that he is subjected to the horrors? Or was it because that Eddie was scrapped out of Homewarming that Home decided to contribute in some way to Eddie’s episode of dissociation/depersonalization & revelation?

And this makes it all the more interesting considering the neighborhood is celebrating “Homewarming” — which seems to be a holiday that celebrates Home with the title and some of the odd holiday rituals (though to be fair, I need to properly read up on everything within the update just to be sure).

Another thing that I feel may be well related to this, and what I have mentioned earlier, is that unlike majority of the other neighbors, Eddie doesn’t have an actual home. All he has is the post office.

I feel this may connect well with my theories/thoughts/ideas about how Playfellow Workshop perceives Eddie as a character in terms of purpose and how he appears to them — a simple mailman. Nothing more, nothing less. It may also leak into the idea of the realm between reality and the WH-world in which since Eddie is simply a mailman, this is all he is given.

No home, nor comforting confines for him.

This can also be taken into account that Howdy is quite similar — as like Eddie, all he has is his bodega.

Do with that what y’all will ;3.

[grunckle]

I think about this og map concept for Rain World a lot.

It was talked about sort of in a stream, where they said the "bridge" on top of the Superstructure was originally where the ending took place.

If I were to guess, this was likely something digital, since thats an idea they played with more in their scrapped game Animalmyn. You would play as a human consciousness uploaded to a digital mall, and be forced to scrounge the different levels to upgrade your form, buy cosmetics, or buy weapons. As the game would progress, the mall would start deteriorating and would become more hostile.

Although the game is scrapped, there’s some old gifs Joar made that showcased its early stages. And you can also find its entire soundtrack online.

Videocult scrapped it because they wanted to move onto bigger projects, but they also gave it to a developer named Bones to work on it themself. There hasn’t been any updates on this in a pretty long time, so honestly I don’t think it’s happening, but there were also some screenshots of the game when Bones worked on it.

Though I don’t think Videocult are done with this digital idea yet. In some of the screenshots for their upcoming game, Airframe Ultra, you can see some… (intentional) glitches going on atop buildings.

It’s just a cool running motif, and it makes me wonder if, like Rain World, these games have a cyberpunk facade that eventually uncovers something much, much weirder and alien.

[bnuuys-writing]

Naga!Jamil x Reader x Roc!Kalim

Omg hiiii, its been a while everyone since i wrote something but here's the first part to something that's been pecking my brain for a while! Sorry its not the update for Vil's Moving Castle, i think im going to scrap it and rewrite it when I have more time.

This is only the FIRST part! I plan on writing a second part whenever i have free time again. Ive been picking away at this for a few weeks now. Anyway, hope you enjoy!

~BnuuyOut!

Well. This isn't how you imagined you'd die. Being cornered by a larger snake-like creature to where there was no escape in sight unless you'd like to jump straight into his fangs…

Let's start this over again, how did you even get in this situation again?

The weather was warm as you entered the freezing cold building. A weird zoo-like research laboratory where you were under contract to work for free because of how gracious your professor was… Ass… You sighed slightly as you tugged on the free lab coat that your professor offered to you that had holes in every pocket, and was that… Dried stains of spaghetti sauce? Ugh. Shaking your head slightly as you made your way to the cafeteria and quietly sat down near the back, waiting to see if this is something you'd have to leave immediately and never return back to, free or not. Minutes passed as others started to file into the room, chitter chatter filling up the room only for a certain crack of a whip to silence the audience within seconds.

“Welcome pups, to your first hybrid meeting of how to be a caretaker!” A man walked out, two dalmatians hounding at each side of him as two others seemed to wheel in cages covered with curtains.

“For those who don't know what you signed up for, which is absolutely idiotic if you didn't read the full internship form, this is a place where we find the extraordinary creatures, house them, and research them before safely releasing them back from whence they came!” The man had a puffy black and white coat, fur lined it seemed from your assumptions as it was just as beautiful as his personality. Rough.

“For those who do not know me! I am your new Professor, your new internship coworker. But more like your boss. If I find out one of you pups messed up something with what is mine, you will be expelled immediately.” Another crack of the whip caused some to flinch at the sound as he continued to ramble on. Yet, your gaze trailed off of him to the cages where you could've sworn you heard something rattling… Like a rattle maybe? Lowering your head just slightly in hopes of catching a small peek, you could only feel yourself tense up in your seat when you saw a glow of slitted eyes shine back at you for just a second. As for what was underneath the curtain, you couldn't figure out just yet. 

Though, snapping your gaze back to your new professor, he continued to speak about how all the students will be assigned to areas that, if they are lucky, will like. If not, they are more than happy to drop out, as for volunteering for a section? It will be all yours, if not with some partners will be either voluntold to join. A large shake at the cage on the left caused everyone to jump in their seats as Professor Crewel seemed to snicker at everyones reactions to the rattling cage. 

“This is our Roc, a creature that hunts over the seas, capturing up sailors from their ships and being able to lift up an elephant in its adult years. Though this one is smaller, only for containment reasons, its adult size was a little harder to capture yet, this one seemed to fit into the snare just like a glove.” Crewel states out as he ripped off the curtain of the cage, a large looking hybrid of a man and a bird, with white dazzling feathers and hair seeming to coat its body. Although it was impressively large, it didn't seem all too aggressive towards everyone, seeming all too delighted in seeing the new faces… Unless you were wrong and it was just looking at who was going to be its next snack. A louder hiss could be heard as Crewel stepped closer to the cage holding what was so called a ‘Roc’ only for the man to seem a big smug at the reaction.

“Now, before anyone can start placing bids on who wants to work with our Roc here, you must come to learn that this Roc comes with another. Although, he is always in a sour mood, they seem to be in some sort of a pact of service to each other. While one leaves peacefully and unbothered, this–” Nothing could stop the gasps of students as the curtain was ripped off of the second cage only for a very, very, pissed looking snake like creature to be staring right at Crewel, its tail flicking with its rattle to try and scare off the Professor. 

“--Creature, comes with it. This is a Naga, and as for its design and pattern, they come together in a pair. So! Who is willing to work with our Roc and Naga?” Professor Crewel stated as the naga creature seemed to turn its body towards the crowd and hiss violently, venom spitting out from its large fangs and dripping down the metal bars of its enclosure, causing it to steam just slightly. 

Silence filled the room. So quiet that you swore, you could almost hear a pin drop within the auditorium. 

“No offers? Our Roc seemed very well trained, and always seems excited to have new fresh blood in the enclosure with him. You’ll just have to try your luck in not getting stuck with our Naga here while you are around the Roc.” Crewel hummed out only for his gaze to land upon you. The only one not diverting your gaze from him. While the other students seemed to look upon the walls with such wonder, some already leaving the auditorium and dropping out from the course, and others seemingly looking sick as they looked upon the angry looking Naga with fear. 

“Ah, you. With the (H/C) and stained labcoat.” Fuck you Crewel. Slowly standing up, dread filling your heart as you heard some others around you, whispering thanks for not being chosen to be their handlers.

“I see great promise with you with these two…” Crewel hummed out with a smirk, as he nodded his head. Oh, how wonderful.

A month had passed since that moment in the auditorium, you had teammates until they all dropped out one by one as they learned more and more about the Roc and Naga together. It seemed from what the researchers had learned about them is that when the Roc lay their eggs and have to go hunting across the seas to pickup sailors for their meals, the nagas were left behind to obey and serve the children until their parents came back. Then came the story on how they captured the Roc and Naga here in the building. The Roc children has been learning how to fly, and the Naga had to follow their every movement so that they wouldn't become the next meal for them. Apparently the Roc in captivity fell from the sky right into the trap, and the Naga has been trying to free him when they were found only for both of them to get sedated and brought back to the research facility.

After observing how handlers dealt with them as well, you began to learn their patterns in making sure that you wont die once you step foot into the enclosure… Like today.

“Alright pup, go ahead on in there, and feed them. Remember, don't look the Naga in his eye, and try to stay over foliage so that the Roc doesn't scoop you up where you stand. Put everything we taught you into action.” And with a crude shove and a loud bang. Professor Crewel really was cruel in some ways, you supposed… Shoving you into the enclosure and shutting the door tight. 

Nevertheless. You were now in the warm enclosure. Alone. Minus two pairs of hungry eyes watching your every movement.

You were careful in your step, making sure to stay under the treeline and foliage in hopes of not getting swooped up by the large bird man. As well avoiding any droppings or anything that you might've mistaken as a snake tail. Buckets in each hand as you traversed the area smoothly, making sure to count your steps just in case you had to make a run for the door and memorizing where you were… Just in case…

You could see their food bowl essentially, a large stone carved into a bowl-like structure with a flowing manmade river for them to get fresh water. The only downfall was that the tree that usually hung over the bowl had fallen due to a storm a few days prior… So your only guardrail was missing. And these guys were hungry… 

“Alright.. You can do this… Show no fear and they'll have no reason to hurt you… Have confidence in your steps…” You whispered to yourself as you took a shaky step forward into the light of the day, no longer under the shady canopy protecting you from the Roc. With another step, you were getting closer and closer to the food bowl without any issues. Just as you neared closer and closer, movement in the corner of your eye was caught as you couldn't help but turn around just slightly… Ever so slowly in hopes of not pissing off whatever was there. 

Slitted eyes bore right into your eyes as you could feel the entrancing pull once again. Slowly, the world around you began to grow darker and darker, all you could see were these entrancing eyes, almost as if beckoning you closer with how they memorized you. Taking slow steps forward, a crack of a tree branch sounded way too close to you as this seemed to snap you out of whatever hypnotism the naga was performing on you. Taking a large intake of breath as you averted your eyes away from the snake man, only to throw it up to see a grinning feathery face a little too close to yours.

A hiss is what snapped you out from your trance from looking at the Roc creature. Shit. Without a second to spare, you ducked back under the foliage as you could feel your heartbeat pounding against your chest as your feet thudded against the ground roughly in hopes of retracing your steps. Yet, in your adrenaline flurry rush, you found yourself in a corner against one of the rocky mountains. Turning around to try and find another escape, you were met face to face with a very angry looking reptilian man. The naga, fuck.

Back pinned against the rocky surface, you could feel the forked tongue flicking out against your cheek as you avoided looking in his eyes at all cost, knowing it would cause certain death. 

Well, either way. This isn't how you'd expect how you'd die.

You could feel the hot breath ever looming closer and closer to you. Yep, even with those buckets of food, you know snakes prefer live meals… Meals that still has their blood pumping with adrenaline as they know they are being hunted down. As you felt death looming close to your neck, inching ever closer before a loud thump could be heard overhead as you were suddenly lifted up by two arms… Two feathery arms.

Blinking your eyes open, looking at the height you are being held over. The Roc, having lifted you up into his arms as he had landed on the mountain. The naga, seeming pissed as the Roc has just taken his meal, began to hiss loudly which… Sllliiggttllyy? Sounded like some type of serpent tongue?

Gripping onto the arms of the Roc, he began to chirp quite loudly into your ear as he squeezed you even tighter in his arms, a bright large smile on his face as his ruby eyes were looking down at the brown eyed naga… So his eyes weren't red, maybe that's when he was trying to hypnotize his prey..? This all seemed too much as you could feel yourself losing precious air by how tight the roc was holding you in his feathered arms. In your losing state of consciousness, you could've sworn you could understand them for just a second.

“Kalim! You know better than to snatch prey from me! That was supposed to be OUR meal!”

“But Jammiillll! They were just so cute, I couldn't just let you kill them!! You should've seen how surprised they were to see me up so close!”

“It doesn't matter, Kalim. Drop them before you get seriously hurt. They don't take too kindly to you holding our feeders.” 

As your mind slowly slipped into a state of consciousness, you could've sworn you heard a yell of Professor Crewel as you're lifted up into the air where sleep took you quickly in your state.

[ranticore]

Chapter 3 - To Be Phocid [Qedivar's research]

It's that time again. Ishmael is a teenage boy, fair warning.

I'm posting this on mobile so I cba linking the previous chapters but go into the siren tag to find them.

x

Following these events, and at Maris’s insistence, Ishmael began to keep a journal. To the delight of this author, his writing was deep, introspective, and highly detailed. From now on, I no longer had to rely on pieced together scraps and reports, but from a primary source. As such, the way these events are related will shift a little, but that is only for events concerning Ishmael.

Cherta, unfortunately, did not keep a journal at this time and remains frustratingly opaque, given Ishmael’s somewhat biased recounting of their activities. Although one must concede to the difficulties of keeping a journal underwater, before the age of sub-aquatic writing systems, and with eighteen other overambitious adolescents in relatively close proximity.

Ishmael’s journal was recorded on a computerified device and was not written by hand, though his deep dream education had serviced to educate him in handwriting skills. This was tested when he was younger, as part of an evaluation to determine the extent of his dexterity. Although the notion of a form of writing which is stored in a purely hypothetical space is very odd, especially in its permanency, it has enabled us to access his thoughts at this day and age, whereas traditional aquatic knot-writing would have long since rotted away.

He wrote in the language of the Predecessors, which I believe to be the root of all air-speaking language families. The translation of these texts is what has taxed me more than any other part of this process, aside from the grievous bodily harm, and it has taken a fantastic span of time to achieve this translation. I cannot credit my sources for fear of implicating them but you can be assured that the finest minds of the Spire collaborated on this project. This Predecessor tongue is what is spoken in all of the videos, enabling me to learn it to a conversational level, though I am hardly fluent.

Some of the journal is rendered untranslatable due to it referring to objects or concepts which were considered common knowledge at the time, requiring no additional definition. These concepts or objects will be clearly marked. However, I believe much of the text to be familiar to many people, telling of the frustration and longing common and recognisable today. That said, I believe it is also important not to take for granted the relatability.

Ishmael is not always familiar to us and existed in a time we would find nigh incomprehensible. Do not take this as reason to doubt his interiority or personhood, and do not fall into the trap of believing that you would have done better in his place, that you would have seen clearly what he obviously did not (and had good reason not to). They may have been phocids, or the predecessors of phocids, but they were new. If you were the first of your kind, could you do better?

I will now present the text in chronological order, starting from the eve of his sixteenth birthday:

-

Entry 1 – I hate seeing that baby siphonid. It’s still moving. It drags itself around on the leg the researchers didn’t take. Now I’m just going to remember this forever, since I wrote it down. Great. I hate that fucking noise. Why can’t they just get it to shut up?

Thank [deity]. They took it away.

Update – it didn’t even taste good.

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Entry 2 - Maris told me to talk more about my feelings. What does she know? Nobody understands me anyway. I don’t think they can feel all that on their face like me. The sipho noise kept touching me. The researchers are always talking about hydrofoils and antennae but I bet they don’t know what I do - how the siphos talk to each other. I told Callum and he didn’t know what I meant, even though he has a beard.

Talked to Lee again about sex since Dan said he wouldn’t tell me himself. I don’t think Lee told the truth about a lot of that stuff. The other kids sometimes joke around a bit too much, but it is kinda funny I guess.

Update - Dan shouted at me for asking, but now I have proof Lee was wrong.

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Entry 3 – The phocids click at each other underwater with their tongues.

Dan got so angry after I pulled my face hair out. He made the interns [untranslatable] search my room for the hairs and they actually found them. They didn’t even do anything with it, just put it in a bag and sealed it away. Looks like nobody wants it at all. Dan says Atom spent 120 billion nua making me, so I think one face hair is worth a few million. If I started selling them to the people outside the lab, I could buy my own stake of land on Siren just like them. I wouldn’t let Lee in. My fingers are probably worth a couple billion each.

Should I

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Entry 4 – Emer (the intern) looked at me like I did something wrong when she changed my pillowcases.

Spilled bile EVERYWHERE when they were testing me. I keep thinking about somehow saving it and trying to sell it. I’m supposed to be a digestive model for Siren food, so my insides are probably worth a lot. I should ask Dan when he calms down.

Callum came around to talk to Dan again. He’s getting really tall, he’s taller than me now even when I stand up straight. He’s so skinny, like the baby siphonids (I can snap one in half with just my teeth now). When Callum was there, he didn’t want to look at me, but I get it. They didn’t even cook the siphonid this time, it was raw and with the shell on. His leg is the same width as one of them.

Emer won’t stop changing my pillowcases. Is there a way to prevent them from smelling like that?? Callum hasn’t been around so I can’t ask. Maris thinks it’s just because people my age start getting sweaty but Dan specifically told me he made me not have sweat glands anywhere but my hands. Then he said the phocids do have sweat glands. I still don’t get the point of sweating if you’re already a stupid wet rat who lives in the

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Entry 5 – I’m seventeen now. Since I’m an adult, I decided to stop being reticent around the phocids. I want to know if they found a comfortable way to walk without the skin coming off their tails. So I went to talk to them today for the first time. There is a window where you can do it, they let it open ever since the climate control got busted again last month.

Cherta is really weird. I knew they couldn’t stay in the pool for very long because they might have a seizure but apparently it can happen any time, not just underwater. They have a button implant that makes their muscles relax. Anyway, their tails have thicker skin than mine so that was useless. But it is still worthwhile, I think, to meet with the phocids. They remind me why I am a human, and they are not. I kind of pity them because all they're ever going to be is a bunch of test subjects in a tiny swimming pool.

Cherta told me that one of the phocids died a year ago. I don’t remember Dan ever talking about it to me, but they said it was a big deal. Apparently they got pressure sickness when climate control broke the first time. I think Cherta broke it the second time, they sounded too proud to mention it. I don’t get it. Anyway, breaking stuff in the lab is against the rules and I think I’m going to tell Dan about that.

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Entry 6 – I made the right choice. Cherta got so angry when they found out I told on them that they had another seizure. The other phocids had to pull them out of the pool. Dan thought I did the right thing but I don’t think he liked me going to tell Cherta about it afterwards, told me no one likes a snitch. Well, then, what am I supposed to do? Just let it happen? I hope Cherta chokes on that gross pool water next time.

Dan suggested I go do something other than visit the phocids and I agree, they’re clearly not worth my time. I went to see Callum instead but he wasn’t in. He has a games console, I saw him show it off to Lee the other day. I wonder if he’d let me try it.

[End of Journal Entries]

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It paints an interesting picture. As Ishmael mentions, Cherta suffered permanent neurological issues as a result of their birth mishaps. This was a point of contention within the lab, beyond Ishmael’s knowledge; the finance manager of the settlement questioned the wisdom of keeping a test subject in an aquatic locomotion study group who could not spend much time underwater. Every time, however, Dan Loris would respond that Cherta now provided essential information about phocid neurology and drowning mechanisms.

The phocid whose death Ishmael mentions was number seventeen, Ambla. It is highly likely that number seventeen’s death was accidental, but the circumstances were not caused by a failure of the lab’s climate system.

I have found the experimental notes from that day; Ambla was brought to an isolated chamber which was controlled by the climate system, with its own test pool, and the quality of the atmosphere was changed to match that of the Precursor home planet. The force of gravity was thus increased. What the Humans did not expect was Ambla’s sudden inability to swim to the surface. They inhaled water, which settled in their lungs and caused them to drown even after they had been pulled out of the pool.

Dan expressed grief in his notes, and surprise. He did not understand why such a thing would occur and blamed the climate system for somehow altering the test beyond his parameters. This is likely what led to Cherta’s misconception that the climate system had killed one of their friends, and their subsequent sabotage of the climate system every few months after that.

But any phocid or selkie reading this will intimately recognise the problem, and I believe the mystery of Ambla’s death may now be solved. The water taken to fill the pool was likely Tel!am’s Blood, a phenomenon all sea-faring people will know about. The Precursors, it seemed, were unfamiliar with it, and had pumped water in to the pool which nobody could swim in. But with the increased gravity, even the fittest phocid would struggle to rise in shallow water.

Regardless, there exists a substantial gap between that last journal entry and the next. Almost a year, in fact, when Ishmael did not write at all, and neither did he participate in Maris’s therapy sessions. I do, however, have a copy of Callum’s journal with me which provides at least half of the narrative, incomplete as it is.