#you never see any of the giants but there’s lots of clues and quests about them

[showrunnerihardlyknowher]

What if I made a little fucked up Stardew Valley esque AU with all my OCs. What then.

[athetos]

I’ve been very low energy and haven’t been able to play live a live much this week so I’ve only gotten the oersted ending so far but thoughts:

Shifu’s chapter was much better than I anticipated, I actually didn’t know about the twist even though it was implying that ending, well done, though I wished I put all my training into the one character and not relatively even between all three.

Oboromaru’s chapter is the best, loved the influence it seemed to have on Undertale, plus so many secrets! Just had a ton of fun with it, could definitely see myself replaying it. Also, his skill set is fantastic, very versatile and powerful.

Sundown’s chapter was tooooo short i loved it it should have been longer, it was a great change of pace but i also understand why it could only be that long. Never occurred to me i could run and thus spare mad dog which sucks because i really wanted to spare him.

Pogo’s chapter was the most boring… the crafting system was interesting but mostly unnecessary, the not having actual dialogue didn’t entertain me much, relied too much on toilet humor or awooga a woman humor. It was fine but felt too long and the superboss just seems like a “but why??” Situation instead of something that feels more appropriate to the setting + reward.

Cube’s chapter was a mashup of 2001 a space odyssey and alien, 2 of my favorite movies of all time, and while it’s obviously not close to that kind of caliber I still loved it, even if the tropes were pretty standard. I’m just a sucker for scifi horror. Captain square was a cool diversion but I wish there was more combat with cube themself. Characters had me weirdly attached to them even though they’re nothing unique.

Akira’s chapter felt like watching a goofy dark scifi anime and while again it quite obviously didn’t meet the heights of, I don’t know, the actual Akira film, it was still fun, and I liked the characters. Lots of side quests and diversions that were cool they had at all. Had some annoying moments but overall fond of it.

Masaru’s chapter was another nice change of pace, I felt it was one of the easier ones but for an episode that’s all about battles, the battles were entertaining, well, entertaining for fights with your typical fighting game heavily stereotyped fighters.

Oersted’s chapter felt generic at first but kept my attention, characters were great to use in battle so that helped. The demon’s lair was pretty confusing even with the map, but got interesting after that. But then when you’re exiled there’s no marker for where to go and I explored the damn lair in full two more times hoping to stumble upon something until realizing I had to be captured again. Annoying. I feel the ending could have been super cool with oersted becoming odio but the execution was meh, it didn’t make total sense to me and felt a bit out of nowhere, there weren’t really any clues if you ask me, but I’ll give it a pass.

Oersted’s bad ending was very, well, what you would expect for a bad ending, but playing as all the past bosses was a blast. The battles were all very easy which was slightly disappointing but I think the point is you should be overpowered because you’re a giant dinosaur or a dude with a huge ass gun, and you want to feel powerful! Not many games let you play as a boss like that so this was great

In short I think this game was very ahead of its time, fun and creative and I’m so glad it got this remake. As a teen I heard about this game and became very intent to play it, I just felt like it would become one of my favorite games but it always kept falling behind on my backlog so I’m very glad I’m playing the hd version since it adds so many QOL features and the graphics are gorgeous, the music is beautiful, etc. yeah if you like jrpgs and want something that feels fresh and has variety I recommend this game a lot

[gukyi]

the search | jhs

summary: your boyfriend, hoseok, decides you surprise you one afternoon and sends you on a scavenger hunt all around the city, marking the memories of your love. 

{established relationship!au}

pairing: jung hoseok x reader genre: fluff word count: 1k warnings: none a/n: thank you to @theevangelist for commissioning this drabble and for donating to blm! this fic is just a reminder to me that i need to write more stuff for hobi because he is lovely and deserves it.

It starts with a note taped to your front door. 

You plop the canvas bags of groceries down at your feet in curiosity as your fingers tug at the index card attached to your grody wooden apartment door, eyes narrowing as you read the scrawled lettering. 

I hope this note finds you well. You are being sent on a quest by none other than your amazing, incredible, wonderful, generous, handsome, talented boyfriend. There is something good at the end of this, I promise. 

There better be, you think to yourself. All you could think about while at the supermarket was how excited you were to come back home and fall asleep on your couch watching reruns of the Forensic Files. 

First one’s easy. Return to the very place we first met. Where it all started. 

You shuffle into your apartment, hands full and note between your lips, and drop off all of your groceries, making sure to put anything cold into your refrigerator before continuing. The moment you’re finished, you head out of your apartment and make a beeline for your local sushi restaurant. It’s several blocks away but your feet seem to be moving quicker today, pink index card clutched in between your fingers as you walk against the wind, hands crossed over your chest to keep warm. It’s cold today—or perhaps you just never dress appropriately—and you sure as hell hope that Hoseok isn’t going to send you on a wild goose chase outdoors like this. 

When you arrive, Hoseok isn’t there (not that you were expecting him to be). Instead, you notice his good friend Jimin waiting in an empty booth, sipping on a soda. 

You have a feeling he isn’t anticipating anybody else. 

It’s hard not to think about this place when it comes to Hoseok. When it comes to who the two of you have become together. 

“Hey, that’s my friend from dance,” Jungkook says to you, pointing to a man sitting a few tables away from you. He’s alone, but checking his watch often, like he’s expecting someone. “Hoseok!”

The man looks up and his expression bursts into a grin, happy and relieved to have been called over. At once, you notice his eyes, the way that they twinkle in the soft white light of the restaurant, like his own little sets of stars. He gets up at once, heading over to your table. 

“Jungkook, what a nice surprise!” He says, making sure to turn and say hello to you as well. You’re frozen still, too nervous to say anything but too entranced to look away. 

“What are you doing here?” Jungkook asks. 

Hoseok shrugs. “I was supposed to be on a date, but it looks like she bailed on me.” For what reason you cannot possibly imagine. Who would bail on someone like him?

“Damn, that sucks,” Jungkook says. “You’re welcome to sit with us, right, Y/N?”

Jungkook’s voice breaks you out of your trance, making you turn to him with wide eyes. Hoseok smiles at your fumble, chuckling heartily. 

“Y-Yeah,” you sputter out. “Of course.”

Hoseok accepts happily, thanking the two of you for letting him crash your meal. He slides in next to Jungkook so you’re forced to look at him and his starry eyes, and he begins to smile. 

“Am I in the right place?” You ask with an eyebrow raise, strolling up to Jimin. He jumps at your voice. 

“Not too hard to find me, right?” Jimin poses. He holds out a blue index card between his fingers.

I knew you could do it. Hard to believe that so much would come from that one meal. You know, I’m actually kind of grateful to the girl that bailed on me. I think that, since our friend groups were so interlocked, we would have met eventually, but if she hadn’t skipped out, I don’t know if we ever would have made what we have now. 

In any case, your next clue is this: my favorite book?

You thank Jimin for his time and promise to buy him a drink sometime soon as payment for sitting in the sushi restaurant, lonely and waiting for you to show up. The hostess does not pay attention to the fact that you arrived and left within five minutes, and you dart off to the next spot on your list. 

It’s ten blocks in the opposite direction—god, couldn’t Hoseok have made this a little less intensive?—but you know that you’re getting close because the smell of coffee is wafting through the air, the wind blowing it towards you. 

The bookstore is right next to you and Hoseok’s favorite coffee joint, a perfect destination for two nerds like yourselves. 

You wander into the store, a crooked little thing, old white walls with peeling paint and random rugs scattered along the floor. Here, you and Hoseok could spend hours, browsing through the hundreds of books stored haphazardly on the shelves, some arranged in an order, and some placed wherever there was an empty spot. The books have long outgrown the store, but the owner still refuses to part with this near-shack. Something about the memories. 

“I never knew this place even existed,” you tell Hoseok as he leads you through the winding passageways and uneven steps of this tiny little bookstore, so tilted and twisted it’s as if the place will fall apart underneath the pressure.

“It’s a secret,” Hoseok whispers into your ear with a giggle. “For only those who know exactly where to look.”

“I take it you read?” You ask. This is a strange place for a first date, but no stranger than any others you’ve been on. 

“I bring a book with me to practice every day,” Hoseok tells you proudly. “Books are dreams turned to reality.”

“There are other ways to turn your dreams into a reality,” you tell him. 

Hoseok turns to you, a gleam in his eye, interest piqued. “Really? How’s that?”

You whisper, a shout into the void, into the air settling between the two of you. “By doing them yourself.”

Despite the organization (or lack thereof) of the shop, you know exactly where to find what you’re looking for. On a small shelf that doesn’t match any of the others in the store is a collection of Charles Dickens works, and three paperback copies of A Christmas Carol. 

You fish through the first two with no luck, but find a purple index card in the third. 

Too easy for you, huh? I guess it’s no surprise that my favorite book is a children’s tale about Christmas. But I think that even adults can learn from ol’ Ebenezer Scrooge sometimes. I just think that Christmas, and the wintertime in general, is magical. And I think that we could all do with never forgetting the past, working towards the future, and living in the present. At least, that’s what I try to do. 

Okay, last one: in a big city, stars are sparse and nearly impossible to see. But there is one place that we can go whenever we miss the Moon and her admirers. 

You suppose that Hoseok has a method to his madness nonetheless. 

There are four parks within the city, but you know exactly which one Hoseok’s talking about. It’s the one in the center, surrounded by skyscrapers and glass windows and street lamps. It’s small, barely the size of a decent parking lot, but it’s filled with trees and a giant fountain in the middle, and signs to keep off of the grass that nobody reads. 

And when you arrive, there you see him, sitting on the lawn on a gingham picnic blanket, with a basket splayed out as he gazes up at the evening sky. 

“I knew you’d know where to go,” Hoseok says when he spots you strolling towards him, fingers toying with themselves like a kindergarten love. 

“Did you ever doubt me?” You ask him. It’s as if Hoseok thinks that you don’t think the same as he does, don’t treasure the same memories you share. “You know we’re not supposed to be on the grass.”

“Oh, yeah?” Hoseok says, pulling you down next to him and wrapping his arms around you. He leans in close, pressing a soft kiss on your lips. “And who’s going to stop me?”

“Stop,” you say with a grin, letting him kiss you again. “The stars are watching us.”

Hoseok smiles. Even if it’s only seven, even if you can’t even see the stars in the city anyway, they will never leave your side. Not when you can watch them in the eyes of the man in front of you, white glints twinkling, shimmering, sparkling. He is golden and beautiful. He is starlight. “I hope that they always do.”

↳ links are broken, but don’t forget that i’m still taking commissions!

[ardentmuse]

Chalk and Leather (Murphy McNully x Reader)

DISCOVERING AMORTENTIA SMELLS LIKE MURPHY McNULLY TO YOU

Harry Potter Hogwarts Mystery - Murphy McNully x fem!Reader

A/N: Since we just finished up the valentine’s day quest, got to give some love to the characters we can’t date. :) 

Masterlist

“What do you smell, Y/N?” Skye asks you as you stand what should have been a safe distance from the cauldron Snape has bubbling in the middle of his classroom. Streams of pink smoke loft occasionally into the air as your professor’s voice continues to cut through the crowd, droning on about how you need to study amortentia to know how to identify it and therefore avoid it. A better policy seems to be just don’t touch any potions you don’t know.

You try hard not to lean forward but it is intoxicating. Skye elbows you and raises her eyebrows; clearly hoping your nose might provide some juicy gossip.

“I smell chalk and freshly cut grass and—“

Your eyes find the real thing you are smelling on the other side of the room. Murphy McNully, one of your dearest friends, is beside Rowan, the two chatting in hushed tones about something or the other. He laughs — the kind of bright, full laugh that consumes his whole face — and you feel the warm trickle in your chest you haven’t been able to explain for weeks, at least until this very moment.

“Leather and shoe polish,” you finish with a whisper. The words flow from your mouth like they’re the solutions to a riddle because they are. You are in love with Murphy McNully and somehow you hadn’t put two and two together until it was right under your nose.

You take another whiff and enjoy the fragrance you associate only with your rambling friend. It’s a pleasant blend of masculine comforts, rustic and warm like the boy himself. McNully catches your eyes across the room. He smiles, always so friendly, though something in your face must be off because he frowns soon after, returning his attention to Rowan and the rest of your class on his side of the room.

“That’s an odd collection of scents,” Skye muses. “I just smell the pitch.”

“Predictable. Maybe I’ll give those bludgers some amortentia next practice and see if they’ll chase after you like some lovesick puppies so I can take the day off.”

Skye cackles even though your joke wasn’t that funny and Snape snaps at the both of you.

“Is this stuff getting to your head, Parkin? Making you dumb?”

“No, Professor.”

“Then I advise you keep your voice down and pay attention,” Snape says, speaking to Skye but looking at you as well.

“Yes, Professor.”

Snape turns on his heels and heads back towards his desk. Skye lets out a breath, shaking off her scolding. You wish you could shake off your feelings, too: joy, fear, anxiety, doubt, hope, and love above all the others. 

As the class ends, your quidditch crew prepares to leave and head to the pitch for practice. McNully usually never misses an opportunity to come with you all and practice his announcing skills but when Skye calls out his name in the corridor of the dungeon, he mumbles something under his breath. He doesn’t even meet your gaze as he rolls down the hall and out of sight.

“Someone’s a little grumpy.”

The worry fills your chest like a balloon, making it hard to breath. 

“Isn’t that odd, though? He’s always chipper.”

“So are you and you look like a house elf denied her supper,” Skye laughs, patting you on the back as she runs ahead to catch up with Orion and the rest of the gang. But you can’t join in the joyous run. McNully is somewhere less than pleased about whatever he saw on your face during potions.

You arrive at the locker rooms and change into your quidditch gear, a little slower than usual. Your brain won’t stop replaying images of the dinners spent playing wizard chess with the dimpled blond currently getting situated in the announcer’s booth, the late nights in the common room, your legs up on his lap, memorizing quidditch strategy, and the after-match hang outs where you often found excuses to be close to him, grab his hand, and congratulate him on commentary you arguably didn’t hear given your focus on the match. How had you not seen before just how much he meant to you and just how many of your tiny fantasies about how nice it would be to have a boyfriend involved soft blue eyes just as you closed your eyes to be kissed or running your hands down crisp white collars as you snuggle close in front of the fire, or the pleasant warm laughter of mirth-filled lungs as warm hands run through your hair, just as soft and strong as McNully’s? Everything you hoped for had been right in front of you for well over a year.

When the team assembles and takes to the air, you heard the faint calls of Murphy’s voice from the booth as you bat at the first bludger. He had come to practice after all, just not with you.

“And Y/L/N whacks the bludger away from Parkin with a—“

There is an odd and long silence that follows and it seems the whole team notices. The entire friendly slows, each broom taking to a lazy bob as your team’s statistician stands in stasis. 

“… some level of accuracy,” he finally says with a cough. 

Murphy is struggling with numbers? That’s odd, you think and it seems everyone else is as confused as you, that is at least until Orion screams for you to focus from the other end of the field, clearly not wanting to lose practice time. But he doesn’t even need to call you from your daze. A rogue bludger is already heading for your team’s latest addition, Oliver Wood.

You fly as fast as you can, swooping down towards the goal posts in hopes of intercepting the ball as the rest of the team resumes play. With a great push, you dangle down from your broom and swing low, just hitting the edge of the wall and knocking it back towards the pitch below.

“And with an impressive show of athleticism, Y/L/N managed to protect our young keeper from a bludger that was—“

Murphy coughs like there is a frog in his throat. It’s alarming and your heart pulls for him. Without a thought for anything but wanting to make sure he is okay, you fly down towards the box where Murphy is sitting. His head is in his hands and his face is redder than it normally is. When he sees you, his eyes bug out a little, but he looks away. His attention is back on the game. He straightens his shoulders and begins commentating again.

“And Parkin shoots for the upper left and misses! A rare miss for the ace chaser, whom this season alone has scored 92.4% of shots on open goals in sunny weather.”

Wait, how come that stat was not an issue?

You hover a bit and stare at the boy who is proving quite the enigma. Your chest heaves a bit as you consider what might be happening, but out of the corner of your eye a stream of black comes barreling through. 

Instinctively, you press forward and swing your bat just as the bludger enters into Murphy’s commentary box. The bludger flies away to the east just as McNully covers his face, prepared for a sure to be painful smack right to the noggin. Your momentum however doesn’t stop just because you managed to knock the ball away. You pull up on your broom but can’t stop and land right down on top of Murphy, curling up in his lap as his wheelchair slides back into the wall. His arms wrap around you protectively, covering your head as the house banners fall down upon you in a giant crash. 

Once your crash ends and the chaos subsides, you realize exactly where you are; seated on Murphy’s lap with his arms wrapped tightly around your waist, canopied in the privacy of fallen tapestries. Murphy’s breathing is hard as his hands curl into the flesh of your back.

And for the first time since potions, he smiles.

“Y/L/N with the greatest save of the day,” he whispers, his hand reaching up to wipe a bit of dust off your cheek. 

You face is hot as you look deeply into Murphy’s eyes, unable to stop the smile on your face, too. And somehow, suddenly, everything feels right.

“And what were my chances of making it?” 

He slides his hand into your hair as he tilts your face up to him.

“I haven’t a bloody clue.” 

He shakes his head and laughs, his cheeks turning the brightest red you’ve ever seen. You start to speak but his voice interrupts you.

“I can’t think of a single thing but you when you’re near, you know that?” 

“I— I can’t either.”

Murphy laughs, the hearty kind you missed just a little, and the matching smile on his face only makes it better. He pulls you closer to him, letting you rest your head against his chest. He takes a deep and stabilizing breath.

“Lilac,” he says more to himself than you, “And fresh clean linens.” 

And now it is your turn to smile as you realize Murphy knows your scent, too— two people attracted by nothing other than each other. It’s impossible to resist the urge, just like this morning in Snape’s classroom, to draw closer to the source of such joy. Every part you longs to lift upward, to taste the thing you’ve been craving so intensely, the thing you didn’t know you needed.

“Y/N! Y/N! Are you okay?” Skye is screaming from somewhere near by. You hear the scrambled sounds of brooms dropping onto the deck and footsteps rushing to your aid.

But McNully doesn’t care. His hand takes your chin and he kisses you full on, not wasting a moment to seal your newly-declared affections. And all you can do is melt into him.

A faint breeze hits your face and you look up to see Skye standing now under the banners, her eyes filled with mischief as she takes you in.

“That chalk smell makes a whole lot of sense now.”

Murphy’s eyes bug out of his head as he pushes back on you.

“I smell… like chalk to you?”

“Among other things.”

He laughs, “I’ll have you know my spell for the chalk board reduces chalk use by 68.3% over traditional writing methods.”

You can’t help but smile. He’s back in all his quirkiness and something about the fact that he can be himself with you in his arms, open about your feelings, brings you more joy than you can say. And that joy is the kind of joy you hope to have every night moving forward with the boy who smells like chalk and leather by your side and loving you fully.

All tags: @fangirlandnerd, @aerdnandreaa, @thisisbullshytt,  @cancerousjojian, @whovianayesha, @themarauderstheoutsidersandpeggy, @luna-xxxxx, @sleepylunarwolf, @starryrevelations, @potter-thinking, @all-by-myself98, @bananafosters-and-books, @cutie-bug, @igotmadskills, @hazelandcoconuts, @yallgotkik, @amberkay284, @the-new-galahad, @13ofjuly, @daft-not-punk

Harry Potter tags: @tessimagines​, @0-lost-in-stereo-0, @whysoseriouspadfoot, @eldritchscreech​, @luckyvirgo​, @hellizhelusive2​, @lexrius, @sapphireorchid​, @amazingwonderlandnapkin, @garbdump​

[retphienix]

There are so many fucking games I want to play for the blog and I hypothetically have the time, but the energy, the attention span, the drive?

In more positive terms here are some various titles I plan to give a shot for the blog.

Let's do a 5am state of the blog kind of thing to clear some thoughts, eh?

Morrowind (Current Game ramble)

For the moment the blog is more or less on break with me playing Morrowind ""For the blog"" but mostly for me, because that's just a game I've wanted to explore. Not that every other game on the blog isn't that, just that I looked at Morrowind and said "That'll be a terrible game to present naturally. That's a stream game, or a condensed video, not a liveblog" and then did it anyway.

I'm loving Morrowind! Honestly the sense of mystery, fantasy, and adventure is just chef kiss levels of perfect to me.

But it's terrible in a photoset, I'm not particularly interested in doing another format for the game, and it's a game with less 'intense narrative themes!' and more 'Incredibly different game design compared to modern Bethesda' in terms of discussion material and let's all be real here:

We're all fucking tired of that conversation lol.

So there ain't much to talk on in depth, it's more of a "Here's a newbie seeing new things!" playthrough with nothing to talk about after the fact, which ain't a strong point for the blog- again- that's a stream/video kind of thing.

ANYWHO- Morrowind fun, about the only news I can offer on that series is that it might abruptly end and become a 'for me' series because I'm not particularly interested in beating the game nearly as much as I'm interested in exploring aimlessly and seeing what happens.

I'm not playing Morrowind for the end goal of beating the main quest, or beating the DLCs. I'm playing it to wander into caves and find new pants, so if I reach a point where I'm satisfied with what I've shared and my motivation has not borne a new end goal then I'll end the live blog and move on to a new game :P

Backlog

The short statement I'll make is that this blog is a hell for my backlog.

Even without infinite money on hand I've ended up with so many physical and digital games just sitting here waiting to be played either because they caught my eye or because of recommendations by various people over the years.

I keep sitting down, cataloguing my backlog, realizing it's pointless to catalog, deleting it all, and then starting over yet again.

The fact is, if anyone recommended it it's probably still sitting in a text document somewhere, or physically on my shelf, and I don't remotely know when I'll get to it.

I've yet to hit the point where I decide to turn this blog into work, so I have never sat down and gone "Well, Retphienix NEEDS to post! Sit down, 8-12 hours minimum, let's play the next game!"

And part of me wishes I'd do that, but the fact is this isn't a job. There's no money here, there's the opposite even! I don't remotely see it that way, but if you squint and tilt your head I've spent a lot of money on this blog over the years.

Capture devices (a lot of them!), consoles specifically bought for the blog, controllers out the wazoo, I've gone through multiple computers for this thing, and the games, my lord the games- so many games.

And that's fiscally, what about manpower? So many hours have gone into this blog, so many hours poured into the background of making all this work, researching shit, putting my all into formulating my opinions clearly for posts, writing, hell video shit even though it's mostly clips as my one step into edited content became an impromptu awkward hiatus from doing more lol.

What was I on about.

Despite all that nonsense, Retphienix is a passion project. Not a job.

If I lack the passion in some sense then the work doesn't get done "just for the sake of the work". And I don't mean lost passion as much as "No motivation on x day; tired on y day; interested in doing something else on z day" etc.

If things aren't clickin' I don't force it, so the blog has all this backlog and isn't put together in a way that facilitates burning through it quickly.

I do sometimes wish things were different though, I know I'd still enjoy such a playstyle, but I can't justify "faking it til you make it" in a format that literally isn't built to pay and was never intended to.

I can't work myself for nothin'.

Hypothetical "Next" games

While the backlog is a wild wasteland of titles, there are some that just kinda guarantee their spots sooner rather than later.

Yakuza 6 and 7 along with Judgment, obviously. The series is one of my all time favorites and I generally have some of my absolute most fun on the blog side of things with those games, so it's a winner on two fronts. It's just fun to react to, post out of context things for, and talk with other fans about and for whatever reason tumblr has a healthy enough fanbase for the series that my meager blog gets some attention there.

Dragon Quest has a strangely weighted chance all things considered. DQ has many of the same advantages as Yakuza- it's a series I adore, it's fun to talk about in this format, and the fandom is big enough to occasionally spill my way making the blogging experience a bit more fun. It's also a series where I don't know what'd come next to be fair. Probably DQ4? I mean, might as well continue on from that point since I have 1-3 done. I can't exactly justify replaying the entirety of DQ11 no matter how much I want to! Turning on the games above gave me DQ goosebumps which kinda settled how likely it is to show up sooner rather than later, lol.

Jeez. I looked at one of my surviving lists and that's like all that's popping out at me.

Other series feel like giant leaps with no gas in the tank, like do I want to start playing Kingdom Hearts? Not really, not right now. Do I finally play Lisa? Eeeeeeh. Persona? Hmmmm.

I haven't the fuzziest. There are so many one off interesting titles, but if the drive ain't there they might as well be textbooks.

Perhaps instead of any major next game I'll just do some afternoons exploring random titles for a bit here and there with no intention of beating em.

The idea is enticing as hell, but the feeling of not giving the game's a "real shake" feels bad.

We'll see. The only certainties seem to be Yakuza and DQ, as much as I'd prefer far more.

Side project hypotheticals

Outside of the basic live blog stuff I'm still interested in exploring scripted stuff. Mostly to prove to myself that I can overcome some anxieties and break from the meandering pace the last effort gave- I can write! That much I know! So just gotta trick myself into writing for a video and then make the video after the fact lol.

Current thoughts are on a video exploring the monster taming sub-genre. It's a genre near and dear to my heart, and one I know some weird things about as is- but mostly it's a genre I KNOW I know very little about despite that, so I'd like to give it an overall look, or perhaps just explore some random entries, I haven't a clue lol. I'd mostly like an opportunity to talk about some interesting entries in the genre, things like explaining my adoration for DWM while explaining how the flaws make it really rough today, or the interesting mash of genres that is Lost Magic, or the more modern take that mashes idle-like mechanics with Siralim Ultimate.

Won't lie, playing the demo for Monster Hunter Stories 2 threw a wrench in that plan because it made me want to talk about it and how the genre might have a new breath of life after really grinding to a halt as pokemon became what it is today, but all to be seen or not lol.

As far as other things like streams? Not really.

The concept of writing a bit more on games is tickling the back of my head lately, but that mostly just means "more posts that aren't live-blogging" as I haven't the fuzziest where I'd share such nonsense.

Really it's all up in the air as far as retphienix content is concerned, beyond the live blogging obviously.

5am closing

It's fun to explore what games have to offer, both on the individual level, the personal level, and as a whole- as a medium.

So I like Retphienix.

And I like all I've made here.

I hope to continue for a long, long time- no matter what future formats might look like.

[bakubabes-tatakae]

For The Love Of Humanity’s Strongest (Part Eight)

Author’s Note: If anyone wants to be in a taglist for this feel free to let me know! Happy to do it for anyone!

(Levi Ackerman x Reader)

Summary: When all seems lost Y/N knows that she can count on one person to always be there for her brother, Eren Jaeger, and herself. Can humanity’s strongest not only keep Eren in line, but keep his relationship alive as well?

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six: *NSFW Ahead!*, Part Seven

Part Eight:

Word Count: 2,046

We all gathered around the table, munching on your dinner, attempting to enjoy each other’s company. The squad was clearly still unsure of Eren as their conversation drifted from the recon mission we would all be enduring in a month's time to the fact that they still had no clue how Eren’s powers worked and didn’t trust him. Eld was the first to mention his concerns directly. “Think of how many people lost their lives in the fight to take back Wall Maria. Then hope comes in a form never expected.” He turned his gaze from his cup of tea to Eren. “One that we’re not even entirely sure that we can deal with.”

I was getting awfully tired at the wise cracks from the men of this squad toward my brother. My eyes turned to daggers and I could feel Levi nudge me with his foot, clearly knowing I was about to go off one him.

Eld continued, not even realizing that I had gotten angry. “Most of us still find it hard to believe, so how does it work? This whole changing into a Titan trick. Really.”

Eren was upset about them not trusting him as well, I could hear it in his voice. He didn’t blame them for it tho. “I wish I could tell you, but the fact is my memories are not clear. Guess it’s kind of like being in a trance.” His voice brightened up a little as he tried to explain anything he knew about his powers to them. “I do know that the trigger seems to be hurting myself in some way. Like biting my hand.”

Levi lifted his glass. “You’re not going to get anything out of him.” He took a sip. “Not that you know who won't have a go at it.” I shot him a glance, knowing full well who he was referring too. “You’ll be lucky to come out of it alive if that one lay into you.” He put his glass back down. “Of course, it’s only a matter of time.”

I growled at him. “Will you stop scaring him Levi?”

Eren’s face turned to terror. “Who are you talking about?”

Like she had been paged to the room we heard a loud bang. “OW!” Hange was here, announcing herself without really meaning too. Petra stood and grabbed the piece of wood that had been holding the door shut, allowing Hange to come in. Zoe rubbed her forehead, pain clearly emanating in that spot. “I’m so sorry.” She sauntered in. “Good evening Team Levi!” She raised a hand to us. “How is castle life treating everyone?”

Levi sighed. “You’re too early.”

“Am I? I suppose I couldn’t help myself.” She stood behind me.

Eren looked over at her. “Section Commander Hange?”

“Hello Eren. In the event you haven’t pieced it together yet it’s my job to spearhead the Scout Regiment’s research efforts. Essentially, I poke and prod our captive Titan specimens.” Her face lit up at the mention of her babies. “I’d very much like your help.”

Eren was confused. “My help? In what way? What would I have to do?” He looked at me, a clear look of wondering what to do being offered to me. I smiled at him to try to calm him.

“Join me of course.” Zoe’s face twisted in anticipation. “On a quest of scientific discovery.”

“I’m happy to help, except, I’m afraid it’s not up to me. I'm under close restrictions under order of the higher ups, you see.”

Hange was having none of that. She glanced up at Levi. “Levi, what’s on the docket for him tomorrow?”

Levi scoffed. “Clearing out all the weeds.”

“Excellent then. It’s a plan.” She knelt to him and grabbed his hand, glory shining in her brown eyes. “Young man, tomorrow will be grand.”

Eren looked nervous. “Oh...kay… but, uh, just so I’m clear, what exactly will I be doing?” She squeezed his hand more, causing him to wince a little. “Are you running experiments or something?”

We all looked around at each other, watching the look on Hange’s face. Her excitement was about to get the best of her as we all mumbled under our breath, hoping that Eren would hear it. Oluo grasped his tea cup. “Idiot, shut up.”

I cleared my throat, attempting to get my brother’s attention, mumbling as well. “Stop talking Eren.”

Hange stared longingly toward him. “Ahhh, I knew it, you possess a curious mind, just like your sister.”

We all started standing and walking slowly away from the table. Hange was about to go off on a tangent and none of us wanted to be caught in the crossfire. Levi wrapped his arm around my shoulder and led me toward the door. As we turned to leave I caught eyes with Eren. “Night little brother, good luck.”

Levi led us down the hallway, toward the room we would be staying while in this giant castle. He spoke as we walked. “You really need to cool it when it comes to Eren. I know you’re worried about him, but they’re your squad. You know they won’t do anything to hurt him unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

I sighed. “I know, it’s just hard when I know that they’re all after him. I know they’d all cut him down in two seconds if they had too, but I know that I couldn’t.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that. That’s why the five of us are here. He’s your brother. Not a single one of them expect you to be able to do something like that. You’re the last person in the squad we would expect to lay a hand on him.”

* * * * * *

When we reached our door he moved his arm from my shoulder and opened the door for me. “Ladies first.” He motioned forward.

I entered the room. The stone walls of the castle didn’t let much heat in, the room was like an ice box. We each stripped our jackets off and boots and climbed eagerly into the bed, both exhausted from the events of the day.

The blankets weren’t doing any justice to the cold air that surrounded us so Levi wrapped an arm around me, pulling me as close to him as he could. I could feel his warm breath on my neck. I rolled over to face him and buried my face into his chest, nestling myself between his neck. “Levi?”

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Yea?”

“Do you think we’ll ever lead a normal life?”

His eyes opened back up, gazing down upon me. “What do you mean by normal?”

“A life where the two of us can finally settle down. It’s been six years since we met Levi, we’ve had anything but a normal life together.” He ran my finger around the material of the shirt on his chest. “I want the normal life, or at least as normal as we’ll ever get. Sure, we have a place together, and that’s normal, but that’s not what I mean.”

“What’s a normal life for someone in the Scouts, Y/n? We barely spend any time at the house we share together.” He kissed the side of my head. “We see each other all the time, but I know what you mean. You mean the nice home life with the kids running around, stay at home mom, dad comes home from work to be greeted with open arms…We’ll never have exactly that.”

“Even just a part of it Levi… any of it.” I could feel a tear slide down my cheeks as I started to think about my mother and father. “I have no one but Eren from my family left levi. I’m never going to be the type that doesn’t want her own family. We always said we’d talk about this farther on down the road, that was years ago now, we’ve never even touched on the subject.”

“Think about our lives Y/n, what aspect of our lives even gives us time for kids? He ran a thumb over my cheek. “I’m not saying I don’t want any, I’m just saying that we have to think about everything when considering it.”

I sighed. “I know. I just… I want that feeling, the feeling of being a mother Levi, someone that will love you unconditionally, you can screw up a thousand times over but the love in their eyes will never change.”

“I’ll make a deal with you…” He was hesitant. “When we have your brother officially in our custody for good, when he’s officially a member of the scouts with no strings attached and we have no one els we have to worry about because we’re obligated too… we’ll at least stop trying to prevent it.”

My eyes lit up some. “You mean it Levi?”

He breathed out heavily. “I don’t mean we’re going to try to have a kid Y/n, we’re just not going to keep the possibility of it from happening anymore.” He closed his eyes as a smile tugged at his lips. “I guess I can’t admit that I wouldn’t mind having that same thing in the future. We’re thirty-two. I guess it’s now or never.”

I could feel the warmth in my cheeks building. “I love you Levi.” I curled myself into his body. “I can’t wait for that day to come, you’ll make the best dad.”

He huffed. “I love you too, Y/n.”

* * * * * *

Sun shone through the windows of the castle the next morning, Levi and I still intertwined together. If the sun hadn’t shone through so brightly we would probably have remained sleeping a lot longer. As I attempted to unwrap myself from him his grip tightened. “No, not yet.”

I laughed. “What do you mean Levi? It’s morning, it’s time to get up.” I tried again, the attempt was futile.

“Just lay here a little longer. I’m sure they’re all just getting up too.” He knew as well as I did that when we were all out together and working the other four people in the squad weren’t able to do anything for themselves, always looking to Levi on what to do next. “They’ll be able to get the day started without me.”

“Sure they will Levi.” I put my hand on his hip and placed my lips on his. “If we're going to lay here a little longer why don’t we make the most of it?”

I could feel Levi smile through the kiss, he pushed me onto my back and kept his lips to mine. “I don’t see why we shouldn’t.” A knock sounded on the door of our room and Levi broke off the kiss, annoyance painted on his face.. “Yea?”

It was Petra, the woman was always right on time to ruin any moment between us that she could. “Sorry sir, I heard you guys talking in here. We’re all up and ready to go, we just need our orders.”

Levi groaned and flopped onto the bed next to me. “I’ll be out in a minute, get everyone in the dining room, I’ll meet you all there.”

“Eren is already there sir, Hange never let him leave last night. He looked pretty exhausted.” She paused. “But I’ll get everyone together Captain.”

When Levi was sure she walked away he spoke. “Every time. Why do we even try to have moments when we’re on missions?”

I raised my eyebrows. “You’re asking me? The girl is in love with you Levi. She has been since the day you asked her to be in the squad.”

He glanced over at me. “Do I sense some jealousy Ms. Jaeger?”

I slapped his gut, sending him sitting up with surprise, but he laughed. “Shut up Ackerman. If anyone is jealous of anyone else it’s her.”

He sat up completely and grabbed his jacket off the chair next to the bed. “You know you have no reason to be, right?”

I brushed my hair back with my fingers. “I know Levi, I never doubt you. I know you better than that.”

Another smile tugged at his lips, turning to a smirk. “Good.” He kissed my forehead and exited the room, leaving me to get ready for the day in peace.

Taglist 💕 @gamegirl23100 @super-peace-fangirl @pjimochi @izzythefanfreak @echimozart @peachymochimochi @hunie-hun @absolute-randomness-forever @omg-lexiiloveyou @dazaismaniaclaugh @renaissance-tragedy @titaniabuck @primusk @always394patronus

[ngame989]

“Friends” - TGG SVTFOE Fanfic Collection Ch. 12

Writing: @ngame989​​

Art: @toxicpsychox​​

Editing: @ubercelloczar​​, @seddm​​

Alternate fic links - FFnet, AO3

Summary: Ludo needs help making friends and turns to Star and Marco for help, but things quickly spiral out of their control.

Comic Page

Masterpost

It's been an incredibly trying month for me and I'm unsure about a lot of things in my personal life now, but this isn't one of them. I'm so happy to finally be getting back to my feet so I can make more of the Starco content I want the world to see. Hope you enjoy, and thanks for your patience. (Also, fair warning, there’s one ever so slightly steamy Starco scene here)

“Have you ever wondered why heart thingies are hearts?” Marco stopped chewing on a bite of his burrito as he turned his full attention to Star. It wasn’t the most confusing thing she’d ever said, but it was up there. “Like, why does this symbol mean hearts and love and stuff?” she clarified, holding up a piece of heart-shaped candy from the post-Valentine’s Day shopping spree Eclipsa had taken her on weeks ago.

“Dunno,” he responded. “Maybe it’s what people used to think hearts looked like or something.”

“None of the hearts I’ve seen on hunting trips with Dad ever looked like this. Although one was made of chocolate.” She shrugged and popped the treat into her mouth, dumping some more from the bag into her mouth soon after. Her cheeks were puffed out, stretching her heart marks wide and Marco couldn’t help but giggle at the sight. “What?” she mumbled, still chewing. He pantomimed the sight in front of him, pointing to his own puffed-up cheeks. Star quickly grabbed two more candies, licking the backs of them before sticking them to Marco’s face, smiling quite smugly at her handiwork. “Now we’re heart twinsies!” She scooted around the table next to him and leaned in, snapping a selfie. “The kids will love this one.”

He swallowed the last bite of his burrito, thanking the heavens for the new Taco Baco location on campus. The other food options there were… lacking, to say the least.

“The Valentine’s Day Chocopalooza was a smash hit, but I have no clue how to follow it! I can’t have peaked after half a year, Marco!” The memories came flooding back: brownie batter as far as the eye could see, melted chocolate inflicting its goopy wrath on every surface in the kitchen, and so much frosting that he still didn’t want to even look at the stuff.

“I think they just like spending time with you. You’re really good with kids, Star. Besides, the only other holiday coming up is Easter, and you’re terrified of it.”

“It has a giant rabbit that lays eggs, Marco! How do you not see how horrifying that is?”

A loud cough from the bushes behind them might normally have only caught Marco’s attention for a passing moment, but another voice frantically shushed it. “Dennis, quiet! The giant bunny schtick is too good!”

“Ludo?” Star and Marco said in unison.

“Hello, Star and Marco!” Ludo exclaimed with an emphatic wave. “So wonderful to see you again! How’s your kid?”

“She’s not… she’s fine,” Marco relented, estimating that it wouldn’t be worth the hassle. “So… how’s it going?”

“Things are fine, family’s good. Bird and Spider told me to say hello.” He seemed even twitchier than Marco remembered. Dennis prodded his brother with a wing, clearly trying to be surreptitious about it and failing spectacularly. “Ahem, well, there is one teensy tiny issue… I ran into Bearnicorn a few days ago. I totally froze up! Things were pretty awkward last time I saw the whole gang and I think I’m finally ready to try again, but I have no idea how to do that. You might not know this, but I have some issues getting over things,” he stated earnestly. Star and Marco exchanged a bewildered glance - he couldn’t be serious, right? Wait, what were they thinking, Ludo could totally say something like that seriously. Ludo took a deep breath and continued, “But Dennis suggested that I come to you two for help, since I had actually managed to work everything out with you.”

Star munched on another chocolate heart as she mulled over what he was saying. “So you want our help to… make friends?”

The edges of his beak-mouth turned up in an ecstatic smile. “I would like that very much!”

***

“You’re sure about this, Star?”

“He’s not hurting anything, Mom.” Star didn’t glance up from the piles of clothing she was rummaging through at the sound of her mom’s wary question; it wasn’t an unfair one, considering the history involved. Even though he was friendly now, Ludo was too much of a wildcard to completely discount as harmless. Still, though, Star saw no reason to suspect any tricks up his sleeve (though there were probably some bugs there). The nostalgia of reconnecting with Ludo was oddly calming for Star, and considering how quickly Marco agreed to help Ludo with his issues, despite the craziness of midterms approaching, she guessed he felt the same. Drawer after drawer bore no fruit in her quest to find the sweater for Marco’s all-important psychology ensemble - the book and glasses had already been secured.

“Though I didn’t say anything, I admit I was initially hesitant about you two sharing living quarters like this, but I must say Marco’s organizational skills seemed to have rubbed off on you,” Moon said with a snicker. She bent down and checked under the bed, pulling out stray bags of cereal and bottles of soda that Star recognized from her and Marco’s late night movie marathons slash cuddle sessions. “...somewhat.”

Think Star, think! When was the last time you saw that dang sweater? Let’s see… he wore it on our Valentine’s Day date so it can’t be that hidden - it was a bit snug on him which made it extra adorably handsome. He’d said he’d wear it more if I wanted, and I fell over laughing when he wore it just last weekend before we… oh corn. Star now recalled where the sweater would almost certainly be as a wave of horror washed over her. She slammed the dresser drawer and whipped around for a mad dash to the nightstand, where- pegasus feathers. Moon had just found the sweater, which was great, and with it was the exact last box she wanted anyone else (and especially her mom) to find, which was... greeeeeeat. Star generally felt she had a solid, trusting bond with her mother, but she’d never been - and still wasn’t - the first person Star blabbed to about her personal affairs.

“Mom, I can explain-”

“Star, sweetie, I’m not upset. What you do with Marco is none of my business, you’re a grown young woman who is more than capable of making her own decisions. If anything I’m simply relieved that you’re taking such sane precautions. I may be old, but I’m not ready to earn my place in the Grandma Room quite yet.” Despite her embarrassment, Star had to admit she was eased by her mom’s understanding,. “And don’t worry,” Moon said softly, “I’ll handle the subject with your father for you, if you’d like.” And just like that, any comfort was washed away by a tidal wave of beet-red cheeks and incoherent sputtering.

Marco poked his head in, causing Star to yelp and jump off the bed. “Hey, you almost ready?”

“Yep! Totally, totally, totally ready and not discussing anything about our personal lives with mom!”

“Uh-huh…” Marco responded. “Well, I’m ready down there if you are. Oh hey, there’s my sweater. Good, we’ll need it... I, uh think we have our work cut out for us.”

Star was worried, but also kinda happy to have an excuse to leave the current conversation as soon as Mewmanly possible. She handed the sweater from her mom to Marco, who put it on as they walked downstairs to where Ludo was curiously poking around the living room.

“Oh, hello Star! I was just admiring your lovely castle. Bit small for my tastes, but what do I know, haha!”

“Yeeeeeeah…” She then leaned over to whisper to Marco. “So, like, what did he say so far?”

“He said that he tried practicing talking to people with garbage dolls.”

“Weird.”

“I don’t even know where to start, really.”

“Hey Ludo,” Star called out, walking over and sitting on the couch next to him. “So, bud, whatcha need us for here, exactly?”

“Ah, yes, well… I’d like to be able to talk to my old friends again without being their boss. You know, the whole scheming to defeat you… steal the wand… take over Mewni and rule it with an IRON FIST-” He had gotten so worked up that he was on his feet jumping up and down on the couch, but stopped and took a deep breath before chuckling. “Aha, see, there it is again! It’s usually not like this, it’s been months since I’ve even once brought up the wand in a game of cha-rads…”

Yeah, this might be a liiiiiiittle tricky. She tented her fingers as she came up with a plan. Could I… nah. Would it…? Mmm, no go. Wait, Star, duh! “ Alright, Ludo, it’s time for some patented psychomological work from Star Butterfly, H.P.D. We need to see what’s going on in your head.”

“Ooo, sounds fun! So for starters I think there’s some lice-”

“No, no,” she responded calmly, “I mean we need to find what’s making you tick.”

“Yup, I’ve got ticks too!”

Marco put a hand on her shoulder, his worried expression clear even to her peripheral vision. “Are you sure he should be in the same house as Mari-”

“Not now, Marco,” Star hissed, swatting his hand away while keeping her gaze trained on Ludo. “Why are you having trouble talking to your old friends again? What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say ‘Boo Fly’?”

“Messenger.”

“Buff Frog?”

“Excellent spy.”

“Lobster Claws?”

“Putting his claws on the wand- oh, wait, I see now! This is like cha-rads but with just words! You almost got me!”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re getting it! OK, one more… Toffee.”

“Candy! It’s so delectable with chocolate-”

“You know what, that one’s probably for the best,” Star murmured. “Well, Ludo, it seems to me like your biggest problem is that you aren’t even thinking about your old crew as regular people. Try this. Think of doing something you’d normally do with your brother.”

“Picking the worms out of our feathers to eat-”

“Yeah, no,” Star cut him off. She wanted to help, she really did, but she had a million other things on her mind and now was just not a great time for endless Ludo shenanigans. “I was thinking something less gross…”

“Basketball?” he cheerily offered.

“Sure. Imagine yourself playing basketball with your brother…” She paused a moment as he started miming out dribbling in his seat. “Now imagine doing the same exact thing but with Bearnicorn there instead of your brother.” His arms twitched a bit.

“Keep dribbling, man!” Marco called out encouragingly. Ludo shut his eyes in concentration and after a moment got back into his awkward, gawkish basketball form.

Ludo’s bulbous eyes snapped back open, frantic with glee. “Aha, yes! I think I see it now! Oh, thank you, Star and Marco! I’m off to go find my friends again!” With that, he bolted out the front door and scurried down the road until he was out of sight.

“You think that’ll work?” Star asked hopefully.

Marco sighed and hugged her from behind. “Not a chance.”

***

“Alright, we have a few minutes left in class so if anyone has any questions on the graded midterms I just passed back, let me know. Otherwise you’re free to leave. Have a good weekend!”

Marco hunched over in his chair as he quickly scanned through the multiple choice questions and short answers. A few stupid mistakes here and there, but still an A - he’d even gotten a smiley face next to his essay assessing some example personality type or another. All in all, things felt right. Karate, sword-fighting, and adventuring were important to him but he’d always felt the most fulfilled helping others with their problems - psychology just seemed right.

A high-pitched, squawking voice interrupted him. “Hey, dude, what did you get for number 12?” Marco looked up at another student - Matt, if he was remembering correctly - who was hovering over him at an uncomfortably close distance. Even with how much life had changed in the past few years, his academic reputation stayed the same.

“Uh, C,” Marco responded absentmindedly.

“Oh, that makes sense. And what about 13?”

“B.”

“And… 14 through 35.”

“Just talk to Mrs. B, man,” Marco irritatedly replied, shaking his head. Normally he enjoyed helping classmates if he could, but he had promised Star he’d helm the planning for the daycare’s Easter party on account of her phobia - well, that, and he’d heard Matt bragging about how he’d blown off studying to play the new Super Slash Sisters game all night long. He looked back down to check over one last page and grinned to himself. The final essay prompt hadn’t been for a grade, but instead asked a simpler question: Why are you here? Without context, it might have seemed odd or downright rude, but the teacher had spent the first few months of the semester encouraging all the students to reflect on their goals and what they hoped to gain from the psychology program. The blunt prompt had caught him off guard, but after realizing what it was asking, he’d spent probably about as much time as he had on the rest of the exam combined describing his experiences and motivations on Mewni that drove him to help and support others.

Of course, he couldn’t help but talk about Star at length as part of that. His adorable, brave, compassionate best friend that inspired him to be more. Where would he even be now without her? He could still be at college, he supposed, but that wasn’t saying much. It was humorous to imagine: waking up, being driven to college by his mom, waving hello to Jackie every day (his foolproof plan to woo her had involved eventually moving past nodding, after all), getting straight As, working fruitlessly towards a red belt after classes, then… what? The world had so much more to offer him, and vice versa, and Star was the one who’d helped him realize that. The words had just flowed right out of his pen, paragraphs and paragraphs of glowing praise and affection, enough to leave his chest feeling as warm as it did when she was physically there.

“Hey, Marco, I have a question-”

Stirred from his contemplative state, Marco wheeled on the figure that had just tapped him on the shoulder, ready to tell Matt off for interrup- oh.

“Ludo? What are you doing here?”

“Oh, well, I was in the neighborhood and I thought I’d just drop in! But also, please help me. I did what you said but then I dribbled Boo Fly on the ground and he got really upset and-”

Marco sighed. Hope Star’s fine with me being late.

***

Most days, Star loved everything about her job. It was hard work, but it was so satisfying bringing smiles and warmth to the faces of the kids in her care and seeing them light up with stories to tell their families at the end of each day. Her hours were flexible, she got to spend time with Marco, and Antonio was a wonderful boss.

Today, however, was not most days.

Of freaking course Easter was Antonio’s favorite holiday.

The kids seemed to be enjoying his antics as he pranced around in a bunny costume, but for the life of her she just couldn’t understand why. Is it a normal rabbit or a person-sized one? No one even seems to know what it is! Does it lay bird eggs or rabbit eggs? Both are pretty horrifying if you ask me! If you get chocolate eggs in your Easter basket, does it lay them too? I’m not eating any soft brown rabbit droppings, Marco! They didn’t even get any days off for it, so Star was convinced the best thing to do was ignore its existence as a holiday entirely. Her incredibly valid concerns had largely been met with amusement, even by Marco, but Antonio had at least offered to let her keep her distance and work behind-the-scenes for the party they had planned, which was now going on in the main playroom.

Packing baskets with candy was easy enough. Chocolate, gummies, cookies, donuts. Candy corn for the humans and candied corn for the Mewmans - as much as the humans liked Mewman corn, they hadn’t quite accepted it as a valid dessert yet. There were a few special ones marked down as well. Some marshmallow mice for the Septarians, a ribeye steak for the Johansen - her third cousin or something like that, she wasn’t even sure exactly whose kid he was - and some dried bugs for the kappas… wait, since when were there any kappas at the daycare? She yanked the full list out from underneath the pile of sweets and quickly scanned it. 105? Aren’t there only 104 kids in the program this semester?

She almost missed it at the very top of the list: “Manudo Avarius”. She vaguely remembered hearing about a sibling with that name at some point… maybe they just joined? Something still seemed off to Star but she pushed it aside and finished the last of the baskets just in time for the end of the party. As the kids left, Star cheerfully handed out the baskets to the tune of joyous squeals from the kids and careful warnings from the parents to not eat too much at once. Pffftt, come on, I eat cake for breakfast and I turned out fine!

Curiously, she hadn’t spotted anyone that resembled Ludo yet even as the remaining crowd dwindled to almost nothing. Antonio had already begun to put away decorations when she finally spotted the figure, taking the basket over to them. But when they turned around, showing a braided beard… oh pegasus feathers.

“Star Butterfly! So good to see you again.”

“Hey Ludo,” she said. “Are you picking up Manudo?”

“Why would Menudo be here?”

“Well the paper said Manudo-”

“No, no, that’s not how it’s spelled, but besides, I’m here by myself. A large man with a magnificent beard asked me for my name and told me I was missing a party with lots of sweets! He kept calling me a child and I said I was a man and that my name was Ludo, but who cares when there’s free chips, am I right?” He reached into one of the five chip bags in his arms and stuffed a handful into his beak.

Man-udo. Dangit, Antonio. “So… good to see you, but what brings you here?”

“Well, I talked to Marco just the other day because it still just wasn’t working, but then I tried something else and that still didn’t work, so now I need your help again. It all started on Tuesday-”

Star slumped down into a beanbag chair and reached into the basket, deftly avoiding the bugs as she searched for cookies to nibble on. This is going to be a while.

***

“So what did you say this place was?” Tom asked as he glanced around the restaurant. The vibrant cherry-red booths and soulful singer crooning over the speakers created a very different atmosphere than anything in the Underworld, but he liked it.

Sitting across from him, Marco downed another fry and took a sip of his water before responding. “Diners are the best places to go for comfort food. Burgers, onion rings, waffles, all that kinda stuff. Emilio’s is the best in town.”

Next to Marco, Star was wolfing down onion rings by the handful. “The secret is that he hired a bunch of Eclipsa’s old chefs, so they make great Mewman and monster food too. Don’t tell Mom but their Mewnipendence Day pies are the best I’ve ever had - though they don’t call it that anymore.” She was still chewing when she spoke, but after so many years of knowing Star he had no trouble understanding her garbled words. “It’s really cool that Emilio was able to get back on his feet after the incident.”

“What incident?” Tom asked, eliciting an irritated groan from Marco.

“So basically, a few years ago, Ponyhead and I-”

“Oh boy, a Ponyhead story,” Janna sarcastically said, rolling her eyes, and Tom elbowed her side.

An older man with olive skin approached the table. ““Does everything taste alright? If your dining experience isn’t absolutely perfect, please let me know, I can get you anything. More to drink, dessert, maybe some mushrooms...”

“It’s great, Emilio,” Marco mumbled.

“Good, good…” Emilio was smiling a bit too hard as he backed away, his eyes lingering on Marco’s meal.

Marco caught Tom’s curious gaze and buried his head in his hands. “Look, it’s a long story. There was this pizza, then spiraling alcoholism, then a bit of arson…”

Janna’s hand, resting on Tom’s leg, unconsciously twitched as she perked up. “Woah, OK, now I actually do want to hear this.”

“Too late, no take backs.”

“Aww, you’re no fun.”

“So anyway, we picked the restaurant this time so have you two decided what we’re doing after?” Oh crud, we forgot to plan. Tom’s initial instinct was to claim a beginner’s mistake, since it was only the second of their monthly double dates and their first time planning the after-dinner entertainment… except the actual reason was that he and Janna happened to get into their first major makeout session the night they had set aside for planning, burning thoughts of accomplishing anything else to a crisp in the process. Star and Marco were the last people that would be squicked out by romantic affection- that wasn’t the problem. After years of slacking on responsibilities and having any kind of social life at all in a misguided attempt to chase after Star, he couldn’t help but feel extra guilty over this specific lapse.

Janna leaned in, whispering in his ear. “Can’t we just hit up the Sands of Eternal Torment?”

“For the tenth time, Jan, no,” he hissed through his teeth. “There’s, like, a 25% chance you’d all have your souls violently ripped from your bodies.”

“Only 25? Ew, nevermind, just let them pick.” She leaned in even closer, her breath hot in his ear. “If it’s somewhere boring, we could always just sneak away and-”

“Good evening!” Tom squeaked and quickly turned his head at the sudden boisterous call from his other side, almost smacking Janna in the temple with his horn in the process. It was an incredibly short bird creature with a thick grey beard - a kappa, if Tom was remembering correctly. It wasn’t their same waiter from before, but hey, what did he know about how Earth restaurants worked?

Tom held out his glass, but the supposed waiter ignored it. “Yeah, can I have a refill on the demonade, please?” Star and Marco glanced over at the waiter, their eyes opening wide before they both groaned and smacked their faces on the table in unison. Alright, maybe he’s not a waiter then.

***

“Star...” Marco uttered. Star removed her wandering lips from his neck and propped herself up to look lovingly at him, shivering slightly as she abandoned the warmth of his bare skin. It had been probably over a year now since they’d first become more intimate like this, but the fire still burned just as hot. Heck, it was better now than those first forays, Star reckoned; with time came confidence and experience that let them enjoy themselves and each other to the absolute fullest. They’d both had busy lives the last few months or so, and with the end of the semester fast approaching Star knew they would be even busier soon, but none of that seemed to matter in this time they’d taken for themselves. Even after a break for a shower and snacks, their present cozy state under the blanket with nothing between them still felt as radiant as any proper afterglow could.

“Mhmm?” A devious thought crossed her mind, but she tried her best to feign innocence as she slowly slithered down his body, leaving fiery trails of kisses down his chest and sweet, sweet abs.

“Not that I don’t like, you know, doing this but I don’t, uh, know if I have it in me for another rouuuuuuuu-” His voice shot up an octave and his whole body jolted as she blew raspberries on his belly button and snuck her arms up to tickle around his armpits. “Star, please- I can’t- I’m- can’t breathe-” he sputtered out between hysterical bouts of laughter.

She was laughing too by the time his flailing pushed her off of him. Before he’d even collected himself, he lunged forward, trying to catch her with a determined-but-still-goofy grin on his face. Star dodged and backed away from the bed entirely as Marco grasped at her limbs. He finally gave up, lying on his stomach while resting his head on his chin and staring up at her. Even though his tush was right there for the ogling, Star was instead captivated by his enamored gaze and dopey smile.

“Dangit, Marco, you know I can’t resist that look,” she huffed, allowing him to take her hands and pull her next to him on the bed.

“I know,” he said smugly. “You’re not the only one who can weaponize being all lovey dovey.”

“The student has become the master,” she quipped, their hands still joined between them as they lay on their sides.

“But I do mean it, Star. I love every single part of you, and that’s not gonna change. Things have been hectic lately for both of us, but stuff with the daycare, what you want to do for a living, Ludo… we can figure that all out. Just reach into your pocket if you need me.”

She gently patted his head, running her fingers through his freshly shampooed hair. It was alluring to smell, to hold, to feel brushing up against her. Though the problems they faced now were of a different kind than the forces of evil that they’d spent their earlier years tackling, his presence was still what she needed most to ground her and make everything feel alright. Her face dipped in for a kiss, initially short and sweet but quickly succumbing to a familiar hunger. She pounced on him but miscalculated her momentum, rolling the whole way over him and pulling him with her so he lay on top. Not complaining, she thought as she hugged him close and indulged in the sensory bliss of his skin on hers.

He lightly rested his forehead on hers. “Do you, um, mind if we maybe don’t, y’know…” he trailed off sheepishly.

“Marco,” she crooned, holding his face in her hands. “How many times do I have to say it: I don’t want to do anything if you’re not comfortable with it.”

“I-I can try that, um, thing again, though, instead if- if you want?” Oh sweet, sweet Marco. Even after years together, he still couldn’t rest until he was sure he’d done everything he could for her.

“Yeah,” she implored, breathy with the mounting anticipation as he began a trail of kisses downward.

“What thing are you two talking about?” Time seemed to stop as any building pleasure completely evaporated. Marco grabbed the crumpled bedsheet and pulled it over the two of them as the couple stared at the window in complete incredulity to where Ludo was standing on a flapping Dennis’s back. “Well, anyway, I need some more advice-”

“GET. OUT!”

***

Marco rested his chin in his hands while Star paced in front of him. Three months. Three months of Ludo showing up at the most inopportune times, three months of Star trying and failing to feel satisfied with her efforts at the daycare, three months of a semester so intense that they were both at their wit’s end with all of it. Ludo had once again come to the college for advice after his 26th attempt to regain his old friends failed just as catastrophically as the previous 25. He was persistent, Marco had to give him that, and the old monster crew had even been pretty supportive when Star and Marco had tracked them down themselves and explained the situation. The issue seemed to be entirely from within Ludo’s own mind, which made it a dozen times harder to solve. It was the last day of the semester and they’d been haunted by thoughts of every minute of summer vacation spent throwing themselves at the brick wall of Ludo’s psyche, so they’d made a pact that today was all or nothing. Neither wanted to ditch Ludo, he wasn’t a bad guy, but enough was enough.

“Any ideas?” Star piped up, sounding entirely lost and uncertain as her gaze kept nervously darting over to Ludo who was brushing his beard and snacking on its droppings in the empty playroom. “We’ve tried psychology, reverse psychology, pep talks, reverse reverse psychology, all-you-can-eat chips, ygolohscysp-”

“Which still isn’t a thing,” Marco interrupted.

“Well I’m sorry, I’m not the one with a fancy degree, Marco!” she growled, tossing her arms out. “Ugh, sorry, this is just so frustrating. Doesn’t he have, like, a thousand brothers and sisters he could hang out with? If he can’t relax around the monsters, why does he always have to pester us when he could-” Her pacing instantly halted as her eyes opened wide. “Oh crud.”

He stood up and placed a hand on her shoulder reassuringly, unsure whether her apparent epiphany was a good or bad thing. “Star?”

“He came to us for help becoming comfortable around his old pals again because he already was comfortable around us.”

“Way too comfortable,” Marco muttered with a wince that Star mirrored. They were still a little bit traumatized from the shower incident. “But that means-”

“He never needed his monster pals, he just needed… friends,” she said just as he had the revelation on his own.

Marco smacked his forehead and sighed. “And he spent so much time fixating on this one thing, and we spent so much time just trying to solve his problem and shove him out the door, that we never tried just… being his friends.”

They both looked through the little window into the playroom, where Ludo saw them and waved with a giant smile.

Star buried her face in her hands, messing up her hair like she was prone to do whenever she was feeling frazzled. “Ugh, I feel terrible.”

“Same, but… we can’t be his only friends, though. I feel bad for him, but I don’t know if I have it in me to be his BFF.”

“You’re right, you’re right, but who else could even handle that? Who? The guy’s so hyper and weird, ugh, he reminds me of me as a kid, except way less cute.”

“...a kid.” They both mumbled simultaneously. It was as if a single lightbulb had gone off above both of them at once as all the pieces fell into place. “That’s it!”

Star bolted out the door to gather the handful of children that hadn’t been picked up yet while Marco got Ludo. A few minutes later, they met up at the rec center basketball court where Antonio helped them set up some kid-sized hoops. It took a bit of coaxing, but after a few minutes Ludo was having the time of his life tossing the ball around. The kids seemed to enjoy it, too, as he regaled them with tales of his adventures on Earth (and a few about a space princess with a cyclops and robot for friends that Marco was pretty sure he made up). Star and Marco had joined for a few games but both decided to just step back and watch from the bleachers for a while.

As they observed the scene, listening to the ecstatic wails of everyone on the court as they ran around with the ball, there was a smile on Star’s face that was more content than Marco had seen in a while. “See? You made their whole week just by giving them someone fun to play with,” Marco said, lacing his fingers through her hand. “They like you a lot more than they like balloons and candy.”

“Even I don’t need candy with you here being so sweet,” she cooed, nuzzling into his shoulder, neither taking their eyes off the courts. Ludo passed the ball to Trevor, who spun around and passed it back in a fluid motion that allowed Ludo to score. The blissful, carefree sight was soothing after the intensity of Marco’s life lately. Just some kids and a small bird man having fun playing a game together… life didn’t always have to be so complicated. The serene moment abruptly ended when Ludo’s beak caught on the rim, leaving him dangling above the ground and shrieking for help. As Star squeezed Marco’s hand, sighed, and stood up to go help the poor kappa, Marco knew it could never be truly simple either.

[angelholme]

May, Myself and I -- Year 3, Day 17 : Narwhal

“Rule -- When you play this card, everyone must draw a card, and they cannot continue to play unless they guess the colour of their own card

Additional rule -- when you play this card, you must say it's name in an amusing way”

Everyone has gaps in their knowledge -- things that they don't know that they don't know. And generally speaking they can get through their life without this knowledge, because it is entirely unimportant and, quite honestly, if you get to the age of thirty, thirty five and haven't learned the latin name for all the bones in the human body then you are probably not going to need to know it at any point in the rest of your life.

And if you do need to know it then someone will teach you it, or you will learn it. It's why I learned about some of the things I now know about for my job (and my previous job) and why I know the meaning of the name Dorothy, Alice and Celeste.

But there are things that you discover by accident, or because you start doing something new.

In this case, it was because my most beloved and I started playing a card-game together. It featured an entirely fictional creature, which is why I thought the one to which the above rules apply was also entirely fiction. I mean -- I had never heard of it before outside of stories, and so when it was part of a game about unicorns what was I supposed to think?

But then I started seeing cute adorable pictures of them -- the creatures I thought were fictional -- and then I saw pictures of them in real life, which quite surprised me. It did come as quite a surprise to see something you thought was a mythical beast sitting on a beach.

Not enough of a surprise to make you question everything you ever knew -- I didn't start to believe in God, or become a conservative, or throw away my entire life to go off on a quest to save the world. It was just a bit of a surprise.

Much as I said in "Distance" -- some people believe in the evidence of things not seen. And that they can believe in mythical creatures that no one has seen and that there is no evidence of. History is replete with examples of these -- Pandas, gorillas and the giant squid, for example. Creatures that people believed in, and that there was a suggestion of, but that were not seen for a long, long time.

I realise that believing in something that hasn't been proved is just one step away from being a conspiracy theorist -- however believing in something that hasn't been proved is a lot different from believing in something that has been demonstrably disproved. But that is a whole different topic, and one I might, or might not, get back to in the future.

And I also realise this is the second time (at least) I have drifted onto the topic of what can be described as faith, and it won't be the last time -- if you've read the word list you'll know I will be returning to it at least once at the end of the month and no doubt I might return to it before then (this is as good a time as any to explain I tend to think of a topic on the day I'm going to write on the day, so even though I am more than halfway through the month of May, I have no clue what I am going to write for Days 18 - 31, although I know that Day 28 is going to start with a reference to a guy named Johnny Ball).

For example -- today I was going to write all about my beloved, but I appear to have got entirely distracted by fictional creatures and giant squids. (But I am fairly certain that says more about my tendency to get distracted and jump from topic to topic like Michael Keaton in Speechless than it does about the wonder and glory of my most beloved).

I also cannot find a way to pivot back to my most beloved -- how we met, why she is the centre of my world, how the pandemic has made it harder to see each other, why she makes my life infinitely better, why I cannot live without her and so on........ oh. Looks like I can do that.

[thiswasinevitableid]

21, Indruck (for the Mermay minifics)

Note: Duck’s design is based on a Grouper (aka one of the strongest fish) and Indrid’s is based on an Oarfish.

Every mer in Kepler Cove knows not to go near the strange lights. Lights that glow bright orange or deep purple, flicker gold to green or fade from blue to silver. But Duck is desperate. 

And so when night falls, and all sensible creatures are safe in their beds or dens or buried beneath the sand, he swims across the flat, empty patch of sand to the cave on the outskirts of town, green lights guiding his way tonight.

The house is cluttered with bottles and shells, with drawings and discarded pufferfish quills, and all around him the lights swirl. They’re solid when they bump him, but when he holds one in his hand, it isn’t an object his eyes understand.

It’s when he looks up to find two red lights, glowing more dimly than the others, staring him down that he remembers the warnings.

“Uh-”

“I am surprised to see you, Duck Newton. In most future, you decided on the prudent option and stayed far away.” The mer comes into view, his silvery tail, streaked with a red fin, matching his silver hair. The tail is much longer than Duck’s own, even though it ends in a standard fin. And he’s grinning. It’s not a Great White grin, but it doesn’t put Duck at ease. 

“You gonna make me regret it? And how do you know-”

‘Your name” The mer says along with him, “I can see the future. Or futures, I suppose, churning and changing, flitting in and out of view like sardines in a school.” He circles Duck slowly, his form long and lean next to Duck’s, which is built for power and unassuming in it’s mottled green, black and white. He remembers the stories of sea serpents, of mers with strange tails and angular faces who would lure the unsuspecting out into the deep trenches, never to be seen again.

“Then you know-”

“-why you are here? I can see it coming, but perhaps you would like to tell me yourself.”

“Do you know what’s been happenin to folks around here?”

“The plague? Yes. I...I tried to warn your predecessor that such a thing might come on the tides. He chose not to listen. And now you are here, a new chosen guardian, forced to bear the results of his disregarding me.” 

“There ain’t any record of you tellin him that.” Duck says cautiously. 

“Is there mention of someone called Indrid Cold?”

“Yeah, now that you mention it.”

The mer points to himself without another word, then swims to his wall and removes several drawings, the images evaporating as he does. 

“Oh. Uh, didn’t know that’s your name.”

“Of course not. Everyone calls me the witch. Or worse. And only the desperate would seek out a monster mer, and I watched the futures as you narrowed your options little by little until deciding on me. This spell” he catches a smaller light in his hand, “will produce a special plant that when ingested will cure those who are ill. But it will cost you.”

“Ah. You’re that kind of mer.” Duck crosses his arms with a roll of the eyes.

Indrid whirls, knocking lights aside as he hisses, “No, I am not. This is how magic of this caliber works. It cannot be given for nothing, no matter how much I wish I could do just that. I do not desire anything from my fellow creatures other than peace and respect, and yet I must demand a great deal to deliver what they ask of me. The choice is yours, Duck Newton; seek my help or do not, but do not act as though I am some predator laying in wait in the dark.” He flicks his tail dismissively, goes back to what must be his desk, fin tense as he waits for Duck to respond. 

Duck looks at the spell, “What’s the price?”

“Ask it.” Indrid sighs, jerking his tail towards the spell.

Duck gazes at the light, repeats the question, and gets a flash of two luminous red pearls. 

“Ah fuck, those only turn up in the oysters near the damn Nettle Eels.”

“Unfortunate.” Indrid continues drawing, back resolutely towards him, “if you decide to attempt it, bring the asked for items here. Only then can you release the spell.” His fin is limp now, his shoulders sag. 

“I’ll do my best. And, uh, Mr. Cold?”

“Indrid is fine.”

“I believe you. About it not bein’ your doin’.”

With that, he swims back to town. But as he glances over his shoulder, still not certain if Indrid is dangerous, the other man is watching him. When he notices Duck has turned to look at him, he lifts his hand in shy wave farewell.

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

“You still got that spell?”

Indrid turns, knowing what he’ll see yet smiling all the same when he does; Duck Newton, arms clearly stinging, with two red pearls in his hands. He retrieves the spell, takes the stones and places them with other items the magic has demanded. As soon as Duck touches the spell, the light bursts into a thousand little specks.

“It is done. The grove of plants should be ready by the time you return to your home.”

“Thank fuck.” Duck slumps against the wall. Then he holds out his hand.

Indrid cocks his head, perplexed. Duck makes an awkward sound in the back of his throat, hand returning to his side. 

“I just, uh, wanted to say thanks. For helpin’ me. Lotta people are gonna be alive because of you.”

“More would be if I had convinced your predecessor of the severity of the plague.”

“Hey now” Duck swims closer, and Indrid finds he has no instinct to back away, “he was a dipshit. Don’t gotta take the blame for that.” He holds out his hand again, and this time Indrid takes it, shaking it. Duck smiles when he does.

As the other man swims towards the exit, he pauses, “There was another spell, wasn’t there? One that woulda cured it without the plant step.”

Indrid swallows, “Yes.”

“What was the price?”

‘I believe it requires a stone from the valley surrounded by the mer-eating eels. The one, ah, almost no one returns from.”

“That’s what I thought. Thanks, Indrid. Thanks for lookin out for me.”

Indrid wishes he could curl his tail all the way around him so he no longer has to deal with the sensation of Duck looking at him with unfamiliar kindness. 

“You are welcome. If you ever need my assistance, you know where to find me.”

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

“Damn thing bit straight through my sword. Minerva’s too.”

Indrid examines the snapped metal, then begins swimming between the lights, “Do you think an increased offensive capability or a defensive one will be better for ridding the reef of the Giant Scorpionfish?”

“Ain’t sure, futures don’t happen to have any clues?”

Indrid pauses, tail waving lazily, then shakes his head, “it seems the two show about the same outcomes of success.”

“In that case, let’s go with somethin’ that’ll keep us safe while fightin it. Don’t really feel like havin some super-powerful weapon floatin around after this is done.”

Indrid picks a golden light from the air, hands it to Duck. This time, he doesn’t immediately move away, instead waits for him to learn the price. 

Duck shuts his eyes, gets an image of deep blue eggs. Then he shivers, Indrid’s tail having brushed along his by accident.

“Eagle Ray eggs. Do you think it wants all of ‘em? Seems kinda rude to take the whole nest.”

“Hmmmm, looking at the futures, it seems two or three will suffice.”

“Gotcha. It may think that’s some tricky quest, but I happen to know where a lot of different nests are around here. I’ll be back in an hour.”

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

“Got your message, you said a tidal storm was comin?”

“Yes, we have about five hours at maximum before it hits here. I already found the protection spell and learned the price, to expedite things. It wants a black pearl, a rare red sea flower, and gold from a sunken ship.” Indrid swims back and forth between drawings, erasing and recreating as the futures change.

“Fuck, okay. Uh, I’m allowed to have help, right?’

“Of course.”

“I’ll send Juno after the flower, Dani and Aubrey can help her. And Ned’s real good at findin gemstones in a hurry. I know there’s a wreck about a two mile swim thataway, but it’s been picked over.”

“I may be able to help; we can use my powers to locate the stray, remaining gold. Come, there is no time to lose.” He darts out of the cave and Duck follows him, watches the light glint off his scales, the way his body twists and speeds through the water.

Even if they fail, at least his last mission will have had a hell of a view.

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

“‘Drid, I was wonderin if you...uh, didn’t know you had pets.”

“I do not. Or, ah, I did not, The Eagle Ray eggs hatched. The spells almost never want animals, so it never occurred to me that the eggs would remain viable--AH! Careful with that, I know you are getting used to your wings but those are fragile. Anyway, what do you need?”

“Not a spell, but could you use your future vision to see if the issues with the Kelp fields are gonna lead to somethin bigger?’

“Why Duck, are you really giving me the honor of being an advisor to a Chosen?”

“ Damn right I am. Also that ray is chewin on your desk chair.”

“AH!”

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

“Hey ‘Drid, can I uh, um, I need some help.”

“Of course, let me just finish feeding Spot and Speckle their dinner. Is it a spell or a future?”

“Uh, it’s, uh, fuck, a, uh, spell? Yeah, a uh, fuck, spell. I need some help findin my, uh, fuck, keys? No, fuck, I mean-”

“You don’t have a reason for coming, do you.”

“Nope.”

“There is no need to lie about one. Wanting to visit is reason enough. You are welcome here any time, my friend.”

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

“Nice, ain’t it?”  Duck stretches out on the warm rock, sun soaking into his chest. 

“Mmmmmhmmm.” Indrid hums beside him, long tail draped off the edge and into the water. 

“You said you don’t come up here much.”

“I had some run-ins with sailors I tried to warn off oncoming disasters. I became a bit of a local legend, an omen of doom, and so decided it was best to lay low.” The words are detached, but Duck rolls over to find Indrid staring wistfully up at the sky, “I do enjoy it up here. I like watching the stars, seeing all the snippets of a new and different world. Some days I think I love the surface as much as I love home. Perhaps that is silly.” 

Duck rolls onto his side, “Ain’t nothin silly about lovin’ somethin’ incredible. I mean look” he points the forest, the tangle of green looking down on the shore from the hills, “look at that. How does it grow? What lives there? There’s so much to know about nature, up top and below.”

Indrid is on his side now as well, “Thank you. It is nice to know I am not alone. In, ah, in my thoughts, that is.” 

Duck reaches for his hand, and when Indrid scoots close enough to give it, Duck presses their tails together. Indrid sighs at the contact, and soon his tail is draped over Duck’s, his fingers tracing abstract patterns up and down Duck’s arm. 

“‘Drid? Would, uh, would you ever wanna maybe...move closer to town? I know Barclay’s been visitin more, Dani too. Seems like you’re startin to know more folks in town. There’s, uh, a house near mine that just opened up. We could be neighbors?” The note when his voice turns up at the end is steeped in vulnerable hope that he prays Indrid can’t hear. 

Red eyes regard him, “No, Duck. I do not think I could be. I am a solitary creature. The spells I help usher into the world and keep safe can be dangerous in their demands, attract dangerous beings in search of them. I ought to remain so, more for the sake of whoever wishes to be close to me than for my own.”

“But-”

“I need to return home. Farewell, Duck.” He slithers off the rock, and by the time Duck is in the water there’s only a flash of silver, disappearing into the darkness on the edge of town.

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

“Barclay, you seen ‘Drid lately?”

“Uh huh, saw him yesterday when I ran some food over. I wanted him to try my new red snapper wraps.”

“Oh. So he’s, uh, fine then?”

“Seems to be. Why?”

“The last few times I gone to see him, he ain’t been home. I’m worried I mighta done somethin’ to offend him.”

“Nah, I bet it’s just a run of bad timing. Indrid likes you more than anyone else on this reef.”

“...If I send someone else to get spells or info, he’s always there.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Oh.”

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

“Mr. Cold, I am here on the utmost urgent business.”

“Hello to you too, Ned, and Indrid is fine. What is…” He sees the oncoming answer and blanches from top to tail with fear.

“Duck is ill?”

“He hasn’t been able to get out of bed for a week. Barely consumes food or drink. The lovely Dani took a look at him, but it does not seem to be an ailment know to her.”

“Show me the way to him. Please.” Indrid follows Ned, and the lights follow Indrid, his foresight not showing him enough to know which spell may be needed. They wind through town, whispers darting from house to house as they do.

The night is only made worse by what he discovers when he reaches Duck’s side.

“He is heartsick. That is why Dani was unable to find means of healing him. Only one exists.”

“One of your, like, spells?” Aubrey asks hopefully, red tail twitching with worry.

“No. It can only be cured with a kiss from one who loves him. Romantically, I should add, as the illness is brought on by a romantic love that one tries to repress or destroy. Do any of you know someone who loves Duck that way?”

All heads in the room shake. He sighs, “May I have a moment of privacy to think?”

When they’re alone, he strokes Duck’s brow, tail curling protectively around him without him truly meaning too.

Then he leans down and plants a single, tender kiss to Duck’s lips. 

Mismatched eyes flutter open.

“‘Oh thank goodness.”

“Fuck, whole body feels like I just got over the fin-pox.” Duck rolls his shoulders. Indrid realizes he hasn’t moved away from him, can’t bring himself to do so.

“‘Drid? Did, uh, did you just kiss me?”

“I, I did. I am sorry, it was the only-”

He’s yanked into the bed, one hand tangled in his hair as the other traps their hips together. Ducks tail flaps excitedly and Indrid’s curls around it as many times as he can. 

“I tried so fuckin hard, darlin, I thought you were angry with me, or that you were pushin me away for my own good, and as much as I missed you I didn’t wanna push you so I tried not to think about you, but, but I, I just started feelin’ sicker and sicker whenever I pushed thoughts of you away.

“Oh my, love, I am sorry. I only meant to keep you safe. I never meant to hurt you so.”

“It ain’t your doin’; I’m the dipshit who couldn’t tell you how I felt. I know you didn’t want to be with anyone-”

“-you are right, I thought it would be dangerous. But, well, in the last few weeks, I have realized that while my powers make for an oft-dangerous time, so does your position in the reef. And I, I missed you terribly. I want to be by your side, Duck Newton, if you will still have me.”

Duck runs a firm hand down his tail, grinning brighter than the lights still spinning around them, “You know, darlin, I think I’ll do just that.”

[sasuhinasno1fan]

When you threaten a snake yokai’s humans- Luktober Day 31

Happy Halloween and sad cause it’s the end of luktober. I wish I had done more but this actually works out as I have 3 gift exchanges to work on now. This is also the only fic I did for this that isn’t lukadrien, mostly. It’s hinted lukanettegamidrien (IDK this ship name), but there is a kinda more lukadrien scene near the end, I couldn’t help it. Also, another @write-it-motherfuckers prompt used, one as a flashback. Anyway, before I babble on, thank you to @lukacouffaineappreciation for creating this event, I liked it. Snake & Yokai

This was annoying. Usually he’d be helping his companions out of these situations, not be in them himself. For someone who didn’t have the ability to summon their magic companion – a dragon, a giant cat or a swarm of ladybugs – he surprised his group by being the one to get them out of situations, even if most who saw him thought him only a simple bard.

They’d have no clue he’d walked the earth longer than any of them had been alive and even further on. Snakes swarmed to him, as he was one of their own in human form. He believed someone once called him a yokai. He didn’t know if it fit in this part of the world, but it’s the name he kept going back to.

He was bound in frail rope and he saw a huge crack in his lyre where it had been thrown. He was going to make them pay for that. Kagami had unexpectedly given him that after seeing him admire it in a marketplace. He’d have to take care of this before the others came looking for him.

“The blonde one, he’s the duke’s son ain’t he?”

“Duke of Paon. Want to rip that bastard’s guts out. Treating my family like they were less than his. Like to see what he’d do when he’s about to lose his son.”

Paon, where Adrien and Marinette were from. The Duke, that would bring a frown to Adrien’s face.

“What about that girl, the one with the dragon? You ever see a summon like that? She’d fetch a nice price.”

“Might as well get them all. And they’ll be back for that one.”

He wasn’t going to let that happen. Perhaps if the situation had been different, he would have found this somewhat entertaining, but given the fact that these, annoyances were trying to use him to bait his companions into willingly walking into a trap, he was feeling far from forgiving. He came to care for them after all, and the protectiveness he had developed over them was only to be expected from something such as the creature he was born as.

Luckily, tricking his “captors” into approaching his bound form, was all too easy thanks to their ignorance of his nature, and once they were within reach….well….

Sinking teeth into someone’s vulnerable throat had never felt quite so satisfying. The screams they let when he easily escaped the ropes and let his glamour drop. Glowing eyes and scaled skin would be the last things they’d see before he split their blood onto the forest ground.

He could have done without having to taste their foul blood though. It felt wrong to act like he was scared of whatever came to kill his captures when his companions eventually found him, but he never spoke anyway. They wouldn’t be able to pull answers from him, unless they wanted to see his fangs.

                                                ________________

“Here you are.” A kind barmaid said, dropping off 4 tankards of the only non-alcoholic drinks the bar had. “Rooms should be ready soon.”

“Thank you.” Adrien said, taking one of the tankards and giving them to their quite companion. “Luka, are you sure you’re ok?”

Luka. he couldn’t give them his actual name without speaking when they all first met. Marinette had given him the name, from a childhood book about a quite bard who travelled. He didn’t need words for his music, much like the book’s character. He nodded at Adrien’s question, sipping at the drink, washing down the blood that made his mouth tacky.

“I would have liked to introduce those men to my sword.” Kagami said, looking at the expertly crafted sword in its sheath sitting on the table.

“Too bad whatever it was got to them first. I would have helped.” Marinette said. “Hopefully it doesn’t come looking for more food in the village. Maybe we should take a break from doing any quests?”

He shook his head. They were on their way to the City of Miraculous. Last time he’d been there, it was only just starting to be known as the magic epicentre of the world. It was much bigger now. The quests helped pay for their way to it.

“At the very least, we should take a break here. An early night would be best.” Kagami said.

“Fine by me. Luka, why don’t we room together? I’m sure Plagg wouldn’t mind cuddling with you.”

Plagg always gave him looks whenever Adrien summoned him, like he was warning him, but his high body temperature did feel nice against his always cold one. He nodded, smiling at the sunny smile he got in reply.

Once their rooms were ready, Adrien led them to their room and closed the door. He dropped his stuff on the floor in the heap he usually did and let his magic surround him. It started to take shape and eventually, shaking off the extra magic like it was fluff, Plagg stood there, yawning and stretching like his usually lazy self. He summoned familiar watched as the two pushed the beds together before making himself at home on the top half of the bed, allowing them to lean on his side.

He’d been focused on looking at the damage left on his lyre when Adrien spoke.

“I was kinda hoping whoever saved you would have been him. You know, the one who saved me in that last village?”

That had been him but he of course couldn’t let Adrien know that. They’d only just arrived in the village when screams ripped throughout it. A monster had been attacking the village, treating it like its personal dinner service. They all split up to get people to safety. Luka had just cast protective spells on a barn, to keep from being destroyed and to protect those inside when the spells he’d put on Kagami, Marinette and Adrien went off. He saw his view go green, meaning Adrien was in trouble. He ran off to see Adrien shooing people inside a building, whatever monster realising Adrien just lost it it’s meal. It growled at him and it had looked like Adrien had expelled a lot of his magic. Without thinking, before the monster could attack, he jumped in front of Adrien, throwing up a protective shield. He felt his glamor slipping as he focused on protecting Adrien and spoke to him for the first time.

“Whatever you do, don’t open your eyes.” He didn’t think Adrien would listen to him but by the time his magic had obliterated the monster, Adrien was still pressed against the door, eyes closed and hands covering hie head, his ever-present hood gone, knocked off from running around earlier. He remembered gently grasping the hood and pulling it up again, leaning down almost resting their foreheads against each other. For a moment he’d been scared that if he did lay his head on his, Adrien would know it was him and he wanted to keep Adrien and Kagami and Marinette closer for a while longer. So instead he whispered for him to open his eyes and was gone before the green pupils were revealed.

He let out a hum then, to let him know he was listening.

“He had to be pretty powerful to destroy that monster. I wish I could have at least thanked him. But hey, if it was him, then he protected something important to me.”

And he’d continue to protect those important to him. If they never heard him speak or never saw his fangs, that was fine. He wouldn’t admit to himself that he was scared about what could happen if they did.

[theroninknight]

Cyberpunk 2077 criticism

I’m not a reviewer. Just a guy that has played video games the better part of 25+ years. Expectations are a strong factor in how well a game will be received. CDPR had built up a strong reputation with well made games in the pass and Cyberpunk WAS supposed to be an easy homerun for them.

  Bugs, glitches, crashes placed aside, the game just feels half done. It was promised as a deep RPG set in an open world and what we got was an action game with RPG elements. Many of the promises made were left on the cutting room floor. Lifepaths don’t matter beyond the intro and a select few dialogue choices. I played a Streetkid and honestly the game felt like it was designed with V being a streetkid from jump. I’ve heard that folks playing Nomad or Corpo were severely disappointed with the opening and I don’t blame them. Originally, I wanted to have a separate playthrough with each lifepath to better experience the game but with what little choices streetkid offered, I don’t see any point to it.

The world, while fascinating at first, is only knee deep. Giant ads ala Ghost in the Shell and Blade Runner play on repeat and if you actually sit there for more than 20 mins, you’ll realize you’ve seen them all. Quest givers and story NPCs aside, the everyday npc of NightCity feels like a shell designed to give the illusion of a sprawling city. On the surface it works so long as you don’t look too close at their behavior. In fact, I could say that about so much of the game and how it feels. Sex is overexaggerated, and that’s coming from a guy who has modded his Skyrim to be a succubus play den. Everywhere you go, there is an ad with some form of sexual innuendo or just plain dicks. It’s a prominent enough for you to notice but stays just long enough as to not overstay its welcome. There was one time I was doing an investigation mission Corpo woman whose penthouse had been broken in.  mood all serious, I’m doing my best Private eye work and then I hear this moaning coming from the walls. I rush over, thinking I found a clue and it was the ad for the Orgasmic drink playing from the TV. It’s a bit of cyberpunk flavor that I’m not sure needed to be in the game at least to this extent.

The gameplay is your typical open world go here and kill or fetch this affair with a sprinkle of real gems in some side missions. This is where the game shines the most in that its not always so cut and dry. One minute you think you’re on a standard assassination mission and the next your going on a joy ride with a reborn Christian looking to change the world. The quests and the world are the saving grace of this game and I can’t think of anything specific about this game I would have to point out.

The story is…unique. There’s a lot to like about it but two things didn’t sit with me well after completing the game. The beginning has you meet with a merc named Jackie and you two become best friends almost instantly. From there, the game does a time skip montage showing all the fun you have with your new bestie until something like a year pass. WHY? The game could have easily took its time to have Jackie show us around the city, get familiar with the place and build a real relationship with the guy. Instead we’re treated to this montage like we were given a relationship skip option and didn’t remember accepting it. It makes your relationship feel forced and rushed and that’s never good.

Keanu Reeves is in the game.

Speaking of Johnny Silverhand. One of the “best” endings in the game is tied to dialogue options you have with Johnny without really knowing about it. This may sound nitpicky but any game that asks you to play for 60+ hours but ties you to dialogue choices without a better understanding of the consequences. True some endings are more organic but as far as I’m concerned, there should never be an ending that requires knowledge prior to starting the game.

Then theres the Roleplay aspect. From a character building standpoint, it leaves a lot to be desired. This game was based on a table top game of the same name and you would think they would give it the same treatment when it came to creating your character or toon as some serious RPers call em. Nope. As I mention before, lifepaths are a shell of a good idea and the perk/skill tree system is a mess. There are two prominent schools of roleplaying, play-as-you-go-jack-of-all-trades and dedicated class builds ala tank, dps, healer, etc. Cyberpunk forgoes the class build system in favor of the more common jack of all trades but with a twist. While you’re not locked into a particular build initially, as you level up, your given two points. One for attributes and another for skills. Your skill tree unlocks as your attributes go up. Once you have an understanding of what playstyle you like, raise your attributes to the required levels and unlock your skills. If you make a mistake, you can go to a ripperdoc and respect your skill points for the hefty price of 100k. At first that may not seem like a bad trade until you realize that your still limited to your attribute point selections from previously. It’s a small oversight and one that can be patched down the line or corrected with mods on the pc but it’s an oversight nonetheless. I’ve played for over a hundred hours and the idea that I have to start a character from scratch for any reason other than to replay the story is atrocious.

All in all, the game is a huge let down for anyone that was expecting to actually roleplay their character beyond surface level shooter. There are a lot of nice components that make the game enjoyable for the most part but it also fails to deliver on what was promised. For me, that’s a bigger deal breaker than bugs and crashes.  Despite how pretty the game can be when it works, its still only a part of the experience as a whole.

There is way more I could complain about but this is already lengthy as it stands.

For fans of Cyberpunk genre I can give this an 8/10. There isn’t anything like it at the time of writing this and hopefully it won’t be the last.

For none fans, I can see this closer to a 6/10. It’s a half decent GTA clone with more steps but a clone none the less. Replay GTA V if you crave a open world city.

[missjosie27]

Year 2 Part 1- Coming Back

Hey, guys! Year 2 of David Grant’s adventures at Hogwarts have begun! Not really much to say except thank you for your patience and I hope you all enjoy! Any feedback is welcome:)

David Grant stared outside of the window almost precisely three months after his last trip on the Hogwarts express, witnessing . The summer passed slowly, too slow for his own liking, but the time had come to return to the gargantuan institution once more and he could not have been more excited.

To be sure, he had not spoken of his adventures to his parents. Evidently, Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall felt it wasn’t important to inform them of the majority of his misdeed and run ins, something for which he was extremely grateful. His mother was overbearing and cautious as it was, and dad didn’t do much to counteract it. Other than family meals, or an occasional excursion into London to visit relatives, there wasn’t much to report from the Grant household. It also went without saying that he had also not mentioned being on Jacob’s trail. Though they only had one clue at the moment, it was enough and more than ever, David believed he was alive. Before his first year, he wouldn’t have even entertained the possibility. Now, he was determined to find the break through that would lead him to his long lost sibling and the vaults were the key.

His thought process brought him back to earth with Rowan prattling endlessly about his summer within their compartment.

“…she’s such a cute cat. Fuzzclaw is the real brains of the family I always say. Also my parents started growing another kind of wood made for a batch of wands. Ollivander just ordered a whole bunch.”

When David didn’t respond immediately, his friend waved a hand to grab his attention.

“Hello? Earth to David? Are you going to say something? I feel like I’ve been talking for over ten minutes.”

“That’s because you have.”

Rowan appraised him.

“You’re distracted and that usually means you’re thinking about your brother, the vaults, or both.”

“Good guess,” David replied. “Sorry, Rowan, I don’t mean to be rude. But my summer was…forgetful let’s just put it that way. Going back to Hogwarts, I have a lot on my mind.”

“Forgetful? Did anything bad happen?”

“More like it was just incredibly boring,” he shrugged. “Mum had us visit our relatives and my little cousins but I rarely had the opportunity to do, well, anything. The sooner we get back to Hogwarts, the happier I’ll be.”

“Too right. I’ve been running through our coursework this year. It should be slightly busier and more challenging than last year,” Rowan said excitedly. “I hope we get to learn more about giants.”

“If Binns doesn’t put me to sleep first, I’d share that sentiment.”

Laughing, Rowan chucked him a chocolate frog, which David began munching on before the spell could take effect.

“That reminds me, did you find anything more about those Aramaic ciphers?” he said through a mouthful of chocolate. “I couldn’t do much with my mum hovering about all the time.”

“As a matter of fact, I did,” his best friend answered. “I wish I had the book on me right now, but I can show it to you when we get to our dorms. But the basic gist is that the language was used by a sect of wizards back in the early Middle Ages, including Merlin. It’s enchantments and power were apparently greater than that of Latin, even though that’s what most wizards used around the time Hogwarts was founded.”

“That’s interesting,” David said genuinely. “Did it say anything about the vaults?”

Rowan shook his head.

“No, but there’s a lot of interesting history there and what the vaults could have or rather be hiding. Aramaic was also inscribed on ancient relics, including one that King Arthur personally searched for: The Holy Grail.”

David thought back a minute, the name sounding vaguely familiar.

“Hold on, isn’t that part of some muggle fairy tale?”

“It’s more than just a muggle fairy tale, Dave. Remember who advised King Arthur at the Court of Camelot? Merlin, arguably the greatest wizard who ever lived. I’ve read that story a million times and I love the adventures they go on. Especially their quest for the Grail.”

“You keep mentioning some sort of Grail.”

“King Arthur and his knights were Christian, which is the majority muggle religion in Britain,” Rowan explained. “The Grail was an important part of their faith.”

David had to admit, Rowan’s encyclopedic knowledge of these kinds of things came in handy and provided entertaining stories. But he failed to make the connection.

“That sounds brilliant and all, but what does a Christian relic have to do with the cursed vaults?”

“Everything,” Rowan said becoming more excited. “Because the Grail wasn’t some religious piece. It was real and created by Merlin himself! Supposedly it had all sorts of powers, and anyone who drank from it would be granted immortality. As I said, it was probably inscribed with ancient Aramaic like we found on the door. It could be one of the treasures hidden inside the vaults.”

This was all well and good, but believe it or not, the now second year Gryffindor held no interest in the concept of living forever. This ‘Holy Grail’ was actually quite fascinating, but it was not quite enough to go off of in terms of actually finding the vault or his brother.

“The treasure is irrelevant, Rowan,” he said firmly. “We need to discover the location of these stairs first and foremost before doing anything else. Jacob is the number one priority.”

“Of course,” the Indian preteen nodded. “Still, doesn’t mean it’s not fun to think about.”

“You read too much, Rowan.”

“And you don’t read enough,” his best friend chuckled.

David chucked the wrapper at him in jest. He peered around idly curious as to where some of their other friends were.

“Did you see Ben on the train, by the way? He should be sitting with us.”

“I caught a glimpse of him,” Rowan told him. “Last I saw he was talking with Bill Weasley about something.”

Well at least he’s in good hands

David was comforted knowing he was probably among those who would treat him well. While Ben had made great strides the previous year, he still didn’t like the idea of him running into any of the Slytherins on his own. Honing his full potential as a wizard would still take some time.

“Maybe we should say hello-”

At that moment, a crash and a muffled yelp could be heard outside the door. The two boys wasted no time in peeking out of the compartment to see what the ruckus was about, only for a blur of orange to stumble into them.

“Quick, shut the door!”

Only then did David realize that the blur was Charlie Weasley, who was grimacing and grabbing his shoulder.

“Charlie are you alright?”

“Never mind that, is the door shut?”

Rowan double checked that it was secure and gave a thumbs up.

“Good. Merlin, that freaked me out.”

“Slow down,” David said, pulling him up off the seat. “Just what the bloody hell happened?”

“I’m not sure, exactly,” Charlie said, still grabbing his shoulder. “I was just reading an article about Chinese Fireballs as I walked down the hallway. Must not have watched where I was going because I accidentally bumped into this Slytherin girl. Next thing I know, she’s firing hexes at me.”

“What did she hit you with?” Rowan pressed him urgently. “Maybe we should find a nurse.”

Charlie gave a wave of his wand.

“Nah, I’m fine. Worst she did was a stinging hex on my back. Though no doubt she was using deadlier stuff than that.”

“Any idea what she looked like?”

“Yeah, actually I do. Pale girl, recognized her from last year. Black hair covering half her face, a little freckly, with giant boots.”

David and Rowan looked at each other, gaging whether or not they were on the same page.

“Does that ring a bell, David?”

“Somewhat,” he said racking his memories. “She’s a Slytherin in our year. Real quiet, never says anything. I think her name is Ismelda.”

“That’s it,” Rowan confirmed. “I remember overhearing Professor McGonagall talk about her hexing a whole bunch of Gryffindors last year. Said she used spells that someone her age isn’t supposed to know.”

David raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah, somehow I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Sounds like another Death Eater in training to me.”

Charlie shrugged as he grabbed a frog from the pile they had collected.

“Lots of Slytherins are gits, but I can’t imagine all of them are.”

“Trust me, the less of their presence I have to deal with, the better,” David frowned. “One in particular.”

“Merula,” Rowan answered for him. “I’m hoping a summer away from Hogwarts mellowed her out a bit.”

“That’s about as likely as a giant’s ass fitting through a straw.”

Charlie snorted as he laid back down on the seat.

“We’re not even halfway to Hogwarts and you both are carrying on about rubbish we don’t need to worry about just yet. Let’s relax and play some exploding snap or something.”

Charlie had a way of putting things into perspective and in the end David and Rowan acquiesced, putting aside the vaults, Merula and everything else. During the course of the game, they discovered their red headed friend’s desire to try out for the Gryffindor Quidditch team, which was not surprising given his natural talent for flying.

“So you have a broom and everything?”

“Yeah,” Charlie said plainly. “But it’s not very good. Mum and Dad really couldn’t really afford a decent one. It’s a cleansweep seven.”

Cleansweeps were serviceable, but it was common knowledge that they couldn’t go as fast as the comet and nimbus series.

“Maybe you’ll get another at some point?” Rowan encouraged. “My family could help make one for you at a discount with one of the better makers.”

“It’s okay, I appreciate that, Rowan,” Charlie said, going pink slightly at the generous offer. “But I’ll make do. It’s the talent after all, not the broom.”

“Well I hope you make it, mate. We can’t be any worse than we were last year. Haven’t had a real team since James Potter was seeker back in the seventies,” David said shaking his head. “The father of the boy who lived himself.”

“He was a legend. If I can be as half as good as him, I’d be more than happy.”

They discussed Quidditch for the better part of the next few hours before the light slowly gave way to dark and the Express was minutes away from pulling into the station.

A knock on their compartment and Bill appeared in the doorway, looking as cool as ever even in his uniform.

“Hey, you all might want to get changed into your robes, we’ll be arriving soon.”

“Time flies when you’re talking about Quidditch,” David yawned, stretching out his arms. “Didn’t even realize it was so dark. Thanks, Bill.”

“No problem. By the way, have any of you seen, Ben?”

That perked up eyebrows.

“We thought he was with you,” David said, a note of anxiety in his voice.

“Wasn’t he sharing a compartment with you earlier?” Charlie asked.

“He was. But then he left, and I haven’t seen him since. I figured he went and found you guys.”

“Well he isn’t here, Bill,” the younger Weasley replied. “Haven’t even caught wind of him.”

An uncomfortable silence followed at the revelation that their friend was missing. Rowan gave a sideways glance to David, who in turn looked at Charlie. It appeared that the mysteries to solve this year had grown by one more.

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Bill reassured them. “I’ll keep an eye out for him. In the meantime, make sure you’re in your robes by the time the train pulls in.”

He exited the compartment leaving the three second years in a state of puzzlement. Rowan looked especially anxious.

“Rowan, relax. We’ll find Ben, okay?”

“It’s not that,” he replied, and now he sounded excited. “I mean I’m worried about him of course, but Bill Weasley actually talked to me!”

“He was talking to all of us,” David pointed out, trying not to laugh.

“I know! But still, no one that cool even acknowledges my existence usually!”

Charlie silently rolled his eyes, while David couldn’t help but give a nervous chuckle. Amidst the positive emotions about returning to Hogwarts, the fact that one of his friends was nowhere to be found was an ominous welcome back greeting.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Given that they were no longer first years, this time around they rode the carriages, which were pulled by some kind of invisible horse, into the front entrance of the school as opposed to crossing the lake with Hagrid (the big man still waved his usual massive hand, cheerfully at them). Privately, David was thankful for this step up in seniority, however minor it might be. His sorting the previous year had been quite the spectacle and he was more than content with being among the general crowd this year.

Still, his brother was out there somewhere and he would continue to pursue that avenue. He didn’t care about the vaults as much as he did Jacob. After a tumultuous first year in which he had risked expulsion (and worse), the last thing he wanted to was to incur the ire of Filch or Snape.

Or Merula for that matter…but in that case I have no choice, he mused.

The returning students made their way to the Great Hall, taking their seats at their respective tables. As the crowd continued to shuffle in, David took his seat next to Rowan and Charlie, Jae trailing in behind them.

“Any sign of him?” David asked.

Rowan scanned around, briefly.

“No, not yet. Honestly I’m starting to seriously worry now…”

“Who are you guys referring to?” Jae cut in.

“Ben. You haven’t seen him have you?”

“Yes, actually.”

Rowan eyes nearly popped up out of his glasses.

“What?! Where?!”

“Just now. Two rows down from you actually.”

The two boys quickly turned their heads to find the blond boy sitting in his seek looking perfectly normal, which in itself was a contradiction.

“Psst,” Rowan whispered trying to get his attention. “Ben!”

“Huh? What?”

He angled to see them better.

“Ben, where the hell were you today on the train?”

“I was with Bill,” he said simply.

“Yeah, but where were you before that?” Rowan pressed. “Or after you left his compartment.”

“Around.”

In David’s opinion, there was something off about their friend. Though he otherwise appeared fine, the non chantant way in which he was talking and the half glazed look in his eye was odd to say the least. But before he had a chance to dig further, they were interrupted by the sound of the Great Hall doors swinging open, Professor McGonagall and the new first years in tow.

Though only second years, David already felt like a veteran from a war compared to the fresh, young curious faces that now entered their presence.

“Did we really look that way when we were sorted?” Charlie whispered, evidently thinking of the same thing.

“Nah, no way.”

Soon enough, Professor McGonagall explained the rules to the young students, the hat sung its song, and the sorting was on its way. Unlike last year, however, it seemed to take forever. Time flew when your stomach was empty and the prospect of food salivating. The young Gryffindors tried to cheer their fellow inductees as best they could but by the time the sorting reached the letter ‘R’ most, including the older students were pretty burned out.

“Is it supposed to take this long?” David grumbled.

“Probably how everyone else felt when we were sorted,” Rowan said.

Though it felt like agony, at long last the last of the first years were sorted and up Dumbledore came to the podium, his midnight robes shimmering, his old, but penetrating blue eyes twinkling at them.

“Welcome to all, once more, to a new year at Hogwarts!” he announced. “To our first years, I give my warmest welcome and I’m sure that our returning students can forgive an old man so he may explain a few rules and boundaries,” he said with a wink.

A few quietly groaned, but that was all the protest one would hear. One did not complain openly to the Headmaster when making a speech, even someone as eccentric as Dumbledore.

“First, I would like to reiterate to all that the Forbidden Forest is out of bounds to all students and there will be severe consequences straying its borders. Second, Mr. Filch, the caretaker, has asked me to inform you that the list of banned items has been increased to one hundred and thirty six. Anyone wishing to know more may see the visit outside of his office door. For those of you know old enough to try out for your respective house Quidditch teams, Madam Hooch will be posting the dates within the next couple of weeks, so do be on the lookout.”

Dumbledore took a pause, his eyes becoming more searching than twinkling, as though he were gazing into the soul of each student in his presence.

“Lastly, I would like to add one thing, Hogwarts is a place of education and growth. Please, focus on your studies and spend time with your friends, but above all else, be careful as you journey about the castle. If you see anything odd that isn’t the Hogwarts sort of ‘oddity’, do not hesitate to tell a professor. Every year is an interesting one, but something tells me this year holds more surprises than most.”

The smile returned to the centenarian’s face.

“But enough of my ominous warnings and grand proclamations. Enjoy the feast.”

Immediately, food popped out of nowhere and David couldn’t help but grin at Rowan at the reaction of the first years. Only a year ago they had done the same thing at their first feast. Now, it was simply time to enjoy.

“Turkey?” a Gryffindor girl in their year offered.

“Don’t mind if I do,” David thanked her. “I’m starving.”

Rowan, however, gave him a small nudge.

“Dumbledore’s speech was especially cryptic. Do you think it means anything?”

Privately, the now second year never put anything past the Headmaster. The man was something of an enigma, even if he was also brilliant. Last year had taught him that much.

“I’m not too concerned with it, really,” he shrugged. “Let’s just eat. Pass the potatoes, will you?”

And so they feasted, stuffing themselves senseless, drinking gallons of pumpkin juice, laughing the night away with old friends in the hope perhaps that new ones would be made as well. Summer vacations were discussed, Quidditch matches polled, old companions reunited, and Jae even mentioned off handedly he was going to take a first hand look at Filch’s list in order to update his buyers. All in all, it was a night to remember, so much so that amidst the merriment, David forgot about Ben’s odd behavior. However, that was only temporary.

The feast ended and Dumbledore ordered them to bed. Being second years, they no longer were required to hang back and wait for the guidance of a prefect. It was truly amazing what a one year difference could make. There would be no Angelica to lecture them this time, though no doubt she would have her eye on him and his friends this year.

Climbing up the last staircase that led to the Fat Lady, David attempted to make conversation with his muggle born friend.

“Hey, mate. Haven’t had a real chance to say hello yet. How was your summer?” he asked, tapping him on the shoulder.

“Hey, Dave. It was good. Not much to report, though. Took a holiday to Ireland.”

“Sounds fun. Wish I had gone out of the country. Mum won’t let me do much.”

“It was actually nice not to think about magic for a bit,” Ben admitted. “For my parents, this is still pretty new. Takes some getting used to, you know?”

“Yeah.”

David silently appraised him, trying his best not to act suspicious.

He seems perfectly fine. So why do I get the feeling that he’s not?

Instincts aside, he simply let the conversation peter out as they took over the second year dormitories and settled in for the night. But even trying to sleep through Charlie’s snores and Jae’s personal tinkering with an object he claimed off a Hufflepuff, David could not put away the combination of excitement and anxiety that rattled around in his mind.

He was back at Hogwarts, but as Dumbledore had hinted, they were in for more than a few surprises.

[botslayer]

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019) review (Long)

Star Wars has a place in all of our hearts, I think. This series has had literally galactic-scale highs and lows. Be it the video games, the movies, the comics, the novels, what have you, Star Wars is one of, if not THE biggest sci-fi universe in the world and one of the most important in all of nerd culture. After the controversial madness that was EVERYTHING about The Last Jedi, I felt the need to see this one. How does this new Trilogy end? Is it any good? Well, let's dig in. 1. Technical aspects The movie looks good for the most part. It's a lot of good CGI and descent puppetry, a lot of explosions, and a lot of color. All the places that the movie goes do feel genuinely unique to one another, so points there, I guess. But it has some serious issues with the editing. The editing is god awful for most of the movie, the camera flips around too much, I think. I don't want constant tracking shots but they keep jump-cutting all over rooms and very suddenly for scene transitions. There are a fair amount of wipes but only one scene transition actually stood out to me at the very start of the movie, everything else was kinda dull. This has to be addressed, Carrie Fisher is still in this movie. What they did was cut snippets of her head out of unused footage from Force Awakens and Last Jedi, then put it relatively well over the face of a body double. This allows her to exist in the movie but it isn't good. From an ethical standpoint and from how it affects the flow of her scenes. Her tone of voice doesn't feel right for any of the scenes she's in and her answers to what people say are usually just kinda weird, as well as what people say whilst responding to her. 2. Acting and characters (very lite Spoilers) The acting in the movie is okay generally. It's nothing to write home about though. It's solid and generally does the job but the characters themselves are a different story. One problem is that the movie introduces a shit ton of them, including but not limited too, (Spoiler warnings for this paragraph), Zorii Bliss, An old Spice running friend of Poe's who is trying to ape a Mandalorian (Like the society) vibe in the look of her outfit but doesn't do it well. Babu Frik, her tiny alien boss and a surprisingly tech-savvy little so-and-so. D-O, a small droid consisting of a cone head and a single wheel, voiced by JJ Abrahms. And Jannah, who like Finn, is a rogue Stormtrooper from the first order. Everyone and everything else introduced are just more generals for the "Final order" (A rebranding of the First Order) and a bunch of background aliens and stuff for the resistance. The main problem with these characters is none of them have time to develop because of how many are introduced. They try with Zorii, bless them, but her scenes are too short so her character doesn't "Develop" it just starts at one point and changes at the drop of a hat. And the returning Characters honestly aren't handled great either. Rey is okay for the most part, but Finn contributed just about nothing, Poe wasn't worth much more than a ride between planets, Kylo Ren goes back to wearing his old helmet for some reason and again, seems to change without much provocation. Leia's death is weird and kinda pointless, although I'm happy they won't do what they did again. The only consistently good, solid characters in the movie were the droids (Especially C3PO) and Chewbacca. Characters with very few lines or who literally cannot speak. That's such a weird thing to say, honestly. 3. Plot and thoughts as we go (Heavy Spoilers) A transmission has gone all across the galaxy, Emperor Palpatine lives. Kylo Ren is hunting for a "Sith Wayfinder" and Rey is training under Leia to become a better Jedi. Kylo finds the Wayfinder and goes to a sort of hidden Sith planet whereon he meets Palpatine, here it is revealed that Snoke was a clone made by Palpatine's servants, "The Nights of Ren" and that Palpatine was "Every voice Kylo heard in his head." (Not too subtle change into Darth Vader's voice as he speaks.) Kylo and Palpatine have a short exchange where the younger pledges both his and the First Order's services to him, in exchange, Palpatine will add a whole new fleet of Star Destroyers to them. Star Destroyers he literally just summons up from the ground. Hangar bay doors don't open, these things just slam up from the ground like titans of myth rising from ancient slumbers. And while that might sound cool, it comes with a lot of issues. For starters: Who made these things? The Knights of Ren? How old is that organization, then? How old are these ships? Why don't they have hangar doors overhead? Hell, we learn later that these things will bolster first Order forces by "Ten thousandfold." How many of these things are there? How many ships does the First Order (Now "The Final Order") have at this point? Anyway, back with the resistance. After a cameo by the best fictional game in the series, Holochess, we find that they're getting information from an ally I never caught the name of, flanked by some sort of weird alien on the ship who's apparently on a first name basis with Finn and Poe. We also learn the Final Order has a spy and a decent chase scene ensues. All well and good, but all this and the conspicuous lack of porgs makes me wonder how much time has actually passed between this movie and Last Jedi. Especially when we cut back to Rey who is trying to hear the voices of past Jedi but just realizes she can't and immediately drops the meditation in favor of running a training course. She ends up getting distracted while running it and accidentally drops a tree on BB8. She says to Leia that she will one day earn the right to use Luke's lightsaber... But it broke in the last movie. Again, can we please get a time stamp? Poe, Finn, Chewbacca, and their crew return, whereupon there's a kind of funny back and forth about what Rey did to BB8 and what Poe did to the Falcon during the chase. The highlight of which is "At least BB8 isn't on fire!" "What's left of him isn't!" During this breif stop, we learn that The Final Order is broadcasting their plans, in sixteen hours they will lay waste to entire worlds because as it turns out, the new ships that Palpatine gave them all have planet-destroying laser weapons on the bottom. A Fleet of Star Destroyers, each with Death Star-grade power. That's definitely upping the anti, I suppose. During this, we also learn that the "Wayfinder" Kylo went after is important because its the only way to find the planet Palpatine is holed up on, a world called "Exegol," you won't find it on any other maps. So the crew goes on a quest to find a man in service to the Sith, a bloke named "Ochi" who was last spotted on a planet called "Pasaana" because for some reason, Luke and Lando Calrissian were tracking him. The movie doesn't explain why they were after him, nor why they seemed to abandon the search. (Or when any of that happened, for that matter.) Our heroes journey to Pasaana where, as it turns out, there's a festival happening. One that celebrates family and ancestry. Cue the best comic relief in the movie, C3PO, as when Poe expresses that he isn't psyched about working with a crowd of people all around him, C3PO expresses elation, "We are very lucky, it only comes once every Forty-Two years--" Etc. Honestly, C3PO is the best part of the movie. As the resistance crew goes about the Festival, Rye gets a necklace from a local who asks for her family name, not just her given, but Rey just says she doens't have a family name. Kylo contacts Rey with their weird psychic bond they had in Last Jedi, and they have an interesting exchange about the last movie and her wanting to take his hand at the end but deciding against it, and how when he offers it this time, she will take it. He steals the necklace Rey got from off her throat because as established in TLJ, he can do stuff like that. He has Final Order members analyze the necklace and learns of the planet Rey and her cohorts are on while they gad about the festival looking for any sort of clues or leads. They end up getting found by Final Order Troopers, but saved by Lando, apparently, Leia told him where they were. They mention the resistance could use his help, but he just says that his flying days are behind him before he sends them off. The gang is followed by Final Order troopers, resulting in a chase scene, one I quite like. The Final Order has jet troopers now, and the crew basically just have their sidearms as weapons, having stolen vehicles from the locals. It's a very intense action scene, even when the crew crashes into "Not-quite-quicksand." Everyone starts sinking in and Finn says he's always wanted to tell Rey something. What it is goes unanswered as he sinks down. The lot of them have fallen into a cavern of some sort. They explore the cave until they find two things, Ochi's land cruiser, and Ochi, who as it turns out is long dead, nothing more than bones and whatever he had on him at the time. Rey digs through his body and finds a scary-looking dagger that has most definitely been used for some less than savory deeds, Rey sensing the negative force energy off it. 3PO tells them that the inscriptions all over the dagger are in Sith Runic. He CAN translate it, but he can't say it aloud. It has to do with Old Republic regulations on translation modules. They keep the dagger, at least. There's also a giant serpent, one the cast calm into letting Rey get close, whereupon we learn she has the ability to force-heal injuries. The snake lets them out and she explains that it's basically channeling some of her own life force into whatever she's healing, and when she sees Ochi's ship, she's unnerved. She knows it from the day her parents left her. Some true madness begins to unfold as Kylo shows up in his ship and Rey cuts one of the wings off, forcing it to crash. Chewbacca is captured and ostensibly killed accidentally by Rey because she summons force lightning and blows his transport's engines. There's another brief exchange with Kylo about him seeing the lightning for real, thus her capacity for darkness, before Finn and Poe tell her they NEED to leave. They do and Kylo radios for pick up as the Final Order literally toes the Millenium Falcon into a Star Destroyer. It is here we learn that Kylo knows about the spy in their ranks and that Chewbacca survived. While they waddle about in Ochi's ship, thinking of a plan, C-3PO reveals that there IS a way to get a translation out of him. Essentially they need to do a factory reset. This means 3PO will lose all memories of his friends and life. But what is that compared to a galaxy dominated by fear? Poe knows the man for the job, trouble is they need to go to a world called "Kijimi" where Poe made a booboo before joining the resistance. But again, literal planets worth of lives are at stake, so he swallows his lack of pride and they go. A not bad tracking shot of Poe creeping around the streets and finding it crawling with Final Order troopers later, his mistake comes up to him. Both her pistols drawn, and one to his head. We learn that "Zorii" and Poe's old outfit were spice runners, and their old friend "Babu Frik" is the guy they'll need to crack 3PO's head open. Babu only sees people who are part of the crew, which Poe no longer is. They eventually convince her and the other spice runners to let them in. There's a genuinely heart-wrenching moment where 3PO goes completely silent before the process gets going and he says he's just taking one last look at his friends. Meanwhile, we see Poe and Zorii on top of a building, Poe mentions how no one came after the last movie, their distress call was for nothing. Way to invalidate the most controversial movie in the series, you dolts. Also, Zorii seems to have changed for no reason. She went from not wanting to look in Poe's general direction to inviting him out to her new life as a farmer on some rock at the fringes of the galaxy. Poe turns her down because he has a war to fight, whether or not he wins. She gives him a First Order Captain's badge, which would allow docking in any Final Order ship or planet because the rebranding is only so recent, I guess. C-3PO gets rebooted and the crew learns what the inscription on the dagger means, but again, the cost is 3PO's memory. He reboots and introduces himself as "C-3PO, human-cyborg relations, who are you?" Babu introduces himself and Rey fixes the wheel on a robot found on Ochi's ship, a little cone head thing we don't learn the name of until about an hour later, "D-O." At about this point, Rey realizes what's in orbit just overhead, Kylo's flagship... And Chewbacca inside. The crew boards the ship to free Chewy and get the Falcon back, along the way, Rey mind tricks a couple of troopers, the crew shoots a few dead, and then she goes off on her own, trying to find something. Her scenes on the flagship are pretty awesome, as she enters Kylo Ren's quarters and starts not only talking to him again but also fights him. This leads to some very interesting cinematography, a fight where when they accidentally break things in their respective locations, they appear in front of the other, so for example, Kylo is in the streets of the city the crew was in, specifically a market in it. He cuts open a pot full of berries/nuts and they all appear on the ground in his chamber while Rey is fighting him. It's pretty impressive. During the fight, we also learn A. the real reason Rey's parents sold her: Protecting her from her grandfather. B. Who this grandfather is. The Emperor. Rey is seriously Palpatine's granddaughter. C. Rey's parents died protecting her. Kylo learns she's in his quarters when she accidentally destroys a podium, on which was resting Darth Vader's semi-melted helmet. From there, it all spirals out, Ren has them lock down the ship, Rey snags the dagger and Chewy's gear, Chewy, Finn, and Poe are caught, only to find out that general Hux is the spy who saves them When his motives are questioned, Hux says he doesn't care if the resistance wins. He wants Kylo to lose. Rey and Kylo have one more confrontation before the falcon shows up and Rey literally leaps into space to get on the entrance to the falcon. Where Finn is. Audibly screaming at her. Y'all can say what you want about a downward bombing in space probably not working very well in Last Jedi, but this is a whole new level of bullshit. Rey leams OUT OF A RAY SHIELD into the vacuum of space. I don't care that Leia survived being out way longer in TLJ, at least she wasn't audibly saying things as she went, at least it felt like she was in space instead of just a big random fall. Also worth noting, to ver their escape, they blast the bad guys with the Falcon's engine trails, this burns or knocks back all the Troopers but Kylo, who is standing roughly the same distance as at least two of them, and Rey, who is closer than ANY of them are unaffected. This one moment is more agitating to me than most of The Last Jedi, honestly. There's Wardian grade plot armor, and then there's this. The crew gets away and Hux is killed by another general because he figured out that Hux was the spy, they end up at another planet because of the inscription and the Falcon crashes, drawing the attention of "Jannah" and her random tribe of people. They resolve to fix the Falcon while waiting for the water to calm, something they at once have zero choice or time for. Turns out the Sith Wayfinder is on a hunk of the second Deathstar. Rant to come. While waiting for the water to calm and repairing the Falcon, we learn Janna is a rogue Storm Trooper, just like Finn. Her entire company was meant to open fire on civilians, but ALL OF THEM refused. Finn mentions he didn't think there were others but I have to question where Jannah's entire unit gets off doing that. How did all of them fight their programming? Moving on, BB8 raises a concern, he hasn't seen Rey in a while. Turns out she stole the rogue trooper's sea skimmer and rides the waves JUST right, so she can make it to the chunk of Deathstar. I was never big into the idea that Rey was a Mary Sue until this happened. I was willing to write everything else off up to this point but NO. She has NEVER used something like this. She spent most of her damn life on a planet with NO water and no point actually drove anything like this save for the land boat she stole from the natives during the festival but even then, it didn't have the quirks this thing had (It's a repurposed ship of some sort, she needs to constantly raise and lower an arm of the ship to reduce drag, I suppose.) I know this seems like the most random thing to officially stand in that camp, but what's that old saying about straws and camel's backs? Rey goes to the shard of the Deathstar and starts exploring, it's full of old classic Storm Trooper outfits, mostly helmets. She goes to the Emperor's old throne room and through an old door, she ends up in a kind of trippy, maze-like space until she finds the Wayfinder and faces a seemingly Sithified version of herself with a dark robe and a collapsable double-sided lightsaber. This version of her fights her for all of four seconds and is never seen again because normal Rey flees out of the room and into Kylo Ren's waiting gaze. Now, my question is WHY would Palpatine keep one of these things on the Deathstar 2? In case he wanted to go to Exegol? Why not keep it in a more remote location than about thirty feet to your left? It's an ancient Sith artifact, you'd figure he'd be more protective of it. But nooo. So Kylo breaks the Wayfinder Rey found, wasting all of our time, before engaging in a lightsaber fight on the outside of the ruins. Finn and Jannah catch up to see this but can't do anything, partly because if they don't hug the ground, the turbulent water below will likely send a wave up just high enough to knock them into the ocean, Rey and Kylo, however, are clear I guess because they have higher ground away from the tides, they still get sprayed a lot. The fight ends with Leia dying from using what's left of her energy to reach her son, Rey stabbing and then healing Kylo before she leaves in his ship. The crew, save for Rey, and Jannah's rogues join up with the rest of the resistance where they find out what happened, and Chewbacca loses it. The Wookie collapses to his knees and starts screaming and wailing, beating into the ground, etc. He's lost all his human friends, 3PO's mind is wiped, the only things left from the good old days are R2 and the Falcon. This is a genuinely harrowing moment for longtime fans, I think. Meanwhile, Rose Tico shows up for the second time this entire movie, the first time being her explaining why she can't go with, she has lines that could have been given to almost any rando in the resistance which is honestly a shame. Then we cut to Ahch-To, The planet Luke exiled himself to in Force Awakens and TLJ, to find Rey burning Kylo's ship and very nearly, Luke's lightsaber. Luke's ghost shows up, catching the saber, and giving her a pep talk, telling her he knows now that exiling himself was stupid and that she needs to face the darkness in herself and the galaxy head-on. That delusion she saw getting her Wayfinder wasn't the first, she's seen herself ruling at Kylo's side as the empress, but given Luke's Pep talk, him showing her a spare lightsaber that used to belong to Leia, and the fact that Kylo had HIS Wayfinder in his spare ship, Rey agrees to continue fighting the good fight. But how will she leave the planet? Luke's force ghost raises Red five from the ocean. I'm not kidding, he literally just force lifts it with some show-offy joy. That thing has been waterlogged for how long? Even assuming Rey could fix it, where the hell is she getting fuel for it? Back with Kylo, we see him gawking out over the sea, a familiar old voice starts talking to him. Han Solo's ghost shows up and they start having a heart to heart oddly reminiscent of the one they had in Force Awakens. Han says he knew his son was in there somewhere, and when Ren says "Your son is dead" Han says "No, Kylo Ren is." In that spirit, I will now refer to Kylo as "Ben" for the rest of the review. Ben throws his lightsaber into the ocean and is left to his own devices by his dad's ghost. The resistance somehow knows that there are radio towers on Exegol that help the ships navigate through the constant storms and rain, Poe and Finn organize a plan, to distract the ships while a ground force attacks the tower and Chewbacca will go off and send another distress signal, allowing others to join the battle if they can. They come up with this because D-O has the plans for the ships and the like stored in his head if memory serves, and also 3PO gets his memory back, R2 had a back up, wouldn't you know it? The Resistance charges into battle against the Final Order over Exegol, And thus begins a fun clusterfuck of lasers and explosions. As one expects from this trilogy. Now, the first order has this actually brilliant moment when they realize they can shut down the tower, and start broadcasting the same helpful signals from one of the ships themselves. Which they do, this allows them to down some Resistance ships before Finn sees what's happening and has them do a ground invasion style attack ON that ship. As in they deploy troops over the top of it ON HORSEBACK. Honestly one of those things that's so loveably stupid. They end up in conflict with a bunch of troopers on top of the ship as they look for weak spots to plant bombs or the like. Rey, meanwhile, has snuck into the Emperor's hiding place, just as Ben lands on the planet. There's a lot of running around on all sides, dogfights under and around the larger ships, Ben fighting knights of Ren with just his bare hands and the Force, Rey being lured into Palpatine's grasp, Finn and Jannah's group shooting at troopers and passing ships as they look for weak spots. It would have all been fairly tense if the editing wasn't done by a coked-up squirrel. Almost nothing feels impactful in the fights, there are too many cuts in scenes largely about singular or just two characters. There are good elements to all this but I didn't care enough about most of these people. for it to mean much. Also worth noting: not much can be done. They've already lost so many pilots, soldiers, and fighters, Finn and Jannah's group haven't fulfilled their goal yet, Palpatine is giving Rey a very "Let the hate flow through you" speech about how it's all pointless and her friends are doomed, but if she kills him, and becomes the empress, the Final Order will be hers to control, she agrees for a moment, letting a bunch of the Knights of Ren and Palpatine begin ritual chanting as a horde of them look on, Poe is out of hope. Rey is about to give in and Ben is surrounded with no weapon. All hope is lost... Until Rey enters another sort of shat with Ben and gives him the lightsaber she was moments ago going to kill the Emperor with. Ben strikes down his aggressors and makes his way to Rey and the Emperor, they slaughter the knights in the immediate vicinity. While that's happening, an entire fleet of random people shows up to help the resistance. Zorri and Babu are right next to the Falcon, which contains not only Chewbacca but Lando. The fight begins anew as Finn and Jannah blow the antennae in the ship they're on and cripple the Final Order Fleet. Now all the Resistance has to do is blast the planet-killing lasers and the entire ship they're rigged up to will also be destroyed... Which makes some sense but is still a pretty massive design flaw. Down with Rey, Ben, and Palpatine, the youngsters try to strike the Emperor down, only to basically have their life forces partly fed upon. Ben goes flying down a naturally formed cave shaft, presumably to his doom. Palpatine has regenerated from the life steal thing and sits on this massive stone Sith throne just under the battle in the sky, and in a moment so absurd I was dumbstruck when it happened, sends lightning up into the sky. A massive MASSIVE pillar of it, so massive that not only does it reach the sky, but when it does, it fans out and strikes dozens, if not hundreds, of resistance ships, taking them right out of the sky. This guy is over a hundred years old, several of which he was DEAD for and for some reason now, he has power I would only be able to describe as "Godlike" for no damn reason. I forgot to mention earlier that he didn't live through being exploded in ep 6. He brought himself back to life somehow, just wrote it off as his access to the dark side. He still looked terrible though, like he was actually a corpse with rotten hands and pure white eyes and all that. But somehow, two random idiot children's life forces, nowhere near in their totality, are enough to rejuvenate him and give him power unseen by most of the deadliest Sith in all of Star Wars. Vader's apprentice from The Force Unleashed wasn't this fucking OP. The worst he did could be chalked up to gameplay, this one-man lightning storm bullshit is actually canon, though. So this creates a problem: How does Rey defeat someone with the power of a god on her own? She ignites Leia's old lightsaber from when Luke was training her and then redirects the Emperor's lightning back into his face, destroying his head. From there, the Final Order's fleet is destroyed and Finn and Jannah are rescued from a fiery death as the ship they're on starts crashing to the ground, I guess being the only surviving members of their attack squad.   Ben climbs out of the shaft and gives his life force to bring Rey back from the dead, they share a kiss and Ben dies, allowing Rey to flee in the Red Five, much to everyone's relief. There are celebrations and hints of things to come, including Lando taking Jannah with him on adventures through the stars, Rose hugging some dude who ISN'T Finn, much to Finn's annoyance, and Zorii and Poe exchanging wordless gestures. The final scene is Rey going to the old Skywalker Moisture farm to burry Luke and Leia's lightsabers just outside the house. How she knew where the farm was or why she buries them is anyone's guess. She pulls out a new lightsaber, a Yellow one. Which... Okay, I guess but where did she get it? Did she make it? How? Where? Did she just find it somewhere? How? Where? But anyway, an old woman comes walking by and mentions that the hasn't been anyone at the farm in so long and asks Rey who she is. Rey says "My name is Rey." "Rey Who?" Luke and Leia's force ghosts appear and smile at Rey. She proudly announces that she is "Rey Skywalker." And her and BB8 watch the suns over Tatooine set. The end. 4. A Nitpick? Some of these are just little things I couldn't find a good place to put elsewhere: In flashbacks, we see Luke training Leia a bit, in those scenes, her lightsaber is green. In the modern-day, for whatever reason, it's blue. I'm not sure if that's an oversight or not. Also worth asking: Where is Luke's personal saber? I did some research and he apparently reclaimed it at some point in the EU (Which is no longer canon) but even in Last Jedi, the last we see of it is him almost using it on a young Ben Solo. Where the hell did it go? 5. Conclusion I see this movie has it’s good bits but it isn't enough to make up for how shoddy the overall product is. There are too many new characters to let even the pre-established ones breathe, let alone each other, the editing was total garbage to the point where I genuinely got a headache, the plot invalidates both episodes eight AND six, while itself being kind of terrible... Nothing can kill Star Wars for me. This movie certainly tried. TL;DR: Do not watch this trash, I don't care if it's your first Star Wars film of if you're a long-time viewer, it isn't worth your time or money. Merry Christmas, everyone, and have a happy new year.  (FTR: This is something I stole from my own deviantART, I’m not plagiarizing shit, I’m just copypasting myself and adding edits if I see hiccups in the future.) 

[samclownchester]

Supernatural Rewatch 01x02

Wendigo

(Next Episode | Masterlist | Previous Episode)

(not spoiler free, I have watched up to 15x13 and this is directed to an audience that has seen that far as well)

So we all know Supernatural isn’t that good at being culturally aware: https://www.backstoryradio.org/blog/the-mythology-and-misrepresentation-of-the-windigo/

But ... anyway...

We start out with Sam at Jessica’s grave: “I should have protected you, I should have told you the truth” D’: I will cry for days.  Honestly though, what if he had? What if she had joined them on the quest to find John? I would watch that show. Addriane Palicki hunting monsters?? sign me the eff up!

Haha, now Dean says “after 20 years” either he’s rounding down or they forgot they changed it to 22 years. Who knows

Dean:“Since when are you all shoot first, ask questions later anyway?” Sam:“Since now.”

I’ve seen a lot of people analyzing the way Sam deals with grief, that it usually makes him fight harder instead of shut down, and you can see that here in the beginning. We can tell from the way Dean is acting that it would normally be Sam who would wait to gather more information, do this the smart way, but instead he doesn’t want to waste any time.

Hailey: “Our parents are gone. It’s just my two brothers and me. We all keep pretty close tabs on each other … I can’t sit around here anymore, so I hired a guide. I’m heading out in the morning and I’m gonna find Tommy myself.” Dean: “I think I know how you feel.”

Here we have our first filler episode parallel family. Tommy is the missing family member (John) Hailey is the protective older sibling who will stop at nothing to save their family (Dean) and Ben is the little brother who gets pulled into it (Sam).  Interesting that Dean’s parallel is a girl ... but I suppose that makes for optimum straight flirting. But I’m used to that being Sam’s (like in Halloween episode in season 14). hmmmm .... things to consider.

Aww hanging out in a bar … Oh hey Sam grabbed his laptop this time. No more library computer.

Also, look how deep Sam is getting into hunting research. He didn’t even want to look into it, he just wanted to go find their dad, but once he gets started he digs in deep.

The lighting is so DARk. My gosh.

Cue emotionally sensitive Sammy! Puppy dog eyes, moving in to sit at eye level with the vic, sincere.

“Why it left me alive … been asking myself that ever since.” Time for Sam to feel some parallel! Survivor’s guilt, first from his mom, now from Jess, not understanding why he’s the one who was left alive.

DEan let Sam use words. Corporeal isn’t even that fancy of a word.

“Her brother’s missing, Sam. She’s not just gonna sit this out.” O.O (unashamed parallels)

Dean like “what do you mean I didn’t pack provisions” with his giant bag of m&m’s lmao. Love him.

Wow, look at Sammy taking charge. <3 Once again, this whole episode is just showing how at home Sam is in a world of monsters. Even Dean, who is a very good hunter, didn’t put the clues together as quickly as Sam in this case.

DEAN “You wanna tell me what’s going on in the freaky head of yours?”

SAM “Dean--”

DEAN “No, you’re not fine. You’re like a powder keg, man. it’s not like you. I’m supposed to be the belligerent one, remember?”

This was honestly a really interesting choice on the writer’s part, to introduce one of the main characters in an emotional state when he is acting so unlike himself. We didn’t get to see much of Sammy pre-Jess’s death. So, we just know that he’s acting out of character based on Dean’s observations. Dean is the belligerent one, Dean usually shoots first and asks questions later. And the show does follow up with this, in later seasons I think we would all agree that Sam usually likes to ask questions, understand the situation, and Dean is much more headstrong and “belligerent.” But when Sam is grieving, he becomes different.

Dean: “Saving people, hunting things, the family business” (Hooray more memed lines!) Sam: “that makes no sense, why doesn’t he just call us? Why doesn’t he tell us what he wants, tell us where he is?” Dean: “I don’t know. But the way I see it, Dad’s given us a job to do, and I intend to do it.”

Ok, this is bringing up another subject – faith. One of Sam’s issues with John (and he has a lot) is that John expects them to follow him unquestioningly and Sam has a lot of questions. Dean had complete faith in his Dad, he didn’t need to know all the details to trust that he would lead them the right way (this is perfectly demonstrated in Sam and John’s argument later in the first season). But when it comes to God, Dean has no faith whatsoever. Sam, however, does have faith in God, for a long time (until the end of season 14 I think). He chooses to hope, to pray even when he doesn’t know if anyone is listening. This conversation does remind me of Chuck in some ways. He manipulates the boys into doing things, going places, but he never outright tells them what to do. I don’t know … this is making me wonder what a comprehensive study of Chuck vs John Winchester would bring up… but I don’t care enough to really do it. Just think about it.  

Dean: “All that anger, you can’t keep it burning over the long haul, it’s gonna kill you.”

Hey, 2005 Dean? Could you maybe come talk to 2020 Dean and give him some advice? A few pointers? Yeah, thanks, that’d be nice.

Oh no, the protective older siblings got taken! Now it’s up to the plucky little brothers to save the day!

Lmao the trail of m&m’s.

Solidifying the parallels at the end there, Sam shadowing little brother Ben, Hailey talking to older sibling Dean. They found their brother, the Winchesters will find their dad.

SAM’S GONNA DRIVE!?!?!? OH MY GOSH THAT HASN’T HAPPENED IN SO LONG THIS IS A FOREIGN IDEA.

[tiny-opal-essence]

Pocket Paladin Chpt 15

Mind-Meld Memories

“Alright everyone, seeing as we have one paladin too many for our usual mind-meld training, Pidge has designed a new version of it,”  Coran said.

‘Hear that?  You’re an extra, unnecessary paladin.’

Well, I’m still a paladin, so *pbbt*.

‘Sticking your tongue out at your own thoughts?  How mature.’

“Would you care to explain, Pidge?”

“Sure.  Basically, with this new software, we can train in different types of terrain and weather, all simulated by our minds.  While in the mind meld, we will feel everything, like temperature, wind, pain.  If something in the training would kill you in a real fight, you would just be knocked out of the mind meld until the end of the simulation.”

“Cool, but how is that going to help me?  I’m still going to be 3 inches tall in the simulator.”

“Actually, you won’t be.  You can think of yourself being back at your normal height while in the mind meld according to Pidge.”  Shiro commented.

“Wait, seriously?”

“That will let you be a bigger help during training.  *gasp* No pun intended.”  Allura put her hand in front of her mouth in shock.

“Don’t worry about it, Allura.  I know you didn’t mean it like that.”

‘Are you sure about that?’

“You said we would feel everything in the simulation.  If we get a cut during training, would that show up on our actual bodies?” Keith asked.

“No, it wouldn’t.  There shouldn’t even be any residual pain from it when you’re out of the mind meld.”  Pidge answered.

“Oh thank God.” Hunk said in relief.

“Any other questions?  No?  Let’s get started.”  Pidge said as everyone put on their helmets.

It was dark for a few seconds as the program booted up.  Once it did, Lance had to close his eyes from the bright light.  As his eyes adjusted to the light, he saw that things looked smaller.  That is, they looked normal.  The trees towering over him didn’t make him feel as small as before.  When he touched the trunk of the tree, he could feel how rough it was, as if he really were in a forest.  The scent of pine was heavy in the air.  The snow *crunched* under his feet and he could see his breath.

He continued to look around and saw the rest of his teammates pop into existence in the simulation.  They were the same height as him.

“Oh my gosh, Pidge, you were right!  I’m normal size!  Thank you, thank you, thank you!”  Lance ran over and hugged the now shortest paladin.

“Yeah, yeah.  Glad you’re enjoying it, Lance.”  She responded with a grin.

No one noticed the soft, fond smile on Keith’s face when he saw how happy Lance was.

Lance let go of Pidge and was immediately grabbed in a hug by Hunk.

“Oh, I’ve missed being able to do this.”

“Same here, big guy.”  Lance hugged him back.

It’s nice to get an actual hug.  Nothing against the “hand hugs”, but they don’t compare to the real thing.  Plus with an actual hug, they’re not worried about hurting me.  Speaking of hurting me…

“Hunk, I can’t breathe.”

“Sorry, Lance!”  Hunk exclaimed as he quickly let go.  

“Hey, it’s fine.  Never apologize for how strong of hugs you give!”

“This simulation is incredible,” Shiro said as he looked around.

“You can actually feel how cold the snow is,” Allura added on while sticking her hand in a snowbank.

“It must have taken a long time to design all this,” Keith commented.

“It did, but it’s worth it, right?”  Pidge asked smugly.

“Paladins, can you hear me?” Coran’s voice sounded in the comms.

“Loud and clear, Coran,” Shiro responded.

“Wait, Coran, are you in the simulation too?”  Lance asked.

I didn’t see him put on a helmet.

“No, I just get to control the simulation and see what the 6 of you are seeing,”  Coran answered.

“This isn’t going to be like when you were the loremaster during Monsters and Mana, is it?”

“I promise I won’t be as devious or mad with power.”

“Monsters and Mana?” Keith asked.

“Oh, it’s this cool game we played while you were with the Blade.  You get to create a fantasy character and go on a quest.  The loremaster lets you know how difficult each task is and you roll a die to see if you accomplish it or not.”  Lance explained.

“Sounds…complicated.”

“It’s not once you get used to it.  It’s a lot of fun.  We should play it sometime.”

“You wouldn’t even need a hologram of your character, you could be the game piece yourself while you’re like this.”

“You’re right Pidge!  *gasp* It would be just like when they played giant wizards chess in the first Harry Potter movie!  That would be so cool!”

“Didn’t Ron almost die during that?”  Keith asked, concerned about Lance.

“Yeah, but Monsters and Mana is a hologram.  Lance wouldn’t have anything to worry about.”  Pidge answered.

“Wait, you’ve seen Harry Potter, but you’ve never heard of Guardians of the Galaxy?”

“Yeah?  What of it?”

“Nothing.”

You’re a hard guy to figure out, Keith.

“Alright.  Is everyone adjusted to the simulation?”

“Yes.” The paladins chorused.

“Good.  Now, your first mission in the simulator is going to be a simple rescue, just to test the programming.  Prince Apollonia has been taken by the Morris Day 6.  You need to figure out where they took him and free him.”  Coran declared.

“Shouldn’t we be practicing fighting Lotor?” Shiro asked.

“Yes, but I need to get more data on how his team works to get an accurate model of them in the simulator,”  Pidge explained.  “Once I do get that, we’ll be able to train to fight them.  For now, we make do with generic villains.”

“We should start looking for clues as to where the Prince may have been taken.” Allura declared.

“How about a couple sets of footprints heading that way?” Lance pointed in the direction the tracks in the snow went.

“Good eye, Lance,” Keith said.

“Guess you guys can call me ‘Eagle Eye Lance’ from now on.”  Lance did his finger-gun thing.

“Nope.  Not doing that.”  Shiro stated.

“Let’s see where these go.” Hunk said as the group started following the tracks.

It was silent on their walk save for the *crunch* of the snow.  They soon arrived at the edge of a clearing.  In the center of it was a tent.  There were 5 girls standing guard of it.

“Coran, I thought you said they were the Morris Day 6.  There’s only 5.”

“Lance, use the heat vision on your scope,”  Allura recommended.

“But I don’t have my bayard, remember?  It wasn’t affected by the spell.”

“Well, here in the simulation, you have your bayard.  You’re the only one that has heat vision, so can you please use it so we can see if Prince Apollonia is in the tent?”  Pidge stressed the please.

“Ok, ok.”

Touchy.  Alright, how do I get this to activate again?

“What are you waiting for Lance?” Pidge asked.

“Give me a sec.  It’s been a while since I’ve used this.”

The bayard turned into a gun in his hands.

Ok, good.  Now how does heat vision work on this thing?  Oh yeah!

Lance looked through the scope.  “I see two people in the tent.  It looks like one of them is walking around the other one.  The other one’s just sitting there.”

“That’s more than likely Prince Apollonia,” Shiro commented.

“And the one circling him must be the 6th member of the Morris Day 6,” Allura added on.

“Only question is, how do we get him out of there?” Keith wondered out loud.

“Maybe we could do a distraction.  Divide their forces.  It would make it easier to get close.”  Lance suggested.

“Sounds like you just volunteered,”  Pidge smirked.

“I did not!”

“Mmm, you kind of did, Lance.” Hunk also smirked at Lance.

“Hey, we don’t gang up on teammates,”  Shiro said.

“But he makes it so easy.” Pidge teased.

“Just for that, you two get to go with him.”

“But-“

“No buts.”

Pidge and Hunk both *groaned* out loud.  

‘They don’t want to work with you.  Working with you is a punishment.’

Lance tried to not focus on those thoughts as the garrison trio walked around to the other side of the clearing.  They let the others know when they were in position.

“Everyone ready?”

“Initiate operation lost in the woods.” Hunk said.

“~OH NO, I AM A SMALL CHILD WHO HAS BECOME HELPLESSLY LOST IN THE WOODS.  WOE IS ME.~”  Pidge yelled out towards the Morris Day 6.  “I still don’t get why I have to be the child lost in the woods.  Lance’s voice carries more.”

“Yeah, but you look more like a small child.”  Hunk said.

“I resent that!”  Pidge hissed out.

“What Hunk’s trying to say is that they won’t expect anything from you-”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Pidge had a bite in her tone.

“-so you can kick their butts and prove them wrong at the same time.” Lance finished saying.

“Didn’t like where that sounded like it was going, but I like where it wound up,”  Pidge commented.

“You have to yell again, Pidge.  They’re not moving from their position yet.”  Allura said over the comms.

“Uggh, fine.  ~THIS IS THE QUICKEST WAY TO THE MARKET.  MOTHER SAID THAT I SHOULDN’T TAKE THE SHORTCUT THROUGH THE WOODS WHILE CARRYING SUCH PRECIOUS CARGO, BUT I AM SO TIRED OF CARRYING ALL OF THIS GOLD.  AND NOW I AM LOST.  WHAT IS A GIRL TO DO?  BUT LOOK!  THERE’S A CLEARING UP AHEAD.  PERHAPS I WILL FIND SOMEONE WHO CAN HELP ME.  I CERTAINLY HOPE THERE AREN’T ANY THEIVES OR RUFFIANS THERE.  I HAVE NO WAY OF DEFENDING MYSELF~.”

“It’s working Pidge!  We’ve got 3 of them coming our way.”  Lance focused the scope on the approaching targets.  The 3 members of the Morris Day 6 got closer.

“Hello, little one.  You look lost.” One of the three knelt in front of Pidge while the other two remained upright.

“Oh, I’m not lost.” Pidge had a smirk on her face.  “Now!”

Hunk and Lance jumped down from their respective trees onto the two standing kidnappers.  Pidge took the last one down with an uppercut from her bayard.

“Alright!  We took care of three of them.  Let’s get the other ones.”

“Wait, I’ve got an idea,” Lance said as they looked at the unconscious members of the Morris Day 6.  “Sweater swap!”

“Is now really the time to be thinking about that, Lance?” Pidge asked.

“No, that’s not what I’m saying.  More along the lines of ‘Disguise mothertrucker!’, like that old vine.”

“Isn’t it ‘Disguise Motherfucker!’?”

“*gasp* Pidge, you can’t use language like that in front of a child!  Shiro’s only 6, you know how impressionable children are at that age!” Hunk said with mock offense.

“Really?  We’re bringing up me being a leap year baby again?”  

“Can we focus back on the mission?  What were you thinking, Lance?” Allura said through the comms.

“Me and Hunk can put on these guys’ cloaks and sneak up on the other two standing guard outside the tent and take them down.”

“What about me?” Pidge asked.  “Don’t I get to be a part of the sweater swap?”

“It would look suspicious if one of the three shrunk.” Hunk said.

“It would look suspicious if only two of the three returned.”

“She has a point,” Keith commented.

“Yeah, that would be more suspicious I guess.” Lance agreed.

“Let’s grab their weapons.”

The three of them quickly tied up the unconscious kidnappers and took their cloaks and weapons.  They then quickly made their way to the tent.

“Where is the gold that child was yelling about?”  One of the two guards asked.

“What gold?  Oh, yeah, it turns out, there wasn’t any gold.” Hunk nervously said.

The guards looked at each other.

“What he’s trying to say is that it was a trap.  Some common thieves in the area looking to make a quick buck.  But we showed them.”  Lance quickly said.

“And what did you do with your adversaries?”  The guard on the left asked.

“We left them tied up to a tree.  They’ll know better than to cross the Morris Day 6 again.”  Pidge answered.

“Interesting.”  The guard on the right said.

“You sound different since you came back.”  The left guard added on.

“Oh, you know, we’re just a bit out of breath, that’s all,” Hunk responded.

“Really?  Your voice just dropped a whole octave because of adrenaline?  Is that what you’re saying?”  The right guard said.

“Yes, that’s exactly what he’s saying.”

The guards pointed their weapons at the three of them.

“You are not our teammates.  Everyone knows the Morris Day 6 is an all-female group.”  The left guard said.

“You kept referring to yourselves as male, proving beyond doubt that you are imposters.”  The right guard added.

“Oh no, how could these two have tricked me?  In all the chaos, I must have mistaken them for who they claimed to be.”  Pidge tried to lie her way out of the situation.

“You are an imposter too.  Did you think we would not recognize the voice of the one who called out?”

“Oh quiznak.” All 6 of the Paladins said in unison.  They could also hear Shiro face-palm through the comms.

The two guards began to fire at the three standing in front of them.

“We’re on our way,” Keith said as the rest of the group ran to support their other members in the field.

Lance, Hunk, and Pidge managed to avoid being shot and were able to take the left guard down.

“Leader, we have a situation!” the right guard yelled before firing once more at Lance.

Lance wasn’t able to get his shield up in time and braced himself to get hit all the while thinking-

Oh please don’t let me get hit by another weird space thing.

And he wasn’t.

“Lance?  Where are you?” Hunk looked around but didn’t see his friend.

“Did Lance get hit, Coran?” Pidge took down the right guard.

“No, he’s still there with you.”

“Down here!”

The others had joined the group at that time and looked down.

“I guess I thought myself small so I wouldn’t get hit,” Lance said.

The others started to approach but stopped when the remaining member of the Morris Day 6 emerged from the tent, holding Prince Apollonia in front of her as a human, err, alien shield.  She was holding a ray gun to his head.

“You take one step closer, and Princey here is finished.” She said as she started moving towards the group.

Lance was still slightly dizzy from suddenly changing height.  He was also on the ground in the space between his team and the leader of the Morris Day 6, who was unaware of his presence.

Keith was torn.  They had a mission to do, but if they moved, the leader would kill the Prince.  But the leader kept getting closer to Lance, and they couldn’t warn him to get out of the way without alerting her to his presence.  If he tried to attack her, she could kill the target and the ensuing fight could kill Lance.  Even though it was a simulator, Keith didn’t want Lance to feel what it was like to die.  Even if it wasn’t permanent.

Finish the mission, or protect Lance?  Mission?  Lance?  Mission?  Lance?  Why is Lance in my thoughts so much?  There has to be a way I can protect Lance without jeopardizing the mission.

Keith didn’t have to worry about that choice in the end.  The leader was suddenly flipped onto her back as she let go of the Prince.  Standing in front of her was Lance at his normal height with his right fist raised to the sky.

“And boom goes the dynamite!” Lance said.

“How did you…?” Allura started to ask.

“Oh, I just thought myself big again.  And it was so cool!”

“Yeah, and we saved the Prince.”

“I thank thee all for thy bravery and courage.  Now, I must returneth home to Lake Minnetonka along First Avenue.  I pray that we meeteth again on a better occasion.”  Prince Appolonia spoke before disappearing.

“Woohoo!  We won the simulator.”  Lance yelled out.

A red X suddenly appeared over everyone’s head.  

“What does that mean, Pidge?” Keith asked as he poked at the one over his head.

“That means we failed the simulator.”

“But we saved the Prince,”  Allura questioned.

“You did, yes, but Lance cheated,”  Coran said through the comms.

“How did I cheat?”

“By changing your height at will.”

“But the first time wasn’t intentional.”

“But the second time was.” Coran pointed out.  “While in the simulator, you need to act as you would in real life, not depend on the unique things that you can do while in it.”

“I would say that I used my resources wisely.”

“Wait, if Lance can choose his height at will in the simulator, does that mean we could too?” Hunk asked.

“I don’t see why that would be important,” Shiro said.  “Lance’s cheating means we lost.  We shouldn’t cheat the system.”

“Yeah, but if we can change our heights too, we could see from his perspective.”

“So, we could see what it’s like to be tiny?”  Keith asked curiously.

“Yes, exactly, Keith!” Hunk said excitedly.  “You guys can’t say you haven’t honestly thought about what the world looks like for him while he’s like this, right?”

“It’s crossed my mind a little bit,” Shiro responded honestly.

“I already have a bit of an idea what it’s like thanks to my link with the space mice, but it would be interesting to know more,”  Allura commented.

“I’m curious,” Pidge said.

“Me too.” Keith agreed.

“Well, if we all think ourselves tiny, we could see how Lance sees the world!”

“Maybe before we do that we could get Coran to change the scenery, to somewhere more familiar?” Lance suggested.  “It might help everyone be more comfortable.”

“Just a tic.”

Their surroundings fizzled out, leaving them in a black void.  Soon enough, they found themselves in the living room area of the Castleship.

“Does this work?”

“Yep.  Thanks, Coran.” Lance responded.

“So…how do we do this?” Hunk asked.

“I don’t know.  I was just thinking about not wanting to get hit by the guns.  Maybe think small thoughts?”

“Better than nothing,” Pidge said as she and the others all closed their eyes to concentrate.  

Lance soon saw his friends begin to shrink before his eyes.

“It’s working!  Keep going, guys.”

Smaller and smaller they became as they thought small thoughts.  Lance continued to stare down at them as they stopped.  They opened their eyes and shook away the blurriness of their vision.  As they looked up at Lance, they all back-pedaled, unprepared for how intimidating he looked.

Is that what I looked like that first morning when I almost… Keith thought.

“Oh my God,” Pidge said.

“Yeah, that’s intense.” Hunk commented.

“Oh, sorry.  Didn’t think about what I would look like from that perspective.”  Lance gently kneeled on the ground in front of them, though the ground still shook slightly.  “Is this better?”

The others nodded their heads.

“Is this what it felt like when you first shrunk?” Allura asked.

“That depends.  How are you guys feeling?”

“Intimidated,” Allura answered.

“Scared,” Keith said.

“Freaking out,” Hunk added.

“Nervous, but curious,” Pidge responded.

“Overwhelmed,” Shiro stated.

“Then you’re all definitely feeling what I did.  Don’t know if that’s good or not, but we all understand the situation.  Do you guys have any questions?”

“How do you handle all of those feelings?” Keith asked.

“I just try to focus on the happy thoughts and how nice it’s going to be to be back to normal.”

“Would you be willing to pick me up?  I want to know what it feels like.” Pidge asked.

“Um, sure,”  Lance said as he brought his hand down flat in front of the rest of the team.

“Is that what it looks like when we get ready to pick you up?” Hunk said with a hint of nervousness.

“Yeah…”

“Cause that’s kind of terrifying.”

“I’ve gotten used to it.” Lance shrugged.

Pidge hesitatingly climbed on his hand while Lance struggled not to twitch too much.

“Ok, I totally get what you were saying before, Keith.  It does feel kind of weird having someone climb on your hand.” Lance commented.

“Weird from my end too,” Pidge added.  

“Any other takers?”

“Sure.” Hunk said as he approached the hand.

“I’m in,” Keith responded.

“Me too,”  Allura said.

“Same here,” Shiro said.

Lance brought his other hand down as well so everyone could fit on them comfortably.

“You guys sure are a handful.”  He joked as he started slowly lifting them up to the counter.

“Good one, Lance!”  Hunk responded with only a hint of nervousness while the others *groaned* at the pun.  Hunk then decided to look down as the group was carried up.  “Ok, looking down was a mistake.” He said as he scooted back towards the middle of Lance’s hands.

“Yeah, it can be a bit overwhelming the first few times,” Lance commented.

“A bit?!” Hunk looked up at Lance.

“You didn’t think I got used to it just like that, right?” Lance responded.

He was extra careful as he placed his hands down on the surface.  He stayed kneeling while everyone stepped off.  He noticed that they were shaking slightly.

“My legs feel like Jell-O,” Pidge said.

“I feel like I just stepped off a rollercoaster,” Keith added.

“Really?  ‘Cause I was going a lot slower than when I pick up the space mice.  *gasp* Does this mean they feel like that whenever we pick them up?”  Lance worried out loud.

“No, if there was anything any of us were doing that affected the space mice like this, they would have told me,”  Allura answered.

“I think it’s just because we’re just not used to being this height,”  Shiro added on.

“Just give us a minute to get our counter, err, table legs, no, umm…” Keith’s face scrunched up in thought.  “Our land legs back.”

Keith looks cute like this.  I wonder if he thinks I look cute at 3 inches tall?

‘You already know the answer to that.  No.’

Yeah, I know he’s straight.  All the girls just flocked around him at the garrison.  And he never dated any of them, which just made them want him more.

‘Remember Gretchen Smith?  And how she only went out with you to try to make Keith jealous?  How she never actually liked you?’

Yeah, I remember how she was a total Beotch.

‘But you still felt like Keith took something from you, causing you to make up this rivalry, to try to prove you actually are worth something.  But you were never good enough on your own.  Even before you were shrunk you always needed help.’

Shut up!  I’m over Gretchen, and I’m over the rivalry.  Me and Keith are friends.  I wish we were more, but I know he’s straight.  There’s no way he would ever go out with me.  That’s never going to happen!

“Lance, are you ok?” Lance realized Keith was looking right at him.

“Hmm?  Oh, yeah, I’m good.  Just lost in thought.”

Hopefully I wasn’t doing a face journey.

“You guys find your land legs?”

They all nodded.

“Yeah, but I think I’m ready to be back to normal height,” Pidge commented.

The others voiced their agreement and thought themselves back to normal.  As soon as Hunk was back to normal height, he wrapped Lance in a hug.

“I’m so sorry if we’ve ever been too rough with you while you’re shrunk.”

“It’s ok, Hunk.  Once everyone got the hang of things it’s been fine.”

“We’re all going to try and be more gentle with you while you’re like this,” Shiro said.

“I agree.  Now, thanks to the simulator, we have a better grasp of what this situation is like for you.” Allura added on.

“Thanks guys, but you’re doing great already.  You don’t have to change anything, please.” Lance really wanted his friends to stop worrying about him.

“Alright, Paladins.  I’m going to bring you out of the mind meld now.” Coran stated.

Everyone closed their eyes for a few seconds and opened them back up to reality.  They blinked as their eyes adjusted.

Lance wished he could have stayed in the mind meld a little longer.  It was nice being back to his normal height, even if it was only a simulation.

Now back to reality with tiny Lance.  Wahoo.  Can’t you just feel the excitement?  At least my floating tray’s fixed now.

He managed to hide how he was feeling from the others.

“Who’s ready for lunch?”  Hunk asked.  “I made more pastelitos for the team per Lance’s request.”

“Yes!  Thank you, Hunk!”

Winner winner pastelito dinner!

“Lunch sounds good,”  Shiro said.

“We can continue to work with the simulator afterwards,”  Allura stated.

“I’ll meet you guys in the kitchen in a bit,”  Pidge called over her shoulder as she walked towards the console.  “I’ve got some updates for the simulator.”

“This is the first time we’ve used it and it worked fine.  How can you already have updates?” Keith asked.

“Just because something works doesn’t mean it can’t be improved.”

“Alright, Shuri.”  Hunk teased.

“That counts as your final guess, Hunk.”

“No, it doesn’t.  Come on Pidge.  It’s the last day of the bet.  Let me have another chance to guess your real name, please?”

“Fine.  One last chance after lunch.  Then we’ll see who’s 20 GAC richer.”

“Deal.”

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

“It looks like the rain’s stopped,” Axha said as she looked up to the sky.

“I bet Kova’s glad it was only a small shower and not a downpour.” Ezor looked over at Kova who did not look happy to be in the rain, no matter how light it was.

Narti was petting Kova to calm him down while he perched on her shoulder.  A drop of rain fell from the thick foliage and landed right on Kova’s head, causing him to *hiss* and dig his claws into Narti’s armor.  She got an amused look on her face at this.

“How much longer do you think Lotor’s going to be?” Zethrid asked as she tried to help Kova calm down.

“He’s relaying the message to our allies on the neighboring planet.  There’s a lot of details to get down for the plan to work.  It could be a while.”  Axha answered.

“What even is the plan anyways?  Lotor hasn’t really told us much.  Maybe like 12% of the plan.” Zethrid wondered.

Narti shrugged making sure that Kova didn’t fall off her shoulder.

“The more people that know about a plan, the more likely things are to go wrong.  I’m sure he’ll tell us more when he can.” Axha said with blind trust.

“I stopped trying to figure out Lotor’s plans a long time ago.  All I heard was that we got the rest of the quintant to relax and that’s exactly what I plan to do now that there’s a break in the rain.” Ezor commented.

They continued walking through the forest until they found themselves on a ledge overlooking a lake.

“Do you think it’s safe to swim in?” Ezor asked as she looked down.

“One way to find out!” Zethrid quickly ran up behind Ezor and lifted her into a princess carry.

“Zethi, what are you doing?” Ezor laughed as Zethrid ran closer to the end of the ledge.  “Babe, stop, no, no, no!  Wooooh!” Ezor continued to laugh as she clung tighter to Zethrid as she lept off the ledge and down into the lake below.

Narti and Axha looked over the edge and saw Zethrid and Ezor resurface in a fit of giggles.

“Come on you two!  The water’s great!” Ezor called up.

Axha and Narti both took a step back from the edge.

“Do you want to go first, Narti?”

Narti pointed at Kova who was just not having it.

“Come on, Axha.”

“Yeah, stop being such a stick in the mud!”  Ezor and Zethrid continued to taunt from below.

“See you down there, Narti.”

Narti and Kova both nodded in response to Axha before starting down a path to the shoreline below.

Axha stepped onto the edge and took a deep breath.  She dove off the ledge and did a nearly perfect swan dive.

“Nice, Axha!” Ezor commented when she resurfaced.

“Show off.”

Axha splashed some water in Zethrid’s face in good fun.

“Oh, it’s on!”

By the time Narti and Kova found their way down to the shore, it was a full-on splash war.  Narti managed to find a relatively dry patch of the forest floor for Kova to lay in before joining the others.  It had been a while since they had had an opportunity to relax and they planned to enjoy it as long as possible.  

Half a varga later, they were all floating aimlessly in the lake.

“It’s too bad we weren’t able to grab him before his team found him,”  Zethrid commented.

“Yeah, there was no way he could get out of that box on his own.  It would have been perfect if we’d just been a little closer.”  Ezor added on.  “Now they’re going to be more protective of him.  That just made our job that much harder.”

Narti nodded her head in agreement while Kova *meowed* back on the shore.  

“They’re still going to take him with them on the lower risk missions though.  Maybe we could do something with that?”  Zethrid suggested.

“That’s what the setup on the last planet is for.  We’re going to give them a reason not to take him with them on any missions.”  Axha explained.  “That way, we can take him from the ship while the rest of their team is outside of it on the low-risk mission without having to worry about deactivating the ship’s particle barrier.”

“Why does Lotor always tell you more than the rest of us?” Zethrid asked.

Axha shrugged her shoulders.  “I’ve been working with him longer than the rest of you.”

“True,”  Ezor responded.

“Maybe we should head back to the ship.  It’s almost lunchtime.” Zethrid suggested.

“Yeah, my fingers are starting to get wrinkly,” Ezor added.

The group headed back towards the shore.  Narti shielded Kova from Zethrid as she shook herself dry.

“Uggh.  I hate how humid it is on this planet.  It makes my fur go all poofy.”

“Aww, but I love your poofiness, babe,” Ezor commented.

“How am I supposed to be intimidating when I look like a walking ball of fluff?  The other planet was nicer.  All that warmth and not nearly as much humidity as here.”

“Yeah, but at least it rains here,” Ezor responded.

Kova *hissed* at being reminded of the rain.

“I think Kova agrees with me that the other planet was better.  What about you guys?”

“I like this planet better.  You can’t exactly go swimming with that tall grass everywhere on the other one.” Ezor said.

“I like this one too.  There’s more cover with the forest here.” Axha voiced her thoughts.

“What about you, Narti?” Zethrid asked.

Narti shrugged her shoulders.

“Oh come on, Narti.  You can’t leave it at a tie.  You have to pick a side!”

Natri shook her head with an amused look on her face.

“You can always ask Lotor, babe.”

“I could, but he’d probably say something about how it doesn’t matter which planet we like better since the most important one for the plan is the next one.”

“One way to find out.”  

“We can wait for him back on the ship.  It looks like another storm’s coming.” Axha observed as Narti picked up Kova and let him hide from the rain in her hood.

“Let’s see if we can beat it, for Kova’s sake,” Ezor said.

Kova *chirped* in appreciation.

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

The paladins were on their way back to the training deck after lunch.  The pastelitos had been delicious, but what else would you expect from Hunk?  Lance noticed that the others were walking slower than normal.

Maybe it’s because of a food coma.  I know I go slower when I’ve eaten a lot.

‘But they did ask if you needed them to walk slower so you could keep up with them on the floating tray.’

Yeah, and I told them no.  They’re just walking slowly cause they ate a lot, right?

Lance thought back on some other things that had happened during lunch.

Hunk had offered to lower the height the floating tray floated at if it was too high.  Lance appreciated the gesture but told him he’s fine with it where it is.  Hunk had said that if Lance ever changed his mind, he would help.  It seemed that after everyone got to see the world from Lance’s current perspective they had become more protective than they had become after he had almost suffocated in the jewelry box.

The rest of the team had gently encouraged Lance to stand further back from the edge of the table during Lunch.  This, even though to him it was like 5 ft. to the edge of the table.  He wasn’t about to fall off the edge.  He figured having to stand a little bit further from the edge really wasn’t that big of a deal, but they kept giving him worried glances and trying to act like they weren’t.  They were acting like helicopter parents.

He knows they care, and he’s glad they do, but there’s a point where it becomes overbearing.  He needs room to breathe and he just wants them to realize that he can handle himself while he’s like this.  But he doesn’t say anything.  Given enough time, things will go back to normal.  Everyone else will realize they’re worrying over nothing and pretty soon Allura will fix him and they can all just forget this ever happened.  It’s really not a bid deal, even if his thoughts keep circling back, planting seeds of doubt in his head.  He tries to ignore those thoughts as the group enters the training deck.

“Alright, Hunk.  This is your last chance to guess my real name.  Get it right, I give you 20 GAC.  Get it wrong, you give me 20 GAC.  What is my name?” Pidge asked, certain that Hunk wouldn’t be able to guess it.

“Ok, I thought about it all through lunch, and I think I’ve got it.  Katherine.”

“Is that your final answer?”

“Yes…no…uh…yes.  Final answer.”

“That is not my name.  Pay up, Hunk.”

“Aww.  What is your real name then?”

“I’m not telling you.”

“But you have to.”

“I never said I would tell you my real name if you lost.”

“Well, then how do I know you’re telling the truth?”

“Would I ever lie to you, Hunk?”

“Yes.  Yes, you would.”

“She’s telling the truth,” Lance said.

“Wait, you knew?  And you didn’t tell me?  Lance, you’re my best friend, how could you not tell me?!” Hunk dramatically responded.

“That would be cheating, Hunk,” Lance answered with a teasing smile on his face.

“We can go double or nothing if you want to try again, Hunk,” Pidge suggested with a smirk.

“Nope.  Trying to guess it was way more stressful than it should have been.”

“*hem-hem*” Allura cleared her throat.  “Perhaps we should be refocusing our efforts on training?”

Everyone agreed.

“Is there anything else the simulator can do?”  Lance asked.

“There’s a lot that it can do.” Pidge began explaining.  “One thing it can do is shift through someone’s memories and create scenarios based on previous situations they’ve been in.”

“Wait, it can look through our memories?” Shiro asked.

Pidge nodded.

“Would it be able to help me fill in the gaps in my memory?”

“It could help, but I don’t know if it could fill in every gap.”

“Maybe it could help you figure out the rest of the project name you’ve been trying to remember, Shiro.”  

“An excellent idea, Keith!” Coran exclaimed.

“That could give us the edge on Lotor,” Allura commented.

“Me and Coran can get that set up right now.” Pidge and Coran went over to the console.

Lance noticed a flicker of hesitation in Shiro’s eyes.

“Do you want to do this now?” Lance asked Shiro.

Shiro thought for a moment before responding determinedly, “I want to know what they did to me.”

“Is there anything the rest of us can do to help?” Lance asked.

“We could all go with Shiro through his memories as moral support.  If that’s ok with you, Shiro.”  Pidge responded.

“That might help, but I should be the one asking if you’d be ok with it.  There’s a lot of blank spots from both times I was a prisoner, and what I can remember is…not good.  They forced all of us prisoners to fight creatures we had no hope of beating.”

“Like Myzax.” Keith commented softly.

“Exactly like Myzax.  They would also force prisoners to fight each other in horrible situations where the only way out was death.  Yours or someone else’s.  It didn’t matter to them.  They wanted blood and a show.  They had us fight each other to discourage us from befriending the others and rebelling, I’m sure of it.  We never knew if we could trust anyone we were with.  All you could do is hope you wouldn’t be the one chosen to fight that day.  I can’t even remember how many I fought.”   Shiro’s voice cracked as he tried to keep his composure.

“We won’t let you face it on your own.”  Allura reached for Shiro’s hand.  “We’re a team.”  She squeezed his hand comfortingly.

“We win together,” Keith said.

“We lose together.” Pidge continued.

“We fall together,” Hunk added.

“We rise together.” Lance finished.

“I’ll get everything set up,” Coran stated.

“Are you guys sure you want to do this?  What you see might change how you see me.” Shiro was still giving them an out if they wanted to use it.

“Shiro, you’re our friend.  Also our Space-dad.” Lance received one of Shiro’s signature Space-dad glares at the comment.

“There’s nothing in your memory that would ever change what we think of you,” Allura assured him.

“Alright everyone, grab your helmets and we can get started,” Coran said.

Everyone got back in the positions they had been in earlier that day.

“If things get too intense for you Shiro, please let us know,” Coran stressed.  “I can bring you out of the mind meld splickety lit.”

“Thanks, Coran.” Shiro smiled slightly upon hearing Coran mix up the phrase.

Once more they found themselves in the mind-meld.  Lance was glad that he was the same height as the others again.  It was nice, even if it was only temporary.  All they could see was darkness.  

“Ok, so how does this work?”  Shiro asked out loud.

“Just think about something and the system should do the rest,” Coran answered from outside the mind-meld.

Suddenly there was a burst of bright colors and overlapping sounds.  No one could make out any of it.

“Try focusing on a specific memory.  You’re overloading the system!” Coran commented.

“Let’s start with something simple.  Maybe something that all of us were present for?”  Allura suggested.

The colors came more into focus and the sound became less muddled.  The team saw images of themselves from months ago.

{So what’s the plan?  We go in there and just *pow pow pow* and free the prisoners?}

{What was that noise?}

{Lazer guns.}

“I remember this!  This is from when we went to save Hunk’s girlfriend!” Pidge teased.

“She’s not my girlfriend.  At least, not yet, I mean, if she wants to be.  I don’t have the guts to ask.  What if she says no?”

“Come on, Hunk.  You’re a catch!  You just have to tell her how you feel.”

“You’re one to talk, Lance.”

“Hey, we’re talking about your love life, not mine.”

“Maybe we should get back to helping Shiro?” Keith interjected.

{Okay, enough with the bad sound effects.  Besides, it’s more like *blam blam blam*}

“Alright Shiro.  Try to focus on your time with the Galra.”  Allura said.

Shiro took a deep breath before everyone was surrounded by darkness once more.  Images began to fly by, faster than any of them could make out.  All they could tell was that there was a purple tint to them.  The sound of weapons clashing and people screaming filled their ears.  The images slowed down and started to go like a slide show, pausing for just enough time for everyone to see and hear.  An old man holding a sword standing next to Shiro.  The man dead on the floor, sword at his side.  The crowd chanting “Champion!”

Shiro tried to shake the memory away, not wanting to think about that moment.  He tried to focus on the memory of the project name, but his thoughts started spiraling out of control, getting louder and louder.

“Think of your happy place!” Lance yelled over the noise as everyone grabbed hands in a circle to try to ground Shiro.

They were suddenly in a new memory.

{I'm going to be a paladin again.}

{Oh, come on now. Do you really want to play a paladin? You could be something completely different: a maven, a mage, a cleric, a klazgool, a bard.}  

{Don't know what's more fulfilling than a paladin.}  

{You're already a paladin in real life!}

“Your happy place is playing Monsters and Mana?”  Pidge asked.

“More the part with being a paladin,” Shiro admitted sheepishly.

“Are you ok, Shiro?” Lance questioned between Keith and Hunk.

“Do you need me to bring you out of the mind-meld?” Coran asked.

“No, I’m good.  Just…forgot how intense some of my memories are.  I’ll be ok.  We need to figure out the name of the project.”

“Yes, but we do not wish to do that at your expense,”  Allura stressed beside Shiro.

“If you need time to catch your breath, we can wait,” Keith added from the other side of Shiro.

“We might be able to, but the universe can’t,”  Shiro stated.  “Every tic we wait is one more tic the Galra Empire has to destroy worlds.  The fate of the universe is in our hands.  I can get through this.  For the universe.”

“For the universe.” The others echoed.

Bright lights started flickering in the mind meld as Shiro tried to focus on the memory.  Then a memory of him being trapped with purple water starting to pour into the space.  Next, he was on a lab table with Haggar cackling in the background.  Then darkness.  It stayed that way for a while.

“Is something supposed to be happening now?” Hunk whispered to Pidge.

“Shhh!” Pidge and the rest of the group said in unison.

“This is a memory, just one that I wasn’t entirely aware during,” Shiro stated.

Everyone quieted down once more.  They heard a muddled *thump, thump, thump* getting closer.  Footsteps.  Heavy ones.  Probably guards.  The sound became less muddled as the guards seemed to stop in front of Shiro in his memory, though it still sounded like they were underwater.

{How long do you think this one’s going to last?}  *Glass tapping noise*

{Given what happened to the last one, I give it a movement, maybe less.}

Both of the guards laughed at the second one’s comment.

{And then we get to start over with the next one.}

Everyone tried to ignore the happy *sigh* the first guard let out.

{The witch’s project is ambitious, though the name is a bit obvious, I mean Project Kur-}

{Hey!  You’re not supposed to say the name in front of them!}

{They’re in stasis.  They can’t hear a word we’re saying.  Don’t let the witch get to you, newbie.}

{…It is a bit on the nose, though, right?  Project Kuron.}

{She could have thought of a better name for it, don’t cha think?}

Shiro suddenly let go of Allura and Keith’s hands and backed away from the circle.  His face was pale.

“You can bring us out now, Coran,” Allura said.

“Right-o.” It took Coran only a few moments to get everyone out of the mind-meld.

Just like before, they all had to blink to get their eyes used to the lights again.

Unlike before, Shiro was very much shaken.

“You know what that word means, don’t you, Shiro?” Allura spoke softly.

He nodded.

Everyone turned to him to hear what the mystery word meant and see why it had affected Shiro so much.

Shiro took a breath.

“Kuron means clone.”

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Realities without Lance: 122 (+2)

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[wardenari]

"Come and find me." for Ari?

OK, Maker this got away from me and turned into something super long. Sorry about that. Hope you like it:

"Come and find me. -A"

That's all the note from Ari said. Alistair had found it on his door when he awoke this morning. He'd been in a funk since the disastorous reunion with Goldanna the night before. He hadn't even joined the others for cards, preferring instead to hole up in his room and lick his wounds.

Alistair ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. He supposed she was going to try to get him to talk, but he really didn't want to talk. She just couldn't understand, he didn't even fully understand. Fergus may be missing, likely dead, but she at least had happy memories of her brother. They'd cared for each other and loved each other. Goldanna, she saw him as the reason for his misery. Just one more person to blame him for being born, something he'd had no control over. Something sometimes he'd wished hadn't happened.

Still, he knew if he didn't look for her, she'd come looking for him, likely with her temper for him ignoring her request. Since she'd only signed it "A", Alistair was unsure if it was a formal request as the lead Warden, or just a friendly ask as his best friend. When it came to her temper, always better to err on the side of caution.

He headed downstairs to the Gnawed Noble's main room. Looking around the only member from his party he found was Zevran. Alistair tensed a bit. It wasn't exactly that he didn't like Zevran. He just didn't like him with Ari. He knew men like Zevran, and worried that he was a heartache waiting to happen for Arianna. She'd already been through so much, that he couldn't help but want to protect her from more pain if he could. Alistair just didn't see anyway things didn't end in hurt between those two, intentional or not.

"Zev," Alistair nodded to the elf.

"Ah, Alistair," Zevran looked up from the book he read, no doubt something dirty. "Did you sleep well, my friend?"

Alistair shrugged, thankful at least that he wasn't bringing up Goldanna. Zevran had been there for that embarrassment. "Only mildly. Any chance you know where Ari is? She asked me to find her."

Zevran gave him a knowing grin. "I do not, but my lovely vixen did order me to present you with this should you ask."

He handed Alistair a folded piece of paper and a small bag.

"I do so love when she get's bossy," Zevran chuckled as Alistair blushed. He did not need those ideas in his head.

"Yeah, uh thanks," Alistair shuffled away. He opened the sack first, in it was a sweet roll. He sniffed it, cinnoman, his favorite. Alistair bit into the roll, feeling slightly, only slightly, lighter as the sweetness of the roll delighted his tastebuds. He opened the note.

"Did you really think I'd make it that easy for you? Come look for me someplace 'Wonder'ful - A"

Ok, so she it was 'friend' Ari sending him on this quest. That at least took some pressure off. Alistair tried to figure out where she could be. He looked on the back of the note, nothing there. The bag was empty. He read it again, surely there was a clue. He walked as he tried to figure out just what she meant. When he came upon the "Wonders of Thedas" shop he figured the clue out.

The Tranquil behind the front desk watched Alistair as he entered the store. Alistair searched around for the familiar bushy red hair but didn't see his fellow Warden anywhere.  He did, however, see Morrigan. Ugh.

"Morrigan," he nodded as he approached the witch.

"I do not see why you two think we should stop to play games when there is work to be done," Morrigan sighed as only she could and handed him a book and another note. "Be gone. Templars scare away the other mages."

Alistair was all too happy to get away from her. He exited and looked at the book. "Illustrated History of the Grey Wardens". Alistair smiled, but only a little. He put the book in his pack, finding he was feeling eager for when he had time to look through it. He opened the note.

"Sorry. I hope she wasn't too awful to you. I'm still 'Wading' around for you. -A"

Alistair rolled his eyes. Her puns were awful. At least this time he knew where to look, and headed off to Wade's Emporium. It was impossible to not notice Sten when he entered. The Qunari seemed to take up half the room as he looked over the weapons on display. The shopkeep looked more then a little uneasy at the giant in his store.

"Sten," Alistair hoped using his name might set the shopkeep at ease, upon seeing that he was friendly.

"Warden Alistair," Sten nodded. "I am considering a weapon, until we find mine."

Alistair looked over the swords and picked up a rather large one, one that even he struggled to hold up. "Try this," he grunted.

"You are Alistair," the shopkeep called.

"Er, yes," Alistair answered hesetently, well aware that they were still wanted posters around Thedas of them..

"I am Herrer," the man introduced himself. "Something was left here for you." He handed Alistair a rune and another note.

"What is the rune?" Alistair looked at the odd symbol on it.

"It is not one of ours, but it appears to be Master Cleansing if I'm not mistaken," Herrer answered.

"Uh, thanks," Alistiar waved goodbye to Sten and attached the rune to his sword. It lit up for a moment, embuing the weapon with extra skills against Darkspawn. That must have set her back a pretty silver, he thought as he placed the sword back in it's sheath.

"Look for Try to find Look I can't think of anything clever, just go to the Pearl. - A"

Alistair chuckled. Then blushed as he realized she meant for him to enter a brothel. Alone. Maker.

He entered the, well he was just going to pretend it was a regular tavern. There just happened to be a lot of barely dressed, good looking people in this particular tavern. Nothing out of the ordinary at all. Nope.

He looked around and spotted red hair. Trying not to look around because... Oh, that was definitely a breast... he knew he was blushing. He was going to kill her. He arrived at the table, and sighed with disappointment to find that it was Leliana and not Ari whose hair he had spotted. She was playing cards with a few others.

Leliana handed him a key without looking up. "Third door on the left, through there."

Andraste's ass, please tell me she didn't get me a whore. Alistair had never felt like running as much as he did at that moment. He walked in the direction he'd been told, his hands shaking. I'll just tell the nice woman thank you so much but no. I'm sure that's ok, she'll be paid anyway, right? He really didn't want this to be how his first time went.

He opened the door, ready to turn tail and run when he stopped in shock. What was before him was definitely not what he had expected. Ari sat at a table, reading something. On the table was a large plate filled with nearly every type of cheese imaginable. A carafe of wine beside it, and she took a sip from her glass.

"Ali!" she beamed up at him. "Come on in."

Alistair blinked a few times and then nodded, closing the door behind him as he took his chair. "Ari?"

"I wasn't sure which kind was your favorite so I panicked and got them all," she indicated the plate.

"I uh...Any cheese is fine really," he picked out a piece of Nevarran blu.

"So," he spoke around a bite, "what was with the having me running around town? Why not just bring the cheese to the tavern?"

Ari chuckled and shook her head, "Because that would have defeated the point."

"The point?" he thought back, but couldn't figure out what she meant.

"Since you got the note this morning, did you even once think about that bi... the unpleasantness from yesterday?" Ari raised an eyebrow.

Alistair's face broke into a wide grin as he realized she was right. "No. No I didn't."

"Well there you go. And now there's cheese and wine and we don't have to share it with anyone else," Ari laughed.

Alistair grinned and helped himself to the treats. He really was amazed at how something as awful as the Blight could bring him something as wonderful as a friend like Arianna Cousland.