#‘but they’re both bad options’ YEAH BUT MAYBE I LIKE HAVING HUMAN RIGHTS OK

[notebookpapers]

Finland if Harris loses I am coming for you

[cognitosclowns]

Genuinely thinking about getting tag teamed by Myc and Andre. Or Myc laying one of their tentacles on readers head, and reader just grabs it and starts playing with it, completely unaware that it’s actually an erroneous zone. They’re just messing with it and Myc is going through a very interesting time.

EEEHEHEHE >:) <3333 ok this is an old ask but the idea of getting Tag Teamed by Myc and Andre is WRACKING my brain rn. so. IM GONNA RUN W/ THAT <3333 TYSM TYSM TYSM-

NSFT!!! minors go away!! Possible tw for Drugs (Myc and his Weird Psychoactive Gunk)

GRGRKGKRKG,,,, options,,, choices,, hgrnurngunrnrugnrungung p e n i s

oh so they’re gonna corrupt you

THEY’RE GONNA CORRUPT YOU SO BAD!!!! WORSE THAN YOU EVER COULD HAVE POSSIBLY IMAGINED!!!

I feel like getting tag-teamed by them is almost inevitable if you’re getting w/ one of them. They’re sort of a package deal. Bare minimum, it’ll be suggested over coffee once or twice

it usually starts out as,, just one of them??

individually they are such GRABBY BASTARD SMDSND + they’re literally ready to fuck,, whenever.

this does mean that if one of them catches you two fucking, the other one will ABSOLUTELY JOIN IN <333 COME ON

HM LETS SEE

Handcuffs aren't necessary when one of your fuck buddies has 6 arms <3

TRULY IF YOU WANNA BE PINNED, MYC WILL HAVE NO TROUBLE. 

It’s easy for most people to forget, but his tentacles are strong. Rope strong. He could keep you pinned in any manner of positions for a senselessly long time without breaking a sweat.

You need your legs up, so that Andre can get that One Specific Angle that turns your brain into jelly? ‘Don’t worry babe, I��ve got ya covered’

OR EVEN. LIKE.

Two tentacles for the arms, two for the legs, two for any assorted holes that Andre may be incapable of filling <3 or even just if,, he wants to get you extra squirmy. You can take two, right?

It’s also super efficient bc. Yeah Andre fucks kinda sloppy, and has a tendency to accidentally move y’all around with his thrusting. (mm. you’ve accidentally bumped your skull on the headboard a few times MNSDMS)

SO!! It’s nice to have Myc there to,, keep you two stuck in place <3 

ALSO TANGENT BUT. Two things I feel like Myc would love is :

Stuffing one of his tentacles in there w/ his dick, along with some comment about how ‘maybe if his dick wasn’t so scrawny, I wouldn’t have to ;)’

Wrapping a tentacle or two around Andre’s hips, and fucking you for him. This is especially good when Andre starts losing energy <3 Myc can easy hold his wiry ass up, so he basically just uses him as a Very Loud, Giggling Dildo <333

ALSO THESE BOYS ARE INCAPABLE OF SHUTTING UP

Each individually is extremely vocal + chatty during sex. Both of them combined is torment (affectionate)

They’re absolutely shameless. Any comments that come to the surface will be said. 

Also don’t be surprised if they pull some ''Good-Cop-Bad-Cop'' shit, with one of them degrading you and the other praising you.

Laying against Andre's body, feeling his hands dig into your thighs to keep you still, while Myc tests the limit of just how stretchy human holes are?? Your poor cock-addled brain is gonna be absolutely flooded with their rambling.

It's all very 'Je-sus, aren't you an overachiever. Three deep and you're still lookin' for more, huh?'

'aww hehe, look at how well they’re doing!

'Aw, you're always spoiling em! If they can get a fourth one in, then maybe we can start talkin' about 'good' '

etc, etc, ad nauseum, carpet diem, you get the drill. They're little bastards who like the sound of their own voices MSNDMSNDMSN

OH AND ANDRE WILL,, 1000% JUST SIT BACK AND ENJOY THE VIEW  WHILE MYC HAS HIS FUN SMNSMDN

There’s something very stimulating to just,, having an outside view of the action. You and Myc being completely undone, while he’s able to be,, a Calm and Collected Outside Observer is EXTREMELY RARE FOR ANDRE SMNSMD

It’s definitely not an Always thing, just an Occasional thing.

Getting different angles?? talking back-and-forth w/ Myc, while his tentacles fuck you open like he’s drilling for oil? Absolute perfection.

He’s not always gonna be a Pair Of Needy Eyes In The Corner Of The Room, though, he does sometimes like getting closer to the action!!

LIKE I can totally see him sitting on the bed beside y’all while Myc has his fun. Just,, lazily kissing your cheek every once and a while, loosely jacking himself off. Maybe a bit of wisecracking <33 

granted, you don’t remember much of it bc. After the third tentacle your brain kinda goes a little squirmy, but the thought is sweet nonetheless <3

ADDITIONAL MISC STUFF??

Myc being into bukkake + Andre being a little freak (adoring) means that you will be coated in fluids of several origins. The bath afterwards is magical tho so it's worth it

OHO getting railed (anally) by Myc feels a bit like a Very Horny Colonoscopy. If you ask, those puppies will go deep. like,, deep deep. Like 'oh my god, it feels like you're in my throat' deep.

and,, yeah usually that wouldn't be all that pleasant, but the Delightful, Stimulating Properties that his tentacle goo evokes turns the experience Transcendental.

Your entire torso feels kinda,, tingly and sensitive and full?? every time he shifts, it feels like he’s hitting alllll the spots you need at once. He says its something about the psychoactive properties, but you’re too fucked out to really care <3

he’s also super gentle - even if his tendrils are super slick and blunt, he doesn’t want to accidentally hurt you. He’s a jerk, sure, but he’s not an asshole.

[and,, yeah those are definitely the times Andre takes a bit more of a back-seat role. Lots of praise n' giggling. He just lays back and runs his hands along your body, maybe even against your stomach-intestine area to enjoy the way Mycs tendrils make your stomach bulge]

Was possessed by the spirit of Tentacle Porn (tm) SMDNSMDN I COULD GO ON ABOUT THESE TWO FOR CENTURIES, BUT I'LL LEAVE THIS HERE <333 MWAH THIS WAS SO FUN, THANK YOU SO DEARLY!!!

[astaroth1357]

Hi!! I've been a fan of your writings! So very well-written and I absolutely love how you make stories! I could like actually flesh out and imagine them. And tbh, that's sometimes hard to do for me with most stories, but yours. Yours are amazing!

But I do wanna apologize if I sound dumb for asking this, but have you ever thought of how they'd react to an MC who keeps making mistakes / extremely clumsy / basically pathetic-like?

I keep reading MCs who are like, yeah amazing and confident and stuff which is great! But, I wonder, what if the Human they got is, like, you know, low-grade if there ever is a thing? How would they react?

I'm sorry!! This sounds like a downer, I'm just really curious how you'd flesh a story out of that ? But if not, still ok! I'm just happy and lucky you got to read my ask!

Thank you for taking the time to read my ask! I'll continue supporting you!

Awwwe thank you!! 😊 I honestly just kind of fell into this writing thing so it really helps my confidence to hear that people enjoy my storytelling (I get all smiley for, like, hours 😅). I'm bouncing through a lot of ideas right now, but I hope this is kind of a taste of what you were going for!

The Brothers with an MC Who's like… Just Below Average at Stuff

Lucifer

Well I see Lucifer going one of two ways: either he's frustrated to have yet another borderline competent charge to deal with or he actually likes their "weakness" if that makes sense.

You can't tell me this guy doesn't get an ego boost from being the most capable man in the room and people asking for help highlights that fact.

So like, he'd like them. But in a condescending headpat kind of way.

"Come here, you pathetic little thing. I'll help you" 😌 (They're trying their best, you prick...)

Mammon 

Like, bro. Same though.

I mean, for demon standards, Mammon isn't great all that much… Or at least that's how everybody sees him anyway, so a human who's also kind of a fuck up will get him right in the ol'chest thumper.

Gets kind of defensive for them, especially if they do the same for him. He can tell that they try their best…

Even if their best is like, not great, they're trying dammit!! Leave'em alone! 😠

Levi

Yeeeeah, he's going to tease them. Like a lot. But he won’t be an ABSOLUTE jerk about it…

Expect a lot of: "LOL, of course that sucked!" or "Well, that's a normie for you." comments if they fail at something.

But he doesn't do it to hurt them and will back off eventually if they say it hurts their feelings. He's a jerk, but not a monster (ironically enough).

Pointing out how clumsy they are though? Always fair game. It's such a… beloved trope after all. (Okay I personally dislike it, but other people don't and I can respect its relatability. He's going to poke fun of it relentlessly though.)

Satan

Honestly just takes pity on them more than anything else. It must really suck to be so pathetic… that poor human... 😔

So like, he'll help them out but it's always got that air of, "Oh honey, you're waaay over your head right now. Let the grownups take over here." to it.

Better than outright making fun of them, I guess… but still.

At least sometimes he'll TRY to teach them how to do things right and his patience isn't terrible as long as they're doing their best. He's less condescending than Lucifer if nothing else…

Asmo 

I mean. I'm not even sure how an entirely unremarkable human gets a pact with Asmo to start with… Man craves novelty.

A pity pact, maybe? Probably not. At best, he may try using his beauty skills to salvage something out of their completely unnoteworthy housemate.

Asmo could make a dead possum look Devilgram-able if he put enough effort into it so that might go somewhere, but they can't just ask him for it. It's gotta be offered.

Otherwise, he's nice enough but not nearly as all over them as he usually is... Take from that what you will.

Beel

Is kind if worried they're going to end up hurting themselves, tbh…

If there's zero chance they can take care of themselves, that doesn't bode well for them. He might be a little rude before getting to know them but after that they got themselves a guard demon.

Even if they're not the best cook, there's no way they can be worse than Solomon so he appreciates their effort if they try (and then pays for takeout so they both don't starve 😅)

Between him and Mammon, they'll find the most understanding ears for their totally average plight. If nothing else, they can seek refuge there.

Belphie 

Is 100% going to make fun of them and really doesn’t care about their feelings on the matter.

Okay that's only half true. Like Levi, he doesn't do it to make them feel bad, but his response if they bring it up would be along the lines of: "I'm not doing it to make you feel bad so you shouldn't feel bad about it." (Truly award-winning conflict resolution from Belphie, everybody 🙄)

From that point their only options are to hack it and grow some thick skin or let it go until they start crying. Tears would shut him up real quick.

Not enough to make him stop, of course, but enough to lighten the severity… Man he's such a jerk sometimes… 😒

[negasonicimagines]

Love Shouldn't Hurt

trigger warnings: abuse, self-hatred, depression, and any other content warnings that come with the Deadpool franchise

request: Love love love your fics!! Can you please do one where Reader is a human and Ellie saves her from an abusive relationship and they fall in love?

notes: this was… a hard one to write. as someone who’s experienced abuse on a few different levels from a partner, you aren’t alone. you may feel like no one else would’ve loved you before, and that no one else will love you after what you’ve been through, but they will. if you’re struggling with abuse, please reach out to someone, anyone. even me, if you really don’t feel comfortable talking to someone you know. it can and will get better. things might not be okay now, but they will be. you are so loved.

i modified the request a bit, i hope that’s ok. i just adore a good best friends-to-lovers piece. sorry for the cheesy title, but i hope y'all are glad i'm semi-back. trying to write more since i'm in a better place and this is a good creative outlet for me.

synopsis: Ellie’s thrilled to return to her hometown after her senior year at Xavier’s is complete. She’s most excited to see you again. But, what happens when you aren’t the you she knows and (secretly) loves?

Ellie’s favorite part about coming home in the summer is seeing you.

Maybe that’s wrong; maybe she should be excited to see her family, or to be back in her own room, or to be away from the chaos at Xavier’s…

But it’s true.

This time, though, as you come out of your house (next door to hers, the only perk of living in suburbia is that you’re so close) you don’t skip along like you used to. Your smile is… Different.

“Hey, Ellie,” you say, and even your voice sounds different. Normally you’re grinning like an idiot, brimming with a puppy dog disposition that acts as a foil to her catlike aloofness. At the risk of sounding like a creepy teenage boy, where’s her hug?

“Are you okay?’ she blurts.

“Yeah, of course,” you laugh it off, your fake smile growing wider. You don’t wanna tell her? Odd. The two of you had drifted apart over this last school year, more than usual. It was normal for one or both of you to get carried away with your studies or other friends and forget to respond to a text every once in a while, so she hadn’t thought much of it. She knew once summer came, you two would fall right back into your routine of slumber parties nearly every night, catching up on all the crazy shit that’s happened in your lives during your time apart and making some more crazy shit happen together.

“...Okay,” Ellie decides to respond. Your phone vibrates, and you flinch, instantly pulling it out and quickly texting back. Your fingers are like lightning. You quickly lock your phone and slip it back into your pocket.

“How’ve you been?” you ask her. “How are things with Yukio?”

“Oh, we broke up almost as soon as we started fucking dating. Thought we’d work out as more, but decided pretty quickly that we were better off as just friends. Our future plans didn’t really line up, among other things. Other than that, I’ve been pretty good.”

“That makes sense,” you say, but you sound even more tense. “Uh, if we happen to run into Vivien, can you not tell her that? She’s the jealous type, and she knows we’re close, so…”

Ellie feels an odd twinge at that, more than just jealousy. Her mom always told her she had good intuition, so she presses further.

“How are things with you two?” she wonders.

“Oh, just great! She really is the best, words aren’t enough to describe it,” you answer enthusiastically, but it still feels so… Off. Maybe it is just jealousy making Ellie feel awkward. Envy was always her worst sin, coveting what she can’t; what she shouldn’t have. You’re her best friend, you always have been. It would probably end like it did with Yukio, burning fast and bright, but once the initial excitement is over… It’s over.

“That’s awesome,” Ellie says. “So, what were you thinking of doing today?”

“Oh, uh, whatever you want is fine,” you chirp.

“Breadstix?”

“They don’t have a lot of vegan options,” you remind her.

“You like it, though. I’ll cope.”

“But-”

“No ‘buts,’” she insists. “I don’t know why you like that place so much, the breadsticks they’re named for are pure shit, but I’ll just cope and get a salad.”

“Last time you ordered it, they put cheese on it, even though-”

“I remember. I’ll just send it back again, it’s not a big deal,” she insists once more. “Why are you arguing so much? It’s your favorite local place that isn’t fast food.”

You sigh.

“Fine, let’s go,” you cave, letting her pull you along to her car. You sit in the passenger seat, buckling your seatbelt as she starts it. She buckles her own, passing you her phone. You look at it as if it’s a foreign object.

“You always pick the music. What’s with you?”

“Have you ever considered that maybe I don’t like making all the decisions all of the time?” you bite back.

Ellie stammers, not sure how to respond.

“Hangry, huh?” She decides that must be the reason for your change in attitude. It’s already eleven, and you’re an earlier bird than she is. You likely skipped breakfast knowing the two of you would be eating when you hung out. She takes her phone back and just picks one of your playlists on Spotify.

You’re quiet on the short drive there, and it makes Ellie feel even more uneasy. Your chatter-- which she usually pretends is meaningless to her --is sorely missed.

You’re texting again, intently focused on the screen as if the task is difficult.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I said that I’m fine,” you quickly answer, locking your phone again and tucking it back in your pocket.

“I’ll drop it for now, but… If something was wrong, you’d tell me, right?” Ellie asks.

“Yeah, of course,” you agree, but she doesn’t feel better.

“Cool,” she replies, parking outside of the restaurant. The two of you get out, it’s early in the lunch rush so you’re still able to be seated pretty quickly. Your drinks arrive just as swiftly, and Ellie catches you texting with that determined expression on your face again. “Seriously. What’s going on?”

“Just Vivien. She wanted to hang out today, but I didn’t know that until I told her I was gonna be with you. She’s just a little disappointed.”

“Well, she can join us, I’m sure-”

“No, no, it’s really alright,” you quickly reassure her. “I- These days, I don’t really spend time with anybody but her. I’m surprised she even let me- That came out wrong, she-”

As you continue to stumble over your words, the pieces continue to fall into place for Ellie, brows knitting closer and closer together.

“Is she hurting you?” Ellie asks. Xavier’s sex education isn’t just about the mechanics, it’s a pretty progressive class. They had a whole unit on abuse. Ellie’s pretty sure she’s seeing signs of it right now.

“No, of course not! I mean, every relationship has its challenges, but-”

“She is, isn’t she? Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“‘Cause I knew you’d look at me like that,” you sigh, giving up on the lie.

“Like what?”

“Like… That. So disappointed in how pathetic I turned out to be. I mean, you’re Negasonic Teenage Warhead, for fuck’s sake, I… It must be so- I-”

“Hey, hey, no, that’s not it at all. I’m disappointed in myself, I should’ve fucking known something was wrong, I mean, I did, the second you came out of your house, but before that… I should’ve checked on you more. I’m- I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault I let it get this bad. She- She’s just- When it’s good, it’s good, y’know, but- I don’t know. I love her.”

“Those PSAs are right, though. Love shouldn’t hurt.”

“It always does,” you murmur, and you give her a meaningful look. If only she knew what the meaning of it was.

“Well, it shouldn’t,” Ellie insists. You’re picking at your pasta. You usually inhale it. Ellie almost asks what’s wrong, but she knows what it is. She’s sure Vivien’s taken every opportunity to break you down. “Eat, please. Or it’ll be a waste of my money.”

“Who said that you’re paying? You don’t even like this place.”

“I said I’m paying. Making a decision so that you don’t have to make them, isn’t that what you complained about earlier?”

You sigh in defeat, eating an actual bite instead of just twirling it around on your fork.

Ellie digs into her salad, she can’t help but fondly smile at you despite the situation. She’s missed you so much.

“When are you gonna do it?” she asks.

“Do what?” you wonder, as if you’ve forgotten the context of the question.

“Leave her.”

“I can’t,” you quickly say, but Ellie still catches a fearful tremor.

“Why not?”

“There’s nobody else. I mean, yeah, you and I are still friends, but… When you reject so many offers to hang out, people stop asking. They stop talking to you altogether, eventually. And… She’s the only person who’s ever wanted me, y’know? And now she’s the only one who ever will.”

“That’s not true,” Ellie says.

“It is.”

“It’s not, I swear,” Ellie insists. “I- You’re gonna need some time to heal, after everything, but… I do.”

“You’re just saying that. There’s no way, after all these years, that you finally-“ you stop yourself.

“Finally?” Ellie asks.

“That you finally love me the way I love you.”

“You mean…? I just thought… I’ve loved you just as long, but I thought you only saw me as a friend, and I didn’t wanna ruin that. The way things went with Yukio just reinforced that- That fear.”

You nod.

“Well, I guess that settles it. You’ll- I’ll call her. I can’t do it in person, she’ll… Y’know.”

“I know,” she gently responds.

You call Vivien.

“Hey, I… I can’t do this anymore. Us.”

You flinch. Ellie can hear the sounds. The yelling. And then the crying. And then the yelling again.

“I mean it. You’re right, you can do better, so… Go do better. We’re not good for each other,” you say with a shaky sigh. “Mhm. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I know. I know. It’s not like that. Yeah. Goodbye, Vivien.”

“I’m proud of you,” Ellie says softly, and you just scoff, rolling your eyes before you sink your teeth in your bottom lip. You cover your mouth. “Hey, hey, you’re gonna be okay.”

“Will I?”

“Yeah. I might be ‘Negasonic Teenage Warhead,’ but you’re Y/N. Twice as strong without the annoyingly long codename.”

“Yeah, right,” you scoff again, eyes watering. “I just- I just don’t know why I wasn’t good enough.”

“You’re perfect, she’s just… Some people just don’t… It’s hard to explain. I have a- He’s not my friend, I can’t believe I almost said that, thank the fuckin’ lord he didn’t hear me… I know a guy who deals with those kinds of people. He told me that most of them, they… They don’t ever change. Maybe they could, with help, but due to the ego that makes them abusive in the first place, they’re never gonna get that help. The world’s better off without them. There’s nothing you could’ve done.”

“That- That makes sense,” you admit. “I just wish we lived in a world where love was enough.”

“Me too,” Ellie sighs, and you take a sip of your drink. She mirrors your action, realizing that she’s actually quite thirsty. The two of you finish your brunch in a heavy silence. It feels like you both should be talking, but nothing feels right to say. That’s okay, though, Ellie’s just missed you so much. As depressing as the current mood is, there’s a bit of hope. You’ll be back to your regular self eventually; a stronger, more mature version, and Ellie will be there to shower you with the respect and affection you deserve when you’re ready.

[cheelduh]

How to strike your way into someone’s heart (Highschool AU)

Part 2 to this. Can be read alone!

Pairing: Childe x fem!reader

Warnings: A lot of swearing I mean what do you expect they’re all teenagers. Lots of brick slapping. Childe clowns Scaramouche. OH YES this isn’t edited at all lmfao have fun.

Synopsis: It’s your big date with Childe after you lost the bet miserably. You decide to pay the occult club a visit in hopes of finding something that can...ease your concerns. Childe on the other hand has Signora give him a friendly piece of advice, believe it or not. 

Note: SRY THIS TOOK ME LIKE A MONTH

For as long as you can remember, you've never believed in ghosts, demons, or souls that lose their way in the endless void, forced to roam the earth in repentance.

Believing in the unknown takes creativity, adventure, maybe even a little sense of fear. Scratch that—a shitton of fear, because humans love to weave in their insecurities and inability to explain something into something of a phenomenon.

Bad luck lies in this category. Bad luck is simply a way to justify the catastrophe that one cannot admit they have fabricated themselves. Everyone wants a reason as to why shit hits the fan, and it can be anything but their own fault.

Bad luck is nothing but a load of bull to you. That's totally why you're standing outside the calculus classroom during lunch break, which happens to be the official meet spot for the occult club.

You raise a fist to knock, but then falter, thinking over your options once again. Is this what it has come to? Putting your faith into the weird kids that once tried to summon Schrödinger's cat for the physics final.

Fischl kicks the door wide open, a smirk playing at her lips once she spots you. "One cannot refrain from the song of your cogitation. The feline for which thou dwell on—"

A squeak leaves your throat and you flinch back, cutting her off. "You can read my mind?"

"Fischl," An icy eyed boy shows up from behind her and points a thumb back. "Mona needs your help."

Fischl squints at you for a brief moment, and then spins onto her heel to go back into the room.

The blue haired lower class man, Chongyun you guess, narrows his eyes at you. "Is there something I can help you with?"

Finally you manage to speak, palms all sweaty. "Yeah uh, I need your help. You know, with occulty things." You use your hands to articulate your thoughts, but ultimately give up.

You're not sure if it's pity towards your pathetic explanation or simply annoyance, but Chongyun widens the opening. He silently gestures for you to follow.

Stumbling on your feet and putting on your big girl pants, you hurry inside of the room, hoping you aren't seen by Beidou. She wouldn't let you hear the end of this.

The temperature instantly drops, and you have to adjust your sight to navigate. There's heavy incense in the air as well as a a few lighted candles from the dollar store, you guess.

Sitting smack dab in the middle of all the demonic markings is Mona, with a mischievous glint in her eyes. Chongyun has made his way next to her, crossing his arms with a sigh, and Fischl is busy cooing at her bird.

"Well well well..." Mona's amused, eyes almost twinkling as she gets up from the poor desk that had to suffer the wrath of her ass. "If it isn't Y/N."

Mona is a glorified dick wiper in your books. One time, she partnered up with you in chemistry last year and refused to do any work because apparently her "star sign" said she was incompatible with science. You haven't forgiven her since.

"I need your help." You barely manage to choke out the words, reigning yourself in by clenching your fists instead. It'll be unethical to claw her face, especially since you're the one who's come to her.

"Oh?" She smiles wickedly, revelling in every moment of this no doubt. "Why would the high and mighty Y/N need help from the 'Whoroscope whore'?"

Fischl nearly slips out a laugh, trying with her upmost ability to refrain from rolling all over the floor.

You blink away your tears of almost-laughter, casually sliding in twenty mora across the table dividing you two. If she's a whoroscope whore like you say she is, she'll definitely put it in her bra.

Mona raises a brow, but her eyes linger on the bill for a second too much. "What makes you think I'll do it for money?"

"That's simple," You say, rolling your eyes. "When you see mora, you cling to it like a baby clings to a tit. Now just take it and solve my issues."

She fumes a litany of curses but snatches the money up anyways.

"What do you want?"

You breathe in, then out. "I need a talisman."

Mona raises a brow, hand on her hip. "I'm sorry. Did I get that right?"

How dare she. You will your eye into not twitching, the beginnings of fire thrumming through your veins, scalding hot. How dare she make me repeat myself.

"You know, the thing to fend off evil spirits," Your statement hangs heavy in the air as the cogs in their brains click into place. "I need one that can remove the most evilest thing times ten to the power of twenty five on this planet."

Everyone immediately thinks of Hu Tao.

Chongyun is the first to speak from an area of expertise, seemingly shocked at your words. "Are you sure you want a talisman that powerful? How bad is the evil spirit you've come across?"

You glance out the window, through the semi-open blinds. The apprehension curls in your stomach once you spot Childe chasing Aether with safety scissors, and you've never been more sure of than anything in your life.

Gulping, you turn back to the exorcist. "I'm 110% sure."

He doesn't ask any more questions and goes to fetch the talisman.

Mona clears her throat. "So I hear you have a date with Childe today. Quite the character you've taken to."

"Oh please," You hiss through your teeth, your blood pressure going up tenfold, "you're the one that told him our star signs were intertwined and that we're fated lovers."

She shrugs innocently, stance casual unlike your own that is ready to lunge an attack.

"Here you are," Chongyun hands you a talisman, a colourful mix of some charms, some kind of liquid in a bottle, and about a shitton of other things. "You'll need these if you're going to face the most demonic of all evils."

You think of Childe's stupidly handsome smirk, the playful life of his eyes, and how gentle and considerate he is with you. You think about how cruel he is to others, but how loving he can be to you.

"Oh, I will be."

—

Childe is getting his ass handed to him by Scaramouche on the switch. It's just that he can't seem to focus, not with the forthcoming date all over his mind.

He hasn't experienced these kind of jitters in a long time. Has to endure that foolish smile that's about to plaster all over his face.

Scaramouche may be a son of a bitch with an agenda, but he doesn't appreciate his acquaintances safeguarding their personal crap when it starts to leak onto him. Especially when it comes to video games.

"Okay," The short boy sighs, stretching over the staff room sofa to drop his controller on the cushions. "Let's hear it." He can't even properly enjoy his victories when Childe isn't giving it his all.

"Hear what?" Childe lays his head back, relaxing from all the strain of endless gaming during the lunch hour. He seems too relaxed for someone who's broken into the teacher's lounge.

"Why you're so distracted." Scaramouche points out. "Not that I care—hey! I'm serious here!"

Childe's cracking up for absolutely no reason, rudely cutting him off. "I'm sorry—sorry it's just so hard to take you seriously when you're wearing that stupid fucking hat."

"Don't question the drip." The older moves his head to glare at him, but the thin stripe of silk on his hat swooshes with him, and it's enough to have Childe clutching his stomach in pain as he barks out in laughter.

"Grow the fuck up." Scaramouche says, no doubt exasperated from the constant shit he gets.

"Ok—ok I'm sorry."

There's a knock on the door before Scaramouche gets the chance to intimidate him again.

"Fuck shit fuck who is that? Wasn't there a staff meeting?" Childe whisper yells, panic clear in the ocean of his eyes.

Scaramouche shrugs and downs a can of soda with no care in the world.

Childe would be nonchalant too. If it were a normal day, he wouldn't give two shits about getting caught.

However, he's looking forward to that date he has with you today. Detention is going foil all his lecherous plans.

"It's me." The feminine sound of a threat calls out from the other side. "Open the door." The clicks and clacks of her toes tapping the floor indicating her impatience.

The two sigh in relief, Childe getting up to open the door. It's way too early in the afternoon to deal with this crap.

"Surprised to see me?" Signora greets sweetly, and if not for the murderous glint in her eyes, he would smile back.

"Yeah, I didn't say Bloody Mary three times." The ginger replies, keeping a steady eye on the upperclassman in case she pulls a fast one.

The blonde shoves him aside in offence, and prances in like she owns the goddamn place. Scaramouche greets her with the bird.

"There's this rumour going around—I'm sure you've heard..."

"Oh?" Childe pockets his keys, ready for an attack, not even remotely interested in the topic.

"Something about how Y/N gave Mona a visit today" Signora muses, elegantly taking a seat on the arm of the couch, "with your date and all, I just thought you should know."

"Hah!" Scaramouche bursts out in laughter, tears in the corner of his eyes. "I can't believe she went to get a horoscope reading on how shitty your date's gonna be."

"Get castrated." Childe growls, flipping him off on both hands.

"Now now boys," Signora's lips curl, and she clasps both manicured hands together, prepared to break the fight if it ever reaches its peak. "Settle down. You two are comrades."

"As if I'm comrades with this SIMP!" Scaramouche has to wheeze out the words.

The youngest clenches his fists, unclenches, and then lets a smirk grow. "Oh? I'm the simp? What about that time Mona pantsed you in-front of all the freshmen and you fell in love with her."

Scaramouche glares at him, a glare strong enough to have anyone shaking in their shoes. "I'm attracted at her sheer audacity of trying to fuck I, Scaramouche, the 8th harbinger, over. It takes balls."

"Mad respect." Signora leans forward to place her phone on the coffee table, then approaches Childe. "Moving on, the reason I've decided to bestow my precious intel on you is because I have a favour to ask of you."

"What?" He says blankly, confused that she has a request for him out of all people.

"I need you to let me get you ready for this date of yours." She gives him a gaze that is enough to wither away any arguments.

Childe shares a look with Scaramouche as if to say "am I fucking deaf because I sure as shit didn't just hear that."

"You sure as hell did, boys." Signora intercepts the connection of their two brainwaves with a dreaded sigh. "I hate Y/N. This is the only way I can get back at her."

"Hey!" Childe exclaims loudly, waving his hands in the air incessantly. "What makes you think I'll let you shit on my future girlfriend."

"I'll be doing nothing of the sorts." She points out, giving him a sly smile. "I just know she's terrified of what's coming. The better the date is, the more she's gonna hate herself. What more do I need but to sprinkle some inner conflict within her airtight resolve?"

As favorable as the proposal is, Childe  contemplates for a second. Signora...helping him? This could work to his advantage if he plays his cards right.

His inner turmoil takes him into the future, where you two are happily married with eight and a half kids. If you ever managed to find out Signora was the culprit that was finally able to set you two up, you'd never forgive him.

"Nah I'll take a hard pass." He doesn't want to think about divorce and custody battles this early on. He'd rather face the brunt of Signora's wrath.

Scaramouche chooses right then to make a tactical withdrawal out through the window since he doesn't want to be a witness to a murder he hasn't caused.

Surprisingly— "Fine then." Signora shrugs, unbothered when summoning out a minty juul from no where. She's disappointed nonetheless.

Childe tilts his head, perplexed, but decides against mulling over it for too long. Instead, he strides off to the door, wanting to get the last two periods over with so he can run home and freshen up for this date.

"Oh and Childe?" Signora calls out to him, but he barely acknowledges her, only pausing momentarily without looking back. "A piece of friendly advice. A diligent student like Y/N, there's no way she'd be into rash things like fighting. So try and control yourself, hmm?"

He flashes the senior a sheepish smile, the front row tickets to the illegal underground fight-club burning in the back pocket of his pants.

—

Childe conceals near the bushes by the gate, expertly hiding his shaking hands by pretending to look for something in his back. His goal isn't to seem desperate, even though he's raced out here at the speed of light after Havria's dismissal.

It's not like he's trying to eavesdrop or anything. He just wants a little insight on how you're feeling about this, in case the rumors of you visiting the occult club wasn't a farce.

From his peripheral, he spots you and a familiar figure that is Lisa, leisurely walking side by side as you approach the main side walk.

"Ready for your date, Y/N? You've been daydreaming all afternoon." Lisa winks, and dodges the shove you send her way with experience like no other.

"Yes, daydreaming about punching you in the face." Your left eye twitches in annoyance as you fix your hold on your skateboard.

"Well then, I'll be off—ah!"

The gorilla grip you have on her sleeve takes away all the time she has to get on the last bus she's about to miss.

Your utter strength is enough to make Childe's knees weak. How pathetic he thinks.

"Oh no you don't," You say in a sing-song voice, "you got me into this, so you're going to help."

"Help with what?" Lisa fakes a hard pout as she bats her lashes, trying to collect pity points.

"I—" You inhale, loosening your grip on her and averting your eyes nervously to see if anyone's watching. "Don't make me say it."

The older girl motions for you to continue, and you're sure you've suffered more for less at this point.

"I've never...been on a..." The sentence ends in a trailed murmur.

Childe doesn't think he's ever seen you so flustered. He's about to snap a picture for later, but decides against it. They'll be plenty of moments later on to see your cute expressions.

Lisa's grin is both seductive and terrifying, Childe notices. "You've never been on a date?"

"Shut up!" You hiss, dropping your board so you can cover her lips with your palm, eyes darting around your surroundings frantically. "Not so loud."

He has to bite at his fist to hide his amusement.

As if she has a sixth sense, Lisa's eyes somehow find Childe's through the abundance of leaves, and there's a glint in her eyes that nearly makes him shart his pants.

"Of course Y/N," She replies sweetly to you, who is currently unaware of the staring match going on. "I'll teach you everything you need to know...and more."

Childe doesn't know if that's a good or bad thing. Nor does he want to find out.

—

You ponder on what's taking him so long, more on edge than you usually are. Thankfully, Lisa basically pried your hair down from its usual up-do. Said something about how you can hide your lack of shits given as to not offend him.

Except you think you're giving more shits that you expected to. Why else would your heart be pounding so hard?

"What took you so long?" You sense him creeping up on you, ceasing his chance to pounce.

Childe groans playfully and slaps a hand over his face as he comes into view. "How'd you know?"

"You have a douche-styled gait." You reply as you remove your gaze off your phone to approach him.

He's prepared to shoot a witty reply, but it dies halfway through his throat when he procures a good look at you. Your hair frames your face elegantly, eyes shining despite the tiredness that's so clear, all complete with a cooling spring dress that hugs you just right.

Mouth going dry, he forgets how to speak the common tongue, unable to tear his gaze off your form.

You shift in place awkwardly. "Uh are you okay? Looking a little...blank."

"Sorry—sorry just thinking." Childe stumbles over his words like the complete idiot and a half he is, berating himself countlessly on the inside. He regains his confidence once he spots the light dust on your cheeks. "You ready for the best date ever?"

"The best date huh?" It's the first time you smile today, and he swears his heart leaps in his rib cage. You're the prettiest thing he's ever laid his eyes on. "I'm ready. I better not be disappointed."

"I wouldn't dare disappoint, girlie." He feigns mock offence as dramatically as possible. "I'll show you how to have some real fun. Cool keychain by the way, for good luck?"

It's one of the charms Chongyun urged you to carry with you at all times to keep all forms of evil away.

"Yeah...something like that."

The two of you ease into the walk in a relatively comfortable fashion, contributing with lively chatter and a few jabs here and there. It's not awkward at all, not like you thought it would be. Your nerves loosen up, mind diverting from the roots of the stress of high school.

"—And you won't believe what Kaeya did the other day. I'm telling you there's something wrong with him because that SoundCloud rapper wannabe Venti goaded him into birdboxing through the hallways at lunch."

"And the son of a bitch did it?"

"The son of a bitch did it." Childe confirmed, gasping through his laughs as the two of you converse in psychobabble. "And guess who he bumped into?"

You're choking in laughter, tears in your eyes as you hunch over and shake. "He didn't. Childe—no he didn't."

"Straightttt into Diluc. And he had the balls to feel him up because he thought he bumped into a hot bab—"

Childe crashes into a sturdy chest and stumbles backwards towards you, but manages to catch his balance midway. Both of you freeze when faced with a buff guy from another school, bandages on his fist and a crooked smirk on his face.

Fuck. You think. Classic high school cliché.

Realizing he can't risk the remainder of this date when it hasn't even begun, Childe raises a hand in apology, aiming to be the bigger person instead of socking the kid in the face.

"Sorry. I wasn't looking." He offers to the guy, but you can tell he isn't buying any of it. There are about four more kids who group, a setup that isn't going to end in your favour.

"Hey punk. You don't remember me?" The upperclassmen barks out, glaring holes into your date.

You deadpan towards Childe, but he's too is racking his brain to remember. Ends up shrugging with no recollection.

"I have a list of names but they're in my other pants." Shit, what an a-grade reply. Now you know you're done for. "Listen dude, I'm kind of on a date and the vibe is going great. Don't ruin it."

"It's a good thing she's here to watch then!" The guy yells, stomping so that he's right in-front of Childe, ready to pounce. "You humiliated me in front of my gang last week. I'm here to rip you a new one."

Childe blinks, tries to remember, and when he doesn't, he grabs a wad full of cash from the his Fanny pack and throws it at the guy's feet.

Everyone's eyes bulge out of their sockets, including yours at the amount of money placed there casually on the crack of the dirty sidewalk.

"Hopefully this is enough for the damages." Childe offers, aiming to not further escalate the situation albeit how pissed he is right now. If you weren't here...well that would be another, much more violent story.

With a soft tug, Childe brings you close and begins to pass the guy, until he's abruptly stopped by a hand gripping his shoulder tightly.

"I don't think so!" The guys barks, and his lackeys move to surround you two. "You gotta pay taxes too buddy." Oh he's getting way too comfortable now.

A feral smile grows on Childe's face as he looks over his shoulder. "Oh?"

"Yeah shithead." The guy seethes, puffing out his chest to size him up.

Childe itches for a fight. He can no longer keep in the urge and is just about ready to raise a heavy fist, but is beaten by the sound of a loud thwack, and then a painful groan following.

There you are, standing in front of the trembling asshole, spinning your crossbody bag in circles like it's a nunchuck in all it's glory. There's a deadly glint in your eyes, pure, unadulterated vexation in your features.

If Childe could fall for you any harder, it's probably happening now. In that exact moment, his heart beats in his ears uncontrollably, and there's nothing but raw adoration that piles up all at once.

You're an angel of destruction, a force not to be reckoned with, and shit, you're the eye of the fucking storm.

Fire courses through your veins as you pulverize the guy with your bag, swinging with such expertise it has Childe in awe. "He may be an absolute idiot for not remembering—"

"Hey girlie you're killing me here!" Your date snaps out of his astonishment temporarily.

"—but you don't get to call him a shithead, you asshole!" You snarl angrily, gripping the handle of your bag tightly, decking everyone that lunges at you, letting out strings of curses with every hit. Every hit sends a flock of them either stumbling back in pain, or knocked out completely.

Childe doesn't even get a chance to lift a finger by the time you're done violating them with your heavy ass pink bag. Stands there like an absolute loser.

"Apologize." You pant, prepared to send another flurry of attacks at the leader, who is crawling away with a battered face. "Apologize or I'll—I'll fucking Russian neck tie your ass."

"S-sorry!" The guy whimpers out and tries not to piss his pants at the threat.

Childe is still in too much shock at the whole ordeal to reply, short circuiting.

Another thirty seconds pass until he registers the smaller hand waving in front of his face. He catches your cold hand through his haze, brings it closer.

Running a free hand through his locks, he doesn't hide his astonishment. "You're fucking gorgeous, girlie." He whistles lowly, eyeing you with a new kind of regard.

"I-I uh." Your face is all shades of red by now, the adrenaline from kicking ass wearing down. "Let's go."

"How is that bag so heavy?" One of the fallen gasps out in pain, clutching his ribs as he trembles on the floor. "Like a buh-brick."

A part of your zipper in open, and Childe briefly peeks out of morbid curiosity. His jaw slackens. "Is that a...no, it can't be."

"It's a brick." You murmur guiltily, gnawing at your bottom lip. "Just in case." Fingers tentatively play with the straps.

Childe is head over heels by now, all smitten as a foreign warmth bubbles up in his throat, and he's just about sure he'll puke his heart out.

His next words are picked out carefully. "There's an underground fight club going on—"

You lock and aim for his right kidney.

Worth a try, Childe thinks.

"SIKE. Joking—joking. Just a joke." He insists, gloved hands raised by his ears in defence.

Clicking your tongue, you scowl and rush past him.

It hasn't even been an hour and it's been the most exciting date Childe's ever experienced. When he sees your lips twitch, he knows it's the same for you as well.

"Are we going or not?" You mumble, avoiding eye contact, a tinge of red still decorating your cheeks.

Childe crumbles into his hands at your deadly duality. One that comes for his enemies and one that comes straight for his heart.

[gaysimpsstuff]

Fatgum As a Dad

This was inspired by a conversation I had on a discord server, we all have daddy issues and want Fatgum to adopt us so here’s all the shit we collected.

There are some serious themes in here, mostly regarding the biological parents of the kid, but it’s vague as possible. If anyone wants me to add a trigger warning please let me know.

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

It all started when he was a kid, when he learned what an orphanage was. One of the kids in his class mentioned being from one, so when he got home he asked his parents about it. 

“Mom, what’s an orphanage?”

“Well, Taishiro, it’s where children that don’t have parents go. Then people can come and adopt the children. Why do you ask.”

“A kid at school said he’s from one, when d’you think he’s gonna get adopted?”

“He might, not all children get adopted. Some of them stay in the orphanage until they’re adults.”

“BUT THAT’S NOT FAIR!” he shouted. “EVERYONE DESERVES A HAPPY CHILDHOOD!”

“Well, honey, life’s not fair. And not everyone gets a happy life. It’s how most villains are made, actually. They were hurt more than everyone else and couldn’t handle it anymore. Not all villains are like that but many are. I think you should stay away from that kid, Taishiro. He might turn out a villain.”

But he didn’t stay away. And he made it his mission to become a pro hero so he could make a ton of money and help as many people as he could. He’d help even villains, keep them from doing something dangerous and inspire hope in them.

Then, he’d adopt any kid who needed a father. All the orphanages and foster programs would be empty. Homeless children off the street and in his house, being fed and clothed. He’d care for each and every one of them, not wanting a single person to feel like they didn’t belong. 

He finds most of his kids at pride parades. He walks around with a shirt that says ‘FREE DAD HUGS’ and a box full of candy. He remembered one of the kids walking up to him slowly.

“Um.. are you Fatgum?” 

“Yes I am!”

“Can I have a hug?”

“Yes you can, Kiddo!” he got down, and the kid put his arms on his stomach (Fatgum’s too big for anyone to fully hug, the dude’s taller than Allmight!) he wrapped his arms around the kid before he heard sniffles. He looked down and saw that the kid was crying.

“M-my parents never hug me like this!” they exclaimed. “They haven’t since I came out. They want to kick me out when I turn thirteen!” 

“Can I have their number? I’m going to... talk to them.”

He ended up taking the kid’s family to court, and since the parents were going to just kick the kid out anyways, they let Fatgum adopt them, but they kept nagging him about how he was ‘going to be raising a little demon.’

“Then call me Lucifer.” he spat right back. Now, that kid’s grown up, has pride flags all around their walls, and doesn’t ever doubt that they’re loved.

Fatgum probably bakes with his kids. Helping them up onto the counter to mix ingredients and play with the dough. If they mess something up or break a glass, it’s fine. He doesn’t yell at them or sigh and shake his head, he just kissed the kid on the forehead and helps them clean up the mess. 

The food always turns out amazing, and Fatgum always tells the kids that. All of his kids are now Gordon Ramsay level chefs and have probably met Gordon Ramsay. 

No matter what their body type is, Fatgum tells his kids their handsome/beautiful and are model worthy. If anyone comments of one of his kid’s body, whether it be negative or... ‘positive’ in a creepy way, you can expect that they’re getting slammed into the ground. No questions asked.

One of Fatgum’s kids is really good at make-up. Like, really good. So Fatgum did the only thing a rational father would do. 

Ask for a make-up job.

It didn’t end all that well...

“Hold still.. I gotta get the eyeliner on.”

“Gosh, Kiddo it’s making my eyes water.” 

“I know, just hold still... aaaand...... done! Now don’t touch it or it’ll smear!”

“Wow, that looks great! You’re really good at this!”

“Thanks, dad- you smeared it already didn’t you?”

“....Nope.”

Fatgum: I'm not gonna do it, it just seemed like a good option. 

Fatgum not even two seconds later after seeing a trans kid crying: now carrying said child on his shoulders while his spouse is chuckling in a corner after signing adoption papers I did it.

This man would get his kids almost anything they wanted. Especially kids with ADD/ADHD/Autism/Tourettes/Anxiety who need stim toys.

Kid: chewing on their nails.

Fatgum: here take this stim toy, and this one, you chew this one so that might help-

Kid ends up with more stim toys than they can count.

Fatgum: just doing his job 

The Daddy Issues Gang: Hi dad- oh shit wait- Hi- I- fuck- trauma ensues. crying

Fatgum: grabs the daddy issues gang we're going to the nearest courtroom say hello to your new father its me im the father ok lets go.

Kid: um, dad can I talk to you? 

 Fatgum, turning around quickly: yes? 

 Me: ‘he moved so quick, he's mad at me, I'm gonna get yelled at’ Sorry, sorry! 

Fatgum: uh, no. I'm getting you ice cream and a new stuffed animal no questions asked

He'd just know when something's wrong, and he’d be great at comforting.

His usual style of comfort is to let the kid sit on his stomach and tell him what’s wrong. His body is one giant pillow for his kids to lay on, he can fit at least eight of them if they cuddle in closely.

Once filmed a commercial dressed as the Cool-Aid man, and all of his kids were in the commercial.

Fatgum: Busts down wall  “OH YEAH!”

Director: “And CUT! Okay, try a little more aggressive-”

Fatgum, in tears: “I don’t wanna scare my kids.”

As stated before, if anyone makes his kids feel bad he’s punching them to the ground, but sometimes he’s not in a position where he can do that. Like if a Karen mom ever comes over.

"Linda stop bringing lemon squares if you're going to talk about my son that way because they're just as sour as your attitude."

Fatgum but he slaps the toxic members of your family and tells them to do better or he's taking you.

Then takes you anyway because you prefer him.

Fatgum with a sweater that says ‘mr dad guy on it’

Fatgum definitely watches ATLA, and quotes Uncle Iroh daily. When his kids are minding their own business they suddenly hear

“Leaves from the vine... falling so slow...” 

INAUDIBLE CHAOS AND PANIC

Fatgum agency cosplayed ATLA characters on Halloween.

Fatgum was Iroh.

Kirishima was Sokka.

Tamaki was either Momo or Appa.

Maybe get a couple others in on it too, Mirio could be Aang and if Kirishima convinces Todoroki to join for a while he’d totally be Zuko.

Fatgum lets his kids squish his face.

Fatgum used to work with a hero who was hard of hearing, so he learned sign language to help them, and he’s got the skill saved in case one of his kids might be deaf.

So one day, Kirishima invites Bakugou on patrol with him, and we all love that headcanon of Bakugou going deaf, so when he gets pissed at something, he starts insulting everyone around him in SL.

Fatgum notices and starts signing back to him.

YOU’RE ALL MOTHERFUCKERS AND I HATE YOU ALL!

Hey, now, let’s calm down and not call everyone motherfuckers.

FUCK YOU TOO

Bakugou...

Everyone thinks that they’re doing magic, because they’re making all these shapes with their hands and keep looking offended at each other.

Now, Fatgum tries his gosh darn hardest to keep up with the memes, so when his kids come home with good grades, he says “That’s so pog, Kiddo!”

All of his kids are embarrassed.

In the middle of a battle, he throws Kirishima at a villain and they both scream “YEET!” the villain afterwords forever lives in fear of the word ‘yeet’ because he thinks it’ll result in a human rock being thrown at his face.

Fatgum can’t text very well, because his fingers are just too damn big-

sonhsisntextsblooklikehthis'

Translation: so his texts look like this

you learn to understand his texts

Someone better get him a large tablet instead of a phone

If he gets married after he adopts the kids, there’s going to be a huge competition over who does the rings and who does the flowers etc.

If any of his kid’s ever bring home a romantic partner, you can bet your ass he’ll be all over them.

“What’s your average grade?”

“E-eighty percent sir!”

“And do you take sports?”

“No sir, I wish to be a biologist.”

“I see, I see...”

“DAD, YOU AREN”T INTERVIEWING MY PARTNER, ARE YOU? YOU SCARED OFF THE LAST THREE I DON’T WANNA DEAL WITH THAT AGAIN!”

“SORRY, KIDDO! I’LL LET THEM GO NOW! I’ve got my fucking eyes on you. Don’t screw this up.”

Hope y’all enjoy this, if y’all want I can write some headcanons for if Fatgum’s kid becomes a villain-

[the-hidden-writer]

And Into The Fire

Chapter 6: Robo-bonding

Summary: Months after the Mitchells saved the world, Linda gets a phone call asking if she’s seen two defective Pal MAX bots. Powerful people are after Eric and Deborabot 5000, and it’s up to the Mitchells to protect them.

Check reblogs for AO3 link!

Robo-bonding

Rick usually loved the sound of crickets at night. On camping trips, he’d make it his mission to get his family to sit outside and appreciate them for at least one night. Truly, the aura of peace and serenity they brought was unmatched.

But now, he’d give anything for them to shut up and stop adding to the awkward atmosphere.

It was their first stop after a full day’s worth of driving. The route to Silicon Valley would take at least two days and the Mitchells had decided to break the journey.

Usually they’d stop at a motel for the night, but ever since they’d technically been harboring fugitives that was no longer an option. Or at least that was the case for the moment, since Rick was happy to leave the bots in the car overnight as long as they were both awake and feeling responsible.

His wife and son were currently in the backseat together, curled up closely against one another as they slept. Monchi was snoring away on his back beside them. Rick had quickly pulled out his camera and snagged a quick photo of the heartwarming sight.

They’d put Eric (actually, Deborahbot had since he was much too heavy for any of them to lift) into the trunk. Deborahbot himself had sat in silence next to his robot friend for most of that first stretch of the journey. He’d only spoken when Linda had asked him directly if he was alright, and once again when the family were saying goodnight to each other.

But when it was clear that Deborahbot wasn’t going to sleep (or go into rest-mode or whatever those robots did) when everyone else was, Rick had listened to his inner Linda and asked him to join him in the front.

Even without his wife’s guidance, Rick knew deep down that it wasn’t healthy to not take a break from watching his brother like a hawk.

So that’s where they were. Rick sitting in the driver’s seat, Deborah sitting in the passenger’s seat, and between them only the crickets had something to say.

“So, uh,” Rick eventually began in a low voice, knowing that the android wouldn’t start a conversation himself, “this is all kinda sudden.”

Deborahbot didn’t reply.

“...Right.” Rick was at a genuine loss for words. He’d obviously talked to the bots before, but never really talked to them. They came as a pair and were always sort of doing their own thing. You could guide them and give them instructions and stuff, sure, but they only really got into deep conversations with each other or maybe sometimes Linda. And even then, it was Eric that tended to do most of the talking.

“It must be hard, huh?”

Deborahbot did not lower his voice when he replied. “What do you mean?”

“SHHH!” Rick pointed at his sleeping family.

Deborahbot 5000 hung his head slightly. “Apologies, Mother’s Husband.”

“No no, you’re good.” Rick wished he’d stop calling him that, though he couldn’t think of an alternative.

“But I mean, um…” he continued. “You bots never leave each other’s side. It must be tough with him gone.”

“But he is not gone.” Deborah said. “He is in the trunk.”

Rick sighed. “That’s not what I…”

The problem with robots is that they weren’t great with picking up on subtext. But to be fair, neither were the Mitchell family.

“Still, you’re worried, right? About him? Heck, even I’m worried and I barely know you guys. I can’t imagine how you must be feeling. If you do... feel.”

There was a short pause. Rick had never realised that robots needed thinking time. Or maybe it was just a defective robot thing.

“I am worried about us, yes.”

Us..?

“Aw shoot I totally forgot they’re after you too!” Rick exclaimed quietly. “Have you had any more attacks since, or..?”

Deborahbot turned his head to face forward before answering. As far as Rick could tell, he didn’t have any cameras on the side of his head so the gesture must have just been for dramatic effect. “Not since this morning. Now that my brother is turned off, they can access him without resistance.”

Deborah said it so casually that Rick almost missed the implication of the words.

“Wait, wait wait wait, hold on,” he said as he shuffled to face Deborahbot better, “what does that mean? You mean they can still get to him when he’s like this? They’re, what, doing stuff to him as we speak?”

“Yes.” Deborahbot answered bluntly.

This was bad. All this time, Rick had assumed that the reason Eric was switched off was to stop Pal Labs from hacking him (or whatever the technical term was). But if that just made it easier for them…

“So then why are we even doing this?” He asked, his voice raising a little. “If he’s just gonna get mind-controlled anyway, why are we taking you guys right to them?!”

Deborahbot’s head turned to face him again. “We are going to ask them to stop.” He said it firmly but there was an edge of doubt creeping into his voice.

“But that was to stop them before they took over Eric, wasn’t it? What if they can’t change back what they’ve already done or something? It might already be too late- I don’t know how this works!”

“Wh-What if…” Deborahbot’s voice was barely audible.

“Yeah, man, what if?!” Rick whispered angrily. “You should’ve thought about this beforehand! We should’ve thought about it before we went along with this spontaneous plan!”

“What if…”

It was then that Rick realised what he’d said and who he’d said it to.

“Oh, Deborah, I-”

“What if they delete his memory?” Deborahbot started to speak faster. “What if they reset him? What if they fix him? What if they break him completely? What if-”

“Deborah…”

This was a mistake. Rick shouldn’t have brought it up, or at least not in front of the poor android. The two were like twins, practically joined at the hip, and were so childish at times that catastrophizing in front of one of them regarding the other was probably the worst thing he could've done. Even though his own concerns about Eric were very real and genuine, Deborahbot didn’t need to hear them.

It had taken 18 years to start getting things right with Katie. He wanted to have another chance to get it right with the bots.

“Listen, that’s not what’s happening.” Rick said, putting a lot of effort into sounding as convincing as possible. “They probably just want you guys back. But once we get there and show ‘em you’re harmless, they’ll let you go! Don’t listen to what I said, you know how I get angry for no reason, haha.”

Deborahbot seemed to think it over. Sometimes, Rick wished that they had proper faces so that he could gauge their expressions properly. It would make his life a lot easier.

At some point during that conversation, the crickets had stopped chirping. He hadn’t even noticed.

“...Do you really think so, Mother’s Husband?”

Rick smiled reassuringly. “‘Course I do, Deb.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Rick sincerely hoped that he’d mended the pit of fear he’d opened within Deborahbot. It was funny, the rift that had once been between him and Katie was caused by technology. Now he was trying to fix a rift with a piece of technology itself.

Deborahbot seemed content to just sit in silence like that for the rest of the night, but Rick wanted to get some sleep.

He nodded toward the trunk. “Hey, you might wanna get some rest. Don’t stay up all night thinking about this.”

“But-”

“Ah ah, no buts.” Rick waggled his finger. “That’s an order.”

“Ok!”

Dangit, for a moment there it had felt so much like he was talking to another human being that he’d completely forgotten to mind his language. He didn’t want it to seem like he was forcing him.

Deborahbot had already opened the door to move back into the trunk with Eric. "Goodnight, Mother's Husband."

“Deborah! Before you go-” Deborah stopped mid-motion to listen to him- “maybe cut it out with the whole ‘Mother’s Husband’ thing.”

Rick couldn’t believe he was about to do this. It was a step that Linda wanted him to take but he’d never quite felt ready for. But the bots needed family now more than ever, and who else was going to give it to them?

“Just call me ‘Dad’.”

Deborahbot cocked his head for a second (long enough for Rick to consider backtracking) before he exited the car and stood up straight.

“Goodnight, Dad.”

Comments make my day! :)

[ultimatetornshipper]

To bee or not to bee - a Jasonette fic

@moonlitceleste I almost let this die, I honestly really wanted it dead but alas it was clearly meant to bee 

(WARNING: contains puns, angst, crack and fluff. You have been warned)

If you don’t want to read my sarcastic/funny/fangirl commentary, skip the brackets

I have another bee movie au, i didn't plan it ("I don't claim to be proud. But my head won't be hung in shame. I didn't plan it. But the light turned red, and I ran it. And I'm still standing. It's not what I wanted, but now that it's right here. I understand it. A story written by my own hand" as quoted from Waitress), it just happened and i just couldn't resist. I'm not sorry

So what if instead of dying Joker turned Jason into a bee. Because Harley convinced him and told him that people were talking shit about him because he's named the Joker and they don't think he's funny. It surprisingly works. (Obviously Harley was the one who made the plan and did the magic I mean really what do u expect of Joker?)

Ok so now Jason’s a bee right? And he’s like 15 because .~:°*plot*°:~.

They look for him and Jason’s like flying around like, “Guys! Guys I’m right here!” Poor kid. (I mean I would make it funny but like angst)

Obviously they don’t understand him because he’s a fucking bee and Joker cackles madly and Harley laughs too but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes and it's kinda that laugh u do when ur supes overwhelmed and sound maniacal but like soft (I’m a simp for Harley being portrayed as the complex and beautiful character she id leave me be)

Jason is very sad. And also quite pissed

Not knowing what else to do he follows Batman home, he listens to them trying to find him, watches Dick freak out and Alfred wipe a tear the rest of the family doesn’t see.

Jason tries to approach Alfred, hoping he somehow recognizes what happened

He doesn’t, Alfred closes him in a glass and paper and takes him outside.

He sneaks back into the manor and sleeps in one of the flowers (it's a red tulip because aesthetic) next to his bed. He cries himself to sleep. (Can bees cry? Is this possible? Is this like a thing??? I don't need sleep i need answers)

The thing is even tho he's now a bee, he still has the durability of a human, so even stepping on him won’t crush him and he still has a human lifespan

Because Harley isn’t a monster and what Puddin didn’t know couldn’t hurt him. (Simping for Harley Quinn strike 2)

After a while at the manor and following them he decides he can’t stand it anymore. Alfred has thrown him out three times and Dick freaks out each time he sees him as he’s a tad allergic (read: he would die if stung)

Which is how Jason found out that getting hit with a newspaper wouldn’t kill him.

He leaves.

He’s a bee and it’s not like he knows about a way to reverse it.

But there was someone who might.

He goes to Arkham.

Luckily, Harley was still there. (YAY we get to see mah gurl)

He flies into her cell and she just watches him, then she seems to click. She gives him a small smile, “Hi birdie,” (she puns, honestly would make for a better clown of Gotham and I saw an idea for that once where she steals Joker’s title once and I’ve been yearning for it ever since)

She holds out a finger and he lands on it, she laughs but tears come to her eyes,” Hey at least you’re not dead. That was his original plan you know? To kill you with a crowbar. I convinced him this would be a cruller fate. I guess maybe it is, but at least this way... Ugh how the hell did I get here,” (Harley angst, honestly it’s all just self service at this point)

He simply stared at her as she cried, and he felt his heart clench. From here she looked so sad... not crazy, just broken.

She took a deep breath and looked at him seriously, “Look kid, there’s a way to get you back to normal, you just need to find someone, they’re called the Guardian of the Miraculous. They can help, I don’t know who or where they are, just follow your instincts. And come say hi when you get back, yeah? I could do with the... healthier company. And remember, I bee-lieve in you,” (Gasp what a shock, you mean to tell me Miraculous magic is gonna be involved in this Maribat au. Well I never what a shock. Also puns. Oh and she’s so nice to him. We love Harley in this house)

He sat there and studied her for a while more, there was more to her than it seemed. Than what he’d assumed.

But for now, he had his own problems to deal with.

She gave him a small wave as he left. (Adorable)

He left and started considering his options, as a bee, it would probably be safest to stay inside, away from birds and things that would view him as a snack.

Staying in Arkham seemed like his best option, as bad an option as it was.

Most of the prisoners wouldn’t have a second thought about trying to crush him.

A strong scent of flowers and plants suddenly came to his attention.

Of course! Poison Ivy. (Round 2 of me simping for beautiful, complex, badass women. Too bad Catwoman ain’t here.)

He followed the smell to her cell and saw her staring out of her small window. He was still taking a chance, but she loved plants and flowers and bees were important to those, weren’t they?

He flew to the window bars and sat on one. The moment she spotted him she smiled widely, in a soft way he hadn’t seen on her before. (Ahhhhh my darling plant redhead. I love writing the Sirens as soft badasses. Also has anyone noticed how rare brunettes are in superhero worlds? Like both in Marvel and DC but like irl brown is like a pretty damn common)

She held out her finger, “Hey there, little guy. A little far from home, aren’t we?”

She had no idea.

He landed on her fingertip and watched in awe as a flower and a few leaves formed on her hand. She let the flower grow itself around one of her window bars and held her finger next to one of the petals.

“There you go, it’s all I can manage with my power dampers. I haven’t had company in a while,” she said softly as he crawled into the flower. He made himself comfortable.

She laughed to herself and he saw her shaking her head, “Talking to a bee, well, I guess stranger things have happened,” (yeah ur crush is dating a green haired murderous psychopath and you get beat up by a billionaire in a batsuit on like a biweekly basis)

The flower was soft and warm and felt safer than he expected it to. He found that he could move between the petals but decided to curl up in the middle. (It's a pink rose this time because fuck yeah flowers)

He slept better than he had in days.

The next morning he took his leave, stopping only at the manor to say a mental goodbye.

Then he headed off.

Jason flew a lot the first few months, our boy was smart at least, travelling with a cruise ship on its way to Europe.

It was Spring in the Northern Hemisphere so he had until Autumn until it was in his best interest to head south to avoid the snow. He decided to head towards Africa when summer started coming to an end. (I have no reasoning for this, just that I want to)

His first spot would be the United Kingdom. Then he'd go through the rest of Europe following his instincts.

At least it was Spring.

Jason diligently searched through England, Scotland and Ireland but found nothing.

By the time he was done he realized it was time to start heading South. He’d decided to take another cruise to South-Africa, where it would be summer, he searched through the country until April. He would admit that he didn’t feel drawn to anything in any of their 9 provinces so his search wasn’t as diligent as in England. He didn’t feel anymore drawn to the neighbouring countries like Namibia or Botswana either.

(Once again no reasoning for why I picked these countries, I mean the French Hugonotes went there when they were fleeing from the French Catholics who wanted them dead so I guess I could make up some bullshit about Mari having an ancestor in common with someone there or maybe it was just the ship he could easiest get access I don’t know, you make something up)

Which was why he decided to go back to Europe as soon as April hit.

He hitched another ride on a cruise headed for France.

It’s been a year since he got turned into a damn bee.

He was sixteen now and while he’d seen some amazing things all through South-Africa (a place that proves that humans really do have a weirdly obvious way of naming things I mean the Amazon river and Chad Lake are just more examples really) as well as the United Kingdom, all he really wanted was to go back home, to be human again.

When he gets there he diligently makes his way through France, eventually arriving in Paris.

He lands on the tip top of the Eiffel Tower. As in the point of the antenna because why not.

During his year he realized that birds and other animals tended to avoid him, sensing his strangeness so that was at least one positive.

He stared out over the city. Well, the one good thing about this was definitely the views he’s been allowed to see.

That was until a massive explosion hit.

“What the fuck?” he said out loud, searching for the source. No one understood him, human or bee, but talking to himself reminded him of his humanity.

He found the source of the explosion but just as he started flying to its general direction, a blinding white light shone followed by a horde of ladybugs that were fixing everything that was wrong. (Imagine how scary this would lowkey be irl tho? Just a shit ton of Ladybugs descending on Paris my dude)

He decided that he needed a night’s sleep before he could even begin an attempt at deciphering what had just happened. He flew lower, finding a nice little balcony right above a bakery. And it had flowers. (I’ll give u five seconds to guess who this balcony belongs to)

He flew down, exploring.

He turned around when he heard a loud thump from behind him. What appeared to be a super heroine in red spandex with black spots had landed on the balcony.

She detransformed and started to talking to a floating bug- fairy thing. Strange. Though it wasn’t like he could judge, as an ex superhero sidekick who was thought to be dead but was actually a bee.

She disappeared down her trapdoor and he made himself comfortable in one of her flowers.

He slept soundly until somewhere during a night another thump woke him. He looked out of his sleeping spot to see a cat superhero stand on her balcony. He leaned down and knocked on her small trapdoor.

Ah, a teammate of hers, they were probably meeting about something, he thought as he heard her open up.

It didn’t take him long to realize that even though they were teammates, the cat, Chat Noir he later learned, was not aware of this fact.

Oh this was rich.

He couldn’t bee-lieve his eyes. (ok so Jason used self-referential puns but can you really blame him? It’s really just me and my pun problem so don’t blame the kid)

He was going on and on about his feelings for Ladybug, the girl’s hero form, that were clashing with his feelings for another girl he fenced with, while she listened, clearly fed up with it.

He also claimed that he thought that maybe they were one and the same. Which, to Jason, was hilarious as he was literally saying this to the actual Ladybug’s face.

Marinette- he learned from the Cat’s ongoing blabbering, he was a real blab-bee mouth, - was clearly tired, nodding half asleep, probably having heard it all before.

When he finally left Jason went to sleep again, incredibly amused and even more thankful that he was fluent in French. ( u think this is plot convenience? Just u wait mah dude iz about to get worse)

The next morning he decided to follow her to school. Which was how he learned of her huge crush on a boy named Adrien Agreste.

After learning the boy could fence thanks to Marinette’s obsession interest in him, he got suspicious.

Could it really bee? (not a typo)

After seeing the boy transform a month or two later for patrol he laughed like he hadn’t for over a year. It very much was. He'd spent the time staying on Marinette's balcony and decided to stay another week before moving on and continuing his search, after all, he couldn't stop now that he finally felt like he was getting close.

The next day she got home crying, claiming that Adrien had started dating someone else.

Kagami, she called the girl. Probably the fencer if he had to place a bet.

“I’m sorry, Marinette,” Tikki told the girl.

“That boy's an idiot,” he said, speaking his mind, another thing he’d gotten use to being allowed to do without consequence.

Marinette nearly jumped out of her skin, she looked around and he realized that she could hear him. He hadn’t really spoken too much before, at least not when she was around. He was usually content with watching her do whatever she was doing that day.

“Tikki, did you hear that?” she asked, Tikki nodded, her eyes landing on him.

“Oh,” the kwami said softly, flying over to him, “Oh, you poor thing, who did this to you?” (Tikki is the first ever mom friend and u can fight me on this)

He stared up at her, flying so that they were eye level.

Marinette gaped at them, heartbreak seemingly forgotten, “Tik- Tikki, are- who are you talking- are you talking to a – Tikki is that a bee?!” she finally spluttered out.

“No,” Tikki said, studying him, he felt his heart twist in hope and his stomach roll in surprise. Did she know?

“I mean yes, but no. He’s a boy whose been turned into a bee,” Tikki explained, turning back to Marinette.

“Oh,” Marinette said softly, turning to him. She held her hand out and after some hesitation he landed on her finger. She looked at him then back to Tikki.

How did they know? Would he really be that lucky? Was this real?

“Uhm, how?” she said, staring at him in disbelief. He tried shrugging but realized he couldn’t anymore- beecause of his- well if you haven’t caught on to the fact that he’s a bee by now you should really start from the beginning of this story.

“I don’t know, but Joker and Harley Quinn were involved,” he said.

Marinette stared at him in disbelief, blinking a few times. She sat in shock a few moments longer. (Our darling is an awkward lil bean, and while in media awkward is portrayed as cute, irl it isn’t, it’s just well… awkward. And we’re writing a serious and realistic fic about this sidekick of guy who wears a batsuit/billionaire's ward getting turned into a bee and falling in love with a magical girl fighting a butterfly man- none of this unrealistic nonsense)

Tikki flew over and sat on Marinette’s shoulder while her holder processed the information, the kwami stared at him sweetly, “What’s your name?”

He swallowed, he hadn’t said his name in ages, it stirred up something (emotion, it’s called emotion, Jason, you know? The thing Batman can’t process??) in him, “Jason Todd,”

Marinette seemed to finally snap out of her daze, “That sounds American. Are you American? Wait if Joker and Harley are involved then you’re probably from Gotham. Are you? Wait I’ve seen the name Jason Todd somewhere. Weren’t you some rich guy’s ward? It was all over the news last year, Alya wouldn’t stop talking about it for a month, she had a million theories. He was – you were announced dead two months after Robin was taken captive by Joker, everyone thought he was – you were killed. Joker made outrageous claims as they arrested him... saying that they’d never find Robin... that he’d all but disappeared in thin air... that he wouldn’t be the only one wearing stripes... I remember because he put a really weird emphasis on the words be and stripes and...,” her eyes widened and she gasped as she looked at him in what could only be described as pure shock. (Yes this happens, people can talk for this long and since I personally know headcannon that Marinette is ADHD this long ass paragraph is just another Tuesday bud)

He sat there, surprised that she figured it all out so quickly. (yeah bub it’s called plot convenience and it’s because of me, the writer, I don’t wanna focus on secret ID shenanigans, I got other plans for yall, also Mari is smart, don’t underestimate her)

“You’re Robin,” she breathed, “they turned you into a bee. Wait- How the hell did they turn you into a bee?!”

He chuckled, “Bee-lieve me I’ve been asking myself that question for more than a year,”

She bit her lip, seemingly contemplating his words and ignoring his pun, “Tikki do you know anything that could help? Do you think Miraculous magic-,”

He felt his heart stop, he flew up to her face, flying at eye level, “Wait, did you just say Miraculous? Harley said if I could find the Guardian of the miraculous, they could help me, do you know where they are? I’ve been looking for so long,” (‘°;~*.plot convenience.*~;°’)

Marinette blinked at him and Tikki's face dawned with realization.

“I’m the guardian of the miraculous,” Marinette said softly, “Tikki, that means I can help him, right?”

Tikki nodded and he had to dial down the hope in his heart because the look on her face told him there was a Kim Kardashian sized butt on the way.

“We can help him, but we’re gonna have to wait. (don’t look at me like that, do u want them to have time to bond or not?) You’re not trained enough to pull it off yet. If you were to do it now, all three of us would be out of commission for far too long, especially with Hawkmoth on the prowl,” Tikki said.

They must’ve been able to sense his sadness because they were staring at him with an incredible amount of pity. The amount was quite unsettling actually and he suddenly felt a primal like urge to pun. (An extract from my book: “My unhealthy coping mechanisms and how to use them,” specifically Chapter 8: “Humor hides the pain”)

Suddenly Tikki’s face lit up, the whiplash of her expression change throwing any notion of punning out the window.

“Well, there’s one thing we could do,” she said, excitedly, zipping buzzing around “If he wears a miraculous, he'll return back to human form while transformed,”

Marinette perked up at the idea, but confusion soon overtook her features, “But Tikki, most of the miraculous are bigger than he is,”

Tikki waved her away,” It’s fine it’ll work,”

“Ok,” Marinette said after a bit of thought. She stood and he followed while she started climbing down her skylight,” I’m thinking you can try each of them out for different patrols and then we’ll see which one matches you best. This could be fun, having some fun sized company while figuring out how to defeat Hawkmoth,”

He laughed, flying near her ear, “Fun sized, huh? I’ll have you know I’m considered tall in human form, unlike some of us,”

She laughed and rolled her still tear stained eyes, and so, the beginning of a bee-autiful friendship bloomed.

Marinette walked to her closet and Jason took in her room. It was very pink, but in a well-balanced way - it wasn’t completely overbearing. His eye caught on a few pictures of Adrien Agreste on her wall but figured now wouldn’t be a great time to bring it up. (Look he’s already more emotionally aware, #foreshadowing of character development)

She removed a big box from her closet. She opened it and it was filled with what appeared to be a bunch of scrap materials. At the bottom she removed a bigger bundle of black and red fabric and he flew closer.

She put it in her lap and Jason had to do a double take when he realized that her hands were glowing and what the actual fuck- it was a box now -fuck fuck fuck- why was it a box? How? What- Jason was pretty sure he did not sign up for this.

She put the box down in front of her and to his relief she opened her mouth to speak as she lifted the lid, so he’d understand everyth- and its jewellery.

The box contained jewellery. Animal themed jewellery by the looks of things.

He then realized that these were probably the other miraculous.

She looked over each artefact before handing him the yellow and black hairclip.

Out of all of them, she picked the bee miraculous.

“Hilarious,” he replied dryly, giving her a look, he realized too late she wouldn’t be able to register- on account of, well you know… (if u don’t know by now, you don’t get to find out anymore)

She gave him a grin and replied, “I certainly think it is,”

Her teasing expression turned into one of worry, “I mean we could switch it out if it makes you uncomfortable-,” (being a sassy people pleaser with no filters really do be like this tho)

He laughed, “Don’t worry, I’m only teasing. What do I do?”

Marinette opened her mouth to answer before obviously realizing that she didn’t have an answer. She turned to Tikki and the kwami had a fond smile on her face before turning to Jason. (Just Tikki casually mentor- moming Mari because Fu is useless)

“Just step on the miraculous, it’ll sense that you’re human,” the creature replied.

When he stepped onto the bee miraculous, its kwami appeared.

Pollen stared at him for a few seconds before she realized what was happening.

After an explanation about her power set and what exactly he could do in suit, he transformed.

He felt his human body appearing. He was taller and more built than he remembered being. His flying clearly had physical consequences then, not that he was complaining.

His suit included a pair of bee wings. His hair was longer than he remembered it being too.

He had a black leather jacket and combat boots. With it was a pair of practical black leggings and a yellow t-shirt with three thick black stripes. (The three stripes represent each one of his families, the Todds, the Waynes and The Dupain-Chengs, because I can) He also had a pair of black gloves. His boots had yellow laces. On his face was a black and yellow striped domino mask. The top sat on his hip. The bee miraculous sat on the middle of his chest in the form of a broach.

He all but sprinted to the mirror. He stared at his face, his blue eyes and his nose that never healed quite right after breaking it that one time. His black hair was messy and stuck up every which way, his cheekbones were as high as always, and he had a little bit of stubble and it was so familiar and so new all at once.

He touched his face, barely registering the tears flowing down his cheeks and laughed in relief. He was human again. This was real! He could- he was closer to normal than he ever thought he’d get to be.

He turned to Marinette who was staring up at him in shock. He picked her up and spun her around, laughing in joy. And after a moment she joined in. He put her down and put his hands on her shoulders, smiling widely, “Thank you. Thank you so much,”

She smiled up at him, a slightly sad look on her face, “I’m sorry, it’s not permanent,”

“Don’t be sorry. For the first time I have hope. It will be permanent eventually, and till then, I have you with me, right?” he squeezed her shoulder, still high on the feeling of hope and warmth and familiarity.

When he was overcome with the sudden urge to pull her into a hug, he didn’t resist.

He held her close, resting his chin on her head, “Damn, I missed this. Hugging, I mean. I haven’t... it’s been so long,” (not that he got all that many hugs from Bruce “emotionally constipated” Wayne)

She wrapped her arms around him, “I can imagine,”

They stood there a while before the time for patrol came along. She transformed and they made their way to the Eiffel tower, where they met Chat.

The cat themed hero rose his brow questioningly, “I thought we didn’t recruit new heroes unless it was an emergency?”

Ladybug smiled nonchalantly, “It’s Guardian business, he’s gonna be a permanent fixture in our team for at least a few months so we might as well get used to working as a team,”

Chat Noir eyed him wearily and he stepped forward, sticking his hand out, “Hi, I’m Blackback, nice to meet you,”

Chat Noir shook his hand and gave Ladybug a sceptical look, “An American? Really?”

“Please Chat, he's not American, it’s just the glamour hiding his actual accent,” she replied simply, shooting Jason a worried look.

He couldn’t give away his identity, but he was also technically a bee, he didn’t really have an identity to give away. So, her behaviour was strange. Unless she wanted to give him an identity somehow?

He couldn’t stop thinking about it for the rest of patrol.

When they got home Marinette revealed that she wanted to give him the fox miraculous. If they asked Trixx she would be able to design the costume in a way that allowed him to look like a normal civilian, without the mask.

Trixx's glamour was also stronger than the rest so his true identity as Jason Todd would be protected.

And she could help him fake an accent.

Since Marinette was a year younger than him he could just pick up where he left off school wise.

She convinced her parents that he was an exchange student in desperate need of a place to stay because the person he would’ve stayed with backed out last minute.

They agreed easily and Jason decided to not question it.

It was his third family. His second if you only counted non abusive ones. First if you wanted one with a healthy family dynamic.

They got him a fake birth certificate and name. He went with the alias Thomas Grayson. He thought it was kind of funny, and it paid homage to both Bruce and Dick. It gave him something from home to hold on to. (Jason isn’t really salty about not being avenged in this au, he didn’t die and Talia and the pit madness wasn’t there to egg on his anger. But maybe if I ever get back to this au we could do a thing with it… guess we’ll have to wait and see ;-) no promises tho)

He built himself another home with Marinette and her family. And before he knew it, he was happy again. He felt secure.

Through the weeks, he ingrained himself into Marinette's life. In a blink of an eye, they were best friends, and he couldn’t imagine life without her.

He loved living with her family as she trained to be strong enough to turn him back to normal.

He grew close to Marinette’s friends and was her shoulder to cry on about Adrien. He and Adrien got along pretty well, and he and Marc and Rose traded Literature jokes. Max would join in when it involved Shakespeare.

Then Lila happened. (She’s a staple in Maribat fiction. U can’t have Maribat without Lila. Or well u can but that’s usually a very specific au)

Her lies started out simple enough. Then she started manipulating everyone and he, Marinette, Chloe and Adrien were one scheme away from being ostracized. They sat in the back row.

They ignored her sneers and let her lie to her heart’s content. Then one day she said something that made both Marinette and Jason freeze.

“You know, I was childhood friends with Jason Todd (I know she usually gets the names wrong but like her knowing the name just makes this next bit better) You know, Bruce Wayne’s ward who died a while ago? It was just so sad. He grew up in a nice family but his parents both died in a car accident and Brucie took pity on him. He even let us keep in contact afterwards, since our parents were such good friends. We all miss them dearly of course. We were neighbours the year we lived in Gotham, you know? We'd play every day-,” she started fake crying, “Oh it just gets too much sometimes,”

But to Jason’s shock Alya didn’t move to console Lila, in fact, she was staring at the brunette in shock.

He turned his gaze to Marinette to see the girl wearing the biggest, coldest, most satisfied smirk. She rested her chin on her hands and grinned at Lila in a way that made shivers go down his spine.

He turned back, this ought to be good.

And it was.

Alya absolutely lost it.

She ripped Lila a new one and frankly? Jason was impressed. (Alya has a temper and she’s a fangirl, and we all know how we get when someone gets something wrong about one of our hyperfixations, even if it’s an old one so like yall can imagine how bad Lila had fucked up)

When an akuma flew in towards Lila, Alya grabbed it, staring the girl down with a fury he didn’t know she could possess, “Don’t you dare! Do you think I’m blind? I’ve seen how easily you get akumatized and this time I’m not letting it happen!”

Of course, Alya then got akumatized but hey it beat another version of Lila.

Everyone made up but they weren’t quite as close as before. Their group tended to consist mostly out of him, Marinette, Chloe, Adrien, Kagami and Luka.

Other than that incident and akuma attacks, life was pretty good.

In fact, it was great.

He and Marinette would spend nights on her balcony, laughing and slow dancing. They star gazed and went on patrols. He helped her when she got nightmares and she returned the favour. They went on long walks and spent the holidays together. They crammed for tests and he played model for her designs. They worked in the bakery and hung out with their friends both in and out of suit. They’d joke about his technical bee-ness and he and Chat drove her mad with puns. In retaliation she’d introduce him as her bee friend to people or only give him honey and bee themed things. (ok this sentence sounds weird but I mean like when she brings them sweets from the bakery to snack on while working and stuff.)

And one laugh, memory and fight at a time, he started to fall. (I just want good things for Jason, and really can you blame me?)

Through the months, he kept up to date on the news about Bruce Wayne and Marinette held his hand each time a new kid joined his brood. She reminded him that no child could be replaced and reassured him that of course Bruce would want him back when they figured everything out.

And if he didn’t, she’d kick his ass into space, and he’d stay with her family in Paris- a family she made sure he knew he was a part of.

He helped Sabine in the kitchen and was the only one who came closest to beating Marinette’s Ultimate Mega Strike 3 record. Tom taught him to shave and bake. He was integrated into their family and they treated him as part of the family.

But even if they were giving him everything they were, he missed Bruce. And Dick. And Alfred. And Barbara. And Gotham. He missed them all so much. He missed home.

So, 14 months later, when Marinette told him they had a meeting with the Justice League about the Hawkmoth situation, Jason felt his heart skip a beat.

“What?” he asked softly, his eyes brimming with tears (Marinette taught him how to emotion, you see. So Jason is emotionally stable-ish enough to cry without feeling embarrassed about it), “I get to see him again?”

Marinette nodded and hugged him from behind, “I’m planning on telling him what happened. Is there anything you can tell him to verify who you are?”

Memories from a million years ago entered his mind, “Yes,”

She took his hand and took a step back, “And I think I can fix you before we go, I’m strong enough. But I’d still like your help in the final battle, I mean I know you’re going home but...,”

He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear and smiled, “Of course, Pixie. I’ll always be there for you when you need me,”

He pressed a kiss against her forehead, a movement so familiar it was practically a part of him. He pulled her close and cried into her hair.

“What if he doesn’t believe me?” he asked softly, after a while, resting his chin on top of her head.

“He will,” she replied, tightening her grip around his waist.

They both knew she had no guarantee of that. That she had no way of knowing for sure. Neither of them did.  And it scared him more than he wanted to admit.

The next day they do the magic turning back thing. It freaks him out quite a bit but not as much as her revealing the miraculous freaked him out the first time, you get kinda used to the magic shenaniganary. They’re both passed out for an hour afterwards and when they wake up, he holds her, crying, because he was finally, finally back to normal and this was real and permanent, and it was over.

She cried with him and held him, and they then went out and he wore a shirt she made for him, and they got ice cream the next day. They celebrated some more and went to the park with the squad and they had a picnic.

It was better than he ever could've imagined.

While the sun was setting, they stood back on her balcony, where they first spoke all those months ago, slow dancing. He pulled away and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and smiled at her as the orange light of the sunset shone on them. (So aesthetic)

“Thank you, Marinette, for everything,” he says as he rubs his thumb across her cheek. His hand holding her face. She puts her hand over his and closes her eyes, savouring the moment.

She opened her eyes again and smiled, “I’d do it again and more, if it meant I’d get to be with you,”

He started leaning down, “If I lost you, I’d fly all over the world just to find you again,”

She raised to her tip toes, faces millimetres from one another, blue bells meeting ice, “So it was all worth it in the end?”

He moves closer, eyes searching hers. “Definitely,” he breathes.

She closes the distance, and he picks her up and spins her around. They break apart and their laughter fills the air.

(now that’s enough fluff, allow me to drown you in angst)

The next day they stood on the Eiffel tower. She took his hand, “Let’s recap. I go in, we have our Hawkmoth meeting, then I ask if I can speak to Batman and Nightwing alone. Then I tell them I found you, then I give them – are you sure it’s necessary for me to give them your blood, hair and a cheek swab? Isn’t that overkill?” (Batman is serious about his no kill rule, but he’s also serious about his there’s no such thing as overkill rule)

He shook his head and she sighed, “Okay. Then I give him means to contact me and I come back. Now remember they might take a while to process and they won’t necessarily call immediately-,”

“What if they never call?” he asked, gripping her hand tightly.

She ran her finger softly through his hair, “Then you have us to help you get through it,”

He nodded, she kissed his cheek and stepped through the portal with Queen Bee, Chat Noir and Viperion. He and Ryuuko stayed behind as backup, he wielded the Fox miraculous these days, but kept the name Blackback, always wearing a black leather jacket no matter the transformation.

He and Ryuko discussed fighting styles, she was kindly trying to distract him, and if it had been anything else he needed distracting from, it would’ve worked.

So passed the slowest forty-five minutes of his life. Chat Noir and Queen Bee exit a portal and so the wait for Marinette and Luka began.

She and Bruce were talking now. Bruce would know he was alive. This was make or break for him. Luka was nearby to act as back up worst-case scenario.

He felt a hand on his shoulder, followed by someone taking and rubbing circles on his back. He looked down to see Ryuuko on his one side and saw Chat Noir on his other.

“We’ve got you,” Chloe said standing in front of him, hand on his unoccupied shoulder.

He swallowed and nodded. She squeezed his upper arm and met his gaze, “Breathe, you’re safe, honey,”

So, 30 more minutes pass. They sit down and somewhere along the line Chat goes and grabs a dozen croissants from the bakery.

In another situation he might’ve laughed. He’d baked this morning’s batch and now he got to eat some of it for free, of course, technically he could get others for free too but-

The portal opened behind them and Ladybug and Viperion stepped out. He noted that she didn’t have the bag of his DNA with her anymore.

She smiled softly at him, “Now we wait,”

And wait they did.

They waited two weeks.

And then the burner phone that's number they'd given Bruce rang.

Jason froze, Marinette jumped up and ran to get it.

He couldn't move as she walked over and put the phone on speaker, she grabbed his hand and he held onto her for dear life.

"We can both hear you now, Nightwing," she said.

There was a beat of silence on the other side of the line, "Can he- If you're- can I speak to him? In- um- private?"

Marinette looked at him, and he nodded. She took the phone off speaker and handed it to him.

He held it up to his ear and squeezed his eyes shut, focusing on the circles Marinette were drawing on his hand with her thumb.

"He- hey Dick," he said. He heard his brother's breathing hitch, followed by a few seconds of silence.

"When did Batman find you?"

"25th May 2017,"

"Who's your favourite author?"

"Mary Shelley tied with Jane Austin,” he replied.

Dick stayed silent for too long and before he could stop himself the words fell from his mouth, desperation clinging to each syllable,” My favourite- my favourite playwright is Shakespeare, and my favourite school subject is English. If I could pick any day job it would be being a writer. My favourite colour is blue. Alfred has a secret fear of dolphins. You have had a ridiculously huge crush on Barbara for years and she had no idea, and I found a picture you drew under your old room's bedside table of you two getting married. I folded the picture up and hid it in a small box of memories I kept in the farthest corner of my closet under clothes I never wore. I have a round scar on the lower left side of my back where Willis Todd burned me with a cigarette when I was 5 that you don’t know I know you know about. My first Christmas at the manor you found me in the rose garden cutting a few off to take to my mother's grave and I was terrified that you would yell at me but instead you drove me to the graveyard and that was the day I decided to give you a real chance. I despise carrots but I eat them when Alfred makes them because I don't want to be a burden. And I-," he choked on a sob- when had he started crying?

He took a shuddering breath, and swallowed some of his tears, trying to make sure the words got out right, "I've missed you guys for every single second that I've been gone,"

His stomach tied itself up in a million knots as the silence stretched on. He could hear Dick moving the phone.

"Can I speak to Ladybug again please?" A female voice he didn't recognize said.

He handed the phone to Marinette and pressed his hand over his mouth to try to contain the sobs. He felt like a knife was twisting his stomach. He couldn't even hear what Marinette was saying. (I’m going through something irl and as a result u guys get to read angst by the bucketloads and I regret nothing)

Dick didn't want to talk to him. He should've just answered the question, he shouldn't have given all the extra information. Now they were never going to believe that it's really him and he would never see them again. Maybe they knew it was him and they just didn't want him-

"Jason, breathe with me," he heard Marinette's voice. His eyes latched onto hers like a lifeline, he became aware of her hands holding his.

She took his face in her hands and rested her forehead against his, in a motion so familiar that it came as easy as breathing. Well as easy as it usually was to breathe, right now excluded.

After he calmed down, she explained to him what they discussed. They would go to Gotham and meet and discuss things from there.

They wanted to meet him, but they still didn’t completely believe that it was him. He knew this for a fact because they had organized for M’gann to be there to confirm what he was saying. (Yassss M'gann my darling girl, I adore out lil Martian)

Marinette had suggested that they meet in the Batcave in an hour. Everyone had agreed. He assumed she had a plan as to why she wanted to wait. And he trusted her, so he waited for her to explain.

“I want to take the team, as backup. If you’re not comfortable with it, I want to at least take Luka. I would suggest just letting one of us wield is miraculous, but his Second Chance Timer limit is an hour so it would be most beneficial,” she said, gesturing with the hand that wasn’t holding his.

He nodded, sitting up straighter, but not releasing his grip on her hand, “We can bring the team, it’s smart to have backup. Besides if things go haywire, we have Luka to stop us.”

“Then let’s go get our team, love,”

(oh, I should probably mention that only he and LB knows everyone’s Identities. Or well rather no one knows like officially. Like everyone lowkey knows everyone's and a few of them have officially revealed themselves to each other, but not everyone is officially revealed to everyone and Mari and Jason are the only ones who aren’t officially revealed to anyone else, it’s kinda like the vibes of knowing your best friend is queer but not saying anything because they haven’t officially come out yet but like you know because they ain’t nearly as subtle as they think. Like that aesthetic.)

Anyway, 50 minutes later, they’re all gathered on the Eiffel Tower. Jason saw Marinette give Luka a nod to reset his timer. Suddenly he was enveloped in a light with a scratch that wasn’t there a few seconds before on his cheek, his expression quite annoyed.

Marinette immediately furrowed her brows, “How many times?”

Viperion shook his head, “Don’t worry, only one so far, but they try to restrain us. We’re gonna have to try plan b this time,” Everyone nodded, they waited two minutes before the agreed upon time and Mari opened a portal, but instead of appearing out in the opened, they hid in the shadowy parts of the cave.

Jason used his illusion to hide them from any observant eyes and they spread out a bit. He and Mari stayed together, Cloe flew to get a higher perspective and hide Viperion on one of the cave’s many ledges while Chat just moved a few feet away to have a slightly different hiding spot. Kagami dropped into her wind form and was flying above them to eavesdrop, she’d go to Luka if she heard anything of importance so he could go restart again.

They’d be one step ahead of the Bats no matter what they pulled, after all, they had all the time in the world.

They watched them all get into position as time neared. Jason didn’t know all the kids but recognized them from the news.

Dick, Bruce and M’gann stood near the bat computer with Barbara – who was in a wheelchair but that was a realization to deal with later- and Alfred.

The minute they were supposed to appear Jason cast another illusion to make it appear as though they had arrived. As expected, weapons and restraints immediately swarmed on them, each kid going for a different miraculous member. Too bad the images turned into orange dust as soon as they touched them.

The tiny one in the Robin uniform was red in the face and immediately started throwing a tantrum, “Father! They’ve tricked us-,”

Before he could get another word out, Chloe mass-venomed the horde of kids that we’re sent to attack them. He counted Black bat, Red Robin, Batgirl, Signal and Robin. They were all frozen in the middle of the room and before the others near the computer could move, Kagami trapped them in a (rather large) ring of fire. They had enough space to move around comfortably but if they tried approaching the edge the flames would grow larger.

Batman growled and his eyes searched through the cave, but he wouldn’t see them, no matter how hard he searched.

Jason stared at them. Dick was also searching the cave, but he seemed to look more hopeful than angry. Alfred seemed his usual calm self and Barbara was glancing around the cave more subtly. He didn’t bother looking at the rest of the batkids because M’gann was staring right at him, staying right where she was despite her ability to fly.

“Hi, Jason,” she softly spoke into his mind, he felt emotion overwhelm him, she’d known him before everything, and she knew it was him and it was a lot.

He knew she wasn’t probing around his brain for information like he was sure Bruce had asked her to, she didn’t have to, she knew it was him.

“Can you please tell me why we’re surrounded by fire?” she asked.

“We have a time traveller,” he replied.

“Ah, not a fan of Bruce’s restrain and question method, then? Can’t say I blame you, though I do think you’ve proven your point,”

“You really think it’s a good idea to release all of them?” he asked sceptically.

“… Good point. Maybe leave the brood in the middle in whatever frozen state they’re in and just let us in the fire out. They really just think it’s too good to be true… Jason, I won’t let them hurt you,”

“Okay,” he agreed softly. He turned to Marinette and gave her a slight nod. She returned with one of her own.

They walked over to Kagami’s ring of fire and he held their illusion until they were right in front of it. He held on to it for a bit to make sure everyone else would be able to stay in position. Chloe would keep the cavalry venomized and Chat and Viperion would stick to the shadows, unless necessary.

Jason dropped the illusion and watched four heads snap to him. M'gann simply gave him a soft smile and a nod of encouragement.

Kagami moved herself to stand next to Marinette and turned back into her human form, glaring at them with a silent warning.

Their attention was elsewhere, though. For a long time they just stood there and stared at one another in silence. They studied every part of one another they could see.

His eyes caught on Barbara’s wheelchair and he felt ready to destroy whatever put her there. She met his eyes and he held her gaze. She must’ve seen something there because she gave a small smile as she allowed a few tears to escape her eyes.

“Miss Martian?” Batman broke the silence like a cheap dinner plate, shattering it in a matter of seconds.

“It’s him,” M’gann answered without a hint of hesitation.

It was Alfred that moved first. He took a few hesitant steps towards him and before Jason knew it the man was in front of him. Alfred reached out and put a hand on his shoulder, desperately studying him for a moment before pulling him into a hug only Alfred could give.

It took Jason a moment to respond but when he did he returned it wholeheartedly.

After a few minutes they pulled apart and it took him a moment to realize that they’d both started crying. When he looked up Dick was only a few feet away. The moment Alfred stepped away Dick pulled him close.

“I thought you were dead, kid. I thought I’d never see you again, I thought I lost even more family. You were too young, too innocent. Fuck Jason,” Dick whispered, tightening his grip, “I’m so glad you’re alive,”

Jason held on to his brother and that night they cried about terrible endings and broken beginnings. They cried about lost time and found family.

It wasn’t the end yet, Hawkmoth was still terrorizing Paris and he had no idea what Bruce thought yet. There were all his other kids, his brothers and sisters. There were his teammates and the incredible story of how he’d been turned into a bee of all things.

They had a lot of catching up to do.

But just for a moment, a strand of a singular moment, he had his brother in his arms again and he was back home. His first real home.

Things weren’t perfect, as things rarely are but it didn’t matter. Because part of the beauty of life is how it builds and breaks us in a cycle of love and loss.

And that night they laughed with a lightness and joy none of them had fully been able to hold onto in years.

 I hope you guys enjoyed!

This is lowkey totally gonna be the au I go to when I don’t know what to write lol, maybe write a bit of what happens afterwards or a part of everything during the year he lived with Mari them or just y’know shenanigans

[chalkrevelations]

WELL. Episode 3 of Word of Honor.

First of all: If you are NEW or JUST VISITING, this is a re-watch, so there are SPOILERS not just for this ep, but for the ENTIRE SHOW. A lot of them, actually. Scroll away and come back later if you haven’t seen all 36.5 eps and want to watch it unspoiled.

So, this ep feels a little disjointed. I don’t think it actually is, not in the way the back nine are a speedrun where the writing starts to feel like it’s thisclose to coming off the rails, but it feels like it, in that we’re now getting a double handful of threads thrust at us that are only just starting to be woven together into a plot, and it’s the kind of hot mess that any fiberwork looks like before the pattern starts to show itself, particularly when you’re using 15 different color threads from jump. There’s generally a major theme or issue or overriding concept that stands out to me in each ep that, you may have noticed, gets primacy of place in these reactions, but honestly, y’all, I really struggled to figure out what that might be for this episode, because a lot of this, on re-watch, strikes me as groundwork for later developments. Wen Kexing gives us an “as you know, Bob” speech about the Amory and the Glazed Armor, we meet approx. 3.2K new characters, and I feel sort of like I should start keeping a chart of who’s supposed to have a piece of the Glazed Armor and who actually does have a piece of the Glazed Armor, but it’s already so confusing that it might be too late.*

ANYWAY, on re-watch, I can absolutely see the value of spending Eps 1 & 2 on introducing us to Zhou Zishu and Wen Kexing and getting us pulled into their orbit, because then we have scenes we’re already invested in to maintain our interest as the background politics begin to frustratingly play out with a bunch of people we don’t know or have any investment in yet. I mean, y’all. I forgot just what an ill-tempered gremlin ZZS was in these early eps. He is so fk’n put out that these people will not let him drink himself to death in the gutter in peace! Or, you know, in occasional Nightly Nails Torment. And the exasperation from both ZZS and Chengling over WKX’s antics – both of their faces are priceless in the scene when they discover he’s the one who’s bought out all the rooms at the inn. I literally lol’d. Again. Even knowing it was coming. All of this interaction is so delightful. This is actually the ep that provoked my very first WoH keysmash flailing Tumblr post and inaugurated the “wen kexing’s thirst is practically a third character” tag. I guess the biggest throughline for this ep is that we can continue to see how everything changes when we know about their previous relationship – things like WKX’s insistence that they have a “deep bond through fate” take on additional layers of meaning rather than just sounding like some dude who’s trying to pick you up at last call. Interesting that ZZS describes WKX at one point during their push-pull conversational dance as “like a wretched soul that keeps haunting around.” You mean, like a GHOST? Like a Ghost Valley ghost? Like the almost forgotten memory of a past life ghost? ZZS wants to know why WKX keeps following him around, and it would be nice if WKX would just come clean, but that would be too easy, wouldn’t it?

ZZS, re: Chengling: I do my best to ensure what was entrusted to me.

WKX: :makes (already! in ep 3!) yet another in a series of bad decisions not to say anything about the fact that he, himself, was in fact entrusted to ZZS:

Show: Here’s the first of many helpings of heartache to come. EAT IT. EAT IT ALL.

(Me: Well, here’s another AU idea: What would the course of this relationship be like if WKX flat-out asked ZZS what ZZS’s relationship to Four Seasons Manor was, and bare-faced claimed sanctuary as long-lost shidi Zhen Yan at this point? Because I bet there are plenty of ways that could actually go wrong. Not to mention the deliciousness of just watching them navigate a relationship shift that sudden. I feel like, at this point, WKX would have to be actively confrontational about it, would have to throw it in ZZS’s face – it would need to be something he did in the heat of anger, in order to have this pushed out past all of his fears. Like, you say that, but where were you when I needed you? Also, you think so, well what if your responsibility actually turned out to be the TERRIFYING GHOST VALLEY MASTER, what then, huh? And ZZS, still pretty actively suicidal over all of his failures, having to deal with what’s now being presented as YET ANOTHER FAILURE.)

Also, the theme of “knowing” (zhiji, the one I know) is starting to slide in sideways – we’re seeing a lot of back and forth between them asking about seeing the other’s “true face.” WKX says that he’ll tell ZZS what he (WKX) wants from him once he gets to see ZZS’s true face (LIES, it’s going to take a lot longer than that). ZZS asks to see WKX’s figurative true face, and WKX looks kind of sad and contemplative as he warns that it may be unappealing or terrifying. So, you know, we’re starting to poke at all the softest, most tender places and the issues that are going to stab me repeatedly in the heart for the rest of the show. We’re also already seeing the way Xiao Chu just layered in references throughout the script when she wrote it that call back to each other – it’s like almost any line of dialogue references three other lines of dialogue (and that’s without even getting into all of the literary references that I’m missing because I don’t have cultural context). You get things like WKX’s little speech right at the end that it’s hard to tell a ghost from a human, which on its face might be referring to the two “ghosts” that were coming for Chengling that he took care of and act as an admonishment to ZZS not to be so quick to assume they’re actually from Ghost Valley, but it also refers to WKX, himself, and specifically lays the groundwork (“someone wearing a ghost mask is not necessarily a ghost”) for his conversation in a later ep with ZZS when he asks if ZZS thinks he’s a good person, and also calls back (“someone who looks human may not be human”) to the line from earlier in this ep, itself, when WKX tells ZZS that perhaps WKX’s true face is terrifying. And so we get a nicely little wrapped package of the dichotomy of WKX and his issues. (As a somewhat related aside, A-Xiang’s little face when Zhou Zishu says all of the ghosts of Ghost Valley are full of evil (at 6:55). D: This reaction is obviously for herself, but also may be the first time she acts as proxy for Wen Kexing, as well.)

What else, what else?

So, nobody has a good opinion of the jianghu. WKX is going to be constantly all, “You killed my father, jianghu, prepare to die,” but ZZS also goes off about how it’s just about greed, hatred and ignorance, and yeah, I guess he’d have a pretty bad impression of it, when Prince Jin and Tian Chuang seemed like a better option than the pressure he was facing, trying to keep Siji Manor Sect alive back in the day. We talk a lot about WKX’s childhood trauma, because it’s so awful and right in our faces, but I don’t know how much we actually talk about the fact that ZZS was a teenager not much older than Chengling when he inherited a sect and tried desperately to keep it from being torn apart by the rest of the jianghu. I think we see some bitterness come out in the first few episodes – frankly, in this ep, he doesn’t seem to make much of a distinction between Ghost Valley and the rest of the jianghu. Also interesting that the metaphor he uses about the jianghu’s and Ghost Valley’s greed for the treasures of the Armory is “reaping without sowing,” given what we find out is actually in there in Ep 36.

We see our metaphor of light get pulled out again – this throughline strikes me as more like beads on a string than a thread, at this point, but maybe I’ll notice it more on this second time through … Anyway, WKX’s comment at 9:11 that it’s almost dawn is notable. Indeed, but is it because your plan is beginning to work and you can see the destruction of Ghost Valley and the jianghu coming down the pike, or is it because you’ve found your shixiong?

I notice WKX has color-coordinated ZZS and Chengling in the robes he bought for them, has already grouped them together, marked them as belonging to each other – he’s already subtly treating them as each other’s family. The show, with a particular lack of subtlety, also will have ZZS there to wake up Chengling from nightmares later in the end of the ep, as Chengling calls out for his dad in his sleep.

OK, Deng Kuan is the guy in charge of the Yueyang sect contingent that arrived in time to see the Mirror Lake chaos in Ep 2 and has taken charge of cleaning up the bodies in this ep. I actually overlooked him, pretty much, the first time around, but here, he’s already got Shen Shen yelling at him (in a completely ridiculous fashion) for not getting there in time to save the Mirror Lake Sect, so he’s just going to be a punching bag through the whole show, apparently. Shen Shen is wu-di, fifth (little) brother, and he refers to Chengling’s dad as si-ge, fourth (older) brother, so Shen Shen appears to be the youngest of the Five Lakes sworn brothers, leading me to believe that some of what makes him so insufferable through a lot of the show is baby brother syndrome. Also, Shen Shen and his group find the Soul Winding Threads of the Hanged Ghost … supposedly. I mean, the Hanged Ghost was the guy who we saw get got in Ep 1, soooooo …. (remember these Soul Winding Threads, btw).

*This got super long so I’m’a put this last bit under a cut, but I did try to start a running tally of who’s holding a piece of the Glazed Armor:

Each of the Five Lakes Alliance sects is supposed to have a piece of the Glazed Armor, yes? So, as of the end of Ep 3 (hierarchical bro-titles are from didi Shen Shen’s POV):

- Yueyang Sect, led by Gao Chong (da-ge) - presumably still has his

- Tai Hu Sect, led by Zhao Jing (er-ge) – presumably still has his

- Danyang Sect, led by Lu Taichong (san-ge, presumably) – apparently the sect has already been attacked off-screen (by “Ghost Valley?” and WHEN?), as we learn in Ep 3 that Lu-zongzhu has been killed and his remaining two tiny disciples have fled to the protection of Ao Laizi and Tai Shan Sect, one of the lesser sects, and are believed to have taken Danyang’s Glazed Armor with them. We learn this from Tao Hong, Lv Liu and Begger Gang Chief, but I notice that Gao Chong only mentions the Mirror Lake massacre as the precipitating event for the Hero’s Conference and total war on Ghost Valley – he doesn’t even mention Danyang Sect, so does Five Lakes not know about this yet?

- Mirror Lake Sect, led by Zhang Yusen (si-ge) – Zhang-zongzhu killed by “Ghost Valley” in Ep 2, Glazed Armor “missing” and speculated POST EP 2 to have been taken by Ghost Valley (but will turn up in a few eps, thanks to our little Goldbean)

- Dagu Shan Sect, led by Shen Shen (wu-di) – presumably still has his

And then we move to:

- Tai Shan Sect, led by Ao Laizi – in-world speculation is that he now has the Danyang Glazed Armor. We do see him near the end of the ep with the two tiny Danyang shidi, where he makes the intriguing comment that he’s going to follow their shifu’s last wishes and keep their Glazed Armor from falling into the hands of the Five Lakes Alliance, so what exactly was going on between San-ge and his sworn brothers at the time of his death? This group also is apparently being pursued by Shen Shen to get their Glazed Armor, and they make him sound awful. You need better PR, Shen Shen.

- Ghost Valley – POST EP 2, speculated to have taken the Mirror Lake Glazed Armor (FALSE)

NOTABLY, “Ghost Valley Master” set a lot of this chaos in motion in Ep 1 when he claimed that Hanged Ghost (who got got a scene earlier) had stolen HIS piece of the Glazed Armor, although he shouldn’t have a piece (supposedly) until after Ep 2, when he’s believed to have taken Mirror Lake’s. So, what piece would that be, exactly, Terrifying Ghost Valley Master? You wouldn’t be lying in pursuit of chaos would you? (Somewhere, WKX gasps theatrically behind his fan, and he doesn’t even know what motivated it, this time.)

[gamesception]

The Promised Neverland is kind of really good, actually?  I mean, yeah, I’m late to the party as usual, but I just binged the first season of the anime, and then the manga from that point on (the site I was on didn’t have any of the second season, but apparently it diverges from the comic and gets bad anyway, so maybe just read the comic to begin with).  And, I mean, spoilers, obviously, but I’m going to get into some extremely major spoilers here so if you haven’t read it or if you’ve only seen the first season of the anime maybe skip this post and read the manga, but...

...

I’ve tried and failed to write a big long post about all the ways it’s so good, how the main three characters are each so compelling, how its pitch dark but not cynical or misanthropic, with mortal stakes but not gore-porny, positive and optimistic without being trite or naïve, how choosing Emma out of the main three to be the primary protagonist and viewpoint character keeps the story from becoming a masculine militaristic power fantasy, how the antagonists are treated as characters and not just monsters - even the ones that are literal monsters, about how the story never supports or glorifies the idea of sacrificing the weak so that the strong can survive, about how empathy and understanding and a chance for peace are extended to every single villain without putting a burden to forgive on victims and without ignoring the need to fight those who refuse the offer of peace and uphold the status quo, how the story opposes oppressive hierarchies at every turn - not just those the monsters use to control the human children at the farms, but also how the monster elites use access to human meat to controller the lower social classes of monster society, and even to an extent within the human resistance.

But there’s just way too much to talk about to get it all into one big giant post, and I don’t have the stamina for a big extended ongoing project right now - or else I’d return to one of the like 12 I have on hold.

But, like, to pick just one thing....

ok, so eventually we learn what the monsters are and why they eat people.  They’re a weird sort of organism that can temporarily take on the characteristics of things they eat.  Eat a bird and grow wings, eat a bug and grow an exoskeleton, eat a human and gain a humanoid body and the intelligence to become self aware, learn language, form societies - for a while.  But if they go too long without eating people, then they lose their minds and revert to a bestial form.  In order to save the humans, the resistance leader Minerva plans to wipe out the monster society altogether.  After all, they literally have to eat humans to continue being people, there is no possibility of peace.

Protagonist Emma, though, has seen not just the horrific human farms and their cruel and corrupt rulers, but also their towns and settlements, their families and children.  She was even saved at one point shortly after her escape by friendly monsters who opposed the farm system, and even though it seems impossible, she wants to save both the humans and the monsters.

A more typical show, at least among those with premises as dark as The Promised Neverland, wouldn’t take Emma’s side in this.  She would be forced to ‘grow up’ and face the fact that she can’t save everyone.  Her naivety would get someone killed to break her heart and teach her to be hard and cruel as if those things are virtues.  Or, more likely, she wouldn’t be the viewpoint character to begin with, she’d be a side character whose ideals would get herself killed in order to elevate the male characters’ angst and justify their violence.  Either way, the message would be “Emma’s ideals were unrealistic and could never survive contact with the harsh reality of the world.”

TPN instead takes Emma’s Side.  She finds monsters who maintain a humanoid body and intelligence without eating humans, and they’re able to spread that trait to the rest of monster society while the humans all escape to the human world.  Now, as much as I don’t like the grimdark ‘there is no peaceful option’ hypothetical version of the story, this development could have been handled pretty badly.  Like, just reading it like that, it sounds like the story raised a big moral dilemma and then chickened out of it.  But that’s really not how it comes off while you’re reading it, for a couple reasons.

First of all, Emma meets the non-human-eating monsters early in the story, long before we get the explanation of how monsters in general work.  So by the time we learn that the monsters must eat humans to maintain their self identity, the audience already knows that there are exceptions and that an alternative exists.  The story never sets this up to be a moral dilemma in the first place, so when the issue is bypassed it doesn’t feel like it’s undercut itself.

More importantly, though, is the thematic & metaphorical content.  Because the monster society is a pretty explicit metaphor for unjust human societies, and monsters represent the people who make up such societies.  Not just the aristocrats who benefit from the unjust society, or those who directly enforce and uphold it, but also regular people.  People insulated just enough from the suffering and death that their lives are built on that they can turn a blind eye to it, but aware enough of their complicity in that suffering that they construct excuses to justify their part in it, and by proxy excuse those at the top who actually benefit from and shaped the society as it is.  People living lives simultaneously just comfortable enough to keep them docile, but precarious enough that they’re too caught up with struggling to maintain the tenuous grasp on the lives they have to feel like they can work towards anything better.  Monster society in TPN is a cage built out of the corpses of humans cattle, but built to imprison and enslave the monster civilians who eat them.

Hanging the story on the fantastical element of monster biology would divorce it from that essential metaphor while also endorsing an outright genocidal worldview, and TPN explicitly calls out the plan to wipe out the monsters altogether as just that - genocidal.  It never even pretends to entertain the notion that the audience should accept that plan as the right choice, even while it doesn’t condemn Minerva for pursuing it. When Emma is proposing her plan to Minerva, the deal she strikes with him is ‘I will try to make my peaceful solution happen, and if I succeed then you cancel your plan to wipe out the monsters’.  Minerva is eventually shown to be lying when he makes that agreement, but Emma isn’t, and note the if there.  If Emma’s plan fails, then she - and thus the narrative - accepts that Minerva’s plan to save the children is still better than leaving things as they are, even if it means wiping out all the monsters.  After all, the society IS monstrously unjust, and even the lower classes within that society ARE complicit in that injustice.

Minerva’s problem isn’t even presented as a matter of him hating the monsters too much to see a route to peace with them.  The story doesn’t frame the conflict between Minerva’s and Emma’s plans as hate vs. love or revenge vs. forgiveness.  It’s instead more of ‘hierarchy and division bad, mutualism/openness/relying on each other good’.  The point is to show how Minerva’s role as a figurehead who believes he has to project strength to uphold the hope that the other humans have placed in him has worn away his ability to rely on others or to be open to alternatives they offer, leaving him with rigid and inflexible thinking.

So when Minerva learns about the monsters who don’t need to eat humans, he doesn’t see an opportunity for a better outcome - potentially even an easier outcome since he doesn’t have to make enemies of the entirety of monster society - rather he sees a threat to his plan to starve the monsters back into an animalistic state.

And if that whole subplot isn’t explicit enough, Minerva’s internalized need to project strength also results in his physical body wasting away in secret from a condition he believes to be untreatable, but the moment he finally breaks down and admits he needs help Emma is able to point to a solution, one that again doesn’t come across as a cop out because again it takes the form of another character the audience was already introduced to a long time ago.

In a story arc that the second season of the anime adaptation apparently cut entirely, wow the more I hear about anime season 2 the worse it sounds.  And after the first season was so good....

...

Anyway, I tried to pick just one thing and this post still turned into a colossal gushing word cascade, and there are so many other elements to talk about.  Like how The ‘Mothers’ and ‘Sisters’ are menacing villains with seemingly no empathy for the children, but when Sister Krona realizes she’s lost the power struggle with Isabella she leaves the kids tools to help them, and then when Mother Isabella realizes the children have escaped, she covers up the route they used in order to buy them a little extra time to get away.  It’s these little touches - just as much as the short backstories that follow them - that show us how, while they might uphold the system out of fear for their own lives, and might have rationalize their part in it in order to live with the horrible things they’re doing, the mothers and sisters don’t actually hate the children.  Knowing that makes it believable when in the end Isabella does turn on the system, and every single one of the other mothers and sisters join her.

The bit when the fighting is mostly over and she tells the Mother at the house “it’s over, now we can just love them” and the other woman breaks down crying is so sad and human, it makes me tear up thinking about it..

Like I said, all the villains are characters, not just monsters.  They all have motivations for the horrific things they do - sometimes irrational, often selfish, but not even the most unforgivable of the monsters are just evil for evil’s sake.

Again, I’m rambling.  It’s just...  I’m used to these sorts of pitch dark dystopias being, for lack of a better term, kinda fashy in their messaging?  Or at the very least deeply cynical and misanthropic and just kind of mean spirited.  And TPN is so completely the opposite of that, in so many ways.

[ramblinganthropologist]

MER Week Day 4: Mass Effect + Mass Effect Andromeda

Summary: 2179. What should have been a normal shore leave on the Citadel leaves Alistair and Bo Peep Shepard in a place they’ve never been before: teachers. What can these battle hardened biotics teach young Kitty and Dick... and why do they look so damn familiar?

---

“Well… we’re here. What do you want to do?”

“How about anything other than getting shot at?”

Now that was something Alistair could agree on as he stretched out as far as he could. His body was still sore from the last mission, the lack of sleep, and the ride to the Citadel. Honestly, he was amazed his bones weren’t cracking to bits as he walked along, taking in the artificial sunshine of the space station. Given what he had just been through, it was a true surprise he was still one piece.

Well, maybe that was to be expecting. After all, he and Bo were N7. They were supposed to be tough.

“Could always head to the Tea Cozy, unless you wanted to save that until tomorrow.” He threaded his arms behind his head as he walked, definitely not the picture of a military officer by any means. “Or we could check out the hamsters at Citadel Critters.”

Above his head, Bo rolled her eyes. “Last time I was there, you forgot I existed when you got too deep into discussions on how fucked up the breeding lines at the gift shop are.”

“Well, they are. I don’t know what they think they’re trying to pull…” His voice trailed off. Bo was giving him that look. “Right… specialist knowledge, general application. I’ll stop now.”

She gave him a nod. “That a boy. Honestly, I could go for chicken nuggets that come from a fryer instead of a microwave. It’s been too long since we’ve had real food.”

Real food sounded great right then, especially if it involved a milkshake. Just thinking about them made Alistair’s stomach growl. Judging from the noises coming from his sister, he wasn’t alone in the assessment. Easy enough – lunch it was. Lucky for them, they weren’t too far from one of their other favorite spots.

A few moments later, and the pair were seated by one of the many fountains that dotted the Citadel, their food spread out in front of them. For most people, it would have been a lot. For them, not so much. When it came down to it, they both just needed to eat way more food to keep their biotic systems operating at peak capacity. There was a term for it, and Alistair knew it, but he wasn’t thinking like a medic then. Instead, he was cradling a large paper cup happily, the sleeves of his jacket insulating his hands as he poked in the straw into the bright green concoction.

Nothing like Citadel Burger’s Shamrock Shake. Was he being a bad Irishman that he loved them? Probably, but it wasn’t like he was born in Ireland – that was his parent’s problem, and they were dead, so they really didn’t have anything to say on the matter. Until they managed it, he was content to put a hurting on the milkshake as he started to nibble on the straw.

“You’re supposed to use that to drink, you know.” Bo snickered as she started on her first order of nuggets. The first dip of the day was barbeque sauce, or at least it smelled that way. “You look like Fluffytail like that.”

He would’ve stuck out his tongue, but that would’ve been messy. Instead, he just kept drinking his milkshake and swinging his foot that didn’t quite touch the ground. What could he say, the benches were designed for aliens, and he wasn’t exactly designed for playing basketball. It was something he had… mostly… come to accept.

Mostly.

“I won’t bite through this one.” He leaned back to watch the crowd in front of them. Then downside of Alliance life was being absolutely surrounded by humans. Even back on Mindoir, there had been aliens around, even if they had been far less numerous than the space station. It was why he liked coming to the Citadel – it helped remind him they were part of a community. Of course, that community wasn’t all that fond of humans yet, but they were getting there.

Speaking of community… off the distance, Alistair watched a C-SEC agent picked up the pace. He looked rather upset about something, but it wasn’t clear what. Or, rather, it wasn’t until the blast of light knocked them into a bush.

“What the fuck.” Bo shot him a glance as she got up, bringing her nuggets with her. “Was that?”

She didn’t need to finish the sentence – Alistair had felt it too. It was the telltale tingle of human powered biotics, as if their amps were ringing out in response to the activity. More than that, it was uncontrolled as hell. That left only a few options – someone who was clearly about to melt down, or they were a kid who had no idea what they were doing. Neither were circumstances he trusted a C-SEC agent to handle, and from the looks of things he wasn’t alone. So, he picked up his milkshake and followed behind his sister as they headed over.

The officer, a young turian with blue face paint, was groaning in the bush. His armor was a bit scuffed, but he hadn’t sustained any permanent damage. He wasn’t alone either – in front of the bush, a teenager was laying spread eagle, dazed and confused.

“Human cannonball’s a classic… so who launched them?” Alistair glanced from human to turian. Neither looked badly hurt, but they probably had some scrapes that medigel could fix. “Bo, want to go?”

But she was already gone before he could finish the statement, heading off in the direction of a nearby park. That left him alone, shaking his head as he activated his medigel dispenser. Lucky for him, he had just refilled it before getting off the ship.

Medigel – never leave home without it.

“Alright, so who wants medigel?” He glanced towards the turian, who was already starting to come to. “How about you, Officer- “

The turian stood up, wincing a little. “Vakarian. I’m fine, just a little rattled. Some human kids…”

His voice trailed off. One of the human kids was still groaning at his feet, clearly the loser in the fight between the species. Honestly, they were kind of pathetic, laying there in a lump, half hidden by an oversized sweatshirt that was clearly a few sizes too large.

Boy, was that a reminder of his teenage years…

“I think they need this more than you.” Alistair knelt down to assess the patient. “Hey, are you able to focus?”

Green eyes slowly focused on him – good, no concussion. While he was shit at gauging ages, they couldn’t have been older than 17. More than that, the metal jutting out of the back of their neck was new. Most kids that weren’t him got that at puberty and spent time after that practicing so they didn’t blow shit up. Clearly, someone was still in the blowing shit up phase.

So… he’d put them 16 at best.

“Y-yeah…” they groaned, holding their head. “Where…”

Officer Vakarian filled that in for him. “In the Presidium. You know you’re not supposed to use biotics here, Dick.”

He looked around, towards where Bo had run off. “Did Kitty cause it this time?”

Dick and Kitty… well, Alistair was in no position to judge anyone’s names Still, at least the officer knew his would-be patient. That would make getting them back on their feet easier, especially if he had access to their emergency contacts.

He wasn’t really used to using those while people were still alive… so this was going to be a new one for him.

Dick shook his head, and then instantly seemed to regret it as he started to groan. “Maybe? It’s kind of a blur, Officer Vakarian…”

He looked up at Alistair, frowning. “Was it that bad you brought the EMTs in?”

Alistair chuckled as he waved his hand. “Don’t worry, I’m just a passerby. I can fix up your scrapes, though. It doesn’t look like you’ve got a concussion. Still getting used to your biotics, I see.”

He offered his hand, and the boy took it. Much to his quiet relief, Dick was still shorter than him. It was a little petty, but the marine took his small victories when he got them. Besides, the boy would outgrow him in a year or so. They always did.

Maybe he had been kidding about being mostly ok with his height… he was only human.

“Yeah… I got my amp six months ago.” Dick touched the back of his neck, frowning. “How’d you know?”

Before Alistair could answer, his attention was drawn by a flash of pink. Bo had returned, and at her side was another teenager. This one shared Dick’s face and green eyes, but the hair was blue and there was a bandage over their nose. At least they didn’t seem too put off by his sister, though the sight of Officer Vakarian caused them to blanche.

Ah. He knew an instigator when he saw one. Somebody was busted.

“We were totally not in the common area, Officer Vakarian, I swear.” Who he assumed was Kitty held up her scraped hands – yep, those were going to need medigel. “Dick and I were just…”

The turian shook his head. “Just using your biotics outside of a registered practice zone. That’s the third time this week. I left you off the last time, but now I’m going to have to call your parents on this one.”

The two teenagers winced at the thought, and Alistair felt a pang of sympathy. While he hadn’t been as young as them when he’d first gotten his amp, he remembered the early jitters of new biotics and the need to get them working. Of course, he had never launched a C-SEC agent into a bush, but… well, hormones and biotics were tricky.

“What if my sister and I talked to them about it?”

All eyes were suddenly on him – the hopeful gaze of the two would-be criminals, the mildly confused glance of the turian agent, and his sister, looking amused by this. Talk about a tough room to work. At least sweat didn’t bead on his forehead. Maybe he was getting used to public speaking.

And maybe the hanar would get into rodeo. No way he was ever talking in front of people…

“And… what would that do?” Officer Vakarian cocked his head to the side. Most people would take that as instigating, but there wasn’t the tone to his voice. Instead, he sounded curious. Maybe he wanted to see how this would play out.

Smart man – maybe he’d be the lucky one to make it to retirement.

Bo was the one who answered for him. She motioned to her neck, allowing the metal to catch the light. Unlike the two teenagers’, her amp had seen some action. It was scuffed and starting to look a little dull. His probably wasn’t much better, but it wasn’t like he could see it. After all, it was on the back of his fucking head.

“We’re biotics who got past the unintentional blow shit up phase.”

Emphasis in her case on unintentional.

Alistair nodded though, keeping his eye on the turian all the while. “Plus, I think two N7 level marines could give these two a worthy lecture. No need to get their parents in on this, Officer. You’ve probably got a hundred more important things to do, right?”

Nothing like giving someone an out and reminding them of the work piling up to get them off your case. He could practically see the gears churning underneath the face plates and face paint. Just a few more seconds of contemplation…

Officer Vakarian sighed and shook his head. “Try to keep an eye on your sister, Dick. I’ll let you both off with a warning this time since these two are going to vouch for you.”

The twins visibly relaxed at this. Not long after, the turian departed – probably to go write a parking ticket or mess up someone else’s day. This left Alistair and Bo in a weird quasi state of loco parentis that definitely made him sweat a little as he eyed the two teenagers in front of him.

Maybe he should’ve thought this one out better.

“Well, I’m getting back to our food before the Keepers clean it up.” Bo glanced over her shoulders at their new friends. “Follow me if you don’t want to get arrested, squirts.”

Back to the food it was then. Much to Alistair’s relief, the Keepers had left it alone. Of course, that didn’t matter much – there were mild injuries to be treated. More importantly, he realized he was getting a rather dirty look from Kitty as she glanced over at him.

Was it something he said?

At least Dick didn’t seem to mind as he settled into the bench. “Thanks for saving us… I don’t think you said your name.”

“Alistair, and that’s my sister Bo.” She nodded her head at his introduction. “Not a problem. Who wants the medigel first?”

Kitty shot him another dirty look as she tugged at her brother’s sleeve. “Thanks for the save, but not int- “

Contact with her scraped palms was enough to make her hiss. Alistair shook his head as he motioned for her to come over. She fought it briefly, but soon she was seated across from him, holding out her hands as he applied the medigel. Maybe in a few years she would be a proper badass like Bo, but she still had a ways to go. Still, not bad for a 16-year-old, especially one so new to biotics. There was hope for her yet.

“Best to clean these up before they get infected. Biotics mess with heal rates and germs can get trapped underneath the skin.” He motioned to Bo. “Ask her if you don’t believe me.”

Next to him, his sister bristled. “That was ONE time…”

And once was enough for him.

“Yeah, whatever, thanks.” Kitty pulled her healed hands away, almost as if she was burned. “Can we go now? I get enough N7 bullshit at home, I don’t need it from two randos on shore leave.”

She sent him a withering glance. “Especially not from the boy scout over here.”

Well, wasn’t someone a fucking delight…

“Kitty, they’re just being nice…” Dick frowned as he turned towards the pair. “Sorry… we uh… don’t really get along with our dad. He’s N7 too.”

Huh. Now that Alistair was getting a good look at them, something did strike him as vaguely familiar. It wasn’t exact, but he’d sworn he’d seen those eyes somewhere before, it just was hard to put his finger on it. Maybe it had been someone he had been in training with? It was going to drive him nuts… damn name was on the tip of his tongue.

“Most of them are bastards except for me and the boy scout.” Bo, always the fountain of truth. “What’s his name? Maybe we kicked his ass for you once or twice during training.”

At the mention of her father’s ass being kicked, Kitty brightened. “God, I hope so. He’s such an ass… but his name’s Alec Ryder.”

…

Oh, fuck.

Alistair felt his eye twitch as he looked from one teen to the next. He could see it now, in the defiant set of Kitty’s jaw and the pointed accuracy of Dick’s gaze. Normally, he saw those features combined and set into the face of an old man he wanted to blast into a fucking wall. Maybe the outright lack of assholeism was enough to make him temporarily forget the face of the man he hated more than anyone else.

Who the hell had taste bad enough to marry Alec Ryder, and where could he send his condolences?

“That asshole is your dad?” Bo snorted. “Al, I think you just found someone to beat you in the shittiest father competition.”

Oh, how he wanted to agree… but was it wrong to badmouth a father in front of his children like this?

Dick must’ve been a mind reader, because he smiled awkwardly. “It’s ok if you don’t like him, we think he’s an asshole too.”

“Oh, thank God…” Alistair sighed in relief. “I didn’t want to talk badly about him in front of you if you liked him.”

So sue him, he didn’t exactly put much stock in father-child relationships. After all, his fucking sucked. Judging from the looks on the twins’ faces, they knew exactly how he felt. And how could they not – they had Alec fucking Ryder for a father. The man was a blowhard douchebag on a good day; Alistair didn’t even want to think of what he might be like at home. His poor wife…

Nah, he was definitely divorced. No way anyone stayed married to that man for long.

“Well, at least we know other Alliance people hate him. Guess that means we’re not crazy.” Kitty seemed visibly cheered by this as she grabbed for one of Alistair’s fries – he let her; she was a growing biotic. “So, what about that little lecture you were planning? Can we skip it if we promise never to do it again and don’t cross our fingers this time?”

At that, Alistair shook his head. “No, we do need to talk about that. You got lucky this time because your strike was off. Full force could’ve really hurt Officer Vakarian or your brother.”

Dick’s head picked up very slightly at that – and as the pieces fell into place, his heart went out to him. Kitty on the other hand just looked mildly annoyed at the assessment of her aim as she stole some more fries. Lucky for him, he’d gotten extra.

“I didn’t even dent his armor…”

Bo snorted. “Not with a strike that weak. If you really want to put some force into it, you need to generate a little spin before you strike. It makes it hit harder.”

“It does?”

Oh, no. He could see where this one was going… best to nip it in the bud before Officer Vakarian got launched out the airlock with their next practice attempt.

“You need better control before you attempt something like that.” He sipped absent-mindedly at his milkshake. “And better separation of your attack styles. That felt like a half warp, half singularity to me. I would focus on getting each move down first.”

It was an argument that often fell on deaf ears, especially if they belonged to teenagers. He could just tell from the look on Kitty’s face that the kind of practice he was suggesting would bore her to tears. On the bright side, at least her brother looked interested. Dick actually had his omni-tool out and was honest-to-God taking notes.

Kid like that was an ego boost and a half… talk about having a favorite.

“That works fine for defense, but if you’re interested in front line assault, you need power. Sometimes it come down to who can hit harder.” Bo cracked her knuckles for emphasis. “I’d start lifting weights honestly.”

He shot her a look over his milkshake. “You’re going to turn them into berserkers, Bo.”

“What, it’s a valid strategy. You teach yours your way, I’ll handle mine.” Bo motioned for Kitty to get closer. “Now… the key to a good smack…”

Alistair was left groaning as he gave up – he knew a lost cause when he saw one. At least there would always be a future for them in destruction. On the bright side, he still had an attentive pupil, eager for more information. He could work with that.

“Well, since they’ve decided to go blunt force, we could discuss defensive maneuvers…”

“Sure, sounds good!”

Music to his ears… now, where to start?

---

“Thanks, Bo! I’ll let you know how the weightlifting goes!”

Kitty’s voice carried over the Presidium as she and her brother waved goodbye. Apparently, it was time for them to go home for dinner. This left their two impromptu instructors standing by the fountain, watching them go.

They were good kids, if a little green.

“Kid’s going to be killer when she gets older.” Bo chuckled, clearly pleased. “How about yours? We got another brick wall in the making?”

Alistair nodded as he worked to clean up their trash. “Dick has promise if he works on controlling his barriers. The new amps are great for fine motor skills. I can’t wait to see what they come up with as their hormone levels even out.”

With any luck, he wouldn’t see either of them in the Alliance anytime soon. As much as he appreciated them helping to keep his brain for overheating, the last thing he wanted was for a young biotic to think their only option was the military. Things were getting better now, or at least better than they had been when he was their age. Maybe with luck, they’d avoid it altogether.

That was at least his hope for them.

“Kitty said she’s going to send me some vids when she makes progress. She’ll probably slide the string bean in there too.” The sight of the clock in the nearby square caused Bo to wince. “Shit, it’s really that late? We were talking to those kids for two hours…”

No wonder his throat hurt so much…

“Guess we just got excited.” The pair started walking back to where they were staying, plans still on their mind for tomorrow. “Though, hard to believe they’re Alec Ryder’s kids.”

Bo snorted at that. “Yeah, they’re actually hu- “

She stopped, and then started to snicker. “Damn… can’t believe I didn’t pick that up until now.”

Alistair cocked his eyebrow as he watched his sister chuckle. If there was a joke, he wasn’t getting it. Of course, maybe he was just tired from the explanations. Either way, it be nice if she let him in sometime.

“What?”

“Their names are Dick and Kitty Ryder.” Another snicker. “Dick Ryder, come on…”

…

“Come on, Al, you know you’d have gone there too if you were in his shoes. Don’t hate cause the kid picked a better name than you did.”

He wasn’t hating… he was appreciating the balls it took to run with the joke all the way to legal documents. There was a difference.

“I would’ve gone with Knight or Ghost personally, but we all know my opinions on riding dick.” It was a miracle he kept a straight face at that.

“He had to, you already got Kitty Ryder. Gotta complete the set after all.”

Bo was grinning like the cat that ate the canary, and honestly, he wasn’t doing much better if the shake of his shoulders was anything to go by. At least he managed to keep walking, though a thousand jokes were still bubbling up with every step he took. He pushed them down – didn’t want to overdo it after all.

“Come on, let’s get back before we find some more biotic children to mentor. I want to watch Forensic Files VI tonight.”

“Ugh, you always want to watch Forensic Files…”

What, it was like the only thing available in like every system. So sue him.

Still, Alistair got a good feeling about the future as he walked with Bo by his side. If the new generation of biotics were like the pair in the park, maybe things would turn out better. Hell, maybe one day he’d hear about the Ryder twins making their own history.

Of course, that was for another day.  At the moment, he had more pressing matters in mind – like beating Bo back so he could wrestle away control of the remote for a few hours. That was a fight he was willing to go to the death on.

Ah, nothing like shore leave. Why wasn’t it always this enlightening?

[malachi-walker]

thought: I know almost nobody would think this unironically because it’s utterly fucking deranged, but the unfortunate implicative intersection between “the fiction you consume and create is indicative of your morality” and “a proper redemption arc for Catra would’ve ended with her dying” is “if you realize that you have done bad things in the past and want to redeem yourself, the first step is to kill yourself”, which, uhhh,,,,,, yeah

Ok, fair warning, I am really tired thanks to several days of family emergency, so I am incapable of gauging how coherent this is. Also please note there is some vitriol, but it's not meant to be directed at everyone who dislikes Catra, just that special brand of anti who decides liking Catra is a good reason for them to pass judgement on you and make sure you know you're scum. Pissbabies, basically.

But sadly I do think this is something that carries over into reality more than anyone wants to admit, especially when you consider how often sacrificing your life is considered to be an ultimate expression of good and not a tragic waste of human potential in spite of what it accomplishes. Or--and this is just the one that's affected me most personally since the tender age of 12--the double standard of how men are allowed to do awful shit like aid in totalitarian conquest, burn villages, and nearly kill the hero (looking at you, Zuko) but their redemption arcs are accepted and hailed as narrative brilliance whereas a female character who does the same from an equally if not worse background of abuse is an awful bitch who should just be left to die. And again, I was 14 the first time someone told my parents right in front of me that I was just a lost cause and they should give up on me, without even knowing anything about me beyond me being a troublemaker with emotional problems beyond what a pep talk could fix, so despite how deranged the implication is it IS something that has real world carry over. The kind of carry over that tells a 14 year old responding badly to a lifetime of abuse at the hands of her murderous birth father that she's just evil and should be given up on because she'll never get better even though she's only just now getting a shot at therapy. Yeah. That happened to me personally. (Did I mention I grew up in the bible belt?)

But back to narrative stuff. The problem with the redemption = death trope is that it only has a net outcome of (and that's if done correctly, a lot of uses fuck it up regardless) cancelling out the bad you did in the past, but also leaves someone incapable of creating any further good and thus taking that score from a neutral zero into positive digits. And it is very much a cultural double standard that you see everywhere narratively, but I don't know about you, but even in situations where it would be absolutely the only option I would still see it as a horrible waste of potential future good.

Also those people conveniently forget that if Catra had died, no one would have stopped Adora's sacrifice. So whether or not you believe Catra's survival is a net positive (I obviously do) calling for her death because of that bullshit double standard does pay massive negative dividends down the line, where Adora at best dies heroically and wastefully against Prime to be hailed as a hero but never get a chance to live a happy life for herself or at worst fails completely due to the poison and the Heart of Etheria ends up in Prime's hands to skullfuck the entire universe with. In fact, the fact that they both survive is a perfect refutation of the narrative concept of sacrifice being a positive under any circumstances. It's a waste, whether it's Catra dying after getting a chance to finally do some good but being unable to or Adora sacrificing everything without ever getting to live for herself because the hero always has to give everything.

Oh, and that whole "fiction consumed being indicative of your morality" thing? If they're saying my morals are trying to give people a second chance to make some good out of their lives instead of just killing them and taking the neutral or negative, then those are morals I'd be pretty damn proud of to stand by. Because I've been there. Because I've been a bad person and done my best to become better, and maybe I would have been able to do it better if everyone around me didn't insist on constantly punishing me for it instead of trying to understand me. And because it's easy as fuck to sit on your ivory tower judging everyone below... Right up until you're the one falling to the ground and hoping someone gives you a hand up before you splatter. And frankly I don't buy that correlation to begin with, so it's already a flawed argument. If there were a correlation between morality and the media you consume, for one there would be a hell of a lot more serial killers running around considering the true crime genre exploded a few years ago and is now more popular than it's ever been in history.

But let's be real here. None of these people are actually considering the overall implications of the view they're espousing. They're just pissy because the mean catgirl didn't get murdered (except she did. And only survived via deus ex She-ra) and will come up with any faux-intellectual argument for why they're right and anyone happy with Catra's redemption is wrong because they can't fathom a world with grey areas or no clear right or wrong answer that they can't fall into. Honestly, this purity rhetoric reminds me of something...

But I'm not surprised that point would escape those people.

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #368

“whatever doesn’t kill you, is gonna leave a scar”

Have you ever bought a YouTuber’s merch? My favorite shirt is the Day of the Dead design by Cloak, which is Markiplier's and jacksepticeye's clothing brand. Mom's friend/former co-worker also got me a Ninja Sex Party shirt because she knew I liked them. There are SO MANY YouTubers I wanna support by buying shirts. Do you think oatmeal tastes better when made with water or milk? Milk, 110%. Have you ever left a note in a library book? No. What time of day do you prefer to wash your hair? Morning. Has anyone ever spread lies about you? Yes. Have you ever taken a photograph with a celebrity? If so, did it turn out the way you wanted, or do you wish you could retake it? No. If you could move out of your home country permanently, would you? If so, where would you go? If it didn't mean being so very far from my family, I would love to move to Canada. Is there a celebrity that everyone else seems to love, but you find totally overrated? Why is it that you don’t like them? I legit don't know who's considered currently popular, and I especially don't know who they are as people. If you could volunteer for any charity, which one would you choose? Do you think it’s more important to help humans, or are animal and environmental charities equally important? Something relating to animals, and I think they're both equally important. Do you prefer holidays where you relax, or actually do things? I like a mix. Something chill, but you still do some stuff as a family. Do you think that after we die our spirit is still alive? Yes. Has anybody ever told you that you could be a model? Someone has mistaken me for a model in a picture I once took. It was one of the most flattering things I've ever heard, haha. Do you use different kinds of moisturizer for different body parts? ie. hand lotion for your hands, face cream for your face. Or do you just use one moisturizer for all body parts? Yes. Have you ever felt like you were someone’s rebound? No. Has anybody ever broken up with you over something really pathetic? What was it? Have you ever been dumped in a disrespectful way? (eg. through text, through a friend..) I have 100% been dumped in a very cowardly and disrespectful way; after dating Jason for nearly four years and being very serious, he broke up with me very abruptly over Facebook Messenger. His reason was valid, but at the same time, he NEVER talked to me about it. Apparently my depression was dragging him down. If he'd fucking communicated it, I would have explored new treatment options so goddamn fast. But no, he decided to snap his fingers and disappear. That's exactly WHY it was so traumatic, I think: it was so unexpected and sudden. Did you have a lot of role models as a kid? Animal enthusiasts like Steve Irwin and Jeff Corwin for sure. Do you feel like anyone looks up to you? Why or why not? God no. I'm just... not someone to aspire to be like. What was the last thing you found offensive? I'm not sure. Who is the nicest person you know? My mom. Do you feel safe in your country? I feel safe in NC, rather. Like I don't expect an atom bomb or terrorist attack or something in this obscure area. In the U.S.A. itself, sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. America is definitely not loved by every other country. Do you feel safe where you live? Not in this city, no. Have you been falsely diagnosed with something by a bad doctor? Yup. Did y'all know I apparently have ADHD? I know, shocking. Have you ever had a doctor refuse to treat you? No. Name the strangest game you’ve ever played (video game or real game): The first Silent Hill, probably. It took a lot of reading to get it. Do you know anyone who has been struck by lightning before? No. Which cartoon character would you want to keep as a pet? Does Stitch count? Or a Pokemon. Do you like marshmallows? Yes. What is your favorite flavor of candy cane? I really like the Jolly Rancher candy canes, I think they are? Have you ever fostered an animal? No. Do you still take hot showers when it’s hot out? Not as hot, but not cold except on very extreme occasions. When writing $ sign, do you draw one line through the S or two? Two. What animal have you always wanted as a pet but couldn’t have? I'm thankful that my parents were pretty open-minded to what pets I really wanted, but one I was never allowed to have was a ferret because of how messy and smelly they are. List three people you’ve had crushes on: Jason, Sara, and Sebastian were probably my biggest crushes. Have you ever thrown up from cramps? No, but god have I felt close. List three people you had a hard time forgiving. Jason, Colleen, and my dad. Who is the most spiritual person you know? Probably my sister's mother-in-law. Would you ever start a vlog? God no, I'd bore people to tears. Are your dreams coming true yet? I mean, I guess in some ways with my mental health. In my deepest depression, what I have now was a dream, even though current me is very discontent with it. Most of my dreams, though? No. Do you struggle with depression? I've been diagnosed with severe depression since 7th grade. Are you haunted by your past? A few things won't leave me alone. What medical conditions do you have? Just a lot. There are even more that are up for debate. I've talked about my diagnosed conditions enough. Do you use a Magic Bullet? No. What does your apron look like? I don’t have one. What are your favorite spicy foods? Hot Cheetos, Takis, hot wings, jalapeno pizza... Man, I love spicy food. Which do you like better: being an adult or being a kid? Being a kid. Were you excited to be a teenager on your thirteenth birthday? I had very mixed feelings. Did you feel insecure in high school? Shit, I still do. Would you ever be friends with someone who was suicidal? What the FUCK is this question? No fucking shit I would be. Someone being suicidal in no way affects who they are as a person. Who was the biggest bully in high school? I don't think there really was one. What was your favorite class in high school? Art. Would you rather have a daughter or a son? If I wanted kids, a daughter. Have you ever written to an advice columnist? No. Have you ever had a doctor not believe what you told him? Maybe? I did however have an employee at the ER the first time I went try to pry out of me that my self-mutilation was for attention, and it wasn't until I insisted about a dozen times that it wasn't that he believed me. It's odd looking back that I got REALLY attached to him during that stay, knowing now that it was absolutely horrible and extremely unhelpful for him to do that. If you’re female, would you feel uncomfortable having a male gynecologist? I would absolutely refuse to have a male one. Do you like Lisa Frank? Yeah, like can you talk about aesthetic. What gives you nightmares? Boy, I wish I could tell you, given how much I have them. Were you ever hospitalized as a child? No. Did you get senior pictures taken? No. What color is your bicycle? I don’t have one. Did you ever have to take home a fake baby in health class? No, thank fuck. Would you rather wear ivory or white on your wedding day? What color will your bridesmaids wear? I'd rather wear black. I think red will be the bridesmaids' color. Would you rather have a swimming pool or trampoline? I want a swimming pool so damn badly so I could exercise my legs without worrying about sweating, and I can stop and rest whenever I want, unlike going walking or something. I don't think my knees could handle a trampoline. Do you think babies are cute? Some, sure. But a lot, not really. Do you dream about the future a lot? Yeah. Do you think about your past a lot? Way too frequently. How good are you at living in the moment? I'm trying to get better at it. Have you ever questioned God’s existence? Yeah. Vanilla frosting or chocolate? Chocolate. What’s your favorite foreign cuisine? I've actually been exploring Italian pasta lately. I'm not a big fan of foreign food that I've tried, though. Have you ever moved to another state? No. Did you do anything productive today? No. .-. Can you say the alphabet backwards? No, actually. Do you like flowers? Of course; does anyone not? Have you ever thought you were gonna die? I didn't care if I did or didn't. What kind of mood are you in today? I was honestly really depressed through most of it. Just health stuff was really getting to me. I just woke up from what was honestly like a four-hour nap and I feel all right, I guess. What are you craving right now? I REALLY want Domino's jalapeno pizza. Is there anyone you would seriously punch right now if you had the chance? No. What is worse, physical or emotional pain? Definitely emotional. Have you ever walked in on somebody doing something… questionable? When Dad still lived with us, I think he might have been watching... you know... on TV when I came into my parents' room for something. Idk for sure though. I didn't ask, and I don't want to know. If you were to make videos on YouTube, what would they be of? Oh god, idk. I don't want to make any. What I'd have most fun with would be reptile education, but I 1.) have literally one snake, 2.) am not extremely educated on a good number of them and don't want to be misleading, and 3.) I would run outta content fast. So, leave it to Snake Discovery, haha. Posting pictures of yourself in a bathing suit on the internet - ok or not? Yes, it's okay????? If you're talking about me personally though, you won't see me dead in a bathing suit picture. Do you typically laugh when somebody falls down? No, I gasp and see if they're okay. What is the most disturbing movie you’ve ever watched? Paranormal Entity. The ending is... a lot. Your opinion of Katy Perry, please? I like a couple of her songs. If you could say anything to your Mom right now… what would it be? "Thank you for absolutely everything."

[honey-hippie-harper]

through the bleeding shell (Re-upload)

This was @obsidianfr3sk ‘s Feel Better gift asfghadsfghadfsghja. It turned out to be pretty depressing in the end bc idk how to write happy stuff but my good intentions were there, ok?

This is a Humon/Renegays fic :’). Which, basically, is about how the Renegays didn’t kiss during the trilogy...sort of. I can’t think of an specific reason why they didn’t besides bad writing and queerbaiting, but I’ve always seen Hugh as this...detached entity. Idk x’d. He shows a pretty dense attitude. And so, I thought that it was partly the reason why they’re not that affective during the trilogy. Not that they aren’t on a daily basis. I just think their relationship was in a bad place when the events happened, because, among other things, Hugh wasn’t grieving Georgia in a healthy way (I headcanon them as best friends </3) and wouldn’t allow Simon to help him. 

idk why I felt the need to talk about that.

tag list (tell me if you want to be in or out): @healing-winston-pratt @obsidianfr3sk @nodrianbcyes @alecjamesartino @everyone-has-a-nightmare @razzmooncake

through the bleeding shell

Being around someone for so long…

It allowed you to know things. Some of them important.

Others, not so much.

Simon had married a person he had been around his entire life; he had slept next to him almost every single day since he was very young. And his name was Hugh Everhart.

Simon knew every spot on Hugh’s body; he knew every mole, every random sun freckle here and there; how his body mass seemed to be well-distributed at plain sight but, in reality, his chest was naturally wider than the rest of his body, as if he had been born with the figure of a baseball player; how he scratched his nose because wrinkling it so much while laughing made it itchy; he knew the way his knuckles turned yellow when he turned them into a fist; he knew there was one single scar below his rib cage area…

He knew everything he had to know about Hugh Everhart, his husband, whom he loved so much that sometimes it hurt.

Yet, Simon was yet to know how and why, lately, he was so cold, despite still being a human furnace who was sometimes annoyed by the blanket on winter nights.

Kasumi frowned, and Simon wished she were misunderstanding, but whatever thing she was thinking, she was probably right.

Cold was a pretty wide term, which could basically mean anything. Being brutally honest, not even he knew what he was trying to convey by using that word, so he supposed he was referring to anything it could express, as a whole.

Thinking about it… yeah.

That option sounded about right.

Another thing that sounded about right, was the idea of Kasumi judging him because of it, which was something Simon knew wasn’t true and, instead, it was just his anxiety trying to ruin his day even more. But sometimes things were like that. He tried to avoid it, but never managed to do such thing. Ever.

“Not to be rude or anything.” She started, but before proceeding she seemed to realize that, maybe, that hadn’t sounded as intended, and her cheeks became extremely flushed, until Kasumi looked like she had ran under the burning sun while wearing a wool sweater for hours. “Really, Si. I don’t mean to be rude. As in...I’m...telling you this...so you think…”

She clicked her tongue, and then both Tamaya, who was also in the room, and him, stared at her as she talked to herself under her breath, making a couple of hand movements, as if she were writing her sentence in the air so she could phrase it correctly.

Sometimes, when Kasumi was nervous, she tended to struggle at putting her ideas together in a gentle, polite manner.

“...I was telling you that, so you don’t think I’m trying to offend you or minimize your pain.” She corrected herself. “Yeah?”

“...Yeah.” Simon nodded.

“Well…” Kasumi rubbed her hands together, more as a distraction than as an actual mannerism. “You know I’ve...never understood. Back at home...when we all lived together and...ugh. You know? Just...don’t mind me. Tam, you tell him.”

“No, no. What you’re saying is important too.”

“I want to listen to you, Zoomie.”

Upon the two pairs of eyes in the room being fixated on her, Kasumi kept fidgeting with the paper cone she now had between her hands, absently.

“Fine.” She whispered in a breathy voice, and then she stared at Simon, who stared back, not because he wanted to be polite or something like that, but because he genuinely wanted to listen to her.

Kasumi wasn’t a talker. That wasn’t an exaggeration or an act of fake modesty. It was just that Kasumi didn’t enjoy a lot of things, and one of them was speaking, to the point where sometimes she didn’t consider it necessary. There were days when she just...didn’t feel like speaking. And she didn’t. Because she didn’t want to. Because she didn’t need to. Because people could understand her anyway.

Still, everyone was willing to listen when she felt there was something she had to explain in a way that was verbal.

“I love my husband very much.” She said, placing a lock of hair behind her ear. “But, still, sex it’s not...a huge part of our relationship because I’ve never understood. When you joked about it back at home, I would just assume you were just doing that. Joking. I...literally didn’t expect you were serious when you talked about experiencing that type of attraction. Because I didn’t. And it’s not that I think it’s repulsive or anything like that. I just don’t get what the fuss is about. When I’m with him...it’s...usually not my first option. To think about that, I mean. And he understands and respects that, which I appreciate a lot.”

The more she spoke, the more confident her tone became. It meant she was growing more comfortable with the conversation, and that her train of thought was getting itself together, nice and slowly.

As for Simon...he was strangely comfortable, too, because this felt like a mature, adult conversation to him. Like a safe space.

After all, he was serious when he told them he needed to talk (now that Evander wasn’t here, because Evander was...not very sensitive). Hence, he was very glad they were being serious about it too.

“I understand that Hugh’s not in the spectrum.” Kasumi cleared her throat. “But...sexuality is fluid. Maybe, if you were talking about only that, it could be a good idea to talk it over. Only if he wants to, of course, because you never know; again, we can’t just assume, because one cannot do that. It’s rude. But what I mean...it’s that, whatever that’s going on in his head, maybe he’s trying to figure it out by himself. It might have nothing to do with his sexuality at all, actually, because, after all, that was just a comment...but it all comes back to the same point. Maybe he just...needs time.”

“Hugh’s pretty dense, Simon.” Simon saw the steamy cup in front of him, but he didn’t realize what it was until the smell of black coffee reached his nostrils. He hadn’t even noticed Tamaya was making coffee.

“Thank you.” He whispered anyway, as Tamaya leaned against the table, putting her weight on her elbows.

For all he knew, and all he cared about, it was pretty easy for people to judge Tamaya and label her as a bad person; she was quiet, although not in the way Kasumi was. On the contrary, she was rather serious, and her resting face was more intimidating than it was warm or welcoming. She was also really bad at controlling her temper, which didn’t help at all, but she wasn’t as bad as people wanted to portray her, or as bad as the recruits talked about her in the halls. Because, when it came to the recruits, Tamaya was strict, yes.

But somebody had to be, because being a Renegade was not a game, and the great majority of the advice she gave was extremely useful and clever.

Tamaya was caring.

Deep, very deep down. But she was.

“He’s pretty dense, but…” She sighed. “Most of the time, that’s not his fault. It’s not a good thing either. It’s not healthy for him and we shouldn’t condone it...but yeah. He can be pretty dense sometimes. He’s like that, most of the time it’s not his fault but...I don’t think you should feel like it’s yours either.”

Simon couldn’t help but flinch a little.

The thing was...he knew that.

It might’ve sounded crazy coming from him, but he knew it wasn’t his fault, even if his anxiety was determined to convince him otherwise.

Also, he was one to know that one couldn’t just fix a person. That’s not how mental health worked; of course, a romantic relationship or a relationship of any kind was a huge source of support and stability, but he knew it wasn’t enough to “heal” a person.

He knew about that, just like he knew that Hugh loved him and he loved Hugh, but that didn’t mean they could fix each other. They could make it a little better, yes; hold each other when things were rough; let the other know they weren’t alone.

But…”fixing” the other.

Not really.

They were humans.

They were people.

And the only thing people could fix, were objects, not other people.

“Like Kasumi said, sexuality is fluid, but it might as well not have to do anything with that.” Tamaya continued. Her voice sounded...soothing, strangely motherly. And she was calm.

Very calm.

It reminded Simon of someone.

They both reminded him of someone.

“Hubby and I, we both experience sexual attraction. It’s an important part of our relationship, and we enjoy it, but sometimes it’s just not the right time. He’s a doctor, I’m a Renegade Council member, and we have three wonderful boys together. Sometimes we don’t have time, so we just sit by the balcony to stargaze, holding hands, or we go out on dates like high school sweethearts, and I stand by the doorframe waiting for him to tell me I look pretty.”

Simon laughed a little.

It was evident she was trying to play it off as something dumb, but he found it absolutely adorable.

“And sometimes I’m too tired or he’s too tired, and that’s normal. It’s not our fault, and it doesn’t mean that we love each other less because…”

“Having sex doesn’t define love.” Kasumi said, and Tamaya nodded.

“Exactly.”

But again.

Again.

Simon knew that.

He really knew.

Hugh and him had busy schedules too. They both were Renegade Council members, and Hugh had it worse because not only was he a member, but also the leader of the Council. He had to be everywhere, at the same time, and people tended to think that just because he was invincible, it meant he didn’t have the right to feel emotionally drained, or at least tired.

Of course he was going to be tired.

He wasn’t a robot.

Hence, Simon understood what they were trying to say, and he agreed with Kasumi and Tamaya.

But the problem was…

He wasn’t referring just to that.

It was...part of the problem, yes.

But now that he knew their opinion about it, he had come to the realization that he still felt...empty and lost. And just...frustrated.

“We’re not only talking about sex, are we?” Tamaya asked carefully, and Simon refused to stare back at her, as he took a sip from his coffee, before answering:

“I’m afraid not.”

“Well...If you’re telling us this, it’s because you do want to talk about it, right?”

“I do. Yes.”

“Well. We’re listening.”

At the same time Tamaya spoke, a cold, little hand, laced between Simon’s.

A hand that felt like the sea and, even if he hadn’t known she was the only person in the room besides Tamaya and him, he would’ve recognized it as Kasumi’s.

So Simon squeezed her hand back.

“We’re listening, Si.” She confirmed. “We’re here for you.”

He knew that, and it was something he was extremely grateful about.

Now he just had to figure out how to put into words what he was feeling, because at this point it felt impossible for him to know.

There were just...so many things, but at the same time such a limited number of details he could recall.

It just felt...unreal.

And weird.

Very weird.

But Simon didn’t feel numb, unlike anyone would’ve expected from him.

In fact, he felt so sad he couldn’t even cry.

And it was the worst feeling ever.

“I don’t know.” He said, in a hoarse voice. “I just...don’t know anymore. It’s just...I…”

“It’s not your fault.”

“I know.” He clarified. “...But maybe that’s why I don’t know what it is.”

For the shortest second, Simon came to the realization he was talking to himself instead of talking to them, or perhaps it was something that, deep down, was giving him the answer to why this whole situation was making him so uneasy and upset. Like, of course it was making him this upset. It was his husband they were talking about. Hugh was his fight. Hugh was…

Simon didn’t know.

But what he did know was that, maybe, it had nothing to do with himself, and that’s why he just couldn’t…

He just couldn’t understand.

Why couldn’t he understand?

Why did it have to be like this?

“I want to know what it is.” Simon took a deep breath, trying to make himself understood; trying to make them understand what he couldn’t. “...So I can...make it better...So I can...help him. So we can...look for help together.”

Simon scratched his brow with his free hand.

“But he’s just… so cold. He doesn’t talk to me. He doesn’t come closer. He doesn’t...do anything. We don’t do anything. And I can’t help but feel like...he’s not here, even though he’s…” Simon scoffed, painfully. “...He’s right there, in front of my face.”

His eyes became fixated on a blank point, as if he were staring at an invisible Hugh, who wasn’t staring back at him.

“And I want him to...tell me. Because if he doesn’t tell me, then I have no way to know what’s wrong. And if I don’t know what’s wrong...then I don’t know for how long I can take it, you know? It’s just...I can’t bear to stand there as he pushes me away.”

Kasumi started running her thumb through his knuckles, and Simon felt Tamaya’s hands on his shoulders, massaging them, gently.

“I’m just scared...that when he finally wants me to come closer again, it might be too late...and maybe I won’t want to come closer again.”

Tamaya’s hands stopped moving for a moment, and Simon could almost feel her and Kasumi’s shock. He hadn’t even planned to say that. It just slipped.

And when Simon noticed it had slipped, it was far too late for him to hold it back.

“Maybe you should talk to him, after all.” Kasumi said, slowly, and Simon stared into her eyes.

He didn’t realize that was the thing he didn’t want to hear until he felt nothing but hopelessness.

Emptiness.

Fear.

A type of fear that became more intense in the moment they heard the door opening, and that’s when Simon saw him.

Hugh was standing right there, staring, and when his eyes laid on Simon, he arched an eyebrow, looking genuinely confused and worried.

“What’s happening here?” He asked. “...Si? Are you okay?”

Are you?

Simon didn’t want to answer. He really didn’t.

He didn’t want this to be about him.

He didn’t want Hugh asking him what was wrong if, harsh as it sounded, everything that was making him uncomfortable or upset had to do with him, not because Simon was blaming him, but because he was genuinely worried.

Let me help, Hugh.

“I’m...fine.”

Let me in.

“...Yeah. I’m...fine.”

Please, love.

Let me in.

Simon could see him hurting, but where he saw hurt, Hugh saw some type of burden that was meant to be concealed, committing treason against his own advice; dodging the sound of the voice of a younger Hugh, who guided a younger Simon through the dark, telling him it was alright.

That pain was alright.

And that pain didn’t make him less human.

Hugh’s pain, in particular, was a grey, bleeding shell that was so thick Simon couldn’t find a way to get in, and Hugh couldn’t find a way to get out.

So they just pressed their palms together through the bleeding shell, staring at each other's eyes through a polarized surface, that stopped their skin from touching, and stopped their lips from finding the other.

And the worst thing...was that Simon was craving that. He craved Hugh’s lips. He craved everything physical about him, just like he craved everything that wasn’t physical too. And he craved him so much he felt like dying every time he was close. He craved him so much it made him feel like a teenager again.

Which, in his case, wasn’t a good thing.

He wished it was.

But...teenage years weren’t fun if you had to spend them trapped in a closet. Things were never good when lived from inside a closet.

He didn’t want his life outside that closet to be like that too.

“Did you have an attack? ...Si, did you take your pills? … You did, right?”

“Hugh.” Simon heard Tamaya’s voice. “Is there...something that you needed?”

Hugh blinked, knowing that, maybe, he had interrupted something.

Mostly because it wasn’t like Tamaya was trying to hide it either.

“...Yeah.” He said, resting his arms on the nearest chair.

Tamaya pulled away from Simon, and Kasumi let go of his hand. They didn’t become fully focused, nor did they put on their “I’m working” mode either, but they did manage to...pretend. Even Simon managed to do so.

“Uh...I…” Hugh snapped his fingers in front of his own face, trying to remember what was it that he had to say.

“....Yeah.” He concluded. “Yeah. Uh… Tam. I need you to head downtown because they want you to supervise some of the floats for the parade. From...up, I mean. So you can check some of the details. I already checked from the ground and everything’s looking good, but now they want you to give them the green light.”

“Right now?”

“Preferably.” Hugh scratched his nose. “Were you...in the middle of something?”

Tamaya filled her cheeks with air, and then let it out, making a little trumpet with her lips.

“No.” She lied. “It’s fine. I’ll go. Just let me put some stuff in my locker, alright?”

“Be careful when you fly, okay? It’s kinda hot outside. If you get dizzy...”

“If I get dizzy, I’ll land. I know. I’m the one who’s flying.”  

Given that she was already heading by the door, Tamaya patted his shoulder, and they said goodbye with a very polite kiss on the cheek, before Tamaya left the room completely, and Hugh drew his attention towards Kasumi.

“Margaret White is acting out.”

Kasumi frowned. Deeply.

“Margaret...what?”

“Uh. White? You know? The Renegades’ ward? The kid?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know who Maggie is.” Kasumi waved her hands in front of her own face. “...Who named her that?”

“Who named her what?”

“White. Who on Earth…?” Kasumi clicked her tongue. “Nevermind, okay? Just...what did she do?”

“Zoomie, I had already told you.” Hugh laughed, confused.

“I thought you were being rude, Hugh.”

Margaret White was the Renegades’ protégé. Her powers consisted of detecting and attracting metals which, evidently, was not something that was out of this world. In fact, she had been recruited at such a young age not because she had extraordinary abilities, but because she was problematic as heck.

She was Max’s age, more or less but, unlike Max, Margaret had no chill.

Her life was ruined from the moment somebody saw her and decided that White was a suitable last name for her, Tamaya used to say.

Margaret’s skin was tan, and she had slanted eyes. Naming her “White” almost seemed like a tasteless joke.

Simon himself thought Hugh was just being disrespectful the first time he told him her name, and he had to hear it a couple of times before he just...accepted he was serious (and that Hugh himself didn’t seem to like the idea of her being named like that very much).

Maggie was really problematic. For real. She had been kicked out of a couple of orphanages already, and maybe she would have been kicked out of this one too, if it hadn’t been a prodigy orphanage, which happened to be under Kasumi’s management, meaning it was directly related to the Council. And they were supposed to make sure nobody got kicked out of there.

Simon liked Maggie, because he knew that there was a chance that everything she ever did had reason behind it. An emotional reason. Perhaps she wanted love. Perhaps she wanted attention.

Perhaps she just…

Wanted someone who didn’t give up on her at the minimum inconvenience.

So he just...tried not to.

Hard as it was, because Maggie tended to make it hard; Kasumi had tried to canalize her to a psychologist many times, but her response always was that “she wasn’t crazy” (perhaps because kids her age were mean and “crazy” was one of their favorite words to use as an insult) and...well...part of the process in children, was understanding when it was the right time and when it wasn’t.

Sometimes forcing kids into treatment made it worse, and Maggie was pretty mature for her age, while painfully childish at the same time. Respecting her space and giving her time was their only option, if they didn’t want to turn her into a ticking bomb.

“Are you for real? I’ve been addressing her like that for like…”

“Just tell me what the little bundle of joy did now.”

“Pff.” Hugh scoffed. “Bundle of joy.”

Then, he cleared his throat the moment Kasumi fixed a glare at him.

“Well...the usual. She stole something from one of the nannies, Carrietta Ferland saw her and she locked her in a cellar so she wouldn’t say anything.”

“She locked Carrietta Ferland in a cellar.” Kasumi rubbed her forehead, and before she left the meeting room, she squeezed Simon’s wrist.

She didn’t say goodbye to Hugh.

Simon didn’t, either, when he excused himself under the sort of cheap white lie he needed to wash his face.

-.-

But one could only wash their face so much, before their partner suspected.

When Simon didn’t come back, Hugh didn’t go after him. He never did at first.

As in…

Hugh always went after him, just not at first; over time, Simon had grown to accept it wasn’t a pride thing.

When Hugh left, he never wanted anyone to go after him, and he was the type to believe that just because he didn’t want something, it meant nobody wanted it; Simon had gotten used to it, because Hugh was his husband, and they accepted each other just like they were.

What Simon refused to accept, was the bleeding shell Hugh was inside of.

He hated it.

He despised it, especially at night. It would grow around Hugh in slow motion, and then he would bleed through, and the whole room would turn red, overflowing it with unspoken, suffocated anger and pain.

Hugh turned his back at Simon that night, so Simon turned his back at him too, not because he was mad, but because he didn’t feel like staring at Hugh’s back today.

Their room became as cold as an industrial fridge, as they both fell deep into the notion the other was not asleep, and that they both were listening to the sound of a room that was currently filled with deathly silence.

Deathly as the bone-chilling cold penetrating their limbs, their organs, and their everything.

Deathly as…

Deathly as feelings.

All the stored feelings, and the way Simon craved something he knew was right there.

Hugh was right there. Right next to him. And his body, which he knew so well, was laying next to him, turning his back at him, with every mole, every sun freckle, a chest wider than the rest of his body…

And one single scar below his rib cage.

The same rib cage that protected his heart.

Say something, Simon.

The same heart Simon had felt beating so many times.

Say something.

Anything.

Maybe…

Maybe this had a reason too.

An emotional reason.

Perhaps love. Or attention.

Say something. Anything.

Because you do go after people from the very first moment.

Slowly, as if he had never moved before in his life, Simon rolled to the other side, and as his trembling hand rested on Hugh’s arm, he became alert, awake as they both were, and he looked over his shoulder.

“Hugh?” Simon asked, the name leaving a familiar firm in his mouth that tasted like home.

He didn’t answer, because that was his name. Hence, he knew he was trying to talk to him.

“Come here, Hugh.”

And Hugh came over, hesitantly, rolling to his side too, as they faced each other, and Simon ran his finger through his face, just...exploring every spot he already knew, as if he were visiting his comfort place, of his favorite bench in the park.

His blue eyes seemed to shine in the darkness, and Simon felt he could’ve gotten lost in them and never come back.

But he didn’t get lost.

Because he had to find the love of his life first.

“I’m never giving up on you.” He whispered. “...you know that, right?”

Perhaps he didn’t.

But, on the other hand, perhaps he did. And Simon was left with nothing but the mere hope it had meant something.

“I’m never giving up on you either, Si.”

But Simon did know that.

Boy.

Did he know.

-.-

What he didn’t know, however, was the answer to the what.

He wondered what that had felt like.

He wondered what Nightmare had felt when, the morning after, she tried to shoot Hugh in the eye from a roof.

Not because he were mad at her.

No. Not really.

She was young after all.

He just wondered what she had felt.

[beautifulterriblequeen]

What if moonshadow elves lost knowledge about themselves?

Hello, hope you have a nice day ! :D

(wait, is it day, for you?) hem! Anyway.

I was analylzing Moonshadow elves again and now I’m asking myself something, wonder what you would think about it:

Remember my “epiphany about the moon arcanum”?, when I said there’s maybe another side of their arcanum Moonshadow elves don’t know about? Something more life-light related:hope.

At first I said “they don’t know about” without really thinking about it. But, what if it’s true? I mean, what if there truly is a part they don’t know about their arcanum, or maybe forgot along the years? What if the war made Moonshadow elves focus so much on death-kill and all they kinda…. lost some of their knowledge about themselves? 

(I think I remember one of your old analysis (I think it was you, I can’t find it anymore), where you compared “young ethari” in the endcredits to the actual one. Where we saw him first doing jewelry, full of hope about life, and the actual one who let that aside to focus on the war) 

Add to this their community is described as “really close-knit”, which means more or less isolationism and so a stagnant, unable to evolve society. A society where the same rules were applied for centuries and so inevitably lost their deep meaning with time. 

I thought it was maybe exaggerated to think this way, but then I remembered the creators said there is 5000years of history in TDP. Even with longer lifespan, there’s no way elves didn’t forget some things with time. (I compare this situation to another one: some discoveries were recently made in egypt, and we learned that a few thousands years ago egyptian themselves re-discovered things they had discovered several centuries prior and forgot)

So I tried to find proof in the show and the novelization, and guess what? We have some! (or, well, it’s more my HC, but as I said, it’ just a theory)

I think this way especially because of Runaan, who was so sure there was “only one way to release”. But then, Zym came and cut Rayla’s ribbon. My personal HC on this is that only the life who was supposed to be avenged can release the assassin from the binding. It would make sense when you know Moonshadow elves “take life but they do not take it lightly”. But even if I’m mistaking, the central fact is that there is more than one way and, clearly, Moonshadow elves don’t know it (if the leader of the assassins doesn’t, then who could?)

What I find interesting here, is that Runaan recites this ritual at the beginning, about how precious life is, like a litany but the way he insists (especially in the novel) about killing Ezran even after he saw the egg, could be the proof it’s just that, a ritual. A ritual whose words lost all their sense, their deep meaning for his people.

Ok, it’s not much, but I think the combination of isolationism, stucking to rules without understanding them deeply and time, is the perfect recipe to lose your way, no? 

Oh, and a crazy other point in between these two theories about “hope” and “lost knowledge” woud be: If there is another aspect of the moon, other elves more hope-related (like Ethari or Rayla), why not another form?

Like sunfire elves have heat and light-being mode, Moonshadow elves could have something else too?. It’s probably stupid, I’m only thinking this way because of how Rayla feels while in moonshadow form in the novelization. It’s not that she hates it or something, but it makes her feel dizzy, as if she wasn’t suited for this. And if not, maybe it’s because she’s suited for another form? 

(sorry, I hope I’m coherent on this one, I’m a little exhausted and my thoughts are a little messy ^^’)

______________

Okay, @lily-lilou​, just let me catch my breath, this whole thing is a ride and I loved it. We definitely vibing here, fam.

whew

Okay, from the top, because I’ve had a lot of these thoughts myself and I’m so stoked to see someone else independently coming up with them!

Yes 100% to Moonshadows losing a part of their own history. (And yeah, I do have a post somewhere on Ethari’s evolution. Probably called it that iirc) If we’re right about Moonshadows having lived in Katolis before the lands were divided, living right near their own Nexus as the Sunfires still do, then when they packed up and left, it’s very possible they literally couldn’t bring everything with them.

I have a quirky little hc that there are still, to this day, Moonshadow villages hiding behind ancient protection spells in Katolis, and that people wander past them every day and have no idea. But it’s one thing not to be able to pack up your actual village. It’s another to leave behind records of your people’s past, their accomplishments and dealings and discoveries.

*eyes Lujanne’s truly massive library, with its huge walls covered in runes and books* This is where the full history of the Moonshadow people probably is kept. And no one has access to it but her.

Those who headed east would only know what they carried with them, and what was handed down orally through the generations. But see, if my headcanon about the Moonshadow assassins being created at that time ends up being true, then that’s probably bad news for history and truth. When you create a whole new class within your culture, you need to bolster it with ideology. You use myth, cultural norms, and current events to make it seem important.

You tell everyone that being an assassin is the most honorable job there is. And then it’s suddenly cool to be an assassin. 

If there were no Moonshadow assassins before the humans were booted out west, then everything Runaan says to Rayla, everything he believes, is pretty young compared to his people’s full history, which he may not know, at least in its true and undistorted form. It’s an illusion. Rhetoric. Propaganda meant to hold soft elves who deeply value life to the hardest task they’ll ever undertake: taking that life from another, for a cause they cannot turn away from, a purpose they are culturally indebted to. Because their people, their princess (?), was the one who asked for the humans to be spared, and so every mistake the humans make from that point on is the Moonshadow elves’ duty to handle.

Runaan was wrong about how many ways there are to release. Has Zym truly been the only victim who wasn’t actually dead, in a whole thousand years? Honestly, probably not, knowing how politics works. But see, if you have an elite squad devoted to serving Xadia, and you tell them that their hands will literally fall off and they will die if they don’t do their jobs because there is only one way to release the ribbon they’re honor-bound to wear, they will take their target or die trying. And if you maybe exaggerated reports of the victim’s death for political purposes and actually have them in a dungeon, or they fled to the human lands as a refugee, or any number of other squirrelly options that Moonshadows aren’t naturally inclined to consider, then you can literally get away with murder-by-proxy. Or containment. Or intimidation. Or whatever your purpose is in taking out a human target who may or may not even be guilty of the crime you allege against them. It might not even be Zubeia and Avizandum’s fault. Unless they can detect truth and lies, they can be deceived by someone unscrupulous with an agenda of their own.

Long paragraph long, there are a lot of problems with the existence and practical duties of Moonshadow assassins. They’re kind of like the War Doctor: born form conflict, and thus only able to serve it, instead of peace. Yes, we all want Runaan to get his happy ending, retire, go home to his soft husband. But really, the whole institution of the assassins needs to go. It was born of war, and if Xadia and the human lands make peace, truly, then the assassins should be dissolved. As I said in one of my fics, Moonshadow assassins are Xadia’s dark magic, turning death into power. It’s gotta stop on both sides.

One of my oneshots for January’s Ruthari Week played with the idea of Ethari having a moonform instead of a shadowform, because yes to elves having two kinds of forms in each culture! I would love to see that for all the elves. And if we use Sunfire elves as a kind of roadmap, with “sun” and “fire” being the heat- and light-beings, then maybe the other elves get their two forms from their names as well. Or so my headcanon went for that fic: a moon form to balance the shadow form, where the elf’s body can glow like the full moon. I didn’t really touch on what that form’s ability would be, but I suppose, logically, it would serve as a portable full moon, powering other nearby Moonshadows even when the moon was down, or new, or a small crescent.

Okay, that’s just fun. I like that idea a lot. The only time “just stand there and look pretty” can be used as a battle tactic!

I can see Rayla getting to have the rare Moonshadow power. That would make her a good balance for Callum and his unusual arcanum as a human. Part misfit, part superpower. It would also probably be a power that puts her closer to Ethari’s soft and protective attitude, no matter what the power really is, since the assassins in Moonshadow culture have clearly adopted their natural shadowy form as a mission tactic, attacking specifically on full moon nights. Literally any other kind of power is probably going to be softer, lighter, more lively and bright, in concept if not literally so. Maybe the other power kicks in on new moons? or is available at any time? I really hope we get a second Moonshadow power of some kind. I am down for all the extra worldbuilding!

Thanks once again for your thoughts! *fist bump* Moonshadow elves. You get it.

[lookimtryingmybest]

“How to accidentally die, meet a shady ghost and become a half demon” A story by Logan Freud.

Part 1 Part 2

CW for discussions of blood, needles and digging up someone's death body and using it for weird magic stuff. Also a few graphic descriptions of injuries (Janus's) and a brief scene where Remus almost cuts himself that might be considered self-harm. And casual conversations of murder because yes. This is the weirdest shit I've written so far.

Janus waved his hand over the TV. He just had to get it right enough, and he could turn it on to watch something. It’s not like he had something better to do.

“You’re running out of time.” A husk voice reminded him.

Janus rolled his eyes, not bothering to turn to the voice. He could see its silhouette reflected on the TV’s screen.

“I know.” He said. “I won’t take much longer.”

“You know what will happen to you if you fail.” The voice warned him.

Janus waved it off. “Yeah, yeah, I know, now fuck off, I wanna watch Buffy.”

“I will come by the next full moon. If you haven’t finished by then, I’ll take both of you with me.” The voice said.

“Wait.” Janus frowned. He turned to face those orange eyes he hated. “Both?”

“You.” It said, smiling at Janus. “And your new friend.”

“Logan.” Janus realized. “Leave him out of this, I’m the one who made the deal.”

The demon smiled. “Someone’s coming home. See you around, Deceit.” It said, before dimming out in the shadows.

“Bastard.” Janus said. He turned back to the TV. A month. He had a month. He could get everything right before the month ended, right?

He heard the front door opening.

Logan entered the living room, followed by Virgil. He smiled at Janus.

“I thought you’d be here.” He said.

“Yeah, wow, congratulations. You have braincells.” Janus said, floating above his level. He noticed Virgil holding the wooden triangle to his eye. “What’s he doing? Apart from looking like an idiot?”

“Rude.” Virgil said.

“He can see us.” Logan said. “And hear us.”

“You could’ve warned me about the face” Virgil said.

Janus rolled his eyes. “Oh, I’m sorry my face upsets you, I died in a fire what the fuck did you expect?”

“Sorry.” Virgil muttered. “Anyways I’ll, eh… be in the kitchen for a while.” He said putting the triangle in his pocket. “I’ll talk to you two later.”

Janus waited for Logan to speak. Logan just looked uncomfortably around for a while, before speaking.

“I… apologize for snapping earlier.” He said. “It was out of place.”

“Damn right it was.” Janus said. “What are you going to do, hug me over it?” He asked, floating near him. “Good luck touching me.”

“I did not mean what I said.” Logan said. “Do you want to go back with the others and talk to them for yourself?”

Janus contemplated his options. He didn’t have many. A month was so little time.

“Fine.” He said. “I’ll go get Virgil.”

He floated through the walls into the kitchen. Virgil was unashamedly eating ice cream out of the container. Janus looked around for something to knock over.

He pushed Virgil’s phone. It barely moved. He tried again, and again, and again until it fell to the ground.

Virgil cursed and grabbed it, placing it back on the table.

Goddamnit, he was an idiot.

Janus took another five minutes to push it over the edge again. This time, Virgil grabbed it midair.

He grumbled, leaving the ice cream on the table and pulling the triangle out of his pocket.

He stared at Janus. “Asshole.” He said.

Janus shrugged. “I want to speak to the others as well. Grab a notebook or something, I’ll need you to make a list.”

“A list for what?” Asked Logan appearing through a wall. “Wow. That was so weird.”

“You get used to it.” Janus said. “A list to get shit going, I’ll explain once we’re there.”

Virgil placed the ice cream back in the fridge. “Let’s go. They’re probably waiting.”

“Got any kings?” Patton asked.

“Apart from myself? No. Go fish” Roman said. He was holding three kings, and he refused to let them go.

Something pulled the king of hearts out of his hands, throwing it to the cards pile.

Patton gasped. “You were Lying!”

“Pat, the game is called ‘go fish but we lie about it’” Remus said. “Got any threes?”

Patton grabbed the king as Roman grumbled, grabbing another card from the pile.

“Nope! Go fish” Patton said. A card flew from the pile and hit Remus in the face.

“Rude.” Remus mumbled, grabbing the card.

Virgil entered the room, holding the triangle to his face. “Janus, stop messing with the game.” He said. He received a card to the face seconds later, when he had already sat down at his pillow. “I applaud your determination to hit me with a card.” He turned to the others. “He had to try five times until he managed to lift the card.”

“So he can touch physical objects” Roman said. “That’s creepy.”

“He can, but he has to try over and over cause most time his hand just passes right through.” Virgil said. “Wanna see him yourself?”

“Sure.” Roman said. He left his cards down and moved to sit next to Virgil.

“Here ya go.” Virgil said, giving him the wooden triangle.

Roman inspected it. Something in the back of his mind told him he’d look stupid with the triangle in his face, but he pushed those thoughts away.

He looked through the hole, and nearly screamed.

The ghost, Janus, it was horrible. Skin falling off his face and blood splattered on his clothes. Roman had to hold a gag back.

Virgil looked at him and gave him a sheepish smile. “Yeah, maybe I should’ve warned you…”

“That would’ve been ideal.” Logan said, appearing in Roman’s field of vision. He looked the exact same as he had in the funeral. “Hi, Roman.”

“Hi, Lo.” Roman said, feeling a bit sick. “Hi, erm… Janus?”

“Yep.” Janus said, floating to his level. “You ok there, princey?”

Roman nodded. “Yeah, perfectly fine…”

“Ro, you ass, let me see as well.” Remus said, nudging his brother.

Roman passed him the wooden triangle. “All yours. I need a, fuck, a bin, please.”

Patton stood up to the corner of the room and brought the bin to Roman. Roman didn’t have time to thank him, as he double over it and emptied his stomach. Patton grimaced and rubbed his back.

“Sorry ‘bout that.” Virgil said, offering Roman water once he had finished.

“Jeez, is he that bad?” Remus asked, before putting the triangle to his eye. “Oh… He is!”

A pause. “It’s not rude if it’s the truth. Also, you’re that kid from the house fire fifty years ago?”

Another pause. “How does he know about this stuff?” Patton whispered to Roman.

“Look, I’m not one to judge Remus’s weird hyper fixations.” Roman whispered back. “He likes crimes and death.”

“So… what’s your plan to get back from the dead?” Remus asked. He listened for a few seconds before turning to Roman. “Get the pen and paper, I’m making a list.”

“A list?” Virgil asked. “For what?”

“For the ritual, duh.” Remus said. “We’re bringing these two idiots back.”

“Ok, ok, we got the incense and the bowl and Virgil and Patton are getting the candles.” Remus said, ticking the things off the list. “Can you get the salt?”

“Yeah, we have to mix it with something else, right?” Roman asked, opening the cupboard.

“No, that’s the weird mix of sulphur and other shit.” Remus said, ticking off the box next to ‘salt’.

“What do we have to mix it with?” Roman said, leaving the salt next to the bowl. He looked over his brother’s shoulder.

“Eh… ivy’s leaves, honeysuckle petals, although those have to be added after burning the other stuff, the incense and…” Remus squinted to read his messy handwriting “virgin’s blood.”

“Wait, blood?” Roman asked. “I thought you said the stuff was easy to get!”

“Well, Janus spoke fast and I copied fast, I didn’t remember the blood part. Nor the virgin.” Remus said. “Besides, the other stuff like a chalk and blackboard are pretty easy to get. We already have one.” He pointed at the blackboard and chalk he had left lying against the wall. He ticked the box next to those items.

“Ok, does it have to be a female virgin? A dead virgin? Cause I’m pretty sure all of us are virgins.” Roman said, taking the list from Remus. “It just says virgin’s blood, didn’t Janus give more details?”

“Not that I remember, let me ask again.” Remus said, taking the wooden triangle again.

“Hey, J-anus.” He said, looking at the space above Roman. Roman shot that space a death glare and hoped it got to Janus. “Yeah, you heard? Anyone’s? What about masturbation, does that count? Good, ok, I can do that. How much do we need? Oh, I thought it was more. Well, I mean, the human body can lose to up six litres of blood. Although you pass out after three or four.”

“Remus, not that I want to interrupt your lovely conversation,” Roman said, taking the triangle from Remus “but we have to keep going. How much did Janus say we needed?”

“Just enough for the bottom of the bowl. Not even a tenth of a litre.” Remus said, moving to one of the drawers and pulling out a knife. “We should put it in the fridge so it doesn’t form clots. Those are nasty.”

“Wait wait wait.” Roman said, practically yanking the knife out of Remus hands. “The fuck you think you’re doing?”

“Getting the blood.” Remus said, trying to get the knife back. “Duh.”

“Not like that!” Roman said. “You’ll need stitches and none of us know how to do them.”

“Well, then, how?” Remus asked.

Then his phone started ringing.

Patton pushed the shopping cart down the aisle. He looked at his phone, at the picture he had taken of Remus’s list.

“Ok, so candles first. Then there’s another few plants needed, which I think we can take from the Twins’s garden.” Patton said “or maybe we have o go to the botanic garden…”

Virgil pulled the cart towards him. “I think the candles are over here.” He said. “Let’s deal with those first. Does it specify how many they need to be?”

Patton read the list. It said ’12 fucking candles’. Of course Remus would be too lazy to write twelve, but would still write ‘fucking’ as if it was necessary.

“We need twelve, but it doesn’t tell me which kind.” Patton said. He grabbed a random candle and smelled it. Lavender. “Will Janus mind if they’re scented?”

Virgil grabbed a black candle. It smelled like chocolate. “I think it doesn’t matter, didn’t it say we also needed sulphur and incense? That should block anything else.”

“You sure?” Patton asked.

“No, but I’m not even sure this isn’t a wild fever dream, so…” Virgil said, getting more black candles.

Virgil’s phone got out of his phone and fell to the ground. Virgil cursed.

“Really Logan?” He grunted as he picked it up. “What are you trying to say?”

“Maybe he wants us to call Remus and ask?” Patton guessed.

“Maybe.” Virgil said. “I’ll do so. Don’t put back the black candles, those are mines for my aesthetic.”

Patton snorted at that, as he watched Virgil dial Remus’s number.

“Hey, asshole, it’s me.” Virgil said. “Yeah, quick question, do the candles need to be scentless?” A pause. “Oh, ok, great, that was all. Thanks.” Another pause. “Why do you need that? Virgin’s what? Never mind, why am I surprised? I should’ve seen this coming. Sure, yeah, I’ll get that as well. Anything else? No? Great, tell Janus he owes me money for this.”

Having said so, he hung up.

Virgil looked at Patton. “He says scentless just in case. They’re probably cheaper anyways.” He took a dozen of candles in his arms and dumped them in the shopping cart. “Now, we need a syringe.”

Patton frowned. “What do we need that for?”

“For the blood.” Virgil said. “Now, where do we get a syringe?”

Patton blinked confused. “In the pharmacy…?”

Virgil nodded and started pushing the cart.

Remus was in the garden grabbing the ivy’s leaves, wearing gloves just in case they were poisonous. He wasn’t sure if they were, but he didn’t want to deal with the consequences in case they were.

Roman was in the kitchen still, making sure they had everything else. And waiting for the other two to arrive.

Remus shiver when he felt something going through him. “Janus?” He asked, barely above a whisper. “What do you want?”

He took off his gloves and grabbed the wooden triangle in his pocket. He placed it to his face and stared at Janus. He was going through the plant in front of him.

“What do you want?” He asked.

Janus floated above his head. “There’s something else I need. It’s right over here.”

“Over where?” Remus asked, pushing his gloves and the bag of ivy’s leaves into his bag pack. He stood up to follow Janus.

“In Virgil’s backyard.” Janus said. “Just follow me, I know a shortcut.”

“That’s not right over here.” Remus complained. “I’ll go get the others.”

“No!” Janus exclaimed, reaching out and passing right through Remus. Remus shivered. “Not for this.”

“…Ok…” Remus said. “If I get murdered I’m blaming you.”

“Fine by me, now follow me.” Janus said.

And so Remus did. Janus led him through the garden, surrounded two houses and crossed the road, right to Virgil’s garden.

Virgil’s garden wasn’t as pretty as Remus’s. His parents didn’t care as much, and just left it to grow as it pleased, only mowing the grass once per month. The grass itself was yellowish and half dead.

Remus liked Virgil’s garden. You could always find cool fungi in it.

“Right over…” Janus said looking at the ground. He pointed at one spot with less grass than the others. “Here. Dig here.”

“I don’t have a shovel.” Remus said.

“There’s one in the shed.” Janus said, pointing at the small wooden house in the corner of the garden. “And they never lock the shed, so…”

“Fine.” Remus said. He pushed the wooden triangle to his pocket for a moment and went to the shed. It was indeed unlocked, but the door was heavy and Remus had to push with his whole body just to open it a few centimeters. He sticked his hand inside and grabbed the shovel that was conveniently near the door.

He went back to the place where Janus had been floating and started digging. It was harder than he anticipated.

At one point, when he had dug a meter, the wooden triangle fell from his pocket and floated in front of him. He grabbed it to stare at Janus.

“Did I dig enough? I still don’t know what we’re searching for.” He asked.

“Ditch the shovel.” Janus said. Remus threw the shovel away. “And grab a handful of dirt. The one at the bottom best.”

Remus sighted and grabbed another plastic bag from his backpack. “Why are we doing this again?”

“I need these, ok?” Janus said. “Now continue digging. With your hands. If you keep using the shovel you will break them.”

“Break what?” Remus asked, as he struggled to open the plastic bag with just one hand.

“My bones.” Janus said.

Remus stopped to stare at Janus. “Your bones.”

“Yes, my bones, can you hurry up?” Janus said, crossing his arms.

“Why the fuck are we digging up your bones?” Remus asked.

“I need something from them.” Janus said. “And I need you to trust me, ok?”

“You’re literally a ghost, how the fuck am I supposed to trust you?” Remus said. “What do you want to do with them? Tell me or I’ll fucking leave.”

Janus grit his teeth. “I’ll only tell you if you promise not to tell.”

Remus sighted. “Fine. Tell.”

Logan followed Virgil to the Twins house again.

He passed through the wall into the kitchen, closing his eyes for a moment. He didn’t like looking at the insides of the walls.

In the kitchen, Roman was placing everything in order as he made sure he hadn’t missed a thing. Remus entered through the door and unceremoniously dumped a bag of ivy’s leaves and honeysuckle petals in the counter. Roman gave him a death glare and colocated them in order.

“Hi Lo.” Remus said. He had taped the wooden triangle to his face. Roman looked at him weird and ignored him.

Janus appeared behind Remus. “So, did they get everything?”

“Yes. Although, may I ask, blood?” Logan said.

Janus raised his hands defensively “hey, I don’t make the rules about rituals, I just follow them.”

Logan rolled his eyes just as Virgil and Patton entered the kitchen.

“Hey, crackheads,” Virgil said “why the fuck do we need blood?”

“Ask Remus.” Roman said, taking the shopping bags from Virgil and dumping the candles on the table. “Why are there extra candles?”

Virgil didn’t reply, only taking the candles and shoving them back to the bag.

Patton laughed at that and pulled out the syringe. “So… blood, huh?”

“Yep!” Remus said. “Janus said it doesn’t matter who the virgin is. Like. We’re all virgins, right?”

“Yeah…” Roman said, looking away and blushing. “Right…”

“Do I want to know?” Logan said, mostly at himself.

“No.” Janus said. “You really don’t want to know the things I’ve seen.”

“You’re just saying that to make me second guess things I’ve done.” Logan said.

Janus tsked. “Touché.”

“…I did not ask for this information.” Remus said, staring at both ghosts. He looked at his brother disgusted and Roman only blushed harder. “Nope, didn’t need to know. I’m gonna go get the final details with J-Anus. You three see if there’s any virgin left among us. Horny fuckers.”

He ignored Roman’s offended noises and went upstairs, grabbing the chalkboard on the way. Janus waved Logan goodbye and followed.

Virgil and Patton looked at each other and erupted in laughter. Roman groaned and hid his blushing face with his face.

“I hate you all.” He said.

“Ok, ok, but I must know, which guy was it?” Virgil asked. “Cause you’re hella gay and can’t deny that.”

“I’m not… look, it doesn’t matter.” Roman said, grabbing the syringe and the cup. “Who’s gonna donate their blood to the cause?”

“I’m not… a big fan of syringes.” Patton said. “Do we even know how to draw blood without fucking up?”

Roman showed him his phone, with a YouTube tutorial on it. “There’s a tutorial for everything.”

“So we need something from you because of your connection to the demon.” Remus guessed. “What about Logan? Do I need to go grave robbing?”

“No. He’s connected to me.” Janus said. “If I succeed, so does he.”

“Why si he connected again?” Remus asked. “Last time I checked, he didn’t even believe in ghosts, nor deal making demons.”

“Yeah, well, now he’s a ghost.” Janus said. “I can’t say for sure, but he saw me before dying, and now he can’t move on, so he must be connected to me, or to someone else from this plane of existence.”

“Oh. Cool, I guess.” Remus said. “And you’re connected to…? Apart from the demon.”

“The demon. And my murderer.” Janus said.

“Wait you were murdered?!” Remus said. “You said you died in a fire.”

“I did. I was murdered. In a fire.” Janus said. He ran a hand through his hair. “Blow to the head, a lot faster than burning alive.”

“You know who it was?” Remus asked.

“Yep.” Janus said. “Not gonna talk about it, cause they died ten years ago.”

“Understandable, have a great day.” Remus said.

“Talk about what?” Logan asked, entering through the wall and shivering for a second. “It’s still weird.”

“It took me a year.” Janus said. “And talk about the ritual. We’re almost finishing reviewing it.”

Remus grabbed the chalkboard where he had written the instructions and showed it to Logan. “See? Resurrection in five easy steps!”

Logan scoffed. “Should I tell the others to go carrying the utilities to the basement?”

“Yes.” Janus said. “We’ll be there in a minute.”

Remus watched as Logan disappeared through the wall again, before turning to Janus. “So… anything else we need?”

“A knife.” Janus said. “That should do.”

“Are you going to leave it there like the shady bitch you are, or are you going to elaborate?” Remus asked.

Janus rolled his eyes. “Hide the knife and hand it to me when I ask you to. Quickly. Also, drop the mixture into the fire at the same time, or the knife won’t do a thing.”

“Ok.” Remus said. He got up and grabbed the chalkboard and his notebook. “Also, I find it disturbing that you watched my brother shag.”

“I didn’t do that.” Janus said. “And about everything related to the situation, that’s what’s disturbing? Not the whole digging my bones out and grinding them to dust?”

“That was… weird, but hey, it was a very educational experience.” Remus said, as he made his way downstairs. “Come on, we have a demon to slain.”

Remus had taken off the stupid wooden triangle of his face by the time he made it down to the basement.

The basement, as creepy as it sounded, was used mostly for storing the old stuff none of Remus’s parents wanted, but were too lazy to throw out.

The four of them had cleared up enough space, pushing the old boxes to the back and cleaned the space.

Remus guided them as they made the salt circle and place the candles, lighting them all on. Virgil volunteered to mix the ingredients, as Roman was still pale from seeing blood and Patton’d rather not get close to poison ivy.

And Remus, of course, set the mix on fire.

As Roman reluctantly read the meaningless words Remus had scribbled on his notebook, two figures started becoming more clear.

Then Roman finished, and both of them fell to the ground.

Logan was able of keeping his balance for a few seconds before slumping against the wall, heaving. Right. Car crash. Broken bones. He should’ve expected the pain. He groaned and looked at the others.

“Hey.” He said oh, so eloquently. “It worked.”

“Not yet.” Janus said, still kneeling on the spot he had fallen. He was panting heavily, grimacing at every little movement he made. He raised his hand to his hair and noticed the wetness. “Concussion, right, I can deal with that.”

He moved to stand up on wobbly legs and Patton made a move to get out to help him. Virgil held him back.

“We stay in the circle. Those were the instructions.” He looked at Patton for a few more seconds before letting him go. “What’s the next step?”

“Next step is” Remus said, “do not panic.”

“Easy for you to say.” Roman said. “This whole experience is going to end me.”

“Roman, shut up.” Janus asked. He looked at the flickering candles. “It’s here.”

“What’s here?” Logan asked, trying to move from the wall.

Janus opened his mouth to answer, when the candles were all blown out. The burning mixture kept going, making everything smell horrible.

And then it stepped in, horns grazing the ceiling as he made his way towards were Janus was standing. And it smiled.

“So the little liar finally came around.” It said, smiling in that way that made Janus shiver. It looked over the four kids in the circle. “Which one of them will it be, Deceit?”

“Wait.” Logan said. “What’s happening here?”

The demon turned to him. “The little snake didn’t tell you? He made a deal. A soul for a soul.”

Virgil was the first to realize what that meant. “You piece of shit!” He yelled, and Janus didn’t even have the decency of looking at him. “I did not agree to this!”

“Stay in the circle.” Janus said, voice barely over a whisper. “It can’t get you if you stay in the circle.”

“One of them will have to come out, if you want to go back to life.” The demon said. “Well, two, if you want your friend to live as well.”

“You set us up?” Patton asked. “Was this your plan all along?”

“No.” Janus said, turning to them. “It was not.” He turned to face the demon again. “I’m not giving you a single thing.”

“Then you’ll die, and so will your friend.” The demon warned.

Janus clicked his tongue. “I don’t think I will.”

The signal, Remus thought, before pulling out the mixture he’d made and dumping it into the fire. He didn’t wait to see how the fired reacted, too busy pulling out the hidden knife from his pants and throwing it at Janus.

Janus tried his best, he really did. But there was only a maximum effort a newly undead body could make. And it wasn’t fast enough.

The demon grabbed his wrist just as the knife was left inches from its face.

“What’s this?” It asked, knowing fully well what was happening. “The little snake thinks he’s strong enough?”

And having said that, he bent Janus’s wrist in an angle that wasn’t supposed to be possible.

Janus screamed as the knife fell from his fingers.

Remus found himself running without second thought, as he did everything in life. With no second thought. And so he punched the demon in the face, making it release Janus.

And stepping out of the circle.

And hurting his wrist.

Then the demon grabbed him by his shirt and threw him against the wall. He heard someone scream his name, probably Roman, as they rushed to his side.

His head ached as he opened his eyes and tried to make sense of what was happening. Roman was fussing over him, talking to him too quick for Remus to understand.

He shoved his brother to the side and tried to focus on the scene in front of him.

Virgil and Patton, both paralyzed with fear, still inside the circle. Both of them trying to protect the other against that thing.

Janus, that little shit, being raised by his neck, struggling with the little strength his damaged body provided.

And Logan, who probably had several broken bones, being the only one to move.

He grabbed the knife from the floor. Without more hesitation, he thrusted it through its eye, straight to where the brain should be if this creature was biologically similar to human beings.

Janus felt to the floor, gasping for air. The demon stumbled back, dissolving into dust.

Logan looked around him, still panting. He could hear his heart beating on his ears.

“Is it… Is it over?” Patton asked.

“No.” Janus rasped. “No, you fools, I told you to stay in the cir–”

And then there was light.

Back when Patton had been five, he had fainted for the first time.

It hadn’t been a pleasant experience, getting sick to the point where you fainted. He had those memories buried in a sea of other, much more pleasant, memories. But he hadn’t forgotten how it felt waking up after fainting.

Waking up after this was fairly similar, only something seemed odd.

Very odd.

He pushed himself to his knees. He was in between boxes, as if they hadn’t moved them in the first place. And he felt… wet. Like he was drained in cold sweat, after a long run in the park when it was freezing outside.

He made it around the corner of the big box, probably containing the twins’s old bunk bed, and came face to face with Virgil.

Or he thought it was Virgil.

His face was a bit more angular, more sharp than before. He had a purplish tint to his skin and bright purple eyes. Eight of them, three smaller ones underneath each ‘normal’ one.

And fangs, Patton discovered, once Virgil screamed and backed away. Patton couldn’t help it and he screamed as well, stepping back.

Once both of them had stopped screaming, which took a few more seconds, Patton stared at Virgil.

“You’re purple!” He said.

Virgil gestured to Patton’s body. “Well you’re green! And frog-like!”

Patton stared down at his hands, noticing the green tint they had acquired. And the fibers between his fingers. And that explained the wetness.

“Oh.” He said. “Oh.” He turned to Virgil. “Do you think this has to do with the ‘killing a demon’ thingie?”

“Maybe? I dunno.” Virgil admitted, inspecting his skin as well. “Where are the others?”

As if on queue, they heard two very distinct voices screaming.

They walked to the back and found what they assumed was Roman and Remus, screeching at each other.

Both of them were on the ground, staring at each other as they screeched. Remus, or whom they assumed to be Remus by the white streak–now more prominent– on his hair and the mustache, had tentacles coming from his back, about six of them. Roman, on the other hand, had bat like wings, plus the spiraled horns that appeared from his head. Both of them seemed to share some characteristics, like pointy ears, sharp teeth, and really loud screeching.

Virgil groaned. “Ok, SHUT UP.” He yelled, his voice becoming louder than he had expected. He shot his hands to his mouth, clamping it close. Both the twins stared at him. “Sorry. But really, you were being too loud.”

“You– you’re…” Roman stuttered, for once in his life lost for words. “You’re… that?!”

Patton rubbed his temples. “Ok, ok, calm the fuck down.” He said, ignoring the gasps that came with him cursing. “There has to be a reasonable explanation for this.”

“Yeah, well I don’t see any!” Remus said. His tentacles shot up in frustration. He grumbled and tried to put them back down. “Why do I get the slimy tentacles and you get the cool wings?”

“Why do I get the horns and he gets the cool voice amplification?” Roman asked, gesturing with his head towards Virgil.

“This… this has to have to do with the whole… demon? Thingie.” Virgil said, running a hand through his hair. “Patton said it, and this whole shitshow went down after Logan killed it.”

“Wait.” Remus said. “Where’s Logan?”

Everyone looked around, as the twins got up from the ground, stumbling thanks to the new difference of balance.

“Logan?” Patton called. “LoLo?”

Then Roman’s phone started ringing.

Logan woke up and looked at the sky. He blinked for a few moments, frowning when Ride’s melody made his way to his ears again.

He sat up, taking off his headphones. He didn’t remember putting them on. Where was he?

He looked around. Oh. That’s where he was.

He got up and ran to the pavement before he got run by a car. Again.

Looking around once he was safe from the cars’s wrath, Logan noticed where he was. In the street in front of the park, where he had agreed to meet up with his friends. Where Virgil had been waiting for him.

He looked to the other side of the street. No one there.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket when he realized. His skin was different.

He might have dropped his phone in shock. He couldn’t exactly tell, staring at his skin as he was.

His skin was like a crystal container where gasses roamed free. No, not gasses. Nebulas. Entire galaxies were spiraling inside his skin.

Logan knew better than to panic right there. Panic could wait, until he was out of sight.

He grabbed his phone from the floor and started going to the Twin’s. That wasn’t the closer one, but he thought that maybe, just maybe, they’d still be there from the ritual. Or whatever that had been. It had not gone as planned.

He checked himself on the camera of the phone as he walked. His eyes seemed to be filled with stars as well, and his hair might have been the only thing that remained like before. Good. He didn’t like changing his hair.

Logan was about to knock on the Twins’s door when he realized they were not likely to answer themselves. Not wanting to scare their parents to death, he pulled out his phone once again and started calling one of them.

“Logan?” He heard Roman say, right after picking up. “Where are you? What happened?”

Logan sighted. “I’m outside your home. Would you mind coming to open the door? I do not wish to startle your parents.”

“So you’ve changed as well?” Roman asked.

“We’ll talk about it when we see each other.” Logan said. He was not willing to have this conversation over the phone.

Five minutes was all he had to wait until his friends came out of the house and tackled him into a group hug.

Logan endured the hug from the ground for five seconds before starting trying to squirm away from it. He sat up and looked at the others.

“So…” He said, noticing their inhuman characteristics as well. “You too, huh?”

“YES!” Virgil said, exasperated. “If you ever dare die in front of me again, I will murder you personally!” To emphasize this, he punched him in the shoulder. Logan pouted.

“Why does Logan get to look pretty.” Roman said. “I wanted to look like a pretty star deity too.”

“At least you can fly.” Patton said, getting up. “Let’s get inside, someone might see us.”

As Logan watched the others made their way back inside, noticing their new… aspect.

Then he noticed, as he entered through the front door.

“Where’s Janus?” He asked.

The others looked at each other, eyes widening with the realization.

“Don’t look at me!” Remus said, when everyone turned to him. “He didn’t tell me this part of his plan, only the stabbidity stab one.”

“Well… where did you wake up, Logan?” Roman asked. “Cause it wasn’t here either.”

“In the middle of the road next to the park.” Logan said.

“Oh, well, then Janus must be at Virgil’s house.” Patton said. Everyone stared at him in confusion. “What? Remus said that Janus died there, in a fire.”

Remus couldn’t help smiling, as he bounced up and down. “You were listening to me?!”

“Eh… yes?” Patton said. “I thought everyone was.”

“I usually tune it out when Remus starts talking of death.” Virgil admitted. “Sorry.”

“It’s ok” Remus waved his hand, dismissing it.

“Well, let’s go to Virgil’s then.” Roman said, grabbing his coat and keys. He stared at the coat for a few seconds and then at his new wings. He then glanced to Remus. “How did you hide the tentacles?”

Remus shrugged. “Just will them to go away, or something.”

“Really helpful.” Roman muttered. He inhaled deeply and closed his eyes. Then opened them. “Nothing? Well, great.”

“Just, I dunno imagine them disappearing or something?” Remus proposed.

“Right.” Roman said. He seemed to concentrate for a second.

The wings disappeared. Roman cheered.

They found Janus asleep on Virgil’s room, laying on the floor.

Remus nudged him with his foot. “Is he… alive?”

Virgil pushed him away. “Of course he is, that’s what the whole ritual was there for.”

Logan kneeled to the ground and pushed Janus to lay on his back.

Janus looked better than he had expected. Yellow scales littered his body, mostly on his left side, were the burnt skin had once been. Apart from that, he didn’t seem to have changed as much, which destroyed Logan’s theory of why he had changed more than the Twins and why the Twins had changed more than Virgil and Patton.

If Janus had changed as much as he did, it would be because they were closer to the centre of the explosion of light, while Patton and Virgil where in the circle, protected, and the Twins were outside but farther from the centre.

He shook Janus gently. “Janus. Janus. Wake up.”

“You sure he ain’t dead?” Remus asked. “The ritual did go shittily, after all.”

“Shittily isn’t an adverb.” Roman said.

“It can be if I want it to be.” Remus said.

Janus groaned, blinking his eyes open. Logan noticed one of them was yellow now.

“What?” He asked. “Where am I?”

“Hey, you’re in my roo–” Virgil started saying, before Janus interrupted him screaming. “Shut UP. Yes, we look different, that’s your fault, now stop overreacting.”

Janus stared at him, then at the others, then at himself. “Scales. Great.” He said, and then grimaced. He sticked out his tongue and stared at it. It was forked. “Snake. Great. Just what I wanted.”

Logan snickered. “Well, none of us could chose anything, you just got unlucky.” He said. “Come on, get up.”

He grabbed Janus’s arm and immediately let go when he yelped in pain. And shoved Logan away. With three arms at the same time.

“Wow, wow, he gets several arms?!” Roman complained. “And pretty scales?! This is so unfair…”

Virgil elbowed him. “Stop complaining, dramaqueen.”

Roman pouted.

Remus rolled his eyes, ignoring his brother and approaching Janus. “Give me your wrist.” He said, crouching in front of him and shoving Logan away.

Janus eyed him wearily, hesitating before accepting. His extra arms seemed to disappear.

Remus gently rolled up Janus’s sleeves and held his bloody wrist in place. He stayed like that for a few moments.

“Is… Is anyone gonna say anything, or…?” Patton whispered, leaning towards Logan.

Janus pulled back and massaged his hand. He looked at Remus and frowned. “How did you do that?”

Remus shrugged. “I dunno, I just repeated what I did earlier when I healed my concussion.”

“Wait, you had a concussion?” Roman asked. “I was worried! You could’ve told me!”

“For what? To worry you even further?” Remus asked. “I’m fine now, so why bother?”

“So… Remus can heal people, Virgil has the weird voice amplification thingie…” Patton said. “We all got powers?”

“It seems so.” Logan said. “Well, now that we are together, we should figuratively tackle the most prominent issue here.”

“You don’t have to say figuratively.” Virgil said.

“Shush.” Logan said, and continued with what he was saying. “Our… new appearances. Might be not so warmly welcome as me coming back from the dead.”

“Honestly I don’t think you coming back from the dead is going to be easy to explain at all.” Virgil said.

“Ooh!” Roman said, bouncing up and down. “I got an idea!”

“Oh, god, I’m scared to ask.” Virgil muttered.

Roman sticked his tongue out at him. He then turned to the others. “Ok, so, if we have cool powers, maybe we can like… hide it? Illusion or something, I dunno.”

Everyone looked at each other for a moment, expecting someone to do some magic trick that would save everyone. Nothing.

“Don’t look at me, I did my healing trick. That’s all I’ve got so far.” Remus said.

Logan sighted, rubbing his temples. “Allow me to try.”

He closed his eyes, and imagined them all, back to how they were. It was hard imagining Janus, without the injuries he had carried as a ghost, but he tried his best.

He felt dizzy for a second, almost losing balance. Janus helped him steady himself, and he opened his eyes.

He stared at his friends, all back to their previous forms. Human. Even Janus.

“I did not expect that to work.” Logan said.

“It didn’t.” Janus said. “Your eyes are different. They’re blue now. Not brown.”

“I think it worked great!” Patton said. “I’m sure no one will notice.”

“It doesn’t matter what you think, Pat.” Janus said. “People will notice.”

“We’ll manage.” Virgil said. “And since when do you get to call him ‘Pat’, huh?”

“VIRGIL? DID YOU INVITE FRIENDS OVER WITHOUT WARNING AGAIN?” A voice yelled from downstairs.

Virgil blushed and turned to the door. “WE’LL LEAVE IN A SECOND MOM.” He glanced at his friends, blushing, and gave them a death glare.

Roman elbowed Patton to stop giggling. He didn’t.

“Ok, darling, don’t stay up late! You’ve got school tomorrow!” Virgil’s mom shouted back.

“Wait. School?” Virgil said.

Logan checked his phone. “It appears to be Sunday again. Eccentric.”

Janus shrugged. “Weird magic doing weird shit.”

“I thought you knew what you were doing.” Roman said.

“I knew. Mostly. I improvised.” Janus said.

“Ok, normally I would care, but you need to get the fuck out of here.” Virgil said. “And figure out a way for Janus to exist now that he doesn’t have any legal documents.”

“Fuck you’re right.” Janus said. “I don’t suppose you’ll let me sleep here, will you?”

“No, we don’t have extra beds.” Virgil said.

“This was my room.” Janus pointed out. “So it would be an extra bed for you, not for me.”

Virgil rolled his eyes. “I don’t care if it was your room, it’s mine now.”

“I’d invite you to my place, but my parents don’t like me having over friends they don’t know about…” Patton said.

“You might come to mine for the night.” Logan said. “I doubt my parents will mind.”

“You mean you doubt your parents will notice?” Janus said. “I’m not a particular fan of your parents.”

“Ok, could you please stop implying you’ve seen every aspect of our lifes?” Roman asked. “You’re creeping me out.”

“Let me think… nope.” Janus said. “Also, that guy? Out of all your options?”

Roman blushed, letting out a series of offended noises. “How dare you?!” Janus only laughed. “Stop it!”

“Ok, as much as I enjoy teasing Roman, Imma have to kick y’all out of here.” Virgil said. “I’ve got shit to process, and y’all ain’t helping.”

“I’ll take a look into getting Janus official documentation.” Patton said. “See ya guys.”

“See ya losers.” Remus said. “Don’t murder anyone with the new powers.”

Janus followed Logan home. As he had predicted, Logan’s parents didn’t even notice his presence. It was like being a ghost again. Only now he had to walk.

“I did not come back to life to do math homework.” Janus complained, looking at the equations in front of him.

“Well, too bad, this is what you get for making deals with demons.” Virgil said. “Math homework.”

“I hate you.” Janus said.

“No you don’t.” Patton said. “Now stop complaining and do your homework.”

“Or, in other words.” Remus said. “Suffer.”

“You’re all so dramatic, it’s just maths.” Logan said. “Maths are easy.”

“Shut up, math gay, you don’t count.” Roman said.

Janus groaned again, considering the option of just knocking himself out. That way he wouldn’t have to do homework.