#’we’re talking about alternate dimensions right now?? really???’ yeah. same girl | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

lollytea · 3 years ago

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Girl Talk

(ngl I hate this sm. I wrote this fic yesterday, the file corrupted and i lost everything, had a breakdown, rewrote everything the next day because I am obnoxiously stubborn. Anyways Hunter and Luz content. Bon Appetit?)

(READ ON AO3)

“Okay, but what am I even supposed to say to her? Oh! Maybe I could write down some jokes on the back of my glyph slips in case things get awkward. Wait, no, I don't want her to think I'm not taking this seriously. I don't need to be goofy all the time just to hang out with her. I need her to know that I'm serious about her and this whole...romantic thing. And I know she gets upset when she thinks I'm making fun of her so...”

“Alright, so, get this. It says here that there was once this old witch who lived on the outskirts of Latissa and his whole thing was experimenting by mixing paints and magic together. Apparently the stuff he created was like....super powerful.”

“I mean, she said she likes me 'cause I'm goofy and funny and lovable and...and...and I'm sure there's other adjectives I could use but I'm drawing a blank here. So, who am I to deprive her of what she signed up for? But I can't just....ugh, I can't even think right!”

“It doesn't have a lot of info on his specific technique but I'm sure if we did some more research, we could successfully replicate his experiments. We're pretty good at figuring stuff out. Woah, wait. I wonder what would happen if we created glyphs with this paint....maybe it would enhance the spell's level of power. Oh, that would be so cool!”

Luz stopped pacing, the floorboards practically burning after she thoroughly wore down the surface with her frantic footsteps. She set a hand on her hip and turned a withering look on her guest.

“Call me coocoo but I don't think you're listening to a word I say.”

Hunter lifted his head to blink up at her, chewing on the end of a pen. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor, boxed in by towers of Eda's Wild Magic books.

There was a glassy look in his eye, as if he was trying to get his bearings after being abruptly yanked out of an alternate dimension.

He had been, in a way. Luz was inclined to call it “Booksville.”

When Luz first met Hunter, this sort of stuff was a big, huge No-No for him. She could've invited him to take a look at any one of those books, packed with information on that obsession of his and of course, he'd be crazy with intrigue but he would hesitate. If he even opened the book at all, he'd card through the pages with an almost jumpy sense of caution, as if the paper itself would sting his fingers.

Well, that ship had certainly sailed. It had taken him a while to get fully comfortable but nowadays, Hunter didn't ask twice before digging into the contents of Eda's books, soaking up every tidbit of every sentence until he had exhausted every page.

He had even brought his own index flags to mark his favorite passages. He had gone on a little rant earlier about how Eda was an outright maniac for dog-earring the page corners.

Luz made a mental note to never show him the state of her Azura books. He would probably cry.

Hunter had become so lost in the Wild Magic sauce, he didn't even seem to care about the fact that he was not supposed to be here.

Of course, Eda didn't mind that he was here. That is to say, Luz didn't technically tell her he was here. She and King were currently out, being menaces to society and all that fun stuff, as they usually were before Luz would sneak Hunter in.

So, to be fair, Eda had never specifically said that Luz was not allowed to let The Golden Guard of the Emperor's coven into their home.

It was probably fine, right?

Yeah, it was probably fine that Luz had been hiding The Golden Guard of the Emperor's coven in her bedroom like some kind of forbidden pet.

Speaking of forbidden pets, that precious red cardinal of his was perched like a Christmas decoration atop his shoulder. That little rascal did wonders for Hunter. He seemed so much cuter than he was when there was an adorable little palisman snuggling up to him.

Once Hunter had processed what Luz said to him, his features screwed up tight. He was offended.

“Whadd'ya mean I'm not listening? I bet you can't repeat anything I was just talking about.”

“Ugh! Yeah, Hunter, I heard you. Paints! You wanna start painting as a hobby and let me just tell you, I fully support your budding creativety and will hype up your work with my entire heart but please. Right now I am having a full blown Amity Calamity!”

“Yeah, okay, that is not what I was talking about. Also, I get that you're freaking out n' all but....what do you expect me to do about it?” He threw his hands about wildly, at a complete loss. “Man, I don't know anything about that stuff,”

“I don't knowww....” Luz groaned. “I just....ugggghhh.” She buried her head in her hands, ruffling her hair into oblivion, like it would miraculously stimulate her brain cells into action. It released some pent up frustration, at least. “I wish it was easier for us to just talk about girls together.”

Hunter perked up. “Talk about girls? Are you kidding? Of course we can talk about girls, dummy!”

“Wait, really?” Luz asked, taken aback by this apparent development.

“Yeah, for sure. One sec,” Buzzing with eagerness, Hunter dove into his stacks of books, emerging seconds later with a worn, dust encrusted volume. It was so ancient, the title had faded away but Hunter still put his finger to where the big letters should be.

“Notable Female Witches of The Savage Ages,” He rattled off delightedly. “They were considered the mothers of Wild Magic. Their style of spell was really quite advanced, see they--”

Despite her frayed nerves, Luz sill managed a weak laugh.

As insufferable as he could be sometimes, she really did like this nerd a lot.

“Okay, Hunter. Buddy,” She said gently. “This stuff sounds really cool and I wanna hear all about it at some point buuuut....when I say girls, I mean...y'know. Amity specifically.”

“Oh. Right. Yeah.”

Hunter's face fell with disappointment but he was quick to snap back into a look of cool indifference. He shut the book in his lap with a soft thump, set it aside and turned his full attention to Luz.

“Sooooo...” he began awkwardly, scratching at his ear. It could not be more obvious that Hunter wanted nothing to do with this discussion. But Luz appreciated that he was trying. “Girlfriend problems, huh? Shoot.”

Luz's cheeks darkened. “Heh. 'Girlfriend'. Yeah, that's...uh...” She was suddenly very inconvenienced by the existence of her own hands so she clasped them together tight to keep herself from fidgeting. “That is.....a word for Amity.”

Hunter frowned, puzzled. “Okaaaay? So, what's the issue?”

“Ohhhhhh, boy.” An ironic, long suffering smile stretched across her face. “Let me just tell you that there is a lot goin' on up here, pal.” Luz tapped her finger against her temple. “So if I'm gonna give you the full unabridged version--”

“You could summarize it.”

“You know I don't know how to do that.”

“Yeah, I know.” Hunter sighed. “Figured it was worth a shot. Okay, let's hear it.”

“Alright but this is gonna be a lot so I suggest you strap yourself in,”

Luz sucked in a deep inhale, with full intent to let the entire flood of thoughts cascade out her mouth.

Hunter's eyes snapped to the floor, like he was actually looking for a safety harness to attach himself to. Then he seemed to realize that was ridiculous, as he scowled to himself. Little Rascal chirped and he irritably mumbled something under his breath in response.

And then Luz took off.

“Alright, so!” She announced, clapping her hands together. “So me and Amity have known each other fooooor...a while now? Yeah, it's been a while. And we've been pretty good friends ever since and then one day, she rescued me from her scary mom and she had this black flowing cape and her voice went all low and then suddenly, huh. Doki doki, y'know?” She thumped a fist against her chest. “I was gettin' all feelings-y up in here,”.

“And then a little later I figured out that we were both feeling kinda feelings-y and I was all like,” She mimed a brain explosion. “Pshww....”

“Pshww....” Hunter repeated quietly, testing out the little sound effect on his tongue. “Doki...doki....?”

“Yeah. Exactly. Doki doki. Pshww.” Luz nodded, as if he had made a valuable contribution. “So, now we're both here in the same boat, fully shish kebab-ed by Cupid's arrow.”

“Hold up. What language are you speaking?”

“And things are....great? Nice? Sorta hard to believe but stuff actually happens. We hold hands a few times, we...” The volume of her voice dropped to a bashful murmur. “we kiss a few times. There was so many beautiful, amazing romance-y moments that happened, just like in movies, y'know?”

“Movies....?” Hunter's bewildered stare turned from Luz to the bird on his shoulder, as if he was going to get any further clarification from either of them.

“Right! But here's the thing. It sorta feels like all that stuff just went by in a blur. I don't even know how I did any of that. The hand holding, the smooches the....ugh! It was like I was on autopilot or something and now I have no idea how to operate. Now, no matter how hard I try to get the vibe right, I can recreate those moments. So now it's starting to feel like...I don't know how to do anything!”

Luz's arms were whizzing around like an out of control windmill.

“I mean, Sure, Amity takes the lead sometimes but I can't make her carry this entire....relationship? Flirtationship? Whatever it is that's happening here! I gotta act or something! But I've been thinking about it waaaay too much. I never know the right time to hold her hand, I never know if she wants me to tell her she looks cute or if now maybe isn't the right time or...it's awkward, okay?! I've been making it awkward 'cause I don't know what to do! I-I don't even know for sure if we're dating! We've never talked about it!”

The last sentence came out as a squeak and Luz realized she had used up all her oxygen and needed to take a breather.

Hunter had not said a word but Luz did not know what to make of that dissecting stare of his, that studied her with a mixture of confusion and fascination. Like she was some kind of peculiar animal. A flushed, panting, peculiar animal.

“So.” He said finally, holding his palm out for Little Rascal to migrate from his shoulder to his hands. “Why don't you talk about it?”

He asked like it was the obvious solution. Luz was a little irked by it, but she kept her patience.

“Oh, Hunter. Sweet Hunter.” She heaved an exhausted sigh. “It is not that simple.”

He still didn't seem to understand. “Well, why not?”

“'Cause it's--.....Uh.” Luz trailed off, twirling her wrist around as if expecting to snatch an eloquent articulation out of thin air.

“Okay. Lemme put it like this. Amity is....really special. To me. Sometimes I still can't believe that she's real and she's friends with me and she likes me and....whew.” She pressed her fingertips to her cheek, surprised by the warmth. Even thinking that sort of stuff prompted a blush or two but it seemed saying it out loud made her face scalding.

“Anyway, now that we're going through....this, everything feels so much more....fragile?” Her voice rose in pitch, uncertain if 'Fragile' was even a suitable word to describe her feelings. It was just a vague, wishy-washy concept to describe.

“Like I feel like I could break it all so easy, just by....” Wait, she knew. She had figured out her handle on this.

“Just by being me.” She felt an ache just by admitting it, but it was the truth. Luz exhaled unsteadily to compose herself, clasping her fists tight into the fabric of her shorts and she continued...calmly.

“I can't risk doing anything that's gonna push her or make her uncomfortable or scare her away or...y'know, ruin this.” She held up her palms with a heavy shrug. “I-I don't have a plan and it would be way too reckless to wing it. Who knows what would come out of my mouth? She tells me a billion times that my weirdness is what she likes about me but...it can just as easily be the thing she hates if I overdo. I can't overdo it.

Luz was expecting Hunter to look at her like she was dumb again, but surprisingly, he nodded. A slow, thoughtful nod, as he absentmindedly scratched Little Rascal under the chin.

As the silence filled a little longer, she was starting to believe he had nothing else to add, which was fine. She had wanted to rant her heart out but realistically, she couldn't imagine Hunter having any advice for her. This wasn't exactly his area of expertise.

“Hey, Luz.” He said at last, voice surprisingly breezy. “You know those books that you really like? Uhh, with the nice witch Azuzu or whatever,”

“It's the Good Witch Azura!” Luz snapped, hands flying to her hips. “And I know you just pretended to not know her name. You're just trying to be cool.”

“Yeah, yeah.” The corner of Hunter's lip tweaked upwards. “And wasn't there that other witch that you liked to pretend was Azura's girlfriend?

Luz scoffed, finding it utterly unbelievable that this obnoxious little man had the audacity to be so dismissive towards her favorite book series, when she had been sweet enough to smuggle him in here.

“She was not her 'Girlfriend', she was her 'Soulmate' and if you even listened to me talk about it, you would know that. For your information, her name was Hecate and she began as Azura's rival but over the course of the series, they developed a beautiful, unbreakable bond that was jam packed with heavy romantic subtext. I mean, even their declaration of their eternal friendship in Book Five, which was really emotionally poignant by the way, reads so much like a love confession, it's a crime. And it's like...Ladies! Just kiss already!”

“Okay. Right. Sure. I understood some of that.”

“I mean, I guess I've read a ton of Heczura fanfics to tide me over. It's hard to find a fic where they don't kiss. Hold on, you know what fanfiction is, right?”

“Yeah.” The light in Hunter's eyes dimmed. “You made me sit through that three hour long slideshow presentation, remember?”

“Oh, right,” Luz popped a finger gun. “That was fun,”

It was fun, but a lot of work. Hunter was pouting over losing a measly three hours of his time. Well, newsflash, nerd, Luz spent two weeks working on that. Nobody is getting their hours back.

“And what usually happens in those fanfictions?” Asked Hunter, propping his chin up with his hand, as Little Rascal hopped over to a pile of books. “How do they end?”

“I told you, they kiss. A lot of the time they look deeply into each others eye and talk about how they complete each other like two halves of one heart. And y'know, moments of miscellaneous fluff.”

“Uh huh. Interesting,” He mused, tapping his pen against his bottom lip.

Luz knew Hunter could be a little...eccentric but was he really analyzing fanfiction right now? Where did the sudden interest come from?”

“So, uh, besides Azura and Hecate, are there any other...boats(?) that you--”

“Ships.” Luz corrected him.

Hunter snapped his fingers. “Right. Ships. Basically love stories that you really like.”

“We talkin' canon or non canon?”

Hunter squinted at her, lost. Seems somebody was not taking enough notes during the slideshow presentation. “Both? A-all...?”

“Oh, well, there's a bunch.”

Luz had no intention of listing every single ship that had captured her heart. They would be here all week.

“I've spent my whole life reading books, watching movies and anime and--”

“Anime...?”

“Hunter, please!” Luz squeaked as calmly as she possibly could, but she could not deny that she had started to vibrate. “You have no idea how excited you just made me at the thought of teaching you about anime but I'd need to dedicate a whole day to that 'cause I need to meet Amity soon and I'm still sorta in crisis mode. So, let's stay on topic.”

Her brow furrowed. “Whatever the heck the topic is! Why are we talking about ships, Huntifer?”

He waved off her question. “Okay but how does the story usually end for all your ships? The book ones, the anime ones, all of them,”

“We've been over this with the fanfiction discussion. They kiss, Hunter. Geez, you want a diagram or something?”

“But what else?” He prompted.

“What do you mean 'What else?'”

Now this was just getting ridiculous.

“They kiss!” Luz said with a huge amount of emphasis. “And again, miscellaneous fluff. They'll do stuff like pick each other up and swing around, hold hands and....walk off into the sunset, y'know?” She waved off all that extra padding as unimportant to the conversation. (Though Luz did really enjoy miscellaneous fluff.)

“Well yeaaaah,” Hunter was giving off vibes of a grade school teacher who gave her little nudges in the correct direction but ultimately wanted her to figure out the right answer herself. She wished he could just give it to her because honestly, she didn't know where this any of this was going.

“But when exactly do they ask each other if they're dating?”

“Whaa?” Well, that settled it. He had paid no attention to the slideshow whatsoever. “Nah, nah, they don't do stuff like that. They don't have to 'cause they're already perfect for each other. All they gotta do is look into each others' eyes and they just...” Luz shrugged, feeling lightness bubble in her chest at the very thought. She had a feeling her smile looked pretty dopey. “They just know.”

“Right. And why don't you and Amity just know?”

The bubbles burst and the lightness turned to dead weight.

The question speared through Luz's gut. Her entire body went rigid.

She had known but...

She had been trying not to...

Not to think about it.

Because if she thought about it, she knew she'd cry.

But there is was. A culmination of every coil of underlying dread that had been gradually writhing in her stomach in a monster of anxiety, summarized in a short and sweet collection of simplistic little words.

Luz did not just know when it came to Amity. She was constantly taking shots in the dark. That is, if she was even brave enough to take a shot at all.

The two of them together were not as seamlessly synchronized as couples in love were supposed to be.

Her throat stung.

Her vision went cloudy with blotted tears but she managed to catch Hunter's stony expression break into one of sheer panic.

“Wh-- Luz! Hey!” He yelped, scrambling to pick himself up from the floor. He nearly tripped over his books as he stood and hurried over to close the distance between them. He made to reach out to her but his hand stopped, just as it was about to brush against her shoulder. It hovered there for a moment, fingers curling and uncurling with uncertainty.

“Luz, listen, I wasn't....I-I mean, what I meant was...uhh. C-c'mon, cut it out!” Hunter's voice crackled with desperation and despite crying her eyes out, Luz felt the watery chuckle at the back of her throat.

“Aww, does crying make the Golden Guard uncomfy?” She tried to tease but her words came out all wobbly.

In fairness to the poor guy, it probably did. Luz couldn't imagine that dealing with tears in a delicate matter, was ever something he would need to handle in his line of work.

For all she knew, this was his first time having to comfort someone like this.

“You don't get to make jokes and cry at the same time. You gotta pick one.” Hunter snipped, but his tone was not nearly as cutting as usual. Luz was almost tempted to call it soft.

Clearing her eyes with the heel of her hands, she finally felt that warm touch on her shoulder, and then another rest against her upper arm.

Somehow the gentleness cracked all her remaining composure and she dissolved into ragged sobs.

Hunter did not speak nor did he let go out her until she got every tear out of her system. He waited patiently, tracing circles with his thumb into her skin.

Eventually, her sniffles fell silent and her eyes no longer blurred. She took a deep breath and the following exhale was shaky but manageable.

“Are you....good?” He asked cautiously.

Luz nodded.

Hunter removed his hands so carefully, you'd think doing so would cause her physical pain. He must have heard once that people were more prone to being hurt when they were already upset and assumed it was literal.

“Do you really think that...Amity and I....” Luz's voice was low and quiet but her jaw was set tight. She refused to let her words be whimpered. She looked up, meeting Hunter's eyes. “Aren't right for each other?”

“What? No! No, no, no,” Hunter looked positively alarmed at the accusation. “Luz th-that's not even remotely what I meant by that.”

“Well, then I guess you accidentally hit the nail on the head.” Luz managed a strained, bitter little smile. “'Cause it's true.”

“Luz, c'mon,” Hunter groaned, exasperated. “Don't talk like that, you've got it mixed up.”

“No.” Said Luz, tone quiet, polite yet strikingly obstinate. “You were right, Hunter.”

For someone who loved being right, he didn't seem thrilled at all.

“When it comes to Amity, I don't just know. I don't always know what she's thinking or what she wants from me. After all this time, I-I shouldn't still be trying to figure her out,”

Luz wanted to figure her out. Every time she was in her orbit, she wanted nothing more to turn over every last piece of that girl and find every hidden gem.

But now, it like she was barricaded. Something was keeping her from moving forward, from discovering Amity.

“I mean, we've kissed.” The memories of Amity were turning more and more bittersweet by the second “I told her I loved her! We had our happy ending already! A-at least I thought it was a happy ending. But we're not acting like people who are made for each other are meant to act!”

“How do you even know how people who are meant for each other are meant to act?!” Hunter demanded, as though it wouldn't reach Luz's skull unless he raised his voice. “In all the love stories you've read, it always ends with a kiss, doesn't it?”

“And--”

“And miscellaneous fluff. Yeah, I get it.” Hunter shooed the detail away before clearing his throat.

“Point is, they never talk about what comes after. You don't read about all those awkward talks where they decide if they're dating or not and talks about what they're okay with and what they're not. It always just cuts to the perfect, shiny romantic stuff, all tied up with a bow and because of that,” He clutched Luz by the shoulders.”You don't know how to move forward in a relationship 'cause you've never had a frame of reference to help you along.”

“Hey, that's not true!” She tore away from Hunter's grip. “I'll have you know that I imagine my favorite ships as couples all the time,”

“Yeah and lemme guess,” He droned, setting a hand on his hip and launching into a mockingly saccharine tone of voice. “They understand each other soooo well all the time, they can practically read each others' mind and everything is smooth sailing and peachy all the time.”

“Yeah, duh.” Luz didn't quite what he was making fun of. “That's what being a ship is all about.”

“Okay, fine, maybe, but I cannot stress this enough,” He ran his fingers through his hair before making a cutting gesture with the side of his hand, directed at Luz. “You are not a ship.”

“Well, yeah, obviously. I'm only one--”

“I mean that the two of you aren't a ship! Listen to me, you're not Azura and Hecate. You're Luz and Amity. You're real people. You've got like a million different emotions and they're messy and crazy and you don't understand most of them.”

“Okay, Hunter, I get it, I'm a hot mess. You don't have to rub it in.”

“We're all hot messes, Luz!” He exploded. “Every single one of us. 'Cause we're real and not book characters.” He was pacing back and forth now as he ranted and raved, gesticulating like a madman.

“We gotta handle all the awkward conversations that don't fit into books. You gotta talk to real people to get them and you can talk to them for years and years but you're never gonna entirely understand them. In your love stories, it's all kisses and happy endings and it's shiny and sparkly and perfect and nerds like you Eat. It.Up!”

Hunter emphasized his point by poking Luz's forehead, shocking a startled laugh out of her. As wound up as he was, the noise surprised him too.

Her laugh was contagious and soon the room was silent, expect for the sound of quiet, breathy giggles.

One of the knots in Luz's stomach had untangled itself. Hunter did make a point that she could understand. Yeah, okay, maybe she had been a little too wrapped up in fiction to successfully navigate through her own life. Luz had never been the most logical person so it was comforting for a levelheaded counter-argument to whatever was currently inflaming her anxiety.

Obviously, this didn't fix everything. Now, she understood why this wasn't easy but that didn't mean she magically knew where to go from here.

Once the shadow of Luz's smile had finally faded away, she looked up and studied Hunter for a long while. Her gaze may have been a bit intense as nervousness began to creep into his features.

“H-hey. Uh. Sorry if I was a little too--”

“Huntifer, I think you might be on to something with this one,”

He blinked at her before brightening with relief, shrugging it off. “Oh. Yeah, maybe. I dunno, I guess it's worth some thought.

Astonishing how Hunter could switch from the cockiest, most obnoxious kid in the Boiling Isles to a remarkably humble guy. Maybe it depended on context. Or he was just embarrassed that he sorta lost control of himself in his impatience.

Luz nodded. “I'd say a lot of thought. But..I think things are still gonna be awkward. With Amity. I still don't know how I'm supposed to talk this stuff through with her.”

Hunter snorted, loosely folding his arms over chest and resting his weight on one hip. And just like that, with that simple change of posture, he looked full of himself again “You wanna know a secret that's probably not much of a secret?”

He beckoned Luz to lean in closer and said in a stage whisper. “Amity probably doesn't know either.”

Huh. Yeah, Luz knew that. She knew that at the back of her mind but...she hadn't really thought about it much. She was a little too preoccupied with her own inexperience.

Hunter's lofty grin softened. “So, it's a good thing neither of you are doing it alone, right? Don't you think you could figure out how together?”

Figure out how together....

The realization sank from the surface of her mind, and everything was processing very fast then suddenly, everything clicked.

Amity.

Luz knew Amity. Luz trusted Amity. Luz loved Amity. If there was any person Luz believed would stumble alongside her through things they didn't quite understand yet, it was Amity. And it occurred to her that Luz would help Amity in return without hesitation.

With enough notches and trimming and smoothing edges, if they worked through this together, Luz and Amity could click too. Maybe not perfectly, not for a while just yet.

But enough that they could make each other happy.

A swing of confidence so strong flooded Luz's system, she swore she nearly collapsed. She felt the grin tugging at her mouth.

She could try. She could absolutely try. They could both try.

“Is...that a yes?” Hunter asked, gauging her expression.

Luz nodded so speedily, it made her head hurt. But then she realized something else and she turned a very specific look on Hunter.

But before he could ask if she was about to attack him, she held up two fingers on each hand and then placed them on either side of her head so they jutted out just behind her ears.

“Man, I don't know anything about that stuff,” Said Luz, in what she believed to be an uncanny imitation of Hunter's voice.

He frowned. “What are the theatrics for?”

“You lied to me!” Luz was delighted.

“I-I didn't lie!” He loudly objected, pointed ears scorching bright pink. “That was just common sense, you doofus. You know, that thing you lack.”

“You know, that thing you lack.” Luz parroted, swinging her hips from side to side. Once again, her impression remained flawless.

“Don't do that!”

“Don't do that!

“Stop, you weirdo!”

At the peak of riled up, Hunter floundered for a retort that Luz wouldn't shoot back at him with childish mimicking. But then he cracked and wound up sticking his tongue out at her.

Luz simply mirrored him and Hunter huffed indignantly, turning on his heel and stomping back towards his books.

He had barely made a few steps when Luz lunged at him from behind, draping her long, lanky arms around his shoulders.

“Wha—Hey! Get off!” He squawked, struggling to pry her off him as Luz squished her cheek against his.

“Huntifer~” She singsonged. “Can you please calm down for two seconds and let me say thanks already?”

Hunter knotted his arms and his scowl didn't soften but Luz didn't miss how he stopped trying to squirm out of her grip.

“Even though you were kinda rambly and all over the place, what you said helped. It helped a lot. I know this is something I can handle and I know that 'cause of you. Thanks, nerd.”

She waited patiently until she felt his shoulders loosen. And then he glanced back at her and there was a smile. A small, tight, subtle smile but it was good enough for Luz.

And then with a burst of adrenaline, she gripped him tighter and planted a big, wet raspberry on his cheek.

Predictably, Hunter blew his top. He screeched furiously and his hands went wild to push her off but Luz was stronger than she looked. And so help her, she would give Hunter this affection or die trying.

Dying trying did not seem unlikely, actually. Hunter had told her once before that if he ever murdered her, it would probably be her own fault. Luz could not argue with that.

“That is so gross!” He griped, once Luz had finally released him.

“You're gross~” She chirped, practically bouncing on the balls of her feet.

Hunter wiped the spit off his cheek with his palm before looking up at Luz with narrowed eyes

Luz did not have time to brace herself and suddenly she was tackled to the ground. She kicked and she screamed as Hunter dragged his disgusting wet hand across her face.

“GrossGrossGrossGrossGrossGrossGroooooss!”

Hunter cackled maniacally the whole time.

They carried on like rowdy toddlers for a while until Luz had to go meet Amity, leaving Hunter and his palisman to themselves.

It was too weird to admit out loud but he was disappointed that she was gone. Hanging out with her like this wasn't that bad. Talking with her, arguing with her, wrestling with her. It all made Hunter feel....so much like a kid.

Something that he had realized recently was that he still liked being a kid.

In spite of the doom and gloom of white of gold, of the clawed scars in his shoulder, of the spear that grazed his hair, a spark of childishness remained in Hunter that had never been entirely snuffed out.

It wasn't until he met Luz that he began actively trying to keep that spark alive.

The sun had long since fallen asleep by the time Luz returned and the moon was pooling in the sky. A little after sun down, he heard the downstairs door slam shut and the loud exuberant voice of The Owl Lady boomed from the floorboards beneath him. By the sound of it, she was celebrating a successful day's work. Hunter wondered what she and the cute little demon had managed to steal today.

His snoozing palisman was tucked snug in the crook of his neck, a pleasant warmth against his skin. It was a good idea to keep the bird close. If someone other than Luz came barreling into the room, he'd better have his staff on hand to magically conceal himself.

But once an hour passed and the chatter of the witch and the demon below gradually faded into loud snoring, Hunter presumed they had passed out on the couch. For the time being, he should be fine.

Hunter hoped that creepy owl tube thing wouldn't rat them out. Fortunately, Luz had promised that Hooty was willing to take a bribe but unfortunately, gossip spread fast in the Boiling Isles. Now The Golden Guard had a reputation for being a lunatic who visited the night market several times, buying dead mice in bulk.

He snorted to himself, combing through 'From Bones to Fire: A Study of Wild Magic Volume 2'. Everything he went through just to get his hands on knowledge.

Well, also to be young with Luz.

Yet another hour passed and somehow, being surrounded by his own obsession, Hunter got a little overstimulated. To give his brain a rest, he was now flipping through some tattered old magazine that Luz brought with her from the human realm. Some of the articles were practically gibberish to him but overall, it was okay. He learned he was a Scorpio. He didn't know what that entailed but it sounded cool.

He nearly jumped out of his skin as Luz burst into the room, announcing her return.

Startled, his palisman flew into a fluster, cheeping like crazy before it settled down atop his head. Hunter, meanwhile, had flung the magazine away so fast, it was like it had contaminated him, and snatched up the closest book to pretend he was reading it the whole time.

Thankfully, Luz didn't notice.

“Hey there, Little Rascal,” She cooed, prancing across the room and plopping down next to Hunter. “And hey, you little bookworm, you.”

“Bookworm?” Hunter knocked his shoulder against hers. “You looking for a fight, kid?”

“Whaaaat? Hunter, you wound me, I was just....Ohhh, my bad. I always forget that our bookworms and your bookworms are two waaaay different things.” She paused thoughtfully before shaking her head. “Actually, I don't retract anything. You look like a bookworm.”

“Yeah, well, you smell like a selkidomus.” Hunter smirked.

“Hey!” Luz bumped their shoulders. “Can you blame me? I've had one heck of a day with lots of nervous sweating!”

He was surprised that got him laughing but that tended to happen around her.

“So, how'd it go?” Hunter asked, even though he already knew the answer.

Luz's beam was as bright as a dozen of her light spells. The corner of her lip was twitching, as if she wanted to smile wider but it was physically impossible.

“We're dating.” She stated, no more than a whisper.

It obvious since the moment she entered the room, far bouncier and bubblier than usual but Hunter still grinned.

He had expected her to scream it from the rooftops, to grind his ribcage into powder with the force of her hug, to set off a riot of firework glyphs, spelling it out in lights.

No matter how she could have chosen to tell him, he would have been just as giddy as she was.

And yet, despite the lack of fanfare, somehow, it still felt so much like Luz. Though he knew that in the morning, she would tell the entire Boiling Isles, right here, right now, only Hunter knew. Something about that felt nice.

But the quiet serene scene was momentarily ruptured when Hunter spotted Luz re-adjusting herself out of the corner of his eye and he was immediately on high alert. Another raspberry, he could sense it.

“Luz, don't you d--”

It wasn't a raspberry.

The feather-light peck against his cheek was gone before he fully processed it, as Luz drew away with that big stupid smile still plastered on her face.

Hunter blinked away the surprise, looking to her with a raised eyebrow.

“What's that look for? In this family, we give each other hugs and kisses~”

He felt his lip quirk upwards as he scoffed, turning away with a shake of his head.

“That was so gross.”

“You're gross.”

“For real, it was even more gross than the raspberry.”

Luz burst into giggles and Hunter could understand why everything was suddenly a million times funnier to her. She will still fizzling with that giddiness that Amity had kissed into her and now it was all spilling out.

To be honest, listening to a teenage girl gush and squeal about her girlfriend did not seem like something Hunter would ever willingly subject himself to.

But this was Luz. His friend, Luz.

He lightly pinched the pudge of her cheek. “Heeeey. You wanna tell me all about it, don't you?”

Luz snapped her head over to gawk at him, astonished. And then the excitement took hold and her hands started flapping and she looked about ready to explode with delight. Her mouth was already flying open to give every solitary detail of her evening with Amity Blight.

But then she stopped, a crease forming on her brow. He caught that unreadable look she gave him and the way her eyes skimmed over the books that scattered the floor around them.

“Hmmm.” She stroked her chin with an over dramatic 'thinking' face. “Y'know what? I'll think I'll keep it all to myself.”

“Oh, really~?” Grinned Hunter. “I can only imagine all the romantic schmaltzy sickening stuff that occurred tonight. Miscellaneous fluff, right?”

Judging by the blood that stained her cheekbones, he must have been correct.

“Hey, Hunter.” She said quietly, resting her weight against his side. “You've been lost in your books for hours now. Would you mind telling me all about the most interesting you read about today? Reading myself is fine but it's way better to hear all about it from a bona fide nerd.”

Frankly, it was embarrassing how fast the giddiness practically electrocuted him and suddenly he found himself rambling. He rambled until his voice gave up but it didn't bother him at all because it was just Luz.

Luz hung on every word he said.

#the owl house #toh #luz nozeda #the golden guard #toh Hunter #lumity

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supercorpkid · 4 years ago

Text

This is why you should never trust an Imp – Part 2.

Supercorp, Kara Danvers x Daughter!Reader, Lena Luthor x Daughter!Reader

Word count: 2376.

You are going to be ok. It’s what you keep telling yourself. So what if there is no you in the future? In two days, that imp is coming to pick you up, and you’ll go back to your own timeline and you’ll be written back into existence.

But what if he doesn’t come? What if that lying cheating bastard leaves you stranding two years into the future where no one knows about your existence and you’re totally alone? You need help. Who can help you besides your moms? Alex, Kelly, Jamie… Jamie! You wonder if Jamie is still around.

You fly to school. You’re still a teenager so, keep your head down, blend in. You can do it. Lucky for you is lunch time, that means you can talk to Jamie freely. You make your way to the table you two usually sit, but she isn’t there. Jamie is a few tables away, in a cheerleader uniform (wait, excuse her?), surrounded by a lot of people.

Ok. That makes sense. You don’t exist here, so she was never stuck with you in the first place, and the only reason why she doesn’t have any friends, is because she is always with a freaking Luthor. And people don’t like Luthors. So, what do you do now?

“Hey, Jamie.” Everyone stops what they’re doing to stare at you. You smile embarrassed. Jamie looks at you with curiosity for a second. Your heart beats faster. Maybe she’ll recognize you. Maybe she’ll remember everything, she’ll remember the conversation on the training center and she’ll know you did the dumb thing, but she’ll help you anyway.

Her face turns back to no expression, like you saw it on both of your moms’ faces. She doesn’t know you at all. Your heart drops one more time, and you can’t take this expression anymore.

“Can I, um, talk to you?” You force yourself to speak. You don’t even know what you’ll say to her, but still, you need to talk to your best friend.

“Why is that nerd talking to you, Jamie?” Someone says and she smiles at the joke.

“I don’t know, I’ve never seen this weirdo before.” She answers, making everyone laugh.

“Scatter, nerd. We don’t want anyone to see you around us.” One of her friends says and you take a deep breath. You know when you’re defeated. So, you turn on your heels and leave. Before leaving school, you take one last look behind you. Jamie seems happy. Happier than you’ve ever seen her. She has friends and there’s a guy practically glued to her, and you can only imagine they are dating.

It’s a weird feeling. You always thought you and Jamie were an inseparable combo, but apparently a freaking imp can separate you two. Rao, you hate him so much!

No time to waste dwelling on this hate. You need somebody else to help you. Maybe you could fly to Superboy and ask for his help. He probably would believe you since he got in so many dumb situations himself. You just need to find him. You fly the whole country and you can’t seem to locate him. Where is Conner? Is he not in the future? Or in this reality?

You sit on top of a tower, and try to think. Lena found out how to combine the alien and human DNA, you know that much. You also know that you and Superboy are about the same age. So maybe, they’ve used Lena’s research to create him. If that’s the case, if CADMUS stole Lena’s research and created Conner, you not existing also made him not exist in this timeline/reality.

You fly back to National City. There’s one person who can help you with your time travel questions. One person who came from the future himself. You need to see Brainy. You wait outside the DEO, so you don’t have to explain yourself to anyone else.

You see aunt Alex leaving with Brainy later that night. They’re talking and laughing, and you just want to run to her and tell her everything. You feel your heart squeezing in your chest, and there’s a tennis-size ball stuck in your throat. What the hell have you done? Why would you do something so stupid like trusting an imp, when everything was completely fine?

They finally part ways, you wipe your tears and breathe deeply before running towards Brainy.

“Brainy! Wait.” He turns around and looks at you confused. He, too, never saw you before. He might not have a lot of face expressions, but you can see that.

“I don’t believe we’ve ever met.” He says monotone.

“We haven’t yet. Or, maybe we have, and now we don’t anymore. It’s confusing.”

“I see.”

“I’m Kara’s daughter.” You smile and he tilts his head at you. “And Lena’s. Obviously.”

“There’s one percent chance that this information is correct.” He says, making you sigh.

“Brainy, please, just hear me out, ok? If after everything I say you still don’t believe me, I’ll leave you alone.” You ask and he doesn’t answer. He doesn’t need to. You can see he has already agreed to it. You look around to make sure no one can see you. “First, you need to see something.” You fly a little off ground, just enough he’ll know you have superpowers, but not enough that people would turn their heads to look at you. When you land back, he has a different expression. You blow out so he can see your freeze breath.

“You’re Kryptonian.” He states, not looking shocked.

“Half Kryptonian. I also have Lena’s DNA.” You breathe heavily. “Ever heard of an imp from the fifth dimension called Mxytopolis?”

“You mean Mxyzptlk?” He corrects you and you shake your head agreeing.

“He said he would show me the future. And I am two years in the future, but no one here seems to remember me.”

“Interesting. Your story seems to be making sense. Although, people usually know they should never trust an imp.”

“Yeah, I know that now.” You scoff, but you’re really just mad at yourself for being so dumb. “Do you think I’m still in my reality? Was I erased from my timeline?”

“Unlikely.” He turns on his heels and walks from one side to the other with his hands clasped behind his back. “He could’ve, however, erased everyone’s mind, but I would say this scenario has a 45% chance of being true.”

“Ok. So maybe I’m in a different reality?” He looks at you, turns on his heels again and paces around himself for a while.

“73% chance.”

“Is there one scenario where we’re closer to 100%?” You raise your eyebrows at him.

“You might be stuck in the fifth dimension. And this is an alternative reality playing only in your mind. Like a…”

“Dream.” You sigh. “Or a nightmare.”

“But the percentage is still only 86%.” He turns to you abruptly. “Were there any further agreements?”

“He said I had to stay here for two days, and then he would come and pick me up.”

“What would you do for him?” He asks and you shake your head as if you mean to say nothing. “Interesting. He didn’t ask for something in return.” He thinks for a while and you don’t say anything to disturb him. “Have you made any contact with any family members?” You nod. “Do they know who you really are?” You deny. “Great. Let’s leave it at that. Until we figure out what scenario is the real one, we better not do anything that might jeopardize that.” You agree again. “Meet me here tomorrow morning. I need some time to calculate further probabilities.”

“Ok. Thanks, Brainy.” You smile at him and he nods one time.

“Of course there’s still 58% chance you’re lying. So, I have to consider that into the calculation. Goodnight!” Brainy leaves and you look around, unsure on what to do next.

No one knows you, you don’t have any money, you have nowhere to go and you’re starving. You should’ve asked Brainy for some money, so you could eat.

You’re not really thinking about what you’re doing next. But you find yourself flying to L Corp and sitting on the rooftop listening to your mom’s heartbeat and her boring meetings. Hearing her voice calms you down. When you think about flying to CatCo and listening to your momma’s boring meetings, Lena decides to go home. So, you follow her.

She doesn’t go to your house. She goes to a very fancy building. You look through the window when she arrives at the penthouse. It’s all so pretty and fancy inside, but there’s something off. It doesn’t feel very homey. Kara arrives a few minutes later, and you hide better so she can’t see you.

You stay there watching them, and feeling empty inside. They’re fine. Honestly, just look at them, talking about their days, laughing, living their lives. Sure, they don’t know you exist, but you at least expected they would be a little less happy given you’re not in their lives.

Is this what Mxyptelk wanted all along? Did he want to show you that people’s life would go on without you, no problem at all? And that some of them, like Jamie, would actually have a better life?

You’re confused, scared, and you can’t help but feel like that asshole is going to double cross you one more time and leave you stranded wherever this is forever.

They go to bed, and you stay there. You sit on their balcony, hold yourself and try not to think about how hungry and sad you are. You listen to Lena’s heartbeat. She’s fine. They’re fine. You take a deep breath and rest your head on the wall next to you, and you fall asleep.

“Shhh… We’re being watched.” You hear Kara’s voice and open your eyes. It’s morning. Shit, they’re up. She knows you’re here. “There’s someone on the balcony. Stay here, love.”

You fly away when you hear that, but you’re not fast enough. Actually, Kara is faster. She grabs your leg before you go too far and you stop.

“Wait. I know you. You’re the girl from the park yesterday. The girl that looks like me when I was young.” She says looking shocked. “What were you doing on my balcony?”

“I’m sorry. I-I just…” You don’t know what to say. What can you say? Should you tell her the truth even though Brainy told you not to do anything that could compromise your future/reality/dream state?

“You have superpowers?” She finally realizes you are both flying right now.

You shake your head agreeing.

“And the watch. You said it’s a family heirloom?”

You nod one more time. Kara doesn’t speak for a whole minute.

“You have superpowers. You look just like me. You called me mom. And the watch…” She seems to be thinking out loud so you don’t say anything. “Are you? No, that’s not possible. You can’t possibly be…”

You nod again. Your stomach growls and Kara notices, looking at it.

“You’re hungry. When was the last time you ate, kid?” She asks and you shrug, still not using your words. “Come on, we need to talk, and you need to eat.”

She holds your hand, probably scared that you are going to fly away when she still has so many questions to ask you. You look at her expression while you fly back to the penthouse. She is so confused, it’s kind of cute. You both land at the balcony and go inside the penthouse. Lena is in the kitchen making some eggs.

“Did you find out who was watching us?” She asks without looking behind her.

“Yes, well, she is here.” Kara says and Lena looks back at you.

“But she’s just a kid. Wait.” Lena squints her eyes looking at you. “Wait a minute, I know you!” She leaves everything behind and comes closer. “You’re the girl who came by my office yesterday. Lexa! Right? You wanted to know about-”

Before she’s finished, you see the eggs she was making are on fire and you use your superspeed to go to the oven, and put out the fire with your freeze breath.

“What the fuck?” Lena asks when she realizes what you just did.

“Language!” You and Kara say unison and she only furrows her brows harder at that.

“Kid, why don’t you explain what’s going on here so we don’t make any wrong assumptions?” Kara asks and you walk back to them.

“I would love to. But I can’t.” You try to smile. Kara puts her hand on your shoulder and all you want to do is hug her tightly and tell her the whole truth.

“You can trust us. Whatever it is, we will believe you.” Kara says and your stomach growls again, this time so loud even Lena looks at you worried. Kara gives you a smile. “Come, let’s put some food into you.”

Kara grabs a cereal box and milk. She puts them on the counter so you can eat. You serve yourself, refilling the bowl three times until you’re finished with the whole box. You stare at Kara trying to tell her you’re still hungry. She seems to understand and doesn’t say anything while she takes another pan and fries some eggs for you. They’re still hot and you’re already inhaling them full speed.

“She can’t possibly eat that much.” Lena says furrowing her eyebrows at you, and you stop immediately.

“Sorry. I-I was a little hungry.” You get up from the stool. “Thanks for the food. I should get going.”

“Wait kid.” Kara holds your hand before you can leave. “If you tell me the truth, I’ll believe you.” She pleads with a gentle smile. “I will.”

“I-I shouldn’t.” You swallow hard so she won’t see your tears. “I have to go before I ruin something.”

“Ok.” Kara runs to the kitchen and comes back to you. “Take this, in case you’re hungry again.” She hands you some protein bars and you accept them, putting in your pocket. “If you need anything else…”

“I’ll call you, Supergirl.” You wink at her before flying away to your meeting with Brainy.

#supercorp #supergirl #kara danvers #kara x lena #lena luthor #supercorp fanfic #supercorpfamily #kara x reader #lena x reader #supercorp daughter #reader insert

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taiblogcomics · 4 years ago

Text

I Can’t Pet Force You To Read This One, But...

Hey there, high school crushes. Well, it's finally here. Can you believe it? Yes, counting from the original Xanga site (which, yes, still counts. It's like our own Golden Age publication or apocryphia), this is our 10th anniversary of reviewing comics. That's fantastic. I'm excited, can't you tell? I can tell, since I'm writing this preamble a good two months before the actual anniverary~

So, last year we reviewed the absolute pile of dreck that is Heroes in Crisis. And while that was worth ripping into, I'd rather not spend the 10th anniversary hating on something. I'd like to do something actually meaningful to me. I've teased about this one for many years, probably for as long as I've been doing this blog, and I think it's time we stopped pussyfooting around and reviewed some Garfield. But not just any Garfield. It's finally time, my friends. This... is Garfield's Pet Force.

I dunno how many people will remember this one. Maybe you recall the direct-to-DVD movie adaptation from 2009, or at least advertising for it. I never saw it, but apparently it differs a bit. They also appeared a few times in those Garfield comics from back in the day. We even reviewed a couple (some were on the Xanga blog). But what we're looking at here are the original novellas published between 1997 and 1999. So yeah, these really are from my childhood. And since I've long espoused that Garfield was always funnier 20 years ago, this must be actual premium Garfield content, yeah? By golly, I hope so, because we got five whole books here today. So we should probably get into them~

Book 1: The Outrageous Origin

This is a classic sort of superhero cover. Standard team shot of poses, and that's fine for a first volume. In fact, that's great. Later editions of this would replace the lightning-filled gradient background with a pure white one, but I have this original version. We'll get to specifics about these characters in the meat of the story, but let's talk about the costumes for a bit. Very classic early-'90s sort of look, before the Dark Age kicked in. Reminds me a lot of Jim Lee's X-Men designs, actually. Making all your characters visually distinct is important in a team book. The heavy lean into secondary colours is unusual for heroic characters, but not unwelcome.

So we actually start with a cold open in the superhero universe. This is pretty much to introduce us to the characters as soon as possible, and thus I'll do the same for you here.

*Garzooka, team leader, super strong, has a razor-sharp claw, and can shoot radioactive hairballs from his mouth. That's... at least a unique power, I don't think anyone on the Justice League can do that~ *Odious, the dumb muscle with the accent on the "dumb". Possibly even stronger than Garzooka, and possessing a "super-stretchy stun tongue", an elastic tongue that can scramble the minds of whoever it adheres to. *Starlena, the team girl. She can fly, and she has a siren song that can put those who hear it into a hypnotic trance. Garzooka is the only one immune to its effects, for reasons that are never explained. *Abnermal, the kid-appeal character. He has ice powers, forcefields, and an ill-defined "pester power" that means he can annoy people on a greater scale than normal folks. It's pretty much only used for comic relief, but that could be a brilliant power in the right hands. *Compooky, the brains of the operation. Other than flight, his powers are limited to super intelligence, which means he's usually the exposition guy. There's probably a reason they left him out of the movie adaptation~

You got all that? Don't worry, we'll introduce you again later in the book. What actually happens in the intro chapter isn't really important, it's just setting up the universe. In fact, it's all taking place within Pet Force #99, a comic just enjoyed by Nermal. Yes, we quickly cut over to the main Garfield universe ("our universe", the narrator calls it), where Pet Force is just a comic book. The Garfield gang is all outside, enjoying a cookout prepared by Jon Arbuckle. Nermal is extremely enthused by his comic book, and brags about how he has all 98 previous issues sealed and polybagged, and this one will soon join them. Sorry, Nermal, this came out in 1997, the speculator boom already went bust~

Garfield dismisses comic books as stupid because you can't eat them or use them as a blanket, and declares that none of the stuff that happens in the comic could possibly happen in real life. Uh oh, irony! Because these things can happen, and do! It's a parallel universe, baby! This might be one of my earliest introductions to a "parallel worlds" concept. Much like Earths 1 and 2 in pre-Crisis DC, the events of the comic are essentially the real life adventures of their super-powered counterparts in another dimension. Most of the action in these stories will take place there~

So here's the setup: Vetvix (the parallel equivalent to Liz the veternarian) is an evil sorceress and scientist, who essentially wants to experiment on animals in peace, and possibly subjugate the universe while she's at it. You could argue that Liz is an odd choice for villain, since our universe's Liz isn't particularly evil. But then, our universe's Garfield isn't particularly heroic either. She operates out of a deadly space station called the Orbiting Clinic of Chaos, and at present she's waiting for the arrival of her henchman, Space Pie-Rat, who is a six-foot-tall anthropomorphic rat dressed in stereotypical pirate getup. Vetvix has just finished inventing a levitation ray, and she'd like Pie-Rat to go out and use it to steal all the food in the universe. Vetvix doesn't think small, is what I'm saying.

The counter to Vetvix is Emperor Jon, ruler of the planet Polyester. He's kind and benevolent, even if he's a little dippy and his fashion sense atrocious. Having gotten wind of Vetvix's latest plan, he contacts Pet Force in their ship, the Lightspeed Lasagna. Upon learning the problem, Pet Force gives chase to Pie-Rat. They eventually corner him on some desolate planet, landing and entering an abandoned factory. Unfortunately, they're not safe amongst the dangerous machinery, because this turns out to be a trap. Vetvix has been busy as hell, because she's also invented a metal that's impervious to their powers. And that's not all, because she's also basically invented the Phantom Zone, where she traps Pet Force forever. It specifically mentions it doesn’t kill them, because it wouldn't be kosher to murder the heroes in a Garfield book~

The Lightspeed Lasagna has both onboard cameras connected to the heroes' belts as well as automatic return protocols, so within two days, Emperor Jon knows exactly what's happened to Pet Force. He needs help, so he calls upon his most trusted and powerful advisor: Binky the Sorceror. Binky's just as loud and obnoxious as in the main universe, but he's also a powerful magician. He conjures up a spell for Emperor Jon that lets him pierce the veil between universes. It's basically Equestria Girls rules: parallel universes have similar characters between them. So to replace Pet Force, they need the nearest genetic equivalents from another universe. And that's the versions of Garfield, Odie, Arlene, Nermal, and Pooky that we know and love~

Back in the main universe, it's another day entirely. Another cookout is taking place, and Nermal has received his special anniversary issue of Pet Force #100. The cover's really special, dripping with '90s cover gimmicks like glow-in-the-dark and embossing. A rarely used one, though, was "portal to another universe". That was pretty expensive to print, so you won't find many comics like Nermal's. Maybe he had something there with the collecting after all. The cover glows, and while Jon is distracted by the grill, Garfield and Friends disappear~

They reappear in Emperor Jon's wood-paneled throne room, now transformed into Pet Force. Emperor Jon and Sorceror Binky try to explain the situation, but Garfield--now Garzooka--is disbelieving of the whole thing. In fact, even the idea that Jon can now hear him talk absolutely floors him. Since he's about to deliver the exposition for everyone, can we talk about Compooky for a minute? This spell has just granted sapience to Garfield's teddy bear. I don't expect deep philosophy from a children's novella, but the ramifications of this are really under-explored. Like, never mind the whole idea of a teddy bear having the same genetic makeup as an alternate universe equivalent. He goes from inanimate object to fully conscious being, and he just rolls with it.

Anyways, once everybody gets caught up on what's going on and accepts the new reality, a training montage ensues so the group can all learn to use their powers without killing each other. Once at least reasonably trained, the reborn Pet Force is sent out to stop Pie-Rat. He's gotten sloppy in the times with Pet Force dead, so they track him down easily. After a brief scuffle where Garzooka takes his eyepatch, Pie-Rat flees in his ship. They follow Pie-Rat back to the Orbital Clinic of Chaos, but they can't go in the front. That led the original Pet Force into a trap. Finding an unguarded maintenance hatch--standard on any big space station--they enter Vetvix's lair for a final confrontation!

After dealing with the Waiting Room of Doom, which slowly fills with outdated magazines, they enter Vetvix's inner sanctum. Frustrated with Pie-Rat's failure, she uses her magic to turn him into an ordinary mouse. Vetvix then attempts to use her same weapon on this new Pet Force, but thanks to story contrivance, it only works on beings born in this universe. As other dimensional visitors already, they can't be banished to another dimension. She then pulls a Dr. Claw and runs off cursing Pet Force's name while her base self-destructs. Vetvix is a very "discard and draw" sort of villain, it seems. Pet Force, of course, makes a harrowing escape just in the nick of time.

Returning to Emperor Jon, they vow to be ready to return whenever they're called on, since evil never stays dormant for long. Odious even gifts Emperor Jon with the mouse-ified Pie-Rat as proof of their victory. Well, I'm glad they remember that, so they didn't accidentally murder a major villain in their first superhero outing. They're returned to their own universe, and the time differential between them places them back with Jon having not had time to even look up from the grill. Garfield begins to doubt the adventure even happened--until that night, when he finds Pie-Rat's eyepatch still on his person. Ah, definitive proof of... eyepatches, I guess~

Book 2: Pie-Rat's Revenge!

You have to wonder where, in a space-faring superhero setting, Pie-Rat got the inspiration for his classic pirate motif. It's a little incongruous is all I'm saying. And hey, remember when I said earlier that Garzooka's purple-and-green colour scheme was odd for a hero? Well, here he is as a villain! That'll catch your eye. This would be a terrific comic cover, which is what you want in a series like this.

The book opens with a brief recap of the previous story's events, then moves into the new plot. See, Emperor Jon has opted to keep the polymorphed Pie-Rat as his pet. How very Ron Weasley of him. That's pretty apt, actually, because similarly Pie-Rat has maintained his intelligence in his new mousey form. Pie-Rat gets sick of being Emperor Jon's pet and plans a daring escape, exploiting the emperor's dimwitted and loving personality against him. Pie-Rat jams the lock with a food pellet and makes his escape that night.

Once free from his cage, he encounters Binky's cauldron, still left in the throne room from when the sorceror summoned Pet Force from Garfield's universe. Figuring he has nothing to lose, Pie-Rat jumps in the leftover brew. Suddenly he finds himself growing. He returns to his original anthropomorphic state--but with a twist. He's now twice his original height, a staggering twelve feet tall. He scoops up the rest of the remaining potion for later, and sneaks out of the palace as best as a 12-foot rat can sneak. Desiring revenge on both his former employer and his longtime foes, he steals Pet Force's ship and makes his escape from the planet, headed for Vetvix's newest base.

After his guards help Emperor Jon put the pieces of the problem together, they decide they must once again call upon the powers of Pet Force to recover their missing vehicle and stop the newly embiggened Pie-Rat. Fortunately, Garfield and friends have been watching movies all weekend, so Jon doesn't notice when his pets disappear from the living room in a bright flash. Of course, once returned to the alternate universe and the situation explained, they still have a problem: how do they give chase to Pie-Rat when he's got their ship?

And speaking of Pie-Rat in their ship, he's followed the trail of a mysterious energy output, and it's led him right to Vetvix's new base, the Menacing Moon of Mayhem. See, this is why you don't blow up your base: the backup base is never as good. if it was, it wouldn't be the backup. Given that it's such a shoddy base, Pie-Rat is easily able to get inside and get close to Vetvix. She's expecting a technological attack, so she's unprepared when he pulls out that vial of magic potion and sprinkles her with it. And naturally, the potion that made him grow 12 feet tall makes Vetvix shrink to 5 inches. It's magic, we don't have to explain it!

Pie-Rat takes the magic crystal that Vetvix uses to fuel her powers, which of course didn't shrink because magic is just bullshit. See previous paragraph's last sentence. And while Pie-Rat takes over the base and begins plotting a further revenge against Pet Force, we cut over to them. They're at Sorceror Binky's own castle, and it's clear he's a bit of a hoarder. This is to their advantage, though, as they eventually piece together a working spaceship out of old car parts and other things, all patched together between Compooky's know-how and Binky's magic. This seems like the sort of book where I could use that "it's magic" quote every other paragraph. But craft a new--if small--ship they do, and speed off in the newly christened Planetary Pizza.

The rickety little ship does eventually find its way to Pie-Rat's base, saving him the trouble of being proactive as a villain. The magic thing keeps happening, and Pie-Rat basically becomes Discord for a bit while he fights them, doing things like turning Starlena's siren song into actual living music notes. One by one, the members of Pet Force are taken out, with only Garzooka is left. He and Pie-Rat struggle, while Pie-Rat tries to aim the magic crystal at Garzooka. Garzooka uses his claw to rip the crystal from Pie-Rat and defeat him.

Unfortunately, here's where the cover comes in. It seems the moments Pie-Rat was focusing the crystal during the struggle affected Garzooka's mind. He puts the crystal around his own neck. which turns him evil. He helps Pie-Rat to his feet, and the pair escape in the Lightspeed Lasagna. While Pet Force pursues them in their ramshackle ship, the new criminal duo strikes the storage planet of Deli to steal their food. Pet Force manages to catch up as the villains celebrate their spoils, and use a magic blast from the systems Binky installed to short out the Lightspeed Lasagna. This enables them to dock with the ship and climb aboard for a contfrontation.

The group fights, and once again the bearer of a bullshit magic crystal subdues the heroes easily. Annoyed now, Garzooka takes hold of Starlena and prepares to kill her or something. She taps into the one thing she has left: she's not fighting just Garzooka, but Garfield in his body. She drops some heavy put-downs, which resonate with Garfield, and he hesitates long enough for her to cut the crystal off him. The crystal hits the floor and shatters, undoing its evil magics on Garzooka's mind as well as on all his teammates. With Pet Force reunited, Pie-Rat is easily subdued and locked up.

The group waits for the ship to power back up, then speed off to apologise to the planet Deli. Following that, they head back towards Vetvix's moonbase. That night, though, the magic that was making Pie-Rat 12 feet tall wears off, and he escapes from his cell. He steals the remaining shards of the crystal, climbs into the Planetary Pizza, and makes a getaway. As a bonus, he also repeats the power-down spell against the bigger ship, giving him ample time to escape. And he's not the only one. Over on the Menacing Moon of Mayhem, Vetvix also returns to her proper size, and abandons this base as well. And when Pet Force fails to find her, they simply return to their own universe, ready to be called on once again in the future~

Book 3: K-Niner: Dog of Doom!

Another very basic comic book-style cover. K-Niner is a much more typical villain in style. This one's actually a wrap-around, and features the rest of Pet Force reacting to K-Niner on the back cover. Which is good because, other than the first cover, the covers all have a heavy Garzooka focus. Which makes sense for a book series, I suppose, you wanna assure the kiddos that Garfield's gonna be in the book. But as a comic book series, this would be a bad look for a team book~

So after our standard introduction and recap, we start off with Vetvix in yet another new base, the Floating Fortress of Fear. I'm sure it's very intimidating, if she can keep hold of it for more than a single book. She's picking up from the epilogue and putting the last touches on K-Niner, mostly enhancing his intelligence. Now, you look at the cover and tell me what kind of voice you'd expect. Some sort of German or Austrian accent, like the doberman on Road Rovers? Does anyone remember Road Rovers~? Anyways, but no: he speaks with a posh British accent. You know, the "I say, good chaps, looks like we're in a bit of a sticky wicket, eh wot?" type. Trust me, you can tell. But just because he sounds refined doesn't mean he's not evil.

I also love that after the initial "trapped them in the Phantom Zone" bit, the villains just go whole ham. K-Niner here demonstrates that he is indeed evil by threatening to rip out Vetvix's throat. Let your villains be villainous is all I'm saying. She's pleased he's so vicious, but feels he needs to learn his place as well. She force-chokes him until he complies. She then gives him his assignment: she thinks dogs should be liberated. The Boy Mayor of Second Life would approve, and so does K-Niner. Turning pets on their masters is just his style.

K-Niner takes a portable evolution gun, and immediately sets off. He begins on the planet Kennel. Isn't it neat how every planet is named after an English word that describes its function? K-Niner quickly takes over the dog population and turns them against their masters, because boosting their intelligence also makes them evil, of course. They use enslavement collars on their former owners, and within a few days, the dogs now run the planet. We cut over to Emperor Jon on Polyester, where a man has crash-landed a ship. He's an escapee from Kennel, and he's here to report the events so we can get the plot moving and once more summon Pet Force!

And summoned once more they are, Garfield and Friends once more conveniently disappearing in a split second while Jon's back is turned (this time they're outside playing volleyball). And once back in the parallel universe, Emperor Jon fills them all in on K-Niner's dastardly doings. Garzooka, naturally, takes great offense to dogs being in charge, and takes his duties as a hero completely seriously for once. Pet Force takes off for a confrontation with K-Niner in the Lightspeed Lasagna. And speaking of Pet Force's ships...

The Planetary Pizza, piloted by Pie-Rat, plants its pads down on polar planet Glacia. Pie-Rat is here seeking a way to restore his magic crystal and regain his mighty magic powers. He's sought out the home of a legendary evil wizard, who's known by the name of... Barfo. I see why Barfo keeps his location a secret. But anyway, Barfo is the one who made the crystal, so naturally Pie-Rat reasons he can restore it as well. Suprisingly once on Glacia, Barfo's evil lair is pretty easy to find. His manservant, Hobart the Gnome, brings Pie-Rat before the wizard, and within moments the crystal is restored! Pie-Rat turns to thank Hobart, but Hobart suddenly turns into Vetvix!

Yes, Vetvix knew all along that Pie-Rat's quest would lead him here. And as she was once Barfo's student in the ways of evil magic, she knew she could get the old coot to go along with her plan. Barfo returns the crystal to Vetvix, restoring her powers. And so Pie-Rat, a recurring villain in three whole books, is unceremoniously done away with, as Vetvix teleports him inside an asteroid, trapping him in solid rock. Even if the asteroid were hollow or he displaced the interior when he teleported in, no doubt he'll suffocate within moments. That's pretty harsh.

With that over, we rejoin Pet Force as they approach Kennel. K-Niner's battle cruiser spots them incoming, and shoots the ship down, even in spite of Abnermal's forcefields. Pet Force bail out of the ship, and Abnermal uses his powers to make snow to cushion their fall. Upon landing, a contingent of mutant animals attack. The mooks aren't much, but K-Niner himself puts up an impressive fight. However, one of the mooks pulls a gun and points it at Compooky. This is why Compooky usually stays aboard the ship, but that wasn't an option. Rather than let their friend get hurt, Pet Force surrenders.

Pet Force is held prisoner separately from Compooky, with both the cell's technology making it freeze-proof and threats of "don't break out, or we'll shoot your compatriot". Their imprisonment is not long, though, as suddenly the power goes out. Pet Force takes advantage of the situation and make their escape, quickly running into Compooky. K-Niner didn't think the hyper-intelligent teddy bear needed a high security cell, and just locked him in the basement. It was easy for him to then break out and shut down the local power grid. This also has the side effect of turning off the control collars the humans were wearing. How convenient!

With control of the planet now tilted in their favour, Pet Force now has time to both fix their ship and reverse the polarity of the brain-boosting weapons, turning the dog population of Kennel back to their normal selves. Though the experience did change the pet owners of Kennel. Having experienced life in their pets' shoes (so to speak) for a bit, they've resolved to treat their canine companions a bit more equally. More being allowed on the furniture, less stupid tricks for treats. Still, Pet Force can't stay long, and they head off in pursuit of K-Niner's battle cruiser. This is why most superheroes don't have spaceships (Jedis don't count): if your enemy also has one, they can flee way more easily than on foot.

Not willing to let another place go to the dogs, as it were, Pet Force catches up with K-Niner. With his previous success, Vetvix has stepped up the timetable and sent him after Polyester right away. Emperor Jon is in danger! They enter the planet's atmosphere, and are attacked by fighter craft. They fend them off, but their weapons system is damaged in the fight, so they can't simply use the reverse brain-rays and solve it quickly. The team splits up instead: Garzooka and Abnermal will go after K-Niner, while the other three will find the planet's power source and knock out the collars, since that worked so well the last time.

The two heroes quickly make short work of K-Niner's guards, and then turn the battle to deal with the Dog of Doom himself. While the struggle goes on, the rest of Pet Force reach the planet's power grid. Using a clever tactic, Compooky overloads the power and causes and electrical storm that simultaneously undoes the brain-boosting effect and shorts out the enslavement collars. There's only a few pages left, after all, and we have to wrap this up. K-Niner is reverted back into an ordinary dog, and the emperor is reverted to an ordinary non-enslaved person. The day is saved!

And now once again, Pet Force prepares to return to their own universe. However... when the spell clears, the five heroes are still standing there. Something is blocking the passage between dimensions, and Pet Force is trapped. And while Pet Force's adventures have taken place between mere moments in their own universe, they have always returned quickly enough that Jon didn't notice a thing. But this time, as Jon retrieves the volleyball and turns around to his pets, he's surprised to find they've all vanished into thin air...

Book 4: Menace of the Mutanator

This one's very striking because of its more painted look compared to the heavy black outlines the rest of the covers have. Does this one count as having the whole team on the cover? Because, spoilers, that's what the Mutanator is: the rest of Pet Force mashed up into a villain. Again, though, that's definitely a striking image that'd draw in readers to a comic cover. In fact, while Garzooka may be over-used as a cover focus, several of these also show him imperiled in some way, and that's nice for character stuff. That helps balace it a bit~

I wanna say, before we start, that I'm impressed by the continuity for the series as a whole. They could've just written each story as a standalone, but for a series of 100-page children's novellas starring Garfield characters as superheroes, things happen in these books. Like, maybe not sweeping status quo changes, but events affect the plot of each next book down the line. And that's where we pick up! Right where the last book left off, with Pet Force now stuck in the alternate universe, unable to return home to Jon. But if they can't go home to Jon, well, maybe then events will conspire to bring Jon to them~

Yep, because Jon happens to wander into the room where they keep the copy of Pet Force #100 that acts as a portal to their universe, he gets transported into the Pet Force universe. And since Emperor Jon is still an extant entity, there's just two Jons now. Jon, of course, is a bit freaked out, and it takes several pages to explain the whole deal to him, and also have a showcase of all their powers to pad out the book some more. Eventually, they decide to call in Sorceror Binky to examine the problem. When he has a go of it, a sudden tornado emerges from the cauldron and whisks away Pet Force--save for Garzooka, whose prodigious strength keeps him anchored.

Garzooka heads out in the Lightspeed Lasagna to track Pet Force's signature, glad to get away from a double trouble Jon. And while he's searching, the scene cuts to Vetvix's Floating Fortress of Fear. Hey, one of her bases actually lasted more than one book! This is where Pet Force has been transported to, once more in a power-proof cell. Vetvix monologues to the heroes, as she is wont to do, explaining that she's the one who cast the spell to keep them from returning home. And further, she's brought them here to mutate them into her servants.

While Emperor Jon exposits about his backstory (turns out he is not of royal blood, and has about as much legitimate claim to the throne as you or I do), the search continues. Sorceror Binky detects Pet Force, giving them all a view of what happens next. The trapped members of Pet Force are literally broken apart and reassembled: Odious' body, Compooky's brain inserted into the chest, Abnermal's hands, and Starlena's head. She christens this beast "Mutanator", and it is soullessly obedient. I also wanna say, Mutanator's kind of a non-binary icon, aren't they? (The comic uses "it", but it was 1998 and alternative pronouns weren't really a thing yet.) Muscular, masculine body, but confident enough to still wear lipstick. It's a look, is all I'm saying~

Mutanator continues to possess the combined powers of Pet Force as well. Vetvix sends them to attack the planet Armory to gear up before attempting to conquer Polyester. And meanwhile, thanks to the convenience of being able to scan all of Compooky's memories now that his brain is part of Mutanator, Vetvix has the perfect trap to spring on Garzooka--or should she say Garfield. Yes, she really knows the whole origin for Pet Force now, and now she knows all Garfield's weaknesses, likes and dislikes, and probably blood type and other dating profile stats~

Thus, when Garzooka receives the coordinates from Emperor Jon and arrives at the Floating Fortress, he finds himself menaced by giant spiders. Vetvix couldn't think of a way to get Mondays to attack him, so the Giant Spider Invasion will do. Spiders are apparently very formiddable foes, Garzooka's personal fears aside. They can swat gamma hairballs out of the air, they can construct webs as quickly as certain Marvel heroes, and their hairy exoskeletons are resistant to both claw and strength. But despite his fear and Abnermal's running commentary, Garzooka manages to trounce the spiders with a carefully applied flame--taking Vetvix's blueprints with them.

Garzooka heads out once again to track down the Mutanator, leaving his less-than-all-together friends in the safety of their forcefield prison. While he's off, we return to the perspective of his target. Using their combined powers, the Mutanator swiftly conquers the planet Armory and sets their sights on Polyester next. It's not a bad plan, honestly. With the stockpile from Armory, not only will the Mutanator be more powerful, Polyester won't be able to use the planet for backup. Fortunately for the two Jons, though, Garzooka intercepts the Mutanator before they can leave Armory.

The fight's actually pretty good. Very back and forth. But even despite Garzooka's great strength, the Mutanator wins in the end. Thankfully, Vetvix puts her conquest of Polyester on hold to take the time to retrieve Garzooka and add his power to the Mutanator. This, of course will be her undoing--in a completely ridiculous way, of course. For back in the palace, our universe's Jon is watching Pet Force's struggles with the scrying cauldron. And he leans in a bit too close. Sowhile Vetvix is prepping the machine to divide Garzooka's body like she did the rest of Pet Force, Jon suddenly tumbles through the dimensional warp caused by the cauldron and lands on Vetvix, which causes her to put the machine in reverse. A real Jonnus ex cauldrona there, eh?

The Mutanator disappears, their existance as a unique being wiped out as their pieces return to their proper Pet Force owners. With Pet Force reassembled, Garzooka takes out Vetvix with one of his gamma-radiated hairballs while she's distracted by Jon. Pet Force decides that the vile veternarian should have a taste of her own medicine, and stick her in the body-splicing machine with some of her guards. This divides them all up and mixes them into bizarre combinations. It also has the side effect of disabling Vetvix's magic, so they can return to their own universe now.

The book wraps up here. Pet Force first returns to Armory to both return the stolen weapons and also make repairs on the buildings that were damaged in Garzooka's fight with the Mutanator. That's the sort of thing I'd like to see in more superhero stories in general. The two Jons part ways, with the Emperor believing the other Jon's heroism to have been deliberate. And thus are Garfield and friends returned home. And just like the end of their first adventure, where Garfield couldn't be sure if it really happened, so too is Jon's memory fading. Had he really witnessed all that? Only his pets know for sure--and in this universe, they can't talk~

Book 5: Attack of the Lethal Lizards

This one's another wrap-around, showing the rest of Pet Force engaging the remaining Lethal Lizards on the back cover. This is one advantage books have over comics: a front and back cover you can use for your story-telling. The Lizard designs are pretty good for a villain group too. Like Pet Force, they don't adhere to a particular theme, but they do look good individually. Garzooka roasting a hot dog on a stick might be a bit too comedic for a superhero story, though. It sets the tone wrong. How "lethal" can they possibly be if Garzooka is out here roasting hot dogs in the middle of battle?

So here we go, last book. After the usual recap, we open with Jon explaining to Garfield and friends his latest plans: they're going to WackyWorld, a theme park dedicated to Jon's favourite cartoon, The Wackies. Both Garfield and Nermal think the show is lame, and if those two agree on something, you know it must be so. In less lame universes, however, trouble is once more a-brewing. So it turns out Vetvix's Floating Fortress of Fear has been orbiting the swamp planet Reptilius this whole time. And her various experiments in the last two books have been radiating the planet in magical energy...

From that magical power, three reptiles find themselves uplifted in intelligence and granted fantastic powers. Please say hello to our three main villains for this book: Snake, an enormous snake (the only one without an anthro design) with stretching powers; Chameleon, who can shapeshift; and Dragon, a komodo dragon with fire breath and the bad attitude to match. While Snake and Chameleon figure out their powers, Dragon declares himself the leader as he's clearly the smartest, strongest, and most powerful. They name themselves the Lethal Lizards and start plotting how to rule the planet.

After that exciting intro, though, the book kind of slows down. First we get a whole chapter of Emperor Jon also deciding to go on vacation, to planet Funlandia. With Vetvix out of commission for a while, there's no better time. In short, he's out of the castle and Sorceror Binky is in charge. This is followed by a chapter of Jon and his pets at WackyWorld. It's certainly an accommodating amusement park to allow pets on its grounds. Garfield at least gets along with the food, but if you know anything about amusement park food prices, the amount Garfield eats will make your wallet weep. Jon takes his mind off it by dragging the pets along to a ride. Surely they have to be under the height restriction~

Fortunately, we get back to the actual stars of this book, and we see a bit more of their dynamic. Snake is the sort who sucks up to whoever's calling themselves "Boss" at the moment. Dragon is power-hungry, and it's clear he'll sell out his allies at the drop of a hat. Chameleon is Starscream. Anyway, they trek through the jungles of Reptilius until they find a downed spaceship. Reviewing the logs reveals it was a scout ship from Vetvix, and they also learn of Vetvix and her mission. However, they don't know where Emperor Jon lives, so they crowd into the the newly christened Rapacious Reptile and set course for the stars.

The first planet they come across is a world called Klod. Quickly the Lethal Lizards beat up the populace and find the local government. Chameleon shapeshifts into a dignitary, pretending to be an advance entourage for Emperor Jon, schmoozing with the governor until he learns both what Jon looks like and the name of his planet. With this information secure, Chameleon nips out suddenly, and the trio sets forth towards Polyester. Governer Klutz calls up the palace as soon as the reptiles depart, and reports the incident to Sorceror Binky.

Binky wastes no time, and he dials up Pet Force. Since all five are in one place, he's able to pull them through even without them being near the gateway through issue #100's cover. Convenient! Pet Force, however, does waste time, as a lengthy comedy scene eats up several pages before we just get on with it. Eventually, the situation is conveyed, and they figure it's safer to keep Emperor Jon on Funlandia for the time being. Compooky stays behind to help plan some strategies, while the rest of Pet Force boards the Lightspeed Lasagna to intercept the Lethal Lizards before they even arrive.

Pet Force spends the next few minutes both scanning for incoming ships and bickering with each other, so I'm very glad when the Rapacious Reptile appears on their detectors before too long. Dragon threatens the ship, telling them to move or he'll knock them aside. It's a spaceship, dude, you can move in three dimensions. The ships trade shots, and while Chameleon's piloting is actually pretty good due to his independently-rotating eyeballs, eventually both ships crash land on whatever planet is nearby.

Both ships crash right next to each other, which is improbable but less ridiculous than some of the contrivances in these books, so I'm okay with it. Now you'd think what with the enemies being reptiles and Abnermal having freezing powers that this battle would be over really easily, but no. In fact, Garzooka and Dragon are pretty evenly matched. Snake turns out to be immune to Starlena's siren song because snakes don't have external ears. See, now there's a contrivance I find a bit weird. Snake swallows Abnermal whole, and Chameleon and Odious get literally tongue-tied. The Lethal Lizards actually live up to their name pretty well.

As the fight continues, half of both sides are laid out when Compooky comes rushing up, saying he has an urgent message from the emperor. And that's when he sucker-punches the team. It was actually Chameleon in disguise, having gotten knocked away when he and Odious separated. So yeah, round one goes to the Lizards, and they make their escape first. Pet Force regroups, and they give chase. The Lizards have enough head start to really lay siege to Polyester before Pet Force arrives, though. They even get access to the palace using Chameleon's shapeshifting, leading to Sorceror Binky letting slip the real location of the emperor just as Pet Force arrives.

Another fight ensues--see, now it's really a superhero story--and the Lizards leave again 2 and 0. This time Snake uses his venomous fangs to attack Starlena. This leads to the weirdest contrivance yet. Maybe not the worst, but definitely the weirdest. They have only minutes to save Starlena. So how do they do it? Well, they notice that Odious drools quite a lot. It's very "fluid output". So they have Binky magically reverse Odious' drooling, so that he has "fluid input" on his tongue instead. It becomes a big suction sponge and sucks the poison out of Starlena. They then restore the drooling, and he just harmlessly drools out the poison. What.

With their teammate saved, Pet Force pursues the Lethal Lizards to Funlandia. They get there just in time to rescue Emperor Jon from their clutches, with Garzooka and Odious combining their strength to literally rip a kiddie ride out of the ground. Starlena corners Chameleon in a hall of mirrors, turning his own trick against him. Snake is undone by Odious' strength. And Garzooka fights Dragon to a standstill, finally trapping all three on a roller coaster still operating. When the ride comes to an end, Abnermal freezes them all until the authorities can retrieve them.

Naturally, Emperor Jon thinks it's all part of the show (because Jon is dimwitted in any universe). The Lizards are sent to a lizard-proof prison (seriously, it specifies this), and Pet Force returns to their own universe. As usual, Jon didn't notice his pets go missing during the dark amusement park ride. The book concludes on an ominous note, however, as the ship carrying the Lethal Lizards makes its jump to lightspeed just as it passes the Floating Fortress of Fear. The shockwave knocks over some debris that reactivates the combining machine, restoring Vetvix to her full evil might once more!

The end!

No, really. Those five books are all there was. I hear it may have continued into the comics, but I don’t know how accurate that is. I didn’t really look into it.

But boy, what a ride, huh? Let’s dissect the books one at a time, since it only seems fair to take them as individual stories.

The Outrageous Origin: It’s a fairly basic origin story, I’d say. It kind of has to be. I guess my main gripe is that, like Rita Repulsa’s entire run on Power Rangers, the heroes never fight the main villain directly. In fact, there’s barely even an evil plot in this one. You have henchmen and some traps, and that’s about it for the menace.

Pie-Rat’s Revenge: A cautionary tale about why you treat your minions with respect. This one’s pretty good, but the events depicted on the cover make up such a small part of the book. Wouldn’t it have been more fun if Garzooka was turned at the beginning of the story? Book 4 would at least do the reverse of that, so it’s not a major complaint~

K-Niner, Dog of Doom: I think this one’s about as middle of the road as you can get. What a coincidence that it’s also the middle of the series! Like I said in the recap portion, it’s a shame that Pie-Rat’s story ended here. This one definitely feels more “villain of the week” than most.

Menace of the Mutanator: This one might be the best book in the series. Garzooka, alone, battling against the best parts of his team? That’s gripping stuff. I guess the main problem is that the Mutanator isn’t really a character in and of themselves. Like, K-Niner, he may have been a generic rent-a-villain type, but he had a personality. Mutanator is little more than an extention of Vetvix’s will.

Attack of the Lethal Lizards: I’m a bit split on this one. The bits with the titular Lizards are great. They steal the show! But the parts where it focuses on either Jon kind of drag, and Pet Force is a bit too jokey here. Like, I get the point is that they’ve relaxed into their roles now, and there’s not much point of doing it as a Garfield story if they don’t actually use the character personalities, but... I dunno. It’s good, but it could have been better~

And that’s it! Like, I dunno how to wrap this up. Pet Force was neither my first exposure to superheroes nor my first introduction to the Garfield brand (you can thank Saturday morning cartoons for both of those). But for some reason, maybe just the absurdly goofy premise, it always kinda stuck with me. And I think that’s a good enough reason to make it my 10th anniversary review, don’t you~?

#books #reviews #Garfield #Pet Force #Garfield's Pet Force #Taiblog

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hayleysstark · 4 years ago

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Words: 2329 Warnings: Swearing Summary: If Merlin wasn't such a colossal idiot, Arthur wouldn't even believe it. The greatest sorcerer ever to walk the earth, the king of the druids and the last dragonlord and the master of life and death and the magnificent, all-powerful warlock Emrys, has messed up with his magic, and gotten himself stuck in Arthur's body. And he's got Arthur stuck in his. But Merlin is a colossal idiot.So Arthur believes it.

Read on AO3.

Arthur thought he had seen the worst of it when an entire camp of druids dropped down on bended knee, heads bowed and hands clasped, and called Merlin Emrys and my lord and the greatest sorcerer ever to walk the earth.

He thought he had seen the worst of it when the quiet, pretty girl wrapped in an old, tattered purple dress crawled out from the silver depths of a magical lake, and told him she was Merlin's wife, except Merlin has never even so much as said her name, because he would probably actually die if he ever had to tell the truth about anything, ever, in his entire life.

Arthur thought he had seen the worst of it when Merlin called up a dragon. When Merlin turned out to be the last dragonlord. When he crashed to the ground, all pale and limp and shaky, in a fit of magical exhaustion. When he turned himself into a girl. When he split himself into nine entire Merlins. When he called up a whole other Merlin from an alternate dimension, and this whole other Merlin turned out to be an absolute lunatic. The little bastard tried to murder Arthur no less than thirteen times because he wanted "justice for sorcerers" or some rubbish like that, before the real Merlin finally got him under control and pushed him back into his world.

(Arthur feels desperately sorry for the Other Arthur in Evil Merlin's dimension.)

Well.

Look.

The point is. This is the point. This is the point right here.

The point is, Arthur thought he had already seen the worst of it, because obviously, it simply can't get worse than Girl Merlin, or Nine Merlins, or Evil Merlin.

But.

That's the thing.

It can.

This is worse than Girl Merlin and Nine Merlins and Evil Merlin, it's so much worse than all of that, and Arthur thinks he would take all of that again before he would take this even once.

"Merlin," he says, and he sounds so wrong, so awkward and off-kilter and not him, and it burns the insides of his ears to hear it, "you have ten minutes to figure this out, and put us right, or I'm tossing you in the pigpen!"

Merlin blinks up at him—and God, this is so weird, it is so weird to see the way his eyes open and shut, the way his mouth opens and shuts, the way his hair falls over his brow, the way his fingers curl and uncurl, clench and unclench, the way his throat jerks when he talks—

"Well," Merlin says, simply, "I already spend all day, every day, with the biggest boar of them all."

Arthur scowls. "It's not funny, Merlin!"

"It wasn't a joke," Merlin says flatly.

"I can't look like this!" Arthur jabs a finger in his own chest. (Is it his own chest? Can he call it that? Can he call it his own chest right now?) "I can't be seen like this, Merlin, look at me! For God's sake! Look at me!" He sweeps a hand down to show off his new and entirely awful body. Except it's not even his body. "I'm you!"

If Merlin wasn't such a colossal idiot, Arthur wouldn't even believe it--the greatest sorcerer ever to walk the earth, the king of the druids and the last dragonlord and the master of life and death and the magnificent, all-powerful warlock Emrys, has messed up with his magic, and gotten himself stuck in Arthur's body.

And he's got Arthur stuck in his.

But.

Merlin is a colossal idiot.

So Arthur believes it.

Merlin scowls. Is that really the way Arthur looks when he's mad? That crease in his brow? That little vein in his neck? "Yes, Sire," Merlin says, acidly, "I can see this is absolutely humiliating for you—"

Arthur shuts him out. He's got bigger things on his mind right now. Like—

"Your ears," he runs his hands down the sides of his head with a little moan. Is this the way Merlin feels? Like he's got dragon wings up there? "I feel like one of Cook's brass pots. With the really big handles. Is that the way you feel? Do you feel like one of Cook's brass pots all the time? Is that why you're so grumpy?"

Merlin glares up from his spellbook. "There's nothing wrong with my ears!"

"There's everything wrong with your ears!" But Arthur takes his hands off his head all the same—it's only going to make him feel worse to think about it, and it's better to not think about it if he's going to be stuck with big ears and an ugly scarf and—

—and—

Oh.

Oh, no.

Arthur rips off Merlin's rough, ratty blue shirt with the ripped-up hem—he can't believe it didn't hit him before, but this is, obviously, the absolute worst thing about being Merlin, and oh, God, it's even more awful than he feared!

"You're so bony!"

"Arthur!" Merlin goes absolutely bright pink. "Put my shirt back on!"

"I—I can see your ribcage! I—I can feel your bones," he presses down on Merlin's narrow, scrawny side, "under your skin! You have no muscle! You look like a girl!"

"Put my shirt back on!" Merlin says again. He's turned all the way red now. "Stop showing me off like that!"

"Showing you off?" Arthur almost laughs. He cannot be serious, can he? "You don't have anything to show off! You're skin and bone!" If only he wasn't stuck with the skin and bone right now. God. He misses his muscles.

"Well, I'm hardly singing from the castle rooftops!" Merlin says, sharply, his cheeks still very red. "I have to look like you!"

Arthur snaps his head up to stare at Merlin. Or does he stare at himself? "What are you on about?" He shakes his head. "You've obviously got the better end of the deal! You get to be me!"

Merlin lets out a very unkind snort. "Get to be you? I feel like a hippopotamus!"

Arthur reels back. A hippopotamus?! "What?!"

"I feel like I'm carrying the Round Table on my arms!" Merlin winces and rolls his—Arthur's?—shoulders. "I'm so heavy!"

Oh. Arthur actually does laugh now. "Yes, that's called strength and muscle, Merlin. Of course, I wouldn't expect you to be familiar with it, but—"

"Look," Merlin says, with a distinct air of utter desperation, "just put my shirt back on, please, and let me focus. I'm never going to find the right spell if you keep whining about this."

"I'm not whining," Arthur huffs, because he's not, kings don't whine, thank you very much, even when kings have absolutely every right in all of Albion to whine. But he does put Merlin's shirt back on—he would be pretty embarrassed of his body, too, if that was all he had to show for himself—and plops down in the nearest chair.

God, it's so strange to look over and see himself in the same way he's seen Merlin a hundred thousand times before—all tucked up on the bottommost stair, spellbook open on his knees, hunched over the dusty old tome with his shoulders up (like a humpbacked old witch, Arthur said, once, and he had bright green hair for a full week before Merlin finally turned him back, honestly, the idiot could be such a girl sometimes—)

"I've got it!" Merlin looks up with a bright grin—even with Arthur's face, he still looks tremendously goofy—and jabs a finger at the page. "Here, it says—oh, it needs a potion, and—um—"

All the color drains from Merlin's face, and he hastily hunches back over the book, almost desperately, and so near his nose nearly touches the thick paper.

"Oh, no."

"What?" Arthur springs from his seat, and rushes over to look at the book for himself, but he already knows he can't read a word of it. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"The—um—" Merlin swallows, hard, and licks his lips, "—the potion needs to steep."

Arthur frowns. Is that all?

"For nine hours."

"What?!"

"The potion itself doesn't look very difficult," Merlin says, thoughtfully, and hunches over the book again. Like a humpbacked old witch.

"Nine hours!" Arthur says numbly. He can't be Merlin for nine hours! He can't! He has so much to do!

"I think we've actually got all the herbs we need in the cupboards," Merlin lifts his head, and looks hopefully 'round Gaius' cluttered, sunlit chambers. "I'm sure I can toss this together before we—"

"Nine hours!"

"Yes, Arthur," Merlin says, and he's got the nerve to sound impatient about it, too. "Nine hours. I thought I already told you that."

"No, no," Arthur shakes his head, so hard Merlin's dark hair tumbles down in his eyes, and he has to reach up and brush it back, "you don't understand, Merlin, I can't be you for nine hours! I don't have nine hours! I have a council meeting in fifteen minutes!"

Merlin finally snaps his stupid mouth shut, but his eyes go wide and round in his—Arthur's—face. "Oh," he says, very feebly. "That's bad."

"And I have three new knights to name in two hours before I have to get down to the grounds for training, and oh, God, Merlin, how am I supposed to spar with my men when I'm skinny as a broomstick?"

"I spar with you all the time," Merlin says. He's gone a bit pink in the cheeks again. "And I'm like that," he waves a hand at Arthur, "all the time."

Arthur snorts. "You do not 'spar' with me, Merlin. You go down with one hit, right off, and you lay in the grass, moaning and whimpering and—"

"You hit too hard!"

"That's the point! I'm supposed to hit too hard, and you're supposed to hit back! You're supposed to pretend I'm an enemy!"

"Yeah, well, it's not so simple for some of us, Arthur, because if I pretended you were an enemy, you would be dead—"

"All right, look," Arthur cuts him off, "we're not going to sort this out if we stand here and quibble about it, so let's get on with it. Go ahead and make the potion, we can leave it to steep in here, no one ever messes with Gaius' things." No one in Camelot has the nerve to mess with Gaius' things. Not even Gwaine. "We can go to the council meeting and explain everything there."

Merlin blinks blankly back at him. "Explain?"

Arthur raises his brows. What's so hard to believe about that? "Yes, Merlin, we're going to explain. We're going to tell the court you mucked up with your magic, again, and it's made me look like you, and it's made you look like me—"

"Um," Merlin says. "No."

Arthur steps back. "No?" His brows lift even higher. "I'm the King, Merlin, you can't tell me—"

"No, Arthur," Merlin says. "Do you want to get yourself tossed in the dungeon? Because that would be the perfect way to get yourself tossed in the dungeon. And burned at the stake at sunrise."

"What?" Honestly, can Merlin even hear himself right now? "They would not throw me in the dungeon! I'm the King!" He stands up a little straighter and throws his shoulders back, but it feels pathetic when he's so scrawny. No wonder Merlin slouches so much.

"Can you prove it?"

"What?" Arthur blinks. "Don't be ridiculous, Merlin, I don't need to prove it, I'm obviously the King, you know I'm the—"

"Yes," Merlin says, firmly, "but can you prove it?"

Arthur reaches, on blind reflex, for his sword, his sigil, his ring, all the things with the Pendragon crest, the Camelot crest, splashed upon them, but—oh—it's all on Merlin now, isn't it, Merlin has his sword and his sigil and his ring and—

—and—

"All they're going to see," Merlin says, "is a servant out to steal the throne."

Arthur tries to scoff. It doesn't come out right. "That's ridiculous," he says, but it's not, and he knows it's not. "No one in the kingdom is more loyal to me than you. No one would ever think you're trying to steal—"

Merlin just looks at him.

Arthur sputters out. He really, really hates it when Merlin's right. It should be illegal for Merlin to be right. He should make that an official law. When he's him again, of course.

(He should also make it an official law that no one is ever allowed to suspect Merlin of treason.)

"All right," he says, finally, "so, what are we supposed to do, then? Just go about our day like everything is normal? Pretend to be each other?" He looks Merlin up and down. "I really don't think you can pull it off. Even when you look like me."

"Shouldn't be hard," Merlin lifts his shoulders in a little shrug. "Walk 'round with my nose in the air, pretend I'm better than everybody, pretend I have literally never seen a woman in my life when Gwen walks into the room—"

"Do you want a day in the stocks? Because you are very close to getting a day in the—"

"You can't put me in the stocks," Merlin waves a hand. "I'm you. If anything, I could put you in the—"

Merlin stops dead. He breaks off, right in the middle, with his hand still up, his blond brow still wrinkled, and he stares, blankly, down at Gaius' overcrowded worktable like he has just glimpsed the very secrets of the universe.

Arthur frowns. He edges a bit nearer. "Merlin?"

"I could put you in the stocks," Merlin whispers, in a voice of absolute and unbridled wonder.

"What?!" No, Arthur does not screech, thank you very much! "No, you can't! Stop talking crazy, Merlin, I'm the King!"

Merlin smiles brilliantly back at him. "Can you prove that?"

#merlin #bbc merlin #emrys' spellbook

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marvelousell · 4 years ago

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The Agreement (Part 15.)

Pairing(s): frat boy!fwb!Tom x reader, frat boy!Harrison x reader

Summary: Tom is a typical frat boy, his love for partying, drinks and girls are bigger than his ego. Y/N is a whole different dimension, she keeps her circle small, and even though she knows her best friend Tom is a total douche, she can’t say no to the little deal that was sealed between the two of them

Word count: 2.8k

A/N: Well I was rooting for the beans to be spilled, somehow I’m sorry to keep you all waiting here for the truth to be said💀. One more part after this and I’m giving you two alternative endings! I will also make 2 epilogues so hope y’all enjoy it!

Warnings: angst, swearing

Add yourself to my tag list || Masterlist

< Previous Part

“Are you sure that everything is all right?” Your voice was small, barely audible because of the fear that you were asking too much tonight. Harrison was wordless for the past hour, the usual talkative and energetic Harrison was replaced with a tranquil and reticent one. It was bothering you, you wanted to be the one who he could trust with his thoughts and feelings.

“Yeah, sorry love. Did I zone out again?” His finger was ghosting over your skin repeatedly in the same way like it was an obligation. He was here, but the fact that his mind was somewhere else and not with you was the thing that concerned him. The messages stayed unread, but he still couldn’t stop thinking about them. You were also there, in the mess of his thoughts. You were such a pure person, the most breathtaking girl he ever saw and your modesty and tenderness still made his heart so warm. However Emily could do the same. Harrison knew she was nothing like you, that she was a total opposite and that was what got him hooked in the first place when he met her. You two were doing so good, so damn good and still are. Why did she came back now? It didn’t trouble him that she returned back home, but the fact that she was messing with his mind now after she completely screwed him over. That was the thing that made him so exasperated. He looked like a fool, he should have left everything he had with her in the past. Harrison was too good to be someone he wasn’t, he didn’t regret forgiving her for what she did, but he regretted not leaving everything there on that party. The coffee was unnecessary, the texting even more and the next meeting was something he didn’t even want to comment. Harrison was a tender-hearted guy, sometimes even too much. That’s why he was stressing, he knew how wrong this was and how keeping it as a total secret was something he will never forgive himself. There were many times when he tried to put himself in your shoes, he even questioned himself what if you did the same to him? What if he was the one to witness your emotional “cheating”. Yes it made his stomach churn from the thought and yes he was in a situation like that with the person who is now giving him once again a hard time. Everything was so wrong.

“You did.” You kept your words to yourself as much as possible, his silence was exhausting and you wanted it to end.

“Fuck.” He exhaled loudly, not sure what to do with this situation that was already so fucked up. Harrison was sure he was going mental at this point, begging for Emily to leave his mind just for a moment so he could breathe.

Your body was still, but not relaxed as it used to be next to him. You took the opportunity to turn on the side like you were hiding from his gaze. And maybe you were? You weren’t sure which reason was it now but the pick wasn’t hard. There were two reasons, two pretty clear reasons. Tom and him.

“Sweetheart.” He sighed as you shut your eyes. It hurt him that you knew something was going on and that you could feel him shutting you out. He didn’t deserve you.

“I’m just tired.” The plain respond and fragile voice was what brought him back where he should be. Here with his beautiful girl. Even if he ruined things, he couldn’t help but smile at your figure and face that tried to remain calm.

“Come here.” He spooned you, nuzzling his face in the warm crook of your neck relaxing immediately as your scent hit him. Was this the safest place for him? It definitely was. He was so sure about it.

“I am sorry for today. I know I didn’t behave like myself. So many things are on my mind that shouldn’t even be there and it’s freaking me out Y/N.” His grip on your waist tightened, afraid that you will leave.

“We all have problems Harrison, but we’re in this together. You having too much on your plate isn’t the thing that’s been bothering me but you shutting me off completely like you don’t trust me is something I’m worried about.” The words were so true, so true that he could feel the knot in his gut getting tighter every second after they left your mouth.

“I know. I know love. I’m so sorry. I-It’s just the whole college situation and I had a little disagreement with Harry so it’s been on my mind for a while now. I’m sorry that I shut you off but this is stupid and making you worry about it wasn’t what I wanted.” Lies. Nothing comes good from them. He swallowed the lump in his throat after he tried to gain your trust with these awful lies. God Harrison you’re a sore loser.

“Hey, it’s okay Haz. Whatever it is about college I’m sure you will ace it I have no doubts about it and whatever thing you had with Harry you will sort it out, you know he can’t stay mad for a second so I wouldn’t stress about that especially. And you never make me worry about your feelings. Please I would rather know what’s going on than see you get lost in your thoughts and overthink it if I’m the reason, if I did something that could made you feel despondent or something.” You were too good to be true, he still couldn’t see your face, he squeezed his eyes shut as the guilt ate him up alive. He loved you, adored every single feature of yours, he wanted everything with you. Maybe this was a call for him to wake up. Harrison could feel the warm small hand resting on his cheek, your face close to his.

“You know that I love you don’t you?” You breathed out a chuckle after he spoke, the warm breath fanning his skin that was prickled with goosebumps. He needed you.

“I do and I love you more. We’re partners, friends, lovers please don’t feel afraid to tell me what you’re feeling. I care about you.” Harrison was feeling like shit. You deserved so much and he wanted to give it to you. It wasn’t the end but he still couldn’t help but feel like it was because of his actions. He hoped that it wasn’t too late for his love. She should be gone and he hoped he will have the guts to say it to her face.

“A good night Tom? How was she?” Tom should have known that the frat is anything but asleep. Before it was everything to him. Coming back from a girl’s place or brining one back here was a boost to his ego when his frat mates would cheer for him hoping they will be just like him. Now it was annoying, especially when he had so much on his mind.

“She was great.” She really was. A bashful and timid girl that loved history like crazy. Tom found it cute, she was nervous and when he asked her about her interests she couldn’t stop rambling. It reminded him of you and your passion about books. Evelyn was someone who could bring him back to his feet. A girl that cared about feelings and not about physical things, a girl that finds joy in small places not packed ones and a girl that could love him endlessly no matter what or who he was once. Tom wasn’t sure if he was describing you or her, but you two were so similar that it made his heart ache from the thought.

“Just great? Man I thought the nerds were much more fun to be with.”

“Brad spare me the stupid comments of yours I’m dog-tired and you’re a prick.”

“Man no need to be that harsh, you will find a new one c’mon.” Brad clearly didn’t get the message, no one would because they still didn’t think that he was a whole new person. It will be tough for him to prove how he isn’t the same guy with the reputation that he was once proud of but a whole new person that cared about feelings.

“It better be worth it since I didn’t sleep this good in a while now Harrison.” It was a shock for Tom to see Harrison this early in his bedroom, he never came unless it was something urgent that couldn’t wait for them to meet up.

“It is. You know that I can only talk with you, we went through thick and thin.” It was the truth, they were inseparable and still are but Tom tried his best to distance himself a little bit only because he loves him and because Harrison deserves to be loved and treated well and he didn’t want to be an obstacle to his happiness.

“Troubles in paradise?” Tom joked, crossing his arms waiting for his best friend to speak.

“Yeah, something like that. I mean I’m the trouble no one else.” He could see the worry on Harrison’s face, Tom could read him like a book knowing that something was occupying his mind for a while now.

“Okay, you should start from the beginning yeah? Is it about Y/N?” Your name rolled off his tongue so smoothly, his heart skipping a beat after it. He wondered how you were doing, especially after he didn’t contact you a few days ago after his date, again.

“No. I mean yes? Somehow it is? But it’s about me mostly. I’m the problem here.” He ran his hands through his hair that was longer than usual, massaging the scalp during the process to calm his nerves.

“You? I never heard you were the problem in a relationship until now.” Tom laughed, not believing that the boy who was always too good with his partners is calling himself problematic. The girls were usually the owners of that title, screwing him over and over again because of his good will.

“That’s why I’m panicking. I’m not like that. Never was and I don’t want to be now. I need your advice I don’t want to mess up a relationship that I finally deserve.”

“Tell me what’s the issue.” Tom was getting impatient, it didn’t seem good, he didn’t want to give an advice on something that may hurt you.

“Emily. Fucking Emily is the issue.” Harrison’s gravelly voice filled the small space making Tom’s blood boil. He needed a moment to process his words.

“Emily? Tell me you’re fucking kidding with me here Harrison.” He was loud and clear, not happy with Harrison’s statement.

“No. Fuck, Tom I’m so lost. We sorted everything out on that damn party, we wanted to forget what happened between us, we wanted to say hello to each other someday like normal people we didn’t want to look at each other with pure hatred flashed across our faces. Nothing else.”

“So what went downhill after that? It was definitely more than just sorting things out Harrison am I right?” He wasn’t ready to snap and he definitely wasn’t ready to hear the rest.

“I really don’t know how everything happened. It was so fast, my mouth was way faster than my brain. She was all like let’s grab a coffee like friends strictly, I know you have a girlfriend don’t worry. Just friends yeah? So I agreed. We grabbed that shitty coffee and we talked and talked for a long time remembering old times and once again I don’t remember how I accepted the offer to see her again.” Harrison wanted this to stop, he wanted to enjoy the time with the girl of his dreams.

“Are you serious? What do you mean you will see her again? Do you even remember how she made a fool out of you? Do you want this to happen again? No, let me rephrase that, do you want her to ruin your fucking chance to live with a person who will care and love you endlessly no matter what? Tell me you won’t see her Haz.” Tom was seeing red not only because of you but because of his best mate, his brother. He knew how much damage she caused to Harrison, how he was the one to mend the pieces and how he was the one to push him into dating and trusting again. Tom didn’t saw this as a chance to get you, even if this happened when he was the old cocky Tom he could never. However he didn’t want you to believe in false love. Did Harrison love you? He sure did, Tom could definitely see that but he could also see the old feelings mixing with his current ones and he didn’t want you to be the second choice.

“She is trying to get under my skin. I don’t know what her intentions are but we’re texting I mean I didn’t answer her a few days now since I was thinking about it and how wrong it is but shit man I-I don’t know.”

“What do you have to know? Would you be fine if you knew Y/N was that close all of a sudden with her ex lover? Mate this isn’t you, are you being serious right now with me? You have the most wonderful girl in front of you and you’re here trying to get an advice or approval from me that going behind your girlfriend’s back is fine.” That’s what he was afraid of. Being a bit to truthful about you and his feelings. Saying things he shouldn’t say to your partner.

“You’re giving me a lesson about feelings and what’s right? Didn’t you fuck Helen when you were with Sierra? Man what the fuck is wrong with you, I love that maybe you finally realised how being a total douche is boring but I wouldn’t do that to Y/N but since when are you so into feelings and loyalty?” If Harrison wasn’t his close friend Tom wouldn’t even hesitate to break his nose at that moment. He was right about everything, every single word was true and that’s what got him mad.

“Since the second you mentioned Y/N, since then. Maybe you should watch your mouth and get your head straight about this situation I’m trying to show you what a great mistake you’re making here. I love her and I just don’t want her to know that her best friend gave an advice how it’s okay for you to have this thing with Emily going on.”

“What a great friend you are, so she knows you almost banged her best friend?” Harrison wasn’t like that, but Tom stroke a nerve of his making him extremely furious and incoherent. The only one who knew about that was Harrison, no one else. Harrison knew immediately who Anna was when they met and after meeting you he finally connected the dots.

“Don’t you even dare to fucking mention that shit to Y/N, I swear to God I love you like a brother but I won’t stay silent about Emily.” He stood up instantly, the blood rushing to Tom’s face as he looked into his eyes that were full of guilt.

“I won’t. Just don’t tell her about Em either. Look, we’re best friends ever since we were drooling and crawling as babies. I came here for an advice, I wanted to meet her but only to say to her that this should stop. I love Y/N not Em Tom. I didn’t do anything behind her back and I never would. I’m sorry that I lashed out I just have so much on my mind.” Harrison voice was shaky, his words seemed genuine and he hoped that Tom didn’t caught the small insecurity in his voice.

“I trust you but I don’t trust Emily. She always says something and you’re like a whole new person wrapped around her stupid finger. Don’t let her play you out again. I’m not a fan of you meeting her again but if you promise me she won’t be in your or Y/N’s life after it I w-won’t say anything.”

“I promise. Thank you bro.” The hug and palms patting each other’s back made Tom exhale slowly, hoping he won’t get you hurt once again. Everything else was a blur after it, Harrison leaving and saying something to him wasn’t what he was focused on. His thoughts were about you only. Tom was having an inner battle about telling you everything but he made a promise. He loved you both however the love towards you was stronger. He couldn’t help but think about you. Tom was a shitty friend, giving Harrison the talk about how wrong is it to be with someone while thinking about another person. And here he was, going out with Evelyn with you wrapped around his heart.

Tag List

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shiny-procrastinates · 3 years ago

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(re)Watching Magia Record S1 - part 1

Hello and welcome everyone to the first post on this watch-along commentary of the first season of Magia Record! Whether you are just now watching it for the first time, or are re-watching in preparation for the second season, or have only played the game and are curious about the anime (in which case I'd be surprised you even exist) I hope you can have some fun reading these ramblings as I try to put my thoughts into words (actually turned more into narrating the show) throughout all 12 13 episodes.

Before we can get to it, though, I have a few warnings to give:

1 - As much as I'd love to be able to memory swipe so I can watch this fresh all over again, such an ability is sadly still beyond my grasp. In other words, this isn't my first time watching (or second, for that matter; more like the sixth… or seventh…). That being the case I can't claim that these are my first impressions and it's very likely this commentary will be somewhat biased by my previous knowledge. However, I can guarantee one thing: I will do my best to keep this spoiler-free, so you don't have to worry if this is your first time watching.

(I will, however, be assuming that you have watched the OG series and Rebellion, so beware of that).

2 - Please don't come into this expecting it to be Madoka 2

Also no, this is not a continuation of the OG, it’s an alternate universe spin-off.

This one's for first-time viewers.

Well, ok, this sounds like vague tweeting and I'm kind of whining here, but I have seen a number of peeps on the internet saying that Magia Record is bad only for their argument to boil down to "because it isn't OG Madoka!"

Yeah it isn't. I'm pretty sure there's "Side Story" written somewhere in the title too.

Leaving aside the matter of nostalgia glasses and whether the original series was that much of a masterpiece or not (it's been over five years since I last watched it, so I can't say anything either way.) it seems kind of weird to me that someone would bash a spinoff on the grounds of how close it is to the original. Because here's the thing: to me, the whole point of spinoffs is taking an already existing scenario and putting a spin on it to make something new. That's exactly what makes them fun!

MagiReco didn't need to be a Madoka clone or to try hard and beat the original. That would probably have made it bad, actually. What it did need to do was to create an interesting story using the world set up by the OG Madoka and the other spinoffs, and that, in my opinion, it did, so I hope people can give it a chance and judge it on its own merits rather than only compared to the original. I'm not saying you can't hate it, either, I myself have my own problems with it, it's just that I want to see more reasonable reasons than "it's not the OG so it's bad".

3 - As you can probably already tell from these warnings, these posts are bound to get looong, so I'd recommend setting aside a fair amount of time and getting real comfy if you're gonna read it all. I also don't mind if you just skip ahead and only read the interesting parts, I'm not the internet police.

3.5 - I don't want to use it as an excuse, but I think I should make it clear that English is not my native language, so I apologize in advance for any mistakes and awkward/stilted text. It's hard to tell by myself, so feel free to correct me if you find something.

SO, with that out of the way let’s get down to what’s really important:

Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story: Magia Record Episode 1

Whew, now that’s a mouthful.

You know, in my mind I always thought a “side story” was something that happened alongside a “main story”, like another POV, so I’m not sure that’s the most appropriate title, but who am I to judge?

So here we go, we’re off with some beautiful futuristic scenery already, that’s the Madoka series I know.

As the classic Sis Puella Magi plays in the background, two unseen narrators tell us the tale of the so called “magical girls” as we are shown the reality of being one, meeting our first witch for this series.

Risking your life to save a cat doesn’t seem like the smartest of things. Rather, witches eat cats? That’s mean.

No, you really, really don’t. This narration definitely seems made to make everyone who saw the original say this, particularly with how silly are the wishes these girls suggest.

And hey, look, even this girl who supposedly had her wish granted doesn’t seem very happy.

Hang in there, this is only the first episode.

Man, this scenery really is pretty though.

After an exciting fight with a witch in the train, our girl here silently goes home to find

Whatever the heck this is.

So, our girl here seems to be having strange visions whenever she enters her room, that is very very suspiciously cut exactly in half. Protagonist, you sure have an unique sense of interior decoration.

She goes on with her day, makes two lunchboxes and… oh, it seems she’s all alone.

Is this something you should be telling your own daughter?

Long story short, Iroha’s parents are abroad right now (as is suspiciously the case with many a anime protagonist parents). I actually love the parallel this scene draws with OG Madoka: whereas Madoka’s parents seem responsible and Madoka even looks up to her mom and they’re a happy united family, Iroha comes off as being the responsible one in her family and her parents are gone from the get-go. This way, the lonely atmosphere of the previous scene also starts making sense.

So, it seems like there’s something Iroha wants to do here, and that’s why she decided to stay behind.

Perhaps. Did you wish to save a black cat?

Wow, this teacher is speaking fast. Calm down lady, we’re not here to speedrun the content, geez. Though I guess we should be happy she’s at least giving a proper class, unlike a certain other teacher…

Oh great, it's this guy.

Ok, Iroha doesn’t remember what she wished for and Kyuubei doesn’t know either, although he knows she used her wish for the sake of someone. Kyuubei theorizes that the reason she doesn’t remember might be that not remembering was part of her wish, but Iroha doesn’t think she’d wish for that. I don’t think you’d ever think to wish for something like that until you had to wish for something like that though.

She’s got a fair point. After all, wishing in this universe is basica— the heck is going on in the background there?! O-kaaay…

Iroha was having a weird think-spot mental conversation with Kyuubei there, and missed speedrun teacher’s lecture entirely. Being meguca is suffering.

We get some school motto propaganda, and now we’re on the roof. Oh? Where did all the friendship stuff from the propaganda go? Seems like Iroha’s not following the school spirit. Unless she considers the white weasel a friend, so that’s why she gave him her extra… wait, Kyuubei can EAT? I thought he was some alien machine-like being. H-Huh...

Classmate A: Tamaki-san, maji tenshi!

She’s probably just shy. According to her classmates, Iroha used to be busy doing something or the other, but no one can remember what that is.

Cute.

But maybe don’t do that somewhere someone could easily walk in on you, Iroha.

Iroha gets a call by the girl from the combat scene from before, whose name is Kuroe. I couldn’t tell from their conversation if they’ve known each other for a while or if they just met each other for the first time in the fight before.

On the train, although she’s the one who called her over, Kuroe remains silent. Iroha, clearly uncomfortable, tries her best to make conversation. Poor Iroha, I know the feeling.

We learn from her that the number of witches around has been decreasing. She comments that being unable to get Grief Seeds is troubling, but it’s better than having witches causing trouble. Poor girl has no way to know just how much of a bad news it is running out of Grief Seeds.

What’s with pink-haired girls and lacking self-esteem? Iroha, are you sure you didn’t wish to save a black and forget that you did? You did save a white one just before.

Kuroe finally decides to talk, and she tells us this:

If you go to Kamihama, you’ll be saved. To anyone that saw the OG, the first thought that comes to mind is that they’ll be saved from their destiny of turning into witches, but it seems Kuroe doesn’t know the truth yet. She just doesn’t want to fight witches anymore. I think.

The train lights up, and…

...this is extremely unsettling considering the truth about witches and the conversation they’re having right now. There’s a lot of this, but this just hits different having watched the original.

Iroha’s not inclined to believe what Kuroe’s saying. Of course, despite not remembering her wish, she’s the type that’s happy with fighting witches if she can save someone, and Kuroe’s not being very convincing either. The whole thing is apparently a rumor spread by some girls who saw a dream that told them that.

Except that Kuroe actually had the dream too.

Like most magical girls, Kuroe made a short-sighted wish, and regrets it. She now wants to be saved, so she’s going to Kamihama.

...or she was, but before that, they’ll have to defeat the witch they let escape the other day, ‘cos she’s back for more.

I actually have so many questions about this scene. Weren’t Labyrinths pocket dimensions? How come this one’s moving in physical space? We know witches themselves move and their Labyrinth goes with that, but I thought it was more, like, the entrance to the Labyrinth moves. Then how come witches can escape if magical girls get carried with their Labyrinth when they move…? Just... just... what?

The answer to all of that is probably “magic”.

Like that, Express Witch Labyrinth crashes right into what seems to be a train station. Labyrinths don’t have brakes, confirmed.

Brutal.

Looks like it’s not only magical girls who have territorial disputes going on. Although it’s nice that they won’t have to fight two witches at the same time, this is not exactly a relief when you consider these two were already struggling with the previous one, and this one just ripped it apart like crab.

As expected, Iroha’s arrows do no damage at all. When all seems lost…

A wild singing mini Kyuubei appears! Is this a shiny?

The singing Kyuubei distracts the witch and jumps towards Iroha, who uses her pro white cat catching skills to grab it, and… something happens. Whatever this Kyuubei did, Iroha’s having some flashbacks now. Sadly, the middle of a battle isn’t the best time to be having a BSOD and, despite Kuroe’s attempts to snap her out of it, they’re sitting ducks right now, a black and a white one.

Thankfully for them, though, they’re not alone in this barrier. This mystery blue haired girl spams flying spears and makes short work of the witch Iroha’s arrows didn’t even scratch earlier. She’s clearly at a whole ‘nother level.

Also, chibi Kyuubei’s gone. Totally not suspicious. Nope. Not at all.

So, from this OP miss get-the-heck-out-of-my-territory, who didn’t even bother saying her name, we learn that not only there is no salvation in Kamihama, there are more, stronger witches, and there are currently no Kyuubei. She gives them the Grief Seeds from the two witches before, and passes on a warning to them. Not the friendliest of magical girls. Though if you consider what happens when you run out of Grief Seeds, one could understand why it’d be undesirable having too many magical girls in the same place.

With this, Iroha and Kuroe take the train back to their town and things are totally awkward again.

Welp, seems like Kuroe doesn’t want to chat anymore, so we’ll have a dream sequence instead.

Forgive my lack of words, but this scene doesn’t need them. This is just… you couldn’t ask for a better representation of what being a magical girl wishing for salvation is like. Everyone has their own reasons, but in the end, having known despair, these girls are desperately clinging to this last hope called Kamihama. It’s almost a pilgrimage.

“Let’s go to Kamihama. We’ll be saved there”

And in the midst of all that is the mysterious girl from Iroha’s dreams.

(the track here, Paradero de Memoria, is also great btw)

Now, with various wishes written all over in the background, we get Kyuubei’s spiel about magical girls. I think this is word-by-word the same from the original too.

We now get to finally know what our protagonist’s wish was.

So Iroha wished to cure her younger sister’s illness, but the sister in question is now nowhere to be found. Worse: everything related to her is gone. Even Iroha, who made a wish for her sake, didn’t remember her existence until now. Oh man, that’s no normal disappearance. What happened? Guess that’s what Iroha will have to find out now.

With that, we conclude the first episode of Magia Record(’s s1)!

This is a really strong first episode in my opinion. It decently introduces our protagonist, sets up the mysteries we will be dealing with from here on and also manages to trace connections with the original, while using the viewer’s previous knowledge to give a whole different impression to some scenes. You wouldn’t be like “hell no” at the rumor there at the start if you didn’t know the truth about magical girls, and I doubt that final scene would hit that hard either. It’s just really good at this and it’ll continue doing that from now on. I love it.

Speaking of the final scene, me having watched the original over five years ago might also be part of it but that is really my favorite scene in Madoka overall. I just really really love that scene. (Seriously, I’ve watched this scene so many times I know it by heart now. Help.)

Alas, I lied, the episode’s not over yet, we still have our classic anime first episode ending-opening to watch. So let’s listen, to Gomakashi:

This logo’s real pretty.

So yeah, pretty standard anime opening. If you pay attention, there are some references to Connect too, what with the selfcest and whatnot. Although I managed to mistake this when I first watched, this one’s actually sung by the trio TrySail rather than ClariS. That’s the VAs for Iroha, Asakura Momo; Yachiyo (the get-out-of-my-territory girl), Amamiya Sora and Natsukawa Shiina, whose character we’ve yet to meet. TrySail has a lot of cool songs, so do check them out if you haven’t already. (free ad)

This time, in fact, the episode is over! Whew, I did say this was going to be long, but not even I thought it’d be this long. By the time this is posted I should have a backlog of these, so my plan is to post one everyday until we are done. I hope you had fun reading this here rant and I’ll be looking forward to meeting you guys again tomorrow, same place, maybe same hour, so we can go on and watch episode 2 together!

(P.S.: I am considering doing a series of posts at a later date comparing the anime to the game, but we’ll see. The first few chapters are fine, but the game is stupidly long, so I feel it’d take a lot of motivation and stamina I’m not sure I have at the moment. There’s also the possibility watching the first arc again would bring back my yt copy-apocalipse grief back and that’d suck, definitely don’t wanna go through that again.)

#magia record #puella magi madoka magica #pmmm magia record #this post apologizes for existing

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i-like-5sos · 4 years ago

Text

No Idea [Malum Fic]

PAIRING: Calum Hood x Michael Clifford

WORD COUNT: 6428

WARNINGS: Drinking, swearing, and just some angst

SUMMARY: After moving across the country to escape the heartache that high school brings and to begin his first year at University, Michael finds himself face to face with the very person that caused his heartbreak: Calum Hood.

A/N: This was made specifically for Mandie for The Club Fic Gift Exchange ! It’s been a hot minute since I’ve written any mxm BUT I’ve missed it and can’t wait to start writing more (if you have any suggestions on how to improve please send them my way, I’ll take all the help I can get).

Fifteen minutes late. I’m fifteen minutes late to my first class as a University student. Great.

I burst out through the doors of the residency building, almost crashing into some blonde girl who’s face leaves my memory as quickly as it entered, and run as fast as I can across the campus to The Arts building. Thankfully I listened to Mom’s advice and looked up a map of the school last night or I’d be fucked right now. Musical Theory. Monday, 8AM. Room 102: Arts Building. I check the room number on my schedule twice before taking a deep breath and opening the door to my classroom.

The door opens to the back of the room and multiple heads spin around to face me. I can feel my face getting hot as I try to disappear into myself and search for a place to sit down. As to be expected, almost every table in the room is full and there’s nowhere to sit… Unless I want to join one of the tables of three and converse in small talk with a group of people that obviously don’t want me to sit with them- and let’s be clear; I don’t want to do that.

I almost settle for a table with two girls seated at it, but then notice the table in the front of the room with only one person there. Thank god. I head toward the dark-haired boy at the table and quietly sit across from him. He doesn’t react as I sit down, his head buried in his folded arms on the table.

I would normally never be caught dead at the front of the room, but here I am, sitting so close to the professor that I can smell his cheap cologne, having to share a table with some random guy who is probably going to hate me for ruining his table of solitude.

As the class continues, I do my best to follow along with the PowerPoint slides on my screen while also trying to focus on what the professor is saying at the front of the room, but I can’t help but glance over to the brunette across from me every chance I get. His head hasn’t left his arms since I’ve sat down, and I’m pretty sure he’s asleep… Maybe I should wake him up. Maybe he’s dead. I begin to picture what would happen if my classmate had died sitting across from me. Would I have to talk to the police? Would I be a suspect? Am I obligated to go to his funeral and give a speech? What would I even say? What if-

“You will have two months to complete this project and it will be worth thirty percent of your final grade. Get to work.”

I turn to face the Professor, and I realize that I may have zoned out for the entire explanation of a project that’s worth almost a third of my final grade… awesome.

Letting out a sigh, I turn back to read through the notes on my screen and, of course, none of them have anything to do with a huge project. There is no way I am going to ask the professor to repeat everything he’d just said.

As my classmates begin to talk amongst themselves about the project that I know nothing about, I glance over to the boy across from me that may or may not be dead and decide that now’s a good a time as any to find out.

“Hey” I say quietly.

No response.

I repeat myself a little louder, “Hey… Uh, my name’s Michael.”

No response again.

“Dude, seriously?” I huff, before picking up my biggest textbook and dropping it onto the table.

It worked! His head shoots up and I notice the headphones in his ears. That explains a lot. I also notice that the boy I’ve been watching all morning sitting across from me is the same boy I’d spent the majority of my high school years watching from across the room. Calum Hood. I haven’t seen him since our high school graduation last June, but he looks about the same. Same dark hair, same brown eyes, same three moles on his cheek, same annoyed and confused look on his face- oh no wait that’s new.

“Are you trying to give me a heart attack?” He glares at me as he rips the headphones out of his ears.

“I thought you were dead or asleep or something.” I shrug before changing the topic, “I didn’t know you got accepted here.”

“Well, obviously I’m not dead, and if I was sleeping, that was a cruel way to get me to wake up... Remind me never to have you actually wake me up.” He places his headphones into his backpack before continuing. “And um, yeah, I was torn between a few different universities but settled on the one farthest from home… Looks like you did the same?”

I nod and chuckle softly. “Yeah. Fuck that place.”

“How pop punk of you.” He laughs, and it brings me back to being fifteen and pathetically swooning over that very sound, never being the one to have caused it. If only fifteen-year-old me could see me now.

Grounding myself, I quickly try to think of something that isn’t completely embarrassing, and remember the mysterious project that I know mothing about.

“So… did you catch anything the prof was saying about this project worth thirty percent of our grade… cause I might have zoned out the whole time...”

He looks confused for a moment, before directing his attention to his laptop.

“I can’t blame you for not paying attention. Five minutes into his lecture I stopped listening to him and started listing to my music instead. Figured I could just read the Power Point later tonight.” He types something before continuing, “I looked through the material on the class page before the lecture started and I think I saw something about a group project that was worth thirty percent… let me just… Okay yeah, here it is.” He turns his laptop to face me, pointing at the assignment on the screen and showing me how her got there.

I quickly follow his instructions to the page and begin reading about the assignment. It’s a group project for 2-3 people about how emotions and feelings are portrayed through song. We’re all supposed to draw an emotion from the professor -that explains why people keep getting up to talk to him- and write an essay about a song that has made us feel this way. Once we finish our essays, we’re supposed to go back to our partners and make a playlist of 25 songs that combines each the emotions we were individually assigned and talk about how easily these emotions can be portrayed in music. Seems simple enough… Except for the whole partner part.

I look up from my computer screen, and before I can talk myself out of it, I ask Calum if he’d like to partner up for the project. To my surprise, he agrees and before I know it, I’m looking down at the paper I had pulled out of the tin can on my professor’s desk. Longing. What kind of lame-ass emotion is longing? I sit back down at our table and show Calum my paper.

“Longing? That’s going to be so easy to write about! And it’ll go great with love. This is going to be a piece of cake.” He enthusiastically, typing away on his laptop.

“You got love? Are you kidding me? That’s such bullshit. Every song is about love… or sex… or drugs, and I don’t think sex or drugs are emotions… so like that’s not fair.” I look back at my small slip of paper, “How am I even supposed to write about longing?”

He breaks away from his typing long enough to look at me, “Longing is so easy to write about. Haven’t you ever wanted something you couldn’t have? Or missed someone or something like that?”

“I don’t know… maybe.” I pause for a moment, “I don’t know.”

He looks back to his screen and continues to type. “Okay, I looked up the word longing and it says here that ‘Longing is mainly a blend of the primary emotions of love or happiness and sadness or depression’. So there. You can focus on one of those four. It’s not that hard, Michael.”

Hearing Calum say my name takes me back for another brief moment. Even though we went to the same school for four years, I never really knew if he had known my name or not… we never really talked or hung out in the same crowds, so I figured it was safe to assume he didn’t even know I existed.

He shakes his head and looks at his screen again as I try to avoid the thoughts of how smooth my name rolled off his tongue that are currently running wild in my head, to focus on what he had said about the different ways longing could be portrayed and experienced.

Just as I begin to reflect on the last few years of my life for a moment that could stand out as ‘experiencing longing’, I’m interrupted by the sounds of my classmates packing up their belongings. I look to my left and notice Calum suddenly standing next to me.

“Here,” he says, handing me a sticky note with a phone number on it. “text me so we can meet up to work on the project.”

“I uh- thanks.” I stumble over my words as I take the paper from him and stick it to the inside of my laptop.

When I turn back to Calum, he’s already on his way to the door. I quickly pack up my books and pause for a moment to look at the sticky note before shutting my laptop, ignoring the heat on my face and the feeling in my stomach.

. . .

I feel like I may have stepped into an alternate dimension when I entered that classroom two weeks ago, because I’ve somehow found myself in the Calum Hood’s dorm room. By choice. His choice. Who would have thought?

To be honest, I’m kind of surprised at how easily we get along. We both have the same taste in music, the same sense of humor, and the same hobbies. Who knew we were so similar? Had we actually spoken to one another in high school, there would have been no stopping a friendship from forming.

Since texting him the day after our class, we’ve pretty much been inseparable. So, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that I’m hanging out with Calum in his dorm room… but I kind of am.

“Okay seriously, Calum. How do you already have four pages written out for your essay?” I ask, scrolling through the Word document open on his laptop.

“It’s like you said, love is easy to write about… You know what else is easy to write about?” He spins around on his desk chair, taking a break from his game to face me. “Longing. Have you even started your essay, or were you just planning on taking me down with you when you flunk out?”

I set the laptop down next to me on his bed. “The only one flunking out here is your team in Fifa.”

“That was a shit insult and you know it.”

“You’re a shit insult.”

He shakes his head and laughs. “Mate, for real. Do you need help writing your part?”

“No. I told you, I’ll be fine. I just need some inspiration… Which is what I should have gotten from your essay but the whole damn thing is about your family. It is so boring! Where’s the drama? Weren’t you a ladies’ man in high school? Where’s that Calum?”

With his eyebrows raised he looks taken aback for a moment and bursts out laughing.

“Did you seriously just call fourteen-year-old me a ‘ladies’ man’?” He asks, making air quotes at the last part.

I shrug and he continues laughing.

“Okay fine, you have a point. But like... what even is longing?”

His laughter softens and he rolls his eyes, smiling at me.

“Do you need me to pull up the definition again?”

“Fuck off.” I huff.

“Okay, fine… What about like, leaving town to come here. Didn’t you miss your girlfriend? Or your friends? Or maybe your family?”

“Girlfriend?” I laugh loudly. There’s no way he’s serious right now… “No. Absolutely no girlfriend. As for my family? I honestly couldn’t be happier to be on my own and out of the house... Also, it’s kind of hard to miss your friends when facetime exists.” I lay back on his bed and prop myself up with my elbow. “What else ya got?”

“Okay lone wolf… what about uh… okay I’ve got it. What about longing for like… touch, or affection, or love, or… fucking I don’t know, food?”

“Yeah, cause I’ll definitely get an A writing my essay about craving a Big Mac. Maybe I can get extra credit if I bring one in.”

He glares at me and rolls his eyes again before shaking his head and turning around to focus his attention back to his game. I drop my head onto his pillow and sigh. Watching him play, my mind wanders as I being to think about his words. Touch. Affection. Love. My heart aches for the poor fifteen-year-old boy I once was, longing for those exact things for over a year and never getting them. I remember the emotional shut down I forced myself to do to move on from the brown-eyed boy that occupied my mind daily. I sigh deeply, taking in the musky scent of the room around me, and as much as I don’t want to admit it, I finally know what I’ll be writing about.

. . .

“Are you sure you know where this party is? I’m pretty sure we’re lost.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure they said it’s in this neighborhood… there should be a street coming up soon that starts with an S… or maybe it was a B. Whatever. We’ll start to see people on the street sooner or later and follow the noise to the right house.”

Calum and I continue to walk aimlessly down the suburban streets with houses that all look the same, in search for a party that I’m not even sure exists at this point.

“You’d think, for someone that probably went to every high school party, you’d know to write down an address when it’s given to you.” I grumble as my feet begin to ache.

“You know, you make a lot of assumptions about what I was like in high school. Weren’t you ever told not to assume?” He says, bumping his shoulder against mine.

“You’re really going to tell me that you never went to any parties in high school? I seriously doubt that.”

“Okay… Well, yeah I went to some parties. Didn’t everyone though?”

“What? No.” I scoff. “Dude, not everyone was invited to parties like Mr. Cool Guy over here.”

“Am I supposed to be Mr. Cool Guy? That’s a laugh.”

“Mate. Just admit it. You were one of the cool kids and you know it.” I bump my shoulder back against his.

“Was not.”

“You were to! Everyone knew who you were. Everyone wanted to either date you or be you. You can’t be that oblivious.” I kick a small pebble as we cross yet another unidentifiable street.

“Date me or be me huh? Did you want to be me?”

Fucking hell. Why am I still allowed to have the ability to speak without a filter?

“No.” I focus my gaze on the cracks in the sidewalk, making sure to avoid any possible eye contact.

It’s quiet for a moment as a car drives past us, filling the silence before Calum speaks again.

“Well, you obviously didn’t want to date me. So, your theory is clearly wrong.”

I walk beside him silently as I debate whether to admitting to the fact that I had the biggest crush on him for over a year when we were younger.

“See, I’m right.”

“I did though.” I choke out before I’m able to stop myself. Fuck.

“What?” He stops walking.

Well, this was fun while it lasted… I wonder if our professor will still let me join another group, seeing as Calum isn’t going to want to talk to me ever again.

May as well finish the job then.

“I did want to date you.” I confess softly as I stop in front of him, keeping my eyes on the ground.

“You’re not... gay though.”

I- What? He’s got to be kidding me right now. I’m pretty sure everyone in high school knew I was gay. Hell, I came out to my parents in the fifth grade.

“Are you fucking with me? Calum.” I finally gain the courage to meet my eyes with his and see him shaking his head. “I’m gay as fuck. Always have been.”

“No way. What about Jessica Hunter?”

We’re awkwardly standing in the middle of the sidewalk and I’m completely over-aware of the man walking his dog across the street as Calum continues to stare at me with a dumbstruck look on his face. Well, at least he hasn’t left yet.

“What about Jessica? She and I hang out from time to time and listen to music together. We’re friends.” Oh god. “Wait- are you thinking that her and I? Oh god. Never.” I shake my head to try and get that image out of it.

“No no... She was in love with you! The way she always talked about you, hung around you, and hung off you… You went to Prom together! You were the reason I never even had a chance with her. I spent so many hours thinking about you and why she chose you over me and I…” he tampers off and continues to look utterly confused.

Am I being Punked right now? There must be a hidden camera somewhere. This can’t be real.

“No Calum. Oh my god. Mate. Jessica and I were always together talking about you. She didn’t want me. She wanted you… We both did. We only went to Prom together cause she was still hung up on you and didn’t have the guts to ask you herself. Plus, you did that whole stag Prom thing with Timothy Anderson anyway.”

He continues to stand there, trying to piece together the story he had so wrongly created around himself.

“So… You’re gay.”

“Yup.”

“And you actually used to … like me?”

“Yup”

“And Jessica-“

“Never had a chance with me. Because I’m gay and she had the hots for you anyway… Are we all caught up? Can we please keep walking? I’m getting cold.”

“Man, did I have this whole thing wrong or what…” He shakes his head and starts walking again.

We continue heading to the party that totally doesn’t exist and get about half a block away from where we had previously stopped before Calum stops walking again.

“Dude! Seriously?” I sigh deeply and stop a few feet in front of him.

“You don’t uh… still have feeling for me or anything. Do you?”

“Yes Calum. I’m completely head over heels for you and plan to propose to you when we get to the party in front of everyone.” His mouth drops and I roll my eyes. “Fuck off. No. Cal, I don’t still have feelings for you. That was years ago. Now can we please keep walking? I’m going to fucking die of hypothermia.”

“Okay… you’re right. Sorry.” He mutters, clearly embarrassed and continues to walk again.

At least I’m not the only one that’s embarrassed.

We walk silently for a few minutes and I feel his fingertips brush against mine and my heart flutters softly. Shit.

. . .

“Are you even listening to me Mike?”

I look up from my phone to see Calum glaring at me. He burst into my dorm room about 45 minutes ago insisting we practice our presentation for the millionth time since he finished his essay. Of course, mine’s not finished yet, but at least I have something to write about now. But, without mine to practice, he’s just been reading his on a loop – I personally think he’s trying to annoy me to death. Jokes on him though, he’s got a nice voice.

“I can only hear your essay so many times before my brain starts to block it out to preserve my sanity.”

“You wouldn’t have to hear it so much if we had something else to practice… like, I don’t know- maybe your easy perhaps?”

How subtle. Ever since he finished his essay (overachiever much?), he’s been on my ass about mine. Even if I actually had it finished, there’s no way in Hell I’ll be letting him see this – let alone hear me read it out loud – until I have to.

“Dude. I’ve told you like eighty times now. I hate presenting stuff. I’m not doing it any more than I have to. Being in front of everyone, having them all stare at me- judging me? Fuck that. Once is enough. I don’t need you judging me too.”

“You honestly think I’m going to judge you? I don’t buy it. You’re Michael Clifford. You don’t give a shit about what other people think about you.”

I can’t help but laugh out loud. If only he knew.

“Well, when I’m putting myself out there in front of a whole room of people then yeah, I’m going to give a shit about what they think.”

“Putting yourself out there? Mate, it’s an essay. You sure you’re not just making up excuses to cover up the fact that you haven’t started writing it yet?”

Calum runs his finger through his hair, and I try not to stare. Why did he have to come to my school again, be in my class again, make my heart ache again. I feel like this time is worse. Being this close, not being able to touch him in the ways I want. Is this some horrible karma for complaining about longing? I shake my head at the joke that I call my love life and push past it like I always do.

“Maybe, but I guess you’ll have to wait and see.”

He throws a pillow at me and tells me to shut up before beginning to read his presentation yet again.

. . .

As I approach Calum’s door, I look down at the folded mess of papers in my hands and decide to quickly shove them into my backpack to make sure he doesn’t try to take them and read my shitty essay beforehand.

I pull my bag off my back and drop to my knees to put the papers away. I finish zipping it up and throw it over my shoulder as I hear the door open in front of me. I look up and see an eye full of Calum’s junk. My eyes widen and I can feel my cheeks heat up as I quickly look away and stand up. I try not to look at his face and pray that my cheeks aren’t as red as they feel.

“At least buy me dinner first. Damn.” He laughs. The sound melts my worries away. Mostly.

“Fuck off. We’re going to be late.” I give him a shove and begin walking to the exit.

Walking with one another to our classes has become a part of our daily routine. Calum decided so about a month ago when he found out that I tripped and scrapped my elbow and knee open like a child while running to make it on time for one of my 8AM classes. So now he seems to think that I can’t manage walking to class by myself. I mean, I’m not complaining. I’ll take any time that I can get with him until inevitably ruin the best friendship I’ve ever had.

As we walk, Calum is -of course- rehearsing his presentation again. I sigh and think about the essay sitting in my bag and how he’s going to react to hearing it. Maybe he’ll just drop the class and ghost me. God that will hurt... Maybe I should just fake sick, or say I never finished my part of the project, or-

My spiraling thoughts are cut short by Calum opening the classroom door and I admit defeat. The two of us sit at our table still -sadly- located at the front of the room. As we sit down, I watch Calum pull out his papers and read them over as if he didn’t just prove that he’s got it memorized by reciting it on our walk over. I set up my laptop and shove my papers under it, quickly checking back to Calum to make sure he hasn’t noticed. I exhale softly and wipe my sweaty palms on my jeans before opening our Spotify playlist, preparing it for our presentation.

A dread-filed hour and a half passes as I listen to the other groups make their presentations and read through their playlists to try and distract myself.

“Group seven, you’re up.”

My blood goes cold and I feel like I can’t move. I feel Calum swiftly kick my shin under the table.

“That’s us. Get up.” He whispers

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. I want to be back at home in my bed. I don’t want this. I don’t want to lose my friend. Why did I have to take this class? Why couldn’t I have been assigned anger. Why didn’t I just sit with those two girls that first day?

“Mike, it’ll be okay. I’ll be up there with you the whole time.” That’s half the problem, Calum.

I sigh deeply and open my eyes. They stay glued to the table as I pick up my laptop and the messy pile of papers underneath it. I walk slowly behind Calum to the front of the room and stop at the podium. I quickly plug my laptop into the screen behind us as he introduces the both of us to the class and begins to talk about the emotions we were assigned before launching into how they relate to one another and briefly talking about our playlist. I feel slightly reassured as he begins to recite the speech that I pretty much have memorized myself at this point. I allow myself to zone out to the sound of his voice as I wait for my cue.

“… and to me that is what love is to me. Family.”

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I rub my sweaty palms on my jeans again and pick up my papers with trembling hands. Closing my eyes again, I take another deep breath and open them once finished. Here goes everything.

“I- um- I’m Michael and I uh… I was assigned the emotion longing. When I first read the small paper and saw I had longing, I was confused and upset that my partner had such an easy emotion to talk about and I um… I had something as complex as longing…” I look over to Calum and he gives me a reassuring smile and my heart skips a beat. “Until he helped me realize that longing is pretty much the universal emotion. It branches into every emotion you can think of. It powers them and really brings the depth to them. Once I had realized this, the only issue I had was choosing which emotional experience to talk about. This itself seemed to be an impossible choice, so I’ve decided to talk about an experience that, like longing, incorporates every emotion. Heartbreak. My chosen song for this was No Idea by All Time Low. Song number…” I quickly look over at our playlist and count the sounds out to make sure I’m right before continuing, “seven on our playlist.”

I press play and I continue over the quiet music, telling the story of a young Michael who was in love with a boy that never knew he existed. A boy who broke his heart without ever even speaking to him. A boy who he was still desperately in love with, years later. A never-ending tale of longing.

Once the longest five minutes of my life had passed, I quickly unplug my laptop and hurry back to our table, avoiding eye contact with Calum the entire way back. I grab my books and shove them along with my laptop and essay into my bag. I damage my papers even more by doing so, but I could care less.

Throwing my backpack over my shoulder, I leave the room as I hear Calum call out after me. There’s no way he’ll catch up to me. Besides, my Sound Tech class was cancelled today, so even if he does manage to catch up, I won’t be there.

I finally make it back to my room without encountering Calum and I toss my bag onto my chair and dive face first into my bed to wait out the impending consequences for ambushing my best friend in the middle of a room full of people. Why did I do that. Fuck me.

. . .

Calum had been planning a party over the last few weeks to celebrate us finishing our project. I had told him time and time again that ‘finishing a project’ is the lamest reason to throw a party. But yet, here I am, in my room surrounded by the pulsating beats of music blasting down the dorm hall.

I’ve managed to avoid Calum for the past four days since the most embarrassing moment of my life. He’s tried texting and calling me too many times to count, and he even showed up to my dorm room twice. I, of course, pretended to be asleep both times.

So, I know it has to be Calum banging repeatedly on my door, throwing off the steady beats of music.

“Mike, it’s Calum. Can I come in?” I hear him shout through the door over the music.

I get up and turn the light off before returning to my desk to continue trying to focus on the game on my computer and pretending I’m not here.

“Mate! I saw you turn your light off! Michael! Open the door!”

The banging persists and my head sinks lower and lower into my shoulders. Go away. Please. I don’t want to hurt. Not tonight. Please.

“I’m not leaving! Maybe I’ll just ask one of those art kids for a sculpting knife and cut your door down! HA! You couldn’t avoid me if I did that! You wouldn’t even have a door to lock!” He slurs half of his words and it’s becoming clear that he’s drunk, and drunk Calum doesn’t quit.

I drop my head onto the desk and breathe deeply for a minute, listening to him yell at me through the door, before getting up and walking over to the sound. I pause there for a moment and prepare for the worst.

As soon as I open the door, Calum falls backwards onto my floor. How in the Hell…

“What do you want Calum? I’m busy.”

He stumbles back to his feet, swaying softly while he regains his balance in the centre of my dark room.

“You’re busy? You’re busy. That’s why you’ve been avoiding me for a week? Cause you’re busy?! Fuck off Michael.”

I say nothing as I lean against my open door, waiting for him to get this over with, so I can shut it behind him and go back to my self-loathing.

“Answer me!”

Clearly the silent treatment isn’t working here. I glance at the hallway full of people, some who have begun to stare at the two of us. I grit my teeth and shut the door, letting the darkness engulf my room, leaving only the light of my computer screen allowing us to see one another as we stand together in the center of the room.

“What the Hell do you want me to say?!”

“Well for starters, how about you tell me why the fuck you’ve been avoiding me?”

“I haven’t been-“

“Fuck off. You have, and you know it. Now tell me why.”

I shake my head and adjust my weight from foot to foot, shrugging to come up with an excuse.

“Oh. My. God. You’re impossible!” He pauses for a moment and takes a deep breath before I watch his posture soften. “Is this about what you said in your essay?”

I go stiff and remind myself to breathe.

“I knew it! At first, I didn’t think that was it, but it fucking was! Why are you avoiding me? Do you think I’m against your sexuality or some shit? Is that why you won’t talk to me? Cause that’s not true! You never even asked me about what I thought about it. About your feelings for me. How I would feel. About my feelings for- about your sexuality. Your sexuality, yeah... You just never asked me.” His face reddens at the last part, probably from lack of air after that speech.

I listen as he drunkenly rambles at me and try to think of something to say. How can he be right? He can’t be. I shouldn’t have to explain myself or my sexuality to him. Why would it matter what he thought about my sexuality?

“Your opinion of my sexuality isn’t needed Calum.” I say, shaking my head.

He sighs harshly and rubs his temples before stomping his foot. Did he actually just stop his foot? Is he five?

“Michael. That’s not what I’m saying! Listen to me! You’re so busy thinking about yourself and your feelings that you’re missing the bigger picture! You’re not the only person in this situation!”

“Oh, I’m sorry Calum. I’m so sorry my feelings were an inconvenience for you! You wanna talk about it? Let’s talk about it! Have my feelings for you ruined your college experience? Have my feelings for you kept you up every night? Have my feelings for you broken your heart?!”

He is silent for a moment before closing his eyes. His body sways softly as he runs his hands through his hair.

“No-” He sighs deeply before replying quietly, “your feelings for me didn’t do any of those things to me. Mine did.”

He opens his eyes and the light of the computer screen highlights the beautiful features of his skin as his words sink into mine.

I stand there with my jaw dropped, staring at the man in front of me. Did he just say… No. No. This is a sick joke. I feel a lump form in my throat begin to form.

“That’s not funny Calum.” I choke out softly.

“I’m not joking.”

“You’re straight.”

“I’m not! I’m Bisexual.” His cheeks redden softly in the pale blue light.

I stare at him in disbelief. He’s got to be drunk out of his mind to lie like this.

“You’re straight.” I repeat in an attempt to both reassure myself and convince him to stop the lies.

He runs his hands through his hair again and lets out an exasperated groan.

“Michael! Fuck! Why won’t you ever listen! I like you! I’ve been trying to tell you ever since you came out to me on the way to that shitty party. I only stopped myself cause you said you didn’t have feelings for me anymore. I’m bisexual Michael! Why do you think I went to Prom with Timothy?”

“That- that was just a stag thing…”

“I wasn’t ready to come out yet. Neither was he.”

He takes a step closer to me, making me overly aware of how small my dorm room actually is. I can smell his cologne and the alcohol -tequila? Yeah, tequila- wafting off him as the space between our bodies lessens.

“So, you’re… bisexual?”

The relief is visible as it washes over him. He smiles softly and takes another step towards me.

“And you… uh… you like me?”

“You wanna talk about it?” He whispers as his eyes drop to my lips.

“Calum, I-”

Before I can finish whatever stupid thing I was going to say, I feel his hands grab my face and his lips crash into mine. I close my eyes and return the kiss. My hands find their way into his hair as he pushes his body against mine. His hand leaves my cheek and finds its way up the back of my shirt, pulling my body impossibly closer to his.

This is more than I’ve ever dreamt of. Calum Hood. Calum Hood kissing me. His hair is softer than I could have ever imagined. I can taste the tequila on his tongue as it slips ever so slightly in between my lips and I suddenly remember how drunk he is. It takes every part of me to pull away and break the kiss.

“Calum. You’re drunk. I can’t.”

“I can.” He steps towards me with a slightly needy expression in his eyes.

“Calum.” I repeat sternly and step away, my back pressing against the door.

He lets out a defeated sigh as he turns around and walks over to the drawer where I keep my snacks.

“Do you have any bread?”

“I- uh… what?... Maybe, why?”

“I want to sober up so you’ll kiss me again.”

I laugh softly and walk over to help him look.

. . .

I wake up to the feeling of something heavy laying across my face. As I open my eyes and adjust my sights to the room around me, I realize the heavy thing on my face is actually Calum’s arm. The events of last night come back to me like a hurricane. Calum arriving at my dorm room drunk, Calum coming out to me as bisexual and confessing his feelings for me… Calum kissing me, and finally, Calum falling asleep beside me while waiting to sober up… I would say it was a dream, but I now have a red, arm-shaped mark on my face to prove otherwise.

I peel his arm off my head and his eyes shoot open, making me jump a little. I watch as he looks around the room and stops once his eyes meet mine. He smiles sweetly at me.

“Hi.” He says, his voice deep and raspy from just waking up.

“Hey there.” I whisper back.

“Guess what.”

“What.”

He smirks at me as his hand finds its way to my cheek and his body shifts towards mine.

“I think I’m finally sober.”

I exhale as my body relaxes from the tension and worry I didn’t realize I had about last night. I chew on my bottom lip as I wait for him to do something.

His eyes explore my face before slowing down at my lips just as they did last night. He blinks slowly and as his eyes open, I find them looking into mine again. He smiles softly as he closes them once more and leans forward, connecting his lips to mine. His pillowy lips kiss mine softly for the best minute of my life, and when he pulls away, he takes my breath with him. I am utterly awestruck by his beauty and the feeling of his lips on mine.

“How about you and I go on to dinner later and get to know the real us? No more assumptions and no more secrets.”

I nod and smile widely.

“I thought you’d never ask.” I agree as he grins before kissing me again.

#malum #the club gift exchange #for mandie #malum fic rec #soft malum #calum x michael #malum fic #malum one shot #5sos fic #5sos one shot #writings #mine

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c-atm · 5 years ago

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Jambudweek 2: Lion (Connverse Crossover verse)

Key: Mister: Steven (Fighting flirty) Heart Berry (HB): Connie (Fighting flirty) Witchy: Connie ( Witchanddemon) Dapper: Steven (Witchanddemon

Lion (Connverse Crossover verse)

It's been about ten days since the event happened.

LHW R&D finally crossed the line and began to experiment with the idea of alternative universes or maybe they always have been doing so, and finally decided to field test a true attempt at moving across dimensions, via Universal warp pads.

They look like your average warp pads, but their stream looks more like the bifrost from that superhero movie.

Regardless, they kind of succeeded. They didn't travel to another universe or an 'AU', They brought people from one to theirs, and as if fate decided to play a joke on them all, the accidental sliders happened to be two very familiar faces, just younger than usual.

Everyone was shocked and bewildered, when 21-year-old diamond hybrid; Steven Quartz Universe and 20-year-old part time college student, and member LHW R&D; Connie Yasha Maheswaran met experienced demon hunters, 16-year-old demon familiar, Steven Diamond Universe and 15-year-old witch and Steven's contractor, Connie Maheswaran.

Moving the two into Connie's little Homeworld residence was easy enough, but they quickly found out that the witch/demon pair was a bit more impulsive, A bit more guarded, a bit more outwardly hardened, a bit more...Independent, than themselves, than they should be. Which really, no one could blame them given the situation and well their lifestyle. Still, they showed that they are as kind, warm and open-hearted as their adult counterparts.

It was a shock for the demon and witch pair as well.

Magic and beings that seemed familiar but not. People who were long passed or just not around for one reason or the next, were now there in person, treating them with the same love and affection as their counterparts.

It was especially emotional for 'Dapper', a name for the younger Steven coined by the older Connie. Partly because of his clothing style, partly to tease her own Steven; and 'Witchy' a playful nickname from the older Steven to the younger Connie; met the Maheswarans and Greg.

A night of tears that was for all involved.

It took a bit for everyone to get settled into the fact that there was a second, younger jambud pair in their universe, no matter how temporary the stay would be. Except for Mister and Heartberry, the older jambuds; who seemed to take the fact that they now each had a younger 'sibling' in a strange stride.

"They're not clones and they have not tried to kill us." No one could argue with their logic.

All in all the younger two was able to find a groove within this new world, and soon found themselves settling in, getting used to everything and everyone.

Until this evening …

The two pairs were resting at Connie's LHW residence watching old under the knife reruns and exchanging information about their worlds. Deepening their siblings like bond and such, when Mister asked a simple question.

"So, what's your Lion like?"

"What?" The witch and demon paired retorted. "What do you mean?" Witchy added questionably.

"Lion? Big cotton candy fluff ball of a cat." HB joked.

"It's just me and my lady at home. We're out too much to care for a pet." Dapper stated as he wrapped an arm around Witchy's shoulder, who despite blushing, didn't remove it.

"It's kind of hard to call Lion a pet." Mister chuckled. "He's more like a partner or adopted rebellious teenage son."

"So what, he's an outside cat who just stops by every once in a blue?'

"Maybe for Mister, here." HB snickered her counterpart question, before squealing at the playfully nuzzling retaliation from her Steven. She tapped his chest to get him to stop, causing the two demon hunters to shake their head at the duo.

HB cleared her throat before answering. "For me, he's more obedient," She grinned cheekily "and Mister is jealous of that fact."

"See how she's messing with me." Mister pinched HB hip, getting a peep out of her and pointed stare out of her.

"She is telling the truth though about him being more obedient."

"You two wanna meet him?"

The demon and witch pair shrugged before nodding. They saw no reason why they wouldn't. It was just a cat, right?

The older pair looked at each other before HB stood up and stepping through the front door. Putting her left index and thumb in her mouth she whistled towards the setting sun.

"He's coming." Mister reassured the two, who looked a bi smug.

"Ah there you go! My fluffy boy, Daddy and mommy got someone for you to meet.."

Witchy bit back a snicker at the sweet talk as Dapper looked on teasingly smug towards Mister, who said nothing, but looked on in knowing indifference.

That soon turned to cheeky glee as he watched the younger Dapper take Witchy in his arms protectively and leap behind the couch, as HB walked in with Lion in toll.

"That a Lion! A real live honest to god lion!" Witchy exclaimed as the demon hunting duo looked at their older counterparts as if they lost their mind as they playfully scratched and rubbed the pink jungle king, who just mewled in appreciation of the attention.

"Yes and he's such a good boy. yes he is." HB swooned as Lion nuzzled his snout against her chin.

"Still gotta work on his parking though." Mister joked as Lion nudged his head against the gem hybrids own, growling gently, before licking his chin, getting chuckles out of him. " Ok, ok you've gotten better."

HB turned to the two with a smirk. "Come on over here. He won't hurt you."

Dapper shook his head, unconvinced. "You're kidding..right?"

"Why would we? He wouldn't hurt…." HB had to pause for a second. " Actually,he would hurt someone, badly...If they were a threat to Steven or me and by proxy, you two."

"Yeah,he's a battle cat for sure." Mister praised rubbing Lion's belly

"My trusted stee, yes he is." HB followed, getting pleasurable yips from the big cat.

Dapper was still unsure, when Witchy climbed out his grasp, and walked cautiously towards the three.

The older jambuds got out of the way and stood back as Lion stood up looking at the younger version of his mistress, seeing the uncertainty in her eyes. He moved his snout closer to her, smelling the heavy, yet oh so familiar scent.

When he was done with his assessment of the younger mistress, Lion stared for a few moments...Before nuzzling his snout against her jaw, giving it a gentle lick and resting his head on her shoulder.

The response was instant!

"Oh! I love you! Such a sweet boy!" Witchy announced as she hugged the beast around his neck kissing it on its skull.

"I know, right!" HB exclaimed as she joined in giving the big cat attention.

"Kind of figured this was gonna happen." Mister stated with a smile towards Dapper who still looked unsure as if he was trying to figure out something.

"He's dead."

Dapper heard in his ear before turning to Mister, astonishment on his face.

"I don't know when or how, but Lion died and was resurrected by my mother. It's why he's pink and can do all he can do." Mister stated cooly, arms crossed as he and his counterparts watched the girls and Lion play together a smile on his face.

"What can he do?"

"Alot."

The demon elbowed the diamond, chuckling slightly. "Cryptic doesn't fit you at all, Big Bro."

Mister ruffled his younger 'brothers' hair "Yeah, yeah." He scoffed a laugh watching him slick his hair back. "Seriously, you want to know what Lion can do. He'll show you."

Dapper arched an eyebrow at that statement as Mister walked up to his Connie, whispering in her ear. She nodded with a smile before standing up.

"You know, it's a nice evening. You guys should take Lion out for a bit of a...Adventure. "

At the sound of an adventure, the pink beast climbed to its feet, almost excitedly. HB gave the beast a kiss under its jaw, before whispering in his ear. Lion turned to HB giving her an affectionate rub with his skull before bending down in front of Witchy.

"Ummm?"

"Go ahead. Get on. " HB assured her 'sister'.

Witchy didn't need any more coaxing as she climbed on the beast back.

"Whoa." She giggled as Lion stood to his full height. feeling a bit of vertigo over how tall he was. She turned to her partner with a smile. "What are you waiting for, you dapper demon? Get on."

"Listen to your lady." The flirty fighters sang before he could say anything in refusal.

Dapper just shook his head conceding. With a gentle hop he landed upon the beast wrapping his arms around his lady.

"So what, gonna take us around the town big cat?" Dapper teased, getting an almost offended look from Lion.

HB chuckled knowingly as she opened the door. " Something like that."

"Wait..gotta check on Lars." Mister said before giving HB a quick peck on her cheek. He turned to Lion, who dipped his head low towards his master. "You two have fun."

The two younger jambuds jaw dropped when they saw the older Steven disappear into the mane of the beast, completely.

"Wait, what the hell just happened?" Dapper yelled as Lion roared towards the door creating a portal right outside the house. "What...What?!"

"Show them a good time Lion, but don't keep them out too late." HB laughed as the jungle cat ran towards the portal. The last thing she heard before it closed was Dappers screaming and Witchy excitement filled laughter.

With a sigh HB sat down on her couch only to hear a text come to her phone. She turned to her messaging app, reading the new text. Quickly she hopped off the couch, grabbed her sword and ran out the door, heading to R&D.

#jambudweek2 #Connverse crossover #Steven universe #Connie Maheswaran #Connverse #Comedic #witchdemonAU #fighting flirty #Lion #Mister #Heartberry #Witchconnie #Demonsteven

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troop-scoop · 4 years ago

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Mistakes & Regrets XIII

Summary: When a trip to your Dad’s hometown of Hawkins goes wrong, you end up in the year 1983, and have to learn how to cope with being stuck in the past.

Pairing: Steve Harrington / Future!Reader (like, a really slow burn)

Warnings: Swearing, Steve implying that something happened to reader that didn’t, heavily implied homophobia, joke about diabetes (I’m at a very high risk to develop type one at some point, making jokes about is how I relieve the stress 🙃 )

• • •

December 31st 1983

The ceiling was spinning, and the crack in the door allowed a tiny sliver of light into the room that came over your body allowing for anyone who passed by the room to know you were in there.

Drinking as much as you did was a terrible idea, and you knew that. But right now, you were supposed to be celebrating the turn of a new decade, making jokes about how the roaring twenties were back. But instead, you were drinking away the anger and malice you held against yourself in a different century.

The heating in the stranger’s home made it unbearable to wear the corduroy jeans that seemed to be too popular in the women’s sections of stores, even if they were ugly. But they were comfy.

You’d kicked off the jeans awhile ago, you didn’t know how long ago, and enjoyed the air that the fan was circulating through the room, feeling the uncomfortable heat inside your body beginning to leave with every gust of air that brushed over your legs.

Closing your eyes you opted to try and get some sleep, hoping that when you woke up the ceiling would stop spinning. But you supposed that was a false dream, knowing that you’d probably wake up with a raging headache and sensitive to even the smallest sounds.

A few of the girls who had tried to get you to stop drinking had put you in this room. That included the party thrower, Alison, and her boyfriend who got you into the guest bedroom with some difficulty and you almost falling out of their arms multiple times. You didn’t know how long ago that was either.

Down the hall you could hear arguing, and heavy footsteps making their way down the hall. Bringing an arm over your face in an attempt to block out the light as the door was opened wider by someone.

“Y/n, c’mon.”

Uncovering your face you looked up and saw Steve grabbing your shoes. You didn’t have the mindset to do anything but stare at him with narrowed and annoyed eyes.

But his eyes were very observant right now. Because the moment he grabbed your shoes he saw your jeans laying by the foot of the bed. And he looked at you, seeing your bare legs.

It was almost midnight, and Steve wasn’t doing much when he got the call from Alison, telling him you needed a ride home.

Dropping your shoes he went to the side of the bed you were laying on and grabbed your face. “Y/n, what happened?”

“Hm?” It took you a moment to realize what he meant but when you did, you could physically feel yourself sober up an ounce or two. “Nothing happened, it was hot.”

You watched him release a breath of relief, one that seemed like it was being held in worry. He let go of your head and helped you sit up. “I’m gonna get you home, okay?” You nodded a bit as he handed you your jeans.

Steve went to the door of the bedroom, closing the door and turning the light on. “No!” You complained covering your eyes from the bright light.

“I can’t see in here, and I have a feeling you don’t want whoever walks by to see you in your underwear.”

You squirted as you pulled your hands away and looked at Steve. “Who says I want you to see?”

He raised his eyebrows and tilted his head, a silent way of saying ‘seriously?’ “You’re wobbling.”

“So?”

“You’re still sitting on the bed.”

“My dad always did say my head was too big for my body.” You got a small smile out of Steve as you slipped your legs into the jeans. He came back over to your side, taking your hand and helping you stand.

You were leaning most of your weight into him, your shoulder against his chest while you pulled your jeans over your hips and buttoned them up. Steve sat you back down while he grabbed your shoes and came back over.

“You’re my best friend,” You told him. “Ever!” You added with a childish grin as he kneeled down, slipping your shoes back onto your feet.

“Well, If we’re best friends ‘ever’ then if I ever get this drunk you better do the same damn thing for me.” He told you, tying the laces on your shoes.

“I’m your best friend too?” You flicked a strand of his hair that was out of place.

He nodded a bit, “Don’t forget the ‘ever’ part.” He joked, finishing up on tying your shoes and helping you back up and wrapping an arm around your waist so you could lean into him for balance.

February 15th 1984

“If my apartment ever gets raided and they find that, I’ll be the one to get arrested.”

“Nonsense,”

“Steve,”

“Y/n?”

The two of you stared at each other for a moment while the five of you stood in the center of the mostly empty living room, with boxes of furniture still sitting around the large room from the furniture store a few small towns over. The only reason why Jonathan and Will were over was because you needed to put it together. Well, Jonathan was there to help, Will was just there because Joyce was at work.

Huffing a bit, you took the bat from him and pointed a finger at him. “If I ever stub my toe on this thing in the middle of the night and lose it, I’ll burn your curtains.”

Steve looked at you with real offense as you walked over to the closet in the living room, where most of your cleaning supplies were kept, and placed the bat in the corner, hoping that the nails didn’t scratch the wooden floors.

“I like my curtains,” He mumbled a bit while Nancy rubbed his shoulder blade in a way to keep him from shooting a response back at you.

Everyone thought that whenever the two of you threw insults back and forth at each other it was because you hated each other. But that was far from the truth. You argued like friends did, and teased each other like friends. It was all in good fun.

“Your room looks like it hasn’t been redecorated since you were ten, and your mom did it.”

Will laughed a bit while he sat in the swivel chair.

“She won’t let me redecorate.” he admitted. “But, speaking about decorating, are you just gonna use boxes of furniture as furniture?”

You tilted your head a bit and shrugged. “Maybe, but if you guys wanna help me build my furniture I’d really appreciate it. Jonathan and I only share two braincells and they fight all the time.”

March 20th 1984

Holding the grey bandana you took one last look at the poster on the coffee table. In the photo your hair had been pushed behind your ear, and the sweater had been itchy, you remembered that.

Sighing a bit you looked over at El and saw her flipping through the channels. “Hey-” You started, only to be cut off by her holding up her finger. “Rude,”

In the time since you learned about Eleven being alive, you learned plenty of things that you shouldn’t have. Things that could get you killed. Things you didn’t even tell Eleven.

For example, according to Owens, your body’s near immunity to normal drugs like tylenol and benadryl growing up was because Will built up a tolerance to the atmosphere in the Upside Down, and you received his tolerance when you were born. And you being in the alternate dimension only built onto it.

Even Owens was shocked when he heard that you didn’t have immunity to alcohol or caffeine.

Eleven stopped on an empty channel, with white noise filling the room. As she gestured to the bandana without a word. Bringing up the grey material you covered your eyes with it, tying it behind your head and closing your eyes, even though the material made everything dark.

“Think.” She told you.

“Yeah, I think I got that, Sherlock.”

You sat for a moment, legs crossed and holding a wooden pencil in both hands until you opened your eyes to be met with echoing darkness, your feet felt cold, and looking down you saw the wet ground. It felt like you were walking through a puddle on freshly dried cement.

Turning around you heard the sound of a car door opening and slamming shut. You were met with an older looking car as you approached. Seeing the back of a young man who was leaning against the roof of the car.

“Tom, it’s gonna be okay,” A familiar voice said. Looking to your left you saw Dad walking over to your pa, a sad look on his face. He looked close to tears himself, and you could see Thomas huff a bit and scoff.

“They hate me, Will.” It wasn’t hard to figure out who he was talking about, considering that you only had one grandparent who was present your entire life.

Looking at your dad you saw his shoulders drop a bit as he nodded. He couldn’t possibly be much older than 20 you observed as he grabbed the roof of the car. “I’m sorry. . . you can. . . go back. I’ll leave, you don’t-”

“Will, don’t do that.”

You knew the story well enough from what your aunt and uncle had told you about your pa’s parents being absent from your life and his.

“Do what?” Will asked, tears welling up in his eyes, while his bottom lip trembled. The last time you saw that happen was when your uncle Dustin got into a car accident and he was laid up in the hospital for a week.

You watched as Tom grabbed Will’s hand. “If my parents can’t accept me for who I love, that’s on them, don’t put that on yourself.”

“It is my fault, I mean in their eyes you were perfect before, you had a girlfriend, and you were going to NYU with your sister, I ruined that. I showed up and to them you’re all of a sudden gay!”

“Will,” Thomas tried to interrupt.

“In their eyes, I probably turned you gay,”

“That’s not how that works.”

“They don’t know that!”

Thomas sighed a bit, giving Will the look you knew all too well whenever he had gotten slightly annoyed with your constant talking in awkward situations.

“Will, I’m Bi, my parents knew that when I told them in ninth grade. I wasn’t ‘all of a sudden’ gay. They just didn’t want me to be with a guy. They kept saying I’d find a nice girl and settle down.”

Will looked down at what you assumed was the side of the road or concrete, but for you was an inch of water.

“I knew what I was getting into when I asked you out. I knew what my parents would say, but it’s still hard, because I always wanted them to accept me. But if they don’t, just because I love someone of the same sex, I don’t care. If they don’t want to be a part of every Christmas and thanksgiving we have together, and if they don’t want to meet our future kids, that’s on them.”

You felt a smile creep onto your face as you crossed your arms and continued to watch the interaction. Seeing Will’s eyes widen a bit, and his mouth fall open a bit.

“You want kids? With me?”

Thomas muttered a swear under his breath, leaning against the car again, covering his face. “If you don’t want-”

“I do. . . I do want kids.” Will told him, grabbing his shoulders, a grin on his face. “I want kids, and I want them with you. I mean, I don’t know how we’ll have them exactly, but I do, with you.”

Pulling the bandana off your face you smiled a bit, wiping the drop of blood away from your nose and looking at Eleven with a smile, leaning into the back of the couch. It was odd to think that your parents agreed to have kids after Pa’s parents disowned him, and right outside the old beat up Volkswagen that Pa drove up until you were five and loved to pieces.

“What was it?” She asked quietly, turning the tv off.

“My parents.” You told her with a smile. You could add that fact that apparently Will was still awkward in his early adulthood.

August 27th 1984

“Make sure he doesn’t get sent to the office,” Nancy insisted while she handed Steve his schedule that had been pinned to the bulletin board on wheels outside with the other Senior’s schedules. You already had yours in hand, and looked up at Nancy.

“Why me, exactly? I have better things to do than babysit your eighteen year old boyfriend.”

Before Nancy could answer, Steve laughed and showed you his schedule. “What the fuck, Steven?” You asked maybe a bit too loud after you skimmed the schedule as he continued laughing.

“Miss L/n, watch your language.” Mr. Haul scolded as he passed by with a freshman who looked familiar.

“Sorry,” You responded with lack of remorse.

The freshman gave you a small smile as he followed the vice principal who also happened to teach third year english. “Thanks again for the water balloons,”

It clicked and you gave a small nod and an awkward smile, watching as another boy caught up with him.

You turned back to Steve and hit his ribs, which sent him laughing again while you snatched his schedule. “Homeroom, that’s fine, but Mrs. Click too? Did you fail her Sophomore history class?” you demanded, looking at him.

Nancy stood awkwardly in front of you two while Steve took the paper back from you hands, even if he had to snatch it back. “I didn’t take it,” He said with a genuine proud smile on his face.

You blinked at him with a blank expression for a moment and hit his arm. “How did you not take it? Are you telling me you took Junior history before Sophomore?”

“Okay, just to explain it to you,” He started in a playful condescending tone. “I opted to take the college level government class, the administration didn’t realize it until I was already halfway through the year.”

“I think you mean college prep, and was it because of your birthday?” You asked, as he was a year older than the rest of his class due to the fact that his parents put him in school a later than they should have. One of the many things they did wrong with him. At least that you learned about in your time of being his friend.

“Exactly.” He said with a smile. “They said that they’d just put me in it the year after. But I chose to take a gap year of social studies.”

“God, you’re an idiot.”

Leaning against the pole you held your binder and watched as Steve examined the rest of his schedule. “Well, I have the same study hall class as Nance, so that’s a good thing. Right, Nance?” Looking up at Nancy you saw her smile and give a nod, and although it had Steve convinced, you were a bit skeptical.

You gave her a smile and saw as her own became genuine as she returned it. Turning your head to look at the parking lot you saw the Ford Galaxie come into the parking lot. “I’ll be right back,” You told Nancy and Steve, walking over to the car.

You saw Jonathan and Will getting out of the car. “Hey, Johnny Boy.” You teased with a smile. He glared at you for a moment, not fully out of the car yet, but sitting in the seat with his legs out.

You went to say something before a loud click and flash went off. You froze up and blinked in surprise, before looking down and seeing Will holding a polaroid and smiling up at you, while you stared back with an unreadable expression. You saw his smile fade a bit.

Jonathan had been telling the truth when he said that this younger Will you’d gotten to know in the past year wanted to be your friend. You saw the awkward attempts at trying to spark a friendship, and most of the time they fell flat. But not because of him. That was entirely on you, since you’d grown up looking in scrapbooks and yearbooks with this young Will’s face in it.

You smiled a bit at him, and his came back as the photo printed out. He held it out to you and you grabbed it.

It was bigger than most instant print photos you’d ever held, and already you could see the blue hues in the photo beginning to kick in your outline beginning to come into the center of the glossy part.

“Who let you have a camera?” You asked with a grin, shaking the photo out of habit as Jonathan got out of the car, closing the door.

“Our mom let it slip that your parents used to take photos of you at the beginning of every school year.” Jonathan informed. “Bob gave it to us. I said he could take the photo,”

You looked to Jonathan and smiled a bit. It was always your dad who took the photos, Pa was usually the one to get them printed out, or the one to put them in a photo album.

“Tell him thank you, for me then.” You told them as Will handed you the camera as well.

“He said you could have it.” Will shrugged.

Nodding you took your bag off and slipped your bag off, kneeling down with it, placing the camera in the bag and looking down at the photo in your hands. Still not fully developed, but almost done. With your mouth open to speak and hair neatly done. Some things never changed. And that included the way your hair was done on your first day of school every year.

Every year, Pa and Dad worked together to try and get your hair to look nice. It was a simple thing, but it was a yearly occurrence, and truth be told, Pa was better at it.

Reaching even deeper into your bag you pulled out an extra pack of gum and handed it to Will. “Don’t tell your mother. She’ll kill me.” You told him.

October 25th 1984

Class was always boring, but even more so when there was a sub reading from the textbook. So the moment you’d walked into Mrs. Click’s class you pulled out the patch Joyce gave you as well as the needle and thread you’d carried with you that day.

“Where’s King Steve?” the familiar feminine voice asked as you approached your seat with the patch in hand. Chuckling a bit, you sat on the cheap wooden desk and shook your head. “Walking Little Miss Nance to her Home Economics class.” You told her.

“Oh, the priss?”

Your shoulders dropped as you looked at her, “Be nice, Robin. Just because you like,” You mouthed the name ‘Tammy’ refusing to say it out loud for her own privacy. “And they’re obsessed with him, doesn’t mean you get to be mean.”

“That was mean?” She asked, while you lowered yourself into your seat, feet up on the desk, even if the space was a bit tight to do that.

“Yes, Rob, it was mean.” You laughed, stitching the ‘N’ into the patch. “Not to me, at least, but ya know, don’t encourage others.” You told her as she stood from her seat, holding her bag.

“Got it, I’m gonna go sit with Nick.” She told you.

“You’re trying to get on your section leader’s good side!” You accused as she walked to the other side of the class. “Sh!” She told you as she plopped down next to the section leader of the band.

You met Robin in art class and the two of you hit it off pretty quickly, hanging out after school sometimes. She was responsible for the posters you had up in the living room of your apartment, which were impulse buys that Robin encouraged.

But you still remembered ‘What about this Kenny Rogers one?’ It had been a joke of course. ‘If you ever bring Kenny Rogers into my home, my parents would kill me, then you.’

Predictably, Steve came in late, holding his breakfast before he’d found his spot next to you, allowing the teacher to keep reading from the textbook. No scolding from the middle aged man while you stitched the letters in as best as you could. You weren’t good with stitching unless it was to fix a button or a popped seam. Something that your Cousin Barb taught you, because and you quote ‘the school system won’t teach this shit, and Uncle Will doesn’t know what the hell a needle is.’

But you would say that the letters were coming out better than you expected, but then again, Joyce traced the letters out for you.

You still weren’t particularly close with Will, but you were willing to help with the costume, since they wouldn’t let you buy Will a store bought one. You’d seen Mike’s when you went over to Nancy’s, and knew that Will’s wouldn’t completely match his friend’s, but figured that it might have meant more to him, since his mom put it together for him.

The door opened and you looked up, seeing the vice principal ask for the sub to come outside. And watching as the man closed the textbook and followed him out, students began chatting away, while you stayed quiet and continued with your work.

Steve turned to you and tapped your knee, catching your attention, making you look at him, seeing the crumbs of his breakfast all over the floor and on his desk, a little on his sleeve as well. “What happened last night?”

Scoffing you shook your head, wiping the crumbs off of his sleeve, going back to your sewing.

“Oh come on, Hopper dropped you off at the video store, you have your own car.” He pointed out. The mention of your old but very well loved and pre owned car made you roll your eyes.

“Leave Delorean out of this.” You told him with a small smile, multitasking by talking to him, but not wanting to get distracted and sew the wrong spot. It wasn’t like typing on a computer or phone where you could look away and still type, and fix any typos you may have made.

“It’s not even a Delorean! It’s a Volkswagen Thing. That’s what it’s called!” Steve told you while you placed down the patch and looked back at him. You could tell him why, but decided against it. Knowing that you didn’t want to spoil the movie that still wasn’t out yet, and not wanting to explain the irony to him. “Leave her out of it,” You stated, He dropped the subject all together, digging into his bag and pulling out red licorice, holding one out to you.

Something about Steve Harrington not many people knew? He had the biggest sweet tooth out of anyone you’d ever met. He always had some kind of candy on him, but never over did himself.

Looking at his bag you tried to spot the packaging he pulled it out of, but when you couldn’t see it, you leaned over the bar that connected the hair and desk you sat in, pulling the front of his bag down a bit to see the packaging. “Ew, no.” you told him.

“You love candy?”

“Not Twizzlers.” You told him with a smile. “Everyone knows that Red Vines are better.” You told him. At that, he sighed and reached into his bag again, and you could hear glass as he pulled out a glass bottle of coke and put it on your desk. You just stared at the class for a moment before grabbing it. “Do you just carry around type two diabetes in your bag at all times?”

“Yes.” Steve told you nonchalantly. “What are you doing? He asked, changing the subject.

“Oh,” You looked back to the patch and picked it up, showing him, “I’m helping Mrs. Byers with Will’s costume. He’s going as a ghostbuster.”

“He chose Spengler?”

You chuckled and nodded. “He and his friends all agreed. It’s a group thing that they’re doing.”

“You’re really close with the Byers.” He observed.

Steve was right, in the past year, you’d grown very close with Joyce and Jonathan, and you liked Bob, he was sweet, and good to Joyce.

“Yeah, good family.” You told him awkwardly.

• • •

@disneyprincessbuffyannesummers @jxnehxpper @yllwtaxi @songofcosplay @potatopooper05 @cheesecakeisapie @robinsdolan @yall-wildin-like-siriusly @the_passionate_freak @bisexualpears @ilovebucketbarnes @random-thoughts-003

#steve harrington #steve x reader #steve harrington x reader #steve harrington x you #Steve Harrington slow burn #steve #stranger things x you #stranger things x reader

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imaginejamesandsirius · 4 years ago

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So lately I've been reading a lot of your fics and I was wondering if you would do one for genderswap James and Sirius. You can genderswap one or both, it doesn't matter. Also great writing, I love reading your stories.

((A/N: I’m not really comfortable writing normal genderswap, so this is a dimension crossover, where women James and Sirius come over and meet the guy versions of themselves))

"So you wanted to go forward in time to see what you'd look like in ten years, but wound up here instead?" Sirius asked. That was what he'd gotten from the story at least.

Girl-Sirius nodded. It was an alternate universe version of him, so it should've looked more like him than anyone else, but mostly she looked like Bellatrix. Girl-James had looked like James only with longer hair, so it hadn't been a mystery who she was. Trying to get all four of them to take turns talking hadn't worked so well when they appeared out of nowhere, so they'd decided to pair off and then compare notes afterwards. "Me and Jamie did the modifications on the time turner last week. It should've been fine but now we're in this bloody weird place instead," she said, wrinkling her nose as she looked around.

Sirius glared at her. Yeah maybe this universe wasn't the greatest thing ever, but he was staying with the Potter's instead of being trapped in Grimmauld Place. This place was pretty damn swell to him. Plus they were in his room, and his room looked great. "What, you don't like bikes?"

"Can't say they're my style, no," she said, eyeing one poster like it was particularly foul.

Sirius huffed and rolled his eyes. "I guess you can't teach taste."

"What are you doing with a room in the Potter mansion anyways? Or is this not the Potter mansion here?"

"It is. Are you still living with your parents?"

"Well yeah, I'm sixteen. You're not?"

"Fuck no. I mean, I'm sixteen, yeah, but I'm not living with them anymore. They sort of kicked me out." Sirius made a face then added, "I sort of left."

"Why'd they kick you out? Like yeah, I bloody hate them, but I've only got to stick it out for another couple breaks and then I can get the hell out of there. What did you do?"

Sirius didn't really know what to do with this. This was weirder than her being a girl-version of him. She still lived there? "I- well- I mean, they didn't take it well when they found out about me and James." To put it lightly.

"That you're friends?" she said, frowning. "My parents knew about that a week into first year; how did you hide it for that long? Are you not in Gryffindor?"

"What?" Sirius asked, frowning at her in return. "They didn't like that we were dating." They hadn't liked that they were friends either, but it was sort of a footnote with Sirius not being a blood supremacist and having a detention log longer than the Black Family Tree and liking muggle inventions. "Totally lost their shit when they caught us. Mr. and Mrs. Potter already knew, so they said I could live with them. That's why I'm here. Nowhere else to go, y'know? Not that I mind living here. The only bad thing to come from it so far is that they both talked to us about safe sex. That's an hour of my life that I can't erase from my memory."

"Wh- you and Jamie?"

"Yeah."

"Really?"

"What's that supposed to mean? I'm bloody amazing."

"Sure, but Jamie's..."

"What about James?" If Sirius got into a fight with himself over James being the best thing on the planet, then that's just what he had to do.

"Well I don't know about yours, but my Jamie is definitely not interested in me. She's only got eyes for Lily sodding Evans."

Sirius blinked. This was so buggering weird. "James fancied Lily, but only for the first couple years of school. He got over her ages ago."

"Good for him. My Jamie's acting like she's never going to get over her, and even if she did, she wouldn't want me."

"You sound awfully sure. Did she say that?"

"She didn't have to," Girl-Sirius grumbled.

"Huh."

"What?"

"I'm no longer the dumbest person I know."

"Hey!"

"Oh come off it, mate," Sirius said. "You can't know for sure that your James doesn't like you unless you ask her. And you can't be an arse about it. Walking up and demanding to know if she fancies you is a great way for her to think you're being insincere."

"What kind of ponce are you? Insincere? Talk to her? No thanks, I'd rather not embarrass myself and utterly ruin our friendship."

"If you can ruin your friendship with her by telling her that you fancy her, maybe it wouldn't be that big of a loss. And for your information, I am the best kind of ponce. I wear makeup and I have a skirt and everything."

Girl-Sirius snorted. "I didn't mean it like that and you know it. Berk. Look, I'm glad that everything's worked out for you and your Jamie, but it's not like that with us. I've got a little crush. So minor it's barely worth mentioning, and she's never looked at me like that."

Sirius didn't believe that for a second, so he rolled his eyes and muttered, "Whatever. Want to go see how they're doing? Wait. D'you still have the time turner you used?"

"Jamie has it."

Sirius nodded, and they left his room to go to James's. His door was open so they were able to walk right in, and instead of leading with anything helpful to getting them back to their own world, Sirius said, "Did you know that they're not dating?"

James pointed at Sirius and gave his counterpart a meaningful look. "See? I told you it's weird." Then he dropped his hand and grinned at Sirius. "I like our universe."

"Only because of that? Not because you- I dunno, like being a bloke?"

"Meh," James said with a shrug, and Sirius laughed.

"You've got the time turner?" Sirius said, looking at Jamie.

"Yeah." She pulled it out of her pocket, then they all frowned at it. That did not look like a normal time turner. For one, the sand was red. For another, the rim was silver instead of gold. "Er. It didn't look like that before. We tried to turn it again when we figured out we weren't in the right place, but it's like it was stuck. It was the right colour back then, though." She blinked. "Erm. I don't really know what to do with this," she said, shoving it back in her pocket like they wouldn't have to worry about it if they couldn't see it.

"Talk to the Ministry?" James suggested, making a face. None of them wanted to talk to the Ministry about anything official-- James and Sirius because they were animagi, and their counterparts because they'd gone into this hoping to misuse a time turner and they were going to get in deep shite for that.

"Last resort," Sirius said. "As much as I'd love to sit here and make fun of you two for not thinking this through, I'm hungry."

James snorted. "Like we always think shite through."

"Hey, have we ever gotten stranded in an alternate universe? No. Bugger off."

They made sandwiches and talked about ways to get them back and the magical theory that they had used on the time turner. They were barely getting into it when Mr. and Mrs. Potter got back home. "Hmm," Mrs. Potter said, eyes taking in the scene in front of her. "Dear? Do you mind explaining?"

"You know how I always said I wanted two Sirius's?" James said with a bright grin.

His parents blinked. "We're going to go to my study," Mr. Potter said. "Can we trust that when we get home from dinner with the Longbottom's tonight this will be resolved?"

"Er," Sirius said. "We'll try our best?" It was the best he could offer since none of them knew how quickly they'd be able to do this. They didn't even know what 'this' was. They had no idea what they needed to do, and once they figured that out, there was no telling if it was going to be a quick fix or if they had to wait a month or summat.

Mr. Potter nodded, but they hesitated before leaving the room entirely. "You know boys, an orgy can seem like a lot of fun, but you have a responsibility to-"

"Oh Merlin," Sirius moaned, covering his face.

Mrs. Potter started to talk. "You should always be safe and-"

"Mum," James cut in, face flaming. "We're fine. We'll see you later."

She hummed, and the adults left the room. James dropped his head to the table.

"I thought it couldn't possibly be worse than the last time."

"It wasn't; they didn't finish this time," Sirius muttered from behind his hands. "Let's just forget that ever happened."

Girl-Sirius wasn't quite so willing to let it go though. "What did you mean when you said you wished you could have two Sirius's?"

"Well Sirius is the best thing ever, so if I have two of them, than the world is twice as amazing." James stated it so plainly; he'd thought about this before.

"You really are head over heels, aren't you?" Jamie said.

"You say that like it's a bad thing. Frankly, I don't understand why you're not bothered by not being with him. Her," he corrected with a frown. "The Sirius in your universe. It's just weird to think that we're the same person but you don't care about that. I've been half in love with him from the moment we met, but you're busy chasing after Lily."

"Not to take sides," Sirius said, "but you chased Lily for a while."

"That is totally different. I chased Lily because I didn't know if you were bent. You might remember that I stopped the moment I found out."

Sirius thought back and- bugger, yeah, James really had done that. "Huh. You're totally love struck with me."

"It's my natural state of being," James said, nodding. "But whatever, let's deal with the tossers who've decided they're better apart."

"We're not better apart," Girl-Sirius said, rolling her eyes. "We're just... not dating. It's not a big deal. Mates don't have to be shagging to be close."

"Peter and Remus will be so relieved to hear that," Sirius said flatly.

"Before we get back into time turner shite, can I kiss you?" Jamie asked, looking at Sirius. She had her arms crossed on top of the table and was leaning forward a little.

Sirius glanced at James, who shrugged. It was just another version of James, and he wouldn't mind that. Would it even really count as kissing another person? Sure this version of James wasn't dating him, but it was James. "Sure."

Jamie grinned. Merlin, she really did look so much like him. "Aces. Erm, not right this second though, because I don't want everyone to stare."

"Everyone would include my boyfriend and your best mate; it's not like a big audience."

"I don't know what blokes are like," Girl-Sirius said dryly, "but for girls, we don't watch our friends snog people."

"Sounds like you could be having more fun," James said with a wink. "Relax, we'll figure out how to get you home, they'll kiss, and we'll all live happily ever after."

"That's a very strange fairy tale," Jamie said.

"Those are the best kind," Sirius said, smirking.

#fanfic #prongsfoot #sirius black #james potter #marauders #filled #no voldemort au #hogwarts time #established relationship #siriuslystarbucks #Anonymous

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phoebehalliwell · 5 years ago

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Centennial Charmed AU where Cole decides that things started to go downhill with him and Phoebe after Prue died, so he rewrites reality to save her, and Paige orbs into a new reality where Prue never died and has to choose between stopping Cole or saving her sister

okay for the record i so incredibly vibe with this ask and i think it would have been a great way for paige to meet prue, as it isn’t the typical like summoning prue from the great beyond to meet paige option, because that’s all fluff and this has Stakes.

i think in this au if we assume all hell breaks loose like continues in canon phoebe should remain trapped in the underworld with cole like the source demanded, and cole kept her down there rather than return her to her sisters. now, Obviously, this is not a recipe for love, but i think cole has enough tricks to just sorta brainwash phoebe into sorta just like an evil husk (like the opposite of what leo pulled with piper in the beginning of season six) with the full intent to leach in the real phoebe bit by bit but the process is definitely going slower than expected bc uhh phoebe’s not too keen on being evil. in this au i would definitely pin prue as the one to go cold hearted assasssin here, completely ready to raze the underworld to get her sister back. in turn i think piper would be ever more manic and fearful that she was in the earlier seasons. i don’t think she and leo would be divorced because again if you’re trying to convince me they’re soulmates don’t have them divorced in every alternate timeline???? but, that being said, i don’t think she would be pregnant bc i think she would have a crippling fear of starting a family bc with her mom dead phoebe gone and prue off the deep end off the deep end it’s clear that all family does is leave you. p3 is very much up and running because all piper does is drown herself in her work as that is the only part of her life she seems to have any control over. she doesn’t use magic anymore, in fact she’s bound her powers, but it doesn’t matter bc prue does enough killing for the both of them. (also paige doesn’t lose orbing in the new reality bc that her innate ability??? she does lose telekinetic orbing)

so paige sneezes herself into a new reality without realizing it, all she realizes is piper isn’t in the back room anymore. but she figures hey you know maybe that was a major sneeze and maybe i was out for a minute or two and piper just went back to darryl’s party. so she pops out of the backroom and there’s no immediate difference and she sees piper at the bar so she heads on over like “haha wow how long was i gone for also where’s darryl wasn’t he just sitting over there?” and piper’s looking at her like she’s talking to me like she knows me but i do not recognize her at all but as i am bartending i’m just gonna place nice and is like “oh sorry no i don’t know where he went” and paige is like “huh that’s weird did you change” and now she’s like actually registering what piper looks like and is like “OOOOHMYGOD WHY AREN”T YOU PREGNANT ANYMORE???????????” and piper’s like “look. you’ve obviously got me confused with someone else so-” and paige is just like “you don’t recognize me At All?” and piper’s like “sorry no?????” so now paige is thinking she’s in some alternate reality or plane or mirror dimension and if there’s anyone who can clue her into where it’s a psychic so paige is looking around like “do you know where phoebe is?” and piper stops dead in her tracks and she’s like “i don’t know if you heard but phoebe doesn’t live here anymore now i’d really appreciate it if you’d leave and paige is like okay well that’s bad and you know offering an apology and leaves p3.

but uhh she still can orb and she can still orb to her sisters so she orbs to phoebe and finds herself in the underworld???? what’s she doing here??????? and she’s like “hey phoebe how ya doin i’m in a bit of a sticky situation here was hopin you could help me out also why are we in the underworld rn?” and phoebe just glares at paige and paige is like “okay cliffnotes version patty and sam’s affair yeah that’s me i’m the baby i’m your long longs sister my name’s paige-” and at the word sister phoebe just like snaps and dives at paige so you know paige orbs out of the way like “phoebe!!!!” and phoebe just dives at her again and now paige is starting to get a lil weirded out because phoebe’s black belt barbie yet all she’s going is just sorta lunging claws out?????? something off. way off. and paige is so caught off guard that phoebe actually manages to pin paige to the ground and paige is like !!!!! hope this works!!! and claps her hands around phoebe’s temples. and phoebe flinches, eyes closed, lost in a vision. she comes to and looks at paige, but there’s nothing in her eyes. paige is like “phoebe. it’s me.” but phoebe just gets up and walks away, emotionless. and paige is like Okay This Is BAD. and when things get bad, you go to the book.

the only issue is paige is leafing through the book and she has no idea what she’s looking for. there isn’t really a page for “oh you’re stuck in an alternate timeline where everything Sucks Balls? here’s a quick and easy spell to get you out!” so paige is just flipping. enchantment spell so she can see past this enchantment? truth spell so she can find the true world?? and she’s like “hello could use some help here!!!!” and then finds herself promptly being thrown into a wall. she looks over to see a woman approaching, and barely registers “prue?” before a bookcase falls on her.

paige wakes up in a crystal cage, with prue sitting across from her holding charged crystal shards. paige immediately recognizes whats up and is all like “woah woah woah please don’t electrocute me i promise i can explain everything!!!!” and prue’s like “okay. why don’t you start by how you got in the attic and what you were doing with the book?” and paige is like “!!!! evil can’t touch the book! evil can’t touch the book and i was touching the book so please don’t electrocute me!” and prue glares at paige and slowly sets down the crystals bc she does sorta have a point but prue’s not convinced. and paige clearly relaxes a little and prue asks again what exactly she is doing here. so paige takes a deep breath and is like “i’m your sister” and prue scowls and telekinetically launches a crystal shard at the cage, frying it. good thing paige has great reflexes. she orbs out of the cage before she can be shocked. so now prue is like. What. The Actual. Fuck. but lucky for her paige is already rambling. “my name’s paige matthews and i was born august 7th, 1977! my parents are patty halliwell and sam wilder! and you never met me because i was given up for adoption!”

now here’s the thing. when patty was pregnant, piper was three or four and phoebe was like two. they Really did not know what was up. but prue was like 7. i don’t remember a lot from age four, but i can easily pull up age seven. and prue now knows patty was pregnant. the timeline fits. she’s just not convinced that the carrot top in front of her is her sister. (she could orb though, so that was a strong piece of evidence for) so she lets paige talk a little more

and paige is like “okay. i think i managed to sneeze myself into some weird alternate universe because um. This Is Not How Things Are. and if i had to guess whose to blame here: it’s cole.” and prue’s like “wow. he’s still a bag of shit in your timeline?” and paige is like “yeah!!!! an obsessive, unvanquishable bag of shit!!!” and prue’s like “well, bright side? he’s not unvanquishable here.”

let’s rock n roll buckaroo!!! well piper is Very surprised to find the girl she kicked out of the bar now brewing a potion in her kitchen, and uhh if we’re being honest Absolutely Pissed Off. because so far this girl has 1) brought up the idea of her being pregnant, an insult to a woman who is too terrified to start a family 2) brought up her kidnapped quasi evil sister not five minutes later to rub salt in that wound and 3) is now actively practicing magic in her home, something piper tries to avoid at all costs. so whatever’s happening right now, Piper Will Not Have It. except prue is chasing her down and refusing to let her leave because that girl is their sister??? and they’re going to vanquish cole?????????? yeah. no. absolutely not. and prue’s got a freshly brewed batch of potion to unbind powers that she’s trying to shove down piper’s throat but she’s really lost it if she thinks piper will ever practice magic again. and now they’re having a shouting match and piper’s trying to leave but prue is forcing the door shut and paige is in the kitchen like this is super awkward and i feel like i shouldn’t be hearing this but at the same time i feel like i should intervene but also i feel like its not my place but also they’re about to rip each others head off so i should probably do something so she goes over to the foyer like “piper. i know you don’t know me but i know you. you are the strongest person i know and the strongest witch i know. you have taught me so much, and i know you’re going to teach my new baby niece a lot too. i don’t think you should unbind your powers if you don’t want to. but if you think you can’t handle them, i promise you you can.” and there’s a moment of silence before piper’s like “strongest witch, huh?” and paige nods and laughs lightly and piper looks and prue with the potion and is like “i need some time to think about it.” and prue’s like >:(!!!!!! but paige is like “no, just let her sort through things. she’ll figure things out on her own time.” and prue’s playfully like “are you always giving me advice in your world?” and paige is like haha p̸̭͕͇͂͑̇͊̇́̽̀͘ä̵͍̪͔́̓̊͊̒͛͌̚ỉ̸̲̬͖̓͛͌͒̅̉̈̇͐͑̐ņ̷͍͖̯̠̞̾̎̂ but doesn’t like really say anything about it.

and piper’s over on the couch in the sitting room just like nervously wringing her hands and prue goes over and just sits next to her quietly with her arm wrapped around her. she leaves the potion in the foyer. you can tell by how rigid they are that they don’t do this often, they’re just emulating the ghosts of their past because they’ve almost forgotten how to be sisters. paige wanders over to the couch and perches on the arm rest because she doesn’t want to insert herself into something that she isn’t really a part of but piper reaches out and takes paige’s hand in comfort. and the chandelier starts shaking.

piper looks and prue and then looks at paige and is like “is that what i think it was?” and paige is like “the power of three” and piper just sighs quietly and stands. she looks to a flower vase and throws her hands at it, blasting it to pieces. she turns to her sisters. “let’s go kill cole”

so piper starts working on the broth for the upper level demon vanquishing potion while prue and paige sit in the living room devising a way to get close enough to cole to get a slice. prue’s talking about how he’s cloaked himself from scrying but he’s never too far from phoebe, and they’ve never really been able to summon phoebe before but now they’ve got the power of three on their side so they can probably bring her to the manor, with cole soon to follow. it’s also safe to say that cole doesn’t even know piper has her powers back, so he won’t be anticipating the good ol’ freeze-n-slice. then paige can orb downstairs, add the flesh, and bring back up the potion and boom no more belthazor but uhh paige wasn’t listening. “what if there was a way to not vanquish him?” “not vanquish cole i thought the whole point was to vanquish cole and get you back to your world?” and paige is like “yeah it was but uhhhh you’re not... in my world. you died... in 2001. shax killed you. i never actually got to meet you until now.” and prue’s like “Oh.” and paige is like “yeah.” and prue sorta just sits quietly for a minute before speaking again. “did they ever tell you about andy?” and paige is like “yeah, he was your boyfriend, right? he died?” and prue’s like “he died right there. he sacrificed himself for us. because he understood that it was his destiny to go and it was ours to continue forward. i never really understood that, i guess” and she trails off staring at the piece of carpet where andy’s body had been so many years before. the words are unspoken, but paige hears them: until now. “but what if it doesn’t have to be like that? what if we could find a way to change things, to keep you alive. i mean, i’m just meeting you now, but... i don’t...” “everything happens for a reason. if there’s one thing i’ve learned to be true, it’s that. paige, it was my time to go. to bring you into their lives to save the charmed ones. this,” prue gestures to the world around her. “this isn’t how things are supposed to be, i’ve felt it for a long time. you can save phoebe, you can save piper.” “but why can’t i save you, too?” and prue just sorta rests her hand on paige’s face and is like “i’m glad i at least got to meet you” and piper from the kitchen is like “potions ready! all we need is some belthazor flesh!” and prue stands up and offers paige her hand. paige takes it and stands and prue whispers to her sister “let’s go save the world.”

so they go up to the attic and summon phoebe with cole soon to follow and cole’s like “paige??? are you fucking with me rn???? die bitch?????” and prue’s like “You Do Not Talk To My Sister Like That” and throws him into a wall. piper freezes him and takes a slice and phoebe’s sorta just reeling in the corner like paige?? and paige takes the flesh from piper and orbs into the kitchen to finish up the potion and puts it in a little vial and goes back up in the attic and cole’s just broken out of piper’s freeze and paige is like “i do hate long goodbyes” but oh! phoebe tackles her and grabs the potion and everybody’s like phoebe!!!!!! but cole’s just laughing like “it doesn’t matter. no matter where we are, we’re meant to be together. it’s undeniable.” and phoebe’s blinking like she just woke up from a bad dream and is looking at cole, at first with a blank stare, but then confusion, and then absolute loathing. “i don’t think so.”

and cole starts screaming as the world starts spinning and with a final triumphant Bang! paige is yeeted back into the attic, back into her attic. and piper and phoebe run up like “paige??? what happened what was that???” and paige is like “that was... cole. we just vanquished cole.” and piper’s like “we???” and paige is like “yeah, i’ll explain everything, it’s been uhh it’s been a long day.” and piper and phoebe pull her into a hug and phoebe’s like “we’re just glad you’re back” and paige is like “lmao yeah i could say the say about you.” “what?” “nevermind.” and then piper looks up suddenly like “did you feel that?” and paige is like “feel what?” and phoebe looks at the her and smiles, tears pricking at the back of her eyes: “prue.”

#bc Fuck the 100th episode being all about cole tf was that about???#sisters only!!!!#charmed #power of four #💌#margaretsminiessays

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tripsonflatground · 4 years ago

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Is it just me, or is it kinda capitalist that in order to get new superheroes, people kill off or age up the old ones and then put the new heroes in the same role/identity? Like, they killed Peter Parker to have Miles Morales. Bucky Barnes and Falcon/Sam Wilson both became Captain America after the death or age & retirement of Steve Rogers, depending on whether you’re looking at the comics or the MCU. Batman goes through Robins and Batgirls like it’s going out of style (and seriously, why does Dick Grayson let other people be Robin? That was a personal nickname from his birth family, right? Why would he give something so intimate away?). Replacing someone else and living up to their legacy rather than making your own path was a whole plot point/theme in Spider-man: Far From Home!

There are exceptions to this, like X-23 and Wolverine, who have managed to have some form of a father-daughter relationship in the comics (although, if memory serves, I believe he’s been killed in recent comics and she replaced him as Wolverine - though I haven’t read anything recent, so I might be wrong, and in the film Logan they killed him off). And things like Conner/Superboy from Young Justice being created with the idea to replace Superman doesn’t count in the same way because it was a villainous plot and Con didn’t end up following through. And there’s a new Ms. Marvel now that Carol Danvers is Captain Marvel, which is a much better alternative considering that Carol wasn’t using that identity anymore.

The idea I’m trying to get at, if it isn’t clear, is that the costume identity, AKA Spider-man, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc. seems to me the thing that’s given value while the person behind the mask is more recently being treated as expendable/dispensable. Which doesn’t make a ton of sense to me, because the person created the mask, and so much of themselves and who they are and what their goals are drove the reasons behind the creation of the identity and the way they behave in that identity. It’s like being a kid and trying on your parents’ clothes or getting hand-me-downs, even if it fits, you didn’t exactly choose it, and you look different wearing it. And I’m calling this capitalist because it feels like capitalism. If we equate being a superhero to a job, which in many ways it really is, especially if you are employed by an organization to do it like SHIELD, then the value is being placed on the role/job, and not with the labor. Capitalism doesn’t give a shit who’s doing the job and how they’re being treated as long as it’s getting done. Employees in the service/retail industry get treated like shit and don’t get paid enough but that will never change unless people have other options and aren’t desperate enough to accept those conditions and get something better. Recently, with the deaths and/or replacements of superheroes in order to have someone else fill the identity in comics and films, the individuals behind the mask, who are the real source of emotional connection and relatability, not the mask, seem to have become dispensable in the eyes of the creators.

And I do get that it’s a shortcut and an attempt to bring in new audiences by putting more modern characters into recognizable roles. But why does the original character have to *die*?

Yeah, superhero-ism is a dangerous occupation, sure, but doesn’t death seem like the most extreme option? It’s not as if there aren’t other possibilities:

1.Having characters be located somewhere else other than New York City or its fictional equivalent (Metropolis, Gotham, etc). There are other major cities in the US where crime happens, let alone other cities in the world. Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis, Dallas, Detroit, Atlanta, Seattle, Philadelphia. Who doesn’t want to imagine a Spider-man or a Batman with a Boston accent? Wouldn’t it be a cool storyline if other Kryptonians not related to Superman escaped Krypton and eventually made it to Earth and moved to different cities and took up mantles and eventually the Kryptonian race could start rebuilding on Earth? Talk about a really interesting and positive way to show a diasporic community. And also, it doesn’t make any sense statistically that the majority of the world’s superheroes are in the US. Put some in Toronto, Paris, London, Cairo, Sydney, Tokyo, Beijing, Moscow, Rome, Athens, Rio, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Seoul, Istanbul, etc. If the Olympics happen there, then there’s probably a lot of people that need saving and crime happening. It’s especially dumb with the alien invasion stories where they show the audience aliens popping up in places other than NYC and suddenly the heroes have to get other there, like unless you got super-speed or teleportation, it’s going to take a while, and how are you even going to communicate with the civilians if there’s a language barrier?

2.Having characters be from other dimensions. Marvel and DC have a history of playing with alternate timelines and multi-verse theory. Into The Spiderverse was a super-popular movie that inspired tons of people to make their own Spidersonas, and the lesson that can be taken from it is that you can take a character and make it still feel unique or individualistic even if you’re using similar themes. Maybe instead of the dimensions having evil versions they have to fight or being fucked up in some other way, make the new version of Wonder Woman or Iron Man or whatever be from an alternate dimension and end up in the main because of science/magic, or a dimension-hopping villain they’re fighting, or an accident, or to get help from other versions of themselves, or even escaping from an apocalypse/doomsday from their own universe. It’s so easy to either send them back to their own universe when you decide you’re done playing with them or keep them around if you want them permanently. Wouldn’t it be fascinating if the Captain America we’re familiar with met a Captain America from an alternate universe where he fought in the American Revolution or for the Union in the Civil War or even in WW1 or Vietnam?

3.Having female characters take on feminine versions of the identity, or vice versa, or non-binary characters find a way to have a gender-neutral version. This has been done with Hulk and She-Hulk, Superman and Supergirl, Captain Marvel and Ms. Marvel back when Captain Marvel was a dude, Spider-man’s daughter May was Spider-girl at one point, Batman’s cousin or something is Batwoman. There’s also been some adjacents, such as AntMan and Wasp or Wolverine and X-23. There are definitely ways that you can use a familiar identity to put more female and non-binary superheroes out there. I mean, military titles (the Captains) or even names like Black Panther, Green Lantern, and Flash aren’t even gendered. You can feminize names if you want to, but I’m pretty sure the female Hawkeye is just straight-up Hawkeye. People like Thor I feel differently about because Thor’s an actual mythological character, not something Marvel came up with, but you could just use a different Norse god/goddess? And yeah, Dr. Strange is the man’s actual name so that’s also a little different, but if he had a daughter or a non-binary child who also got their doctorate, they are in fact entitled to call themselves Dr. Strange rather than something lesser. Not to mention, that whole alternate universe versions point I just made? Yeah, these can be characters from gender-bent alternate universes or a universe where humans are androgynous or something.

4.Have multiple characters use the same secret identity. This would be the perfect concept for twins or friends with the same build. The bank’s been robbed but A is on a date? B can totally show up at the scene! B got really hurt in their last fight? A’s got them covered. There’s a bit of risk to it, like if people recognize they have different voices or someone notices them at two different crises happening at the same time, but that’s just what makes the challenge of pretending to be the same person interesting. And it could get even more complex if you had triplets doing it, or four college roommates, or whatever. It’s also a great excuse to be able to write deep interpersonal relationships and identity struggles. Hell, can you imagine how much scarier multiple Batmans would be? They could play even more on the “you never know where he’s going to be next or what shadow he could be hiding in” thing, like, just when the crook thinks he’s lost Batman, another comes out out of nowhere.

And if superhero writers don’t want to do any of this, there’s also the C-List and D-List heroes that maybe got introduced in like the 70′s or 80′s or whatever but didn’t take or ended up being a blip in another character’s backstory. If you want more modern superheros connected to the major ones so you can use them in the same stories, it is totally valid IMO to try revitalizing these obscure concepts. I have a vested interest in seeing if Monica Rambeau shows up as her hero identity Photon in the Captain Marvel sequel. This idea is still using what you have, but it doesn’t capitalize the lives of the characters you have or make them expendable in any way. In fact, it’s also kind of like recycling, or the opposite of capitalism, because you’re trying to use alternative resources or all of your resources instead of very specific ones to the point of over-saturation.

Look, I’m just very tired of superheroes getting killed off to be replaced by someone else using the same identity or because it’s edgy or dark or whatever. Even a debilitating injury that leaves them in a wheelchair or blind or deaf is a hell of a lot more interesting. Once a character’s dead, they’re dead, there’s nowhere else you can take them unless you bring them back to life (which admittedly happens a lot in superhero universe) or have them hang around as a ghost or something. It’s boring, it doesn’t give the audience any closure and just messes with their emotions for shock value, and it promotes toxic capitalism.

#superheroes #marvel #dc #capitalism #killing characters #alternatives to killing characters

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queen-of-deans-booty · 5 years ago

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Changing Channels: Part Three

Pairing: Dean x Reader

Word Count: 1,985

Warnings: typical supernatural violence, language, angst, blood, you know the usual

Author’s Note: I am so sorry this is out late. I’ve been dealing with shit the past few days.

I do not own anything from Supernatural. All credit goes to their respective owners. Any and all comments on these are appreciated. I really want to hear what you guys think about this one!

Feedback is the glue that holds my writing together.

Tags at the bottom

The basketball game was in full effect. Sam and Dean played against two other people, a woman sat beside the lake nearby and did some yoga, and an older gentleman sat on a nearby bench. Sam and Dean were in a Herpes commercial based on the line that Sam needed to say. He played basketball and shot it into the net, turning around to face the metaphorical camera.

“Seriously?” Sam asked, clearly very uncomfortable.

“Hey, you're the one who said play our roles,” Dean shrugged.

“Yeah. Right,” he sighed. Dean slapped his brother’s shoulder before going back to the game. “I’ve got genital herpes.”

You were supposed to be playing your roles, but you had a lot on your mind. Not only did you have to watch this and play this stupid game, you had a small child that was drawing on the sidewalk with chalk.

“Look, Mommy!” she grinned, pointing to her work.

“It’s very beautiful, sweetheart,” you smiled.

Internally, you were horrified at your response. The words just came out on their own because you didn’t even have to think about saying it. The little girl looked exactly like you and Dean, which got you thinking about Amara and the line of witches she claims to have been influencing since the beginning of time.

Amara was a real pain in the ass, but you would gladly deal with her than with the Trickster. There was something not right with that man. You couldn’t put your finger on it, but he felt much more powerful than he was letting on. Almost as if he was hiding his true identity from everyone.

It was like he was hiding himself from everyone.

Something compelled you to look up, and when you did, you saw Amara standing on the other side of the basketball court. She was wearing a long black dress with a deep neckline. Her hair fell down in soft curls, but her face was hard. She wanted to tell you something, but it was as if something wasn’t letting her. The basketball players passed by her, and when the last one passed, she vanished like Castiel did.

“What’s happening to me?” you muttered to yourself.

Dean grabbed the condiments off the motel table and placed them in the fridge. The motel was the same one you were rooming in, but it was much brighter and cleaner. He closes it, turns around, and all of a sudden applause comes from out of nowhere. There is a sandwich on the table, about a foot tall. He approaches the sandwich, places his hands on his hips, and looks off in the distance.

“I’m going to need a bigger mouth,” Dean said, earning a laugh track that came from nowhere.

Sam entered the room, and as soon as the door closed behind him, another applause track sounded.

“Hey there, Sam. What's happening?”

“Oh, nothing. Um. Just the end of the world,” he shrugged. Cue the laugh track. Sam looked at the sandwich on the table and places his hands on his hips. “You're gonna need a bigger mouth. Hey, uh, have you done your research yet?”

“Oh,” Dean gets a “busted” expression as he turns away from Sam, and a laugh track sounded, “yeah. All kinds of research. All night.”

“Yeah? Hm,” Sam nodded.

Cue your part, and you came walking out of the bathroom with nothing but sexy lingerie on. Wolf whistles and applause comes from nowhere as you leaned against the door frame.

“Dean…” you trailed off, giving him a sexy smile. Both brothers looked at you with different expressions. Sam had the bitch face while Dean looked nervous. “We have some more research to do.”

“Dean…” Sam said in a warning tone as he crossed his arms.

Dean looked dead ahead as if there were an audience in front of him.

“Son of a bitch!” Dean gasped just as a laugh track sounded.

Sam suddenly looked annoyed, and he walked over to you and grabbed a blanket off the bed as he passed it.

“Here,” he muttered, slinging the blanket over your exposed figure.

“Thanks,” you sighed.

“How long do we have to keep doing this?” Dean asked through a forced smile.

“I don't know,” you said. “Maybe forever?”

“We might die in here,” Sam announced as he escorted you over to Dean in the kitchen.

A laugh track was coming from all directions, and it was starting to drive you insane.

“How was that funny? Vultures,” you scoffed.

The door opened to reveal Castiel sporting some minor injuries. Applause erupted out of nowhere at the new presence.

“Are you okay?” you asked.

“I don't have much time.”

“What happened?”

“I got out.”

“From where?”

“Listen to me. Something is not right. This thing is much more powerful than it should be.”

“That’s what I’ve been saying this whole time!” you yelled.

“Are you talking about the Trickster?” Dean asked.

“If it is a trickster.”

“What do you mean by that?” you asked.

The angel goes to answer, but he is flung back into the wall face first. The Trickster appears at the open door with a grin.

“Hello!” he laughed.

The audience cheered at his presence, but you were fed up with this shit. Castiel gets up, but he has his mouth duct-tape shut, and that is when you lose it.

“Stop!” you yelled, thrusting your hand in front of your body.

A pulsating wave of magic shoots out of it and into the Trickster’s body which sent him tumbling back. He stared at you with wide eyes, and you rushed over to Castiel to make sure he was okay.

“Are you okay?” you asked.

He could only nod, so you reached up to remove his binding when he disappeared in a burst of static. Glaring at the wall, you turned to the Trickster who stood up.

“I’m going to allow that,” he spoke before turning to the brothers.

“Where did you just send him?” Dean asked.

“Relax, he'll live… maybe,” he laughed along with the audience.

“Alright, you know what? I am done with the monkey dance, okay? We get it,” you gritted out, joining Dean and Sam’s side once more.

“Yeah? Get what, hotshot?”

“Playing our roles, right? That's your game?”

“That's half the game.”

“What's the other half?” Sam asked.

“Play your roles out there.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Oh, you know. Sam starring as Lucifer. Dean starring as Michael. Y/N starring as Amara, if she’s real. I hear rumors, you know. Your celebrity death match. Play your roles.”

“You want us to say yes to those sons of bitches?” Sam shouted.

“Hells yeah. Let's light this candle!”

“We do that, and the world will end,” you argued.

“Yeah? And whose fault is that? Who popped Lucifer out of the box? Hm? Look, it's started. You three started it. It can't be stopped. So, let's get it over with!”

“Heaven or hell, which side you on?” Dean asked.

“I'm not on either side.”

“Yeah, right. You're grabbing ankle for Michael, Lucifer, or Amara. Which one is it?” you asked.

“You listen to me, you arrogant dick. I don't work for either of those S.O.B.s. Believe me.”

“Oh, you're somebody's bitch,” Dean taunted.

The Trickster’s smile vanished, and he grabbed Dean by the collar and shoved him into the wall.

“Don't you ever, ever presume to know what I am. Now listen very closely. Here's what's gonna happen. You're gonna suck it up, accept your responsibilities, and play the roles that destiny has chosen for you,” he threatened.

Your legs bounced into action, and you rushed over to Dean to come to his aid. Placing your hand on the Trickster’s chest, your eyes turned bright blue with the threat of hurting him.

“Let go of him,” you growled.

The Trickster stared into your eyes, but listened to you and let him go.

“What if we don’t?” Sam asked, changing the subject back to the original one.

“Then you'll stay here in TV Land. Forever. Three hundred channels and, uh, nothing's on,” The Trickster grinned and snapped his fingers.

Then everything went dark.

A man lies on the ground with a gruesome stomach wound. Crime-scene markers surround him and cameras flash. You, Sam, and Dean are standing outside the crime-scene tape, watching various extras do their job. Turning around, you couldn’t help but notice the attire the Trickster wanted you to wear. Matching blue shirts and suits with sunglasses on.

“Oh, come on,” Dean muttered just as a police officer ducks under the crime scene tape.

“So, what do you think?” he asks you three.

“What do I think? I think go screw yourself, that's what I think,” you glared.

“Uh, could you give us a sec, please? Thanks,” Sam smiled, the officer doing what he was told. “You two need to calm down.”

“Calm down? I am wearing sunglasses at night,” Dena yanked his off. “You know who does that? No-talent douchebags. I hate this game. I hate that we're in a procedural cop show and you wanna know why? Because I hate procedural cop shows. There's like three hundred of them on television and they're all the freaking same. It's ooh, plane crashed here—oh shut up.”

“Hey,” Sam interrupted, pointing to an officer who was sucking on a lollipop. “Check out sweet tooth over there.”

“You think that’s him? The Trickster?” you asked, suddenly getting a thought in your head.

“Just, um, follow my lead,” Sam whispered, taking the lead over to where he was.

Your body moved for you, but your mind wasn’t in the right place at all. All you could think about was the Trickster and what Castiel said before he arrived.

Something is not right. This thing is much more powerful than it should be.

Why would the Trickster be interested in Michael, Lucifer, and Amara? What business does he have if he can create alternate dimensions and TV land to live in forever while the world burns out there? Why does he care so much about something that he has no business caring about?

Unless he isn’t the Trickster at all, but something more powerful.

Michael and Lucifer.

Two brothers in a family of four.

If bible study is right, then there are four brothers that are more powerful than any kind of angel out there. More powerful than Castiel or Uriel or Anna. Raphael is another of the big four because you and Dean helped Castiel with him when Sam was taking a break.

Only one brother left.

Gabriel.

Your eyes widened in realization when you figured out exactly who you were dealing with.

“Y/N, you okay?” Dean muttered.

Your focus was brought back to what was happening, and you nodded silently.

“Good one, guys,” the lollipop-sucking officer laughed at something Sam said.

He got up to leave when Sam came behind him and stabbed him in the heart with a bloodied stake. The officer struggled to breathe and collapsed on the ground.

“Sam, what the hell are you doing?” you asked.

None of the other extras were paying attention except for one, and he morphed into Gabriel, the youngest Archangel.

“You've got the wrong guy, idiots!”

“Did we?” Dean asked with a smirk.

Sam came up behind him, giving him the same treatment as the other officer. Gabriel doubled over in a heap of static. Your surroundings changed to that of the warehouse, and Gabriel was laying on the ground with the stake still inside him. Your suits and sunglasses were gone, and your normal comfortable hunting clothing replaced them.

“Come on, let’s get out of this town,” Dean declared, shaking off the confusion and strangeness.

“Something still isn’t right,” you sighed, following them out of the warehouse and to the car.

“Just be glad we’re back home,” Dean muttered as he got in the car.

“Yeah, home,” you sighed.

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margoshansons · 5 years ago

Text

Desperate Measures 3/?

Bellamy Blake x Reader

Summary: After helping a little girl get over her nightmares, Y/N gets caught in a nasty bout of acid fog with the one person she can’t stand.

Warnings: angst, nightmares, swearing, violence, gore, survivor’s guilt, depression.

Notes: This was a tough one to write, ngl. Based on 1x03 “Earth Kills”

When she slept she saw only nightmares. Visions of another life she must’ve had, despite her scientific background claiming it was all bullshit. There was no other way to describe it.

This last one had been particularly bad.

A woman burning at the Stake, claiming she could save hundreds of lives. It was the same voice that had plagued her dreams since she was five years old. The same voice that whispered too many people. The same voice that had driven her mother mad while she waited in her cell during the weeks leading to her floating.

She couldn’t fall back asleep.

That last nightmare had felt too real. As if she was the one burning up into the skies instead of the unknown woman she saw every night. Jasper’s moans drew her from her thoughts and she gathered her jacket, ready to help in any way possible. The dropship was too full of sleeping prisoners to work on Monty’s radio, so instead, she moved outside, sitting next to a grove of trees, watching the stars twinkle above her as she counted the constellations.

A twig snapped behind her, revealing the existence of the only twelve-year-old in camp.

“Hi” Y/N smiled softly, meeting the girl’s anxious gaze. “Charlotte right?”

She nodded. The older delinquent patted the patch of grass beside her. “Come on and join me.”

Charlotte sat next to the eighteen-year-old, scratching at her legs nervously as silence enveloped the two of them.

“I couldn’t sleep” Charlotte confessed after several minutes of silence, “So I went out on a walk, I didn’t--I didn’t realize I was outside the wall until it was too late. Please don’t tell Bellamy, please.”

Y/N stared at the younger girl, a wild smirk crossing her face as she leaned in close. “Your secret’s safe with me. Why can’t you sleep?”

“I uh, I have nightmares” Charlotte admitted, “My parents got floated and I--uh I just can’t sleep.”

Pain shot through Y/N’s heart. She had been younger than Charlotte when she lost her own mother, and those memories found a way into her dreams as well.

“I’m sorry that happened to you.” Y/N whispered, “But can I let you in on a little secret?”

Charlotte nodded, apprehension strewn across her face.

“I get nightmares too” She admitted, making Charlotte the third person to know about her terrors. “That’s why I’m out here tonight.”

Awe crossed the little girl’s face, “You get nightmares? But you’re so strong.”

Y/N laughed lightly at the compliment. “I’m not, I’m just good at getting over them.”

“How?”

She licked her lips, biting her cheek as she debated sharing her strategy with this little girl. Instead, she chose an easier route. “Easy, you find someone to talk to about them.”

“But…” Her face fell. “I don’t have anybody.”

Y/N brushed a strand of hair away from the girl’s forehead, “You have me, and Clarke, and Wells, and Octavia, and everyone in this camp on your side Charlotte. They all wanna help you.”

“Really?” Her bright blue eyes were still fearful as if she didn’t actually believe anything Y/N had been saying up to this point.

She nodded, and the two stayed there the rest of the night until Charlotte fell asleep in her arms. Y/N continued to stare up at the stars, wanting nothing more than a blissful sleep. But Jasper’s moans kept her awake, and Bellamy’s stare provided another distraction as he left the dropship that morning.

She wouldn’t deny that he was attractive, but that was where her admiration ended for him. To her, he was a nuisance, a problem getting in the way of her and Clarke from taking care of the rest of the camp. The sun began to peek over the trees, clouds joining the yellow orb, marking the second sunrise in a row she had seen on Earth.

It was gorgeous.

Marcus would appreciate this. He grew up on stories about the Earth, the same as she did. So why does it seem like they’ve lost hope? Her gaze hung on the last star glistening in the morning sky, sending a prayer up to the Ark, hoping her dad was listening.

Her eyes drifted closed, hoping the action would lull her back to sleep, curing the tiredness she felt.

“Hey,” Bellamy’s gruff voice interjected her sleeping time. “We’re going hunting.”

Y/N stretched, a yawn escaping her as she slowly removed her arm surrounding Charlotte. “Sure, what do you need?”

His smile looked out of place, “an extra weapon.” He tossed her a spear, the handle barely avoiding hitting the poor girl. She arched an eyebrow.

“You do know that I suck at combat right?” she double-checked, making sure she didn’t wake up in an alternate dimension where Bellamy Blake was actually being nice to her.

Instead, he laughed. Laughed. Yep, definitely alternate dimension.

“You handled yourself with the panther, I think you can handle a few rabbits and squirrels.”

She rolled her eyes, pushing herself off the ground with her hands. Bellamy turned to leave, Y/N sending one last look at the sleeping girl before joining him outside the wall.

“Why are you doing this?” She asked, creeping through the stalks of grass. “Being so nice to me?”

Bellamy paused before announcing his intentions, “Think of it as a thank you for saving my life kind of gift.”

Y/N smirked, hiding the chuckle behind her wall, which had become more glass than steel over the past few days.

“And as much as I hate to admit it” He began, gaze staring directly at her sunlit face, “You’re the smartest person in camp. We need your brain.”

She froze, throwing a playful look of victory at the older leader, “Was that a compliment I detected Bellamy Blake?”

“Shut up, I already want to take it back.” He threw back, their gaze meeting one more time before a scream launched them out of the moment. The two leaders looked at each other before running in the direction of the sound, boots stampeding against the ground.

Y/N tossed the spear downward when she saw who it was.

“Charlotte” She moved closer, raising her voice, “What are you doing here, we could’ve killed you!”

The girl trembled from the scolding. “I had--I had another nightmare, I woke up and you were gone so I went to find you and--”

Y/N pulled the girl close, hand running through the braids in her hair, soothing the girl until she was back to normal. “Shhh, it’s okay, I’m here.” She broke away momentarily, tilting her chin down to meet the girl’s frightened gaze, “Did you wanna talk about it?”

Charlotte’s gaze shot around, eyeing Bellamy and Atom before softly shaking her head. Y/N understood, whispering, “Alright, maybe later then.”

“She needs to get back to camp” Strict Bellamy was back, a far cry from the easygoing leader she had spent the last few hours with. Unfortunately, Y/N had to agree.

“No please,” Charlotte begged, not wanting to let go of Y/N at all.

“It’s not safe out here Charlotte” Bellamy warned, a glimpse of his softer side showing through.

Atom chimed in patronizingly, “Especially for little girls.”

“I’m not little” she shot back, grasping onto Y/N’s hand for strength.

Bellamy bit his lip, a ghost of a smile on his lips. His gaze flickered between the two of them, before handing Charlotte his makeshift knife, grabbing the spear Y/N had dropped earlier.

“You ever killed something Charlotte?” He asked, eyes flashing with worry.

She shook her head.

“Who knows,” Bellamy began to joke, shrugging his shoulders, “You may be good at it.”

Y/N rolled her eyes at his antics, encouraging a twelve-year-old to commit murder her first time on the ground. She brandished her knife, ready to continue on their trail until a bellowing sound tore them away from their goal.

“What was that?” Jones asked, fear crossing his face. Birds flew past them at light speed, almost as if they were running away. She could only stare behind her, a swirling cloud of yellow and orange smoke making its way toward them, insects crawling over her feet in a futile attempt to survive.

“Something’s wrong,” She whispered reverently, eyes widening as the fog grew closer, “Run! Run now!”

They wasted no time, crossing the plains as fast as their feet could carry them, Y/N dragging Charlotte behind her, refusing to let her grip up even for a moment. The fog grazed against her hand, a prickling sensation transitioning into excruciating burns.

Acid fog, she realized.

She sped up her pace, searching frantically for a place to take cover. At any time the fog could be upon them at any time they could be suffering from burns beyond their imagination.

She found refuge in a cave, Bellamy coming in close behind her, ready to jump out at the sound of Atom’s voice.

“Bellamy!” He moaned.

“Atom!” Bellamy called, ready to run into the fog at the sound of his friend’s cry.

Y/N caught his arm, pulling him back into the cave, “Bellamy no! There’s nothing we can do unless you want to die of chemical burns.”

His eyes were rimmed in red as they stared her down, turning his head back toward the acid covered forest where Atom lay dying.

His breathing grew shallow, sniffing until he nodded reluctantly, the three delinquents settling in for the night as they prepared to wait out the fog.

And then it suddenly dawned on her. She was stuck in a cave for god knows how long surrounded by killer fog on a planet that could kill them. And somehow that wasn’t the worst part. No, the worst part was that she was stuck with Bellamy Blake.

“Y/N?” Charlotte’s voice echoed in the cave as night fell. “I’d like to talk about my nightmare now if that’s okay.”

She settled in against the rocks, sending a glance at Bellamy’s sleeping figure before moving closer so Charlotte didn’t have to worry about being judged. “Sure, yeah, go ahead.”

The little girl inhaled before dropping what had been bothering her since day one. “I see--I see my parents dying.” Sobs threatened to escape, face contorting in pain, “And then I see his face, and--and he sends me down with them.”

Y/N pulled the girl closer, arms wrapping around her as Charlotte sobbed into her shoulder. “Hey, shhh, you’re gonna be okay. Everything’s gonna be alright.” She rubbed her hand up and down the poor girl’s shoulder, shutting her eyes. “I see my parents too.” She admitted, whispering the confession in her hair. She recalled Kane’s regretful face as he told Shumway to press the button. Didn’t even have the decency to do it himself.

“But it’ll all be over soon, I promise.” Charlotte nodded before floating to sleep in her arms, the girl stirring only during her dreams.

Y/N stood up, waiting to take watch. She couldn’t fall asleep. Not when that woman’s screams awaited her.

“You should get some rest” Bellamy’s rough voice murmured from the other side of the cave.

Flashes of her night terrors crossed her brain and she shook her head, “I’ll uh, I’ll rest when we get back to camp.”

“Sparky,” The nickname sounded unfamiliar in his mouth, “I can see the circles under your eyes, you’re practically asleep already.”

She shook her head, refusing to be that vulnerable with a man who had done nothing but torment her since she got to the ground. “You look just as bad as I do.” She shot back, eliciting a chuckle from the kid. “What do you know?” She whispered, a smile stretching across her face, “Looks like he has a heart after all.”

Bellamy met her gaze, half-smile across his face, brown eyes softening as the fog passed over them. “I always had a heart, I just don’t show it all the time.”

She nodded, recalling another phrase from her dreams, “Love is weakness. I guess that’s another thing we have in common.” She turned her gaze away toward the sleeping child, making sure Charlotte remained still.

Love was death. Attachment was death.

Bellamy wrapped his arms around his knees, “Oh yeah? What’s the other thing?” His tone was playful, her answer anything but.

She met his gaze, uttering the words she had been dying to say to him since he had insulted her their first night on the ground, “We’re both orphans, aren’t we?”

Silence met her words, relief flooding from her shoulders as her stomach untwisted itself.

Tension coated the cave, encircling the two in a bubble as Bellamy fidgeted under her gaze. It had felt so good to finally say it aloud. To finally tell him what had hurt all those nights ago.

“Y/N I had no idea--”

“That Kane wasn’t my biological father?” She continued to shove his mistake in his face, unsure why she was unloading all this onto him. “That I’ve been parentless since age five? Both of them floated? Yeah, why would you?”

She turned away, her malicious tone hanging in the air as she drifted off to sleep, the hard rock more comfortable than any tent she had slept in so far.

***

Bellamy shook the older girl awake, guilt wracking his body as he did it. If he had known. If he had reached out before making stupid assumptions--

No. She said it herself. Emotion is weakness. Love is weakness.

It was better this way.

This way they both survived.

“Franco,” He used her last name, a sick feeling entering his stomach at the idea of using her given name after the fiasco last night. “Franco wake up!”

She jolted upright, as if someone had pushed her through to the other side. Her breathing was small, shallow, and her chest heaved as her eyes flitted between Charlotte and Bellamy’s locked gazes, fear flashing by so fast he swore he imagined it.

“Come on, the fog’s cleared up.” was all he said, holding out his hand. She grasped it and he pulled her up, quickly disappearing behind the cave exit, meeting with Jones.

“Where’s Atom?”

“We thought he was with you.”

No. Atom had to have made it. He had to. Confusion spread throughout his chest, his head turning quickly as a scream passed through the air.

“Charlotte!” Y/N called, sprinting past him, racing toward the scream. The two men followed after her, Monroe trailing behind as they reached the clearing where Atom lay, pus boiling all over his skin, blood vessels popping as Bellamy knelt beside him, cradling his friend’s head in his arms.

Y/N knelt across from him, horror circulating in her gaze as she placed a hand against his chest, gently listening to the wheezes, a soft plea barely reaching their ears.

“Kill… me...please.”

***

Y/N stared in horror, grasping the handle of her makeshift knife. “Charlotte, go back to camp.” She ordered, hand shaking as she handed it over to Bellamy.

“No, I want to help”

“Charlotte.” Y/N’s tone turned stern, a warning, “Now.”

She heard the faint shuffling of footsteps behind her until the sound disappeared, loneliness surrounding the couple as the wind whistled faintly through the woods.

Bellamy shook above the deteriorating delinquent, Y/N’s knife held firmly in his hands.

He couldn’t do it.

Y/N placed her hand on his, covering his hand to steady it before gingerly taking the knife back.

“Okay, hey Atom” her tone grew sweet, plastering a fake smile on her face as she stared at the helpless kid, “I’m gonna help you okay?”

Atom’s head nodded slightly, the pain only allowing him to move so much. Her hand shook, vocal cords humming a long-forgotten song to ease the pain, the blade slicing through the layers of skin, causing Atom to bleed out, staining the greenery crimson.

She raised her eyes forward meeting the horrified stares of Clarke, Finn, and Wells, pretending to be unaware of the intense gaze Bellamy was sending her way.

“Get Clarke whatever she needs,’ Bellamy called to his troops as they returned to camp, gaze flickering toward Y/N. She sat against the dropship, eyes blank as she stared out emotionless.

She killed someone today.

She was a killer now.

Maybe she should’ve stayed on the Ark after all.

A familiar figure slid down next to her, Monty offering her a silver cup. “Miller told me what happened, thought you might want some of this.”

She flashed a tight smile before gulping down the wretched batch of moonshine, an empty numbness snaking its way through her body, “Thanks Monty, I needed that.”

She stared above at the sky, eyes trained on the bright orbiting station above them. “Did you know it was my birthday when we came down?” She spoke forwardly, catching the kid by surprise. “It was either death by earth or death by space. You can guess which one I chose.”

Monty pressed his hand on hers, the contact barely registered as she swigged the rest of her moonshine. “You made the right choice.”

“No, I didn’t” She spoke hauntedly, “I should’ve floated myself.”

That night against the dropship, alcohol rewiring her brain, Y/N drifted away, and for the first time in eighteen years, a new terror joined the rest.

Yikes. So Y/N suffers from this thing known as depression and survivor’s guilt. As we all know there is no easy fix, this will be a constant throughout the series. I’ll put it in the warnings as we go forward.

If this isn’t something you’re comfortable with I won’t be offended if you stop reading, I promise.

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