#⤷ ᯽･ﾟ: peachy matters | dash games.

[yasashiiku]

𝑯𝒐𝒘 𝒂𝒅𝒐𝒓𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆 𝒂𝒓𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖?

❝ ... !!! ❞

❝ That's flattering, but keep your hands to yourself. ❞

❝ ....... ❞

[helliontherapscallion]

(Y/n) and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Week: Monday

Tuesday     Wednesday     Thursday (Part 1)     Thursday (Part 2)     Friday     Saturday     Sunday

Spotify Playlist (collaborative)

Pairing: SBI x sister!reader (she/her pronouns)

Warnings: swearing, toxic friends, panic spirals/attacks, injury, taking pills for pain

Summary: you have a very bad week, how will you manage? (Characters are fully human, but based on their DSMP characters. High school AU)

Word count: 4,818

(A/N): I’ve never played volleyball or watched Haikyuu before, so I’m not 100% certain how games work. Also, I probs should’ve split this into two parts, but eh.

“(Y/n) love, you look homeless in that sweater, it’s literally so fucking ugly.”

“Haha, yeah it is. I guess I just wasn’t really trying today.”

Adrian snorted, scanning your body with his cold eyes. “Today? You don’t try at all. You always look like trash.”

“More than trash, you always look like you just rolled in dog shit.” Sammy threw her head back and cackled at her own joke.

Your friends around you erupted in laughter as you four walked down the hallways of the hell that was your public high school. You awkwardly chuckled alongside them, you didn’t really find it funny, but you didn’t want to draw more attention towards yourself. 

“Seriously, (y/n), I really don’t know why we still hang out around you anymore. You really let yourself go.”

“Yeah, now that I think about it, you did gain like five pounds in the past week.”

“Really not a good look on you, love. Then again, nothing you do can make you look good anymore.”

You tried to not let their comments get to you, you really did, but sometimes their comments just rooted themselves deep into your subconscious. You didn’t try looking good anymore, you couldn’t wear anything without them criticising it. You could never win. 

“Awe,” Adrien poked your cheeks, “stop looking so sad. We’re just trying to give you advice. You really need it.”

“Yeah, (y/n). You’re so sensitive, get a grip.”

“Guys look, I think she’s gonna cry!” 

You wiped at your welling eyes with the sleeves of your sweater. “I’m not. I just got allergies.”

Annie rolled her eyes. “Uh-huh. Anyways, what are our plans for Halloween? We should totally dress up like sexy angels! I think that’d be so cool. Like, Clint’s party won’t be ready for us.”

“Oh, about that Annie…”

“God, what now (y/n)?”

“I was actually planning on spending Halloween night taking Tommy and Tubbo trick-or-treating with my brothers and dad. I won’t be able to go with you guys, I’m sorry.”

The group groaned loudly. “C’mon (y/n), you never hang out with us anymore.”

“Oh my god (y/n) you still go trick-or-treating? We’re juniors.”

“I’m sorry, I’ve just been busy with my AP classes and studying for the SAT. My team captain’s really been pushing the team hard with volleyball practice. State finals are soon and we want first this year.”

“No matter how much studying you do, you’re gonna fail. You’re stupid, so why try? Just give up and hang out with uuussss.”

“Yeah (y/n),” Adrien looked at you suspiciously, “you’ve been ignoring us lately. I thought we were friends. Do you even wanna be friends anymore?”

You felt a flare of panic flare up in your gut. “I do! I-I just have so much going on right now. It’s starting to get hard to juggle everything.”

“We’re starting to think that you don’t like us anymore, we want our (y/n) back!” Sammy whined. The others agreed with her, making you feel guilty. You were ignoring them, it was selfish in your opinion. You supposed that you could skip out on taking Tommy and Tubbo trick-or-treating, there’ll be other years you could take them. 

“I guess I can take Tommy and Tubbo another year. They’d just have to go without me this year.”

They cheered, giving you praise. You beamed at that, they seemed down lately and you loved it when they’d give you compliments. They didn’t do that much, so that made their praise more special to you. You strived to get compliments.

You four went off to your separate first classes for the day. Yours was statistics, a class you’ve been struggling in lately. You didn’t know anybody in there except for your oldest brother Techno, so you tried to stick with him. Unfortunately, the teacher’s seating chart placed you both on opposite ends of the room, probably because of your last names indicating that you’re siblings. You placed your stuff down on the table and plopped down into your seat, already drained. You had a long day ahead of you; you had a major AP world history test in your next class, you had to give a presentation in your AP english class that was worth a quarter of your final grade, and you had a semifinals volleyball match that would last until late in the night. If your team won, you would be going to state finals, so it was a lot of pressure on your shoulders. You were the main setter, so you had to really focus tonight if you were going to score your team points. 

“Alright class, pull out your homework!”

Fuck, you had homework? You looked in your folder, only to see the unfinished sheet full of equations you didn’t understand staring back at you tauntingly. Mr. Mullins walked over to your desk, took one look at your blank homework, and just walked right past you. Another big fat zero in the gradebook for you, just what you needed. At least he wasn’t in the mood to berate you today. You didn’t need any more stress piled onto your shoulders. 

The lesson felt like it dragged on forever with you frantically trying to copy down the notes on the board and trying to understand the content at the same time. Overtime, he would call students up to the board. Hopefully, he would skip over you today. “Ms. Minecraft.” Goddamn it, you spoke too soon.

Your head perked up and you looked at him. “Yes sir?”

“Come up to the board and solve this.”

Gulping, you felt panic rise up in you and stood up with shaky knees. On the board was part of the newer content he was just teaching. Something that you understood only a little bit better than the rest, and that’s not saying much. You still didn’t understand the content completely. Your writing was shaky as you wrote what you thought was right on the board. Finding the answer, you circled it and looked at Mr. Mullins. He looked disappointed. 

“That’s wrong, Ms. Minecraft. Please sit down.”

You felt like your face was on fire as you saw the entire class burning holes into you with their eyes. Though they looked dead inside, as per usual with any morning class full of tired teenagers, their effects still took hold on you. You wanted to crawl into a dark hole and die. You sat back down and stared at your note packet, you couldn’t focus on the lecture anymore. Your attention was fully on your surroundings, you were hyper aware of every little whisper and bouncing leg in your peripheral vision. You could feel yourself spiraling, usually that wouldn’t happen until after your third class. Today was going to be rough. 

The loud chime of the bell startled you out of your thoughts. You shakily put your papers back into your binder and put the binder back into your backpack. Right as you were about to walk through the door, you heard Techno catch up to you. “Hey, you good?”

“Yeah Tech, I’m just peachy.”

“Are you su-”

“Technoblade. I’m fine. Now if you excuse me, I have to get to my next class. I have an important presentation I’ve gotta prepare for.”

Without giving him any room to argue, you rushed off to your english class. You had Adrian and Annie in your class. For your presentation, you were paired up with people that you hardly knew. At least they did their part in the project, you were certain you were going to die if you got paired up with Adrian and Annie again. You loved them, but they never did any part of their portion of work. They left it to you to finish at midnight the day the project was due. To be fair, they both told you they had family emergencies, so you covered for them just that once. 

You pulled out your flashcards only to have them knocked out of your hand when someone bumped into you. You quickly crouched to pick them up so you could have them in order by time class started. “Oops, sorry love.”

It was Annie. She and Adrian towered over your crouched form smirking at you. Looking back down to rearrange your cards, you murmured “it’s ok.”

“Are you ready for this presentation, I know I am.”

You smiled a little. “Actually, I think I’m going to ace this. English is my best subject.”

“Yeah (y/n), I wasn’t asking you. I was talking to Annie. Besides, you’re probably going to fail this.” Adrian scoffed. 

“Thank you for asking, Adrian,” Annie shot a pointed look at you, “at least someone cares.”

The bell rang, signifying the start of your second block. You felt like you had a lump in your throat blocking your breathing. If Adrian, one of the smartest kids in your english class, said that you were going to fail, then you probably were going to fail. That would take a huge hit on your grade, this project was worth a quarter of your final grade after all. You were zoned out for the entirety of your classmate’s presentations putting yourself into a spiral. You jumped when Mr. Todd, your teacher, called your group up to present.

You stood stiffly in the middle of your two groupmates and clutched your flashcards with clammy hands. Luckily, your part of the presentation was not first. When it came to your part, you were stuttering and tumbling over your words. You even dropped your flashcards in front of everybody, causing half the class to snicker. Your face burned as you hurried to pick them up and your other groupmate took this as a signal to continue the presentation. You still had an important point to make that was integral for the set up to your other groupmate’s part of her presentation. You stared at your flashcards for the rest of the presentation. 

When the bell rang, you made a mad dash out of the classroom. You didn’t want to talk to anybody, especially not Adrian or Annie. It was a relief that you had your lunch period at the moment. You could hide yourself in the bathroom nobody used and let your panic attack ride itself out. 

You ducked inside a stall and sat on the toilet, bringing your knees up to bury your face in them. The tears and panic you were holding in all day let itself out with explosive effects. You started to hyperventilate as you muffled your sobs with your knee. Your chest painfully clenched so you couldn’t breathe. Your limbs felt like they weighed two tons each and they were shaking intensely. You didn’t hear the end of the lunch bell ring. By the time you calmed down slightly, you were five minutes late to AP world history. 

You packed your stuff up in a hurry, power walking through the halls. You probably looked like shit, but you didn’t care, you had a class to get to and a test that you probably wouldn’t be able to finish now. You lost ten minutes of your test time. When you tried to open the closed door, you found that it was locked. You had to knock if you wanted to get in. You raised a shaking hand to knock, but the door was opened by a less-than-impressed Ms. Osborne. She ushered you to your desk and gave you your unit test. 

You couldn’t focus. The multiple choice section was usually a breeze to you, but you couldn’t comprehend any of the questions. When you could comprehend them, you couldn’t concentrate on choosing an answer. You did your best to find the correct answers, but you were almost positive that at least half of them were wrong. Your handwriting was nearly incomprehensible and your essay topic was something you didn’t study for. When you were done with half of the body paragraphs, the bell rang and you had to turn in your unfinished test. 

You had your independent online psychology course next in the library. You usually worked alone secluded in a corner deep inside the library where nobody went. You would get some solace in being alone. Maybe you’d calm down enough so that you could ride home with your brothers and not go for a long walk so you could avoid them. 

You settled down in the comfortable chair and pulled out your laptop to get started. Psychology was your favorite class. It was easy for you to understand, it didn’t have much of a workload attached to it, and it was fun to learn about. It always calmed you down reading about the intricate workings of the brain. 

By time the day was over, you got most of your psychology work done and you were on your way to the car you shared with Technoblade and Wilbur. You took out your spare keys and slumped against the window in the backseat. You were absolutely drained after your terrible day and you still felt panic swirling deep within you, waiting for the right moment to strike. 

You stretched out your legs across the seat and leaned your back against the door. For the first time that day, you felt peaceful. You still had at least fifteen minutes to yourself until your brothers would start to make your way to the car. You felt the panic subside slightly and you fully relaxed. You closed your eyes and let yourself drift off into a light sleep. You needed your energy for tonight’s match. 

The door you were leaning on swung open and you tumbled backwards smacking the back of your head against the metal frame of the car and reverse scorpioning onto the pavement. Your entire upper back and the back of your head exploded in pain and your lower back hurt slightly from having your back bent uncomfortably. You heard laughter above you as you felt tears of pain start to slip out of your eyes. Your legs swung out from their place above your face and landed on the ground with a painful thump. 

You saw three blurry figures above you laughing at your pain. You reached up with a shaky hand to wipe at your tears and saw Adrian, Sammy, and Annie. They were cackling as you shakily stood up and sat on the comfortable seats of the car. You waited patiently for them to calm down. 

Eventually, Sammy calmed down enough to explain what happened to you through chuckles. “I’m sorry (y/n), it was just too good to resist. You should’ve seen your face.”

She and the others broke back into uncontrolled laughter as they remembered your embarrassing fall. You were used to their antics, and quite frankly it felt good to make your friends laugh, even if it were at your own expense. Just as they were calming down once again, you saw Wilbur and Techno walk out the front doors of the school laughing at something the other said. Annie and Sammy heard their laughter and quickly turned around to watch them. They had massive crushes on both of your brothers, many in the school did. 

Your brothers made their way to your shared car and stopped to look at you in slight confusion. “(Y/n), were you crying? What happened?” Wilbur asked worriedly. 

“Yea-”

“Oh Wilbur, it was terrible, (y/n) fell out of the car. I don’t think she closed the door before she leaned on it.” Annie interrupted you with a faked concerned tone, a complete contradiction to her reaction before your brothers came.

Techno hastily made his way to the driver’s side door. “Well, if she’s hurt we better get going, right Wilbur?”

“Yes! We better get going, please excuse us.” He sat in the passenger seat and closed the door without hearing Sammy and Annie’s desperate attempts to stop them so they could talk to them. Your brothers thought Sammy and Annie were annoying. They absolutely hated being around them. 

Waving apologetically at your friends, you pulled yourself into the car and closed the door. Annie and Sammy looked offended that you had let Wilbur and Techno get away from them. Avoiding their eyes, you looked down at your tightly clasped hands. They were shaking slightly. 

After pulling out of the parking lot, Techno glanced at you from the rearview mirror. “You ok (y/n)?”

“Yeah, my back just hurts and I have a headache.”

“Well, do you wanna go and get some ice cream? We still have some time left before we have to pick up Tommy and Tubbo. Dad doesn’t have to know,” Wilbur asked you.

You sighed, you wanted nothing other than to take a nap before your match. “Sorry, but I need to watch what I eat today. We have semifinals tonight and I can’t have anything sugary. I just wanna go home and take a nap.”

Your brothers were quiet for the rest of the car ride until you reached your driveway. Techno twisted his body around in his seat to look at you after he put the car in park. “Did you actually fall out of the car?”

Shit, should you tell him the truth? If you did, they would almost certainly get mad at your friends. Sammy and Annie would never forgive you if you turned your brothers against them. You decided that you would take one for the team again. “Yeah, I wasn’t paying attention.” 

Techno snorted. “Well, that was stupid,” he jokingly said. “Next time you’re gonna get run over by a parked car.”

You knew that he meant that as a joke, but it still stung. Stamping your emotions down, you laughed with him and Wilbur. It was stupid of you to do, you shouldn’t have let your guard down if you weren’t at home. 

You winced as you slung your bag on your back and walked the best you could back into your house. Your upper back was killing you. You made a beeline to the bathroom and rummaged through the medicine cabinet looking for some pain relief pills. You took some and shambled off to your room to take your well earned nap. You set your alarm’s setting to its loudest volume and passed out. 

You jolted up and gasped when you felt a wave of pain hit your upper back. You blearily looked at the time. You had a little under two hours before you had to get back to the school for your match. You groaned when you pulled yourself up, your head pounding with every turn. You pulled yourself out of bed and once again took some pain pills. You went downstairs to grab an apple or something to eat. Your dad was at the stove stirring something around in a pot. 

He turned to look at you with an excited smile. “You ready for your match tonight? You’re gonna kill it!” 

You only nodded halfheartedly and plopped yourself down at the table with your apple. Philza frowned at your lack of enthusiasm, but he figured that it was just because you just woke up from a nap. You’d bounce back eventually. 

“Wilbur told me that you fell out of the car? How’d you do that?”

You shrugged, wincing slightly as it moved your back slightly. “Dunno, must’ve not closed the door.”

Philza was at your side in a hurry, his hands hovering over your shoulders. “Did you get hurt? Show me where it hurts.”

“My back and the back of my head.”

“Can I move your shirt so I could look?”

“Sure, go ahead.”

You felt him gently pull the neck of your t-shirt away from your body to peek at your back. You heard his breath hitch as he looked. Was it that bad? “Good god (y/n),” he breathed out.

“What, is it bad?”

“Don’t you feel how bad it is? Your entire back is bruised. I think there’s some blood too.”

“Damn.”

“First, language. Second, that’s all you have to say? Aren’t you in pain?”

“Yeah, but the pain pills are gonna kick in soon. I’ll be fine.”

“Would you be able to play tonight? I really think you should sit this one out.”

“No, I’m playing tonight Dad.”

“(Y/n),” oh no, he was using his stern dad voice. “It’s not a good idea to play tonight. You’re hurt, I’m sure they’ll understand if you sit this one out.”

You felt frustration rise up in you. “We’re in the semifinals. They need me, I’m the main setter. They’d lose without me playing.”

“(Y/n), I’m serious. You’re not playing today.”

“Dad, I am playing today. Look, I’ll talk to Coach Williams to see if I could be rotated out more often. I know she’d let me.”

He stared at you for a while before sighing. He knew there was no convincing you. “...Fine. But you better talk to Coach Williams about sitting out for a bit if your back hurts too much or I swear I’ll drag you off the court myself.”

You smiled a little at the small victory. “Thank you! I promise I’ll sit out if needed.”

He quirked an eyebrow at you. “If needed?”

You sighed, “when needed.”

He walked over to the pot, stirring the contents slightly. “That’s better. Dinner’s almost ready, I made some pasta.”

“It smells good, but I think I’m skipping out on it for today. I already ate this apple and if I eat any more I’ll probably hurl on the court.”

He made a displeased noise in the back of his throat, “fine, but you’re eating something when we get home tonight.”

He walked off to go get your brothers and Tubbo for dinner. You could hear their booming steps racing down the stairs towards the kitchen. They raced into the kitchen and almost crashed into the back of your chair. You stood up and looked at the two excitable fifth graders. “Careful boys, don’t want you getting hurt.”

“You’re no fun (y/n),” Tommy whined.

“Sure, sorry bout that,” Tubbo beamed at you.

You chuckled, making your way upstairs to get ready for your match. You took off your clothes with great difficulty and slipped on your jersey and your spandex shorts. They were way too short for your tastes, but you couldn’t wear longer ones, they’d just get in the way. You fondly remembered how your dad flipped out when he first saw you in them, he hated them with a burning passion. He still hates how short they are.

When you were struggling with pulling your hair back into a tight, sleek ponytail, the back of your head throbbed continuously with pain. You most likely bruised your scalp. 

You slipped on your shoes that were made specifically for playing volleyball and headed downstairs. You were met with Tommy and Tubbo jumping in excitement seeing you in your uniform. They loved going to your matches, even if they would always pass out in the car after them because matches usually ended late at night. You grabbed your dad’s keys and headed to his car. Before you could lead the boys out the door, Philza’s voice stopped you.

“(Y/n), coat.”

You huffed, grabbing your coat and putting it on before tossing him his keys. You four got into the car and set out for the high school. The short drive was filled with Tommy and Tubbo asking you questions about volleyball and encouraging you. “(Y/n), you’re gonna kick their butts!”

“Yeah!” Tubbo cheered 

Despite their voices causing a spike of pain to shoot throughout your head, you laughed at their enthusiasm. It was always nice to hear your little brother and pseudo brother in the stands cheering you on, they were your and your team’s personal cheerleaders. 

Not long after you got to the school, you were stretching with your team on the gym’s floor. Your posse found their way into the stands, sitting in the front row. The away team watched your team like a hawk, analysing every single player for any weakness. It was because of them that you tried to not show any pain when you moved your back. You talked to Coach Williams before the team stretch and she was obviously sympathetic with your situation. She agreed to switching you out with the standby setter every few rotations. 

The echo of the whistles caused pain to ring in your head every time someone scored or a foul was called. Your team captain, Haley, was constantly, yet discreetly checking on you throughout the game since she was always next to you. She was the team’s main spiker after all. 

The game droned on and on before you realized that the opposing team was targeting you when they were offensive. They probably realized that you were injured a round ago. You tried your best to block every ball that was sent your way, but a few managed to slip past you when you couldn’t move fast enough. This team was good, but your team was better. 

The score during the final round was tied and the clock was on it’s last ten seconds as the ball soared your way. You dove to hit it, landing on your shoulder on the hard floor and hitting it up high enough for Haley to spike the ball down. The crowd went wild as the ball bounced off from the opposite end of the court almost simultaneously with the screeching of the referee’s whistle, signifying the end of the game and your team’s victory.

You laid on the floor in pain, you thought you must’ve pulled your tender muscles in your back and shoulder. It hurt to move it. You felt one of your teammates grab your hand to yank you up into a giant full team group hug. You yelped slightly in pain as you felt arms press against your back and hands firmly patting your bruised shoulders. You were whisked away into the locker room to change into the pajamas you brought with you. 

“(Y/n), are you alright? That was a pretty hard fall.” Haley’s soft voice asked you. You felt your heart sing in your chest. 

“Yeah Hales, I’m fine. I just pulled a few muscles.”

Her perfectly shaped eyebrows furrowed together, “are you sure? As your team captain and your friend, I’m worried about you.”

You couldn’t help the smile that spread across your face. You felt warm knowing that she cared about you. “I’m sure, worrywart.”

She rolled her eyes playfully and breathed out a soft laugh. “Sorry for asking, grump.” Her laugh sounded like music to your ears. 

Your phone vibrated in your pajama pocket, alerting you of your family waiting for you in the car and for you to hurry up. You sighed, “sorry Hales, I gotta go. Dad’s getting impatient.” 

She gave you a small smile. “Oh, well, tell your family I said hi! Good work on the court today, I wouldn’t ask for a different setter.”

You felt your cheeks warm up and you watched with wide eyes as she left the locker room. Your phone vibrated again, your dad was really starting to get impatient. 

You walked out of the school as fast as you could to find your dad’s car waiting for you up front. Jumping in and softly closing the passenger side door, you slumped against the window. “(Y/n),” Tommy’s tired voice slurred. “That. Was. Pog…”

You glanced back to see him and Tubbo snoring away in their seats. Your match was more exciting than usual, so that must’ve really tired them out. You chuckled, turning back around to lean against the window. You took care not to put any weight on your shoulder or back. 

“(Y/n), you were amazing out there, but why did you dive for that ball? That fall looked like it hurt.”

You hummed tiredly, “thanks Dad. I just did what I thought would win us the game. We’re going to finals!” You quietly sang. 

“Did you hurt your shoulder?”

“I actually don’t know, but I think I might’ve pulled a few muscles. Nothing too bad.”

“...I scheduled a doctor’s appointment for you tomorrow morning during your first and second blocks. I want you to get your back, shoulder, and head looked at. You looked miserable the entire match.”

You sighed, too tired to argue, “mmk.”

He chuckled before the car fell into a comfortable silence. The gentle bouncing of the car and the subtle hum of the engine was lulling you to sleep. Your eyelids were drooping by the time you pulled into your driveway. 

You drug yourself out of the car and into the house, leaving Philza with the sleeping boys. You walked straight to your room and plopped down on your bed, passing out instantly for the second time that day.

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[wanderingcas]

Safe and Sound. Commission for @starsmish 3.5k words

. . . 

Castiel leans back against the wall adjacent to the men’s bathroom, looking down at the watch-face poking out of his sleeve. People stare at him curiously as they filter in and out of the restrooms. Castiel smiles politely back, all the while keeping his eyes trained for a specific face: one with bright green eyes, a jawline that Castiel is positive would cut glass, and dusty blonde hair. 

He was assigned to Dean Winchester approximately two weeks ago. What Castiel originally thought was going to be a low-key assignment, protecting Lawrence’s newly-appointed councilman is turning out to be one of his more difficult cases. 

The first red flag is that Dean’s family hired Castiel without informing Dean at all. According to the family, Dean had been receiving death threats from an alt-right group so cleverly named “the Trumpers” because of Dean’s very liberal agenda in his politics. The family was concerned. Castiel assumed that Dean was also concerned. 

But when Castiel walked into the room and saw Dean for the first time, saw the equal parts of surprised and pissed off look on Dean’s face: that was Castiel’s second red flag. 

He checks his watch again. It’s been 20 minutes. 

“Goddammit.” Castiel pivots and swings through the bathroom door. He opens each empty stall. He does a useless circle around the empty bathroom. 

“God damn it,” he says again, voice echoing off the tiles.

. . . 

It isn’t hard to find Dean, as the workaholic councilman is parked where he usually is: his office.

Castiel smacks a styrofoam cup onto Dean’s desk. Drops of cold coffee spring to liberate themselves through the plastic lid’s opening. “You forgot this.” 

Dean’s eyes barely leave his computer screen. “Mm,” he replies. He picks it up; sips. Grimaces. “That’s disgusting.” 

Sitting in a chair across from Dean’s desk, Castiel says, “Yes, Dean. That’s because it’s cold. Because you left it. Hours ago.” 

“Huh,” Dean says.

“When you left a location without informing me,” Castiel continues to explain. “Again.” Dean still doesn’t look up. “That’s dangerous,” Castiel adds.

“Uh-huh.” 

Castiel kicks the desk with the toe of his foot, making it rattle. “Are you even listening to me?” 

Dean finally takes his hands off the keyboard, folds them in front of him. “Cas. I have more important things to do than listen to you bitch about how you failed at your job. Again.”

“You can’t keep running away from me,” Castiel says tightly. “I can’t keep you safe if you’re constantly running away.”

Dean leans back in his chair, laces his fingers behind his head. “I dunno, I’d call it more like… walking briskly. Not my fault that you’re too slow.” 

“I was waiting for you.” 

“Huh. Didn’t see you.” 

“I was waiting,” Castiel continues, leaning forward, “as I was all the other times when you’ve attempted to ditch me. During that press conference on Wednesday, at every grocery store you go into, at the restaurant last night—” 

“Well, you being on my date was a little weird, to be fair,” Dean says.

“Dean.” Castiel pinches the bridge of his nose. “You hired me to protect you. I can’t do that if you won’t allow me to do so.” 

“My family hired you,” Dean corrects, “and based on some stupid disorganized Trump fanatic group that couldn’t even find their own ass if it was handed to them. Nothing’s gonna happen, okay? I’m keeping you around to make my brother chill out. That’s it. I don’t need your damn protection.” 

“I disagree,” Castiel says. “I’ve been monitoring tagged posts with your Twitter username, and some of them are violent death threats. From multiple extremist groups. Additionally, you did a very poor job at hiding the letter you received that depicted a very graphic drawing of you getting eaten alive by hellhounds.” 

“But that’s all they are, Cas,” Dean says. “Threats. Nothing’s actually happened. You’ve been up my butt for weeks; have you seen anyone stalking me? Confronting me personally?” At Castiel’s reluctant dissenting head shake, Dean says, “See? It’s fine. Nothing to worry about.” 

Castiel hasn’t known Dean long, but he can identify three qualities in him: stubborn, handsome, and fiercely loyal to his family. Castiel straightens in his chair and plays his last hand “Elections are coming up,” he says. “That’s when people get most heated. And if you’re ignoring the seriousness of the situation, there may be an attack on you that could get multiple people hurt if it’s not intercepted. Like the woman you were on a date with last night.” Castiel takes a breath, attempts to hit home. “Or your family.” 

It has the desired effect: Dean’s face becomes stormy and still. He slowly points a finger at Castiel, jabbing with it in the air. “Don’t you dare bring my family into this.” 

“I am not doing so. The people who are threatening your life will.” 

Dean sits, stone-faced, until an unheard noise makes Dean snap to attention. “All right, Cas. You wanna play it like that? Then here’s what I think: you’re bad at your job. It’s why you work as an independent contractor who costs next to nothing to hire. You’re shitty at your profession, and you’re blaming me for it. I’m not a ninja, and yet I slip past you every goddamn time. You think that’s a coincidence?” 

Castiel clenches the fabric of his pants, bunched at the knees, willing himself not to take the bait. “If this whole thing is some sort of ridiculous self-punishment—”

“Where the hell did you pull that out of your ass?” Dean scoffs.

“—from that attack last year that hurt your brother, instead of you, because he got caught in the crossfire—”

Dean says, voice raised and sharp, “Don’t you dare bring that up, you son of a—”

“You could really get hurt, Dean!” Castiel shouts above him. “This isn’t a damn game. No matter what your problem is with me, or with having protection in the first place, you have to face the facts.” 

They stare at each other in a moment of silent standoff. The hallway beyond Dean’s office’s open door has gone tensely quiet. 

Dean stands and pushes his chair back harder than necessary. “I did a little digging on you too,” he says, a little too calmly. “You were fired from the former Secretary of State’s detail because you made a mistake on the job. It’s classified, obviously, but I’m willing to bet it had to do with that bomb making its way to the East Wing. Am I on the right track?” 

Castiel clenches his jaw. “The whole security detail was fired,” he says. “Not just me.” 

There’s a flicker in Dean’s expression—a softness that Castiel had not seen yet from him—but it’s gone as fast as it occurred. He replaces it with a condescending smile. “Pretty hard to protect anyone properly after that piss-poor mistake, huh?” 

Something in Castiel’s chest splinters. “All right,” he snaps, the backs of his knees smacking the chair as he stands. “Message received. I’ll resign from protecting you, effective immediately. You won’t be hearing from me again.” 

“Peachy,” Dean shoots back. He falls back into his chair, trains his eyes once again onto the computer screen again. 

Castiel has his hand on the knob, clenching it so hard it could shatter. “Whatever your opinion of me is; I hope you think about what I said.” He turns the knob sharply against the silence behind him, says, “I don’t want to see you get hurt,” before slamming the door behind him.

He takes the stairs that are down the hall from Dean’s office. His feet hitting the metal stairs echo sharply in the empty space. Striding through the lobby of the office building, he narrowly avoids connecting shoulders with a group of men who are walking quickly in the other direction.

When he gets outside, he doesn’t know what to do. He pulls his scarf against the wind. As is the theme of the week, people look at him strangely as he stands there, staring down at the sidewalk. The sun begins to slump in the sky. 

“Idiot,” he says to the ground, as if to explain. “He’s a goddamn idiot.” 

Despite this, he knows he has to go back in. 

He’s clenching and unclenching his hands, indecisive, until his phone begins vibrating violently in his coat pocket. He scrambles to take it out with his stiff fingers and pulls off a glove with his teeth so he can hit the green button on the touchscreen. “Hello?” 

“Cas—” says Dean’s voice, cut off by something that sounds like static. 

Castiel holds the phone closer to his ear, listening intently. “Dean? Hello?” 

“Cas—” says Dean’s voice, again, this time more desperate. It sounds like some sort of fabric is being rubbed against the receiver, making the connection fuzzy. A few odd thuds are heard over the receiver. 

“Dean, what’s going on? Where are you?” He hears Dean’s voice again, but this time it’s not forming a word—more like a cry. The realization of what’s happening dumps over Castiel like cold water. 

“Fuck,” Castiel says. 

Like a shot out of a gun, he whips around and bolts through the revolving doors. He holds the phone to his ear like a lifeline with one hand, pushing people out of the way with the other. “Dean, hang on!” he shouts into the phone. “I’m coming, just hang on! Call the police, tell them to come to office 202!” he barks at the bewildered doorman as he sprints by. 

He was only gone for ten minutes, he thinks desperately. Or twenty. How long was he standing outside?

Castiel dashes into the stairwell he used earlier to leave. As he begins sprinting up the stairs, he hears the grunts and thuds he heard over the phone become a reality.

Castiel throws his phone aside and increases his speed, taking two stairs at a time. He sees a group of men all huddled around one broken one. He jumps at the back of one of the men, barely slowing his sprint, knocking him to the ground. 

Seeing Dean bleeding and curled up on the ground brings out something primal in Castiel. He kicks a man over the railing, barely hearing the thump that follows. He punches a man with one fist and pivots to scissor-chop a man’s neck with the other. Castiel barely sees how many people there even are, barely stacks the odds in the fight: he just knows that Dean is in danger, Dean needs to be helped, Dean needs protection. 

Among the chaos, Dean has teetered to his feet and is fighting beside Castiel, landing the occasional second blow after Castiel deals the real damage. Castiel grabs Dean by the arm, leading him toward the door that opens to the hallway. He fumbles for his taser, aiming and firing at a man running toward them. 

“Go to your office and lock the door,” Castiel tells Dean, already pushing him into the hallway. He sees an argument in Dean’s eyes; Castiel barks, “Go!” 

. . . 

In the end, one man against six is a bit stacked, even for a trained bodyguard. He’s caught in a headlock and can barely see out of his left eye by the time the police arrive. 

As soon as his neck is free, the police shouting at the assailants to get on the ground around him, he stumbles into the light of the hallway and runs toward Dean’s office. 

He finds Dean with the EMTs, a blanket being put around his shoulders, a stretcher prepared for him to be taken to an ambulance downstairs. 

Castiel stands in the doorway, waves off the medic trying to treat him. “Focus on the councilman,” he snaps. 

Castiel walks beside the stretcher as they wheel Dean out of the building; Castiel can tell that Dean is pretty hurt since he barely protests to the special treatment. 

When Dean reaches for Castiel’s hand, he decides that Dean is downright delusional; nonetheless he grabs Dean’s hand tightly, refusing to let go during the whole ambulance ride to the hospital. 

. . . 

“Cas.” 

Castiel raises his head from where it’s cradled in his hands. His delirious mind mistakes the voice for Dean’s; a few blinks into the fluorescent hospital lights confirms that it’s Sam Winchester looming before him. 

He feels a whole new wave of shame overtake him. “Sam.” Castiel wipes a shaking hand over his face. “God. I don’t know how to—” He stutters out a breath. “How is he?” 

Sam sits in the plastic chair next to Castiel’s. “He’s stable. A few broken ribs, concussion… nothing too serious, though. They’re going to keep him overnight for observation.” 

Castiel nods. He can’t sit still, has a weird tremor in his leg. “I am so sorry,” he whispers. 

“How long have you been here?” Sam asks. 

It’s a ridiculous question that Castiel couldn’t care less about the answer to. “I don’t know. What time is it?” 

“They brought Dean in six hours ago,” Sam says. “I got on a flight as soon as you called me.” 

Castiel nods numbly. He doesn’t even remember that phone call. Or where his phone is now. 

“Cas.” Sam puts a hand on Castiel’s shoulder; he flinches at the touch. “Have you had anyone look at you?” 

“There was a nurse,” Castiel says. He vaguely points to his swollen left eye. “Stitches.” He can’t meet the younger Winchester’s eyes. It makes no sense that Sam’s being gentle or caring to someone who so tragically and stupidly let his older brother down. If anything, Sam should be shoving lawsuit papers underneath Castiel’s nose.

“They arrested all the guys that attacked him,” Sam says. He huffs a laugh. “Although the majority of them had to be hospitalized, too, after the number you did on them.” 

Castiel clears his throat against the scratchiness that’s rising up in it. “Dean fought back, too.” 

Sam chuckles, shakes his head. “Of course he did.” 

They sit in silence, as nurses and white coats and stretchers scurry by. Castiel keeps his eyes on the scuffed linoleum floor that’s yellowed with age.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Sam says, shattering the silence. 

Sharply rising to his feet, Castiel says, “Don’t.” 

Sam stands with him. “Seriously, Cas, it wasn’t. Dean was being difficult. He ignored the dangers—and you can probably tell by now how freaking stubborn he is. I’m honestly surprised you lasted this long with him.” 

“I should have stayed by his side, no matter how much he complained,” Castiel says. “It’s part of the job. I didn’t do my due diligence, I didn’t protect him, I didn’t even see this attack coming—”

“Cas, whoa, slow down.” Sam puts a hand on his shoulder again, pulls him to face him. “These guys that attacked Dean aren’t even an alt-right group that was contacting him with those death threats. It was a completely random attack. They saw Dean go into the building and they impulsively decided to go in.” He looks imploringly at Castiel. “I don’t blame you, not even for a minute. And neither does Dean.” 

Castiel feels something thrum through him. “He’s awake?” 

“Yeah. And he’s asking for you. That’s why I came out here.” 

“I don’t—” Castiel shakes his head. “I don’t think I can—”

“I think he wants to apologize,” Sam continues, “Which for Dean is … well, frankly, a minor miracle. So don’t pass up this opportunity, okay?” 

Castiel looks for a moment at Sam’s reassuring smile. “I’ll go,” he finally relents. “At the very least to apologize to him.” 

“Whatever makes you two stubborn idiots talk to each other,” Sam says with a gentle pat on Castiel’s back. 

Dean’s hospital room is a private room with a security guard stationed in front of it. Castiel doesn’t meet the guard’s eyes as he walks in. 

Dean is on the bed, hunched over a sprawl of papers on his lap. He’s shirtless, bandages wrapped around his bare torso.

Castiel stands there for a moment, mouth open, staring at the scene. “What the ever-loving hell are you doing?” 

Dean looks up. “Hey, Cas,” he says with a lopsided grin. 

“‘Hey, Cas’?” Castiel spits out. “Are you kidding me? You’re doing work?” Dean opens his mouth to argue, barely gets a word out before Castiel is striding over to him and snatching the papers from him, dumping them on the floor. “And you shouldn’t be half-naked in a hospital where you can catch a cold,” Castiel continues, snapping Dean’s hospital gown in the air before depositing it on his head. “Put that on.” 

“Jesus, fine,” Dean tentatively putting his arms through the sleeves, wincing at the disturbed bruises on his skin. “I didn’t realize Sam hired a nanny instead of a bodyguard.” 

Castiel sits in the chair adjacent to the bed, bristling. “I won’t have you getting hurt on my watch again, Dean,” he snaps. “Not for the last few hours I’m in your employment.” 

Dean blinks. “Are you quitting?” 

Castiel looks at him incredulously. 

“Okay, yeah. Well, I probably owe you an explanation.” Dean shifts minutely in his bed. “And an apology.” 

Seeing Dean vulnerable deflates Castiel from any anger. “No, I have to apologize. If I had been there—”

“But you weren’t, because I pushed you away, Cas. The things I said to you…” Dean rubs at the eye that’s not bandaged, huffing out a sigh. “I said those awful things because I knew pissing you off wouldn’t make you go away; hurting you would. I know how to find people’s weak spots and apply pressure. It’s why I’m in politics I guess.” 

“It’s not like the things you said to me weren’t true,” Castiel says softly. “You’re right in that I did get fired. That I failed at my job. Similarly to how I failed at this one.” 

“No, Cas, that’s not it. You’re human, okay? But I just—” Dean pauses. Frowns down at his hands clasped over the thin, blue hospital blanket. “Sam was attacked last year. You know that. He didn’t get hurt, but—those people were after me. And I didn’t protect him. My whole life, it’s just been me and Sam against the world. I always protected him, kept him safe, and last year I realized that I just… can’t anymore.” He laughs, but it’s humorless. “It was fucking depressing.” 

Castiel blames it on the lack of sleep when his hand reaches out and gently grasps Dean’s arm. “Dean…” 

“And then Sam hires you because he thinks that I can’t take care of myself, and I just saw red. I saw you as this, I dunno,” Dean waves a hand in Castiel’s direction, “physical manifestation of everything I can’t do: take care of Sam or even myself from a bunch of crazy lunatics. I took it out on you. And I’m sorry.” 

Tightening his grip on Dean’s arm, Castiel says, “I shouldn’t have left you.” 

“It’s not your fault, Cas. Seriously. I don’t blame you for a second.” Dean wraps the hospital gown tighter around himself. “I blame myself, for being a coward. Not really facing the dangers that are out there.” 

Castiel shakes his head. “Dean—”

“I know there’s bad people on both sides,” Dean says, words rushing forward. “I just wanted to… I dunno. Be one of the good guys. Be brave.” 

“You are brave,” Castiel says. “You’re assertive in your beliefs, you don’t back down from your opinions just because someone dissents. That’s brave.” 

Dean shrugs, pondering on that for a minute. The heart rate monitor beats a steady thrum in the silence. “That means a lot,” he finally says. 

“Good. Because it’s true.” Castiel adds, firmly, “And protecting you has been an honor.” 

There’s a rise of color on Dean’s cheeks; he chuckles, “Jesus, Cas, buy me dinner first.” 

Castiel smiles. He pulls his hand back; as he does, Dean grabs it, just as firmly and decisively as he did while riding in the ambulance just hours before. 

“I’ve been an ass,” Dean says, “and I would understand if you don’t want to. But honestly, Cas, I want you around.” 

Castiel tries to take his hand back, but Dean holds tighter. “No, Dean. I think you’re incorrect. I wouldn’t keep you safe, I’d just—”

“I was safe until I pushed you away,” Dean says. 

Castiel can’t argue with that. He looks away from Dean’s green eyes are imploring. “I suppose that’s true,” he admits.

“I won’t do that again,” Dean says, “seriously. I’ll let you do your job. If I promise not to keep trying to dodge you, and at least, uh—try to be less stubborn and make your life easier… would you—” 

It’s the lack of sleep, Castiel thinks, it must be, because his mouth is moving and is interrupting Dean to say, “Yes.” 

Dean gapes at him. “You really want to—”

“Yes,” Castiel says again. More sure this time. He squeezes Dean’s hand tighter. “If you promise not to leave me standing in front of bathrooms again as you climb through the windows, then yes, I will stay. Keep you safe.” 

The smile Dean gives Castiel is blinding and beautiful, and if Castiel were hooked up to that heart rate monitor, it would be going wild, giving him away. It’s the first real one that Castiel’s since he started protecting Dean.

“I promise, Cas.” 

[going-dead]

What if..?

Hey back from months of making zero DP content, hyper fixation is back and here for a while. So here’s my entry for Danny phantom angst day as well as Ectober day 1 prompt: What if? (list by @fruitloopghost )  I wrote this in one sitting instead of doing something productive like homework so sorry for any errors, I’ll comb through and edit when I have time. Click the read more to read it.

What if they hate him, try to capture him, or just shoot him? What if he gets thrown out, allowed to live but not around them. That would somehow be worse Danny figured. “Well are you going to say anything?” Danny asked, staring at his parents. He would settle for anything talking, questions, yelling, any type of reaction just not silence. Transformation rings split once more leaving a dark haired boy in their wake. Jazz was nervously looking between their parents. Danny didn’t know what she was nervous about, it was his half-life at stake.

Maddie’s hands were shaking as she lifted them as if to ward off her son. Her face steeled. “No. Jazz take Danny upstairs and make sure he gets to his room. Your father and I are going to work this out, we will solve this Danny don’t worry. You’ll be rid of Phantom soon”

Danny’s face twisted in a mixture of hurt and confusion. “But there’s nothing to get rid of? I’m me still, kinda human still, I just have a bit extra tacked on. But that bit is still me, Phantom is me as much as I am Phantom. It’s not a ‘we’ scenario it’s me.” He tried to explain, turning his hand invisible as if to prove a point. He looked to his father pleadingly who had yet to speak up,

“It will be okay Danny, but we’re scientists. We observe the world with facts. And the fact is that we just found out our son as you put it is ‘half ghost’. This is an unknown and we are going to have to be wary until have the facts.” Jack gave a smile, but it was obviously forced. The man smiles so much it’s easy to tell when it isn’t genuine. He gave Jazz and Danny a shooing motion. Leaving no room for argument as he and Maddie descended into the lab with hushed argument.

Jazz rested her hand on Danny’s shoulder, a gesture of comfort, and led Danny upstairs. “Don’t look so glum Danny. Look on the bright side, they didn’t shoot you or try to take you into the lab!” They stopped outside his bedroom door.

“Honestly I’d rather have them try to attack me, at least that way I’d know how they felt about all of this.” He shrugged. Just because they were tolerant of him at the moment didn’t mean that their attitude won't change at any moment. He didn’t have to alert Jazz of that though she had enough worries.

“I’m sure they just need some time, they’ll see that your ghostly half doesn’t make them any less their son.” She gave him a hug before going to her own room. They had school tomorrow, it would give their parents time to adjust by themselves.

Danny gave a weak smile before retreating into his own room. He fell face first onto his bed and hugged his pillow. No matter the end outcome of this his relationship with his parents would never be the same as before. He let his thoughts fade as he drifted into sleep.

Danny didn’t wake up strapped to a lab table or connected to a bunch of instruments, so that was a plus. Did normal teens have to worry about that? Probably not Danny mused. He threw on some clothes and headed downstairs for breakfast. He was surprised to see the table set and filled with food. His brows knitted in confusion, usually he would have to make himself breakfast, his parents still asleep or already down in the lab. Jazz would cook occasionally if she woke up a bit earlier but nothing like this. 

Jazz herself came down a few seconds later, confusion evident on her face as well. The question of who was answered shortly after when Jack and Maddie stepped into the kitchen. “Ah good you’re both up. I was starting to worry you wouldn’t have time to eat. Your father and I decided it was time we had a family breakfast for once.” Maddie smiled clapping her hands together.

Danny and Jazz looked at each other in suspicion, but sat down all the same. Food was loaded onto everyone's plates, everyone except Danny started to eat. He poked his pancake with his fork, as if he expected it to explode. Jack was already halfway done with his food when he noticed Danny’s plate was still full. “Come on Danny-bo… Danny, the pancakes aren’t going to bite you.”

“Biting isn't what I’m worried about.” He mumbled, though food trying to eat the Fenton family members wasn’t unheard of, ecto-radiation was no joke. All the same he slowly took a bite of his food. He waited a few seconds, not passed out or hunched over in pain, he shrugged and continued to eat. That wasn’t to say he was comfortable, the moment the food passed his lips his parents seemed to watch his every move, studying him. He suddenly felt like an animal in the wild being observed by researchers. 

Not soon enough it was time for Danny and Jazz to head to school. Jack had already excused himself, Danny not sure to as where he went. He shouldered his bag walking with Jazz towards the front door. “Bye mom, I love you.” He called over his shoulder.

“Goodbye Danny.” Danny pretended it didn’t hurt when she didn’t say I love you back, she always said I love you back. But it was fine, teenagers aren’t supposed to tell their parents they love them anyway. Right? It didn’t matter, he had to get to school. At least that way he wouldn’t have to see the disappointment in his parents eyes everytime they looked at him. At least his teachers had a reason to look at him in disappointment.

School was uneventful, other than Sam and Tucker being relieved to see him okay. He was pretty sure the whole school could feel how nervous he was as the school day drew to an end. He didn’t want to go back home and have his parents treat him like something other. His teachers didn’t call him out when he fell asleep in class, even Dash stayed away from him that day. It wasn’t until he was in the car with Jazz did he figure out why. 

“Um Danny are you okay?” His sister asked almost warily.

“You mean other than the fact that our parents could turn on me at any second? Just peachy.”  Danny snapped. He was surprised to see Jazz almost flinch.

“Can you tone whatever you’re doing down a bit? I’d rather not get frostbite and feel an overwhelming sense of terror driving. It’s just not safe. You can talk to me you know that right?” 

Tone it down…? He looked down at his hands and saw his ghostly aura flicker around him, much brighter and far reaching than usual. And while the green and blue mixture was pretty to look at, that isn’t the case if a human comes in contact with it. Of course they can’t see it, but they sure as hell can feel something wrong. He flinched. “Oops sorry Jazz, didn’t even notice I was doing it. It’s probably just because of nerves. I really don’t need to figure out a random new power while mom and dad are watching my every move.” 

Jazz nodded her head in agreement. Shaking the effects of Danny’s aura off her she pulled out of the school parking lot. “If you want, I can spend the day with you. That way you don’t have to be alone in a room with mom and dad.” She offered glancing at Danny out of the corner of her eye.

“Yeah that’d probably help.” Danny answered. Secretly relieved and happy she offered. When they entered the driveway he took a deep breath, scaring his parents with his aura or ‘scary eyes’ would not help his situation.

Entering the house his parents voices immediately called out from the lab “Danny? Could you come down here for a second?” Danny shot a panicked look at Jazz. She motioned for him to breathe, grabbed his hand and walked slowly down the stairs and into the lab.

Jack looked up hearing footsteps descending down the stairs. “Oh hey Jazzy-pants, you don’t need to be down here. Just going to confirm some things with Danny.” Seeing Jazz’s glare he quickly backpedaled. “Not saying you have to leave though! More the merrier right hun?”

“Of course dear. No need to look so worried Danny, we’re your parents we wouldn’t ever hurt you intentionally.” Maddie walked over to her kids. “Nothing bad, we just need a few samples. Hair, saliva, vitals those sort of things. Only blood if you allow it of course.” 

Danny shifted on his feet uncomfortably, he couldn’t really say no now could he. Plus he was a bit curious about what they’d find. They led him to the chair near the computer and sat him down. Jack grabbed the hair, saliva, and blood samples, with Danny’s consent. While Maddie started on taking his vitals. “So what we were thinking was: What if we could find out what is causing your ghostly abilities. Could we remove them? Make you normal again?” 

Danny was about to speak up about being ‘normal’ but Jack interrupted. “Maddie come look at this!” He was leaning over a microscope. Danny took off the blood pressure cuff and followed his mom over to where his father was. Jazz was on her phone looking up occasionally to make sure Danny was fine. “It’s incredible, I haven’t put it through the scanner yet but I’d bet my fudge that is ectoplasm mixed in with his normal red blood cells. There that word was again normal. What if Danny didn’t want to be normal. 

Maddie took the samples and carefully put them into the scanner. She tapped her foot waiting for it to finish. She jumped to attention when the results showed up on screen. “DNA...blah blah blah...fifty percent… Oh no.” Maddie staggered away from the machine, looking absolutely crushed. “Oh Jack!” She pulled her husband into a hug. “There’s ectoplasm directly entangled with his DNA, we can’t fix him. Our boy Jack, he’s never going to be the same baby boy we held in our arms.”

Danny looked at his parents, not in fear or anger, no it was in defeat. “Does that really change the fundamental aspects of who I am? I’m still me still Danny, i’m still a teenage boy who sleeps in class and likes video games. I’m not a broken toy you can just throw out because I'm no longer what you want. I’m your son! You’re supposed to love me and accept me for who I am unconditionally.”

Maddie looked at Danny confused. “Of course we still love you. This is just a hard thing to accept, it’d be one thing if it were something like you and Tucker decided to date, we would support you fully. But you have to understand this from our perspective. We found out that our son who we’ve cared for since he was born, is part ghost.”

Danny shook his head. “I understand just fine. I’m the one who had to come to terms that I pretty much died. That I was the only one actually qualified to fight ghosts without obliterating them. I’m the one who had to figure out ghost powers while still going to school, alone except for Sam and Tucker. I’m the one who had to stitch wounds closed and hide the pain of broken bones, that thankfully only lasted a few days. Injuries I got trying to save people all while the government,  my classmate, and my own parents tried to kill or tourture me.  But no, you're right, finding out your son happens to be different, that has to be so much harder.” He gave a dry laugh. “I’m going to my room. I can figure dinner out myself. Come get me when you’re done mourning, not all that or that you’re the reason I’m like this in the first place, but a son who is still here.”

[ask-stjerne-and-logan]

BaFS Fanfic Chapter 6: The Clouds start to Part

Stjerne woke up bright and early that morning. The rain clouds from yesterday were still in the sky. Stjerne yawned and stretched. She jumped down and ran off towards Ozpin's room, wanting to see if he was awake. Once she reached his room, she saw him fast asleep in his bed. Stjerne walked silently over and planted a light kiss on his forehead and ran off. She ran down the hallway and reached a door on the end of the corridor, which led outside. She walked outside and looked up at the dawning sky. The sun was just starting to rise. To Stjerne, her mom was just like the sun, bright, golden and beautiful. It awed her to see the sun rise so early in the morning, especially when it gave off a dawn so colorful.

"Morning Mom!" Stjerne greeted, sitting down on the ground and watching the sun rise. Suddenly, she heard a meow behind her and turned her head to find a small kitten walking towards her. It had a good and grey specks of color scattered here and there in it's white coat of fluffy fur, and it's eyes were bright green The kitten circled Stjerne curiously, and then sat in front of her and looked at her. Stjerne smiled and petted it, to which it did not resist.

"Hi there! Where did you come from?" She asked. The kitten meowed.

"Are you hungry? Follow me!" Stjerne stood up and beckoned the kitten to follow her. She ran back inside, the kitten at her heels. Remembering where the faculty lounge was, she dashed inside and opened the fridge. Peach was still sleeping on the couch, wrapped up in a blanket like a sushi wrap. Stjerne pulled out a carton of milk and set it on the table. She grabbed a plastic bowl from under the sink. She filled the bowl with milk, which the kitten eagerly lapped up in it's mouths. Stjerne giggled as she put the milk back in the fridge. She eyed Ozpin's new oversized hot chocolate can and tried getting a mug from a cabinet. To do this, she had to climb on the counter, which she had never done before.

"Whoa!" She stumbled, nearly losing her footing. Stjerne tried grabbing onto the cabenet door, but her hand slipped and she fell backwards, right into Doctor Oobleck's arms. He had gotten up early and was just about to grab coffee when he noticed Stjerne losing her grip on the cabinet handle.

"There now!" He exclaimed as he set Stjerne on the ground. The kittens continued lapping up their milk.

"Whoa! Thanks Uncle!" Stjerne grinned.

"What in all of Remnant were you doing up there?" Oobleck asked as he pulled a can out of the cabinet.

"I wanted to try that." Stjerne pointed at the hot chocolate can, "And I tried getting a mug, but...." Her voice trailed off awkwardly. Oobleck looked around and grinned.

"Well, in normal circumstances, Ozpin would kill anyone who would get into his hot chocolate, but since it's for you, I suppose I can help you." He winked and pulled out another mug. Stjerne sat down near the kitten and watched it drink it's milk.

"I don't recall us having kittens." Port walked in, seeing the kitten.

"Neither do I." Oobleck looked down, now just noticing the it.

"Oh! I found it outside. This poor little guy looked so hungry." Stjerne explained.

"Well, I guess it doesn't hurt to feed it, but you can give it something else other then milk." Port said.

"This little thing looks about a few weeks old, a month at most, so that statement is correct Peter." Oobleck calculated while he warmed up water for his coffee and Stjerne's hot chocolate.

"Can I keep it?" Stjerne asked. The kitten had finished it's snack and was cuddling with her.

"Well, it does seem to like her." Port said, gawking slightly over how cute Stjerne looked with the kitten cuddling her.

"Mmm. You'd have to ask Ozpin first." Oobleck said, pouring his coffee. He gave Stjerne her mug, with the hot chocolate mixed in.

"You better disguise that hot chocolate or Ozpin will kill you." Port warned her. Stjerne looked around her in a frenzy. She set her mug gently down on the table and dashed over to the fridge again. She pulled out a can of whipped cream and chocolate syrup. She hurriedly shook the can and doused her mug in whipped cream and drizzled the syrup on.

"I'm not sure what difference that will make." Port said, confused.

"Except all the extra sugar that's going into that mug." Oobleck laughed.

"You'll see! Now it's a milkshake. A hot milkshake" Stjerne quickly put the can of whipped cream and chocolate syrup away and sat at the table, ready to drink her beverage. Port shook his head and drank his coffee that Oobleck had given him. Oobleck set his mug down as he started cooking breakfast on the stove.

"Pancakes anyone?" He asked.

"Sounds good." Port said. Stjerne nodded in response as she started drinking, trying not to burn her tongue.

"Good morning all." Glynda stated as she and Ozpin walked in. Stjerne panicked and quickly chugged her hot chocolate down, afraid that that rumor about Ozpin was true. She drank the whole thing without putting it down for a minute, then set the mug down and wiped her mouth.

"Morning!" She hiccuped.

"How did you do that?" Glynda asked.

"What?" Stjerne asked.

"Drink all of that in one setting." Glynda clarified, warming up more water for her tea.

"Oh, that? I don't know how. I guess it's something my dad did." Stjerne shrugged.

"What were you drinking?" Ozpin asked, sitting down.

"Uh....chocolate milk." Stjerne answered.

"Uh huh." Glynda shook her head, seeing through Stjerne's white lie. She gave Ozpin a mug of warm water and turned around, making her tea. As Ozpin stirred his hot chocolate into his mug, he felt something furry rub up against his leg. He looked down to find the kitten, purring and rubbing it's head against his leg.

"Why do we have a small cat in the lounge?" Ozpin asked.

"I got it!" Stjerne jumped down, "Come on you. You might get trampled." She picked the kitten up before eyeing Port.

"What?" Port asked. Glynda, Oobleck and Ozpin all held their breath, trying not to laugh. Stjerne ran over to the couch, where Peach was still asleep.

"Here. Cuddle with Peachie. She needs comforting." Stjerne ordered. The kitten settled down on Peach, snuggling up to her blanket and her warm body. Stjerne came back over, just in time to get her pancakes.

"Yum!!! Thanks Uncle!" She said, digging in.

"You're welcome." He bought two other full plates back over, and rubbed Stjerne's hair good naturedly. The professors ate their breakfast, and then sat back.

"Well, what's on the agenda for today?" Glynda asked.

"Why don't we assemble here in the lounge later and grade papers?" Port said.

"Sounds good." Oobleck sipped from his mug again.

"Well, I did all my paperwork on Thursday, so I'm good for now." Ozpin finished his mug. He looked at Stjerne, who had just finished her pancakes.

"What about Peachie?" Stjerne looked back over towards Peach, who was still snoring on the couch.

"Good point." Glynda shook her head.

"Agreed. Bartholomew, Peter, do you two think you can...you know?" Ozpin nodded in Peach's direction.

"Well, she'll have to snap out of it sooner or later." Port said.

"Agreed. We'll try again." Oobleck agreed.

"Good. Stjerne, why don't you spend the day with me?" Ozpin recommended.

"Really?" Stjerne felt excited.

"Of course. We have matter to look over." Ozpin stood up, "Thanks again for breakfast Bartholomew."

"Of course. Any time sir." Oobleck grinned. Stjerne jumped down and gave Oobleck a quick leg hug before running after Ozpin. The kitten perked up and jumped over Peach, waking her up.

"Huh?! What?!" She sat up with a haphazard mess of her hair, snarled from her two days of grieving.

"Ah, so the Peach awakens." Glynda said, bringing over some mint tea for Peach.

_______________________________________________________________________

Ozpin walked back to Stjerne's room and helped her get ready for the day. She then went with him to his office, where they went back down to Ozpin's chambers. He figured that this would be the best place to commence training with Stjerne. When she got older and learned how to fight, he would use the arena. For now, his hidden lounge would have to suffice, as they were in a place where the students wouldn't pry.

"So, are we doing what we did last time?" Stjerne asked, slipping off her shoes on the doormat.

"Well maybe later. But for now I'm going to train you." Ozpin said, taking off his shoes and his coat and setting his cane up against the wall.

"Training?" Stjerne tilted her head in confusion.

"Yes. Your mother left you special powers that will go berserk if not trained. So to prevent an outburst, I am going to train you to control your powers." Ozpin tried to explain in the best way possible. Stjerne sat on the couch and listened. She knew that Ozpin was serious, and that she should try her best to be serious too, despite the fact that she was only six. Her mother had taught her that there was a time for fun and games, and a time to be serious and listen. It may sound complicated to a regular six year old, but being the daughter of a huntress, Stjerne knew that since both her parents were gone, she would have to do her best to live up to both their teachings and that of those around her. Especially that of the teachers, who were experts in the fields of combat and education. It was the best she could do for them. Inwardly, Stjerne knew that she had her promises to keep, and they could not go unanswered. For her, this was a start to fulfilling them.

"What kind of training are we going to do?" Stjerne asked.

"You know your 'death stare of Doom?'" Ozpin asked, kneeling down in front of her.

"Yeah." Stjerne answered.

"Can you do it for me now?" He asked.

"But I can only do it when I'm mad." Stjerne felt more confused.

"Just try. Focus on the one thing that makes you mad and use that to make you angry." Ozpin said. He inwardly hoped he wouldn't have to provoke her into staring angrily, but fortunately, he didn't have to. Stjerne closed her eyes and thought back to yesterday, when that group of women had abused that fox faunus and talked about the teachers at Beacon. Stjerne opened her eyes, and the same flame shone in them, just as powerful and angry as before. It took some effort, but she kept it up until Ozpin allowed her to calm down.

"Good. Now I know how much of your power has awakened." Ozpin said.

"How much?" Stjerne asked.

"Not very much, thank heavens. But the older you get, the more power you will gain. You're safe for now." He stood up.

"Will it only happen when I get angry?" Stjerne asked, feeling a little panicked.

"Well, not always at your age. Your new power will rely solely on your emotions. Like I said, the older you get, the more power will awaken. When you reach the age of maturity, you will be given an Ōrajio, which will aid in controlling your powers. For now, we just have to train you until you reach the age of 15." Ozpin reassured her.

"I hope I don't use my powers to hurt you or the others." Stjerne looked up at Ozpin, her face displaying worry.

"Neither do I. Nor would they, as well as any other innocent bystander. But I don't think that will happen any time soon." Ozpin gave her a reassuring smile, making Stjerne feel reassured.

"So, what now?" She asked.

"Well, since your powers haven't awaken for now, I suppose you're safe for a while. We'll lay off the training until your powers start to awaken more. When you see that your powers awaken more, please come and tell me or the other teachers." Ozpin answered.

"Okay." Stjerne promised. Suddenly, she heard a meow. The kitten had followed Stjerne and Ozpin into the room. It sat on the doormat, watching everything.

"Wha? How did you end up down here?" Stjerne asked.

"I'm just as surprised as you are. How did you come across this cat anyway?" Ozpin shook his head.

"Oh yeah! I met this kitten outside. I was watching Mom wake up." Stjerne explained, realizing that Ozpin didn't know where the kitten came from.

"Wait, what do you mean when you say "Mom"?" Ozpin looked at Stjerne in a confused way.

"Somehow, I always felt like the sun was my Mom. Or rather, my mom was the sun. She was always so bright, and big and beautiful. When my Mom went on missions, she always told me to look at the rising sun and to think of her. She told me to look at the setting sun when it was getting late and to think of Dad." Stjerne recounted in her own childish way. Just hearing this made Ozpin felt sad all over again. He still felt that the role of father had been taken from Verusium by him, but he shook his head and reminded himself of what Glynda had said. Still, he couldn't hide the tears that started to form in his eyes.

"I...see." Ozpin wiped his eyes.

"Are you okay?" Stjerne asked, noticing Ozpin's hesitance. She stood up on the couch and, trying to get closer to Ozpin's level.

"Yes...I will be." Ozpin answered. Stjerne hugged Ozpin, trying to comfort him. Ozpin smiled sadly at Stjerne and hugged her back.

"You're like your mother in so many ways. Please never change Stjerne." He whispered, too quietly for her to hear. Stjerne sat back down, the kitten snuggling up to her.

"Whoa!!" Stjerne fell back down onto the couch.

"It seems your new friend has taken a liking to you." Ozpin laughed a bit.

"Yeah. Can I keep it Oz? Please?" Stjerne pleaded, giving him her best pleading face. The kitten looked up at Ozpin with it's cute baby kitten eyes, as if to be begging "please let this girl keep me!" Ozpin couldn't resist the cute looks the two were giving him.

"Alright. But you're responsible for this kitten. Whatever trouble it causes is on you." Ozpin said.

"Thank you!" Stjerne threw herself on Ozpin again. The kitten had jumped down and started purring and rubbing up against Ozpin.

"Hey Oz, I...." Qrow walked in, seeing the Stjerne and the kitten, "Okay. Do I want to know?"

"How did you know I was here?" Ozpin asked. Stjerne let go of her hug and sat back, with her new pet sitting next to her.

"Glynda told me." Qrow answered, taking a swig of his flask.

"How in the world did she know I was here?" Ozpin wondered. Stjerne shrugged her shoulders.

"I dunno." Qrow shook his head, "what's going on here anyway?"

"I was figuring out how much power has awakened in Stjerne." Ozpin answered.

"How much?" Qrow asked, leaning up against the wall.

"Not very much. I think they'll start to awaken when she's at the age 10 or 11." Ozpin mused.

"Heh. That's a relief." Qrow sat down on the other side of Stjerne, "where'd this mangy little beast come from?"

"This is my new pet! Meet Clockwork!" Stjerne pointed to the cat.

"You thought of a name already?" Ozpin asked, sitting down.

"Well, kinda." Stjerne shrugged.

"Heh. Do you even know what gender they are?" Qrow asked.

"No...." Stjerne shook her head. Ozpin picked up the kitten.

"It would seem Clockwork is a female. I hope we aren't due for a litter of kittens anytime soon." Ozpin set the kitten down.

"It's only a baby Oz. I don't think we have to worry." Qrow said.

"That's not what I meant, Qrow." Ozpin said, mentally facepalming himself. Stjerne placed the kitten on her lap

"I'll turn you into a warrior cat!" She said as she punched the air with her fist. The kitten meowed in agreement, rasing it's paw slightly. Oz and Qrow could barely refrain from laughing.

"I'm serious. I will turn Clockwork into a warrior cat." Stjerne gave the two men a deadpanned look.

"Good luck with that!" Qrow laughed. Irratated by Qrow's remark, Clockwork immediately jumped on his face and started scratching him. Qrow dropped his flask and started panicking. Even his aura couldn't protect him from Clockwork's lethal claws.

"Ack!!! Oz, a little help?!" He flailed his arms. Clockwork held on with an iron grip. Qrow started tripping and stumbling around. After a few minutes, Oz stood up and chased him, trying to help him. Instead, Clockwork started attacking him as well, jumping back and forth between the two men, scratching and meowing furiously. Stjerne giggled at the ridiculous scene that was unfolding before her. Suddenly, she spotted Qrow's flask on the ground and carefully snatched it up before she got knocked over. She jumped back on the couch, and started laughing as she watched the two men trying to get ahold of Clockwork, who was still going berserk. Glynda came in and was shocked to see the two men being attacked by a single kitten, and Stjerne laughing her heart out. She rolled her eyes and used her telekinese to pull the feisty kitten off of the two men. Qrow and Oz both had scratches on their face and hands. After calming it down a bit by petting it, Glynda gave the kitten back to Stjerne.

"I see you have somewhat of a warrior cat." She commented.

"Told you so!" Stjerne looked smugly at Ozpin and Qrow.

"We never should have doubted you." Qrow rubbed his face.

"Agreed." Ozpin sat down, giving the kitten a look-over, "I guess even the smallest of creatures have a strength as strong as that of a beast."

"Heh. She fought like a kitten would." Qrow scanned the ground, looking for his flask, "Has anyone seen Mr Flasky?" He asked.

"You mean this?" Stjerne held up Qrow's flask. Qrow stiffened up a bit. He didn't like it when other people handled his flask.

"Y-yeah... Mind giving it back..." Qrow reached for it, But Stjerne held it back.

"Sorry Qrow. But you have to catch me to get it!" Stjerne laughed as she ran. Much to Ozpin and Qrow's surprise, Stjerne managed to jump flamboyantly from the couch to a chair. Qrow scowled and turned into his Crow form. Stjerne seemed a bit shocked, but didn't flinch. Qrow proceeded to chase her around the room. This went on for a few minutes until Oz finally shook his head and grabbed Stjerne by the waist as she jumped by. Picking up on Ozpin's cue, Glynda suspended Qrow in mid-flight.

"Alright you two, That's enough." Ozpin laughed, taking Qrow's flask out of Stjerne's hands and holding it out to Qrow. He turned back into his human form and accepted the flask.

"Heh. Thanks Oz." Qrow sipped from it.

"When are you ever going to stop drinking that?" Glynda asked.

"How about, never." Qrow smirked, taking another chug.

"Glynda, you know it's impossible to stop Qrow from drinking." Ozpin grinned.

"Hey, I'm an adult, and I act like one." Qrow protested.

"We're both adults, and act like it, you mean." Oz corrected.

"If you ask me, you two act like a pair of kittens." Glynda rolled her eyes. Stjerne burst out laughing at this. Ozpin rolled his eyes and picked Stjerne up again, giving her a noogie.

"You think that's funny don't you?" He grinned.

"Stop stop stop stop!!" Stjerne laughed, failing her arms.

"Give her all you got!" Qrow urged.

"Oh don't worry, I will." Oz assured him. Glynda leaned against the door and watched Oz serve torture to Stjerne. She was glad that he was feeling better about Stjerne. She knew Ozpin had been worried before, but now he seemed determined to finish the daunting task of raising the young girl with him.

"Alright, that's enough. Pretty soon you'll be giving Stjerne hair tangles that will be impossible to brush out." Glynda stepped forward. Ozpin complied and loosened his hold on Stjerne, who scrambled out and rubbed her head.

"That kinda hurt." She giggled softly.

"Sorry. Next time, I won't be so hard." Ozpin sat back, rubbing her hair.

"You have such thick hair." Glynda gently held a strand in her hands, examining it, "how you managed to go through life with this much, escapes me."

"Mom said I was born with a lot of it too." Stjerne recalled.

"That's right. You were there when Stjerne was born, Glynda." Ozpin reminded her.

"Oh yeah." Glynda sat down on the other side of Stjerne.

"You were?!" Stjerne bounced a bit, excited at this new information.

"I was. I wasn't the only one. Peach was there was well. Along with Oobleck, Port and Ozpin." Glynda nodded.

"That's sooo cool! Does that mean you guys are really family to me then!" Stjerne looked between the teachers.

"Hmmm. I guess you can say we are, on a different level." Ozpin mused.

"Yes!!!" Stjerne hugged Ozpin again.

"I swear you are a hug monster, just like your mother." Glynda muttered. Ozpin just gave her a reassuring smile.

"Heh. You two look like a couple. Stjerne's gonna grow and be a mix of you two." Qrow laughed. Ozpin just deadpanned while Glynda used her Telekinesis to try and grab Qrow. Unfortunately, Qrow shapeshifted into a crow and flew off, aiming for the window. Glynda saw this and slammed the window shut, causing Qrow to smash right into the glass and fall to the ground.

"Is he alright?!" Stjerne panicked.

"He'll be fine. Qrow has suffered worse then this before." Ozpin said cheerfully. Meanwhile, Qrow had picked himself up and shapeshifted back into human form.

"Owww. Glynda! What the-" Glynda picked him up and slammed his head into the floor.

"Language Qrow. I know what you were about to say." Glynda said darkly.

"Ugh. Thanks a lot, Goodwitch." Qrow stood up, his hand on the wall for support.

"How did you do that?" Stjerne asked.

"Huh? Oh, you mean my crow form?" Qrow asked, catching on.

"Yeah! It's so cool!" Stjerne nodded.

"Huh. Well, that's a first. Anyway, You can thank Ozzy for my crow form." Qrow gestured at Ozpin.

"Huh?" Stjerne looked back at Ozpin.

"Well, it's a bit complicated. I hate to ask, but can I answer that question later?" Ozpin asked, feeling a bit uncomfortable.

"For now, just say that it's magic." Glynda filled in.

"Okay. I guess that works." Stjerne shrugged. Ozpin gave Glynda a grateful look.

"One thing I wanna know. Why weren't you scared when I shapeshifted? Most people freak out if they catch me shape-shifting." Qrow asked, sitting himself down on the ground.

"I just wasn't. Sure it was weird, but it didn't scare me." Stjerne answered. Clockwork climbed on her lap, begging for her attention with her purring, to which Stjerne responded by petting Clockwork.

"Heh. Well, I'll say you were the first person who didn't freak out when they see that." Qrow laughed a bit.

"Stjerne will have to grow used to seeing magic in action. She will be using magic of her own in the future." Ozpin said quietly.

"Then let us hope and pray that she will be ready when that day comes." Glynda agreed.

"Amen." Qrow raised his flask in agreement.

"I hope I'll be ready too." Stjerne looked at Ozpin.

"I'm sure you will be." Ozpin reassured her, rubbing her hair affectionately....

_______________

Yep, here's part 6. More on the way. Hope you guys are enjoying this so far.

@phoenix-no, @saiyoyuutsume, @aquarius-power

[astralescent]

Art credit [x]

I confess this is long overdue, I said years ago I would do one for 300, then 400, and when I got to 500 I barely had the time to think about it before I was at 550... anyway, you get the idea. I don’t know where you guys keep coming from, but man am I glad to see you. It’s thanks to all of you this blog is still kicking well into its third year and I’m honestly so thankful this blue prince can still instigate some interest.

There are some people I want to give a special shout-out to, however, because they keep me motivated to get online every day and do what I do more than most. 

@ofimitations / @windsadept / @felinae / @birdballads / @larchangele​ ; This is probably getting repetitive at this point, but you still deserve a mention more than anyone else. You were there long before this journey started and I hope you’ll be there long after. I still very much admire how well you can grasp the characterization of any muse you dare pick up and, of course, your talent for art. Hopefully you keep sharing those with me for many more years to come. You’ve been the greatest friend I could have hoped for and a reliable enabler, supporter and reminder that someone somewhere does enjoy the effort I put into this character - on top of being an outstanding roleplay partner and writer. Together we ride -- and that’s an understatement.

@radiantxhero ; you were the first person I met through this blog and definitely the one to have the biggest influence on it. On day one, we had an immediate connection both ooc and through roleplay, and I knew I could count on you to push my writing and characterization to the next level. I was right in the sense that there’s little I haven’t done with you. Our muses have come much farther together than I had ever expected them to, and I’ve found a friend I know I can always confide in and who will never give up on me, no matter what.

@miracleblossom​ ; you let me into your sanctuary, quite literally, and that’s something I’ll never stop being thankful for. Not only is it the side of this community I like best, but you also turned out to be a very good friend, and I love getting to geek out over games and movies with you - as scarce as it is nowadays. I’ll never forget the early botw days, or our few movie nights, and you’ll always be one of the best things that happened to this community in my opinion - no matter how sparse your activity becomes.

@caraidean​ ; you honestly restored my faith in multi-muse blogs. It’s so refreshing to see someone who’s so dedicated in developing them based on canon rather than collecting them for the heck of it, and to have them all be treated with the same amount of effort. It’s admirable, really, how well you manage to do them all justice, on top of being an excellent partner in general when it comes to plotting and writing long, relevant threads. I hope you stick around for a bit because I’m so excited for the couple of things we have planned. I’m definitely glad I found you and hopefully I can live up to your expectations.

@bladeoath ; I haven’t forgotten you and all you’ve done for me when I was first getting into this blog; pushing me to live up to your writing but also encouraging and reassuring me regarding my first language handicap. You more than anyone taught me to keep my head up and just do what I love no matter if it pleases other people, and I’ll never forget that. You can disappear for months and keep switching blogs but you’ll always be my Lucina, and you’ll always be my friend.

@recklessmoon​ / @galdrxr​ ; we may not see much of you these days but I still love your muses and your writing to bits, and it’s always a treat when you show up in the server on discord. I hope you’re doing well and I that we can see more of you sooner than later.

@pueravem​ / @absolutely-peachy​ ; our interactions may be kept to a minimum but you’re still one of the first Smash blogs that stuck out to me as someone that was here to stay, and I don’t forget people who reached out to me when I was at my lowest. I know real life can get in the way, but you’re truly one of the most positive presences in the community and I hope you’ll continue to be for a while.

@madkingtrashking​ ; I know you’re probably very aware of this at this point, but you are such a refreshing presence on the dash, the way you care about your muse despite how most people feel about him is admirable, and you deserve more recognition for the work you put into him.

@naglfcr / @delleal​ ; I may have only found you recently but I love how you go about portraying your muses. I can easily agree with how you think of them for the most part, and I very much enjoy your interventions on discord.

@dawnpriiestess​ ; I fell in love with your Micaiah instantly - though I believe I already told you that, so things could only get better when you joined the chat and I got to see you were a really cool and creative person on top of a good writer. Here’s to hoping you stay with us for a bit, I really like having you around.

@radiantwill​ ; a weird egg, but a good one. I already told you how much I love your portrayal of Ike, but I should also point out the intensity and sincerity with which you write is just as phenomenal. I’ve found in you a very relatable roleplayer and person, too, and I can’t wait to get started on those few shenanigans we talked about.

@clericallis​ ; we’ve barely scratched the surface of our first thread, but I can already tell I love how much you care for your muse. It shows in your writing, but also in the way you speak of him, and I’m looking forward to seeing more of both.

@valflame​ ; my biggest regret is admittedly not clicking that follow button earlier; I absolutely adore how you don’t back down from situations where your muse’s more ‘negative’ qualities need to be put forward. It’s amazing to finally see someone bold enough to portray a villain in all their flaws and complexity instead of shying away and caring only about making him them look good. I hope neither of you ever lose that fire, and that I’ll still be here to see it for some time. I know you get this a lot, but if anyone in this fandom makes me want to play fe4, it’s you.

@heroismdreams ; you’re doing amazing sweetie. honestly, you deserve all the love and attention coming your way, your cynthia is incredible. I can safely say this is the best second gen portrayal I’ve seen since leaving the fe13 community, and I love how sincere your writing is and how willing you are to reach out to the FE community beyond Awakening.

@ardent-lux​ ; our interactions have been minimal up to this point, but it’s still a treat to be following you and to see you on the dash. You’re both an impressive artist and a talented writer, and you have one of the best developed OCs I’ve had the privilege to see on this website. 

@daein-liberation​ ; you deserve a shout-out if only because the Dawn Brigade deserves more development and appreciation, and I’m glad you’re providing that for us, and doing so with great accuracy, at least from what I’ve observed. I also enjoy how interactive you can be - it really brings the dash to life which I was missing before I found you.

@tikiwiki​ ; I don’t care how long you’re away or that you may never return, you’ll always be my Tiki and I will never stop hoping you’ll be back.

[spamzineglasgow]

(REVIEW) Pain Journal Issue 3

In this review, Maria Sledmere draws out the material poetics of intimacy, glimmer, memory and salt in issue 3 of Pain Journal, from Partus Press, asking what kinds of dream-writing and ecopoetics we might find among the tangle, the camaraderie, the trace.

> Pain is an immaculate journal of new poetry and short, creative essays, edited by Vala Thorodds and Luke Allan, published by Partus Press and designed by Studio Lamont. Folding out the cover of issue 3, you’ll find an epigraph from Robert Creeley’s ‘The Flower’: ‘Pain is a flower like that one, / like this one, / like that one, / like this one’. Pain is a making, a sap, a sort of seedling and fruiting of where we are in the years. It likens itself to more than we’d tend to acknowledge. A blood, a fur of skin, a flower. It’s such a luxury to hold issue 3 in its peachy, matte dust jacket, admiring the beautiful type and the list of contributors. There’s an air of the covetable to Pain: maybe it’s the print quality, maybe it’s the poetry, maybe it’s the curation. I think it’s also something to do with the cover, dominated by the sans serif title PAIN: when I read this walking in the street, I make some kind of statement. It feels charged with the ambiguity of some high fashion statement, and yet what lucky readers are we that something of the contents may tell the pain — we don’t just wear it.

> Where to start! These are lush poems of communication, intimacy, sensation. Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir’s ‘Gleam & delicacies’ is a surreal and elliptical lyric of superstitious glimmer. Poetry as ‘a trap for the superstitions’. I find myself googling what a ‘glowfruit’ is and find some reddit discussions around the appearance of ‘glowfruit trees’ in Sims games. There’s this line, ‘I still have wild glowfruit trees. Do you?’, which feels like a summons, a challenge. Enter into this logic with me, where the one-time event of the glowfruit’s arrival has seeded the game’s eternal time. Someone comments, ‘They seem kind of random to me’. I had forgotten the magic of games and their luxurious richness and dream logic of glitches and hacks and splintered paths of narrative. Perhaps my childhood adoration of Sega and Nintendo was my way into poetry. The opening veils of an overlain world. Sigurðardóttir’s poetics have that quality of drifting between rooms and scenes, or falling between bodies and scales by one gesture of a linebreak, the slide of a button control, ‘I give birth to suns / for the morning hoax / slippery planets’. It reminds me of David O’Reilly’s video game, Everything, where you can move between a roving shrub, a celestial body and an oil rig in the space of ten minutes. What is meant by a ‘nighthaired waiter’? There is a dream-hand that extends to our proprioceptive venturing, that offers casual refusal (‘I didn’t come here to toothbrush the wolf’) by way of assembling the real and its purpose. The real which feels more like a ‘silhouette’.

> Significant, perhaps, that this poem of mirror-tricks and shimmers stands opposite Ruby Silk’s ‘Re:’, a poem that takes the banal conceit of email and pulling on tights in the swimming pool changing room to figure something of desire and its thirst. ‘we communicate drily’, the poem begins, ending with a slide on the nature of being quenched, on the question. Both poems forego punctuation, and more or less carry themselves on the turns of language: objects form a multiple syntax of moving between. Their cleanness on the page is perhaps what makes them gleam, they seem to hold their own. The gleam is present elsewhere in the issue, with Eloise Hendy’s ‘scrubland’ beginning, in the manner of Marianne Moore moving into Plath territory, ‘i too have a gleaming future. / a future like a fish scale, the eye / of a small bird’. Trauma or remembered pain is a matter of scale(s) and perception, of the body and its existential whittling, whitening. The speaker asks about whiteness, light, memory and dream: ‘all that spilt milk. all that gleaming’. You could say the gleam is metonymy for shame, the beaming cheeks, the sense of glowing or almost burning there in the situation. No capitals, a whittling. The idea of ‘nonsense’ itself, whittling down to the first gleam, its tender origin: ‘as a girl i was very soft’. The way the lines and stanzas slip, enjambed between, the idea of a passing through. The speaker offers her hurts: her fish eye, her pale appetite, her starved future, her dreams of fish bones and choking. ‘be gentle with me’, she implores. I think of this line from the film Lady Bird (2018), after Lady Bird loses her virginity under a pretence of shared experience and the boy Kyle is like ‘Do you have any awareness about how many civilians we’ve killed since invasion in Iraq started?’ and she replies, ‘SHUT UP. SHUT UP. Different things can be sad. It’s not all war’. ‘as an adult i am softer still’, Hendy writes, as though softening herself into the palest ghost and somehow becoming defiant, ‘my hand / is an arrowhead. a future / like a fish eye’.

> It’s no surprise that Pain is tinged with other existential tremors, those of the body and the world, of ecology and domesticity, of sex and dust. Helen Charman’s ‘In the pocket of Big Pig’ wears high theory cool on its sleeve as it sweeps into the muck and dirt of where we are. The movement of ‘manmade’ materials into the ‘natural’ is an aesthetic act: ‘Plastic / can holders entwine themselves around the / sea kelp — to tame and smooth frizz’. In that em-dash I feel the lines reaching out, the kelp and the twine and the human arms, the bristles. Does poetry do more than brush back the mess of the world, or tease it back into static? What are the ethics of pain’s poetic entanglement?

    ecopoets try again and again to convince us of the whiteness of the snow drift. I like            muddy ducklings               dirty reedbeds

                                                          (Charman, ‘In the pocket of Big Pig’)

If ‘muddy ducklings’ has that childlike assonance of storybook rhyme, ‘dirty reedbeds’ feels adult, insistent, dark. The place where you tangle and possibly drown. Turning away from the pristine ‘snow drift’ that pulls us into the picturesque, an ecopoetics that continues the aesthetic throwback of nature poetry before it, this is an anthropocene poetics of living in a fraught, affectively entangled now: ‘I think we’re nostalgic for more than VHS when we / fuck in front of the Blue Planet poster misty-eyed as if / we’ll ever get to show the oceans to our own kids’. Sex is ambivalently yoked to procreation in the ‘misty-eyed’ act of fucking to get back to something primal, deep and planetary. The world as it once supposedly was and exists now mostly as mediation: scenes on tv, posters for Blue Planet. And the word ‘fuck’ for sex that feels iterative rather than tender, two bodies trying to make something of what they have, an intensified point in time and space, a mediation or trace of each other.

> A similar kind of iterative sweetness and friction occurs in Jack Underwood’s ‘Behind the Face of Great White Shark’, where some new entry to the ecosystem upsets the home, ‘Since we brought you home from the hospital / I have begged these hours to a stub’. Enter the metaphoric playground of sharks and dogs, worms, rats, beans and bananas. Something of this new love, the baby perhaps, the shark or the tender thirsty thing at dawn, is a hurt: ‘I admit I have been sick / since we met, pursuing this love-wound / like a moon beyond the windscreen’. A love you’d drive to all through the night, to arrive back where you started, chaste in your own ‘dawn kitchen’ with a moony look in your eye. I think of Dorothea Lasky’s ‘wild lyric I’, the one she discusses in her new book Animal: this playful and manipulative ‘metaphysical I’ that ‘can harness all fragmented senses of self and use them whenever it needs to’. Underwood’s I thrashes like a shark on the sick shores of a new love, a birthing tide, dark and light. An I that threatens violence, desire from all angles and limbs ‘fucking ambidextrously��; an I that ‘can keep you safe inland’, that pulls you into its glow, for this is just ‘the lesser work of living’.

> It is tricky to identify highlights from a journal where, as with amberflora (whose sensibilities resonate here), the selections are impeccable: focused, resonant, but also lovely alone. Nina Mingya Powles’ ‘The Harbour’ has something of Clarice Lispector’s radiance, pressed into a teeming poetics of its own. Its section titles add an epistolary quality, italicised as they are, ‘Dear whales,’, ‘Dear dreamer,’. Post-Arika, with all talk of Moby Dick and the mathematics of the whale, it seems these cetaceans are having a real moment. Powles’ address to the whale is elegiac, ‘I can pinpoint all the places you have died, / where I’ve buried you’. She’s putting pressure on the work of metaphor, the whale as so much more than whale, the whale as what cannot be contained, the whale that cannot contain itself. Her whale is more of a comrade, a friend:

When I looked out of the train and saw your deep blue body and you saw mine you stayed close to me, swimming alongside. We were both travelling home.

What if ecopoetics, or anthropocene poetics, were something more like this surprising camaraderie? Does it matter whether the encounter was imagined or actually happened? Running through Pain is this suffering silk with its shadows and texture of echo and gleam, ‘the dream is wet skin against her hands / the fact is echolocation’ (Powles). I’ve been thinking about what the tensile ethics of this fugitive touch are: the touch of the image, the whale and the speaker on the train, the relative distance of speed and time between them, the hospitality she extends to the animal she is also. ‘I’ll show you my mother’s potted orchids’, in a world where to cross one human threshold is to know that later the sea will be deep enough for you once more. Pain asks how much of each other we need to hold. There’s this passage from Hélène Cixous’ novel Hyperdream (2006) that speaks to this:

I hear it, I hear a murmur your skin speaks, a blood thinks, I hear your thought running under the skin I hear your life thinking under the neat eternal spotless silk. I read with my life. I am torn. At the same time I am healed and glued back together again. During this time the world suffers and dies [...]

What is the murmur of our speaking skins, our thinking blood? The body that dreams? One pain can open the next, there’s a gesture of infinity, the way that Anne Boyer identifies in her ‘meditation on modern illness’, The Undying (2019): ‘My new calamity meant it was possible to feel every cell at once and, in these, every mitochondrion, and that it was possible, too, to have a millionfold shitshow of sensations in locations newly realised’. To have your body illumined, intensified, surged to the end of each nerve and cell with this searing consciousness. When I had shingles, I felt real dreams; they seemed to extend to a million tips, concentrated in clusters on the skin of my belly. Real dreams/real hurt. Is a body in pain the body that dreams the most, from her almost-paralysis in sensory excess? I think poems like Powles are asking these questions, declaring, spacing, opening up, leaving us on the brink of a blank that is its own quiet sublime, ‘everything is so !’. And if ‘the fact is letting go’, what of the fact have we been holding all along? Is this like Creeley, gesturing towards this or that flower, as a way of describing, to insist on it. Something we ask as children: does a flower or a plant feel pain? Pain, pain. There it is in the world, it just is, like a flower, or something more tiny and abrasive, salt after salt. A period.

> Rowland Bagnall’s essay ‘The Metal We Call Salt’ closes the journal with a meditation on the poetry of Philip Levine and Elizabeth Bishop, writers who ‘[address] the delicate failure of poetry to say the things which can’t be said’. This is Creeley, surely, with the flowers which stand for the shapeless pain. I’m reminded of a line from Rachael Allen’s ‘Kingdomland’: ‘the glass and salt my crooked pathway; impassable glass and salt’. The glittering remainders which excoriate the entry and exit of threshold, painful debris of the sea. This is the ‘tantalising’ poetics that Bagnall writes of, words that ‘say that they are lost for words’, words that gift and withhold by their material gesture: words that carry traces of what they may be. Salt-tanged and gleaming as glass. ‘What got revealed when the layers of leaves / Were blown backwards?’ Ralf Webb asks, in his ‘Three Sonnets’. What is it to walk over the crunching ‘pathway’ of such poems for pain, ana-cathartic as they move into, above, through, around and from the wound and its ferric sting? The essay also looks at the paintings of John Salt and photographs of Mark Ruwedel, considering how as a preservative and purifier, salt as both an archival and corrosive mineral: art as what consumes and reveals, what glints with the not yet spoken. Salt in the wound for pain will sting, but it will clear. These poems are such interfusions, sweetness and dreams, the ‘torn’: healed and suffering of a life and a world, coming over. And, for just a while, Pain will hold you together, soft in its peachy embrace.

Pain issue 3 is out now and available to purchase here.

~

Text: Maria Sledmere

Published: 5/1/20

[ideunjo-blog]

𝐋𝐀 𝐋𝐀 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄.

──  january 2019. ──  on-set of romantic and idol. ──  word count, 1,152. ──  points earned, +5 exp, +5 sp.

"what's my ideal type of man...”

eunjo repeated in a murmured breath, pupils dilating ever-so gently as she dreamed up specific traits and attributes that she deemed ‘ideal’ in a romantic partner. these questions were already beginning to feel so shallow and silly, but she knew that they needed to be answered as finding love was the sole purpose of this newly green-lit televised event. being that aurora as a group was known for mediocre variety appearances, their main vocal had a lot riding on her shoulders; midas media placing her in this position in hopes of changing the minds of the general public. truth be told, she was glad that she was apart of a female collective that was regarded for their voices, and their dancing, as opposed to their visuals or personalities, but she understood that having the full package in any predicament was optimal... she was just questioning why she, out of all the beauties in her group, was the one who was carefully selected to embark on this wild journey to change the minds of the general public. despite being given an image that marketed her as the damsel-in-distress that all heroes longed to rescue from peril, or as the pixie dream girl that’s easy to fall for, she wasn’t at all confident in her approach to dating — the opposite sex often intimidating her more than intriguing her. 

she’s always considered herself a romantic at heart, but she’s seldom had the opportunities to explore that side of herself. after all, she started the her trainee experience at the fresh of thirteen — at the very beginning of where most girls would begin to navigate their way through rosy pools of hormones, or where they’d start to receive love letters from boys who longed to get to know them. with that in mind, she genuinely had no clear idea as to what’s worked for her, and what hasn’t. sure, a minimum amount of ex-boyfriends have accumulated within the last few years, but not enough to make a difference on her thoughts toward the matter. so, while the query seems simple enough, for eunjo, it’s a bit more complicated, but alas, with all of those thoughts in mind, she inhaled and exhaled a deep breath; shrugging her alabaster shoulders delicately as a mellifluous chuckle lilted from betwixt her peachy, glossed lips.

“i suppose, above all else, i’d love a man who listens to me well, and who is more caring in his nature.” she began, long lashes fluttering closed for a second as she painted vivid imagery in her mind; the thought of sharing evenings with someone that showed her attention making her smile. “what matters the most to me is a man that is earnest, and kind; someone that i’ll happily introduce to my father and brothers who i know they will like. i’d like to think that i’m not really particular when it comes to someone’s exterior appeal, but of course, someone who dresses well and takes care of himself is an added bonus!” the chanteuse divulged, a roseate blush painting over the apples of her cheeks; revealing itself even through the layers of bb cream and powder that enhanced her features. “really, though, i’d like anyone that is in touch with his inner child and his feminine side. i wouldn’t want someone that was afraid to show emotions, or who was afraid to have fun. i hope this doesn’t seem as if i’m asking for a lot, but... overall, to me, a golden heart and a diamond personality matters a lot more than dashing looks.”

hopefully her answer wasn’t deemed too politically correct or vanilla, but it was the truth; she’d be happy to date anyone that treated her well, no matter who they were. however, when the questions shifted onto what types of dates she’d prefer to go on, this is where she thought she’d have more fun — the options being nearly endless. “oh, these are easy! as cliché as these may sound, i’ve always adored the idea of going on hikes with a lover; preferably with a lovely picnic in tow! i think getting together to make the food that goes in the basket, and supporting one another over the rough terrain of the mountains until a scenic destination is found, and shared with one another, is very romantic. it’ll also test the relationship a lot, too.” eunjo began, becoming lost in her fantasies. “i mean, if one of you is afraid of heights, or uncomfortable at all, you would ideally have the other to guide you through it. in that sense, it’ll help you build trust with one another, and i think that that’s really special, and pivotal, in how a loving relationship thrives.” deciding to delve into more possibilities, the budding singer-songwriter combed her manicured fingernails though her long, waved tresses; feeling more at ease now. “it’s also been a dream of mine to climb atop a large building in the city and watch the sunrise with someone i care about a lot; maybe even share a kiss as soon as day breaks.” a playful wink was sent to the lens of the camera before she was overcome with embarrassment; collapsing her head into the palms of her heads as stifled laughter poured from her.

was this going to be a great circumstance for her to show off her variegated charms? truth is, she had no idea... but she did her best not to make an absolute fool of herself during this first filming session. her first few takes seemed to have a nice flow to them — at least in her own opinion — so she hoped that the audience received her well. that was the whole point if this, after all. then, in what seemed to be a lot sooner than she realized, she was led to the final portion of what she was asked to do: to select a date location to enjoy with an unknown partner. of all the options listed, one seemed to fit her interests a whole lot, so with confidence, she smiled wide and nodded her head. “of all these great choices, i’m going to have to choose the vr room and arcade. i’m a huge lover of video games, and i think it’d be fun to play them with someone else! i just hope i won’t end up being too competitive...” eunjo lamented, eager to see who she will eventually be paired with, and hoping that this venture wouldn’t besmirch her squeaky clean image. the last thing she’d want is to be the cause of drama but she’s doing her best to remain optimistic — knowing that this should be more fun than stressful. so, she’s looking forward to dipping her toes into variety more, and who knows? maybe she’ll emerge as aurora’s new variety queen when all is said and done!

one can only hope, anyway.

[yasashiiku]

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