#(This was a set I meant to add further commentary to but as of now Im honestly kind of too tired to so clearing it out of queue)

[heesdreamer]

YOU MAKE ME

PAIRING ➩ heeseung x reader

SUMMARY ➩ struck with insomnia your entire life, you’ve taken to exploring the city restless all night. things change when you meet a tall boy with tired eyes and bruised knuckles

WARNINGS ➩ heeseung is lowkey crazy and obsessed with reader, parental death and abuse and implied violence, sexual scenes and commentary, mental health talk (especially insomnia)

WC ➩ 17k

AUTHORS NOTE ➩ (i lied lol part 2 soon) NOOO PART 2 plz don’t request im so serious i rlly love this story and it’s completed it has nothing else to add! im glad you guys enjoy my work enough to want more but when there is no feedback in ur comment and just “need part 2” when i spent so much time writing 13k+ words it makes me feel terrible lol. i rlly hope you love this as much as me (NOT PROOFREAD)

Your mother used to tell you that she thought you were born from a piece of the moon.

When you were old enough to understand her and her strange sayings, she’d tell you stories about how when you were a baby you’d never sleep through a night. She looked mystified as she explained to you the ways in which you’d gain energy every time the sun set, becoming whiny and ornery whenever she’d take you with her to run errands during the day.

She told you how you struggled in school for most of your early years, always being found curled up in your backpack cubby or under the slides at the playground because you hadn’t gotten enough sleep the night before.

You always were much more cynical than your mother, less of a dreamer and typically prone to aggravation or grumpy tired mumbles. She’d tell you your connection with the moon was a blessing, a lifelong friend for you and you’d retort back that it was a nuisance.

When your mom died you finally realized what she had meant for the first time. You spent nights awake, like usual, but now they were accompanied by nothing but the sounds of your low sobs and your father drinking himself stupid just below your bedroom. It wasn’t until you cracked open your bedroom window for some fresh winter air did you catch sight of the moon and finally feel it, finally feel the connection you’d always been told you had.

Years had passed now and while you didn’t cry every night anymore, you still rarely found yourself able to sleep through the night.

You’d also turned your back on the moon again now that you were older and still just as restless, sleeping throughout your classes and lacking any social life considering the way you wandered through the halls like a ghost with sunken eyes and dark circles.

It was frustrating to you that nothing seemed to be working, no amount of teas or yoga exercises. You’d gone as far as to take prescribed sleep medication, only working enough to make you more exhausted than you already were yet not putting you to rest like you were longing for.

Years of trying and you’ve mostly given up, accepted your condition and never once considered it the blessing your mother had tried to convince you it was.

Blessings wouldn’t leave your bones aching, they wouldn’t leave you slow blinking trying to understand what your teachers were saying or stumbling holding your lunch tray. Blessings surely wouldn’t have you stood in the middle of a dirty 7/11, clutching three bags of chips and a large slushee while you impatiently waited for the two people in front of you to move along.

You’d realized a few things by being a night owl, only ever interacting with people having the same issue as you or people who worked early enough that you’d pass by them on your way back to your house.

You’d taken to spending your nights awake out in the city, sick of staring at your ceiling or scrolling down the same boring timelines that carried nothing but the same content posted thousands of times with different wordings. So you started to explore at some point during high school, each night pushing yourself to wander further and find something interesting before heading back.

Sometimes you ended up at the river, sitting and watching drunk older men laugh with their friends like they were teenagers, catching the ends of failed dates as they walked home with their heels in their hands.

Other times you sat and drank coffee in the few 24 hour shops scattered around the city, sipping it slowly until it was cold and the added sugar was hardening at the bottom of your paper cup.

Most times however you simply found yourself stood in this exact position, holding your snacks of choice and tapping your foot impatiently while you waited for the drunk college students in front of you to stop joking around with the exhausted cashier and pay for their beers. It wasn’t that late yet, not quite the time of night that got you weird stares for wandering around in your pajamas.

You could hear the cashiers tired voice repeating their total to them, asking if they wanted to pay with cash or card and you sighed softly. You tilted to the side with an exaggerated sway so you could see over their laughing bodies, vaguely meeting eyes with the boy behind the counter before flopping back to your original position.

A heavy sigh was slipping out of your mouth before you even realized it and one of the drunk men turned back to look at you, an eyebrow cocked in offense as he let out a nasty laugh after taking you in.

You were pretty used to that reaction, standing in your plaid pajamas with your favorite bunny slippers and knitted hat. Your eyes were low and heavy with sleep deprivation, an annoyed glint to your expression that seemed to aggravate him further once the glare was set towards him.

“Are we bugging you Ms?” He was asking it in a mockingly sweet tone, clearly antagonizing you due to your impatience. You sighed again and your eyes drifted to the side for a moment in indifference, too exhausted to hold a conversation let alone argue with a grown man who didn’t know how to behave in a public setting.

“Yeah.. a little bit.” You were casually mumbling after a few beats of him and his friend staring at you, realizing now they weren’t going to just let you go without a response.

He was scoffing like it was the craziest thing he’d ever heard and you felt a little jolt of your inner alert system when he was taking a step towards you, his much larger frame slightly intimidating on top of the fact he was drunk and not thinking clearly.

He stopped early in his advances however and you were confused for a second before you registered the sound of the cashier clearing his throat, the two men turning back to look at him with an incredulous look. When you’d first gotten a glimpse of him he’d been bent over the counter, his elbows resting against it with a bored expression but now that he was standing up to his full height you faltered a bit at how tall he was.

The two men seemed to be thinking the same thing as you, suddenly hesitant in their childish behavior and awkwardly handing him a wadded up bill before taking their case of beer and staggering out of the convenience store.

“Thanks.” You were muttering and dumping your snacks out onto the counter, awkwardly catching one of the candy bars that bounced off a bag of chips and almost fell back onto the ground.

“No problem.” He was responding back with a small shrug and you glanced at him curiously, scanning his tired eyes down to the work uniform that didn’t fit him properly.

“You’re not Jake.” You were announcing and he faltered in his scanning, eyes widening a touch as he looked down at you. He was wearing a name tag but you came by often enough to know that it wasn’t his own, never having seen him before and growing used to the friendly smile the usual third shifter would give you every time you dragged yourself in.

“Uh.. no. I’m not, yeah you’re right.” He was awkwardly muttering back and you almost felt bad for calling him out so directly so you laughed a bit to ease the tension, just as awkward considering you weren’t used to extended social interaction this late at night. “He had a concert he couldn’t miss.. asked me to take over.”

You were nodding softly, mouth parting in understanding and awkwardly shuffling while the conversation quickly died into a weird silence. The sounds of your slippers against the tiled floor was scratchy and too loud for your taste, making you wince slightly at how embarrassing this whole interaction was.

“Are you getting paid?” You don’t know why you asked him another question, why you were carrying on a conversation when it’d been years since you’d had one randomly like this but you liked the way his big eyes flickered back up to you.

“Yeah of course.” He was breaking out into a wide grin at the mention of it, finishing scanning your snacks and looking at the register for a second like he’d forgotten what to do next. “I’m normally up all night anyways so I don’t mind much.”

This piqued your interest but you kept your face neutral, nodding softly and picking at the peeling leather of your wallet while you waited for him to give you your total. He was looking up at you again before he spoke and his eyes landed on your hat for a second, still smiling softly as he looked at the knitted bunny ears.

You cleared your throat and he stopped staring, stammering out how much it had cost you and you slid a few bills over to him while watching the way he fumbled around trying to get the register to open.

“Well… have a good night then.” You were mumbling to him while grabbing the plastic bags he was handing you over the clear divider, your fingers brushing against his warm knuckles for a second. “Not Jake.”

“Goodnight.” He was casually saying back and you wanted to correct him on his wording and tell him you didn’t sleep much either, tell him you understood filling your nights with mindless task and the dark circles under his big eyes. Instead you just bit the inside of your cheek and turned to leave. “Have fun wandering.”

——

You’d left early the next night, starting your walk around midnight instead of the usual 3am and you hurried down to the bus stop that would take you deep into the city. You pulled your headphones on tight and chewed on your lip as you waited for the stop you were planning to get off at.

When you got there, you were tugging on the stop signal line and standing up before the driver pulled the brakes. You swayed slightly when he came to a complete stop and you thanked him as you hopped off the high step, speed walking towards your destination and adjusting your bunny hat on your head before you passed through the doors.

The loud chime of the stores entrance bell rang uncomfortably loud through your ears and you winced at the volume, ducking behind one of the tall shelves and grabbing a few snacks at random before making your way over to the register.

Jake was there again now, giving you that familiar greeting smile and you couldn’t help but feel a small wave of disappointment. You weren’t sure why you thought the boy from last night would be back again considering he’d clearly told you he was just filling in for his friend but you frowned slightly and mumbled a greeting to the boy in front of you instead.

“You’re here early.” Jake was starting and you almost sighed. He was friendly and you admired how much energy he had but he often tried to engage in conversation with you whenever you came by, despite the annoyed glances you occasionally threw his way. “You almost missed me.”

You picked your head up at this, suddenly more alert and raising an eyebrow towards him in interest. As far as you knew, Jake was the only third shift worker and he must’ve barely started considering how early in the night it still was so he must’ve meant he was leaving before his usual time.

“Who’s going to watch the store then?” You were asking him and you tried to ignore how knowing the smile he was giving you was, laughing slightly at the fact you were suddenly interested in what he had to say for the first time ever.

“My best friend, Heeseung.” He was responding slowly and you faltered slightly, not knowing the boy from yesterday’s name so you didn’t want to get too excited over nothing. “He helped me out last night and said it was more interesting than he expected so he offered again.”

“He offered?” You were speaking before he even finished his last syllable and you flushed with embarrassment at the look he gave you, shuffling awkwardly on your feet and waiting for him to respond now that you confirmed it was the same person.

He didn’t say anything but he gave a soft hum of agreement and continued to swiftly bag your snacks, much more natural and efficient than his friend but you liked the way Heeseung stared at the register like it was an alien object. You were interested in him just from the small conversation you had, although feeling uncomfortable at the emotion considering it wasn’t something you usually felt.

You chalked it down to the fact he reminded you of yourself, not so much in his lazy smiles and casual demeanor but something about the way his tired eyes looked around.

Jake was opening his mouth again to speak and you looked up at him curiously but you both froze at the sound of the entrance bell ringing again, looking over to see the boy in question entering.

He froze when he saw the two of you staring at him, eyes falling to your hat and then down to your face which caused his to flicker with recognition. He cleared his throat and scratched the back of his neck, looking even taller now that he wasn’t standing behind the counter.

Heeseung was wearing a large hoodie pulled over his head and you could see the wires of his headphones going down into his shirt, tangled around his wrist that was clutching onto the strap of the backpack he was wearing. It was light looking and you weren’t sure if he had anything inside it or if he was just carrying it to give himself something to hold onto.

“Hey.” Jake was smiling at him and simultaneously handing you your plastic bag full of random snacks, hitting you with the reminder you had no real reason to stay in the store now despite the fact Heeseung had just arrived.

“Um.. thanks.” You were awkwardly muttering and taking it from him, shifting a few steps towards the door but stopping when you realized the tall boy was still standing in front of it and you had no way around him.

He was watching you still with a curious expression and you felt embarrassed suddenly, knowing Jake must have pieced together your reason for coming here so early and now he was watching you clam up and leave before you’d even gotten the chance to speak a word to the boy.

You were just standing there in silence, waiting for him to move and silently praying he would do you didn’t have to awkwardly shuffle around his large frame, when he suddenly was adjusting the backpack on his shoulders and clearing his throat while looking past you towards his friend.

“Change of plans. I’m busy tonight.” He was saying in a low determined voice and you could hear Jake sigh from behind you, your eyes widening slightly in confusion until the other boy was looking back at you with a small smile on his face. “Want to hang out with me?”

It took a few seconds for you to register he was actually asking you, staring up at him with an open mouth and stuttering for a moment before giving up on a verbal answer and nodding your head swiftly. He smiled even more at that and then he was waving goodbye to his friend, turning back around and holding the door open for you so you could quickly scurry out of it.

You weren’t too sure what to do, still feeling too nervous to speak clearly so you paused and waited to see if he would say something first. He didn’t but he lifted an eyebrow and gave you an expectant look, silently telling you that you were in charge of your destination for the night.

The pressure of a decision made you sigh softly and you gave him a weird look that made him chuckle, thinking for a moment before turning on your heel and walking away. He jogged slightly to catch up with you and you walked in comfortable silence for a few moments.

“Can I ask where we are going?” He was eventually mumbling, leaning down and towards you slightly so you could hear him at his low volume. Your lip curled up at the fact he was whispering for no reason.

“You don’t trust me?” You were asking him back and your teasing attitude seemed to catch him off guard for a second, raising his hands in mock defense and cocking an eyebrow in challenge.

“I do trust you actually, weirdly.” He paused and you could feel him looking sideways at you. You ignored his gaze and kept facing forward, following the sidewalk that was cutting through the park near the river. “Considering you don’t even know my name.”

You almost replied telling him that you did know his, that you’d been repeating it in your mind since Jake had informed you of it in the store but you figured that would be too forward and instead you just hummed softly. He didn’t ask you for your name, or even offer his and for some reason you had a feeling he already knew it.

Possibly asking Jake about you, an easy answer considering your unusual attire and late night arrival, and that being the reason behind the cashiers knowing smirk when you pushed through the glass door.

“Is this what you normally do?” He was talking again after a few more minutes of silent walking and this time, it was your turn to look at him from the side of your eye. “Walk around?”

“I don’t know.” You shrugged and you felt one of the bunny ears from your hat fall off your shoulder at the movement. You weren’t sure why you didn’t give him a straight forward answer, knowing perfectly well your usual routine.

It felt strange to be accompanied by somebody even though he wasn’t talking much, you could tell he was thinking and wanting to ask you things and as much as you were intrigued by him it was slightly unsettling you to be around somebody for this long.

You spent most your days isolated, not having anybody to talk to at home considering any attempt of conversation with your father usually ended poorly anyways, eventually giving up altogether unless he was grunting something to you every morning when you wandered back into the house.

At school it was relatively the same, or most times worse. You don’t think the other students necessarily meant to complete ice you out but nobody seemed to know how to talk to you after your mom died, at first being overly compassionate and eager to empathize with you vocally and then eventually fading off into small pitiful smiles when they met your tired eyes in the hallway or eyeing you when you came into class late with messy hair.

Heeseung didn’t seem to be giving you any of these looks, he looked confused by your behavior at times but it was accompanied by small smirks or friendly chuckles.

You once again wondered why he was awake right now, why he seemed like he was used to this setting as much as you and not like he was forcing himself to stay up for the sake of making a new friend. You were curious what he was thinking about and what lead him to ask you to hang out in the first place.

“Have you been to the coffee shop on 44th?” He was suddenly asking and breaking you from your train of thought, his voice still in a low whisper.

“Why are you being quiet?” You ignored his question and raised an eyebrow in his direction, tugging on your sleeve and watching the way he faltered slightly.

“Guess I’m not used to talking to somebody this late.” He was shrugging now and he almost looked embarrassed at your question, making you feel slightly guilty for making him uncomfortable.

It wasn’t that late yet, people were still wandering around from bars and late night dinners and you could hear the squeal of the bus brakes still running. The city was rarely ever dark, even in the parks near the bridge but the mood changed sometime around 4am and you felt like the trees were sleeping. Everything was still awake now however and Heeseung whispering was driving you a bit crazy.

“What about Jake?” You were asking him more now, trying to make conversation so he knew you didn’t mean any harm from your comment.

“Jake’s a freak of nature.” He was relaxing again at the mention of his friend, a smile naturally slipping back onto his face at the familiar topic. “You know he works this shift and still goes to school? He even plays football at Hope.”

The mention of your schools college made you freeze for a second, faltering in your step and causing him to look back at you with concern, turning his body so he could face you now that you were lagging behind him. He raised an eyebrow at you and you gave him a confused look.

“You guys go to Hope?” You were saying it slowly so he heard you clearly and his head cocked like a confused dog.

“I don’t, Jake is older than us.” His use of the word threw you off completely and he must’ve noticed because he let out an awkward laugh at your reaction, scratching his neck in embarrassment. “We’re in the same grade.”

“We like… as in me and you?” You rushed out and he nodded his head, hands coming up in panic when you let out a low groan of guilt.

“It’s okay, don’t worry! I didn’t recognize you at first either, it’s a big class.” He was rambling to try and make you feel better about the fact you didn’t even realize he was your classmate, his comfortable behavior suddenly making more sense. You’d definitely never spoken to him but the fact he’d seen you around such a familiar place would make more sense towards why he was so willingly to walk around with you in the middle of the night.

“I’ve been there since Kindergarten.” You blurted out with wide eyes, exclaiming loudly in pure shock that you’d been so oblivious.

“Me too..” He was awkwardly offering with a wince like he knew it would just make the situation worse that’d you’d been classmates for over a decade.

You raised your sweater covered hands up to your face and groaned loudly, pulling your bunny ears in front of your eyes so you didn’t have to look at his sheepish expression anymore. You could hear him laughing softly at how dramatic you were being and you moved one ear to the side to send him a half glare.

“It’s really okay.” He was laughing out and you could see his soft smile from your one uncovered eye, watching him with a flushed face and growing embarrassment the more amused he became. “It’s not like you’re there much anyways.”

He was saying it casually, like he hadn’t even thought about it before it came out of his mouth but you both froze up at the same time at his accidental admission. You slowly moved your ears to the side and raised an eyebrow at him, leaning your upper half forward slightly and trying not to smile at the fact he was now the one flushing in embarrassment.

“So you notice me?” You were dragging out the words and your lip curled up in amusement, racking through your mind for times you’d seen the tall boy and coming up blank. In your defense, your entire school catalogue section of your brain was completely empty and that included cute boys with giant backpacks.

“I mean… well it’s just like… it’s not like I was stalking you or anything.” He was rambling on and moving his hands around a lot like he was really trying to prove his point, going back to awkwardly scratching at his neck when you gave him a disbelieving look.

“Heeseung.” You cut him off and he paused for a second in surprise, making you realize you’d just said his name without ever asking him for it.

He seemed to relax at that, knowing you also knew more about him than you were previously letting on and his shoulders lowered now that he was less tensed. He looked like he wanted to speak again but you felt embarrassed suddenly and took a few steps forward slowly, waiting for him to get the memo that you wanted to continue on your walk.

The two of you fell back into another spout of silence, awkward at first and then more comfortable as you got deeper into the city. It was more relaxed accompanied by the sounds of people laughing and cars honking their horns, kitchen staff wishing each other goodnight as they left different restaurants and swapped signs over to closed.

You were glancing over at Heeseung after a while and you studied him for a moment while he wasn’t paying attention, his big eyes looking around the city with the same expression you assumed you often had. No matter how many times you came down here, you always felt the exact same.

You always had this longing to capture the moment in some sort of way, giving up on photographs and videos quickly into your new habit considering they simply never were able to fully express how it felt. You tried writing about it, talking about the city always felt awake and how it unsettled you in a way that felt like a friendly challenge and not like your world flipping upside down.

“Where do you go?” You were asking him before you even realized it, watching his side profile as his big eyes opened wide for a second at the sudden sound of your voice and then darted right to look at you.

He seemed to think for a second and then he answered slowly. “I don’t know actually. Just here I guess, I just like to be here I think.”

The two of you watched each other for a few beats, holding the others gaze and you liked the way the neon signs behind you were reflecting off his round dark eyes. It was like a little piece of the city was frozen inside them and you almost said that to him before swallowing it, realizing how creepy it would sound out loud.

You didn’t say much else for the rest of the night, wandering around a bit more before eventually settling at one of the small parks near the center of the main area of downtown. You sat in silence like that, you pulling out your notebook that had few words and many sketches and Heeseung playing with the strings of his headphones as he listened to music.

You could faintly hear it coming from them, loud enough to reach you a few feet away and you considered telling him he was able to play it out loud if he wanted to but for some reason you felt like it was private, leaving him to listen by himself.

When the night was slowly changing into that familiar blue color, the stage right in the center of night and day when everything is coated in the indigo filter, you were standing up off the ground and dusting off your pants. Heeseung was looking up at you due to your sudden movement and you stood over him, offering him a hand so you could pull him up.

It was mainly his own strength put into moving his weight forward considering he was a lot taller than you and you were quite weak due to your lack of sleep, but he seemed to appreciate the friendly gesture and gave you a small smile after he was back on his feet.

“What bus do you take?” He was asking you on your way back to the 7/11 and you felt him looking at the side of your face.

“15.” You answered slowly, your voice softer now as the exhaustion started to seep in. You were suddenly grateful it was a weekend, the social interaction leaving you more tired than normal and hopefully giving you the opportunity to sleep an hour or two. “You?”

“Same, but Jake is bringing me home with him today.” He was mumbling and nodded your head, picking at the skin around your nails and feeling more guilt at the fact you’d never seen him on the bus before either. “Did you want a ride home?”

His question was surprising you and your eyes widened, looking at him and seeing the concern pass over his face at your sudden change of demeanor. You were shaking your head quickly, ears swooshing around your head and you raised a hand to shake it, really emphasizing your denial.

You couldn’t imagine your fathers reaction to you being brought home by a car, especially one that contained two teenage boys in the front seat. It already took him long enough to stop punishing you for leaving at night, eventually giving up on denying you your freedom once you started to pace around the house all night instead.

“Alright, no problem.” He said quickly and you were glad he didn’t push the topic although you could tell he wanted to, a curious look on his features. Heeseung seemed to have a habit of clearly showcasing his emotions and you were grateful considering it made him easier to understand but frustrated when it was a look of pity or sympathy on his face.

You didn’t say anything when he continued to walk with you past the convenience store, walking side by side on the sidewalks even as they thinned out as you slightly left the city area.

He still didn’t speak again even when you both stood together and waited for the bus to arrive, him leaning against the plastic material covering the stops bench and you standing outside of it so the driver didn’t just blow right past you, not expecting somebody out this late.

It was you that finally turned towards him once you caught sight of the bus approaching, tugging on one of your ears awkwardly and shuffling your feet while you waited for it to get closer. You could hear it squealing to a stop, the doors creaking open while he looked at you with a raised eyebrow.

“I’m…” His stare was throwing you off and you started to falter in your words while nervously looking behind you towards the driver who was waiting. “I’ll be here tomorrow around the same time so… if you wanted to.. or if like..”

You trailed off with a sigh but he seemed to get the general idea, a small smile on his face as he dipped his head down slightly in a conforming nod, relief washing over you at the fact he hadn’t found your indirect invitation weird or out of place. You raised your hand in a wave goodbye and he returned, watching you as you pulled your headphones over your hat and ears and boarded the bus swiftly, softly thanking the driver for waiting and finding a seat towards the back.

You could see him outside the window as you pulled off, still leaning against the booth and watching the bus as it left until it rounded the corner. You flushed at the fact he had walked you to your stop despite needing to return back to the city area to get a ride from Jake, not even hesitating when you passed by the store earlier.

It was exciting to be interested in somebody or even something at all, rarely feeling too extreme of emotions considering how dull and hazy everything became with your repeated exhausted routine. Not even your father, sprawled on the couch and surrounded by empty beer cans, could damper your mood as you entered your small house.

It took you a long time, hours staring at your ceiling with a half wandering mind but you eventually managed to get a little bit of sleep, thoughts of Heeseung and his wired headphones accompanying you.

——

The routine continued like this for awhile and you slowly got accustomed to it, now expecting to see him every time you boarded the bus and he was already there waiting for you with his large backpack saving you the seat beside him.

Sometimes you didn’t talk, walking in silence for hours or finding a nice place to sit and do your own individual activities side by side. Other nights you struck up small conversation, talking about the city and your favorite places to go and every once in a while delving into deeper categories that slowly chipped away at the uncomfortable feeling that always came along with attempting to trust somebody.

Heeseung was nice to you and you liked that about him as selfish as it sounded. He never expected you to answer his questions and he rarely pried, around the second day he had even started to pull out snacks from his backpack and hand them over to you after he opened them.

It was a bit into meeting now and he was walking you back to the bus stop, large hands tightly holding onto the straps of his backpack like they always were. He had lots of little habits like that and you carefully filed them all away in your memory. Sometimes he boarded the bus with you but others he just walked with you down there before leaning against the booth and waiting for you to round the corner.

Sometimes you wanted to ask him where he lived, he had to be further away from the city than you considering he was always on the bus before you at the start of the night but that would put him at even more of a distance from your school than you were already at.

Speaking of school, you’d yet to see him around the building and you surprised yourself by actually keeping an eye out throughout the day. You were scanning your tired eyes around the cafeteria and turning your dizzy head in classrooms to see if he was present but you’d not caught sight of him yet and you felt weird about asking where he was.

Maybe he didn’t want to be friends outside of the few hours of the night you spent together, time almost nonexistent here. You felt like the world was frozen most nights you spent with him around the city and you figured he must prefer that aspect versus actually interacting with you in the daytime where other people could see.

You were too distracted in your thoughts that you didn’t even realize your brain was auto-piloting and boarding onto the bus before you even checked if he was coming along, going to turn around to see and completely missing the first large step off the ground. You fell forward and you imagined your side would’ve painfully landed directed on the jagged edges of the steps but you didn’t get a chance to find out, suspending in mid air considering Heeseung had jolted forward to grab onto you.

You could feel his hand wrapped around your side, the other placed in the middle of your shoulder blades so he could support your weight without falling forward himself. Your eyes were wide from almost hurting yourself and you flushed bright red at the concerned look on his face, helping you back to a standing position but keeping his hand on your waist even after you were fully stable.

The bus driver was clearing his throat and Heeseung glanced behind him awkwardly like he was originally not meant to get on the bus, but he turned back towards you and took a step onto the same one you were standing on.

It didn’t pass by you that this was the closest you’d ever been to him, normally keeping a few feet between you when you found a place to sit for the night and rarely ever being close enough to bump shoulders while walking side by side. Now, since he was stood on the same small step as you, you were practically pushed up against him while his hand was still gently against your side despite not having a reason to hold onto you anymore.

He was leaning forward, his chest pressing against you more and you awkwardly looked down at his feet instead of focusing on how tall he was at this distance, and you vaguely registered the fact he was paying for both of your bus tickets.

He seemed to catch on to the fact you were out of it a bit and losing focus, his hand pushing into your side slightly to let you know it was time to fully enter the bus and find your seats. You expected him to let you go once you entered the thin aisle but he didn’t and even when he was stood behind you walking towards the back, he kept his hand around your waist like he was guiding you.

It was removed once you took your seats and you found yourself still able to feel it for some reason, the feeling burned into your mind as he awkwardly cleared his throat and scratched at the back of his neck again.

You glanced over at him and his nervous demeanor, his hands fidgeting with his ripped pants now like he was also still reeling from the feeling of touching you so randomly. His hair was messy like normal but it was getting longer now, falling forward into his eyes so you couldn’t quite see what his expression was. You watched him as he put his headphones in but you leaned forward slightly to confirm that he wasn’t actually playing any music.

“Did you have somewhere to be?” You were asking him softly and then repeating it louder when you realized his headphones might block out some of your volume.

He looked at you with a raised eyebrow and took the one closest to you out of his ear, wrapping it around the outside instead and thinking for a second before he gave you an answer.

“Not necessarily.” He was mumbling back but sighing softly when you gave him a disbelieving look. “Okay well kind of but I want to get you home first.”

“I barely tripped.” You were rolling your eyes at him being overly concerned but the flush in your face gave you away and he laughed softly.

“Maybe I just wanted to hang out with you a little bit longer.” He was shrugging and turning his head to look at you better, smiling more at the way you squeezed your shoulders together and awkwardly glared forward at the floor.

“We could always hang out in school.” You were offering after a few beats of silence and you immediately regretted it, not sure how it even managed to escape your lips considering you’d already told yourself you weren’t going to question him.

His initial reaction didn’t give anything away to you, face remaining blank like he hadn’t put much thought into it but you noticed his hands starting to pick at the tape wrapped around his headphone wire and you felt guilty for bringing it up. You were about to back track and tell him to forget about it or change the subject but he was humming softly.

“I think that’d be nice.” He was saying it casually but there was a nervous edge to his voice and your mouth was downturned slightly. “Where do you eat lunch at?”

“Near the side doors.” You were answering smoothly although you left out the fact you more so used the free half an hour for a quick nap instead of actually eating. “You?”

“The library.” He was saying it hesitantly like he wasn’t sure if he should lie or not, knowing full well there was a no eating policy in that section of the school and you’d realize he wasn’t actually eating at lunch either. You both paused for a second in heavy silence before you were snorting a laugh.

“So you’re a loser basically?” Your comment was teasing and he visibly relaxed at your reaction, chuckling softly and nudging you with his thin shoulder.

“Sorry to disappoint Ms. Popular.” He was retorting back and you were glad to see the small smile return to his face and stay there now that you’ve both established this change in routine.

You wondered if he’d been thinking about it too, keeping an eye out for you or if he was actively avoiding you throughout the hallways like you’d previously thought. Maybe he figured the same as you, that you wouldn’t want to be suddenly seen with him or you wouldn’t acknowledge him and it would ruin the friendship you were slowly building.

When you got off the bus it was nice to see him still there, trying not to wince at how close the stop was to your house and how if it didn’t pull off immediately he’d see you walk up to the overgrown grass with windows titled off their hinges.

You tried not to think about it and after you gave him a small wave through the window you turned on your heel and kept your face forward, steely in your resolve to not spare him another nervous glance. This time you father didn’t seem to be home and you were grateful for that considering you had a feeling you were absolutely radiating with how much you were thinking about the boy.

It was hard to go to sleep, even more so than normal, with the ghost of his hand pressed again you and the knowledge that tomorrow you now knew where to find him. It was up to the two of you to decide if you used this information or ignored it and you weren’t sure which route he was hoping you’d take.

——

“I thought you’d forgotten about me for a second there.” Heeseung’s low voice was hitting your ears the second you crossed into the library and you let out a sigh of relief upon seeing him.

You were worried for the first half of the day that it would be awkward, that you wouldn’t know what to say to each other and it would ruin everything you’d be enjoying so much, but you knew from the second he spoke that you’d made the right choice in coming to find him.

“I was about to give up.” You scowled at him and placed your bag down on the back of the chair, climbing up and sitting across from him at the high top round table in the back of the library. “You’re hard to track down.. plus the librarian kept glaring at me every time I passed her desk like I was trying to steal her books.”

“She’s probably just used to only seeing me.” He was explaining with a small smirk at your complaining and you frowned at him softly while taking a second to take him in.

You weren’t sure why you expected him to look different during the day time, feeling a bit stupid now that you looked at him and he looked exactly the same. Almost exactly, outside of how much more exhausted he looked now that he was running on even less sleep, his hair was messier than it was around 2am and he was nervously looking around.

Heeseung was always handsome to you, despite the fact you tried to pretend you didn’t think so the first few times you hung out, but you noticed things about him under the school lights that you had missed outside in the near dark.

For one, he had his eyebrow pierced. You’re not exactly sure how you managed to not notice that considering you were currently frozen to your seat as you saw it gleaming against the light when he turned his head to look at you in confusion.

He looked embarrassed at the fact you were staring at him so intensely and he brought a hand up to mess with his bangs, the face jewelry disappearing back behind his hair and showcasing why you failed to see it before. His hand had bandaids on a few of his fingers and you almost asked him about them until he tucked them back into his hoodie sleeves.

“You don’t eat?” He was clearing his throat and asking you in a low tone, leaning forward slightly to ensure that you could hear him.

You were shaking your head softly and then shrugging, almost becoming awkward enough to regret coming. “Foods no good here anyway.”

He watched you for a few seconds and you were curious what he was thinking, if he was making similar observations as you. You were suddenly reminded you couldn’t wear your bunny hat to school and it might be the first time he’s seen you without it, seen how dark your under eyes are and how dry and chapped your lips become this time of year.

You didn’t like that you thought about this, didn’t like that you cared about what he was thinking about your appearance.

“We could go get some food after school.” He was suggesting it with a shrug but his eyes were watching you intensely with a hint of hesitance, almost like he was expecting you to say no.

You felt like your breath caught for a few seconds, holding tightly in your chest and you hoped your eyes didn’t widen too much at his suggestion. He was still watching you but his eyes softened slightly at your surprised expression, amused that you seemed just as nervous as he was about this change of pacing.

“Are you paying?” You were eventually wheezing out after a few seconds, letting the words tumble out at the same time your big gulp of air did.

His smile was familiar, the same one he gave you when he caught you staring at him in the park for a sketch reference, the same one he would offer everytime you’d skip onto the bus and grin once you caught sight of him saving your seat. You thought it looked even better in the sunlight.

——

You tried not to think about how weird it was that you and Heeseung left school together, side by side and bumping into each other while navigating the hoard of students all trying to squeeze out of the doors to escape the building.

You wondered if anybody else thought it was weird, if anyone paid enough attention to you in recent years to wonder who the tall boy next to you was. The boy who was currently snaking a hand down to your side like he had at the bus, gently guiding you through a gap in the crowd so you could get outside faster than it would be to stand and wait.

Your face was flushing bright red but he luckily seemed to focused on getting out of the mass of people to realize, eyebrows furrowed in a stressed out expression.

He didn’t remove his hand even after you’d gotten out of the tight pile of bodies, keeping it there comfortably but you knew by the heavy silence that you both were aware it wasn’t anything normal for him to do. You almost couldn’t tell, almost convinced yourself this was his typical behavior and you’d somehow just not realized it, but when you caught his eye and he quickly looked away with a small pink to his cheeks you knew it wasn’t.

Little things were different during daytime hours but not enough to make your head completely spin, giving you that familiar overwhelmed feeling that left you taking deep breaths in the bathroom stall.

The bus was actually full of people for once, only one seat left in the middle of the aisle and Heeseung hurriedly sat you down on it before it was taken. He was standing above you holding onto the pole near the top of the ceiling and you would’ve felt bad he had to do that so you could sit if it wasn’t for the small glances and grins he was sending down your way every time he caught you staring.

When you reached further into the city, somewhere you didn’t fully recognize but he must’ve considering the was leaning forward towards you and tugging on the stop rope, you both thanked the driver and left the bus.

You tried not to be disappointed when he didn’t hold onto you again, silently cursing yourself for feeling that way anyways and pushing it down. You took your backpack off your shoulders as you walked and held it in front of you, fishing for something inside with an annoyed sigh after a few seconds passed without feeling it.

Eventually the familiar fabric was grazing your fingers and you smiled softly as you pulled out your hat and situated it over your head again, pulling a few pieces of hair out in the front and glancing over at Heeseung who had been watching you.

“Woah Y/N, when’d you get here?” He was mock gasping, a hand coming up to cover his mouth and stumble back on the sidewalk like you had surprised him.

You grumbled at his antics and elbowed him in the side, trying to pretend your heart didn’t pick up in pace when he laughed loudly at your reaction and grabbed onto your jacket so he didn’t go tumbling into the street from your small shove. He didn’t let go for a few seconds even after he was steadied, rubbing the materiel between his fingers before dropping it.

You wondered if he was always this touchy with people or if he had just grown comfortable with you fast considering the strange and slightly intimidate circumstances you’d been hanging out under.

He was walking side by side with you but you were following his lead, still not exactly sure where he was bringing you to. You fell back into a comfortable silence like you always did as you traversed the city and you felt a little bit dizzy due to exhaustion and the bright glare of the sun.

It only worsened when you were rounding a corner, passing by a large building that was originally blocking your view of the next street over, and you caught sight of a familiar back that caused you to freeze in your tracks.

Heeseung took a few steps forward before realizing you weren’t continuing and he turned back to look at you with a concerned expression, approaching you again and standing in front of you. His large frame was blocking your view now but you slowly leaned over to look past him and immediately shot back to hide behind his chest and wince.

“What’s wrong?” He was rushing out and his eyebrows were furrowed with worry, a hand coming up but stopping just short of your arm like he wasn’t sure he was supposed to touch you.

“I-I have to go.” You were rushing out and you felt embarrassed underneath your panic, hands shaking slightly and you swallowed harshly.

He was frowning and turning his body to look behind him and try to see whatever had spooked you, immediately whipping back around due to the fact him moving had allowed you to see the man again, this time facing your direction with a suspicious look on his face. You imagined it was due to the fact Heeseung was just standing in the middle of the sidewalk but your heart started to race so hard it was painful at the chance he had seen you.

“Who is that?” Heeseung was, thankfully, getting the idea slowly and lowering his face as he spoke to you. You didn’t answer immediately and he was bending down so he was closer to your face, his hand finally connecting to your arm and cupping the back of your elbow. “Y/N, who is that?”

“It’s my dad.” You whispered back in a harsh tone and you’re not sure why you said it, never talking about family or each others parents before and never planning to.

Heeseung paused for a second and then his eyes were darkening like he had figured something else out, you felt humiliated knowing he must be piecing together every strange reaction you’ve ever had to the suggestion of being brought home by Jake or for him to walk you to your door.

He was glancing behind him again and a small noise of protest slipped out of your mouth, your hands coming up to land on his chest and scrunch his hoodies fabric up in your hands. He was looking back at you quickly and his eyes softened at the scared expression on your face but could still see anger swimming in his.

You weren’t sure if Heeseung was a violent person, thinking there was no way it was possible for the boy who was as sweet to you as he was unprompted, to ever willingly harm somebody but you’d also never given him any reason to be mean or treat you poorly. You thought about his bandaged hands for a second and then immediately felt guilty for doing so.

“Let me take you home.” He was saying after a few seconds and you shook your head, too overwhelmed to think clearly for a second. “Baby, let me take you home.”

The pet name snapped you out of it and you looked up at him, feeling more and more humiliated by the second at the fact your eyes were watering and you were still anxiously bunching his hoodie in your hands.

“T-the bus is too slow, he’s just now leaving the liquor store but he has a car and by the time we walk back and get on and it makes all the stops it’ll be too late and-“ You were speaking a mile a minute and you felt his hand squeeze your arm before he cut you off.

“I’m parked around the corner.” He rushed out in an attempt to stop you so you could take a breath, freezing and furrowing your eyebrows in confusion when you registered what he was saying. He winced slightly at your reaction and a weird feeling passed through your chest. You were raising your hands off of his chest before slamming them back down against him in annoyance, ignoring the small pained sound he made.

“You idiot.” You spat out at him in a harsh whisper, shaking your head and glaring up at his guilty face. “You’ve had a car this entire time?”

He looked sheepish and you suddenly felt very stupid for somehow missing this, and then slightly flattered and embarrassed that he had been riding the bus with you every single day despite being parked in the opposite direction. It made sense now to you why he was sometimes hesitant to board, unlocking the knowledge that he had been riding it all the way back alone after you’d gotten off.

“Not the entire time.” He was trying to explain himself but you could tell he was lying slightly. “It was in the shop the first time we met, that’s why Jake drove me home.”

You sighed and glared at him again but you weren’t actually mad, just slightly upset that he had been inconveniencing himself this much for some reason you didn’t quite understand.

“I just wanted an excuse to spend more time with you.” He was offering an explanation before you even had a chance to ask him and your expression softened at the reasoning, hands flatting out against him in a silent apology for hitting him.

“You’re still an idiot.” You were mumbling but your voice held no malice and he smiled at the fact he was clearly forgiven. Things felt tensioned again now that the conversation died down and you were both suddenly reminded of the fact you were touching each other and standing nearly toe to toe. “I really do have to go.”

“And I really will take you.” He was whispering back with a stressed sincerity and you frowned from the guilt of both making him drive you and not eating together like you had planned.

Heeseung was guiding you back around the buildings corner slowly, backing you up and shuffling forward with you so you didn’t need to step out from behind his chest and risk being seen. You were pouting as you awkwardly walked backwards and it remained on your face even when you were able to face forward like normal and follow him to where he had parked his car.

His car looked pretty much exactly how you figured it would, low to the ground and chipping paint in different sections of it but it was very him and you laughed softly when you remembered how ridiculous it was that he’d had one this entire time.

He seemed embarrassed when you got into the passenger seat, looking into the backseat to check if it was messy and rearranging the different CD’s that were sitting on top of his center console. You moved them over to your lap and started to mess with them while he pulled off the curb.

“Basement, Title Fight,” You were humming softly while flipping through them and reading out the artist titles, ignoring the way he was sending you nervous side glances between looking at the road. “Elliot Smith.. is this what you’re always playing in your headphones?”

“Too cliche?” He was retorting back and you scrunched your nose when you looked up at his side profile, a small smirk playing on his lips at your amusement.

“The fact you even keep CD’s still is kind of cliche.” You were throwing back to him and he glanced at you to smile fully and shake his head, watching the way you were leaned against his car door and casually looking through his stuff for a second before going back to focusing on the road.

“You still like me even though I listen to scratched CD’s and drive a 2002 shit bucket?” He was responding and you both paused.

His wording didn’t miss you but you weren’t sure if it was intentional or not, also unable to tell if he was speaking in a platonic way or if he was genuinely asking you if you liked him romantically. His mouth was parting like he was trying to think of a way to backtrack and you cleared your throat before he could, leaning forward to push a CD into the radios slot.

He didn’t say anything for a few seconds and you let the song play for a beat or two before you were leaning back into his torn leather seats and glancing at him again.

“Yeah.. I still like you.” Your voice was lower than it was before, barely filtering over the sound of the music building up but you knew he managed to catch it considering the way he was biting the inside of his cheek and avoiding looking in your direction for the rest of the ride.

He didn’t need to ask you for the way to your neighborhood considering he’s been riding past it 4 times a day but he glanced at you for help when you entered the street and you leaned forward to point towards your house. Your dads car wasn’t in the driveway and you breathed a sigh of relief when he pulled up near the curb.

You didn’t think too much about the state of disarray your home was in this time, for some reason not minding if he saw how messed up things were for you. The feeling had settled into your stomach that he wouldn’t care, that he wasn’t going to give you a sorry look or treat you differently.

He was surprising you by opening his door before you’d gotten out and you watched him round the hood with confusion, flushing when he came over to your side to open yours for you and hold it while you scrambled out. You leaned against the door once he had closed it behind you and he stood in front of you like he had on the sidewalk, his dirty sneakers pressing against the toe of yours.

“So…” You were dragging out the word and trailing off nervously, looking up at him through your eyelashes and thinking about how cute he looked peering down at you.

“So.” His lips were curling up in a smirk at your lack of words and you frowned at the expression, reaching up to pinch at his arm and keep it there when he let out a low chuckle. His hand was coming up to touch your bunny hat and you laughed softly at the way he pushed it behind your shoulder, almost like it was a piece of your hair.

“We shouldn’t be talking here.” You told him in a low voice, not wanting to speak any louder considering how close his face was getting to yours. “My dad would kill me if he saw you.”

“Right.” He was nodding but he wasn’t taking a step back or making any move that indicated he was going to leave, just watching you and you could feel his arm tense underneath your touch. “Do you want me to go?”

You were shaking your head swiftly although you knew he needed to, you liked his company and you found yourself missing him every time you were away for too long. You somehow managed to have fun today despite the fact you’d almost had a panic attack upon seeing your dad and how awkward it had felt to search for him in the school.

“I should go.” He was sighing even though you had said you didn’t want him to, thinking logically despite obviously also not wanting to leave. He was leaning forward again and for a second you could feel his chest pushed up against yours before he swayed back like he hadn’t done it.

Your heart felt heavy at the fact he was going to leave you there, in such a rotten place that left you restless and miserable, but you were slightly humiliated by the large frown on your face. Before you could think about it, in an attempt to hide your expression, you were pulling him forward by his hoodie sleeve and wrapping your arms around him in a tight hug.

He hesitated for a few seconds, just from the surprise of the contact, and then he was slowly wrapping his long arms completely around you and keeping you pulled tightly to his chest. You could feel him take a deep breath, surrounded by his warmth and burying your face into the soft fabric of his oversized hoodie, listening to his heart beat increase slightly when you squeezed him for a second.

You were pulling back after a few seconds, leaning into the car again and you knew your face must’ve been flushed red with a dazed look in your eyes considering the way he faltered and smiled sheepishly at you.

“Well.. I have to go.” You were rushing out to him and he nodded, taking a step back so you were able to walk away without having to push past his large frame.

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” His voice was lower than normal and carrying a slight rasp that made something flip around in your gut, trying not to look at him as you quickly waved and scurried away up your front path and into the doorway.

You stood there, back pressed against your front door now that it was closed, and took deep breaths to try and calm yourself down as you listened to his car pull off. A smile was building itself up on your face despite being slightly embarrassed over your bold move and you felt like a cloud of giddiness was following you around.

“So that’s what you sneak off to do every night?” Your entire body froze up in shock and you immediately stopped in place, bones going rigid and blood running cold at the sound of your fathers slurred voice coming from the living room.

Any sense or happiness or calm Heeseung had brought you was immediately disappearing and replaced with terror at the realization he was home, and had clearly seen you through the window before you came inside. You were stuck in silence and you could feel the dark tension radiating off of him although you couldn’t even see him yet.

“You’re out there embarrassing me, making a mess of our name.” He was hissing and you watched him rise from his arm chair and come out of the shadows like a fairytale monster, cowering in on yourself like you were a little girl again. “Whoring around with that delinquent.”

“N-no dad, I promise it isn’t like that I just-“ He was cutting you and your stutters off, slamming his hand down against the wall near your head and you closed your eyes in a wince, listening to the way the framed photos rattled on the wall.

A few seconds passed and you were holding your breath, waiting for him to continue to insult you and tell you what you had done wrong but when the tension continued to grow you realized he was more angry than you thought. You felt your hands hit the floor before you felt the pain in your cheek, not even realizing he had hit you for a few seconds because of the shock.

He’d hit you before but it was rare in recent years, not wanting to risk you showing up to school with a black eye or bruised cheek.

Your hand was coming up to cup the side of your face, shaking against your skin and feeling how hot and swollen it already was from his large calloused palm. You didn’t want to look at him and see his sneering face, instead staring forward at the way your bunny hat had flown off on impact and landed a few feet away on the floor.

“No more going out at night.” He was spitting the words down at you, curled into a ball against the wall on the floor and willingly away the pain under your palm. “I’ll put a padlock on your door if I have to.”

With that, he was staggering back into the darkness of the living room and you could hear the groan of the armchair under his weight. You sat there for a few more seconds, frozen and making sure it was clear for you to move before you were scurrying up the stairs and grabbing your hat as you passed by.

When you got to your room you threw it into the corner and collapsed onto your bed in a fit of sobs, burying your face deep into your pillow and crying so hard you thought you might just explode.

You felt even worse for the reason you were crying, not because you’d gotten caught or punished and not because your father was upset with you. You cried over the fear of not being able to see Heeseung anymore, the idea of never being able to safely return to the city at night causing you such distress you continued to sob until your throat was sore and your chest ached.

The sun was setting eventually and your room was darkening, never having the light switch turned on and just letting the night take over every single day, but you failed to notice considering how burrowed under the covers in your own misery you were.

You didn’t mean to care about somebody this deeply, having sworn against it after your mother passed and you were left with a shell of a man, your father becoming half the person he was with grief and never bothering to heal himself for your sake. You’d spent recent years tiptoeing around the house and trying to show as little evidence as possible that you existed, part of the reason he didn’t fully mind you disappearing at night or sleeping all day.

You felt stupid but getting caught with Heeseung after so narrowly escaping your father in the city, completely letting your guard down and being foolish because of your feelings.

But the other part of you didn’t care, you deserved to be giddy and act stupid because you liked somebody and his reaction wasn’t your fault.

Thinking of Heeseung made you remember he’d probably be waiting for you tonight and you started to cry harder again. You were worried he’d over think about your intimacy and small confession today and mistake you not showing up to the bus stop as you rejecting him, retreating back into yourself and leaving him alone like he had been before your night time meetings.

You must’ve dozed off from crying and the stress of the day, only waking up with dry skin and swollen eyes when you started to register a faint repeated noise.

You were sitting up with a puffy pout and looking around in a dazed confusion, at first because you couldn’t identify it and then even more so because you realized it was coming from your window. You staggered out of bed to open it and stop the noise and you let out a gasp, ducking and just barely missing being hit by a small stone that flew into your room.

“Fuck.” A voice down below was whispering and you glanced down to see Heeseung stood at the side of your house with his hoodie pulled up over his head. “Did I hit you? I’m sorry.”

You felt panic grow in your chest at the sight of him although you were happy to see that you had a chance to explain what had happened, glancing behind you in fear before turning again to glare at him from the second floor.

“You can’t be here.” You hissed out and he gave you a guilty look, like he knew you were going to say that but couldn’t help himself anyways. You let out a small sigh and you eyes softened at his expression. “I told you he was going to kill me.”

You didn’t need to say it for him to understand that your dad must’ve been home and you saw his face darken again like it had earlier, feeling thankful that you were too high up and it was too dark for him to see the bruise that must have been forming on your face now.

“Is he awake?” He was whispering back after a few seconds and you paused at his unexpected question.

He didn’t say anything when you held up a finger to indicate you’d be back, tiptoeing back to the other side of your room and cracking open the door. You held your breath so you could hear every noise clearly and you waited until the sound of his snores filtered up the stairs to you, confirming he had drank himself unconscious again and was out for the night. You still didn’t want to risk sneaking out and having him wake up and you walked back to your window with a heavy heart.

“He’s out but-“ You were starting to explain you couldn’t come along when Heeseung was nodding and walking towards the front of your house, your eyebrows furrowing in confusion as you called his name softly. He turned back to look at you and you raised your hands in bewilderment. “What are you doing?”

“Let me in.” He whisper yelled back and gave you a look like it was an obvious thing for you to do, smiling slightly when your astonished face only deepened.

You were groaning when he disappeared around the side of the house and you left your room before you had a chance to think about it more, sneaking down the stairs as silently as possibly and trying not to let out a breath when you passed by the entrance to the living room.

It was strange to see Heeseung on your porch when you cracked open the front door, even stranger when he took a step inside your hallway and you took him in against the familiar setting. You hadn’t had somebody inside your house in years and you were thankful that he kept his gaze tightly on you and didn’t look around at the mess.

You brought a finger to your lips and indicated towards the living room where your dad was, a loud snore coming from him at that exact moment and causing you to jump where you stood. Heeseung was bringing a hand up to your arm in an attempt to calm you and he nodded in understanding that he needed to keep quiet.

When you took a step on the first stair you winced and glanced back at him, knowing his weight and tall frame would make it groan louder than normal.

Still, you took his hand in yours and let it hang behind you as you gently led him up the old wood and into the hallway that would lead to your bedroom. He still didn’t speak once you entered it and for a second you were worried he would ask you to turn the lights on, thankful when he finally took a deep breath and glanced around at your belongings.

“So this is where she returns to.” He was muttering under his breath and you felt a little embarrassed as he took in your room.

Not as embarrassed as you felt when he was looking back at you intensely, you figured he could see you better now that you were closer and illuminated by the moonlight shining in from your window but you knew you were correct when his eyes were hardening again suddenly. You winced slightly when his hands were coming up to cup your face, the right one just hovering and not connecting with the bruised and swollen skin.

“This was him?” He was whispering, his eyes filtering up to stare into yours and your stomach turned at how serious he sounded. You hadn’t seen him have this look in his eye before and it put you slightly on edge.

You were hesitantly nodding your head and you knew your eyes must have started watering judging by the fact his face softened and he gently caressed your uninjured cheek, shaking his head and bringing you over to sit down on your bed.

“I’m sorry.” He was whispering to you and leaning forward to connect your foreheads, watching you with a hurt look. It was reminiscent of the pitiful glance so many people have given you throughout your life but you knew it was different, he was different.

“It’s not your fault.” You were telling him and you truly meant it, your hand coming up to rest on his wrist and squeeze it softly.

“It is though. I should’ve dropped you off up the street where the bus stops, it was stupid.” He was muttering and you wanted to remind him that you’d pointed out your house and you’d been the one to tell him to stay, but you weren’t sure it was going to make much of a difference.

You thought about the fact he was inside of your house right now, only a few hours after you’d gotten punished for even being seen with him and you snorted a teary laugh at the irony of calling such a small act, such as earlier stupid.

“You make me stupid.” You were telling him and he smiled softly at your joking tone, knowing that you were completely serious.

“You scared me when you didn’t show up.” He was saying back and his tone was serious again, brushing back your hair that was normally hidden under your knitted hat. “I was about to tear the city apart looking for you before I thought about coming here first.”

You laughed slightly at the idea of somebody as kind as Heeseung raging through the city in search of you, pressing your head harder against his before leaning back a bit so you could take a deep breath and shake your head at him.

“You’re lucky I woke up before him.” Your tone was light and teasing but you both understood the heavy truth in the statement, his face dropping again.

He had failed to take you literally when you exclaimed about your father killing you but you didn’t blame him, not liking the guilt that coated his face again as he mirrored your deep breath.

“You couldn’t have known.” You were telling him in a gentle voice but he was still not looking at you, only picking up his head when your hand was brushing through his bangs. “Heeseung, it’s not your fault.”

He was nodding softly and chewing on his lip but you had a feeling he was only agreeing to make you feel better, still having that dark guilty look on his face. You sighed softly and glanced behind you at your small bed, scooting back a few inches before looking at him again.

He was giving you a soft and tired smile, clearly understanding what you were insinuating and you tried to not throw up from nerves when you were both moving around so you could lay down on your bed together. You’d been experiencing the most intimacy you’d had since you were a kid with him and your stomach was tight with anxiety.

Heeseung didn’t seem to think much of it, flopping back against your pillows and sucking in a deep relieved sigh. His one knee was bent upwards towards your ceiling and his left arm was sprawled across the rest of the bed, leaving you no choice but to lay on top of it. He was pulling you forward slightly by your shoulders so you could rest your head on his chest and you were slightly relieved to hear how fast it was beating, despite his calm demeanor.

“How’d we get here.” You were whispering after a bit of silence and you could feel his laughter before you heard it, his warm chest rumbling slightly with the sound

“I thought you looked cute standing up to two drunk assholes.” He mumbled back and you pinched his side slightly, draping your arm across his stomach. “You should’ve seen Jake’s face when I asked about you the next morning.”

“Probably the same expression he had when I ran into the store four hours early.” You felt embarrassed to be admitting it but you liked the way it made him laugh again, gently rubbing your shoulder over the shared fact you both had been interested in each other from the start.

You fell into silence again and after a moment you picked your head up again to look at him closer, still pressed against his side but rolling onto your stomach slightly so you could study his face. He was watching you with a curious expression and your hand come up to brush his bangs back, revealing his eyebrow piercing to you again.

He didn’t say anything when you pressed against it, rolling one of the balls between your fingers for a few seconds before rubbing along his eyebrow bone until you hit the bump of metal, but his eyes darkened slightly at your fascination and you faintly felt his hand slip down to your side and squeeze it.

“He called you a delinquent.” You were whispering to him with a small smirk, raising an eyebrow as you recounted what your father had said about him. “He’d probably lose his mind if he came in here right now.”

Heeseung didn’t seem to share your amusement about the subject considering how hard his face was as you talked about it, only his eyes staying soft as he looked over your features from such a close distance.

“I’d kill him.” He was mumbling back and you snickered for a second before realizing he wasn’t laughing, his face serious as he watched you for your reaction to what he was saying. You frowned slightly and laid your hands down on his chest, rubbing it for a second before shaking your head.

“Don’t say that.” You were muttering under your breath, following it with an awkward laugh at the sudden tension in the air.

“I’m serious.” He was saying back immediately and you looked back up at his eyes, frowning deeper since you knew he was telling the truth. A part of you felt strangely prideful about it, your stomach lighting up at the fact he was so protective over you and willingly to interfere if your father busted through the door.

The other part of you was slightly concerned with his sudden demeanor, only catching glimpses of it before and brushing it off considering how gentle and lighthearted he always was with you. You wondered if it was a good time to ask him about the bandages around his hands but you decided against it.

“Then what?” You surprised yourself by humoring his hypothetical situation for a second, watching the way his eyebrows jumped in surprise. “What happens after?”

“You can come with me.” He was saying it swiftly like it was something he’d considered before, eyes remaining serious despite the fact he was noticeably being more careful with his words.

You hummed softly at him, your hand moving from his chest to trail up his neck for a second before coming back to rest again. You didn’t think anything of the movement, just absentmindedly touching him and being fascinated by the feeling of somebody else’s skin other than yours, but you could tell by the way his eyes darkened that you had caught his attention.

“Would you come with me?” He was asking in a low voice, eyes tired and lazy as he peered down at you but very much focused in on your expression as he waited for your response.

You were watching him in return and you were sure he could feel your heart beating against his arm, rolling back around so you were laying on your side again and cuddled up against his side instead of laying on your stomach and directly facing him. You knew your face must’ve been flushed by now and it continued to redden as you thought of a response.

“Of course I would.” You mumbled back and it slightly scared you how much you found yourself meaning the words.

Now it was his turn to him, low and rumbling in his chest against the side of your face. You scooted closer to him instinctively and you felt his hand gently squeeze against your side when he realized you were moving again, your shirt riding up slightly as you shifted so now his skin was pressed against yours.

You were glancing up at him at the feeling of him touching you and you awkwardly looked away when you realized he was already staring, a hazy look in his dark eyes. Heeseung’s demeanor felt different tonight, or maybe it was just the intimate setting.

“C’mere.” He was rasping out the word and the syllables were slurring together, your heartbeat so heavy and loud that you almost didn’t hear him for a few seconds. You scooted up further on his chest so you could look at him, your upper half lifted slightly so your face was hovering over his and he could bring a hand up to cup your uninjured cheek again.

“We can run away together.” He was muttering now that you were close to each others faces again, his big hand nearly covering the entire side of yours and you smiled softly at his statement. He looked slightly serious still but you saw the corner of his lip quirk up and you ducked your head in embarrassment. “I’d take care of you.”

“Oh, would you now?” Your voice was teasing and you raised your eyebrows at him, biting your lip to try and stop the big smile on your face from spreading. You let your arms shift forward again to rest on his chest and you could feel his collarbones under your palm.

He was nodding but not speaking again, watching you intensely and you felt your smile drop slightly at the look on his face. You’d been with a boy before, not all the way and nothing serious but you wouldn’t consider yourself necessarily unexperienced. Still, you’d never felt so tensioned and attracted to somebody before like you did with Heeseung and he hadn’t even tried to kiss you before.

His demeanor, confident but not ever cocky and sometimes sheepish like he acted on impulse, was the most attractive part of him to you and being in such close proximity didn’t help.

“Could you take care of me now?” You weren’t sure what pushed you to whisper the words out to him, hesitant and slow but being said nonetheless and you watch his eyes flash with something unfamiliar for a moment.

Then Heeseung was leaning forward off your pillows, his hand that was cupping your face being used to bring you forward so you could meet him halfway into a slow kiss that sent a shiver down your spine. You could feel his heart beating underneath your chest as you scooted forward more to completely lay on top of him and kiss him deeper.

You were overwhelmed by how perfect it felt to be kissing him, how warm and familiar the feeling of him underneath you was and you sucked in a small breath when he pulled back for a second before surging forward again to kiss him more.

If he was surprised by this he didn’t show it, his hand pushing up more so your shirt would ride up on your stomach and he could feel more of your side under his hand. You knew he felt the shiver wrack through you, the goosebumps on your skin at the feeling of the callousness of his and he chuckled softly into the kiss that was getting heavier with every passing second.

You could feel Heeseung biting down on your lip, almost painfully, and you were reminded of that dark expression he sometimes got. He was immediately licking over the skin he had bitten, soothing it out with his tongue and you made an embarrassing noise when he was suddenly slipping it into your mouth.

“Calm down.” He was pulling back a few centimeters to whisper to you, his voice breathy and carrying a small chuckle as he teased you for your reaction.

“I can’t.” You responded honestly, shaking your head softly and leaning in again to peck his lips quickly. Kissing him was addicting and you felt like your head was spinning from the way he was gently rubbing up and down your side so slowly.

He was laughing loudly at your response and your heart clenched affectionately at the sound, immediately followed by the reminder he wasn’t supposed to be here. You glanced over at your door nervously and when you looked back at him again he was frowning and following your line of vision, seemingly also snapping back to reality.

“I should probably go.” He was muttering and your stomach dropped painfully although you knew he was right, it wasn’t smart to get in trouble more.

“I won’t be able to come out at night for awhile.” You were telling him and your voice sounded saddened and panicked, bunching up his hoodie in your fist again like you had earlier when your anxiety picked up.

“Doesn’t matter.” He was shaking his head and petting your hair softly, raising his eyebrows to really exaggerate the fact that he meant what he was saying. “Find me at school tomorrow and we can figure something out okay? He can’t stop me from seeing you.”

You watched him in silence for a few seconds before you were leaning in to kiss him harshly again, completely drinking him in and savoring the feeling of him pressed against you in case it was the last time you got to have him like this. His hands were sliding back into your hair, keeping you tight into the kiss and moving against you just as desperately.

You felt overwhelmed at his sincere words, never having somebody so adamant on being around you, being so protective over you that he was willingly to risk his own safety just to have a conversation with you.

“You’re crazy.” You were gasping out when you pulled back for air, laughing at the way he was pressing more swift kisses against your lips as you tried to talk.

“You make me crazy.” He was slightly altering and repeating the phrase you had said to him earlier, a smile coming back onto his face now that you clearly felt better about the situation.

It took you a while to get off of him, even longer for you to actually leave your room considering the way he kept shaking his hands around your waist to pull you back in to kiss again. At one point he had you pressed against your bedroom door and you tried not to think how tensioned it felt to kiss standing up like this, letting him lean you against the old wood and explore your mouth with a heavy sense of longing and desire.

You were eventually take control of the never ending situation and pushing him out of your door with a final kiss, watching him smile at you and walk slowly down your stairs. He had suggested you stay up in your room in case the door closing woke up your father and he came looking for you, better to find you upstairs versus suspiciously in the front hallway.

You followed Heeseung’s frame, craning your neck outside the window to be able to see parts of your front lawn, and watching as he tugged his hoodie back over his head and walked a few houses down to where he had parked his car.

He was looking back at your window before he got in and the two of you watched each other for a few beats before you were raising your hand in a shy wave, smiling at the way he returned it before getting inside his car and pulling off slowly.

——

You were getting stares as you rushed through the school halls, your peers not used to seeing you so alert at all throughout the day but especially so early in the morning. You’d only slept for an hour or two but you felt energized at the idea of seeing Heeseung again as you searched for him.

The search stopped short when you were suddenly smacking into somebody rounding the corner, clearly not expecting to encounter somebody moving at the speed you were.

You both flew back from the impact and you landed on your butt a bit away from the boy, glancing up swiftly to see it was somebody you recognized, a friend from middle school who had slowly stopped talking to you after your mother died.

“Shit, I’m sorry Sunoo.” You were stuttering slightly and you suddenly remembered that conversation didn’t come easily to you, forgetting this fact considering you only ever spoke to Heeseung. “I was just-“

“Looking for Lee Heeseung?” He was cutting you off and you paused in your explanation to stare at him, his tone more judging than you remember ever hearing it. “What are you doing hanging around with him Y/N?”

He was standing back to his full height and offering you a hand but after faltering for a few seconds you paused, scoffing under your breath and standing without taking it. Once you were off the ground you were glaring at him, not liking the heavy glance he was sending your way.

“What does it matter to you?” You normally wouldn’t be so confrontational but it upset you how concerned he seemed to be despite completely ditching you alongside the rest of your friend group while you were grieving.

He had no place to judge you or who you decided to hang out with, although it confused you how worried he seemed to be about Heeseung. You weren’t sure how he even knew about the boy considering you didn’t recall ever seeing him around school or your old friends before your run in at the convenience store.

“He’s dangerous Y/N.” He was spitting the words at you but you could tell you weren’t the reason for his anger, eyebrows furrowing slightly as he looked at you like he was confused if you truly didn’t understand the reason for his worry.

“What are you talking about?” You were looking at him in bewilderment and you felt your heart start to beat slightly at the fact he was clearly implying something had happened with the boy you’d spent so much time with recently. You were suddenly reminded that you didn’t know much about him, never talking about family life or what he did outside of being with you.

“Why don’t you ask him?” Sunoo was sighing and you were confused at his sudden dismissal until you realized his eyes were going past your shoulder now, turning your head and seeing the boy in question standing a few feet away and watching the two of you interact.

Heeseung didn’t look dangerous to you, especially in the way he was clutching the straps of his backpack and carrying a nervous expression. His eyes softened slightly when he saw you but he must’ve registered the worried look on your face because he was suddenly turning in place and going back down the hallway the way he came.

You sighed when he pushed out the side doors, turning back to glare at Sunoo quickly before hurriedly following after the tall boy and rushing back down past the lockers.

“Heeseung.” You were calling his name once you pushed through the double doors, the cold morning air hitting your face swiftly and you winced a bit. “Hee, stop.”

He paused at the sound of your voice and you saw him suck in a reluctant breath before he was turning around to face you. You caught up to him quickly and stopped a few inches in front of him, reaching up to grab his hoodie sleeve and trying not to be offended when he flinched away from your touch.

“What happened?” You were questioning him with slightly widened eyes, looking up at him and trying to read what his face was expressing. “Why are you running away from me?”

“What did he say to you?” His voice was hardened and he was staring daggers down at you, your face crumbling at the harsh expression that you’d never seen directed your way before.

“Nothing, he said nothing.” You were shaking your head quickly and he let out a disbelieving scoff, looking away from you and clenching his jaw in agitation. “Hee, I’m serious. He didn’t say anything, a bunch of none sense I didn’t even understand.”

He was glancing down at you again like he was trying to see if you were telling the truth or not, being met with your big wide eyes and sighing softly in guilt for being so quick to anger. His hand was coming up to touch your face and you leaned into it even though you were still feeling confused over what was happening.

You didn’t say anything when he was reaching down to grab your hand gently, leading you with him out towards the parking lot where you spotted his car parked near the back. You frowned softly behind his back but got into the passenger seat anyways and watched as he started it up but didn’t pull off.

The heat blaring created a small rattling noise and you could hear the song you’d put on before still playing faintly, flushing a bit at the realization he hadn’t changed the CD and was just letting it play on repeat.

“Are you scared of me?” He was suddenly asking and you glanced over at him from the passenger seat, seeing the way he was staring down at his hands as he picked at the skin around his fingers. His legs were spread so his knee was pressing against the middle console and you reached over to place your hand on it gently.

“Of course I’m not.” You were whispering back to him and shifting your body so you could completely face him, your eyes following along his side profile and frowning at how defeated he looked.

“Even if I told you I did something bad?” He was finally glancing at you and you felt sick at how vulnerable his eyes looked, shifting nervously over your face and you hoped your expression didn’t convey how nervous you suddenly felt. “That I hurt somebody really bad?”

You were watching him in silence and it felt like the air from the car got sucked out with his words, hinting towards something darker than you’d expected him to admit. You thought back to the expression he sometimes carried, the way he spoke about your father so casually and the worry on Sunoo’s face. You watched him while thinking of this and you thought about all the other things to.

How he was always so gentle and kind with you, warm and comforting and never doing anything to make you feel worried despite most your time with him being spent alone and late at night. You didn’t know every detail about his life but that didn’t make him seem dangerous to you, he felt familiar and safe and you instinctively squeezed his knee.

“Did they deserve it?” You were finally croaking out, settling on a response that you felt properly conveyed your stance on what he was saying.

You’d thought from the moment you met him that Heeseung was similar to you and you knew the reasons you couldn’t sleep, the demons that kept you up all night restless. You tried to imagine what his looked like and you figured if you were bigger and braver, maybe you’d tried to hurt yours back too.

He wasn’t saying anything for a few seconds, just looking at you like he hadn’t expected that response and you knew immediately it had been the right thing to say. His face was crumbling and he was biting his lip to stop it from trembling, ducking his head forward to nod as an answer to your question.

You were leaning forward over the middle console to pull him in for a hug, not caring about the way the plastic pressed into your stomach uncomfortably or the burn your arms felt from stretching so far to embrace him. He’d help you more than once, brought you back from a dangerous place and a low state of mind and your heart tugged at the sight of him showing that same vulnerability now.

“It’s not your fault.” You were whispering into his hoodie and his arms were snaking around your middle, a small surprised noise slipping from your mouth when he was tugging you over the console and situating you in his lap. He was burying his head deep into your neck and your hand was coming up to rest on the back of his head, his hoodie fabric under your palm.

You didn’t need to hear the full story, you didn’t need for him to painfully recount the details or what had happened for him to do something so drastic and you didn’t need to know who.

Him softly crying into your neck and clutching onto you like a scared child was all you needed to believe him, to understand that whatever rumor or perspective others such as Sunoo had, was wrong.

He was picking his head up to look at you and your heart broke at his red face, tears streaming down his cheeks and a frustration expression coating his features like he was mad at himself for showcasing how upset he was. He was suddenly pressed against you in a kiss and you hesitated for a second in surprise before kissing him back.

You were pushing his hoodie off his head so you could put your hands through his shaggy hair, pulling him tighter against you and feeling the way his wet face was pressing onto yours.

“You can’t leave me.” He was gasping into your mouth and his hands were shakily coming up to cup your face, tilting your head softly and humming into the kiss when you were licking into his mouth and leaning forward so his back was pressed against the car door.

Heeseung was moving a hand down towards your back and you could feel him continuously tugging you forward into him, your hip bone pressing against his stomach as you both found comfort in each others touch. You let him do this for a few seconds longer before you were pulling back a bit to address what he had said.

“I’m not going to leave.” You were gasping as you said it, still trying to catch your breath and he was shaking his head before tugging you forward again, a small noise slipping from your mouth at the feeling of him dragging you up further into his thigh.

“I’m serious.” He was still speaking into your mouth and you pulled back further to look at him, the dark expression back in his eyes now as he watched you. “I’d go crazy if you left.”

It slightly unsettled you how serious he sounded, how he really stressed the words like they were the most important in the world. His hands were still holding onto you tightly like he was terrified you’d slip away if he let up even a little bit and your eyes bounced around his face for a few seconds before you were nodding.

“We can be crazy together.”

“You can’t leave me.” He was gasping into your mouth and his hands were shakily coming up to cup your face, tilting your head softly and humming into the kiss when you were licking into his mouth and leaning forward so his back was pressed against the car door.

Heeseung was moving a hand down towards your back and you could feel him continuously tugging you forward into him, your hip bone pressing against his stomach as you both found comfort in each others touch. You let him do this for a few seconds longer before you were pulling back a bit to address what he had said.

“I’m not going to leave.” You were gasping as you said it, still trying to catch your breath and he was shaking his head before tugging you forward again, a small noise slipping from your mouth at the feeling of him dragging you up further into his thigh.

“I’m serious.” He was still speaking into your mouth and you pulled back further to look at him, the dark expression back in his eyes now as he watched you. “I’d go crazy if you left.”

It slightly unsettled you how serious he sounded, how he really stressed the words like they were the most important in the world. His hands were still holding onto you tightly like he was terrified you’d slip away if he let up even a little bit and your eyes bounced around his face for a few seconds before you were nodding.

“We can be crazy together.”

[louisisalarrie]

wow thank you so much for your succinct summary of their personas and the stunt histories, that was a great recap. You touched on a few other points Louis vs S!mon and the reason for bbg in the first place and then dragging out until today (I personally think it’s a combination of the consequence of Harry’s fame - to keep Louis as far away from him as possible but also some legal repercussions for Louis if it would end - I don’t think that whoever set up this stunt thought it through) . Also related to stunts what were/are your thoughts on the Olivia tattoo? I just can’t imagine what he traded this one for?

Hello anon! Thank you for the kind words, and welcome to the show.

I 100% agree that the bbg stunt was not entirely thought out, and it went further than any of them were actually planning for. Maybe B threatened to out Harry and Louis unless they kept the stunt going and therefore giving her more money? Maybe careers got in the way, promo, whatever… either way, it’s a horribly planned and thought out stunt which I very much wish was over. But yes, very poorly planned, some hiccups, and now here we still are. The s*mon vs Louis dynamic is very interesting. I might go through and add my thoughts to that one day.

Ahhh and the Olivia tattoo. Wow. That certainly is a weird one, huh? I don’t think even the solo harries were prepared for that. But, let’s run through it a bit, as there are a couple of theories to touch on and a few points I wanna make:

Okay… so. The tattoo was another nail in the coffin for a lot of larries, because we just couldn’t believe Harry would do that for the sake of a stunt (particularly one that was so damn obviously PR that some solos believed it was too). We didn’t think he’d take it that far, and it was hard to keep pushing and believing when something that massive and permanent happens. However, we speculated on a few different theories, and some of them kind of add up, and some of them don’t.

I want to start by saying that in all my time, I have truly not seen any form of body modification clauses in a contract re: stunting. That goes too far into a human rights issue and ethics (what little are left) and the legality just doesn’t hold up. There is maybe 0.01% of me could believe that any clause could lean towards “hey, if you get an Olivia tattoo, we’ll give you a big payout and end the stunt earlier than it’s meant to”. Which leads me to my first point, is that I believe Harry chose to get this on his own accord. This isn’t a tattoo he was forced into getting.

Now, if he actually initiated it and said something similar to the above to his team and was like “I’ll get an Olivia tattoo if we just end this god awful stunt and I can spend more time with Louis/choose my stunts and outings” or whatever it may be, it would be an interesting agreement, and his team would probably go for it. The timeline of when we first see his tattoo (May 2022) and him and OW breaking up (November 2022) is 6 months apart. Maybe it was meant to go for longer. Maybe he did initiate it and get something out of it, im not sure. But, this kind of theory could be plausible, which I know you’re probably thinking “um, even if he did get something out of it, why tf would he put that god awful woman’s name on his leg” and I guess this theory could hold up to a lot of us because we have tattoos (I’ve seen similar commentary from others about this topic that have tattoos, so stay with me here, it’s okay not to have any or to have them and not feel the same way I/some of us do).

Okay… I have a bunch of tattoos. Harry has a bunch of tattoos. Louis has a bunch of tattoos. So many folks around the world have plenty of tattoos and we don’t all feel the same about them. However, I’ve had many conversations and found a somewhat general consensus from people who are moderately to heavily tattooed that after you get your first few (which are often times extremely meaningful to begin with), you kind of just forget they’re there? Idk, it’s hard to explain if you don’t kind of experience it, but sometimes I’ll forget about them and then someone asks me about one and I’m like “oh lol” and it’s because we see them every day. They become a part of you. When you look in the mirror you don’t really recognise them individually anymore. You’re just looking at you.

So in saying that, as we know Harry and Louis are heavily tattooed and a lot of their tattoos obviously mean a lot to them and to each other, they also do have some stupid ones. Harry has “big” on his big toe and Louis has a bunch of little sketches on his arm that are pretty funny. They don’t take all of their tattoos seriously. Just the ones that matter. And I find getting tattoos that don’t really mean anything like it’s just a stupid little cartoon outline of a cow with cowboy boots on that you think is cute, is easier when you have more tattoos. My first ones were absolutely meaningful and then I started loving getting them as each of them became a moment, a memory, and a time I was in. A part of my life, no matter if it was a good moment, a tattoo to remember something I overcame, or a stupid little drawing that made me happy, ya know? (Sorry this has gone too far deep into tattoos in general but I just wanted to note that I think Harry and Louis probably feel similarly to me about them based off their artwork.)

Anyway, my point is, is that that theory could stand. It definitely could. I’m not sure he would bargain for that, but hey, he might have.

Another one is more towards the song “Olivia” by one d, which Harry wrote with Julian and John. Harry said that the song “could be a place, it could be a person, or it could be a feeling”. There was also speculation that that song was called Olivia because it’s a way to say “I love ya” without actually saying it, which was obviously then connected to larry. So, there’s also the idea he got it tattooed for that reason, and hey, two birds one stone if he did the bargaining above too.

Anyway, Louis has(?) the E tattoo (it disappears and comes back in photos, sometimes it’s smudged, I’m just confused with that one) and that’s meant to be for someone he’s been with for yeaaaaars. But he has big massive matching tattoos with his actual buddy bro pal lover, and nothing for F. Harry has an “Olivia” tattoo for whatever reason, which if it was me, I’d probably have gotten it covered up by now if it actually was for my ex gf, but it is what it is. And let’s remember that Harry and Louis have a hell of a lot of big statement matching tattoos and that’s what matters.

[mareastrorum]

The Fool and the Soldier: Chapter Commentary

Chapter 7: The Serpent & The Crown

On off weeks, I’ll be posting some commentary on the prior week’s chapter. Since this is a longfic, I expect that it will be helpful for keeping track of stuff, plus I might mention something you missed. Of course, this will include spoilers, so continue with that in mind.

These aren’t meant to be comprehensive! There is so much more going on that I’m not saying. Feel free to ask questions too, either in replies or asks. If it’s too spoilery, I’ll let you know. I’ll add them to the body at the bottom as I receive them.

See the directory for other meta posts.

The Serpent & The Crown

Oh man, this chapter title has layers.

Molly revised this card in chapter 3, after reading a short story in the book Caleb gifted to him during their downtime in Zadash. As noted later in this chapter, the point of the story is not to take the first opportunity as soon as it appears because that may cut off further options. (Molly interpreted it as waiting to see what else he could steal from a mark before making a move. Not wrong, per se, but not exactly what the author intended.) Many of the scenes focus on opportunities and delayed gratification. What can they do or have now? What do they hope will come? Are they willing to wait for the mere chance of something better?

Because that was the focus, I ultimately didn’t include scenes for POVs from Beau or Nott. Beau’s arc wasn’t about that issue, and Nott’s only became that later, when she realized that her family wouldn’t care that she was a goblin then again once she was turned back into a halfling. However, all the rest of the Nein at least brush against those questions at this point in their development, so I felt comfortable with those two taking a back seat.

Of course, this is also the first part of Fjord’s arc, where the Nein learn of Uk’otoa (the serpent) and his offer of the power to rule the sea (the crown). Up until this latest live show, Fjord always seemed to be struggling with this idea of who he is and who he should be. That manifested in different ways throughout C2. Currently, we’re looking at Fjord’s relationship with power generally. He knows he wants it, and he’s not self-aware enough to sort out why, so he’s chasing it out of fear of losing an opportunity, something he’s rarely had in life.

Why are we bothering with that in a story about Lucien trying to murder Molly? Hmmmm…

One More Time

I wanted to touch base with Jester because she left Nicodranas without saying goodbye to Marion in canon, and I felt part of that was because she wasn’t sure she could sneak all the way to the Chateau and back without getting caught. I also wanted to explore the fact that Jester did miss home and considered staying (which was stated in the stream).

Jester’s arc isn’t usually the subject of a lot of discourse or commentary because it closely resembles a coming of age arc. She goes off to explore the world, learns what it’s really like, matures, falls in love, etc. She’s a sheltered kid that only saw people through a particular set of lenses, and traveling with the Nein has given her more perspective.

But does Jester want that? The answer is a resounding “yes,” but that moment was handled much later in canon. She originally left home because she was forced to—there really was no choice involved. Nott offering the hat of disguise gave Jester an option that wouldn’t have come up until the pre-peace-negotiations gala a few dozen episodes later. By that point, Jester had a much stronger relationship with each of the Nein and there was no doubt whether she would continue with them.

In the Origins comic, Jester repeatedly wanted to see more people and explore the city, sneaking out and causing trouble. But she brought things back for her mother. Marion wanted a better life for Jester, but her own fears and limitations kept her from providing that, so she urged Jester to go and provided a ton of money to help.

So this scene provides a little insight into all those factors. Jester wants to grow and experience new things, she wants to help the Nein, and she wants to bring a piece of that home with her. It’s no longer about being unable to go home. She can, and she’ll visit, but unlike a lot of the rest of the Nein, she gets to choose what life she leads really early on in the story.

Master Doolan Tversky, the Archmage of Dysology

Oh, this thread is still going. Yep. There’s a lot I won’t explain in this part, but I can at least go into a few things.

There’s very little canon characterization of Doolan. She’s a gnome, she’s very much obsessed with biological research of magical beasts, she’s willing to drop a lot of money on things she wants, and she’s pretty focused.

But Dysology has a few meanings. It’s criticism or the study of bad science. Given how much the Assembly was involved in politics of the Dwendalian Empire (they aren’t just doing personal projects), I tried to come up with a persona that would be into biology, magic, and politics all in one. The result was a scientist who is decidedly amoral and disregards the rules. Not evil, not good—motivated entirely by research and knowledge. Which is exactly the type of person who would be happy to conduct autopsies on a bunch of blood hunters.

Relatedly, that’s why I chose the bull wasp motif for Doolan as well. Omnivorous animals aren’t evil; they eat. That’s how she views herself and her associates. They aren’t doing bad things, they just do what they’re meant to do. There’s a hierarchy, everyone has a purpose, and Doolan just happens to be at the top.

Good people don’t usually end up in leadership positions in totalitarian regimes.

This scene was originally going to be after the next one, but @fruitzbat gave a good suggestion that fitting it between these two scenes flowed better and provided a starker contrast between the Nein and the Assembly.

Gods

This scene rehashed a conversation between Yasha and Caduceus because it covers topics important to both of their arcs. They’re the most similar with respect to their relationships to their gods, neither of which are big talkers. Even though some of the dialogue is taken straight from canon, I added more to flesh out the discussion.

This happens in a few scenes, and it’s all for the same reason: there are elements of canon that really can’t be skipped over if this story is going to have a coherent plot and satisfying character arcs. When I get to those moments, I try to freshen them up in some way to avoid boring the reader, while also avoiding deviation for its own sake.

We needed some circus kids moments, given that Yasha went off as soon as she woke up after the Iron Shepherds. Yasha and Molly had a very playful dynamic, and she was also the only one who he would cave to easily. If not for her, Molly would have tried to blow off Cree or otherwise avoid that conversation in the Evening Nip. Thus, Yasha is uniquely positioned to prod Molly about his dreams without him staunchly denying everything.

I also absolutely had to bring the peacock back. Yeah, they’re only supposed to be capable of flying short distances, but this is an Exandrian peacock and he’d not going to let Nott leave without him.

Colors

I wanted to check in with Caduceus because actually adjusting to the idea of moving forward without a plan or guidance from the Wildmother wasn’t overnight. He settled into it gradually over the course of this plotline. This scene also gave the generic idea of time passing before the Nein met up with Avantika without revisiting combat or other developments that weren’t as pertinent.

However, I also wanted to nudge the AU plot along. Molly was knocked out the entire time the Iron Shepherds and the Nein moved through the Savalirwood and Shadycreek Run; he never saw the distinct color of the woods. So Molly had no reason to know that he was dreaming of a real place, let alone real people or events. At least, he didn’t until Caduceus mentioned that the trees there were purple and gray.

Caduceus probably would have realized that he was upset about that in particular if not for the seasickness—not that he would have explained anything anyway—but now Molly has information to inform him of what he’s seen. He’s totally not panicking, guys. Just queasy.

I also took inspiration from a canon scene of Caduceus zoning out about whether he'd met a ghost he didn't want to punch. This is one of my favorite C2 animatics for it.

Dream: Cold

The opening rhyme is an Irish children’s song that’s fairly well known in the English-speaking world.

In the United States and western Europe, a lot of the modern discourse on poverty focuses on food insecurity and homelessness (specifically, the lack of shelter, not any other facet) and little else. Notably, those were the only topics that TNEOL bothered with, and both were resolved in passing by introducing Auntie Mama, who handled both of those issues so that Lucien Tavelle only had to deal with the trauma around his family and the dangers of taking jobs for the families. As a result, pretty much none of Tavelle’s characterization was tied to racism against tieflings, how he survived in Shadycreek Run, the trauma that arises out of the desperation of poverty, nor the types of relationships he would have had under those circumstances. That’s just not included. Instead, his flaws are treated either as tragic/traumatic traits arising out of experiences with abuse by his family/Azrahari or as personal moral failings.

That’s such a typical tactic for published stories about minorities that grew up in poverty, and I’m absolutely not going to do that.

The dreams have already included examples of crime, fishing, etc. as means of survival, as well as avoiding threats of slavers, gangs, and fey. This dream addresses extreme weather, sickness, and the lack of family or social units (meaning groups of people that work together out of cultural obligation or some connected identity).

Homeless people die in extreme weather unless they can get to secure, prepared shelter, and in a town like Shadycreek Run, such shelter is not going to be common. People who live in violent, gang-run neighborhoods are rarely charitable with their homes because of the risk that the person they help will take advantage, and further, this is not the modern world with a culture of charitable giving or volunteering. Offering shelter to someone is a substantial risk, and that still requires some sort of agreement between those people. There has to be some conversation and trust. Homeless kids are not likely to ask strangers for a place to sleep because—again, in a town run by violent tribes, two of which run with the slave trade—adults that are likely to say yes are also the most suspect. Thus, homeless kids often die in blizzards.

That said, there are some people willing to provide temporary shelter, especially when they see sad kids shivering in the snow. Thus, the blacksmith allows a small group to take refuge from the cold while he’s there and has an eye on them. (In addition, Lucien keeps watch while the rest sleep.) As implied by his statements and scars, the blacksmith was also a former slave and has little interest in tipping anyone off that the kids are there. The temple to the Raven Queen also accepts the kids once they trudge through the snow to get there. Whether they could have sought such help earlier is anyone’s guess, and it’s entirely possible that they would have been turned away if the situation wasn’t desperate enough yet. On top of that, while cold doesn’t cause illness, enduring extreme cold compromises the immune system and kids get sick. A few that didn’t die to hypothermia still died to illness.

In addition, there’s the issue that the allegiances of the street kids are fickle. Younger, weaker kids don’t have much choice in who they stick with, and older, experienced kids eventually find opportunities to pursue. Thus, the goliath offers to take her two favorites with her to a gang, leaving the little ones and “the problems” behind. Smaller, disorganized groups without strong hierarchies don’t often last, especially when faced with challenges like blizzards.

Life is hard for kids on the streets. There’s kind people that mean well, and most of the time, they aren’t willing or in the position to offer long-term solutions. Unfortunately, when someone grows up with a vivid, consistent experience of scarcity, apathy, and danger, the nice lessons they hear from well-meaning, kind people tend to get warped. Thus, the blacksmith makes a curved sword rather a straight blade or some other tool, and his lesson isn’t about how to help or to seek help, but to endure. He has scars of his own, and he knows that other people cannot be relied upon. Allowing the kids to take up space and providing some advice is the most he’s willing to give.

I’m not writing a story to make privileged people feel like the desperation of the poor isn’t their fault or their problem. Society is to blame for poverty, and every single person has a part in that. There were things that bystanders could have done to save more kids, and they didn’t do it. It’s risky, yeah, and in the end, most people who have something to lose don’t want to take risks to help people they look down upon.

So they don’t.

Memories

Now the story can finally get into the Tombtakers’ interactions with Lucien in detail. We also see what Lucien can do while he’s in someone’s head. Oh boy!

I came up with Jurrell’s game quite a while before this scene as a way of providing retrospection and exposition in the Tombtaker scenes. That provides the reader with some insight into the other Tombtakers’ pasts and how they get along with Lucien. So now there’s multiple options for scenes to show that off. We’ll see a lot more of their backstory over time.

Lucien is a French name IRL, but there is no France or French language in Exandria. However, the French accent tends to be common along the Menagerie Coast. Going off that, I decided I’d interpret that as the Ki’nau language (Naush) and accent since it had not really been tied to a specific place in canon. Then I tried to brainstorm why Lucien would have that name if he grew up in Shadycreek Run. While researching Irish folklore, one of the figures that stood out was Lugh (modern “Lú”). Depending on the cycle (Irish folklore is divided into cycles with repeating/related myths), he was a trickster god, a god of light, a master craftsman, and a jack of all trades. Putting that all together with the earlier decision I’d made that he learned from Seanchaidhe, I came up with this backstory for how Lucien got his name.

When Matt introduced the Tombtakers as a group, Lucien was the only one that didn’t have a last name. In a campaign that was rife with chosen names, I felt that was an intentional choice to suit the character. Thus, my version doesn’t care what his name was. He doesn’t have a family, so as far as he’s concerned, he doesn’t have a family name. Whether he ever had a prior name is anyone’s guess at this point.

Lucien isn’t kind. He’s playful, curious, and willing to go along with things he doesn’t necessarily enjoy—but he also retaliates. So he doesn’t hold back when he has the chance to question Tyffial about something delicate. As for his intentions, that’s for the future.

Without the eyes, Otis doesn’t have darkvision, and I thought it’d be funny to include a watch where they absolutely don’t see trouble coming. It was convenient for a transition in this scene.

Lastly, @grayintogreen correctly commented that these were the “Syphilis Bandits” that the Mighty Nein repeatedly encountered in the Marrow Valley. They lived though!

Avantika

This was a scene that I felt I could not skip, but it was also so boring to include. Eventually, I finally tried drafting it from Avantika’s POV, and it felt so much better than any of the other versions I did. Doing her perspective also gave a decent amount of exposition so that skipping the early conversations with her wasn’t as big of a problem. It turned out to be very efficient for moving the plot along while keeping things interesting, even if there isn’t a lot of extra meat to the scene.

Eyes

Matt had so many eye motifs in the campaign, and I know Fjord and Nott would have been suspicious of Molly every time they came up. It’s such a fun thing to poke at.

Jester breaking the pencils was based on Laura actually breaking a pencil in the stream and joking that Jester had done it. I added it into the scene so that it happened throughout the conversation.

We also get a callback to the fairy tale the card/chapter title was based on. I like nesting stories within stories, so we’re going to see more of this.

Trostenwald

This scene mostly speaks for itself. More insight into Lucien’s abilities, as well as how conscious hosts are while he’s taken over. And some rather disturbing plans for Gustav...

Opportunity

Now that we got past the boring setup, time for Fjord’s perspective! Fjord has terrible insight, and he heavily relied on the others’ opinions to try to sort out what to do.

The story Molly mentions is another one of the three Stories About Snakes by the Brothers Grimm. However, he’s trying to be subtle with Fjord, who’s pretty dense. Their dynamic was so fun.

I also wanted to address that Fjord was definitely interested in Avantika. He was ambivalent about a lot of stuff during this first part of his arc, and it was a later decision in canon to try to sabotage her. I wonder if that will be different now…

Urukayxl

And, of course, a final check in with Molly. I figured he’d help with the snake makeup, but the advantage didn’t roll much better.

However, Jamedi is undead, and Molly is spooked around undead after what happened with Lucien. He’s not going to hesitate to pick a fight, but with Jamedi hiding out and bigger threats, he can’t spend the time to do anything about it. I also wanted to make clear that even though Molly was an anxious character, he channeled that into action. His panic attacks weren’t obvious outwardly, and they usually came after there was nothing left to fight. I took that to mean that he was capable of keeping himself together as long as there was something he could do.

It’s also very specific things that made him panic. He did in Alfield when he triggered the Rite of the Dawn, and then again in the Evening Nip when Cree called him Lucien—it’s when he’s faced with Lucien’s past, which he doesn’t understand and doesn’t want to understand. Danger from combat and social situations generally don’t phase him. However, now he associates undead with Lucien, as well as the dreams (thanks to his conversation with Caduceus). He’s not going to be able to hide it from the Nein forever.

The combat wasn’t important and moved quickly in canon, so I breezed through it too. There’s only a few small changes. First, Caleb didn’t have Invisibility at this point because he’d used the scroll against Lorenzo, but in this story, he saved it and inscribed it into his book in Zadash. Second, Molly looted a necklace that wasn’t from the show. Third, it was Fjord who teleported up with Misty Step to shove the yuan-ti guard, so I had to switch that to Molly. The first two are going to have further ramifications down the road.

[shinra-makonoid]

Thank you for your long response. Before, I used to check regularly on Twitter whats going on in Germany in that side. But actively seeking it out made me more depressed. Even if there are many supportive posts, some are overly cringe, "too demanding" and I have to clench my teeth when anti-trans people flock to that post and seem to be the "sensible ones". At the same time I kind of understand some of the more "hardliners" on "our" side because eventually you'll just get tired of arguing and trying to convince the other side. But this other side (the radfems, the anti-lgbt, the right, etc.) they probably feel that way too, just out of a different belief. And thus everyone just gets more aggressive on all sides.

I'm not equating their side with ours. People over ideas always. Even with nonbinary people. I might not get the logic behind it but like you said, people do identify as that because they believe that explains themselves. Of course maybe there are some doing it out of trend or misguided by mistaking it for something else but most of them are not doing it to push an agenda (at least consciously).

All trans people are immediately associated with the trans community, but not all of them are activists. It's not purely political or activism. Radical Feminists on the other hand are purely a collective of people who are together because of certain beliefs or views. Not all of them are women and not all women are radfems. Just like not all "tras" are trans and not all trans people are "tras". Both radical feminism and trans activism are politically motivated. But trans people themselves are not, yet they are all pushed in the same pot.

I admire you that you use your time to argue with them, "poke holes in their ideas" and try to highlight our individualism. I tried to do that too. But every time after a while of doing that or being too long in this negative mindset I ended up deleting Twitter (or blocking tags on tumblr because whenever I delete tumblr I eventually come back). Quitting Twitter was easy in comparison, because here it's less … in your face. Or at least less negative in your face.

I know that I don't have to tell everyone about being trans or associate myself with that community. I've been stealth for 5 years but the fact that you get associated with that no matter what you say is just annoying. And like you mentioned I'm scared of the ripple effect.

And yes I understand what you're saying about these receipts being used to make us look bad, and that tons of this stuff can be cherry picked for any group. This further depresses me because all that time arguing about how we are all individuals and not a monolith, is wasted on trying to convince people who have already made up their mind about you. Because sometimes when reading through some commentary of radfems or concerned christian parents ... it is just so obvious that they are already set on misunderstanding you but try to argue under the guise of "just asking questions", often "out of concern for the children", therefore implying "how can YOU not ask these questions or care about kids". And worse that with us trans men they add the little bit of guilt of "you're confused and being manipulated. I'm just helping you".

And thank you for your last part. My aunt even told me she's glad that me telling everyone about me meant that she could tell her sister (my mother) about herself. On some level I know that but I always think of my grandmother who lived in such different times. My grandmother was also the only one who knew about my aunt. But she always said that, her life was awful in soviet union and that all the great things we have now and the hardships that she gone through or that every previous generation has to go through is worth it if it means the next generation has it easier and not have to live through the same bad things.

When listening to some other old people or people on the internet it always shocks me how outright spiteful some older people are and actually argue that children have to go through the same bad things in order to "understand our pain", instead of just working towards the goal of not causing it for further generations.

Yeah this is what scares me the most in French, the misinformation and the posts from people who are adjacent to our causes, but who have so many holes in their arguments, you cannot help but understand why people would go against them.

However, with my continuous browsing about "what was the truth about trans people", I realized that even though I disagreed with their frame, I still wanted to fight for them more than I wanted to fight for radfems'/conservative ideology. I would prefer to fight for non-binary and trans people who think gender identity is a social construct, more than I would prefer to fight for the other side. I have a complicated history with that, because the last time I tried to share my knowledge and my beliefs, my peers (people who called me friends and all) turned against me and really literally bullied me online so.

In my experience, Twitter was more dooming for me than Tumblr, because for tumblr to hit you with radfem propaganda you have to seek it out. Rarely, if ever, do I come across a radfem post on my page. Usually when I engage it's because I purposely browsed a radfem tag because I was like "let's see what the nuts are going on about these days". Twitter however, you get it recommended if you start following a couple of people, and in the end, it's everywhere, and everywhere people attacks you, from all sides, and you can't answer the way you would on tumblr. I like taking time writing on my posts, and overall source everything, but you cannot really talk on Twitter, so you use very fast tracked discourse points that will lack nuances you would like to portray in longer sentences. On Tumblr, taking time to answer someone can also distance you a lot from what the person said. You start digging around what they said, the little holes in their argumentations, and that helps a lot in my opinion. It's not as scary and as tangible as what it looked like before.

In regards to being stealth and still being worried over it, I think I understand. My number one priority is to try to talk while maintaining that stealthness, but there is only so much you can do for it. If people on 4chan are decided to hunt you down and make your life a living hell, they can. Ideas and arguments are enough for it to be it. And if you have a controversial take on trans issues, that isn't "mainstream" compared to your peers (like trans organizations), you won't be sure they will help you, because for them you're as good as an enemy. I'm considering approaching trans organizations again, but shutting my mouth in regards to our differences will be difficult if I do so. What you must try to do, is to keep being true to yourself and what the facts are, or what they're closest to, because otherwise, you'll end up like Blaire White, and you do not want to end up like Blaire White. Admit your fault as best as you can (as it isn't always easy either), that will show that you can change your mind and grow as a person too.

When you argue with someone about a subject, never think about changing their opinion on the subject. You probably won't. Your real target are the people who are not quite sure but read your post because they were browsing your blog or your opponent's blog. That's who your post is really for. That is why I do not always respect my opponent in discourse. But sometimes it can bite my ass back (like being dogpiled for saying that no murdering is not right and/or vigilante justice is bad, even if [insert reason], you probably remember). If they manipulate others, call it out, make sure the person who is reading you tries to question it in some way. Well I'm not a master debater, but that's what I think, at least. The way you debate on social media is different than the way you debate in a 1V1 person in a private discussion in my opinion too.

If your aunt is glad, then be glad too. You have nothing to feel bad about, no matter what other can tell you. You inspired someone, and that's something most people can't do, it's really precious.

Yeah I know about the older generations thinking we have it all easy and all. Fuck them. They're the same people thinking that spanking and overall hurting your child when you're angry is okay because "well, I was beaten up and I turned up fine!" (no they didn't). I think older generations underestimate the way their lives were fucked up by abuse and historical traumas, and how it affected their children after that, because of it. But they can't help it probably so... It's difficult to navigate.

I appreciate your asks as always.

[norarigby]

Iwaizumi Hajime - The Little Things

The Little Black Box Masterlist

Pairing: Iwaizumi Hajime x reader

Warnings: Just Iwaizumi Hajime (27) Athletic Trainer being a big, clingy baby

Word Count: ~1.2k

A/n: Day 1 of the Little Black Box series complete! Even though I don’t want to focus on proposals with this series, I loved this idea so I feel like it’s fine. Enjoy and I’ll see you tomorrow with some Sakusa!

Iwaizumi’s keys jingled as he unlocked the door to your shared apartment. He sighed as he took off his shoes and set down his bag. As he stood back up, his eyebrows furrowed. It was oddly quiet in the apartment. Where were you? Even if you couldn’t meet him at the door, you’d usually at least shout a welcome home.

Iwaizumi walked around the front of the apartment to try to find you. You weren’t in the kitchen making dinner or on the couch taking a nap. Iwaizumi then padded softly to the bedroom. When he got to the door, he stopped and his features softened as he saw you deeply enthralled by whatever book you were reading. He couldn’t wait to have you tell him about it later.

He watched from the doorway at your face contorted with concentration. You were even chewing on your thumbnail, hooked on every word.

Iwaizumi loved these moments. He loved watching you when you thought no one was looking. Sometimes it was during the first light of morning just before he would get up for a morning jog. Sometimes it was when you two would be watching a movie and you would get just a little too into the scene that was playing. Whenever it was, he cherished the moment always taking a mental picture before it was over. You’ve caught him a couple times and every time you teasingly called him a creep. And every time he would just smile wider and attack your face with kisses.

But as much as he loved this moment, he wanted to cuddle with you just a bit more. So he walked over to the bed and plopped his body on yours. He tightly wrapped his arms around your waist and snuggled into your stomach.

You raised an eyebrow and lifted up your book so you could see the top of his head, “Well hello to you too.” Iwaizumi just grumbled an incoherent response. “When did you get home?”

“Couple minutes ago.” He mumbled.

You sighed and marked the page you were on. The book would have to wait. Iwaizumi was definitely not a clingy type, but a tired Iwaizumi meant that you had a very clingy Iwaizumi on your hands. And he could get very upset if you didn’t give him enough attention. So you set your book down on the dresser, laid down further on the bed so you were more comfortable, and began to gently run your fingers through his hair.

You hummed, “I’m sorry I didn’t hear you and come to say hi. How was you’re day?”

Iwaizumi recounted his day while stealing one of your hands so he could play with your fingers while he talked. These softer moments were rare, usually saved for mornings that were slept in or when one of you had a bad day. And while he hadn’t necessarily had a bad day, he must’ve missed you especially today. You hummed in response to his stories and even interrupted every once in a while to add your own commentary.

After he finished his account of his day, he propped his head on your stomach to look at you, “How was your day?”

“I had lunch with some of the executives and I think it went well. They liked my pitch and we’ll start really working on making it happen tomorrow, so I took the rest of the day off.” You stopped running your hands through his hair and cupped his cheeks, “Speaking of, aren’t you home a little earlier that usual?”

Iwaizumi frowned, “No? I pulled in at about 5:30 like usual.”

Your eyes widened before you groaned, carding your hands over your face, “I meant to start dinner at 5! I must’ve lost track of time!”

Iwaizumi shifted so that his forearms propped him up just above your face, “No worries. We can always just order takeout. It can be a celebration of your work accomplishment today.” In all honesty, a night in with some takeout and some dumb movie sounded really good to him right now.

Your hands lifted from your face and you lit up in excitement, “You mean it?”

He couldn’t resist smiling at your reaction, “Of course I mean it. Pick whatever to eat and we can even watch one of your movies if you want.”

“Iwaaaa,” You whined. “You’re too nice to me! What did I do to deserve you?”

“I could ask you the same question.” Iwaizumi planted a kiss on your lips before getting up to change into something more comfortable, “Order something delivery. I’ll even pay for it. I think my wallet’s in my bag.”

You bounced up from the bed an placed another kiss on his check before going to get his wallet from his bag. You checked the main pocket. No luck. You checked the big side pockets. No luck.

“Hajime, what pocket is it again?” You shouted.

“It should be in the small front pocket.” Was his response, but it barely registered in your head. When you opened the front pocket, you quickly realized that it was definitely not the right pocket. And you definitely should not have seen what was in that pocket.

“Babe? Did you find it? It’s just in the front-“ Iwaizumi had peeked out to see if everything was alright and instead was met with you standing above his bag, staring at something in your hand. You turned fully towards him and looked up slowly. Iwaizumi’s eyes immediately saw what you were staring at and his eyes went wide. They darted between the small box in your hand and your eyes.

The two of were absolutely silent, just looking at each other. A minute passed. Then another. Finally, the two of you bursted into laughter. He came over and hugged you as you both continue to laugh. He should’ve known he would never get to properly propose to you. As your laughter died down, he pulled back and held the box between the two of you, “Well this is not how I saw it playing out, but I was going to propose sometime soon anyway.”

Iwaizumi opened the box, planning on showing you the ring, but found the ring missing. He looked at you again in panic, but softened when he saw you showing the ring on your finger. You smiled as you wiggled your ring finger in his face, “Had to make sure it fit.”

He rolled his eyes and smiled, “You tease me too much.”

You wrapped your arms around his neck and his hands settled on your hips, “But you know you’re going to have to properly propose to me at some point, right? My mother will never let me live this down if she found out this is how we got engaged.”

Iwaizumi leaned down so your foreheads were touching, “So does that mean you’re saying yes?”

“Iwaizumi Hajime. I cannot give you a proper answer until you properly propose to me.” You cupped his head in your hands, “I’m going to get in some sweats. Find your wallet and then join me so we can decide what to eat and watch, okay?” You returned your head to rest against his. “I love you.”

Iwaizumi made a mental note that you were still wearing the ring and hadn’t even made an attempt to take it off. So even if you didn’t give him a verbal answer, he knew.

He smiled and spoke softly, “I love you too.”

(Posted on February 22, 2021, 11:03 AM) 

[work-of-waking-up]

In Defense of the Psychopath

Alright, wanna venture into my crazy ass brain? I’m going to start by saying one thing that will set the tone for everything else that follows: Villanelle is not a psychopath in the way that we currently understand them. Why am I even bothering to write about a fictional character, you ask? Because representation is important. Media portrayal of various mental and behavioral health topics (including ones that people might not think need to be discussed) is important and this show has a big audience. I also just want to contribute to the conversations that are taking place because I am seeing A LOT of them and the reason for that I believe boils down to the fact that Jodie makes Villanelle so relatable and people want to know what that means and looks like for them. Even those who felt they could relate to Sandra’s Eve, or the relationship between the two, maybe questioned what that meant the further they went down the path with them. “It’s probably a bad thing I relate to a psychopath, right? But she can’t be a psychopath because she cries and she feels things! Psychopaths don’t cry, which means she isn’t realistic so therefore it’s okay that I relate to her! Right? Or are my assumptions about psychopaths and people with antisocial personality disorder wrong? I relate to Eve but look what she is underneath it all...so does that mean I relate to that part of her too?” Not only is villanelles character relatable, but people see the freedom inherent within her, the freedom that Eve sees, and they realize that, at least on some level, they want it too. The show has (unintentionally I think) created a massive dialogue which is super cool and you can tell everyone involved on the show is aware of that now, I mean they have a consulting psychiatrist so I think that speaks for itself. This is less of a commentary on the character herself and whether or not she is a genuine psychopath, and more so a commentary on the conversations she has inspired and why... For the record, this is literally just my opinion sprinkled with a few facts, nothing else.

So, the term psychopath gets thrown around in the show, more so in the beginning, MI6 explicitly labels Villanelle this way, even going so far as to use her in a presentation about psychopaths, although I think that was more so to gauge Eve’s response than anything else. The reality of Villanelle, which we come to learn, is that nobody has been able to get close enough to really know the truth. Anna and Konstantin both got close but we never hear either of them use that word (Konstantin says it once but he clearly doesn’t mean it, it was more of an attempted manipulation tactic). They make it clear that she has, and can, and WILL cause damage, but that’s as far as they go. Eve is getting close and she tells Villanelle when they first meet that she knows Villanelle is a psychopath but it’s obvious from Eve's behavior and things she says later on that she truly doesn’t believe Villanelle is what everyone says she is. It’s easier to label her as a psychopath because that alienates and isolates her and her behavior completely. She is an outlier with behavioral anomalies and therefore it isn’t necessary to look any closer. For MI6 and others (not talking about the shows creators) to label Villanelle as a psychopath is easy, it’s lazy, it’s reductive, it serves a single purpose... a means to an end. They (anyone other than Eve basically) simply do not care about Villanelle’s truth. But as an audience we are lucky enough to see more of her with each episode. The psychopath label begins to fade and Oksana is what’s left. We know based on what she has said that she is aware that people think she is a psychopath, a monster, a person built to kill. It’s not always easy to decide that who you are is different from who you’ve always been told you are, especially given her history. Villanelle hasn’t told us yet if she thinks (or knows) that she is a psychopath, but it’s clear towards the end of last season that she no longer wants to be the person that they (meaning the twelve, Dasha, Konstantin, etc.) created. We see moments where she clearly has no remorse and clearly enjoys what she does, but then we have little moments sprinkled in between where she very obviously struggles, even if its short lived. And those moments are important. We have the moment where she struggles with the choice to shoot Konstantin, saying he is a good person, she thinks. This comes shortly after a conversation she had where Irina tells Villanelle she thinks she is a good person because she is sad, so we know she is thinking about it, we know the awareness is there, and it becomes more and more there as times goes on. I like to think of it in terms of having moments that are pure Villanelle (ie the way she killed Inga in the Russian prison), and then we have moments that are Oksana, vulnerable and emotional. Villanelle is a creation and a mask whereas oksana is the truth. Those moments are starting to really mean something. I'm not even going to start with her trip to find her family, that’s its own thing, but it's a Really Big Thing.

So. Villanelle is not a psychopath in the way that we currently understand and perceive them. Yes, she displays psychopathic traits, and yes, she absolutely has antisocial personality disorder. I read an article where the psychiatric consultant for the show (makes it pretty obvious how hard they worked to make Villanelle as realistic as possible) said that the Villanelle in Luke Jenning’s books scored a 32 on Hare’s psychiatric checklist, but I like to think (and I think a lot of people would agree) that number is a bit high, at least for Jodie’s Villanelle, maybe not even hitting 30 at all (close though, let’s be real lol). The max score is 40 which would be a fully blown primary psychopath. For reference, Ted Bundy scored 39. This checklist is flawed though, mostly created and based off the prison population. Which is why it isn’t used as a proper diagnostic tool. 32 is apparently extraordinarily high for a female (think Aileen Wuornos), which brings me to my next point which is that because it’s hard to measure a lot of the classic traits objectively, there is not a ton of solid data surrounding psychopathy, and even less of it is on female psychopaths. Like most things in life, psychopathy exists on a spectrum, there are levels and layers. It’s not black and white, there’s no definitive test (psychopathy isn’t even in the DSM-5 because as I said earlier it’s extremely hard to measure objectively) and it's important to distinguish between someone who exhibits psychopathic traits and someone who is actually an identifiable psychopath. Chances are high that someone you know displays at least one characteristic shared with psychopaths and this doesn’t make them one.

I think what’s important about this is that mental disorders (mental illness/personality disorders/etc.) of any kind are much more nuanced than a lot of people tend to think they are. That they exist less in black and white and more in shades of grey. Jodie Comer is absolutely remarkable for showcasing that through portraying the different layers of Villanelle. Her performance is a literal gift. We cannot keep thinking and acting like we know everything about how a person thinks, feels, and behaves based strictly and entirely on one label. The thing that has stuck out to me the most, the reason I decided to even write this bullshit babble, is that one of the most searched topics about the show is whether or not it’s realistic that Villanelle cries, and honestly how sad is that? That makes me sad for V. Is it more realistic for her to develop connections and cognitive empathy if she was made into a psychopath vs if she was born that way? Is there a legitimate difference between the two? And how do we even decide which one is applicable for someone? It’s important to add that antisocial personality disorder is not the same thing as psychopathy or sociopathy. You can have aspd and not be a psychopath. Research has shown that about only a third of those diagnosed with aspd would meet criteria to be considered a psychopath. Society is not doing a great job at getting people to understand this. But to be fair, understanding personality disorders specifically has been somewhat problematic, a lot of diagnostic confusion and overlap between disorders. A LOT of work needs to be done. But as far as portrayals go, society has strictly chosen to go the route of giving us psychopathic characters and having them be inherently violent, incapable of remorse, feelings, or change. Poverty of all emotions. Subhuman. They are made out to be so abnormal and unrelatable to the point where the character of Villanelle has sparked so much debate and fascination simply because she exists in a way that actually IS relatable...and layered and beautiful and thrilling. We thought she would be the bad guy and yet we root for her at every turn, we cry for her, we want good things for her! We see her darkness and without question or hesitation we forgive it. She makes us question what we’ve previously been shown. Questioning whether or not it’s realistic that she acts the way she does is less important than questioning our own personal assumptions and beliefs and where those come from. I think that’s awesome. Villanelle is truly a gift. She is hands down one of the most well written fictional characters, which is saying a lot considering when you put something, or someone, in a box it doesn’t leave tons of room for expansion. and I honestly don’t even really need to say this, but.. Jodie Comer.

[curiositys-cat]

Burn Up The Light: Chapter 7

Sandstorm keeps a careful eye on Fireheart these days, though maybe that’s nothing new. Even when she hadn’t wanted to, back in the beginning, she’d always been  aware  of him and his bright coat, the way his voice cut through crowds, the-- just about everything, really. No matter what he did, he had a way of filling the space.

Maybe that wasn’t accurate. Other cats didn’t seem to notice it, so maybe it was this-- no matter what he did, Fireheart had a way of filling her thoughts.

But she watches him now, because he watches her-- because he  knows  her, and she’s going to get him right back.

Dustpelt had just scoffed when she’d told him this particular plan. He does that whenever she mentions Fireheart. He’s been doing it a lot lately.

“Fireheart looks off today,” Sandstorm murmurs over the rabbit she and Dustpelt are sharing. She keeps her voice down, but his ears prick in acknowledgment. “Do you think something happened with Cinderpaw?”

Fireheart plods across the out of the medicine cat’s den, coming to a rest at the base of highrock, where a shadow stretches for just a few tail lengths. When he lays down, it’s more of a collapse. Sandstorm frowns.

“Does anything new need to happen?” Dustpelt asks.

“Hm. Maybe not. He looks exhausted, though,” Sandstorm says. “More than normal. And he looks like he hasn’t had a proper groom in a moon.”

“Someone should fix that. Why don’t you go over and share tongues, hm?”

Sandstorm almost chokes on her rabbit. “What?”

“You said he looks ungroomed. Offer to do it for him, if it bothers you so much,” Dustpelt says with a roll of his eyes, and Sandstorm gets the definite feeling that she’s missing something. She’s quick to shake her head and follows the impulse to leap to her feet, legs suddenly jittering with nervous, buzzing energy.

“I’m not doing--  that -- but I can do something else for him.”

“Suit yourself,” Dustpelt says, looking at her with unimpressed half lidded eyes. “Make sure to get a good sniff of him while you’re over there so you can describe how he smells to me again.”

“It was important to the story!”

“Sure was. I’m not saying I was  glad  when Tigerclaw interrupted to give me dawn patrol, but...”

Sandstorm resists the urge to box him around the ears like she would’ve when they were apprentices-- she’s a warrior now, and she’s got more important things to do than tumble around camp with her best friend, no matter how much she’d like to see his face if she took him down right now. If Bluestar saw, she’d fix Sandstorm with one of those  looks .

But. Bluestar isn’t around.  

Sandstorm sends herself hurtling at Dustpelt, eyes gleaming with sharp light. They’re laughing before they hit the ground.

--

Cinderpaw’s accident lays like snow over the clan, the kind that melts during the day and freezes thicker at night, trapping everything beneath it in sickly ice. No one knows what to do. There’s sympathy, of course, and hope, and a sense of relief and heartbreak in equal measure from the nursery, where Frostfur minds Cloudkit with an almost obsessive fervor. She stinks of guilt and grief and a fear that hasn’t gone away since the day Cinderpaw came off the Thunderpath.

In it all, no one else seems to notice how badly Fireheart is doing. Maybe they do, but with all eyes on his apprentice, Fireheart’s pain seems smaller. It is. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t hurting, and Sandstorm hates seeing the way his steps grow heavier with each passing moon. He’s a creature meant for crowing, not for this slinking half-sleep.  

Sandstorm, once she’s brushed herself off, heads over to him, on a warpath to make his life easier. She gets his murmured permission, and then goes to hunt down his old apprentice, and the extra one he seems to have taken on these days with Graystripe’s absences. She’s noticed those too, of course, but that’s none of her business. For now.

Cinderpaw and Brackenpaw meet her at the thorn tunnel. “Are you both ready to head out?”

“Yep! Weather’s great!” Cinderpaw chirps. Sandstorm gives a look at the heavy clouds and shakes her head.  

Her brother is more subdued. He always is, but he seems even quieter in the shadow of his lightning crack of a sister. It’s slow going, but Cinderpaw keeps a steady pace, and a steady stream of infectiously good natured commentary as they go.

“I think we should hunt here,” Brackenpaw starts before they’ve gone far, tail twitching nervously.

Sandstorm look at him curiously. “We’re too close to camp. Prey won’t linger this close to cat-scent. Has Graystripe not--?”

“No, he has!” Brackenpaw asserts, a little too quickly. “It’s just that I haven’t been going out as much, and it’s pretty cold, and I guess I just think I don’t want to go too much further.”

“I see.”

“Sandstorm’s too nice to say it, so I will,” Cinderpaw cuts in. “That’s a mouse-brained idea if I ever heard one. Let’s go.” She doesn’t wait for them to reply, pushing off deeper into the woods.

They continue in silence. Cinderpaw no longer seems to want to chat, eyes trained in front of her, jaw set as she pushes the pace. Brackenpaw scrabbles behind, hovering uncomfortably as he goes.

When they arrive at the spot Sandstorm’s picked for hunting, a shaded grove near the Riverclan border, Cinderpaw’s breath is puffing out hard in front of her. Sandstorm makes no comment. Let her be the judge of how hard she wants to push. When someone hurts like that, sometimes exhaustion is the best you can do-- wear yourself to the quick and when the night tries to haunt you, at least you can escape to sleep.

“Yellowfang said you’d be able to collect some herbs for her out here,” Sandstorm offers. “You know what you’re doing?”  

“I do,” Cinderpaw says. “Catmint and dock grow in wet, shaded areas like this. I’ll have a sniff around and see what I can find. You two enjoy hunting.” Her eyes flash as she says the last bit, but she turns before Sandstorm can see any more.

“We’ll be nearby.” Sandstorm touches her tail-tip to Cinderpaw’s shoulder before the apprentice starts away. She wishes she could do more, but saying it aloud would be worse. If Cinderpaw doesn’t want to acknowledge that she might need accommodation, she certainly doesn’t want anything that Sandstorm could tell her about grief.

Sandstorm’s heart aches for the apprentice, but she’s smart enough to keep that to herself.

“Shall we hunt?” Sandstorm turns to Brackenpaw.

“Yes!”

A few beats pass. Sandstorm cocks her head when no further response seems forthcoming. “Brackenpaw, can you tell me what prey is around?”

Eyes going wide, Brackenpaw drops his mouth open so far to scent she’s surprised it doesn’t hit the ground. “I think there’s a vole over in the roots there,” he finally says. “Sorry.”

“No need to apologize. Different warriors do things differently, I suppose. I just assumed Graystripe had taught you like my mentor did me.”

“I think he might’ve,” Brackenpaw squeaks. “I just-- I guess I forgot.”

“Why don’t you see what you can do with that vole?” Sandstorm prompts.

She watches him drop into a hunting crouch-- not a bad one, all things considered. But it’s clumsy, and he’s only getting as far as he is on natural talent, not training. She’s not surprised when he overshoots, only barely managing to avoid bonking his head on the tree-trunk.

“When was the last time your mentor took you out hunting, Brackenpaw?” She asks.

“Sorry, I know I jumped too far. I think I could’ve gotten it if I’d been a little more careful.”

“Probably,” Sandstorm agrees. No point in lying to apprentices. “When did Graystripe last take you out here?”

Brackenpaw looks away. “Not that long ago.”

“The half-moon?” The moon will be round in the sky tonight.  

He still won’t look at her.

“The day before the last gathering,” he says. “But it was really good! We caught enough prey for all the elders-- and Dappletail said my mice were extra plump!”

“She knows good prey when she sees it.” A full moon since his mentor had last taken him out-- maybe there’d been a patrol or two since then, but it's worse than she’d thought.

“I’ll get the next one,” he says. After a pause. “I’ll try.”  

“Yes, I’m sure you will,” Sandstorm says, shaking her head as she tries to drive her wonderings away. Graystripe’s business is his own business, and if Bluestar feels he’s neglecting his warrior duties, that’s for her to say. Sandstorm has a job in this clan, and minding everyone else’s apprentices isn’t it. “Let’s find you something warm to sink your teeth into.”

It’s the middle of leafbare, and there isn’t much to go around to start with. Between Brackenpaw’s earlier attempt and the way her thoughts wind round her head like honey-suckle vines, it’s slim pickings. Brackenpaw does his best, but when all he has to show for his efforts is a half-starved mouse, it’s hard to miss the sag of his shoulders, the shame that slicks down his ears.

“We should find your sister,” Sandstorm meows around her blackbird. It’s not much, but it’s something.

“Can we just hunt for a little longer?” Brackenpaw casts a look around, as if prey is just going to wander into his paws. “I’m not ready to head back yet.”

“The prey’s all bolted to their holes.”

“Then we’ll find some more birds! There are always birds, even in leafbare,” Brackenpaw protests. Then, seeing Sandstorm’s unmoved expression, he adds, “please, I can’t head back with just this.”

He scuffs a disdainful paw over his mouse, turning it onto its stomach. It’s barely enough to feed a kit, and they both know it. What an earnest little cat he is, all rushed apologies and open worry. Sandstorm shakes her head, but before she knows it she’s agreeing.

“Fine. We’ll stay for a little while longer, but I want to see you working hard-- we need something more than fluffed fur to show for a whole day’s hunting.”

He nods solemnly, like she’s said something profound rather than muttered an instruction.

“Do you think that you could-- I know that I’ve been an apprentice for a while, but, could you just remind me about hunting?”

“What, in general?” Sandstorm asks, blinking.

“I mean, or just birds, or whatever we find!” Brackenpaw hurries to add.

Stars above. “Yeah, okay.” She drops down into her best hunting crouch and walks him through the basics-- stuff he should’ve had down moons ago, but from the way he’s drinking it in, it seems like at least some of it’s completely new to him.

He copies her, body low to the ground and almost deathly still. He starts padding forwards. His ears angle towards a scuffling that she hadn’t noticed until he’d started towards it. Another mouse maybe. Even if he misses, she’ll commend him for getting wind of it before she had.

His steps are light on the frost-crusted ground, quiet enough that even a mouse won’t notice his approach. He’s a quick learner, despite everything.

Just a tail-length away, one puffed breath between him and his prey, Sandstorm notices him slow. The next trembling paw he puts down slips on an ice-slick leaf, and all at once he’s a scrambling frenzy as he tries to hook the mouse before it manages to retreat. From the way his tail  thwaps  against the tree, she knows that he’s failed.

“Fox-dung!” Brackenpaw curses. “If I hadn’t  slipped --”

“It happens to the best of us,” Sandstorm says.

“But now we’re just taking back  this  , and everyone’s going to be hungry because I  slipped ! It was a stupid mistake!”

Sandstorm takes a step towards him, ready to try and comfort him-- she’s no stranger to a hot-blooded outburst after a bad hunt. “We learn and do better next time. What did we learn there?”

“That I’m a useless hunter,” Brackenpaw spits. “Can’t even catch a mouse.”

“The evidence to the contrary is in a hole with my blackbird.” Sandstorm keeps her tone even. “What else?”

Tail lashing, Brackenpaw looks away in frustrated silence before he finally breaks. “To pay more attention to where I’m putting my paws, I guess,” he says. “But I already knew that. I just forgot, because I’m  always  forgetting.”

“We learn by doing,” Sandstorm says. “And it seems to me that you haven’t had much practice.”

“Because I’m not good enough for Graystripe to mentor!” Brackenpaw returns, with more fire than she's ever seen in the calm apprentice's eyes. “I’m just-- not good enough.” His voice breaks, softens. “I didn’t understand it at first, but now I know. He doesn’t want to train me because he knows it’s  useless. ” There's a lower venom in that hiss, the kind that only the young really feel, self-revulsion big and loud enough to break the banks of a frozen river.  

“Brackenpaw,” Sandstorm says.

“I miss going hunting with him,” Brackenpaw continues. “But he’s so busy, so it’s not really surprising that he doesn’t want to make time for it, you know? It’d be okay if I were learning faster from Fireheart, but--”

“Mentors don’t get to choose whether or not they  want to train their apprentices, Brackenpaw-- it’s a duty, just like hunting and patrolling. If Graystripe’s not doing that, it’s a reflection on him,” she meets his eyes, “not you.” She knows before she’s finished saying it that it’s useless. Platitudes, no matter how true, are as good here as a twig in a forest fire. They only make it worse.

Brackenpaw snorts. “It’s not his fault his apprentice has three left paws. And Cinderpaw doesn’t want anything to do with me either, and I just-- I don’t know how I’m so  bad  at  everything .”

“I can’t make Graystripe a better mentor, but I can let you know-- you might feel lonely right now, but you’re not alone.” Brackenpaw’s shoulders climb high and tight. “Brackenpaw. Look at me. I mean it.”

Begrudgingly, he meets her gaze, but he breaks it almost immediately.

“If you want to be a good warrior, that’s the first thing that you have to know. No one in a clan stands by themselves. From the day we’re born to the day we die, we’re always just one part of something bigger,” Sandstorm says.

“I know all of that,” Brackenpaw shoots back. “But that doesn’t mean I want to be the weakest part of it! Cinderpaw’s going to be a medicine cat and save lives, and I’m just going to be-- here.” He looks around the empty clearing, to the scrap-pile of prey. “I just want to know what I’m doing  wrong .”

Nothing, she wants to say. You’re too young for these mistakes to count. Even with his sister-- and she can see what’s happening there, his overbearing concern coming hard on a cat who wants nothing more than to live freely-- it’s an honest mistake, an easy one, and it’ll all be salvageable when they figure it out.    

Instead, she finds herself thinking of Fireheart.

“Fireheart’s done worse than you ever have.”

Brackenpaw snorts again, but he can’t hide the way his ears prick in interest.

“You may be too young to remember it, but I was an apprentice with him,” she says. “And the  list  of things he got in trouble for-- it goes on. I’m not exaggerating when I say he spent half  his apprenticeship picking ticks off of elders-- you can ask Dappletail yourself later.”

“I’m just good at pretending,” Brackenpaw says. “Nobody but Graystripe has noticed how useless I am out here--”

“And what am I? A tree trunk?”

“You’re just being nice,” Brackenpaw shoots back.

“You and your sister-- when did I get nice?" She mutters. "Look, I’m trying to make a point. Fireheart was an  awful apprentice. He was always sleeping in late for patrols, and going off wandering in the night doing Starclan knows what-- he talked back to the senior warriors, and he couldn’t catch birds for a moon longer than the rest of us. And Bluestar was his mentor.”

This gives Brackenpaw pause. “Bluestar?” he asks.

“He was a kittypet mess, and she didn’t give up on him. Because she knew that he was a warrior at heart-- that he  wanted it.”

“Wanting catches no prey. It doesn’t matter”

Sandstorm flicks him with her tail. “Wanting got Fireheart to a warrior name, and plenty more besides it. He wanted this life so badly that he rebuilt himself around it-- burnt everything that he was down to the ground and grew again from that little wanting root. And for a little while, he was really, truly alone.”

“What did he do?” Brackenpaw

“His best,” Sandstorm said. “That’s all he ever does. I really don’t think it’s anything more than that-- he’s just got a good heart and this infuriating tendency to follow it further than anyone with his head screwed on right would do.”

“Is that-- a good thing?”

“Unfortunately.”

Brackenpaw’s face twists in confusion. Sandstorm changes tack.

“What I’m trying to say is that you just have to keep trying, with all of it. No one knows it better than Fireheart, and it sounds like you’re going to have to learn it well too. You have to figure out what you want, and if the answer really is to be the best warrior you can, you’ll do it. You just have to decide,” she says, tasting Fireheart’s words on her tongue.  

“You said he was lonely,” Brackenpaw says. And it’s that part that he cares about more than the rest of it-- he doesn’t just feel useless, he feels  abandoned , alone in a way that no clan cat was ever meant to be. Alone in the way that so many felt, with the way that the forest seemed to claw youth out of its apprentices, leave them scarred and grown before the kittenfluff had left them. “But he’s not anymore.”  

“I should hope not!” Sandstorm gives a laugh.

“And now he has someone like you,” Brackenpaw murmurs.

Sandstorm’s eyes go wide. “Well-- and Graystripe and Yellowfang and the rest. He has all of us. But--” she gives a hasty lick to her fur, “I suppose he does have me, too.”

And where had all that come from? Why was Fireheart her first idea when she tried to think of a good warrior? Was he that much on her mind?

But how wouldn’t he be? Fireheart’s the brightest star in any sky-- you’d have to be blind not to see it, willfully ignore him, like she had when she was younger. And the way it feels to think about him, too, like catching a rabbit racing across a clearing, exhilarating and all-consuming. Like waking up to thunderclap, jolting into blood pumping wakefulness. Like--

A rustle of the bush at the edge of the glade and Cinderpaw bursts through, crying out around a bundle of dark leaves in her mouth-- but Sandstorm realizes quickly she’s not running away from anything. Instead, she’s  herding , a fat vole scuttling just before her paws.

Sandstorm could snap its neck in a single move, but she ignores her rumbling stomach. “Brackenpaw!” she calls.

He freezes, startled for a single suspended heartbeat, and then he snaps into action. Brackenpaw leaps, landing squarely on the creature’s back this time and sinking his teeth into its skin. One solitary squeak and that’s it.

“Thanks, Brackenpaw!" Cinderpaw pips, muffled around her herbs, eyes shining.

“That was great-- you drove it right into my paws,” Brackenpaw says.

A moment of hesitation, and Cinderpaw’s eyes flick over her brother, searching for a trace of insincerity. She doesn’t seem to find it, though, and when she purrs it’s with her whole chest. “I just saw it and thought--”

“Good catch, the two of you!”

Sandstorm starts off towards camp, leaving the siblings to exclaim over their catch without a warrior looming over them. On the way back she thinks of Fireheart-- and the fact that she can’t stop thinking about him.

[commentaryvorg]

Digimon Data Squad Dub Comparison Episode 1 - There Are Monsters Among Us!

This is a companion to my commentary on the original Japanese Digimon Savers! Reading my commentary on the original version of this episode (which you can find here) is recommended before reading this dub comparison.

Original name ~ Dubbed name

Masaru Daimon ~ Marcus Damon

Yoshino Fujieda ~ Yoshino “Yoshi” Fujieda

Captain Rentarou Satsuma ~ Commander Richard Sampson

[Since several characters share the same name between the original and the dub, quotes from the dub will always be in italics, while quotes from the original will not, in order to distinguish them.]

First off, can we talk about the characters’ dub names? The dub doesn’t actively draw attention to its setting much (but then again neither does the original, really), but it also does not change the fact that this is taking place in Japan and these characters are actually Japanese, despite that we’re hearing them speak English. Some of them keep their Japanese names, too, even if maybe they have slight shortenings of them to be easier for a Western audience to remember. But then some characters’ names are randomly changed to completely English ones, even though these characters are apparently still meant to be Japanese and living in Japan. It’s just strange – if they’re okay with keeping some of the Japanese names, why not keep all of them?

(Honestly, despite my complaints, I am kind of a little glad that they changed Masaru’s name in the dub, because Marcus comes across somewhat of a different character to Masaru for reasons I will be discussing at length. In that sense, it’s convenient to have different names to differentiate them by.)

Kudamon:  “He’s a renegade to begin with. We have no choice but to dispose of him.”

~~~~~

Kudamon: “The target is a renegade. We must catch him before he gets out.”

This is actually more reasonable than what Kudamon says here in the original.

Satsuma:  “The only ones who can keep Digimon under control… are Digimon!”

~~~~~

Sampson: “Only a high-level DATS agent can capture a Digimon.”

The original version of this line was already awkwardly expositiony, sure, but this one just doesn’t make as much sense. The point is not that Yoshi is a high level DATS agent, but that she has a Digimon partner.

The dub completely replaces the original’s soundtrack. I did a shoutout to the BGM here in the original, and I also want to do a BGM shoutout here in the dub! This piece here is very different sounding from Provocation Infinity but still gives a similar sort of actiony gung-ho feel appropriate for Marcus and Agumon being fighty dorks, and I like it. It’s used often enough in moments like this such that it’s the only dub theme aside from the evolution theme that I’ve become able to pick out and recognise the melody of, even though this is only my second time watching the dub. Though I don’t know what the dub soundtrack’s titles are (actually, after having a look, it seems like the dub OST was never released, so nobody does), I like to think that this one is probably Marcus’s theme based on the moments its used in, so I’m going to be calling it Probably Marcus’s Theme.

Marcus: “This is my training ground!”

This park is apparently specifically his “training ground”, even though it’s just an ordinary park that anyone can visit. Um, okay? (More on this at the end of this episode.)

Masaru:  “I’m the number one street fighter in Japan, Daimon Masaru-sama!”

~~~~~

Marcus: “One day, I’m gonna be a champion ultimate fighter!”

They’ve changed “street fighter” to “ultimate fighter”, which, okay, makes him come across a bit less like a delinquent, fair enough. But a noteworthy difference is that he’s only trying to be the best ultimate fighter. Masaru, on the other hand, feels like he already is Japan’s number one street fighter. This change still sounds fine and in-character enough on the surface, but it’s a meaningful distinction that will become quite relevant further in as we get more into Masaru’s character, so keep this in mind.

Marcus: “Fans all over will chant my name! They’ll say, ‘Marcus Damon is the best!’”

I get that what the dubbers are going for here is something equivalent in spirit to Masaru using -sama on himself. But there’s other, simpler ways to do that – just have him call himself “the great Marcus Damon”, or something like that.

As it is, what they’ve done here is make it seem like, apparently, Marcus has fans, or at least he wants to have fans. Which is not even remotely the point of his fighting thing in the original, nor will it be in the dub, either. He’s not doing this for recognition from others; this is something he’s doing entirely for himself.

Yoshi: “Raptor-1 can talk…?”

This was not a thing implied in the original – that apparently, Yoshi (and presumably therefore everyone else at DATS) hadn’t even heard Agumon talk until now. I guess they’re going for giving more of an explanation as to why DATS treated him like a monster, but I find it difficult to buy that Agumon really wouldn’t have said at least some stuff while trapped at DATS HQ. (“I’m hungry,” if nothing else, right?)

Lalamon: “Yoshi, he’ll destroy the human!”

Oh, boy. This is one of those English dubs that refuses to directly acknowledge the concept of death because apparently the poor kiddies can’t handle that or something. I will attempt to not rag on it every time it does so – only because that’d get really boringly repetitive – but I will be talking about it a lot in future episodes when death becomes quite a story-important thing that is happening.

For now, let’s just point out that it sounds really silly to talk like a human can be “destroyed”. There’s plenty of other ways to get across that Agumon is dangerous without directly referencing death that would sound more natural.

Marcus: “Then I’ll knock you out like I did these guys!”

Masaru did not mention the fact that he was responsible for beating up all the dudes this early on. I guess here in the dub, Yoshi just isn’t paying proper attention, because she’s going to continue to assume it was Agumon who hurt all the students.

Kudamon:  “He’s too dangerous.”

~~~~~

Kudamon:  “We cannot let this escalate.”

I am sad that the dub lost the fun “who’s too dangerous?” double meaning of Kudamon’s original line.

Yoshino:  “Hey, you! Get away from him! You’ll only lose if you fight him!”

Masaru:  “Huh? This isn’t about win or lose! This is about fighting man-to-man!”

~~~~~

Yoshi: “You can’t fight that creature! He’s too dangerous!”

Marcus: “Huh? Look, toots, I’m the dangerous fighter here! And I don’t need any babysitter to hold my hand!”

We really, really did not need Marcus being vaguely misogynistic by calling Yoshi “toots”, or by implying that she’s nothing but a babysitter. We really didn’t.

This also replaces Masaru’s original line that has that fun aspect of him not even caring about winning and just wanting to have a good challenging fight with a worthy opponent, so we lose that, too.

(Though, ignoring the misogyny, I do enjoy Marcus responding to “he’s too dangerous!” with “hey, I’m dangerous”.)

Agumon:  “Yeah! It’s man-to-man!”

~~~~~

Agumon: “That’s right! This is between him and me!”

Agumon then also isn’t able to agree about this being man-to-man, and this just becomes a less interestingly nuanced “stay out of our fight”, rather than really about the kind of fight they want to have.

Masaru:  “Got it? Now stay out of this!”

~~~~~

Marcus: “This is a fight between men, so stay out of it!”

Having removed Masaru’s reference to men a few lines earlier, the dub does something which is going to be extremely rare by its standards and actually adds in a reference to men here. …Unfortunately, because they’d also added in Marcus’s random misogynistic lines earlier, this comes across much more like it’s about gender, and he’s just essentially saying “we don’t want any girls in our fight”. Which, no. Masaru talking about manliness is never actually that much about gender at all, despite the word he uses.

Masaru:  “I see you’re pretty brave.”

~~~~~

Marcus:  “I dunno what you are, but you’re goin’ down!”

We lose the sense of Masaru having respect for Agumon challenging him in place of some basic I’m-better-than-you trash talk. And this also adds in Marcus calling Agumon a what, rather than a who, indicating that apparently Marcus is paying some attention to Agumon’s species and is seeing him, at least a little, as not quite worthy of the same respect as a human.

After their big cross-counter…

Agumon:  “I wasn’t ready. But you won’t get me this time!”

~~~~~

Agumon: “Hey! I wasn’t ready! I was waitin’ for you to say, ‘One, two, three, go!’”

The dubbers completely missed the point of the original, “I wasn’t ready.” Original-Agumon’s line comes across as “I wasn’t expecting you to be that strong, but now I’ve got the measure of you”, like he’s gained more respect for Masaru’s strength. Meanwhile dub-Agumon is just whining and acting like Marcus totally cheated rather than acknowledging his unexpected strength.

Agumon kicking Marcus in the crotch is cut, replaced with a rather cheesy-looking comic book POW sort of effect across the whole screen.

There’s a cute acoustic guitar BGM here for their bonding moment that I like, especially after recognising its melody and realising that this is a variation on Probably Marcus’s Theme! That seems very appropriate.

Agumon: “You’re… pretty good… for a human.”

Geez, what a backhanded compliment. Apparently dub-Agumon still sees Marcus as below him simply because he’s human, rather than fully acknowledging his strength regardless of species.

Agumon: “Let’s call it a draw.”

This line fills a silence, stating something that was already perfectly well implied in the first place by the fact that they’re no longer fighting and yet there’s no clear winner. It shouldn’t need to be said. In fact, it makes it seem a lot more like this fight really was just about winning or losing to both of them, when in the original that was never the point.

Rather than “Aniki”, which, okay, works fine in subs but can’t really be kept in a proper official English dub, Agumon calls Marcus “Boss”. I guess this is acceptable, but I feel like it would have been better for them to lean into the “big brother” meaning of aniki, rather than the “boss” one, for reasons I will be grumbling about a lot.

Masaru:  “Aniki?”

Agumon:  “Yeah. You’re the first person to acknowledge me as a full-fledged individual, Aniki.”

~~~~~

Marcus: “Boss?”

Agumon: “Yeah. Y’see, you’re the only guy who’s ever matched me blow-for-blow in a fight before.”

So, in this version, Agumon gaining respect for Marcus has absolutely nothing to do with Marcus treating him like a person. It’s just because of his strength, nothing else. Way to lose that really fun little bit of nuance and character depth on both sides.

(Also, what does Agumon even mean, “before”? It’s not like he’d have been able to have proper fights that weren’t just defending himself while trying to escape until now.)

Agumon:  “That’s why, from now on, I’ll be your follower!”

~~~~~

Agumon: “That makes you the boss. From now on, you give the orders and I’ll faithfully follow!”

Matching Agumon in a fight shouldn’t really suddenly make Marcus the boss who gets to order him around, should it? Plus, here’s Agumon explicitly saying Marcus can give him orders, which was not at all part of the arrangement originally. This whole thing has such a different tone to “you treated me like a person when nobody else did, so now I look up to you and will be loyal to you.”

Marcus:  “I never thought one day that I’d have an employee that’s as funny-lookin’ as you are.”

Oh, boy. Meanwhile, instead of “follower”, we have… employee. That is even more completely missing the point of the aniki-and-follower relationship of the original. If they didn’t like the gang connotations of “boss”, maybe they should have gone for “big bro” instead, perhaps? But no, they just doubled down on the “boss” in a totally different and inappropriate direction. Marcus has apparently just started up a small business.

The heartwarming BGM gets a record scratch as Yoshi reminds them she’s still there. I admit, it made me chuckle.

Yoshi: “So, are you gonna come quietly, or do I have to use force?”

Marcus: “Who’s she talkin’ to, you or me?”

I do enjoy this – a little implication that Marcus has some experience with being treated in a similar way, perhaps by the regular police.

Masaru:  “It’s the aniki’s job to look after his follower. I’m not handing him over to you!”

~~~~~

Marcus: “I’ve never had an employee before, and I’m not turning my only one over to you!”

Instead of Masaru doing this out of feeling like it’s an aniki’s responsibility, Marcus is making it about himself. He doesn’t want to lose his new and only employee. Like Agumon’s just a possession of his now. Nothing about how this is something that should be expected of him as a boss.

Later, at the tower, as Agumon asks Marcus to help him evade DATS:

Marcus: “What am I getting myself into this time?”

I enjoy this too. More implications that Marcus is used to getting himself into all sorts of Trouble.

Agumon: “I’m starved!”

Marcus: “Well, suck it up and act like a real man!”

Again with the dub adding in references to manliness that weren’t there originally, as if Marcus actually has a concept of manliness that will continue to be a running theme. Haha, I wish. Get ready for me complaining about the exact opposite of this in basically every other dub episode.

Agumon: “I’m a growing boy!”

How does Agumon even know this phrase? This is an entirely human concept. Dub Agumon will be doing a lot of this, awkwardly invoking human ideas that he shouldn’t have any conception of.

Yoshi: “Yum. I love chocolate pudding – it reminds me of being a little kid again!”

Yoshino’s coffee jelly gets localised into chocolate pudding, because I guess coffee jelly is more of a Japanese thing that Westerners might be unfamiliar with? I enjoy the added detail that it reminds her of being a kid and that’s why she likes it.

Masaru:  “I don’t know anyone by that name!”

~~~~~

Marcus:  “I have no idea who this ‘Raptor-1’ is!”

Marcus’s line loses the technically-not-lying and respecting-Agumon’s-identity of the original line. He does know who this “Raptor-1” that Yoshi’s talking about is, even if that isn’t actually his name.

Masaru:  “How’d you know my name?”

Yoshino:  “You yelled it out earlier for everyone to hear.”

~~~~~

Marcus: “How do you know my name, anyway?”

Yoshi:  “I know everything about you.”

No pointing out that he yelled it out earlier like a huge dork. Instead, she just really leans into the DATS-are-creepily-authoritative vibe that she already had a little of in the original.

Yoshi: “Born April 2nd in Tokyo, blood type B, Ootori middle school eighth grade.”

Him being born in Tokyo was not a detail mentioned in the original. And also probably not true in the original, since the series is set in Yokohama and there’s no indication that his family moved here. The dub is presumably still set in Yokohama even though it’s never mentioned, just because the scenery is that of Yokohama, so I guess they’ve just established some dub-only canon that the Damon family moved home at some point. This will actually come up briefly later. I am shocked that I’m saying this.

At least, props to the dub for mentioning Tokyo and making it pretty overt that, yes, this is set in Japan. (You know, with this Japanese guy called Marcus.)

Yoshi also does not explicitly specify Marcus’s age, only that he’s in eighth grade. Which (I’m pretty sure, though I’m unfamiliar with American school grades and may be wrong) would make him fourteen anyway, at least assuming he hasn’t been held back at any point. Keep this in mind, because this will also come up later.

Yoshi: “…and you now live with your mother Sarah and your little sister Kristy, who looks up to you even though you generally act like a jerk.”

First of all, how the hell does DATS have so much information that they even know how his sister feels about him?

Second of all, more importantly, way to just tell us that, hey, did you know, Marcus is A Jerk, hey, guys, you’re supposed to think he’s a jerk, because… he fights things, I guess?

The reality? Masaru is not a jerk. Not even slightly. He’s reckless and hot-headed and will fight anything that poses a challenge, but that is not even remotely the same thing as being a jerk to people.

But apparently the dub doesn’t understand this, and they seem to think that being a jerk is somehow meant to be one of his most noticeable character traits. And I guess they’re trying to present the idea that he’s going to slowly grow into being a nicer person through the power of Digimon and friendship? Which is not at all any kind of arc that Masaru is going to have, because he is not actually a jerk in the first place.

If it was just this one line that seemed to think this, I wouldn’t be that annoyed. But one of the biggest things I’m going to be complaining about with the dub is the fact that they actually do change Marcus’s character significantly to make him noticeably more of a jerk than Masaru ever was. We’ve already seen a little bit of this sort of thing going on so far in this episode, with how they’ve removed focus from the bits with Masaru treating Agumon like a person and instead made it all about fighting, and specifically winning those fights. But, oh boy, there’s going to be a lot more, to an extent that it has to be deliberate.

And aside from me just finding this very frustrating as someone who deeply loves Masaru’s character to see him distorted like this, I also can’t help but boggle at why they would ever want to do this at all. Why would you deliberately adapt a character – the main character – to be less likeable than in the original version of the work? How does it not occur to you that this is only going to make your new audience enjoy the work less? I do not get it.

Lines like this one here are even worse, because they blatantly violate “show don’t tell”. Along with making Marcus act like a jerk and showing us that, the dub’s narrative is also telling us that he’s a jerk and insisting we should think that about him instead of letting us make up our own minds. It’s so lazy and heavy-handed. There will be more like this and I do not like it one bit.

Yoshi: “I’m with the Digimon Data Squad.”

I guess the Data Squad really is its full name in the dub. Even though the acronym is still DATS. Don’t ask me how that’s meant to work.

Marcus: “That’s a great story, dollface, but what’s it gotta do with me?”

Can we not with the Marcus being casually misogynistic? Can we not? (Thankfully, this isn’t going to be a recurring thing. Other ways in which Marcus is being made less likeable will be, but at least not this.)

Marcus does not say anything about assuming Agumon was just a frog. Since Masaru having thought that is going to be relevant again later in the series, this is a loss of not just a moment of amusing dorkiness but something actually meaningful.

(One thing that is very clear about the dub is that, with a few exceptions, they do not appear to have watched ahead to see the whole series first and are just dubbing episode-by-episode. For a series like this with quite a strong overarching plot and lots of little things like this that get callbacks, that means that a lot of this overarching sense of cohesiveness will be lost, simply by accident, because they didn’t realise there was something important there worth keeping around. This is another thing I will be talking about a lot.)

Yoshino:  “As long as you keep running from DATS, Raptor-1 will only starve to death.”

~~~~~

Yoshi:  “If you don’t return Raptor-1 to us, he’ll starve to death!”

This is a little different. Yoshino was only trying to get Masaru to come to DATS, supposedly to pick up some Digimon food. Yoshi, meanwhile, wants Marcus to bring Agumon to DATS. Which on the one hand is a more helpful strategy for what she’s trying to achieve. But on the other hand, he doesn’t bring Agumon, because obviously the dub can’t change the episode that much, so instead we’re just left with that awkwardly not being what happens despite it being brought up.

Yoshino:  “You…”

~~~~~

Yoshi: “Thank you.”

The hint that Yoshino is gaining a new respect for Masaru from his desire to help Agumon gets lost here, in favour of simply a thanks-for-finally-co-operating. Might partly be just lip-flap’s fault – the Japanese “you” is two syllables – but still, Yoshi’s tone of voice could at least have done some of the work to imply the same as the original, and it doesn’t really.

Kudamon:  “This is the boy that put Raptor-1 under control? He doesn’t appear to have any special power, at any rate.”

~~~~~

Kudamon: “Interesting that this is the boy who fought Raptor-1, because nothing about him indicates that he’s able to fight at that level.”

We lose any implication that Satsuma might have been telling Kudamon things about Masaru offscreen, and instead here’s dub-Kudamon simply refusing to believe the evidence of his own eyes. You literally watched him fight Agumon on your screen. He very evidently can fight at that level.

Kamemon: “Enjoy.”

Marcus: “I’m not thirsty.”

Kamemon: “Suit yourself.”

Kamemon actually says words in the dub as he brings Marcus tea! This was very bizarre to me when I’m used to original-Kamemon, who almost never speaks at all.

Masaru:  “Just hand over what I came for.”

~~~~~

Marcus: “Just say what ya have to say and stop wasting my time!”

Apparently the dub has forgotten that Marcus only came here to pick up Digimon food for Agumon, and suddenly he expects to be receiving a speech here when he shouldn’t.

Masaru:  “Renegades?”

Kudamon:  “Yes. Raptor-1 has already entered the human world and injured humans. He cannot be allowed to go free.”

~~~~~

Marcus: “Why are you calling him a renegade?”

Kudamon: “Because Raptor-1 has already entered the human world and made contact with human beings, so he can no longer be allowed to go free.”

I would complain that it’s a bit much that Agumon’s getting in so much trouble simply for meeting humans in the dub, and not specifically injuring them like they were assuming in the original. But, as it turns out, the original is also going to call Digimon simply meeting humans a “crime” in the next episode, possibly as part of its early weirdness. So, eh, this isn’t really the dub being any sillier than the original here.

Satsuma:  “Daimon Masaru, you should work with us to create a bright future for both humans and Digimon!”

~~~~~

Sampson: “Please co-operate. The future relationship between humans and Digimon depends on you returning Raptor-1 to us.”

Also, apparently Sampson isn’t actually trying to recruit Masaru to join DATS with this speech. I can understand the logic behind changing that, since Satsuma was going about that whole thing weirdly vaguely.

That said, saying that the entire relationship between the two species hinges on this one Digimon being returned doesn’t make any sense. So I get the feeling that the implication of what Satsuma really wanted in the original line just went completely over the dubbers’ heads, and they simply thought they were translating his intent directly and made it sound rather silly as a result.

Masaru:  “What the hell is this? Stop pestering without even listening to what I have to say first!”

~~~~~

Marcus:  “Why not? Because I don’t owe you people a single thing!”

We lose the fun subtle Masaru-y nuance of him caring about being given a chance to express how he feels here. Though I suppose it’s also relevant and illustrative that Marcus is implying he would help them if he felt like he owed them, showing a sense of responsibility there.

Masaru:  “…but have you even considered why he suddenly showed up in this world? He admired this place! He admired this wide world, filled with things moving around that he’d never seen before.”

~~~~~

Marcus: “Have you thought about why he came to the human world in the first place? What if he didn’t have a choice? Maybe things were bad for him back in the Digital World!”

This would be Marcus being sweet and thinking about how Agumon feels… if it wasn’t for the fact that Agumon told him he doesn’t know about anything except the institution, and therefore clearly didn’t deliberately try and run away from something bad in the Digital World. Pay attention to your foll – uh, employee, Marcus. Masaru’s line there had somewhat forgotten or misinterpreted what Agumon had told him, but Marcus’s is doing so to a much greater extent.

Masaru:  “But if he starts rampaging, then I’ll be responsible.”

~~~~~

Marcus: “And if he gets into any sort of trouble, I’ll claim full responsibility for his actions.”

This sounds like a perfectly reasonable translation, but the dub version of the sentence does not work nearly as well to foreshadow the thing that the original line is foreshadowing and this makes me sad.

Marcus: “But only if you give me some food for him!”

…This is immediately following the previous line. So I guess, since they never give him any food, Marcus doesn’t end up obligated to take any responsibility for Agumon getting into trouble. (Even though that’s still what he is going to do when they think Agumon’s attacking the hamburger shop. But this makes him come across like someone who’s less willing to do so no matter what and has less of a strong sense of responsibility.)

Kudamon:  “It looks like you’ll have to take responsibility sooner than you thought.”

~~~~~

Kudamon:  “Do you now see how hiding him has created a security breach for all of us?”

This change makes a fair amount of sense, since original-Kudamon was being unreasonable by insisting Masaru should take responsibility for Agumon’s hunger when that was really Yoshino’s fault. And it also fits with the fact that Marcus never actually promised to take responsibility since he wasn’t given any food.

Yoshino:  “So this is where you were hiding him. Since he’s nowhere to be seen, it must be him who attacked the hamburger shop.”

~~~~~

Yoshi:  “So this is where you were hiding Raptor-1. A lot of good it did you, since we confirmed it was definitely him who attacked the hamburger stand.”

No, you didn’t! How did you confirm a thing that isn’t true? If this is Yoshi lying, that’s just a dick move; she doesn’t even have anything to gain from it. It feels more like this was the dubbers not paying attention and missing the original’s meaning, which is very obviously that Yoshino was assuming based simply on the fact that Agumon went missing. But he didn’t actually attack the hamburger stand! Did they not even watch ahead to the rest of this episode to realise that?

Marcus: “Why’d you attack a hamburger stand?”

Marcus asks this of Agumon after finding him with his head dorkily stuck in a trashcan, not really all that close to the explosions and flames. Way to jump to freaking conclusions after basically just finding proof that Agumon isn’t the culprit, geez! …Though I suppose that can be partly blamed on Yoshi inexplicably insisting he definitely was.

Agumon: “Huh? I didn’t attack anything, but a hamburger sure sounds good!”

Agumon should not know what a hamburger is. Again with his dub version knowing more human things than he should.

Kudamon:  “He hasn’t been tamed. I don’t understand why he’s fighting alongside human beings.”

This just makes no sense. What the hell does “tamed” even mean? Doesn’t it just mean “has become willing to work with humans”? Because if so, he evidently has been tamed, actually. Just sounds frustratingly like Kudamon trying to insist he Knows Better than this nobody kid, and I don’t think that’s meant to be his character.

Agumon:  “Aniki! He’s really strong…!”

Masaru:  “Doesn’t that just fire you up!?”

Agumon:  “Y… yeah!”

~~~~~

Marcus: “No! Agumon!”

Agumon: “Boss! I’m fine, but could you lend a hand?”

Marcus: “Ha! How about I lend a couple of fists!?”

The dub’s version of this exchange is kinda still cute, but it loses that fun nuance that Masaru loves how strong their opponent is, and that Agumon is learning to agree with that idea thanks to him.

Yoshi: “That thing will tear you to pieces!”

See, here’s a way to avoid directly using the word “die” or “kill” while still making it clear that’s what she’s referring to, without awkwardly acting like humans can be “destroyed”.

Masaru:  “When you’re in a man’s fight, you’re already risking your life! The moment you get scared of dying is the moment you’ve lost the fight!”

~~~~~

Marcus: “Besides, the ultimate fighter is always willing to make the ultimate sacrifice!”

This significantly changes the meaning here, and instead Marcus is apparently consciously willing to get himself killed if necessary, even though the kinds of fights he’s been in before really aren’t something that’s actually worth dying for at all. Masaru’s philosophy of acknowledging but then choosing to brush aside the potential risk in order to fight better makes more sense, because he’s not actually intending to die for anything.

The dub’s changed version of this line will also not work for the callback that the original line is going to get later in the series. I’d talk a lot more about why not, but, spoilers, so I’ll save that for then.

There’s a brief snippet of music here during the Anime Sads that appears to be a sad piano variation of Probably Marcus’s Theme, which feels appropriate. I don’t remember it from my one previous dub watch-through, but I hope it gets used in some of the future much more substantial moments of Marcus being sad about things.

Masaru:  “You… How dare you hurt my follower!”

~~~~~

Marcus: “It’s… It’s fightin’ time!”

We also lose another future callback here. But on the other hand, “it’s fightin’ time!” is going to become Marcus’s catchphrase that he uses basically every time he fights (a dub-only catchphrase that Masaru has no equivalent of, and that I’m really pretty happy with), and this moment when he’s avenging Agumon getting hurt is definitely an appropriate moment for it to start being a thing.

The dub’s term for Digisoul is, instead, DNA. Luckily for the biologist in me, who would otherwise be tearing my hair out over this, this stands for something entirely different from deoxyribonucleic acid, because boy would it being that kind of DNA make absolutely zero sense. It’s still pretty awkward that it happens to be the same acronym as a commonly-known thing that it could easily be mistaken for, mind you.

I don’t know why they couldn’t just keep the term Digisoul, though. It’s a perfectly good term! It can’t even be that the dubbers have some kind of oh-no-religious-references objection to using the word “soul”, because that word is also in the dub’s opening song that we’ll be hearing every episode.

Old man:  “By mastering this technique, your Digimon can Digivolve.”

Um, sure. The technique of waving your glowing hand over the Digivice is definitely something that needs to be “mastered”.

Marcus also yells “DNA Charge!” out of nowhere for the first time. But in his case, the old man never actually mentioned the word “charge” when telling him what to do here, so it’s even less clear how he knew that was what he was supposed to say.

Alas, the English dub does not dub the original evolution songs in Digimon. The evolution music instead is an instrumental version of the dub’s opening song, which, though I prefer Believer, is an acceptable replacement in terms of creating a similarly triumphant mood.

Marcus: “That’ll teach ya! Don’t mess with my employee!”

Oh my god, wow, way to completely unintentionally mood-whiplash the triumphant moment by reminding us that this huge powerful dinosaur is actually just your subordinate in the new small business you’ve set up here, Marcus. A small business of punching everything.

Agumon:  “Aniki! I’m hungry!”

Masaru:  “What the hell… That’s so anti-climactic…”

~~~~~

Agumon: “Boss! I’m hungry.”

Marcus: “What else is new? I’m just glad you’re safe.”

This addition is cute. Originally Masaru’s just referring to the anticlimax of Agumon devolving so fast.

Masaru:  “How about going for a hamburger?”

Agumon:  “Does that taste good?”

~~~~~

Marcus: “How about a nice hamburger?”

Agumon: “Ooh! With cheese, too?”

On the one hand, at least the dub remembered the fact that this Agumon somehow already knows what a hamburger is. On the other, this raises even more questions in terms of how he also knows that they can come with cheese.

Yoshino:  “But that one’s already injured 13 students!”

~~~~~

Yoshi: “But Agumon still injured fifteen men!”

Remember how the original tried to calculate fifteen minus one and got thirteen? Well, the dub tried it and got fifteen. Somehow each of them managed to get this very simple sum wrong in a different way.

(And yes, the dub did also specifically have Lalamon sense fifteen humans at the park in the beginning. Actually, it flashes back here to a part where Yoshi was then relaying to HQ that there are fifteen victims, but that was before she saw that Marcus was still standing. I guess it’s plausible to assume that Yoshi herself forgot to subtract Marcus after that and this is her mistake rather than the writers. Not convinced that’s the case, though.)

Also, told you the dub would forget about the part in the beginning where Marcus yelled out within Yoshi’s earshot that he beat up the dudes.

Marcus: “Those were some punks claiming to be ultimate fighters who wanted to train in my area, so I fought them for it, and guess what, I won!”

This begs the question: how the hell is that park supposed to be Marcus’s training ground? Surely, it’d make most sense as a training ground if it was where people regularly come to challenge him to fights? Instead, he only fought the dudes there because he wanted to drive them away from his training ground, so that he can continue to train there, alone, in a perfectly ordinary park that isn’t a gym or anything like that. How is he supposed to train there without opponents? Does he just, like… punch the trees?

I understand if the dub wants to make Marcus have slightly less of a teenage delinquent vibe, but the resulting implications they have here instead are just amusingly nonsensical. It does not seem like they actually thought about this very hard at all.

Overall differences

Overall, the dub of this episode shows a pattern of things generally making a bit less sense and having a bit less nuance, and Marcus in particular being just a bit less interesting and distinctive than Masaru. This is going to be such a regular pattern for every single dub episode that I probably won’t even bother to remark on it in most of these summaries going forward.

In terms of more specific effect on how this episode comes across, I think the most noticeable shift is that the sense of Marcus’s empathy towards Agumon despite his species is watered down slightly. Perhaps most notably, Agumon did not become loyal to Marcus because Marcus treated him like a person, but instead just because he matched him in a fight, which is less meaningful.

The terms “boss” and “employee” also give something of a different vibe to their relationship than in the original. Obviously the dub had to localise “aniki” to something, but I don’t think this was the best choice. This’ll be a thing in every episode, of course, but I’m bringing it up here because this is where it starts.

Then there’s the part where one of Yoshi’s lines casually established that Agumon had never spoken before. As much as this doesn’t make any sense to be a thing – why would he not have spoken while being held in DATS? – I guess it makes it slightly more reasonable that DATS then sees him as just a monster? Though they should also be changing their tune quite quickly when they realise he can speak, which of course they don’t. I guess this could have been an attempt to justify the original’s issues with DATS’s attitude towards Agumon… but not a very effective one.

[whateverthedragonswant]

So I read this very interesting post that was pro-Jonerys written around the time after season 7 aired, I think. It was very well-written and explored examples of Jon’s growing feelings for Dany all throughout season 7. But when I saw the examples used, I thought “oh man, this is the trap the show set and this awesome person unfortunately fell right into it.” Jonerys was meant to get our attention, to hide what was really happening with Dany behind the scenes so to speak but then shove it into the forefront in 8x05 so we would supposedly feel a jarring impact from Dany’s dark turn that we weren’t supposed to see coming. And while this person didn’t have season 8 to work with at the time (and I totes understand, season 7 was one big ball of confusing and guesswork not just for Jonerys but also other characters/story lines as well), I wanted to take another look at their examples (while also including some of my own) of Jon’s feelings for Dany in that 7th season.

Example 1):

This is meant to call to the audience a growing attraction between Jon and Dany, and tension. But notice it’s the physical Davos is mentioning here. Not that Dany is a great queen or her good heart that Jon is supposedly taking interest in. It’s a physical attraction. This is also important as it will come into play later in 8x01. 

And notice how it’s Davos to bring the subject up, not Jon. This cements this is the show trying to sell the GA something, an idea, that will then later come to fruition once its “product” is sold and the GA start embracing the idea.

Example 2):

This isn’t someone who is deep in love. Dany isn’t in love here either. This is him hoping that she’ll understand how important her joining the fight is, that these cave drawings are what will cement that joining as allies against the Night King. And it almost seems as if yes, she now understands and they can work together and you can see Jon is hopeful, which she immediately dashes when saying “I will fight for you. I will fight for the North...when you bend the knee.” You can even see Jon’s disappointment after this statement.

This scene is not Jon being jealous. This is Jon studying the interaction between Jorah and Dany. Remember, this scene is on the heels of a semi-disagreement that Dany and Jon are having after she’s returned from the battle with the Lannister army. Dany is trying to convince him that she did the right thing and when she sees he’s not immediately agreeing, she gets annoyed and tries to convince him further. Then Jorah shows up. This is a side to Dany that Jon still has yet to see. Dany immediately becomes soft, is affected by it that we even see her eyes become slightly teary and she smiles, and even hugs Jorah by the end of it. This is still the Khaleesi, the Breaker Of Chains, the Mother Of Dragons even, but this is also Dany, young Dany who Jorah met back at her wedding to Drogo. This is the side of her Jon has never seen before, that he and (from what he sees) Tyrion and Varys have not been able to access. But suddenly Jorah shows up and she’s practically purring (that’s not a dig or a slight, it’s truth, her soft side came out in this scene, Emilia showcased the difference brilliantly). Because Jon still doesn’t have Dany’s promise of support yet and he can’t leave yet, it’s no wonder that he’s studying the one person that seems to bring out that side of her. And it’s also no coincidence that Jon ends up stepping into a role similar to Jorah’s in the last season. Jon is who Jorah would have become for Dany had she been able to return his feelings.

Example 3):

Yes, in the 7x06 script, it is confirmed that in this moment, after seeing Dany grieving Viserion, Jon realizes he does have feelings for her. We already know there was a growing physical attraction between them as stated by Davos above but now after seeing how Dany came to save them, he realizes okay this is who Missandei was talking about, this is who Jorah is in love with. And sure enough, we see Dany pledge to fight the Night King with him, without needing him to bend the knee. This is the same Dany the audience is charmed by, the same Dany that is fiercely stanned, the Mother Of Dragons, the Khaleesi and Breaker Of Chains, the queen many have chosen. Do I think here that Jon is head over heels? No. I think he does have feelings though that are growing, that he is starting to feel love, but it’s not an all-consuming passion and love. 

Example 4) Boatsex:

Okay, before we delve into this, I want to show you something:

It is a common trope or theme that in a romance, the first kiss is shown. Whether it happens passionately or is just a small peck on the lips or an accidental smooshing, it’s always shown. Hence here are other examples of romances written on the show:

(I couldn’t find a gif of the cave scene above)

Regardless of how these pairings above ended up, regardless of these first kisses leading right into sex or not, they had build-up before that first kiss and more importantly, that first kiss is shown. These are romantic-coded relationships meant to be read romantically by the viewers as, you guessed it, romances. 

This is not a romance:

Gif credit

The door is closed and the next scene we get is Dany and Jon mid-makeout, naked on the bed. The first kiss is not shown. Considering how they built up other romances on the show, if Jonerys was the “it” couple and the true romance of the show, if both loved each other so passionately, this was a very important element that they “missed”. Something that has nothing to do with the chemistry between the actors or bad writing or bad editing. It was purposely “missed”.

This scene below comes after that rolling around and a lot of people think it’s Jon gazing down on his beloved before that special moment:

I hate to burst anyone’s bubble but that’s not what this moment is. What you’re seeing is Dany is deep in this relationship happening (it’s clear as day on her face, again Emilia is just brilliant), Jon sees this and hesitates for a moment (most likely feeling somewhat guilty because his feelings are not as deep as hers but he can see how deep this is for her, notice how he keeps studying her face in the second gif), and then makes the decision to go through with it. And all during this, we have Bran’s voiceover revealing who Jon really is. Not to mention the obvious sexual positioning, it starts out with Dany on Jon’s side but over him and then he rolls them over and that’s how the sexual encounter progresses.

Dany who Doreah taught that “love comes in at the eyes”. Notice how Jon chooses to kiss Dany as they start doing the deed so their eyes are closed due to the kissing. Then compare it to the sex scene Dany has with Drogo in the tent (after Doreah’s lesson) back in season 1, where Dany is on top and in control, where she stares into Drogo’s eyes. Now rewatch the boatsex scene again. Jon was in control here. 

This moment is not meant to be read a true romantic moment. You know how I know that?

This:

There was absolutely no reason to show us (the audience) Tyrion’s reaction during the love scene. Yes, I’m sure there is some jealousy and concern over how this will go but in order for the one true romance of the show to have their moment, why are we shown an outside character’s reaction not once but twice? It’s not as if there is a love triangle happening between Jon, Dany, and Tyrion. So why show us? Their love scene already has an “interrupting” factor with Bran’s voiceover that they try to mix in with the love theme of “Truth”, so why add this, too? 

Because it’s not going to end well. Because it’s not a pure two-sided, mutually deep romance.

And on top of that, this interview with Peter is very telling. “He loves her -- or thinks he does.” “She’s awe inspiring.” “He knows the two of them getting together could be very dangerous.” -> this relationship or getting together will not end well

“He loves her -- or thinks he does.” “She’s awe inspiring.” -> this is the way it’s been going the whole show is the arc of Dany in the show that most people feel enamored with from characters in the show to every last GA member, the Khaleesi, the Breaker Of Chains, the Mother Of Dragons - this is who Tyrion fancies himself in love with, who he supports and has faith in; this is who Jorah is head over heels in love with; this is Missandei’s queen who she & the others have chosen; this is who Jon has started to have feelings for (as per the 7x06 script confirmation) and loves by the time they get to Winterfell. In the end, though, Dany is no longer the Khaleesi or Breaker Of Chains and has even surpassed the Mother Of Dragons arc in that she uses Drogon purely as a weapon after 8x04. 

Example 5):

Going back to what Davos said up above in Example 1, we get this scene in 8x01. We see Jon and Dany being viewed by Tyrion, Davos, and Varys, while making commentary. Notice again how Davos is the one to mention a possible union of the two, ruling the 7K together. Yet, while we see what appears to be a nice moment that these guys are viewing between the couple, we purposefully are not able to hear what is being said between them, and are viewing them from a distance like these guys are. Why? Because the show is selling/pitching you the idea once again through Davos while he is selling Tyrion and Varys on the idea of a union.

When we do eventually join Dany and Jon down there, what do we see? Dany telling Jon that Sansa doesn’t like her, Jon trying to reassure her, and then her subtly threatening if Sansa doesn’t respect her... 

All of this was to show you that from the outside looking in, Jon and Dany seem to be the perfect power couple, the ultimate romance (despite the Targaryen secret). But when we actually do go inside, not all is as it appears to be.

You know what reinforces that idea? This:

Jon and Dany actually had a semi-romantic moment, after displaying that the actors did indeed have chemistry in their banter before Jon rides Rhaegal, and boom, Drogon “interrupts”. To the point where Jon positions Dany in between them and keeps an eye open as he kisses Dany, watching Drogon warily. Once again, not only will this romance not end well, but it’s not a true romance. Drogon is clearly watching and you almost get a sense of distrust or at the very least, wariness. If Drogon is sentient enough to not kill Jon after he kills Dany, then he is sentient enough in this scene and that begs the question, just what is he thinking? 

Example 6):

This scene, Jon says “She shouldn’t be alone” when Varys tells him how Dany has stayed in her room, locked away in her grief. This isn’t Jon saying this because he’s love struck. This is Jon being compassionate and more importantly, because he’s thinking of a certain line said to him by this man:

“A Targaryen alone in the world is a terrible thing.” And this is after he says, “No one to guide her.”

Jon now knows that he is the only family she has left in the world and now Jorah and Missandei are gone, leaving her with only Grey Worm, Varys, Tyrion, and himself to guide her. This is why Jon stayed by Dany’s side despite any amount of fear he had, despite her turning into dark!Dany at the end and leaving the Khaleesi, the Breaker Of Chains, and the Mother Of Dragons behind. He cared about her, plain and simple, but he was not head over heels in love. The show did a terrible job portraying that, because it was more interested in hiding Dany’s dark turn (while also giving hints so it’s weird why they chose to try to hide it at all) and keeping something also hidden about Jon (maybe pol!Jon? or maybe that Jon wasn’t as in love with her as she was with him? or maybe that he ultimately is the one to end up killing her? I don’t know, again, weird they gave all these hints but still kept it hidden, again, terrible job).

This doesn’t take away from the attraction he felt to Dany or any feelings of love that he had for her up to the end. He just wasn’t in love. Sure, he was awed by her like Tyrion, like Jorah, like mostly everyone else had been up until season 7. Dany’s line in 7x07 confirms this, when telling Jon about the dragons in the dragonpit: “They inspired awe and wonder. They were extraordinary.” And then she came to Westeros, a place where they had seen dragons before (think Aegon, the dragonpit, the dragon skulls in the basement of the Red Keep, the Targaryen tombs in the Sept, Aerys, Rhaegar), where Jon tells Dany if she uses the dragons (in 7x04) then she’ll “just be more of the same.” Dany’s line to Jon in 8x04 cinches it: “People have looked at me that way before. But never here. Never on this side of the sea.” The North (and Westeros) were never going to see her as the Khaleesi or the Breaker Of Chains. “The North remembers.” And the first thing Dany does when going to King’s Landing for a ceasefire talk, she rides Drogon to the dragonpit meeting. (It was smart and safer for her to do so, but Drogon of course lets out an intimidating roar before leaving, this is a land that is happy for Targaryens to remain out of power despite Cersei or the Starks or any other family). So it’s no surprise that Dany never experienced “love” in Westeros. Her dragons “overshadowed” her other two personas and once her dark turn happened (and lbr, she was on the verge of all season 8), there was no chance for the people to love her and accept her for either of those two arcs. Same goes for her relationship with Jon. Jon wasn’t ready to kill her after she massacred King’s Landing, he was actually defending her (which was very out of character and then was later confirmed by Bryan Cogman and Kit Harington as Jon being used as the audience mouthpiece and Tyrion was the writers’), ready to stand at her side, even if she chose to kill him later on. Only when it comes to his sisters, only when Dany unknowingly confirms that they indeed won’t have a choice in her new world, does he choose to act. 

The show’s mistake in that scene was keeping Dany a sympathetic character until the end, which negated the moral of her story. But their even bigger mistake was using dialogue to callback to season 1 Dany, the same Dany the GA and Jon cared about, in a bid to make it a more tragic moment. It made it more tragic alright, but not in the way they were hoping. 

Ship and let ship is my philosophy. So if you enjoy the idea of Jonerys, by all means, you do you. But sadly, this show really almost baited the audience with this idea of this ultimate tragic romance when it was anything but. Personally, this is why I’m anti-Jonerys. More than any other reason, this is why. The relationship wasn’t a good one for either Jon or Dany. And in my opinion, it wouldn’t have worked out even if Dany had lived, even if Dany hadn’t gone dark and burned down King’s Landing. This romance in this particular showverse was never going to be a love story for the ages. It was never meant to be.

tldr; Jon did care about Dany, had feelings, but he wasn’t in love with her. The show pulled the old bait and switch with it. They showed you a power couple that was supposed to enamor you and then break your heart, but then revealed it was never going to be the ultimate romance and negated the true moral of Dany’s story alongside Jon’s character with it.

[long-bodyswap]

Yotta Life

(Im sorry I don’t have the credits, but if you know the author you can @)

It’s been an adjustment lately getting used to all this fame and attention since Adele’s new album came out.  The whole world knew it would be huge, but even the most optimistic among us couldn’t have imagined that it would have the best selling first week sales of any album in history!  With massive, iconic numbers like that, it was only natural that she would need more security while she goes on her whirlwind press promo, and I’m the best in the business- ermmm- I mean technically my host, Peter Van der Veen is the best in the business, but it’s not like anyone could tell the difference since the spell I used gave me access to all of his memories, training, and personality traits.  No one has suspected a thing, and I’ve been inside Peter since he was Lady Gaga’s bodyguard!Possessing the top bodyguard for the stars has been a dream come true because I’ve met and spent time with almost all of my idols.  Gaga is much more normal in private than people give her credit for, but my favorite client so far has been Adele, BY FAR.  Never have I ever met such a witty, sweet, funny as shit, monumentally talented, and down to earth person.  Rumor has it she used to be quite the drinker before she had her baby, but every now and then she’s whipped out a little reward for the road with her team, meaning I was naturally drawn into the fun.  IIt’s been simply remarkable getting to know Adele and honestly consider her a friend.  She’s so honest and personable that I catch myself shifting out of Peter’s stern persona, dropping sass and giggling to her jokes.  I remind myself often that it’s only acceptable around Adele, but anyone who had previously known Peter would be immensely suspicious.  Still, it’s been the single most meaningful (and lucrative) gig I’ve ever done. You can see that I try my hardest to remain stern and serious.  It’s so hard because even her commentary during casual conversation is adorable and hilarious enough to make a stone gargoyle let out a good chuckle.  Sometimes it honestly is too much and I can’t help but smile and join in the silliness.  It’s comforting at least to know that Peter’s smile looks so fucking sexy- almost as sexy as his stern smolder.  

The bulk of the promo circuit ended in December so now that it’s January 2016, I finally have some time to myself.  Adele thanked me profusely for my service and friendship and begged me to free up my schedule so I could join her when her tour starts in April.  I promised her I’d lock in the dates, but it’s going to be nice to have some time to have fun behind closed doors…At the very least it’ll be nice to show off this body.Fuck, what a great day.  I’m rocking this perfect bronze and I can finally show off this sculpted body.  I work ridiculously hard to keep it up to Peter’s standards, but it’s so worth it.  Peter’s body looks sexy as hell in a suit, but it was meant to be seen and envied by others.  And the Adele gig was so lucrative that I’m set to be enjoying the next four months shirtless and glistening at this Mexican resort.  I used this morning to do a power workout of sprints and chest interval training in a nearby canyon, and then I rewarded myself with a nice afternoon spent relaxing at the beach.Peter’s sore muscles always made me horny for some reason, which meant that I was on edge almost all day every day…I didn’t mind though.  It reminded me of how powerful and full of my vitality my host was.  What I did mind though was burning in this hot sun.   Noticing a cute boy eyeing me, I saw an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone.  The adorable fucker looked about my real age, but way better looking, not that that mattered since I was inhabiting Mr. Europe 2005.  Being bisexual, I’ve been able to use Peter’s body to anonymously fuck around with hotties from all over the world, but I’ve gotta say I’ve developed a strong preference for boys, so let’s test the waters and see if this kid wants a taste of the premier bodyguard to the stars.“Hey, kid.” I said in a deep, yet friendly tone.  “You got a sec to help me out with something?”  I made sure to flash him a subtle smile, also pulling my shades down so he could see the twinkle in my beautiful eyes.   It only took me a second to realize I had him hook, line, and sinker.That big smile was one thing, but I had also completely stopped him in his tracks.  He was walking back over to me without a single hesitation. “What can I do for you?” The chap asked with a friendly tone that was masking what I, after maaaanyy similar encounters, knew was lust.“You see, I’m going to start burning soon, so could you help me with a fresh layer of sunblock?”He kept his jaw from dropping, but I knew he was shocked and ecstatic.   “You mean, on your back?” He asked, treading cautiously.“Actually, I was hoping you could help me with the whole thing,” I said, pointing out my sculpted chest and abs before biting my lip in a fake show of nervous anticipation.  

The boy paused to think for a second before smiling again and walking over.  “Sure, I’d love to help out,” he said in a  way that tried to make it sound like he was just doing a normal favor for a stranger.  

I grinned in relief before putting my shades back on and getting out my tube of sunblock.  I laid down, making sure to get comfortable before I took a second to adjust my junk since I was about a quarter hard from the sheer testosterone pumping through my veins.  

“Sorry about that,” I said before getting relaxed again.  “Had a brutal workout this morning.  Always gets the testosterone flowing, if you know what I mean.”“I could tell you had a good workout this morning.  You’ve got the pumped look.  Maybe you can share some workout tips- I’m trying to bulk up, but it’s been kinda hard.”“Son, you don’t need to add a single pound of mass.  The lean look is really sexy on you.”  I said that right as he popped the cap open, making him blush before he squeezed a healthy helping of that cream into his hands.  

“That’s easy for you to say,” he said before slathering that cream on my abs.  I shivered and gasped from the cold, tightening my core from the surprise, but he kept talking.  “Especially when you have a body like this.”As far as I could tell, he had no idea who I was, so it was safe to see if I could push his buttons a little.As he spread the cream over Peter’s ripped abs, I quietly moaned from the feeling of those smooth fingers rubbing that coconut scented goodness into my stolen skin.  The look on this boy’s face was one of inner conflict.  He didn’t know if he should go a little further, but he finally got my subtle hint and began rubbing me more purposefully until he was giving my abs a slow and deep massage.  

“You have…so much definition,” he marveled as he worked his strong fingers more and more expertly.   “mmmmmmm that feels so good, kid.  Guess you could tell that yesterday was ab day,”  By this point his constant touch had me more than half hard.  He definitely noticed my long and thick cock growing in my shorts, but he didn’t back away.  He started massaging me even more purposefully, sensually even.  Damn, this kid had some kink in him.  

“And I’d bet money you did a chest day today,” he said slowly and smoothly as he began working his magical hands up to my muscular slabs of pec perfection.  I moaned louder this time as he worked his hands up to my chest so he was grabbing a pec with each hand, squeezing firmly enough to loosen up those stiff muscles.  He squeezed harder, massaging my sore chest and making me groan in a mix of ecstasy and agony.  I was shocked though as he, without stopping his deep tissue chest massage, began to gently flick and rub my nipples with his thumbs.  I inhaled deeply, feeling my cock twitch and continue to engorge as this boy worked Peter’s incredibly sensitive nipples.  My breathing picked up, getting slightly faster before this kid made his big move.  I gasped loudly as he leaned down and began sucking on one of my nipples before reaching the other hand down to rub my cock through my shorts, making it pulsate and swell to full hardness.  

“Unnnngggg,” I groaned as I looked down at this cutie with thick, bushy eyebrows give in to his hunger for cock, specifically my cock.  I gasped again as he gripped my cock through the shorts, feeling the thickness of my girth and the obvious length before smiling, apparently satisfied with Peter’s thick 8.5 inches.   “If you wanted me, you should have just said so,” he whispered seductively into my ear.  

I knocked the big tube of sunscreen onto the sand before grabbing him and pulling him on top of my powerful chest, enjoying the weight of his body against my greased up chest.  I brought my mouth to his and he eagerly opened as I locked our lips and brought our tongues into a dance of lust.  Fuck, he tasted so minty.  My rock hard cock pulsated as I humped my crotch up against his, feeling his hard dick rub back against mine as I let us get lost in the lust.   FInally breaking the kiss, I told him, “I have a room,” barely having the breath to make the sentence.  He just smiled before we made a mad dash to pick up our shit and cover our raging hard ons as we ran back to the hotel.   I woke up the next morning alone int he bed except for a little note that had a phone number and the name Zac.  Man, last night was crazy.  I mean, I’ve done some kinky shit with Peter’s body, but I think I blew four of Peter’s loads into that boy last night.  Yeah, there was the load when I was fucking him doggy style.  Then another when I was fucking him missionary.  The third one was when he was riding me.  mmmmm, the last one was my favorite.  I pinned that kid against the wall with my strong arms and bounced him up and down off my powerful thrusts until I finally blew that last load so deep inside him.  On that one things got so intense.  Zac was hollering and almost hyperventilating my cock made him feel so good.  He didn’t even touch his dick that time since he was scratching at the wall the whole time, but his cock still blew a load all over the two of us.  That was about when I hit my limit.  I remember roaring so loud I thought the walls were vibrating before finally, dripping in sweat and muscles and veins bulging all over my body, I blew all of the remaining cum in Peter’s balls so deep into that boy.  When I calmed down, I carried the boy back to the bed and we both laid there making out and squirming from the afterglow of our orgasms before passing out from our multi-hour fuckfest.  

I smirked as I thought to myself how this would be my life for the next four months.  I got up and walked over to mirror, admiring my boxer-clad vessel, still just as high off of the beauty of this stolen body as I was two years ago when I first took Peter over.  

“You’re one sexy man,” I said to the reflection before winking.  God damn, seeing Peter’s body respond to my actions was still so satisfying.  I felt a fluttery sensation deep in my gut before blushing from the sight of the sexy body in front of me.  Mmmmmm yeah, Peter might be a strong and tough man, but I can always make him do whatever I want because he’s powerless with me inside.  

“Don’t ever forget that you’re too weak to resist me.  You couldn’t do a thing to stop my soul from slipping inside you and stealing you,” I taunted his reflection as I leaned his head down to his pit and huffed in his manly sweat and stench from yesterday’s workout and fuckfest.  

“You smell like a real man,” I said with appreciation before I stripped off the boxers and brought them up to my face which instantly scrunched up into one of ecstasy, huffing in the crotch area, almost coughing from the power of the manly muskiness.  It was so fucking masculine and sexy, and it always got me hard.“That turns you on doesn’t it, you kinky queer?” I asked his reflection before I brought my lips to the mirror and pretended to make out with Peter.  My heart sank though as the cold glass reminded me that I was on the other side.  Sure, I could take over some other stud for a night and use my powers to mind control Peter into having a wild night of passion, but it takes me a lot of time to build up the energy to switch, so I only like to switch sparingly.  I need at least three months to build up the necessary energy, so I don’t use the gift for casual flings.  No.  It’s a commitment, so the stolen life has to be perfect.  I stayed in Peter for the last two years because life has been so perfect, but it would be nice to finally feel and taste his body from the other side…Still, I’d need to find the perfect body and life in the next week or two in order to have enough time to get back inside Peter in time for Adele’s tour.  I guess I’ll just have to wait until after the tour…My frustration built, and I decided to take it out on Peter.  Even though I knew he was blacked out, I liked to pretend he was aware of everything when I got mad.  Grabbing his semi-hard cock, I pumped it until I got it back up to full hardness, watching myself make angry, yet sexy and turned on faces in the mirror as I pumped myself mercilessly.  

“Yeah!  You like that you queer slut?!  I’m gonna make you eat every drop of this cum!  unnnnngggggggg it’s gonna taste so fucking good, you fag!  Who’s the tough guy now, you freaky fag?  Can’t believe a tough guy like you is gonna eat your own load like some queer cum whore!”  God, this always made me feel so turned on and so much better.  I was getting close to orgasm when the phone rang.  I instantly clicked ignore, but it started ringing again.  I growled as I clicked ignore a second time, but the damn phone rang a third time.  Cursing, I let go of Peter’s cock and switched to his professional voice as I answered the phone.  

Even though I was initially annoyed, I was so glad I picked up the phone.  Smiling from ear to ear, I listened to a very special new client ask for my services over the next three and a half months.  Apparently he needed extra security for his wife, so tomorrow I would be on an early morning flight to Beverly Hills.  My vacation wasn’t over, it was just moving to another locale…and I’d finally have the chance to taste Peter’s lips and mouth from another perspective.Fuck, I was so excited I went back to pumping Peter’s cock.  I ate his load, this time to celebrate!  Now it’s time for me to get cleaned up, buy tickets, and pack!It was so lucky to get that call from Bastian Gillmeier, or Bastian Yotta as the media and instagram know him.   couldn’t help but enjoy one more early morning walk in Peter’s body, happily flaunting his muscles as I left shirtless and enjoyed the feeling of the breeze on his skin.  But then I checked his watched and realized how late I was.  

“Shit!  Better get back and shower.  Gotta get to the airport.  Damn, I won’t even have time to yank out one last load!”   I quickly cleaned up and called for a cab, and before I knew it I had checked in and boarded my plane en route to Beverly Hills.  Still, I was frustrated by this libido and the desire, no, the NEED to feel Peter’s cock be relieved one last time.  It was one of those rare flights where it was barely at half capacity, and somehow I was the only one in the first class section.  This airline was my favorite too because instead of thin curtains separating first class from economy, there were actual doors, affording me a much greater sense of privacy.  Still, I didn’t feel comfortable pumping a load out with that cute flight attendant around.  With me being the only client, he was checking on me practically every ten minutes, and I wanted to make this last.  I thought about going in the lavatory, but there was something so nasty and classless about that.  No.  I guess I’d need to test the sensibilities of this handsome flight attendant. Maybe he could even help me out.  

I looked behind me and predictably saw him waiting there with a puppy like grin, waiting to please me.   “Would you like another drink, sir?”I flashed him an enticing grin as I thought pensively.   “That does sound refreshing,” I remark as I subtly relax in my seat, getting more comfortable and spreading my legs just a little.   “Another barcardi and coke?”“I don’t know.  I’m craving something a little different.  I’m just so on edge.  I could really use something to help me unwind,” I say breathy as I rub my hands in between my thighs and groan lightly.   This boy gulps loudly, nervously adjusting his tie.  “W-w-well…We have mojitos.”“No…that’s not what I want…” I say with a husky tone as I look him directly in his eyes, licking my lips while I rub my host’s crotch, groaning slightly more loudly as I feel this meat starting to get hard and strain within the confines of its denim prison.  

“Sir!  This is inappropriate!  I’m going to need to ask you to-”“Shut up and touch it.  I know you want to.  Your cock can’t lie to me.   “SIR.  If you don’t stop I’m going to have to-HUH?!” he gasped as I grabbed a hold of his arm and yanked him close to me.He was speechless from the shock as I pulled him onto my lap, keeping him firmly locked in my grip thanks to Peter’s strong muscles as I went to work grinding my tented crotch against his backside and reaching my hand around to begin rubbing his engorging cock.   “MMMMmmmmmmpppphhhhhhhhhhmmmmmnnngggggggg” he groaned through Peter’s big hand that was muffling his shouts.  

He squealed as I grabbed a firm hold around his rod, stroking and pumping him through his soft uniform pants, breathing hot on his neck as I whispered into his ear.   “You’re getting so horny, boy.  I can feel you getting hard in my hand.  mmmmmm a tasty boy like you is just the refreshment I needed.”  I followed by licking up and down his neck, making him gasp as shivers coursed their way up and down his spine.   “You liked that didn’t you?” I asked with a chuckle before experimenting and easing up my grip on his mouth.  

He took several deep breaths before slowly turning his head to face me.  It could have gone either way at this point as I saw the panic and indecision in his eyes.  But then the look in his eyes focused in and I knew he has made his decision.  

He lunged as he joined his mouth with mine, moaning loudly into my mouth as he wrestled his tongue past my lips and hungrily tasted me.  I needed to remind him who the big man was in this steamy moment, so I forced Peter’s tongue into this boy’s mouth, reveling in the pleasurable moans echoing into my mouth as I ferociously tasted my mile high slut.   Pulling back, he now had a look of hunger in his eyes.  “I-I’ve never done this before at work…”“It’s just the two of us in here.  No need to worry about anything.”He looked into my eyes briefly before biting his lip nervously.“Can I…taste it?” He asked with such anticipation in his eyes.   I just smirked at him.  “You think I’d say no to a hot mouth like yours?  Get to work, boy.”I closed my eyes, smiling with satisfaction as this boy crawled down onto his knees, no longer able to suppress his desire as he unbuttoned my jeans and pulled down the zipper.  I lifted my butt up to help him as he pulled down my pants and drawers, letting this big fat cock spring out, slapping him lightly in the face as he gawked at my host’s unveiled meat.  

I shivered as he immediately went to work, grabbing me with one of his hands, pumping me softly as he wrapped his lips around the head, getting it nice and moist as he swirled his tongue around.  My fingers were trembling, and the sensation crashing through my cockhead, down to my groin and down my thighs was so powerful that I had to bite my lip and focus on gripping the armrests just to keep from shouting out.  This boy knew what he was doing, and he had just barely gotten started.  

I felt the veins on Peter’s muscles expand, letting an intense surge of blood-flow crash through every part of his body.  It was a euphoria like no other, and it only intensified as this mile high slut began bobbing his slick mouth up and down, up and down, picking up speed as he kept sucking that meat and swirling his tongue over all of Peter’s most sensitive spots.  I cringed and scrunched my face it felt so fucking good, but I didn’t want to make too much noise.  At this point though I think he was almost challenging me to give in and admit how good it felt.  He finally had his wish as he all of a sudden jolted his head down, swallowing every inch of my meat as he scooped both hands up my shirt and found my sensitive nipples.  

My eyes shot wide open as he began deepthroating me with ferocious speed, all while squeezing, twisting, and rubbing all over my massive pecs, and particularly, my tight and hard nipples.  My back arched violently as a loud groan finally escaped my lips.  I bit my lip though to shut myself up, scrunching my face up again and hyperventilating as this boy kept swallowing my entire length.  

I couldn’t have hoped for a better last orgasm in Peter’s body, but I still wanted it to be at least partially on my own terms.  Growling as I felt the testosterone levels in Peter’s body rising, I grabbed the boy’s head with both of my hand’s, getting no resistance from him as I began to pull him down onto my cock, harder and even faster than he was already going.  Mmmmmmm it felt so satisfying as I used Peter’s strong arms to pull that mouth and tight throat down onto his juicy meat.  Such a good throat fuck, but I couldn’t hold my hips back anymore, so it got even more intense.  I know I might have been going rough on the boy, but he wasn’t complaining as I started bucking my hips up, thrusting into his mouth and thrusting powerfully down his throat.  The boy kept squeezing my pecs and nipples, getting more intense as I added more and more power to my throat fuck.  My toes were curling in my shoes as I looked down at this hungry mile high slut, and seeing the desperation in his eyes finally sent me over the edge.  Groaning loudly, I slammed his mouth down onto one last powerful cock thrust after what had seemed like an eternity of building pressure in Peter’s massive balls.  With that thrust, my pent up load was finally free, releasing stream after stream directly down the hungry throat that was so expertly milking my cock.  I shivered as kept yanking his throat down onto each new ribbon of cum, milking out over a dozen shots before the stream finally slowed to mere droplets which we sucked straight out of me with that skilled mouth.  

Attention Passengers,  Please prepare for landing.  We will be arriving in approximately five minutes.  

“Damn, sorry boy.  I guess I don’t have time to return the favor.”He just smiled adoringly at me though.  “No, don’t be sorry.  That was-That was amazing!  I’ll be thinking about you and this later tonight.  This will be on my mind for the next month at the very least!”He gave me one more passionate kiss before he straightened his tie and uniform, giving me a sexy wink as he made the landing preparations, leaving me in my golden orgasmic bliss.  He was kind enough to point to my ankles though, reminding me my pants and boxers were still down, leaving my softening meat out for the world to see.  I quickly pulled my pants back up as we began the descent.  

I hopped in the cab at the airport, unable to contain my grin as I gave the driver the address of Bastian’s Beverly Hills mansion.  The cab driver wasn’t particularly talkative, so I sat in eager silence as I mentally prepared for my transfer and mini vacation from Peter’s body.  

The passing vistas and palm trees zoom by as I absentmindedly reach my hands underneath my shirt and begin rubbing and feeling Peter’s body.  I know I’ll be feeling this body from the other side, but I’ll miss the feeling of ownership and possession.  Something about feeling Peter Van der Veen’s abs and squeezing those massive pecs with his own strong hands was immensely satisfying.  Taking over strong men and making them my hosts…my vessels…will always be my drug of choice.  

“We’re here, Mister,” the taxi driver says, looking at me with an odd expression as I realize I’m still circling Peter’s hard nipples.  I swoop my hands out from under Peter’s shirt, unable to help but go a little red in the face as I awkwardly thank and pay the guy.  I pull out Peter’s wallet, so comfortable now seeing his ID and associating that image and identity as my own.  That’s when you know you’ve found a keeper, when you look at your host’s ID and instinctively think, “Damn, I look hella fine.” 

I tipped the guy well to mask the awkwardness and walked over to the front door, suitcases in tow.  There was a note on the front door telling me to come on in and meet my new employers in the back.  The note said to just keep on following the central corridor until I reached them.   Opening the door, I was blown away by the extravagance of this massive and modern mansion.  

“What a great place to vacation,” I said aloud to myself in shock as I plopped my bags on the marble floor, closed the door, and began the long walk down the central hallway.  I passed by massive living and entertaining rooms, all decked out with expensive art, impeccable decoration, and state of the art technology.  The kitchen and dining room was as large as most people’s whole apartments, and I think I walked passed a whole new set of entertainment and party/recreational rooms.  It was simply unbelievable, but I got pulled back to reality as I heard light moaning emanating from the last room at the end of the hall.  

The moaning was definitely deep, low, and masculine.  Judging by the videos I had watched during my research, I knew it was Bastian who was cooing and making those sweet sounds of pleasure.  I could hear him faintly egging on what I can only assume was his wife, Maria.  That accent was still distinctly German, and thought some people thought it was a little harsh, I shivered from its foreign and exotic appeal.  I had never taken over a foreigner before, so I wondered if I would have the joy of speaking with such a German flare.   I kept walking cautiously towards the moans, concerned that I was going to interrupt a particularly private and intimate moment.  Still, I advanced.  That’s one of the great things about Peter’s body.  I’m this massive tank of toned muscle, but he is so light on his feet.  I barely make a sound as I walk right up to the cracked door and slowly push it open as I walk inside.  

“Huh?” I asked aloud as I creaked the door open and saw Bastian, shirtless and laying down on a medical table as his wife performed a spa facial.  She was dressed and made up to the nth degree with her pink mini dress, pumps, and full make up while she massaged her husband’s face, working the active ingredients deep into his skin that would help maintain his youth.  He clearly found the experience very pleasurable as the sounds coming out of his mouth were almost orgasmic.  

“That must be you, Peter,” he said in his sweet German accent and without even opening his eyes.  

“We’re just finishing the last step,” Maria said with a smile as she spread the remaining moisture serum down his neck before clicking a button that brought the reclined medical table back up to a chair-like angle.  

Bastian finally opened his eyes as he smiled at me, happy to see that he had been able to afford my services.  My host was, after all, the most sought out bodyguard in Hollywood.  

“Maria, can you give us some time?  I need to show him the house and talk about the next three months.  Here’s some cash–go buy something pretty,” he said as he casually handed her a thick strap of hundred dollar bills.  She was almost giddy with joy as she collected the multi-thousand dollar wad of cash and left to go shop to her heart’s content at her favorite designer stores.   “Now, that frees up some time for just us guys,” he said with a cheeky grin as he got up off the table and put his shirt back on.  

This was going too perfectly.  I tried to suppress my own giddy grin as he began to show me around the house, when like he said, it was just us guys.

[risingsouls]

Recruited: Chapter 10

[I did another thing! This one is a lot shorter than the last several have been and a little more filler-y BUT we’re getting close to canon stuff (that I’m trying to figure out how I want to write and format still). SO here we gooooo!]

Vegeta

Any miniscule time he was forced to spend alone with Frieza aggravated the prince. Whether to bear the brunt of some reprimand, to listen to him discuss business to an audience of intergalactic dignitaries at a stupid feast he was dragged to and forced to endure like some pet, or to nod along with him prattling on about himself and insulting Vegeta or his race in a single breath, he preferred it when running an empire distracted Frieza from his existence. This rare occasion of the tyrant requesting his company on a special mission had the same effects: the usual rage of being helpless to end the emperor's life, the discomfort of watching his every step and word, the humiliation of bearing his belittling commentary and pretending to be his proud, obedient attack dog. It was maddening, and the only solace in the trip was that he left Dodoria and Zarbon both been behind to attend to other business.

Nappa, Raditz, and Nabooru had also been ordered to deal with another assignment while Vegeta accompanied Frieza. Disconcerting due to the fact that, in circumstances such as this, his cohorts would be ordered to remain on base until his return, placed on a schedule that included training and any other grunt work the commanders could find for them. However, he supposed Frieza wanted to keep his top teams busy conquering planets for him. Vegeta hadn't missed the increase in work they had been assigned, and even their latest three day reprieve had been cut short. He tried to convince himself it all meant nothing, that, even if Frieza noticed how the four of them trained more often than usual in their free time, his ego would keep him from getting too suspicious. But Vegeta couldn't deny the increase in his own paranoia with each passing day. Each day he stepped closer to exacting revenge and killing the bastard, and he constantly found himself dwelling on every possible scenario that could skew or outright obliterate his plot.

"It's almost a relief to have different company for once," Frieza mused, a wine glass held between his middle and index fingers. He nodded to the bottle, a silent insistence Vegeta top him off. The Saiyan swallowed his grimace and did as he was bade. Zarbon's or Dodoria’s usual task. He noted the shift of his crimson eyes to the still near full glass in his gloved hand, and took the hint to take another measured sip. "Zarbon and Dodoria tend to bore me after a while. And their bickering...if they weren't so loyal and useful, I may have offed them by now out of sheer annoyance."

Vegeta chuckled, practiced amusement and rehearsed reactions. "I can only imagine," he responded. Another glance spurred him to add, "I suffer the same with Raditz and Nappa. Though it's less their bickering than some inane, disgusting topic of conversation I don't care to hear in detail."

"Yes, I suppose that is an unfortunate vice of the lower classes, their obsessions with sating their lust." Frieza swirled the wine in his glass, black lips downturned in disgust. "A product of lower brain function, I suppose. They have little more than lewd absurdity to keep their minds occupied. Something the two of us fortunately don't suffer from."

The prince bowed his head, performing each gesture that appeased Frieza with loathing. He didn't care for his useless compliments. He found it hard to focus on them when all he could imagine was ripping those horns from his head and burying them in his eye sockets. Or shoving the wine glass into his mouth and forcing him to chew it up and swallow the shards to laugh as he watched him spit blood onto the pristine floor.  "Thank you, my lord. Your compliments are the highest honor."

"And they do not come lightly, Vegeta. You are an enigma of your kind. Had your race not perished, you would have made a fine ruler. Far better than your father." Vegeta ignored the twinge of rage his words plucked in favor of focusing on drinking the dry wine. "Yes, my tutelage has done wonders for you. Perhaps if my father had done the same with yours as I have done for you, perhaps he, too, could have evolved from a mere monkey playing court and dressed in regalia to a full-fledged ruler."

To keep his grip loose on the stem of his glass and not shatter it proved challenging in the face of his father's mockery. No matter his mixed feelings of the deceased Saiyan king, he did not take insults of his memory well. Especially from the likes of Frieza. He bit his tongue and once more drank to silence the blazing barrage of insults he wanted to sling in retort. 

"You are too kind, my lord." The words burned like acid on his tongue. "I agree that my growth under your watchful eye has favored me greatly. I thank you."

"Of course. I saw promise in you the moment I set eyes on you. However, there is always room to grow and learn, wouldn't you say?"

His tone, the smirk on his lips, ramped Vegeta's paranoia to near overload. Had Frieza found out about his plotting? Led him and his team straight into a trap of some sort?

He was given little time to consider as Frieza spoke up again. "Earlier you only mentioned your Saiyan comrades. It reminded me that you and I have never fully discussed the fourth I added to your team. How has she fared?"

"Nabooru is a competent warrior, well-versed in her craft and battle strategy. She fits in well, and, outside of being mouthy and questioning my authority once in a while, she's proven her worth." He glanced to the wide window before them, to the passing stars and junk, the endless void of space. "She learns quickly and strives to improve where she can. She was hesitant to carry out orders, but has grown out of it for the most part."

Frieza laughed. "Such a glowing report from the commander who pitched a fit over my decision." Vegeta's lips tightened to a thin line and his brows lowered ever further, only encouraging the emperor's delight. "I can't say I'm surprised she has a belligerent streak. Her former king said the same of her when I asked in one of our visits. Your temper must be improving if her first strike didn't convince you to kill her. I have seen you kill for less, after all, Vegeta."

Vegeta clicked his tongue. "She's simply lucky she figured out not to take her insubordination too far with me. Otherwise, I would have. Her power level and skill be damned."

"A lesson well-learned, it seems. I recall it took you some time to learn the same, but I suppose you had the excuse of being a mere child."

Vegeta merely nodded, the memories of the physical abuses doled out by Frieza's or one of his cohorts' hands when he rebelled and the scars left behind all too fresh despite their age. The mental mutilation of the mind games the tyrant played with him. Each had served their purpose because he vowed and showed respect to the bastard with little beckoning. It made him sick, clawed at his pride and convinced him death would be a more pleasant fate. But he wanted revenge more than anything, so survive he must. No matter the cost. It would be worth it someday.

"Sir, we are approaching our target," the captain announced. "T-minus five minutes."

"Excellent. Remember, there will be no need to land here." 

Vegeta glanced to Frieza when his scouter pinged. He pressed the button on the side. "Ah, what good timing, Nabooru. You have landed on Planet Noya and met with the other team there?"

Frieza cut the transmission and sighed dramatically. "Unfortunate, really." He finished off his wine and set the glass aside. "Shikoo and his team were quite the commodity. But one too many rumors about stoking rebellions and insubordination makes it difficult to keep such bad seeds among the loyal."

He waited for her reply, the smirk on his lips growing ever wider. "Yes, yes, I am aware of the success in purging the planet. The instructions to rendezvous with the soldiers sent to Noya were...purposefully vague. The task for you and the Saiyans is to kill that team. Don't worry your pretty head over why, dear. It's unbecoming of a soldier.. Their punishment has been a long time coming."

Vegeta's throat closed up and his mouth dried out. "The proper decision, it sounds like, sire," he managed, finishing his own glass and abandoning it. "Not to overstep my own boundaries, but I assumed we were purging this planet we're going to."

"We are. In a sense." He hoisted himself into his hover chair and propped his elbow on the edge, cheek resting in his palm. His crimson gaze rested on Vegeta, unblinking. "The denizens are...formidable enough, especially en masse, and intel suggests they wish to rebel against me. I have decided the time and potential casualties aren't worth the effort for what little the planet has to offer in the long run, so destroying it entirely will be a far better use for dealing with them. One and done, as they say."

A rare instance in which Vegeta agreed with Frieza’s methodology. He wished he would pass down such an order more often than he did, frankly. Putting down rebellions wasted time when they typically ended up murdering them all anyway. Any extra precautions and instructions usually forced them to hold back or went up in smoke not long after they landed. While he understood that some planets had more value than others, blowing up the planets and washing their hands of the business would allow them to take on more jobs. Send a team to gather whatever resources from the planet beforehand and then he and his team or one like his could destroy the place and move on. Not to mention he liked the thrill, the power behind destroying an entire world on his own.

A blue green planet slowly drifted into view, decent sized with a large landmass facing the ship in its current position in its rotation. Frieza waved for him to follow him to the center of the ship. "Come along. Vegeta. We will approach close enough that your ki will protect you from the lack of oxygen. I will allow you to do the honors." 

Vegeta took the blare of the signal for the opening of the uppermost hatch as his cue to surround himself in a protective barrier of energy. While he could not survive the void of space this way, it offered protection from suffocation for at least a few minutes. More than enough to obliterate the planet and retreat into the safety of the ship once more. He followed Frieza up and through the hatch, hovering over it and facing the planet.

Though only allowed the chance to destroy entire planets on a few occasions, he made a point to remember what it felt like. The exact amount of energy he needed to build in his palms, how to adjust for the size and density of the planet. Back of one hand pressed to his palm, he shifted his arms back behind his head. Violet energy surged around his hands, his body, the draw and thrill of powering up familiar and welcome. Up and up he allowed his energy to rise until he deemed it the perfect amount to accomplish the task at hand. He shoved his hands outward once more and the stored cache of energy fired from his palms and through space, surging through the planet's atmosphere and striking the surface within seconds. The blast drilled through the landmass toward the core, wide cracks and fiery splotches already spreading from the point of contact.

With another beckoning from Frieza, Vegeta lingered a moment longer to watch the spectacle of magma shooting upward and his blast rending the planet in twain before following him back into the ship. The hatch closed and they returned to the navigation deck.

"Not bad, prince," Frieza drawled, scarlet gaze locked on the demolition out the window. "A bit messy, but unfortunately we don't have time to witness the entire fireworks show." A nod to the captain. "To our next destination."

The captain bowed and turned back to the controls. Before they swiveled around fully, Vegeta caught a glimpse of the planet's final moments: a series of explosions peppering the surface as its stability caved. Within moments, it would be nothing but space dust floating among the stars. A mere memory until it faded from it. Would any of its race survive? Would they hear the news of their home's destruction immediately, or only find empty blackness when they return? Would they, too, be plucked from whatever refuge allowed their survival to serve the Cold Empire? Told that a meteor destroyed their planet and they really had little other choice left as the empire still technically owned them?

His jaw tightened. He couldn't dwell on such things. None of it mattered. It never did. I never would.

[imissthefire]

Kierarktina. Anything kierarktina by you as long as it is fluff, pleaseeeeeee

here’s a drabbly fluffy bit I wrote mostly while half asleep.

enjoy <3

By the time Mark and Cristina had made it to Faerie, the sun had already set, and the world was quiet. The night sky, however, was awake and alive. Swirls of colour and stars emblazoned the sky like a beautiful painting, coming alive with piskies and nymphs darting by.

Mark and Cristina walked hand in hand down the familiar path towards the cottage. Kieran would be there already by the time they got there, but only just by an hour.

The moment the two walked over the threshold, two became three as the triad crashed into each other in a strong embrace. Kieran’s hair shifted to a lighter blue, streaked with white and gold—one of his happy shades. Cristina was the first to find her lips crashing into his, smiling into the kiss as she felt Kieran laugh softly.

His laugh. Something that was seldom heard by the rest of Faerieland was enough to make his loves themselves laugh. It was a sound so sweet and pure, a feeling so light and happy. Kieran’s smile, Kieran’s laugh, Kieran. At long last, the trio were reunited.

The day may be nearing an end, but the night had only just begun. Kieran pulled briefly away from Cristina to sneak a quick kiss over her shoulder to Mark. The three had become a pile of hugs and a chorus of “I missed you” as the world around them slowed. Outside, the night air danced with the scent of the faerie woodlands, a sweet yet fresh smell that came in through the opened windows.

It was moments like these that kept Kieran sane. Moment when he could express the love in his heart freely, moment when he could love and be loved. He longed for a day when they could all three be together without a barrier between them, when a King could have more than a mortal lover, but a recognised mortal consort—or, two mortal consorts in his case. Life was too short for his loves to wait for him at all times. Perhaps a new ruling would be in order some time…

But that was a thought for another time. Now was time to celebrate being with his loves. Kieran watched as Mark and Cristina excitedly and animatedly recounted their most recent adventures in the mundane world. He followed along as their conversation had them relocate to the bedroom. Kieran lay his head on Mark’s chest and holding Cristina in his arms, listening intently as Cristina continued on about how her mother had paid a surprised visit and teased Mark endlessly. This caused Mark to interject with a few comments, explaining further how he had to prove not only himself, but Kieran also, as suitable men to be in Cristina’s life.

Kieran could not help but feel as though he were missing out on so much in their lives. Before Mark could add further commentary to Cristina’s recount, Kieran interrupted the two.

“Perhaps Cristina may better acquaint me with Lady Carmen some time,” he idly suggested.

Cristina craned her neck up to look at Kieran, her brown eyes meeting his black and silver ones. “You’ve met my mom before, but maybe meeting her more formally would be something we can arrange.” Cristina bit her bottom lip, “though, she doesn’t often travel to Faerie,” she added.

Mark, already seeing into Kieran’s scheme, spoke next. “I don’t think we need to bring Carmen all the way out here, Tina,” he said. “Did I assume correctly, Kier? You want to come out to us?” he asked, quirking an eyebrow expectantly.

Kieran nodded lightly, “perhaps it’s time I better get to know my mother-in-law, as you would call her in the mortal world.”

Cristina couldn’t help but giggle, “we aren’t married yet, you know.”

“No, not yet, my Lady. But this is but a small obstacle in our journey together.”

“Slow down, Kier, we can’t get married. You know that,” Mark had a twinge of disappointment in his tone—but, unfortunately, he was right. His face wore a frown, he wrapped his arm tighter around Kieran.

“As I said… not yet, my love.” Kieran swiftly added. He would find a way. He knew he would. If it meant moving mountains, he would do it. If it meant bending the heavens, he would do it. If it meant he could officially proclaim his love to Mark and Cristina, he would do it.

“So, us getting married is in the cards?” Mark asked hopeful of the response.

“I know not what cards you speak of, nor do I know if this is another mortal idiom, but I do know that I will not give up on us. Not now, not ever.”

Cristina kissed Kieran on his cheek, smiling as she gazed lovingly into his bicoloured eyes.

“I love you,” she said, kissing him again, this time on the tip of his nose.

“and I love you, my Lady of Roses.” He returned the kisses, one on her cheek and the other on her lips. “And I love you, my Son of Thorns,” he said, turning to look to Mark, a smile on his face.

“I love you too, Kier. I love the both of you more than I ever thought I could love anyone.”

“I love you,”

“I love you.”

"I love you.”

[nothingunrealistic]

just for fun, some snapshots of this fic as it was being written, with commentary. under a cut to avoid dumping dozens of screenshots in a row on anyone’s dash. also i’m going to reblog this and add some more because tumblr is cutting me off from saving any more changes but i’m not done saying what i wanted to say.

i got this prompt back in july, dropped it into a new google doc, and then didn’t do anything with it until october. as you can see, i didn’t immediately have any good ideas, so i just let it percolate in the back of my mind (along with one or two dozen other writing prompts and projects) for a while.

then, three and a half months later, i finally had an idea! at three in the morning! (not pictured: half a dozen links to pages about autistic burnout, meltdowns, and shutdowns. research is important but it’s not as fun to look at.)

sometimes you think of dialogue well before you think of how to fit it into a scene.

this was eleven days later.

finally! some actual prose! and a way to tie the story to the events of canon! (after this, i worked on this particular fic every day until it was done.)

just putting stuff in brackets works basically every time. the bracketed notes start out as a more high-level interview of what’s going to happen, then get broken down / separated / elaborated on further until they pretty much stand in for individual paragraphs / sentences / lines of dialogue or inner monologue.

see: stuff from the Big Block Of Text getting copied and pasted to where it should be.

pretty sure *this* big block of text got written on one of the rare occasions where i actually managed to write for the entire hour i have set aside specifically For writing. if i were to break down the revision history further, it’d almost certainly show that many of these paragraphs started out as bracketed not-quite-prose, some of which still remained at this point. (also pictured: one particular line from mafee that did not make it into the final draft.)

more details from canon and just details in general.

mafee does Not have rights. (also, it turns out it’s much easier for someone to press their hands against their whole face if they’re not wearing glasses.)

by far the funniest change i made while writing this.

writing any new character’s pov is an adventure in trying to nail down how they’d talk inside their own head. doubly true for any new billions character given that no one talks like a normal person on billions; triply true when it’s a character like rian who Knows no one talks normally and is trying to fit in with the Accepted Dialect.

i’m like dropping hints that winston is having a bad time right now.

winston is having a bad time right now.

rip post-it note fidgeting; long live pen fidgeting. (another research topic: what *do* quants do all day that they might still be working on late at night? well, possibly, backtesting and optimization of algorithms.)

two character threads that started here: rian trying (and ultimately failing) not to make it obvious that she Cares about winston, and winston speaking more tersely than usual, for obvious reasons.

i watched Many clips from the show trying to figure out whether the doors at axe capital ever stayed open on their own, what sound they made when people opened them, and if it was even plausible for characters to hear construction noise through the glass when the doors were shut. (on that last point, i ultimately decided that if the mase cappers could hear becky lynch yelling through a closed door — and most likely they did hear her before they saw her — they could certainly hear power tools.)

“everyone else went home” was the best reason for mafee to walk back into the tmc office that i could think of. he just wants to hang out with Someone yknow?

mafee’s made the noise worse not only by leaving the door open, but also by sitting down loudly and talking a lot!

mafee’s use of “quisling” is a very specific shoutout to the incident he’s describing. axe declared that there was a quisling in the office; mafee had to ask what that meant, and donnie defined it for him; a few episodes later, mafee went out of his way to drop “quisling” into the conversation when talking about it to someone he wanted to impress.

getting the wording of this exchange just right was tricky. also rip mafee’s chair spinning.

switched up the placement of hammer noises and drill noises so that it’d be a Continuous, unrelenting noise that forced mafee to talk louder still and ultimately became too much for winston.

also had to figure out how to fit this comment from mafee into the flow of the scene.

mafee jumps to act as soon as he realizes something’s wrong; rian thinks about what the best course of action would be first.

rian’s got a pretty idealistic perspective on how taylor operates. (this connects nicely to a canon comment from wendy about how taylor tries “to solve every problem [they] see.”) she’s also still working out How people talk here.

wanted to include this early point about it being quieter in taylor’s office, but i couldn’t really make it work.

this was the first point at which i had a clear idea of how this fic was going to end / would conclude in any satisfactory way. bringing that “rian cares but doesn’t want that to be Known” detail full circle.

punctuation pickiness! (and the door is finally closed!)

you know what sounds even worse than metal on wood? metal on metal!

i spent so much of one day just working on these few paragraphs.

and then i got the idea to throw in rian’s recollection of winston’s description of the mase cap office either late that night or the next morning and wrote most of it down while sitting through a meeting. (ft. more emphasis on the Separation between rian and winston & taylor.)

DUMBO is an acronym (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass) but it isn’t always written in all caps. i found a style guide (from a college department in nyc, though i can’t remember which one) that declared it should be written as Dumbo rather than DUMBO and decided to go with that.

mafee is WELL out of the loop here. no wonder he wants to leave.

i went pretty hard on “mafee is being Less Than Kind And Understanding about this whole situation” and eventually had to have him walk it back with “well i didn’t WANT him to suffer or anything.”

this is everything i managed to get done in the Designated Writing Hour (and then some) the night that the supernatural finale aired. oops.

i was torn between rian hearing Something to alert her of taylor’s presence and hearing nothing at all; ultimately i chose the latter. (this revision was also from the brief period of time where i changed the google doc to a landscape layout in the hopes that the Changed Visual would shake some more ideas loose. it worked, a bit.)

see: rian Not hearing taylor.

this detail was added pretty late — one of the last changes i’d made the day before posting. (i’d also switched the google doc back to portrait mode at this point.)

[fridayfirefly]

Lost and Found [Part Three]

Masterlist | Ao3

A/N: Sorry for the long wait, but I wanted to make sure this chapter was perfect, and now I’m super proud to show you all

The evening after Damian made his leap of faith and lost the pen was one of the rare nights where his entire 'family' managed to make it to the dinner table. Grayson and Barbara (Damian used her first name only because she threatened to ram him with her wheelchair if he kept calling her 'Gordon') drove in from their shared apartment in Blüdhaven. They were Soulmates, currently dating and soon to be engaged, if the ring box in Grayson's sock drawer (which Damian found when he broke into their apartment last month) meant anything. Todd came in that morning unannounced, claiming to be "in the mood for Alfred's cooking" (Damian suspected that Todd simply doesn't like eating alone, but said nothing). Drake was free for dinner because he didn't have any evening classes at Gotham University. Stephanie Brown arrived the day prior because Drake asked for her assistance on a case he was working on. Of all the heroes who fought crime in Gotham, Damian was least knowledgeable about Stephanie Brown. In all the time Damian had lived with Father, he had only spoken to Brown a few times and had only patrolled with Spoiler once. However, it seemed that Damian would be patrolling with Spoiler a lot more in the coming weeks. Earlier that day, Brown had offered to remain in Gotham and take Grayson's place on patrols. That way, Grayson could stay in Blüdhaven, instead of driving to Gotham on his nights off at the Blüdhaven police force to patrol.

Selena Kyle showed up for dinner as well, though she made no references to their conversation the night before. Father and Alfred were also at the dinner table, but Damian already knew that they would be there. Damian had lived with Father for almost three months, and he had seen the way that the Manor worked. People came and went; it seemed that the only people who stayed the same were Father and Alfred.

Once dinner started, conversations drifted around Damian. He struggled to find the right words to explain that he made contact with his Soulmate. He felt the need to say it, if only for the purpose of stopping Grayson's constant nagging.

“So when’s Connor coming to visit?" asked Barbara.

Damian turned his attention to Drake, interested in any news about Drake's Soulmate. Damian had yet to meet Connor Kent, but he was certainly interested in meeting one of his brother's Soulmates.

"He's coming over a week from Saturday and then staying for a week until the new semester at Metropolis University starts. Connor's bringing Clark, Lois, and Jon along with him. Jon's still on summer vacation, so Clark and Lois plan on leaving him here with Connor for the week so that he isn't home alone all day while they're at work."

"Jon is Damian's age, right?" Barbara asked.

"Yeah, Jon's turning thirteen next month," Drake answered.

Damian wondered what Jonathan Kent would be like. Hopefully not as immature and imbecilic as his classmates at Gotham Academy.

As the conversation hit a lull, Grayson piped up, "Damian, what's new with you? Are you still ignoring all your problems?" Grayson's tone was far too innocent for the taunt veiled underneath the niceties. Damian shot Grayson a glare, which was matched by Grayson's own stubborn look. Logically, Damian knew his teasing was fueled by well-intentioned concern, but Damian still found it annoying.

"Don't call her a problem," Damian growled. No one at the table looked concerned by their interaction, so Damian assumed that Babs and Stephanie had both been informed of what had happened two weeks ago. "The answer is no, anyways. I'm not ignoring her. I lost something for her last night."

All other conversations halted when Damian revealed his secret. "Good for you, Demon Spawn," Todd said, speech muffled by the mouthful of food he was trying to talk around.

"That's great news!" Grayson's face was lit up. "We should celebrate. I haven't had an opportunity to throw a party at the Manor in ages."

Damian sighed. Any attempts to halt Grayson's party planning would surely fail. There was no stopping Grayson’s unnerving desire to celebrate every little thing.

"Babs and I can set it up. We can do it next Saturday, while the Kents are here. After all, it's been months since the last time the Banquet Hall was used."

Father rolled his eyes at Grayson’s antics, the slight upturn of his lips proved that he was in support of Grayson's idea. It had been less than one minute since told his tell his family that he had lost the pen for his Soulmate to find, and he was already regretting it.

——————————————————————

It had taken Damian six hours and eighteen jewelry stores throughout Gotham to find the perfect gift to give to his Soulmate. It was a bracelet, made of silver and designed to look like feathers wrapping around the wrist. But it still wasn't perfect, which was why Damian was knocking on Drake's bedroom door.

Drake opened his door, looking much better rested than he had at dinner two days prior. The dark circles under his eyes had faded, and Damian could see only one coffee cup on his desk, instead of his usual three to seven. "Do you need anything?"

Damian nodded. "There is something I need assistance with. Given that it is within your area of expertise, I came to you for help."

Drake looked shocked at Damian's request, but also interested. "Come on in."

Damian walked into Drake's room and shut the door behind him. "I understand that you are knowledgeable about nanotechnology." Damian set the bracelet down on Drake's desk. "Would you be able to monitor heart rate and blood pressure through this, without the modifications being obvious to its wearer?"

Drake picked the bracelet up and examined its size and weight. "It'll take me a few days, but I think it can be done..." Drake trailed off, grabbing a spare piece of paper off his desk and jotting notes down. "It's for your Soulmate, right?"

"Yes."

"Cool," said Drake, "Is there anything else you want to be added to it?"

Damian paused for a moment, considering his words. "Could you add a tracker? One that activates only if the heart rate and blood pressure monitors detect that she's in potentially life-threatening conditions?"

Drake nodded. "I can definitely do that. If I connect everything to an app on your phone, then those kinds of settings can be done through the app rather than through the bracelet itself. But you know, I won't judge you if you want the tracker to be available to you now."

Damian shook his head. "I don't want to invade her boundaries. I just want to keep her safe and out of harm's way."

"That's genuinely really cool of you, Damian," Drake said. "I think Connor's going to like you."

"Tt. Everybody likes me."

Drake laughed. "Sure, Demon Spawn."

Damian turned away from his brother, leaving the room before Tim could catch the small smile on his face.

——————————————————————

"No more complaining, Dami. I didn't get to throw you a Welcome to the Manor party or a belated Birthday party, so you're going to suck it up and enjoy this one," Grayson instructed. He and Barbara had already bought refreshments, created a playlist titled "Can Damian Even Dance?", and decorated the Banquet Hall. Though in Damian's opinion, a blind cat would have been better at decorating than Grayson. Instead of buying normal party decorations, He and Barbara had gone to thrift stores, buying up used gender reveal party decorations. They then wrote the word Soulmate overtop of 'boy' or 'girl' so that each banner proclaimed "It's a Soulmate."

"I'm not complaining. I just think that your decorations look terrible."

"Don't call them terrible, they're made with love." Grayson could barely keep a straight face while saying it.

Damian rolled his eyes and walked out of the Banquet Hall, heading towards the foyer. He knew that Grayson was the type to go all-out when it came to showing his emotions (i.e. throwing a party to show that he's proud of Damian and supports him) but Damian wasn't really the type to enjoy a party, especially when he's the guest of honor.

"The Kents are here," Tim called out as he opened up the front door.

Damian watched as Tim greeted the Kent family. Damian had already met Clark Kent, though strictly through his superhero identity and was familiar with both Connor and Jon's time spent as Superboy. And Lois Lane-Kent, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of an award-winning novel (which Damian has read), was just as well-known in America as Superman.

“Clark, I know you've already met Damian, but the rest of you should come and meet him. After all, Dick is throwing the party in his honor.”

Damian walked into the foyer to meet Tim’s Soulmate’s family. “Hello,” Damian dipped his head in greeting.

“It’s nice to meet you, Damian,” Lois politely greeted him.

"I've read your book," Damian blurted out. "I found your commentary on the negative ramifications of superheroes on our society to be enlightening."

Lois smiled brightly, "I'm glad you enjoyed it. I've always been interested in how Superheroes influence modern society, and I think it's important for people to understand that Superheroes aren't always a good thing to have. Because Superheroes exist, citizens allow themselves to become complacent, pushing the burden of stopping crime onto Superheroes, instead of trying to prevent people from becoming criminals in the first place. It's definitely a multifaceted phenomenon, and one that our society needs to be aware of."

"It's a very complex issue," Damian agreed. "I hope we can talk about this further at a later date."

Lois nodded. "Definitely." She glanced towards her husband. "Clark and I should go find Bruce and catch up with him." The pair left the foyer, walking in the direction of Father's office. Damian, Tim, Connor, and Jonathan walked in the opposite direction, towards the Banquet Hall.

"So you're Damian," said Connor. "Tim's told me a lot about you."

"Tt. Knowing Drake, it's likely all lies and slander. Drake's jealousy often gets the best of him."

"Jealous of what? The fact that you're so effortlessly annoying?"

"You're obviously envious of my innate ability to do everything better than you."

Connor, Tim's Soulmate, let out a laugh. "Tim didn't tell me that you're funny."

"He's not funny, Connor. He's annoying. Now come on, you have to see the decorations Dick and Babs put up. They're awful."

"How do you mess up party decorations?" Jonathan Kent asked.

Tim made a face. "Dick likes to challenge himself by putting up the worst possible decorations. Last year he and Babs convinced Alfred to have us all make the Christmas tree decorations ourselves. I still don't think I've gotten all the glitter out of my hair."

“At least these decorations are harmless,” Damian cut in. “Imagine what would have happened had Father not vetoed Grayson's Fourth of July cookout earlier this summer.”

Connor laughed. “That definitely wasn’t Dick’s best idea. I doubt that fireworks and the Wayne family mix well.”

When they got to the door to the Banquet Hall, Grayson's music already playing, Tim turned to Damian. "By the way, Damian, I finished the modifications that you asked for. It's in my room on my desk when you want to go get it."

"Sure. Tell Grayson I'll be a few minutes."

Tim and Connor walked into the room, but Jonathan stayed behind. "Is it for your Soulmate - what Tim was fixing for you?"

Damian's eyes narrowed. "Maybe."

Jonathan's face brightened. "Cool. Are you planning on losing it tonight?"

“I take it Tim told you and his Soulmate about my Soulmate," Damian commented, ignoring Jonathan's question.

"Tim didn't tell me, Tim told Connor. He wanted Connor's advice on how to apologize to you, for what he said about your Soulmate. I couldn't help but overhear; superhuman hearing doesn't exactly have an off switch. Besides, I was mostly just interested in the fact that your Soulmate is French. My Soulmate's French too."

Damian didn't know how to respond to that. Jonathan Kent was like a breath of fresh air.  He was entirely unconcerned about Damian's wealth and status. He understood the sort of responsibility that being a superhero entailed but didn't get weighed down by it. He had just met Damian but already trusted him enough to reveal information about his Soulmate. Jonathan Kent, who seemed so easy to read at first glance, was secretly a conundrum.

The modifications on the bracelet were almost completely imperceptible to Damian's trained eye. Besides a small change in weight, it appeared unchanged. "I like the feathers," said Jonathan, "Definitely more subtle than anything I could come up with. But what was Tim doing with it?”

“Modifying it,” Damian said curtly. “It now measures heart rate and blood pressure.”

Jonathan nodded, “That’s a smart idea. I might have to ask Tim to make me one."

As they left Tim's room, Jonathan continued to fill the silence. "I don't know how you managed to not lose something for so long. I lose stuff all the time. My Soulmate will probably end up figuring out I'm Superboy because I accidentally misplaced my uniform."

"Your Soulmate doesn't yet know that you're Superboy?"

Jonathan shook his head. "We haven't met in person yet, plus the language barrier makes communication through the Soulbond difficult if we aren't both using translators. My Soulmate only speaks a little bit of English, and I'm even worse at French. But I'm getting better. I take classes now."

"I'm fluent in French," Damian added. "If you ever need something translated, I'm sure I could take the time to help you out." Jonathan Kent was one of the few genuinely good people Damian had met. Damian wanted to get to know him better.

"Thanks, Damian."

As Damian passed his bedroom doorway, he noticed something new sitting on his bed. A black book. He changed course, heading straight towards his new Soulmate object. It was a sketchbook. Damian quickly flipped through the crisp, new pages. His Soulmate must be a designer - the first three pages contained clothing designs. The first page was a dress, pink and white striped with a bow around the waist. The second page was a jacket, olive green with gold-colored buttons. The third page was a plain white t-shirt, simple at first glance, but the detailed notes beside the design indicated that she meant to cover the shoulders and shirt sleeves in a detailed embroidery.

"Wow," said Jonathan. "Did you know that your Soulmate was so talented?"

"No," Damian breathed out, taking in every little detail. He had never been so fascinated by fashion designing. Everything about the sketchbook showed talent, dedication, and skill. He could hardly tear his eyes away from the sketches - they were so detailed, with little notes in the margin indicating everything from what store to go to to buy the fabric, to the exact shade she wanted, to whether or not it needed hand stitched. All three pages were dated August 20th - she had planned out all three pieces of clothing that very day. Damian couldn't quite believe that his Soulmate was so perfect.

But pushing towards the front of his mind was the knowledge that he would have to return the book. It was obviously important to her, something she would never want to lose. Damian pulled his phone out and took three pictures, one of each of the sketches, to make sure he didn't forget a single detail. Then he grabbed a sticky note off of his desk and wrote, "I figured you might want this back - D.W."

Damian could feel Jonathan watching him. "I'm glad you're a good person, Damian."

"Thanks," Damian said dryly, but the compliment still stuck with him. He had never cared about being a good person until he lived with his Father. He didn't think he would be good at it, but maybe he was wrong.

Then, it was just a matter of losing the sketchbook so that she could get it back. Damian, not wanting the book to get damaged in any way, decided to just toss it into one of the open doorways on the way back to the Banquet Hall. It worked to lose the book only because the Banquet Hall was in one of the sections of the Manor that was rarely ever used, except during social gatherings. The twisting hallways and odd door placements were designed to keep snooping Gala guests from getting into the main part of the Manor without physically locking doors. According to Grayson, they also made for very intense games of Hide and Seek, which Damian had yet to play (Grayson had promised him a game, though, and had yet to break a promise).

"So what is your Soulmate like, Jonathan?" Damian asked him once they found their way back into the Banquet Hall.

"You know, you can call me Jon." Jon's facial expression switched to something that could only be described as dreamy. "My Soulmate... he's wonderful. He loves music, it's his biggest passion. He sends me music recommendations all the time, usually weekly playlists, unless he's bored or wants me to listen to something special. His favorite color is green and he has a pet turtle named Oliver. He has three best friends beside me, and he says he can't wait to meet me in person, but we're waiting until we're at least fifteen."

The night passed quickly in Jon's company. It was a new experience for Damian, having someone his own age to talk to. Conversation flowed easily from Soulmates to Superheroes to school. It was the first time Damian genuinely felt like he had made a friend.

Once midnight came around the party ended. Lois and Clark left to drive back to Metropolis, and Grayson and Barbara left for Blüdhaven.  Tim took Connor up to his room, and Brown and Todd both left for their own (rarely used) bedrooms. Damian knew that Jon was staying in the guest bedroom three doors down from his own, so he offered to take him there.

The sticky note on his floor was the first thing Damian noticed, once he was finally alone. Written in the same handwriting as the designs from before was the sentence, "Thanks, it's a birthday present from my parents - M.D.C."

Damian knew it was time to give his Soulmate the bracelet. Wrapping it alongside the box of replacement pens he had gotten her, Damian made sure to write in his best handwriting, "Happy Birthday M. From your Soulmate, D.W."

Taglist: @fanboy7794 @mikantsume @hetalia-lover-is-here @howtoshuckatlife @you-will-never-know-how-i-think @redscarlet95  @derpingrainbow @friedchickening @constancetruggle @melicmusicmagic  @beautym3 @kunstner1 @shizukiryuu @worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry @crazylittlemunchkin @black-streak @darkshadowguardian @mystery-5-5 @trubel43 @fandomfan315 @vincentvangoose

[regolithheart]

Love In The Time of Coronavirus: Chapter Two

Summary: One pandemic, one lake house, and two people who loathe one another. Will they be able to survive the outbreak...and each other?

MASTER LIST

Read on AO3.

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

CHAPTER TWO:

FUCK! Fuck, fuck, fuck. 

Nesta was being punished—for all the horrible things she had done in another life. Probably for all of the horrible things she had done in this life. Would things have been different if she had volunteered more? Gave money to charities? Stopped calling people idiots?

Looking at the man standing outside of her car, grinning at her, confirmed that no, nothing would have prevented the universe from deciding to ruin her life.

“I’ll talk to you later,” Nesta grumbled and hung up the phone before Elain could respond. 

She narrowed her eyes at the figure watching her, trying to assess her options. If only she’d arrived five minutes earlier, she could have gotten the worse news in recent memory and turned her car around. She would have gladly driven all night, that six and a half hour drive in reverse, if it meant she could avoid the predicament she was now in.

But there was no point in wishful thinking. That wasn’t how life worked for Nesta. So she took another deep breath and stepped out of her car. 

“Nesta Archeron.” The voice was deep and much closer than she had expected. How he got to her car so quickly, she didn’t know. 

When he reached over to help her, she slammed the door shut. It was much more forceful than she had expected it to be, but being able to take out some of her irritation in that way gave her a little relief. 

The man’s eyes were still holding her face which made her want to ball up her fists, but Nesta noticed his grin falter a fraction before he twitched his thumb towards himself.

“Cassian,” he offered.

“I know.” She turned on her heels, but caught the reassuring nod he gave himself—the slightest movement of his chin—out the corner of her eye.

She popped her trunk open. 

He followed her. Of course he did.

“Need a hand?”

Nesta grabbed her suitcase and heaved it out in one fluid motion, then grabbed her work bag and slung it on her shoulder. 

“No.”

There was that insufferable grin again. 

“Looks like you do,” Cassian said and grabbed the bag full of books before Nesta could protest and closed the trunk with a firm hand. 

Nesta ground her teeth, but he was already walking towards the house.

“You coming, sweetheart?”

Nesta’s bag bounced and kicked up the gravel as she wheeled it behind her, but she refused to walk any quicker. 

Cassian had already turned the corner and she let herself pause for a moment to take in the scenery. Past the manicured lawn and white Adirondack chairs were stone steps cut into the gentle slope that wound down to a wooden dock nestled in the water. 

Tall oaks framed her view and Nesta saw a pair of swallows skim the rippling surface. She watched as they danced around each other, dipping, gliding, pulling apart and then diving close. 

She grimaced at the thought that one single cocky male with a man-bun no less, was the only difference between her idea of paradise and her idea of hell on earth.

Turning around to head inside, she saw Cassian standing there watching her and she didn’t know what agitated her more. The fact that one of his eyebrows was raised, amusement on his face, or that he was holding the door open, waiting for her. 

Nesta marched through the French doors, ignoring him completely. 

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

The house in one word was…beautiful. It was so beautiful that as she looked around, Nesta was only mildly irritated at Rhys. She had hoped that she would able to turn her scrupulous eye on it and tally up all the tell-tale signs of architecture-by-numbers and she was ready to use every ounce of that as ammo against him. 

She had almost stopped in the middle of the doorway when she saw the large white cedar dining table with the 180 degree view of the lake, not the live-edge walnut table with gaudy chandler she had expected to see. And her body hummed with pleasant surprise to see that the rest of the house was decorated in the same modest way with soft muted colors as to not compete with the surrounding landscape that could be appreciated through the large expanses of glass. 

Cassian cleared his throat behind her. “Would you like a tour?”

Nesta tried her best at a non-committal shrug and was glad that he didn’t comment. 

He set down Nesta’s book bag onto the counter of the breakfast bar and gestured wide. “Kitchen and dining room,” and nodded his head past Nesta’s shoulder. “Living room.”

Nesta eyed the double-height room and appreciated the openness of the living spaces. She followed Cassian down the corridor as he pointed out the butler’s pantry and half-bath. Next to it was the office where the two side walls were lined with bookshelves, flanking the large window that overlooked the lawn.

“You can work in here…if you want.” Cassian said, motioning to Nesta’s work bag which she still had slung on her shoulder.

She hummed and shrugged again, hitching her bag higher on her shoulder.

Across the office was the media room which housed a projection screen and what looked to be a custom made sofa big and deep enough for ten Cassians to lounge comfortably. Nesta eyed the array of pillows in varying shades of purple as she ran a hand along the arm of the sofa. Mohair. 

Next to the media room, as Elain had promised was a home gym. There were some weight machines as well as a treadmill and two Pelotons, which made Nesta roll her eyes. Free weights and yoga mats sat in one corner of the room and Nesta’s jaw nearly dropped to see an actual sauna across from the en suite bath. 

Cassian chuckled at the look on her face. 

“Believe it or not, it gets used quite often.”

Nesta had told Elain this wasn’t a vacation, but she made a mental note to take advantage of the sauna as much as possible while she was stuck there. 

“And here,” Cassian said, taking long strides to the French doors that clearly opened to the outside, “Is the back patio.”

It was a sliver of space that was sandwiched between the house and the sloping hill next to it, but it was big enough for a small lap pool, an outdoor shower and a Jacuzzi. 

“If you didn’t bring your own, there are extra towels and swimsuits for guests in the linen closet. Although…” Cassian’s eyelids drooped as he eyed her up and down, the tip of his tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth. “I’m not one for ceremony around here.” 

Nesta looked at him and took two steps closer. His grin widened, showing his canines. 

She tilted her face towards him, her smile matching his. “Eat shit,” she said and walked away. She heard his bark of laughter behind her.

The only other room on the first floor was the master bedroom which was modest in size given what Nesta has need of the house so far, but it did open up to its own private patio with a spectacular view of the forest meeting the water. 

What wasn’t modest however, was the master bathroom and closet, which combined was the same size as the bedroom. Possibly bigger.

Nesta felt an odd flutter in her chest when she saw Feyre’s clothes neatly hanging in the closet next to Rhys’. She quickly left the room and almost ran into Cassian in the corridor. 

“The bedrooms are upstairs. You can have your pick,” he said.

She was surprised that he didn’t add any additional commentary when she nodded at him. 

She wanted to protest when he grabbed her suitcase on the way, but she found that her throat was dry, so she simply followed him up the stairs.

“So when are Elain and Gregory showing up?” Cassian asked. 

Nesta couldn’t tell if he was trying to make a joke or if he really forgot Graysen’s name. Either way, it was funny enough to take the sting out of the fact that Elain was still in Los Angeles and Nesta allowed herself a smile. 

“Not until tomorrow,” she answered stopping next to him on the second floor. 

He gestured to the first door which stood ajar. “This is my bedroom. Feel free to stop by anytime.” He nudged the door open further as he grinned at her.

Nesta looked at him and refused to let her eyes wander past his shoulder. That was exactly what he wanted and she wasn’t going to play his game. She held his gaze with a hard glare of her own and then continued down the hallway.

Cassian chuckled as he easily caught up with her. “Mor and Az’s rooms, but they’re not here to object if you take one. Guest bath, guest bath, guest room, and another guest room. This one actually has its own bath connected to it.”

“Great,” Nesta said, pushing the door open and dropping her work bag onto the bed. The fact that the bedroom had its own bathroom was a plus enough, but it being as far away as possible from Cassian was a little miracle that she thought the universe owed her. 

Cassian followed and set the suitcase down at the foot of the bed. “There’s one more floor…if you’re interested in seeing the library.”

He left the room and it irritated her that he already knew the answer before she even said it. 

Nesta debated whether or not to close her bedroom door and deny Cassian the acknowledgement that he knew anything about her. However small the insight was, it felt like a violation, especially since she hadn’t offered the fact willingly. 

In the end, her love of books won out and when she reappeared in the hallway, she saw Cassian leaning against the railing at the end of the corridor, waiting for her.

“Needed a moment?”

Nesta’s spine tingled with fire. “Your big ego was sucking all of the air out of the room. I needed to catch my breath.”

Cassian’s grin widened, but he didn’t provide a remark which Nesta thought was oddly out of character for him. He simply stood up, stretched his arms over his head which revealed a slice of bronzed skin between his jeans and t-shirt, and began to climb the stairs.

He was trying to rile her up on purpose and she refused to fall for the bait.

The entire third floor of the house was half terrace that looked like it doubled as an outdoor living space, complete with outdoor sofas and loungers, and even another dining table, and a library. Any wall that wasn’t lined with floor to ceiling bookcases was a window. 

The focus of the third floor, as was with the other floors, was the breathtaking view onto Lake Velaris, but Nesta was overcome by the stacks before her. Unlike the office where the bookshelves were all lined with trinkets and photos, the library was full of an extensive collection of books. 

There was all the classics, bound in leather. Some, to Nesta’s surprise were even first or second editions, just sitting there waiting to be touched. There were old Californian almanacs and all types of history books. There were large atlases spanning decades and art books featuring well-known and obscure artists alike. And a quarter of the books were in different languages. Nesta counted at least five as she scanned the shelves. 

She rounded one of the stacks and saw Cassian sitting in a window seat. His legs were stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankles. His arm was slung across the upholstered back of the seat and he was looking out the window, watching the trees rustle in the breeze.

His ear twitched when he heard her approaching and he turned to look at her. “Does it please the lady?”

Leave it to Cassian to ruin the first bit of real happiness Nesta had found since she had arrived. And no longer under the library’s spell, she crossed her arms. 

“Why aren’t you in France?”

Cassian raised his eyebrow, amused, but also a little perplexed. “What an odd question to ask someone. Why aren’t you in France?” 

Nesta did not want to play this game with him. “Why aren’t you in France with Feyre and Rhys and…the others?”

“Oh.” He scratched his chin and the sound of his fingernails against his five o’clock shadow grated on Nesta’s nerves. “I was never in France with Feyre and Rhys and…the others.” 

He grinned at her, then leaned his shoulder against the shelf next to him. 

“Actually, I was in France with them, but only for a couple of days back in February. Have you ever been to Taillé? It’s a bit pretentious, but the risotto was top notch. That reminds me…” Cassian was on his feet in one graceful movement and was leaving Nesta behind as he descended the stairs.

Nesta rolled her eyes. It was rich that he would call anything pretentious considering the fact that they were currently quarantining themselves in a lake-side mansion. 

She could hear him shuffling and moving things around on the first floor so she gave the library one final longing look, with the promise to return, and went downstairs.

In the kitchen, Cassian was putting things away. It looked as though he had been in the middle of doing so when Nesta had first arrived. 

She walked slowly around the grey marble island, taking stock of the groceries and nearly stumbled over a crate of wine at her feet.

“You never answered my question,” she said, plucking a grape from its bunch.

Cassian looked back at her.

Was he really this dumb or was he trying to get under her skin?

“Why aren’t you in France with…your family?”

He shrugged. “Rhys was there because Feyre was. I think he was using the time to look for some real estate opportunities, and since Azriel’s his finance guy, he needed to be there to bless any deals. And Mor…just does whatever she wants, but if you ask her, she’d say as vice president, her role was crucial.”

“Don’t you work for Rhys, too?”

Cassian paused at putting the eggs away. “My company works for Rhys’.”

“Your company? What does it do?” She had to admit, she was a little intrigued and paused to wonder if he had told her this before. Perhaps at some gathering or dinner she had been forced to attend.

The color on Cassian’s ears made her think her suspicions were true. 

“Cyber security.” His answer was curt. 

So she could get under his skin. 

“Like in…hacking and stuff?”

“Something like that.”

Maybe not so dumb after all. 

“And your family asked you to stock the house with provisions in the anticipation of their arrival.”

“I volunteered.”

“But now they’re stuck in Europe and you’re stuck…with me.” It satisfied her to think he might be equally as unhappy as she was with this arrangement.

Cassian turned to her, closing the fridge door behind him. The tension in his shoulders was gone, or perhaps it was never there to begin with. Maybe she had misread his body language because his usual arrogant grin had returned.

“I like to think we’re stuck here together.” He picked up a box of rigatoni. “Hungry?”

There was the tip of his tongue again, poking out of the corner of his smile.

Nesta bristled. “No,” she said before grabbing a banana from the bowl in front of her and turning on her heels to march upstairs.

She hoped she wouldn’t have to deal with him for the rest of the night.

[hellzyeahwebwielingessays]

The Not-So-Amazing Mary Jane Part 25: AMJ #2.1

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Just like the first issue, I’m going to go through the issue page by page.

Believe it or not. the problems literally start on the recap page.

For starters check out this line:

....and staffed with outsiders (like MJ) whenever possible...

This is incredibly odd as it seemingly contradicts what issue #1 established.

I say seemingly because it depends upon how you define ‘outsiders’. Outside of what exactly?

The Hollywood system?

Traditional film or TV circles?

By those metrics the inclusion of so many criminals and former felons could fit the bill.

However, the recap lists Mary Jane as an example of such ‘outsiders’, which muddies the waters.

I suppose from a certain point of view she might be called an outsider but in context it doesn’t seem an appropriate descriptor at all.

Mary Jane has  acting credits. She’s worked on Hollywood films before. She’s worked in TV before. She’s worked on stage before.

Alright, she’s not exactly Scarlett Johansson, but she’s not really an outsider.

More poignantly, the recap seems to be implying that MJ was included specifically because of her alleged outsider status. Putting aside how MJ isn’t really an outsider, this just doesn’t add up.

As detailed in parts 5-6, we the audience know  that MJ’s inclusion is either due to:

Mysterio knowing about her connection to Spidey or

Kindred ordered Beck to include her.

The latter is the more likely answer. But even if it wasn’t the implication here is that Mysterio always wanted Mary Jane in his movie.

This is imbecilic of him because he is aware of her connection to Spider-Man!

Beck could be viewed as an obsessive and an egomaniac, but he’s not an idiot. If anything he is dangerously cunning. If he really just wanted an outsider actress with talent he’d have endless options other than Mary Jane to pick from.

Regardless of your feelings on the matter, the reality within Hollywood is that actors are a dime a dozen.

If Beck knows who Spidey is and therefore knows about MJ’s connection to him, he must have a specific reason  for hiring her. He must have a particular need to keep her on set as he practically begged her to do in issue #1; a fact acknowledged in the recap itself. In fact in ASM v5 #25 Beck personally sought out Mary Jane’s former  agent in order to get her into the movie. He didn’t look at a pool of actors and cast someone. He was incredibly specific.

Based upon the information we’ve been given, MJ’s connection to Spidey is the only explanation for all this. So what the Hell is this nonsense about her being an outsider? If he wanted an outsider why did he personally seek out  Mary Jane?

I’m sorry, I can’t give the benefit of the doubt on this front. This is a clear cut example of incompetence. Either Williams and/or her editors weren’t paying attention to prior stories (including the first issue!) or they were and didn’t care.

Regardless it’s bad.

Moving on, we then have Cage McKnight referred to as a “superstar director”.

Wasn’t Cage supposed to be an indie director? Call me nuts but a ‘superstar director’ is surely someone like Spielberg or Ryan Coogler. An indie director is by definition not a superstar. It also further contradicts ASM v5 #29’s claims about McKnight harder to reconcile. In that issue McKnight was supposed to be a new and fairly unknown director.

But I’ll let all that pass because he could be a super star on the indie scene.

Additionally, the recap in general fails to acknowledge the presence of criminals on set. They are simply referred to as outsiders and people who were on their ‘last hope of making something meaningful’. This totally obscures the reality of the situation and paints it as a lot less dangerous or irresponsible.

We then come to the most damning line in the entire recap.

MJ agreed to keep Quentin’s secret—even from Peter/Spider-Man.

That literally never happened in issue #1.

There was never a moment MJ agreed  to keep Mysterio’s secret from Peter. Sure, we never saw her tell him the truth. But the story never highlighted the fact she was knowingly withholding information from him. She was incredibly casual about the film project and showed no signs of apprehension about lying to her partner.

It’s not even that Williams was being incredibly subtle. The first issue simply failed to ever acknowledge the fact that MJ was lying to Peter; she just did it!

More significantly the implication is that MJ is keeping this secret from Peter specifically because she’s sympathetic to Mysterio and his crew’s desire to make something meaningful. So I guess Williams is maintaining the mischaracterization from last issue huh? See prior instalments for why lying to Peter, sympathising with Beck and trusting him is OOC for Mary Jane.

Honestly, how would Matt Murdock feel about MJ letting Mysterio tell his magnum opus before he dies? The last time he was dying and decided he needed a magnum opus his girlfriend died!

Surely Karen or Gwyneth or any of the other innocent people Beck killed wanted the chance to do something meaningful with their lives too?

Why should Beck be afforded such an opportunity when he denied similar chances to people far more deserving?

Now granted this is just the recap page but the importance of a recap page is not to be underestimated.

Every comic is someone’s first, Stan Lee himself said that.

Recap pages are important as they give new readers the opportunity to jump on ship and thereby hopefully buoy up the sales as they naturally decline from issue #1 onwards.

Speaking from experience here, growing up my UK Marvel reprints had fairly detailed recap pages that provided enough context for me to pick up basically any issue and generally understand what was going on.

Having the recap contradict the actual story is misinforming and can thereby create a false impression of the work. Screwing it up is also just a bad sign for the rest of the comic. That’s particularly true when it’s providing details that weren’t actually present in the stories it is recapping.

Anyway, as we get into the story proper, we see MJ performing a scene from the movie.

I am not exactly sure if Williams is trying to make some commentary on Mary Jane here.

The dialogue her character says could be interpreted as commenting upon MJ’s growth as a character, on how she grew more capable of defending herself. Of how as she grew older she realised the real dangers in life were human beings not childish imaginings of monsters.

The main reason I suspect this might’ve been meant as commentary is that the dialogue specifically pints out how people wear masks to hide their true natures.

Masks are a recurrent theme in the Spider-Man mythos and particularly prevalent with MJ’s character.

If this was Williams intent it demonstrates a certain understanding of Spider-lore and of MJ that’s been woefully been lacking for most of the 2010s.

And one could justifiable argue the dialogue about how she grew stronger and more capable of defending herself is supported by her evolution over time. MJ never underwent a clear cut arc where she became more capable of defending herself. She was basically just shown to have bravery, common sense and resourcefulness. The frequent dangerous encounters she endured afforded her chances to put those skills into practice thus she got better at it, but she didn’t undergo active training towards that end like Batman.

Furthermore the dialogue can be argued to be talking about Mysterio as well, specifically the lines about monsters hiding behind pleasant masks. This is applicable to Mysterio’s masquerade as Cage McKnight.

However the comparison (if intentional at all) breaks down in two key areas.

The dialogue implies ‘Mary Jane’ learned that humans are the real monsters in life as she grew older. This is patently not true as MJ’s father was frequently abusive even when MJ was a baby.

This was the norm for Mary Jane’s entire childhood and she herself created a mask of her own to cope with it.

ASM #259

It was even implied MJ suspected Peter of being a ‘monster’ like her father precisely because she knew he hid the truth of himself.

So MJ would’ve been acutely aware that people can be monsters and use masks to hide this fact.

The second way the comparison breaks down regards Mysterio. If we accept that the dialogue is commentating upon Mysterio then it’s Williams acknowledging that Mysterio is  a monster in disguise. This in turn throws her characterization of MJ into question. It implies Williams is knowingly writing Mary Jane as an idiot and out of character. It also doesn’t jive with his sympathetic portrayal in issue #1; nor in fact in this issue as we’ll see.

Of course all of that is hypothetical. I fully admit I might be reading more into this than was intended. Williams could’ve just thought this dialogue seemed cool and that was all.

I should also briefly discuss the artwork. In issue #1 I critiqued it because at times it made the intent ambiguous. In fairness that might be more down to Williams or the editors as opposed to Gomez. I suspect it will become a problem that will crop up moving forward. Nevertheless, it doesn’t detract for the utterly gorgeous aesthetic of his artwork.

With all that’s said let’s get back to the story.

MJ’s scene is interrupted when ‘Cage’ realises a pair of men are removing the wind machine. Actually, they’re removing several pieces of equipment the crew were renting. Mallorie, ‘Cage’s’ right-hand woman (sorry I don’t know Hollywood lingo), snatches a small piece of equipment and makes a point of withholding it from the men. MJ begins to ask what’s going on, turning on some of the charm for one of the men (named Noah).

‘Cage’ though is far less polite, demanding Noah’s attention. He warns him that, once Hollywood hears of this situation, he’ll struggle to find future work. Noah angrily retorts that ‘Cage’ hasn’t paid his rental fees in weeks, a fact confirmed when he checks his phone.

There are a few things to unpack from these pages, most of which further confirms topics we’ve already touched on.

For starters, we could argue Beck’s rudeness and threat exemplifies the danger he poses. Not just because he is a violent man, but also because he is seeking to ruin an innocent man’s business. This is something he could theoretically use McKnight’s reputation to achieve even more effectively.

Admittedly, that’s a little nit-picky.

Beck in Cage’s role here didn’t act unreasonably. He’s a bad person but even a good person could be forgiven or at least understood in this situation.

The real Cage McKnight may well be miffed at his equipment being removed and the lack of professionalism. That wouldn’t necessarily be grounds for Noah’s business to be harmed either if he was genuinely being unprofessional. Not to mention, we could easily give Beck the benefit of the doubt and say his threat was simply a bargaining tactic to get what he wants.

However, what’s less forgivable is Beck’s carelessness.

In the grand scheme of his history, failing to check his phone or pay some bills is hardly his worse crime. But it is endemic of a larger issue. Beck has never made a real movie before, not as the director anyway. The closest he’s ever come are his crimes, which granted would demand certain similar skills. However, he pulled off those crimes with little concern for any henchmen he involved nor any legal or financial obligations. He funded his crimes through other crimes. He viewed his helpers as disposable. And as for breaking the law, that obviously wasn’t going to bother him.

In this story Beck has dozens of people who’s jobs (and possibly their careers) ride on his decisions. The narrative has even painted him as genuinely wanting to help them. And yet he has failed as an incredibly basic responsibility. He hasn’t even considered delegated that task to someone else. It’s exemplary of selfishness at worst, and poor leadership at best.

I’m not trying to argue any of this is out of character for Mysterio. Rather, it’s the implications of this within the status quo that are concerning.

On to of everything else, Mary Jane has decided to go along with Beck’s passion project without considering if he’s even qualified for the job. Creative vision isn’t enough, you need basic competency as well. You need to know how and who to delegate stuff to if it’s not your forte or not what you are interested in.

It’s also further exemplifies the potential damage Beck can bring to the real McKnight’s reputation. If word of this gets out suddenly McKnight at best might be regarded as rude, at worst a poor leader and incompetent. Incompetent with money no less, which (above anything else) is likely to paint him poorly in the eyes of the Hollywood power players.

This misuse of Cage’s reputation continues into the next page where Beck outright throws McKnight’s name around. He claims there has been a mistake because his movie was given a generous budget. Mary Jane tries to calm the situation down and sits in one of the fold out chairs. Her plan is to prevent the men from removing it off the set, a scheme Mallorie (literally) adds some weight to.

In spite of ‘Cage’s’ borderline verbal abuse, Noah expresses respect for Cage and the film project, suggesting he talk to the money people.

By rights MJ in observing this entire scene should be much more sceptical of Beck. At the very least she should wonder if she’s made the right decision in helping him. SPOILERS: She won’t.

What she does do though, is use her charm/social savvy to defuse situations and keep Mysterio under control. This is clearly part of the direction Williams wants to take the series in. In fact it’s the central conceit of this entire issue.

On this front Williams does a superb job. No seriously, I might hate this status quo. I might loathe the mischaracterization facilitating it. I might despise the contrivance that keeps it going. But it’s stuff like this where Williams once more displays a deftness with MJ’s character.

She understands  that Mary Jane possesses superb social skills that can serve as a form of ‘super power’ within certain contexts. Williams has (clumsily) generated one such context and thus allowed MJ to shine. You could genuinely cite or post this scene to exemplify some of the strengths of Mary Jane’s character. If you want a Spider-Man comparison, it’s a little like citing Otto injuring Scorpion from ASM #700 as an example of Peter’s raw power. How we got to that moment was nonsensical but unto itself it is a great example of a singular aspect of the character.

Another example occurs when MJ prompts ‘Cage’ to seek out more money for the film.

This moment demonstrates MJ’s practicality and determination. It’s just a shame that display entails her helping a criminal and suggesting they con yet more people!

The next page is a montage of just that, with Hollywood money people turning them down. ‘Cage’ reacts by angrily flipping tables. In contrast MJ calmly and politely tries to inject some positivity into the meetings.

Williams again does a great job of showing MJ’s personality. She keeps in control and is a great people person. She is practical and knows how to help Mysterio get stuff done.

But take note of ‘Cage’s’ misbehaviour in front of the money people. This opens up the possibility of him being dangerous and unstable, therefore a liability if left unchecked. Were this an exception to the rule or extenuating circumstances, that’d perhaps be understandable. But Mysterio, whilst not exactly defined by his rage, is  a violent person. He has inflicted physical and mental harm/abuse to people. And his bouts of bad behaviour are likely to negatively impact the real McKnight’s chances of working with any of these people in the future.

I’ll leave it there for now. We’ll pick up where we left off last time.

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