#(it is now 3 am. oops)

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

more of the dapper lad! i Cannot get him out of my brain

[doctorsiren]

they hate me cause my daddy is rich and I’m like…he’s not my real dad in fact he killed my real dad and then adopted me and he didn’t treat me like a son and he changed who I was as a person and ruined my life…leave me alone…

[squuote]

slightly expanding on my narrator design via how he expresses w/out his ‘mask’. shoutout to my pal @zulzinho for tossing the idea into my head, ive been messing around with it for a while ^__^

[that-was-anticlimactic]

see a world so beautiful and strange (spinning off somewhere)

“Why? Why are you suppressing?”

“Because I can't tic,” Alya whispered, fingernails digging into the skin on her arm. “I know Tourette’s isn’t exactly uncommon, but it’s part of my identity as Alya Césaire. It can’t be a part of Rena Rouge, too. Someone could figure out who I am and then…”

And then she’d have to give up the coolest thing that’s ever happened to her, give up living her dreams.

[or, alya is suppresses as rena rogue in order to protect her identity, but neither ladybug nor trixx will let her hurt herself like that]

🦊2,345 words | alya-centric, alya & ladybug friendship🦊

happy tourette's awareness month!!!

[pearl-kite]

So I came to the realization today that I am not going to get anymore work on this trunk done this year. I still need to finish stripping the paper inside and redoing that, but it's just. Not happening until spring. With that realization, I decided it's time to finally bring it back inside, put all the junk on my floor that used to be in it back in it, and guys

It looks good.

This is going to be a summary post of the project, so let's go back and remember what I started with. Back in, like, 2015 or something, I bought this dome-top steamer trunk at a missionary shop for $65

Yeah. Rough. But underneath that paint it was sturdy, and the only thing missing was the lock and the right-side hasp. While I lived overseas this sat in my parents' house, and when I got back I kept meaning to do something while storing all of my yarn and cat food in it. When I finally got my own space (almost a year ago now!) with my own garage, I finally decided: it was time.

Heads up, this is a long post under the cut.

Did a lot of research online, grew to hate how generative AI has even permeated niche topics like how to refinish a vintage steamer trunk, WHY is there generative AI for that, PLEASE stop, went to Lowe's and bought some supplies (I used Citristrip for the paint stripping, it worked VERY easily), and started stripping that hideous brown* away.

Almost instantly I could tell how good it could be. The tin looked amazing, and for most of the stripping process I wondered why on earth someone would cover it with any color. It took multiple layers of stripping, and I got better at it over time.

I did also start to see some oxidation issues with the tin that made the purpose behind the paint job a little more understandable.

One side was particularly bad, but I will never forgive the decision to paint the entire thing one single color.

At first, the flat metal seemed okay, but the longer I worked on stripping, the longer it was exposed to air, the rustier it started to get. I had already planned on coating it, and I ended up getting some Rust-Oleum Rust Reformer spray paint. Instead of removing the rust, it bonds to the oxide and stops the process from continuing. It also happens to leave it a nice matte black that didn't need additional painting. I taped everything off, then sprayed.

Then it was time for the tin. I looked for ideas, and the best one I found was Rub'n'Buff. It's not so much a paint as a pigmented wax, with the idea that you can buff it to a higher shine. As I was stripping paint, I found a spot under one of the slats that the painter missed, and the original tin had been painted a gold color, so I used that to decide on color. I decided on Grecian gold, though I used the antique gold as a kind of base to make sure the Grecian stretched far enough.

I originally started applying it with some craft foam brushes, but they didn't really want to work for me, so I ended up buying a pack of makeup sponges, the little disposable wedge ones, and the finer texture worked much better. I had to trim them down pretty frequently, because the wax would build up and stop applying as nicely, but there were more than enough in the pack to finish the job.

The coverage is amazing for this stuff. This side was the worst of them, and one layer of the stuff was almost perfect. The Grecian gold was almost a bit runnier, though, and ended up needing a second layer to cover some patches that were almost too thin, thus the other underneath.

This tin is so pretty though. I still kind of regret that it needed it; the places that weren't oxidized were so bright in a way that the Rub'n'Buff had no hope of emulating. There are some places you can still buy the embossed tin for rehabing trunks like this, but I haven't found one with a pattern quite like this, and this one is so much nicer than the ones I've seen. I'm very glad that it was all intact except for where the lock goes.

After the tin came the slats. I knew from sites like Brettun's Village that I wanted to use tung oil, so I had bought what I thought was tung oil. Turns out Minwax gets to call their tung oil finish that even though there's. No... tung oil. in it. ? So uh, if you want actual tung oil, do NOT listen to Minwax, they're lying, I don't understand why it's allowed. It still looks nice enough, but quite annoying.

Speaking of Brettun's Village, they not only do their own restorations AND provide a guide, they have a very extensive supply of recently furbished and original parts. They happened to have a nearly identical hasp to the one that was missing (so nearly identical I only noticed after my dad pointed it out) and an old lock also similar to my original, made in the late 1800s/early 1900s.

The next step was to tackle the inside. Instead of just adding more paper on top (like the last people did, so now there are two layers, one of which hides some original stickers ;3;), I decided to try to scrape that out, and I've found some structural issues that the metal and slats outside have held together and kept hidden.

The top split in the wood is an actual crack on the front that needs fixing. The middle split is just the gap between the planks. The bottom is also a crack, but not as extensive as the top one.

So the final steps, when I get the motivation again come spring, is to finish getting as much of the paper off as I can. Then my dad is going to help me use some bondo to hold the cracks, and I'll find a removable wallpaper I like. Then I can sort out what I'm going to do with the lock. That top split runs right through where the lock should go - you can see some of the wood filler we already put in from where the original was ripped out - so we can't try to put anything there or it'll crack worse.

But I brought it in today!

It looks so good, I glance over and get to feel so satisfied; I did that.

*I don't like to call any color hideous, because a lot of the time it really depends on the context, and it's an okay brown. But for THIS? It was probably the worst brown they could have picked. Mixed with the orange of the paint stripper it looked like I was scraping diarrhea.

[the-first-spinjitzu-master]

It’s the first time I’ve used watercolor in years!! I thought I’d practice on my favorite character of all time <3

[babybirbb]

Just started watching suits recently and was wondering if you had any good fic recs, particularly AUs. The nature of the show really lends itself to Selkie fics imo but also I just love selkies

anon i need you to know that as soon as i saw your ask i immediately went scouring through the AU tag on ao3. i’m not gonna lie, i'm not usually an AU reader but i wanted to challenge myself to provide some recs as unbiasedly as possible.

at first observation, i noticed a lot of the AU fics were still in some way canon (divergent and adjacent)-- usually splitting off somewhere along the show or a situation where Mike or Harvey is still a lawyer, while the other was not. i will say i skipped over smut-based (omegaverse, bdsm) and lengthy fics (under 20k is nothing, anything more than 50k is pushing it for me) cause i just did not have the brainpower to even try to get through them :/

so of course the ones i ended up liking were mostly canon divergent/adjacent but i tried my best to get you something different. what i managed to dig up for you is under the cut and i really hope you like them anon (also fyi these are all pretty much marvey fics, hope that's okay!) <3 also thanks so much for the ask! i enjoyed this little scavenger hunt haha!

As the World Caves In by SupernaturalIdjit16 | Mature - Zombie Apocalypse, Warning for the usual triggers that come with zombie apocalypse. It’s not a complete work but it literally got updated today!

Here at the end of all things by tattooedsiren | Explicit - Apocalypse, Hurt/Comfort, Mike and Harvey protecting each other, Mike does shoot someone and goes a bit into the psychological aftermath, light smut towards the end

The Haunting of Penthouse B by Skara_Brae | Teen+ - Supernatural Elements, Happy ending, Mike’s a ghost…or is he?

Meet Me at Midnight by butdaddyilovehim | Teen+ - Superheroes/Superpowers, Protective Harvey, he's also Batman…need i say more?

Complications by LearnedFoot | Teen+ - Canon divergence, Fake/pretend relationship, Harvey decides not to hire Mike, instead asks for his help to spite Jessica, of course they end up falling in love

The Touch by FrivolousSuits | Teen+ - Magic, Angst, Soulmate inspired, it’s also from Donna’s pov which was super fun and interesting, as was the nature of the magic

TBR list:

Wear My Name by Lunarflare14 (Teen+) and whatever the question by tattooedsiren (Explicit) - These are both Fake/Pretend relationship AUs based/inspired by The Proposal movie! (a very good movie imo)

The Game by FrivolousSuits | Teen+ - It’s a Hunger Games AU so i am intrigued, just haven't gotten around to reading it yet

Ocean Dream by Blue_Five | Mature - i apologize for being unable to provide you with a selkie fic so the best i could do was the incomplete merperson au... i hope it's enjoyable...😅

[somegrumpynerd]

Me: ah nice a week off! I can hopefully finish some of the drawings I started :D

Also me: gets like 5 new ideas and it’s monday

[bookishjules]

love cc’s books but the most unrealistic part is her having not a single character hate being a shadowhunter like?? imagine you live in a whole ass society and you can’t partake in certain roles because you never received proper education and the option to leave this life of demon killing… give me a character that wants to build rockets! give me a character than wants to open a restaurant! give me a character that wants to be a singer! i want a character that despises their parents and the government for being forced in this life (and then maybe learns to love it? because then us, as an audience, would really see why it’s worth it)

i have a theory that twp might end with the shadowhunter word being more integrated into the normal mundane world. kids attending public school and receiving training after school and during summers, etc etc

while i totally see where you're coming from, i do have a counter point: jessamine.

girl hated the life and the world she was born into so much that she married the first mundane man who promised her a way out. and a big reason for her strong aversion to shadowhunting too is because it was a life her parents didn't want for her, didn't want for themselves. the only reason she was as involved as she was is because of the established procedure for orphans in shadowhunter society.

additionally, we have jem, who upon returning to mortality decides that he cannot live as a shadowhunter without will.

i've thought about this a decent amount before actually. i think the distinction between nephilim and shadowhunter is that one is a race and one is a profession. being a shadowhunter is expected and is overwhelmingly the norm, which is why it tends to be used interchangeably with the term nephilim, but i don't think it is necessarily the end all be all (even if it is their heavenly mandate as a race)

that said tho!! you are very very right about the extent to which the shadowhunter upbringing prepares little nephilim for the mundane world, which is to say, uh.. barely. and this makes it incredibly difficult to breach that barrier, explore other aspects of life, and actually make it on your own out there, especially if you are connected to an institute. which is one of the reasons we see jessie struggling so much in tid.

i think something that's special about tlh is that (maybe because demon activity in london is pretty chill leading up to the series), the characters seemed much more inclined toward certain mundane pursuits. christopher may not have built rockets, but he did know how to blow things up. lucie has the time to write novels. matthew is very up to date on mundane culture, and folds into it easily. shadowhunting responsibilities didn't take any opportunities away from them and their individual explorations of the world.

however, if we put jessie, who had no real aspirations but hated shadowhunting, and matthew, who has plenty of aspirations but still holds onto his shadowhunter identity, on a scale.. we see that there is a middle piece missing, which is the one you described--someone who hates shadowhunting and has outside aspirations. and boy oh boy do i think that would be such an interesting character. especially the way you described it!!

i think in the same vein of children of shadowhunters who left to marry a mundane finding themselves pulled back into the world, it would be really interesting to see children of ascended shadowhunters kinda being enticed by the mundane. ofc shadowhunter blood rings true and all that but i can see there being a sort of romanticization of this world they live in but not of, that their parent(s) got to experience fully and yet all they know of it is how to protect it..

which rounds itself back to your last point so well! because really they should know more about the people and the world they are called to protect. and i think if shadowhunter society kinda becomes dismantled and decentralized (bc lbr something seriously drastic has to change politically).. it really only makes sense. also it's much nicer of an ending than um.. all shadowhunters losing their role completely. not to make a pjo reference, but i feel like it would almost be like switching from everyone being year-rounders at camp half-blood to those who just come for the summer. it would be interesting to see what causes that sort of change, if the threat of demons becomes neutralized enough for them to function in that way. it would also be interesting to see just how much more can be accomplished in terms of art and science when the nephilim aren't so restricted to training and battle and death.

[perpetualexistence]

Bad news: I don't think I'm going to be able to write for ever day of TD horror week as I'd originally imagined.

Good news: The days I am going to be part of will be Cooking. I shan't spoil too much about it but one day already has 2.5K words and is only like a fourth of the way done.

[candycryptids]

Well, now I have to pop in and ask YOU a question. Which is hard because looking over all your characters pages, I'm sobbing on the fucking floor... I love them all so much????

But! I'd really like to know what sparked Chuusday's interest in technology and how did she get so good with it?! ♡

N..nobodies ever asked that before 🫣💦 So I’ll hammer some of the details out for you RIGHT MEOW! A 2sday-Wednesday special :3

Actually we’re gonna cover a lot of ground I haven’t talked about openly before so settle in

Chuu’s fascination with Machines n the like started REAL early, early when she was small. She wanted to…. Disassemble things. Crates, shelves, alchemist tools of the trade, Mammets… carts… she wanted to lay it all out. See how it fit together. And then MAYBE put it all back together again. And she lived on an island, in a port town, with her mom (an actual Viera) who was continuously unwell and kept getting worse every time she got better and sick again, and the sunseeker chirurgeon who was trying to treat her condition, and his partner, another sunseeker who if I recall correctly, was an alchemist. So. The house she was staying in had no shortage of things a Viera with curious + grabbing destructive hands shouldn’t be grabbing.

It takes coaxing to get her to start putting stuff back together again all the time, and by that point at least she’d stopped trying to pry nails out of things (wooden objects were a pain, she found, to take apart, and piece back together, the wood sometimes was old and slightly rotted, the nails came out unkindly, the shapes were often simple.)… things with screws and bolts were… fun. Her dads (in her mind, they were her dads, but out loud, it was sir, and mister) kept trying to send her out on Missions (chores; your mom isn’t doing well, we don’t want you to have to keep hanging around the house while her every breath rattles and her every cough is harsh and wet. Chuu knew. She was 14. It wasn’t hard to figure out…) for, small stuff. Fetch quests; go pick up ingredients for dinner, or hunt down this one small herb on the cliff side above town for this tincture I’m trying to make to help alleviate the cough symptoms. I have enough for now but having more to replenish what I’m using isn’t bad.. low stakes, yknow.

And when her Mom finally passed from her illness the pair kept Chuu on (Chuu herself will not comment on the her mom and the dads’ relationship, but I CAN and I’ll tell you those fuckers were poly. They might never have slapped a label on it but the love was there. It didn’t start that way, but it certainly was that way by the end.)

This ended up wildly off track didnt it. (Let me get it back on track, and in so doing gracefully gloss over the chunk of history I’m unclear on 💖)

She gets REALLY good at what she’s doing when she signs on with the Garlean Empire. It wasn’t�� a hard choice. There was nothing left tying her down where she had been by that point; they’d offered direction, room, board… and, well… her current skills were enough to get placed under Midas’ guidance.

And she found that. Magitek is incredibly interesting compared to whatever she’s had her hands on before and she loves it. Purpose. Drive. She learns how to build things that she’d never dreamed of before under Midas’ guidance. She helps refine designs for two legged heavy artillery a lone person can pilot. To deal with the enemy. She does not think about who the enemy is. The enemy is a problem, and the Machine, glorious, flawless, violent, is the answer.

And then they blow up Bozja. Midas with it. An entire city, wiped off the map. She finds that the numbers- subjects- on the sheet that they’d been running experiments on have faces. Haunted, tired faces, with dull eyes and drawn cheeks and small hands. Children. You can’t just quit, but Midas was gone. Cid was missing. Nero was a thorn in her side and she didn’t want to continue work under someone less competent, or pursue someone else’s dreams. So …. She went missing too. Crashed an airship into Thavnair and stripped the wreckage to the bones for coin. Went into temporary hiding in Kugane, then Ul’Dah, and finally fell in with the slightly sketchy free company she’s with now. She maintains their airships and submersibles and they don’t ask where she came from 💖

I think I got a lil lost in the reeds and I was supposed to go to sleep like 4 hours ago but I kept turning this question over in my mind like a rubrix cube despite my best efforts >v>; The Long And Short Is; she’s always wanted to know how stuff worked, and falling in with Garlemald for (cautiously estimating her time there at about 30+ years) helped her understanding grow in great leaps. Around the start of 2.0 she awakens the Echo (Thrice damned Migraine Creator) and doesn’t realize it’s use until her next encounter with Allagan tech (where she interfaces on a personal level and. It kicks her new obsession up. And… allagans did quite a bit of soul research… it is, somewhat, why there is a Tuesday.)

… 🫣 thank you for the question !!!!!!! I’m. Hopin this makes even a lick of sense, ahaha… some of the stuff I had partially cemented in my mind… I had to fix, after reading the actual lore and wiki -w•;; but not much.

[tetzoro]

good morning friendz and happy monday !! sending out the best energy & hoping that today treats you kindly ! let’s try to make this week a sweet one (ㅅ´ ˘ `) 🤍

[planetarythorns]

I hate pjsk because I've been trying desperately to get all of my favorites lately on jp (wd3, wxs world link, Toya4) and instead the game has been telling me to kick rocks and has given me three Nene 4 stars I didn't want like. Did I use all my luck on Rui4 or something??? Is this punishment for hyperfixating until I got that full set??? BECAUSE I WENT ON MY BRAND NEW ACCOUNT ON MY OLD PHONE AND GOT TOYA'S NEWEST 4 STAR IN THREE 10 PULLS???

the gacha game gods hate my main account specifically and I've been robbing some Nene and Haruka fan for like 2 months now. Send help.

[gothoffspring]

my 15 minute sim surpassed my expectations to say the least

[lavenoon]

AU Glamrocks, here we go! Close-ups, lines, and character descriptions under the cut <3

Freddy: Code Name: Gold (jokingly called “Golden Boy” by his team members)

The oldest of the Glamrocks, and an import. He’s been with Fez from the start, and has come a long way from “Friedrich Fassbär” (changed to a civilian Freddy Fazbear - bear being a literal translation, and “Faz” sounding similar enough - what a harmless suggestion by the Fez higher ups). Originally programmed in German, sometimes he still slips up even after all the updates and upgrades he went through. Of the Glamrocks, past and present, he’s the only one who wasn’t commissioned by Fez for the purpose of agent work. He was young when he met the late head of Fez, and promptly scouted - young enough to leave behind his previous life and move. 

He’s proud to be such a cornerstone of Abra Fez, but it also comes with a burden. From the start, he’s watched people not return from missions, taking on more missions himself as if he could protect everyone if he just did all the work. But in the end, his friends - because they are friends, thanks to Fez’ policy of agents being allowed to share their identity with other agents if they so choose - pulled him back from that brink, and reminded him that it’s not his responsibility, that all agents chose this work, and are aware of the risks. Things happen, but he can only do so much.

Then Foxy “died”, and only a few short months later, Bonnie “disappeared” - it broke him. Freddy grew into a workaholic, and his anxiety skyrocketed about losing more friends. He doesn’t take it out on Roxy or Monty, and doesn’t fault them for the roles they fill. He’s grown to befriend both, though Roxy and Monty themselves keep a bit of a distance for their own reasons. Freddy would like to be greedy, he would like to have it all - his old friends, well and alive, and new friends joining them. The reality that that’s impossible hurts him, and so he drowns himself in work. He remains close to Chica, though often their conversations take a dive in the direction of nostalgia and grief, so they don’t seek each other out exclusively a lot, and besides, he barely has the time nowadays, anyway…

An all-rounder in terms of stealth and intelligence collection

Roxy: Code Name: Gaze (or Glare, when she’s angry - but only where she can’t hear)

Foxy’s direct replacement, and while she wasn’t told in as many words, she’s smart enough to figure that out. Many, many inadequacy issues about it - how is she supposed to live up to someone she never even knew? How is she supposed to feel like she earned her spot when she was instantly promoted into the Glamrock rank after completing training? Is she even any good? Overcompensates by putting on a show and acting aloof and at times even seemingly arrogant, very proud of her sight and the advantages it gives her. That part is real - and she knows she's good, with very real talents and tricks up her sleeve. But her "competition" is long dead, and the knowledge that if he hadn't died she would have just become a normal agent eats at her.

When she joined she barely got to know Bonnie before he disappeared, too, and while his loss hit her as well, she wasn’t as affected as Freddy or even Chica. Meaning she watched in detail how her new coworkers were crushed by the news, acting like barely a shell of their former selves for a long while. For a long while she thought about if that was their reaction to losing Foxy, too - not that she'd ever know. 

Felt very awkward for the short while it took for Monty to be promoted into the ranks, as the only one not still mourning, wondering if perhaps she’s not affected enough, and if that makes her an even worse person in Freddy’s and Chica’s eyes, because she’s already replacing their friend. 

Assumes many things about Freddy’s and Chica’s views on her in general, doing none of them a favor. A few times she tried asking about Foxy, but felt too bad about the sadness it caused, and so he now haunts her. Sometimes she wonders if the voice telling her she’s a failure is his, because she has no image of him to compare against. She pushes all of that away and still befriends the two, with just those lingering anxieties she’s too scared to bring up, because what if they confirm? With Monty she’s a bit more relaxed, though he has his own issues to work through, so it’s not like they’re closer to each other than anyone else.

Highly driven to prove herself and her merit, doing her best to prove (to Fez, to Freddy and Chica, to herself) that she is the best, and to leave the shadow of Foxy she was thrust in behind.

An all-rounder in terms of stealth and intelligence collection

Chica: Code Name: Pepperoni (usually shortened to Pepper, or the occasional Pep) 

Oh, she tries so hard. Has always done her best to be fun and energetic, and felt comfortable with her spot in the world. Then half her friends died in a very short time, Fez started pushing for upgrades and changes, and nowadays she looks in the mirror and barely recognizes herself. She barely recognizes Freddy, either, and it’s almost scarier - she knows she’s still the same person, still feels like herself, even if that peppy energy feels harder and harder to keep up. But for Freddy, the only old friend she has left, she doesn’t even know if he’s still the person she knew underneath all that grief. 

Her little family has changed irrevocably, and she tries to make it a new one, even with all of them resisting in their own ways. She huffs and puffs fake complaints, she teases and jokes, and she’s loud enough to cover the awkward silence that so often settles around them all. 

She feels just a little abandoned, and isn't quite sure by whom. By Foxy, or Bonnie? For dying? By Freddy? For grieving? By Roxy and Monty, for not even trying to get as close as she hoped? By Fez itself, for reminding her that everything is temporary, and that their work is dangerous, and not doing more to protect them all? But no, that last thought is dangerous - the seed of doubt is there, after Foxy and Bonnie both started doubting, and look at what happened… She’s smart, smarter than people may think, and she’s terrified of the thought that the agency she has dedicated most of her life to would kill her or her friends so quickly just for being inconvenient. 

Most of the time, she’s glad to have “one of those faces”, and a chipper attitude that makes people want to talk to her, underestimate her, and give her aaallll the information she wants. But when she starts feeling isolated by circumstances, with Freddy’s mind too clouded by grief and guilt, and the newbies remaining distant, there are suddenly many scary realizations just waiting to be had, and she can feel them creep closer with a dreadful finality. All she ever wanted was for her family to be okay, and happy, but it seems so unattainable when she struggles to stop everything from tearing at the seams. She pretends she’s fine just to act as the glue keeping them all together, too scared of losing them, too, even if it’s not the happiness she had before.

Her disposition makes her more inclined to accept missions for intelligence collection

Monty: Code Name: Nine Iron (Chica uses any golf term arbitrarily)

Technically, a little older than Roxy, but worked as a normal agent for a while. He quickly showed potential, despite some anger issues that made him decline many polite and formal undercover missions. Loud and energetic as he is, he sells himself as a dumb brute a lot, but hides a keen mind. He’s just not the most patient person, and he knows it - but when he was recommended for a team-up with a Glamrock he didn’t dare question it either. 

And then the mission went sideways, Bonnie disappeared (which Fez seemed all too eager to label as destruction after minimal evidence), and Monty was briefly investigated before being cleared. A little while after, when he was offered to join the Glamrocks, he did end up questioning it - why replace the guy so quickly, and with him of all people, who couldn’t even help Bonnie out? That’s just a bit too good to be true - it’s fishy.

Fez calmly explains the facts, and they don’t look good for Monty. A rising star on his best way to become a great agent, but with violent outbursts that have left the clean up a mess many times before. A Glamrock, meant to mellow him out on a difficult mission, and no witnesses to his destruction, with very little evidence. Monty can shut his mouth and take the job and thus the benefits it comes with, or at any point they can reopen the investigation and he won’t like what they’ll find.

He takes the job. But in turn, he’s very quickly disillusioned with Abra Fez as an agency, and only the threat hanging over him keeps him from spilling it all. Sometimes fights with the others about things Fez wants them to do, which they think is because of his little anger issues, and he lets them believe it. Any suspicion the others may have harbored however he quickly dissolves, simply because of the subdued condolences he shares the first time he joins their ranks. They’re all welcoming, and include him in their off the clock hang outs when those do happen, but his lack of faith in Fez makes him feel like an outsider anyway. 

But after years of the other shoe never dropping, he does his best to push it all away and just be a part of the group. If he can’t believe in management, he can believe in the people who stuck out their necks to help him so many times before, and he’ll do the same right back - he couldn’t help Bonnie, and he’s feeling so very guilty for his unknowing complicity in his disappearance, but he can make sure none of his friends suffer the same fate. 

(Besides, he’s aware of the fact that he’d be the first Fez would silence)

His disposition makes him more inclined to accept stealth missions, and/ or missions with anticipated enemy contact

But then, enter a little menace:

Gregory: no official code name, but when he declared he wanted one, Roxy offhandedly called him Arsonist. Freddy in the background gasped as if personally offended, which Chica took as a prompt to amend “in Training!” - Freddy’s reaction was to cry out a “No!” much like the “Show me what you have” “A knife!” vine, while Monty started losing his shit. Roxy slipped the kid a lighter while Freddy was busy telling Chica that “in Training” does not make it better. Freddy personally calls him Superstar, after Gregory commented that “Glamrocks” sounds more like a band than a team of secret agents. The kid loves it, soothing even the sourest of moods into quiet grumbles. 

Doesn’t talk much about the time before Freddy found him - where his parents are, why he was living on the streets, and why he was so insistent to go with the guy who had just started a fire. 

It also wasn’t exactly a matter of being found. Gold was on a mission to destroy a particular batch of evidence and prevent the company in question from making headway, so he figured to kill two birds with one stone and simply set the building in question on fire. Easy job, he thought. Not a residential area, and with extensive research on work schedules, there shouldn’t be any casualties - except someone started throwing rocks at him while yelling, and ruthless as he is he would never hurt a child. 

Even though said child turns out extremely feral, and barely stops berating him for burning down the warehouse with the laxest security, where’s a kid supposed to sleep now, huh? His things were in there, asshole! 

Gold, close to tears he can’t shed, feels incredibly guilty and apologizes throughout carrying Gregory away from the fast burning crime scene. Lil tot keeps hitting him, though. Gold quickly finds out the kid stonewalls at everything except his own name, won’t even say what was in the warehouse that was so important to him. For a while Gold just stares at the kid, contemplating how to continue - he can’t just leave him there, but he can’t expect Gregory to go with a stranger, and his life is dangerous - 

“So, where are you going now?” 

Entirely too nonchalant, but when Gold does not react as intended (i.e. with a direct answer), the kid huffs and crosses his arms. Boldly declares he’ll stick with - uhh, what’s his name, actually? 

Freddy introduces himself through a slip up, and immediately freezes. Gregory grins the smuggest of grins. So if Freddy doesn’t let him tag along, there’s a lot of information he has that many people would be very interested in - namely the police and the company in question. Kid has been living on the streets for long enough to know a sucker, and Freddy is a big one. 

The other Glamrocks were a bit wary of the kid first, but not entirely surprised that a feral stray decided to bully Freddy into adopting him. They’re all unfazed through their circumstances, and so when going through missing child reports does not yield any matches, Gregory gets a new faked identity (though various last names had to be rejected - RIP Gregory Fartmaster, you were never meant to be) and gets officially (but technically, very illegally) adopted by Freddy.

He calls Freddy both by his name and Dad, though he’s a little bashful about the latter. Freddy wants to melt every time. Both end up an emotional mess and don’t address it until the next time it happens. Monty is a very cool uncle, but fumbles a lot - especially when Gregory asks about the unholy amount of bent golf clubs Monty owns. He takes the kid to minigolf just so he’d stop asking, which Gregory promptly starts exploiting. Roxy starts out very aloof - but Gregs is very persistent, and quickly figures out how to get her talking. So she can see through walls? So cool! What’s the weirdest thing she’s seen? The grossest? Can she look through that wall right there? What’s on the other side? Roxy is unfortunately not immune to childlike wonder and admiration, and gives in quickly. Chica doesn’t even need to be convinced! She’s quickly very affectionate (lord knows she’s aware that Freddy needed a win - needed to not feel like he failed someone again), and a little too enabling for Freddy’s taste. A little trip to grab some fast food is always on the table, and she very seriously asks him about fashion advice sometimes, so he can feel included. His advice objectively sucks (for formal events), but once she wore hot wheels earrings for him and he’s been riding that high ever since.

Since Freddy found Gregory and thus, has a little human to take care of, he has lightened up considerably again. The novelty of everything keeps him on his toes, and seeing the positive impact he has on Gregory/ the safe home he can give the kid has helped him heal. He still misses his friends, but he has someone to take care of at home, and so he no longer works himself into the ground. The future is once again looking bright, despite the pain of the past, and he’s eager to explore it.

Roxy gets to bask in the admiration of someone who has never known Foxy, and in whose eyes she’s her own person and that person is great, even if some compliments just lead to sly requests of checking gifts for their content before it’s time to unwrap them.

Chica gets to see her oldest friend become himself again, and feels a lot lighter herself in turn. Gregory has no issue keeping up with her energy, and where their interests don’t match up, their sense for shenanigans does and they both enjoy that immensely.

Monty has little time to ponder the past when there’s a menace making a mess of the present, but he doesn’t find it in himself to complain, even if the kid tests his limited patience a lot. He likes being the fun uncle a lot more than being a fraud, and so he embraces it.

(And so, Gregory is starting to acquire parental units)

He does know that their work is secret, though, and has the official explanation of what to say when people ask what his father does for work memorized. After [REDACTED] on the street, he’s smart enough to keep secrets, and only complains when secrets are kept from him. He likes being in the know, and really, with how involved he is, doesn’t he deserve to know? One day he’ll say the wrong thing to the wrong person, all because no one clued him in… 

That would be a tragedy, no? (:

[lanternlightss]

i am itching to say something but it’s technically spoilers but siren venti Can talk, it’s just at. this moment in time they are trying to appear as nonthreatening as viably possible here (even if. this attempt didn’t go so well …)