#*things like this yet but I’ll stockpile them so when I finally do I’ve got them there ready to go ✨ helps to try and have something

[the-gotheltic-rowan]

thrift day ✨

[castiel-left-his-mark-on-me]

I wish I knew what The Plot-verse Jen and Mish are doing for the wedding day <3 I like to think that Dani is having a small argument w Jen over what he should or should not do regarding the fan (and chad and samantha) wedding.

And just like that ... you have me writing more Cockles in The Plot-verse.

They got in late last night. Dani and the kids are still asleep, but Jensen is just too excited stay in bed. It’s been far too long since they’ve seen each other, and he can hear Misha hobbling around in the kitchen—something he really shouldn’t be doing just two days after a hip replacement.

But when he walks around the corner, seeing the man standing by the stove—skin glowing gold in the morning sun, Jensen waits just a minute longer before going over to bitch at him for being on his feet, because he doesn’t get to see this sight often enough. The man he loves … right here, finally within reach.

“Good morning” he says eventually, walking up behind Misha just as the man is reaching for the coffee pot. “What the fuck are you doing walking around?”

Misha laughs, leaning into Jensen as Jensen’s arms snake around his middle. “Makin’ coffee. I figured everyone in the house needs it after staying up so late.”

“I don’t think the kids do.”

“Not directly, no; but if they want me not to beat them with my crutches—they’ll want me to have my coffee.”

Jensen rolls his eyes and smiles. “They’ve been giving you grief?”

Misha finally rotates in Jensen’s arms, looping his own around the back of his neck before kissing him. “They’re animals.”

“Just like their dad” Jensen snickers, nuzzling Misha’s nose.

Misha scoffs in feigned offense. “I’m an angel … didn’t you know?”

“Yeah, yeah” Jensen muses. “Well, Angel. You need to go sit down. I’ll make the coffee.”

With a frown, Misha groans. “I don’t want to let go of you just yet. You’re quite an attractive crutch, and I need the support.”

Jensen squeezes the man tighter, breathing in the smell of him—a rather pungent smell. He probably hasn’t showered since the surgery; but he’s still his Mish. He’s still his home, his constant, and Jensen will never not want to fill his lungs with the man. “I’ll always let you lean on me, no matter what.”

Misha’s face softens, and his eyes widen as he looks him over. “Aw … what’s gotten into you? You’re so mushy today. I love it.”

Jensen finally tugs the man back, repositioning him so he’s braced against his side and Jensen can help him to one of the kitchen chairs. “Well, it is Valentine’s Day” Jensen chuckles, setting Misha down softly. “Also, I’ve missed you—a lot.” He leans in and kisses those pink, chapped lips, but when he pulls away again, Misha’s eyes are even wider.

“Shit.”

Jensen furrows his brow. “What?”

“It’s Valentine’s Day?”

Jensen chuckles. “Yeah. Why? You forgot?”

Misha swallows thickly and then nods.

Jensen rolls his eyes and then kisses him again. “Don’t worry about it. Just having you within kissing-distance is gift-enough for me.”

Misha half smiles but his gaze turns far-away, like he’s deep in thought.

“You didn’t get anything for Vicki, did you?” Jensen surmises after another moment later.

Misha eventually shakes his head.

Jensen straightens back out before turning towards the kitchen counter, knowing that the man will truly need coffee now if he’s going to start worrying so early in the morning, but maybe Jensen can help with that too. “It’s not a problem, Mish. I actually ordered flowers for both Dani and Vick… they should be getting here any minute. Just pull the card off and give her the other bouquet” he says, taking the coffee pot out of the machine and moving to the sink to fill it up with water. He raises his voice to talk over the noise. “And if you’re really worried about it—I also got two small things for Dee, so you can have one of them for Vick … I don’t know if she’d like it though. Vintage tees and headbands aren’t really her thing.” He shuts off the water and glances towards the man sitting at the table—who is now trying to stand up yet again. “Jeez—Mish!” He sets down the pot and scurries back over to the table to push Misha back into the chair. “Will you stop? I can handle things in the kitchen, alright? Just stay put!”

But Misha only reaches up, taking a fistful of Jensen’s t-shirt in his hand in order to yank him down and kiss him hard.

Jensen stumbles a little, but he catches himself on the edge of the table, quickly melting into the kiss a moment later, losing all comprehension the moment after that.

“You …” Misha starts when he finally breaks away, “are an extremely thoughtful man.” He kisses him again, harder still—slipping Jensen just enough tongue to make his body arch.

Jensen bites Misha’s lip as his sweatpants begin to tent; but he forces himself to pull away—knowing there’s nothing either of them can really do right now, and he really doesn’t need blue balls before noon. It’s a shame though, because he could spend all day tangled up with this man and never tire of it.

Misha smiles at him, face lighting up with many things that he could say, but doesn’t have to, because Jensen knows them all. “I love you—and thank you … for the flowers, that is. I’ll give those to Vicki; but you keep the gifts. We don’t normally do too much for Valentine’s day anyway; but I do usually get her flowers and cook her dinner.”

Jensen pulls away a little more and then leans his forehead against Misha’s, looking into those ocean-blues, feeling them calm him with their waves of warmth. “Well, that’s why we’re here, babe. To help you cook … help with the kids. Help you and Vicki manage while you heal. I got you, so just sit back and relax, alright?”

Misha nods against him, giving him one last peck before Jensen slips away to tend to the coffee—but Misha gives his ass a quick slap just before he’s out of reach. “Damn … I wish I could get on that.”

Jensen looks back over his shoulder and gives Misha a wink. “You and me both.”

***

The Coffee brewed and breakfast cooked—a filling array of waffles and eggs and spicy gourmet sausage that Misha had stockpiled in preparation of Jensen and Danneel’s visit. In fact, the man had loaded up on all the Ackles favorites—from beer, to games and toys for the kids, to all their favorite meals and snacks. He took care of just about everything they could possibly want or need; which makes the fact that he’s fretting over forgetting Valentine’s day all the more hilarious to Jensen.

“I can’t believe I didn’t get you anything!” Misha whines for the twentieth time today as he looks over the bracelet Jensen just gave him.

It was hand carved, ash and oak, with lines of black onyx inlayed between the woods, creating almost a braided effect. The craftsman said it was symbolic of two differing souls coming together to become something entirely new. And the onyx represented that new reality—black like the endless universe, reflecting all the light and love that shines within it. It was perfect, and Jensen felt that he was fated to find that bracelet—having accidently stumbled upon the tiny shop after taking a wrong turn when trying to find a gas station near their new cabin in Colorado.

They had decided to buy the place only a few months back—inspired by Misha’s purchase of Faith Ranch. So now, their families have two properties to go to be alone together. Faith Ranch and Serenity Lodge.

Yeah, the names are a little corny, but Jensen feels like they’re pretty fitting whenever they’re all finally together. The serenity he feels seeing all their kids playing … the faith he has in the future when he watches Misha and Danneel and Vicki all laughing with one another – it’s perfect; and he feels so very blessed that they have those places to run away to now. To be together and to be themselves.

In fact, the original plan was to have Misha and Vicki and the kids come up to Serenity to stay with them as Misha recuperated from his surgery, but with the winter storms and all the new frost hitting the area, Misha’s doctor said that Colorado was probably not the best environment for a man with stiff joints and limited mobility. So, Jensen and Danneel changed their plans and headed towards Washington, knowing that ultimately—it didn’t matter where in the world they were, as long as they were all together.

 The kids had all gotten up with the smell of breakfast, and once they shoveled in their food—they were all begging to go out back and play—meaning that the adults’ peaceful morning of gift giving and quiet coffee-drinking came to a speedy end. So, Danneel, Vicki and Jensen spent twenty minutes after breakfast trying to wrestle all the little ones into jackets and long pants and winter boots, which was quite a feat, even with three sets of hands, they were still outnumbered. Arrow and Zepp kept pulling off their jackets because they said they were too hot. JJ and Maison kept torturing West with annoying, made-up songs that all seemed to end with the same line “West smells like poop”; which ultimately made West retaliate with pokes and tickles and name calling—and that of course caused the girls to run away and scream at the top of their lungs, which of course meant that the three adults were chasing them all over the house—just trying to finish dressing them so they could finally kick them outside.

Misha sat back and laughed as he watched all the commotion go down, for once—seeming to enjoy the fact that he was immobile and unable to help.

Eventually however, the kids did get dressed and were set loose in the yard, leaving the grownups to watch them from the sunroom, drinking their second and third cups of coffee in somewhat relative-peace. The glassed-in space was warm and bright, and filled up with the scent of roses and gardenias. The two beautiful bouquets that Jensen had ordered (one of which, Misha did end up commandeering) are sitting on the coffee table between them all, adding just the right amount of color to the room.

Misha leaned against Jensen’s side as he scrolled on his phone; and Danneel and Vicki sat in the chairs across from them, talking about politics and lamenting over the current state of the senate, while Jensen just sat there quietly … smiling to himself because he hasn’t felt this happy in a while. His family is all together. The coffee Misha got was his favorite, and he has a belly full of waffles and sausage. This is quite possibly, the best Valentine’s Day he’s ever had.

“Fuck!” Misha yelps suddenly, bolting upright with a groan. “It’s our wedding today too?”

Jensen crinkles his eyes as he stares at the side of the man’s face, cracking a smile because—surely, the man is losing his mind. “What?”

Misha is still staring at his phone, scrolling furiously through—what Jensen thinks is Twitter; but Misha is moving too fast for him to be sure. “Apparently—it’s Dean and Cas’s wedding day today.”

Vicki and Danneel stop their conversation to gawk over at him too. “What?” They both ask again in unison.

Misha finally looks up from the screen, and then around to all three of them. “It’s our wedding day!”

And Jensen is rolling his eyes now. “We heard you the first time, Mish—but we’re gonna need you to explain it now.”

Misha shifts in his seat, wincing as his sore body twists in his hip-brace. “Remember that whole Chad-thing I was telling you about?”

“Chad? Chad who?” Danneel asks, and Vicki snickers to herself, obviously remembering something about all this, but Jensen is drawing a blank.

“Lindberg—he played Ash on Supernatural. I’ve only ever met him at conventions though. Nice guy.”

“Funny guy” Jensen adds on, starting to recall Misha mentioning the man at some point last week.

“Very funny—so funny in fact, he has written this whole additional arc for the show, set in Heaven, where he and Ellen are running the Roadhouse again, and of course … the fans are eating up.”

Jensen laughs. “I’d expect nothing less.”

Misha nods before continuing. “Yeah, well … it all started on Dean’s birthday … a party at the Roadhouse seemed to be the event. Both Chad and Samantha Ferris made this whole story out of it; but now, I guess the story went on to include Dean and Cas’s wedding … on Valentine’s Day, no less. Looks like Chad is going live in a little bit to talk to fans about it. He and Samantha are making it a whole thing. And now ‘DeanCasWedding’ is trending on Twitter.”

“That’s adorable” Vicki chuckles.

“So adorable! Oh my God! You guys should totally join in!” Danneel squeals.

That makes Jensen’s eyes go wide. “No way! Not gonna happen.”

Danneel’s smile somersaults into a pout. “But why not? You guys would break the internet!”

“Yeah, and that’s exactly why not. I’ve been pretty quiet about the finale; so, I don’t think the first time I really break my silence should be about our characters’ supposed marriage. That’s treading a really thin line in our contracts.”

“It’s just a silly story by one of the past actors. I don’t think it’s that big of a deal” Vicki offers, but now Misha is the one shaking his head.

“No, Jensen’s right. The simple act of us participating in something like that might be an invitation for the network to extend our NDA’s. As harmless as it would actually be to them and the canon of the show, our direct participation in it would raise too many eyebrows” Misha finishes, but now both the women are frowning.

“Well, maybe there’s something subtle you could do. Even if it’s just liking some of Chad’s tweets or something.”

“Maybe” Jensen offers, already thinking that that probably won’t happen; but who knows. He’s feeling rather soft today. If applied right, he can probably be pressured into just about anything.

“Mommy!” Arrow screeches, and the sound is immediately followed by Maison’s dubious laugh.

Both Vicki and Danneel look at one another before sighing and setting down their coffee cups.

“I’m sorry. Our daughter loves to torment those around her. She gets it entirely from her father” Vicki says, tossing a pointed look at her husband.

Misha gasps. “Who … me?” he mocks.

Danneel laughs as she looks at him adoringly. “It’s good-hearted torment, I’m sure.”

“Is there such a thing?” Vicki asks before moving around the chairs towards the screen door to the backyard.

Misha fakes a cry and then burrows his face into Jensen’s neck. “She’s so cruel, Jensen. Hold me!”

Jensen busts up laughing, but he does as he’s told, wrapping his arms tightly around the man’s body. “Shh—it’s okay, baby. I got you.”

Vicki smirks at the two of them nestled together on the couch. “You can have him. I’ll just take your wife off your hands.” And with that, she loops her arm with Danneel’s and pulls her out the door.

“Sounds good to me!” Danneel chirps, skipping along beside her as they go to check on the kids.

“Hey! I tend to like my wife!” Jensen yells, but Vicki just flits her hand in the air and waives him off.

“Hmm” Jensen grumbles. “Those two better not forget about us.”

Misha laughs, kissing his neck right after and it shocks goosebumps up all over Jensen’s body. “Don’t worry. They’ll remember we’re here as soon as the kids get too crazy.”

Jensen smiles. “True enough.”

They fall silent a moment, melting into each other’s warmth as the outside chill seeps in through the cracked back door, but the contrast only seems to make their closeness feel more intense.

“So—do you think you’ll do it?”

“Do what?” Jensen asks, mind already wandering towards all the future days that could be like this one. Their families—together, happy and full of love.

“Do you think you’ll actually like one of Chad’s tweets or whatever?” Misha finally pulls back a little so he can look Jensen in the eye.

Jensen sighs and then shrugs again. “I dunno, man. I’m just really hesitant about anything having to do with the show right now, even if it is just a silly makeshift fan-fiction put together by some of the past characters. I just don’t want to start picking at that scab, you know?”

Misha sighs as well, and then nods—leaning his head back onto Jensen’s shoulder as he scratches beneath his leg brace. “I get it. It should be harmless and all in good fun, but these things can snowball pretty quickly.”

“Exactly.”

“It is fun to think about though.”

“What’s that?”

“Dean and Cas—tying the knot.”

Jensen huffs a laugh before gathering Misha’s hand in his own. “Yeah. That would’ve been a fun scene to shoot.”

“Dean—all nervous at the end of the aisle…” Misha says dreamily.

“Cas, picking apart all the wedding traditions—talking about their archaic and barbaric origins” Jensen laughs.

“Charlie, punching him in the arm and telling him to stop killing the romance.”

Jensen nods. “She so would! She’d totally do that. Oh, and you know Bobby would be crying.”

“Oh yeah... and Sam would probably tear up a bit too.”

Now Jensen shakes his head. “Nah, Sam would just be making a smirky little bitch-face as Dean cried.”

Misha grins wide against Jensen’s shoulder. “Oh God … Dean would be bawling his eyes out.”

“He’d be marrying the love of his life … so yeah, of course he’d be bawling his eyes out!”

“You think Cas is the love of Dean’s life?” Misha asks, pulling back again suddenly to wonder at the side of Jensen’s face.

Jensen turns to him, a little surprised by the question. “Sure … don’t you?”

Misha’s face shifts into a cautious smile. “Well … I mean, I know that Dean is the love of Cas’s life. Obviously … the show admitted as much; but we never really talked about what you thought Dean’s take on the whole thing would be. We talked about the confession scene itself, and Dean’s reciprocation and how it was a long time coming for the show; but never what it might’ve actually meant for our two characters … if they ever had the chance to actually do something about it, that is.”

Jensen straightens out on the couch, being careful not to move too quickly and accidentally jostle Misha’s still fragile body. “Well …” he begins, trying to get back into Dean’s mindset, something that used to be as easy as flicking on a light switch for him; but now—with months and months having passed where he hasn’t been Dean Winchester, he’s finding it’s a little harder to get there, “I guess… since Dean is in Heaven now, he’d finally let his guard down. He wouldn’t be so hell bent on keeping his distance, because he’d know he finally doesn’t have to worry about losing everyone he loves; and that includes Cas.”

“But … a wedding?” Misha laughs; however, Jensen doesn’t miss the hopeful uptick to his voice.

“It’d take some doing … but yeah. I think Dean would eventually pop the question. He’d drive Cas around Heaven for a while, listening to some tunes, eating some good ass food. And then they’d find some beautiful lake somewhere, sit on Baby’s hood … and Dean would just know, ya know? So, he’d throw his arm around Cas’s neck and say ‘Cas—what the fuck are we doin’? We should just get hitched already’ and then he’d kiss him like there’s no tomorrow.”

Misha smiles, eyes scrunching up with his grinning cheeks. “I suppose in Heaven, the concept of tomorrow isn’t really a thing.”

“Yeah, time works different in Heaven … isn’t that what the script said?”

“Something like that” Misha mutters, inching himself up to reposition the leg he has propped against the table. “So … we’d be super corny and get married on Valentine’s Day?”

“Why not?” Jensen laughs. “Dean does enjoy a good Rom-Com moment. And we all know he’s about as corny as they come.”

“True” Misha chuckles. “Well, in that case …” He sits up straight and sobers his face, narrowing his eyes a little before he turns a serious gaze in Jensen’s direction. “Happy Wedding Day, Dean” he says—in his deepest, raspiest Cas-voice.

Jensen starts to laugh, but quickly stops himself so he can get into character—half smiling, looking away … bashful, but still intense. “Back at ya, Cas.” He clears his throat as he looks around the room, trying to think of what Dean would say next … but then it hits him. Dean wouldn’t say anything. Without a second thought, Jensen leans forward and reaches out towards one of the bouquets, pulling out a long strand of Baby’s Breath … quickly breaking it in half and twisting the stem around itself, finally tucking the ends between one another to make a small, vined circle. And then, turning slowly in his seat, he grabs Misha’s—Cas’s left hand and holds it between them, slipping the make-shift ring onto his finger.

Misha looks down at it a moment, breaking character as his voice cracks in a sigh; but as he looks back towards Jensen—a slight sheen of tears in his eyes, he falls back into the angel’s grace, eyes seeming to glow blue in the morning sun, shoulders squaring on the wings of the day. “I do” he says raggedly, sounding choked up, but still like a tried-and-true angel of the lord.

“Me too” Jensen rumbles, voice just as deep before finally leaning in to kiss his angel’s lips; but soon enough—their Heaven falls away, as do Dean and Castiel, leaving just the two of them, real and mortal and alone in the sunroom of Misha’s home.

A flowered ring on one hand.

Each other’s hearts in the other.

Two families growing together in the grass and sun.

And a real-life paradise, alive and thriving all around them.

Yes … Jensen thinks, this is indeed the best Valentine’s Day he’s ever had.

[pterodactylterrace]

Guys Like You Chapter 4

Title: Guys Like You

Chapter: 4

Chapter Summary: It’s not a date, but I’m totally calling it a date in my head

Rating: 18+ for later chapters

Warnings: Mentions of blood

{Prologue} {Chapter 1} {Chapter 2} {Chapter 3}

So, what are the odds of getting an entire day just canceled? Like, everyone just collectively agrees to go back to bed and skip the entire day for the good of mankind? Or at the very least for the good of one very tired single mother?

Briar had a bad dream the night before and came flying into her room just after midnight. Then the little girl had curled up against her mother in a way that had Faye contorted into an odd position, which led to the backache of the century.

Combine that with Briar's constant rolling and kicking and she also didn't sleep worth crap. Her alarm going off that morning sounded less like a happy little chime to welcome in the day, and more like execution bells leading her to her death. Naturally Briar had hopped straight up, entirely too happy to greet the day, and bounded off to plunder the kitchen for snacks. Faye on the other hand, ended up calling set to let them know she wasn't feeling well enough to come in.

Sometime around eleven in the morning she was met with horrific stomach cramps that had her wondering just what she had eaten the day before. Nothing Briar hadn't eaten, and she seemed just fine. Was this how she dies? A bleak implosion on an unassuming Thursday? Was she really going to go out like this?

It was during her next trip to the bathroom that she realized it probably wasn't death coming for her, the cramps were more likely caused by her monthly visitor showing up to kick her while she was down. Weird, usually she didn't really get cramps. Figures she would get stuck with this mess today. Now her back hurt, her stomach hurt, her head hurt, she felt like a walking zombie, and upon further inspection, she was a tired hurting zombie that had forgotten to replenish her supplies after Briar had mistaken them for candy and stickers. Just what she wanted, a trip to the store while she felt like death, with an energetic threenager in tow.

Half an hour of wrestling with Briar to get dressed and actually put on pants later, her phone started going off. That was when she remembered inviting Henry over for dinner that night under the guise of "wanting to try a new recipe and needing another adult to try it". In all honesty she was just trying to lure him back. She'd gotten a taste of having him around and found herself quickly becoming addicted. In truth, it was a recipe she had mastered while she was pregnant with Briar but hadn't made in a while. What he didn't know wouldn't hurt him, right?

Unfortunately, it was looking like she was going to have to postpone their "it's not a date but I'm totally calling it a date in my head" for another time. A time when her body didn't feel like it was imploding and when she had slept for more than twelve minutes. A time when she could feasibly pounce and possibly even have a reason to break into the unopened box in her bedside drawer. It had been a going away gift from her sister when she had moved to England, with the explicit instructions to "go and getting that English dick" or something. It had been ten months and she still hadn't opened it. Turns out having a child that you are responsible for running around your house can take a toll on your sex life.

"Hey, Henry." Faye sighed, hitting the speakerphone button and setting the phone on her bed to grab something for herself to wear.

"Hello, Miss Warren. I must have missed you on set today." Ugh, ever since Mrs. Anderson had called her that, he had been a dog with a bone.

"No, I wasn't in today." Faye sighed, grabbing an old ratty bra to throw on along with her "I give up" sweats.

"Did you have the day off?"

"No, I'm just not feeling great. Sorry I didn't call you earlier. I hope you haven't left yet, Briar and I need to run to the store."

"I'm already on my way." Henry informed. "I can grab whatever you need, I'm already out after all."

"I need pads and tampons, Henry. I doubt that's too high up on your list of things you wanted to go shopping for today." Faye sighed, digging her knuckles into her lower back to try and relax the knotted muscles.

"Anything else?" Wait, seriously?

"Not that I need right now?" Why was that a question? Was this some vivid hallucination or something?

"Alright, I should be to your house in about half an hour."

"Uhh... yeah... see you then. Just let yourself in if I don't answer the door, I may be sobbing hysterically into my rubber duckie." Faye really needed to have a talk with that voice in her head that keeps her from saying or doing anything weird. It seems to have gone strangely MIA in the last few months.

"The toddler won't attack me if I walk in, will she?"

"She'll probably be in the bathroom reminding me I'm naked every few seconds."

"She did seem to enjoy that the last time I was over."

"You have no idea."

"I'll see you in a bit, enjoy your bath." Yeah, right. Who wants to bleed into their bathwater?

Naturally, her hyperactive daughter followed her into the bathroom, pointing out everything she could as her mother tried to shower. "Mommy, you look like a tiger!" "Mommy, you have a big butt!" "Mommy, when will I get boobies like yours?" "Mommy, you're nakie!" "Mommy, do you have a boo boo on your butt?" "Mommy, when do I get pictures on me like you have?" "Mommy, are you in the shower?" "Mommy, why are you nakie in the shower?"

Briar, her little womb nugget. Her angel. Her reason for getting up most mornings. The light of her life. The fountain of endless questions.

"Henry! You're back!" Briar gasped from the other side of the curtain, the sound of her little feet on the tile letting Faye know she had left her station at the edge of the tub to greet their guest. "Mommy has stripes, I'll show you!"

"No! No, that's ok." Henry quickly deflected, snatching her up in his free arm before she could scurry back to the curtain. Once was enough of that for right now. It had taken her mother almost a week to look him in the eye after that day. It had taken him almost as long to tear his eyes from her backside every time she turned away. It wasn't even like he was actively trying to stare, his gaze just kept being pulled to it like a magnet. If she caught his rubbernecking however, she never let him know.

"But she's a  tiger! RAWR!" Briar giggled.

"I can hear you!" Faye grouched.

"I'll leave this on the sink for you. I forgot to ask exactly what you wanted, so I grabbed a lot of options." Henry called over the sound of the water. "Briar, why don't you show me how you make that tea again?"

He must be an alien. That was the most obvious explanation for him. Guys like him don't make the dreaded tampon run. Especially unprompted. He does realize he's too damn pretty to have to do such things, right? They also don't entertain your tiny clone for you to give you a moment's peace. Nope, he's clearly an alien. The MIB would be by any minute to wipe her mind.

When Faye finally put away the veritable stockpile she had been graced with and redressed herself, she wandered back to her living room, half expecting fire and mild chaos. She wasn't expecting to find Henry reading a Greek Mythology book to her overly fascinated daughter.

"The minotaur! Oh no!" Briar squealed excitedly when he turned the page, a depiction of the beast staring back at her.

"Don't worry, little one. You see that man? His name is Theseus, and he takes care of that mean minotaur." Henry soothed.

"Snaps his neck actually." Faye provided, curling up at the other end of the couch.

"Oh, you're familiar with the story?" Henry chuckled.

"Who's book do you think that is?"

"Just because you own it, doesn't mean you've read it." Henry pointed out.

"Those were my bedtime stories. Now Briar keeps wanting me to read them to her at night too."

"A little mythology nerd in the making." Henry chuckled, poking the toddler's side, making her squeal in delight.

"Books are for nerds!" Briar declared, snatching the book from Henry's hands and racing down the hallway.

"Yeah, don't even ask me what that was about." Faye sighed, shaking her head at her daughter.

"Feeling better?"

"Feeling more human." Faye forced out around a stifled yawn.

"Why don't you lie down and rest? I'm pretty sure I can keep Briar entertained and manage something for you guys to eat."

"You don't have to, Hen. You've already done so much." Faye declined, pushing herself up and mentally steeling herself for the meal prep she had ahead of her.

"Nope." Henry quickly interjected, popping up from the couch and snatching Faye up like she weighed nothing, ignoring her surprised squeal. "You're laying down, I've got this." He insisted, replacing her on the couch.

"Henry!"

"What? Don't think I can handle one toddler? Do you forget I have nieces and nephews? I'm sure one child will be a breeze for an hour or two."

"You don't know my daughter." Faye mumbled.

"I'll handle it. I had to go all morning without my favorite artist. If watching Briar for a little while means you'll be back tomorrow, I'm game."

Clearly someone forgot to inform him he was an incredibly attractive, successful actor. Faye decided she should catch some rest while she could, just in case someone decided to let him in the loop within the next hour or so.

[imjustheretoseetheprivateblogs]

Rayllum Valentines Week Day One: Valentine’s Day (February 14th)

Solemnly, Rayla waited. Waited for the sun to rise. Soon, the day would begin and the most infamous day of the year would begin.

The holiday which little Moonshadow elves still told stories about to scare each other during the darkest of nights during new moons.

The day on which humans celebrated their own dismemberment, presenting the bloody evidence to one another in a macabre show of their passions.

The day as infamous to the elves as the death of Avizandum.

The Day of Valentine.

But today, Rayla was ready. More than ready.

The doors and windows to her and Callum’s adjoining rooms had been barricaded. She’d stockpiled enough provisions to last three people a week and a half, her bed made for an excellent rampart when turned on its side, and she’d set enough improvised traps in the room to make any would be assailant stop long enough for her to disarm them.

Moonshadow elves could do a lot with empty bottles and a few choice dead plants.

But homemade smoke bombs aside, she would have to find Callum and Ezran soon. Callum was just next door, so getting him to safety would be easy, but Ezran was all the way down the hall. Not only would getting to him be dangerous, but getting both the prince and herself back to her fortified room would be too.

But she couldn’t think about that right now. She would never allow Callum or Ezran to be disemboweled by some raving lunatic. They meant too much to her to leave them to some backwards custom humans hadn’t yet out grown.

Suddenly, there was a knock on her door. Rayla steadied her breathing and tightened her grip on her weapon. This was it.

“Rayla? Are you up?”

Callum!

Rayla jumped over her bed and over her trip wires, making a dash for the door. Removing the chair she’d jammed under the doorknob, Rayla opened the door enough to see outside.

“Callum?”

Callum stood in front of her door, a sheepish smile on his face and his hands behind her back.

“Hi Rayla,” he said, wiggling his fingers before returning the hand to behind his back.

“Are you alone?” Rayla asked.

Callum frowned.

“Yes…?” he said, confusion on his face.

“Well, get in here!”

Grabbing him by the collar, Rayla dragged him through the door, slamming it shut behind him. She was briefly aware of something hitting the floor behind him, but paid in no mind. Their survival was her top priority.

“Rayla, is everything al—what happened to your room!?”

Ignoring his question, Rayla unceremoniously picked Callum up bridal style and bounded across the room until they were safe behind her bed.

“There,” Rayla said, dropping him, “we should be safe.”

“Safe from what?”

“Shush.”

Rayla placed a finger over his lips.

“I need your help. You’re safe, but Ezran’s still in his room.”

“He’s not in his room.”

Rayla felt her stomach drop.

“He’s what?”

“He’s outside the castle. You know for Valentine’s Day.”

This was not good. Ezran was outside the castle. Away from Rayla or any of the guards, he could be torn apart by a frenzied mob.

“Stay here,” she said, rising, “I’ll go get him.”

“Rayla, wait.”

Callum made a grab for her arm.

“Don’t try to stop me Callum,” Rayla said.

Callum frowned.

“Stop you? From what?”

Not as agile as she was, Callum opted to take the route around her rampart to talk to her face to face. Which unfortunately meant he would be headed straight for one of her tripwires.

“Callum…!”

All too late, Callum became aware of the line at his feet and the sound of dozens of glass bottles falling from where Rayla had secured them on the ceiling with a web of fishing lines. The air filled with black pepper and dust, sending Callum and Rayla fleeing from the room coughing and rubbing their eyes.

“What the hell was that?” Callum spluttered, “Are we preparing for war?”

“Not,” Rayla said, thumping her chest with a fist, “Valentine’s Day.”

Callum looked like he was about to explain something, only to suddenly slap his hand to his forehead and then sprint down the hall.

Great, Rayla thought, now I have to princes who forgot about self-preservation.

The consternation was short lived, however, as Callum returned, carefully carrying a box in his hands.

“Callum, what’s that?”

Callum blushed and held out the box to her.

“I…I’ve got something for you.”

“Oh, Callum, you didn’t…”

“It’s fine. I wanted to.”

Wanted to? Callum wanted to vivisect his fellow humans?

“I had Barius and Ezran’s help. I… I had to call in some favors but…”

Callum’s eyes shifted around the room, as if there would be words to say written on the walls before finally looking at her again.

“Here,” he said, handing her the parcel, “I was going to give it to you first thing this morning, but I was so nervous, I guess…”

Rayla didn’t hear the rest. She could only stare down at the plain off-white package now in her hands.

The love of her life, a deranged maniac who gave her a box of severed body parts on this most grim of holidays.

“Aren’t you going to open it?”

Rayla looked up, where she found Callum watching her with expectant eyes. Expectant puppy dog eyes no-one could say no to.

Rayla sighed.

Might as well get the mental scarring over with.

Gingerly, she lifted the lid, bracing herself for the stink she knew accompanied pieces of the dead.

Except there were no dead body parts in the box.

Instead, nestled inside the box was a moonberry tart (she could tell from the smell; the non-threatening, non-stinky, delicious smell) and artfully written on top of it, in pieces of dough, was the message ‘For Me, My Elf, and I’.

“Callum,” Rayla said, looking up at him, “I don’t understand.”

Callum’s previously proud expression changed to one of confusion.

“I thought you said you liked the moonberry tart recipe Barius had.”

“No, I do, it’s just…”

Her confusion probably mirrored his own by now.

“Why?”

Callum shrugged.

“It’s Valentine’s Day. This is my Valentine to you.”

“This?”

Rayla looked down at the tart.

“And it’s not made of body parts?”

“Body parts?” Callum asked.

“Because on Valentine’s Day, humans rip hearts and organs out of other humans chest to give to other people they want to sleep with, right?”

For what must have been five minutes, Callum stared at her. Then, as if she’d just told a joke, laughter burst out of him. Rayla scowled.

“Did I miss something?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Callum said, wiping his eyes, “but I think we might need to have a talk about Valentine’s Day.”

[phoenixyfriend]

The MILFnevka AU

Once again something that was brainstormed en masse on the GG fanworks server.

I was... very much spearheading this one, but I dragged in @professorsparklepants for a lot, because Anevka, as well as input from @fenerismoon, @purronronner, @gelpenss​, and @whirlibird. The original conversation took place mid-September of 2019.

AU where Tarvek's side of the family squeezed in an extra generation or so.

Aaronev was still Lu's generation, but he had Anevka young, and she was an only child who was already an adult by the time Lu disappeared. As a result, Aaronev let her married before she ended up in the machine (because he wasn’t desperate yet), and he couldn't risk drawing the attention by the time Agatha’s gen is being born.

So instead of being Tarvek's SISTER, she's his MOM.

Anevka formed her own faction, separate from the Aaronev and vaguely aligned with Terabithia’s.

She insisted Martellus and his branch hang out with Tarvek because being an only child is lonely, and also it keeps Tarvek out of his grandfather's sights and vague plans of body-hopping.

She is a Protective Momma who is a little TOO down with murdering anyone who threatens her child.

Agatha: you're just going to listen to your evil mom? Because no offense but that's worked out really bad for me so far. Tarvek: She's not EVIL, just... Valois... anyway the Baron knows what she's like and mostly he just rolls his eyes and tries to keep her away from Queen DuPree.

Anevka is definitely the mom that uses her position as mother of the king/heir to stockpile as much power as possible and control everything behind the scenes. Tarvek is currently trying to undermine this and wrestle back control as secretly as possible.

Wine mom with eighty hidden stabbing implements.

When Agatha is discovered, Anevka still kills her dad, but it's not like she can steal Agatha's voice in this AU, so she just settles for aggressively matchmaking her with Tarvek.

Anevka's managed to rein her dad in, mostly, because she's a powerful spark with an Undefined Husband who nonetheless has enough good connections to cause a ruckus if he finds out about the Summoning Throne, and he's too sparky to wasp.

This did lead to his early death and no siblings for Tarvek, but not before Anevka managed to fight her dad down to ONLY trying to throne the girls who were legitimately likely to be Agatha.

And then Agatha's in Sturmhalten and Anevka's just like. Well. Time for plan A. And kills her dad.

Regarding Gil...  She kinda wants to pat him on the head and tell him to try harder.

I'm not wholly convinced Tarvek got kicked off of Castle Wulfenbach, depending on how Anevka married and decided to approach things. She might have warned Tarvek to AVOID stealing information, even, if she was worried about Aaronev trying to do something.

Less "do whatever you can to help us gain power" and more "do whatever you can to stay out of Sturmhalten."

Tarvek: My mom is a bitch and I love her so much

Klaus hates it when Anevka comes to CW because she acts like some unholy cross between Lucrezia, Terabithia, and Zantabraxus and she keeps hitting on his top enforcers but with knives and pretty dresses.

Unstoppable Divorce energies

Anevka: Do you like my new dress? Klaus: Your bodice is far too low cut, please stop visiting me dressed like my ex. I'm the same age as your father. Anevka: I know, it's really fun to watch you suffer as you fail to resist the urge to tell me to put on a sweater.

Tarvek: MOTHER YOU'RE EMBARRASSING ME IN FRONT OF ALL MY FRIENDS PLEASE STOP HITTING ON THE BARON AURGH. Anevka: I'm not HITTING on him, I'm trying to make his face turn puce. Anevka: I am, however, hitting on Von Pinn. She looks like she knows how to have fun. Tarvek: MOTHER.

Tarvek, to Gil: the baron can't be your dad, he's old enough to be your grandfather. Gil: He’s at a solid age for both.

Anevka and Klaus have zero actual attraction to each other but there's definitely A Dynamic that's eerily reminiscent of his relationship with Bang, with slightly less "I did a violence, be proud of me" and slightly more "I did a sexy and/or politics, be proud of me."

Tarvek: I have a problem. Gil: What's up? Tarvek: All of our friends want to fuck my mom. Zulenna: I don't. Tarvek: That's because she used to put you in time-out when we were five.

Anevka is prime Dangerous Widow material. She didn't actually kill her husband but a hell of a lot of people think she did.

Seffie thinks her Auntie 'Nevka is the COOLEST

Anevka having an intermittent fling with that "darlingly stupid young hero, Tryggvassen" makes me laugh way too hard and also dips into my nonsense love of Otharnevka.

At one point we did sidle over into “what if Single Father KB tho”

Like they met at some point on vacation while the kids were still kids, which does lose us the “Anevka aggressively ships her kid with Agatha” thing, so I’m not sticking with this but there’s some hella fun tidbits.

Anevka: Guess what. Klaus, very tired: What. Anevka: I'm getting married. Klaus: Again? Good for you. I hope this one lives longer. Anevka: He has the same name as you. Klaus: Get out of my house.

KB isn't a widower, things are just complicated and everyone blames Lu. There's time travel involved, of course.

"So your daughter--" "Sister." "...how--" "Just... just blame my mother."

He's LEGALLY Agatha's dad, maybe? Their dynamic is parent-child. Just, you know, as far as blood goes...

Anevka wants KB to help her bag Othar again. KB thinks she means finally killing him. Anevka: I might. Haven't decided yet.

Overall, though, including KB is too complicated without undermining the entire premise I want. Which is mostly canon but Anevka is Tarvek's embarrassing, mysterious, prone-to-assassination mother.

Seriously though, the entire attraction here is Anevka having the Dangerous Widow Whom No Man Can Tie Down vibe

She's a solo act. Some flings, sure, but overall? Chaos. Refined, elegant chaos.

Anevka as Bang’s sugar mom was suggested. We were obviously all on board.

Bang doesn’t need a sugar mom, but it makes the vein in Klaus's forehead throb, and that's very important.

Bang absolutely tries to get Tarvek to call her “mom” while she’s ‘dating’ Anevka. One time he does call her that and it throws her for SUCH A LOOP because no wrong.

Anevka occasionally daydreams of a world where she could have both Othar and Bang at the same time without them IMMEDIATELY trying to kill each other. Only occasionally, though, she has evidence to plant and blood to spill.

BACK TO ANEVKA SHIPPING HER KID WITH HIS POLITICALLY-APPROPRIATE CRUSH.

Anevka: Oh look, my future daughter-in-law. Tarvek, tired: Mother, she doesn't like me. Anevka: Whyever not? You're clever, handsome, politically apt, charming, sensitive, heir to a throne, you are EVERYTHING a maiden could wish for. Tarvek: You just think that because you're my mom. Agatha: No, no, she's not wrong. You're just not someone I trust. At all. Especially since you say you've been a honeypot before. Anevka: See? A simple hurdle, dear, I'm sure you could whip him into shape in no time. I could even loan you the whip. And the harness, perh-- Tarvek: MOTHER.

Anevka sends Tarvek out with Othar for “field trips.”

It’s great!! Multi-purpose! Absolutely helps boost Tarvek’s image if he’s associated with Known Hero, gets Othar out of her hair for a little bit, sometimes he can be pointed in a direction that’s useful to her.

Othar refers to this outings as “stepfather-stepson bonding times.” Tarvek absolutely hates it. Detests it, really.

Somehow something goes wrong and like 50% of the time and he ends up getting accused of murder, probably.

It’s so unfair. Especially since of the two of them, Othar is more likely to murder than him. (It’s because everyone knows what those Valois types are like, and Othar is a hero.)

Gil: What's so embarrassing about your mom? Your mom's nice. (To me.)

She gives him head pats and lollipops. His own dad certainly never gives him head pats OR lollipops.

Anevka: Well I WAS going to push him towards dear little Seffie, but he seems to be quite enamored with YOU, darling. Tarvek: Mother, PLEASE stop getting invested in my love life.

Anevka’s job is to meddle, he’s lucky she isn’t drawing up contracts and going Full Arrangement.

I also love the idea of Anevka having one of those "sunshine embodied anime mom" smiles as she says "Oh Tarvek, dear, look at all your little friends!"

She's genuinely enthused but Klaus is heavily disturbed by Anevka smiling like that.

"Is she going to sacrifice them?" "Uh, no, it isn't Sunday."

Human sacrifice is actually garish and passe these days, haven’t you heard?

Just imagining one of those Stately Child and Parent portraits with Anevka and Tarvek here.

When Tarvek was born, Anevka has an "I've only had my son for an hour and a half" moment... and then just shrugged and rolled with it.

Anevka "Hot Mom" Sturmvoraus is one of the MANY banes of Klaus's existence, but she's definitely one of the friendliest on the list... as much as he may resent that, at times.

Anevka: Is the Baron in? Boris: Actually... [Crashing noise] Boris: He just left. Anevka, pulling on the rocket boots she stole from Othar and heading towards the broken window leading to the outside of the ship: That's alright, I'll catch up.

(I love how Anevka's name just lends itself so well to AU portmanteaus.)

Anevka definitely susses out Gil's identity but she doesn't actually DO anything about it other than angling for Useful Connections.

She's always telling Tarvek to bring his friend along, and Klaus doesn't want Gil anywhere near that family but he doesn't want it to look like he has any particular interest in Gil.

Imagine Klaus actually encouraging Gil to persue Agatha with the idea that it will put some distance between Gil and "that damn woman and her spawn." Anevka for her part is pushing Agatha towards Tarvek. Meanwhile the three of them are working it out between themselves.

She just has This Energy, folks:

Tarvek: Oh no. Theo: Whats the matter? That's your mom, right? Tarvek: Oh NO, she's wearing her 'NEWLY WIDOWED BUT OUT ON THE PROWL' OUTFIT Theo: ????? She hasn’t been widowed- Tarvek: SHES AFTER THE BARON AND I'M GOING TO DIE OF EMBARRASSMENT, THEO

The one thing here is that Anevka's not into Klaus and he's not into her but by GOD is she going to fuck with his head about it.

She’s just doing this for the Big Dick Energy of trying to Get Baron Wulfenbach.

Embarrassing mom of the deadliest degree.

Tarvek: YOU’RE GOING TO RUIN MY LIFE. Anevka: Don't be so dramatic, let your mother have a bit of fun. Besides, he's not expelling you anymore, is he? Tarvek: I almost wish he was-

Also Gil and Tarvek reconciling early on due to the immense power of being Embarrassed By Your Parents.

Anevka and Klaus getting increasingly bitchy at each other at dinner, and Tarvek and Gil are just. Bright red and glowering at them.

They’re DESTROYING their COOL TEEN CRED.

Tarvek doesn't ever wants to marry a woman who has been married before, not because of some weird distaste of so-called "sloppy seconds," but rather that he's just scared that they're going to be like his mom, and planning to kill him for his money.

Tarvek, waking up in the middle of the night: What if they really do get married and I have to have Gil as a stepbrother. Tarvek: (screams internally for a few hours)

Anevka is also that Sailor J contouring video

While Otharnevka is... this thing

Some more relevant Vibes: Divorce Court Half-Mourning Upper East Side Widow

Everyone always assumed she had murdered her husband. It was a natural assumption, but ultimately wrong. She had had plans in place to kill him if the need arose, but in the end she hadn’t needed them.

Most people grossly underestimated how complicated it was to arrange for someone to be t-boned by a semi carrying flammable chemicals.

Othar as Anevka's second trophy husband and Tarvek's annoying stepdad has a very specific energy.

That energy is at least 20% "the lovebirds take anniversary honeymoons every year" and 60% "Tarvek hates being in the room with them because they're gross and embarrassing."

This is partly fun because Othar being Tarvek’s stepdad is... a lot.

But honestly, I'm also just enjoying cougar Anevka with Trophy Husband Othar. They're actually in love!!! BUT. Cougar with a trophy husband.

Anevka makes sly comments about Othar and Klaus having sexual tension.

Also I have headcanons about NB Tarvek and like

I think she'd be supportive up until the point of "you want to be Storm King, don't you?"

Less "this isn't natural and you shouldn't be this way" and more "this is going to cause you trouble due to social norms."

"Keep it under wraps until your throne is secure, then you can come out in a blaze of glory." No dresses in public until you're king, then do whatever you want. After all, “Your Majesty” is gender neutral.

Anevka caught Tarvek playing dressup in her closet one time and just criticized the color relationships.

And you must try to avoid wearing that particular shade at all, my dear, it really doesn't look imperial.

[refinedbuffoonery]

Flawless (1)

A Heist/Ocean’s 8 AU // Masterlist 

This story has been rattling around in my head for months now, and I’m so excited to finally share it with you! I’ve been describing this as an Ocean’s 8 AU, but it’s based more on the concept of the movie than the actual plot, although a few of the basic scenes are the same. Regardless, I have big plans for these girls. Content warnings for this fic are listed on the masterlist (link above). 

*****

“Good morning,” the parole officer said. “Please state your name for the record.” 

“Riley Davis.” 

“Thank you. Miss Davis, the purpose of this hearing is to determine whether you are likely to break the law again if released. According to the record, this is your first conviction, and you have never been suspect in another criminal investigation. During your time in prison, you kept to yourself and were well behaved.” The man looked up from her file. “As you know, parole is not a right. Parole is an immense privilege, Miss Davis, one you should not take lightly.” 

“I agree,” she said. 

“Good. What would you do if released?” 

Riley paused, thinking through her answer. “I would settle down, find a good job, fall in love, maybe have kids. I’ve learned my lesson, sir. It was a mistake. Now all I want is to lead a simple, happy life.” She placed one hand over the other, crossing her fingers on her covered hand. 

He squinted at her for a long time, like he was trying to read her mind. Riley painted her face in remorse. After several minutes, the parole officer relented and, apparently satisfied with her answers, said, “Very well.” 

Riley breathed a sigh of relief. By the end of the day, she’d be free. 

The officer continued, “The following are the conditions of your parole. You will report to me, in person, every two weeks until your parole period has ended. You may not cross state lines without my express permission. You must find and maintain steady employment. You may not use drugs or alcohol, nor enter any drinking establishments. You may not possess firearms or other weapons, and you may not associate with other persons with criminal records. In addition, you must obey all federal, state, and local laws, and generally be an upstanding citizen. If you do not follow these rules, Miss Davis, you will find yourself back in custody. Do I make myself clear?” 

Riley nodded. So close. “Yes, sir.” 

Extending his hand, the parole officer said, “Congratulations, Miss Davis. You are now a conditionally free woman.” 

“Thank you.” Riley shook his hand. 

The rest was all a blur. One minute she was sitting in a cold, metal chair with her wrists cuffed to a table, and before she knew it, Riley found herself changing out of her atrocious orange jumpsuit and pulling on skinny jeans and her buttery soft black leather jacket. Wearing real clothes didn’t hide the fact that she looked like shit, but in that moment Riley didn’t care. She was getting out of prison. 

After two years, one month, and four days, she was finally being released from prison. 

Two officers walked her to the exit. Opening the door, Riley squinted in the bright afternoon sunlight. She found herself in one last cage of chain-link fences with coils of barbed wire arching over the tops, and Riley quickened her steps through the open gate in front of her. 

A familiar face waited in the parking lot, perched on the back of a motorcycle. “Welcome back,” Nikki Carpenter said. The pair shared a conspiratorial grin. 

Riley hadn’t known who the officers called to pick her up, but perhaps her best friend coming to take her home was the universe’s repayment for the last two years. Nikki handed Riley a helmet before putting on her own and swinging her leg over the sleek, white bike. 

Riley started to put the helmet on and hesitated. She turned, looking back at the concrete cage she’d spent the last two years of her life in. Even though her sentence was only three years, the nagging voice in the back of her mind had reminded her every day that she might not make it out. Taking a shaky breath, Riley vowed to herself that she would die before finding herself on the wrong side of those fences and walls again. 

Never again. No matter what. 

Nikki must’ve noticed her hesitation, because she rested a hand on Riley’s shoulder. “You okay?” 

Still facing the prison, Riley couldn’t form the words to respond. 

“Hey. Thank you,” Nikki added softly. 

Riley didn’t want to deal with the implications of that ‘thank you.’ Not yet. Finally tearing her eyes away, she said, “Let’s get out of here.”

*****

“God, I need a drink,” Riley said as soon as they entered Nikki’s cozy two-bedroom apartment. Located in the heart of downtown LA, it was on the top floor of her building, so Nikki wasn’t subject to loud overhead neighbors stomping and dropping things in the middle of the night, but the elevator moved at a glacial pace and descending twelve flights of stairs was a bitch. Riley preferred residences that were easier to vacate—in case of emergency or unfortunate run-in with the feds—but it was nice enough. 

Nikki raised her eyebrows. “Isn’t avoiding alcohol a condition of your parole?” 

Riley shot her a withering glare and strode into the kitchen. She opened the white-painted cabinet above the stove, revealing Nikki’s extensive stockpile of wine and hard liquor, and dug around until she found the mason jar full of moonshine hidden in the back. Taking a big swig, Riley held Nikki’s gaze, daring her best friend to try to stop her. 

Nikki simply opened the fridge, pulled out some sort of leftovers, and put them in the microwave. While she waited, Nikki studied her. This is what it feels like to be an animal at the zoo, Riley thought as she squirmed under her friend’s scrutiny, crossing her arms over her chest. Riley took another big gulp of moonshine, letting the clear liquid burn her throat and make her stomach churn. 

The microwave beeped. Nikki grabbed a fork and the food and held it out to Riley. Content to doom herself to the worst hangover of her life, Riley shook her head in dismissal. 

“Eat,” Nikki commanded. She tugged on the waistband of Riley’s jeans. “You and I both know those weren’t mom jeans when you bought them.” 

Riley blinked. She’d eaten less while in prison, but it never seemed like a big deal. But the way Nikki was looking at her...she might as well have turned into a skeleton. Suddenly self-conscious, Riley obediently traded her drink for the food—lasagna, she realized—and settled onto the couch. 

After two years of cardboard-flavored prison food, the lasagna tasted like heaven. 

Riley waited until Nikki was mid-gulp before announcing, “I’ve got a plan.” Her best friend nearly choked. “Want to help me get the gang back together?” 

“What’s your plan?” Nikki ground out between coughs. 

Riley grinned. “I figure it’s time we go on that little trip to Paris we’ve always talked about.” 

Nikki shook her head. “Damn, you’re one crazy bitch, Riley Davis. You know that?” She paused, contemplating. “I’m in.” Handing back the moonshine, Nikki added, “But tonight, I say we get drunk and celebrate your freedom. Deal?” 

“Deal.” 

Thirty minutes in, they’d finished the whole jar of moonshine, and Riley’s head spun. She stumbled into the kitchen in search of water, suddenly grateful Nikki had made her eat a substantial meal before drinking. 

“So,” Riley slurred. “How’s it going with that boyfriend of yours? The cute blonde one.” 

Nikki groaned. “You mean the big fat liar? Fabulous.” 

“So it all blew up in smoke.” 

“You have no idea.” Nikki shoved a handful of popcorn in her mouth. “Anyway, I’m back to being single, but Sam and Desi are still as insufferable as ever.” 

“Think they’ll get married?” 

“No way. That’s just one more thing they’d have to deal with if they ever have to fake their own deaths.” 

“On the contrary,” Riley drawled, “they should take out disgustingly large life insurance policies and then take turns faking their deaths every time they run out of money.” The idea sounded flawless to her drunk brain. “I’ll help them with their new identities for a cut.” 

“How big?” 

“Twenty percent.” 

Nikki snorted. “Like they’d ever agree to that.” 

Riley snuggled up to Nikki as they settled in to watch a movie, ducking under Nikki’s arm and using her boobs as a pillow. As Riley’s eyes caught Nikki’s laptop charging on a nearby table, her friend’s babbling about what chick-flick to watch faded into white noise. Riley’s fingers twitched. It’d been too long since she had the comfort of a keyboard beneath the pads of her fingers—since she felt powerful, the way Riley always did when armed with a computer. 

Too long, in fact, since she’d had any agency at all. Riley banished the thought before Nikki could notice where her attention had wandered. 

The movie turned out to be one they’d seen a thousand times, but Riley didn’t mind. Honestly, she needed the familiarity, not that she would admit that to Nikki. Even drunk, Riley loathed to reveal any sort of weakness, no matter how small and insignificant. 

Nikki pinched her side. “You’re brooding. Stop it.” Riley grumbled, but she let the movie distract her all the same. 

When the credits rolled, Riley glanced up at Nikki and found her friend already staring down at her as she rubbed Riley’s head. That caged animal feeling resurfaced. It was moments like these when Riley hated how well Nikki knew her, making it that much harder to hide everything going on in her head. 

In an attempt to escape, she said, “I’m thirsty. Let’s celebrate.” Riley forced a giggle as she walked back to the kitchen, grabbing two wine glasses from the cabinet. Everything in Nikki’s kitchen was exactly where it was two years ago, the layout as familiar to her as her own. Did she still have her own? Riley was too drunk to remember what happened to the spacious penthouse apartment of a convicted felon. 

“Riles, nooooooooo,” Nikki whined. “We are so drunk already. We cannot drink any more.” 

“Relax.” Riley rummaged through the fridge, pulling out the milk and a bottle of chocolate sauce. She filled the wine glasses with milk, then added an ungodly amount of chocolate, giggling again when the bottle made a fart noise. Riley didn’t mix it very well, but she was too drunk to care. “Your chocolate milk, milady.” She held out the better mixed of the two, keeping the worse one for herself. Nikki accepted. 

Riley held up her glass in a toast. “To freedom,” she said. “And doing whatever the fuck we want.”

*****

“Phone,” Riley demanded the next morning. Nikki handed hers over without even looking up from the scrambled eggs she was making. Riley unlocked it on the first try. “You haven’t changed your password in the last two years? C’mon, you know better than that!” 

“My password is twenty-nine characters long! I don’t think anyone is going to…Wait you still remember it?” 

Riley scrolled through Nikki’s contacts with one hand, the other busy stuffing her face with toast. “Obviously,” she said through a mouthful of cinnamon swirl bread. 

“Damn,” Nikki muttered, turning back to her eggs. 

Riley found the name she was looking for. Desi Nguyen. The call nearly went to voicemail before the woman on the other end snarled, “What?” 

Riley couldn’t help her grin. “I’m out, and I’ve got a job.” 

“Good for you. Let me know how long you last living the clean life.” 

“No, you jackass. A job. You in?” 

Desi didn’t even hesitate. “Hell yeah I’m in.” 

“Great,” Riley said, “and since I’m assuming Cage’s mouth is too occupied to answer, tell her I say hello.”

“Fuck off,” Desi growled, but it came out just a tad breathless. She hung up before Riley could make a snarky comment about being right. 

“So,” Nikki asked. She dumped the scrambled eggs on two plates. “Are they in?” 

“They’re in.” Riley smirked, gratefully accepting her plate. She sat down at the kitchen table and resumed scrolling through Nikki’s contacts. Riley reached the bottom of the list, but the name she was looking for wasn’t there. Riley checked again to make sure she hadn’t overlooked it. 

“Why isn’t Leanna’s number in your phone?” Nikki kept eating. “Nik,” Riley pressed. “Why don’t you have her number? What happened while I was...gone?” If Nikki noticed how she’d stumbled over the last word, her friend didn’t let on. 

“Leanna got out. Got clean. She’s CIA now.” Nikki’s cold stare was clear. Do not ask me about this again. 

“Oh.” Riley hadn’t seen that coming. “How the hell did she pull that off?” 

“She’s good at making people disappear,” Nikki said matter-of-factly. “Guess she finally used her skills on herself.” There was more Nikki wasn’t saying, but Riley didn’t push her. 

They ate their scrambled eggs in silence. 

As she cleared their plates, Nikki said, “So tell me about this plan of yours. Are we really doing it?” 

“If by ‘it’ you mean the heist of a lifetime, then yes. We are absolutely doing it.” Riley swung her feet onto Nikki’s now-vacated chair. “I had two long years to figure out exactly how to pull it off. All I need now is my team.” 

Nikki raised an eyebrow. “Your team? Last I checked, the Five Eyes were our team.” 

Rolling her eyes, Riley snarked, “Semantics.” 

“Whatever.” Nikki was clearly upset, but Riley couldn’t bring herself to care. “I’m going to take a shower.” 

“Don’t drown,” Riley replied automatically. 

As soon as she heard the rush of water moving through the pipes, Riley snatched Nikki’s laptop. Once again, the password was still the same. Nikki took long showers, so Riley figured she had at least thirty minutes to find the information she needed. 

Hacking into the CIA’s employee database was all too easy for someone like Riley Davis. She practically had the secrets of the universe at her fingertips, but Riley didn’t waste time snooping. All she cared about was one name: Leanna Martin.

[barbasbodaciousbeard]

If You Love Someone, Let Them Go: Part 4

Summary: Since starting with SVU, Sonny hadn’t kept much terribly close to the chest. The squad knew about his family, growing up on Staten Island, the classes at Fordam. What was hidden was why he didn’t date. Sonny Carisi was also separated from his childhood sweetheart, a separation neither ever took to divorce. They had the same haunts. They’d grown up neighbors. Their paths crossed every few months, and divorce talks would turn into reminiscing would turn into a night spent together, sometimes sex sometimes just talking until the early morning. It always ended with one of them waking up alone however. How will that change when the squad finds out?

Pairings: Sonny Carisi x Original Character

A/N: The babies. I’ve outlined like eight chapters at least, so I think this thing’s just going to go until I run out of steam. So here’s a third part already. Also, I threw up a pinned post masterlist to throw my AO3 links on

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3

November 2014

Victoria had gone to her mom’s house, the one by the Carisi’s, for Thanksgiving, but she should have known better than to think that she’d be there. Housekeepers kept the place up, but Irene hadn’t been around much since her daughter was seventeen. She hadn’t been there the year before for Victoria’s first set of holidays alone, and she wasn’t this year either. The year before, Victoria had made the rounds between childhood friends. Rachel would normally be who she went to now that she was coming to terms with the possibility of an actual divorce. She said she was coming to terms with it a lot for someone who just avoided the subject entirely and cried in Sonny’s Fordham sweatshirt at least two nights a week. Coming to her mom’s house when the childhood friends from the year before were at their significant other’s families’ houses was not her best idea when it meant she could hear the bustle of activity at the Carisi’s house. 

“Bella?” she said softly when she answered the knock at her door. It was late, and she’d heard everyone start to wind down and broken out the wine.

“Hey Tori. I know coming over ain’t exactly an option, but I snuck you a plate. And a bottle of wine from their stockpile.” Victoria motioned for her to come in, watching her unload a bag onto the kitchen counter. 

“That’s really sweet of you.”

“I wanted to make sure you ate good. You’re getting awful skinny for a baker.”

“Ain’t got Sonny making spaghetti like three nights a week.”

“He’s getting skinny without the endless supply of cannoli. Maybe you oughta come over and reconcile.”

“Bella, he knows what he has to do for us to be okay. I wouldn’t care if it weren’t for the fact whatever he needs to talk to me about made him push me away.”

“At least say hi before the end of tomorrow? He’s got the sad puppy eyes, watching your house.”

“We’ll see.” Bella said her goodbyes, and Victoria opened the second bottle of wine, settling on the porch. She saw Sonny making his way over a half hour later, sighing as she downed the end of the glass. 

“Bella send ya?” she called, bundled up in the blanket she’d brought out.

“Just said you were here. Heard you pop the cork and needed a break. Besides, you shouldn’t be alone on the holiday.””

“Nosy neighbor, huh?”

“The sound really echoes between these houses. I’d have invited you, but Ma…”

“It’s okay, Dom. You free all weekend? Or they got you working?”

“I’m not Staten Island anymore,” he said proudly. He’d been drinking too, which made it easier for both of them.

“Where are you now?”

“Manhattan SVU.”

“You made it?” Her voice was ecstatic, and he grinned when she jumped from the porch swing to hug him close. “I’m so proud of you, Dom.”

“Thanks, Tor. It’s only been three months, but I think it’s the right place. I feel like I’m really doin’ something, y’know?”

“Yeah. And you’re such a good guy, y’know? I bet victims feel comfortable.”

“That means more than I can tell you.”

“Want a glass of your mom’s wine to celebrate?”

“I’ll grab the second glass.” Before she could stop him, he went in, coming back and dropping on the swing beside her. She poured them each a glass, head resting on his shoulder as she sipped her own. It was quiet, and she wanted to get at least this long to be close to him. The hope from Teresa’s wedding wasn’t there. This would just be an evening, and he’d go home.

“How’s classes?”

“They’ve been good. I take finals next week.”

“Halfway through,” she grinned up at him as he took a share of the blanket. 

“And, I don’t know how else to bring it up, but I’m working on figuring out how to talk about how I felt. It’s like my brain disconnects when I try. I said it to my new boss, and I went to therapy. Apparently it sounded heavy.”

“I appreciate that, Dom. I know that isn’t easy for you.”

“Don’t tell nobody. Ma’s not happy about it.”

“I won’t. Spousal privilege.”

“Now we really can’t get divorced.”

“You’re not wearing your ring.” His hand slid into his hoodie, pulling out a chain with the gold band on it. 

“Yours is on your right hand.”

“It’s just hard to explain.”

“I know. The squad doesn’t know yet. I’m already trying to be the new guy. Saying I won’t divorce my wife even though I only see her ever four to six months because I truly believe she’s made for me and I love her? Way too much to unpack.”

“We hired new people. Hard to seem like the boss with her shit together when you ain’t lived with your husband in over a year.”

“We’ll figure it out.”

“You’re confident.”

“You’re not?”

“I’m scared you won’t trust me to tell me.”

“It’s not about trust, Tor. I know it’s a lot, but trust me on this. It’s not about you.”

“Okay,” she nodded, taking his hand. “You’ve been really open with me tonight. So I’m willing to believe you.”

“Thanks, doll. I’m going to tell the squad about you. That’s step one. Then I’m going to get my head out of my ass.”

He pressed a gentle kiss to her temple, arm slung around her. It felt weird knowing there were people in his life who didn’t know she existed. It bothered him too. He didn’t know how to go into everything. Whenever he talked to his mom or Gina, it ended with him crying, telling them that he knew God had made them for each other, and he’d ruined it all with his free will. He wasn’t ready to be that vulnerable. Telling them what he couldn’t tell his family was one thing; they saw the same thing, day in and day out. He couldn’t taint them. He could make himself seem broken, some newbie who couldn’t tell a woman he’d been with a decade how cases made him feel. 

“Do I have to go home or can I just hold you tonight?”

“I’m not up for analyzing things tomorrow. Limbo isn’t changing until you can tell me..”

“That’s okay with me, doll.”

“Then okay. I’m eating the slice of pie Bella brought over first.”

“Of course that’s fine,” he chuckled. “I had t’loosen my belt. Had like a quarter of the pie myself.”

“So there was pumpkin. You just ate it,” she teased, leading him in. The house looked the same as it had when they were kids. Once they got married, they never really spent time there, always going to his family’s house, and Victoria’s mom coming if she felt like it. Now that he worked with SVU, he remembered how often she was alone as a kid and felt grateful it was his family that lived next door. That could have ended very differently for her. He’d tell her about that when the damn finally burst. She plated her pie, tupperware stacked in the fridge, before she leaned over the counter and took a bite. 

“Chocolate bourbon pecan. The one you taught her.” He missed that part of the holiday the most. This was the second Thanksgiving he didn’t get to watch Victoria carefully teach his mom a new dessert. She gathered new recipes all year round, spreading them out to narrow down which she’d get the ingredients for the weekend before Thanksgiving. Sonny would usually make lasagna that day, listening as she described the pros and cons of each option and offering his opinion when prompted. 

“She did it perfect.” 

“Nah. Your crust is better. You ever gonna tell the secret?”

“Not a chance. Gotta keep my edge. You think she’s ever going to tell the secret ingredient to her cannoli filling?”

“Noted.” He dropped onto the stool on the other side of the counter, chin propped in his hand. It had taken a couple more beers than he should have had to come over, and now with the wine, Sonny had the sleepy eyes and goofy grin that gave it away.

“You’re drunk.”

“Just tipsy.”

“No gettin’ handsy, Sonny.”

“Promise. I’m a good boy.”

“Mhm,” she laughed, holding out a bite of pie he took gladly. “We’re going to have to get you to bed soon. Otherwise, you’ll get grumpy.”

“You make me sound like a toddler.”

“Only when you’ve been drinking.”

“Y’know, I’m a detective now. If I hadn’t fucked up, we might be down that road.”

“Dom, we’re so far from kids right now.”

“Let me be drunk and sentimental.”

“I thought you weren’t drunk.”

“Fine, I’m drunk.” 

“I appreciate the honesty,” she grinned, putting the plate in the drying rack. “I bet you still got a pair of sweats in my room from high school.”

“Lucky me.” She led him upstairs, digging them out of the dresser and tossing them to him. When he caught them, he was prouder than he should’ve been, stripping his jeans off and pulling them on. Victoria hadn’t taken her pajamas off that day, climbing into the bed. Sonny belly flopped next to her, and she pulled her knees up, laughing loudly. With a grin, he settled the blanket over them and flung an arm over her. Maybe he was taking advantage of the excuse drinking gave him, but he liked hearing her laugh. Sonny Carisi was still a gentleman though, and he was careful to keep his arm on her stomach and his hands on her ribs. This visit was more delicate than the wedding. Memories probably still helped; they were in her teenage room after all. His parents were always home, and her mom wasn’t. 

“Whatcha thinking?” Victoria asked gently, hand smoothing over his hair. 

“I miss this.”

“Staten Island?”

“Watching you eat pie when I’m drunk and staring at ya.”

“You’re sappy. Get some sleep.”

“If I go to sleep, it’s over sooner.” She smoothed his hair back gently, smiling as she pressed a kiss to his forehead. He closed his eyes and hummed, and Victoria thought describing Sonny as a puppy seemed even more apt. He was curling against her, pleased at the attention as she scratched his scalp. WHen they were kids, he’d always said If I go to sleep, it’s over sooner with excitement as they waited on vacations or holiday mornings. He’d said it sadly tonight. She didn’t like that. The more times she saw him, the more tempted she was not to wait it out and come home. So what if she had to worry he’d pull away again?

It mattered because she had to remember how she felt. Waiting at home all those months, fighting him, begging for something to prove he wanted her there. Victoria couldn’t do it again, but she also couldn’t picture turning thirty without Sonny. Having a kid without him. Sitting on a porch with some other guy. After a while, soft snoring alerted her that he’d fallen asleep, arm still flung over her and his head on her shoulder. Her cheek rested against the top of his head as she tried to memorize what this felt like again. 

He’d met a therapist. That was what made it feel more like there might be a conclusion to the separation. Before tonight, she’d accepted this weird limbo may be permanent. Despite the mentions of divorce, she knew neither of them would do it. Therapy wasn’t something Sonny’s family valued, and he’d always been resistant to the concept for himself. When Victoria went, he was supportive and recognized the good it did her, but his father had always demeaned it, and that stuck with him. That wasn’t a problem before when Victoria could weasel the problem out of him. He didn’t think he was in the wrong before, but it seemed whatever was wrong was something he realized was too big for him. It didn’t bother her that she couldn’t fix it for him; she was just glad he was accepting help somewhere.

She wasn’t sure when she fell asleep, but Sonny was gone when she woke. Her first response was panic, that maybe how they left things the morning after the wedding meant he’d opted for the same response as the first time and gone home before she woke up. Her mind stopped racing, however, when she realized she could smell coffee and bacon wafting through the door. She slipped out of bed, finding him in the kitchen with his hair askew as he flipped a pancake. 

“Mornin’ doll,” he smiled shyly, pouring coffee and sliding the mug to her. It seemed like he wasn’t sure if he was supposed to be there, and she supposed she didn’t know if he should be or not. “I got some time before I have to go to the precinct, so I figured I’d make you pancakes.”

“Thanks, Dom.” She pressed a kiss to his temple. “Ain’t Ma going to be mad?”

“She can deal with it. She had me all day yesterday. I know I ain’t ready to tell you what you need me to, but I want to leave on a good note. Prove I’m really trying.” Victoria set her coffee back on the counter, arms sliding around him as she pressed her cheek to his back. His free hand rested where hers clasped as he flipped another pancake.

“That means a lot, Dom.”

“You felt like I didn’t want you with me. Leaving when you’re asleep or pressuring you won’t help. You told me what to do, and all I can do is prove I want you while I work on doing it. If you love somebody, let ‘em go. If it’s meant to be, they’ll come back. And it’s meant to be, Tor. Ordained by the big guy.”

“You really believe that?”

“Believe it? I know it, doll.”

“You know I do love you?”

“I know. And I do love you. We just never had to communicate before.”

“How dare we develop real problems in our twenties?”

“Right? What chumps.”

“Should we go to therapy together?”

“I’m not ready yet, Tor. But I think it would be a good idea when I am.”

“Me too,” she said, squeezing him before she let go. “I can see you’re trying.”

“I’m just glad you ain’t mad I haven’t told the new squad yet.”

“It’s super complicated. I understand.”

“Yeah. I’m still growing on them. I don’t want to seem like I’ve got a lot of drama too. Because weirdly, we’re low to no drama. But ‘Yeah, I’m married and we see each other for a day every few months while we try to figure out how to talk’ sounds bad.”

“Only a little,” she laughed, taking their plates to the table as he refilled the coffee. They ate happily, Victoria kissing him softly when he left to get dressed for work back at his mom’s house. Gianna Carisi was in the yard, shooting them a disapproving look. He shook his head at her, ushering the woman inside before she could try to talk to Victoria. Sonny understood his mom’s stance: her son could do no wrong. In reality, they had both done wrong. Victoria should have told him how she was feeling before they were in too deep, and he shouldn’t have waited so long to process what he saw on the job. 

“Ma, you leave my wife alone.”

“You’re not acting married. You’re acting like acquaintances that get lucky sometimes.”

“And you’re not helping my chances of fixing things.”

“Dominick, it’s been over a year.”

“And I’m finally getting off my ass, going to therapy, and trying to work with Tor.”

“You don’t need therapy, Dom. Just man up, like your father.”

“I do. And it’s helpin’ and I just got to spend a night and morning with Victoria with no fighting. That’s a step in the right direction.”

Tag list: @fear-less-write-more​

[1000scrubs]

Round 1: Tonzy

Writer Tonzy’s entry for the initial prompts from 2 years ago

It was sort of brilliant actually... I don’t know if anyone even saw it coming. It was gradual at first. A couple big news articles about how the bees were disappearing, but nothing we hadn’t seen before. But over time it started getting worse. At first everyone was thrilled.  Chemical pesticides were a thing of the past and malaria was at an all time low. But then the grocery shelves started looking just a little sparse. By the end of the year they were practically empty. And it wasn’t just the bees, oh no. Butterflies, silkworms, hell even the stinking flies had started to disappear.

Well by then it was all out panic. All around the globe people were stampeding. Stockpiling food to keep them through the next year, but that only drove the prices up. It only got worse from there. Food became a rare commodity, most of us had to scrape by on processed food bricks and such.  Desperation turned to violence, soon we were on the brink of world war 3.

But that’s exactly where they wanted us. They had the whole world in their hands. While everyone was distracted by the food shortages, they swooped in and took control of the largest food distribution centres that were left. Massive ships descending from the sky.  We were at their mercy.  

It’s been around five years now and almost everyone left has gone underground.  But damn if this apocalypse isn’t good for business. Bodies littering the streets, mortality rates skyrocketing. Someone’s gotta get rid of them all, so the aliens have been  tripling the rations for anyone brave enough to do it. Lucky me, I’ve been an undertaker all my life. It’s dangerous though, above ground is a wasteland filled with the worst dregs of humanity. It’s where we banish the criminals. It’s a lucky thing that I’m the best.

I started running an underground smuggling route from my cemetery. Hidden in the crypts, where no one would think to look. People pay good food to get smuggled back into civilization. Every so often someone would come through spinning wild rumours about a device that could fix our unique alien problem. Bring the bugs back and restore our humanity. Like everyone, at first I assumed it was just wishful hoping. Brought on by our imminent destruction. But the rumours only got louder and stronger. More specific. Something about a mad scientist who found a way to jump through time and space to recover a lost artifact. It sounded like a load of bull except for the very precise science that accompanied it. Not that I particularly knew what any of it meant, but it definitely sounded too good for someone to have just made it up.

That’s when it all changed. Her name was Carrie. She was older, in her 60’s, with a stern face and narrowed eyes. I met her on one of my morning digs through the deserted towns. She must’ve known me by reputation, because she approached with no hesitation. “The Undertaker. You can get me back to Karyon?” Her voice was low and gravelly as the dust swirled around us. “For what price?” I asked hesitantly. Her confidence was unnerving in this hellscape. “I’ll give whatever you want, just name it.” She snapped. “Garlic bread.” It had came out of my mouth immediately. I had been waiting 5 years for that buttery, cheesy bread between my lips. Just the thought of it made my mouth water. “5 loaves.” 1 for every year. I knew I was pushing my luck. I must’ve smuggled thousands of people, but not a single slice of garlic bread had I ever seen. “Done.” My eyes must’ve showed my suspicion. She gave a deep throaty chuckle. “I’m good for it don’t worry. I had a good job with the aliens.”

We waited till nightfall before I led her down the crypts to the small dark tunnel.  I had my back turned to her, no reason to suspect anything. She was half my size, practically no meat on her bones. Then everything went dark. The next thing I remember I was waking up on a cold dark floor with a bright blue light strobing on and off. An acidic taste in the back of my mouth and a pounding headache.

Carrie stood looming over me. My eyes were throbbing beneath my skull and there was a weird pressure there that made my ears stuffy.  I saw her mouth moving but all I could hear was a ringing whine in my head. “WHAT?” I could barely hear anything. She pursed her lips tightly, her eyes flashing in anger. She picked me up and shoved me roughly towards a small bench in the corner of the room. I felt a sharp sting on the side of my neck and suddenly everything went clear. “Shut up. We don’t want any unnecessary attention.” She hissed, “this is our last chance. I will not have some narcissistic undertaker ruin it.” Narcissistic! The nerve! I opened my mouth to retaliate but she quickly cut me off. “Say another word and I’ll kill you myself. Just listen.” She pulled a small pouch out of her jacket. A small silver disk slipped out of and lit up with a quiet whirring noise. Bright light illuminated the room and I had to squint to see what was hovering above it. “This is our last hope. This is the Declaration of Independence.” She must have seen the incredulous look on my face, “ obviously not the real one, it’s just a projection. It’s the key to ending this goddamn horror.” “What are you talking about?  Everyone with a Third grade education knows that’s just an ancient piece of paper.” “No.” She hissed, annoyance flashing through her face, “This is the key to our salvation.”

— 2 months later —

Hot air blasted against my cheek, singing the fine hair. I ducked for cover. Not for the first time, I thought of the warm buttery, cheesy prize awaiting me at the end of this god forsaken mission. “At this rate I deserve a mountain of garlic bread for all this.” “Shut up.” Carrie glared from where she was situated behind the wing of our rocket. “If you could think about anything other than yourself for once...” More gunfire peppered the area. I grabbed my weapon and let loose, several alien figures dropping to the ground with garbled screams. They were segmented like an insect, with bulbous orange heads and black pincers at their mouths. Several more blasts shot out and the last few aliens fell.  “We must be quick” Carrie dusted off her arm and strode off briskly. I exhaled softly, finally able to take a good look around. This place was familiar, yet exceedingly foreign. As if you asked someone to recreate all life on earth from memory. The bubbling sound of running water, the rustling of purple tinged leaves, the crunch of green stones beneath our feet. “This is planet K-4670.” Carrie spoke softly, as if the sound of her voice was an intrusion on this serene world. “The first inhabitable planet discovered outside of our solar system.” “Inhabitable? Don’t you mean inhabited?” I tried to keep the sarcasm out of my voice but based on her severe glower, I hadn’t succeeded. “Of course we didn’t know that.” Her face softened slightly. “This place is rich in valuable resources. We hadn’t seen signs of intelligent life forms.” Her hands fidgeted with the cuff of her sleeves. “We thought we could do something good. Renew our dying planet.” “So you exploited this one instead?” I looked up. The sky looked the same as Earth. Puffy white clouds floated against  vibrant blue. “We didn’t know.” Carrie quickened her pace, her posture stiff. “Bullshit.” I huffed. Ahead of me, Carrie tilted her head slightly, an ugly look on her face. We walked in silence from there, occasionally passing the scars of our discoveries. Looking into one of the deep craters, I saw remnants of a sprawling civilization. Eventually we reached our destination. A giant tower crawling with aliens. We stopped a fair distance away. The place resembled a massive termite mound. Carrie shoved something into my hand. “This will get you back where you need to go.” The object was the size of my palm and smooth to the touch. “What do you mean, what is this?” “Just press the button when I tell you.” Her arms were crossed in front of her. “I haven’t told you this yet, but thank you. You’re a good person.” She pat my arm awkwardly and turned away. “I’ve been called many things in my life ma’am, but good was never one of them.” I stared at her back, once again noticing how small and frail she looked. Without her usual overbearing personality, she was just a little old woman. “We should get this over with.” She turned back to me, an unbearable sadness washed across her face briefly, before she steeled back into her usual sneer. “Let’s go.” We snuck around to the back of the building, carefully avoiding the rounds of guards that walked by. The inside of the tower was dark and cool. The green rock walls were worn smooth. A dim glow permeated the long empty corridors. For all the activity outside, the interior seemed abandoned. We worked our way slowly through the winding paths, until we came to a large high roofed room. It was empty, apart from a tall podium set in the centre. “There it is.” Carrie breathed. She took a step and reached up at the podium. “Stay your hand witch.” A garbled voice emerged from the shadows, accompanied by a metallic whine. Carrie snatched her hand back, a single drop of blood falling to the floor. A hulking beast of an alien emerged from the shadowy corner. It stalked closer, stopping several feet away. Several hair thin needles twirled between its fingers. “You’ve made a mistake coming here.” It’s words sounded strange, unlike any accent I’d heard before. The large black pincers made sharp snapping noises as they opened and closed around its mouth. “You’ve given us no choice.” Carrie clenched her fists at her sides, when she opened them again four white indents were pressed into the pink palm. “I will do what I have to for my people.” The alien made a noise that could loosely be described as a laugh. “We’ve given no choice? We were living peacefully here, we had no quarrel with you. It was your people that destroyed our homes and killed us in droves.” “We didn’t mean to cause such pain, we didn’t know you were here.” I spoke up from beside Carrie. Glancing at the stiff look on her face. Another laugh echoed against the four walls. “Is that she told you runt?” I bristled at the insult, my stature had never been questioned before. “We made contact with your probes. We accepted your surveyors into our homes. We taught you everything you know about our planet. Yet your greed cannot be satiated. You wanted this planet for yourself, so you tried to exterminate us.” The clicking of its mandibles was deafening in the silence. Carrie said nothing. I turned to face her, but she avoided my gaze. “We know we have no future, what you see here is the last of our population. So the last thing we can do, is to take you down with us.” “You would kill millions of innocents for revenge?” I was seething. Angry at this alien for what they had done, angry at Carrie for what she had started, and angry at myself for trusting her. The alien turned to me, it’s small pale eyes seemed to look straight through me. “Innocents? Do you mourn the millions of us who were buried in these craters?” Its voice was rising in anger. “Enough! There are no innocents. Your people never questioned where your wealth was coming from. Your people didn’t want to know that there comfortable lives were paid in blood!” All three of us moved in the same moment. Carrie reached up and grabbed the wrinkled paper on top of the podium. The alien extended its long arm and shot out a handful of paper thin needles. I pulled out my weapon and shot straight at its chest. Time seemed to slow down. The alien crumpled to the floor as I caught Carrie’s falling body. “Take it, press the button.” Carrie desperately shoved the paper into my hand, her body convulsing as she took gasping breaths. “I’m not just going to leave you here.” I stared at the vibrant blood red stains steeping into the aged yellow paper. Her wrinkled face seemed to sink into itself, her eyes bulging. “This is what I deserve. You must get this back. Give it to my daughter. We must save Earth. My life is insignificant.”  She spoke in a strained staccato. She fished into my pocket and pulled the palm sized item out. She clicked something into place and pushed it into my hand. “Get out of here, you don’t have much time.” I lowered her body to the ground and stepped back. A hint of a smile was on her face.  She closed her eyes and a sigh escaped her dying body “I’m sorry.” The sound of feet echoed down the hall. Shadows were rushing forward to the room. I pressed the button and everything disappeared.

White light pierced my eyes. Loud ringing enveloped my brain. Yellow paper stained with blood was clenched in my fist. A stern face. Brown hair.  Sharp eyes. “Give it to me.” A voice. My head throbbed. Fingers grabbed at my clenched hand and forced them open. The woman took the paper and cut it open straight through the centre. A thin blue glowing string was pulled out. “She sewed this into the Declaration of Independence, she knew we would need it.” The woman placed the string on a round tablet, scanning it. A diagram appeared on the screen. It looked like a weapon. “Here, you must be hungry.” She handed my a warm plate. A long forgotten aroma wafted against my face. I couldn’t believe it. A plate stacked high with freshly baked garlic bread. I didn’t hesitate. Handfuls of warm cheesy bread were shoved into my mouth. I could barely register the taste with how fast I was swallowing. Eventually the last slice sat on the plate. This time I ate it slowly, savouring every bite. My face covered in crumbs, I finally asked.  “What are you going to do with it?” “I will finish what my mother started.” She turned to me with that severe overbearing look. I saw a flash of silver before blood spurt from my throat. It ran down my throat as I choked, struggling to take a breath. I fell to my knees, one hand grasping at my gauged neck. I looked up at her in a panic, only to be met with an apathetic stare. “Thank you for your service”. My body collapsed. Red blood pooling on the floor, the last bite of garlic bread stained red as my body began to die. At least I got paid.

Who: narcissistic undertaker obsessed with garlic bread What: steals the Declaration of Independence When: The ‘When’ prompt was lost Where: the first inhabitable planet discovered outside the solar system Why: because all the insects disappeared

[stardancerluv]

Gotham Lockdown 2020

Part 3

Summary: Roman has made it to Gotham. My gif!

Warning: Passionate reunion. Small amount of a daddy kink.

Side story of Creative Fervor, as time goes on Reader has gotten comfortable with Zsasz, and now calls him Victor.

You nervously wrung your hands as Victor drove to the airport. “I am so glad that this worked out.”

“It’s a relief.”

As he parked the car, you turned to Victor. “Should I really wear one of the masks?” He gave her a look.

“Yes, damn it.” He sighed. “Yes. We don’t know what’s or who’s flying in. Roman would kill me if he knew and didn’t make you wear it.”

You nodded. “You’re right.” Now you were the one who sighed.

When Victor cut the engine, you reached into your purse, you handed him his mask. “I will give Roman his.”

“I am going to go down to retrieve his luggage. You two can meet me down at the carousals.”

“You’re not coming to the security gate” Not sure if you wanted to be alone especially if there were a lot of people.

“We have divide and conquer. The faster we are out of there and back to the club the better it will be for all of us.”

You nodded, he made sense. “Alright.” Taking a breath, looking in the mirror you slipped on your mask. Then you slipped on a pair of gloves.

“Are you going to pin it?”

“Why?”

“Because you two...” He gave you a half smile.

“Ooo oo...good idea!” You looked in your bag. You happened to find two bobby pins. Looking once again in the mirror you secured the mask in place.

*****

Once inside what you saw shook you to your core. You had never seen an airport this empty. Roman, Victor and you had barely been able to walk through a mere 5 days before, now it was empty.

“I’ll see you soon.” You watched as Victor disappeared going down the escalator.

You nervously played with your hair, then you stopped. You realized you might undo what you did with the pins.

You put your hands behind your back. Looking at the arrival board. You saw that his plane was now listed as disembarking, your heart began to race. Moving this way and that way, you even jumped as you tried to see if you spot him. Since most people were as tall or taller than you.

You saw him, your heart leapt when you did. When he saw you, confusion crossed his face. You watched as he realized with a head tilt why you were wearing the mask. A huge smile spread across his face and he walked faster.

The moment he passed through the threshold, you ran over to him. “Roman!” He put down his carry on bag and held his arms out for you. you ran into them and he swung you around. “Baby its so good to see you.” He hugged you close before he put you down.

He leaned in. “Wait a moment.” It broke your heart to stop him, especially when his brow furrowed. You reached into your bag. “Allow me.” He nodded. You had never been so glad he wore gloves more then he did now. So you only had to worry about the mask. You then carefully tucked the straps behind his ears under his hair.

“There you go.”

You gasped as he immediately grabbed you then and kissed you mask to mask. You could feel the warmth, you could feel his lips despite the barrier. “I’ve missed you baby.” He pulled back. “I am glad that I’m home now.”

“Me too.” His blue eyes were so fierce over the mask. “Victor has gone downstairs to get your luggage.”

“Alright, let’s get down there.” He picked up his carry-on. “Eeww. You should have burrowed one of my pairs.” He said when he saw the rubber gloves you are wearing.

“Roman, your hands are much bigger then mine.”

“Oh!” He chuckled. You had not realized how much you missed that sound until just then. “True.” He squeezed your hand.

*****

Roman slid right into the back seat, as he did so he reached out and pulled you close. You watched as he moved to see as much he could. Gotham was already looking different then it had when he left.

“Fuck. Gotham.” He shook his head when he saw how considerably empty things were looking. “So we have a nice stockpile of things ?” He finally ask Victor.

“We do Boss. Was there anything you want we may have forgotten?”

“Chocolate covered almonds?”

“Got ‘em!” You chirped happily.

“My Truefitt & Hill 1805 Shaving Cream?”

“Yup!”

“Extra gloves, and not those kind.”

Victor, nodded from behind the wheel. “Yup along with three new suits.”

“That is spectacular news. I can’t wait to see them.”

*****

“I am going to lock up and seal things off down here.” You helped Victor as he took out Roman’s suitcases. “We should leave these down here. Roman, anything you need out of them?”

“Just the smaller bag thats in the bigger bag.” He came around, opened the suitcase and grabbed what he needed.

“Ok, so I will check that everything is as it should be all sealed and secured.”

“You will have to show me all you did.” Roman, told him.

“Of course. After you have rested you just finished a more then twelve hours to get here.”

“Yeah, that was rough.”

“So rest, and we can talk later.” Then Victor looked at you. “You get some sleep too.”

“I will!” You exclaimed.

“Y/N, I heard you pacing for most of the night.”

You guiltily shrugged. “I was worried.”

“Now you can stop for the time being.” He scratched the back of his head. “So I’ll be up later and we can discuss all about what happened in Italy and Antonio.”

“Good.”

Soon, then it was just you and Roman in the elevator going up to the penthouse.

*****

Once the elevator doors opened he walked out, then he pulled you close. He was already tearing off the mask and you did as well. As your lips touched, a sound came from the two of you that was a mixture of relief and a moan of pleasure.

Both of you, continued to kiss but an eagerness took a hold of you two as you tore at your clothes. His blue eyes were a flame as you both grew breathless, needing to feel, to see each other. A level of want consumed you.

Your clothes, the gloves the mask were all left as a small path was created in your wake. Giggles came from the two of you hopped pulling off your boots, your shoes. With a force that only Roman had he grabbed you, pulling a sound from you as he held you to him and he kissed you again. Your arms wrapped around him, your fingers entangling in his soft strands.

You parted once again. This time you couldn’t stop yourself from being a little coy, after it had been a few days yet it felt like forever. You laid down on then bed, removing what had been left of your clothes. Above you, he shed what was left of his clothes.

He came down on top of you, you barely were able to enjoy the feel of his naked warmth. His hand was soon between then two of you, your breaths mingling as a gasp erupted into a moan as he moved and you with him taking him as deeply as you could. Now there truly was no space.

He stopped, “Y/N” it had felt so amazing you had not realized you had closed your eyes. When he said your name, you opened them once again and smiled. “There you are.” He whispered.

“Always.” You replied.

Your hungry kisses matched his thrusts which were exquisite torture. “Please,” You begged, don’t torture us.

“Alright.” He breathed his lips pulling on your lips.

Moving together pleasure erupted all through you. Moans, groans and sounds you didn’t know you could make came out of you. As you arched against him you grabbed at him wrapped your legs around him. Anything, to simply touch more of him.

It was not long before your felt your felt yourself getting close.

“Yes..yes...just like that daddy.”

“Fuck, he groaned, moaning above you. The sight of his shoulders, just the mere sight of him above you got you closer still. His eyes only meeting your made you almost cum from that. “Cum for me baby.”

The sensation, the taste of him as you kissing finally brought you closer. “Daddy.” You whimpered.

You arched against him, as you did you felt as he dragged his tongue up your body. “Cum for me. I want to feel it.”

“Yes.” You whimpered matching his thrust. In your arch against him, you thought you were going snap in two but then he thrusted again and you finally came undone. “Daddy!” You screamed aloud as you came hard holding onto him.

His eyes locked with yours, you could feel the familiar tightening in him.

“Oh, baby!” He called out, then moments later your felt the tremors as he came hard within you.

For a moment, he just stayed that way looking down at you. You reached up and tucked some of his hair behind his ear. You both shared another kiss that sent shivers on your back. He finally pulled out and laid beside you. Going up on an elbow, you looked down at him. You both were still very much out of breath.

“I was so worried.” You said, shaking finally.

He reached out with his arm pulling you close. You happily curled up to him.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“You had better not.”

You shared a lingering kiss, his fingers stroked and entwined in your hair. He squeezed you, “Baby.” You swallowed down the relieved tears.

@darling-i-read-it @spn-obession @vintagemichelle91 @xxxeatyourh3artoutxxx @ewanfuckingmcgregor @zodiyack @angel98624 @starwarsprequelfangirl @nebulastarr @emyliabernstein @thepeachreads @itsknife2meetu @whyisgmora

[lambourngb]

Duty of Care and /or Gravedigger’s Union

I did Grave Dancer’s Union - a nod to my 90s love of Soul Asylum here.

Duty of Care was another torture Michael fic- I wrote it pre-season 2, when I thought the love triangle was going in a particular way. I don’t know if there’s still an appetite to season 1 au stories? There’s some season 1 characterization of Alex ahead, particularly in regards to Jesse.

Here’s what I had - some of which already appeared here before Last Year’s Wishes ate my brain.

****

“Can’t believe Maria is still wearing the pendant of alien poison around her neck while she dates your alien ass, Guerin..” Kyle commented watching the decay values multiply as Liz titrated pollen into the samples.  

The current theory on alien resurrection, and it said a lot about his life that he had competing theories on alien-involved resurrection, was that their ability to manipulate energy changed based on their needed life skills at the time of adolescence. Michael had been separated from his siblings young, and needed to develop defensive skills. The defiant and pained look on his face when he explained stopping an item being hurled at his head at the age of 7 was a needed survival tactic courtesy of foster homes he had passed through kept Kyle from questioning any further.

Isobel had through her mother Ann’s never-ending dinner parties and charity benefits, found comfort in seeing and knowing what was meant under the sugary sweet words of adults around her. Being a small child paraded around adults who were charmed by her blonde hair and blue eyes meant she had the most exposure to social events while Max hid in his books. 

Finally Max had anointed himself as a fixer early on in their life. He had taken responsibility for Michael being left behind, and had tasked himself to protect his sister afterward. The defensive use of healing fit with his offensive ability to kill in the service of keeping those he loved safe. 

At the most basic level, it was all energy from synaptic responses in brain waves to manipulating molecules to move or stop an object. How a pollen interrupted that energy use could theoretically solve the problem of how to jump start an ability.

“You think you might get around to telling her the big secret anytime soon?”

The mask over his mouth and face did little to block the glare Michael shot at him. “Shut up Valenti.” 

“I don’t see what the big deal is. It’s Maria. She is a card carrying member of the ACLU and the Nature Conservatory. I had to bail her out of jail last year during an ICE protest. She’s not going to turn you over to the government.” 

“Kyle!” Liz scolded, “We talked about this. Agency. It’s up to Isobel and Michael who knows. I already broke that with you.”

Michael ran a gloved figure over the counter absently. “I hate secrets, okay. This isn’t any fun for me, especially considering how many people already know. I went from having just Max and Isobel, to basically the whole graduating class of New Roswell High in on it. A lot of loose lips.”

The habit of 20 years of paranoid silence was probably a lot to try and break with a new relationship if that was the basis of it. There was a good amount of slack that Kyle could extend to Michael, including trying to be understanding when he started up with Alex’s best friend in the wake of Max’s death, but exclusion of Maria from the secret felt wrong to him.

He couldn’t fathom the reasoning behind lying to someone that he wanted to be in a relationship with, and he had a feeling that it wasn’t because of worries that she would tell someone about the aliens living in Roswell. While he couldn’t outright call Michael an asshole on Alex’s behalf, he could poke and prod him when the opportunity surfaced.

“You should look at this way Guerin, that larger circle means if something does happen, you’ve got more back up than just Isobel, with Max being out of commission.”

“Oh yeah, so if the government disappears me to a black site, you’re going to ride to my rescue?”

“Yes.” Kyle replied seriously. “I wouldn’t be alone either.” The name Alex Manes went unsaid, but from the brief wince on Michael’s face, he knew exactly who was being referred to obliquely. Scored hit again.

“Well as fun as this discussion is, I’m going to take off. Iz and I have practice plans.” Michael slipped his hat on, and tucked the stool away. “Liz, call me if you have a breakthrough on nullifying this stuff. For a rare flower, there sure was a lot of it stockpiled in Noah’s cave.”

“Sure thing, Mikey.” 

“Valenti, make sure she goes home to sleep and eat at some point. I don’t want to have to put her in a pod next.” He ducked out of reach of her hand, laughing at the offended look she sent his way. 

“Far be it for me to agree with him, but he’s right. You’ve been burning the candle at both ends and the middle between rebuilding your lab, researching Max’s healing power, studying this pollen, not to mention working at the diner. We should make time for something else, like a drink or a movie. Recharge.” The past month since Max’s ‘death’ brought back the manic energy burst from solving the issues with the depowering serum. From one catastrophe to another, it was barely time to recover before the next happened.

“I know, I just. I need to stay busy. It’s so quiet without him.” Liz stretched and started to tuck her last slide away into the cooler. “But I think I am done today, if I work anymore, I’ll just be making mistakes.”

Kyle slipped on his coat and held the door. “Not that I don’t believe you leaving on your own volition, but let me walk you out.”

“Lucky for you, I’m too tired to be offended.”

Kyle kept his hand on her back gently steering her through the hallways. The third shift was on at the hospital, and he winced to think about his own upcoming shift at noon tomorrow. Balancing football, his pre-med studies and his social life in Michigan taught him valuable life skills in working on short sleep, but even the hours of residency had no competition on his current life of alien lab work and tracking down government funding of a black ops prison project with Alex. When he mentioned a night off, he wasn’t only including Liz in that need.

Inhaling the cool night air, he calculated if he made it home, heated up a meal, and fell asleep promptly there was the opportunity for 6 good hours of sleep before meeting up at the bunker to check in on the data mining project Alex was running. 

“You know, you should go a little easier on Michael.”

“I thought everyone in this town was in love with Max Evans, but apparently it’s Guerin.” Kyle retorted sarcastically. 

Liz bit her lip at the mention of Max before sighing softly. “I’m serious, Kyle. He’s really messed up right now. I was actually shocked he was somewhat sober tonight.”

“I’m not going to be petty here Liz, and mention the obvious that we are all really messed up right now. I get where you’re coming from about their need for secrecy, but Maria really deserves better. I’m not her best friend like you are and Alex was, but I’ve been here in this town with her. She was there for me after my dad died, and she supported my mom’s election for sheriff. With Mimi getting worse, she deserves to have someone to count on, not someone who is lying to her, and by extension, making all of us lie to her as well.”

“Alex was? Past tense?”

He arched his eyebrow in disbelief, “I guess I am going to be petty tonight, but seriously Liz? Have you talked to Alex lately? Every time Maria comes up in conversation he puts his best ‘Baghdad was a little warm and I was just doing a job’ face on and repeats to anyone listening how happy he is for them. Guerin messed him up, and worse, took away from him one of the few people he lets himself drop that soldier bullshit front he has.”

Liz sighed, tucking her hair behind her ear. “I know the history with Michael is a little complicated, but we don’t always get to choose who we fall for and who we don’t. Love is messy. It doesn’t color inside the lines and follow any of the rules.”

“Maybe you’re right about that, and maybe there’s no avoiding the heartache. I do believe though that you can choose whether or not to be a dick about things, and Guerin not telling Maria is a dick move and it’s got consequences.” Kyle unlocked his car, and opened the passenger side with a gesture. “Our sister doesn’t have many friends, and he’s robbing her of one right now. Rosa lost ten years because of aliens, don’t you think that’s enough loss for all of us?”

“Do you know how annoying you are when you’re right? I’ll talk to Michael, better yet, I’ll talk to Isobel about letting Maria in on the secret.”

He slid into the driver’s seat, smiling across to her. “Tomorrow. Tonight, what’s left of it, is for sleeping.” He turned the ignition, and stopped,  as the headlights came up illuminating the familiar green Chevy sitting across the lot from them. “That’s Guerin’s truck.”

“He left before we did, what’s it still doing here?” Liz ducked out of the passenger seat and ran toward the truck without waiting for an answer. Kyle swore softly, untangling his hand from the ignition to follow her. The truck looked undisturbed, no sign of the occupant. Liz reached for the driver’s side door, testing it, and gasped as the door swung open. The ever present black hat slipped off the dash into the floorboards.

There were three things Michael prized above all others, his truck, his cowboy hat, and his sister. To leave two out of three unprotected was highly out of character for him. Kyle turned around the parking lot, scanning for signs of him. 

“Kyle, look,” Liz grabbed his arm and pulled him down toward the wheel well of the truck. Gleaming silver in the light , tucked on top of the tire tread, was a syringe needle with a depressed plunger.

“That’s not good.”

She stuffed her hand into her pocket and withdrew a spare latex glove to wrap around her fingers as she lifted the syringe from the tire.  She peered closely at the vial, a sickly yellow liquid film thinly coated the inside. “I think someone took him, and without testing it, I’m guessing this is some sort of knock out drug based on the pollen.”

Kyle reached for his phone, mentally saying goodbye to the idea of sleep anytime soon. “I’ll call Alex, you call Isobel. And I don’t know, I guess call my mom? I mean, we usually call the police when someone gets abducted.”

Liz thinned her lips, holding the needle with one hand as she dug out her phone with the other. “I don’t think you can call the cops on the government, which I’m guessing that’s what we are dealing with since they knew how to knock out Michael.”

The government, or more specially it was probably someone related to Project Shepherd. Kyle sighed, holding his phone to his ear. It rang once, before he heard, “What’s wrong?”

He pulled the phone away from his ear to make sure he had called Alex and not the psychic alien sister, “How did you know something was wrong?”

“You’ve called me twice in the last three months, once to tell me you put my dad in a coma and once to tell me about Max. You’re a texter, even though I explained it’s easier to keep things secret if you call. So again, what’s wrong?”

Kyle slowly walked back toward the hospital. He should have volunteered to call Isobel, because this was not going to be easy. “It’s Guerin.”

“Is he okay?” 

“We don’t know. We think someone took him. Liz and I found his truck at the hospital, unlocked. It looks like he got jumped by someone who knows how to incapicitate him.”

“I’ll be there in 20 minutes.” 

Kyle wasn’t surprised to see the call disconnected. It was a forty minute drive from the cabin to the hospital if someone followed the speed limits. 

*** 

“It’s Guerin.”

Alex was somewhat aware that he must have replied. He was in his SUV and away from the bunker, before he’d registered that the call had ended. He could only be thankful that today had been a ‘pull day’, rather than a ‘push day.’

Alex could divide his days into two motivations, he either wanted to be as far from town and the chance of running into someone he knew (Michael) or he wanted to be close in case something happened that he could help fix (for Michael). The cabin was isolated enough that only Kyle made the trip from Roswell, but not in recent memory with the pace of lab work and hospital hours. Alex could comfortably avoid reality with his laptop until the second feeling took hold. The Project Shepherd bunker was an easier location to reach Isobel or Liz from when the inviatble call for assisting an intoxicated Michael came. 

Seeing Maria meant seeing Michael in the evening hours, and it was strange to resort to in his post-service life the habit of a decade before; lying and hiding himself in every interaction. His calendar had a weekly reminder to join Liz and Maria at the Wild Pony for a beer, usually scheduled early enough that Michael was still at Sanders working, but late enough that the automated work emergency text to his phone could reliably give him cover for an exit. 

Psychic as she was, Maria always let him go with a pained but relieved look. It wasn’t her fault that he was still in love with Michael. It wasn’t her fault that Michael wasn’t in love with him. Neither he nor Maria had so many friends that they could afford to lose one, but neither was fooling the other that the relationship hadn’t changed in the aftermath of her dating Michael. 

This wasn’t his first go around with unrequited love. 

He’d survived Brendon Urie, and he wasn’t ashamed to have been a sixteen year old pouring over fan meet and greets on livejournal before hitting the road with Rosa to see Panic at the Disco in Albuquerque just after school let for the summer. He might have mapped out Los Angeles coffee shops to busk at after he turned legal and could escape west to be a musician, coffee shops close to Silver Lakes and Encino neighborhoods to be organically discovered by his crush.

He had survived his fourteen year old obsession with Kyle, that lasted until it was safer to love unattainable rockstars versus the childhood friend now high school bully. He could laugh at himself for thinking that Kyle had turned on him because he felt the same way but just didn’t know how to articulate it outside of shoving him against the lockers and jeering at him in gym class. 

Unrequited love that had once been returned was a higher bar to clear than a fan fantasy or a childhood crush, but then the sins Alex carried were deeper and more lasting as well. More than a ruined but now healed hand and a discarded scholarship, he had the murder of Michael’s mother to carry.  He would survive Michael not loving him, he was reasonably sure of it. He wasn’t sure if he would survive something happening to Michael because of the Manes family legacy. 

Someone knowing how to subdue and take Michael pointed to his family’s involvement. 

He didn’t bother with the visitor’s desk at the hospital foyer this time, walking purposefully toward the elevator and wing where Liz’s new lab resided. The door opened to his touch, revealing Isobel hovering anxiously near Liz’s shoulder as she swabbed a syringe. 

“You made good time.” Isobel greeted.

“I hacked the traffic lights.” Alex informed, setting his laptop case on the lab table, and popping the case open. A few keystrokes and he was inside the hospital network and probably breaking a dozen federal laws of privacy. 

Kyle closed the door, and shook his head, “Seriously?”

“No. I was at the bunker.” He brought up the internal security logs, noting visitors and elevator access. “So what do we know?”

“Not a lot,” Liz replied, her gaze fixed on a spread of swabs and slides. “I’m trying to pull as many samples as I can from this syringe so I can analyze it. There looks to be a reservoir of 3 CCs. My original serum required a dose of at least 6 CCs to incapacitate, so whatever they used was more concentrated.”

“Hopefully less lethal,” Isobel observed. “Are you in the hospital network already?”

“Just what’s linked to the internal wifi signals. I’m going to need access to their security office since it appears the actual camera footage is on a closed circuit.”

Kyle pulled out his ID badge, “I can take you there, but how are you going to get the guards to let you look at the footage? I can still call my mom and make this an official police investigation.”

Alex dug into his pockets for a thumb drive, and then turned to Isobel, “I’m hoping you can influence the guard into letting me download the footage. If you can’t, then we will need to bring the sheriff into this.”

Isobel tapped her forehead knowingly, “If I can’t influence the guards to let you in, I can at least make one of them think he left his car unlocked or his coffee pot plugged in.”

“Let’s go then. Michael has been missing for at least an hour.”

Kyle tapped his badge at certain checkpoints, opening the electronic doors as they headed down to the security room. Alex made a mental note to scrub the ID tags once they were done, on the off chance someone was curious about the movements of a doctor who should have been long off duty.

The windowless room was covered in screens and held one guard boredly sipping his coffee while he watched a television show on his phone. There was a chance they didn’t need a psychic to gain access, but it was probably better safe than sorry.

Alex moved quickly after Isobel held the security guard’s mind in hers and slide behind the desk to call up the footage on the parking garage. Mindful of time, he plugged in his drive and started transferring all the raw data from the camera recordings. The antiquated hospital computing system did nothing to soothe the anxiety. 

Long experience working with poor computing power and broken infrastructure while deployed in Iraq was the only thing that kept his inner impatience off his face. Touching the mouse or tapping his fingers never moved data faster. 

Finally the file clicked over complete, he slid back from the bank of monitors, and nodded to Isobel. The security guard took a deep breath and look around briefly before picking up his phone and restarting the television show on his app.

The door clicked shut as the three of them hastened back to Liz’s lab. His hip barked at the hurried extension he placed on his body. With the clock ticking, the discomfort slipped into the box marked ‘to deal with later’. Once the drive was inserted, it was a matter of minutes to set up a scan for vehcile traffic entering and exiting the hospital parking lot. 

Liz dug out a bottle of acetone for Isobel, who accepted it with a small smile and then nodded over to the laptop. “I hope you are having more luck with the security footage, than I am having with this drug.”

“I grabbed everything from the last 72 hours, just in case. It’s possible someone followed Michael to the hospital,” Alex balanced carefully onto the stool, keeping the weight off his prostetic. “I would have found a less populated area for a snatch and grab, but maybe they were worried about Michael’s powers and if so, then likely they scouted the view points of the cameras before they made their move to minimize their exposure. At least that’s what I would have done, if I had discarded the open road or home as possible targets.”

“Well we all know what a paranoid and careful asshole you are, Alex.” Kyle observed, working on a second set of samples. 

“I try not to repeat my mistakes.”

“Like Caulfield?” Isobel asked pointed. 

A sharp stab of pain went through him at the reminder. As if the prison ever left his mind for a moment these days. “Yes, like Caulfield. I should have found a more covert way to gain information than assume it was abandoned. I should have realized my dad had more going on than surveillance on Roswell.”

Kyle touched Alex’s shoulder with a comforting clasp, “At least we know he’s not personally behind this. Master Sergeant's main nurse likes me, she would have called if something had changed.” 

Alex stayed silent, knowing that his next task would be gaining access to the long term rest home in Santa Fe where they had transferred his comatose father after he had attacked Kyle. There had been initial protests regarding the forged records until he had pointed out the other option had been to kill Jesse. 

The classic body Chevy truck flashed on the screen with the timecode marking it as Michael’s arrival at the hospital. Alex paused and marked the frame for reference, then eased through the later clips watching for his exit. There were two cameras concentrated on the parking lot, one at the entrance/exit, and one with a long panoramic view of the lot, primarily to ward off a car thief or would-be mugger. It was grainy in grey scale, but at least he could be thankful that Michael drove such a distinctive truck. The task of finding an unremarkable Honda Prisius would have been daunting.

His hand stilled as he paused the footage on the slow but unmistakable swagger of a figure striding away from the hospital entrance toward the parked Chevy. Michael’s black cowboy hat hid his face but even absent such an identifiable marker Alex was sure could have picked out his body in a sea of others without question. 

Michael reached his truck with no issue, unlocking the driver’s side door. His hand swept off his hat and casually tossed it into the front seat of the cab. Behind him, in the next parking aisle a nondescript panel van, a door opened slid open and a glint peeked out. Michael reached behind his neck, his body half in the truck and slapping at the skin there. 

Alex inhaled sharply, fear and dread rising. It was a terrible thing to watch knowing it had already happened. Two figures dressed in plain dark clothing emerged from the van, and started toward the truck. Michael’s body half fell from the cab, and curled around the front wheel. Alex watched as the two effortlessly brushed off the weak struggles to fight their grasp of Michael’s shoulders, tugging him backward to the waiting van. 

His body was tossed without care into the back, the door sliding shut blocking the last view of Michael. The two men split up from the van, circling around to the front doors. Alex numbly clicked on the frame, saving it, and switched over to the second camera focused on the entrance. 

Watching his brother Flint calmly pay the ticket machine was not much of a surprise at this point. 

“Kyle, I’m going to need you to call your nurse friend to check on my father.” He was proud that his voice was calm and even, despite the rising sickness within. “The good news is, this wasn’t a government issued black ops team that took Michael.”

“And the bad news?” Isobel prompted.

“It was personal, which means they aren’t as invested in keeping him alive.”

* * * * 

[Isobel details their mental bond. That it feels blank]

“I was always closer with Max. I don’t know if it was a twin thing or being raised together, but Michael was always harder to connect with until recently. We’ve been practicing so much together, he started to take up a bit of space here, “ she patted her chest. “Not enough to fill the void where Max was, but enough that I could tell if he was happy or if he was angry. Strong emotions only came through. Lately it was a lot of anger but he wouldn’t tell me what was going on… “

“And now? Do you feel him now?”

Tears filled her eyes and she shook her head. “It’s empty. Blank. Like it was when we kids before he moved back to Roswell. I think he’s still alive, but he feels very far away, or very weak.”

[Alex waits patiently for the call. He thinks this is going to be an exchange of Michael for his dad, until he realizes his dad is not at the long-term care facility any more]

[Round table discussion at Max’s house to figure out what Jesse wants. Isobel finds out more about the shared past of Michael and Alex- and Maria shows up at the end looking for Michael]

“It’s been 2 days, why hasn’t your dad called with his demands? Is he not reading from the classic villain script this time?” Isobel wondered bitterly. “What is with your family, Alex?”

Kyle injected, “We don’t know that Sergant Manes is involved.”

“Don’t we? He disappeared from the nursing home just before Michael was taken. It seems pretty convenient timing to me.”

Alex pressed his fingers under his eyelids to relieve the building pressure. It had been a long two days of nothing after he received the call that the psuedonmyn he had checked his dad in unrder was no longer a patient in the long-term coma ward in Sante Fe. The staff was calling it a miracle that just after a devoted son had prayed at his bedside, he had woken up. Alex knew it was anything but divine intervention to have Jesse awake and free in the world. 

“Isobel is right, this has Dad written all over it. Somehow Flint found out what had happened and woke him up. It’s been two days because I’m guessing he is still weak from the inactivity.”

Liz stirred from her claimed spot on the couch, cracking an eyelid. “What makes you think there’s going to be a demand, Isobel? Manes has what he wants, a new alien to test and torture. If you look at the research side of things, the aliens in Caulfield were all weak and elderly, and Michael’s a healthy 28 year old. Whatever fucked up weapon he was developing might need a younger test subject.”

“Now there’s a comforting thought.” Kyle muttered. 

“I don’t think it’s research. This still feels personal to me. Michael still has an offensive power to defend himself with, the softer target would have been Isobel if he just wanted an alien to grab.”

“Gee, thanks Alex. Come closer and I’ll show you what I’ve been working on and see if you think I’m still a soft target after I turn your skull into crushed bone.”

***

Alex’s fingers were numb, as he pressed in his code to access his Whatsapp account. Waiting in his inbox was an unknown number and a video attachment. He abruptly dropped into the deck chair as the video opened to his worst fear made real.

Michael’s left eye was swollen shut, blood staining from the corner of his forehead, dripping down his cheek bone. His arms were stretched high above his head, disappearing out of frame. His shirt was missing, and there were sluggishly wounds striping over his shoulder and licking across his collar bone. 

The camera turned, Michael blurring out of view. The monster that starred in seventy percent of his nightmares filled the screen. “Hello, Alex. I was hoping to keep you out of this, son, but this creature is being very uncooperative.” 

Off screen, he heard a weak, “Go fuck yourself, Manes. I keep telling you, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Jesse nodded to someone out of frame, and Michael screamed in agonizing pain. Long hiccuping gasps for air puncuated another softer, “fuck you.”

“Like I said, uncooperative. When we last saw each other, you had something that belonged to me. Jim Valenti stole it from our base, and refused to tell me what he had done with it despite my best efforts at persuading him.” 

Michael cried out again, choking on a soft sob. Alex forced himself to watch, drinking in every detail for his later plans. 

“With N-38 gone, I can’t hurt this thing the same way I did dear old Jim so I’ve had to get creative. Electricity just makes some of them stronger, but good old heat and sharp still work on them. We both know you can break its bones with enough force.” Jesse turned, pointing the camera toward Michael again, focusing on the dangling bare feet. “There are more bones per square inch in the foot, than anywhere else in the body. I am telling you this so you don’t doubt my resolve. This thing is relatively harmless for its kind, and I’m willing to return it to you in more or less good condition, if you bring me what Valenti stole. Let me know what you decide to do.”

The video cut off. 

****

There was an expected role to play, like there always was when Jesse Manes was involved. Once it meant peppering his speech with ‘yes sir’ and ‘sorry sir’ and toning down his clothing in hopes of escaping his fists, and when that proved futile, it went in the opposite direction with makeup, nail polish, and piercings.

For all of his proud talk about the service, his father never served anywhere but stateside. His knowledge of tactical defense and enemy counter measures were likely twenty years of date, and Alex was counting on his father’s pride from keeping him unaware of the technology shift. The set up of the Project Shepherd bunker confirmed that.

He tucked his personal side arm into his thigh holster, securing to his left leg and reached for his secondary weapon to slip into his boot strapped to his prosthetic. The weight of the kevlar and vest registered briefly on his shoulders before it slipped into the blank shroud that had enveloped him as soon as he heard Michael’s cries. Knives and a pair of percussive grenades weighed down each side of his pockets.

A floorboard behind him creaked, his gun cleared the holster before his mind caught up on who would have followed him to his cabin. It was a little concerning that the sound of a vehicle hadn’t registered until now.

“Whoa, don’t shoot.” Kyle lifted his hands, halting abruptly.  He took in the dark clothing, combat hardware and the array of weapons spread on the cabin’s table. “I guess we are going full cliche today, good to know.”

Alex dropped his arm away, resecuring his gun. “Then you know what I’m going to say already.”

“Humor me, then. This is a trap, Alex.”

“I’m well aware.” Alex flipped open a black case and pulled out his phone and laptop. Carefully he pulled out three silver discs, and a pair of jeweler’s glasses. He sat down in the chair, slipping the glasses on to peer down at the discs. “I’m going anyway.”

Kyle sighed, aggrieved. “Well I did promise Guerin if he got his ass kidnapped by the government, I would come to his rescue.”

Alex didn’t look up from his work, pressing a small pin on each disc. “You’re not going with me, Kyle.”

“I know this face is distractingly handsome, but tell me you remember all the time we spent on the range together as kids. I can shoot a gun.” 

“Shooting a paper target is different from shooting at a human being.” Each disc beeped softly, then went silent. He pulled the glasses off with a satisfied smirk, “Besides, I need you to come with the cavalry. These are military grade GPS trackers that I’ve linked to my laptop and my phone. Once my father sees I’m there without the piece of the ship, he’ll take me to Michael so he can teach me a lesson.”

“What makes you think your dad won’t find these trackers?”

“I’m sure he will, but I’ve got a back up plan on that as well. My father has underestimated me my entire life. He thinks I am weak, that my emotions and desires cloud my judgment. He’s going to see he was wrong.”

“Alex.” Kyle hesitated, struggling for a moment before taking a seat at the table. He gently laid his hand on Alex’s wrist, stilling the other man. “We all want Guerin back safe but I want you to consider for a moment that your father is right, that your emotions are clouding your judgment. Because what I’m seeing right now is kind of freaking me out, dude. You’re dressed from head to toe in black ops murder gear with GPS trackers, which I didn’t even know you could buy, talking about going in alone, guns blazing, against your dad.”

“I got them on Ebay.”

“That’s what you’re choosing to focus on?”

“What are my other options, Kyle? He’s got Michael. He’s had him for two days, and there is exactly zero chance he doesn’t want both the UFO fragment and Michael.” Alex wrenched his hand away,. He inhaled deeply and pushed down the swell of thoughts of what had already happened to Michael in two days.

“I agree, but back when I laid him out with barbiturates in our bunker, you and I had a discussion about killing him. I seem to remember we decided against that.”

“No, Kyle, you decided against it and I went along with it. Which was clearly a mistake. This has been a long time coming, okay? He brought this on himself when he took Michael.”

“I knew there was no talking you out of this. I just don’t want you to do this alone.”

* * * 

The lights were all on at the formerly known as Evans-Bracken residence, now just Evans. 

“You look like you’re ready to storm the castle.” Isobel commented, before pushing the door open and turning back into the house. “I still haven’t felt anything from Michael. He could be dead, and all of this would be pointless.”

Alex winced and acknowledged the point before pushing the thought down. “He’s not dead.”

“How do you know? Your so-called cosmic connection?” She sipped from the glass in her hand, the scent of chemicals wafted to him. It was clearly not water.

Gently he wrapped his fingers around her hand, guiding the glass away before resting it on the table next to him. “Maybe, but in reality, if he was dead, my father would have taken someone else as leverage and he would have taunted me with my failure to protect Michael.”

****

[ So as you can see it needs a massive rewrite to fix my characterization- but I still like the plot of Jesse taking Michael for the ship piece- especially since the show fumbled on this so badly in 2x10-2x11. ]

[roseydeloom]

Gremlin Izuku

Ok so this is a continuation of this post that @lovelyflowerlov and I are working on. It started as a shitpost and now we’re here and living our best lives. I’m making this separate just because the other is getting too long to scroll through. Click the link for context on the AU

—————————-

Before some more Battle Trial stuff (which I will get to later) I thought about what exactly Izuku’s quirk and appearance is.

Quirk

Possible Quirk names: Gremlin, Unhinged, Energize

Because we’re having Izuku be a Gremlin Boi™ and thus have, in the words of flower, “Teeth that are even more sharp than a shark, Amazing Bouncy Skills™, never ending enthusiasm, a night owl, and Bastard™ Energy” I say that his quirk is the ability to inhibit the body’s inborn limiters. You know, the things that make it so you don’t tear your muscles from bones everytime you use them. A common example being how your jaw is strong enough to bite off your finger, but your brain prevents you. Mainly basing this off hysterical strength and this video. Izuku can consciously turn this limiter off, both on himself and others. He could chomp his fingers like carrots if he wanted to. But it’s not just muscle limiters

You know that little voice in your head that tells you not to do or say stuff? The social conventions you know to follow, and thus what to do or say? The things that limit your actions? Ya, Izuku’s quirk prevented him from getting that. Though he does kinda have the opposite of it, explained later. He has to actively think about what he can and can’t do in a situation, and sometimes he just forgets or doesn’t understand that there are unspoken “rules” he needs to follow or behaviors he shouldn’t express. When activated on another person, they no longer feel pressured to act a specific way. His quirk also encourages reckless behavior; acting without care for possible harm to self. Izuku has grown up with this urge so he has learned how to fight it off, and actually has remarkable self control to not do 90% of the stuff his quirk tells him to. Not so much the case for people who have this pushed onto them for the first time. Kinda like Trigger and making people act differentenly :)

Example: during the Entrance Exam when he saw Uraraka trapped under gravel and the 0 pointer coming closer, his first instinct was to destroy the robot. To him, the rubble wasn’t the immediate threat and instead the robot that was walking towards her was. Shinsou was the one to convince him to try getting the debris off her first, and go from there. Only after that failed did Shinsou let Izuku enact his insane plan of eating the 0 pointer’s wires (which Izuku then teased Shinsou with the fact it worked and we should have just done that first, Hitoshi)

Because he can use all his muscles whenever he desires, his body naturally has a higher glucose stockpile than normal people to make up for the fact he will use more ATP working a higher volume of muscles (since muscle contractions use energy and glucose is the first energy storage the body burns through). However, he also needs to burn through that energy or else he risks damaging his nerves because of too much glucose in the blood (reason for nerve damage in diabetic people). Thus, he naturally has a higher energy level than other people so he jumps jumps jumps, has never ending enthusiasm, and always likes to be doing stuff. Tapping his foot, twirling his pencil, humming, analysising and writing in his notebook. This does infact burn his energy; mental fatigue is a thing my dudes. This also makes it so he loves to cause chaos, mischief, create pranks, and generally be a little nuisance, since it requires careful planning and energy running around to set it up, but that’s mainly just him being a little Bastard™

Appearance

So I definitely like the idea of him having sharp teeth and being shorter than cannon. I also think this boy would have BIG BONES to make up for the extra stress his quirk puts on them when his muscles are used. This translates into Izuku being a bit more on the chunky side, along with the natural ability to grow big muscles as, once again, a defense mechanism against his quirk. Sum up: he’s that dude that has always been on the bigger side and won’t get stick thin no matter how hard he tries, but when he flexes his arms turn into pure muscle and he can jump over your head from a standing jump. So basically chubby bulky

[Sources: 1 and 2, 3. These images are close to what I’m thinking]

Also I thing he would be darker skinned since he runs around outside in the sun constantly to burn off energy, so he got at least a tan from all that

Quirk Apprehension Test

So once Flower mentioned that we totally just forgot about this part of the plot, I proceeded to laugh for like 5 minutes over the fact we did. I totally forgot this existed until you mentioned it. My idea is as follows

Aizawa: This test is to gauge your abilities, quirks, and potential to be a hero. You are to use your quirks during the test to increase your scores

Some idiot: This sounds fun! We get to use quirks!

Aizawa: Fun? How about this: whoever comes last gets expelled

Class: *shouting*

Shinsou: *worried because his quirk doesn’t help him physically*

Izuku, manic grin spreading across face and turns to Shinsou: *whispers* I have an idea. I’ll use my quirk to help both our scores

They then proceed to complete the test with Shinsou getting better scores than he should be able to get. Aizawa knows this since, while he doesn’t read the entire file on students so he can form his own opinions, he does look over the basic info of name, photo, and quirk name/description. Shinsou shouldn’t be doing this well, and he also acts differently once it’s his turn to preform. Aizawa sees Shinsou and Izuku being more comfortable with one another than they would be if they just met, and in addition to the fact they were together during the Entrance Exam, he guesses that they’re friends and Izuku is using his quirk to bost Shinsou. During Shinsou’s turn for the ball toss, Aizawa cancels Izuku’s quirk so Shinsou no longer receive its effects and throws the ball a lot shorter than everyone expected

Aizawa, glaring at Izuku: I knew it. You’re using your quirk to help your friend

Izuku, turning and smirking: And? What about it?

Aizawa: I could expel you both right now for cheating and interfering with results of a test

Shinsou: *face deadpan but shitting his pants, hoping Izuku will weasel their way out of this*

Izuku, gremlin smirk forming: No you won’t, Eraserhead. If you were doing this test you would have used your quirk to cancel your clasmates’ quirks to put you on a even playing field. I’m doing the exact opposite and helping. Plus, you only said “use your quirks during the test to increase your scores.” You didn’t forbid using our quirks to affect other people’s scores, nor saying we could only increase our own score.

Aizawa, cheshire grin: So you are related to your brother. Alright. Shinsou, throw the ball again and Midoriya, you can use your quirk

Shinsou, thinking: how is always able to pull us out of repercussions for our actions?

Battel Trial

Finally back to what this whole things should have been about! Jeez that took forever and I’m starting to get sleepy typing

Based on the pros and cons you gave and also what amusing me the most because I’ve writing this for 5 hours is that the Villains (Shinsou and Uraraka) should win.

Once Izuku gets over the fact he’s having to battle his basically second brother, Shinsou calms him down and tells him it’s fine, just pretend we’re sparing with Tenko again, he gets pumped af to brawl. Maybe a little too hyped up, since it makes his energy levels twice the ridiculous amount they were before and makes him even more jumpy and animated. Iida interprets this as him not taking things seriously and chastises him for it, which pisses Izuku off because he is taking it seriously. It’s just not being expressed in the way Iida expects it to be expressed. So, he’s definitely not as helpful to him as he could be while in the planning phase, and might have made things a bit harder than they needed to be when explaining the blueprint, just to annoy him.

Shinsou and Uraraka don’t have this problem and quickly come up with the idea to put the bomb on the roof. This is so Uraraka can use her quirk to send things high into the sky with only her nausea as the limit instead of the ceiling, and they’ll bring some more ruble and boxes up there too so she has ammo. She’ll try to stay as quiet as she can to guard and hide the bomb while Shinsou is a few levels below to make the heros think the bomb is there.

A trick they have up their sleeves is that Uraraka noticed that the blueprints had really weird airducts (something only she would notice because it’s so minor) and when they went to check it out, the airducts were actually tunnels disguised as airducts. So now the villains have a way of getting around that the heros don’t, and won’t be seen. With Uraraka directing him from the blueprints, Shinsou has his own private hallways! He can definitely use this in combination with his voice changer :)

I’m not too sure how the fight would go down, but some parts I think would happen is Shinsou trolling them from inside the tunnel with his voice changer. I don’t think he would spring the mind control on him just yet, Izuku taught him to have Fun™ afterall, and would switch between Inko’s and Tenko’a voices while messing with him. I just want my baby to create some psychological torture ok Another thing would be them finding the bomb on the roof and when Izuku’s about to grab it, that’s when Shinsou uses his mind control with AFO’s voice. I’m guessing they had some family videos with him in it so that’s how we knew what his voice sounded like.

Like you said when Izuku got controlled he was in a jump so when he fell he breaks out, but at that point Uraraka had moved the bomb and Shinsou is dealing with Iida. They’re running out of time so Iida and Izuku are starting to become a little desperate, so Iida yells at Izuku to use his quirk on him to make him extra fast so he can grab the bomb. He does, but Iida doesn’t expect it to be so powerful since the other times in the exercise Izuku used it on him he was holding back. Iida becomes a knockoff Sonic and shoot towards the bomb way faster than he expected. He didn’t expect to go the speed of Retro Burst without trying, so he overshoots it and ends up falling off the ledge near Izuku. He’s able to catch himself on the roof, but he’s not able to pull himself up without help and he’s starting to slip. Izuku has to pick between the bomb and Iida, and he decides to save Iida. While pulling him back up the timer goes off and the villains win.

Iida thanks him for saving him while Izuku just kinda goes “Duh, I wasn’t gonna let you get badly hurt if I could stop it. Annoy and inconvenience maybe, but not hurt. Of course I picked you. Anyways gotta go bug Hitoshi”

Just because Izuku is a dramatic bitch, while they’re walking back Izuku jumps unto Shinsou’s back and starts rambling to Uraraka and Shinsou about how cool their plan was, asking about the voices in the hallway and Shinsou’s new mask, clarifying some parts of their plan he didn’t get, and just generally being very animated and his talkative, analyzing self. Iida starts to think that maybe he was too quick to judge the green bean

[notapaladin]

with my heart in my lap

Acatl’s snarky narration: “Or I could grow fangs and turn into a coyote.”

Me: WELL NOW

...yeah, so I wrote were-coyote Acatl smut. I’ve been battling pretty bad physical anxiety symptoms lately (brain: “clearly if someone passes a value judgement on anything related to your new fave thing they are also passing judgement on YOU” me: “that makes...no sense...” brain: “too late, open the gates and release the Fear Juice”) so this maybe isn’t the BEST writing I’ve put out but hey, I managed it!

Also on AO3

-

There were nights Acatl loved. Nights where he could relax with a full belly and a reasonably peaceful heart, where his only major concerns were the day-to-day problems of his temple and any outstanding cases at least didn’t require his personal attention. Nights where he could rest and dream of anything other than blood and death. (And if some of those dreams were of Teomitl’s bright eyes and the curve of his mouth, that was a strictly private matter.)

And then there were nights like this.

He’d been able to sense the change in the air at dawn; as the day wore on, the tension prickling across his scalp and over his skin only worsened. He’d found himself snappish and ill-tempered even with Ichtaca, and had only barely remembered to send a messenger to the palace to let Teomitl know there would be no lessons today. There couldn’t be, with the full moon coming on. At least his order had learned to work around his...condition. Though their High Priest would be indisposed, they could care for the dead just as well without him. Ichtaca had been very firm in making sure he knew that when he’d first been appointed.

(It hadn’t been the most embarrassing conversation of his life, but it was absolutely up there. There just wasn’t a dignified way to discuss an unbreakable curse that put him out of commission every full moon.)

He knew he shouldn’t worry. His priests had matters well in hand, and he’d always maintained enough control over his own mind to ensure he wouldn’t be a physical danger to those around him. Politically...well, that was another matter. He didn’t even want to think about the repercussions for his order if word got out; Acamapichtli would surely love nothing more than to destroy him after what he’d done to Tlaloc. But it would be well. All would be well. All he had to do was stay inside and out of sight until dawn.

As the sun set, he made his preparations. Ichtaca had been by earlier to stockpile plenty of food—duck and rabbit and turkey, venison and the tough flesh of peccaries—so he wouldn’t be half-starved by the time he was done. There was fresh, cold water waiting by his mat, along with thick blankets that he really didn’t need (indeed, the curse always made him run almost painfully hot), but he appreciated the gesture anyway. He’d just lifted his worship-thorns to his ear for his nightly offering to Mictlantecuhtli when he heard something that did not belong in the routine of his cursed full-moon nights.

Someone was coming. For a moment it was almost reassuring—just one of my priests checking on me, I’ll send them away—and then he recognized the footsteps. There was only one person in Tenochtitlan who walked like that, like he was angry at the distance he crossed for separating him from his goal.

He almost couldn’t breathe.

Teomitl.

It was all the warning he had before the entrance curtain jingled with the weight of a hand on it, not yet pushing it aside, and his student’s voice called softly, “Acatl-tzin?”

I have to get him away from here. I can’t let him— “What are you doing here?!” It came out as far more of a snarl than he intended, and if the circumstances hadn’t been so dire he would have felt bad. But his teeth were starting to itch, and that was the first sign.

“One of your priests said you would be indisposed for the next three days. I came to see if there was anything I could do.”

He wasn’t sure which priest he’d sent to the palace; the closer it was to sunset, the harder it was to focus on anything outside of his own body. Suddenly that seemed like a dreadful oversight on his part. Duality, hadn’t they all been warned not to go into details? Or had Teomitl asked, in his usual terribly persuasive way, and had the priest folded like wet paper? He took a deep breath, feeling it rumble through his lungs. His skin felt hot and tight across his back. “No. I am fine—“ A sudden lance of pain scorched through his chest, and he broke off with a cry. “Ah!”

“Acatl-tzin?!”

And then Teomitl was there, in his house, and Acatl couldn’t do anything about it. He was grateful that he was already sitting down; it was easier to breathe as the pain ebbed. When he could think again, he registered that Teomitl was kneeling by his side with warm hands resting on his arms, and his deep brown eyes were very close. “I’m…” He couldn’t even finish the sentence. Like this, it was impossible to lie.

Teomitl’s gaze flickered around the room for a moment before returning to Acatl’s face, eyes dark and serious. “What happened? Should I fetch you a healing priest?”

He closed his eyes. Duality, you won’t leave me alone until I tell you, won’t you? Even though...even though I… Even though he couldn’t bear the thought of Teomitl looking at him with horror and disgust, even though he couldn’t bear the idea of burdening another person—a warrior of imperial blood, no less—with his secret. (Even though a part of him whispered warm and bright in his chest, Maybe it will help. Maybe he will help.)

“Five years ago,” he began, “I fought a shapeshifting sorcerer.” Saying the words brought the events of that night flooding back in a tide of sensation—the brisk night air, the stitch in his side, the blood on his hands and cloak, the savage snapping of teeth in his face. “He was—“ Duality, there had been so much blood. His breath came harsh in his throat, and he knew it wasn’t only due to his own memories. All of a sudden, he hungered. “He took coyote form. To—to hunt. To slay innocents for his own lusts. I slew him, but in his final breath he—cursed—“

Pain stole the words from his throat, and he nearly gagged. Gods, not now. Not now! But there was no stopping it; he barely managed to shove Teomitl away as he collapsed onto his side in the patch of moonlight on his floor, breathing hard. Dimly he heard Teomitl’s shocked cry, but he could find no reassurance to give him. I’m so sorry.

In his more lucid moments, he’d briefly wondered if the sorcerer had suffered through as much pain in his transformations; it wasn’t something Acatl could imagine any sane man choosing. His chest felt as though it’d been hollowed out and filled with fire, the long bones in his legs and feet screaming as they stretched. He could barely feel his face, the pain of a shifting skull and growing jaw simply too much to register. If he’d had any breath, he would have screamed. Next to that, the burning itch of erupting fur was almost pleasant. He clawed off his loincloth frantically, unable to think of modesty past the oversensitivity of his skin. If Teomitl was horrified, he could damn well deal with it.

The agony faded slowly. After long moments during which he counted each heartbeat, he became aware of his own body again. Or rather—his own body, for the duration of each night of the full moon. A man’s torso and arms covered in reddish-gray fur, the head and hindquarters of a giant coyote, hands ending in razor-sharp claws. He licked his lips, tasted blood, and heard his stomach growl.

“...Acatl.” Teomitl’s shaking voice was coming from a spot just within arms’ reach. “Gods. Gods. Is that—are you…?” Words seemed to have failed him.

A sensible man would have run. Acatl, not for the first time, came to the conclusion that Teomitl was anything but. With effort, he nodded. This close, he could smell Teomitl’s skin; if he listened, he could hear his pulse racing hard through his veins.

“Oh, Acatl-tzin.” He didn’t sound terrified. Dismayed, certainly, and perhaps a bit concerned, but not terrified. “Does it hurt?”

He shook his head, taking a deep breath. It was possible to talk in this form, though only with some difficulty. Long words made his tongue hurt. “Not anymore.” After a small eternity, he managed to open his eyes and focus his gaze on Teomitl’s face. He looked smaller like this, more vulnerable. Like prey, whispered his instincts, but he shook the thought away. I am not so much of a beast. And he is strong. It was several more long moments before he could arrange himself into a more or less upright seated position, grabbing at the remains of his loincloth to drape over his lap as his sense of shame reasserted itself.

Someone had to be embarrassed, because Teomitl clearly wasn’t. He was studying him with open curiosity as he moved, head cocked to the side like a bird. Still, he swallowed hard when they made eye contact, and Acatl saw his eyes widen. One hand hovered half-curled in the air, frozen in the middle of reaching for him as he clearly thought better of it. “...Can I...touch you?”

What. But Teomitl was still watching him, and Acatl felt his heart skip a beat. Gods, yes, please. He closed his eyes, barely daring to move, and nodded.

A gentle hand landed on his jaw first, tracing through the thick fur. If it hadn’t been so warm, it might have tickled; as it was, he found himself shivering for an entirely different reason. Teomitl murmured, “Remarkable. Sorcerers don’t usually...leave themselves in this in-between form, do they?” At the minute shake of his head, Teomitl’s fingers tensed. “Thus the curse. Still...Acatl-tzin, I cannot imagine anyone being scared of you like this.”

“...I am a monster.” It slipped out before he could take it back.

“You are not.” Both hands came up on either side of his jaw, cradling his face; he opened his eyes instinctively and found himself meeting Teomitl’s narrowed, serious gaze. “You are Acatl, no matter what form you take.”

He was absurdly grateful to be covered in thick fur. It meant Teomitl couldn’t see how hard he would surely have been blushing if he was in his human skin. “Teomitl…”

Teomitl took a slow breath and dropped his hands. “...I’m sorry. I overstepped.”

Overstepped? It took him a moment to figure out what Teomitl meant, but then he realized. He’s never addressed me like that before. The thought made his heart flop like a landed fish in his chest. Hastily, he shook his head. “No. I—you can say my name. Like that. I don’t...I don’t mind.”

Teomitl’s smile was as slow and radiant as the dawn. “Acatl.” He only hesitated a heartbeat this time before reaching for him again. “Can I…”

His claws dug into his knees, drawing pinpricks of blood, but he nodded. Whatever was between them felt too fragile to disturb with words, but he burned for more—had been burning for more ever since that first proper lesson with Teomitl, where his student had looked up at him and smiled and he’d felt it like lightning in his bones. Duality, let me have this. Even if it kills me, let me have this.

This time, Teomitl’s hands fell to his shoulders. The fur was thinner here and over his torso, no impediment at all to the careful touch tracing wiry muscles and old scars. (He was being so careful—so careful, like Acatl was something rare and precious instead of a beast—but each touch made Acatl’s blood burn anyway.) His voice was warm and assessing, with a smile curving his lips that Acatl was afraid to look too closely at. “Mm...you’re built the same. Larger overall, I think, but the same.”

He huffed out a breath. “Not very...impressive, I know.” Not like Teomitl, whose bare skin was distracting whether it was gilded by sunlight or edged in the glow of the silvery moon. The boy moved like a jaguar, all coiled power and sinuous grace. Even when he was fully human, when a good half of his mind wasn’t taken over by the instincts of the coyote, it was a sight that made him hunger. Xochiquetzal said I’d forgotten what made me alive. Maybe I had. But then, I hadn’t met him yet. Now, it was all he could do to keep his gaze trained on a point just over Teomitl’s left shoulder and his mind on anything but the profound urge to feel hot flesh against his. His pulse thundered under his skin. Though it be jade, it is crushed, as soon as the flowers open they fall...

Then Teomitl slid his hands down over his chest, thumb finding the edge of one nipple hidden under the fur, and all thoughts of hymns and Mictlan flew out of his head. He gasped out loud, snapping his eyes back to Teomitl’s face to find him grinning. “Very impressive to me.”

“Teomitl!” For a small mercy, Teomitl’s hand stilled. Acatl’s heart did not. It was racing, hammering against his ribs so hard it was a wonder they held. He swallowed convulsively past the sudden lump in his throat. He’s so close. So trusting, so...so tender with me. I could—

“It’s true.” Teomitl’s smile turned wicked. “You’re beautiful as a man, you know, but in this form...it’s new. I like new things.”

He thinks I’m beautiful. And he...even in this form he’s...interested. In me, in this most monstrous part of me. His mouth suddenly felt very dry. “Do you, now.”

“Mmm.” Teomitl’s hands slid down lower; it felt natural this time to lean back, shivering, as fingers slid over his flat stomach. The loincloth bunched in his lap was suddenly not nearly enough fabric, not when Teomitl was right there and eyeing him like a feast. “I think I like it a lot.”

He was half hard already; it would take no effort to get the rest of the way there. He’d never looked at himself in this form, but he knew it hadn’t escaped his transformation unscathed—bulbous in some parts, tapered in others, wholly inhuman. And, judging by the hot gleam in his curious eyes, much to Teomitl’s taste. “Ngh. You, uh. You do?”

This time it was Teomitl’s turn to swallow, finally averting his gaze. “Yes.” It was hushed, heated. “Can I—“

“Yes.” He didn’t need to think about it. Anything you want to do. Everything. It’s yours. I’m yours.

Another visible gulp, but then Teomitl’s focus was back on him and he felt heat suffuse his face again. That smile—soft, hopeful, hungry—was entirely too much. “Lay down for me?”

He laid down. It felt strange, honestly; he typically spent his full-moon nights hunched over awkwardly and trying to shrink back into his skin, every moment a prayer for the sun to rise quickly. Being sprawled on his back should have felt vulnerable, and it did, but with Teomitl shifting to kneel between his thighs—gods, there was not enough fabric—it was also making his blood pound. He was powerless to repress the rumble in his throat or the shaky, indrawn breath when Teomitl’s fingers brushed the inside of his hip. “What are you—oh.”

He was bared to the open air, and Teomitl breathed out slowly as he took in the sight. “Oh, very interesting.”

Acatl steeled himself to say something—it’s the mark of a beast, you see the curse couldn’t even leave that alone—but then one calloused hand wrapped stroked around his length from base to tip, and what came out was a shocked, wordless moan.

Teomitl looked distinctly smug. “Hmmm. You are larger in this shape than you are normally. Everywhere. Do you like this?”

“Teomitl—“ He cut off with an embarrassingly needy whine as Teomitl’s grip tightened. “Oh gods…” That wicked hand just wouldn’t stop. His clawed feet dug into the floor under him as he wriggled, seeking more of that friction.

Teomitl stilled his hand. His breath caught in his throat as he shifted, spreading his knees apart, and Acatl only needed to take a breath to smell his arousal. “You do. Duality, you really do.”

I do. I want more. All thoughts of consequences had flown out the window; there was only Teomitl’s hand on his cock, Teomitl’s eyes bright in the darkness. He needed to be closer. Before he could think better of it, he reached out and snagged Teomitl’s cloak to pull him down on top of him; the roughness of his own voice surprised him as he snarled, “I want to touch you.”

Teomitl went willingly, propping himself up on one elbow. In this position they were close enough to kiss if Teomitl felt like braving the fangs; instead of fear or trepidation, his eyes held only the vivid light of desire. He swallowed roughly, rocking his hips forward. If Acatl had had any doubts as to the state of his arousal, they were promptly erased. “You can.”

He shuddered down to his bones. The change in position had left Teomitl’s hand still for the moment, but it was more than pleasure that was coiling through his veins. He wants me. Gods, I still cannot believe… “Even when I’m...like this?” But Teomitl had said he could, and it was impossible to resist; he let his hand drift down over Teomitl’s side to his hip, marveling at how soft the skin felt over such hard muscles.

Teomitl drew back, and for a moment Acatl was afraid he’d misjudged—but then he tilted his head and nuzzled up against his cheek in what was almost a kiss, and Acatl’s heart skipped a beat. “Please.”

Well. Since he’d asked so nicely. He’d never even tried to touch himself in this form—monster hissed the voice in his head whenever he so much as felt a flicker of desire—but now Teomitl was in his arms, warm and solid and alive, and any lingering hints of revulsion were washed away in a tide of desire. It was the work of a moment to tear the loincloth away, fine cotton giving way like paper to his claws and making Teomitl jolt with an eager gasp. Teomitl’s cock was hot and thick in his hand; when he gave it a slow upwards stroke, Teomitl bucked against him with a growl that sent his blood racing again.

“Harder.” Teomitl was working him again, steady though his own hips were rocking roughly into Acatl’s hand; when he shuddered and met his gaze, hazy-eyed, he found himself grabbing for his hip to hold him in place. He’d said harder, after all. And harder was what he got, Acatl stroking him in a rhythm that made him whine. “Nnn...Acatl…”

“Oh,” he breathed out. “You are so good for me.” Teomitl dropped his head against the crook of his neck, burying his face in the thick ruff of fur there; it wasn’t enough to muffle the noise that escaped him, nor the way he arched into Acatl’s grip. He likes that. He—

Then Teomitl was doing something with the angle of his wrist, and his thoughts scattered. There was only the flame heating his blood to an inferno, the pulse of his cock swelling as he approached his release. He wasn’t going to last much longer. “Teomitl—“

The base of his shaft had swelled into a knot; he hadn’t quite realized it at first, but then Teomitl got his hand around it and squeezed and he was coming with a howl. His mind went blank. It was only when the sharp shock of the first peak faded a little and he could think again that he realized Teomitl was still unfulfilled; he pumped his cock faster, and in a few more rough strokes Teomitl was following him over the edge with a hitched gasp.

More. It hit him like a thunderbolt, and his cock pulsed in Teomitl’s hand. Strong fingers rippled around it, and he groaned. It wasn’t enough. It didn’t feel like anything would be enough. He wanted to roll Teomitl over, pin him down, sink in deep. He tried to speak, but only a growl escaped him.

Teomitl’s shaky panting against his neck evened out, and he sucked in a huge breath before letting it out in a sigh. “Gods, you’re still hard. Incredible.”

Words were beyond him. He thrust up into Teomitl’s grip instead, and Teomitl sat up and straddled his thighs so he could put both hands to work. Watching his lover as he pumped one hand over his shaft while the other wrapped nearly all the way around his knot—narrow-eyed, focused, hungry—was almost more than Acatl could bear. Each breath came out in a growl as Teomitl set a pace that left him helpless to do anything but buck into it, half-formed thoughts of more than Teomitl’s hands skittering around the edges of white-hot desire—and then he was coming again, so hard that his vision went white.

For a long moment afterwards, he couldn’t speak. His knot seemed slow to deflate, but it was...enough. For the moment, his desire was sated; he was still twitching, thought he could maybe handle more, but with the edge worn off he could think again. Duality, they’d made a mess. (There might have been less of one if he’d been inside, buried to the hilt, feeling Teomitl hot and tight around him—no. There were limits, surely. Teomitl probably wouldn’t want that.)

Teomitl clearly didn’t care how much of a mess they’d made. He stretched out on top of him, nuzzling at Acatl’s collarbone affectionately. “You feel wonderful.” It came out half-muffled by Acatl’s fur, but he didn’t seem to notice.

He took a deep breath. Hesitantly—even after what they’d just done, it was strange to think he was allowed this intimacy—he slid one arm around Teomitl’s waist and let the other rest at his back, just between his shoulderblades. He could feel each thump of his heart. “...I still cannot believe this appeals to you…”

Teomitl smiled. “Because it’s you.”

He started to respond, unsure of what he was going to say even as he opened his mouth—why or I love you both seemed strong candidates—but the rumbling of his own stomach cut him off, and his ears flattened with shame.

It didn’t help much when Teomitl chuckled. “Hungry, after all that?”

He nodded, feeling his face burn. “It...takes a lot out of me. Changing.” And everything else.

“Hmm.” Slowly, Teomitl pulled away and sat up. There was a clawmark at his hip. “Let’s eat and clean up. And then…” His gaze, drifting around the room, slid back to Acatl with a hopeful gleam. “The night is long, you know. And I’m not especially tired.”

He closed his eyes, letting out a shaky breath. Teomitl was energetic in this, too. “Duality, you are going to kill me.”

“I don’t think so.” He could actually hear Teomitl’s smirk. “You seem to have very impressive stamina in this form.” His voice dropped to a purr. “I’m looking forward to experiencing it later.”

His spent cock gave a hopeful twitch, but then Teomitl was uncovering a tray of roasted venison and he realized he was, in fact, too hungry to give into it just yet. There would be time for such exploration after he’d whetted his appetite.

&

At least turning back was relatively painless. Of course, he still felt like he’d been flattened under the Great Temple when he woke up, but he always slept through the actual shift. He met the dawn naked, drained, and somewhat sticky, but being in his own skin again was a boon in its own right.

And this time, he wasn’t alone. He felt Teomitl’s presence before he even attained full consciousness; there was a warm arm flung over him, a head tucked into his neck, long legs tangled with his. He blinked awake slowly, unsure of what to do, but Teomitl took choice out of his hands by murmuring, “Good morning,” against his skin.

He shivered in pleasure as the words wafted over him. “Mm. Good morning, Teomitl.”

“I love you.” It was barely audible. “I told you that last night, didn’t I?”

He had. Effusively. Their late dinner had led to careful kisses and thorough, wanton exploration as Teomitl coaxed him into some semblance of comfort with his transformed state; by the time they’d both finally been exhausted, Acatl had been forced to admit that being three-quarters coyote did have some advantages. With his inexperience, he doubted it would have been quite so easy to reduce Teomitl to incoherence in his human skin.

The memory of those sweet moments made Acatl shiver. “I could hear it again.”

Teomitl kissed him. It was better—far better—when they both had human mouths; he could mold to the shape of his lips, tilt his head just so, feel Teomitl sigh and arch slowly against him. One hand slid into his hair, a gentle caress, as Teomitl pulled away to breathe, “I love you. No matter what shape you take.”

“Oh?” Their noses were still brushing, waking a contented glow in his chest and bringing a smile to his face. He suddenly found himself with the urge to tease. “Even when I’m only a very boring priest, and not—hm, how did you put it. Interesting at all?”

“Boring?!”

By the time they finally got around to breaking their fast, he was more than glad his priests didn’t expect much of him while the moon was full. Teomitl was very, very thorough when it came to showing him how much he was loved.

[homespork-review]

HOMESPORK ACT 5 ACT 1: Mobius Double Plusungood, Part 2

BRIGHT: Nepeta wants to know what’s going on. Aradia finally stops dodging the question and tells Nepeta she’s dead, but doesn’t elaborate on how it happened. She asks Nepeta to keep it a secret, which Nepeta agrees to. Aradia’s also picked up some froglike traits from being merged with the sprite -- namely a tendency to ribbit.

In retrospect, it’s kind of funny that an active player can merge with a sprite. The role of a sprite seems to involve having detailed knowledge of how the Game works and what the player should do next, but only dispensing vague advice to the player. Prototyping a player would give them full access to that knowledge with no sprite vagueness to get in the way. The Game doesn’t seem too concerned about that, though.

CHEL: Now it’s time to get to know AG better. A doodle of her declaring her to be a HUGE BITCH fades into her standing in her room. Rather gothic, and also filthy-looking; it’s dark, with a red sky outside, and cobwebs and broken Magic 8 Balls lie around everywhere. There’s a FLARP poster and numerous pages of notes on the wall.

Your name is VRISKA SERKET.

You are a master of EXTREME ROLE PLAYING. You can't get enough of it, or really any game of high stakes and chance. You have persisted with the habit even in spite of your ACCIDENT. But then again, you don't have much choice.

Your lusus is VERY HUNGRY, ALL THE TIME. She can only be appeased by the FLESH OF YOUNG TROLLS. You cloud campaigns for teams of Flarpers, utilizing your abilities for ORCHESTRATING THE DEMISE OF THE IMPRESSSSSSSSIONA8LE. Your victories supply you with treasure, experience points, and SPIDER FOOD.

You are something of an APOCALYPSE BUFF, which is something you can be on Alternia. You are fascinated by end of the world scenarios, and enjoy constructing DOOMSDAY DEVICES for the hell of it. You are drawn to means of DARK PROGNOSTICATION and the advantages they offer, particularly in gaming scenarios. Your abilities in this department were hobbled with the loss of your VISION EIGHTFOLD, and you have since sought alternatives through various BLACK ORACLES. You consult with these ominous globes, but routinely destroy them in frustration over the PUZZLING GUARANTEED INACCURACY of their predictions. Breaking them has developed into a habit BORDERING ON FETISHISTIC, and with each you destroy, you add to an insurmountable stockpile of TERRIBLE LUCK. You have to stop. But addiction is a powerful thing.

FAILURE ARTIST: FINALLY we get a name for her and we don’t have to keep saying AG. I imagine the non-Homestucks are feeling like I did when I played Danganronpa 2 finally and saw the “fingers-in-his-ass” guy.

CHEL: She examines a drawing on the wall, of her FLARP character MARQUISE SPINNERET MINDFANG, who is just Vriska in a different coat and seaboots, with a hook instead of her robot hand. She is the scourge of land dwellers and sea dwellers alike, and worst nightmare to silly BOY-SKYLARKS everywhere. She has accumulated more treasure and gained more levels than any member of the PETTICOAT SEAGRIFT class ever. She gained all the levels. All of them.

En route to her computer, Vriska steps on a D4, and complains about how she’s had terrible luck since her mysterious accident. I’d just like it noted that this is a small but noticeable occurrence of Vriska’s tendency to blame others for her problems; if she cleaned her room some time, that wouldn’t happen. Still, she doesn’t worry about it too long, as she’s busy.

So many irons in the fire. Such a tangled web. It is a web full of flaming irons and mixed metaphors.

BRIGHT: Vriska equips her weapon of choice, a set of enchanted D8 dice called the FLUORITE OCTET.

...okay, I’m getting used to characters having semi-absurd weapons, but seriously, what? Let’s review everyone else’s chosen weapons: Hammer, knitting needles, sword, gun, sickles, lance, clawed gloves, walking cane. Sollux had some throwing stars but didn’t assign them to his specibus owing to his telekinesis being enough; we haven’t seen Aradia’s strifekind yet, but she also has telekinetic abilities, and hers are apparently enhanced by her being dead. So that’s a lot of genuine weapons, and some things which aren’t weapons but can readily be used that way in a pinch...and then Vriska has a set of enchanted dice.

It’s a good fit both for Homestuck’s absurdity and for Vriska’s obsession with luck. But it does stand out rather.

Anyway, rolling the dice will execute a wide range of highly unpredictable attacks. Very high rolls can be devastating to even the most powerful opponents. Apparently these work everywhere, not just in FLARP games. Also, while we see ghosts, psychic powers, and superpowered coding, I think this is the only reference to plain magic we have on Alternia.

Vriska steps away from the computer to avoid talking to GA, who she refers to as an unwelcome solicitor, but returns to it when someone else starts messaging her. Vriska calls him this guy; he has no icon -- and, oddly, no username -- and types in white, which means the reader (and Vriska) ends up highlighting the conversation a lot. 

Hello.

AG: Oh my god, why are you talking to me????????

This is the last time we'll ever talk.

AG: Still sticking with the white text I see. So smooth and stylish!

AG: I forgot how much I loved highlighting it to read all the 8oring things you have to say.

AG: It's like a fun game for super extra handicapped retarded people. Like opening a present! Find out what o8noxious thing the mystery tool typed.

AG: What is it!

A parting courtesy, I suppose.

All the ways I've exploited you were meant to bring about the events that will take place this evening.

Knowing this will provide context for the events in your near future, and will affect how you behave in response.

These events will be just as important as those preceding it.

I've gone to great lengths, you see. 

Well, this guy sounds ominous.

Also, using ‘handicapped’ and ‘retarded’ as insults is entirely in character for Vriska, who has no time for people who can’t operate on her level. Currently Vriska’s also being shown as an unlikeable character. We’ll see how that develops.

CHEL: Still, a lot of people really don’t like those words being used casually, and the fact that we need to show you how things develop should imply that they won’t develop in a way you’ll like. So…

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 39

White Text Guy, as the characters refer to him for a while to come yet, continues gloating about how successfully he’s exploited Vriska, who tells him she’ll log off and orders him not to use that nasty trick where you log me 8ack on out of petty douchey spite! WTG says he’ll be brief, though he’s not particularly brief in fact, tells her he no longer hold[s] her accountable for any wrongdoing, and says that if she accepts this, she may get her luck back. Vriska doesn’t believe him and continues to rant, and he points out that her unpleasant, simplistic temperament is what made her so easy to mess with.

If you turn a swarm of wasps on a crowd, the outcome is certain.

He leaves with these even more ominous words:

Though the magnitude of the ensuing destruction resulting directly from your actions will be neither possible or necessary for you to fathom, there nevertheless ought to be a silver lining.

The only question is whether you will live long enough to see it.

Vriska, enraged, lifts a Magic 8 Ball with the intention to smash it, but decides she can’t be bothered, and answers GA, hoping some camaraderie will cheer her up, even if it’s from a meddler. However, GA’s first question is “Is Your Lusus Dead Yet”. Not particularly cheering, is it?

Vriska, for the first time, expresses concern and sympathy for another person when GA says her own lusus is dead, though it may be undermined slightly by her own personal disappointment in never having got to meet said lusus. GA doesn’t seem very concerned, and says “Maybe You Still Can”. According to her, though, all their lusii are dying, as a “Preemptive Consequence” (if that’s a meaningful concept) of the upcoming Game. Karkat blames himself for activating the cursed code, but GA thinks it was inevitable. However, Karkat’s idea of a curse Is Inseparable From His Perception Of Events As Intrinsically Negative And As Tailored To His Personal Dissatisfaction, and so is Vriska’s poor luck. GA points out that if Vriska cleaned her floor she wouldn’t step on so many things. THANK YOU, GA, you made my point for me! Vriska is angry at GA “meddling” so, and demands to know why she does.

GA: Because Youre Dangerous

[...]

GA: Its Ok To Be Dangerous

GA: Lots Of People Are

GA: And Dangerous People Can Be Really Important

GA: Maybe Even The Most Important Sometimes

GA: But It Just Means Theres Got To Be Someone Around To Keep An Eye On Them

As Vriska gets angrier, it’s noted that she puts 8s in her typing in places where they don’t work as Bs or as “eight” sounds, and they become more numerous.

AG: Or you know, if you're so h8gh 8nd might8 an8 th8nk you're so gr8at, m8y88 you c8uld oh I d8n't kn8w........

AG: TRY AND ST8P ME FROM DO8NG B8D THINGS????????

GA: That Wouldnt Work

GA: If I Tried To Stop You You Would Regard Me As An Enemy

GA: Instead Of Merely As A Nuisance

BRIGHT: GA’s strategy appears to be trying to talk Vriska into being a better person, either by persuading her that it’s the right thing to do or by being so annoying that Vriska does the right thing to avoid being meddled with. She’s making an effort, I’ll give her that. And given that she doesn’t live anywhere near Vriska, there isn’t all that much she can do to rein her in.

CHEL: Vriska signs off, ranting about her “Lousy st8pid godd8mn supportive friend!” and heads down the enormous staircase to check on her lusus.

You wonder if any other kid on the planet has such a high maintenance lusus? You DOUBT it.

As a matter of fact, one does and Vriska knows that, but we’ll see them later. Not a continuity error, it’s just Vriska self-pitying.

From a window, we see a doomsday device hanging over a chasm by chains attached to the surrounding cliffs. Vriska built it for an especially powerful and influential member of the nautical aristocracy, with help from an as-yet-unnamed nearby friend. Vriska reaches the bottom of the stairwell, and we meet her lusus, which is…

… a spider about the size of a cathedral. For the sake of our arachnophobic readers, we’ll refrain from posting a picture. Suffice it to say she’s as terrifying as she sounds. Pan out to show the entire valley is filled with cobwebs, and Vriska’s hive is matched by a similar one on the other side of the valley.

Before we move on, I’d just like to chat a little about the astrological symbolisms used here. Vriska’s the Scorpio troll, and it puzzles a lot of people that she’s spider-themed instead of scorpion-themed. Both arachnids, but not the same thing. However, Scorpio does have multiple symbols, depending on the source of the interpretation of the constellation, including the spider and the phoenix. Observe! (I enjoy astrology. Sue me.) Also, a scorpion would be a lot harder to get the story symbolism out of; Vriska is at least attempting to be a master manipulator pulling on strings, i.e. webs. The astrological symbolism and alleged personality traits aren’t used for all of the trolls in general, either. The troll with the sign of Aquarius the Water-Bearer is seadwelling nobility and probably wouldn’t be happy to be represented astrologically by a servant, and Gamzee is basically the opposite of the ambitious and hardworking traits of the allegedly typical Capricorn. Basically the signs are mostly aesthetic and if Huss can work in some connected symbolism that’s a bonus. I don’t consider this a negative thing in particular, though it might annoy some astrology buffs.

Actually, I don’t know how intentional this was, but one fan actually analysed how the social expectations on Alternia are in fact the exact opposite of what would actually suit their astrological sign. It didn’t get finished but there’s some interesting information - read the posts in question here, beware spoilers!

BRIGHT: One amusing consequence of this can be turned into a game: Go to Tumblr, find an astrology post, and see how long it takes to figure out if it’s a Homestuck riff. Some of them even just say ‘Vriska’ for Scorpio.

It’s probably just because I mostly follow fandom-related blogs, but I’ve yet to see a Tumblr astrology post that wasn’t a more-or-less-subtle Homestuck joke.

CHEL: And the ones which aren’t make for great fanfic prompts!

BRIGHT: Vriska’s lusus is fine, as it happens. Vriska pretends to be happy about this, but she’s rather less convincing than Dave is about his own guardianship issues. 

FAILURE ARTIST: And we turn from Vriska to look in her neighbor and it’s….that creepy guy! Hurray!

Your name is EQUIUS ZAHHAK.

You love being STRONG.

You are so strong, you would surely be the class of the elite legion of RUFFIANNIHILATORS. And while such a calling would be quite honorable, you would prefer to join the ranks of the ARCHERADICATORS, perhaps the most noble echelon the imperial forces have to offer. Unfortunately, you SUCK AT ARCHERY. You have not successfully fired a SINGLE ARROW. Every time you try, you BREAK THE BOW. You are simply too strong. You have broken so many bows, it has developed into a habit BORDERING ON FETISHISTIC. You have to stop. But addiction is a powerful thing.

You have a great appreciation for THE FINE ARTS. You use your aristocratic connections to acquire PRICELESS MASTERPIECES, painted in the oldest and most respected Alternian tradition of NUDE MUSCLEBEAST PORTRAITS. These striking depictions of the EXQUISITE FAUNA native to Alternia remind you of the PUREST PHYSICAL IDEAL that must be sought by anyone who professes a LOVE OF STRENGTH. When those of lesser bloodlines turn up their uncultured noses at such stunning material, it MAKES YOU FURIOUS.

Practically everything MAKES YOU FURIOUS. You have so much rage, it can only be expressed through STAGGERING QUANTITIES OF PHYSICAL VIOLENCE. You build strong and sturdy robots, set them to kill mode, and BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF THEM in caged brawls. Sometimes you LOSE TEETH. But they usually grow back.

FAILURE ARTIST: Equius Zahhak’s first name is obviously a take on the Latin word for horses, but his last name is from a Persian demon who is also known as “he who has 10,000 horses”. 

So yes, that furry porn on his walls is high art to trolls. Though the prequel Hiveswap Friendsim, which has artist characters, doesn’t have MUSCLEBEAST PORTRAITS. Maybe Equius is actually weird.

CHEL: Actually, the Friendsim does have musclebeast art; if you squint at the beginning of Nikhee’s route, you can see depictions of white muscular chests flanking the arena, which don’t look like troll chests. Hiveswap proper is rated PG, so we’ll be spared it there, too.

FAILURE ARTIST: Equius is more even-tempered than his introduction suggests. He’s not completely violence-free (as we will see)  but he’s not in a constant ‘roid-rage. Heck, from what we’ve seen before of him he just gets peeved and snotty. 

Equius calls for his lusus Aurthour, who I guess could be called another self-insert. Aurthour is a centaur-type creature with cow udders and a mustache and looks like something out of Hussie’s early comics. Aurthour carries a glass of lusus milk on a platter, presumably from its own udders. Ummm. 

You cannot hope to beat Aurthour in a butler-off. He is simply the best there is.

Sweet, I guess.

CHEL: I wonder how Aurthour contorts around to reach his udder. Centaurs aren’t really known for flexibility.

FAILURE ARTIST: We find out why Aurthour has a shiner. It’s not because of domestic abuse but because when Equius “gently” pats Aurthour, Aurthour bruises. Yet this creature is the only lusus STRONG enough to raise Equius. 

Equius tries to drink the glass, but it shatters in his hand. Which begs the question of why Aurthour doesn’t use an alternative to glass. Well, I guess Equius going straight to the source would be too disturbing even for Hussie. A bigger problem is how Equius can do the fine detail work of building robots when he can’t hold a glass. 

Equius goes into a rage, which just means he stands around in Hero Mode while the lusus milk quickly evaporates. Wait, quickly evaporates? What is it made of?

CHEL: I assumed the heat of his rage boiled it.

FAILURE ARTIST: Equius tries to equiup equip a bow but fails due to his strength. Like the glass smashing, this is a normal occurrence. You’d think he’d give up but apparently breaking bows is like popping bubble wrap to him. Expensive bubble wrap. So he has the useless 1/2bowkind, a bowkind for when he’s ever that lucky, and the fistkind which he actually utilizes. Yes, in Homestuck, you can register your fists as lethal weapons. 

Equius talks with Nepeta and the narration summarizes like thus:

CT: D --> Yes AC: :33 < no CT: D --> Yes AC: :33 < no CT: D --> Yes AC: :33 < no CT: D --> Yes AC: :33 < no CT: D --> Yes AC: :33 < no CT: D --> Yes AC: :33 < no CT: D --> Yes AC: :33 < no

Equius is still worried about his good friend Nepeta, so he decides to relieve his stress by talking with another friend. And here comes a line fans take as meaning trolls don’t have friendship. 

It should be noted that in troll language, the word for friend is exactly the same as the word for enemy.

Though that line contradicts Equius considering Nepeta his friend only a few lines back. This worldbuilding sucks. 

CHEL: Well, he doesn’t treat her the way a human should treat a friend at this point.

FAILURE ARTIST: So Equius trolls this frienemy who turns out to be Gamzee.

centaursTesticle [CT] began trolling terminallyCapricious [TC]

CT: D --> Have I ever told you what a reprehensible disgrace you are

TC: hAhA, fUcK yEaH, oNlY eVeRy MoThErFuCkIn DaY bRo!  

Yeah, Equius, pretty much everyone tells Gamzee that every day. 

Equius says he wants get some things off his chest, which giving what we later learn about troll relationships might be adulterous. Gamzee tells him not to let his feelings be bottled up lIkE a FuCkIn AlL sHaKeD uP bOtTlE oF fAyGo and this metaphor makes Gamzee thristy. Equius berates Gamzee for drinking soda, which seems harsh but we later find out soda is booze for trolls. He’s also angry at Gamzee for doing sopor slime. Now, fans think Karkat didn’t like Gamzee doing sopor slime but we never actually see it. It’s just Equius who cares. This leads to an exchange I find interesting.

CT: D --> You will stop

TC: WhOaAaA, i WiLl?

TC: hOw Do YoU kNoW tHaT?

CT: D --> No, you don't understand

CT: D --> It's not a predi%ion, it's an order

CT: D --> I command you to stop

Gamzee is so passive he finds it hard to imagine making decisions that will change his future. Sad. And when Gamzee does get what Equius means:

TC: Oh, AlRiGhT bRoThEr.

TC: yOu MoThErFuCkIn GoT iT.

CT: D --> What

CT: D --> Are you serious

TC: yEaH.

TC: I mEaN, yOu GoT tO sHoW sOmE fAiTh In YoUr FrIeNdS, cAuSe ThEy'Re AlL tHe OnEs WhO'rE bEiNg To LoOk OuT fOr YoU.

TC: sO fUcK iF yOu SaY i'M nOt DoInG tHe ShIt RiGhT, tHeN wHaT tHe MoThErFuCk Do I kNoW!

CT: D --> No

CT: D --> This is una%eptable

CT: D --> Ok, let's start over

CT: D --> I apologize

CT: D --> I was completely out of of line, and I'm sorry

CT: D --> I have no right to talk to you like that, or tell you what you can't do

TC: aWw, No WoRrIeS!

Gamzee was ready to kick sopor slime except Equius backed down. Wondering about the timeline where Equius didn’t back down. 

Still, Equius begs Gamzee to behave like a superior. Gamzee asks what that means and Equius gives a very creepy answer.

CT: D --> 100k, it isn't that difficult

CT: D --> Try to be cognizant of your desires and needs

CT: D --> And attempt to regard those around you as simple vehicles meant to bring about your gratification

At least Equius is a hypocrite...most of the time.

Equius asks what Gamzee is doing and Gamzee relates his adventures in Sgrub. He bonked an imp on the head and scared another with a horn and eventually ended up sharing pie with them. Equius likes the tales of valor but is disappointed with the peaceful end. 

Equius asks Gamzee to roleplay and Gamzee says yes; there’s an uncomfortable sequence where Equius tries to get Gamzee to virtually dom him. Gamzee is terrible at being assertive, but Equius is still whipped into a state of contrition. Basically, Equius is getting off on this. 

CHEL: It should be noted that tricking a child into sexual behaviour is a form of abuse even when it’s done by a child of the same age. Not cool, Eq, and not funny, Hussie.

CALL CPA PLEASE: 11

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 40

SEND THEM TO THE SLAMMER: 4

Though, while that is clearly the reading we’re meant to get from that, I have to say Equius never reads to me like he’s actually enjoying being ordered around. With Gamzee he’s just frustrated that he’s not behaving in a correct manner, and in later exchanges he seems knocked off-balance by the normal social order being upended. I know I’m just projecting, but it reads more like he has some issues with anxiety or OCD and is desperate for someone else to take control and tell him what they want him to do so he doesn’t have to worry. He sweats constantly during these exchanges, which is supposed to imply he’s aroused, but people sweat when they’re worried or afraid too.

FAILURE ARTIST: On a lighter front, Equius says he doesn’t live near the ocean, which considering his neighbor regularly goes on a pirate ship is an odd thing to say.

CHEL: How near is “near”? He might just mean not within walking distance so he can’t casually wander out to the sea like Gamzee does.

FAILURE ARTIST: Equius ends by wondering about the social order that puts someone like Gamzee above him but someone as graceful and poised as a certain mysterious she is of the lowest caste. Gamzee (and the readers) ask who she is and Equius brusquely says D -->I shouldn’t be talking about this D → You’re the enemy before signing off. 

CHEL: If one’s been paying attention, one can guess.

Next, Equius and Vriska are in cahoots. Cahoooooooots. Vriska declares her intention to meddle, and they have a brief exchange about sarcasm. It’s horribly inconsistent whether trolls have sarcasm or not, as I’ve pointed out before. Already gave a point for it, though.

Anyway, Vriska asks if Aradia’s present is finished. It is.

CT: D --> But I don't understand why you're intent on gratifying that worthless peasant

AG: 8ecause I promised I would and it's none of your damn 8usiness! Man.

Their plan is to let Aradia usurp Sollux as leader with her cute little ploy (recall her sending him to sleep and letting him swallow mind honey earlier), then both snatch power from her and become joint leaders. Each asks the other if they’re planning something sneaky and each insists they’re not. Equius can sense that Vriska is trying to read his mind, and when she won’t stop, he takes control of her cybernetic arm, which he built, and makes her slap herself in the face.

FAILURE ARTIST: So given that Vriska tried to read Equius’ mind, despite the dangers (both physically and mentally), it is unbelievable she refrained from reading Karkat’s due to delicacy. 

I think Hussie has said in his commentary that Vriska had a crush on Equius. The fandom prefers lesbian Vriska at this point and so has ignored that. YMMV on if there is evidence of a crush in the text but I find the idea amusing. 

CHEL: Equius goes to fetch the present for Aradia which he was supposed to give to Vriska.

You naturally will doublecross your accomplice, just as you assume she has plans to doublecross you. You assume she is assuming the same of you. Business as usual for blue bloods.

How the hell does this society get anything done?

You will deliver it to Aradia yourself to gain her favor, and then doublecross her and take your rightful position as team leader. How ironic that someone of your blood purity must work to win the favor of the lowest sort of peasant. Humiliating. Strangely titillating, even. But in the end, class order will be restored.

He takes the tarp off the present, and it is…

Why, Aradia. It appears the red glass of your eye has caught the pink and green glint of the moons in their perigees. The sweet poetry almost makes a man forget how the grime that once filled your veins made his stomach turn. It is a good omen for illicit lovers. Could you imagine the scandal if anyone found out?? No one must ever know.

But worry not. Your heart will pump no more of that despicable red sludge. You have been given a new heart. You can be taught the ways of the class you were always meant for. No one is beyond redemption.

Be grateful, dear Aradia. For the first time in your meaningless life you have met a man with true compassion.

Jesus fucking Christ. See what I meant when I said his interactions with girls were worse than his posters? No points because it’s supposed to be creepy, and with the teachings of his society it’s not entirely his fault, but wow.

FAILURE ARTIST: Well, his interaction with a girl is creepy. His relationship with Nepeta is more problematic than fans remember but that’s two-sided and not infatuation. As for Vriska, he’s cold and business-like with her. He collaborates with GA but that’s off-screen and was probably also business-like. Meanwhile, he has lustful interactions with most every male character. We’ve seen how he acts with Gamzee and we’ll see more later. Equius’ interactions with guys are another example of Hussie using male attraction to other males as a punchline.

CHEL: But yes, he’s built her a robot body. Unfortunately for everyone involved, while making out with it, he feels judged by one of his battlebots, gets angry, and punches it. It goes flying out the window and robosplodes above the valley, and its remains hit Vriska’s doomsday device, setting it off. It breaks before it can actually destroy the planet, but the chains holding it up snap, sending it swinging into the cliffside, causing another explosion. The cliff collapses, taking part of Equius’ hive with it, sending Aurthour plummeting into the chasm and crushing Vriska’s spider lusus under tons of rubble.

Cutting back to before that, we see Terezi battling imps on her treehouse’s rooftop, when Vriska messages her, declaring that playing the game together means breaking their truce. Terezi says that’s not what the truce was about; it was about STOPP1NG TH3 3NDL3SS CYCL3 OF R3V3NG3 and Vriska not using her powers maliciously anymore. Terezi’s next couple of comments are just calling Vriska a liar so I’ll just take Vriska’s, to further illustrate her behaviour.

AG: Man, you like to give me such a hard time a8out all that. I can't catch a 8reak! AG: Can't you see I'm trying to put all that 8ehind me and make amends with every8ody? AG: No, of course you can't see that. What am I saying! [...] AG: I'll prove it to you. I'm giving Aradia a present that will make her feel all 8etter finally. AG: Then I'll 8e in the clear. Phew! Totally redeemed. You'll see. I mean smell.

Vriska appears under the impression that large flashy gestures are the important part of an apology, not actual sincerity. Terezi points out Aradia doesn’t care about anything anymore and probably won’t care about this.

AG: Man, why can't you cut me some slack for once???????? AG: It's not like I even did anything that 8ad to you. AG: I lost seven eyes 8ut you only lost two! I would say you came out ahead in the 8argain. GC: 1 KNOW GC: 4ND 4CTU4LLY GC: 1 N3V3R R34LLY GOT TH3 CH4NC3 TO TH4NK YOU >:D

Vriska’s disbelief aside, Terezi really is serious here. Not surprising to the reader, her blindness is basically a superpower.

AG: Remem8er Team Scourge? How convenient all that must 8e to have forgotten! You were so nasty. AG: Oh man, if you crossed Terezi Pyrope you were fucked!!!!!!!! GC: Y34H 1F YOU W3R3 4 B4D GUY GC: W3 W3R3 SUPPOS3D TO B3 L1K3 4 V1G1L4NT3 DUO D1SP3NS1NG JUST1C3 GC: 4ND YOU COULD T4K3 TH3 B4D GUYS HOM3 4ND F33D TH3M TO YOUR STUP1D SP1D3R GC: BUT 1NST34D YOU JUST F3D H3R 3V3RYBODY! GC: 4ND L13D 4ND L13D 4ND L13D

Okay, this little exchange needs some more dissection. Terezi is supposed to be the “good cop” of Team Scourge, the by-the-book one on the side of the law. But we saw what Alternian law is like, and later on we’ll see demonstrations that things such as having a birth defect or, according to Hiveswap, owning fiction which so much as mentions the possibility of rebellion, are punishable by death. Not only is this not making Terezi look any better, if she’s as obsessed with the law as we saw, who would she deem not a “bad guy”, and why would Vriska have such a shortage of “bad guys” that she’d need to take anyone else? Hussie appears to have forgotten that the Alternian concept of justice is different from the Earth one.

FAILURE ARTIST: And what we would consider a “bad guy” wouldn’t be the same on Alternia. There’s tons of trolls murdering other trolls on Hiveswap Friendsim without any hint that’s illegal. It’s probably completely lawful for a highblood to kill a lowblood just because the lowblood annoyed them.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 29

BRIGHT: Maybe. I’d say what this shows us, and is intended to show us, is that Terezi’s sense of justice isn’t just based on Alternian law, but on her own moral code. The law made it perfectly acceptable for Vriska to feed lowbloods to her lusus regardless of whether they’d done anything, but Terezi didn’t think it was right, and for her that superseded the law. She’s the ‘good cop’ not because she always follows the book, but because she’s willing to ignore it.

We also know she thought Vriska was on the same page as her. Note that Terezi makes two accusations here — the first is that Vriska killed people who don’t deserve it, and the second is that Vriska lied to Terezi about doing so.

CHEL: That may be what it’s intended to show us, but what we’ve already seen is that she worships the law; she draws and gleefully licks pictures of the head of the troll court, His Honorable Tyranny, and she shows no concern in her roleplay with hypothetically executing people for relatively trivial crimes. That makes this a bit… shaky, IMO.

BRIGHT: True. Terezi may have stopped killing since her FLARP days (or, at least, we get no indication that she’s still doing so), but it doesn’t seem to have shaken her belief in the Alternian legal system. Just her belief in Vriska, who even brings up a similar point.

AG: Well if you want to know what I think, you should start changing your tune. AG: Cause even though you got all these highfalutin morals and fancy reserv8tions, you know as well as me that a killer is a killer is a killer! AG: There 8n't no ch8nging your ways for good, and one d8y you're going to flail that silly l8ttle cane of yours and not find n8thin to 8ump into, and fall f8ce first into the shit ag8in. AG: And you're going to do something t8rri8le to some8ody and wish you could t8ke it 8ack 8ut you c8n't!!!!!!!! AG: And then you'll work hard to win 8ack their trust, and you'll try and try and tr8, and you'll see how hard it is! AG: You'll seeeeeeee!

Vriska’s making this all about her own feelings about Terezi abandoning her, but she’s not wrong.

Vriska hears the doomsday device exploding and the subsequent rockslide, and goes to  find out what it is. Terezi tells her not to get crushed.

The next page jumps back in time again -- this time, quite far back. Terezi’s eyes are normal, and she’s talking to Aradia about Tavros’s recovery. Aradia says he’s probably paralysed for life. Terezi brings up the possibility of getting him robo-prosthetics, but after the Vriska debacle Aradia is firmly against having anything to do with bluebloods.

CHEL: Terezi warns Aradia that revenge attempts will end badly and she wants to handle it. Aradia says Vriska isn’t able to control her, but Terezi says Vriska will find a way to harm her anyway. They lament how they were both distracted by the same person.

AA: wh0 was he anyway GC: PR3TTY SUR3 1T WAS VR1SKAS FR13ND AA: what was he d0ing there AA: watching us GC: WHO KNOWS GC: H3S NOT R34LLY H3R FR13ND THOUGH GC: YOU SHOULD S33 HOW H3 T4LKS 4BOUT H3R B3H1ND H3R B4CK GC: SH3 H4S NO 1D34 HOW B4D H3S PL4Y1NG H3R GC: BUT TH3N 1 DONT TH1NK H3 KNOWS HOW B4D SH3S PL4Y1NG H1M 31TH3R

This sounds like they mean Equius, but we’ll see. Aradia feels she’s letting Vriska win by doing nothing, but Terezi has a plan. She confirms that her friendship with Vriska is over.

Cut to Aradia’s house, and here I need to go into a bit more detail. This is her house:

Aradia’s a maroonblood, the lowest of the low on the hemospectrum, peasantry and cannon fodder and supposedly extremely numerous. Yet her house looks to be about the size of the entire block of flats I live in, and she lives in it alone, with no other buildings at all in sight. In the next page, we see inside her house, which looks exactly the same as all the others; she has piles of roleplaying books and posters and a computer, and nothing looks to be in disrepair.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 30

BRIGHT: Her house also looks a lot like Tavros’s, what with the windmill feature on top and the brown hangings rather than maroon, which threw me off at first.

CHEL: We’ll talk about this more later. For now, let’s stick with the most noticeable thing; Aradia is alive! Her skirt is untattered and her eyes have colour and pupils. Her lusus is alive too, napping beside her. It’s not quite clear what it is exactly; it has a sheep-like head, but its body is long and slim with much bigger hind legs than forelegs. Could be supposed to be dragon-like? I’ve also seen it interpreted as kangaroo-like. I don’t think we ever get a better view of it.

Anyway, Aradia knows Terezi’s advice is sound, but she can’t bear not to do something to Make her pay. She puts her hands up to her temples, and the image fades back and forth with one of wrapped troll corpses in Spidermom’s web…

It's a shame it had to come to this. You don't like summoning the spirits of the dead to settle scores.

But if she had to face her victims again, maybe she'd finally learn to feel remorse.

OOOOOOOOOO

This begs the question, how the fuck can the highbloods oppress people who not only hugely outnumber them but can shoot lasers from their eyes, control animals, and summon the dead at will? Well, there’s actually some explanation for that. The player trolls all appear to have unusual levels of power, for whatever their given powers are; most maroonbloods can’t do this. In Hiveswap a main character is a more typical maroonblood, who can just about bend spoons with his telekinesis and not much else (though we haven’t seen him speak with dead yet, and it’s possible he’s better at that). Not all trolls even have their caste’s powers, as far as I can tell, as we do see a yellow in Hiveswap Friendsim who’s not a psionic and some ceruleans who don’t seem to have mind-control powers as well. Head or eye injuries, which aren’t exactly rare in Alternia, can cause the loss of said powers. Also, the highest blood castes have powers of their own and other things to hold over the lowbloods’ heads. It’ll be a while till we get to that, but I’ll say now it is convincing, we do not have an Oppressed Mages scenario.

Anyway, Aradia does her thing…

As Vriska cowers on her floor, White Text Guy messages her again. Vriska replies angrily, ghosts looming over her shoulders.

Aren't you going to kill her?

AG: Who????????

Your friend.

The one who summoned the spirits.

AG: Will that make them go away?

Does it matter?

She brought them here to torment you. This obviously warrants revenge.

Vriska asks why WTG doesn’t kill Aradia instead, since he helped kill Tavros; he replies “All I did was stand somewhere for a few minutes. I just gave you an opportunity to do something you wanted to do anyway.” So, seems it wasn’t Equius they meant earlier. Vriska protests she never intended to kill her gaming companions, and blames him.

Again, I didn't talk you into anything, nor am I doing so now.

You were, and are, going to do this regardless.

I only ever place myself into positions of tangential involvement with events that will bring about my employer's entry into this universe.

I oversee the events as they take place, and ever so slightly nudge them into motion when necessary.

BRIGHT: Looks like Aradia and Terezi haven’t told her Tavros survived, which is eminently sensible. This conversation also highlights another Vriska trait: That she’s a very active person, but will try to shift responsibility as soon as she doesn’t like the consequences. That could be a result of her upbringing -- Vriska had to actively go and kill people for Spidermom, but she wasn’t responsible for the overall situation. (Although -- how much did she do to ameliorate it? By the time SGRUB starts, Spidermom’s far too big to fit into Vriska’s home. Vriska might have been able to get away with not feeding her at that point; there’s not much Spidermom can do if she can’t get to her.)

CHEL: The later addition to the canon, Pesterquest, claims that the lusii can psychically nag their charges and she could bother Vriska that way, but that directly contradicts Act 5, in which the trolls want to prototype their lusii so that they’ll be able to communicate properly with them for the first time, and also couldn’t Vriska just move further away?

BRIGHT: Inertia is very much a thing, and people do often just settle into a rut of ‘this is the way things are’ even when something could be changed, so it’s not improbable that it wouldn’t occur to Vriska to move — come to that, I don’t believe it occurs to anyone else either — but the fact that it doesn’t occur to her does say something about her character. 

CHEL: Also, why didn’t Vriska feed the spider on animals? The possibility is never so much as considered by her or anyone else, though it seems the most obvious thing to do. Sure, the spider might be picky, but as we said, it can’t leave the valley due to its size, or it’d be hunting for itself. If it’s left with the choice to eat cows or die, it’d presumably pick the former, especially since the lusii aren’t supposed to be sapient and thus wouldn’t have the capacity for spite. For assuming that Vriska did what she had to when such a screamingly obvious better option is never addressed, here we go with a new count, which will rise whenever Vriska’s horrible actions are excused.

ALL THE LUCK: 1

 Back to the scene, Scratch claims omniscience, which Vriska mocks.

AG: Sure you know a lot, 8ut I know for a FACT there's stuff you don't know.

That's true.

But the gaps in my knowledge exist by design.

They are the pillars of shadow on which my comprehensive vision is built.

Necessary pockets of void meant to effectuate outcomes I've foreseen and which will require my influence.

Each dark pocket, in time, will be filled.

[...]

I don't lie.

Deception is only necessary for those like you to achieve their objectives.

I play with my cards face up.

Isn't it funny how during our various matches, I can tell you what my moves will be in advance, and still win?

Vriska, angered by this, does in fact plan to kill Aradia; Not much point in living with all these moaning spooks just to spite some guy you don't give a shit about. She can’t control Aradia because Aradia’s own powers get in the way, but there are other people she can use.

How about this guy? Unfortunately, you can only control him about half the time.

Then again, that should be all the time you need.

Cut back to Aradia’s place, and she receives a message from Vriska, telling her her boyfriend is outside. 

BRIGHT: Vriska also lightheartedly tells Aradia she’s sorry, and that she’ll make it up to ‘him’ someday. Presumably ‘he’ is meant to be Tavros, except that Vriska seemed to think Tavros was dead in literally the last conversation she had. This is probably just a slip-up on Hussie’s part, but it’s possible to read this as Vriska referring to a different ‘he’ entirely, considering what’s about to happen.

CHEL: Aradia looks, and sees a figure hovering telekinetically over the fields....

Note what’s in his hand. You do not under any circumstances eat the mind honey… His eyes start flashing and Aradia looks afraid, but we suddenly cut to a view of Alternia, and then to a closeup of its green moon. The prompt instructs us to Be the white text guy, and we meet him in a very familiar-looking green mansion.

You try to be the white text guy, but fail to be the white text guy. No one can be the white text guy except for the white text guy.

The white text guy is known as Doc Scratch.

He is an officer of an indestructible demon known as Lord English. His job is to pave the way for the arrival of his master, who will be summoned upon the termination of the universe. He has worked at this task for many centuries, and will continue to do so until THE GREAT UNDOING.

Scratch is Alternia's FIRST GUARDIAN. Every planet destined for intelligent life has such an entity meant to protect it, and facilitate the planet's ultimate purpose. A first guardian is typically almost as old as the planet itself, and each has a unique, circuitous origin through the knots of paradox space. They can be born into a great diversity of forms, though they all share a common, especially potent genetic sequence. 

Remember Rose’s MEOW book, and how DD used it to create Becquerel? Yep.

The code grants them near omnipotence, and when merged with a host of great intelligence, near omniscience as well.

BRIGHT: Only near-omniscence, however. Scratch is surprised to find Terezi contacting him, but he’s able to work out that she got Sollux to help pretty fast:

Occasionally I discover there are things I have not always known.

It gives me the opportunity to make deductions, which are practically always flawless.

It's gratifying.

He also suggests she call him ‘Mr. Vanilla Milkshake’, and then hints that Aradia might not be straightforwardly dead by stating that Sollux and Terezi believe she is dead, and will soon believe she is not, both of which are true statements about their beliefs rather than reality.

Props to Hussie on this: I’m pretty sure every Homestuck fan wants to punch Scratch in the face. He’s just so obnoxious. 

Terezi, however, refuses to let Scratch keep derailing her for long. She wants Scratch to get involved in their feud again, and she has a good reason for him: She knows how Vriska’s been able to come so close to beating Scratch in their games lately. Before she can tell him, though, she needs to talk to Vriska again.

She starts by asking how Vriska feels about killing Aradia, after she promised not to. Vriska responds with dramatic insincerity about how she feels awful, and then says Terezi should be happy that Team Charge is out of the picture. 

AG: Uuuuuuuugh, what do you want from me????????

GC: 1M NOT SUR3

GC: 1 GU3SS 1M LOOK1NG FOR SOM3 R34SON TO CH4NG3 MY M1ND

GC: 1 DONT KNOW WH4T YOU C4N S4Y TH4TLL DO 1T

GC: 1 SORT4 HOP3 TH3R3S SOM3TH1NG THOUGH

In the end, there isn’t. Terezi tells Vriska she’ll be dead in a couple of minutes, and to ‘CONSULT W1TH YOUR L1TTL3 4DV4NT4G3’ if she doesn’t believe it, then leaves the conversation.

Vriska’s little advantage turns out to be a MAGIC CUE BALL, which is similar to a magic 8 ball except that it’s predictions are specific and accurate, and it lacks a portal through which the user can read said predictions. Fortunately that’s not an obstacle for Vriska: Her VISION EIGHTFOLD allows her to see through the opaque casing.

CHEL: Vision Eightfold is the vision from the one of Vriska’s eyes which has seven pupils, which she covered with an eyepatch with seven rubies on it when she was FLARPing. Also remember that Jade had a Magic Cue Ball but couldn’t read it? Yeah, it’s another one.

BRIGHT: One other thing: According to rumour, it used to belong to the man on the moon.

As Vriska asks the cueball whether she should be worried about Terezi’s threat (answer: YES), Terezi lets Scratch know where his missing property has gone. Vriska asks the cueball how it’s going to happen…

I WILL EXPLODE IN YOUR FACE.

Boom.

This section is one of my favourite Terezi moments. It really shows off Terezi’s ability to outthink and manoeuvre people. She’s never spoken to Scratch before, but she still plays him against Vriska easily.

CHEL: This is why Vriska has a plain eyepatch and a robot arm in her future appearances, but she’s otherwise fine. Bluebloods are tough, apparently.

BRIGHT: Back in the future, Spidermom has survived the rubble falling on her, but just barely. Vriska puts her out of her misery with her magic dice, which summon up a massive guillotine and decapitate the lusus, drenching Vriska in spider blood.

GORE GALORE: 11

The decapitation sets off another landslide, sending Equius’s house straight down on Vriska’s head, but before it can land, a portal opens underneath it and transports it into the Medium.

Vriska promptly jumps on Trollian to freak out about this, because her plan depended on her getting Aradia’s surprise present from Equius to pass along and then Aradia and Vriska entering the Medium together, and never mind that a house was about to fall on her -- in fact, when Aradia points out that Vriska was about to die, Vriska accuses her of planning this. Aradia placidly agrees.

CHEL: This is part of my evidence for thinking Vriska might not be neurotypical. Not the priorities most people would have. Also, meanwhile, note that the lusii have the same blood colour as their charges, while the non-lusus animals Nepeta killed were black and had red blood. I’m not sure whether that’s a species trait, or a side effect of the weird bond between them (doesn’t make a lot of biological sense, but then this is basically fantasy with a sci-fi coat of paint).

Vriska is enraged by things not going the way she planned; her grand gesture of apology, the robot body, will now be handed over by Equius and not her, ruining her chance to be friends again with Aradia. Again, she doesn’t seem to understand how apologies work.

AA: were we ever really friends

AG: Yeah!!!!!!!!

AG: I don't know. I felt like we were even if you didn't think so.

AG: I guess I'm not very good at acting like a friend. Or saying stuff like, hey friend! You're my friend! It doesn't really occur to me.

For some strange reason related to her prototyping with the frog statue, Aradia types out “ribbit” into the chatbox, and informs Vriska she’s not on the Blue team as she expected, enraging Vriska further. Vriska accuses her of taking revenge, which Aradia denies, saying Vriska was always going to be on the Red team, and that she doesn’t care about her death.

AG: You're so infuri8ing! Why c8n't you just h8 me? It would 8e a lot easier th8t way.

AG: Or at least feel 8othered or annoyed or S8METHING! God!!!!!!!!

AG: May8e I sh8uld just rip my he8rt out of my chest and pound it to a 8loody pulp here on my desk with my sup8r strong ro8ot arm.

AG: Pound pound pound pound pound pound pound pound!

AG: Look at that, more nasty 8lue 8lood all over me. Why not! Might as well op8n the floodg8s and p8nt my whole hive with this oh so envia8le cerulean SWILL.

AG: 8ecause clearly it's up to me to feel em8tions for the 8oth of us, you misera8le soulless witch!

AA: 0_0

AG: I h88888888 you!

AG: H8 h8 h8 h8 h8 h8 h8 haaaaaaaate!

AG: I only regret killing you cause it m8de you so 8ORING!!!!!!!!

AA: s0rry

Aradia assures her that the teams are meaningless, but being on the Red team will put Vriska in the position they need her in. Vriska’s confused and angry, and leaves the chat.

In Equius’ LAND OF CAVES AND SILENCE, he trolls Aradia again, telling her he will be the sole leader, which she doesn’t care about. He’s surprised she isn’t objecting, and says he needs a towel.

CT: D --> Never mind

CT: D --> I'm trying to stay professional about this

AA: ab0ut what

AA: what are y0u talking ab0ut

CT: D --> Forget it

CT: D --> It's just pleasant to consort with one of lesser breeding who clearly understands her place

He’s been established to suffer from hyperhydrosis, but he’s clearly also supposed to be getting off on this, which, since he’s thirteen, is icky to read.

CALL CPA PLEASE: 12

It only gets worse.

CT: D --> I 100k forward to seeing how well you serve me, server player

AA: uh

AA: thats n0t quite the meaning 0f the w0rd server

CT: D --> What do you mean

AA: as y0ur server i manipulate y0ur envir0nment t0 help y0u advance

CT: D --> I don't understand

CT: D --> Are you

CT: D --> Are you saying

CT: D --> That

CT: D --> You are in a position of control over me

AA: i supp0se s0

CT: D --> Oh

AA: what

CT: D --> Oh my God

He babbles about how he needs fresh air or another towel, getting so agitated he actually drops an F-bomb, which he immediately covers up with “Fiddlesticks”. He says he wants to break something, and Aradia offers to break something for him, as she’s developed an interest in breaking things recently. Next page, she flings an “abluti0n trap” through his wall. 

FAILURE ARTIST: The running gag of girls fucking up boy’s homes with bathroom appliances continues!

CHEL: He’s very happy, except about her commoner slang.

CT: D --> In fact, this is an order from your leader

CT: D --> Call things by their proper names

AA: what

AA: y0u want me t0 call it a bath tub

AA: that s0unds ridicul0us

As FA noted, this bit of worldbuilding ends up retconned out with all trolls calling things by strange rewordings later on.

Whatever it’s called, Equius asks her to throw it through the wall again. She asks if that’s an order, and he can’t decide.

CT: D --> You could cause quite a bother for me, with the power you wield

CT: D --> I can do nothing to stop you, peasant girl

CT: D --> It's so magnificently depraved

CALL CPA PLEASE: 13

Aradia ribbits again and he takes it for roleplaying, but commands her to continue to do as she pleases. He tells her he’s bringing the robot body, and muses on whether she should actually be co-leader again; in fact, he decides, she should be the actual leader, in secret, through him. She points out that’s what they’re doing anyway.

CT: D --> You take to authority well for one of your b100d

AA: i d0nt have bl00d

CT: D --> Not yet

CT: D --> But soon your heart will beat anew, and through it, fresh b100d and fresh passion

AA: 0_0

CALL CPA PLEASE: 14

Equius proceeds to STRONGJUMP right up to his first Gate, punching off an ogre’s head as he goes, and to STRONGFALL out into LOQAM, where Aradia waits. Equius hands over the robot and Aradia enters it; she seems happy, but Equius cautiously asks if she feels anything else.

EQUIUS: D --> Can you detect anything within you might describe as

EQUIUS: D --> Smoldering passion

[...]

ARADIABOT: 0h g0d

ARADIABOT: 0H MY G0D WHAT DID Y0U D0!

ARADIABOT: did y0u pr0gram this r0b0t t0 have feelings f0r y0u?

ARADIABOT: R0MANTIC FEELINGS???

EQUIUS: D --> Hrrrk

ARADIABOT: ANSWER ME BLUE BL00D SCUM

EQUIUS: D --> I

EQUIUS: D --> Yes

EQUIUS: D --> Uh

EQUIUS: D --> It's a chip in your heart

EQUIUS: D --> Is that not ok

Understandably, it is emphatically not.

GORE GALORE: 12

Now, this is undeniably a really, really, really creepy thing to do. I’m not sure how much blame can be applied to Equius here, though; he’s been raised in a society which would presumably tell him she would have to accept his advances no matter what, considering their caste difference. In a horrifying way, the chip might have been, in his mind, the nicer option. Still, as I said, creepy.

CALL CPA PLEASE: 15

BRIGHT: I think it’s telling that he asks if it’s not okay after Aradia freaks out, as though he honestly hadn’t considered that Aradia might have a problem with it. Specifically, up until that point, Equius seems to be interacting with Aradia more like she’s a prop than a person — it doesn’t seem to occur to him that she might not want what he wants, unless their wants conflict in a way that he finds titillating. Then she freaks out and he’s surprised. And that in turn speaks volumes about how lowbloods are viewed by highbloods in wider society.

Contrast Vriska, who absolutely realises that people down spectrum can have their own agendas and emotional reactions; she just does her own thing anyway. Vriska is actively malicious; Equius is, at least in this case, accidentally malicious. Note that he doesn’t make any effort to prevent her from removing the chip once he realises she’s distressed. (Not that he really gets a chance.)

Equius in particular also seems to have a problem about slotting people into roles in general -- he does it with Gamzee, too, although since Gamzee is higher-blooded than him, he has to at least face the fact that Gamzee doesn’t fit into his role. He comes across as very sheltered.

FAILURE ARTIST: Equius considers it such a good thing to be a highblood that he thinks he’s doing her the greatest favor by turning her into one. 

CHEL: This also brings up the question of where he got all that blue blood. I hope it’s synthetic. If not, he’s already said he doesn’t kill animals, so I’m not sure whether it’s creepier if he killed another troll for it or if he slowly drained it off from his own.

Aradia’s not contemplating that, too busy crushing the artificial heart and slapping the shit out of Equius for multiple pages, before, er…

Yes, she’s apparently making out with him as a reward for violating her mind, even after the chip was removed. 

BRIGHT: The first time I read Homestuck, I thought that was meant to imply that not all of the programming was gone.

FAILURE ARTIST: Hussie did confirm the programming was gone. He compared it to a failed roofying.

CHEL: This is a bit of a shock, but it makes somewhat more sense when we see more of troll culture, not long in the future. Still, right now it’s probably upsetting for a number of readers because that part of troll culture hasn’t been established, so…

CALL CPA PLEASE: 16

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 41

[totaldramafan-lauri]

A Heartstone Birthday

I knew that my birthday this year was gonna feel.....at least a little bit empty. It hasn’t been BAD so far, but I haven’t been able to shake away that feeling as I look back to where I was last year compared to this year. I think back to those I celebrated with, and.....it hurts.

And.....I don’t wanna hurt. Or force people to pay attention to me. But I also wanted to do something special. So, I decided to do something I’ve been meaning to do for a while, but kept putting off for months: My return to Heartstone.

The last time I’ve played this game was.....September, I think? I didn’t WANNA be away for so long, but between mental health stuff and Splatoon 2 taking priority when I WAS in the mood for games due to Splatfests.....I just kept procrastinating on a game I DO really enjoy. I guess another part of the equation is the stress of trying to remember what I was doing, too. That’s a pretty big reason why I wasn’t interested in AC until this game.

So.....yeah, I’ve missed a LOT......the big things I really regret missing are Halloween, Toy Day, and New Year’s. Especially Toy Day, if that’s anything like it was in New Leaf. But, although it stings, I just gotta suck it up and wait until, uh....this year. Muuuuuuch later this year, ugh.....why do I suck at playing this game!? XD

But at LEAST I didn’t miss my birthday. And, yeah, this was a good day to return on, because it was really cute! And also a bit more interactive than I expected.

Scoot took me to his house, where I celebrated with him, Hazel, and Margie. I think that means that these are the villagers I’m closest with? And I’m happy about that! And also not really surprised. Scoot and Hazel were my starting villagers, and I just really adore Margie and have given her a lot a gifts. XD

After blowing out the candles and receiving my present from them (an entire birthday table!), here’s the part I wasn’t expecting - I got to hit a pinata around! O__O That’s....new! And inside were.....cupcakes? I don’t think those are the kinda treats you should really put in a pinata.....but whatever, I like it! The only downside to the event was that.....that was a really cute pinata, so I felt bad about breaking it! =<

I absolutely love the whole cupcake thing, though! I love how you go around giving them to the villagers you didn’t celebrate with, so everyone has a bit of the party! Also, it gave me an excuse to catch up with everyone after so long, heh....Most of their presents were clothes I wouldn’t wear (I’d never sell them, though!), but one of them got me a winter hat that I decided to put on, cuz.....winter. It’s green, which I don’t like as much as blue and black, but it’s still cute and would go with a black winter coat just fine.

(Guess what? Pietro was thinking of moving away.....Like Alastor would say: HA, no! Like I’d let one of my villagers go on the same day I came back! And especially not him! XD)

Sadly, however, there weren’t enough cupcakes for everyone, which....I really think there should have been? It just feels kinda wrong to leave one villager out....For me, it was poor Deli, who I saw last. And eating’s his thing, too.....And he told me he missed me! I feel bad....I’m gonna have to find something to give him to make up for it.

So, that’s about it for the birthday stuff, but I still had a lot to do on my first day back! First off, this is my first time seeing winter in this game, and it looks great! .....But why are the flowers still blooming, and why are the fruit still-? Uuuuuuhh.......I-I won’t question it. It’s a game. And I like seeing my black tulips still there....

A lot of the day was spent refreshing myself on what I was doing before I left. What items I was holding, what I was planning on doing with those items....How many Bells I had, and so on. I also tried seeing if there were any new bugs in the winter by catching a few, but only one was new. While it does make sense for not many bugs to be out, I’m definitely gonna keep an eye out for more. And finally, I went to the Able Sisters to get myself a winter outfit, since I don’t wanna be walking around in the snow in a t-shirt.....and luckily, they had a black coat that I liked! It’s called a “peacoat”....it looks good on me, but I’ll still check to see if they can gave more types of coats....Like, maybe a more fluffy one? Or maybe a scarf? Are there scarves in this game? I’d wear one! I hate the cold, so more warmth the better.....but for now, I’m all dressed up for the winter!

Also, there are a lot of random snowflakes drifting about, which I’ve been collecting......and somehow they’re not melting in my pockets. XD I already have my first seasonal DIY recipe, which involves snowflakes. So....I assume that snowflakes are primarily a DIY ingredient for winter recipes, like the shells were in the summer! (Or maybe they have another use I haven’t seen yet, I dunno) I don’t really want a winter room, but I’m collecting them anyway just in case I wanna make at least one thing with them. You never know.

So, I pieced everything together pretty quickly after opening all my birthday presents and not being able to put all of them away - I wanted the next house extension ASAP, didn’t I? XD Well, I better get on that....I think I’m pretty close. And once I remembered that, I remembered the long-term goal....the K.K. thing, which I still haven’t gotten cuz I’m been slacking- SERIOUSLY, why am I so bad at this game!? XD OK, OK, one thing at a time.....new room. Right. I remember what I wanted my next room to be.

So, aside from my birthday, nothing major happened today. It was just me catching up with everyone, updating my appearance for the season, catching some stuff, and remembering my goals. Next time, I’ll definitely work towards upgrading my house. My full storage will drive me crazy if I don’t knock that out right away. And I’ve also stockpiled a lot of furniture for the next room, since I know what I want it to be, so I can’t wait to set that in motion! I also think I wanted to build a bridge somewhere near my house, but my black tulips are in the way, so I’ll have to move all those somewhere...but I’m not in a major hurry to do that as much. It’s just something I wanna jot down so I’ll keep it in mind.

(Also note to self: “I’m sorry” gift for Deli. Keep an eye out.)

I’m gonna TRY to start playing this daily again, but it’s a habit that I’ll have to force myself back into. I know there’s another Splatfest coming up this month (one that’s BRAND new, so I won’t wanna miss it), plus I now have Pokemon Shield so I finally wanna start playing that.....but I’m still gonna keep at least some focus on this game. This isn’t a game I need to spend a TON of time on each day. Maybe just an hour or two, unless something big happens. While I’m bummed about missing the holidays, I like this game, and I’m happy I made myself play it today. I missed it.....and I needed it.

[impartofthesolution]

Road to London

           Alone.  It’s not a good word.  It’s not typically a fun or appealing word.  But, it’s a safe word.  Because if I’m alone, that means there’s nothing nearby to hurt me.  That’s the closest thing to a promise I have anymore. Sure, I miss my crew, but they only slowed me down, or at least, that’s what I keep telling myself.  What I have to tell myself.            It’s been two weeks, but I’ve really only been alone ten days.  Those first four were awful.  I was always moving, got almost no sleep, killed more zombies than I could count, and had to leave the bodies of the people I grew to love, unburied.  Then, I got in the clear, and there has been no zombie activity at all as I continue to make my way north.  Alone.  Safe. For now.            As I simultaneously watch my step on the potholed road and scan the horizon for signs I’m no longer alone, I reflect on my state.  I suppose I’ve always been the loner type, more alive in my head than I was around people. It served me well, when the outbreak came.  It spread far too fast, too many people unwilling to believe their friends and family could be infected.  It tore through households; friends went for a drive somewhere and never came back.  I stockpiled what I needed in my small house. I could stretch any ration as long as I had to to see this through.            The only problem is, I’m still not through.  The outbreak created hordes of ravenous monsters, and it became unsafe to say.  The radios talked about a party, thousands strong, making their way to the city, devouring everything.  So I left. I took what I could, “borrowed” what I needed, and left.  I didn’t even have a gun back then, but I’m not sure if that would have made my life easier or harder.  I certainly hadn’t learned to use it yet.  We learned early on that cars attract the zombies, and the zombies ate all the horses.  That left walking.            Rumor has it that there were some cities in Canada that had missed the earliest wave of outbreaks and had quickly contained the threat from within.  It made it so much easier to keep the zombies and threats out.  They’re fearless devils, but they lost their humanity and all that makes humans special, namely, our minds.  They’re no threat to an organized defense.  If only we had more of those.            Buffalo is 60 miles away, I note the highway sign. It’s Buffalo, cross a bridge, and then I’m in Canada.  Which, to be fair, is little different from the fields and roads and small towns I’m seeing.  Until I get to London and an old fort there.  Thankfully, I don’t have to go anywhere near Toronto; that place is a writhing nightmare of destruction.  In addition to the zombies, violent street games have divvied the city.  Nope, no place for a woman, or anyone in her sane mind. I’ll take my chances with asylum in London.  They couldn’t possibly turn me down, a single woman out in the world who can prove she can’t be infected.            Oh yes, my forearm aches as I remember the decaying jaws biting down on my arm in the early days of my escape from Harrisburg. I kicked and thrashed and did everything I could.  That was my first kill.  But then, I just locked myself up and waited for the madness to take me, unable to take my own life.  A few days passed, my arm was swollen and slightly infected, but not with the zombie contagion.  A group of survivors escaping to Canada had found me.  Ryan assured me if I could have turned, I would have.  He was the one who gave me my first gun and taught me how to use it.  I had no idea handguns could hold 15 or more rounds in a magazine.  I was just used to seeing revolvers on TV.            I make it another six miles before finding a small town as dusk was settling.  It is quiet, which is a good sign.  Towns like these usually were safe.  The zombies ransacked them for every ounce of meat and then disappeared when it was all gone. Lucky for me, they wouldn’t touch water or canned foods.  I didn’t bother to carry much with me; it was too heavy.  Finding somewhere with basic supplies like food, clothes, and bedding was pretty reliable.  I tried to stay light with my guns, ammo, maps, and a rather large first aid kit.            I find a store, grab a shopping cart, and look to see if there was anything the scavengers left behind.  The virus came so quick, there weren’t many of us left with our humanity.  The odds were good that there were few enough survivors to have come before me that there would still be supplies left.  I take what I found and go to search for a defensible looking home that hopefully had clothes that fit me for after my bottled water shower.            Buffalo is my only real threat.  I managed to skirt around the edge of the city until I walked along northern tip of Lake Erie.  Now, I could see the zombies milling around the US side of the border. From what I can see with my binoculars, the bridges look clear.  I suppose there isn’t really anything interesting to a zombie on a long bridge. But the city of Buffalo, that could keep a large pack of zombies occupied for a while, longer than I had to wait them out.  I have to make my move, and make it now, while it’s still light out.  Sure, I could hide a little better in the dark, but it would also be far harder to see the zombies.  I’m a better shot during the day, too.            There are more ways to cross a bridge than to walk the dotted line.  My target is the structure underneath, moving from beam to beam.  Most zombies couldn’t follow me or even see me down there.  All I had to do was get there.  I screw the silencers into my Berettas and hoist my backpack up on my shoulders.  I am ready for anything.            Making my way carefully along the side of the street, my primarily goal is to not attract the zombie’s attention.  I either need to strike first, or not engage at all. Otherwise, I’d be swarmed, and I have no backup this time.  On the plus side, I don’t have Robin to accidentally kick a can and alert an entire nest to our presence, either.  One small mistake, so many deaths.            I turn a corner and a twisted form hunches in front of me, back to me.  It must be eating a rat or a possum or… I don’t care.  I look and check to make sure there are no others and I shoot. Perfect, effective, trained.  A bullet through the head and the zombie collapses with barely a sound.  Alone, again. It’s an illusion.            I continue on, effectively staying undetected by the mindless fiends.  The bridge is back in my view.  It’s a couple of hundred yards out, and I’m in the last bit of cover I’ll have until I crawl under the bridge.  I survey my surrounds, looking for the best path forward.  Guns blazing is a dangerous option.  I have roughly 30 bullets without reloading, and I see at least 10 zombies.  That means another 10 zombies are out of sight.  There’s no way I can try to engage them one at a time.  I finish my plan: I need to make it as far unseen as possible, engage and kill the first attack wave, and then I just have to make it under the bridge.  Hopefully, that’s only a 100 yard sprint by that point.            Just then, I hear a noise above me.  I look up, and on top of the building above me, a zombie looks down straight at me with its one eye and crooked jaw.  I’m faster, whipping up my gun and shooting it in its only eye.  My gun may be quiet, but it’s not silent.  A quick look around me tells me I attracted some attention from the zombies on the road to the bridge, but there’s nothing coming up front behind me. Stealth gone, I start jogging towards the bridge and the two zombies eager for a fresh meal.            Shhht, shhht goes the report of my Beretta.  One zombie falls motionless, and I don’t even break a stride.  The other zombie is 20 feet away.  He must have been someone import, for he was wearing a suit, still distinguishable though it is in tatters.  I stop, aim, and fire.  Four, I keep track of how many bullets I’ve spent.  By now, I’ve attracted the attention of all the remaining zombies. There were the 8 I had seen plus another 5 had appeared.  Thirteen is too many to take on.  All I have to do is take out the ones in front of me and outrun the ones closing in from the sides.  I take a shot at the lead zombie and miss.  I mutter an unladylike curse under my breath, still careful not take make unnecessary noise.  I have to run if I want to not get mobbed by the zombies coming from my right.            As I’m running, I fire off five rounds, dropping two zombies quickly.  I’m breathing heavy.  The bridge is still 150 yards off, and there are still 5 zombies in front of me.  My chances are slim, but I have no hope.  I keep charging.  I try to steady by aim, but the running and adrenaline shake my hands. My final six shots in my right hand pistol only fell two more zombies.  Without even looking, I extend my left arm to the left and fire, hearing a zombie drop a second later.  I switch my loaded gun to my right hand.  Three zombies, 50 feet away.  I put three shots in the lead zombie, and it topples in a pile of gore.  I jump it and take out the second zombie while in the air. Ten shots left, I remember.  The final zombie is closing fast.  It lunges at me with wicked claws and two obsidian marble eyes.  I duck and slide on my leg, tearing the “borrowed” jeans.  The zombie passes overhead, and I shoot up at it, flinging it over and behind me.  As I try to stand up and continue running, the zombie’s foot connects with my head knocking me sideways.  There are four zombies closing in from my right, but my concern is the last zombie my left.  I was knocked dangerously close to her.  She reaches out with her only arm, and all I could do is bash it away with my left arm. Her decaying limb goes flying.  I sweep her legs as I spin back to full standing. The bridge is so close.  I take off in a full sprint.  I reach the edge of the bridge and jump, arms extending. Ooof, the breath is knocked out of me as I catch a horizontal bar under my arms.  I barely stay on, dizzy and winded and gasping for air.  I turn behind me.  The two closes zombies had fallen off the edge.  The others had run along the bridge above me, looking for a way to get to me, but they can’t.  I’m safe. Not alone, but safe.  For now. Back to Table of Contents (x)

[maximumcatfeels]

So, this will eventually be a finished story, but for now… It’s Halloween. I’m excited. I just redid my icon and my header picture. And I just wanted to share this small piece with you guys.

It’s not Beta’d yet (obviously) and I’m hoping I can get the actual story done by New Years… but I don’t have high hopes for that time line :S

There is some bad language in it so far, so uh be aware? (Moira is cranky AF)

As for pairings : Currently it’s Pharmercy and Sigmoira – but it’s more that everyone thinks Moira and Sigma are together and they both dance around the issue. Also the Pharmercy is SUPER unhealthy. 0/10 do not model any relationships off of it, guys.

Anyways, enjoy.

________

Moira O’Deorain had troubling remembering things before her death. To be fair her death had probably been very traumatic, if the shackles on her wrists and ankles were any indication. That and typically one didn’t turn into a banshee if you happened to pass on peacefully. (Actually, she didn’t know anyone that turned into a banshee after death besides her, but that was neither here nor there.)

That being said, Moira did remember a few things. She had been a witch in a small coven in the woods outside Aldersbrun. She used to have two dogs and a pet rabbit, plus a small hutch of rabbits she kept for meat and … magical experiments. Her little cottage near a large pond was dilapidated now, but it had been quite cozy when she had been alive.

She also knew - like she knew her own name - that the Witch of the Wilds, otherwise known as Angela Ziegler, was a massive winged cunt.

A massive winged cunt who was currently knocking on the rotted remains of her cottage door.

“Sod off!” Moira yelled through the door, rummaging in a ratty torn bag, checking that it had what she need to check her snare traps. She didn’t have time for this, she needed to get out and (hopefully) get some rabbit meat for dinner.

“Oh Moiraaaaaaa,” the literal witch sing-songed, apparently ignoring her, “is that anyway to talk to an old friend?”

“If you were an old friend, you’d know that is how I talk to everyone, now feck off!” Moira yelled over her shoulder, stuffing her favorite skinning knife in the bag. Thank the moon and stars she had a ward on the door keeping the bitch out.

“You didn’t use to be like this,” lamented Angela. Moira looked over her shoulder and noted the blue eye of the witch looking at her through one of the many holes in the door.  Did this witch know no boundaries? “I would know, you know. Since I’m an old friend.”

Moira resisted the urge to poke the witch’s eye out with a long clawed finger. She was pretty sure that Angela couldn’t break the ward as long as no part of her got through the door. Sadly, if Moira poked her eye out, she’d probably get some blood on her claws and then Angela would be able to get inside. Pity.

“I don’t have friends now, and I doubt I changed that much from when I was alive. Now leave!” Moira barked out as she slung the bag over her shoulder. She needed to get going, the sun was rising and she had shite to do.

The blue eye that had been peering through the hole in the door retreated. “But wouldn’t you like to know for sure?” came the purr of a determinedly persistent witch. “I could restore your memories, you know. And your house.”

Moira mouthed the next words sarcastically as Angela said them, “I would only ask for a very small thing in return.”

Every single time, this is how the conversation between them went. Moira was tired of it. Maybe being blunt would help get rid of her. She didn’t want to open the door with Angela right there. Bitch might take it as an invitation to come in.

“No. I’ve seen what you ask for in return! Quite frankly, I don’t even know if I have a soul anymore, so stop asking!”

“It doesn’t have to be your soul…” Angela purred. Moira could see that she had plastered herself, well-endowed chest first against the door, a half lidded blue eye peeking through a hole. “Your mind or magic will do…. Hmmm, maybe even your bod-“

“No!” Moira was not going to play those games! Especially not with her! “Don’t you dare even go there! I am done with this conversation! Now leave before I start screaming!” She would start doing her banshee wail, if that’s what it took to get rid of this witch on her doorstep, but she’d rather not. She’d probably wake half the forest, and Akande, the fish monster living in the pond, did not appreciate that.

“Wait!” The witch sounded genuinely panicked. She had also stumbled away from the door a step or two, just in case of screaming.  “I just wanted to beg a favor of you!”

Moira scoffed. That wasn’t new either. “Let me guess, you got bored with your latest conquest and ‘accidentally’ did them a mischief?”

“No!” Now Angela just sounded indignant. “Fareeha is doing just fine!”

Moira rolled her eyes. How well could anyone be after having their soul stuffed in enchanted armor and their original body possessed by another spirit?

“What I need from you, my beautiful banshee,” Angela continued in her sultry you-definitely-want-to-take-this-deal tone, “is help me and my servants in assaulting the Castle this year. It happens tomorrow night, and I believe with you on our side, we can have the upper hand for sure.”

Oh bollocks, it was that time of year again, wasn’t it. She had finished her warding preparations last week, but she needed to stockpile a few extra days of food, too. Moira sighed, she had to get rid of this witch, now, or else everything would be behind schedule.

“No. I’m working.” That was… not the best answer, but it was fairly accurate. Angela didn’t need to know what the work was exactly.

“What do you mean working?! You’re dead!”

Maybe a dose of truth would get her to leave, Moira thought as she snapped back, “Every single fucking year, you either win or you lose your fight with the castle defenders with minimal difference either way, but the rest of the fae and supernatural folk suffer. When you win, the humans send more hunters, who tear up the forest looking for you but finding the rest of us poor sods. And when you lose, there’s a power struggle between idiots until you reform.”

The witch was silent for a moment. Moira hoped that she would take the hint and leave now, but sadly, the brat then asked, “And what does that have to do with you?” and Moira’s already thin patience frayed even more.

“I sodding live here, you insufferable harlot! I have to deal with the aftermath!”

“Harlot?! Harlot?!“ Ah, shite, now the witch was pissed off too. “How dare you! Like you’re one to point fingers!  I bet you’re just going to go disappear for a few days with your own man whore, the astro-mancer who lives on the edge of your territory!”

Oh. That. BITCH. That was it!

Letting her fury take over, Moira threw open her door and screamed right in the stupid witch’s surprised face.

The force of her scream forced the witch to topple backwards and be dragged by the sonic blast along the gravel laden ground of the walkway.

“Ugh. I don’t know why I even bother!” The witch huffed as she got up; reaching for her fallen hat and tugging her rumpled clothing back into place. “I’m just trying to help you!”

“I don’t need your help! Now begone!” Moira screeched, no longer caring about the neighbors.

The witch plopped her signature hat back on her head, hopped on her broom side-saddle and flew away with only a “hmph!” thrown over her shoulder in lieu of a goodbye. Which was fine by Moira.

“Good riddance.” She muttered under her breath.

She stepped outside (finally!) and shut the door behind her. But as she turned back to start down the gravel path, a new visitor zipped into view. Oh god, it was that annoying will-o-wisp, Lena. What else could go wrong today?

“Yes, Lena?” Moira sighed.

The Will-o-wisp rocked back and forth on her heels, mischievous smile plastered on her face, “Sooo, I couldn’t help but overhear part of your row with the Witch…”

Moira dug her claws into the strap of her ratty bag. “Get to the point,” she growled.

“You ARE going to the astro-mancer’s house instead of helping her, aren’t you?”  Lena asked, cocking her head to one side.

Moira counted to ten in her head, then exhaled. “Yes-“

“And you ARE setting up wards at his place to keep her out, right?” Lena interrupted.

Moira blinked. She set up those wards to keep the bitch out, and keep her from bothering poor Siebren yes. But why was Lena asking this now? “Well, yes but-“

“AND you ARE setting up protections to keep hunters away too, right?”

Moira was still confused as to where this was going. “Yeeessssss….” She answered slowly. “But what does-“

“Do you think Emily and me can spend a couple of days crashing at his place, too? I helped defend the castle last year,  (and they don’t need me this year thankfully) but I think the witch is pissed off at me. And yeah, she can’t do nothin’ to me, but she might target my new girlfriend Emily. Well, I say new – but is it really new if you were already dating in a different dimension? Anyways, have you met Emily? She’s a doll! Best human I’ve ever known! We need more humans like her! She doesn’t even ask about how I technically don’t exist in this plane or why I’ve got a pumpkin shackled to me chest-“

Moira blinked a few times at the sheer amount of word vomit Lena was spewing in her direction. But eventually her mind caught up and parsed the first question.

“Lena!” She said sharply to get the will-o-wisp to shut up for two seconds. “It’s not my house. You’d have to ask Siebren if he would allow it.”

“But what about your wards?”

Moira furrowed her brow. “What about them?”

“Don’t you have to let us  in or else I’ll get poofed?”

“No? That’s not how they work. Who told you that?”

“Sombra! You know, the new bride of Junkenstien’s monster that actually doesn’t want anything to do with him? Anyway, Sombra said you had to uh…’white-list’ us to get in through the wards or else we’d be poofed!”

Moira had NO idea what the hell Lena or Sombra were talking about. “Look, Lena, the only people who can’t go near Siebren’s house are the Witch of the Wilds, her known cronies, and hunters. Everyone else can go into his house as long as you politely ask Siebren, the actual owner of the house. So go ask him, not me!”

Lean’s face lit up. “Everyone can go?”

Moira froze. Oh shite. She should not have told Lena that. “Now, Lena, wait! Hold on a mo-”

But it was too late, the seed had been planted. Lena started babbling again, “Oh oh oh! We could make it a party! We could invite all the fae and supernaturals of the forest! Like a giant feast and slumber party! Oooooh! We could do party games! Like bobbing for eyeballs! Or pin the tail on the hellhound! Ahhh! This is the best! I’ll go ask him right now!”

Moira called out, “Wait, Lena!” but Lena just chirped “Thanks luv! Hope to see you there!” and zipped away like a hyper active flea.

Moira stood there in silence for a second, her mind reeling. The wards were done and so were the protections to keep nosy hunters away, but she didn’t have nearly enough food for a party much less several days of waiting out hunters with that many mouths to feed.

“Well,” came a low smooth voice behind her, “you know your soft hearted idiot mage is going to say yes to her. And yes to anyone else that asks.”

She turned around to see Akande, the fish monster, resting his head on his arms on the shore of the pond, webbed feet kicking lazily behind him.

“Good morning, by the way,” he added with a small wave of his webbed fingers. ”It’s always so lovely to be woken up by a screaming match between two magic users before the sun has risen. Especially when you are nocturnal and trying to fall asleep.”

Moira sagged her shoulders. “How can I make it up to you this time?”

Akande smirked. “Make sure there’s a tub of water filled for me at your precious Siebren’s place. I’ll come by and ask for his official permission tonight.”

She groaned, and pinched the bridge of her nose with one hand, but nodded.

“Oh and don’t worry, I’ll make sure to get the word out that the guests for this particular party need to bring their own food provisions. I sincerely doubt you’ve got enough stashed away for that many people. Besides, you’ve only been hoarding human food, have you not?”

Moira felt a surge of gratitude, “Yes, all the food has been for him, so I don’t have to leave and restock it.”

“And what about for you? Do you have some food for you tucked away?”

Moira shook her head. She trod a weird line between fae and undead, so her sustenance needs were tricky. If Siebren remembered to put out offerings of milk and honey, she’d be fine, but usually he forgot and she’d have to sneak in eating the life force off a passing bird or another small creature while he wasn’t looking.  “I’ll be fine.”

Akande raised one fishy eyebrow, but didn’t call her out on it. “Well, at any rate, I’ll bring in something as payment for the hospitality.”

Ugh, every time Akande brought her food it was a large stinky fish. Only now it would be several large stinky fish. Great.

“You better get going; the sun’s rising. And I know you don’t do well in the noon-day sun. See you later tonight, Moira.” And with that, he pushed himself back into the pond and disappeared into the water.

Moira sighed one more time for good measure and then set off to go find some food for the upcoming “party”.