#-1 authority; too big it makes you look even more like a high school-er

[cat-mutual]

disco elysium gameplay is so realistic, i equip my green hat and then i find 42 centimes as well as a set of 5 A5 envelopes in the communal laundromat.. also theres people with a french accent everywhere

[warsmith-38]

How I would do RWBY pt. 2

Season Two

Emerald and Mercury go to book store.

Try intimidating ex-White Fang owner.

He’s tense, but not impressed.

Adam walks in.

He shits himself.

Tries fighting.

Dies. Painfully might I add.

Emerald and Mercury banter. Adam just seems bored.

Cinder (teenaged, not adult) scolds them for 86ing the guy in such a public and possibly trackable way.

Adam assures them that they weren’t seen. He has practice in that sort of thing.

Torchwick is annoyed at working with these people but at least he’s getting paid a mint.

Cinder says that, with all of the stolen dust, phase two of plan can to be started soon.

Neo give her a look of ‘get over yourself, you chuunibyou.’

Meanwhile, back at the ranch.

More guests arrive.

Ironwood talks with Ozpin about world affairs.

Grimm populations and attacks are getting worse, but are still manageable.

Says that he has brought plenty of extra security in the form of Penny and a big amount of security robots and mechs.

More bonding scenes because reasons.

RWBY + JNPR have food fight because funny.

Velvet and Blake are closer than earlier and give little ‘anti-racism’ classes for Weiss.

Blake is friendlier with everyone now that she knows they wouldn’t kill her since she’s a faunus.

Ruby has taken on the role of mechanic for everyone’s weapons.

Jaune dominates wargaming night.

Ren and Fox try to help Ruby with her hand-to-hand skills (Yang is not a great teacher of such things)

Scene of properly meeting team SSSN.

Nice guys, but a little too uncoordinated in style.

Ruby ends up having a frustrated breakdown.

Gives WBY speech of how they have to get involved and screw the people telling them to sit down and let them handle the problem instead.

Blake is the first to go along with what she’s saying.

Yang and Weiss argue that this is not a good idea, saying that this sounds like Ruby just wants to go play vigilante again.

Blake says that Ruby has a point, nothing will get accomplished if they sit around doing nothing.

Weiss is the one that cracks next. Agrees that the authorities aren’t exactly inspiring confidence since the run in with Torchwick.

Yang finally gives in, if only to make sure Ruby doesn’t get herself murdered.

Ruby, in her excitement to actually be doing something, rushes out the door to get snacks and runs into someone.

That someone is Cinder.

Cinder, Emerald, Mercury, and disguised Neo (Team CEMN (Cinnamon (work with me here))) keep up the façade of Haven guests from canon.

Ruby almost immediately starts gushing over their cool weapons before being reined in by WBY.

Emerald pickpocket’s Weiss’ wallet and snags rich girl’s cash before putting it back.

Mercury and Yang have a very clear stare-down of ‘punching vs kicking, who will win?’

Neo and Blake…stare at each other (Adam is Blake’s Rival/Foil. Blake v. Neo is just pair the spares).

RWBY has made new friends. (The poor dears)

RWBY start their investigation.

Team SSSN turns up to help at the last minute.

Okay, sure, free help.

Blake and Sun try to find local White Fang schmucks.

Scarlet and Sage go off to do random shit.

Yang drags Neptune to Junior’s club to check the pulse of the criminal element of the city.

Ruby and Weiss dig up information at library place-thing.

They encounter Penny on the way.

Penny acts weird(er) and tries to bolt off.

Weiss agrees that Penny is suspicious as hell and, with all the happenings, that means that she could be a potential lead.

She lets Ruby go after her while she about her investigating alone.

Penny reveals to Ruby that she’s a mechanical maiden (Persona 3 is best Persona).

Ruby is VERY interested now.

Ruby already liked her as a person and now she knows that Penny is a person who is also a weapon.

Zero downsides.

Penny, happy to be accepted, let’s slip that she knows some crazy stuff is happening in the world.

Says that that’s why she was allowed to come to the tournament, as extra back up just in case.

Says that the communications tower is the most obvious target but might not be the actual target.

Can’t elaborate further because of Ciel and her bodyguards showing up.

Ciel gives Ruby the third degree on encouraging Penny’s truant behavior.

Ruby gives her the finger.

Ciel takes Penny away and Ruby gets back to work.

Weiss gets whatever information about the White Fang and Torchwick that isn’t classified, and a little that is, transferred to her.

Her older sister is a high ranker in the military and her father bankrolled a good chunk of said military.

Ain’t nepotism a bitch?

Yang and Neptune come up empty handed, but Yang got to pick another fight at the club before the cops showed up so she’s all good.

Neptune thinks that that’s all Yang went there to do in the first place.

Scarlet and Sage get captured by the White Fang. (They said they had fresh cookies, what were S + S going to do, say no?)

Blake leads Sun along a trail of breadcrumbs to a White Fang hideout.

Sees a recruitment rally going on.

Blake has a heart attack seeing who’s giving a speech.

It’s Adam.

Speech is an emotional call to arms against the cruelty of humanity.

Crowd is skeptical but still listening.

Reveals his brand.

Crowd is now enthusiastic to sign up for the White Fang.

Adam reveals newly stolen war-mech.

Says that they’ll test its power by executing Scarlet and Sage.

Blake spoils his moment by covertly revealing that Roman is the pilot of said mech (Neo is co-pilot).

Crowd turns against Adam for his hypocrisy.

Adam cheeses it.

Roman takes it on himself to attack Blake and Sun.

Scarlet and Sage are freed and take on the rowdy crowd.

While running, Blake and Sun encounter RWY and Neptune.

Sun and Neptune get good hits in but are btfo’d.

Scarlet and Sage find them and all is good for team SSSN.

RWBY has quasi-rematch against Roman + Neo.

Fight goes well.

Team CFVY shows up and stomps the mech.

Looks like Team Rocket’s blasting off again!

RWBY celebrates a fight well won.

CFVY are pissed that RWBY would do something so dangerous and make them promise not to do things like this again.

RWBY lies through their collective teeth about not doing it again.

Get put on probation anyway.

Pyrrha and Jaune are having a moment together before Jaune ruins it.

Jaune admits that he lied and cheated his way into school due to impatience and lack of immediate combat skills.

He confesses all of this out of guilt and plans to turn himself in.

Pyrrha is actually rather angry at him.

1. for cheating to get what everyone else fought tooth and nail to earn the right to and 2. Putting the rest of his team at risk due to his inability to keep up with them in a fight and for associating them with a cheater/liar.

Not to mention lying to her face.

Says good riddance.

Cardin overhears and blackmails him into doing what he says or else he’ll narc on him and say that NPR knew and thus were complicit in the crime.

Jaune goes along with it while creating plan to oust Cardin and get him kicked from school.

Has conversation with Ren and Nora, both of whom are pissed at him.

Of course Pyrrha told them.

Jaune tells them that he knows he’s a piece of shit but also has Cardin to deal with.

Ren and Nora begrudgingly agree to help him get rid of Cardin.

Tells them his plan.

Plan proceeds to fail and Jaune ends up fighting all of CRDL alone.

Loses.

Grimm outside of their power-level shows up.

Jaune’s quick thinking and tactics get it killed.

Cardin is grateful and promises to keep quiet about blackmail. Even means it too.

CRDL is never a real issue again due to them actually realizing that it’s a very cuntish thing to bully the guy and/or the friends of the guy who actively saved their lives.

Jaune plans to give one last apology to his team before he turns himself in.

NPR say that they deliberated amongst themselves.

They have decided that Jaune doesn’t get to take the easy way out.

His penance is to train his ass off, night and day, to catch up to them on the physical level.

Jaune’s role is to be the strategist and that it’s his job to make plans that keep them all alive.

If he fucks up, they work his ass harder until he doesn’t fuck up.

They haven’t fully forgiven him, but they’re giving him a chance because they genuinely like him.

Jaune is touched by their compassion and promises make up for his mistakes.

Sparring day in class.

Jaune has match against disguised Neo.

Neo wins but Jaune starts to have suspicions.

Pyrrha and Mercury spar.

Pyrrha wins but Mercury now has valuable data on her overall fighting style and semblance usage.

Cinder and Ruby are last match of the class.

Cinder has fire powers as a semblance.

Has second semblance giving her bullet time.

Bullet time doesn’t work all that well against Ruby because of her super-speed.

Ruby gets some pretty good hits in. Kinda kicking Cinder’s ass.

Cinder then decides she’s done playing nice and goes on full offensive. Even starts to scare the crowd.

Times up!

Due to technicality, Ruby won the fight.

Aura cohesion (health bars) Cinder:48% Ruby:51%

Emerald and Mercury are blue in the face with fear of what Cinder might do, having officially lost a fight.

Cinder helps Ruby up, apologizes for going overboard, and offers to buy Ruby lunch the next day.

Ruby happily agrees to hang out with her newest friend.

Cinder later explodes at her hideout and incinerates a White Fang member that got a little too close.

Adam pretends to care. Doesn’t actually.

Ruby and Cinder become shockingly good friends (as far as Ruby is concerned).

Cinder explains the concept of a second semblance, confirming to Ruby that she’s a ten-percenter.

It’s somewhat rare, but it’s common enough that people know how it works and why it unlocks.

Great emotional duress.

She was raised in an orphanage that REALLY sucked.

She awakened both semblances pretty quickly and was snatched up by the authorities as soon as possible to be a huntress.

She’s mostly lying about the details but there is still the base truth.

Ruby tells her that she lost one of her parents too.

Summer just didn’t come home one day, being told she was killed in the line of duty by a lucky grimm.

She’s always thought that there’s more to this story, but doesn’t have the means to follow up just yet.

It’s part of why Ruby wants to be a huntress, to do her best to make sure that some other kid never experiences that kind of loss because of the grimm.

Cinder tells her that that’s not the worst motivation. (she means it more than she thinks)

Since Blake saw Adam at the rally she has become obsessed with analyzing all the data gotten during investigation.

RWY is worried.

Yang talks to her about it, giving the speech about her mother and the problems with obsession.

Blake talks about how dangerous she knows Adam to be. Is vastly terrified of him.

Yang reassures her that the team can handle that punkass.

4 on 1, let him try it. They’ll put the boots to him. Medium style.

Blake reluctantly snaps out of her funk.

Dance comes.

Everyone’s having a good time.

Pyrrha decides to properly forgive Jaune.

They kiss and, after a wacky JNPR argument because funny, so do Ren and Nora.

Insert the cool JNPR dance scene here.

Ruby is happy for her friends but notices some bullshit going on near the comm. tower.

Cinder is infiltrating it wearing something that actually makes it difficult to tell who it is.

Makes a big show of knocking the guards unconscious.

Places real obvious hacking device onto console.

Ruby comes in and shoots at her.

Cinder pops smoke and disappears.

Authorities arrive and (as far as they can tell) disable the hacking device.

Ruby is given a commendation for her actions and her team is taken off probation from earlier.

Upper echelon is pleased that enemy plot was foiled.

Exactly as the bad guys wanted.

Ozpin presses the doubt button.

Teams gets chaperone assignments.

JNPR requested a special Grimm bounty mission.

RWBY gets put on simple observation mission.

JNPR spends time tracking and eventually fighting nuckelavee grimm with Prof. Port.

Ren comes to terms with fighting the grimm that killed his parents.

Y’know, sub-plot stuff to relieve some main plot tension.

RWBY is sent with Dr. Oobleck into ruins to observe and document the growth rate of the non-hostile presence of the local *loud snoring*.

Actually sent near suspected White Fang supply depot with hope that they uncover it and fix problems.

Find it fairly easily after a little bonding moment or two with everyone.

Torchwick and Adam are in charge of train depot. (Torchwick gets the train, Adam gets the depot)

Ruby goes in on her own because she was told not to do things like that.

Ruby gets double-teamed by Roman and Adam. Neo watches like a little shithead.

Ruby fights like a demon but still gets bested.

Adam says that he is now bored and leaves Roman to finish up.

Oobleck and WBY show up.

Roman starts the train, tries to cheese it.

RWBY + Oobleck board the train.

Yang fights Neo.

Weiss fights masked White Fang member (later revealed to be Ilia).

Ruby and Blake fight Torchwick.

Oobleck fights the stormtroopers.

Neo, the crafty, dodgy, dexterity style, sly-bitch, kicks Yang, the brutish and blunt boxer, in the ass.

Raven pops up through a portal.

Neo am-scrays after almost getting her shit pushed in.

Raven says a scant few things to Yang and leaves her a trinket and a map, telling her to follow it when she can before leaving.

Weiss wins her fight.

Blake and Ruby kick Roman’s ass.

Discover train is full of dust explosives to blow up a chunk of Vale and let the grimm through in droves.

Was originally intended to be deployed before explosion but Roman decides ‘fuck it’ and tries to turn it into a kamikaze run at the last minute out of spite.

Oobleck disconnects the explosive cars.

Train still rams hole into central Vale.

Grimm incursion.

RWBY fights as best they can.

Almost get overrun when Teams CFVY, SSSN, and CEMN show up to help.

CEMN only involved because evil plan failed and they want to try and clean up any possible evidence.

Neo (in disguise) tries not to be obvious that she’s still tired from earlier.

Horde battle with large hydra (or something) grimm being final boss of season.

They kill it, of course.

After the battle RWBY thinks that the problem is more or less solved.

Adam is still loose but his plan is foiled and his co-conspirator, Roman, is in prison.

All they have to do is hunt him down.

If he’s going to try something, it’ll be at the tournament. RWBY will have an extra eye open during.

JNPR returns triumphant from their mission and wonders what the hell happened while they were gone.

Cinder is livid that plan-A failed and they lost their best chance to kill Ozpin.

Yeah, their plan is to fuck up Vale and get and chance to kill Ozpin.

Is reassured by the mysterious figure she’s talking to (Salem) that plans can change and still succeed.

Adam is looking through security footage taken from depot.

Sees Blake.

He smiles.

Season two done.

[terreisa]

Love Down the Line: Chapter 5

The last thing Indie musician Emma Swan needs is a gigantic wrench thrown in the workings of her biggest tour to date weeks before its launch.  When her backing guitarist that caused the problem says she has the perfect solution Emma is skeptical but left with little choice but to accept.  Unfortunately she isn't really prepared for said solution to be former Rock Star and leading man of Emma's teenage fantasies, Killian Jones.  With no other options and a month of performing across the country ahead of her Emma just hopes she doesn't come to regret letting Killian onto her stage and into her life.

Ch 1, Ch 2, Ch 3, Ch 4, AO3

~*CS*~

Cincinnati, May 12th

“Emma, sweetheart, how’s the tour?  Are the fans nice?  Have you been able to go sightseeing anywhere?”

“Are you getting enough sleep?  You didn’t on the last one and you were basically a zombie when you got back.  Did you pack that melatonin I dropped off?  What about your meals?  You’ve been eating something green everyday right?”

Emma rolled her eyes at Mary Margaret and David’s unending questions.  While they’d never formally adopted her they were as close to having parents as she was ever going to get.  She absolutely loved them but sometimes they drove her nuts with their worrying.

“The tour is going pretty good and the fans are great as always.  No sightseeing since this is the first day of rest we’ve gotten so far and I don’t really feel like leaving the room.  I packed the melatonin and I’m getting as much sleep as I can and I’ve eaten green things.  Sour apple rings count right?”  She stifled a laugh at David’s spluttering and Mary Margaret’s attempts to calm him. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding.  Tink’s been on a health kick lately and has been making us drink these smoothie things with more vegetable juices and leafy greens than frozen fruit and Killian refuses to eat fast food so we’ve been stopping at actual restaurants or he’ll cook for us on the bus.”

At the mention of his name Killian popped his head through the doorway that connected their rooms.  One of the greatest perks of having him on the tour was no longer having to share one room with both Ruby and Tink while Will got an entire room to himself.  Of course Will hadn’t been as enthused about having to share for once.

“Need something, Swan?”

“Oh, that’s very thoughtful of him.  You have been trying to be friendly with him, haven’t you?  I know you were hesitant at first but Ruby has nothing but nice things to say about him and he’s been through some tough times.”

“What’s he been cooking?  And what kinds of restaurants?  Some of those places can be just as bad as fast food and he might not know it.”

Emma was extremely glad that it was only Mary Margaret and David that were on speaker.  Though she wouldn’t have put it past Killian to have heard everything they said with the way they were just shy of yelling into their phone to make sure she heard them.  As it was he could probably tell they were talking about him from the heat she could feel in her cheeks and ears.  She waved him off from her spot on the bed, turning slightly so he could see the phone she was holding.  His eyebrows shot up before silently apologizing and ducking back into his room.

“You guys really need to chill out.  Everything’s going great, Mary Margaret, and it’s early enough that we’re still getting along.  And please stop analyzing what I’ve been eating, David, you’re a sheriff not a nutritionist.”

They both hemmed and hawed but it had been that way since she’d started going further than fifty miles outside of Storybrooke to play her music.  At first it had been annoying and unwelcome until she’d realized that that’s what people did when they cared about someone.  The Nolans were second to none when it came to worrying and being overprotective out of love.

“Then, as a sheriff, is he being respectful?  And I don’t just mean with you and Tink.  He’s not trashing hotel rooms or causing disturbances in the cities you’ve been playing at has he?  I’ve read about some of the trouble he’s gotten into-”

“David, you didn’t!”

“Are you kidding me?”

“Online, stuff online!” David corrected impatiently. “I’m not going to illegally pull a file on someone, no matter how much I want to.”

“So you’d rather rely on gossip sites?” Emma hissed lowly, not wanting Killian to overhear any part of her conversation at the moment. “I thought we’d agreed to not look at those after that one article made you both join Twitter just to berate the author and the site.”

“Hey, now, I got rid of it after that,” Mary Margaret said defensively, “I’m only on Instagram now.”

“I only promised to not look at stuff about you,” David grumbled. “A man with a very public history of causing trouble joins the band on only the good word of one person?  I have the right to be concerned.”

She bit back her sigh of frustration.  As much as she didn’t like David’s attitude she couldn’t help but understand, seeing as she’d felt almost exactly the same way in the beginning.

“Yeah, you do, but I’m not too worried about it and you shouldn’t be either.  You should be more worried about what Ruby’s going to do to you when I tell her you don’t trust her.”

Their twin gasps had her grinning.

“That’s cold, kiddo,” David grumbled.

“Just like your lasagne will be once word gets to Granny,” she said, snickering. “Look, everything’s going great and will keep going great unless you keep sending bad vibes my way.”

“Bad vibes?” Mary Margaret asked with a smile Emma could hear in her voice.

“Yup, the baddest of vibes, ones where I end up with laryngitis or the bus gets a flat in the middle of nowhere or my guitarist breaks their hand and can’t go on tour.  Oh wait, that’s already happened.”

Killian took up space in the doorway once again, his eyebrows high on his forehead.  She shook her head at his unasked question but didn’t shoo him away again. 

“According to Ruby it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to her and that it could be the best thing to happen to you.  She has been very forthcoming about what Killian going on tour with you might end up becoming,” Mary Margaret said smugly.

“Wait, what do you mean?”  David asked confused as Emma scrambled to end that conversation before it started.

“Would you look at the time?  I gotta go!”

“Emma, sweetheart-”

“I’ll call you guys in a few days.  Love ya, bye!” With a huff she ended the call and dropped her phone onto the mattress, knowing she’d only postponed the inevitable gossip session Mary Margaret wanted to have with her.  She looked at Killian, who was still lurking in the doorway, “Yeah?”

“Not to be nosey-”

“But you’re going to be anyway,” she groaned, “You heard your name and you’re curious.”

He chuckled and strode into her room, settling himself on Tink’s bed, leaning back against the headboard, “You would be too.  Especially when you have a tenuous hold on a gig and the person who decides your fate has mentioned your name and then not long after is discussing ‘bad vibes’.”

“You think too highly of yourself,” she said dismissively. “I was talking to Mary Margaret and David about how terrible your cooking is and that it’s been giving my stomach bad vibes.”

“You’re a terrible liar, Swan,” he said with a shake of his head, “If I recall correctly you had three servings of last night’s fare.”

She rolled her eyes, “Just replenishing the reserves I used up during the show, Jones.  The stir fry wasn’t that special.”

“I see,” he said seriously, rubbing his hand thoughtfully over his chin, “I guess I’ll strike it from future meal options, wouldn’t want you to have to force yourself to eat it before complaining about it to others.”

“That’s not-” she huffed, knowing he’d called her bluff, “Whatever, you know it was great.  That’s what I was telling them.  David was all upset that I might not be eating what he considers a balanced diet.”

He chuckled, “And the bad vibes?”

“They worry too much and I basically told them they’d be jinxing me if they kept it up.  I don’t think Mary Margaret believed me and I know neither of them will relax until the tour’s over,” she sighed, flopping back onto the mattress and staring at the ceiling.

“Is this the same David that inspired you to learn guitar?” Killian asked casually but she could hear the hesitant caution in his tone.

“Yeah, him and Mary Margaret, his wife, kinda latched on and never let go, not even when-” she paused, still unwilling to share her whole messed up story with him, “things got really rough for me.  They’re pretty much my parents in every way without actually being my parents, including getting all up in my business and then nagging me about what they find.  You know how it is.”

“I wouldn’t, actually,” Killian said softly.  She sat up on her elbows and he gave her a self-deprecating shrug, “Mum died when I was eight and my father left when I was ten.  Spent a few years living with a distant cousin until things got straightened out.”

She blinked at him in shock.  Not once, in any interview or magazine profile had that part of his childhood been discussed.  They had only ever mentioned where he’d gone to school before he’d dropped out when the Realm of Jewels started getting big.  At the time, when she’d been devouring every piece of media she could when it came to her favorite band, she hadn’t paid attention to that lack of detail.  It hadn’t mattered then and while it still made no difference to her it did go a long way in explaining why she felt like she had known him for years instead of weeks.

“You, uh, got adopted then?” She asked hesitantly as she sat up, needing to know if he’d had the same heartaches as her or if he’d been one of the lucky ones.

“Er, not as such, no-” he looked up at the ceiling, his Adam's apple bobbing as his hand rubbed at the back of his neck, “First my brother was granted civil rights for adolescents, essentially cleaving himself out from under the burden of our father.  Once he proved he could support not only himself but me as well he became my legal guardian.  He had just had his seventeenth birthday the week before.”

“Seventeen?” she breathed, “And you were fourteen.”

His head snapped back down, his eyes wide and his voice a little unsteady, “You really must have been quite the fan if you still remember that bit of trivia.”

“Maybe I was,” she said softly.  She dropped her gaze to where her hands were balled up into tight fists in her lap, “Must have been nice.  Living with someone that actually wanted you.”

“It was but then there were times where it wasn’t,” he gave a deep sigh and when she looked up he was staring down at his own hands as they played with denim over his knees. “Liam had been my hero my entire life just being my older brother.  When he became my guardian I felt as though I had to push myself into perfection to live up to what I thought he expected of me.  I’d already started drinking by that point but it didn’t truly become a problem until I was sixteen.

“I knew Liam was disappointed but he had no idea how to help me and I’m not even sure I would have accepted it had he offered.  Instead he proposed a compromise of allowing me to play with his newly formed band if I curtailed my drinking substantially.  It worked, for a while at least.  I’d been playing for quite some time on my own but with the camaraderie of the band and the discovery of actually enjoying writing songs I found an outlet for all the feelings that I’d been trying to drown with the drink.  For the first time since Liam had assumed my guardianship I felt as though he was my brother again, not just my beleaguered caretaker.”

Emma wasn’t quite sure what to say to that.  She didn’t want to inadvertently come across as judgmental by commenting about his drinking but she would have given anything for some relative to have saved her from any one of her foster homes and done whatever they’d ask in gratitude.  Though, when she thought about it, Mary Margaret and David were practically the next best thing and she’d given them plenty of teenage attitude at the time.  Especially when it came to the year she would give anything to forget.

“Did he throw a fit when you decided to quit school for the band?” She asked, hoping to steer the both of them into less painful and mine filled waters.

He looked up with a small grin, “It was his bloody idea.  Liam didn’t want to leave me to my own destructive devices and since the band had been steadily building momentum he was loath to relegate shows to only weekends and holidays while I was in my final year.  He put it up to a vote with the others and they agreed.  And since I didn’t have a licence yet and therefore couldn’t do my share of the driving I spent my time on the road reading anything and everything I could get my hands on.  I’m fairly certain I got a better education that way than I would have otherwise.”

“So is that why you guys were the Jolly Rogers first?  A bunch of pirates driving all over England to pillage seedy pubs for fame and fortune?”

“Something like that,” he chuckled, his grin widening.

She grinned back, feeling somewhat proud that she’d been able to somewhat keep herself from completely depressing him with her curiosity.  As much as she’d obsessed over him when she was younger she was surprised by how much she actually didn’t know about him, even though she’d just berated David for taking gossip as truth.  There was a part of her that itched to know more about him, the real person and not the persona she and millions of fans thought they knew.  Their little chats on the bus and in the small bits of down time just weren’t enough and suddenly she had an idea on how to fix that.

“Alright, where to Jones?”

“Er, what?” He asked, his confusion at her non sequitur furrowing his brow.

“I’ve never been to this city before and I know you have so you are now my de facto pirate tour guide.”

“Swan,” he sighed, though his smile was growing by the second, “I’ve only been here twice and both times I only had a few hours to explore, which back then was usually as many bars as I could get to before sound check.  I’m probably the last person that should be leading you around this fair metropolis.”

“Too bad-” she jumped up off the bed and began looking for the shoes she’d kicked off as soon as they’d walked through the door earlier that morning, “Google ‘things to do in Cincinnati’ and pretend that you know what you’re talking about.  Then I’ll pretend to be impressed like every other time you think you’re being all too cool for school and worldly.”

“Too cool for school?” Killian repeated incredulously. “What are you, twelve?”

“Twenty-eight,” she said absently, grinning triumphantly as she extricated one shoe from under the desk and spotted the toe of the other poking out from under the bed Killian was sitting on.

“Twenty-eight and apparently have no idea how to stroke a man’s ego so he’ll want to do ridiculous favors for you,” he muttered.

She looked up at him sharply and got an eyebrow wiggle in return.  With a huff she sat back on her bed to slip on her shoe, “I don’t need to stroke a man’s anything to get him to do stuff for me.”

“Oh, really?” He asked incredulously. “And what pray tell do you do?”

Gladly rising to the challenge she straightened from her bent position she subtly arched her back and blinked owlishly at him, nearly grinning in triumph at the way his mouth parted slightly and he sucked in a breath.  She did let a small smile grace her lips as she pointed to the shoe under the bed.

“Can you grab that for me first?”

He nodded, a little slack-jawed, and as soon as he bent over the side of the bed she relaxed her posture.  When he came up with the shoe she was waiting with her hand out, her brow raised and a shit-eating grin all in place.  At his look of indignation she kind of wished she’d had her phone ready to get a picture of it.

“That’s- that’s bloody manipulation, that is!” He spluttered, slapping her shoe into her palm.

“Ooo, someone’s got their panties in a twist.  All I did was ask you to get me my shoe,” she said innocently, putting the shoe on. “Come on Tour Guide, show me the good stuff.”

“Unbelievable,” he growled, but he was shaking his head and smiling.  He stood and moved back to his own room, shouting through the open door, “I expect you to pay for whatever unique culinary delight we’ll inevitably be trying.  Fool me once, Swan.”

“Shame on you,” she cheerfully called back.

Making sure she had her phone and room key she shot off a text to everyone who needed to know where they were going.  It was a request from Regina that she had chafed at and ignored at first, until she began being recognized in the streets and the paparazzi had started following her around.  After one incident that had had her holed up in the backroom of a used bookstore with a dead phone, no one’s number memorized and a show that had been only a couple of hours away Regina had put it in her tour contract that she had to be in contact at all times.  She still chafed at practically being under her manager’s watchful eye like a toddler but she and Regina both agreed that it was better than being saddled with a handler instead.  At her insistence Ruby, Tink and Will were also in the group text so Regina wouldn’t try to hound them about her whereabouts thinking they could be hiding her.

Her phone chimed as she debated whether or not to put on a sweatshirt or her leather jacket.

Rub a dub: you know you could leave me out of this now right?

and ease up on the guilt trip I’m taking you on?  no way! She responded, deciding on the sweatshirt and tying it around her waist.

Rub a dub: jokes on you, girly, i’ve got a front row seat

to what? She sent, suspicious and wary about what Ruby could mean.

Rub a dub: if you’re asking you’re not ready to know yet.

Emma glared at her phone for a moment before sending multiple texts demanding Ruby to explain herself that all went unanswered.  She growled in frustration and turned to glare at Killian who was once more leaning on the door jamb, chuckling.

“Ruby’s being an ass,” she gave as an explanation, shoving her phone in her back pocket.  Then she got a good look at what Killian was wearing, “Is that a Reds hat?  I thought you didn’t know the city that well.  Why do you have a hat for their team?”

“Oh, you’re a big baseball fan then?” He asked, clearly surprised.

“David is, I’m more of a fan of the way the pants fit.  Plus the Reds had that jersey with no sleeves last year.  Arms like those tend to stick out in a girl’s memory,” she said dreamily, remembering just how well the players wore those particular jerseys.  Then she mentally shook herself and nodded at the hat, “You didn’t answer my question.”

His lips quirked in amusement, lightly touching the hat’s bill and then the sunglasses that she hadn’t noticed hanging from his shirt collar, “I’ve found that it’s the easiest way to blend into the crowd.  When we were at the height of… everything it was hard to even step out of the hotel without getting mobbed.  Liam discovered, quite by accident mind you, that people didn’t expect to see us dressing ourselves down and to be fans of the local sports teams.  Unfortunately it means I have a wide array of ball caps that one would consider quite a collection if they weren’t solely for a practical use.  If I had a choice I would have donned the hat from Pittsburgh but I’m not quite sure what rivalries are predominant in this city and I’d prefer not to be verbally insulted over the wrong choice.”

Emma gave a surprised laugh.  Just minutes before they’d been having a somber conversation that could have dragged the rest of the day down.  Instead they were joking around about baseball and overzealous fans.

“Should I put on some super elaborate disguise too?” She looked up at him with a teasing grin. “I could get a wig or maybe some of those glasses with the fake nose and mustache attached.”

Killian snorted, “As entertaining as that would be I think you’ll be fine, love, as long as you don’t wear the red leather.”

Feeling offended for half a second she begrudgingly agreed with him.  Her red leather jacket was her signature look, she’d worn it for all three of her album covers and went out on stage wearing it for the first half of the show.  It was as much a look as it was a kind of armor, one she’d been wearing for much longer than she’d been famous for it.  Having Killian tell her not to wear it, no matter how practical the advice was or that she’d already decided on a sweatshirt, had her suddenly feeling vulnerable.

“Do you… um, do you have a hat I could borrow?”

He looked at her for a moment before nodding and moving back into his room.  She followed, shoving her hands in her pockets to keep from hugging her middle to keep herself steady.

As much as the room was identical to hers and Tink’s, the boys’ room looked like a tornado had run through half of it.  There were clothes strewn across the far, unmade bed, a rifled through duffle bag under the window, and a tray of mostly-eaten room service food on the desk.  In sharp contrast the closer bed was tidily made, a small orderly stack of books and notebooks on the bedside table closest to it.  Killian was sorting through one of the drawers of the bureau near the foot of it.

“We’re staying for one night and you put your stuff in the drawers?” She asked incredulously, moving closer to his nightstand to see what books he was reading.

“If it makes any difference-” she looked over at him and saw that he had the bill of a red hat clenched tightly in his hand as his gaze darted between the nightstand and her, “I only unpacked enough for the two days we’re here.  Er, looking for something, Swan?” 

“Just wanted to see what you were reading,” she said cautiously.  Feeling that she’d accidentally hit on yet another touchy subject she stepped back and waved her hand towards the bureau, “But that’s not important, you really took the time to unpack stuff for only two damn days?  Do you also set all your stuff out on the bathroom counter with a ruler to make sure it’s all lined up perfectly?”

“Do you want to stand here nit picking my travel habits or do you want to go explore the city?” Killian asked pointedly, stepping forward and holding the hat out to her though she could see the tips of his ears turning pink.

“Fine, let’s go-” she grinned, grabbing the hat.  Catching sight of the logo on the front she held it up with a sigh, “Really?  Red Sox?  Is it because I’m from Maine?”

“Would you rather wear the Yankees cap?” He challenged.

She shuddered, adjusting the snaps so it’d fit, “Never.  David would kill me if I was photographed in it and I’d never be allowed to step foot in Storybrooke again.”

“Do you have a preference then?” He looked back at the drawer, “As I said I have quite the array.”

“This is fine,” she said, trying to sound like it was a burden when she really didn’t care.  Grinning she put on the hat, pulling her ponytail through the opening in the back.  When she looked at Killian for approval he was watching her with a half grin on his face, “What?  Did I somehow put it on wrong?”

“Nothing of the sort, Swan,” he said softly.  Then his grin widened “Shall we?”

“Lead the way, pirate guide.”

What followed was a day unlike any Emma had ever had on a tour before.  They roamed the streets of the city with Killian making up facts about the various things they saw and their history as she egged him on, resulting in ridiculous stories that had her laughing until she was crying.  To her delight they ended their excursion sitting in the upper tier at a Reds game, thoroughly enjoying themselves as just two faces in the crowd.  Though, when it came time for the kiss cam she found she was surprisingly disappointed that the camera hadn’t been trained on them.  It wasn’t until they’d returned to the hotel and spent an hour moving back and forth between each other’s rooms before parting ways for the night that she figured out what Ruby had meant about having a front row seat.

[entity9silvergen]

He Is Mild And He Is Meek (ATLA Fanfiction)

Summary:  

He is mild and he is meek, he is Momo and he is what I seek.

Suki always wanted three things in life. One was to become a professional soccer player. The second was to live in a cute apartment filled with succulents. The third was to get a cat.

Momo probably wasn’t anyone’s first pick as a pet but Suki was determined to get this cat to love her as much as she loved him. If only he’d accept he had a home now.

Fandom: Avatar The Last Airbender

Characters: Suki, Momo, Sokka, Aang

Relationships: Suki & Momo, Suki & Sokka, Momo & Aang, Mentioned Aang/ Katara, Past Suki/ Toph

Other Tags: AroWriMo, Oneshot, Modern Setting, Modern AU, Transgender Character, Aromantic Character, Trans Suki, Aromantic Suki, Lesbian Suki, Aro Trans Lesbian Suki, Trans Aang, Bi Sokka, Queer Toph, Cat Momo, Dog Appa, Pet Adoption 

Warnings: Brief Mentions of Sex, Minor Swearing

Word Count: 6.7K

Chapter Count: 1 (Oneshot)

Author’s Note: I was working on my third AroWriMo story and was about to take a break when this idea hit me. I know it’s kind of out there but I like trying different stuff so here we are.

This is very out of my comfort zone. It’s a Modern/ Real World AU story with a sapphic aromantic transfem Suki adopting a cat. I am an achillean aroace trans man with a dog. I also don’t play soccer or work in tech and I’m writing about that a lot here. I am writing about so many things I don’t know about so feel free to call me out if things aren’t quite accurate. The main focus is on Suki and Momo becoming friends so hopefully it won’t be an issue.

The title comes from the poem The Lamb by William Blake.

This fits with the prompt for Week 4, non-romantic relationships. Because pets count, guys. Originally I was going to write a fic about Lin figuring out she’s aro and coming out but I like this better.

Also read it here on Ao3.

======

As long as Suki could remember, she’d always had three goals in life.

Goal number one had always been to play professionally for a women’s soccer team. 

Unfortunately, biology was not in her favor and she couldn’t even play on her college soccer team. For either sex. What kind of bull was that? If they were going to misgender her, they could at least do it by letting her play for the men’s team. Not that she would if she was offered. There were some things she wouldn’t compromise on. 

It was upsetting but she tried not to let it get her down. She’d come this far and she wasn’t going to let this stop her. She ended up on her school’s girl’s ice hockey team for all four years. It was just because they were short on players and they needed six to compete. Apparently not a lot of girls were interested in ice hockey? Suki actually really enjoyed it, even if the other teams always called her a man when they lost. 

Maybe it was for the better because once she’d graduated, one of her teammates introduced her to the Kyoshi Warriors. They weren’t professionals but they competed in organized tournaments. All women's organized tournaments. It wasn’t what Suki had dreamed of but soccer was still a part of her life. Maybe one day the sports industry would be more accepting but for now, this was enough.

Goal number two had always been to live in a cozy apartment with a crapton of succulents. 

She was a cottagecore lesbian who couldn’t keep a plant alive for the life of her, okay? And succulents were cute. Don’t judge. This one was a much easier goal to accomplish. She and her buddy Sokka had scored a job in webdev for this big gaming company right after they graduated from college. They were stuck coding for a smaller, newer game but popularity had surged and she and Sokka were making decent coin now. Enough that they no longer had to crash at Toph’s place. Well, Suki didn’t have to. Sokka stuck around for a bit. Suki was pretty sure they tried dating and it didn’t work out. That was probably a good thing because Suki really didn’t want to tell Sokka she’d been hooking up with Toph when they’d moved it. How awkward would that conversation be? Like, hey Sokka. You know you’re dating my ex-fuck buddy? Well now you do. Bleh.

But the point was that Suki had it good now. She wasn’t rolling in dough or anything- she’d painted most of the artwork around the apartment and all her succulents she’d grown herself from cuttings because she still couldn’t really afford to do anything else- but she was doing well. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to stay here forever but she might.

The third and final goal was to get a cat.

Because who needed a girlfriend? Or boyfriend? Or enbyfriend? Wives, husbands, any kind of spouse wasn’t the life for her. No, she wanted to live with a cat in a house filled with plants, damn it. Would the cat try to eat her succulents? Probably. Would that stop her? No. No, it would not.

So that led to right now. With her ideal home secured and a place on a soccer team, Suki decided it was time to get a cat.

She’d spent awhile looking online. Like, years. Years of research. She didn’t have much experience with cats. She had a pair of cats as a kid, sisters actually, but they’d died when she was pretty young. Not because her family was filled with terrible pet owners or anything. No, the cats had just gotten old. Her parents just decided to get a lot of pets as “practice” or whatever before having kids. She’d found out later in life that it’d taken a long time for her mother to get pregnant with her big sister Ty Lee so maybe they’d thought they just weren’t going to have kids or something.

Ty Lee’s friend Mai had a cat growing up, a kitten, so most of Suki’s cat experiences came from that. The cat’s name was Azula and she was a mean thing. Suki had gotten countless scratches on her arms from her but they were worth it to have those brief moments of sheer, unfiltered acceptance only an animal could have before the little jerk unleashed hell on her hands. Azula somewhat grew out of it when she reached adulthood but she never stopped being a terror.

Mai moved away at some point when Suki was around nine or ten and she took Azula with her. Which made sense, Azula was a cat, but Suki still missed having her around. Since then, the only cat she’d interacted with was this tortoiseshell she’d seen on a walk in high school. She’d been having a pretty day- er, week- and she thought a walk to the elementary school down the block would clear her head. She’d spotted the cat across the street and hurriedly crossed in hope she could get a better look. It’d been a pleasant surprise that the cat seemed equally delighted to see her and approached her as well, demanding pets for a good half hour before Suki realized she had to be getting home. She came back the next week, hoping to see the cat again, but she never did. It was too bad, she’d never met a cat who did anything like that.

So the years of research were necessary. She was only experienced with, what, four cats? Wait actually, her extended family members had some cats but they didn’t count. They were assholes. But four to seven, give or take? Not a lot.

Constantly googling stuff about cat care made stuff about cat adoption show up on her brower a lot which was kind of annoying in college since she couldn’t have a cat in her dorm but she let herself indulge once in a while. She had to know what kind of cat she wanted, right? Well, she thought so. Turns out she was a bit off center. Cats weren’t really bred like dogs. With dogs, you had a ton of options. There were labs, german shepherds, huskies, dobermans, dalmatians, sheep dogs, collies, and countless other breeds. With cats, you had orange, white, black, brown and grey. You also had stripes, patches, and plain but that was pretty much it. It was more important where the cat came from than what kind.

It took Suki awhile to realize most of the advertisements she saw were from cat mills. Turns out there are a lot of weirdos out there who bred their cats to pump out kittens to sell. On one hand, gross and she knew she shouldn’t further support those kinds of businesses but on the other, they needed good homes. These people had no morals, who knew where those little kittens were going to go? Not the sellers, that’s for sure.

It was hard to tear herself away from those sites but she was glad she did.

There were a lot of family cats who’d gotten pregnant by accident and the owners needed someone to take the kittens off them. They sold cheap but the cats were usually well taken care of and the sellers made sure the new owners weren’t, like, animal abusers are anything. The bar was kind of low but it was a lot better than kitten mills.

Then there were shelters.

Suki’s family, as much as they loved animals, never got pets from shelters. They had too many issues, they said. It’s easier to train a younger animal, they said. You have no idea where they’re from, they said. Ty Lee always pointed out the animals needed homes. Suki always asked if the animals who were there for too long got euthanized. Neither sister could really remember what their parents’ responses were but neither of them ever tried to buy pets from shelters, even as adults.

Until now.

Looking on the shelters’ websites swayed Suki a bit. A lot of shelters didn’t euthanize but usually pets would go to different shelters if they were at one for too long and sometimes those new shelters did. There was a wide variety in the policies at the different shelters. Some of them really prioritized the animals’ wellbeing but some… really… didn’t.

She decided on visiting a small volunteer-run animal shelter. They were having a… a sale? What’s it called when places with animals just stuck a bunch of animals outside and let people wander around and look at them? A farmer’s market? No, wait, that was food. An open house? Gosh, she should know this. She didn’t though and she was going anyway.

It was a Sunday the day she decided to go. It was the only day on the shelter’s calendar that lined up with her schedule for the next month or so. After throwing on her lucky green blouse, applying some light makeup, and firing off a quick text to Sokka letting her know she wouldn’t be around today, she headed out.

“Hey there!” a bright boy in a blinding orange t-shirt greeted as she approached the shop the kennels were set up. “I love your necklace! Where’d you get it?”

Suki tried her best not to finger the necklace she had on but quickly relaxed when she noticed the dog tags around the boy’s neck. The pronoun dog tags. This guy was trans too. Or an ally at least. He probably recognized her programmer socks from a distance and her white ring up close. It was a massive relief. She hated getting questions about her name when she signed paperwork. And knowing her, there was a pretty good chance she’d be signing some adoption papers today.

“Oh, um, I made it,” Suki said, feeling a bit proud at the way the boy’s eyes bugged out of his head.

“Really? That’s so cool! I’ve looked for pronoun necklaces online but they’re just so chunky. That’s why I like my dog tags! My dog Appa has some too!” the boy rambled excitedly. “Anyway, anything I can help you with? You are here to look at animals, right? If you’re not, I’d totally apologize for just yelling at you out of nowhere but it’s kind of my job.”

Suki laughed and decided she liked the guy. “No, don’t worry. I’m here to look at cats, actually.”

“Oh that’s great! I love cats but I’m allergic,” the boy- Aang, according to his name tag- said. He jangled something in his pocket, presumably allergy pills, and began leading her to the tables where lighter animals’ kennels were placed on. “We’ve got some good ones here today! Who should we visit first? You looking for a boy cat or a girl cat?”

“Gender is a social construct,” Suki responded, amused by Aang’s delight at her response. “Surprise me.”

“Okay, um, let’s see. Oh here’s Haru! He’s a good boy,” Aang said, leading him over to a wire exercise pen with three cats inside. “See, Haru’s the brown one. Teo and Duke are the other brown ones.”

One of the cats meowed loudly at the sound of his name, startling the other two awake.  One of them lifted his head with a dazed look in his eye and a long piece of lint stuck to his face. Suki couldn’t help but snort at the sight of it.

“Classic Haru,” Aang chuckled. Suki still wasn’t quite sure which cat he was talking about but he was already moving along. “Um, okay, so over here we’ve got three more. This is Lu Ten and- Jet! Stop trying to eat Kuei’s ear! Wait, no. I’m sorry. Don’t look at me like that! You brought this upon yourself!”

Suki’s attention drifted down the table as Aang bickered with the cats. They were funny but she was too distracted by the lone crate at the end of the table for her to notice. She lifted a finger, drawing Aang’s attention to it. “Is there anyone in there?”

Aang looked up, Jet in one hand and Kuei in the other. “Oh that? Oh yeah, that’s Momo.”

“Can I see him?”

Aang put Jet and Kuei down, looking kind of hesitant. “There’s a reason Momo’s all alone.”

“Is he aggressive?”

“What? No. No, he’s like the total opposite of aggressive. Really shy actually. He’s a rescue. My girlfriend found him on the streets a couple weeks after this hoarder got evicted. The guy had, like, sixty cats who all got sent to shelters around the state but some of them got loose. We think Momo was one of them. He gets kind of scared around other cats,” Aang said, scratching the back of his head with one hand. “I don’t think he’s scared of humans, exactly, but I don’t think he’s going to get adopted anytime soon. I’d take him but, you know, allergies. I thought it might do him some good to get used to being out here though. Took me forever to convince my boss.”

“Can I see him?”

“O-okay. I don’t see why not. Just try to stay quiet. I don’t want to scare him too much.”

Suki nodded and Aang led her down the table. The crate was facing away from the rest of the animals and Aang made sure to move slowly when he moved into sight. “Hey, buddy. It’s me. Aang. You remember me? Yeah, you do. I brought Suki! She’s just going to say hi, alright?”

Aang nodded to Suki and she shifted so she was within view of the wire mesh that was the crate’s door. She crouched down a bit, trying to get into view, and was immediately met with two wide, green eyes.

“Hey, Momo,” she cooed. “Is this alright?”

She slowly put her hand near the door. Momo stared at it for a few moments from his place curled up at the back of his crate before stretching his neck a bit to sniff. She glanced at Aang, trying to see if what she was doing was alright. He looked absolutely mystified. Taking that as a good sign, she put her hand against the door. To her surprise, Momo got up and nuzzled her hand through the wire.

“Wow, he never does that,” Aang commented. “Hopefully that means he’s getting better. Or that you have cat magic!”

“Can I adopt him?” Suki asked before she knew what she was saying.

“I don’t literally mean you have cat magic.”

“Wha- Yes. I know I don’t have cat magic, Aang,” Suki sighed and ducked her head a bit to look into Momo’s cage. He was a cute little guy. Maybe a year old. If he was from a hoarding house like Aang thought he was, he’d probably been born there. Poor boy probably didn’t know what it felt like to have a real home. “I think… I’d like to give him a shot. Give him a home. I know I’d probably have to put more work into it than I would for another cat but I’m willing to do that extra work for him. He deserves it.”

Aang smiled and it wasn’t one of the beaming ones like before. This one was a lot softer. “You have no idea how happy that makes me. You really sound like you’ll be a good pet-owner. We have to do background checks and stuff, obviously, and you can’t, like, take him home right now but if you think you’re ready, I’ll put your name down and we can start the adoption process.”

Suki shot Momo one last glance and nodded. “Nothing would make me happier.”

===========================

She ended up driving to get him at seven am the next Friday.

She’d been planning on getting him in three weeks but on Thursday Aang had called her to tell her Jet was stirring up trouble again and Momo had freaked out and he really wanted to get him out of there. They’d planned on Saturday but Momo freaking out was agitating the other cats and Aang thought it would be best if Suki came sooner so she got herself and Sokka out of work and now they were driving to the Southern Air Animal Shelter.

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me you’re getting a cat,” Sokka whined as they pulled into the parking lot. “At least tell me he’s black. Then you’d be, like, a sexy lesbian witch with a sexy black cat... famialir… thing.”

“Momo’s white.”

“Aw. That’s too b- Oh wait, that actually fits your aesthetic way better. Blue eyes?”

“Green.”

“Even better! I like him already!”

Suki snorted and flicked him in the side of the head when they pulled into their parking spot and came to a stop. “Just wait here, alright?”

“Sure thing. Try not to take forever. Unlike some people, I need to get back to work this afternoon.”

Suki flipped him off and headed inside.

The woman at the desk was kind enough and Suki didn’t have to wait long before she was redirected to Aang. The man looked a bit frazzled but still looked bright as ever. “Hey Suki! Boy am I glad you’re here. I’m sorry we had to hurry things like this but I really think this is what’s best for Momo.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Suki assured him. “Is he alright?”

“I think so. I’m just glad he had a home lined up and all ready to go,” Aang admitted as he led her to the part of the building reserved for cats. “I mean, he’s well treated here and I’ll miss him but I think he needs his peace.”

The cat corner wasn’t nearly as loud as the dog department must be but there were a few more vocal cats meowing here and there. Suki kind of wanted to stop to play with them but she wasn’t here for them. She was here for Momo.

Once again, Momo was at the farthest end of the wing and as far away as the other cats as possible. She felt a stab of pity for him when she saw him. He was curled up at the back of his kennel, face buried in his tail. When he heard them approach, he looked up with the most terrified look in his eyes and mewed softly.

“I know, buddy,” Aang told him, looking sad, “but Suki’s here. Do you remember her? She’s going to take you to your forever home.”

Aang unlatched the door and Momo tipped his head, looking confused. With Aang’s approval, Suki reached in and pulled him out, holding Momo carefully. “There we go. It’s going to be alright now, Momo.”

“Let’s get him out of this wing,” Aang said. Suki nodded in agreement, feeling Momo quivering in her arms, and the two hurried away from the other cats. Back in the lobby, Momo already seemed a lot calmer. Still nervous but better.

“Normally, all the paperwork would be done by now but due to the circumstances, just sign here,” the woman at the desk said, sliding a form across the table. “We can mail you the rest of the paperwork or you can come by later.”

Suki nodded and jotted down her initials on the form with her free hand. She tried at least skimming the rest of the form like any responsible person should but she was too worried about the cat in her arms to really care. The receptionist glanced it over once before giving Suki the okay.

“Do you have someone to drive you home or do you have a crate in your car?” Aang asked when she was done.

“Both. I came here with my friend and I already bought everything,” Suki told him. She flashed him a smile. “Thanks for everything, Aang.”

“No problem. Just doing my job,” Aang answered, matching her smile. He passed her a slip of paper. “Here’s just some extra info about Momo I had jotted down. I have one for every cat. I dunno, it may help.”

Suki thanked him one more time before saying goodbye and returning to her car where Sokka was waiting. Honestly she’d kind of forgotten he was there, despite mentioning it to Aang, until she saw his face light up at the sight of the cat.

“Is that him? Oh, what a beautiful boy,” Sokka cooed when Suki took shotgun with Momo in her lap.

Momo glanced up at Suki before shooting Sokka a confused look. Suki scratched him behind the ears. “That’s right, Momo. Sokka’s weird.”

“Hey! I’m the weird one?”

“Yup,” Suki said, popping the p. Sokka made a face at her. She laughed. “Just drive, knucklehead.”

“As my queen commands,” Sokka responded extravagantly and hit the gas. Suki held onto Momo securely and soon, they were heading to Momo’s new forever home.

The drive was overall pretty good. It was a nice drive through some countryside. Suki and Sokka had been too tired that morning to really appreciate it but now that they were more awake and in less of a hurry, they could just soak it in. Suki lifted Momo up a bit so he could look outside, smiling at the way his green eyes widened in wonder at the endless stretches of grass around them.

Momo was fairly calm for most of it but he was a cat in an unfamiliar situation so he cried a bit once in a while. Sokka pulled over to let Momo use the bathroom about halfway through. Sokka told Suki that when his family got their puppy when he was a teenager, his dad had been holding the dog in the back seat and the dog peed on him within twenty minutes of getting in the car. Suki laughed but privately she was grateful Sokka remembered. She wasn’t wearing nice clothes or anything but she really didn’t want Momo peeing on her or in Sokka’s car.

They got back to Suki’s apartment within the hour. Sokka punched in the codes for the gate and elevator, Suki’s hands too full to do it herself, and they headed inside.

“We’re home now, Momo,” Suki told the cat softly, putting him down once the door was closed. She didn’t think he’d run but better safe than sorry. Momo was definitely going to be an indoor cat. “Go explore.”

Momo seemed frozen for a moment before disappearing in a flash, scurrying behind the couch to where most of the cat stuff was. Suki would’ve taken that as a good sign if he’d run to the cat tower but no, Momo had ducked under the little table beside the couch and was watching everything warily.

“At least he’s not hiding under the couch or under the bed,” Sokka pointed out when their efforts to coax him out failed.

“I guess,” Suki sighed, sitting down on the rug a few feet away from the cat. “You want to stay?”

“I need to get back to work,” Sokka told her regretfully. “I’ll text you if anything important happens. And I might be by later. Hopefully this little guy comes out by then.”

Suki nodded and bid him farewell before glancing at Momo. He’d stubbornly tucked in his paws and planted himself firmly under that little table. She shook her head. “What am I going to do with you?”

=====================

Suki didn’t have to go back to work that day but she did have a soccer match. She could skip if she wanted- they were just playing the Ba Sing Bears and honestly they weren’t that good- but she figured she’d give Momo the chance to explore his home alone. According to the note Aang had given her, Momo was fine being alone for good stretches of time.

(It also said he was litter trained, good on a leash, practically melted into neck scritches, didn’t like his ears being poked, loved polka music but hated any kind of rap except for French, and his favorite show was the Aquaman cartoon from the 60s but Suki didn’t really know what to think of that.)

The Kyoshi Warriors unsurprisingly won their game but the Ba Sing Bears had put up a good fight. The score came closer than it usually did and Suki got more of a workout than she had in awhile. She got home late, having stopped to grab a bite to eat with her teammates. When she opened the door, Momo looked up and froze mid step from where he was standing on the back of the couch.

They made eye contact for a moment and Suki wanted nothing more than to rush over and cheer that he finally ventured out of his hiding place but, not wanting to scare him, she withheld. Tearing her gaze away, she headed to the bathroom and turned on the shower. She needed it after that game.

She was sweaty and grimy and the hot water was relaxing but she tried to keep the shower quick. As nice as it was to close her eyes, let the heat wash over her, and lose herself in her thoughts, now wasn’t really the time for that. She washed and dried herself quickly before throwing on some lounge clothes and tying her wet hair up in a towel to dry.

When she left the bathroom, Momo was back under the table, eyeing her warily. Suki tried her best to give him his space for a little while, giving the apartment a once over to see if he’d tried to eat any of her beloved plants- he did not- before heading to the kitchen to prepare some cat food.

“I hope you’re hungry, Momo,” Suki said aloud as she plopped down on the rug, cat bowl in her lap. She shook it a bit before plucking a piece out and holding it up like an offering. “You want some?”

Momo just stared at her and didn’t move a muscle. Suki put the piece of kibble down halfway between them and waited. When Momo just looked at it, she went on her phone and tried not to look at him too much.

She was just about to send Sokka a funny meme she found when Momo stepped out, took the piece of kibble, and wandered up to her.

“Hey, buddy,” she cooed. She lifted her hand slowly, waiting for his reaction, before sinking her hand into his soft, white fur. “That’s right. Not so scary, huh? It’s just me. You want some food?”

Momo let out a pathetic mewl and clambered onto her knee to dip his muzzle into the bowl. He took a few neat bites at first before throwing himself into the meal and scarfing it down.

“You were hungry, huh?” Suki said, laughing a bit when Momo slipped and nearly fell in. “I probably should’ve fed you sooner. Don’t worry, tomorrow we’ll get on a schedule.”

Momo swallowed his last bite and mewed again, as if agreeing. Suki set aside the bowl and Momo wandered off but she felt like she’d made some progress. Momo would settle in well.

===================

“He’s not much of a hunter, huh?” Sokka stated as he bounced a feather on a string in front of Momo’s face. Momo just blinked at it and yawned.

It’d been about a week since Momo had moved in with Suki. She thought things were going pretty well. Momo didn’t hide under the table anymore. He seemed to like it down there but he never ran down there in fright and it didn’t take much coaxing to get him to come out. He seemed to prefer the cat tower anyway, though he never climbed very high.

Cats weren’t terribly exciting pets. Momo wasn’t a kitten, she didn’t need to teach him to use a litter box, and he wasn’t much of a scratcher. Still, as timid as he was, he’d proven himself to have some personality.

“He can be spunky when he wants to be,” Suki told him. “Try a ball, he likes batting those around.”

Sokka looked around for a ball and was just about to toss it to Momo when there was a knock at the door.

Momo’s tail shot up but he didn’t run. Suki considered that a good sign. “I can get it.”

Sokka didn’t respond and leaned down to roll Momo the ball. “Go get it. Fetch, boy.”

“He’s not a dog,” Suki called as she opened the door to reveal a familiar face. “Aang?”

“Hey Suki,” Aang greeted with a wild wave. “I just came by to drop off the rest of Momo’s paperwork.”

“I almost forgot about that,” Suki admitted. She accepted the stack of papers from him- ugh, she was really not looking forward to reading through all of those- and stepped aside from the doorway. “Come in. I’m sure Momo would like to see you. I’ve got a friend over but I’m sure he won’t mind.”

“I don’t!” Sokka yelled from the other side of the apartment. 

“Sokka?” Aang called as he entered. “Sokka, is that you?”

“Aang?” Sokka looked up from Momo, face flashing with recognition at the sight of the bald figure by the door, and grinned. “Oh hey! I didn’t know you and Suki knew each other!”

“I didn’t know you two knew each other either!” Aang said, slapping hands with Sokka when he approached. “This is way cool!”

“Wait, how do you know each other? Exes?” Suki guessed, glancing between them.

Sokka made a face. “Ew, no. Aang’s Katara’s boyfriend. We all went to high school together.”

Aang laughed a bit and scratched the back of his head nervously. “So how do you two know each other? Exes?”

“Ew, no,” Suki said, mimicking Sokka’s reaction. He stuck his tongue out at her.

“We went to university together,” Sokka explained. “And we were roommates for a bit, during and after college. And we work together. Just best friends in general. Wow, I’m really surprised I haven’t introduced you two yet.”

“Too much trans power in one room,” Aang joked. He and Suki high fived.

“Too much power for any room,” Suki agreed. “Have you met Toph? The three of us would be unstoppable.” 

“Oh my god,” Sokka said, rubbing his face with his hands. “Just go look at the damn cat, Aang.”

“Don’t talk about Momo that way,” Aang complained but was already hurrying over to the cat tower. “Momo! You miss me, buddy?”

Suki heard a mew from Momo and a sneeze from Aang and she figured everything was okay.

“You look over this and make sure I’m not signing away my soul or some shit,” Suki said, sliding the paperwork into Sokka’s hands, and joined Aang by the couch with Momo against Sokka’s protests.

“No swearing in front of the baby!” Aang piped up as Momo poked his head out of the cat tower and slunk down to the floor. Aang patted his lap and Momo slowly padded over to him. He didn’t climb into his lap like Aang seemed to want but he was nosing his knees curiously and that seemed to equally excite Aang. “What a good boy!”

With Sokka muttering behind her, Suki sat down and scooted over. Momo largely ignored her in a very catlike manner in favor of getting chin scritches from Aang. “I think he’s been settling in well. He doesn’t really hide anymore and he doesn’t really care when someone’s in the room with him.”

“That’s good,” Aang said, moving to scratch Momo’s ears. “Has he been eating?”

“Yeah. Kind of fast actually. He threw up once. It was pretty early on though so it might’ve been stress.”

Aang nodded thoughtfully. “Poop?”

“In the litterbox. Normal looking.” As far as she could tell at least.

“What about wandering the apartment? Does he go in the other rooms yet?”

“A bit. I’ve found him around once in a while but he seems to like it here the most. Is that something I should be worried about?”

Aang shook his head. “If he’s wandering around, that should be a sign he’s getting comfortable. I think it’s normal if he just hangs around in here most of the time though.”

Suki nodded, a bit relieved. It sounded like she was doing a good job. Suki, responsible cat owner. Then came Aang’s next question.

“Have you been playing Aquaman for him? I have some DVDs if you need them.”

======================

It was about a month and a half since Suki got Momo when she had the chance to get another day off from work. 

She loved her job, she really did. Working at Avatar Gaming was truly a dream come true and the project she was working on, The Last Airbender, was actually a lot of fun to work on. Granted, she wasn’t really part of the design or story building parts of the team but it was still satisfying work and could be entertaining. She still got to play around with different characters and attacks regularly. Plus, the work environment was great. She loved going into work. That didn’t mean she didn’t like a day off once in awhile.

Though today, she’d really regret taking the day off.

Momo was a bit antisocial today so Suki was alone in her bed painting her nails. Not the best place to do it, she knew, but she was careful. She missed a phone call, not wanting to pick up her phone with the polish still wet, but it was just Sokka so she didn’t think much of it. He could wait.

It was a good hour later before Suki remembered to call him back. And once she did, she really wished she’d called him sooner. Or not at all.

“Hey,” Sokka said quietly as Suki turned up the volume. His voice cracked, worrying Suki.

“Is everything okay?” Suki asked hurriedly. “Did something happen at work?”

“You could say that.” Sokka laughed but it sounded hollow. “We’re getting laid off.”

“What?” The world seemed to stop around her.

“We’re getting laid off, Suki. The whole team.”

“I heard you,” she croaked in disbelief sitting up a bit straighter. “I- What happened? Why?”

“The Last Airbender is getting popular,” Sokka told her. “They want to- They want another team to work on it. They said they wanted to make it cleaner. More up to standard with their other big games. Make it fancier or whatever. There’s a chance they might hire some of us back but…”

“That’s bullshit,” Suki said almost automatically but it felt like someone else was speaking through her mouth. “No way in hell am I working for them again if they think they can just lay me off.”

Sokka chuckled again. This time there was a bit more life in it but it still sounded as empty as Suki felt. “That’s what I said.”

“Do we have any details yet? How long do we keep working? Are we getting severance pay? Do you have money saved? Are we going to have to-”

“I don’t know yet,” Sokka admitted. “They just announced it, nothing more. They said they’d write everything up soon. I’m… I’m on a walk right now. Just soaking everything in. Trying not to kick over any trash cans. Can I call you back? I just wanted to make sure you knew.”

“I- Yeah. Yeah, Sokka. Take however much time you need.”

“Bye.” Then, almost as an afterthought, he softly added, “Love you, no romo.”

That got a chuckle out of Suki, despite the water beginning to well up in her eyes. “Love you too, Sokka. No romo.”

Suki’s phone beeped as Sokka hung up and the dam broke.

Suki didn’t know why she was crying. Geez, she was a grown woman. Getting laid off wasn’t really a big deal, people got laid off all the time, but it was a big deal for her. She’d been working on that game practically since it’s making. Right out of college. It was the longest job she’d ever held down and she’d grown really attached to it. It was hard to think that she wouldn’t be working on it anymore. That her employers just saw her and her team as… worthless.

And there was the whole financial aspect. She needed that job. She needed income. She needed to pay for her apartment and for food and water and medical expenses and for Momo’s everything and insurance and everything. It was all so much. She was fine now but what if the money she had saved ran out before she found another job? Or if she couldn’t find a good job and she got stuck in some minimum wage shithole? 

She wasn’t in college anymore, there were no counselors to help out or career fairs to go to. She’d need to, like, job hunt. With a lay off on her resume. Did layoffs affect things? She knew it wasn’t as bad as getting fired but still. Like a dishonorable discharge. Wait, no, that was probably really disrespectful to say. But it couldn’t look good. Gosh, working for Avatar really was a dream job. She doubted any other big gaming companies were hiring. Any gaming company would be amazing but it was unlikely she’d get another opportunity. Unless they were producing more new games. But then she could just get laid off again when it started getting popular…

She was spiraling. Fuck, where was her phone? If it got tangled in the bed sheets, she’d never find it. She needed to hold something. Something to ground her, something to distract her.

She heard a mew and saw Momo poke his little head through the door.

“Go away, Momo,” she choked out, burying her face in her hands. “It smells like nail polish in here. You’ll hate it. You have such a cute nose and it will hate it.”

Momo ignored her and the smell. He hesitantly padded in before trotting up to the bed and neatly leaping up to where Suki was. Suki momentarily drew her hands away from her face to look at him. He mewled again and butted her knee with his head.

And then Suki couldn’t hold back the waterworks anymore.

Until now, her tears had been silent but now they were gushing out and she couldn’t hold back the sobs. She pulled Momo into her lap and held him close, too caught up in her own whirlwind of emotions to be surprised that he wasn’t struggling. She ran her long fingers through his short, white fur and let herself cry unabashedly. 

Momo didn’t judge her. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t make her feel any worse. Momo didn’t even look at her. He just sat with her, lending any comfort he could with his presence until the tears and sobs began dying down.

“Thanks, Momo,” Suki sniffed, playing with Momo’s ears absently. “You’re a good friend, you know that buddy?”

Momo didn’t give any sign he’d heard her and just snuggled down further into her lap and purred softly. And Suki smiled. She didn’t think she could but she did. She didn’t know what was going to happen and she was terrified for her future but at least she had her cat. With Momo here with her, things would be alright.

============

Other AroWriMo stories my me

[phoenix-downer]

Till Death Do Us Part Chapter 2 - Sehnsucht

Sora/Kairi. Angst, romance, reincarnation, rebirth, pining. ~1000 words. Read Chapter 1 here. 

The feeling first came to Kairi when her mother and father took her to see the cherry blossoms one spring.

“Pretty!” she cried as the breeze picked up and she tried to catch the petals in her hands. 

“They are beautiful, aren’t they sweetheart?” her mother said as she helped her father set up the tarp and lay out the snacks. It was time for hanami, or flower viewing, and dozens of groups had already staked out their places below the cherry trees. 

“Look, papa!” She opened her palm and showed her parents the petals she’d managed to catch. 

“Very good, Kairi,” her father said. “And what’s this type of tree called?”

“Sakura, of course!” she said with a giggle. 

“Exactly. And they only bloom like this for a couple of weeks a year,” he said as he slipped his shoes off and sat on the tarp. “That’s why it’s important to enjoy them while we can.”  

“What happens after they bloom?” 

“Well, eventually the flowers die and all the petals fall to the ground.” 

She frowned at the petals in her hand. “They die?”

“Yes, and it’s very important that we mark their passing. But we must also appreciate things while they last. It’s…” He paused for a moment and frowned. “Mono no aware.” 

Kairi tilted her head. “Mono no aware? What’s that?”

“We all have a little sadness inside us,” her father explained. “But we have happiness too. Life is bittersweet, and the fact that we get to see it before it fades away is what gives it meaning.” 

“Yes, and once it fades away, new life comes to take its place,” her mother explained as she handed Kairi her thermos of green tea. “Next year the cycle will repeat and the flowers will bloom again.”

“Oh, okay.” Kairi frowned, and her hand fluttered to the crown necklace around her neck. “I… I can feel it. The sadness, I mean.”

“That’s good, sweetheart,” her father said. “Don’t be sad, but never forget that sadness, either. It’ll make the good times that much better.” 

She nodded. She took her father’s words and her mother’s explanation to heart, and every year, the cherry trees reminded her of their wisdom. She was glad they had shared it with her, for ever since she could remember, something had felt wrong. About her, about her life, about the nature of reality.  

It didn’t make any sense. She had a good life. Her parents loved her, and she had plenty of friends. She did well at school, and she’d even won a regional competition for her art. 

Today she was going to see it at the Prefectural Art Museum with her parents and Selphie. Selphie looped her arm through Kairi’s and excitedly chatted away about all the latest gossip at school, but Kairi found herself zoning out as they wandered the halls of the museum. 

“Earth to Kairi? Did you hear what I just said?” Selphie said with a sigh.  

“Sorry, no. Could you repeat it again?”

“Kento likes you! Aren’t you gonna go out with him?”

“Er, no?”

“Kairi!” Selphie whined. “He’s so good-looking, and nice, too!”

“Sure, but I’m just not interested in him.”

Selphie rolled her eyes. “I swear, no one is good enough for you! It’s like you’re holding out for someone that doesn’t even exist.” 

“Well, maybe I am,” Kairi said cryptically. “In the meantime, have at Kento and whoever else catches your eye.”

Selphie smirked. “With your blessing, I will.”

They wandered around the art museum a little longer until they found the right gallery. There. On the wall was the painting Kairi had made. Seeing it again stirred up those old feelings of… of mono no aware, as her father had called it. Ever since she could remember, a shadowy figure had haunted her dreams. But he wasn’t scary, not at all. Something about him felt… familiar, almost. Some nights, she could almost hear his voice. But his face always eluded her. 

Selphie’s eyes went wide as she gazed at the painting. “Kairi, this is beautiful. You really made this?” 

“Yeah, I did. Crazy, right? The inspiration just struck one day, and I couldn’t stop till I was finished.”

Against a background of sky and sea, the caption next to the picture read, a shadowy figure hovers over the waves and reaches its hand towards the viewer. But in a stroke of brilliance, its face is obscured by the light from the sun, thus allowing the viewer to imagine whatever face they may wish. Artist: Kairi Uchida, third year high school student and winner of the Tokyo Prefectural High School Art Contest.

“Sehnsucht?” Selphie said as she read the title. “What’s that?”

“It’s a German word. It’s kinda similar to mono no aware, but it means something more like… a deep longing for something better, I suppose.” 

Kairi had discovered the word in her quest to put into words the feeling she’d carried with her all her life. A German author had written a poem with the same title that captured how she felt perfectly, and this painting was inspired by it and by her dreams. 

Selphie studied the painting for a few moments. “So this is your dream guy, huh?”

“N-No!”

“Uh-huh. Sure it’s not. It’s just too bad he doesn’t have a face.” 

“Yeah,” Kairi said with a sigh. Until she discovered the identity of her shadowy figure, the Wunderland Friedrich Schiller had written about would forever elude her. With each passing year, the longing and dissatisfaction inside of her grew. 

Maybe she really was just chasing a shadow. Maybe the thing, no, the person she hoped for didn’t really exist. She should follow her father’s advice and enjoy the things she already did have in life while they lasted. And maybe, just maybe, the longing itself was a part of it, a part of mono no aware. 

Still, as she gazed at the painting for a few moments longer, she couldn’t help but wonder:

Did her shadow long for her as much as she longed for him? 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N: A big thank you to @seaberry-siren for giving me the original prompt, @angel-with-a-pipette​ for her help with fleshing this into a full-blown story and reading it over for me, and @rapis-razuri​ for also reading it for me! I was also listening to a song by Ravel called “Mother Goose Ballet M. 62: Apotheosis: The Fairy Garden” (Ma mère l’oye, ballet M. 62: Apothéose: Le Jardin féerique. Lent et grave in French) on loop the entire time after I’d found it by chance, and it actually inspired me to keep writing this story. And that poem Kairi mentions is very much real; you can find an English translation of it here if you like with the original German following it. 

Thank you to everyone who left comments on the last chapter! I really appreciate the support. I’m thinking this story will have one more chapter, but we’ll see!

[evak-fic-rec-turtleanon]

Evak Fics - Cheating

** Cheating when they're in a relationship with someone else ** One of them cheats when Isak and Even are together 😞   ** Others: Cheating with a twist, or emotional cheating, or they didn't cheat but was cheated on.   ** Bonus: Lighter fics

***** CHEAT ON SOMEONE ELSE *****

We Can't Keep Doing This by neelabrenner (563 words) - Isak and Even are in their thirties. They love each other deeply, and they are married - but not to each other. Life keeps bringing them together, and they let themselves be lead.

Worth it by ForEvenAndEver (yuraxchan) (842 words) - Love is always worth it, no matter what.

bruise by evak1isak (1.5k words) - Isak is not out in high school. However, this doesn't prevent him from getting a boyfriend. A boyfriend, who, in theory, is in a relationship with a girl.

Artificial and Colored by stormboxx (1.5k words) - Even and Isak stay in the room for the whole day. Well, almost. Right after the scene 'Hjernen er alene' ('The brain is alone')

Neon Party: Redux by givemesumaurgravy (1.7k words) - what if Noora didn’t come home and interrupt our lovely babies the night of the neon party when they almost kissed in the kitchen?

We're something she can't see by suckmyboardbxtch (1.8k words) - Even and Isak have a little place where they can meet and fall in love with each other, even though Isak is Even's second.

whose world is this by withoutwords (1.8k words) - It’s the same Isak who does his own laundry, and cooks his own dinner, and calls his dad for money. But now he kisses boys.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. by withoutwords (2.2k words) - The walk back to school is long. His head and his feet and his bag feel heavier, and his skin burns with the thought of people staring. Strangers and students and friends all staring, like he has it printed big and bold across his forehead. Homo. Home Wrecker. Loser.

Home by endlessandinfinite (2.8k words) - Isak tastes like happiness. Even tastes like trouble. These are the moments that matter. These are the moments they live for. And Isak is home.

never make him (love me) by eliottlallemants (14k words) - Isak is in love with Even. Even isn't in love with Isak. Or so Even thinks.

If You're Under Him [You Ain't Getting Over Him] by givemesumaurgravy (SERIES, 4 fics) (15k words) - Isak Valtersen is happy. He's finally starting his surgical rotation at the hospital where he hopes to work someday and he's happily married to his best friend. But then Isak meets Even, the intriguing new barista where he gets his daily coffee.

After Hours by rokklagio (SERIES, 5 fics) (15k words) - Even was a habit he just couldn't quit. Set ten years later.

I’ll Love You Forever by shk_1991 (16k words) - Isak and Chris are young and in love in their early 20's, they are going to get married and got their long life in front of them. But then it goes wrong and suddenly all their dreams are gone. Not only for Isak and Chris but also for Sonja and Even. Sonja and Even are in their late 30’s and live in a happy marriage with three children. Their marriage is put to the test when Even falls in love with Isak. The question is whether Even and Isak are ready to give up everything for their love.

You'll Kill Me If You Stop by photographer_of_thoughts (22k words) - Isak decides to go and see the film 'Call Me By Your Name' because he can't turn off his own feelings that have been building for a long time now. He thinks he won't see anyone he knows there because this isn't the kind of film his friends or anyone from Nissen would appreciate. But then he sits next to Even, who is also seeing the film alone.

don't you keep it all to yourself by colazitron (24k words) - AU in which Even didn't need to repeat his last year and instead started working at the coffeeshop Isak passes on his way to school every morning.

A Force of Nature by Laika_the_husband (30k words) - In this story Isak Valtersen is a cheating bastard. He will hurt his wife, his lover and himself in the process.

The Workings of Love by endlessandinfinite (36k words) - “So, you’re in love with me.” Isak nods. “And you’re in love with him.” Isak nods. Jonas laughs humorlessly again.

Legitimate Expectations by champagneleftie (57k words) - It's a good time to be Isak Valtersen. The up-and-coming Norwegian authority on matters of freedom of press, several Supreme Court wins already on his resume - and still barely thirty. He's carved out a place in the world that he never thought he'd reach, but sometimes that place just feels a little too small and rigid. Enter Even.

Only You Can Ease My Mind by martls (85k words) - Or the alternate universe where Isak meets Even at the psychiatric hospital his mom was admitted.

***** CHEAT ON EACH OTHER  😞 *****

all my tears have been used up by wolfsbanex (707 words) - He'd lost the only part of his life that made it worth living because of a couple random fucks. How ridiculous.  

When We Were Young by thoughtsafterdark (2k words) - Even and Isak broke up 10 years ago. Isak had just gotten back from New York and his friend Magnus is throwing him a welcome home party. Isak had said specifically NOT to invite Even and Magnus still did.

Liars by endlessandinfinite (3.5k words) - They’re okay. They’re beautiful and tragic and out of control. They lie and cheat - living with broken hearts. But this is it. This is their life.

I can hear your heart crying out for me by Skamtrash (6.1k words) - Isak never thought one intoxicated experience could fuck his life up so much. Isak cheats on Even.

Shatter Me by givemesumaurgravy (6.6k words) - “I’m not going to yell or any of that. I’m just going to make this really fucking awkward and uncomfortable for you.” “W-what?” Even says, sniffling. “I want you to tell me everything that happened,” Isak says.

look how fast the night changes by Skamtrash (7.3k words) - Isak cheats on Even, there's no alcohol, no intoxication. Just a seriously stupid decision.

Im So In Love I Dont Know What To Do by Skamtrash (9.5k words) - Even screwed up when he was drunk and cant hold out from telling Isak any longer.

If It Makes You Happy (Modern Boys part two) by Laika_the_husband (41k words) - Part 2 of Modern Boys series. You should totally read part 1 before this. Set in the 90s. Isak is torn between familiar but unattainable Jonas and dangerous but perfect Even.

Love is a battlefield by Minutebyminute (56k words) - Isak and Even have been drifting apart for a long time. Love conquers all. Love defeats all. Sometimes love pulls you apart. Sometimes for a period in time, sometimes forever. And sometimes love is a battlefield.

All Stories Are Echoes by sebastianL (felix_atticus) (123k words) - This is about potential--realized or not--memory, bravery, movies, accidents, and the nature of stories. Also love, because what other kind of story could it be?

***** OTHERS *****

The lie I didn’t have to tell. by verlore_poplap (orphan_account) (925 words) - Isak has an adultery kink that Even is happy to oblige.

Just This Once by writeawaydays (3.1k words) - Isak finds out his boyfriend has been cheating on him, so he invites the cute guy that's been watching him at school up to his apartment looking for rebound sex.  

The Boy Who Likes Isak's Smile by wyoheartsmusic (7.6k words) - Isak is heartbroken and there is a boy who is very determined to make him smile.

Lyrics and Life by Midlifecrisis (7.9k words) - Not sure how to describe this one. Established relationship. Cheating and not cheating? They are very much in love.

Just not right now by cuteandtwisted (8.1k words) - No cheating but maybe emotional cheating? Ish? "You can't... We can't.. It's not right." Isak settles into an unhealthy longterm relationship with his busy lawyer boyfriend and convinces himself that happiness is not for him. Enter his boyfriend's childhood friend: Even.

I Dare You to Love Me by photographer_of_thoughts (8.4k words) - Isak and Even do not meet in high school but they do meet at Isak's wedding...to someone else. But there's no cheating.  based on the movie "Imagine Me and You"

(WIP) On the Edge of the Night by Laika_the_husband - So this is a complicated one. This story will explore Isak, Jonas and Even from high school to adulthood. There will be no good people here. Nor bad people. Just people. Every protagonist is also an antagonist, and themselves are their greatest enemies.

something sweet (to mend your heart) by cuteandtwisted (22k words) - In which Isak becomes jaded after he gets cheated on and copes using sarcasm and humor. He's determined to end the school year without drama and avoids his ex and all his awful friends at all costs. Well, all of them except maybe half-decent Even Bech Næsheim, who's somehow determined to earn his friendship and fix his heart.

Self Control by nofeartina (28k words) - “I never meant to hurt you, Isak.” Without any pause Isak replies, “Well, you did.” He looks him in the eyes, and continues. “You fucked me up, Even." 10 years later Even comes back to Oslo and Isak has a boyfriend. No cheating but maybe some emotional cheating. Kinda.

Reflections by Laika_the_husband (30k words) - Isak and Even break up and Isak gets a new boyfriend. But Even is very much still in the picture.

No day without it by skambition (32k words) - His hair was a little shorter than Even was used to, and his face had gotten even more beautiful over the last 10 years. The same amazing cheek bones, the same cute little nose, the same flawless, pale skin. And his lips. Those goddamn lips. They brought back memories that Even had tried to forget about for like 10 years now, memories of laughing, smiling, kissing.

and this mist, it makes it hard to see by vesperthine (36k words) - Emotional cheating mostly. In a way, it was escapism. In others, not so much. But Even has only been there for three months when Isak shows up. And it makes a mess out of everything, while other things settle into place.

what i like about you by cammm (44k words) - Insane infatuations turns into a short lived mutual distaste. Until that mutual distaste quickly shifts into something more. Isak has a boyfriend.

Minute by Minute by Lisa94 (56k words) - Isak is angry at the world after his ex Julian cheated on him. But he can´t escape his life or his ex. He needs the help of his friends to find to himself again. (Basically Isak going through the five stages after a break-up)

(WIP) I Can Hardly Breathe by Flatfootmonster - In this universe, Even and Sonja married, so I shouldn't really need to tag infidelity as it is implied (but who is being unfaithful? *dramatic drum roll*)

The Weight Of Us by verlore_poplap (orphan_account) (81k words) - I believe this is a complicated one. It's been a long time since I read it. Isak gets engaged to Emma. Even is married to Sonja. And then a bunch of things happen. Even's sister has cancer

Twice by intothewind (101k words) - Kinda with a twist but also not (shrug emoji). “I told them we were dating, so they’d let me in their band.” Jonas states, shrugging his shoulders like it’s the most nonchalant thing in the world.

***** BONUS *****

FIFA madness by Bellakitse (1.4k words) - Even and Isak are playing FIFA, when Even questions Isak's awesomeness at playing the game. Isak is going to prove him wrong, or he would if Even could keep his hands to himself.

That was cheating by yourfriendlyneighbourhoodme (1.4k words) - As part of Kose group's team building, Isak finds himself dragged on a Laser Tag trip which turns out to be more exciting than he hoped, thanks but no thanks to a certain Even Bech Næsheim.

this is what it's like to be lovers by moonlightphan (4.1k words) - where Isak and Even have a conversation about micro-cheating, and their boundaries.

[littlejeanniebean]

The Outsiders | Sodapop x Cocoa | Part 2

A/N: You can read part 1 here! This cute family photo is from @ohmy80s​ :) - J xx

In the coming days, I rack up a phone bill so high, Darry just about has a heart attack when he gets the bill in the mail. I picked up an extra shift at the DX to cover it, but it was worth it to get to know Cocoa.

She's in her senior year, reigning champion at an interstate math competition, wants to become a banker, but will settle for professor at a women's college. She's been living with her aunt since her mama died, doesn't know who her daddy is, and more importantly, doesn't care. She applied to UCLA and is waiting on pins and needles to hear back. 

I know she'll get in. She's too smart not to. Now while I might feel a certain way about her, I like to consider myself a man of honor. I know I'm never leaving unless Ponyboy becomes a famous author and Darry can finally reach his full potential because he doesn't have to support us anymore. So for the record, she kissed me first. I did kiss her back, but in my defense, she kissed me good. 

"You look like one of 'em actors, you know," she says breathlessly after our seventh kiss in the empty football field at her school. We never talked about it, but we both know we can’t tell anyone about us.

"Like one of the good ones?" I tease.

"No, the trashy ones who look better than they act," Cocoa deadpanned.

She meant it to be funny. I meant it to be funny. But hearing her say it aloud made me flinch and she noticed.

"Poppie?"

"It's fine."

"No, it's not," she cups my cheeks in her warm hands, "You're a wonderful person and beautiful thing is you don't even need to think about it -"

"Wonderful never made anything of anyone," I try to make her understand, "Wonderful… can't help you get where you wanna go, Cocoa."

"Where is it you think I wanna go?" she sits back on her haunches, hands on her hips, "Where is it you think I wanna be other than right here with you, hmm?"

I can't tell if she's mad at me or something else, so I shrug neutrally, "LA maybe?"

"... Maybe," she concedes, "A big maybe."

"I'm sorry. I like you. A lot. We can… How about we just enjoy this?" I'm nothing if not a people pleaser, apparently.

Cocoa smiles and runs her thumb across my lips, "Think you might be enjoying it a little too much. Got lipstick all over your face, shugga…"

I start the kiss this time. 

She gets her letter the next day. A big, fat one, she calls to say. That's a good sign, she says, but I can tell she's still nervous. So I tell her I'll come over and we can open it together. I buy a stick of cinnamon gum for her to mark the occasion. She's leaving right after graduation. Her aunt has a cousin who has a grandmother who runs a boarding house for girls where she can stay, get a job before the first semester. I tell her I’m proud of her and the way she smiles all wide makes me believe I mean it. 

The next day, I go to work, idle at the pumps mostly. This one guy drives up in a hurry in a rusty pickup filled with sour-faced boys and men.

“Fill ‘er up quick, man,” his beefy arm is hanging out the window and he bangs on the side of his door to punctuate his sentence, fidgeting with his cigarette.

“Sure,” I amble over in a kinda relaxed way, but this isn’t my first rodeo. The boys have swastika tattoos. There’s a gun barrel poking out of the tarpaulin in the basin and I pretend not to see it. I’m good with faces, so I try to get a good look at as many of them as I can.

As soon as they drive away, I call the cops. It takes a minute to get through and the voice of the lady in dispatch is tight and rushed.

When I tell her about the gang’s tattoos she mutters, “Should know better than to put up a school right next to a greaser neighborhood... Thanks for the tip, kid.”

I’m running down the street before the words really make it all the way into my brain. There are three ambulances outside Cocoa’s school, a bunch of students in clusters outside. Sirens and people are wailing. 

I see one of the girls she walks with, “Have you seen Cocoa?”

She shakes her head, fat tears streaking down her face.

Weaving through the crowd, I keep thinking I see her, I keep hoping, but each time it’s someone else. 

I’m calling her name, getting strange looks, but I keep calling ‘cause I can’t see no more. I rub the wetness out of my eyes and run to the Holy Mary Hospital - a colored hospital. It’s farther than it should be from their neighborhood, but it was the only tract of land big enough that they could buy. 

I give her name to the receptionist. She’s in the OR. I have to wait. I can’t think straight, so I go to the payphone and call Darry at his new job bookkeeping at the garage and tell him everything.

“Hold up, I know that gang,” he says.

“No, they’re not from around here, I woulda recognized ‘em,” I tell him.

“No, no, listen, call Two-Bit and the Shepherds, tell ‘em to meet me at the garage.”

“What are you gonna do, Darry?” 

“Somethin’ the cops would never get around to,” he hangs up.

I do what he asks, but then I go pick up Pony from school and bring him to the garage with me.

“What are you doing here?” Darry gets in my face immediately, “Why’d you bring Pony into this?”

“I didn’t bring him into anything,” I meet his gaze steadily, “unless you’re ‘bout to do somethin’.”

“This is our territory. If those guys wanna come around here, packing heat, they gotta answer to us.”

“Did you ask them to meet us here?” 

“Yeah, so?”

“Call it in.”

“They ain’t gonna do shit, Soda,” Two-Bit drawls.

“‘Sides, punching a Nazi every now and then is good for the soul,” Steve finally comes out from under the Mustang he's been fiddling with and wipes the grease off his hands.

Shepherd, his crew, and some of the other mechanics stand off to the side, eyes watchful and glinting like coyotes. 

“When the perps are starin’ ‘em in the face, they can’t ignore ‘em,” I face Darry, but talk loud enough to make everyone uneasy, “The Nazis ain’t like us. This ain’t gonna be no rumble. It’ll turn into a fucking massacre.”

Darry runs his hands through the grease in his hair once. Twice. “Call it in! Clear out, boys! Let’s let these motherfuckers dig their own graves and rot in them.”

There are murmurs of agreement, some big-talk about how they woulda taken the Nazis in the fight, but we’re outta there fast. 

“Want us to go in with ya, Soda?” Pony offers when Darry pulls up at the hospital.

“No, thanks, Pony,” I hop out. 

Ignoring the way my palms sweat and my knees shake at the thought, I ask the receptionist if Cocoa’s out of the OR and doing alright. 

“She is.”

I exhale.

“But only family is allowed to visit,” the lady looks me up and down with a deep judgement carved into the downturn of her mouth.

I’ve been in hospitals before and know that’s a load of crap, but I appreciate her looking out of Cocoa, so I nod and back away.

“How’s she, Soda?” Darry asks.

“She’s good,” I smile a little just thinking about it.

“It just came on the radio!” Ponyboy grips my arm excitedly, waking me at five in the morning, “They got ‘em! They got those sleazy mother-”

"Language!" yells Darry from the shower.

"Motherfuckers," Pony whispers to me.

“Great,” I mumble, realize what he means, then throw myself into a sitting position, “That’s great!”

Darry whistles on his way to work, Ponyboy forgets the time because he’s writing his next story and I have to get him out of the house before leaving myself. I buy a stick of cinnamon gum at the DX and go to the hospital on my lunch hour. 

I have what the boys like to call the gift of persuasion, but really I just keep my head down, look up and smile if I feel anyone staring too long, and walk on by. That’s how I’m able to find Cocoa’s room. She’s asleep, so I leave the gum on the nightstand and kiss her forehead. When I turn around to leave, her aunt is standing in the doorway with a lunch tray. 

“Ma’am,” I say, because what other option did I have?

“You the Curtis boy, ain’t ya?”

“The middle of three, yes, ma’am,” I pull up the chair for her and she sits down.

“The one who didn’t finish school.”

I thought of Cocoa, smiling wide, telling me I’m wonderful and I tip an invisible hat to her aunt on my way out, “Yes, ma’am. Please let me know if either of you need anything.”

[areyounotthrowingawaymysocks]

Playground (Daveed x Emmy/ Anthony x Jasmine)

Pt. 1 Pt. 2 Pt. 3 Pt. 4 Pt. 5 Pt. 6 Pt. 7 Pt. 8 Pt. 9

Pairing: Daveed Diggs x Emmy Raver-Lampman and Anthony Ramos x Jasmine Cephas-Jones

Word Count: 2217

Warnings: Bullying, Injury, Hospital, Surgery

Author’s Note: This was originally a short, fluffy fic about the kids playing together at the playground. Then I decided to re-write it while editing today and this was the end result. Whoops!

While Emmy and Jasmine were at work together, both currently working on a new musical, Daveed and Anthony decided to band together to take care of the three kids. Daniele, Callie, and Michael were five now and were all in the same kindergarten class. The two couples tried to get the kids together at least once a week, and they regularly watched each other’s kids so that they could still have date nights and some child-free time. 

On this particular Saturday, Daveed and Anthony decided to take the kids to the local park where they could run around and get some energy out. The park also had a playground where they would be able to play on the jungle gym and swings for a while before heading home for dinner. 

Daveed and Daniele arrived at Anthony and Jasmine’s apartment around two, after a long and messy lunch of mac and cheese and fruit snacks, the only things she would eat when Emmy wasn’t home. Anthony opened the door to reveal Michael running around the apartment in just his underwear while Callie was playing quietly in the corner with her dollhouse. It never ceased to amuse Daveed how different the twins were. He sent Daniele over to play with Callie and then made his way over to Michael and tried to convince him to put on some clothes. After about fifteen minutes, Michael was finally dressed and the group made their way down the street to the park.

As soon as they arrived, all three kids joined a game of tag with a few other kids who were already playing. Daveed and Anthony took a seat on a nearby bench where they could chat while still keeping an eye on the kids to make sure no one got hurt. After about twenty minutes of tag, Daniele and Callie came over to ask if they could go over to the playground now. They called for Michael and made their way over, the girls heading straight for the swings while Michael ran for the sandbox when he saw there was a dump truck that no one was playing with yet. 

After a little while, Daniele and Callie decided to head over to the jungle gym to practice their gymnastics. Their were some older kids hanging out there too, but they stayed on the lower bars like Anthony had told them to so they weren’t worried. Daniele was showing Callie the new flip she had learned in class when one of the bigger kids came over to them.

“Are you babies done yet?” she asked, her hands on her hips, glaring at Dani and Callie. “Why don’t you go play with the baby toys over there?” she pointed at the baby swings across the park.

“M-my Papí says I can p-play here if I w-want!” Callie retorted, her small voice wavering as the older girl stared her down.

“Y-yeah! D-daddy said we could p-play f-flips!” Dani added, moving to stand next to her friend.

“Well, only big kids can play on the bars. Prove that you’re big kids and we’ll let you stay,” another girl added.

“Fine!” Daniele shouted, climbing up the ladder to the higher bars.

“Dani! Papí told us not to go up there!” Callie called after her, looking back towards Anthony and Daveed who were busy talking and didn’t notice the altercation their daughters were in.

“It’s fine, C! We’ve been up here before! C’mon!” Danielle called from the top of the ladder.

Callie hesitantly made her way towards the ladder and began climbing up after giving one more glance towards her father. When she reached the top, she couldn’t help but feel proud of herself for making it up so high. She could see the whole playground from up here. Michael was still in the sandbox, currently dumping sand down another kid’s shirt. She could see Anthony and Daveed, still on the bench, unaware that their daughters had climbed up higher than they were supposed to. But before she could get too comfortable up there, the older girls were back.

“Now you gotta do a flip up here,” the older girl said, demonstrating by flipping herself backwards so she was hanging by her knees, “Your turn,” she said as she flipped back up.

Daniele hesitantly adjusted herself on the bar and then helped Callie adjust herself. They squeezed hands and then let go as they flipped back. Daniele felt her legs slip off of the bar, and the next thing she knew, she was on the ground, searing pain in her left arm. 

“Dani!” Callie called as soon as she realized what had happened, “Hold on! I’ll be right there to help you!” she yelled to her as a tear slipped down her cheek.

“Here, I’ll show you the fastest way to get there,” the older girl said before pushing Callie off the bar, laughing as she fell to the ground next to Daniele and then running off with the rest of the older kids before they could get caught.

Callie hit the wood chips below with a thud. The pain was instant and all she could do was scream. Anthony heard her and he and Daveed went running, shocked to see both of their daughters lying on the ground below the jungle gym. Daveed could tell just by looking that Daniele had broken her left arm, the swelling and bruising already setting in. Callie was in even worse shape. The broken bone in her leg had pierced her skin and she was bleeding. Anthony was using his sweatshirt to stop the bleeding while calling an ambulance. He told Daveed to call the theater and have Emmy and Jasmine meet them at the ER. Michael had noticed the chaos and the crowd that had formed and made his way over. Daveed kept him turned around while simultaneously cradling Daniele so that he wouldn’t see his sister’s injury. After he reached the theater and confirmed that the girls would meet them at the ER, Anthony had him call Stephanie to pick up Michael so he wouldn’t have to be at the hospital with them. He explained to his son that he was going to have a special sleepover with Auntie Steph and that he’d get to watch movies and pick whatever kind of take out he wanted for dinner. 

After what felt like an eternity but in reality was probably only a few minutes, the ambulances arrived to take the girls to the hospital. The EMTs quickly splinted Daniele’s arm to keep it stable on the trip. They took a bit longer with Callie because they had to bandage her wound before they could splint her leg. When they finally arrived at the hospital, they put the girls in a shared room because they had been crying for each other the whole trip. They were both given pain medication so they were super sleepy and a little loopy when Jasmine and Emmy arrived. Both women were in a frantic state, clearly having gotten quickly changed out of costume and jumping into an Uber as soon as they got the call. 

The girls were both taken back for x-rays, Jasmine having to go with Callie who was convinced that she was being taken away from her parents forever. Fortunately, Daniele’s arm was a clean break that would heal with just a cast. She chose purple, to match her new sneakers, and was excited to have all her friends draw on it at school on Monday. Callie, unfortunately, was going to need surgery to realign her bones and place several screws. Anthony and Jasmine were nervous, as was to be expected, but they were grateful to be at a pediatric hospital with a world renowned orthopedic team who they felt would do everything they could to help their daughter heal as quickly as possible. 

Daniele was allowed to go home after her cast was put on, so she said goodbye to Callie and wished her good luck with her surgery. Emmy promised that they would come back to visit the next day once Callie was recovering and that seemed to calm the girls down a bit. The Diggs family made their way home, leaving Callie and her parents to prepare for the long night ahead of them. Despite the heavy pain medications, she was still in a significant amount of pain, which the doctor said was to be expected with her injury. Her surgery had been booked for 7am the following morning, and she would be unable to eat all night, so they tried to come up with some different ways to distract her both from hunger and pain all night. Luckily, the hospital didn’t have a restriction on visiting hours, so Cynthia and Mario came over around 9 with a big bag of supplies they had picked up from the apartment: pillows, blankets, dolls, art supplies, books, stuffed animals, movies, the iPad, and Anthony’s laptop. They also grabbed changes of clothes for all three of them, toiletries, and phone chargers. Stephanie had also stopped by the apartment and grabbed anything she would need to take care of Michael for the few days they were expecting to be in the hospital with Callie and a few days after so she could recover at home in peace. 

Around 2am, Callie was awake and crying from pain, Jasmine doing her best to hold her without hurting her leg while they waited to hear back from the doctor about giving her more pain meds. Jasmine put Lion King on for her, one of her favorite Disney movies, and was singing along to some of the songs, quietly kissing her head, trying to calm her, to no avail. Callie was just whimpering at this point, too tired to fully cry. Anthony excused himself from the room and Jasmine assumed he was going to go beg the nurse to page the doctor again. 

Twenty minutes later, the nurse came in with more pain meds for Callie. Jasmine thanked her and the woman offered her a small supportive smile in return. Jasmine was so grateful that Callie had a nurse who was so attentive to her needs and was helping to make sure she was as comfortable as possible until she had her surgery. With the additional medication, Callie quickly fell asleep. Jasmine noticed that Anthony still hadn’t returned, so she texted him to see if he was okay. When she didn’t get a reply, she decided to go look for him, hoping Callie would stay asleep for a little while.

She found him crying on a bench in the family waiting area. She quietly slipped next to him and wrapped him in a hug, rubbing steady circles on his back to help steady his breathing.

“Bubba, match my breathing. In. Out. In. Out. Good job. Keep going,” she coached him, feeling his breathing begin to regulate, the tension being released from his body.

“My fault,” he muttered into her shoulder, his voice wavering from tears.

“What do you mean, Bubba?” she asked, holding him so she could see his face.

“It’s my fault she’s hurt. I shoulda watched her better,” he said, turning away, unable to look her in the eyes.

“Bubba, look at me,” she said, turning his face so she was looking at him, “I know how hard it is to watch both of them at once. Especially somewhere like the playground. She’s gonna be okay. Let’s go back in there with her before she wakes up again looking for us.”

The next morning, Callie was brought down for pre-op around 5:30. By 7, she was pretty doped up from the medicine the anesthesiologist had given her, but she was excited that when she woke up from her “nap” her leg would be fixed and she would have a purple cast to match Dani. When she was wheeled back to the OR, Anthony and Jasmine were led to a waiting room, where both of their mothers were waiting already, along with Cynthia and Mario. They all waited together, taking turns comforting Anthony and Jasmine until a nurse came out to tell them that Callie was out of surgery and should be waking up shortly. She explained that one parent could come sit with her now and that the other could join once she was fully awake. Jasmine followed the nurse back and took a seat next to her sleeping daughter, admiring how peaceful she looked for the first time since they had arrived at the hospital. 

A few hours later, Callie was back up in her hospital room surrounded by her family. Everyone had come upstairs to see her once she was moved back up and they all brought gifts. Jasmine’s mom had gotten her a new Barbie, Anthony’s mom got her a stuffed pig, her current favorite animal. Mario and Cynthia had stopped at the American Girl store and gotten a set of crutches and a cast so her doll could match her. Stephanie brought her a box of her favorite cookies, and Michael had drawn her a picture. She was still a bit drowsy from the anesthesia and sore from surgery, but Callie was grateful to be spending a day surrounded by her family who cared about her so much.

[hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger]

10: Stay Alive

Miles has been Spider-Man (in-universe) for less than 5 years. And he’s stayed alive. That’s cute, even though him staying alive owed a lot to Molecule Man.

Ultimate Peter Parker only ‘died’ (and he didn’t even die really) because he sacrificed his life. It wasn’t like he made a mistake, he actively chose to give up his life.

Meanwhile 616 Peter Parker managed to stay alive for like 10 years before his first death in Secret Wars which was due to a literal God so...is Miles remaining alive that impressive? Is it even something to put him over Peter?

Using the argument that Miles doesn’t die whilst fighting Ultimate Goblin instead of dying is again fucking ridiculous because Peter battled and survived Ultimate Goblin multiple times before his ‘death’ in Death of Spider-Man. In that instance it was again an act of sacrifice more than anything and he was carrying a major injury from saving Captain America and taking a bullet for him or something IIRC.

So it’s a false equivalency even if you ignore the fact that the Oz drug both Peter and Miles have make them effectively immortal.

Him surviving Secret Wars isn’t that impressive either. So he manages to stow away and avoid death. How...heroic? Not to mention PETER also avoids the final incursion on his own lifeboat.

Yes Molecule Man saves Miles and brings back his mother, but he literally saves everyone too. He just happens to shunt Miles into Earth 616 and resurrect his mother. That’s not something Miles can do that Peter can’t because it was based upon Miles having a random burger on his person. Had Peter had that same difference. Uncle Ben would probably be back if Peter had a burger.

It’s not that Miles has the magic power to bring back dead people via his actions he just got lucky.

Also doesn’t him never having his loved ones remain dead kind of make him a Marty Stu?

 9) Alleged immortality

Again...Marty Stu.

But for the record Ultimate Peter, whom this video apparently wants to conflate with but also switch out for 616 Peter when convenient and not treat as a separate character. Also has that power and it’s not even alleged. Also gotta love CBR using a picture of 616 Norman Osborn who looks nothing like Ult Norman when discussing the Goblin killing Peter. Then following that up with Raimi Norman who like 616 Norman is definitely not a Hulk Goblin.

 8) Regenerate

 Miles is more durable huh?

 So...when exactly did Miles survive being crushed beneath machinery weighing a locomotive...under water?

 When did Miles survive being buried alive for 2 weeks?

 When the fuck did Miles survive a beating from Juggernaut, or Morlun, or the Hulk, or Collossus empowered by both the Juggernaut’s powers AND 1/5 of the Phoenix Force?

 More durable my ass.

 The evidence for this is also laughable.

 First of all it’s based upon being able to burst from his restraints and fight back after being drugged which...Peter has definitely done at least once or twice.

 Second of all it literally comes from a comic based upon the USM CARTOON not even the canon Miles. It’s literally cherry picking anything from any version of Miles.

 His durability is also being measured by being able to survive several thousand volts of electricity and like...does the author of this video not know who the fuck Electro is?

 Being tortured by doom and then saving his Dad is also not something Peter couldn’t do. Peter wet through worse in the MP trilogy alone.

 Same thing about being lit on fire. Shit one of those crappy #700.ONE issues showed Peter doing that!

 7) Spider Sense

So Miles spider sense allows him to predict the future when he is dreaming.

Er...Peter’s spider sense has done that in the JMS run...

Not to mention this point is ‘Miles can do this and Peter can’t because it MIGHT develop into something more later maybe’

His Spider sense intensifying isn’t that unique either. Peter’s does that too, again especially in the JMS run.

Miles’ Spider sense going off faster than Peter’s also could just be artistic licence stanning him in his own title.

 6) Speak Spanish

 This is the first legitimate point in this article.

 Too bad it ruins it by saying Peter had difficulty connection to certain residents because of language barriers.

 First of all traditionally Peter as Spider-Man is a pariah.

Second of all how many times honestly has he been shown to be disconnected due to a language barrier within NYC. MOST PEOPLE speak English like him.

Being bilingual also doesn’t give a character ‘more depth’. It’s literally just a skill. By this logic Peter being able to drive gives him more depth than Miles.

Yeah it acknowledges his community which is nice but that’s not greater or lesser depth that’s just a unique feature. And one that he technically doesn’t even need to speak Spanish to acknowledge. I barely speak Greek but I still acknowledge my culture.

 5) Learns Quickly

Yes Miles definitely learns quickly, unlike Peter Parker who

-          didn’t have a mentor or video footage upon which to learn how to be a superhero from but still owned Doc Ock early in his career.

-          Figured out a cure to the Lizard within hours of seeing his notes for the first time

-          Invented webbing in his room.

What? Miles gets the win because he was able to learn how to fight from Peter’s video footage when he was 2 years younger?

The age gap is mitigated when you literally have basically an instruction video to follow whilst Peter despite beig slightly older still figured it out entirely on his own.

Miles studying Norman’s fighting style and using that to defeat him is also not that big of a deal. Peter can and kind of has done that. he just REMEMBERS his enemies fighting styles instead of going over video footage of them. If anything THAT makes him FASTER than Miles in the learning department.

 4) Maintain a Relationship With Gwen Stacy

 Oh....fuck....you....

 First of all Miles and Peter’s relationships with Gwen are different given that Miles’ is mostly platonic and a colleague and Peter’s was romantic oh and you know THEY WERE DIFFERENT GWEN STACY’S

 Yeah Miles being able to keep a relationship with a Gwen Stacy who doesn’t die is much fucking easier when he and Gwen have the benefit of hindsight from 616 Gwen’s death AND Spider-Gwen has fucking super powers.

 If MILES was dating Gwen whilst lying to her about being Spider-Man and she had no powers and they didn’t know she could die like that how well would he have actually been able to keep her around?

 Not much better if at all.

 Bringin up Gwen’s clone is also fucking asinine. It wasn’t that Peter was UNABLE to maintain a relationship with Gwen’s clone so much as he didn’t want to. Or rather he was unable to keep a relationship with her clone because he’d moved on and was in love with Mary Jane which isn’t a matter of him lacking an ability Miles has at all.

 Also Gwen doesn’t help Miles cope with his mother’s death. At all. Because they didn’t spend any quality time together until AFTER his mother returned to life. FFS CBR!

 Saying Miles was able to save Gwen when Peter wasn’t is again bullshit because the circumstances were totally different. In particular Peter saved Gwen MULTIPLE times in the past before she eventually died due to a small but significant mistake.

 3) Be a team player/more sociable

 I will grant this article that TEENAGE Peter was less of a team player and less sociable, but that changed over time.

 The article shoots itself though by

a)      Implying Peter was an Avenger as  a teen

b)      Saying he was never truly a part of the Avengers team when he was on it. Er....yes he was. It was badly written but he was truly a member no doubt. His self doubts also rarely if ever came into play. Over all he lacked much personality whilst on the avengers

 the article is also two-faced because it ignores how Ultimate Peter WAS a team player and WAS able to have friends and accept help as a teenager.

 2) Communicate with his best friend.

 Well Ultimate and 616 Peter’s best friend is Mary jane and he communicates with her just fine...especially with his body language If yA Know wat I mEaN ;D

  Everything the article says aboiut Ganke pretty much applies to Ultimate and 616 MJ in regards to Peter.

  More than anything this point is where you REALLY see the video cherrypicking between the Ultimate Peter or 616 Peter. Literally in the last point it was quoting Captain America saying Spider-Man wasn’t ready to join the team from the Ultimate universe yet when it comes time to analyse his friendships in high school suddenly we switch to 616.

 1)      Turn invisible

Not only should this have been one of two things on this entire list but this list is so bad it literally IGNORED the one other ability Miles literally has that Peter lacks, the Venom blast.

 How do you fuck up that badly?

 0)      The ability to be falsely praised and put over undeservedly

Now THAT is an ability Miles truly has that Peter doesn’t.

[kaiba-fangirl]

Fill in the questions/statement as if you are being interviewed for an article and you were your muse

Tag 10 people to do this meme, (repost, don’t reblog)

TAGGED BY: not @rogueprinceconsort =P & I know I’m not a RP blog, but I am a fanfic author so I still do the same kind of stuff, just everyone at once with chapters, so I’m sure ya won’t mind... idk itching to write Seto but his mind is all over the place in Ch7 of And You? (AO3/FFN), & I know I’ve missed a bunch of personal tags in the past, so, well, I’m here now. TAGGING: anyone 1. WHAT IS YOUR NAME?

“Seto Kaiba.”  (海馬 瀬人 Kaiba, Seto)

2. WHAT IS YOUR REAL NAME?

He narrows his eyes, already suspicious. “Legally, that IS my real name.”

3. DO YOU KNOW WHY YOU WERE CALLED THAT?

“I was born Seto,” he answers flatly, then smirks. “The Kaiba family name I earned for myself and my little brother at the age of 10, when Gozaburo agreed to adopt us thanks to my, superior negotiating skills.” [Seto after Egyptian Pharaoh Seth. Kaiba for, apparently, hippocampus/seahorse.]

4. ARE YOU SINGLE OR TAKEN? “Taken. Happily married to the number 1 female duelist, Mai Valentine. She’s now heading the new Fashion Tech and Merchandise Department at Kaiba Corp.” [but he’s also still looking >.>]

5. HAVE ANY ABILITIES OR POWERS? “Just bleeding edge technology development and superior dueling skills,” he shrugs smugly. [and hacking.] [You also accidentally activate latent magical powers every so often, dumbass. Sure he’s a genius. A genius that weaves techno-sorcery into everything & commands gods without even knowing it.] “Anything else you may have heard about magic or spirits or real monsters, is all just nonsense hocus pocus. It’s sensationalists trying to make our amazingly life-like holographic projections seem dangerous.”

6. STOP BEING A MARY SUE/GARY STU. “Heh, doesn’t that just mean born talented? You should be so lucky.”

7. WHAT’S YOUR EYE COLOR? “Blue,” he chuckles childishly. “It was probably what first drew me to, you know, Blue-Eyes, when I was young.” [It’s not. The Blue-Eyes White Dragon was his magical monster of light ‘girlfriend’ in Ancient Egypt in a past life of his 3000 years ago.]

8. HOW ABOUT YOUR HAIR COLOR? “Chestnut.”

9. HAVE YOU ANY FAMILY MEMBERS? “Living, my little brother, Mokuba, and now my lovely wife.”

10. OH? WHAT ABOUT PETS? “No pets. I barely have time for having two people in my life now it seems, and that’s even with Mokuba off travelling.” [any pet energy is expended on more Blue-Eyes White Dragon themed everything]

11. THAT’S COOL I GUESS, NOW TELL ME ABOUT SOMETHING YOU DON’T LIKE. “You wanna see a REAL Gary Stu?! As in, there is no reason he should have made it this far?! Joey fuckin Wheeler. This loser stole his way into my tournament, then has the nerve to even challenge me for 3rd place as if that meant anything, and he still ends up 4th even?! How! He operates on pure luck, and leeching off his ‘friends!’ His deck is a mess, I mean have you even seen his lineup?!?!” [Well that would all be redacted. Now, since this is for an interviewer for a published article...] He calmly and thoughtfully looks off at a spot on the far wall behind the interviewer. He purses his lips and furrows his brow, genuinely distraught, drawing from a direct encounter. “I’m actually more concerned than ever about the state of refugees- whether they have that official label or not. Around the world. Especially the children. These children don’t know what’s going on, and people say they care about children, but they really don’t. They’re not thinking of those kids- of refugee kids. Of poor kids. Of orphans or abused kids. And the way these refugees are being treated, those kids are getting hit with all those things at once. Ya know, I- I was fortunate enough to have that opportunity to be adopted, in a strong first-world nation, but I know what it’s like, to know that the grown ups are just using you, not listening to you. You’re nothing to them; maybe pawns. Now, I’m doing all I can, as president of Kaiba Corp, but there is still only so much we can do. We’re not making tanks or any weapons at all anymore-” He chokes at the thought of a tank staring him down specifically, compared to the latest news. He clears his throat to manage. “Not since the day I took over. We may not be contributing to that military industrial complex anymore, but the state of refugees today is still just as bad if not worse. Now they’re using weapons outlawed by the Geneva Conventions, and in countries that pride themselves on freedom and opportunity. Pteh. It’s madness. It’s evil.” [...aaand that just became the cover story] [We’ll be back after after a short break.]

12. DO YOU HAVE ANY HOBBIES/ACTIVITIES YOU LIKE DOING? “Besides dueling, uh, tinkering. Reading. Hacking into random databases I shouldn’t be in.”

13. EVER HURT ANYONE BEFORE? “Next question. Don’t even print that, or you’ll be hearing from my lawyers. And they don’t play so nice.” [By ‘lawyers’ I’m pretty sure he just means goons.]

14. EVER… KILLED ANYONE BEFORE? "No.” [Gozaburo.]

15. WHAT KIND OF ANIMAL ARE YOU? "Dragon.”

16. NAME YOUR WORST HABITS. "Tch, I wouldn’t have gotten to be president of a multi-billion-dollar corporation if I had bad habits.”  [That is literally his worst habit. Also how he got there is because of all his bad habits.] He chuckles at what he’s about to make fun of. “Then again, some people think that working too much is a bad habit.”

17. DO YOU LOOK UP TO ANYONE AT ALL? "How could I when I’m already on top?”

18. GAY, STRAIGHT, OR BISEXUAL? "Irrelevant.” He smiles menacingly. “Card games are more important anyway.” [Bi and trying to figure out how to tell his wife. Then again once he does that, the press will be easy. Possibly also grey ace or demi, since he does enjoy the physical aspects of being married & his crush.]

19. DO YOU GO TO SCHOOL? “Graduated high school early and then went right back to work as CEO, at the time. I don’t have time to waste getting a piece of paper to validate my knowledge that I’m already putting to use at Kaiba Corp everyday. --but I certainly support everyone staying in school as long as they can. Kaiba Corp offers a free college tuition program for any employee, paid ahead of time, and schedules can be worked around class and homework time as needed.”

20. DO YOU EVER WANT TO MARRY AND HAVE KIDS ONE DAY? “I never thought I would want to marry, but I have always assumed I would want to adopt. Now I am married, and we both want to adopt. Someday. It needs to be when I can have time for them...” [and he’s wondering why you are supposed to only marry one person...]

21. DO YOU HAVE ANY FANBOYS/FANGIRLS? “Yeah,” he laughs, genuinely embarrassed at this level of pure idolization, “I find it endearing to see people dress up as Yugi and I at events.”

22. WHAT ARE YOU MOST AFRAID OF? “Losing my little brother.”

23. WHAT DO YOU USUALLY WEAR? “Full-length pants, tight fitting turtlenecks, boots, and a trenchcoat. More leather and straps and buckles, the better.”

24. DO YOU LOVE SOMEONE? “Of course. My little brother and my wife.” [and Joey]

25. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU WET YOURSELF? [he just makes this face:]

[but possibly the last time he did hard drugs]

26. WHAT CLASS ARE YOU? (HIGH CLASS, MIDDLE CLASS, LOW CLASS) “Highest class.” He winks, for the spotlight.

27. HOW MANY FRIENDS DO YOU HAVE? “I don’t need ‘friends’ outside of my family.”

28. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON PIE? “Finally, an intelligent question!” he laughs rudely. “My thoughts are that we should change the standard approximation for π to something closer to 3.16. That’s what I use in my calculations, and I find things just seem to work out better for me because of it.”

29. FAVORITE DRINK? “I’ve started drinking a lot more water, and I think that’s pretty much all I drink lately.”

30. WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE PLACE? “It’s comforting being in my office, knowing where I belong, knowing that with me there, everyone I love is safe, knowing how I got there, and being proud of all I’ve accomplished, but...” [sometimes anxiety about it being Gozaburo’s old office creeps into his mind like an evil spirit or ghost...] “But more than that, I enjoy the wild freedom of just taking my Blue-Eyes jet out with some good music playing.” [oh my various gods he will always be an emo teen at heart <3]

31. ARE YOU INTERESTED IN SOMEONE? He scoffs. “Yes, I am genuinely interested in my wife. Mai is an amazing person. And- Ah, and, um, next question?” [and Joey!]

32. WHAT’S YOUR BRA CUP SIZE AND/OR HOW BIG IS YOUR WILLY? “What kind of magazine is this for, anyway?” he asks as an aside, then thinks up a ridiculous enough response. “Ever hear of Zorc? I’d say that’s roughly one-third the size of mine.” Under his breath, he scoffs in disgust. “Imbeciles.”

33. WOULD YOU RATHER SWIM IN THE LAKE OR THE OCEAN? “Er, a private pool, thanks. Too many paparazzi anyplace else, and I wouldn’t want to close off anything from the public.” [I hear there’s a river in Egypt he lives in though]

34. WHAT’S YOUR TYPE? “Independent. Strong. Great duelist. Someone who knows what it’s like at rock bottom, but still managed to claw their way to the top...” [he spaces out off to the side]

35. ANY FETISHES? *zoom out to room full of Blue-Eyes White Dragon themed EVERYTHING* “Nah.” [*insert Will Smith presenting his AO3 tags]

36. SEME OR UKE? TOP OR BOTTOM? DOMINANT OR SUBMISSIVE?

[Switch! But “And You?” is stuck at a T rating, sooo...]

37. CAMPING OR INDOORS? "The fuck- you’re giving me whiplash with these questions,” he mutters. “Camping sounds nice. Real camping. Mokuba and I used to build forts and play outside a lot. I should ask him if he wants to go on a camping trip when he gets back. I doubt- well, no, I think Mai would like that, too.” [And Joey can cook them “candy bars!”]

38. ARE YOU WANTING THE QUIZ TO END?

[devoutbrother]

INTERVIEW YOUR MUSE !

1. What is your name?

“ Er, I’m assuming you want my full name. That’s usually how it goes on these things. Arthur Ernest Hastings. But please, just call me Arthur... “

2. Do you know why you’re named that?

“ Nope, not really sure. I assume it’s something my mum wanted. She was always big on pretty names -- not surprising, since her name was Maeve. “

3. Are you single or taken?

“ God, if only. Yeah, the tall bloke with the big ears and large glasses finally has a woman! Heh... I’ve never had a true one, despite all my fancies. It’d be nice, wouldn’t it? To finally call someone mine. “

4. Have any abilities or powers?

" MMM. Well, I can write well! Does that count? What about speed? I can run fast, if for a bit... “

5. Stop being a Mary Sue.

“ Excuse me? Aren’t those the characters that authors write? The ones that make no sense? What are you talking about?? I’m real; this isn’t fiction! “

6. What’s your eye color?

“ You could see them if you’d look at my face, and not on the floor. “

7. How about your hair color?

“ Can’t see that either?! Christ, are you blind? “

8. Have any family members?

" Heh, yeah. An older brother. Percy. Then there’s mum, and dad. Edmund was a close family friend, and so was Sal for a while... “

9. Oh? How about pets?

“ Oh, Jesus... yes. There was Stripe. He was such a good dog. He would always listen, and even dad was fond of him. But, it’s hard to have pets after a war. “

10. That’s cool, I guess. Now tell me something you don’t like?

“ Well, that might be too hard. There’s a lot of things I’m not too fond of. “

11. Do you have any activities/hobbies that you like to do?

“ Journalism was fun! Running around finding the latest and hip stories to write about! It was the bee’s knees. But, it’s mostly just writing now. And the occasional jog. “

12. Have you ever hurt anyone in any way before?

“ In more ways than I can count... and in ways that will never be forgiven. “

13. Ever… killed anyone before?

"  ... Oh, I hope I didn’t. I never tried to. “

14. What kind of animal are you?

“ That’s hard to say. I haven’t thought about animals in so long because of Joy. All I know are the basic ones like cats, dogs, and lizards. Hm... Maybe an elk? Or a gazelle... “

15. Name your worst habits?

“ Uh, I used to smoke? In secondary. Stopped that after a bit, though. I also had a bad habit of drinking when I was growing up. Erm... I suppose a healthier one of mine would be my obnoxious pen tapping when I’m trying to proofread my papers. “

16. Do you look up to anyone at all?

" Gemma was always a good worker. And a fantastic writer. She’s achieved a lot through her life, before what happened! But I’m not sure who else, heh. I can’t really remember... “

17. Are you gay, straight or bisexual?

“ Bisexual? What does that mean? Er -- uhm, I’m... straight. Only been attracted to women before. And it’s not really... normal, to be gay. Right? “

18. Do you go to school?

“ I used to. I went for a while, until I got my job at the O’ Courant. “

19. Ever want to marry and have kids one day?

“ Oh God, no. I can barely keep myself in line! I don’t wanna imagine what would happen to those kids if I have any. But marriage? I wouln’t mind finding a lady to love... “

20. Do you have any fangirls/fanboys?

" Would that looney up the tree count? I’m also remembering my fans I had in the parade. Jesus -- that’s one of the few things I miss about my old life: people knew who I was, and appreciated my presence around them. They thought I was some celebrity, before I became a downer. “

21. What are you most afraid of?

“ Don’t laugh. But... trains. “  Soft, quiet gulp.

22. What do you usually wear?

“ Well, I tend to like fancy clothes! Mum always wanted to make sure we looked nice, and act decent and proper. Even when I’m at home, I’ll try to dress nice. As nice as possible, for sitting at a chair and reading the paper or a relaxing novel. “

23. What’s one food that tempts you?

“ Heh. Chocolate. If I have a few pounds to spare, I’ll go out and buy a bar. Or a slice of cake. “

24. Am I annoying to you?

" If you would focus on my face, and not ask some rather ridiculous questions, then no. This isn’t that irritating. “

25. Well, it’s still not over!

" I didn’t figure so. Considering you’re still sitting here. “

26. What class are you (low/middle/high)?

" I used to be high. But now it’s hard, settling in a place when you can barely speak the language. “

27. How many friends do you have?

" Eh... not many. I’m pretty sure I lost all of them the moment I became a downer. Heh... “

28. What are your thoughts on pie?

“ Ouu! Is it strawberry pie? Or, mmm! Chocolate pie. Either of those sound rather delicious right now. “

29. Favorite drink?

" Anything that gets me through the day. Honestly, with what I’ve had to drink, it might just be water. A fresh glass of that can make you feel better than any cup of Joe or tea. “

30. What’s your favorite place?

“ I’ve had so many of those throughout the years. Mum’s room, then her grave. Then it was wherever Sally was, and then Pru’s office. But here...? I’m not sure if I’ve found one yet. Maybe work. Hm. “

31. Are you interested in anyone?

" I used to be. I don’t know I still am... Or if I can be again -- I’m not someone people usually seem to love in return, I’ve noticed. “

32. That was a stupid question…

" Uh... Well, I didn’t think it was. This quiz is about me, isn’t it? “

33. Would you rather swim in a lake or the ocean?

" MMM. That depends -- where is this rhetorical body of water? Is it by a lab? Or is it somewhere fresh? “

34. What’s your type?

“ A lady who’s smart and loyal. Dedicated and loving. Someone who isn’t confrontational, and can help me solve a problem together. But, then again, it’s hard to find that type when you’re so defensive and stubborn you can’t really change. Heh. Maybe I’m too picky, aren’t I...? Then again, Sally was a thing. “

35. Any fetishes?

“ Now this is a question I’d call stupid. It’s a tad too personal, right? “

36. Camping or outdoors?

" Camping or outdoors? What do you mean? Isn’t camping supposed to be outdoors? ...No. I can’t stand sleeping outside -- the night’s peaceful, I’ll give it that. But it’s hard to trust what’ll happen out there at that time. “

TAGGED BY :  @heartless-wilson​ ! TAGGING :  @acetyleneactor​ ,  @serialhost​ ,  @wcnderwitch​ ,  and anyone else who wants to.

[ivanaskye]

We need to talk about NaNoWriMo.

You’ve heard of it. Your friends have heard of it. Your grandmother might have heard of it. Your dog has definitely heard of it.

You’re probably thinking about participating.

And I want to tell you, from the bottom of my heart: you don’t have to.

Not if you’re a beginning writer.  Not if you’ve never written a novel.  Not if you’ve written a few.  Not if you’re a journeyman writer.  Not if you’re aiming for publication.  Not if you’re a hobbyist, not if you’re a professional, not if you’ve been writing for one year or five or ten or twenty.

You don’t have to.

That doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing to do!  Lots of people find NaNo very useful and productive.

But it is not the only way to be productive, and it is not the only useful way of thinking about writing.

So, with that said, let’s talk about ten things NaNo doesn’t prepare you for.

1. Outlining

This, as far as I can tell, is the obvious one.  NaNo has a tendency to emphasize the 50,000 words in November thing—but not so much what you might want to do before November.  For people who are “pantsers”—that is, they prefer to write “by the seat of their pants”, without outlines—this is often fine.  But I can’t be the only outliner who has at times felt poorly served by a hyper-popular event that hardly even mentions outlines.

So, let’s get something straight right here, right now: outlining is real writing work. You’re being productive if you’re “just” writing an outline. You can be productive in stages of the process other than drafting.

If you don’t want to use an outline, of course that’s fine.

But if you do…

Well, consider counting outlining words as words.  Because they are!  They’re real creative work; they really count as doing something.

And actually, I have enough more to say on this subject that I might as well expand it into point #2…

2. Teaching yourself how to outline

NaNo, and the conversations and mentality around it, by way of not really focusing on outlining, are also really bad at teaching you how to outline.

This is actually an issue for a lot of beginning writers, I think—you might have heard “hey, try outlining!”, but that doesn’t mean you know what an outline looks like.  You probably already do know what a draft looks like, because… well, that’s every book you’ve ever read!  They’re not first drafts (hopefully), but they are, you know, written prose.

But how many writers’ outlines have you actually seen?  Probably not very many.

So, if you haven’t really outlined before and want to—or if you have before, and aren’t sure the way you’re doing it is best for you—I’d really suggest asking around on forums etc. what people’s different outlining methodologies are.  There’s some interviews with authors out there which ask about it, too.

(I’ll write up my own methods sometime if there’s interest, but for now, at least google around.)

3. Editing

I’m definitely not the only one who’s brought this up.

Many a successful NaNo-er has gotten to December and just… stopped.  They have a draft, but what to do with it?  Who knows!

There’s no big push of “National Editing Month” in December, or January, or um… any time, really.  And so there’s not likely to be a community of fellow editors polishing up their NaNo works—even though a bunch of people have works to polish.  They just know how…

4. Teaching you how to edit

Yup, just like the outlining predicaments mentioned earlier, editing is also not particularly well-taught—and not necessarily all that many readers understand what their favorite writers’ editing processes are like.

Again, I strongly suggest googling around about the different options…

(And I could make another post about this in more depth too, again if there’s interest.)

5. Getting you beta readers

One thing that can make editing a lot easier is having someone to beta or alpha your work—read it over even when it isn’t polished, and tell you if something makes no sense or if you have a typo or if Elle’s shirt was red on page 4 but green on page 5.

But one thing that NaNo doesn’t do a great job providing is… a community of beta readers, or advice on how to get them.

(Unfortunately, I can’t give a lot of suggestions here because I often struggle with this as well.)

6. Preventing burnout

For a lot of people, NaNo is a lot. 50,000 words in a month?  That’s 1,667 words a day!  And most people participating in NaNo already have responsibilities of some kind—whether that’s school (in which case, November is like, the worst month to attempt to write a novel) or work or whatever.

And the culture around NaNo encourages folks to just go for it no matter what—which definitely can be a good thing, depending on the person, but also can lead to… completely burning out after November ends and being too tired to create anything else ever for the next several months.

In other words, NaNo doesn’t really teach you a lot about how to pace yourself.  1,667 words a day isn’t necessarily a bad goal, but is it a goal that makes sense for where you’re at?  What if, instead, you could do 500 words every day… for a whole year?  Or 2000 words for strings of days with weekend breaks in between?  Or, or…?

And speaking of that…

7. Year-round writing

NaNo’s a great sprint, with people encouraging each other to just go for it and make something happen.

But what about when you don’t have that community?

What about when you don’t have that externally set goal of 1,667 words a day, with badges and so on to earn along the way?

This is something I struggled with myself, back when I did NaNo—I completed the novel I was working on within the first 18 days or so, and then just… stopped.  I didn’t use the rest of the month to write another one; I didn’t even write anything as long as a short story for months after.

Why? Because I didn’t have an external reason to.  I knew I loved writing—I felt so good when I did it!—but I didn’t know how to motivate myself.  Not if it wasn’t already put into the bin of “something I was supposed to do.”

Actually, that could even have its own point…

8. Self-motivation without cheerleaders

This is hard.  This is legitimately really hard.  I’m not going to downplay it.

But if you want to be a creative person in a world that seems to think peoples’ only worth is their ability to work high-paying jobs which likely bore them to death?  You are going to have to learn how to self-motivate.

I can’t tell you how, because even more than other things about writing, this one really differs by person.  Sometimes the techniques that work great for one person and get them to feel great about themselves are the very things that send other people into spiraling depression.

It’s really, really hard.  And NaNo doesn’t prepare you for it.

9. Slower, more careful writing

So… you may have noticed that 1,667 words a day is a lot, for lots of people.  So how do many NaNo writers choose to accomplish it?

Well, they write as fast as possible.  And sometimes what that means is writing, frankly, kind of sloppily.

I want to stress that this isn’t always the case.

But it often is the “mode” of writing that desperate first-time NaNo-ers are likely to try: the Just Get The Words On The Page Even If They Suck method.

And that’s not necessarily a bad method!  Sometimes it’s the only thing that works for a particular day or scene or whatever.  But you kind of want to be conscious about choosing to write with that philosophy—and aware that other philosophies of writing exist.

Because, honestly, hyper-fast, sloppy writing is a pain in the butt to edit…

(Then again, maybe that’s actually why you want to do it—if you’re someone who likes editing more than drafting.  That’s something I can’t relate to at all, but I know there are people out there who are like that.)

Sometimes, an hour could be used either to write, say, around 1000 super-fast sprinted words… or 500 more carefully thought out words which will take half the time to edit later.

And you want to figure out which feels right for you, and makes things easier/better/more enjoyable.  This might also completely differ by day or by project.  But you want to be aware of it.

10. Project-switching

A lot of writers—and I do mean a lot—are, in one way or another, working on multiple things at once.  For instance, they might be editing one story in the same week that they’re working on drafting another.  Or outlining one thing and drafting another.  Or drafting, like, two things that they switch between depending on their mood.  And so on.

But you’d never know that from NaNoWriMo.

The focus on writing exactly one novel in exactly one month drowns out the very real possibility that with a different workflow and more switching between things, there are people out there who could put out two novels in two months… without having either done after the first month.

Or, you know, two in three—or two in four, or, or—which is a “slower” rate than NaNo asks for, but also lasts longer than November (see points 7 and 9.)

Working on multiple projects at once isn’t for everyone, of course—some people prefer focusing on exactly one thing at at time—but it’s still another possibility to be aware of.

Tl;dr

That was a pretty long post there—about the length of a day’s NaNo requirement, to be exact.  So what’s the take-home?

Well, here’s what I’d say: Remember that outlining is real writing work.  Remember that editing is real writing work.  Remember that you can go at all sorts of speeds and use all sorts of processes to get writing done.  And remember, maybe most of all, that November is only one out of twelve months in the year.

Thanks for reading.

[warenerd]

100 Days of Graphic Novels

Subtitle: “Working 70 Hour Weeks and Commuting Means Reading But Not Writing.”

I am trying for more accountability, but, when my idiotic work schedule gets even more idiotic, sometimes it’s just my judgmental calendar of doom that’s keeping me on track. Also my cat. He judges me - harshly.

Look on my missing leg, ye Mighty, and despair!

Ahem. Anyway. So many books:

Day 1: The Umbrella Academy vol 1: The Apocalypse Suite Day 2: CatStronauts: Mission Mars Day 3: Apannine War Diary Day 4: Alex + Ada vol 1 Day 5: Alex + Ada vol 2 Day 6: Visitations Day 7: Another Day of Life Day 8: Daredevil Visionaries: Frank Miller vol 1 Day 9: Punisher: Welcome Back, Frank Day 10: Scarlet Witch vol 1: Witches’ Road Day 11: Jessica Jones vol 1: Uncaged Day 12: Infidel Day 13: The Deep Blue Good-by Day 14: City of Illusions Day 15: Mockingbird vol 1: I Can Explain Day 16: Ms. Marvel vol 1: Best of the Best Day 17: X-Men Gold vol 1: Back to the Basics Day 18: Kaptara vol 1: Fear Not, Tiny Alien Day 19: Eclipse vol 1 Day 20: Defenders vol 1: Diamonds are Forever Day 21: Hellcat vol 1: Hooked on a Feline Day 22: Chosin Day 23: Elektra vol 1: Bloodlines Day 24: They’re Not Like Us Day 25: Multiple Man vol 1: It All Makes Sense in the End Day 26: Captain America: Sam Wilson: Not My Captain America Day 27: A Russian Journal Day 28: Iron Patriot vol 1: Unbreakable Day 29: Divinity Day 30: Jessica Jones: Alias vol 1 Day 31: Tales of Suspense: Hawkeye and the Winter Soldier Day 32: The Fuse vol 1: The Russian Shift Day 33: Jessica Jones: Alias vol 2 Day 34: Into the Tunnel Day 34: Jessica Jones: Alias vol 3 Day 35: A-Force vol 1 Day 36: Edge of the Spider-Verse Day 37: Descender vol 1 Day 38: Descender vol 2 Day 39: Black Panther: World of Wakanda Day 40: A Farewell to Arms Day 41: I’m Not Leaving Day 42: Green Arrow: Year One Day 43: Daniel’s Story Day 44: Aurora’s Motive Day 45: Jessica Jones vol 4 Day 46: Symmetry Day 47: Afar Day 48: Morning Glories vol 1

Day 49: One Way Ticket

           A math professor at a nearby university related her escape from WWII to England. Interesting not just for the political trials and hoops through which she had to jump to get herself and her family out of Europe, but also for the way that retelling, rather than primary recording, has influenced the main thrust of the story. Also: illustrated. Adorably.

Day 50: The life of Captain Marvel

            I’m not saying I hated this book – I’m just saying that I’m opposed to it on a cellular level.

Day 51: Captain Marvel vol 1: In Pursuit of Flight

            Did I need a mind-bleach of what I’d read the day before? Yes. Yes, I did.

Day 52: The Boy Who Reversed Himself             True story: William Sleator was my favorite author for about a year in middle school. I read every one of his books that our libraries had, and then I read them all again. Six or seven times each (to the shock of absolutely no one who knows me). This book has forever changed the way I consider catsup. And it wasn’t nearly as racist as I’d expected, flipping back through. Hooray?

Day 53: To Fight Alongside Friends

            My best friend roped me into doing an online werewolf game based in WWI. I role-played as Charlie May, the author of this diary, and refused to respond with anything but direct quotes from his book. If nothing else, I entertain myself.

Day 54: Operation: Broken Wings

Day 55: My War Diary

            This one is by Dov Yermiya and is about Lebanon from June 5 – July 1, 1982. I have about six books within easy reach called “My War Diary.” This could prove problematic later. (Also, despite writing about Waltz With Bashir in grad school and for my dissertation, I still don’t know enough about this conflict)

Day 56: Descender vol 3 Day 57: Morning Glories vol 2 Day 58: The Drowned and the Saved Day 59: Jessica Jones: Pulse

Day 60: Zlata’s Diary

            I read this when sitting in the jail on a Friday night. There’s nothing quite so jarring as reading a firsthand account of the absolute disruption of life (and childhood, in a lot of ways), while listening to drunk sorority girls sob on their phones to their mothers and then scream about their Uber.

Day 61: Captain Marvel vol 2: Down Day 62: Avengers: The Enemy Within Day 63: Captain Marvel: Higher, Further, Faster, More Day 64: Captain Marvel: Stay Fly Day 65: Captain Marvel: Alis Volat Propiis Day 66: Carol Danvers vol 1: The Ms Marvel Years

Day 67: One Week in the Library

            Please give me more weeks, Image Comics. Please.

Day 68: The Troop

            Noel Clarke, I love you, but this feels like well-trod ground at this point.

Day 69: Bitch Planet

            I legitimately squealed, out loud, when Kelly Sue DeConnick was on screen during Captain Marvel. High pitched. And then, because I have no game, I whacked my BFF on the arm and whispered (er, “whispered”?) “THAT WAS KELLY SUE!!” No one else was impressed by my mad comic knowledge, but, eh.

Day 70: Jessica Jones vol 3: Return of the Purple Man

           Guess which superstar never read volume 2? That’s right - THIS superstar.

Day 71: Mr. & Mrs. X

            Basically, I love Gambit. I’m okay with Rogue, but I’ve lived in the Deep South for too long to be completely okay with the extremes of character. And I also don’t really like Deadpool. At all. Despite all of that, I still enjoyed this.

Day 72: Secret Avengers vol 1: Reverie

            Unlike this, which did NOT get better with age. Ooooof.

Day 73: Avengers AI vol 1: Human After All

Did I buy this simply for this picture of Vision holding a kitten? Yes. Do I regret that? No.

Day 74: Tet Day 75: Iron Fist: Rage Day 76: Zero vol 1: An Emergency Day 77: Faster than Light

Day 78: Descender vol 4: Orbital Mechanics

            I sent my BFF a copy of Descender because it’s gorgeous. Because she has even worse impulse control than me, she bought all of the other volumes and has already finished the series. I can’t even be mad.

Day 79: Lost Dossiers: Super Spy

            AKA: This would have made way more sense had I realized that this was a supplement to another work… which I don’t yet own. Womp womp womp. Maybe tomorrow I’ll read the From Hell companion, just for kicks.

Day 80: Carnet de Voyage Day 81: Hype Day 82: Dancer Day 83-85: Day 86: Wonderful World of Oz

Day 87: Port of Earth

            Know what I love about Zack Kaplan? He creates immersive worlds that aren’t just one thing – there’s not just one neat storyline wrapped up by the end of the trade, and there isn’t just one type of story at work.

Day 88: Material Day 89: Captain America: the 1940s Newspaper Strip Day 90: Peter Panzerfaust vol 1: The Great Escape Day 91: Cowl vol 1

Day 92: Ministry of Space

            That ending, though.

Day 93: X-Men Gold vol 2 Day 94: The Winter Soldier vol 1: The Longest Winter Day 95: The Winter Soldier vol 2: Broken Arrow

Day 96: Graphic Classics vol 22: African American Classics

            I yelped when I saw that Afua Richardson, Personal Hero, had worked on this. I have a panel from her illustration of Langston Hughes’ “Rivers” (done for NPR), and it is one of my very favorite things.

Day 97: New York: The Big City

Day 98: A Wexford Childhood

            You would think that a memoir covering 1915-1930 might touch on some rumbling of war. You’d be wrong. But, it was an interesting view of the changing world, nonetheless.

Day 99: Winter Soldier vol 3: Black Widow Hunt

            Brubaker, why must you hurt me so?

Day 100: X-Men Rarities

            There are few things that bring me such joy as the stiff pages of a 90s era Marvel trade – and, when those trades include comics with Chamber? I am so in. Now, someone explain to me how they always smell like cigarettes and wet dog, regardless of origin, and I’ll be all set.

[jokertrap-ran]

BAD MEDICINE ~Infectious teachers~ [PC GAME] Nagihara Taiki (Mathematics) Route Translations (Part 8)

MC’s name is retained as the original MC name Kawana Hina.

* Words within ‘   ‘ are spoken in English – *Spoiler free : Translations under cut!

Prologue / Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4 / Part 5/ Part 6 / Part 7 / Part 8 / Part 9 / Part 10 / Part 11

Hina: (The latest high-end computers! As expected of this school to have such resources already prepared and on hand…Not to add that they all look brand new…)

Hina: (Let’s see…The topic I have to research on this time consists of famous people who’ve graduated from this school and..)

Hina: …Hm…?

Hina: (Isn’t this person on the network news Nagihara-sensei’s father? I see, so he IS a famous person after all…)

Hina: (He won his first Sunset Award as a mathematician?)

Hina: (Oh! They also attached a link to his profile information!)

Hina: (What should I do? I’m curious but I don’t want to pry any further that necessary.)

Hina: (But it’s not like I’m prohibited from reading through it since it’s been publicized to the world…)

Hina: Here goes nothing then…

Hina: (Whoa, what a huge wall of text! I guess I’ll start reading from the first page?)

Hina: (Nagihara Taizo…He graduated from a prestigious university, acquired his degree overseas,)

Hina: (Carried out theoretical mathematical research in several laboratories to date and the papers he published has caught the international limelight.)

Hina: (After returning back to his home country, he got appointed as a university professor and has multiple concurrent posts of being the director of several research facilities.)

Hina: (He has also written many papers about education in general…)

Hina: (Wow, that’s some amazing personal history he has under his wing. I didn’t think that such people actually existed till now. He’s just like a character you’ll find in a story…Wait, what’s this…?)

Hina: (Although he had fathered two sons in the midst of his smooth sailing life as a mathematician, His eldest son had died much too young before his prime.)

Hina: (He had received a very big shock and this was what he said during the interview,)

Hina: (--My son, he was a genius and had true talent for mathematics. It would not be an exaggeration to say that he could surpass me if only time allowed him so…)

Hina: (The death of my son doesn’t just affect the field of mathematics but is also a loss for mankind’s evolution.)

Hina:

(I must continue to make amends to the world for the loss that it has suffered as long as I remain walking this world.)

Hina: (And I suppose this duty of mine will also be passed down to my youngest son in time…)

Hina: (His first son has passed away but his youngest still survives…Then, does that mean that Nagihara-sensei is the youngest son…? )　

Hina: (I wonder if it’s written somewhere…? Maybe I should search further?)

Hina: …Is there really nothing written about that…?

???: You seem pretty absorbed in whatever you’re looking up.

Hina: Wha…!?

Hina: N-Nagihara-sensei…

Hina: (How long has he been standing behind me!? I didn’t notice his presence at all…!)

Nagihara: I came here with the intent of marking papers seeing as I do so every once in a while, but…

Nagihara: What are you doing?

Nagihara: You seem to be looking up on something of importance on the computer…

Hina: No! Uh- T-This is just…

Nagihara: Why are you hiding it? Is it something that would be bad if I found out about it?

Hina: No, not at all…!

Nagihara: If so then why don’t you move over and let me see the screen?

Hina: …Very well.

Nagihara: …………

Nagihara: …Oh. I see now. So that was why you were staring at me all so intently earlier?

Hina: (He noticed me staring at him…?)

Nagihara: Let’s go outside for a while. There’s something I’d like to talk to you about.

Hina: O-Okay…

Nagihara: Feel free to sit over there if you’d like.

Hina: Y-Yes…

Nagihara: The guy you were searching up on, Nagihara Taizo, is indeed my father.

Nagihara: I’m well-told that I resemble my father both by students and teachers alike.

Nagihara: Well, it’s not like I’m hiding it or anything. In fact, most people in this school would know about me and my father.

Nagihara: So, anything else you’d like to know?

Hina: Huh…?

Nagihara: Is there anything else you’d like me to tell you about? You were researching my father, weren’t you?

Nagihara: I’ll tell you everything within my knowledge. I garner that it’ll be way more efficient than looking it up on the net.

Hina: Er…Well, I was actually just wondering what kind of a person he was…and the like…

Nagihara: I see. So, did you come to find anything in the end?

Hina: He’s a very respected teacher in his own right…And I also heard rumors about how he’s a genius mathematician on the television.

Hina: And also, I just happened to notice that he was the author of the reference book I borrowed from the library…And…

Nagihara: ………… And what?

Hina: Huh…? U-Uh…Um…

Nagihara: Is that all? What were you going to do with all that information in the first place?

Nagihara: Would it benefit you in any way by researching up on Nagihara Taizo for that matter?

Nagihara: …Ahh, sorry. I spoke too much.

Nagihara: It was probably just your sheer curiosity about the matter in play and you didn’t mean anything more than that.

Nagihara: Although, it would have been better if you had just asked me about it in person…

Hina: B-But…

Hina: (It doesn’t seem like an approachable topic one can ask about on a whim. Even right now…)

Nagihara: Is something wrong?

Hina: (He’s being kind of scary.)

Hina: (He’s speaking the same way as he always does, just a little curter but somehow or rather…he’s terrifying.)

Nagihara: Whatever that was written on the page was true. My father, Nagihara Taizo, is a absolutely talented mathematician and is still one of the leading forces on the front lines of the mathematics world now.

Nagihara: I have utmost respect for my father in regards to mathematics.

Nagihara: And my older brother… As it so happens, I lost him back when I was young.

Hina: (Just like I thought, the one who died was none other than Nagihara-sensei’s brother…)

Nagihara: That’s all. That’s why there’s no longer any need for you to read up further about the matter.

Hina: I’m terribly sorry…

Nagihara: Why are you apologizing?

Hina: It’s almost as if I’m prying into your private matters so I’m apologize because I don’t think I should be doing that.

Nagihara: ………………

Nagihara: Let’s close the conversation here then.

Nagihara: Dismissal time has already long passed. Please head home.

Hina: Sensei, um…

Nagihara: I’m going to have to leave this room before you if you’re not going to head home. I still have to warn the others that are still within the school compounds.

Hina: …Alright, I understand.

Hina: Please excuse me.

Nagihara: Goodbye. Do be careful as it’s already dark outside.

Hina: (He didn’t raise his voice or anything but it was almost as if I was talking to a different person…A rather terrifying one.)

Hina: (I probably stepped onto his tail when I started prying into matters that I shouldn’t be concerning myself with…)

Hina: (Haa…I really don’t understand this formula here either…)

Hina: (What should I do…? I have to hand this in by the next lesson but I’ve not managed to solve even a single question since I started…)

Hina: (It would be for the best if I asked Nagihara-sensei about it… I know that…But it’s hard to approach him now given what has transpired between us…)

Hina: (I’m the one at fault to begin with. I shouldn’t have snooped around his private matters like that.)

Hina: (He seemed like he was in a really bad mood when we were talking though. Could it be that he doesn’t get along well with his father?)

Hina: (But he did say that he really respected him…)

Hina: (mmmm…I should stop thinking about it. I don’t want to make Nagihara-sensei think of me any worse than he already has.)

Hina: (I’ll just keep the pen he handed to me as a good-luck charm and continue working hard!)

Hina: (I’ll study my hardest and then, little by little…I’ll work my way to solving it!)

Hina: (I’ll do it to the best of my abilities. He’ll smile as he talks about mathematics again if I do that, won’t he?

Hina: What should I do?

  Choice A: Head to the hallway. Choice B: Go to the infirmary.

[turningpagebooks]

BLOG TOUR - Q&A AND EXCERPT: “I Do Not Trust You” by Laura J. Burns and Melinda Metz

Laura J. Burns and Melinda Metz, authors of Sanctuary Bay and the Edgar-nominated mystery series Wright and Wong, are back with a story that features their signature plot twists and uneasy ever-changing alliances. I DO NOT TRUST YOU is a thrilling journey at every turn that asks – what would you do to save the ones you love?

Memphis "M" Engel is stubborn to a fault, graced with an almost absurd knowledge of long lost languages and cultures, and a heck of an opponent in a fight. In short: she's awesome. Ashwin “Ash” Sood is a little too posh for M's tastes, a little too good looking, and has way too many secrets. He desperately wants the ancient map M inherited from her archaeologist father, believing it will lead him to a relic with the power to destroy the world. M obviously can't trust him. Equally desperate to find the relic for reasons of her own, M forms an uneasy partnership with Ash.

From the catacombs of Paris, to a sacred forest in Norway, to the ruins of a submerged temple in Egypt, together they crisscross the globe in their search. But through it all, M can never be sure: Is she travelling with a friend or enemy?

Add it on Goodreads

Buy on Amazon CA or Chapters Indigo

Q&A

Who is one of your favourite female protagonists? What's one of your favourite books by a female author?

An oldie but a goodie: Elizabeth Bennet. Smart and self-aware, navigating an oppressive world with humor and optimism. We also love the Daughter of Smoke and Bone series by Laini Taylor. (So hard to narrow this down to a few!)

What was your favourite scene to write? What's the best thing about co-authoring a book?

We liked writing the scenes between M and Ash when they're getting to know one another. It's fun to create the sort of verbal sparring that shows them building a relationship while still not quite building trust.

The best thing about co-authoring a book is not having to write the whole thing yourself! It's fantastic to have somebody to share the work of plotting, writing, and solving problems.

Do you have any writing tips? Editing tips?

For writing--and this took us a long time to learn!--the best tip is simply to write. Get a draft done. Don't worry about it being good, just worry about it actually existing. Once you have a first draft, you can see what works and what doesn't, and you can revise. Revising is easy once you've got the whole thing in front of you.

We were both book editors before we became writers, which means we have so many tips for editing that the list would take forever to read! Be aware of small things like not repeating words or sentence structure. Be aware of big things like making sure your pacing doesn't drag. Remember to do the basics--check your spelling and grammar. Write down the timeline of your story and be sure it works. But most of all, trust your editor! You can edit the book yourself to the point that you consider it perfect, and yet your editor will still have notes. Pay attention to them. A fresh perspective on your writing is invaluable, and that's what an editor gives you.

EXCERPT

“You should’ve seen Miss Memphis here get into it with Nick last period,” Brianna said, squeezing in between M and Inez at their usual spot in the cafeteria. “She shut him down with her crazy ancient cultures voodoo.”

“He’s an ass. He’s lucky he’s hot,” their friend Ayana commented, waving her spork in Nick’s direction.

M shrugged. “I wouldn’t try to debate him in Physics. I just know more about Rome than he does.”

“What about AP Chem? Would you debate him in that?” Inez asked in a fake-serious voice. “Would you debate him in German class?”

“She’d debate him in German, in German,” Brianna joked. “And if he tried to fight back, she’d switch to Greek.”

M threw a French fry at her. “I can’t help it. I grew up speaking different languages.”

“And learning about pharaohs. And becoming well versed in the history of the Etruscan people,” Ayana said, putting on a fake accent that was probably supposed to be British. “Oh, and setting broken bones in the bush.”

 “That only happened once,” M muttered. Her friends laughed.

“Anyway, it was epic. Thanks,” Brianna said. “I can’t stand fighting with people, and Nick always goes after me.”

“He knows you hate it,” M pointed out. “That’s why he does it.”

“An ass, like I said.” Ayana shrugged.

“You think he’s coming to the party tonight?” Brianna asked.

“Probably. Everyone else is,” Inez replied. “Even Memphis.” M made a face. “Anything to get out of the house. Bob and Liza would expect me to play board games with them otherwise.” Her friends exchanged a glance. M winced. “No offense.”

“Oh, were you offending someone?” Nick piped up from behind her. “Good girl.”

Immediately Bri looked down, while Ayana rolled her eyes. Inez just smirked, glancing back and forth between M and Nick.

“I was not offending anyone. I only meant I don’t like parties,” M said. She didn’t bother to turn toward him. It didn’t matter; he inserted himself onto the bench next to her anyway. A little tingle ran up her spine as the scent of his co- logne hit her nostrils, spicy and warm.

“Mmm, they’re boring. Everyone talking about the prom or the senior trip or whatever. I’m over it,” Nick said.

Me too, thought M, wishing she didn’t agree with him. She loved her friends, but even they were all about high school. M just didn’t care. High school was nothing more than what she had to get through before she could leave. After the crash, after the shock of Bob and Liza becoming her guardians, she’d asked if she could go off to college early, either Boston University or the University of Sheffield in England. Both had the kind of archeology program she wanted and would’ve let her in with no questions. They knew her father. They knew high school was a waste of time for someone like her.

But her guardians said no. They said she needed stabil- ity and normalcy after losing her dad. Never mind that traveling the world and taking care of herself was normal for her. While she and Dad technically lived in Boston, she’d never spent more than a few months there during the school year. They traveled. Half the year spent on digs. She missed it.

“What’s with this thing, anyway? Is it to fight off bad guys?” Nick teased, finding an excuse to touch her. He reached for M’s collapsible bo staff, tucked in the inside pocket of her jacket like always. But before he touched it, be- fore his flirty smile registered in her mind, M had already grabbed his hand, twisted it back to the breaking point, and used the pain to push him off the cafeteria bench and onto the floor. With her other hand, she whipped out the stick and shoved it up against his throat.

M froze. He’s just hitting on you. Her friends were aghast, and everyone nearby watched, openmouthed. Nick’s eyes were wide with panic.

“Sorry.” M stood up, leaving Nick on the floor. “I’m really sorry.”

“Freak,” he muttered, climbing to his feet. He glanced around, noticing the barely concealed laughter from onlook- ers. “Jeez, I just wanted a fry,” he joked, as if he hadn’t been humiliated, then hurried out of the cafeteria.

“What. The. Hell?” Inez asked. “He was flirting with you and you beat him up!”

“I know.” M groaned, shoving her staff back into her pocket. “I didn’t mean to. It was just reflex.”

Her friends were silent. She���d freaked them out. Should she explain the years of self-defense and martial arts training? That she and Dad ended up in some rough places? Her friends lived in a city, they understood danger. Sort of. In a nice, upscale Boston kind of way.

M sighed. There was no point in trying to explain. Nobody understood her life.

“You kinda push all the guys away,” Brianna pointed out quietly. “Maybe not like that, but still . . .”

“I don’t do romance,” M replied. She was done with love, period. She’d loved her parents, and they were both gone. Love hurt too much. It was better to steer clear of it.

They all ate in silence for a minute.

“I mean, he is an ass,” Ayana said finally. And everybody laughed.

 M: You up?

MIKE: It’s a 12 hr time difference. Of course I’m up.

M: Like you never sleep in on weekends.

MIKE: Fine, your text woke me.

M: I don’t think that glyph is a lotus. It’s bending the wrong way.

MIKE: It has to be a lotus. If it’s not, the whole phrase is wrong.

M: The rest of the phrase never sat well with Nefertum anyway.

MIKE: Your dad said it was a lotus.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

LAURA J. BURNS and MELINDA METZ have written many books for teens and middle-grade readers, including Sanctuary Bay, Crave, and Sacrifice, as well as the Edgar-nominated mystery series Wright and Wong. They have also written for the TV shows ROSWELL, 1-800-MISSING, and THE DEAD ZONE. Laura lives in New York and Melinda lives in North Carolina, but really they mostly live on email, where they do most of their work together.

[leapwriter]

25 Questions Tag

And thanks again to @falling--in--place for the tag! :D

This is ridiculously long so I’m putting this one under the cut.

1. Is there a story you’re holding off on writing for some reason?

I don’t think so.

2. What work of yours, if any, are you embarrassed about existing?

I have a few…early works that should probably serve out their remanding days as kindling. There were also some fanfics from my old FFN days, but those have been deleted for a long time.

3. What order do you write in? Front of book to back? Chronological? Favorite scenes first? Something else?

I write the scenes that grab me first. Whatever feels “important” — key scenes, the things that inspired that piece in the beginning, the ones that I can’t ignore go first. Then the rest of the story is built around those. It’s a bit like being a detective — I follow the clues and from there figure out what happened and how we got from once place to another.

4. Favorite character you’ve written?

How do you pick a favorite child....I’m going to cheat and say it changes all the time (which is true).

5. Character you were most surprised to end up writing?

I usually end up with at least one surprise character per wip -- random unplanned characters who fuck with my plot are a tradition at this point.

6. Something you would go back and change in your writing that it’s too late/complicated to change now

Nothing, really. In old works I’ve moved past the point of wanting to mess with them without a complete rewrite, and my current wips are still very much in the messy first draft stage, so I don’t doubt most of it WILL change at some point.

7. When asked, are you embarrassed or enthusiastic to tell people that you write?

On the internet? Enthusiastic. In real life…not so much. I’m always nervous about people I know offline finding my blogs.

8. Favorite genre to write

Fantasy! Specifically urban fantasy but I have my roots in high fantasy. Horror is also fun.

9. What, if anything, do you do for inspiration?

Go for walks if I can, if not pace in circles or take a shower. Movement helps me think. But for more traditional “inspiration”, moodboards, music playlists, and stuff like that.

10. Write in silence or with background music? Alone or with others?

Silence and preferably alone. I have a hard time filtering out background noise so I struggle to write with music or even people talking.

The playlists come in when I’m daydreaming or brainstorming ideas.

11. What aspect of your writing do you think has most improved since you started writing?

Er…all of it, probably? Hopefully my ability to write nuanced, well developed characters though, as that’s my favorite part of writing. I’m a character driven storyteller, so I really hope I’ve improved at least SOME in that area haha.

12. Your weaknesses as an author?

Adverbs. My habit of starting things and then abandoning them when they stop being “shiny and new”.

13. Your strengths as an author?

I like to think it’s writing angst, or emotionally tense situations, or just…tension and conflict in general. It’s one of my favorite parts of the writing process, anyway.

14. Do you make playlists for your work?

Yeah, usually when I’m supposed to be writing or working on something else…

15. Why did you start writing?

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

16. Are there any characters who haunt you?

Just the dead ones ;)

Kidding, kidding. Probably all of them when I’m not writing them.

17. If you could give your fledgling author self any advice, what would it be?

Purple prose is not your friend. Whipping out the thesaurus just to put in fancy words for NO REASON does not make your writing better. Not everything you write has to sound like a dramatic, gothic horror novel that got dipped in 7 layers of pretentious pseudo philosophical ramblings.

18. Were there any works you read that affected you so much that it influenced your writing style? What were they?

When I was a kid, Harry Potter was a big influence. During my early teen years was the first time I started looked at writing more analytically — picking it apart, thinking about themes, and word choice, and phrasing as something to consciously do, not just…let happen.

Harry Potter was my obsession at the time, so it was the first work of fiction I started “taking apart”.

A bunch of epic, high fantasy novels, for better or worse... (The Wheel of Time was like...a big deal for me in high school)

And a WHOLE lot of fanfic writers. Fanfic had a huge formative influence on me.

19. When it comes to more complicated narratives, how do you keep track of outlines, characters, development, timelines, ect.?

Haha…outlines. Yeah.

Um, sometimes I scribble stuff down in like 10 different word documents, on my hand, and on that napkin I picked up and shoved in my pocket, but then usually forget about those notes or misplace them when I need them.

Outlines are great in theory, but I never use them in practice. When I’m smart, I dump all those ramblings into one scrivener folder so I can at least find them but…I am a chaotic, disorganized writer.

So I guess the answer to this question is: I don’t. I just jump into things blindly saying, “I’ll figure it out when I get there” and hope for the best.

20. Do you write in long sit-down sessions or in little spurts?

Both. It just depends on what I have time to do.

21. What do you think when you read over your older work?

I get that it served its purpose, but it still makes me cringe a bit to read the really old stuff.

22. Are there subjects that make you uncomfortable to write?

Yeah, but if it’s something that makes me super uncomfortable I just avoid writing about it. I want to enjoy what I’m writing, not have to force myself to get through it.

23. Any obscure life experiences that you feel have helped your writing?

I don’t know, what counts as obscure? Maybe?

24. Have you ever become an expert on something you previously knew nothing about, in order to better a scene or a story?

Er, lots of medical/first aid stuff, murder related things, a variety of weapons. I tend to forget things pretty quickly after I’m done though, so I probably don’t remember half of that stuff now, unless I’m still using it haha. 

25. Copy/paste a few sentences or a short paragraph that you’re particularly proud of.

Mmm. Me and my writing are not getting along at the moment, check back later.

Tagging: @mukur0writes and um @damawrites. If you don’t want to do this, feel free to ignore it!