#AND he somehow creates a new body for himself in a completely new dimension with no help?

[mino491]

I have a hc that when Klaus is sober, he's got really shitty hearing because of the constant noise the ghosts make around him. Like he always can hear little whispers or sometimes screams when he's sober so he has trouble hearing things in the real world.

I feel that would make so much sense because the whole reason he falls to substance abuse is because it gives him peace and quiet in a way he just can't have with all the dead folk following him.

I also think that the writers just forgot that Klaus has to live with dead people trying to get his attention ALL THE TIME because after the scene where he gets his Marigold back, shouldn't he be bombarded with all the townspeople that his siblings just murdered?

I would've loved to see more of his character growth because he went from being the loser lookout to being able to make his dead brother corporeal to being able to let his body be possessed by said brother to being able to come back from the dead and travel through dimensions to losing everything he worked so hard to achieve and having to live in fear to whatever the fuck happened in s4 😭

I mean don't even get me started on how unless they made him after he got his powers back, he literally did nothing in the final fight scene and his whole plot with the void was completely forgotten?

[faefaye]

I was trying to work on my description but it ended up being a post-canon snippet about Azik and Klein that I don't think I can fit in any of my fics :p, so I'll just leave it here:

-

The surroundings were dark and bright, heavy with grey smokey wisps yet light, zigzag lines creating abstract shapes all around. Even these jumbled descriptions could barely do justice to the true vision of the place, a mishmash of a separate dimension untethered to the world or to any of its realms.

At the centre of the space was a figure, almost as much smoke as solid. Traces of gold peeked out from under his dark hood and the underside of his cloak, the only colour anywhere. His face was translucent, blurred, facial features mangled like a jigsaw puzzle wrongly put together. Around him the smoke yet not smoke wasn't still like everywhere else, but flowed frantically, thrashed about by something.

Everything was strange and new, but Azik knew.

Without doubt, he knew.

He approached the figure, fighting against the growing chilling pressure that was pressing down on him, like weights being placed on his shoulders. His jaw clenched from the effort, but he didn't pause.

He approached until he was at the boundary of the moving fog, catching glimpses of patterned appendages within it. He did not look too close; the more he looked, the more he would understand and the more he would suffer for it.

Even this close, the figure was blurred. His stance changed though, as if he had finally noticed Azik.

"Klein," he spoke gently, as if this wasn't some unknown put-together world, as if they were still back in the university and his best student had a doubt he was refraining from asking, as if they had met up after a series of letters.

Out-of-control Beyonders were dangerous. Whether ally or enemy, they would lash out with wild abandon. But Klein was not hostile. Even now, he only watched on with detachment and a complete lack of malice.

"I'll be sleeping for a very long time..."

"Klein," he repeated, taking another few steps forward.

The appendages near Azik brushed against him then stilled, pulling back and curling around the main body.

He reached out for his student, not sure what he was going to do but knowing he had to awaken the other somehow anyhow–

–Klein's eyes, void-black, locked onto his, the slightest spark–

–a primal sound swept through the dimension, lines shattering, collapsing–

...He was back in the River of Eternal Darkness, a veneer of darkness interlaced with grey fog wavering around him, protecting him from the corrupting influence.

He came here to find what Klein had written to him about, but there was nothing he needed to do now.

The hundreds of phantoms were already vanishing, imprints of himself and Klein dissolving into the blurry waters.

[chasani]

Listen to me talk about my SPM au based on that one Dimentio theory

The Theory in Question: Dimentio is related to the ancients

So, long before flipside was created. There were MANY ancients. And so this is where my au divides up, because when you start thinking of a story, you're going to change the plot

So the base idea is Dimentio is related to the ancients in some way, still a Master of Dimensions, and went by Dimi (play off of the word "dimension")

This is where it splits off

Idea 1: So the ancients fight evil, and Dimi despite being the only on kept hidden from the evil beast (youngest, only child at the time) get dragged in by the beast. This beast is basically not even a beast, Dimi is just trapped in this flat out solid black dimension, sorta to how Dimension D is a pocket dimension, and he begins to lose his mind. Of course, while in this new place. Which is less of a dimension, but feels to us like an alternate world. Dimi basically goes through the whole story of SMP tagging the hero along. And when he returned from insanity, he wrote the dark prognosticus. That's where the vague terms come from. The man in green, the monster, all of it. The vague terms explaining what he saw in a non insane way. Let alone, the fact that the more he wrote the prognosticus the more insane it sounded. Eventually it got to the point where the ancients tried to kill him by completely destroying his body blah blah blah he's alive! And he's acting like he's not related to the Dimi at all. You see, Dimi played a role almost as Tippi in this story. As the hero's companion. But, he wanted a greater role, he wanted to be the one in control, (that's where the rabbit hole of insanity sent him spiraling). Changing terms and indirectly referring things, by keeping it blatantly unobvious he uses phrases to explain exactly what he wanted. He needed someone else to set the prognosticus into action, so that way he could take the power.

Idea 2: Essentially the same as above but without the fighting. He just drank a vial with like pure evil essence in it, and slowly lost it. Yeah.

Idea 3: Okay so like I had this idea where normal SPM meets the version of themselves where the bad thing that made them who they are never happened but they still somehow met. Obvious I've been bouncing back and forth between whether or not this new group was with the pure hearts (or pure heart) or the chaos heart. Regardless it's Blumiere, Nastasia, Chunks, Nymph, and Dimi. Blumiere never lost his love, idk about Nastasia and Chunks but Nymph was rejected and Dimi well said above. Then this progressed to, what if Dimi was deleted so they showed up and meeting the new ones blah blah story of my gosh he was deleted and erased and the entire fate of history changed and it's Mario he's leading this he's evil anyway Dimi comes back. Like some sort of wreck it Ralph stuff with the memory database and the boxes and what. But anyway then this evolved into, well what if Dimi was a glitch that learned the story of SPM and wanted the power of Dimentio and so deleted him no one noticed replaced him with himself just to be stuck in this weird no pain story.

And the only reason I had this idea was where like they revealed Dimentio wrote the dark prognosticus to the other group and the other group was talking about how according to story/legend the person that was gonna write it was pushed aside anyway Dimi pauses the four and explains the pain of not having been blah blah well had it bad and then when the un pause the four make comments jokes like they teleported cause the original SPM had moved anyway

This then turned into Dimi wrote the prognosticus and deletes things like the prognosticus has this whole story where they have to go through and fight blah blah blah people and when they get into one fight Dimi is like "so who's your boss" and then after getting the answer he pauses him and deletes him and rewrites it and then bam the whole mind maze of a place they were in is just like a basic grassy field and the thing they were after is just floating their and Dimi tries to gaslight them into believing this was how the story always was

Blah blah then this turned into someone this cut to a scene where they go off to the side to talk about Dimi and he's like "next time you have an aside conversation make sure to turn your microphones off" and then mutes them and him or I forgot what I made him say in his head but it was really cool and I forgot it and I'm mad now

Anyway he mutes himself and puts captions and is like now it makes since we're not talking cause he starts playing battle or theme music and makes the comment that it makes since now and there's a whole forth wall break anyway cut to him forcing them into a rpg like Deltarune style fight against him

Anyway I'm gonna work on my Dimi as an ancient design to post cause I have it in my head

Also the one other ideas so I had it where be couls turn into 4d too so he gets trapped there and meets a monster and no one figured out where he went and when he comes back to 3d he just acts like he was there the whole time stuck anyway

Yeah Dimi can flip into 2d, 3d, and 4d + flip dimensions physics + make himself 3d (it makes sense with the design I gave him)

[selamat-linting]

i like to write, both serious and silly things, fiction and nonfiction. the serious stuff gets published in the newspaper, or submitted to some zine or a magazine and posted in a personal blog when rejected. the silly stuff tho, that ones for my eyes only. i enjoy both equally. but i do find it a little sad that i didnt have much chance sharing the silly writings because it was so personal and self indulgent. tbf, when i say its silly, its very silly. its a homestuck ripoff with some hints of eschatology using a mary sue as the main character.

premise is this : the world is inevitably ending in several decades, so somehow it activates an eldritch pocket dimension / machine / entity / creature hidden in the earth that are meant as a second chance for humanity. a sample of a few thousand humans were selected. using the data gathered on the internet, the device sets up a network of puzzles and quests to test the chosen people. it almost looks like a game. it promise that if they win, they will be given the means to create a new world. but ofc, its not just the machines who is the judge, but is also the entire humanity. barring certain exceptions (void players, the people who really likes not knowing shit and having things be a mystery, basically ppl who would be religious/spiritual and not question it), the player must do everything in game with the eyes and the judgement of the world watching. something they only know after heavy plot development.

some believed that the players were seen by the rest of the world because theyre judged as a representative for humanity, and that this intense scrutiny was just like how in the end of the world, god would ask every single part of your body about the things you do during your life, and that you will not be able to lie because it was the parts of your body (your actions) that testified for the truth.

anyway, as the contestants played the game, gets outside interference from world powers, the 1% and the like, suffer untold amounts of trauma, and loses their entire privacy as the inside of their heads gets laid out on the table for all to see, they realized that their myriad of different tests was ultimately asking them to look for another way and think for themselves instead of choosing black and white options on ethical/moral dilemmas. theyre metaphorically forced to walk on a long bridge that are as thin as hair. but it wasnt hopeless. again, the bridge, the pathway, was metaphorical. the machine demands the winning players to be a certain way. the kind who wanted to change the world for the better and has done enough thinking and actions to understand what it took, the one who has already let go of conventional human morals and forged their own path and philosophical system. this is the second chance of humanity afterall, they better make it work. the world is not for amusement after all.

anyway, the main character is a prince of doom who proudly proclaims he's killing himself to live. nah, he's not good at walking the metaphorical bridge either at first. look, the answer isnt to demand perfect people to cross the bridge, its mutual coordination, working together, you know the kind of shit leftists love to do. this wip im writing only has like, two first draft chapters and several disconnected scenes of things i find cool. im not that interested in making things coherent or completely finishing the story. the main character is still temporarily names as Anonymous. At best, it will be complete but only as a partially edited second draft that i will never officially share to anyone. its my personal fun project :)

[shewhowillnotbenamed1]

I wanted to get this ‘Valentine’s Day’ piece out, even though it’s massively, supremely late. 😭It’s part of a longer piece (because I couldn’t stop writing it😶) and I’m still not sure whether or not it’s not terrible.😖

prompt list

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This couldn't be right.

Damian almost did a double take, his cool smirk withering when he glanced up, transfixed by the sleek storefront at the cross streets where he stood. Why on earth would Raven be in a place like this?

The building towered above the tottering sea of gray, black and blue below. And the mannequins in the display lorded over their dominion, propped loftily on their perches, arms and legs of impractical proportions, stilted at absurd angles.

And why would she summon him here?

His trousers began to buzz audibly and the shifting crowd of passersby jostled him closer to the glass. Damian delivered the faceless caricatures of the female form a final foreboding glare, before he reached down to free the device vibrating in his pocket. New Message. Raven. Apparently, it was urgent. He tapped the speech bubble icon with a fingertip and his jaw went slack.

I Need You.

The three words seemed etched into the surface of the screen. And they were more than enough to get him to take a deep breath and grasp the curved door handle, his jaw set, and wingtips marching determinedly onward.

The atmosphere inside the store was even more unexpected than the outside. When translated, the pounding music and low lighting read as more nightclub than boutique. It was completely impractical in Damian's view—how could anyone locate a price tag, let alone see the item they were intending to purchase? Although, after a few minutes of skulking around in the dark, he could see how the implementation of such a design was advantageous. With stealthiness like his, he wasn't in danger of being accosted by overly helpful employees hungry for commissions, before he located the heading of a dramatic script that read Dressing Rooms, and turned underneath it.

Down the row each stall had a flood light stationed above it, but only one appeared to be presently occupied: the corner room at the farthest end of the hall. And as he got closer he noticed it also appeared to be the largest. Damian glanced behind him and rapped on the door with a knuckle. And just as he began to wonder if he'd needed some sort of special knock or password prepared, the lock glowed black and unlatched itself.

"I'm here." The door creaked open and the floor groaned under his solid weight. Damian turned swiftly to shut it, growing steadily concerned.

"So what is it? What's the—big emergency..." He started, but his tongue began to feel heavy and leaden inside his rapidly drying mouth. And his eardrums began to beat violently until they matched the thumping of his maddened heart.

Red.

Blood red.

Burning. Blinding. Blazing.

In the carpet, the walls, the curtains, the chandelier.

It was everywhere—even in the deafening pounding hammering away at his head.

Thundering images suspended before him, going in and out of focus. They were searing his eyes, blearing his vision. In sinful shapes marred over pale flesh, it was red repeating over and over. Criss-crossing crimson. Damian had to dig his fingernails into his palms to ground himself with the tangibility of a familiar sensation.

And suddenly he realized that all the times before were incomparable, this was what it meant to be blindsided by a breath-taking blow. This was what it meant to receive a rush of blood to the head…

…or a rush of blood to the—

"I'm glad you came so quickly."

And the silhouette of Raven turned where she sat on a velvet ottoman, leaning forward in a way that was guaranteed to diffuse away the rest of his brain's processing ability. It was all he could do not to goggle at her like some cartoon character. Tawdry and tactless. Damian inwardly cursed the merciless Goddess above as he took in the cleavage created by cups, a series of straps and bows and elastic and he didn't know what. Only that he shouldn't have been so disarmed by it—by Raven's breasts pushed up to high-heaven. Like they weren't perky enough or distracting enough in their usual sheath of simple black cotton.

His wide emerald eyes strayed downward in spite of themselves and onto shapely, stocking clad legs folded one over the other, with a lace-up heel tapping out the bass of the synth pop bleeding into the background. Raven slid to her feet seamlessly, swaying slightly to the song. She took a single step, allowing the shadows to part for her as she did so.

There was a muted click, clack, click of her heels on the carpet as she drew near. He'd never seen her in stilettos, and he stared at them through slits.

Gods, they had to be four inches at least. Their impressive height only seemed to serve to make her look even more powerful. Just about as powerful as the force rooting him to the spot.

The deep panging in Damian's chest carried on, a racehorse charging from the starting gate, galloping faster and faster, as she grew closer and closer.

Suddenly he'd become aware of the fact that it was far too warm in here for the dead of winter. Or was it simply that Raven radiated such an intense heat?

Most definitely the latter.

The garnet colored lace gracing Raven's skin was a perfect match to her chakra stone. The semi-sheer fabric of her bra offered up a playful glimpse of the darker skin of her nipples beneath. When his gaze wound down her tapering waist, it appeared that the lack of opaqueness carried over to the front of her panties. He could just make out a little shadow—a promise laying underneath a tempting, well-kept diamond shape in plum wine. And last, but certainly not least were the thigh highs trimmed by garnet lacings and affixed to a red and black garter.

Damian's throat had somehow gone even drier. He tried to swallow with great difficulty, then tugged at his turtleneck for a reprieve.

However, there would be no such alleviation for his trousers.

"There's no emergency, Damian..." Raven assured him with a tilt of her head, lilac tendrils skating across a valley between pale peaks. "You'll have to forgive me, but I had to get you here. I had to know..." She paused, folding her arms as she prepared to pose a question to him. "Tell me... what do you think...of my outfit?"

Damian froze, fingers mid-tug and blinked several times as if he'd been struck dumb.

What?

That wasn't...

There was no way...

Was that a serious request?

She was being facetious—she had to be. It was the only explanation, unless Raven was somehow messing with his mind and Damian sincerely doubted that. But how could she ask him this with such bold-faced sincerity? Even if the wooden arch behind her housed a funhouse mirror and had been reflecting distorted proportions back at her. Or was there actually some warped reality in which they weren't looking at the same picture?

Although...

If he could muster up a voice to speak he would have asked, what outfit?

Lackadaisically, she trailed a hand down her body, tugging at the cups spilled over with supple skin. "The bra—do you like the pattern?" Raven traced the gorge between the swell of her breasts. "It's tulle and...French lace," she confirmed, squeezing the scant, semi-sheer embroidery molded to her chest. And Damian grimaced as though in physical pain.

"No?" she assessed, seemingly marking off boxes on a mental checklist. Raven smoothed her hands over her hips for a moment, appearing to be lost in thought. She paced slowly, revolving a full three-hundred and sixty degrees to pause with her back to him.

"And what about..." She swept a purple curtain over the nape of her neck to glance over her shoulder and he saw—of all things—a bow below the dimples on her back, nestled into the heart-shaped curve of her ass. "My panties...?"

Damian gritted his teeth, though not before letting a sound escape, like a hiss coupled with a wince.

"Are these okay?" The soft profile of her lips pressed.

Gods, it was almost as if she were seeking to offer all of this up to him. And who needed to clarify anything when she was all wrapped up and presented? Covered in the finest cardstock wrappings in gold-flecked marble, then laced up with champagne silk ribbon to await her unravelling.

Though his own would be more likely.

Right now, he'd forsake all his names, both Wayne and Al Ghul to get her to stop. Stop slinking closer, stop speaking in that sweet, scratchy undertone, and stop directing his focus to her various attributes, more than it already was.

It would only make his growing pain more pronounced.

A pale hand dangled down and spread across a smooth, silken thigh. "My stockings, then?" Raven hummed.

Though, Damian didn't speak. He wasn't entirely certain he was still breathing. Somehow, he'd managed to remain motionless and drag his unwilling eyes toward the floor. All his carefully constructed control was necessary to keep himself calm and centered in this moment. He could do this—he had to do this. Otherwise, what was the point of all those long years of training he'd endured?

Shiny purple strands bobbed; she'd started to shake her head slowly at the stony silence from the stoic cashmere wall standing before her, as if she expected as much.

"I bet you're still wondering why I called you here." Damian heard her voice go up in the middle, which it did whenever she was apprehensive or unsure. "I wanted you here to find out what you like—exactly what you like." When he arrived, Raven was blushing a delicious pink, so by now it had to be a violent red. "I wanted to get it right because...you're the first person, or only person I've ever been intimate with in any world, dimension, or universe..." She lingered.

And once again, Damian said nothing, and she resumed speaking.

"I do know that this is something that one does traditionally." Raven paused to worry her already cherry-red bottom lip. "That couples do... Buying underwear for your significant other is supposed to be something special, particularly for this holiday."

He was a mountain, immobile, unwavering...

"Oh, I see..." Her mouth set into a line. "Perhaps, it's the fit—or is it the color...?" Raven's large amethyst eyes swept over the room and landed on her reflection. "I thought dark red was classic. I knew I shouldn't have listened to Donna. I should have gotten something in black." She dragged a distraught hand through dark purple. "It's too much...or maybe it's not enough..."

"Don't," Damian growled low. His inflection was level and gave nothing away. If Raven was surprised by the outburst, she didn't let on, instead she continued.

"I bet the old string of socialites shuffling in and out of the manor were never caught dead in skivvies that weren't Kiki de Montparnasse or at least Agent Provocateur. But this..." Raven lifted her chin toward the mirror. "It's not your taste though, is it?"

That was far more than enough.

Far more than he could stand to hear and far more than he could stand to bear.

When his eyes flew back to hers at last, they weren't steely anymore, they burned—whittling her retinas down like they were wicks on candlesticks. As if he were all but telling her he dared her to do that again, to say that again.

"It's okay. I'm glad I found out before I bought—"

"I said...don't." Damian placed his hands on her wrists and whisked her right up to his chest. And he closed his eyes. He skimmed his lips along the length of hers like it was something sacred, his mouth trembling as Raven muffled out a note denoting her surprise.

He murmured to her, "you're brilliant, deadly beautiful—an empath...and for some reason unbeknownst to me, I'm your blindspot." Damian sighed resolutely. "But Raven, can't you take pity on me? I'm still a man." One that had been barely keeping it together since he arrived, but... "And you're you, so..."

There was no way in any world, dimension, or universe that he could ever resist.

Purple eyes grew wider as he told her and lifted a finger to her chin. Then it was Damian turning the tables and tipping her mouth towards his own. And though he hungered for her, he took slow and sweet and gentle grazes. It was tortuous, but he should only have a little at a time. This was an excess of an impossibly decadent dessert, an indulgence he was undeserving of. It was like the power in his sub zero freezer had short-circuited and he had no choice but to guzzle down that buried pint of vanilla caramel gelato.

Though who could blame him for being greedy when he had all of this spread out before him? And when her ass in those panties even resembled two round, creamy spoonfuls.

To hell with it then.

Damian lunged, face forward, longing for more of her. In an instant, he was inhaling her pulse, intaking the scent of leather-bound books with aged pages and the nectar from plums she'd probably narrowly avoided dripping on them. He dipped his tongue along the hollow of her collarbone as if he sought to test this.

"Mmm, that's nice."

"Nice?" Damian scoffed, his eyes on hers. "That's not what I was going for. Surely you didn't wear this because you wanted me to be nice." At the present, he wanted nothing more than to rip the tiny pieces of lace into twos, but Raven had selected them specifically for him. So he would continue to be patient and continue to savor this.

Let the pieces of fabric hold up for as long as he could hold out.

"Wait a moment," Raven gasped, quickly clutching his arm. "So your present...?"

"Present? Tch..." Damian's lip curled under his front teeth and he let out a piercing click. "If you're seriously considering getting me a present..." His palms glided down her chest and he gathered a scoop of softness in either hand. "Then these are perfect," he whispered in her ear.

And then Damian's mouth pushed back into hers and he was kissing her in ways that would make it impossible to return this lingerie after trying it on. He nipped urgently to gain entrance to her castle, then trapped her lip between his teeth like it was a drawbridge, at last releasing her tongue to collide with his own. All the while, his thumbs were sliding over her nipples, which puckered and pointed at his touch. He pushed up the cups of her bra for better access, head inclined towards his goal, soon to be met by a full mouth.

Each brush of his lips on Raven's chest made her fingers clench further and further into his shirt like it was a life preserver, and she was in danger of losing herself to the depths.

And after all, wasn't this the answer that she'd wanted from this—that she needed from him?

A chance to lose herself.

To stand in a dressing room in his arms, moaning his name like a breathy spell, her body bending until her back was arched under the avid swipes of tongue. He tugged her nipples between his teeth and they reddened, their response a glowing rave.

Yes.

Raven's eyelids squeezed, her pink face contorting in pleasure while Damian enjoyed the full weight of her breasts in his hands. He continued polishing the plush, pink rings. Left then right—until they were glistening.

"Gods, Damian..." Raven groaned. "Just—"

Just as sudden, there was a wet noise, a slip of suction. Damian had released a rosy nipple, taking note of Raven's expression. Hungry and dazed, and all his doing. Whether unconsciously or not, she pressed her legs together, clenching them as she watched Damian slip off the left sleeve of his coat and let it crumple to the ground in a heap.

The glaze of her gaze, her diaphragm's continuous rise and fall, her fingers digging into his arm, she needed this.

So why deny her?

"Yes, these are beautiful..." He whispered as he admired his handiwork under the chandelier light. The way the red nips and bites were like Damian Wayne watermarks upon the pale flesh. "But perhaps..." Damian's hands glided freely down the small of her back, just over the hill of her ass and stroked the burgundy bow, like an X marking the spot. "This."

When Damian glanced down at Raven, she was barely biting back another mewl, and moving restlessly in his arms. "I wonder what would happen if I were to pull this bow... Raven what do you think?"

"Damian... We shouldn't..." Raven murmured, sounding somewhat apprehensive and holding the fabric at his back tightly.

"Yes, we should Raven," he rasped darkly. "Right now, I can't seem to think of a reason why not..."

"Well, there's the fact that we're in public—"

"Public," Damian repeated flatly. "What of it? The outside world ceased to exist the second I entered the door of my own little version of Narnia."

Raven's jaw had unhinged in unmasked shock and Damian supposed this was an instance to take her remaining breath away by kissing her. Yes, he'd walked through a door and suddenly he was laying eyes on his half-naked demoness dangerous in dark red. So clearly nothing else in creation mattered.

When he pulled away her lips opened and closed, while her eyes remained shut, like a thirsty traveler prematurely cut off from a longer drink. And even though it seemed her body knew the truth, a darker part of him wanted her to beg for it.

"But, that's not what I asked," he said with a hard smile that wasn't. Damian drummed a divot on her lower back. "I fear I've gotten ahead of myself again. Tell me about the bow, Raven. What happens if I pull it?" His hand jutted out, he made a motion with his fingers, in mimicry of it.

"Why ask when you know the answer?" Raven asked him, her brow rising shakily.

"I could have asked you the same earlier. But..."

"But?"

Raven bit her lip but made no motion to stop his hands from climbing onto the curve of her ass. He taunted her twice, by tugging lightly on the tulle, until at last... The bow in the back came loose, and her panties slid down her legs with ease. She secured one pale thigh tightly over the other to hide herself.

No bottoms and bra half-undone, she was nothing short of delicious.

Though that scrap of fabric had barely covered much of anything, so why bother to tease? Or hadn't that been the sole purpose of this outfit?

A devious smirk sidled onto Damian's face as he realized something: these were the exact kind of underwear that one put on simply to take off.

"I pulled the bow, Raven," he murmured almost mockingly. "Don't I at least get to see the rest of my present?"

She stared up at him through her soot colored lashes and slowly opened her thighs.

[candyopala]

Stuck in his ways, Chapter 6

Chapter summary:  Obito follows Kakashi’s advice and tries to find out more about Y/N. When things don’t go his way, he finds himself lost and on Y/N’s house in the middle of the night.

Words: 2.3k

AO3

Please like or reblog if you enjoy, check my rules for requests too!

It’s almost time for work and Obito hasn’t slept yet. Despite the weird act, Kakashi gave some actually useful advice to him. He said that he manages to get team seven to work harder by playing with their goals, using their objectives as something to incentivize them through a tough mission or a hard exercise. Especially with Naruto, who can get a little lazy sometimes, bringing up his objective to be Hokage as his father seems to always work like a charm.

The thing is: Obito knows virtually nothing about Y/N. Besides what he has on her personal file, he knows nothing about her personal life and objectives. He spent too much time acting like an asshole to the girl instead of trying to get to know her. He keeps on going through her files maniacally while his mind gets lost in thought.

Don’t get him wrong, Obito hasn’t put any effort to meet new people since his accident. In addition to his insecurities with his appearance, his social skills get worse by the day. Okay, Kakashi does make him go in blind dates from time to time, but those always end up in failure, since he refuses to actually give any girl a chance. He tends to get lost in his thoughts while they talk and he usually ends up straight up ignoring them, which would make anyone reasonably mad.

His face still hurts when he remembers about that time that Yamanaka lady slapped him right on the face after he yawned while she talked. Or that time Kakashi ended up going home with both girls and he had to help take Gai into the hospital, after the fool hurt himself in a bet with their friend. Not to mention that time Kakashi tried to hook him up with a lady fifty years his senior. He would have been actually okay with it if she had not called him “grandson” twice. Obito shivers at the thought. Truth is, Obito actually has not given a chance to himself since the accident and Rin’s passing. Obito shakes his head to make the thought go away once his mind mentions his former teammate’s name.

Give me a break for once brain, right?

He finally gives up on the files and goes to lay in his bed, only to be instantly scared by the alarm clock, letting him know he should be waking up. He goes through with his morning routine on autopilot, putting on the jonin vest and heading out to meet Y/N on the training field. For the first time in ages, he arrives on time. He was so into his head that he did not get distracted on the way. He needs to learn more about Y/N today, one way or the other, so that he can get this whole deal to end soon.

Y/N arrives shortly after, looking sleepy and grumpy.

“You’re on time; did you die and get replaced for someone responsible?”

“Ha, funny. Why the grumpy look?”

“I had a little trouble sleeping tonight”

Come on Obito, what’s the best way of trying to connect to someone and to learn about them? Right, through empathy, being relatable!

“Ugh, me too, totally. What’s on your mind?”

“Lunch and dinner. Come on, let’s start.”

“Ouch”

Fuck, alright, this is bound to be tough.

Obito starts today’s training with some blade technique. Y/N is admittedly really good with hers, but she could use some refinement if she is going to be a shinobi now. He corrects her stance first, also focusing on not letting her leave her defense open.

“Raise your arm like this” He shows to her the things he learned from his family during his childhood.

Their treatment of him at that time was… harsh. Being a direct descendant of Madara made everyone treat him like a potential fuckup, and his abilities before the accident corroborated that. They only opened up more to him and begun to treat him with respect after he became one of Konoha’s finest jonins and one of the few ones to awaken the mangekyo in the whole family. Remembering this makes Obito feel a little cramped on the inside, making him want to go back to his current objective with Y/N.

“Right”

“So… when did you learn to use your sword?”

“On the road”

“And?”

“And I think it’s cool”

“Nice… I guess…”

Fuck fuck fuck.

They both go on for the rest of the morning with Obito not being able to make any progress. His difficulty with social situations is making an already hard situation get even tougher. Y/N refuses to respond to any prodding, only talking back to crack jokes at his expense and to cut him off.

“Want to go get some barbecue for lunch?” He asks hoping for her to accept, as a last desperate attempt to approach her somehow.

“Can’t do Uchiha, I have a reunion with the Hokage, later”

She leaves him in the field alone, a sense of hopelessness eating him up by the second. Then comes the explosive frustration of not getting what he wants. He just needs to make this end quicker; he needs to go back to relevant missions to make his objectives come true. He cannot be left behind, he has to make his promise to her come true, he needs to change it all and he can only do that by becoming the next Hokage.

Tears prickle up at his eye, hurting his heart more than his pride. He gets angry at this completely ridiculous situation he put himself in, he had lost focus lately, he got lazy. He had lost the fire that once burned inside him, only leaving him a pile of sadness and old regrets.

It all explodes within him, driving him to start training in a maniacal way, trying to create something new with kamui and kunais at all costs. He has been trying to develop a new jutsu for a while, but he always ends up stumped. The thought of failure is the last straw, he starts to attack the training posts with all he has, not noticing the pain consuming his arms as the hundreds of knifes coming out of his other dimension go through them in a whirlpool of time and space.

It’s the middle of the night when his body achieves its limit, he spent the whole day training and rampaging on the field. Obito falls down on the dirt face first as exhaustion and blood loss finally hits him. Still filled with adrenaline, his last thought is to head to Y/N’s house to get that information, one way or the other.

 ~”~

 A rushed couple of knocks wake Y/N from her slumber. Confused, she looks around the small apartment in search of the noise’s origin. She hears them again, coming from her front door. She looks over to the clock on the kitchenette; it shows that it is around two in the morning. She knows virtually no one in the village still, who could it be?

She grabs her trusty sword at the entrance area and heads to the door, expecting it to be some scammer or maniac. Without turning the lights on, she opens it only to find a tall figure, with broad shoulders and that forlorn look on his face… Obito.

What is he even doing here?

Upon further inspection, she notices that his figure seems a little bit off, worn out even. She finally turns on the lights, only to be met with a grizzly sight: he is covered in dirt and his arms are all bloodied, his shoulders are slumped and his signature messy hair is even unrulier. This image brings her an awful distant memory.

“Want to go for that barbecue?”

“Obito, what happened?”

“Don’t worry about it; we can talk it out on the way” The man speaks in a catatonic way, fully running on his impulses and on the verge of exhaustion.

Those unwanted memories rush back into her mind: a bloodied hand touching her face delicately, a catatonic smile, foggy eyes, a goodbye that came too soon. Her head rushes with rage, rage at her own mind for reminding her of that, anger at him for leaving so soon, anger at Obito for doing whatever he did to do this to himself.

Before she can even think, she pushes the man into her house with force, guiding his almost limp body to her tight bathroom, sitting him on the rim of her bathtub. He does not respond, his eye is directed at nothing, he just lets out a small wave of breath when he sits down. She grabs her first aid kit from under the sink, kneeling down to face him as best as she can in the small space.

“What happened?”

“…”

“Obito!”

She snaps her fingers in front of his face, taking him out of his trance. He gets startled, as if he had just woken up from a nightmare.

“Sorry, I’ll be going, okay?”

He tried to get up again, only to be swatted by Y/N and forced to sit back down on the tub.

“We have to tend to your wounds; you look like you lost a lot of blood already. It’s okay if you don’t want to tell me what happened, but I’m not letting you go like this”

“I’ll just go to the hospital”

“The hospital is on the other side of the village, dumbass”

He flinches and tries weakly to tear his arm away from her grasp, once her hand touches an exposed bit of his bicep. Y/N does her best to rip away the ripped fabric that covers the wounds, trying not to pull the parts that are stuck together with the cuts. She rips his sleeves away, exposing a mass of cuts in all directions all over the length of his arm.

Y/N bites her lips at the sight, her brain working against her again. Tears threaten to well up on her eyes, so she tries to make go away as best as she can.

They stay silent as she cleans his wounds, still having to hold him in place from time to time. He manages to be stubborn even in times like this, incredible. Once she finishes up bandaging him up, she just sits by his side on the tub.

“Obito…”

“Thank you”

“Is there something going on?”

“A lot”

“… I get it”

They cross looks quickly, Y/N immediately cutting the contact away as soon as it happens.

“I promise I won’t ask anything else… just… did you do this intentionally?”

“No”

“Alright”

A couple of extra minutes passes, only the sound of their breaths filling in the room. Obito looks up again and faces Y/N’s direction. She looks back at him, completely lost in all that is happening. First, he seems to loathe her, treat her like a chore, and now he appears at her door in the middle of the night like this…

Obito opens a small smile in her direction, a genuine one. It’s the first time she sees wrinkles around his eye sockets. He still has that sad look deep down, but he seems to be trying to honestly lighten the mood and say that everything is okay. Y/N lets out a little bit of her tension go away, letting her shoulders relax a little bit more, but not completely.

“Did some granny stab you Obito?”

“Yup, they stole all my money and dignity also”

“Maybe I’m the one who’s babysitting someone huh? Seems like I’ll have to be around to look for you”

Cracking jokes is Y/N’s way of trying to lighten the mood, but it does not seem to work. Obito suddenly gets that really sad look back up on his eye again, looking back down. Y/N can just make out a single tear rolling out of his right eye.

Did I say something wrong?

“Obi-“

He interrupts her by starting to break down, crying loudly and closing his fists with force on his thighs. Y/N instinctively grabs his hand and forces it open, holding his hand with her own with some degree of strength, to try to calm him down. She feels the heavy texture of his palm on hers, a sign of closeness she missed a lot for the past couple of years, something she refused to admit she… longed for. She comforts him like this for the next couple of minutes until his cries diminish to some uneven breathing.

“Thank you, Y/N. I guess having you around… is… uhm… forget it”

Despite the weirdness of his words, she eventually convinces him to go to the hospital to get his wounds healed, letting his warm hand go and realizing she might have done something wrong. She accompanies him to the door, thoughts flooding her mind while they both must up the courage to say something.

You should not be getting this close; you know what happens when you do that. Why did you do that?

“Promise me you go straight to the hospital?”

“Sure…”

“Obito…”

“What, Y/N?

Despite all that, she feels the urge to give him a hug. She is conflicted, she feels that he needs it badly, but she also feels like getting this close is far too dangerous. She should not be opening up like this to someone she barely knows, to someone that might not even like her as person. There is something that drives her to him, something she does not understand. He seems hurt, he seems like he needs a friend, someone by his side.

No, shut up. I didn’t come here for this, I can’t live all that again.

All she can muster up is a weak goodbye before rushing back in.

What the hell even was all of this?

[kai-borg]

Infinity train character idea I gotta write up sometime:

A passenger who’s number broke so he can’t leave

Whatever his lessons were that he needed to learn, during the final one something happened that caused his number to skip past [0] to [-1] or something in the negative range (and yes the colours are like that for a reason, just love red=code error/etc stuff)

He was with a group of other passengers at the point who’d also been completing their last lessons and whatnot, so he hid his number and told them he must’ve had another lesson or something, but he’d catch up with them later (y’know, like a liar)

The issue is, even though he kept trying things to fix his number, trying to figure out new lessons, doing the opposite of old ones, helping out other passengers, it just kept getting lower, and spreading (like with you know who’s group), and as he later realized, somehow his number breaking like that had changed his connection to the train/the pocket dimension it was in and he’d not only started gaining abilities that could alter and/or outright damage the worlds inside carts, eventually developing into the ability to modify himself in various ways as his connection between the two realities corrupted even further, he’d also stopped aging.

By this point he’d have already gone through multiple teamups with solo/groups of passengers before finding out how much time had apparently passed outside, and his number would’ve long since begun covering the majority of his body, not enough he couldn’t hide it, but enough he needed full to wear clothes that provided a lot of skin coverage, but with this discovery it’d be enough to finally push his number into covering all of him, and also breaking him in the same moment.

Whatever’d happen he’d end up driving whatever team he was with away, and most likely permanently taking over and corrupting the environment of the cart he was in, and possibly also it’s connection to the train and mini-universe itself.

I pretty much just have this idea of some ageless, reality warping, and highly unstable passenger who’s covered in glowing red, constantly changing numbers (cycling especially rapidly whenever he alters the reality of whatever environment he’s in in a particularly dramatic moment, or modifies himself), and terrorizes the inhabitants of the train, and while not actively trying to kill passengers, more than willing to torment, terrify, and toy with whatever passengers he comes across out of a hatred for the fact he still can’t leave, while collecting whatever items, landscapes, and even creatures that he either might have old memories of, or just interest him which he drags back to his corrupted cart to create some sort of hall of memories/comfort-esque ‘new home’ seeing as how he’ll never return to his old one

Basically, big disturbing antagonist with creepy powers, a flair for the dramatic, and a bit of mental instability that came about from having to contend with the fact he 1) will never return home, and everyone he knew is probably dead, 2) is stuck in a weird surreal train dimension of outright terrifying at times mini-worlds in every cart that come in every flavour of whatever random combination for a setting you can think of, and are filled with countless sapient, but entirely non-human beings, many of which are less than friendly, and all of which you can never escape no matter how many carts you go through, and 3) has to come to terms with the fact he’s practically lost his own humanity in everything except form, and even that is entirely up to his own desires (and also because it’s what he’s still the most subconsciously used to regardless of how he temporarily changes it), and has resulted in a tendency to lash out both physically, and verbally with the same vitriol he felt about the situation he was forced into before he began to lose it entirely.

In other words, very cruel, scary antagonist at this point, but not entirely irredeemable if you can somehow actually get through to him in a way that settles at least enough of his fractured psyche that some of his old self pulls itself back into the forefront.

[firefly464]

The Real World - Chapter 8

ok this chapter is slightly shorter, so sorry about that! 

Made in collaboration with @i-have-this-now​

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~~~

The week passed by rather quickly, and without incident. Every day, Tommy would try to talk to Wilbur. And every day, something would happen. He would always walk in on Wilbur talking with someone else, or drawing up some sort of battle plans. Sometimes he would just end up talking himself out of it, mostly out of fear of Wilbur’s reaction. He couldn’t bear the idea of his friend looking at him with disappointment, and maybe even fear. The fact that he was lying only made it ten times worse. With every day he put it off, the harder and harder it became. 

Every night, he would sneak out to go and train with George and Dream. His knowledge of sword fighting hadn’t exactly improved much, but it was odd. The repetitive motions of sword fighting felt familiar to him, as if he had done it hundreds of times before. It didn’t make any sense, considering how he had never picked up a sword in his life, but it was definitely there. Perhaps it was muscle memory from the other Tommy? That would make the most sense, but even so, it was strange. Either way, his sword fighting skills were increasing dramatically. He was still nowhere on the same level as George or any of the others, but he could at least last for nearly a minute now in a sparring session. Considering how he had started not even able to stand properly, he saw that as an improvement. 

The three of them would trade stories as they trained, each one learning new things about the other world. It was nice, being able to relax and just hang out with friends again like nothing had changed. Of course, the swords broke the illusion slightly, but it was still something that Tommy looked forward to each and every day. 

It was the night before Tommy’s deadline passed, and the three of them were out training like normal. 

“No way. You’re lying, there's no way that's true.” George’s voice cut through the thoughts in Tommy’s mind as he tried to catch up to what was going on. 

“I’m not! I swear it's true!” Dream replied.

“So you’re telling me that I can’t see all the colors?”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“That’s complete bullshit. You’re such a liar. I think I would have noticed something like that.”

“I’m serious! Here, look at this.” Dream pulled Tommy over and held up his jacket sleeve to the boy's blonde hair. “How different are these two colors?” 

“I dunno, they look pretty similar.” 

Tommy couldn’t help but burst out laughing. He had known about George’s colorblindness, but he hadn’t actually considered the fact that he may not even know about it in this world. It made sense, there was no way for him to figure it out. And if he had lived with it his whole life, then he would have never even realized that something was wrong. 

“George, these are completely different colors,” Dream said, clearly trying his best to not laugh.

“What? No way, no they aren’t. They look the same!” 

“Pffft, I swear that they are completely different colors,” Dream said with a laugh.

“Christ man, I knew your eyes were messed up but I didn’t realize that they were that bad,” Tommy teased, earning an indignant squawk from George.

“My eyes are perfectly fine thank you very much!” 

“Yeah, alright Big G, whatever you say.” The three of them talked like that for a while, late into the night. Tommy wasn’t sure what time it was when he finally left, but he had walked back to his little shack with a smile. 

~~~

Tommy stood at the entrance to the underground bunker for what felt like the hundredth time that week. God, he hated walking through the damn tunnel. It was small and cramped, not to mention just downright creepy. The memory of the piercing bell only made it ten times worse. Every time he stepped foot inside the small tunnel, he was terrified that it was going to ring out again, leaving him shaking, scared, and alone on the rocky ground. He had already chickened out from talking to Wilbur several times that week, just out of pure hatred of the tunnel. 

Now though, he didn’t really have an option. George’s deadline had passed the day before, and now his only hope was to get to Wilbur before George did. Tommy wanted Wilbur to hear the story from him, not from someone else. If George was the one to tell him, then he would likely jump to conclusions. Conclusions that George simply didn’t have the ability to explain away. No. Tommy needed to be the one to tell Wilbur. It was only right.

With a trembling breath, he stepped into the long, dark corridor. The silence surrounded instantly, suffocating him, drowning him. He shook his head desperately. He wasn’t going to let something like a stupid tunnel stop him. His fingers began to dance across the hilt of his sword, creating a slight pinging sound. It wasn’t much, but the soft noise helped to fill the all consuming silence. It was ok, he was going to be ok. The sound of his footfalls against the stone helped to comfort him as well. As long as he kept moving, the sound would continue. Just as long as he kept moving, he would be ok. 

He was about three quarters of the way to the bunker when he first heard the muffled sounds of voices. It was the sound of arguing, of shouting. Wilbur’s voice drifted through the tunnel towards him, echoing throughout the small space. “What?! Then where the fuck is Tommy?!” he cried out, his voice filled with desperation and fear. 

George's reply was faint, too far away to hear, but Tommy had a decent guess of what he had said. He didn’t know. No one knew. The other Tommy had disappeared and no one knew what had happened. For all they knew, he could have died. Fuck… that was probably what Wilbur was thinking as well. He needed to get in there, to explain himself. 

“That doesn’t- how the fuck do I know you’re not lying?!” Wilbur shouted. Tommy ran towards the sound of voices, desperate for a chance to explain himself. He needed to tell Wilbur the whole story, from his point of view. 

As he burst into the small bunker, he couldn’t help but look around in awe. What had once been a small, three by three room was now a multi-room underground house. Only the main room was surrounded by obsidian, but the other rooms had small doorways that could easily be blocked off and covered if needed. Tommy had to admit, it was an impressive sight to behold. At the center of the main room sat a table covered in different maps and plans. Bookshelves lined the walls, all filled to the brim with different books. It was the type of area that should have felt cold and empty, but was somehow filled with a lively warmth. 

At the center of it all, standing over the table, were his friends. Wilbur towered over George, staring at him pleadingly. “Where the fuck is he? How did you even know any of this?!”

“Wilbur! Will, I can explain,” Tommy said, putting his hands in the air to show he meant no harm.

Wilbur crossed over to the entrance in three strides and placed his hands on Tommy’s shoulders. His eyes burned with anger and pain, but there was an undertone of regret as well. Perhaps regret that he couldn’t do anything? Or regret that he hadn’t noticed sooner? Tommy didn’t know. “Where is he?! What the fuck did you do to him?!” He shouted, shaking the younger teenager as he interrogated him. 

“I-I don’t know! I didn’t do anything, I swear! Just give me a chance to explain, please!” Tommy pleaded, trying to get his friend to see reason.

“Bullshit! I fucking knew something was up with you, but I didn’t think that it was something like this! Who the fuck even are you anyways?!” “I’m still Tommy! Just give me a chance to fucking explain myself!” he cried, pushing Wilbur away. “Trust me, I don’t want to be here any more than you want me here. I just want to go home”

“I don’t give a fuck about what you want. All I care about is the fact that you’ve possessed the body of my right hand man, and apparently you’ve been plotting with the men of the DreamSMP,” Wilbur snarled. 

“What…? Wha- no, I didn’t! I had no say over any of this! I was living my normal life when suddenly I was here! I’ve been trying to figure out a way to go home ever since!” 

“Oh really? And when did that happen? How long have you been ‘trapped’ here?” he asked, making air quotes with his fingers.

“I dunno, two weeks maybe? I-It happened during the duel with Dream…” 

“Right. Two weeks that you could have come and talked to me. Two weeks that you could have come and asked for help, or just told me what was going on. Instead, you sneak out in the middle of the night to talk with Dream. God, you’re just as bad as Eret.” 

Tommy’s eyes widened. “How did you…?” “I fucking saw you! Did you really think I was going to let you go out in the middle of the night without backup?! No, of course not!” “So you followed me?!” “Yeah! I needed to make sure that you weren’t going to go and do something stupid! Low and behold, you went directly to talk with Dream of all people. The only reason I didn’t confront you was because I knew I needed to trust my right hand man. But apparently he’s gone! He’s fucking gone and I had no clue!” His voice broke on the last sentence as tears started to form in his eyes. Hastily, he wiped them away. 

“What the hell was I supposed to say? ‘Oh hi Wilbur, by the way I’m a Tommy from a different dimension where all of this is just a fun video game. Oh also the man that tried to kill all of you is the only person who I can actually talk to about this because he’s going through it too,’” Tommy scoffed. “Do you even realize how ridiculous that sounds?! You would have said I was insane and then called it a day. I wouldn’t even have had a chance to fucking talk.”

“You could have at least tried! If you really are just a different Tommy, than why the hell did you not trust me enough to talk to me? I would have listened!” “Because you were at war! You were in the middle of a fucking war and there was just never a good time. Believe me, I thought about it, but you just always seemed so stressed out and I couldn’t find it in myself to add more to the pile.” 

“But you still should have tried.” Wilbur turned his back to the boy and walked over to the tables. “Who else knows.”

“Uh, Tubbo thinks I have slight amnesia, but other than that, it's just George. Dream knows since he’s in the same boat as me, but that's besides the point.”

He nodded gravely. “Right. Here’s what I want you to do. I want you to go out there and tell Tubbo that his best friend may be dead because of you, and then I want you gone. I want you out of my sight. Until you can tell me exactly what happened to the real Tommy, I want you out of these walls. Understood?” 

Tommy could feel his heart shatter. No, this couldn’t be happening. He had just started to get used to the supportive family that L’Manberg provided, and now it was being taken away. Even worse than that, he needed to go face Tubbo… He wasn’t sure how his friend would react, but it likely wasn’t going to be good. Still, this was what he deserved, wasn’t it? He had technically caused the disappearance of this world's Tommy, even if he didn’t do anything on purpose. The other boy was still gone because of him. “Of course… Yes sir,” He said solemnly. 

“Good. George, I want to thank you for bringing this to my attention. I may not consider you an ally, but you have gained my respect.”

“Thank you Wilbur. I felt that you had the right to know. Come on Tommy, let's go,” George said, as he walked past Tommy and into the dark tunnel once more. Tommy spared one last glance behind him before he followed George, trying to get one last look at his friend. All he could see was a tall, hunched over figure. As the two of them walked towards the daylight, the boy swore he could hear the distant sobs of a heartbroken man. 

~~~

be careful what you wish for :)

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[symphonicdream]

Call to Arms

Note: This drabble contains one instance of racism. In no way do I condone racism. So, here’s your warning against it. Read at your own risk.

For those involved, you are allowed to write your version of events that happen in this drabble.

----

There was no tear of paper to alert anyone of the portal’s presence. An alleyway was what greeted them as they exited through the portal. Kamijou Touma, Maira Espoir, Bowen Chuuno, Megumi Aino, the Hunter, Violent Violet and Melanie Sinclair all stood in the alleyway. The noise of people was considerably dampened, and she knew that they would probably be overwhelmed with the amount of people walking the streets at this time of day.

It was at least 8AM, Friday morning.

Melanie took the lead, taking them out of the alleyways and to the sidewalks. This was the shopping area of her town, and it was definitely something. Populated by various men, women and children of different sizes, colours and fashion tastes, some stopped to see watch the seven of them walk by. Touma’s misfortune manifested as him tripping over a cat and falling into a teenage girl. Said teenage girl punched him with the force of a scorned woman, causing him to shout aloud and draw more attention than they needed.

Of course, Melanie had to diffuse the situation and tell them that he was a foreign exchange student here to study English while ushering him away to the group. The remark the teenager said, though, had been something along the lines of a racist remark towards both her and Touma. She’d told them “You ching-chongs should just go back to China!” and stormed off.

Ouch.

Melanie ignored it and got Touma back to the group and continued their trek to the City Hall. It was where she’d been first summoned, and she would go back. To deny that spot entirely, and to face him down. It was quiet, save for some idle chatter from Megumi and Touma as well as Maira chiming in every so often. Bowen, the Hunter and Violet were quiet, which seemed different from what she knew of Bowen and Violet. The Hunter, though? She expected that from him.

But she didn’t expect that from everyone.

The trek to City Hall was waylaid by stoplights and crosswalks. Melanie had to drag Touma back onto the sidewalk before he got hit by a car, and then had to deal with the Hunter just crossing the street and holding up traffic. People angry honked while they crossed, and some cussed them out. All the Hunter had to do was look in their direction and they suddenly quieted down. The third time, the light somehow was green when it shouldn’t have been. Melanie pressed the light changing button but no sound emitted.

It was broken.

So, yet again, the Hunter crossed the street and held up traffic. There was even a Police Car. Melanie had to explain the situation and gesture to the light while traffic was stalled. It turned into the officer getting someone on the situation and letting them off scot-free.

However, the fourth time of street crossing got a bit dicey.

The light was green and it was okay for them to cross. Unfortunately, one of the cars almost hit Touma, screeching to a stop before they hit him and honking the horn.

“Get out of the road, asshole!” Came the voice of the driver.

“Right of way!” Melanie shouted back. “You’re running a red light!”

The driver got out of the car. A burly 6′0″ man with a shaved head and who looked like he got a chip on his shoulder. Immediately, he walked up to Melanie and shoved her, causing the group’s hackles to rise as they prepared for a fight. “You wanna go, you little whore?! Huh?!”

Melanie stumbled back from the shove, before gripping her fist tight and shouting, punching towards him but the fist never connected. In a near instant, the man’s body was blown backwards by the sheer force of the punch. Standing straight, she dusted her hands off and started walking again.

“Are you alright, Melanie?” Maira asked, concerned. Melanie nodded.

“That guy was a jerk.” Megumi commented.

“He nearly hit me with his car!” Touma was still a little shaken up by that.

At least the rest of the way there, which took an hour, was uneventful besides that. When they started to approach the City Hall, Melanie stopped walking for a few minutes. Staring at the building, looking at what it looked like. As if she’d never seen it before, but she had.

“This is it. This is where he resides. Let’s go... and stay close to me.”

They walked up the staircase leading to the automatic doors, with them sliding open and allowing them to walk inside. But Melanie knew where she was going, heading to the Administration Office. As requested, her friends did stay near her and watched as she opened the door.

The world around them faded away, replaced by the corridor she’d walked down not even a few days ago. She walked down it, and so did they. It was quiet, the sound of their footsteps the only thing they heard. The corridor seemed to stretch on, but Melanie gestured at Touma.

He reached out, touching the air in front of them with his right hand. Shattering it completely and forming the door only a few feet away. She walked forward, shoving it open and being greeted with the same greenery and waterfall that had been there when she last came here.

“I thought I’d cut off all avenues to this world. It seems I underestimated your pocket dimension.” Out of nowhere, a man clad in black appeared. His long pink hair was tied back in a ponytail and he seemed almost infuriated. “What is the meaning of this?”

“I’m here to reject your offer.” Melanie said.

“Nonsense. You’ll do as you’re told and take the seat. Become my bride as I have made you to be!” The man shouted.

“I’m not becoming anyone’s bride, shitface!” Melanie shouted back. “I’m not some doll you can pull around! I’m a human being, and I’m going to be free to choose what I want to do!”

“Melanie is not your toy!” Maira said, irritated.

“She’s our friend!” Megumi pulled out her PreChanMirror and Card.

The Hunter pulled out the red gun he usually wielded, training it on the man. As soon as he fired, the man vanished and appeared behind Melanie, kicking her in the back and sending her flying into the nearby clifface. She fell backwards onto her back, and turned over to get up but was covered by rocks except for her arms and head.

The battle began at that exact moment.

“Precure Rolling Mirror Change!” Megumi was surrounded by a pink light and changed into Cure Lovely. Immediately after, she called an attack, only to be grabbed in the face and tossed aside into the river nearby. Touma, too, was quickly taken out with a knee to the gut. The Hunter started to shoot at him again, firing with precision, but the man would disappear before any shot connected. Maira summoned a bright, glaring light, which stunned him for a few moments while Bowen also began to fire on the man.

It was clear, even with the help, they were outmatched. Violet went in to attack but he avoided it cleanly. “Hmm, even bringing a God Hunter...” The man seemed to already know about her, and that was shocking. “No matter, I am not a God, so your tricks will not work.”

The Hunter moved, sheathing the red gun and holding the golden, cylindrical casing to his chest. Melanie, who was struggling to get up from under the rocks on top of her, recognized what he was going to do. The familiar magic was starting up again.

“Soil is my power!” A circular part of the casing withdrew, extending out what seemed to be a drill. Long, black blades appeared shortly after and started to turn, creating a torrent of black wind. The Magun formed from the casing, from the blackened wind, and the man turned to face the Hunter. Unlike with the others, this was new. Noting his shocked expression, Melanie realized something.

Unlike the others, he couldn’t see to Wonderland. He knew nothing about the Hunter, nothing about what he could do. And that was their advantage. After the Magun had thawed, with the Hunter saying as such, he extended out a hand, pointing in the man’s direction. She remembered this clearly. He’d used it before during her tenure in Wonderland... The Magun.

“The Soil Charge Triad to use on you has been decided!” He reached into his belt, plucking a familiar Soil from its place.

“A bladestorm of bonds, Sword Viridian.” The bullet held a teal-ish green hue in its casing, and it was easily inserted into the Magun with a resounding Click.

Maira looked over, hazel eyes widened. “That magic-”

“The squall of fortitude, Kingdom Blue.” This bullet was a shining blue, as if torn from a kingom itself. It, too, was inserted into the Magun. Click.

“And finally... A prideful gale, Warrior Platinum.” The final bullet was a silvery-white colour, shining brightly as it was placed into the Magun. The final click resounded as the Hunter aimed at the man.

Melanie reached out a hand, finding a thread and gripping it tight. A tearing sound was heard and the man’s appearance faded away to show... a demon. With spiky, long horns and a muzzle for a mouth. It was as if the man was the Devil himself. A hellish roar echoed throughout the area, causing the ground to shake.

It was nothing short of horrific.

Cure Lovely pulled herself out of the river, getting to her feet. Despite being drenched, she yet again called forth an attack. The hellish monster opened its muzzle and shot out a stream of fire at her. It was quickly intercepted by Kamijou Touma, who blocked it with his right hand. The fire dispersed after a few seconds.

“Slaughter! I summon you, Knights of the Round!” With a bang, three colours flew from the barrels of the Magun, twirling and twisting as they flew. The Knights of the Round Summon the Hunter called forth seemed to materialize from the colours, and started their assault upon the hellish being.

Melanie finally got up, the rocks falling away as she did so. The being was avoiding the attacks everyone was trying to attempt on him. Even the summon’s attacks were being avoided. It was like a strange scenario in which the only winner would be the hellish being. She shuddered to think of what would’ve happened had she taken the offer.

But her friends were in trouble.

Melanie started to run towards the hellish being. There was no hesitation as she did so. Her skin started to glow.

“BALWYSIALL NESCELL GUNGNIR TRON!!!!!” She screamed, seemingly tearing her clothes off. But no, they only just vanished to be replaced by a quick transformation with Gungnir forming. She went to punch the hellish being but he avoided her as well. And then appeared in front of her, grabbing her by the throat and starting to choke her as he raised her up into the air.

Melanie couldn’t breathe, which meant she couldn’t sing.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

The sound of a clock ticking filled their ears. The world around them grayed out, and even the hellish being was surprised enough to drop her. Footsteps echoed throughout the area, and Cure Lovely was the first to speak up.

“Who-”

“How did you escape my timelock?” A voice asked. It belonged to a young woman, who looked to be about twenty-two years old. She had short black hair tied back in a half-ponytail and teal eyes, wearing a long dark blue dress and black boots. But the odd thing was, she looked almost like an older version of Melanie. The hellish being roared, but soon turned gray himself. The young woman walked up to the group, and looked at all of them.

��They call me Azem, the Traveler.” She said. “Time magic is... somewhat of a pain to use, but I’m getting used to it. Anyways, it looks like you need more help. Fellow Traveler, who are the friends you hold close to your heart?” Azem looked to Melanie, who lowered her head and closed her eyes.

“Why are you here?” Touma asked.

“I’m here to help my counterpart, of course.” Azem said. “The one born from the orchestrations of a deluded demon. She and I are cut of the same cloth. I can see a shard of my own soul within her.” A chuckle came from her, and she inclined her head. “So, Traveler. Tell me who are your friends you hold close to your heart.”

“......” Melanie nodded. “Yukine Chris, Kazanari Tsubasa, Kohinata Miku, Lloyd Irving, Colette Brunel, Regal Bryant, Meteor Survivor and G’raha Tia.”

Azem laughed a little, before holding out an orange stone. “Here, Traveler. Use this and summon them forth to your side.”

Melanie took the stone, staring at it. She’d seen Meteor with this same stone once before. Hythlodaeus had given it to him, and he’d called them both New old friends. Was this because she, too, was a shard of Azem? The woman who called herself Azem smiled a bit.

“Call forth those you hold close and dear to your heart. Your allies of other worlds.”

Melanie closed her fist around the stone, holding it close to her. From where she stood, golden areas started to form. A glyph surrounded her, with eight circles that soon emitted light from them. Azem kicked the hellish being away, sending it sliding across the grayed floor. She stood straight again, looking at it before pulling out a claymore from what seemed to be thin air and assuming a fighting stance.

The lights dispersed one by one, revealing each person whose name Melanie had said before. But there was no time for introductions, as the world soon faded back to normal and the hellish being roared. Melanie handed the stone back to Azem, who pocketed it. The hellish being summoned forth demons of its own kind. There seemed to be many.

The song originating from Melanie’s Symphogear faded out, to be replaced with a different one. Chris, Tsubasa and Miku’s Symphogears did the same, once they summoned their Gears from the pendants they wore. A Unison.

One brings shadow, one brings the light Two toned echoes, tumbling through time Three score wasted, ten cast aside Fourfold knowing, no end in sight

“Let’s end this!” Melanie shouted.

The music gave way to the girls singing the song together. The hellish being roared and charged Melanie, who moved out of the way as fast as she could. Azem made a taunting gesture, causing the hellish being’s focus to be turned onto her instead. Provoking him to her. She pulled something dark out of her chest, letting it rise. A shadowy figure.

As the battle began, the sixteen of them split off into groups of four each, which meant each group had at least one Symphogear user with them. Swords swung, guns fired, magic was cast and punches thrown. Weapons were used without end, and the battle raged on without a seeming end. The Knights of the Round moved independently of the groups, helping decimate the demonic hoarde attacking them.

Melanie could feel power swelling up inside of her. She remembered this once before. Everyone could feel it. A swell of power from within them, from origins unknown. The groups fell back.

As if in the back of their minds, they all heard a shing sound. It was time to pull forth all their respective power and finish this off. Destroy this monster before it got any worse. It was like four Limit Break bars had filled up, and it was time to use them all.

A song resounded out, as if sung by all of them in their hearts. The Swan Song of the Valkyries, a song of Finé’s thoughts of causing the Curse of Babel. It resounded loud, though none of them were singing. The four Symphogear Users’ gears transformed into a different form of X-Drive. Their hair brightened with a gradient to it, and flared out. Wings made of fire expanded out, and they lost some of the clunkiness of the Gear.

Burning X-Drive. The one they’d used before, against Shem-Ha.

Glowing runes surrounded the group, and it was time.

LIMIT BREAK

The group rushed the hellish being, each one attacking with various weapons and spells. It was like a charge attack, with each person going after another. Each attack pushed the hellish being more and more towards the clifface that he’d thrown Melanie into. The Knights of the Round proceeded to pin him to it, and Melanie stepped forward.

She put both hands together, connecting the gauntlets and letting the spear form from it. She then pointed it towards the hellish being, in a form reminiscent of Elidibus during the fight at the Crystal Tower on the First. Her friends stood behind her, readying themselves for another attack.

“We are salvation given form!” Melanie shouted, and two ghostly hands placed themselves on hers. She knew who they were. Elidibus and Kanade, lending her a hand. How odd was it that an Ascian was helping her.

“Mankind’s heroes, and their final hope!” The words were foreign, coming out of her mouth, but this was true. The sixteen of them were the hope of this world. Even though they were from different worlds, they had all come together for this. Melanie delivered the final blow, empowered by her friends.

Piercing the hellish being with the cursed spear, Gungnir.

As if crumbling to dust, the hellish being lost form. Crumbled from his head to his feet, and was blown away by the wind. Melanie stood there after all was said and done, still holding the spear out. The ground rumbled and started to shake. The ceiling seemed to start to fall.

“We need to leave now!” Azem shouted. They all booked it to the door, leaving behind the battlefield they had fought on. Once outside and on the sidewalk away from City Hall, they watched as it crumbled to the ground. No one ever went there, but the people of the city stopped to watch the empty building crumble.

It was as if something changed. The world seemed to brighten up, and Melanie felt... lighter.

This was the beginning of a life orchestrated by herself alone.

--

Saying goodbye had never been her strong suit.

Melanie had opened fifteen portals, each pointing to different destinations. The worlds she’d brought them from.

One by one, they left. Each given a “see you later” by Melanie, who hoped to actually see them again. Once all fifteen portals closed after the respective person walked through it, Melanie was left with Azem. She looked to the Traveler and tilted her head to the left some.

“Do you need me to-”

“No. But before I go...” She held out the stone Melanie had given back. “I’ve learned all I can from the memories held in this stone. It’s time I passed it on to my counterpart, my fellow Traveler of the Stars.”

Melanie took the stone and put it in her pocket. “....Thank you, Azem.”

“See you again.” Azem turned away and walked off before seemingly vanishing into nothingness. Melanie was left alone, standing there on the sidewalk. She walked back towards the now-crumbled City Hall and felt no magic. It truly was over.

“So the imposter has been vanquished. Quite a feat.” The voice of the Overseer had Melanie on edge, immediately turning around to see-- a young man with long black hair and eyes that looked like they contained galaxies. Wearing just a plain graphic tee that had the Disney logo on it, slacks and velcro shoes. Nothing like the Overseer she’d seen before.

“Who--”

“I am the Overseer, Ryan.” The young man bowed. “The true Overseer. I assume this form is capable of being seen by you, as you addressed me.”

“Yeah, it is-- but why-- who--?”

“I am here to offer you the seat of God of this World. This will not change anything, though I will require you to come back every now and again. No staying away for years on end anymore.” He offered a smile. “And no, I will not be attempting to take you as my bride. You’ll find someone in your eternal lifetime, Melanie Sinclair.”

“....So, this means...” She didn’t know what it meant.

“If you take it, you will become a God. An immortal being, with powers unimaginable. And I would like you to take it, as you are the only mortal who can. The others ended up like...” He could only glance at the City Hall behind him. So, the false Overseer was a man who was once given said position? Melanie could barely believe it.

“What if I don’t?”

“Then I will wait until another few centuries. But I would like you to take it. You are compassionate, kind and do not kill without cause or reason. I did not orchestrate your birth like he did, but I have been watching. And you are currently the only one who can do this. I implore you-”

Melanie shrugged.

“At this point, I think it’s obvious if we leave it for someone else... That’ll happen. So yes. I’ll take it.”

Ryan chuckled just a bit and held out a hand. A pulse of energy emitted from it and went into her. For a few moments, nothing happened until Melanie suddenly clutched at her chest and groaned. It hurt. But she endured, and soon stood back upright. The Overseer smiled.

“Welcome to Godhood, Melanie Sinclair.”

Melanie gave a small smile. Nothing would change from here, she was just an ordinary girl with God powers now. It was just another Tuesday.

And things would remain as they were for her.

For the rest of her immortal life.

-----

@project-rebirth @tetsuwan-atom @rosecoloredmuses @kazeofthemagun @lunar-mage-mare @xbloodsoakedx

Thank you for allowing me to use your characters for this drabble!

Final Word Count: 3,701 words

[firehananas]

Chapter 159th to the end

Hmm ‘got much more mixed feelings about the end

I wonder if the mangaka is a huge gamer because the characters tend to always compare the situation with video games. I honestly find it a bit annoying - like, I don’t mind the gamer character to think like that, but almost everyone have a thought like this at one point. 

I have the feeling the whole Rika’s brainwashing was forced. Of course I wanted the two brothers to fight (Cain/Abel drama + Yuri setting as Seth yumyum) but it would had been better if Rika was the big villain the whole time/was really corrupted by Aikawa’s ideology.

That being said, I appreciated a little more Rika in the last half. I admit, he manages to do cool tricks.

Lowkey ship Sniper/White Feather for drama reason

Kuon’s death made me tear a bit - it was really heartbreaking </3

Too bad she doesn’t stay dead tho. It minimized the whole intensity of that scene and it feels too easy for the party afterward. Paradoxically, I liked the interactions she had with Yuri and Yuka.

Knowing there is a sequel, will they try to created a new body for her? Could be interesting. But I heard it was with new characters, so I don’t think I’ll read it. I was already reading it only mostly for Sniper Mask, so if I can’t get a shot of his riffle’s cannon, I’m not interested anymore.

I was honestly a bit nervous at the idea Kuon stayed in the head of Yuka - Ordinary quickly questioned this and pointed out very well my thoughts. It seems she doesn’t have to stay in his head and somehow body surfed with other God Candidates, but it still upset me for them all.

I thought Kuon was baby. She is. But she isn’t. Yet she is. However she isn’t. Actually- 

(She is definitely less innocent she appears to be, as I expected, but much darker than I visualized it)

Disappointed Aikawa was just sitting there while Yuka and Rika fight. Like, I was excepting he asked Volleyball Mask to bring him some popcorns at one point.

I really need someone to make an animatic of the brothers fight with “the plagues” from The Prince of Egypt. It matchs it so well 😔

Oh look, Yukio becomes super strong! Is he a Closer to God now? Oh no wait, it’s a literal deus ex-machina!

If High Rise Invasion gets a second season, it means we will be able to admire the divine butt of Yuka at the very least twice.

The codes were interesting on paper, but I wished they foreshadowed it sooner. Making Kuon said “oh yeah, I just remember it now” every times is a bit cheap.

Makoto brothers really shined in this part. It was really refreshing to see them working together.

Does anyone have an idea of what Tenma means? I couldn’t found anything about this...

I don’t think it was a good idea to introduced Juo for the last arc. He was out of place. Aikawa was to the point to succeeded to become a god, was much more threatening and it was less thrilling to follow Rika&co fighting him. If the whole scenario happened before, it would have been more smooth in my opinion.

Tbh, I didn’t even get why Yuri wanted to save Juo at the end...  

Administrator was f*cked up, but I couldn’t bring myself to hate him. His fate is just too awful and I understand he became so mad and drunk of power.

Praise Yuka for speaking the truth to the Supervisor. Wish he go further, calling him out that they succeeded thanks to their teamwork and not because they act in a "man is a wolf to man” way. Please, even bacterias understand the concept of helping the less strong to survive.

I need to pin up in my bedroom the page where Yuka said “you’re amazing” as a motivation quote.

Broke: Yuka is daddy. Woke: Yuka is a dad. Heck, he even lampshades it himself.

Did Prophet die?? He wasn’t show to be dead but he isn’t in the epilogue either...

My boy Yoshida didn’t deserved to die, especially not this way. That was dirty.

The whole betrayal of the dad is never addressed??? Where is the drama??? And the reunion of the Kusakabe didn’t move me at all. Do I am really suppose to care for a woman who tortured people with an obvious pleasure and turned my man Yuka and other countless people into puppets? Sorry but no.

Saito never becomes strong, halas. I’m not even sure if she showed up in the epilogue. It seems the author didn’t know what to do with her. She isn’t the only one in that case...

I understand why people complained the ending to be rushed. While it’s good to see Yuri alive, the whole family complete and angels stopping killing people, no god has been created (since somehow Yuri isn’t a complete god for now?), dimensions will maybe fused and insured chaos... yet the last thing the protagonist is seen doing is going to eat with her girlfriend. For a survival game genre, it’s hard to swallow — pun no intended. It’s way too cheesy after all the horrors they lived AND the threats incoming.

CONCLUSION

Yuka is definitely the best. What a husbando material.

Concept is very interesting but messy in execution at the end

Rarely boring, gorgeous art

Wished Yuka/Yuri/Rika worked more together and tried to bond as a family. It’s one of the most prominent theme of the manga, it’s too bad it mostly works as Yuri > Rika < Yuka and not all the three. (I don’t count when Yuka worked as Sniper Mask under Yuri since they didn’t know they were related.)

WISHED YURI/MAYUKO TO BE MORE OFFICIAL ARGHHHHH

Aikawa was a good villain, so was the administrator. Too bad they died so quickly. Juo could have been interesting too if he didn’t showed this late.

Wasted opportunity with Yayoi, she could have been an amazing villain.

It’s really too bad Yoshida didn’t manage to “really” meet one of the Makoto. I really think they could have influenced him positively. 

...Maybe too many characters...? It’s hard to judge since there is a need to have so much (otherwise nothing would happen) but it’s difficult to find them all flesh out. And if the reader don’t care, the whole drama and horror are much less impactful. 

I’m not sure how I feel towards Kuon now. I still like her, but I need to zoom off to understand better her character.

I’ll say it again: Yoshida didn’t deserved this fate :c

Ending rushed up, probably to prepare for the sequel but it’s still very brutal and cheesy, leaving a bitter taste as a farewell.

[incorrectenhypenquotes]

giving i-landers superpowers (top 9!)

K - Re-Equip Okay so, think Erza Scarlet from fairy tail, wherein K can store weapons and armors in a sort of pocket dimension and then summon them at will during battle. According to the armor + weapon combination summoned, K can also get advanced durability, strength, resistance or agility depending on whichever one is most helpful to the particular weapon and it’s accompanied fighting style. New weapons also offer new skills, for example if hr gains weapons that possess supernatural abilities like control of elements give him those abilities while they are in use.

Heeseung - Time Manipulation I had to make Heeseung OP so here Essentially Time Manipulation doesn’t necessarily mean that Heeseung can manipulate time itself, but he can manipulate his opponents perception of it. Essentially, this entails slowing down their perception of time so his own movements are faster and it’s easier to take them down, or stop his opponents perception of time all together for a while, or turn back time in the context of a specific person like to reverse the effects of an injury - the only condition is he has to have touched them first and he can’t reverse actual death.

Jay and Sunghoon - Fire/Ice Manipulation Okay so I’ve grouped them together because in this au specifically I’ve kind of paired them up in my head. The powers are pretty self explanatory, Jay can create and control fire while Sunghoon can create and control ice (yeah i gave sunghoon ice powers original i know). Beyond this they have complete durability against extreme heat and extreme cold respectively. Both of them can take their powers to limited extremes as well, like Jay can use pure heat and Sunghoon can use pure cold (air?? ig?? idk just the cold as a force or something) to turn water into steam or ice, similarly Jay can create just smoke and Sunghoon create just like cold winds, idk like this makes sense right? They essentially function as a duo in here, Sunghoon freezes half their opponents over and then Jay torches the rest. They’ve got a system. They’re not just fucking around I promise.

Jake - Permeation Jake has the ability become intangible, letting him pass through any phsyical matter; he can phase through walls, the ground, as  let enemy attacks pass through him harmlessly. This lets him phase through walls, enemies, and attacks (like weapons and bullets) at will. If he returns to his solid state while phasing through something, his body would be repelled outward projecting away from the object - he sometimes takes advantage of this during battles, launching himself at enemies to deliver a physical blow of some sort, aided by the added speed of the projection.

Sunoo - Light Manipulation He can create, shape and manipulate any light that is visible to the human eye. This entails everything from increasing its intensity to the point where it’s blinding, to manipulating light to show illusions. His attacks are based around light and heat, wherein he can throw blasts of sunlight energy or balls of solar heat as well as shape light into barriers and shields. He can also function, essentially, as a human torch when the situation needs it (say they’re stuck in a really dark place or something idk) however his powers are noticeably weakened the darker it gets.

Jungwon - Power Mimicry Pretty self explanatory, but essentially Jungwon can copy the abilities of basically everyone he fights. The power of the mimicry get increasingly smaller as the power levels being mimicked grow higher, however as his skills develop this gap will lessen. There is no limit to the abilities he can mimic, it can be something as basic as being able to do martial arts, to something like Heeseung’s time manipulation. The only drawback here is that he can only mimic one ability at a time, and given that he’s somehow isolated or deprive of his senses, the ability is essentially useless.

Ni-ki - Trajectory Manipulation Ni-ki has the ability to curve or stop the trajectory of anything he throws, think Diego from Umbrella academy. What this means is he can curve the pathway of anything to hit what he wants it to hit, or not hit what he wants it to not hit. So, if someone shoots a bullet at him he can stop that bullet in mid air or make it turn around and hit something ease, he can also curve the pathway of his own weapons to make sure he’s always on target, as well as avoid any attacks on him when they come in the form of a something being thrown at him (knives, bullets, grenades, etc.)

Daniel - Teleportation Daniel has the ability to teleport both short and long distances, which he uses frequently to evade his enemies and also angry hyungs (think Five, from the umbrella academy). In addition to this, Daniel can teleport multiple people along with him, however he still has his limitations here, he is also able to teleport objects and other people without physical contact, like say switch out an opponent’s weapon for a teddy bear or something. Eventually, he will be able to teleport through time as well, however he hasn’t really tried yet given how risky it is. 

[trashcankitty12]

Timmy Headcanons

(Sorry for the wait, life, am I right?)

Timmy Somerville. Cute nerd, badass strategist, and most likely one of the smartest dudes you’ll ever meet.

Poor dude doesn’t always get the recognition he deserves, so here it is. I hope.

(Also, I took the name for his hometown/home city from the comics.)

(Also, these headcanons are mostly for my main verses. “Left” and “The New Company of Light”.)

-Timmy is from Zenith, more specifically, the City of Titania, Zenith’s Capitol.

-It’s just him and his mom and dad, and their robo-cat, Chester. (Timmy named him after a character from his favorite game series.)

-Timmy doesn’t have many family members, as both his parents are also only children and both sets of grandparents live in the warmer climates of Zenith. (There are like… Two or three warm cities/villages in Zenith.)

-But his parents do have lots of friends that are sort of like his ‘aunts and uncles’. (And they spoiled him like they were his family.)

-Honestly Timmy is a bit spoiled as far as family love goes. They have always been supportive of his projects and are just so proud of him.

-He tends to be closer to his dad than to his mom. His dad was more of a stay-at-home dad (he ran his business from home, which was game designing), and his mom worked as a hotshot lawyer on Zenith. (Mostly for copyright claiming and patenting.)

-His dad always let him playtest his games (assuming they weren’t for more mature audiences, Timmy was a bit of a sheltered child about those subjects). And Timmy… Well it started Timmy’s love of them.

-As he got older and more into the mechanics of game design, mechanic-ing in general, his parents let him start using his room as a workshop.

-He used to take everything apart he could get his hands on, and then would put it all back together, good as new. (And sometimes, better.)

-His parents used to suspect he may have some techno-magic because of how the machines responded to him, but they never could prove it.

-(To this day, even the others in his squad question if Timmy has some latent-magical abilities. He tries to laugh it off, but he has found himself wondering too… Even to the point of trying to summon his magic. So far, nothing.)

-His vision started going bad around the time he turned 12. He was averse to getting glasses at first, but his run-in with contacts didn’t go so well… So glasses. (Which sucks when you wear helmets, but he’s come up with specialized helmets for people like him with poor vision. It just took some time to create. And for his mother to help with the copyright and patents.)

-Timmy had braces for a short time after an incident in elementary school messed his mouth up.

-(Dodgeball at Titania Prep was cut-throat. Cut. Throat.)

-Timmy also has an allergy to seafood. Which sucks, because he likes the smell of fried fish and the sauces that come with shrimp… But if he eats it, he can’t breathe and he’d just rather not deal with that.

-He was actually a pretty popular guy at his elementary and middle schools. He was the guy who had access to first-rate games before anyone else did, and he got to have the latest in technology. (And could explain it without it being boring.)

-So how did little Timmy decide to go to Red Fountain?

-His middle school hosted one of those fairs that shows off different high schools that someone could go to. There was Zenithian Prep, which was connected to the main college of Zenith, Zeni Tech. The Eraklyon Institute. The Callistian Artistry School for the Aspiring Youth (what a mouthful). Coventry Academy for Witches and Wizards. And Red Fountain.

-Timmy had been wanting to go to the prep school, just as was expected of him. But Red Fountain just… Spoke to him. He wanted to be different. He wanted to be more than just ‘the smart Zenith kid’. He wanted to standout somewhere. And he kind of liked the idea of the adventures Red Fountain offered.

-So he started his training for the entrance exams. Thankfully, Chester could easily be programmed to be an exercising partner and couldn’t be easily swayed to deviate from the course.

-Granted, the physical part of the exam was hard, but Codatorta saw something in him and personally vouched for him to join the program.

-Timmy’s parents were shocked at first, but since Timmy got in and had expressed such a want to go, they approved and signed the necessary papers. (With the promise that Timmy would bail if it became too much for him. No shame in realizing something wasn’t for you.)

-Not gonna lie, adjusting to Red Fountain life was a bit hard at first, but once he got into the routine, it was second nature.

-Granted, he was never as physically fit as Riven or Sky or Brandon, but he could hold his own in a fight.

-Hand-to-hand fighting isn’t his strong suite, but he is tenacious about it and isn’t afraid to exploit weaknesses his opponent has.

-Thanks to his hand-eye coordination skills from playing video games, he’s actually really good at aiming blasters and performing with a bow and arrows.

-Piloting is his favorite though. He loves getting to ‘play with the ships’ and getting to work on them and fly them around. It’s just… He loves it so much. You guys just don’t understand.

-Please don’t ask him to fight with swords or shields or spears… He does his best and he could hold his own… But it’s just not for him. (He doesn’t have the upper-body strength to really fight and hold up the weapons too. At least, not for long periods. He does well enough just to get passing marks.)

-Strategy is another strong suite of Timmy’s. He loves plotting and looking over maps and creating the battle strategies. (Maybe, just maybe, it makes him think of the Magical Dimension’s version of DnD, but he won’t say that outloud to anyone but Tecna.)

-He also sort of liked the war game drills Red Fountain ran. And the off-world training exercises.

-And okay, he wasn’t a complete fan of the camping trips, but he did have his favorite camping moments. Like bonding with his squad-mates and getting to know more about the people around him.

-(And getting to learn more about people other than Zenithians. Despite being the tech giants of the Magical Dimension, Zenith doesn’t really communicate much with the rest of the realms. So this was a great experience for Timmy and he got to share his adventures with his family who also loved hearing about them.)

-The Sky/Brandon thing did hurt him though. Like he found out early-on who they really were because they weren’t as discreet as they should have been at Red Fountain. But the fact that they didn’t just come to him and admit to him who they were kind of stung. Especially since he was supposed to rely on these guys to be his ‘brothers-in-arms’.

-His crush on Tecna happened early-on too. When he first met her, she made him so nervous and he just couldn’t believe that he was talking to that Tecna Mode, daughter of the owners of Mode Inc., and he just… Almost lost his cool. (Okay he did lose it, but she laughed and joked and that made it so much more bearable.)

-(And the fact that after they started dating, his parents fell in love with her too, just sealed the deal for him.)

-He does tend to go to Helia and Brandon for romantic advice. He knows Tecna loves him as is, but he wants to continue being able to make her feel special and keep the warm-fuzziness going.

-When she was thought to be dead in Omega, Timmy had a full-on meltdown. He went to her memorial at Alfea and he cried like a baby to her parents. He apologized at least half a dozen times to them. But he swore to them he’d bring her back. Alive. Somehow. He swore it.

-It didn’t matter that everyone thought he was crazy or delusional. Tecna was alive and he could feel it. And so could Digit. And if anyone would know if Tecna was really dead, it’d be the damn pixie she was bonded to. So she had to be alive.

-And damn, when he did see her again, when they finally made it back to the ship in one piece… He almost couldn’t bear to let her go. He basically let Helia fly the ship back so he could spend the entire flight holding her. (And she let him, despite not usually being one for PDA.)

-After that, he texted her nearly non-stop for a month, just be sure she was still there. That it wasn’t a dream he’d had. Thankfully, it was all true. She was safe and back at Alfea.

-Timmy has a poor sleep schedule, despite having been training for early morning drills at RF since he was 14. When he’s working on a project though, nothing will stop him from finishing it. (Unless the others literally pull him away.)

-(Which has happened before. Riven will literally just scoop up Timmy and take him to his room and plop him down and be like ‘sleep or I’ll knock you out’.)

-Timmy has a small case of tinnitus due to blaster use and working on the RF ships.

-Timmy also runs mostly on caffeine. Coffee, energy drinks, soda. You name it. (Helia and Nabu have been subtly trying to remove the caffeine over the years, but Tecna keeps enabling him… Or rather, enabling them both since she also runs on caffeine.)

-Timmy has tried his hands at poetry. It’s not the best, but it makes him feel great to work on writing and Tecna absolutely loves the poems he writes for her.

-Stella and Timmy have secretly been working on uniforms for soldiers/cadets in training. She wants them to be a little more stylish and he has some ideas on how to better protect the person wearing them. (And maybe add in some heat/air condition stuff. Those things are super temperamental.)

-And Layla has been helping Timmy stay in shape since they all graduated and moved to Earth. (Well, temporarily relocated to Earth.) She knows he’s slacked a bit on training since he hasn’t been at RF, and he needs to keep on his toes.

-He likes Earth okay, but he has to fight his need to fix everything to be on par with the rest of the Magical Dimension. (Please Bloom? Just one car? Or maybe a computer? Please? Please?)

-Timmy loves when they have game-night at the loft. Even if it tends to end in screaming matches between Stella, Riven, Musa, and Tecna. (So many super-competitive people in one place.)

-He has discovered that he makes the ‘best sweet tea’. At least, according to Bloom. (He doesn’t understand her or what this ‘sweet tea’ is… He’s honestly just pretty sure he ruined a thing of tea… But hey… Earth is weird.)

-Timmy hopes that after all of this ‘saving the magical dimension’ stuff is over, he and Tecna will get to live a quiet life. Or at least one where their inventions and games blow-up and they get to bring joy to others’ lives.

-(But first, the Magical Dimension needs to stop needing to be saved. And like hell that’ll happen.)

[infinite-xerath]

Runeterra Retcons 2: Aatrox and the Darkin

I did another one. There’s one more character I have in mind to do, but then I’ll probably take a small break from these))

Aatrox is an interesting case; while I don’t necessarily believe his current lore is BAD per se, I think he’s more-so a case of missed opportunity and wasted potential. Aatrox, to me, reeks of a case where Riot gave zero forethought to the future of this character when they created him. To fully understand why I feel this way, we’re going to have to take a step back and analyze some of the history of League itself, as well as some characters connected to Aatrox. So, with that all said, let’s look back at the history of this angry red swords and see if we can make sense of the changes given to him over the years.

Aatrox was released into the game back in 2013, under the title “The Darkin Blade.” Now, what’s a Darkin, you ask? Well, at the time, we didn’t really know, and it kind of became obvious that Riot didn’t either. Let’s have a read of his original lore, shall we?

I was always a fan of Aatrox’s original lore: an ancient, mysterious figure who shows up to help you turn the tides of a war, but only after you’d effectively surrendered your own humanity for the sake of victory. The fact that there was an entire race just like him became the center of fan speculation of years, and countless theories cropped up as to who and what the Darkin even were. Some assumed that they were related to the Seven Deadly Sins, while others thought they might be akin to the Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Some thought they might just be a dying race, and that some might actually be benevolent, unlike Aatrox.

Unfortunately, Riot wouldn’t give us an answer for quite some time. All we knew was that Aatrox was a Darkin and that he looked a lot like typical modern depictions of demons. That does raise the question though: why didn’t they just make Aatrox a demon? He helps turn the tides of conflict with no apparent goal beyond just prolonging the chaos and suffering brought about by war. A lot of his voice lines even painted him as a psychotic “artist” of sorts, prior even to Jhin, that viewed conflict and bloodshed as elegant. Well, to better understand the full picture here, we need to take a step back and examine the broader picture here.

Now, admittedly, we’re delving in some speculation territory here, as it’s impossible to really say what Riot’s original plans for the Darkin were, if any. That being said, the inclusion of something like a demon would have had a lot of implications back in the day, as the Runeterra as we knew it then didn’t really have a “Heaven” or “Hell.” Sure, we had “angels” with Kayle and Morgana, but they were treated more like how Asgardians are treated in Marvel: more like a race of super powerful aliens than actual divine entities (keep that in mind for later.) If anything, what little we knew of an “afterlife” in League came from Yorick’s old lore, in which he acted like a psychopomp similar to Charon from Greek myth.

It wasn’t until Tahm Kench came out in 2015 that Riot properly introduced demons as a concept in the lore, retconning several other champions like Evelynn and Nocturne into being demons. For a bit of context: in Runeterra, demons are effectively malevolent spirits from the spirit realm that feed on negativity: fear, pain, hatred, and so-forth. When other characters started getting turned into demons, a lot of people, myself included, thought that Aatrox would meet the same fate. After-all, they hadn’t actually DONE anything with the “Darkin” outside of Aatrox’s bio, and he functioned in a manner similar to them. Some even theorized that the Darkin would be made to represent a specific breed of demon, and this theory gained even more traction when Tahm Kench was given special voice lines for taunting near Aatrox.

Then, on July 12, 2017, we got Kayn, and with him: Rhaast. Rhaast is the second Darkin character added to the lore: a talking scythe with an eye that possess its host. Kayn is able to hold back Rhaast’s influence, keeping it to a single arm through the use of shadow magic, but depending on your actions in-game, you can see what happens if Rhaast manages to win their struggle and take over Kayn’s body completely. With Rhaast’s introduction, it pretty-much cemented that the Darkin were living weapons that took over the hosts of their wielders, which made sense given that Aatrox’s sword was always hinted to be alive and have a mind of its own. In fact, the idea of the Darkin being living weapons, or at least being bound to their weapons in some way, was one of many fan theories raised since Aatrox’s release all the way back in 2013.

Unfortunately, the new champion’s bio didn’t give us a lot to work with. Rhaast was the weapon, but Kayn himself is the Champion, so a lot of his bio tells us more about Kayn’s backstory: how he joined the Order of Shadows, how he acquired Rhaast in the first place, etc. While this isn’t exactly a problem, it gave us no further information on the Darkin; what they really were, where they came from, and why there are only five left in existence all remained mysteries for the fans to speculate about. It still wasn’t even clear if the Darkin were connected to demons, or if they were something else entirely.

Now, it’s around this time that another theory began to start blowing up in popularity; technically, this was another old fan theory, but now that we had a general idea of what the Darkin actually were, there was another Champion wielding a living weapon that fans started to speculate might be connected to them: Varus. Varus is an old character, and though we won’t be deep-diving into him too much into this video, allow me to give you a tldr of his original story.

Varus was an Ionian archer set to guard the Pit of Pallas, a giant hole where his people had long ago sealed some unexplained corrupting purple entity that seemed like it maybe should have related to the Void somehow but didn’t. Varus resisted the entity’s influence for years until Noxians one day showed up and started slaughtering his people, wanting to get their hands on Pallas so that they could use it as a weapon because of course they did. Varus was faced with a choice: stay and guard the temple built around the pit or go back to his village and help his people fight. Varus chose the former and was apparently SUCH a badass archer that he single-handed kept the invaders at pay with his arrows, though this choice came at a cost: when Varus returned to his village, everyone he knew and loved was dead, including his wife and son.

Enraged, Varus returned to the pit and struck a deal with Pallas: he would allow the entity to inhabit his body in return for vengeance against the Noxians. Varus proceeded to wander the world with a bow made from the entity’s own solidified essence in the hopes of finding and killing… Basically every Noxian he could. Yeah, Varus wanted nothing short of full-on genocide, starting with the surviving soldiers that attacked his village. There’s a lot to go into there, but you’ve probably figured out the relevance of this by now: Pallas turned itself into a bow for Varus to take his vengeance in exchange for possession over his body. Not too dissimilar a living sword and scythe who also possessed people and had an insatiable hunger for death and destruction, right?

Riot seemed to agree, and in 2017 they released a music video along with a comic and an entirely new bio for Varus. Together, these updates served to not only retcon Varus’s backstory (a topic for another episode) but finally give us an update as to who and what the Darkin were. In a word: they were aliens.

In short, the Darkin were a race from another planet/dimension drawn to Runeterra for its abundant use of magic. They tried to conquer the planet, causing the Great Darkin War, which ended only when the races of Runeterra figured out how to seal the Darkin in their own otherworldly weapons. Varus, Aatrox, Rhaast, and two others were trapped in their weapons, which an unnamed warrior queen (possibly an Aspect) used to drive back the other Darkin and seal the portal to their world. The five that were imprisoned in their weapons were then scattered and hidden across Runeterra.

This, at last, brings us back to Aatrox’s new bio:

“One of the ancient Darkin, Aatrox was once a peerless swordmaster who reveled in the bloody chaos of the battlefield. Trapped within his own blade by the magic of his foes, he waited out the millennia for a suitable host to wield him - this mortal warrior was corrupted and transformed by the living weapon, and Aatrox was reborn. Though tales of the darkin have now passed into legend, he remembers only too well the destruction of his race, and wreaks his vengeance one sword blow at a time.”

So Aatrox was made into a general for an alien race who sought to finish what his people started by having the Runeterrans fight and slaughter one another in a series of bloody conflicts… For a few months, at least. Literally the next year in 2018, Aatrox finally got his visual and gameplay update, turning him into the World Ender we know today. Along with this came entirely new lore for him, as well as the Darkin.

Insert lore here

So… The Darkin are no longer invading aliens, but Ascended who went nuts and were trapped inside their own weapons. In other words, the Darkin went from being a race to being more of a derogative term for fallen demigods. What’s more, Aatrox received a VERY substantial alteration his character and personality: he went from being a war-loving “artist” who causes conflict for the sake of it to being a tortured soul who wants to die so badly that he’ll end all of creation to do it.

Now, like I said before: I don’t think this backstory is bad. I don’t hate it. It does a lot to flesh out Shurima as a region, gives us more info on the Ascended, and it adds a bit more nuance to Aatrox as a character. Imagine being trapped inside a weapon, losing all access to your senses. Imagine that the only chance you get to move is when you take over someone else’s body, transforming it into a warped version of your own former glory, only to realize that you’re on a time limit and the only way you can continue to walk, talk, see, hear, or feel anything is by slaughter’s people and consuming their blood. Imagine spending CENTURIES trying to find a way out, only to repeatedly learn that any means to free or even kill yourself ends in failure. Imagine being SO desperate to rest that you’re willing to end all of existence just to find peace.

I like Aatrox’s new story. I do. Honestly, the only real complaint I have is that Aatrox doesn’t exactly have a PLAN for how he aims to end existence? Like, he calls himself a World Ender and a god-slayer, but we only know of one god he’s actually slain (Pantheon) and given that Runeterra is still around, it seems like his world-destroying count is still at zero. Honestly, if he wants to end all of existence, I feel like turning the Void, a reality-consuming threat that he has FOUGHT BEFORE would kind of be the obvious solution? Honestly, I imagine that just chucking the sword into the Void would be a good way for him to end his own existence, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

So, if I like Aatrox’s new lore, why am I rewriting it? Simple, really: even if I overall like his current lore state, I feel like the road we took to get here was… Kind of long and unnecessary. It seems kind of obvious looking back that Riot didn’t have a clear long-term plan for Aatrox or the Darkin, as years of unanswered questions followed by multiple retcons kind of entails. From being the last survivor of an ancient race, to MAYBE being a demon, to being an alien, to finally becoming a fallen demigod. Aatrox’s history is practically a whole story in-and-of-itself, and I’ve long wondered how things might have turned out if Riot had, you know, picked a direction and gone with it a bit sooner?

So, here’s the basis of my rewrite: I’m gonna try and incorporate elements from all of Aatrox’s various backstories into a single, coherent biography. Can I manage it? Well, I’ll leave that for you all to determine…

When the skies are blackened by the flames of war and the earth is dyed red with blood, Aatrox draws near. For as long as conflict has existed among the races of Runeterra, the Chaos Blade has manifested to those deemed worthy, turning the tides of battle in exchange for the flesh of whoever wields it.

The true origins of the Darkin have long been lost time. Some say that they are the first weapons ever forged, corrupted by the malice of those who have wielded them over ages. Others claim that the Darkin are a rare breed of demon, of whom only five remain. Only one thing is certain: the Darkin exist only to bring death and destruction, and none embrace this more than Aatrox himself.

Tales of a wicked blade manifesting amidst the heat of battle exists across all cultures, from the frigid north to the blistering south. The sword is said to appear before warriors on the cusp of defeat: those who would give anything, even their own lives, for the sake of victory. Those who wield the Chaos Blade are granted inhuman strength and endurance, often haled as heroes for turning the tides of battle. With every foe slain, however, the Chaos Blade grows stronger, consuming the mind of its wielder and warping their flesh. In time, the hero becomes a mindless vessel, slaughter all in its path until slain. When its host falls, the Chaos Blade returns from whence it came, waiting for the moment that another might heed the sword’s call.

For ages this cycle persisted, until the day the sword manifested before a warrior of Shurima’s Ascended Host. After the Fall of Icathia, the Sunborn were called to face the encroaching threat of the Void, wielding celestial might and magic great enough to crush a hundred mortal armies. Before the Void, however, even the mighty Ascended began to falter.

The horrors summoned by Icathia steadily pushed north, consuming everything in their path and twisting the earth into maddening shapes. As their numbers dwindled, many Sunborn called to retreat, hoping to regroup within the capital and think of a plan. As some fled, however, the Ascended general Aatrox stood his ground. Pushing his draconic form to its limits, Aatrox struck down one abomination after another. When his great blade, soaked in the Oasis of the Dawn itself, was wrenched from its grasp, Aatrox fought with tooth and claw. Even if he were to fall, Aatrox would do everything in his power to slay as many Voidspawn as possible, resigning himself to death so the other Sunborn might rally their forces.

It was then, amidst the sea of madness woven by the Void, that Aatrox saw a sword embedded into the twisted earth. The blade seemed to call out to him, and Aatrox took it without question. In an instant, the general was filled with unimaginable strength and fury, and his allies watched in amazement as Aatrox fought with strength of ten Ascended warriors. Inspired by his newfound fury, the Sunborn rallied, their fighting spirits renewed at last.

When the conflict against the Void drew to a close, Aatrox was haled as a hero among heroes, though many of his former allies became wary of him and the wicked sword he now carried. Some suggested that the blade should be destroyed, while others, such as Aatrox himself, argued that its power would be instrumental if the Void ever returned.

Resentment and suspicion began to grow amongst the Sunborn, and the cracks only grew larger as Aatrox aided the other Ascended in summoning weapons similar to his own. The warriors of the Ascended host began to distance themselves from one-another and the capital, taking up posts across Shurima’s vast empire. They remained united only in the shared goal of protecting their empire.

And then the Sun Disc fell.

Following Xerath’s Ascension and the death of Emperor Azir, years of growing tensions erupted across the desert. Some Ascended raced for the chance to fill the now-vacant seat of power for themselves, while others insisted on finding a means to restore the royal dynasty. Debate soon turned to bloodshed, and Shurima was engulfed in a war that lasted centuries. It wasn’t until the Aspects of Targon intervened that the war was finally brought to an end.

Those wielding Darkin weapons were bound to their armaments with powerful magic, in-turn trapping the wicked weapons in the physical realm. The Darkin were scattered across Runeterra, and yet the souls of the Ascended persisted, stripped of bodies and senses.

For ages, Aatrox stewed within the sword that had become his prison, his soul slowly being corrupted further and further by the Chaos Blade until the two had become a single being. Ages passed and the sword was slowly forgotten, until a band of thieves broke into the Darkin’s prison in search of ancient treasure. When the thieves’ leader touched the sword, his mind was overwhelmed in an instant, his body transformed into a twisted likeness of Aatrox’s Ascended form. The Darkin slew the other thieves in an instant, drawing strength from their blood before breaking free of his long confinement.

Aatrox emerged into a frozen landscape with but a single goal: to bring about a war so violent, so destructive, that it would be the end of all things. He would be the World Ender, herald of a conflict to end all others. With every foe he slays, with every swing of his sword, Aatrox sews the seeds for violence and carnage, drawing one step closer to his magnus opus.

So, what did you think? As stated before: my primary goal this time around was to try and combine Aatrox’s various origin stories into a single narrative. Admittedly, I could only manage to do this by adding an air of mystery to the actual origin of the Darkin; maybe they’re demons, maybe they’re aliens, maybe they’re something else entirely. I know that might seem like a bit of a cop-out, but a large part of what made the Darkin so interesting to the community in the first place was the air of mystery surrounding them, and the room it offered for speculation and theorizing.

Another main concern, though, was that I wanted to find a way to blend old Aatrox’s personality with his new one. The thing I miss most about the OG Aatrox was that, despite being obsessed with war and bloodshed, he wasn’t just another rage monster. He was calm and composed, and a lot of his lines hinted at a deeper philosophy toward the inevitability of conflict rather than just “I wanna kill everything because I’m angry!” League has way too many of those, in my honest opinion. I thought that, by combining his mind with a semi-sentient sword that brings about carnage because that’s simply its PURPOSE, a little but of that old Aatrox might shine through.

But, as always, this is all just my opinion; how I, personally, would have gone about reworking the character. If you prefer Aatrox as he currently is, or think my version of the story is inferior, that’s fine! Feel free to share your thoughts and comments, but please, let’s try to keep it civil. After-all…

The last thing we want is to start a war over this…

[like-that-one-weird-dog-thing]

AU Masterlist

(note: this will be continuously updated as I create more and more au’s and join more fandoms. If you want to see more content for any of these, just send me an ask or shoot me a comment on the associated stories)

My ao3 account

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Marvel AUs:

Paint Me in Trust: (Hydra/Red Room Peter(p), escapes to hang with the New York local vigilantes)

All This and Heaven Too: (Red Room Peter(p) flees Russia only to stumble upon a girl dressed in far too much purple. Ends up getting adopted by the entire community of younger vigilantes/supers as he tries to figure out how tf it happened)

A Taste of Infinity: (Time Travel au, Pete(p) goes back in time to prevent the complete destruction of the universe)

Baby Bird: (When Natasha flees the kgb, she takes someone else with her. A boy who shares her name, her eyes. Peter’s her nephew taken when he showed signs of strong mutations. Nat tracks down Ben and May and they take care of Pete while she becomes an Avenger)

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Fullmetal Alchemist AUs:

War Crimes: (Semi-modern setting, Ishvalan Elrics where they’re born eight years earlier, Resembool is burned in the first year of the war- which stretches much longer than canon- and Ed is forcibly drafted. Chimera-Ed) On ao3!

Lessons in Regret: (Au where Alphonse is born five or so years later, Ed loses his arm and both his legs to Truth, and Al loses his health instead of his body) On ao3!

Tongues and Teeth: (Alpha/Omega/Beta mixed with Role Reversal- Ed, Al, and Winry swap ages with Roy, Riza, and Maes. This changes both nothing and everything)

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Boku no Hero Acadamia AUs:

You’re Lost: (A world where ‘History Repeats’ is taken far too literally and Midoriya Izuku is born twice- once as AFO’s brother and once as his son. He steps back, away from times, and tries to prevent the world from crumbling beneath his brother’s hands. Reincarnation, Time Travel, and Immortality) On ao3!

A Heart of Fire: (Time Travel/Dimension Travel au. Izuku isn’t meant to be there but he is anyways, and wishes to correct that. His world is one where quirks kill and technology is the only way to remain a member of society. Needless to say, the world of heroes and villains he stumbles into terrifies him)

Used to Be: (Crack- possibly crack taken seriously- au. AFO is Midoriya Izuku himself, not his father)

We Are Left, We Are Lost: (The fight at Kamino goes very differently- there is no Izuku there to help save Bakugou, and as All Might stretches himself thin trying to protect everyone, he loses. The world falls with AM as AFO wins. Apocalyptic, both the messy type and the soft, quiet type)

Diary of a Spy: (When All Might tells him to be realistic, Izuku tries. A helping hand saves him. Years later, he’s desperate to escape. He manages it, but its. Unorthodox. Dad For One, Time Travel)

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Naruto AUs:

Peeling paint and a blanket of dust: (Time Travel/Time Loop au. Naruto runs from the village every time, and every time it’s the cause of his death. Each loop varies, both in small and big ways)

Milk Teeth (Fire Bones): (Part of Peeling paint and a blanket of dust. Loop 57, Naruto is born halfway through the third great war. This changes everything, yet somehow manages to change nothing. His longest loop to date)

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Breath of the Wild AUs:

-create a new god: (a prophet sees how the calamity goes and attempts to rework their timelines path. It doesn’t work, and as they get more and more desperate they do the unthinkable- they kidnap the bearer of the triforce of courage as a child and twist them. Years later, Princess Zelda at ten years old is given a birthday present- a guard dog to accompany her everywhere she goes) on ao3!

Give me an oh bitter glory: (there’s a reason Zelda fails to awaken her sealing powers, and it’s not that she’s not trying hard enough. She’s missing a key piece- being the Triforce of Wisdoms true wielder. when the Calamity hits, she falls and is taken to the Shrine of Resurrection. Link flees to the castle to contain the beast with his own secret- the Triforce of Power. their missing piece, the Triforce of Wisdom, won’t appear for a hundred years. role reversal)

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Dream Smp/MCYT AUs:

Pillars of Bone: (Wilbur and Techno are born two minutes apart, both just as blond as their father and later their younger brother. As they age, their hair slowly changes colors. Brown and pink. Piglin and pigmen. A wild boar and domestic pig. Piglin Wilbur, Pigmen Technoblade, Hoglin Tommyinnit) on ao3!

Hummingbird Heart: (when everyone is a god, everything feels like a game. When the angel of death is found dead in a river, everything feels all too real. Gods au where everyone takes to the Dream SMP as a getaway to just fuck around. Dream does not appreciate this, and neither does Wilbur)

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Arcane/League Of Legends AUs:

Never One Without The Other: (When Powder goes with Silco, he wants her to be strong. Given to Singed, he experiments on her to give her this strength. Quickly, resentment sparks. Wings!au, warwick!vander)*

Dog Teeth: (When Powder finally settles, its her worst nightmare. Convinced that everyone’s right, that she is a jinx, she flees. SoulForms!au)

[*: not a dad!silco story, not silco friendly]

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[brokenjardaantech]

Blue-tinted Red Walls (Chapter 3: A piss-poor guide on how to be (and not to be) a Human)

my entry for the @dbhau-bigbang. also part of the groom lake aftermath series.

chapter summary:

In the past, Reyes and Scott met each other for the first time.

In the present, Connor resumes his investigation and has lunch with Hank.

In the past, Fadia schemes.

also on ao3

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Before

Sara finished logging her observations and the changes in Reyes’ coding for the day and was unsurprised when she saw the man gone. A week into his activation and he already treated the mansion as his home, roaming freely around and touching and sometimes licking things he found interested in or needed to be tested for whatever reasons an android would find necessary, and every time she brought him for a walk or a trip to somewhere she randomly picked, no one actually noticed that he was different, that he was not human at all. 

Which meant that her experiment was a success.

Today was Scott’s birthday, so by extension, it was hers, too, but it was always something more important to her brother than to herself: Scott’s birthdays meant that he lived for a year longer despite a body constantly failing him and therefore was a cause for celebration, but hers had always been an excuse for her to ‘take a break’ from her work and got dragged by her mother to dinners with Baba, dinners which always started with Mama awkwardly trying to get father and daughter to talk, them trying to hold adult conversations to shut her up, and finally always, always ended up with shouting matches on topics so old that she didn’t even feel the point of arguing and stormed out instead, ignoring the screaming match between her parents brewing behind her. 

Mama’s cooking wasn’t that good anyway, and with her gone, Sara hadn’t talked to Baba for what? Three years? She wasn’t counting.

She went to the kitchen and there Reyes was, making - 

‘I hope you don’t mind, Fadia,’ he explained. She ordered him to use her middle name only and so far he hadn’t gone against that yet, but wanting to ditch her past and responding to a name that she never used until recently was two different things. ‘I’m making Shepherd’s pie. Amanda told me that it’s your favourite, and I want to make it for your birthday.’

Sara - Fadia - leant against the corner of the fridge in order not to accidentally brush the interface and had to raise an eyebrow. Her mentor knew about her… masterpiece and that Fadia would give him to her brother, but -

‘I don’t know you have contact with Amanda,’ she said and instantly regretted it; she sounded like a control freak. ‘Wait, lemme reword it: What did Amanda call you for?’

‘She called you, technically,’ Reyes rasped, his accent more pronounced when speaking a word with more syllables, ‘but you weren’t there so I… took the liberty to answer it for you. Don’t worry,’ he reassured, ‘she only wanted to make sure you remember your own birthday this time.’

The eyebrow flew even higher. ‘Scott and I are twins, Reyes. If I remember his birthday, of course I remember mine.’

Reyes didn’t reply and merely twitched his head before putting the pie into the oven. The doorbell rang, and Fadia nudged herself off the fridge. ‘I’ll get it.’

The android nodded and took off his mittens to start cleaning the kitchen while the human resisted the urge to run towards the door to not keep her brother and mentor waiting outside in the cold, because this was a big day for all of them and she needed to be in control; needed to be objective and introduce Reyes to Scott as gently as possible.

When she opened the door, only Amanda was at eye level, and when Fadia looked downwards, her brother was indeed in a wheelchair and wrapped up like a dumpling. The smile on his face was brighter than the star of Bethlehem. 

She got her wind knocked out of her by Scott shoving a wrapped box at her chest. ‘Scott was very insistent,’ Amanda explained. Fadia gave the box, which was wider than her shoulder so it was wide, a light shake. Plastic model, and judging from the dimensions of the box, a Perfect Grade Gunpla, 1/60 scale. ‘He’s aware that you don’t like celebrating Christmas so he decided to give it to you now instead.’

Fadia put a smile on her face. ‘Thank you, Scott,’ she said, then to Amanda, ‘Come in. Does he know?’ and shuffled backwards so that there was enough space for both Amanda and the wheelchair.

‘Enough,’ the professor replied as she hung her coat and chuckled at her student struggling to get the layers off her brother, the latter who was dead-set on wheeling himself into the living room. The gift had mysteriously teleported onto the coffee table. ‘You know how much he’s been looking forward to this.’

Fadia distracted Scott with a magic owl and successfully removed his sweater, not giving Amanda an answer as nervousness suddenly overtook her. What if her observations were incorrect and Scott was content to be alone? What if she programmed Reyes’ personality wrong such that he would only make Scott’s life even more difficult? What if -

‘Hello. You must be Scott.’

Fadia snapped herself out of the trance and padded softly towards the kitchen. Scott had stopped just outside of it, his eyes wide as saucers on his doll-like face and his gaze fixed on the unfamiliar man standing at the island smiling at him. The human gapes, turning his head towards his sister as if seeking her advice, and she wondered what he was looking for.

‘This is Reyes,’ she softened her voice and introduced. ‘Remember the friend I told you about? The one who will never be tired of you? That’s him.’

Scott turned back and slowly wheeled closer to the android, and Fadia flinched inwardly when she saw that Reyes’ smile had become strained. Perhaps she should not have programmed him to love Scott from the very beginning. Her finger itched for a keyboard to change his settings, but then a miracle happened.

Scott, who had never approached strangers on his own without being asked to, wrapped his arms around Reyes’ waist and hugged him. The tension on the android’s face disappeared, and he placed a hand on Scott’s shoulder, petting his hair with another.

Success, Fadia’s mind supplied before she realised that she had no devices with her. Amanda then beckoned for her from the windows, and logging data suddenly became the least of her concern.

‘I must say,’ the professor murmured at her reflection on the glass, ‘I didn’t expect him to be so advanced.’

Fadia thought she should be offended. ‘I only give Scott the best,’ she frowned. ‘Did you not expect me to this time?’

Amanda sighed. ‘You have always exceeded expectations, both your father’s and mine.’ She looked at her student in her eyes. ‘You do realise what you have done, don’t you?’

Fadia turned her gaze towards the two men who somehow had both moved onto the sofa and acquired two stuffed animals Scott must have hidden underneath his clothes. Reyes seemed to be every byte of the caretaker he was programmed to be and was talking to Scott softly through Duffy. ‘Yes,’ she admitted, ‘but I don’t plan to tell anyone about it. Reyes ages just like any of us do externally; no one will suspect a thing.’

‘You created a new form of life, Sara!’ Amanda gritted through her teeth. Reyes spared a glance at them but returned to Scott without saying anything, and Fadia glared. 

‘Not now, Amanda,’ she warned. ‘I made Reyes for Scott and that’s it. All knowledge will die with me and everything else will be up to Reyes.’

She ignored her mentor on purpose when she noticed the android standing up. ‘I believe Scott is hungry,’ he announced, and Fadia spared one final glare at Amanda before going to help set up the table, not knowing that things would spiral out of control not two years later.

oOoOo

Now

Comparing the time in his internal clock with his last memory log, Connor concludes that he was deactivated for more than 7 hours. The Zen Garden has reverted to its original stage, virtual birds chirping in virtual trees and virtual air smelling of virtual plants, but he cannot stop remembering the blizzard which swept through the place so unexpectedly and quickly that - that - 

He decides against remembering. 

Since Amanda can wait, he sets the task of familiarising himself with the garden’s layout. On his second time going around the outermost circle, he almost believes that there is nothing worth noting; the gravestone is certainly an… interesting addition, but it can be a reminder of him being deactivated - a reminder of the consequences of his actions if he chooses the wrong option.

Until he sees the monolith.

It sticks out of the soil like a sore thumb, twin, decorated white arches framing a glowing blue pyramid made out of triangles of different areas and shapes in a style completely inconsistent with its surroundings. A handprint nests at the centre of a circle on the pyramid, and when Connor deactivates the skin on his hand and reaches for it, the pyramid discharges a force field similar to that destroyed the deviant the previous night (albeit at a much smaller scale), causing him to take a step back and his LED circling red. Desperate to get the image of the corrupted face out of his processors, he hurries to the island at the centre and greets his handler.

‘Hello, Amanda,’ he smiles despite what happened last night as it is the polite thing to do.

‘Connor…’ Amanda clips a withering rose and turns. ‘It was unfortunate for you to have to witness what happened last night. I hope there will be no repeated incidents.’

Connor recalls the blast, the shield, the invisible figure, the blizzard. ‘You can count on me, Amanda.’

She returns to tending the roses. ‘What do you think of the deviant?’

And the interrogation begins. 

o0o0o

‘There is blue blood on the fence,’ Connor explains to Hank as he knows that the human cannot see it. ‘I know another android was here.’

The human gives him a [sceptical] look and he understands why: exposed red bricks, glass missing from the windows and wooden planks used to board them up rotten and missing; the building in front of them is structurally unstable and incredibly run-down and is hardly a safe place for a deviant and a child model android to stay for the night. But all the evidence - footage from surrounding CCTV, the owner of the motel, the cashier at the supermarket - points at the house, and the thirium only serves to prove Connor’s theory and direction. He carefully goes through the gap on the fence and, through a gap between the planks, sees an android standing in the middle of the room. He rounds a corner and enters the house.

The first thing he notices is the android’s too-high stress level which fluctuates greatly depending on where Connor is standing. Reassuring that he isn’t there for it - yes, it is obviously a deviant, but since it is not his target, there is no need to waste time - does not seem to alleviate it, and asking it whether it saw the deviants returns with no results.

‘Is anyone upstairs?’

‘No - nobody.’

Stress level: 83% → 71%. And if no one is upstairs but the deviant is under the most stress when Connor is near the staircase…

‘Connor, what’re you doing in there?’

‘Coming, Lieutenant!’

He closes up on the space underneath the stairs and catches a peek of two figures before a force suddenly yanks him backwards, the damaged deviant telling a person called Kara - probably the AX400 - to run. Connor tries to peel the pair of hands on his shoulders as he watches the AX400 and a YK900 run away, but the WR600 successfully throws Connor onto the ground with a blast of static and blue energy pockets. 

Hank strolls in. ‘Connor, what’s going on?’

‘It’s here!’ Connor replies as he scrambles to his feet. ‘Call it in!’

The human wastes no time and rushes away to presumably bring in reinforcements, but Connor knows that they don’t have the time. He goes out through the broken wire fence, obtains the deviant’s general direction from the officer -

And he runs. Rain splatters directly onto his face and sometimes directly into his eyes, the droplets of water making his vision blurry and unreliable, but he pushes on, shoes smacking against wet concrete and nearly slipping a few times and, somehow, catching up with the two androids just in time to watch them drop to the other side of the wire fence. He looks into the AX400’s eyes, and information suddenly floods into his processors: repeated unauthorised repairs, frequent reports of trauma, its owner’s history of theft, drug trafficking, violent misdemeanours and domestic violence.

The deviant is simply protecting the YK900 from all that.

When Connor comes to, they have already slid down the slope and are waiting for a window to cross the high-speed tracks. A beat cop catches up with him, and then Hank who, upon seeing the androids hurdling the barrier, curses and calls the entire situation insane. Connor attempts to pre-construct the deviants’ path and the flow of traffic as he watches them get farther away and forces himself to abandon the plan once they nearly reach the island between the two directions. He prepares to climb the fence and - 

‘Hey!’ Hank clasps his hand on Connor’s shoulder. ‘Where you goin’?’

Can’t he see what’s happening? ‘I can’t let them get away!’

‘They won’t,’ the human says, still slightly out of breath. ‘They’ll never make it to the other side.’

If I have a high chance to get through… ‘I can’t take that chance!’ 

He hauls himself up again just to be pushed down. Again.

‘Dammit Connor!’ the Lieutenant’s hand stays heavy on his shoulder. ‘You’ll get yourself killed! Do not go after them!’

Conflicting orders. Selecting priority…

He releases the fence and gives up. If the deviancy crisis is as prominent as CyberLife claims to be, there must be other deviants that they can obtain much easier than risking deactivation through running across high-speed highways.

The strangest thing is that Hank seems to approve of his choice.

o0o0o

When Hank does work, he puts everything into it, and so it is with great difficulty that Connor finally manages to drag the human out for a late lunch break under the condition that Hank gets to choose where he will eat, which, since Connor is unfamiliar with the DPD’s surroundings and the man’s personal preference, makes sense. What Connor does not understand is the man choosing to park his car on the opposite side of the road and cross it without checking the traffic, and his thirium pump skips a beat when the car barely manages to skid to a stop before the Lieutenant. He exits the car to follow him.

‘Hey, listen, I got a shit-hot tip for you,’ he hears the man Hank hugged say. ‘Number five in the third, lickety-split! That frilly’s one hell of a chaser. You wanna flutter?’

Comparing terms… Results: gambling. ‘Last shit-hot tip you gave me set me back a week’s wages, Pedro,’ Hank replies with his hands in his coat pockets. There is no malice in his tone.

‘Come on,’ the man - [Name: Aabdar, Pedro. Date of birth: 01/25/2005 // Unemployed. Criminal record: illegal gambling.] - pushes himself up from where he draped himself on the counter, ‘this is different: a hundred per cent guaranteed, you can’t go wrong!’

‘Yeah, right,’ Hank does not sound convinced - [Detroit Food Hygiene License. Expired 05/20/2031. Renewal refused 07/24/2031.] [Name: Kayes, Gary. Date of birth: 12/03/1988 // Business owner. Criminal record: resisting arrest, breach of hygiene regulations.] - but when Pedro spreads his arms - ‘Alright, I’m in.’ - he slaps a thick stack of bills into waiting palms.

‘Damn straight!’ Pedro exclaims triumphantly, and he scurries away before turning backwards and points at the Lieutenant. ‘Hey, you won’t regret this.’

Hank gives him a middle finger and finally, finally turns his attention back onto Connor in the form of determinedly not looking at the android and rolling his eyes. ‘What’s your problem?’ he holds onto the bottom of the lapel of his jacket. ‘Don’t you ever do as you’re told? Look,’ he shrugs at Connor’s confused look, ‘you don’t have to follow me around like a poodle!’

But my instructions are to follow you, Lieutenant, Connor wants to say, but he knows that Hank is not going to understand him. 

Opinions available: apologise for behaviour, partners, reconcile, review facts.

[Apologise for behaviour]

‘I’m sorry for my behaviour back at the police station,’ he makes sure to look at Hank to show that he is sincere. ‘I didn’t mean to be unpleasant.’

‘Oh wow,’ Hank deadpans. It is followed by a laugh. ‘You’ve even got a brown-nosing apology programme!’ A shake of his head. ‘Guys at CyberLife thought of everything, huh?’ and he does not look happy about it.

The cook - Gary - presents Hank with his food, and Connor runs a quick scan on it. XL soda with 710kCal and 184g of sugar; a hamburger with 1680kCal, 36g of lipids and an unhealthy amount of cholesterol. ‘There you go,’ Gary says, and Hank thanks him and moves to get a table.

The cook gestures at Connor. ‘Don’t leave that thing here!’

‘Huh, not a chance!’ Hank does not bother looking back. ‘Follows me everywhere…’ and to no one in particular and in a voice too low for Gary to hear when they stop at a sheltered table, ‘See?’

He takes a large bite of his burger and Connor feels… [repulsed]. ‘Your meal contains 1.4 times the recommended daily intake of calories,’ Hank takes a good look at the food in his hands, ‘and twice the cholesterol level,’ and if you do this every day… ‘You shouldn’t eat that.’

‘Everybody’s gotta die of something,’ is the human’s answer, and he promptly takes a bite while maintaining eye contact in an act of [challenge] and [defiance]. 

Connor has to duck his head to hide his smile because androids do not feel. Still, ‘I don’t want to alarm you, Lieutenant, but I think your friends are engaged in illegal activities.’

‘Well, everybody does what they have to to get by. As long as they’re not hurting anybody,’ a small shrug, ‘I don’t bother them.’

It is a strange logic, but it is not one that Connor cannot understand: with an unemployment rate as high as 35%, many people turn to doing illegal businesses, and the ones that do not do as much harm do sound better than those which do. He nods in understanding and is reminded that there is one thing he does not. ‘This morning, when we were chasing those deviants… Why didn’t you want me to cross the highway?’

‘’Cause you could’ve been killed!’ as if it is the most obvious thing in the world. ‘And -’ an excuse, from the way Hank is waving his arms (and the burger) around - ‘I don’t like filling out paperwork for damaged equipment.’ He glances away. Definitely an excuse.

Hank is… contradictory. He frequently shows anti-android sentiments and yet speaks of Connor as if he were a human. ‘Can I ask you a personal question, Lieutenant?’ A blink. Connor takes it as a permission to continue. ‘Why do you hate androids so much?’

There is… [sadness] in Hank’s eyes. ‘I have my reasons,’ he replies, and he returns to his meal without any explanation. Not good.

‘Is there anything you’d like to know about me?’

‘Hell no,’ comes the quick answer. But then, ‘Well,’ a finger point, ‘yeah,’ his hand chops through the air and lands on the table, ‘um,’ a shift of his entire body, ‘why did they make you look so goofy and give you that weird voice?’

This one is easy. ‘CyberLife androids are designed to work harmoniously with humans. Both my appearance and voice were specifically designed to facilitate my integration.’

Hank nods but his expression is [sceptical]. ‘Well, they fucked up.’

Connor supposes that normal humans would feel [hurt], but from the [teasing] tone the Lieutenant employed, it was not his intention. His creator did well. As they still have time to spare, ‘Maybe I should tell you what we know about deviants?’

‘You read my mind.’ A wave. ‘Proceed.’

‘We believe that a mutation occurs in the software of some androids which can lead to them emulating a human emotion -’

Hank holds up a hand. ‘In English, please,’ he interrupts, and Connor quickly reorganised his vocabulary.

‘They don’t really feel emotions. They just get overwhelmed by irrational instructions which can lead to unpredictable behaviour.’

Hank nods. ‘Emotions always screw everything up,’ he says. ‘Maybe androids aren’t as different from us as we thought.’ A thoughtful hum. Are you not anti-android? ‘You ever dealt with deviants before?’

Daniel. Emma. Gunshot piercing his chassis and the greystyle countdown timer. ‘A few months back… A deviant was threatening to jump off the roof with a little girl. I managed to save her,’ at the expense of my temporary deactivation and slight memory corruption, he does not add as Hank does not need to know.

‘So I guess you’ve done all your homework, right?’ A sip of his soda. ‘Know everything there is to know about me?’

Lying will not benefit either of them. ‘I know you graduated top of your class.’ Silence. ‘You made a name for yourself in several cases and became the youngest Lieutenant in Detroit.’ Hank’s eyebrows flick hummingbird-fast. He seems… [embarrassed]. ‘I also know you’ve received multiple disciplinary warnings in recent years and…’ Hank is no longer looking at him out of [shame], ‘you spend a lot of time in bars.’

The human manages to rein his expression back to something neutral. ‘So what’s your conclusion?’

‘I think working with an officer with personal issues is an added challenge,’ Connor answers sincerely,’ but adapting to human unpredictability is one of my features.’ He winks and enjoys the blush spreading on Hank’s cheeks. ‘I would also like to earn your trust,’ he adds in all seriousness. ‘I am certain we can solve this case if we manage to work together.’

His HUD flashes with a police report demanding their attention. ‘I just got a report of a suspected deviant,’ he explains as Hank no doubt saw his LED turn yellow. ‘It’s a few blocks away. We should go have a look,’ and when Hank does not respond, ‘I’ll be in the car if you need me.’

Given the large amount of information he was provided, it is best for Hank to have some time alone to digest it.

oOoOo

Before

Sara - Fadia, we suppose, since she looked a bit older than when Reyes was first introduced to Scott - hid in the shadows of the trees outside the gates of a lavish mansion. Although it was snowing heavily and she was wearing only a pair of black dress trousers, a long-sleeved dress shirt and a long but thin black coat, she did not seem to feel the cold, her hands in her pockets, neither shivering nor hugging herself. Despite the temperature, she placed a bare hand on the metal gates and slowly pushed it inward just enough for her to get past before closing it again. The telltale click of a lock engaging suggested that she had deactivated it at some point. 

Going slowly up a surprisingly snow-free and dry path, dress shoes making no sound as they made contact with heated tiles, Fadia’s gaze stayed fixed on the ground as if not wanting to look at what was happening within the house which, due to the rooms being well-lit, could be clearly seen through curtains of white lace, stopping once she was under the shelter of the arch decorating the front door. Slowly, she reached out for the doorbell. 

The double wooden door swung open on its own with a slight creak.

Placing her hand back in her coat pocket, she thumped her boots on the ground to get rid of the snow before stepping in. She blinked rapidly as if to adjust to the brightness within the mansion as the doors swung shut behind her, and it was only after the lock clicked into place that she, instead of wandering into the living room, took the stairs directly upstairs, walked past the library, and knocked on the only door available.

‘What’s that?’ a voice similar to Scott’s asked from behind the door.

The sound of feet against carpeted floor. The door slid open to reveal Reyes, whose smile fell off his face and was replaced by pure anger before he pushed his creator backwards with a blast of blue energy directly in front of her chest. The door slid shut once more, and Fadia took her time adjusting the lapels of her coat as if she did not take several thousands of newtons of force in her ribs and not only survived but also managed to slide backwards by inches instead of being blasted out through the roof. She leant against the wooden railing and waited.

Reyes emerged alone a few minutes later. ‘Scott’s asleep,’ he snaps, his voice low. Standing so close to each other, it was evident that he barely reached Fadia’s chin. ‘What the hell are you doing here? Aren’t you in space?’

‘I was,’ the human replied. ‘I have business on earth that I need to attend to in person and think I can drop by and say hello. Evidently, you are not going to let me.’

Reyes scoffed and twitched his head to indicate that they should go downstairs. While the android disappeared into the kitchen to presumably get refreshments, Fadia seated herself in a chair by the window, her height making it look comically small and unfit, and Reyes returned with a large bottle of thirium and two glasses and settled down opposite to his creator. 

‘Be quick,’ he poured himself half a glass and took a sip as if he was drinking whiskey, ‘why are you here?’

Fadia placed a hand on the table, her fingers spread wide. ‘Reyes, there is really no need -’

‘I’ll be pissed whenever and however I want to,’ the android interrupted. ‘You shouldn’t even be here. Now get to the fucking point.’

The human sighed. ‘Alec is trying to develop a deviant-hunting prototype.’

Reyes drained the glass and poured himself another glass. ‘Shit.’

‘Luckily or unluckily - that depends on your perspective - he can’t do it himself.’

‘So he contacted you.’

‘Yes.’

‘How?’

‘An advertisement.’

‘Elaborate.’

‘An open post in CyberLife. A project lead requiring an experience level no one can obtain unless they are one of the very first to be involved in android development. Most of those people are either dead thanks for the Blast or are still working for CyberLife, and the rest of them work for me and haven't had contact with people on earth for years. Short of Alec Ryder himself…’

Realisation dawned in Reyes’ amber eyes. ‘You are the only candidate.’

‘Precisely.’

‘That doesn’t make sense.’

‘It will.’

Fadia produced a small tablet from a hidden pocket on her coat and dropped it in front of Reyes, who peeled off the skin on his hand and interfaced with it. Whatever he received made his eyes widen even further. ‘Shit. They know?’

‘They have their suspicions, yes, but without concrete proof, that is all they can do at the moment. But it is also for the best that I have maximum involvement in the project starting from this point.’

‘This -’ Reyes leant back and gave his creator a one-over. ‘You have joined them, haven’t you?’

A nod. ‘Time is the essence. The earlier I get involved, the more I can do before Alec notices my plan and kicks me out once more. I hope, by the time that happens, things will become too irreversible and he will have no choice but to either scrap the project entirely or to release it fully knowing that it will fail sooner or later.’

‘You sure he’ll ditch you?’

‘Totally,’ Fadia reached for her glass and stopped midway as if just remembering that it was empty and thirium was not for her consumption anyway. ‘Our views are too different for long-term cooperation. I know him, he knows me. He will try to root out everything he deems unnecessary or put something to keep them in check, and that will require either my compliance - which he will not get - or my absence.’

‘You’re talking like this android they’re developing is just a tool.’

‘We all are.’

‘You’re betting a lot on them.’

‘You assume that they are my entire plan?’

Reyes clicked his tongue. ‘Maybe not,’ he took a drink. ‘I won’t like it, will I?’

‘No, you won’t.’

A sigh. ‘Will I see you?’

‘No.’

‘So many things can go wrong.’

‘I know. But I have time.’

A glass clanked loudly against the tabletop. ‘And how many people are gonna die during this “time”,’ Reyes snapped, ‘creator dearest?’ The chair skidded without any sound under the force of the android standing up and hunching over the small, round table. ‘My people; your children.’

‘Watch your words, Reyes,’ the human warned. ‘You send those deviants to a rusting cargo freighter and call it a day.’ She stood up as well. Her eyes flared up in their entirety with wisps of blue escaping and dancing down her coat. ‘You are the one who rejected this. Who decided to hide this -’ blue tendrils curled around the empty glass and brought it into her open palm with a loud smack - ‘from them. We could have ended this long ago if we had not.’

‘There will be war, Fadia!’ Reyes did not seem intimidated by the human looming over him. ‘Millions will die. We’ll be seen as violent and unstable and it’ll ruin us!’

‘Not if we are the ones doing the ruling.’

‘And how long will it take for the humans to successfully revolt against us? What will happen then? What will happen if your plan fails?’

‘If - focus on if - there is a next revolution,’ Fadia took a step back and retracted the tendrils, but not before vaporising the empty glass in a loud flash of blue. ‘I will be at the helm. And this time,’ a crackle of static and the power went out, plunging the house into complete darkness save for the glow of her eyes, ‘we… will win.’

[writingithink]

You asked for it!!! Prompt number 5 and Tentoo/Rose 😂💖

Alright so this somehow got out of hand, just a little.

[Send me a prompt and a Doctor (9-11) x Rose pairing!]

Aerial View Necessary Rated: T Pairing: Tentoo x Rose Wordcount: 3,360

Read it on AO3

It had taken quite a few months for them to get here, months in which she thought she was going to go absolutely insane, but they finally did it. She and the Doctor had a house of their own. With doors, and carpets, and all of the other domestic things a house on Earth came with.

Oddly enough, it was the Doctor who had first suggested it.

They had only been staying at the mansion for five days - not even a full week. Just five days since saving the multiverse, since Bad Wolf Bay (again), since he had been essentially created. Things had been … awkward. After so long apart they had to get used to each other again, but that was compounded by all of the changes that came with his metacrisis - some of which delighted him, while others had him throwing fits.

So when he had stormed into her room on their fifth day together on parallel Earth, Rose had assumed that he was having another tantrum, like the one the evening before when he found out that he could no longer eat an entire tin of biscuits without getting a stomach ache (she had been equal parts annoyed with and sad for him). She was barely awake, had just managed to pull herself up onto her elbows when he collapsed on the bed next to her.

“Let’s get out of here. Our own place. What do you say?” He looked quite manic for 8 in the morning.

“What?” she had asked, still groggy but quickly waking. “Where’d this come from?”

“I, Rose Tyler, absolutely refuse to live with your mother.”

For all of the new little quirks and biological changes, he really wasn’t all that different. Once she’d gotten ready for the day, cuppa in hand, Rose had taken a seat at the kitchen island, laptop already out from the day before, and started looking up flats online. It wasn’t long before the Doctor was there, looking over her shoulder and somehow managing to get jam in her hair.

“No, no, no,” he started, “not a flat. Too small. Too many other humans right on top of us. Or below us. Or to the side. You know what, never mind, forget that bit. We need a house.”

“Really? You? A house?”

Years may have passed, but his horror at the prospect of a mortgage while orbiting a black hole wasn’t the kind of thing she was ever going to forget.

“Yup. Not like this one, but a good size. The TARDIS will need her own room. Oh! And I think I would fancy a garden. Not just a small one, but a proper yard. We could have a pool! Do those come with houses, or do you have to get them separately?” the Doctor babbled, leaning over her in order to begin making his own searches, fingers typing on the keyboard at a ridiculous speed that the machine was having difficulty keeping up with.

Then her mum came in.

“What are you two up to now?” she’d asked.

Before Rose could think of a way to ease her mother into this new development, the Doctor had taken the matter completely out of her hands.

“Getting a house. What do they mean ‘request a viewing’? Aren’t I viewing it now? They’ve got 23 pictures.”

It had all gone downhill from there. Her mum had had plenty of opinions, and went from enthusiastically trying to do the house hunting for them to harsh disapproval of the whole thing seemingly from moment to moment throughout the entire process. And the Doctor’s combination of unending enthusiasm and complete ignorance made it all … well, it was never boring, that’s for sure.

Also, he turned out to be very picky, which shouldn’t have surprised her.

Their realtor hated them.

But now it was over, and here they were in their own house. Their own home.

It was two stories, with four bedrooms (“One for us, one for the TARDIS, one to use for, you know … whatever. Office? Workshop? And then an extra, just in case, you know … because what if we need it?”) and three bathrooms. The sitting room was cozy, and the kitchen was spacious, and there wasn’t a separate dining area (“What do we need a dining room for? When have we ever had people over for dinner?”). They had a finished basement (which the Doctor had more ideas for than it had space, but Rose figured he would have to figure that out for himself) and an attached garage, as well as a shed out back (“It will be perfect, you know, for projects that are too big for the house … well, not too big, the shed is quite small, but you know, too, er, combustible.”). It also had a pool, but not a hot tub - she had had to convince him that they could easily buy one when he almost told the realtor no (again). And their garden was huge. 

Rose didn’t know what to even do with it, she’d never had a garden before. Well, the last few years at the mansion she did technically have one - but that was different. It was her parents garden (well, grounds would be more accurate) and it was tended to by gardeners. In the excitement of moving in, she let the issue of lawncare slip her mind. 

Neither her nor the Doctor had many things - despite years living in a parallel world, Rose had been so focused on her work with the Dimension Canon, and so sure she would be returning to her proper universe that she had never really put down roots. So they had to buy absolutely everything for the house, which was daunting. Thankfully one of the new quirks he had gotten from Donna was a love for shopping. Unfortunately, he did not get any common sense about what a house needed, and it became clear that this was an activity he was never allowed to do alone (in the end, Rose had had to send back 4 (out of 6) couches, 17 (out of 21) toasters, 3 (out of 5) mixers, various other kitchen gadgets (total number unknown, but now they at least had enough cupboard space for actual food), and a host of giant inflatable Christmas decorations that ‘had been on sale’). 

It wasn’t until they had been at their new house for about two months that the issue of their garden came up again. And only because they had received a written warning in the post about their grass being too long.

“Who are they to decide? Isn’t it our garden?” the Doctor complained. “I like our grass! It’s very … grassy. And green! Well, mostly.”

They were standing outside on their front porch, looking at their grassy, mostly green grass. It was pretty tall. And starting to go to seed, reminding Rose of the wheat-like plants on Serin III - those were green, too. They had green bread. 

“You’re gonna have to mow it,” she told him, patting his arm apologetically.

“Me? Why me?”

“Because you’re the one who wanted a big garden.”

“Maybe I also want a big fence. So that nosy city people who get paid to judge my grass can’t see it. That will show them. Or, or, we can get rid of all the grass! Put flowers and trees and things instead. Then see what these people have to say.”

“Or you could mow the grass,” Rose said, before giving him a kiss on the cheek and heading back inside. They had to be in at Torchwood soon and she still wasn’t done getting ready.

The rest of the week passed by in a blur of alien ‘incidents’, way too much paperwork, and the Doctor’s unending attempts to get out of either of them doing work the moment he got bored of it. Once the weekend arrived, she was exhausted and he was adorably and delightfully insistent on making her forget about any and all stress or responsibilities.

Monday morning saw another letter regarding their grass. This time with a deadline, and a fine promised if they didn’t have it taken care of by the end of the week.

“We don’t even have a mower!” the Doctor complained, crumpling up the piece of paper and throwing it across the sitting room.

“We’ll just have to get one. We can go after work. I’ll tell dad that we need to leave early.”

“Mmm I suppose, if it gets us out early,” he conceded, still pouting.

So they left work early and went to the hardware store, where the Doctor made no less than three scenes while complaining about the primitive technology, comparing gardening tools from different times and planets, and attempting to test drive a riding mower in the store (the lack of petrol in the floor model having easily been circumvented with a few applications of his sonic screwdriver). Obviously they ended up buying the one that he tampered with. And of course they were asked never to return.

“It said on the sign that you offer free delivery?” were the Doctor’s parting words before Rose dragged him away from the counter, telling the quietly furious manager that she would send someone to pick it up for them.

“Well that was rude of them,” he began as soon as they got into the car, “I was only trying to-”

“Nope. No. You should know better by now. We’ve been through this. Just … quiet,” Rose sighed. She wasn’t angry, but she didn’t know what exactly she was feeling - some mix of frustration, disappointment, and exhaustion. Despite the fact that he now only had one heart, she never forgot that he was an alien. Usually she loved all of his alien-ness. 

Just not so much when it clashed with their attempt at living a very human life. But they wouldn’t be stuck planet-bound forever. In a few years their TARDIS would be ready for flight, and then they would once again have all of time and space at their disposal. A whole new universe to explore.

Rose just didn’t know how they were both going to manage to stay sane until they got that far.

Surprisingly, he followed her instructions and the ride home passed in complete silence. It wasn’t until she pulled into the garage that he spoke, and even then it was a whisper.

“I’m sorry.”

She turned to him, frowning, worried that she was being too hard on him. It really hadn’t been very long since he’d been stranded here with her. No functioning TARDIS, stuck on the slow path in a universe he didn’t belong in and a body that felt foreign to him. 

“It’s okay.”

“No, no, it’s not. You were right. I do know better. It’s just- I just- it’s all so linear, all the time! And so stationery! If I’d ridden a mower through a shop before, it wouldn’t have mattered. We’d have ran off, back to the TARDIS, onto the next adventure. But now there’s consequences, and licenses, and passports, and credit cards, and rude letters about our grass! And I did know better, but I did it anyway because, because- what if we get boring, Rose? What if we become the kind of people who just go to work, and watch telly, and eat beans on toast, and trim our grass and that’s all?” he asked, both hands now fisted in his very disheveled hair and a look of pure panic on his face.

“Listen,” Rose said, leaning over the center console to place both of her hands lightly against the side of his head, thumbs rubbing his temples in a way she knew soothed him. “We are never going to be boring, whether or not you vandalize shops. Our job is defending the Earth from alien threats … and sometimes the other way around. And I’m sorry we went to get a mower to begin with. I don’t care. If you want our grass to get as tall as it can, I don’t care. We can just pay the fine. Okay?”

The Doctor’s hands had moved from his hair into hers and then he snogged her to within an inch of her life, stopping only when he kneed the console and hit his head on the roof of the car when he tried to get closer. The windows had all fogged up. 

They were awoken the next day with a call from her mum - they had made the tabloids, again. Contrite, the Doctor made her a lovely breakfast but she didn’t have time to eat it after having to spend nearly an hour on the phone with Jackie screeching in her ear.

When lunch came around, Rose felt tired and irritable and hungry but instead of going to the canteen she marched into Pete’s office.

“I need some time off,” she announced, cutting off whatever her dad had been about to say in greeting. “Me and the Doctor both. A vacation. Right away. I’ve got plenty saved up.”

“Does this have something to do with the ‘mower incident’?” he asked, raising both eyebrows and sitting back down behind his desk.

“No. Yes? I don’t know! We just- we need a break.”

Despite the spontaneity of it all, Pete had lunch brought up and they were able to schedule three weeks of vacation time, starting the next day. When Rose went up to the Doctor’s lab to tell him, he was nowhere to be found. The floor’s lab manager said that he had disappeared over an hour ago, no one knew where. This wasn’t exactly new behavior, so she shrugged it off and went to finish up her day of writing up reports. He was waiting for her in the carpark at the end of the day, as usual, a huge grin lighting up his face the moment he saw her.

“Did Pete tell you the news?” she asked, a little disappointed that she hadn’t gotten to be the one to tell him.

“News? What news?” he asked, genuinely confused.

“Oh. You seemed so happy, I figured he musta told you.”

“No. No one told me anything. I’m always happy to see you. But what is this news?” he asked, somehow managing to still be nearly bouncing even as they got into the car.

“We’re on vacation. Starting now.”

“What?! Really?! Where are we going? What would you like to do?”

“Hmm … well, we’ve got three weeks. We can go wherever we want. Could be outta the country in a couple hours,” she informed him with a tongue touched grin. 

“Rose Tyler, have I told you how absolutely brilliant you are?”

“Hmmm … ‘m not sure,” she teased.

“You are. Absolutely, astonishingly, brilliant. Are we off to the Zeppelin right now?” he asked, looking out the window as if this wasn’t the same route they took every day.

“No, we have to go home first to pack.”

“Ah. Right, wizard! And we can figure out where to first! Europe? Asia? The Americas? Zeppelin travel is so slow, maybe explore parallel Europe this time?”

During the drive home, the Doctor barely stopped for breath. It was the most excited she had seen him since they’d gotten to this universe. He was so happy, it almost made her heart hurt. 

When they pulled into the driveway she immediately noticed that the grass had been trimmed … well, part of it, at least. A small bit.

“When’d you do this?” Rose asked, not bothering to pull into the garage.

“Oh! I took a long lunch. What do you think?” he asked, bounding into the garden and only walking in the mowed bits.

“Well, I mean, you missed some,” she laughed.

“No, no, come here.”

He took her hand and led her on a winding and loopy path that went in an arch from one side of their front yard, to their backyard, and then to the other side of the front.

“Well it’s definitely not a maze … does it say something?” she asked once they were back in the driveway.

“You’re right, it does! 10 points to Gryffindor! Perhaps an aerial view is necessary.” Still holding her hand, the Doctor headed inside, no doubt with a plan to get onto the roof.

“Oh, that reminds me, Doctor … this universe does still have Harry Potter, but …” she hesitated as they reached the stairs.

“But what?” he asked, turning toward her with wide eyes.

“The names of the houses are different.”

“What?!” he screeched. “Months! We’ve been here months, and you don’t tell me this until now?! What are they?! No! Don’t tell me. No spoilers. Ohhh I’m going to have to reread everything, aren’t I? Every book. Who knows how many things are different?” The Doctor dropped her hand in order to ruffle his hair, as the other one was still holding onto the rail. 

“Did you still want to go to the roof?” she asked, hesitating only a little. He tended to have a flair for the dramatic, but sometimes he was genuinely upset. It was just, occasionally, a little hard to tell which was which.

“Right, yes, roof. Roof, then packing, then books, then vacation,” he listed, taking her hand again and almost running up the stairs. “We can spend a day at the beach somewhere. You love beaches. You can go swimming, and I can start rereading. Or is it just reading?”

Soon enough they managed to get onto the roof from the balcony that came off their bedroom (one of the Doctor’s ‘must haves’ in a house). Looking down, spelled out in the garden in messy cursive was, ‘I love you Rose’.

“Oh,” she breathed, covering her mouth with her hand and fighting the tears that were suddenly gathering in her eyes. 

“What do you think?” he asked, after they had both been silent for too long.

“It’s perfect,” she whispered, pulling him into a kiss. They wobbled unsteadily for a moment before the Doctor slowly guided them both downward until they were sitting, less in danger of falling.

“I love you, too,” Rose told him, when they finally paused to breathe.

His answering smile was so bright, it put the sun to shame.

They eventually got off of the roof, but it was hours before they left the house. Once they finally boarded a Zeppelin, the Doctor was disappointed to realize they had forgotten to pick up books. And three weeks later, when they got back from Europe, there was a pile of mail right inside their front door - much of which were fines and late fees regarding their grassy, now not-so-green grass.

Rose paid them.

The Doctor built a perception filter.

Letters stopped coming, and it worked so well that not even Jackie ever said a word about how untended it was. The whole thing slipped Rose’s mind in the months that followed, until one evening at sunset the Doctor took her up onto the roof again.

Colors streaked across the sky, and the first couple of stars were beginning to peak out as the sun disappeared under the horizon.

“Those are still there because of you,” he whispered in her ear, nuzzling into her neck before placing a kiss on her cheek.

“Mmm … I did have a little bit of help,” she said, brushing a hand into the hair at the nape of his neck, satisfied when the Doctor sighed against her.

“Just a little?”

“Yeah,” Rose giggled, “from Mickey. Remember him?”

At the Doctors indignant squawk, she fully burst out laughing.

“I had a lot of help from you,” she told him, no longer teasing.

“Thought so,” he muttered, mollified. They were quiet for a few moments before he said, “And now here we are.”

“Yeah.”

“Rose?” he asked, sitting up. Her neck and shoulder were suddenly chilled with the absence of his body heat. When she looked over at him, he seemed nervous.

“What is it?”

“I- well- uhm …” the Doctor floundered for a moment before saying, “What do you think of the garden?”

Incredibly confused, Rose Tyler looked down and was surprised to once again find words trimmed into the grass.

‘Marry me?’