#Adam and Eddie strike again | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

strangersatellites · 1 year ago

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pride, envy, sloth, gluttony, greed, lust, ao3

Seven Deadly Sins Series (NSFW 18+)

wrath (noun): uncontrolled feelings of anger, rage, and even hatred. wrath often reveals itself in the wish to seek vengeance. in its purest form, wrath presents with injury, violence, and hate

cw: rough sex, unhealthy relationships, blood, unsafe sex, choking, slapping, dacryphilia, angst (????) on accident, probably more tbh they genuinely fucking hate each other in this universe

This thing they’d had going on for three months now really had started off fun.

It started out soft and sweet. Stolen kisses in the back of The Hideout, quick, messy blowjobs in the backseat of Steve’s car, booty calls late at night when one or the other couldn’t sleep.

He can’t really identify what went wrong or when. All Steve knows is that the butterflies that he used to get when Eddie came around have turned and twisted into something sharp and heavy. Now when they’re within earshot of each other it's all biting insults and low-blows.

Somewhere along the line, the happiness that Eddie planted in his heart morphed into bitter resentment. But Steve’s nothing if not self-sacrificial, and the sex was too good to give up. Who is he to deny himself of the only good thing Eddie has left to offer him? So now he finds himself shoved into bar bathrooms and left high and dry, bruises mottled up and down his chest and dark bags under his eyes from a fitful sleep. Somehow he’s convinced himself it's better than nothing.

On nights where he can’t shake the memory of Eddie’s lips on his and his heart fluttering pretty and soft, he goes out.

He goes out to a seedy club and he finds someone that he won’t remember the name of in the morning and he tries anything to clear his mind. Nothing’s ever as good.

Tonight he’s found himself a few beers deep and tracing water stains on the bar top at some place he’s never been just outside of town. He’d spent the last ten minutes or so talking to a guy that looked like he’d show him a good enough time. Dark, curly hair cut so that it flopped down into his face, pretty blue eyes that went a shade darker when they looked Steve over, and a shirt cut low enough that Steve could see ink swirl across his collarbones in vines and leaves.

Steve thinks his name is Adam, but he wasn’t really listening and still really isn’t. He’s found that a few soft laughs and hums while guys talk is usually enough to feign interest long enough to coax them to a bathroom.

This guy, Adam maybe, is about two seconds away from dragging him there himself, he can tell. It’s written all over his body language. Steve smiles his prettiest smile and flutters his eyelashes.

But as soon as he opens his mouth to purr something like “Do you want to get out of here?” There are strong arms snaking around his waist and teeth scraping at his throat and Steve’s blood runs hot in an instant. He’s well-accustomed to it no longer being a good sensation.

Steve shoves his elbow back with as much force as he can muster and it all goes red before he even hears his chuckle.

“Strike out again, Harrington? I made it just in time then, huh sweetheart,” Eddie coos in a tone dripping with condescension.

He’s on his feet and shoving at Eddie’s chest with enough force he knows it’ll bruise, sees it knock the wind out of him a bit. Gets right up in his face and would do anything to rip that self-satisfied smirk right off of it.

“You miserable fucking prick,” he spits, uncaring of the way Eddie flinches back the tiniest bit. “I was not striking out, and I never am! And yet here you come acting like you’re saving some damsel in distress when it’s you crawling back to me. Every. Single. Time,” he punctuates with jabs to his chest.

Eddie’s smile doesn’t leave as he huffs a laugh. His tongue swipes across sharp, sharp teeth and he leers at Steve with narrowed eyes. Predatory in a way Steve liked once upon a time but now makes him want to punch out his teeth. He’s got his hands in his pockets and he looks entirely too comfortable with the fact that he just ruined Steve’s night. Again.

“God, sweetheart. You’re so wound up,” he whispers, face pinching up in faux concern. He brings his hands up to smooth down Steve’s biceps and digs his fingers in tight enough that he doesn’t budge with Steve’s attempts at shaking him off. “Tell me. When was the last time someone fucked you good enough that you remembered his name the next morning, now be honest.” He leans in close and that smirk is back and Steve hates it. “You can say it was me, honey. It’ll be our little secret.”

And Steve’s seeing red again because he’s right.

It was him. It’s always him and probably always will be.

He gets back up in his space once more and makes sure he’s looking at his eyes when he whispers a sharp “Fuck. You.”

And it's only for a split second but he swears he sees hurt flash through brown eyes. Gone in an instant and replaced with a real, raw indifference that Steve thinks might be worse.

He feels a hand at the back of his neck and Eddie’s lips brush his ear.

“Yours or mine?”

And it was always going to go like this. Steve’s not under any illusions. Knew this time wouldn’t be different. But it still stings the way that he knows in an alternate universe that question might’ve been accompanied with giggles and a kiss.

But then he remembers the way that Eddie looked so proud when Steve first said he hated him and the rage is back ten-fold.

He turns on his heel and knows he’s being followed.

“Yours. Don’t want you in my fucking house.”

*****

Steve’s got Eddie’s wrists pinned to the wall above his head and his teeth raking down his neck. Wants to leave a mark. A memory.

He hears Eddie gasp as Steve’s hips shove hard against his own and he shoves harder in retaliation.

“Remember when you used to kiss me?” Steve asks, Eddie’s breath against his face enough to pull some bricks from the walls he’s spent months building.

He feels more than hears Eddie’s hum. Feels his knee come up to shove him backwards until he’s the one pressed against the wall, face turned sideways and arms pinned behind his back.

“Yeah sweetheart.” He leans in to bite at Steve’s ear and make him hiss.

Steve’s grinning, ugly and mean when he grits out “Worst decision of my fucking life.”

But now Eddie’s the one smirking, he can hear it when he speaks. “Mine too. Liked my life a lot better when I didn’t know what you taste like.”

Steve aims for the shin when he bucks a foot backwards, nails it if Eddie’s grunt is anything to go by. He spins around and shoves at Eddie hard enough to send them both to the floor, grateful for a second the fact that his muscle mass makes it easy to manhandle his way into what he wants.

He laughs, loud and fake. “Now see, that I just don’t believe, Eddie.” He’s got his eyebrows raised high and pout on his lips and he knows what’s coming and he relaxes into it.

And yeah maybe Steve’s strong, but Eddie knows him. Knows when his guard is down. He gets his knees up around Steve’s hips and flips them over, Steve’s back against the ground and there’s the fury Steve’s been after. Been trying to bring it out all night.

Eddie’s got a ringed hand pressed tight against Steve’s throat when he finally lets himself feel. Feel good the way only Eddie can make him. Lets the fight drain out of him as his vision goes spotty. Eddie’s spitting words in his face, “Do you ever shut the fuck up?” and saliva into his mouth and it’s so bad-good.

His next breath is heaving as he comes back down and Eddie’s already standing and walking away.

“Get up. I don’t have all night.”

And now that he’s got Eddie mad, got him fired up, he knows he can let himself go. Lets himself fall even though he knows Eddie’s not going to catch him. Thinks it's worth it until it's not. Until tomorrow when he remembers the way he and Eddie won’t look at each other when their friends are around. They way they don’t talk.

Because this is how it's always going to go. He’s going to let Eddie rile him up, make his sharp, heavy butterflies flutter out in words he thinks he doesn’t really mean. He’s going to push and push and push until Eddie breaks. And even though he started it, Eddie always will. Break, that is. He’ll break out of his self-assured, indifferent asshole persona and he’ll turn into something real and mean. Someone that hates Steve back.

Steve thinks it shouldn’t feel as good as it does.

There’s nothing gentle about the way Eddie stretches him open. The way he smacks the inside of Steve’s thigh hard enough it leaves a welt the shape of his hand.

He’s got two fingers inside him and Steve feels so good and he can’t help but talk. Head thrown back, words fall from his lips between desperate moans.

“Hate you so fucking much.”

A smack to his ass and a dejected huff.

“Yeah. I know you do sweetheart."

Steve groans in annoyance but his back arches all the same.

“Hate it when you call me that.”

And he’s not looking but he knows Eddie is rolling his eyes.

“I know you do, baby.”

And there’s tears pricking at the back of his eyes because sure he really does hate this man. Really does think he’d have been better off never meeting him. But all he can hear when Eddie calls him “baby” is the way he used to say it through laughter against his skin.

He knows he’s pouting but he thinks he deserves it with the bitter memories he’s fighting away. “Hate that even worse.”

Eddie pulls his fingers out and crawls up his body to squeeze at his cheeks until he fishmouths.

“I know. Now shut up and stop crying. You wanted me mean and you’ve fucking got it baby.”

Steve gasps high in his throat when Eddie grabs him by his hips and flips him onto his belly and something about this flavor of anger Eddie’s wearing sets Steve off again. But this time his anger isn’t a facade. It's raw and real and it's hurt that got brushed aside and became something else entirely.

“Hate what we could’ve been. Hate that I hate you.” He says into a pillow.

He hears Eddie groan and not in a good way. In the way he does when he’s annoyed. He feels his weight lay over his back and his hand on the inside of his thigh yanking upward and open.

“Well I hate that you don’t know when to stop talking." He grits out and the pressure as he presses inside Steve is enough to make him white out.

By the time he builds up a bruising rhythm, punching Steve’s breath out of him on every thrust, he’s talking again.

“Could’ve given you everything you wanted sweetheart,” and his tone is so patronizing, “But it just wasn’t fucking enough was it?”

And Steve’s barely holding on to his consciousness through the pressure deep in his guts and the hand pressing the back of his neck down, down, down. But he’s still got enough wherewithal that that strikes a chord.

Because no, having Eddie behind closed doors wasn’t enough. And Eddie knows that. He knows how that hurt him and chooses to use it against him anyway.

His voice is muffled into the pillow and broken up by whimpers and whines but he speaks anyway.

“Well it wasn’t my– shit, so good. Wasn’t my pride that got in the way.”

Eddie’s hips slow to a deep grind and freeze pressed to the hilt.

The hand at the back of Steve’s neck slides to the front and yanks him up on his knees, pressed against Eddie’s chest.

His chest is heaving where its plastered to Steve’s back and his voice rumbles through them both.

“Maybe not. But it was you that kept your mouth shut and made it my fault.”

Steve goes to argue but gets cut off by the sharp stinging of teeth breaking the skin against his shoulder blade. His breath goes ragged on a shriek and his vision whites out around the edges. Eddie’s shoving him back down, ass-up and face smushed sideways. His hand slips up and pries his mouth wide open and shoves in hard, stopping anything he could possibly say. Steve’s eyes are wide where he’s staring, gone glassy and wet.

“And it looks like now you don’t know how to do that, do you baby?” He asks.

And he’s got his fingers down his throat and his dick shoved deep.

There’s blood dripping from his teeth in that sharp, bitter smile. And he’s so pretty. And Steve hates him.

He chokes around his fingers on a sob as Eddie picks up his pace again.

Hates that it feels so good.

Hates that he comes back for this.

Hates that Eddie’s right.

Because maybe he can’t pinpoint when or where things went south, but he knows it has everything to do with the way he started needing more and not asking for it. Knows Eddie was letting him figure it out on his own. And instead of just going for it, he knows he started blaming.

So maybe he does hate Eddie. Hates him for the way he didn’t push him when he knew he needed it. Hates that he still uses him like this.

But he really hates himself. Because he could’ve had what he wanted but he didn’t take it.

(Hates that tomorrow he’ll forget this all again, too far in his head and in the feeling of Eddie taking what he wouldn’t give. He’ll forget it all and go back to hating him again.)

A sharp smack to the outside of his thigh brings him barreling back down into reality and it's Eddie’s words that send him hurdling into release.

“Here you fucking go again with the crying. God I hate that you’re so fucking pretty.”

Steve hates that that’s what does it for him. Hates that his crying is what does it for Eddie. Hates the way he’s filled up and will have to go home messy, the way Eddie pulls out of him and throws him his clothes.

He hears the flick of a lighter and Eddie’s heavy inhale from far away.

“I assume you can show yourself out.”

As Steve pulls his shirt over his head and wipes the tear tracks from his face he thinks “Yeah. This is why I hate him.”

And from the other side of the room Eddie thinks that if Steve would say half of the things that run through his mind with Eddie inside him, maybe they wouldn’t hate each other at all.

#seven deadly sins series #wrath #steddie #steddie fic #steddie smut #steve harrington #eddie munson #gin writes #this got way more angsty than I intended I am so sorry #they're both really awful for each other in this please be warned #this is also nearly triple the length it was supposed to be #can you tell this got away from me be honest #sponsored by gin watching shrek 2 and 3 #shameless delete and repost since the last one was up way too damn long for the interaction it got (respectfully)

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michael-the-candybar · 3 months ago

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Intro (Ig 😭)

Basics

Name: Michael/Mic (nickname pronounced like tic not mike)

Pronouns: He/Him

Sexuality: Pansexual and asexual!

Intrests

Movies: The Maze Runner, Jurassic Park, Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, Spiderman, Deadpool, Any Adam Sandler film, It, Scream

Shows: B99, Superstore, The Office, Friends, Heartstopper, Doctor Who, Camp Cretacious, Gravity Falls, The Owl House, Amphibia, She-ra, Derry Girls, SVU, The Goldbergs, Modern Family

Music: David Bowie, Conan Gray, Taylor Swift, Blink-182, The Smiths, Olivia Rodrigo, MCR, ABBA, Marina, Radiohead, Mitski, Boy Genius, Phoebe Bridgers, Chappell Roan

Hobbies: Drawing, Reading, Guitar, Yarn bracelets, Painting

Favourites

Actors: David Tennant, Andrew Garfield, Adam Sandler, Dylan O’brien, Thomas Brodie Sangster

Colours: Red, yellow and green

Fics: A Serpent And His Rose by Lovelylittlemaniac, Starvin’ Darlin’ by showinalittlelife, Kill Your Darlings by MesserMoons

Songs: I hate It Here - Taylor Swift, Alley Rose - Conan Gray, Mama’s Boy - Dominic Fike, Bigmouth Strikes Again - The Smiths, Can’t Catch Me Now - Olivia Rodrigo, Now and Then - The Beatles, I Know The End - Phoebe Bridgers

Random

Me core characters: James Potter, Remus Lupin, Evan Rosier, Luna Lovegood, Eddie Kaspbrak, Newt, Dipper Pines, Peter Parker, Edric Blight, Issac Henderson, Jonah Simms, Neville Longbottom, Luke Dunphy

I hate mushrooms and math

(this will probably be edited a ton)

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solarsonicsoda · 7 months ago

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Rebbie's Wrestling Reviews - AEW Dynasty 2024

Kazuchika Okada (c) def. Pac by pinfall for the AEW Continental Championship in 21:55

This match was simply awesome. Two guys who have absolutely all the tools put them to good use in this opener. Pac sold everything amazingly, he is brilliant at what he does, and there were many great sequences between the two men. Some of the specifics of this one were absolutely unreal too. Avalanche brainbuster, that brutal barricade DDT Pac took, an awesome springboard moonsault, a standing Brutaliser, a Black Arrow into the knees: so much brilliant wrestling. Of course, there was also Okada’s rug pull of the Rainmaker taunt. He had us in the palm of his hand and everything about that moment was hilarious. Loved this one.

4.5 STARS OUT OF 5

House of Black (Malakai Black, Brody King, & Buddy Matthews) def. Adam Copeland, Eddie Kingston, & Mark Briscoe by pinfall in 17:46

Super fun! Loved the energy they brought to this one, and the pace was quick which is just what I want from a trios match like this. Briscoe had a pair of great spots on the apron here, first launching himself off a chair to attack Matthews, but then being launched off into a brutal Death Valley Driver by King into the barricade. I also really enjoyed the triple Spears later in the match. Generally just great fun here all executed well, and I enjoyed Black picking up the win after never truly meeting Copeland in the ring until that final moment. That’s fun and I look forward to Black challenging for the belt in the future. Potentially at Double or Nothing? I will say though, maybe Rick Knox could have picked a better position to count that pin, he was looking directly into the misted face of Copeland…

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Willow Nightingale def. Julia Hart (c) by pinfall for the AEW TBS Championship in 6:01

This is not the most revolutionary match on the card, but it was pretty satisfactory. It was pretty short, but I didn’t realise it was quite this short! It was worked sufficiently though and it gave us a big championship win for Nightingale! That’s going to be raising the rating! Mercedes Mone slightly cramps on what’s a lovely moment but I’m excited for their match at Double or Nothing! Feels big time!

3 STARS OUT OF 5

Roderick Strong (c) def. Kyle O’Reilly by pinfall for the AEW International Championship in 17:18

Another brilliant match. Great sells, great strikes, great technical work: what not to love? Some of the transitions and reversal in this one were simply beautiful, there was an awesome ankle lock transition by O’Reilly, there was a tiger driver that became a guillotine hold, there were sweet counters of some of their common offence: I ask again, what’s not to love?! O’Reilly has great facials for a match like this and I thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing! I think the finish was a tad sudden, I’m not entirely sure why Wardlow showed up, but good for him. We also see that Adam Cole can walk post-match!

4.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Chris Jericho def. Hook (c) by pinfall for the FTW Championship in 16:34

Please say sike right now. I will say, I was actually enjoying this one for most of its run. Hook has some awesome suplexes, he wrestles with such a unique form and stuff, he’s just very engaging. Hook sends Jericho through a table off the apron with a T-bone suplex, he suplexes him in a bin, and he kicks out of two Judas Effects! That all went so hard! I don’t particularly remember what Jericho did but oh well. Now, why the hell did he win? Jericho got to dominate, and like he overpowered Hook, in a strike exchange, which should never be happening with Jericho who is not known for anything close. Then, after all their action, Jericho is walking whilst Hook is selling his ass off for Jericho post-Judas Effect, and then he hits him with his baseball bat and wins. WHY?! I do think this “Learning Tree” character can be fun, but it should be a character where he goes in there and loses a lot, and convincingly. No one wants to see Jericho have many long matches, nor do they want to see him win titles. How does this help Hook? He does not need to reclaim the title again from the likes of Jericho, it makes him look like a dork. This should have been a feud where Hook won every encounter. Really stupid finish on a flawed but fun schmozz.

2.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Toni Storm (c) (w/ Mariah May & Luther) def. Thunder Rosa by pinfall for the AEW Women’s World Championship in 15:08

First off, Team Timeless were absolutely slaying with the looks here. Yes, of course that includes you Luther. This was a pretty good match overall. Rosa hits a great Tornillo, Nigel McGuiness is a hoot on commentary as usual, and the Death Valley Driver on the apron was awesome. Some sweet sequences and combos in there too, like a cool tornado DDT into a Northern Lights suplex from Storm. I don’t particularly care for the Storm Zero kickout as it was done, I feel like it was a bit early for something like that for me. Rosa also had a real smooth transition into a backbreaker late on before Storm rightfully got the win. As I say, good match, just not the best. I feel I’ve never particularly gotten into Thunder Rosa’s work. Like, she’s a good wrestler, but I just don’t feel much about her in-ring skill, and I don’t like her promos. Regardless, they had a decent showing here.

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Will Ospreay def. Bryan Danielson by pinfall in 32:40

I’m going to start by mentioning how brilliant the atmosphere was with this St. Louis crowd. They were awesome the whole night but here was their peak. Everyone was just having a blast it seemed. Now, there’s a lot of hubbub about this one, and I’ll start with this now: No, this isn’t the best match ever. What it is though is really quite great. So many unreal spots here and a solid bit of story throughout. There’s the likes of Danielson fully tying up Ospreay, the tiger suplex off the top rope, the series of counters from an Oscutter to a Lebell Lock, and the staredown with the elbow pad removal. I want to mention the dodging of a Hidden Blade to hit a running knee from Danielson, loved that. All of these moments were great. In my notes though, I did eventually end up writing three things down in all caps. First, “TRIANGLE HOLD STYLES CLASH”. Yeah, that’s awesome. There was also the finishing stretch with “HE JUST HIT A TIGER DRIVER 91 ON DANIELSON”. I think that speaks for itself as something wild. Thankfully he took it as safely as he could, that is to say “I bet his shoulder hurts like hell”. Then, the best of them all: “KNEE OSCUTTER REVERSAL”. This was simply perfect, what a reversal for the Oscutter, and what a running knee it was. Beautiful. Overall, it was a really nice match that pulled me round into loving it, even if Ospreay can be a bit much with some of his style for me. It works for a big match! I don’t love the finish really with the doctors, but it’s not super egregious. It was probably a Danielson idea, but I’d prefer a clean finish here. Maybe there’s a sequel on the horizon. Anyway, on a first watch, I’m concluding that “the greatest match in US history” is not quite that (some people just love a man’s particular style and that’s ok!), but is still pretty stellar.

4.5 STARS OUT OF 5

The Young Bucks (Nicholas Jackson & Matthew Jackson) def. FTR (Cash Wheeler & Dax Harwood) in a ladder match for the AEW Tag Team Championships in 21:34

Now, something completely different! There’s plenty of ladder-based fun here, like some fun dropkick spots and one of the Bucks heading up for the belts off of a rope run. A ladder bridge was a large part of this one, first with a moonsault by Wheeler and an EVP Trigger by the Bucks atop it. Wheeler had a great performance here, and he hit a tope onto Matthew that sent him through a table, which I loved. Shortly after, Harwood would take a hurricanrana through one too, which I did like but it was a tad awkward. I really loved the Power and Glory off the ladders, that was super awesome, and the Wheeler tope through a table at the end was wild! He went so fast! There was a scary moment, as Nicholas would 450 Wheeler through a table, but as Harwood tried to piledriver Matthew through the ladder bridge, it would give way. Fortunately, it seems everyone is ok. This was a pretty fun match all-in-all, and I really enjoyed the finish with big shit-eating grin Jack Perry helping the Young Bucks.

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Swerve Strickland (w/ Prince Nana) def. Samoa Joe (c) by pinfall for the AEW World Championship in 17:59

This is the moment I was waiting for! This was a pretty good match, Joe looked like an absolute beast in this one and I loved him for it. Swerve did his part too, selling very well for the big man. I especially loved his sell off the leg sweep, that was great. I do think the kickout from the Muscle Buster came a bit early in this match, it felt a tad flat for me, but it was soon followed by the House Call whilst Joe was in the ropes and the 450 Splash to the back of the head. I absolutely loved that spot. Those final moments were also great though, with Swerve doing whatever he has to do and with a great leap over Joe. That Swerve Stomp had me on my feet! The right man won here and it was absolutely essential here. What a great run from Samoa Joe though. Unfortunately, it is, indeed, Swerve’s House.

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Overall, this was a pretty good show! Not quite as good or as consistent as Revolution 2024, but another great PPV! This one is getting 4 STARS OUT OF 5 from me!

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etceteria · 1 year ago

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have yall read the rumours about a winter season of all winners big brother due to the writers strike.... imagine lisa jun eddie morgan taylor hayden derrick rachel dan maggie etc back.. my only hesitation is you just KNOW CBS would invite cody, nicole and derrick and i CANNOT handle another season of a bb16 cast member steamrolling. also there are so many shit winners lately like j*ckson and st*ve. i didnt like josh or andy but seeing them back would be entertaining. id also like to see jordan, drew, kaycee play again. ian i think had his time on bb22 but could be another option. xavier was pretty boring tbh and adam/dick/boogie would never get invited i dont think. will prob would say no

#bb25

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splitting-infinities · 1 year ago

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no vacant stare, no time for me

It's difficult to choose between remembering a loss and forgetting a friendship. After Crowley's Fall, Aziraphale arrives in Eden wondering if he should ask for his memories to be taken away.

A Good Omens fic I wrote in 2019. It seems relevant again.

Memory, like water, is a fluid, destructive thing.

It seeps downward, erodes and carves deep grooves into the mind. It exposes layered thoughts and words and sounds and tastes. It leaves a mark, but you don’t notice until enough time has been used up. Until the damage has already been done.

Aziraphale knows there is a canyon in his mind, a striated passageway of well-worn details of someone he has since lost. Red hair, white robes, and lazy, affectionate speech. The smell of ozone and earth and balsam. A friend he knows so well that every part of his mind is linked by one recollection or another. An ouroboros of word associations.

After the Fall and its fallout, there is not a day that passes where Aziraphale does not keenly sense his friend’s absence. A phantom limb, a skipped meal, two hands hovering on the precipice of touch but never quite reaching it. Michaelangelo hasn’t been created yet (only Adam himself, and only just), so there is no iconic painting in existence to depict this feeling.

It hurts like a gaping wound.

And it is also numb.

Aziraphale wonders if that’s even possible, despite the concrete proof that shows up in his cyclical eddies of emotions. Grief, pain, blankness, loss, love, anger, cruel compassion.

He is constantly on the verge of begging for his memories be taken away. He hates that he and his friend are now on opposite sides; it feels less like a vertical fall and more like a horizontal chasm has opened up between them. If only he could just forget...

He cannot count how many times he nearly asks. The words tumble around within him, a raging waterfall of fear and want. But something always stops him from getting the words out. Maybe more than one something. This is Asking A Question, and though all questions get answered in one way or another, Aziraphale is worried about the nature of this particular answer given recent events.

So, he tries not to think too loudly, lest it get heard before he’s ready. Aziraphale is not necessarily impulsive; if he makes a decision quickly, it's because he's confident it's the right choice. But this isn't one of those times. He isn’t sure it’s what he wants, after all.

He wants to forget.

And he also doesn’t.

You see, the grooves of a deep friendship are still there, the memories swirling - sauntering - downward through eons of erosion. Without them, Aziraphale would only have a dry, empty canyon. Nothing can replace those empty spaces, not ever. And without the memories, he’d always wonder what was supposed to be there. What the missing piece was. Who it was.

His first night in Eden is spent looking up at the stars. He is guarding Adam and Eve, a flaming sword casting shadows on the palm fronds around him. His pose would probably look rather grandiose in silhouette, but Aziraphale is too wary of this sword to appreciate the aesthetic. It doesn’t fit quite right in his hands. He wonders if he’ll just have to get used to it. He’s becoming rather good at getting used to things.

He does not sleep, but the humans do, so for now he is alone and awake and pensive. If his friend were here, he would turn to him, and ask:

“When did the constellations get so small? They must be a very long way away from Earth.”

His friend helped hang the stars all that time ago, although to that poor soul, they must be more distant now than they’ve ever been. The realization lances through Aziraphale’s heart like a strike from the flaming sword. Hot and bright and painful.

“If only you could see this world, my dear,” he murmurs apologetically. There is no response, nor did he expect one. He supposes his friend has gone where he cannot follow, so he takes to morosely watching the moon trek across the dark sky. It leaves no trail in its wake - it doesn’t carve, it orbits.

Aziraphale wishes his memories did that. It certainly would be kinder, if they formed ripples along the surface, rather than irreparably digging into the soft parts of you.

He can practically see, even now, his Fallen friend’s “watch this, angel” smile, his iridescent feathers fluttering, the glow of a newly made star sitting in his palms. The memory of the delight on his friend’s face is gouged into the dark space behind Aziraphale’s eyes. An afterimage of innocence, paradise. And as much as it aches, he cannot let himself forget that beautiful moment. It is precious now that so much else has already been lost.

A star shoots across the black. Aziraphale ultimately composes a carefully worded wish that his recollections did less damage and shed more light.

Wishing is not the same as asking questions, right? Wishing is a form of hope.

The next day, the Tree bears its first fruits, and they gleam a tempting and luscious red.

A river chisels its way through Eden.

A snake mirrors the water’s path and weaves amid the soil and roots.

More damage is coming. Oh, yes.

But also some light.

It's sunny enough that Aziraphale casts a shadow when he stands on the wall the following afternoon. He gazes out at the thunderstorm, marking the rain ahead.

He and Crawly (or Crowley, as he’ll later be called) have just met, and they watch the humans begin their exile.

Unable to tell what his friend remembers, Aziraphale pretends he recalls nothing. He keeps his memories to himself, keeps his stare vacant and mildly professional, even though his watery eyes are cataloging every feature, every new change in that familiar face. The old canyon is there and always will be. A monument, a guarded Eden of the past.

What used to be is forbidden now. What is to come seems, to Aziraphale, like a gift, even if it's not what he expected.

A sun has risen over new, blank, unexplored lands in his mind. A whole world.

Ready to be explored, carved, shaped. Remembered.

All they need is time.

And time they have.

#good omens #writing #good omens fanfic #find more of my works on ao3

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dankusner · 5 months ago

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Dallas charter changes could decriminalize Marijuana , increase council pay, term length

Dallas residents could vote this fall on whether the city should decriminalize low levels of marijuana possession, if a proposed change to the city’s charter is approved.

Council member Chad West plans to introduce on June 26 an amendment to the city’s charter that would direct the Dallas Police Department to stop issuing citations or making arrests for Class A or Class B misdemeanor marijuana possession.

Several of his colleagues, including council members Adam Bazaldua, Zarin Gracey and Jaime Resendez are supporting the measure, according to a Friday news release.

The process to tweak the city’s charter that happens every 10 years also has whipped up discussions about extending council member’s terms, increasing council pay, moving city elections from May to November and instituting ranked-choice voting.

In announcing his proposal, West cited similar actions that were approved in other Texas cities such as Austin and Denton with over 70% voter approval.

“We’ll be immediately sued by Ken Paxton if the voters end up passing it,” West said. “But I think it’s, one, the right thing to do because our voters want it. And two, Ground Game Texas has already collected 50,000 signatures, I have no doubt that they’ve collected at least 20,000 that are valid.”

Ground Game Texas has been collecting signatures to decriminalize marijuana possession.

Dallas would be the biggest city to approve this measure if the City Council adds the measure to the ballot.

“They’re going to get this on the ballot regardless, we might as well greatly reduce the amount of staff time we have to spend on this and the city secretary’s office ratifying the petitions. If we put it on ourselves, they don’t have to complete that process and spend their entire summer ratifying the petitions,” West said.

The move to decriminalize marijuana would coincide with other debates that are likely to be taken up again on June 18.

Earlier this week, council members spent over six hours discussing recommendations from the 15-member charter review commission along with some of their own.

Increasing council pay to $125,000 for council members and $145,000 for the mayor drummed up two separate amendments.

Council members are currently paid $60,000 and the mayor is paid $80,000.

Their salaries have not been changed since 2014.

Council member Kathy Stewart wanted to reduce the salary recommendations to $80,000 for council and $105,000 for the mayor.

Council member Adam Bazaldua wanted to tweak that to $95,000 for council members and $115,000 for the mayor.

“By design, these roles have had very low salaries with the intent of independently wealthy people to hold these seats, which has created huge disparity in adequate representation from certain communities, especially whenever we observe a single-member district form of government,” Bazaldua said.

Council member Paul Ridley said the proposed hike in council pay was coming at a bad time.

The city is facing a $38 million shortfall in its budget and has to come up with a plan to fill a pension shortfall.

“I think it strikes a bad note to our residents that we would be considering feathering our own nests by an increase of almost 60% in our pay,” Ridley said.

One of Mayor Eric Johnson’s amendments would create a provision that could allow the city to give Dallas Police Chief Eddie García a contract.

But council members said that provision should not be limited to just one employee.

Two amendments, increasing mayoral power and allocating 10% of the city’s budget to the Park department, will be discussed in the next meeting on June 18.

Two of West’s amendments that would’ve moved elections from May to November in odd-numbered years and extend the number of years in a term also kickstarted robust discussion.

In March, the charter review commission rejected the measure to move elections, and it is likely the measure could fail once again.

West said the change could save the city money.

Ahead of Wednesday’s meeting, members of the North Dallas Chamber of Commerce, American Jewish Committee, League of Women Voters and other organizations sent a letter urging council members to approve West’s amendment to move elections. “Multiple elections, and run-off elections scattered throughout the year at oddly placed times can cause voter fatigue, reducing voter participation— which makes the process less inclusive,” the letter said.

The reluctance of Texas lawmakers to expand the legality of marijuana in the state isn’t stopping a growing industry of niche cannabis producers who see opportunity in the Lone Star state.

So what’s it like to be a craft hemp cultivator trying to grow legal cannabis in Texas?

Colt Power, the co-founder and CEO of Power BioPharms in Fort Worth, said its been challenging to navigate the legal landscape.

Recreational marijuana use is illegal in Texas, but certain people can qualify for medicinal prescriptions for low THC cannabis for particular health conditions.

Beyond that, CBD derived from hemp that contains less than 0.3% THC is legal in Texas.

Power said his interest in the weed industry began when he used CBD to help deal with lingering injuries he sustained while playing sports in college.

After experiencing the health benefits for himself, Power said, he saw this as a great business opportunity to help people in Fort Worth area and Texas as a whole.

“It’s an opportunity to create good in the world and improve the lives of others everyday,” Power said.

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joywritesbutitsactuallymystories · 1 year ago

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The ghost

Steve Allan was your typical Londoner. Each day was planned, the whole week through. On Saturdays he went on a walk through the park. It was getting dark, so Steve decided to take a shortcut. It was dark on the Square. Only one of the street lamps were working. Eddie was there, an empty bottle in hand.

Like I said, it was dark. Steve could barely see where he was going. It was only natural that he couldn’t see the figure, silently moving towards him. The man felt a sharp pain in his neck and started losing vision. It was over in a few seconds. He fell into the light of Eddie’s street lamp, The London Eye looming above.

Robert Constantine, the world-renowned detective, sighed. He had come to the conclusion that catching the Ghost Killer was impossible. Major Crimes was working on this case for the last year and a month, and every next murder only seemed to complicate things. A murder a month, every one different. Nothing tied the deaths together. Nothing except the murder weapon. A thin, iron needle. That was all. For all we knew, we could’ve been on a wild goose chase. And yet, they did not disappoint, once again striking.

This time around it was a middle-aged man, Steve Allan, who fell under their needle. Finally, we had the smallest of leads – Steve's wife knew three previous victims, Samantha Black, Adam Curtis, and the first one to die, Andromeda May.

Needless to say, it was a dead end. The wife of Steve, Janet Brown was proven innocent, and the famous detective without a lead.

We returned to the precinct and Robert interviewed a witness of Allan’s murder. We only had one, as none of the residents of this part of the city were looking out their windows at the time. Even if they were, they wouldn’t have seen much. Almost all the lamps in the region were broken. Edward Dean, the local drunk, was sitting in the reception. Rob invited him into the interrogation room.

“So, Mr. Dean, what exactly happened last night?” Rob opened his notepad.

“Well mister. I was sittin’ an’ drinkin’ a bottle of gatter an’ he just keeled over.” He wildly gesticulated with every word. He stopped, drank a swig of beer and continued his story. “Never did like ‘im. Deserved what happened, really.”

“Why did he deserve what happened?”

“Didn’t like his lifestyle, is all” he answered, and I knew Constantine wouldn’t get anything more out of him. We left the interrogation room.

“What now?” I asked. Robbie answers:

“I don’t know.” We return to the briefing room and continue looking through the scarce pieces of evidence we have. A latex glove, collected from the murder of Jacob Hamilton and a few witness statements. Nothing soluble, especially seeing as the glove had no traces of DNA on it, neither the murderers nor the victims. The only good piece of news we had that day was that the needle that killed Allan was the same one used to kill all the others.

But then a policeman approached me.

“You are under arrest, for the murder of Steve Allan.” He lead me out of the room, leaving behind a very confused, very hurt Robert Constantine.

~~~

To whom it may concern,

While looking through my apprentice's laptop I found this blog, and took it upon myself to bring this story to an end.

The author of the earlier texts is indeed the murderer of Steve A., as well as twelve other civilians, the list being as follows:

Andromeda May

Matthew Lakes

Robert Kilburg

Orion Jane

Inez Ilsley

Jacob Hamilton

Martha Green

Nico Freeman

Rebecca Evermoore

Veronica Davis

Adam Curtis

Samantha Black

As you can see, the last names line up in reverse alphabetical order, which suggests that the serial killer planned being discovered.

I must say, I was very disappointed in my assistant after finding out about the crimes. I don’t hide the fact that I was friends with my accomplice, and trusted them deeply. Still, this does not cloud my judgement, and I will do all in my power to make sure their rule of terror ends.

Signed,

Robert Constantine

~~~

Fools. You really thought this was over? You cannot capture a ghost. The thirteen were just a warning, a prologue to something much, much bigger. Cut one head, two sprout from the stump.

The streets of London will run red. The tower will fall, and when We are done with you, even the ravens will abandon ship.

So, lock your windows. Barricade your doors. Hold your loved ones close. For when you’ll die, you’ll die alone. And no-one will be left to mourn your ghost.

~~~

The serial killer sat in silence in the interrogation room. A smile crept onto his face. He would’ve known those footsteps anywhere. Robert Constantine, the world-renowned detective. The two friends sat opposite each other, one looked at the other with kindness in their eyes, the other one with hurt.

They sat for a while in silence, before the detective finally spoke.

“Why?” The question hung between them. The other leaned back into his chair, their smile turned into a grin.

“Why wouldn’t I, Robbie?”

They sat in silence for some time before Robert, the world-renowned detective, left the room. The place was completely empty. He turned on his desk lamp. Robert sighed, taking off his glasses. “Finally it’s all over”, he whispered to himself in relief, “Never again should I come back to this case.”

#writing #writer #writerblr #short story #jonny writes stuff

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leo-dooley-lab-rats · 1 year ago

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Donald Davenport is very distant emotional from his kids. He doesn’t even let the kids call him ‘dad’ or even ‘Donald’. It’s always ‘Davenport’ or ‘Mr. Davenport’. I think it took Tasha and Leo coming in go have Donald start opening up. Plus, Donald strikes me as a bit of hermit type. I mean it’s a known fact Donald’s best friend is Eddie(a computer/AI/smart home security he built). Donald doesn’t have friends.

I do think the whole mess with Douglas going evil, experimenting on kids, and then dying really messed Donald up. We don’t know the exact timeline for this, but based off what we do know Adam, Bree, and Chase don’t remember anything about Douglas. Adam who canonically the oldest couldn’t have been more than two or three(as two or three us when memories typically start forming). I think Donald finding out about the experiments on human kids and Donald taking the kids happened around when Adam was three-ish. This was likely the event that caused Donald to kick his brother from Davenport industries. If I had to guess Douglas faked his death not long after getting kicked out from the company. I think Donald felt like he pushed his brother to his death and felt guilty for it.

I guess the point I’m making here is that it took Tasha and Leo coming along for Donald to open up again. Once Tasha and Leo convince Donald to let Adam, Bree, and Chase leave the lab and go go school, he starts being more open with them. He acts more like a father figure to the kids. I think it helps that Donald was always trying so hard to connect with Leo in the beginning of the show that he started to connect with his actual kids.

this thought is plaguing my brain. it's bouncing in my brain

did donald tell ABC he loved them while they were growing up in the lab?? did he??

was the first time they were told they were loved when leo said he loved them to davenport???

am i just going bonkers here.

#lab rats #chase davenport #disneys lab rats #disney channel #disney xd #adam davenport #donald davenport #bree davenport #leo dooley #great post fyi #hope you don’t mind me piggybacking off your post

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ladyeternal178 · 8 years ago

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There is no Song In My Heart

Dear Adam & Eddie:

If you’re going to try and rip off Joss Whedon this blatantly, you need to not be so phenomenally bad at it.

Seriously: the infant son of a hero and a villain is kidnapped away from someone that was taking him to be hidden from one of his parents for his own safety. He is taken to a demon dimension by his kidnapper, where they raise him like their own child and train him to serve their agenda. When he gets back to his parents’ dimension, barely any time has passed for them but he’s a fully-grown adult because time flows differently where he was raised, and he starts going after the good guys and his family because of the machinations of the bad guy that raised them.

Am I talking about Gideon from Once, or Connor from Angel? The only way to tell them apart is the fact that Connor actually managed to beat Angel a couple of times, whereas Gideon has never gotten the better of Rumple. Even when Gideon was using the Dark One dagger, Rumple outmaneuvered Gideon at every turn. Somehow, A&E managed to make the son of the Dark One, a character that could’ve been a huge wild card that completely realigned the balance of power in Storybrooke, totally fucking useless and only slightly less relevant to the story than the dwarves are.

But now they’ve also completely wasted the potential of a musical episode at the same time they were trying desperately to pull it off by using a similar set-up to BtVS’ Once More With Feeling.

See: Once More With Feeling used magic to make everyone burst into song, too. And it played with the idea that music, when combined with magic, can be used as a weapon. But where The Song In Your Heart utterly and completely failed to live up to its spiritual predecessor is that, rather than having the musical curse woven into the modern setting and illuminating something about the characters’ current emotional states, or revealing something critical that had been kept hidden from the others before now, they decided to cram yet another flashback confrontation between Snowing and the Evil Queen into an already overfull backstory.

All in the name of giving Emma’s massive inferiority and martyr complexes an opportunity to rear their ugly heads again and then allowing for a deus ex machina, a/k/a Henry, to come in and rescue her from them.

It makes no sense that Fiona and/or Rumple didn’t go after Henry when they were rounding up everyone in Emma’s immediate family to use as hostages. Henry might not be able to use his author powers to affect the Final Battle, but he’s still the Truest Believer. He above anyone would be the person most likely to keep Emma from being mired in self-doubt, since he has absolute faith. And maybe Fiona doesn’t know about that part, but Rumple does, having been privy to the events in Neverland and therefore knowing the reason why his father wanted Henry’s heart.

Not to mention that Henry is Emma’s son. You’re trying to tell me that the woman who turned herself into a fairy and very nearly used the Dark Curse’s precursor to banish all children in the Enchanted Forest to another realm in order to protect her own son didn’t think that holding the Savior’s son as a hostage wouldn’t get Emma to do anything she wanted? I doubt it, considering she didn’t even have compunctions about harming children to achieve her own ends before she became a fairy. And it’s not like his adoptive mother/step-great-grandmother, step-great-great-aunt, grandparents or step-father-to-be were in any position to stop her from hurting Henry, considering they were all her hostages, too. So why have she and Rumple leave Henry out there free to act instead of using him to leverage Emma?

Answer: A&E decided that the plot device they wanted to use was cool enough that the audience would ignore the plot hole and forgive the deus ex machina needed to pull it off. And they were wrong on all three counts.

The hard-won admission by Buffy to most of her loved ones that she’d been in Heaven when the Scoobies had resurrected her at the climax of Once More With Feeling was a cathartic paradigm shift for the characters and a gut-wrenching emotional pay-off for the viewer at the same time. We’d been hanging on the edges of our seats waiting for that reveal to happen, and the way we got it was pitched perfectly. Emma’s emotional epiphany in The Song In Your Heart didn’t have the same impact because we’ve been here before. We’ve been watching Emma re-learning this lesson in various ways since the Neverland arc in Season 3, and A&E are clearly running out of ways to keep convincingly putting her through this particular emotional journey.

But I think perhaps the biggest sin this episode commits is the aforementioned shoe-horning in of the musical confrontation between the Charmings and Regina. The Song In Your Heart isn’t even the first episode this season to be guilty of throwing something into the characters’ pre-Curse lives to set up a Chekov’s gun that will be used in the very same episode. But even with the pre-first-Curse timeline being a bit murky, A&E are running the raggedy edge of feasible when it comes to how much they’re trying to claim happened between the Charmings’ wedding and Regina’s first casting of the Dark Curse.

Magical settings don’t give you carte blanche when it comes to how much can reasonably fit into your backstory or timeline, and the advent of online fandoms with on demand access to re-watch, scrutinize, analyze and categorize every event in every episode has largely eliminated showrunners’ ability to rely on Bellisario’s Maxim when it comes to them prioritizing the cool factor of a plot device, twist or arc over the cohesiveness of their world-building. Flashbacks to the time before the first Curse are this show’s stock-in-trade, but even in the context of a musical episode, this vehicle could’ve been used in far better ways than it was here.

For example: in the modern Storybrooke era, the Black Fairy has cast a spell compelling the characters to sing what’s in their hearts because there’s something she needs to know from one of them that will give her an advantage in the final battle. They’re singing because truth potions/spells don’t necessarily get people to speak the truth of their hearts, but music always gets at the emotions we think we’re keeping hidden even from ourselves.

You could’ve had Snow & Charming waxing rhapsodic about their own wedding which dovetailed into a flashback about the ramp-up to the ceremony we saw in the pilot. You could’ve had Regina singing about how her mother’s pursuit of revenge, and her own, have robbed her of getting to have a wedding day like Emma’s, paired with a flashback of the Evil Queen observing the preparations for the royal wedding and finally snapping over Snow getting to have the happy wedding that she and Daniel nwere permanently denied. You could’ve had Zelena singing about how everyone’s making such a huge deal out of the wedding and it’s not as important as they’re all building it up to be before slowly revealing that, unlike Emma, she has no one that cares enough about her to want to give her a special wedding day and she is still mourning the one person that would’ve possibly ever wanted to marry her to begin with.

And then at long last, you have Emma singing about how she’s happier than she’s ever been and looking forward to marrying Hook, but the part she's not letting anyone see is that she’s frightened of losing the family that it’s taken so long for her to find and build and accept: if not to the Final Battle then to some other evil because there will always be darkness for the Savior to fight. That she knows they’ll carry on if she dies because that’s what they do, but she doesn’t know how she’ll go back to being alone again if something happens to them because she needs them to remind her that she’s no longer a lonely, unwanted orphan girl.

Cue the Black Fairy now knowing what she needs to know and cursing the town so that when Emma wakes up the morning after her wedding, she’s alone, isolated from everyone she loves, and she has to face the Final Battle without the support system she’s come to rely on to remind her of her own self-worth.

Was this episode fun for the OUaT cast & crew to make? Probably. The actors certainly seemed to be having a ball with the musical numbers, and some of the vocal performances were unexpectedly good. But it didn’t really serve the overall narrative, it didn’t give us any insight into the characters that we didn’t have already, and the emotional pay-off didn’t have anything to do with the musical device. The emotional pay-off was the wedding, and while I’m glad they didn’t fuck around with the actual ceremony (ruined weddings are one of my top five most-hated plot devices ever), there was no dramatic tension at all in the 50 minutes leading up to that moment and no interesting character development to make the time feel like it was spent wisely.

A&E should’ve called Papa Joss to consult. We would’ve gotten an episode with some heart for the songs to be in.

#once upon a time #ouat spoilers #ouat season 6 #episode 6x20 #the song in your heart #Adam and Eddie strike again #negative review #what were the writers thinking #was everyone on the creative team very stoned?#i'm a cranky bitch when my shows let me down #papa joss #joss whedon #joss whedon did it better #ats #btvs #once more with feeling #wasted potential #missed opportunities #serving the narrative comes first

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majicmarker · 2 years ago

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Just found out you’re writing some hellcheer a/b/o???! I’m drooling over here oh I love your writing so much you capture Eddie’s POV and Eddie and Chrissy’s dynamic so well AH I’m so ridiculously excited for this (sorry ig this isn’t a question)

(no apologies necessary, compliments are what the ask box is for, LET ‘EM AT ME)

i am. Making An Attempt. we’re lookin down the barrel of a two-(possibly-three-)shot, we’ll see how it shakes out i’m kinda just fiddling with it whenever the mood strikes, but! have a snippet—

Chrissy is considering how, exactly, to misbehave so badly in the next couple of weeks that her mother will lock her up in her room alone for the duration of her heat — which will be miserable, sure, yes, but if her choices are solitude and Jason, she’ll take the lesser of two evils — when she turns the corner, and runs straight smack into — into —

Oh.

A large, warm hand wraps around her elbow, steadying her — “Whoa, whoa, sorry —” and Chrissy breathes in deep, awash in a sudden wave of scent: woodsmoke and cinnamon, dark chocolate and good whiskey (which she’s never had, but it’s rich and thick and smells like honey).

This is what it should smell like, this is what she wants on top of her, wrapped around her, keeping her safe and warm and well-loved.

She looks up, from an Iron Maiden T-shirt to a guitar pick to the bob of an Adam’s apple to the slight smile on Eddie Munson’s face, the slight smile that’s fading as he breathes, too — inhale, no exhale.

“Oh.” He blinks, swallows again, and his voice is a rough scrape she wants to feel on the insides of her thighs. “Oh, Jesus Christ.”

#thecultured-swine #ask #eddissy #hellcheer #kattyshack fic

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eddiecore118 · 2 years ago

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This is the definition of rough draft. Which will probably never make it out of my word doc 🙈.

Warnings - brief descriptions of cardiac arrest

Eddie comes to. The sky is dark again, no longer illuminated by lightning. He’s flat on his back, ears ringing, head pounding.

“Eddie don’t try to move,” Chim’s face comes swimming into view. “We need to get your C-spine stabilized, and then we’re going to board you for transport, okay?”

Eddie just blinks. He takes a moment to remember where he is – the Highrise call.

Buck and Rawlings had to go up for the mother and daughter on the aerial. They were successful - he knows that much. What happened after is a little fuzzy. “What….” his throat feels like sandpaper. He tries again, “What happened?”

“There was a lightning strike. You were thrown off the engine and landed pretty hard Eddie,” Chim explains, fastening the C-collar into place and motioning for Rawlings to approach with the spine board.

He feels Chim clamp down on his shoulders, head wedged between his forearms - someone else has his hips. In his periphery, Rawlings is on his right, spine board angled downwards.

“Chim this is unnecessary,” Eddie protests.

“Sorry Eddie, not your call on this one. Okay everyone, on my count - ONE, TWO, THREE!” Chim instructs.

By the time they've secured him to the board and moved him onto the stretcher, Eddie's remembered the sequence of events. He and Buck were together at the bottom of the aerial, right before….

“Chim, where’s Buck?” Eddie asks, trying to sit up against the spine board's straps.

“Hen and Bobby have him,” Chim states calmly, placing his hand on Eddie’s chest.

“Chim, we need you over here NOW!” Bobby yells.

Chim meets Eddie’s eyes - his unease apparent - before grabbing his med bag, and taking off in a sprint towards Bobby.

“Rawlings undo the straps, right now!” Eddie demands, trying to slip his arm out from underneath.

“You know that isn’t going to go over well Diaz. Chim was adamant that we need to clear your C-spine first.”

“I’ve cleared it! Undo the fucking straps, NOW Rawlings!!!’ Eddie roars, right as he wiggles his arm free, quickly undoing the buckle for the chest strap, followed by the head strap. He sits up rapidly, undoing the rest. Leaping off the stretcher and spine board, he starts running towards the three figures he can see kneeling over someone. As he’s sprinting, he rips off the C-collar, firing it to the side and almost crashing into one of the bystanders.

He comes skidding to a halt in front of Bobby, Hen, and Chim. Between them is Buck – unconscious.

Hen’s yelling for them to bring the ambulance around, eyes darting back towards the portable monitor, Ambu bag and mask in hand. Chim has just finished cutting the last of Buck’s uniform shirt away, frantically trying to dry Buck’s chest in an attempt to get the defibrillation pads attached.

“Eddie….” Bobby starts, arms out trying to shuffle Eddie back from the scene.

“No! Bobby you don’t get to do that,” Eddie counters, darting around Bobby. Dropping to his knees, he looks over at the monitor reading the wide QRS complexes. “V-tach, starting compressions.”

“Diaz….” Bobby starts again, authoritatively.

“No! Bobby, you don’t get to do that either,” Eddie shouts, continuing compressions.

“Eddie hold compressions, rhythm check,” Hen cuts in. “Still V-Tach. Everyone clear.....! Shocking!!”

Eddie watches as the first shock is delivered. Buck’s skin has taken on that ashen tone of cardiac arrest victims, his lips tinged blue. He notices burn marks on Buck’s chest and shoulder. Eddie holds his breath, willing the monitor to show a normal rhythm.

“Still V-tach, resume compressions,” Hen orders. “C’mon on Buck!”

The ringing in his ears is back.

Eddie resumes compressions.

Seven Sentence Sunday

tagged by @buddierights @monsterrae1.

heres some of the prequel to the buddie divorce series (the first chapter is literally 9k and we still aren't finished lol)

“Okay,” Buck says. “Would you like a drink?”

The man cuts his eyes at him, livid, and pushes away from the bar.

“A guy named Buck. Do you know ‘em?”

Buck pauses. He watches the man shake his hand out and open and close his fist.

“Yeah,” Buck says, slow. “That’s me. Why—”

Before he can finish, the guy lunges at him, fist colliding with his jaw. Buck stumbles back and tries to maintain his balance, but feels the man grab his shirt and shove him to the ground.

“Fuck you,” the guy grits out, throwing another punch. Someone’s screaming and another person is trying to pull him off, and Buck can barely keep his eyes open as the room starts to spin. “You fucking prick.”

Buck’s head lulls back as he takes each punch and feels the grip on his shirt loosen as the man is pulled off of him.

“Stay away from my wife,” the guy snaps. Buck manages to tilt his head up and stares at the angry, blurry figure of the man pacing around. He jabs a finger in Buck’s direction.

“I don’t know what…”

“Now, he wants to lie,” the man scoffs. “You’re the worst kind of person, you know that? If you sleep with someone’s wife, at least own up to it.”

Buck swallows and blinks, hoping the dizziness fades and the ache settles in his jaw and cheek.

tagging @eddiecore118 @eddiediazisascorpio @eddiediass @kitkatpancakestack @daughterofbuddie @the-likesofus @megslovesbooks @ajunerose @spotsandsocks @swiftiebuckleys @swiftiediaz @gayhoediaz @girldiaz @loveyourownsmiilee @elvensorceress @rewritetheending @jacksadventuresinwriting @bekkachaos @lostinabuddiehaze @elfbuckleys

#911 fic #seven sentence sunday #this is never making it out of the word doc 🙈

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harperhug · 2 years ago

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So I was thinking about this post, but with a little more actual plot this time below the cut. @nick-wilde-is-hot I made an extra, unrelated character survive, just for you. Obviously, trigger warning for child death, but if you saw any of the movies mentioned, this is much, much tamer than all of them:

So James McAvoy plays an adult Finn Blake, staring at Deputy So-And-So at the library as the latter looks up property records for the earliest Bughuul-haunted houses he could find. The deputy goes outside to call someone who lives near one of the houses, and Finn follows him out just in time to hear the deputy greet Amy Yamada. Finn sneaks off to call his sister (who is played by Kathryn Adams, because I just happen to be watching House MD right now and that was the first name I saw) to ask if she’s had any dreams lately, and Gwen says she’s been having dreams about Amy Yamada (played by Rinko Kikuchi, mostly so Mana Ashida can play young Amy) saying “Like finds like” and reaching her hand out. Finn tells Gwen about seeing Deputy So-And-So and how he looks exactly like Max.

Back at her home, Amy, an alcoholic with dead parents, tells the deputy (let’s call him Ward, like Edward, but not Eddie) that she exchanged letters with the family who used to live the house, which takes her a while to find, but she does and she tells him their new address. After the call, Amy realizes how weird it was that the letters suddenly stopped, so she looks up the new address and her first result is a news article about the family burning to death in their own garage. The second is a sales record for the house, which says that the house was sold again within the year, then one more time (again within a year). She decides to go investigate the house and finds Ward in the process of burning it. He tells her about Bughuul and how it infects homes and families. Amy asks where the curse came from, and Ward responds that it could only have been multiple child murders in the same house. Amy tells him about what happened at 4471 and 2, and they both agree to go there to see if they can do anything.

Gwen and Finn go to 7741 and 7742, respectively, just before Wars and Amy arrive at the latter. Finn takes Wars into the basement, and while Amy feels very uncomfortable, Ward actually feels safe. Finn asks if he knows a Max Shaw, and Ward says Max was his father, who disappeared almost right after he was born. Finn tells him that Max died in this basement, so his soul may still be here, which would be why Ward feels safe and Finn and Amy very much do not. He adds that he may have been destined to investigate this case. “Like finds like.” His father investigated The Grabber, who accidentally fed Bughuul children’s souls until he grew strong enough to infect the earliest Bughuul-haunted house. (I know the timeline doesn’t add up. Be quiet.)

Ward says he’s been going around burning houses to end the curse, but maybe he can strike at the source: the houses where The Grabber killed and buried his victims and Max, since the Norwegian family on Dr. Stromberg’s tape lived in 4471 and the family that drowned in Sacramento lived in 4472. Ward contacts Dr. Stromberg to ask if there’s a ritual that could take souls from Bughuul, and they could perform it. Stromberg tells them they need something for the soul to gravitate to. They need to find a token to remind the kids who they were before they died. (Yes this is basically the ritual of Chud.) Amy’s related to Bruce, so she can basically be his token. She takes one of his plastic baseball trophies just in case.

Gwen remembers when she saw an eyeshadow palette at a store window that she couldn’t afford that Showalter bought for her “But only if I can borrow it. And call me Christine when it’s my turn to use it.” She buys a small makeup kit and labels it “For Christine” in glittery blue ink. Finn still has the bike lock he took from The Grabber’s house, but he forgot the combination. But Amy remembers because she used to have a crush on Griffin because he used to let her ride with him, which her parents never would because she was supposed to stay home and study. Amy visits the store where the pinball machine was, remembering the time she bumped into him and started crying because she thought he was gonna beat her up, and instead he helped her get home and taught her how to identify the good alcohol that’s worth stealing. She gets a pinball for Vance, but also steals a bottle of tequila. Finn goes to the nursing home Robin’s uncle (Antonio Banderas, because I like looking at him) lives in and breaks him out. They buy a copy of Texas Chainsaw Massacre just in case.

Amy goes to 7741 and lies in Bruce’s grave, hand out-stretched, calling for Bruce’s help like Gwen had pictured. The tokens are put in a circle around her, candles in between them. The candles are suddenly extinguished right as Bruce takes her hand. Gwen, Finn, and Amy can see all the kids standing there, along with Max and Bughuul. Bruce and Amy hug before she pulls him through, and Bughuul vomits out Ted (from “Fishing Trip” in Sinister 2). Amy gives Christine the eye make up and tells her to come out (in more ways than one) and be herself. Bughuul vomits out Emma (from “Christmas Morning” in Sinister 2). Amy gives Griffin his bike back and tells him to take her on a ride on it when he gets out. Bughuul vomits up Peter (“Kitchen Remodel”). Finn and Robin’s uncle pull Robin back and watch him grow up, old and new memories overlaid on top of each other. Bughuul vomits out Catherine (“Trip to the Dentist”). Amy asks Vance to teach her how to play pinball, and Max gets to hug his son. Ward pulls Max out and Amy has just started to pull Vance back when Albert Shaw appears out of nowhere and hits Amy because she’s not a ghost, nor psychic enough to see him. Vance and Ward jump in to defend her, both of them also getting beaten because Bughuul is helping him. Amy tries to save Vance again, but Vance keeps trying to fight Albert until Max goes back in and pulls his brother back into hell, pushing Vance out. Bughuul no longer has the energy to hold anyone’s souls so the rest of Bughuul’s victims (except Zach because he died a different way) are returned in a bright flash.

Finn wakes up in the same bed as Robin (Gael García Bernal because, again, I like looking at him), 27 years after Robin died but also didn’t. Gwen opens her eyes to her helping an adult Vance (Dacre Montgomery, because come on) with his hair as Amy tries and fails to do the same for Bruce (Remy Hii and no I do not care that he’s not Japanese) for their wedding, before yelling for Griffin (Robert Clark) to do his hair instead. Either Griffin kisses Amy before going in, or Gwen kisses Amy on her way out, depending on how you guys think this should end. Ward opens his eyes when Ellison Oswalt asks if his class on forensic pathology is boring, and Ward says no. Ellison laughs and introduces a clean-shaven version of James Sandin, who talks about how to survive a home invasion. Christine’s (Candis Cayne) puppy is carrying the rings, and Stephanie Stevenson is the flower girl. Pastor Milo Jacobs (“Sunday Service” in Sinister 2) has Vance and Bruce read their vows. (And if people really want him to live I guess Zach could be playing at the reception with Caleb and Courtney.) Amy sees her parents give Bruce away, and fidgets with her sobriety chip.

Amy goes outside because everything’s better now that her brother’s back and she feels like she failed at everything. Bruce finds her and says that she’s the reason he even met Vance, and her trust in him is why he trusted him too and why they got together. So technically they created their happy ending together and he loves her. Finn tells Ward that, since Albert had psychic abilities, Max probably did too, and Ward most likely has some level of it. All of the ghost boys will always be half-in half-out of the ghost world, and Amy—who touched it briefly—will have a little bit of perception left. Gwen or Griffin waves to Amy as she comes in and they dance.

#the black phone #personal #fanfics #sinister movies

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solarsonicsoda · 6 months ago

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Rebbie's Wrestling Reviews - AEW Dynasty 2024

Oh my God, I've been sitting on this finished review since Dynasty! Quick! Take this!

Kazuchika Okada (c) def. Pac by pinfall for the AEW Continental Championship in 21:55

4.5 STARS OUT OF 5

House of Black (Malakai Black, Brody King, & Buddy Matthews) def. Adam Copeland, Eddie Kingston, & Mark Briscoe by pinfall in 17:46

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Willow Nightingale def. Julia Hart (c) by pinfall for the AEW TBS Championship in 6:01

2.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Roderick Strong (c) def. Kyle O’Reilly by pinfall for the AEW International Championship in 17:18

4.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Chris Jericho def. Hook (c) by pinfall for the FTW Championship in 16:34

2.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Toni Storm (c) (w/ Mariah May & Luther) def. Thunder Rosa by pinfall for the AEW Women’s World Championship in 15:08

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Will Ospreay def. Bryan Danielson by pinfall in 32:40

4.5 STARS OUT OF 5

The Young Bucks (Nicholas Jackson & Matthew Jackson) def. FTR (Cash Wheeler & Dax Harwood) in a ladder match for the AEW Tag Team Championships in 21:34

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Swerve Strickland (w/ Prince Nana) def. Samoa Joe (c) by pinfall for the AEW World Championship in 17:59

3.5 STARS OUT OF 5

Overall, I'm going to give this show 4 stars out of 5.

#rebbie show reviews #aew #aew dynasty #aew dynasty 2024 #dynasty #dynasty 2024 #all elite wrestling #wrestling #pro wrestling

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galvanizedfriend · 4 years ago

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Tagged by the lovely @arrenemris! ❤️

Rules: tag 10 people you want to get to know better

Relationship status: Straight, but men suck. That's my relationship status.

Favorite color: Green.

Three favorite foods: Cake, Japanese ramen, gelato.

Song stuck in my head: Please Forgive Me by Bryan Adams. Why? I wake up with the weirdest songs in my head. It was The Start of Something New from High School Musical the other day.

Last song I listened to: Dust to Dust by The Civil Wars.

Last thing I googled: Ever Given HSKDGAHDGSADH

Time: 18:50

Dream trip: Greece. 😍 But I would also love to do a long trip across Germany and Scotland and have Costa Rica and the northestern part of Brazil on my list as well.

Anything I really want right now: For inspiration to strike so I can finish writing something again. :(

Tagging: @recyclingss @enniec123 @destellolunar @diaz-eddie @helpless-in-sleep @misssophiachase @sekretny13 @helpfulfairy @celestewrote @strangenightsofdaydreams and anyone else who would like to play! :)

#tag games #arrenemris #thank you for tagging me madina!!

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willcwthewisp · 4 years ago

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spirited away | eddie & willow

TIMING: before mother’s day. LOCATION: willow’s apartment. PARTIES: @specterchasing and @willcwthewisp. SUMMARY: eddie goes on a medium-driven chore, but gets medium uno reversed. also the spiderman meme except it’s mediums.

Willow sighed as she lowered her paint brush, feeling that familiar nagging sensation tingling in her neck that came whenever a portrait wasn’t quite right. It looked fine— lovely, even. But there was simply something amiss that the ghost in question hadn’t approved of, and she’d lost the snippets he was saying to her quite some time ago, as if his words had flitted out her open wind on the breeze. Oh well. The piece would be a nice one to sell, and there still might be a person who recognized what it was that she’d painted. There’d been quite a few instances of people coming forward, asking questions about certain pieces she’d done that looked far too similar to their memories of loved ones, or scenes of their youth. That was generally when she passed the painting off to her brother, a medium and exorcist who was much better equipped to deal with the ghost of the painting, and the loved one that came along with it.

It almost came as a relief when she heard a knock at her door. Almost. Rising from her place at the easel in her art room, she peered through the peephole of the door only to be met with the face of someone she’d never seen before. “Ah- sorry, can I help you?” she began nervously, already thinking of the disaster that could strike if she ended up having to open the door. She didn’t have any interest in causing a hospital visit today. Or any day for that matter. Maybe she should request to be moved to the first floor of her complex. Then it’d be a little less worrisome when it came to potentially throwing people across the hallway.

Eddie had some reservations about showing up to a stranger’s house unannounced, but they were outweighed by curiosity and a sense of duty. The ghosts made Willow out to be someone like him. In all of Eddie’s years in White Crest, he’d never had the opportunity to meet someone else who could interact with the dead. Admittedly, it seemed like she had a knack for ignoring them and that didn’t sit well with him, but he tried to reserve judgement until there was proof beyond the claims of a few disgruntled apparitions.

“Yeah, so, hey,” he said, eyes locked onto the peephole. It struck him as odd that she didn’t open the door, but they lived in White Crest, after all. Being careful saved lives. “I know you don’t know me and this is probably wicked weird for you, but I’ve got a message from a, uh, mutual friend that they’d really like you to hear. It’s a little private, so I’d feel a little more comfortable giving it to you in… well, private. You wanna open the door for me?” He thought about reassuring her that he wasn’t some kind of bloodlust-y murderer, but realized that would only make him seem more dangerous.

Willow’s fingers tapped nervously against the door, still looking through the peephole and reminding herself that this man couldn’t see her in return despite the eye contact he made. “A mutual friend?” she echoed, the phrase throwing her. She’d purposefully distanced herself from the bulk of her friends ever since this whole sporadically throwing people problem had come to her attention, and she hadn’t had all that many to begin with. It was a choice of her own, never having been someone to seek out the company of too many people. Willow had been more than happy with that before her telekinesis had made any company dangerous. Now she relied on the people she called at her telemarketing gig to remind herself she was alive. It wasn’t all that helpful when they were yelling half the time.

The ability to say ‘no’ was another of her shortcomings, and Willow walked a few paces back and forth as the man asked to be let in. Going back to the door, she glanced at him once more through the peephole. “I...okay- alright. But just- don’t come too close, okay?” If she could keep a table between him and her, things should be alright. Without further delay, she was opening the door to reveal the interior of her apartment, already taking a few careful steps away from the man.

When Eddie’s question was met with a few long moments of silence, he half-expected his venture to be rendered fruitless. He couldn’t find it in himself to blame Willow for not trusting him, but he did wonder where her sense of adventure was. If a stranger came knocking on his door with the promise of a vague message, they wouldn’t have been able to finish their sentence before he welcomed them in.

Just as he turned away from the door, she finally spoke up. A warning. “No problems there, I’m a big fan of boundaries,” he enthused as the door opened. Willow seemed even more skittish than the average White Crestian as she put ample space between them. Eddie decided not to let it bother him—she likely had her reasons.

“Okay, so, the friend in question is a little on the dead side,” he explained carefully as he stepped into the apartment. “Actually, there’s a few dead friends. Is that… like, is that unusual for you, having dead friends?” As accustomed as he was to having conversations with ghosts, he knew that wasn’t exactly normal. His parents made that perfectly clear to him. If Willow wasn’t as much like him as he hoped she was, he needed to ease her into the subject matter.

“Great- good, that’s good,” Willow babbled nervously as she did exactly as she’d planned, skirting around to the other side of the table that was in her kitchen while Eddie spoke. But the mention of dead friends was more than enough to catch her interest, and in a reflexive move she looked over to the chair that Kal often loved to frequent. He was the ghost she heard most reliably, and currently her best friend seeing as she’d banned herself to as much isolation as possible. Unfortunately she wasn’t entirely sure whether or not he was here at the moment, her focus pulled away from any attempts to perceive him by the stranger in her apartment.

Thankfully, Kal had no problem speaking for himself. The ghost had already taken up a spot at Willow’s shoulder the moment Eddie had stepped into the apartment, feeling rather protective after the last stranger to enter Willow’s abode had left her tired and crying. “What do you want?” the ghost asked the man reflexively, not actually expecting an answer from one of the living. That was- until he recognized the familiar aura of what Eddie was. “Oh shit- you’re a medium, too?”

Willow, still blissfully unaware of the guardian ghost asking questions on her behalf, was doing her best to play it close to the chest. She wasn’t entirely all that private about mediums and their abilities, but it wasn’t exactly the best idea to lead with ‘occasionally I see and hear dead people.’ “Um- do you have dead friends?” she asked, unable to come up with any better reply while being entirely oblivious of that fact that Kal had already given her away.

Willow’s babbling and general nervousness faded into the background the moment Eddie laid eyes on Kal. “I am!” he announced, eyes glistening with pride before finally prying them away to look at Willow. “Looks like we both do,” he said with a wide grin. Hope had taken hold of him before he reached Willow’s apartment, and now he knew it wasn’t in vain. Finally, he knew someone like him; someone he wouldn’t have to hide from, not that he usually did such a good job with keeping secrets. Eddie didn’t know how to be anything except himself, but he thought it might be nice to have someone in his life who didn’t look at him like he was speaking in tongues when he talked about the dead.

“You don’t have to hide anything from me, I’m just like you,” he told Willow. He thought it was a little strange that she apparently hadn’t heard the ghost out her, but maybe she was just playing it cool until she knew she could trust him. “Okay, maybe not just like you, but we’ve got a pretty cool common denominator.”

Eddie took a moment to center himself. Amidst the excitement, he nearly forgot what he came here for. He looked back to Kal. “I’m just here to talk to her about her paintings, nothing weird, I promise.” Again, his eyes switched their focus to Willow. “See, some of our dead friends aren’t exactly happy with how they’re being portrayed, and they’ve been very adamant that I bring the issue up to you.”

Willow almost jumped at the stranger’s exuberance, momentarily confused while he replied to Kal. She still couldn’t hear the ghost, her mind moving far too fast at the moment for it to slow down enough to listen to her ‘dead friend.’ “Like me?” she repeated the words skeptically until he began speaking to Kal once again. “So you’re a medium?” Kal put his hands up as if trying to stop Eddie’s words before he could get them out...to little avail. “Hold on- don’t say that!” Willow’s paintings were one of the few, free joys the woman had left in the world, and he wasn’t too keen on seeing whatever reaction she might have in response to the other medium’s claims.

But the words had been said, and Willow’s lips had already turned downwards into the beginning of a frown, looking towards the door of her art room and then back to Eddie. “They don’t like them?” Did they want her to stop? She’d always loved painting the stories she heard from the ghosts, even if some of them were sadder than the rest. Those were the paintings she also gave to her brother, the ones that had such miserable stories attached to them. Surely all ghosts deserved to move on if that’s what they wanted, but the ones that could only focus on their pain...that could only give Willow the traumatic stories of their demise, those were the ones that needed it the most. “I mean...I know my pictures aren’t perfect to what they remember but…” she trailed off with uncertainty, not entirely sure where that sentence had been going.

Kal’s warning went unfortunately unheeded, and Eddie only realized its importance once he saw the frown on Willow’s face. Her second question dampened his initial excitement. He didn’t know how important her paintings were to her, but it already sounded like he wounded her pride. So much for making friends.

“Well, I didn’t say that,” he quickly backtracked. “I’m sure they really appreciate the time and effort you put into memorializing them—I know I would.” Eddie spent more time than he cared to admit wondering about his own demise and what would follow it; how he’d be remembered. If someone cared enough to put his final moments on canvas, he couldn’t imagine being anything other than grateful. “Really, they just have a few minor critiques. You know ghosts, they can be a little picky.” He shot Kal an apologetic glance. “I know how hard it can be to feel the pressure of someone’s last wishes on your shoulders, it makes you really wanna do right by them, but there’s no way to do it perfectly every time, y’know? And only a few have come to me, so I bet you’re actually doing a really great job overall.”

The stranger was sure of the dead’s gratitude because the ghosts had said as much to him? Or was it because he assumed such a thing? “Did they...tell you that?” Willow asked tentatively, hoping that the answer might be yes. She didn’t paint solely for the ghosts, but it’d be nice to know that they got some enjoyment out of it as well. She’d always thought they liked having their stories listened to, being given a moment to relay something important of their life and seeing it painted before their very eyes. Still standing behind Willow was Kal, nodding his head emphatically as if he could provide the answer for Eddie, or at least signal the other man into giving a good one.

The mention of ghosts being less than fond of her paintings was awkward enough, but now came the part where Willow had to tell this man that she actually wasn’t all that familiar with working for the dead, at least not in the way most mediums were. She wasn’t as self-conscious about her lack of abilities when it came to her family, having accepted long ago that she was different, and actually being somewhat grateful for the fact that she’d gotten to live a life of her own rather than one ruled by the departed. But when such an admission was being made to another medium that wasn’t related to her...well, it was nerve wracking to say the least. “Ah- well- about that. I don’t actually see and hear them all that well. Just sometimes. Not like the rest of my family or most mediums or whatever.” The last of his words had another semi-hopeful spark entering her eyes. “Really? You think so? Do you know which paintings the ones that have come to you are upset about?”

Seeing Kal’s emphatic nodding convinced Eddie to mirror the action. “Yeah, of course,” he said. In truth, they were usually more concerned with their grievances than what they enjoyed about Willow’s work, but Eddie felt like her spirit had been crushed enough for one evening. If she needed to hear a white lie to keep her self-esteem from folding in on itself, he would more than happily oblige.

“Oh,” Eddie uttered upon hearing her confession, more interested in learning that her family shared her gift than anything else. He wondered what that must be like—to be surrounded by people that understood you. Mild jealousy flared in his gut. He thought he’d met someone like him, but instead it seemed to inhabit two completely different worlds. “At least you have people in your life who can help translate,” he offered, smiling sadly in spite of himself.

Willow’s follow-up question pulled him out of his self-pity. “Yeah, one sec.” He pulled his phone out of his back pocket and opened the notes app. “George, the guy who died in a house fire, he said his eyes weren’t that close together. Shelly, the elderly woman who died of natural causes, says that you got her bedroom all wrong—she can’t stand your choice of wallpaper. And, um, Andrea, killed by some kind of demonic moose, would like it if you painted her with a little more dignity. She swears she didn’t go out screaming.” Eddie looked up from his phone to see how much damage their criticism had done. “See? Not so bad, just… little things.”

“Really?” Willow asked again, rather smitten with the thought that the ghosts might like her work. Sure, the person she painted most for was herself but...it was still nice to hear that people had enjoyed your work— especially when they were the inspiration. “Well then...I’m glad they like it.” The very beginnings of a smile had taken to the corners of Willow’s lips, looking the most relaxed she had since this conversation began.

But that smile quickly turned to concern as Eddie spoke. He didn’t have anyone with him? How had he learned about the world of ghosts in the first place? “You parents...they can’t sense ghosts?” Willow supposed the ability didn’t have to run in families, but she was rather biased when she’d been raised in a family full of spirit-sensing humans. “Well you know- if you ever needed someone to help you translate I’m sure anyone in my family would be happy to. Especially my mom or brother.” It’d been some ten minutes of knowing the man after he’d shown up unaccounted at her door, and she was already offering him access to her family. This was probably what some of her more cynical friends were talking about when they said her kindness would get her hurt.

Willow listened carefully to his requests, trying to memorize them all before she realized she’d most likely forget. “Do you think you could send the list to me? I could give you my number.” Then he’d also have it if he had any ghost questions, and was too nervous to ask how to contact her in the future. Going over what she remembered from his list, her lips pursed ever so slightly as she thought of the paintings in question. She couldn’t be sure, but this seemed more like an issue of vanity rather than her skill. Except for the wallpaper one. She often filled in the lesser details of paintings that ghosts didn’t bother to outline with her own artistic license. “Yeah- not too big.” Now that it was clear it was more the ghost’s problem than her’s, she was somewhere closer to being set at ease.

At the sight of Willow’s sort-of-smile, Eddie grinned from ear-to-ear. It felt like he managed to do something right. “Yeah, me too,” he enthused. He didn’t know Willow well, or at all really, but he already had a sense she might need the validation. Eddie couldn’t blame her, he had a lot in common with Tinker Bell, himself. When the applause stopped, so did his heart. Considering that, he realized he might have been projecting, but doing so in this instance seemed harmless enough.

The smile dropped as quickly as it disappeared, giving Eddie a taste of emotional whiplash. Willow seemed concerned about him, he didn’t intend for that, but her offer struck him right in the heart. “I don’t really wanna bother anyone,” he said politely while every fiber of his being revolted against his ill-timed manners. “But, I mean, if they… if they would be happy to help, like you said, it’d probably be better for everyone if I took you up on that, right? Who wants an uneducated medium running around solo?” He shrugged while his heart beat wildly in his chest. Finally, people who would understand him. Eddie’s throat tightened as he considered the possibilities.

“Oh, yeah, no problem!” Eddie brandished phone and closed the distance between Willow and himself with little regard for how intentionally she’d cultivated it. “Here you go,” he said amicably as he offered the device to her.

Oh! The younger man looked very nice when he smiled, like he didn’t have a single intention to hurt anyone that lived in this world. The change in his demeanor had her mirroring it instinctually, and her own smile grew bigger— as if they were stuck in a feedback loop of grins. While he began to speak of being a bother, Willow’s head was already shaking in a fierce denial of the concept, not willing to let him disparage himself in her presence. “You’re not! I’m the one who offered, anyway! And I mean- it’s always nice to have more ghost friends, isn’t it?” Friends were the last thing she needed while she was a literal flight risk in the sense of sending those around her sailing via telekinesis. But she couldn’t just let him fumble in this strange world by himself. “Perfect, then! I could put you into contact with my brother first! He’s the most involved with all the spiritual stuff- he’s actually an exorcist in addition to his mediumship.” If this young man latched onto her brother, Forest, there was also less risk of him coming around Willow to get hurt.

Gingerly accepting his phone while being careful to avoid any contact, Willow tapped her number into the contacts, adding her name to the entry. Oh, right- she hadn’t actually introduced herself quite yet. “I’m Willow, by the way. Willow Finch.” She made no inclination to offer a hand for shaking, still avoiding physical contact at all costs.

The moment Willow uttered the words ‘ghost friends’, Eddie felt a rush of unexpected affection. His entire life, most people either completely denied the existence of ghosts or spoke poorly of them. For a moment, Eddie struggled to find the right words to say, an unheard of predicament for him. “Sorry,” he said with a laugh. “It’s just—you ever hear something that sounds too good to be true? I’m waiting for the rug to be pulled out from under me.” Not only did her family have mediums, it had exorcists. He wondered if she knew how lucky she was.

Eddie watched as she entered her phone number, half-expecting it to begin with 555. “Oh, right, I kinda did walk into your home without telling you who I am, didn’t I?” It wouldn’t be the first time he disregarded common courtesy and overstepped boundaries, and it likely wouldn’t be the last either. “The ghosts told me your name, but I’m Eddie, Eddie Carridine. It’s awesome to meet you, Willow Finch.”

Willow’s heart already ached for him, recognizing a loneliness in his words that she knew intimately these days. Perhaps their situations of isolation were from different patterns, but they’d been cut from the same cloth. The feeling of being alone wasn’t kind in the least, no matter where it stemmed from. Not for the first time she wished she could lend someone physical comfort in addition to emotional solace, the desire to lay a gentle hand on his shoulder growing stronger the longer he stood in front of her. “Of course. The world can be disappointing in the worst ways,” she began softly while forcing herself to stay where she was. “But I also know me and my family. And I bet you’ll be begging to get rid of us before they’d even think about leaving you alone. It’s just not in our blood.” After all, wasn’t that one of the tenants of being a medium? Ensuring that not even the dead were left behind, let alone one of their own. Where that was potentially comforting to Eddie, it was less than ideal for Willow— constantly having to make her own space when it came to the people that loved and raised her for fear of hurting them.

“You were just trying to help,” Willow began with a chuckle, the only reservations left in her being based around keeping Eddie out of arms-length. And so far he’d respected that. “And the dead...they have a lot less people helping them than the living- so I’m glad you did.” Her smile was softer this time, still settling into who she was while she was less concerned about a stranger being in her home. “It’s awesome to meet you too, Eddie.”

Kal elected this as good a time as ever to re-enter the conversation, some of his wariness stirpped away as the conversation proceeded. Besides— he was naturally inclined to like any medium he came across. “She means it- you know. About not leaving people alone. She can’t see me half the time, but she still talks to me. Even if she’s not even sure I’m here. She’d do the same for you.” It was why he’d become so attached to Willow in the first place, unable to deny the heart she had for caring.

Eddie smiled sadly when Willow mentioned disappointment. The world let him down a few times, but he placed the blame on himself more often than not. He made eye contact with his biggest disappointment every time he looked in the mirror. Willow swiftly pulled his mood out of the gutters of self-deprecation when she told him he wouldn’t be left alone, not by her family. A lump formed in his throat, forcing Eddie to convince himself not express such intense emotions around someone he met minutes ago. “Where’ve you guys been my whole life?” he asked, making an attempt at levity. Nothing she said felt real, but Eddie had a penchant for far-fetched beliefs.

“Yeah, you actually get it,” he said, nodding as he did. It made sense for a fellow medium to empathize with ghosts, but that didn’t make it any less surreal. “I’m glad I did too, otherwise we might not have ever met. That would’ve been a pretty big loss, I think.” He didn’t want to sound too certain, he knew how intense he could be.

Kal captured his attention next, confirming what Willow said. The lump in Eddie’s throat quivered, forcing him to clear it. “You guys make quite the duo,” he observed. “I, um, appreciate it—everything, I mean.” His gaze turned back to Willow. “You didn’t have to be so kind, most people wouldn’t. So, I… yeah, I’ll make sure you don’t regret it.”

Willow could tell he was on the verge of spilling over, she recognized it well when she’d seen it so often in herself. A gentle shrug tugged at her shoulders in response to his question, knowing he was trying to lighten the mood, but unable to perfectly match the nonchalance. “Just sitting here waiting, I guess. I think you’re actually running a bit late.” Another bell-like laugh trickled from her lips, not wanting to come on too strongly despite the kindness in her words. But she recognized a lost soul when she saw one, even if she’d seen less wandering spirits than most mediums had.

She got it. Maybe not quite as much as someone with fully realized abilities, but she’d seen enough of it through her sister and brother, and parents as well. For a moment Willow was also overcome by emotion, her throat tightening as Eddie landed his compliments. How long had it been since she’d had such a tender moment in person? How long had it been since she’d made actual eye contact with someone for this extended amount of time? “I think I’m the one who would have been missing out,” she answered with the corners of her eyes crinkling in a welcoming happiness. She didn’t mind his intensity, oftentimes having a penchant for it herself when it came to the delicate side of life.

Willow was silent a moment while she assumed Kal was talking to Eddie, reckoning the way his gaze flitted to the ghost over her shoulder. She’d seen it in the eyes of her family more than enough times. “Kal’s been here with me when...I haven’t been able to see much of anyone else. He does just as much for me as I do for him.” Possibly even more. “The way I see it- kindness is free, isn’t it?” Another shrug claimed her, and for a moment she thought she could almost feel Kal’s hand as he laid it onto her shoulder. “I’m just glad I can give it. You just focus on being kind to yourself, and we’ll call it even, yeah?”

Fresh tears stung Eddie’s eyes. He immediately blinked them away, trying his best to save face. Showing his emotions rarely sat well with him, but he felt safe here even though he only just arrived. “Sorry,” he offered yet another apology as a second wave of tears formed in his eyes. “I’m sorry, this is probably so awkward.” He wondered what Willow thought of him crying at the first sign of kindness. Eddie pulled the hem of his jacket’s sleeve into his palm and wiped away the evidence of his emotional outpouring. “I promise, I don’t usually do this in front of people I’ve just met… or anyone, actually.” He let out an empty huff of laughter, suddenly unable to make eye contact.

The blows kept coming as Willow turned the compliment around on him. “Yeah, well, we’ll see,” he countered. “Get back to me when you’ve known me for a few hours.” Eddie felt pathetic and happy at the same time; exposed and protected. It didn’t make sense, emotions weren’t supposed to contradict each other so harshly, not in his experience.

Eddie watched as Kal’s hand rested on Willow’s shoulder. He said she couldn’t see him half the time, but Eddie liked to think he could recognize love when saw it. An irresistible urge came over him and, before better judgement could kick in, his arms wrapped around Willow.

Willow was a sympathy crier. There was no way around it, and her own eyes were beginning to well as she watched Eddie’s fill with tears, though her’s were born of the happiness that came from witnessing the weight fall from the other medium’s shoulders. Her heart ached for him, recognizing just how desperate he must be to break down so easily when faced with the bare minimum in terms of showings of kindness. Her own clumsy laugh danced with Eddie’s while she gave him whatever time he needed to recollect himself. She’d already decided she was going to ask him to stay for some juice and cookies. Or maybe wine and cookies? He looked fairly young, just at the cusp of drinking age. Someone so young should never have been as alone as he seemed, and her soul began to hurt all over again.

All that turned to panic in the very blink of an eye as Eddie reached for a hug, and Willow’s hands were thrown out in front of her while she yelled frantically, “No! Don’t!” But it was too late, and as the young man came into contact with her hands she felt the telekinesis flash along with her flaring emotions. In another blink, he was pulsed back from her with a thrust far too powerful for the force to have come from her hands alone. “Oh god- oh god,” she gasped as she ran to his landing place on the couch. He’d fallen on something soft, but she wouldn’t feel relief until she knew he was alright. “Are you okay? Are you hurt? Oh no- oh god I’m so sorry.” This time her tears were ones of dread and hopelessness. She should have known. Should have known things were going far too well, and that danger was lurking around the corner.

Eddie pushed the envelope often, it didn’t always end well, but he could honestly say that being telekinetically launched across the room was a first. He hit the couch with a thud, feeling like the air in his lungs had been knocked out of him. Before he could manage to sit up, Willow appeared next to him spewing apologies and concern. Eddie looked up at her, recognizing that she never meant to hurt him, and couldn’t help laughing. His lungs hurt, but he preferred the pain over crying. Propping himself up on his elbows, Eddie shook his head. “Hey, accidents happen,” he said with a wide grin. “But, uh, do you think you could teach me how to do that?”

Accidents happened, but they happened far too often when it came to Willow and her telekinesis. “But they shouldn’t,” she insisted, head shaking even as she skittered to put space between her and Eddie once again. “I don’t- I don’t control it.” The admission was paired with a blanket of shame and guilt falling over her features. Eddie had trusted her to give an answer when she offered help, and she was already failing the first question of that test. “I’m sorry- I can’t- I don’t know how to teach you. I don’t even know how to teach myself.” That was why he should stick around her brother more than he ever clung to her. “You should- you should go for now, I don’t want to hurt you if you stay longer.” How could she offer him a home, and then cast him out in the next breath? Was that not the cruelest thing she could have done? But if he left disappointed, at least he left whole and with his life still intact.

“Thank you, though.” He’d given her so much in just the span of a half an hour or so. “Really- thank you. I’m um- I’m glad the ghosts chose you to deliver the message, and brought you here.” Now the ghosts of her anxiety would just have to get him to leave. “And I do want you to text me.” In person wasn’t something she was willing to offer in the wake of having lost control, but she remembered how relieved he’d look immediately before everything had gone south, the look of a man crawling towards an oasis in the midst of a desert while he’d throw himself into his attempted hug. She wanted to be the person that quenched his loneliness. Willow just wasn’t sure how to do it while keeping him in one piece.

#// I AM EMO ABOUT THESE TWO MEDIUMS #AND FRANKIE IS A GIFT #wickedswriting #chatzy #ch:eddie #spirited away

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g0dspeeed · 4 years ago

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Unconditional Positive Regard, 4

To finally meet her, Adam Smasher feels relieved.

Well, kinda.

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

Intake

Towering over her with enough girth to block out the sunlight from the street windows was Adam and his dwindling patience. He could feel the hot coals of his temper start to heat up as the terrified receptionist tried desperately to avoid eye contact.

It would be simple, he thought. The only thing that separated his frame from her own was a large desk counter. With one hand he could flip it on her, break some bones and crush her skull if she kept stammering as stupidly as she was.

“Um, do you, do you have the extension number-”

So simple.

“If I don’t know her fucking name, then why would I know the extension number?” he snapped.

“R-Right, um. One, one moment, please, Mr. Smasher, sir.”

Red eyes rolled at her incompetence. Been in the building for less than five minutes and his composure was already diminishing. The receptionist worked quickly on the screen in front of her, her blue optics lighting up intermittently. His glare settled on the frozen form of the other receptionist. She, too, deterred her gaze away from his own and busied herself at her side of the counter.

Pitiful, he thought.

No spine.

“The, the only thing I can see in our calendar is a note about scheduling a future appointment, sir.”

“I know,” he breathed. “Make me an appointment with Services. Now.”

“Oh, we, um, we don’t typically do walk-in appointments-”

“Today you do.”

Adam’s cold stare ended any argument that the receptionist prepared to make.

She pressed a button on a switch board.

“Hi, I have a Mr. Adam Smasher here for a walk-in appoint-Yes, I know that, but he insists to be seen. Well, can you check? He’s at my desk…”

At the receptionist’s rising panic Adam couldn’t help but feel a sense of satisfaction. Didn’t take much for that fear to kick in. Just a little physical presence and she was malleable to his whim.

A moment later, she ended her conversation and looked up at him with a weak smile.

“They said to wait in their lobby on the Services floor,” she stated.

Without so much as a thank you, Adam turned from the poor woman and headed towards the elevators. He smirked to himself as she exhaled behind him.

Even though the Arasaka Netrunner lacked proper access to the information he sought, Adam wasn’t planning to relent any time soon. For one, the job depended on it. Second, Adam knew that he simply would have to gain intel the more direct way, in an approach that was familiar, easy, and frankly more enjoyable.

Deep, deep, deep in the dark depths of his mind there lied a third reason. A reason that Adam would deny ‘til his dying breath if someone were bold enough to ask. A reason that sounded like curiosity, but actually teetered more so on the line between obsessive and slightly enamored.

But he would never admit that.

Not to a single soul.

The elevator doors opened on the Services floor, allowing the soothing fragrance of flowers to fill his senses. The lobby was empty like before, void of any witnesses as Adam stepped out of the elevator and approached the double doors. There was that same sense of determination in him, one that was resolute on getting this meeting over with and finally answering some of those damned questions that kept him up at night.

However, before he could grab the handle, the doors swung open. Out stepped the same doctor from before, Dr. Estrada, greeting him with that million-eddie smile.

Adam grimaced immediately at feeling the man’s positive attitude rolling off him like radiation.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Smasher,” said the doctor warmly. “May I call you Adam?”

“No.”

“Okay. I’m glad you decided to reschedule. Some of us were worried that you wouldn’t.”

Though annoyed, the doctor’s greeting also brought on a wave of confusion. The words as well as the man’s smile seemed oddly sincere. The doctor’s eyes held a friendliness in them with no hint of any fear or resentment from what occurred in the lobby during their first encounter. Another new kind of interaction, a change that was unsettling to the hardened merc. Those who were on the receiving end of Adam’s wrath seldom stuck around for a round two, let alone approached him with such confidence and genuineness that the man before him showed. Never broke eye contact. Never spoke in a small or mumbling voice laced with anxiety. There was a strong reminder of that initial meeting, however, one that the doctor would have a difficult time hiding. Ugly, purple bruises colored his neck in a pattern that matched the length of Adam’s fingers. His head moved stiffly.

“Have you deposited your weapons into our reservoir?” Dr. Estrada asked. When Adam didn’t respond, his hand gestured towards the reservoir unit and he added, “After they’re deposited, please also turn off your combat cyberware.”

A pause.

Adam squared his shoulders.

“And if I refuse to listen to this bullshit request?” Adam grumbled.

The doctor appeared to contemplate, as if truly mulling over Adam’s question.

“If you choose to refuse, that’s fine. We would have to reschedule for a different date.”

Another pause.

“To be honest,” continued Dr. Estrada, “You could walk in there completely ignoring our request without much issue. Our staff only has defensive cyberware programmed, and not even everyone has the full modifications so there wouldn’t be a lot of resistance. Not really anyone back there has any experience with combat, much less any violence other than that from who we work with, but…”

The man shrugged.

“She still wouldn’t see you,” Dr. Estrada concluded. “She keeps her word, keeps her promises, and when she sets an expectation, she won’t back down. Ever. And that’s just something you’re going to have to get used to, my friend.”

When it became clear that the doctor wasn’t going to offer anything more or elaborate, Adam found himself in disbelief. Again he felt unsettled. The words shocked him in their sincerity and his response, Adam’s own lack of anger or bitterness, was so foreign.

“Who the fuck is she-”

A loud scream cut through Adam’s words, upsetting the peaceful atmosphere of the floor. The doctor’s body stiffened and his hazel eyes lit up as he received new data.

Before the doctor could explain anything, another shriek ripped through the air, this time drawing out longer and with an even higher pitch.

Dr. Estrada’s smile vanished as he quickly exited through the double doors.

The whine of scraping metal echoed beyond the doorway, followed by the floor shaking as if something large and heavy was suddenly dropped.

From his place in the lobby, Adam could hear chaos build and build along the chatter of nervous voices that muttered and called out to one another in hushed tones.

Seeing that it was clear that the doctor wasn’t going to return anytime soon, Adam chose to cross the threshold.

The other side of the doors consisted of a large open space that was attached to several hallways and lined with tall windows. The space itself held many desks with computer screens and office supplies. Adam recognized some of the women from his first visit. Already appearing alarmed by whatever was happening, the sight of Adam Smasher stalking through their office certainly did not alleviate any of their fears. Before he could interrogate them, another scream rang out with enough volume to make him wince. He headed down the closest hall, towards the source of the dreadful noise.

At the hall’s end there was a group of concerned women, Dr. Estrada, and a couple in civilian clothes. The couple was holding hands, both looking more terrified than the others. All stood by an open door. Their postures were rigid.

Dr. Estrada acknowledged Adam as he approached the scene.

Again, before Adam could ask what the hell was happening, another scream cried out followed by a deep, shaky sob.

It was only then did Adam realize that the pained voice was that of a child.

Dr. Estrada motioned for the merc to come closer, though he pressed a finger to his lips as he did so. Adam complied, his eyes peeking into the open doorway to see what the commotion was about.

The room was destroyed. Absolutely torn apart. Books, papers, and other office supplies littered the floor, along with broken glass, a shattered computer monitor, and a large couch completely flipped over and on its side. One piece of framed art hung crookedly above a large dent in the wall, the metal bent and scuffed.

Small whimpers could be heard with breaks of short sobs in between. It was there amongst the wreckage and debris of the office did Adam see two forms huddled behind the flipped furniture. A small child, a girl, stood hiccupping in a pink, frilly dress. Her shoes were gone, but that wasn’t what made her so striking. All of her limbs were artificial, all new and polished chrome.

The girl couldn’t have been any more than five years old.

Her modified hands were gripped into tight fists at her side as she stood before the crouched body of the woman.

Her.

The woman with the golden eyes.

Adam swallowed at seeing her again.

How poorly his memory served in recalling their vibrancy.

Dressed casually in a pair of dark jeans and a graphic t-shirt, the woman spoke calmly to the child.

“You’re very sad that our time is over,” she said. “I see your tears.”

Once more, the girl cried out. Adam winced at the painful noise, but his attention never turned from the woman’s face. The woman did not react at all.

“I hear you,” she stated. “You don’t want to leave, but it is time to go home-”

“No!” yelled the girl. “I-I don’t wanna go home-”

“I know. I hear you, but our special time is over for today. I will see you next week-”

“No!”

The girl’s metal hands then reached out and grabbed the woman’s face. Those in the hallway gasped.

But Adam, without a second thought, stepped forward and completely entered the room.

Both the woman and the child quickly looked up and stared at the large merc as he stood before them.

The child’s anger disappeared, twisting into pure fear at the sight of Adam’s glowering presence. Her small hands detached from the woman’s face as she drew closer to the woman’s body for comfort.

“You’re okay,” chided the woman softly into the child’s hair. “He won’t hurt you.”

“He looks mean,” argued the girl, her wide eyes never turning from Adam’s scowl.

“He does,” agreed the woman, a hint of amusement in her own voice. “But know what else I see?”

With a raised finger, the woman pointed to Adam’s exposed arms.

“This man has a body like yours,” shared the woman tenderly. “See his arms? See his head? See his face? Some of his body is different, too, and that’s okay.”

She winked at Adam playfully. His scowl, though still very much present, weakened slightly at the unexpected act.

“Its time to go home,” the woman repeated, this time a firm tenor to her words. “You can choose to walk with me to the elevator or your parents can help you. You have a choice.”

Stare never leaving Adam, the child nodded her head and took the woman by the hand. As if leading her away from danger, the child pulled at the woman’s hand with a new urgency. The woman mouthed for Adam to wait in the room as she rejoined the others in the hall. The door closed behind them.

Mentally, Adam was already kicking himself over how easy it was for his focus to be deterred, let alone how he reacted to seeing her in person again. Why he decided to insert himself in the chaos with the child, he had no clue. Didn’t give a fuck about children. So long as they stayed the hell away from him, there would be no issue. But something disturbed him in seeing how the child grabbed her, how the woman contained the pain she felt in the child’s sudden hold on her face.

The woman’s words and how they were said weren’t lost on Adam either. Not one bit. How this woman was able to deescalate tense situations and how similar her dialogue with the child was to their own exchange in the lobby infuriated him.

Is that how she perceived him?

Like that of a child?

“Sorry about that.”

Angry red eyes fell upon the woman as she closed the door behind her and began tip-toeing through the mess in the office. A small smile touched her full lips as she went to stand behind a metal desk.

“Sometimes its hard to go,” she continued with a shrug. “And although I appreciate your desire to help, please don’t interfere next time.”

Adam scoffed.

“I’ll do what I want.”

Sensing his attitude, the woman’s smile flattened into a pressed line.

“Yeah, I know, Adam,” she returned. “I know that you’ll do whatever you want. Which is why I’m glad you decided to come back so we can go over how exactly this all will work out.”

“’Bout fucking time,” he groused.

To his surprise, the woman scoffed and shook her head.

Adam immediately crossed the room to stand over her. He savored how far she had to crane her head up to meet his eyes.

“Something I say amuse you?” he challenged darkly.

What he expected was her instant submission.

What he expected was her to avert her eyes like everyone else, to deny she did anything or apologize altogether, and to wait for his next command.

What he didn’t expect was what came next.

“Yes, actually,” she stated, not even hesitating to pay back his hard stare with one of her own. “Yes, I find it amusing that you’re so inconvenienced by your own stubbornness and are trying to blame me for it. You had the choice to cooperate with our policy and chose to strangle my colleague because we held up our expectation, then you have the nerve to come into my workplace, my office, demand for an appointment, and then proceed to complain because of the stalling that you yourself created. Does this normally work for you? This whole standing-over-me-tough-guy routine? Because I can do this all damn day. I really can. Know why? Because I do do this all damn day, but last I checked we both are pretty busy adults and I’d like to not have my time wasted by your outdated ways of handling things. Or is this some kind of foreplay to you?”

Oh.

Oh, where was he to begin with that?

It took every ounce of patience and self-control to not pick her up and shove her against a wall. No one spoke to him like that. No one questioned him the way she did, whether there was some truth to her words or not. Fortunately for her, she was named as a person of importance to Arasaka. Fortunately for her, there were still many questions that she held the answers to, her value in that light being the only reason she still breathed and was alive to argue with him.

“Who,” he began, his voice low and tightly controlled. “The fuck are you?”

A smile, one that hinted at some little victory, he figured, one that somehow made Adam even angrier, pulled at her lips.

“Bothered you, didn’t it?” she said. “Thought it would. You’re not used to waiting-”

“Answer me-”

“I’m Lumen,” she answered. “Dr. Lumen Furi.”

Not bothering to wait for his reply, the woman stepped away from the desk and began tidying up the office. Adam watched as she began making small piles of all the trash and debris, his anger still very much pulsing through his body. Anger from how she was talking to him, how she dared to tease him and make smartass comments in response to his voiced frustration. That anger was there, true, but more so was Adam upset with himself for how he allowed it and how learning her actual name brought some relief.

“The contract,” began Lumen. “Is one that I don’t really like.”

“What is it?”

A sigh.

Her face wore a look of disdain as she turned to speak to the merc.

“I’m conducting research on cyberpsychosis and crisis intervention,” she said. “I want to know if mental health crises are related to cyberpsychosis and even though I think it is, its 2070 and people still think that it’s just a hardware problem. They’re not looking at it seriously, at least not from a mental health standpoint, so I need hard data to prove my theory. And that’s where you come in.”

His eyes narrowed.

“Myself, Dr. Estrada, and some of the other researchers will be working with law enforcement and a Trauma Team convoy to provide crisis support to different neighborhoods in Night City. As you can imagine, it can be pretty risky work and we’re sorta ‘ride alongs’. Trauma Team has enough on their plate and covering our asses isn’t something they need to be concerned about. Arasaka is already backing our research, so-”

“Why?”

She shrugged.

“I guess they want in on the medical market? Not entirely sure. Don’t really care. What I do know is that they offered your services to aid in our groundwork.”

“In security.”

“Yep.”

“For how long?”

“Three months, once or twice a week, depending on the city region and time of day. Starting next week now that you decided to show up.”

His tempter bristled at the snarkiness in that last comment, but he decidedly shifted his focus to the contract instead. The jobs that he detested the most were that of security or protective services. He’d prefer that the only ass he cover was his own, and often the target was too slow, dumb, or fragile to make his job any easier. Although the woman appeared to be in good shape and proved her intelligence in their limited interactions, her ability to defend herself wasn’t clear, not yet. If anything, all she proved to him was that she enjoyed throwing herself in the middle of dangerous situations, a trait that wasn’t valuable to her new bodyguard.

“Fine.”

The word caused the woman to perk up. The sight entertained him.

“But I have limits,” he added. “Hard ones. And if you refuse to abide by them, you’ll either die or this contract is null.”

Her arms crossed, but she looked at him with expectation.

“Going to teach you some basic self-defense so you don’t get yourself killed. Until you do that with me then I won’t allow you to go into the field. Period. Next, I want to know what cyberware you do have and outfit you with defensive cyberware should anyone get too close.”

“Isn’t that your job?” she quipped. “To make sure no one gets ‘too close’?”

“Something tells me that you’ll fuck it all up and I’m not about to let you ruin this for me.”

He caught it. Small, but he saw that flash of rebellion, that grain of resistance, before she checked herself and pursed those lips shut.

“Last,” continued Adam. “You get a tracker.”

“Why-”

“Because I fucking said so. That’s why.”

The two stared at one another with enough intensity to start a fire. She didn’t balk at his stature, nor at how harshly his eyes took her in.

“Might I suggest a compromise?” she questioned.

“I don’t do compromises-”

“Humor me.”

When he didn’t argue, she resumed.

“If I have to have a babysitter, then I also would like a tracker for you.”

“What good-”

“Because I fucking said so.”

At that, Adam couldn’t help himself. He stomped towards her with enough force that she stepped back, pressing herself against the desk. His frame enveloped hers, all black camouflage and large arms caging her in on either side of her hips. Sitting on top of the desk, she gaped with wide eyes up at the furious mercenary, his face inches from hers as he towered over her body in muted rage.

“This is my job, my fucking ass on the line, and I’m not letting anyone, anybody, fuck up all the shit I had to do to get where I am,” he declared, voice shaking. “I don’t give a shit about who you think you are, I’m the one who says how this contract will go. Me!”

That’s it, he thought, his eyes unashamedly studying every curve and how that primal fear shattered that confident front of hers.

That’s what he liked to see.

The fear.

The uncertainty.

He got drunk on it, finally, the sight of her weakness, the proof that she was like everyone else.

Standing so close to her body, Adam picked up on the deep notes of her perfume.

“Is this what you wanted?” he growled, a new lowness coating his voice. His body shifted to stand more directly between her knees, causing her legs to spread. “Is this that ‘foreplay’ you were bitching about, Lumen?”

No response came from her at first.

Nothing.

Nothing new for him to be challenged with.

Nothing special.

But just as he felt that familiar burst of empowerment swell in his chest, the woman did something to instantly snuff it out.

Gently.

Kindly.

With a soft hand, the woman reached up and cupped Adam’s face. His own hand shot up to grip her wrist, a hard warning. It was ignored. Completely ignored as her thumb lightly stroked his cheekbone with an easy slowness. He swallowed.

As his smirk fell as did the look of uncertainty from her own face. Golden eyes glittered with something warm, something that Adam couldn’t quite define. A raw energy hummed between them as she held him there, held him in a paradoxical space of peace and a primal urgency to do something more.

A small smile.

“I love your eyes,” her voice said in a near whisper. “Red. They fit you.”

Just as his mouth parted to reply, an incoming call crossed his HUD. Adam moved away from her and the desk as if her hand burned. Her smile remained as he answered the call, the client on the other end simply informing him that he was running behind and would be late to their scheduled appointment.

“I’ll see you next Wednesday,” stated that woman above the sound of the client’s words. “You can go.”

And that he did. Adam held his composure, but never has he left a client as quickly as he did that that day.

#cyberpunk 2077 #cp2077 #adam smasher

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