#And also puts the timeline such that the rest of the brood is there listening in to the above over the comm lines

[ailithnight]

There are two huge parts of the reason things in Amity Park have calmed down.

1. Danny learned how to redirect ghosts towards less human disruptive pursuits of their obsessions.

And 2. The humans around Amity have become largely desensitized to the ghosts. Meaning their thresholds for tolerating and working around ghostly disturbances are much higher.

When Danny set out to track down Condiment King, it was with the intent to give him the same treatment the rest of the gallery has been getting. Ie making sure he isn't posing an active threat to people, redirecting him to less threatening pursuits if he is, and dragging him back to the Realms for time out only if he can't be persuaded not to endanger people. Other than that, just update him on the lives of his friends (because for a ghost, a few years out of touch is nothing, nowhere near long enough for those bonds to fade).

This to say, when Condiment King and Box Lunch return to Gotham, now educated in how to avoid making Phantom take them back to the Realms; and Batman eventually, begrudgingly calls Phantom to get him to wrangle the them back home; Danny shows up and just laughs. Because Condiment King and Box Lunch are playing by his rules. They're being minor nuisances, but not endangering people. Danny just asks if they're having fun and playing nice, then encourages them.

Then turns to Batman like, "You said he was your Rogue, not mine. By all means, have him back now," salutes and vanishes.

Runaway Rogue

So! A couple of years ago, Danny lost one of his Rogues.

It's not that they got Ended or anything, he literally lost them and couldn't find them. One day they ran off after being defeated and never showed up again. They were one of his Joke Villains, not posing a real threat but still extremely annoying when they wanted to be.

He hadn't seen them in Years now, and with the situation in Amity quelled and more free time on his hands than he had gotten in Years, he decided to finally track the Ghost down and see what he had been up to.

His search led him to Gotham, where he finally found the one Rogue that he had lost all those years ago.

Condiment King.

[south-sea]

i want to talk about how second chance and semi-modern shadow ‘interact’ with their respective marias in present day so let’s do that

semi-modern is arguably the more straightforward one so i’m starting with him. the shortest way of putting it is it borders on introject system activity or like having her ghost around. (could be either; even if i say one thing i’d rather it be the kind of thing that could easily be one or the other depending on what the reader prefers.)

he will occasionally have extraneous comments/thoughts/full on conversations in or with her voice. the thoughts are in fact separate enough he considers them genuinely from her—and accepts this as the case especially after learning he shares or at least has a copy of her soul.

she exists parallel to him, and as more time goes on, the more he gets comfortable with the idea and even engages her first for things like reassurance, points of view, and even if she happens to remember something he doesn’t. though there were also times some part of him questioned if it’s really her, or if his mind is just using her voice and general likeness to cope. given she is not capable of fronting/“possessing” him, he can see it both ways.

it’s not really something he talks about with other people; it’s not their business/relevant for anyone else to know. rouge and omega both know, though, and it’s a contributing factor to why omega in particular tends to refer to shadow as they/them by default after learning both this and his complete lack of preference in gender identity. in a way, omega acknowledges shadow as a system (or literally haunted individual) more than shadow himself does.

calling them a system is almost something of a shorthand, at least from an outside/scientific perspective. in reality, that is literally her half of his soul bubbling up and manifesting in a much more proactive/reactive way than only some nebulous feelings/preferences/etc (as it is for second chance shadow). though she may never be strong enough to have the communicative capabilities of an extant person, the more he engages with her, the more reliably she responds.

the days she’s dormant are the days he spends more time brooding, or gets especially reckless.

second chance shadow on the other hand is a complete mess. to start with, he died before ever learning he shares a soul with hers. one of the earliest ‘interactions’ he has in his second life is what he eventually refers to as “maria days”, which he otherwise does not ever actually talk about. it’s not until later that he learns it goes a lot deeper than that.

on his timeline, gerald effectively engineered a “bliss switch” in his brain that activates when he’s critically injured and on the verge of passing out. it acts somewhat like the pleasant feelings some people experience when they’re dying, and in second chance shadow’s case, causes hyperrealistic hallucinations of maria tending to him.

she will comfort him with words or gentle little touches, and the illusion is so real to him his body reacts as though he can really hear or see her; his ears quiver to listen, he can feel it if she’s touching his cheek, his head would automatically stop lowering as if he’s really resting it on her shoulder, and it’s all so vivid he can feel and hear minute details right down to sensing a heartbeat.

he rarely remembers these hallucinations, due to the nature of why they happen, or passes them off as “dreams” when he does. in one rare instance, the illusion of maria had touched his paw and ear that had been badly damaged and were persistently hurting, told him it was time to wake up—and when he finally came to, he found that his paw was no longer oversensitive, and his ear wasn’t as stiff. not too unlike a coma patient dreaming of a loved one doing such a thing and only then recovering, or other such ghostly encounters.

in the shortest terms possible, while semi-modern shadow has the echoes of maria’s soul in his own and may converse with it, second chance shadow basically has maria coded into his brain to act as a biological coping mechanism through extreme emotional/physical trauma. calmer shadow means higher chance of survival, after all.

both things contribute to why, in either timeline, they spoke to her during their fall back to earth.

[mama-qwerty]

Sonic Prime Questions

Okay, so I’ve had some time to digest Sonic Prime, and lemme say, I really enjoyed it. It was fun, with interesting characterizations, and nice visuals.

There were a number of things that left me wondering, though.

~ Why was Shadow looking for the Chaos Emerald? He seemed pretty intent on finding it, like it was some urgent matter he needed to address. Why? This also seemed to be before he ran into Sonic, which would mean there was a whole other ‘thing’ going on with Shadow that made him search for the emerald. What was he doing?

Theory - He was actually sent back in time to stop Sonic from shattering the Prism. That fight between them was meant to distract Sonic long enough for Tails to take more readings and figure out what was going on and how to handle the Prism.

Husband’s Theory - He was between brooding sessions with nothing better to do.

*****

~ The Chaos Council - Okay, so we know they’re “Eggman” but how does that work, exactly? Are they clones? Eggman (Eggmen?) from alternate realities he pulled together as a “think tank” sort of thing? And why do we not see the middle-aged Eggman from the Prime universe? Age-wise, he should be between Mr. Dr. Eggman and Dr. Done It. Where is he? He was technically close to the Prism when it shattered, but not as close as Sonic. Was he affected differently due to his proximity?

Theory - All these dimensions hold shattered versions of everyone but Sonic and Shadow. Ergo, each of the Council IS Eggman, but he was shattered into five different ages. No other dimension we’ve seen so far has an Eggman, so all of his ‘alternates’ ended up in New Yoke City, and that’s why what world is completely paved over and the other worlds aren’t.

*****

~ I know this universe seems based a lot on the games, but Sonic didn’t seem very . . . Sonic. He seemed to refuse to listen to anyone, and was more interested in jumping into things without any thought or understanding of the situation. Every time he saw a version of his friends, he immediately ran toward them and acted like they knew each other, even after traveling to what is very obviously a completely different world.

Theory - Sonic seems . . . I dunno, young? Like maybe this takes place pretty early in his adventures, so he doesn’t have the benefit of experience to draw from. Mr. What You See Is What You Get is doing what he does best--jump in feet first and be the hero.

Husband’s Theory - He’s intentionally designed to be “not ideal” so we can see some character growth throughout the series. He’s flawed, but will grow, which we’re already seeing signs of.

*****

~ Where are all the Sonics? Do they not exist on these worlds? Are they simply minding their business elsewhere? Did they vanish because Prime Sonic seemed to be infused with the Prism?

Theory - There ARE no Sonics on these worlds, because Sonic (and presumably Shadow) was at the epicenter of the shattering of the Prism. They were essentially protected from the blastwave that enveloped the rest of Green Hill, and thus, immune from the shattering that occurred to everyone else in its wake.

*****

~ The Prism apparently has time altering abilities, not only because Sonic was gone for weeks according to the New Yoke timeline, but also because in Nine’s flashback, the world was already paved over. How long ago did the Council come into power? Where did they find the Prism Shard? Rouge and Knux both remember before the world was torn up. How long ago was that? Even if we say Nine was about four in his flashback, it takes a while to construct an entire city. Was Dr. Babble around then? Is Dr. Done It essentially Eggman Prime who arrived a long time ago and put things in motion, eventually finding/creating the other members of the council?

Theory - Yeah, I got nothin’ that may explain this. Let’s say Rouge’s flashback was about 5 years ago, the Council would have needed time to get enough supplies and resources to not only build the robots and machines necessary to plow over Green Hill, but also to implement all that construction and keep the locals from causing trouble. So there would have had to have been a longer period when Eggman/the Council were working behind the scenes. The city looked like it’d been built up over time, and the people seemed beaten down, as happens with long-term occupation by an oppressor. So I have no idea how to explain that.

*****

I’m sure there are other questions bobbing around in my head, but these were the main ones that come to mind right away. Really hoping to see more really soon!

[purplecraze]

Fugo how do you think your life would be if you date each member of your little group you have like in different timelines

“uh...mmm. It's a bit weird to think of it like that. I love them a lot, but not in the way how I'd want to date them, I think... doubt any of them would really be up for it, either. Mun has-....” He stares at Umi for a while, looking like he could have known she'd go haywhire over romance talk. “....-a lot. To say about it, though. The floor is yours...”

(ooooooohhhhh!!!! *screams of the rooftops* OOOOOOOOHHHH!!! welcome to golden territory!! FugoXeveryone, oh hell yeah!! (just doing the canons for now))

Bucciarati Bucciarati and Fugo would be an absolute power team, they’d be communicating in a way that’s bringing up speculations on whether they’re actually telepathic. They just naturally feel what the other needs at the moment. Long private strategy sessions, spinning around each other and closing in, that end up in shy hand-holding and kissing. Bucciarati always waits for Fugo to initiate it, to be sure he's fine and ready for it. He's very careful with him. Bucciarati knows how to handle Fugo’s self-destructive tendencies well, without making him feel less or like he’s a trouble to his elder. The problem with them though, is that Fugo would put Bucciarati on too much of a pedestal and would lose sight of Bucciarati’s weaknesses. And that’s not a topic Bucciarati would address. But it would take a toll on their relationship without a doubt. In turn, Fugo would brood in silence over how super social Bucciarati is. He’d easily feel neglected. And there’s the hurdle of transferring from high admiration to equal lovers. will there ever come a time where they’ll be on first name basis? probably not... The one time, Fugo muttered ‘Bruno’ in a small voice and Bucciarati replied with ‘yes, Pannacotta?’ it was just so horribly awkward, it never happened again, EVER. Would it last? Yes. But only in the sense that neither would admit on giving up. they both would be running into complications on it, it wouldn’t make them very happy, but they'd be content enough.

Abbacchio This would work well. Fugo is one of the few Abba can hold a decent conversation with. Fugo wouldn’t condemn him for the saltmine coming loose once they get to deep conversations. Abbacchio isn’t exactly booksmart, so he can’t always keep up with ‘what’s this brat spewing on about now?’, but he loves to just sit and listen to Fugo going on and on about this tidbit of historical knowledge he found. Abbacchio is the best person to handle Fugo’s tantrums. ‘no, not now, think with your head *slap against the back of Fugo’s head*’, his tactic is diversion. just force Fugo to completely focus on something different and the topic of his anger will evaporate. Fugo would bring out the caring side of Abbacchio, without it turning absolutely one sided. Fugo would hear Abbacchio out on his troubles too, without getting pushy on it. he does, however, tend to say a bit too much. he won’t catch on to the moments where he’s supposed to just shut up and hold the other. Would it last? no, not at all. the very instant the both of them get too comfortable, they’ll be like ‘okay, this lasted long enough, let’s not.’ because why would you NOT destroy happiness with your own two hands, in stead of waiting for it to crash and burn??

Mista Oh geez, this would be one hot mess of a dumpster fire! It’s a ride Fugo NEVER AGREED to be in, but that doesn’t mean it’s not enjoyable. Mista just drags him along like a puppy, saying ‘c’mon, we’re going to have a great time!’ Mista would show him off. everyone needs to know this beauty is his ✨boyfriend✨. even though Mista tends to be flirty, he is super loyal to him. the moment Fugo would as much as make a sound over Mista talking to someone, he’d be like ‘don’t be mad Pannacotta, you know I only have eyes for you~’ It’s wild and intense and overwhelming. Fugo would not quite come to his right in it and it would get kind of suffocating for him on the long run. Guido doesn’t know how to respect boundaries either. Fugo would start fights, one-sidedly, a lot. both in words and fists. Mista wouldn’t easily be taken aback on any of it, though. Almost patronizing, he’d reply like ‘okay well, you do you...’ and take very little of the criticism. Then there’s the entire tetraphobia matter. Fugo would often lose his patience on it. But he’d also try his hardest to be helpful on it. He would look up on the phobia, it’s origin and how to deal with it. He would tell him it’s not an uncommon superstition and throw the theory behind it. Mista doesn’t usually get it. But when Mista’s having anxiety over it, Fugo doesn’t question its bizarrity and searches for ways to snap him out of it by making the topic either 3 or 5. usually 3. because destroying stuff is easy. Would it last? not a chance. Fugo gets mean on break-up. in particularly heated arguments, he’d be the kind of petty asshole who would take every book, text, dictionary around the house and HIGHLIGHT 4 letter words. ALL OF THEM They’re in the type of relationship that goes horribly wrong after a month, but they forgot that happened like half a year later and try again, failing miserably once, twice, 10 times more.

Giorno His relationship with Giorno is a strange one. The events of Man in the Mirror had Fugo starstruck and he thought very fondly of him since. But it came to crash and burn down when he found that he was the mastermind behind usurping the boss. Fugo loathes himself for the decision he made at that day, but a large part of that hate is to prevent himself from blaming either Bucciarati or Giorno. Because he knows Giorno is dangerous if he wants to. All the more as his new boss. At the end of Purple Haze Feedback, they have a very beautiful conversation and Fugo swears loyalty to him. It was the only way for him to move on after everything that happened. But they were also very sincere and shared memories that others wouldn't understand. He's also the only one who ever called him Giogio. They connect well and Fugo is very reliable. Giorno trusts him blindly and appreciates his criticism. Over time Fugo will grow bolder and says what's on his mind, knowing Giogio will take his shit and filter it well enough. Any initiative will have to come from Giorno's side, though. Fugo often feels like it's not his place to do so. But I don't think Fugo would ever forget that it had been Giorno who initiated the plan that had led to his friends' deaths. Forgive, yes absolutely. But not forget. Would it last? 50/50. there are 2 outcomes: they either spend the rest of their lives together, or Fugo ends up killing him. And I think Giorno would have peace with that.

Narancia Oh geez, where do I even start? They're not perfect, not at all. They fight and argue and it's led to many MANY bruises on both sides. But that's just how they are and if you'd ask either of them, they would be ready to die for the other without a shred of doubt at any given time. As much as they fight, there's also a lot of adoration from both sides. Fugo doesn't even have to try, to see stars of admiration in Narancia's eyes. It fills him with pride and makes him feel so good about himself. Narancia needs to work hard for Fugo's approval. but because of that, it makes actually getting it so much worth it. Both of them get horribly giddy on impressing the other.  A new dance, a fun date plan, a mastermind prank. The most important part for both of them is their honesty. Narancia knows that Fugo would never lie to him or hide the truth, like how his father and old friends had. And Fugo can trust that he can say whatever he want, even without filter. They can both rest assured that no matter how big their fights are, the day ends with kissing either way. A part of Fugo wants to better himself for the other's sake, but it weights him down as well, thinking he's not good enough. Narancia isn't the brightest, but his abundance of empathy and sincerity knows how to hit Fugo just right into believing he's good as he is for today. And if not that, Nara reminds him that he's not a saint either. They’d find happiness in a lot of little things. getting to snuggle for 5 more minutes, welcoming the other home, cooking for the other, singing along to the radio, doing the dishes. all those mundane moments are really precious to them. Would it last? Definitely. They'd have some bumpy rides, but neither of them could ever get bored of the other.

Trish The start of their relationship would be so incredibly AWKWARD. They both have no clue what to say and Fugo feels hella uncomfortable. But bit by bit, they start to warm up to one another. Fugo wouldn't want to involve her in any more mafia business. But for Trish, that week together is a fond and priceless memory. She'd want to know what went through his mind when he was left behind. And both of them would want to apologize. Want to start anew. And would want to get to really REALLY know one another. Fugo's anger is just..... it doesn't exist around Trish. She is super calm and soothing and just knows how to convey a certain energy to him which puts him at ease. Both of them don't like to be touched, so they're very careful with one another, asking permission, asking if the other is alright. They both really love music and share their favorite songs. She sings them as he plays the piano. And when the shyness slowly melts away, they both find that the other is super fun to be with. Dumb jokes, running jokes, ironic quoting, shitty puns. They both hadn't ever expected the other to be so entertaining. They learn new things on one another every day. And they try to improve, learn new skills. Trish would want to pick up on baking, Fugo would pick up on girls' fashion, doing her hair or her nails. Would it last? Yes, I think it would. They need time to heal and feel at ease, but I think they could really find peace and a new life in one another. I think Fugo could even come to love her enough to pop the question~)

[saturno-sol]

The Brainrot has gotten to me

WELL HERE YOU GO FOLKS (almost) ALL MY NOTES ON WYRMTHREAD (Chantilly/Quezal) both in Canon and in a Happier AU because yes Most put under a readmore because its over 1K long and the very end has some suggestive things because I’m allowed to think like that too so just as a heads up

Anyways here

Canon Codex

Do not establish a relationship outside of a blooming interest in each other that gets nipped in the bud due to...yeah cries 

So let us not delve too deeply into Canon rn, and sadly since the plot absolutely needs Chantilly gone to progress we turn to HAPPIER AUS!!!!! :DDDDD because I drove myself deep into brainrot and aoughhhhghhhghhhhghh

Songs I associate with canon because music is good- 

I THOUGHT YOU WANTED TO DANCE by Tyler the Creator

Mr Loverman by Ricky Montgomery

Rest Easy, I’ll See You Again by Cuco (the title is a LIE) 

Pain by Pinkpantheress

La Gata Bajo la Lluvia by Rocío Dúrcal

The Night We Met by Lord Huron (thank you Jaxx) 

Noche No Te Vayas by Los Tres Caballeros 

Better Timeline AU!!!! 

Placeholder name but honestly it might stick because I’m too lazy to think up of a better one hghfdnkj, am open to suggestions tho

Basic Premise of this AU: Through some magic fuckery or whatever, Chantilly is allowed out of the Troupe and decides to tag along with our funky wyrm gal because nowhere else to go/hrnng big lady pretty. They actually do start going out and it turns out hey! They like each other, like a lot. 

They like each other so much that they get married and bam, WyrmThread real 

This is great because not only is my otp now canon and alive, Fuego (and later on Lune when Fuego adoptskidnaps them into the family) now has both parents! And they love their kids sm like damn do not get in between them else you want to get yeeted to Unalive World. 

In this one, the motivations for [REDACTED] have now morphed into somewhat the same way in terms of being dealt with but now we got the lacey boy to help Quezal do [SPOILERS], fight [SPOILERS] and help complete [SPOILERS] and help establish her empire. (I’m sorry but I am not revealing any important Codex spoilers yet)

“Will you be the Malfina to my Connecticut Clark?” 

Girlboss and Malewife, except they’re both still murderous and would happily see you to your grave if you intervene with any of their plans. I’ve given Chantilly throwing knives :) because he deserves to be dangerous. 

He deserves to look cool!! With knives!!! Fighting alongside his wifey!! 

Of course NKG fucks off when Chantilly leaves the Troupe but I love to think of him being akin to a disapproving in-law (“Really Chantilly?? You run off and marry some wyrm that didn’t even have a kingdom to begin with? Have the standards of the Nightmare Vessels deteriorated as time went on?”) 

Chantilly is somewhat concerned that Fuego is much more, for lack of a better word, feral than a regular Grimmchild would be but he doesn’t regret the decision to have him. He loves his bitey son even if he scratches through fabrics like water. 

And Quezal enjoys having another person to coil around and snarl at anyone that gets too close to them. It does take a while until they’re like velcro due to her issues with touch being equated to violence (Thanks dad /s) but once she overcomes that fight or flight response she absolutely does not let go of him. 

Burrowing into a dark place and nuzzling until he smells like her makes Wyrm brain go brr. And since he isn’t a wyrm there’s no instinct yelling at her to maim him if there’s no babies to take care of/mating season passed, he in her eyes is harmless. Even if they both know different, at least in her brain he is just a lil guy, no threat to her. 

Chantilly loves all the attention he’s getting from her, absolutely will allow her to carry him off and coil up against him as long as he can work on sewing while she broods over him. 

He’s naturally warm and for a wyrm that needs outside heat to regulate her inner temp like a snake he’s like a hot water bottle, world cold husband warm. 

Happby family can these Queers be HAPPY PLEASE 

Love languages!!! 

Quezal once she gets comfortable with physical stuff likes to nuzzle and bite :) but not to draw any hemo or cause harm, just to hold in mouth. She also likes to do acts of service, making sure that her husband is wont for nothing and doing little things like sharpening his knives for him. 

Chantilly loves to gift-give! Usually things he made by hand. 

“Quezal pls let me make you pretty dresses and outfits please you would so look good in teal” 

He likes kissing a lot, smoochies for wife and cuddling is great for him too, as long as he can sleep with his chest unobstructed he’s good 

They both love showing each other off

“Look at my partner they’re the fucking best ever, none of you bitches can compare to them.” 

When the empire is finally formed and Quezal takes her place as Empress she offers the title of Emperor to Chantilly 

He declines, Royal titles are just not his thing and he feels uncomfortable with them, so instead he goes by the title of “Lord”

His duties consist of assisting with any paperwork Quezal doesn’t want to deal with and being eye candy (/j but also not really he loves being shown off esp in new outfits) 

He also deals with nobles that aren’t too pushy, the ones that do are quickly steered towards Quezal. And usually after a meeting with her they learn better than to try to smart mouth either of them. 

Family Notes!

Chantilly’s the one to go to if you need advice and soothing comfort

Quezal’s the one to go to if you need someone beat the fuck up and also advice but in the no nonsense way. 

She also comforts but it's not in the way that Chantilly will delicately soothe the pains away, she tells you how it is but will hug you and tuck you into bed if wanted. 

On the other hand, Chantilly is the one Fuego and Lune go to if they want to do something crazy or stupid and know that mom won’t say yes. 

He dresses them up in poofy outfits (see the clown costume I’ve thrown on Fuego as an example) and shows them off to Quezal 

“Look my dear! Aren’t they the sweetest things you have seen!” 

It is very funny 

SONGS I ASSOCIATE WITH THIS AU

Meet Me At Our Spot by WILLOW

First Love/ Late Spring by Mitski

I Hear A Symphony by Cody Fry

She’s My Collar by the Gorillaz

My Kind of Woman by Mac DeMarco

New Light by John Mayer

Vivir by Jardin

coffee by Miguel

Never Getting Rid of Me from the Waitress Musical

WARNING WARNING

Ok next few am going to be a bit suggestive so stop here if you’re not into that but

I’m debating on if they’d have more children than Fuego and Lune and if so, how many HDJFJKSJ (thinking of twins named Arco and Iris because Arcoiris means Rainbow and I kind of like that and I’m also a sucker for twins) 

Listen, they’re both switches but most if not all the time Quezal’s the one topping. The man is submissive and breedable what do you expect HDJFJS

s i z e  D i f f e r e n c e 

Chantilly is a sensual romantic and loves a lot of buildup while Quezal just wants to get on with the good stuff, they make it work with communication and understanding each other :) 

They’re both capable of carrying so if they did have more kids I’d imagine they’d take turns on who’s turn it is to be eggy. (And I have so many thoughts about how they’d treat each other while pregnant but HHHHFJFJFHHHF too embarrassed rn waagaghgg) 

These two love each other very much and I love them. 

[pollylynn]

Title: . . . Makes the Heart WC:  1100

“What— My damage?”  — Richard Castle, I, Witness (7 x 13)

She wishes he had told the woman on the other end of the phone no. It’s the farthest thing from fair, and she’s glad that’s the voice that wins the race to the tip of her tongue when he, rightly pleased with himself, announces that he’s the one getting the call for once. She is legitimately glad that she sells the fantastic, she sells the It’s not like I don’t leave . . . well enough that he’s able to recapture the ebullient feeling. She is definitely, honestly, and lots of other -ly words glad. But she still kind of wishes he’d told that woman no. 

Because now she’s at the precinct. Now she’s feeling his absence here like a hundred tiny pinpricks an hour. She feels the boredom of not very important paperwork without him to gripe at every time he distracts her from her very important paperwork. She feels defensive every time someone asks after him, asks how the PI business is going, and even though most of the inquiries are good natured enough—sincere enough—she feels defensive and oversells. 

Today, she is particularly feeling his absence, because Ryan and Jenny have taken the ill-advised step of trying to fix Esposito—Esposito—up, and she has all kinds of thoughts about that. These range from How dare you? on Lanie’s behalf to Oh, thank God! also on Lanie’s behalf, and kind of on her own, because Esposito is  less a brooding, Byronic hero than he is whiny. But she also has questions for Mr. and Mrs. Ryan, like who the hell would have signed up for a convenient-for-all-your-murder-and-body-disposal-needs ski weekend with Esposito and Lanie? 

In short, she has a lot of things she needs him pretty urgently for today. But he’s not even available for whispered phone conversations or text sniping. Instead, he’s off having potential clients and whatever, and whether it’s fair or not, she wishes he’d said no to the woman on the other end of the phone. 

She wishes he had told Eva Whitfield, as the name of the woman on the other end of the phone turns out to be, no. Her fairer, more reasonable inclinations don’t quite win the race to the tip of her tongue this time. Wait, tonight? she blurts as though she has not reached for the phone, half naked, mid-make out plenty of times. But she was looking forward to to making it way past half naked and her ambitions go far beyond making out. 

But he wonders aloud what he was supposed to tell his friend, who wants to see, in living color, that her marriage is well and truly over, and her fairer, more reasonable inclinations show up, panting, but ready to respond when he asks her, more than a little miserably, to remind him never to take this kind of case again. She reminds him that saying yes to things he’s not necessarily excited about is part of the plan for making a go of the PI thing. And still feeling a twinge of guilt over the fact that she’s faking it till she makes it today, she goes the extra mile and offers to cook him dinner. 

Guilt-motivated or not, the offer to cook ends up lifting her spirits, at least in the short term. She has the loft to herself and the role-reversal is pleasant. She enjoys the solitude for the way it builds the pleasant anticipation of seeing him. She enjoys the work of her hands and the excellent-smelling fruits of her labor. She has everything on the food front well underway and she eyes the rest of the loft like a battlefield waiting for her to wage war. She thinks about the pleasant tables he has set for her and the way he can, without fail, anticipate whether it’s a wine and jazz and candlelight night for her, or one of those days when she wants junk food and beer on the couch. 

She eyes up the theater on which her victory will play out. She tries to put herself in his shoes—to think about the cues he must be picking up on in her voice, in details like an actual phone call versus a terse series of texts. She’s good-naturedly cursing his name, because she can’t figure out at all how he always knows, when the phone rings. She does a little soft shoe of triumph. She’s sure the stars have aligned and she’ll know from this well-timed call exactly what it is that he listens for. 

But his voice breaks up. What she hears of it is heart-stoppingly frantic. The call drops, The screen of her phone goes horribly blank. Fear climbs the back of her throat and the only thought in her head is that she wishes he’d said no to Eva Whitfield. 

The phone rings again, a million years later. It has to have been a million years, and she’s been standing there. She has just been standing there, doing nothing. But she hears his voice, faint and no less frantic. He doesn’t sound right. On any number of levels, he doesn’t sound right, and she makes him stay on the phone while she juggles the landline and calls the Westchester PD. She makes him stay on the phone while she races to her car and tries to will Manhattan traffic out of existence. 

She finally hangs up—grudgingly hangs up—when and only when she knows local law enforcement is on the scene. She lets her foot grow heavy on the gas pedal and beats the steering wheel and fumes about head injuries and yet more memory loss. She beats the steering wheel and fumes about the very real possibility that he could have died in those damned woods—he could have disappeared for good this time and left her never knowing.

Her tires screech as she brakes to a hard stop near the Westchester cruisers are pulled up at disorganized angles. She sees him startle as her headlights sweep across the scene. She sees in that instant, the fear and bewilderment, the trauma and grief and guilt written all across his face. She beats the steering wheel one last time. She composes herself as best she can. She climbs out of the car and she races to him. She folds herself into his arms and whispers, Castle, I'm so glad you’re okay. 

She bites her tongue. She doesn’t tell him she wishes—devoutly wishes—he had told Eva Whitfield no. 

A/N: The timeline of Castle’s unconsciousness  . . . it’s a wonky thing. Much like this would be. Were it A Thing. Which it is not. 

images via homeofthenutty

[nommy-thoughts]

Danger Noodles Chapter 3 The Part With the Vore

Wordcount: 2 K

Summary: Giant nagas, unlike micro nagas, have gastric brooding. In other words, Protective Baby Noms are a thing!

Note: This story follows two timelines, one with vore and one without. This chapter belongs to the vore timeline and is almost entirely different from the non-vore version.

Cowritten with @that-prey-lounge​!

[Danger Noodles Masterpost]

~~~~~

Roman awoke, heart pounding in his chest. Remus was also awake, he could feel the tense grab on his bicep.

“Wolves.”

“They won’t come in here.”

“They might come for the butchered carcass. We didn’t eat it and it smells of blood. The bears haven’t just put the pressure on us.”

Roman bit his lip, glancing down at the three humans snuggled up in their nest of coils. “We can’t let our humans get eaten. Not by anybody. They’re so small and defenseless.”

Remus nodded. “Like babies,” he agreed.

Roman suddenly perked up. “Like babies! Remus, we can protect them like Mom used to protect us!” He looked at the humans again, mentally comparing them to the infants he and Remus had once been. Adult humans were bigger, and the twins weren’t yet fully grown. Roman frowned in realization. “I don’t think we can fit more than one apiece.”

Remus considered it. “Virgil seems most capable of protecting himself.”

The twins shared a look, and Roman picked up Patton in his hands. The little human squirmed slightly, but Roman managed to shush him and lull him back to sleep.

Remus untangled Logan from Virgil and softly rubbed the human’s hair until he was fully asleep again.

“Down the hatch, for protection.” Remus looked over at Roman, who nodded.

Roman opened up, unhinging his jaw. He flexed a muscle in his throat, opening up the right passageway and sealing off the wrong one. It absolutely wouldn’t do to get this wrong. Gently, he eased Patton’s legs down his gullet.

Remus followed his example, easing Logan down the right passageway so he’d be safe in Remus’s pouch.

The twins clicked their jaw shut in near unison, hands supporting their middles as the humans slipped down into them. Unlike their dinners from earlier, the humans stopped at the base of their human-like torsos. Rather than a stomach, they were inside the special brooding pouch every naga had to carry their young in until they were strong enough to handle themselves in the outside world. The twins had never used theirs before, but this felt very right.

Slowly, the twins sank back into their nest, curling up belly-to-belly so that their gently swollen middles touched. Roman pulled Virgil over, draping him across their bellies, and without needing even a word to communicate the idea, the twins wrapped each other and the humans in a protective hug, then coiled their tails all round so that the three little ones were protected in the very center of the ball. Their arms kept the heavy mass of scales suspended over Virgil so he couldn’t be crushed by accident.

“Remember curling up together in Momma’s pouch?” Remus said softly, already drifting off again.

“Mm-hm,” Roman murmured. “That was good. Never felt safer. I couldn’t tell where my tail ended and yours began, most of the time.”

Neither naga considered, as they fell back asleep, that humans didn’t have childhood experience with being protected inside their parents, and wouldn’t immediately realize that that was what this was.

The twins were awoken by the sound of screaming.

The rising sun softly filled the usually dark cave with gentle morning light. Virgil filled it with panicked screams, frantically squirming between them. The two nagas moved apart.

Virgil scrambled away from them and over to the three humans’ bags. After a moment’s fumbling, he yanked his long knife free, brandishing it in the direction of the two nagas, who were clutching their softly bulging bellies.

“What is it?” Roman softly rubbed his middle, feeling Patton wake up inside. “Where’s the danger?”

Virgil spluttered and pointed his knife at the naga. “Spit them up! Right now!”

“Huh?”

“You’re both monsters! You murdered my friends!”

Remus blinked, and then looked at Roman. “Humans don’t have pouches. Roman, humans don’t have pouches.”

“He thinks we killed them.” Roman covered his mouth in horror.

“Of course I think you killed them!” Virgil snarled, clearly enraged. “What happened to Patton being ‘too cute to eat,’ huh? Couldn’t you have at least spared him?” His voice was tight, on the verge of tears. “Couldn’t you have eaten me instead?”

“We did spare them.” Roman put his hands on his abdomen. “They’re safe—”

“Try that with someone else.” The knife pointed at them trembled. “Spit them out, or I’m going to gut you!”

Remus glanced at Roman, making a small hand gesture. Roman nodded, and they pounced.

Roman pinned Virgil on his back. Remus disarmed him and tossed the knife away.

“Listen to us, your friends are safe. We’ve just tucked them away in our pouches.” Roman felt Patton squirm a little more.

“Why should I trust you? You ate my friends!”

Remus scoffed. “It was barely eating. We just put them in our mouths and swallowed. They are not in a stomach, and they’re fine.”

Logan was moving too from the noises surrounding him and the quick movement. Patton was the first to speak, however. “Roman? Is that you?”

Virgil cried out, and Roman felt Patton squirm a little more vigorously.

“Virgil! Where are you? R-Roman! What happened?”

“Wolves got too close for comfort in the night. Remus and I swallowed a couple of you up to keep you safe.” Roman gently patted his belly. “We, uh, forgot humans don’t have baby pouches to do this kinda thing with.”

“Ah,” Logan said, oddly calm, his voice muffled by the layers of Remus’s flesh between them. “That would explain the unusual surroundings.”

“Logan!” Virgil shouted. “Are you alright?”

“Yes, I’m fine,” Logan said. “This is definitely not a stomach. It’s quite dry, and there’s only one opening, up at the top.” He was quiet for a moment. “Did you say this is a baby pouch?”

“Yeah.” Roman gently rubbed his belly with the heel of his hand. “Naga parents keep their babies in here for the first couple years. Most of my earliest memories of my Momma are her pouch.”

“Fascinating.” Logan sounded like he was itching for his notebook. “That would explain why your food slid past your bellies right to your tails yesterday. I was under the impression that all nagas had two stomachs, but apparently not.”

Roman blinked. “Who told you that?”

Patton perked up. “Oh! Our mouser naga, Dee-Dee!”

“Can— can you let them out?” Virgil interrupted. “This is unnerving.”

Remus nodded and Roman slithered back, letting Virgil up. After a second, the twins started to make a noise not unlike a cat with a hairball, and then Patton and Logan both tumbled to the floor. Luckily, the nagas had been bent over, so it wasn’t a long drop. They picked themselves up.

“Impressive,” Logan said, dusting himself off. “Not a single tear on my clothes, despite your sharp, backward-pointed teeth.”

Virgil grabbed his friends, squeezing them in a tight hug.

After a second, Remus tapped Patton on the shoulder. “Don’t mean to interrupt, but, uhm, Dee-Dee? A mouser naga?”

Patton nodded. “I’m allergic to cats,” he said, like that explained everything. Roman supposed that to a human, it might’ve.

“What is a mouser naga?” he asked.

“They’re nagas, like you guys, but really little.” Patton estimated about two or so feet with his hands. “Dee-Dee is only about this big. He’s just a little fella, and he used to be even smaller, but he’s been growing. I bought him a while ago because we had a real bad mouse problem, but he’s part of the family now.”

The twins blinked owlishly at each other. “We didn’t know those things existed.”

“What did you think I was referring to when I mentioned smaller nagas last night?” Logan asked.

Roman shrugged. “Juveniles?”

Remus estimated the size with his own hands and shook his head. “I don’t think we were ever that small before.”

Logan shrugged. “Humans have been basing assumptions of your species off the observation of the micro naga, since it’s dangerous to study you directly. Obviously that resulted in some errors.”

Roman tsked loudly, shaking his head. “Looks like Remus and I might need to let you poke at us more, if you don’t even know about the baby pouch.”

Logan practically lit up. “Would you really?” he asked eagerly.

“Of course, if it’ll help your understanding.”

Virgil sighed quietly. “And the nerd is going to bounce off the walls.”

Logan nodded, grinning broadly. “This is splendid!” he said. “I can get my equipment, and conduct a proper study. I may be the first person to ever have this opportunity.”

Remus scooped Patton up, hugging him softly. “All because this little dumpling won us over.”

Logan paused. “That’s right. Patton, I owe you. Thank you.”

Virgil softly touched Logan on the arm. “I don’t want to be That Guy, but we really have to go. We were supposed to be home yesterday, and we’ve got things to do.”

Roman pouted. “Do you have to?” he asked. “Don’t humans like eating food in the mornings before they do things?”

“We do,” Patton agreed. He gave Virgil a pleading look. “I’m hungry, Vee.”

Virgil sighed. “All we have is room-temperature venison, and our snacks, which we can eat on the go.”

Remus chewed his lip, resisting the urge to just coil around the three of them and never let go. “We’ll escort you to the edge of our territory.”

Logan nodded stiffly. “Sounds reasonable, considering someone got us lost.” He side-eyed Virgil, who at least had the grace to look a little embarrassed.

“So are you not gonna eat the rest of the cook deer?” Remus asked, edging over toward it.

“I’m thinking no,” Virgil said.

Remus grinned and swept the meat up into his hands. Roman hissed slightly as it vanished into Remus’s stomach.

“You glutton!”

“You snooze, you lose.” Remus shrugged, licking his lips.

“You didn’t even savor it!”

As the twins devolved into arguing, the three humans collected their gear, making sure everything was in place.

Virgil retrieved his knife from where it had been flung. Inspecting it, he frowned. It had a ding on the blade from striking against a rock. That would take some effort to smooth out. He was about to head back to the others when he noticed something that gave him pause. Behind one of the larger rocks was a pile of bones of all sorts. Some of them were definitely inhuman— for example, a curved rib bone nearly as long as Virgil was tall— and he couldn’t spot any obviously human bones in the pile, but even so, a chill ran down his spine.

’That was nearly us.’ Virgil swallowed nervously as he returned to the others. ‘Thank goodness Patton can melt even the iciest of hearts.’

They were on their way out of the woods soon, and the twins’ playful banter almost made Virgil forget about the bones. Almost.

It didn’t take long before the nagas complained that humans walked too slowly. That was all the warning they got before they were scooped up into huge arms. Roman lifted Logan, while Remus picked Virgil and Patton up together, squishing them into each other in his hands for a few moments.

“Remus,” Roman scolded lightly. Holding Logan against his chest with one hand, he used the other to help his brother reposition. Remus ended up with a human in each arm, half leaning on his chest.

“Comfy?”

Virgil squirmed a bit, more uncomfortable with the situation than with his position. “It’s fine.”

Traveling like that, they covered ground much more quickly. Soon, they reached the edge of the twins’ territory. Although they stopped, the nagas looked very hesitant to set their new friends down. Patton patted Remus’s arm. “It’s okay,” he said. “We’ll come back to visit.”

“Promise me?”

Patton nodded. “I promise.”

Logan brushed himself off. “Of course we’ll return eventually. I’ve been promised cooperation in clearing up biological misconceptions.”

Virgil tightly hugged himself while everyone said their goodbyes. When it came his turn, he gently patted Roman on the forearm. “Thanks… for not eating us.”

“You’re welcome.” Roman softly ruffled his hair. “Take care of yourselves.”

The three humans continued forward, with more than a few backwards glances at their large new friends.

~~~~~

Chapter 4: Home Again

[pikapeppa]

Fenris/f!Hawke and the Inquisition: Possessed

Chapter 49 of Lovers In A Dangerous Time (i.e. Fenris the Inquisitor) is up on AO3! Only an excerpt is here (8170 words); read the whole thing here on AO3. 

In which the adventures in the Frostback Basin continue... 👀 

******************

It was past noon by the time Fenris and his companions finally made their way back to the fishing camp. They’d ended up spending a couple of very damp hours in the swamp to the east of Stone-Bear Hold; it turned out that Storvacker was being held by a group of Hakkonites in an old Tevinter prison at the northern margin of the swamp. After freeing the bear – who had joined them in fighting the Hakkonites, to Dorian’s mixed horror and delight – Hawke and Dorian had discovered a number of very macabre skulls that reeked of blood magic, giving Fenris even more motivation to eliminate the Jaws of Hakkon. 

They’d also rescued Colette, Professor Kenric’s research assistant, from a very angry gurgut, and Blackwall and Sera had accompanied her to a Tevinter ruin to the northwest while Fenris and the others went to investigate the island off the southern shore.

Dorian grimaced at the mud stains on his borrowed boots as they made their way along the winding trail out of the swamp. “Odd how many Tevinter ruins there are in this area, isn’t it? It is slightly warmer here than in the rest of the frigid south, but still. It’s a strange place for the Tevinters of old to try and establish themselves.”

“Kenric said the same thing,” Hawke said. “He mentioned this wasn’t a very good military spot, so maybe they were ritual sites or something like that instead.”

Fenris made a disgruntled noise. “Blood magic rituals, most likely. Sacrifices to the Old God Razikale, if that prison is anything to go by. The Tevinters likely came south seeking new victims for their nefarious plots for power.”

Cole blinked absently. “Praying, pleading, praising, but no answer and no help. They were very scared.”

Fenris raised an eyebrow at this, but Bull shrugged unconcernedly. “It seems like the Vints got their payback for settling so far south. Maybe the ancient Avvar sent them crying home to their mothers.”

Dorian wrinkled his nose at Bull, but Hawke spoke up. “Their timelines don’t match up, actually,” she said. “I’m pretty sure Kenric said the ancient Avvar came here much later than the ancient Vints.”

Fenris shot her an impressed look. “You really were listening to him.”

“Give me some credit. I’m not a complete idiot,” she retorted. Then she smiled suggestively. “Besides, listening to him is a pleasure. He has such a lovely Starkhaven accent, don’t you think? It’s like listening to Sebastian, but without the piousness and the ‘you shouldn’t spit sunflower seed shells in the Chantry’ lectures.”

Varric snorted a laugh while Fenris shook his head in mocking censure. Dorian shot them a funny look, then returned to the topic at hand. “Maybe the ancient Tevinters got cold and decided to head home to warmer pastures,” he suggested. 

“That doesn’t sound very Tevinter,” Fenris said flatly. “Tevinters are more likely to dig their heels in and double down when they see that their schemes are failing.”

Dorian shot Fenris a debonair smile. “We are a stubborn bunch, aren’t we, Fenris? I would say it’s part of our charm.”

Fenris huffed. “I hardly count myself as Tevinter.”

Varric smirked at Dorian. “Ah, lay off of him, Sparkler, you’re going to make him start brooding.”

“I don’t brood,” Fenris complained.

Dorian laughed. “And there’s that homeland stubbornness I so adore.”

Fenris gave Hawke a long-suffering look. “Remind me again why you invited them to join us?”

Hawke pinched his chin affectionately. “Because you’re smiling. And I’d do anything to put a smile on that gorgeous face.”

Bull chuckled. “Keep it in your pants, little Hawke.”

Hawke laughed and shoved his arm, and they continued on their way back to the fishing camp. Less than an hour later, they were stepping off of the rowboat and onto the island. 

Varric pulled a little face as he looked around. “That’s a lot of demons. Chuckles would be right at home.”

“Oh, they’re not demons, they’re just wraiths,” Hawke said dismissively. “This must be what that Rolfson fellow was so nervous about.” She started wandering toward the center of the island. “Damn, there really are a lot of them. This place must have seen a battle or something.”

Cole nodded. “They watched the dead and dying, pressing close, clustered to hear, and forgot how to go back.”

“Not exactly reassuring there, Cole,” Bull said flatly.

 Fenris, meanwhile, was distracted by the buzzing in his left palm. The magical energy was rippling in a way that reminded him of being near a rift, but… different somehow. Not gentler, exactly, but less rhythmic than the usual harsh buzz. 

Then Hawke was beside him. She brushed her fingers over his left wrist. “What’s wrong?” she asked. 

“Nothing is wrong, exactly,” he said. “Just… odd. I think we’re looking for a rift.”

“I think we’re looking for that,” Varric said. He pointed to a dilapidated cabin about two hundred paces away on top of a short hill, which was shimmering from within with a familiar green light.

“Oh, that looks about right,” Hawke said. She nudged Varric with her hip. “I knew there was a reason we brought you along.”

He huffed a little laugh, and they began to make their way across the desolate-looking island toward the cabin. They hadn’t gotten very far when Bull wrinkled his nose. “Anybody else smell sea air and spice?” he asked. “That’s… that isn’t right.”

“Your mind is being influenced by the spirits here,” Dorian said. “They’re drawing sorrow from you like you’d draw water from a well.”

Bull grunted. “Glad I asked.”

Fenris frowned at this troubling description. “Drawing sorrow from us? They are making us feel sorrow on purpose?” He scowled suspiciously at the surrounding wraiths. “That sounds like a demon’s work.”

Cole shook his head. “Not new. It was there already.” He looked at Bull. “Sorrow close to the surface, close enough to touch, like Tama’s lips on your forehead–”

“Okay, Cole, that’s enough for now,” Bull said gruffly. 

Dorian ran a finger along Bull’s arm. “Don’t worry, amatus, I’ll keep you safe.”

“Thanks. I think,” Bull said, but his tone was slightly softer now.

Hawke turned to Cole. “You say the spirits here forgot how to go back. How does that happen?”

“They start off light, floating, fluttering close to taste,” Cole said. “But it seeps in, soaking and sinking until they stay. They’re heavy now. They don’t know they can be light.”

Dorian thoughtfully stroked his chin. “They almost sound like washcloths sinking in a bath.”

Cole nodded. “Sinking, soaking in sorrow. Yes.”

Hawke frowned. “Isn’t there some way we can help them get back to the Fade? Squeeze the sorrow out of them, so to speak.”

“They need to remember. To know,” Cole said. “To want to know, and then to go back.” He studied a nearby cluster of wraiths. “They’re not much. They don’t know they’re them. I know, but they’re not like me.”

“Oh,” Hawke said softly. “So… we can’t help them, then?”

Cole turned his vacant gaze to her. “If they were more, you could do more. But they aren’t.” 

Hawke nodded, but her expression was downcast, and Fenris felt a pang of affection. Of course Hawke wanted to help even the simplest spirits. Despite her complaints about being the Champion of Kirkwall and her mocking commentary when they got sent running around on errands for the Inquisition, it had always been in Hawke’s nature to try and help – even if the people she was trying to help didn’t want it.

“You can’t save everyone,” he murmured.

“I know, I know,” she sighed. Then she shot him a chiding look. “I’m not the only one who needs reminding of that, though.”

He shrugged and looked away from her pointed gaze. She’d spent the last few months trying to convince him to let go of some of his Inquisition duties. But this wasn’t the time to discuss the matter yet again. 

Just then, he heard a mournful woman’s voice drifting through the air. “Sleep. I need to… I must find you…”

A chill rippled down the back of his neck. The voice had the same odd echoing quality as that spirit of command in old Crestwood. A spirit’s voice, then?

Hawke clasped his hand, and he looked at her wide-eyed face. Before he could say anything, the mournful voice spoke again. “No, no, no… Ameridan? Ameridan, why? Vhenan, I’m… dreaming…”

“Ameridan?” Varric said. “Well, at least we’re on the right track.”

“I can’t,” the voice lamented. “Not without… This blood, my blood? No, I can’t…” 

Fenris swallowed hard. Maybe it was the spirits on this island influencing him, but the spirit’s voice sounded incredibly sad – so sad that it was making a sympathetic lump rise in his throat.

They hurried toward the cabin at a faster clip. When they reached the cabin, it was to find a somewhat familiar sight: a sort of semi-rift, reminiscent of the one that had hovered half-open in the Temple of Sacred Ashes, way back when Fenris had first woken up with the anchor on his hand. 

“It’s there,” Cole said. 

“What’s there?” Dorian said. “The spirit who’s talking, you mean?”

“Yes,” Cole said. He looked at Fenris. “It wants to come through. It wants to help.”

Fenris nodded. He already knew what he had to do: open the rift completely, then seal it up properly. He could only hope that this mournful spirit would be the only one that came through the opened rift.

He held out his left hand and reached for the rift, pushing a hint of magic out of his mark instead of pulling it in. The space inside of the cabin bloomed with light for a moment, and a spirit materialized from the newly-opened rift. 

“Hello!” Cole said.

The spirit fluttered in agitation. “Telana slept. I slept, to find him in dreaming. But I… the blood…” The spirit settled close to the ground in a hopeless sort of way. “Telana wanted to reach Ameridan again, one more time, but she couldn’t. I couldn’t. I died. I tried to stay, but only pieces came through.” It floated toward Fenris’s left hand. “You opened the sky for the rest of me.”

Fenris instinctively closed his fist. Then Hawke spoke to the spirit in a hushed voice. “You’re Telana’s spirit, then? Or… or a spirit that thinks it’s Telana, whoever this Telana is?” She looked askance at Cole.

“It hurts. She hurt,” Cole said. “The wraiths knew only the pain, but she knew why. Daring, dreaming into darkness, for Ameridan.”

The spirit drifted up. “Ameridan, yes! Inquisitor. Beloved. I… she came with Ameridan to hunt the dragon. Huge – power like none had seen. It came from the mountains with the Avvar. Towns fell, all dead. One last favour for Emperor Drakon: slay the dragon, save Orlais.”

“That’s what Ameridan was doing here, then?” Dorian said. “Hunting a dragon in Drakon’s name?”

Bull hummed thoughtfully. “A pretty damned big dragon, if this demo– spirit-thing is right.”

Varric scratched his chin. “Funny that the history books seem to have forgotten about this.”

His tone was slightly sardonic, but the spirit answered him anyway. “Not forgotten. Forbidden,” it said. “Darkspawn in the north, all of Orlais afraid. No one could know. ‘Orlais must stand unstained, no fear to falter. Please, my friend. For both our peoples.’” The spirit floated slowly toward the corner of the cabin. “They fought at the shore. Spirits and magic – cold, so cold. They rested here, then up the river. Metal spires: a way to stop the dragon. Then Telana returned here alone to wait for him.” The spirit drifted sadly down toward the ground. “Forever waiting. Dreaming… then dead.”

They were all quiet for a moment. Then Hawke kneeled beside the spirit. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “It sounds… that sounds like you had a shitty time of it. But we’ll find Ameridan for you, all right? It’s… we’ll find him.”

Cole crouched down as well. “You did what she wanted you to,” he said kindly to the spirit. “You can let go of her now.”

“Thank you,” the spirit said. “It was hard. I… she… went a long time ago. I stayed because she asked.” 

Fenris took a tentative step toward the spirit. “Go back to the Fade,” he said quietly. “I will close the Veil behind you.”

“Thank you,” it said once more. Then it faded back through the rift. 

Fenris pulled at the rift with his left hand, and a moment later, it was gone. He idly shook out his hand, then looked down at Hawke. 

She was kneeling still in the spot where the spirit had disappeared, and she looked troubled. Fenris took a step closer to her. “Hawke? What’s wrong?”

She looked up at him and smiled. “Nothing!” she chirped. “Everything is great, actually. We have so much more information now.” She stood up and elbowed Varric. “See, my favourite rumour was half-right. Ameridan did have a mage for a lover.” 

“A somniari, in fact,” Dorian said. “Not unlike our dear old friend Solas. That’s likely how Telana got this spirit to help her.” 

“Let’s get our facts straight here,” Varric said. “Orlais was tied up in the Second Blight, so Drakon asks Ameridan to come here to fight this super-powerful dragon, since it could raze Orlais if it got any closer?”

“That sounds about right, yes,” Dorian said. “Though I’m curious about this dragon. How powerful could it have been that Drakon had to send one of his finest warriors to fight it during the middle of the Blight?” He looked at Fenris. “We’ve fought half a dozen dragons with you and survived all of them. If Ameridan was such a renowned dragon hunter, why didn’t he survive?”

“Maybe it was just one dragon too many,” Bull said.

“Maybe,” Dorian said thoughtfully. 

“How the fuck does this get covered up?” Hawke suddenly burst out. “I mean, all right, keep it quiet so Orlais doesn’t get their knickers in a knot while the Blight’s on them, but to completely cover it up?” She turned to Fenris. “There had to be documents somewhere to show that this mission happened. Orlesians are too fussy to not keep records. And – and forgetting Ameridan’s lover, like she didn’t exist? How could that happen?”

“The Chantry,” Varric said wryly. 

Hawke wilted. “But that’s such nugshit!” 

“I think it’s more than that,” Fenris said quietly. “I think Telana was not just a mage, but an elf.”

They all looked at him. “What?” Dorian said. “Why do you think that?”

“It was something the spirit said, before we got to the cabin,” Fenris said. “She said ‘vhenan’.” He looked at Hawke, whose eyes had gone wide. “It’s an Elvhen word, yes? For–”

“‘Heart,’” she said. “It means ‘heart’. Or ‘home’, sometimes, depending on the context, but – yes, that’s right, it’s Elvhen.” She rubbed her mouth for a moment, then looked at Fenris. “Fuck. Telana was Dalish. Of course that’s why she got erased from history.”

Her eyes were wide and sad. Before Fenris could reply, however, Dorian broke in. “The Inquisitor was in a relationship with a Dalish elf?” he said skeptically. “That’s rather unlikely, don’t you think?”

“How so?” Fenris said. 

“Well, the Exalted March on the Dales hadn’t happened yet,” Dorian said. “The elves were very insular in those times – I suppose that much hasn’t changed, really. How do you think an Orlesian military man and a Dalish elf could have–”

Fenris interrupted him. “What makes you think Ameridan was Orlesian?”

Dorian’s eyebrows shot up. “Er. That he was apparently Drakon’s best friend in the whole wide world?”

“Perhaps Ameridan was Dalish too,” Fenris retorted.

Dorian’s eyebrows rose a little higher. “You think the first Emperor of Orlais, the hyper-Andrastian king of conversion, was close friends with a Dalish elf?”

“Is it that outlandish?” Fenris said. “Someday they will probably say similar things about me.” He waved irritably at himself. “The elf ex-slave as the Inquisitor, with a mage for wife and a qunari, a spirit and a Tevinter altus for friends? It sounds preposterous. Varric is the most plausible part of it. If I wasn’t living it, I might doubt the veracity of it myself.”

For a moment, no one spoke. Then Fenris sighed and rubbed his forehead. “I’m… I apologize for my tone,” he said to Dorian. “I didn’t mean–”

“Don’t apologize,” Dorian said softly. “It’s… you’re right. It is possible that Ameridan was an elf.”

Fenris shrugged listlessly. “I could be wrong. ‘Ameridan’ is not a particularly Dalish-sounding name.”

Then Hawke chimed in. “Maybe Ameridan was a human who was just so charming and persistent that he won over even the most grumpy elf.” She leaned against Fenris’s side and smiled sweetly. 

Everyone relaxed slightly at her lighthearted tone. Fenris huffed and ran a hand along her back. “Of course that’s the story you’d prefer.”

She winked at him. “Speaking of stories…” She turned to Varric. “Have you got all of this down? This has to be book-worthy.”

Varric tapped his temple. “Got it. I’ll take notes tonight when we’re settled down.”

 “You’re so clever,” Hawke simpered. “I wish I had a brain half the size of yours.”

He smirked and shook his head while Dorian groaned at her smarminess, and Fenris rolled his eyes playfully. They retrieved Telana’s belongings, which included a sealed order from Drakon himself that confirmed what the spirit had told them. As they returned to their boat, they made their plans for the rest of the afternoon: Fenris, Hawke and Cole would return to Stone-Bear Hold to tell Svarah about Storvacker while Dorian, Bull and Varric returned to the research camp to report their findings to Kenric. They would reconvene at the treehouse camp at the base of the Varsdotten River later tonight, along with Blackwall and Sera, to share what they’d all found.

Read the rest on AO3!

[prettywordsyouleft]

Aerobatic // AIRFORCE7

Summary: All Yugyeom wanted to do with his life was dance. But when he was drafted into the air force, he wasn’t expecting to find new ways to do just that.

Pairing: Kim Yugyeom x reader (ft. GOT7 as AIRFORCE7)

Genre: pilot au / 1940s era / romance / friendship au

Warnings: Due to the era it’s set in, this will contain minor war conflict in some of the stories. I will not be making the war-zone my main focus in this series however. 

A/N: Welp, the final puzzle piece is now being shared. I really liked how this story comes full circle with the kind of connection and feelings in the first one with Mark. I look forward to see how everyone puts the stories into the correct timeline now that they’re complete!

Word count: 3923

Thank you everyone for supporting this series. 

When the music was played just right, there was no stopping him. Yugyeom would turn up to every social event rain or shine for a feel-good time. With the war overseas robbing the youth of their freedom, he was persistent on enjoying his for all he could. His eighteenth birthday was looming upon him and he knew he would have to register for service to his country soon after. Yugyeom hoped to be one of the lucky ones who didn’t have to head in for training before he was twenty-one. He was a dreamer, and not very realistic. He didn’t have any clue of what war meant passed what they showed on the cinema reel before the movie started on a Saturday night. And by the time he was at the dance hall afterwards, he was too busy dancing to have a care about anything else in the world.

Most of his friends would turn up to meet ladies in hopes they’d find their Mrs Right. There was a focus on bringing people together just in case the distress overseas found its way to their nation. Falling in love was all that seemed to be talked about in his circle of friends, or at least, falling in love with the female body. Yugyeom wasn’t exactly forthcoming in these conversations. It wasn’t that the body of a woman turned him away either. In fact, finding the right partner was just as important to him as it was his friends. But he was looking for someone who could move in rhythm with him, who would dance the night away.

He hadn’t yet tried anything that required taking off his clothes yet.

“Where are you off to?” Youngjae asked, chuckling at Yugyeom’s eagerness to get onto the dance floor. “Don’t you want a drink yet?”

“I’ll drink when I’m thirsty!” he called, listening to the band before launching into his own movements. Sure, he could dance like most others could. Swing was in and he could expertly dance to jives, hops, shags and other types of dance as well. It was if the music of the band possessed him and Yugyeom would dance to their beat as well as his own all night long. Sometimes he would be invited up onto the stage to dance and those were the nights he held out for during the dreary daily grind of working at the wood mill and listening to those who already served their time during the first world war brood over the happenings overseas. Dance was an escape, and was the one thing Yugyeom was the best at in this town.

When Yugyeom saw you step out onto the floor, he made a beeline for you before any other man could. You grinned and took his hand immediately. “You again.”

He nodded; a shy blush crossing his cheeks that he hoped was masked by the exertion of dancing for twenty minutes already. You giggled as he pulled you close and it was as if you had just added to the atmosphere, improving the sounds echoing around the hall.

“Didn’t you have enough of me last weekend?” you asked and Yugyeom spun you about, shuffling his feet before bringing you back to him. You moved in sync with him, sliding across the wooden floors with ease. “I heard all the men were rather put out.”

“Should I share you then?” he wondered and your grin grew wider. “Fancy that, wanting to dance with someone else. Though I suppose they might be less enthusiastic than me.”

“Do I match what you like in a dancing partner?”

He nodded and you giggled again, his insides fluttering just as much as your yellow skirt was with your dance moves. He looked around at the sea of women in navy, red, white and black before glancing back at you. He decided you liked to stand out and that yellow was now his favourite colour.

For two more songs, there was little chatter between you and then you gestured for a break. He led you over to his table, Youngjae glancing up from the conversation he was having with a pretty brunette to tip his head in greeting at you both. You took the drink Yugyeom offered and then smiled at him.

“What is it?”

“I’m curious about you,” you admitted, resting your head on your hand that you had propped up on the table. “How old are you?”

“Almost eighteen.”

“Ah, you’ll be a soldier soon.”

“Not necessarily,” he said pointedly and you laughed in response. It frustrated him. “Why, must I be a man of the military for you to keep dancing with me?”

You shook your head, your smile still warm. God, he could stare at you smiling all night long. “What do you want to do with your life, Yugyeom?”

“Well, I want to dance.”

“Every day?”

He nodded once again, growing shy. “Wouldn’t that be wonderful? To perform for a crowd one day would be absolutely the best. I could travel the country, from stage to stage until I wind up on Broadway.”

“Broadway’s a big stage, are you sure you could handle that?”

“Don’t you dream big too?” he wondered and you shrugged, taking a sip of your drink. “I think a big stage would suit you just fine.”

“I’m not so sure I want to be the centre of attention like you. I want a quiet life. So far that’s not really been a thing for me. My Mama says girls in our gene pool are destined to make men miserable around them. You shouldn’t try to add me into your dreams, Yugyeom.”

“Well, why not? You’re the best dancing partner I’ve ever had,” he told you honestly and your smile faded, your gaze now hard and unwavering. He felt the heat rise up his neck with your stare and broke away, blinking rapidly. He lowered his head. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No, I think that’s the sweetest thing a man has ever said to me.”

He glanced back at you, blinking again since you were closer now. He reached out to grab a hold of the hand you had upon your face, brushing his fingers lightly over your cheek before taking your hand away. You were back to smiling once more. Without saying anything, he helped you onto your feet, pulling you back out to the dance floor. But this time, instead of bouncing around energetically, he held you close, swaying slowly with the rhythm you both created together. Yugyeom then bent his head down, capturing your lips softly with his.

When you pulled away, you smirked, placing a hand on his chest to settle yourself. “Your moves are as smooth and your dancing, Kim Yugyeom.”

“Well, I can’t have you thinking you’re unlucky, Y/N. You’re the best woman I’ve met yet.”

Over the next two months, Yugyeom met with you regularly. He took you out to eat, to the cinema and of course, went with you to countless of dances. He hadn’t ever experienced love before but he believed this was it. His mind was full of you.

His birthday finally arrived and you had baked him a cake to surprise him with, blowing out the candles together before kissing him passionately. “Happy birthday, Yugyeom.”

“I’m eighteen,” he stated and you nodded, bopping him on the nose. He chuckled. “You can’t do that to me now, I’m no longer a child!”

“Is that right? So you’re legally a man now?” you asked, coy, intentional. He licked his lips and followed you as you turned to the record player in his small apartment, grabbing you around the waist and pulling your back firmly against his chest. You threw your head back over his shoulder, swaying to the music playing softly. Your hands reached for his, running them slowly over your body, each curve caressed more by his hands the longer you encouraged him. Eventually, you turned around, not losing any rhythm, still swaying with him as you stretched up to kiss him, his mind swirling with passion. He didn’t think he needed any extra gifts for his birthday but after you were both spent from sharing your bodies with one another, Yugyeom decided that this was possibly the best day of his life. He had danced with you all the way to euphoria and he was certain he didn’t want to come back down from such a high.

You reached out to cup his face in your hand, smiling when he drew your body closer to his. “I love you, Yugyeom. If the big stage is your dream for us, I’ll follow you towards it.”

Six months later the only stage Yugyeom had in sight was the small one the Corporal stood upon to give out orders to the men standing before him. He had no desire to get up on that stage or for anything that happened in his daily life now. The high he had felt with you had come crashing the day he was drafted into the air force.

“Do I have to go?” he had asked as you tidied his uniform, smiling weakly up at him. You held such a power over him and if you said no, he would evade it as much as he could. Of course you nodded, knowing it was compulsory now that the war was growing bigger, and threatening the peaceful times of this nation. He could tell you didn’t want him to go, for you to dance alone after all these months of doing so together was breaking you as well.

“I’ll do what I can to be transferred to where you’re stationed, hm? We won’t be apart for long.”

“Even a day without you is too long,” he whined and you gave him a look for being so petulant. But he didn’t care. He didn’t dream of this kind of uniform.

“You’ll be fine. Now go make me and this country proud.”

Knowing that his best friend was also stationed at the same base made Yugyeom feel somewhat at ease.

“Don’t look so low,” Youngjae chided and Yugyeom glanced up at him. “It’s not so bad being here.”

“You came willingly before me though. I didn’t have a choice.”

“Planes can be fun, you know.”

“I don’t want to shoot things out of the sky, I just want to dance.”

“Well here, dancing boy. Why don’t you jive your way off to see the Major, he wants to see you,” a fellow airman announced and Yugyeom rolled his eyes, taking the note sent for him and headed out of the bunkers to the office. Despite his reluctance, he wasn’t a bad cadet. He did all that was asked of him. You had been adamant that he continued to put his best foot forward. And for you, he was doing just that.

He didn’t have to like it, however.

When he arrived in the office, the Major beamed at him. “Son, I hear you have some magic feet.”

“Uh…”

“We’re thinking of putting on a show and we want you to help us put it all together.”

“A show, sir?”

The Major nodded. “Yeah, we’re bringing in a couple of top guns from another base; one of them is pretty decent up in the skies. Aerobatics is the new wave of fun the men can have so they say. If we build them up well enough, we might just be able to encourage others to join us. Now, that fancy female Captain training you doesn’t like to think of men flying in the skies for fun all the time but I don’t see any war coming our way, so what do you think? Reckon we could pull it off?”

“A show with music? With an actual band?”

He chuckled heartily. “Son, we could have an orchestra for all I damn well care. I just want the men to have a good time, invite some women to dance the night away with them after this Wang pilot shows off up in the skies. We have a couple of men here already that could join him. They reckon we could make a team force out of them. Are you in?”

Yugyeom nodded. “I can organise some music and dancing but I would need some help. There’s someone who I think would be able to make this a hit but she’s a town over, sir.”

“What and who do you need? I can make it all happen.”

Preparations for the gala began and Yugyeom was finally thrilled to get some time away from training drills to plan it. And when he saw you arrive on base for the first time, any ill thoughts he had about this place went away. “Are we really putting on a show?”

“Well, you’re here aren’t you?”

“They put me up in some nice lodgings too,” you said with glee, looking around the place in awe. For the first time then, Yugyeom saw the air base for what it really was. He grinned and dragged you over to the hangars, showing you inside.

“This is what I fly at the moment. They say they’re building a newer version of this plane that could very well be the best fighter in the skies yet. It’s called a Mustang.”

“I like how freeing that sounds,” you mentioned with a smile. He showed you around the base until you stopped at the site for the gala, discussing what would be needed for the show to be a success.

“Ah, and here’s the other star of the show,” Yugyeom mentioned, pointing to the runway that a plane was preparing for taking off. Jackson Wang would always come out to play and run through his segment for the show around this time of the day and Yugyeom angled you so you could watch on. Yugyeom grinned as the pilot took to the skies. “See, he’s really good.”

As Jackson ran through his routine, Yugyeom watched on in awe. He hadn’t done anything quite like that yet in a plane, but to him, it definitely seemed more to his liking than all the combat training he was often subjected to. And whilst he found Jackson had no qualms doing that either, he was certain the grin on the fellow cadet’s face only came about because of the rush playing so far up in the air.

“Why he’s dancing!” you cried as the plane rolled over and Yugyeom glanced at your excitement. You clasped your hands together and nodded in Yugyeom’s direction. “Don’t you think?”

“The Major called it Aerobatics.”

“Well, to me it looks like he’s taking on the clouds and moving with a beat up there that cannot be heard from down here. Listen to the way the engine sounds too. It’s like it’s having fun.”

Yugyeom watched Jackson with renewed interest. Could he really continue to find a way to fulfil the tempo in his heart up in a plane? Once Jackson landed, you ran over, congratulating him for putting on such a show.

“Oh, that’s nothing,” Jackson stated smugly, slapping Yugyeom on the shoulder.

“Nothing? Then I can’t wait to see what something is,” you replied, and Jackson chuckled at your response.

“I like this one, is she the girl you don’t stop going on about?”

Yugyeom flushed with colour and then distracted the shorter man with a request instead. “Do you think you could teach me how to do some of that?”

“Do you have stable basics in a plane, cadet?”

“Well, some.”

“Talk to me when you can fly a plane better than BamBam. Then we’ll see how good those dancing feet can be up in the air.”

In between the gala preparations, Yugyeom took his pilot training more seriously. When his Lieutenant approached him after training, Yugyeom was amazed to be given another hour of coaching by him. Jaebum seemed impressed with his skills and soon Yugyeom was smiling all the time on the air base.

It wasn’t unnoticed by you. “Do you know how handsome you are when you smile?”

“Do you know how beautiful you are, period?”

You rolled your eyes but the smile didn’t erase from your lips. You nestled into his side, grateful that he had been given permission to stay with you over the weekend. “Flying means something to you now.”

“I’m really close to being trained by Jackson on how to do some of his aerobatic stunts. Another pilot, Mark, he said I’m the fastest learning cadet they’ve had at the air base. Isn’t that something?”

“It sure is,” you agreed, kissing him fondly. “And with only a couple more days until the gala, your dancing feet will be itching to put on a show, huh?”

“You bet!”

“I have some good news. The ladies in the office told me that I might be able to become a typist for the base. I just have to pass a couple of tests and if I do, I can stay here in town.”

Yugyeom gasped, scooping you up into his arms and placed kisses all over you until you were giggling in his embrace. When he was done, he stared at you. “What about dancing?”

“I can still dance,” you told him, nodding your head. “There’s the hall in town and we’re doing this gala are we not?”

“It’s still not the biggest stage,” he murmured and you cupped his face in his hands. “I don’t know how long I have to stay a pilot for either.”

“I’m happy though, Yugyeom. I’m really happy here. Can’t we look for the bigger stage later on in life?”

He thought over it for a moment before nodding, kissing you again. He could wait as long as you were by his side.

“So we’ve got something to run past you.”

Yugyeom glanced up as the men all sat down beside him, placing down their food trays. Whilst he spent a lot of time with the elite team now that they were training him, he wasn’t exactly privy of sitting with them often. He then noticed one pilot was missing. Jaebum shot him a solemn look. “Mark’s out.”

“What, the show is tomorrow! Out how?”

“The fool got mad at a cadet and broke his hand. No flying for a month for him,” Jinyoung mentioned, shrugging softly. Yugyeom hadn’t spent much time with the elite pilot, but he did know he was pretty knowledgeable about planes. He had turned to him a couple of times when the lessons hadn’t made much sense. And even if Jinyoung had complained in doing so, he actually made everything seem a lot easier to understand for Yugyeom. His bristly persona was really only an outer façade.

“So, we want to know if you’re in,” Jackson asked, slinging an arm around the back of Yugyeom’s chair. “I know you’re still learning but it’ll be good for the men to see a protégé in the making.”

“Eyyy,” Yugyeom responded, shaking his head and blushing at the title. “I’m just learning ways to make this journey enjoyable whilst I’m here.”

“We need you. I’m not going to do it and Jaebum-hyung has other commitments. Jinyoung-hyung claims he can do some aerobatics-”

“And I can,” the pilot firmly concluded, BamBam rolling his eyes at the interruption.

“But doesn’t see the value in doing them so it’s up to you. What do you say?”

“Will I have enough time to do my part of the show still?” Yugyeom wondered and all four men nodded. Yugyeom’s smile spread across his lips and Jackson whooped ecstatically. “I’m in!”

It was tight, but Yugyeom managed to fit in a final training in the skies before running through the show programme with you on the ground. He knew he was now relying on you to do more than you had initially signed up for but you assured him you would be fine and to enjoy the new element for the day. He couldn’t help but feel nervous. On stage, he had no issues with performing, but up in the skies, well, it was new territory for him.

“You’ve got this, Kim, just don’t flake on me,” Jackson encouraged, slapping an affectionate hand on his back before heading over to his plane. He had spent little time flying the newer Mustang, the older styles being what he had trained in. Now with the Rolls Royce Merlin engines in them, Jaebum said the Mustang was as wild as could be. And Yugyeom had experienced that earlier in the week. He wasn’t so sure a wild horse would be the best partner for his debut stage, but it was all he had to work with now.

Their Captain prepared them both for take off, giving them the signal to get up into the skies. Yugyeom had no troubles doing that and the unique engine rumbling sounded like the beginning of a song. Once up in the air, he laughed, whizzing around the base with speed, just like Jackson had taught him. As he listened to his cues, Yugyeom also focused on the sounds around him. Ever since you had mentioned the sky was like an amphitheatre for the planes, he had started to envision it like that. His performance anxiety shifted and Yugyeom prepared for a basic loop. He wasn’t able to execute the move as gracefully as Jackson, but he did it and it energised him to carry on with the remaining elements to his performance, landing his plane and hopping out to see the crowd of fellow pilots, base personnel and the public all applauding him and Jackson. He glanced at his friend, Jackson laughing heartily as he bowed and soaked in the feeling. He then pointed to the stage you were standing on.

“Shouldn’t you hurry, you need to get up there and join Y/N for your other performance.”

“Right, thanks, Jackson.”

“Oh uh, I know it’s a saying for good luck, but don’t break a leg. With your newfound flying ability and Mark out of action, I’m going to need you up in the skies at my side, you hear?”

Yugyeom grinned and nodded before dashing off to meet you for the next performance. You held out a hand for him and when the music started, he launched into the prepared routine. After that, the floor was open for everyone to dance upon and the final rays of the sun soon were out, the night sky filled with twinkling stars. Yugyeom looked up at them and wondered what it would feel like to fly amongst them.

You smiled knowingly. “How do you feel?”

“Everything went according to plan.”

“Yes but how does this feel?” you asked, pressing your hand over his heart. “It wasn’t Broadway.”

“No, you’re right, it wasn’t the biggest stage.” He grinned, leaning down to kiss you. “But I shared it with you.”

“You know, I think your dream is now bigger than Broadway. Who needs that stage when you have all that up there to perform in? The skies the limit isn’t it?”

Yugyeom gazed up again, reflecting on your words. If someone had asked him if performing as close to the heavens as he could was ever part of his journey, he was certain he would have laughed at them. Now, as a pilot who could dance down here with you and up in the clouds in a plane, Yugyeom realised it wasn’t the size of the stage that mattered.

It was all about who he performed with.

_________________

All rights reserved © prettywordsyouleft

[GOT7 Masterlist] | [Main Masterlist] | [Request Guidelines]

[minecraftoworymode]

local admin discovers this CRAZY life hack, other admins HATE him! click to find out more -->

no but seriously what the hell kind of drama is bad enough that you kill one of your best friends and torture the other for an unspecified but presumably quite lengthy amount of time? did fred start kinning one of romeo’s ‘no doubles’ IDs? did they accuse romeo of being a homestuck and, having no way to deny the truth, he killed them in a blind panic? they didn’t play romeo’s nine-hour oblivion mod and he took this as a supreme betrayal? romeo wouldn’t get off the xbox when it was xara’s turn? what led to them fighting “for control of the world”?

i mean, given how much romeo wants friends you’d think that for him to consciously yeet the only ones he had there’d have to be a really good reason for it, right? right??

[well, at least it’s free real estate. everything in this post is headcanon territory, so to save both of us the trouble of having to read “i think” or “probably” or “evidence suggests” every two sentences i’ll be speaking as if this actually happened. but if anyone else has an idea of what the heck happened, i’d love to hear others’ takes!!!]

big Fs in the chat tonight, pals. for all that he wants people to like him, romeo is really, really, REALLY bad at going about it like a normal person. (ESPECIALLY in canon. like. frankly it’s almost to the point of seeming intentional because NO ONE can be that dense about being such an absolute and utter scoundrel. who does things that actively malicious without being aware of how hurtful it is? even capitalists generally know they’re being bastards. canon, man. i dont know.)

but- he wasn’t always quite that bad at it. it’s just that once you’ve tripped and spilled paint all over your canvas, and also you have god powers that give you infinite copies of other peoples’ paintings, it’s a lot easier to plug your ears chuck the canvas in the trash and go LA LA LA, MUST’VE BEEN THE PAINT’S FAULT instead of admitting you made a mistake, cleaning up the mess you made, and trying again.

the admins’ friendship was the canvas. here is the paint.

romeo really wants people to be his friends, and he couldn’t have had better ones than fred and xara. and honestly? he was perfectly fine with leaving behind everything and everyone else he’d ever known- all he needed were the other admins, no one and nothing else. dependency whoms’t? but for fred and xara, whose stances on relationships were , just a bit healthier than that- as much as they loved romeo- they missed the people they’d left behind.

romeo had invited them here- first xara, then fred- and while he’d of course agreed to let them go back whenever they asked they’ve- like, the idea hasn’t really seriously come up in... it’s been a very long while. i’m still working on the exact timeline here but it’s been- he’d almost completely forgotten about it, actually. they, on the other hand... hadn’t. 

it’s like a freaking 2x combo double whopper whammy of being abandoned and also not being “enough” that hits romeo right in the heart nuts. but hey! necessity (or what he thought necessity) is the mother of invention, and for all that he thinks himself stupid he figured out a solution- more than a solution, even! he could do them one better than bringing them the people they missed. he would bring them the people they wanted.

the custom npcs mod allows you to create, well, npcs. it allows you to set their schedules, dialogue, stats, appearance, etc. and you do most of it by right-clicking with a hoe which i find hilarious but ANYWAY romeo came up with something similar. at first, his constructs were... not very convincing, but a little help from a bright-eyed friend made them almost indistinguishable from real people. (herobrine is another post, but for the record this isn’t even the biggest crap he’s pulled.)

he was so excited, presenting his gift to fred and xara. look, i was thinking- you said you missed that one roommate, right, even though they always left the door open and didn’t put food away? ta-dah! look at that, closing the door like a gentleman! and you were missing your counsellor, right? well, miss no more! they’re programmed to always be there for you- you never have to worry about scheduling or other patients, here’s someone who will always care! and that’s not all- if you’ve been having trouble with any of your moderators- or even the normal humans, those are fun too sometimes- this lets you change their mind! literally! no more arguing about what colour to make the new concrete blocks, no more fighting over who gets the first seat in the rollercoaster, you’ll never have to deal with any of that ever again-! ... hey, why aren’t you- why do you- why are you looking at me like that? xara? ... fred?

yeah, it... doesnt go over too well. the tool ends up broken, and romeo promises to not use it again- though only because it upset fred and xara, not because he really saw anything wrong with it. and he keeps that promise for a time. of course the paint can is already leaking, but romeo doesn’t see that yet. none of them really see what’s coming, not fully. how could they? no one wants to think the worst of the ones they love.

but they’re all understandably... tense, and romeo always tended to look to people to vent his emotions, and- the person who would come to be the warden  has a huge fight with romeo, right in front of fred and xara’s salad. like. it’s really bad. they’re both on the verge of tears and the warden SLAMS the door as he leaves, which does make romeo cry. and the other two are like... hey... do you want anything... some cake...? prog rock...? we can cuddle...? n romeo’s usually already invited himself to one or more of those things by now but instead of throwing himself into their arms and wailing he’s just, standing there silently, tears streaming down his face, looking of all things pensive. and next in the series of many shocking things to come, he does something he’s never done before: he brightens and says, “i’m going to fix this,” before resolutely walking out the door.

fred and xara are like. oh my god. is- is he actually going to talk out his feelings and problems? is this- is healthy open communication here? did we do it? have we reached the mental wellness? is it finally happening? n romeo comes back a few hours later with his arm around the warden’s shoulders and they're both smiling and laughing and it sounds like everything's worked out just fine. in fact, after that, a bunch of people who’d had beef with romeo in the past seem to work things out with him, all parties seeming genuinely happier for it. romeo’s made a real change! fred and xara have never been more proud, more relieved, or more wrong.

he can’t lie to his friends. he can lie to everyone else, up to and including himself, but not to the ones he loves. it’s just... they’d been so happy, and he’d never seen anyone that proud of him, and, and...

that doesn’t go over too well either. and he should really make the tool out of something other than like, wood, so it stops getting broken so easily? he certainly has time to do so- the silence that follows is the longest the admins have ever gone without talking to one another. in retrospect they probably should’ve known that things were only going to get worse from there, but could you blame fred and xara for hoping beyond hope that- since they were always the ones to drag romeo out of his sulking and brooding- him coming to them first was a sign that he’d changed, for real this time? and the way he starts the conversation- by saying how the admins’ absence has impacted the people in their care- it’s certainly promising.

but- ah, what’s that line? something like,

"Oft expectation fails, and most oft there Where most it promises; and oft it hits Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits."

there are very, very few things that make fred visibly angry. not that things don’t ever make them mad, it’s just that their dedication to living their best life means that they’re generally able to keep a firm grip on how they express their emotions. but for romeo to brainwash- no, worse than brainwash- they don’t even have a word for it- fred’s own people? they’re called their friends for a reason! it doesn’t MATTER that he thought it’d make fred happy- did he think, for even a moment, about listening to what they’d said? does he not realize how absolutely vile it was to do that? the others are real people, too! all of them, not just the ones he considers his friends- do you even understand what that word means, romeo? "friend"?

what really burns is that fred isn’t just angry- they’re disappointed. they’re scared. they’re just as hurt as he is, which is just- how DARE they?! ROMEO’S the one who’s being yelled at! why are THEY crying?! (they’re all in tears now, actually, but romeo doesn’t notice his own.)

a deep breath. fred asks him to undo what he’s done. romeo doesn’t move.

a tense heartbeat. fred asks again, and takes a step forward. this time romeo flinches back.

there’s not a single quark between the three of them right now not on edge. it feels like the air before a lightning strike. something’s going to break. none of them are backing down. maybe none of them can because, if romeo’s not going to do it himself- fred takes a final step forward and asks, remarkably calmly, for romeo to give them the tool.

and then he does! and they apologize to each other for not having been more open about their feelings and defining and maintaining their boundaries and then they make up and have a really good hug and it’s great, everything’s great, and this is probably the mental image romeo tried to fall asleep to before realizing that that wouldn’t stop the nightmares and just giving up on the whole “resting” thing. 

if you’re beginning to notice a pattern here with things really not going well, you might just be onto something about romeo’s behaviour. but to be fair none of them had gone into this situation expecting a fight- it was just, fred tried to take the tool and romeo instinctively pulled his weapon and- none of them realized quite how long fred had been losing blood? romeo had been lashing out, fred had been trying to take something he was holding while also trying to defend themself, xara had been trying to protect fred (and was also lashing out too, just a little)- i mean, they realized. eventually. and by that point honestly accidentally stabbing them wasn’t going to do anything the life force loss hadn’t, so like... 

okay, brief side note: as operator, romeo’s existence maintains the mcsm universe. he can’t die, even if he wants to. xara and fred had the next best deal (arguably anyway), in that they could only be truly hurt by one thing: the person who’d given them administrative powers in the first place. which happened to be the same person who’d, like, just stabbed his best friend and was now staring in open horror as said friend’s skin flickered back to its original appearance before-

just like that they were gone. just like that. the lack of body and inventory really should’ve tipped them off that something wasn’t right, but for all that they both replay that moment in their minds for years to come they somehow never consider that fred wasn’t quite dead. and romeo had always had such an imagination! but maybe it was for the best that they didn’t consider it, anyway. ... maybe it was for the best.

it doesn’t have to almost kill xara for romeo to take her powers, but it does anyway because if romeo made a lot of stupid decisions before that’s just gotten amped up to eleven now that 90% of his impulse control is gone.

oh.

oh no.!!

romeo watch out almost a millennium of unprocessed trauma and grief is sneaking up on you- romeo- oh my god he can’t hear us he has minecraft airpods in- romeo oh nO

anyway thanks for coming to my tedtalk! tune in next time to hear about the fallout of romeo’s actions across multiple worlds and the group of dissidents whose entire existence is to, well, diss romeo, aka soren’s cult. in conclusion:

[hymn2000]

Where The Darkness Ends - MCU AU fanfic - C9

Story summary: The concept of having a baby has been more of an idea for a long time now. Ideal candidates for a three-person baby, Loki and Tony have finally, after many Peter-based setbacks and challenges, got to the point of being tested. Now, they just have to wait for the results before they can move on to the next stage.

Previous Chapter(s): 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Part of my Frostiron and Spiderson series.

Warnings/themes: family stuff, mental health stuff, hurt/comfort, hospital/medical stuff, fertility stuff, IVF, potentially some medical inaccuracies, alcohol misuse

You can also find me on AO3

Chapter 9 - Sooner Or Later

-

Loki and Tony’s visit really unsettled Peter. He was uncharacteristically quiet for the rest of the evening. He ate absent-mindedly, and ended up eating too much as a result. He lay on the sofa with a tummy ache, brooding.

“I think you need to call it a night” Thor said eventually. “It’s getting late. I think you need to rest”

Peter didn’t argue. 

“Do you want me to take you?”

Peter shook his head. Thor nodded understandingly.

“Ok. I’ll come and check on you in a little while”

“Ok. Goodnight”

“Goodnight, little one”

-

Thor rested a hand on Peter’s head.

“I know you’re awake”

“I don’t wanna talk” 

“Is there anything in particular you want to do tomorrow?”

“I said I don’t wanna talk”

Thor sighed. “Ok, kiddo. We’ll talk tomorrow”

-

Peter wouldn’t say a word all day. He refused to go on a walk. He spurned all of Thor’s suggestions of things to do. Instead he spent the day in front of the telly, eating crisps and thinking. 

The doorbell went at seven o’ clock that evening. Peter stayed on the sofa. Thor answered the door, and a few minutes later, Loki, Tony, and Pepper came into the living room. 

“Hey, sweetheart” Tony said. 

Peter looked at him, and then back at the telly. Tony sighed and sat down beside him. Peter immediately stood up and moved onto the other sofa.

“Peter! Don’t be like that”

Loki sighed and sat down next to Tony. 

“How are you doing today, Peter?” Pepper asked.

Peter shrugged and turned the telly up. Pepper sat down next to him.

“Peter, you can’t stay quiet forever” Thor said. He turned to Loki. “He hasn’t said a word all day”

“Bambino, listen” Tony said. “I know I’ve been rubbish, but I’m here now. I want to make amends. Why don’t we go out? Come on, we can go out somewhere nice, just us two. What do you say?”

Peter didn’t look away from the television. He didn’t want to listen to him. He wasn’t hungry either, so there was no point in going out for tea. He just wanted to stay in and watch telly. Was there really anything so wrong with that?

-

The visit didn’t go well. Peter ended up storming to his room because Tony kept bothering him, which resulted in another argument with Thor. This was going to be a lot harder than they first expected. 

-

Peter emerged from his room after his parents had left on the seventh unsuccessful visit. Thor shook his head at him.

“You need to talk to your parents”

“I don’t want to” Peter said, turning the kettle on.

“I know, but the only way you’ll make up with them is to talk. You need to at least try”

“I don’t see why I should” Peter said. “They ignored me when it suited them. Why shouldn’t I ignore them when it suits me?”

“Is that your plan? To ignore them for a month?”

“Yes”

“It’s not a great plan” 

Peter shrugged. Thor sighed and turned the kettle off. 

“You’re not helping yourself or anyone else, you do know that, don’t you?”

“You said I wouldn’t have to see them if I didn’t want to”

“I know I did, but it’s been a little while now, and I think you need to start reconciling”

“I don’t want to. It always feels so forced anyway, what with both of them, and Pepper, every night. Daddy never really says anything and none of them look like they’re here out of choice”

“Of course they come out of choice, Peter. They love you. Even if you won’t talk to them, they still want to see you. They’re doing their best, you know. They’ve come a long way in the last week”

Peter went to turn the kettle back on, but Thor stopped him. 

“You can’t ignore this forever”

“I can try”

“I won’t let you”

Peter tried to turn the kettle on again, and Thor grabbed his hand.

“Stop it! Now, I think we need to sit down and talk about this. You’ve been so quiet this week”

“I don’t want to talk”

“Well, then I think it’s time to go to bed” Thor said. “Do you need a towel?”

“I’ve got one” Peter grumbled. He looked at the clock. “It’s only ten o’ clock”

“It’s bedtime” Thor said firmly. “Go to your room”

-

Loki put his mug down.

“He probably just needs a bit more time to process everything” he said. “He probably still feels neglected”

“He barely even looks at us!” Tony said. “He hasn’t said a word these past four visits. He just kinda blanks us and then disappears at the first possible opportunity”

“He’s just upset” Pepper said. “He’ll come round eventually”

“Maybe we should get Thor to send him back to school” Loki said. “He seems to be doing ok - current issue aside - and his school work is fine. Maybe a bit of normality will help him. If he sees his friends again and gets back into the routine, maybe he’ll want us again”

“I don’t want to send him before he’s ready”

“I think he is ready” Pepper said. “He’s bored at Thor’s. They’ve exhausted all possibilities of things to do at this point, and he told me he doesn’t have enough to occupy him. I agree with you, Loki: send him back”

“Well...” Tony thought for a minute. “Ok, well, I’ll ask Thor to pitch it to him. I don’t suppose it’s really gonna affect us anyway”

Loki nodded slightly. Tony sat down heavily.

“...I think I should go alone tomorrow”

Pepper and Loki looked at him. 

“Why?”

Tony shrugged. “I’m the one who put him there. I think I’m the one he’s angry with more than anyone else. I was the one who let him down, so I think he needs to make up with me before he’ll be happy to talk to either of you”

Loki didn’t say anything. Pepper took his hand, giving it a squeeze.

“I think it might be a good idea” Pepper said. “You know your son better than I do”

“You’ll still stay for a bit though, right?” Tony said. “You’ll stay with Loki?”

Pepper nodded. “Of course. I’m not leaving you two alone just yet”

-

Pepper sat down with Loki after Tony left the next evening.

“Right, you can speak now” she said.

“What do you want me to say?”

“Anything. It’s strange seeing you so quiet. You should definitely be throwing a tantrum”

Loki smiled slightly. “Well, I’ve been feeling a bit too subdued for that”

“I’ve noticed” Pepper said. “Now talk to me”

“...I can see why he’s gone alone” Loki said. “But still, I feel as though I’m very disconnected from it all. From Peter, and the whole situation surrounding that. And I feel as though this is my fault”

“What?”

“All of it. I got greedy”

“What?”

“I did” Loki said. “I’ve wanted a baby since before Tony and I got together. Not that Tony always wanted the same thing. But then he did...”

“What makes you greedy?”

“I got all this” Loki gestured to the room. “I got all this. A home. A life. A job. Friends. A husband. A son. A family... But I still wanted more. I just had to have a baby. I already have so much more, so much more than I ever thought possible. I’ve been so lucky. But it couldn’t be enough. I just had to have more. I’d already had enough kindness, and now, well, my luck ran out. It’s like everyone, everything was saying; we’ve given you so much. You’ve got enough. You can keep what you have, but that’s it. You can’t have any more than you’ve already got”

“This isn’t a game of luck, Loki” Pepper said. “There’s no one up there controlling fate. It’s just the way it is. Maybe it is unlucky. But maybe it’s just one of those things. No one’s punishing you for wanting more. You’re not the first parent to want a second child”

“I sometimes feel like I don’t deserve the child I have”

“You’re a brilliant dad to that boy”

“I still think about the first time he called me that”

“He’s yours, no matter what”

“I keep telling myself, at least I’ve got him... But it’s not that much of a comfort. I just keep thinking about what could have been, everything we’d all planned. We were going to have a baby”

“I know”

“I still want one”

“I know. I do too. So does Tony”

Loki nodded. “...Peter was so ready to be a big brother. He’d’ve been good at it”

Pepper held Loki’s hand tight.

“It’s not that I don’t still love him” Loki said. “It’s just that I haven’t known what to say to him. He hasn’t been interested anyway, so it hasn’t been that important. I-... I just need more time to get to grips with this”

“Sometimes it doesn’t feel real”

Loki nodded. “No... Sometimes it just feels like a rumour. Even though I know what-... what my results were and are... Sometimes it feels like there’s some hope. Even though there isn’t”

“You need to talk at the therapy sessions” Pepper said. “You really need to get everything off your chest. Tony and I have both talked, but you’ve just stayed quiet. I can understand why, but still. You need to talk”

“I’m talking to you now” Loki said. “It feels odd. Like I’m listening to someone else talk. But it’s me”

“I get that”

“I don’t know what to do, Pepper. As much as I know it might be one of those things I won’t get over, but instead learn to live with, it’s still hard to figure out how to reach that point. I’ve been trying to think about it properly but my mind just goes blank and I find myself staring at the wall or ceiling for minutes at a time, unable to zone back in. And I keep having dreams where everything went right and we’ve got a baby. It would have been a girl. It’s always Princess in the dreams, never Oliver. We would have had a baby girl”

“Part of me thinks the same”

“The dreams feel so real, like memories. Visions, perhaps. Peter sometimes talks about other timelines, other existences. It’s just fiction, things from his books, but maybe that’s what the dreams are. Another lifetimes memories. Sometimes I wake up and it takes a minute for me to remind myself that it was a dream and not a memory”

“You’ve gotta stay in your own reality, Loki”

“The other realities are nicer”

-

Peter didn’t look happy to see Tony. As usual, he stayed quiet and averted his gaze, leaning against the arm of the sofa. Tony sighed and sat down beside him.

“You’ve had some post. It’s on the kitchen table here when you want it” he said.

Peter kept his eyes glued to the telly. 

“Daddy and I got you some things. Thor’s putting them in your room. Thought you’d probably smack them out of my hand if I tried to give them to you direct”

Peter glanced at him, but quickly looked away.

“I’m gonna put my arm round you, alright?”

Peter didn’t respond. Tony put an arm round Peter’s shoulders. Peter startled and froze, but he didn’t move other than that. He swallowed, keeping his eyes fixed on the television. He wasn’t sure how he felt. Tony rubbed his arm gently.

“There we are” Tony said softly. “You’re quite warm. You’re not feeling poorly, are you?”

Peter didn’t say anything. He felt a little funny though. Maybe he was poorly. He wasn’t sure. He looked at Thor, who was watching them closely. Thor smiled reassuringly at him, and mouthed; “it’s ok”.

“We were talking last night, me and daddy and Pepper” Tony said. “You’ve been doing well with your school work and Thor has talked to us about you, of course, and, well, we were thinking you might feel ready... ready to go back to school?”

Peter paused for a moment. He didn’t say anything, but he finally relaxed a little and leant against Tony. 

“You could wait until Monday, obviously. I know it’s only Tuesday, but still. If you feel like you’re ready, I’ll give the school a ring and let them know”

He paused, and then put his other arm round the boy, hugging him properly. Thor watched them, getting ready to step in if need be. As it was, Peter seemed ok: he settled against Tony, who continued to rub the boys arm.

“I am sorry, you know” Tony said. “About everything”

“I know” Peter said. 

Tony looked surprised. “You spoke!”

Peter kept his eyes down, and kept quiet.

“We can go out, if you want to. I did promise I’d take you somewhere nice” Tony said. “We could go now?”

“He’s already eaten” Thor said. “He’s started eating in the evenings again”

“Oh, I see” Tony said. “Well... that’s good, isn’t it? Well, maybe we can go tomorrow? Or another time. It’s up to you, kiddo”

Peter rested his head against Tony’s chest, listening to the sound of his heart beating. It wasn’t as though it had been such a long time since he’d heard such a sound:- he’d often rested on Thor’s chest listening to his heartbeat - but it felt as though it had been years since he’d heard his father’s heart. It sounded so different to Thor’s. It was nice; comforting. Peter started to feel a little more relaxed. He started feeling calmer, less angry and resentful of his father. He started feeling closer to him. Just a little bit.

Tony ran his fingers through Peter’s hair. “I’d almost forgotten how soft your hair is. You’re such a fluffy little thing”

“How’s Loki?” Thor asked.

“Much the same” Tony sighed. “Pepper’s with him. Hopefully they’ll get talking. He’s been so quiet lately”

“I’ve noticed. I can’t help thinking it would be easier if he was shouting and screaming about it”

“Oh, definitely” Tony nodded. “It’s weird seeing him so quiet. I wish he would just shout a bit. He cried for so long, and now he just cries a little bit, and he’s so quiet. He’s thinking such a lot, but he’s just not sharing much”

“Poor Loki. I’ll try to talk to him some time soon. He looked better yesterday, mind. Less pale” Thor said. “He’s better, evidently. He’ll keep getting better. So will you”

Tony nodded. He kissed Peter’s forehead gently. 

“We’ll all get there. Eventually”

“Peter?” Thor said. “Are you ok?”

Peter made a vague noise and closed his eyes.

“He’s been so sleepy today” Thor said. “He didn’t get out of bed until after one. He had a disturbed night, and he was so fast asleep this morning that I didn’t want to wake him”

“Maybe he’s getting ill” Tony frowned. “He’s quite warm”

“Maybe he’s just tired. He fell asleep for a bit around four o’ clock too”

Tony looked down at Peter. “Poor little thing. You’ve had a tough few weeks, haven’t you, chick?”

Peter did not reply. 

“Is he asleep?”

Tony shook his head. “Not yet”

“You are allowed to go to bed if you’re tired, little one”

“I think he’s comfortable here” Tony said. “At least, I hope he is...”

“He looks it” Thor said. “He’s... Well, I think he’s doing ok”

“Going back to school might be good for you, darling” Tony said. “Something to do, at least. Besides, you’ll see your friends again. I bet you’ve been a bit lonely here”

There was a long silence. 

“Your voice isn’t quite ready to come out, is it, chick?” Tony stroked Peter’s cheek gently. “My little boy...”

“It’s getting on a bit, Tony” Thor said. “I think you should put him to bed”

Tony pinched Peter’s ear gently. “...He’s asleep”

“Well, in that case, perhaps you should call it a night”

“I’ll take him to bed anyway” Tony said. “I’ve carried this little boy enough times to know I can do it”

-

Tony left Peter in the joggers and vest top he was in, and tucked him into bed with his rocket and seal. He kissed him gently on the forehead and knelt down by the bed.

“I love you, chicken. I absolutely adore you. And I’m sorry. You know I’m sorry... I’ll be back tomorrow. Just me” He glanced at the bag beside the bed. “There’s some stuff in there for you when you’re ready to open it. There’s a letter, too. Hopefully at least one thing in there will bring you some comfort”

-

“So, how did it go?” Pepper asked when Tony got back to the house.

Tony shrugged, sitting down next to Loki, putting an arm round his shoulders and resting their heads together.

“He let me hug him”

“Oh cool” Pepper said. “That’s progress, then”

“Yeah... He fell asleep on me too. I’ll go alone again tomorrow night and see what happens. Thor said he’d been asleep most of the day, and he did look kinda tired. Maybe that’s why he relaxed against me”

“Or maybe he’s just ready to forgive you” Pepper said.

“Maybe he just needed you” Loki said. “You know how much he loves you. He basically hero-worships you”

“...What about you? How did tonight go?”

“We talked” Loki said. 

“Ok” Tony nodded. “And..?”

Pepper and Loki looked at each other.

“And it was ok” Pepper said. “I think we made a bit of progress”

“Good...” Tony kissed Loki’s cheek gently. “Loki?”

“Mm?”

“I think you should call Jo Jo”

Loki paused. “Why?”

“I think it would do you good. See a friend. Another friend. I know you told him about all this”

“I’ll think about it”

-

Loki called Jo Jo the next morning. Jo Jo wasn’t working, so they decided to meet up. Loki told Tony he didn’t know how long he’d be, and he left. Tony got out a rough pad and sat at the breakfast bar, sketching. Pepper soon joined him. 

“What’s going on in that head of yours?”

“Absolutely nothing” Tony said. He sighed, setting his pencil down. “I don’t want to wait until this evening to see Peter”

“Who says you have to?”

“You’d be here alone if I did”

“I’m a big girl; I can look after myself”

“...Are you sure?”

“I’m sure. Go on. He is your son, after all”

Tony looked at her. He stood up, hugged her, and grabbed his keys.

“See you later”

-

Thor didn’t look too happy to see Tony.

“You could have let me know” he said.

“Sorry. I didn’t think it’d matter”

“Well, we were going to be going out” Thor said.

“Oh”

“Mm” Thor sighed. “Well, you’d better come in then”

Tony closed the door behind him and went through to the kitchen.

“He’s in his room” Thor said, following.

“Ah. Ok, thanks” Tony nodded, wandering off and knocking on the spare room door. “Peter, darling? It’s dad”

There was a brief silence, and then the door opened. Tony smiled at Peter.

“Hey, sweetie” he said. “How are you doing?”

Peter didn’t respond. He looked past Tony at Thor, who was stood close by.

“We’ll go tomorrow” Thor said.

Peter nodded slightly, and went and sat down on the bed to take his shoes off. Tony went and sat down next to him.

“Sorry I didn’t say I was coming earlier. Were you gonna be going anywhere nice?”

Peter shook his head slightly, pulling his shoes off and setting them down by the bedside table.

“Have you had lunch yet?”

Peter shook his head.

“Ok, well, how about us going out for something to eat? We can go anywhere you’d like, anywhere at all. And then we can talk. What do you say, kiddo?”

Peter looked at Thor, who was stood in the doorway.

“Don’t look at me, little one” he said. “It’s your decision. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do”

Peter nodded. He looked at Tony and shook his head.

“Ok, maybe some other time then” Tony said gently. “Well, how about I make you lunch here? Are you hungry?”

Peter shook his head. Tony sighed silently.

“Ok” he said. “Do you mind if I give you a hug?”

Peter hesitated, and then shook his head. Tony carefully wrapped his arms round Peter. He held him close, breathing him in, touching his hair gently.

“My boy. My little boy” he kissed him hard on the cheek. “I love you so much”

Peter leant against Tony. He didn’t hug him back, but he stayed quite contentedly in his arms. He’d missed this. And somehow, he felt comfortable enough to admit that to himself.

-

Peter wasn’t speaking, so Tony didn’t stay for too long. He’d had a cuddle with his son, and that was enough for him for now. 

Peter had a bit of a cry after Tony had left, and later found himself feeling lonelier than ever. All of a sudden he missed his dad again. He really, really missed him. And he wanted him. Badly.

And then he started thinking. 

He was staying with Thor, of course. But no one had explicitly told him he couldn’t go home. Not recently, anyway. The house was his home, and it had been for so long now. Why shouldn’t he go home? Ok, maybe there’d be some issues with him going back full time, but what was there to stop him from going back just for a little bit, just for a visit? He wanted to see his dad, and see his dad he would.

-

It was dark when Peter reached the house. He’d thrown a tantrum and Thor had sent him to his room, and he’d taken that opportunity to sneak out through the bedroom window. Peter opened the front door and slipped into the house as quietly as possible. The house was strangely quiet and dark, but he could hear something in the distance.

Peter made his way up the stairs, slowly, carefully. He reached the top of the stairs, and went onto the main hallway. It was still dark, but he could see that the kitchen light was on, and the sound he’d heard was clearer now. He realised it was Tony talking. He crept closer, stopping against the wall by the kitchen door, hidden from view.

“...There’s no help for it” Tony said. “We can try as hard as we can, we can talk for hours on end, but that’s all”

Peter listened, soon realising Tony was alone, and talking on the phone.

“I don’t know what else I can say. There’s no proper support for people like us. All the help is for women. I kinda know why, I can see why, and it’s good there’s stuff for them, but it doesn’t help me and Loki. I’ve found a few articles and stuff but it’s all either stuff saying there’s no help for men facing infertility, or stuff like those leaflets and like Loki said people would say; just telling us to go for adoption and sperm donation... Yeah, I guess traditional IVF is sort of an option for us, but I don’t think Loki would ever be on board with it”

Peter stayed as still as he could, his heart thudding in his chest. He could hear the hurt in Tony’s voice, and it was unnerving. The past six weeks seemed to have gone on for years. It was scary how bad things still were.

-

Peter listened to Tony talking for a long time. Eventually, the conversation turned to him. 

“I do miss him now” Tony said. “It’s been a lot longer than I realised... Yeah, of course I missed him at first. But then I was drunk for so long I couldn’t really think about, but this last week has been horrible”

Peter swallowed hard. He could feel his pulse beating in his neck. He felt bad, eavesdropping like this, but he couldn’t help wanting to hear it. 

“Things have been better the last couple of visits. I mean... Well yeah, that’s what I thought, all things considered, but I guess he was angry and upset... I think he still is, but it’s a bit hard to tell, considering how long I went without seeing him” Tony said. “...Well, today, he kinda hugged me. Well, he leant against me when I hugged him, anyway. It’s was so nice to hold him again. It’s kinda hard to explain. It’s just always been a nice thing, yknow, holding him... Well exactly. Despite everything, I mean, it could’ve been worse. Even if he’s cross with me, I’ve still got my son. That definitely counts for a lot”

Peter’s eyes welled with tears and he covered his mouth with his hand. He wasn’t sure why he was feeling so emotional, and he wasn’t entirely sure what he was really feeling. 

“...Yeah, that’d be good. I’ll have to talk with Loki and Pep when they get back, confirm things. Ring me tomorrow, and we’ll talk... Yeah, we’ll plan it. Talk to you later. Love you, pal. Bye now. Bye”

Peter heard the phone being put down, and suddenly he couldn’t stay hidden any more. He ran into the kitchen, making Tony jump and gasp.

“Peter?!”

Peter ran and threw his arms round Tony, burying his face in his chest. Tony stood in shock for a moment, and then hugged the boy back, holding him like he would never let go.

*

[dholwrites]

*sniggers* ok ok how are the undateables when it comes to swearing? Do they swear? How do they react when the WoL does?

Aymeric

Aymeric doesn’t swear, he doesn’t see the need to be swearing at all in public. However, spending most of his life around Estinien, he’s heard firsthand a long string of swears. It occurs so often that it doesn’t even faze him anymore than normal chatter. The initial swear that comes out of you does startle him. if it’s a common occurrence, he gets used to it. There was a small competition among his knights, to see if they can get him angry enough to swear. Estinien joined in and won quicker than you could utter a word. He knows Aymeric too well.

There’s a good reason why he doesn’t bring Estinien into big meetings. Aymeric is well aware that he would instantly lash out when they would pull an underhand move. While he's a good prop for intimidating lords from speaking, meetings are forced to a screeching stop to wrestle him to the ground. Estinien doesn’t only lash out with his words but also his lance. Aymeric quietly hoped that with you around, perhaps it would go smoothly still

He spoke too soon. A Lord (Dounon was it?) made an underlining comment of his relationship. It’s something that he can easily brush aside. But the man continues to take small jabs at him until the conclusion of the meeting. Someone could call him a buffoon for this childish behavior. Of course, Aymeric didn’t need to do so. You have that covered for him. The hell that you’ve unleashed from your mouth at Lord Dounon echoed throughout Ishgard. Aymeric has the day marked down on his calendar.

Estinien

He swears like his life depends on it. Sometimes worse than the sailors in Limsa, but you rather not make it a contest. You’ve witnessed him string together the most colorful things when a dragon swooped in and picked him up. Estinien actually holds second place on swearing in the Dragoon Barracks. If asked who is in first place, he will simply grumble to himself and stalk off to brood. Hearing his significant other swear doesn’t affect him. There’s a tug at the corner of his lips every time he hears you use something of his. He’ll actually find it a bit strange if you don’t swear yourself and will do his best to get you to say your first one.

“Just say it already!” He bellows from across the field. Estinien had been persistent ever since he found out. To the point even the largest of dragons doesn’t seem to faze him from his goal. To get you to swear. A stupid goal? Yes. But irresponsibility is in his blood and Halone damn him for being hard headed too. He knows that you’re not scared of them, being in his mere presence gives you more than enough options to pick from. All you really need to do is actually pick. He would prefer if you picked one of his more creative ones but gotta start somewhere right?

He was smirking at you, you could even feel the curve of a smile on his lips as his eyes gleam with amusement. Estinien is pleased, even more than pleased. Perhaps even ecstatic with this result. Of course, he won’t say that. Not now. He needs to see if you’ll do it again when he works with more than his tongue. The hand on your hips tighten their grip as the owner gets back to work between your legs.

Thancred

He can and does swear. He usually doesn’t, because ‘the ladies love poetry'. Thancred claims that he wants to set himself apart from the rest of the other thieves, bring actual charms into the mission. Y’shtola is inclined to disagree. Thancred is extra observate of when you swear. He picks up when you mutter swears under your breath. Like when you’re backed into a corner or when a new problem arose. It felt like he gets to see a smaller part of you. Each word paints a better picture of the person under the title.

You always swore when something didn’t go as planned. In battle, it’s alarming. Especially when you get thrown across the room or face first into the ground. But right now you’re sitting on a chair. Dangling it on the hind legs to reach the table, for a fork. You were a bit too lazy to get up to walk the length. Instead you resorted to see if your Echo could float the fork into your hand. he should warn you, but his curiosity stops him. Your hand hovers just ilms always from the fork, on the other delicately balanced a piece of cake. F’lhaminn had given it to you with the promise of a review. now it stands a higher chance of meeting the floor than your mouth.

A screech from the chair, quickly followed by one of your own. The chair wobbles off balance, starting its descent to the floor. The plate tipping off balance. The slice slowly slip off the plate. Falling. Falling. Splat. Onto your face. The loudest swear he’s ever heard rip out your mouth echoes throughout Rising Stones.

G’raha Tia

He swears more often than he would like to admit. A lot of time out of frustration as he tries to piece together relics of the past. You could physically see the build up before he screams it out into the world. Sure the Allagans have everything on file, but they don’t record the things that people are suppose to know already. Like how to find a book for dummies, G’raha really wishes he doesn’t have to admit that. Hearing you swear wouldn’t drive him away. G’raha would let out a small chuckle to himself, beckon you to sit next to him, and tell him what is wrong.

You didn’t think you would ever see a group of scholarly students duke it out as anything other than theories and ideas. Then again you have a habit of seeing and doing the impossible as G’raha admitted to you. He may or may not be involved in a historical swearing competition with his peers. The rules are simple, figure out what was the oldest swear discovered. Allagans are excluded because everything about them mess up the natural timeline. There’s no way to make sense of this other than listen in. But G’raha had even gotten into a fight over how old the word ‘damn’ is for the last two hours now. Pulling out textbooks the same way summoners summon their carbuncles.

Why isn’t the referee stopping the debate? Who else would G’raha argue with other than the referee.

Cid

He swears when he’s in pain, usually choking it out between gasps of pain from drinking salt water coffee again. Most of the time, he’s a clean slate. Because of his looks, a lot of people would expect a more old fashioned type of swearing. Unfortunately, Cid is dangerously good at figuring out what are the new ones being used and wield it. If not, there’s nothing stopping him from convincing Wedge and Biggs to teach him.

There’s a few things that you know for sure about Cid. One, he likes working with machinery and inventing. Two, Cid might have the patience of a saint but Nero will cut it down to a candle wick. Three, Cid knows Garelean swears. The combination of these facts can lead to many scenarios. Like right now. Cid and Nero hurling insults at each other, Garelean insults that no one else would understand. Well everyone except you.

The Echo helps translate the foreign language into something you can understand. Cid finds out when you started translating and telling everyone else the words being thrown around. Deciding to take advantage of this while he can, Cid calls for your attention in private. Slowly and surely, he starts to teach you every single Garelean swear he knows. Everyday he would put time aside to make sure that you memorize everything he’s telling you. All this effort boils down until Nero once more comes by to annoy him. Now the both of you can tag team and beat Nero at his own game.

Alphinaud

Alphinaud doesn’t swear. The Scions and many adventurers do their best not to around him. There is a bit of an image that they like to keep. This doesn’t mean that he hasn’t  heard anyone swear before. A quick trip through Limsa would quickly change that fact. He does have a mental image of you with every aspect of a hero. He never considered if you would ever swear.  Pure shock would spread across his face as soon as he hears you voice out a crude word. His heroic image of you has completely shattered.

Everyone makes a big deal out of it. The fact that they’ve caught you swearing around Alphinaud is already bad enough. When he  followed it up with a swear of his own it made the situation all the worse. It was something in the moment. The pain shooting through your foot and up your knee. You barely missed the chair right next to the table that attacked you, stumbling with your other to get seated. The pain dulls into a throbbing ache is when you finally turn to your companion. His eyes and mouth wide open, perfectly groomed brow raised in alarm, his ears seem to slightly droop. A face of shock.

Just over his shoulder, you spied Thancred. The wide cheeky grin says it all. You swore. In the midst of the pain, you allowed a word to slip. A nervous sweat broke on your back as you eye the door. A good idea is to make a break for it before Tataru finds out.

“Did you just say ‘Fuck’?” The words were quickly followed by a body hitting the floor. Thancred lays at the feet of his chair clutching his side, dying of silent laughter. You make a dash for the front door. To be greeted with the sight of a stern Tataru. Shit.

Haurchefant

New recruits try not to swear around him. But when you’re being put outside in the freezing water with nothing but your smallclothes, it’s hard not to express your pain. Haurchefant is actually quite open on his opinion of swearing, he doesn’t care. He does occasionally swear when he’s pumped on adrenaline. Sometimes even swearing as he shouts out orders. He doesn’t even realize what he had done until he has returned back into his office.

It’s always a welcoming sight to have you in his office. Sitting by his table, stripped of most of your gear. While The snow storm throws itself at the windows, he basks in the warmth of your presence. though that doesn’t ease the growing stacks of paper, it made the room feel easier to breath in. You took the hot chocolate eagerly from his hand to your mouth. The result: A loud swear as the cup was nearly dropped to the ground. Hearing you swear made him giddy. Like a sudden shot of energy to the heart that he can’t quite describe.

Haurchefant pulls up a chair and plants himself just barely a hairline away. He offers you a trade. An Eorzean swear for an Ishgardian Swear. Sure, he’s heard a few before from the adventurers that have stopped by. But it’s different with you. There’s a gleam in your eye that tells him you’re amused. Haurchefant takes your hands, hot chocolate forgotten on the table, and with his own bright eyes invites you to say yes. He’ll nudge, pout, and dramatically plead until you finally agree to his deal. The storm is easy to forget when you’re teaching an angel to curse.

Hien

Hien won’t swear. It’s considered a crude way of talking and he has been warned against using such a language. Hearing you cuss will makes him cringe a bit, but it will not be something that he could hate you for. You will start to get on his nerves if you purposely swear more often after he had asked you to tone the profanity down around him. This is not a matter he wants to fight you about. Hien understands that it’s a trait that you have, but there’s only so much he can handle when he’s around you.

Recently you’ve picked up a few new words from the Confederacy. A small part of him is already starting to regret asking them for him. He admires their word, he really does. He even found it funny when they sent the both of you to inspect the ship for repairs. But the language sure does need some adjusting to.

You were teasing him, he just knows it. Every time he tries to tell you to stop, you flash him that blinding smile with a squeeze to his hand and he melts. There’s no way for him to stay angry at you. The plan took awhile to figure out, he even enlisted the help of Alphinaud. For every day you don’t swear, you’ll earn points to be traded in for rewards. He’s even made a list; be it a kiss anywhere you like, a dinner date, or even an entire day of just the two of you. It’s a small list. A limited amount but just enough to keep you interested for a trial run. It started off well, a kiss on your shoulder, forehead, and neck. They pick up, a kiss on your nape, collarbone, the inside of your wrists. The list begins to grow. This deal works amazingly. Before long, you were hoarding points until you would have him massaging the aching muscles of your back.

Now has been the longest time you’ve been away. But every night you would relay in your head all his ‘rewards'. It was torture if anything, the damned prince would tease your skin with his lips and fingers until you were close to jumping his bones. Then pull away just to declare you’re out of points! The nerve of him. Armed with more than enough points, you plan to keep him awake. All night long.

[atlantic-riona]

All of the asks for the Raven!!!!! Because I love him!!!

I’m so happy you love him, because I do too! and this was a lot of fun to write, especially because talking about Bran inevitably leads to me poking fun at him XD

Their age? Bran is 19

Their sexuality/sexual preference? straight

Any siblings/Only child? MANY SIBLINGS--there’s his twin sister, Cait, and then there’s Gwydion, Alasdair, Art, and finally Conor (going from oldest to youngest)

Their favorite season? he's never been able to decide, so it varies from season to season

Who were/are their parents/guardians? THIS IS SPOILERS TERRITORY but I can tell you that his mother was named Ailbhe and his father was named Ler; Ailbhe was a soldier in the Imperial army like Cait and Ler was a sailor

Their gender? male

Their date of birth? goodness, I don’t know...*consults timeline* gonna have to say probably sometime in early spring, and for specifics...let’s say March 11

What clothing style? clothes (jk he usually wears loose tunics and loose ankle-length breeches. sometimes he wears a vest with it but he always leaves it open because he hates feeling constricted. he honestly Does Not Care what he looks like; which his brothers hate because he usually ends up Looking Good anyway)

What is their favorite food after a break-up? apple pie

Their favorite thing to do after a break-up? brood in the corner and convince himself that it was his fault

What happens in the ‘honeymoon phase’ for this character? he would probably spend a lot of time teasing her and generally be overjoyed to be around her

How many serious relationships have they been in? one so far, with Marian

What is their nationality? Falian

What languages do they speak? he speaks Falian, Vala (the language of the Valavir), and a few others (that I haven’t figured out the names for yet)

What is their profession/Education? he is a former mercenary and wants to become a healer. he’s completely self-taught in everything, but is just as educated as anyone who’s gone to university

Their favorite comfort food? apple pie

What’s a food they hate? vegetables in general, but he can never admit it, because then all his younger siblings would have an excuse to not eat their vegetables

Their music taste? it would probably range between traditional Irish and Scottish music and the more modern Gaelic-inspired music (am I saying that Bran would listen to Celtic rock? ABSOLUTELY)

Is there a story behind their name/meaning? ehehe...yes. a long one. because I put a ton of time into finding the right names for any of my characters, and this involves a lot of research, so apologies for the info dump in advance! the name Bran has mythological connotations--there are characters in both Welsh and Irish mythology with the name (Bran the Blessed and Bran mac Febail). also I knew my Bran’s father was a seafarer so I wanted a first or last name that referenced the sea or sailing in some way. In Welsh mythology, Bran the Blessed is brother to Manawydan fab Llŷr, and in Irish mythology, Bran mac Febail goes on a long sea voyage and meets Manannán mac Lir, an Irish god of the sea. Both Manannán mac Lirand Manawydan fab Llŷrare thought to be connected (possibly descended from an earlier, shared god), and in fact, both their last names mean “son of the sea” or “son of Llŷr/Ler.” in Irish mythology, Ler is hypothesized to be an earlier god of the sea who Manannán eventually replaced (it’s not exactly the same for Manawydan fab Llŷr). so Bran’s (my character, not the mythological versions) father got named Ler to reference the sea, and also because I thought it was a cool name. in addition, the name Bran means “raven” (which isn’t why he got named “the Raven,” that came later) and the raven in Celtic tradition represented war, death, and prophetic knowledge/omens (usually of death). it could also be used for someone who had raven-dark hair. so basically, since my character was someone with dark hair like a raven, spent much of his time on a battlefield, and had connections to the sea in the form of his father, it fit perfectly. (later, when I was looking for a sort of folklore sounding title/epithet, “the Raven” seemed to fit because of the connotations mentioned previously, and it was only after I started using it that I remembered his real name already meant “raven.” so his name is either “raven” or Raven XD)

Something they do that seems childish to others? sometimes he sulks up in a tree or in another high place. which, in his mind, is considered “serious contemplation,” but the rest of his siblings just call it “pouting”

What is their all-time favorite TV show? he would probably enjoy shows that were about families and had a sense of humor, maybe like Republic of Doyle (alternatively, he’d enjoy cartoons like Batman: the Animated Series)

What is their all-time favorite movie? Bran would probably enjoy Lord of the Rings a lot, now that I think about it

How big is their family? just the six siblings (for now...)

Are they close to anyone specific in the family? he shares everything with Cait, because they’re the oldest siblings and he trusts her more than anyone, but he’s also very close to Alasdair, because they have shared interests and temperaments

Have they got any allergies? yes, to people who are named Ferhon or Lucan

Are they an emotional person? he tends to put everybody else’s needs before his, so he bottles up any emotions that are not helpful for the people around him (which doesn’t always work out well for him)

Do they get angry/lose their temper quickly? no, any anger usually builds up really slowly and then BOOM one day he loses his temper and that’s that

What are some of their guilty pleasures? reading, apple pie, lying/sitting down doing nothing

Do they have pets? Do they want pets? he has a pet! (sort of) Marian gave Alasdair a puppy, who has since become the family dog

Do they like kids? Do they want kids/have kids? he loves kids and wants to have lots of them someday

Who’s cuddle buddy are they? there is no specific cuddle buddy really--all the sibs sort of pile up on top of each other if they’re relaxing or something

Do they have any tattoos? no

Do they have any piercings? nope

What is their hair colour? Is it their natural colour? wavy black, and it is naturally so

Do they like musicals? would probably not really mind them, as long as he isn’t forced to sit through one

Do they like marmite? I’m not sure, because I’ve never had it myself :)

Do they like glitter? probably not

Do they believe in the supernatural? yes (he IS the supernatural, to be fair)

Have they ever seen a dead body? TOO MANY

Have they ever had a near-death experience? ALSO TOO MANY

Have they ever broken a bone? you know what, yes. going to make it canon now.

What are they like when they’re drunk/what kind of drunk are they? it’s a 50/50 chance if he’ll be mopey or ready to start a fight

Have they ever drunk underage? there is no drinking age, so no

What is the first thing they do when they wake up? make breakfast for everybody

Do they consider themselves popular? that would require having more than a few friends (also he’s CERTAINLY not popular with the Empire at the moment)

How do they like their tea/coffee? I have to confess something: most of my characters drink tea, but I Do Not like tea and so have no idea of the Nuances of it. so...I don’t know

What do they smell like? woodsmoke and pine, also various herbs if he’s been working

Are they a virgin? yes

Do they wear glasses/contacts? no; he has excellent eyesight anyway

Are they good at remembering significant dates? Anniversaries, birthdays etc? once in a blue moon (and by that I mean he totally asked Art to remind him if something really important comes up since Art’s the only one in the family who bothers to keep track of the dates)

thanks! :)

[justreadingfics]

Soft Touch, Tough Soldier.

Pairing: Bucky Barnes (Winter Soldier) X Reader

Summary You don’t have a life of your own anymore. You are theirs. Just as much as he is. Despite the horror you both live in, you find each other.

Word Count: 4.7k

Warnings: angst, reference to torture, reference to violence, brainwashing, implied smut.

A/N: This is my submission for tricia’s1kchallenge (the outstanding @tilltheendwilliwrite). Thank you for allowing me to participate T., and for helping me so much with this one. You rock! I adore you. Congrats on the milestone, you deserve it all. I got prompt 9.  “I have to go, but I don’t want to leave you.” English is not my first language. I feel like this differs a bit of what I’ve written before, so I really, really would love to hear from you guys. Xo.  

Source for timeline: http://marvelcinematicuniverse.wikia.com/wiki/Timeline

Source for Romanian: Google Translator and @morningriseghost who so kindly messaged me. 

Gif not mine. 

 Washington, DC. Apparently this was going to be your new home for a while. At least it was what you had heard some of them saying. Not that it matter in any way, not that you were allowed to leave the constricting walls of whatever shitty facility they chose to operate.

You didn't have a choice. You wish you could even remember what it felt like to walk on the street of a city, to feel the air around you, to listen to the mix of noises showing the place was alive, that you were alive… But you couldn't. You didn’t have a life of your own anymore. You were theirs. Just as much as he was.

You sighed profoundly, biting the nails of one hand, while the other fumbled with the buttons of your white coat, and your foot tapped repeatedly against the floor. Why was it taking so long for them to bring him to you?

It had been long since the last time he had been out of Cryo. Your patient, your Soldier, your love... The only anchor that kept you holding on to this life.  It had been 7 months and 12 days since you last saw him. The longest period you’d ever gone without a glance of his gorgeous face since you got to that hell, three years before. Now you were so close to see his oceanic gloomy eyes again, but every minute seemed like a painful eternity. They must had something big and atrocious planned to keep him guarded for so long. The thought of what kind of nasty mission they undoubtedly had prepared for him made your stomach twitch in knots.

The nerve-racking waiting and the longing to see him soon draw your mind to the very beginning.

~~~~

You had freshly graduated from Harvard Medical School followed by a residency in Neurology. First in your class, receiving all the honors possible, with a backpack full of dreams to pursue hanging on your shoulders. That’s the reason why when one of your Professors offered you an opportunity to be part of a big and intriguing research program of a mysterious organization you didn’t even blink twice before getting on board. Who would have thought that your dear Doctor List was actually a leader of the dishonorable organization called HYDRA?

At first they tried to brainwash you with their sick philosophy to make you stay. But, when it didn’t work out as expected, they started using what they knew best. Torture. Pain. Intimidation.

Every escape attempted meant at least one broken limb for you. Not to mention the constant threats against your family members. So, at the end, you were left with no choice other than to give in to your new life as a HYDRA Doctor.

Your job would consist of evaluating and treating an asset of theirs, one they kept in cryogenesis and took out only for missions. You should check for any brain damages resulting from the process and from other perverse techniques described in his medical file, which forced your heart to be scrunched while reading it. Basically, you had to assure they wouldn’t fuck him up to the point of no return or make him useless for the organization plans.

You would never forget the day you first met him. Just like now, you were anxiously waiting for them to bring him to you. But your anxiety wasn’t caused by the same reason then.

Then you had been terrified. You knew nothing about his life, his backstory, but you were aware of the wiping process and the horrific brainwashing methods he was constantly submitted to. Yet, he was HYDRA’s deadliest weapon, so your expectations rested on that, and not on the fact that when two guards rushed into the room, startling you and placing him roughly in the treatment chair right to your front, you would meet with the bluest pair of eyes you had ever seen.

The two guards stepped away to stand by the door while you did your work. Your eyes were fixated on the broad figure that sat in front of you, wearing what you understood to be a tactical gear. A rough leather vest with no sleeves, exposing both his flesh and metal arm, which you knew about by reading his files, but what really held you interest was how dead his beautiful eyes remained.

He didn’t look up at you, he didn’t even acknowledge your presence or the whole situation which surrounded him.

Your breathing was erratic while his remained impassive. Though you weren’t afraid anymore, there was another rush of feelings surfacing inside you which you couldn’t quite put a finger on. How could someone seem so menacing and helpless at the same time?

You took in a deep breath to put your feelings on check and start the examinations procedures. The least you wanted was a punishment for being distracted. So, as you were used to doing during your residency, you explained to him everything you were doing and were careful to ask for permission before every single one of the procedures, even if all your words seemed to be falling into a void as he lingered silent and as still as a statue.

The images displayed on the exam machine shattered your heart. It was unbelievably heartbreaking how damaged his hippocampus and other essential parts of his brain were as a result of the endless wiping, yet you were amazed at the capacity of learning, clearly enhanced by the serum injected on his system.

When you were done with your work, you noticed, for a very unprofessional reason which most likely could get you killed, you weren’t quite ready to let him go. He intrigued you in a restless way. Against your better judgment, you slowly stepped closer to his chair after glancing at the both man guarding the door. They were engaged in a conversation with their back turned to you, so you felt confident enough to do what you had no idea why you needed to do.

You kneeled in front of the expressionless man. While his breathing was stealthily quiet, your ragged one assaulted your ears. He didn’t flinch or look directly at you, not even when you propped yourself with your hands on the arms of the chair with your face inches from him. You couldn’t believe how handsome he was with those chocolate locks brushing his features, some strains wet in sweat and glued to his skin.

But when you couldn’t help yourself and raised a hand to tenderly cup his scruffed jaw his eyes flicked swiftly to yours. It didn’t startle you, instead, his baffled stare and the sway of his chest showing the increase of his breathing only urged you to say what had been haunting your mind ever since you read his medical file. “I’m sorry...” you whispered, meaning your words.

His forehead furrowed while he blinked several quick times, and, opposing the former deadpan expression, in his eyes you saw fear, confusion, sorrow, but you also saw softness, curiosity, and appreciation. His beautiful, slightly parted lips were trembling like there were words trying their way out of the prison of his mind.

The sounds of his heavy breathing mingled with the thuds of your heart against your chest. Hypnotized by the beauty expressed in his gaze. You missed when he hesitantly lift his metal hand to lightly coat the one you had caressing his cheek. The sudden icy touch prompted a gasp out of your throat and sent sparkles all over your body, but you couldn’t move your hand away from him.

Right then you realized how much trouble the Soldier would be for you.

You weren’t wrong. That very same night you had a piece of that trouble, while you were lying down on your single bed in what your capturers liked to call a bedroom but you knew as your cell. With your back turned to the door, you didn’t see or hear him coming in, but you felt his overwhelmingly quiet presence behind you. An unbidden wave of fear ran down your spine making your eyes widened and your body tense. You made sure to slow down your breath, but you knew it was of no use.

His enhanced senses weren’t a secret to you, he would know you were awake.

The attack you were expecting never came. He just stood there in the dark inside the small room, staring at the back of your body, you assumed. Unexpectedly but not in a unwelcoming way, the whole situation ceased to be frightening to you when some curious feelings started to inflame your insides from the bottom of your core, and you felt your whole body relaxing, even if you never turned to face him.

His brooding presence was somehow comforting and the risk involving the situation was… insanely alluring to you. You knew he had gotten closer when rushes of hot air coming from his breathing enticed goosebumps to erupt all over your skin laid bare by a tank top and shorts.

You took in a sharp intake of air, your whole body shuddering when a cold metal finger touched ever so lightly the place where your skin was exposed on your low back and moved all the way up to your neck, unhurriedly making its way down again to the starting point, getting close to the band of your shorts. It became an almost impossible mission to suppress the yearning, dirty sounds fighting to escape from your lips as an expression of sheer arousal. Before you could show any further reactions he was gone.

He left as stealthily as he had got in.

It left you panting and feeling cold lines of sweat running over your skin, trying to understand what had just happened and why you were feeling that way, like there was a magnet pulling you over to that man. A man whose name you didn’t even know, if he had one at all.

During the protocol of the examination session the next day, and the subsequent ones, whoever watched the interaction between you two saw nothing but stoical behavior coming from him and professional manners on your end. It was amazing how bad guys couldn’t figure out anything beyond hate and fear, so the touches that were prolonged more than necessary and the affection coloring the gazes of both of you meant nothing to them.

That first night was followed by another, and another, and another. He always adopted the same pattern, standing inside your room watching you on your bed before running his metal finger over the usual path on your spine, never exchanging a single word with you. Most people would see that behavior as disturbing, but God knew how much you longed for those hushed minutes with him.

Afraid of scaring him off with a sudden move, you remained on the same position to allow him to come closer and touch you. You couldn’t sleep before he arrived and struggle to close your eyes after he would leave you.

You both kept this dynamic several nights and days until the craving for more of him took the best of you. During one particular night you decided you hadn’t had enough, so when you felt his presence behind you and the familiar cold touch of his finger, you boldly turned around, grabbing his flesh wrist when he promptly moved to get up from where he was kneeling by the side of your bed.

“Stay,” you whispered.

He kept looking at you with widened eyes but with an unreadable expression, keeping himself deliberately in place since he could easily unraveled himself from your grasp.

“I need you to stay,” you kept on without averting your eyes from the ones which had the power of melt your heart. “I need you to touch me,” you huskily confessed while softly guided his flesh hand to cup one of your breasts, feeling an electrifying coil squeezing your core when his hand met the covered mound.

His mouth had been long opened, then his eyes closed and his heaving chest proved how hard breathing was becoming for him, just like it was for you.

“Please, I need you…don’t go away…not tonight, please,” you pleaded, not caring how pathetic you were sounding. You needed this man, that was the simple truth, and you wanted anything but to run away from the feeling.

He snapped at your breathy supplication, and the walls he had been struggling to sustain between you two crumbled down when he pulled you closer with his metal arm, and leaned forward to press his lips to your begging ones with unrestrained passion. Soon, skin met skin and your searing sweaty bodies became one until the despair of your touches burned in a fiery pleasure you had both been deprived of for too long.

You didn’t count how many times he had taken you that night. He couldn’t get enough of you just as much as you needed to feel him, to be closer and closer, to have him inside you.   

From that unforgettable night on, your life with HYDRA consisted of enduring whatever you had to just to survive and wait for your encounters with the unnamed soldier, whether it would mean the wordless, ardent nights inside your bedroom or even the chance to furtively touch him in the medical bay.

So, it did nothing less than break your heart on the occasions when they wiped his brain so much he wouldn’t remember you. At least, at first when they sat him down on the chair before you, but at night he rarely failed, always finding his way back to you, somehow breaking through the barriers of his own mind. When it came to you, you were each and every time waiting for him, eager for his both soothing and ravenous touches.

~~~~

That day in that dreadful facility in Washington, after so long he had been on cryo, depriving you of his warmth, you had no idea what his reaction to you would be. Would he remember you? Would he still find his way to you, no matter what?

The clench in your stomach constricted further when, like a replay from the first time you’d seen him, two guards stormed into the room, dragging and pushing him into the chair. The hatred in your eyes aimed at the HYDRA assholes for the unnecessary violence of their actions soon turned into worry for the numbness the gaze of your lover displayed, like his soul had been detached from his body.

In a way you knew this was what they did to him with the wiping. The anguish in your heart almost made you gasp when he didn’t respond like he usually did to your gentle touches disguised in medical techniques.

Defeated, despite trying hard but gently to trigger him into recognizing you, all there was left was fighting against the tears forming in your eyes and go on with your procedures, silently hoping for the night to bring him back to you.

But your hopes were in vain. He didn’t search for you that night, and the next day, when you were with him again, he still didn’t seem to recognize you, keeping to his emotionless behavior.

There was something wrong...

Your heart sank, and your concerns were confirmed when the exams you ran on his brain showed that the recent wiping had been even more damaging than the previous ones. When you tried to argue with the doctors responsible for the procedure they only explained that the orders had come from above. Apparently the missions he had been assigned for required so. When you tried to reason further, they said, with a scientific interest and nothing else, that they knew how harmful this could get for the “asset’s proper functioning”, but they couldn’t do anything. It wounded you extremely to acknowledge that neither could you.

You spent the next couple of nights in tears alone in your room. You cried for his absence, but most of all you cried for being so helpless while you witnessed them tearing him apart. You would do anything to give it all back to him, whatever the life HYDRA had stolen from him, as they had from you.

You caught yourself wondering about the man you never knew, the man behind all of that horror, behind the soldier, what was his history? Had he been happy? Did he have a family looking for him? Friends? A girl? You guessed you would never find out. You didn’t even know how old he was since the medical file delivered to you was restricted to the minimum necessary and the cryo process made it hard to estimate.

On the third night you had lost hope he would ever feel him in your arms again. That was until you got out of your bathroom wrapped in a towel after a shower and met with his brooding presence inside your room. The smile which instantly curled up your lips faded as soon as you took him his demeanor.

He was wearing his tactical gear, covered in dirt, hair disheveled, strained all over his face while his jaw remained clenched and his hands were balled into two fists. He was staring intensively at you, but you couldn’t read his expression.

You noticed bruising over his neck you knew would soon be gone, but it didn’t stop you from worrying.

However, you didn’t know what to expect from his gloomy and unsteady presence, so you fought off the urge to run to him and wrap him in your arms, remaining cautiously still by the bathroom door, waiting for him to move first.

His tongue swept over his lips before you heard his voice for the first time ever. “I know you,” he stated, a rough gravelly sound, but instead of the expected menace, you heard vulnerability in his words.

This and the sentence itself were enough to send you running in a straight line to press your lips against his shaking ones. His muscles seemed to relax under your touch when you cupped his face between your hands, and he circled one arm around your waist bringing you closer to him.

Reluctantly you broke the long delayed kiss, but didn’t step away from him. He rested his forehead against yours and sighed once again, “I know you.” This time you heard a bit of relief in his voice.

“You do… you do, my love, you know me,” you hurriedly confirmed, running your hands to the nape of his neck, tightening the embrace, afraid he would slip through your fingers again.

You felt his muscles going rigid like before, and you stopped breathing, afraid you had gone too far with your affection and had triggered him somehow.

But his hold on your back over the towel separating your body from his hands became stronger and he added softly, “And I knew him…”  

Frowning, you leaned back but kept your arms around his neck to watch his face. What you saw was despairing confusion while he tightened his lips and narrowed his eyebrows, forming a grimace. “Who?” you asked.

You felt his heart become erratic against his chest when he responded. “The man on the bridge, I knew him.”

The vulnerability expressed in his words and in his whole body language was almost palpable and you wished you could do something to help him, but then heavy boots and words spoken in Russian were heard coming from the corridor outside your door. You desperately took your lips to his again, then pressed your chest against him, enveloping his body  in a close-fitting grip, resting your chin on his metal shoulder and diving a hand on his hair.

“I thought I had lost you. I can’t lose you,” you whimpered, not even trying to fight the tears.     

He nuzzled in the crook of your neck taking a long inhale of air, as if he was making sure to engrave your scent in the deepest part of his mind. “I have to go, but I don’t want to leave you,” he confessed in a low but firm voice against your skin.

Somehow you managed to form a smile through your tears. You leaned your head away from his shoulder to once again look at him, sliding one hand to caress his jaw like the first time you had ever touched him. “They can’t see you here with me, my heart… but I’ll be always waiting for you, no matter what, you have to know this. And you will find me again, won’t you?” You didn’t know if you were trying to reassure him or yourself with those words.

His metal thumb wiped away a tear rolling down your face, and your soldier once again warmed your lips in a kiss, sweet and soft, but full of longing. “Always,” he breathed after giving you a final peck and looking down at you with a blazing conviction in his eyes which left you with no choice but to believe his promise.

But a few moments after he was gone, you found yourself curling your body in a ball on the floor, listening to his excruciating screams echoing through the corridors. They were wiping him again, and you knew it would be even harder this time.

Whatever happened on that last mission had triggered him to not just remember you, but also this said “man on the bridge”. If they noticed any of that, they would definitely make sure to delete everything they could so they could keep their compliant machine.

You cried yourself to sleep with the dreadful feeling it wouldn’t be easy for him to keep his promise.

~~~

It all happened in a blur, like you were a spectator of your own life.

The evacuations sirens were filling your ears and your thoughts couldn't follow a coherent line. All you knew was you had to move. You knew a situation like this would come at some point. It meant you had two choices: to vanish on your own or they would vanish with you.

You chose the first option and for the first time in a long time you gathered the courage to make an escape. The chaos worked in favor of you and other prisoners to run away from the facility. Against all odds, you were able to walk on a city street again. No, not walk, you had to run for your life and couldn’t really enjoy the foretaste of freedom.

While you made your escape, you heard a word here and there and slowly you managed to catch a glimpse of what was the cause of all that buzz. Apparently a woman they called “Black Widow”, who was part of SHIELD (a name you had heard before as one of HYDRA’S major nemesis), exposed every file of both organizations, revealing its members and doings. You realized it meant you would be exposed as HYDRA associated as well.

Who would believe you were held there against your will? What would happen to you until you could prove your hostage situation, if you ever could achieve such thing? You would never go back to be at the mercy of any institution, not even the government. Then you understood you wouldn’t have to run just from HYDRA, but also from everyone else.

Another thing you learned was your beloved Soldier was actually James Buchanan Barnes who used to be part of the Howling Commandos you had heard so much about in history classes when you were little. Your heart caught in your throat to know that he was considered missing after a confrontation with his best pal, Captain America himself.  

The man on the bridge.

That was when you knew your fearful feelings had been right. You would never find each other again. You discovered, then, what numb emptiness felt like.  

To hold any hope of survival for yourself, you sank down deep inside the fear of a life without him, of a life of not knowing if he would be alright, of never having the chance to explicitly tell him how you felt for him, so you grasped all your hopes on the possibility that, yes, he was fine and finally free of the horror he had been imprisoned in for nearly 70 years. The faith you put on that thought was the only way you would be able to go on.

Lucky for you, one of the hostages who managed to escape by your side used to be a C.I.A agent, who identified himself to you just as Agent J. He helped you create a whole new name, a new home, a new life.

~~~

One year.

That was how long you had been succeeding on surviving after the apparent dismantling of HYDRA. You had serious doubts they had been fully defeated, but at least you had never been found by whatever might have remained of the hateful Nazi group, or by anyone else for the matter.

And anyone else included him.

There wasn’t a night that you wouldn’t dream of the touch of his finger sliding over your back. Sometimes you would get to the point of waking up swearing you had felt it for real, and it wasn’t just a product of your reveries, but he was never there when you looked for him.

You knew it in your gut he was alive. You knew what he was capable of and how the serum inside his system was strong enough to help him heal from the most severe injuries.

Yet the hope of him getting to you again never out weighed the certainty it was  impossible. After all, you had disappeared without leaving any traces behind. Agent J. had picked a place for you he had considered suitable for someone who wanted to vanish from the rest of the world.

It was hard at the beginning to get used to absolutely everything there. But it felt like a paradise after HYDRA. Soon you found yourself a small apartment and a job at a coffee shop which helped you immensely with the language. Little by little you were building a life for yourself, a routine, blending in with the lifestyle of the foreign country, pretending you could be happy again someday, and get by the pang in your chest every single time you thought of him.  

One of your favorite things to do was to head to the local street market early in the morning before work to get yourself some fresh fruits.

So there was the place you were that morning. While you walked around the fruit stalls, the noise of the busy city had a calming effect on you, It was a proof that you weren’t a prisoner anymore, even if you would never get back to your old life. Feeling in a good mood, it lit up your eyes to see a stand full of your favorite fruit.

A smile slipped through your lips and you decided to stop and buy some of them to eat at your lunch break later that day since they looked so juicy and tender.

“Sunt prunele coapte?*Are the plums ripe?” you asked in raw Romanian, but still making yourself understandable enough to the attendant. You nodded and smiled when she answered positively.

“Ok, deci vreau…*Ok, so I want…” You never finished your order. The hand that was fumbling over the fruits froze in place when you felt it.

It was real this time.

Instead of metal, it was a gloved finger that met your lower back and slowly slid it’s way up, coaxing the little hairs on the nape of your neck to rise before descending back again over the familiar path which ached to feel that touch again.

All the air had disappeared from your lungs so you had no idea how you ended up able to whisper the words, “You found me.”

The whole world around you faded into that husky voice you thought you would never hear again.

“Always.”

 Perm. Tags (OPEN): @mytasterpeculiar  @yikesbuckster @melconnor2007 @iamwarrenspeace @kaaatniss @kissmyjassdaddy @adaliamalfoy @roselock20 @curlycals @capbuckthor @lilasiannerd @tomorraw @ria132love @alwayshave-faith @camillechan @strange-intricate-dysfunction @cassandras-musings  @random-fluffy-pink-unicorn @captain-chimichanga @tilltheendwilliwrite @super-complicated @50shadesofeyeys @cokamarie24 @jayzayy 

[cyrelia-j]

[drabble] #8 Formal (Jack/Sarina)

Continuing 30 Days of Jack With another little bittersweet Jack/Sarina. Probably should’ve mentioned it sooner since people are coming in at different points, but this is Jack/Sarina moving to Jack/Julian. These aren’t always being posted in chronological order. For now the timeline is as follows: 1, 2, 7, 4, 8, 3, 5, 6

Warnings: minor angst (brief note: I also threw in at the very end the passage from Peter Pan running through Jack’s head when he’s considering the stars. When I post on AO3 it’ll probably go back into the story itself)

“This smells nice.”

           “Of course it smells nice. It’s an Essential hm- classic scent, medium hold hmhm, I’m not an animal,” Jack grumbles, pacing in Sarina’s room. He made it here again, a walk across the great black ocean, the sea of stars swirling beneath his feet. His shoes are polished star bright- if there’s one thing he’s never gotten Wrong it’s Appearance.

           “Sit,” Sarina orders, pointing to the couch- she’s gotten bossy since she started talking, but he catches a smile. Usually Jack is the one pointing “sit” and he… deserves that and she deserves better than him- better than Bashir.

             “Mais je n'aurai plus d'envie, Il s'est chargé de ma vie…” Jack whispers. He never understands why his voice is steady when he recites. Maybe he should become a parrot.

           “O saisons, ô châteaux. Dramatic much?” She flicks his ear, same as Lauren. His foot taps anxiously, tapping tapping- “No Poe,” she interrupts (she’s a mindreader!) and he listens to her tone, having only a short time to learn her voice. Jack thinks she’s expressing... levity, lightness, that unbearable lightness of being that’s always escaped him. Is that what freedom means?

 Jack nods sharply, not sitting in silence long, not caught in his head like he’s always done around her because she was quite clear that she won’t let him brood- stuck trapped in his mind. He’d scoffed, asking how she’d do that light years off. She said that she can’t but“Julian” will. “Julian”. Not “Bashir”. Jack doesn’t know “Julian”, Jack knows Bashir and he still doesn’t believe her when she says if he stays, shows them he can adapt, (not be Normal, but Adapt), then he doesn’t have to go back.

He just has to convince Bashir, Sarina says.

 Jack bites his thumb, yanking it back out of his mouth when she warms the waxy pomade between her fingers and starts running it through his hair. He said he could do it himself but she insisted- for all the times he’d brushed her hair for her patiently, gently, and he… didn’t know what to say. Sarina has nice hair and it wasn’t fair that Lauren was the only one who could touch it. So of course he’d brush it for her. She smiled again when he said that and he… looks out at the stars with a sigh, leg still shaking jitterbug jitterbug and she asks him what he’s thinking.

 “The stars,” he mumbles. “I was… th-thinking what it must be like to be a s-star.”

“Happy or sad, Jack?” Sarina stops, resting her chin on his shoulder from behind, quietly, gently like she always used to. He blinks a few times, wishing that he was someone like Bashir (but not Bashir,!) who could turn and kiss her, or let her kiss him, and feel those stirrings but...

“…I don’t know...” He sighs, thumb coming back up and he swears he’s going to sit on his hands when he finds hers there instead.

“Me neither.”

 “Stars are beautiful, but they may not take an active part in anything, they must just look on forever. It is a punishment put on them for something they did so long ago that no star now knows what it was.”

(A translation of Jack’s recitation earlier is from Rimbaud’s “O Seasons, O Chateaus” and is: “ Now all desire has gone; It has made my life its own.” or another translation is “ But I will have no more desires, It has taken charge of my life.”)

[pizzafelony]

also not to be That Person but car boys fucked me up so badly that im thinking abt the Overarching McElroy Product Timeline theory in the back of my head pretty much constantly... self indulgent noodling under the cut

so theres two key theories, temporarily named Single Timeline Theory and Alternate Paths theory -- 

Single Timeline Theory runs with these events in chronological order:

first ending takes place (nick and griffin separated in the time stream)

nick, griffin, and ball become bustos 1.0, 2.0, and The Blob respectively

the events of car boys, up to and including Some Sort of Digital Heaven 

reunited once more in the time stream, we then proceed to the after credits ending

Alternate Paths Theory takes a different approach, viewing the two endings as two parallel universes:

first ending (Bad Ending Timeline) has nick and griffin separated, leading to the above events, ending with Some Sort of Digital Heaven

after credits ending (Better Ending Timeline) has nick and griffin together, slowly developing their godlike powers over millennia

the only real difference is that in ST theory, n&g already possess their godlike powers at the start of their thousand year car trip in the time stream,, personally i prefer the AP theory, just bcause the rest works out easier in it--

so once you have this framework, you can fit other mcelroy content into it, and uhhh okay half of this has already been theorised by others, but if i may, i put my own spin on it:

nick turns on Candle in the Wind. griffin goes to sleep for a thousand years.

nick has these years to ponder on the nature of existence and creation. griffin broods on how he never got to say goodbye to his loved ones, and how much destruction they wrought.

griffin wakes up. nick, desperate for conversation and for new creations, encourages griffin to think up new video game ideas with him, and creates CoolGames Inc.

over the course of these long conversations, nick and griffin’s powers begin manifesting. as they do, nick, still wanting fresh creations, asks griffin to build him a skyrim game that is unrecognisable as skyrim (Touch the Skyrim). however, griffin’s powers for destruction are inescapable, and his versions of skyrim continuously break.

over the course of Touch the Skyrim, nick and griffin become more and more powerful, and as they do, become unrecognisable to each other, and thus unstuck from each other in the timeline

and thus they fall into the Adventure Zone universe.

nick is transformed into the light of creation, that which creates their universe.. and griffin becomes the hunger, constantly chasing after the light, knowing he has to get back to nick but not knowing why

two notes:  i know most ppl posit griffin as becoming The DM for obvious reasons but like. listen,

secondly, its just TOO TEMPTING to think of, in this fiction, the details nick brings over to the taz universe from touch the skyrim......... the progeny of susan crushbone.. arms as trees and trees as arms.... FLYING BOATS......