#I don’t know if the links I put in there work because they’re the German ones and my phone didn’t let me get to the original site versions

[writerfae]

Ok 👉🏼👈🏼

I have a question ??

How do you make your mood boards? I don’t have an artistic bone in my body, so I don’t really draw my characters. Pfp isn’t my art, just my ocs haha.

Anyway some of it is a time/laziness issue. But like, I feel like I could do a mood board.

And I was wondering how you make them, because they’re so pretty ??? Every time I see one of your mood boards—instant dopamine. The colors and 🥺

Sorry for just popping in your ask box, but I was wondering like where do you find pictures, what program you use, stuff like that.

(Also sorry if this is a basic question. I literally have zero experience with any sort of art that’s not writing)

Hi! Don’t apologize, I’m always open for questions like this ^^ (also thanks for the compliment!)

So, making moodboards is pretty easy actually! The secret is finding fitting pictures and a good app to make a collage out of it

Let’s start with the pictures.

I gotta (shamefully) admit that for my latest moodboards I took most of the pictures off of Pinterest (which is always my last choice, but I ran out of good pics and tbh? Everyone else does it and I’m not using it to make money or whatever so I guess I’m fine)

But usually I use sites with free to use pictures like unsplash and pexels. There all you have to do is look for and download the pictures you need. Just type in search words that fit to the character/world you aim for.

I don’t know if you need it, but here’s some things I look for when I make OC moodboards:

a face claim / prominent feature of my character (hair, eyes, whatever)

their favorite color or just one you associate with them

maybe also a texture, like wood or leaves or clouds

the character’s hobby or things they adore (yes this includes food)

everything you associate with them tbh: animals and plants, maybe even an element

symbolism, so things that are important to them or make out a part of their personality (see: a crown as symbol for an OC who’s a queen)

jewelry or clothes they would wear

I personally don’t use this one too often but many people also use fitting quotes

(For me it’s also important to stick to a color scheme and make it all fit together aesthetically, but that’s probably a weird quirk of mine and honestly everyone should do what they prefer. If you rather have it colorful or just want to go with the vibes, go for it!)

Choose as many pictures as you like. Personally I use between five and nine (nine only if I make a “classy” moodboard), but like I said, that’s up to you.

By the way, moodboards aren’t just great for characters but also for character groups, story locations and just story vibes in general (I know you know that already, I just felt like mentioning it ^^)

Okay so now you have all your pictures, but how to turn them into a moodboard?

I do all my moodboards on my phone/tablet, so I use apps to put them together. There’s plenty of collage apps you can use, or just any picture editing app with a collage option (I think most have them).

Just search for “collage”or “photo collage” in your app store and you’ll find many apps you can download for free.

Now to find a good app that fits your needs is up to you and probably requires you to try out different apps to find the one that is best for you.

Some only let you do before mentioned “classic” collages (you know those 3x3 pics that are simply next to each other, like a grid), but there’s also ones with more unique layouts you can use.

I recommend the latter because it gives you more options and makes the moodboard more interesting, but again, just a personal opinion.

I don’t know if it’s available for you, but I use an app called InCollage (it’s only for android though, I think). If you don’t want to use apps I’m sure there’s online programs for these kind of things as well.

And when you found the right pictures and your preferred collage app to use, all that’s left to do is create the moodboard!

Throw all the pictures in a collage and rearrange them however you like. Choose a layout of your liking and a fitting background. I usually go with a color/texture that matches the pictures or my OC’s color. And that’s it!

It can take quite some time to find the right pictures and arrangement (my personal record is spending three hours on a moodboard xD) but it’s really quite simple! And so much fun too!

So that was my (admittedly way too long - sorry for that) guide. I hope I was able to help and wish you lots of fun creating your own moodboards! :)

[vixensbrainrotts]

Tokyo revengers headcanons

Content: Tr headcanons

Content warnings: None I hope, please let me know if there are any!

Vixen's two cents: I’ve been wanting to dump all my headcanons somewhere for a while now so here! I don’t think that these are all, but I’m gonna make a second post about any further headcanons I have. Also, i apologize for not including everyone here, ill make sure to include them next time. I hope you enjoy, and if you do, please tell me about it! Don’t be afraid to send me requests either, I’d love to write most anything (I’m uncreative sometimes)! Oh also, what are some of your headcanons? Do you agree with any of mine? I’ll link the part two once i figure out how to do that lol

(VOLUME II)

Kokonoi who is genuinely so bothered by bugs you won’t believe it. He has to leave the room as soon as he sees the „threat“, and fast.

Izana who curses loudly on Filipino whenever he accidentally hurts himself. You can hear him shout from across the whole house when he bumps himself on a corner.

Chifiyu who has a passion for graffiti. He loves tagging and wild styling and spraying elaborate throwup-styles on walls on Toman turf.

Inui who is colorblind, which is really unfortunate because he has an interest in fashion and styles. He relies on Koko for the greater part, but has recently discovered apps that identify color, which has vastly improved his personal style and allowed him to take on more challenging shades.

The Katawa twins who have an honestly really impressive Pokémon card collection and often play against each other to pass time. The amount they have spent on it is sorta concerning and more often than not stop by the little magazine store to buy another pack to "improve their decks" before gang meetings.

Hakkai who has a distinct dislike for the color orange but keeps finding himself surrounded it. He hates it but the walls in his room are orange. He could puke because his favorite faux-fur-coat is a darker orange. There’s no reasoner doesn’t like the color but something about it makes his skin crawl.

Hanma who is German/Russian and makes sure everyone knows it. He is proud of his heritage and will often use German and Russian idioms when conversating. It’s all fun and games till he starts swearing in his mother tongues during fights, bashing in his opponent’s skulls whilst cursing in a foreign, very aggressive manner.

Nahoya and Souya who work like devils in the kitchen. It’s a perfect tandem in between them, they somehow always know what the other wants and needs. If Nahoya needs a hand in opening the oven, Souya’s doing a 360 no look opening. If Souya’s hands are messy from kneading the dough, Nahoya automatically turns on the tap for hand washing. Twin telepathy is real and they’re the number one proof.

Mucho who can’t do shit in terms of math. You need him busy? Ask him for 7x9 and he’ll be unresponsive for the next 3-5 minutes. It’s really frustrating to him because he genuinely puts in so much effort to understand the formulas, but the numbers simply don’t click in his brain.

Smiley who got the smiley piercing the moment he found out about it. It’s really impressively healed and works so well on his face. Some even say that his smile has gotten wider ever since he got it. He also has a poorly healed nose stud on the left side that he only keeps in for sentimental value. He got it in the seventh grade during school and he got his ass whooped when he came back home with it.

Kisaki who unintentionally practices calligraphy because he writes exclusively in cursive. All of his notebooks look fake because all the letters look identical and everything is evenly spaced. The highlighter girlies in his classes wish death upon him on a daily.

Rindou who’s cracked at Chemistry for no reason. He doesn’t even have to try, it’s like the formulas unfold in front of him and the laws and rules just make sense. He can’t even explain it but ask him anything, and I mean anything he can give you the right answer. Just don’t ask him to be your lab partner. He has a nasty history of breaking test tubes.

Kakucho who knows how to dress. Like really know how to dress. Anywhere, anytime he’s looking like a Pinterest board. He doesn’t really try or occupy himself with things fashion, but he just looks so good and coordinated all the time. He thought it was natural to know what looks good or not, so he’s sometimes a bit perplexed by the things that his peers wear. He tries to be nice when he tells them it doesn’t work, but comes across a little brash because it frustrates him.

Kazutora who has unnaturally sharp canines. Like, it’s kinda scary sometimes because they poke out of his mouth even when it’s closed. He’ll commonly run his tongue over them when he’s bored, poking and prodding at them to check if they’re still sharp. It’s one of the features of his face he really does like.

Mitsuya who gossips like a Girl. He lives for drama and tea (silently) and due to his club being occupied by mostly girls, he’s surrounded by it constantly. The girls talk and talk and talk and he eats it up. The scary part is that he remembers nearly every part of it, so he knows so much. He’ll never share it with anyone but likes to know what’s happening. Sometimes he even correctly predicts scandals due to background knowledge.

Leading from the last one, Mitsuya who has a deep voice. One that rumbles softly when he speaks and sounds like the ocean when he laughs. It’s a killer during after-noon classes when he has to present or read something cause it has such a calming effect. He’s put multiple of his classmates asleep accidentally.

Draken who know just the tiniest bit about sowing from helping out in Mistuya’s workshop. He knows how to close a seam, he knows how to sew a button and he knows how to patch a hole and that’s it. He’s lowkey proud of it though.

[luckyreds]

A long rant about Winters and Liebgott under the cut:

This is also unedited and written on the way back to work so it probably doesn’t explain my points very well but what can you do-

Winters’ relationship with Liebgott is so intriguing to me because it exposes one major flaw Winters’ seems to have, which is his inability or unwillingness (?) to see the war from someone else’s point of view.

To him, the war so far has been fairly impersonal. He joins the paratroopers because if they’re going to war he wants to fight with the best. But his motivation as to why doesn’t go deeper than that. The war is pretty simple and clean cut. They train, fight in either Europe or the Pacific, win and return home. It makes sense for him, after all until that point in his life he has experienced the world as a heterosexual white male in the 30s and 40s. Safe to say he hasn’t faced any discrimination focused at him ever. And It’s reflected in his worldview, To him, the germans are just that; germans. They are just soldiers fighting a war just like them, nothing deeper than that.

But for Liebgott, he knows what the Nazi’s are doing. It’s very personal to him. In the show, he even wears the star of David next to dog tags. Which if he was captured, would’ve been a death sentence. We know this. Lieb is proud of what he is, A Jew. He probably knew what was going on in Europe before even joining the army. As word of what the Nazi’s were doing travelled quickly in the Jewish community.

His anger towards the Germans is justified and understandable. For me (and I’m sure many others) at least, as someone who has grandparents that are still alive and well who grew up during ww2 and experienced it first hand. And even had conversations with my great-grandparents about how it was/what they experienced.

It’s is the big obstacle in their relationship. Winters views Liebgott as someone quick to anger, one can’t be trusted with prisoners. (Which were SS’ers, so save to say Liebgott hated their guts, and once again for good reason) their interaction in crossroads is the first time we see them at odds. And it is a glimpse of what is coming in why we fight.

Because oooh that episode (alongside the scene in points) is were we see it in full. It is a good episode. However here is where Winters also messed up majorly. After finding the camps, having Liebgott translate once. Finding out they’re Jews. The realisation for Liebgott that they’re his people. That he could’ve been one of them. It would’ve messed up anyone.

Yet Winters then asks Liebgott to shut the camps, which to this day I have trouble watching that scene. To ask him to order them back into the camp when Webster is right there! To see Liebgott break down, to see that anger fester. He hated the nazi’s before but now, any good nazi is a dead nazi. And you understand him, because who wouldn’t feel that way after what he saw.

Yet the show seems to suggest Liebgott is in the wrong. It feels like Winters punishes him by having him translate what the nazi general is saying. It almost feels violating.

And it does a huge disservice of Easy co. as a whole by making direct links of the nazi prisoners and them.

Anywho, I forgot were I was going with this and I’m not sure if I put it in the right words. Something about never having your world view disturbed and Winters inability to see how bad it all affected Liebgott, maybe because he never experienced it. I don’t know. But definitely one of Winters worst decisions ever in the show.

[nehswritesstuffs]

fly little seagull, the world awaits - Part 3 of 4

Alright, so I know that Oda-sensei said that Law would be German if he was from the real world--now work with me here--let us please entertain the idea that he is very specifically Northern German. Extra-specifically a native Low Saxon speaker (like, all of it, not getting that deep in lol) who then used German or whatever as a prestige/professional/educational language. Why? Because look at the man: think of him on the coast of the North Sea, staring out at the ocean and being particularly brooding. I will also accept the Baltic. It just fits, okay? Additionally: Wikipedia linking to the same article in other languages is honestly some of the tightest shit and this is not the first fic I’ve used that tactic for (and if anyone more informed wishes to correct me, then please do! I’m doing my best, but I can be better).

Chapter 1 on [tumblr] - [FFN] - [AO3] 

Chapter 2 on [tumblr] - [FFN] - [AO3]

Law learns what Cora-san possibly felt thirteen years ago in probably the worst way possible. [9709 words; AU where Law realizes he accidentally became a dad while staring down canon events]

It was later that evening, with all the Hearts on the Polar Tang and the vessel having set sail for the next island. Law had Penguin and Shachi in his cabin, sitting on his bed as he explained his plan from his desk chair with detached, clinical precision. Though there was no real vice-captain or second-in-command in the traditional sense, such duties often fell on the ones who had been around the longest, with Penguin and Shachi routinely proving the most capable. The two men in front of him took in every word with the gravity he hoped they would; the future was hinging on it.

“You trust Fred?” Shachi asked, raising an eyebrow.

“She and Bepo remember each other, and she’s been able to tell him things only she could know—there’s no way that they’re not cousins. Acting in our absolute best interest? Possibly not. But she was definitely not lying when she said guests were welcome and they’d protect you and Nauja.”

“I still don’t see why we can’t come along on your revenge mission to help make sure you don’t die,” Penguin frowned. “I mean… it’s always been the four of us.”

“…and this is between Doflamingo and me; always has been.” Law exhaled heavily and scratched his scalp. “As much as I want my lieutenants by my side, I don’t want to put anyone in danger.”

“You can risk our lives, you know,” Penguin insisted. “That’s part of what being a captain is—knowing they can put lives on the line… not just their own.”

“I’m a doctor—putting lives on the line without it being the last possible resort is sort of the complete opposite of my thing. Besides… I want you all to take care of Nauja. There’s no way she’s coming anywhere near Dressrosa or Doflamingo’s influence.”

“For someone who really wasn’t thrilled by the idea of her sailing with us, you sure do treat her like she’s your kid,” Shachi noted. His captain didn’t answer, instead avoiding eye contact by staring at a bit of his blanket. “It’s not an insult, you know.”

“I know.”

“Cap, you’ve been a great dad to her—far beyond what any of the rest of us could.”

“I know, Penguin.”

“She’s not your blood, but she is your daughter.” Shachi stood from the edge of the mattress and held Law by the shoulders. “Don’t throw your life away; make sure you come back to your daughter. I will beat your ass if you don’t.”

“You’ve never been able to beat me up.”

“Oh, but I will find a way for this one, trust me.” Penguin nodded behind him in commiseration. “Don’t leave that girl with her uncles and aunt. She will be inconsolable and I don’t know if any of us are equipped for that.”

“…even her aunt?”

“Especially Jean Bart.” When Law did not so much as crack a smile, Shachi exhaled in defeat. “Come on, Cap… work with me here…”

“Make sure she knows,” Law requested, voice wavering. “Even if she’s fostered with Bepo’s cousins, I want her to know.”

“We promise,” Penguin swore. He got off the bed as well, he and Shachi both enveloping Law in an all-around hug-attack. “Fuck… we’re gonna miss you, man.”

“It’s been a great run,” Shachi sniffled. “If you’d asked us fifteen years ago we’d go through these adventures, all the way down to you leaving raising your legacy to us… I’d’ve said you were lying out your ass.”

“How will we know when to leave Zou?” Penguin asked. “Not like you’ll be around to give the signal.”

“Wait for news of what comes out of Dressrosa,” Law replied, thankful that the hug had yet to break. When it did, they’d both see the tears going down his cheeks. “If I don’t kill him, he’ll be pissed enough to come after everyone. Even if he is dead, there might be enough of a lashing out from the remaining officers that it will still make things difficult. Only move when you can guarantee the crew’s safety. You can tell them that’s my final order.”

“This isn’t fair,” Penguin choked out. He kept his face hidden against Law’s shoulder, as did Shachi. “We said we’d follow you to the end.”

“We were lost teenagers…”

“We became brothers that day—don’t fucking give me that,” Penguin hissed. They all eased the hug into more of a hold and it was revealed that all three of them were crying. “Please come back to your brothers… to your daughter… I don’t fucking care how. We won’t fucking care how.”

“You know I can’t promise that,” Law croaked. “We’re only having this conversation because I can’t promise that… just…” He exhaled heavily and bit his lower lip before continuing. “Please let me go into this with a clear conscious. I can’t let anything distract me, or Doflamingo will live.”

“Fine then: once the coast is clear, we’ll break up the crew and take your kid and run off to butt-fuck nowhere,” Shachi said. He didn’t make eye contact—it was too painful. “We’ll use her to pick up women and con people and we’ll raise her to know and to fight and to remember and then she will be the one to slit that fucking creep’s throat…”

“…because she will know everything, and when she does, there will be nothing anyone can do to stop her,” Penguin warned.

Law hesitated for a moment before nodding, his voice cracking as he quietly whispered, “Okay.” He put his hands on the backs of Penguin and Shachi’s necks and brought them close so their foreheads were all touching. “Okay.”

It was not okay, but really, what choice did they have?

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

A few nights later, Law stood outside Nauja’s room, staring at the metal door in front of him. In less than an hour he was going to take one of the Polar Tang’s lifeboats to a nearby island which he hoped would be the first stop on his way to eventually finding Doflamingo’s head at his feet. He knew, however, it was very easy for the opposite to happen as well, and the chance that he would never return was too large to ignore.

‘Cora-san,’ he thought, ‘was it this difficult for you when it came to me? You made it seem so effortless.’ He leaned forward, letting his right hand and forehead rest against the cool metal. ‘Vaor, Moetje, how do you get the courage to tell a kid you might not be around to watch them grow up after all?’

Fuck… he wasn’t just scared, he was terrified.

Just then, the door began to give and Law stepped back in surprise, seeing Nauja’s curious face poke out of the room. When she saw it was him, her face lit up.

“I thought it was you, Law-san!” she squeaked happily. “Come in! I want to show you something!” The girl opened the door wider and scurried back into the room, allowing him access to her space. He stepped over the threshold and took in the sight of the repurposed cupboard now fully and truly her bedroom—it was messy, but lived-in, just as his was at her age.

“Nauja-ya, I’m going to close the door,” he said as he went through the motion. “There’s something important I want to discuss.”

“Okay, but first I want you to see these!” She made him sit on the edge of her bunk as she shoved papers in his hands. “I’ve been working hard on them when I’m not studying! Aren’t they neat?!”

Law looked carefully at the drawings now in his hand: they were all of the crew, of her, of him. It was clear she was trying to recreate photographs, the poses making it so it could be nothing but. They were still a child’s drawings, but more of a child much older and with actual training. He got to one of the two of them, napping together on the deck curled against Bepo.

How could he choose dying at the hands of Doflamingo over raising this child? Fuck… they could run, find a place quiet and out of the way, and leave the Tang in the crew’s hands. He could do what Cora-san wanted to do with him: settle down away from fighting, away from war, and bring the child he found himself with to adulthood as he grew older than his own father ever had the chance to be. There was always that option, where he could become an unassuming town doctor in a backwater, nothing-happens island, lies about a dead wife and a respectable career at the ready. He could be the loving, protective father he knew she deserved… live the life that Cora-san always wanted to be for him…

“Law-san? What’s wrong?” His attention was torn from the drawings and he saw that she was staring at him. He touched his face and found bits of wet upon his cheeks; he’d been crying.

Law needed to chose fighting Doflamingo, because if he didn’t, there was no place in the world that would truly keep his daughter safe.

“These are wonderful,” he admitted. He handed the drawings back and wiped his eyes with his sleeve, thankful it was just some errant tears. “I must have just been more surprised than I thought. Did you have any help?”

“Nope!” the girl beamed. “Ikka-ya offered to help with some of the straight lines, but I told her no thank you! I want to get really good at drawing!”

“This is already impressive. I can tell you worked very hard.”

“I need to work harder, though! I want to be one of the best! You need to know how to be very accurate when drawing medical stuff!”

That piqued his interest. “You want to do medical illustrations?”

“Yeah! Well, I still want to be a doctor, like you, but I also want to be able to do drawings! I’m not very good at those yet, but I’m gonna practice real hard!” She pulled another drawing from her desk and showed him; it was a copy of an illustration of a hand’s skeletal structure from one of his textbooks. “See? I’m not good at that yet, but I’m still learning, right?”

“You are,” he agreed, chest filling with pride. “This is wonderful, Nauja-ya. You are very talented.” He watched as she put them away and sat next to him.

“What did you want to talk about?” she wondered. “Are we going to an island where I have to behave extra? I don’t like those islands.”

“No, actually…” He swallowed hard. “I’m going off on my own to do something very important that’s not Warlord stuff… it might be a long time before I return.”

“…why…?” Her voice was quiet as her eyes went wide in confusion as she suddenly realized the situation. “You can’t leave…” Her voice then cracked, which made his heart ache. “You gotta stay here, on the Tang. With everyone. With me.”

“Nauja-ya, I need you to listen to me, alright?” He held her face with both hands, his thumbs stroking her cheeks. “This next part of the journey is too dangerous; I need you to stay with everyone else while I go on my own.”

“That’s not fair,” she sniffled. “I want to help…”

“I know you do, and I need you to remember that I’m not taking anyone else with me. It’s that dangerous.”

“Is it dangerous like going to a Warlord meeting?”

Now was not the time to sugarcoat things. “It’s dangerous because I plan on fighting the bad man that killed Cora-jiisan.”

Nauja thought on that, the gears in the girl’s brain turning methodically. Law watched as she silently came to several different conclusions, with the last one being clearly one of dread.

“Are… are you going to die?”

“Preferably not,” he admitted. She couldn’t know that it was more probable than anything… not yet. “In the meantime, I’m making you temporary vice-captain. It’s going to be your job to help Penguin-ya and Shachi-ya keep these idiots in line, okay?” She nodded silently, which he took for what it was worth. He kissed her on the forehead and took a deep breath, steadying himself before he grinned as wide as he could. “I love you, Nauja-ya.”

“I love you, Law-san.”

“…and the rest of the crew loves you too. Remember that—can you remember that for me?”

“That you love me, and the crew loves me!”

“That’s right. Now I’m going to need you to stay in here, alright? Only Bepo-ya, Penguin-ya, and Shachi-ya know I’m leaving. I don’t want the others to learn about it and they try to stop me.”

“O… okay…” Nauja watched as Law went to the door and went out, pausing just long enough to give her another smile. “Good night. I love you.”

He closed the door, and that was the last she saw of him for a long, long while.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Zunesha.

The entire crew trembled as Bepo brought them to the ancient, massive elephant that he called home. It plodded slowly through the mists and seemed to ignore its visitors, who were all completely dumbstruck that they made it. The peal of a bell, low and sweet, met the Heart Pirates as ropes and cables and chains were lowered down in response to Bepo’s signal.

“They’re having us dry-dock at the gate!” he squealed excitedly. “Come on, everyone! Let’s get the ship secured!”

Before long, the Polar Tang was being lifted into the air, traveling up the leg of a giant fucking elephant, because of course this was where Bepo was from and where Law wanted them to hang out while he took care of things. The only thing keeping them from hiding Nauja below deck and drawing weapons was the navigator’s sheer glee at the situation. They all watched instead as the winch system pulled them up and shifted them over into a docking bay.

“Who might you folks be?” a kindly gorilla asked as they disembarked. By the way the other Minks at the dry-dock seemed to behave, he seemed like the harbormaster of sorts.

“Mark-san, do you remember me?!” Bepo gasped. He ran over to the gorilla and hugged him tightly, which surprised the harbormaster.

“Wait a moment… Bepo, is that you…?” the harbormaster marveled. The bear stepped back and nodded tearfully. “You troublesome cub! You stole my best boat!”

“What… no way…?!” One of the dock hands—a teenaged quokka—went directly up to Bepo and stared. “You’re the kid that stole Dad’s boat and ran away at age eight?!”

“I’m really sorry!” Bepo replied. “All I wanted to do was find my brother!”

“Whoa—you’re a legend!” another teen dock hand—a lemur—gasped. “And now you’re back! Leading a crew of Lesser Minks! That’s great!”

“Well, I… uh…”

Bepo began to panic as he was pulled in towards the forest by the dock hands. The harbormaster looked at the rest of the crew, who all swallowed hard under his stare.

“Garachu,” he nodded. “Tell me: what is the name of the banner you folks fly under?”

“We are the Heart Pirates,” Penguin said nervously. He stepped forward; someone had to do it. “Bepo’s our navigator; we need to speak with whomever’s in charge.”

“Who is your captain?”

“We need to speak with whomever’s in charge,” Penguin repeated. He shivered as the harbormaster and dock hands all froze and stared at him. “We invoke Minkdebt to seek refuge under the protection of Day and Night. If you cannot take us all, then please take your kinsman and the cub.”

“The cub…?” The harbormaster raised his eyebrow as Shachi stepped aside and gently guided a trembling Nauja to stand in front of them.

A cub.

Not only had pirates shown up at the gate with a long-lost Mink countryman, but they arrived with a Human cub and a request for refuge.

“Jason, Kenichiro,” the harbormaster scowled, “get me the Kingsbirds. They’re going to want to know about this.”

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

“Orphans…?”

“Some of them, anyhow,” Monet shrugged. She kept writing in her journal, playing it casual for the Shichibukai in their midst. It had to be the one with actual medical knowledge to plop himself in the middle of their business and get curious enough to ask questions. “Cesar’s experiments involve a new drug that can potentially cure them of the undue gigantification they’ve been experiencing. All of them come from Human stock that doesn’t get much taller than yourself.”

“Then why all the secrecy?”

“You never had to work within bureaucracy, have you?” The harpy put down her pen and turned in her chair. “You know… utilizing your chosen craft instead of your necessary one. Getting the government to sign off on potentially life-saving procedures is like shooting into a crowd with no Haki and having already downed a barrel of alcohol—luck of the draw.”

“Vegapunk’s influence usually supersedes that, doesn’t it?”

“For Vegapunk.” Monet took her glasses off and tried to read Trafalgar—something was radiating off him that made her want to choose her words carefully. “What makes you a sudden bleeding heart? You don’t strike me as the ‘friend to all children’ type.”

“Let’s just say I’m partial to people who haven’t been fucked up yet by the Government—it’s a refreshing change of pace.”

“Even though they’re the age when children learn to keep lies in their hearts the longest?”

“Only if you lie to them.” Law tried to keep his expression even-keeled; to fuck this up now would mean that nothing would be able to get off the ground.  “Do you have experience with such a thing?”

“Lying to children? What adult doesn’t to some extent?” The Warlord shrugged and settled further into the couch, seemingly preparing to take a nap.

“I suppose.”

Monet frowned at the room—Cesar was going to help her keep a close eye on this one.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

‘If I am to agree with you on one thing in twenty years, it should be about this.’

Nekomamushi read the note over again and again, taking glances all the while at the strangers sitting in his presence: twenty humans—nineteen adults, one cub—and a young Mink who had last stepped foot on Zunesha’s back fourteen years prior. They had been kept from the general populace of the Mokomo Dukedom until their fates could be decided, barring even the young Mink’s family from meeting their long-lost son. Now it was up to him; there was little mistaking that bastard Inuarashi’s handwriting, nor the faith he placed in the Kingsbird who handed him the note.

“Let me make sure I have this correct,” the cat said. “You are the crew that has taken care of young Bepo here all this time. Not only that, but your captain is currently on a suicide mission to take out Joker—whom you claim is Warlord and King of Dressrosa Donquixote Doflamingo—which should then send ripples in the underground that shall reach Kaidou and beyond. His last request of you involves attempting to find refuge here, for the child at-minimum, but preferably for the whole lot of you as he takes that man down and potentially draws the ire of dangerous individuals from within Joker’s organization.”

“I know it is asking a lot of people we have never met before in our lives,” Penguin said, “but as you said: we took care of Bepo when he was young. The only thing we truly desire is our kid’s safety and we will invoke the Minkdebt if we have to.” He looked over at Nauja, snuggled up in Ikkaku’s arms with her Sora blanket and Professor Nanuk as she slept due to the late hour. It was the only reason why they were speaking so openly—he didn’t know what she would do if she knew everything as the rest of them did. “We’ll leave her here if the rest of us are unwanted; we’ll manage.”

“Say the Lord of the Day and I agree to refuse your quarter because you are not the captain to whom the Minkdebt belongs?” Nekomamushi purred. “Where shall you go? What shall you do?”

“We’ll still make it our mission to keep the kid safe, but we’ll figure out something else,” Shachi admitted. “It’ll be much more difficult. We might have to do something like find an island in the Calm Belt or hide in the most remote reaches of the Cardinal Blues.”

“You would do this, for a child?”

“We would do this to protect the last thing we have of our captain,” Bepo stated. “The captain took care of me when the only people around were bullies and thieves. You lived with Lesser Minks before as well, milord—weren’t there good ones? Ones who kept you safe, for whom you would do anything to repay your debt to them?” Nekomamushi frowned at that, his thoughts seemingly brought to another time long ago.

“You don’t know the half of it.” The Lord of the Night turned his attention to the sleeping child. “Bring her here.” He waited as Bepo carefully lifted Nauja from Ikkaku’s lap and brought her over to the Mink lord. “What does this child do that makes her so important?”

“She is exactly that,” Penguin said. “Our captain was a dour man, living life with the singular goal of taking down Doflamingo. This child almost made him throw that all away as she turned him into something different… something he never thought he’d be.”

“…a captain…?”

“…a father.”

Nekomamushi nodded, looking at the letter, then Nauja.

“Even fools can come to the occasional correct conclusion,” he said, “and if letting you stay is so simple a decision that Inuarashi can make it, then it’s already done.”

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Pirates and Marines both gasped in shock as Cesar Clown slumped to the ground and writhed in pain. Law stood over him, barrel of his borrowed pistol still smoking from its spent shot and Room still up. At least he waited for the kids to be on the Marine ship…

“Fuck!” Cesar wailed. He tried to claw at the back of his right shoulder, though it was little use. “You could have killed me!”

“That’s too kind a thing for the likes of you,” Law growled. He then replaced the pistol in its owner’s holster and produced a scalpel from his coat pocket. “Does anyone have a sack I can put this garbage in?”

“Need I remind you that for the plan to work, we need him alive?” Nami frowned. “He’s a scumbag, but shooting him in the back with a seastone bullet so he bleeds out is sort of the last thing we want to do.”

“It will make things easier, at the least,” Law replied coldly. A Marine brought him a large cloth sack and the surgeon began to slice away at the scientist’s body, placing him inside bit by bit. “It’s as easy as picking apart a bug.”

“Congratulations, Luffy: you made an alliance with a psychopath,” she grimaced. Her straw-hatted captain snickered in response.

“Shishishi—he’s just pissed at Clown-guy making the kids hurt so much,” Luffy said, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Seastone means he can’t turn into gas, and the cutting him up and putting him in a sack thing makes it so he can’t try anything else, right?”

“So you do have a functioning brain stem; this might not be hopeless after all.”

“Just don’t get too carried away, okay Torao?”

“Need I remind you all that he literally gave us a hundred beating hearts?” Smoker reminded the Straw Hats. “Your navigator said it best: you made an alliance with a psychopath.”

“If he doesn’t murder us in our sleep, it’ll be a miracle,” Usopp shivered. He then grimaced. “Oh… I wonder what would happen if the bullet wound healed over…”

“He won’t be able to use his Devil Fruit ability until he has it surgically removed,” Law said frankly. “Consider it an additional security measure.”

“Psychopath,” several Straw Hats and Marines sighed in unison. Law didn’t care—he needed to make everything count.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

It was odd being such wanted celebrities, the Heart Pirates found out. It made sense, since they did show up with someone who had been missing since childhood and presumed dead, but the warmth and kindness that the Minks were displaying was something that they had never felt before.

“This place is absolutely fucking wild,” Clione marveled, “and I’m not saying that because they’re Minks.” He and some of the other Heart Pirates were watching Nauja as she played with some of the Mink children, the group being led by Bepo’s father.

“I can’t believe that Cap did this to us,” Uni groused. Clione and Ikkaku stared at him in exasperation. “Okay, yeah, we should have seen it coming, but the fact that he still did it is staring us in the face…”

“Do you think he’ll make it back?” Ikkaku wondered. She caught a wayward ball and tossed it back towards the children.

“Hard to tell,” Uni mused. He watched the children and groaned. “I’m glad I’m not the one in charge of telling Nauja her dad’s headed off to his death. That’s a shit job.”

“No kidding,” Ikkaku grimaced. “I could barely stand to tell her when the Den Den died.”

“I know; if he wasn’t already dying, I’d say we should kill him.” The trio looked to see Shachi and Penguin, holding five longnecks between them. They passed out the beer and sat down with their comrades. “I’m thinking the North Blue.”

“I say the East Blue,” Penguin scoffed. “If we’re gonna hide out, at least make it somewhere warm and quiet.”

“Straw Hat’s from the East,” Uni noted. “Can’t be that quiet.”

“Ever thought of it being here?” Clione asked. He gestured to the playing children with his bottle. “She gets along great with the kids her age, and Bepo’s parents love her as though we just showed up with his brother’s kid.”

“Still too close to Grunkle Mingo,” Shachi scowled. “It’d be a risk taking her, but it’d also be a bigger risk leaving her here. I just…” He took a drink of his beer and sighed. “Ugh—fucking hate this.”

“You know that whatever it is, we have your backs, right?” Ikkaku mentioned. Shachi simply stared at a bit of grass, while Penguin simply took another drink. “Don’t be idiots. We’re in on it too.”

“Yeah,” Clione added. “Can’t get rid of us all that easily.”

“Thanks… that means a lot,” Shachi admitted. The five then continued drinking their beers, watching the children play. At least they weren’t going to have to shoulder it alone.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

The route to Dressrosa was a long one, even with an Eternal Pose. Law did not appreciate being dumped into the middle of a bunch of Straw Hat antics, from which there was seemingly no escape. No matter what secluded corner of the ship he found to plan his contingencies, the others seemed to find him, which was beginning to grate on his nerves. He eventually gave up when the Straw Hats decided to have dinner out on the deck, where they turned their meal into a picnic.

“This is indecent,” Cesar’s mouth grumbled soon as it was put together. Law held the part of the man’s head that was the mouth and one of the ears so that Blackleg-ya could approach brandishing a protein shake and a straw.

“Something tells me you’re in no position to complain considering you’re alive right now,” the blond scoffed. He aimed the straw for the mouth and Cesar took it, beginning to drink. “Fuck… this is so creepy and weird.”

“You get used to it,” Law shrugged, “and no, I don’t know how it works anymore than you know how Bone-ya does.”

“Aaaahhhh! It’s going again!” Luffy cackled from the railing. At that, Sanji pulled the shake out of Cesar’s mouth.

“Don’t fucking piss while you’re eating.”

“I’m not the one who decided to attach my dick to the side of the ship.”

“…and let you piss all over yourself in the sack? I don’t think so,” Law frowned. “Let us know when it’s done, Strawhat-ya.”

“It’s done!” Luffy announced. Sanji allowed Cesar to finish the shake and Law cut the captive’s mouth in two again, depositing the pieces in the sack. “What are you going to do when he needs to poop?”

“Luffy, you’re ruining the ladies’ dinner, shut the fuck up,” Sanji hissed.

“Sanji-kun,” Nami sighed, “if we hadn’t built up tolerances to Luffy’s bullshit a long time ago, none of us would even remember how to eat.” She was sitting at the picnic table with Momonosuke in her lap, the boy clinging to her as they ate. “You certainly do enjoy Sanji-kun’s cooking, don’t you, Momo?”

“Most assuredly,” Momonosuke said, nuzzling into Nami’s chest. He grinned perversely when she wasn’t looking, making Sanji, Brook, and Kin’emon seethe in jealously.

“Oooh! Torao! Sit next to me!” Chopper requested as the other doctor made his way to the table. Law did so and glanced at the book open next to the reindeer’s plate.

“You’re a pathologist?”

“Not solely, but I do have an interest in it,” Chopper said. “I want to be able to cure any disease.”

“Even the ones that cannot be cured?”

“There are physical limitations to the body, but any disease should be curable in theory. While some are generally benign, I think it would be good to have cures for those who want them, and to keep the knowledge of other things around in case they pop up again.”

“We met Chopper because Nami was sick with something no one else knew what to do with,” Luffy explained cheerily. “A weird bug bit her and she almost died.”

“That’s probably not something you should be telling people without Nami-ya’s permission,” Law stated. Nami herself shrugged.

“I don’t mind—you’re another doctor.”

“This is true, but not everyone who hears such things would let it go, or use the knowledge for good.”

“Have you come across anything that was difficult to treat, Torao?” Chopper wondered. The man took a bite of fish and nodded. “Oooh! You’ll have to tell me later!”

“Maybe after we’ve dealt with Doflamingo, Tony-ya,” Law said. The reindeer’s face lit up, reminding him of someone who was hopefully far away at that point. “In the meantime, do you have any of your research here on the ship? I’m interested to see what you’re working on.”

“Yes! Definitely! Oh, it’s good to finally have another medical professional on the ship for once! Give me a moment to finish my dinner and I can bring you to the infirmary!”

“I’d like that,” Law stated. The rest of the crew watched carefully as the two doctors interacted, taking note of the admittedly soft way in which the surgeon was interacting with their figurative little brother. He allowed himself to be led from the table soon as they were both finished with their food, vanishing into the infirmary. It was an odd thing, but at least it wasn’t Law brooding in the corner as though he was going to murder them all in their sleep.

When it came time to check on them later, Robin and Nami found Chopper and Law both sleeping slumped over on the desk, having fallen asleep while talking. They put blankets over them and let them be—hauling them into the bunkroom would just do more harm than good.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

“GO AWAY!”

“FINE!”

Nauja glared at the door, trying to visually bore a hole in it so she could see the wee dragon inside. Even though he wasn’t supposed to be that much older than her, she hadn’t liked this Momonosuke from the moment they met. He was bratty and didn’t want to come out of his room, which made things difficult. She finally had another Human kid to play with and he was just a pain in the ass. Ugh—it made her want to scream!

Storming away from the small hut, Nauja tried to find something else to do. She tried the crew, only to find that they were mostly busy helping the Minkfolk and otherwise not around. Bepo-ya’s young cousins were busy studying, as were the other Mink children, and even though they were nice enough to invite her, she didn’t really feel up to it. Then there was the newly-arrived Straw Hat crew, which was helping alongside the Hearts and making themselves useful. Even though it was only half the crew, they were very nice, and always did their best; no wonder they said that Law-san had allied with them. The only bad part was that they had been the ones to bring Momonosuke to Zou, all while Law-san had stayed back in order to fight some Flamingo guy… that’s what they said, anyhow.

This was boring. They had already been there on Zou for so long that it was beginning to grate on her nerves. The slow sway of Zunesha’s gait was a poor substitute for the rocking of the sea and the soft skin of his back very much unlike the reassuring solidity of the metal that made up the Polar Tang. She had already explored plenty, so what else was there to do?

“Nauja-chan! Can you come over here, please?” She looked over her shoulder to see the Straw Hat cook waving at her from the window of the community mess hall. “I have a job for you!”

“Uh… okay.” She went into the kitchen and was immediately placed on a stool and given a basket of green bean pods with instruction to snap the ends off.

“I was doing a lot more complicated shit at your age in the kitchen, so I think you can more than handle it,” he chuckled kindly. “Let me know when you’re done with that and I can give you some more prepwork to keep you busy.”

“What if I don’t want to?” she posed.

“I’ll tattle on you to Bepo and the goons,” he threatened teasingly, voice remaining gentle. “If it were up to me, you wouldn’t need to do this, but they don’t want to get back on your ship and be rusty at chores.”

“They’re not my dads.”

“Yeah, but they’re the ones with authority over you and they said I should draft you as kitchen help because you already do it on your ship. Now don’t lose the ends of those—I’m going to use them in a soup.”

Nauja pouted for a moment before she began to indeed snap the ends off the bean pods. She grumbled sourly as she did so—there were other things she could have been doing at that moment… the only problem was that she was stolen before she could figure out what.

Wait a moment… it had been a long time since they had come to Zou, wasn’t it? She tried to think while she cleaned the beans—how long had they been there? It was surely no more than a few weeks… or was it…?

She didn’t know how long it had been since she last saw Law-san.

A chill ran down Nauja’s body—she didn’t know when she last saw Law-san. Well, she knew that they last saw one another on the Tang, but how long ago was that now? Suddenly, lots of things began to feel like they made sense. There was a reason why they went to Zou without the captain, why the Minks looked at her while talking in their language, why Penguin-ya and Shachi-ya kept staring at her with sad, sad eyes.

Law-san wasn’t coming back. All the Hearts were so sad because Law-san wasn’t coming back, and without him, they were going to leave her here.

She was going to be alone again.

“Nauja-chan, what’s this?” Sanji-ya crooned. He took the beans away from her and knelt down in front of her to be at eye level. “Young ladies shouldn’t cry, not unless they’re calling for help.”

“I want Law-san,” she sniffled. “I need Law-san.”

“Trafalgar is coming back, don’t worry,” he assured her. It was weird, but Nauja noticed that Sanji-ya was the only one of the Straw Hats who could easily pronounce Law-san’s family name, said with the same ease as someone who had been saying such names their whole life. “Why would he leave an adorable angel like you if he wasn’t planning on coming back?”

“He didn’t know if he was going to survive going against the bad man!” Nauja cried. “Law-san said that the bad man killed Cora-jiisan a long time ago, and that he’s super-dangerous! I’m scared!”

Sanji-ya held her gently by the shoulders, trying to look in her eyes. “Nauja-chan, everything is going to be fine…”

“It’s not! He’s going to die!” Her tears were now fully sobs, shuddering and ugly. “I’m never going to see Law-san again! He said I was allowed to need him! How can he say that and then leave?! It’s not fair!”

“There, there,” Sanji-ya shushed. He brought her close and hugged her, letting the child sob into his shirt. “I know you miss him, but you’re going to have to trust him, okay? He wants you to trust him.”

“How do you know what he wants?!”

“Something gives me a sneaking suspicion, is all.” He sat down on the stool and held her protectively in his lap, stroking her hair and rocking her gently, all while he hummed a song that sat low and rumbling in his chest. She recognized the song after a few bars, letting out a startled gasp.

“How do you know that song?!” she demanded. “Law-san sings me that all the time!”

“Trafalgar? Sing? I’d pay to see that.” Sanji-ya laughed and shook his head. “I’m from the North Blue like he is—my mother sang that to me when I felt sad. I don’t remember the lyrics anymore, but I do know the melody.”

“You don’t need to do this!” Nauja snapped. She wriggled out of his grasp and drew her dirk, pointing it at the chef. “Stop lying to me! I’ll just figure out how to kill the man who killed Law-san! I don’t need a lullaby to feel better!”

“Nauja-chan, relax,” Sanji-ya assured her. He placed his left hand on both of hers and lowered the dirk. “I was a scared little kid at eight years old too. You can count me as on your side.”

“Yeah, right; you’re just lying to me.”

“The liar on my crew is not currently on Zou, my dear Nauja-chan, and I hope you take care to remember that.” He stood and smoothed out his pant legs before gesturing to the beans. “Maybe you just need to get lost in your work.”

“Uh-huh, sure.” She sheathed her dirk and sat down hard on the stool, folding her arms across her chest. “Weirdo.”

“I am not weird; you are just scared, and that’s making you irritable and irrational and not yourself,” Sanji-ya frowned. “Snap some beans and you might be able to calm down.”

“You’re the one who looks like a comic book villain,” Nauja grumbled. She watched as something flickered across the blond man’s face, only for it to get smothered by a mask.

“A comic book villain? That’s a new one.”

“If you’re from the North, then you know about Sora too. Your eyebrows curl like the bad guys’ or haven’t you noticed?”

“It runs in my family,” Sanji-ya said firmly, tone changed just enough to sound… Nauja didn’t know. How did he sound? “Now clean the beans.”

“Uh… yes, sir,” she squeaked. Nauja slowly went back to cleaning the beans, unsure why there had been a sudden shift in Sanji-ya. She didn’t like it, but it made her wonder if there was a family with Germa 66’s curly eyebrows, was there an entire island like that? Was it a dominant gene? She wondered her way through the beans as well as some potatoes, with the tension in the air dissipating by the time she was sent out to ring the dinner bell.

She did not forget, however. What exactly was going on…?

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Later on that night, as everyone was getting ready for bed, Nauja cornered Penguin and Shachi, threatening to run away like Bepo and the Lords of Day and Night did at her age if they didn’t tell her why Law was taking so long. Neither man answered her question, though Penguin scooped her up into his arms and carried her back to her bed.

“We’re staying here until we hear news out of Dressrosa,” he explained quietly as he tucked her in. “We’ll figure out what to do from there, okay?”

She nodded, fear confirmed, and waited until Penguin left the room to cry herself to sleep.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Arm throbbing, Law was wide awake as he lay in the small Dressrosan house. Snores filled the air from the remainder of his allies that were packed in there, everyone resting after the harrowing day. It was a comfort to know that Doflamingo was now dethroned and awaiting a prison transport to Impel Down. Everything he had ever done—all his varying enterprises and empires—now lay shattered; he would be a disgraced man for the rest of his days, rotting in Impel Down until he was nothing more than a pile of bones wearing tacky sunglasses.

Then why couldn’t Law find sleep?

Carefully, Law got up and used Kikoku as a crutch in order to hobble outside. He sat down on a bench and looked up at the stars—there were less of them thanks to the moon and the lights from the city, but they were there all the same. Once he was comfortable, he used his Devil Fruit ability to open a cavity in his chest and pulled out a photo. It was of Nauja, smiling brightly as she sat on his shoulders with Professor Nanuk. As he stared at the photo, his shoulders began to feel lighter and his limbs not quite as stiff and sore.

“Your family?”

Law looked over and saw Kyros closing the door behind him. He leaned on an actual cane, still not used to the prosthetic that the Straw Hat shipwright built for him, hobbling over to the bench to join the younger man.

“Something like that.”

“I could tell you were fighting for family,” Kyros said. A pause settled over them, during which Law never took his eyes off the photo. “May I see?”

Wordlessly, Law passed over the photo, watching a knowing smile settle comfortably on Kyros’s face. “Her name is Nauja.”

“The love of a daughter is something one must never take for granted,” the older man said. “You fought for the memory of a father, and that is worth much, but fighting for a child’s future is one of the most noble things one could do.”

“Having her around has taught me a lot,” Law nodded. He accepted back the photo and placed it in his chest once again. “I just want to see her.”

“Why do you think I kept sneaking into the Corrodia Coliseum?” Kyros looked at him and clapped a hand on Law’s shoulder. “It’s difficult and hurts, but it’s also one of the easiest and best things in the world. Both heart-wrenching and rewarding.”

“What is?”

“A father’s love for his daughter… what else?” Kyros chuckled to himself, remembering something from long ago. “How old is she?”

“She’ll be eight later this year—I’ve had her since she was six.”

“Did her mother have her before that?”

“She is as much my blood as you are; my navigator found her and she became my responsibility.”

“Then she is even luckier than I thought.” Kyros rubbed the joint of his new leg; phantom limb sure was being a bitch. “Did Doflamingo know?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Law replied. “None of the Straw Hats know—I acquired her after we last met prior to this.”

“Then she will not be my secret to tell.”

“Thank you.”

The two fathers sat there and quietly exchanged stories until the sky began to pale on the horizon. It was something they knew the others wouldn’t understand, even if they empathized with them.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

The journey to Zou felt to Law as though it took ages. Honestly, it felt longer than the route from Punk Hazard to Dressrosa, if one was to press Law. He could not rest properly, let alone enjoy his drinks, and it was difficult to not let it show to the others on the… ugh… Going Luffy-senpai. Every so often he caught a nearly knowing look from Nico Robin, despite the fact it seemed as though everyone else bought his act. Of all the times he regretted the stoic, aloof, loner routine, it was then. All he wanted to do was make sure that Nauja and the others were alright, but without so much as a transponder snail, the only thing he could do was wait.

For all it was worth, Law knew that there was nothing that could have prepared him for the sight of the giant elephant Zunesha. Bepo had warned him, of course, but it was still beyond what he could have imagined. There was something incredibly off about the entire thing as they went up the elephant’s leg… something that he couldn’t quite place… and it made his stomach twist in nerves.

As it turned out, something had been wrong: Zou had recently been under attack. Kaido’s men had tortured the Mink Tribe in order to get them to turn over the pirates they had been harboring. Not a single Mink budged, and they were able to present their guests safe, sound, and—most importantly—alive. The Heart Pirates all ran up to their captain, not a dry eye amongst them.

“You fucking bastard, scaring us like that,” Shachi cried, clinging to Law.

“Yeah,” Penguin added tearfully as he joined in the hug. “You’re never allowed to do that again, asshole.”

“Okay, fair,” Law replied. His crew all took turns hugging him and thanked whatever would listen that he was alive. Their captain came back to them alive. Everyone was there except for one… which he noticed immediately.

“Where’s Nauja?”

“We made her hide since we didn’t know what was going on,” Bepo explained. “I’ll get her!” He then ran off happily.

“Wait a second… who’s Nauja and why would she have to hide?” Usopp wondered. “I thought your crew was full of people who could at least take care of themselves.”

“Not this one,” Law replied. He waited until Bepo popped back out from behind some rubble to be hopeful, breaking into a near-jog when he saw a sobbing Nauja running towards him. She leapt into his arms as they met and he hugged her tightly, falling to his knees.

“You made it,” she croaked.

“I did.” He held her close as she cried into his shoulder, the little girl shaking from all the emotions washing over them both.

“Oh… I didn’t know you had a kid!”

Oh, fuck… that was right… there were other people there aside from the crew. Law turned and saw Luffy standing there and smiling like a ray of sunshine. Nauja looked at him tenuously.

“Hi there!” He waited for the girl to respond, to which she just stared. “I’m Monkey D. Luffy, and I’m gonna be King of the Pirates! Your dad and I are in an alliance! That makes us friends!”

“Strawhat-ya, I…”

“My dad’s gonna be King of the Pirates!” Nauja insisted. Law and the other Hearts—and even the other Straw Hats—froze. “Dad’s the greatest pirate ever!”

“I dunno about the greatest,” Luffy mused, “but he is pretty cool. He’s our friend too. We’re going to have a party—would you like to join?” Nauja looked up at Law and he gave her one of his few true smiles over the past few months.

“No one throws a party like Strawhat-ya,” he assured her.

“Shishishi! This is great! More friends!” Luffy went back to jabbering on at Sanji about all the neat things he wanted the other man to cook.

“I was wondering how all the kids on Punk Hazard loved you, then I met her,” Nami chuckled. She watched as Law’s face grew dark from blush—he was caught. “She’s done her best to be a good playmate for Momo while we’ve been here.”

“Have you been playing good with Momo-ya?” Law asked. Nauja grunted into his shoulder.

“I can’t because he’s dumb and refuses to play,” she claimed, clinging to him as he stood. “Momo-ya is a dumb boy sometimes. Why won’t he come out of his room?”

“I’m sure he just wanted to see his dad again, just like you did, little miss,” Franky said. She peeked at him before hiding her face again. “Oh, are we being super-shy this week?”

“No; she’s just normal and knows you’re weird as hell,” Nami deadpanned. “Come on Nauja-chan—we can go see what Sanji-kun has cooking…” She went to go take her from Law, only for the girl to squeak and cling tighter.

“I think I’ll handle this, Nami-ya,” Law replied. The Straw Hats noticed a softness to his voice that was not normally there, one they could tell existed for one person. “Let us know when Blackleg-ya has food ready, if you please.”

“Right… yes…” The Straw Hats allowed Law to wander off towards the cluster of his crew, still holding Nauja aloft. They continued to welcome him, hug him, cry over the fact he was there in front of them again, fully knowing the fact he was even alive was a miracle.

It was Nika, one of them said. The mercurial, ancient god that was on the lips of rural grandmothers and in faerie stories from before the Void Century; only he could have pulled off something as monstrously difficult as bringing their captain back to them while Doflamingo still lived. There was no one else that could have tampered to make it so the Captain’s haphazard alliance choices made things better than expected. Law lived, Doflamingo was being locked away for the rest of his miserable days, and the crew was finally whole again.

Was it mentioned that the captain was still alive? Because he was. Despite all odds.

Eventually, Sanji called that dinner was ready and everyone began to flock to the community mess hall. With Nauja still refusing to let go, Law continued to carry her, the child clinging to him like a limpet. The blond chef noticed as he passed the man two plates and got his attention, motioning with his head to use the back exit. Law did, slipping out unnoticed by the others as he found a quiet spot to sit, away from all the commotion.

“Come on,” he urged. “You have to eat something. I’d hope by now you have learned that Blackleg-ya doesn’t tolerate food waste.”

Slowly, Nauja detached herself from Law and accepted the plate, eating next to him. Neither said anything for a few minutes, the pair letting quiet settle around them. They were nearly halfway done with their food before the girl began to sniffle and lean into her father’s arm.

“Hey,” Law said. He put his plate down and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “I’m back.”

“You almost weren’t.”

He paused at that, giving the statement the severity it deserved. “You’re right. I almost died. A few times, in fact.”

Silence.

“Cora-jiisan’s killer is in prison; Justice has finally been carried out,” he continued. “We will be able to live free of him. We can be a family and I won’t have to fear for your safety.”

“I… I thought the crew is our family.”

“Not… not the way I’m talking about.” He swallowed hard as she looked up at him, her eyes large and wet with tears. “I want to refer to you as my daughter… my kiend… my famke…”

“…but… I don’t look like you…”

“Not looking the same didn’t stop Cora-san from taking me in, nor did it stop you from telling Strawhat-ya I was your dad earlier.” He smoothed her hair and scratched at her scalp, his heart breaking at the way she was trembling. “I think we’ve been dancing around the subject for a long time, haven’t we?”

“But what if you had died?!” Nauja snapped. She pushed Law’s hand away and stood, facing him as she cried. “Penguin-ya and Shachi-ya said they were going to look after me! They’re not my dads!”

“Nauja…”

“You almost left me with them and died! Penguin-ya and Shachi-ya are nice, but they can’t replace you!”

“…Nauja…”

“You went to die and I didn’t have the chance to call you ‘Dad’ or ask you more about Flevance or medical stuff or show you any more drawings or show you that I can fight with a sword…!”

He blinked. “You can fight with a sword?”

“No, but I will! And you almost missed that! I was scared I’d be alone again!”

“Nauja, I had your caregivers in place… I made sure you would be taken care of…”

“I love my uncles, but they’re not my dad!” she wailed. “You’re not like my other dad was! You answer my questions and let me stay with you when I have a bad dream and teach me about medical stuff and science and let me sit with you and train with you and…! And…!” She was crying too heavily to speak, instead her sobs drowning her words before they could be said. He pulled her close and rubbed circles on her back as he tried to gently shush her.

“Maybe how I handled it wasn’t fully fair, but now that risk is gone, Trafalgar Nauja, and I no longer have to fear my adoptive uncle using you as bait.”

Nauja sucked in a breath. His uncle…?

“Cora-jiisan’s older brother and his killer are the same man,” Law continued. “I planned on fighting him to the death, because if I didn’t, then I could never truly rest. I was not free.”

“What…” Nauja breathed in deep to suck some snot back into her nose. “What was the price?”

“Hmm…?” He looked at her face and saw her brow was knit in concentration.

“You said that freedom has a price. What was it?”

He had told her that, hadn’t he? It felt like so long ago now.

“Whatever price I paid,” he said, “it was almost the wrong one.” Law held Nauja’s face, brushing the tears away with his thumbs. “I’m glad I didn’t.”

“I’m glad too.” She then chewed her lower lip in thought. “Uh… Law-san…?”

“Yeah?”

“What did you call your dad? In Flevench?”

A smile crept across his lips. “Vader or Vaor; there were more in our language, but those were the main two. There… there are other ways, you know.”

“I don’t want other ways.” She hugged him around the middle, hiding her face in his shirt. “I’m so glad you came back, Vaor.”

“I am too, famke; I am too.”

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

As it turned out, Kin’emon was not Momonosuke’s father. Nor, in fact, was Momonosuke an ordinary little boy. He was, in fact, Heir to the Shogunate of Wano, with Kin’emon, Kanjuro, and Raizo as his retainers. It was their goal to take down the false Wanolese ruler and the Pirate Emperor associated with him, freeing the land from over two decades of strife. The Straw Hat and Heart Pirates listened as the tale was told, the alliance tenuous until they learned of who the Emperor in question was:

They were going to finish the job from Dressrosa and take down Kaidou.

There was just one small problem: as the alliance was being formed in the Whale Tree, Big Mom’s envoys had a different sort of plan in mind.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

With the Sanji Retrieval Team already on the way, the remaining members of the Alliance were readying to leave as well. It was difficult, however, as the littlest Heart Pirate was adamant about her position.

“I want to go too!” Nauja insisted, stomping her foot on the ground of the dry-dock. Law stood there with his arms folded across his chest, unperturbed, while everyone else was loading up the Polar Tang with supplies.

“You are staying with Alana-ya and Yepo-ya,” he insisted. Bepo’s parents were standing not that far away, having attempted to chase after her. “It’s dangerous.”

“I don’t care! You almost died before! I’m not letting you go again!”

“We could very well all die and then what would happen?” Law posed. “You’re staying here, where it is safe.”

“I’m going with you!”

“You are not!”

“Yes I am!”

“Sweetie, your father wants you to stay here,” Alana said gently. She tried to coax the child back, only for Nauja to push away.

“I don’t belong here! I belong with my dad!” the girl insisted. She saw heartbreak on Bepo’s parents’ faces and instantly felt terrible. “You’re all really nice to me, and I want to visit, but I have to go with my dad!”

“The only place you have to go is back to town, famke.”

“I just got you back! I need you, Vaor!” Nauja then burst into tears—real, genuine tears—and clung to Law’s leg, refusing to let go in an attempt to anchor him in place.

“Maybe, this time the child might be right on this,” Yepo suggested. He looked at Law, who was at a rare loss for words. “I’ve already had one child run away from my house in the dead of night; I don’t want this one to do the same.”

Fuck—he was right, wasn’t he? It was either take her along now, or have her chase after them later. A child on her own in the New World, or at his side where he could take and shamble her away from danger… he guessed there was only one option he realistically had left.

[goodluckdetective]

*sigh*

Gang, please cite your sources. There is some real info here (the babies report though I will say, unlike OP implies, babies and kids did die in the attack. However the beheaded rumors were untrue and racist). The top two posts might be real or fake, but I couldn’t find reports on either from any news source and that includes ones outside Western interests (I combed through Al Jazeera and if i find it, I’ll update this. I’m not debunking these OR confirming them. So don’t take this post as an argument either way.) However some of this stuff is debunked with like one Google search.

She was found dead just this morning. I can’t fault OP for not knowing this at the time of posting but they’re framing (she’s alive and totally safe) is disingenuous.

And while the mass rapes claim is false and racist, sexual assault did happen. While folks (rightfully) don’t trust the IDFs word, they released body cam footage of Hamas fighters that was watched by international news orgs. (And before someone says it, yes the fact the video was released by the IDF means it has obvious bias, however it’s ludicrous to say none happened). I think it’s fair to put this claim down as a mix of truth and false: the scale of which is unknown but claiming either extreme is false.

Now before anyone accuses me of supporting Israel War crimes let me be explicitly clear: I don’t. What the government of Israel is doing Palestinians is an atrocity, apartheid and covers multiple war crimes. I support Palestinian’s right to freedom.

However, I don’t have to lie to do that. Two things can be true at once: the government of Israel has done and continues to do horrific things to Palestinians and they have reacted violently to non-violent protest. They are currently killing the people of Palestinian indiscriminately (with mass punishment which is a war crime) and have in the past. That’s a fact. Also, Hamas appears to have killed people in-mass indiscriminately on October 7th. That also is a fact. Scale and firepower is obviously different, but both events are real.

And one fact among all that OP seemed to miss: Palestinians are not fucking Hamas. They’re people who need help right now. And when you make these posts trying to erase real atrocities by Hamas (which echoes a lot of antisemitic narratives that Jewish people are “liars” working in a “mass conspiracy”)and equating them to Palestinians you are literally making the same equillivance fucking Bibi is making.

Anyway, I’m a white American and thus I don’t want to speak about this more than a fact check because you really should listen to those this impacts (and if anyone has more information for me or something I got wrong in this post PLEASE let me know. I’m only responding to this because this seemed egregious and I couldn’t find someone who already fact checked it.). So here are some a link to a well accredited Charity providing medical care to those in Gaza, here’s a link on how to contact your reps if you’re an American and here’s a link to an upcoming protest to put pressure on the government to call for a ceasefire.

"noticing a lot of the propaganda about alleged atrocities committed by Palestinians in this attack being retracted lately while at the same time I've seen news of Palestinians providing reassurance and safe passage to frightened Israeli women and children it's real funny how that works"

[cuckoo-on-a-string]

Soft Target: Ch. 5

18+ content, minors DNI

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

This is short, but I wanted to get something up before diving into edits for my other fic (so I can send them off to my lovely new beta reader).

In hobbit birthday tradition, I will give the first ten folks to comment and/or reblog with a comment a drabble/mini fic (in the coming months). Happy to write for Zemo, Safin (Bond villain), or Bucky/Winter Soldier. Other characters possible upon request, but may take more time.

Chapter 4: Link

Chapter warnings; smut, Zemo manipulation at its finest, thigh riding, German and Slavic pet names in place of Sokovian.

Enjoy!

Oops, all smut.

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

“Then I must work to make my intentions clearer,” he said, stepping closer.

“Do you even know what they are?” she challenged.

She was asking about blood and death. An inkling of something very different stirred in a place he wasn’t prepared to search.

“Maybe not,” he confessed. A soft smile rose to banish the stiff horror in her eyes. “But it isn’t to murder my host while she makes a cup of tea.”

Maybe it would be better if he did. Then, at least she’d know. She didn’t believe he really had no idea what he intended to do with her. Baron Helmut Zemo was a man with a plan, and even if she’d been a surprise addition to the equation, he’d had enough hours to recalculate.  

Balancing on the cusp of threat and flirtation was exhausting, and if he wanted to kill her, the kitchen wouldn’t be a bad place.

“What are you thinking?”

In the still room, his voice felt louder than it should. It felt physical, a touch without consequence, and she bit her cheek hard against the pleasant shivers rolling down her spine. Why did such a bad man have such a lovely voice? And how was she supposed to answer his question?

“I’m thinking it would be easy to clean up the blood in here,” she said.

His head tilted to the opposite side in time with a step forward. Standing by the counter, she didn’t have room to retreat, but she turned to face him, ready for a fight. If she had a moment, she could grab the kettle and swing for his face. He’d have to at least block, and that may provide a window to escape.

But he stopped just within reach, hands empty at his sides, all thoughtful expression and bobbing head, like a snake studying a mouse in the corner of its cage. Wander eyes dipped from eyes to lips, rolling down her body and back up again, lingering on places of interest with no strategic value in a fight.

Her battle plans crumbled, and she stared back, thrown entirely off her rhythm.

“Would it put you at ease,” he murmured, “to know you interest me far more than your family?”

“I don’t doubt it.” Her mouth had gone dry, and when her teeth instinctively pinched her lip, she tasted pennies again. It would never heal at this rate. Further proof the man was bad for her health. “They’re only in danger because of me.”

Zemo hummed, shifting so another precious inch between them disappeared as he made a show of considering her point. For a moment, she felt like a fish on the end of his line, watching as he reeled himself closer and closer to his catch.

It was cruel of him, and she clung to the splinter of rage as he dipped into her personal space. He’d run out of room soon, and they both knew he wouldn’t touch her, so this farcical seduction would only leave her aching and lonely in her room. By herself. While he smugly filed this little encounter away in his book of petty victories.

“Would you believe me if I said they were in no danger because you are in no danger? At least not from me?”

Laughing a strained little bark, fit to burst with nervous energy doing its best to turn erotic, she pushed back into the sharp edge of the counter. “I think we already covered that.”

His head dropped, like he’d been bested, but when his eyes flicked back up to meet hers through his lashes, the impish light in them promised anything but peace.

“Actions speak so much louder than words.”

She scoffed as her heart kicked into overdrive. Deadly or not, his gaze burned with intent, and she felt too warm, too exposed, too close to doing something dangerous and stupid that no one had ever invited her to try before. She flailed for a defense. For room to breathe.

“Right. Because you’re so easy to read, you enigmatic fuck.”

“You’re trying much too hard, draga.”

The endearment, pet name, whatever it was, caught her attention. She didn’t know the word, but her body translated the velvet purr into a sizzling heat, like an electrical fire, burning low and hot. She gulped, and her hands flexed on the countertop behind her.

Every twitch betrayed her, and if he couldn’t see the signs of her growing arousal by now, she’d seriously misjudged him.

Humiliated, she turned to the floor, only to see his foot slip between hers. When she snapped to attention, he had her caged between his arms and counter.

“I don’t need to kill you.” He smiled, not a trace of his pensive frown to be seen, so near she imagined she could taste the expression. It bared something sweetly malicious in his manners, and his dark eyes twinkled with fiendish delight at her stuttering breath. “I want to like you.”

Her own words, wrapped in his sinful voice, sounded so much more suggestive than she’d meant them to be.

No space remained. When she breathed, her chest bumped his, and his rich cologne filled her senses. His voice. His smell. They made him and his actions too real, and she struggled to interpret them as anything but what they appeared to be.

It wasn’t possible. Even if she might want it to be.

“I find the softest things wear the prickliest armor.”

His voice reverberated in her bones so she breathed in time with him, so she fell quietly under his spell. He had her where he wanted. Now if only she knew what he wanted.

She could see the end of this, even if she couldn’t understand how they’d arrive. Though she ached to continue – with what? – she made one last attempt to save herself.

“This isn’t kind, Baron,” she whispered, feeling that prickly armor peeling away. Admitting he could hurt her. Admitting vulnerability.

Nearly kissing her ear, he whispered, “I am not a kind man. But there’s something you need, draga. I’ll help you, if you let me.”

She closed her eyes, afraid to shake her head lest she brush against his face.

“You won’t even shake my hand. Don’t tease me. Please.”

“Oh, I have every intention of teasing you,” he said, “and delivering on everything I promise. In the end. There are many ways to pleasure a woman without ever touching each other’s skin.”

Her eyes flew open, and she met the wickedest grin she’d ever beheld. He delighted in his games, and he’d maneuvered her effortlessly to the brink of the cliff, all the while whispering encouragement to jump. If she accepted, gave him that kind of power, she may never get it back.

“May I help?”

A soft target indeed.

She’d never had any power to begin with.

Swallowing, she decided she might as well jump since he’d already wrecked her.

“Yes.”

The foot between her legs slipped forward, and his chest pushed flush against hers, forcing her off balance as his knee pressed into the gap. His thigh moved between hers, pressing against everything that demanded friction all at once.

She gasped, and he bent his knee, forcing his thigh higher, lifting her onto her toes. Half-bent back over the counter, she couldn’t be any more at his mercy if she tried. Her hands scrabbled for a sturdier grip.

“Hold onto me,” he purred, rolling his leg to send fluttering waves through her core.

Helpless to do anything else, she grabbed fistfuls of his sweater. It was as soft as his thigh was hard.

“Very good.”

He crooned over her as he continued his ministrations, stoking the fire he’d set. He experimented with different rhythms, different angles, forcing her to whimper and adapt as he ground up against her.

The jeans she’d chosen were close to jeggings, thin enough for her to feel the pressure and drag of each roll of his thigh, every bounce of his knee. She suspected the fabric gave her tormentor an advantage, too. Thicker denim would leave him to guess where her sweet spots hid. If he was guessing now, he had the devil’s luck. Every slide stole her breath, and the mounting pressure left her feeling like she might explode.

Her hips jerked erratically as she tried to keep still, tried to save face as she let a man she’d known for two days work to – as he so elegantly put it – pleasure her.

He caught onto to her reticence quickly and moved to correct it. Warm hands wrapped around her hips, guiding down harder on his knee as he tsked.

“Don’t be shy, liebling.”

His voice was really doing it for her, and she followed his instructions, carefully rolling her hips to chase the beginning of her end. Her face flamed, and she couldn’t meet his eye, but it felt too good to stop. With his hands on her and his chest pinning her, she could image she was being held.

The long, winding cord grew tighter and tighter in her belly, like a rope going taut before it snapped. She’d really fall this time, too. No one could save her from the fallout of her own choices, and she knew, even as she ground down against his knee, that her prickly armor would never quite keep him out again.

As her orgasm approached, her thighs began to shake, and her pace faltered as they threatened to give out after balancing for so long on her toes. But the baron didn’t let up. His hands grasped tighter driving her against every glide and bounce of his knee, giving her everything she could feel through the layers of clothing between them.

“You’re doing so well,” he purred. “Nearly there.”

His warm murmurs sent cold shocks all the way out to her fingertips, and she clung to him, biting her ragged lip to stop from making too much noise. Aware of the fear tangled too tightly around her arousal, he shushed her, comforting her as he drove her relentlessly towards the brink.

“Don’t worry. It is only a little death.”

The rope snapped, and she fell.

As she slumped, twitching and exhausted, Zemo tucked an arm behind her back, keeping his leg between her knees as he withdrew just enough for her feet to fall flat on the floor. He pet small strokes down the middle of her back, watching her recover with naked pride.

“You did beautifully, draga.”

“No one’s ever – I mean – that was – ”

Blushing, she stammered herself silent, suddenly and wildly aware of her own inexperience. And position.

The baron grinned, all teeth. “It was. Thank you.”

Why thank her? She’d barely done anything, certainly nothing to help get him off.

“Would you like me to… help?... you?”

He chuckled, shaking his head. “No, no. I am well enough for now. Perhaps another night, liebling.”

She wasn’t sure what to say to that, how to approach the idea of other nights, or more illicit tumbles into the chasm of the baron’s schemes.

Finally pulling away, he made the slightest adjustments to right his sweater where she’d tugged it askew. “I should return before Sam comes looking. I will see you in the morning.” Another smile, softer, without teeth. “Rest well.”

She kept her place against the counter as he left and listened to him climb the steps. Even after he’d closed the door, and she knew she was entirely alone in the kitchen, she lingered. Breathing. Coming to grips with her after glow and the shadow of the baron’s smirk.

Tags List:

@dweeb-central​

@nvtaliaromanovv​

[staticscreenwriting]

Where the heart is // B. B.

Summary: Bucky and (Y/N) are getting a divorce because they are silly and both love the other so damn much. (Happy Ending!)

TW: Talk of divorce. Talk of potential pregnancy and babies.

A/N: Likes, reblogs, comments are all much appreciated. I am German. Sometimes I get the tense wrong or make mistakes. I am useless when it comes to punctuation. Go easy on me, please.] 

TAGLIST: Find the link to join my taglist in my bio. Will reblog this post with the taglist attached seperately. 

Waking up from this nightmare How's your life, what's it like there? Is it all what you want it to be? Does it hurt when you think about me? And how broken my heart is

The apartment is deadly quiet as Bucky steps inside, only the rattling of his keys echoing through the halls that once seemed so warm and inviting are now but a cold reminder of what used to be.

People never really talk about these moments. The after. The wreckage. The ruins of what used to be. Sure there are movies and books and countless songs but they take the feeling and they wrap it up in beautiful words and prose and make something beautiful of it.

There’s nothing beautiful in the way Bucky feels as his feet drag him towards what used to be his bedroom, which is now hers. There’s nothing beautiful in the way he feels as his eyes wander over to the closed door behind which lays an empty room. One that is empty not because of choice but because of the shitty cards life has dealt both him and her.

There is nothing beautiful about the way he feels. Only sadness. Only hurt.

When he turns the corner and steps into the bedroom, his heart drops for a second. He hadn’t expected her to be here, not with how quiet the place is. But sure enough, there she is. Sitting on the fluffy comforter they bought together, legs tucked underneath herself. She said that comforter was the exact same shade of blue as his eyes. Now she doesn’t even lift her head to look at him, focusing only on the box resting on the bed before her.

“Hey uh — I didn’t expect to run into you.”  

“ I live here. Sorry to disappoint.“

“ I know, that’s not what I meant. It’s just so quiet. “

She shrugs but still doesn’t look up. There’s so much resentment there, dripping from every word. He can’t fault her for it. Not even a little. If he was her, he’d hate himself too. Maybe this will make it easier for them. If she hates him, that’s a straight cut. Right? Hating is easy. It’s loving that’s hard.

“ It’s like that now. You here to get some of your stuff?” she asks, looking up at him for the first time. Her eyes are red and tired. Not like they were when he left, filled with tears and sorrow. Now they’re just infinitely sad and exhausted. Like all the life and all the warmth and all the passion that he fell so deeply in love with, has been sucked out of her. He hates knowing it’s partially his fault.

“ If that’s okay with you.”

“ sure. “

The movies and the poems and the books and the songs, they never talk about this. The after. The limbo. The “will you keep this or shall I take it?”

They don’t talk about the fact that you’re supposed to pack 5 years of relationship into a bunch of boxes and figure out what to do with it.

He quietly walks into the closet, as if making any noise would break whatever bubble is currently surrounding the two of them. Sometimes he wonders if things would be different had they been different people. Had they been able to express their feelings differently. Sometimes, in the most secret part of his heart, Bucky wishes there would’ve been screaming. Maybe screaming would’ve been helpful. Sure, it’s not the most eloquent way of communication but at least it is communication. But there was no screaming. Only silence. Only feelings swallowed up to never be spoken about. To suffocate them from the inside out.

Making as little noise as possible, Bucky grabs some of his clothes and stuffs them into the duffle bag Sam gave him. He had that look on his face, the pitiful one. The one that says “sorry, man”. There’s no reason to feel sorry for Bucky. This is his fault after all.

There’s a sound coming from behind him, and for a second he really believes it’s his mind playing tricks on him. But then he hears it again, louder this time, more clearly.

She’s laughing. Maybe not a full-on laugh but a chuckle. It’s been a while since he’s heard that sound.

“ What’s got you laughing like that ? “ Bucky asks as he turns back around only to be greeted by her smiling face. God how much he misses that smile.

She looks back down towards the box in front of her and the picture in her hand.

“ It’s uh — it’s a picture of the first time you stayed over. “

His legs carry him towards the bed as if they work on autopilot. As he sits down next to he can just about make out the scent of her shampoo. The one he bought for himself last week, not because he necessarily likes to use it. He bought it because he misses the scent. Because he misses her. And if he can keep her close like this, even for a small moment, he’ll buy an entire store's worth of shampoo.

Her fingers gently grip the picture so as to not rip or crumble it. He can’t hold back the smile that pulls at the corner of his lips as he recognizes the picture. It’s a slightly less gloomy version of him, in love and asleep. Curled up on her old tiny couch in her old tiny apartment with her dog Yoda sleeping soundly on his chest. He was so nervous to stay over at her place the first time he did. Nervous about so many different things but mostly about doing something to hurt her. Physically but also emotionally. To think that now his biggest fear came true, crushes his heart even further.

“ I miss Yoda. He was a good dog,” she says as she puts the photo back into the box. Truth be told, Bucky misses him too. He was grumpy and lazy and he didn’t ever really listen to them. But he was loyal and cuddly and all in all, he was the perfect dog for the two of them. And he had accepted Bucky into his and her life immediately. As if he knew that Bucky of all people needed nothing more than a chance to prove himself to be something other than a killer.

There are more pictures in the box, alongside other clutter that Bucky can’t quite make out. One of the other pictures he can see clearly, is one of the two of them on their first Halloween. The Halloween that Bucky didn’t want to dress up for. The one he promised himself he would spend curled up on his couch watching a scary movie and not open the door to anyone, Trick or Treaters or otherwise.

He ended up going out anyway. With her. FOR her. And it was one of the best nights of his life even if it meant he had to dress up like a skeleton.

“ What is all this? “ he asks though, by the way his heart starts beating faster, Bucky isn’t sure he even wants to know the answer to that question. “ You getting rid of our pictures? “

He doesn’t want it to sound so accusatory. They’re broken up. Separated. In the early process of a divorce. She has every right to get rid of their pictures. Get rid of him. Bury the memories. Just because he can’t let go doesn’t mean that she’s grieving in the same way.

“ No, “ she scoffs and pulls out a small scrap of paper, “ this is a memory box I started when we first got together. It’s things I didn’t know where to put but that I wanted to hold on to. I had planned to give it to you for our 10 year anniversary but … well “

She doesn’t have to say it. He knows.

“ Then after the — seperation I put some other stuff in there. Memories.” 

“ Can I see what else is in there? “ he asks “ since I won’t get to see it on our 10 year anniversary.”

Bucks isn’t quite sure why he adds that to the end of his sentence. It makes him sound spiteful and mean and he can tell, by the look on her face, that it hurts her. And he’s done enough of that in the past. Isn’t that exactly the reason they are here in the first place?

She considers it for a moment and Buck can only guess the different kinds of emotions running through her then. He feels them too. All of them. They are confusing and most of them are negative. She has no reason to let him see this, relish in sweet nostalgia with him as if everything is okay and they’re not getting a fucking divorce.

“ Sure, I guess. I —  yeah.”

She scoots more to the middle of the bed, making more space for Bucky to sit down properly. He’s perched on the side that was his. The side he fell asleep on and woke up on so many times. And she was there next to him. Always there and warm and soft. And she’d smile at him through sleepy eyes and a hazy mind and she’d rival the sun. And then she’d gently comb her fingers through his hair and say good morning and he knew it would be — a good morning.

He hasn’t had a good morning since he left.

She moves the box to sit between them on the bed and motions for Bucky to start digging in.

There’s a pile of what he realizes are old movie tickets. It's something they used to do when they first started dating. Thursdays were movie days. But while everyone went to see the new blockbusters, the two of them would pick the movies that sounded the weirdest and they’d buy a big bucket of popcorn and blue raspberry slushies and just relish in the grandeur that is bad cinema. Most of the time they were the only ones at the cinema. Sometimes things got — R rated.

“ Why did we stop doing this? “ she asks as Bucky looks up from the tickets “ going to the movies I mean. It was always my favorite day of the week. “

He tries to remember. Tries to pinpoint the moment when life changed and their Thursdays weren’t their Thursdays anymore. He can’t. He comes up empty.

Sometimes life changes in little ways, ones you don’t realize at that moment and they don’t seem significant either. It’s a broken tradition. A missed movie night. It’s slow and creeping but at some point, you stop and look at your life now and it doesn’t resemble your life then anymore. Everything has changed and you didn’t even notice. Not for one single second.

“ I have —  I have no idea. “ he has to confess.

“ Remember that movie with the killer florist ? “ she asks and her voice is laced with laughter. Something sparks up in his heart. A tiny flicker of something he’s missed. Something he hasn’t felt in a while. He can’t help but laugh along.

“ I do! Or the one where the woman fell in love with the Koi in her neighbor's pond? ”

“ Oh god! That was terrible. “

“ It was.”

She looks wistful for a moment as if her thoughts wander off to some long-forgotten memory.

“ What are you thinking about? “

He never usually had to ask her. He’d either know or she’d tell him on her own accord. It’s like there’s an invisible wall between them. One he wants to break down or climb over so badly. But does she want him there? After everything?

“ The day we saw that movie was the first time you said I love you. “

It’s true. Now that she mentions it he remembers it so clearly. It’s like he’s suddenly faced with a scene from a movie he’s forgotten about a long time ago but once someone mentions it, he remembers it in great detail. Knows every word. Every line.

“ I still don’t quite know what it was about that moment that made you say it but — “ she trails off, a smile playing on her lips.

Bucky knows. It wasn’t a groundbreaking realization back then. He’d been feeling it for months. Fell deeper in love with her with every glance, every smile, every silly movie he got to watch with her. They went to some dingy diner after the movie to grab a burger and some fries. The leather seats were old and the filling was spilling out, the air smelled of grease and air freshener, and the laminated menu cards were sticky with undefinable stains. All things considered, it should’ve been a bad date. It wasn’t though. Nothing was ever bad with her. She smiled. All she did was smile and hum along to some song Bucky didn’t know as it spilled from the jukebox. And it occurred to him then, that there was no need for a big gesture or a special moment. Every moment with her was special. Life couldn’t get any better than this. Existing was enough if only she was there.

“ Nothing. “

“ Hm? “

“ There was nothing special about that moment. I just realized that I would be okay with anything if only you are there. You — that’s all I need in life. “

She looks at him then and for a second he thinks that maybe she’ll kiss him. Tell him that they are making a mistake and ask him to come back. Tell him that she doesn’t blame him. That she forgives him. That she wants him anyway. Despite — everything. She doesn’t though. Just sighs and pulls another picture from the box.

It’s a picture of the two of them cuddled up on the couch with a tiny white ball of fluff resting on her chest.

“ Our first picture with Alpine. “

“ That was taken on the day we found him. Look, you can clearly see the scratches on my face from crawling around the dumpsters to rescue him. “ Bucky points out.

He had never thought of himself as a cat person. Really he wasn’t so much an anything-person anymore, after Hydra. But somehow that little cat had wormed his way into his heart and refused to leave.

“ Was worth it though! “

Bucky nods his head in agreement “ it was. “

“ You should — you should take him. He’s really more your cat than mine.”

“ He’s our cat.” he points out.

“ Bucky there won’t be an ours anymore. Soon.”

It breaks his heart. Over and over again. He just got used to being himself. The version he was when he was with her. How is he gonna deal with doing it all over again? He doesn’t want to be a version of himself after her.

“ I don’t have a place yet and Sam’s allergic. “

“ He can stay here until then, of course. I love him. “

There’s a lot of love there that’s being given up on, Bucky realizes. And he hates every part of it.

“ Shit, remember this? “ she chimes up again as her hand holds onto a thin receipt, the black ink bleached away and thinned out from years of being stuck in a box. From years of memories fading.

“ Is that from the —”

“ The tattoo place, yeah. “

The patch of skin on the inside of his arm grows hot as if he is suddenly aware of what is there. Something long forgotten. A small letter forever etched into his skin in black ink like the way she’s forever etched into his heart. Always there. Forever. Just like the delicate lines that write his own name onto her collar bone. James. Not Bucky. Not Winter Soldier. James.

“ Oh god, I can’t believe you kept these,” Buck exclaims as he picks a pair of bright blue knitted socks from the box. They’re made from scratchy wool and there are a million and one holes in them. It’s so her. So quintessentially her. To keep them. With their holes and their scratchy wool and all. Even if they’re a mess. Even if they’re broken. She holds onto things no matter how bad. No matter how lost and sad and broken and useless. She holds on tight and doesn’t let go. Unless you make her. Unless you force her to. Unless you break her heart.

“ Umm … you made them for me. Like you literally learned how to knit to make me a pair of socks to keep my feet warm. That is the most romantic thing anyone has ever done for me, Buck. Of course, I kept them. “

Bucky bashfully shrugs his shoulders, a tint of red dusting his cheeks. “ I’m glad you liked them. Even if they’re scratchy. “

“ I like you and Alpine and you guys are the scratchiest,” she points out. She’s not wrong.

“ Was I a good boyfriend? “ Bucky asks and while in the grand scheme of things it really doesn’t matter, he wants to know anyway. Wants to know he did something right.

“ You were the best boyfriend. “

“ I’m sorry I was a shit husband. “

She stays quiet for a moment and with every second that passes by he breaks more and more. He wonders how much of him is left at this point. How much there’s still to lose. Then again, what does it matter? He lost her and that’s all that really matters.

“ You weren’t a shit husband, Bucky. “

It’s like the world suddenly moves in slow motion as they both grab the 2 things left in the box.

Bucky holds onto the blue velvet box knowing exactly what’s inside. The last time he held it, got on his knees in front of her, put the ring on her finger, that was one of the best days of his life. A sign that the Winter Soldier was his past and that he could finally truly move on. They were younger, in love. Happy. Now he hardly remembers what happiness feels like.

“ I was so nervous to give this to you. Not because I thought you’d say no or anything. I just — I just wanted to be enough. The ring and the proposal and — me. “

“ You were always enough. “ she says and he can hear the tears in her voice. It’s thick and heavy and he knows that if he looks at her now, there will be tears in her eyes too.

But he doesn’t look at her then. His eyes fall onto the piece of fabric in her hands. It’s so small. Soft peached colored with a little bunny embroidered on the front. It’s tiny and cute and it belongs to no one. It’s tiny and it should’ve been theirs. But it isn’t.

“ No, I wasn’t. He says and shakes his head. You deserve more than I can give you. “

She throws the baby romper back into the box and gets off the bed as if someone has set it on fire.

“ What’s wrong? “ he asks as if he doesn’t know. Everything. Everything about this situation is wrong. They’re supposed to make love on this bed, not cry over memories long gone. Push away thoughts of their looming divorce.

“ I don’t know, Bucky. Maybe you can tell me. “ She calls out to him as she pulls the rest of his shirts from the closet and throws them into the bedroom. Colors of fabric flying through the air like wings of a bird flapping through the winds. Some of them she lops at him, passion and anger and wrath and sadness filling her eyes. “ Maybe you can tell me why the fuck we’re doing this. Why we’re putting ourselves through all this pain and suffering and this bullshit divorce. Maybe you can tell me why you left me to have a fucking breakdown every time I walk into my closet and see this goddamn dress, “ she cries while holding up the hanger over which her beautiful white wedding dress is draped. God, she looked so beautiful that day. Like a goddess. Like an angel. Like his redemption.

“ We were happy. We were trying to have a family. And then what — it doesn’t work and you leave? You just gave up. “

“ I didn’t give up. “

“ Yes, you fucking did! You gave up and you served me divorce papers and you didn’t even give me a fucking choice. “

“ You agreed! “

“ Because I love you and if you don’t want to be with me, then I am not keeping you. I love you enough to let you be happy even if it’s without me.”

Those words send a shock through his heart. Like an icicle. Cold and sharp and unforgiving.

“ You think I don’t love you? You think YOU are the reason?,” Bucky questions before grabbing the romper from the box and holding it up “ this is the reason. This is my fault and mine alone. It’s my fault that this belongs to no one. It’s my fault that there’s an empty room in this apartment that you can’t walk into because it hurts you too much to see it empty. You deserve to be a mother and clearly, I can’t give that to you. That’s the burden I carry but it’s not one that should be put on you. I can’t give you this but you deserve it and you should have it. So this is me letting you go so you can find someone that can give you a baby. Someone who isn’t broken. Someone who doesn't have a body that doesn’t work anymore. Not in the way it should. “

“ James, “ her words a but a whisper as his name tumbles from her lips and she lets her wedding dress fall to the floor to sit next to him and hold his face in between her hands. “ That wasn’t your fault and you are not broken. I want a family, yes. I want a child. But with you. I want a family with you and it doesn’t matter if it’s my blood or not. It’s our family whichever way we decide to do this. And if we — if we stay just us and Alpine that’s fine too. I just want you and whatever else we decide on. Together. I love you, James. I love you and I miss you and I don’t want a baby if it’s not with you. A family means nothing if it doesn’t include you. Whatever the consequences of the serum are, they are not your fault. You are not broken, James. You are you. You’re a hero. A husband. And maybe one day a father but above all, you are James Buchanan Barnes, a survivor and you are not broken.  “

He knows he should be saying so many things right then but all his thoughts get tangled up and won't find the way to his lips.

Instead, he says the only other thing he can think about right then.

“ You looked so beautiful in your wedding dress. “

She laughs through the flood of tears that leak from her eyes and trail down her face.

“ I mean you always look beautiful but that day. My god. I honestly couldn’t believe you said yes to me — of all people. 106 year old me. Wouldn’t believe it until the moment you walked down the aisle. Then I knew that this was really the start of my new life. Of my forever. “

“ I miss you Bucky. “

“ I miss you too. “

“ I don’t want to divorce you. I want to be your wife and I want you to be my husband.”

“ Even without the babies? “

“ Yes, “ she nods and brushes her fingers through his short hair. “ You are my family James and you are enough for me. Always”

“ I love you. “ he says because really, it’s the only thing he can think of. The thing he wants most. The only thing that matters.

Without another word, he pulls the ring from the box and delicately slips it back onto her finger. Where it belongs. Where it always belonged.

“ I’m sorry I was ever this stupid. I should’ve just talked to you “

“ Yeah you should have but right now can you — can you just kiss me? “

She doesn’t need to ask him twice. He kisses her once, then twice, then once again. It’s been a long long time since the last time he’s kissed her. Too long. Way too long.

He’s not gonna stop anytime soon. Never again. Never ever again.

“ Hey, “ he says “ how about you slip into your wedding dress I think for all my stupid decisions I owe you a dance. “

“ I think you might be right. “

And she’s smiling, so bright and radiant. Like the sun. Like all the stars. Like his own personal light in the darkness.

“ Don’t expect too much though. I just cried, my hair is a mess — I won’t look the way you remember me looking in this dress. “

“ You’ll look gorgeous.”

And he’s right. She looks breathtaking. She looks like a wonderful, wonderful dream. Like love captured in a person. Like a second chance. Like his home.

There are a lot of thoughts racing through Bucky’s mind as he pulls her close and they sway to the melodic tunes of their wedding song as it sounds from the speakers of her cellphone. But above all there’s love. And the knowledge that he is enough. That they are enough. Their tiny little family. Perfect and not broken or missing anything. It’s good as it is.

They don’t have to think about who gets to keep the decorative throw pillows, the records they used to collect together, the plates that were a wedding gift, the cat. Because it’s theirs. Together. Shared.

And forever.

[agermanadventurer]

A start

Let’s start somewhere shall we?

The German language is generally considered quite hard because of it’s grammar - which is understandable. If you are a monoligual English speaker you have never encountered the different complexities that are going to show up. But have no fear-! All of these things have been learned before and can be learned by you if you aspire to. I am not going to make this blog a step-by-step blog to learn German - I simply don’t have neither the time nor the patience to do that. But I will guide you to some free sources to get started to be able to follow along with other things I’ll be talking about in the future, and these are both things I’ve come across in my studying and also things I wish I had found earlier.

BOOKS (pdfs)

german language course - Simply named German Language Course is a pdf book that is written by several collaborating authors in an effort to create a beginner’s guide to the German language. It’s constantly being improved but the newer version here is lacking a bit and the original release from 2006 linked above is a bit more put together but choose from your own accord.

basic german - Basic German, a text/work book for grammar! Really- there’s a lot of grammar in there but it’s quite easy to navigate and can be useful for anyone learning the language or the grammar. 

mein-deutschbuch.de - Mein Deutschbuch is technically a website but nevermind that. It offers lists of different grammar rules and gives you excercises to practice your grammar. The only downside is that everything is in german. It’s great for more advanced learners though.

pdfdrive.com/german-language-books - And here’s a link to many other free books that can be downloaded.  

YOUTUBE CHANNELS (for language learning)

Get Germanized - A youtube channel dedicated to teaching it’s viewers German and also about the German culture. There are full course German videos only focusing on exposing and teaching as well as shorter videos with cultural comparisons and entertainment. 

Easy German - Easy German publish videos for both advanced learners and beginners. They focus much on teaching spoken German but also talks about grammar,  and they offer new vocabulary. 

Learn German - A channel that uses a simple artstyle to explain different parts of the German language. The channel also sorts their videos after language level so even for someone in level C1 might find something useful in there.   

Learn German with Herr Antrim - Herr Antrim wants to teach you German for free. His videos brings up grammar, pronounciation, and tak about the German culture.

Besides these channels you also have plenty of videos repeating german phrases and vocabulary for when you sleep (can’t really recommend to sleep while you listen to them) and you can sit down and take a few notes from those too if you want to become familiar with the sounds and some of the phrases.

YOUTUBE CHANNELS (for entertainment and exposure)

Hi From Hamburg - Lila is an american who moved to Hamburg and is making videos talking about her experience with it and she makes a lot of videos for simple entertainment. Her channel is one of the few English ones I’m going to include in this list. 

Dinge Erklärt - Kurzgesagt -  Kurzgesagt is a channel with pretty animation explaining different concepts, ideas, and myths in our modern society today. They talk about philosophy, science, religious ideas, psychology, and more.

maiLab - MaiLab is a scientific channel in German. In their videos they talk about various topics within biology, chemistry, psychology, or of different concepts and myths in society today.

Related to maiLab are also channels like Quarks and MrWissen2go.

100SekundenPhysik - For those who are into physics, this one can be intresting for you. 100SekundenPhysik brings up and explains physics, but in German and in short comprehensible videos. 

Dagi Bee - For those not as interested in science, here’s an entertainment channel (and a few more after this). Dagi Bee is a channel created for entertainment, she features music videos, make up and hair turtorials, reaction videos, vlogs and more.

Marvyn Macnificent - Marvyn makes entertainment and vlog videos; challenges, make up tutorials and reviews, collaborations (and videos with friends), and also different types of discussions of other social media figures.

Alycia Marie - This channel is for any make up and cosplay fan. Alycia’s channel is made up of make up tutorials, make up reviews and comparisons, as well as cosplay displays. She also have a second channel for her music.

Other channels like Dagi Bee and Alycia Marie is for example Luisa Crashion and Jasmin Azizam

DoctorBenx - A look into the gaming part of youtube and we have DoctorBenx as a prominent figure on the list. His videos consist of him playin games such as Minecraft and Roblox but also GTA5 and simulator/indie games. He works closely with the youtuber AwesomeElina.

Vlesk - If anyone’s still into Among Us you’ll want to check out Vlesk who almost exclusively makes videos of said game at the moment. His channel is rather young still but the older videos are him playing TTT in Garry’s Mod. 

Zombey - For those more intrested in playthroughs, Zombey is more appropriate. His channel features many different games such as Demon’s Soul and Fall Guys. 

APPS

Duolingo - Duolingo is always mentioned when it comes to these things, but it’s a good app. It provides a simple, almost game-like, format that helps you practice different concepts in your target language.

Memrise - Can’t forget Memrise on this list. Memrise uses video clips of real life people using the language to get you to associate the phrases with the situation and to get you to immerse yourself with the language. 

Drops - Drops focuses on visual learning, getting your brain to associate the vocabulary you’re exposed to with the pictures and symbols on the screen. The app is great for learning new vocabulary and you can choose yourself which topic to start with.

Wordbit German - WordBit German is useful for vocabulary exposure. You download it and every time you open your phone a German word is shown on the screen and you can mark different word by familiarity.

HelloTalk - This app helps you to reach out to native speakers of your target language and you can also help others seeking to learn your language. You can send voice messages, make corrections and translate the messages directly. The app can be used for free, but there are many functions that are limited without paying. Other similar apps are also available (often with lower quality but they are free). 

PODCASTS (language learning)

Slow German - The journalist Annik Rubens talks about everyday topics and phenomenons in the german culture and society in short recordings. Perfect to practice your listening comprehension as a beginner and get used to the new parts of the phonology - and it’s available on Spotify. 

Easy German - They also have a podcast! They also talk about the german culture but also topics relevant to the rest of the world, though in a bit more natural speed and with a bit more relaxed manner. (Available on Spotify)

Radio D - Unfortunately not available on Spotify but it is easily found with just a google search (and by the attached link). The podcast is made for complete beginners, guiding you throughout different scenarios and settings and building up your understanding and basic knowledge of the language. Transscripts are also available for download.

Coffee Break German - A series of lessons where the listener, together with the English speaking host Mark, gets to learn German phrases and vocabulary from scratch with the help of Thomas. Each episode is between 20 to 30 minutes so get your pen and paper out to take effective notes. (Available on Spotify)

 You will come across many other podcasts, these are just a good place to start.

PODCASTS (for entertainment)

Eine Stunde History - With new episodes every Friday this podcast takes events throughout history and compare their relevance to today and the future. Perfect for those who have an interest in history. (Available on Spotify)

ZEIT WISSEN - Woher weißt Du dass? - The central theme being science, this podcast gives you a scientific perspective on a new question that is being explored every week. You want to know if humans can hybernate or what the consequenses of having sex with the neanderthals were? Not necessarily! But now you can! (Available on Spotify)

Verbrechen - This podcast features true crime, being led by Andreas Sentker and Sabine Rückert. Sabine is the one talking about the cases she’s been met with throughout her career in law enforcement. (Available on Spotify)

Biologie Passion Podcast - If you have a biology test coming up, if you want to repeat some long lost knowledge from school, or maybe you just have a passion for biology - then this is a good podcast for you. Christian Schweda is happy to teach (or reteach) you some biology. (Available on Spotify)

Eli’s Abitur Crashkurs - For those of you who are study freaks in general, you can visit Eli on Spotify! She has made a podcast on everything she has to study for during her Abitur. And the best thing is - they only come in 10-20 min episodes. But be aware for speedy speech. (Available on Spotify)

Die Copycats - Both on Youtube and on Spotify these guys talk about all sorts of nerdy things from video games to bad music and give their opinions on many other things. They’re quite small so go and give them a bit of love. (Available on Spotify)

#QueerAsBerlin - Not available on Spotify unfortunately. But as the title suggests is this podcast a commentary, interviews and a view on different aspects of social problems through the lens of the LGBTQ+ community in Berlin.  

Bin ich Süßsauer? - For my fellow asian LGBTQ+ people out there; this underrated podcast features an asian host in Germany, talking about different parts of LGBTQ (from what I understand the host themselves are trans and therefore the general theme) with different guests. Of course this can be enjoyed by anyone, just a small shout out for diversity. (Available on Spotify)

Schnapsidee - der Podcast über Liebe, Love & sexy sein - From the name alone you are most likely able to deduse the theme of this podcast. Anna and Paula talks about their love life, relationships, and sex! Their content is lighthearted and enjoyable to listen to. (Available on Spotify)

Dick und Doof - Without any real theme to their podcast, the two friends Sandra and Luca is having a great time, and we get to listen to their conversations about anything and everything. The both of them focus mostly on humour, sprinkled with an insight in their private lives. (Available on Spotify)

Alliteration am Arsch - Or AAA in foreshortening, features Bastian Bielendorfer and Reinhard Remfort who found themselves as friends after realizing the things they had in common and now we get to listen as the both of them discuss anything and everything through the lens of comedy. (Available on Spotify)

[jupitermelichios]

@glorioustidalwavedefendor I don't mind at all 😊 Glad to put my theology degree to actual use for once!

So … as far as I understand it, that means the wikipedia entry has it the wrong way round? Wikipedia says evangelism rose, → high church used Gothic revival as a political tool Wen actually it was he other way round, they just build those churches for other reasons (political, aesthetic … culture … ) and accidentally pissed off what would eventually become evangelism?

So the first thing you need to know is that English culture from the mid 1500s through to the late 18th century is this continuous cycle of 'strict protestants push back against perceived catholicism', 'catholics and high church anglicans push back against percieved puritanism', rinse and repeat. (And both sides have very valid fears - James II is actually catholic and does start to push the country back towards catholicism, and then the protestant push back involves his daughter mary and her husband actually leading a german army to invade the country, and then james's son (he's usually just called 'the old pretender' but his name was actually James, and if you've heard of bonny prince charlie, james is his dad) leads repeated attempts to take the throne by force with scottish and french support, so neither side is wrong when they fear the other is trying to literally take over. (incidentally, Mary's invasion was called the glorious revolution, a name which is referenced in pratchett's night watch!))

The second thing is that while all churches are political to some degree, Anglicanism is a state religion and the monarch is literally head of the church, so it’s way more political than most. This means that people's political views play a big part in how they relate to the church.

And the third thing is that Anglicanism is, in many ways, a compromise that suits no one, and it’s aware of it. Elizabeth I really codified the church in its current form, and she did while trying not to start yet another religious war. It was just enough of a middle ground that it only really pissed off the extremists at either end of the spectrum, and they were going to be pissed off anyway because they were extremists, so it worked. But I don’t think it’s controversial to say that if it hadn’t been the state religion, imposed by law, it probably wouldn’t have really caught on. This has improved over time as Anglicanism has grown increasingly into its own identity, but there’s a reason the church is haemorrhaging members right now when more extreme protestant sects are growing, and (imo) a lot of it is that aspect of compromise.

It’s also important to bear in mind that the anglican laity don’t get a choice about whether they’re high church or low church - if your parish has a high church vicar, you go to high church services. If you’re in a town big enough to have multiple parishes, you could go to the next parish over, but if you’re rural, that’s probably not an option. Plus vicars are appointed by the bishop, and high-church bishops pick high-church vicars, so it’s very likely the next parish over has a similar outlook. Unless you live on the border of two dioses, you’re kind of shit out of luck. (Parishs and dioses work a bit like counties and states in the USA, with multiple parishes making up a dioses, and multiple dioses making up an archdioses)

All this means that when people start looking for social reform, they tend to leave the church, because it’s so strongly linked to the monarch, and when they want religious reform, they tend to leave the church because there’s nothing low-church anglicanism can do that another protestant sect can’t do better, because they aren’t having to compromise with high-church bishops in their own church the way the anglicans are.

This means that when the protestant > catholic cycle swings around to protestant, the church of england has a tendency to double down on the high church stuff, because that’s the unique thing anglicanism has to offer. Plus there is a very clear line of succession from Jesus (whether he was the son of God is entirely a matter of faith, but there’s very little reason to think he wasn’t a real historical figure) through St Paul to St Peter, who was the first pope, so by emphasising anglicanism as the heirs to catholicism, by saying ‘yes the catholic church strayed from god’s word over time, but they once were christ’s church and now we’ve taken all the good stuff and got rid of the bad, we’re christ’s church’, it lends legitimacy. And when there are firebrand protestants out there telling people that the church has lost God’s approval, that legitimacy matters a lot.

Then in the late 18th/early 19th century there’s this period of incredible social upheaval in europe - the july revolution in france followed by napoleon, the decemberist revolution in russia, the belgian revolution in the netherlands, and in the uk there’s peterloo, the radical war, the spa fields riots, the cato street conspiracy… suddenly all the ideas that the Levellers first proposed in the aftermath of the civil war are gaining traction again, so at the same time as the church is trying to emphasise its unique qualities, the aristocracy are also trying to emphasise their own wealth and power because they’re genuinely terrified they’re going to be overthrown but also they’re all morons, so instead of compromising with the reformers (that does happen a little, with some parliamentary reforms, but not significantly) they think any compromise will be seen as a sign of weakness and instead get real into fancy art and architecture. (Disappointingly, this does kind of work, at least for a while)

So basically, you're right that they poured fuel onto an existing fire, but that fire was like one of those silent hill coal seam fires that will never go out and had been burning for 300 years at this point. Wikipedia isn’t wrong - the gothic revival cathedrals were a backlash against social and religious reform movements, and then there’s a backlash to that backlash, which eventually becomes the third great awakening, because time is a flat circle and history is cyclical.

→ Wen you say “A lot of people around the world” do you mean anglicans around the world or just generally christians of all denominations around the world?

Initially it’s all Anglicans, but this is the height of the british empire when “a third of a map was pink” (for some reason british map makers always coloured empire countries pink) and Anglicanism gets exported to every country England invades (it’s not imposed by law in most colonies, by the incredibly low standards of 19th century colonial powers, the empire has relatively high religious freedom, but converting means you’ll probably get treated better by the colonisers, plus a truely insane amount of money is being poured into missionaries at this time so the church is getting sold hard in every country where england sets foot). Anglicans encompasses a lot of people.

Plus once the movement gets some momentum, it begins pulling in people from outside the Anglican church as well and there’s backlash against other churches who are perceived as not being strict enough in their faith, especially in the USA.

→ You say a bit further down that: a lot of the people looking for salvation elsewhere where actually from the high church. What made them change their mind all of a sudden?

Part of it is that, as noted above, most congregants didn’t actually get a choice about whether their church is high or low, so they may never have been thrilled with how their particular church is operating, and the increase in perceived ‘papacy’ (such a fun word to say) is the straw that broke the camel's back. they also may be attending a church that was previously relatively low church which has been getting higher because of the cultural shift in the church, or a change in vicar or bishop.

Part of it is also that this is an era where there suddenly are a lot of alternatives as new churches begin springing up, and more relaxed religious laws means they’re not immediately getting shut down, so they’ve got a lot more choice than they’ve had for a while.

A lot of it is the industrial revolution. The upheaval that enclosure of common land and the migration to cities as factories begin springing up caused in people’s lives is almost unimaginable now, and if you’re sharing a single room with three other families working 12+ hour days and your kid lost an arm to machinery and you still can’t afford to eat, seeing the church spending unimaginable amounts of money on fancy buildings is probably going to make you incredibly angry, especially if you’ve also been hearing social reformers talk a lot about how the monarch and the upper class, who are the ones running the church, have no right to govern you in the first place. Before enclosure, the rural poor could generally always feed themselves, even if the food was boring, and if they couldn’t it was usually because of a bad harvest or bad weather, which was out of anyone’s control but God's. Which isn’t to say it was a good life, it absolutely sucked in a lot of ways, but the lives of the newly urban poor arguably sucked a lot worse, and this time, there was someone they could blame that on.

And finally, a lot of it is that there was increasingly a culture where leaving the church and seeking salvation elsewhere was socially normalised. It’s like how there were people in the 1940s who dieted and joined proto-wellness movements, but if you read books of the era, they're always described as being very weird, so not many poeple did it, whereas today, it’s considered totally normal, so a lot more people do it. It creates this snowball effect where the more people do it, the more normal it becomes, and so the more people do it, and so the more normal it becomes. The more people dissatisfied with the high-church movement left anglicanism, the more normal it was to leave, and so the more people did it.

Is Wee Frees' a play on something?

Pratchett’s Wee Free Men are a play on the churches! They’re called the Wee Frees because they’re small, independent, and it rhymes, and the name’s been around for a couple of hundred years at least. But since his depiction of the Feegals is strongly influenced by scottish independence movements of the past which were usually deeply religious, the name he gave them references the churches. (Plus they're also small and independant!)

It had never occurred to me that them thinking they’re already dead might be a reference to the way Calvinists think a person’s life is basically just an extension of their afterlife, but you very well might be right, that's really cool!

[chromatic-lamina]

just the things i like, 1030 spoilers (kid, law, marco, other stuff)

Drake and Apoo not out of the game is fun

And, genius, Oda. I did not think of this. Kinemon’s detached lower half

lets us know that this dude is still alive too:

As does Apoo also being alive, but more importantly:

O-Kiku, my beloved. BUT what I really like are our two sexy geriatric dudes (though mere whippersnappers on the OP timeline) here:

Marco, looking fine there, man. And Izou’s doing alright (blasting away). Guess Marco got his strength back a few chapters ago. And well, if Kawamatsu’s your thing.

Of course Kanjuro (his character is fascinating. Like the emptiest of vessels is the evilest of conductors?) decides to just send everything to a burning hell in a hand basket (at Orochi’s behest).

BUT

I really love Marco above (oh, and Yamato runs through the castle like a pretty fox wolf), but come on KidLaw Nation!

Now, y’all know that I’m MarcoLaw, first and foremost, and I’m also strongly ZoLaw, but right now Oda is playing into KidLaw lando, and I’m not adverse to it.

Also, it was Law’s sloppy workmanship that saved Kin’emon. Ah, so our perfectionist head canons (one I don’t really share, but I can see where it comes from), aren’t always backed up by the official release (surprise). Guess he might have been a bit tired after the events of Punk Hazard. (Edit in: it has been pointed out that Kin is either shifting the blame here from himself or the Strawhats :-))

And let’s not forget these scary dudes on the move:

Although Brook and Robin have their own brand of fear too. Wonder why the colour of the arrow changes to grey. Anyway. That’s my arrow over CP0′s heads. Not part of the scans.

BUT BUT BUT Marco is absolutely fine. And Killer copped a beating last chapter only for this to happen:

BUT never fear, because Law and Kid 

had a secret flashback tête-à-tête (and as if I know where all the accents go. Thank you, dictionary).

FIRST, they test their abilities out or have conversations about them on the by and by (or in the midst of battle). [Maybe this exchange went on while Momo ripped up the castle floors).

SECOND, Law is willing to DIE for his man. (Now, I don’t recommend this. And ZoLaw is my bigger ship, BUT, Oda’s toying with you, guys...).

I mean, KidLaw is the original ship with this dude. Let’s keep going. I’m just going to put the coloured pages in, and I’ll put the link in the comments, cos you know how tumblr gets about links.

Kid’s is the same. SO, both of these guys are at death’s door right now, which doesn’t bode well. BUT, they’re not exactly doing it for each other (well, I might argue that Law’s doing it for Kid), but they’re definitely working as a team. And I want to know about these Awakening conversations the supernova have.

Like, what if people confused it for a fundamental religious gathering and there’s all these guys (and one gal) sitting in a room showing their party tricks and trying to get to the next level. It could be like a poetry slam, and about as interesting. The next one to take the mic! No Luffy! Put the mic back. You’re not literally meant to take it. 

Anyway, not only do we get insight into their power and their awakened power, looks like Big Mom is in trouble.

The translator’s note says that the kana says ‘wille’ where it says ‘wave’ above. German for ‘will’. I’m guessing that Brad there is a mistranslation of ‘Brat’, although it could be the way that Big Mom is speaking. (It has been pointed out, probably effects of the anaesthesia or the attack in general).

And:

LOVE. “Don’t tell me what to do.” Law’s taking care of his man, and his man’s relying on him to do so. Only he’s not doing it fast enough. BUT, maybe they did hit their limit. I’ve got a feeling that a mythical Japanese Wolf might cushion their fall.

Who said Kid wasn’t a team player? Maybe it’s only when Luffy and Apoo (and Hawkins) are the choices.

Also, the castle is on fire. Kanjuro added fuel to the fire. And there’s a bunch of explosives in the cellar, or basement or wherever. And it’s bound to crash into the flower capital in a matter of minutes?

Got a kinda meta out  there on the possibilities of meanings for kroom (if it’s kept in the official translation). Will link later.

[chibi-sunrise]

Where can I watch Luminaria’s Anime?

For Global Viewers

You can watch the first episode of the “Tales of Luminaria the Fateful Crossroad” anime with EN subtitles here. We’ve also got Spanish subtitles, French subtitles, German subtitles, Italian subtitles, Portuguese subtitles, and Russian subtitles.

You can now watch the first episode of the “Tales of Luminaria the Fateful Crossroad” anime in EN dub here.

You’ll need a Crunchyroll or Funimation subscription to watch the second episode on their respective websites. I once saw one of my mutuals was able to watch it without subscriptions (with ads, of course), but I haven’t tested it for myself.

For JP Viewers

If you’re recommending the anime to a friend who lives in Japan, this tweet lists different sites where they’ll be able to search for it. Tales of Luminaria’s official anime website has been shut down, though, so you won’t be able to check it for details on the different options… But I’ll provide whatever links I can find!

We have Amazon JP Rent/have Amazon JP Prime or the dアニメストア subscription service so far.

Well, I’m sure most people on tumblr will know where else they can watch the anime if they’re interested enough… If using official means is the best way to directly support the works I care about, then I’ll use official means as much as possible. And if those official means aren’t, then…I won’t turn down other options.

If you’re interested, then click the readmore for links to voice actor interviews regarding the anime, comments from the anime directors, the motion actors, two event reports on the CG animation studio’s lecture on their animation work process, and more!

So first up, this post has the bulk of information on the anime. You’ll find the anime directors’ comments, scenario writers’ comments, and a twitter thread about the AniTsuku free web-only seminar that was held on September 23-25, 2022.

This tweet will lead you to a detailed event report on the Tales of Luminaria seminar that was held at the time. If anything happens to that tweet, then I’ve also got the direct link to the article here. I’ve also got another article that covers different information on the event here.

We also have these tweets from a few of the motion actors who helped construct the scenes for CG animation. We’ve also got a tweet from the animator in charge of facial expressions! I loved their work on the Fire Emblem Heroes special Book movies; check out this one in particular for their work on facial expressions.

And this post has Luminaria’s Writing Team’s comments, which include a note about the animation.

This tweet leads to Comic Natalie’s interview of Arai Ryohei (Leo’s VA) and Takeda Kaito (Hugo’s VA) If anything happens to that tweet, then I’ve also got the direct link here.

This tweet leads to Comic Natalie’s interview of Umehara Yuichiro (August’s VA) If anything happens to that tweet, then I’ve also got the direct link here.

This tweet leads to Comic Natalie’s interview of Uemura Yuto (Lucien’s VA) If anything happens to that tweet, then I’ve also got the direct link here.

I want people to be able to recognize the Luminaria anime as the top quality work it is. There was so much work, passion, effort, and love put into this animation; please don’t dismiss it just because it’s CG.

Oh, and these aren’t comments, but check out the art the anime directors did! Midori drew Easter Leo here, drew a piece for Celia’s birthday here, and sketched a little something to celebrate that Itaindou completed accepting orders for Luminaria’s custom hanko stamps here. And Shiori drew Laplace here.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

We Were Something, Don’t You Think So? [Chapter 2: The Middle Of Nowhere]

You are a Russian Grand Duchess in a time of revolution. Ben Hardy is a British government official tasked with smuggling you across Europe. You hate each other.

This is a work of fiction loosely inspired by the events of the Russian Revolution (1917-1923) and the downfall of the Romanov family. Many creative liberties were taken. No offense is meant to any actual people. Thank you for reading! :)

Song inspiration: “the 1” by Taylor Swift.

Chapter warnings: Lots of shouting, if you never learned about the Russian Revolution then here's your mini crash course, references to historical stuff like violence and disease, Kroshka the mule emerges as the only emotionally stable character.

Word count: 4.1k.

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

Please let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist! 💜

Taglist: @imtheinvisiblequeen @okilover02 @adrenaline-roulette @youngpastafanmug @m-1234 @tensecondvacation @deacyblues @haileymorelikestupid @rogerfuckintaylor @yourlocalmusicalprostitute @im-an-adult-ish @someforeigntragedy @mo-whore

I wake up feeling harder, as if sleeping on the ground with all its stones and cool indifference has taught my spine to straighten, to endure. This is a welcome revelation. I will need to be resilient, for my family and for myself. I also wake determined to set things right with my rescuer. I am a perfectly charming person, Mother and Papa have always said so; I’m not painfully shy like Olga, or aloof like Tati, or rather dull like Maria, and I certainly don’t run around putting frogs in people’s shoes like Anastasia. I make for excellent company. Surely Ben will realize this and we will become inseparable travel companions.

Outside in the overcast brisk morning air, Ben is already busy tacking the mule. He glances over and tosses me an apple. It bounces out of my floundering hands and rolls off into the woods. This is not an auspicious start to the day.

“You’ll still have to eat that,” Ben says. “There’s no extra food. I was only able to ask for as much as I could justify needing myself.”

“Right.” I go fetch the apple—rummaging around in leaves and sticks and shrubs—and take a bite, even though it’s bruised and definitely tastes like dirt. I beam at Ben triumphantly. I am tough! I am daring! I am enchanting! I can pull my own weight on this journey!

Ben doesn’t seem to notice. He pats the mule’s thick brown neck and smiles fondly at her. “How are we feeling this morning, Kroshka? Hmm? Who’s a lovely mule? Who’s going to take us all the way to the Trans-Siberian Railroad without even one measly word of complaint? That’s right, you are! Yes you are!” He lands a smacking kiss on the velvety grey fur of her muzzle.

I attempt polite conversation; more than that, I endeavor to learn about my dashing yet evasive rescuer. “So, tell me Ben, have you worked for Sir Buchanan long?”

“Four years,” Ben replies curtly.

“And you are…” I think of his notebook. “A…writer of some sort for him…?”

“I’m his press attaché.”

“Ah.” I recognize the French word for ‘attach,’ but not its meaning in the context of employment with an ambassador. “I can’t say I know what that entails.”

“I handle Sir Buchanan’s relations with the Russian newspapers. Drafting statements and briefing him on local opinions and the like. And since his health has declined, I find myself delivering some of his particularly confidential correspondence.”

“Oh, I see. And he could spare you for this mission? It seems like a burden that would be better carried by a man with military or exploratory experience.”

“My Russian is passable. And I can tolerate rougher conditions than most.” He points to a pile of clothes he’s laid out on a tree stump. “Those are for you. There’s a stream out that way.” He flicks a thumb towards the east. “Get ready however you need to, but be prepared to leave in fifteen minutes.”

I examine the clothing: plain and practical undergarments, a heavy wool sweater, stockings, boots, and something unexpected. I hold them up with clammy hands. “These are…” I swallow noisily. “Trousers.”

“Yes. They’re travel attire. Comfortable and easy to maneuver in if we need to move quickly.”

“I’ve never worn trousers before.”

“I thought you were amenable to a…a…what did you call it? An adventure. A grand adventure.” He says this melodramatically, like there’s some humor in it. Like he’s mocking me.

“I suppose I am,” I mutter, still scrutinizing the trousers.

“Fifteen minutes,” Ben reminds me sternly. Then he begins to disassemble the tent.

I trudge off through the woods until I find the stream. I clean myself with ice-cold water, drink it down until my teeth ache, change out of my nightgown and into these strange new clothes—Trousers! Mother would lock me in church for a month!—and gaze up into the cloudy, pastel blue sky that peeks between the fingers of the trees. It is very still here, and cold, and deathly quiet. I try to remember the last time I was truly alone, without Mother or Papa or my siblings or servants or guards within shouting distance. There is none that I can remember; perhaps there is none at all. Out here in the Siberian wilderness I feel unmoored from civilization, diminutive, vulnerable, peculiarly inconsequential. I decide I don’t like being alone. By the time I return to our campsite, Ben is ready and waiting beside the loaded cart. His right hand is resting on a clunky metal monster with ‘Olivetti’ written on it.

“I’m a press attaché,” he says with a mischievous grin. “And you’re a typist.”

“A what?”

“You work for Sir Buchanan’s office as a typist. That’s our story, anyway. You came along to assist me during my audience with the former tsar, and now we’re traveling back to Sir Buchanan’s headquarters in Saint Petersburg. So if anyone happens to ask, that’s what you are to tell them. Oh, and you’re British. Your English sounds clean enough.”

“Alright,” I reply, still gaping at the metal monster like a black box with gnashing fangs. “But what is that?”

Ben’s jaw falls open. “You don’t…?” Then he rubs his forehead, sighing deeply. “Jesus Christ. You’ve never used a typewriter. Of course you haven’t. Great. Fantastic.”

“We always write by hand. My penmanship is flawless, Mother saw to that.” She’s still battling with Anastasia, but that’s a war that may go on as long as the one between the sun and the moon.

“Okay. Okay. This works out, actually. Because I’m not going to entertain you all day. So here is your assignment.” Ben slaps the back of what he tells me is a typewriter, and then waves for me to come closer. He reaches into the pocket of his coat and produces a British passport. Every line is filled out except for the name. He slides the paper into the machine and makes some bewildering adjustments. “So, you insert the paper, set the carriage—that’s this roller-type piece here—and type.” He taps forcefully on the keys until two words appear in the blank reserved for the passport holder’s name: Lana Brinkley.

“That’s me?” I ask doubtfully.

Ben smirks, amused. “That’s you.”

“So you could have given me a better name if you wanted to!”

“But then how would you learn humility?” He removes the fraudulent passport, shakes the paper until it dries, folds it into a neat little square, and slips it back into his coat pocket. “If you’re typing a longer message, the typewriter will ding when you’ve reached the end of each line. Then you use the lever to move the paper down, reset the carriage, and resume typing.”

I nod, but without much confidence. This seems complicated.

“You said you wanted a carriage,” Ben teases.

“Yes, one with magnificent draft horses and velvet seats and preferably no less than two servants. Not…whatever that is.”

“Well, if you’re going to pass for a typist, I’m afraid you must learn to type.” He finds me a stack of blank paper in his collection of bags and trunks, and then climbs into the front of the cart as I get into the back. The trousers, I hate to admit to myself, do make it easier to move around, although I’m not sure I approve of how much they accentuate the shape of my body. The thought of Ben looking at me in them gives me a plunging sort of feeling that is half-mortification and half-thrill…not that he has exhibited any interest at all. “Before we go any farther, do you have anything with you that I don’t know about?”

He means things like the heirlooms I have squirreled away in the large steamer trunk: the jewels sewn into my dress, the photograph. I can sense that he wouldn’t want me to have them, although I’m not sure why. In any case, I have no intention of giving them up. The jewels are the only thing of value that I have to trade if we find ourselves in a desperate situation. The photograph is the only string left that connects me back to my family, my home. “No,” I reply primly.

“Good.” He whistles at the mule and she tugs us through the trees and out onto the dirt road that leads, eventually, to the train station. As we ride joltingly along, the creaky cart wheels bumping over every rock and mound and muddy trough, I practice my typing: very slowly at first, and with only my index fingers. I read aloud as I go, gradually picking up speed.

“There once was a German princess born in the Duchy of Hesse. She was very beautiful but very shy. She had a wonderful talent for playing piano, but would run and hide if anyone asked her to perform in public. One day, when she was attending the wedding of her sister, the princess met a prince from a distant kingdom. They were only children, but they instantly knew they had found true love. They snuck off together and carved their names into a window pane. Over the years, each conspired to marry the other. They refused many suitors and wrote each other hundreds of letters. His family did not approve of the princess’s religion and lack of charisma; her family did not approve of the prince’s distant and troubled nation. But at last it became apparent to all that no earthly forces could keep the couple apart. Ten years after their first meeting, the prince and princess were finally married. And they lived joyously and peacefully in each other’s service for the rest of their days.”

Ben lights one of his hand-rolled cigarettes. The smoke doesn’t bother me; on the contrary, it reminds me of Papa smoking his pipe in his study, in the garden, as he read to us by the fireplace, as he danced with Mother in ballrooms back when she could still dance. It reminds me of home. “I’m not sure if you’ll ever give Shakespeare a run for his money, but I’ll admit I’m marginally entertained.”

I smile to myself, sentimental warmth rising in my face. “It’s Papa and Mother’s story.”

“Huh. I didn’t know your people were allowed to marry for love.”

By ‘your people,’ he seems to mean royalty, and there is some derision in his deep voice. “Well, surely duty must come first. But when love can accompany it, that’s a happy coincidence.”

“And what if duty compels you to marry a man who is, say, cruel? Or dreadfully boring? Or in love with another woman? Or who closely resembles a mole-rat?”

I resume my typing with a new exercise. For each letter of the alphabet, I type a French word that begins with it. “I don’t think that sort of thing happens very often.”

“But if it did.”

I shrug, not especially enjoying this topic of discussion. “Then duty comes first, as I said. But I believe most royal couples are perfectly content. At least nine out of every ten.”

“That many!” Ben marvels sarcastically. “Have you ever considered that your own personal experience, as pleasant as it may be, could be coloring your perception of how the world works?”

I ignore him and continue my typing. Attaché for A, bisou for B, croissant for C, doux for D…

After a moment, Ben says: “You aren’t going to regale me with another fairytale? I’m devastated.”

“I’m busy practicing my French now. Please don’t intrude.”

“You speak French as well as Russian and English?” He sounds impressed; for a split second anyway, just long enough for me to catch it like a firefly in my fist.

“And Italian, and Latin. And I’ve just started on Japanese.”

“But no German? That seems like it would be an easier beast to slay.”

“I’ve always purposefully avoided learning it, even though Mother’s family is German. I never envisioned myself marrying a German. I figured Maria could take that bullet. She doesn’t care, she’d marry anyone who could give her a castle and ten babies and a bulldog or two. I would say she was a milkmaid in a past life, but Mother’s heart would stop dead if she thought I subscribed to reincarnation.”

“Not fond of Germans?” Ben asks. “Well, who can blame you. Half the world isn’t fond of them at the moment.”

“I suppose they weren’t so awful before the Great War. But they’re rather boorish, aren’t they? They always sound like they’re angry. Like someone just stole their horse and they’re screaming at them from the front porch to come back or else.” I smile dreamily as I type. “I’ve always fancied the thought of marrying a prince from a glamorous, romantic kingdom. Maybe Italy or Greece. There has even been talk of me marrying Uncle George’s eldest son David. He’s rather beguiling. Tall and slim. Clear blue eyes like a lake. And he’s going to be the king of the British Empire one day, you know. We could holiday together in beautiful, sunny colonies like the Bahamas.”

“You’re still as important as all that? Important enough to make a marriage of that political significance, I mean.” Ben glances back at me and lifts one thick, dark, inquisitive eyebrow. “Seeing as your family doesn’t have a kingdom anymore.”

This is an insensitive thing for him to say. I frown down at the typewriter. “A wife almost always assumes the kingdom of her husband, so why should she require her own? She needs only sound breeding and a suitable temperament. And besides, we might yet return one day.”

Ben twists all the way around to stare at me, the reigns falling out of his hands. Fortunately, the mule seems to know her own way around. “I’m sorry, what?”

“It has been a brutal few years. The Great War, the supply shortages, the bad harvests…the people are frustrated, and understandably so. They lashed out blindly, at those who didn’t deserve it, at us. But the dust will clear. And when it does, I think the Russian people will come to their senses and realize that they want us back. That they need us.”

“Are you insane?” Ben snaps. “Are you utterly brainless? What’s floating around in that skull besides fiction and languages you’ll never use once you’re married off to some prince who only sees you as a broodmare?”

“How dare you! You can’t speak to me like this—!”

“For years, for a bloody decade, Sir Buchanan warned your father about what was coming. He tried to get him to moderate his views, to give the people more voice in government, to stop murdering them when they protested. And when none of that worked and the end was apparent, Sir Buchanan tried to convince your father to abdicate long before he did. Don’t you understand?! None of this needed to happen! Your family could have fled to Britain years ago, before the animosity against your father spread like wildfire across the globe, and Russia could have established their own parliament like Britain’s and negotiated a peace treaty to stay out of the war and none of us would be here now if not for your father’s selfish, pointless obstinacy—!”

“My father is a good man,” I choke out as hot, furious tears burn in my eyes.

“And he was a terrible ruler!” Ben shoots back like artillery. “He ordered protesters to be butchered, he sent untrained boys to die in some other country’s war, he clung to the throne for no one’s benefit but his own—”

“And what about my benefit?” I demand, still weeping, feeling monstrously like a child. “What about my mother’s and my sisters’ and Alexei’s? He must have feared for our futures if we were dethroned and left without any resources, any security, anyplace to call home—”

“He did you no favors,” Ben says harshly. “Half the country—the country that you obviously have not even a rudimentary understanding of—are moderates scrambling to secure the Provisional Government and disentangle themselves from the war while still somehow preserving their dignity and that of the millions of dead soldiers Russia has already laid on the altar. The other half are trying to instigate a wholesale communist revolution. There is no one, no one, who wants the tsar back. And you better pray to God that the communists don’t manage to seize power before King George gets your family out, or your father just might be guillotined on the steps of Saint Basil’s Cathedral.”

I bolt to my feet unsteadily, grip the side of the lurching cart, and leap out onto the dirt road.

“What the hell are you doing?!” Ben shouts after me.

I take off sprinting down the road, the wind whipping my face, sobbing as I run beneath the shadows of trees until my lungs are columns of flames and my legs feel wobbly and boneless. I can hear the pounding of the mule’s hooves approaching, the hurtling of wooden wheels, the slapping of leather reins. I am forced to slow to a vigorous march as my body betrays me, wheezing and aching and as ineffectual as a woman is so often assumed to be. The salacious trousers have come in handy once again. Who would have guessed.

Ben pulls up alongside me, reining in the mule to match my pace. “Hey! Get back in the cart!”

“I’ll walk the rest of the way to the railroad station.”

“It’s 200 more kilometers!”

“See you there.”

Now Ben jumps out of the cart. The mule, perplexed but not rattled, comes to a halt and waits in the middle of the road with her long ears angled in opposite directions. Ben rushes in front of me and leans down until we’re at eye-level, breathing heavily. I can smell smoke on him, and something else too: maybe cologne, maybe soap, maybe aftershave, maybe just the scent of a man in his prime. His lips are pink and full and soft-looking, I notice, as if for the first time. His cheeks are irritated and red from the wind; the ruthlessness of the climate here doesn’t agree with him. It is the only way in which I am stronger than he is. His green eyes are wide and blazing. “Get. In. The. Cart.”

“No,” I whisper, tears all over my face.

“You can’t just run off like that,” he pleads, less angry now. “Where are you going to go? There’s nothing out here except trees and…I don’t know…probably bears and wolves and maybe even Siberian tigers. You can’t get ripped apart by wild animals. Don’t you want to make it to London? To argue for your family’s liberation? They could find no fiercer advocate than you, of that I am convinced.”

“How would you possibly protect me from a bear?”

Ben unbuttons his coat and pulls up his white wool sweater to show me a pistol tucked into the holster clipped to his belt. “Just in case,” he says, smirking crookedly, lowering his sweater again. “Now I am keeping no secrets from you, and you are harboring none from me. We’re even.”

I nod, sniffling, thinking of my jewels and photograph hidden in the steamer trunk. My words are so strained I can barely hear them myself, my hands are trembling; hell, I’m trembling all over. The possibility is unimaginable. “Do you really think they’re going to kill Papa?”

Ben sighs, shaking his head. “No, I don’t,” he replies gently. “I think the Provisional Government will be able to keep the communists in check for now. I think they will leap at the opportunity to ship the former tsar off to Britain without the potential controversy of a trial and execution. And I also think we should get back in the cart and keep moving now.”

“I’m sorry your boss gave you this assignment and now you have to risk your life for a family that you evidently hate,” I lash out like a cornered animal, hissing and brandishing its glinting claws. “For a grand duchess that you hate. This must be an awful inconvenience for you.”

“It’s rather more complicated than that,” Ben says. “There’s some opportunity in it as well.”

Of course: his leather-bound notebook full of observations, his scrawled recollections to one day build into a famed article about our journey. An article full of what he truly thinks about me. I feel suddenly, violently nauseous. I feel horrified.

What happened to the grand adventure that I imagined? Where did it go?

And all at once, I can’t even remember how I pictured this journey unfolding; I can’t conjure up some rose-colored vision of me and Ben falling into an effortless friendship, flirting lightly and innocently, discovering new corners of the earth together, parting ways in London as lifelong confidants. Now I can only see Papa as he murmurs folktales older than Christianity with candlelight dancing on his smiling face, as he chases me and my sisters around the gardens with outstretched arms and sparkling eyes, as he carries Alexei from one room to the next when my brother’s joints are inflamed and excruciating and useless, as he never unburdens his mind to his wife or children but spends long afternoons chopping wood as the sun sinks into the west and the lines in his pale face grow deeper.

He couldn’t be responsible for bloodshed, for mercilessness. He’s not that kind of man. He’s never been that kind of man.

“We really should keep moving,” Ben prompts.

“Fine,” I fling back as I shove by him. I mop my tears away with the sleeve of my wool sweater, climb into the back of the wooden cart, and sit as far as I can from Ben with my bent knees hugged to my chest. I stare silently off into the forest as the mule drags us towards the Trans-Siberian Railroad, towards Moscow and Saint Petersburg and the Baltic Sea and London, towards the conclusion of this tenuous partnership and the redemption of my family. I am looking forward to soon never having to see Benjamin Hardy again, and yet I’m also not; and this is a difficult paradox to put into words of any language.

We don’t stop until it’s almost dusk. Ben hops down from the cart, leads the mule off the road by her bridle (and gives her an encouraging scratch on the forelock when she hesitates), and begins to set up camp in a small clearing encircled by heaps of frost grass. Dinner is loaves of bread again—even more tough and dry than yesterday—and metallic-tasting water from canteens. Dessert is a hand-rolled cigarette for Ben and a handful of honeyberries I found in the bushes for me. And when Ben grapples with the tent, I come over to help him with it just to prove I can.

Ben builds a fire, and we sit wordlessly on opposite sides of it with the reflections of flames in our eyes. Ben jots down today’s thoughts in his notebook, every so often glancing off into nowhere and tapping his chin thoughtfully with the end of his pen, biting his full lower lip absentmindedly as he sifts through the ocean of word in his head to fish out the right one. Meanwhile, I read my copy of Tarzan of the Apes. I stumble across a few English terms I don’t know—quixotic, cartography, constellations, ruminate—but I don’t ask Ben about them.

After a long time, when the moon and stars have emerged bright and ancient in the night sky, Ben closes his notebook and watches me. At first I ignore him. And then, eventually, I can’t anymore.

“What?” I ask irritably, keeping my place in Tarzan of the Apes with my pinky finger, which is nearly numb from the cold.

Ben’s words are calm, restrained, painstakingly chosen. Firelight is fierce and bloody on his face. “I had two infant brothers die of pneumonia, a perfectly preventable illness had they had access to good doctors and proper nutrition and a warm dry home, which they did not. I had a sister die in childbirth because there was no midwife available to attend to her. I have had friends come home from the war with limbs or half their faces missing, a fate which I myself am spared only because of my employment with Sir Buchanan. You have no idea what the world has been through while you were off playing board games and reading novels in greenhouses and lounging on lakeshores with your idyllic little family. You have no idea what life is like for the rest of us. And perhaps that’s not your fault, and it is unjust of me to resent you for it, and I must learn to temper this wrath I’ve been carrying around in my chest since childhood. But it’s still true.”

He stands, clutching his notebook with hands that are red from the savage Siberian wind, and vanishes into the tent.

[phantomdecibel]

I’m not going in and editing this word vomit but like. fair warning, I did write it at two AM so. take that as you will

OKAY SO

Purgatory aka today’s event. Its kind of a tournament, yeah, but not exactly like MCC lmao

All of the players on the server have been split into three teams (I wanna say there’s about… ten players per team? not positive tho, idk exactly how many people are on the server) and were sent o a whole new server while quesadilla island undergoes “maintenance”. Each team, blue green and red, have their own island triangulated around the spawn island, and they have to collect a shitton of various items to turn in for their tasks. Global tasks are first come first serve at spawn, and then everyone has personal tasks they complete at their team’s island. Completing the tasks earn them points, so does killing other players (supposedly) and just. logging on I think? The rules were explained hours ago man, I’m not certain on that last one. There’s one global,, progress bar split between the three colours, so if one team were to have 100% of the progress the other two would have 0% etc.

The “they” in question in that one post u linked is the red team! At that point in time (and the point when the streamer I was watching got kicked) the red team was beating the green team, and the blue team was winning by a LANDSLIDE. this was scuffed for a number of reasons but mainly: green was trying, and for the last couple of hours, red was not

(in all seriousness thst’s probably bc when red was trying they claimed a whole bunch of the global tasks, which seemed to gain teams the most points. It was scuffed for so many other reasons tho and was HILARIOUS)

red also had like half the members green and blue did, because literally (nearly?) every player who did not regularly log on or play consitantly/would not be participating in the event was on red team XD

they had like. half the team members the other two teams had

also, a number of the players they did have weren’t used to streaming for extended periods of time (like, 1-3 hours generally) and the event was seven whole hours so by the time the end of this shit was rolling around! they were losing their minds! They got a bit targeted by the other two teams, half the items they needed were incredibly difficult to get, and everyone kept getting fucked up by the random inversed controls, un/lucky mining drops, and firey death from above, so by the time three hours rolled around, red was completely demoralized and just. stopped trying lmao. And hour after that and they were still beating green. Who were still trying. So yeah! Scuffed!

and on top of all that the eggs are still missing, the new Eye Overlord hates their guts, and there’s one team that if they lose, the eggs will all die! Oh and no one knows which team it is so. Theyre all at eachother’s throats!

I want to tell you about the Shenanigans of the red team. bc they were hilarious. feel free to stop reading here if it’s not interesting, but I think you might enjoy the Many Ways these mfs lost their damn minds :) so here’s a lil rundown

So red was; Philza, Foolish, Cellbit, Slimesicle, JaidenAnimations, Baghera, Felps, Carré, Wilbur, German, Vegetta, and Willy, of which only the first six and Carré where on, though Carré left shortly before they all lost their damn minds haha. Those five who weren’t online don’t log on very often or weren’t expected to join in on the event, and Carré wasn’t making any promises about logging in consistently lol

They’re dropped in a glass dome – I assumed the other teams were too, but I saw someone mention that that might not be the case? and everything is foggy and tainted red. Immediately they start trying to break out, though they’re in adventure mode so it doesn’t really work, and the admins inform everyone that they’ll be put in survival once they choose a team name and leader. All of the team names are wonderful and amazing but red’s specifically is BOLAS?!???!, which I BELIEVE means balls, and their leader is Philza, though that’s really just on paper and doesn’t affect anything. Two of the island members are stated to be permanently dead which is an objectively hilarious way to justify them not wanting to play on the server if you ask me–

red is made up of less pvpers or grinders and more heavy lore people, so you just KNOW there’s some amazing jokes going on rn, charlie is amazing at improv and it fucking shows. The teams are also all tossed into their domes like the Eye Man was shaking them out of a burlap sack and despite being provided with parachutes there were many deaths lmfao

everything starts out pretty seriously all thins considered, everyone’s stressed as fuck bc their children’s lives are on the line, but red’s decent to madness starts with the blue team showing up out of fucking nowhere to kill them, and this is already several hours in so charlie has already started to lag a bit, and lures BadBoyHalo into a 1v1 so that the rest of red can ambush him – which is the exact moment that the world starts to burn and everyone is set on fire! At some point during the global warming moment the majority of red builds and hangs out in a hottub, though I was watching phil so I don’t know the exact details for that (speaking of phil. mans the designated leader and her immediately goes singleplayer hardcore mode and runs off on his own and escapes the map. The world is superflat ocean outside of the islands. Hes looting ships and is not supposed to (later the admins spawn 40-some swordfish on a ship to keep him from looting it kekw))

this spawns an Immense Hatred. red now loathes blue smile. oh also phil spends the first hour on half health bc there’s no food in their dome and it takes them that long to break out into the Larger World

one of the teams is cursed btw and if they lose then all the players and eggs will die. they are not told which team this is. If one of the other teams win they get to “pick some of the eggs” to bring back with them, so everyone is very stressed. Red goes in immediately knowing they are fucked, they go through soooo many ups and downs of hope and despair, starting with despair and coming out of the first blue confrontation with hope bc turns out Carré is cracked at pvp. he is their mascot their lil guy

the teams all start discord calls which is where the chaos really starts, honestly the (red for sure haven’t checked the other teams yet) stream is just very entertaining in general even if you don’t watch qsmp, with charlie going full weasel mode and spying on the other teams and then hopping back to red all excited to tell them what blue or green are up to so they can sabotage, since they’ve lost all hope of winning. Foolish dehydrates to death. Charlie drowns and says that he was trying to drink lmao. no one can mine stone btw, the server is glitched for the first hour or two. about an hour and fifteen in red has 16 deaths (blue has 8 and green has 4. cue more despair/acceptance. they barely have iron and étoiles almost has full diamond armour apparently. the server decides to reverse the controls. phil is unaffected by this for the first little while lmao, but once the inversed controls do hit him he decides he can’t do this sober and Acquires Alcohol

like this main is just sitting in the sky with jaiden sipping his fancy lil drink watching cellbit get mauled by a mob. they have money called ‘bings’. the inversed controls go back to normal. phil locks jaiden in a hole. This torment is for two whole weeks.

the discord group starts up around the 3h mark on phil’s stream and it is. incredibly entertaining. it's close to midnight for this man. “but your body still exists right” after cellbit dies in lava is a great sentence out of context

and then we get another despair spike! bbh kills charlie in cold blood with all their task stuff on him :) this entire time baghera has been trying to convince phil to go on a murder spree, and charlie decides that killing bbh is his new life goal. they still have hope for day two. cellbit gets stuck inside a block and mobs spawn Directly On Players. Something exlodes. phil abandons everyone to Return to The Ocean while the rest of red moves the base underground and discuss how to absolutely fuck up the other teams (“I think we need to resort to gorilla warfare” and “this was actually my plan to kill your child” – charlie qsmp purgatory event 2023)

carré really is just their lil guy hes so quiet while theyre on the discord call man they call him their mascot-

“who’s ready to become real unhealthy on the qsmp?” – charlie, again, he has so many banger quotes. Already they deciede to say fuck the rules we do what we want. Cue turning off chat to avoid seeing jaiden’s death message. Foolish is out for blood, and so is cellbit, and baghera is still begging phil to commit as many murders as possible. “my head is wood?!?!!??” “hey man and I c=sincerely mean this; *starts barking*”. blue mounts their attack, which charlie finds out about via eavesdropping. missa hops into the discod to tell them that he loves them (aww). the sun starts burning everything alive and red builds a fucking hottub. Its like four blocks big and baghera is doing the poledancing emote. carré puts a fish in the hottbu. charlie is still trying to do that 1v1 (and failing, just slightly). blue is still trying to kill them and carré pops off and kills them all. This event is going to shatter their in-lore community but red has just devolved into just chilling and hanging out and also practicing phsycological warfare

Ehhhhhhhhh gonna skip to them losing their minds bc its my favourite part smile. blue keeps spawncamping red and just keeps showing back up to slaughter them. blue and green team up to kill red, having had zero conflict between the two so far and everything kinda spirals from there. At one point bad kills jaiden for the sole purpose of stealing her hat. phil still has his drink and it is probably not helping. you can hear both cellbit and charlie losing their voices. they've been pack bonding and it shows, if these motherfuckers get split up I’m rioting. phil hunts down tubbo. charlie has begun to refer to himself as mama and the other red are his children/litter and he is on a mission to feed them all (“I am coming to spawn with bread for my sweet children. I have wheat for my litter”)

they're on their way to spawn and being hunted by phantoms, though when they get there they’re killed by green with enchants, and blue is there too (killing). everything is in shambles, and falling to pieces. charlie's bread is stolen, though he gets it back eventually. jaiden declares herself the king of pirates. Their apple tree starts to burn down. Blue shows back up to spawncamp them again, and then phil and charlie die to green again, and red Officially Gives Up

Charlie Hates Everyone who’s not red now (his words), phil is surprised they didn’t quit sooner. they have given up on the eggs and are yelling its hilarious. “we cant even place blocks over half of our fuxking land because my bodies litter the ground” – charlie, shaking with rage and on the verge of tears (losing his voice), and contemplates leaving in a boat forever. He’s making Noises, just some straight up Sounds. he is yelling XD “slime armour??? I DON’T EVEN KNOW IF ITS MADE WITH REAL SLIME!!!” phil is back in his boat 10k blocks out, charlie’s breakdown sounds like the first to reeeaally start. cellbit requests spectator mode

charlie and baghera decide to leave and start a survival letsplay, though charlie dies (agsin) before they can do that. étoiles has dmed phil to say that he hates everything. cellbit and charlie start beating the shit out of eachother, and baghera dies. I sincerely wonder what the other teams were thinking when they saw those death messages lmfao. phil is still out in the middle of nowhere looking for ships – and an admin shows up in front of him to spawn ten dozen swordfish. baghera starts screaming in the gamechat, and they deciede to build a little hut instead of doing tasks. foolish has devolved to wantingthe other teams to come kill them again so he can get angrier. “hatsune miku is going to log on and rip you a new one” – cellbit. baghera is begging the admins to kill her daughter so that she can fucking leave, she has also offered up her computer, her house, and her cat. they are still screaming in gamechat

cellbit builds a fireplace after they decide to huddle in a circle, and jaiden says that they don’t deserve fire. charlie asjks if they can pray for a second, and puts in in gc, as everyone else becomes lightheaded. jaiden screams out a kys though I don’t knowthe context over it, “just gas us already” – foolish. jaiden and charlie try to convince phil and foolsh to kill themselves in game to get back to their island quicker, and jaiden, charlie, cellbit, and baghera start burning themselves to death in the campfire. It is the most fun charlie has had all event, and then he attempts to gaslight bbh. “don’t die on-stream foolish, youll get banned-!” – philza. The brainwrinkles are smoothing out, and that is a subject of conversation

“spawn the ender dragon admins, fucking do it” – jaiden. they're all in hell and they want out. the body with all of baghera’s stuff has despawned, but no one gives a shit. They want to go to brazil instead of playing in the event. Or dysney. Or a real island, where they would have to amputate cellbit’s broken leg(?), because that would be more fun. It’s 1am for at least one of these people, and it shows. They have packbonded, and have vowed to build a town instead where they will trade people task materials for emeralds and combat log if anyone tries to fight them. Their trades are going to be very bad (one seed for one emerald). they make villager noises and build an emerald vault for the other teams to break  into. “I cant tell if im having a great time or a panic attack right now,” “we’re in a manic state” – charlie and jaiden, as foolish and phil make it back. they start throwing themselves in the fire again. phil tells the other teams that burning to death gives you more points, and then they start some impromptu karaoke and poledance around the fire over jaiden’s corpse, literally all four of them except cellbit (carré is just. gone, he didn’t even say goodbye kekw). none of the timers match up. charlie is going to stare at the potato in their fridge until it explodes but gets distracted by the fidget spinner phil brought back. charlie kills foolish for getting in the way of building their circular house, and charlie starts eavesdropping again. half their team isn’t just forever going to be missing and somehow theyre still in second place as they roleplay a village. Jaiden wants to pretend theyre back on quesadilla island and foolish decides to build a statue but gets sidetracked by the house’s windows being filled with dirt. they come up with two solutions which are fight god and kill quackity over and over again. baghera is out for phil’s blood she wants him dead. Jaiden turns her location back on on the map. phil decides to fistfight baghera to let off steam and after killing her lets her kill him. she beats him to death. he finds this hysterical. charlie kills jaiden and vice versa. cellbit kills jaiden for killing charlie. charlie kills cellbit for killing jaiden. foolish kills charlie for killing cellbit. jaoden tries to kill foolish for building stairs but he kills her first and the timers freeze. baghera gets kicked from the server and they all sit in a circle to confess their sins (cellbit: massmurder, charlie: knows there’s a code impersonating his daughter, foolish: clogged phil’s toilet. it devolved from there). phil logs out to see if the timer will reset (it does) (he gets banned from the server a second after). red declares that they were very happy with the way the day turned out, before deciding to just become Straight Up Creatures that are decrepit, committing cannibalism, making weird creature noises, crawling on the ground naked, hissing at torches. I want that so much. I want to both see and live that. they’re gonna ask the admins to give them special models before going back to the cannibalism point which like. Same. charlie goes to bbh’s chat to tell him that he changed his life which, in context with the previous discussion, is hilarious.

Anyways the admins have decided to try and rebalance the teams and honestly? If they do I will riot. Do Not separate them. they're amazing okay quackity don’t separate them. Rebalance the teams only if it will make red worse lET THEM GO FERAL OKAY!! jaiden asks for poison tipped claws instead of separating the team theyre so pack bonded okay they’re creatures. wish I had those vibes like damn. give them their enrichment puzzles. Honestly I feel like the cursed team, if it even exists, is just going to be whoever wins so that they get to bring the eggs back either way. This stream was hysterical. dont do it dont separate them. do not

ignore previous ask I have some three thousand words for you whenever you’re ready smile

Send it!

[emptymasks]

I’ve seen a lot about your thoughts on Elisabeth and Tanz der Vampire, and they’ve been really helpful getting into those musicals! But you have a huge list of other musicals that people can get into…

So I was wondering if you had any musicals you hadn’t mentioned in a while that you really like or would like to talk about??? (preferably something from your lists that has a blue heart please?)

Oh if only you knew how long the list of European musicals really is... I however have only seen 9 (if I counted right) and I have a lot more that I still need to watch. Oh also, I only put the blue hearts on any musicals that I was providing multiple links for so people could see which version I reccoment the most highly. If a musical only had one link and didn't have a blue heart it doesn't mean I didn't like it.

I've watched: Mozart das Musical, Elisabeth das Musical, Tanz der Vampire, 3 Musketiers, Mozart L'Opéra Rock, Dracula (the Graz production), Rebecca das Musical, Roméo et Juliette and Schikaneder.

If you enjoyed those two you're likely to enjoy Rebecca! It's written by the same composer/lyricist team as Elisabeth and Mozart (and same lyricist as Tanz der Vampire - though if you're listening to any German musical, original or translated, 90% of the time the lyrics will have been done by Michael Kunze that man is everywhere). The Stuttgart production has my favourite set design of any musical! Well... Actually probably. There are so many big set pieces it's insane, way more than I've seen in some Broadway and West End musicals. You can tell so much work went into it and the visual effects that I won't spoil if you don't know the plot but if you know the plot you know what I mean by the effects at the end are so good and I didn't expect them at all and I freaked out so much the first time I watched it. Jan Ammann as Maxim in the Stuttgart production is the best Maxim. No I won't take any argument. Other actors feel a bit one-dimensional to me, but the way Maxim acts at times comes from trauma and some actors and productions seem to forget that, but Jan really goes for it and his Maxim is a lot more sympathetic and I just want to give him a hug. Pia Douwes as Mrs Danvers, if you've seen her in Elisabeth what more do I need to say, she's amazing. A musical goddess. Her Danny is a bit more wild than some, but she kills it. My favourite video, which I put the blue heart next to, has understudy Christina Patten as Ich/I, but I adore her she's my favourite. She adds some spunk to Ich in act 2 and her voice is so pretty and aaaa. I just love these three actors together in these roles.

Roméo et Juliette is another favourite of mine! It's hard to choose which one to recommend, but it has to be the original 2000/2001 production because of the sweetness and chemistry and voices of Damien Sargue and Cecilia Cara as Romeo and Juliet. They're so pretty and work together so well. The only reason I say it's hard to pick is Mercutio. I adore him, but in the original production they cut out a song they had planned for him and he doesn't really do much at all? In the 2010 revival they gave him two more songs and you care about him so much more and John Eyzen plays such a good Mercutio. So I'd recommend the original but if you want to like Mercutio more, which you should he's amazing, I'd recommend watching at least clips of John's. It's an interesting musical because all productions are non-replica and also change around the order of songs, add or take away characters, all sorts. The Hungarian production is also very popular and I'm sure it's great, I just haven't' gotten around to watching it yet.

Mozart das Musical was the first non-English language musicals I watched so I have a fondness for it, but it's not my favourite. However, I do realise I have forgotten most of the songs and the few I've gone back and listened to are better than I remember.

Dracula isn't super popular and I understand why, I don't love the plot of the Dracula/Mina romance in it, however. I do love this musical because despite how I find the plot lacking, the songs are so good! At least, I love them. And the actors are all doing a great job. And it's one of the few Dracula adaptions to keep Quincy Morris so they get bonus points for that.

Mozart L'Opéra Rock and modern French musicals... This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but they're often more like pop-rock operas now. So if you're not into musicals with that style of music it might not be for you, but I still enjoyed it even though I didn't think I would because of the style of music. Mozart and Salieri's chemistry is very good, Salieri's bisexual crisis song is iconic, actually all of Salieri's songs are iconic.

Schikaneder... eh. I didn't like it that much and I didn't really like any of the songs. There's no English subtitles, but someone sent me the entire English synopsis and I watched it with a German friend so I had double the help of understanding it. Doesn't mean others might not like it, just none of the songs stood out to me and I had no desire to listen to any of them again. It's by Steven Scharwz of Wicked fame and I love Wicked, but I didn't love this.

3 Musketiers!! God it's so underrated and not spoken about within the European musical fandom that I even forget about it and literally forgot to write about it earlier in this post. It's a Dutch musical (though did also have a German production) and it's really good!? Faces you might know are Pia Douwes as Milady de Winter, Stanley Burlseon as Cardinal Richeliu (Netherlands Der Tod in Elisabeth), Henk Poort as Athos (Netherlands Phantom and Jean Valjean). The dialgoue is funny, the songs are good, some of the set pieces have no right to exist in this tiny musical?? They made this giant boat and pelt the actors with rain just for one 5 minute song and then we never see the boat again? And while I recommend the Dutch one because Dutch musicals deserve more love and it has official English subtitles!! Official ones, not fanmade! I have the DVD and it comes with English subtitles (and Dutch and German subtitles) which is so nice. The German version is also good, good cast, Pia came back and Uwe Kroger as Richeliu and omg they rearranged the songs and the German arrangement of Nicht Aus Stein is insane and amazing and frankly iconic.

That's all of the ones I have watched. Next on my list to watch are Rudolf and Notre Dame de Paris, both of which I have listened to some songs from and already love (I've listened to way too much of Notre Dame de Paris and am so in love).

I want to start organising streams where I'll host the musical either by getting the video from Youtube or my own files and anyone who wants to join can come along and watch with us, chat with us if you want or just watch there's no pressure to chat. I thought about doing weekly streams? This would also make me finally watch some of the ones I've been meaning to for ages. But I keep wondering about time zones. I'm in the UK and would want to stream at about 11pm at the latest (11pm BST/GMT+1 as we’re in daylight savings at the moment, if the streams continue past the end of October which would be wild then I’ll make a note of the time change that would be to 11pm GMT), which I know can work for other UK and Europeans, but for any Americans would be in the afternoon. So, I wondered if doing it on a weekend would be better? Then it doesn't matter if it's in the afternoon? Maybe Saturday evenings then? It would either be Saturday evenings UK time or Friday evenings UK time. What do you guys think? If people are down then I'll make a separate post with a list of what we'll be watching each week and if anything happens to me that means I can't stream one week then everything will just get pushed back a week, but I don't see that as likely to happen. And I'll only be streaming those that have English subtitles, so don't worry about not being able to understand anything.

edit: am also open to 10pm bst if others want that, im just trying to think of what time works best for everyone so sorry if 11pm is a little late for europeans, i know 10pm could be a little early for americans. also in case it sounded like these are the only musicals i will be streaming, thats not so, ive got more than just the ones mentioned on this list!

(Tagging some people who I know are or might be interested in streams to see what you think of that plan: @sirona-art @ringwraith100 @tanz-der-trash @smilingwoland @the-weird-dane @witchgaye @ami-fidele @kisstheghouls @looking-4-happiness @ladysapphire928 @sloanedestler @tinywound @persephonaae @phoenixdewinter @uwucoffee @freshbloodandgothicism )

[malienessan]

A different kind of Christmas

A while back I posted what I fondly call my death fic, The Lives and Deaths of Rhett McLaughlin. Some of you have read it, some of you might be saving it for later, and a whole bunch of you don't want to read it, due to the fact that it's pretty sad.

However, in one of the chapters, Rhett and Link celebrate Christmas together, in a place you might not have thought Christmas was celebrated at all.

I'm putting it all below the cut, in case you're not interested at all. This part of the chapter contains no spoilers for the fic itself, it's not particularly sad, except for the theme it's dealing with, but I'll write more about that if you click through.

If this is where you stop, I perfectly understand. I'll see you in another post.

Hello again and welcome to join me, Rhett and Link in a different sort of Christmas celebration, in the trenches of WWI. I'm not claiming this to be historically correct, but it's not entirely incorrect either. If you read up on the matter, you'll see that I've tried to get the facts straight.

The only thing you need to know to understand what's going on, is the premise of the death fic. It's an AU, never met, taking place roughly in 2050. Thanks to advanced technology, Rhett is able to remember past lives, and we find him just as he's 'waking up' in his remembered life.

If this excerpt makes you want to read more of this fic, please mind the tags and warnings. This part you'll read isn't particularly sad, except for the fact that they are at war, and the lingering anxiety that comes with that. But there is also happiness in the midst of it all, and it shows that sometimes you can find something good in a place you'd least expect it.

(Sorry, also got to mention, there is mentions of guns firing, of Rhett shooting someone, but there aren't any details about it. Got any questions, come to me. Want me to tag differently, tell me.)

Alright, here goes:

I wake up sitting in mud. My bum is wet, my feet are wet, there’s water dripping from the helmet on my head. I’m clutching a pack of cigarettes, which is, amazingly enough, dry. There’s a half-smoked cigarette butt in my mouth, I probably fell asleep as I was smoking. I start feeling my pockets for a lighter, but don’t have time to find one.

“McLaughlin! Stand-to!”

I get up, shaking exhaustion and confusion from my brain. The sun is getting low in the sky, and I can see that all my comrades are climbing up the fire step. We are all tired and exhausted, but it needs to be done. I chat a little with Abrams and Thompson, they’re on either side of me. I wouldn’t call us friends, but we’re acquainted at least.

“Heads up, men! Prepare to fire!”

I have caught up with my memory now. I am in Belgium, fighting with my fellow Brits side by side with the French and the Belgians, against the Germans. It was supposed to be over in a matter of weeks, but we have been here for almost three months now.

I aim my rifle at the enemy’s line. In daylight I can clearly see the enemy, we’re no more than 60 yards apart. We’re a little bit familiar with each other by now and since this war has dragged on far longer than anyone would have thought, we’re all tired of shooting at each other. We do it anyway because that’s how it works.

As the sun finally sets, we’re starting to fire at random. I aim at the enemy’s trench, firing a couple of bullets. Our commander barks at us to fire more, so I do, maybe a dozen bullets altogether. I don’t much feel like killing anyone, to be honest.

I have before, though. When I had been here about two weeks, I was on the fire step at night, keeping watch. I saw something move and then a small flash of light, like a cigarette lighter. It was too far away to be one of ours, so I fired. There was a scream, just one short yell, full of anguish. Then silence. Nothing else happened during my watch, but the next morning, after stand-to, I could see a german soldier on the ground right about where I shot someone. I did not feel proud about it, it was more a feeling of doing my duty.

When it’s full dark, we climb down from the fire step and those on supply duty get started with that. I will be back up there in a couple of hours, until then I can rest a little. I sit back down in the mud and light a cigarette. There isn’t much else to do when it’s dark, we rest and we smoke. Someone is supposed to patrol No Man’s Land, the open field between our and the German trench, but we have made an unofficial sort of truce, agreeing to not attack or kill at night.

That sounds strange, right? Well, let me tell you something even more strange. A couple of weeks ago, a German sergeant waved a white flag from his trench, and then casually strolled over to us, to ask how we were doing. He asked about what was happening in the English football league, apparently some of his men live in England and wanted to know how it was going for their teams.

On our stretch of the trench, we haven’t had any casualties since that happened, us Brits don’t have too much quarrel with the Germans. The French and the Belgians more so. We have heard that there is somewhere, where the French and Germans have a truce daily to collect the dead for burial. Nothing about this war makes sense, neither the animosity nor the friendliness.

While I’m waiting for fire step-duty, I roam through my memories a little. I’m from Britain, south of the country. My brother is in the war, too, but he’s a little to the north of where I am posted. We send each other letters every now and then. He writes a lot about how he misses his girl and that he’s worried about mother and father. I mostly write him about how boring it gets for long stretches at a time. He probably thinks I’m a stupid child, and he’s not necessarily wrong.

I’ve just turned 20. I don’t have a girl to miss, but my brother’s girl’s little sister would gladly greet me with a kiss when I come back as a War Hero. She is pretty, but when I decided to join the war, I told her to find someone else, someone who would stay at home with her, not leave with risk of being killed. I don’t know. If I ever get home from this filthy place, I might marry her.

I am dirty. It’s bloody impossible to stay clean here, but I make an effort, at least, I scrub parts of my body with wet paper once a day, to not feel like a complete savage. My feet are still alright, but several of my comrades have gotten infections in the skin and boy, do that stink.

I light another cigarette and enjoy the smoke burning my lungs for a few minutes before I get on the fire step. I keep my fingers crossed for a quiet night and I get my wish fulfilled. Soon it is dawn and time for another stand-to, until the sun has come up properly. I have breakfast with Abrams and Hammond, Thompson is on the fire step.

Together, we take care of our chores. It’s our turn to empty the latrines and to secure the walls of the trench. It’s dirty, but we get it done in decent time. We chat while we’re working. Abrams has a wife at home, she’s expecting their first child a couple of months from now. Hammond is as young as me, but he has a fiancé who is waiting for him. She sends him erotic stories to read when he misses her too much. He blushes when he tells us, but we can see that he likes that we get a little envious. Abrams’ wife is too pregnant to consider erotic stories, I guess, and I don’t even have a girl.

When chores are done, I wash off and get a clean uniform. It’s time to shave, and I have a special place I do it. I stand facing the German trench, shaving together with a guy on the other side. We’ve been keeping this routine up for almost a month. I shave, he shaves, we don’t talk, but we communicate with nods, smiles and gestures.

He’s young, I would think that he’s younger than me. I don’t know if he’s short or tall, I think shorter than me, based on the assumption that they have the same depth in their trenches. His hair is dark, almost black, and his beard grows a lot faster than mine. I have considered walking over there, like that German sergeant did, but my commander would probably not like it. I just would like to say hello, before either one of us gets killed. I can’t tell what color eyes he’s got, but I think they’re brown, considering his black hair. He’s got a nice smile.

When we’re done grooming, I light a cigarette. He’s patting his jacket, and then drops out of my vision for a minute, coming back with a lit cigarette in his mouth. We smoke, and then he starts singing. It’s faint, but I immediately recognize it as Silent night, and he’s singing in English. He’s got a bit of an accent, but his voice is nice. I join him and soon several of my comrades join, as well as more of the Germans.

Our commanding officers frown a little at us, but we are already in an unofficial truce, so they let us be. And it’s only ten days until Christmas, we’re all feeling a little sentimental, I guess.

As Christmas comes closer, it happens more and more often, that one side starts singing and the other sides join. We don’t fire at each other at stand-to to any greater degree, even though we have got word of the French general trying to order his troops to be more aggressive. Our commanders tell us that what the people in charge don’t know, won’t bother them.

With two days left for Christmas, I get a package from my mother. She wishes me a happy holiday and have packed home-knitted woolen socks, candy and a few packs of cigarettes. She doesn’t approve of me smoking, but she knows that most of us here use it for keeping our morals up. We have little to look forward to, but having a smoke is one thing.

Our days in the trench look the same, week after week, after week. Stand-to in the morning, then we clean our equipment, and the officers make an inspection. We eat breakfast, do our daily chores and in between we are on the fire step. When we have a little time off, I usually play cards with Abrams, Hammond and Thompson or I try to get some sleep. At sundown there is another stand-to and after that we get supplies and take turns on the fire step, again.

It’s dreary.

When it’s light out, I almost always smoke with my German friend. One morning I yelled at him “What’s your name?”. The air was completely still and my voice carried without trouble. It’s not uncommon for both sides to communicate like this now, even if it felt a little weird to reach out to him like that. It felt a lot more intimate than shaving or sharing a smoke, or singing, even.

“Link!” He shouted back, pointing at himself. I mirrored his gesture, shouting “Rhett!”. He smiled again, and I swear that the sun came out at that exact moment, shining straight at him. Made me almost lose my breath.

The day after, it’s Christmas eve. A german soldier is holding up a piece of paper, with the words “You no shoot, we no shoot” on it. Everyone on our side is looking at it in confusion. We don’t shoot that much these days, but he wants something more, apparently. Someone on our side, I think it’s Abrams, pull out a white handkerchief, waving it about and the next we see are two Germans getting out of the trench, walking towards us.

I stay put, I’m cleaning my rifle and I’m not really sure what’s happening anyway. It’s a long step from shouting and singing, to actually meeting in No Man’s Land. But Thompson is on the move, meeting the two Germans, together with three other fellows.

They come back after half an hour. I have been watching them, while more and more have joined the group in No Man’s Land, from both sides. They were talking and laughing. I look for my pal, Link, but I can’t see him. I think he might be sleeping. I sleep whenever I get the chance, I bet he does too.

When our guys come back, they are almost giddy. The German’s have offered them small gifts, a little booze, a cigar, some candy. Thompson gave someone a couple of his cigars and a piece of chocolate he’d been saving for Christmas. They say that we’re having a proper truce, from today until sunrise on Boxing day. No fighting, no shooting. We will have a day of silence. It’s almost  unreal, every day here is filled with the sound of grenades hissing, gun shots fired and people screaming.

There is no stand-to that evening. It’s Christmas Eve and we get proper Christmas food. It’s delicious. I save some of the fruit cake we get for dessert. If Link shows up tomorrow, I want to give him a piece. I don’t know if he’s had fruit cake before. I think I might give him a pair of my new socks as well, it would be nice to know that his feet are warm and dry, at least until the trench is flooded the next time. Maybe he’ll get a couple of cigarettes, too.

I don’t know why I want to give him gifts, I really don’t. I think maybe it’s been so long since I’ve felt like a normal boy, I just want to give a friend some presents. Even if that friend potentially will try to kill me two days later.

When Christmas morning comes, I’m awoken before dawn. It’s Abrams, telling me in a quiet voice to come immediately. I get up on the fire step. We can see lots and lots of small lights along the German trench. No one understands, until it dawns on me. It’s candles. They are lighting candles. Suddenly I can hear a voice I recognize. It’s Link’s voice, carrying over the dark and cold plains.

“Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht! Alles schläft, einsam wacht Nur das traute hochheilige Paar Holder Knabe im lockigen Haar Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh! Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh!”

I don’t understand the words, but I know the song. He’s singing Silent Night in German. Soon, more Germans join him and it’s beautiful. When they start the second verse, I start singing too, but in English. My comrades start singing as well, and as the sun rise, we and our enemies share a wondrous moment.

When the song ends, I can hear Link, shouting with his stupid and cute accent “hey, Rhett, do you know Lo, how a rose e’er blooming?”

It takes me a few seconds to get that he’s calling to me and I shout back “yes! Shall we sing that?”

“You start!”

And I do.

“Lo, how a rose e’er blooming, From tender stem hath sprung. Of Jesse’s lineage coming, As men of old has sung; It came, a flow’ret bright, Amid the cold of winter, When half spent was the night.”

My comrades sing with me and this time, the Germans sing with us from the beginning. It’s strange, hearing our version at the same time as theirs, but it feels right, too. When we have sung it, two verses, a quiet settle over us. The sky is white and grey, it might snow. It’s cold and we can see our breaths. But our hearts are warm for a little while and as I look to the other trench, I can see that Link is on his way towards us.

I scramble up the fire step and we meet halfway. He is taller than I had thought, but still almost a head shorter than me. And he doesn’t have brown eyes, they are blue as the sky. I think I’m staring at him because he smiles at me. It’s an even nicer smile up close. He offers me a cigarette and helps me light it before we even say a word.

“Hello Rhett. It’s good to meet you.”

His accent is obvious, but he speaks a lot better English than I would have guessed. I tell him so and he tells me about his English father.

“I was ten when he died, and mother wanted to move home to Germany. I can speak English well enough, but I sound like a German, right?” He grins, knowing he’s right.

“Yes, eh, I mean… yes.” I grin back. By now, a lot of other people have joined us. There is merriment all around and talks about having breakfast together in No Man’s Land. Me and Link raise our voices, we’d very much like to keep talking. We’re basically the same age, Link turned 19 this summer, so we feel a little bit connected.

The few hours between breakfast and lunch, we and our “enemies” walk back and forth between the two trenches. It feels amazing. At some point, there is a Christmas Tree presented from the German side. We place it in the middle, and those of us who wants to, meet at the tree and exchange gifts. I ask Link if it’s okay that I give him something.

“You have gift for me?” He raises his eyebrows. We had breakfast together, then I followed him to their trench to see what it was like. It was pretty much like ours, muddy and wet. It feels like having a best friend again, I haven’t had that since I was ten, I think. I’m a bit of a loner, I get by on my own. But this is nice.

“Yes, I have gift for you. Is it alright?”

He’s smiling even bigger, how that’s even possible, and nod eagerly. But he stops me and says he needs to run to his trench first. I think he might have something for me, too.

He’s back in a few minutes, a little out of breath after running. His cheeks and the tip of his nose are red, it’s cold. His cap is a little askew and he’s smiling, big. He’s looking at me with those blue eyes, so intently that I can barely stand it. I avert my eyes and start pulling his gifts from my pockets. I don’t have any wrapping paper, naturally, but Link doesn’t seem to mind, as I hand him a pack of cigarettes, one of the boxes of hard candy that my mother sent, and a pair of woolen socks.

“Rhett? Is this all for me?” He’s looking at me with big eyes, like he’s not used to getting gifts. Then he smiles and I can’t breathe properly. “I want to put on the socks. Can you help me?

I nod and he leans at me when he unties his boots. and exchanges his thin, slightly dirty socks for the ones my mother has made. He sighs, heavily, when he pushes his feet back in the boots.

“Thank you. They are very comfortable. It’s like a fluffy cloud in my shoes.” He puts his hand on my arm, squeezing it. I think he would want to hug me, but that would be overstepping our boundaries.

Then he opens the bag he’s got slung over his shoulder. He gives me a razor with a mother-of-pearl handle, a box of cookies and a small bottle with a brown liquid.

“It’s rum. It’s good, makes you feel warm inside.” He makes a gesture as to take a sip, and I do. It burns all the way down to my stomach. I hand the bottle to him, and he sips as well. When I get the bottle back, I take another sip, just to be able to put my lips where Link had his a moment ago.

“It’s nice, Link, thank you.” We stand there, looking at each other awkwardly. I stuff my gifts in my bag, but I keep the bottle out. I don't bother with the fruitcake I saved, I don't have it on me and I don't want to leave Link's side. He offers me a cigarette from the pack he got, and we smoke and drink together. Then someone shouts “football!”.

Someone on our side, I think it might be Hammond, have a football. It comes flying into the middle of No Man’s Land and someone on the German side give it a kick, screaming “goooooaaaal!”. There are objections from the English side, and soon we’re playing against each other. The sun is starting to set, but we don’t care.

The game is not as heated as you would think. We play for fun, war is serious enough. I try to keep up, but football has never been my game, I’m too tall, can’t keep track of my limbs. Besides, I’m more of a cricket guy. I stand to the side and look at the rest of the men, feeling more joy than you would think possible on the Western front.

Then Link rushes by, intercepting a long shot from an Englishman. He stops a second, laughing at me.

“You will let us win, right? The Germans are superior, always.” He winks at me and with a grin I accept the challenge. I start running after him. He’s fast and he’s good with the ball, but I have long legs and I’ve soon caught up to him. I have no chance at actually getting the ball from him, and soon he passes it to someone else. At that moment I’m right along side of him and I shove him with my shoulder.

Poor Link is in the middle of a running step and my tackle sends him flying sideways and he lands in the mud with a loud “plop”. I start laughing, I just can’t help it. When he pushes away from the mud and I see that he’s covered in mud, from nose to knees, I laugh even harder. He glares at me but not for long, soon we’re laughing together.

“Come on, I’ll help you clean up.”

I gesture at our trench. Most of the men are playing football by now and we’re only about 10 yards from where we keep our supplies. I’m thinking I can give Link something to wipe his face with.

Carefully, we climb down the fire step, and he follows me a bit further north. I find a rag and some clean water, and I hand it to him. He wipes at his cheeks and around his mouth, but he misses a lot.

“You got something there, and there.” I point at his face, but he misses it again. I sigh, taking the rag from him and with a hand on his shoulder, I carefully get all the dirt of his face. He’s very still, a little pale. I notice how muddy and damp his coat is and shrug mine off.

“Here, Link, wear this. I can get another tomorrow.” I help him put it on. It’s a little big on him, the sleeves cover his whole hands and I almost think he looks like a child, playing dress up. I don’t know how I feel about that, but there’s something stirring in my belly.

“Rhett. Thank you. You are a true friend.”

I can’t talk at the moment so I just nod. Then he comes close, too close. He gets up on his toes and plants a kiss on my lips. In surprise, I push him off me, glaring at him. Something warm is spreading through my guts. Link stares back, defiantly, his chin tilted up. I can almost see the challenge in his eyes. I accept it, grab him by the lapels and kiss him back, hard.

The world stops when we kiss. The stars come down from the sky and circles around us and when I feel his tongue enter my mouth, I pull him closer than possible. He tastes of the booze we shared, of cigarettes, a little bit of mud and something sweet that I think is him. His stubbled jaw feels rough against my chin, and I shiver from head to toe.

“Are you cold, Rhett? Do you need your coat back?” He stops kissing me to worry about me and I only shake my head and close the distance between us again. I know that there is no one nearby, but I still want to go somewhere else. With my lips moist and a little swollen from kissing, I grab Link’s hand and pull him a little further north. That’s the spot where I go to shave, it’s like a nook and we have a corner we can huddle in.

“Rhett, can I touch you?” We are in the corner, Link has got his back against the wall and I’m in front of him. I don’t know what we are doing, and I don’t know what we can do, but I nod eagerly at his question. He fiddles with my buttons and it doesn’t take him long to work his hand into my underwear, where he gently wraps his long fingers around my cock. I kiss him again, to try to hide my moan. I have had a girl’s hand around me, but this is different.

“Link. Why… Oh, Link…” I thrust against his hand. I want to come, so bad but I want to touch him, too. I can’t get to his buttons, his jacket is in the way. I start pulling at whatever buttons I can reach and eventually I’m at his pants. He’s laughing a little, whispering in my ear how glad he is that I am with him now. I get my hand in his underwear and I feel how hard he is.

I don’t know if it’s the booze or if it’s the weird situation or if I would have reacted like this no matter where I would have met Link. But at this point I’m not questioning it, I want to be here, with him, I don’t care that he is my enemy or that he, too, is a boy.

“Rhett, oh, just like that… I little harder, please.” I do what he tells me, and I try to keep the same rhythm as he has on my cock. I know that I could get on my knees and suck him off, but I want to feel his tongue in my mouth when I come.

I can feel him groaning deep in his throat. His cock is wet now, I think he’s getting close. I am, too. I thrust into his hand and I have my tongue in his mouth. With my free hand I pull him as close as possible as I desperately roam his mouth with my tongue and make him come in my hand. When he moans into my mouth and I can feel the stickiness from his cock, I come as well, trying to keep quiet, almost succeeding.

We stay close for a few minutes, I won’t stop clutching him to me. My beating heart is slowing down, and I feel a heavy weight on my shoulders, in my soul. My right hand is around his cock, but I want to let go and grab my left arm. Not yet, though. Not yet.

Eventually, we must let go. I find a rag we can wipe ourselves with, I try to get most of the come out of my pants. We stay in the corner for a little while, but soon he must go.

“Rhett, thank you. I will never forget this.” His words echo through my brain. I kiss him again, I can’t speak. When we stop, he’s looking at me and then he leaves. I stay behind, I don’t know what to feel anymore.

Night comes, but I don’t sleep. There is no one on the fire step tonight. The next morning is Boxing day and at sunrise, everything is back to normal. The Christmas tree still stands in the middle of No Man’s Land. My comrades wonder where I went to, but I said I got a little drunk and wanted to sleep it off.

When the sun is fully up, I shave with my new razor. Link is in his trench, shaving too, and when he sees that I’m using his gift, he gets the biggest grin on his face. The “look, the sun is coming out”-grin only he knows how to make. When we’re done shaving, we smoke together, he’s smoking from the cigarettes he got and before we wave goodbye, he calls out to me “thank you, Rhett, I will never forget it!”. I know what he means and simply yells back “neither will I!”.

[incorrectbandofbrothersquotes]

You Better, You Better, You Bet - Chapter 3

The Wildest Times of the World

Ron Speirs x Juliet Fletcher

Summary: Juliet Fletcher reaches a breaking point in her life. When she is at her absolute lowest, she meets Ron Speirs, and something happens between them that neither of them will ever forget.

Word Count: 4.9k

Tag List: @vintagelavenderskies @how-are-those-nuts-sarge​ @iilovemusic12us @hesbuckcompton-baby @tvserie-s-world @whovian45810 If you’d like to be added, let me know!

A/N: Sorry this update took so long! But I hope y’all enjoy it :)

Warning(s): none :)

Chapter 1  Chapter 2

AO3 link

Chapter 3 let’s go!

Three chilly October days after Ron’s abrupt departure from London - which Juliet was still seething about - she arrived home from the store to a different person she expected to never hear from again. Lottie stood at the front door, muttering to herself about whether or not to knock. Juliet was especially surprised because it was raining, which would have normally kept the editor indoors if she could help it. Juliet watched a moment, not wanting to give away her presence immediately. It satisfied her to watch Lottie fret like this. After a few moments, Juliet caved and cleared her throat. 

Lottie gasped as she whipped around, clutching at her chest. “Heaven's sake, Juliet! How long have you been standing there?”

“Not long,” Juliet said, intentionally vague. “Can I help you, Lottie?” 

“Well…” Lottie hesitated, shifting her weight and toying with the fingertips of her gloves. “Shall we go in? I really need to speak to you.” 

Juliet decided not to comment on Lottie’s self-invite into the house. She figured with no other job openings popping up, this could be her opportunity to try and gain back some favor at the London Pursuit. She couldn’t imagine that Lottie was here for a personal reason. That was not the sort of manager she was. 

Once inside, Lottie followed Juliet to the kitchen - again, kindly not saying anything about the state of the house. Juliet set her grocery bags on the table before taking her coat off. Lottie shrugged hers off as well, removed her hat and gloves, and took a seat. 

“Cuppa?” Juliet offered. 

“Sure,” Lottie replied. 

Juliet put the kettle on. Then she started unloading the bags. 

“So, what did you want to speak to me about?” she asked, trying to sound as casual as she could. 

“It’s the Albourne story,” Lottie said, voice tight, almost like she was spitting the words out. “All the other reporters are too busy to cover it. And if I have to go through the process of hiring someone new, we won’t get it in time.” 

“I’ve already told you, I think it’s -”

“You needn’t remind me of your insolent remarks,” she snapped. 

Juliet sighed, picked up a can of beans and placed it slowly in the cupboard, forming as polite a response as she could muster. But Lottie beat her to the next word. 

“If you agree to cover this story, I’ll let you cover the war down there,” she said. 

Juliet almost slammed the cupboard door shut in surprise. “What?” 

“You can cover the war news from there,” Lottie repeated. 

“Do you know something the rest of us don’t?” Juliet returned. “Because if you know the Germans are in Aldbourne and you haven’t said anything until now, you might be in trouble, Lottie.”

Lottie rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean, Juliet. The Americans are there, you could write about them.” 

Juliet bit back the snappy retort she had about that, and dialed it down. “Fascinating as the Yanks are, I reckon they’re not doing much actual fighting in Aldbourne. Unless you mean brawling in pubs.”

The English had almost adjusted to the American presence by now. However, Juliet had slipped out of more than one pub after a fight broke out between some bright-eyed, blue-blooded American who spoke too boldly about their importance in the war effort and an Englishman who naturally took offense to the effort of “our own lads” being minimized. It escalated. Drinks were thrown, followed shortly by fists. Others jumped in to either assist or attempt to separate the combatting parties, only to get swept up in the action either way. It was entertaining, sure, but Juliet thought it made rather a mockery of the term “Allies.” 

“They’re doing something there,” Lottie insisted. “And I give you full permission to try and find out what. As long as you cover the story about the girl as well.” 

“Observing Americans isn’t really covering the war, and you know it, Lottie,” Juliet said. 

“I’m not sending a woman to the front line, there would be a mob at the office door,” Lottie said. “I personally don’t care if you want to go and get yourself shot, but your blood cannot be on my hands.”

Juliet had to concede that point. Other papers had already suffered the ramifications of sending women reporters even within the vicinity of the front. There were boycotts led by counter-feminist groups and concerned mothers about the message it sent about women’s roles. It was one thing for women to work while men fought the war, but to put them in the line of fire? That was just indecent. 

“Well, good to know my life isn’t as much of your concern as public opinion,” Juliet joked.

Lottie frowned. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Relax, Lottie, I’m taking the piss,” Juliet returned with a wave of her hand. 

She paused, mulling over the offer Lottie was bringing. She wasn’t in much of a position to refuse work, but the idea of covering that gruesome story was almost too much to bear. Even if she was a bit interested in what the Americans were doing. Then, something else crossed her mind. 

“Why do you want this covered so badly?” she asked. 

Lottie’s face flushed and her mouth drew tight, which Juliet understood to mean the reason would not be to her liking. She braced herself. 

“A family friend is with the Wiltshire police,” Lottie admitted. “He thinks it would look good for the department to solve a case like this and put the murderer away. And to have the press cover it, especially a London paper with circulation throughout the country.”

Juliet couldn’t stop herself from rolling her eyes. “You’re killing me, Lottie.” 

“This is the deal I’m offering,” Lottie sighed. “I know you’re opposed to it, but this is the compromise I’m willing to make.”

 Juliet considered her options. She did need the money. But the subject matter and the reasoning were so against her ideals and ethics as a journalist. How could she live with herself if she broke them for money? But there was her mother to consider as well. Which brought up another objection. 

“Even if I wanted to,” she said. “I can’t. It leaves no one here to look after Mum.” 

“I thought you had a brother,” Lottie returned. 

“He lives on Guernsey,” Juliet reminded her, minding her tone so she wouldn’t sound too bitter. “Otherwise, I’m certain he’d be here.”

Lottie shifted uncomfortably. “I apologize. I forgot.”

“S’fine,” Juliet replied.  

“Can’t you hire someone to look after your mother?” Lottie asked. 

Juliet only raised a disbelieving eyebrow at her - as if to say, “you’ve seen the house, you think we can afford help?” Lottie understood the implication. 

“What if…” Lottie trailed off, considering. “What if I hired someone to look after her?”

Juliet blinked. “That’s...generous of you, Lottie, but I’d never be able to pay you back or -”

“Don’t worry about that,” Lottie said. “I want this story and - believe it or not - I want it done well. I know you’ll handle it as tastefully as possible and you could really show that -” 

She was cut off by the kettle screeching its completion to boil, so Juliet went to take it off the burner and fetch some tea cups. She poured the tea and served it, and Lottie thanked her quietly, almost abashed by her admission to decency. But there was something more. 

“Really show what?” Juliet pressed.

Lottie heaved a defeated sigh. Like admitting this was something that exasperated her. “That women can handle tough topics. It’s not covering the war, but it’s a step in that direction.” 

Juliet couldn’t help but agree. If women could handle murder and the investigation surrounding it, surely women could be seen as sensible enough to tackle tragedy on a larger scale. They weren’t going to faint at the sight of blood or burst into tears over sentimentality. She couldn’t help herself. Juliet wanted to be part of that narrative. 

“Lottie, I’m surprised at you,” she teased. “I didn’t take you for such a feminist.” 

Lottie’s jaw dropped and she gaped at Juliet, totally affronted at the suggestion. “I am no such thing!” 

Juliet shrugged, unfazed. “Yeah, I probably wouldn’t be either if I had your tits.” 

Lottie could only sputter in response and Juliet snickered before sipping her tea.

“Juliet!” Lottie scolded. 

“I’ll do it,” Juliet said suddenly. 

Lottie closed her mouth, stunned. “You’ll - you’ll do the story?” 

“Yes,” Juliet assured her, smiling. “You’ve given me a real reason to. And if there’s someone here to look after Mum and I can get a bit of war news as well, then what choice do I have but to say yes? You drive a hard bargain, Lottie.”

Lottie’s relief was palpable. “Thank you, Juliet. Really.” 

“When do I go?” Juliet asked. 

“There’s a train to Aldbourne tomorrow morning at nine,” Lottie said. 

“I’ll be on it.” 

***

Aldbourne was probably a village that once called itself sleepy. But now it was overrun by Americans - mostly paratroopers - which created an upheaval the likes of which many residents had never seen before. There was life in the town. The Women’s Land Army, or “land girls” as they were called, were taking full advantage of the flirting opportunities that arose with these American men, who lacked British decorum and were therefore prime targets for a fling. As Juliet walked from the station to her lodgings, with all the people mulling through the heart of the village, she found it almost hard to believe she was there to report on a murder. 

Lodgings were difficult to come by with the Americans billeted in just about any space they could fit. Even horses were having to share their stables. But Lottie pulled some strings and got Juliet a room above the Blue Boar, a pub. She wasn’t sure how much sleep she’d really be able to get with the noise of a pub below her, but she didn’t dare complain. Not when she was one step closer to getting what she wanted. 

The owner was a portly, older gentleman by the name of Jacob Powell. His kind, round face welcomed Juliet warmly, and she was grateful for the reception. She didn’t want to infringe too much on his hospitality, so she refused a cup of tea for the moment, insisting she needed to get unpacked and to the police station as soon as possible. 

“Oh, yeah, that's a gruesome business about the little girl,” Jacob said. “Are you really going to write a story about it?” 

“I’m no Agatha Christie or anything, but I’m going to do my best,” she returned, keeping her tone light. She wasn’t in the habit of discussing a story with just anyone. 

He shook his head. “It’s just a right shame.”

“Concisely put, Mr. Powell,” she replied. “If you’ll excuse me.” 

“Right, sorry,” he said bashfully, and he reminded her that the offer for tea still stood if she changed her mind before closing the door behind him. 

First, Juliet set down her suitcase with her clothes. Second, she heaved her typewriter onto the desk in the corner of the room. It was beside the one window that looked out onto the street. Juliet approved of the set up since she liked natural light while she wrote. She got her things exactly where she wanted them, but hadn’t bothered to remove her hat and coat since she was going right back out. Securing her notebook, pen, and room key, she left. 

The police station was one of the dullest she’d ever seen. Given the nature of the town, it didn’t surprise her. Lottie’s contact was Otis Allen, a lieutenant in the Wiltshire Police, who was still in Aldbourne to lead the investigation. He was a tall, thin man, with kind blue eyes and straw-like blonde hair. Rather unimposing for being in law enforcement. But Juliet observed right away the misshapen mound where his right ear should have been. He mentioned it before she had the opportunity to ask. 

“Sorry about the grisly ear,” he said. “My gift from the Germans last time they had a go at us.”

“A bit rude,” she teased. “Flowers would have suited just fine, I think.” 

He chuckled at that as he gestured for her to take a seat across from him at his desk. With that, she noticed a gnarled hand - the few fingers he had left were permanently curled under themselves. He disguised it fairly well with a glove, but she saw anyway. 

“Those Jerries really overdid it on the gifts,” she remarked. “I bet it wasn’t even your birthday.”

He fully laughed at that and she noticed his expression softened. When they’d met, he’d been a bit rigid, but his muscles relaxed now, put at ease by her gentle humor. 

“Thanks for that,” he said. 

She cocked her head to the side. “For what?”

“For the jokes,” he answered. “Ever since that war, all I get are pitying looks or fear. Thanks for treating it like it’s...normal.” 

“I’ll leave pity to the nurses,” she said with a smile. “Now, what have you got so far on the case?”  

He went over the basics with her. In September, a six-year-old girl, Peggy Lee, was drowned in the tub, allegedly by her host, Meredith Fisher. Peggy had been with the Fisher’s since January with no reported issues. When Peggy did not arrive for school the next day, her teacher phoned the Fisher’s home with no answer. They chalked it up to Peggy being ill or some other explainable matter, and moved on. When she was absent the following day as well, they called again, and Meredith told them that yes, Peggy was ill, and could not come to school for a few days. Ashley Fisher, Meredith’s husband, was in London on business at the time, and when he returned at the end of the week, found Peggy’s body and called the police. Meredith claimed initially there was an accident, but evidence from Peggy’s autopsy proved foul play was involved. Juliet took fervent notes as Otis explained it all, trying not to get disgusted by the whole thing. 

“Where is Mrs. Fisher being held now?” Juliet asked. “Surely not here in Aldbourne.” 

“‘Course not, she’s in Trowbridge,” Otis assured her. “Mr. Fisher is here though, if you’d like to speak to him.” 

She blinked. “Is he an expert on the case or something?”

“Well, no -”

“Then what insight could he possibly give me?” 

“He’s a witness,” he reminded her. 

“Investigators and lawyers question witnesses,” she said. “I need facts from experts to put the story into context. His testimony would only sway readers' emotions, and that’s not what I’m after.” 

He smiled. “Well. You’re not like any reporter I’ve ever met.” 

“I should hope not,” she returned. “I’m not covering this for the sensation. Why do you think I haven’t asked you where the Lee family is?”

His eyebrows went up a ways on his forehead. “You’re not going to interview them at all?”

She shook her head. “Nope. An interview with them is even less useful than an interview with Mr. Fisher. They weren’t even witnesses.” 

His eyes sparkled as he looked at her. “Right. Emotional appeal instead of factual.”

“Exactly,” she said. “And besides, I’m sure the last thing they need right now is some reporter sticking her nose where it doesn’t belong.” 

“I like you, Miss Fletcher,” he said simply. “You’ve got...surprising respect for this. And a good head on your shoulders.” 

Juliet forced a smile to swallow her question if he’d be surprised by her if she were a man. She didn’t know where her control came from during interviews, but she was grateful for it. 

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” she said. “Lottie told me the goal was to get this story widely circulated, and I truly believe that’s possible with the facts alone. I don’t believe in patronizing the audience to get their attention.” 

“You’ve got more faith in people than I do,” he scoffed. “But I like your style. I look forward to working with you.” 

“The feeling is mutual,” she returned. She did like Otis, even if he had briefly underestimated her. “Tomorrow I’ll be able to meet with the doctor who conducted the autopsy, yes?” 

“Yes,” he confirmed. “The prosecution is having a psychiatrist evaluate Mrs. Fisher this week, so I’ll keep you updated on that as well.” 

“I’d love an interview with the prosecutor too, if that’s possible,” she said. 

“I’ll speak to him about it,” he told her. “Have a good evening, Miss Fletcher.” 

“Thank you, Lieutenant.” 

They shook hands before she parted. She made her way back to the Blue Boar, dodging GIs all along the way. They were winding down for the day, it seemed, going for runs, dates, or drinks, depending on their mood. She got a whistle or two, which she ignored, mentally going over her notes. She was also relieved she wasn’t going to have to fight Otis on how to do the story. She really was getting free reign on how to put this all together, and she was excited by the opportunities that meant for her. 

Her excitement was sucked away when she reached the Blue Boar and found her things had been hurled onto the street. Her mouth fell open. She had only just arrived, what on earth could she have done?

She marched toward the door, straightening up to her full height, prepared to demand an answer from Jacob. But she didn’t have to go far, he met her at the doorway, blocking her entrance with a glower on his face that could have melted snow. 

“What’s the meaning of this?!” she demanded. 

“I don’t want any of your sort staying in my establishment!” he shot back. “Did you think you could fool me?! I read the papers!”

“What the bloody hell are you talking about?” she returned. “What papers?!” 

He pulled a rolled up newspaper out of his back pocket and threw it at her. She caught it and opened it with a snap. She recognized it as a society gossip periodical that she usually tried to avoid. On the side of the page, she read the headline “ARTHUR BURNS’ EX-FIANCE TURNS LADY OF THE EVENING?” with a photo of her leaving the hotel she’d met Ron in, looking furious as she absolutely was that day. Her heart dropped as she read the copy beneath. 

Desperate times must truly call for desperate measures, it began. Juliet Fletcher, 31, who just earlier this year was scorned by Arthur Burns when he terminated their engagement, was spotted leaving a hotel after a rendezvous with a mysterious American. The receptionist, who wished to remain anonymous, said Fletcher returned the following day, found the Yank gone, and stormed out, seething. 

‘It was clearly a dispute over money,’ the receptionist said. ‘They left the hotel together early in the morning, and she came back in the evening after he’d checked out. She was so sneaky about what she needed, I knew it couldn’t be anything respectable. And then to be as furious as she was about his leaving, it was obviously about an unpaid sum.’

Could it be that Miss Fletcher has fallen into disgrace after Mr. Burns left her? Could it be that she needed additional income after becoming accustomed to the Burns lifestyle? What else could possibly drive her to stoop to such lows? 

The Burns family refused to comment for this story, and Miss Fletcher herself appears to be out of town at the moment. And who can blame her?

“Oh, this is ridiculous!” she cried. “It isn’t true!”

“Pictures don’t lie, missy,” Jacob practically spat. “Now clear off from my property or I’ll have the police on you!”

A small crowd had gathered to watch the confrontation unfold. Doubtless, the raised voices had drawn attention to them, but Juliet could not bring herself to care. The injustice of it made her blood boil. She squared her shoulders and planted her feet. 

“It’s not true, you idiot!” she shouted. “This paper is known for misrepresenting the people they write about!” 

“I said - CLEAR OFF, YOU!” he roared. 

She scowled at him as fiercely as she could manage, but he slammed the door in her face. Head held high, she went and snatched her things off the ground, slinging them onto her shoulders before facing him again. 

“THIS ISN’T OVER!” she hollered back. When she turned on her heel and saw the Aldbourne residents watching with avid interest, she snapped at them too. “Should we have sold tickets?! Mind your business, people!” 

Properly scolded, they scattered like roaches. Juliet heaved a sigh, wondering where to point her feet. Fuming, she considered parking herself outside the door and shouting until Jacob had no choice but to hear her out, but she couldn’t risk arrest. Not when she was relying on the police as sources for her story. 

Her thoughts were completely interrupted when a platoon of paratroopers jogged across the square from where she stood. Leading them was the man Juliet held solely responsible for all her troubles as of late - Ron Speirs. She told herself not to get distracted by the sweat on his brow or the way his backside looked in the little shorts he had on, and focus on what mattered. He was getting away with what had happened - or rather not happened - while she was publicly shamed. Abandoning her bags, she hurtled after the platoon, catching up with surprising speed in her heels. 

“HEY!” she bellowed. 

The whole platoon stuttered in their cadence, and the few in the back turned their heads at the sound of her voice. Ron either didn’t hear her, or ignored her, and she wasn’t sure which was more infuriating. She gained on them. Taking a deep breath, she prepared to get louder, absolutely refusing to be ignored. 

“RONALD SPEIRS!” she yelled. 

He called his men to a halt, stopping alongside them and turning to face her. He blinked in surprise at the sight of her - he had evidently not expected her here - but he didn’t say anything right away. She caught her breath as she marched up to him. This time, she was ready, wallet in her coat pocket. She whipped it out and brandished it like a sword. 

“No one pays me a kindness and gets away with it!” she shouted, popping the wallet open and fishing out the bills she owed him. “That,” she slapped the first few onto his chest, and he caught them before they fluttered to the ground. “Is for my half of the hotel room!” She did not acknowledge the snickers that went through the platoon, and then forced a second handful of money into his hand. “And that is for the potatoes and cab fare!” 

He looked levelly at her. “I really didn’t expect to be -” 

“I don’t care what you expected!” she continued. “You left me to look like a prize idiot!” 

He glanced at his platoon, who were murmuring to each other as speculation began about how their lieutenant knew this strange woman. 

“I’d rather have this conversation in private if it’s all the same to you,” he said. 

“It’s not all the same to me, you punk!” She accentuated this with a shove to his arm. He didn’t move, but it made her feel better. “You humiliated me in front of the stupid hotel girl, which has now resulted in me losing my lodgings, so yeah, I’m going to stand here and embarrass you in front of your little mates!” 

“Juliet -” 

“How dare you leave before I could pay you back!” she went on fiercely. “You said you’d be there! You lied right to my face! Like a - a - a liar!” 

“Eloquently said,” he returned. 

“I don’t need your wise-ass remarks!” 

“Settle down.” 

“I WILL NOT SETTLE DOWN!” 

Her face was red with how much yelling she’d been doing, so she took a deep breath to collect herself. She felt a tingle in her throat, so she tried to clear it. 

“I’m going to, though,” she said. “Not because you told me to, but because my voice is getting hoarse.” 

He stared at her for a beat. “Okay. Why don’t you start from the beginning?”

“The receptionist at the hotel in London spoke to a gossip columnist about seeing us together,” she said. “Now, the owner of the Blue Boar says he won’t have one of ‘my sort’ in his rooms.” 

“I see,” he said with a nod. “I’ll sort it out.”

“No, I can’t owe you another favor,” she returned. 

“So you just came over here to yell at me?” he asked, to clarify. 

“And pay you back!” she insisted. “Now that’s been accomplished, we can part ways and I’ll never speak to you again. Starting now.” 

“Juliet -” 

“Starting now!”

With that, she turned on her heel and stormed away. He watched her go for a moment, enjoying the way her skirt swished around her legs, the shape of which he enjoyed more than he cared to admit. Shaking his head to clear it, he faced his men again. He noticed the stifled laughter behind their hands and smirks on their faces.

“Something funny?” he snapped with a scowl. 

They straightened up and muttered quick “no, sir”s under his glare. 

“Good, we’ve got a run to finish,” he said. 

They continued down the road. But Ron knew just what he was going to do afterward. 

***

Night fell over Aldbourne like a frigid shadow. Juliet, with aching feet and chattering teeth, took shelter in a phone booth across from the Blue Boar, having scoured the village for anywhere else to stay to no avail. And she was not a moment too soon in closing the booth door. Just seconds after she did, a soft rain began to patter against it. 

She needed to call Lottie and see what her options were. She couldn’t stay in Aldbourne without a room, but that put everything on hold. She pushed the coins into the slot and called Lottie at home, adding guilt to her weariness. 

“Hello?” came Lottie’s voice after just two rings, which relieved Juliet a little since it meant she was not in bed already. 

“Lottie, it’s Juliet,” Juliet said. “Look, something’s happened and your friend Jacob’s given me the boot.” 

“What?” Lottie questioned. “Why?” 

“Some stupid fucking article accusing me of being a prostitute,” Juliet snapped. 

“There’s no need for that kind of language,” Lottie replied coolly. 

Juliet hesitated a beat. “Okay, given the nature of what I said, I’m not sure if you’re referring to ‘fuck’ or ‘prostitute.’”

“Both,” Lottie said, and before Juliet could protest, she went on. “Tell me what you’re talking about.”

Juliet explained everything - that her arrival went fine, but at some point during her interview with Otis, Jacob had read that article about the hotel nonsense, and had refused to let her back inside. 

“Now I’m stuck in a phone booth,” she finished. 

A beat passed and Juliet feared for a fleeting second that her time had run out. She dug in her pocket for more coins, but Lottie spoke again. 

“So...what were you doing in a hotel room with an American?” she asked. 

“That’s your takeaway from everything I just said?!” Juliet cried, incredulous. “Lottie, I’m exhausted and freezing, I need a place to stay or a ticket home!” 

“Was it something indecent?” Lottie pressed.

“No!” Juliet returned. “Look, I got drunk, I almost got hurt, and he just looked after me for the night, but nothing happened, I swear. Believe me, he’s the last man on Earth I’d ever want to shag, even if he is ridiculously good loo-”

She stopped suddenly and whipped around when she heard a knock on the door. There he stood. Ronald Speirs, looking expectantly at her. 

“Son of a BITCH!” she swore, stamping her foot. 

“I beg your pardon!” Lottie gasped. 

“Must go, Lottie, my mystery American has returned,” Juliet said through clenched teeth. “Aldbourne’s about to have another murder on its hands.” 

She hung up harshly, slamming the phone down before Lottie could protest. Then she wrenched the door and faced him, eyes blazing. She opened her mouth, preparing to dismiss him completely, but he beat her to the punch. 

“Jacob changed his mind,” he said. “You can have your room back.” 

She deflated and blinked at him in surprise. “I said I didn’t want -”

“Do you want a bed for the night or not?” he cut across her. 

Her drained muscles screamed at her to agree, but her pride was stronger. She started to refuse him again. 

“Buy me a drink, and we’ll call it even,” he said, as if reading her mind. 

“That’s not really the same,” she argued. 

“I didn’t go out of my way,” he told her. “The Blue Boar is where the officers drink. It came up, I explained, simple as that.” 

“Okay, one drink.” She held his gaze. “And then we’ll never speak again.”

He looked into her eyes, so long and so intensely, in any other context she would have thought he might kiss her. But he didn’t. In fact, he didn’t do anything. He just shrugged, turned, and walked back toward the pub. She didn’t totally blame him since the rain was beginning to come down harder. With a defeated sigh, she scrambled to collect her things and followed him.