#I know notes will decrease every time I post a new part but you guys who look forward to the series make it worth it

[gojonanami]

thank you all for the lovely comments, tags, and asks about prof geto (4) — you guys are truly wonderful and I feel very lucky 😭💕

[saintobio]

sincerely not. (final)

↳ gojou satoru/reader

with an arranged marriage set in place, the sacred bond is doomed with a wife who wants to make the relationship work and a husband who’s ready to ruin it all. unbeknown to him, a tragic fate already lies within the pages of his romance book.

genre. heavy angst, unrequited love, arranged marriage, modern au, 18+

tags/warnings. mentions of trauma, mentions of depression, blood

notes. last chapter everyone! donut be scared :] the angst is lesser than part 19. thank you for the overall support this series has received! please see more notes after the cut

series masterlist -> sequel

additional notes. i don’t wanna be too dramatic so i’ll try to keep it short, you guys probably have heard about this a million times whenever i answered asks, but sincerely not was supposed to be my last piece of writing on tumblr. i had such a terrible writing slump before i posted it and it came to a point where i wasn’t satisfied with all the content i’m putting out. i didn’t expect that sn would blow up, or let alone have such a loyal and supportive audience that now became the reason why i work hard every week to pump out long chapters. i sincerely can’t thank you guys enough for going through this 5-month journey with me. with more than 200k words, 20 chapters, and a community built because of this series, this is perhaps a work that i will cherish and remember for the rest of my life. thank you to each and everyone who stayed up all night reading this series, to those who always eagerly left comments and theories under every post or in my ask box, and to those who contributed amazing fanarts for this fic. from the bottom of my heart, thank you and i love you. - sincerely, saint ♡

3 YEARS LATER

“As you all know, three years ago, I lost control of this company.” Standing in front of the executives and the shareholders was Satoru Gojou in his three-piece Zegna suit. “The market cap suffered a significant decrease to eight billion less. Because of the scandals and mismanagement on my end, not only did many investors pull out, but we also lost some of our most brilliant employees who all have contributed to the company’s growth over the last twenty-five years.” With all eyes set on him, the tips of his fingers felt unusually cold, but he had to continue his talk by walking around the new faces that filled up the conference room. “I know what you’re all thinking: ‘Why is the Chairman talking about his sob story?’ After all, no one would have thought that a person like me could still save the Gojou Group from its massive decline. Many journalists even referred to it as a major corporation failure. When my company’s stock price bottomed out, many people took the chance to buy stocks dirt cheap and I was already foreseeing how long it would take for me to file for bankruptcy. I went through terrible depression, my health deteriorated, and my mind was in a dark period for a year after I got divorced, but I still did everything I could to salvage the only thing I had left. But how could I? Where do I begin? At the time, it was nothing but a hopeless and ambitious thought.”

Satoru stopped from his leisurely gait and placed a hand on top of his CFO’s shoulder. As he looked down at the blond with a grateful smile, he then proceeded to finish his speech, “To play this game or any game, you must have a good mentor. Mine was my colleague, Nanami Kento, who once told me that if my life crumbled apart after I lost my wife, I should also think about my innocent employees whose lives would be far more affected if I didn’t do anything to save the company. He was right. I couldn’t possibly mope around and watch more people suffer from the difficulties I've caused. And so, I sought his advice and worked with him to rebuild the Gojou Group from ground zero.” Satoru turned on his heel as he finally arrived at the far end of the table. “Just like Nanami, you are all here because you’ve given me another chance at reconstructing the company from the damages I had done. It was a tough three years and we’re still working to restore everything back to how it was, but I just wanna take this time to express my sincerest gratitude to each and every single one of you inside this room for inspiring me and allowing me the opportunity to rise up from the bottom. In return, I will ensure—as the Chairman of the Gojou Group—that you will all be generously rewarded for your dedication and hard work. Thank you.”

After the general shareholders meeting, Satoru was back in his office with his CFO and his secretarial staff who were seated on the couch to deal with schedules and paperwork while discussing the spontaneous speech he had just done at the meeting.

“What in the world was that?” Nanami asked, unfolding a newspaper before resting his back against the couch. “You made a speech like you were stepping down from your position.”

Satoru chose to sit at the edge of his office table as he took a sip from his coffee mug. “Why? Do you wanna be an interim CEO again?” His tone was playful, although remembering how difficult it must have been for Nanami to be in the highest executive position at such a desperate time. Back to the days when Satoru was mentally and emotionally incapable of making good business decisions, the Gojou Group and its twenty subsidiaries would have all collapsed if not for Nanami’s immediate action plans to keep the company intact as one of the nation’s largest conglomerate in terms of assets and the second largest in terms of sales.

That being said, the blond didn’t even hide his year-long exhaustion after becoming the company's major pillar of support. “Please. I’d rather retire early than have you punish me with that title ever again, interim or not.”

“Don’t say that, Nanami. We’re gonna have a really long loving relationship as Chairman and CEO-to-be, you know.” Satoru continued to tease and earned Nanami’s glare as a response, all before the former noticed his secretary who was chuckling at the sight. “I think Miwa has better time management when she’s reporting to you, anyway.”

The blue-haired girl was quick to deny. “Not true, Chairman!” said Miwa while arranging some papers on the coffee table. “I always handle my time perfectly well no matter who I’m reporting to.”

Undoubtedly. Even if he treated her like a robot sometimes, Satoru was lucky enough to have had the chance to see Miwa’s professional growth from the past three years that she had been his executive assistant. He would never in his life forget that this girl stayed by his side during the lowest period of his life. Her loyalty was what led her closer to him to the point where they grew a sibling-like connection. Although they maintained a professional superior-subordinate relationship, he was able to joke around with her while she was given the rare opportunity to speak to him informally at certain instances: one, when he needed a good scolding and two, whenever he was teasing her about Yuuta (but that was a story for another day).

“Let’s see… What if I reassign you to be Yuuta’s secretary one day?” Satoru grinned in mischief as he set the coffee mug down. “He’ll be graduating next year and I’ll appoint him as the Vice President once he returns to Japan.”

Instead of Miwa whose cheeks were suffused with a pink tint, it was Nanami who immediately reacted in surprise. “You’re really gonna train him for the position as soon as he comes back?”

“Yeah.” Satoru offered a nod before signaling his secretary to reach for the special suit she carefully hung on his rack this morning. “He looks forward to it. He’s smart, responsible, and analytical, so you won’t have a hard time mentoring him.”

The man exhaled deeply, languid as he flipped the pages of his newspaper. “Why do you always leave the job to me?”

“Because you’re the best, Nanami~! Take it as a compliment.”

“I don’t need compliments, I want a Bugatti in return,” he made a quick bargain, “a mansion in Aoyama and a one-year vacation leave to Kuantan, Malaysia with no texts, calls, and emails from you.”

Satoru was better off as a statue after hearing his CFO’s offer. “And that’s what I call a good businessman!” He gave him a well-deserved clap and turned to his secretary in haste, “Miwa, take note. This kind of brazenness is something I wanna see from you.”

The girl simply laughed at the good-humored exchange between Nanami and Satoru while she held the expensive suit in front of the latter. As if she had read his mind, Miwa suddenly asked, “Are you really going to… do that today, sir?”

It would be nice to blame the air conditioner for the sudden thickness in air density. Not even ten seconds had passed and the mood swiftly changed into something more sullen, more gloomy. As Gojou took off his Zegna coat and unfastened his cufflinks, his gaze fell down on the visible scar on his forearm. Once a deep gash that required multiple stitches, now a reminder of that cold December night where blood and glass shards surrounded him as he sobbed his heart out in his mother’s arms.

He could ask Miwa’s questions to himself and only one answer would come out each time. “I have to.”

“Want me to go with you?” offered Nanami out of genuine concern. “I can reschedule my meeting with the finance department.”

Satoru, despite being genuinely appreciative of their concern, did not muster enough courage for the past two months anticipating this day just to back out at the last minute. “No, I got it.” That was all he had to tell Nanami and Miwa before he changed into the classic Givenchy tuxedo that was gifted to him three years ago. “Take care of everyone here while I’m gone.”

Gojou could barely remember what the atmosphere was like on his own wedding day. Because it was rushed and planned by everyone else except the bride and groom themselves, he didn’t have a great archive of memories relating to that special day that ultimately changed his life. Frankly, he was fairly busy with the company back then so he didn’t have much time to participate with the whole wedding preparation, leaving the designers and wedding planners to be the ones who visited him in the office just to remind him that he was going to become a married man. His distaste towards the forced marriage doubled his anger towards an innocent bride that later became a vital part of his life.

Many people asked him this: would Gojou consider marrying again? His answer would depend on the person. The answer, among many options, was only one particular woman with a selfless heart and an altruistic soul. Satoru couldn’t think of getting married to anyone else other than his soulmate whom he had promised a wedding back to when they were six year-olds. His childhood friend who had spent his birthdays with him just before they grew apart. His other half whom he had shared the most memories with from then and now. The lover, the wife, the mother of his child.

His one and only.

In an alternate universe, he had the option to restart his life back from where it all began. On the wedding day, where white primroses adorned the trellises, where satin linens complemented the dome of cloudless skies, where elaborate details and enchanting décor ignored the idea of ‘less is more’. But no matter how grandiose the setup was—whether it was whimsical or glamorous or traditional, in his previous life, he had forgotten the true essence of his own wedding—it was being united with his partner in life.

Beyond everything, marriage was a sacred bond between a husband and his wife.

The reminiscence of being surrounded by wedding decorations was déjà vu for Satoru who had not paid the slightest bit of attention to it three years ago. Or did he? Because with the way he recalled the tiniest details of his first wedding, it looked like he did pay a significant amount of recognition to the special day as much as he initially thought. The redolence of jasmine added to his nostalgia as he continued to walk like a ghost along the pathway where the wedding planners were passing left and right. They were oblivious to the man with white hair in a black tuxedo, concealed by a face mask while keeping himself unseen by blending amongst the low number of guests who had just arrived. The French baroque cathedral boasted of timeless elegance and one look at the ceiling gave him a breathtaking view of the magnificent Rococo art. Didn’t he get married in a garden? The decorations were either just black, ivory, and champagne not apricot and periwinkle blue. Right, Gojou remembered. Every stark difference was screaming to be remembered. The color palette, the theme, the flowers, and even the venue.

This wasn’t an alternate universe nor was this his own wedding.

This simple and yet sophisticated church wedding was his Earth-shattering reality to serve as a reminder that the tragedy was in his romance book, not yours.

With over seven billion people around the world, he was granted to be with only one person that had been his supposed life-long partner. Unfortunately, life could no longer offer him a rewind after everything that had happened. He didn’t have a free pass to travel back through time and rewrite his past. Just like the ugly scars on his forearm, some things just never fade. What he had for himself was the future—the chance to be a better man without the expectations from a yearned woman. A closure, not to accept his defeat, but more so to prove his eternal love.

Not many guests were familiar to him except for your cousins and the groom’s immediate family. The wedding in itself was an intimate setup, seemingly only for those who were dear to the wedded couple-to-be. It was a great contrast to your first glamorous wedding where almost every famous personality was invited amongst the swarm of influential businessmen. In this wedding, attention was not being waved at his face because the primary focus was the ceremony that would soon unify a man and a woman as one.

He wasn’t even invited, so why the hell was Satoru Gojou in here?

Thankfully, no one had really noticed him as he managed to escape from any unwanted attention by sneaking close to the walls until he finally reached one of the exits that headed towards the back. There was a pavilion just a couple of steps away from the church where they kept the bride before the actual ceremony would begin. Needless to say, Satoru’s blood had drained from his face as soon as one of the notable bridesmaids walked out of the door.

“Ieiri.” Gojou took off his face mask and noticed how his voice had become unstable. “Where’s she—”

“Inside,” replied Shoko, pointing towards the room. “She’s with her friend, but it should be fine. Gen went to see their father. Did anyone see you?”

“No, I don’t think so.” His heart was pounding on his chest. His head, pulsating. Air was luxury for him to breathe at this moment when he thought of the man he would become once his eyes were set on you again three years after you left.

Ieiri must have felt his temperature rising (or falling in that sense) because cold sweats started forming on his temples, but not until she snapped her fingers in front of his face to wake him up from his trance. “Hey, it’s okay.” A couple pats on the back lessened Gojou’s tension. “You can do it. This is your last chance.”

They said during moments of panic, it was normal for a person to feel numb. Everything was in slow motion and very few sounds were picked up by the ears as all the unnecessary hubbub would be blocked out. While he tried to reach for the doorknob, Satoru’s hand was visibly shaking due the accumulation of anxiety that he never realized had built up upon coming here. His nerves were like seismic waves forming ripples on a pond. What was he scared of? He had gone through so much alone for the last three years, but even so, this day might be the summit of his pain. It would mark as the highest point in his mountain of broken heart and eternal loneliness.

It was different in his head than when he actually opened the door and stepped inside the room. A girl with dark hair in a half-updo was smiling at you from the mirror as you two were unaware of the new presence that had entered the room. Even from afar, even when he could only see your side profile, Gojou had already fallen weak on the knees. A wave of strong emotions washed over his body as he saw the very woman that he loved and still undeniably did.

“…Y/N.”

When had he last called you by your name?

To him, the name that rolled off his tongue had also sparked a flame to his heart. To you, on the other hand, the voice that called it out was nothing more than a stranger from the past that you wanted so badly to erase. He could see it in your eyes with how they widened in shock, leaning on the negative scale more than the positive as you hastily got up from your seat. “W-What are you doing here?”

The girl who stood by your side kept a guarded stance while she mumbled, “Y/N, should I call for Toji?”

“No need.” Satoru blinked thrice in the same second and shook his head. “He knows I’m here. He…” trailing off, he drew in a deep breath, “He told me to see you before the ceremony.”

It happened a week ago when Gojou found out you came back to Tokyo after three long years. He heard rumors about you dating Toji, but he never really thought that your bond was deep enough to lead to another marital union. Wasn’t it such a cruel fate? Someone who was once his bride, was now someone else’s.

As hard as it was for Satoru to swallow, he knew that Toji Zen’in must love you a lot and he wasn’t even surprised that you ended up with his rival after all the things that had happened. Not many guys would allow an ex-husband a chance to meet his bride on the wedding day just for the sake of closure. But you see, your groom respected you and trusted you and cared for you enough to understand that this was something you and Satoru had to have. A private moment to conclude the relationship that scarred both you and him, which could possibly cause complications in any of your future marriages if not resolved. There was no harm in having this much needed conversation, especially since three years had gone by and you were close to strangers at this point. Or at least, he was to you. Any feelings you once harbored for him were completely gone like how the same gleam in your eyes that used to shine for him was now empty.

You must have realized that fearing Satoru Gojou would not help you in the long run, so you ended up allowing him inside before you turned to your friend. “Akemi,” you spoke to her calmly, “can you excuse us for a while?”

From the corner of his eyes, Satoru noticed how the woman with the gentle face glanced at his way before she decided to trust your words and subsequently made her exit. With the door shut in a 33-square meter room, it didn't seem as if the distance between you and him was there. Not when he had become too enamored of your ethereal beauty to a point where he couldn’t breathe.

And he had to swallow. Hard. Because you were so goddamn beautiful that his eyes were filling up with tears. Are you real? The pain he felt sure was. Are you really in front of him? He scanned every inch of your face and remembered how he used to wake up staring at those eyes each morning, how he used to touch those cheeks, how he used to kiss those very lips. He never had the chance to appreciate you back on your own wedding day and his greatest regret in life was not telling you how breathtakingly regal you looked in a wedding dress. Forget the swarovski crystals that hugged your figure or the natural make-up that enhanced your features—Satoru believed that no other woman could beat your grace and elegance in his eyes even if you were wearing a simple white dress with a bare face.

You aged three years older after you last saw each other, but the most fascinating part of it was seeing you in the best version of yourself. Not a trace of heartbreak. Not a hint of loneliness. There was that certain class and maturity that made him fall in love with you all over again.

“You look beautiful,” he meant to say it aloud despite the clench it caused his heart because he had to let you know no matter how shameless. “I know I never got to tell you this before, but… this, this is also how beautiful you looked on our wedding day.”

You watched him take a deep breath as if he was the rightful groom who was star-struck at the sight of his bride. “You never even looked at me on our wedding day.”

“I did, I know I did…” He stared at you in pining melancholy. Did Gojou imagine having this casual talk with an ex-lover? He was afraid that this might be the calm before the storm. “I’m sorry for bringing it up. I-I don’t intend to stay throughout the ceremony today.”

“So, what are you here for?”

“…”

“Satoru.”

“I just think that, maybe…”

With a distant gaze, your impatience led you to go straight to the point. “We’ve been divorced longer than we have married, Gojou.” But what hurt more was the way you avoided meeting his eyes. “If you have nothing important to talk about, save it. If you’re here to congratulate me, thanks. I hope you find someone else to marry, too—”

“Why did you let go?”

The sudden question rendered you speechless, so much that you almost sympathized from the guilt and agony that casted your ex-husband’s face. Satoru had been suffering for three long years thinking of the picture perfect family that he had lost and all of those unwanted memories during his darkest days were now swallowing him in whole. They were burying him six feet under and pulling him back into that abyss of torment that he thought he had already escaped. It was endless, bottomless, complete darkness.

But even with the obvious pain in his visage, you couldn’t find the right words to answer. He had to be the one to clarify it further. “Our baby,” his voice broke and his words took him back to that sorrowful day at the hospital, “I wanna know why you let go. I-I don’t understand why you did it.”

“You know why.” Tears were threatening to spill from your shiny eyes. “Don’t bring it back. I don’t wanna talk about it right now.”

It hurt. It hurt so much that he wanted to hug you, but couldn’t. That he wanted to wipe your cheeks, but couldn’t. That he wanted to kiss your forehead, pull you into his arms, hold you close. It hurt how much he longed for you day and night for the past 1,095 days, hoping that you would come back to him and be his wife again. How foolish. This woman in front of him wasn’t the same one he married for that woman had given up on him, but him—he never once gave up on you. He kept holding on like you were the last buoy keeping him afloat in the vast sea. “I messaged y-you nonstop.” His breathing hitched as a sob rose in his throat. “I sent you hundreds of voice mails even if you had me blocked everywhere. I followed you to New York and tried to search every corner of it for you, b-but I was told to leave you alone. In the end, I had to leave you alone and give you space, because I didn’t want you to hate me more than you already do. Do you know how it feels to be… to be abandoned by someone you love, and three years later that person comes back only to marry someone else?”

Out of the many things Gojou learned from his therapist: you can never suppress sadness. It always managed to seep out and the best way to handle it was to release such a heavy emotion out of the bottle. His face was already a screaming sign of Fragile: Handle With Care. But if anyone were to break him, the privilege was yours.

“Satoru, we never should have married in the first place,” you argued, eyes glistening with similar blues as you looked up at him, “We were doomed from the beginning because that marriage was never genuine. Stop holding on to me like I’m more than just a key to your personal goals.”

“Y/N, I love you…” At this point, he couldn’t stop the waterfall that gushed out of his eyes, emptying his sockets until he could no longer cry. His voice was thick with tears, his words were strangled in his throat. “I love you, I cherish you. I still do. I still fucking do and I’m so miserable without you. Don’t say that I was never genuine when I truthfully fell in love with you.”

You refused his words and swallowed the pity forming at the back of your throat. “No, you fell in love with the idea of me. You fell in love with the idea of having your own happy family regardless of the person you wanted to share it with.”

Satoru attempted to reach for your arm, but felt wrong for having tried because his cold hand didn’t deserve to touch your sacred warmth. “That’s not true.”

“I’m not your wife anymore.” Your reminder served numerous stabs in his hollow heart. “Gojou, you need to move on and live your life without me. You’re young, you’re single, you can easily go back to the way you were before you were ever married. You can even forget our marriage happened. Just please… Please find your happiness elsewhere.”

“I don’t… I don’t wanna forget.”

He came here promising himself that he was only going to apologize and clarify his intentions, it was never part of his plan to be a sobbing mess in front of you while begging for the love he had taken for granted. He wanted his wife back. He wanted Y/N Gojou to accept him again and give him another chance to be a better husband. But that was not the agreement he had with Toji when he allowed him to have this talk with you. Gojou had to remind himself not to steer away from his original path and respect the boundaries that were set in order to live a guiltless life. He ought not to be selfish, but more selfless because that was something he learned from you.

And in saying that, his only option for you to achieve your peace and true felicity was to let you go. Like setting a dove free from a bird cage, spreading its wings into open air before flying away—you had to have that freedom without a pathetic ex-husband clinging on to you. All he ever brought you was misery and heartache, so the best way to repent for his sins was to cut the thin string that kept you tied to him.

“Do you love him?” he asked once and for all, even though it shattered him inside, even though it squeezed his heart and every artery. Layers of unsettling emotions overcame him as the thought of you marrying someone else, having a family with someone else, doing the things you did with him to someone else—absolutely, agonizingly wrecked him. “Will you be happy if you married him?”

Along with your modestly downcast eyes, you took the chance to dodge the direction of his desolate gaze. “Probably so much more than when I married you.”

Who knew that an honest answer could make one’s world crumble into ashes?

In every sad song, sad movie, or sad novel there was, Gojou believed that his tragedy could sell billions of copies because there was nothing more satisfying than reading a story about how the man who once had it all, in the end lost it all.

As for you, your immediate thought was to turn away, searching through your jewelry box on the table before taking out the very last piece that connected you to him.

Your wedding ring.

The same ring he was still wearing to this day.

“Satoru, I loved you.” Your words flew past your mulberry lips as you reached for his hand. Throughout your marriage, it was for the first time he ever heard you say those three words. Three words that were now in the past just like the ring that you placed on his palm. “If you ever wanted to hear it, I did love you. I loved you so much that I stayed that long because I wanted us to work. I love you enough that I want you to be happy, even if we’re no longer together.” Gojou’s eyes were the loneliest shade of blue as he felt your thumb running across his cheek. “For the eleven months and twenty-two days we were married, all I did was to try and fix you. Now let me fix me.”

Didn’t you know? When you were in love, your voice was always the calmest. Your eyes, the dreamiest. Your face, the softest. It was a slapping contrast to the loom of darkness that swept over your ex-husband’s face—the man you once loved and was bound to by vows. But if his sorrow meant that you would find your joy, then he was ready to have his heart broken over and over again by the one person he loved the most. You.

Words needn’t be said. He accepted the ring you returned with a great wretch of sadness, keeping it safe in his own hand like he was holding onto a person in the form of a gold wedding band. In an hour or so, another ring would adorn your finger and it would be much more beautiful than the one you previously had from an ex-husband that you easily forgot about.

Your love story ended here.

On the first day of spring, where flowers bloom to signal the start of your new beginning. The radiant woman he loved the most would start a new chapter in life with someone else. And unlike you, Satoru was stuck in his cold, winter sorrows. There were no four seasons in his calendar for his days remained in the coldest months of the year because his source of sunlight found another world to shine on.

“I have to go.” The soles of his feet wanted to stay, but he couldn’t linger around any longer than he should’ve. What last words would he have to say to his ex-wife? ‘Have a happy marriage’? When that, in fact, was a form of self-punishment. But on a similar note, he felt the longing in your eyes and it allowed him to wish for nothing but the best for you. “I know he’s gonna take care of you, but… just in case,” he trailed off, forcing an upward curve on his lips, “I hope he kisses you every morning when he wakes up.”

“Satoru…”

His words were surprisingly cathartic. “I hope he’ll call you beautiful each day, stroke your hair when you lie on his lap, take you out on movie nights and spontaneous dates.” To make it more lighthearted and less dramatic, he added a few happy memories. “I hope he won’t drink straight off the milk carton or forget to turn the lampshade off at night. You deserve to be with someone who lets you spend pink toilet papers and expensive skin care masks on his credit card. Someone who stares at you in your sleep, thanking God for blessing him with a wife like you.”

Your lips quivered, eyes achingly staring at his.

Gojou ignored the weakness gnawing his chest and offered a smile that may have a million meanings, but truly only translated to one: I’m happy when you are. And so, he tucked a piece of hair behind your ear and leaned in to plant a kiss on your forehead. It was a harmless, unassuming kiss to let you know that he would always care for you the same. “I love you.”

Hesitance then bathed your eyes as he pulled away. Was that guilt in your gaze? Or was it pity? Either way, you squeezed his hand and opened your mouth reluctantly. “Wait, I… There’s something you need to know.”

At the rate of your growing anxiety, Satoru decided for himself that today was not the day for you to deal with it. He may have been selfish all his life, but he didn’t want to ruin your wedding for his sake. With the Zen’ins was where you belong. After all, they were a family void of drama or any ulterior motives that could break your trust in the long run. That was the household you deserved to be in.

“Will I be crying on my knees if I did know?”

You held your breath. “Maybe.”

“Will it fix us?”

“I don’t think so.”

Knowing a disappointing truth was better than wondering forever. But in that moment where palpable silence became one of his biggest fears, he decided that the less he knew, the better. “It’s okay. You don’t have to say it,” he assured, backing away and learning the art of letting go, “I should head out.”

“…Okay.”

His cue to leave was your sudden sympathetic gaze. His signal to turn around and step out of the room was the fact that he despised seeing sympathy in your eyes because it made him yearn and seek for your love. He didn’t need your sympathy, he needed you. It was a dangerous zone that he ought to avoid or else there was no going back.

The only way was forward.

Walking through the hallways alone gave him a newfound sense of catharsis. Although the other half of his soul remained with you, lovers didn’t necessarily have to be soulmates. They came in different shapes and forms, be it with a childhood friend, a past lover, an ex-wife. He was content for not sticking to his brand of selfishness which cost him a wife and a child in return.

Fate must be playing with him, because just as he turned to the corner of the hallway, he stumbled upon a little boy with white hair who was hiding his face against the wall.

Could it be…?

Stopping in his tracks, his eyes widened and brimmed with tears. He must be imagining this whole thing. He must be hallucinating. Why did his chest hurt this badly? Why did the atmosphere suddenly make him feel queasy? He felt sick to the bones after remembering the depressive episodes he went through because of his unborn child. The pain he suffered from his loss was more than a person could take. And now, this…

“‘Gumi!” The giggling kid ran past Satoru to meet Toji’s teenage son who immediately carried the little boy in his arms.

“There you are,” Megumi spoke to the child with a rare smile on his face, “You’re not supposed to show yourself when you play hide and seek.”

Satoru’s heartbeat quickened exponentially. His pulse was thumping with a heavy beat. It wasn’t until Megumi saw his figure down the hallway when the dark-haired boy became nonplussed. He knew what the older guy was thinking, and he didn’t seem to know how to react to it.

The little boy with similar white hair was facing away, so Gojou was yet to see if the kid looked like a splitting image of him to confirm his questions. He was already shell shocked and he would probably break down had he learned that the child was indeed his.

But seemingly hearing Satoru’s trail of thought, Megumi took the chance to keep the little boy away. “Come on, let’s go see your mom.”

“Mama?” The kid turned around, noticing Satoru’s presence as the person who carried him walked further and further away. Each growing distance did not do anything to melt the block of ice he had become. Frozen as he stood there, eyes wide at the sight of the child with white hair and baby blue eyes.

This couldn’t be real.

At the beginning of spring, the sky was crying and so was he. You were moving into new spheres, but this heart of his could love so infinitely that everything becomes muted. His heart could love so blindly that everything you do merited its forgiveness. It was unimaginable for anyone who actually cared to understand the gravity that had fallen on Satoru as he rushed into the parking lot. In a daze, lost in his own thoughts while putting the missing puzzle pieces together.

Three years in New York City.

Had he been deprived of a child that he believed hadn’t been born at all?

He was searching through his many antidepressants in the glove compartment of his car. Satoru had been so full of anxiety for this day that he missed taking a couple of pills that he strictly had to take to aid his severe depressive episodes—one of which was about to happen in a few. That child of his could have been a hallucination after all. His mind liked to play tricks on him ever since his mental state went on a downward slope. It wasn’t your fault nor anyone else’s.

It was his.

The onus was always on him. The blame, the criticism, the hatred even to himself. While the wedding was on going, Satoru was in his car crying silently to himself with his head on the steering wheel as his saddest thoughts haunted him. He could easily walk out of the car, crash your wedding, and perhaps confirm if that child was not just a fragment of his imagination.

But what scared him the most was getting a confirmation that you did hide his child for three years without telling him. Why did that scare him, you wonder? Because it meant that he would have to hate you again. It meant that he had to feel strong hostility towards you, when that feeling was the last thing he ever wanted to feel for his own wife.

During his lowest moments, the person he ran to was also the person who once ran away from him. You weren’t aware, but his mom never once left his side at times where the world felt hopeless. Or when breathing felt like luxury than a need. Or when simply existing felt like an undeserved privilege. She stayed and nurtured him to make sure that he wasn’t alone as much as he believed. It was her duty as a mother to care for her child. The only person who truly understood his never-ending pain.

“Mom.” One minute he was crying soundlessly in his car, the next he was on his phone choking a sob. “Mom, I-I can’t do this alone.”

“Satoru? What’s wrong, honey?” Worry laced her voice on the other end of the line. “Where are you?”

His chest rose and fell heavily. “I w-wanna wake up from this nightmare. I wanna wake up next to her.”

“Where are you?” His mother repeated her question with her anxiety increasing tenfold. It was one of ‘those days’. Those terrible, dark days where the other side was whispering in her son’s ear, tempting him to escape this world in his own hands. “Did you go to her wedding? My son…”

Gojou released a sigh, but it sounded more like a plea for help. His eyes were bloodshot and forlorn as he stared at the ceiling of his car. “I saw her and she looked beautiful. Sh-She’s happier, she’s… she’s… Mom, I love her.”

“I’m coming to pick you up.” He could tell his mother was tearing up. “Stay where you are, Satoru. I’ll be there as soon as I can—”

“We have a child,” he spilled out of the blue and the way it flew past his lips only brought a burning ache in his chest. “Our son, he looks j-just like me.” He pictured it all out in his head—how his son would look sleeping in your arms, how his son would run towards his stepfather each time he came home, how his son would look at Satoru Gojou without recognizing him as the father who anticipated his birth with such excitement five months into your pregnancy. “I have a son and he doesn’t know me.”

Deafening silence took over his mother, though it didn’t last long until she spoke in a careful voice. “What are you planning to do right now?”

There was no handbook on what to do after finding out that your ex-wife faked her abortion all along. He wanted to be angry, he wanted to yell the nastiest profanities for the absolute fool he was seen as, and yet everything he would do would just be futile at this point. He was already having difficulty in processing the idea of your marriage with someone else, much less a child with you. Instead of fighting for the family he lost, he felt like he would actually just lose a hundred battles more.

He had to think. Think, away from this place, away from the wedding that was happening inside the cathedral. He needed to clear his mind and figure it all out on his own. For one, was he supposed to pretend that nothing happened? Were you supposed to hide the child from him forever? Were you going to let another man be a father figure to a child who looked exactly like the husband you escaped from?

In a minute, Satoru revved his engine and accelerated the car past forty. He hit sixty when he drove through the street, then he hit a hundred when he reached the freeway. He tightened his grip on the steering wheel and drove with blithe disregard for the rules of the road as tears blurred his vision. But maybe, instead of finding a way on how his presence could contribute properly to an ex-wife and a long lost child, he had to choose the easier option—to disappear. Because for all its worth, he wasn’t needed anymore. You managed three years without him, and you could manage fifty more years without him.

His little boy could continue his life not recognizing his shameless father who cheated on his mother, neglected her, ruined her. He was a bad influence and that was solid proof that Satoru could have never been a great dad as much as he liked to believe.

Though, for one reason, you were wrong. As he stomped his foot on the gas pedal, he remembered your words from earlier, ‘you fell in love with the idea of having your own happy family regardless of the person you wanted to share it with’. He didn’t want that family with anyone else but you. That mansion he purchased wasn’t meant for Sera, but for a home he pictured out with a woman he would marry and have dozens of children with. He wasn’t given a chance at explaining himself nor was his voice heard when he tried to beg for forgiveness. You didn’t owe him one, but it broke him to know that because of that miscommunication, your love couldn’t be fulfilled in this lifetime.

This was a world where he was and would always be alone.

Reaching for his pocket, he took out the ring you returned to him and placed it between his fingers, reminding himself of a piece of you that he could still hold onto.

Other than the ring, he also had memories of both good and bad. The wedding day, Iceland, the auction, the morning after his father’s birthday, Bora Bora, Nana’s death, finding out you were pregnant, knowing you had stable angina, that sunset in the yacht, Eula going to jail, him losing everything including you. If any author decided to write about him one day, Satoru hoped that people could learn from his tragedy and value their marriage before it was too late.

Wasn’t it pathetic how he barely remembered everything he had done for the past three years except for those moments with you?

His phone rang wildly from the cup holder as his mom ceaselessly called him. But before he could manage to reach for the gadget, he failed to hit the brakes when the traffic lights turned red. Another blinding light greeted him in slow motion—he realized that the lights were from another car. A much bigger vehicle was speeding towards him when the corner of his eyes saw it from a split second and it was all too late when he tried to steer himself away given the car’s screeching sound, the cacophony of horns echoing left and right, and the tires skidding on the pavement. The collision happened faster than his mind could take. Although his ears picked up the sound of a glass shattering, his eyes didn’t capture the sight of the vehicle that led him to a fatal crash.

There was no deus ex machina to save him from the accident and neither were there flashbacks of his life from childhood until now. There was only darkness that pulled him in and embraced his soul into that empty, inescapable void.

On your second wedding, you expected that things would be easier this time around.

It took you three years to rebuild yourself to be the strong, independent woman that you were now. The process was a difficult path and you could admit that many times, you wished that you didn’t have to go through all of it alone. Being a single mother and studying fashion at the same time was a tough journey, but also the best decision you had made in your life. You learned how to love yourself, along with your son who grew up to be a very sweet kid, while understanding what your real worth should be in a society where being a divorcée at age twenty-eight was considerably acceptable.

You had your father and Gen’s support while raising your son in a country minus the spotlight from the media that could have caused you more stress three years ago. You hoped Satoru could understand. You just wanted to raise your baby in an environment without all the negative energy that surrounded him and your past marriage. So even if he would end up hating you now, you only ever wanted to prioritize your child. Your decision not to tell him was because you no longer had any connections as husband and wife soon as you divorced. Keeping the baby back then could mean that it would be harder for Satoru to let go, so despite having heard his heartbreaking screams that day in the hospital, you had to act on the advice that your father and sister gave you which was to finally put an end to your arranged marriage.

Besides, you were still blessed with a respectable man who had been there for you through thick and thin. A man you would soon lock eyes with once the towering doors by the vestibule was finally opened.

But at the thought of marriage, you suddenly remembered your first husband. You were foolishly thinking of Satoru Gojou at a wedding with a different man. Your trembling fingers matched the increased pace in your heart, just as much as how you blinked through the sting in your eyes. You realized that you were blinking tears until the wooden doors swung open to welcome you into another marital union that once put you through hell.

There they were, awaiting for you to walk down the aisle in your glamorous bejeweled gown. You saw your small audience of families and friends smiling at you as they eyed you with admiration. You saw Toji Zen’in at the far end of the aisle, handsome and perfect in his classic tuxedo while anticipating his status as a married-to-be.

With all eyes on you, you slowly made your way across the aisle, but each step was suffocating. The thought of going through marriage—hoping that it would be perfect only to be crushed by reality in the end—scared you. You didn’t realize that you had developed trauma with weddings all because of a certain white-haired male who altered your vision of what marriages were supposed to be.

Three steps.

Could you really do this again? Could you become someone’s wife and be locked under the vows of marriage for better and for worse?

Two steps.

Could you really offer yourself with wholehearted devotion towards a man who could end up ruining your trust once more?

One step.

The loud thumping of your heart was the answer: maybe you could. For Toji. For the love you deserved. For the marriage you always dreamed of.

But although you concluded with that answer, your hand lost grip on the flower bouquet as you saw another future as a wife back to square one.

“Call the ambulance! 911! Somebody help!”

“Sir, please stay with me.”

The light came back to him while he was sandwiched between the cold dirt and the hot metal of the car. The heavy weight of the vehicle was pressing down on him and keeping him paralyzed amongst the broken shards of glass. No voice escaped his hoarse throat, but he could feel blood dripping on the side of his head where a throbbing sensation had just started to grow.

Yet all in all, he was numb.

He couldn’t move his hand, couldn’t see beyond the confines of his car, couldn’t breathe more oxygen that his lungs needed—all his mind could process was the thought of you. Right when the shiny gold ring was within arm’s reach on the concrete floor, Satoru lifted his broken arm up just to hold onto that one piece of memory he had of you.

He wasn’t certain if he was only waiting for death or something much worse, but at the rate of the excruciating pain that his brain was giving him, he knew one way or another that he would lose a part of himself from hereafter.

But he hoped to every saint that he wouldn’t lose that part of him that loved you.

That Satoru who first fell in love with you at the age of six, got married to you at the age of twenty-five, and still loved you at the age of twenty-eight was the version of him that he wished not to lose.

He was an antagonist in his own tragic story and was merely a plot device to set up conflicts, obstacles, and challenges for the protagonist. Although in most fairytales, the main characters were granted a happily ever after, you and him were given an inevitable twist of fate.

Perhaps this was the end. Or perhaps it wasn’t.

Sometimes the end wasn’t really the end.

After all, this was a universe where he was a character with unmistakable flaws that could not be redeemed. While that may be true, he hoped that you wouldn’t forget that at a certain point in time, he was truthfully, unselfishly in love with you.

That in this universe and in all other parallel universes, he was and would always be sincerely yours.

jjk general taglist: @kity @deeznutss @suhkusa @wonyoschubs @the-golden-jhope @6mattsun9 @hokageyamz @ermahgerd-larry-and-ziam @crashica @aizawap @juniorhooter @atsumusoup @gxtitobxby @dora-the-grownup @softy-woo @tsumume @kac-chowsballs @anime-nymph @kageyamakock @onlyonew @underratedmage @crapimahuman @alicia-1725 @fatal-impact

sincerely not taglist: @itsnotsoni @pluviophilefangirl @daphnxy @choso-bee @omisemi @captainchrisstan @http-strawbebbies @xllance @jonsncws @and-you-found-me @tobiotetsu @jeonjungkookismyfuture @d-efend @honouredsatoru @my-reality-is-in-my-head @blueowl51 @misslovingpearl @cuteissei @japanesevenom @borpcorp @ushi-bakatoshi

[dorimena]

may i have aizawa or todoroki where they're in a meeting and the reader is controlling the vibrator in their hole 👉👈 (also can I be 🍦 anon as well?)

Of course you may! Aizawa’s came to mind first, but I’ll be sure to also post Todoroki’s later this week, so your sin is multiplied. And yes, you can! 𝖂𝖊𝖑𝖈𝖔𝖒𝖊 𝖙𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖈𝖔𝖛𝖊𝖓𝖙, 🍦 anon (๑˘︶˘๑)

𝔠𝔥𝔞𝔯𝔞𝔠𝔱𝔢𝔯; aizawa shouta

𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡 𝔠𝔬𝔲𝔫𝔱; 2.0k,

𝔴𝔞𝔯𝔫𝔦𝔫𝔤𝔰; sex toy (vibrating butt plug), public sex, slight exhibitionism, implied humiliation kink, implied degradation kink, implied bondage, implied edging, cursing, dom!reader, sub!character

𝔬𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔯 𝔱𝔞𝔤𝔰; gender-neutral reader, Aizawa wanted to impress you, sidekick is a voyeur, Aizawa suffering to not show he’s actually a bottom is beautiful.

𝖁𝖎𝖇𝖗𝖆𝖙𝖔𝖗 𝖎𝖓 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖍𝖔𝖑𝖊.

“Don’t you dare think about it.”

He shakily grumbles to you, closing his eyes momentarily as he tries to compose himself again, crossing his arms to make himself seem unbothered. After all, it’s not every day he’s wearing a vibrating buttplug in public.

“Dare think about what, Eraserhead?” The CEO of some hero agency’s voice asked curiously.

Shit. Now everyone is looking at him. Why is he even wearing this thing?

Oh right.

Before the impromptu meeting about some tip of the whereabouts of another underground drug trafficking ring, he was in the middle of preparing a… surprise for you, when you came back home from wherever you went. But you somehow found out beforehand, because you showed him how the control was in your possession after you caught up with him in the hallway on your way to the same meeting.

So here he is, wearing a promised ‘super intense’ vibrations, black silicone with a matching ‘diamond’ butt plug under his luckily loose hero outfit. 

Grunting to subtly clear his voice and keep it steady, he looks back at the addressing man.

“You want to simply use us to continue patrolling the same areas everyone else seemed to map out already. That-”

You interrupt his answer by turning up the intensity a bit, knowing it’s most definitely poking at his sensitive spot by now. You’ve seen his sly attempts of shifting and adjustment. You’re humming, looking over at him to see how his mouth has clamped shut but his lips are trembling. His body’s rigid, tense, and his back has straightened up considerably. You’re pretty sure you heard him moan lowly.

“Eraserhead?” The man asked again, raising an eyebrow at the sudden loss of words while the room falls silent- shit, they can’t know about the vibrator! Aizawa doesn’t even know how loud it is, he only cleaned it and skipped the trial part.

Swallowing harshly, he hopes his voice isn’t going to betray him and is loud enough to cover up the mysterious buzzing. You aren’t going to be nice with this apparently.

“Th-that we should begin the next s-step…” Never mind, guess his voice fucking hates him and his train of thought.

“I’ll, uh, take that into consideration, and I suppose it could lessen…” and whatever is said after that leaves Aizawa´s focus as you increase the vibrations again, making his thighs want to match the speed and his mind suddenly scream at him to ‘keep yourself composed.’

A vibrator is nothing new.

A butt plug is nothing new.

A vibrating butt plug is new, and doing it in public during an important fucking meeting is making him feel a lot that it’s overwhelming him.

You aren’t even going to let him think or compose himself as you move a little closer to his side, acting like you’re paying attention to what the others are saying, before pinching his inner thigh. 

No one’s paying attention to you two anymore and are starting to get loud, and you wanted him to see that before you murmur.

“Thank you for the gift. I’ll make sure to use it to its full potential.” Now that has him suddenly praying for whichever higher celestial being is there to hear him to please, please, please not let anyone catch on to what’s going to happen.

So, you turn the vibration up a few more settings, holding back a laugh of amusement as he jerks violently in his chair and your hand finds itself trapped between his quivering, muscular thighs, that soon enough begin bouncing as he tries to find purchase on something, anything. His hands gripping the fabric covering his arms isn’t helping. Leaning forward to rest an elbow on the table and resting his forehead on his palm, he uses his other free hand to wrap around your wrist near him because the feeling of your skin touching him always keeps him grounded. Surely this doesn’t look suspicious.

To anyone who would be looking, it just looks like you’re trying to not let the unnecessary noise get to him, but really he’s desperately whispering “slow down, s-slow down!” as he tries swallowing any other embarrassing noise that should only be heard in the bedroom, and soon enough gripping your wrist harder, trying to make your trapped hand touch his aching bulge, twitching for attention.

A strangled whine escapes his dried throat, and that catches the attention of some random sidekick nearby. And when you turn the toy off, Aizawa huffs in disappointment before glaring over at the younger male. It’s enough to have the sidekick smile awkwardly before turning away, feigning ignorance to whatever he might’ve heard.

Now that the coast is quickly cleared, you lean in to swiftly ‘fix’ his weapon and with a hush tell him not to “let anyone know” before turning up the intensity again, this time making sure it’s at the highest the small machine can offer.

Remember when he said he was promised it to be ‘super intense’? He regrets it. He really, really regrets it.

He quickly tries grabbing whatever part of his binding cloth is closest with his mouth to help gag, at least muffle, his sharp cry of your name, gritting his teeth as he tries not to be louder than the debate happening. But with the tip of the butt plug pressing really hard onto his prostate, he can’t help jerking his hips forward and back while letting out airy whines of anything yet nothing.

You’re just watching his reactions, drinking in every slip of noise he makes. You know he’s going to slip up sooner or later, with the way his hips are slowly losing control and his legs are twitching too much to not pass off as suspicious.

Even his cute whines are becoming wanton moans of your name, the binding cloth being forgotten as he loses concentration. He can feel how wet his boxers are, how sticky they feel against his hardened member that twitches on tempo with his thighs. He needs you to touch him there. Please, please, please.

“Pl-please?” He exhales shakily, choking on a small groan as your right hand wiggles around to free itself from his weakening grip.

Before you could answer, you hear someone call his name. Quickly turning off the toy, your left hand lets go of the control in your pocket as you place it on his forehead.

“Eraserhead, are you alright?” The same man from earlier asked. You wonder why he’s so attentive.

“No, sir. He seems to be picking up a fever.” You finish with a worried expression morphing onto your face.

“Oh, then he should go home-”

“I don’t mean to interrupt, but it’s best if he stays. He wouldn’t have come if you’re just gonna send him home.”

You’re so clever, knowing how to justify his loose composure and charm the head prohero behind this mission. He would’ve continued mentally praising it, but he was rudely interrupted since you decided to turn the toy back on to the highest setting.

“O-Oh shiiiiit.” He hisses, opening his legs as he just accepts and welcomes this sensation. This is definitely out of his usual character, but having this butt plug thing tease him for hours, even when off, it was enough to keep him horny and just be ready to satisfy the ache in his dick and the burning desire running throughout his body.

Hell, he’ll even call you whatever you want if it means you’ll let him cum sometime soon so he can pay attention to what’s going on.

Who cares if he’ll walk around with sticky cum on his thighs or leaking through to his pants. That’s the good thing about wearing black.

You eventually decreased the speed so that it’s at a somewhat safe setting, not wanting to overwhelm him so soon after covering his ass, but also to see how long this could drag. He did say it was your gift, so let’s take it to its fullest potential.

Hours passed since you’ve had this toy buzzing inside of him, and even if he’s supposed to feel grateful, he feels more frustration than gratitude. Sure, you’re being considerate, that way he was able to properly take part and become a little more attentive with the meeting, but his painful erection and oversensitive prostate would love to oppose.

Luckily, the meeting looks like it's coming to an end, and even with his occasional hiccupped whines and hushed moans, you’ve grown bored of such constant reactions and you’re missing his outstanding earlier performance. Surely nothing bad is going to happen; he’s put off his ‘fever’ for so long.

It’s time to help him. Pity he’s talking right now.

“So, we’ll send these g-guys... fuck.” Aizawa whispered the last part, twitching with the sudden increase of the speed.

“What was that?”

Just as he was going to reply, you finished increasing up to the last setting once more, humming curiously while the same ‘worried’ expression from before appeared on your face.

His face is completely red, whether in shame, embarrassment, in flushed pleasure, who knows. His eyes are quivering as his brain tries to register the overwhelming intensity of the vibrations, and he thinks he can even feel it in his brain.

He quickly dismisses whatever he was going to say with a singular hand motion, sliding his notes towards you so that you can finish sharing his idea to the others before they turn their eyes on someone else.

Even if the attention isn’t on him anymore, he can’t help but like the idea that they already know what’s going on, with the way the same sidekick from before is also blushing and seems fidgety. He’s trying so hard not to rub himself against your pliant hand, which you never finished slipping away, but he’s so, so sure if he does feel you, he’ll just sob.

It’s too much.

“T-too mu-uch. T-turn i-it down- augh.” He’s trying his best to whisper, but really he’s so overwhelmed he dumbly moans it out into your ear.

You shake your head, ‘accidentally’ brushing your fingertips over his bulge. If only this toy had another setting, maybe that would help make him shameless.

His eyes and throat are burning, shame eating away at his stomach before being overcome slowly by the need to cum. Has he always been this dirty? This easy to let defile? No, god no, but with you he can’t help it. Why else would he have bought a ‘super intense’ black silicone with a matching ‘diamond’ butt plug? It’s obvious he wanted to show it off, be a good boy for you, to treat you right.

So, seeing how you don’t want to turn it down and kind of going against your words of not letting anyone know, this is what you truly want, right? Him not-so-quietly and not-so-nonchalantly lose control over everything going on, with the slight exception of his breathing, while you continue to expose him like this to an uninterested crowd. Maybe he would like a crowd to watch him and mock him? Maybe call him a slut while giggling about how disgusting he is? Being tied up and strapped with a bunch of more vibrators all over his body? Being covered in so much cum he’s too dirty to be touched by anyone?

His grip with himself is loosening and his hips are trying to chase after your fingers or try to grind down some more onto the butt plug. Combining his growing need with his shameless fantasy, he couldn’t warn you properly, or himself, before he abruptly cums hard in his pants, a sob of “please” muffled by  your quick right hand and the one with the remote lowers the speed so it helps ride out his unexpected high and not hurt him. 

The only thing is, that you forget just how long his orgasms can last with just butt play. It’s a toe curling, leg shaking, dick exploding orgasm. It’s enough to suddenly make you wonder if he’ll be able to walk on stable legs.

The meeting ends with everyone confirming all conclusions while you’re whispering sweet affirmations and praises into his ear, pressing your palm harder onto his mouth with every other sob of your name, shameless dumb moaning and the occasional hiccups of gratitude.

Now, how to bribe the poor horny sidekick who has been not-so-secretly watching this whole ordeal into staying quiet?

[perhaps-in-anotherdream]

ONLY ONE LIFE ♡

Here is a little something that I hope can be inspiring as we step into another page of the brand new notebook consisting of 365 pages. And there’s a little personal note at the end of the post. Please remember that this clip is a spoiler from an unreleased content on the global server. So if you don’t want to be spoiled, please just directly scroll down to the “personal note” part. ♡

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[Note]: This clip is from Victor’s Business Exhibition Date (企展之約), where LFG participates in a corporate cultural exhibition for elementary and middle school students, and in this part they are talking about the “hope” Victor has written down for the students to hang in the “Hope Tree” :>

–

I hurriedly take several steps forward to catch up to him, taking his arm.

MC: Victor, why did you write “You only have one life” on the post-it note today?

Victor: It’s true that you only have one life. Even an elementary school student knows this principle.

MC: ....that’s not what I meant.

MC: I’m asking, what did you want to imply in it? For example, are you asking the kids to seize the day and work their hardest?

His gaze lands on me. Seeing the serious look on my face, he slows down his pace slightly.

Victor: If you were to meet your childhood self, would you tell her to work her hardest?

MC: Hmm.... it’s hard to say.

MC: I might tell her what she needs to do in order for the me in the present to be even happier?

Victor: And that’s the reason why you can’t preach to others using an overly objective and rational principle.

Victor: Admittedly, it’s a desirable trait to work one’s hardest so that nothing will be an excuse to stop in their footsteps.

Victor: But this doesn’t mean everyone must have the goal of working their hardest. After all, everyone has different expectations of themselves.

Victor: Not everyone wants to stand at the peak.

Victor: As compared to looking down from the mountaintop, there some people who just wish to happily appreciate the scenery along the way without much hassle.

Victor: This might sound simple, but being an ordinary person isn’t an easy thing either.

Victor: “You only have one life” – this phrase can have many meanings under different contexts.

I’m stunned for a moment. I initially thought that Victor’s words were meant to be an inspirational quote about success, but I didn’t expect for him to have such thoughts.

Even when faced with young and tender children, he doesn’t want to give a defined answer on the basis that he is a mature adult.

My lips curl upwards, and I can’t resist sticking a little closer to him.

MC: You are right. Aside from the ones who stand at the peak, there are even more ordinary people in this world.

MC: Ordinary people have only one life too. They also need to cherish it properly and do the things they want to do.

MC: CEO Victor, I have learned from your advice!

–

✧ Personal Note ✧

My last year on Tumblr has been absolutely amazing. Initially, I started the blog cause it seemed an interesting app, which now has turned into a beautiful part in my memories. I have met so many amazing people here and have made many great friends as well. You guys have been so inspiring and loving. Every text, ask, comment– any interaction I’ve had with any of you has made my time worthwhile and it was absolutely inspiring. Thank you guys so much for everything! ♡

This year, the coming days may get progressively busier as my university will be conducting physical classes. And as a fresher, I have many things I need to figure out! :> So inevitably, I will be dedicating more of my time in my studies, in the world of CS and in figuring out life HAHA~

So my time on the blog might gradually decrease. Rest assured though, I will still try my best to make time and annoy you people with my ramblings HAHA, cause no matter how busy, bumpy, distracting, adventurous life gets or it has gotten in the past, my love for this man and this game has always been on the constant rise~ ಡ ͜ ಡ

Anyway, let’s see what the coming days has to offer! I hope that the coming days will bring us many many many pleasant surprises, blessings, perhaps one or two bumps in the road to make the good worth its value, and maybe a miracle wouldn’t be too bad either HAHA~ (✯ᴗ✯) May we can achieve the things we couldn’t in the year before; be it reaching a new career goal or a life’s resolution we’ve set for ourselves or be it simply spending a little more time with our loved ones. We have only one life after all. So as long as it’s within our power, let’s not hesitate to make the most of it!!

And even though a little late for this.... Happy New Year, everyone!!! (*´ω｀*)ﾉ♡

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[supernovafics]

𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐋𝐈𝐄 𝐋𝐄𝐀𝐃𝐒 𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐑𝐔𝐓𝐇

pairing: tom holland x fem!reader

summary: in which tom is your ex-boyfriend and a night in vegas for your mutual friend’s birthday leads to a surprising drunk confession

warnings: explicit language, drunkenness, so much angst, (italicized means flashback)

word count: 2.9k

author’s note: first time ever posting any kind of writing on here but i’m actually very proud of this so i hope you all enjoy! things gets berry berry angsty and sad in this so i’m sorry in advance </3

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

Against your many drunken protests, the night was coming to an end. You did not want to leave the club you were in along with Zendaya and the friends she invited, so you pouted at the girl, knowing that since this whole Vegas trip had been for her birthday, she would be able to make everyone stay.

“Come on, Z. We should all have a couple more drinks,” You told her, words coming out slightly slurred, showing how inebriated you were.

“No way, Y/N. I think you’ve had enough drinks for the night,” Zendaya responded, and instead of verbally responding to her, you simply pouted again.

You felt upset that you had to leave, but the tiniest part of you that was sober knew you would thank her in the morning for making you do so.

Zendaya turned her attention to Tom, who was sitting at the table that the group of friends had been occupying for most of the night. “Tom, since you and Y/N are staying at the same hotel, can you make sure she gets back to her room okay?”

Tom turned his gaze away from his phone and nodded at Zendaya’s request. He looked at where you were now standing by the bar, animatedly talking and laughing with Jacob and Harrison. Seeing how happy you looked with them reminded Tom of the situation the two of you were in.

For the past two days of this Vegas trip, you both had barely spoken any words to each other. This avoidance wasn’t necessarily purposeful, it was just something that happened, and it honestly made sense. With the way things ended between you two, there was bound to be some lingering awkward tension, especially since this was the first time you guys had been in the same vicinity of each other since the breakup, which happened a little over six months ago.

Neither of you hated the other, but you definitely weren’t going to initiate anything more than some simple small talk.

However, tonight was much different than the past two days in Vegas had been. You were drunk, and anytime you were in this intoxicated state, you became overly friendly and a little too honest, a mixture that almost always led to some type of disaster.

• • •

The beginning of the elevator ride up to your floor was fairly quiet until you started drunkenly rambling to Tom, acting as if there wasn’t any awkward tension between the two of you. It was mainly because the drunk version of you gave zero fucks about the awkwardness that had been lingering for so long.

“We should’ve stayed for just one more drink. It would have been really fun,” You said to him, grinning widely as you leaned back against the wall of the elevator. Tom was standing right next to you. He had been like this the entire way to the hotel just in case you tripped or anything else; he had seen you drunk enough times before to know some of your usual mannerisms.

“You’re already pretty drunk, though,” Tom responded, chuckling lightly.

Even though his words were true, you still gasped, offended. “No, I’m not!”

Once again, Tom laughed, and the sound made your heart simultaneously flutter and ache.

His laugh was your favorite thing about him, not only the soft and happy sound of it but the way his mouth turned up in a wide smile as he did so too. And hearing that oh-so-familiar laugh right then made you realize that this was the first time you’ve heard it in a while, and it also made you desperately want to listen to it again.

“I still love your laugh so much,” You told him, knowing you would not have said that if you were any hint of sober.

As the words spilled from your lips, you noticed the corner of Tom’s mouth perk up the tiniest bit in a smile. “And this honesty is how I know you’re very drunk right now.”

You rolled your eyes, and a full smile took over your features. “I didn’t see you drink at all tonight.”

Tom simply shrugged. “Wasn’t really in the mood.”

The grey elevator doors then opened up to the nineteenth floor before you could say anything in response to Tom’s statement. Both you and he exited the elevator, and you began walking in the direction of your hotel room. That was until you noticed that none of the numbers was the one for your room, and instead of the room numbers on the doors decreasing to the one that was yours, they were actually increasing.

“Wait, fuck. We’re going the wrong way.” You quickly turned around and started walking in the opposite direction. The abrupt action caused you to trip over absolutely nothing but your own feet. Tom attempted to reach for you, but you hit the ground before he could even get the chance to grab your arm.

“Shit, you okay, Y/N?” Tom asked as he knelt down next to you.

You nodded at his question as you laughed a bit and sat up on the carpeted floor, crossing your legs under you. “I’m okay. Can we actually sit here for a sec? The floor is pretty comfortable.”

Tom smiled amusingly at your drunken actions and proceeded to sit down across from you on the carpeted floor of the hallway.

It was quiet for a few moments, and things mainly consisted of you silently admiring his face and him attempting to decipher what you were thinking.

“How are you and Lily?” You asked him. The question randomly came to mind, and before you could stop it from coming out of your mouth, it was blurted.

To say Tom was confused about your words would be an understatement. He hadn’t posted anything about his new relationship yet since it was still slightly recently, and he was nowhere near ready to do so. When you two were together, it took over ten months until you both decided to “go public” with your relationship.

“We’re good,” He answered after his brief moment of confusion. “I didn’t even know that you know about Lily and me.”

Your shoulders lifted in a simple shrug. “I was talking to Harrison about a month ago, and he accidentally mentioned it.”

That conversation was something you remembered all too well. Specifically, the bittersweetness you felt when Harrison told you that Tom was with someone new. You knew that it was a good thing, and overall you were happy for him, but you couldn’t help but feel the tiniest twinge of sadness, knowing that Tom being in a new relationship meant that things were truly over for the two of you.

The thought made you feel a thousand times more upset than you knew you would’ve felt if you were sober. And it also made you feel like an idiot because you were the one who ended things all those months ago, so you shouldn’t be feeling sad at all. But if you considered the circumstances which made you end things, your emotions entirely made sense.

“Hey, are you okay?” Tom was quick to notice how upset you looked, and his voice was full of concern.

God, now you absolutely hated the fact that you were drunk. It made the tears that were threatening to spill from your eyes feel uncontrollable.

You ultimately swallowed back the tears and sad thoughts, letting your drunken mind roam to a place that was much less depressing. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I just— Nevermind. Hey, do you remember that time we went to Disney and became completely obsessed with the churros? I swear we both had like five that day.”

You had no idea how your mind brought you to thinking about and bringing up that story, especially because it was something you hadn’t thought about in forever. But the memory always made you laugh, just as you were doing right then.

Tom laughed too as he nodded his head. “That feels like it happened so long ago, but yeah, I remember that. Honestly, I’d go back to Disneyland just for the churros.”

The more you thought about that memory, the more you missed those times with Tom. It made you wonder if he missed that as well. Does he miss me too?

Even though you were drunk, your brain was smart enough not to ask that question. However, it was sadly not smart enough to stop you from saying the next thing you said.

“Can I tell you a secret?”

Once again, a confused expression took over Tom’s features. He had no idea where you were going with your question, but he still nodded his head, quite curious about what you were going to tell him. “Sure,” He said along with the nod.

You leaned a tad bit closer toward Tom and dropped your voice to a whisper. “Sometimes I wish that I didn’t lie to you at the airport by saying I wouldn’t do the same for you, which was basically me saying that I didn't love you. Because I really did love you.”

Your softly spoken words lingered in the air between you and Tom for many moments after they fell from your lips.

If you somehow remembered what you just told him in the morning, the smallest part of you that was sober knew that you would completely regret the confession you made.

However, you were unsure if you’d regret the confession more than the actual lie you had told Tom all those months ago; because that was something that the deepest part of you regretted every day.

• • •

The next time you two would see each other was very uncertain. Tom was getting on a plane to London, which was what led you to drive him to LAX, and it was a flight that you would’ve taken with him if there weren’t some things you needed to handle in Los Angeles for the next week.

You were both pretty good at making set plans on when you would see each other next, especially considering how busy your schedules could always be. But, this time was much different. A photography job was going to be taking you to New Zealand for the next six months, and Tom was going to start filming a new movie in Canada in a couple of weeks. It felt like your lives were moving in two completely different directions.

You had known that fact for a long time, but you loved him so much that you always pushed away all of those doubts and worries that would flood your mind.

The past week was when you finally decided to stop. You couldn’t halt the thoughts that took over your brain, and quite frankly, you didn’t want to. Mainly because of how much sense they made. Both of your respective careers were exponentially growing, with your nature photography becoming more recognized and Tom receiving more acting jobs. And those facts were something that you knew would only continuously draw the two of you farther and farther apart.

“So, I’ll see you soon?” Tom’s questioning words pulled you out of your thoughts, and you turned to look at him as he began gathering his things from your car, knowing that the drop-off point you had to park in front of didn’t allow for too long goodbyes.

You were quiet for a few moments, having absolutely no idea how you wanted to word your next statement. Tom looked over at you with curious and hopeful eyes, and that expression made what you knew you had to say feel a million times harder.

“I don’t know,” You finally said, the words coming out soft and almost too quiet, but Tom was still able to hear them.

His eyebrows furrowed in immediate confusion, and he stopped his actions of attempting to make sure everything was in his carry-on backpack. “What do you mean?”

“Next week I’m going to New Zealand for six months, and you’re going to film in Canada. And then after that, there are probably just gonna be more jobs that will push us further away from each other. Our lives are moving in two completely different directions, Tom.” Your words came out rushed, but that didn’t change how true they were.

“We know how to make things work, though. We just had to do a long period of long-distance a few months ago when I had to be in France for a month, and you were here, and we made it through that,” Tom told you, and there was that hopeful look again, making your heart lurch the longer you looked at him.

You pulled your eyes away from him and turned your attention downward for a brief moment. “Yes, we did, but it was still so hard, and we both knew it. And even then, we at least had a set date when we knew we would see each other again. Right now, we have absolutely no clue, and it’s just going to continue to get harder.”

Tom wanted to rebuttal your statement, but he didn’t know the exact thing to say right then, so instead, he opted for the dreaded question, “So what does that mean for us?”

A beat of silence went by before you answered him with, “I think we both know what that means.”

“Just say it, Y/N,” Tom said, and you could already see the hurt that was brimming behind his features. It made you hate the fact that you'd become able to read him so well. You turned your gaze away from him and instead focused your eyes on the Nevada license plate of the car that was in front of you.

This was it. There was nothing more you could do to tread around the words that had to be said.

“I think it would be best if we broke up.”

Silence prevailed in the small space of your car for what felt like hours but was actually just barely a minute. A car honking from behind you put an end to the quiet, and you finally turned to look at Tom.

“You should go. You’re gonna miss your flight.” The fact that you were still processing the last words that you just said to Tom made your voice sound distant and quiet.

Tom was quick to shake his head. “I don’t care about the flight right now. You can not expect me to give up on us so easily, Y/N.”

You didn’t know what to respond to him with, so instead, you just gave him the smallest shrug.

“I love you. We can figure everything out and make it all work,” Tom told you. “If there are times where I need to give up an acting job to make sure that we’re not away from each other for months at a time, then I’ll do it. I really don’t need to take on every role that is offered to me, and I won’t if that means I don’t have to lose you.”

You knew exactly how true those words were, and that was what scared you. In a heartbeat, Tom would give up any acting job if that meant he would get to spend more time with you, and you would do the exact same for him. However, you knew that that was not a good thing. You had always been someone that thought about things long-term, and you knew that regret would eventually spur from both ends if the two of you continuously did that, and that regret would lead to resentment. That was exactly what you did not want to happen.

Once again, you were quiet, not responding to his words with anything, so Tom took that as his cue to continue on, saying something that almost mimicked your previous thoughts. “I know you’d do the same for me too, Y/N. We love each other so much.”

You did love Tom so much, sometimes maybe even too much. And you also knew that he loved you the same amount too; it was a fact that was easily confirmed from the current pleading look in his eyes. However, as much as it hurt, you knew exactly what you needed to do.

“No,” You said with the slightest shake of your head. You took a shallow breath and disconnected your eyes from Tom’s before you finished off your sentence. “I wouldn’t do the same for you.”

There was no need to look at Tom to gather his reaction to your words because you had a strong feeling what it was. Hurt and heartbreak. And that was something that you really did not want to see.

The sound of a car honking again behind you broke the growing silence again, and Tom took that as his cue to finally exit your car. He said nothing to you as he slung his bookbag over his shoulder, grabbed his suitcase from the backseat, and then headed into the airport.

You had just told him something that was a complete and utter lie, and as much as you wanted to chase after him and tell him that your statement had been just that, you didn’t. As you watched his figure become smaller and smaller as he continued inside the expansive airport, you noticed that he did not turn to look back at you once. That was what let you know that the damage was done.

Your heart hurt like hell right then, a completely self-inflicted wound, but you knew that in the long run, your actions would prove to be the right thing. The pain from it all would ease up eventually.

• • •

Tom had absolutely no idea what to say in response to your confession. He was beyond confused and had no idea if you were even telling the truth; he honestly hoped that you weren’t.

That day at the airport was fucking heartbreaking for him, and if it actually had all been just a lie, he wouldn’t know how to feel.

Before he could utter any type of response to your previous words, your drunken mind moved to a completely different place, disregarding everything that had come out of your mouth less than a minute ago.

“I’m really tired,” You said and stood up from the cross-legged position you were in on the floor so that you could start heading to your hotel room.

Tom wordlessly followed suit, and less than a minute later, the two of you were standing in front of your door. You pulled your key card from your pocket and managed to unlock the door after receiving some help from Tom. Using the card was something that had already been slightly difficult to do sober, so adding your drunkenness to the table did not make it any easier.

When the door was opened, you began to step inside the room, but you stopped when you decided to pull Tom in for a hug. He felt completely awkward and tense at the action, but that was something that you didn’t at all notice due to your inebriated state.

“Goodnight, Tommy,” You said to him once you pulled back from the embrace. The nickname you used to always call him, slipping out way too easily.

“Goodnight, Y/N,” Tom responded, forcing out a small smile. His mind was still completely stuck on your drunk confession, and he knew that he would be thinking about it all night.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

let me know your thoughts! <33

[misschifuyu]

- I've been meaning to make a post on this for a few days now, but ive managed to hold it back a little longer.

As a first comment, with what I'm about to say I am in no way asking for pity; this is simply how things have been as of late, and I just want to tell you guys instead of just outright going silent for a period of time.

From a general overview, I no longer enjoy writing as much as I once did. I don't want to just leave it at that because it is far from being the only reason that may push this blog into an indefinite hiatus. But, to place down a first point, writing has become a sort of...duty, in the sense that I feel that I need to post these writings on a fairly regular schedule.

Now, I know what many of you might say - and some have even said: don't overwork yourself or feel pressured to write. Truthfully, I wish I could; I really do. But on the other side of the coin that represents recognition amongst the fandom, for me there's almost an obligation to have to continue writing, to fulfil all these wonderful requests from people I adore and care for more than anything.

It's overwhelming. Some might say "Belle, you've gotten this far, just do it", and to that I say I wish I could. However, writing out of obligation shows in what is posted, it shows that no interest is being put in and the quality considerably decreases. The last thing I want to do is botch everyone's requests just because I feel that I need to do them, whether or not they're well written.

This is simply something that has happened to me before, so it comes as no surprise for me, personally. However, despite this repetition of circumstances, I still feel horrible about myself, disappointed to the extent that I don't even feel that I should be part of this fandom after losing interest in writing for it.

Another point in this - and this may come off as harsh, but in no way is this my intention - is the rise of people in the fandom. In no way am I considering the increase of fans as something negative; in fact, this brings along new writers.

Now, the problem here is that I see all these wonderful, new, fresh writers and think "Wow...you are all doing so amazingly and receiving the recognition you deserve", which is something I wish for any writer. However, this makes me want to leave space for these new writers, to leave behind the posts I've made and let the new, amazing authors take over because it's what they truly deserve.

I mean, I'm sure many have gotten tired of seeing my writing style all the time, and for that I believe I should step down from the blog until further notice - though, the possibility stands that this return may never happen.

And, finally, my personal state. I'm grateful for being somewhat stable when it comes to my wellbeing; however, I have noticed a spike in the way I feel every time that I come on here. I feel extremely anxious - unwelcomed, even, at times - and it destroys my motivation to get back on my keyboard and write for all of you.

As materialistic as this may sound, I start to get worried over the notes I receive, how well a post does, what you guys think of it, etc. To put it simply, for everything that I post I have to try and keep myself from stressing over the amount of notifications because I've fallen into a mindset that if one of them doesn't get X amount of notes, my writing is bad.

And it's damaging, exhausting; I'm sure you guys can get a slight idea of how this just doesn't sit well on somebody. Especially since this hasn't been cause by another person, it's all because of me.

It's all because of me; I haven't been able to integrate myself in the fandom either. I see so many authors interacting with each other - the most wonderful sight one could ever witness - whilst I'm stuck on my writings, losing contact with everyone because I have to do these requests, I have to get them done. And I just wish I could communicate more with everyone; but this is all on me, at the end of the day.

It is doing anything but good to me, and there are days where I simply want to delete the blog and erase all of those anxious feelings, because it's the only way I can think of that would work. But I don't want to do that, because I want to let others enjoy what little work I've done up until now and because I care for you all so, so much.

It pains me to have to say this, but I'm going to have to take a break. No requests shall be deleted, forgotten or even ignored; they will all stay safely in my inbox until the time comes around that I feel able enough to do them justice.

With that, I leave you all with wishes that you take care of yourselves, to be the best version of yourselves each and every day and that you all mean the world to me. I'm so sorry that I'm doing this to you all.

belle ♡

[amberofembers]

International Herzog Week

A/N: hello! i hope you enjoy this dumb little fic about andrew and his herzog nonsense. 2.6k of fluff, if you’re into that :)

ao3

—

It was the third week of lockdown, or maybe even the fourth – it was hard to keep track of anything related to time nowadays. The days were becoming less discernible and everything seemed to still. The birds still chirped at daybreak but there was a certain quiet that filled the air.

It wasn't all that different from the previous few months and by this time, you had fallen into a comfortable routine at home. The gradual crescendo of your alarm pulled you from the depths of sleep. Unlike most mornings, the sound wasn't jarring but felt more like a gentle tap on the shoulder signaling the start of the day. As you stretched your legs, the duvet crinkled along with your movement and a quiet grumble was heard on your left. Blinking in the sunlight, you turned to face Andrew, whose brows were set in a slight frown as he stirred awake.

"Morning, you," you said softly, your voice raspy from sleep.

No reply was heard from him, but the corners of his mouth turned up slightly as he placed his hand over yours underneath the duvet.

You had gone to bed without him last night, knowing his tendencies to stay up late. He had no fixed schedule to follow and, unsurprisingly, his sleep schedule was completely messed up. Seeing him awake before lunch would be a rare occurrence.

"What time did you go to bed last night?" you asked as you peeled yourself away from the warmth that you both had created under the duvet.

"Four"

"Oh god, your lifespan is steadily decreasing," you chuckled as you draped your legs over the side of the bed.

You padded over to his side of the bed, giving him a peck on the forehead. “You can go back to sleep, I gotta start work soon,” you said gently. He reached out to grasp the hand that hung loosely by your side and his eyes opened to a sliver, just enough to catch a glimpse of your face.

"Morning, love," he said, voice only slightly above a whisper.

"Yeah, morning," you let out a quiet laugh, "go back to sleep,"

“Stay here,” he whined, tugging your hand.

“You know I’d love to,” you huffed, “you’re just rubbing it in now”

You shook his hand off yours in mock anger, letting his hand fall from your grip down to the side of the bed. “Babe…” he pouted. You picked his hand up, giving it a soft kiss before placing it on his chest, “Work awaits, my love.”

As you headed towards the bathroom to freshen up for the day, you peered back into the bedroom. Andrew had rolled himself up in the duvet on your side of the bed, his feet sticking out slightly. Your heart skipped a beat upon seeing his hair messily splayed over his face and the pillow - How lucky you were to be waking up to this every morning.

—

You chose to set up your workstation on the large wooden table in the dining room. There was a study in the house, but the gentle morning light that entered through the big glass windows of the dining room gave it a warmth that was irresistible. Preoccupied with replying and sending out emails and with a few zoom meetings here and there, the morning passed quickly. The initially steaming mug of coffee you placed beside your laptop had gone cold, you realized as you absentmindedly took a sip from it.

“Morning... again” You heard Andrew call out.

You looked up from your laptop, then back at the time displayed at the corner of the screen – 1pm. “Good afternoon to you too,” you said, shaking your head.

His hair was tied loosely in a bun and his glasses were set slightly crooked on his face. He wore a grey sweater that barely covered his torso and a sleepy smile.

“Time doesn't mean anything anymore,” He yawned as he strolled over to where you sat, threading his hand through your hair. You paused your typing, glancing up at him smiling, “imagine if my camera was on.”

His eyes widened comically as he jerked out of frame, “Jesus, that would be awkward,”

You chuckled under your breath, gesturing towards the kitchen “There are some blueberries left, can you finish them before they go bad?”

He nodded in accordance and headed to the kitchen to fix up some food. With the weather deep in autumnal bliss, it was probably going to be another round of oatmeal.

Some clinking of spoons on bowls and kettle boiling sounds later, Andrew emerged from the kitchen, a bowl of oatmeal held in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other.

He placed them carefully on the table, plopping down opposite you. You reached over the table to pull the saucer below his cup over, taking a sip of the warm coffee. The bitter liquid felt rough on your tongue as it flowed down the back of your throat. Your nose scrunched up involuntarily.

“That’s what you get for stealing my coffee,” Andrew teased.

“I’ll never understand the voluntary torture of black coffee,” you grumbled, “at least it was warm.”

Andrew pulled the saucer back to his side of the table. A comfortable silence blanketed the dining room. The clicking of your keyboard and the sounds of his spoon hitting the bowl padded the silence while the muted rustling of dried leaves could be heard through the windows.

“Is there such thing as insanity among penguins…” A voice broke the silence.

You sat upright with confusion, looking over your computer screen at Andrew. He was staring intently at his phone, his brows furrowed with concentration.

The voice that came from his phone went on about insane penguins and something about their certain death. As you listened, you stifled in some laughter. What was this video about? Andrew, on the other hand, seemed a little too invested. You watched in amusement as he replayed certain parts of the video.

“Bit morbid for a Monday morning,” you pointed out.

“It’s Herzog,” he said conclusively as he looked up from his phone

“Her who?”

“Herzog, he’s a German filmmaker.”

“Ah…” you nodded. You still had no idea who Herzog was.

“Look,” he thrusted his phone in your direction, leaving you to look at a lone penguin waddling away into the mountains.

“And here, he is heading off into the interior of the vast continent. With 5000 kilometers ahead of him, he’s heading towards certain death,” the narrator of the video concluded.

“Poor guy,” you said as you looked up at Andrew bemusedly.

“Poor lad indeed.” He sighed.

“Why are you watching a video about deranged penguins?” You chuckled.

“I dunno,” he shrugged, “It popped up on youtube.”

“So this is why you sleep at 4 in the morning, huh…”

“No! I was watching American news and ehm… ” He trailed off, his eyes looking upwards in search for words , “...Working.”

“He was a good looking man, that Herzog,” He said as he turned his phone to you, showing you an old black and white photo of a mustached man. You gave him a murmur of assent.

“Thot… Hah!” he huffed a laugh. You stared at him quizzically.

He tried to stamp down his laugh, considering the calm of the afternoon but he was too pleased with his joke. “That… Herzog…. Over…” He struggled out between fits of laughter, “...There”

“Fuck, that was bad,” You offered him smile, “commendable attempt, though”

“No?” He tilted his head forward, looking the slightest bit affronted, “It’s so bad that it’s good, though...”

You shook your head. Andrew frequently made jokes that were questionable at best, and you’d give him shit for it usually, but the smile that was plastered across his face as he thought about his dumb joke was so endlessly warm that any snide remark you had disappeared immediately. His smile had a warmth that filled the room, one that danced over your skin and surrounded you in a tight embrace. You looked at him fondly as he struggled to maintain his composure.

“Oh my god, should I post it?” He said, his voice dripping in childlike glee.  

“No!” you exclaimed, “I swear to god, don't do it Andrew”

He raised an eyebrow almost like he was challenging you. “I’m gonna post it”, he grinned. He tapped away on his phone, smiling to himself.

—

Andrew had finished his breakfast - or lunch - and went to the kitchen to wash the dishes. He’d taken your empty cup as well, a sweet gesture you took a mental note of - remember to do something nice for Andrew sometime today.

As he left the table, you took the chance to check your phone. Scrolling through Instagram, you saw that he had posted a story.

“Jesus christ, Andrew...” you mumbled to yourself, maybe slightly too loudly because you heard him call out from the kitchen.

“It’s good, isn't it?”

“You posted the THOT thing and 20 million videos about the penguins?”

“Yeah, it’s so cool!” He protested, popping his head out of the kitchen door, “and the joy of discovering insane penguins deserves to be shared!”

“Mmm… Morning affirmations with Herzog,” you said, fluttering your fingers.

His eyes widened in revelation, “That’s fucking gold. Hold on, I’ve gotta post that too.” He grabbed the hand towel as he dried his hands briskly.

“Oh no, what have I done...”

“You being a genius is what you’ve done” he looked at you endearingly as he snatched up his phone from the table, “Can I steal the morning affirmations line?”

“Go ahead,” you said, “it’s not that funny though.”

“It’s brilliant,” he beamed, bending down to place a quick kiss on the top of your head. “Think I’m gonna be in the studio today, good luck with work, yeah?”

—

As the day went on, you busied yourself with more work. You would be lying if you said that you stopped to stretch periodically. It was more like forgetting that your body existed for an entire hour while typing in a hunched position until realizing that, wow, your neck ached. You looked at the time - 5pm. As you rubbed your smarting eyes, you decided it was time for a break.

You noticed that Andrew hadn't emerged from the studio yet. He could spend hours on end in that room, either working on lyrics or fiddling with his guitars or humming along to the piano. The studio was one of your favorite places in the house, because it felt so much like him. Notebooks scribbled with odds and ends of ideas strewn on the floor, the thermostat always set a bit warmer than the rest of the house, the sound of music and occasionally his voice filling the room as he tinkered around with ideas.

From time to time, the room would be livelier with musician friends coming over to work on material. You'd stay out of the studio when it got too crowded. Lately, since it’s been just the two of you, the studio started to feel like the most intimate place in the house.

Remember to do something nice for Andrew sometime today, the thought popped back into your mind.

Doting on each other wasn't a typical thing you two would do, it was more small gestures that showed you cared about each other. Those tiny gestures of affection were usually pleasant surprises and received with much tenderness. On one particularly bad work day, you remember how he wrote you a sweet letter and hid it underneath your pillow for you to find it the next morning. When you found the letter and thanked him for it, he blushed a deep red and hid his face behind a curtain of his hair, smiling sheepishly. Thank god, I thought you were going to find that too cheesy, you remember him saying.

Since today was a studio day, you figured he could do with a warm cup of tea. Pulling the sleeves of your sweater down to your palm, you gave your limbs a much-needed stretch and shuffled to the kitchen to make some tea for the both of you.

Precariously balancing two steaming mugs in both your hands, you carefully walked to the studio, trying not to scald yourself with hot tea.

The door to the studio was ajar and through the gap you could hear the faint strumming of a guitar float through the hallway leading to it.

“Can I come in?”

The guitar strums stopped as Andrew chirped, “Yeah, come in! I missed you.”

“I’m only 3 doors down, love,” you said as you pushed the door open with your foot.

“Yeah, but it’s too cold…” His eyes travelled to where you stood in the doorway.

“Tea?” The excitement was apparent in his voice.

You handed one mug to him, nodding, “careful, it’s hot.”

You headed to the small couch tucked into the corner of the studio and set your mug on the table next to it. A wool blanket was draped haphazardly over the couch so you balled it up, using it as a pillow of sorts. He placed his guitar on a rack nearby and stalked over to where you sat, tea mug held tightly in his hands. You shuffled to one side of the couch to give him some space but it still seemed like the couch was far too small for the both of you.

As he sat down, he leaned over and gave your shoulder a gentle kiss, muttering quietly into your hair, “Thank you for the tea, love. Sorry I didn't come out much, I’ve just been trying to hammer out this idea that’s been swimming in my head for far too long.”

“It’s okay,” you said reassuringly. Your hand reached out to his face that was placed near your shoulder, stroking his jaw with slow, hypnotic movements. He hummed softly, leaning into your touch.

“What was the idea about?”

“Herzog,” he stated plainly.

“I hate you, Andrew, I really do,” you said incredulously.

“You don't,” he grinned, “but anyway, it was just a riff that begged to be completed. I don't have lyrics yet.”

“About the Herzog thing, though…” He began, “People aren't getting it.” He seemed equal parts disappointed and humored.

“Of course they aren't!” You let out an amused laugh, “I think you should clear it up. Instagram really isn't fit for weird shit, maybe keep that to twitter.”

“I’m off twitter, though.”

“Suck it up, big man,” you teased.

“Okay fine, I’ll tweet about it,” he sulked, reluctantly unlocking his phone, “What do I even say?”

“Happy international Herzog week, folks!” you joked.

“You are too good at this,” he turned his head to stare at you in awe.

“My god, please don't tell me you're using that too…” He stayed silent, reacting only with a sly smile.

“You’ll have to start crediting me for all those punchlines...” you hesitated, “actually, no, don't. They're not that good, it’s better if people think it’s you.”

He chuckled and gave your side a small shove, “I think it’s hilarious.”

“Can you italicize stuff on twitter?” He asked.

“No… Oh wow you’re going all out, huh?”

“Only the best for your joke,” he said, giving you a playful wink.

You pulled yourself closer to him and draped your legs over his, his sweatpants folding underneath yours. The warmth of your bodies meeting gave you an immeasurable sense of comfort and security. One of his hands rested on your thigh while the other was used to type his very complex tweet. As his eyes stayed fixed on his phone, his index finger absentmindedly drew circles on the fabric of your sweatpants. Melting into his gentle touch, you closed your eyes, making a mental note to maybe move your workstation to the studio instead.

[yellowocaballero]

hi i know it's been the hottest of seconds but director's cut for the prophetic spring if you're still doing these? 👀

Sure! I’ve spoken a lot about the prophetic spring, but I’m fairly certain I could give some meta information about my intense life-long obsession with Tim Drake. Dude has been showing up in my fics since I was 14.

But actually, the ficlet I wrote ages ago might be more interesting? So here it is. Exploring a dynamic that was WAY underserved for how important it is: the Steph, Cass, Tim dynamic!

No CW that haven’t appeared in the prophetic spring, but specific mention for drug addiction and drug depiction, as well as references to molestation, abortion, torture, and suicide. Story under the cut. 

Tim stared down into the toilet bowl. It was a little yellowed. He needed to clean it. 

He stared at the small baggie of pills in his hand. 

He visualized dropping it into the bowl, flushing it. Possibly mutating an alligator, or giving the race of mole people that lived in the Gotham sewers a nice surprise. 

Tim sighed, and pocketed the drugs. Maybe tomorrow. 

**

A month after the incident with a runaway foster kid and a, in retrospect, kind of embarrassing fake fight with his older brother, Tim got a text from an unknown number. To make matters worse, it was at an insane hour of the day - noon. 

Texts from strangers were hardly uncommon. Tim had an extensive contact network, growing larger by the day, but he had set up a Google Voice on his computer so they were all routed through a program there. Being bothered at all hours of the day on his phone was hardly his idea of a good time. The only people who really had his real number were his bullshit ‘friends’ and his asshole ‘family’. He hadn’t even given his number to his ‘friends’ - he had given it to Kon under strict confidentiality, and then Kon had given it to all of Young Justice. Asshole. 

405-555-1998: dropping by in three hours so make sure ur presentable :)

As Tim had just woken up, most of his brain was occupied by a single whuh? 

Just as his mind swirled in sleepy confusion, his phone buzzed again.

405-555-1998: B1706XQE45

The code checked out. It was an ally, not an unknown or an enemy. 

Tim groaned, covering his eyes with an elbow. He needed coffee.

****

The coffee was a new thing - rather, it was something he had drunk plenty of growing up, because there had been nobody around to inform him that coffee was bad for developing brains. Growing up completely unsupervised was probably why Tim was a drug addict now. He could totally blame this on his parents never loving him. 

Not a drug addict, Tim thought to himself anxiously as the coffee sputtered into the extra large gallon pot. Just someone who...uses drugs...in an unhealthy way. Substance abu - substance user, who just used it maybe as a bad coping mechanism. Not that Tim had good coping mechanisms, but it was better than sawing off heads or becoming a drug lord. When you thought about it, it was either being a serial killer or doing drugs, so logically it means that he should do more drugs to decrease the amount of fun little murders he does -

Tim made toast.

The coffee was a new thing, because he was trying to use it to replace the drugs. He had cut back. The stupid little sorority that called themselves the Birds of Prey had been talking to him about it. He had agreed to try. It was best to set expectations low, so he couldn’t disappoint. Actually, Tim loved disappointing, maybe he should set them higher. Maybe he could make inspirational speeches about how he was a good guy now? Ha ha. 

The three hours had been a deft move. The texter knew noon was his average wake-up time at best, and the three hours gave him enough time to sober up if he had been high or drunk at the time. Tim didn’t like to start popping the minute he woke up, but - well, sometimes he did. Or sometimes he was awake at noon because he had been on an all-nighter drug binge. They hadn’t given their name, either, which meant that it was somebody who he wouldn’t want to see. 

He could bounce, escape to some corner of Gotham until they gave up. Except he had the sense that whoever had gone through the effort to get his number wasn’t the type to give up. Almost nobody Tim knew was the type to give up. His ‘friends’ and his ‘family’ never gave up. On anybody but him. 

A voice in his head, not quite yet suffocated, sounding altogether too much like the Replacement, echoed in endless attempts to get him to come back. Oh, whatever. Kid was a try-hard. He needed better taste in made up families. 

Over the next three hours, he debated his tactics. If he wasn’t escaping and the texter was playing the buddy card, then the situation probably wasn’t dangerous. He strapped in his armor under the baggy pyjamas that he never took off anyway, and spitefully made no effort to control his hair. He did put on make-up, an old hand from keeping CPS off Bruce’s trail - man, he should have pretended Bruce was molesting him, that would have been funny as fuck - to hide the bags under his eyes. No use looking pathetic. 

He hid a few more weapons around his apartment. He anxiously checked his phone, staring not at the new texts but at Harley’s offer sent a week ago. He still hadn’t replied. He didn’t know what to do with it. 

As if he could ever feel safe sleeping under the same roof as her?

As if he ever felt safe anywhere?

Maybe he had nothing to lose. That was the greatest part about this, the most wonderful aspect of what he had done to everybody in his life. When you have nothing, you have nothing to lose. That’s freedom, or so Janis had always told him. She knew what she was about. Overdosing on heroin at 27 - that was understanding what it meant, to have nothing. To be free.  He was almost jealous. 

At two on the dot, a polite knock echoed through the apartment. Tim looked up from where he was relaxing on the couch, with all of the possible entry points in his line of sight. That wasn’t a knock he had memorized, and he had memorized everyone’s knocks. 

Nothing for it. He’d have to get rid of them as quickly as possible. Maybe he can pull the insane sociopath schtick again; that had always been effective in ditching his parents. Tim sighed, walked over to the door, swiped his thumb against the keypad, undid the three deadbolts, and opened door only to see - 

Stephanie Brown, hands propped on her hips and smiling widely. Cassandra Wayne, standing right behind her, serene as ever. 

Tim closed the door - or he tried. Steph had expected the move, and the minute he had opened the door her foot had jutted out and blocked him from closing the door. Effortlessly, she wrenched it back open and stepped into his apartment, forcing him to press against the wall and scowl as insane women infiltrated his space. 

“Wow,” Steph said loudly, “this place looks like a wreck!”

Tim groaned. 

***

The thing with Steph and Cass was this:

How to describe it?

The sister he had never expected, the best friend he had never thought he would have. Cass was his twin, Robin’s shadow, the other side of his mountain. Bruce had adopted Cass barely five months after he became Robin, and Tim had unabashedly resented her for stealing Bruce’s attention so quickly. He had always liked her more, but Bruce had liked everyone more than Tim, so maybe it was no surprise. She was sweet, kind, gentle, and no trouble. Tim wasn’t any trouble either, but he couldn’t be the rest of it if it bit him in his ass. 

Robin was the brain. Cass was the muscle. They were a team so closely linked, conjoined at the hip, that Tim couldn’t remember a patrol ever done without her. Bruce had let them start patrolling alone at fourteen (“You didn’t let me work alone until I was fifteen, and I was an assassin,” Damian had spat), and they had been an unbeatable team. Robin’s hand-to-hand was weak, but nobody ever got through Batgirl. Batgirl struggled with technical knowledge, reading and writing and investigating and chasing down leads, the only area where Tim had ever excelled. Together, they had almost been as good as Batman. Sometimes, Tim had let himself think that they might be better.

They had been so similar. Everyone had always said so. They’re both so quiet, the Justice League had said. Emotionless little freaks, the Rogues had said. Neither of them blink, their schoolmates had said. But there had been nothing to say, not between them: they could have a conversation without words, without even Sign. Cass had known every twitch of Tim’s body, had understood him down to his core. Nobody else ever had. Everybody had always called Tim inscrutable and impossible to understand - but to Cass, Tim had been an open book. She knew every inch of him. And she had loved him anyway. 

And Steph! When Steph had found them when they were fourteen veering on fifteen, and from then on it was as if she had always been there. She was so big, so smiling, so much, and she had never apologized for any of it. Nothing scared her. To Tim, that was the perfect vigilante - somebody who was scared of nothing, who never hesitated, who was good. 

Not even Bruce could intimidate her. When Tim was fourteen, he had thought that was the most amazing thing in the world. Bruce intimidated everyone, but Steph had just stuck out her tongue and kept badly backflipping off roofs anyway. Through twin convincing, Tim and Cass had convinced Bruce to give her a chance, and Spoiler had slot into their dynamic perfectly. She was their best friend, always. 

She wasn’t good at hand-to-hand at first, but Tim had improved by then, and they could cover her. She improved faster than he had, and judging from the reconnaissance footage Tim had frantically consumed after he came back to life, she was amazing now. She was wickedly smart, practical and down to Earth. If Tim was better at hacking into a computer, Steph was the one who found the post-it note with the password stuck under the desk. 

But more than any of that, she had brought the social skills. She had brought the calming presence, the sweet hand to victims and civilians, and her good humor was infectious. Steph was good with people. She was a born leader. Resilient. Brave. Everybody liked her. Everybody loved her. Tim had. She had loved him too. She could have done so much better than Tim and Cass, weird little societal rejects, but she had chosen them as her family. 

It had been the three of them. For as long as Tim’s life had meaning, for as long as he had been loved, they had loved him. Tim had grown up alone, in a world of one, and they had infiltrated it. They had expanded it, and they dragged his life into more than just Tim. Into Tim-and-Cass-and-Steph. Into Robin-Batgirl-Spoiler. Into meaning, and love. 

Tim hated them. And he wanted them to suffer. 

“That’s the Stephanie Brown I remember,” Tim sneered, closing the door behind him. Steph had quickly thrown herself onto Tim’s couch, clearly somewhat surprised at how comfortable it was, and Cass had  perched daintily on the arm. Cass had always refused to sit like a normal person - she would rather sit on the backs of sofas, or on the arm, or perched on chairs like a bird - “If I had known you were coming I would have jumped cities.”

“We would have chased you down and you know that,” Steph said cheerfully, like she said fucking everything. “Besides, if you had known we were coming you would have gone into witness protection. You’ve been avoiding the fuck outta us.”

“Wonder why,” Tim said, injecting as much mean-spirited sarcasm into his voice as possible. “I need more coffee, don’t go through my shit.”

The apartment was small, and the kitchen had a cut-away wall where he could see through into the living room. Stephanie hated nothing more than being ignored or looked down upon, and if he dismissed her and didn’t react then she’d grow infuriated with him and leave. He couldn’t fight with her, because if it came down to a battle of rhetoric or emotions she’d win single-handedly. She was so good with words. Cass...had no weaknesses. 

Which was inconvenient, because it was Cass he absolutely had to get rid of as soon as possible. She was very emotional, and more than a little sensitive. Especially to rejection. If he was cruel enough to her, she’d start crying and leave. There was only one problem with that. 

As he jammed more grounds into the machine he watched the girls out of the corner of his eye. They weren’t talking or whispering to each other, both fully aware of how well Tim could read lips. They weren’t even having one of those body language conversations they could only have with each other, aware that Tim could crack that too. Instead Stephanie was casually sprawled on his couch, looking for all the world like a middle aged dad watching the football game, looking around the room. Cass, as usual, was zoning out. Or, of course, looked like she was zoning out - Tim could tell that she was waiting for something to happen, and was preparing herself for it. 

Shit. Tim fought the urge to gnaw on his fingernail. Cass was going to be a problem. 

He risked another glance backwards. She could see him, so she knew. Fuck. He had never been on the other side of her mind reading. It was fucking inconvenient. Psychics should be shot on sight. 

The coffee sloshed into the biggest cup he could find in his kitchen, and Tim began draining it immediately as he leaned over the cutaway. He kept the cup held up to his face, obscuring it. Face covered, everything under the elbows covered - best he could do without preparation. 

“This little field trip sanctified by Sgt. Brother?” Tim asked, sipping the scalding hot coffee. Not hot enough. He needed - he needed - they’d see -

“We’re nineteen, we don’t need his permission for everything we do,” Steph said, amused. So she was going to speak for Cass - hardly unusual, as whenever they were all together Steph tended to be the only one who spoke - but seeing as Tim was Tim then it was definitely a strategy. 

“He lets his precious baby sisters knock on the door of drug lords for fun?” Tim sneered. 

“If they’re incompetent and retired, sure!”

Tim gritted his teeth. Don’t rise to her bait. Don’t. She was the best person in the family at getting a rise out of their enemies. He didn’t stand a chance. 

“What do you want?”

“We thought we’d take you roller skating at the rink,” Steph chirped. 

Tim stared at her. 

“Or the pool,” Steph said, faux-thoughtfully. “Or just the mall?”

Fuck this. Tim headed for the door, ready to walk out of the building barefoot in his pyjamas. He tugged at the doorknob, only to find that it wouldn’t open. 

Tim breathed in through his nose, then out through his mouth. There were other exits. He was not trapped. Had his apartment always been so small? He could have sworn that it was bigger. 

He turned around slowly. Stephanie was grinning at him, twirling what looked like a small plastic cylinder. Tim recognized it instantly - fancy League tech. Overrides all electronic locks and controls them. They all used it to trap perps and heighten their fear tactics. Tim jammed his thumb on the keypad. Nothing happened. 

Cass glanced at Steph, and made a small motion. Tim couldn’t interpret it. Why couldn’t he interpret it? Did they have a new code? It was Cass. When nobody else had understood her, Tim always had. Now they had their own language, one that Tim couldn’t interpret anymore. Tim was lost in translation, always drifting. 

“We aren’t bringing you in,” Steph said, just as light as ever. No trace of pity or caution or gentleness in her voice: just relentless cheer. “Literally all we want to do is talk. Play a board game, maybe?”

 Tim’s eyes flickered to the hidden panel in the wall next to him where he had stashed a gun and a sword. 

“Bro,” Steph said, “you really don’t want to escalate this.”

“Do you think you can take me?” Tim asked curiously, letting his hand drift to his arm. He shook his long pyjama sleeve down to cover his wrist. “That’s pretty cute. Last time I checked, you’re the shittiest at hand-to-hand in your team.”

But Steph just rolled her eyes. Shit, wasn’t he supposed to be ignoring her? He couldn’t, not so long as she kept pushing and pushing. Not so long as she was in his house. “Leave off. Just because Jay and I are the last people in the fam who weren’t trained in Mystical Ninja Arts doesn’t mean I’m incompetent. Hands in the air, by the way.”

Stephanie was overly sentimental. New tactic. He raised his hands slightly in the air, caught reaching for the weapon hidden in his armor. “Incompetent enough to let me die.”

There. Finally. Thank god, Tim thought he was losing his touch. The muscles clenched in Stephanie’s jaw, and just a twitch of her eye - banishing a bad memory. “Everybody’s been saying you’ve turned rude. I guess you’ve just been avoiding us because you don’t want to hurt our feelings, right?”

“I didn’t remember a lot when I was first resurrected,” Tim said casually, despite the fact that he had never told anybody about the first awful six months. Something about Steph and Cass just pried it out of him, like invasive surgery. Or an autopsy. “I remember everything about those six months, though. Homeless. Practically retarded. Brain damage does that to you, you know. I lived on the streets, did you know that? It was a miracle I lived through it.” He gasped, as if he was remembering something. “I slept on 34th street! You lived near there, didn’t you? Maybe you even walked by me.”

Steph went white. Cass’ expression froze. He was pushing hard, but these two wouldn’t react to anything less. Steph could trade barbs better than he could, even now. 

“It’s a good thing Talia found me,” Tim continued. “She was the only one who cared.”

That did it. Steph tensed, leaning forward, and even Cass stiffened. “Is that what she told you? How can you believe her?”

Tim just shrugged, walking back to the kitchen and hiding his body language again. He took an extra loud slurp of the coffee, just to be annoying. “Talia never lied to me. She said that nobody cared enough to save me. And guess what!”

Steph’s jaw clenched again. She was a hot head. A fierce temper, an impulsive girl who jumped in feet first and sanity second. Woman, now. When had that happened? “Cut that shit out. We all know what you’re doing. You’ve been doing it to everyone. Did you think Connor didn’t warn us?”

Snitch. Tim slurped his coffee again. “Connor’s been telling everyone to give me space.”

“Yeah, everyone but us.” She stood up now, ignoring the flicker of a frown on Cass’ face, and folded her arms. A challenge against the world. Against Tim. It didn’t matter. “You don’t believe half the shit you’re spewing. You’ve never believed your own bullshit, Tim. You’re just saying it to drive everybody away. It’s not going to work on us.”

“Why?” Tim asked innocently. “You’re too thick?”

“Because we love you!” Steph cried. Tim rolled his eyes. As if he hadn’t heard that one before. “Saving Richie proved it, you aren’t as insane as you keep pretending you are. You know what you’re doing is wrong, you just don’t care.”

“Wow, you caught me.” Tim took another long swig of his coffee. It was making his hands jittery. Good. “Local genius aware of his actions. Call the press. Call Uncle Clark, he needs a scoop.” He arched an eyebrow at Steph. She hated that expression of his - she had always found it so aristocratic and pretentious. Joke’s on her, he was pretentious. “Do you mind if I go do a line? I’m not high enough for this conversation.”

If she had told him who she was, he would have done a line anyway just to spite her, and she knew it. “You don’t want to try,” Steph said stubbornly, “but you’re trying. You don’t want to care, but you care. You don’t want to feel it, but it hurts so much you can’t bear it. You can’t get anything past us, Tim. It’s always just been us. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”

Doesn’t that mean -

“What that means,” Tim said, and he found the words scraping his throat. He found himself talking a little louder than he meant to. The coffee, you know. Made you jittery. “is that you should have saved me. If you loved me so fucking much, you would have been anything other than useless. You’ve always been the most useless girl in the world, Steph. You couldn’t save your crook of a dad or your junkie of a mom. You couldn’t save your baby and you couldn’t save me. You’re ghetto trash putting on airs, and everyone can smell it on you.”

As soon as he said it, he tensed. He shifted his stance, ready to throw the coffee and spill the scalding liquid on her. Obscure her vision. It would take a second for her to vault the cover, so he could duck down. From there he could get the gun, shoot the window, jump out the window. She couldn’t win. Tim had the most powerful weapon in the world in his disposal and that was his infinite, burning hate. His hate for Steph and Cass burned him to the ground, and his world with it, and he was going to burn them to cinders because he couldn’t do anything else. 

But Steph didn’t move. Cass got off the sofa. She walked up to Steph, and gently pressed a hand on her shoulder. She squeezed. Steph exhaled, long and shaking, and nodded at Cass. She walked into Tim’s bedroom - hey! - and shut the door. 

Then Cass stared at Tim, and there was no more need for words. Not between them. 

Tim vaulted the cut away wall, aiming for her feet first. Cass didn’t dodge - that would imply that she moved like an object moved. She moved like water moved - swift and supple, with such infinite grace and precision that it was like she wasn’t human at all. 

But he had gotten better. He didn’t spend two and half years trained by the League of Assassins in crochet. Tim lashed out with a foot, she dodged again. He threw a punch, she moved. He feinted, clearly leaving her an opening, and she didn’t take it. 

Bitch. 

Cass shoved away his coffee table, sending it skidding across the floor and opening the floor space. The rug became their arena, tight and intimate, no room for maneuverability. Tim acted and she reacted, Tim lashed out a sweep kick and she jumped over it, Tim tried to grapple and she broke his hold. She never threw him to the ground, never pinned him. She just moved. 

She was good, but not good enough to toy with him and win completely. The way to win against Cass was to leverage your height - Tim was taller than he once was, although that wasn’t saying much - weight, and strength against her. A couple good hits and she was down. 

The issue, of course, was hitting her. 

He got a hit in. It was much easier when she wasn’t even fighting back. She rolled with it effortlessly, taking the impact to gain a little space between them. She breathed deeply, sweat rolling down her neck. Tim used to take a cold compress and press it to that neck. She used to smile at him. Thank you. 

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Cass said. 

“Too bad,” Tim said. 

Fights weren’t like in television, long and choreographed extended scenes to entertain and thrill. When Ro - Tim was in a fight, a real fight, it was typically finished in less than a minute. The only way that a match can get long is if the other person was deliberately tiring you out - a risky strategy - or if you were of completely equal strengths with similar fighting styles. Or if it was a spar. 

As Tim tried to hit her again and again, he realized that it was a spar. 

No, not even that. It was a conversation. 

Tim grabbed her wrist, and said: I want you to hurt. Cass broke the hold, telling him that he can’t. Tim leveraged the motion and kneed her in the back, telling her that the only goal of this fight was pain. Cass let the impact take her down to the mat, an incredibly disadvantageous position, but rolled out of the way just as Tim tried to exploit the opportunity. I’m not scared of you. Tim hit again, and again, and again, failing every time. I want you gone, Tim said, and this is the only way I know how to do it. 

This is what Tim said: as much as I once loved you, I now hate you. The infinite depths of my love, my twin sister, how we moved in perfect sync. I hate it all. As much as I cared, I now hate. Feel this hate. I hate you. I hate you. I hate you.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Cass said. 

They moved in perfect sync, even now. Cass couldn’t predict his movements before he made them, like she used to - his training was different now, developed and refined. But Cass knew the League of Assassins too, had been trained by them just as he had, and they were written into her bones when they were only carved into Tim’s. After his third patented Talia move, she adjusted to fit his style, and their fight metamorphosed into more of a dance. Like they used to. 

“Why not!” Tim screamed, the stupidest possible thing to do in a fight, but Cass didn’t take advantage of his exhale. He lashed out a fist to cover the opening, but it was lazy and over-extended, and she dodged easily. “I’m going to kill you!”

“I’m not going to hurt you.”

Tim desperately tried to call the green to his vision. It was so easy. All he had to do was tap into that rage. Talia had called it blood lust. Said it was normal, even good. But it wouldn’t come. Where was it? It was his only friend. 

Desperately, Tim went in for another punch to the face - Cass’ jaw was the weakest part of her body, an old injury - but he over-extended again, and this time Cass took the opportunity. She grabbed his arm and pulled him forward, dropping him to the mat. She didn’t try to twist him around, instead landing him on his back. Bad move for her. 

She kneed him in the chest, putting her full hundred and thirty pounds on him. She twisted his hands behind his back, pinning him, and Tim could do barely more than wheeze. 

He looked at her in the eyes for the first time. They were infuriatingly calm. Her hair was tangled and clumped with sweat, but she wasn’t breathing hard. Her expression was placid and serene, as if she was watching one of her stupid fucking nature documentaries instead of pinning her brother to a hard and scratchy rug in a shithole apartment, three years after he was tortured to insanity and shot himself in the head. 

So much time had passed. So much had happened, nasty and festering and putrid, and Tim had let it happen. He had made it happen. There was a rot in Tim, and it had eaten him up until there was nothing inside. If you cut him open, would it spill out? Would it infect her, infect Steph? Could he make them suffer?

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Cass repeated. “So don’t be scared.”

“Scared?! I’m not fucking -” Tim wheezed, cut off by the lack of air as Cass pressed down. 

“I’m sorry you’re scared. I didn’t mean to leave you alone. But I did. I’m sorry.”

“I’m going to kill -”

Cass pressed down on his chest again, cutting him off. She had finally done the one thing nobody in Tim’s life had ever figured out: how to make him shut up. “You can be as mean to me as you want. It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you. I’ll stay.”

Tim wheezed. In that, maybe, Cass heard something, because she continued as if he had spoken. Or maybe she just wanted the chance to talk. It had been stolen from her for thirteen years, and it was valuable to her. 

“You do not have to be kind. You do not have to hug me, even if I want you to. You do not have to be my brother. I know it hurts too much. But you are me. I am you. You do not even have to try for that. I do not have to give it to you. You have it.”

Tim couldn’t help it. He cried a little, and then he couldn’t stop. 

Cass got off him, but she kept her promise. She didn’t hug him. She just propped him up against the sofa, holding his hand, and didn’t speak. At some point the door creaked, and he felt Stephanie next to him. 

This is why, Tim thought hysterically, he had been avoiding them.

He knew this would happen. There was no hiding from Cass. There was no posturing, no pretending. She didn’t want anything from him. She never had. There was nothing he could say that would drive her away, because Cass did not listen to the words people spoke. She spoke only for clarity, when she could not afford for her words to be misconstrued, and for the comfort of others. 

Cass knew that he had been lying out of his ass. Cass knew that he wasn’t as insane as he pretended, as cruel as he wanted to be. 

He couldn’t make Cass hate him. Shit. 

None of them said anything. Nothing needed to be said, not between the three of them. Cass might be having a silent conversation in Sign with Steph, but he didn’t care enough to open his eyes and look. When they had first met, it used to make Steph so mad that Tim and Cass were having ‘secret conversations’. She had poured over her dictionaries, learning as quickly as physically possible so she could keep up. Everything Steph had, she had worked hard for. 

Steph was in college now. Premed. She wanted to be an ER doctor. Steph wasn’t a genius, she had to study hard. She wouldn’t be able to superhero in med school, so she was ready to hang up her cape for a few years until she achieved her dream. Steph said that she could do just as much good as a doctor as a superhero. She hadn’t always wanted it. When they were kids and Bruce used to ask her what she wanted to do when she grew up, in his awkward faux-dad way, she had always shrugged and said that she might be a nurse. 

“Why not med school?” Bruce had suggested, between sleepy spoonfuls of oatmeal. She used to spend more nights at their place than at her own. Her mom hadn’t noticed. 

Steph had just shrugged awkwardly, nibbling her whole-wheat organic toast that she would stare at suspiciously. Rich people, she would say, sighing. “I would never be able to afford it. And no way I’m smart enough.”

“You’re good enough,” Bruce said, which was the closest he ever came to praising somebody. “I’ll pay for it.”

Steph had gaped. Cass had eaten her Lucky Charms smugly. Tim had rolled his eyes. “An in-the-know doctor for the vigilante community would be invaluable,” he had informed her, pretentious and callous. “We could use you.”

“You deserve it,” Cass had signed. 

“You have a bright future, Stephanie,” Bruce said, buckling under the panic of being a responsible adult. “I would hate to see you waste it.”

He would hate to see any of them waste their future. He had hated to see what Tim had become. He knew that. The last time he had ever seen Bruce, it was just to disappoint him. Bruce was the only parent he had ever had, and his standards were so sky high it was impossible to do anything other than disappoint. 

The fact of the matter was this: he loved Cass and Steph more than he loved Bruce. He could hate Bruce. He could hate himself. But Cass and Steph…

Bruce had ear-marked a lot of money for Steph, both for whatever continuing education she chose and for her future. It had raised a lot of questions among the lawyer team, but ultimately she had been written off as another of his strays. Tim had left her a lot of money too. There probably wasn’t any point: when she married Cass she’d have equal access to the fortune. Rich people, Stephanie used to whisper in awe, looking at organic toast. 

Cass was majoring in dance. She wanted to be a ballerina. 

Tim’s future...Tim’s future…

“Or we can watch a nature documentary,” Steph said out loud. “If we all promise not to say a fucking word.”

Incredibly, unmistakably, irrevocably, Tim groaned. “Not the fucking bee one again.”

“I like the bees,” Cass said serenely. 

“If you aren’t going to get out of my house can I at least smoke up?” Tim asked miserably. 

“I brought gummy bears,” Steph said, chipper as ever, “which are way better.”

“I’m going to the fucking bathroom,” Tim grumbled, which everybody knew was as good as a yes. 

“If you take anything I’ll know,” Cass said serenely, and also threatened. 

“Fuck you, bitch.”

Steph and Cass high-fived, and Tim sulked angrily to the bathroom. He took a second to look at himself in the mirror - looking for Tim Drake, failing, as always - before opening it and grabbing his baggie of pills. 

He looked at it. He looked at the toilet. He looked at the baggie. 

He didn’t flush them. He put them back in the medicine cabinet. Tomorrow. He’ll do them tomorrow. Not today. He can hold out for 24 hours. It’ll be fine. 

For a wild, stupid, insane second, Tim wondered if he could say that tomorrow too. If tomorrow he would look at them and say: maybe tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that…

If there was a future, for a fuck-up like him. 

The faint strains of Cass’ stupid fucking bee documentary began playing through the thin walls of his shitty little apartment, and Tim turned out the lights of his bathroom and closed the door, locking it securely behind him. 

[wiypt-writes]

Stark Spangled Banner

Ch24: Like The Old Man Said…Together Part 1- I Wouldn’t Call It A Comfort

Summary: The Avengers track Ultron and it’s a race against time before the AI can put his plan into action.

Pairing: Steve Rogers x OFC Katie Stark

Warnings: Bad language, Smut (NSFW) violence and crazy assed robots. Oh and “Something dramatic, I hope!”

A/N: This chapter now contains additional content which is why It has been split into two parts.

Disclaimer: This is a pure work of fiction and classified as 18+. Please respect this and do not read if you are underage. I do not own any characters in this series bar Katie Stark and the other OCs. By reading beyond this point you understand and accept the terms of this disclaimer.

A/N: Another massive big up for @angrybirdcr​ for her edits xx

Chapter 23 Part 2

Stark Spangled Banner Masterlist // Main Masterlist

“I’ve put the boys to work.” Laura gestured out of the window as Katie chewed on her grilled cheese. She’d had a good four hours sleep and was feeling much better after a scalding hot shower. She glanced across the lawn area to where Steve and Tony were positioned at the side of the house, both holding an axe, stood by a stack of large logs and two piles of smaller logs.

“You got Tony doing manual labour?” Katie grinned at her. “Well played.”

Laura chuckled and then began to chat to about her plans for dinner. “Clint suggested comfort food. fried chicken and Mac and Cheese to be specific”

“You’ll win Steve over instantly.” Katie leaned against the counter. “I’m happy to help, lot of people to feed, not to mention Stevie eats enough for three.”  

“You wanna take her up on that.” Clint walked into the kitchen and opened a drawer near the door.“She’s a damned good cook is Nova. Obviously, not as good as you, babe.” He added as a quick afterthought. “Smooth Barton…” Katie laughed as Laura threw a tea towel at his head. Easily catching it ant tossing it back, he pulled a tape measure from the drawer and left through the backdoor, still laughing, the kids trailing behind him.

Katie stared at the back door as it shut, the normality of the scene suddenly hitting her. He had a wife, two children, and still managed to hold down the ridiculous lifestyle the Avengers and SHIELD demanded.

“How do you do it?” She blurted out. The woman placed the last plate on the sink to drain and straightened up. “I mean this, it’s so ordinary.” she turned, once more looking out of the window. She watched Steve swing his axe, his light blue Under Armour skin top clinging to every part of his torso.

“It’s possible…” Laura mused, standing behind her as she followed the younger woman’s gaze. You know, to have a domestic life…well, a variation on one, away from the mess.”

“Problem is the pair of us are tangled in the mess.” Katie muttered, not taking her eyes off Steve.

“Well then, you should understand each other more.” Laura pointed out, before she changed the subject. “Here, they could probably use a drink. You wanna take ‘em that jug of ice tea for me?”

“Sure.”

A minute or so later Katie crossed the lawn with a tray sporting a full jug and two glasses towards where both men where stood by the decreasing mound of large logs and the two increasing mounds of smaller ones.  Steve’s pile of cut logs was significantly bigger than Tony’s, which was hardly surprising.

And the pair of them were bickering which was also not surprising.

“Is that a problem?” Steve asked, picking the two halves he had just cut up and throwing them onto his pile, bristling slightly at the fact Tony was digging into why he wasn’t as affected by the Maximoff’s visions as everyone else. Truth be told he had been affected, big time, but since he and Katie had talked it through he felt better. But he wasn’t about to tell anyone that, frankly it was no ones’ business what any of them had seen bar their own.

“I don’t trust a guy without a dark side. Call me old fashioned.” Tony shrugged

“Well let’s just say you haven’t seen it yet.” Steve glowered at him, his temper starting to rise. He couldn’t help but feel pissed at Tony, because if it wasn’t for him they wouldn’t even be in this mess.

“You know this is what he’s trying to do right?” A soft voice spoke and Steve turned to see Katie setting a tray of drinks down behind them. They both turned to look at her “Ultron is trying to tear us apart.”

“Well I guess he’d know.” Steve jerked his head in Tony’s direction “Whether he tells us is a bit of a question”

“Banner and I were doing research-”

“That would affect the team” Steve picked up another log. His voice was gaining momentum, and Katie let out a groan, she knew he was getting angry.

“That would end the team” Tony said simply, “Isn’t that the mission? Isn’t that the “why” we fight, so we can end the fight, so we get to go home?”

Without so much as a huff of noise, Steve ripped the log he was holding apart with his bare hands in a fit of temper that aroused Katie far more than it should have done. Tony raised his eyebrows slightly and Steve’s chest heaved as he regained his composure. He turned to look at Tony and spoke, his voice calm and measured.

“Every time someone tries to win a war before it starts, innocent people die. Every time.” He spoke softly but sternly, trying to make his point. Loki, Hydra, SHIELD with Insight.. now this.

“I’m sorry. Mr. Stark,” Laura headed across the lawn towards them all. “Uh, Clint said you wouldn’t mind, but, our tractor, it doesn’t seem to want to start at all. I thought maybe you might…

“Yeah, I’ll give her a kick.” Tony smiled at Laura then as he turned to leave he looked back at Steve delivering his next line with the air of a petulant child “Don’t take from my pile.”

“You know if he wasn’t your bother…” Steve reached for a glass of tea, draining it in one and leaving his sentence hanging. Katie took a deep breath and stood up.

“Cut him a bit of slack yeah?” Her eyes flashed. “The Maximoff girl. She got to him too.”

Steve looked down at her and frowned, that was news to him. “But I thought…”

“It was the day we found the sceptre.” Katie said. “She got to him in Strucker’s lab only he didn’t know what it was at the time. And you wanna know what he saw?” her voice wasn’t angry but she levelled Steve with a look that left him with no uncertain terms she was defending her brother “He saw us all dead because he hadn’t tried hard enough.” Steve inwardly groaned as she finished. “That’s what Ultron is about, that’s why he started it again.”

“Sorry, I didn’t know.” Steve shook his head, gently

“Well now you do.” Katie shrugged and decided to change the subject, “Oh, and by the way, what you did with that log back then-” she mimed pulling something apart. “-kinda turned me on a hell of a lot more than it should.”

He grinned and stepped towards her, closing the short distance they were apart “Well, if we go back inside I can…”

“Nice try, you have wood.” Katie pointed the logs

“Yes and I’d kinda like to do something about it!”

“Steve!” Katie spluttered out through her laugh, as she hit him in the chest, mentally making a note toe have words with Sam for teaching him innuendoes and street slang

He stepped back, laughing and rubbing at the spot where her hand had connected with him. He cocked his head playfully to the right, and was about to say something else about the fact he was feeling pretty horny on account of it being a few days since they’d last enjoyed one another seeing as his plans for her and that tight blue dress had been interrupted post the party, but Katie’s attention was taken by something else.

“Lucky!” She grinned crouching down to pet the dog who was jumping all over her, giving out little barks. “Man you got big!” Steve looked down at his girl and the sandy coloured dog, frowning as he noticed it only had one eye.

“Is this the pizza eating puppy you talked about?” he asked, bending down to pet the dog. “Sure is.” Katie grinned standing up as the dog ran off back to Barton after he whistled. “Not so much of a puppy now though.”

She smiled and made her way back over to the house. Steve looked at the pile of logs, then her, then back and picked up his axe again.

Inside, Katie started to help Laura with the dinner, the pair of them working together easily. Steve and Clint joined them in the kitchen not long after, both men sitting at the table with a beer as Lila scrambled up onto Steve’s knee, Steve waving away Clint’s instruction for her to leave him alone, he didn’t mind one bit. Katie had noticed the small girl sat there, talking to Steve and she’d smiled and turned back to her cooking. She was just rinsing off the salad when she looked up out of the window, seeing something that she really wasn’t expecting.

“I don’t believe it.” She whispered as she watched Tony and the tall, bald headed man with the trench coat and the eye patch walking up the path towards them. She turned to Clint and Steve “We got company, boys.” Both men stood up as the door opened, Lila jumping of Steve’s knee. The soldier’s hands went to his hips, his mouth forming a thin line as his eyes fell onto the man in front of him.

“At ease Soldier…” Fury said, a smile creeping across his face as Tony walked into the room behind him muttering about traitors, Maria Hill and ‘Goth Pirates’

****

“Ultron took you folks out of play to buy himself time.” Fury said glass of water in his hand as he leaned against the kitchen counter. “My contacts all say he’s building something. The amount of Vibranium he made off with, I don’t think it’s just one thing.”

“What about Ultron himself?” Steve asked, he was stood in the doorway to the kitchen, leaning against the door frame, arms folded.

“Ah. He’s easy to track, he’s everywhere. Guy’s multiplying faster than a Catholic rabbit. Still doesn’t help us get an angle on any of his plans though.”

Tony shoved the last piece of the chicken he had been eating in his mouth and walked to the sink to pick up a towel to wipe his hands. “He still going after launch codes? “

“Yes, he is, but he’s not making any headway.”

Katie frowned from her seat at the table, opposite Natasha. “Well that doesn’t make sense. Tony cracked the Pentagon’s firewall in high school for a dare”.

Tony smiled fondly at the memory. That had earned him an ass whooping and a half from his dad.

“Yeah, well, I contacted our friends at the NEXUS about that”. Fury continued

“NEXUS?” Steve questioned.

“It’s the world internet hub in Oslo” Banner explained, he was stood behind Natasha leaning against the sideboard. “Every byte of data flows through there, fastest access on earth.”

At that point Lila ran into the room, a piece of paper in her hand.

“So what’d they say?” Clint asked, turning 3 darts over in his hand from his stance a few feet away from Fury.

Lila handed the piece of paper to Natasha, who looked at her, then the paper, grinning and gave the little girl a one armed hug. She placed the paper down on the table and Katie noticed that it was a watercolour paint picture of a butterfly.

“He’s fixated on the missiles.” Fury drained his glass of water. “But the codes are constantly being changed.

“By whom?” Tony questioned. At that point Clint threw the darts straight past Tony, about an inch or so away from his ear straight into the bullseye of the dart board. Tony spun round to glare at him, Clint shrugged apologetically, grinning at the same time. Hawkeye by name, Hawkeye by nature.

“Parties unknown.” Fury said, a puzzled tone to his voice

“Do we have an ally?” Katie asked.

“Ultron’s got an enemy, that’s not the same thing.” Fury looked at her “Still, I’d pay folding money to know who it is”

“I might need to visit Oslo, find our unknown.” Tony pondered, to no one in particular.

“Well, this is good times, boss, but I was kind of hoping when I saw you, you’d have more than that.” Natasha sighed, leaning back in her chair.

“I do.” Nick looked round the room. “I have you.”

Everyone shared a look round the room at one another. None of them were feeling particularly useful if truth be told.

“Back in the day, I had eyes everywhere, ears everywhere else.” Fury continued “Yet here we all are, back on Earth, with nothing but our wit, and our will to save the world. So stand. Outwit the platinum bastard.”

“Steve doesn’t like that kind of talk.” Natasha looked at him.

“You know what, Romanoff? “ Steve’s tone was dead pan. She smiled mischievously.

“So what does he want? “ Fury continued.

“To become better. Better than us.” Katie looked around.

“Right, he keeps building bodies.” Steve agreed

“Person bodies. The human form is inefficient, biologically speaking, we’re outmoded.” Tony mused “But he keeps coming back to it” 

“Yeah, when you two programmed him to protect the human race, you amazingly failed” Katie sighed, looking over at Tony then to Bruce, who was looking at Lila’s drawing over Nat’s shoulder, his arms folded, a thoughtful look on his face.

“They don’t need to be protected, they need to evolve.” The Doctor said, not looking up. “Ultron’s going to evolve.”

“How?” Fury asked.

“Has anyone been in contact with Helen Cho?” Bruce glanced around the room.

There was a pause, and then all at once there was a flurry of activity. Tony whipped his phone out and began to dial, Nat and Katie both stood up, Clint hurried out of the kitchen and Fury was also talking to someone as Steve and Bruce began discussing the intricacies of what Ultron was likely to want Helen for, which centred around the regeneration cradle, a larger version of the technology that had healed Clint after he had been shot when retrieving the sceptre.  

“If Ultron is really building a body…” Steve trailed off as they all prepared to leave,  his voice dropping

“He’ll be more powerful than any of us. Maybe all of us.” Katie sighed.

“An android designed by a robot” Tony finished.

“You know I really miss the days when the weirdest thing science ever created was me.” Steve raised his eyebrows. Katie and Tony both smiled gently.

“I’ll drop Banner off at the tower. Do you mind if I borrow Ms. Hill?” Fury said, pulling on his trench coat.

“She’s all yours, apparently.” Tony shrugged “What are you gonna do? “

“I don’t know. Something dramatic, I hope.”

Katie found herself slightly concerned that the threat of Fury doing something dramatic didn’t worry her half as much as facing Ultron.

*****

Clint expertly piloted the Quinn Jet low enough for Steve to drop onto the roof of the U-GU-Gin Genetic Research Lab roof.

“Two minutes. Stay close.” Steve instructed as the jet roe again to hover above the building away from any eyes.

A few moments passed and then the crew on the jet heard Steve shout “Dr Cho…are you hurt?”  There was a bit of a conversation which they didn’t hear, but then Helen’s voice came over the comms loud and clear, if a little strained.

“The gem, its power is uncontainable. You can’t just blow it up. You have to get the Cradle to Stark.”

There was another pause before Steve’s voice spoke clearly ”Did you guys copy that?

“We did.” Clint said.

“I got a private jet taking off, across town, no manifest.” Katie read the details on the computer screen in front of her. “That could be him.”

“There!” Clint said loudly, pointing out of the front window of the jet. Both Natasha and Katie moved so they could follow his gaze. “It’s the truck from the lab. Right above you, Cap. On the loop by the bridge.”

The jet scanned the truck, confirming their suspicions with the imaging that they all saw on the monitor.

“It’s them.” Clint continued. “I got three with the Cradle, one in the cab. I could take out the driver”

“No.” Katie instructed. “If what Helen is saying is right, that truck crashes, the gem could level the city.”

“We need to draw out Ultron” Steve spoke on the coms. They all waited for a further update and, thirty seconds or so later, there was a loud bang and he followed up his commentary. ”Well, he’s definitely unhappy! I’m gonna try and keep him that way.”

Katie looked down to see Steve was clinging onto the back of the truck and her heart skipped a beat. Making a decision she strode to wing space of the jet and pressed her palm to the pad besides the large locker that contained her suit.

“You’re not a match for him Cap…” Clint said

“Thanks Barton!” Steve replied, sarcastically.

“We need to get down there, give him some back up…”  Katie called, turning round to look at Nat as she stepped backwards, allowing her suit to form around her.

“Ok.” Clint said, nodding “I’ll give you the cover up top.”

Nat took off her headset and joined Katie in the equipment store, pushing a small coms piece into her ear. She headed to the back of the ship, straddling the motorbike that was propped up at the side.

“He’s lost his shield. I’m gonna drop you as close to it as I can.” Clint advised as he flipped a few controls.

“Roger.” Katie continued with the final checks to her suit, without JARVIS she was flying this thing herself, just as she had been at Klaus’ base so she needed to make sure everything was right. Clint steered them down towards the road.

“We got a window. Four, three…give ‘em hell.” Clint said, pushing the button for the ramp. Natasha sped the bike off and dropped down with a squeal of tyres before taking the jet higher.

“Us girls are always picking up after you boys.” She said gently and Katie headed to the back of the ramp, her scans watching as Natasha picked up Steve’s shield, following Clint’s commentary.

“They’re heading under the overpass, I’ve got no shot”

“Which way? “ Nat asked.

“Hard right… Now.” Clint instructed. Natasha did as she was told. As Clint hovered over the top of them Katie shot out from the back of the jet and swooped down just as Natasha threw the shield up to Steve. Steve caught it and instantly flung it, sent the AI flying backwards. Ultron wasn’t down for long, jumping up and resuming the fight as Katie landed behind the Robot as he sent a blast of power at Steve, who instantly held his shield up as he was catapulted backwards onto the bonnet of the car behind. She fired a repulsor at the AI, causing him to turn his attention to her as he wheeled round and shot back. She flew out of the way as the shot hit the car behind, the screeches of brakes and grinding of metal hit her ears as cars collided on the road.

“You Starks are like insects.” Ultron hissed out. “Annoying and irritating.”

“Yeah well, some insects pact a bit of a sting.” Katie shot out a static pulse from the shoulder of her suit. It immobilised Ultron for a good few seconds, which was long enough for Steve to climb back onto the top of the truck, hitting him once more with his shield. As Ultron fell forward towards Katie she jumped up, kicking out with her boot, pushing him down into the metal of the truck before landing.  Ultron regained control of his functions and the three of them began to fight, Steve and Katie dodging the rays of power as they flew at them, Ultron easily deflecting the beams the Supernova suit sent his way.

“Clint can you draw out the guards?”  Nat’s voice came over the comms.

“Let’s find out.”  Clint replied simply.

Katie fired another static pulse towards Ultron, but he easily deflected it and shot once more at her as she spiralled away.

“You think I’d let you get me with that again?” he growled.

“No but, made you look.”  She grinned, and at that point Clint shot the jet downwards and it fired off a few shots at Ultron, deliberately missing the delicate package the truck contained. It worked and as Katie watched 4 Ultron Sentries fly out and follow the jet upwards. Ultron turned and flew at Steve who spun, slamming him into a concrete pillar by the side of the road. Katie swooped in, firing again but Ultron was ready and caught her with a beam causing her to spin blindly through the air.  With no JAVIS to help, it took her a while to regain control but eventually she righted herself just in time to see Ultron spear at Steve, the two of them crashing into a nearby moving train. She shot forward, putting all her power into her thrusters, speeding up to catch it.

"Heading back towards you, whatever you’re gonna’ do. Do it now.” Clint informed over the coms as Katie dropped down so I was level with the train, looking into the windows.

“I’m going in, guys can you keep him occupied?” Natasha questioned as Katie finally caught up with the right carriage to see Ultron sending Steve flying again, landing hard against a metal door.

“What do you think we’ve been doing!”  Steve grit out, shaking his head, as once again he stood up, and resumed his fight with the AI as Katie shot a beam through the window, catching the robot unawares and causing him to fly out of the side of the train.

As she flew in through the window, the AI came crashing through one a bit further up and the two of them shot at one another, the beams hitting in mid-air and deflecting off one another, blowing a hole in the roof of the train.

“The package is airborne.” Clint informed us, “I have a clean shot.”

“Negative I am still in the truck.” Natasha said.

“What the hell are you doing?” Katie yelled, as Ultron sent a bench of seats towards her, which she blasted out of the way.

“Just be ready, I’m sending the package to you, Clint!”

“How do you want me to take it?” Clint asked sarcastically as Katie looked up through the hole in the roof to see the truck way above them.

“Uh, you might wish you hadn’t asked that.”

At that point Katie was floored as Steve landed heavily on top of her, having been blasted off his feet by Ultron.

“Ow…” he muttered, rolling over and off the top of her. Katie groaned as her head bounced off the inside of her metal helmet and hadn’t even had chance to right herself when suddenly she was lifted off her feet as Ultron’s hand crushed at the neck of her suit.

“Like I said, insect.”  He growled, his grip tightening as she raised both her palms to fire, blasting them both backwards, in opposite directions as Katie crashed into the carriage behind. She sat up and shifted the debris and shot forward, as Ultron came again but he was sent backwards as a blur knocked him off balance- the male Maximoff twin. Ultron took a menacing step forwards and the metal guards shifted red and bent in front of us in a protective manor. The female, Wanda, stood behind Ultron, hands outstretched and glowing red. Ultron turned towards her.

"Please, don’t do this.” Ultron pleaded with her.

“What choice do we have?” Wanda countered.

Ultron turned back around and fired in Steve’s direction. Katie was quicker though, pulling him out of the way as the front of the train blew out. The AI then blasted out the side door and escaped.

“We lost him!” Katie said into her coms, face plate sliding back as Steve made his way to the front of the train, reaching over the driver. “Clint, Nat He’s headed back towards you.”

“Nat we gotta go!”  Clint said.

Steve turned back to Katie, shaking his head, he could find no pulse. The driver was dead and the train was out of control heading straight for the end of the line.

“Nat… NAT? Cap you guys see Nat?” Clint questioned worriedly.

"If you have the package, get it to Stark! Go!” Steve commanded, looking up instinctively as Katie reached his side.

“Do you have eyes on Nat?" Clint questioned once again.

"Go!” Steve ordered once again and it seemed Clint obeyed because there was silence on the other side of the coms. Katie looked at him, both of them worried about our friend but equally knowing they had to tackle the problem in hand. The train crashed through the stoppers at the end of the line and carried on, heading straight through the narrow streets.

“There are civilians in our path.” Steve turned to Pietro, once more resuming command. He nodded and sped off in a blur.

“Can you stop this thing?” Katie asked Wanda. She looked unsure but nodded and blasted red tendrils down into the underlining of the train.

It began to slow, but nowhere near enough for them to avoid the building they were heading straight at. Katie slid her face plate back and Steve held his shield out in front of them, protecting them from the impact, and they felt the train starting to slow down, before it eventually came to a steady stop a moment or so later in a street lined with small trading stalls and shops.

As the passengers scrambled to get off the train Steve and Katie remained where they were for a second, Katie’s face plate once more retracting.

“You’re bleeding.” Steve said gently, wiping at her brow.

“Least I’m still here.” She shook her head. “What about Nat?”

“We’ll find her.” He took a deep breath, looking her in the eyes. “I promise.”

He slung his shield onto his back and the pair of them exited the train. Katie spotted Wanda stood next to her brother who was resting against a wall breathing heavily, hunched over with his hands on his knees. As they approached he looked up at Wanda, waving her away

“I’m fine, I just need a minute.” He assured her.

“I’m very tempted not to give you one.” Steve snapped, giving the twins a hard look. The two Maximoffs shared an uneasy glance

“The cradle? Did you get it?” Wanda asked.

“Stark will take care of it.” Steve told her, his tone still clipped.

“No he won’t.” Wanda said incredulously.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Katie glared at the girl

“He will do anything to make things right.” Wanda implored.

Steve turned and gave Katie a questioning look before he spoke into the coms.

“Stark come in. Stark? Anyone on coms?” The only response Steve got was silence. He looked at Katie who tried as well, getting nothing but static. She then tried to route through her phone, but there was nothing there either.

“Ultron can’t tell the difference between saving the world and destroying it.” Wanda pressed “Where do you think he got that from?”

Katie took a moment to look around, squinting against the sunlight. People were gathering, chattering in Korean and pointing at the train stretched down the middle of the road.

“I saw into his head.” Wanda implored. “I saw what he has planned. It’s not what he said, not what he told us he wanted.”

“Oh and what did he say he wanted?” Katie asked, turning back to her, her arms folding across her chest.

“He said he wanted peace” the boy, Pietro spoke.

“Oh, well…” Katie snapped, looking round nodding and clapping her gauntlet clad hands together sarcastically “Good job”

“Look…” Steve stepped forward a little before his girl lost her temper, his hands grasping the buckle on his utility belt. “This isn’t about sides, or what’s happened before. It’s about how we shut Ultron down.”

“So, what happens now?” Pietro asked.

“That depends on you.” Steve answered, putting his shield on his back, keeping his stance non-confrontational. “You’ve worked with Ultron; you know how he thinks. We could use the help stopping him.”

Wanda snarled, lips curling back over her teeth. “We won’t work with Stark.”

“Well, you kinda have two options.” Steve retorted immediately, before Katie had chance to. The authority emanating from him was immense, his eyes steady. “You work with us, or work with Ultron. Your choice.”

Katie looked up at Steve as the twins both exchanged glances. Eventually she got fed up and sighed.

“I’m going back to check on Dr Cho.” she looked at Steve “And then I’m going home to figure out how we find Nat…”

“Katie… wait…” He started towards her as she turned, making to walk off up the narrow street

“I’m done waiting Steve.” She snapped, turning to look at him. “And seeing as you don’t seem to want to give things a second’s thought, why should I?” “What’s that supposed to mean?” He frowned, running to catch up with her.

“You work with us?” She imitated his voice. “How do you know that she isn’t in our minds, right now, and this isn’t some elaborate scam to get us right where Ultron wants?”

A breeze whipped her hair slightly, and Pietro stood at Steve’s side, Wanda in his arms.

“You move too slow.” the young man taunted looking at them. “We’ll meet you at Cho’s office.”

Katie let out a loud groan of annoyance and walked and out onto the main road, looking around. Steve took a deep breath, she was angry, he knew that. His girl held a grudge, far better than he ever could and he had a feeling that Wanda Maximoff wasn’t going to get round her with a simple apology. But they didn’t have time for that, they needed to get home, find Nat and figure out Ultron’s next steps. And the Maximoffs would be helpful.

Sirens were now flooding his ears and the Emergency services were all over the place, freeing people from the cars, crashed buses, you name it.

“Could use a ride.” Steve turned to her, raising an eyebrow. She glared at him for a moment, before sliding her face plate back down. Without saying a word she gripped his harness at the top above where it held his shield and propelled them both into the air.

Dr Cho was going to be ok. Thankfully. The Scientist kindly offered them the use of her QuinJet, which technically belonged to Tony anyway, but they were grateful nonetheless. As Katie thanked the man who had led them to it, Steve turned to the Maximoff twins.

“Go on.”

Katie felt her mouth drop open as Wanda hesitated and looked to her brother who simply nodded and the two of them boarded.  Katie watched them incredulously before she rounded on Steve and he winced, awaiting the barrage which hit him full pelt.

“I can’t believe you seriously want to take them back to base.” She hissed at him.

“I told you before, they can help.” He replied calmly.

“You’re out of your mind!” Katie shook her head, the petulant child in her well and truly rearing its head “You know what actually, if they’re going, then I’m staying here.”

“For God’s sake Katie…” Steve groaned exasperatedly, running his hand through his hair, his helmet hanging in his left hand “You’re being unreasonable…”  

“I’m being unreasonable?” She rounded on him, her cheeks flushing with anger. “You’re the one who wants to take them right into the middle of our base, give them access to all our technology, when we don’t know if they’re still working for Ultron or not!”

“Katie, just get on the fucking jet now.” Steve’s voice was low, but he was angry.  He didn’t have time for this shit, he was tired, worried, and just wanted to get them all together so they could find Nat and end this and she was behaving like a total brat.

Katie looked at him, his eyes were flashing and he had a look on his face she couldn’t ever recall him using on her before. It was enough to shock her into compliance, but only after she shot him the dirtiest glare she could, before she stormed onto the jet.

Two hours later and Katie still hadn’t spoken a word to Steve or anyone else for that matter, she was fuming. Pietro and Wanda had been mostly silent up until that point, exchanging the odd bit of chatter between themselves in Sokovian, but neither approaching either of the other two until Pietro came to the cockpit.

“Miss Stark, I’m sorry, but please, do you have a spare jacket? My sister is cold.”

Katie glared at him, then looked to the back of the jet where Wanda was sat on one of the chairs, her knees pulled up to her chin. Damned it, despite everything Katie felt a small pang of pity for her.

“Sure, just give me a second.” She answered, a little gruffly but less angrily as she stood up out of her seat.

Steve had to smile, despite everything she wasn’t callous, and she knew what it was like to be cold and frightened. Katie glanced down and caught the look he was giving her and she glared at him.

“I will slap that smirk right off your face.” She threatened. Immediately he held his hands up, palms facing her in an “I’m sorry” motion and she walked over to the back of the jet and started looking in a few of the cupboards. Eventually she found a black fleece jacket, emblazoned with U-Gen logo, along with a blanket. In one of the other cupboards she found bottles of water supplies along with some snack bars and bags of chips.

“Here.” She walked over to Wanda and handed her the jacket and fleece.

“Thank you.” The teenager pulled the fleece around her.

“You hungry or need a drink?” Katie offered.

They looked at one another.

“I’m not going to poison you.” She rolled her eyes.

Wanda nodded and Katie handed her a bottle of water and Pietro took a granola bar from her and a bag of chips. Katie glanced at the twins and then suddenly had to ask the question that was on the tip of her tongue.

“Why do you hate us so much, the Avengers?” She blurted out. Steve turned his head slightly so he could listen in.

“I don’t hate the avengers. I hate you and your brother. Well I did. I don’t know maybe I still do.”

“But why?” Katie said, puzzled “You don’t know us?”

“Our home was bombed.” Wanda said, looking at her hands “It hit 2 floors below and blew a hole in our floor. Our parents fell but Pietro grabbed me and we rolled under the bed.” “The second one hits.” Pietro continued gently “But it doesn’t explode. It just sits there, three feet from our faces. And on the side of the shell is painted two words…” “Stark Industries” Katie swallowed, suddenly understanding. “You know we shut the arms side of the business down once we both realised the damage it was doing. I know that doesn’t absolve us of any guilt but…my brother is a good man, maybe he doesn’t always get it right but he tries.”

“But that is my point.” Wanda pressed “Ultron…he wants world peace, but he thinks the way to do that is to kill people, innocent people.”

“That’s not what Tony wants” Katie pressed

“But he created Ultron.” Pietro joined the conversation

“Yes, because of you!” Katie implored.

“Sorry, because of us?” “You made him see something, in Strucker’s lab. A vision, a vision that showed all of the Avengers dead, the world ending and Tony was left alone because he didn’t try hard enough to stop it.” At that point Wanda and Pietro exchanged glances as she continued “You made him believe he needed to do something, something more and Ultron was the result. He was supposed to be the thing that Tony thinks we need, something to bring peace…”

“You know, maybe we aren’t that different to Stark after all.” Pietro broke the moment or so silence that had descended. “I mean, we volunteered for HYDRA.”

“They said that they would make us super-human, like your Captain America over there.” Wanda sipped her water and Steve’s eyes flickered over the back of the jet for a moment before he turned back to the front. “Then we could fight…”

“They didn’t say what it would cost.” Pietro spat. “The experiments. The constant pain.”

“Guess we all made bad decisions for what we thought were the right reasons.” Katie shrugged “What matters now is how we fix this mess.”

With that she left them to it, taking her drink and one for Steve to the front of the jet.

“Thanks.” he said gently

“I assume you heard all that.”

“Super sensitive hearing, Doll, what can I say?” He smiled. She rolled her eyes. “You still pissed at me?” She raised her eyebrow at him, and with a teasing note chastised him. “Language.”

Steve smiled, reached over for her hand and drew it up to his face, pressing a soft kiss to her knuckles before he let go and took a drink of water, before he glanced back out of the front window of the jet.

An hour or so later they managed to get through to Clint on the coms.

“Any news on Nat?” Katie asked him.

“I’m trying the old fashioned way. That should avoid Ultron. I’ll find her”

“I don’t doubt it Hawkeye.” She smiled.

“What about Stark and the cradle?” Steve asked.

“In the lab with Banner, why you ask?”

Katie glanced at Steve, his jaw set tightly but that was the sum total of the reaction from him. He didn’t want to voice what was on his mind and risk pissing her off even more. Instead he chose his words carefully.

“Just… well, the twins told us what’s in that Cradle and Ultron’s plans for it. I’m worried Tony could start something he doesn’t understand.”  “Twins? The Maximoffs?” Clint asked and then he let out a groan “You’re bringing them here aren’t you?”

“You gotta trust me on this one, Clint.” Steve sighed “They’ve seen Ultron’s end game. They want to help us fight him.” “Yeah well I’ll make my own mind up on that one, I’ll see you when you get back.” “Great…” Katie sighed “Now he’s pissed as well.”

**** “I’m gonna say this once!” Steve’s voice was loud

“How about "nonce”?” Tony shot back.

“Shut it down!” Steve pointed at the cradle.

“Nope, not gonna happen.”  Tony shook his head.

There had been a bit of a fight in the lab, shields being flung, repulsors fired, and then Thor had turned up, supercharged the cradle, and it had gotten even stranger when a red man, an android had emerged.

“I’m sorry,” he said sincerely, in JARVIS’ voice “That was, odd. Thank you.” He added nodding respectfully to Thor, before his unnervingly human-looking eyes trailed over Thor thoughtfully. Then he rolled his shoulders and a cape of his own appeared and flowed down his back.

“Thor, you helped create this?” Steve asked

“I’ve had a vision, the world, where it starts, all hope and life and at its centre, is that.” Thor responded pointing to the gold stone in the middle of the man’s forehead.

“What the gem?” Banner asked in confusion. Thor nodded.

“It’s the mindstone,” He explained. “One of the six infinity stones, the greatest power in the universe and it is unparalleled in its destructive capabilities.”

“Then why would you bring it to life?” Katie asked, taking a deep breath, folding her arms.

“Because Stark is right.” Thor said.

“Oh, it’s definitely the end of times.” Bruce sarcastically to Tony’s shocked but proud expression.

“The Avengers cannot defeat Ultron.” Thor continued and the red man politely cut in.

“Not alone.”

“Why does your vision sound like JARVIS?” Katie questioned still cautious of this new being.

“We reconfigured Jarvis’ matrix, to create something new.” Tony walked up towards his masterpiece and examined him.

“I think I’ve had my fill of new.” Steve replied sarcastically.

“You think I am a child of Ultron.” The red man stated rather than asked.

“You’re not?” Steve replied suspiciously still glaring.

“I am not Ultron.” He answered simply. “I am not JARVIS. I am…” He looked down at his hands as if they would hold the answer.

“I looked in your head,” Wanda stated stepping towards him. “I saw annihilation.”

“Look again.” Vision responded in the same simple tone.

“Ha, her seal of approval means jack to me.” Clint snorted, Katie found herself inclined to agree.

“Their powers, the horrors in our heads, Ultron himself, they all came from the mindstone.” Thor said, looking round “And that is nothing compared to what it could unleash, but with it on our side-”

“Is it?” Steve cut Thor off then turned aiming his next question at him towards the red man, needing to hear confirmation “Are you, on our side?”

“I don’t think it’s that simple.” Vision answered truthfully.

“Well it better get real simple real soon.” Clint said seriously.

“I am on the side of life,” Vision continued, “Ultron isn’t, he will end it all.”

“What’s he waiting for?” Tony asked.

“You.” He stated easily, looking around at us all.

“Where?” Katie pressed.

“Sokovia.” Clint supplied helpfully. “Yeah, he’s got Nat there too.”

Katie looked at Clint who raised his eyebrow slightly and he shrugged. He’d found her, just like he said.

“If we’re wrong about you,” Bruce said approaching the man. “If you’re the monster Ultron created you to be…”

“What will you do?” The red man asked and Bruce stayed silent.

“I don’t want to kill Ultron, he is unique, and he’s in pain,” Vision paced slowly around the room, “but that pain will roll over the earth, so he must be destroyed. Every form he’s built, every trace and presence of him. We have to act now. And not one of us can do it without the other.”

He turned back to look at everyone in the room individually, then he did something completely unexpected as he picked up Thor’s hammer from the table. Steve felt his eyebrows raise in shock whereas Katie was looking at Thor, her mouth open, the god was wearing a look of utter confusion.

“There may be no way to make you trust me, but we need to go.” Vision finished holding out the hammer for Thor to take. Thor took his weapon back and the man walked away.

There was a moment of silence before Thor coughed.

“Right, well done.” he said awkwardly patting Tony on the shoulder and followed the red man out of the room.

“Three minutes, get what you need.” Steve announced.

**** Chapter 24 Part 2

[artificialqueens]

I'm Not Into Sometimes, Chapter 1 (Rosnali) - SnowBun

A/N: After who knows how long, I am finally writing again. A true shocker. This one will be about 5-8 chapters long (again, who knows? I’m just winging it) with much emotion. Hope you guys are all well during this difficult time xx

For me, because self-love is admitting that you’re suffering through the writing process for your own pleasure.

Summary: Denali goes viral on the internet and is hired to choreograph for Rosè.

–

Two weeks.

It’s been two weeks since Denali posted the video of her choreography to 100% Pure Love. Two weeks since she posted a video of her spilling all the passion in her cup on the dance studio floor. Two weeks since the world has watched and decided to give her five minutes of fame.

At first, it was validation. She thought that her existing followers and a few other people would see the video and think, “Denali’s fucking Talented with a capital T.” It was the way every other video she had posted had gone down. She knew the video was above even her standards, but the larger than usual wave of gratification didn’t feel like anything special.

But then Monet X Change jumped into the party, sharing the video and telling her millions of followers that she was one of the best choreographers and dancers she’d ever seen. That’s when she knew this one was different. This was more than validation; this was the world suddenly turning its head to put its eye on her.

Yet, she thinks that two weeks might have been the limit. She’s posted more content to keep people interested, but nothing has quite captured people’s attention like that first video. The stream of DMs, comments and views have been decreasing and she thinks, “Well, I just have to keep trying.”

But here she is, sitting at her desk job, feeling utterly fucking useless. She’s staring at a screen when her heart is all the way on the other side of the city, its thump, thump, thump beating along to the rhythm of music.

She’s aware of the student loans that beg to be paid each month, but every breath is a punch of anxiety to the stomach. Inhales of whispers saying, “Look where your passion has gotten you.” She chokes on the air, leaving her lightheaded and powerless.

Her phone lights up. “There goes another one.” She thinks to herself as she swipes to open Instagram. If she follows the pattern of the last two weeks, it’s either a new fan complimenting her or a dipshit asking for her nudes. Oh, the sad reality of virality.

But she stares at the bright blue check mark beside the username. She thinks it’s staring back, laughing and saying, “Look at your face, priceless!”

“Hi Denali!” It reads. “I’m Tamisha Iman from Iman Entertainment. I’ve been loving your videos and I wanted to reach out with an opportunity to choreograph some projects. Here’s my email so we can discuss details. Hope to hear from you soon!”

Her brain can barely register the words on the screen, but she knows that there’s only one thing left to do. She knows that the last few months of working her ass off as a part-time choreographer have led up to this moment.

She walks away from her desk, the sound of her pumps on the floor echoing in the aisles of the bland beige office. She hears the receptionist say something about him being on a call, but she doesn’t even stop to take a breath before swinging the door open. She’s face-to-face with her boss, a man who probably doesn’t even know her name, with a smile and a look in her eyes that’s almost delirious.

“I quit.”

—

On her way home, she realizes that she’s an idiot.

“You’re so stupid!” She says to herself as she swings open her apartment door. She hasn’t even replied to Tamisha and she’s already indulging spontaneous moments of catharsis over security. What if she found someone else in the span of an hour? The woman was in the business long enough to know someone just as good with far more experience. That last thought threatens to send her into a spiral, so she pulls out her phone and rushes to email a reply.

“Thank you so much for thinking of me, Ms. Iman! Really glad you liked the video. Could I have some details about this opportunity? I would love to work with you on any upcoming projects.”

For a moment, her thumb hovers over the send button. She takes a snapshot of this moment in her head. “This is it,” She thinks to herself. “This is where it all starts, Denali.”

She presses send and lets out a long exhale.

—

Three days.

It’s been three goddamn days since she quit her job and emailed her reply. It’s been three days of complete and utter suffering as the receiver of radio silence. The first evening, she had remained wonderfully calm in the fact that it was too soon. The second evening was more hellish, each notification popping up on her phone looking more and more like mockery. This third evening was the worst of them all, leading her to wallow in the idea that she had prematurely quit her stable job for an opportunity that she had never been promised.

“Denali, you can’t just stay there.” Kahmora says from the kitchen, her tone soft and understanding.

She knows her roommate is right. She knows that she has to get up and face the music. She knows that her only two options right now are to God forbid, crawl back to her old job or call every single one of her contacts to stock up on gigs; but there it goes again, that little voice in her head that won’t quit, that stupid tiny voice that gives her hope that maybe, just maybe, tonight is the night she’ll get a reply.

She clutches the phone in her hand like the rosary from her all-girls Catholic school days. Every time she thinks about letting it go is accompanied by a sense of hope, faded like the old pictures her mother left in the attic at home.

Kahmora sits beside her and she leans on her friend, willing herself not to burst into tears. “You’re not any less amazing, you know.” She reminds her as she strokes her fine, blonde hair. “Maybe this opportunity just wasn’t meant to work out.”

It doesn’t take a philosophical genius to know that Kahmora is right. She’ll lay awake tonight and replay the words in her head like a mantra straight out of one of those self-help tapes they used to use on smokers in the 90s; but damn, did it sting like a bitch.

The phone comes alive in her hand, a notification glaring at her through the screen. She swipes so fast that she thinks she might have just broken some world record. As she rushes to check what it is, she prays to whatever higher power that is out there that this was it, that the snapshot in her head wasn’t for nothing.

Her eyes dart across the screen, expression the very picture of stunned. She turns her head to look at Kahmora, staring at her with anticipation.

“What is it?”

“I’m choreographing Rosé’s new music video.”

—

For a week, Denali lived, ate and breathed making the choreography for Phenomenon. Every waking moment was spent perfecting the moves. She made sure that every jut, pivot and turn was sharp and purposeful. She wanted to make sure that there was no doubt in Rosé’s mind that she wasn’t just a ten-minute internet sensation, but a damn good choreographer.

Part of that job description was to study Rosé’s movements in her past music videos. She had heard the singer’s voice everywhere (who hadn’t, really,) so there was no denying her incredible vocal talent. However, watching her move was just as breathtaking. She was a spectacular performer with a beautiful toned body, so unlike what she was used to seeing for other artists.

After Kahmora had dropped her off and she’d promised to return in three weeks in one piece, she boarded the plane with a ticket Tamisha had bought for her. Even with all the comforts of business class, she could not bring herself to settle. Anxiety-inducing questions popped up in her head and she did her best to swat them away like flies.

“What if she thinks I’m just that girl from the internet?”

“What if she hates the choreo?”

“What if we don’t get along at all and I get blackballed?”

By the time she gets into the car that Tamisha had sent to pick her up from the airport, her thoughts have swirled and mixed, creating a dangerous cocktail of nerves that settles in the pit of her stomach.

As the car stops in front of the Iman Management Agency office, she settles for a nice deep breath. “You’re going for the gold, Denali.” She whispers to herself.

When she swings the door open and quickly lets her eyes roam, she comes to the disappointing realization that Rosé is nowhere in sight. For a week, she’d hyped herself up to make a good first impression.

The disappointment is quelled when Tamisha Iman stands up from her desk. She is nothing short of glamorous, with her gorgeous dark hair and tailored suit. Her smile is warm and inviting, and she almost forgets that the very thought of this moment would have made her throw up a few days ago.

“Denali!” She beams, walking over to shake hands. “So nice to meet you, I’m Tamisha. I gotta say, I thought I had seen everything after 30 years in the business; but I’ve never seen anyone move quite like you do.”

“That’s so nice of you to say, thank you.” Denali replies appreciatively, albeit somewhat shyly. “That video popped off so unexpectedly. I’m really glad you liked it.”

“Oh, who wouldn’t?” Tamisha gestures for her to take a seat in front of her desk. As she moves, Denali notes the utmost grace and poise that she carries herself with. With all her experience, she expected nothing less than this type of professionalism. “I see someone move like that and I know that they have what it takes to work with my talent.”

“Speaking of which,” She starts hesitantly. “I was hoping to meet Rosé. You know, get to know her and be comfortable before we start working.”

For a moment, Denali senses an exasperation when Tamisha sighs; but then, she just smiles apologetically. “I’m really sorry, but you’ll have to wait until your first session tomorrow. She’s really throwing herself into finishing this album, so she couldn’t make much time in her schedule.”

At first, she feels disheartened. It’s a mixture of, “Am I not worth meeting?” and the excitement of finally meeting the woman whose talents she’d been studying for a wholeass week; but then, the disappointment gives way to more anticipation. Meeting her in the studio means meeting her in her wheelhouse. There was no way, shape or form that she could disappoint anyone in her area of expertise.

“No worries, Ms. Iman. I’m looking forward to meeting her.”

—

Denali expects that she’s going to wake up with a headache that feels like her brain is in a meat grinder when she gets up the next morning from a restless night; but it’s only 5:30 and she knows that the idea of today, the culmination of a lifelong dream, is far too thrilling for her to have no energy.

She swings her legs out of bed quickly, not giving herself too much time to think. She knows that the studio is barely five minutes away from the hotel and that the call time is 7:00, but if she sits still too long, she knows she’ll concoct another dangerous cocktail of anxiety and insomnia. If possible, she’d like to avoid that.

She steps into the shower and lets herself breathe deeply, relishing in the way the lungs fill with air and her muscles contract. She focuses on her senses and lets it flood her head. Better that than a doom scenario her mind will inevitably come up with.

She puts on her leggings and a sweater over her mesh top to protect herself from the chill of New York air. For the shortest moment, she allows herself to stare at her reflection and hype herself up.

“Move aside world, it’s your girl, Denali.”

When she gets to the studio, it’s predictably empty. It looks little like the studio she went to in Chicago. All the walls are a deep cool grey instead of the white walls with a brick accent that she’s used to. The floor is a much darker shade of brown too; but even then, she is reminded of home. This little box is where her love lies and she feels safe.

She checks her phone and sees that it’s only 6:40. “Huh.” She says to the empty air. She walks towards the mirror at the front of the room, the click of her heels echoing against the four walls.

“Might as well.” She says to herself as she sticks her phone in the dock. She chooses 100% Pure Love and starts swaying along to the music. If she’s honest, she hasn’t fully listened to the song since she recorded that fateful video; but when the music hits, her body remembers the movement. She watches herself in the mirror, the planes of her body shifting in fluid motions. She can see her body come alive, marrying freedom with control and she remembers then why the feeling is unparalleled.

Right as the song finishes, she hears another set of heels tapping against the floorboards. She sees someone come into view through the mirror. She spins as gracefully as she can to greet her, but her brain suddenly stops working.

Rosé is special and she knows it right away. She is somehow exactly the same but completely different from what she had expected. She sees the same face, sternly set jaw and amazing body that she had seen on a screen. The fact that she looks just as good in person leaves her completely dazed.

“Hi.”

Denali shakes her head, laughing lightly to hide that she’d been staring like an idiot. “Sorry, I just got a bit surprised.” She walks over, hand extended. “I’m Denali, the choreographer.”

“Rosé.” Her lips are pressed into a tight-lipped smile as she shakes Denali’s hand. The response is verging on cold, but it’s nothing for her to cry home about. She wasn’t so naïve as to think that this would become a ‘I’ll be your new best friend’ type of situation.

An awkward silence falls over them and Rosé refuses to look away. She feels like she’s being studied and she thinks her skin might start to itch from the discomfort. “So uhm,” She claps her hands together. “Let’s get straight into it?”

“Sure.”

Denali squats down to change the track as Rosé drops her bag in a corner of the room. “I’ll show you the choreography first, then we’ll go off from there. Sound good?” She called over her shoulder.

“Yeah, let’s do it.” Rosé replied as she sat at the side of the room.

Denali stands to the back of the room, staring at her reflection and willing herself to ignore the head of pale pink hair to the side. She marches forward, all attitude and spice, forever thinking of how to make every single moment an amazing performance, no matter the audience. As she sees herself dance, she realizes just how proud she is. This choreography is one of her best and she knows it.

She ends with her arm straight out and pointing at the mirror. She catches her breath, realizing that she’d been holding it. Her eyes move to Rosé who, apart from slightly raised eyebrows, is expressionless. She tries her best not to feel offended. She’s this proud of her work and she can’t even get a smile?

“So, what do you think?” She asks, hoping for a comment, quip, any response that could validate her work.

“It was good but,” Rosé pushes herself up and stands next to her. In the blink of an eye, there’s a shift. She becomes fully immersed in the work, nothing short of absolutely serious and a picture-perfect professional. “That part right before I enter the second verse. I was hoping for something like…”

She goes to the back of the room and spins to the front, a flurry of cotton candy clouds sweeping through the studio. Denali feels dizzy, but she can’t deny that Rosé looks fantastic doing the move and, to her chagrin, it does suit the music more. Even then, there’s an ache that comes with admitting it.

“Yeah, I think we can make that work.” She looks at Rosé and their eyes meet. It feels like too much, like sinking into a hole in the ground because holy shit, she can see straight through me. She’s never seen eyes quite like that before.

“Okay!” She exclaims quickly, giving herself an excuse to look away. “Let’s start from the top.”

The next two hours pass fairly quickly. By how quickly Rosé catches on and the number of edits that she makes to the choreography, she can tell that she’s had some type of professional training. The idea of that leaves her intrigued, but it’s overshadowed by her dejection. She’s a spectacular student, but the detached responses and almost too professional attitude leave Denali thirsty for some kind of gratification.

By the end of the session, Rosé has learned at least half of the choreography and Denali can’t deny that she’s impressed that she could keep up. She turns to look at her and is surprised to see her smiling for the first time. It lights up her whole face, even those damn eyes that she can’t bear to look at.

“Oh God, that was great!” She exclaims and it reminds Denali of a child after getting off a rollercoaster. “This is going to be my best video yet.”

Denali smiles back, finally relaxing after getting a hit of that delayed validation. “I think so too.” She agrees, looking down at her feet. “I mean, your work is fantastic and it’s honestly such an honor to do this with you.”

Rosé laughs and she decides that she likes the sound. It’s not the tinkling of windchimes on her mother’s porch. It reminds her of the beat of music when it moves through her. It’s deep, genuine and comforting, pulling at the rope bundled up into knots in her stomach.

“Are you kidding, Denali?” She says in disbelief. “Your choreography for this has been so good and I could not have asked for someone better to work with.”

She lets herself look into her eyes, now so full of joy and warmth. It feels like a different person, but she knows that it’s just two sides to the same coin. There’s something about the blurred line between the professional student she had just taught and the sincere woman speaking to her that blows her mind.

“Not gonna lie, that makes me feel really relieved.” She admits, pretending to wipe sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand. Rosé laughs again and she has to bite her lip to stop herself from smiling too wide.

Rosé’s phone suddenly rings and she runs over her to her bag to check it. She groans and turns to Denali, looking irritated for a reason she can’t quite place. “Shit, I should get going.” She picks up her things and smiles again. “It was nice to meet you, Denali.”

“You too, Rosé.”

The singer is walking away when she stops in the doorway. She turns around and gives her a wink, so private and secret that she thinks it might be hiding from the glare of the sun streaming in through the windows.

“See you tomorrow.”

When she hears the door close, Denali all but collapses onto the ground, folding her legs under her and sighing deeply.

“Well, fuck.”

[cassyapper]

OKAY IVE ACTUALLY PLAYED TWO SESSIONS SINCE MY LAST POST SO IM GONNA COMBINE THEM HERE SORRY FOR THE LENGTH BUT,,IVE COME SO FAR I DONT WANNA STOP NOW

this is gonna be very messy cause i WILL be jumping back and forth as things come back to mind so uhh pls enjoy this absolute ramble <3

anyway. i continued playing omori and boy do i have some Thoughts

so first session; i went through the pyre(something i forgot the full name sob) forest/sprout mole village/sweetheart’s castle in one go and let me TELL YOU. DOING THAT WAS FUCKING INSANE I WENT NUTS holy shit.

so anyway.

pyre forest!!!! the lil race against the big spider coming after u for disturbing the smaller spiders mechanic was very fun i had a lot of fun figuring out the best routes to take. i know normally mechanics like that lead to ppl getting frustrated cause u have to keep retrying but i had a lot of fun!!!! sum annoyance but good natured type, th kind that just makes u try harder u know? i just enjoyed it JKFN;FN; candles in the foggy forest....now That is an aesthetic

the rare bear scared the fuckin shit out of me i remember it didn’t attack me straight away so i was like “aw (:” but then when i press x on him it takes me to a BATTLE SCREEN AND SUDDEN THAT MF IS TERRIFYING I WAS LIKE WHWHWHWHWKJDNJ. very funny i honestly wished i recorded my reaction

also omori is afraid of drowning...................................i am breathing heavily. i think whatever happened to mari is related to at least one of the things omori is scared of. so either heights, spiders, or drowning it seems. spiders doesnt seem super likely as a contributor to her death, and while falling from a height is more realistic, such a senseless way of dying doesnt seem to rlly fit ? with the vibe i get from the kiddos in the real world. which makes me think maybe drowning/otherwise suffocating is how she died...but we’ll see. also due to the forgotten library part, we know omori explicitly feared spiders/drowning before mari died so it’s also probable im jus talking out my ass here but still,,,,thoughts

also this motherfucker?

literally fucking terrifying. IT’S BODY IS MADE OF SUCC’D SPROUT MOLES...i still have no idea what exactly it was doing to them but jesus h christ!!!! evil and fucked up. do not feel bad for curbstomping it

sprout mole village!!!! very cute, im v excited to send that one dude his brother’s care package. i like how, when theyre not lost, sprout moles can be real endearing lil guys,,,theyre not my fav lil enemies but (:

also for some reason omori is the first game ive played where i really care about getting achievements ? so i literally did the back and forth on my save file just to get all the season sprout mole achievements JKDJFJ;. i ended up sticking w spring tho before moving on for real cause spring is my fav season irl (:

also i felt SO BAD for cutting down that one sprout mole’s chistmas tree he was just trying to celebrate but i wanted to see that present and coincidentally becoming a christmas ruiner was an achievement so all’s fair in love and war i suppose

ALSO. th fuckin plant monster thing under the scientist sprout mole’s room. major little shop of horror vibes from the design, absolutely adored it!!!!! originally i did  just cut the wire holding the piano over it, ending it in one go, but i was very curious abt it so i reloaded a save file to actually fight it and

i know it only spread that gas to make the kiddos happy cause being happy reduces attack i think ? it decreases attack/defense but seeing the kiddos smile so much was nice (:

however

omori...sunny....son boy.........u good ?

and now. sweetheart

the way the sprout moles completely adore and depend on sweetheart gives me such awful evil vibes and combined with such a luxurious background was fucking incredible

sweetheart herself, speaking of. bitch (sorta affectionately, certainly not derogatory)

i talked to every sprout mole in the audience before taking my seat and i literally dont know why. even when i picked up the pattern of where the unique dialogue could be found (usually the sprout moles farthest right) i still talked to all of them......just in case ? i have no idea. i dont know why i did that. i feel it’s important that i note it tho

LMAO SO WHEN SPROUT MOLE MIKE DID THE MINUTE OF SILENCE FOR YE OLD SPROUT MOLE

I LITERALLY FELT SO FUCKING BAD LMAO I WAS LIKE OH MY GOD NO!!!!!! I DID THAT!!! I KILLED HIM!!! OH MY GOD!!! I WONDER HOW AWKWARD OMORI KEL HERO AND AUBREY FELT IN THE AUDIENCE HOLY SHIT THEY HAD FRONT ROW SEATS TO SPROUT MOLE MIKE’S MOURNING!!! MY GOD FJKFN;;

also sprout mole mike describing 3′7″ inches as ”towering” was the FUNNIEST shit i have ever seen. also i have to wonder, since sweetheart made up the whole show of sweetheart’s quest for hearts in the first place, if she was seriously down to marry a sprout mole if one suited her fancy. jus v funny to me honestly. SPEAKING of sweetheart’s dating patterns I NOTICED THOSE FEM SKELETONS IN THE DUNGEON!!!!! BI SWEETHEART!!!! SHE’S JUST AS DOWN FOR GIRLS AS SHE IS BOYS

i know TECHNICALLY not everyone is in the dungeon for failing to be a good enough suitor but STILL...COME ON. THIS WAS BEFORE WE KNEW THAT. SWEETHEART BI I WILL DIE ON THIS HILL

anyway

when the lights when out and lightning struck the third contestant, i knew Immediately something was gonna go down. and when the mustache sprout mole was like “oh yes!! u!! in the striped pjs!! u absolute beast ur perfect!!!” i KNEW hero had just been selected as the replacement i was goign completely fucking nuts i was like OH MY GODNFNG; HIS HEART IS ALREADY TAKEN BY MARI!!!!!!! STOP

i ended up taking so many screenshots during this part cause i was going feral so here take a glance just cause i love, uh, hero

OUR HERO IN SHINING ARMOR DJLBH;KFJB

also GOD FUCKING DAMMIT IM SHORTER THAN HERO

hero shaking on the stage when he was introduced...oh my HEART....IM SO FOND FOR THIS BOY WTF!!!!! DKJDN;N

this is not really NEWS to me since it’s implied hero is tall but like come ON..... sorry just every time i find out a character is explicitly taller than me i need to huff about it, moving on,

HERO FUCKS

sorry i just have so many screenshorts during this aprt cause i was going fucking crazy but

literally terrifying! sweetheart bathes in that shit!! christ!

is blood good for ur skin? i imagine, so long as like...gore isnt in it and it’s solely blood it cant be BAD necessarily......but good ? regardless very fucked up. besides the fact that well, uh, BLOOD, blood is also sticky as hell. ur telling me sweetheart willinglhy bathed in that shit? disgusting. at least thin it out

anyway I HAD SO MUCH FUN DOING THE PUZZLES AT SWEETHEART’S CASTLE....FROM THE DUNGEONS TO THE KITCHENS TO THE BALLROOM TO THE LIBRARY TO THE GARDENS JUST EVERYTHING!!!! IT WAS SO FUN I ENJOYED FIGURING IT OUT SO MUCH IT WAS LITERALLY DELIGHTFUL...I LOVE THIS GAME SO MUCH THE GAMEPLAY IS SO FUCKING EPIC I LITERALLY HAVE SO MUJCH FUN.......OH MY GOD I JUST. INCREIDBLE!!!! FUCK

also the lil sir maximus bit.........i honestly felt really awful over having to kill them ): i think i even tried running once but it wouldnt let me...it hurt man ): they were just a family....

um but anyway,

i think it was rlly sweet how aubrey protested to the wedding cause she was worried abt sweetheart,,,like i cant rlly explain it idk how to put it into words,,like sweetheart is clearly not mentally well and having an episode, and aubrey being the only one to say “hey what ur doing is self-destructive and isolating” just mmmh. she cares a lot,,,and *i* care aubrey

also sweetheart’s battle theme fucking SLAPPED...SO GODDAMN HARD IM STILL QUAKING OVER IT....FUCKING BANGER YO!!!!!! INCREDIBLE

ah but alas

BASIL........I NOTICED THAT IT WAS HIS GHOST/SHADOW DURING THE EXIT FROM OTHERWORLD AS WELL BUT JUST FUCK

im so worried about basil ):

and it being so obvious that none of the others can see...........them asking omori if he’s okay.....oh my god. i go nuts

and then...the forgotten library part

i literally cried, again, oh my fucking god

these kids loved each other so much they ADORED the time they spent with each other and im QUAKING to know WHAT HAPPENED TO MARI......HOW DID THE FALLOUT GO. I NEED TO KNOW I NEED TO KNOW I NEED TO KNOW

i know there are multiple endings to this game and on god i am not QUITTING until i get the happiest ending there is for these kids im literally a goddamn fuckign mess oh my god

MARI SHWOING UP IN THE LIBRARY AT ONE POINT AND LEADING OMORI...........IM LTIERALLY GOIGN INSANE OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD HE LOVED HIS SISTER SO MUCH HE’S SO CLEARLY LOST WITHOUT HER I CANT FUCKING DO IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I NEED TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED. I NEED TO KNOW I NEED TO KNOW I NEED TO KNOW

GOD

okay sorry i just. ive said ti before but the grief in this game is so real and palpable and it aches, it aches so bad. also the white egret orchids in the library...i see u

but regardless.... session two real world electric boogaloo

LOVE that kel is like “so i need to run errands but u wanna come with me right? of course u do!” like fuck i rlly do. kel is just so delightful i would literally do anything to spend time with him

ALSO i noticed u can just refuse to open the door both times kel’s knocked now and it makes me wonder....if u could choose to ignore kel ? and then venture out urself or just ? i wonder what would even happen if u chose to not open the door. im CERTAINLY not doing it myself at the very least not this playthrough but i am curious...i bet that’s how u get a bad ending, by not talking w kel

but anyway....

aubrey and her gang not saying anything in the pizza parlor........i jus think abt that is all

ALSO!! pet rocks!!!!!!!!! LOVE this lil thing it’s so cute. jus rock paper scissors it babey

speaking of lil bits, love all the mini quests in the real world...it’s just rlly fun and builds up this cute lil town........it also makes me think that whatever happened to mari cant have been anything except an accident, bc no one comments on what a tragedy it was to omori. like if it was murder, there’s no way such a horrific situation wouldnt engulf the town for a bit and sweep over it for weeks at least, but that just doesnt seem to have happened. this is def me reading too into it tho;; point is neighbors nice (: also i got the seashell necklace and i go apeshit

ALSO......THE FUCKING...........CHURCH. I VISITED WITH KEL ON A COMPLETE WHIM CAUSE I WAS CURIOUS IF THE PASTOR WOULD TALK MORE ABT AUBREY BUT NO. INSTEAD HE TALKS ABT THE WEIRD VIBE FORM THE GRAVEYARD HE’S GETTING!!! AND THE DUDE WHO CHILLS IN THE GRAVEYARD SAYS SHIT ABT THE SPIRITS GETTING READY FOR SOMEONE TO JOIN THEM!!!! BITCH WAHT THE FUCK

THERE’S NOF UCKING WAY THIS ISNT ABOUT BASIL. THERE IS NO!!! WAY!!!! I SWEAR ON GOD IF BASIL DIES I WILL LOSE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ESP CAUSE THERE IS LITERALLY NO OTHER WAY HE COULD DIE EXCEPT SUICIDE THAT’S WHAT IT HAS BEEN IMPLYING OVER AND OVER I GO NUTS I GO APESHIT NO NO NO NO!!!!!!!!!!!!

FUCK

OKAY SORRY I JUST. HHHHHHHHHHH

baby has acquired baby

kel’s family is rlly cute,,,,v heartwarming. i trust them

i do worry abt like...the stark difference between recognizing kel’s accomplishments and hero’s...i just idk. i just keep thinking abt that bit in kel’s story abt hero’s depression when his parents focused on hero and ignored him, and i just. kel’s family is good People but i worry if kel has a good support system...i jus........): i am watching

ahh THE BASIL MISSING PART MADE MY HEART LITERALLY FUCKING DROP..I WAS SO FUCKING PANICKED I WAS LIKE OH MY GOD THIS IS IT BASIL IS DEAD

THANKFULLY HE WASNT BUT HOLY GOD HOW THAT WHOLE SITUATION PANNED OUT MADE ME GO NUTS!!!!!!! BASIL...AUBREY...HER GANG.......FUCK OH M YOGD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

THANK G O D I SNOOPED AROUND KEL’S HOUSE BEFORE LEAVING I WOULD HAVE H A T E D TO FIGHT THEM ALL AT ONCE IM GLAD I WAS ABLE TO JUST PEPPER SPRAY THEM JESUS CHRIST

oh my god kim like asking for aubrey all concerned before deciding to trust her and leaving.....kim i diagnose u with lesbain

the whole fucking. basil almost drowning scene. i seriously feel like ive changed like as a person over it. i am thinking . i am thinking. i am only evee thinking about mari and how omori just loved her so much and how the thought of her gave him strength. th pic of her ghost holding omori’s hand in the water made me cry

MMMM BUT. HERO!!!

I DIE I DIE I DIE HE’S SO PRETTY FUCK ALSO HIM PICKING UP BASIL WOOOOOOOO THIS IS WHAT IVE BEEN WAITING FOR THAT’S WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT YEAHHHHHHHH

god i feel so bad about leaving aubrey tho. shes so clearly not okay and she so clearly did not mean to push basil in and oh my GOD I JUST...PLEASE....PLEASE CAN WE JUST TLAK TO HER I NEED TO TLAK TO HER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I NEED TO FUCK

the ghosts of omori and aubrey on the swings made me cry out like i had been physically assaulted

AHH BUT THEN TAKING BASIL HOME AND WHILE HE’S IN HIS BED HE JUST SAYS “oh sunny...there’s not way out of this...is there?” I LITERALLY GO BUCKWILD APESHIT INSANE STUPDI!!!!!! BASIL YOURE PUTTING UP A LOT OF ALARMING FLAGS HERE!!! PLEASE DO NOT FUCKING DIE!!!!!!!!!!!!

FUCK. CHRIST. HELL. SHIT. THIS GAME IS DRIVING ME FUCKING CRAZY

GOD

oh my god but the day ending with hero and kel sleeping over at omori’s house...im kdnd im jkdim im not uhm okay THEY BUILT A BLANKET FORT PLEASE..I LOVE THEM

goddd hero going into the piano room....playing sum........and then asking omori abt the song he and mari used to play on violin...and then THE TITLE SCREEN MUSIC STARTS PLAYING....HI. HI HELLO HI YOU CANT FUCKIGN DO THAT HI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FUCK YOUFBJFGJNGN;EJNE; IM GOIGN NUTS

also the name omori comes from the piano.............interesting...i wonder why sunny likes being called omori in the dreamscape...

god but omori not having a srs hallucination cause he’s w his friends and he feels safe...im gonna sob

However. i did glance into the bathroom mirror. AND INSTEAD OF THE EYE MF IT’S A DISTORTED AS HELL GHOST MARI???IM SO FUCKIGN SCARED. IM SO SCARED. WHAT THE FUCK. WHAT THE FUCK? CREEPY AS HELL!!!

ohh my god this GAME

so finally i ended up in whitespace again. do NOT like that omori is completely alone in the world!!! what the FUCK!!!!!!!! I AM SO SCARED AT ALL TIMES. im literally about to go play sum more tho after dinner so i will see what happens. god i jsut......this game is so fucking good it has me by the balls dude. SO glad i decided to play it bruh

anyway thanks for reading all of this if u did, it’s an absolute monster ik and ur a real one

[theonlyjourneythatmatters]

Another day, another pound

So I know I said I was going to post yesterday, but I had a very long day and I was tired, so I didn't feel like it. I've struggled this week with motivation and energy and I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because of this heat- I don't know.

But with that said, I'm here now. And I've learned a few things! As I've said before, I am no expert and do not claim to be. I just know what's been working for me and that I can share that knowledge and experience with ya'll. So here we go.

What I learned this week:

It's better to get your bulk calories in at the beginning of the day. Breakfast should be your heaviest calorie meal. If you prefer a light breakfast, then focus your calories at lunch. This is because you're more likely to work off those calories during the day than you are at night after dinner. I know a lot of people prefer a heavy dinner- but this is a major reason why that weight doesn't come off like you want it to. You're not burning off those dinner calories!

Everything you do burns calories. Well, I didn't JUST learn this- I've known this. But for some reason, it didn't click! So don't think ONLY strenuous exercise will help you burn calories. Of course, exercise will help you burn them faster in a shorter amount of time, but if you can't get to the gym every day, you're still burning calories.

My apple watch tracks everything. I wear it from the time I get up in the morning til I'm ready to lay down for the night. And what's better than counting my steps? It counts the calories burned, too! Adding this at the end of the night helps me keep a better estimate of what I've taken in vs put out for the day for calories. Do yourself a favor- invest in something that keeps track of that (watch, fitbit, etc). It is well worth the money especially for weight loss.

Sundays are for meal-prep!!!

I meal prep for the following week(s) on Sundays. I typically prep every other Sunday for my work lunches. I do -not- meal prep for dinners.

Every Sunday, I prep my snacks for the week (usually strawberries and blue berries). If there's a new item I want to eat, I'll prep that up as well. Today, I wanted to add cabbage soup to the work lunch mix. SO, that's what I did. I made it in the instant pot, so this is the instant pot recipe- but this can be adapted for a regular stove top. I included pictures for reference so ya'll can see the sizes.

I also decided to meal-prep some breakfast; which I do not normally do. But the meal replacement shakes don't seem to be working as well as they had been previously, so I'm going to retire them for a bit.

Cabbage Soup

Ingredients:

2 heads cabbage, medium; chopped in large chunks

3 pieces of thick sliced bacon (I used Great Value brand); chopped and cooked

1 15oz can tomato sauce (Great Value)

1 bag Premium matchstick carrots (Bolthouse Farms- 3.5 oz bag)

1 sweet Vidalia onion, medium size; chopped in small pieces

1 tbsp. of the following: course sea salt, ground black pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, Slap ya Mama Cajun seasoning (or Tony Cacheres- I like my soup to have a bit of a kick, but you can decrease or increase this amount to suit your tastes)

7 cups water (divided- explained in steps)

Directions:

Put the instant pot on sauté and set for 20 minutes. Chop the 3 pieces of bacon into bite sized pieces and begin to cook them until brown. (I cooked mine a little longer so the crisp wasn't completely lost in the soup)

While the bacon is cooking, start cutting up both heads of cabbage. Cut them into 1-1 & 1/2 inch chunks after removing the core. Set aside in large bowl.

Once the bacon is cooked to your liking, add 1/2 cup of water to "deglaze" the pot. This gets up all of that stuck-to-the-bottom flavor that you need. DO NOT DRAIN THE BACON. We need the grease.

Begin to add the cabbage a hand full at a time, making sure it mixes with the water and bacon pieces. Allow each batch to wilt down some before adding the next batch. Continue with the cabbage until it's all incorporated. Once complete, add 1/2 cup of water.

Add the carrots and mix with the cabbage and bacon mixture.

Add all of your seasonings into 1 cup of water and pour over the top of the cabbage. You can mix it now if you want to, or you can wait.

Set the instant pot to pressure cook, and set for 10 minutes. Once the 10 minutes is passed, allow the pot to Natural Release for another 10 minutes. After the Natural Release is done, use the manual release. * NOTE: this is a dish with a good amount of liquid. Use a potholder to dish towel to put over the valve when you do the manual release to avoid any splattering liquids.

Once the pressure is released, stir the soup and taste test it. Add any seasonings you feel like it may need.

Chop the onion into small pieces and add it to the soup. Add the entire can of tomato soup, and 5 more cups of water. Stir well. Pressure cook for another 2 minutes and allow to Natural Release for another 10 minutes. Give it one last stir and taste test, and enjoy!

Step one: Sauté the bacon. Ya'll see all that bacony flavored goodness stuck to the bottom?? We WANT that.

Step two: Cut the cabbage. Size isn't that important- but you do want bigger pieces as cabbage likes to shrink!

Step Four & Five: Mix the cabbage and carrots and allow to wilt a little bit

Finished product: big bowl of deliciousness

This recipe yields 20 cups of soup, which is 10 full servings. There are 48 calories and and 4.8g of proteins in a single cup of soup- but I recommend 2 cups being the serving size.

*This recipe can be changed to fit your specific needs. I do not add meat to mine other than the bacon, but you can add chicken, stew meat, etc. You can also add different veggies. I sometimes add canned diced tomatoes but I didn't have any today. Just be mindful of the added calories and adjust the recipe to reflect that (especially if you're using a calorie counter that allows you to create customized meals).

I got 6 meals out of it (would have been the full 10 but I only had 6 available soup bowls); my husband and I had a bowl each, and so did my son. There was some left but no one wanted it so it got thrown out. It was delicious and filling. And the best part? SUPER low on calories! Most soups are; and I will be adding more to my blog as I make them! I make a knock-off Olive Garden Zuppa Toscano, so that might be my next endeavor!

Breakfast:

For this meal-prep, I used eggs, Conecuh sausage links, bacon (same as the one I used for the soup), and sausage patties.

Breakfast # 1: Scrambled eggs, thick sliced bacon, and Conecuh sausage

Ingredients

2 eggs, scrambled

1 tsp butter (I used Country Crock Churn Style)

1 tsp shredded cheese (I used shredded Colby and Monterey jack Great Value brand)

1 oz Conecuh sausage (you can use any type of sausage- I just prefer this brand)

1.5 slices of thick cut bacon (Great Value brand)

Course sea salt

Ground black pepper

Directions

Make 2 eggs, scrambled with butter and whatever seasonings of your choice

Add the cheese to the eggs when they're almost done cooking

Cook the bacon in the air fryer for 6 minutes (time varies depending on how crispy you like your bacon)

Cook the Conecuh in the air fryer for 7 minutes

Put the eggs in to a freezer-safe bowl

Cut the Conecuh and bacon into smaller pieces and put on top

Freeze

This recipe yields 1 full serving. It has 295 calories and 20.5 grams of protein.

Breakfast 2: Scrambled eggs, Conecuh sausage, and sausage patties

Ingredients

eggs, scrambled

1 tsp butter (I used Country Crock Churn Style)

1 tsp shredded cheese (I used shredded Colby and Monterey jack Great Value brand)

2 sausage patties (I used Tennessee Pride)

1 oz Conecuh sausage (any brand, this one is just my preference)

Course sea salt

Ground black pepper

Directions

Make 2 eggs, scrambled with butter and whatever seasonings of your choice

Add the cheese to the eggs when the eggs are almost done cooking

Cook the sausage patties in the air fryer for 8 minutes or until cooked through

Cook the Conecuh in the air fryer for 7 minutes

Put the eggs in to a freezer-safe bowl

Cut the Conecuh and sausage patties into smaller pieces and put on top

Freeze

This recipe yields 1 full serving. It has 481 calories and 29.6g of protein.

But enough of the recipes......

Like I stated previously, it's important to get the bulk of your calories during the day so you have the opportunity to burn them off. I've just been walking. I walk at work, I walk around the house- when I shop, that's when I get a lot of steps in.

Granted, walking doesn't burn a lot of calories. However, if you have your tracker on, throughout the entire day, you'll have burned at least 1 full meal off. It is also especially important to stay hydrated. Water no only helps with cutting down muscle pain (when you exercise), drinking a full 8 oz of water before each meal and after can help you feel fuller faster, and feel fuller longer.

I purchased a QuiFit 1 Gallon Water Bottle from Amazon. It arrived today and I plan to use it at work. I have the worst time drinking enough at work. The water from the sink tastes funny. We have a fountain that fills water bottles, but and don't always remember to bring a bottle of water that I can refill later. The simplest solution was to buy a water bottle and keep it at work.

I think that's all for today, guys. I have school work to do! I'll make a post later next week (unless something cool happens before then that I need to mention) that details what types of foods I eat for dinner since I do not meal prep those.

Have a great day, and thanks for reading!

XOXO, Lauren <3

[hazard-and-friends]

Month 11

What the fuck. Holy hell buddy.

The focus here will be catching us up with the missed months and then next month I’ll do a 1 year retrospective.

The last time I posted one of these was January 9th. In late February, we moved from FL to WA; at the end of the month we moved into a new, one bedroom apartment. In mid-March I started a part time job which I adore (running puppy camp at a R+ facility! in the next few weeks I’ll start teaching swims and puppy play groups!). So first we did a massive amount of prep for the move, and then we did even more prep for post-move things like “meeting my family” and “oh shit there’s hills now” and in between the two we’ve made huge strides on the cat thing.

The details!

Night time: We have completely stopped putting him in the crate at night. There were two reasons for crating to begin with: 1) We didn’t know where Penny wanted to sleep and didn’t trust them when we were asleep and 2) to create good sleepy associations prior to the plane flight. #2 is no longer relevant and a) Penny wants to sleep Up or in the bed and b) Hazard laaaaargely doesn’t care about her once the lights go off. So he sleeps on the floor, after a VERY exciting 4 nights at the airbnb where he got to sleep in the people bed with the people (Penny slept on top of the catinets cabinets).

Crate in general: I spent 2 months working on the plastic crate not being the actual devil, and he did end up being happy in it. But he’s regressed to thinking that crates in general are prison spaces due to the plane flight, so it’s all to the good that he doesn’t have to go in at all anymore. Regular crate training (for trials) is on the task list.

Medications: He was on trazodone through late March. For the flight itself, I started him on gabapentin (100 mg 3x daily) 24 hours before the flight, and gave him a double dose when we left the apartment. All of this was cleared with his vet first, consult with your own etc. No side effects and the gabapentin definitely helped--but he was still upset at takeoff and landing. One of the reasons I wanted him to see a vet in March was to switch off trazodone and onto something actually validated in separation anxiety. He’s now on Reconcile, 24 mg once a day. At 2 weeks in: No lasting side effects (the first 48 hours were a little weird), and overall anxiety is decreasing.

Anxiety in general: IT’S BEEN A FUN TIME Y’ALL. Because trazodone and prozac (Reconcile) both affect serotonin, he had to come off trazodone for 4-5 days before starting Reconcile. Which confirmed a bunch of things:

Trazodone wasn’t doing very much at all. 90% of the time he was unchanged.

He is WAY more anxious on car rides than anyone realized. Once off trazodone, he started whining continuously on the way out--the way back is fine, either because he’s exhausted, he knows we’re going home, or we’ve already been to the superfunexcitingplace.

Trazodone wasn’t doing SHIT for his separation anxiety, which was unchanged.

He was only slightly more reactive to the cat and no more reactive to strangers. Cool.

Now that we’re 2 weeks into Reconcile: Starting to see big improvements in separation anxiety (more on that later) and cat tolerance is back to baseline (ditto). Car rides are still chatty but rapidly improving. No side effects, still playful and happy and silly.

Separation anxiety: Over a month, we achingly worked our way up to 90 seconds of me gone, or 30 seconds of me gone if I had done one preparing-to-leave thing. And even that was unreliable. That’s not right, guys. That’s the big reason we switched medications. Because keep in mind that all of this is while Jo was in the room with him. Yesterday I left to run errands with no prep and he just watched. I love Reconcile. It took about 5 minutes for him to settle down, but still. Plan is to bust ass and get to 15 minutes with no pre-departure cues and then add them back in.

Cat: Two steps forward one step sideways. While he chases her every other day or so, there are no gates in the new apartment. Sometimes we close the door to the bedroom so Penny can be unmolested, but often she’s the one who wants out, and she’s finding more and more places to chill. Moooost nights Hazard gets tied (harness to longline to my desk) but that’s more so that we don’t have to be constantly watching. At night there’s sometimes scuffles, but those end with Penny wherever she wanted to be and Hazard under the bed.

Weight: Vet had him at 44 lbs but he hadn’t pooped that day. He’s now on diet Hills SD, 1.5 cups, but he also gets around 100 pieces of treats a day so that’s surely impacting things. He’s looking better and better though--nice thigh muscles.

Formal training: I have completely jumped the shark and started teaching rally cues. As soon as the budget balances I want to get back to doing rally with Sydney’s trainer, and he’s picking up the basics really fast. Also, recall?? Is coming along fabulously?? Amazing. Love it when I don’t have to do anything.

I jest, I did a lot. We did a bowl game where I put him in a wait, put food in his bowl, then went to the other side of the room and called him. He had to come to me before going to the food, and that really helped recall click in a way that other games hadn’t.

Handling: After 11 months I admitted defeat and took him to the vet for nails. The vet tech’s verdict is that he sang at her but she got them done in 5 minutes so hey. We’re going back to the very basics and doing it to enthusiasm, not compliance, this time. Sigh.

Good note: I did teach him a chin rest and he now LOVES offering it. Amazing. Love him so much.

Stranger danger: the BIGGEST progress. In the last month he’s met both my parents, my grandparents, one of my siblings, and a friend. 6 people, 3 genders, aged 19-77, and a whole array of builds and heights. They’re all white but you can’t have everything. A growing theme is he’s much better in novel environments than in his home base, so probably we’ll be meeting people outside and then walking them in. But still, seeing huge improvements in his willingness to associate with strange humans and let them touch him.

Walks: 40 min morning/20 min evening, except for once a week when it’s a 50-60 min hike or sometimes we rent the field at my work... It’s hard to be a dog ;) Fitness is less his problem on walks than focus for that long, so the hike is actually easier for him than 40 min along a 35mph road. Still, we’re getting lots of nice perky behavior out and about.

[notebooknebula]

Chris Prefontaine - Scale and Automate Real Estate Investing

https://www.jayconner.com/chris-prefontaine-scale-and-automate-real-estate-investing/

After many years of coaching and constantly doing deals himself independently, Chris Prefontaine founded Smart Real Estate Coach in 2014, bringing in his son Nick, daughter Kayla, and son-in-law Zachary as the company began to grow.

The family team coaches investors on how to properly scale and automate their businesses throughout North America — all without using their own cash, credit, or taking out bank loans to buy property. His team buys and sells homes in his own market every month.

Join our new Private Money Academy with a free 30 day trial, 

https://www.jayconner.com/trial

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Jay Conner (00:01): Well, hello there! And welcome to another episode of Real Estate Investing with Jay Conner. I’m Jay Conner, The Private Money Authority and your host. And let me give you a special welcome, particularly if this is your first time to tuning in. Here on the show at Real Estate Investing with Jay Conner, we talk about all things that relate to real estate investing from single family houses to commercial deals, to self storage, to land, to anything that you can imagine. Even note investing. Anything that you can imagine that relates to real estate investing. This show is for you, whether you are a seasoned real estate investor, or a brand new real estate investor.

Jay Conner (00:51): Here’s why. First of all, we talk about private money a lot on this show. How to get funding for your deals, regardless of your experience or your credit or your verification of income. You know, whether you’re seasoned or you’re brand new, everybody is always looking for new funding for your deals. As a matter of fact, on today’s show, my special guest, we will be talking about creative ways to get funding for your deals regardless as to whether you have private money lined up or not. In addition to that, people are always looking for ways to find really, really hot deals. We talk about that on the show here, we talk about how to automate your business, how to sell properties very quickly in order to reduce your carrying costs.

Jay Conner (01:36): But before I introduce to you my guest today, I want to give a special gift to you. You see, I mentioned a moment ago, I’m known as the private money authority. So if you are seasoned or brand new and you want more funding for your deals, I’ve got a free gift for you. And that is, I just recently launched my brand new membership, which is titled The Private Money Academy. It’s a monthly membership where I am live at least two times a month for the entire Academy where we do a hot seat. We analyze your business, help put a plan together to expand your business and scale it and grow it very quickly. I answer Q and A every time live twice a month for Academy members. We’ve got a closed Facebook group where you can ask questions at any time. It’s a very, very expensive and live forum. And we also have brand new training content for the Academy members every month. Well, I’ve got a brand new offer here. Brand new, and it’s free. You can have free access to the Academy for four weeks, and I’m going to give you the URL right now. To where you can go take advantage of this free gift after we finished the show and that’s www.JayConner.com/Trial That’s JayConner.com/Trial

Jay Conner (03:05): So you may be tuning in on YouTube, or you may be on Facebook, or you may be listening to iTunes or Google play or one of our platforms. And so no matter where you’re tuning in from, we need your help. Please subscribe, rate and review. If you’re watching on YouTube, be sure and subscribe and hit that little bell. So you can be notified every time that we go live with a new guest and new training. And speaking of guest and training today is no exception to the past where I’ve got a fantastic expert guests to join me. And so I’m so excited to have him on before I bring him out of the green room and bring him on here, live on the show. Let me tell you just a little bit about my friend.

Jay Conner (03:50): First of all, he is a three time best selling author. One of his books, Real Estate On Your Terms, we’ll be talking about that. Secondly, the new rules of real estate investing and also he is co-author with Moneeka Sawyer’s, Real Estate Investing For Women. He’s also the founder and CEO of SmartRealEstateCoach.com. And he’s the host of the Smart Real Estate Coach Podcast. In addition to that, he’s been in real estate for almost 30 years now. His experience ranges from constructing new homes back in the 1990s and owning a Realty executive franchise to running his own investments, commercial and residential. Well today he runs his own buying and selling businesses where this family thing, which purchases about two to five properties every month. So this guy is still in the trenches today and knows exactly what’s going on. He’s an expert in the realm of terms, he’s also an expert on how to take your business from part time to full time. And he has this very, very special strategy and formula that he employs and also educates his students on which is called, The Three Pay Days. With that, I’m excited to have on and introduce to you my special guest today, Mr. Chris Prefontaine. Chris, welcome to the show!

Chris Prefontaine (05:16): Hey Jay! Good to be back, buddy. Good to see you as always.

Jay Conner (05:19): Good to see you too. And I’ll tell you folks, one special reason I love having Chris here on the show is because Chris and I have got the same exact core values and ethics when it comes to doing business. It’s all about putting the other person first. Whether you’re talking to a buyer or you’re talking to a seller, or you’re talking to a private lender, Chris believes exactly the same thing that I do. And that is, put other people first and you don’t have to worry about yourself. Just sort of like Zig Ziglar said. So Chris, I had you on the show. I guess it’s been coming up on a year ago. I lost track of time, but since that time we’ve had this crazy thing called COVID-19 come along. Corona virus. So first of all, if you would Chris share with the audience how have you been dealing with the Corona COVID-19. How’s it affected your business? And what have you done to adapt? And as your business increased, decreased or stayed the same?

Chris Prefontaine (06:25): Yeah. Thanks, Jay! It’s interesting because when this happened, so I’m going to go back to March when it started to happen. I said to my son, Nick and my son, Zach, I said, okay, I’m hoping what we built post-crash was built to what our expectations were, which was to weather all storms. It really was built to do that. And so our business has tripled and the amount of properties we’re doing as has all the students, so super happy with it, super pleased with it. It’s still, as you know, nobody knows the answer, right? The billionaires don’t know the economists don’t know. So the jury is still out, but so far, we’re just, we’re not getting by with driving. And I love to see that for the students, cause it’s almost like they had an, it’s not even, not official. It’s just a massive pump up in business.

Chris Prefontaine (07:07): I think a lot of that’s because the banks are making it very difficult for your conventional buyers, which makes it difficult for the sellers. I see that, especially in the higher end, you know, the jumbo loans over and over and over again. So I love, and I think you do too, dealing with those buyers that are truly great buyers. They just need a little bit of time. So that’s the kind of path we took since April. What do we change? Only thing we change as a team is virtual meetings every morning, cause we’re virtual, except for one day a week now. And then the, from the, from the standpoint of sellers, we started about a year and a half, probably about the time I was on your show or early, we started pivoting to virtual. Anyway, it just, now that’s overwhelmingly accepted by the sellers, whereas before it was a bit of a sell to let them know how we’re going to do things virtually. So I I’ll end that question or that answer with my son-in-law said to me the other night, we’re at dinner privately. The family. And he said, I gotta tell you, I think COVID coincidentally is one of the best things that ever happened to our company in our portfolio. So probably a little bit different answer than most people give. But that’s been, it’s been a disguised blessing for us so far.

Jay Conner (08:17): Well, when you say your son said, dad, coincidentally, I think this is a, been a blessing for us. You may or may not have heard of my definition of coincidence, but my definition of coincidence is God’s way of staying anonymous.

Chris Prefontaine (08:35): I love it!

Jay Conner (08:36): Well, your story, Chris, and your results and your experience since COVID-19 is exactly the same as mine. My business has tripled both my coaching business and my buying and selling house business. Year to date since January, of course, you know, COVID came in strong in March. I have bought and sold more houses this year than any year since I went full time back in 2003. My coaching business has skyrocketed. And I think another reason for that is because what you just said, virtual. And I really cannot tell you, I wish I could tell you. Well, I can give you part of the reason, part of the reason our real estate investing business at sky rocket is because I was, and you were prepared for the increase in business.

Jay Conner (09:34): For the all cash deals, we have plenty of private money on the shelf ready to take advantage of serving all those people and et cetera. But the, but the demand itself, I must say, I can’t, I cannot give you a definitive answer, but I’m thankful for it on both the buying and selling side. And we were prepared to take care of it. Now, your popular business model that you talk about, your strategy is a strategy that’s called the three pay day strategy. And we talked about it. Last time you were on the show, but we got a whole lot more additional new viewers and audience members since then. So from scratch, how about explaining your three day strategy or three payday strategy and what that means?

Chris Prefontaine (10:22): Yeah, so the three payday is this is on the exit. So we buy them on lease purchase or owner financing sometimes subject to, but all of our exits, almost all of our exits are going to be rent to own. And when we do that, we create the three paydays. That I know you’re familiar with, but the first payday is a nonrefundable down payment. And the second pay day is the difference between what I’m paying the underlying mortgage on that’s in the seller’s name or the seller directly, if it’s owner financing and what I’m collecting from my buyer, my buyer who needs time to get financing. That’s payday two. Payday three is the, is pretty cool because not only the cash out the mark-up and the price that we were able to achieve, but it’s also all of the principal pay down. When you start looking at principal, pay down on some of these deals, of course, the longer the term, the better, right? But when you’re talking about on financing deals, Jay, we only do on a financing deals when we buy, when they’re free and clear property. So we’re doing always principal only pay downs. And so over the course of three, four, five, seven, 10, my building 20 years, you got some massive principal pay down. So I love the three paydays. I also love the longer terms, especially during Covid.

Jay Conner (11:29): So let’s just make sure our audience understood what you just said. So you said the majority of these deals that you’re doing, the three payday strategy and those three paydays again are on the selling side when you’re selling the home they are, you’re getting the nonrefundable option fee or down payment. You’re getting positive cash flow between what you got coming in, what you got going out per month. And the third one, what’d you say the third one was?

Chris Prefontaine (12:02): Principal Pay down. And if there’s any mark-up from what we purchased to what we’re selling.

Jay Conner (12:07): Yeah. It’s just so that principal pay down means you, and then this is what I want everybody to not miss. You’re buying homes from sellers and the way you’re funding those deals, the way this third pay they have is you’re buying those houses with the seller, being your lender. The seller is your bank. The seller is taking a note back and selling to you as seller financing, or you bought it subject to the existing note. Is that right?

Chris Prefontaine (12:39): That’s correct. When they’re free and clear the seller financing, we prefer so that we can structure whatever we want for principal pay down. And the third way buying them would be lease purchase. So more of a sandwich, sandwich lease.

Jay Conner (12:51): Gotcha. So, what are the reasons, what are the benefits, why have you decided to exit with the rent to own strategy versus putting it in the MLS and cashing out?

Chris Prefontaine (13:06): Yeah, mainly it’s the three paydays Jay, but I’ll tell you a pre COVID, but certainly more so now to our earlier comments, both of us. The amount of buyers, the buyer pool for people that can’t walk in a bank today and get financing. And then especially when you get to jumbo and above is crazy. We had a guy, give you a direct example. I think it’s always easier to understand. $1.3 million house. One of our students had a buyer saw that same home had an under agreement. COVID hit, he has a 760 credit, but he didn’t have enough down at the bank. Wanted to see some ungodly amount, like two and a half year reserves, 25% down. He had like 10% down. So he, he thought he lost that house. My student picked it up. We did together. We partnered on it and this guy came out again for the same house and did a rent to own on it because we’re going to give him the two year ramp. He needs to save more money than satisfy the bank. Well, those are everywhere right now. Like the buyer pool is enormous. Prior to COVID I use the percentage of like 60% to 80% of the buyers couldn’t get financing. If you took a snapshot in time, I don’t know what the number is today, but it’s bigger. And so they need our help. And that’s the cool thing about a very healthy relationship. So to what you said earlier, if we put their interests for us, it’s a win-win. Big win-win right now, helping these people.

Jay Conner (14:24): So I’m going to ask you a question that you could actually take three days live seminar to answer. We don’t have three days. So let me just ask you to let your consciousness just flow and just answer it the best that you can from the 30,000 foot view. Here’s the question. When you and your students are talking to a potential seller, of course, all these sellers were talking about where you buy creatively on terms are off market. Clearly you’re not buying these properties in the multiple listing service they’re off market. When you are beginning a conversation and establishing rapport and getting information on the property, we know that the seller of that property in most cases, either has not considered or even thought about the possibility of selling their property on terms. They are thinking somebody just going to buy this house. So my three day seminar question is, what is your talk off? How do you convince someone to agree to sell their house on terms? Before you answer this question, Chris, I want you to explain to everybody and unpack what does it actually mean. The sell on terms. Let’s get that clear you, after you clear up black and white, easy peasy, really, what does it mean to sell on terms? How do you convince somebody to do that when they never consider doing that? And when the conversation started with them, they’re anticipating, you know, getting a check and getting all their money.

Chris Prefontaine (16:22): Yeah, absolutely. So terms to us, cause it does mean different things to different people, as you and I said off air. Terms to us is simply lease purchase, owner financing and or subject to because we combined some of these strategies. That’s what terms is to us. Those are the three areas we live in. The conversation, this, the question you asked with the convincing is by far the biggest thing we get in live trainings. So it’s not convincing. So just to clarify that, so it’s like the same reason you would go to an autobody or an attorney or an accountant because you have something you’re trying to either fix, improve or accomplish, because not always negative, especially with debt free properties, it’s not negative. They just wanted the most. So that’s, so first and foremost, I have a simple question at the beginning of the conversation. Jay, if you were to get your price, I haven’t seen your home yet, but if you were to get your price, are you open to doing that on a lease purchase or owner financing?

Chris Prefontaine (17:15): Now most say, well, I just want to sell it out. Right? And my answer is I get it. 99% of the sales I deal will say that. Of course I would want to sell tomorrow of a full price cash, and have no issues. Right. But the reality is this. Mr. Seller, you have a significant part of the buyer pool right now that can’t do that. They can’t, they can’t do, they can’t buy your home because of financing. Now that has made, it’s made even easier for me to explain with Covid. It’s even, it’s even worse for them. So that’s the conversation. And then back to the convincing, there is no convincing if they can, A. Wait for their cash, if they have any in the house, any equity left. And B. I can solve whatever issue they have. Give you some off the top of my head.

Chris Prefontaine (17:57): I’m moving to Texas. My family is already there. I want to be there for the holiday. I have two homes. I can’t keep them both during COVID. I owe about what it’s worth. I can’t afford a realtor. If there’s any motivation for selling, that makes sense for me to solve. I can solve it. As long as one of two things are in the mix. One, I need my cash right away. Two. I’m a year behind and has no equity in my house. Like those are the two things that I just can’t do anything with typically. But every other scenario, if they can wait, we can solve it with a lease purchase or owner financing or subject to. So is that, was that a condensed enough or too condensed?

Jay Conner (18:34): Yeah. Yeah. You took three days and put it in three minutes. Which is what I wanted you to do. So what would you say is a realistic percentage of people that you’re talking to. And this is putting aside those that you can’t help. Like, you know, those scenarios, you just, I mean, you know, they’re a year behind and they have no equity. You know, those do have equity. Those that, you know, the math would work if they get it and they can wait, what percentage of those people that you talk to actually end up being, you know, agreeable to selling on terms in some kind of structure?

Chris Prefontaine (19:17): Yeah. About a third. But let me clarify where the third came from. The third have already been weeded out by virtual assistants who spoke to them and they said, yeah, I’m somewhat open. Have someone call me. You know, they weren’t shutting it down totally. They could wait for their equity. So out of those that we get about a third are open to terms. Now I can’t tell you in accurate metric from April 1 to now segregated. I can just tell you ongoing. We’re about a third. So it’s a significant amount. Look, here’s a stat. This is a cool thing. I, some of us, our company and some of our students are niching down just to do owner financing, just at target free and clear properties. Well, if you look at this different stats, but if you look at the stats about a third of the property, the United States are debt free or close to it.

Chris Prefontaine (20:02): That’s a lot of properties! You don’t need to talk to many of those. These street paydays, those free and clear properties. If you get four year terms, you’re talking about six figure deals right across the board. If you get a house that’s 200 grand or higher and you get four years of more, and the principal payments, you’re talking six figures, three paydays, you don’t need to do, you know, 50 of those a year. You can go out and try and do that, but you don’t need to do that for most people. So super, super, super lucrative for both parties. If, if that’s the criteria. So probably a longer answer to your good question.

Jay Conner (20:36): That’s good. Would you say most of these sellers, you’re able to negotiate, that you do negotiate terms, they are willing to take payments or whatever. Would you say most of those are principal only payments or do some people you have to pay interest?

Chris Prefontaine (20:55): Okay, good question. So in the mix of what we do about 20% of the properties we take on our contract offering clear, and yes, we do those with principal only payments. Now there’s been a hybrid or two. I’ll give you two real examples. We did our office building and the owner is very sophisticated investor owns probably not the largest landowner, but one of the largest on Island here where we live. And so he sold me the building and he said, I want five and a half percent interest. This is a year and a half, two years ago. I said, well, you should pay principal. So here’s what we did. We both loved it from when I closed on it in November of 18, all my payments. And there were teared up payments were principal all the way until about September of 19. So as long as the shorter that is, I took that principle five 50 and had it paid down to four 90 without a penny of interest, then he advertised it at 5%. And he got his way. And I got my way. There was no way I would’ve got a 60 grand pay down in principal by doing a conventional mortgage. He knew that. And I knew that. So we both got our way. That’s one example.

Chris Prefontaine (22:01): The other way we do things is let’s say I’m three years into a four year on a financing term. This was an exact deal. And every holiday season, I send them a note or an email. And I say, look, I know you got three years left or two years left, as we click along. If I was to prepay 6,000 was in this case, it was 6,200 prepay. So take it for another day, like prepay some principal when you extend it a year. So I get another year principal pay down that’s of course, if my buyer’s not ready to cash out, it works even better. We did that two years in a row at a particular property. The third year, last Christmas, they called us and said, will you do that thing again? And I said, well, instead of that, why don’t we do this? If you guys don’t need the cash, why don’t we change your note? That’s going to be coming up next year. Why don’t we change that to an interest rate of 4.2? And why don’t we put that out 15 years for balloon? So a four year deal on a financing principal only became a five, then became a six, then became a 21 year deal. So that’s why I said earlier, you can mix and match some of these strategies depending on what the motivation is of the seller. In this case, they didn’t need the money and their account and loved it, that they were going to stack it in some interest. So we do sometimes that was another long answer, but I hope that helps.

Jay Conner (23:12): Oh, it did help because what you just explained was a real life example of the deal after the deal, after deal, after the deal.

Chris Prefontaine (23:21): Exactly.

Jay Conner (23:23): So that’s a great example of, I mean, you know, when I first heard years ago that sellers of homes of houses, of single family houses, would be willing to take a note out 15 years, I thought to myself who in the world would wait 15 years? I mean, they might be dead by then, who would wait 15 years to get their money? And I, and the light bulb finally came on to me years ago. Well, the same answer is to the site to a different question. Who in the world would be willing to sell their property and agree to leave the mortgage in their name and trust me to make the payments? The answer is the same. And the answer is, I can’t make a decision and have the same motivation as somebody else for the seller. They do things for their own reasons. I do things for my reasons and I need, and we need to let them make their choice. Right? One of the biggest mistakes I made when I started in real estate investing was making decisions for other people or deciding in my mind what I thought they would do, or they would not do. And I don’t have a clue what somebody else is going to do until I give them the choice. So my lands! Give them the choice! Right?

Chris Prefontaine (24:44): Yeah. To your last point there about making the decisions pre COVID too many of our students and us, when we first started, we’d say, if they asked us how long a term we may have come out with a term back then, like four years. Now, simply by changing how we answer that we’re getting five, seven, 10, and 20, just as easy as we were getting three to five in the simple question, when they say, how long is, if you got your number, I don’t know if you’ve got your number, what’s the longest you could see yourself going in terms? And I am pleasantly surprised. I won’t say shocked at how many sellers are programmed to say things like, well, I wouldn’t go up 30, like a regular mortgage, but I might go up 20 or might go upto 10, like automatically they do. And so it took us four or five years to figure that one out, but all the students, new students now. So you think we would have had to pick it out first. New students, as soon as we told them that technique thought that was normal. And they’re getting those longterm,

Jay Conner (25:38): Chris, you’re the expert on terms. I’m the expert on private money. But I got a question for you and your students to play with, and I want to hear how it goes. So the question that you just said was, well, what’s the longest you could go? I would love to play with this question. And that question would be, well when they say, well, you know, how long have I got to go? I might ask them, well, how many years would you like to continue receiving monthly income?

Chris Prefontaine (26:15): I love it! in to the point!

Jay Conner (26:15): Well, I don’t, whatever. I don’t want to ever stop getting monthly income.

Chris Prefontaine (26:20): No, I love that one. Thank you for the share.

Jay Conner (26:23): So anyway, it just came. It may be a stupid idea, but I don’t know sometimes what I think stupid works and vice versa. So, so the next question. You talk about operating. In the midst of this current chaos, you talk about operating in the perfect triangle. What does that mean? What is the perfect triangle that you talk about?

Chris Prefontaine (26:50): Yeah. I thought of this right when Covid hit and literally I moved home to the home office here. And that was, we’ve got a really cool community, like really a family environment in the office and amongst our community. So I said this, if we can all attach ourselves to one side of triangle, a cause, just a cause. Like a major mission, like right now, because of the chaos, sellers and buyers are some of them afraid, but all of them need a guide. They’re like screaming for help. And in some cases, literally don’t know, should I sell, can I sell? Does this work? So find a cause that can, then the second piece of the triangle actually affect lives, like affect them, generationally affect them. That’s what we’re doing.

Chris Prefontaine (27:32): We’re going to affect generationally. These people that thought they couldn’t buy or sell. And that’s going to forever be in their family. And then third. And in affecting our lives as well. And then third piece of the triangle is to get paid, to do it. So find a cause. Go out and affect lives positively, including your own. And then get paid to do it. I don’t think that triangle has ever been so prevalent because of the chaos right now, because of the need for a guide and someone to like take them by the hand. There was a major survey done, Jay, I’m going to forget the name. One of my mentors told me about it. They do a trust survey every year. It’s not cause of COVID. They happen to do it right around covid. But the number one thing with sellers and buyers was this trust factor. Like they just want a guy that they can trust and that perfect triangle is where we could camp out.

Jay Conner (28:18): So beautiful way to describe win-win-win. Final question, Chris. For this show. And that is given your experience. We’ve had COVID come along both you and I lived through 2008, 2009. I mean, you’ve been doing this real estate investing thing for 30 years, yourself and your family. What’s the best advice you can give today on how to prepare to handle the next recession. When’s the next recession? Well, if we, any of us knew that we could retire today.

Chris Prefontaine (28:56): You wouldn’t be yet.

Jay Conner (28:58): Is there going to be another recession? Of course. Is it going to be another stock market crash? Of course. You know, it’s cycle cycle, cycle cycle. So what do we need to do to prepare?

Chris Prefontaine (29:11): Sure. I mean, I could go a couple different directions here, personal and business, but let’s go business first. I will personally tell you my opinion, never, ever, ever sign personally on a bank piece of paper, pledging your assets. That’s my opinion, except for maybe an exception of your own home. I could see that working, but you could still buy that on terms as my family members have. So that’s number one. Don’t sign personally. Number two. So then you’re not worrying about if,if,if,if,if. That they’re going to come knocking if the market drops. Okay. Number two. Hang out with someone that weather the storms, Jay, you said you and I have gone through ’08. I went through ’08. I went through 9/11, like you did. I went through my son’s accident where he was put in a coma and that was an overnight shot. You know, all these things beat us up, but they also weathered us because unfortunately success without the, those trials and tribulations, their rotten teacher, they really are.

Chris Prefontaine (30:01): So if you’re going to do anything in real estate, just hang out with someone that weathered a few storms, that’s the way to do it. Just don’t deviate. There’s no reason to reinvent the wheel. And then lastly, on a personal note, pre ’08, I know I would have no problem, no problem whatsoever. Having a personal residence that had there was leverage 70, 80, 90% of it. I would have no problem doing it until you said, Oh, that’s normal. I have good rate. And I’m in real estate. I will tell you if you can live on 50% or less of your income and never have to be in that debt or leveraged position, you will also sleep better. So if you could tell all of these are based on my way, crashing, not needing to sleep at night. When I put my head in the pillow, I want to know that everything’s fine. And so that’s a smidgeling of what I would tell people to do.

Jay Conner (30:48): Awesome advice, Chris. Awesome advice. So Chris, I know that the audience wants to stay connected with you. So how can folks further the conversation and stay connected and get plugged into Chris Prefontaine?

Chris Prefontaine (31:03): Sure. Thanks, Jay! They can go to SmartRealEstateCoach.com There’s if they don’t mind listening to me babble for another 45 or so minutes, there’s a free webinar there. It’s content rich. It’s not going to teach how to make a million dollars. It’s going to expose you to some more information on what is possible for you. And then if you want, we can actually, I’ll probably get a, I’ll get a spanking for this one, but I’ll offer a free strategy call for anyone that wants to talk, especially with Covid here. Just go to SmartRealEstateCoach.com/Action. That’s all. They’ll just ask you if you’ve done deals. If you haven’t done deals, no wrong answer. Allows myself or my son, Zach, to help you out with a free strategy call. No ties, no hooks. We’ll get on 15 minutes. We’ll make it well worth your time.

Jay Conner (31:46): That’s awesome. Well, thank you so much, Chris and parting comments.

Chris Prefontaine (31:53): I said some of them in the interview, cause you, your questions were just spot on. I don’t care what niche you’re looking at. You and I have both advocates of exposing all niches. We both do that on our podcast. I love that. So, find an issue and get behind. I’m not so naive to think it’s mine. I’m sure Jay feels the same way. Find one you can get behind. Secondly, find someone in there that has weathered a few storms. And third don’t deviate for three years. Like just don’t. Don’t get the shiny object syndrome. You’ll have a great experience with that simple formula.

Jay Conner (32:19): I love it! Chris, thank you so much for joining me on the show!

Chris Prefontaine (32:22): Thanks for having me, buddy. Good to see you.

Jay Conner (32:24): Absolutely. And, thank you! My audience for tuning in to another episode of Real Estate Investing with Jay Conner. And I’m so glad you were here. Be sure to tune in for the next show. Here’s to taking your real estate investing business to the next level. I’m Jay Conner, The Private Money Authority. And we’ll see you then. Bye for now.

[cruddyborderlandstheories]

THE SEEIN’ DEAD MOD IS A BAND-AID FIX

gearbox locked zane’s lazy fix behind a paywall

tl;dr: for the love of god, the seein’ dead class mod should be what the seein’ red capstone is and vice versa. also. MORE SYNERGY. also i redesigned all of Zane’s trees and augments for more synergy you’re welcome.

is 1am and i don’t want tomorrow and im angry and thinking about borderlands so this seems like the perfect time to immerse myself in remaking Zane’s skill trees (for the 5th time). mainly because some of zane’s skills are still irking me and i’ve written extensive essays for the bl3 subreddit about the seein’ dead class mod and just playing around with zane’s skills in general, but i don’t think i’ve ever posted here before about it. so here we are. i notice i usually save lore/theories/characterizations for this blog and meta/balancing/gear talk for reddit. not sure why that’s a split for me. 

now i’ve remade zane’s skills a number of times, but honestly this was all before the seein’ dead mod was released. then, instead of fixing his skill trees, i wrote a lot of essays about why that mod was a terrible bad decision on gearbox’s part (you can read one of the shorter arguments in a comment from 5 months ago here). I’m just gonna remake the skill trees now with all his current abilities in mind.this post really should be titled: ALL THE PROBLEMS WITH THEIR BALANCING DECISIONS

so imma just talk for a bit about why i love/hate the seein’ dead class mod. 

Obviously it’s a god tier mod, and you see almost no zane builds without it, and no top tier, can solo m10 true takedown builds without it (unless ur like, the 1% of masochistic players, in which case i salute you). and while that obviously means its a good mod, it also shows the problems with all his other class mods and his skill trees in general.

They all kinda suck. and that wouldn’t be a problem, bc, hey, the seein’ dead mod is ez to get, just pop on over to the casino and kill a few baddies and they’ll  drop like candy. Which is really awesome!

slight problem.

the dlc is locked behind a PAYWALL

now this is a problem because if zane was a top tier character BEFORE the dlc, and everything was hunky dory and people weren’t on their knees begging for gearbox to fix Zane, then him getting a new badass class mod wouldn’t be such a big deal. but the problem was this was gearbox’s solution to giving Zane a buff.

they literally locked a buff for a character behind a pay wall.

I recommend Zane is every single person I try to convince to play bl3, but i always have to add this like, commercial-esque asterisk. you know, terms and conditions or, side effects or whatever. *you probably want to get the seein’ dead mod if you’re looking at end-game play because unless you wanna struggle that’s his only viable play style.

what if they don’t want to buy the dlc?! for real...

There’s also the point that this class mod makes his (arguably) BEST capstone obsolete. so we have distributed denial which literally no one uses because its broken, double barrel which is always traded for seein’ red or more points in other skills, and seein’ red, WHICH WAS MADE USELESS BY THIS CLASS MOD

gsfdhjikdhgdaskjfhgaskdfjh

okay and it wouldn’t even be so bad

IF THEY DIDN’T CHANGE HIS ENTIRE SKILL SET BEFORE RELEASE

like they lowered ALL his kill skills, then they turned Seein’ Red into his capstone instead of Death Follows Close, meaning they nerfed Death Follows Close so it could fit as just a game changer. my poor boy was g u t t e d.

so, imagine this, everyone is reaching the end-game content of bl3. it’s a month or 2 weeks or whatever after the game dropped and people are finally hitting level 50. and moze/fl4k/amara are all killin’ it, and the zane players have to work their ASSES off to do like... 50% of that damage output (now, they did also eventually nerf the crap outta moze and fl4k but the point stands). 

so instead of gearbox going: “oh... shit that pre-release nerf was an awful idea, revert the changes guys” they decided to keep him gutted and then they released what was, in my opinion, a kick in the nuts with the maliwan takedown (aka the antifreeze mod, alongside the spiritual driver) ahahahahahaha. what good times it was. (I say this sarcastically.) 

man i remember people were soooo livid with that class mod release. well, both of them. zane mains were pissed off (for good reason). “yes, let’s make the people who are begging for a straight damage increase jump through MORE hoops (LITERALLY) for a pitiful amount of damage. oh, also, let’s give their 28 skill point build to the strongest character in the game for free and also make it 10x better”. because it was 10x better than violent momentum (driver didn’t have a damage cap) until they fixed both the spiritual driver and the violent momentum skill. it was the worst of times.

i will note here they did, around this time, let zane have stackable kill skills, but it was only 2 stacks and also it was still *incredibly* difficult to achieve stacks because zane just. struggled to kill anything. I still remember when i grinded the shit outta an antifreeze class mod and it took me over 20 minutes to kill Wotan my first time solo on m4. Not the fight UP to wotan. literally. just killing wotan.

then the seein’ dead mod dropped and i had. a fuckin. 15 minute decrease to my time on killing wotan (5 minutes!!!!). now i am not perfect, and i 100% believe i could’ve lowered the time even more. but that... that shows a VERY CLEAR problem.

they never actually fixed zane, they gave him a class mod that’s stupid OP just to make sure he could hang on next to the other Vault Hunters. it’s just a bandaid fix. you remove the class mod, and he’s back to pre-jackpot power levels (which will NOT hold up at m10, let me tell you). 

all his pre-jackpot problems are still here, and that’s why people are not using any other class mod of his. I bet we could have some really fun builds with the conductor mod! but nobody will ever use it because it’s just... not even close to the seein’ dead mod.

So what does the seein’ dead mod do that makes Zane so good?

IT BRINGS HIM BACK TO PRE-RELEASE VALUES

this mod, plus Death Follows Close, brings Zane back to pre-release zane. and i don’t understand how gearbox isn’t putting two and two together and going “Oh.”

it also is a BETTER VERSION of Seein’ Red!!! something players could have had at, like, level 15, but instead had to wait until they hit a capstone! the capstone is completely obsolete at this point. There is nothing seein’ red can give you that seein’ dead doesn’t do but better. Getting that capstone is a w a s t e of skill points.

AND they locked this fix behind a pay wall!!! i cannot say that enough. you don’t wanna get the handsome jackpot dlc?? guess u don’t wanna play zane at endgame then. too bad, so sad.

have i stated that enough? because it still blows my fuckin mind. THEY LOCKED A CHARACTER FIX BEHIND A PAYWALL

djhdgakjhakjdah. imagine playing without any prior knowledge and being like, aw man i love this zane character. can’t wait to get to max mayhem end game like all my favorite youtubers and friends!! then finding out you gotta drop 15 bucks or whatever it is just to actually be able to play at max mayhem level. that is not a skill difference, that is A BALANCING PROBLEM MY DUDES. like. my favorite zer0 build was still viable without the story DLCs. obviously grog > rubi, pimp > lyuda, rapier > law but, it was still fuckin viable.

guh. gufhgufhsdgkfjsdh. it bothers me.

ok so there’s a lot i just went over: my main issue? is that by making Seein’ Red a capstone, they did nothing to make it an actual legit capstone. They definitely nerfed Death Followed Close to make it a gamechanger, but they never gave Seein’ Red a buff to move it from a gamechanger to a capstone. It was the same exact skill. Seein’ Dead is what Seein’ Red SHOULD be and that’s what angers the crap outta me. they locked this obvious fix behind a pay wall (AND a gear slot!!!!!) n ur probably thinking ‘but cruddy this WAS really nice of them to try and fix zane... they could’ve just let him be suuc’ and like, yeah, they could’ve, and it is good they’re TRYING, but also, they’re leaving the people who DON’T buy the DLC high and dry.

keep in mind i DO own the dlc. have the season pass and everything. IM STILL MAD!!!

Zane should be strong no matter what class mod the players want to use. Same with Amara, same with Moze, same with Fl4k. FFS, it is not that hard. CHANGE THEIR SKILLS!!!!!

so im gonna be taking the time to go over all of zane’s skills and shit just to put him more on par with the others (WITHOUT THE SEEIN’ DEAD MOD)

imagine the seein’ dead mod doesn’t exist for this. we’re gonna make a balanced character since apparently THAT’S TOO HARD FOR A TRIPLE-A BALANCING TEAM

first things first, the tree with the most fuckin problems: 

Under Cover

oh god this tree is a fucking train wreck what the hell were they thinking. good god. my eyes. they’re burning.

not actually, but it still kinda sucks.

Action Skill: Barrier is fine. I would not add the ‘picking it up decreases benefits’ when Zane’s whole schtick is running around fast. You get the full bonus no matter what form it’s in. also, you can hold down the action skill activation button to deploy the barrier directly on yourself.

Tier 1: Hearty Stock is a trap. never get this. so dumb. no synergy with his other skills. Adrenaline is okay, but not really great during end game. Ready For Action is similarly okay. Just a very MEH start to this tree. 

Adrenaline: Zane gains increased Action Skill Cooldown Rate. 10% per level, up to 50%. this shouldn’t be tied to his shields being full because if your barrier is down (cooling DOWN)... your shield is taking damage. c’mon now. THINK GEARBOX T H I N K

Hearty Stock: (maxed) Zane and his clone gain 5% magazine regeneration while an action skill is active. This skill stacks. In it’s original state, this skill is such a trap skill. for real.

Ready For Action: i mean, it’s fine. We’ll keep it. +30% shield recharge rate and -29% (why????) recharge delay

Tier 2: ech. Stiff Upper Lip is not that good. Brain freeze is what u really want. Rise to the Occasion is also okay.

Brain Freeze: keep the same.

Stiff Upper Lip: when Zane is damaged with a hit that would break his shield, he gains (max) +20% bonus gun damage on his next shot through the barrier.

Rise to the Occasion: Zane and his clone gain health regeneration. +5% max health/s. Not determined by shield availability.

Tier 3: `screams in confident competence` oh lawd. this skill is good. the accuracy thing is kinda laughable. i tell you, i always thought that zane was originally meant to be the sniper with the Under Cover tree but they decided to swap Zane and Fl4k’s skills. which is why Zane has soooo many accuracy buffs.

Confident Competence: fine the way it is. I would also add, since this IS a game changer, that the Barrier’s damage amp is now 40%.

Tier 4: ew. tier 4. Really Expensive Jacket is literally the only skill you might want to get and EVEN THEN. ugh. Best Served Cold is so pointless. and so is Futility Belt. YOU TAKE MORE DAMAGE WITH IT

Really Expensive Jacket: Elemental Status Effects have reduced duration (-50%). Additionally, Zane is not slowed by Cryo anymore.

Best Served Cold: Remove the cooldown. Buff up the damage at least 200%. Make it an AOE Brain Freeze. That is, the cryo novas stack and if overkill damage is high enough, enemies hit with the novas freeze. Kinda like a discount Frozen Heart.

Futility Belt: HA. Ahahahahaha. Ha. Zane gains resistance to non-elemental and cryo damage (+15%). Futhermore, after killing an enemy, Zane’s barrier gains additional cryo damage (+20%) for 8s.

Tier 5: is oki. My only real complaint is with Nerves of Steel. Like. Seriously.

Refreshment: god tier skill actually. Keep the same.

Best Served Cold: also keep the same. The only change I will make is this: resetting your action skills’ cooldowns counts as action skill start and end.

Nerves of Steel: The longer Zane’s barrier is active, the more stacks of Nerves of Steel he gains (a maximum of 15). For each stack, Zane gains 2% shock damage, 2% cryo efficiency, and 1% damage to frozen enemies. (why shock damage? cryo doesn’t do well against shields.)

Tier 6: *cries in the worst capstone in the entire series* WHO DID THIS. WHY. WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU???

Distributed Denial: no. just. no. scrap this whole damn thing. IT DOESN’T EVEN WORK!!!! either fix it COMPLETELY or do something else. My recommendation? Whenever Zane throws down his barrier, his shield instantly begins recharging. If Zane’s shield is already full or recharging, enemies with no shields (or freeze immunity) that touch Zane’s Barrier for the next 10s are instantly frozen.

Augments: why the hell do i gotta place my barrier down when my entire fuckin’ character is about RUNNING. ALSO JUST AS A BLANKET STATEMENT: ALL THESE AUGMENTS WORK 100% EVEN IF HIS BARRIER IS PICKED UP. SO DUMB. a fully pointless restriction.

that last sentence immediately fixes Charged Relay and Nanites or Some Shite.

Redistribution: If his shields are full, Zane can sacrifice 50% of his shields to have his next shot deal 100% bonus cryo damage by holding F.

All-Rounder: Fine as is. Only thing I would add: whenever Zane melees an enemy, his shields are drained by 50% and his sliding augment is added to the melee attack.

Deterrence Field: Fine as is. But! I would add: whenever Zane sprints into an enemy, his shields are drained by 50% and slam augment is activated.

THAT WAY we can have both slam/sliding relics actually DO SOMETHING. because my god they’re so useless rn.

alright, moving on.

Hitman

Tier 1: is okay. nobody ever takes cold bore. ever.

Violent Speed: fine as is, but we’re taking it back to pre-release values. Max: 30%. can stack 2x.

Cold Bore: Zane gains (max) 20% bonus cryo damage to all shots fired while moving.

Violent Momentum: fine as is, but taking it back to pre-release values. 30% gun damage at default walk speed. Additionally, Zane can now shoot while sprinting.

Tier 2: my boy zoomer needs more fun.

Cool Hand: fine as it is. I would buff his base reload speed up to 20% and kill skill reload to 20% as well. 17 and 13 are such weird numbers.

Drone Delivery: fine as it is. Additionally, Zoomer’s base shots now take on the element of Zane’s grenade mod.

Salvation: fine as it is. I won’t mess with this bc life steal is messy business (coughs in grog)

Tier 3: hhhynf.fdsg. 

Death Follows Close: Kill Skill Bonus: +30%. Kill Skill Time: +7s. Additionally, enemies targeted by Zoomer take 5% more damage from Zane.

Tier 4: these two skills are actually p dope by themselves. it can stay as it is. I would MAYBE increase the violent violence max buff up to 20% but that’s just me.

Tier 5: ahahahaha. this skill. just remember, we’re pretending Seein’ Dead doesn’t exist, so imagine how this skill looks next to calm cool n collected. so pointless.

Good Misfortune: Killing an enemy with a critical hit adds (max) 10% efficiency to Zane’s kill skills for 8s. This does not stack.

Tier 6: WE’RE GONNA MAKE YOU RELEVANT AGAIN BOO HANG IN THERE

Seein’ Red: Zane has a (4%) chance to activate his kill skills upon dealing gun damage to an enemy. Additionally, enemies targeted by Zoomer now take 15% more damage from Zane.

so why didn’t we make good misfortune the infinite action skill build?? BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT CCnC IS SUPPOSED TO DO!!! why have 2 skills that do the exact same thing AT THE EXACT SAME TIER except ONE IS OBJECTIVELY WORSE!!!!!

what happens to the Seein’ Dead class mod if we’re giving its perk to this capstone? I’m so glad you asked. “Zane activates his kill skills when activating his action skills. Additionally, the kill skills activated this way have 15% more efficiency”. look how much better balanced that is!!!! that’s a class mod!!!!!!!!

Augments: these aren’t THAT bad, but they could be a lot better.

Winter’s Drone: Zoomer gains 20% bonus cryo damage to all shots.

Bad Dose: pump these numbers up. Fire Rate: +7% per affected enemy. Movement Speed: +10% per enemy. everything else is fine.

Boomsday: just make this more beefy. fr. It’d be a good choice if it were stronger.

Static Field: also fine. I would again give it better damage output, but that’s just me.

Almighty Ordnance: remove the build up honestly. Like i get the vibe and it’s really cool, but in combat it just DOESN’T WORK. maybe if Zoomer is targeting an enemy, he will unleash the missiles if they are above 50% health after 30s or something. I honestly think these should have a debuffing factor instead of a damage factor (you know, to not get in the way of boomsday). maybe something around 15%? the 1x per action skill activation thing would be easily subverted with CCnC with the changes we suggested, so it could work. 

Doubled Agent

ahhh, Blane. Blue Zane. Love ya, buddy. One change: he prioritizes pinged targets. That way you can kinda get him to fight specific people. Also, lower the teleportation timer. pls.

Tier 1: actually p good. could be better, but its not bad.

Synchronicity: Zane gains 20% bonus damage per active action skill. While Zane has an action skill active, he gains a stack of Synchronicity. Max Stacks: 10. For each stack of Synchronicity, Zane gains 5% Action Skill Cooldown Rate and 2% Action Skill Damage.

Praemunitus: Zane and his digiclone gain (max) 30% magazine size.

Borrowed Time: For each action skill active, Zane gains 30% action skill duration. The longer Zane’s action skills are active, he and Blane gain a higher Fire Rate and faster Reload Speed, up to 20%. (the idea is you choose between this or synchronicity bc... either permanent action skills build or fast paced action skills build)

Tier 2: Donnybrook is fun. Fractal Frags is fun. Duct tape mod is a GODDAMN DISAPPOINTMENT

Donnybrook: fine as it is. I might buff the max numbers up to 20% gun damage and 3% health regen. But that’s really it.

Fractal Frags: Blane will periodically toss a grenade from Zane’s stockpile at his targeted enemy (cooldown: 20s). Kill Skill: Blane has a 45% chance to throw a free grenade.

Duct Tape Mod: this skill... why... No cooldown. NONE. Zane has a 1% chance to also fire a grenade from his gun. Kill Skill: This is increased to 15% for 8s (stays at 1% for the whole time, but the kill skill will increase by 3% for each tier)

Tier 3: Actually Quick Breather is one of my favorite skills. this can stay.

Quick Breather: Same as is. Additionally, Zane and his clone gain 25% Gun Damage after swapping places for a short time (8s).  I really wanna promote swapping places. It’s really underutilized. they’ve ADDED stuff to this skill already!!! even tho it didn’t work until the next patch. BUT THEY SHOW ITS POSSIBLE TO ADD TO SKILLS!!!

Tier 4: actually a really good tier. a few minor changes. 

Pocket Full of Grenades: Kill Skill: Zane gains (max) 15% grenade regeneration for 8s. If Zane’s grenades are full, any excess grenades are shot from his gun with 25% bonus damage.

Old-U: If Zane falls into FFYL while his digiclone is active, he can press the action skill activation key to destroy his clone and gain a second wind. When he does this, he takes the place of his clone. His clone will also drop a grenade when it is destroyed.

Supersonic Man: Zane gains increased movement speed for each active action skill: (max) 15% each. Additionally, teleportation is considered to be Zane’s maximum speed for its duration and 5s after. 

Tier 5: oh god oh fuck oh god.

Like a Ghost: Oh god why. Zane and his digiclone gain a (max) 15% chance to ignore all damage while teleporting and for 7s after.

Boom. Enhance: actually a pretty swell skill. I would probably add Health Regen +3% per grenade tho. Blane needs help a lot.

Trick of the Light: bring back the shock damage. Zane deals 40% bonus shock damage for 7s after swapping places with his clone.

Tier 6: oh ngl I actually love this capstone lol

Double Barrel: Zane’s digiclone gains a copy of Zane’s current gun when it is deployed (and all the anointments work and he actually fires it like a reasonable person). Zane’s clone now deals damage equal to Zane’s base weapon damage. Upon swapping places, both Zane and his digiclone deal 50% bonus damage for 7s.

Augments: 

Binary System: is okay. Kinda uhhh underwhelming tho. Buff up the damage and also maybe reduce teleportation time.

Schadenfreude: I like this one a lot. Zane’s shield is restored by 100% of the damage his digiclone takes and vice versa.

Dopplebanger: lower the waiting time. I get that u don’t wanna override the teleportation, but it’s really annoying. Buff damage and don’t make it dependent on action skill duration. If this explosion kills an enemy, the clone is reactivated with 50% action skill duration.

Which One’s Real?: I’ve never actually felt this work. Maybe for like 2 seconds? Make it work more like Zer0′s hologram or Timmy’s Jack clones or smth. Maybe give an activation cue? im v lost with this one. Enemies targeting Zane take 30% more damage from the digiclone.

Digital Distribution: 75% of the health damage Zane takes is distributed to his clone instead. The digiclone gains 5% Health Regeneration/s and sends out 3 [level specific damage] shock spikes to enemies that attack it. 

literally all Zane needs is SYNERGY. if they can change a few skills, pump up a few numbers, and ffs fix the seein’ red/dead capstone/mod, they’d be in FUCKIN BUSINESS

but no instead

THEY LOCKED THE BUFF BEHIND A PAYWALL.

WHYYYYYY

[myonmukyuu]

SIFAS mini guide: countering stamina drain for songs that aren’t easy-mode

or how not to die in early game SIFAS

Edited 2/28/20. After playing tons in JP I’ve ascended.

Hello friends, I’ve noticed than a lot of people have been having issues with SIFAS - namely y’all keep getting hardstuck early because you keep running out of stamina during tougher live shows. Believe it or not, you’re NOT forced to grinding out easy mode for macarons until you’re tough enough! With the power of team building and a galaxy brain, you too, can take down intermediate songs with weak baby teams!

I’m no expert, (after all I can’t read Japanese) but I’ve taken the time to write up a quick run-down on what you need to know to not die. If there’s misinformation, let me know bc I’m still learning too!

This guide covers:

Benefits of being Alive

How Stamina works

Live Show Appeals (this is why people keep failing btw)

Dealing with Appeals and not getting DESTROYED

Blade Subunit Switching

I’m going to assume that you guys know how to team build and set subunits. (If you don’t I’m happy to explain but this post is MEGA long).

Benefits of Being Alive

Before I get into the nitty gritty of things, I want to point out why you should try for this kind of approach for liveshows. When your team is weak and you’re challenging songs that are tougher than recommended, any mistake could cost you the liveshow. Personally I find this makes the game more thrilling but if you don’t there’s also another good reason! 

Basically, the drops (macarons and stuff) from S-ranking an Easy song is complete garbage. However, surviving an Intermediate song with even a C or B-rank is A LOT better. It really helps you farm drops a lot faster, allowing you to unlock that new costume even faster! Also the beat maps aren’t boring.

Of course this approach doesn’t let you automatically challenge every difficulty at the very beginning, but it does help you push your team’s ceiling!

How Stamina Works

In a live show there is a passive stamina drain. It doesn’t matter if you completely nail the song as each note will deal some stamina damage by default. If it doesn’t make sense, think of it as the Idols becoming worn out over the course of the song. 

So if they perform while their stamina is in shambles this happens:

To mitigate the constant drain of stamina you need to start applying strategy, and you have a number of options:

Level up your idols’ stamina stat to increase your team’s maximum (definitely helps but won’t cure your tendency to get obliterated)

Use Gd (Guard) type Idols for the passive stamina reduction (viable!!!)

Use Idols with defensive skills: Heal; Damage reduction; Shield. (also viable!!) Edit: Heal, and Shield are the most valuable of the three

On top of this, your Voltage output is drastically cut when your stamina becomes orange (smol debuff)  or red (you die irl).

So basically focus on using defensive Idols to increase your survivability?

Nope! That’s not all there is to it. Even if you stick to a subunit entirely made of healers, you likely won’t make it through a tougher song. Why? well I’m glad you asked!

Live Show Appeals

During a live show, you’ll given multiple chances to do Appeals. If you’ve been playing blind, and are also illiterate in Japanese you might’ve not noticed Appeals at all. Basically, they’re like time sensitive challenges that reward or punish you for failing. 

If you succeed an Appeal? Bonus score! Bonus notes that don’t drain stamina!

If you fail? You take a massive hit to stamina.This is the live show killer that most new players are intimidated by. On a more difficult song, failing to succeed an Appeal can easily chunk a third of your stamina (or more!!), usually immediately failing the show if your stamina is low. You could try healing this damage off, but more often or not your defensive subunit won’t be able to break even. So to avoid failing? Just succeed the appeals!

While playing through a song you might find some weird notes that glow purple. They’re denoted with a START and an END. This is an Appeal and the Start-end indicate the time frame that you must complete the Appeal’s challenge in.

Also at the topmost bar on the live show screen, you’ll notice streaks of pink among blue. This bar represents the song’s progression. The pink represents the parts of the song that an appeal will be active in, and for how long. 

The objective for an individual appeal can be a range of things including:

- Getting X amount of Voltage 

- Getting X amount of Voltage using your Special

- Getting X amount of Y notes (hitting Great or above for example)

- Hitting notes with X different members (basically alternate between subunits to achieve this.)

The best thing about it is that Appeals are always the same for a particular song (though story songs might differ). Here’s Kach's resource of all songs and their translated Appeals for reference. You can also check a song’s Appeals by clicking song info and scrolling to the bottom.

Appeals in Psychic Fire as found in the song info.

Dealing with Appeals

The first thing you’ll probably notice about Appeals is that they’re very time sensitive, and sometimes your subunit is too weak to complete the challenge in time (so you get eliminated). 

The easiest way to deal with most Appeals is to whip out your Special skill. Consider saving your SP if you notice that an Appeal is about to begin. Not only do some Appeals require your SP skill to succeed, but the raw Voltage gain will more often or not be the make or break for higher Voltage requirements. Also, the earlier you complete the Appeal, the better as remaining notes become bonus notes which do not drain stamina (yay).

Some Appeals have SP-boosting notes that help you recharge faster - it’s good to remember if these are available to take advantage of.

Again, make sure you’re prepared for the upcoming Appeals or you may receive nasty surprises!

Sub-unit Switching

Cool, so now we know that in order to avoid our dooms we must succeed the Appeals of a song. But is doing that so simple?

You might find that completely using a Voltage-based sub-unit (or one that isn’t specialised at all) to clear Appeals will result in your complete and utter destruction because the passive stamina drain combined with the orange/red stamina bar debuffs will render your team so weak that they will fail all upcoming Appeals (which effectively erases your existence from the universe).

So we gotta Sub-unit switch smart!

The easiest thing to do is to set up a sub-unit that focuses on Guard or other defensive skills outlined earlier and swap them with your Voltage/Skill/Special-oriented sub-units when it’s time for Appeals. Typically a Guard-oriented idol doesn’t have high voltage output and it’s very difficult to recover from Appeal stamina drain even with a team of healers.

EDIT: The way you organise your subunits really do depend on the song. Sometimes you’ll need SP focused ones, or even Sk focused. Gd is always good to have just in case something goes wrong. However I wouldn’t say to only bust out your Vo during Appeal times. Experiment with how long you can use Vo until you need to switch and utilise it to the best that you can! If you have UR Initial Ruby, it’s very likely stamina won’t be a problem for you until later in the game.

Things to Keep in mind:

It’s up to you to find the perfect balance between high Stamina and high Voltage. Sometimes you survive very well, but your safe-playing nets you a pathetic score. On the flip side, sometimes your Voltage greed results into you dipping in Red stamina. Sure you don’t die, but your Voltage output gets nerfed greatly.

Guard Idols passively increase Damage reduction, but at the cost of decreasing Special recharge-rate which can be pretty bad if you’re relying on your SP skill to win you the appeal. So swap mindfully.

Personally I find Damage reduction and Shield more useful than Healers as Healers can’t usually outheal the stamina drain I receive this early in the game.

EDIT: myon u dumb b, damage reduction isn’t very useful!!! just because you watanabe let you down with the heals that one time...Healing is useful and Shield is the best! (especially when Ruby is involved)

Wow this ended up a ton longer than I expected. Hit me up if anyone has any questions or if I said something completely wrong!!