#I know this is a little disjointed but I’m working and I’m on mobile so…

[paracawsal]

I’ve been noticing a lot of blanket statements about witchcraft and magical practice on here recently and I’m not loving it

“Don’t take from closed cultures” is about all I have.

‘If you don’t do x your spell will fail and you’ll never get results!’ meh

‘If you substitute x for y, nothing will work!’ ehhhhh

‘If you don’t time your spell perfectly with the moon cycle/astrological hours you’re going to have a bad time!’ maybe, but eh

Maybe it’s my disability/chronic pain, maybe it’s my practice being mostly intuitive, maybe it’s the time I dabbled in chaos magic and discordianism but

The most successful spells I’ve done are ones I’ve done when I needed to do them with the energy I had at the time, with the tools I was guided to use. I’m a big fan of ‘set it and forget it’.

A lot of the time I’m just carving something into a candle, putting a little oil on it, telling it what it’s supposed to do, lighting it and letting it do it’s thing- when I have the need to do it.

For me, waiting for the *perfect time* and *proper ingredients* etc is far less effective, because my heart isn’t necessarily in it. No, intention isn’t everything, but it’s something. I also ask for help from allied spirits so it’s not all on me to worry about.

In my experience, the harder I try, the more I fail. I have to trust myself and trust that I’ll have help in the working and just let it be.

So yeah. It really just depends on the practitioner.

[gremoria411]

Gundam Iron Blooded Orphans Urdr Hunt Masterpost - Part 1

Alright, I’ve finally finished watching Gundam Iron Blooded Orphans Urdr Hunt, however when putting together this post I didn’t quite realise the scale of it until I was almost finished. As such I’ll be splitting it into three (ish) main posts - This one will be discussing the Ending, a little bit on Londo Bron, and the Zagan. The second post will be my thoughts on Cyclase Mayer and Gjallarhorn, and the last post will be my thoughts on Wistario and the rest of the cast. I’m also planning to do both a post on the series mechanics (in which I’ll talk about the mobile suits and mobile armours) and a character piece on Londo Bron at some point in the future. It just felt a little too long to be just one post, even for me.

Overall, I enjoyed Gundam Urdr Hunt. That said I’m glad I waited to watch it until now, because I think if I’d watched it without the promise of the movie on the horizon, I would have found the ending disappointing. But we’ll get to that. I’m largely going to be referring to my prior post, but I’ll be covering a lot of the same points. Though some of these I noted down as I was watching, so it might be a little more disjointed than usual.

We’ll get to the ending Immediately, as it happens. As I said, I found it overall a good show. The ending, well, it isn’t really an ending. It’s sort of a “the adventure continues”. Katya is recovered and Wistario goes around and thanks all the other Urdr Hunt Participants (except Cyclase) then returns to Radonitsa Colony on Venus. It feels more like the culmination of an Arc than a conclusion to the series, which I guess it is. But Gundam’s never been a series that has arcs so it’s a little odd. All that said, this is where i feel Urdr Hunt’s nature as a video game works against it, since most of the story prior to this has been “gathering the party”, with the Mobile Armour (Nerimiah) functioning as the final boss. I think the movie’s a way to give it a proper conclusion that isn’t tied down to the needs of a videogame.

But the battle at Ratatoskr I do have one criticism of - Wistario races to reach the shuttle, but it’s struck by lightning and explodes. Agonising moments pass, as Wistario thinks he’s failed, then Katya appears from the explosion. Putting aside the fact that we knew damn well she was gonna survive, fuck those Gjallarhorn Pilots, am I right? Also, she survives an explosion in just a normal suit? No shrapnel or explosive force? It feels more annoying because she could have just been in a casket or escape pod or something, but no, magic explosion. I don’t know, it just seems odd, like there’s so many other ways that it could’ve gone that would’ve made more sense.

I like how we get that view into Gjallarhorn with Mcgillis, Okina Uroka and Isurugi. It’s nice to see an internal view on how that all went down (even though I’m sure Uroka is seething on the inside). It’s also very interesting how Uroka just straight up doesn’t answer Mcgillis’ direct question. Way to tip off you have something to hide, my guy.

In brief, the ending’s just alright, there’s stuff I liked (Gjallarhorn), stuff I didn’t (Magic Explosion) and stuff I’m middling on (Nerimiah). I’m glad that there’s a movie coming so it can have a proper conclusion.

However, I do have plenty of other things to say, so let’s get to those;

Londo Bron is an idiot and I love him

I’ll be doing a proper post on him at some point later, but I’m so very happy for his inclusion in the series. He’s basically one of Carta’s former subordinates, her ex-“knight” if you will and I absolutely love the character dynamic this brings to the table. If I didn’t already love the Zagan, he would have definitely made me look at it fondly.

Speaking of, the Gundam Zagan. I’ve already talked about it just from a design perspective prior, but it’s an absolute juggernaut in this. It carves through three Grazes with ease, and is the only enemy in the series to seriously give Wistario a run for his money. It does all this, with a pilot without Alaya-Vijinana. I don’t doubt that other skilled pilots like Londo Brom exist in post disaster, but the Issues certainly weren’t head of the Seven Stars for nothing. It would have been sufficient as a final boss in my mind, but I really can’t find flaw with it. (I might do a proper post on the series mechanics too)

It’s possible that it’s stored in Ratatoskr as a last resort if Nerimiah was to escape. I’m genuinely unsure as to why anyone would willingly preserve a mobile armour, especially (presumably) Arzona Issue, but at least Zagan’s inclusion as part of the prison shows some foresight.

I really hope it’s able to be salvaged though, mostly because if it appears in something else, we might get a HG kit of it. (Also it bothers me a little that Londo Bron essentially wrecked a relic of the Calamity War in its first sortie in 300 years against Wistario. Kinda feels like I’m watching someone use an antique vase to bludgeon a child to death).

[gaythingliker69]

Platinum Wings - Part II

Part I

The sun was harsher, the nights felt longer, the smile she wore hurt. The mask looked out at the client, a buffoon who asked for a scorpion fo complete his disjointed sleeve. The mask, smiled, talked, accepted payment, then watched the client leave. Then the mask fell, and Mary Saotome sank into her chair once again.

It had been two weeks. Nothing. Mary had no way to contact Ririka, to ask the question she so desperately needed to ask, so she had to wait. The first few days had been filled with hope and childish butterflies, allowing her mind licence to wander and dream. But as time dragged on, her hope deserted her, and the butterflies turned from childish to mocking. Weekends passed, still nothing. It normally took people time to recover from such a big tattoo, especially for their first one, but Mary’s brain told the last pieces of resistance in her heart that if she wanted to, she’d have called. Mary had messed up the only chance she’d had. This is what she told herself as she worked, turning over what could have been in her wrecked heart.

Mary glanced at her mobile phone, then the company landline. Was it too much to ask for her to call? Mary felt stupid, like she’d failed somehow. She sighed, stood up, and went to the single toilet in the parlour. She threw water over her face, trying to shock herself out of the daze she constantly found herself in. Then, she stopped stock still, her hand on the tap to turn it back on. The phone was ringing.

She ran through the building, those nervous butterflies powering her tired legs. It wouldn’t be her, it couldn’t be. But she had to hold out hope, to keep that door open just in case it was her. She grabbed the phone, answering and pulling it to her ear.

“Hello?” said Mary, her breath attempting to return to normal.

“Hi, this is Mary isn’t it?”

It was her. She’d ring back. It was her.

“Yes! Yeah, is it Ririka?”

Almost immediately she scolded herself for that. Too forward. But she couldn’t forget that voice. Not ever.

“Yeah, that’s me. I was calling because I want an adjustment made to the tattoo…”

Mary’s stomach pitched. So it was just work. Did she not like it? Had Mary done a poor job?

“…there’s nothing wrong with it, I just want something small adding.”

That was a little better.

“Of course, whatever you need. When do you want to be booked in? I’m free all afternoon at 2 if you’d like.”

“Yes, that sounds great! I’ll be over then.”

As Ririka hung up, Mary wondered at the hints of excitement in Ririka’s voice. It’d all be down to the new tattoo, nothing more.

———

The day was eerily similar to the first time they met. Afternoon sunlight poured in where it could, but it was outshone by Ririka as she opened the door and moved up to the reception again. Mary couldn’t help but smile - she was glad to have her back in the shop.

“It’s good to see you again,” started Mary, trying to contain her excitement. “What can I do for you?”

“It’s good to be back! The wings are great, I’m so happy with them,” replied Ririka, beaming with pride. “So do you know the theatre masks? Like comedy and trafedy?”

“Yeah, one kinda smiles and ones kinda sad, right?” asked Mary, caught off guard by the odd question.

“Exactly. Well, I’d like a tragedy one between my wings and at the top. Right on my spine. Like this.”

She produced a crude drawing on what looked like scrap paper. The mouth was a crescent, turned so it curved down into a frown typical of tragedy. The eyes had two edges, and were angled so the outside corners pointed to her cheeks and the inside ones pointed at the forehead. There was a simple outline of a mask, one that would cover the whole face with no gaps to show skin. It felt almost out of place compared to the elaborate wing design.

“Ok, seems simple enough. That’s all?”

Ririka nodded, and they moved into that back room again. There were a couple of new drawings and stencils decorating the walls, and Ririka’s wings took pride of place over where Mary kept the ink. Mary got to work, and the routine felt similar, like a rehearsal. She still had to look at the floor when Ririka changed, as she became overcome with that unfamiliar nervousness. Her hands still tingled and blazed when she gently patted the small stencil down. Her mind began to drift as she looked at the beautiful woman before her. Because she was, Mary realised. She was beautiful.

“This is gonna hurt okay? I’m sorry,” said Mary, but the last two words were drowned out by the needle. Ririka’s grip tightened and the sides of the bench, and she squeezed her eyes shut. It took all Mary’s will to keep going, to not stop and soothe the pain. But the tattoo didn’t take long, and soon Ririka was taking deep breaths as the cream was massaged into her back again. Mary couldn’t get used to the feeling of touching her - she doubted she ever would. If they ever met again, Mary chided herself. The rehearsal continued - going back to the desk, money, small talk. Now. It was now or never.

“Ririka?” said Mary, cutting through the brief silence with her shaking voice.

Ririka looked up from her purse, her eyes lighting up with that same sparkling energy as last time. Hope. It was hope. It made the turquoise if her eyes grow just a little brighter, like ocean waves glittering in the morning sun.

“I meant to ask you this last time, but…”

She trailed off. A lump in her throat formed, and she felt the butterflies spread their wings in her stomach. She had to power through. To ask. She cleared her throat.

“There’s a nice cafe I know round here, and… and after I’ve finished work one day, well I was wondering if you’d like to go there with me?”

Awkward delivery. She was too nervous, it hadn’t come out right. But then Ririka seemed to glow, an ethereal energy emitting from her. She smiled widely, covering her rosy cheeks with her palms.

“Oh my gosh Mary, I’d love to! I don’t have work on Tuesdays is that ok with you? Actually, you can have my number, that’ll be easier.”

Mary seemed to enter a daze as she write down the series of digits. Ririka babbled, she talked more than Mary had heard her talk in the two appointments. The words washed over Mary, that light voice making them oh so easy to listen to. Ririka skipped to the door, opening it to allow the noise of outside to spill in again.

“See you Tuesday!” beamed the blonde woman, before disappearing into the street, nearly skipping as she went. Mary was alone in the parlour again, but she wouldn’t cry this time. She smiled, and the smile lit up her face in a way nothing ever had before. If she’d seen herself, she might’ve realised it was a molar warm glow as the one Ririka gave off, complimenting the glow. If they’d been together then they’d have come together like magnets.

Tuesday, Mary thought. She would see Ririka on Tuesday. And suddenly, the sun wasn’t harsh anymore, it was beautiful. Her smile no longer hurt, and the mask was discarded.

Tuesday.

[lifblogs]

I Won’t Run, The Guilt Is Mine

Angstpril: Day 3 - “I can’t.”

1547 words

read on ao3

graphic depictions of violence, injury, battle, medical care, angst, whump

@chaos-company

Anakin and Ahsoka were taking heavy fire from Separatist forces. The mission had been going great in terms of low death rate, but now clones—men that Ahsoka had tried to take time to know—were being killed. Luckily Rex, Fives, Echo, and Jesse were still alive. But she wasn’t sure about some of the other 501st members she’d taken a liking to. They had been outflanked and cut off, and now their only hope of getting out of there was to have their main attack force take out the cannons so the gunships could come in and extract them.

“Well this is going great!” Anakin called over the heavy blaster fire. He redirected some blasts with his lightsaber, taking out droids.

Ahsoka grit her teeth as she wielded her two sabers, doing the same.

“Don’t blame me!” she responded. “This was all—your—idea.”

“Cut the attitude, and go help our men on the other side.”

“Right away, Master.”

Ahsoka ran to support the north flank. They were positioned in a circle, and when one man fell along the front lines, he was dragged inwards, and another took his place. It was efficient, but the droids just kept closing in.

“Good to have you here, Commander!” Rex greeted her as she slid in front of him and deflected a red bolt that had been heading towards his helmet.

She spared him a quick nod, and got to work.

The noise around them grew louder, and she thought somewhere close by she heard their other men fighting. A cannon blew up, shaking the ridge to their northeast.

Suddenly, the men around Ahsoka were rushing around her, and she sensed panic through her Force connection with Anakin.

“Master.”

Another explosion shook the battlefield, fire and debris shooting up into the air. Their men crowded each other, chaos overcoming what had once been so orderly.

Then there it was again: panic, helplessness.

“Rex, hold the line!”

“Yes, Commander!”

Ahsoka wove through the troopers, everything a blur of white and blue. They weren’t in a circle anymore. The droids had swarmed them, and they were retreating, making a crowded and disjointed blob, which was quickly becoming fractured.

Her master was far out in the field now, cutting down droid after droid, and using the Force to toss them into each other, push them away. But he was tiring.

“Ahsoka, a little help!” he cried, desperation injecting into his voice.

Heart beating frantically, breathing much too quick, she leapt over some droids, trying to get to his position.

Pain flared in her shoulder, and then her leg, and she plummeted towards the hard ground.

She cried out as she fell.

“Ahsoka!”

Distracted, Anakin had just taken a hit to his abdomen, and had fallen to his knees.

Help, the bond seemed to say, even as she felt his worry for her. But the blaster bolts hadn’t hit anything vital, and had mostly grazed her. Still, she had a hard time fighting as she got back up, the pain slowing her down.

HELP.

“I can’t!” she cried. “Master!”

Explosions shook the ridge, and gunships flew towards their position. But Ahsoka couldn’t feel relief. She couldn’t see Anakin. Where he’d been was nothing but flashing lights and smoke.

Ahsoka took a hit to the back of the head. All went black.

~~~

Adrenaline spiked through Ahsoka so suddenly and with such force that she felt like her chest was going to burst. That’s what woke her.

Blaster fire. Anakin crying for help. The explosions.

“Master!”

Before she knew what was going on or where she was, she was sitting up, reaching for her lightsabers—they weren’t there. Hands held her down.

“No, no! Get off me!”

“Commander.”

Rex?

Ahsoka blinked, beginning to take in her surroundings. She was on their battleship, in her own room in the med bay. Rex and Fives were holding her where she was uninjured, keeping her steady.

A fierce ache raced toward her skull and up through to her montrals, particularly the one on the left. Her shoulder burned, as did her leg.

“The—the battle,” she said. “What happened? Where’s Anakin? Did he make it out?”

“He’s being seen to,” Fives answered. “Now, Commander, you should really lie back down.”

Ahsoka tried to brush them off, but her vision began to swirl, and everything blurred.

For the second time that day, she lost consciousness. The last thing she remembered was Rex lowering her back down, and medicine being injected into her upper arm.

~~~

This time when she woke up, she hurt less, and was in less of a panic. But instead, her body felt heavy, and numbed, the back of her head cold.

Probably a chill pac, Ahsoka realized as she took in her surroundings. Still in the gray and stark cleanliness of the med bay. And this time she was alone. She was warm, at least, but then she winced, tiny pinpricks alighting in her body, and she realized she was under a shock cloth. It would help her, but... she had to go find Anakin.

Ahsoka pushed off the shock cloth, and immediately missed its sturdy warmth. Shaking slightly, she left the bunk they’d put her in, and all but fell as she put weight on her right leg.

Right.

She’d been shot.

Looking down revealed that a medpatch covered part of her leg where her clothing had been torn through, and under that she wouldn’t be surprised if there were mechnosutures.

Great.

A quick exam of herself showed the same for her left shoulder.

Ahsoka held herself up by gripping the bunk, and as dizziness swarmed her, somehow seeming to plunge through her entire body so that nausea began to overtake what strength she’d thought she had, she looked for anything that she could use as a crutch. She hadn’t been left any; probably because she wasn’t supposed to be out of bed and mobile.

Too kriffing bad.

She spotted an IV pole across the room, and limped/dragged herself to it. Then, gripping it in a sweaty palm, she went to go find Anakin.

How badly was he hurt? He was alive still, that much she could sense. But would he stay that way? Was he even conscious? Would he blame her for what had happened?

Perhaps his blame didn’t matter because all Ahsoka could feel was a stone in her stomach from the knowledge that she hadn’t been able to help him, that she’d let him down.

It didn’t take long for her to find Anakin—he was in the room next to hers—and when she did, she saw that he was unconscious. He was burned and bloodied, but had been cleaned up as best as could be managed. Some medpatches were beginning to have a pink tint to them, and she wondered just how deep his wounds went. He lay under a shock cloth, and an oxygen mask was over his face.

Ahsoka nearly collapsed at the sight, and it had nothing to do with the damage to her body.

She went to him, and fell before his bunk.

“Oh, Master.”

She reached to take his hand that had fallen out from under the shock cloth, but then she realized that was bandaged too.

Tears pricked the corners of her eyes as she stared at him. And stared.

Oh blast, this was her fault. All of it. She’d left his side, she hadn’t noticed the enemy surging towards his flank, and she hadn’t been able to reach him to help him. She’d gotten hit in the head of all things! How pathetic. She wasn’t just some regular soldier, or someone fresh out on the field. She was his Padawan, and yet she’d let him down.

“Master, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean...”

She cut herself off as he coughed, and then his blue eyes blinked open slowly. Despite the medicines he’d surely been given, they were still clouded with pain.

“Master?”

He reached up to remove the mask from his face. Ahsoka wanted to stop him, but she didn’t know where she could even touch him. Where wasn’t he injured?

He groaned, but managed to do so.

“Ahsoka, I’m fine.”

“No, no. Look at you!” she argued. “You needed help, and I couldn’t help you. You could’ve died!”

He coughed, let out another groan, and then murmured, voice rough and breathy, as if each word caused pain, “I’m—fine—Snips.”

“Stop lying. You’re not fine. You’re— Oh, how could I have let this happen?”

“You did what you… could.”

“No, I didn’t! I listened to my fear, my pain. I could have saved you, I could have—”

He reached out with his injured hand and weakly grasped her good shoulder. “You couldn’t have,” he murmured.

She bowed her head, and felt tears begin to flow.

Of course. She’d failed him, and he thought so too.

“Anakin, I’m sorry.”

“It’s… alright, Snips. It’s alright.”

Ahsoka didn’t believe that, couldn’t believe that. All she remembered was her failure, her weakness, lying on the ground as she screamed, I can’t!

She had failed him. His injuries were proof of that. Even her own were.

“You—have—to—forgive—yourself—Snips.”

She nodded, vision blurred as more tears fell.

Yet, inside, she knew, I can’t.

[melodious-madrigals]

***

Steve knows what a television is, and how it works, okay?

Well, he understands it conceptually.

(In theory, anyways.)

It shows a moving picture; it’s one of the technological leaps that has happened since he ‘died’. He’s seen glimpses of what Diana’s computer and mobile phone can do, with their sleek lines and the way they light up and retrieve information faster than he can comprehend. He’s seen the display screens in the metros, and the streaming advertisements that flash by as the train speeds through the dark tunnels, the sequences of pictures that replicate people in motion, a little disjointed but just as good as the cutting edge moving pictures he saw in the 1910s. But in the month that he’s been in the 21st century, he’s never actually seen one of these movies that everyone talks about, or anything on the Tee-Vee, really.

To be clear, he doesn’t particularly feel like he’s missing out. Diana doesn’t have a television in her apartment, and even though Barry has scoffed at this fact all four (4) times Steve’s met him (time he pulled him a hundred years forward in history inclusive), there are plenty of other things for them to do.

(For one thing, Steve has yet to exhaust the new and creative ways in which he wants to worship Diana’s body, thank you very much.)

The point is, Steve does not care a whit about television or moving pictures beyond a cursory, isn’t-the-future-interesting sort of way.

And then Diana suggests that they go to the cinema on a date.

"I think you'd enjoy it," she says, and maybe he's an absolute sap, but the fact that she thinks he'll like it is all the convincing he needs. 

He agrees immediately, and that's that. 

*

“Do I need to get dressed up?” Steve asks the next afternoon as they’re getting ready to go to the cinema.

“Not even a little,” replies Diana from the bathroom, in the process of braiding back her hair. “The cinema is dark and traditionally one eats a lot of horribly sugary food.”

This suits Steve, who likes sugar and doesn’t particularly like suits. (It also doesn't hurt that the casual button-down he'd earmarked for the evening and now gets to wear is one that always makes Diana's eyes darken a little.) 

When they arrive, Diana is the one who chooses their seats and pays for the tickets, while Steve looks around gamely at the bright posters, still a little unsure what to expect. 

Next, she steers him to the concession stand.

“We could have just brought snacks from home,” says Steve, glancing warily over the prices on the overhead menu. He's still not used to modern pricing; it makes him itchy. 

“Not for your first cinema experience,” says Diana. “That wouldn’t do.”

In front of them, a pair of bouncing children tug on their mother's sweater, pleading for the largest size possible of—

“Popcorn?” asks Steve, pleasantly surprised, and now examining the food displays with renewed interest. It’s something he remembers eating as a child, on cold autumn nights around the fireplace.

“It’s a cinema staple.”

"That, then." 

Diana orders a bucket and a selection of candy to go with it. They're left with enough time that they can duck into their seats a few minutes early. The lights are still low and the screen blank, but they dig into their treats anyways.

“It’s got no substance to it,” Steve says of the popcorn, though he promptly shoves another handful into his mouth and then sends a lopsided grin her way, cheeks bulging. “More salt and butter, though,” he adds after a moment, and Diana smiles.

“Yes, humans got rather good at that.”

“I’m certainly not complaining.”

It’s just then that the lights go dark, and the screen comes alive. 

As the opening scene plays, Diana watches Steve's eyes widen just a little, the way he jumps at the sound and leans forward, almost entranced by the screen. 

"Wow," he breathes, more to himself than to her. "Motion pictures really do have sound now." 

Diana bites back a smile, and has to force herself to look back at the screen. 

(It doesn't work: the movie is passably interesting, but it doesn't hold a candle to expressions on Steve's face, and she spends most of the film watching him fondly instead. The way his eyes go so wide that she can see the flashing reflection of the movie mirrored across them. The way his lips part slightly and he sucks in a sharp breath as the action races towards its peak. The little expressions that flick across his features, one after another as he gets lost in the story. She doubts she'll be able to give nuanced commentary on the substance of the film, but it's worth it.) 

*

“That was amazing,” Steve says breathlessly, as the credits roll. “That was amazing. I knew technology had come a long way, but it’s so lifelike and crisp. Like it was really happening in front of us."  

Diana wonders briefly if this was what it was like for Steve when she first arrived, seeing bits of the world through fresh eyes, experiencing simple pleasures as something profound, revolutionary. For her, the progress happened so steadily that she never really stopped to marvel how far it’s truly come.

"It's extraordinary," she agrees, and he wastes no time in launching into an excited analysis of the film. 

When he eventually gets to the special effects, Diana makes a mental note to show him some of the movies from the '80s to demonstrate just how quickly ‘cutting edge’ effects have changed. She also makes a mental note to invest in a television, and maybe reinstate her Netflix account, and to look up drive-in theaters. 

"So," she says, when Steve takes a breath, "same time next week?" 

His ensuing grin is all the answer she needs.

(Popcorn is nice and all, but there’s at least one other cinema tradition she’s looking forward to.)

[thewebcomicsreview]

So I've been following this one guy who gives really good writing advice, but lately he's been: telling people it's OK to skip the Intermission in Homestuck; defending bad writing as a "structural issue" (those poor writers, it's not their fault they've structured their story / writing process in a bad way); priding himself on making a half-assed "unfinished-on-purpose" comic review. This person was my main source of writing advice, so I don't know where to turn to. Any recommendations?

The only other webcomic review guys I’m aware of are the Bad Webcomics Wiki, but if you think I’m too nice on writers, they might be up your speed anyway and oh my god they just posted a review of a SpiderForest comic. Guess it’s time for

The Webcomic Review Reviews Webcomic Reviews

So, this is a review of a SpiderForest comic called “The Guide to a Healthy Relationship” which is a comic about LGBT people, and it’s being reviewed by the Bad Webcomics Wiki, so obviously there’s going to be a whole bunch of slurs, so consider that a content warning and I’m putting the rest of this behind a ReadMore

This is going to be slightly disjointed because the BWW review is disjointed, but I’ll do my best

We’re already in some factual trouble right on line one, since TGtaHR is a traditional webcomic and not a long-scroll mobile-friendly webtoon, nor is it hosted on webtoons.com. Is this nitpicky? Maybe a little, but we’re off to a poor start here. 

This comic is just under 200 pages.

I feel like if you’re going to write a big thing attacking a webcomic’s story, you should try to have some kind of understanding of what that story is. I know what the story of Sinfest is, and Sinfest is a confusing nightmare.

Okay, so maybe the reason you think this story is bad is because it’s 2deep4u. 

So, in the space of about twenty pages, we learn that Apollo had a friend named Julian who killed himself, and then we cut ahead to Julian drinking on the job, going to a party, taking drunks, and waking up naked in the bathtub covered in beer bottles, and the living room is full of too-hot-for-tumblr passed-out drunks. The Bad Webcomics Wiki calls this “Softcore porn that is never brought up again”, because the Bad Webcomics Wiki is written by high school dropouts for an audience they presume has never read the comic proper. 

This debauchery is never brought up again because it’s not relevant to the plot, it’s relevant to the character. Apollo is fucked up because his friend killed himself when he was a teenager, and he deals with being fucked up by retreating into sex, drugs, and rock and roll. That’s what’s being established here. Also being established if you’re paying attention: Apollo has scars on his chest. 

In chapter 1, Apollo goes to a party, the entirety of which is dedicated to him walking around naked, and we get a bunch of obviously sexual shots of his dick, clearly catering to the author's gay fetish. His boss goes to his place to check on him, and it is revealed he is a hoarder. This never comes up again.  

1. In this scene, there are two panels where you can see Apollo’s penis, one panel where you can see someone’s vomit-covered dick, and two panels where you can see a woman’s breasts. None of these panels of flacid dicks or sagging boobs are sexual, though. The dicks are unpowered, it doesn’t make a bit of difference guys, the balls are inert. 

2. What the fuck is a “gay fetish” and how it different from just “being gay”.

3. I don’t know the author, even though we’re both in SpiderForest, so I don’t know where Dani The Carutor lies in the whole gender spectrum thingamabob, but I will note that “Dani” is usually short for Danielle. So maybe it’s not a safe assumption that the author is a man? I dunno. That’s just me, guessing people’s genders by screen name is hard, so I try not to lest I embarrass myself.

4.So, when you say Apollo is a “hoarder”, you link to a page showing his room is disgusting and covered in garbage

Is your takeaway from these panels....that Apollo is some kind of fanatic garbage collector? That his room is full of garbage because he actively works at having as much garbage as possible because he wants it? 

There are a couple pages explaining Apollo's purple special snowflake eyes with some snowflake "disability".

Apollo has Ocular Albinism, which is a real condition that really exists, and really does give you purple eyes. It also gives you major vision problems, which are the context in which it gets brought up, because Apollo needs help crossing the road because he can’t see well enough in the light. So I don’t know what the scare quotes around “disability” are for. He can’t see. You could, if you were so inclined, connect this plot point with the way the chapter titles are named after mental conditions, and start to formulate some coherent critique with the seemingly cavalier way this comic uses disability, but that would require thought. It might even require research into difficult topics, because you’d ideally not want to make a fool of yourself talking about things you didn’t understand well enough to talk competently about. 

Chapter 2 is the most pointless, as it is basically there to confirm what we already know so the author can insert a cringy buzzword (see image below)

Okay, so a couple of things

1. In what fucking universe is “tranny” an SJW buzzword? What the fuck are you even talking about? 

2. Having the protagonist of your comic say someone is “smart, for a tranny” is like the least SJW thing you could possibly do.

3. Perhaps “Apollo is asking someone for help but casually insults her causing her to leave” is some kind of “character” moment? The author of this review is so /pol/-poisoned that they have no ability to understand “context” or “characterization” or basically any thing that exists. 

4.Your list of the comic’s characters includes this bon mot: 

So what the fuck? That’s so stupid I’d think it was an intentionally hypocritical joke if I had any reason to believe you were capable of it.

Chapter 3 is dedicated to revealing the boyfriend shit

I should point out that Apollo and Julian being boyfriends is something the BWW invented, the comic itself clearly states they were “best friends”, not boy friends. Couple of dudes being prudes. 

Apollo believes that Julian faked his own death, which fucked up Apollo for years, and now that they’ve met each other Julian keeps ghosting him. Apollo’s motives for chasing Julian around are extremely clear. 

That’s a scene transition, bay-bee! 

Apollo finally gets ahold of Julian. Julian blows him off and Apollo gives up. There’s then a clear scene transition to Apollo, at a restaurant, talking about what we just saw. This is a perfectly clear scene transition, with a transitory panel and everything to indicate that this is the next day. It’s certainly more clear than Apollo waking up in jail in chapter 2 which you skipped over. Are you actually reading this comic at all? 

You are such a fucking moron, holy shit. 

Julian got beat up for being trans. It’s unclear if he’s actually trans or just a feminine-looking cis dude, but regardless it was bad enough to traumatize him and this all happened when he knew Apollo, who calls Julian his “best friend”, and says things like

There’s literally two dots here, and you’re unable to connect them. Galia even has the same hairstyle as Julian to make it visually obvious This Is What The Reference and you still missed it. 

Julian and Apollo walk around the woods in their underwear for no reason whatsoever. Julian takes some drugs or something, and passes out?

Hm. Why does Julian go outside at night? I wonder if that’s explained in the comic?

Oh, I see. He went outside to smoke. But why did Apollo go outside at night?

Oh, he was looking out the window and saw Julian mysteriously go off into the woods. I guess that’s explained, too. I guess you just missed those pages

Julian takes some drugs or something, and passes out?

Huh, I wonder why Julian was asleep

Oh, he has Insomnia, so he took something called Halcion. I wonder what that is.

Oh, it’s a prescription insomnia medication. And you shouldn’t take alcohol with it, wow Julian is dealing with a super pushy alcoholic I should file that information away for later, like how knowing Wellbutrin’s side effects in teenagers were critical to understand Drop Out. Luckily webcomics are comics, on the web, and I can look this up! 

He is then woken up by the fatty side character punching him. Somehow, Julian destroyed the kitchen, even though he was passed out - this is never explained, and makes no fucking sense

Sigh.

So, here are some hints as to what happened.

1. 

Julian has bruises all over his body, which you have consistently failed to notice.

2. 

Daniel, Julian’s friendly boyfriend, has like no negative reaction whatsoever to Brandon, some random dude, punching Julian in the fucking face

He even takes Brandon’s side and basically implants the idea that Julian did it into Julian’s head, and that last panel is rather threatening. 

Julian took insomnia medicine, and fell asleep, and then got wrongfully blamed for destroying the kitchen by Daniel, who know’s that Julian was passed out and couldn’t have done it. Who actually did destroy the kitchen is a mystery, but Daniel is the most likely culprit. 

it transitions into this trippy bullshit with blood, and body horror, and Julian's hair is suddenly short

It’s short because it’s a flashback to when he was a teenager, and he had short hair when he was a teenager so that literate people are able to understand this without getting confuzzled. 

Apollo turning into Daniel in this trippy dream sequence is also pretty relevant! 

Also, we have random nudity and sexualization of this sick person.

No, we have reveals that he’s in worse physical shape than we thought.

By the way, in your character list, you describe Daniel as

Daniel (Side Character): He may as well be a wall. This guy has no personality whatsoever. No quirks, no interests, no purpose outside of causing superficial melodrama.

If you’ve made it all the way to this point and not picked up on Daniel being an abusive boyfriend and the primary antagonist of the story, you may be beyond hope.

The rest of the chapter is Julian being angsty, and SO ILL while everyone talks about how weird he is

Again, that’s very clearly and obviously not actually what’s happening in the story.

What’s happening isn’t “Julian is sick lol”, it’s “Daniel is working to turn everyone against Julian”. That’s why he destroyed the kitchen and blamed Julian for it; to ensure that the other boys all thought Julian was a nutjob and thus keep them from reaching out to Julian and providing Julian with a guide to a healthy relationship instead of the abusive one he’s currently in. Your inability to read even slightly between the lines isn’t just distressing in terms of your inability to think critically about stories, it’s maybe worrisome re your ability to think about the real world, too. How are you this dense? It’s like watching Star Wars and not picking up that the empire and the rebellion don’t like each other. No wonder you’re confused! 

Chapter 5 is still in the works. It jumps the shark right away with Apollo getting drunk and sleeping with Julian's boyfriend. The author makes Apollo the guilty party and not the boyfriend

The comic is fairly clear that Daniel is the bad guy

This webtoon is so convoluted there is no saving it at this point. Each chapter is titled after some mental illness such as 'Monophobia', 'Anxiety', 'Psychosis'. You think they would have some thematic meaning with each chapter being about one of those things. Nope, they're just titled like that to show how EDGY this webtoon is! You can taste the cringe. Julian's mental shit has no rhyme or reason - he will act sick when the plot calls for it, and if it has anything to do with the chapter's title, it is also crazy inaccurate.

The author of this review somehow managed to read the entirety of The Guide to a Healthy Relationship without picking up that Daniel was an abuser. The comic thus seems convoluted to him because he thinks all the things happening are random events without rhyme or reason because he has completely failed to notice the whole plot, which is not subtle. Just....fucking staggering incompetence, as a critic.

Guess you’re stuck with me, anon.

[watch-grok-brainrot]

okay that was a lot of information for both tea AND cdramas!! i started watching cdramas this year because my friend got me into cql. basically a few pretty famous blogs in one of my fandoms watched cql and went crazy about it, then my mutual watched it and she kept reblogging some stuff (also comparing wwx to one of the characters we got and how they're similair and different, aka kinda crazy genius, they die! invents cool stuff, black hair, orphan etc.) and eventually, when we talked once, she told me to watch it in like july? so i did watch somewhere in august? (so, yeah i'm pretty new ig) after i finished some other shows. i just binge watched the whole show, got my sister's bff into it (who is basically my sister) when we celebrated my dad's birthday in a very small circle of friends, and just..... watched it over and over again. the only other cdrama that i've watched is the wolf, i started it for xiao zhan and i'm staying for him and ma zhaixing. i want to watch NiF because a lot of people have told me how good it is but i haven't found the time yet to do so. (i'm currently watching a lot of stuff and reading two-three books and playing a couple of video games)

ajdksks i'm so used to watching things where i understand the language, 'cause i can either watch it in english or my native language, that i sometimes forget to look at the screen and then i have to get back and watch the scene again ahdjsksk i'm not that good at staying focused so normally i wil play a mobile game or scroll through my phone while watching a show (however, i'm sometimes able to stay focused on the show like i did 98% of the time while watching cql)

random fact about me: if you start ranting to me about a thing, or explain it to me whatever, and i think it's interesting or that i need this for later, there is a pretty high chance of me remembering this for months. except for names. i forget names, if we don't know each other or i deem it not worth remembering, in like a couple of minutes or a few hours. this made my grades always really good but good lord, i could have 273892929 classes with someone and if i don't think they're memorable enough i will only have a vague feeling of what their name is (which..... doesn't include historical persons, i'm pretty good with them).

also my fav ost songs are: wei wuxian's, lan xichen's, lan wangji's and i kinda like jiang yanli's and wen qing's a lot for the lyrics. - ❄🐇

Hey snowbunny! I got to this tonight! Food coma stopped and i’m on my computer. yay!!

aaah. I haven’t watched the wolf yet. It’s on my list. i’m working through evernight right now. :D

hahaha. i know the feeling of forgetting to read subtitles and then going wtf. that’s why i stopped watching as much anime as i used to. i can’t be bothered to read subs unless the show is really good. 

oh man. my brain is also a weird little sponge. i collect useless info in completely arbitrary ways. i know disjointed facts. 

what books are you reading? i just read erha and am now trying to reread mdzs. 

[megabadbunny]

if we let go (5/?)

A lazy smile quirks Rose’s lips. She doesn’t know why she’s so surprised. She did say he was the one who let her in, after all. It’s just nice, she supposes, to be right about something for once. (It’s very nice to be right about him.)

Right after Journey’s End, Rose gets a choice, even if she has to carve it out for herself. This chapter has lemons; visit ff.net for a citrus-free experience.

***

prologue | chapter 1 | chapter 2 | chapter 3 | chapter 4 | chapter 5

chapter five: you gave me a life i never chose

After what feels like a lifetime (but is, in actuality, a mere thirteen hours, seventeen minutes, and forty-six seconds), amidst a landslide of half-empty teacups and coffee mugs and medical-technical gear and bits and bobs, the medscreen finally (finally) begins to beep.

“Really?” murmurs the Doctor, straightening up from his slumped position over his research materials for the first time in hours. Hardly daring to believe, he reaches for the device with only the smallest amount of trepidation, mentally preparing himself for whatever he might find there. He flips the screen his way. And there, amidst a string of medical technobabble reassuring him of Donna’s stasis (respiratory and cardiopulmonary systems going a little faster than he’d like, but stable enough, considering), reads a string of text distinctly unlike the rest:

<oi>

<oi spaceman>

<you there>

Eyes widening, the Doctor reads the text again, over and over, barely able to process what he’s seeing (never mind that he engineered things for this very purpose—the fact that it all worked is nothing short of miraculous).

The device beeps again as new text blinks across the screen, bright white lines flashing cheerfully against the grey. 

<oi doctor i’m talking to you>

<i can only imagine you’ve got something to do with this>

<whatever this is>

<speaking of which, where the hell am i>

<what’s going on>

<why can’t i move>

<can anyone hear me here>

<hello>

<hELLo spaceman are you ThErE>

“Yes, yes,” the Doctor stammers immediately, out of instinct, more than anything—doubtful Donna can hear him right now, after all, even if he is stationed just a few feet away from her comatose self. Half-panicked, half-giddy beyond belief, the Doctor scrambles around in the technological viscera scattered over the medbay counter until he finds all the pieces he’s looking for (cables, clamps, Martha’s old mobile, a webcam the size of a thumbtack plucked from the year 2057, a simple jury-rigged electroencephalographic scope, the usual) before realizing that, oh, right, Donna would probably like an answer, wouldn’t she? and abandoning it all to type out a quick <<Yep, I’m here>> before he returns to the task at hand.

<great> flashes across the screen in response. <so you gonna tell me what the hell is going on? or where the hell i am? or why’s it so dark here? or why can’t i move?>

<<Why, hello, Donna! It’s nice to hear from you, too>> the Doctor types into the medscreen, even as he smiles. <<No need to thank me for saving your brain from immediate and irreversible liquidation, original memories fully intact and pristine. The dulcet vision of your digital voice is the only accolade I need.>>

<glad to hear it>

<now answer my questions please dumbo>

<<You’re still on the TARDIS. You can’t move or see or otherwise process external stimuli because you’re in a medically-induced coma.>>

<well isn’t that wizard> reads the immediate response in a tone so reminiscent of Donna that the Doctor can’t help but laugh. <you wanna tell me why i’m in a coma?>

Smiling, the Doctor shakes his head. <<In the wake of the metacrisis-event, due to the external memories’ rapid deterioration of your brain, I’ve telepathically isolated the offending elements from your neural network and blocked them from re-entry>> he explains, typing between bouts of plugging in cables and adjusting dials on the electroencephalographic scope. <<Unfortunately, the best way to maintain the integrity of the telepathic blocks involves keeping your conscious mind safe from anything that might trigger the memory of the offending elements, which involves putting you in a persistent vegetative state until we can find a way to safely and permanently extract the metacrisis material from your temporal and parietal lobes, without damaging any of the surrounding tissue or neural pathways. Got it?>>

If the medscreen could convey an exasperated sigh, the Doctor imagines it would right about now. <in english please> the screen flashes at him.

The Doctor grins madly as he works, relief bubbling up in his head until he’s almost dizzy from it. He’s never been so happy for a companion to do the digital equivalent of offering him nothing but a blank stare; no more babbling about macrotransmissions or shatterfrying or mountains that sway in the breeze means his telepathic blocks are holding firm. That means no more Time Lord knowledge overwhelming human brains, which means that, for the time being anyway, Donna’s safe.

Which means, he realizes as he fishes his specs out of his pocket, that he may actually have a chance of saving her.

<<My memories are still in your head and you’re stuck in a coma until I can remove them>> he types to Donna. <<But don’t worry, in the meantime I’ve rigged up this handy-dandy medical transceiver and plugged it directly into your subconscious so we can still communicate!>>

<oh god no> flashes across the screen. <doctor do NOT make me a brain in a computer, i expressly forbid it>

<<Wouldn’t dream of it>> the Doctor replies before affixing the tiny webcam to the side of his specs.

<good>

<why do you need to talk to me anyways>

<or talk to my brain or my subconscious or whatever>

<not like i’ll be any help, can’t see or hear or do anything>

“Oh, ye of little faith,” murmurs the Doctor, slipping on his glasses and fiddling with the settings on Martha’s mobile phone. “When have I ever let you down?”

“That tatty old suit lets down my sense of fashion every single day,” mutters a digitized version of Donna’s voice, and the Doctor laughs, now, properly laughs. A spluttered sound of indignant surprise erupts from the webcam’s built-in speaker, and the Doctor laughs harder, imagining the shock that would sweep across Donna’s face right now, were it capable.

“Oh my god!” shouts Donna’s voice from the speaker, disjointed and tinny in that way that voices-projected-from-telephonic-devices often are, but still her voice, nonetheless. “Doctor, I can hear you!”

“Yes!”

“And you can hear me!” yells Donna’s voice.

“Oh, yes!” the Doctor shouts gleefully in reply.

“But how? I’m still asleep, aren’t I? I still can’t move or see anything—”

“Well, then,” says the Doctor, fiddling with more settings on the mobile as he smiles what may or may not be the universe’s smuggest grin, “Let there be light!”

He hits one last button and is rewarded with a high-pitched screech not unlike one that might rip out of a pterodactyl. “I can see!” Donna shrieks, and silently, the Doctor adjusts the webcam-speaker’s volume, lest Donna’s voice split his eardrums or manage to wake her own comatose body somehow. “Oh my god, I can see the TARDIS—her walls, I mean—and cabinets and lights and—you’re in the medbay, right? Oh, you are—cos that’s me over there on the bed, isn’t it? Oof, I look a bit peaky, don’t I? But how on earth—?”

“Oh, it was just a small matter of rigging together the right materials to tap into your subconscious mind. Simple enough, if you’ve got a spare mobile and travel-size electroencephalographic scope lying around. A direct line, if you will,” the Doctor laughs. “Doesn’t get much more direct than this!”

“This is bonkers, absolutely bonkers. I can’t believe you managed it!”

“Didn’t I mention, though?” asks the Doctor as he springs up, feeling lighter than he has in days—maybe weeks, maybe longer. “I’m brilliant!”

“You really are,” Donna concedes, and in any other situation, the Doctor might feel mildly insulted at how surprised she sounds to admit it. “So, what do we do, now? What’s the next step?”

The Doctor considers as he darts over to Donna’s body on the bed, double- and triple-checking her vitals, just to be sure. “Well, now that the imminent danger has passed, I suppose it’s time to do a little research, scan our local solar systems to locate the equipment we need to finish the memory extraction.”

“Sounds good to me. The sooner I stop being a vegetable, the better, and if anyone can fix that, it’s you.”

No, not just him, a stubborn little voice at the back of the Doctor’s head insists. Not him. Them. Because in all honesty, the only reason he’s got any hope at all right now is all because of—

He chuckles, silently chiding himself. He really can be an idiot, sometimes. Doubting himself. Doubting her. He should know better than to distrust Rose’s instincts, whether they’re telling her to help Donna or bolt back for the TARDIS at the last second or anything else; for all he knows, her intuition could very well be a side effect borne of the Bad Wolf phenomenon (but really, he suspects it’s all just her and her gut, in the end. She’s surprisingly insightful, for a human. Always has been. He’d do well to remember that, he thinks).

Looking down at the medscreen, at the numbers displayed across its surface showing a significant calming-down of Donna’s vitals, the Doctor softens. Rose was right, in more ways than one. The Doctor reminds himself to apologize to her at the first available opportunity—though really, he thinks as he stows the medscreen and all of its connected parts safely inside his pockets, wouldn’t she prefer that he showed her how right she was, instead of telling her?

“Hang on, how come my hands look like your hands?” asks Donna, interrupting his thoughts. “I mean, obviously they’re your hands, but it’s the wrong angle, like they’re coming out of me instead of you. Like a first-person videogame thing. Am I seeing the world through your eyes, right now?”

“Near enough,” the Doctor replies cheerfully.

“Okay, but—but not like. Not literally though. Right?”

“Strictly figuratively,” the Doctor laughs. “Don’t worry, Donna. It’s all in the glasses.”

“Oh, thank god. The thought of accidentally seeing you naked again makes me throw up in my mouth a little bit.”

“On second thought, maybe I’ll leave you in the coma after all,” says the Doctor.

 ***

 Rose awakes with a start, tensing at the weight pressed against her, the unfamiliar room surrounding her. Her first thought is that she must have been knocked unconscious during a jump gone wrong—not terribly common, but it’s happened before—but as her eyes adjust to the semi-dark, taking in everything in the room from the curved ceiling to the carpeted floor to the telltale rough coral walls, recognition slowly filters in, and she remembers.

She made it. She made it back to this universe. She made it back to the TARDIS, back to the Doctor. (Doctors, plural? Both of them, then.) And he—

Oh. That weight, that body pressed close—that must be him. One of them is with her right now, isn’t he? Because this is his room, isn’t it? And if she turns over, Rose will see the Doctor lying in bed next to her, won’t she?

Her limbs still thick and heavy with sleep, Rose lazily rolls over to find the Doctor (the human one, she remembers, because that’s a thing, now), curled on his side and fast asleep. Slumber-tousled hair tumbles over a forehead smooth from worry, the Doctor’s mouth parted just slightly, his eyes shuttered, as if in prayer. It’s strange seeing him like this, not because of their years apart, not even because they’re both lying in his unfamiliar bed, but because Rose is casting about in her memories to recall the last time she ever saw him so quiet and unguarded, and she’s coming up empty-handed. She has seen him sleep before, technically; that’s not new. But she has never seen him really, properly vulnerable, in this body or any other. She’s never seen him look so human.

Human or not, it’s surreal to be so close to the Doctor right now, after so many years apart. So Rose just watches him for a moment, just taking everything in. Part of her can’t believe it, even though he’s right here, right in front of her. It’s all almost too much to absorb.

(Only almost, though. God, he’s pretty like this. Then again, he’s pretty much always pretty.)

Probably she should go ahead and get up (escape, she doesn’t think, before the moment swells too much in its sentimentality, before he wakes up and goes flighty, before she grows vulnerable herself), but struck with a sudden curious need, Rose shifts in the bed instead, one hand lifting up. She places her palm flat against the Doctor’s chest, gently, feeling its rise and fall with each deep inhale and soft exhale, before tracing a line down to the bottom of his ribcage. She can sense his heart beating, behind layers of tee shirt and skin and muscle and bone, pulsing quietly almost in time with her own.

It’s all very different. But not bad different.

“I thought I was the rude one,” mutters the Doctor, eyes still solidly shut.

Rose twitches. “Huh?”

“I thought,” the Doctor repeats, eyes sliding slowly open, “that I was the rude one.”

There goes her plan. “Oh, don’t worry,” Rose chuckles. “You’re plenty rude.”

“Says the person trying to tickle me awake.”

Cringing, Rose starts to draw her hand back. “Sorry, I didn’t mean—”

The Doctor stops her hand before it can withdraw very far, anchoring her fingers and palm solidly back against his chest. “S’all right,” he mumbles, blinking sleep away. “Probably a good time to get up anyway.”

He’s right.

Neither of them moves.

“Did you end up getting any actual sleep last night?” Rose asks.

“Do you know, I think I did, after…” the Doctor starts to say, and trails off. Rose can practically see the memory of the night before as it replays in his mind, and admittedly, it’s a little difficult to tell in the semi-dark, but is he blushing? “After you came in,” he says hurriedly. “What about you?”

“Yeah,” says Rose, hiding a grin. “I’m good.”

He smiles at her then, almost shyly. “Good.”

And that marks a good time to get up, Rose thinks. For her to put space between them before he has the chance to. 

(Except he still hasn’t moved his hand from hers. Palm pressed against his chest, Rose can feel his heartrate pick up beneath her fingers, and suddenly she’s very warm, and moving seems difficult.)

“But, like I said, probably good to go ahead and get up,” the Doctor says quickly, and Rose imagines that if his hand weren’t full of hers, he’d be nervously tugging on his ear right about now. “You know. Get the day started, and all that.”

“Probably. What time is it?”

At that, the Doctor blinks just a little too much, fully awake now. “Well,” he says, drawing the word out. “That’s sort of an interesting question, isn’t it? What time is it. Difficult to answer, considering the relativity of time (especially on the TARDIS), and taking into account that there’s no real universal chronometrical measurement or standard, and we’re really just relying on observations alone, which can vary greatly depending on the observers’ proximity to a gravitational mass—”

“You don’t know,” Rose realizes aloud.

After stuttering for a second, the Doctor closes his mouth. He shakes his head, the motion tight.

“Because of the metacrisis?

He nods.

“I’m sorry,” she says, and she means it.

He shrugs. “It’s no worries.”

“Not even a few worries?” Rose asks, lips quirking in a small smile.

“Eh, I’m sure I can manage without the time sense. Plenty of species do. Now, the bypass, on the other hand...”

As if on cue, the Doctor starts to yawn, only to snap his mouth shut halfway through. “Oh,” he says, nose wrinkling in disgust. “Rose, I don’t mean to alarm you, but I think I might have morning breath now.”

Rose chuckles. “Many of us do.”

“Well, isn’t that wizard,” the Doctor says drily. “Being human is just wonderful, can’t imagine why I never tried it long-term before.”

“It’s not all bad, you know.”

“Hmph. I’ll believe it when I see it,” he grumps. “Or hear it or smell it or feel it or taste it, as the case may be.”

Humming thoughtfully, Rose takes a moment to consider. Her fight-or-flight instinct is still murmuring quietly in the background, telling her that this is as good a moment as any to end the conversation, go ahead and get up and wash up and go about their day, whatever it may bring; the sooner she leaves this warm little cocoon, after all, the sooner Rose will be able to build her walls back up, retreat back to safe territory. Before things get out of hand. Before she has a chance to get hurt again. (Before any of them do.)

She ignores it.

“That,” Rose says, scooting just a little bit closer to him (just the littlest bit closer, mind), “sounds like an awful lot like a challenge.”

“Oh?” asks the Doctor, eyebrow arched in amusement.

“Yes,” she says solemnly, nodding. “Tell me: what do your human eyes see?”

“Plenty of stuff. It’s not my physical sensory capabilities that concern me.”

“Humor me.” Rose curls her fist against his chest. “What do you see right now?”

Beneath his ribcage, Rose swears she feels his pulse skip a beat. “Well,” says the Doctor, “not to belabor the obvious, but I see you. In my bedroom. In my bed, of all places.”

“That’s not so bad, is it?” Rose asks cheekily, tongue pressed against the back of her teeth.

The Doctor grins at her in a way that makes something flutter in her stomach. “Not bad at all,” he concedes.

Rose smiles. “And what can you hear?”

“All the same things you can, I imagine. Your voice, my voice, the TARDIS’ hum,” the Doctor counts off, “the buzz of the temporal-spacial equinometer, the quiet hiss of the life support system, faint overtures of the Vortex—”

“Right, of course I can hear all of that,” teases Rose, rolling her eyes.

“The sounds of you wriggling in the sheets like the squirmy little thing you are…”

With a laugh, Rose’s smile widens. “How’s about your nose?”

The Doctor wrinkles said nose again. “Aside from my aforementioned temporary halitosis, let’s see. It’s picking up on a hint of recycled oxygen courtesy of the TARDIS, traces of residual space matter from our time onboard the Crucible, traces of the toothpaste you used last night…”

He leans in closer, making a show of sniffing her hair. “Moringa oleifera, arginine, extracts of Fragaria ananassa, other components of your shampoo. Still partial to strawberry, hm?”

“Now you’re just showing off,” Rose laughs, and he laughs too, nodding enthusiastically.

They are very close now.

The Doctor hasn’t moved his hand, still holding hers against his chest, but that’s all right; Rose’s other hand is free, and, feeling brazen, she reaches up with it now, to run her fingers through the Doctor’s gloriously rumpled hair. If his hair is any different from his Time Lord counterpart’s, she can’t tell; it’s still thick, smooth, stupidly pretty. Her fingertips glance against his scalp first, scraping lightly after, and the Doctor’s eyes threaten to shutter closed, fluttering like he’s fighting to stay awake.

“What do you feel?” Rose asks him.

The Doctor hums deep in his belly, the sound rumbling against Rose’s fingers. “Sleepy, if you keep doing that.”

Rose’s hand slowly drifts downward, tracing a path from the Doctor’s ear down to his shoulder, joining its counterpart on the Doctor’s chest.

“Suppose you’re going to suggest I eat some candy or a biscuit next,” the Doctor chuckles wryly. 

“Oh yeah?” 

“Certainly. What better way to appeal to my sense of taste and thereby prove your point?”

Rose considers for just a split-second before she draws in close to kiss him. It’s impulsive, and her heart races in her ears for all that it’s a short and sweet and chaste kiss, but it’s worth it for the small sound of surprise the Doctor makes when her lips meet his, and the dazed look on his face when she pulls back.

The Doctor blinks at her. “Do you know,” he replies, just the tiniest bit breathlessly, “I might be willing to slightly revise my stance on my newfound humanity.”

“Just slightly?”

“Just a little bit,” the Doctor agrees before leaning in to return the kiss. His lips work softly against hers, the pressure light, relaxed, and Rose melts into it immediately, even as some distant part of her brain still reels in disbelief that this sort of thing happens, now, that this is something they can do—that they can see each other, and hear, and smell, and feel, and, as the Doctor’s lips part to grant entry to Rose’s tongue, taste. Rose’s tongue glances against his briefly before retreating and he chases after her, suddenly starving. Distantly, she thinks she should tease him that his morning breath isn’t that bad after all; presently, she wonders how the Doctor would react if she pulled off his boxers, if he would rather straddle or be straddled. Her hands fist in his tee-shirt, his pulse speeding up against her knuckles as she pulls him in until they’re so close, they’re nearly touching, the scant space between them nearly buzzing with the desire to be bridged.

The Doctor breaks the kiss long enough to catch his breath, and if Rose didn’t know any better, she’d think he was gasping. “We,” he starts to say, and swallows. Sighs. “Erm. We really should…”

“Get up now?” Rose supplies, but she doesn’t move away, closes the whisper of a gap between them instead.

“Hmm. We should,” says the Doctor, even as he bends down to press a kiss, featherlight, to the pulse point beneath Rose’s jaw.

Her breath hitches in her throat and she fights not to let her eyes fall shut. It’s impossible not to feel a little giddy at the closeness of him, the sudden sensation of their bodies sliding together, skin achingly close to skin; she wonders if that’s as true for him as it is for her, with all his fresh new cells and nerves buzzing beneath thin layers of clothing and pretense. 

“Yeah,” she sighs, hands slipping down to the elastic of his boxers. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, last night was—”

“Unexpected, but inspired?” asks the Doctor as he kisses her neck.

“And probably a little too much, too soon,” Rose adds, playing with his waistband. “Better to ease into this sort of thing, right?”

“That would be very responsible of us.” 

“Yeah,” Rose pants as the Doctor insinuates one of his legs between hers. “We should take things slow. Make sure…”

“No one gets hurt?”

She slips a finger beneath his waistband. “Are you talking about the two of us, or—”

“Much as I hate to admit it, this equation has three variables.” The Doctor nips her collarbone, soothing the hurt with his tongue after, sending heat pooling deep in Rose’s belly. She fights the urge to grind down on the Doctor’s thigh. “And as much as I’d like to pretend it doesn’t matter,” the Doctor continues, as if he doesn’t notice how hot and wet she suddenly is, “the other me is bound to have conflicting thoughts about all of this.”

“Then maybe he shouldn’t keep pushing me away,” says Rose, running a teasing thumb along his hipbone, relishing the feel of him stiffening against her.

“A fair and rational point,” the Doctor concedes, even as he shudders and kisses the swell of her breast, his lips warm and soft through the fabric of her shirt. “But I’m not sure how much rationality applies in situations like this.”

Rose pulls back enough to properly look at him. “He’s not the one who let me in,” she tells the Doctor, her gaze hard. “He’s not the one who stayed.”

“So is this a reward for me, or a punishment for him?” the Doctor asks. 

He doesn’t look angry, or sad. There’s no blame in his tone. His expression is perfectly neutral, like a scientist putting forth a vague hypothetical. Rose sees through it immediately.

“There’s no one else in this room,” she tells him, “but you, and me.”

The Doctor nods. “Good,” he breathes, and Rose kisses him again, fiercely this time. It’s a bruising thing, greedy even, but neither of them are complaining as Rose’s tongue slides over his, slick and warm and sweet. The Doctor groans into her mouth as her thigh brushes against his cock, as she finally surrenders to the urge to grind down on his leg; his fingers knot in her hair as he takes control of the kiss and it’s only a little frantic, the way they’re clinging to each other, and it’s awkward, this tangled mess of clothes and limbs, but it’s delicious, too, the friction and the need and the way the Doctor maybe-accidentally bites her lip when Rose’s hand slips into his boxers to stroke him from base to tip.

He’s hot in her hand, hot and hard and wonderfully human and his reactions are human too, as he abandons the kiss in favor of burying his face in the join of Rose’s neck and shoulder, panting, his hands flying down to clench her by the hips, pulling her into him. A moment later and he’s pulling at her tee shirt, dislodging her hand from his shorts so he can strip her shirt all the way up and off. After urging Rose onto her back, the Doctor takes just a second to appreciate the view, his eyes at half-mast and lips just parted, before he dips down to kiss her breasts. Swearing under her breath, Rose arches off the bed, into his touch; he rewards her with his fingers on one nipple and his mouth on the other, teasing both to stiff, sensitive attention.

His thigh is still wedged between hers and Rose grinds down wantonly, practically whimpering, grateful for the chance to relieve the mounting ache throbbing between her legs. She wants so badly to touch him again but it’s difficult, positioned the way they are, and it’s only made more difficult when his hand leaves her breast in favor of sneaking beneath the waistband of her borrowed boxers, brushing featherlight and tentative over the seam of her sex. At that point it’s almost impossible to think about anything but his mouth on her breast and his fingers gently stroking her and how it’s so good, it’s so good, it’s almost perfect, and she reaches down to guide him, push his fingers into her slick wet sex and show him how she likes to be fucked.

Rose clamps down on any cries that might try to escape as the Doctor picks up on her rhythms, fingers fucking her gently at first, then—at her grasp tightening on his wrist—more, harder, until sweat starts beading on Rose’s forehead and breasts and she can feel her climax tensing deep in her belly, coiling tighter with each delicious thrust. The Doctor is a fast learner. (Of course he is.) But she wants more.

“Off,” Rose says breathlessly, pushing at the Doctor’s waistband until he seems to get the hint, propping himself up on one elbow as he removes his hand from Rose’s boxers. But instead of immediately disrobing, he looks at his hand thoughtfully for a moment, and even in this dim light, Rose can see how slick his fingers are, nearly glistening from her. She has approximately half a second to feel embarrassed before the Doctor’s tongue darts out to taste his fingers. Rose just stares as he plunges his fingers into his mouth, tongue swirling around the tips, like he might do with a strange new specimen he just encountered, or perhaps one of his very favorite jams. He hums appreciatively and Rose only just manages to stifle a whimper as renewed heat floods between her legs.

The Doctor glances up at her, removing his fingers from his mouth with an obscene smack. “Rude?” he asks innocently.

“Very,” Rose says, pulling herself up by his shirt so she can kiss him again. He tastes like sex. Like sex and something sweet and something musky and animal, primal. He tastes incredible. Struck with indescribable need, Rose pulls at the Doctor’s clothes and this time he definitely gets the hint, sitting back just long enough to strip off his shirt and boxers before returning to help Rose wriggle out of her (his) shorts and Rose might knee him in the ribs a little but before she has a chance to apologize he’s covering her mouth with his, claiming any words that might tumble out. Settling between her thighs (and god, but that’s glorious, the feel of them sliding together, skin on skin at last), the Doctor urges her legs over his hips and around her waist. After teasing her for a moment with his hand, fingers sliding through slick heat to make sure she’s ready for him, absolutely sure—and she absolutely is, almost embarrassingly so, though she can feel herself tightening with anticipation—he pushes inside.

The fullness is almost overwhelming. Rose bites down on his shoulder to keep from crying out.

He draws in a sharp breath. “Is that—?”

“It’s good,” Rose stutters against his neck. “It’s good. You’re good.”

The Doctor leans back to look at her, concerned. He thinks he hurt her. Rose shakes her head—he didn’t hurt her—well he did, just a little bit—well, she’ll be a little sore later—but good sore—and she doesn’t mind, she was a little overeager herself, she just tensed up is all, excluding last night it’s been a little while since she’s done any of this, and this is all stuff that can be discussed later, and don’t you dare stop now, don’t you dare—and she pulls him down by the shoulders for a kiss.

“Don’t stop,” Rose pants into his mouth.

“Right,” he says, distracted, between kisses and bites. It’s a question, not a declaration; for her, not for him. He doesn’t move, doesn’t push further, though Rose can tell he’s aching to. His whole body is humming under her hands, sweating with the effort of holding back. But she’s adjusted to him now, enough that the stinging has given way to warmth and she really, really wants him to start moving. Her hips roll forward, pushing him in deeper, until Rose can feel the full length of him inside her. The Doctor groans at the back of his throat.

“Good?” Rose prompts, chest heaving.

“It’s—ah—good,” he grits out. His hips start moving, grinding against her with slow, long thrusts, his eyes clenching shut. Rose suspects this is the moment his respiratory bypass would be kicking in, in the other body. “Very good,” he gasps.

They fall into a rhythm, pushing and pulling and sliding together, fingernails digging into each other’s backs and hips and shoulders—they’re definitely going to find each other’s marks, later. But for now, Rose arches up and kisses the Doctor’s throat, mouth drawing a path up to his jaw, lips pressing against the space behind his ear until she can feel his heartbeat hammering there. She nips at the sensitive flesh and hears him bite back a curse; she grins so he can feel her teeth on his skin. The Doctor slides his hand back between them and his thrusts pick up in speed and urgency. Tension starts building up again, low in Rose’s abdomen, down where they’re joined, where he’s teasing them both. Little shocks of pleasure ripple through her, previews before the main event. 

It’s almost too much, the sensory overload—she very nearly wants to push him away, wants the maddening tension to stop, wants to shatter into a thousand glittering golden pieces. She bucks against him wildly, her toes curling at the feeling of him meeting her stroke-for-stroke, her breath leaving her in a staccato. Their exhales are punctuated by gasps and groans as they clutch at each other, Rose reaching up to drag her fingers through his hair again, her fingernails scraping against his scalp. She feels his responding hum deep in her own sternum and pulls him up for a kiss, mouth open, tongue sliding against his.

After a moment, the Doctor breaks off the kiss, his face twisted in concentration. “Oh,” he gasps out, his voice ragged and husky, words breaking in the air. “Oh, Rose. Oh, fuck.”

Now it really is too much. Rose lets out a shout and her eyes slam shut as she comes, shuddering, muscles clenching deliciously around the Doctor. She arches off the bed, scrambling at the Doctor’s back for purchase as he empties into her with a muffled groan. His thrusts slowing to a stop, the Doctor slumps over her, only to roll off onto his back immediately afterward, chest and stomach heaving as he gasps air back into his lungs.

It’s very quiet in the room, except for how they’re both panting like they just ran a marathon. Lightheadedness swells up in Rose’s skull, complementing the something that feels an awful lot like tenderness settling nicely behind her ribs.

She tries to shut that line of thought down before it can get too far. Because any minute, Rose thinks, he’ll spring up; time to go, time to move on to the next great adventure, time to pretend none of this ever happened. That’s how he would have reacted before, she knows (or she suspects, rather, as if he would have even let things progress so far, before), and there’s no reason to pretend he wouldn’t do exactly the same thing now, last night’s venture notwithstanding. That, Rose reasons somewhere in the pleasant post-sex haze that seems to have replaced her brain, was just a fluke. It’s much more like him to push her away, or to run. Which means it would be better for her, really, if she was the one who left first. So she’s going to. Before he does.

Any minute now.

A few long seconds tick by, and Rose can’t help but notice neither of them is moving away.

Huh. Imagine that.

Tentatively, eyes still fixed glasslike on the ceiling overhead, Rose extends her hand somewhere in the netherspace beside her, where she can hear the Doctor breathing, where she can feel the dip in the mattress that signifies his weight pressing down. She doesn’t have to reach far; her hand finds his almost instantly, or maybe his finds hers, their fingers twining together regardless of the sweat cooling on their skin. She offers a little squeeze, and the next exhale that leaves the Doctor sounds suspiciously like a sigh of relief.

A lazy smile quirks Rose’s lips. She doesn’t know why she’s so surprised. She did say he was the one who let her in, after all. It’s just nice, she supposes, to be right about something for once. (It’s very nice to be right about him.)

“I must say,” says the Doctor, still sounding just the littlest bit winded, “you make a very compelling argument in favor of this whole humanity business.”

“Damn right I do,” Rose mutters, and they both laugh.

 ***

 Grinning ear-to-ear, it’s all the Doctor can do to keep from running as he strides down corridor after corridor toward his bedroom, hands in pockets and a whole heaping helping of pep in his step.

“Can’t help but notice this isn’t the way to the console room,” pipes up Donna’s voice from the webcam speaker.

“Nope,” says the Doctor, popping the p at the end. “Got to make the rounds first, wake up all the non-comatose humans. And I wouldn’t mind a moment to freshen up in the bath as well. And yes, I will take off the glasses first,” he says before Donna has a chance to.

“You better.”

The Doctor rolls his eyes. “Don’t worry,” he laughs, reaching for the handle on the bedroom door. “I’ll make sure nothing has a chance to offend your delicate—”

The sound of laughter from inside the bedroom stills his hand. 

...human sensibilities, he thinks and forgets to say, but it doesn’t matter. The Doctor fully expected to open the door and see his room, painted dark by synthetic night and occupied by a bed and one (1) singular sleeping human—which, of course, is still a strange thing to see, this whole other version of his current self outside the confines of a mirror or any other reflective surface, but still: expected. What he did not expect, however, was not just one human in his room, but two. And after the events of last night, he certainly did not expect to hear either of them laughing. And apparently together.

To be fair, it isn’t the sound that sends his stomach plummeting so much as the implications accompanying it.

Probably he should turn and go, give them some privacy, but he’s too busy lingering and simultaneously chiding himself for lingering. He and Rose shared a bed plenty of times before—well, not always a bed, per se, sometimes more of a bedroll or a cot or a prison bunk or the occasional pile of prickly sneeze-inducing hay—so there’s no reason he should be standing and staring like this, no reason at all for him to be gaping at the door to his room like some kind of slack-jawed idiot. It doesn’t matter what they might or might not have got up to in there, besides sleeping. He’s a Time Lord, for goodness’ sake. He doesn’t—he can’t—care about any of this. He’s better than all this. He’s got to be.

“Wow,” pipes up Donna, cutting through the sluggish silence like a knife through jelly, and the Doctor jerks back from the door before the sharp sound of her voice has a chance to disturb anyone and make the situation even more awkward than it already is. “They didn’t waste any time at all, did they?”

The Doctor does not reply, preoccupied with collecting some thoughts and working overtime to push others away, racing to put as much distance between himself and his room as possible. This doesn’t change anything, he knows. He’s still got things to take care of. He still has research to do. He still has to help Donna. He still…

Jaw set, he grits his teeth against the unwelcome feelings trying to swell up uncomfortably in his throat. What’s wrong with him? Isn’t this what he planned for? Isn’t this what he designed?

(Isn’t this more or less what he knew would happen, when he pushed her away for the umpteenth time? When he told her she wasn’t welcome here, with him?)

“Doctor?” asks Donna’s voice, unusually quiet, now. “Are you all right?”

The Doctor shakes his head in an attempt to clear the nonsense away. “Of course I am,” he replies. “I’m always all right.”

 ***

 He knows he should feel guilty, on some level, allowing himself any measure of happiness while Donna’s in crisis and his other self is so busy tending to her. But the human Doctor is finding it increasingly difficult to dampen his grin whenever Rose so much as glances his way, and when she returns his smile, lashes fluttering and lips curving shyly upward as the two of them make their way to the console room, it takes every ounce of the Doctor’s considerable willpower to keep himself from pulling her into the universe’s tightest, happiest hug. If he were a cynical man (and goodness knows, at times, he has been), he’d chalk up all this giddiness to the postcoital hormones fizzing pleasantly in his veins. Just chemistry, pure and simple. But right now, he’s fairly certain the only chemistry involved here is how hopelessly drunk he is on her.

Of course, then they step into the console room, and the Doctor is forcibly reminded that, much like with actual alcohol, when humans forget to pace themselves, afterward they get to deal with fun little things like hangovers and other delightful consequences.

“There you two are!” pipes up his other self, darting about the control desk, flipping switches and pulling levers. “I was starting to think you’d sleep the whole day away, the both of you. Of course, Rose, you always did sleep like the dead, metaphorically speaking—you could put Donna’s coma to shame—but it’s surprising even to me how quickly your particular brand of circadian rhythms has spread to those around you. Suppose it only makes sense, given the matching human physiologies and all. Still, you two missed quite a lot while you were out, so you’ve got a bit of catching-up to do, the both of you.”

He sounds cheerful enough, bordering on oblivious, but this is a manner the human Doctor remembers all too well, recognizes with startling clarity once viewed from the outside—he’s just a little too nonchalant, just a little too casual, yet somehow manic at the same time as he makes a show of checking monitors and typing commands and pressing buttons, perhaps, just a little harder than he needs to, unable to look either of them in the eye as he does so.

He already knows. Somehow, he’s figured it all out. He knows everything. Of course he does.

Speaking of hangovers, the Doctor’s starting to feel just the littlest bit queasy.

“How’s Donna doing?” he calls out anyway, ignoring the sick feeling twisting in his stomach.

“Oh, right as rain,” Donna’s voice chirps out of the blue. “Thanks for asking!”

Rose and the Doctor both jump. “Donna?” asks Rose in disbelief, glancing around the console room as if Donna may manifest from thin air at any moment. “Donna, was that you? Where are you? What’s—”

“You rigged her up to a medical transceiver, didn’t you?” the Doctor realizes immediately. “And it worked?”

“Apparently,” says Donna. “‘Course I’m still stuck in the medbay, still put under and all that. But he’s got a camera or something sort of rigged up to his specs, so even though I’m asleep, I still can see and hear everything he does. Isn’t that genius?”

“Wow,” Rose breathes. “Are you all right, Donna? You’re not still in pain, or anything?”

“Can’t feel a thing. Could probably use an extra blanket, though, knowing how cold he keeps the place.”

Laughing, Rose shifts her focus to the other Doctor, shaking her head in wonder. “This is incredible,” she says earnestly. “God. You’re brilliant.”

“Thanks,” replies the other Doctor with a grin that’s just a little too tight. “Of course, it’s just the first step of a much longer process, it isn’t exactly a tenable long-term solution to keep Donna rigged up like this—”

“No brain-in-a-computer for me, ta.”

“—but it’s a good first step nonetheless.”

“What’s step two?” asks Rose.

“Step two for me is scanning the nearby systems to find the equipment needed to extricate the offending material safely from Donna’s brain,” replies the Time Lord Doctor, tilting his head distractedly at the monitor as he types in another command. “Step two for you lot, I suppose, is whatever you want.”

“Great,” says Rose. “We want to help you.”

“No need,” the Doctor insists. “I’ve got it all under control. And you know what they say about too many cooks in the kitchen. Speaking of, have you two eaten yet? The galley’s fairly well-stocked at the mo, lots of good proteins and complex carbohydrates at your disposal. I’m sure you two are famished after everything you’ve both got up to last evening. Humans tend to rack up quite the appetite, activities like that.”

The Doctor’s blood pressure drops like a stone. He glances at Rose to find her face carefully composed, her earlier excitement already fading like it was never there. 

“You talking about everything with the Daleks and the end of the world?” Rose asks coolly. “Or the sex?”

If she were physically present, the Doctor imagines Donna’s jaw would drop open at that, at the bold frankness of it. Now the blood comes rushing back into his cheeks til he thinks he might catch fire from it. Rubbish human body and its rubbish autonomic nervous responses.

His other self does not look away from the monitor in front of him. “I’m sure the latter is absolutely none of my business,” he says pleasantly.

“You’re right. It’s really not.”

“Yeah, it’s not really any of my business either,” Donna pipes in. “So could we maybe turn the transceiver off for this—”

“Fair enough,” interrupts the Time Lord Doctor, “but then that does beg the question of why you brought it up.”

“It was gonna come up sooner or later. I’d rather bring it all out into the open now. Or would you rather I made passive-aggressive jibes about you two and you lot and snide comments about late-night activities?”

“Honestly, it would be delightful if we didn’t comment on any of this at all.”

“Great,” Rose laughs weakly. “So just ignore it and it’ll go away, just like we always used to do?”

“That’s what you came back for, isn’t it? To get back to the way things used to be.”

“I came back for you!”

“All right,” says the human Doctor loudly, surprising himself and everyone else. “That’s enough!”

No one responds, the console room silent except for the glass column grinding quietly away over the hum of the TARDIS. The Doctor glances between Rose and his other self, pulse pounding sluggishly in his chest, the sick feeling in his stomach growing heavier with each passing moment. The other Doctor still won’t look at either of them.

“That’s enough,” he says again, quieter this time. “We can all have a good row about this later. Our priority right now is taking care of Donna. Everything else can wait. Right?” he adds to Rose, arching an eyebrow meaningfully.

Jaw set and gaze hard, eyes flashing, for a moment it seems like Rose is going to argue with him. But she quickly relents, tension easing from her shoulders. “Right,” she says quietly, nodding.

“Right?” the Doctor snaps at his original self.

The Time Lord Doctor doesn’t look at him, too busy staring at his monitor. “Right in theory,” he murmurs, slowly. “But in practice…”

“What?” asks the human Doctor impatiently. “What is it?”

His original self scans the readings on the monitor again and again, as if different information may yield itself on repeat viewings. Whatever he sees there makes the tight, forced grin melt right off his face. His brow furrows in alarm.

“Doctor?” asks Rose, concerned, now.

In lieu of responding, the original Doctor pushes away from the control desk, racing toward the TARDIS doors. With a great heave, he throws them open, to reveal—

Nothing.

No planet surface beams at them from outside the TARDIS. There is no sun, no stars, no vortex. No light, no dark. No warm, no cold. An empty, silent, colorless expanse extends as far as the eye can see.

“Oh, no,” murmurs Rose, clutching a hand to her stomach.

“What is that?” demands Donna’s voice. “Is something wrong with your glasses, Doctor? I can’t see.”

“That’s because there is, quite literally, nothing to see,” says the original Doctor quietly, shaking his head.

He turns to face Rose and the human Doctor, eyes wide with fear. “We never made it out to the other side,” he says. “We’re trapped in the Void.”

***

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter [forthcoming]]

***

P.S. I would like to give a big shout-out to the absolutely wonderful @tenroseforeverandever​​ @goingtothetardis​​ @hanluvr​​ @ladydiomede​ @wordmusician @gallifreygirl81 @OH @super_powerful_queen_slayyna and absolutely anyone who ever said something nice about this story or especially if you encouraged me to continue it. I’m sorry this chapter was three years in the making (!!!!) but it is heartily dedicated to y’all lovely lovely peaches! <3 <3 <3

[albatris]

Sorry in advance for the potentially dumb question, but: do you suffer from psychosis/schizophrenia? I’ve seen you reblog a lot of posts about it, of course, but i was curious. Also, if its not too personal, if you do, how much does it impact your writing/the weirdness glitchiness factor?

Not a dumb question at all, you’re all good!

So this is kinda…….. not something I’ve spoken about in a great amount of detail or specifics on this blog? And talking about it directly is actually kinda weird! I wasn’t expecting this to feel weird, but it totally does! So please excuse how long this answer took me hahahahaha

So I mean YEAH psychosis is a thing that I possess, this is a thing that resides inside my brain and occasionally outside of it………. I’m not schizophrenic, I’m more in the schizotypal realm of things, which is like….. I mean, that’s a label that best encompasses my experiences and so far it’s the only label that’s been vaguely and tentatively applied to me that’s ever really made me go “oh hey yeah that would actually explain a whole fucking lot” but like. Bits of it are still kinda wonky. Mental health is wonky, I think, generally speaking…………….

I was gonna talk a bit here about my specific experiences but, like, I really had no idea where to start with those and I don’t actually know how relevant it’d be to this question aside from being vaguely tangential in terms of psychosis………… so uhhhh I’m gonna jump ahead and talk WRITING which is WAY more in my comfort zone apparently

and oh my god this was so many words, I’m so sorry in advance, I have no idea if any of this is actually like………… super interesting? But I enjoyed the opportunity to talk about it so cheers for that! I think!

(and I’m sorry if you were expecting like………… a really short sharp sweet answer, I don’t really deal in shorts or sharps or sweets, I mostly deal in, uh………. rambling)

Rest of this post, under the cut, which I hope actually works on mobile, for the sake of your dashboards - 

So this message was an adventure for me into how the questions “How does it affect your writing?” and “How does it affect the glitchiness/horror factor?” are actually two entirely separate things. I mean, they’re two separate things because I’m assuming by “glitchiness factor” you’re thinking specifically of the stuff in my recent ATDAO posts about body horror and the unreality? In which case………… let me get to that in a moment

And since this post got super long, I’m going to start with my extremely short summed-up answer, and then elaborate on it………

In terms of how it affects my writing? In lots of direct ways!

In terms of how it affects the glitchiness and horror aspects? In some weird roundabout ways! It’s not where the horror stems from, but it’s where the response to the horror stems from and where a lot of my descriptive choices stem from! It’s not the horror, but it’s kind of the lens through which I explore the horror!

AND NOW HERE WE GO………… WORDS AHOY

So in terms of how it affects my writing, generally speaking

boring straightforward answer first:

It’s something that crops up in a super literal sense, just in that I’ve got a fair few characters who are psychotic to some degree or another, and it’s something that plays into how they relate to the world and their specific character voice and how they respond to the situations they find themselves in. 

somewhat irrelevant, it’s, uhhh….. something that I feel interacts with themes in a different sort of way, too. ‘Cause a lot of times there’s, like….. stories about people going on cool magical sci-fi quests, and there’s Stories About Psychotic People, and there’s not an awful lot of overlap between the two unless it’s in the context of “and the whole magical quest was a delusion all along!” which, ew

and for fucking REAL there is so much interesting ground to cover and opportunities for different perspectives and new avenues through which themes can be explored, like, in that overlap of stories. It’s something I wish I saw a lot more of in fiction! Which is another huge driving force in, like, why I write stuff the way I do

and now slightly more interesting:

Worldbuilding! It’s definitely something that plays into worldbuilding and like…. my love of creating stories that are kinda just……. “reality but a little bit to the left” if that makes sense? 

Whether this is something like Undertow, where there’s a degree of magic woven into the fabric of the universe, where things are connected by invisible threads, where I can give opinions to objects and feelings to the weather and the streetlights, where the earth itself has a voice? Or whether it’s something like ATDAO, where reality is coming undone at the seams and the fact that everything is just a little lopsided and haywire is a Mundane Part Of Everyday Life? That’s something I find super cathartic and quite lovely to play around in! I’ve always experienced the world as Just A Little Bit To The Left, and writing was one of the first avenues I found to kinda…. channel and explore and expand on that and put my feelings of strangeness into words?

It’s kinda, like, I like being able to share that kind of vision with others in some sort of way, and not necessarily in a frightening or horrible way, y’know? 

THIS IS ABSOLUTELY NOT TO SAY that anything I write is, like, 100% a direct mirror or my own life and how I see the world lmao. A lot of my writing takes experiences and feelings and little facets of how I experience the world and works them into something that’s often more literal and concrete, or it’ll start out as My Thing and as I’m writing, it sorta blooms into something totally different. But bits of it are in there, sure, although they change shape a lot! And it’s definitely in there with a lot of the general overarching feelings and concepts! Yeah!

One other thing that kinda leads onto my next topic is, uh…… that a lot of how I interpret events and meanings in the world around me can be kind of frightening and threatening, and that’s not reeeaaaally something I want to delve into too much in my writing from a worldbuilding perspective? So generally the parts of ATDAO’s “reality but a little to the left” that start to twist into horror and unreality are things I’ve constructed specifically to serve that purpose, more so than things I’ve pulled directly from my experiences.

AND NOW IN TERMS OF GLITCHY HORROR STUFF HELL YEAH

so again I’m assuming by “glitchiness factor” that’d be all the unreality and all the body horror stuff and weird horror? Which, fuck yeah! Despite my squeamishness when it comes to horror, this is one odd little corner of ATDAO that I’m extremely fond of hahahaha

And, like, initially when I considered this question I was like…. oh, this is not something that really has any of its roots in psychosis or my experiences of mental illness. And that’s…… kiiiiiind of true? My construction of the unreality and its contents is a lot of me just me sitting at my laptop going “Hahahaha that makes me physically nauseous! That’s the worst thing I’ve ever come up with!! I’m adding it in immediately!!”

But yeah, it definitely does factor in, though! Maybe not in as interesting a way as you’d hoped? 

So first off, my experiences are something that sorta plays into my word choice and the specific way I use language in those scenes. And I’m also gonna go ahead and say that dissociation and specifically derealisation are also things I draw from pretty heavily for those kinda……. more glitchy horror-ish parts? So for me, my experiences factor more into HOW I describe the content more so than any of the horrid glitchy gory content itself. 

‘cause it’s kinda, like, a specific kind of fear, I think, it’s a little bit off-beat and weirdly-worded and disjointed and it hits your senses all wrong, it doesn’t make an awful lot of sense but it’s still extremely real. There’s a lot of weird or unsettling bullshit that goes on in the unreality that there’s no convenient Real World Descriptive Equivalent for. Like, cityscapes made entirely of soundwaves, the aforementioned body horror stuff in earlier posts, places that are a complete and total lack of Anything where there’s not even space or colour or texture or light, senses getting all tangled up into each other, something being simultaneously bigger than the sun and smaller than an ant, voices unravelling like twine? LOTS OF WEIRD, BASICALLY

There’s no nice neat right way to describe that, and if there was, it probably wouldn’t pack the punch it needs to, yeah? But I love that kinda shit, I get to pull from a bunch of really weird sensory experiences and feelings I have no real way to articulate and I get to use language in creative ways to evoke the same feelings, the same experiences, the same sense of fear and wrongness? I get to draw from weird shit to describe a bunch of weird shit that makes NO fucking sense whatsoever and that can’t realistically be tied up with words

Point is, they’re experiences I draw from in order to Get Real Fuckin Weird With Words

and getting weird with words in this specific way is CATHARTIC as FUCK dude it’s so good, it’s one of my favourite things. This is, like, the dark edgy version of what I talked about earlier in regards to worldbuilding and me painting a nice odd vision for people to share in hahahaha

“let me take you on a nice gentle stroll through my imagination” vs me supplexing you to the ground and beating the shit out of you with a bat 

And one other thing is just……. I’m sorry, I’m super tired, this bit is probably gonna be jumbled and wordy and maybe not super relevant but uhhhhhhh

So the unreality is not something I initially drew from any particular place in my psyche, but it IS something I’ve come to construct in a specific way, and a lot of it is something I build with the questions of like…… “How does a psychotic character respond to this input?” and “What does this scenery draw out in my character and how does it challenge them?” in mind, so I guess………… in that sense, there’s definitely still a fairly big impact? But kind of in a sideways way. The unreality is not so much based on psychosis, but it’s something I use to highlight specific elements of it, I guess, but mostly in terms of the skills it draws out

‘cause like. in ATDAO the only characters who kinda get to butt heads with the unreality aside from that one random dead car driver who may or may not be vaguely half alive in a state of horrific limbo are Jacob and Tris, and like

I don’t ever really frame Tris’s psychosis as some horrible terrible thing he’s burdened with that makes life a terrible living hell 24/7 but it is, like………. something he struggles a lot with over the course of the story, both in general terms and in terms of people not taking him seriously about the Extremely Real Fantastical Nonsense that’s going on and in general being hesitant to trust his perceptions of reality. And ALSO I guess in terms of just…….. the way he relates to the fact that he’s been dragged into some Extremely Real Fantastical Nonsense? And him wrestling with how he’s supposed to believe in something like that when no one else can see the evidence and everyone is telling him he’s just crazy, and how “ridiculous interdimensional dumbass sci-fi quest” is something that’s reserved for other people, because he’s already been there like four times already and it has extremely different implications for him

In terms of mental illness, all my protags have patches of the story where they make it through kinda “in spite” of their struggles with mental illness (though that’s a sentence I fuckin hate) and other patches where mental illness is just a thing they deal with alongside whatever plots they have going on…… but their experiences with mental illness are also something that gives them specific skills and perspectives and ways of understanding the world that are invaluable, and some of the most important parts of the story are the parts where they make it through specifically BECAUSE of those skills and perspectives

Which is kind of the Whole Thing With The Unreality, that’s its whole deal

The unreality is a fucking huge turning point for Tris as a character, because it’s specifically because of his experiences with psychosis that he’s able to navigate it so effectively, it’s because of the specific skills he’s developed and the practice he’s had in similar circumstances

not, like, the SAME circumstances, but things from other contexts that kind of, transfer, circumstances where the same skills are applicable

‘cause like, turns out, he’s really good at navigating confusing frightening hellscapes where nothing makes sense and mis-stepping can get you killed, because he’s had a whole lot of practice just like. existing as a person with psychosis in a weird apocalypse world where reality is collapsing in unpredictable ways. He spends a lot of his life trying to make sense of reality and figure out the rules and developing countless systems for navigating the world safely, which he often needs to adjust at a moment’s notice, or completely scrap and reconstruct. He’s had a lot of experience of just sorta waking up and whatever bullshit is going on he’s just gotta be like “ok cool so this is what we’re doing today, I have to deal with this, so how can I deal with this”. He’s used to grounding himself and problem-solving even under intense pressure and when he’s terrified and regardless of whatever objectively horrifying nonsense is happening around him. He’s used to sorting the horrifying things that are not dangerous from the horrifying things that are extremely dangerous.  

He’s basically the one character who can get tossed into the unreality and actually work with it and figure out the rules even though everything is screaming and glitched out and trying to kill him, he’s spent most of his life developing the perfect skill set for it

(and like, this is the first point in the story where he sorta realises that his specific way of viewing the world is going to be a strength rather than a weakness, but like. despite the fact that Tris is basically a walking panic attack he’s actually always been the one of the team who’s been the most adept at navigating daily life with the apocalypse, it’s just not something he’s ever really picked up on)

and uh

that’s kind of a vaguely irrelevant note to end on, actually

HEY THAT WAS SO MANY WORDS I’M SO FUCKING SORRY

I DON’T EVEN HAVE A NEAT WRAP UP TO THIS POST

MY WRAP UP WAS THAT SUMMARY AT THE START

IF YOU READ THIS FAR I HOPE IT WAS AT LEAST SOMEWHAT INTERESTING

[why-this-kolaveri-machi]

Fic: after the in-between

a spur-of-the-moment, thoroughly indulgent titans fic!

Summary: Trigon is defeated, and our heroes are on their way to start a new era of the Titans. However, Trigon isn’t quite done with them yet.

Warnings: set after 2.01: Trigon, so spoilers for the same. plentiful swearing. vomiting. a thoroughly indulgent sick!fic ft. dick, jason, rachel and gar.

-

About half a day into their ambitious cross-country road trip from Gotham to San Francisco, Dick starts looking at Jason in that weird, scrunched-up way of his, like he’s sucking on a lemon and hates it but is just masochistic enough to finish it off. It goes on for long enough that Jason starts to get irritated; they’ve barely started what’s bound to be a long-ass journey, his head is already pounding from listening to the kids chattering away in the backseat, and now Dick’s definitely going to wrap the car around a tree if he keeps taking his eyes off the road to look at Jason like—like—

“You’re sick,” Dick says.

Rachel and Gar stop whispering so fast that Jason’s brain adds a cartoony tyre-screeching noise to the silence that follows. “What?! I’m—” he swallows around an inexplicably dry throat, “I’m not.”

Dick nods, looks straight ahead and says, like he hasn’t even heard Jason, “We’ll stop at the next motel we find, get on top of this before it gets worse.”

He sounds very matter-of-fact about it, like he’s just stated some bald, obvious truth and is just waiting for the rest of the world to catch up. For all the stories that Jason’s heard of Bruce and Dick’s epic dust-up, Dick sounds exactly like Bruce, right down to talking about feeling unwell like it’s a goddamn mission. “For fuck’s sake, I’m fine,” he says, which would’ve sounded very convincing had his voice not cracked around fine.

“I could use a bit of healing time, anyway,” Gar says before Dick can reply. “So a stop right about now sounds good.” He works his bruised jaw a bit, winces.

“Yeah, a break sounds good,” Rachel says, and Jason’s used to being talked around instead of talked to, sure, but it still stings that these two… children want to treat him like he’s the unreasonable one.

“Yeah, okay, whatever,” Jason says, sullenly. “We’ll stop.”

“I wasn’t really asking for a vote, but sure,” Dick says, amused.

By the time they check in at a motel, Jason’s definitely feeling more than a little light-headed, and he’s sweating under his layers even as the chill wind cuts at his face like knives. He doesn’t know when he started leaning on Dick, but he’s definitely grateful when the guy guides him in front of the toilet when the nausea hits like a battering ram. The first, convulsive wave of vomit burns his throat and nose, and he thinks he whimpers a little bit—which, hello, mortifying. He feels a large hand squeeze the back of his neck and Dick says, “you’re all right,” with the same, annoying, Batman-esque matter-of-factness, but this time it reminds Jason of the first time Batman stood between him and evil, and it’s more reassuring than anything.

That’s the last thing Jason is properly aware of for a while. He hears disjointed voices, feels flashes of intense heat and cold, coarse motel sheets against his legs and the press of fingers against his lips, trying to get him to open his mouth. His heart thunders against his ribs as he watches horned shadows creep across the ceiling, his body numb and paralysed and utterly helpless. He’s Jason Todd—he’s motherfucking Robin—but right now all he wants is to burrow into some place cool and dark and safe until the storm passes.

The storm passes. Eventually.

At some point he opens his eyes to a very tired-looking Dick Grayson peering into his face and says, “Dude, personal space.”

Dick leans back in his chair and lets out a long breath. “Well,” he says, “I’m glad I don’t have to go back to Bruce to tell him that I lost his Robin in less than a day.”

Jason bites his tongue on a sharp retort; he thinks Dick might be joking, but he’s been a sour-faced whiner for so goddamn long that it’s kind of hard to tell. Instead he settles for asking, “how long?” and coughs.

Rachel hands him a glass of blessedly cool water as Dick says, “About half a day. It kind of came on real quick and left just as quickly. Rach, uh—she thinks that this might be some kind of side-effect of Trigon possessing you.”

Jason almost chokes on a mouthful of water. “—the fuck?!”

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees both Rachel and Gar flinch, and feels sorry for all of about three seconds. “Trigon’s presence lingered in all of us for some time—I could see it,” Rachel says. “But you’re clean now.”

“That’s good to know,” Jason says, “but how about a heads-up next time, huh? A little hey, Jason, I think my shitty father just gave you a case of the demon-flu, so watch out for that or something.”

Gar glares at him while Dick heaves a sigh. “Jason.”

“I’m just saying.” Jason shrugs. “Besides—I’m not the only one who got whammied by that monster. How come you guys are not spewing your guts all over the place?”

Dick levers himself painfully out of his chair and starts to walk to the other end of the room. “Maybe you’re just that annoying,” he says with a wry smile, and oh yeah, Jason definitely prefers broody-asshole Dick to this.

“Maybe that stick up your ass gives you immunity,” Jason says, which earns a snicker from Gar.

Dick turns, opens his mouth like he’s going to say something—then his eyes roll up in his head, and he collapses.

Rachel is at his side in an instant, crying out his name. Jason jolts out of bed, his sore muscles protesting, and settles ungracefully at Dick’s side. It doesn’t take long to figure out that Dick is sick—and has probably been that way for a while. He’s burning up, there’s a sort of chesty whine at the end of every breath that’s getting more and more pronounced by the second, and they can’t really get him to wake up all the way. Jason’s first big adventure outside of Bruce’s bat-bubble has gotten off to a really shitty fuckin’ start.

Gar hovers near them, looking warily down at Dick. Jason hasn’t exactly missed the way Gar flinches every time Dick talks to him, or the way he can’t really bring himself to meet Dick’s eyes. He’s pretty sure that Dick’s noticed, too, and decided to push that uncomfortable conversation further down the road to deal with, which, you know, makes sense. “What’s wrong with him?” Gar asks.

“He’s an idiot,” Rachel says fiercely, making Jason jump. “He was possessed the longest—and he’s been driving practically non-stop since then. He’s been ill all this time, and he didn’t say a word.”

Gar relaxes a little. “Of course he didn’t—it’s Dick. He could be beaten half-to-death and in the middle of drug withdrawal and he’d still insist on having the wheel.”

“At least Kory set him right last time.”

“Yeah. God, I miss her.”

“Me too. You think we should call her, make sure that Hank and Dawn aren’t—”

Jason clears his throat loudly. He’s used to being out of place wherever he ends up—he’s made a skill out of making his presence known anyway—but maybe standing over a possibly dying ex-Robin is not the best place to make either of those points. “Help me lift him up,” he says. “We need to get him on the bed.”

Between the three of them, they manage to get him lying down on a bed. He hasn’t really woken up, and Jason’s worried that they’ve got a concussion to worry about on top of the brain-melting demon fever. He props Dick into a semi-reclining position with some pillows to ease his wheezy breathing, manages to force a couple of spoons of liquid fever-reducer into his mouth, and places a damp cloth on his forehead. Not that that cloth is going to do a thing to reduce the fever, but from Jason’s experience, it usually feels pretty damn good.

“You’re pretty good at this,” Gar says, staring at him.

Jason shrugs, thinking of Alfred and feeling a strange pang in his chest.

A few hours later, the fever reduces enough for Dick to wake up. Rachel’s sitting at his bedside, asleep, head pillowed in her arms next to his hand. Gar’s curled up on the couch behind her, snoring. Dick opens his eyes, blinks blearily at the room. He sees Rachel and Gar first, and smiles—so softly, so fondly, that Jason feels a rush of irrational anger.

Finally, Dick turns to him. “You okay?” he asks, in a hoarse whisper.

You don’t have to put on the martyr act for me, Jason thinks, nastily. Instead he says, “Doing better than you.”

“Mm.” Dick closes his eyes; his face spasms, pained. “Give me a day—we’ll be good to go.”

“Sure,” Jason says. “But we’re taking turns driving.”

Dick gives a lazy half-smile. “Not exactly the Bat-mobile.”

“You’d probably be better off driving the Bat-mobile sick and exhausted. It’s got auto-pilot and it’s virtually crash-proof.”

“Oh. Right.” Dick looks at him, his eyes glinting in the moonlight streaming through the window. “That’s why you get the Bat-mobile and not the Bugatti.”

“Shut up and sleep.”

[rueitae]

Soulbound

Finally I can post this. For @defendersofaurita‘s pikelavar week. About 4,000 words.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/19902532

~~~~~

There is it; the Jewel of Jitan.

Meklavar’s heart races, each beat pounding slowly and deliberately in her ear like a giant’s footsteps. Excessive sweating has always been an issue for her, but in this moment she curses how gross the skin under her gloves is despite the coolness of the cave, while nerves flutter about in her gut. Here, in a few moments, she’ll finally have her family’s heirloom back. She can’t afford to make any mistakes.

Rising from her spot behind a crate, she counts two of Countess Covara’s guards and knows a third roams on patrol; the dark clothing and red crest is unmistakable. How idiotic for her not to make the connection between her father’s chief rival and the rapid organization of the Black Fang before following this lead to their hideout.

She tightens the grip on her axe, the cloth of her gloves blessedly still dry enough to do that. It’s enough if she needs to do battle. Though she has had years to dream of this day, Meklavar realizes she is severely underprepared for this moment. 

Why hadn’t she asked for help from her companions? Surely a year was not too long a time to forget their incredible defeat of the Coranic Dragon. Block had been so eager to go home, Valyun accompanied Jiro in search of his brother Shiro, and Pike... 

Pike. The insufferable fool still makes her blush like a lovesick maiden - which, Meklavar supposed she technically was - whenever she thinks of the soft kiss he bestowed upon her lips when they parted. 

“I’ll see you again sooner than you think,” he said with a mischievous glint in his eye. “I just have one little job to do then I’d love to see your home.”

“To meet my family, right?” she’d pressed, thought in jest. “And not to rob us blind?”

He bristles. “I’m not a thief!”

“You’re right,” she said smugly. “A thief would know what a trap looks like.”

He struggled for words, his mouth flapping about uselessly. “You’re lucky you’re cute!” he finally said.

She hadn’t expected to be apart for this long, though it isn’t anything she can help now. Meklavar is on her own for this and she will get the Jewel back home where it belongs, no matter what. 

But patience is something Meklavar has never had in spades. Already she’s been waiting for what feels like hours, made worse by her treasured family heirloom resting elegantly on a pedestal next to a large stone table - only yards away from where she hides. 

Her leg is numb, fallen asleep in the long wait. It’s simply an annoyance as far as pain goes, but she’ll need her mobility because, as Pike would say, her window of opportunity could come at any time. 

Meklavar shifts in her tiny hiding spot, doing what she can to stretch and relieve her limbs in this limited space and--

That isn’t stone that bumps into her back. 

“Hey,” Pike whispers. “Come here to look at all the pretty rocks?”

The suddenness of the conversation after hours on edge breaks her. Her mind registers Pike’s voice - how could she ever forget the way he speaks to her with genuine interest in her skills and quest - but her body reacts on instinct. She shrieks - or tries to at least. Pike’s hand covers her mouth, the metal jewelry on his fingers leaving a gross metallic taste on her lips.

So her shriek turns into a muffled, “MMMMHMHMM!”

“Shhhh,” he hisses urgently. “I dunno what possessed you to sneak into the lair of your family’s greatest enemy in that armor. You’d make a terrible thief.”

Fresh anger warms her ears. Meklavar whips around, Pike’s hand slipping from her face - a dull clunk sounds as the horns of her helmet hit the rings on his finger, earning a hiss of pain from the actual thief between the two of them as he sucks on the offended knuckles. Any sympathy she has for him is buried under her fumes. 

“What are you doing here then?” she fires back with a hushed whisper. “It’s been a year, Pike. Where have you been?”

Pike’s childish scowl turns into a more sobering, thin line. “On a job. I didn’t think a genius would be dumb enough to waltz right in here. You need to get out of here right now.”

“I’m not leaving without the Jewel of Jitan,” she insists. “You know what it means to me - what it means to my family.”

His tail twitches in agitation, ears turning, listening. “Quiznak,” he says, eyes flickering with unmistakable fear. He meets her gaze, and Meklavar’s heart breaks at the sorrow he projects before he speaks, “Do you trust me?”

“Of course I do,” Meklavar says before she can really think it over. They’ve traveled together far too long, she knows his fears and secrets - and he knows hers. “What are you plan--”

Pike gathers her into his arms. For a heartbeat it's nice - the way he holds her - as if nothing in this world can rip them apart; face nuzzling into his chest. Meklavar missed his companionship so much. She wants to apologize for their rough meeting and ask where he’s been and how he fared since parting.

“Please forgive me.” He rips off her helmet and his claws dig uncomfortably - though not painfully - into her arm. 

He stands, and she rises with him; axe clattering to the floor. Now exposed to the guards she spied on not moments before, her heart leaps into her throat; what is Pike doing?

A job. 

Meklavar freezes in fear. Oh Ancients, Pike is employed with Covara and he’s going to use his position to weasel their way out of this.

“Well, what do we have here?”

Meklavar knows that lifeless and dreary tone anywhere. Closing her eyes, she swallows hard to reign in her shuddering breaths; better to do it while her face is flush against Pike’s chest than staring into the face of the woman who prefers her dead. 

She’d been so, so close to getting her family’s priceless heirloom back. Meklavar doesn’t know what Pike thinks he’s doing - she chooses to trust that he wouldn’t do this without reason; she wants to believe he’s as good a person as she remembers, that their adventures together didn’t amount to nothing, that their relationship means something, that he meant his preemptive apology. 

“Seems your gut was right, Your Countessship,” Pike says. Any other time Meklavar might tell him that wasn’t a real term, but she’s hardly in a position to correct his showmanship. “There was a threat to the Jewel after all. Shall I take her to the dungeon for you?”

Rough hands grab at her arms and she stumbles away from the false sense of security in Pike. Meklavar is barely aware of her strained biceps, when a soft, manicured hand - not Pike - cups her chin. 

“No,” Covara says. “I’ll give you further instructions once I’ve dealt with her.”

Pike’s sharp intake of breath doesn’t escape her ears, and Meklavar’s stomach twists into knots. Already this has taken a turn for the worse. 

“Meklavar Forestguard,” Covara says slowly, enunciating each syllable with more hate than the last. Long nails threaten to break skin and a cold thumb presses more purposefully against her throat; will she cut off her breath right here and now?

“You always were a nosy child, much like the rest of your family,” Covara muses. “I’d hoped to hunt you down after securing the Jewel’s secrets, but now it can’t be helped.”

“The Jewel of Jitan and it’s secrets are not yours,” Meklavar seethes. “They don’t belong to anyone - without it the Nightmares will return before long and--”

“Let them come.”

The admission weakens her knees, though she hardly stands on her own anymore. “You can’t - you can’t mean that,” Meklavar protests. “They’ll saturate this land and kill everyone!”

Meklavar shivers as Covara’s slender fingers brush gently across her cheeks; the touch far too intimate for her liking. The woman towers over her, looking down on her almost hungrily.

That’s when she sees the red glint in her eyes, an evil Meklavar once hoped to only know from the safe pages of a book. 

Covara is too far gone to be saved; already enthralled by the very Demon King the Jewel of Jitan keeps locked away. 

“I can control them,” Covara states cooly. “I need only more power, more knowledge. Knowledge that the Jewel of Jitan will grant me and power that it’s guardian will provide me.”

“No!” Meklavar shrieks, tugging on her captors for any glint of freedom. She knows enough of the ancient rituals. Covara intends to drain Meklavar’s life force to unlock the power of the Jewel of Jitan.

She happens a glimpse of Pike, standing solitary off to the side. Body rigid, his face is etched in shock; eyes wide. He keeps the rapid rise and fall of his chest barely contained, but Meklavar knows his fear - this is far worse than he’d bargained for.

He laughs nervously. “Surely she can’t cause much trouble now that you know she’s here. There’s no need for this,” he pleads. 

“I did not hire you for your opinion,” Covara says curtly. She turns to other mercenaries. “Take her.”

With a jerk, Meklavar is pulled towards the very object she seeks to liberate. It brings her no joy now, only a rising panic in her heart.

“You can’t control them!” she yells, doing all she can to drag her feet - curse her short stature! “They only answer completely to the Demon King - you’re being played for a fool, just like the dark mages of the past!”

Stone slams hard against the back of her head. Meklavar’s head swims in a fuzzy cloud, vision disjointed as her back bends sharply backwards. Iron shackles clink resoundly around her wrists. With a quick gasp, she struggles aimlessly, kicking at the hands that work to grab and bind her legs to the other end of the stone table. 

Covara’s footsteps ring louder as she approaches, while the first of Meklavar’s ankles is chained down. “Other mages made the mistake of giving in to their greed. I simply wish to study and enjoy the company of these beautiful creatures,” she says as she stands before the altar. The chains offer little movement to see anything other than Covara’s uncaring face. 

“I wonder,” Covara airs as she brushes a strand of hair out of Meklavar’s eyes, “what kind of creature of the night you will become when I raise your body.”

“It won’t work,” Meklavar begs, because it’s all she has left at her disposal. Pike won’t be able to do a thing, not with the power that spills out from the mad woman’s fingers - only a small taste of what Meklavar knows she is capable of. “Please. Trust me, it will backfire on you.”

“Perhaps you’ll be a fiend like your father.”

The next breath is hard to take. “Wh-what?” Meklavar hasn’t seen her family in a long time, but surely Covara hasn’t-- “You’re lying,” she accuses, blood simmering to a boil with every tick. She doesn’t want to believe it. Last she was home, her mother and father and brother were working to soothe the darkening forest in the absence of the Jewel of Jitan.  

If they were dead then the forest was lost.

And so was she. 

The response is a low chuckle, the first real emotion Covara has shown. “He proved more useful in death than in life. I think you will be more like your mother; a gargoyle, cunning and fierce in the skies. You will be a good leader for the Demon King’s army.”

“You’re a monster,” Meklavar seethes. Never once had she stopped to consider her family succumbing to the dark creatures in the forest, Covara must be lying.

She has to be lying. Otherwise Meklavar fears heartbreak may kill her if Covara doesn’t. 

Covara places a hand gently on Meklavar’s chestplate; deceptively soft and kind. “Yes,” she says softly - longingly. “I suppose that will be for the best if I am to be in their company.”

Meklavar’s breath hitches as a soft purple glow emanates from the hand on her chest. 

“Now,” Covara says, the stroking of her skin feeling like slime. “Offer your quintessence to me, child. Provide me the power to call them forth.”

Meklavar screams. It’s as if a thousand nails punch into her skin from the same direction, breath taken from her lungs like a swing of a hammer. Her body arches back and her limbs wail, stretched out and strained to the point it’s nearly unbearable. 

Slowly she loses the fight within as life drains from her body. 

With a thud, her head hits the stone altar. Meklavar gasps, body in shock as her energy returns all at once. The dull pain is nothing compared to what Covara had been doing - but, Meklavar wonders as her vision comes into focus, why did she stop?

“Sellswords are not what they used to be,” Covara says. “You are a foolish little boy.”

Covara stands above her still, but through her stomach is the gold tip of a blade Meklavar recognizes.

Pike stands behind her, eyes narrowed dangerously as he holds the hilt of the short sword. “Not so foolish as to continue serving you when I can save my friend. Let her go,” he demands. 

The anger and seriousness of his tone catches Meklavar off guard. Never has he sounded less like a thief and more like the assassin he persistently claims to be.

Meklavar believes it for the first time.

But no amount of athletic skill will save him from Covara. Her heart skips a beat as she realizes the danger that he’s put himself in for her sake - all for naught.

“Pike! Run!” she shouts, for whatever good it will do him. She can’t see him die, it would be the final twisting dagger after hearing her family’s possible fate. 

A single eyebrow rises skeptically, his face back to it’s friendly and goofy self. Pike, you idiot, there’s no time.

“What are you talking about I-- AH!”

“Pike!” Meklavar screams as Covara turns in place inhumanly fast, clasping Pike by his throat and lifting him off the ground, leaving his feet to dangle in the air; his hands wrapped around Covara’s in an attempt to free himself - to no avail.

“Such ferocity will make for delicious quintessence…” 

“Don’t you touch him!” Meklavar growls, pulling at the chains with all her might. Her fate may as well be sealed, but she can still do what she can to save him. 

Covara looks upon her with a soulless gaze; a scientist examining her experiment. “The boy means much to you?”

The observation sends more of a chill down Meklavar’s spine than the threat of her own death, because now Pike has Covara’s interest. 

And it’s all her fault. 

Pike growls; teeth grit in anger as Covara continues, “It’s just your sort of plucky luck to have a dear companion nearby.” She lets go of him, and Meklavar feels a bit of relief though he falls to the floor in a heap - at least he still has breath. “It is for my benefit.” 

Covara closes her eyes and breathes deep, looking altogether unconcerned with her impalement. She reaches back and grabs the hilt without looking, and in one horrifying movement, easily rips the sword from her body.

Black blood drips from the blade, proving the woman is no longer even human. 

Meklavar moans as Covara’s boney hands cup her chin Her throat strains as Covara pushes as if to threaten to snap her head from her body. 

“I have always wanted to observe how the soul link spell functions, but never have I found two suitable specimens,” Covara continues. Meklavar twists her head, anything to be free of the vice-like grip. “Your love for each other is equally as strong as your quintessence.”

The purple glow returns to Covara’s hand, hovering around Meklavar’s throat. 

“The only thing more delicious than your death, is having you serve me willingly,” an evil grin worms its way up her face. “Which I am sure you will do with the boy’s life tied to yours.”

Meklavar braces for the pain.

It never comes. 

Covara falls to the floor, writhing in pain. “Im-impossible! The blade… it was sunforged… how?”

A sunforged blade, one of only a handful of weapons capable of harming creatures of the Demon King.

“Just lucky, I guess.” Pike says, his breath louder than his words; she can’t see him but she can hear the smirk in his voice. 

Meklavar wouldn’t put it past Pike to know the item’s exact value. How he came in possession of the one thing that can change their fortunes tonight, she doesn’t know and doesn’t care. For now, the corners of her mouth tug up her face in uncontrollable relief. Perhaps they’ll get out of here alive after all. 

“Now you’ll know what it’s really like to be one of the Demon King’s minions,” Meklavar says smugly. “You’ll be stuck with them for the rest of time.”

Covara rises - though she stumbles backwards - a purple aura surrounding her. Meklavar can feel the dark energy slowly slip away from this reality. The mercenary guards have had their last straw of magic and take off running at the otherworldly display. 

Pike does no such thing. He stays and uses the stone she lays on to lift himself up, flipping a dagger to his hands  with skill that looks like magic - ready to fight if needed. 

“I will return sooner than you think, child,” Covara promises; eyes wild and crazed as veins protrude from her body, threatening to explode. She holds a hand outstretched towards Meklavar and the other at Pike. “And I will have your life.”

Dark magic hits Meklavar, clogging her nose so that all she smells is the stench of tar. She chokes for air and can only watch as a thin green wisp of energy travels from her chest and mingles with a blue that she can only guess belongs to Pike. 

Instantly, fear overcomes her senses - a fear for herself, sprinkled with idle worry of blood stain devaluing the sword. 

Pike’s feelings. 

“With your souls entwined, it will be easy to find you and use you,” Covara says, her voice now more like a hollow echo. Her lips turn up wickedly. “Become as close as you like; for it will be all the more enjoyable to tear you apart.”

She lets out an unearthly shriek, rising from the ground before dissipating; like ink smearing in water. 

Silence. 

Meklavar huffs, exhausted mentally and emotionally. She rests her eyes, relieved the danger is over. 

“Hey, hey, tell me you’re okay.” Pike’s voice. 

His concern fills her like a jar overflowing with wine, and a sense of admiration and desperation digs right to her soul. 

A soul-link; Covara’s parting gift has ensured she won’t be able to stray too far away from Pike. Not if they both want to live. They’ll share pain and emotions; a ritual usually only ever used by couples in the forest who have been together for decades. 

Pike isn’t from the forest. He has no idea what’s been done.

“I’m fine,” she says. “Can you get me out of this thing?”

The shackles jingle as Pike begins to fiddle with them. She feels his lightheartedness before he jokes, “What kind of thief do you take me for? I can pick a lock.”

True to his word, she is already freed from the first. It falls back to the stone with a resounding clank. She holds her hand to her chest simple because movement is once again her own. “You don’t have the best track record when it comes to thieving. You almost convinced me you were a ninja-assassin with how terrible you are,” she teases. 

Regret. Shame. Fear. 

Pike unlocks the last one. Meklavar sits up, glad to be free. No sooner than she does, Pike restricts her with a bone-crushing hug. 

“I’m so sorry,” he says before she can voice the question. “I thought she’d just imprison you, and I could break you out later. I should have smuggled you out right then and there.”

Meklavar sighs, resting her head on his shoulder and returning the hug. “You did what you thought was right. I’m not blaming you for anything, Pike. You still saved me.”

“You almost died right in front of me,” he chokes. “And it would have been all my fault.”

“Pike…” She wants to tell him it’s okay over and over again. He may not even listen to her words, but he can feel her emotions just as loudly as she can feel his now, so she pours comfort into him. “What were you even doing here?”

He hugs her tighter in response; a thanks. 

He chuckles. “What else can a thief do? I was trying to steal the Jewel of Jitan. I’d heard it had gone missing, so I thought I’d try my hand at taking it back.”

Meklavar sinks her teeth into her lip. “You caring fool,” she says, swallowing a sob. “It’s right over there unguarded. You’d better take it.”

“Please, let me hold you for just a little bit,” he insists, nestling his face in the crook of her neck. “Then I’m coming with you wherever you need to go.”

Admiration again. Love. 

Warmth fills Meklavar’s cheeks, but not out of embarrassment. She likes this feeling; she likes feeling the same for Pike. Despite Covara’s evil intentions, she doesn’t mind that it’s the goofy thief she can feel the emotions of as long as they’re like this.

At least until she can find a way to undo it. Surely there’s something in her family’s library that covers it.

She needs to confirm her family’s fate for herself anyway. For that she needs a friend to be her anchor.

“We can’t part anyway,” she confesses. “The spell she cast on us linked our souls - literally.”

There’s a long pause before Pike lets go of her, his eyes wide. His emotions cycle through confusion and disbelief. “You mean… she wasn’t just saying a bunch of magical mumbo jumbo?

Meklavar snorts, with a renewed love of how easily he amuses her. “It’s exactly because she was saying a bunch of ‘mumbo jumbo’.”

“Oh,” he says simply. A sense of panic rises, reverberating through her soul. 

“I’ll see if there’s a way to reverse it,” she explains. “My family has a lot of books on magic.” And there’s one more thing that will help.

Jumping off the stone, Meklavar takes the few steps towards where the object she seeks rests. Gently, she takes the Jewel of Jitan in her hands. The green gem pulses for joy, acknowledging her guardian bloodline. 

Salty liquid touches her lips - she hadn’t realized she’d been crying. She holds the Jewel close to her chest. Her mission - her reason for leaving home - is complete. 

“The Jewel of Jitan isn’t just another pretty gem,” she manages to say through both relief and the weight of her new mission to make sure Covara can’t return. “It’ll bolster the magic of any sorcerer, so we can borrow some power to undo the soul link.” She chuckles darkly, nervously; what if he abhors this situation they’re stuck in or grows to hate her? “I can get pretty moody, I’d hate for you to have to feel all of that.”

He smiles brightly, eyes soft. “There’s no one else I’d rather be stuck with.”

Meklavar can feel his every emotion; there is no trace of a lie in that declaration. And she isn’t sure if it’s truly her own or not, but she feels the same. 

She takes his hand and meets his trepid gaze, no doubt wondering her reaction. 

“Well then, let’s get going. This may have happened maliciously, but I’m looking forward to everything coming out of it.”

Rising on her tiptoes, she greets his cheek with a kiss - a bookend to their time apart. To her amusement, they glow red.

But a grin twitches on his face, and Meklavar is quite content with that response. 

[shadowofthelamp]

SU Movie Liveblog

I had this open in one tab and the movie in another and wrote down my thoughts, let’s go! so sorry to people on mobile.

DIAMOND SONG, DIAMOND SONG

Yeah, makes sense that two years still isn’t really enough to sway them from thinking he’s still pink in some way- especially considering even the crystal gems had that problem after thirteen years.

ICE COLD, STEVEN

his big grin when connie kisses his cheek.... SO good

FAMILIAR DID NOT PREPARE ME FOR OLDER STEVEN’S SINGING VOICE

steven getting a song about being proud of himself and knowing he’s grown into a good person is also SO GOOD

and pearl! pearl’s part! also so great!

oooh, they’re all getting a piece!

garnet referring to her first fusion with terms like parents talk about a baby is PRECIOUS

AAAAA FIRST GLIMPSE AT BBY AMETHYST.... and she comes out with weird limbs like one of those drawing pose dolls, what a nice touch!

DON’T THINK I DON’T SEE THE BETAS THERE.... but no jasper, hmm....

RECREATING THE THEME SONG, I SEE YOU...

maybe it’s because I know what’s coming but making a song called ‘happily ever after’ is just asking for disaster, honey...

Steven Regrets Tempting Fate

steven looks younger when spinel asks who he is and that HAS to be by design.

hmm... is the gem drill connected to her form somehow, with how she formed her hand and it came out?

oooh boy, I’m gonna guess.... spurned member of pink’s court?

SPINEL GETS A SONG RIGHT AWAY, AND HER ANIMATION IS SO FUN

I LOVE IT

and ‘other friends’? yeah, definitely part of pink’s former court.

HER WEAPON IS A FUCKING SCYTHE HOLY SHIT

oh fuck oh fuck oh fuuuuuuck

‘holy s-he really got everybody!’ the boy is 16 greg, he can hear A Swear

oh shit, THIS THING TAKES YOU BACK TO ‘RESTART’ MODE, THAT’S WHY STEVEN’S POWERS DON’T WORK- THEY DIDN’T UNTIL HE WAS AROUND 13

well, THIS is uncomfortable, but it is always nice to hear pearl sing

the expressions seem... idk, extra cartoony here? pearl’s face is so round and everyone’s eyes look extra big. idk if it fits, but it’s probably meant to be a bit unsettling.

huh. someone smarter than me at analysis will have to talk about amethyst’s mimicking.

damn, they really did try to pacify pink with gifts of gems, didn’t they? I can already see so clearly what happened.

‘it took me MONTHS to stop trying to kill steven!’ peridot is so good

and then bismuth and lapis just build on it, NICE

that pose, with him having a hand on his face and looking back at the injector.... I swear either him or greg have had that EXACT pose in some other episode.

okay, pink was hyper and childish, but even she would have gotten bored and annoyed with spinel. I bet spinel was commissioned specifically by blue, but the pink that blue thought she knew, not the one that actually existed.

wow, about fourteen minutes. pretty short turnaround time for a ‘well shit that went bad fast’ reprise.

spinel’s little squeaky shoes during the reprise is... wow

BISMUTH GETS PART OF A SONG....

‘hijinks will ensue’

ANIME-ASS GARNET REFUSION....

if I was new!garnet I’d be scared and confused too... cmon, steven. she clearly looks really disjointed rn.

the first time I actually said ‘oh my GOD’ out loud in this movie was pearl rolling out the stairs and the red carpet

I OWN A CAR WASH

oh geez. boy do I think I know exactly why pink ditched her.

okay, we are.... about halfway through the movie. I do admit I didn’t think this would take this long.

also sandals as tap shoes?

the comic timing of amethyst opening her eyes and look over made me wheeze with laughter.

‘I’m back, you dip.’

also having amethyst be the first to come back was probably a good call.

holy shit is that ACTUAL BLOOD

‘you’re going to die ANYWAY’ gee thanks peridot

oh hey, rebecca as an extra, I think!

I love seeing how sadie’s letting her hair grow out the dye- it makes such a cool effect. and yeah that was how service jobs felt.

steven is just ‘what did I do to deserve this...’

geez, even years after he’s accepted things, steven’s still got a bit of a tight spot regarding rose. not surprised, though.

GARNET, THEY’RE MISSING GARNET, OOOOH

YES YES YES YES YESSSSSS I’VE WANTED THIS FOR /YEARS/, NOT UNDER THIS CIRCUMSTANCE BUT I’LL TAKE IT

I love how easy it is, same as it was for smoky the first time. steven fuses easiest with his family.

okay who the hell is that voice, I checked on imdb and it’s probably either chance the rapper or gallant since those are the unlisted named ones

WHY IS HE BUFF, THIS IS A RIPOFF, BOTH STEVEN AND GREG ARE SOFT BOYS...

yeah.... I don’t like his design. this is the first fusion I really didn’t like that of. ugh.

d’awww, garnet’s wearing steven’s jacket

they threw in the pilot design again!

OPAL SINGING, and admittedly, I do like the steven and greg fusion’s voice

ooooh boy heading for that ocean of poison ain’t gonna do him any favors

pink.... she recreated that garden, made it her sanctuary on earth. she didn’t have only bad memories of it- she must not have realized how much she mattered to spinel like she didn’t realize she mattered to the other diamonds.

the distorted almost circus-like music....

A SONG FROM PINK HOLY COW. wait... that voice sounds really different. is that the same voice actress?

yiiiiiiiiiiiikes. geez I see the reasoning here, holy COW.

‘actually, I can totally believe it’ yeah, as much as I like pink, boy did she fuck up a few times

okay, we got 24 minutes left, this can’t work, right? although spinel only cracked somewhat recently, it sounds like. so really, she’s not that far gone- and considering what we know, probably didn’t fully understand the consequences of her actions.

greg. greg. gross.

I... dunno really how to feel about the su movie being.... basically what everyone who misinterprets su says it is. spinel was made to be redeemed in twenty minutes. her backstory makes it almost shockingly easy. she’s technically the only villain to actually fall like that- like it’s been pointed out, peridot took months, bismuth was already sympathetic, and the diamonds took multiple episodes and still aren’t fully there yet.

I did kinda call that it wasn’t going to be that easy, but whoof. I don’t blame steven though, kid’s under a lot of pressure and is possibly literally dying.

OH, HERE’S THE THEME SONG FOR THE MOVIE

wait.... we haven’t seen alexandrite yet, wasn’t she in the trailer....? and they’re all hugging...

the little crack in his voice between ‘please’ and ‘hurry’...

I love how spinny and magic fusions and gem reformations are in the movie....

wow, BOY did the song sound different when it was released out of context

HE’S GOT CONTROL OF PINK!STEVEN’S SHIELDS AND CRYSTAL PROJECTION SHIELDS....

he sounds so.... adult. I know it’s just that zach is 21 years old now and his voice has changed, but steven really has grown up.

‘well, I changed white diamond’s mind with a single absolutely raw insult so you can’t blame a guy for trying’

yeah I’D KINDA WORRY ABOUT THE POISON.... LIKE RIGHT NOW....

WHY ARE THEY PLAYING THE HAPPY TUNE THE POISON IS STILL A VERY PRESSING ISSUE

if this is how they fix it I’m gonna be a little annoyed, not gonna lie

I just realized spinel reacted to steg so much because it jumpstarted part of her memories- her friend left to become a ‘fusion’.

white being passive-aggressive, I see. 15000 year old habits die hard.

steven: thanks for insulting my home five minutes after getting here, grandma. bitch.

haha, diamond ex machina

[johnnymundano]

The House by the Cemetery (AKA Quella villa accanto al cimitero) (1981)

Directed by Lucio Fulci

Written by Dardano Sacchetti, Giorgio Mariuzzo and Lucio Fulci

Music by Walter Rizzati

Country: Italy

Language: Italian

Running Time: 88 minutes

CAST

Catriona MacColl as Lucy Boyle (credited as Katherine MacColl)

Paolo Malco as Dr. Norman Boyle

Ania Pieroni as Ann (babysitter)

Giovanni Frezza as Bob Boyle

Silvia Collatina as Mae Freudstein

Dagmar Lassander as Laura Gittleson

Giovanni De Nava as Dr. Freudstein

Daniela Doria as the first female victim

Gianpaolo Saccarola as Daniel Douglas

Carlo De Mejo as Mr. Wheatley

Kenneth A. Olsen as Harold (credited as John Olson)

Elmer Johnsson as the Cemetery Caretaker

Ranieri Ferrara as a victim

Teresa Rossi Passante as Mary Freudstein

Lucio Fulci as Professor Mueller (uncredited)

The House by the Cemetery is a disjointed 1980’s schlocker by the entertainingly inconsistent Italian director Lucio Fulci. As movies go, it’s terrible. As Lucio Fulci movies go, it’s quite good. As horror movies go, it’s kind of for diehards only; not because it’s so harrowing (it isn’t) but because you need to forgive its many, many failings in order to enjoy it. It’s not for everyone, but then what is, besides death. Appropriately enough for a house by a cemetery there’s plenty of death in The House by The Cemetery, so much in fact that several of the characters are in fact dead to start with. Ghosts then, except for the guy in the cellar with a head like a burn scarred testicle. 

Of course this cellar is in The House by the Cemetery, and of course our expendable family move in. Lucy (Catriona MacColl; good) is a mum ,and the ‘70s not really having ended yet in 1981, that’s about all she gets to play with. Norman (Paolo Malco; not bad), her husband is an academic studying (something I either missed or which is less than explicitly stated). Whatever he’s studying it has a high mortality rate (it’s probably Sociology; tough gig that). See, Norman’s colleague, Dr Peterson, murdered his wife and hung himself, while studying (mumble mumble) at the house by the cemetery. Norman and his family move into the house (by the cemetery; that’s important) to complete Dr Peterson’s research into (cough cough). Even before they leave the city, Bob (Giovanni Frezza), their small son, is having spooky experiences which I feel legally obliged to state in no way suggest someone has been watching The Shining (1980) and taking notes.  In many ways The House by the Cemetery is like The Shining, but The Shining written not by Stephen King, but by a glue huffing Guy N Smith. 

Wait, I think Norman is researching the house itself (?), because there’s a lot of talk in libraries about a one time resident Dr Freudstein (yes, really; I know, I know) who killed his family back in Victorian times. A kind of academic boon for Norman’s researches then is that Dr Freudstein (I mean, wow, that name...just wow) is actually still in the basement, kind of dead but kept mobile due to his non-specific “experiments”, when he isn’t doing those he presumably sits very quietly in the basement. The perfect tenant then, except every now and again he’ll come up and stab someone repeatedly with a poker, or saw through their neck or stab them in the head. Obviously no one would want to live in a house where defrosting the fridge could be suddenly interrupted by a maniac with a cheese melt face ripping your throat out. So, cunningly, the realtor (Dagmar Lassander; angry and confused alternately) just never mentions this offal faced tenant, or even the fact the basement is boarded up. But then it seems to be boarded up with magic nails because old face ache nips in and out smoother than a teenager sneaking down for a midnight snack. Mind you, I’m not sure the realtor knows what’s going on, she seems quite surprised when the man with a boiled arse for a face starts stabbing her really slowly with a poker. So maybe no one know he’s there? Which makes precisely no sense.

But, unlike scarlet corn syrup and maggots,  sense is in short supply in The House by the Cemetery. I mean, the cemetery isn’t just by the house; some of  it’s actually in the house. There’s a tomb stone inlaid into the ground floor. Because, reasons. Unfortunately, it is established that there is a huge basement under the house so that makes no sense. A lot of this illogicality is intentional as  Fulci’s obviously going for a dream-like state, and every now and again that works; dream logic is light on sense and nightmare logic doubly so. Creepy child trapped in photograph, shop window dummy prefiguring death by decapitation, a kid playing hide and seek with a ghost, these are all flesh crawlingly good fun. The problem is that this dream logic saturates every scene, even the mundane stuff, so the whole thing just ends up bafflingly irrational. 

People wander about ostensibly doing normal things but none of it makes much sense. At one point the nanny, Anna (who is played by Ania Pieroni as though she is possessed, for no clear reason), is cleaning up a massive blood trail in the kitchen when Lucy, not unsurprisingly, asks what she’s doing. Anna stares at her like she’s on a crack high and the conversation moves on. Lucy apparently is more used than I am to massive blood trails in the kitchen. About half way through the movie you realise you have no idea why any of what’s happening is happening, or even why any of the characters are where they are, or doing what they are doing. The only thing you are sure of is several of them have died violently at the hands of someone with an inside out face, and before moving into a house you should always check the basement.

To be fair to The House by the Cemetery, the version I saw  was dubbed and this dubbing was just terrible. Just bloody awful stuff. It was so terrible it did the cast no favours whatsoever. The kid, Bob, is largely irritating because of the dubbing, which sounds like a someone doing a shrill impersonation of Little Lord Fauntleroy. When he’s allowed to act without speaking he’s remarkable, largely because in those bits he looks shit scared out of his wits. Seriously, he looks pretty genuinely distressed, I hate to imagine what they were putting him through. I’m sure he shows up in the jeep at the end of Demons (1985), so clearly he survived the filming experience. Basically, The House by the Cemetery is probably a much better experience viewed with subtitles, but I doubt even that would actually catapult it into “good”. It is, however, very enjoyable and a great deal of fun, with some really quite nifty direction by Fulci. Bonus: contains a fantastically ridiculous bat attack.

[coffeeandcalligraphy]

Lots of writing! | Writing Update #1

Hey People of Earth!

I have many a things to update. mwahaha

The first of which is this bad boy!

FISHBOWL was a one shot-ish thing I worked on in mid August because I didn't want to write the scene I had to write, but also didn't want to write outside of my universe. Soooo, of *course* your girl wrote herself some more fanfiction because? I mean? Why not!

It’s not unheard of on this blog that I ship (and then, subsequently cannoned) my boyz Lonan and Harrison. I’d written the first chunk of this story on mobile, just in a note, because I’d gotten an idea for some dialogue. (I had the whole story written besides the beginning and end.) The struggle was figuring out how to start the story. I toyed with a couple ideas, writing a million different first sentences. Frustrated that I wasn’t feeling any of ‘em, I shelved the project for the night and went to bed.

The next day, I came back to FISHBOWL, and I looked over the random first sentences I’d jotted down. One caught my eye, and so aha, I found my sentence. (I struggle with writing openings, so once the first sentence is nailed down, I usually am able to get a good flow rather quickly). I wrote the entire thing in one sitting, and while it’s disjointed and weird, I had a lot of fun.

EXCERPTS:

The story itself is basically plot-less since it was only meant to entertain myself, but I think I wrote some cool stuff, and explored a setting (Lonan’s room) with a lot more diligence than I have before.

This excerpt’s first line inspired me to write the rest of this story (lol my only motivation). It’s not even a favourite line, it just helped me wrap my head around the language a bit/gave me the idea to have a fishbowl-lens look on the story. 

The bottle is crystal edged. Half drained. A kaleidoscope through his eye.

He passes it over with ease. Harrison can’t tell if he’s done it because he’s drunk, or because he doesn’t want questions. 

“My mom likes this shit,” Harrison says, fingering the bottle, like he’s holding a memory and not jade-tinted glass. Careful, so he won’t shatter it. It’s almost like he’s a child again.

I also lluuuurve this next paragraph, just because loppy IS SUCH A NICE WORD. loppyloppyloppy. I just like the personality of the objects in Lonan’s bedroom (because he’s got none). Like his poor depressed lonely fishbowl, poor slothy aloe, poor upset betta.

Harrison watches the fishbowl on the nightstand. He should change the water. It’s aglae’d and forgotten, almost, like the loppy potted aloe on his desk. The blue betta hardly slashes through the water. Ris reaches over and unscrews the pot of pet store bloodworms, sprinkles in a pinch of the pellets. The fish cuts around its browning bamboo stake, and vacuums two into its mouth. Its fins wiggle like ink drops.

This is the last paragraph of FISHBOWL, and I mean, I like her tho?

The betta fish glugs through the water in a flowery whoosh. Bottom feeds the last of the bloodworms. The takeout containers are empty, and rolled onto their backs. Stained rusted orange with dried chili. The aloe plant is still curved instead of straight. Harrison makes a note to water it in the morning. The digital clock bleeds 6:22 in neon cherry light. When it bounces off Lonan’s eyes, they look purple. 

So that’s it for FISHBOWL! I had a lot of fun writing this lol. Maybe too much. I must be stopped.

CHICKEN NOODLE is chapter 14 of REWIRED, and to be frank, it was a bit of a pain to write. I’d churned it out after writing a really intense scene previously, and couldn’t really feel into the flow of the words as easily as I’d done before. The first scene took a chunk of time to write, because I wasn’t sure where I was taking it. After finally nailing a concept, I did complete it, and I’m rather happy with how that section of the chapter turned out. 

However, lol, scene two is a mess?? In my opinion at least, I did read this chapter to @sarahkelsiwrites​ last night, and she rather enjoyed it! Because it was SUCHHH a mess, and I had no motivation to write it, I, toward the beginning of the month, adapted the scene to screen. 

Stripping back the scene really allowed me to figure out how I wanted it to end (which was exciting!). Obviously, it isn’t a very good screenplay, but it was exciting to have a different take on the scene/focus on a new form to learn instead of self deprecating!

The following excerpt is from the beginning-ish of the chapter and sets up the concept:

Maybe this is how it feels. To be a child, or a fetus, or a cell, or a human, stuck in the womb of a mother. Sloshing in amniotic fluid. Doing little fetal summer saults. Eating what she eats. Drinking what she drinks. That last serving of apple crumble. The remnant touches of cognac stuck to her lips. A dog and a bone, a human and its lung, a plant and its gardener, a mother and her child. Can’t live without her, even when you want to. Bitter dependency. 

my favourite parts of this are ‘fetal summersaults’ and ‘human and its lung’ like ooooh. I’m like not 100 on it but I don’t mind it!

PEACH is chapter 15 of REWIRED, and oh boy is she a CHAPTER. I drafted this one as well as 16 over three days (they’re both super short), and I’m shook??

Chapter 14 ends with Reeve saying some *very* horrible things about another character (Emily), and her relationship with our boy Harrison. Because of this, she’s finally decided to check out Emily for herself, and see if she’s really as horrible as Reeve (who’s assumed her to be a Lolita figure), has anticipated. 

Here’s an excerpt:

Emily and I sit on her pull out. My mother would haphazardly call it tacky—blue gingham, red quilt—but I almost like it. With its coffee stains, and holes that vomit polyester. Second-hand charm. Maybe Harrison toted it off some suburb’s curb for her.

So this is the final chapter I’ll be updating you guys on (because it’s the most recent one that I’ve written lol). 

LOLITA, LOLITA, takes place in short succession after PEACH, and deals with a familiar theme--romanticizing/glorifying a female figure (sorta similarly to Lolita, which contributed to--of course--the title). This chapter is sort of the tail end of the ‘whimsical’ adventure Reeve has had entering Emily’s world, and has a lotttt of French inspiration.

Emily, as a character, does study the French language/culture a bit, and Reeve really clings to this particular detail. I think in a lot of ways, she does this because this is a detail she previously ridiculed (in the line: The kind of girl who learns French in her spare time and smokes essential oils, from chapter 10). 

Here’s the first one (I think it’s kind of clunky honestly but I like the idea so when I revisit, hopefully with some editing I can clean it up):

We split a brownie over a glass of Pinot Noir. She says it’s a French thing, and I imagine the bottle emptying on the veranda of a politician’s off coast villa. My lipstick stains the rim of the glass in a ruby porthole. It tastes like fruity hand sanitizer to me.

I also really like the next one, particularly the end. Like with before, I think it’s kinda clunky but I ain’t all that mad:

She’s pulled her hair into a bun. The gold ridge of a bobby pin peaks out from behind a twist. Hiding between the white of her scalp. My nails have dried, now, and she’s gifted me her peach lip gloss, which I wear gracefully on my lips like it isn’t second-hand, but a lavish salve made in Europe. Tested on the eyelids of a fetid rabbit. Warm and licked at on the mouth of a rich young woman. An off brand perfume clings to her throat. The plastic breath of amber and ylang-ylang. I’ve tried to mimic her up-do, but my hair falls, even when I pump it with hairspray. Je suis amoureuse. I should tell her. I am in love.

^^ the perfume in question in my head is like a bootleg version of Chanel No. 5, hence some of the perfume’s classic notes!

The second half of this update deals with Reeve *attempting* to talk to her brother (@Lonan @Lonan). They’ve now migrated to his room, which she notes, is vastly different to Emily’s.

The first excerpt is a line I find kind of funny because a) food b) relatable c) lol Lonan’s ideas for gifts tho d) SAME e) grapefruits ?? f) it’s kind of adorable

He’s brought me half a grapefruit and a spoon. A surrender, or a lost attempt at a gift. The flesh wet, and pink.

like tbhhh grapefruits as presents sounds litttt

The next is actually sort of stolen from FISHBOWL, ha. FISHBOWL takes place in Lonan’s room, so I *very much* stole all the description from there and shoved it into this chapter. oops lol.

His room feels smaller, somehow. I think he’s moved the bed. Or it might be the new coat of paint. The addition of small things, like houseplants, candles, miniature replicas of American landmarks. A wilted aloe plant. A fish bowl. The blue betta inking the water in bored compliance. I think to ask him if he’s made the space more claustrophobic on purpose, but don’t at the last second. Lonan’s never been one to collect clutter. 

And lastly! Not my favourite but eh:

I say, “I like what you’ve done with the place,” even though I don’t. “What kind of plant is that? This one?” I get up from my spot on the floor next to him. Touch at the pot next to the watering can. Finger the waxy leaves. Anthurium, peace lily, ficus? Probably a ficus. “I think Mom would like these. You should take a picture to show her later.”

I like the tone of this scene a lot because it’s so dissociative. Almost underwater. It’s kind of a very thin version of my usual style, but I think it works for what I was going for for sure (I hope lol). 

So that’s about it for this update! I know it was a lil different, but I hope you guys enjoyed regardless! As always, thanks for reading! :)

--Rachel

[closetofanxiety]

New Jersey Death (match) Trip

I’m sorry this is long. If you’re reading on a mobile device, I know Tumblr makes you scroll through the whole thing instead of respecting their own html cut. 

Let’s just get this out of the way: I’m not reviewing the matches from Game Changer Wrestling’s Tournament of Survival 3. I haven’t watched enough death matches to qualify even as a mildly informed observer, and you know what? They kind of run together. It’s hard to distinguish one from the other, when you’re seeing one after the other.

When the first light tube spot happened on Saturday night, with a loud POP that could be heard everywhere in the building, the crowd erupted. By the time the hundredth light tube spot happened (not an exaggeration!), late into the show, no one in the crowd reacted at all. At some point, you just become numb.

I will say that, for sheer “Oh my God” spectacle, it’s hard to beat this kind of wrestling. I posted a bunch of short clips to my Instagram story, and friends who care not a whit about wrestling were messaging me all night about them. “What is that?” “Where are you?” “That looks insane,” etc. And when you’re standing a few feet away, the brutality is mesmerizing and almost artistic, like Artaud’s idea of the theater of cruelty, but for real.

On the other hand, all the criticisms I’ve heard of death match wrestling were on display: the comparison to the numbing effect of pornography seemed apt, as did the common complaint about guys who are theoretically trying to kill each other calmly waiting while their opponent sets up the next ridiculous spot. During one match (Ciclope vs. Alex Colon? I don’t know. They genuinely run together, especially in a tournament), one guy was setting up panes of glass on two chairs, but they kept slipping off, so THE REF started helping him out, while his opponent just waited on the turnbuckle for the suplex. Tell me that’s somehow less of an “exposing the business” scenario than an intergender match.

So, the matches were fine if you like death matches. Ciclope won, and good for him. What follows are my disjointed recollections of my first - and presumably last - experience at a death match tournament, lazily organized by chronology.

Saturday, June 2, 5:15 p.m.

I arrive at “the historic Starland Ballroom,” which turns out to be a grim loading dock of a building in an industrial park. The parking lot is practically full, and I am arriving 15 minutes after the scheduled bell time, thanks to traffic jams in Meriden, Fairfield County, and New York City. Let me say this: if I never drive across the George Washington Bridge again, it will be too soon.

Luckily, I have not missed anything. Doors were supposed to open at 4 p.m., but there is still a line of people snaking around the side of the building. We’re not just on Indie Time, we’re on Death Match Indie Time.

The crowd is about what you’d expect, with a uniform of black T-shirts and baggy shorts and a general commitment to ill health, although there are more women here than at most wrestling shows I’ve been to. I may be the only person here who has a favorite book. I see three different TSOL t-shirts, which somehow makes sense. I am surprised at the number of WWE shirts I see. I briefly thought about wearing a Kevin Owens shirt, but feared I’d be mocked and derided; within minutes of arriving, I see a huge guy with sleeve tattoos wearing the same shirt. There are more WWE shirts here than CZW shirts, in fact, which I guess is not surprising, given the enmity that exists between the established New Jersey promotion and the GCW upstarts. There are, in fact, more T-shirts here that say “CZW is Pussy” [sic] than CZW shirts.

There are people tailgating in the parking lot, and fragrant drafts of marijuana smoke drift by. A burly guy in an orange T-shirt that says SECURITY waddles up to me and tells me I can’t bring my shoulder bag inside the venue.

“I understand, safety first at the death match tournament,” I say. He nods, either not getting the joke or deciding whether I need to be restrained in a chokehold.

5:35 p.m.

I’m through the doors. There are metal detectors and bored-looking bouncers in orange shirts, because this is a crummy rock club. A guy in front of me with neck tattoos is told he has to take his bottle of prescription medication back to his car. A woman is arguing about a bag search.

There’s a small table set up just behind the metal detectors. It’s hard to know who might be part of the GCW staff. A guy in a black T-shirt and baseball cap is yelling at a woman, possibly about people getting in with bogus tickets.

“I know every name on every ticket sold,” he tells her. Then, to me, he says, “What’s your name?” as I hold out my crumpled printout.

I tell him, and he says “You’re good.” I don’t feel good, but I go in anyway.

The venue is absolutely packed. There’s a ring set up in the middle, and a VIP seating section on what must be the stage for all the shitty bands that play here. There are rows of chairs on all four sides of the ring, and all of them are occupied. Behind the chairs, in standing room areas, crowds of people jostle for position.

My ticket theoretically entitles me to a seat in the third row. Pathetically, I hold my ticket up to a person working at the GCW t-shirt table and inquire about getting a seat.

“Sorry, bro, first come, first served,” I am told. I could have saved $15 and bought a general admission pass, I ruefully reflect.

It’s standing in the back, near the t-shirts and the barbecue vendor, that I notice the long bar is empty. This is a shame, as I am extremely thirsty and would pay at least $10 for a bottle of water. It turns out the venue decided not to serve alcohol tonight, which is the first good decision anyone has made all day.

I wander around, noticing merch tables and the Nick Gage-mocked treats for sale. No one has any water. The treat woman, God bless her, points me to a small bar in the back of the room where the venue is selling pizza, Red Bull, and bottles of water. I buy two and want to sob in gratitude.

“Yo, we’re starting soon!” a voice announces over the PA. It is now 40 minutes after the announced bell time.

5:45 p.m.

A man in black shorts and a baseball cap bounds into the ring. The crowd erupts in cheers. It is the same guy who knew every ticket buyer’s name. This must be a GCW owner.

“Yo, look at all these mothafuckin’ shot callers in this place!” he yells, and the crowd roars its approval. Are GCW fans shot callers? Am I now, by extension, a shot caller? I feel briefly stirred, until I reflect that a genuine shot caller would be allowed to bring his shoulder bag into the venue.

The guy tells us that regular ring announcer is sick tonight. “He’s in the bathroom, shitting and puking,” the guy says, and the crowd cheers, as if excited by any bodily function. Instead, there’s another ring announcer, who is dressed like a frat guy at a golf course and sounds like the world’s most convincing Joel Gertner impersonator. I mean, he really, really sounds like Gertner. It was uncanny, and throughout the night, it was weird to hear that voice and see it coming out of a guy who incels would characterize as a “Chad,” instead of a tubby, hairy Long Islander with a leopard-print neck brace.

We’re ready to go. The music starts. It’s Nick Gage’s music. The crowd goes insane. I am watching from the small bar at the back of the room. I have two bottles of water and a cupcake. I wanted the “MDK” variety (red velvet with cream cheese frosting), but the woman told me they all melted, so I get the “Ultraviolent,” which is just a vanilla cupcake with buttercream frosting. It’s a little soggier than I’d like, but it hits the spot. I am eating a cupcake and watching men rake pizza cutters across each other’s faces. This is Roman decadence. Our society is doomed.

The matches come and go. Shlak is here; people on Woke Wrestling Twitter hate Shlak and regard him as a Nazi, but I don’t know exactly what the source of that grievance is. He was recently shot in the leg, as he posted on Twitter, along with the motto, “I welcome death.” He gets a big welcome here. In his match, Markus Crane - who is introduced by Not Joel Gertner as “The Devil’s Big Red Dick” - repeatedly does horrible things to the leg where Shlak was recently shot. Eventually the referee stops the match and awards the win to Crane, which results in bloodthirsty disapproval from the crowd.

As this is going on, I notice a man watching the show at the bar, with his 8 or 9 year old son. I briefly think about calling the police, but instead I pay $3 for a slice of pizza that I saw delivered in a box and have another water. Between matches, members of the ring crew use huge industrial brooms to sweep all the broken glass out of the ring, because, safety first at the death match tournament.

7:30 p.m.

It’s intermission now. I don’t know who’s winning. I go over to Takayuki Ueki, the Big Japan wrestler who lost to Nick Gage in the first round. He seems nice. I buy a Big Japan yearbook from him and get him to sign it. Some other guys are selling loads of wrestling magazines from Japan. I buy one with a Minoru Suzuki cover and one with a Naito cover. I am a gormless tourist. “Got any joshi magazines?” I ask. The guy looks at me like I just asked him to make me a casserole. He does not have any joshi magazines.

I buy a Tournament of Survival shirt with all the participants, because I want to remember one of my most questionable decisions as an adult. Now I have a shirt with someone who may or may not be a Nazi. I will not wear this on first dates.

The show starts up again. I’m standing closer to the ring now. During one of the matches, I get hit with broken glass from one of the light tubes, a spot happening about 15 feet away. I decide to go back to my spot in the bar at the back of the room. I have another water.

Nick Gage comes out to wrestle Ciclope. A guy tries to start a “U-S-A!” chant and is immediately drowned in a sea of booing. I’m oddly relieved that the death match crowd in 2018 has no time for jingoism. After 10 minutes of brutalizing each other with glass, pizza cutters, light tubes, a fishing pole (don’t ask), and whatever else, Ciclope beats Gage with a schoolboy, which is hilarious. To me, anyway. The crowd is infuriated. Nick Gage was infuriated, and suplexed the ref through a pane of glass. Well, Nicholas, perhaps you shouldn’t lose matches to routine roll-up pins, hmm?

Joey Janela comes out. He’s wrestling the resurgent PCO in a non-tournament match. This is my first glimpse of the new look PCO, who I have vague memories of from childhood, during his goofy Not-the-Mounties stint in the WWF as one of the Quebecers. Pierre Carl Ouellet, Indie Darling, is one of the weirder and better wrestling stories of 2018. It would be like the Ding Dongs coming out of retirement to win the PWG tag team championships with a dizzying routine of high spots.

Janela and PCO start with a lockup and go into chain wrestling, and it’s like listening to jazz after hours of black metal. It’s so different and refreshing. Eventually they start breaking out the Home Depot supplies, of course, and since part of Indie PCO’s gimmick is that he has a gross, welt-covered chest, there are lots of chop spots involving that. But this is a good match overall. A solid 3.5/5 and my favorite of the night.

9:00 p.m.

It’s time for the main event: Ciclope vs. Miedo Extremo. It’s a death match. Ciclope wins. I scoot out early so I can exit the crammed parking lot and get on the road to my hotel, which is in Neptune. I have a full day ahead of me tomorrow at Asbury Park, where I plan to visit some weird places for a newspaper column I write. It’s also, unbeknownst to me, the day of the Asbury Park Pride parade, so the town is quite full, which explains why I paid $250 for two nights at a Red Roof Inn. I may be the only person in the state who, in about 12 hours, was a death match spectator, Catholic Mass attender, and inadvertent Pride parade viewer. What a day. What a weekend.

[jflashandclash]

Attrition of Peace (Traitors of Olympus)

Forty-Four: Ajax

When Dreams Come True 

             When Axel collapsed to his knees, Pax had to pause to reconsider their life decisions. Maybe they’d pushed the whole Paxes are the coolest thing since chimpanzees learned to ride bicycles too far. Maybe the Fates were filling in a MadLip with Cards Against Humanity for the Pax brothers.  

             Whatever the reason, the timing of Axel’s mental episode was about as good as the timing of Achilles’ last step.

             “Ares, are you this pathetic a coward? Fight me like a real warrior—” Axel’s voice crippled to pained pants. Pax could almost hear Axel’s internalized, meditative counting. This was what Axel did when the Leonis Caput’s memories synced with his: the way he quivered, covered his face, crumbled into himself, the rage and malice he emitted, the way he tore at his ears and hair like a bunch of microscopic Ares-lice were stabbing him with baby spears.[1]

             Pax wanted to tell Axel now wasn’t the time for hardcore dander removal nor the time to challenge Ares, but—

             “Aphrodite, if you were ever hoping we’d… you wouldn’t let…” Axel released an inhuman growl, his claws dropping to hug himself. The tips of his nails sank deep into Axel’s exposed forearms and gashed his skin.

             “Wow!” Pax said.

As terrified as he was of the ship, and as nauseous as he was from seeing Flynn, he couldn’t be useless right now. That wasn’t a normal-Axel-breakdown. The Silver Tongued Snake needed to get to work. He focused on trying to take care of Axel, and about how to talk them out of this and crawl back up to Alabaster and Reyna with a white “halp” flag. Assuming the ghost army hadn’t overrun Camp Half-Blood, but one thing at a time.

             Pax set a hand on Axel’s shoulder, trying to surreptitiously remove Axel’s claws from his arm. He gave Ares and Aphrodite a sheepish smile.

             Aphrodite raised an eyebrow at him and Ares looked amused.

             “Listen, Jerk of War and… Aphrodite.” Pax realized calling her “leave favorite goddess” was probably a bad idea right now. “I know we started off on the wrong foot, what with Axel almost castrating you during a fight and some other minor—”

             When Axel’s hand shot out to shove Pax, it was hard enough to throw him off balance. Pax’s back slammed into Johnny’s Rocket’s wall and he skidded down to the ship’s deck.

             “Get away from me!” Axel snarled, his voice wavering.

             Pax sat there, stunned, watching Ares laugh. Aphrodite sighed and fluffed her now-long locks. “Oh, I’m going to enjoy this,” Ares said. He removed his arm from Aphrodite’s shoulder to crack his knuckles.

             The ship workers—their old friend—all paused in their work duties to watch. They looked horrified. The mop in Flynn’s hands snapped against the floor.

             Ares walked towards Axel and set a hand on his forehead, forcing Axel to look up.

             “Hey!” Pax shouted. This was bad. Pax couldn’t fight Ares, or he didn’t think he could.

             He was about to yell, “No face-high fiving my brother!” when Ares did something he didn’t expect.

“I remove my curse from you,” Ares said, “And grant you a fighter’s, my, blessing.”

             “No…” Axel whined. His hands went slack and flopped to the floor.

             “Now, go forth, Monster of the Labyrinth, and hunt your prey.” Ares detached the Leonis Caput helm from Axel’s belt and placed it over Axel’s head. The God of War grinned, taking a step back to admire his handiwork. He looked at Pax and grunted, “Ajax Pax. I think we’re supposed to give you a five second head start or something, but I don’t care about that shit. Ready or not, here he comes.”

             Pax didn’t understand. He numbly watched his brother get up and turn towards him. Although Pax could normally see through Axel’s Mist alterations, Axel’s figure blurred with that of the Leonis Caput: his limbs turned skeletal, his skin seemed to hang loose. In the grey light, the plumes of his helm smeared to a bloody mane. Normally, even in costume, Axel had the look of a strategizing human. Now, his body heaved like a hungry, wild beast.

             “Ajax, run,” Axel’s voice sounded distant, small, and scared. In alarm, Pax realized he couldn’t see Axel’s mouth move under the helmet, just the vile grin of the monster. “Don’t use anything I’ve taught you.”

             But… but Axel had taught him everything. They trained together every morning since their acrobat days. And, besides, what was Axel talking about? Pax could hear him in there somewhere and it’s not like Axel would ever—

             The monster threw its head back and released an agonized wail, two-toned with Axel’s baritone and the Leonis Caput’s growl. One that twisted into a raw scream. [2]

             Pax scrambled to run. Shaking, he snatched up one of the smoke bombs Alabaster had resupplied in his utility belt and dropped it.

             Right as the green tendrils billowed into the salty air, the Leonis Caput lunged. Pax rolled into the smoke screen, the way he’d always dodged—

             And felt the Leonis Caput’s claws dig into his hip, then around Pax’s utility belt.

             Pax screamed in pain, wrenching to the side to dislodge his brother’s grip. Axel lifted him by the belt. Something sharp scraped his skin.

             The leather around Pax’s waist gave. Pax flopped onto the deck, his pants loose. He scrambled backwards, kicked the material off so he’d have full mobility, and struggled to get the skinny jeans over his combat boots. To save time, he kicked those off too.

             The ocean breeze dissipated the green haze enough that Pax could see the Leonis Caput stand to full height.

             Pax’s heartbeat thundered in his ears. The ship’s deck, his brother lost like an animal, someone laughing like a stereotypical villain in the background: he’d seen this before. He knew how this ended.

             He was already shouting through sobs, “Ares’ big, scary, evil plan. To have one brother pants another…”

             Pax trailed off when the Leonis Caput dangled the utility belt off one obsidian blade. All of Pax’s weapons, tricks, and household goods were on there: his daggers, helm, smoke bombs, knock out darts, serums, EpiPens, and emergency gum and condoms. Pax was naked, and it wasn’t just because he’d kicked off his pants.

             “You don’t happen to have any walnuts on you, right?” Pax whispered.

             As the Leonis Caput drew Pax’s own celestial bronze daggers, Pax puffed up his cheeks and popped them.

             Then, the Leonis Caput tossed Pax’s other defenses over Aphrodite’s and Ares’ heads, into the deck’s swimming pool. Aphrodite followed the progression with an iPhone. She giggled at Pax’s Pegasus boxers. “Oh, this is going to get such a high rating on GodTube.”

             “Ares, Aphrodite stop this. Ajax isn’t the one you want—” Axel’s shaking demand felt detached from the Leonis Caput, and came out more as a plead.

             Ares laughed. He cracked his neck to one side, took Aphrodite by the waist, and pulled her into one of the patio chairs. “No, but I’m rather enjoying this. Front row seats to see you beg for mercy.”

             Pax needed to make a plan. But he wasn’t the planner, Axel was. And—even if he had weapons—he couldn’t attack the Leonis Caput. That was his brother in there. He wanted to find a good corner of the ship to curl up, hide like a baby, and cry for his mother—er—cry for a good maternal figure. What he needed to do was talk their way out of this, and reason with Ares and Aphrodite, but that sounded as useful as reasoning with Hercules’ foot. Plus, Pax already found himself shrieking, “Chinga a tu puta madre!” at Ares.[3]

             Not a great start to diplomacy.

             The Leonis Caput slid one of Pax’s daggers into its fur to sheath it. With the other in hand, it began a jerky, twirling dance towards him. The jagged movements reminded Pax of their weasel’s war dance—everything was disjointed to confuse its prey.

             Tears streamed down Pax’s face while he scrambled back to his feet. His breath was tight. Every time his mind synthesized intel about his brother for a weakness—

 Axel Pax

Powers: Manipulation of Mist. Clear sight. Jaguar transformation. Increased speed, strength, ability. Heightened senses. Utter obliviousness to women’s attraction. Expert fighter and badass. Coolest brother ever.

Weaknesses: Stupidly stubborn, social justice warrior, guilt-ridden, nicotine addiction, his little brother, killing his little brother, killing his little brother, killing his—

                 Pax sprinted towards the back entrance to the bar. The door was slightly ajar. If he was smart and quick, maybe he could trap Axel. He could kick Axel into the bar shack, brace the exterior door with some of the patio furniture; then, he could release the chain holding up the metal gate that covered the guest access and lock the gate to the bar counter. No one would have to die. No one would need to be pinned to a deck. They’d just have to pants Ares, get that on video, and post it along with Aphrodite’s video.

             Despite how silent the Leonis Caput was, Pax could sense him closing in. The sense of approach made him choke on his gasps.

             When Pax got close to the door, he launched off the ground with his nondominate foot, planting his next step on the doorframe to run up the wall. He hoped Axel’s momentum would be too fast—that he’d skid into the shack or, if Axel could stop, that Pax would backflip off the doorframe, land behind Axel, and kick him inside.

             In mid-flip, he registered his mistake.

             Axel knew when Pax was getting ready for a flip.

             Claws sank into Pax’s shoulder.

             Pax screamed.

             Pax’s momentum broke.

             In the split second of reaction time, he reached down with his other hand to jam his fingers at the exposed pressure points along Axel’s forearm.

             But the Leonis Caput had already hurled him off course.

             Pax slammed into the deck. His face smashed into a piece of smoldering wood near the patio chairs. On contact, his shoulder cracked.

             A sob erupted from his mouth.

             For a stunned moment, all he could smell was rot, saltwater, and smoke. He thought about all the warm days he’d spent on this ship, playing pranks with Mattias, performing concerts for the bored army, and about the times Jack talked Luke into some beach days in Belize so he and Axel could visit Chiich and show Alabaster their home town.

             He thought about how Jack was a decapitated head now, how Will, Joey, Kouta, and Santiago were dead, how Lapis and Hiro had left he and Axel to help Eris bring a ghost army to obliterate Camp Half-Blood, how his topside friends might already be dead, and how—if they survived—his only chances at a healthy, happy relationship would be dating each other. When had the fates decided his story would be so angsty?! He hadn’t asked for much; he didn’t want glory or fame—he just wanted infinite craft projects and a dozen Pax children!

             Pax tried to push up off the grossly warm muck on the floorboards.

             Pain erupted in the shoulder that had cracked. He squealed. The arm wouldn’t move. The other trembled violently.

             Footsteps approached.

             His gaze hardened on his functional hand, placing it flat against the floorboards.

             As soon as he went to push off, a bronze blade slammed through his palm, thudding into the deck at an angle, pinning him.

             Pax stared as glittery blood smeared onto the slimy wood and his hand. His cries clogged into hyperventilation. He remembered this. He knew what happened next.

             But, in his dream, he’d never heard Axel speak.

             “Ares—please—” Axel’s distant, small voice trembled violently. For the first time since Frasco died, he could hear Axel choking on sobs. “Stop! I’ll atone for my sins—I’ll—I’ll do anything—”  

             Someone laughed.

             Pax’s mouth was moving. He was screaming something at Ares, some kind of curse or swear.

             He tried to yank his hand up, to force the blade out of the—

             The world flashed white for a moment.

             Pax squealed again. He’d forgotten his blade expanded at the base. Everything flared, like he’d shoved his injured shoulder and pinned hand into a meat grinder at the same time. He couldn’t—couldn’t get enough leverage—

             “Aphrodite—p-p-please—please—I’ll be your slave! You can use me however you want—I won’t resist—and I’ll never think of Reyna again, and I’ll tell you I love you—”

             “Ares, maybe we should reconsider—”

             “Stay strong, babe. He’s no Adonis.”

             Pax twisted his neck, catching sight of the animalistic arch of Axel’s legs. Axel still looked like he’d become the monster, but Pax could hear Axel’s hysterical tears. That was his brother trapped inside. The Leonis Caput withdrew the other dagger from his furs.

             “Axel…” Pax whispered.

             After Frasco died, Pax had never wanted to hear Axel cry like that again. He’d wanted to keep Axel smiling and laughing, like Axel always kept him safe and fed.

             “Please—gods! Titans! Anyone! Hecate! Morpheus! PLEASE!” Axel wailed.

             Pax choked back a sob. “Axel, it’s not your fault—”

             The Leonis Caput’s legs leveled with Pax’s shoulder. “Don’t say that—”

             “Don’t go all stoic about this. Talk to Reyna, Alabaster, and Kally.” Pax tried desperately to get his breathing under control so he could talk fast. He forced a smile, one that probably broke the Guinness Mythological Records for fakeness. “And quit smoking. You know those things have a c-c-component of urine for fl-flavoring.”

             The Leonis Caput slowly knelt beside him. “Shut up, Ajax—” Axel couldn’t finish the comment.

             “We’ll see each other again. Remember? I’m like a stomach parasite—”

             The Leonis Caput grabbed Pax’s hair.

             “—you can’t get rid of me.”

             Aphrodite had gone completely silent. Ares made a grunt, like he wasn’t pleased that Pax had to get a lot off his chest before the whole eternity elsewhere thing.

             The Leonis Caput pulled Pax slightly upright by his hair. Pax strained not to scream at the pain in his shoulder, or the way the dagger tugged at his hand on the deck. But he knew Axel was the one in there, seeing all of this. He wanted to pretend things were as painless as possible.

             “Regardless of this, you know, you’re still the best big brother anyone could ask for,” Pax whispered, “Sick burn to Kouta, right?”

             Axel wept as the Leonis Caput hefted up Pax’s second dagger in his other hand.

             While Pax was trying to act relaxed about the whole eminent death thing, he had to close his eyes when he saw the tip pointed at his throat. He may have loved Axel, and wanted to minimize the killing-your-own-brother-guilt thing, but he was still a coward.

             Pax could feel Axel’s body tense. He figured the moment was coming, and said, “Goodbye, Axel. I love you, bro.”

             He’d thought a lot about what would be the best or most heroic last words. He figured nothing could top those.

Author’s Note: Thanks for reading! Sooooo, this was supposed to be the last chapter in the book, in the spirit of Riordan cliffhangers, but Mel basically said she’d murder me if I didn’t put an epilogue in. Who else is in the murder party?!

Axel, put your hand down. I revoke your right to enter this party.  

Footnotes: 

[1] One day, I need a drawing of this.

[2] This scene was conceived to What’s Up People by Maximum to the Hormone.

[3] *ehem* Don’t say this. It’s a very impolite thing to imply someone should do with their mother.