#If I see one more article with SECRET KNEWS ABOUT JAKE and it's just that he was in the after credits I'm going to punch someone

[drifting-pieces-blog-blog]

is there any major moon knight news? (Comics or Show) I wasn't always online and barely keep up with marvel stuff but I really love Moon knight

Major news? In the comics: He's alive again! But that's old news. He came back about a month or two ago.

Moon Knight (the title, not the character) now has two runs going, which is just...Unheard of in the Moon Knight fandom! Which means he is popular and Marvel is taking note of it. Which can lead to a lot of very good things! Phases of Moon Knight is an exploration of different Moon Knights that have existed. This is interesting for those looking for more of that delicious lore and Khonshu stuff and more of the Fists. (Not exactly my cup of tea, as I'm in it for my boys, but I'll read it!)

Moon Knight has also been popping up in other comics a lot more! And not just as a background ghost! Check out the new run of Werewolf by Night! We're getting back to our roots! (It also has Elsa, who is greatly underappreciated).

Speaking of - Marvel MCU has announced that they have plans for a season 2 of Werewolf by Night! In no way is this an official promise to do it, as they have not confirmed the cast return, dates, or story, but only that they are looking strongly into it!

Which, if they bring back WBN, it could mean a wider introduction into the MCU and the formation of something that Moon Knight could become a part of! (My boys getting back together with Jack!)

Moon Knight also appeared in the What If Venom issue as a key player and let us not forget the Blood Hunt vampire extravaganza lead by McKay! And it didn't suck! (At least the parts that I read didn't. I've yet to read the main parts). Considering how much Age of Khonshu sucked, this is good news! And means that Marvel might start looking at Moon Knight seriously and as a $$ item.

Sadly, there are no news sources that I can trust right now about a season 2 of Moon Knight. They have discussed off and on that Oscar is up to continue the part and that they are looking at a potentially good story line for season 2, so maybe that means they are starting to actively consider making a season 2.

I do think that Marvel MCU is a little gun-shy right now. They have been scrapping movies and shows and plans left and right as the interest in superhero movies wanes. But honestly, the lack of interest has to do with the fact that Marvel shat out things so fast and so connected that people started to feel lost and disrespected for not knowing ALL the lore, when they really just wanted to see their favorite characters do the thing. That's just my opinion.

(DC also didn't help by the massive fiasco of shitty SHITTY movies that were coming out and then the constant censorship of the studio leading to director releases and reshoots... That that's a different rant all together.)

In other news, Marvel has ALSO started to secretly and quietly release novelizations of comic runs!! WHAT?! Venom What If-Moon Knight novelization just came out this past week! (There is also a Loki novelization that just came out for all those Loki fans out there).

So for all those fans that love to read more in search of deeper thoughts and secrets and takes, there you go! (Man I used to suck down Novelizations of movies when I was little and I think I'm looking that way again, I say as I eye the new Batman sequel book that is about to come out).

Sooo... Probably not the news you were looking for, but I've got my finger vaguely on the pulse of Moon Knight news and trust me when I say don't fall for all the fucking click-bait headlines that say SEASON 2?!!! and then it's just a retelling of some old news they found that the fandom already knows about season 1. I hate the way today's news stories are written.

[justabigassnerd]

New Family Member

Pairing - Jake 'Hangman' Seresin x daughter!reader, Jake 'Hangman' Seresin x Bradley 'Rooster' Bradshaw

Word count - 1,744

Warnings - just fluff :)

Summary - the Bradshaw-Seresin family gains a new member, who is instantly very popular amongst the Daggers

A/N - hey y'all it's Hangman junior time! this was a fic I'd been debating for a while and I buckled and had to write it. I won't ramble too much, as per y'all, please send in requests, feedback and enjoy!!!

Bradley and Jake had been talking about adding to the family they had created for a while. Both men knew they didn’t want another kid. You were more than enough for them and with their careers, they wouldn’t want to be palming a baby off to you to look after because they were busy. So, they decided to start thinking about pets instead. Both of them wanted a dog, one that would be friendly and loving to everyone involved with their lives and if they got a large dog, they’d maybe train them to be able to protect you if you were to walk them alone.

Bradley and Jake didn’t clue you into their pet search, wanting it to remain a surprise for you since Jake knew you’d wanted a dog growing up, but he was unable to get you one. They didn’t have much time to actively go to shelters and see the dogs available for adoption but one day, Bradley had caught wind of a dog online who was but a year old and was looking for a new home. The dog had a fair bit of training under his belt, including recall and toilet training and when Bradley showed the article to Jake, they knew they found the dog for them.

After some time meeting the dog, making sure he was the right pup for them before stocking up on dog supplies and storing them in the garage where you wouldn’t find them. It was time for Bradley and Jake to bring the new family member home.

“y/n, we’re back!” You heard Bradley say as the door opened and your eyebrows furrowed when you heard the tapping of claws against the hardwood floor coming from downstairs. With curiosity getting the better of you, you head downstairs to greet your parents and stop halfway down the stairs when you see an Alsatian trotting over to your dad with a toy hanging from his mouth.

“What is going on?” You ask, slowly making your way down the rest of the stairs and sitting on the last step as the dog notices you, immediately making his way to you and nudging your hand as his tail wags.

“We’d been thinking about getting a dog for a while now, and Jake said you wanted one when you were little. This is Moose, he’s about a year old.” Bradley explains as you pet Moose’s head, scratching his head softly as he sits himself at your feet.

“How did you plan all this without me knowing?” You then ask, looking up at Jake. You knew he hated keeping secrets from you, especially when he knew that you would love what the surprise was.

“Oh believe me it was hard. We’ve been squirreling stuff away in the garage for almost a month now and I wanted to tell you about him so bad.” Your dad says as he approaches you, scratching Moose behind the ear as his tail wags with more ferocity.

“Do the others know about him?” You question, getting up and following your dads to the garage to get Moose’s new bed and toys into the house.

“Not yet. We wanted him to get settled with us first before we started introducing him to everyone. Although I doubt it’ll take him too long to settle in. He seems at home already.” Bradley laughs as you all watch Moose hop up onto the sofa, sprawling across it and watching you all carefully, tail thumping softly against the pillows. You set his bed up in the living room as Bradley plays a game of tug of war with Moose, holding no candle to the strength of the Alsatian who playfully growled until he won and then shoved the toy back into Bradley’s hand to initiate another match. Jake set out the dog bowls, filling one with water and then hanging up the lead by the front door before returning to the living room to play with your new family member.

The next few days you settled into a new routine consisting of Bradley and Jake taking Moose out for a morning run before they went to work, giving him breakfast when they got back, and you would emerge for your own breakfast. You’d all give Moose a pet and a promise of coming home before leaving the house for school or work. Jake had installed pet cameras in the house to keep an eye on Moose and see how he was doing during the day, and he would entertain himself, playing with his toys or relaxing in his bed until you came home, and he’d shoot up and come running over to greet you happily. You would then put your bag away and take Moose out for another walk to let him stretch his legs and run around the nearby park where you’d play fetch and chase him around playfully to make sure he got all his pent-up energy out before you would return home to do your school work while Moose got in a nap before your dads returned home and got his energy up again. He’d be given dinner just before you had your own and he would remain entertaining himself in the living room as you ate and when you joined him in the room, he’d flop across your laps for belly rubs while smothering everyone in kisses. After a week of Moose being part of the family, you began to talk about him meeting the Daggers.

“We should have a beach day. He’d love to have a run around on the beach and meet the others. Wouldn’t you, Moose?” Bradley says, scratching Moose behind the ear as he pants happily, tail slapping your side with each wag.

“I’ll text the team and let them know, we are long overdue a game of dogfight football. Maybe Moose will join in.” Jake says, pulling his phone out and texting the Dagger group chat.

“I don’t think it’s a maybe dad. He will get involved he loves footballs.” You laugh, remembering how you were in the park going over some training with him when a football landed nearby, and it almost took Moose’s whole focus off you because he decided he much preferred the football over you. You managed to keep his attention on you so the kids playing with the ball could scoop it up and return to their game, but you made sure to buy a football for Moose that day.

After setting a time and day, you, your dads, and Moose headed to the beach to meet up with the Daggers. When you arrived at the beach, you were greeted by Payback and Fanboy who instantly noticed the new addition and Fanboy was sat on the floor within seconds so he could greet Moose who pushed him back onto the sand and smothered Fanboy who laughed and soaked up every bit of attention he was getting from Moose before he moved to greet Payback who patted his head and received gentle licks on his hand in response. As more of the Daggers arrived, they got an enthusiastic Alsatian coming their way and you noticed how each and every member of the Daggers lit up upon seeing your dog and how they instantly got down to his level to greet him. It was clear that Moose loved Fanboy the most. He was the only person who could meet his energy and Fanboy was more than happy to repeatedly throw a ball for him or get in the sea with him. When Maverick arrived, Moose came bounding up to him, deciding to wait until he was as close as possible to shake the water out of his fur, subsequently soaking Maverick in the process who chuckled and crouched down to say hello to Moose.

“You must be the surprise Hangman was talking about, aren’t you?” Maverick says lightly, patting the dog’s side as he pants happily, tail swishing in the sand.

“Mav, meet Moose.” You say, crouching down near Maverick who glances over at you with a gentle smile.

“Moose? That’s a great name. Hey buddy, you’re one lucky dog. You’ve got a great family.” Maverick says softly to the dog, ruffling his fur as Moose barks in appreciation, getting close to Maverick to cover him in kisses, making you laugh as Maverick splutters and quickly stands up with a chuckle. When the team decides to play dogfight football, everyone quickly figures that Moose was going to get involved no matter what, so the team made a rule. Moose was to be a floating player, if he got the ball and ran it down to either of the touchdown areas it would count for the corresponding team. Moose was enamoured with all the attention he got when he got the ball, so much so that he began running off in the wrong direction entirely just to show off that he had the ball and no one else did. Moose ended up scoring an almost even split of points amongst the two teams and he was highly praised as the best player of the whole game. Soon everyone moved to lay across towels or sit on beach chairs and Moose flopped across your lap the second you sat down on your towel, panting as you pull out his collapsible water bowl and filled it with cool water for him to drink which he does so before flopping back against you with a huff.

“Moose you’re not the lightest thing in the world, bud.” You chuckle as you scratch your dog’s belly, looking up when you see two figures approaching you.

“I see he’s found the comfiest pillow available.” Jake chuckles as he moves to sit down on his beach chair with Bradley mirroring his actions.

“Oh, don’t I know it.” You laugh, looking over at your parents as they shrug jokingly with smiles on their faces. You look over at the Daggers who are chatting amongst each other as they relax, some occasionally cooing at Moose in the hopes he’ll come trotting over but he was content to just lie on top of your lap and take everything in.

Adding Moose to your family would remain one of the best choices your parents ever made. He fit in perfectly with your family and all the Daggers loved him. You couldn’t wait for the adventures that were to come with the newest addition to the Bradshaw-Seresin family.

taglist (comment or ask to be added):

@zbeez-outlet @kaceywithak @tsnelf7 @starkleila @cassadilasworld @shanimallina87 @madstxo @chaoticassidy @padsdarlg @lauraseresin @alohastitch0626

[upindreamland]

Obvious - Chris Evans

Chris Evans x fem!victoria secret model reader (she/her pronouns) oneshot

Request: a request where reader is famous victoria secret model and she is married to chris evans (fluff)

Italics mean flashback

Warnings: None. Just a lot of fluff. Please let me know if I missed anything.

AN: I hope you like it. I tried my best to mention the model aspect of it so I hope it’s what you were looking for. Please enjoy! (also I made the tweet gif myself so it’s not the best…)

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

Y/N'S POV

Once I got inside our house, I let out a long sigh while finally being able to put down my bags. Taking in the scene around me, it looked exactly the same as Chris and I left it before our trip. Deciding to leave my suitcases near the front door I made my way up to our bedroom. Knowing how I needed time to relax, Chris dropped me off and went to buy some groceries for this week. 

Once I made it to the bedroom, I changed out of my airport clothes and into some sweats and a baggy t-shirt. Laying on my side of the bed, I decided to scroll through Twitter to waste some time before Chris got home. While scrolling, one tweet caught my eye:

Wondering exactly what they were talking about I clicked on the replies. One reply had attached the clip:

Seeing the way Chris was looking at me made me fall in love with him even more. Since the beginning of my career, I thought that if I were to date someone, they would only see the Victoria Secret Model side of me. I was scared that they wouldn’t accept the other parts of me that weren’t the perfect model they see in public. I’m glad that I was able to find someone who has looked at me the same way as he did when he first saw me all those years ago. I was getting flashbacks to a scenario just like this - the time when Chris and I first met. 

I was sitting outside in the backyard feeling out of place at a party at some famous person’s house that I didn’t even know. There were still a good amount of people around me but not as many as there were inside. Looking up at the sound of someone clearing their voice I’m shocked to see Chris Evans standing right in front of me. Chris emerged into the spotlight a couple of months before me when “Not Another Teen Movie” came out. 

“Is this seat taken?” Chris said pointing to the seat next to me. 

Recovering from my shock I shake my head no. 

“You don’t know the host either huh?” He asked. 

“Was it that obvious?” I ask, feeling my cheeks heat up. 

“Kind of. You’re Y/N right?” 

“You… You know my name?” 

“I mean yeah why wouldn’t I? You have been all over the magazines as the up and coming Victoria Secret model. I should be asking you how you know me…”

“Who said I knew you?”

“Oh darling don’t act coy. Your face said it all when I came over here.”

“Oh sorry I confused you with that hot dude named Jake Wyler in that one movie.”

“So you think I’m hot?”

“I never said that!”

The rest of the night went by super fast. Chris and I just sat there talking about everything and anything. It was relieving talking to someone who understood the craziness of being young and becoming famous so quickly.

Feeling my phone buzz I looked down to see that my manager was texting me to remind me that I had a shoot tomorrow and I should head back home soon. Feeling disappointed that I would have to end our conversation I looked up at Chris and said

“Sorry to have to cut this short but I have to get going, I have a photo shoot in the morning.”

Something flashed across Chris’ face when I said that. 

Before I could figure it out he responded with: “Oh okay. Bye”

Waiting to see if he would say anything else, he went to open up his mouth but quickly closed it. When he opened it again he said, “Hope to see you again soon”

And with that I walked away. Not knowing when I would be able to see him again.

The next day my best friend texted me a link to an article. Opening it up I was surprised to see my name along with Chris’ name on the title. Scanning through the article there was a recording of Chris and I last night at the party. Some time during our conversation someone recorded Chris and I talking to each other. More specifically it was me talking about whatever and Chris looking at me with so much adoration. Feeling bummed knowing that I wouldn’t be able to see him again I went through my day getting ready for my photo shoot. 

While on the way to the studio, I decided to stop by my favorite coffee shop, The Little Cafe. I didn’t know why at the time but while I was about to open the door, I got nervous. Turns out that this coffee shop was going to be the place where my relationship with Chris would start. 

When I opened up the door, I was immediately struck with the smell of freshly ground coffee beans. Ordering my drink and sitting down to wait, a shadow came over me. Looking up I was shocked.

“Funny seeing you here” Chris said.

“Definitely, I didn’t expect to run into you here. I was just thinking about you.” I responded.

“Oh you've been thinking of me?” He said with a small smirk forming on his face.

Rather than trying to explain it to him, I decided to pull my phone out and show the article my friend sent me. 

“Oh wow I didn’t know I was that obvious”. He responded after the video was over.

“What do you mean?” I asked confused.

“Well for starters I thought you were really pretty and wanted to get to know you. While you were talking I couldn’t help but get lost in how normal our exchange felt.”

I was speechless.

“Then, when you told me you had to leave I was trying to find the courage to ask for your number but I got scared. I’ve been beating myself up over it all night. Now that you are here though, I’m not going to let that happen again. So can I get your number and maybe if you’re up for it go out on a date with me?”

I was even more speechless. Not knowing what to say, I just nodded and handed him my phone. When he handed it back to me I didn’t know what to say. I went to respond but was pulled out of the moment when my phone started ringing with my manager's name on the screen. Sending him a disappointed smile I promised to text him and answered the phone call.

Ever since then, it’s been history. 

“Y/N?”

Taken out of my flashback I realized that Chris was now standing in front of me. 

“Are you okay?”

“Huh? Oh yeah I’m fine I was just scrolling through Twitter.”

“Uh oh. What happened this time?” Chris asked, worry written all over his face.

“Nothing bad this time. It’s just a clip of you at the show.”

“Oh really. Let me see.”

Showing it to him I could see a blush rising to his cheeks.

“Huh I guess I’m still pretty obvious when it comes to how much I love you.” Chris said.

Now it was my turn to blush. I was at a loss for words once again. Through the ups and downs of both of our careers - like not seeing each other for weeks on end due to both of our busy schedules, - he has still stuck by my side and supported me no matter what. He still looks at me with that same type of adoration he had the first time we met at the party. I couldn’t have chosen a better husband to be there to support me while I do what I love.

“Come on downstairs. I got you coffee from The Little Cafe while I was out.”

I will never fall out of love with this man. 

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

AN: THE END!! I hope you enjoyed it. Sorry if it’s all over the place. Also thank you for the request. This will be my first one ever.

[black-dhalias]

All Ten Toes -Avatar-

Tsu’tey X F!Reader (8K Words) Warning: death, descriptions of war, angsty, violence

While sitting in the hangar, your body pressed against the metal as you lean onto the truck. Even as you watch the soldiers, as you see the war brew around you—the sheer beauty of Pandora shines through. You can see the towering trees that just brush the sky.

Arms crossed over your chest, you spot him rolling up—Jake Sully, another Avatar pilot and veteran... Just like you. You uncross your arms and walk in his general direction, lips curling upwards under the mask.

"Sully?" He nods, and you nod in the direction of the base entrance to which he falls in line beside you. "Y/L/N. Just wanted to meet the fellow not scientist joining the Avatar program."

He smiles under the mask, which tells you everything you need to know. "Navy?" You roll your eyes, side-eyeing him.

"Semper fi." His eyes widen, but he sees it—just in the way you carry yourself now. You're not just a soldier, but a marine—like him. Reaching the door, you code you both in and gesture him inside.

"Appreciate the welcome. So what's the mission?" You raise a brow, pointing him int eh direction of the briefing.

"Don't die, hot wheels. Briefings down the hall, just through that door."

So when you and Sully approach the Colonel, side by side, you have a feeling it has more to do with your shared background. With the fact that you are both ex-military with a knack of taking risks, and paying for it in the end. Trudy points over at the helo, your heart pounds louder and then fades off.

"I'm putting you both on door guns." Trudy was your roommate, she kept your secret and you kept her sane—not a lot of women running around that aren't scientists. You nod, well at least your time in the service keeps you from being too bored around here; it keeps you useful.

"This low gravity'll make you soft." An uneasiness grows in the pit of your stomach, and you like to listen to that feeling—because its usually right, and he's always put you on edge. "You get soft. Pandora will shit you out dead with no warning." As he sits up, you shift, tucking your hands behind your back. Wrist in your palm.

"I pulled your records. Corporal." Eyes on Sully, then you. "First Lieutenant." Your lip twitches, you haven't heard that in a while—can't remember the last time someone called you by rank. He doesn't linger on you for long though, turning back to Sully. But all you hear is the dull ringing in your ear, feel your body detaching until you hear your name over the ringing.

"Several tours Lieutenant. A couple badass career moves, medically retired at the peak of your career because a lunatic blew your leg off." Its a quote from one of the articles written about you, about the four that were in that bathroom. You wish none of them knew, that he didn't know, but its in the file—clear as day.

"The Avatar Program is a bad joke. Bunch of limp dick science majors." He points at you and while your urge is to step back, you don't—stuck at attention. The weight of your leg becoming more apparent, but its in your head just like the burning sensation. "We're going to talk about the fact that seasoned marine wasn't in your resume."

You feel Sully watching you, but ignore it—keeping up with the colonel. "However, it does present an opportunity both timely and unique." He shouts, but your blood has run cold and chest tight. "A couple of marines in an Avatar body. That's a potent mix. Gives me goosebumps. Such marines could provide the intel I need, right on the ground. Right in the hostiles camp." You never thought twice then, driven only by orders—mind resorting to all it remembers and knows.

"Look Sully. Y/L/N." You swallow. "I want you to learn these savages from the inside. I want you to gain their trust." Easier said than done. "I need to know how to force their cooperation, or hammer them hard if they won't."

"Are we still with Augustine?" Orders, that's how you both run.

"On paper. Yeah, you walk like one of her science pukes, you quack like one, but you report to me." Your posture stiffens, the doubts still flood in even if you know that you're going to listen. You preferred when it was a secret.

"Can you do that for me?" Sully affirms first. Eyes on you, nod. May god forgive you... because you're not sure you will.

To see ten fingers and ten toes, all at once—it is something you never thought you would see again. Even on the overlook, the fact that you have both legs is more overwhelming than the view.

"I never thought I would have two legs again." You break the long silence, the weight of training has become easier given time and you appreciate the breaks he began to give you.

"What does that mean?" To him, he's only ever known you as this—something that is a force of nature like you were on Earth. But on Pandora, you don't feel like a force of nature anymore. You never even mentioned it to him before now because it never crossed your mind.

"Back on Earth, when I was still a warrior—" You recall Sully's first lie to the Na'vi, that you were warriors of the jarhead clan. "A man was so against women warriors in my clan, he set off an explosion in a room for women. Killed three others, injured me beyond repair." You pause, trusting the words and trusting him not to repeat them. So when you finally get the courage to look at him, he is not showing you pity. He almost looks admiring, but that's just a trick of your mind. "When I woke up, I didn't know what had happened to me... I was so scared and went to walk out of the room." You've never spoken about it, not even to Trudy. "When I hit the ground. My whole life was gone. My career. My friends. My leg. Took months of rehab and therapy, got a prosthetic. Signed up to come out here." On Pandora, at least you were somebody. Worth something.

"Then you have always been brave." You smile and he miles back, your heart rate quickens. You like when he smiles on those rare occasions.

"Come with me." He declares, standing and holding out his hand, and you trust him without a second thought. The ringing always dulls around, so much so that you know he won't lead you astray.

In the helo, you feel alive—Pandora is alive around you. A living, breathing thing. You think about what Sully said when you asked him not to say anything to the others about your military experience. "You can't run from who you are, Lieutenant." Echoes upon echoes of memories, even as Trudy grilled you nightly for information about the Colonel you shake your head. Because the memories were coming back to fast, the ringing getting too loud.

Yet you can't shake the feeling that it feels good Jake knows, and that its not just you going behind their backs. Grace looks back at you before looking forward to Trudy, her voice going over the head sets. "You sure you want a plant scientist to be on a gun?" Its taunting, but lighthearted—to which Sully responds by giving you a look. Trudy laughs, oh you'll hear about this later tonight when you get back to base.

"Oh I think she's got this." Grace raises a brow at Jake's comment before returning to what she was doing.

Now here's the truth, you would say it was marine comradery that got you stranded in the middle of the jungle. Soaking wet, surrounded by darkness. You want to defend yourself, but the truth is you're as much of an idiot as Sully and you weren't going to let him be an idiot on his own.

"So how do they think you lost your leg?" You laugh coldly, he gets you stranded in the middle of Pandora without any defenses and he's asking you personal questions. Your hands squeezing the water from your clothes.

"Car accident." But you placate him anyways with an answer hoping it'll shut him up for a while.

"Are you ashamed?" Nope, hasn't crossed the line yet, but the ringing grows louder in the back of your head.

"Maybe I was tired of being some trigger happy jarhead?"

"Its more than that."

"Why does it have to be more than that?"

"Because you lost your leg, and your instinct is to get on the first flight to Pandora."

Following, hand in hand with Tsu'tey, he guides you towards the top of home tree—the greenery thick as the branches flatten out enough to walk out onto. "You must learn one more thing." Just one more? Even as your feet find the grooves naturally, instincts guiding your every step—you no longer have to look for where they go.

"There has to be more." When he looks at you, something has changed—but it doesn't make sense. Did you mistake pity for admiration? Does he feel sorry for you?

"You are almost ready." One of the people, but now your stomach is doing backflips because you have betrayed him. Betrayed the people. So the ringing grows louder until he tightens his hand, and you center—the ringing dulls.

"Just watch." Tsu'tey taught you that sometimes it pays to watch and listen, and all the military training—all the 'go go go' mentality does is drive you into the ground. Sometimes the world needs to be still.

You stumble into the people, wrists bound together as some reach out to run their fingers along your limbs—this is the closest you've ever been to a native and its the closest you'll ever be. Because you'll be dead soon enough. Glaring at Sully, you never should have ran after him—should have let him die out there or get caught on his own.

But your oath means something, and so do your friends so here you are because those things mean something to you. Like you said, you won't let him be stupid on his own. Now you're both just a couple of stupids. Two people stuck in front of the leaders of the Na'vi. A chief. His wife. Their daughter. And the betrothed. They all hate humans, and they hate the Avatars—the dream walkers. Demons.

This is a fitting end for you though—the colonel wanted trust and that wasn't ever going to happen. For you or Sully.

Watching Tsu'tey from the branch, you leap for joy and cheer him on before he lands. In front of you is a Banshee and a grinning Tsu'tey, the funny thing is you don't remember him ever smiling at you like that before. Maybe he has and you never had a chance to notice. Never could see what it meant. Not that you think it meant anything at all.

Tsu'tey waves you forward, but you are not able to bring yourself to walk forward—which causes a crease to form in his brow. To smooth that crease, you step forward and watch it flatten out. Fear builds, but so does curiosity until its nose is in your palm. The banshee does not flinch or run for, it remains grounded even as Tsu'tey steps off.

"This is Ikran. With Tsaheylu, we are one." That is the word you would use to describe them. The look Tsu'tey shares with them, but what you don't see as you run your fingers along the back of its head. That is how he looks at you.

"I don't like Jake Sully... But you are different." He tolerates you is the difference, Sully is intolerable even to his friends. Even as he guides your hand, his fingers ghosted atop yours. "To be one with  Tsaheylu, requires more than what he has. It requires spirit." So even as the Banshee's wings beat and your heart speeds up, you did not expect to see the flashes of your life on Earth.

You see your family, the reason you joined the marines in the first place. Being sworn in.

There is a whooosh of harsh winds against your cheek, Tsu'tey closer than you remember as the ringing begins. You see your best friend, the world overcrowding and resources running thin. You see the first time you were shipped out. The ringing is louder as you see yourself entering the bathroom—it's all in slow motion. The drift is beginning to close in on you, and blur the memory with Tsu'tey. The explosion. The smell of burned skin.

Your body has gone limp, you can't hear Tsu'tey, but you can see him. It is so bright. You hear your name far off, caught in the drift. Deeper and deeper, as it all goes brighter. The light that slants in from the top of the tree, cutting into frame and overwhelming your sight. The last thing you see is Pandora. Oh Pandora... You don't feel him shaking you, or hear him yelling. None of it because you are being pulled out of the chamber — unconscious.

You lean against the tree, huffing a little as glance up at Tsu'tey, both irritated and amazed at how hard he seems to be pushing you. Day after day, and it doesn't get any easier with time. He pushes and pushes, and he keeps pushing until you physically cannot move another step. Yet when he drops down from the trees, eyeing you harshly— you straighten up and stare him down. You want to believe you can handle him, even if it means pretending like your mind is not stretched to its very limit as you look at him.

Becoming one with the people, as the tribe elder said, has become next to impossible with Tsu'tey as your guide. He has made no secret that he wants you to fail, to barely be able to get up the next day—let alone be here. "You did good." It's as if something breaks mechanically as you skip a step, body adjusting as your mind processes his words. Hardly a compliment after the day you had, but coming from him, you beam a little. He thinks you did a good job.

"I did my best." And he smiles. Odd, a returned gesture of kindness. You quirk your head, but don't mention it in fear of it never happening again. You had always shown such interest in him, curiosity of the things he knows about Pandora, but he barely glanced your way. Barely seemed to notice you hit the ground over and over again, the mud that was caked into your body as you wiped it away. But he did. In his own, a silent judgement—kind of way.

At first, his disinterest was defeating and it made you want to quit, but that defeat quickly turned into motivation. Instead of drifting off in thought every time he critiqued, you would power through and push yourself further than before—you suddenly had a lot to prove to Tsu'tey.

You feel yourself being ripped away from your Avatar, your mind splintering and you realize Grace is hovering over you with—hate. She seems hateful and angry. But so are you.

"Are you kidding me? Are you serious right now?!" You can hardly breathe as you fling the tech off your frame and swing your leg over the edge.

"When were you going to tell me?" You glare, grabbing the prosthetic that's leaned against the chamber.

"Grace you just pulled me out of there mid-link. What if-"

"You work for the Colonel now?" Shit. You adjust the prosthetic and swallow down the bile, she doesn't care about you. Just about her science.

"Grace listen-"

"No you listen! You report to me, my science and my program! I can take this shit from Sully-"

"Ma'am... with all due respect, I report to you and him. That's my job. My expectation because he's the one that signs my check, and makes sure I get my benefits."

"You're starting to sound more like a soldier than a scientist, Y/N." It is her sneer that does it for you, that pushes you over the edge and sends you into thought. You can hardly breath as you tuck your hands behind your back, wrist into palm.

"Maybe I am."

"Get out of my lab..."

"With all due respect Grace, make me." You may lack one less limb than her, but you take her and half this department before they got you down. "I have every right to be here, I worked just as hard and did just as much."

"Pack your shit, we're leaving. All of us." You don't break eye contact, watching as she lights a cigarette and turns her back to you. A part of you wishes you had hit her, just once. One good hit, but you watch her begin packing and then go to your room.

You have to prevent yourself from jumping across the helo when Grace comments about how it explains why they always gave you the gun. Its because you were trained, military—and you weren't someone she has control over and so she moved you all. Everyone to shacks in the middle of nowhere.

She kept you under wraps though and out of the chambers, careful to keep you from reaching out to anyone. It was like a cruel punishment, and all it did was tether you to the crutch. Not caring enough to put on the prosthetic in such a small space with every intention of sitting most of the day.

But every night you hear about his life, his journey to becoming one with the people—for days. You had half hoped Tsu'tey would ask about you, but he didn't—he was harsher on Sully, protective when Sully tried to bring you up.

You had tried to listen to Grace with interest, leaned back almost completely in your chair as she continues to lecture you about lying. Detailing every lie you ever told, forgetting that you really do have a degree in biology. You just never applied it in a science context until you were on Pandora. She even touches im how its dumb to lie about something so stupid when you are friends. So even as Norm sits next to you, having dealt with Grace for about half as long as you when it comes to her judgement.

"Honestly Y/N, you should have just said something. But instead you let yourself be micromanaged by a couple G.I. Joes." You lean forward, chin on your hand that rests on your thigh.

"So what?" You pause, "I was just supposed to admit to being a soldier and hope you didn't judge me so quick?"

"I wouldn't-"

"Like with Jake? Honestly Grace, its plenty important to you that your science project remains yours."

"Well I mean of course its important, we don't need another-"

"Another what? Trigger happy moron? When have I ever been that?"

The conversation ends there, and back to being grounded and ignored. Graces specialty around here. She had Sully, that was her in with the clan... You weren't important to that.

Grace throws something in front of you, papers—you half expect them to be resignation papers. She likes trying to force your hand into leaving, the betrayal still fresh in her mind.

"Don't make me regret this." Its approval to make her your boss, she signs your check...You nod, pulling yourself to your feet—using the crutch, you head the link chamber.

Your throat tight as you settle into the gel, leaning back and letting the tech settle over your body. Melding to you as you shut your eyes and head into the dark. Hopefully you aren't dead yet.

At first, there is a block that keeps you from fully coming too and then the darkness shifts. You feel your fingers and toes, all ten toes. You open your eyes and find yourself in a large room, the familiar hammocks beneath you. Then you see the healers, who see you awake and push you back into the hammock.

"Stay." They whisper, you nod, but as soon as they turn the corner—who climb out of the hammock and feel the wood beneath your feet. The stiffness in every muscle unmistakable to the point that you think about listening, but why would you?

First step. You've got this. Second step, you see a figure turn the corner and stumble back- "Tsu'tey."

"You're not welcome here, demon." It feels as though everything, every fiber of being has drained away from you—leaving only a shell. You half wonder if he realizes how cruel he looks, how much hate he conveys with those eyes—you're tired of people looking at you with hate.

"Are we back to this?" You ask lips pressed into a thin line, it may be a different body, but it is still you and the same mannerisms.

"You walk in a false body."

"You knew this." You sneer, walking towards him until you are just in front of him. While your tone is angry, your eyes are sad. "I never made that a secret."

Even as the hardness melts away from him, when he reaches out to touch your cheek and push hair away from your face. "You-" He pauses, not trusting himself to speak before he puffs out all the air in his lungs. "You worried me."

"I didn't want to."

You didn't know this, and you wouldn't unless someone had the guts to go around Tsu'tey, but he spent most of his days with your still form. The healers had spread the rumor quickly of his interest, but they had grown accustomed to seeing you with him. Assumed it was by the chiefs orders alone, but it was also because he found comfort in your presence. You never expected anything more of him and he appreciated the gentle kindness that your words often held.

Pinned to the ground, you struggle against the binds until the arrows and spears lock your muscles in place. Even with hands grabbing at you, pulling the braid taunt and tender, all you can think about is Tsu'teys' word to describe you: 'demons'. You shouldn't take it personally, you've never met him in your life and know that the Na'vi hate you.

Approaching Home Tree though, you fall under the spell of Pandora once more and the world shifts for a second. Beautiful. Unlike your science buddies, you never had the chance to see this in person—the friendship with the Na'vi long over.

"We have tried to teach sky people, but you cannot fill a cup that is already full."

"Trust me, our cups are plenty empty ma'am." Oh Sully, you poor idiot— you think, trying your best to not squirm under Tsu'teys glare. "Just ask Dr Augustine, we're not scientists."

"Then what are you?"

"We are Marines..." You speak up, going along with Sully and hoping your not dead in the next hour.

"Warriors... From the jarhead clan." Tsu'tey swears and you worry that you might be walking a thin line... He seems the most hostile, less willing to listen and bend.

"The chief says we're the first warrior dream walkers. That they must learn from us." You repeat as Sully nods to acknowledge as you wait.

("Tsu'tey you will teach the woman dream walker:") That does not receive a favorable response from him, one that makes you think Sully might be the only one to live between the two of you.

"Learn well Jake Sully. Y/N Y/L/N. Then we will see if your insanity can be cured." Yup, you're still going to die.

Once asleep, you begin to come to— hearing voices calling you and all you can manage is a laugh as you sit up straight. Holy shit... Now no one can say anything, because you're there. Inside the village.

Even when you wake again, you feel that jittery feeling until you hear him.

("Wake up demon.") What a way to wake up, to know he thinks so highly of you:

("You do not have to he so rude Tsu'tey. I'm very capable of understanding you.") He humphs.

("I do not care if you understand me. Go home demon.")

("You would hate that wouldn't you?") If his glaring eyes could push you out of the hammock now, you'd be falling to your death right about now.

.

.

.

Yet that wasn't the first time that you were torn from a link, but it certainly would be the last. You stand beside Tsu'tey knowing full well what is about to happen, Grace standing in the crowd. ("Tsu'tey will lead the war party!") There is a roar as he throws his bow into the air, you half imagine him to die if he proceeds. You know he will. As Jake enters, you feel it beginning to shift and it changes Tsu'teys expression.

"You mated with this woman!?" Fuck. You attempt to get closer, but are incapable of getting closer as people stop you. Starting with Neytiri's mother.

Tsu'tey paces, you see the shake in his chest and the tremor in his voice as he pulls his knife. You plead with him without saying a word to stop, but he doesn't. Yet once blood is drawn, you rush to Tsu'tey. He shakes you off, wiping away the blood.

Grace drops. Your eyes widen. Jake drops and Tsu'tey pulls his knife, and Neytiri protects his body. You look at Tsu'tey, feeling the shift again. Your breath catches, he meets your eye— to far to catch you, and too far to do anything yet watch your knees break. "Tsu'tey I-" Then you drop.

Waking from that moment, the panic still bursts through as your chamber is forced open. "Rise and shine, marine." Then you feel a fist hit your cheek, it'll bruise nicely— as you go unconscious. You're definitely getting tired of this.

They keep the cuffs on you, sitting you in the chair as you sneer at Colonel. You hadn't stopped with the ring of threats, your cheek still burning from the initial hit.

"We can talk them out." You assert, swearing up and down as your jaw tightens.

Parker turns towards you, pointing. "You're not going anywhere." You slump into your chair, but he nods in Sully's direction.

Tsu'tey watches Jake, the image of you dropping still stuck in his brain. He sees Grace, but he does not see you. Even as they tie Jake, the words slip out. "Where is Y/N?"

"You have to go! Y/Ns life depends on it!"

You sit in silence, in an isolated room until your chest begins to hurt. They took your prosthetic, took everything from you—chest completely solidified and throbbing. You feel the hard throb of your heart, you were supposed to be a protector of The People. Yet here you are, stuck in a place you don't want to be—in a room on your own. Waiting for the inevitable.

They let Norm sit in, but you weren't allowed— because you were one of them. You hear the shouts before you see them being forced into the same room, you don't ask because you know— you dont want to know anything.

Not a sound. You didnt speak because you couldn't, you were supposed to be there for Tsu'tey.

.

.

.

You half expected to never wake up again when the bullet hit you, the blood blended so well with the burnt red color of your t-shirt. You wanted it to just be a wine stain, to disappear and fade off to become just a stain. Yet it didn't. Instead, you felt a dizzy spell begin to fall over your frame and send you tumbling to the helo floor just after Grace.

Fuck, you think leaning onto the cold metal—the whirring sending you off to sleep.

You feel the burning sensation of your hands cupping the wound until you no longer have the strength; however, just as you are beginning to slip too deep. The world becoming too fuzzy to hold onto, Sully is shouting out for help—is he? You think so, its not him shouting—or anyone... Its what you wish they were doing, but instead you are laying in silence. Wondering what will take you first, blood loss or the shock of it all.

Tsu'tey listens to Sully, "I will fly with you." Sully nods, knowing full well what comes next as his eyes grow more serious. Which worries Tsu'tey.... "Where is Y/N?" He asks, it is almost as if he knows—as if he feels you fading in and out, even in your human form.

Sully's eyes shift to the ground, he can't lose two people in one day and he's afraid of what happens if you die. Of what Tsu'tey will do... Because the warrior may be hardheaded, but he cares about you in his own way. Whatever way that might be.

You lean into the pillow: is death supposed to feel this painless? Supposed to brush into your mind and numb the edges, to make it easier to stomach when you're able to watch it walk towards you. Inch by inch, step by step—the door opens and you force yourself to look up.

You're not ready to let go yet, "Hey Y/L/N... How ya feeling?" You try your best to smile, but to Norm, it is the saddest attempt he's seen out of you and Grace. "Look there—" You half expect it to be Pandora, or the Banshee Norm said Sully now rides... You expect Neytiri, not Tsu'tey.

He is watching you curiously, trying to see you in this form and he does... In your eyes and nose, the way your cheek is built and structure of your face. He sees a lot of you. He sees a lot of blood too. More than he has seen from a human.

"He insisted..." You half laugh, but choke on the lack of air—that bullet did a lot more damage than you expected it to have done.

"That's just a nice way of saying he made you." Even through the window he can hear he soft lulls of your breathing, and the dulcet of your voice. That too is very similar to the way you knows you. This is you.

"Glad you're still making jokes..." He whispers, taking out on of the masks that you are not so fond of, but know you need. "C'mon we got a party to go to."

Norm lifts your head and slips on the mask, watching your expression as it tightens—missing the pang of guilt that shows on Tsu'teys' face. Even as he lifts you, he tries not to jostle you too much. Trying his best to keep you grounded with him, hushing your small cries and soothing the sharp intakes of air. Norm's always been kind like that.

Yet once outside the hatch, Tsu'tey is standing next you—he's taller than you remember.... The Na'vi are taller, you curse yourself for forgetting such a simple fact. Something you should be aware of and remember, but everything seems out of touch now.

He tilts his head as he reaches out to brush his fingers against your cheek, feeling the soft flesh not jagged and bone like as he imagined aliens to look. Finally, you are able to bring yourself to look at him—really see him with your own eyes, you've always seen him. Tsu'tey had tried to rationalize everything he felt for you, wanting to find a reason to hate you. To hate your people. And he does hate them, just not you. He could never hate you.

"You're beautiful, even now." He whispers, reaching under Norm's arms and taking you into his with ease. You lean into him, maybe being close with him will make all the pain go away.

You half imagine Pandora to lose its beauty as the world becomes fuzzy, but it does not lose its beauty—the night life on Pandora is greater than any night on Earth. The wondrous colors and blends of glowing plants, the sounds of the forest humming to the song of the people.

Where you used to hear ringing, all you see is mouths moving—watching as the world fades out. "Be strong dewdrop." He whispers, such a name that would have made you laugh at any other point. Just not now as you struggle to grasp onto life. Why is it you can hear him?

Maybe that's just what you imagine he would say as you watch his lips move, as your body rests beneath the tendrils of the Mother Tree. You breath in and let your eyes close— this is it?

One last chance to relive it all, right on the border of life and death. Barely hanging onto the threads, pieces of who you are. Your mother and father stand before you smiling, even after the gunshots. Your sister smiling, even after she disappeared in the crowded Earth. Your best friend smiling as you walked into the women's restroom, just before it was blown to nothing. Your doctor smiling at you, just before he told you that your leg was beyond repair and somewhere in the disposal rooms. The bomber smiling as he admits on tape to killing your three closest friends, and how his one regret was not killing you too. Your therapist smiling when they say you've made progress even though you can't think about the past without your ear ringing. The scientist smiling, just as they take your resume to send you off to Pandora. Sully smiling when he hears your a Marine. Norm smiling when you speak to him in the Native tongue. Grace smiling when you stand up for the science, for the team, and for the Na'vi.

Tsu'tey just smiling at you.

You open your eyes... No burning, and no pain—just silence as you finally look around. You as the tendrils break away from you, as you look at your hand and then your toes. All ten toes.

You should be dead, but instead you are here. Ready to fight.

Tsu'tey let's his hand drag across your arm, down to the palm as he uses his other to touch your hair. It shouldn't feel different, you know this body— but it feels very different. Real. You don't feel like a ghost living in a shell, you feel every fiber of yourself.

"This suits you." Short sentences, but you half smile as you chuckle. Using your palm, you guide his hand to the place between your neck and jaw, leaning into the touch.

"I have not changed."

"You have... You're more you than you've ever been."

.

.

.

Nothing in all of your entire life could prepare you for this moment, to the five feet distance between you and your adversary. No amount of warning or preparation, or anything in between, could have given you enough courage to face this head on. Well, that's a lie-- he gave you the courage to see the world differently. To see all the world's in the universe differently because you're not afraid to admit you came to Pandora as a soldier-- a strategist, who knew Pandora inside and out, which gave you the opportunity to pilot an Avatar.

Your heart pounds viciously in your chest, threatening to burst through your ribs and rupture at any second. You have experienced war on Earth, been at the center of the devastation, but this feels different. You feel as though you have something to fight for right here, right now-- Pandora feels like your home.

Perhaps there is an important distinction to make, you are from Earth-- that is where your family is, but this planet feels more like home than Earth ever did. Maybe that has less to do with the planet itself, and more to do with the person you associate with Pandora. Never did you expect to be here, but it happened and now you worry that this beautiful world will be destroyed. Obliterated by the selfishness and greed of your kind, and it breaks your heart. On Earth, you were a strategist at the Pentagon having dedicated your life to service at the age of 17-- you knew nothing other than follow orders. Now you feel independent of orders, you feel as though both loyalty and duty has shifted to Pandora, and Tsu'tey. Even the thought of him gives you some form of comfort and strength.

That was the biggest shock, to find that you had a heart still and it had the capability of beating in time with another's. Mostly for the fact that you haven't been in love in over a decade because look how well it turned out the first time-- you became the good soldier, the one who followed orders and kept her head down as not to draw attention. You'd say it worked out pretty well for you because you were never hurt like that again. But now, you have opened back up and in turn, you feel whole again. You feel as though you have finally cut away those layers of scar tissue.

Following Tsu'teys' lead in the mountains and struggle less than the others because you're used to the challenges he gives. The truth is, he only looks back to look for you—and once you meet his eye, he faces forward once more and continues the journey. You trust your hands and body to know the way, and trust him to never lead you in the wrong direction. Just as you reach the top, he takes your hand and pulls you the last bit with a smile on his lips. It fades quick though, his expression hardening with a scorn.

("You will go last.")

Even as you watch Sully succeed, your nerves build and mount; you hesitate to move from your place at the edge of the falls. Hidden by the shadows of the cliffs edge. Even as you watch others succeed, you are still nervous.

("Tsu'tey.") He watches you before nodding in the direction of the Ikran, under his eye you do not feel as judge as you thought you would.

("Do not hesitate. The Ikran will know and so will you.") Through the falls, through the mist that touches your cheeks and sends a cold chill through you. You feel has hand wrap around your arm and pull you back towards him, the shadows of the cliffs casting a harsh shadow on his features. But on you, the light slants through the stone and cuts through you. You meet his eye, trying to read his expression as your heart pounds deep in your chest. You've never been able to read through the mask that he wears with everyone else, its always too much for you. ("Good luck Y/N.") He leans down to kiss your temple, his lips linger there and you go absolutely still. Completely silent. So when he lets you go, hands lingering on your shoulder you can just listen. ("You are the strongest one out here.") He is soft in private, most as impossible and hardheaded as others see him.

"Stronger than me." This is why he wanted you to go last.

Your first flight on your Ikran should have been the moment that stuck out when you think back. But its not. Instead it is the fact that Tsu'tey had finally let his guard down completely, finally seemed to trust you.

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.

.

When the dust cleared that day, the silence of those lost was deafening—everyone wanted to celebrate in the beginning as the long war was over. Things could finally calm into peace, but there was work to be done.

Days went by, the rest of your race went home— days turned into weeks, and Jake joined you in the new body. You were what remained of the Avatar program, strong enough to live in both bodies and strong enough to choose the one that kept them with them. Soon enough, you no longer felt fear every time you walked with Tsu'tey. No longer felt the judgement that was mostly in your head.

You sit beside Tsu'tey, legs intertwined as you face each other in the trees. His entire demeanor has changed from when you first met him, he hates you less. His fingers are curious as they trace your limbs, he had imagined this a thousand times over—thought it was impossible to love you as much as he does.

"Now you must choose a man." Your eyes widen at the assertion, his body close, but far as his words put distance.

"Must? Sounds boring."

For a second, he hesitates, but he continues—still he traces your skin, feeling every finger and dimple in your hand. "A mate is important. Necessary. You have to choose."

"But what if they don't choose me?"

"Only an idiot would do that."

"Are you an idiot, Tsu'tey?" You ask, trying to will him to hear you as he often did to you. Trying to make him understand without ever saying a word.

It starts small, his lips on yours which surpasses all feelings and all logic. You are not left wondering about what's to come or what he feels, even as he separates. Caressing your cheeks and skin, willing you to hear him without a word and you do.

Tsu'tey kneels before you, shifting both your bodies so that you are chest to chest— you can feel both his breathing and his heart as you let your hands run down his chest and torso.

As he brings his braid to the front, he reaches around your shoulder to yours. You feel every caress of skin and brief, fleeting touch. You try to feel more whole, but there isn't a piece missing anymore.

Nothing to fill because you are already whole.

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.

.

Flowers of luminescence crowd the clearing as you let Tsu'tey embrace your hand until you are close. His body in a short sway as he smiles, others say that they only ever see him smile when he is with you.

("I'll swim and sail through savage seas... with never a fear of drowning. And gladly ride through the waves of life.") You start with quiet dulcets, your voice soothes every part of Tsu'tey and it grounds him to Pandora.

("If you would marry me... No scorching sun or freezing rain. Will stop me on my journey. If you will promise me your heart. And love me for eternity.") He smiles, joining into your dance and following your lead as you guide him with your hands.

("What are you doing?") You hush him.

("My dearest one. My darling dear. Your mighty words astound me. But no need for mighty deeds. When I feel your arms around me.") You geek him become more willing to move with you, twirling as Pandora comes alive beneath your feet.

("But we are already mated?") Still you hush him.

("But I would bring you rings of gold. Id even sing you poetry. And I would keep you from all harm. If you would stay beside me. I have no use fir rings of gold. I care not for your poetry. I only want your hand to hold. I only want you near me.") By now, he is into the movements and leading the dance. Even as Pandora comes alive around you. All is well.

("To love and kiss, to sweetly hold. For the dancing and the dreaming. Through all of life's sorrows and delights. I'll keep your laugh inside me. I'll swim and sail on savage seas...") As your voice slows, so does the movements.

("With never a fear if drowning. I'd gladly ride the waves of life. So you will marry me...") He leans down to press your foreheads together with the softest smile, with the gentle hands. Warrior or not, you've never had him be less than gentle with you. Even as the world caves in, as all the world fell apart and things shifted into something new and different. You were always the thing he coveted... protected...

For a second, all of Pandora is still... Not a sound. Only the glow to remind you of the truth, that you are alive and in one of the most beautiful places.

("What does that even mean?") He whispers and all you could do is smile. How could he say something so perfect, to male you laugh and smile? Yet he could listen to it all day, listen to you just speak a sound. It is his greatest pleasure, that and seeing you move through the trees.

Knowing he taught you to climb and move, but you showed him how to move forward. How to let go. How to keep loving, and how to love more.

So this is probably the happiest ending I've ever written, cause who doesn't love a feel good story. This is also eight thousand words long… so a lot of time and thought went into this.

[spine-buster]

The President Wears Prada (William Nylander) | Chapter 34

A/N: Soooo this is the penultimate chapter.  This feels very bittersweet to post because we all know how the series turned out.  Anyway, other stuff happens to, but the series...🥺

August 8th, 2020

Aberdeen Bloom was thinking about last night.  Again.

And she shouldn’t be.  She was having breakfast with the team for God’s sake.  Everyone was eating pancakes or waffles or avocado toast and she was fantasizing about William fucking her raw from behind and watching him through the mirror.  She could swear she still felt his slick and hard cock inside of her.  She could swear she still felt him pounding her from behind and grabbing on to her mouth to silence her and—

“Aberdeen.”

—her whimpering and trying to be quiet and the same time—

“Aberdeen.”

—and his low, guttural grunts as he fucked her and made her be quiet and—

“Aberdeen!”

She snapped out of it.  She looked to her right to see Jason looking at her like she was crazy.  “Your phone is ringing,” he said like it was the most obvious thing in the world – because it was.  The thing was blaring out for God knows how long and she was just sitting there.

She grabbed it, not bothering to look at the number, and brought it to her ear.  “Hello?”

“So what did the boys get up to last night?”  Alec Young’s voice asked from the other end.  

That brought her back down to earth.  She got up out of her seat and made her way towards the doorway, where it would be much quieter.  “What did they get up to?” she feigned ignorance.

“You can’t tell me that after a win like that all they did was go to bed,” he said in a tone of voice that made Aberdeen want to punch him through the phone.  She couldn’t believe he was the one responsible for editing her piece, that it was him who was a deciding factor on whether or not she got a job with the magazine.  “Did they sneak girls into the hotel?  Prostitutes?  Did they get one for Matthews for scoring the overtime winner?”

Aberdeen sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose.  William Nylander fucked the president’s assistant.  They’ve been carrying on a secret affair for the better part of a year now and nobody has a fucking clue.  They were so desperate for each other that they broke every bubble guideline so he could fuck her raw in her bathroom as she bent over the marble vanity.  How’s that for a scoop?  “With all due respect, Alec…”

“Aberdeen, come on.”

“I’m trying to take the more balanced approach, the more human side, the—”

“There’s gotta be something!”

She sighed again.  She knew he was more or less her editor and all, and her job depended on him, but she was on her last nerve.  “You want something?  Okay, here’s something.  Two days ago Courtney Muzzin and her daughter Luna stood outside of the Royal York Hotel with a giant sign on Bristol board that said ‘We love you, Dada’ and aimed it directly at Jake’s window,” she said, the edge very evident in her voice.  “I can’t lie, Alec.  I can’t just make up stories about drugs and prostitutes and whatever else you think is going on here.  They can fucking sue me.”

“Aberdeen, we need a story.  If you don’t give us the story, you’re not working at Toronto Life.  That’s it,” he said, hanging up.  

Aberdeen felt her chest tighten.  She couldn’t do it.  She couldn’t go back on her morals.  She couldn’t just…betray her friends.  Her family.  Her work family, but her family nonetheless.  She had to stay resolute.  She was going to get this job, and she was going to get it whether Alec approved of her story or not.  She was going to get it whether Alec wanted her there or not.  She was going to get it whether he liked her writing or not.  She was going to prove him wrong.  She was going to do it on her own terms, with her own talent.  She was going to bank on herself.

When she got back to her seat, Jason was still eating his breakfast.  She picked up her fork and ate a piece of watermelon before moving on to her yogurt parfait.  “Who was that?” he asked.

She shook her head slightly, signaling that she didn’t want to talk about it.  But when Jason continued looking at her, she knew he wasn’t going to let it pass.  “The guy that’s responsible for editing that article I’m submitting to Toronto Life,” she said.

“What did he want?” Jason asked.

She sighed.  “He wants a story filled with booze and drugs and women, because he’s convinced so many of you are still like that,” she began.  “He thought we would have ordered a stripper or something for Auston last night for scoring his overtime goal.  He doesn’t think Courtney and Luna Muzzin standing outside with a sign about loving daddy is going to sell magazines.”

Jason nodded his head in understanding.  He’d been around hockey for such a long time – he understood completely where Alec got his mentality from.  “And you refuse to write that.”

“It’s not just that I refuse to write it.  I can’t write it.  None of it would be true.  Imagine me writing about you guys with hookers and blow?  I’d get sued!”

Jason chuckled.  “And he doesn’t get that?  How’s this guy an editor for a prominent city magazine?”

“Beats the shit out of me,” Aberdeen shrugged, fiddling around with her spoon.  “But…that’s my issue.  I’ll figure it out.  I’ll write something that will blow his mind and make him wonder why he ever thought he wanted me to write about hookers and blow in the first place.”

Jason smiled.  “Atta girl.”

Jason continued to eat as Aberdeen continued to fiddle with her spoon.  She looked across the room briefly to see William chowing down on some avocado and a piece of toast.  He was scrolling through his phone and, periodically, would look at something Pierre would show him one-third of space away at the table.  Less than ten hours ago his body was pressed up against hers.  Now they were separated by a sea of tables and hockey players.  

“Can I ask you a question?” she asked Jason suddenly.

“Anything,” he didn’t even look at her when he answered.

She hesitated for a second.  “If…I mean…if things don’t go the way we want them to go tomorrow…” she began.

“You mean if we lose,” he interrupted, finally staring her dead in the eye.  “You can say the words Aberdeen.  It’s okay.���

“If we lose tomorrow…I…what should I do?  Like, how should I act?  What should I say?  I don’t want to make you guys even more upset by saying the wrong thing.”

“I doubt you can make anyone on this team upset—”

“Jason.”

He sighed.  He set down his flatware and brought his hands together.  “I think being there physically is good,” he began.  “Like, just being a presence.  Telling the guys you’re there if they want to talk.  Don’t bring it up unless we do.  Some guys are more open.  Others bottle it inside and never want to talk about it.  You have to figure out who’s who in that sense.”

“I just want to be a good…support.  I don’t want to be that person that seems apathetic because I don’t care about hockey as much as you guys.  I know how important this is for all of you.  I know how hard you guys are working to get it done.  I just want to make sure everybody, like…knows that, you know?”

“They know, Aberdeen,” Jason said confidently.  “And I’m not just saying that.  Trust me.  They know.”

***

“How many words do you have now?” William asked through the FaceTime call.  They were lying in bed together.  Virtually.  As always, he was less than 50 feet away in his own bed.  Aberdeen felt cold without his touch, now that she had felt it in the bubble.  It took every ounce of strength and willpower within her not to sneak into his room and beg him to fuck her again.

“I’m at five thousand right now,” she answered.  “I got a call from Alec today.  He’s such a dick.”

“It sucks that you’ll have to work under him.  I mean, if he’s even your editor at the magazine.  He might work in a different department or whatever.”

Aberdeen shuddered at the thought.  Him becoming her boss would be a nightmare.  Beth Zadakis – who Aberdeen originally met with – would be the much better choice in her eyes.  “Here’s hoping he is in another department,” she bit her lip.  “But enough about me, Willy.  How are you feeling about tomorrow?”

“I don’t know…” he said, giving his own shrug.  “I’m not nervous or anything.  I just…I know what I need to do.  I know what we need to do.  We just gotta do it.”

“D’you remember what I told you before we got in here?  That I’ll love you whatever happens?” she asked.  William nodded his head.  “That still stands.  Whatever happens tomorrow, I love you.”

William nodded his head gingerly.  “If we lose…” he began softly, “it’s gotta be, like, a media blackout for at least a week.  Until they make us do those exit interviews or whatever.”

“Deal,” Aberdeen nodded.

“It’s gonna be bad if we lose, Aberdeen,” he warned her.  “You’ve never experienced it before because you don’t watch or whatever, but they’ll be saying a whole bunch of shit—”

“—I won’t listen to any of it—”

“—No, Aberdeen, listen,” he cautioned, his tone of voice more serious.  “They’ll be saying a whole bunch of shit about me.  I didn’t produce, I didn’t perform, I should get traded, blah blah blah.  Same shit, different day.  I’m always the scapegoat.  I just…I know how emotional you got when you read up on everything near my birthday.  I just don’t want you getting upset.  I’ll never forgive them anyways, like in general, but I’ll really never forgive them if they make you cry again.”

“I won’t, Willy.  I don’t – you don’t have to worry about me.”

“I just want to protect you, minskatt.”

“I know you do,” she smiled softly.  “But none of that matters.  All that matters is that I love you.”

“I love you too.”

***

August 9th, 2020

In the end, it wasn’t shitty play.  It wasn’t a patented Leafs Meltdown™.  It wasn’t that they weren’t trying.  It wasn’t even anything bad.

It was just a hot goalie.

That was the most Aberdeen could have asked for, she guessed.  She didn’t really know, because at this point, she was devoid of emotion.  Everything in her was just…empty.  She couldn’t feel a thing.  That was, until, the camera showed a close up of the bench, and she saw Jason hunched over, his head down.  

That was when the tears started.  She couldn’t care less about Kasperi beside him.  It was Jason that she cared about.  Here he was, near the end of his career, signed with his hometown team for league minimum trying to chase his dream of winning a Stanley Cup with the team he grew up watching.  And now, in this wonky season of benched home openers and valued leadership to a stopped and re-started season due to a global pandemic, everything around him came crashing down.  Having to leave his family, his wife, his four daughters, all to chase the dream, all for it to disappear.

“Stop crying,” Brendan said from beside her.  She couldn’t discern his voice.  He wasn’t giving a command.  He wasn’t mad.  He wasn’t angry.  But it was obvious that he wasn’t happy.  He barely blinked as he looked down at the ice, hands shoved in his pockets.

Aberdeen wiped her tears quickly with the back of her hand.  “Sorry,” she said meekly, knowing she was offering absolutely nothing.  

When the buzzer rang and the teams lined up to shake hands, she made her way out of the box, waiting for Brendan and Kyle to follow.  But they didn’t.  She waited and waited and waited but they weren’t coming.  She peeked back into the room and watched as they stood still, looking down at the ice until the last of the team made their way through the tunnel.  Aberdeen realized then that they were staying because the camera was on them.  Of course it was.  The media was going to squeeze every emotion out of the boys until they were shells of themselves.  She bet two of them were being forced into media interviews right now, barely out of their hockey gear.

When they finally made their way down to the locker room, it was eerily quiet.  That’s the first thing Aberdeen noticed – the lack of noise.  It was so different from just two nights ago when they were all screaming and hugging her.  When she walked in behind Brendan and Kyle, and finally saw their faces, she immediately looked for William’s.  He looked so defeated.  So broken.  For a guy who was very apathetic in front of the camera, making it looked like nothing phased him, he was definitely showing his emotion now.  Her breath hitched in her throat as more tears threatened to spill.  After William, she looked for Jason – then she really had to stop the sob.  

She didn’t know if Sheldon had already given his post-game speech.  She was almost sure he did, because Kyle and Brendan took so long, and because she absolutely knew he wouldn’t end the night with what he ended up saying, the only thing she heard him say.  “Pack your bags tonight.  We’re leaving tomorrow morning.”

They’d been through a hell of a season.  A wonky start.  A shitty coach.  A coaching change.  A loss to their own Zamboni driver.  A fucking worldwide pandemic.  A bubble.  The media was never on their side.  And—

“Go to the media room, see how the conversations are going,” Brendan said, his voice low.  “Send Morgan and John out as soon as possible, then make sure the media know about their future availability.  We have to speak to the team.”

She furrowed her brows at him.  Why would he banish her from the locker room so he could talk to the team?  “What are you gonna say?”

“What’s it to you?”

He heart froze.  So he was angry.  And he was taking it out on her.  “Fine,” she huffed.  “I thought we were a team, but I guess not.”

***

Nobody ate when they got back to the hotel.  There was no point.  Everybody just disappeared back into their rooms, probably to pack, probably to wallow in their own self-pity for the night until they had to leave tomorrow and face the world, probably to just lie in bed and stare at the ceiling for hours.  Aberdeen knew that’s what she would be doing.

Well, after she got to the bottom of one thing.

“What did Brendan and Kyle say to you guys?” she asked William on the phone.

“I can’t tell you.”

She furrowed her brows – not like he could see her.  “What?  You can’t tell me?”

“I can’t tell you,” he repeated.  “It stays between us.  In the locker room.”

“I…you’re being serious.”

“Of course I am.  It’s…I can’t tell you.”

Aberdeen knew she wasn’t going to get it out of him.  She’d have to give up.  Not that she wanted to.  “Well, I love you.  I’ll always love you,” she said instead, changing the subject.  “I’m sorry things didn’t go the way we all wanted them to.”

“I am too.  This fucking sucks.”

Suddenly, there was a knock at her door.  She rose up immediately from her bed.  “Please tell me that’s not you,” she said.  “We’re leaving tomorrow morning.”

“What’s not me?” William asked, confused.

Aberdeen stopped.  She took her phone off her ear.  “Who is it?” she asked out loud.

“It’s me,” she heard Brendan’s voice from the hallway.

She threw her phone dramatically across the room and onto her bed.  She threw it so violently it almost hit the wall.  “Let me get my mask!” she called out, grabbing one from the dresser before hooking it onto her ears.  She took a deep breath before she opened the door.  When she did, Brendan walked straight into her room.  She was shocked.  “You’re coming into my hotel room?”

“Oh fuck it, we’re leaving tomorrow morning,” he mumbled, waving off her concern.  The door shut behind her as she walked into her own room gingerly, watching Brendan pace back and forth.  He stopped when he noticed her.  “I want to apologize for what I said to you today after the game,” he said.  “It was out of line.”

“Thank you,” she said.

“There are just some things that need to be said to the team only Aberdeen.  Meaning the players.  You’re part of the team but it’s—it’s—”

“Don’t worry.  I get it.”

Brendan stopped, taking a deep breath to steady himself.  “For my entire life I’ve wanted this team to be successful.  My entire life.  I was born two years after their last Stanley Cup win.  And growing up, I adored this team.  And when I was a player – it didn’t matter that I was a Red Wing.  I love them, too, but in a different way.  Not the way I love the Toronto Maple Leafs.  And when I was given the opportunity to be the president, I made sure I would never take it for granted.  And I made sure – I made a promise to myself – that I would be the one to see this team to victory.  And every time that we don’t get to that victory, I break that promise,” he said.  Aberdeen understood completely.  “None of…this is about you, of course.  This is about the team.  This is about promises that we make to each other.  Promises that we make to ourselves.  Promises we make to get better, to succeed, to climb that mountain and get to the promised land.  This is about the integrity of our character.  The pride we have in this hockey club, to put on that Maple Leaf every night.”

Aberdeen stayed silent.  Brendan was bearing his soul to her.  Every word he was saying was impassioned and coming directly from his heart.  She didn’t want to speak, because there was nothing she could say.  She watched as he took a few steps forward and put his hands on her shoulders.  “You’re part of this team, Aberdeen.  I think you always will be to these boys.  You were the soul of this team this year.”

She shook her head.  “I don’t believe that.”

“I do,” he said confidently.  “I know so.”

“How do you know?”

“Because their soul is hurt right now, but it hasn’t died,” he said.  “It’s still there.  They still have it in them.  Just like you have it in you.”

***

August 10th, 2020

Aberdeen stood absent-mindedly off to the side, the bus being loaded with the team’s bags.  Some of the boys had already gotten on the bus.  She should have gotten on too, but her feet were planted firmly in place for some reason.  

Fifteen days in the bubble.  And now it was all over.

“Hey Aberdeen?” she heard Auston’s voice from behind her.  She spun around to face him.  “I’m sorry we couldn’t do it for you.  Like, for your story.”

***

Kasha came to pick up Aberdeen.  She brought Minerva in her carrier, who kept meowing at the sight of Aberdeen.  Aberdeen took her out and cuddled her against her chest, giving her tons of kisses.  

She watched Tyson do the same to Ralph, wondering if he’d still be on the team next year.

***

When she and Kasha got back into her apartment, Aberdeen went straight to her bed.  She plopped down dramatically and only moved when she felt Kasha standing in the doorway.  “D’you want to go out?  You finally have some freedom,” Kasha suggested.  “We can go for tacos, for brunch…”

Aberdeen perched herself up on her elbows.  “Do you think I’m the soul of someone?  Or something?”

Kasha looked at her strangely, but answered the question nonetheless.  “I definitely think you have the capacity to be for someone.  You know I believe in the concept of soulmates.  Why do you ask?”

“For who?”

Kasha shrugged, but a small smile appeared on her face.  “For William.”

“Why William?”

“Because from the few times I’ve seen you to interact together – like last year, and then at the Halloween party – he looks at you like you already are his soul.”

***

“You should come over for lunch one of these days,” Jason said to her on the phone.  “Jen would love to have you over.  I’m sure the girls would love to see you too.”

Aberdeen smiled into the phone.  Jason Spezza was deflecting.  This was not part of their original conversation.  “When you’re okay, maybe I will.”

“I’m always okay,” he defended.

“You’re not right now,” she said definitively.  There was no beating around the bush.  “But you will be.  At your own pace.  And when you’re good to go, I’ll come over.  And you better cook and let me and Jen sip margaritas in the backyard.”

Jason laughed his infamous laugh.  “Deal.”

***

August 11th, 2020

“Media blackout?” Aberdeen asked William on the phone.

William nodded his head on the FaceTime call.  “Media blackout.”

“I’ll come over tomorrow when Kasha’s back at the office,” she said.  “We can cuddle.”

“That’s all I want to do right now, to be honest.”

***

August 12th, 2020

With Kasha going into the office, Aberdeen was able to sneak away to William’s.  He let her in easily, without much fanfare, and he enveloped her in a hug and brought her down with him on the couch as they lay their together, every limb wrapped around the other.  Aberdeen was running her fingers through William’s hair soothingly as his head lay on her chest.  Hockey was still on in the background.  Alex was still playing, and William wanted to support him.  Aberdeen already knew he’d be calling his brother after the game.  

“I love you so much,” she whispered out of nowhere.  She just felt the need to say it.

William looked up at her.  “I love you too.”

“That last night at the hotel, Brendan told me I was the soul of the team this year,” she said.  His comments were still on her mind.  “Do you think that’s true?”

William nodded his head.  “I do.  I think you’re my soul, too.”

***

The kisses were slow at first.  Needy.  William needed her.  He needed to be comforted.  His brother wasn’t around to talk to, and it was the middle of the night in Sweden so he couldn’t call his parents, although Aberdeen was sure they would have picked up the phone if they saw it was William calling in the middle of the night.  So until he could speak to his brother and his parents, Aberdeen would be there for him, kissing him as they lay facing each other side-by-side on his couch.  There to console him.  There to comfort him.

They kissed for a long time.  Such a long time.  It told Aberdeen that William needed that intimate physical contact, not just flat-out sex, and that he was savouring his time with her as much as she was with him.  But who was she kidding?  He always did.  He always savoured his time with her.  It didn’t matter where, or when, or how, or how much they’d lied to the people around them to get some alone time.  By the end of it she was sure her lips here swollen and red, and when she opened her eyes to look at his, his were too.  So puffy.  So soft.  In their glory.

She felt his hand dip beneath the hem of her pants and grab the flesh of her ass to squeeze it.  She hooked a leg over his torso and could feel his growing erection graze her thigh.  She shivered at the feeling, digging her nails into his bicep.  

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled against her lips.

“Sorry for what?”

“Sorry we couldn’t do it for you and your story.  I won’t forgive myself if you don’t get that job,” he revealed.

“Shhhhh…” she cooed, cupping his face and kissing him.  “What did I tell you before we got into the bubble, hmm?  I love you no matter what happens in there.  I love you Willy.  I always have and always will.”

“I love you too, minskatt.  I need you.  Do you need me?”

Aberdeen’s heart fluttered at his question.  She nodded her head automatically and gave him a quick kiss.  “I need you.  I’ll always need you.”

With their pants and underwear pushed down their legs, William slipped himself into her slowly, watching the look on her face change and hearing the long sigh escape her mouth.  This is what he loved most about their physical relationship.  They could do anything and it would feel like the best time every time.  They could have regular sex.  They could explore a new position.  They could have rough, passionate sex like that night in the bubble.  They could have close, intimate sex like right now.  Each time was incredible.  Each time he loved more than the last.

Each time, William realized how much he needed Aberdeen, and how much Aberdeen needed him.  They needed each other.

“You feel so good, Willy,” Aberdeen’s voice brought him back down to earth.  The pure euphoria in her voice was music to his ears.  “I need you, Willy.  I need you.”

He moved his hips to thrust into her, and so did she.  Their bodies moved together as they always did, and the pleasure they experienced together was paramount to absolutely anything and everything.  

After they both came together, William squeezed his arms around Aberdeen and pressed her against his body even closer than they were before.  He nestled his face into the crook of her neck, dragging his lips along her skin until he got to her ear.  “I need you more than anything,” he whispered.  “You’re my entire life.  You’re my entire soul.”

She believed him.

***

August 25th, 2020

Aberdeen was with Camden when the news broke.  She was spending the day at her parent’s house because Camden had admitted he missed her, so Aberdeen decided to spend the day.  They played video games.  They watched Brooklyn 9-9.  They went on a bike ride around the neighbourhood with masks on and stopped at a local shop to grab some smoothies.  It was perfect sibling bonding time while Siena slaved away in their bedroom studying God knows what for God knows which course come September.  

“Did you see the news?!” Camden asked as he emerged from the smoothie shop with both their smoothies.

“See what?” Aberdeen asked, thinking the worst.  

“Kasperi was traded!” he announced as he handed her the mango smoothie she requested.  

“What?!” she shrieked, grabbing her phone out of her back pocket.  She hadn’t looked at it since they went on the bike ride about an hour ago, because she wanted to spend actual quality time with her brother.  Now, she saw that she missed the alert from the Leafs app on her phone, and a slew of texts from Willy.

“Yeah.  He got traded to Pittsburgh—”

kappy just called me he got traded to pittsburgh just got told r u around? can i come see u? ok so ur not at ur place… ur not at Scotiabank r u?

“—for a first-round pick.”

“A first?!” she shrieked again.  She was shocked.  Shocked.  She didn’t know how Kyle was able to finesse a first-round pick for Kasperi fucking Kapanen.  Her mind was in three places at once as she thought about the trade, her brother standing in front of her, and William’s texts.  For all his faults and questionable judgement in girlfriends, Kasperi was one of William’s best friends.  She knew it would hurt William to see him leave.  That’s probably why he was trying to find her.

I’m at my parents hanging with Cam today.  He missed me.

i know

You know?????

“Cam, I think we should head home,” she said, hopping back onto her bike.

Camden’s eyes lit up.  “Why?  Do you think Brendan Shanahan will want to call you?”

He was so cute.  To think she was important enough that Brendan Shanahan would call her about a trade.  She let him think so.  “He might…” she said, opening the Leafs app on her phone.  “Let’s just go.  You lead the way.”

It wasn’t the smartest choice, but as they biked through their neighbourhood back to their house, Aberdeen read the statement on her phone.  PRESS RELEASE -- -- -- The Toronto Maple Leafs announced today that the hockey club has completed a trade with the Pittsburgh Penguins, acquiring the Penguins' first round selection in the 2020 NHL Draft (15th overall), forward Evan Rodrigues, forward Filip Hallander and defenceman David Warsofsky in exchange for forward Kasperi Kapanen, forward Pontus Aberg and defenceman Jesper Lindgren.

So Pontus was leaving too.  Another Swede.  Aberdeen wondered if William had a strong opinion on him leaving as well, but she doubted it.  She thought about what was going through William’s head as she and Cam continued their bike ride home, but as they turned on their street and they got closer to their house, she noticed a car parked on the street.  A very familiar looking car.

“Oh Jesus fucking Christ…” she mumbled to herself.  

“Whose car is that?” Camden asked, speeding up.  “Don’t people know they’re not allowed over houses anymore?!”

Aberdeen mentally prepared herself as she and Camden walked through their front door.  And that’s when Aberdeen saw him: William sitting on her couch with her mom, mask dangling from his wrist as he held a mug of tea.  “There you two are,” her mom smiled.  

“WILLIAM!” Camden screamed as he kicked off his shoes.

“Hey buddy,” William smiled as he watched Camden’s face light up.  He watched as Camden readied himself to run over to him for a hug but then stopped himself.  It made William sad, knowing Camden couldn’t do what he wanted to do.  “How are you?”

“I’m good!  I’m – do I have to get my mask? – are you staying for dinner – are you going back to Sweden? – are you—”

“Whoa whoa whoa, slow down young man,” Orla smiled at her son.  “I don’t think you’ll be needing your mask.  And yes William will be staying for dinner—”

“—YES!—”

“And no, I’m not going back to Sweden.  I don’t want to have to quarantine again.  I’m done with quarantining,” William added.

“Me too!” Camden said, exasperated, as he plopped himself down on the couch next to him, sipping dramatically on his smoothie.  “I haven’t seen anybody besides these guys since March!”

***

Aberdeen was sure William was a near-perfect human being when it came to interacting with Cam.  That afternoon saw them playing street hockey and video games, with Aberdeen even leaving them alone together while she helped her mom make dinner.  When Mirza came home from work and saw William, his face lit up.  Even Siena was happy to see him, despite her stress from studying. 

Maybe this would make it easier for when she had to tell everyone that they were dating…eventually.

William promised to drive Aberdeen home, which meant Orla and Mirza could escape into their room to sleep and not worry.  They gave Cam special permission to stay up well over an hour passed his bed time.  It was only when Aberdeen told Cam that he needed to get ready for bed that she and William had their first moments of alone time the entire day he spent at the house.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t talk about the trade.  I know you’re probably feeling like shit right now seeing your best friends being shipped off.  Are you okay?” she asked as they lay on opposite ends of the couch.  

“Much better now,” he said, his voice soft.  “I love your family.  They make everything better.”

She smiled.  “I think Cam just has so much energy and asks so many questions that it takes your mind off of it,” she giggled slightly.

“That’s part of it, but it’s more than that,” he said.  “It’s your mom’s cooking and your dad’s smile and Siena’s, like, stares.  It’s Cam being so cute.  It’s this house and the vibe, like at Christmas.  It’s everything.”

Aberdeen couldn’t keep the smile off her face.  “For what it’s worth, they love you too.”

“Do you think we’ll have a family like this?”

Aberdeen would have frozen if she was uncomfortable with the line of questioning and what William was insinuating.  But she didn’t, because she wasn’t.  She nodded her head before reaching between their bodies to tickle his fingers with her own in a small, unnoticeable sign of intimacy.  “I do,” she said softly.

“I love you, Aberdeen.”

“I love you too, Willy.”

“Aberdeen?” Cam’s voice suddenly rang out as he walked back into the living room with his pajamas on.

Their hands separated quickly.  “What is it, Cam?” she asked.

“I saw your name all over hockey Twitter.”

Both Aberdeen and William shot up.  “What do you mean?” William asked.

“What the hell are you doing on hockey Twitter, Camden?” Aberdeen asked sternly.  “You’re twelve.”

“Joey at school has an account and he shares it with me!” he said, as if that would make Aberdeen calm.  It just fuelled her anger and made her want to punch a twelve year old boy named Joey.  “It was because Saylor Greene talked about you.  Who’s Saylor Greene?  Does she work with you?” Camden asked.

Aberdeen’s heart fell into the pit of her stomach.  William jolted off the couch and typed something into his phone as he walked outside.  “Give me your phone,” she held her hand out at her brother.

“But Aberdeen—” he watched William leave to go outside.

“I said give me your phone now,” she repeated.  

Camden handed it over.  She began to scroll through the screen to see the tweets he saw, and read what he’d just read.

@leafsbabe34: saylor greene is having a meltdown on her twitter about the leafs. she’s a psycho

@coolcoolcool: good luck to kasperi Kapanen and his psycho girlfriend in pittsburgh.  Pens PR never ever puts up with this type of bullshit so it will be interesting to see what happens to her.  Good riddance.

@amandaaalove44: she brought so much drama to Toronto…bye bye saylor!

Okay…innocent enough.  Aberdeen still didn’t like Camden reading all of this but she didn’t see any mention of her name.  How the hell was she being dragged into this?  She scrolled some more, reading much of the same tweets, and then she saw it.

Aberdeen’s stomach was in knots as she read all the tweets, all the insinuations, and all the outright accusations.  Saylor was naming her without naming her.  Any hardcore fan would probably know who she was talking about.  Hockey twitter would definitely know thanks to the Blueprint birthday video.  She felt sick.  She felt sick as she saw Saylor’s replies to everyone’s tweets, calling them out and being downright rude to people she didn’t even know.  She was sick as she saw fans commenting on the situation and bringing her name up because they knew it was her.  

“Aberdeen?” Camden’s voice was soft, confused, as he watched his sister furrowing her brows at his phone screen.  She looked at him.  “I’m sorry I was on hockey Twitter.”

“You have to promise me to never go on there again,” she said.  “I mean it Cam.”

He nodded his head.  “I was just trying to see what they were saying about William.”

She inhaled.  “Now you really can’t go on there again.  Not until you’re thirty.”

“Sixteen.”

“Deal.  Now come here,” she extended her arms.  

Camden went in for a hug.  “Where’d William go?”

“Don’t worry about it,” she said.  “Let me hug you in silence because you’re gonna become a teenager one day and you won’t let me do this anymore.”

Her phone buzzed from beside her.  Brendan’s name flashed atop of a text message.  I’m taking care of it.  And as she continued to hug Cam, she could hear William’s voice vaguely from outside on the deck.  “This is twice now with a girl you’ve dated.  TWICE!!!!!”

***

August 26th, 2020

“How many words do you have left?” William asked as he massaged Aberdeen’s shoulders.

“I’m just editing,” she said, reaching her hand over and placing it on one of his.  “I’ll be done within the hour.  I promise.”

William bent down to give her a quick kiss.  “You got this.”

***

To: Alec Young [young@torontolife.com] Cc: Beth Zadakis [zadakis@torontolife.com] Bcc: From: Aberdeen Bloom [aberdeenbloom@gmail.com] 23:15     08/25/2020

Hello Alec and Beth,

As requested, here is my 10,000-word report on the NHL Bubble experience.  Please note that I have also included photos to accompany the text.  I have received express approval from those in the photos that they can be used for this article.  If you would like me to send proof of permission, please let me know.

I hope you enjoy my work and choose it for publication in Toronto Life.  I understand that the article may, perhaps, be a departure from what was expected.  However, I believe the work speaks for itself.

Best, Aberdeen Bloom

***

August 27th, 2020

“So what happens now?” William asked.

“We wait,” Aberdeen said, her breath shaky.

[sanderssideswriting]

Youtuber Life Chapter 4

Ships: familial sleepxiety and eventual Prinxiety

Words:???

triggers: attempted suicide mention

first  last  next

Summary: Remy Sanders is a famous beauty vlogger and just moved to LA with his teenage son Virgil after their location was leaked by fans. Remy AKA CoffeeAddiction has several million subscribers. Virgil also has a secret Drama channel, where he doesn’t show his face and uses a voice modifier. He just hit a million subs and grows more everyday because of the level of production his videos have, the mystery around who he is and the fact that he ALWAYS has the latest information regarding youtube drama.

“Welcome back to another episode of “the fuck did she say now? I have a DID drama update. I’ve been waiting awhile to gather information to do a long segment. Since she first came out about having DID which has been disproven time and time again she’s tried to make it more believable in the stupidest way possible. By reviewing Chick-Fil-A’s spicy chicken sandwich, five fucking times. I watched all those videos plus others to see if she’s trying to keep up the lie. She’s really not. I swear every time I have to give her my views to tell you all what’s going on I die a little inside.”

“Who are you talking about?”

“DAD! Read the fucking sign! I’m recording!”

“Are you talking about Trisha?”

“Yes dad, now let me tell them about her.”

“She’s a total bitch! I fucking hate her!”

“WE KNOW! Damn it, now I’m going to have to edit all this out.”

“I’ve been looking into DID. And it’s actually a very interesting topic, and I encourage everyone to learn more about it. There will be links to videos and article on DID in the description. DisociaDID has not been on social media very much since all of this. I know they attempted suicide. Not because of Trisha or atleast only partly. Nin the systems host was dating someone in another system called Team Piñata who was discovered to be doing some shit I will not mention because it’ll get demonetized. I actually feel really bad for they system, it seems like they have been going through a lot recently. Now for all the OTHER shit Trisha has said and done over the past few weeks.”

Virgil edited the video and posted it, making sure to edit out the bit where his dad interrupted him and called Trisha a bitch.

Roman texted him.

Roman: You’re a meme Virgil: I’m well aware, fucking Jake Paul Roman: I thought you hated the guy, why are you fucking him? Virgil: I’m so fucking done with you

“VIRGIL!”

Virgil rolled his eyes “What?”

“I have in idea for a video get your ass down here!”

Remy was in front of the camera “K, so what if I mixed all of my eyeshadow together into one?”

“First of all Cristine did that with nail powder and polish and Safiya did that already in one of her weird make up science videos. Second, scraping the eyeshadow would kill you to watch.”

“UGH! You’re right, what else could I do?”

“A Bob Ross painting on your face. you could use only drug store products for something,”

“Bob Ross painting with drugstore shit!”

Virgil shrugged “yeah sure, you could also get lip gloss mix it together and try to make something really fucking weird, or do that with gel polish”

“I refuse to touch lip gloss, it’s fucking gross.”

“Bob ross painting not on your faces with lip gloss and other lipsticks.”

Remy nodded “thanks Virgil, you’re helping my buy it later.”

“No, people at school could see me, you can order it,”

“that’s less fun though,”

Virgil rolled his eyes “fine dad, I just need to make sure that no one can recognize me.”

He was ready pretty fast, with a light brown wig and blue contacts he also had close that where black and purple reserved for the occasion.

“Hello everyone! We are in the car today at our local Walgreens because we’re going to be buying lipstick, lip gloss and lip liner to make a Bob Ross painting!” 

“Not on your face.”

“Not on my face, fuck lip gloss.”

“I wasn’t aware that was a kink or whatever.”

Remy glared at Virgil “smartass, you can walk home.”

“Gladly, I’ll be laughing when I see you trying to film and carry everything and talk and pay the cashier. You’ll be a meme.”

“You already got memed once this week, I’ll meme you myself if I have to. Or I could turn you into an E-Girl, you did lose that bet.”

“I absolutely despise you,”

Remy laughed “no you don’t.”

“I really do, and you can’t make me e an e-girl.”

“No, but the people can, there’ll be a poll right here, vote should my intern be an e-girl for the day?”

Virgil groaned “times like these make me wish I was aborted.”

Remy laughed.

The rest of the video went ok and no one recognized Virgil.

Raccoon: I hate life Dukey: I saw, I voted yes, you’d make a wonderful e-girl hiss hiss motherfucker: so did I, suffer bitch Raccoon: you’re both traitors  hiss hiss motherfucker: at least we’re not going to be an e-girl

Virgil was pissed the whole week. “What’s up with you Dr. Gloom?” Roman asked.

“Made a bet with Remus, and lost, I’m going to commit toaster bath.”

Roman made a face “why would you make a bet with my brother? nothing good comes out of it.”

“I thought I’d win, turns out he’s totally willing to eat deodorant if it means I’ll have to dress like an e-girl for a day and make a tiktok.”

Roman laughed “I cannot wait to see you dressed as an e-girl.”

“I can, I’ll be locking myself in my room all day.”

“I’m surprised Remus didn’t say you’d have to walk around in public like that.”

“He did, but he can’t see me, so I’ll be in my room.”

Remy was in front of the camera. “Time for you to become an e-girl!”

“I’d like to say a very special fuck you to everyone who voted yes and that after this I’m going to commit toaster bath,”

“It’s one day, you’ll be fine.”

“One day in my room with the door locked and curtains closed.”

Remy laughed “oh no gurl, you’ll be going out, I suggest you make plans.”

“WHAT? That wasn’t part of the deal!”

“I thought it would go without saying you’d have to go outside.”

Virgil just glared, happy his face wasn’t in frame.

The makeover took well over an hour. when it was over he looked almost unrecognizable, thankfully.

Virgil: Hey, anyone want to hang out, my dad’s kicking me out of the house for the day says I need to be “social” whatever the means Princey: So you do need to go out as an e-girl Virgil: unfortunately, anyone free? Logan: I have to study and Patton is out at the animal shelter volunteering, Roman? Princey: I’m free, meet you at the mall? Virgil: Sure

“Dad! I’m going to hang out with Roman see you later.”

“Have fun on your date!”

“dad! It’s not a date!” He slammed the door and left.

Virgil waited in a café for Roman. He got an iced coffee as always.

Someone shoved him while he was waiting in line.

“What are you? A boy or a girl make up your mind,”

Virgil didn’t look up from his phone “gender is a spectrum and gender norms are fake and I refuse to give into toxic musicality and if you have a problem with that you can leave because I already ordered and payed for my drink and am not leaving until I get it.”

“You can’t change your chromosomes, it’.” the guy said in a feeble attempt to get back at Virgil. basic biology

“How about you stop relying on basic biology and come back when you can argue the same statement with complex biology. If you really knew anything about biology more then the basics you’d know that scientifically there are at least three genders according to chromosomes. Male, female and intersex, and that once again biology isn’t fucking basic otherwise everyone would be a biologist. I can wear a skirt if I want to.”

He grabbed his coffee and left, Roman had arrived a few minutes prior.

“Damn emo nightmare I didn’t think you’d go all out on the E-girl look.”

Virgil shrugged “go big or go home, and I was kicked out for the day so I had to go big. Dad said I needed to go outside. For some reason, no idea why. I mean last time I left the house of my own free will not for school was only six months ago.”

Roman looked at him in doubt “I’m pretty sure you’ve been outside of your own free will sooner then six months ago.”

“Outside? Yes, of my own free will? not so much. Oooh hot tpic.”

Roman laughed.

“Shut up princey, they have cool stuff, including gay stuff.”

Roman shrugged “could be gayer.”

“You’ve been in hot topic?”

Roman shrugged “a few times with Remus, he makes me go, bribing me with Disney.”

Virgil smirked “why am I not surprised you can be bribed with Disney?”

He started looking around at My Chemical Romance t-shirts and other things. He also grabbed some purple hair dye.

“Where to next princey?”

Roman shrugged “Game stop?”

“Sure,”

They hung out at the mall for awhile longer before guess what another youtuber came.

It was Safiya doing a weird makeup science vlog.

“Virgil, planning on becoming a meme again?”

Virgil rolled his eyes “no, besides Safiya’s cool, I like her make up science videos. I just hate vloggers who do shitty content and make to much money through it.”

They left shortly after going their separate ways.

“How was your date?” Remy called from the basement.

“Not a date! You made me get out the house!”

“Come down here and finish filming!”

“So, how was your day of being an e-girl?”

“Got harassed about my gender and whatnot, I fucking destroyed the idiot, that was fun.”

“And who did you hang out with?”

“I told you and again, it wasn’t a date, everyone else was busy.”

Remy looked towards the camera in doubt.

“Well I’m never doing this again, I’m going to go change.”

The video went viral when it was posted several days later.

I saw a kid at the mall dressed like an e-girl a few days ago. They got harrassed at the Starbucks.

[buzzdixonwriter]

I've Told You A Million Times To Avoid Cliches Like The Plague

Recently a year old re-print of a 1959 Writer’s Digest article by Donald Westlake started circulating on social media.

First off, if you don’t know who Donald Westlake is, go find out.  You like rough edge crime stories, try his Parker books published under his Richard Stark pseudonym; you like funny crime, dig up the Dortmunder series under his own name; you like odd ball history, check out Under An English Heaven “being a true recital of the events leading up to and down from the British invasion of Anguilla on March 19th, 1969 in which no one was killed but many people were embarrassed.”

Second, Westlake was a serious writer in that he took the craft of writing Very Seriously indeed, no matter how light hearted and funny some of his books could be.  He wrote a blistering letter (later turned into an essay) in the fanzine Xero (starts on page 97) where he excoriated  the sci-fi field of the era as being neither artistically nor commercially viable.*

So who am I to challenge this master’s assertions?

Well, I take the craft of writing Very Seriously indeed myself, and to quote a late, lamented friend:  “Fools rush in, and there we are…”

The Writer’s Digest article is a mixed bag, partially a quick off-the-cuff job for a few bucks, partially a valid observation on pitfalls in writing popular fiction in September of 1959.

Bear the date in mind, it’s crucial to this discussion.

This was an era when Americans read a lot.  Millions of people subscribed to The Saturday Evening Post or dozens of other slick magazines (not to mention the digests, which are what the form the old genre pulps mutated into), and this meant each week dozens of new short stories or serialized novels were available to them (and that’s not counting non-fiction).

Westlake in 1959 was commenting on an over saturated market, one where too many writers and editors simply replayed old tropes over again and again because they knew a significant portion of their audience felt comfortable with them (this is particularly true in the slicks, more so than the digests).

Westlake divides his 36 plots into three groups:  Mysteries, science fiction, and slicks.

My first quibble lays in what Westlake means when he says “plot”.

From the original article:

“A plot is a planned series of connected events, building through conflict to a crisis and ending in a satisfactory conclusion. A formula is a particular plot which has become stale through over-use.

“My own working definition of plot is what I call “5C.” First, a character. Anybody at all, from Hemingway’s old man to Salinger’s teenager. Second, conflict. Something for that character to get upset about, and for the reader to get upset about through the character. Third, complications. If the story runs too smoothly, without any trouble for the character, the reader isn’t going to get awfully interested in what’s going on. Fourth, climax. The opposing forces in conflict are brought together. Like the fissionable material in an H-bomb and there’s an explosion. Fifth, conclusion. The result of the explosion is known, the conflict is over, the character has either won or lost, and there are no questions left unanswered.

“5C: Character. Conflict. Complications. Climax. Conclusion.”

All well and good, but in his article Westlake provides almost no examples of same.

To me, a plot is a quick summary of a story that lays out beginning, middle, and end:   G.I. Joe captures a Cobra secret weapon but doesn’t realize what it is.  Cobra needs to get the weapon back without alerting the Joes to its potential, and the Joes must figure out what Cobra is after before they can get their hands on it.

(There’s a lot you can do with that plot.  It can be a slam-bang action oriented story, a techno thriller, or a slapstick farce depending on your angle of attack.)

What Westlake presents are more along the lines of story springboards:  ”What would happen if…”

A lot of the situations Westlake presents are rife with potential: “John Smith is sitting in the park, feeding the other squirrels, when a beautiful girl runs up, kisses him, and whispers, ‘Pretend you know me.’”

Okay, let’s list the possibilities, shall we?

She’s being stalked by a creepy guy and needs protection…

She’s been hired to set Smith up for some reason…

She’s mentally disturbed from trauma in her past…

She’s a flipping psycho intending to kill Smith…

She’s a secret agent slipping a secret code in Smith’s pocket…

She’s a silly college girl doing this on a dare, unaware Smith is a serial killer…

Six stories right off the top of my head, and each one could be played in several different ways, from deadly serious to over the top farce.

That’s a lot of potential in a single trope.

Here’s another: “John Smith, private eye, is sitting at his desk, when Marshall Bigelow, thimble tycoon, trundles in waving thousand-dollar bills and shouting, ‘My daughter has disappeared!’”

Well, d’uh, isn’t that what private eyes do?  Find missing people?  Or uncover who committed a crime when people don’t want the police involved?  Or find out if a spouse is cheating?

Name a private eye story that doesn’t play off some variant of this.  From Murder, My Sweet to Harper to Shaft, hiring a private eye to find a missing person is a perfect way to get a story started.  “You find my Velma.”

Of the dozen story springboards he offers in his mystery section, none are unworkable, though two remain overly familiar to this day and probably are best avoided unless the writer can provide some incredible new spin.  

The science fiction section is more problematic, and here’s where I suspect Westlake was slumming (there ought to be an article on the type of articles one shouldn’t write for Writer’s Digest that includes articles like the one Westlake wrote).

Seven of the eleven clearly reference classics of the genre, and if this wasn’t a deliberate dig at those authors on Westlake’s part, one can only argue that while they may be shopworn now due to retreads by the untalented, these ideas remain strong enough to support a good story.

The other four remain headscratchers.  Two -- Adam & Eve and “atoms are tiny solar systems” -- are indeed hoary old ideas, burned off by EC comics earlier in the decade. 

I can’t say there weren’t thirteen year old aspiring sci-fi writers who submitted these to publishers and editors back in the day, but they seem more likely to have been found on the pages of fanzines (i.e., what sci-fi geeks had before the Internet) than a professional slush pile.

We know Westlake was active to some degree in sci-fi fandom of that era; could those two tropes have come from seeing those stories in the pages of amateur magazines?

The remaining two ideas represent a ribald attitude I don’t recall seeing in sci-fi digests of that era.

Oh, sex was starting to rear its beautiful head in science fiction, and there were a few cutting edge stories, but these two seem more like set ups for smutty fanfic, not genuine submissions of the time.

Again, something I’d expect to see in a fanzine, not a professional market.

Like I said, I think this tips off that Westlake is having us on, that this whole article came off the top of his head in a matter of minutes instead of being carefully thought out.

On the other hand, his critique of slick magazine fiction seems pretty spot on and devastating.

While he covers several sub-genres, his primary focus seems to be on stories written for a female audience, the type found in McCall’s and Ladies Home Journal.  He doesn’t come close to a dozen examples, however, as several (even those labeled as sub-examples) are just the same story springboard in different settings.

Two of his bad examples, however, stand out quite clearly as a dislike (whether personal / professional / aesthetic, I can’t tell) aimed at a specific series of stories found in The Saturday Evening Post, i.e., the Alexander Botts, tractor salesman stories of William Hazlett Upson.

One of Westlake’s verboten plots isn’t even a plot but a literary device: “Any story told in an exchange of letters”.  The other one that ties into Upson’s oeuvre is “Joe Doakes, a traveling salesman for a paper clip company, gets involved in some pretty unbelievable adventures in a small town in the Midwest. The other participants are a local belle and a salesman for a rival paper clip company.”

The two combined describe Upson’s Botts stories to a T.  The second one is richly ironic since Westlake eventually used the same basic premise for his Dortmunder series (the only change being Dortmunder is a thief, not a salesman; po-tay-to, po-tah-to).

Finally, Westlake left himself a huge out with “If you can take one of the 36 clichés listed above, and give it a brand new twist, so it doesn’t look like the same story any more, you may have a sale on your hands. If you search hard enough in the magazines on the stands today, you’ll find one or more of these variations currently in print.”

Look, I get it.  I’ve faced deadline doom before myself, and more than once have fired off a short piece that contained all the depth of a dixie cup.

This isn’t the worst writing advice I’ve seen, but it’s far from the best, and Westlake coulda and shoulda done better.

  © Buzz Dixon

   *  He wasn’t alone in his opinion, though ironically the 1960s proved to be one of the most fertile eras for the genre.  Yet Westlake and other writers such as John D. MacDonald, Frederic Brown, and John Jakes left sci-fi for other genres because it couldn’t support them either as artists or professionals.

[chilly-me-softly]

Okay the 'children from previous relationships' are just the cutest to read! You write them so good! Can you do one the other way around? Like James having a son - an exact copy of him- from a previous relationship and you meet him for the first time, maybe at the sons soccer training or something and afterwards you have dinner at James place and stuff. Thank you x

Thank you! Hope you like it! xxx

Jake is the exact copy of James, same eyes same smile and same hair color. Same initials - it had been a case, but eventually JM had become their special way of communicating - and same passion for football. Obviously at home they couldn’t miss a ball and of course James had a garden almost half the size of a football pitch so they could run free with the ball between their feet.

The kid was already going to a football school, one of those that mostly helped him to discharge his energy. In the end he was only three years old, he would have a lifetime to play at his father’s level.

It was no secret that James had a son, he had only managed to keep it hidden for the first few months. After the first photo on the social media to give the news of his birth, the whole world had gone crazy. Everyone was trying to find out when he was conceived, where James was, who his mother was and the circumstances that had led him to keep the baby. All things that James had never given an answer to because they were private and nobody except him had to know.

You hadn’t forced him into anything, the two of you had started going out by chance and although you knew who he was, you hadn’t let yourself be influenced by various articles. You let your mind operate like a blank sheet of paper, ready to be covered in ink.

And it had worked, not with little effort given the situation, but after months you were still together and James had already invited you to his house when Jake was at his nan’s. As much as James wanted to take it easy, for Jake’s sake and his own, he felt something in his stomach when he was with you. He had never been seriously in love in his life, Jake’s mother had been an affair and when she found out she was pregnant she didn’t want to have anything to do with it. It was hard enough to convince her not to get rid of the baby, his baby. So, no, he had been many things in his life but never in love.

But maybe with you, he watched Jake sleep and imagined you stroking his hair and pushing him out of the room so as not to wake him up. He’d chase the boy around the garden and imagine him screaming for your help.

And Jake was at his nan’s, she’d take him to soccer and he’d go get him back. And you’re at his house, on his couch, giggling, watching TV in his arms and then he asks you.

“Do you want to come get Jake with me?” your eyes rise up to meet his already pointed at you. You smile tenderly nodding, “I’d love to” and his lips are on yours in a moment in a sweet kiss.

“I always like to come a little earlier and look at him” he admits when he takes you to sit in the family stands, playing with your fingers and kissing a few knuckles from time to time.

“I can understand why” you murmur as you watch all those children kick a ball, a smile on their faces and the lightheartedness in their movements.

Practice time ends and James pulls you up by going to fish out his son. You’re trying to get past that wave of kids when a crazy splinter dives into James’ arms. “Daddy!”

“Hey champ, you did good”

“I know” the baby giggles when James starts to tickle him. And you’re on the sidelines until James introduces you.

“JM, this is (Y/N). I want you to treat her very well because she’s a very special person to daddy, okay?” the baby nods as James puts him down and he takes a few steps towards you. 

“Are you daddy’s girlfriend?” is the first question he asks you and you immediately look at James embarrassed, but his reassuring smile makes you smile as well and relax. So you nod and lower yourself to his height.

“Yes, that’s me. You’re very good, even better than your dad” you look at James stuck your tongue out and Jake finds it very funny.

“She stuck her tongue out at you” he giggles, hiding his face in his hands and you look at him softly before you get up and follow them both to the car.

“Okay JM you know what to do. Shower” the little puff but runs towards the stairs, guess even football can’t calm a hyperactive kid like that.

“You can come if you want”

“I just met him. Don’t you think it’s a bit much for him for me to see him naked?” you ask hesitantly and he giggles, leaving a kiss on your temple. “He’s a child”

“Exactly. Go on. I’ll wait here, I’ll prepare something for dinner” you shrug while he hurries up the stairs and you go into the kitchen preparing something simple.

The laughter of the two of them come to your ears and you smile as you set the table. You want everything to be perfect and you apply yourself so that everything is perfect in every detail and when the two of them come down to the kitchen you are still at the stove. James hugs you from behind leaving a kiss on your neck while Jake climbs on the chair to steal a piece of bread.

“(Y/N)” he calls you chewing and you turn around to look at him, James probably got wet in the bath because now he’s changed too. The two of them look like twins and you giggle watching James put on the most innocent face he has. “Should I call you mommy now?”

Again you’re petrified in front of the child’s questions, you guess he’s trying to find a place for you in his life. So you go sit in the chair next to his, “You can call me whatever you want Jake. But I don’t want to force you, if you don’t feel like it, you can just call me (Y/N)”

“I’ve never had a mum” suddenly the baby gets sad and you can see out of the corner of your eye James change position, ready to approach at any time.

“Neither have I, and I know how hard it is sometimes. So if you want you can do it”

“Okay” he leans over to give you a hug and dinner more or less proceeds along this line, with Jake asking questions over questions and you trying to answer them as simply as possible.

After dinner Jake has a half hour to watch TV before going to sleep, but he falls asleep in his father’s arms strangely so James takes him to bed. Almost fifteen minutes later he is again holding you in his arms, on TV something other than cartoons.

“I’m sorry about before. If you’re uncomfortable with the mom thing…”

“James” you shut him up, “I plan to stay with him and you for a long time, so if he wants to call me mom, he’s more than welcome”

A smile is painted on his face now, “Oh I see, he can and I don’t”

“You won’t call me Mama. It’s weird” you giggle and he looks you in the eye for a few seconds before he bends down to kiss you. “Thank you”

Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5 - Part 6

[jedi-mabari]

Powers CH. 6

Word Count: 1766 Warnings: none A/N: This chapter is shorter than the other ones, but it covers everything I wanted it to, so it is done. It heavily features @goodboiboomer-fc5 Catalina Rojas, and she is also the one that gave me the idea for this.

Previous Chapter /// Next Chapter

Summary: Percy and John decide they need to see what Catalina can do, and find a quiet spot away from the den to keep her secret and their promises.

_____________________________________________________

Percy woke up from a nightmare about being to slow in saving Cat from the Project. To save them all from falling into the hands, Cat had disintegrated them all in a burning ball of gas. Cold sweat clung to her skin, making her shiver and forcing her even farther from sleep. She grabbed her blanket, wrapping it around herself before padding down the hall to the kitchen.

She paused outside everyone's doors to listen and make sure they were fine. She lingered at Jacob's door, debating on whether or not to knock and crawl into his bed. She decided against. He wouldn't have asked what had waken her, but she didn't think she was going to be able to get back to sleep anyway.

She reached the kitchen and started the coffee. She grabbed a protein bar from the cabinet as she waited for the coffee to brew. She looked through the cupboards, taking inventory of their food, knowing they'd have to make a trip to the grocery store soon, silently chastising herself for not insisting they did it while her, Faith, and Catalina were in town.

"It's not your job to make sure we have everything we need," Joseph said from the door, making Percy jump and curse herself for letting her guard down even in the bunker.

"I know," she said, rolling a puffed piece of rice from her breakfast between her fingers, focusing on that instead of Cat's secret. "But it's better that than just letting things get away from us." Joseph smiled and nodded.

"That's true," he chuckled, stepping into the kitchen. He grabbed two mug from the rack by the sink and set them down in front of the coffeepot. "But if you take on too much, which we all know you tend to do unless you're stopped, you are pulled in too many direction to focus. And that puts your and everyone you're trying to protect in danger." Percy knew he was right. It wasn't even the first time he had to have that conversation with her.

"I know, Joseph," she said, pouring them both a cup of coffee. Joseph picked up his mug and shrugged, blowing on his beverage before taking a sip.

"Focus on what's important. Don't let anything else distract you." Percy took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

"I will." Joseph smiled, turning back to the door. He was gone as quickly and quietly as he showed up. She sat down at the table and read over a newspaper that John had left carefully folded up. Her eyes scanned the paper, picking up on the major headlines to see if anything was actually going to pique her interest.

She was in the middle of an article about the dangers of climate controlled houses when John walked into the kitchen.

"It's a fluff piece, there is no danger to living in a climate controlled environment." Percy frowned at the paper and shook her head.

"I don't know, John. The research is there. It causes dehydrati-"

"In extreme cases in the elderly and the young. Just get a humidifier, fucking christ," he argued. Percy laughed and dropped the paper on the table.

"God, it is so easy to get you going," she said, standing up to get another cup of coffee. He glared at her as she grabbed the coffee pot before he could reach it. She smirked and poured the last of the pot into his mug. She set her mug down and started a second pot of coffee as John fixed his own cup so he could stomach the bitter beverage.

"Have you figured out the enchantment on the bullets yet," Percy asked, picking the newspaper back up. John took a deep breath and shrugged.

"Yeah, and thanks for bringing that second gun down. It'll really help to recreate the effects if we have more rounds to study." He sat down, pulling the business pages out of the newspaper.

"No problem. Maybe I'll take Jake out to see if we can get more." John chuckled and shook his head, absentmindedly twisting his mug on the table. "We can do that after we take Cat out. We still need to see what she can do." Percy's eyes flicked to the door to make sure no one was lingering there.

"Are you sure we have to," John asked, looking up from his paper. "I don't want to push her too hard." Percy pressed her lips together and shook her head.

"You know that we need to understand how far she can go, John. I don't want her to get hurt, but I also need to know if she poses any danger to us." John frowned, glaring at her.

"She isn't a threat, Percila. She's an ally. She's one of us." Percy set down her newpaper and shook her head.

"I'm not saying she is, John. I'm just saying, if she loses control, that isn't going to end well for any of us." John's glare softened a bit and he looked back down at his paper.

"Just don't push her to hard," he sighed, taking a sip of his coffee.

"We won't," Percy said, finishing her cup of coffee and folding the newspaper back up.

"We?" John quickly looked back up at Percy. "What do you mean we?"

"Well, we'll have to go outside of the perimeter. Which means we're gonna need wards, so yeah, we. You, me, and Catalina." John opened his mouth to protest, but Percy held up a hand before walking out of the kitchen.

~*~*~*~*~

"The border isn't much farther from here," Percy said, adjusting the pack on her back. "But to be safe we should go another half mile so we won't be disturbed." John let out a loud groan and Catalina had to stifle a giggle.

"Do we have to?" Percy rolled her eyes at John's complaining.

"You know, if you wore proper shoes and drank anything other than just coffee, you wouldn't have such a problem." John stopped and glared at the taller woman. Percy frowned back at him and they all continued their hike. John lingered close to Catalina, almost protectively, like he was ready to dive in front of a bullet for her.

Within an hour, they were safely away from the den, and John was setting up the wards. Catalina was pacing around the clearing, wringing her hands. Percy watched John as he finished the wards, hiding the three of them from prying eyes. Once he was finished, they both walked to Catalina.

"Okay it's time," John said, shooting Percy a wary look.

"Alright, Catalina, show us what you've got." Catalina swallowed hard, moving away from the other two, who took several steps back. Catalina stood in the middle of the clearing for a moment, clenching and unclenching her fists.

"I don't know about this," Cat said over her shoulder. Percy walked up to her and shook her head, placing her hand on her shoulder.

"We just have to know what your abilities are. We need to know what your limits are, but today we aren't going to push you very far. Just, make a star." Catalina nodded, closing her eyes. Percy stood back, crossing her arms over her chest. John moved back to her side, watching Catalina carefully.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?"

"So long as you set up the wards, even if the Project is out here, they won't see us." Percy looked at John, noting how nervous he looked.

"I meant her. When we found her, she was building stars and selling them in terrariums. I don't think it's a good idea for us to push her." Percy looked back at Catalina as she slowly started forming a small star.

"We have to know what we have on our hands, what she's capable of." John nodded slowly, knowing Percy was right. But she could tell it still didn't sit right with him. Percy and John had to cover their eyes as Cat built the star, the heat from it forcing them to turn away. It wasn't long after that that the star was gone and Catalina was struggling to stay on her feet.

John to her, bracing her just as soon her knees gave out. Percy walked over to them, kneeling down to make sure Catalina was okay. She brushed some hair out of her face, pressing the back of her hand to Cat's forehead.

"She's cool."

"Obviously," John snarked, glaring up at Percy. She rolled her eyes and grabbed his hand, pressing it to Catalina's cheek.

"No, as in cold. She was practically standing in the middle of a star. She should be warm at the very least. You could feel it radiating off of her before." Catalina's eyes slowly opened and Percy smiled. "That was impressive, Cat. Does it always take this much out of you?"

"No, but I don't usually make anything near that big." Percy nodded as she started digging around in her bag. She pulled out a granola bar and a juice box.

"You need to eat something." Catalina let John prop her up as she took the food Percy offered. "You did great," Percy said, handing food to John as well. She sat down in the dirt and opened her cantin, taking a slow drink. They sat in silence for a while, Percy watching how at ease Catalina already seemed with John. After finishing her food, she seemed to perk up, like she had gotten her energy back.

"What do you think your max ability is," Percy asked as John started taking down the wards. Catalina shrugged, unsure how to answer.

"I don't really know. I've never tried to make anything bigger than what I showed you." Percy nodded, wrapping her arms around herself.

"Okay, well, we'll keep practicing, but I'm not gonna push you further than you're willing to go." Catalina nodded, picking up a small stick.

"I want to keep trying," she said hesitantly. "But I don't want to use it to fight." Percy nodded, standing up as John made his way back to them. Percy helped Cat to her feet, smiling at her.

"Don't worry, I won't make you use it as a weapon." John folded his arms over his chest and smiled at Catalina.

"We should head back to the den. I don't like being out in the open like this," John said, and Percy nodded in agreement.

"Yeah. We'll come back out again soon. I want to keep working on this with you," Percy said, looking at Cat. They all agreed to keep working on it before heading back to the den.

[aion-rsa]

Star Trek: Lower Decks Episode 5 – All the Easter Eggs and References

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This article contains spoilers for Star Trek: Lower Decks episode 5.

This episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks pays tribute to the oldest Trek monster of them all, slips in a few overt references to Enterprise, and even gives us a Geordi La Forge teddy bear.

Although Star Trek Day isn’t until next week, on September 8, Star Trek: Lower Decks is paying tribute to the first aired Trek episode of all time by stuffing its latest episode with more references to the franchise than its ever done before. Yes, somehow, “Cupid’s Errant Arrow,” seems to have more shout-outs and callbacks than all the other episodes of Lower Decks combined. We’re not sure if this is true, or whether some clever spacetime compression is at work, but this episode seemed a lot like a Captain Kirk sundae, with Trip Tucker sprinkles, and a side helping of a Will Riker burger. Yeah, two of those jokes are actually from this episode!

Here are all the Easter eggs, references, and shout-outs we caught in Star Trek: Lower Decks episode 5, “Cupid’s Errant Arrow.”

As real as a hopped-up Q on Captain Picard Day 

Boimler says his new girlfriend Barb is “as real as a hopped-up Q on Captain Picard Day.” This references Q, of course, both the character played by John De Lancie in TNG, DS9, and Voyager. But, it also references the species of the Q Continuum in general.

“Captain Picard Day,” comes from the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “The Pegasus,” and is generally agreed to be June 16th on our calendar. This is the second Captain Picard Day reference in from a new Trek series in 2020. In the first episode of Picard, “Remembrance,” Jean-Luc saw his Captain Picard Day banner — made by children on the Enterprise 1701-D, in his personal archive. 

Love on the holodeck

When Mariner accuses Boimler of having holodeck girlfriends, he protests, saying “I don’t do that anymore.” Characters on Star Trek, specifically The Next Generation, have a long history of falling in love with holograms.

Reginald Barclay was probably the biggest offender here, and, in “Hollow Pursuits,” he made two holographic recreations of Deanna Troi.

Geordi fell in love with a hologram of Dr. Leah Brahams in the episode “Booby Trap,” and Riker nearly fell in love with Minuet in “11001001.”

Later in the episode, Barb says she believed the Mariner was a “rogue holodeck character,” which could also be a reference to “11001001,” since Minuet’s job was to keep Picard and Riker distracted while the Bynars messed with the Enterprise.

But, when we think of rogue holodeck characters, we generally think of Moriarty from the Sherlock Holmes episodes “Elementary, My Dear Data” and “Ship in a Bottle.” Boimler referenced the holographic Moriarty just last week in the Lower Decks episode “Moist Vessel.” 

Geordi  La Forge Teddy Bear 

While waiting to meet Barb, Boimler is clearly holding a teddy bear meant to remind us of Geordi La Forge. Does the bear’s uniform match the TNG era? Or should we not worry about the teddy bear’s uniform?

Phylosian

Mariner offers to set-up Boimler with a “Phylosian,” who works on the Cerritos, and mentions 

“she seems like a nice plant person.” Phylosians are plant people. This race of plant-based aliens originated an episode of The Animated Series called “The Infinite Vulcan.” 

Is Barb a Time Lord? 

While catching up with Boimler, Barb says that in a previous mission she had to “reverse the polarity and reboot the time stream.” Variants of the phrase “reverse the polarity of the neutron flow,” is a catchphrase usually associated with the Doctor from Doctor Who. It (mostly) originates during the 1970s Third Doctor era of Jon Pertwee, specifically the episodes “The Terror of the Autons,” “The Daemons,” and “The Sea Devils.”

That said, the phrase “reverse the polarity,” exists throughout all eras of Trek, starting with the TOS episode “Who Mourns for Adonais?” all the way through the Enterprise episode “Harbinger.” 

Barb claiming she “rebooted the time stream,” is also a common Trek trope, and can be traced all the way back to TOS episodes like “Tomorrow Is Yesterday,” and “City On the Edge Of Forever.” 

1920s Chicago 

Barb’s reference to being stuck in 1920’s Chicago references the TOS episode “A Piece of the Action,” where the crew encounters an entire planet of 1920’s mobsters. However, in that episode, there was zero time travel, just a planet of alien mobster imitators. 

Hunky Trek dudes

Intimidated the “hot hunk” named Jet, Boimler says “That guy is like a Kirk sundae with Trip Tucker sprinkles.” Obviously, this references Captain James T. Kirk and the chief engineer of the Enterprise NX-01, Charles “Trip” Tucker. 

Starfleet relationships ending very badly.

Mariner says that “When a Starfleet relationship seems too good to be true, then RED ALERT, it probably is.” Then she launches into a litany of examples.

“She’s an alien who is going to eat you” Most aliens in Trek don’t actually eat people, but aliens who suck out the life force of people they’re pretending to date are fairly common. For example, in the DS9 episode “The Muse,” Jake Sisko is having his energy drained by a creature who is pretending to be an older woman who loves him but is really draining his life force. 

“Or a Romulan Spy” This probably references the Romulan spy T’Pel from the episode “Data’s Day,” though nobody was trying to date her. In Picard, Agnes Jurati was an unwitting Romulan spy, though it’s unclear if the Lower Decks writing team knew about that when this episode was completed.

“Or a Salt Succubus” Ha! This is the big one. In the first aired Trek episode ever, “The Man Trap,” the shapeshifting M-113 lifeform pretends to be McCoy’s old girlfriend Nancy Crater but also turns into a variety of other attractive people and attempts to seduce several crewmembers, and even, in the guise of a hunky dude, makes a pass at Uhura. (Note: Uhura is the only person who didn’t fall for the salt vampire’s bullshit.)

“Or an Android” In TOS, Nurse Chapel falls in love with a secret android duplicate of her old boyfriend Roger Korby in the episode, “What Are Little Girls Made Of?” And, in the TOS episode “Requiem for Methuselah,” Kirk falls in love with Rayna, who is also a secret android. 

“Or a Changeling” There are a lot of people who fall in love with shapeshifters in Star Trek, but saying “a Changeling,” probably refers to the actual species of “Changelings” from Deep Space Nine, of which, Odo is the most famous. 

“Or one of those sexy people in rompers who murder you just for going on the grass” This references the episode “Justice,” in which Wesley falls in some grass and is nearly murdered by scantily clad people who were previously flirting with everyone. 

DS9/ old uniform flashback

Mariner’s flashback to her time on the USS Quito seems to take place while the ship is docked at Deep Space Nine. Notably, the crew does not appear to actually be drinking on the space station, but rather, on their own ship. Because this flashback takes place prior to 2280, Mariner and her shipmates are wearing the later-era Starfleet uniforms with the grey shoulders, first introduced in Star Trek: First Contact. For more about what this all might mean, read our deep dive into this flashback scene here.

Mariner’s conspiracy chart 

There are probably more Easter eggs in this scene than the entire show combined, but let’s do our best! Mariner has several pictures of several Trek aliens displayed, and she mentions some of them, but others are just kind of there. Here’s what we spotted. 

“Barb’s not a Dauphin!” Mariner points to a picture of a furry alien called a Dauphin, which comes from the TNG episode “The Dauphin,” in which Wesley Crusher’s new girlfriend is revealed to be a furry shape-shifting monster with claws.

A picture of Lal, Data’s first daughter. In one corner, there seems to be an image of the android Lal, before she had decided on her gender and species. This version of Lal exists in the teaser of the TNG episode “The Offspring,”

“She could be a Suliban!” Mariner mentions the Suliban, which are time-traveling shapeshifting aliens that plagued the crew of the NX-01 Enterprise, starting with “Broken Bow.”

The Bynars: The purple-headed Bynars from “11001001,” are also pictured. This means that Mariner is entertaining the theory that Barb is a holodeck character, too. Just like the aforementioned, Minuet. 

Seska: Mariner talks about undercover Cardassians for a second, and we see a picture of someone who looks like Seska. In Star Trek: Voyager, Seska was a Bajoran crewmember who turned out to really be a Cardassian spy. Her goal was to get close to Chakotay and to send secrets about the Maquis to the Cardassians. Seska was revealed to be a spy in the episode “State of Flux.”

Duras sisters: The Klingon traitors Lursa and B’Etor seem to be pictured here, too. At this point, in 2380, the Duras sisters have been dead for nine years. They died in Star Trek Generations when the Enterprise destroyed their Bird-of-Prey. That said, maybe they managed to escape?

Transporter clone: Mariner has a picture of two Barbs standing next to each other in the transporter. This references various transporter duplicates throughout Star Trek. The most famous examples are Kirks’ transporter duplicate in the TOS episode “The Enemy Within,” and Riker’s transporter duplicate in the TNG episode “Second Chances.” 

M-113 Salt Vampire: Mariner has a very prominent picture of the M-113 creature in its natural state. This is actually the second time this creature from “The Man Trap,” has appeared in animated form. Very briefly, the M-113 creature was depicted at the beginning of the animated Short Treks episode “Empriah and Dot.” 

Humpback Whales: Mariner has a huge picture of a humpback whale. This must reference Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home in which the crew goes back in time to bring whales into the future. What does that have to do with Mariner’s theory? She’s worried about time travel? Does she think Barb is actually Dr. Gillian Taylor? Well, considering that Barb is voiced by actress Gillian Jacobs, it seems possible that this is a reference to Gillian Taylor (Catherine Hicks), the marine biologist who traveled from the 20th century and into the 23rd. 

An Andorian named Jennifer

While running through the corridors, Mariner pushes an Andorian out of her way and says dismissively, “Jennifer!” Is it weird that an Andorian has the name, Jennifer? Well, maybe not. In Voyager, a young Ktarians girl, Naomi Wildman, had the name, well “Naomi.” 

Breen Infiltrator

Barb says she briefly thought Mariner was a Breen Infiltrator. The Breen were a rarely-seen, but often mentioned alien enemy of the Federation in TNG and DS9. During the Dominion War, the Breen actually were the ones who led the Dominion attack on Earth.

The Breen weren’t seen in canon until the fourth season DS9 episode “Indiscretion.” Throughout all their appearances, the Breen appeared entirely inside of “refrigeration suits,” and no one has ever seen what they actually look like. Meaning, the idea of a Breen Infiltrator is inherently hilarious because they could, in theory, look like anything under those helmets. 

Parasite and Pheromones 

When it is eventually revealed that there is a parasite connected to Boimler, there could be a small reference here to the TNG episode “Conspiracy,” in which Picard discovers several members of Starfleet Command have little bug parasites controlling them.

At the same time, the idea that an alien could have pheromones so strong that other humanoids find them irresistible vaguely recalls Star Trek: The Motion Picture. The backstory Ilia is that she is a Deltan, a species of humanoids who produce pheromones so strong that most people can’t resist. This is why she says “my oath of celibacy is on record.” She’s letting Kirk know that she’s not going to seduce everyone for her own gain, even though she totally could. 

Calibrate the Dyson’s Sphere 

Ron Docent (played by Matt Walsh) bemoans his various responsibilities on the USS Vancouver, specifically having to “calibrate the Dyson’s Sphere.”  In Trek canon, as far as we know, there is only one Dyson’s Sphere, the one discovered by the Enterprise in the TNG episode “Relics.” 

The password was “Riker”

Tendi correctly guesses that Docent uses the password “Riker.” This seems to imply that Riker is famous and well-liked enough in 2380, that he’s a common password. In canon, Riker is in command of the USS Titan during the events of Lower Decks.

Interestingly, if we go by the Picard timeline, Thad Riker, Will, and Deanna’s first child, will be born in 2381, which means, there’s a good chance that during the events of this episode, Deanna Troi is pregnant. Could the Troi-Rikers be buddies with Ron Docent? Is that why he choose “Riker” as his password?

We may or may not see the Troi-Rikers in a future episode of Lower Decks, but for now, you’ll have to excuse me. I need to change my password.

The post Star Trek: Lower Decks Episode 5 – All the Easter Eggs and References appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2ELS5F7

[five-fictions-5-9]

Guess I haven’t posted in awhile. My friend got me watching TUA though so I have a good excuse, Five is definitely my favorite character. I’ve been writing some stuff for that, but it’s on another blog. It’s called fivefictions-5-9, or maybe TUA fictions(but mainly Five) idk, I’m not quite sure how this all works. Anyways, enjoy.

Jake glanced out the window, the city was dark. The only source of light was the spotlights occasionally panning the grounds.

Jake grabbed his backpack, slipping it on his shoulders as he snuck out the window. He silently went down the fire escape, towards the barricade. Crossing it earlier today had been incredibly annoying. He hoped to avoid any guards, as at the moment it was past curfew.

He arrived about fifty yards from a major checkpoint. Three Officers were gathered around a Lieutenant. Was that one of the Lieutenant’s from the picture? Jake managed to see half of their face. It was the red-head, she was reading over a report, “And why didn’t you catch them?”

Typical high rank officers, Jake thought to himself. They always wanted to act like if they had been there things may have gone differently. One of the Officers said, “There were a bunch of gang members, we didn’t have time to apprehend both the gang and the group of ‘heroes’.”

This caught Jake’s attention, earlier today his group had stopped a gang from shooting up a warehouse, then the Emperor’s Knights showed up. The Lieutenant handed the report back, “If you see them again make sure to contact me, they sound like a good ally. Now, down to business, you said that our target already moved through here?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And who was on shift when that happened? What gate was it at, do you have any footage.”

All three officers nervously shook their heads. Jake crept closer to the barricade. It was a simple task, hop it and run. The Lieutenant continued, “And why not? Were the systems hacked? You’re always supposed to be rolling film.”

One of the other Officers spoke up, “It blacked out, must’ve been hacked.”

“Do you have the camera SSA?”

They were all silent, confused. Jake was almost tempted to school them on it, just like Gabby had to him, but he remained quiet. Finally the last Officer said, “The what?”

“The system switch alternator? The internal processing chip? All the other cameras were rolling at the time so explain to me how they just hacked one, all of our cameras run off SSA, and Internal processing chips, there is no individual bullshit.”

The Officer shrunk a little, it seemed to Jake this Lieutenant didn’t mess around. He swung his leg over the barricade, intending to get out of here. He heard, “Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”

He froze in place, unsure of what to do. He heard heavy footsteps, he was shoved off the wall. He looked up, a rather large, definitely drunk, stood above him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw more movement.

---------

Kyra stared down all the Officers, who remained silent. She heard, “Hey! What the hell are you doing!?”

She turned around, expecting to see Owens yelling at his Officers, but instead a huge man shoved some kid off the barricade. It was an odd scene to say the least. 

In one swift motion Kyra brought her hand gun up, “Hey! Freeze!”

The man either couldn’t hear her or didn’t care. He proceeded to kick the kid. Kyra quickly jumped the barricade and promptly tackled the man. He struggled, and since he was much bigger than Kyra, managed to throw her off. 

He promptly attempted to punch her, missing. He stumbled around as he got up, Kyra punched him, square in the jaw, hard enough to knock him out. He fell with a heavy thud. 

Kyra shook out her hand, then turned to help the kid up. The side of his face was bleeding a little, but besides that he was okay. Kyra said, “Your dad?”

---------

Jake rubbed the side of his head, “I’ve never seen him before in my life.”

The Lieutenant looked skeptical, “Excuse me?”

“He’s just a stranger.”

Jake realized to late that this might not have been a good answer. What reason would he have to be out at this hour? The Lieutenant rubbed her hand, “Why’re you out here?”

“I was-” he glanced at the man, “Running from him.”

The Lieutenant glanced at the now unconscious man, “Sure.”

Her accent sounded like she was from Atlas, Jake was almost sure of it. It surprised him how clearly she spoke Saturnian since she wasn’t from here. She continued, “Name?”

“Jake.”

“Last or first?”

“First, my last name is Declo.”

“Okay Declo, I’ll need to take you back to EKSS, just for identifications and to file a report, then you can go back home.”

Jake could tell she wasn’t buying his story. He remembered the article, with any luck he could pull this off, “Hey, you’re that transferred Lieutenant, aren’t you?”

“One of them, yes.”

“Oh, well then you must not know how things work around here.”

She crossed her arms, furrowing her brow, “Don’t I?”

“Yeah, see,” he lowered his voice, “I’m undercover for that case on our target, so if you’ll be so kind as to take my mark back, I’ll be on my way.”

She smirked, “Who assigned you?”

Jake tried to think of everything he knew about the ranks and roles of the Emperor’s Knights, “Carlson.”

“Oh really?”

“Yep, it’s pretty top secret, you know how he is.”

“Uh huh.”

Jake couldn’t read her, it was near impossible. She seemed so serious, and yet so- not. He quickly thought of something else he could say, “Officer Reynolds, it’s been nice meeting you Owens,” he only hoped he had guessed right, “but I’ve got to run.”

“Hold on, hold on,” her tone had changed from lethal to friendly, “You’ve got to tell me, how’d you do the job in ‘07?”

Jake blinked, what job? He hadn’t guessed right, that was the only logical explanation for her sudden suspicions. Before he could even begin to develop his lie West said, “Lies always do tend to have detail, I suppose. C’mon Declo, let’s go to the main office, shall we? I’m sure you’re well acquainted with it.”

Jake had to give her one thing, she was smarter than most Lieutenants. He took this time to think, how could he get out of this one?

[fulcrumahsokaamidala]

Saturday Spectacular #20

Happy Saturday!!! So this is me thanking awesome fanfic writers for their amazing work and all the time they put into their fics. ♥️ I want to recommend spectacular fanfic stories I read this week! ♥️ They are posted in the order I read them. All posts will be tagged #saturday spectacular fic rec

Airplanes, Coffee and Deadlines by @hope-for-olicity | Arrow | Completed

Summary: Felicity begins working at a national newspaper where she has always dreamed of working. On her first day, she meets a very interesting photojournalist. The two will eventually work together but sparks fly immediately.

It Will Be Fun. Trust Me. by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Felicity doesn’t agree with Oliver’s plans for a relaxing vacation. How will she ever get him to see her perspective?

Just Follow Me. I Know the Area. by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Rewrite of the infamous 3x01 date.

Now? Now you listen to me? by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: It’s moving day for our favorite Queens.

I Know You Didn’t Ask For This by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Set in season 2.

I Might Just Kiss You by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Set in season 2.

Yes, I'm Aware. Your Point? by @stephswims | Arrow |  One-shot

Summary: Established Olicity.

No, And That's Final. by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Established Olicity. Shopping for a present for Thea. Sort of.

Can You Stay? by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Set in Season 2 after the Russia debacle.

There Is A Certain Taste To It by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Established Olicity.

Listen. I Can't Explain It. You'll Have To Trust Me. by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Set in season 2. Day 10 of Fictober. Felicity has a feeling.

It's Not Always Like This by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Another Season 2 ficlet.

What If I Don't See It? by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Set in Season 4.

I Never Knew It Could Be This Way by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Takes place in season 1.

I Can't Come Back. by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Set in Season 1 before Felicity finds out Oliver is the vigilante, or can be a completely separate AU.

That's What I'm Talking About by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Established Olicity builds a sunroom.

Listen. No, Really Listen. by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: The conversation that should have happened in Season 4 to prevent Season 5 stupidity.

There Is Just Something About Him by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: AU.

Secrets? I Love Secrets. by @stephswims | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Season 2.

I Wrote Your Name in My Heart by @alanna-the-lionheart | Arrow | Completed

Summary: One cold night in December, a group of men kidnap Oliver right in front of Felicity. They leave behind no ransom or demands, no hints to his fate, and no clues to follow. As the new year starts, the team begins to lose hope that they will ever be able to save the Green Arrow; all except Felicity, because Felicity just got Oliver back, and she’ll be damned if she’s going to lose him again. Her hope pays off in the end…but when they finally find Oliver, they find a broken man they barely recognize. Felicity vows to do whatever it takes to make the man she loves whole again. Started off as a future fic but is now technically alternate canon/AU (takes places starting in early December 2016).

The Legacy of a Queen by @inlovewithimpossibillity​ | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Series of one-shots from a future AU where Oliver and Felicity are able to raise their children after they defeat the Ninth Circle and Oliver hangs up the hood

Lucas’ Adventures by CSM | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Post 2x07. One late night in the foundry Oliver finds an abandoned baby, who he later finds out is his biological son, the only thing is the baby seems to think Felicity is his mother, which is impossible. Or is it? aka, Mia Smoak gets tired of her baby brother and sends him to 2013 where their unsuspecting parents find him. Companion piece to Impeccable Genetics.My contribution for the Olicity Summer Sizzle

Three Little Words by @realityisoverrated-fic | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Oliver Queen loves easily and fully. When he loves someone, those three little words come easily. For Tommy, love has always been something used against him. To Tommy, those three little words are dangerous.

There Are Two Sides to Every Story by @oneofthosecrazygirls-fics | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Susan Williams and Bethany Snow are two of Starling City’s most prominent journalists…but their styles are very different. This is a series of articles written by these two journalists from the time of the sinking of the Queen’s Gambit to the present day.**set in the What Should’ve Been ‘verse**

Ride or Die by @someonesaidcake | Arrow | WIP

Summary: They say that life is a series of events that we can neither predict nor control… And then there is him. He’s a bit of an enigma. ~*~*~*~Young CEO Felicity Smoak is just trying to make her mark on the world, yes she’s a little high strung and stressed, but it was what is was… until he came along. With eyes a girl could lose herself in and shoulder-tapping hair made for hanging on to Oliver Queen was reckless and carefree. Also, he rode a bike. He was everything she wasn’t and he was a sucker for those sinful red lips and everything that came with them.*main story complete, now snapshots*

missing the bullet by @alexiablackbriar13 | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: After Oliver and Mia's cage match wins in Russia, Mia ends up getting shot when Oliver tackles the man aiming at her rather than jumping in front of the bullet. (A sort of alternate spec for 8x05)

by your side by ppperaltiagooo | Brooklyn Nine-Nine | WIP

Summary: in which jake is sent undercover again and amy finds out she is pregnant while he’s gone.

Queen vs Queen by @muslimsmoak​ | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Felicity Mignonette Renaldi Smoak has been handling being a princess pretty well so far. After all, she did only find out at the ripe young age of 15. Now, she is 21 and ready to take the throne of Genovia after being under the tutelage of her aunt. But there’s only one thing in her way, wait, actually two. Two things in her way: Oliver Queen, the hot young bachelor she danced with the night of her homecoming ball, who neglected to mention that he’s after her crown alongside his uncle Malcolm Merlyn, and the fact that she has to marry within 30 days if she wants to be Queen. Ray Palmer, Duke of Keystone is sweet, sensitive, intelligent and kind and seems like the perfect choice. But marrying and falling in love are two different things.

Silent Killers by @oliversmuse​ | Arrow | Completed

Summary: Oliver Queen and Felicity Smoak have been married for three years and work CSI for the FBI. This story will follow their relationship and the cases they encounter.

Passion Killer by @oliversmuse​ | Arrow | Completed

A Shot in the Dark by @oliversmuse​ | Arrow | Completed

Summary: Part of the Silent Killer's series. Oliver and Felicity try to solve the case of a mother that was shot in her car on the way to work.

If I Can't Have You by @oliversmuse​ | Arrow | Completed

Summary: Oliver and Felicity are called to a murder suicide. As they work together they try to unravel why a wife would kill her husband and then herself and where the couples marriage took a wrong turn. Part of the "Silent Killers" series.

Kerosene and Desire by @smoaking-greenarrow | Arrow | Completed

Summary: An Olicity Notebook AU with a darker twist.

Alpha by @oliversmuse | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Oliver Queen was a powerful vampire that was captured by a group experimenting on hybrids. Turned into a hybrid that is half vampire and half wolf he is strong, fast and deadly. While in captivity he meets Dr. Felicity Smoak a hermatologist who is called in to monitor his feedings. All Oliver wants is to be free, away from the experiments and being in a cage, and strangely he feels he can trust Dr. Smoak. There is also an unspoken attraction between them that is forbidden. Can he convince her to set him free or will her attraction to him tempt her to keep him close?

Leaves of Change by @hope-for-olicity​ | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Felicity Smoak returns to her small hometown of Silver Lake just in time for the Harvest Fest, she came home to get grounding and figure out what she wants to do next the last thing she expected was that she’d want to stay.

The Donor by @spaztronautwriter​ | Arrow | Completed

Summary: Felicity Smoak has always dreamed of being a mother and she isn't going to let a little thing like men stop her from making that dream come true. Having a baby by herself might just be biting off a little more than she can chew, but one way or the other it's about to change her whole life.

Like Real People Do by more0rLessJess | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Felicity Smoak has had a rough couple of years and all she wants to do is move on with her life and start her own tech company. After an incident at Queen Consolidated, she quit and accepted a job working as a technical analyst and computer expert at the Starling City Police Department, where she’s stuck for at least another year thanks to the non-compete clause she signed in her Queen Consolidated contract. But as much as she’d rather be in the tech world, she does love being able to help others. Plus she gets to do that with the help of a certain Detective, who she may or may not be attracted too. Oliver Queen just finished five years in the Army Special Forces and is only working as an SCPD Detective because his best friend and fellow soldier, John Diggle, said it would be good for him to help pull his life together after years of hardships in the military. Oliver expected to hate the job, but what he never expected was meeting the IT girl with a heart of gold and her own demons to deal with. Captain Quentin Lance just wants a functioning police department.

And My Arms Will Be (Just Like Walls Around You) by  imfallingforyoureyes102 | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: But then lightning hits again, thunder fracturing the silence, and the Oliver that Thea sees is ten thousand miles away from the Oliver she knows.  God, when she’d said he needed to let someone in she knew she was right.   His face is pale white - his mouth drawn into a tight, pained line - and the way Oliver clutches the doorknob like a lifeline is enough to draw a panicked breath from Thea’s small frame.  (Or, while Thea hides out in the kitchen during a party at the Queen Mansion, a thunderstorm hits and it's Oliver who's stumbling in through the doors on the verge of a panic attack. Thea's all too scared and all too shocked and it's only a certain blonde that comes tumbling in after him who is able to pull the shattered pieces of Oliver Queen back together).

Artemis by @laxit21 | Arrow | WIP

Summary: When the Queen’s Gambit sank, two people were stranded on Lian Yu. Five years later, four came back.

Daughter of the Demon by @laxit21 | Arrow | WIP

Summary: What if in 1988 while traveling through Las Vegas Ra’s al Ghul bumps into a nice waitress named Donna Smoak and they have one-night stand together? A little bundle of joy named Felicity Smoak is the result. In 2014, the Demon Head becomes aware of his youngest daughter’s existence.

The Ravager by @laxit21 | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Slade Wilson’s plan for revenge against Oliver took time, money and no shortage of lives to pull together. His plan didn’t anticipate Felicity Smoak. How will his plan change now that his lost-lost daughter is working with the very man he’s trying to destroy?

Felicity of Themiscyra by @laxit21 | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Years ago, Donna Smoak left the island of Themiscyra and her sister Queen Hippolyta behind to live in man’s world. She never told Felicity the truth about where she came from. As a result of the Undertaking, Felicity discovers some of her Amazonian abilities and makes an interesting new friend: Diana Prince.

The Daughter That Was Left by @laxit21 | Arrow | WIP

Summary: Before the Gambit, Oliver Queen met QC intern Felicity Smoak. When he boarded the Gambit, he left something behind. Now, five long years later someone is waiting for him.

I Scream But No Sound Comes out by @laxit21 | Arrow | WIP

Summary: When Oliver returns from Lian Yu after five years, he comes back different. What happened there damaged more than just his body. How will his friends and family deal with this new Oliver?

How Not to Peel an Orange by imfallingforyoureyes102 | Arrow | Completed

Summary: “Oliver Queen, you give me back my orange!” 

Felicity jams her finger into his chest with a small grumble. 

“Yow! Hey, Edward Scissorhands,” Oliver growls, grabbing onto Felicity’s hand, his own hand absolutely engulfing hers. “Watch the claws.” 

Oh, I’ll show you claws Oliver,” Felicity retorts spitefully, yanking her hand out of his grasp and swatting his arm repeatedly. “Give me back my fracking orange!” 

(Or, after finishing a conversation with Laurel right outside the elevator bank, Oliver finds Felicity eyeing a small orange wearily. Laurel watches the amused banter that springboards back and forth between the two, and it isn't long before she sees exactly who Felicity Smoak is in Oliver Queen's life).

you got all my love to spend by @inlovewithimpossibillity​ | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Lingering on an executive floor to talk to an executive assistant seems a little unprofessional to Oliver. And that opinion definitely has nothing to do with the way that Felicity is laughing along to whatever the delivery guy is saying. Nothing at all.[Set early-S2, Oliver's pig-headedness rears its head but Felicity is taking none of it, leaving Oliver searching for a way to make it up to His Girl Wednesday]

late night secret gatherings by @alexiablackbriar13​ | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: Post-8x04. Oliver catches Mia sneaking out of the apartment and follows her to find that she’s secretly meeting Connor in the bunker for stress relief in the form of training. What he witnesses between them is more than enough to cause his overprotective fatherly instincts to flare up.

Vows by Abbie | Arrow | WIP

Summary: After the Siege of Starling City by Slade Wilson, threats and pressures force Oliver and Felicity to take desperate measures to protect their secrets, their team—and their very lives.

In Another Life by @inlovewithimpossibillity​ | Arrow | One-shot

Summary: This world has his head spinning and he’s constantly alert for whatever it might throw at him next. He’s trying to stay vigilant in case another figure from his past appears or something else throws him for a loop. He never, in a million years, would have expected what comes out of Dinah’s mouth next, however.“That was Rene, he said that Zoe needs to get some homework done so could you collect Mia? You’re so out of it anyway that you might as well take the rest of the day off.”[8x06 spec AU within which Oliver's alternate reality brings him face to face with a figure he never expected to see again]

Let me know if you want to be tagged!

@hope-for-olicity @emdee8907 @malafle @laxit21 @icannotbelieveiamhere

[reddielibrary]

Secret Santa: Mary | @allahlav

Gift for: Ray | @ethereal-eddie

Special Message: hope this fic is everything you hoped it would be! i had so much fun writing it! <3 happy holidays!

Word count: 2,762

Eddie had never really liked Christmas, all things considered. The decorations were annoying, the music was dull and repetitive, peppermint was gross, and the concept of Santa just seemed creepy. The Christmas of his childhood wasn’t the commercial, happy one that was constantly shoved in his face nowadays, either, filled more with awkward silence and advent candles.

Beverly and Ben’s annual Christmas party got bigger and bigger every year, and by the time they were well into two years of marriage and owned their own apartment, it was less of a casual affair between their small group of friends and more of a legitimate, adult house party, complete with their coworkers, extended family, and hors d'oeuvres. They had a real Christmas tree! And lights were strung up around the house and on the lamppost in front of the house, like they were in one of the movies they used to mock and take a shot every time something cliche happened on screen.

Back when Christmas hadn’t been so bad, when the six of them were in college and the party was just them, several bottles of alcohol, and shitty made-for-tv Christmas movies, Eddie had almost looked forward to this night.

Eddie looked wistfully over at Stanley and Mike, who were pouring drinks into clear glasses, not red solo cups like they once had. “I at least had hope that you’d be just as miserable as me.”

Stan, who was wearing a sweater that read ‘HAPPY HANUKKAH YA FILTHY SCHMUCK’ over a pristine white collared shirt, shrugged and passed his boyfriend a glass. “It’s fun.”

“I think Bev is starting to call it a non-denominational-holiday party,” Mike chimed in, looking pointedly out the door of the kitchen where the hustle and bustle of the party was. “But that might’ve been to piss off her ‘put the Christ back in Christmas’ boss.”

Speaking of, Eddie needed to call his mother. Sonia Kasprak was probably wasting away sitting by her phone, waiting for her son to call and wish her a merry Christmas Eve. Eddie’s face must have shown some sign, as Stan reaches over to pat his back. “Don’t think too hard about it, Eddie. Just drink and have fun.”

The pair left the kitchen after that, into the party that Eddie felt worse about attending by the second.

Eddie followed, unsure of what else he could do, awkwardly waving a hand or muttering hello to those he recognized and some he didn’t, towards the couches where those he really knew were sitting.

On the couches, Bill and Ben were talking animatedly to each other, probably about some building Ben is designing or an article that Bill has had published. Next to them were Audra and Beverly, looking lovingly at their husbands over glasses of wine. A familiar figure was splayed across the armchair, one long leg tossed over the arm and the other up on the coffee table, a Santa hat pulled over most of his face. Eddie knew who it was immediately, the curly black hair splayed underneath the Santa hat and trashy converse dead giveaways.

Eddie doesn’t know Richie Tozier, per se. Eddie knows him just about as well as Eddie knows the Queen of England, or Jake Gyllenhaal. That was to say, Eddie knew very little about Richie Tozier and also knew a great deal — like his curly hair and crooked teeth are immensely charming — but doesn’t know how he takes his coffee or if he has any opinions on Olympic figure skating. Eddie didn’t even know how Beverly and Ben knew Richie, only that he started showing up around their house a year ago and never really left.

“Hey Richie,” said Stan, leaning over and flicking the white ball at the end of the hat. Eddie took a long drink of whatever Mike had made him (thankfully no peppermint), looking at Richie as the man in question tugged the hat off his head and shoved his glasses back onto his face.

“Stan my man! I didn’t know the party had arrived.” Richie threw a careless arm up into the air, almost smacking Ben’s mother in the face. “L’Chaim!”

Stan and Mike sat on the floor between the couch and the armchair, leaving Eddie hovering awkwardly. Richie exchanged pleasantries with Mike and Stan briefly, before looking to Eddie. “Spaghetti! It’s been a while since I’ve seen you!” Richie swung his arm out again in an attempt to grab Eddie, but was too far away and nearly slipped out of the chair.

Eddie racked his memory to remember the last time he saw Richie. They’d only met a handful of times, the most recent being Richie passed out on the Hanscom’s couch, only awoken to Eddie dropping off some paperwork for Beverly. (They hadn’t said much to each other. Richie said that Bev and Ben weren’t home. Eddie gave Richie the paperwork and told him to have Bev call him. Richie, still slightly drunk from the previous night, had dropped all the paper on the table and fallen back asleep)

“It’s Eddie,” he said, choosing not to think about how little he really knew about Richie outside of all the times they’d run into each other in varying states of drunkness. They shared a long, lingering look before Eddie turned away, back towards the kitchen and far away from romantic holiday air of the living room.

-

The tiny balcony outside of Ben and Beverly’s apartment was cold, but at least it was absent of Christmas cheer. Snow was falling over the city of New York, lightly and not even enough to stick on the ledge, but it was a nice distraction.

The door behind him could be heard sliding open and closed, All I Want For Christmas Is You becoming louder for a few moments before quieting again. “I think I’m going to leave soon,” Eddie starts, looking over his shoulder expecting to see Bev, or Mike. He doesn’t expect to see Richie Tozier looking at him with a cocky smirk.

“Mariah Carey not your style?” Richie sat down in the metal chair next to Eddie, kicking his feet up against the brick ledge.

“Christmas music, in general, isn’t my style.”

Richie looks aghast. “At all? No Frosty the Snowman or Blue Christmas?”

“No.” Eddie forces his gaze away from Richie, who is being swallowed by a green army coat that he wasn’t wearing earlier. At least the Santa hat is gone. If Eddie closed his eyes and forced his brain away from this stupid balcony, he could almost pretend he was at home by himself and it wasn’t Christmas eve anymore.

“What about How The Grinch Stole Christmas? You’re acting a lot like him.” Eddie rolled his eyes and kicked at one of the legs of the chair Richie was on. “Oh, come on. There’s gotta be a Christmas song you like.”

Eddie gave Richie a flat look. “Why are you out here?”

Shrugging, Richie glances over at him. Blue eyes meet Eddie’s brown ones. “Cause I feel like it. Why do you hate me?”

The question is abrupt, making Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up. He sputters a little, then, “I don’t hate you.”

“You act like you do.”

“I don’t know you!”

Richie sits up and leans over the ledge, looking down at the empty street below them. He doesn’t sound angry, or upset. Just curious. “I’d like you to know me.”

Eddie feels the urge to kick his chair again. “I still don’t understand why you’re out here.”

Throwing his hands up again, Richie looks over at him. There’s a smile on his face. “That’s what someone who hates me would say!”

“You’re impossible.”

“Come on, ask me anything.”

Quiet befalls them. Eddie isn’t sure what to say. After a few minutes pass, neither of them moving to further the conversation (Eddie too nervous, Richie seemingly content to sit in uncomfortable silence), Eddie stands. “Well, I’m going to leave now.”

Richie stands too. “I’ll walk with you.” His smile lights up the dimly lit balcony. “We’re going to be friends even if I die trying, Spaghetti.”

-

Eddie very quickly learns that Richie talks endlessly. That’s not so much a surprise, they’ve met on multiple occasions, after all, but he hadn’t been expecting this. Incessant babble and chatter. As soon as they’re out of the building Richie launches into the story of the time he met a magician in the park around the corner, or when he got food poisoning from the Thai restaurant a few blocks over. Eddie isn’t bothered so much. It’s a nice distraction.

Every once in a while Richie reaches up and shakes the snow out of his curly hair. Eddie isn’t ashamed to admit that it's cute.

“So,” Richie starts after he finishes explaining his brief stint as his high school football team’s quarterback, “thought of a Christmas song you like yet?”

“Surprisingly, no.” Eddie kicks a chunk of snow across the sidewalk and into the road, watching as it breaks into pieces. “No such exist.”

Richie steps in front of Eddie, stopping both of them in their tracks. Richie takes advantage of their height difference and grabs Eddie by the shoulders, shaking him. “Edward Joseph Kasprak—”

“Not my middle name.”

“—I swear to God by the end of the night, not only will we be very best friends, you will like a Christmas song.”

Eddie wiggled himself free and stepped around Richie. “Whatever you say. Say, how do you take your coffee?”

Turns out Richie Tozier takes his coffee with extensive cream and sugar. The twenty-four-hour coffee shop is luckily open, but Eddie and Richie are the only customers at ten pm on Christmas Eve. They leave quickly after they get their drinks, not wanting to bother the poor teenage girl behind the counter who looked ready to commit second-degree murder when they walked in.

“Do you have any opinions on Olympic figure skating?” asks Eddie, once Richie has fallen back into step with him after holding the door open.

Richie doesn’t hesitate to answer. “I have a framed photo of Tonya Harding.” Eddie snorts into his coffee. Richie continues, “okay, maybe not, but I do love that woman.”

They sit on a bench and drink their coffee, Richie naming as many Christmas songs as he can find.

“Most Wonderful Time Of The Year?”

“It’s not.”

“Last Christmas?”

“It’s basically every other breakup song, why does it have to be Christmas themed?”

“Dominic The Donkey?”

Eddie rolled his eyes as he took a long sip.

“Jingle Bells? Sleigh Ride?”

“Sleigh bells are tacky.”

“Silver Bells.”

“Blegh. Reminds me of my mother.”

“Baby It’s cold outside.”

“Rape-y.”

“Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.”

Pause. Eddie thinks for a moment. Then, “don’t know it.”

Richie, who had been scrolling through a list on his phone, honest to God, throws the damn thing. Eddie jumps at the sound of the phone hitting the concrete, his fingers tightening around the paper cup. “Jesus Christ, why did you do that?”

Richie walks over to grab it from where it landed by a trash can. The screen doesn’t appear any more cracked than it had been, which was to say, it was cracked quite a bit, but Richie doesn’t seem so bothered. Instead, he sits back on the bench, closer to Eddie than he was previously. “I can’t believe you don’t know this one.” He hums a high and sweet tune, looking expectantly at Eddie.

Shrugging his shoulders, Eddie leans his head back to look towards the sky so his face won’t be so close to Richie’s.

“We are listening to this right the fuck now.”

Eddie could feel Richie’s breath on his neck, and his arm on his back where it rested on the back of the bench. Snowflakes landed on his face, the warm flush of his cheeks causing them to melt immediately. Eddie wondered if Richie was having the same hyper-awareness.

Apparently not, as the song in question started to play once Richie pulled it up on his phone, tinny and small through the speakers.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas, let your heart be light, next year all our troubles will be out of sight. Have yourself a merry little Christmas, make the yuletide gay. Next year all our troubles will be miles away.

Eddie finally looked back down at Richie, who was humming along. His glasses were foggy.

“I like it,” said Eddie, looking away and focusing on the music. It was sweet. Wasn’t commercialized or overdone or extraordinary. Eddie could close his eyes and imagine himself wrapped up in a blanket by the fire, Richie beside him telling him stories, this song playing on a record far away.

Jesus, Richie was turning him soft. They hadn’t even really been friends two hours ago. Now, Eddie felt like he knew more about Richie than any other person he’d met. He knew about the route Richie takes to work, how he met Beverly on the long train ride, and his two cats (“Thor and Loki, cutest cats in the world. Don’t tell Loki he’s adopted, though.”). Minute details, like Richie’s habit of tugging on the curls that hang around the right side of his face, or that his phone password was 742443, but he messes it up a lot.

“You’ve officially accomplished one of your goals tonight,” Eddie whispered once the song was over and Richie was shoving his phone into his coat pocket.

“What, are we not best friends yet?”

Eddie hums.

“There will be a quiz at the end of the night, Edward. You better hit the books.” Richie jumps as Eddie hits his arm. “Not what I meant.”

As he goes to stand, Eddie extends his hand. “We’re almost to my apartment. And it’s almost midnight, which means that it’s almost Christmas.”

Richie’s eyebrows raise and he doesn’t comment right away. Instead, he slides his cold fingers into Eddie’s and follows his lead. He waits until after they’ve turned the corner to say, “why do you hate Christmas so much?”

Thinking, Eddie tries to keep himself grounded by focusing on Richie’s hand, its warmth slowly starting to spread from where they connect and through Eddie’s body. “The Christmas of my childhood was always just my mother shoving religion down my throat. In high school and college it always seemed so lonely, the one time of the year where everyone was busy doing things with their family, so I was stuck with my mother. It’s just never felt like the good thing that everyone chopped it up to be.” It hadn’t always been so bad. After college, there were some Christmases where Eddie and his friends sat on the floor of empty apartments and ate shitty Chinese food, playing drinking games to Hallmark Christmas movies and exchanging homemade gifts because they were fresh out of school and too poor to buy anything. “Some were okay,” Eddie finished, sniffing awkwardly.

Richie nodded understandably, and didn’t push any further. “At least now you’ve got Judy Garland and me to put up with on Christmas.”

Eddie could feel his cheeks turning pink. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

They were quiet until they reached the building, then stood outside the building, looking up at it with their hands still clasped. Richie glanced at his phone, then looked over at Eddie. The snow stopped falling not too long ago, but Richie still runs his hand nervously through his hair, shaking away the snow that isn’t there.

Richie speaks first. “I’ll see you later, right?”

Eddie turns to face him, unable to hide the smile anymore. “We’re best friends, of course you will.”

Richie sets a hand on Eddie’s shoulder, shaking him lightly. “You get out of the quiz this time, Kaspbrak.” They share a long look, one of many throughout the night. Eddie nudges his way closer until they’re pressed flush against each other, only their bulky coats between them. They meet halfway, Eddie pushing up on his toes and Richie leaning down, their lips pressing together. It’s chaste, but warm and soft and perfect.

They pull away, with quiet promises to talk later. Richie kisses him once more, a bit more desperate this time, then stalks off in the other direction, yelling something about Eddie receiving a passing grade. Eddie really can’t keep the smile off his face this time, and wonders why they hadn’t been doing that all these months.

Once inside the building, in the lobby decked out in holiday decorations, Eddie thinks that maybe Christmas isn’t as bad as he thought.

[thetaylorfiles]

Hey so I'm kinda new here, how did you realize and stopped being a kaylor? How hard was it for you?

It wasn’t hard at all. I wasn’t invested in needing Taylor to be gay. It was fun thinking I was part of a group who uncovered some hidden clues and secrets. It was fun speculating and trying to decipher clues. But I get to do that still. Just this time in relation to her music, not her relationship.

The only part that was disappointing was that I did think it would’ve greatly benefitted society and humanity if someone at her level of success came out as gay. It could really have helped to dismantle homophobia to an extent.

But it wasn’t hard. I don’t have a hard time admitting when I get something wrong and I’m not really competitive at all. So this wasn’t something that I needed to be right.

How I realized it all was a gradual process. The first major thing for me was both the fact that T and K stopped hanging out and then when K posted an extremely impersonal birthday wish. I was used to these two women absolutely gushing over one another in posts and in person. And then Karlie posts (“happy, happy bday @taylorswift13”) and it just hit me like bang (ha). I knew right then that they were not together.

However, I still believed that they HAD been together and had just broken up. So I continued reading Kaylor blogs and being part of the community even though I wasn’t known at all really. I just had the opinion that they had split up.

As I started to voice that opinion in responses to others posts, I got some pushback and told I was wrong. But I didn’t mind all that much because the entire time I was a Kaylor, I never believed 100% of what they were selling. Some of the stuff seemed like off base reaches. Sometimes I’d wonder if T and K were involved but not as deeply in love as others thought. Maybe it was hookups. I didn’t know. I sometimes thought that maybe Calvin and Josh agreed to open relationships. There were plenty of times I wondered if Tayvin was real. And I didn’t mind not knowing - or rather being certain I knew- everything.

Then I started doing some of my own research and I saw how happy Karlie and Josh seemed to be on pics that the Ks never posted. And I saw more detailed timelines and pictures of Harry and Jake and Calvin that we’re never discussed by Ks. I started to think I’d had it all wrong.

Somewhere in there Karlie got engaged. That was big. That helped solidify that I had absolutely been wrong. But I knew even before that. However I still wondered if T wasn’t bi and Joe wasn’t a coverup muse for Karlie still.

But as time went on, all the excuse and reasons Ks had for Joe being her beard fell through. I’d believed Taylor needed a public muse for Karlie for Rep. When Joe was still around well after he was necessary, so to speak, I accepted that I’d had that wrong too and that he was a real boyfriend.

It helped also that Taylor spoke to her fans about him, naming him, sharing anecdotes about him. I believe that her relationship with her fans that she’s cultivated over her career was way too important to her to ever lie straight to their faces like that. Should she ever come out and admit that Joe and the rest were beards, I didnt see that going over well after having personal conversations with fans about him. She’s too savvy to make mistakes like that.

Karlie got married and the way that the Ks spin it about it not being real, about being a photoshoot for Vogue Brazil that never materialized made me even more confident in disbelieving all of thought to be true when I was a Kaylor. It was so reminiscent of Larries going into denial and making up preposterous lies about Louis’ baby.

Also, I did my own research and found that no one but Kaylors thought Josh Kushner was involved in anything illegal. There’s not one article out there validating their assertions. Look for yourself. And Taylor continues to quietly date Joe, erasing the idea she needed a public beard for publicity. There is ZERO reason for her to have a beard. She could just as easily be single and closeted, you know?

So it was a gradual process. And along the way, facts just kept piling up that disproved the Kaylor narrative. And once you’re out of it, you can look back and see how so much was based on coincidences and conjecture instead of facts. And how the narrative is the same in every single conspiracy theory.

And underscoring it all, I came to truly love and admire Taylor, so I decided to afford her the respect she deserves. And that means listening to her words and her actions and believing her.

[sarcasm-and-studying]

We Don’t Talk About the Stories

October 13

Before I start, let's get one thing straight.  I'm not the type of person to fall for some run of the mill conspiracy.  I don't believe in magic, and I take most things told to me with a truckload of salt.  I mean, when you spent a good nine years of your life believing your house was taken over by a secret race of anthropomorphic gloves, you tend to start being a bit skeptical about the world around you.

Having said that, I truly believe my history teacher might be an immortal.

It started off as a joke, one of those blatantly untrue ‘rumors’ everyone spreads to feel like they’re a part of something bigger than themselves.  It was somewhere around mid September when we all collectively realized that perhaps we weren’t completely lying to ourselves after all.  

Mr. Robert T. Johnson is a quirky man with giant gold-rimmed glasses and a curly beard concealing most of his face.  He dresses in vests and bow-ties that come in a variety of earthly tones, and he uses phrases like “that’s so Jake!” - phrases we’re pretty sure no one’s used in over a century.

I want to put a disclaimer here - a disclaimer that is brought on by my confidence in the second paragraph of this entry.  Every ‘proof’ I have to offer of the supernatural is purely circumstantial, and can be, in theory, explained in a perfectly rational way.

At any rate, a huge reason why these rumors exist is because of Mr. Johnson’s stories.  Every once in a while, he gets a droll look in his eye, and the class always exchanges excited glances.  The stories range from the slightly peculiar to the straight up ludicrous, yet every student believes without a doubt that Mr. Johnson actually did punch a Nazi in a French aquarium, or that he actually did date an attractive acrobat who scammed a loan shark out of half a million dollars.  

Yet these stories never have any time stamps, and whenever someone inquires Mr. Johnson as to when he actually had time to go on these adventures, he always gets flustered and quickly changes the subject.  Pretty soon, we learned not to ask too many questions.

The most notable one of these incidents took place at the concert of some obscure musician with an unfamiliar name.  By next period, someone googled the guy.  Apparently his last concert was in 1903.

Yet we’d already learned not to ask too many questions, so we left the answers up to our own imaginations.  And our imaginations did run wild, leading us to the perhaps slightly irrational conclusion I am sharing with you now.

December 27

My hands are almost shaking as I write this.  I wish I didn’t believe the rumor, I wish I could listen to my rational mind.  Yet the further I go into the school year, the more I seem to stop listening to logical reasoning of any sort.

The last few months have passed without any major incidents.  Mr. Johnson remains as suspicious as ever, although new ‘proof’ has come up.  My teacher seems to… imply he knows a lot of languages, as in his stories he regularly talks with residents of other countries.  As always, he dodges questions, though.  He doesn’t strike me as a language kind of guy, and however many he knows, it’s probably more than an average person learns in a lifetime.  

The girl who sits in front of me in homeroom has never talked to me before, but today she leaned back in her chair and rested her elbow on my desk.  

“You’re in Mr. Johnson’s class, aren’t you?” she inquired, her voice quivering with excitement.  “Here, take a look at what I found while researching my forensics project!”

It was a scan of a news article with a giant picture of a policeman leading a man away in handcuffs.  The policeman looked exactly like Mr. Johnson, except clean-shaven and without glasses.  

The only problem was that the photo was taken in Ohio, and the policeman was identified as ‘Mr. Green’.  

Oh, and it was taken in 1923.

“Mr. Johnson, do you have any ancestors who lived in Ohio?” I asked him at history that afternoon.  “A grandfather, perhaps?”

Mr. Johnson stiffened up at the word ‘Ohio’.  “Why do you ask?” he inquired, exaggerated nonchalance barely concealing a panicked note in his voice.

“I... was just wondering,” I replied, shifting awkwardly.

“My family did move here from Ohio!” he told me with a hearty laugh, switching to a laid back tone of voice.  In a matter of seconds, all his tenseness had evaporated.  “How did you find out?”

“A friend of mine was researching for a project,” I blurted without thinking.  “She saw a picture of a man who looks just like you in some article about a murder case...”

.

A few days after that, Akane told me the scans had vanished from the internet.  As soon as I came home from school that day, I messaged a few of the websites that previously provided the scans, asking them about the disappearance.

.

A few weeks have passed.  Not one of them has replied.

February 16

The history teacher next door has left.  It happened without any warning, and I am yet to meet a person who isn’t surprised by Mrs. Sheldon’s disappearance.  She was an old, sweet lady, someone who has spent a good portion of her life teaching at our school.  For her to leave like that, here on Friday and gone on Monday - it greatly disturbed the status quo.

According to the dean, Mrs. Sheldon has grown extremely sick and won’t be able to come to school for a while.  She knew neither this mysterious illness nor how long this ‘while’ was going to last.

The new history teacher is a woman in her early to mid thirties, with a round, trustworthy face and strong arms.  Her name is Mrs. Merri.  She has started to decorate her classroom, the most notable of her posters being a ‘cheat sheet’ on some war we aren’t supposed to learn about until next year.

A girl in my math class was crying because she missed Mrs. Sheldon so much.  I feel sorry for her.  Fortunately, it doesn’t seem like Mr. Johnson will be leaving anytime soon.

March 24

I have asked around about what Mrs. Merri is like.  People seem to have different opinions of her.  Most people say she is nice, but some of the more ambitious students complain about how she doesn’t seem to be too experienced in teaching a history class.

People have mostly stopped talking about Mrs. Sheldon.  Now, it’s just one of the many interesting things that have happened at my school.

April 2

I usually get a little early to school, and I often hang out in Mr. Johnson’s classroom for ‘tutoring’ until the first bell rings.  Today, however, his door was locked and he was nowhere to be seen.

“It seems like Mr. Johnson is running late,” Mr. Merri said.  She was leaning on her door frame, smiling openly.  “Why don’t you come into my classroom instead?”

“Sure,” I shrugged, glancing behind her into the open room.  Almost a dozen students sat at the desks, pouring over textbooks or conversing in hushed voices.  I recognized Akane, as well as some other kids who I usually saw in Mr. Johnson’s class.

I took a seat next to Akane and pulled out my phone.  For a while, we all worked in relative silence.  

“I see a lot of unfamiliar faces today,” Mrs. Merri remarked at some point.  She was perched, nonchalantly, on her desk, gazing over us in amusement.  “Don’t tell me Mr. Johnson always gets this much more students in the mornings.”

Someone assured her this was an unusually busy day.

“He seems to be a good guy,” she continued.  “I’d like to get to know him better.  Does he tell you guys stories in his class?  Because I’ve only spent a few days talking to him and I’ve already heard he’s been all over the world.  Asia, Africa, Europe…  And he’s been all over the US as well.  Has he ever told you guys about Ohio?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Akane freeze up mid-page turn.  

“Not really,”  I said nonchalantly.  “He’s mentioned vacations in different countries, but you make it seem like he’s some sort of world traveler.  I certainly don’t remember anything about Ohio.”

I remembered a rumor about how some girl saw Mrs. Sheldon in a grocery store recently looking very healthy and very much not like a person who has to leave school because of a mysterious illness.

“He doesn’t really tell stories,” Akane picked up.  “He’s honestly a reserved kind of guy when he teaches our class.”

The rumors about Mr. Johnson’s mysterious past, Mrs. Sheldon’s sudden disappearance and quick replacement, the absolute confidence with which Akane and I delivered our lies - all of these things led a few of the other kids in the classroom to slowly nod their agreement.  

Mrs. Merri regarded us with a cold, skeptical stare.  Now she didn’t seem so friendly anymore.  “So he’s told you… nothing?  Nothing about his personal life at all?”

“Honestly, yeah,” said someone to my left.  “I wish he’d tell more stories.”

“Mr. Johnson’s traveled across Europe?” piped up a boy in the front.  “That’s amazing!  Could you tell us more?”

Mrs. Merri let the topic evaporate, and in less than a minute the first bell rung.  I’m going to tell Mr. Johnson about this, Akane told me under her breath as we filed out of the door.

Mr. Johnson did not tell our class any stories that day.

June 12

The next day, Mr. Johnson did not show up to class.  

We later found out he had left a note of resignation on the principal’s desk the afternoon of the incident.  He didn’t answer his email, and his phone went straight to voicemail no matter who called him or when they did it.  Most of his belongings were left in the classroom, never to be picked up again, which would’ve been cause for alarm if it wasn’t for the disappearance of a whole row of books on his bookshelf, a whole row of books we knew Mr. Johnson cherished dearly.

So wherever he left, he left of his own accord.

A few days later, Mrs. Merri was replaced by Mrs. Sheldon again.  Any questions about her alleged illness were avoided by both her and the school staff.

Now, more than ever, I suspect that both Mrs. Merri and Mr. Johnson have giant secrets.  I don’t think I’ll ever find out, though.  

I never saw either of them again.  

[likethetailofacomet]

Tic-Tac-NO!

A/ N: So. this is a thing that happened. I…I don’t really even know. Well, that’s not true. I do know. It happened like this. Yesterday I posted a list of ten words that had to do with my most recent WIP and @ooo-barff-oooChaos Queen that she is, decided to take all ten words and come up with scenarios about each one. OBVIOUSLY I have to do at least 5 of them now. This was one.

Pairings: Jake x Kara, Mike x Eva, Kenji x April 

Word Count: 2,138 

Warning: We’re about to get personal with Kenji and April 

It was late August and a passing summer shower beat steadily against the covered porch of the McKenzie house, the breeze occasionally blowing a droplet sideways beneath the overhang and onto one of their faces. The air was warm despite the rain and the late hour, painting the sky a deep eggplant, lazy wisps of blue-gray clouds all but dissipating as they swirled, the stars and the moon begging to poke through. Laughter and the soft golden glow of the lantern lights poured from the porch as Kara handed Kenji a beer and, clutching her own beverage, slid onto Jake’s lap. His arm came around her and he kissed the tip of her nose, smiling and whispering a “Hey, Princess,” for her ears only. Across the way Mike and Kenji were engaged in a debate with Eva and April over which of them had packed more useless junk for their moves- that day had marked the official end of the Katsaros family’s southern migration, as well as Eva’s, Jake and Kara having helped them in their exodus of New York, and they were using the night to celebrate the whole family being together. Molly and the boys along with Hideki were all fast asleep upstairs, and though the adults were all exhausted from hauling boxes and moving furniture, sweating in the sun before it gave way to the rain, they had caught their second wind from the joy of being together and the buzz of the alcohol in the beers they were drinking.

Eva was smacking Mike’s knee playfully, expressing the importance of her collection of hair products and why she’d had to stock up on conditioner from her favorite salon in New York before they left. “Mike, don’t be ridiculous,” she rolled her eyes. “That was one box, okay? How could it have possibly made a difference in the grand scheme of things?”

“Darlin’,” Mike said, tucking Eva’s long, flowing, soft-despite-the-humidity, chocolate locks behind her ear. “It was one box of hair junk, another box of makeup junk…let’s not get into your shoes…” he laughed as she slapped his knee again, eyes twinkling as they widened. “Hey!” he chuckled.

“Hey yourself, babe, you knew what kind of woman I was when you put this ring on my finger.”  She wiggled her hand showing off the diamond that she’d been wearing for nearly three years as the two of them kept their relationship up with flights back and forth from New York to Louisiana. She took a sip of her beer, her eyes dancing as she did, and he squeezed her thigh.

“I sure did,” he said, biting the air before kissing her on the cheek. Kara caught Jake smiling over at them, that brotherly look in his eyes, and she knew that he was proud of Mike for the way he’d let Eva turn his life around. She felt the smile grow on her own lips. She knew that Mike’s past was just as lonely and broken as Jake’s was, but with Eva, his future was bright and whole.

“Okay, okay, guys but hear me out now,” Kenji stood, the neck of his beer between the thumb and pointer finger of his right hand, his wedding banded left hand pointing accusatorily at April. “This one,” he jabbed his wife in the shoulder with his pointer finger and she mocked being wounded- with her super strength she had barely felt it at all- “This one just had to bring the paper copies of every project she’d ever worked on, every report she’d ever run, all the articles, all the folders full of lab work and trials and-“

“And all of our top secret information, Kenj,” April tugged at Kenji’s wrist, easily pulling the massive man back down to the cushioned bench. “Or did you forget that, ya know, we have super powers that,” she made air quotations around her next words, lowering her voice conspiratorially, “don’t exist.”

“Fair…fair point,” Kenji said, ruffling April’s thick black hair. “Alright, Darwin, looks like you win for ‘most useless junk packed by our wives’.”

Jake noticed Kara looking over at the way that Kenji was brushing his nose against April’s, and the nearly permanent way that both of their cheeks were lifted into their eyes from happiness and laughter and smiling until it hurt. He knew she was thinking about when she’d met her sister, the two of them stranded in the crystal dimension together, April so drained and weak that she almost didn’t make it home, and he knew that she was reveling in how far April had come from then, and how much it had to do with the man by her side.

“Nuh-uh,  Metal Man,” Mike shook his head. “Nope, I have retracted my former statement. Eva did nothing wrong, never does.”

“That’s more like it,” Eva said as she and Kara laughed while April rolled her eyes.  

But Kenji wasn’t letting it go so easily. “No way, man, you can’t compare redacted top secret government information and heavily guarded trade secrets to hair care products and shoes.” He took the finger he’d been pointing at April and instead directed it at Mike.

Mike was getting ready to respond when Jake interrupted. “Easy way to settle this,” he said, moving to grab the wooden box that was stashed on the side table next to the wide Adirondack chair he and Kara were sharing. He shook it and the contents rattled over the sound of the pattering rain. It was a hand carved wooden game set complete with chess, checkers, puzzles and a tic tac toe board. “The McKenzie dispute resolution method,” he said, opening the box and rummaging through the different types of boards until he found the one cross hatched with two vertical lines and two horizontal lines. “Any time Molly is arguin’ or if Princess and I can’t agree, we settle it the civilized way.” He held up a wooden X and a wooden O. “Good ‘ole fashioned Tic Tac Toe. Scrap Heap vs. Darwin. Right now.” He slammed the board down a bit harder than he meant to in his tired, happy, inebriated state, and a snort of laughter burst from his lips to mix with Kara’s tingling giggles.

“NO! NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!” Kenji stood, shaking his head feverishly, a look of pure horror on his face as April hid her scarlet cheeks behind her hands. Mike and Eva suddenly found the slats of the porch floor extremely interesting as they averted their eyes.

“Woah, woah, woah,” said Jake, a mischievous flash in his cobalt blue eyes. Kara could tell that he wasn’t going to let whatever this was go, and she smirked at her sister as April peeked out from between her fingers. “Someone gonna explain why I mentioned an innocent game made for children and the four a you are actin’ like I suggested strip poker?” He took a long pull from his beer as he waited for one of them to bite.

“Well,” Eva started, but Mike quickly stopped her with a hand on her knee and a light lipped shake of his head.

Jake saw his friend’s attempt to silence her, and it only made him push harder. “Nuh, uh, Darwin, don’t you go tellin’ miss Eva to keep quiet. I can tell that this is a good one from Kenji’s reaction, and I think Kara and I deserve a good, funny, embarrassing story as payment for helping you all move your hair stuff and your lab reports and all your other crap, right, Princess?” he looked to Kara for confirmation.

Kara was still eying her sister, barely able to keep her laughter from tumbling out at the way April was shaking her head and furrowing her eyebrows; at the way Kenji was still standing like he was hoping he might suddenly gain the ability to fly away. “Yeah, I think that’s only fair,” she nodded to her husband before turning back to Eva. “Go ahead and spill the beans, E.”

Kenji was shaking his head muttering “nothing is sacred, I swear,” and April’s eyes were pleading with Eva desperately, but Eva seemed to be siding with Jake and Kara on this one, deeming it too hilarious to keep under wraps any longer.

“Well,” she said again, a little louder this time. Kenji sunk back down to his seat realizing that it was happening. April groaned and hid in Kenji’s shoulder. “Well, it’s funny you should mention strip poker, Grandpa,” she had taken to using Mike’s nickname for him- the only other person he’d allow to call him that until the day he actually became a grandpa-“Have you ever heard of Strip Tac Toe? Because apparently, that’s how Kenji and April settle disputes.” She looked at the Katsaroses and raised an meticulously arched eyebrow. “Isn’t that right, April?”

April was trying to disappear into Kenji’s shoulder. “I don’t wanna talk about it!” her voice was muffled by the fabric of Kenji’s shirt. He had his arm around her, comfortingly rubbing her back, that look of horror on his face fading to one of complete resignation.

“Well, too bad, Miss A,” Jake was loving this a little too much. “Looks like the secret is out.” He turned back to Eva. “Now what I really wanna know is how you two know about this arrangement,” he indicated between Mike and Eva.

Eva sighed, looking over at Kenji who rolled his eyes and nodded, seeing no way out and knowing that his brother in law was like a dog with a bone when he latched onto something that might make for a good joke. “Well…remember last year when Mike and I went to Tahiti? And Kenji and April’s apartment was being renovated so they stayed at our place while we were gone?”

Jake nodded. “Yeah, I remember,” he was resting his elbows on his knees and leaning forward, his attention completely captured by the embarrassment unfolding in front of him, taking great joy in the fact that the embarrassment was not his own.

“Well…I don’t know if you remember the detail about us having to come home three days early because of a storm in the forecast? We tried to tell Kenji and April that we’d be back early…you know, to let them know to expect us…but,” she shrugged, “they didn’t get the memo and, well…” Mike covered his eyes as if he was still trying to wipe the images of his friends’ nearly naked bodies in Eva’s living room from his mind.

“You walked in on Strip Tac Toe?” Jake looked at Kenji with a shit eating grin. “Like that time I walked in on you posin’ for Miss A like an un-masked hero?” Kenji and April groaned in harmony and Jake almost fell out of his seat with laughter. “What was the argument, I gotta know!”

“I tell you and you never speak of it again, got it?” Kenji leveled Jake with a look and the pilot held his hands up, making a face as if to say ‘I accept these terms and conditions’.

Kenji sighed. In a barely audible voice he mumbled, “It was over whether we should have Korean BBQ or Sushi for dinner.”

Kara completely lost it, Jake guffawing right alongside of her. “Oh my god, A, you two just cannot keep your clothes on, can you?”

“No, they can’t and It’s a real problem,” Mike said, pointedly looking at Kenji.

“Alright, alright, you got your story, Wingnut, you happy now?” Kenji grumbled.

“Happier’n a dead pig in the sunshine, Tin man, really. Miss Eva, thank you for your cooperation in this highly important matter.”

Eva gave in to a fit of laughter that had been threatening to burst forth from the second Jake produced the tic tac toe board. Mike followed suit with Kenji finally cracking and before they knew it the 6 of them were belly laughing as the summer storm blew right on by and the sound of the falling rain quieted until they were just left with the sounds of the night and the crickets and the frogs.

Kara felt her heart swell as he husband’s chest rumbled with laughter, as her sister’s cheeks turned back to their original shade, as Mike blinked his eyes enough to rid the images from his mind. She remarked for what felt like the millionth time about how at one point, she was nothing, from nothing, and had no one. And now, well, now she had the world right here on the porch, and heaven inside in the form of her sleeping children and nephew. Their memories were heavy on the laughter, full of the good stuff, and that was only going to get better now that they had their whole family all in one place.

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