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carolperkinsexgirlfriend · 11 months

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Steddie Upside-Down AU Part 1

Eddie doesn’t even know why he’s at this stupid party. It’s full of jocks showboating for their girlfriends, their girlfriends clustering together and giggling like watching Tommy Hagan do a keg stand is somehow dreamy. He’d had an entire beer spilled on his shoes, been heckled out of the kitchen and into the backyard, and left to brood out by Harrington’s ostentatious, heated in-ground pool. And it’s barely been an hour.

Within that hour, he’s made enough money to buy two month’s worth of cigarettes. That’s the rub of it all, isn’t it? Counting his time with packs of cigarettes, and bald tires that need replacing. And stupid things like food for their barren fridge and heat in the trailer once fall fully bleeds into winter. Wayne can only do so much, with rolling blackouts hitting the plant, and rent increasing a little more every year.

So Eddie goes to parties full of people he hates, lunch box secured to his person with the chain at his hip, switchblade stuffed in his back pocket. Just in case.

This party is only ramping up, people trickling out from the overstuffed house to loiter on the back porch, occasionally stopping by to procure his services. As the first hour dwindles into the second, Eddie’s supply is getting dangerously low.

He’s just considering leaving when he notices the King himself trailing after two girls he vaguely recognizes as the two that have been haunting the edges of the jock table the past few weeks.

The brunette is scowling, hand wrapped tightly enough around her redheaded friend’s wrist to make the skin turn unnaturally white as she yanks her along none too gently, her short legs making ferocious strides that have both her captive friend and Harrington stumbling to keep up.

Harrington’s got his hands up like he’s placating a spooked horse, talking too quietly for Eddie to hear over the pounding beat of the music. The girl isn’t spooked though. Despite being the shortest of the group, she looks like a predator on the hunt, just waiting for a slip up to make her kill.

Whatever Harrington is saying must not go well. The brunette shoves her friend behind her, stabbing her finger into his chest, voice rising in rage. “–know he meant it, Steve!” she yells, flatting her palm to push him back harshly. She spins on her heel, continuing her trek past Eddie’s spot by the pool and out toward the open gate to the driveway. “As long as he’s here, we’re not going to be!”

“Don’t be like that Nance,” Harrington placates, following in her wake. “Tommy’s just drunk.”

“I don’t care about Tommy!” Nancy snaps. “I care that you’re friends with such a despicable person.”

“Nance–”

“I thought you were better than this, Steve Harrington,” she says.

Then they’re both through the gate and gone. Harrington doesn’t follow. He stands there, staring where the girls had been, back to Eddie. He’s still as a statue for a long, endless minute before growling, low and angry, pulling his fist back and punching the side of his house.

The hit makes a meaty squelching sound of breakable skin striking an immovable object and parting under its pressure. It almost echoes through the yard in the silence between songs, the whispering from all the onlookers starting up just before the next top forty song begins blaring.

Harrington spins, glaring out at the clustered people on the porch, hands on his hips, blood dripping down onto the green of his sweater, the light blue of his jeans. It’s a little thrilling to see the King bloody, even at his own hands. Like a true royal, he snaps, “go inside,” voice demanding obedience. And they do obey, scuttling back into the house in small clusters, shutting the sliding glass door behind the last of them.

Harrington sighs, shoulders drooping as he lifts his injured hand up to look down at it. He still hasn’t noticed Eddie in his spot by the pool.

“Trouble in the kingdom, your majesty?” he asks, jumping up from his cross-legged position on the pavement to saunter up to the other boy. He leans into his space, smiling coyly as Harrington leans back like he carries an airborne disease. “Anything this lowly court jester can do to help?”

He looks shocked at Eddie’s presence, like he never even considered that his decree wouldn’t be obediently followed by everyone in his backyard.

Eddie smirks, fishing in the pocket of his jean vest for his cigarettes. He taps one out, and holds it out–ever the consummate servant–to Harrington, who curls his lips up in disgust and takes a step back away from him. Eddie shrugs, stuffs the pack back into his pocket and fishes his lighter out of his jeans.

“Munson?” Harrington asks, squinting like he’s never seen Eddie before, despite living in the same janky town, and going to the same schools for the past five years. “Who invited you?”

Eddie takes his time lighting his cigarette and taking a drag, marveling as the little divot between Harrington’s eyebrows grows deeper with every passing second. He holds the smoke in, feeling it settle his nerves as he stares daringly into Harrington’s eyes. He doesn’t look away as he exhales, smoke blowing into Harringotn’s face. He doesn’t cough, just gestures his hand in front of his face impatiently to clear the smoke, looking one more insolent move away from smacking Eddie in the face.

“Someone has to sell party favors to Hawkins’ elite,” Eddie replies, shaking the lunchbox where it’s resting just below his hip.

Steve scoffs. “Well, the party’s just about over so why don’t you fuck off, man.”

He gestures behind him to the open gate. Eddie takes another drag, ashing his cigarette on the pristine concrete below him. Harrington balls up his fists before immediately releasing the tension with a wince, shaking out his injured hand.

“Looks like it’s in full swing to me.” Eddie gestures to the sliding glass door back into the dining room. The curtains are closed now, but Eddie can see the darkened silhouettes moving to the beat still pumping through the house.

“I’m kicking them out.”

Harrington crosses his arms, seemingly once again forgetting about the bloody state of his hand. He’s almost pouting now. Eddie has the insane urge to boop him on the nose. He takes another drag.

“Upset your little girlfriend wouldn’t put out?” he asks, jutting his bottom lip out, trailing a fake tear down his own cheek with his free hand. “Poor little rich boy.”

“What the fuck is your problem, man?”

“Me?” Eddie asks, dropping the burning filter of his cigarette to the ground and using the heel of his boot to smear it into the pavement. “I’m dandy. Who wouldn’t want the undivided attention of the King?”

He smiles then, condescending and bright, planting his feet as Harrington’s gaze darkens further.

“I always knew you were a freak,” Harrington snarls, drawing out the F sound like he’d rather use a different word that begins with the letter F.

“And a startling comeback from the King!” Eddie calls, showboating like he’s DMing for Hellfire in the dingy drama room. “How many F words did your Daddy teach you?”

Eddie didn’t realize that Harrington wasn’t angry before until all the light leaves his eyes. They go blank, soulless, like there’s no real person behind them. He uncrosses his arms, fists once again clenched, not even seeming to realize that it further splits his knuckles as he takes a threatening step forward. It’s a little scary, the way one question seems to have flipped him into an entirely different person.

Note to self, do not mention the absentee Father. Eddie takes a step back on reflex as Harrington uses his bloody finger to jab into his chest, hard enough to sting. Eddie looks down as blood smears, idly grateful that he’s wearing black.

“You have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about,” Harrington spits.

Eddie, having never learned to bite his tongue, opens his mouth to crow about this new F word in Harrington’s repertoire, when he hears a sound behind him.

It sounds almost like the foxes that sometimes chitter in the woods surrounding the trailer park. But there’s something wrong with it. It’s high pitched and cutting in and out, like a record skipping again and again. It’s staticy, reverberating behind him like the static of the television between channels but worse. A recording of television static sped up too fast and fed through three long distance phone calls.

Eddie’s hands tremble, something animalistic coursing through him at the sound–fight or flight kicking in with only one option left. In front of him, Harrington’s gone quiet, eyes wide and unblinking as he looks fixedly past Eddie’s left shoulder.

Then, abruptly, the sound cuts out, replaced with a guttural growling so deep he can feel it pulsing through his muscles, urging him to run. It unsticks his feet, but before he can dart through the open gate, or maybe to the shut sliding glass door to hunker down with the other party-goers, Harrington shoves him backward. Hard.

He loses his feet, loses his breath, until he’s choking on chlorinated water. He comes out of the water spluttering, coughing up water until it burns, his layers of clothing doing their best to drag him down into the bottom of the pool to drown.

His eyes are closed against their stinging, ears clogged with water where he’s struggling to tread in the deep end of Harrington’s stupid heated pool that the King himself just shoved him in.

It’s a low enough moment that Eddie can feel his mind covering up the impossibilities of the night, paving over the impossibilities to rewrite the story to make sense: King Steve saw him, set up some speakers to spook him, and then shoved him in the pool. Nothing unexpected there.

But then Eddie opens his eyes.

Harrington’s on the ground. Harrington’s on the ground fighting against the grip around his wrist, pulling him toward the water Eddie’s struggling to stay afloat in.

It’s not a person dragging him, not a practical joker wearing a suit. It can’t be. The thing is standing upright, sure, but it’s too tall, too thin, too featureless. Its forearms are uncannily long, fingers twisting and look as if they have too many joints facing the wrong directions where they curl around Harrington’s wrist, claws sharp enough to make him bleed. Its ribs are showing. And there’s no face at all, just creased flesh puckered together where a mouth ought to be.

At least, that’s what Eddie thinks until Harrington struggles harder, fingers of his free hand digging into the crack in the pavement, momentarily stalling their forward momentum. Then, the seams where its head connects open, like a flower toward the sun, if each petal was fleshy and covered in dozens of sharp looking teeth. And it screeches, ear-splitting and horrible, as if reprimanding Harrington for not laying imobile like a good little live meal.

It tosses Harington into the pool. He hits with a splash, immediately flailing out, smacking Eddie on the side of his face. Eddie reaches out on instinct to pull the guy toward him, trying to keep the both of them above the water line while Harrington reorients himself.

It shouldn’t have taken long. Harrington is the captain of the swim team. He should have been able to kick his feet under him and been off to the other end of the pool within seconds.

It wasn’t fast enough.

Eddie doesn’t even see it move, it’s so fast. He’s holding onto Harrington, arm slung around the other guy’s waist, clutching tightly at the front of his sweater. Then, Harrington’s being pulled forcefully to the bottom of the pool, Eddie along with him.

All of his orifices are burning from the chlorine–throat, nose, eyes, ears. He feels blind, deaf, lost, anchorless, except for the feel of Harrington’s skin beneath his hand, so he clutches, hooks his hand through the guy’s belt to keep his hold.

There’s a sensation, like meat parting around him. Then he’s breathing, sucking in oxygen, eyes still closed, head spinning. Harrington’s ribs are rising and falling rapidly. It lasts only a moment, the pair of them breathing and touching and panicking in tandem.

Until there’s that sound. Foxes chittering strangely, but it’s echoing now, weirdly like they’re in a cave forty feet underground.

Eddie opens his eyes. The sky looks wrong–darker than it should be, and it almost looks like it’s snowing. One of the flakes hits Eddie in the cheek and he rubs at the spot, feeling it flake apart and smear across his face. Not snow. Dust? Ash?

They’re in some sort of pit made of concrete, cracked under the force of the sickly vines crawling across its surface. It’s deep enough that Eddie’s not sure how they’re going to get out.

It’s not until he sees the ladder at the edge of the hole that he realizes where they are: impossibly, in the bottom of Harrington’s pool, somehow drained of water and decayed and made wrong, in a matter of seconds.

The chittering turns to a growl. Harrington jumps up. Eddie’s hand, where it’s still tucked into his belt, jerks violently up with him, pinky getting stuck between belt and pants as he hastily tries to extract it. Harrington darts away, and Eddie’s pinky pops. It’s barely audible beyond the growling, but he feels it as a release of pressure and then sharp pain.

Eddie looks down at his now free hand. There’s chaffing on his palms, and his pinky sits at an awkward angle, already swelling around the knuckle where it connects to his hand.

Nausea rolls through him–shock, maybe–at the sight. More than the pain, it looks like another wrong thing in a long line of wrongness that makes up his night, this time, attached to his own body. He heaves, water spilling out of his mouth, burning with chlorine as Eddie forces his eyes away from his hand.

Harrington’s across the pool, holding some sort of pole with a torn net at one end, thrusting it into the creature’s mouth, farther and farther. But the metal’s warping, almost decaying under the saliva in the thing's face, pole becoming shorter and shorter until It’s almost upon Harrington.

Without thought, Eddie jumps to his feet, stumbling behind the thing and bashing his lunchbox into its head.

It’s probably the surprise of the hit that makes the thing stumble. Harrington wastes no time, jabbing the rest of his pole, fast and deep into its maw. It wails, the strike fast enough to get through whatever was melting the metal, piercing something deep inside the thing.

Eddie’s not stupid enough to think it’ll stay down. He skirts around the thing, latching onto Harrington’s wrist and pulling him along in his wake. He doesn’t hear the pole clatter to the cement of the bottom of the pool, hoping that means they have a little more time, doesn’t dare turn around to look as Eddie drops Harrington’s wrist to climb, hand over aching hand, up the ladder and out of the pool.

Nothing looks better once he’s topside. The sky is still wrong, filled with ash and discolored light. There’s vines up here, too. And it’s quiet, so quiet he can hear every sound Harrington makes as he scrambles up the ladder behind him.

Eddie doesn’t wait for him. He runs, fast as he can to the sliding door to the house, wrenching it open and falling past the curtain into the house. He hopes, hysterically, that no one sees him making such a fool of himself, hopes somewhere deeper that someone does and will put themselves between his fleshy body and whatever comes through the door behind him.

But no one’s there. Harrington’s kitchen is dark, the living room past it dark as well, a disturbing red glowing faintly through closed curtains like he’s landing himself in a scene straight from Evil Dead. There’s no shadows of partygoers moving, no top forty, no drunk teenagers to spill beer on his shoes.

He stands, frozen, something horrific building in his throat, like a scream or a sob as he stares, unmoving, curtains moving against the small of his back until something slams through them, pushing him to the cold linoleum.

He pictures teeth, swears he hears a growl, but when he twists wildly from his prone position to scoot backwards on his ass, arms preemptively raised, he sees Harrington sliding the door closed and clicking the shitty plastic lock into place.

It's hilarious, like the thing they’d both seen back there would be stopped by a little piece of plastic, or doors, or the safety of his house. Eddie bites back a laugh that’s fighting its way up his throat like chlorine, burning and not where it’s supposed to be.

Harrington’s back is shaking with the force of his pants as he yanks the curtains closed. He pivots, face devoid of anything as he bends down and yanks Eddie up by his wrist hard enough to sting.

“Harrington, the people–” he starts, but his wrist is yanked harder as he’s led up carpeted stairs and into a bedroom.

Eddie gets only a sense of plaid and emptiness before he’s being shoved into a closet, Harrington stumbling in behind him and closing the doors quietly and squatting down next to where Eddie had fallen. The outside of their thighs are pressed together. Something hysterical bubbles up his throat again at the irony of the moment. He bites his lip against it.

Harrington’s feet are beneath him, ready to jump and fight anything that might follow them up here. Eddie can’t seem to get his ass on the floor, the lethargy of shock making him complacent, the knowledge that he’d never stand a chance if that thing makes it into the house making the effort of vigilance not seem worth it.

Harrington looks fierce, like he really is in a scary movie, an action hero, the final girl, the one who’ll get to the end of the movie by any means necessary. But Eddie can feel his body shaking where their legs are pressed together. Eddie gets the insane urge to hold his hand.

It feels like hours pass like this, Harrington at the ready, Eddie succumbing to his sleepy shock, before Harrington slowly lowers himself to sit on the ground beside Eddie, knee overlapping his as he sits crisscross, still looking at the door.

“Harrington, what–”

“I don’t know, Munson.” His voice is a sharp whisper, biting in its carelessness. He doesn’t even look away from the closet door.

“Your house is just empty, man.”

That gets him a scoff and a loosening roll of his shoulders as Harrington finally turns his head to the side and meets his eyes. Eddie tries not to notice the way it slides his thigh more firmly atop his own.

“That’s what you’re worried about?” Harrington demands, and for a moment, Eddie’s afraid he somehow heard his thoughts, another in a long line of indignities in this new world they’ve found themselves in, but he continues, “–the people? Not the flower monster that tried to eat us, or the red sky, or the shitty vines all over my house?”

“People means help! Who’s going to help us now?” Eddie demands, voice rising higher than it should. He swings his hand wildly, less of a gesture and more of a limb seizing with panic until it hits the closet’s wall with a hollow thwack, sending a bolt of pain from his pinkie finger down his wrist.

Harrington turns violently, almost climbing in Eddie’s lap in his bid to both cover his mouth and wrench his hand away from the wall and clutch it tightly in the space between their chests. Eddie bites his own lip at the pain of the squeeze. It’s dark, but he can see the way Harrington’s eyes are widened with fear, the whites too visible.

“Shut up,” he hisses, hand squeezing a little tighter around his cheeks.

They sit in the silence of the moment, staring at each other, ears straining for the sound of anything coming for them.

All is silent. Harrington’s hands ease away and he slowly shuffles out of Eddie’s space.

“Sorry,” Eddie says, almost reflexive.

Steve doesn’t reply, but he doesn’t turn away either. They’re still both staring at each other. Eddie’s too tense to feel awkward about it.

He sits in the silence. He’s never been good at it—the quiet. It eats at him, picks away at his skin until he’s back in a run-down apartment with a Father in jail and Mom gone from the room even as she rots away on the couch. The silence eats and eats and eats, until he can almost smell the mildew of the always-closed windows, can feel the springs of his old mattress digging uncomfortably into his back.

The springs prod him, and he blinks into the closet, Harrington’s finger jabbing into his side.

“Don’t crack on me now, Munson.” He’s not smiling.

“Aww,” he replies, trying to make his tone its usual cloying flirtation, “didn’t think you cared, your highness.”

He twists his mouth up at the side. It doesn’t quite land on a smirk—he can feel the way it wobbles. If Harrington notices, he doesn’t call him on it.

With a roll of his eyes, Harrington responds, “like you said, no people means no help, means you’re all I’ve got.”

“Don’t sound too happy about it,” Eddie mutters, but the house is too quiet and they’re sitting too close together.

Harrington scoffs, but he leans back further, settling fully on his ass for the first time since he’d dragged Eddie into the closet with him, like all he needs to feel at ease is Eddie being a dick to him. He’s not sure whether or not that’s infuriating or charming, but the knot in his throat that feels suspiciously like tears breaks loose when Harrington leans back on the heels of his hands.

There’s something to the ease of Harrington in this moment that makes Eddie wonder if he’s ever actually seen him at ease before. When Eddie had watched him across the lunch room, eyes unwillingly drawn to the jocks table, his shoulders were always relaxed, mouth always turn up at the corners, but there was still something so stiff about him. Eddie’s not sure he’s ever seen him lean back like this.

It's almost like, without eyes on him—or with only Eddie’s—his body has gone ragamuffin. A marionette with all it’s strings cut. It’s like. Like—

It’s like hiding from a horrific Lovecraftian monster in the alternative dimension version of his own closet with Eddie Fucking Munson is the first time Steve Harrington has felt comfortable in his own skin. Either that, or Eddie’s spiraling.

“Stop staring at me, man,” Harrington says, draping a hand over his eyes to block out the nonexistent light.

It’s only then that Eddie realizes he has been staring. He snaps his gaze to the floor, running his fingers through the soft shag of Harrington’s fancy carpet. It’s things like this that got him marked as queer within weeks of moving here.

“What’re we gonna do, man?” Eddie asks, like a broken record.

Harrington sighs, drooping further into the carpet. “I vote we go to sleep and hope this was all a bad dream.”

And as if his word had been decreed, Harrington stretches out as much as he can in the confined space, using a pile of dirty clothes as a pillow, and closes his eyes. The side of his leg ended up pressed across the entire side of Eddie’s thigh.

Eddie stares, struck dumb by the audacity of Harrington checking out in a moment like this. When his silence gets no reaction, he slumps down, dragging his cheek into the soft carpet as Harrington slumbers beside him. It feels like hours until he falls asleep.

Part 2

#steddie #steddie fic #steve harrington #eddie munson #st fic #steddie upsidedown au #my fic

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the-californicationist · 8 months

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The Simple Mistake (Ghoap)

Ghoap fluff, hurt/comfort (please be nice i dont write ghoap)

Johnny wasn’t often the smaller man. In most situations, he was the aggressor, or at least the larger of the pairing. But, he felt himself being lifted as if his body were mostly air. He was being carried like a sack of flour, hoisted over a huge, mountainous shoulder, and tossed into arms that cradled him with ease. The sergeant could feel the way his captor’s muscles bent and twisted, even under all his black gear, and although the gunfire and the flashbangs were deafening, he could hear the hollow, steady swell of the man’s breathing as it filled his wide chest.

“C’mon, Sergeant. Just a few minutes and you’ll be right as rain. Hold on,” the dark, muffled voice told him.

The man had been making these threats the whole time, promising him freedom and safety, telling him he’d be alright. Johnny didn’t much care either way, not anymore. Right now, all he wanted to feel was more of the same, more of these shoulders, more of this expansive back whose lats were pulled wide like spread wings. A great bird of prey, or a vulture come to claim its carrion.

Bullet wounds were always a fucking mess, that was for sure. Luckily, the pain of it was being covered by an immense layer of shock. Johnny could feel the symptoms; chills, loss of sensation, trembling… it was all there. But, he was thankfully lucid, so they may not have hit him in a vital spot. Because of the vest and all of his gear, he hadn’t been sure exactly which bullet had landed the blow, but he felt the punch of the projectiles in his leg and chest, so something was bleeding… that much was clear.

It wasn’t his symptoms that concerned him; it was the tone of his Lieutenant’s voice as he reassured him over and over and over again, killing Makarov’s men as he made his way out of the warehouse with a series of pistols that he procured from the piles of dead terrorists. Having to stop and murder more Konni operatives made their journey a slow one, and Johnny could tell Ghost was becoming more and more frustrated.

“Where are these fuckin’ bastards all comin’ from?” The strong English accent was a comfort to the Scot, as much as it was an annoyance.

He didn’t reply to the question, not even with a snarky jab, and he stayed as still as he could, trying to make it easy on his carrier.

“You alive, Sergeant?” The concern had increased by an octave.

“Solid,” Johnny managed to respond, but it was getting a little hard to breathe.

“Almost there, mate. Almost… there,” Ghost rushed into a heavy, lockdown facility and shut the door behind him.

There were three inches of steel between them and their enemies and absolutely no communication service. The silence of the safe room settled around the two men like a dark blanket, shielding them from the outside world. The light was dim, the floor was mostly sand, and there was a marked lack of furniture.

Johnny felt himself being gingerly laid down on a desk, all of its contents fiercely strewn on the floor of the room, and Ghost began to remove the sergeant’s gear.

“Jesus, LT,” Johnny panted, “Feels like you didnae even break a wee sweat, sir. I wanna be just like you when I grow up.”

The lieutenant was too focused for his jokes, his voice flat and cold, focused on ripping Johnny’s gear from him piece by piece,

“You’ll be better than me, Johnny.”

Johnny felt like he was being mauled by a bear. His body was jostled around like a ragdoll as Ghost pulled plate after plate from his chest. Eventually, his vest was ripped away, and then Johnny saw the glint of a huge knife. He barely had time to gasp when Ghost sliced up through his shirt and sleeves, yanking it off of his body, revealing his chest, sweaty and hairy, tanned in odd lines where his tank top and tee shirt had been. The sergeant chuckled a bit, nervous, smiling up at his commander,

“Maybe I already am, sir.”

Ghost didn’t reply. He was too focused on the task at hand. His eyes were wild, checking and rechecking Johnny’s body for the source of his blood. Finally, the sergeant was turned, lifted with ease from the desk, so that Ghost could inspect his leg.

“Trousers have to come off, Sergeant,” the lieutenant explained.

It was barely a warning. In one swift rip, Ghost shucked Johnny’s pants down to reveal… all of him.

Johnny wasn’t really one for underwear, but he was kicking himself for that habit today.

“LT! Christ!”

“You’re hit in the side of this leg. Need an XStat here. Deep breath.”

Johnny didn’t have time to breathe at all. The searing pain from the insertion of the wound-sealing device made his face twist into a wild grimace, and he shivered from the hot flash of agony.

“Fuuuuckkk…” Johnny moaned, writhing and fully naked on the shitty desk.

Ghost was on the ground, digging in his gear bag, and he produced a foil shock blanket. He unwrapped it, ripping through the packaging, and lay it over his sergeant, tucking it around him.

Johnny was shuddering, and his voice shook, but he tried to smile,

“Th-thanks, LT… Wish I had a wee bit more warmth, though. Cannae seem to stop shakin’.”

Ghost pulled off his gloves, and then, to his shock, Johnny watched as he removed his mask. He didn’t see Simon’s face often, but when he did, he tried not to stare. It was just a face, after all. There were no odd deformities, but it was as if some version of Zeus had just revealed himself through a swan or a bull; it was meant to be witnessed.

The lieutenant didn’t meet his eyes, but he scooped him up, his huge arms curled under his back and in the crook of his knees, and brought him down to the ground. Then, he just… held him there.

Johnny tried to remember the last time he had been held. A wee lass from high school, perhaps? But, she had not cradled him like a bairn. Perhaps it was his ma, when he drug his knee climbing through nettle at his uncle’s farm, burning up like the idiot he was, sniffling about the sting.

Now, here he was, a grown man, cradled again in the same way. The bulk of Simon was warm against him, but the gear dug into his naked flesh. Ghost could sense his discomfort and moved him aside for a moment, shrugging out of his vest, and replacing Johnny right back into his arms.

“Are you warm?” Simon asked quietly, a little under his breath.

“Aye, sir, thanks for tha’.”

“Are you in pain?” This question came out like a prayer, and it unsettled the younger man.

“Aye… but, it’s better now, sir.”

“Good. Help’s comin’. Sent Laswell a ping before we got locked in.”

Johnny chuckled, resting his head on Simon’s shoulder,

“She’ll find us in a right state.”

Simon shifted a bit, and there was a long pause before he muttered,

“I’m sorry, Sergeant. When they arrive, we can —”

“Haud yer wheesht,” Johnny interrupted him, pressing his forehead into Simon’s warm, bare neck, “It’s a fine state.”

“Aye.”

“Aye?” Johnny’s blood rushed through his veins, “So, you have taken a shine to me, then.”

“Aye,” Simon said, finally turning to meet Johnny’s eyes as he lay in his arms. He pressed his nose into Johnny’s space, close enough for a kiss but speaking to him instead,

“I’ve taken a bloody shine. It’s bright enough to keep me awake at night, and it’s blindin’ me now. Everything in me says that I should leave you alone. Your rank, your future… you rely on me. But, I can’t stop staring at the shine of you. So bright. All the time.”

Johnny’s arm crinkled through the foil blanket as he reached a hand up to touch the coarse shadow on Simon’s jaw, drawing those full lips into his, petting his cheek, tasting the cigarette smoke on his tongue. He moved against him, feeling Simon’s enormous strength respond in a generous outpouring of affection, like a statue once frozen now come to life. They sank into each other, melding together, melted like hot wax, fusing, tumbling until there was only the shine of love between them.

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shanastoryteller · 1 year

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Happy happy pride month 🌈🏳‍🌈🥳 Are you still doing the “cursed identity porn” au where LWJ can’t really see the Yiling Patriarch (because the mask?), but still tries to settle into being married to him? (Or JC traveling back in time?) Thanks!

a continuation of 1 2 3

Lan Wangji watches Wei Wuxian fold himself back into the silent, untouchable persona of the Yiling Patriarch and he mourns the loss of the warm, cheerful man he’s gotten to know. He still doesn’t understand the need for the secrecy, why he cannot be both the kind and generous father and sect leader and the man powerful enough to win a war and tame the Burial Mounds. But Wei Wuxian asks so little of him that he can’t bring himself to push for more than he’s willing to give.

Meng Yao does most of the talking while they travel, procuring their rooms and ordering their food. He does it with the same casual efficiency that he does everything and Lan Wangji thinks that this is a skill he must have picked up in the Nie, must have learned in service of Nie Mingjue.

They share one room even though they can afford more, but there’s a wariness that Wen Qing can’t hide and Meng Yao likely is that causes them to draw close. After Meng Yao comes back with dinner, Wei Wuxian takes off his mask and he’s surprised at how weary his husband looks, a weariness that he hasn’t seen once in the Burial Mounds, no matter how rowdy the children or demanding the villagers or intense the cultivation.

Lan Wangji lays his hand on Wei Wuxian’s arm, squeezing to get his attention. He meets his gaze slowly and offers him a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. “Are you alright?”

“Fine,” he says. Lan Wangji raises an eyebrow and the warmth in voice seems real enough when he adds, “I am, I promise. We just have to get through this night hunt and we’ll be back home and everything will be fine.”

He doesn’t understand what everything is, why attending a night hunt as a war hero is causing so much discomfort, but he just tips his head down and says, “Yes, it will.”

Lan Wangji always sleeps lightly and that night everyone wakes him at least once. Wen Qing’s nightmare wakes her before he can, Wei Wuxian tosses and turns, and Meng Yao gets up far too early to pace the length of the room. He can easily withstand a night of poor sleep, so he says nothing.

They gather whispers and stares as the walk through Lanling and walk up the Jin’s obnoxious steps. Lan Wangji greets Sect Leader Jin and Madam Jin, curling his lip back when they neglect to greet Meng Yao but lets it lie when Meng Yao catches his eye.

They’ve barely stepped into the banquet hall when a beloved and familiar voice calls out, “Wangji!”

Xichen does not break the rule against running, but he does walk very quickly over to them, a bright smile lighting up his face. Lan Wangji wonders at how different he looks to when his brother saw him last. He still wears his silver cloud ornament around his forehead, but now it’s on a black ribbon. He has on soft grey robes embroidered with red and silver and a black underrobe made of the same fine silk as his ribbon. He does not think it is a color palette that is flattering on him, but at an official event such as this it's important that he wears his husband’s colors.

His brother grips his wrists in his hands. “Are you well?”

Lan Wangji smiles then says gently, “Sect Leader Lan.”

Bewilderment crosses Xichen’s face before being replaced in understanding. He squeezes his wrists then steps back, going into a shallow bow. “Greetings, Patriarch. Apologies for my break in decorum.”

Meng Yao waves a dismissive hand, “It’s fine, he’s not offended. You are his brother in law now.”

And his husband cares very little for decorum.

Wei Wuxian reaches forward and lightly presses up on Xichen’s arms to coax him out of his bow. The spell on the mask makes it impossible for Xichen to comprehend Wei Wuxian’s smile, but Lan Wangji hopes that his soft touch conveys something to his brother.

#prompt answers #prompts are closed #asks #anon #untamed

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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 year

Text

The Sacklers woulda gotten away with it if it wasn't for those darned meddling feds

The saga of the Sacklers, a multigenerational billionaire crime family of mass-murdering dope-peddlers, is an enraging parable about how the wealthy, the courts, and sadistic high-powered lawyers collude to destroy the lives of millions, profit handsomely, and evade justice.

But there's an unexpected twist to this tale. After the Sacklers procured a sham bankruptcy that denied their victims the right to sue while leaving their fortune largely intact, the Supreme Court – yes, this Supreme Court – saw through the scam and froze the process, pending a full hearing:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/10/us/supreme-court-purdue-pharma-opioid-settlement.html

The Sacklers basically invented modern, legal dope peddling. Arthur Sackler, the family's original crime-boss, revived the practice of direct-to-consumer drug marketing, dormant since the death of the medicine show, to peddle Valium. An aggressive and shrewd lobbyist, Arthur built the family fortune and, more importantly, its connections:

https://www.timesofisrael.com/how-the-sackler-family-built-a-pharma-dynasty-and-fueled-an-american-calamity/

A generation later, the family's business company created Oxycontin, and procured misleading and false research about the drug's safety kickstarting the opioid epidemic, whose American body-count is closing in on a million dead. Armed with inflated claims about opioid safety, the Sacklers' pharma reps bribed, cajoled and tricked doctors into writing millions of prescriptions for oxy.

This scam had a natural best-before date. As ODs flooded America's ERs and bodies piled up in America's morgues, it became increasingly clear that something was rotten. The Sacklers pursued a multipronged campaign to keep the truth from coming to light, and to keep the billions flowing.

On the one hand, they hired McKinsey to find novel ways to encourage doctors to keep writing prescriptions and to convince pharmacists to turn a blind eye to abuse. McKinsey had all kinds of great ideas here, including paying pharma distributors cash bonuses for every overdose death in their territory:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/03/business/mckinsey-opioids-settlement.html

When the issue of these deaths came up in public, the Sacklers blamed "criminal addicts" for their own misery, stigmatizing both people who desperately needed pain relief and the people who'd been deliberately hooked on the Sacklers' products. The legacy of this smear campaign is still with us, both in the contempt for people struggling with addiction and in the cruel barriers placed between people in unbearable agony and medical relief.

But mostly, the Sacklers kept their names out of it. They laundered their reputations by donating a homeopathic fraction of their vast drug fortune to art galleries and museums in a bid to make their names synonymous with good deeds.

The Sacklers didn't invent this trick. Think of the way that history's great monsters – Carnegie, Mellon, Rockefeller, Ford – are remembered today for the foundations and charities that bear their names, not for the untold misery they inflicted on their workers, their crimes against their customers, and the corruption of governments.

But the Sacklers made those Gilded Age barons seem like amateurs. They invented a modern elite philanthropy playbook that Anand Giridharadas documents in his must-read Winners Take All, about the charity-industrial complex that washes away an ocean of blood with a trickle of money:

https://memex.craphound.com/2018/11/10/winners-take-all-modern-philanthropy-means-that-giving-some-away-is-more-important-than-how-you-got-it/

As part of this PR exercise, the individual Sacklers kept their names and images out of the public eye. For years, there were virtually no news-service photos of individual Sacklers. When journalists dared to criticize the family, they used vicious attack-lawyers to intimidate them into retractions and silence (I was threatened by the Sacklers' lawyers).

They also worked their media mogul pals, like Mike Bloomberg, who added their names to the "Friends of Mike" list that Bloomberg reporters were required to consult before writing negative coverage:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/02/29/friends-of-mike-enemies-of-the-people/#sacklerbergs

But Stein's Law says that "anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop." As lawsuits mounted, the Sacklers found themselves increasingly synonymous with death, not charitable works. But like any canny criminal, the Sacklers had a getaway plan.

First, they extracted vast sums from Purdue and shifted it into offshore financial secrecy havens:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-purduepharma-bankruptcy/sacklers-reaped-up-to-13-billion-from-oxycontin-maker-u-s-states-say-idUSKBN1WJ19V

Even as this money was disappearing into legal black holes, the Sacklers demanded – and received – extraordinary protection from the courts, who aggressively sealed testimony and materials presented through discovery:

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-courts-secrecy-judges/

When this gambit finally failed, the Sacklers insisted that were down to their last $4 billion, and, with trillions in claims pending against them, they declared bankruptcy.

When a normal person declares bankruptcy, they are required to divest themselves of nearly everything of value they possess, and then still find themselves hounded by cruel arm-breakers who deluge them with threatening calls and letters:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/19/zombie-debt/#damnation

But for the richest people in America, bankruptcy is merely a way to cleanse one's balance sheet of liabilities for any atrocity you may have committed on the way, without giving up your fortune.

The Sacklers are a case-study in how a corrupt bankruptcy can be conducted.

Purdue Pharma presents a maddening case-study in the corrupt benefits of bankruptcy. When it was announced in March, many were outraged to learn that the Sacklers were going to walk away with billions, while their victims got stiffed.

First, they converted their victims' right to compensation into "property" that the Sacklers themselves owned. This transferred jurisdiction over these claims from the regular court system to the bankruptcy court. A bankruptcy judge – not a jury – would decide how much each of these claims was worth, and then what how much of that worth these victims (now recast as creditors) would be entitled to through the bankruptcy.

Thus tens of thousands of claims were nonconsensually settled without a trial, by an administrative judge with no criminal jurisdiction, not a federal judge who'd undergone Senate confirmation:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/31/vaccine-for-the-global-south/#claims-extinguished

These "coercive restructuring techniques" are not available to everyday people who are drowning in student debt or credit-card bills – these are the exclusive purview of the wealthiest Americans, who enjoy a completely different bankruptcy system that is rigged in their favor.

Three judges – David Jones and Marvin Isgur of Houston and Bob Drain of New York – hear 96% of the country's large corporate bankruptcies:

https://www.creditslips.org/creditslips/2021/05/judge-shopping-in-bankruptcy.html

These judges are unbelievably horny for corporations, embracing a legal theory "that casts the invention of the limited liability corporation alongside that of the steam engine as a paradigmatic development in the pursuit of prosperity":

https://prospect.org/justice/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-the-sacklers-purdue-pharma-bankruptcy/

Now there are more than three bankruptcy judges in America, so how do the nation's biggest companies get their cases heard by these three enthusiastic Renfields for corporate vampirism?

They cheat.

For example: when GM was facing bankruptcy, it argued that it was a New York company on the basis that it owned a single Chevy dealership in Harlem, and got in front of Judge Drain.

The Sacklers were – characteristically – even more brazen. They really wanted to get their case in front of Judge Drain, the nation's most enthusiastic supporter of "third party releases," through which bankrupt billionaires can wipe the slate clean, securing dismissals of all claims by the people they wronged.

Drain is also uniquely hostile to independent examiners, "an independent third-party appointed by the court to investigate 'fraud, dishonesty, incompetence, misconduct, mismanagement, or irregularity…by current or former management of the debtor."

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3851339

If you're the Sacklers, hoping to keep two thirds of your billions and extinguish all claims by your victims, there is no better helpmeet than Judge Robert Drain of the Southern District of New York.

So, 192 days before filing for bankruptcy, the Sacklers opened an office in White Plains, New York (a company may claim jurisdiction in a specific court once they've operated a business there for 180 days).

Then they filed a bankruptcy in which they altered the metadata on their casefile, inserting the code for a Westchester county hearing into the machine-readable, human-invisible parts of the documents they uploaded to the federal Case Management/Electronic Case Files (CM/ECF) system (they also captioned the case with "RDD, for "Robert D Drain").

They chose their judge, and the judge obliged. UCLA Law's Lynn LoPucki is one of the leading scholars of these bankruptcy "megacases," and has written extensively on why these three judges are so deferential to corporate criminals seeking to flense themselves of culpability. She sees judges like Drain motivated by "personal aggrandizement and celebrity and ability to indirectly channel to the local bankruptcy bar. The judge is the star and the ringmaster of a megacase – very appealing to certain personalities."

Thus, these judges are "willing and eager to cater to debtors to attract business…[an] assurance to debtors that…these judges will not transfer out cases with improper venue or rule against the debtor…"

https://www.fulcrum.org/concern/monographs/02870w66d

This kind of judge-shopping goes beyond the Sacklers; the cases that Drain and co preside over make a mockery of the idea of America as a land of equal justice. "Prepack" and "drive-through" bankruptcies are reliable get-out-of-jail-free cards for capitalism's worst monsters: private equity firms.

Whether PE murdered your grandmother by buying her care-home and putting each worker in charge of 30 seniors:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/portopiccolo-nursing-homes-maryland/2020/12/21/a1ffb2a6-292b-11eb-9b14-ad872157ebc9_story.html

or poisoned your kids by filling your neighborhood with carcinogens:

https://www.webmd.com/special-reports/ethylene-oxide/20190719/residents-unaware-of-cancer-causing-toxin-in-air

limited liability wipes the slate clean.

30% of America's bankruptcies are private equity companies using the bankruptcy system to wipe away claims for their misdeeds, while keeping a fortune, thanks to the shield of limited liability.

Take Millennium Health, JamesS lattery's fake drug-testing company, which promised to help nursing homes figure out whether seniors were abusing (or selling) their meds by testing their piss for angel dust and other drugs. Slattery defrauded Medicare and Medicaid for millions, borrowed $1.8 billion (Slattery got $1.3 billion of that). He eventually walked away from this fraud after paying a mere $256m to settle all claims, and kept a fortune in assets, including the 40 vintage planes his private company ("Pissed Away LLC" – I am not making this up) owned:

https://prospect.org/justice/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-the-sacklers-purdue-pharma-bankruptcy/

For the wealthy, bankruptcy is the sport of kings, a way to skip out on consequences. For the poor, bankruptcy is an anchor – or a noose. This is by design: judges who preside over elite bankruptcies speak of their protagonists as heroic "risk takers" and tiptoe around any consequences, lest these titans be chained to a mortal's fate, costing us all the benefits of their entrepreneurial genius.

PE companies helped the Sacklers design their own bankruptcy strategy, and it was a standout, even by the standards of Bob Drain and his kangaroo bankruptcy court. But now, the Supreme Court has pumped the brakes on the whole enterprise.

The judges ruled that the exceptions the Sacklers took advantage of were intended for bankrupts in "financial distress" – not billionaires with vast fortunes hidden overseas. In so doing, the court threatens all manner of corrupt arrangements, from "the Boy Scouts, wildfires and allegations of sexual abuse in the church diocese — where third parties get a benefit from a bankruptcy they themselves aren’t going through.”

The case was brought by the DoJ's US Trustee Program, which lost in the Second Circuit when it tried to halt the Purdue bankruptcy and argued that the Sacklers themselves had to declare bankruptcy to discharge the claims against them.

Now the Supremes have hit pause on the bankruptcy the Second Circuit approved, and will hear the case themselves. It's only one step on a long road, but it's an unprecedented one. Some of the country's filthiest fortunes are riding on the outcome.

Going to Defcon this weekend? I’m giving a keynote, “An Audacious Plan to Halt the Internet’s Enshittification and Throw it Into Reverse,” tomorrow (Aug 12) at 12:30pm, followed by a book signing at the No Starch Press booth at 2:30pm!

https://info.defcon.org/event/?id=50826

I’m kickstarting the audiobook for “The Internet Con: How To Seize the Means of Computation,” a Big Tech disassembly manual to disenshittify the web and bring back the old, good internet. It’s a DRM-free book, which means Audible won’t carry it, so this crowdfunder is essential. Back now to get the audio, Verso hardcover and ebook:

http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/11/justice-delayed/#justice-redeemed

Image: Edwardx (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Serpentine_Sackler_Gallery,_June_2016_05.jpg

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

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starwarsmum · 2 months

Text

I made a thing! Just a silly drabble.

Alfred's Appreciation Party

Summary:

Just a fun little supposed-to-be crack fic.

The bat boys decide Alfred deserves to know how much they appreciate him and are throwing a party. Fluff ensues when Damian contacts an internet famous baker that Alfred likes and convinces her to come and cater the desserts for the party.

Notes:

Hi! Welcome to my first Daminette fic, inspired by the song "Bread" by Anya Nami.

It started as something that was supposed to be light and funny and then spiraled into a whole 10k word fic. I'm not really sure what happened, I think I was possessed. Hope you enjoy it!

I'm not sure how in-character everyone is, but I think I stayed fairly true. Either way, aging up a little means they've had time for growth, so I think it's a reasonable progression.

Bold is messages, italicised bold is in French.

“Tt, I already know what I shall be procuring for Alfred, I do not need your input, Todd.”

The boys were crowded around the dining table, Alfred having gone food shopping half an hour prior and they were trying to coordinate gifts for Alfred's upcoming appreciation party. Jason had been needling Damian about his usual efforts in gift-giving, and he was determined to do better for Alfred.

“Oh yeah, demon spawn? You sound mighty cocky, what's your plan?”

“For your information, I am awaiting a response from Alfred's favourite online baker, whom I shall convince to come and make his gift.”

“Oooh, sounds fancy. What, did you message them yesterday or something?” Jason was mocking him and Damian bristled, a sneer working across his face.

“Do you really think I would leave it so last minute, Todd? I messaged her 3 weeks ago, and it is just as well as she is yet to respond.”

The silence in the room was nearly absolute, the only sound being Tim's fingers tapping away on his laptop. If Damian was a lesser man, he would have fidgeted.

“Why are you giving me that look, Grayson?” Damian ground out, trying to rein in his irritation. Dick was perhaps the only person other than Alfred that Damian would like to impress with his thoughtfulness and it appeared as though he was failing.

“Baby bird, if you messaged her 3 weeks ago and she hasn't responded yet, I don't think she's going to.”

“Tt, this is ridiculous, she is well known for her friendly manner. Why would she not respond to my request?”

“Well, what did you send her?” Damian tutted again before pulling up the direct messages on his phone and turning it to face the others. They peered down, Jason choking back a snort and Dick glancing over at him in pity. It read:

Hello. I request your presence at a family event, to bake one of your masterpieces for my pseudo-grandfather. A timely response is advisable as the event in question is taking place in 8 weeks. Regards.

“...baby bird, this sounds like a bot.” Dick sounded exasperated and Damian huffed, snatching his phone back.

“How would you suggest one goes about requesting services via message? She is clearly a professional and therefore I have messaged accordingly.”

“I dunno, Dames, but it wouldn't be like this! You write like a stuffy 80 year old!”

“Jesus, demon spawn, don't you ever do anything like a human?” Jason added, half jokingly. Damian glared at him, making the taller man's grin widen.

“I do not see any of you coming up with something better.” Damian was already outside of his comfort zone, messaging a complete stranger even if it was for a service.

“I mean, I guess it depends how old this baker is. I wouldn't message the same thing to a 40-something year old as I would someone my age.” Tim said, interjecting to try and bring them back on point without a fight brewing.

“Elaborate, Drake.”

“Well, someone my age would probably work well with a funny meme or something but a 40 year old? Probably a cutesie video, especially if it's coming from someone as young as you.”

“Very well, Drake. How old do you believe her to be, based on her posts?” He knew that Tim was best versed in business, being co-CEO, and trusted him (in this) to give him the best advice.

“I mean, she's pretty proficient at her craft and she writes pretty professionally, but she also shared that whole bread meme thing, so…late 20s? Purely as a guess. I'd need to do more research to get an exact age but if I search it on the batcomputer, there's a higher chance of Bruce seeing it and it getting back to Alfred.”

“Tt, very well, we shall have to go with your initial assessment of late 20s then. What do you suggest I do to get a response?”

“I mean, you already tried to message once which means you need to prove you're not a bot…so a video maybe?”

“Drake, that sounds-” Damian was cut off by Dick, who squealed and bounced up in his seat.

“Like the best idea ever! Oh my god, Tim, you said she shared that bread song, right? Lil D should do a video with that song in it! It'll show he's paying attention, and prove he's a real person!”

“That's a bit of a leap, Dick, but it'll show he's not a bot I guess.” Tim had returned to being engrossed in his work, not bothering to spare any more time on Damian's problems.

“Didn't the original video have the singer in some kind of bread costume doing a dance? Damian, you should definitely do the dance! And then we can help you craft the message to send with it!”

“Grayson, I do not think that a damning video of me doing what I am sure is a demeaning dance is a good ide-” Damian said, beginning to get frustrated with his favourite older brother, only to get cut off again.

“Come on baby bird, this is for Alfred! I know none of us can do a cake justice and you've already started a conversation with this woman. You don't want his big day to be a flop, do you?” Dick’s eyes were wide and he had a slight pout. Damian sighed internally.

“Tt, fine. Show me this cursed video and I shall endeavor to replicate the dance.”

“That's the spirit, Demon Spawn.”

_ _ _

Damian sat in his room, glaring at the video paused on his laptop screen. It was just as horrendous as he had assumed it would be. How could anyone find this amusing, let alone a professional baker?

He scrolled further down the page, looking for any alternative videos that she seemed to enjoy but most everything else was professionally made cakes, breads and desserts. He was about to give up when he came across a post she had shared about an animal shelter and commented that she would be attending and providing goods for the charity event. He smiled slightly, a plan beginning to formulate.

_ _ _

Marinette was working on her latest masterpiece, a suit for Jagged which had an English theme - she had run with it a little, adding little embroidered crowns and clock towers. A few of her friends were there, working on various homework pieces and revision for tests, but they were working in amicable silence.

She stretched when a chime sounded from her phone, allowing her concentration to move over to it as she had finished a particularly stubborn section. Rolling her shoulders, she saw that someone had messaged her through her baking channel. She had set it up on the American part of the site so that she could spread her expertise further than France and it had been well received. She opened the message, frowning as she recognised the chat name as one she had received a suspicious message from just shy of a month before.

*video file attached

Greetings again. I have yet to hear back from you regarding my request for your services at my pseudo-grandfathers party. It has been brought to my attention that you may have believed my message to be a ‘bot’, which is not the case. I have attached a video of myself, and two of my pets, to prove that I am serious about requesting your services. I am now 1 month away from the family event and need to know whether you would be willing to come and prepare the aforementioned baked good(s). I look forward to your timely response.

Marinette sighed and clicked onto the video, after making sure it wasn't sending her to a different site. She raised her eyebrows as a familiar song started up and a tall Arabic boy (man? She couldn't tell but she thought he might be just slightly older than her) began to sing along. He looked uncomfortable but determined, a very attractive look for Marinette and her jaw dropped as a black and white cat sat regally beside him, its tail seeming to swish in time to the music. And then a great dane joined on ‘thick and fried’ which made Marinette giggle.

“Dupain-Cheng, I thought we agreed that you were not allowed to play that ridiculous song any more?” Chloe groaned, dropping her head into her hands as everyone else laughed.

“This is not my fault, Chlo!” Marinette squeaked, flushing and pausing the video. “I can't help it if someone else sends me the song! I was just trying to be responsible and check my messages for the baking channel I run.”

“Wait, someone other than you likes that song?” Alya said, leaning over to take a look. “Is that English? Why are you getting messages in English? Like you're not famous enough in France, you're spreading to America? Damn girl!”

Marinette giggled and shushed her, biting her lip as she read over the message, then silenced the sound on her phone so she could watch the video again without annoying her friends. She contemplated the message and decided to write back immediately, getting carried away in her enthusiasm for his video.

Oh my God, that video is my new fave thing!

How did you get your dog and cat to do that??

Wait, wait, sorry, I'm supposed to be professional on this profile, dammit.

Let me start over.

Hi! You were correct in guessing that I thought you were a bot, sorry about that. I would love to offer my services to you, but I will need to know what it is you want so that I can plan accordingly.

Also, there's not much on your profile, so I can't work out where I would be coming to? That's also kind of important information, so I can plan around my other commitments.

Damian hadn't expected her to answer so quickly but was pleased that the video had done as intended. He pondered how to continue the conversation before responding.

Thank you for your responses. I am based in Gotham, New Jersey and the event is being held at a local hall. Such an important event would normally be held at the manor but Alfred would become too aware and that would spoil the surprise.

Rose squealed, reading the messages over her shoulder, before turning to tell the others that Marinette was being commissioned for cakes in America. Everyone else started chattering at this point, excitement building as Alix counted forward the dates from when Marinette had received the messages.

“That means you'd be over there just before the end of November. We don't have any big tests or anything planned for then, do we?”

“Hn,” Marinette confirmed, still slightly in shock. Her mind was racing and she was already flying through some websites to look for cheap flights, and whether she would be able to take the baked goods from home or if she'd need to be there early for set up and baking itself. She found reasonably priced flights and a hotel near the airport that she could use, but that meant more traveling on the actual day…

New Jersey USA? Uh, sure, I mean, I am based in Paris, France so it'll be a little harder to get there but I think I can get some cheap tickets. When exactly is this event?

*picture attached

Please find all the relevant details on this invitation. The distance is of no consequence, if you are amenable. I can provide transport to and from the event, as well as somewhere to rest.

Okay, that sounds fine. Is there any chance we can change from a text conversation to a phone, or video call?

That sounds agreeable, is now convenient?

Marinette excused herself from the room, running her fingers through her hair and making sure it wasn't standing up on end as it tended to when she got too deep into her creative groove. She wanted to make sure she looked appropriately professional as this was technically a client call, even if it had started with a silly video.

When she was slightly calmer, she settled herself onto the kitchen stool, with the laptop on the bar and clicked the video call icon. It rang twice before connecting to a much darker room, the sun just beginning its path into the sky. Marinette gave a little squeak as a pair of green eyes connected with hers and she felt herself flush lightly.

“Greetings, my name is Damian. You are…much younger looking than my brothers and I had assumed.” The Arabic boy began, brow furrowed in thought.

“Oh, uh, hi, I'm Marinette! And, um, thank you? I mean, I'm nearly 18 but people do think I'm much younger. It's the height usually, I think.” She fidgeted slightly, wondering if he was going to change his mind. If he had thought her older, perhaps he was uncomfortable with having a seventeen-year-old work on such a big event.

“I did not intend to make you uncomfortable, my brothers and I merely thought you were older based on your skills and manner of conduct. But if you are not yet 18, I am not sure whether we are able to conduct business.” Damian's brow was still furrowed and Marinette struggled to get a read on him. She wasn't always great at reading boys, especially ones she found attractive- no, bad Marinette, stay on topic.

“Oh, no, that's fine, my honorary uncle has been commissioning me for things since I was 14 and he's based in America. And my parents are bakers, so I think they'd rather I'd rep them internationally.” She was babbling, but all of her words were coming out in the right order at least. She thanked every kwami in existence that she had been taking English lessons from Felix since she decided to go international with her brands.

“Excellent, then the next thing we will need to discuss is the actual request. Alfred is very important to our family and so I would like something equally special for this occasion.”

They chatted for half an hour, discussing Alfred's favourite foods, drinks and hobbies. Marinette gathered that whilst he wasn't a blood relation, he was important to Damian and that meant she needed to get this right if she wanted to impress him. Not that she wanted to impress Damian for any reason other than professionally!

When the call finally ended, Marinette promised to send him an email with her final designs for the desserts as well as an estimate on price. Once those were all finalised she would send him a list of ingredients she would need on the day. He in return would make sure her flights and accommodation were arranged and send her all the details for those.

As Marinette turned back towards her loft room, she saw the trap door snap shut and heard giggling. She groaned before going to face her friends. She glared at Alya and Rose, the two most likely to have been spying on her conversation with Damian and only got smirks back.

“So, he was cute,” Rose began, squealing when Marinette blushed. “I knew you thought so too! And his voice sounded so…” she sighed and waved her hands gently.

“Rose, he's a client,” began Marinette, turning resolutely back to her work station. She only had a few finishing touches to add to Jagged's suit, so she wanted to push through and finish it so she could turn all of her attention onto Damian's request. “Regardless of his voice, politeness or eyes, I am going to be professional and work on his commission without making a fool of myself, I hope.”

“His eyes, huh girl?” Alya interjected smugly, making Marinette flush again. “Let me guess, if you were distracted by his eyes, they must've been green, and he was super sunshine-y? You so have a type.”

“For your information, he was perfectly polite and not sunshine-y at all. So clearly I don't have a type-”

“Oh, so you are interested in him?” Alix piped up, glancing up from her maths homework. Seeing Marinette turn an evening deeper shade of red she chuckled before turning back to her work. “Whatever, I'm not interested in forcing you to admit it.”

Marinette grinned at her gratefully before turning the topic forcefully onto the coming week's events at school. There were a few more good-natured jokes but they all knew that Marinette did things in her own time. Even though she and Adrien hadn't worked out, she had managed to start dating him eventually and they had remained amicable even after the break-up.

_ _ _

“So, baby bird, did you get a response from the bakery woman? We've managed to book the entertainment, the rest of the catering, all the invitations are back so it's just the cake! We just need to know if we need to arrange an alternative.”

Dick had come to Damian's room and they were sitting on his bed whilst Damian groomed Titus. Damian had been chatting with Marinette regularly for the past 3 weeks and felt confident that come the following week, Alfred would be both surprised and pleased with his gift.

“Tt, that will be unnecessary, Grayson. She responded and I have arranged for her to come the day before and for her to have access to an adequate cooking space.” Damian gave Titus a final brush before ordering him to lie down. He turned back to Dick and pulled his phone towards himself. He could see the light indication showing that he had a new message, which he was sure would be from Marinette.

“Wow, seriously? Way to go lil D! Is she aware of the amount she'll need to bake? We, uh, kind of went overboard on the invites.”

“I have made all necessary arrangements, Grayson, I do not appreciate your lack of confidence,” he snapped back, a slight sneer curling his lips. His look softened however as he opened his chat to see the final designs of Alfred's desserts. He turned the phone so Dick could see them, huffing. “Do you see? Marinette has adequately captured the theme for the event and I have no doubt that she will be able to perform exceedingly well on the day. Was there anything else you required?”

_ _ _

Back in Marinette’s room, she was chatting on the phone, holding up the suit she had created so that it could be seen in all of its glory.

“Yes, uncle Jagged, I have your latest commission ready to go! I didn't realize you had another concert already, are you going on tour?”

“Rock n roll M! It looks awesome, better than I could've hoped. And nah, it's not really a concert, an old family friend is throwing a party for his butler and I grew up around him so I offered to rock the house for them.” Jagged gave her a thumbs up through the screen and played a riff on an imaginary guitar.

“He's throwing a party for his butler?” Marinette blinked several times, shooting him an incredulous look. She knew Jagged was eccentric but it sounded like his family friend was equally, I'd not more, so. She tried to imagine Chloe, even after she had made vast improvements to her personality, doing anything remotely nice for her butler and drew a blank.

“Well, he's more of a father for him since his own mom and pops passed away. Old Alfie P has been with the family forever and the kids decided he'd earned a little party. So I'm headed back to Gotham next week to rock out.” Marinette was nodding along to this until she did a double take.

“Wait, Gotham? You don't mean Alfred's appreciation party, do you?” No way, there was no way that Jagged was talking about Damian's party. She knew it wasn't his actual grandfather but he had spoken about the man with such warmth and affection that Marinette had assumed it was an old family friend that had been around enough that he was basically family. Like Jagged now was for Marinette.

“M, how the heck do you know about a party halfway round the world?” Jagged was laughing again, although he looked incredulous.

“Jagged, I'm making the party cake! I got a request from Damian ages ago, he's flying me over and putting me up for a couple of days so I can sort it out.” Flabbergasted, Marinette immediately started thinking about how she could avoid people making the MDC connection if Jagged was at the party too. She had no idea how popular he was in the states and didn't want to be outed before she turned 18.

“Well hell kid, small world I guess! Rock n roll, if you're gonna be there it'll be the party of the century!”

_ _ _

The flight had been long and Marinette struggled to sleep thanks to an older man snoring loudly only 2 seats from her. She was sorely regretting insisting that Damian only pay for standard seats instead of business but she hadn't wanted to take advantage. As the plane landed, she rushed to get her belongings and get out of there, hoping she wouldn't be too delayed by customs.

As she wheeled her carry-on suitcase through the arrivals area, Marinette could see the tall, dark and broody Arabic boy standing primly to the side. He held no sign but was wearing the agreed upon colours so she would be able to spot him easily. She felt her heartbeat pick up as he spotted her and clipped a nod in her direction and she let a smile spread across her face.

“Hi Damian, thanks for picking me up, this airport is bigger than I expected! And you are way taller than I thought you'd be.”

“Tt, I imagine you think that of many people. You are much more petite than I had assumed as well.”

“Wow, rude! I'm just compact,” Marinette laughed, before taking his proffered elbow delicately with her hand. She felt how tense he was

“Apologies, I merely-”

“I'm kidding, Damian, I know I'm short. But you're still way hotte- taller, way taller than I thought you'd be.” She blushed at her slip, looking away, missing the slight pink tinge making its way across his own features, though she did feel how he relaxed and allowed herself a moment of relief.

“Ahem, yes, well, we should make our way to the car, my acquaintance is likely growing bored.” He had taken hold of her suitcase and wheeled it along. She beamed at him again, embarrassment pushed aside by the news of meeting one of his friends.

“Oh, sure, let's go! Do I get a name for this ‘acquaintance’ of yours, or do I have to guess?” she said teasingly, watching as he rolled his eyes but allowed his mouth to upturn slightly.

“Tt, Kent is of no importance, you need not concern yourself with acquainting yourself with him. You will likely have to interact with many imbeciles in the next 24 hours, there is little point in beginning your torment early.”

“Kent, huh?”

_ _ _

“Hi there! So you're the mysterious baker from France that Dames has been chatting with. Did you have a good flight?” Another tall, dark-haired boy was leaning against the car, although he was much more smiley than Damian. Marinette smiled up at him and extracted her hand from Damian's elbow to offer it for a handshake

“And you must be Damian's acquaintance, Kent! The flight was okay, just very long. I'm very relieved to be back on the ground for the next 24 hours.” The boy’s grin widened and he took her fingers in a light grip. He shot a hurt look at Damian, although I was tempered with exasperation.

“Acquaintance? Damian, buddy, that hurts.”

“Tt, your feelings are of no consequence to me, Kent. If it were not for the fact that Alfred cannot know of this collection, I would not have involved you.” Damian had looked away and Marinette stifled a giggle. She was trying very hard not to find him overwhelmingly attractive but it was cute when he squabbled with his friend.

“Wow, just wow. I'm gonna tell Dick that you were mean to me again, and in front of company as well!” Damian opened his mouth to say something scathing but Marinette felt it was time to get them back on track.

“Sorry to interrupt, but it really has been a long day for me, any chance we can wrap this up and head on over to my uncle's place? I already messaged him to say I'd landed.”

“Of course, allow me to take your luggage and settle yourself into the car, please.” Damian immediately opened the trunk and slid her suitcase in. He then held open the back door for her before gently closing it. Jon was shooting him a raised eyebrow over the top of the car but he chose to ignore it, settling himself into the front passenger seat.

But in spite of this, he couldn't help the red tinge to his neck and ears that crept slowly and stayed for the duration of the drive.

_ _ _

Marinette had spent most of the morning prepping in the kitchen of the party hall. She had known there were going to be quite a few guests but the size of the hall had still shocked her. But once she was in the groove of baking, she had forgotten about what she was baking for.

So when Jagged and Penny showed up, early so that he could put on the suit she had made and set up, she was once again blown away by the grandeur, as well as by the decorations which had appeared in the interim.

“Wow, this is a gorgeous set up! And that backdrop is exactly Jagged’s style! Penny, did you see the backdrop?”

“Yes, Marinette, I saw. The tables for the cakes are through here.” Penny was smiling indulgently, much as she did when Jagged was getting overexcited, as she steered the younger woman towards a group of ridiculously attractive men. They all had dark hair, although their ages seemed to range slightly, and Marinette was relieved to see Damian standing with them.

“Oh my God, lil D, is this her? The baker? She's so adorable! And tiny!” The oldest looking one positively bounced towards her, holding out a hand that she accepted gracefully.

“Hi, I'm Marinette and this is Penny. Are you another of the hosts for this evening?”

“Eep! Too cute! I think I'm gonna combust.” Dick felt like a tensed up coil, practically vibrating with enthusiasm as Damian maneuvered himself beside the tiny French girl and glared at him.

“Tt, Grayson, calm yourself. Yes, Marinette is the baker and Penny is her aunt. We still need to set up so if you are capable, you can carry some of the boxes through from the car.” He continued to glare at Dick, although it only seemed to make his grin wider, before Marinette interjected.

“Thanks Damian, but we can do it ourselves. I'm sure he has plenty of other things to be getting on with.” Marinette beamed up at Damian and he relented, huffing. Dick's smile only grew until he was beaming too, watching as his baby brother took hold of the girl’s shoulders and began steering her away from them all.

“Tt, then he should be getting on with them, whilst we finish preparing your uncle’s set.” Jason and Tim eyeballed Damian as well, although they were still fairly engrossed in their heated debate over which of Jagged's songs he would be playing that night.

_ _ _

“Rock n roll, M! Those cakes look incredible, and the macarons are perfect. And the suit fits perfectly, just like always!” Jagged hung himself over Marinette's small frame for a moment before removing himself and draping an arm over Penny's shoulder.

“Jagged, please, you're embarrassing me!” She flushed, burying her face in her hands as Jagged chortled and Penny smiled. She was smiling though, she knew the cakes looked incredible, macarons arranged by colour to make a picture of Alfred’s face, a cake in the shape of Buckingham Palace, which Marinette had been reliably informed was where he had worked in his youth and an assortment of sweet and savoury scones.

“Nonsense, Rockette, you should be proud of what you've done! Penny, isn't Marinette just too shy of how good she does?” Jagged ruffled a hand through Marinette's hair, making her squawk and flap his hand away.

“You really are, Marinette, Jagged wouldn't have such an iconic look if not for you.” Penny chided, pulling Jagged's hand away herself as they were approached by Dick and Jason.

“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God! You're Jagged Stone! Like, really, actually Jagged Stone! Jason, did you see who's here?” Dick was flapping again, bouncing up onto his toes and gesturing wildly.

“Shi-”

“Language Jay-bird! There are cute little ears around,” he said, gesturing to Marinette, who pouted adorably.

“Believe me, I've both heard and said worse. There's a reason people say ‘excuse my French', Grayson,” she snarked back, folding her arms across her chest.

“Oh, please, call me Dick, Grayson is just what lil D calls me. My name's Dick Grayson,” he said, ignoring her attitude.

“Wait, does the little French chick know Demon Spawn? How? Isn't she way too sweet to be anywhere near him?” Jason eyeballed her, taking in her messy hair, jeans and apron.

“Marinette here is the dessert caterer for the evening! And she makes it possible for me to be on stage, like, ever,” Jagged said, nodding sagely. He was beaming with pride.

“Oh, does she provide you with snacks or something? You must be older than you look, those cakes are perfect,” Jason said, complimenting her whilst also fishing for information.

“Hmmm? Oh, yeah, little M’s in her last year of high school, loads of people think she's in her first though. But my niece is killing it, especially since old hawky got caught.”

“Jagged, don't you need to set up? Maybe do a practice song?” Marinette started prodding him towards the stage, trying to get them off of the embarrassing topic. “Sorry about him, he tends to get a bit dramatic,” she said, rolling her eyes as he finally sauntered away.

“You know he only does it because you sell yourself short, Marinette.”

“Penny.”

“What? You know, you'll be 18 soon, you'll need to come out with your brand if you want to make it more global. Commission-only might not work so well.”

“Wait, I'm confused, won't you just open a bakery when you graduate?” Dick looked confused, his gaze bouncing between the two.

“Bakery? No, Marinette’s a fashion designer. Baking is what her parents do, which is why she's so good at it. Her parents would need to disown her if she hadn't started learning as soon as she could walk,” Penny said, laughing at the mix-up.

“Oh, really? What sort of things do you design?” So sue him, Jason was increasingly curious about the kid.

“Well, everything I wear tends to be my own design and I make accessories too.” Marinette looked away, hedging around the conversation guiltily.

“Marinette, you're still selling yourself short! What she's not saying is that Jagged wears her brand exclusively on stage. Honestly, I think he'll be wearing her brand until he retires.” Penny's eyes gleamed as Jason's jaw dropped and he whirled to face Marinette fully.

“Wait. Wait wait wait. Wait. Are you telling me that you, small sunshine child, baker extraordinaire and that has been chatting with Demon Spawn, are MDC?!” he shouted, making several heads turn their way before continuing with party prep.

“I mean, my name is Marinette Dupain-Cheng, so it's literally my initials,” Marinette shrugged, cringing slightly. “I plan on going bigger with my brand once I'm out of school though.”

“Then why on earth are you here as a baker? Oh man, Timmy's gonna freak, he's been searching for MDC’s identity for literal years.”

“I mean, I have socials, why didn't he message me?” Marinette asked, bewildered. Whilst she wouldn't have shared her identity with an internet stranger, she would have been fine to take on a commission.

“Tt, because Drake is a caffeine addict who doesn't use his intelligence appropriately. I assume he only attempted to find your data instead of opening a dialogue.” Damian appeared at Marinette's shoulder, gently touching her elbow to get her attention. “I assume you would like to change before the event begins, Marinette? It will not be long before the guests begin to arrive.”

Marinette startled when she saw the time, cursing under her breath in French which made Dick and Jason raise their eyebrows, and Penny to laugh. Excusing herself, she started to pull the rest of her bun loose as she walked away, hastily untying her apron as she disappeared through another door.

_ _ _

The party was in full swing, Alfred having been suitably surprised and bashfully appreciative of their efforts. He had personally thanked all of the boys under his care - all of them, Bruce included, would always be boys to him - and mingled with old friends and family acquaintances alike.

Damian didn't smile at the result, but he did feel a deep-seated sense of satisfaction. He had already heard Alfred commenting that the dessert looked wonderful, and he was looking forward to telling his pseudo-grandfather that he had arranged for his favourite online baker to make them personally.

He spied Marinette near the stage where Jagged was crooning an old song, apparently from his earlier work. She looked beautiful, wearing a red dress that ended just above the knee, her black shoes comfortable but not visibly well-worn. She had redone her hair into an intricate bun, leaving her shoulders and neck bare. He flushed lightly as he caught himself following the lines of her neck, up to her sparkling smile.

He decided to make his way over to her, noting that she was chatting with Kent again. He was unreasonably pleased that she seemed to be getting along with his friend, although he hoped that they weren't getting along too well. “Marinette?”

“Hm? Yes, Damian?” She turned her smile towards him and he blinked as his heart stuttered. Jon gave him a curious look but he ignored him.

“I would like to introduce you to Alfred, as the main reason I sought you out is because he is a fan of yours. Would this be acceptable?” He offered his arm once more, trying not to preen when she took it without hesitation.

“Sure thing, Damian! Jon was just telling me about some of your pets, but I'm sure we can pick back up on that later?” She smiled back at Jon, flushing happily at how well her evening was going. She had mostly outgrown her awkward teenage phase so whilst taking hold of Damian's arm made her heart thrum pleasantly, she wasn't a stuttering mess.

“Tt, if you wish to know about my animals, I shall be more than happy to introduce you after this event,” Damian said, unreasonably pleased once again that she had been talking about him.

“Really? Awesome! Then I guess I'll see you around Jon, thank you for keeping me company.” She allowed him to pull her away, giving a small wave to a grinning Jon as she went. She leaned in to Damian conspiratorially and whispered, “So, how do I look? I don't want to meet your pseudo-grandfather looking messy.”

“Alfred will not comment on your appearance, regardless, but…you look…well put together.” He flushed slightly as his gaze flicked down and over her, making her skin buzz. She bit the inside of her cheek and refrained from squealing at the almost compliment. She had spent enough time chatting with him over the phone to know that true compliments were rare and he very much understated things.

“Oh, uh, thank you. You look well put together too,” she said, pulling slightly away without letting go of his arm. They were approaching Alfred, whom she recognised from the picture Damian had sent her in preparation for the macaron art.

“Tt. Marinette, this is Alfred. Alfred, this is Marinette, she is responsible for the desserts this evening. You may know her better by her online handle 'dc.boulangerie’.” Damian was a little stiff, feeling self-conscious even though he was only introducing her as the evening's dessert chef. It felt more momentous than it should and Damian felt an unusual amount of pressure building up inside of him. He wanted Alfred to like Marinette, and he had wanted to be the one to introduce her, whatever that meant for him.

“It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss Marinette. I have been a long time admirer of your baking. I would enjoy having a conversation with you at a more appropriate time and venue.” Damian let out a breath as Alfred inclined his head towards her respectfully and he felt himself relax.

“Well, Damian invited me to meet his pets, assuming you all live together, I'm sure we can find time to chat,” Marinette said, squeezing Damian's elbow gently as she leaned towards him. The conversation continued lightly and Marinette allowed herself to reciprocate Damian's dry humour, startling a chuckle from Alfred and a warm eye roll from Damian.

_ _ _

A short distance away, Jason, Tim and Dick were watching the pair with interest. Jason commented on it as Bruce joined them. “So…we all see Demon Spawn flirting with the French Pixie, right?”

"It's so adorable! And did you see him blush? I wish I'd caught it on camera.” Dick was watching them with a sappy grin on his face, squealing as Damian leaned down and murmured something in the girl's ear.

“Are we sure we weren't all dosed with something? Cos this is freaky. Either that or the world's ending,” Jason said, eyeing them more warily than any of the others. He grunted a hello as the Kent family came to join them.

“Well, you might be able to get something on camera next time Dick - he invited her to meet the other Alfred as well,” Jon said, not bothering with any preamble. He was both smug and floored that his best friend was showing interest in a girl - especially one as cute and friendly as Marinette.

“No way, he set up a second date? That's so smooth! Bruce, have you been teaching him how to talk to girls?” Dick was practically vibrating at this point, beaming at Bruce now.

“Dick, I wasn't even aware he was inviting Miss Dupain-Cheng this evening. Do you mean to tell me nobody here has been giving him pointers?” As everyone either shook their heads or gave a sound of derision (Jason), Bruce hummed thoughtfully. “Well, perhaps he's better socialised than we give him credit for.”

“No, that can't be it, he threatened a girl at school just last week for getting too close to his locker. It must just be Marinette, she's a total sunshine bomb on him.” Jon was cocking his head slightly as he very obviously (to them) eavesdropped on Damian’s conversation.

“Well, I think I’ll go and introduce myself and see it firsthand,” Bruce said, clapping a hand on Clark's shoulder in a friendly manner.

“I'll come with you, Bruce, Jason said something about her having an in with my favourite designer,” Tim said, as enthusiastically as he could manage with how tired he clearly was, before they made their way over to the pair in question. Marinette was speaking animatedly, clearly in the middle of a very entertaining story as Alfred had a small smile.

“...and that's when everything went downhill! I mean, who thought it was a good idea to put those colours, with that fabric?” Those around Marinette laughed out loud, even Damian giving a short bark. Tim and Bruce watched as Marinette smiled up at him, clearly delighted that she had produced that sound from him.

“Alfred, are you having a good evening?” Bruce and Tim had finally reached the small group, making their way to Alfred first and foremost. The older gentleman inclined his head to both of them individually as Damian leaned down once again to murmur something in Marinette's ear.

“Good evening, Master Bruce. It has been splendid, I must confess that I had not expected such a grand event for me.” Alfred was also eyeing Marinette and Damian, who had seemed lost in their own little world for the moment, although Damian proved he was listening when he rolled his eyes and responded.

“Tt, Alfred, that was the point of the evening. If you had expected it-”

“What Damian means is, you're welcome Monsieur Alfred. Honestly, Damian, can't you hear a compliment for what it is?” Marinette chided him, making him grimace in good humour. At some point during her story, she had let go of his elbow to gesture and his hand had found its way to her opposite hip and he gave her a gentle squeeze.

“...I am glad you are having a good evening, Alfred. Father, Drake, this is Marinette Dupain-Cheng. She is responsible for the dessert catering this evening.”

“I'm Tim, and you must be the person with the connection to MDC! You're wearing an original of theirs this evening, aren't you?” Tim barrelled into the conversation intent on only one thing, making a pained expression cross Bruce's face.

“Ah, yes, Jason mentioned that you've been trying to track down Jagged’s personal designer for a while. What is it you want from her?” Marinette sounded politely bemused and Damian had to cough to cover a snort that tried to escape him.

“So you do know them! Oh my god, I can't believe I might know who they are soon! Okay, so, I've been hoping to commission a piece for the next Wayne gala.” Where he had seemed half asleep before now, Tim was wide awake and buzzing with anticipation.

“Oh, is that a big event?” Marinette asked, frowning slightly when they all turned to look at her in astonishment. She raised an eyebrow delicately at Tim, waiting for him to elaborate.

“Do…do you not know who the Waynes are?” Tim sounded dumbfounded and he was looking at Damian, who was looking uncomfortable suddenly, rather than Marinette. She glanced at Damian before responding.

“I mean, I live in Paris? I'm guessing they're American celebrities. And if they aren't a big name in fashion, I'm not really interested in celebrity gossip. I take it they're a big deal over here?”

“I'm surprised Damian hasn't mentioned them, at least once, given how vain he can be,” Bruce said drily, causing his only blood son to glare at him.

“Tt, that's enough, father. If I had thought it relevant or worth mentioning, I would have. Marinette, you said you wished to continue your conversation with Kent earlier, is that still something you desire?”

“Sure, it's been a pleasure to meet you, Alfred and I'll look forward to chatting with you tomorrow! If your kitchen is big enough, maybe we can do some baking together?”

“Our kitchen is of an adequate size and appropriately stocked. I shall look forward to it.”

Marinette gives a goodbye to Bruce and Tim before placing her hand back into the crook of Damian's arm and strolling away with him.

“Well, that was interesting. How did Damian get in touch with Miss Dupain-Cheng? She doesn't seem like someone he would normally spend time with.” Bruce was slightly blown away with the interaction: since when had Damian been willing to get to know other people?

“I mean, actually, he spends most of his time with Jon, and she seems a lot like a smaller version of him.”

“Yes, but he still complains about spending time with Jon, even if he doesn't mean it, whereas that? He was polite, let her touch him and chose to walk with her instead of dismissing her to get her away from us. And, apparently, he didn't tell her his last name. I would just like to know how he came to be acquainted with her.”

“Oh no!” At Tim's sudden outburst Alfred moved towards him, alarmed.

“What's wrong, Master Tim?”

“She didn't tell me how she knows MDC!”

_ _ _

Across the room, Jon glanced over at the trio before turning back to Marinette and Damian. “So anyway, Marinette, Damian never told me how you two met!”

“It isn't a very interesting story, I'm afraid,” Marinette said ruefully. “He messaged me on my baking socials, and then we did a couple of calls. Et, c’est l’histoire.”

“So Damian successfully navigated an online message? Well enough to get you to fly over from France for a single event?” Jon was amazed, Damian didn't really use social media, and he certainly didn't message strangers on the internet.

“Oh, no, he most definitely did not! I read his first message, he sounded like a bot and she ignored him.” Dick sounded gleeful as he pushed himself into the conversation. “So we told him he should send a follow up with a video to prove he wasn't a bot.”

“Mon dieu, so you're the reason for the video! I thought it was out of character for him after speaking with him for a while. I must thank you Dick, that video was the highlight of my year.” Marinette looked delighted and bounced onto the balls of her feet as she shook Damian's arm.

“Wait, you actually did the video?! How come I never got to see it, lil D?” Dick looked offended, pouting at Damian. Jon laughed aloud, quickly covering his mouth to stifle it.

“Tt, because I only chose to embarrass myself for Alfred, not for your amusement. Marinette, I forbid you to share it with these cretins, or I shall be forced to rescind my invitation to the manor tomorrow.” Damian sounded annoyed but his neck and ears were red again, making Marinette giggle as she patted his arm.

“Alright, Damian, I won't share the video with your brothers this evening. I want to meet Titus and Alfred junior far too much to risk making you my enemy.” Damian allowed his mouth to turn up at one corner before he fixed his face back to neutral.

“Excellent. Which reminds me, we should arrange a suitable time for me to collect you tomorrow.” He had leaned back down to her, making it more intimate and she flushed again, although she managed to keep the conversation going.

“I can make my own way to you if you give me the address! It doesn't make sense for you to come and collect me if we are only going to return to your home.” She whisper argued back to him, her head leaning back so she could glare playfully into his face. It was entertaining, if a little bewildering. More bewildering was when Marinette was knocked slightly sideways by a purple haired man.

“Little M! My mate Brucie invited us to lunch tomorrow at his house, you're not flying back til the next morning, are you Rockette?”

“Jagged! Tu m’as fait peur! Oui, I am not flying until the day after tomorrow but Damian has already invited me to spend the day with him. You will have to go with Penny I'm afraid.” Marinette was holding her hand over her chest whilst Damian had a hand hovering nearby to her. Whilst she calmed down, Jagged threw himself back over her shoulders with a slight whine.

“Aw, c’mon Marinette, it's not every day you get to spend the day with Bruce Wayne! He's got connections which could help boost your brand, way better than I ever could. I know you do more than just my style so I can't be the only one repping you around here.”

“Mon dieu, alright, Damian, would it be alright to visit with you in the evening? We could have dinner together. I will just have to check with Monsieur Alfred in regards to his schedule.” Marinette turned towards him apologetically only to see a pained expression crossing his face again.

“Wait a second, Dames, does Marinette not know your full name?” Dick sounded delighted again, throwing his arm around Damian’s shoulders. Damian huffed angrily and jabbed Dick in the ribs to make him get off.

“Jesus, Demon Spawn, did you forget to introduce yourself to her? Normally it's the first thing you say. Or, well, the only thing you say.” Jason had a smarmy grin and he stayed just outside of stabbing reach, which Damian found irritating.

“It was not relevant, Todd,” Damian bit out, his jaw tight. Marinette looked at him concerned for a moment before the confusion on her face cleared up.

“Ah, I see why Tim was confused as well now. I take it you are a Wayne, Damian? I understand, many celebrities choose not to use their last names before getting to know someone.” Marinette shrugged delicately and took hold of Damian's hand.

“Rockette, are you telling me you flew halfway around the world to a party without knowing who you were with? Hardcore.” Jagged looked impressed which made Jason snort, breaking the tension again.

“It would hardly be the first time, Jagged. Marinette told me the story of when she first met Adrien, she-” Marinette squawked and flapped her free hand at Penny to quiet her.

“Merde, yes, thank you, Penny! I very much doubt everyone here needs to hear every embarrassing thing I have done. I have already explained to Damian that I don't follow American celebrities. The Waynes are not in fashion, yes?” She peered up at Damian with a grimace.

“Well, no, but they do have a hand in almost everything else. You're friends with Max, how do you not know Wayne Enterprises?” Marinette groaned at Penny, bringing her hand back to her face. She stood like that for a moment until she whined again, turning to bury her face into Damian's arm.

“Wait, so Bruce Wayne is from Wayne Enterprises? That's why Felix was laughing so much when I told him about the party! Oh, I will never live this down!”

That made everyone laugh and Marinette glared around at them all. She was muttering obscenities under her breath again, as she ran her hand through her fringe. She blushed as Damian squeezed her hand, before fucking it back into the crook of his elbow. Jason nudged Dick, motioning his head towards the pair which would normally make Damian glared at them, but it seemed as though he was too occupied.

_ _ _

Marinette nervously straightened out her shirt, checking her hair. She had 5 minutes before Damian arrived and she had been ready for at least 20 minutes already. He had told her to dress in her jeans today so she had paired it with a long sleeved green peasant blouse that she had made after the first time she video chatted with Damian. The fabric reminded her of his eyes, not that she admitted it to anyone.

When Damian arrived on a motorcycle, Marinette felt her face burst into flames. She had known he was attractive before - it was impossible not to know, he was over 6 feet of muscle - but his long legs flicking over the back of the bike before he sauntered over to her? That reverted her back to a stuttering mess, and she felt 14 years old all over again, instead of the confident, capable 17 year old she had been around him so far.

She remained unable to say a complete sentence to him, even as he handed her a spare helmet and helped her into a jacket. Then she sat behind him, holding tightly and feeling his chest moving with every breath. He wove through traffic expertly and she felt safe leaned against him, his warmth seeping into her on the chilly November morning. It was lucky it was dry, the air crisp and whipped against her clothes.

They pulled up to Wayne manor and Marinette temporarily forgot about how gorgeous Damian looked in the face of the enormous mansion. She swore softly, eyes wide as they removed their helmets.

“Mon dieu, I thought manor meant, like, gah, un maison? But this? C'est un château! Damian, mon cher, how do you find anything!?” The endearment slipped out of her but she was too amazed by the manor to notice.

“Tt, it is not as grand as you are making it. It has been in the family for many years, although it was rebuilt after the earthquake. But if you are uncomfortable, we can forgo lunch with my family and find somewhere quieter-” Damian was almost rambling, she thought, as well as slyly trying to get out of the family meal. His cheeks were dusted in pink at her slip and he found he did not want to share her time with the rest of his family.

“Of course not, Uncle Jagged would not forgive me if I failed to attend. Penny would be disappointed too, and I cannot stand when she is disappointed. Besides, if I want to spend more time with you, I shall just have to adjust. And…I am sure I would like to spend more time with you.” Marinette’s own cheeks reddened as she said this, stealing a glance to see the flush spreading up Damian's neck.

“I would like to spend more time with you also,” Damian said softly, offering his hand which she took gratefully. “Alfred has asked that we visit with him first, and then after lunch I shall take you to meet Alfred the cat, Titus and perhaps we shall take a walk so you can meet my turkey and my cow.”

“Will you be staying with me whilst I cook with Alfred? I would hate to have to try and find you in this giant house.” She tugged on his hand gently until he began leading her inside. Despite Damian's insistence that the manor was not as big as she was proclaiming, Marinette was awestruck by the gothic interior designs and knew that once she had her sketchbook available, she would be designing many new items. Perhaps she would talk to Jagged about a more gothic theme for his next show, or maybe she would make something for Juleka…

Time passed quickly in the kitchen with Alfred, friendly chatter and expert advice both given and received. Damian. Sat quietly to the side, sketching in his own workbook and adding his thoughts every now and again. Marinette couldn't forget that he was there but she did feel a fresh blush steal over her every time she looked towards him. Luckily, Alfred said nothing about it, perhaps not wanting to embarrass the young woman and man.

Eventually, everything was cooking, so Damian set aside his book and fully joined their conversation, starting a friendly debate about the merits of vegetarianism. The time passed even more quickly when Alfred announced that they should take their seats in the dining room as both Jagged and Penny should be arriving soon and the others would then make their way for lunch too.

As it turned out, Jagged had arrived about an hour before this and had been chatting with Bruce and the other boys as they were huge fans. He took the admiration on the chin, chatting amiably with them until Tim woke up enough to remember that he still didn't know who MDC was.

“What're you talking about mate, you met MDC last night!” Jagged exclaimed, slightly bemused when Tim went bug eyed. “Little Rockette is my one and only designer, Timmy. She has a wicked sense of style, she even made my suit last night.”

“Wait, Damian's new girlfriend is my favourite designer?! How has he hidden this from me?” Tim wailed, turning to the door as Damian and Marinette stepped through it. “How long have you known? Why wouldn't you tell me?”

“Tt, first of all, Drake, I was not aware that she did fashion until last night. Secondly, Marinette pointed out to me yesterday that I contacted her with relative ease and she has social accounts as MDC. Therefore, you should have contacted her yourself. Do not hold others to blame for something you brought upon yourself.”

There was silence for several minutes while Tim stared slack jawed at Damian. And then Penny stage whispered to Marinette, “I see why you like him, Mari. Do I need to have a talk with him?”

“Penny,” Marinette hissed, swatting her whilst everyone else laughed. “Oh, sure, laugh it up, everybody laughs at Marinette.” She pouted and crossed her arms, which made Damian glare at them, which only made them laugh harder.

_ _ _

After lunch, Damian led Marinette around the manor grounds, Titus on his leash, so that Marinette could meet Jerry the turkey and Batcow the…cow. She had giggled adorably when Dick had mentioned the name of the cow and promised that she didn't think less of him for naming his pet after a hero.

“Tt, Batman is a vigilante, not a hero. And if there had not been a batsymbol on her side, it would never have occurred to me to name her Batcow,” he said, grumbling. She giggled again, walking on the other side of Titus. Damian would never admit to it, but he wished he had offered her the leash so that he could walk next to her.

After the visit to his other pets, Damian led her back to the manor, releasing Titus from his leash and ordering him back to his room. Marinette cooed over him for another minute before reluctantly letting him leave. They chatted comfortably about different pets they wanted, which led into their future plans.

Whilst Damian didn't want the day to end, he reluctantly took her back to her hotel, with the promise to pick her up in the morning as her ride to the airport. As he walked her to the door of the hotel, Marinette screwed up her courage and pulled him down for a kiss on the cheek. Blushing furiously, she stammered a goodbye before rushing into the hotel.

Damian stood dumbfounded for more than a few seconds before shaking it off and climbing onto his bike with a small smile on his face.

_ _ _

“Thanks for everything, Damian. I wish I didn't have to head home so soon but what with lycée, I can't afford to stay any longer. But we can stay in touch, right?”

They were standing before the departure gates in the airport, Damian holding the handle of her suitcase whilst Marinette fiddled with her handbag strap. Her courage from the night before had fled in the morning light. As he handed over her suitcase, reluctantly, he grasped her hand tightly. He smiled as a blush worked across her face.

“Of course, Marinette, I shall await your message to say you have landed safely. I am certain we can find time to meet again before Christmas. Father has been saying that I should travel more to learn about his business and there is a Wayne Enterprises branch in Paris…”

“Then a bientôt, mon cher, I will let you know once the plane lands and when I get home.” Marinette felt emboldened with her hand in his and placed her other on his cheek. She brushed a kiss to his cheek, lingering slightly.

Unlike the night before, Damian retained some of his faculties and firmly placed his hand on her own cheek before leaning in to kiss her gently on the lips. Marinette froze momentarily, making Damian freeze and start to pull back before she flung her arms around his neck to pull him closer and kiss him back enthusiastically.

The end

#Daminette #maribat #damian x marinette #my first fic #after i couldn't find the fic i wanted i got possessed by something i made an entirely different fic #i did this in 2 days #so its probably not great #but i enjoyed it #so maybe yall will too #daminette fanfic #im not joking i was possessed #my partner says hes gonna read this but i dont think he will #he doesnt really DO romance #lmao #ao3 fanfic #ao3

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air-exec · 2 months

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What life is like on a troop train...

(Life Magazine - November 13, 1943)

What life is like on a troop train… speeding over the Water Level Route

This is "Main 100"… a twelve car troop train…identified on railroad orders only by its code number.

A few hours ago, no one at New York Central knew this train would be needed. Yet here it is, assembled, scheduled and speeding to its secret destination.

Sometimes "Main 100" is all Pullman, sometimes all coach, sometimes a mixture of passenger cars, baggage cars, and freight cars for equipment. But whatever its make up, its job is the same…to move its share of the 2,000,000 members of the armed forces carried on duty each month by the railroads of America.

Visualize the thousands of cars and engines required for this task. Add on the large number of accommodations needed for fighters on furlough. You'll see then why train space for civilian travel is often "sold out"…why trains are sometimes unavoidably delayed…and why civilians should travel only on urgent and essential business.

"Main 100" must have the right of way.

Field Kitchen The Mess Sergeant, an Army Cooking School grafuate, sets up his field kitchen in a baggage car to serve 3 or 4 troop cars. That's what many baggage cars are doing. So if you must travel, travel light!

Mess Call Men eat at their seats. On some trains they file up to the kitchen to be served; on others, food is brought to them. Meals are tops and plentiful. One reason why your home and our diners are rationed.

First Aid In one of the washrooms, the Army Surgeon sets up a "field hospital" for minor accidents or ills. His prompt care of scratches and colds keeps our fighters among world's fittest

G.H.Q. on Wheels From these "headquarters," the Train Commander orders the time for reveille and taps…the posting of guards…all the details of this traveling Army camp, of which he alone knows the final destination.

Railroad Liaison A New York Central Passenger Agents acts as "Train Escort" to assist the Train Commander with transportation matter…procure extra supplies…arrange for stops…handle mail…and perform may other services en route.

Music By The Mile The soldier with a portable radio competes with the local "live talent." Barrack room ballads and current hits share honors with "Sweet Adeline" and other old close-harmony favorites by the company quartet.

Preparing For Taps Men are usually allowed later hours en route than in camp. At the time set by the Train Commander, the Porter makes up the berths…as carefully as he would for the most generous traveler on a limited train.

V-Mail Soldiers long for letters, and write many to get answers. For secrecy's sake, none many be mailed en route…except through the Train Escort who posts them only at points permitted by the Train Commander.

39 Men To A Car Soldiers sleep two in a lower berth, one in an upper. Even with such full cars, today's military movement needs half of the Pullman's, a third of the coaches. One reasons you may find train space hard to get.

Seeing America Soldiers spend much time at car windows. They are moved an average of six times for special training…seeing the Hudson River and Great Lakes one trip, perhaps the Rockies or California next.

BUY MORE WAR BONDS

New York Central ONE OF AMERICA'S RAILROADS - ALL UNITED FOR VICTORY!

#wwii era #wwiii #life magazine #journalism #history #wwii history #us military

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caesariawritesstuff · 5 months

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Friend

Summary: Edward Nigma isn't one for making friends. But you can't help but feel like there's a small sliver of friendship developing between the two of you.

Content Warning: Platonic Relationships

Word Count: 1.3k

● Ao3 ● X ● Retrospring ● Read on Ao3 ● Masterlist ●

The Iceberg Lounge was crowded. A sea of people wandered around, drinks in hand as they swayed to the rhythm of the music. In the center of the room was a large pool of water, an iceberg at the center, complete with penguins waddling about. Normally, you would’ve enjoyed the sight. But tonight was different. You weren’t good with crowds. There was always too much small talk, too much noise, too much of everything. A nervous knot twisted in your stomach, and you shifted in your seat, glancing at Edward beside you.

He sat back in his chair, a bored look on his face, one hand balancing between his cane and his chin. His green suit was vibrant and pristine, his Bowler hat not a hair out of place. But unlike you, you knew he only hated being here because it was dull, because he believed his mind better than engaging in such formal social events. But, you’d been the one to encourage him to come. Being invited to the Iceberg Lounge on account of Oswald Cobblepot’s latest victorious heist was one you didn’t think Edward should pass up – not when he’d supplied Cobblepot with a special device that let his goons bypass several high-tech security systems. Edward got his cut of the money, of course.

You reached forward, grabbing your glass of wine and taking a small sip. The sweet taste of citrus and lemon notes exploded on your tongue. Your gaze slid back to Edward; he didn’t normally drink, but tonight there was a glass tumbler resting on the table in front of him.

“How much longer do we have to stay here?” he asked.

“Just a little longer,” you assured him, but it felt like you were telling yourself more. Unlike him, you made your way in the criminal underworld by talking to people face-to-face in business deals, trading your own information for their services. But talking to people face-to-face about what you knew and felt comfortable with was very different than being in a room filled with people.

“I can’t believe I let you drag me here,” he sighed, looking a bit like a child forced to attend Sunday church services. “I can feel my synapses melting away.”

“Oh, stop,” you shushed him, smiling. He glanced at you, but the very hint of a smile twitched at the corner of your mouth.

“Very well, I suppose I can deal with this for a little while longer. I do owe you for the information you procured for me, after all,” he said.

You nodded. “That’s right. You do owe me,” you said. Not only a long with the small criminal empire you ran, acting as an information handler for Edward was something you’d never expected to fall into it, but, well…you didn’t mind. And his pay was fair enough.

Turning your attention back to the rest of the room, that knot in your stomach tightened. You sipped your wine again, desperately hoping the alcohol would help loosen you up, not make you feel so nervous…but instead, it only worsened your anxiety. The hairs on your neck stood on end and you glanced around, gaze flickering between the dim lights, the bodies, all the noise – it was too much. Too overwhelming. You glanced over to find Edward suddenly occupied with speaking to Oswald, who’d wandered over, his laughter loud and bellowing throughout the room.

The two men were so engaged in discussion that you quietly slipped out of your seat, heading through the room. You pushed through the crowd, a bead of sweat rolling down your brow. You swallowed a sudden wave of nausea threatening to overcome you. You needed a breather, something to focus on that wasn’t the loud music, the lights, the everything.

When you made your way towards the front of the lounge, you came to a set of stairs leading to the main floor. It was empty, save for a few bouncers standing by the door, arms folded behind their backs, stern looks on their faces. You sucked in a breath and walked halfway down the steps, before sitting down. Your silk black dress shimmered against the lights, crinkling as you sat. Alone, away from everyone else, that knot in your belly finally unwound, loosening just a bit. Enough for some of your nerves to melt away. You put your face in your hands and sighed, cheeks burning; what a pathetic fool you must look like to everyone else, too overwhelmed by a party to handle staying longer than an hour.

You’re not sure how long you sat there, head in your hands, until a voice said your name. You looked up, a gasp escaping your lips, startled – but it was Edward standing there, towering over you, resting his weight on his cane.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, one eyebrow quirked upward.

“Nothing,” you lied, looking away. “I was just, uh, taking a phone call.” You said, tucking your shaking hands under your thighs so he wouldn’t see.

He studied you carefully, blue eyes examining every inch of you. “My dear, you’re a terrible liar. And you left your phone at the table.” He smirked, holding out your phone for you to take.

Shit. “Thanks,” you sighed, taking it from him.

“So. Are you going to tell me why you’re lying to me and sitting here all alone?” he asked.

You opened your mouth to answer him, but quickly shut it. Hesitated to answer, to show your weakness to Edward Nigma, of all people. He rolled his eyes and snapped his fingers, drawing the attention of a nearby waiter. But you were too out of it – too lost in your anxiety attack to focus on what he was doing. Your legs and hands trembled, and you bit your lip, as if it was the only thing you could focus on.

A moment later, Edward was suddenly sitting beside you on the steps. “Here,” he said, handing you a small glass of cool, clear liquid. “Drink.”

“What is it?” you asked.

He sighed. “Don’t ask questions, just drink it.”

You hesitated, but brought the glass to your lips and sipped – a second later, you realized it was water. Just water. Cool and soothing as it traveled down your throat. Exactly what you needed, some hydration to help clear your thoughts.

Before you could pull the glass away, he raised his brows and said, “All of it.” His voice was sharp, commanding.

You nodded, but downed the rest of the glass. When you were finished, you set it aside and asked, “There. You happy now?”

“Yes, actually, I am. So. Are you going to tell me why you’re here?”

“I…don’t really like parties,” you answered.

He chuckled lowly. “You don’t like parties, and yet you’re the one who forced us to come here?”

“I didn’t force you,” you shot back. “I thought it’d be good for you to make an appearance.”

“Yes, yes, you’ve made that quite clear,” he replied. “And yet that small mind of yours can’t even handle a simple party.”

“I know, I know. You don’t have to rub it in,” you sighed.

“I’m not,” he said. “But if you want me to, I can—”

“All right Edward, I get it,” you said. He smirked. For the slightest moment, you felt something shift between the two of you. You weren’t sure what it was, but…you’d never expected Edward Nigma to be the comforting sort of person.

But here he was, sitting on the steps. Getting you water. Asking how you were doing. Perhaps there was some good in him, after all.

Edward stood, holding out his hand to you. “I think we’ve made enough of an appearance, haven’t we?”

“I think so, too,” you said. You smiled and took his hand, and he pulled you to your feet. But Edward let go and led you out of the Iceberg Lounge. And for the first time since allying with Edward, he didn’t feel like just an ally. He felt like a friend.

#caesariawrites #arkham riddler #the riddler #arkhamverse riddler #arkhamverse #edward nigma #theriddler #edward nigma x reader #edward nygma x reader #edward nigma x you #edward nygma #arkham edward nigma #edward nigma x y/n

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usafphantom2 · 30 days

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U.S. Air Force Testing New Sensors On The F-22

The F-22 recently tested multiple new sensors as part of the modernization, with plans for a rapid prototyping effort to field them and expand the capabilities of the jet.

Stefano D'Urso

F-22 new sensors

U.S. Air Force F-22 Raptors assigned to the 27th Expeditionary Fighter Squadron and Philippine Air Force FA-50PH light jet fighters conduct joint combined exchange training, above Basa Air Force Base, Philippines, on Aug. 9, 2024. (U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Mitchell Corley)

The U.S. Air Force is testing multiple new advanced sensors on the F-22 Raptor, which could extend its service life and also be applied to systems of the Next Generation Air Dominance family. The info was disclosed during the Life Cycle Industry Days conference.

“The F-22 team is working really hard on executing a modernization roadmap to field advanced sensors, connectivity, weapons, and other capabilities,” said Brig. Gen. Jason D. Voorheis, Program Executive Officer for Fighters and Advanced Aircraft. “The Raptor team recently conducted six flight test efforts to demo advanced sensors.”

Voorheis also added that the service is planning for a rapid prototyping effort to get these sensors fielded quickly. “We’re executing that successfully, and that will lead to […] a rapid fielding in the near future,” he said.

The news was first reported by Air and Space Forces Magazine, which also added that Air Force officials have also confirmed that the stealthy pods seen since last year being tested on the F-22 are indeed InfraRed Search and Track (IRST) sensors. The development of a new IRST sensor for the Raptor was also confirmed by the service’s budget document, however they did not mention the sensor being podded.

The sensors are part of an upgrade program worth $ 7.8 billion before 2030, of which $ 3.1 billion are for research and development and the remaining $ 4.7 billion are for procurement. This is in contrast with previous statements that the Air Force was looking to retire the F-22 around 2030.

“From an F-22 sunsetting perspective, I don’t have a date for you,” said Voorheis when asked about the topic. “What I can tell you is that we are hyper-focused on modernization to sustain that air superiority combat capability for a highly contested environment for as long as necessary.”

This also reflects recent comments by Gen. Kenneth Wilsbach, head of Air Combat Command, who mentioned that the service should retain also the older F-22s in the Block 20 configuration, together with the latest ones. The General added that several upgrades are being planned and even the older Block 20s are still very capable, should they be needed for combat in an emergency.

An F-22 Raptor assigned to the 1st Fighter Wing, Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia, approaches the boom of a 134th Air Refueling Wing KC-135R Stratotanker to refuel along the east coast of the United States Aug. 14, 2024. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Teri Eicher)

Voorheis also mentioned a software being integrated on the Raptor, which he defined as Government Reference Architecture Compute Environment, or “GRACE.” He further explained this open architecture software would allow “non-traditional F-22 software” to be installed on the aircraft and provide “additional processing and pilot interfaces.”

It’s unclear if the new GRACE is related to Project FOX, the innovation project tested last year which allowed to integrate on the F-35 software applications developed for the F-22. This allowed both 5th gen fighters to fly with common tactical software applications.

The F-22 upgrades

Some of the upgrades expected for the F-22 Raptor were unveiled in the Fiscal Year 23 budget request documentation and in an official artwork shared by Gen. Mark Kelly, then Commander of Air Combat Command. In the artwork we can see three Raptors loaded with new stealthy external fuel tanks, two underwing faceted pods and a new unknown air-to-air missile, but there are even more novelties in the documents, which unveils a previously undisclosed relationship between the F-22 and the development of the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD).

Two years after the upgrades were announced, we might have gotten, earlier this year, the first glimpse of the new stealthy external fuel tanks being developed for the F-22 Raptor. The aircraft was, in fact, spotted near the Mojave Air and Space Port and shows the Raptor with two fuel tanks, whose shape is reminiscent of the one shown in 2022.

The new tanks are officially known as Low Drag Tank and Pylon (LDTP) and designed to be stealthier and more aerodynamically efficient than the current 600-gallon fuel tanks. In the FY2023 budget request, the Air Force mentioned that the F-22 LDTPs are advanced technological designs providing increased persistence and range while maintaining lethality and survivability, critical to future mission execution and to maintaining Air Superiority.

U.S. Air Force Capt. Samuel “RaZZ” Larson, F-22 Raptor Demonstration Team commander and pilot, practices different maneuvers while training for the upcoming 2023 airshow season, at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia, Jan. 6, 2023. (U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Mikaela Smith)

The low drag tanks are intended to reduce drag, facilitate supersonic flight with external tanks and extend the range of the F-22. The pylons are equipped with smart rack pneumatic technology to accurately control ejection performance and smooth wind swept surface for minimum drag without stores.

The two pods installed under the outer underwing hardpoints have already been spotted during flight testing on an F-22 at the Air Force’s Plant 42 facility in Palmdale, California, in February 2022. The latest budget documents mention an InfraRed Search and Track (IRST) sensor being developed for the F-22, which is now confirmed to be the sensor housed inside the two pods, although they could host also other capabilities in addition to the IRST.

In July 2024 we got an up-close look at one of the pods installed under a Rockwell Sabreliner 65 testbed after a test campaign at Nellis AFB, Nevada. It would have been expected to see some kind of transparent surface associated with the IRST, however the surfaces on the nose of the pod appeared to be opaque. We still cannot exclude that there are two different variants of the pod, depending on the equipment inside.

The last upgrade featured in the artwork is a new unknown air-to-air missile. While there are a number of air-to-air missile programs in the works, it is possible that the one in the image could be a representative design, which may or may not correspond to the real deal, for the highly secretive AIM-260 missile. So far, the missile has never been depicted in any kind of image and details about the program are very scarce.

The development of the AIM-260, also called Joint Advanced Tactical Missile, was first unveiled in 2019 and has been in the works at least since 2017. The goal of the new long-range air-to-air missile is to replace the AIM-120 AMRAAM (Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile) and counter the threat posed by the Chinese PL-15 missile, while avoiding any foreign threats being able to outrange the AIM-120.

Among the few known technical details, the new missile will be compatible with the AMRAAM dimensions, but obviously with greater range, and is planned to be carried in the F-22 weapons bay and on the F/A-18 at first, with the F-35 to follow. Flight tests are already in progress and the missile is expected to be fielded by next year. Because of these reasons, it would be reasonable to suppose that the one shown in the image could be at least a hint at the AIM-260.

Other upgrades mentioned in the budget request are a Mode 5 Identification Friend or Foe (IFF), Link 16 and Multifunction Information Distribution System Joint Tactical Radio System (MIDS JTRS), a new Operational Fight Program, advanced radar Electronic Protection, Embedded GPS/Inertial Navigation System (INS) Modernization (EGI-M), Open System Architecture (OSA), new encrypted radios.

File photo of the U.S. Air Force’s 5th gen aircraft, the F-22 and the F-35. (Photo: U.S. Air Force)

A new helmet is also being tested by F-22 pilots, as part of the Next Generation Fixed Wing Helmet program to replace the current HGU-55P helmet, which has been the standard issued helmet for the last 40 years. The goal is to provide pilots a more comfortable, stable, and balanced platform to accommodate helmet-mounted devices usage without imposing neck strain and discomfort to the user.

Despite various integration efforts in the past, the F-22 is not equipped yet with a helmet that provides the essential flight and weapon aiming information through line of sight imagery: the shape of the Raptor’s canopy, optimized to preserve Low Observability, doesn’t allow enough range of motion and minimum visibility to a pilot wearing the JHMCS or the Scorpion.

About Stefano D'Urso

Stefano D'Urso is a freelance journalist and contributor to TheAviationist based in Lecce, Italy. A graduate in Industral Engineering he's also studying to achieve a Master Degree in Aerospace Engineering. Electronic Warfare, Loitering Munitions and OSINT techniques applied to the world of military operations and current conflicts are among his areas of expertise.

@The Aviationist.com

#f22raptor #aircraft #aviation #usaf

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pareidoliaonthemove · 6 months

Note

Febwhump - DAY 27: left for dead, with Scott

Left For Dead

Part Two

(Part One is here)

Pain.

The entirely of Scott’s dark world was pain, and it was only long practice that allowed him to pull his mind back from the darkness it wanted to retreat to, and assess his body.

Right Leg: source of most of the pain. Obviously broken. The faint sensation of warm wetness suggested that he was bleeding. Either that or he had lost control of his bladder. Either way, less than ideal.

Left Leg: painful, but not nowhere near as much as the right. Hopefully only bruised. One broken leg was annoying. Two was … well, Scott really didn’t want to think about it.

Abdomen: a dull ache that was only apparent to him if he concentrated. Maybe some bruising? Currently among the least of his worries.

Chest: hurt like hell. The familiar pain of broken ribs, coupled with the equally familiar feel of a harness. Coupled with the padded surface he was, yes, sitting in, Scott was able to surmise that he was strapped into a cockpit chair.

A plane. He was in a plane. He had crashed a plane!

It was that thought that forced Scott’s eyes open, and yep, the intense light sensitivity confirmed his suspicion of a head injury, possibly a mild concussion.

As his eyes reluctantly focused, the battered remains of the family plane’s cockpit swam into being around him. A bleary look out the crazed cockpit windscreen showed sand.

Memories shuffled back into his skull, lining up into a vague semblance of order. Norway. The meeting. The urgent need to get home and truly secure his ‘cargo’. Loss of power. Lining up on the smooth sands …

… the fall.

Scott groaned. How had he missed that drop off?

“Shut him up, would you? Opening this box, ain’t easy.”

Scott started, and struggled to turn in the embrace of his restraints. He managed to loosen the pilot’s harness off enough to turn …

… only to find himself staring down the barrel of a rifle.

“Hold!”

The commanding voice came from somewhere in the main cabin. Footsteps and then a figure wearing black from his combat boots to his balaclava. Identical to the figure holding the weapon steady, aimed between Scott’s eyes; and the figure standing at the rear bulkhead, a stethoscope in place as he listened to the faint sounds from the muffled tumblers of the old style of safe Jeff favoured on the professional advice of Parker.

“You know the orders, man. Fingers off triggers. No evidence.”

The gun didn’t waver.

“Stand down!” There was no mistaking the anger in that voice.

The gun was lowered. “Sir.”

“Back to your station.” The gunman stalked back to the main cabin.

“Who are you?” Scott’s voice was faint, and raspy. Not the commanding presence he wanted to project to these intruders.

“Just a simple man trying to make his way in this world.”

The voice was smirking, and after living with John for most of his life, there was no way he could mistake the ‘Star Wars’ line. Great. A wanna-be Jango Fett.

“Mercenary.”

A shrug. “Businessman. I provide security services and procure items on order.”

“By knocking planes out of the sky? How many people have died so you can ‘procure objects to order’?”

Another shrug. “If it is necessary.”

“What do you think I have?”

“You know what I am after. And I know you have it. For now.”

“Who’s paying you?”

“I cannot tell you that. I assure total discretion.”

“How much to make you break that contract?’

“I do not break contracts. Once I accept a contract, I keep it. If I do not double-cross my clients, my clients do not double-cross me.” A glare. “I thought Tracy Industries worked on a basis of honestly and integrity. Or is the great Scott Tracy above that?”

Scott grit his teeth. “Nobody in Tracy Industries is above the values of honestly and integrity.” He eyed the interloper. “Surprised to find a mercenary who understood the concepts, though.”

A snort.

“Will ya’ll kindly Shut. The. Fuck. Up?”

The other man seemed inclined to oblige. Scott was desperate to slow down the opening of the safe.

“What makes you think you can get away with this? I’ve got a direct line to International Rescue, Thunderbird Two will be here any minute.”

A definite smile behind the balaclava. “I doubt it. You have not been in radio contact with anyone since departing Trondheim.”

“Thunderbird Five would have logged and monitored my flightpath. They’d have seen the change in the transponder squawk and launched.”

“Even if our blocker failed, they think you are taking the eastern track back to your ‘secret’ island base. So be a good boy and be quiet.”

Scott stared at him in disbelief. The eastern track? How …

John wouldn’t have had a particular reason to track his actual flightpath. Nobody had known he was going to Norway. There were no hotel bookings, no car hire, and the runway permits had been requested the bare minimum hour out. So John would have relied on the filed flightpath, and the reported positions from his tap into CATCH.

His brothers didn’t know where he was. They didn’t know he was in trouble.

He was on his own. Injured.

At the mercy of mercenaries.

The mercenary stepped closer to him, Scott watched warily, noting a logo, barely visible in the darkest possible grey on the black shirt. A kind of upwards lightning strike, double ‘Z’, with a triangle arrowhead on the top line. Scott didn’t recognise it, but he was certain Kayo or Penny would.

Another black clad figure approached the leader and made a suppressed gesture, like he was suppressing a salute. Scott made note of the fact, it would be a useful clue when it came to trying to ID these men.

“Sir, restoration mission complete. All hardware removed. There is no trace that anything was ever there.”

“And the electricals?”

“All anyone will find is some old wiring that frayed and shorted out the avionics controls, resulting in a loss of control.”

“Very good. Restoration Team to fall back staging position.”

The man nodded, twitching again as though he wanted to salute, and turned smartly on his heel, marching briskly out of the cockpit, and Scott heard numerous footsteps filing out of the cabin and crunching onto loose sand.

“Got it!” Scott twisted back again, and his stomach fell at the sight of the safe door swinging open. The distraction caused by the departure of the ‘Restoration Team’ had been enough for the ‘Cracksman’ to finalise the combination.

“Very good.” The sealed attaché case was brought out and presented to the leader. He briefly examined the wax seal pressed over the biometric sensor. “Open it.”

The cracksman nodded, set the case upright on a stable section of the dash, and pressed the short edge against his stomach. From a pouch on his belt, he pulled out a small device, and grasped it in both hands. The object resolved into two short handles and a length of fine wire. Clearly separating the handles activated some form of electronics as the wire slowly began to glow a cherry red.

Carefully, the wire was brought to the base of the wax seal, and after a second as the cracksman breathed out slowly, and on the rapid inhale, he pulled the heated wire quickly under the seal, cleanly separating it from the case without damaging the World Government’s seal.

Scott stared, horrified. The seal was supposed to be a tamper proof bonding, not merely old-fashioned wax, but a new programable polymer, that could only be separated from the case with the application of a specific electromagnetic output – that would be provided once Scott had the case and its contents secured in Tracy Island’s most secure workshop.

Calmly setting aside the seal, the cracksman pressed his finger to the biometric sensor. Scott’s horror gave way to disbelief as the case beeped obligingly and the locks disengaged.

The cracksman presented the open case to the leader. He lifted out the folder, and quickly riffled through the pages, before nodding his satisfaction. “This is what we require. Very good. Resecure everything, and then Acquisition Team fall back to staging point.”

A nod and the cracksman shut and locked the case, before carefully lifting the seal and pressing it back over the sensor, before bringing the device out of its pouch, and wedging one handle into his belt, carefully held the seal in place as he once more drew the wire under it. After returning the device to its storage place, he tested the seal.

It held.

Sliding the attaché case back into the safe he shut the door and spun the dial, locking it securely.

Turning back to his leader, he accepted the folder. The leader didn’t release it, staring into his man’s eyes. “Guard this with your life.”

“My life. Yes, sir.” The folder was relinquished to him and he turned and exited the cabin.

Only one set of footsteps this time. Despite being termed a ‘team’, Acquisitions was this single man.

The leader turned is attention back to Scott, as yet another man entered the cockpit. “All secured, sir. Restoration and Acquisitions clear of the site, Security are following them.”

A nod. The newcomer looked at Scott. “He’s conscious.” The shock was evident, as was the unspoken ‘He’s alive.’

“Surprisingly, yes. We clearly underestimated Mr Tracy’s skill as a pilot. And evidently this plane has some … undocumented design features. A pity we can’t exploit them.”

“Your orders?”

A long moment as both men stared consideringly at Scott. His mouth went dry as his palms turned wet. A large knot formed in his throat.

“He would fetch a large ransom …” the underling ventured, uncertainly.

“He would.” Scott relaxed minutely. “But that is not our objective here. We have a contract to do one thing, and we do one thing only. Lining our own pockets on the side creates a trail, one that can be followed not only to us, but to our client; and that would have an extremely negative effect on our life expectancies.”

The other man nodded, and once more Scott was staring down the barrel of a rifle.

“Hold.” The order was sighed. “Think, man. It would be difficult to explain a bullet in his brain if the plane is supposed to have crashed.”

“What are we going to do with him?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?” Both Scott and the underling echoed the word.

“We do not need to. He is injured, half the world away from where he should be, with no way of calling for help. This is the middle of the Gobi Desert. No one comes here of their own free will. He may be found, eventually. But he will not be able to tell anyone what happened here. The only story will be the one we have told.”

A nod, and the underling departed, leaving Scott and the leader of the mercenaries alone in the plane.

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but people will coming looking for you,” Scott said, not quite knowing what he was hoping to achieve.

“Nobody will. You will go missing with the World Government’s top secret plans. Eventually, it will become evident that somebody has the computer system and encryption protocol, somebody who should not. People will take two clear and simple facts and drawn a clear and simple conclusion.”

Scott shook his head. “My brothers …”

“Will not know where you are. For all your family’s power and technology and vaulted prowess, they will not be to account for your absence. They will be under suspicion as much as you. After all, such a close knit family, if one is a traitor, all must be traitors. How else would they have amassed so much money?”

“No. We’re International Rescue. They will find me. We are trusted. We are respected.”

“They may find you, certainly they will look. And you may be found. Alone, half the world away from where you were supposed to be, with an empty attaché case where the top secret plans should be sealed as per the World Government’s Protocol for the transfer, locked in your safe, on your plane.” A shrug. “We are, if I am permitted to say so myself, very good at what we do. No, we are The Best at what we do. No one will ever know we were here.”

Scott shook his head. “No, there is always evidence. Your man touched the biosensor with gloves on, that will smudge any fingerprint I may have left on the sensor …”

Scott had a feeling the man was grinning. “Forgive me if I do not divulge all my secrets. ‘Monologuing’ is a bad habit for a man in my position to get into.”

“Only the villains monologue,” Scott grumbled, before trying again. “Nobody will truly believe that I stole those plans …”

This time there was a definite grin. “Why? Because you are hero? Because the people love you? Mr Scott Tracy, CEO and Commander of International Rescue, Pilot of Thunderbird One, do you know the thing – the ONE THING that the people love more than a hero?”

Scott shook his head. “The only thing, Mr Tracy, that people love more than a hero, is to see him humbled. The whole world loves to watch a hero fall. And you have so very far before you hit the ground.”

The man walked to the cockpit door, before turning back to Scott. “It is a pity you will not be around to see what happens next. It will be quite the show. Enjoy your stay in China, Mr Tracy. The view here is to die for.”

And then Scott was alone.

Notes:

At long last, we got to the relevant part! I really hope this lives up to your expectations, seeing as you enjoyed Part One so much.

#thunderbirds #thunderbirds are go #left for dead #febuwhump2024 #plane crash aftermath

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