#Some of Them Are Butchered I Know

[thesetwoidiots]

Ironstrange, but it's random Helluva Boss quotes

Tony: We're rich! People want us for our money and our bodies.

Stephen: Our money, maybe.

Tony: Speak for yourself, darling.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stephen: What do you want, Tony?

Tony: Hello to you as well, my long dicked sorcerer~

Stephen: *Spits Out His Tea*

Peter: *Spits Out His Coffee*

Stephen: What-

Peter: The-

Stephen: FUCK-

Peter: DAD?!?!?

Tony: Language! Everyone!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stephen: I can't do it! I'm not strong enough!

Tony: Baby, you don't have to rely on your hands. Work with what you're good at.

Stephen: I'm not good with my hands???

Tony: ...

Stephen: Oh! Right, you mean- Yeah. *Uses His Magic to Blow a Door to Bits* Probably should have done that earlier, huh?

Tony: I love you, Stephanie, but for FUCK'S SAKE!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stephen, with a bit of twang: Mama, Daddy, you haven't met my husband Tony. And his charge!

Peter: I'm not just his charge!

Tony: Yeah! He's our son!

Peter, blushing: Only on paper. Y'all don't deserve my name yet.

Tony: It's nice to finally meet the sperm and egg factory that popped out this gem of a sorcerer. You two have raised one sturdy son-of-a-bitch.

Eugene: *Chuckles* That we have.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Victor, to Stephen: You'd better move that eyesore of a family somewhere else! Or else I'll-

Tony, charging his repulsors: You'll what?

Victor: Uh... I'll tell Mama and Daddy!

All Three: *Burst Into Laughter for a Couple of Seconds*

[totally-here]

3 times Phantom's Guardian was Mentioned + 1 Time He Showed Up

One

Phantom’s introduction to Young Justice wasn’t as dramatic as Empress’ or Slobo’s, or even Arrowette’s first introduction to the cave. No, it wasn’t during the Olympics, or on a battlefield, and he didn’t come in injured and looking for help. 

Impulse just brought Phantom in one day and insisted that he should join because he’s their age, interested in justice, and now that Greta’s human again they need another ghost member. So Phantom stayed, popping in and out for missions but never really sticking around all that long. 

Today is one of the days that Phantom’s with them on a mission, that being looking around a lab of the Brain’s that had an energy surge recently, despite it being presumably abandoned. 

Kon got paired up with Phantom to check the rest out first, since they both have better hearing than Anita and Tim, who were both still in the main room working on checking the computers for previous activity. 

The room is dark except for the light green ball glowing slightly above Phantom’s hand. He waves it around enough for it to reflect off of glass, then throws it up to the ceiling. The light expands enough to illuminate the room. 

Phantom mumbles about not knowing he could do that. Kon ignores him and moves closer to inspect the glass tubes to the side of several monitors set up. 

“Looks like cloning equipment,” Phantom says, casually. He drags a finger through the dust gathering on one of the monitors. “Don’t think they’ve been activated recently, though, so that’s good.”

“What? You got a problem with clones or something?” It’s a quick and defensive answer, and Phantom puts his hands up in surrender. 

“Not in concept.” He shrugs and joins Kon near the tubes. “But not a lot of people ask before making clones.”

“So I don’t need to sic Superman on you?” Obviously Kon could chew Phantom out himself, but few can do a “not mad, just disappointed” face better than Clark. 

Phantom scrunches his face. “Why would you need to?” 

Kon stops pretending to inspect the tube and stares at Phantom. “You do know I’m a clone, right?” The blank look on Phantom’s face tells him that no, he did not. “Well I am. Clone of Superman, though we’re pretty much brothers now.”

“Cool,” Phantom says, not a bit less friendly. He hesitates for a second before continuing, “Could I maybe ask you how you got there? Me and my clone have landed on cousins, but that was also, like, given to us by her evil dad. So.”

Phantom trails off. Huh, that makes three members of the team that have been cloned. Not a lot, but it’s weird that it’s happened three times. 

“You’re making sure she feels accepted, right?” 

“Yeah! Well, whenever she’s around. She,” Phantom waves his hand around, looking for the right word, “She’s a wanderer. Exploring the world and stuff. But Richard has a room for her at home, and I remind her of that whenever she does stop by.” 

“Well, first of all, don’t push it so hard,” Kon says. Phantom nods enthusiastically. “And second, who’s Richard?”

Kon doesn’t know a lot of Richards, and he doesn’t think that Phantom ever mentioned one before. Or even if he remembers his living life. 

“Oh, he’s my, uh, guardian? I guess that’s the best term. The guy I’m living with who forces me to go to school sometimes.” Phantom looks away and back to the tubes. 

Before Kon can ask for more details, Robin and Empress come in with a report of dead computers and wanting to know where they’re at with the cloning room.

They’re unimpressed with their lack of progress.

Two

Wally doesn’t really need to come by the Hamilton Lodge that often, not when that’s Young Justice’s territory and he doesn’t want to get involved in all of That.

But Red Tornado said that the team has a file on a planet that’s very quickly becoming a league problem, and he figured it might be a good time to try to check in with Bart, anyway. Make sure he hasn’t run any cars off cliffs again and all that. 

So he stops by Manchester to ask Bart about the file, then they both head East to actually find it. 

When they arrive at the hotel minutes later, Wally’s surprised to actually find it… clean? There’s no visible trash or overturned furniture or anything else he’d expect from an abandoned hotel filled with teenagers. Well, maybe not filled, lately. He doesn’t think anyone’s living here currently, with Greta at Elias’ for the school year and Slobo gone. 

Still, the room smells slightly of artificial pine scent, and Bart perks up before disappearing and reappearing rapidly, holding a teammate up by his armpits. Said teammate just accepts this, his legs folding into a wispy tail, and head rolling against his shoulders. 

“This is Phantom!” Bart holds him up higher. Phantom waves. Wally’s only heard of him through Max’s updates, the same way he would hear about Preston or Carol, but with more wariness about the supposed ghost. 

Actually looking at the pale face and glowing green eyes contrasting against the darker than dark jumpsuit, Wally’s a little more ready to accept his claim at being undead. 

“He stress cleans,” Bart explains, moving to carry Phantom under his arm. Wally bites down the urge to tell him to put him down, but only because Phantom doesn’t resist the hold, only moving to get into a more comfortable position. His hands are touching the floor. “So what happened?” 

Bart directs the question downwards, and Phantom heaves a very dramatic sigh. Definitely a teenager. It does raise the question of who exactly this kid’s mentor is. Hopefully he does have one. Maybe he’s the Spectre’s kid?

Phantom phases through the arm holding him only to lay on top of Bart’s hair. “I accidentally called Richard dad. And then fled.” 

Bart nods sagely. “Classic. One time I accidentally called Max dad, so I had to start a fire to distract him.”

Phantom sighs again, almost dreamily. “Genius.” 

Wally doesn’t have time to unpack all of that. Well he does, but he’s not going to, because there’s really only one Richard that comes to mind that might have the heart to take in a dead kid, even if he doesn’t go by his full name.

But surely Dick would have told him, or any other Titan, if he had adopted a kid. Right?

But there’s still a little shadow of doubt. Maybe Dick wanted it to be a secret, or it was really new or had a rocky start. Phantom doesn’t seem to hold himself like a Bat, but it’s not a guarantee Dick would have trained him. 

“The lodge looks nice,” Wally offers out loud, which Phantom shrugs at and wraps his tail around Bart’s head to keep secure. “Anyway, Impulse. The file on Myrg?” 

“Oh yeah!” Again, Bart disappears then reappears a few seconds later with a paper file. They really need to start digitizing more of these things. “That’s the planet where we played baseball so that they wouldn’t destroy Earth!” 

“You what.” 

The prospect of Dick following in his dad’s footsteps is forgotten in the face of what the hell Young Justice got up to on Myrg. 

Three

Tim may be in a…Predicament. 

It’s not his fault. Really. He knew what he was doing. He couldn’t let a civilian fall for the trap. But they were already so close, so he just, kinda, pushed himself into the rope instead. 

So there Robin is, tied upside down in a warehouse, with the Joker below next to an overly complicated control panel. The clown’s rambling about bombs hidden all over the city that Tim knows Batman is already tracking down with Batgirl. 

Tim’s not really paying attention to the rant because of that, more focused on wiggling enough to get the spare mini-birdarang out of his glove to cut the rope without notifying the Joker. 

“Yikes, bad time?” Asks Phantom’s voice beside him. Based on the source and accounting for the slight echo, he’s floating with his head near Tim’s, likely upside down. “Want some help?” 

Tim gets the birdarang out and starts sawing at the thick rope. They should be fine anyway, but stalling the Joker for extra time would be helpful. “Can you possess the Joker? Just hold him still.”

“The correct term is overshadow, but sure.” The voice disappears, and a few seconds later the Joker freezes. 

His body jerks forward, then backward, and a laugh chokes out of his throat. His hand claws over his mouth at the noise and he hunches over. All movement halts before he rights himself, shaking out his hands and rolling his shoulders. Phantom looks up at Tim and his eyes are glowing. 

Tim cuts through the rope, kicking and using the momentum to right himself and land on his feet. He brushes past Phantom in Joker’s body to handle the control panel. He turns off the radio broadcast and dismantles the bomb strapped to the panel.

Threat handled, he turns to Phantom and holds up some handcuffs. “Let me arrest you?”

Phantom obliges, turning the Joker’s body around and putting his hands behind his back. Tim lets him walk by himself out of the warehouse and moves the handcuffs around a lamppost. The Joker’s body jerks again, then slumps forward, just as Phantom reappears next to him, scowling down at the unconscious body. 

“That felt really slimy. Zero out of ten, would not do again,” Phantom grouches. 

“Why’re you in Gotham?” Tim asks. It’s not like Phantom makes a habit of visiting. The last time he came into the city, he complained about feeling the dead under the streets. Fortunately, that let Tim uncover a few tunnels that Talons travel through. Phantom, however, was unnerved by the Talons and left quickly. 

“Oh, Solomon Grundy’s back in our sewers. Richard said I should probably tell one of you Gotham heroes, since you keep track of those guys.” He shakes out his hands like they were cramped in the Joker. 

They hadn’t seen Grundy in a while. Tim assumed he was currently in a less violent personality. “What’s he doing?” 

Phantom shrugs. “Just chilling. Mostly underground. I tried to talk to him but he only grunted back at me. He also tried to pick me up, dunno what that was about.”

“Maybe because you’re both dead?” Tim guessed. That would be a surface level connection. Ivy and Woodrue have had more luck working with Grundy than anyone, and Phantom definitely doesn’t have the connection to the Green that’d help with that. 

Police lights turn around the corner, and Tim shoots a grapple to get to the roof above them. Phantom follows, but disappears as soon as they’re on the roof. Going back home, probably. 

Cass drops down from the roof she was listening on. “Richard?”

“Not the same one.”

They both stick around long enough to watch the Joker get put into the cop car. 

Plus one

A spaceship landed in the forests of New York, and Cassie’s team was the first to respond to it. Technically not respond, but check it out, since there wasn’t any alert or anything. 

Still, Wonder Girl has Empress, Robin, and Superboy on the other side of the ship, watching what looks like the back door, while she, Impulse, and Phantom watch the other door and main window. She has binoculars, but the windows are so tinted she can’t quite make anything out. 

No aliens have come out yet, and she hesitates to have anyone go in, in case whoever inside does turn hostile. 

Impulse has offered to run through a total of five times already, and it’s a testament to his restraint that he hasn’t, and a testament to Cassie’s that she hasn’t yelled at him yet. Phantom at least isn’t being annoying, but he’s not necessarily helpful, either. He’s not even watching the spaceship anymore. Now he’s trying to make a flower crown out of dandelions. 

“Door’s opening on our side,” Robin says from the comms. “But no one’s coming out.” 

“Alright, good enough to try to get in,” Cassie decides. She turns to Phantom, who’s closing off the circle of flowers. Beside him, Impulse has since pulled out a gameboy. “Phantom, go in invisibly through the open door and report back. Try to see what their plans are.” 

“Oh, sure. One second.” Phantom finishes the crown and tries to put it on Bart’s head. It doesn’t quite fit over his mane of hair, but Phantom shrugs and leaves it sitting there anyway before going invisible. 

“Maybe I should shave my head again,” Bart says as his game character dies. 

He gets a resounding no in response. 

Half an hour later they have a very annoyed Green Lantern lecturing them about league jurisdiction and knowing when to call someone else. 

Apparently, the alien ship was just stopping to complete some maintenance, and did not appreciate any spying on them, and especially did not appreciate who did it. Green Lantern was more than happy to explain that Wonder Girl’s team is not really a part of the Justice League and he can help with their maintenance. They denied his help and left to find a place with less people in it. 

“-and you!” Green Lantern rounds on Phantom next, but Cassie knows none of them are really listening. Sure, they messed up by freaking out the visiting aliens, and yeah maybe they should have contacted the league about it, but they’ve dealt with stuff worse than this! It’s not Cassie’s fault she thought that this would have stuck to the formula. 

“Who even are you?” Green Lantern runs a hand through his black hair, stupid green gauntlets shining in the sunlight. “Do I need to call your mentor?” He frowns. “Or do they know you mess up alien technology by just being around it?” 

Phantom scoffs and rolls his eyes. “How was I supposed to know their tech would go all fuzzy when I came in?” 

“You wouldn’t have to know if you just stayed out of the spaceship!” 

“Hey!” Cassie cuts in. “Technically that was my call. It’s not all on Phantom.”

“I still could've been more careful,” Phantom says to her, ignoring Green Lantern as they argue about blame. 

“Cut it out for a second, okay?” Green Lantern puts a hand between them and they stop to glare at him. He pulls the hand back. “Look, can I just talk to one of your adults about this?” 

Robin glares. “We don’t need an adult. We have this under control.”

“Only because I’m here now.” 

“I’ll call my mentor,” Phantom says. Kon opens his mouth, most likely to offer to call Superman instead in hopes of a lighter sentence, but Bart covers his mouth, smiling like he knows something Cassie doesn’t. Tim and Anita share a look, and don’t intervene as Phantom pulls out a phone from his chest. 

It rings once before it’s picked up. Cassie can’t hear the other side of the conversation, but Kon’s eyebrows scrunch in confusion. “Hey, do you think you can pick me up? Green Lantern wants to talk to you.” Phantom looks Green Lantern up and down then says, “No, this one doesn’t have a cape.”

Phantom says goodbye after rattling off their coordinates, hangs up, and stares at Green Lantern in silence for a few seconds. 

And then a swirling mass of black seeps into the space next to Phantom. The end of a cane steps out of it, followed by a leg, then the rest of the immaculately dressed man holding the handle of the cane that’s shaped like a bird’s head. 

“Phantom,” The man says. His voice drips with condescension in only a way a british accent can, yet Phantom smiles up at him. The shadowy portal behind him disappears. “What, exactly, happened?”

“That’s the fucking Shade,” Anita hisses to Robin, who shrugs noncommittedly at her. Green Lantern seems to recognise him too, taking a step back and clenching his hand that holds his ring. 

“Well, the team and I were staking out this spaceship–super cool, by the way–and I went inside to check it out, but my presence messed with their tech–which was an accident–and they freaked out, so I freaked out, and then we kinda got into a little fight until Green Lantern came to mediate.”

“Hm. Is that right?” The Shade asks Green Lantern, who nods slowly, still anticipating an attack. “It seems like the problem’s fixed, then.”

“Well, yes, but–”

“And it does seem about time for these kids to get home, doesn't it?” The Shade pulls out an actual pocket watch, chain and all, from his suit pocket and takes his time in checking it. “I’ll see them home.” 

Shadows grow from behind the team, swirling until they become a giant, gaping maw that swallows them up and spits them out in a different forest, or maybe just a different part of the same forest. 

Either way, Cassie has to take a moment to make sure she doesn’t throw up from the sudden vertigo the shadow portal caused. 

The Shade looks at Phantom, and raises an eyebrow. “You can’t expect me to always bail you out.” 

Phantom shrugs, looking guilty. “I know. Thanks, Richard.”

Oh, so that’s who Richard is. Annoyingly, neither Tim or Bart look surprised by this revelation.

[queernarchy]

the irony of nat going out for hours every single day to hunt food for a group of girls who do absolutely nothing but sit around and hallucinate all day only for the same girls who have never hunted a day in their lives to not even hesitate in grabbing spears and weapons to hunt her

[ruvviks]

my cyberpunk wip folder is entirely too large on account of too many ocs at this point so have these sketches i might never finish :] top to bottom left to right: ambrose, @mojaves' seb + cassidy's arm, cato, jesse, mojaves' gabriel, seb again + reuben + aubrey, mojaves' vega + reuben again, reid </3, becca <3, james & aubrey again, the butcher, seb AGAIN, kaida, vitali, and johnny!vincent

taglist (opt in/out)

@shellibisshe, @florbelles, @ncytiri, @hibernationsuit, @stars-of-the-heart;

@lestatlioncunt, @katsigian, @radioactiveshitstorm, @estevnys, @adelaidedrubman;

@celticwoman, @rindemption, @carlosoliveiraa, @noirapocalypto, @dickytwister;

@killerspinal, @euryalex, @ri-a-rose, @velocitic, @thedeadthree;

@jacobseed, @swordcoasts

[bunnieswithknives]

sorry if idk this but what do you think about Wordgirl now in 2024 do you still like it do you still want to make art or talk about it or are you just done with all of it forever and plus i seen that you haven't made art of it since 2022 so you just done with all of it oh yeah and what about The Magnus Archives + Wordgirl ao3 fic too like is that just going to be and i know that your working on 2 au's now just wanting to know that's all

My interests tend to come in intense bursts and then fade. Unless something like, big happens like it gets a reboot its unlikely I'll be coming back to it anytime soon. As for the fic I don't have any current plans to finish it unfortunately.

[late-night-vocaloid]

wait wait put your favorite vocal synth songs that you don't necessarily know if people would know in the tags (any level of popularity dw too much about it), the kind you can't stop replaying. what would you tell people to go listen to right now.

[phoenixtakaramono]

New Threadfic Announcement + Sugar Baby AU Threadfic Update Status

(TNotG’s prologue can be read here)

The one addition I forgot to mention, I probably may or may not drag the Truce universe’s Supe!Butcher & Homelander into the threadfic’s multiverse shenanigans, because why not? It adds a bit of extra danger & incentivizes TNotG Billy to want all of his parallel universe selves to gtfo back to their worlds.

If you want more context details about the threadfics, you can read about them here that I organized for easy reference.

Tl;dr let’s cross our fingers that Twt doesn’t shadowban me because this’ll be a lotta tweets that’ll be tweeted within a span of a few days (I’ll of course screenshot them and crosspost those tweets over here on tumblr for y’all). I’m hoping they do not mistake my account as a spambot when these updates come out 😬

And regarding the next update for Operation Babylon (the Sugar Baby AU) which’ll be posted first:

[tojigasm]

Reading the VoughtHQ spoilers about Homelander and Ryan and being on the verge of tears because the cycle repeats no matter what.

[love-and-monsters]

Trying to think of ways for vampires to get a reliable source of blood from humans without just ‘they take it from blood banks’ is uh. Tough.

[gwydionae]

SAY IT WITH ME:

FEMALE CHARACTERS CAN BE WARRIORS AND FEMININE

MALE CHARACTERS CAN BE SMART AND MASCULINE

BEING BOTH IS NOT A "FLAW" WHERE ONE NEEDS TO BE REMOVED

IT'S CALLED "COMPLEXITY"

[nanihirunkits]

one of us has to take one for the team and tell directors and editors that we do not need 34798284 angles of the exact same kiss .and while we're at it we should also talk about the overuse of slo-mo during pivotal moments

[ilmaveivi]

@ olli määttä on GOD we gon get you some umlauts on your jersey

[spacemancharisma]

not to be aggressively southern on main but ppl who think that singing with a twang and saying yeehaw to whatever beat they threw together automatically makes it a country song or even a country fusion………… this is simply not the case

[pageofheartdj]

I cannot take your 'respect ace people' in fandoms seriously when you are in same breath imply that you see a specific half of ace people not real/valid. Someone explores their experience of being an ace and you claim it to be an erasure because it's not how YOU see aceness.

You can want a very specific asexual experience to be portrayed more, you have your right to it. But then you just basically demean others' experience? You moralize your preferences and judge others by theirs and then frame it as 'I just want to complain'? No, you straight up say other asexuals who have different experience and different desires than yours are bigots and aphobes by your words.

[wow-an-unfunny-joke]

I miss having an ask blog, that was so fun!!!! I just don’t have anything to ask blog about. Like I guess I could do a bsd ask blog, I have some neat ocs I’ve been wanting to yap about (Jim Butcher, Robert Louis Stevenson, James Herriot. Authors, but as bsd characters) but they’re all unfinished and I haven’t made anything for them yet (hopefully will start working on fics for Stevenson and Herriot soon). Also I get suuuuper nervous when interacting with other blogs.

But it was soooo fun while it lasted, and I soooo miss that

[smilesrobotlover]

Whumptober day 6- alternate prompt, reluctant whumper.

Had to do an alternate prompt. Ok so this isn’t an au that y’all are familiar with. I’ve talked about it a couple of times but I doubt anyone remembers it. This fic about my other Link oc who I called Real. Basically the main premise of his story is that the royal family found the hero of Hyrule and raised him in the castle, however the royal family is stupid and the “hero” they found is not the hero at all. They raised him to be a strong hero, they made him believe that he had the hero’s spirit, and so they created a monster. We’ll call him Fake. Real is the real hero lol. But he doesn’t really know. And Fake was so angry about this that he took Real to try to steal the Triforce of wisdom and the master sword. Real escapes and has Linebeck the 67th, who goes by Beck, to take him home. It’s this whole thing and I really wanted to write a fic for this au so I hope you enjoy even tho you don’t know the full story

Warnings for a bloody injury

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The young hero dragged himself across the island, making his way towards the docks where Beck waited. He sucked in a breath and clutched his arm. He could hide this, easily. He forced a smile when Beck saw him, and he quickly moved onto the boat, ignoring Beck’s gaze.

“Uh, good to see you too?” Beck said, and Link nodded before turning to the lower decks.

“Good to see you too Beck,” he said quickly, speed walking across the deck.

“Is something wrong?” Beck asked.

“No, no nothing is wrong,” Link said quickly.

“Then why are you acting so… weird?” Beck moved in front of Link, blocking him off from the decks.

“I-I’m not,” Link stammered, “I’m just…. Dirty… is all.”

Beck stared at him while Link moved around him, jogging to the lower decks. He almost made it to the door when Beck suddenly grabbed his arm, causing Link to hiss in pain.

“Oooooh I see,” Beck deadpanned, seeing the blood soaked sleeve, “You’re trying to hide an injury from me.”

Link ripped away from his grip, not looking at him. “I’m fine,” he grumbled.

“Good goddesses Link, what is wrong with you?” Beck snapped, blocking Link’s way. “Trying to hide an injury like that will only make things worse!”

“I don’t need your help!”

Beck rolled his eyes. “So what? You’re going to let that bleed out until you die? Is that your plan? Or are you going to let it get infected? Or are you going to let blood get all over my ship?”

“Just shut up and get out of my way!” Link yelled, trying to move past Beck, who didn’t budge.

“Link– you— ugh,” Beck’s expression softened slightly, and he gripped both of Link’s shoulders, looking him straight in the eyes. “Kid, I don’t know why you try to put on this– tough guy act– but it’s not gonna work on me. Just let me help you for once.”

“I don’t need your help!” Link yelled again, breaking free from Beck’s grip. Beck let him go this time, but he slowly followed him into the deck below. Link marched over to his bed and plopped down, cradling his injured arm. He got hurt, again, because he did something stupid, again. How was he supposed to be some big and important hero if he couldn’t even keep himself from getting hurt. He was always a careless kid, and everytime he’d come home with a new bump or bruise, he’d get nothing but a scolding from his mother. He’d gotten quite good at hiding some small injuries from his mother, but he felt like he could hide nothing from Beck. He could even feel Beck’s gaze piercing his neck, and he desperately tried to ignore it as small drops of blood landed in his lap. Finally, the silence was too much for him, and he spoke up. “What do you want?”

“I’m making sure that you take care of yourself.”

“Why?”

“You said you didn’t need my help, so prove to me that you don’t need my help.”

Link glared at him while grabbing his blanket and throwing it over the wound. Beck groaned.

“Well that’s better than nothing.”

“Will you leave me alone?”

“Why are you so mad at me trying to help you?”

Link squeezed his arm and curled up on the bed, not saying anything.

“Link, look, if you want to stay on my boat I need some level of respect, ok?”

Link growled and curled up even tighter.

“Link, hey, talk to me.”

Link shot up and stared down Beck. “Why do you care so much?”

“Excuse me?”

“Why do you care whenever I get hurt?”

“Uh, because I don’t want you to die? Or to be in pain? Is that so bad?”

Link didn’t say anything again and curled up. Beck sighed and walked over to him.

“Link, putting a blanket over your open wound isn’t gonna do anything. Please, let me just… bandage it up.”

“No.”

“Fine, let me get you bandages so you can do it yourself!”

“No.”

“For the goddess’s sake,” Link heard Beck grumble as he got up and left the deck, leaving Link alone. Link curled up tighter and clutched his aching arm, shame making his face go hot. He blinked a few tears away from his one good eye and buried his face in his knees. He heard Beck return and bandages were thrown at him gently. He looked up at Beck who was staring at him with a softer expression. Link pursed his lips and sat up, grabbing the bandages with his good arm and taking off the bloodied blanket, looking at the mess before him. He looked up at Beck with an unsure look, and Beck tilted his head.

“Need help?”

Link sighed, too tired to argue and nodded. Beck smiled slightly and grabbed a rag with a bowl of water and sat down on the floor, looking at the injury. Link sucked in a sharp breath as the rag began cleaning the wound. After what felt like forever, Beck began wrapping up the wound with the bandages, and Link watched silently, guilt bubbling up in his chest.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly.

Beck looked up at him and smiled. “It’s alright, I’m sorry too, for raising my voice.”

Link hunched his shoulder and felt the tears beginning to sting his eye again. Beck finished wrapping his arm and gave it a gentle pat, before standing up to leave.

“W-wait, Beck?” Link called out, and he stopped, giving Link his full attention. “Are you…. Mad?”

“Well, not anymore, I guess I did lose my temper back there thou–”

“No, like… mad that I got myself hurt.”

Beck frowned. “No. I’m mostly upset that you don’t want to take care of yourself when you are hurt. So much so that you actually hide it from me.”

Link looked down. “Whenever I get hurt, my momma gets mad at me. It’s just easier not to tell her.”

Beck stared at him with a blank expression, and Link looked away.

“I’m not mad. We all get hurt, Link. Sometimes we can’t control it,” Beck finally said.

Link sighed and looked down at his bandaged arm. “I wish I was stronger… I wish I was a better hero…”

“Well, I don’t want to underestimate you, but you are twelve. Asking you to be a perfect and strong hero now would be like asking a baby to run around castle town in a minute. It’ll take time, kid.”

Link sighed. “Yeah…”

Beck leaned against a wall and pursed his lips. “You don’t have to hide any injuries from me, ok? In fact, I don’t want you to hide injuries from me. I won’t get mad at you if you’re hurt, ok?”

Link looked up and smiled at Beck, who smiled back before turning to the stairs.

“Now get some rest, kid,” he said, “I’ll be here if you need me.”