#There's a kid right there hes killed people on your order Shanks
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charkyzombicorn ¡ 2 years ago
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Shanks telling yasopp about some of his old adventures when he was a roger pirate.
Yasopp genuinely interested: Oh really?
Bucky roo speed Blitzen shanks into a wall ďżź
The whole crew:...
Roo:
Yasopp: Pfft--
Ben: Nope don't encourage him
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beanghostprincess ¡ 1 year ago
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I feel like the minute Luffy gets a crush on someone he panics and straight up hates it. It's like why am I acting so weird like it's just Zoro/Saji/ usopp!!! Every time they compliment them or smile at them, he has to cover his face with his hat. He starts laughing like an idiot and makes terrible comebacks. All of his confidence and stupidity turns into awkwardness and self-consciousness. He's straight up not having a good time.
Luffy would kill himself on the spot. He instantly just jumps into the fucking sea.
Zoro: Something something, of course, my captain Luffy: I- Haha. My heart is beating funny. Haha. Give me a moment, Zoro! <3 *literally just jumps into the water* Nami: LUFFY WHAT THE HELL??? Luffy: Glupglupglupglup
He knows what a crush is, he's not stupid. He just doesn't fucking want it because he doesn't know what to do with so many overwhelming emotions so he genuinely goes to Chopper to make it go away. Chopper is confused af because he genuinely doesn't know what a crush feels like exactly and he thinks Luffy is going to die of a weird illness so he PANICS. And if this happens casually when Law is around (make it around wci), he can't just take it anymore:
Law: Luffy, for the tenth time, you're not fucking sick. You just have a crush on your cook. Luffy: Torao you're the worst doctor in the world!! You're wrong!! I hate this!! Law: Yeah, well, people normally hate it. Deal with it. Why am I even helping you here- Luffy: MAKE IT GO AWAY!!!! Law: I CAN'T MAKE IT GO AWAY YOU FUCKING MORON THAT'S A YOU PROBLEM. IT'S NOT A MEDICAL CONDITION. Luffy: Then take my heart and just??? Throw it away??? Law: I am going to kill you with my bare hands. Luffy: Please? :( Law: Luffy, I swear to God-
The poor thing is so lost and he gets really overwhelmed by absolutely nothing. Like. Genuinely nothing- And the girls are always there to help him out, but sometimes it's just such a funny sight.
[Luffy sitting with Robin on deck and watching the crew just do their things. Usopp practicing his aim and new inventions in front of them] Usopp: Hey, Luffy! Check this out! *does the stupidest most sexiest thing in the whole world because he just looks hot af when he's shooting at stuff* Luffy, blushing uncontrollably, covering his face with his hat and dying from a heart attack: Jndjkandeuiwbkwendknjdkjs *Incoherent noises* Robin: Are you alright, captain? Luffy: Make it stop, Robin :( Robin: Haha, I'm afraid I can't do that. Usopp: Luffy??? Robin: He says it's really nice!
And a little bonus:
[Red Hair pirates and the Strawhats finally meeting and throwing a party together] Luffy: And then Zoro cut that guy in half like it was nothing! It was the coolest thing ever, right, Zoro? Zoro: I would go to hell and back for you, captain, and that's the anecdote you tell him? Luffy: I- It was a really cool fight! Shut up, captain's order! Don't say things like that! Zoro: Mm. Shanks: Oh. *Turns to Beckman* When were you gonna tell me the kid is down bad for his first mate? Benn: Congratulations, you got one out of three. If you guess who are the other two, I'll let you drink more than usual today, captain. Shanks: *Blushes uncontrollably* Chopper: Oh no!! You're sick too??! Shanks: What do you mean, funny reindeer? Chopper: Luffy does that when he's around Sanji a lot!! Shanks: :) The other is Black Leg. Benn: Not fair at all.
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thessalian ¡ 2 years ago
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Faerun!Alisaie vs The Powers of Persuasion
But first, old ruins, as guarded by a Three Stooges routine
Gnome: Hey, you! Hands off! This is our treasure! Or was it the ship you were after? 'Cos we saw it first!
Alisaie: Dude, we just came from there, so no you didn't. And I should warn you - if your idea of 'treasure' is brains with feet and squid-faced horrors using your skull as a soup bowl with the contents of said skull as the soup? Then go nuts. If not? I'd stay clear.
Gnome: ...Right. Thanks for the heads up. Let's get out of here, people; leave the others to loot the ruins!
Bandit Group 1: *leaves*
Shadowheart: Didn't we kill basically all of the more ... squiddly survivors of the crash?
Alisaie: Maybe we did and maybe we didn't, but we're unsure enough that it's not technically a lie. Right. Let's see what they mean by 'the others'. *knocks on locked door*
Astarion: *holds up a set of lockpicks with a frustrated expression*
Alisaie: *puts finger to lips with a 'shut the fuck up' expression*
Bandit: *from behind door* That you, dude? What's going on?
Alisaie: *dead-on impersonation of Gnome* Yeah, it's me. My asshole comrades lost the bloody key again.
Bandit: *from behind door* Well, guess you get what you pay for. C'mon in. *click as door unlocks*
Astarion: ... *quietly* All right; I'll give you this. That was far more fun. *opens door and immediately shanks dude behind it to death*
Alisaie: Well, that was ... extreme.
Astarion: Worked, didn't it?
Alisaie: Yes. Okay. Everybody quiet. There are probably more.
Several rather easy kills later, as Controller Person has figured out a few neat tricks when it comes to turn order and hiding companions, and into the main crypt
Alisaie: Okay, I spent a lot of time hiding out in libraries as a kid and this is ... nothing I know anything about.
Gale: One of the death gods. Scribe of the dead, something?
Shadowheart: Ha! What are the odds we'd trip over one of his old places?
Alisaie: Is this a "my god is better than their god" thing? 'Cos ... y'know, I get the temptation but you're here and breathing and they're piles of bones on the floor, so-- *presses button*
Skeletal Scribes: *get up and start shambling*
Alisaie: ...You're here and breathing, anyway. Want to prove exactly how much better your death god is than their death god?
Shadowheart: You really do know just what to say, don't you?
Stabnation: *ensues*
Further travelling through the wilderness
Alisaie: So our betting pool is ... brain-damaged lich for Gale--
Gale: He had that vibe, really.
Alisaie: --really advanced zombie for Shadowheart--
Shadowheart: If it was a lich, it would have killed us all.
Alisaie: --Astarion bringing up the rear with "I don't give a fuck"--
Astarion: Well, I don't.
Alisaie: --and me? Well, bards go big or go home, so I'm going with "tattered remnants of the ancient god the temple's devoted to, inhabiting whatever body's handy". None of this answers why he feels bound to our camp, but never mind. ...Okay, anyone hear a ruckus? A kerfuffle? A brouhaha, maybe?
Gale: Maybe a commotion, but-- 'kerfuffle'?
Astarion: For my sins, it's a Baldurian one. Probably hasn't made it as far as Waterdeep yet. And do we not just say 'bloodbath' anymore?
Alisaie: It's not a bloodbath. Not yet, anyway. Bloodbath has more of a squelch-splat undernote to the yelling.
Goblins: *are attacking*
Wyll: *swashbuckles his way into the fray*
Alisaie: ...Duuuuuude that is epic.
Shadowheart: Dark Lady be praised...
Gale: ...Why, exactly?
Shadowheart: Look at that. That's bard-bait right there. And a certain amount of squirming leads me to believe he shares our condition. He'll join the party, and we'll have to leave someone behind.
Gale; Shadowheart: *meaningful looks at Astarion*
Astarion: Oh, because being left back at camp with my book and whatever wine you send this way is such a hardship.
Alisaie: EARN YOUR REPRIEVE BY SHANKING GOBLINS!
Astarion: Oh. Right.
Stabnation: *ensues again*
In the Emerald Grove, after the stabnation has come to an end with none of the scouts having died even a little
Zevlor: You led goblins here? We're boned enough as it is without goblins coming right to the door!
Aradin: If you'd just been quicker about opening the gates in the first place--
Alisaie: --Well, if he'd done that, the raiding party would have gone away and come back with more reinforcements and battered the gate down and then everybody's screwed to the wall. As it is, Aradin and his valiant scouts risked their lives to lead that goblin raiding party into a clever trap, opening a hole in their scouting sweeps of the area that could be exploited to the advantage of any tactician clever enough to give the go-ahead to such a plan. And your plan worked brilliantly, even with us blundering into the middle of it, so you're both heroes and should take a breath before you say something you're going to regret later.
Astarion: *watching Alisaie defuse this messy situation from a distance* Aren't we the only reason those scouts survived?
Shadowheart: Don't interrupt a genius at work, Astarion.
Astarion: Fine; I'm going back to camp so I don't have to watch altruism happen. Call me when you actually want to do something naughty. *leaves*
Gale: Well, hopefully our swashbuckling friend really is willing to join us or we're going to have to either call him back or get Lae'zel. Who ... we should not bring here or Alisaie's thing about the cheese wheels will be exposed for the lie it was.
Wyll: *wanders back over with Alisaie* What's this about cheese wheels?
Alisaie: *digging around in a sack* Long story, fit only for a campfire and a beer. Look, we're going to see if we can talk this Kagha into maybe not sending tiefling refugees out to become goblin target practice, and also ask her where this Nettie is because hey, druid healer, might be helpful, and also I went shopping. Got rid of some of the variegated junk and turned it into useful things.
Gale: So I see. Nice armour.
Alisaie: Yeah, they didn't have anything better than you already do, Gale, but if we can scrape up the gold, he had a staff that might be useful someday. Anyway, Shadowheart, here. *hands over good armour* Also, some supplies, some healing potions, materials for more healing potions, and trick arrows. We're good. Now let's see a druid about a tadpole.
Shadowheart: You really think they'll help us?
Gale: Look at what we've seen so far. That woman could talk her way out of a demon pact if she had to.
Wyll: *tinysquee*
Gale: What was that?
Wyll: Nothing; nothing! Just ... happy to be among the skilled.
Gale; Shadowheart: Riiiiiiiight...
Alisaie: This from the people who have made their desire for their privacy very clear. Or were you putting an "all cards on the table" policy in place for Team Dangerous Company? If you were, you'd obviously be telling us what your various bits of bullshit are as a show of good faith. I don't want to know until and unless you want to tell me, but you don't get to ask for his bullshit when you're being cagey about yours.
Gale; Shadowheart: ......Fiiiiiine.
Alisaie: That's the spirit! Now, if we don't want to be all Elder Brain hive-mindey nobody-has-secrets-at-all-for-we-are-one...
Shadowheart: Right!
Gale: Yes!
Wyll: Druids right down this way! Let's go!
Alisaie: *grin* I love being me.
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butwhatifidothis ¡ 2 years ago
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i absolutely never felt bad for randolf. cause youre right. this guy went to fucking war. for clout. like bro im not gonna feel bad for you when you get shanked in your quest for glory. that sounds like a you problem. i feel a little bad for fleche, being that she represents cycles of violence and lashing out, but i also think that if youre committing yourself to killing someone you should be prepared to be killed back
Yeah like Randolph is... a dick. A huge fuckin' dick. It wasn't like he was trying to get recognition for fighting battles that were, like, worth fighting for - he fought to catch the eye of a violent imperialist, and was willing to endanger orphans in order to do so. How honorable. Oh fuckin' wow boo fuckin' hoo amiright guys, the clout chaser died trying to kill people trying to fight to get back their freedom from a warmongering emperor that's killing everyone to make herself ruler, don't that just tug at your heartstrings? Fuckin' no lol of course it doesn't.
And with Fleche, it's like... I want to feel bad for her right? She's clearly just a kid consumed with grief and rage at the death of her older brother, not exactly a heartwarming concept. But she's like... so clearly a plot device? That it's hard to really give much of a shit about her. Like looking at the game as the game (so no meta explanations) she really does only give two shits about Randolph dying if Dimitri is like... in his presence when he's killed. Where's her ass at in VW and SS? Because there is legit 0 things that could even begin to explain why she'd only give a shit with specifically Dimitri when Randolph's just as dead either way.
So Randolph's a cock and Fleche is a tool - caaaan't really say that does much for me personally
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gladerscake ¡ 4 years ago
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No One Better
(Gally x Reader)
Hope you have some time, because this one’s large and in charge (of the feels, that is). Huge thanks to all the lovely people who encourage me to keep writing. Enjoy!
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A few beads of sweat rolled down your temple, your bottom lip beginning to sting from how hard you were biting down on it, your brows furrowed in intense concentration, all while you were struggling to finally saw through this one stupid chunk of wood. It was a particularly thick one - you’ve been at it for almost ten minutes, with frustratingly minimal results. The muscles of your right arm were positively aching, pleading for you to drop the shucking saw and just ask somebody for help.
However, your resolve was stronger than your protesting muscles. You could do this. You didn’t need help.
You gave yourself a minute to rest before drawing in a deep, determined breath, and getting right back to it. You couldn’t believe it - will all this effort, you’d only managed to saw through half of it, thus far. Gally always made it look so easy...
“Having a bit of trouble there, baby?”
Your mouth immediately curled in a little grin at the deep sound of his voice. Gally’s voice. As if on cue, just when you were beginning to think about him.
The Keeper of the Builders, who you now proudly called your boyfriend, seemed to have a sixth sense for those things. To anything that had to do with you, really.
It’s been a bit over a week, since you two had made the fateful transition from close friends to something much, much more thrilling. And even though it hasn’t been that long since the change of your relationship’s nature, you could say, without question or a shadow of a doubt, that you’ve never felt happier.
The way Gally treated you on the daily, with such gentleness, care, and endless affection, made your heart bloom with delight at his mere presence. You couldn’t say you had been shocked by his manner - he’s always been kind to you, since the moment you two have met. But seeing this side of him, the loving and warm side, the one nobody else but you got to see, was a gift in itself. You believed you were immensely lucky that Gally returned your feelings and wanted you by his side, and you couldn’t wish for someone better. To you, there was no one better - simple as that.
As of this moment, you chose to bite back a cheeky remark in response to Gally’s slightly teasing question. Instead, you straightened out your posture, allowing your grin to grow as you loosened your death-grip on the saw handle and turned to face him.
“Me? Not at all! What gave you that impression?” You chirped as Gally chuckled, deeply, taking a big step closer to you. His striking bluish-green eyes peered down at your delicate features, an amused grin playing at the corners of his mouth. God, you could never get used to how attractive he was to you...
“You’re kidding, right? I could hear your grunts all the way from the Deadheads.” He glanced at the saw in your hand, trailing his gaze to the chunk of wood and your underwhelming progress, and swiftly figured out what was causing his girl such distress.
You playfully rolled your eyes at his comment “Well, not everyone is a big hunk of muscle like you, my Keeper.”
Gally tried to control the blush he instantly knew was about to paint his cheeks. ‘My Keeper’. You’ve been calling him that often since you two became a couple, and he would be lying if he said he didn’t absolutely love it. It almost always distracted him from whatever he was doing or talking about, but he didn’t mind. He definitely didn’t want you to stop.
Nonetheless, he kept his composure and cleared his throat, grinning down at you “You flatter me, baby. But you’re not wrong.”
You released a light-hearted laugh as he quickly scooted behind you. “Here, let me help.”
You felt a familiar warmth spreading through your body and circling your abdomen as Gally reached around you, his powerful torso nearly pressing against your back, his calloused hand enclosing around your smaller fingers on the handle, in order to guide your movements. Your pulse was already beginning to quicken, your face gradually getting hotter, as you struggled to ignore the effect his closeness was having on you.
“T-Thanks...”
Gally pressed a sweet peck to your cheek as he tightened his grip “Mm-hm. Now, shoulder up...” He instructed, softly, his breath slightly tickling your ear. You did as told. “Yep, just like that. Now lock your elbow. Your arm’s a little wobbly - that’s why it’s taking so much out of you.” Again, you did as he said, doing your earnest to focus on the task at hand, and not on your boyfriend’s low, breathy voice in your ear, or the heat of his strong body, or the way his arms felt around you...
“Like that?” You inquired, timidly, glancing up at his freckled face.
“Exactly. Now, drag it back and forth, and don’t squeeze the handle too hard - you’re just wasting energy that way.”
You took a deep breath and proceeded sawing through the wood, with Gally’s help, as he kept a firm grip on your hand. To your surprise and relief, it really did feel a lot easier, now that you were no longer straining your muscles in all the wrong ways, and in a matter of minutes, the sawed-off piece fell to the ground with a soundly “thump”.
You let out a victorious laugh, causing Gally to chuckle at your reaction. He thought it was entirely too cute.
“Finally! I did it!” You beamed at your boyfriend as he pried the handle out of your hand, placing the saw on the work table before interlacing his fingers with your own.
“You sure did. Next time, if you’re struggling with something, just come get me, okay? There’s nothing wrong with asking for help.” He smiled, pressing a gentle kiss to your forehead.
You closed your eyes, blissfully, giving him a short nod of agreement. “Fine, fine, if you insist...” You mumbled, the urge to kiss him coating your senses and pulling you closer into him. You didn’t fight it. Standing up on your tippy-toes, your linked your arms around his neck and leaned in, pressing your soft lips against his, your ears basking in Gally’s deep hum of satisfaction. His hands wasted no time gripping your waist as he kissed you deeper, his lips moving so seamlessly and tantalizingly against your own, your mind beginning to swim at the sensation.
Despite not wanting to break the kiss, the distant sounds of other gladers working and chattering forced you to stay aware of your surroundings as you reluctantly pulled away from Gally’s lips with a sweet final peck. The builder grinned, giving your waist a languid squeeze before delivering you a wink that almost made your knees buckle.
“As much as it kills me, I gotta get back to work, baby.” He feigned a sneer as you chuckled, nodding in compliance and unwinding your arms from around his neck. You stepped back, already missing his closeness and warmth.
“Same here. Meet you at dinner?”
“You’d better!” Gally smiled, genuinely, before turning on his heels and departing to his task of fixing the Med Hut’s leaky roof.
-later that day-
“Alright, boys, let’s wrap this up. We’ll get back to it first thing tomorrow.” Gally clapped a couple of his builders on their backs - his way of letting them know they had done a good job without actually having to say it. He wasn’t big on dishing out praise and compliments, unless it came to you.
“Whatever you say, boss!” Scott, one of his most capable builders, quipped as he climbed down from the roof, fist-bumping a couple of his friends while they stretched their sore muscles.
Gally huffed to himself before going to pick up his instruments, his tall form disappearing from the guys’ line of vision.
As soon as the Keeper appeared to be gone, Scott’s expression promptly melted from cool to sour, a hint of spite flashing through his eyes.
“Looks like someone’s in a hurry to get back to his girlfriend.” He deliberately over enunciated the last word, frowning, as if just the thought of it was too ridiculous to occur.
Another builder, Jack, cocked a questioning brow at his friend “Oh? Jealous much?”
Scott rolled his eyes in response “I just don’t get it! How did that even happen? Why him? She had like forty shanks to choose from, and she went for him?”
Jack had to snicker at the guy’s plain and obvious jealousy, the sight of it being thoroughly entertaining. “Hey, easy, man! Clearly she sees something we can’t. She’s made her choice - deal with it.”
“Yeah, but did she have to pick the ugliest one? I mean, honestly, if it were someone like Minho, or Ben, or hell, even Newt, I’d sort of get it, but...”
Gally scoffed, bitterly, rejecting the idea of listening to the rest of that lovely conversation. Did they really think he couldn’t hear them? He’s only been a few feet away this whole time, for shuck’s sake. His features darkened, his hands clenching into fists. He knew it was stupid to let something like that get to him - obviously it was nothing more than jealous ramblings of some dumb shank, who would most likely wet himself if he knew Gally had heard him.
Still, as much as he despised to admit it... It stung, hearing that. Mostly because, deep down, some obnoxiously self-deprecating part of him, agreed with Scott’s words.
Gally had never really given much thought to his looks. That is, until you came along. As his feelings for you grew, so did his insecurity. He knew he wasn’t conventionally “hot”. True, he was one of the tallest guys in the glade, and he assumed he had a nice body, thanks to his job as a builder, so he at least had that going for him. His face, however... Gally didn’t believe it was anything to be considered “handsome”. As opposed to you, who he thought was the most gorgeous thing he’d ever laid eyes on.
He hated this, hated feeling like he didn’t deserve you, hated knowing that you could probably do so much better than him, especially when you weren’t there to reassure him, to tell him otherwise and kiss away his every troubled thought.
Gally growled, internally, his jaw tensing and his knuckles turning white. No, he needed to snap out of it. What the hell? You wanted him. You chose him, you were with him, you were his. He couldn’t let his faith in your devotion to him crumble, just because some dumbass had opened his big resentful mouth.
With an exasperated grunt, Gally stalked off to meet you for dinner, as promised. He was sure that as soon he saw your face, he would forget all about what had just happened. He hoped gazing into your glimmering eyes would be enough to hush every last unwelcome thought. Yet, as hopeful as he was for that, the tension in his broad shoulders remained, as if something heavy was weighing down on him, with very little he could do about it.
-later-
Something deep within you was telling you something wasn’t right. You felt a nagging sting of worry pinching at your heart as you made your way back to Gally’s hut, that you and him now shared.
You couldn’t help but sense that Gally had seemed a bit... off, all throughout dinner. The soft smiles he’d sent your way didn’t reach his eyes. His usually bright bluish-green eyes had been tinged with an underlying bleakness, and you had no clue where it was coming from. You’d tried to ask him about it, but the only response you got was a mumbled “It’s nothing” and a hurried kiss on your cheek.
You didn’t like it. You knew Gally so well by now - you could tell when something was bothering him. You cared about him, deeply, and so, seeing him so obviously anxious about something and not telling you what it was, put you in a bothered state as well.
Whatever it was, you needed to get it out of him. Gally was your boyfriend, and a pretty amazing one at that. If there was anything at all that you could do to help him deal with what was plaguing mind, you would do it, over and over again, if you had to.
You pushed the door open and entered the hut, a loving smile curling your lips as your eyes fell upon Gally. The builder was sitting on the bed, busily scribbling something in his journal, his knit brows and slightly clenched jaw painting his face with a look of pure concentration. Probably sketching in some alterations for the Med Hut expansion. You released a muted giggle, thinking his expression was entirely cute.
Gally immediately looked up at the sound that escaped you, his smile reflecting your own, his deeply focused gaze softening the second it landed on you “Almost bed time, huh?”
“Yes, indeed.” You delivered a little grin as you shut the door behind you and approached him, your delicate hands landing on his shoulders with a pleasant squeeze “And you’re still not done working?” You eyed the journal in Gally’s hands.
He responded with a scratchy chuckle “Perks of being a keeper, baby - I’m never done.” He feigned a deep sigh that made you giggle once more, but nonetheless, placed the journal aside, wanting to give you his full attention.
The only instances where you two got to be truly alone with one another were early in the morning and right before bed, so Gally cherished these moments with you. He would spend every second of every day alone with you if he could, but for the time being, he’d take what ever little scraps of time he could get.
“Well, I’m here now, so... Maybe you’re done, after all?” You smiled, your hands kneading his shoulders in a relaxing manner, feeling his firm muscles slowly release built-up tension under your touch.
Gally grunted, deep in his throat, as his own hands took a hold of your waist, pulling you closer in a not-so subtle motion.
“I sure as hell am, now...” The deep, slightly raspy tone of his voice made you weak in ways you hadn’t imagined before, but you were far from complaining.
With a playful smirk, Gally suddenly fell back on the bed, and you yelped in surprise as with one simple, yet effective tug, he brought you down with, causing you to topple onto him.
“Gally!” You attempted to scold, lightly slapping his chest, but the laughter bubbling from within you, as well as the rising pink hue to your cheeks, let him know how you truly felt about it.
“Aww! Sorry, is this too much?” He asked, almost rhetorically, a cheeky glint dancing in his eyes.
The blush adorning your cheeks only grew as you gazed down at him in pure fascination. Sometimes you still couldn’t believe Gally was yours, that you got to see the side of him everyone else was blind to. You shook your head, leaning down to plant an amorous kiss on his plump lips, as he took no time melting into it with a low-pitched hum. His large hands, warm and eager, gripped your waist tighter as he shifted you both up the bed, until the back of his head almost knocked against the makeshift wooden frame. You whimpered, softly, against his mouth before breaking the kiss. You witnessed, with a tinge on satisfaction, that his freckle-littered cheeks were now even redder than your own, his breath escaping through his parted lips as he stared at you like you were something out of this world.
Gally felt like he could never get enough of you. Your closeness had his heart nearly beating out of his chest, and the intoxicating sensation of your lips on his sent him reeling with more need than he knew what to do with. However, as he gazed at you, taking in every detail of your breathtaking features, his mind involuntarily called back to his inner turmoil, a couple hours prior. The spark in his eyes dulled, the corner of his lips twitching with a barely-noticeable frown as he was pulled back into that loathsome state of self-doubt he’d tried so hard to fight against.
The rapid change in his expression, as minimal as it was, did not evade your notice. In a blink of an eye, your dream-like state morphed to concern as you reached up a hand to cup his warm cheek “Hey... Gally, what’s wrong?”
He huffed a light puff of air, tilting his head to nuzzle his face into your cupped hand, the small gesture nearly making you swoon.
“It’s nothing. Stupid. Don’t worry about it, baby.” Gally mumbled, the response identical to the one you’d received at dinner.
Well, that wasn’t going to be good enough this time. You frowned in sympathy “Yeah, that’s what you said earlier, too. I didn’t believe it then, and I don’t believe it now.”
Gally relinquished a hushed groan, evidently reluctant to share what was on his mind, but all you wanted was for him to know that there was nothing in the world he couldn’t talk to you about. You leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to the exasperated crease on his forehead, momentarily feeling it smoothen out under your lips.
“Come on... please? I can’t go to sleep if I know something’s bothering you.”
Gally sighed, deeply, his intent gaze meeting your own, and once again you were met with the somber pool of dejection that you had been so quick to spot.
To say he was hesitant to discuss it would be an understatement, but the plea in your gaze and soft voice was impossible for him to ignore. There probably wasn’t a single thing you couldn’t get out of him.
With a defeated grunt, Gally reached a hand up to carefully thread his calloused fingers through your silky hair, his voice dipping an octave lower as he finally spoke “Sometimes it just doesn’t feel like I’m good enough for you, Y/N.”
Your breath hitched at the mere sound of those words leaving his mouth. You felt a ferocious urge to stop him right then and there, yet... you didn’t. No, you couldn’t interrupt. You asked for this, for his honesty, so now he was giving you exactly that. You had to let him finish.
“I mean... You could’ve had anyone. Absolutely shuckin’ anyone, but for a reason I still don’t fully understand, you’ve picked me.” Gally bit the inside of his cheek, his rough fingertips turning cold as he let the words fall from his mouth. “I know what people are thinking. ‘What the hell is an amazing, sweet, funny, beautiful girl like you, doing with one of the ugliest shanks here?’. And you know what? I hate it, but they’re not wrong.”
Every sentence shot an icy pain through your heart as you had to bite your bottom lip to physically restrain yourself from shutting him up. You couldn’t stand that Gally was so critical of himself, especially when you saw him as the best thing that’s ever happened to you.
“And please don’t take this the wrong way - I’m not doubting your... feelings for me, and I’m so lucky that they’re even there, it’s just...” He trailed off, briefly, wanting to choose his next words carefully. “It’s a bit of a struggle to understand. Because you deserve the best, and I’m... well, hardly that.”
A short pause. Finally, it sounded like he was finished, and now it was your time to let him know precisely how you felt about all of it.
With a preparatory intake of air, you cupped his face in both hands, making him look nowhere else but at you, your eyes shining with determined empathy. “Gally... I chose you, because it’s always been you. Forty shanks here, and not one of them ever made me feel even a fraction of what you make me feel. I can’t explain why, because it’s not something that has an explanation - I don’t have an alphabetised list of reasons why I fell for you! I just... did. Because of who you are - that’s everything about you. And I don’t know who you’re calling ‘ugly’, because it sure as hell isn’t my boyfriend.” You paused, watching his eyes as he stared at you, mesmerized, without blinking, his mouth falling slightly agape as you could practically hear his heartbeat drumming in his chest. “So... Yeah, I can confidently say, without question, that I’m pretty happy with what I chose.”
After a few seconds of wired silence, Gally finally broke out of his entranced stupor, his voice nearly quivering as he traced a finger down the soft curve of your jaw.
“And what is it, that you chose?”
His touch made the loving warmth within you spread like wildfire, soothing your throbbing heart and coaxing a delicate grin to etch your lips “The best.”
At that, Gally released a short, incredulous huff, but couldn’t find it in himself to question it any further. You were truly a gift to him, a gift he had no idea what he’d done to deserve. In that moment, all the worries he’d had were effectively silenced, pushed away into the farthest, deepest crevices of his mind, not to be heard from again in a long time, if ever. Not a minute more would be wasted caring about anyone else’s opinion on your relationship with him. The only one that mattered was yours, and that’s the one he would hold into, for as long as you’d allow it. For as long as you’d want him.
Gally’s muscular arms wrapped around your frame, pulling you into him, tightly and protectively, as he buried his face in your hair, trying to get you as close as humanly possible, and still feeling like it wasn’t enough.
You responded by nuzzling into the warm crook of his neck, your lips pressing the gentlest of kisses to his sun-kissed skin, the heat of his strong chest soaking into you and shrouding you in an impenetrable sense of comfort and love. His love. The type nothing else could compare to or dare to challenge.
“You know, the day you change your mind will definitely be the most devastating of my life...” Gally whispered, almost inaudibly, the consuming safety of his embrace clouding your senses.
All you could do was breathe a soft chuckle, holding onto him tighter as your lips murmured against his neck “I guess it’s a good thing that day isn’t coming.”
Because in your mind, with all the uncertainties and uneasiness that surrounded the glade, that was the one thing you didn’t have a single doubt about. It was him. Gally. And there was no one better.
Thank you for reading!
Tags: @seldomabsent @obsessivelycapricious @ultraintrovertedgryffindor @maraudersimp @lattsgocaps @magnoliabloomfield @sherbertscarrothead-2 @the-marvel-meme-emporium @abundantxadorations @izzymultifan @willseyebrows @annoyinglythoughtfuldestiny
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skeleton-in-a-hoodie ¡ 2 years ago
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I think one of the parts of being a ghost that really messes with GS2 Splinter, but doesn't really bother DDMG Splinter anymore, is that even though he's still him, he doesn't think the way he used to.
The best example I can think of right now is how much more aggressively Splinter responds to threats. Like this man spent three and a half seasons only really killing when he had to and avoiding conflict. But then after he dies, if someone hurts his kids he's like "Ah, so you have chosen death."
Pre-death Splinter would not have tried to chew the general's face off, but post-death Splinter would have happily done so, if only Bishop hadn't turned up at just the right time to help Mikey and Casey pull Splinter off him.
It's something that genuinely frightens GS2 Splinter because he knows how he would have handled things if he weren't a ghost, but doing things that way seems strange to him now.
("If you kill this man, it will only make things worse for our family. Whether he deserves it or not doesn't matter. Do you really want the EPF after you and your children? What would that do to your family? You are already fighting one war, don't make it two."
vs
"Kill him. If the EPF come after your children, kill them too. Protect Mikey and Casey. Protect your family. RIPE ANYONE WHO HURTS THEM LIMB FROM LIMB IF YOU HAVE TO.")
At the start of the au, whilst Splinter is avoiding coming to terms with his own death or how he's changed, he spends a lot of time trying to figure out what he should do and questioning his own actions. Half the time he feels like in order to do anything he's got to wrestle his own brain to the ground and demand it stop being an asshole and just let him think.
DDMG Splinter meanwhile has forgotten so much about being human that his baseline for what is normal human behaviour is really wonky. He knows right from wrong, but his idea of that is slightly to the left. He also doesn't get the same level of utter confusion GS2 Splinter does after acting like a yokai.
This means he spends less time questioning his own decisions, but also means that he has zero clue how to approach social situations. He knows the etiquette for ghosts and yokai, but humans? No idea. There's all these little rules that all the other parents seem to know that he doesn't, and his kids seem just as perplexed as him. Splinter wants to ask the other adults about it, but something holds him back - when he thinks about it, he remembers feeling very confused and alone and slightly afraid.
It can create issues because sometimes he approaches a problem from the perspective of a yokai or ghost defending his Domain and family, when a more human approach would work better. Same goes for GS2 Splinter tbh e.g. trying to shank Apolex for cursing Casey when Leo is trying to appeal to her better nature.
So essentially you've got GS2 Splinter who can remember being alive and figure out alive!Splinter's thought process and reasoning from that, and so feels upset when he realises that's not how he thinks, but this means he still understands how living people think
vs
DDMG Splinter who remembers jack about being alive, so has no idea how alive!Splinter would think about certain things, and as a result feels more comfortable doing rat ghost/ yokai stuff because it comes naturally to him, but struggles more to understand humans
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thisisawonderfulusername ¡ 5 years ago
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let’s save the world
season two, episode five
five hargreeves x reader
summary: gathering the family together never ends well, but at least you can relax with a few of the siblings.
trigger warnings: cursing, drinking
word count: 5k
a/n: it took me literal years to find a gif for this one. not even kidding. i ended up settling. i am also sorry about how long this took to come out, i was very busy with school and some other health stuffs😂 anywho i hope you enjoy it
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you all watch as reginald’s car gets farther away, and you sigh softly. it’s the eyeball all over again. time to chase after it before it bursts into flames before your eyes.
“you know, i’m starting to get the impression that dad’s avoiding us.” you look to five, away from all the people that filed out of the consulate.
“what gave you that idea?” you chuckle quietly, shaking your head as you look down at the dress you wore, and hated. you couldn’t wait to get it off, but you frown as you notice the missing piece. “i lost my bow to choke that guy, and it didn’t even work.”
scratching the back of her neck, lila glances to the three of you. “i hate to be the boring one, guys, but we need to get the hell out of here.”
as she moves to leave, you getting ready to follow, five steps in front of you to look at the woman with narrowed eyes. “when you mean ‘we’, who exactly are you referring to?”
your eyebrows furrow in confusion as you look at the boy, and lila seems just as confused, shifting her gaze to the side for a moment. “not a lot of ambiguity in that sentence.”
five doesn’t back down- by now you’re used to that. “listen, i don’t know who you are or where you came from, but i’d advise you return posthaste.”
diego leans towards him, “five, she’s right, we have to get out of here.”
“i just saved your life, you kinder shit!” lila spits out, “if i hadn’t stepped in, all that would be left of you is a blazer and some bloody socks.”
looking to the side as you chew on your lip, you felt quite ready to leave right about now. the dress was starting to feel a little too tight, enhancing the pain you felt from the hits you had taken.
“that’s the problem.” five points out, “you’re too good, you ask too many questions. you know too much. and you fight like you know what you’re doing.”
looking back to the small group, you think about what he had said, and it was starting to make sense. “he’s got a point.” you mutter, looking at the girl with a raised eyebrow, almost asking for an explanation.
“so i know how to handle myself, and that makes me the bad guy?”
you wanted to believe she was a good person, the ‘crazy lady’ who you had met in the car who just seemed to be tagging along- but she was starting to seem more suspicious the more you hung around her.
“whoever you are, you’re in my way.” five tells her, “if i see you again, i will kill you.”
he starts to walk away, and for a moment, you’re planted in your spot, staring at his retreating form. quickly shaking your head, you leave the other two behind, catching up to him.
-
when you got back to elliott’s, you had crashed on the couch after changing back out of the dress, and as you did, you had seen that one of the punches you took left quite a gash in your side, and you assumed the only reason you hadn’t noticed it before then was because of the blood that had clotted and dried around it, or maybe the adrenaline from such a fight.
either way, it didn’t matter. you were use to getting injured by now, it was a part of working for the commission and now, apparently, it’s a part of saving the world. you simply cleaned it, put some bandaging over it, and called it a day.
now, you sat on the same rolling chair that you always claimed in the door frame to the kitchen, leaning your head against the wall as you watch luther- who had finally decided he was ready to help, apparently- made some scrambled eggs. the mug that you held, filled as much as possible with coffee, was still scalding hot, but that didn’t stop you from taking the smallest sips every so often.
diego paced the kitchen floor, “no, no, no. i don’t understand. they keep following me.”
luther doesn’t even look up from the pan, which was basically overflowing with the eggs. “who?” he questions, his eyebrows furrowed slightly.
“those dutch sociopaths!”
“they’re swedish, you idiot.” five corrects him, leaning against the wall across from you, “hired guns paid to eradicate us before we can do any more damage to this timeline.”
“yeah, but why now?” diego raises an eyebrow at the boy, “i mean, i’m-” he snaps his fingers, “-fine. for three months until you showed up.”
luther nods slightly, “yeah.” he finally looks away from the eggs, “i was here for a year and no one messed with me.”
looking back to you two, diego holds his arms out, looking for an explanation. rolling your eyes, you stand up, kicking the chair away from you and into the living room. “so you’re saying it’s our fault, hm?” you raise an eyebrow at them, “even if it was, and it’s not, it doesn’t change the fact that we only have six days left before the end of the world.”
nodding, five glances at you for a second. “the closest anyone’s gotten to dad was that driveway, at the consulate.”
as his stirring slows, luther looks up. “well, that’s not exactly true.”
your eyebrows furrow in confusion, and you watch as five steps closer to him. “what do you mean?”
“i saw him.”
you listen as he recounts the time he landed in the alley, when he got on a bus and went straight home- to the umbrella academy. when he arrived, there was some sort of house party going on, as people filled the building, all chatting and drinking champagne.
reginald stood with a circle of people- coincidentally talking about the end of the world and the uncertainties with time. when he walked away to get another glass was when luther stepped in, and was brushed off and humiliated in front of all the guests.
“that’s pathetic.” you all watch as the man scarfs down the eggs he had made, diego being the first to speak when he finished his story.
luther looks to him as he shovels more eggs onto his fork, “yeah, well, at least he didn’t shank my ass.”
“no, bro.” diego leans forward slightly, “he shanked your heart.”
you can’t help the small laugh that escapes you at the comment, and five looks between the two of them as luther hums in acknowledgement.
elliott enters the kitchen, looking to the large man. “is that my bath robe?”
luther looks to him, his mouth full and his eyes wide as if someone caught him sticking his hand in the cookie jar. “no.”
“look, who cares what he shanked?” five finally speaks from beside you, moving to the more important business. “he knows something about time travel.”
raising his hand slightly, elliott looks to him, “uh, why don’t you just do your thing and, uh, time travel us out.”
with a sigh, five stands up to refill his mug, and you quickly hold out your own in a silent request. “anyone care to explain?” he questions as he takes the cup, walking over to the counter and grabbing the coffee pot.
“first time he tried, he got lost in the apocalypse.” luther states.
diego is next, “second time, he ended up without hair on his balls.”
chuckling quietly, you finish, “this time he scattered us all across the timeline here- in dallas, texas, also possibly triggering a doomsday.”
five turns as he finishes refilling the mugs, looking to the man. “any more questions, elliott?”
he quickly shakes his head, and diego starts to speak again. “guys, you’re all missing the big picture here. dad is the ringleader of a sinister cabal that’s planning to kill the president.”
you take your mug back with a quiet thank you as five hands it over, and luther looks to luther with confusion written all over his face. “a cabal?”
“ignore him.” five tells him, leaning against the counter, “look, the way i see it, we only have one option.”
without looking away from his eggs, luther raises the question everyone has. “oh yeah, and what’s that?”
“it’s time to get the umbrella academy back together.”
oh god
you’re not sure if you can handle them all at once again.
diego looks at the ground for a second. “hell yeah. family meeting.”
“okay, then can one of you guys get allison?” you look to luther as he stares down at his plate, suddenly incredibly invested in his eggs.
raising an eyebrow, you take a sip of your coffee. “are you two still... uh, canoodling?”
the man doesn’t answer, only tilting his head to the side a bit. diego slowly leans towards him, “do we need to talk?”
“no, she’s married.” luther speaks through his mouth full of eggs, and you scrunch your nose up slightly.
diego nods slightly, “dude, that’s rough.” he leans back into the back of his chair.
luther forces a chuckle, “i can handle it.” the expression on his face only a second later, as you honestly think he’s close to crying his eyes out.
“i’ll get her.” five sets his mug down, and you watch as he walks towards the archway into the living space. “do you think you can get vanya without, uh, squeezing her to death?”
luther looks at him with a deadpan expression from the comment. “i’ll try.”
“good.” he looks to you, “you should go with. just to, you know, supervise.” you nod with a light laugh, though luther doesn’t look nearly as amused as you are from the light jab at him. a second later, five is gone with a flash of blue.
you down the rest of your coffee as elliott stutters for a moment. “uh, what should i do?”
with a small smirk on his face, diego looks towards him. “prepare for company.”
-
“y’all know, jell-o used to be a delicacy.”
you sit in the living room of the apartment after you had managed to get vanya, along with her, luther, and diego, as elliott goes on about the disgusting concoction in front of him.
“in order to make it, you have to boil down a whole mess of hooves... you know, horses, cows, pigs, it doesn’t matter.” fire begins to dance across your fingertips as you stare at it in boredom, your lips pressed into a thin line. “but not everybody has a bunch of hooves lyin’ around. it wasn’t until, uh, a couple of sassy new yorkers figured out how to dry it out for the rest of us to use to... enjoy this ambrosia.”
diego looks to him after sticking all his knives in a little sheath, clearly as bored and annoyed as the rest of you. “if we have some, will you shut up?”
your nose scrunches up at the thought of having to eat that... sludge, and the fire immediately dies out. “maybe.” he quickly grabs one of the bowls around the table, beginning to distribute the thing he called food.
“i’m good.” you mumble, waving your hand as he looks to you, clearly disappointed from your refusal, but you could handle that. there was no way you were going to eat whatever that was.
luther’s face is scrunched up as he watches the man scoop up the ambrosia, deciding to look away and to vanya instead. “how are you feeling?”
the woman, who was slouched into the couch with her hands resting on her stomach, glances towards him. “pretty shitty, to be honest.”
flipping one of his knives in his hand, diego looks to her. “how would you say you are on a scale from one to... ending all life on this planet?”
sighing heavily, you lean forward and rest your elbows on your knees, ignoring the searing pain in your side. “seriously? put the knife away, idiot, she’s fine.”
his gaze doesn’t move from her. “the last time i saw this one, she had me suspended midair, sucking the life out of me with energy tentacles.” he stops flipping the knife to point it towards you, “i think i’m allowed a little time to process.”
“i would love to see an energy tentacle.” elliott looks up from his creation, looking between the three of you.
shaking your head, you sigh. “no you don’t.”
vanya sits up, looking to the man. “i don’t remember what i did, but i’m sorry.” she shrugs slightly, “if that means anything.”
he looks to her for a moment before he finally stops pointing the knife around, instead holding it at his side on the armrest. “it does.” that surprised you, but at least you wouldn’t have to stand around for another family argument. “just going through a lot right now.”
beginning to speak about ‘a girl he likes’, you roll your eyes. before he’s able to speak too much, the bell on the door downstairs jingles and you can hear laughter- allison and klaus.
“anyone here?” she calls out, and you stand from your seat, as does everyone else, going to stand at the railing of the balcony.
you can tell that the two of them are at least a little drunk from the amount of giggling from the two of them. they stop to look up at the five of you, and klaus takes his glasses off. “i know this is impossible, but did we all get... sexier?”
rolling your eyes, you watch as everybody else goes down to have a heartwarming family reunion, allison and vanya hugging before klaus joins in.
“alright, let’s get down to business.” five turns and goes up the stairs, everyone else following. as they come up, you take your seat once again, all of them taking their own places around the room.
standing in front of all of you, five sticks his hands in his pockets. “first thing i want to say is i’m sorry. i know i really screwed the pooch on this whole going back in time and getting stuck thing.” diego nods slightly, and you prop your feet up on the coffee table, nudging the empty bowl out of the way. “but the real kick in the pants here is, we brought the end of the world back here with us.”
“oh my god, again?” everyone looks to klaus in silence. “all of you knew? why am i always the last to find out about the end of the- oh my god, my cult is going to be so pissed, five! i told them we had until twenty-nineteen!” he whines.
you sigh softly as you run a hand down your face, “well, better inform them it’s coming sooner than that. we have six days.”
“is it vanya?” he takes a sip from his drink, and allison scoffs, “what? it’s always vanya.”
deciding to ignore it, vanya looks to five and you turn back in your seat, shaking your head. “do you have any leads, five?” the woman questions, and diego is already handing him the file that holds the picture of their father in the knoll.
“yeah, we have one.” five tells them, passing the folder over to allison, who doesn’t waste time in opening it up.
“holy shit, is that dad?” she looks at it in disbelief, and vanya quickly leans toward her to examine the photo as well.
after a moment, five continues to explain. “we’ve been trying to talk to him about what exactly this means, so far we’ve got nothing.”
“not nothing,” diego quickly adds, “we know that he’s planning to kill kennedy.”
“possibly,” you make your entrance into the conversation, “but we don’t know who or what sets doomsday in motion.” you remove your legs from the table, leaning forward slightly, “could be kennedy, could be something that doesn’t have anything to do with him.”
five nods, “but, if we know something changes the timeline, we have to make it right.”
her eyebrows furrowing, allison cuts in. “yeah, but how are we supposed to do that if we don’t know what to fix?”
“oh, come on, do the math.” diego tells her in irritation, “we know dad’s having shady ass meetings with shady ass people. we know he’s on the grassy knoll in three days to kill the president. so i think we all know what we have to do.”
“kill dad.”
“find dad.”
the two have very different ideas, apparently, and five turns his head to look at him with furrowed eyebrows, and you have to bite your tongue to keep from laughing at the incredulous look.
it’s quiet for a moment before vanya speaks. “none of us are supposed to be here, right? i mean, what if it’s us?” she looks around, “has anyone here done anything to screw up the timeline?”
another bout of silence surrounds you as looks are exchanged between everyone, before luther takes a deep breath to start a circle of accusations.
“diego has been stalking lee harvey oswald.”
pointing a finger at the big man, his voice raises immediately, “and you’re working for jack ruby!”
“allison has been very involved with local politics.” klaus pipes up from his seat beside you.
“okay, and you started a cult.” she points at him, giving a mocking smile.
while klaus hissed as if he were a cat, vanya sat up in her seat slightly. “i’m- i’m just a nanny on a farm, i don’t have anything to do with all of that.”
allison looks at her, “well, maybe you do, we just don’t know it yet.”
a loud whistle catches everyone’s attention, looking towards diego. “look at yourselves. everything in our new lives is connected to kennedy. that can’t be a coincidence. luther works for ruby, allison is protesting against the government, dad’s on the grassy knoll, klaus-” he pauses for a moment, looking at the man, “is doing something weird and pervy, but it’s probably connected in some way. clearly we were sent here for one special reason. save john fitzgerald kennedy.”
rolling your eyes as everyone starts to argue, you stand from your seat, feeling a headache coming on from being around this incredibly dysfunctional family, unable to not think about how peaceful it was when you were normal for once, just working in a diner.
“guys, you all die.” you look back at five as he speaks, cutting through all of the clashing voices. “i was there. i saw it. i wish i could forget it, but i can’t. i saw russian nukes vaporize the world with all of you in it, in a war that never happened until we brought it here. hazel gave his life to save us so you may need to shut up and just listen to me.”
you frown slightly at the confession, feeling bad that he had to see his family die yet again. you couldn’t imagine seeing your family buried in the rubble of your home, or actually watching the blazing fire that wipes them out from a nuke that takes out the city.
“i don’t know if the things we all experienced here are connected. i don’t know if there’s a reason for everything. but dad will.” he looks around at his family and to you, “we need to him before everyone and everything we know is dead.”
you’re about to voice your agreement, but luther is the one to speak first. “okay. i’m out.”
with furrowed eyebrows, you watch as he stands from where he sits, already heading towards the stairs. “were you even listening, luther?” you question in disbelief.
he looks to you. “yeah. yeah, i was. i heard a fifty-eight year old man who still wants his daddy to come and fix everything.” he gives a derisive grin, “and you can count me out. it’s time we all grew the hell up.”
everyone begins to call him back, and you can’t believe what you had just heard, quickly running around the chairs and being able to step in front of him before he starts making his way down the stairs, you walking backwards with each step he takes. “you’re kidding, right?”
five appears next to you with a blue flash, and luther finally stops as he stares up at him. “no one leaves until we figure this out.”
he looks between the both of you for a second, before suddenly he’s grabbing your arm and tossing you over the railing of the stairs as if you’re as light as a feather. you yelp from the surprise, and five is gone before you can grab onto him, landing on the tile floor with a groan as you curl in on yourself.
“asshole!” you call out to him as he leaves the building, diego following after him for who knows what reason.
standing from the ground, you hiss in pain as you feel the gash in your side sting like hell. you lift your shirt slightly and peel the bandage back a bit to see that the scab that was starting to form had teared apart, and you press your lips together as you let the bandage and your shirt fall back into place.
“let’s go!” you hear klaus call out, and you see the remaining three siblings start to make their way down the stairs. “oh, y/n!” he calls when he sees you standing at the bottom, smiling slightly, “would you like to get some tacos with us?”
looking to the side for a moment, you sigh, before looking back to him. five was gone and you didn’t know when he was coming back, so why not? “tacos sound amazing right now.”
-
music played from the radio resting in front of the mirror on the table matching the rest lined along the wall in the hair salon, and allison ranted about her husband, comb in hand as she messes with klaus’ hair.
with a groan of annoyance, she continues. “the nerve of that man.” she chuckles bitterly, shaking her head, “i mean, one thing goes wrong, and he’s on a warpath! i mean, doesn’t know who i am?” she looks into the mirror in front of him, pointing the comb, “no, no. no ray, you know exactly who i am. you just can’t handle it. i’m protecting him.”
you take a sip from the bottle of champagne on the table next to you, already feeling the alcohol taking effect as you smile slightly, watching the two of them as you hum along to the music. “protecting him from what?” klaus questions, his cigarette between his lips as he raises an eyebrow at her.
“the end of the world, for one.” she responds, the irritation clear in her voice.
vanya speaks from her seat across the room, her feet propped up on top of the table. “hey, is the world really going to end in six days?”
it’s quiet for a moment, and you take another drink from the bottle. “it did last time. i saw the aftermath.” you shrug, “sure, i didn’t see this one, but five wouldn’t lie about something like this.”
klaus gets up from the salon chair, and allison puts the comb she was using to the side. “hey, wouldn’t it be weird if five grew up all hot?” he asks, moving to stand in the middle of the room, grabbing one of the extra bottles to fill up his flask. allison expresses her disgust. “oh, ew! ew! please, miss ‘luther was my lover.’“
holding her hand up, the woman started defending herself. “we have never even kissed.”
“yeah, but you guys were making little sick moon-dog eyes at each other, all through puberty and breakfasts and all that.” he argues, motioning wildly with his hands.
turning her seat around so she can look towards all of you, vanya voices her confusion. “aren’t we all brothers and sisters, or?”
klaus snorts at the question, and you look to allison as she sits in klaus’ previous chair. “well, technically, it-”
“technically?” you cut her off, sitting up in your seat with a chuckle as you look to her, “if you have to use the word technically, you’re already in trouble.”
klaus giggles from where he stands, looking to vanya for a moment, “okay, can- can we focus?” allison dismisses the conversation, “i mean, clearly, we’re not saving the world tonight, but maybe, maybe, we can at least try to save my marriage!”
“no!” klaus cries out, and you grin, “no, because that’s- that’s like asking a nun how to hump someones leg. i mean, who in this room knows shit about relationships, huh? this one-” he points at vanya, “in secret love with some... farm frau,”
“her name’s sissy.” the woman whines.
“which is an improvement from her last lover, the serial killer.” he laughs, and vanya looks very confused from that comment, her eyebrows furrowing. “meanwhile i’m carrying a torch, for a soldier i haven’t technically met yet, luther is... in love with his sister. and you!” he spins around to point at you now, and you’re surprised by his sudden call out, “y/n, you don’t even realize that you’re ridiculously in love with five!”
you gape at the declaration, not even able to comprehend the accusation, but it doesn’t matter, because he keeps on. “face it, the only healthy long-term relationship in this family, was when five was banging that mannequin.” allison crosses her eyes, falling back into her seat, “the only thing the umbrella academy knows about love,” he holds his flask up into the air, “is how to screw it up.”
the two women mutter their agreements, and you take a long drink from the bottle, sighing as you let your head fall against the back of your chair, the champagne resting on your leg.
“how do you guys deal with this?” vanya questions, and you lift your head slightly to raise your eyebrows in question, and she continues. “all of it. the time travel, seeing the dead, the end of the world...”
“well i get really high,” klaus tells her, plopping into the chair behind him, “allison, allison... lies to herself.” the woman kicks a rolling stool towards him in irritation, causing him to flinch, “y/n works herself to death helping five, and you suppress all your emotions, deep, deep down, until you... you blow shit up.”
rolling your eyes, you decide to ignore his comments, looking to vanya. “yeah, i’d like to not do that anymore.” she looks to the floor.
“well,” you stand up, stumbling slightly, “you have six days.” you look at the nearly empty bottle of champagne, and you scrunch your nose up. did you really do that?
“what are we supposed to do with six days?” allison scoffs.
klaus mutters an ‘i don’t know’ and vanya seems like she has an ah-hah moment as she sits up in her chair. “i’m going to tell sissy i love her.” she announces, and klaus looks at her with raised eyebrows, his hands up in the air at his sides, “i don’t want any secrets.” she shrugs her shoulders.
“yeah-” allison grabs her bottle and stands up from her seat, “yeah, you’re right! ‘cause if everything’s going to go tits up, the least i can do is be honest with my husband!”
klaus rests his elbows on his knees, “oh... does that mean i’m going to have to face my cult?” he sighs, “i just hate group breakups- it’s why i stopped dating twins.”
vanya throws her hands out to the side, her eyebrows furrowed. “this family is amazing.”
the other two chuckle, and you shake your head with a grin on your face. yeah, their family is incredibly dysfunctional, but at least they were connected on some level. “let’s not get ahead of ourselves.” allison giggles, and klaus stands to hug her, both of them struggling to stand upright on their feet.
they motion for you and vanya to join, and when the woman hops over to engage in the group hug, you sigh and join in, having to lean against them all to keep yourself up.
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five-rivers ¡ 4 years ago
Text
Long Night in the Valley Chapter 11
“Where are you going?” demanded Shigaraki, scratching his neck in agitation. 
Touya Dabi looked lazily over his shoulder.  “I’ve got something to do in town.  Might as well avoid a second trip, right?  You all go on back.”
“Aw, Dabi, you’re ditching us?” asked Toga.
“Yup.  See you back at base.  Let me know if you manage to wear down the giant, ‘kay?”
“Wait, wait, does that mean—Does that mean he has a way to get out past all these guys unnoticed?  Pfft that guy doesn’t know anything!  What are you talking about?  You’re gonna get caught, Dabi!”
Dabi ignored Twice, just giving the League of Villains a lazy wave over his shoulder before making his way down off the roof via the fire escape. 
Yeah.  He had a way out.  More importantly, he had some curiosity to satisfy and chaos to sow.
Time to bother a certain little birdy…
.
Hawks was in the middle of directing the clean-up team when he got a text.  From a contact labeled ‘boyfriend.’ 
The person in question was not, in fact his boyfriend.  Why, then, did he have him labeled thusly?
Because the person calling him was, in fact, the villain he was milking for information, and that did not fit well into a contact list.  On top of being suspicious. 
(Oh, and he lived in anticipation of the moment someone noticed the name of the contact and reported it to the press, causing his expensive commission-funded PR team to drown in delusional fangirls.  It was the little things in life that made it worth living…)
(In his opinion, they deserved it for making him go through with that frankly traumatic series of photoshoots right after he turned eighteen.)
Hawks…  Considered ignoring the call.  Today, to be honest, had sucked.  He’d been informed the former #1 hero had been kidnapped, ordered to hunt down a (questionably innocent) teenager, and lost a fight with said teenager.  Adding pretend terrorism to that might just be the straw that broke the camel’s back. 
Except…  People’s lives depended on the intelligence he was collecting.  He retreated to the shadows of a nearby alley and answered the phone. 
“I’m sort of busy right now,” he said. 
“Yeah?  Busy getting your teeth kicked in by All Might Junior?” Dabi cackled. 
“If you called just to make fun of me, I’m hanging up.”
“Do you really think I’m that petty?”
“Yes,” said Hawks. 
“Aww, that burns, chicken wing.  What if I told you I had a tip?”
“Oh, yeah?” asked Hawks.  “About what?”
“C’mon, you know you have to pay for it.”
Hawks covered the phone receiver while he sighed.  “What do you want?” he asked, more composed. 
“Just a ride out of town.  Didn’t think you guys would be this antsy today.  Did the kid kick your hill over, too?”
If Hawks had been religious, he’d be praying for patience. 
“Just you, or are your friends here, too?” asked Hawks as he tapped in a Heronet request for everyone to be on the lookout for the league of villains on his other phone.  “I can give everyone a ride.”
“Nah, just l’il ol’ me,” said Dabi. 
Yeah.  Hawks hadn’t expected Dabi to own up to his crew being in town.  Even if they were. 
“I’ll see what I can do,” said Hawks, texting the hero commission.  Maybe they’d see fit to cut their losses as far as the spy gig went and—Nope, they were approving his request regarding Dabi.  “What about that tip?”
“Here’s half of it,” said Dabi.  “Get your guys to scrape some of the runt’s blood off the sidewalk and run a DNA test on it.  I hear he’s related to someone interesting.”
Hawks closed his eyes.  If Midoriya was related to All for One, it would be the metaphorical nail in the coffin for him.  Having your life and future ruined because of who your parents were…  Hawks hadn’t exactly experienced something like that, but he’d felt the fear of it for quite some time.  
(Despite everything, he still wanted to be a hero.)
“Thanks, for the heads up, dude.  Where should I pick you up?”
.
“You really need to check in on your safehouses more often,” said Izuku as Toshinori reapplied the bandages around his ankle.
“I know.  I was busy.  I’m sorry.  I haven’t exactly been helpful in all of this, have I?”
“I would have been caught within the hour, if you didn’t pick me up,” said Izuku.  “I wasn’t in my right mind.  But what now?”
“We can still go to Deika, I suppose,” said Toshinori.  “We just, ah…”  He looked up at Gigantomachia and Izuku followed his gaze with a wince. 
Yeah.  That wasn’t going to fly in any reasonably populous area. 
As he watched, Machia pulled a small box out from beneath his shirt.  Izuku blinked.  That was a two-way radio. 
Wait. 
Gigantomachia pressed a button, and the radio crackled to life.  “DOCTOR!” shouted Gigantomachia.  “I HAVE FOUND THE LITTLE LORD AND HIS FRIEND.  WHAT SHOULD I DO?”
Izuku tensed.  He and Toshinori should have realized Machia would have some way of communicating with the doctor.  After all, he’d said something along the lines of ‘call the doctor’ earlier. 
Sure, both Izuku and Toshinori were injured, exhausted, and distracted by events playing out inside their heads, but just because a mistake was understandable didn’t mean it was forgivable.  Or survivable. 
The radio crackled with static.  No response.
Izuku let out a sigh of relief as Machia repeatedly tried to raise the doctor on the other end of the line before breaking down in tears. 
.
“Are- Are you sure we shouldn’t pull over, Dr. Tsubasa?  Your phone is going off an awful lot.”
“I’ve been getting a lot of prank calls lately,” said Garaki, knuckles white around the steering wheel.  “I’m sure it’s nothing.”
He was, in fact, quite sure it wasn’t nothing.  But he couldn’t take a call from the League of Villains, or even Machia, with Midoriya Inko in the car. 
He checked his GPS.  Yes, Machia was staying still, which probably meant that he had Midoriya Izuku.  Hopefully, he had already disposed of All Might, and could, therefore, devote his energy to keeping the Midoriyas from escaping and Midoriya Inko from attempting to kill Garaki once they arrived.  And—
No, he was moving again.  Curse the creature.  How hard could it be to keep one teenager in place?
True, the teenager was the son of All for One and starting to grow into his terrifying legacy, but really. 
“And you’re sure your friend will help us keep Izuku from being arrested?” asked Inko.  She had been asking him some version of this question every few minutes since they got in the car.
“Quite sure,” said Garaki.  He had been giving some version of this answer every few minutes since they got in the car.
“Is he… a lawyer of some kind?”
The picture of Gigantomachia as a lawyer was so incongruous that Garaki flinched and nearly drove off the road. 
“No,” he said, perfectly calmly, not at all freaking out over what All for One would do to him if he involved Inko in a car accident.  He laughed nervously.  Oh, he’d better hope the accident killed him.  Goodness. 
“You have your driver’s license, right?” asked Inko.
“Yes,” said Garaki.  His phone started buzzing again.  He ignored it in favor of checking the GPS again. 
Oh, dear.  He knew where Machia was going. 
This could be… interesting.  He glanced at Inko.  Very interesting.
At least he knew how to get there.
.
“I’m just saying,” said Izuku, who had been relieved far too early in the game.  “I really, really don’t get along with Shigaraki Tomura.  I think we should probably not go anywhere near him.  It’s a really bad idea.”
“But he can call the doctor for you!” said Machia, excitedly as he bounded through the forest.  “Then you can be better, Little Lord!  All fixed up!”
Again, that did not make Izuku feel better.  He squirmed against Machia’s arms. 
.
None of the League of Villains were bad at sneaking.  In fact, they were all quite good at it. 
However, they’d come into the city with the expectation that they would have a quick getaway courtesy of the doctor if anything went wrong.  Which they no longer had.  Because he was ‘not in his lab’ and ‘busy.’  Self-important NPC…  until the noumu got up and running, his whole point was to provide fast travel. 
Anyway.  Between being unexpectedly stranded and the stupidly huge numbers of heroes out looking for the cauliflower brat aka player two (Tomura didn’t have any proof he was actually Sensei’s kid, and until then…), they were going into this stealth mission with serious handicaps. 
(With Dabi gone something like ninety-nine percent of that handicap was Twice and his inability to walk around like a normal person.  Tomura had left his hands at home and Compress just had to take off his mask.  Toga would have the easiest time of it, Tomura could admit, because she just had to shank someone.)
“I hate to say it,” said Mr. Compress, “but I think our burnt friend might have the right idea.  Splitting up will give us better chances.”
“No way,” whined Toga.  “We’ve got to stick together.  Right, boss man?”  She hugged Tomura’s arm until he pushed her off with his knuckles. 
“There’s a car down there with the keys still in the ignition,” said Twice, pointing down into an alley.
They all leaned over the side of the roof to look at the car.  It was old-fashioned.  Antique, even.  Someone clearly put a lot of care into keeping it clean and running. 
The keys were, indeed, still in the ignition. 
“A sting?” suggested Mr. Compress, uncertainly. 
“Nah, they don’t use cars like that for stings in this city,” said Tomura, revising his opinion on whether or not Twice was a handicap.  “They use, like, sports cars.  Who here can drive?”
“I don’t have a license,” said Toga.  “I was too young when I ran away from home.”
“I didn’t ask who had a license.  I asked who can drive.”
“I can drive—Badly!—I drive fine.  Hardly ever crashed—depends what you mean by ‘crash.’”
Tomura scratched his neck.  He wasn’t touching that with a ten-foot pole.  “Compress, tell me you can drive.”
“I never learned how to use a stick shift.”
He pulled his bloody fingernails away from his neck.  “Okay.  Here’s the deal.  Twice, if you crash us, I’ll kill you.”
“Sure thing, boss!” said Twice, saluting.  “Not if I kill you first, jerkface!”
This was going to be a long drive.
.
“We’ve got a new message from the HSPC,” said the producer, sliding a piece of paper onto the presenter’s desk.  “Read that as soon as we come off the commercials, okay?”
“Got it,” said the presenter, putting her headphones back on.  She read the notice. 
Members of the league of villains have been sighted in Musutafu and are believed to be present in connection with the kidnapping of Yagi Toshinori, also known as All Might.  Please exercise caution…
.
The commission investigators had been waiting for at least half an hour before any of the UA staff even deigned to greet them.
“It’s about time,” said Abe. 
“Sorry,” said the teacher waving.  “You can’t come in.”
“Excuse me?”
“The campus is on lockdown because of what happened at the testing center,” explained the teacher.  “We can’t open the gates without Nezu’s authorization, and he was called away to deal with an emergency.”
“What,” said Ito, dropping his cigarette and grind it under his heel.  “Seriously?  This is the emergency.  One of your own teachers got kidnapped.  All Might got kidnapped.  Don’t you care?”
The teacher snorted.  Abe and Ito stared at him through the bars of the fence, taken aback. 
“I’m sorry, it’s just—”  The man snickered again.  “Midoriya kidnapping Yagi.  That’s certainly an image.”
“Midoriya is a trained in combat and has three dangerous quirks.  All Might can’t even use his one anymore.”
“Yes, yes, I’m not saying it’s physically impossible.  But—”  He started laughing.  “Possible and likely are two different things.  Excuse me.  I never introduced myself.  I’m Lunch Rush, and if you ever saw those two at lunch time together, you’d have a very clear picture of why this whole situation is absurd.”
“Maybe you can show us the tapes, then,” said Abe.  “After you let us in.”
“No, sir, I’m afraid I can’t.  Even if I had access to them, there are students in those videos!”
“So?”
“Minors, you see.  Without written parental permission or a court order we can’t show them to anyone not affiliated with the school.  Now, I must be going.  I have a culinary arts class to teach!”
He was still chuckling as he walked away.  “Midoriya kidnapping Yagi, oh ho, I knew I’d get a kick out of actually hearing someone say that seriously…”
.
“Wow,” said Twice, “this car gets terrible gas mileage.”
“Are we going to run out?” asked Toga.  “That’ll be exciting!  I’ll have to flag down some generous motorist to give us a lift~”
“Yes!  Not soon!”
Compress leaned forward from the back seat and started fiddling with the radio, barely staying on each channel long enough to tell if they were playing music or news.
Tomura groaned and covered his face with his hand.  He contemplated whether it was worth letting his pinky drop just to escape this. 
“… League of Villains?” 
Compress stopped changing channels.
“They’ve been saying it all along.  I know it’s hard to believe that UA could miss something like this, something like a traitor, but it’s just facts.  The League’s presence in Musutafu confirms it.  He kidnapped All Might for them”
“It all seems awfully coincidental, though, and the commission isn’t showing us any pictures—How do we know for sure the League is in the city?  For that matter, if the League is really involved, how do we know Midoriya Izuku isn’t just another victim?  We never got a full tally of their members.  They could have someone with a, I don’t know, a brainwashing quirk.”
“Yumi, you really need to lay off the late-night conspiracy theories.  We can trust the hero commissioookkkhhh—”
The radio died horribly as Tomura decayed it out of console.
“I am going to commit murder,�� said Tomura.  How did this always happen?  How was it always this attention-grabbing, kill-stealing little—
“I guess we have time for a pit stop.  No, we don’t!”
“Don’t you dare stop this car until we’re back at base,” growled Tomura.  He took a deep breath that really wasn’t calming at all. 
“I kind of have, to, I mean, road signs and all…  Uh.”
“We’re villains, dude,” said Spinner.  “You can break a few traffic laws.”
“Hell ye—Not if we want to live.”
“You can follow the traffic signs,” allowed Tomura.  He leaned back his seat, ignoring Mr. Compress’s complaint about squished legs. 
Player two.  Finishing the tutorial and then blazing through a quest like that.  Crazy OP character build. 
He still wanted player two in his party.  He also wanted to knock the brat so far off the leaderboard that he’d never play the game again. 
These were, Tomura acknowledged, somewhat conflicting desires.  He was, at the moment, leaning toward the second, but the first would give him ongoing dominance which would be incredibly satisfying. 
If player two really was Sensei’s kid…
Then Tomura… He’d be like… a big brother.   An older sibling. 
That felt… weird.  But also weirdly like something he wanted.  Ugh, it sounded like a pain.  Stupid story-mode side quest with garbage rewards, except the garbage rewards were the best rewards. 
He hadn’t built his character for social interactions.  He was combat class, high DPS. 
Why couldn’t things just be simple?  Why couldn’t he just destroy what he wanted?
“Heyyyy!” squealed Toga.  “It’s a McDonalds!  We could get murder and fries.”
“Do.  Not.  Stop.  The car.”
.
Machia thundered into the abandoned quarry with all the enthusiasm of a deranged puppy. 
“This is Shigaraki Tomura’s secret hide out!” proclaimed the giant, setting a windswept Izuku and Toshinori down in front of a crumbling, half-collapsed building.  He beamed proudly.  “SHIGARAKI TOMURA!” he screamed at the building, frightening away the few brave birds in the quarry that had yet to leave.
No one came out.  Machia sniffed the air. 
“Oh,” he said.  “They aren’t home.”
“That’s fine,” said Izuku, patting Machia.  He didn’t elaborate.  Most of his brainpower was currently tied up in preventing his legs from folding underneath him. 
“Why don’t we,” began Toshinori before hacking up a large quantity of blood.  “Why don’t we just show ourselves in?  I’m sure it will be more comfortable for young—For the little lord to wait inside.  And perhaps one of them left a phone we can use.”
“The last time you went into a building by yourselves, you were attacked,” rumbled Machia. 
“That is true,” said Toshinori, “but there’s no one in this building.  You’d be able to smell them.”
“Not if they were invisible.”
Izuku blinked slowly.  “That,” he said, “doesn’t sound right.”
He continued to blink as Toshinori convinced Machia that he would, in fact, be able to smell invisible people.  He must have missed something, though, because next thing he knew, Toshinori was steering him into what passed as the building’s door. 
“Alright,” said Toshinori, voice low.  “We’re going to get you cleaned up as best we can, then we’re going to take everything that looks useful and sneak out.”
“Like… food and stuff?”
“Yes.  And we’re also going to see if we can break enough things that they’ll have to take care of that instead of following us.”
“We could just set some things on fire,” said Izuku, who had never considered himself a pyromaniac of any kind, but who had also grown up alongside Kacchan. 
“Good idea,” said Toshinori, who had been the type of fifth grader who made jokes about setting things on fire but had only ever burned his workbook at the end of the school year.  “Let’s see if these guys have running water.”
“You know,” said Izuku, carefully avoiding a bunch of old food wrappers.  “I sort of expected a more impressive evil lair, all things considered.”
“This is average for high-level fugitives, actually,” said Toshinori.  “Especially if they don’t have a lot of connections or cash.”
“Huh,” said Izuku, cautiously opening a door.  “Here’s the bathroom.  Huh.”
There were a lot of hair products in the bathroom.  A lot a lot. 
It’s like the candles budget chart, snickered Six in the back of Izuku’s head.  Help, I’m trying to balance my evil lair budget.  This is what I’ve got so far:  Electricity, 100 yen, building, 1100 yen, furniture, 200 yen, hair styling products, 9,000,000 yen. 
Izuku wheezed. 
But, seriously.  Why did they need this much hair stuff?  Shigaraki obviously hadn’t ever even heard of personal grooming.  Toga had her natural hair color.  Compress didn’t show his face or his hair.  Spinner had a lizard mutation.  Dabi—
It was totally Dabi. 
Oh gosh, based on how most of the hair dye boxes were labeled for temporary use and quick removal…  Haha, was Dabi just… just waiting… just waiting for an opportune moment to dramatically reveal himself? 
Izuku started wheezing again. 
“Are you alright, my boy?” asked Toshinori confused.
“This is Dabi’s hair dye,” said Izuku.
“Hm.  I hadn’t realized he dyed it.”
“I want this hair dye,” said Izuku.
“I suppose we can try to find the brand once we get to a supermarket,” said Toshinori, confused.
“No, no,” said Izuku, still gazing down at the box sitting next to the sink.  “I don’t want to use this brand of hair dye.  I want to use this hair dye.”
“Oh.  Oh,” said Toshinori.  “This hair dye.  Dabi’s hair dye.”
“Yes,” said Izuku.
“To be petty.”
“Yes,” confirmed Izuku again. 
“It has been a long time since I was… petty,” said Toshinori.
“Vlad-sensei’s car?”
“That was convenience, not pettiness.”
“Well,” said Izuku, picking up the box.  “We are sort of… you know… villains, now.  Since we fought Hawks.   I am anyway.”
“You’re not a villain,” protested Toshinori. 
“I mean, from a legal standpoint,” said Izuku.  “Not a moral one.  And, well.  Villains are petty, right?”
“I do not believe pettiness is an exclusively villainous trait, my boy.  In any case, I wasn’t condemning you.”  He put his hands on his hips and looked up at the cracked and crumbling ceiling.  “If we had more time here, we could set up some things that would really annoy them.”
“More than stealing their food, their money, their clothes, and their hair dye before setting their house on fire?” asked Izuku. 
Toshinori scratched his head.  “You know, now that I think about it, probably not.  But does this really qualify as a house?” 
.
“Hey,” said Hawks.  “So, about the other half of that tip.”
“Huh?  There isn’t a second half.  That was just to keep you from ditching me.”
Hawks had met villains who were civilized professionals.  Why couldn’t he be trying to infiltrate a society made up of those types, and not one that included the racoon currently filling his car (technically the commission’s car) with the scent of smoke and charred flesh?
“Well, what about that ‘interesting parentage’ you were alluding to?”
“Oh.  Shigaraki thinks Midoriya is his sensei’s kid.”  Dabi shrugged.  “Honestly… yeah.  I kind of see it.  But you’d think he’d get his kid to work with us instead of whatever is going on between him and Shigaraki, on the other hand…”  Dabi trailed off. 
Hawks momentarily glanced away from the road to see Dabi with an uncharacteristically pensive expression. 
“I mean,” continued Dabi, leaning on his hand as he stared out the window, “the whole hero thing could be sticking it to his old man.  I can respect that.” 
“You sound like you’re talking from experience,” observed Hawks. 
“You still talk to your parents?” asked Dabi. 
“Nope.”
“Heh, you wouldn’t tell me even if you did, would you?”
“Hey, you are a villain.  I’ve got to keep my soft spots covered, right?”
“Right,” drawled Dabi.  “Kid held up pretty well against you, didn’t he?”
“He did okay,” said Hawks.  “He got away, after all.”
“Wonder how he’d do against Endeavor.  One-on-one.  What d’you think?”
Hawks couldn’t help but swallow.  If it were one-on-one, and Midoriya could still use Erasure…  He hated to think it, but Endeavor might lose.  A man with no quirk against a strong enhancer and that black tentacle emitter…
He wondered how long it would be before Midoriya got put on the S-rank villain list.  The paperwork had to be in progress. 
(After all, he’d defeated the number two hero – or near enough – while holding off three others.)
(On the other hand… that building…)
“It’d certainly be a fight,” said Hawks, neutrally.  “Is Midoriya really not working with you?”
“Nope,” said Dabi, not quite managing to pop the ‘p’ with his burnt lips.  “Not saying he isn’t a villain or whatever.  That’s up to you guys after all.”
“Not me,” said Hawks.  “I’m on your side, remember?”
“I remember,” said Dabi.  “Anyway, I only was face-to-face with him that one time in the forest, last summer.  He had a great expression.  Not as great as – Well.  That part doesn’t matter.”
Ugh…  Hawks hadn’t taken Dabi for the kind of killer who’d reminisce about his kills.  Maybe he could – No.  Lose Dabi and he’d lose his lead on the League, and who knew how many more people would end up dead.
He just wished the commission would give him backup on this.  Someone who actually worked with infiltration.  Someone who could help him minimize the damage the League was doing. 
“Pull over,” said Dabi.  “This is my stop.”
“You live around here?”
Dabi snorted.  “Not a chance.  You get to see our base once we’re sure you won’t tattle.”
“Come on, you can’t blame a guy for curiosity,” said Hawks. 
“Sure can,” said Dabi opening the door and jumping out onto the gravel margin.  “I’ll call you.”  He walked off the side of the road into the scruffy tree cover and disappeared. 
“Well,” mumbled Hawks, deliberately ignoring all the elocution lessons the commission had stuffed him with.  “That was useless.”
Except for the tiny feathers he’d snuck into the lining of Dabi’s coat.  But those had limited range and Hawks wasn’t good enough at stealth to follow Dabi without making an idiot (a potentially dead one on top of that) out of himself. 
His phone began to ring, the bugs in the car having shown the commission that Dabi was gone.  Hawks sighed and answered.  Time for new marching orders. 
.
The landscape was much more intact, now.  It was still a battlefield.  Four was dodging bullets and catching grenades to sling them back at his attackers.  He dove to the ground right before a cheerily painted building exploded into splinters. 
Danger Sense, Aizawa concluded.  Some kind of limited precognition? 
“Shigaraki?” said Iida.  “He’s a Shigaraki?  He’s related to—to him?  To Shigaraki?”
“Sensei,” said Uraraka, tugging on his sleeve, “that other man, you don’t think that was, you know, the man from Kamino?  All for One?”
“Midoriya thinks that All Might is related to All for One?” muttered Todoroki, just load enough to hear.  “That – no, that does make sense.  Their quirks are wrong, though, but if there are enough generations, you can’t really predict…  Does that make Midoriya and Shigaraki cousins?”
Todoroki paused.  Aizawa braced himself, both for the violence he was sure he was about to see, and the torture Todoroki was about to inflict on him. 
“Midoriya is related to All for One,” whispered Todoroki. 
.
Shouto didn’t blame Midoriya for trying to hide it.  If at all possibly, he would have hidden the fact that he was related to Endeavor.  Sure, he might have lost some privileges, but he also would have gotten rid of the constant comparisons between himself and his father. 
Much like Shimura Souma had to face. 
It must have been terrible for a young Midoriya to learn that he was related to a man who had so injured his father. 
To learn that he was related to this man. 
(No wonder he based this shade on Shouto, although Shouto didn’t think that Endeavor was quite as bad as All for One.)
There was a sound like cymbals being brought together, then—
Light.
And—
Sound. 
A group of soldiers who had been sneaking up on Four were obliterated by a lightning strike that left behind fire and glassed soil. 
Four got up and did a sort of awkward bunny hop away from the strike zone, blinking dazedly and covering his ears.  Shouto knew he’d be behaving similarly if his dream body behaved at all realistically.  Especially given the risk of being electrocuted due to the charge in the ground…  Or was that just for downed power lines and Kaminari?  He didn’t remember, and apparently neither did Four. 
There was another crash of the cymbals, like thunder before the lightning and the lightning struck again, farther off. 
And then a woman, a few years older than Four ran out from between two of the buildings, cymbals in her hands.  Her graying hair was worn in tiny braids and her skin was dark.  Mixed race – That would have been rarer back then.  She had other musical instruments (drumsticks, some kind of flute, what looked like maracas) attached to her belt, but was otherwise dressed in generic military surplus gear.  There was a massive surgical scar stretching across her throat. 
“Haruna,” said Four.  “What, what are you doing here?”
‘Haruna’ tucked one of the cymbals under her arm and began signing aggressively at Four. 
“Ye-yes.  But – Your children, they need you.”
More signing.  “I’m not being hypocritical.”  He gestured to the mark over his eye.  “I’m dying anyway.  You aren’t.”
Her face twists, then twists again as she notices more armed men approaching.  She claps her hands, metal sewn into the palms flashing before a slender bolt of lightning cracks across the sky. 
This is when Shouto realizes who she is.  He’d learned about her in art class, of all things.  Thunderclap.  One half of one of the first villain duo to be marked as S-rank, active during the dawn of heroics.  Her birth name was widely believed to be Harmony Trey, and she’d used the alias Miura, but records from back then, even for something that important, were sketchy, and criminals were never good at keeping paperwork up to date in the first place.    
Her quirk was sound-based weather manipulation.  No one knew what had happened to her throat, but the public of the past had been grateful for it.  She could cause lightning strikes with a clap.  What could she do with her own voice?
Something like twenty percent of the early propaganda pieces for the Hero Practices and Standards Commission had her and her partner on them, being defeated or held off by various newly licensed heroes. 
Neither of them had ever been caught. 
Was she ‘Three?’  If so, Shouto could understand why Six didn’t want to say anything, although All for One was much more jarring and—
Hold up.  Thunderclap had been active over a hundred years ago.  If All for One was here, too, then that meant that either:
Midoriya’s subconscious was terrible at timelines (and so was Shouto’s because he’d just accepted all this without question until a split second ago). Or—
All for One had an immortality quirk on top of all the other terrifying things he could do.
The fact that the second one was more plausible was unfair of reality. 
(Shouto liked ‘conspiracy’ theories, but his theories were, for the most part, well, not things that would keep him up at night for fear of nightmares.)
Except she didn’t seem to see them at all, so maybe not.  The rules in the dreamscape had, appropriately, a dreamlike consistency.  That is to say, hardly any. 
“Please,” said Four.  “We don’t both need to die.”
Thunderclap looked like she was about to cry.  But she nodded.  Four turned to face the rest of the small army bearing down on him. 
.
The house looked cozy, thought Tenya.  Sort of like that cabin his family had rented in the countryside a few years back.  The lights were dim but warm.  The smell of food and spices permeated the air.  Children and teens of various ages were draped over furniture. 
In the kitchen, four adults sat around a table.  Four, Thunderclap, a man who was entirely green, and woman with hair so golden it literally glowed. 
As a middle schooler, Tenya had done a lot of research into discrimination against people with mutation quirks and vestigial or tangential mutations.  It had branched off into research into quirk-based discrimination in general.  If this scene was truly set near the dawn of heroics, the green man and the golden-haired woman would have risked being attacked just walking on the street in most cities. 
He looked back through the doorway at the children in the other room.
Both the yellow hair and the green curls were painfully familiar. 
Did Midoriya really think he was related to Thunderclap of all people?  The idea was preposterous. 
Except—
Oh, he was getting just as bad as Todoroki.  Not to mention, even if Midoriya did have a terrorist in his family tree a hundred years ago, it didn’t change anything about Midoriya.  Goodness, Tenya most likely had some less than savory characters in his own family tree, even if he didn’t know about them. 
Four doubled over clutching his head, interrupting the apparently light-hearted story the green man was telling. 
“They’re coming,” gasped Four.  “They’re coming.  Go bags – phone tree – we have to.”
“I’ll get the kids,” said the golden-haired woman. 
.
“Your body is shutting down,” said a man in a doctor’s coat.  “These cracks, they aren’t just on your skin, they’re on your organs, too.  I can’t find any reason for it.  Maybe if we had access to genetic testing…” he shook his head.  “Maybe you can still get it.  Your quirk is concealable.  Not like most of us here.”  He took a moment to tug on one of his long, sheeplike ears.
Four shook his head.  “Too big a risk.”
“Mhm, it’s up to you,” said the doctor, dubiously.  “I’m sorry I couldn’t help you more, Yagi-san.”
“It’s still Shimura.  Yagi is my wife.”
“That’s still confusing.”
“The name change thing is western,” said Four, “and I picked Shimura for a reason.”
Aizawa steadied himself against a wall.  The last two shifts had been disorienting. 
“Is there anything else I can do?” asked the doctor. 
“Can you help me tell my wife?”
.
Four was screaming and holding his face.  In front of him was a huge boulder, split in half. 
.
“Hoshino,” said Four, leaning down so that his head rested on top of the golden-haired woman’s.  “I gave it away.  I gave it away.”
“Lariat worked out, then?” asked Hoshino.  Yagi Hoshino, Aizawa had to presume. 
“He’s a good person,” said Four, hoarsely.  “I like working with him.”
“You don’t have to stop.”
Four closed his eyes.  “I think… without it…  I might be able to live here.  At least, visit more often.”
“I’d like that.  I think the kids would, too.”
.
Four, hunched over, clutching his head. 
.
Four, in an alley, fighting men with knives, standing in front of a young woman with clawed hands.  He’d been stabbed in the side. 
.
They were back in the house, watching a news program.  A trainline had been hit by a villain attack.  A ticker on the bottom read ‘mutant metahuman train under attack by Evolutionary gang.’  The reporter’s voiceover was saying something along the lines of this is why mutants shouldn’t be allowed on public transport, they bring their gang wars with them.
Lariat was on the scene.  A man recognizable only by his green skin at this distance fell out of one of the train cars.  Lariat grabbed him with one of his black energy whips and put him back. 
Thunderclap relaxed her death grip on Four’s arm by just an iota. 
“He saved him,” said Four. 
.
A much younger Four leaned against a wooden wall.  He was splattered with blood, his clothing torn. 
“I couldn’t save her,” he whispered.  His hands were shaking.  “Shimura-san—”  His breath caught. 
.
A woman with her hair gathered into a curly gray ponytail sat at a desk, blankly staring at the content.  She wore a grey cardigan and could have been Thunderclap’s sister.  Her eyes were obscured. 
Which meant she probably was, all things considered. 
Which meant that she was the other half of that S-rank villain pair. 
Tempest.
“You don’t have to do this,” said Four.
“I do.  You don’t understand how many people he’s killed.  You don’t understand what he’s done.  He has Haruna.  I can’t—”
The scene sheered away as Tempest turned to face Four. 
.
Do you remember when I first met you?
“Oh, this isn’t a pleasant one,” said Four, voice deceptively mild. 
They were in an underground facility.   The walls were concrete and metal, covered in pipes.  The sounds of footsteps echoed down the hallway, starting and stopping. 
“Although,” said Four, “there were certainly some good points as well.”
A teenage version of Four ran down the hall, frequently looking over his shoulder.  His hands clutched a ring of keys by their blades and a pair of ID cards.  His long, shaggy hair hung in his face, and he kept having to push it out of the way. 
He reached a door at the end of the hall, and started fumbling with the keys, muttering under his breath.  He slid one of the cards through a scanner near the door.  It clicked open. 
First contact. 
There were definitely fewer voices involved in the proclamation, now.  Two men, one woman.  The woman had an American accent. 
Beyond the door, a woman was strapped to the bed, unconscious.  No, not a woman, the same woman who had been at the desk. 
Tempest.  Storm-caller.  A villain who had been responsible for bringing so many storms to bear against Japan that they had permanently changed the coastline. 
“Got to get you out of here before Dad comes back,” muttered the younger Four, untying the straps.  “You need to wake up.  Ah, Narcan.”  He started rifling through a cabinet.  “Narcan, Narcan…  Narcan.  Found you.”
“Don’t look for Three,” said Four.  “She doesn’t want to talk to you.  Or anyone.  Do you know where Jinoshi Lake Camp is?”
“My class went there on a history field trip, once,” said Uraraka. 
“Yeah,” said Aizawa, not liking where this was going at all.  “I know the place.”
‘The place’ being what amounted to a concentration camp for quirked people in the early days of the quirk boom.  How bad it was tended to be glossed over in history lessons, but Aizawa had long been able to read between the lines. 
In the earliest days, the government had tried surgically removing quirks.  Typically by removing the relevant body parts.
“That’s her contact point.  Don’t look too closely.”
Aizawa supposed he knew how Thunderclap got her scars. 
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hailbop1701 ¡ 4 years ago
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Chapter Three: An Explosively Good Time
Chapter three guys! I'm both nervous and excited for you all to read it. It's pretty long and we delve a bit deeper into the story. Kirk wants answers and Bones needs a new shirt. 👀 Well, I don't want to give anything away. I truly hope you all like it! Thank you to my wonderful beta reader @dw-writes. You're amazing doll!
The tram slowed to a smooth stop, John lifted his weapon just as the doors opened. He swept the area with Beckworth on his left. Nodding to the security officer, John moved forward making sure Kirk and Chekov were just behind him. Taking up the rear of the group were Lawrence and Bitar, bickering all the while. Rolling his eyes, John squared his shoulders as he led the group into the residential area. The double doors hissed open to reveal a courtyard and John couldn’t help but appreciate how real it truly looked. Cobblestones, rich green plants, a running fountain, and automated birds chirping happily.
Beckworth let out a low whistle from beside him, “Fancy digs,” he murmured with an amused smirk. John stopped, listening for any possible threats that could be hiding in the area. Nothing. Just the hum of the base and the bubble of the fountain in front of them. It was way too quiet and peaceful for his comfort.
Jim moved so he was standing on his other side. “I don’t like it,” the Captain whispered to him.
John hummed in agreement, something didn’t feel right. He almost let out a snort. ‘Nothing about any of this feels right,’ he thought. The hair on his neck stood on end. John scanned the area again, only this time he eyed the plant life and the cobblestones. All of this said “TRAP”
Lawrence walked forward, his gaze on the plant life all around them instead of what was right in front of his nose.
Spotting what he was looking for, John hissed and was behind the young man within seconds, he grabbed the kid’s vest and yanked him back.
Lawrence yelped as he fell onto his ass, “What the-”
John held up a hand to silence gasps and yells of surprise. He then pointed at a thin fine wire mere inches away from where the security officer had been standing.
“Shit,” Beckworth grumbled crouching down to get a better look at the “Booby trap.”
“Holy crap, thanks Doc.” Lawrence gasped out as he scrambled to his feet again.
Bitar rolled her eyes. Reaching up, she gave Lawrence a swift smack upside the head. The action started a whole new bickering match.
John sighed, gesturing for the others to follow him and move out of the way. Pulling a knife from his boot, he gently tossed it up into the air before catching it nimbly by the blade. With a quick flick of the wrist, the knife shot from his hand. Spinning in the air a couple of times, the blade sliced through the wire before embedding itself into the cobblestone. Cocking his head to the side, he heard a mechanism click. Chekov let out a startled squeal as a haphazard metal spike trap sprung from the bushes and trees. Grunting, John strode forward, he examined the trap with a deep frown.
“Used pretty recently,” he muttered, touching one of the spikes. He showed his fingers to the group, “Fresh blood, and someone had to have reset it.” He wiped his hand on his pants.
Kirk furrowed his brow in confusion. “Do you think that means we’re not the only ones surviving here?” he asked, sounding hopeful.
John jerked his knife free from the path. He grimaced at his friend. “Honestly? It could go either way,”
Jim wasn’t the only one looking at him with a confused expression. Sighing John fiddled with the knife in his hands. He chewed on the inside of his cheek, trying to come up with the right words. He really didn’t want to give his best friend any more bad news. Sheathing the knife back in his boot, John pulled his tricorder free. Scanning the blood he began to explain. “This stuff can really mess with your head, and I’m not just talking about C-24 fucking with your DNA. Being hunted by monsters with an extreme possibility of never making it out, and a chance that you’d turn into something that is worse than death...well, I’ve seen highly trained and skilled men crack. Go insane and beyond reason.” He paused as the scanner chimed with the results that he wanted. Turning the device around so the screen faced the group in front of him. Chekov’s mouth dropped open in shock, he looked at John with horror in his eyes. John continued, “The blood has no trace of C-24 or any sick and twisted variation. It’s completely human…” He paused glancing at the screen again, “And Andorian, and Vulcan,”
Kirk choked for a second, “So you’re telling me that the trap was made by a living person and they’re killing other living people?”
John put the tricorder away, “That’s exactly what I’m telling you.”
Chekov took a shuddering breath, while Kirk just set his jaw. “So we’re being hunted on two fronts,” the Captain sighed, running a hand messily through his hair. Beckworth’s eyes darted around the peaceful courtyard with a healthy dose of paranoia. His younger security officers ceased their quiet bickering and pulled out their phasers, ready for a surprise attack.
Reaper clenched his jaw and tensed. The hair on the back of his neck and his arms stood straight up. They were being watched, and not just by the cameras, but by a live body. He could hear their heartbeat thudding deeply in their chest. In his periphery, John saw a shadow on the second story landing.
Jim Kirk knew Leonard McCoy. Even though he may not have known as much as he originally thought. So when Bones - Reaper- tensed, he knew something was wrong. “Bones…” Jim prompted, trying to keep as casual as possible. The man tilted his head to the left; a subtle gesture but Kirk got what his CMO was trying to say: “Someone is watching”
Out of the corner of his eye, John watched as a shadow quickly disappeared. The sound of muffled hurried footsteps echoed in his ears. “Beckworth,” his voice carried no southern drawl but reverberated with authority. Beckworth couldn’t help but stand up straighter. In fact, everyone stood up a bit straighter, even the Captain.
“Yes, sir?”
“Get everyone to the third floor, there’s a bridge up there that attaches to the rest of the shopping district.” His orders were clear and without room for argument. Jim opened his mouth to protest but Chekov beat him to it.
“But what about you?” he asked, eyes wide.
John couldn’t help but smirk at the young navigator. With a half-hearted shrug, he turned to look at the second-floor balcony. “I’m gonna go say hello to the locals,” he muttered while moving off. The rest of the away team watched slack-jawed as Reaper bounded up onto a nearby chair, and table before he lept up, catching hold of a stone carving halfway to the second floor.
“Jesus, McCoy!” Beckworth called out with a short hysterical laugh.
John easily clambered up to the second floor. Swinging himself up onto the metal banister, Reaper sat and appraised his surroundings. From this vantage point, he saw a lot more, he couldn’t decide if his new view was a good thing or not.
The courtyard was clean at first glance, but from where he was John saw the gore underneath all the beauty. There were multiple bodies hidden in the garden, blood tainted the fountain and coated the walls surrounding him. Frowning, John leaned back on the banister to look down the long hallway. He was being watched again. Glancing down, he saw that the group was making their way through to the stairs. Nodding in approval, John rolled off of the banister onto the dirty corridor floor. A long blue - or what used to be blue carpet was covered in blood and torn to shreds - lined the hall. If John could hazard a guess, he had a faint idea of what wandered through. ‘ Damn Hell Knights,’ he thought darkly.
Taking a deep breath and closing his eyes, Reaper let his surroundings disappear for a moment. He could hear the base thrum under his feet, but it was growing faint; they were on the clock. The heartbeats of the rest of the away team thudded steadily, some rapid in fear, some in calm easy thuds. Then there was what was a lot closer. Running footsteps, and labored breathing. It was heading straight for him. John sighed sadly; this wasn’t going to end well.
Cracking his neck and rolling his shoulders, John opened his eyes just as a blur of a man jumped at him. Quickly stepping to the side, John saw what had been killing everything and anything. The man was ragged like he had been surviving in this hell hole for quite some time. His hair was long and matted, full of knots, and coated in many different substances. His clothes were ripped and repaired and ripped again. Reaper wrinkled his nose, pitty filling his gut.
‘Poor bastard,’ was all that ran through his mind as the cracked man screamed at him, pouncing again. John leaned back, holding up his arm, only noticing the makeshift knife at the last second. Letting out a string of curses, Reaper kicked away the madman and looked at the shank sticking out of his arm with an annoyed expression.
“God fucking damnit!” he hissed, yanking the blade out of his forearm.
The man he had batted away looked at John in pure terror. “Demon!” the man shrieked, pointing at John with an accusing finger. Rolling his eyes, Reaper tossed the knife away over the side of the nearby banister. He could hear it clunk against a mass of water as it landed in the fountain.
“You’re not the first to call me that, and you’re sure as hell won’t be the last,” he drawled to the man, who was scurrying backward away from John as fast as he possibly could. John held up his hand peacefully, “Easy now, I’m not gonna touch you.”
The ragged man stopped his scuttling and paused. He looked visibly confused. “You’re not- who are you?” he asked, voice raspy and raw.
Reaper chewed on the inside of his cheek; Jim called it his nervous tick. “My name is Doctor Leonard McCoy, I arrived on the USS Enterprise. My team and I are trapped here just like you,” he soothed trying to bring out the humanity in the man before him.
“Enterprise,” the man breathed eyes wide, his breathing quickened, almost panicked. “No, no, no,” The man shook his head in denial, he reared and screamed “No!” once more before he started laughing. It was hysterical and Reaper was now completely convinced that the guy was way too far gone.
John watched the man carefully, trying to figure out if he needed to be taken care of or just locked away in a closet until they could get back to the ship. But before the ex-privine could formulate a plan of action, the survivor abruptly stopped laughing, looking as serious as could be. “You’re the one she wants. Death himself.” The words were in a hissed whisper as if speaking any louder would bring forth the demons lurking in the shadows. John froze, body tense ready for an oncoming attack but none came. “You can’t run away from your past forever. If you do those around you are going to suffer and die.” With those final words, the man whirled around and sprinted at break-neck speed down the long hallway. “Face your past Grimm!” he hollered as he rounded a corner and was out of sight.
That was until John heard him let out a startled scream. To anyone else, it sounds as if a paint-filled balloon popped behind a closed door but, to Reaper, it sounded almost too familiar. During the third world war, John experienced a new form of suicide bombers. The bombs weren’t visible, you could almost never tell it was there until it was too late. “SCED” or “Subcutaneous Explosive Device.”
Reaper flinched at the memories that assaulted the forefront of his mind. During world war three John was not officially in the armed forces but had stepped in multiple times to help the wounded and civilians to safety. During that time he had seen and experienced firsthand what a “SCED” could do. Shaking his head, John moved cautiously forward and peered around the corner. John choked on his breath his eyes went wide,
“Shit,” he cursed, stepping out to take in the scene full on. The corridor was dripping and smoking. Blackened blood coated the walls and floor, parts of more than one person could be identified. What made John’s stomach churn and made his scientific mind curious was the fact that the blood was smoking. The man who had run from him was laid curled up on the floor, covered and burnt beyond recognition.
Kneeling down, John examined the man more closely: he was missing a couple of limbs and his face was stuck in a silent scream. ‘Burns aren’t consistent with an explosion,’ he thought with a furrowed brow. Cocking his head to the side, John sniffed the air and immediately sneezed. Wrinkling his nose, Reaper scowled. “Acid. It smells like fucking acid,” he muttered with a shake of his head. “What in the hell are these things mutating into?” he asked himself quietly as he slowly got back to his feet.
A low rumbling growl made John freeze and cautiously turn around. There stood a very large, incredibly fat infected not even ten feet away from him. Raising an eyebrow, John harrumphed, “Well, aren’t you all quiet-like. I’m impressed with you bein’ as big as you are.”
He had never seen an infected like this before; John fully just realized that he was in completely new territory. The demon snorted, seemingly unimpressed by Reaper. It stepped forward, its form expanding and gurgling as it went. Backing up, John reached and pulled his rifle from his back and took aim. The demon let out a blood-curdling scream as it expanded further, its skin pulled apart and cracked, revealing a glowing blackness underneath.
John fired just as the monster before him blew. The final thought that ran through his mind for quite some time was simple: “Fuck me,”
------------------oOo----------------
Sound was the first thing that came back to him. It wasn’t that spectacular if he were being honest. His head ached and the ringing in his ears was starting to piss him off. Groaning, John rolled to his side so he was sitting up on his elbow. His vision was blurry but was quickly clearing, and he grimaced as his surroundings came into focus. The area was worse off than before, the walls were practically melting and Reaper didn’t want to find out if this was going to cause a hull breach. Quickly pulling his rifle from under him - it was a miracle in itself that he managed to save it last second- and got to his feet, John stumbled down the corridor until he hit the stairwell. ‘Third floor,’ he thought numbly, he could faintly feel his burns and other fractures slowly knit back together. The healing process didn’t take long but it was damn uncomfortable. It felt as if his whole body had gone to sleep, the sensation of old TV static. It was always a painful experience.
Staggering up the stairs, John let out a sigh of relief as the numbness in his body began to fade. “ ‘bout fucking time!” he growled out as he made his way to the third floor. As soon as he was close enough for the sensor, the door hissed open.
Multiple cries of concern and joy filled his ears.
“Bones!”
“Doc!”
“Thank the Gods, we thought you were dead!”
And Chekov’s accented, “Doctor McCoy,” made him smile minutely.
Waving away whoever’s hand was trying to help him through the door, John straightened and cracked his back and neck. He looked closely at the group in front of him with a doctor’s eye before nodding satisfied.
Kirk coughed trying to cover a chuckle, “Ugh Bones, you uh need a new shirt,” he faked whispered, and pointed out the obvious.
Reaper rolled his eyes, “Oh gee Jim, I haven’t noticed,” he ground out.
The Captain scowled back half-heartedly but everyone could see his concern. “You okay?”
“I just got blown up by a fleshy acid bomb and I’m stuck in what has to be one of my worst nightmares. I’m - “ Reaper took a deep breath and shook his head. “I’m fuckin’ fantastic. This place should rate five stars, too bad Yelp is no longer a thing,” he muttered walking toward one of the residential quarters. Kirk grimaced at the blatant sarcasm, McCoy’s tone and quips were answer enough.
John squinted at the nameplate next to the door controls, his lip twitching in irritation. Sure, he was glad to see the away team unharmed, but the exploding demon really wrecked what was left of his day; though that wasn’t saying much.
“Well, Daniel Garrets, I hope you have a shirt my size,” John muttered punching the door just right. Bitar let out a soft curse from the group behind him as the door bent and caved in ever so slightly. Pushing his fingers into the small gap John yanked the door open easily. The door let out a shuddering groan as it was forced to roll on its track. Light from the corridor shown faintly into the dark room. Before anyone could go in, Reaper held up a halting hand and cocked his head to the side, listening. He breathed in deeply and all he could smell was must and dust.
Nothing had been in there for quite some time.
Moving in, John pulled his rifle around so it was aimed into the darkness; he’d rather be safe than sorry. Despite his gun being slightly melted it still worked perfectly fine. Reaper didn’t want to express it but he was rather impressed by how detailed the replica truly was.
Clearing the room, John waved the rest of the team in. John eyed down both sides of the hallway before he forced the door closed with a deafening squeal. Turning around, he saw that Chekov all but collapsed in a chair, his nose buried in a PADD. Jim paced the length of the room in deep thought, muttering to himself. The three from security were quietly talking about the best way to keep their captain and Chekov safe. John wasn’t the least bit offended that he was no longer included in that list. Though it did make him a bit sad, it was a step closer to leaving the Enterprise. To leaving his first home in a long, long time.
Sighing, Reaper shucked his rifle and his tattered shirt. Bare-chested he moved through the small room to the closet, silently praying that the man who had once lived there wore the same size. Opening the closet John frowned a little, not quite but close enough. Grabbing a simple black t-shirt from the hanger he pulled it over his head and rolled his shoulders so it fit on his frame better. Turning from the closet he moved into the bathroom.
Upon finding the sink, John started the tap and let the water run for a few seconds before ducking his head under the stream. Grumbling, he ran his hands through his hair trying his best to pull the matted blood and bone from the tresses. Lifting his head he saw Jim in the mirror. He was leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed, an almost unreadable expression on his face. He wanted answers now.
The shock of the reveal was wearing off and now Jim Kirk wasn’t going to hold back anymore. Veera’s dramatic reveal was something he didn’t want to believe but now he didn’t have a choice. Since the atrium, Jim has been in complete and utter denial. He had seen what his best friend could do, he had seen how different he was. Jim’s eyes flashed in the light, his jaw set. No more joking, no more keeping up his causal maverick front. He was pissed and McCoy - Grimm- was going to see it. But no matter who Bones was. He will always be Jim’s friend. He had already decided to hear the man out. To listen to what he had to say, to hear what’s true and what’s fiction.
Reaper hummed and jerked his head, inviting Kirk into the small space. Moving into the room, the starship captain kept silent waiting for his friend to talk. As he carefully thought over his words, John rummaged through the cabinets around him, after he found what he was looking for (an electric razor) he finally spoke.
“I told you the gist of what happened on Mars. Olduvai. It was an honest to god shit show, Jim. Eight fully trained specialized privines - eh private military contractors - were sent in to search for some scientists. Well, we sure as hell found them.” John let out a dark humorless laugh and shook his head. He was halfway done cutting down his hair, it was no longer messy but shortened and military. John swallowed hard, he looked just as he did when this all happened the first time.
Kirk thinned his lips as he let his friend search for the words he was looking for. Reaper brushed away the dirty hair from his shirt and clicked off the razor. He turned and leaned against the sink, crossing his arms he looked down at his boots.
“We found that the research up there wasn’t exactly kosher. They uncovered humanoid remains in the archeological dig and found that some of these remains had a synthetic chromosome. It made them superhuman. Faster, stronger, incredibly intelligent, and apparently live obscenely long lives. The Oldulvians ruined themselves and we almost followed in their footsteps more than once. They created a rudimentary transporter called the Ark and fled to Earth to escape themselves. You see, C-24 didn’t affect everyone the same way. There were some that turned into monsters.
My sister - Sam- who was an unwitting accomplice in all of this, had a theory that it only turned those with genes that had markers for insanity. She was actually the one who discovered that not everyone would turn into monsters. But, by that time, my CO had lost what was left of his sanity. He began to kill everyone whether they were infected or not, and at this point, some infected had gotten through the Ark and into the Earth facility. No matter how horrible it sounds, but we were lucky that the quarantine was still active at that time. A little over two hundred people died, men, women, and children, my unit included. Only Sam and I made it out.”
Kirk was smart enough to figure out this was a shortened account of events but it was enough for now. He nodded but frowned, “How did you get C-24?” he asked curiously.
John snorted, chuckling darkly. “Projectile weapons are a bitch kid. I got a damn ricochet in the gut. I was bleeding out and on my way to hell but my sister decided to take a gamble and inject my ass. Turns out she was right, but it had its consequences.” John ran a hand through his newly cut hair, a haunted look crossing his face. He looked up, “For what it’s worth Jim, I’m sorry.”
Kirk looked away his expression guarded. John knew he wasn’t going to get away cleanly but knowing the outcome of something didn’t make it hurt any less. His eyes were locked onto the floor, he was wound tighter than piano chords. He was expecting to be shouted at, told to go to hell. And he believed he deserves it.
“What can we expect here, Bones?”
John relaxed ever so slightly, shocked at Kirk’s tone. It showed less anger and frustration and more like his friend, John wasn’t forgiven yet but it was a start. He grumbled, “Well, we can expect strong ass monsters who want to either turn you or eat you. Other than that, I’m in new territory. This is completely new and, if I had a month, maybe I could tell you how much of a difference it is. The crazy pirate bitch changed things so much that it shouldn’t even be called C-24 anymore. Who knows what else is lurking out there.”
John could see how much Jim didn’t want to hear that by the set of his jaw.
“Keptin, Doctor!” Both men turned to face Chekov as he barreled into the small room holding up his PADD.
“What is it, Chekov?” Jim asked hopefully. The young man turned the PADD around and showed them a single dot on what appeared to be a map of Genesis.
“Sir, I managed to vind this under the station's jamming signal. It appears that there is another Starfleet officer trapped here! “
John and Kirk looked at each other, both were wondering if it could be a trap. “Is it just a signal or-”
Chekov was already shaking his head before Jim could finish. “No, there is a single message attached to the ping. It just says a name and some sort of code…” he trailed off as he tapped hurriedly at the screen. Turning the PADD around Chekov let the message play.
John felt his blood freeze.
“This is Layla Grimm, I’ve been compromised. Code: Ghost, I repeat - Code: Ghost! Run Uncle J-”
Reaper felt his knees buckle as screams filled the air of the bathroom. He faintly felt Jim grip his arm trying to keep him upright. His blood pulsed in his ears and all he could see was red. The look in John’s eyes made both Kirk and Pavel back up a step giving the CMO some space. John gritted his teeth breathing hard. “Where was that sent from?” his voice was sharp, making Jim wince.
Chekov cleared his throat as he looked down at the screen in his hands. “The medical wing sir,”
John looked at Kirk who just nodded in approval.
“Looks like we’re goin’ hunting.”
Tags:
Everything: @thottiewithashotgun, @lauraaan182, @writerdee1701, @stileslover13-blog, @cowenby2, @bluesclues-1234
Hollow Castle: @chook007, @lauranthalasah
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fulcrum-agent ¡ 4 years ago
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010. Heady [FFXIVwrite2021]
His voice comes over the Linkpearl unexpectedly.
"A-Aquila......Father is here...I don't know what to do; he's standing right outside Calcifer.....what do I do?" He says in a slightly panicked tone.
"You stay the fuck in the lab and let me deal with him," she replies immediately.
She's given a timid reply, "Ok...."
"Once some ground rules are out, I'll let you know," she explains to him. "But he gets to find out all the ways he will die if he messes with you."
His voice pitches upward a little as he asks, "A-are you bringing Leth? Rolno? Locke? any kind of backup?"
"Locke's still recovering, Rolno's about to get laid, and Leth got shanked earlier," she explains calmly. "Besides, I don't NEED back up now, thanks to Merrick."
Sounding more than just a little concerned, he murmurs, "Alright..."
Their father takes a sip from the cup in front of him as she arrives. Upon seeing him, she draws her blade, assuming the same stance that the former Blade who owned it used.
"...what are you doing here?" she asks coldly.
The man, without looking up, speaks - his cold, nearly monotone, and emotionless voice carries over the wind.
"Is that any way to address your Father? Daughter of mine, I taught you better."
He finally stands up and brushes himself off, and faces her fully, his hands neatly folded behind his back. His eyes looked down at the sword, then back to her; a slightly raised eyebrow was the only indication that he had acknowledged the weapon.
"You PROGRAMMED me - you didn't teach," she corrects him harshly, not taking well to him using that particular phrase. "Not that such'll save you anymore. One of your little projects saw to that."
The man tilts his head. "Oh?"
"Yeah. C-04-01B. Merrick. Somehow, you managed to make him even more monstrous than yourself," she retorts sharply, blade still ready to strike. "Again. Why. Are. YOU. Here."
Her father seems lost in thought for a moment.
"Interesting, I was sure I destroyed him when he malfunctioned.....I suppose he must have found an escape and has since degraded since his creation," He did not seem too concerned with the escaped Clone. "It took me quite a while to find you and Liocyon; I've come to bring you home....seeing as you failed to even do that."
"Spoilers: We're not going, and you've lost the power to make us," she immediately slings at him, still debating on just attacking him. "It was NEVER in the plan to go back, especially after finding out why Lio left."
He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose as he replies, "These antics of yours are growing tiresome, my child."
"You created them at the end of the day," she points out. "I'm pretty sure you were entirely aware of how trying to enslave me was gonna work out."
She's given what passes for an incredulous look by her father as he echoes, "Enslave? is that what you think I was doing?"
This finally breaks from her calm tone of voice.
"Septimus is DEAD because of what you did!" she shouts at him, giving him a gaze that likely has made some random primal rollover disturbed in their sleep. "YOU should be the dead one."
He gave the barest hint of emotion at the mention of Septimus's name; his eyes seemed to soften just slightly.
"What happened to your brother....was a tragedy," He said in a slightly softer tone, "Believe me when I say....that I grieved with the rest of you."
"If that's fucking so, why did you even programme me to kill our family!" she shouts; for the moment, the last vestiges of the conditioning can't fight past her seething rage. "I nearly killed LIO because of your bullshit!"
The almost emotionless state returns the response, "Better to die at the hands of a family member than one of these barbarians."
"If not for these 'savages', Merrick would have succeeded. You're only dealing with me because they rescued me," she retorts hotly, clearly provoked by his words. "If not for them, Lio would be dead. Because that's Merrick's goal - to replace my brother."
This actually gives her father pause before he brushes the information off again.
"That clone is delusional; I never made him for that purpose, for replacing Lio."
"Intent or not, that's what's going on, Father," she counters, the last word sounding like pure venom. "You've created one hell of a mess. He's MURDERED dozens of people - 'savage' and Garlean alike."
Her father furrows his brow as he flatly states, "A pity but hardly my problem or my concern."
"Oh?" she slowly lowers Talekeeper, assuming her...perceived lack of a stance. "Actually, it is. And you're going to fix it."
She's given what passes for a quizzical look as he states, "There is nothing to fix."
"Yeah. There is. Put on that damned monocle and LOOK," she orders him. "There's something only you can repair. It's the only reason you're not dead."
Without bothering to do as asked, he questions, "And what is that?"
"I have an aetherpool. Two pre-teen kids worth of aether. Enough to use aether," she explains to him, like he's five, "but not enough to dispatch your monster."
He makes a motion for her to continue, seeming undisturbed by this news, and she sighs a little.
"I...need you to finish what he attempted. So that I can eliminate the threat he poses to Liocyon," she explains, voice returning to that sort of mimicry of his own. "But don't think I won't stab you, somewhere non-fatal, if you do ANYTHING to Lio."
The man quirks his brow. "You want me to...expand your limited aetherpool?"
She nods at Cicero, "Yup."
"If this conversation had happened a few years ago, I would say it's impossible...." he ruminates before stating, "as it stands, I think I have knowledge and capability to do as you ask; there is one hiccup, though."
Her eyes narrow at him.
"Hiccup? The fact your lab in the Capital can't be accessed?" she asks him.
The man's lips form a thin smile as he gives what might be a mock-praise, "What a smart girl you are."
She smirks a little at that.
"Smart enough to know how to get all your equipment out," she almost teases him.
"Not only my lab equipment but my research notes..." he emphasises, "unless you have a team willing to infiltrate Empire territory and access my lab."
"Pfft. We HAVE your notes already. Tana grabbed every tomestone that wasn't nailed down when she left," she explains to him. "What we don't have, currently, is any of your equipment or anything close enough to it. All that shit here is Sharlayan."
He shrugs and continues, "If you can bring me my equipment, I can work on your little request...I have a condition, though."
She rolls her eyes faintly. "Because, of course, you do."
"I want to see Liocyon."
"And I have conditions on that," she retorts immediately, voice razor-sharp. "You do ANYTHING harmful to him; I will make you regret it. Slowly."
"To the pain."
With a faint sigh and a small wave of his hand, he agrees, "Your theatrics are noted. I assume he is inside that......establishment."
She nods once.
"Yeah, but Calficer's more likely to kill you than let you in," she somewhat smugly points out. "I can go get him, though."
He makes a motion, "By all means."
She decides to prove a point before such. Without warning, she blinks into the Lifestream only to reappear with her sword right across Cicero's neck, edge gently touching such - enough to leave an extremely thin red mark but not enough to cut deeply.
"Just remember my conditions, "Father," she states before blinking again, displacing back to where she was before turning to get Lio. Talekeeper stays out.
Her father seems unphased by the threat "Noted."
She enters the House of Mystery, looking to her pacing brother immediately. "He's aware of the conditions."
Her twin turns paler shade. "He's not g-gone?"
"Nope. We've a little arrangement. He's allowed to speak to you, so long as he doesn't do anything shitty," she explains to her twin. "If he does ANYTHING harmful, I'm corps-a-corps'ing his dick."
He takes a deep breath, his body trembling slightly.
"Alright..." he says weakly. "Ok...just....stay with me, please."
She nods at Lio, grinning. "He can't stop me anymore," she reminds Lio, "so I'll be right beside you unless I have to suddenly castrate him."
Her reflection nods before looking to the door. "Alright then..."
Aquila Aurelius returns with Lio in tow, the rapier still out and perhaps at the ready. Her lack of stance is maddening to anyone who knows how to sword fight.
After they exit the house, her brother stands behind her. "H-hello F-Father...." *He says weakly, his eyes looking towards the ground.*
Cicero Aurelius would calmly watch his daughter and son exit the building, a small smile turning the corner of his lip* "Liocyon....you've changed quite a bit since I last saw you, have you finally embraced science?"
She mutters, "...wears the coat better than you ever did..."
Her twin looks over at her before looking back to his father, trying to explain himself, "I have...it was...it was required, someone needed it..."
Their father looks over to her for a moment before looking back to Lio and nodding.
"Good, good..." He takes a few steps forward as he speaks, "You look so much like your mother....she wanted to be here, you know.."
She glares at him at the mention of their mother, despite the accuracy. "Then why isn't she?" she retorts sharply.
Their father gives her a look as he answers, "It is unsafe for us outside of the safehouse."
Her twin takes a step forward as he eagerly asks, "Mother is here? what about the others?"
She moves her blade between her reflection and their father.
"Ah ah ah," she notes to their father. "And who the fuck's fault is it that she's not safe?"
"The fool that sits on the throne now," the man said simply. "He turned our country into a damn cult."
This causes her blade to focus on their father again, pointed aimed right at his throat as she retorts, "Nah. YOU made it, so none of us are safe outside the estate."
Shaking his head, the man intones, "Everything I did was to make it safe for you and Liocyon."
Her brother gently places his hand on her shoulder in an attempt to calm her, softly murmuring, "Aquila.."
Reluctantly, she drops the sword away from their father's throat, though Talekeeper remains out.
"I don't think experimenting on your own kids and turning them into monsters is really for the best," she points out with a huff.
"Perhaps one day you will understand what I was trying to do,"
their father sighs, "In any case, fine....bring me my equipment, and I will expand your aetherpool...after that, perhaps we can sit down and discuss things as adults?"
Her twin looks between her and their father, moving closer to his sister.
She shakes her head at her brother a little bit.
"...he wasn't supposed to know that, but...fine," she concedes, looking at their father before adding, "...but the conditions stand, even then."
For his part, the man makes a mock 'oops' face as he flippantly states, "My mistake, but fine."
"...I have a shorter blade that I can use," she points out. "Won't kill you, but it'll hurt."
Their father waves his hand as he mocks, "Yes, yes, you're threats are noted...I will take my leave; contact me as soon as you have my equipment."
She nods once, Talekeeper remaining out until he's well and gone.
"Yeah, sure. Say hi to mum for us," she quips.
The man looks back at Lio. "It was.....good to see you again, son."
Her reflection nods as he murmurs, "Father..."
In a flat tone, as he turns, their father states, "Aquila."
"Father."
((Adapted from an RP with Liocyon.))
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serararku ¡ 4 years ago
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The Black Adder Boys
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It was sunset when K’thalen arrived at the outskirts of Gavin’s Gully. The bandit patrols on the lookout for both easy pickings and Immortal Flames’ agents sniffing around their turf never even noticed his presence, thanks to the cover provided by the ugliest and angriest dust storm this year. He wouldn’t mind putting these criminals into the ground, of course, but he preferred to keep his low profile for the time being.
He walked straight down the main street like he owned the place, keeping one hand on his hat to shield his face from the wind and sand, and the other firmly on his studded forge iron belt. The tattered ends of his long leather trench coat flicked up with each gust of wind, flashing the particular firepower he brought along with him. It didn’t take long for the sparse denizens of Gavin’s Gully to catch wind of his approach now that he was within the shanty town. Decent folk knew trouble was brewing and none of them wanted anything to do with it, wisely deciding to shut their blinds and retreat away from their windows; everyone else watched him with curious suspicion, already auctioning off whatever loot they would pry from this deadman’s corpse. He approached the biggest building left standing in the town, and turned to glance over his shoulder. The building across the street was completely abandoned- he would have to keep that in mind.
Creeaaak!
K’thalen swung the tavern’s doors wide open when he stepped inside, letting a dusty gust of wind rush in between his feet before the door closed behind him. His eyes darted across the room like an apex predator to make a quick count of everyone present: three men at the pool table, another four sitting at a nearby table playing cards, one man standing behind the counter, three leaning on the railing on the second floor, and two more keeping to the window on the other end of the room. It looked like a Keeper of the Moon Miqo’te family of three were being held captive: the father held at gunpoint behind the bar, a son crumbled on the floor after a recent beating, and a daughter at the card table- their plaything until they got bored of her sniffling. Everyone stopped what they were doing once they heard the howling wind and the creaking door, with wide eyes and skeptical glares burning holes in his face once he began to make his way to the bar. He kept his movements slow and deliberate in case any of them were trigger happy, with one hand gently pulling his hat off while he ran his fingers through his raven-feathered hair.
“Can we help you?” The man holding the pistol against the gut of the barkeep asked. K’thalen first dusted off the road from his sleeves and sat down on the only stool that wasn’t broken, then set his hat on the counter.
“Treehollow. As tall as you can pour it.”
Laughter ripped through the tavern like someone spilled firecrackers across the floor. Even the father nervously laughed along with his captor, until his side was jabbed with the pistol. “What’re ya laughin’ at?! Ya heard him didn’t ya!? Get ‘em a damn drink!” The man winced and swiped a tall mug from the back shelf, before fumbling with the tap. K’thalen slowly looked over his shoulder at the boy on the floor; he was still alive at least, but no older than twelve. Once these brigands had drunk this tavern dry, he and his father would likely not be long for this world.
“Are ya lost, boy?” The man huffed, hoisting himself onto the counter beside K’thalen. “Do ya not know who we are?”
“Don’t know your face.” He answered, studying the barkeep’s face. His eyes were glazed over and empty, yet still exhausted from the fear of death; the poor man was hopeless in his situation, knowing these thugs would have their way with his children until they no longer amused them. “But I know your colors. You’re the Black Adder Boys.”
“That’s right.” He gave his buddies an amused sneer before returning his attention to the stranger. “‘Course… the real question is, who’re you?”
K’thalen lifted a finger as he raised the mug to his lips. He made him wait for a full seven seconds as he downed his drink in a half-dozen gulps. When he finally set the empty mug down, he smacked his lips a few times before answering, “A visitor lookin’ for a friend.” His ears pointed behind him when he heard the pool sticks slap against the table, and the skidding of chairs sliding backward; he furtively slipped his free hand down into his lap and braced himself.
The man leaned down to eye level and whispered, "Ain't no friends o'yours 'round here, mister. So why don't you uhhh… disappear before we beat ya to death?"
With a slow nod and pursed lips K'thalen reached for his hat and slipped it back onto his head. "Aye, I'm gone. But I'm takin' the barkeep and his kids with me."
"You'll be lucky t’leave with your life." The friendly facade has melted away now that he was no longer amused. He placed a firm hand on his shoulder before saying, "You don't make demands o'us, ya hear me, cat bastard? Leave all o’your money on the count-”
K’thalen whipped his elbow into the man’s face with a wet crunch! He then swung his arm around and smashed that tankard against his head so hard the wooden mug split in two- he shot up to his feet and pulled his revolver from its holster and spun around to face whoever stood behind him. His ears flattened against his head when he saw how many barrels were pointed at him. If it weren’t for a Hyur standing by the door with his arms crossed, he would be dead already.
“That’s enough of that, lad.” He chuckled, his eyes snapping to the barely conscious man with the broken nose. “Put ya gun down, nice and easy. Ain’t nobody need to die in our own turf.”
He was reluctant to drop his custom six-shooter, but he obliged all the same, keeping his other hand hidden. “You the one in charge ‘round here?”
“I am. You can call me Alfric.” Once the revolver smacked against the floor, he raised his hand to signal his buddies to lower their own weapons. “... you sound familiar. Do I know you stranger?”
The last thing he needed was someone recognizing who he was before he was ready. “Just passin’ by, lookin’ for a friend.” K’thalen’s ears perked up to the sound of subtle footsteps on the upper level over his head. “He goes by the name of Turold Two-Shank. Your boss.”
“Was my boss.” Alfric slipped his thumbs into the loops of his pants. “Poor bastard bit off more than he could chew, and now he dines with the dead. We answer to Jack now.” He paused to study the stranger one last time. “I’m only gonna tell you this once. Empty your pockets and leave that shiny piece on the floor there, and you’ll only walk outta here with your life and some bruises. Can’t have strangers makin’ fools of my men, especially my boss. You underst-?”
“Fuck that!” The man with the smashed nose gurgled out. “Someone shoot this sumbitch!” K’thalen saw him reaching for something in his peripheral vision, and that was all the excuse he needed.
Tha! Like lightning his hidden hand shot from his coat and fired! Blam! Blam! Blam! Three shots, one for the loudmouth, and two more at the man in charge. -thump! He leapt backward up and over the counter, rolling his fingers across the steel hammer to unload the rest! Blam blam blam! The barkeep covered his ears and dropped down behind the counter with K’thalen, as a hail of bullets ripped through the bottles on the back shelf and busted the wooden barrels overhead. “He got Alfric!” He heard someone shout under the chorus of gunfire. “Kill that cat bastard!”
K’thalen laid low against the counter as he fished out a fistful of bullets from his pocket, his heart beating against his chest like a drum. The barkeep was screaming as malt liquor showered them from above, but at least he was flat on his stomach and unharmed; slowly but surely the barrage from the Black Adder Boys died down once they were out of ammo. “Did we get em?!” Someone shouted, with the familiar sound of several people reloading- it was now or never! “Oh shi-!”
He rolled out of cover for round two. Six muzzle flashes made six falling corpses. He dropped the smoking gun and jumped for his prized revolver, popping the hat off a man above him with a single shot; he then spun around on his heel and struck the man using the daughter as a shield in the groin, allowing her to drive her elbow into his nose and break free of his grasp.
“Grab the boy and get back behind the counter!” He ordered, spinning his empty revolver before sliding it back into his lucky holster. “Them boys outside heard that commotion!”
“W-what are we gonna do?!” The father pleaded, throwing his arms around his children. “There’s dozens of them! You ain’t got the firepower for them all, mister!”
“Don’t I?” K’thalen pulled off his coat and let it drop to the floor. He reached for his prized possession on his back and pulled it over his shoulder; the magitek rifle unfolded and clicked into place, with ceruleum canisters glowing on its underside. He leapt behind the counter with them and pointed the strange weapon toward the door, and metal bars drove into the wooden countertop as a small half-visor dropped over his right eye. “Cover your ears!”
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SHOOM! SHOOM! SHOOM! SHOOM!
As soon as he saw silhouettes and shadows rushing toward the door and windows, K’thalen made them disappear. Superheated ceruleum-propelled slugs punched fist-sized holes through the front entrance of the tavern, and the building across the street, and the building behind that one, and the one behind that one too. Glowing red shells littered the table and floor to his left, as he fired over and over again; it wasn’t until the barrel was shimmering and white-hot did he finally stop, but not because he wanted to; he was out of rounds at last.
The rifle slowly collapsed back into itself, but he wisely kept it anchored to the counter instead of putting it on his back to give himself second and third degree burns. The father slowly lifted his head to see the aftermath, and the daughter soon followed. The front door was gone, as was most of the wall; they could see across the street that the other building was completely toppled over and in ruins. “Menphina’s madness… what was that?!”
“Magitek.” K’thalen slowly rose to his full height, slipping more bullets into his favorite revolver as his rifle began to automatically cool down. “Stay behind the counter. I gotta have a chat with a friend of ours right quick.” Slowly he made his way around the counter, stepping over corpses and broken bottles to reach the man he neutered- he was still clutching his bloodied crotch, whilst he struggled to breathe. When he noticed his approach, a scornful grimace spread across his pained face.
“W-what do ya fuckin’ want?!”
“Looks painful, lad. Real painful.” K’thalen pulled out his revolver and crouched beside the man. “Tell me where Jack is holdin’ up, and I’ll put you outta your misery. Bleedin’ out from what’s left of your balls is a bad way to die.”
“H-he’s gonna skin ya alive…!” The man spat, in between his groans and wincing. “He’s g-gonna… turn you int-to a coat… y-ya filthy… cat bastard!”
“Suit yourself.” K’thalen slipped his gun back where it belonged and bounced up to his full height. He glanced over at the family watching him; seeing a man- even a worthless bandit- squirm around and slowly die in his own blood was not something he wanted to put them through. With a sudden change of heart, K’thalen pulled out his revolver and turned back around to finish the job.
“W-wait…! W-!”
Blam!
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portiaphan ¡ 5 years ago
Conversation
DV Characters as Things Hannibal Buress Has Said
Alex: "I'm a gangsta, and gangstas don't ask questions." Yes they do ask questions! I thought that was a main point of being a gangster. "Hey, mothafucka, where's my money?" That's a question. "Do you want to die tonight?" That's a question too. "What? What?" That's two questions.
Alva: Gibberish rap is - I freestyle all the time, just hangin' out with friends. And sometimes when I'm freestyling, I'll lose my flow, you know, but I'll still wanna - I don't wanna just stop rapping because I lose my flow. So I'll just put in nonsense words till I can bring in regular words again.
Brielle: I couldn't imagine only being an actor or a writer. Because what the hell do I do when I'm not working? Mope?
Battista: I’m a dumb guy. My point of view is limited.
Bellamy: Why are you booing me? I'm right!
Beau: SIX PACK ABS! TEN PACK ABS! TWELVE PACK! What if I want an odd number of abs? What if I want a five pack to show people I'm still humble?
Bernadette: My other airport nemesis is airport security. I don't like them at all. They seem so dedicated to keeping bottled water out of the sky.
Calina: I acknowledge that I jaywalked, I apologize not for the act of jaywalking but how my jaywalking made you feel. I'll try not to jaywalk in the future while you're watching but trust that I'll do it for the rest of my life - it's the best way to go about being a pedestrian.
Castora: There's a lot of dudes in my neighborhood that have handlebar mustaches. Which is cool if you want to have a handlebar mustache but don't try to have a conversation with me like you don't have a handlebar mustache.
Catherine: He said, "Man, we are right by the Adige River. These buildings are 200-300 years old, they have rats everywhere. Even the five-star restaurants have rats!" Somehow he made me feel like the asshole for bringing up rats! I don't know what kind of jedi mind trick that was - it confused the hell out of me because I still ended up ordering food then.
Cyrus: So we talk for a little bit. She says stuff, I say stuff, she says stuff, I say stuff. You know how a conversation works.
Celeste: I get upset easily by people. I saw this guy- he was on the phone. He had the phone between the ear and shoulder like that, but he didn't have anything in his hands. Which is really upsetting! Who the hell do you think you are? This action for people that are multitasking. Where's your other task? You're not doing anything else.
Daphne: He'd be the worst real estate agent ever. "Right here we have a 34 bedroom house. Let me show you around the property. Great features to this place, some of the rooms have extra, smaller rooms in them."
Delilah: I was in Scotland for all of August and it was the darkest time of my life. Mostly 'cause they call cookies biscuits. I don't like that at all. It was an incredible culture shock for me, tough to adjust but I tried for a few weeks. Pass me the chocolate chip BISCUITS. Let's have biscuits and milk, everybody. I love Oreo biscuits. But, in the fourth week, I couldn't handle it no more. THOSE ARE COOKIES THOSE AREN'T BISCUITS. Those are cookies. Cookies are cookies and biscuits are biscuits. If you call cookies biscuits, what do you call biscuits 'cause I'm not saying scones.
Everett: I did not move to Verona with a plan. The first time I moved to Verona, I just popped up. My sister was living here in Verona. I just popped up. She had her baby and a husband, and I just popped up. "Hey, what's up? I got $200 and dreams. Let's do this."
Genevieve: I can't just look at a status and move along. I see a status got 36 'likes' — can't accept it got 36 'likes' and move along. I got to click on it and start reading the names of the people that liked it. "Oh, yeah. Jim would 'like' some shit like that."
Grace: Yo ma, money over everything.
Halcyon: Awe man, I gotta get a team. I don't have a team, I just have friends. I call up my friend, "Hey man, I know you're my friend but I need you on my team right now."
Hazel: You have a regular-sized tub and a miniature tub, the sink.
Henry: You never know what could happen when you go into a store - somebody might pull a Tonya Harding on you and break your knee cap. And now you got your knees all fucked up just ‘cause you wanted to get that vinyl.
Hugo: It sounds like God owed someone some money and they couldn’t get to him, so they murked his son. That’s what I really think happened. Jesus got stabbed up in an alley… but it’s easier to sell crucifixes. You can’t sell a pendant of someone getting shanked up in the alley. It’s a marketing scheme.
Ivan: Come to your place at 5:00 in the morning, eat your food, drink your drinks, leave at 6:30 without fucking like it’s cool. That’s a passive burglary.
Isabelle: Two separate charges $400 at Barnes and Noble. Who balls out of control at Barnes and Noble?
Juliana: Believe in yourself like one of those weird-ass clothing stores that only have six shirts in them. So many questions. How much do these shirts cost? How long have y'all been here? Why is there a DJ?
Katarina: Kill people, burn shit, fuck school, I hate spam emails! That's annoying! You think you have an email from a friend but it's spam.
Lucien: I believe in my ability to not spill food in my pants 'cause I'm a goddamn adult. And I've mastered the art of getting food from my plate to my mouth without messing up my jeans. You need to believe in yourself, too and get your life together, that's for babies. Have some confidence in your eating abilities and hand/eye coordination.
Lucrezia: I'VE ALREADY SEEN LIMITLESS.
Lillian: I'm not a club person, I'm more of a bar/lounge type of person. But, I'll go anywhere if you give me a free bottle of alcohol.
Mikael: I have weird aspirations. Like, I really want to kick a pigeon.
Matthias: It's a weird emotion when you're flattered and cynical at the same time. "Oh, that's nice that you would say that, but what the fuck are you up to?"
Marcelo: I just wear black and gray all the time. If you Google Image me, you'll just see a bunch of black and gray. It's simple. If I like a shirt, I'll buy six or eight of them, wear them back-to-back, and just wait for somebody to say something. "That's the same shirt you wore yesterday." "Yeah, but this one is fresh."
Maeve: When people go through something rough in life, they say, "I'm taking it one day at a time." Yes, so is everybody. Because that's how time works.
Nikolai: But this time, it was me and this old lady we were jaywalking together. We weren't together like that. But if we were, so what? Mind your business.
Odessa: It was a phone interview and sometimes when I do phone interviews and the journalist is boring, I just start saying crazy stuff to make it fun for me.
Olivio: There have been times I’ve been out, and my phone battery is at nine percent, and I was like, "Time to go home."
Orion: Don’t thank the lord. I gave you that compliment, thank me.
Priam: I lost my debit card recently, had five charges on it before I caught it. First charge, $30 Chuckee Cheese. Who goes to Chuckee Cheese as soon as they find a debit card? Are you serious?
Paola: I applied for a job at Starbucks. One of the questions was, 'Why do you want to work at Starbucks?' Uh, because my life is in shambles.
Pandora: I don't even know how to use a semicolon to this day, I use a comma every time. And you know what? If I email somebody and they get upset about me using a comma instead of a semicolon, that's not a person I want to work with anyway. And that's how you weed people out of your life.
Ramona: I went into this restaurant in Verona called The Two Gentlemen. Went into the bathroom at The Two Gentlemen, huuuuge rat in the bathroom at The Two Gentlemen and the rat looked at me like "the fuck you doing here?" That was his vibe, very negative vibe.
Rafaella: Sometimes I get drunk and I get into arguments with taxi drivers. And I get out the cab and I slam the door. That's not the way to win an argument with a taxi driver. The way to win is you get out of the cab and you leave the door open.
Regina: And that was the first time in my life, without any sarcasm, I could say, "What? You want a cookie or something?" Because any other time you say that, you being mean, but I meant it from my heart. "How many cookies you want, man? You want seven cookies? That's way too many cookies. You're being ridiculous right now. You can take, like, three or four cookies and get out of my face. Otherwise, you're taking advantage of my generosity."
Ronan: Wack.
Roman: In my hometown of Verona, I'm kind of a medium deal.
Theodora: We got interns at the job. You can just tell them to do stuff. You gotta be nice, though. I had this cat fax something. I handed him a couple of pages, and I handed him another page. I said, "Hey, man, fax something for yourself, too."
Tomas: Rap videos confuse me cause they have to be continued at the end but the never make a sequel. Where’s the second video? There’s so much suspense!
Trinity: I was at the airport and there was this kid, four or five years old walking with his mommy, fixed his fingers in a fake gun, and then took a shot at me. And I'm looking at the wall to see if there's something on the wall he could've been shooting at 'cause I'm in denial. I look back at him, he looks me in the eyes and takes too more shots. Now I'm hit three times, that's an act of aggression. I need to defend myself.
Valentina: Morpheus, Dorpheus, Orpheus, go eat some walruses. Orifices, porridges. Morpheus, Morpheus. Going to the Buffet and Walruses. Confidence, corpseses. Worcestershire sauce. Go into your orifices. Red pill, blue pill. Morpheus, walruses. Seashells by the seashorpheus. MORPHEUS DRINKING A FORTY IN THE DEATH BASKET.
Vivianne: "We'll keep you in our thoughts" With the other bullshit in your heads? No, keep me out of your thoughts, because I hear some of the stuff you talk about and if that's close to what you're thinking about, I don't want to be around that, so keep me and my family out of your thoughts, unless you're thinking of making me a sandwich.
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luscaina ¡ 6 years ago
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Spooky Family Headcanons + Kaku AU
i cannot stop thinking about this post bc i love the concept so much so now yall have to just sit down and endure a new rant of headcanons from yours truly
how did Kaku end up on Kuragaina?
no one knows, this is an AU i do what I WANT OKAY
okay but WHAT IF Spandam spun some lies during the whole Enis Lobby debacle and attributed the failure onto the CP9?? so now they’re kinda on the run or some shit and had to scatter or whatever, anyway Kaku is my favourite so he gets to be special now
i correct myself: Mihawk has now THREE (3) headaches
fun fact everyone! Kaku is the Middle Child (Perona is like exactly 2 months older than him lmfao)
Mihawk thought Zoro and Perona are bad; Perona looks like a literal angel next to Zoro and Kaku
whenever the two of them are paired up, one has to say some complete bullshit and the other goes absolutely feral, Mihawk is this fucking close–
he has never consumed so much wine in his entire life, he actually started drinking tea in order not to permanently cripple his liver
Kaku: “well, I think–” Zoro: “nobody cares what you think” Kaku: Kaku: “unlike you, I actually have the ability to think” Zoro: “are you calling me stupid” Mihawk: *brewing his 5th cup of chamomile tea in a span of 2 hours*
despite their constant fighting, the boys enjoy sparring with each other; beats those annoying as hell monkeys any day
when Perona found out that she was the oldest she gloated for a good 3 minutes before Kaku unhelpfully supplied she’d age faster than he would and promptly made her cry
Mihawk once took them all on a grocery trip – never again.
now he usually just picks one to accompany him depending on what he wants to get done; for practicality, he takes Zoro; for basic common sense, he takes Kaku; and in all things fashion, he takes Perona bc his sons the other two are atrocious and as the long running Goth Fashion Icon he will not stand for slander in his own four walls
bc Mihawk, Perona and Kaku are Cultured people, they regularly partake in High Tea and catch themselves secondhand embarrassment from Zoro’s shitty scone etiquette
since Kaku low-key misses his days as a shipwright, he usually takes care of any reparations in the castle; from rusty pipes to the broken leg of Perona’s favourite armchair
Kaku loves to make Ships In A Bottle or just generally create miniature versions of ships he likes, so he often tinkers on them in his downtime
once Zoro accidentally broke one of Kaku’s projects and Kaku went full Giraffe form and sat on him for 2 full hours before letting off and ignoring Zoro a whole week straight
that’s how they all found out that Kaku, when mad or particularly upset, gets downright Petty
Zoro, at the dinner table: “can you pass me the chilli” Kaku: “i don’t know, can you pass me my 3 days worth of work spent on my high detail model of the Thriller Bark?” Zoro: “oh for fuck’s sake I SAID I WAS SORRY”
one of Kaku’s other favourite pastimes is to discuss the One Piece equivalent of shakespearean books in Mihawk’s collection with him
his fascination with them might explain why Kaku speaks like an Old Man
Kaku, frustrated: “well this just dills my diddly darn pickle!” Zoro, in most profound disgust: “just say Fuck, for the love of–”
Mihawk has his kids categorised in his head; Perona – the one who makes the rules Zoro – the reason why they have rules Kaku – the only hope for a normal child
Mihawk: “and these are my three children; my ghost princess daughter, my geographically challenged son and our newest addition, my semi-cultured professional assassin son”
Perona is most definitely the Big Sister who bullies her younger brothers into participating in Spa Day with her
and that’s how the rumour spread of Roronoa ‘Pirate Hunter’ Zoro now walks around with sparkly blue nail polish
((back with his crew, Zoro retained the habit of thumbing over his nails and gets confused for a second on why he can't feel the smooth glide of nail polish under his thumb))
((it’s his way of missing his weird gothic makeshift family))
on his birthday Kaku received a giraffe-patterned floaty from Zoro and for the life of him he couldn’t figure out if he was making fun of him or not bc Zoro seemed so super serious about it
Shanks: “you got yourself a third brat??” Mihawk: “how dare you call him that” Shanks: “???? you call the like that all th–” Mihawk, gathering his hell gaggle of halfway delinquents: “don't ever talk to me or my children ever again”
harming anyone in this family has become goddamn LETHAL bc you have one dedicated Goth Dad who WILL smite you with sheer will power alone, a kickass Ghost Princess who will traumatise you for life, one stabby and always down to slice Right Hand Man Of The Future Pirate King, and one assassin Giraffe who knows how to kill you 56 ways with a paperclip and a string alone
Kaku: “hey do you guys ever entertain the idea that Mihawk...might be a vampire?” Perona & Zoro: “what” Kaku: “y’know...the whole goth aesthetic, living on a dark island, the castle, him always drinking ‘red wine’, his boat shaped like a fudging COFFIN” Perona & Zoro: (later) Mihawk: “why is there garlic hanging of my highly polished crystal chandelier”
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chillin-at-partys-bar ¡ 5 years ago
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tagged by @goldenscar​ tagging whoever wants to do it who hasn’t done it yet :D
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—    BASICS.  
▸     IS    YOUR    MUSE    TALL    /    SHORT    /    AVERAGE ? He’s 6′6 1/2, 199cm. Though he’s tall perhaps according to average person, according to yonko he is a smol boy.
▸      ARE    THEY    OKAY    WITH    THEIR    HEIGHT ? Shanks is very comfortable with his height. He doesn’t need to be taller, and shorter would be silly. He’s just the right size for prime spooning his favorite little spoons. And he gets to be the little spoon sometimes so win/win.
▸      WHAT’S    THEIR    HAIR    LIKE ? Very red and beach wavy. Not washed as often as it should be, but it is a feature of himself that he does care about more than one would think.
▸     DO    THEY    SPEND    A    LOT    OF    TIME    ON    THEIR    HAIR     /    GROOMING ? His hair is important to him, even if it didn’t start out that way. He’s Red-Haired Shanks. He’s gotta take care of the branding. Day-to-day he doesn’t care too much about his general grooming, but he is aware he’s a captain and must be presentable at a moment’s notice. 
▸      DOES   YOUR   MUSE   CARE   ABOUT   THEIR   APPEARANCE   /   WHAT    OTHERS    THINK ? Shanks wants a lot of things in life, and he has an important position - being a yonko and a pirate captain. This means that his appearance is important whether he likes it or not. He wants his crew to be proud he’s their captain, and he can’t do that if he looks like a mess all the time. Don’t get him wrong, he loves lazing about in pajamas. But he also requests meetings with important dignitaries. It would be unbearably rude to him to show up to a requested meeting for important business and to not at least present himself well. Now, cleanliness and good appearance does not mean he’s rethinking the pants.  
—    PREFERENCES.
▸      INDOORS    OR    OUTDOORS ?     outdoors ▸      RAIN    OR    SUNSHINE ?    sunshine ▸     FOREST    OR    BEACH ?     beach ▸      PRECIOUS    METALS    OR    GEMS ?    gems ▸     FLOWERS    OR    PERFUMES ?     flowers ▸     PERSONALITY    OR    APPEARANCE ?   personality ▸     BEING    ALONE    OR    BEING    IN    A    CROWD ?     in a crowd. ▸     ORDER    OR    ANARCHY ?     order - but sometimes a little anarchy is in order ▸      PAINFUL    TRUTHS    OR    WHITE    LIES ?     painful truths ▸     SCIENCE    OR    MAGIC ?     magic ▸      PEACE    OR    CONFLICT ?     peace ▸     NIGHT    OR    DAY ?     day ▸      DUSK    OR    DAWN ?     dawn ▸   WARMTH    OR    COLD ?     warmth ▸     MANY   ACQUAINTANCES    OR    A    FEW    CLOSE    FRIENDS ?     many acquaintances ▸     READING    OR    PLAYING    A    GAME ?      playing a game
—    QUESTIONNAIRE.
▸      WHAT    ARE    SOME    OF    YOUR    MUSE’S    BAD    HABITS ? He does binge drink, which can be a big hazard to him for a multiple of reasons. Not excluding his general health, but it leaves him open to an attack if he’s too drunk. He also has a bad habit of trusting people he meets in bars. He’s gotten a bit better, but he’s still more likely to call a stranger in a bar a friend than an enemy, so it’s an easy way to get to him. 
▸      HAS    YOUR    MUSE    LOST    ANYONE    CLOSE    TO    THEM ?      HOW    HAS    IT    AFFECTED    THEM ? Gol D. Roger is still the most significant loss in his life. Not only because it was Roger who passed, but because of what it meant for Shanks. He went from being a part of a crew, having a family, to being abandoned over the course of a year. As a young teenager he lost everything he held dear, and though he’s an adult now it remains a sore spot. 
However, with how silly he acts and how much he struggles to avoid the topic, he hasn’t disclosed his feelings to anyone. 
▸      WHAT    ARE    SOME    FOND    MEMORIES    YOUR    MUSE    HAS ? Despite the prior notes, he has some amazing memories. The time he spent with Luffy is at the top of the list, just taking it easy on a small island with an energetic kid. Sparring with Mihawk is always something he will hold close to his heart. Though currently it’s harder and harder to have those moments of pure joy, he feels very blessed that he has at least forty years of good times to get him through the rough stuff. 
▸     IS    IT    EASY    FOR    YOUR    MUSE    TO    KILL ? If he can avoid killing, that is his first option. But he is a pirate, and he has been one for years. He knows when he’s in a situation where killing is necessary and though he doesn’t take great pleasure in it, he will kill to save his life or the life of his crew. It does take a lot to get to that point though, as simply challenging the yonko (no matter how cocky the challenger is) is really not enough to get him to want to end a life. Threatening his crew, his territories, or his friends however are plenty enough reason for him to take action. He is much more lenient towards Marines, however, and prefers to let Marines who challenge or threaten him to live. His understanding is they are usually fighting for the safety of everyone, and Shanks is aware he is a threat to that. 
▸      WHAT’S    IT    LIKE    WHEN    YOUR    MUSE    BREAKS    DOWN ? It greatly depends on the cause. If it’s a tragedy that cannot be helped, he has a bit of fury that sets in before he feels himself filled with grief. He tries to think about what could have been done to stop it, what could have been done before it was too late - but he ends up shutting down, focusing on training. If he becomes stronger, he doesn’t have to suffer again. 
If something happened and it was caused by a person, his break down turns into a blinding rage. It’s the only time people should truly fear the man, because he doesn’t care who he has to go through to make sure the person who caused his pain suffers. He’ll go until his body is exhausted and he passes out, often not being able to leave his bed for a few days after from simple loss of energy. 
▸      IS    YOUR    MUSE    CAPABLE    OF    TRUSTING    SOMEONE    WITH    THEIR    LIFE ? Yes. He trusts his crew with his life every day. He trusts they’re going to fight by his side, especially his core group - Benn, Yasopp, and Lucky. They’re his closest friends and he would lay his life down for them, and he knows they would do the same. He trusts them with everything he has, and it isn’t lost on him that they chose to follow him above all others. 
▸      WHAT’S    YOUR    MUSE    LIKE    WHEN    THEY’RE    IN    LOVE ? The sweetest puppy dog. His favorite thing to do with a loved one is to just lay down in the sun, snuggling. He loves to observe every feature on their face, and will constantly be thinking about what he can do to make them happy. He is clingy, but he travels a lot and so can handle long distance. He’s faithful - especially if that’s the boundary that’s set. He isn’t completely opposed to a poly relationship, but he really needs to just have one person the focus of his love. 
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alice1290 ¡ 6 years ago
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Read All About It - An Ace/OC fanfic - Chapter 6
Strolling hand in hand down the streets of Fishman Island made it almost feel as if they were a normal couple, not a pirate captain and a Revolutionary.
“So, my partner gave me a good nickname.”
“Better than missus?” Ace teased.
She rolled her eyes. “Yes. He called me the Revolutionary Spade. Really the Red-haired Revolutionary Spade, but that’s a bit much.”
“Eh, too long for a bounty poster. Revolutionary Spade is better.”
Ashina shot him a playful glare. “I’m still trying to not obtain one of those.”
“Sorry, missus,” he teased, gently bumping her shoulder. “with me you’ll end up with one in no time. Just wait ‘til Isuka knows your name: Ashina the Revolutionary Spade.”
“Ugh, at least with Missus they don’t know my real name.”
Ace laughed and let go of her hand, only to loop his arm over her shoulders and pull her closer. “I’m hungry,” he said, catching the smell of food in the air. “Let’s get some food.”
When he spotted the ramen shop, he remembered it being one of her favorite foods, so he dragged her inside with him. The menu was small, but the place smelled amazing.
They ordered and true to her normal self, Ashina only ate one bowl. It was a large bowl, but still, Ace wondered if she ate enough sometimes.
“Are you sure you’re full?” he asked, swallowing a mouthful of noodles and meat.
She giggled. “Yes, Ace. Are you? That’s your eighth bowl.”
“Almost.”
Ashina giggled again, propping her head up on her fist, elbow resting on the bartop. “You really are a bottomless pit.”
As soon as he was finished Ace grabbed her hand and strolled out of the restaurant.
“Ace, what are you-”
They made it a few paces down the street with the store owner shouted.
“Stop them! They haven’t paid.”
“Come on!” Ace shouted, breaking out in a run.
Ashina kept pace with him, grumbling at him for his dine and dash antics. By the time they outran the people chasing them, and were officially lost someone on the island, she was laughing. They came to a stop and Ashina bent over, hands on her knees, as she tried to catch her breath between laughter.
“What the hell, Ace, I could have paid.”
“Sorry, it’s a bit of a habit.”
She rolled her eyes as he shrugged. Ashina looked around as she stood straight. “Why don’t we find our way back to the market and then to the ship. The log pose should be set soon.”
Ace grinned. “Let’s go.”
It was easy to find their way back to the heart of the city by the noise of the crowd. Ace stayed close to her as they weaved their way through fishmen, merfolk, and other humans. His hand occasionally touched the small of her back, directing her one way or another since he could see over the crowd better than her.
“Thanks to you and all that running, now I want a snack,” she commented.
“You should have eaten more ramen.”
“I was full then!”
Ace just laughed, but his eyes scanned the streets around them. He pointed to the left and grinned. “There’s a takoyaki stand over there.”
“Oo!” she squealed with excitement and took his hand, dragging him behind her through the crowd. “Hurry up, Ace.”
They reached the stand and Ashina looked over the selection. “I’ll take one regular and one spicy, please.”
The fishman behind the stand expertly flipped four of the regular little balls into a cup and handed it to her before doing to the same from the pile of spicy takoyaki. Ashina handed Ace the spicy one and then dug out the requested amount of beri from her pouch. Once she paid, she looped her free arm through his and they started walking again.
She dropped his arm once they were clear of the crowd, and popped one of the little balls into her mouth. She hummed in satisfaction. “That’s yummy. Ramen and takoyaki, we’re going to make our way back to Fishman Island one day, just for the food. By the way, you never did say what the fight with Draw was about.”
Ace scratched the back of his head, ruffling his hair. “Oh, well… uh… he offered me a position as a Shichibukai, and I said no.”
“He did what?” Ashina stopped walking and stared at Ace with wide, surprised eyes. “Wait, you said no?”
“The Shichibukai work for the World Government, and I don’t want to answer to them. I’m a pirate, not a marine’s dog.” Ace looped his arm back around her waist and pulled her closer. “Come on,” he said, starting to walk again.
Ashina smiled as she fell into step with his pace. “They won’t like that you turned down their offer.”
“Draw didn’t. He did say he doesn’t like the idea of the Shichibukai either, but he got mad I rejected the offer. He set fire to some buildings and risked some people’s lives just to push my buttons. He pissed me off, and we started fighting.”
Ashina grinned as they reached the ship. “Your bounty is going to increase because of that, you know that, right?”
“That’s a good thing.” He gave her a big grin making Ashina laugh.
“Let’s go, Fire Fist.”
.
.
.
“So, Captain, where are we headed now?” Saber asked as the rest of the crew gathered on the deck of the Spadille.
The question caught Ashina’s attention and she looked up from the book in her hand. Ace grinned at the crew. “I’m going to find the man who saved my brother’s life when he was a little kid. Luffy used to talk all the time about Red-haired Shanks, so I’m going to find him and thank him.”
Ashina felt the blood drain from her face. Ace had never asked about her parents, and she’d never volunteered the information. In all of their late-night conversations, after the moments that shared Ace’s admittance that Gol D Roger was his father, they didn’t talk about it. Ace knew he mother was gone and that he father was somewhere out in the world, but… now it felt like she was going to have to come clean.
“Rumor I heard in the market is that he’s on a winter island,” Saber said.
Ace nodded. “We’ll go there first and see where the journey takes us. When I finally encounter Whitebeard, I’ll prove I’m going to be King of the Pirates.”
“Um… Ace,” Ashina began, getting to her feet. “I feel like now might be a good time to mention something.”
“What?” he asked, clearly confused. “I know you don’t like the cold, but-”
She cut him off with a dismissive wave of her hand and blurted, “Red-haired Shanks is my father.”
Deuce and Saber’s eyes practically popped out of their heads and Banshee gave an unlady-like curse. Mihar and Skull shared a chuckle. Ace stared at her.
“What?” Ace managed to stammer out.
“Red-haired Shanks is my father,” she repeated.
“Oh. Well…” He looked unsure of what to say next as he shuffled his feet.
“It’s okay!” Ashina blurted reassuringly. Ace, I love my Papa. He’ll be surprised to see me I’m sure, since the last time he saw me he was leaving me on the doorstep of the Revolutionary Army. It’s been five years, I’d like to see him.”
Ace beamed and pulled her in for a hug, keeping an arm around her waist and close to his side as he turned to face the crew. “Set sail, men!”
Ace gave orders as Ashina stood beside him and the crew scurried around the deck as they set sail out from Fishman Island, preparing to enter the New World. Her first adventure on the second half of the Grand Line and she was going to see her father.
“Hey, Ace?”
“Huh?” He stopped giving orders and looked down at her.
“It might be a good idea to notlet my father know we’re a thing. I’d hate for him to kill you.”
Ace frowned, but nodded, agreeing to her suggestion.
“How’re we going to find him? Which island do we travel to?” Deuce asked, stopping beside them.
“Oh!” Ashina exclaimed, slipping a hand into her pouch. “I have the solution for that.” She withdrew the slip of blank paper. “I have his vivre card.”
.
.
.
“Can you use your Haki to tell where they are?” Ace asked.
He was standing close behind her, keeping her warm with his internal fire. “I could, but the vivre card will lead us to him.”
She shivered and Ace pulled her closer, keeping an arm wrapped around her front. It wasn’t snowing right now, but the cold, biting wind was relentless. “Let’s get moving then.”
It wasn’t long into their trek that the snow began. The further into the snowy mountains they walked, the harder the wind blew and the more snow fell.
“The snow storm is getting worse. Even with your extra heat,” Mihar commented.
“We’ll keep going until we find them.”
“Are you serious, Captain?” Saber yelled.
“I want to meet him. We keep going no matter what.”
Ashina just shook her head, trudging through the freezing snow behind Ace. Being near him was slightly warmer than the surrounding temperature, but that would end as soon as they reached her father. She didn’t want to give him any ideas that Ace and her were in fact lovers, mainly because she preferred her lover alive. It was late as they neared the cave opening and the sound of voices and smell of wood smoke reached them.
She already dreaded the idea of having to sleep through the night not curled up to Ace. Ashina fell back into the mix of the crew as they reached the mouth of the cave, suddenly nervous to see her father again. Deuce picked up on her actions, and stepped to the left, effectively blocking her from view.  
“Who goes there?” One of the Red-Haired Pirates yelled out, Ashina recognized Yassop’s voice.
“I’m Captain Portgas D Ace of the Spade Pirates.”
“So,” a voice Ashina instantly recognized as her father’s answered. “The Spade Pirates? The famous Super Rookies… have come for me?” The slick of his sword being partially withdrawn echoed in the quiet cave.  
“No, no that’s not what I’m here for,” Ace said quickly, shaking his hands in front of him. “My little brother owes you his life and he never stopped talking about you growing up! I just wanted to meet you and say thanks.”
“You mean Luffy?” Shanks replied excitedly, letting his sword fall back into its sheath. “I never knew he had a brother! I see. I’m glad you came. Please tell me more.”
“Oh, sure,” Ace hesitated and looked behind him, eyes scanning his crew, before he turned back to the Yonko. “but I brought another surprise.”
Ace turned sideways, looking back at Ashina, who was still partially hidden by Deuce, and she took a breath before stepping forward. Shanks took her in and his eyes widened as his smile grew bigger.
“Hi, Papa.” She gave him a small smile and a little wave.
“My baby girl!” Shanks jumped up.
“She ain’t a baby no more,” one of the men near the back of the cave said, earning a glare from Shanks before he turned his attention back to Ashina.
Shanks swept her up with his one arm, easily lifting her off her feet. All the worry and nerves left her instantly as she relaxed into the strong, loving embrace of her father. She returned the hug just as fiercely, burying her face in the collar of his shirt to inhale the familiar scent of ocean, sweat, booze, and something distinctly Shanks. She pressed a kiss to his cheek as he set her back on her feet.
“What are you doing in the New World with pirates?” he questioned, a teasing grin on his face. “I dropped you with the Revolutionary Army, not Rookie pirates.”  
Ashina shrugged. “Got separated on a mission for Dragon. Orders were to stay with the Spades for now. Maybe he wants to see what’s happening on this side of the world? Who knows?” She skirted around the real truth that Dragon gave her a choice and she chose to stay with Ace… for a multitude of reasons.
Shanks seemed to accept her answer and nodded, but turned a hard gaze to Ace. “Keep an eye on my daughter, Rookie.”
Ace nodded quickly. “Yes, sir.”
Shanks grinned then and spun around to his men. “Let’s have a party!”
.
.
.
This was awful. The idea of Ashina not sleeping beside him, curled into his warmth as she did every night never crossed his mind. Every night she lay in his arms, but not this one, and he felt a fool for not understanding sooner what she meant when she said to not let her father know they were a thing. All night she avoided being near him, because when they were near, they gravitated closer and always wound up touching.
Of course, her sleeping with him would clue her father in to the truth of their relationship. A truth he wasn’t sure he wanted to face the consequences for, because there would be consequences. One arm or not, Shanks was still a powerful Yonko, and Ace wasn’t wishing to test the man’s ability.
Ace glanced across the room and spotted those green orbs in the dying light of the fire. Ashina couldn’t sleep either. They stared at each other across the cave, neither speaking for fear of waking the others. Ace watched as she silently sat up and then stood. She made no sound as she tiptoed her way gracefully around the sleeping bodies of two pirate crews, keeping her blanket hugged tight to her shoulders. She folded herself gracefully down to the ground, and he scowled at her, even as he lifted his own blanket for her to slide in beside him.
Ashina hummed softly in her throat as she pressed her back against his chest. He amped up his internal temperate and she hummed softly again. Ace pressed his lips into her hair as he slipped a hand around her waist to pull her impossibly closer.
“What happened to not letting him know we’re together?” Ace asked softly, a teasing lilt to his voice.
He felt her shrug one shoulder. “It’s cold and I can’t sleep without you.”
“Your father is going to kill me in the morning. You know that, right?” he whispered in her ear.
She turned in his embrace to face him and dipped her head below his. Her lips pressed against the hollow of his throat. “Maybe, but it will be worth the warm night of sleep.”
He could feel the smile on her lips and huffed out a breath through his nose before pressing his lips to the top of her head. He couldn’t argue with her logic and he’d use any excuse to hold her slender frame against his.
.
.
.
The morning sun was beginning to rise and fill the cave with light when Shanks woke up. It took him a moment to remember it was real, but he quickly turned his head to look at his daughter. She was no longer on the mat she had fallen asleep on, and he frowned. He scanned the cave, scowling when he spotted her red hair.
“What you make o’ that, Captain?” Benn spoke quietly from beside him, already awake.  
Shanks’ frown deepened as he studied the pair. They were lying facing each other and the curve and ripple of the blanket made it obvious the Rookies’ arm was curled tight around her waist, holding her close to his chest. His other arm pillowed her head. Her red hair was wild around them and the boy’s nose was buried in the wavy locks.
“I don’t like it, whatever it is.”
“You left her alone at fourteen with the Revolutionaries. Had to of known she’d grown up.”
Shanks sighed, unable to take his eyes away from his little girl, who was clearly no longer a little girl. “She’s growing up too soon. It shouldn’t be time for her to be doing…” he waved his hand at the sleeping pair. “things with boys.”
“Ace isn’t a boy, and she’s not a little girl anymore, Boss. At least she found a strong man.”
Shanks glared at Benn. “He’s still a Rookie… and I don’t have to like him, especially seeing as his hands are on my daughter… but he … he looks familiar,” Shanks trailed off, studying the sleeping Rookie.
“How so?”
Shanks shook his head. “What are the chances though?”
“Of what, Boss?” Benn asked, not following his captain’s random train of thought.
“I think he’s Roger’s kid,” Shanks breathed out.
Shanks stared hard at the dark mop of hair. It was dark and wavy like his former Captain’s had been. He’d caught glimpses of Roger’s ghost in Ace’s smile and eyes in firelight of the party. He’d also noticed the shared glances between him and Ashina. Shanks should have known they’d be together. He tried not to think too much on how they passed their time, he was more worried about her future. Being a pirate was dangerous, and the Rookie had big dreams. Ashina was smart, and strong, but a father worried for his daughter.
His only child. He knew she would remain secret no longer. Her secrecy was his only request to Dragon when he left her with the Revolutionary Army five years ago. Keep her secret, she’s already a skilled kunoichi like her mother, train her to be stronger, stealthier, help her remain unseen, unknown. With Ace, the Marines would soon learn of her, and there would be no mistaking who her father was. Shanks only hoped Ashina was ready for the dangers she would encounter here in the New World. He also hoped the young man, who he was positive was his captain’s son, would be strong enough to protect himself and her.
.
.
.
“Where’s Papa?” Ashina asked, looking around the cave in the early morning light.
“Went outside since the snow storm calmed,” Benn answered. He gave her a knowing look. “Was wanting to speak to you.”
Ashina frowned slightly but nodded. She pulled her fur cloak tighter around her shoulders and headed out of the mouth of the cave. He wasn’t far from the entrance, perched on a snow-covered boulder near one of the only, scraggly evergreen trees that stood near the cave. He looked up as she walked over, but did not speak. She hopped up onto the rock and leaned into his side. She still found it strange sometimes that he was missing his left arm. She remembered when it was still there and the year he had returned and it was gone.
“The Rookie’s Devil Fruit seems to have lessened the snow storm,” Shanks commented, breaking the silence.
“He’s strong.”
Shanks snorted. “He’s young and reckless.”
“Weren’t you young and reckless once?”
Shanks grinned at her. “You callin’ your old man old?”
Ashina giggled and shook her head. “Never, Papa.” Ashina paused and then added. “Ace is strong and he’ll only get stronger.”
“Strength is good, Ashina, but it will bring danger.”
“I’m not afraid,” she stated with confidence.
Shanks kissed the top of her head. “Of course you’re not. You’re your mother’s daughter after all. You look like her more and more each time I see you, Ashina.”
He was quiet for a moment and they both watched the softly falling snow. “I wasn’t much older than you when you were born.”
“Papa…” Ashina cut in, hoping he wasn’t going there. Her mother gave her the embarrassing sex talk, and she didn’t really want to hear her father stumble through it.
“I want you to be careful, Ashina.”
“We are careful, Papa.”
“We? So you are having sex with the Rookie?” Shanks leaned back, his eyes narrowed and his cheeks slightly red with anger.
Ashina waved a dismissive hand. “He’s not my first, Papa.”
Shanks waved his hands in front of him and shouted. “I don’t want to know this about my baby girl! Now I have two boys to murder. It is just two, yes?”
“Papa!” Ashina felt her cheeks burn from her blush. He wasn’t wrong, but she wasn’t going to admit that either.
Shanks smiled good naturedly and bumped his shoulder to hers. “Please be careful, Ashina. You have big dreams. I hope you still have those dreams. Don’t let them go because of a boy.”
“I still want to change the world, Papa, and I can still do that being a Spade pirate. But… you know, I didn’t stop your dreams.”
Shanks sighed. “I wasn’t a good father either.”
Ashina frowned and took his hand in hers. “Of course you were, you are, Papa. Just because you weren’t there all the time doesn’t mean you were a bad father. You’re a pirate Papa, I learned what that meant and how much it meant to you. A pirate drop anchor in one place? Papa you’d be bored out of your mind,” she said on a giggle, making him smile. She paused for a beat and then added softly. “I don’t plan on babies, Papa.”
“Things happen, Ashina.”
“Well, fuck, Papa don’t jinx me! Jeez. We’re careful. I’m careful. I promise.”
“Good. I want you to be happy. Doesn’t mean I don’t want to wring the Rookie’s neck for touching my daughter.”
Ashina giggled and leaned in to kiss his cheek. “I think you’re allowed to feel that way, just please don’t act on it.” She rested her head on his shoulder and he squeezed her hand.
“I love you, Papa.”
“Love you, Baby Girl.”
.
.
.
Shanks wasn’t ready to tell Ashina goodbye as they stood next to the Spadille in the late morning sun. Growing up, he’d made it happen where he could see her once a year, with the exception of a few times where it just didn’t work, for a few days. Then she’d traveled with him for a year before he dropped her with the Revolutionary Army on Baltigo. That was five years ago. She was nineteen now, a young woman in her own right, but she would always be his little girl. It worried him that he didn’t know when he’d see her again. Not to mention the lurking, deaded thought of ifand not when.
“Stay safe,” he whispered, pulling her into a hug.
Her arms wrapped tightly around his waist. “I will, Papa. You be careful.”
“Don’t worry about me, baby girl.” he said to her, keeping her held tightly to his chest. “Keep up your training, okay?”
Ashina nodded.
“Good. I won’t have to worry too much then. Until next time, baby girl.” Shanks kissed the top of her head and then let her go.
Ashina stepped back, and then lunged forward to hug her father once more before turning to board the Spadille.
“Ace, a word.”
Ace stopped in his tracks, nodding to Ashina to go ahead, and turned back to Shanks.
“I know you and my daughter are… together. Break her heart and you’re going to join the one-arm club, and if she gets hurt, or worse, I’m going to kill you, got it, Rookie?” Shanks asked Ace in a low voice giving him a deadly stare.
“Got it.”
“Good.” Shanks stepped back, clapped him on the shoulder and smiled at Ace. “Safe travels.”
“Yeah, uh, thanks. It was nice to meet you, Shanks.”
Ace turned on a dime and quickly boarded the ship.
Shanks waved goodbye to Ashina, who stood at the rail of the ship, waving back to him.  Ace gave the orders for the crew to set sail, and Shanks watched as he came to stand beside Ashina, an arm looping around her waist.
Benn chuckled from beside him. “You’re maturing as you age, Captain. I half expected you to not let her go with the Rookie.”
Shanks laughed, but then sobered, eyes watching the ship was the sails unfurled and she picked up speed, carrying his daughter away from him once more. “Eh. As much as I’d like to castrate the boy for being with my daughter, I can’t hold her back. Tsuna would never forgive me for not letting our girl chase her dreams and be free.”
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neverwatchedonepiece ¡ 6 years ago
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594-595: "Formed! Luffy and Law's Pirate Alliance!" and "Capture M! the Pirate Alliance's Operation Launches!"
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After seeing what the Strawhats are really like and realising what he’s got himself into, Law has longing visions of the apocalypse.
That look on Law’s face.
You all know the one I’m talking about.
The one that started as a sweatdrop and morphed into a full-blown look of: I deeply regret this but am in way too deep to back out now.
I watched that scene three times. Pure gold.
If You Keep Telling Everyone About Our Plan, Maybe
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So I think I misjudged Trafalgar Law.
Maybe.
Still not one-hundred percent certain Law does not have another hidden agenda but... I am about seventy percent on board with the fact he has good intentions. At the moment. Like Robin said, pirate alliances are marked by betrayal, so this could change in future. (But I don’t want it to. I like Law as a good-ish guy.)
Like Nami, I was also was not expecting Luffy to accept so quickly. Maybe at the end of the arc, I thought. Have no idea why I even entertained that daft idea. This is Luffy we’re talking about. 
Law sold it as best he could without giving Oda’s entire plot away. “I’m not saying we can beat the Yonko right away. There is a chance, if we do it step by step. What do you say?”
Luffy’s daft but not an idiot. He asked Law to which Yonko he was referring. I’m guessing that was important because I honestly can’t see Luffy going against Shanks unless something really serious puts something between them. I was pretty damned interested in Law’s answer, so when Oda used that favourite trop of his: a sudden howling blizzard carried away Law’s voice, I laughed like a drain and cursed Oda and his teasing ways.
Fine. I get it. I won’t know at least until after this arc.
I also liked Luffy’s reasons for accepting Law’s offer of alliance. One, it sounded like fun. Two, he thought Tra-guy was a good guy. And three, even if he wasn’t, he had his Strawhats, who had spent the last two years training to become stronger (with the implication they could kick Law’s ass if the misbehaved).
This totally won over the Strawhats. They sort of melted into a puddle of giggling, flattered, enraged goo. Law was standing there staring like, “Wtf are these people?”
Still, as a gesture of goodwill, he unshambled all those who were able to be restored to their bodies. I am guessing is because of plot. Chopper and Franky are back to normal (Chopper had to leave with Law for a reconnaissance mission to Caesar’s lab). However, Nami and Sanji are now inhabiting each others’ bodies (because Sanji was not nearby to be restored to his own. I’m guessing you’ve got to be in Law’s Room).
Law was also not keen on the experiment kids. They were a pain. A liability. Forget about them. He’d heard from Caesar they’d been drugged. Chopper and Nami protested. They knew about the drug. They had already decided to take the kids back to their families. Law revealed the World Government have been trying to turn people into giants for hundreds of years. Why? In order to manufacture soldiers to increase their military might.
Apparently, Caesar wants to perfect the process first and outsmart Vegapunk and the World Government. (Okay, so Caesar is not still working for the WG after all. Is he that wealthy he can fund himself or is another faction bankrolling him? Maybe the Yonko Law is talking about defeating?)
Law was still unconvinced helping the kids was a good idea. “Are you willing to stay here alone?” he asked Nami.
Luffy, the Best Captain, jumped in. He would not leave anyone behind. If Nami and Chopper wanted to help the kids, he was fine with that. Sanji felt responsible for the Samurai Guy too. So Luffy would stay with them.
Usopp was so funny here. He leaned over Luffy’s shoulder and gave Law some Strawhat Context. “You think an alliance is a cooperative relationship just for some common goal, don’t you?” 
Um... yes, Law answered.
Ha. Well Luffy’s idea was different. It’s like being friends to him. And if Law was thinking of taking control, it would not be that easy. Once Luffy feels sure about something He Will Not Back Down. His selfishness, Usopp said, was as formidable as a Yonko. (”That must he hard,” Luffy said. xD)
At that point, I think Law reached his Strawhat Saturation Point. These people were like freaking aliens to him. But whatever. He’d agreed to an alliance. So he laid out his plan of action. While the rest of the Strawhats took care of the samurai, he would go research the drug behind Caesar’s back. He needed the Strawhats’ doctor. Chopper was strapped to his hat. xD
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Then, when that was clearly undignified, his back.
Before Law left, he issued a warning. Caesar wanted the Strawhats and the G-5 Unit dead. Until Caesar gets what he wants, he will not stop attacking. If any info leaked about him being on Punk Hazard, Caesar would lose his perfect hiding place. This is high stakes stuff for Caesar. He will fight tooth-and-nail to win. Not only that, he is a Logia type Gas Gas Fruit user who owns weapons of mass destruction with a 300 million bounty. Law cautioned anyone who couldn’t use haki to stay away from him.
Useful intel to have, to be honest. Thanks, Law.
And it was thanks to the conversation that I now know Zoro and Sanji can also use Haki. Did I miss that or is that completely new thing?
After that, came the part of the episode that was my Absolute Favourite. I definitely did not see this coming. Before Law left with Chopper, Luffy said, “So we’re gonna kidnap the Master, right?”
“Not for any money,” Law said. “To raise havoc.”
Despite the Strawhats asking, he would not tell them what lay ahead before they even successfully kidnapped Caesar. Focus on the job at hand. He would spill all later. Then said, rather ominously, “When we get Caesar Clown, things will move whether you like it or not.”
Ooooooooooooooh....
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH.
Now this is a juicy nugget of plot. I also do not think this has ever happened in One Piece: defeating the arc villain in order to kidnap him, use him as a catalyst and trigger some nefarious skullduggery in the New World with a view to taken down a Yonko.
Caesar Clown must be really something. I guess if he is an inventor and purveyor of weapons of mass destruction, his services will be in demand within certain sections of the OPverse. 
This is cool. I was a bit miffed when I realised this arc would end quickly as it has been great so far. You guys were right. This is an intro arc that seems to lead on to bigger things involving Trafalgar Law’s crazy idea.
Also, I cannot wait for Chopper to lay eyes on Caesar Clown for the first time. Chopper is gonna have to exercise some wicked self-control to not smack him for mistreating those kids. Chopper also asked Law an interesting question: if Law was so strong and could reach Caesar Clown that easily (because Law had just Roomed himself round to the lab’s back door), why could he capture Caesar himself?
Law deflected, as he always does. “I cannot because of a problem I have. That’s why I need help from you guys.���
A problem? Must be a pretty big problem. 
And by the way, where are your crew, Law?
I am making myself suspicious again.
I need to just believe in Law, like Luffy does. Because the arc villain is making a move.
And That Move Is Called Smiley
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Smiley.
Cannot get over that. xD
Caesar, you crack me up. 
He’s probably one of those deranged scientist types who give their hellbeast creations adorable names. Everyone flees from the tentacled abomination that is Mr Binky Sparkle-Pants. Everyone knows Candy Smoochy Schmoo will devour your soul.
This one is called Smiley. Smiley is a sentient, hill-sized conglomeration of incredibly toxic waste left over from the chemical explosion four years ago. Caesar gleefully explain to Monet that when he escaped custody and returned to Punk Hazard about three years back, he did not purify the island of the poison gas (*the* only good deed he had left to his name!) I mean, why would anyone do such a wasteful thing? All that poison lying around? That H2S gas he had invented that killed everything on the island in second? It’s Free Real Estate, right?
What he did was (probably) use his Gas Gas Fruit (thanks for the confirmation, Law!) to gather all the leftover poison gas and compress it into a monster, which he secured in a vault on the burning half of the island.
And he called it Smiley. xD
I guess Caesar has a sense of humour?
At any rate, this squamous behemoth was unleashed by the gang of unfortunate fodders who were trying to break into a vault at the end of the last episode. I knew they’d meet a sticky end. I just didn’t know how sticky. 
They tried to call their wonderful Master to report they were being killed by a poisonous monster. 
Sympathy? In MY Laboratory? Get the FUCK OUTTA HERE!
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But Caesar was in the lab, heard the DDM, was all like, “ugggggh, so needy!” He told his main minion not to pick up the call. Why? The fodders would just be screaming “Help, a monster is killing us! Save us!” How annoying, right?
And you know what else was annoying? The amount of visitors. Ugh. So many. Caesar seems to work in euphemism a lot because all he said was, “You can stop gathering test subjects now. We have enough.”
I’m guessing that’s code for “these freeloading Strawhats and Marines have overstayed their welcome. Time to die!” He had a jolly good lol to himself while Monet studied quietly in a corner (she must have learned to block out the cackling by now or she would get zero work done).
Caesar’s knowledge of how to manipulate human nature was summed up when he said, “People tend to forget tragedies in no time!” That is harsh but true. He knew sooner or later what happened in Punk Hazard would be forgotten by the majority, leaving him free to practice his wicked experiments with impunity.
He really is a piece of work, eh?
As of now, Smiley is currently oozing towards Caesar’s lab. Zoro, Sanji and Brook saw it approach on the horizon. 
They found Kinemon, by the way! His torso fell into the lake and sank like a rock because he’s a Devil Fruit user. Because of that, the rest of his parts became super weak and he almost froze to death. If Zoro hadn’t found him, he’d be dead. At least he’s finally grateful for the Strawhats’ help. I wonder what he’ll say when he finds out they’re working with Law, the guy who slashed him up? I wonder what Zoro, Sanji and Brook will say when they find out Luffy’s working with Law?”
It won’t be a secret for long, they way Luffy’s going on. xD
NO, WE DON’T HAVE A SECRET PLAN AT ALL. WHY DO YOU ASK?
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While Law was sneaking round the back door with Chopper and Smoker and his crew were battling to seize Caesar’s ship, Luffy had a Big Idea. Back at the camp, he whispered to Robin and Franky, the Strawhats who would go with him. (I’m assuming Nami and Usopp are guarding the kids and waiting for Zoro, Sanji Brook and Samurai to return.)
Smoker was having a tough time. Fighting in someone else’s body was difficult. Poor Tashigi kept turning to smoke at random and couldn’t turn back. (You know what? If this wasn’t such a serious situation, it’d be well fun to have a go in a Devil Fruit User’s body!)
Then Luffy arrived with a literal BANG! He cannoned into the snow right at the front door of Caesar’s Lab and roared, “SHOW YOURSELF, MASTER! WE WILL KICK YOUR ASS AND KIDNAP YOU!”
I swear the impact from Law’s facepalm was heard as far as Raftel.
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Trip Advisor Review: Punk Hazard
“Arrived on island. Was welcomed warmly by hotel proprietor. Accommodation was clinically austere but the bar was well-stocked. Woke up one morning and I was a centaur. Not pleased. Proprietor maintains he has no recollection of how this happened. Only other guest remains tight-lipped. Refused refund. One star. Would not recommend.”
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