#They tried to make their special son an exception from a state law and it didn't work | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

the-firebird69 · 2 years ago

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There's a huge fight going on here this guy Trump has to leave everybody doesn't like him and he's sticking he's sitting here same people do like a little kid kissing everybody off I've heard enough from everyone I want him out I'm ordering him out again. I'm ordering him to be out by noon I don't want to see him here at all I don't want to see him on TV in front of me and every station going to trace down whoever's having them do it and kill them

You have other things happening here there's one doing. Trump was having it done the headless horseman b*******. I'm sending teams after him sons are too and daughters and his cadre we're going to clean you up but take you out

On top of the sheriff and other law enforcement agencies the max are going after judges and they're going after those who work for those judges too. I'm going to take them down. These idiots the trumpsters have several junctions in town they need to be removed we're working with Mac I'm getting them out and it's been a little bit difficult so going after their support found out it's all over the world so we're taking them down and we're pulling them all out and soon there won't be any including Dan. We're pulling out a huge number of them. And really it's the clones we're fighting Trump on this special TV thing and we think that Trump wanted to get hit and her son says we should hit him and right in the head all of them except for the clones now teach him we said that we had enough of you and said go ahead and do it I said yes and you'll be gone thankfully. It's because you're d****** around with her son trying to threaten him with your idiotic move. Turns out the clones had a big compound these assholes went there with like five people and they're blocking his exit. Can you send out drones and it came back and said nobody's there he went outside and you said I'm going to give you a chance to live you have your sniper and leave now and I said no and start to end guns at him and got shot and it said I can't stand this anymore these people went to die they're trying to threaten him no start shopping how much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a wood so you start chopping them up and taking their stuff and they keep doing that do other people too

Here in Port Charlotte we have several of these trumpsters saying some real rude stuff about our son so we're going to kill them I'm sending in units and Mac is going after them too and to terminate them permanently and we'll use it as a threat

Other offices are now under scrutiny especially judgeships and things like that and yeah the fight went differently it wasn't too long ago. And we will tell you what offices shortly

The offices of the justice department of the State of Florida and they're starting to fire people who work there and their government workers and they're going with the other percentages but not that much like one person per building but now they're going after them we'll just saying and doing is ridiculous the laws are trying to make an enforce a ridiculous no one wants to hear it anymore as well as nobody wants them in office. And it is going on now and we're not we're just going on now anyways and it was planned by the Max and still is and we're going to take you apart for the stupid insinuation.

Office of the general counsel and that is an office that is used for lawyers the lawyers are on the bar and they are members and we are going after the ones who are retards and pulling them off and we are going after people breaking the law and they are

Office of postal inspection by the state and most states have them if I have a lot of complaints with them they did nothing sat back and laughed and said that'll be the day or it will start doing something to see who it was and what they're doing and this you better not do that and they tried to hurt him and evaded them and start hitting them. But other than that nobody does anything so getting rid of them cuz they just sit there and do nothing they're trying to obstruct mail and reroute it and stop people from getting payments from court cases

There's another office that we're upset with and it is in the max are laying off it's the office of judicial support and one of these offices are normal but these are bloated and so they're firing tons of people then today I plan on laying off half of what they plan to lay off which would be all of them so trying to put the screws to our son a little bit and it's going to go on them and Mac knows them to kill the people doing it to our son and they'll fight around with him for a while get hurt and they'll have to engage

Office of the data and it is for general information and the state and they collect information on people and it is part of the census bureau no that is a part of the state's department of health and that's what they work under and we're eliminating this department in about five other departments like it that are under the department of health of the state. We are examining their method too they say they're hitting someone because they're getting fired and having us do it and turned out to be true so I started hitting them and the people getting hit are going to hit them but this is a big deal there's four other departments it's like the department of youth commissioning where they see if you use their fit for duty there's human beings and they're examining their own and they get very beat up there's a department of local affairs to examine domestic disputes and they're good guys but they're going around cause of trouble and there's a department of critical abuse spousal abuse and stuff ever found starting trouble between people and the health department department of consumer goods and services to make sure that products are not making people insane and you try to bother people with it in other words they took the max stuff and they put it in writing gave people jobs to do it because they couldn't remember what they're doing and they suck very badly. It was very true they got their asses kicked because of this and other idiot things I can Max is dissolving his agencies mostly out of sheer embarrassment

Several other offices of being eliminated fully and others being trimmed until the more like are out

Office of consumer affairs and this is actually the product office and Macs firing the morllock. And it's going to fire most of them today the useless agency and they bother people you see that sun make money I'd have absolutely nothing millions of times and these people are crud dirt and s*** and he wants him to help and ken and others.

Department of actions and committees is a real department it's going to be dissolved and firing everyone in it they're just building money out of the state

There's several departments like that and they're being eliminated there's a few real ones they have to clean people out of and department of fisheries and it's for fishing and department of agriculture and these are State organizations the state EPA and other other organizations like that there's probably 20 of them and they're cleaner clearing them out of there can't get anything done with these assholes in the way and they're starting on the State Assembly workers and they're starting on councilman selectman workers and mayor workers and they're doing that today and they're down to that percentage where it starts hitting them important at least stupid people. Do not believe how dumb they are he's going there to talk to someone that send you around the whole building they have a son do it one day cuz he has more patience he came out said they locked me out. They've done similar stuff to him he just sits there to leave bring him to the right department he tried to do that and they wouldn't do it goes back in size and says you're violating my civil rights I wish to file a complaint what department is it. So they haven't go around the building and we had sheriff's following. Arresting each group as they told him to go somewhere else had them all outside lined up is walking up and down the road saying now which department should I go to of mine to tell them what to do to you oh yeah these people right here and he left. And a lot of them are weeping and crying he said you're trying to do this to our people and we started beating them to death half of half of them we could not revive and we burned in the incinerator on site that they said he used on people like that. And one of them starts saying it we locked his arm off and the other started screaming and told them to shut up. These stories happen every day everybody knows that these idiots here are incompetent and they're causing it there's a few more but he's got to get ready and charge his phone

It's like aviation and more but they're all the state and the federal government already has that stuff but the state usually is does a layer but they're ridiculous is one about firearms. I'm going tobacco drugs illegal drugs they take them all out today 15% to 0 or it's really like 12%, thank God

Thor Freya

God bless you for putting it out they come up to us and they ask to be fired they demand it it's wonderful and yeah the idiots are all bent out of shape cuz they're sitting on a black guy and they consider a gorilla to be a black guy and leatherback to be a black guy and King Kong was laughing all night long yes people sending him footage he loves it and you get some fights with him sometimes but they listen to him and it's a horrible thing now but really these guys are complaining all night long we have to sit here while he's sitting there so she and she's Prego so if you go down the coast and start dying she's going to feast on you so don't do it and my grand nephew says the last sentence and died and went missing probably have a whole bunch of these leatherbacks going around kicking your ass you'll get as you suck so bad. I'm clearing you out you're going to blow I'm going to call in troops now but man you people suck you're so God damn stupid

Mac daddy

You have to tell you you can't watch TV here because they're all like doing this TV stuff to him all the program is in TV stations are knowing the s*** out of us I want them out Max says I already pissed off enough and get him off the radio

Agree

Olympus

Somebody shoot these stupid f**** on the TV they're saying stuff from the radio right now I need someone down there to shoot him give it to anybody yeah imitate them

Hera

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atozphantomsquadron · 2 years ago

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Epilogue

I was in tears by the time I finished the last of the journals. In my time in hiding, I’d tried to avoid any news coming from the New Empire, so seeing from one of my best friends in the supernatural community that it was going away was a great and welcome surprise. That and the two marriages in the end, these were making me emotional. Maybe my wife and daughter would be released soon!

I removed the special reading glasses, and time resumed its normal passage. The books returned to a scribble of runic gibberish, unintelligible to any except the people they were intended to be read by. I took a deep breath, and it felt extremely good. I guess I had been holding my breath since I had read Alanna’s battle with Mamuna, and simply forgotten about it, caught up in the story as I was.

I returned the last journal to the box, accidentally knocking over the newspaper, the one I’d propped up which announced a prisoner amnesty. When I did, I spotted the last of the contents of the package, a small, folded-over note. I reached into the box and withdrew the card. Thankfully, I didn’t have to put the glasses back on to read it, but what surprised me about it was that it only had one line, written in a feminine hand.

Look outside your window! -AWB

I puzzled over this message for a while, particularly who did I know that had the initials AWB? My eyes widened when the realization hit me: AWB was Alanna. Alanna White Bear. I threw the note aside and ran to my window, opening it with shaking hands and sticking my head outside.

On the sidewalk, three stories down, stood a very happy party, smiling up at me. A tall blond woman, cuddling arm-in-arm with her escort, an even taller heavily muscled man, stood behind the two people I had been waiting to see for years.

My wife and daughter.

I bolted out of my apartment, down the stairs, and out the door, clutching my family tightly to me once again. This close to the party, I finally realized that the blond woman was Alanna, which would make her escort the man she had married, William White Bear. These thoughts were buried by my happiness at being reunited with my family.

That was four years ago.

As I write these words this evening, I’m awaiting my cue to take the stage at a victory rally in Wyoming, at the Hidden-In-Plain-Sight Ranch. I can hear the crowd outside, clamoring for the guest of honor, who I’m supposed to introduce.

Change came quickly once the New Empire regime was taken down. Presidential elections were just re-established this year, after allowing the former House Speaker to serve out a full term. Over the course of two years, a constitutional amendment overturning the Regents’ power grab was unanimously ratified by the remaining states, and olive branches were extended to the independent republics of Alaska and Texas to coax them to rejoin the Union. A concerted effort was made by the re-established in their power Congress to effect changes across the board to all social and military programs. The SSA was disbanded, returned to its original military and law enforcement purposes. An additional division was made out of the former blueshirts, which was tasked with beginning cleanup and recovery duties in the Missouri Rad Zone, with the goal of making the state habitable for human/supernatural residents once more.

Which leads us to tonight. This year has been the most good-natured Presidential election cycle in recent memory, since it’s been so long since there’s actually been an election. It culminates in this celebration tonight.

A knock comes on my door. When I answer it, standing there is Alanna White Bear, holding her one-year-old son Julian. “It’s time.”

I smile back at my friend, whose journals I had the privilege of transcribing. “How’s married life treating you?”

“Pretty well. I’m about to finish college this year, so is William, and everyone at the Ranch has been so helpful with the baby.”

“I can imagine, he’s quite the cutie.” I pinch the tot’s cheek. He grins and giggles, shrinking back toward his mommy, but still showing signs of his supernatural nature, a pair of vestigial wings that I’ve been told on several occasions, by both Alanna and William, will never work. “I remember you when you were not much older than Julian here, you did many of the same things as I recall.”

She nods, wistfully. “Those were the days, huh?”

“They were.” I clear my throat, collecting my notes. “Okay, I’m ready.”

Alanna leads me out the door, to a stage set up just outside the foyer of the Ranch house. It’s coated entirely in crepe paper and patriotic bunting. I spot my wife and daughter, sitting to one side, and they wave to me. I wave back, then make my way on the stage, adjusting the microphone slightly so that it comes to my mouth.

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming here tonight. We’re here for a most auspicious occasion. Let me tell you, I’ve known the people you’ve come to see for a while, through their actions and their friends. I can think of no one else better suited for this honor which is about to be bestowed. So without further ado, please allow me to introduce to you a combat veteran, a dedicated parent, an honorable individual who showed the nation what their true colors were. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the President-Elect of the United States, Kitty Salem!”

I turn and applaud, and from behind me approaches the entire extended Salem family. Kitty is the first to walk out, waving enthusiastically to the crowd, limping slightly from the injury she incurred at the final battle. Cyrus accompanies her, not bothering with a HoSIP to make himself look taller; he’s apparently embraced his shortness finally, after so long. Behind them enter royalty, King Fahaian and the tiger-like Queen Michika, looking just as overjoyed as Michika’s parents, leading their toddler daughter Princess Akiko for a while before the queen finally picks her up.

Kitty comes over to the podium and embraces me. “Layin’ it on a little thick, aren’t you?” she whispers.

“You deserve the praise,” I respond. “Now get out there and talk to your people!”

I release the embrace and cross the stage, back to where my own family sits in waiting. My wife turns and whispers to me. “Did you ever think that one interview so long ago would lead to this?”

I smile back at her, as confetti starts to fall. “It was a really wild ride.”

She takes my right hand, as my daughter takes my left, and we watch Kitty give her victory speech. Hope rises in my soul, hope for humanity and for the world. If a nation that so shunned supernaturals just barely four years ago can embrace one as their President, there’s truly hope for us as beings of mercy and love. Alanna’s story shows what power love and loyalty hold, even in today’s modern society.

#phantom squadron #eden inviolate

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johnemulaney · 3 years ago

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John Mulaney: From Scratch in Las Vegas, September 4

Once again, spoilers for the show and what will presumably be in the special. This is about his relapse so tread with caution is that will be an issue for you. However, the tone of his struggle is the same one he used in his past specials so if you didn’t have any issues then, I think you’d be ok with this. Of course, use your own best judgement, friends.

The opener was Seaton Smith.

He opened with trying to find the rich people in the crowd but acknowledged that they’d go mwrmwmwrw money isn’t everything so then he started talking about golf and went aha I got ya’ll.

There was a joke about weed being the only Christian drug

He had a bit about when white people are nice, be nervous

He had a bit about there being a black man on the Bachelor and was like America (ABC and Disney+) were not ready for a black man to be fucking a house full of 50 white women. That shit premiered on Tuesday and the Capitol burned on Wednesday.

He also did some crowd work and roasted a couple in the front row for having different answers about kids and she was like I didn’t hear the question and was roasted about how not hearing questions you don’t want to answer is certainly a tactic, often used by drug dealers

He also had a bit about how different child rearing is in Texas versus New York and about how hitting your kids is treated differently, like his dad would have just threatened it whimsically.

Now on to the Main Event!

The first thing he said was “hiiiiiiiiii” exactly in the tone you think he said it in. he followed that up with a little shrug looking adorable and a little bashful

“It’s him! Mr. Problems. Oh Las Vegas, Oh my god” he then talks about how Vegas is a land of vice and a Choice for him to preform in as a recovering addict. He had a sober buddy and 3 bodyguards with him at all times.

“And here’s what happened” December 18, 2020, he gets invited to a friends apartment for dinner AND HE’S TWO HOURS LATE because he stopped, coked out of his mind, at SNL for a haircut because he still had his building access badge and he went to the hair department and they were like, he’ll leave faster if we just do this, and then he stopped at his drug dealers.

He called venmo and cashapp, apps for drug deals and was like what do normal people even use them for. He maxed both out paying for drugs.

He was the best looking person at his intervention. “Coke skinny, new cut” and the 12 people intervening looked like shit. He looked “tears for fears while they all looked jerry garcia” (I hope you know who those musicians are besties).

He immediately yelled “Can I go to the bathroom” to you know, dump his drugs because when you walk into that, you know what it is.

He was not allowed to go (he would be asked if he still needed to pee later and would say “what?”

There were 6 people in NYC and 6 people over zoom in LA because he guesses 6 people couldn’t be bothered to fly in for HIS INTERVENTION

Interventions can go two ways, it can be kind of accusatory and this is how you let us all down, or it can be supportive. Everyone but Nick Kroll got the memo to be supportive.

Nick Kroll went first.

Nick Kroll listed all the ways John was a bad best friend and brother over zoom and John was getting texts during the intervention saying Nick wasn’t supposed to do that and they were all sorry.

Bill Hader went next. he originally wasn’t going to be able to make it so he had recorded a thing but since he was there, he did it live. (He would eventually send the video to John in rehab, which is not what you want on the way to rehab “awesome, more intervention”)

He tried to derail the intervention, “there’s not enough latinx representation” he said he’d go to any rehab except the one they had picked out for him. This was a star-studded affair and he was mad no one was being funny.

Natasha Lyons went next, telling him his life and career is in shambles

So he gets carted off to rehab after this intervention. Don’t let 12 comedians pack your bags for 2 months at rehab. it was bombas socks and iphone chargers.

A little secret about rehab, you’re not allowed to bring drugs in. You remember how he was late? In his pocket on the way to rehab included: a huge amount of pills, 3g of coke (which was 2g by the time he got there, courtesy of a koala station in a gas station bathroom), and $2000 in cash. He had other plans for the weekend. He was admitted for xanax, coke, perocet, and adderall addiction. Say what you will, but he does not do anything half way.

It’s 4am when he’s sent to detox, he’s been awake for 3 days.

He also gives a small lesson on how to get drugs. Find the lowest rated doctors on yelp and webmd reviews and go ask for them, they need all the business they can get. You become like Captain Phillips, I am the doctor now.

Dr. Michael was his shady doctor. He was a first avenue apartment where he would write prescriptions from his kitchenette where his girl Minerva was always asleep. “I didn’t kill my wife Minerva.” But John would ask for his drugs, Dr. Michael would write the script and then ask what he needed it for. Dr. Michael would also make John take his shirt off, always offering a flu shot and going no, shirt all the way off (in case you were wondering how bad this addiction actually was)

The first moral is now you know. The second moral is get vaccinated.

He’s sent to the regular ward the next afternoon and they finally get him to sleep.

He’s sketched out that doctors have last names at this establishment

He asks for drugs such as klonopin and is taken aback a bit when he doesn’t get them. The doctor is like PA state law says no, and so John suggests they go to a CVS in Jersey to get some.

His bestie Pete Davidson starts calling that night. Except Pete changes his number every month and a half so John has him send a selfie and saves the new number under some other random name, at this point in time, Pete is saved as Al Pacino. (We get an Al Pacino impression) John is asleep and his nurse sees Al Pacino trying to call him 5 times and so she wakes him up.

Pete Davidson and John Mulaney did not do drugs together. (The author is lowkey surprised and sad about that, like if Pete was my bestie, we’d make so many poor choices) But Pete was always very supportive of his sobriety.

John needs recognition so badly, in group when they introduced themselves he said “I’m John M.” and no one cared. So he left a tabloid out with the news of his admittance and his face on it in the rec room on the table. The not being someone was “driving him bananas.” When they talked about what they do for a living and he said I’m a a stand up comedian, someone asked if he made a living that way. He said “yeah ask your daughter” (or your son)

One of the things you do at rehab is break up with your drug dealer.

One of his drug dealers only bought drugs to keep John from buying worse off the streets and only got into the game because John kept asking him for drugs and was his only buyer. That guy was originally a painter and John has no idea how they met. John is the only person to turn an innocent man into a drug dealer.

Here he did the Baby J is back baby joke. the Park Theater is one of the biggest stages in the world so he did that joke in one pace across the stage and said the stage is that joke long.

“I am no longer on drugs. It’s very good but also ah---” He’s in a 12 step anonymous group.

“I need attention, clearly.” After a show you think he would be sated, but no.

He wants that attention that the kid who’s grandparent died and showed up to school dressed for the funeral and got to sit in the beanbag chair for reading despite it not being his turn, gets. He went on about being willing to let one of the lesser important grandparents die so he could get attention, for quite a while.

He feels left behind in science, like his C’s and D’s in those classes. All those classes were was putting things on a windowsill for the janitor to throw away. He had a bit about how the fuck people put dinosaurs back together, it’s like getting wayfair furniture without the instructions.

He also things the moon belongs to America. Like we got there first and when other countries say stuff about the moon he’s like mmmmmmm.

He also had a joke about paying to get into college and like, for white people that’s always how it’s been.

The show ended with him going over the highlights of that GQ interview that he was so coked out for that he forgot he did it entirely. He has no memory of it at all. He was just called up that day and asked for an interview and you know how coke is the best drug to receive attention on? He just did whatever he wanted with that attention.

And that was the show.

#John Mulaney #john mulaney: from scratch #spoilers #kid gorgeous #The Comeback Kid #The Top Part #New In Town #show write up

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postmodernmulticoloredcloak · 4 years ago

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I decided to watch the Walker pilot so you don’t have to. #1

I don’t know why I’m doing this, but I’m doing this and the more I put it off the less I’ll want to do this. So. Let’s start.

The fist thing we see is Jared Padalecki, em Walker, driving. He’s vaguely smiling and there’s the sun behind him. He seems happy. He’s driving a truck, for some reason my mind goes to Twilight. I’d rather watch that. At least there are vampires (not dressed like clowns) there. Anyway. Walker is meeting someone. He’s meeting his wife! “Look at you!” she says. The camera makes us look at him. He looks like this

I am unsure whether we’re supposed to see this as sexy or cool. It looks frankly ridiculous. I don’t know if I’m just not American enough to appreciate the aesthetic of this. But I didn’t go through 15 seasons of Americana-in-British-Columbia for nothing. If a character appeared like this on Supernatural, it wouldn’t be presented seriously. It would be played for a chuckle or in a light-hearted way at least. Not even Dean Winchester would find this hot.

The Padaleckis tell something to each other. Apparently he needs to go home with the kids and his parents because it’s game night. My mind immediately goes to Game Night the episode and I am sad now. But Walker lifts my mood in its own weird way. He doesn’t know the rules because every time she tells him the rules, he blacks out. I would make a fun quip about this, but the truth is that I relate to him a lot right now because I blacked out during the entire scene. I’m not sure what they said other than the game thing because I wrote it here. I already forgot the rest.

Anyway. What we’re supposed to get from this scene that they’re Very In Love (see that soft warm light?), and that he’s anxious because he’s not great at being a father because he’s shit at games apparently, but his wife is like ~don’t worry so much~ because she’s a kind, understanding wife. He tells her to be safe, because the Texan countryside is dangerous or something. She needs to stay on a route he approved for some reason. Is she traveling with supersoldier serum in her car? Is Hydra going to murder her? [cue the Marvel snipers shooting me to death because they don’t want Marvel to be associated to this]

Later, everyone is having fun playing fake monopoly, but Walker (whose mannerism is just Jared, he’s not even trying) is apparently too stupid to understand a game for kids. Plot twist, this is anti-cop propaganda because it says cops are dumb.

“Et tu Brute” Jared says when the kids point out he broke a rule so they get an extra turn. I thought I was safe from hearing Jared speak Latin! I thought I was safe! I am never safe!

Emily (Gen) suddenly texts him “SOS. Answer” which is OMINOUS! Oh my god! Aren’t you feeling the tension. The rest of the family keeps playing fake monopoly. Someone throws dice. Are we supposed to go “oh! The dice are ~symbolic because someone’s playing dice with her life” or have I been watching too much good tv.

She is running somewhere in the countryside, wearing a white shirt (is this the cowboy lady equivalent of the Wife Nightgown?). She says something is not right. He’s worried. Then he hears gunshot and her scream. He does the Alarmed Jared face, presses lips together and does a Upset Jared face.

Then he goes out, tries to call her again, and again, does a Jared Upset Sniff--

Oh! We actually see her! She’s alive, but she’s been shot in the stomach. Her white shirt is definitely the cowboy lady equivalent of the Wife Nightgown! Ah the blood coming from the stomach! How terrible! Her phone is ringing but she cannot reach it. She is definitely alive right now, though. She’s breathing heavily because of the wound, which is breathing, which is the opposite of being dead.

He decides that she’s dead, and lets out the already infamous manly scream of anguish.

It would be sad if it wasn’t that literally one second ago we saw her wounded but alive. Her turning out alive in the season finale or so will shock everyone. Nobody will have seen it coming. Who wrote this? They should have just shown the ringing phone and her bloody hand/side, making the audience assume she was dead, instead of showing her breathing. Now the audience is gonna assume she didn’t actually die, and wonder “why didn’t he call someone or went looking for her” but apparently Jared’s characters have forgotten that, like, ambulances are a thing. Jared’s manly screams of anguish are more important than common sense.

I’m not going to say anything about the manly scream of anguish. I’m not going to say anything about the manly scream of anguish. I’m n

We’re just 4 minutes in, guys. Why am I doing this?

Eleven months later, says the screen.

It’s night, outside a house. The son is waiting for him. The daughter doesn’t think he’s coming. On the porch there are two men, one is his brother and one is apparently his former partner, now new boss. He’s dressed like you’d expect a normal person to be dressed in a casual Texan night, hat and tie and all. If you are law enforcement in Texas and don’t wear a cowboy hat at any moment, you will be executed. That’s what the death penalty in Texas is for.

Somebody arrives, but to the kids’ disappointment is some dude whose function is to tell us the men’s names. The brother is Liam, the cop dude I forgot.

Walker is being sad on the back of his truck and drinking alcohol, which is the only way television can express a man having trauma. Holy shit - he reminisces of his wife like this is some emotional Lord of the Rings scene in a place where Elves live except this is not the Lord of the Rings and is just ridiculous, look

She’s seen running towards the gazebo, then she turns

This is exactly shot like the scene where Arwen has a vision of her son. Flowy hair and all. I cannot take this seriously.

He smiles sadly. Then a cop car arrives.

Mexican Lady Cop(TM), whose function in the story is to be a Mexican Lady Cop(TM) asks for his licence since he’s drinking alcohol in a public place.

“You ask so nicely” drunk Walker says. Ew. “Yeah, they train the girls special” Oh! Can you see? She is the Feminist Icon who Takes No Shit from the Dude! I’m so excited. I am slowly losing the will to live.

She drives him home on the police car. His legs don’t fit. At least this is realistic.

He does exposition in the car, including “I needed to visit a ghost instead”. There-there was no need to say it. What’s the demographic they’re aiming for? Five year olds? Do they have to spell everything out loud?

“It’s been a while since I had an actual conversation” he says, which supposedly explains why he’s making awkward exposition, but it’s just bad writing. At least they acknowledge it’s bad writing.

She figures he’s law enforcement coming back from an undercover mission from some drunken ramble he makes. This is worse than the Sherlock phone cable port thing.

She says she just got promoted from state trooper, ehe she will work with him wink wink nudge nudge. Is she going to be a cop-buddy-character slash love interest except when they’re almost about to realize they’re into each other, his wife comes back and draa~ama? I can already see it.

He goes home, makes some Jared grunts, and falls asleep on the couch.

Next morning, he goes out and jogs to where he left the truck. He puts on a cowboy hat which is supposed to be an artistic shot.

I’m slowly dying. He makes some Jared Deep Breaths, at least this made me laugh.

Wait, he’s now wearing a black hat. He’s in mourning, see? What.

He drives to his father’s ranch. His father is Super Not Impressed. It’s awkward. They took about horses. Mitch Pileggi is thinking that at least the other show was more exciting and there was Jensen Ackles in it.

He gets into his parents’ house and the dogs run to him, he does the Jared Dog Chuckle. He hugs his mom. He hugs his son - “August, my boy!” he says, like a normal person his age says.

He hugs his brother and they joke-wrestle and he says “I’m still the big brother” and did I mention I’m dying inside. I just can tell this is SUPPOSED to be reminiscent of Dean and Sam��s first meeting at Stanford in the pilot except Jared is the big brother now. Ew.

We learn that the brother is a DA and gay. All pilots suffer from Forced Exposition Syndrome but it’s like this isn’t even trying.

He goes to work and hugs (very manly hug of course) his friend-now-boss, who is called James. James asks him if he’s good and he’s like yeah I’m good, which our I’m Fine Lie Moment #1. Some things never change.

Enter the case of the week - a cop offered roadside assistance but he was assaulted. We’re already starting with a “Oh No Poor Cop :( Someone Doesn’t Like Cops And Gets Violent” plot. Yay.

Ta-da! Mexican Lady Cop appears, cowboy hat and all. James says she’s Walker’s new partner. My heart cries while Walker says “figured you’d be a guy” and she replies “so did my mom”. The feminism is so strong :’) She’s such a strong female character :’) I’m so happy :’)

Then Walker makes such a quintessential Jared thing with his mouth that I need to stop this here and take a break.

It’s been 13 minutes. So much still to go. I’m bored. Why am I doing this.

#cw's jared: legit texan #marghe watches walker for some darned reason

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impulsivefanwriter · 3 years ago

Text

A Tiny Spark Leads to a Roaring Flame (But Flames Can Always be Doused by Water)

Heeyyyyy so y’all know the Reverse Thanos Snap AU for SPBNR? Basically everyone but Smith/S!Kai gets sent to the M!verse. Everyone. The entire population of S!verse Ninjago City & a few surrounding areas. Except poor Smith. Essentially it happens because S!Garmadon tries to send Smith to a place where he can't mess with his plans, and ends up sending everyone away from Smith to take him out of the equation.

The second part to this AU is that the S!Ninja end up searching for Kai in the chaos and grab the Red Ninja before jetting out of there with the Bounty. Except... they didn’t grab Smith (who’s still home), but rather Red (M!Kai).

Red thinks the S!Ninja are babysitter clones created by Garmadon after he somehow turned Lloyd younger without his memories & is trying to raise him to be his new General #1. With this in mind, he pretends to be S!Kai, and waits for the moment he can rescue Lloyd.

What would happen in the S!Ninja discovered his deception/their mistake of grabbing a wrong Kai and mistake Red for a recreated Aki (aka Bizarro Evil Clone Kai) before he could enact his plan?

Well, this is that idea. (Title inspired by how a crack AU spiralled into a beautiful angst-fest)

Enjoy. :3

-----*-----

Red was going to get Lloyd out of here tonight.

Away from these Not-Friends made by Garmadon to emulate the Ninjaforce. Away from this flying ship built to emulate Master Wu's ship, so familiar and yet so off. Away from this false reality and back to the real everything where they could hopefully get his memories back and his age back and everything back to the way it was before the city descended into chaos.

He just had to... bide his time. Be patient.

FSM, he was bad at being patient.

His hands itched to grab Lloyd and run now, but he was horribly outnumbered and without his mech. No matter how badly he wanted to, he couldn't rush this. If he did, he would make everything worse. Like he always did.

But fate- or rather, Lloyd- had other plans.

The little version of his younger brother- yes, they were roughly the same age normally, shut up, Lloyd was still his younger brother- had been... eying him weird all morning. Not like Not-Jay and Not-Cole and Not-Zane, but like Not-Nya. Like he actually knew instead of suspected. These babysitter clones seemed to think he was the Not-Kai, and if that was the opportunity the universe was going to give him, then by the flames of the departed world was he going to skip this chance to save Lloyd.

Currently he stood on the deck of the ship as they parked in the sky a few meters above the docks on the outskirts of the city. It wasn't the docks with the Bounty warehouse, curse his luck, but it wasn't the endless sky or the empty ocean (though it was still too close to that murky, haunting water for his liking. Water was his sister's domain for a reason). At least he could sneak Lloyd off in the cover of night, maybe find someone in the city who wouldn't recognize the Son of Garmadon this way and would be willing to help them hide until they could make it back to the real ninja.

"Kai," Not-Zane spoke suddenly next to him.

Red would never get used to the way his voice... lacked the same effect the real Zane's had. The effect that Kai and the rest of his team had assured their friend over and over was unique, special, but in a good way. To embrace it. That it wasn't noticeable, but when it was, that it was so Zane that his friends didn't care that it was different.

This 'Zane' sounded much too different than his own. He hadn't recognized Kai's tested line of 'road work ahead' when they passed one of the many construction signs littering the city (even more so since the chaos happened a week ago), and instead had responded with 'a great deal of work to fix in the city'.

Seriously, Garmadon, do better research on your clones.

Not-Zane was also much too... calm. Too 'wise' compared to the wild teen that was Zane. And he walked without heelies or whatever Zane used to slide around like a boss, though he was still silent. And that meant, like now, he snuck up on Red fairly often- and Red was training to be a Ninja, so that took serious talent.

"Kai," Not-Zane said again, and Red finally broke his gaze from where he'd been staring over the railing, planning tonight's escape route. "Lunch has been made for over an hour. Are you alright?"

Red forced his brightest smile. "Course I'm alright! Just trying to figure out what happened, as usual."

Why Lloyd was suddenly like, 8, and without his memories. Why the Not-Friends were on this Not-Ship and had mistaken him for Not-Kai. Why the city was in a state of disarray and chaos.

Not-Zane studied him, then turned to give the city a sad look. "I'm not sure myself. My scanners can't seem to figure out what is happening. It is as if... blocked by some force."

Red winced, then expertly disguised the move by leaning against the rail. Zane never would use 'my scanners', despite how often Red and the others assured him it was okay. Yet another reason why this wasn't his friend.

"You know Ninjago City," Red said with a weak laugh. "Always one crisis or another. Always those annoying Garmadon Attacks"

This seemed to satisfy Not-Zane, who nodded thoughtfully. "This event definitely seems to have Garmadon's hand in the mess."

He patted Red on the back. "Well, don't worry yourself ragged, Kai. Come in for lunch soon, alright? We have training for Lloyd later."

Ah, right. Training. AKA what Red assumed was how Garmadon was planning to shape this impressionable version of his friend into his new General #1.

"I'm ready for training now, Zane!"

Speaking of Lloyd-

The little gremlin came up from the hull with the rest of the Not-Ninja. Red hated when the entire group was together; it was way more difficult to act as Not-Kai around them, especially around Not-Nya.

For starters, Not-Jay had a notch in his eyebrow that the real Jay never had. He was missing the iconic freckles, and the scarf, and the fluffy hair, though you could always say it was just a wardrobe change. What you couldn't change was the personality differences. This couldn’t be Jay. Jay was anxious and quiet, his jokes (while plentiful) said more timidly and his newest ideas shared with hesitance that only shrank after years of encouragement. He would never be this loud, ever.

Not-Cole was the leader, probably because Lloyd was so young. But even then, in Red's team, Nya would probably take second-command. Cole was their sturdy support, yes, but he was chill, laid-back. Ready to follow and support his friends to the ends of the earth with his tunes and occasional sarcastic wit, but not lead. Not like Not-Cole, who was more serious and commanding and didn't. listen. to. music. Red hadn't spotted a single record or boombox in the room in the hull. That was a tragic oversight on Garmadon's part. The members of his research team should be Fired.

And then there was Not-Nya. Who wore a dress with confidence that his sister would love but never publicly wear. Who had short hair- Nya had tried that style once, and decided it itched around her neck too much- and jewelry, and a giant flying Samurai mech suit. His sister had the Water Strider Mech, and Not-Nya had a flying combat suit. Sure. Close enough. Personality-wise they were similar.

Similar at first glance. Nya was fluid and adaptable to whatever role she needed filling. She was spunky, and as fiery as him when it came to tempers, though she knew how to keep hers in check (she had to, right? No one called her hot-headed and impulsive and reckless and blamed her temper for mistakes or damage or whatever the news comments liked to say about the Fire Mech). Not-Nya was also adaptable and independent-minded, but she seemed more rigid. More doing her own thing.

Point was, everyone wasn't actually his friends, despite how much they tried to prove they were. And they kept acting like he was this Not-Kai, who was just as hot-headed but apparently more mature and training-oriented and basically the better, cooler (or hotter, perhaps, for the fire theme of the red ninja) him, since his acting never seemed to fully convince them. Trying to impersonate a standard he couldn't seem to reach, some legendary hero he wasn't- er, wasn't yet! Yeah! He just needed to prove himself, be better, and he'd be fine. Just... fine. Yeah.

Mini-Lloyd (Red was tempted to call him L'ilyod in his head, but that felt wrong somehow, like he was infringing on some kind of copyright law) stared at him like a goddamn falcon, and he wasn't talking about the bird that circled the ship. He had this bowl-cut Red would tease him about endlessly after all this was over- seriously, how had Mr. Fabulous Hair started with this mess? Garmadon probably didn't even have hair, so there was no way the guy knew how to style it, and it was very evident based on Mini-Lloyd's hairdo.

Red noticed that all of them were staring, actually. Despite his relaxed rest against the rails, his fingers behind his back clutched the cool bar with a dull shake. He didn't notice how the metal seemed to glow red under his touch.

"Training, right, we should get onto that," Red tried. "What do you want to start with, Lloyd?"

"How about a little game?" Lloyd asked with complete innocence. "What we were playing last week before we got interrupted."

Oh sh!t.

"I-I don't know, shouldn't we start with stretches? Or how about some sparring, that's always more fun than a game!"

"But I wanted to continue our game..." Mini Lloyd said, and FSM's sake, he couldn't deal with that pouting look.

Okay. Okay, don't panic. Think logically. What kind of game would an 8-year-old Lloyd like to play with him? Something physical, so no board games- he liked to test his mettle against Zane on those, and sometimes he would almost not-lose. Logic puzzles also fell more on Jay's area. Trivia, especially music trivia, was a bubble between the anxious motormouth and Cole. Video games fell on team building, and wouldn't classify as a training warmup.

"Well," Red said, taking a hopeful stab in the dark. "There's not too much space on the deck for... tag..."

Lloyd nodded, looking satisfied. The Not-Ninja looked- well, their expressions were hard to read because of how different it was compared to his friends. But Red was a master of deception (well, fire, but eh, technicalities), and he had them fooled, and he just had to keep it up until nightfall so he could rescue Lloyd and explain in a safe location-

"HE'S NOT KAI!"

Orrrrr improvise. Okay, yep, he could improvise.

Red lunged forward and grabbed Mini Lloyd's wrist from where he had his hand extended in an accusatory point. He ducked under Not-Jay's attempts to grab him- fast, but not as fast as his Jay, his Jay who could disappear from an awkward social interaction in the span of a flickering lightbulb- and dragged his younger brother with him as he vaulted over the railing. Not-Zane almost managed to yank him back onto the Not-ship, but his icy grip caught only empty air as Red pulled Lloyd into a tight hold and ducked.

He hit the dock below with a stumble, rolling back onto his feet and taking off with a very stubborn green ninja in tow. It took all his strength to drag Lloyd (kicking and screaming like he was being kidnapped or something when Red was just trying to rescue him, for FSM's sake. Lloyd didn't know that, but he could still try to be at least a little more considerate.)

The wooden docks creaked and shuddered underfoot and Red grimaced; whoever rebuilt them after the latest Garmadon attack had shredded them like newspaper clearly hadn't wasted any unnecessary change. It certainly didn't help that Lloyd packed quite the punch for someone so small. Red definitely would come out of this with bruised shins and arms from where Mini Lloyd tried to push him away, but it would be worth it to keep his teammate, his younger brother, safe.

Then green filled his vision and broke his hold on Lloyd's wrist, sending him skidding across the dock planks as he was sent flying. When he finally rolled to a stop, neck and shoulder stinging from where the blast had caught him (no burns, just jitters like he'd been shocked), he had to take a few seconds to re-orient himself. Did the Not-Ship have cannons or something? What hit him from behind, so close it could have hit Lloyd?

Lloyd. Was Lloyd okay?

Red pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the bleeding scrapes on his hands and legs from where he'd gotten banged up by the splintered docks. His gaze, sharp and frantic, searched for signs of green. The warning of more blasts, the flash of the fabric of a gi, anything.

He spotted his brother in the arms of Not-Cole. No, no, no-

And suddenly Not-Nya was there, given a boost by Not-Jay. Her grip was as if she were wearing the robotic mech suit, harsh and powerful and near in-human. She threw Red back to the dock floor as her face twisted with the fury of a storming ocean. A resounding crack rang out over the harbour.

Red couldn't tell if it came from the planks under him or his own shoulder.

She pinned him to the wood, barking accusations and threats in his face faster than Not-Jay could talk. Red blinked through a haze of pain, trying to focus on her face and words. She was missing the beauty mark on her face, he noticed. Yet another tell she wasn't his sister.

"-scar on the wrong side-" And it was hard to hear again over the ringing in his ears. He tried to throw her off, get back to Lloyd, anything, but he was-

Useless.

Her hands suddenly got in his face, slamming his left cheek to the wood. She was close- close to his face, close to his eye, close to his scar- pushing and prying as she tried to do something. Red picked up in his struggling, his attempts to free himself turning to desperate shoves and wild clawing like a trapped animal. He wouldn't let this creation of Garmadon's finish the job that teen had started all those years ago.

"Or better yet, he needs to shut his damn mouth."

The flash of a knife. His vision half-blurry. Blood- so much blood- and a lasting scar.

"-contacts-" "-red-" "-struggling-" "-we know what he- it- is already-" "-not the real Kai-" "-wish-" "-Garmadon-"

He had to get away. Get Lloyd away from them now.

In one surge of strength- and yep, his shoulder definitely wasn't okay after that move, as if he'd ripped it not just from its socket but from its very attachment to his body- he knocked Not-Nya aside. If he could’ve seen through the red haze, he might have noticed red embers dancing around his fingertips as his desperation and fear tapped into something deep in his soul.

He tried to shoot to his feet, tried to run for Lloyd (held so tight in Not-Cole's grip, surely they were hurting him, he couldn't let that happen-). He roared, "LEAVE MY BROTHER ALONE!", but before he could take another step through Not-Jay and Not-Zane in his path, the docks gave one last ominous shudder before deciding it had finally had enough.

The planks crumbled underfoot like charred firewood in a crackling campfire, and Red was sent tumbling into the frigid ocean water below.

#spbnr #reverse Thanos snap au #reverse thanos snap #ninjago #lego ninjago #same People but not really #kai ninjago

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fallout-drabbles-n-stuff · 3 years ago

Note

Companions and their mental health statuses?

(Wrote this while listening to a Spotify playlist named "going absolutely fucking apeshit" anyway- I'm gonna split this up by what I think character wise...and then my experiences with these seggsy bitches in game bc boy, it's been wild)

Cait:

•Sufferer of severe trauma throughout her life.

•Shit just gets worse

•Fights for her life and has a strong love for psycho before a special someone convinced her she is worthy of being loved

•Trust issues out the wazoo..for sadly, good reasons.

•Maybe not the worst on the list, but definitely up there.

In game experience...

•GOD DAMN FALLOUT VERSION OF LYDIA- like seriously? Gtfo the doorway! I'm getting blown up!

•Hates everyone and everything except sole and breaking the law.

Curie:

•Actually not all that bad...except for secret abandonment issues.

•Usually masks it by burying herself in research.

•As far as these poor bastards go, she's probably one of the most mentally stable- which is scary.

In game experience.....

•Sweet Frenchie with asshole pets.

(I don't travel with her often 🥲)

Danse:

Pre-Blind Betrayal-

•Confirmed sufferer of PTSD

•Blames himself for the death of several team members.

•Evidence points towards un-talked about alcoholism.

•Seems to be attracted to power armour..

•Not very good but not the worst on this list..

Post-Blind Betrayal-

•Same as above but add on identity crisis times a thousand and two.

•Will literally kill himself (or let you kill him) if you don’t convince him otherwise.

In game experience....

•Fucking goes apeshit, pre or post BB

•Completely unaware of his surroundings unless it has to do with vertibirds flying over head, then it's time for guerrilla warfare. "Fate has decreed that you must die!"- he speaks, drawing a laser rifle.

•Has been caught on multiple instances doing drugs out of the drug vending machine in Nuka World despite clearly being against them.

Deacon:

•Probably one of the more mentally fucked.

•Lost his wife in front of his own eyes in a notably terrible way.

•Escapes his deep seeded pain through his elaborate schemes, justifying it by telling himself it helps his organization.

•Still feels like shit every waking minute.

•Cant really allow himself to get close to anyone because of his experiences.

In game experiences...

•Asshole

•Jumpscare king, mainly because I didn't know he changed outfits THAT often.

•Doesn't like physical affection??? Shit that actually makes sense..

•Stalker.

Gage:

•He's pretty "meh" on the sanity scale. He's ruthless, but he's entirely stable besides his attachment issues.

•Trusts too easy and hates himself for it...also tries to make himself not be that way and for the most part, it works!

•Problematic raider.

In game experience...

•Makes stupid comments at inappropriate times as though he wishes for the enemies to murder us

•Thinks that walking through walls is entirely possible and gets stuck every time I run with him

Hancock:

•The actual worst on this fine list of mentally messed up individuals.

•Self worth is just nonexistent despite being a pretty all around decent guy

•Uses drugs to cover up terrible trauma to the point of putting himself in the greatest danger just short of dying

•Oh yeah, doesn't mind death actually.

•Doesn't feel worthy of anything deep down.

in game experience...

•Shoots sole for stealing shit in the third rail

•Unhinged

•Sits for hours

Macready:

•Lost his wife in a horrific way

•Only has his son, who he is convinced is going to die sooner than later because of something he can't control

•Willing to do everything if it means caps to send to his sick child

•Doesn't really have a place to call his "home"

•Reckless and unforgiving

In game experience...

•Being nice? How dare you speak such ill language.

•Kleptomaniac

Maxson:

•Does as good as a boy his age with all of the responsibility possibly could.

•Just imagine- your dad died when you were super young. Your mother shipped your ass away. The people you loved like family died all around you. Now you're stuck in foreign land and have no fucking idea where to begin, only that you have to mobilize these fuckers you're in charge of and remain a good leader...

•Still not good enough? Okay, pile on insomnia, alcoholism, and the thought that you have no one alive that truly loves you as more than just the "elder". Oh, but you eventually got to spit out some kids somehow because you're the last of the great "Maxson" line...

•Also not exactly on the "stable" side..

In game experience...

•Stares intently down the Prydwen command deck with his hands behind his back..for hours.

•Never wants to chat :(

•Long winded and short sighted, bad combo..

Nick:

•Has to deal with not only demons that technically aren't even his, but after "reunions"- Kellogg's fucked up self haunts him. He keeps it to himself and suffers silently.

•Deals with the pain of knowing there will never be a place where is truly just himself. He's a man trapped inside of a metal cage..and yet he's not even really "that" man, is he?

•One could easily understand how he has some issues too.

In game experience...

•Cigarettes? Yes.

•Oh, Youre in a fight? Seems like a good time to tighten the bolts in my hand right about now...

•Wields a flamer like a champ.

Piper:

•Surprisingly..has the most sound mental state out of all.

•Is a little obsessive tho

•Has had to adapt to the role of sibling and parent to her younger sister, which isn't easy for anyone.

•Often delves into her work, sort of like curie, to avoid dealing with the pain of her parents no longer being there for her or nat.

In game experience..

•Hey kid, want some Nuka-Cola?

•Mayor McDonough shall die, even if it means execution by the hands of everyone else in Diamond City.

Preston:

•Has canonically admitted to considering suicide.

•Is holding onto the last threads of hope he has with a fucking death grip.

•Definitely not of the best mental state

In game experience...

•Doesn't know how to properly use furniture.

•Can hear sole coming from a mile away and is already getting the map out for the next settlement

X6-88:

•Emotions? Is that a snack?

•Seriously though, he has been "reset" so many times that sometimes-he doesn't even realize it- he doesn't even know what "he" is. Every aspect of who he is..it should be gone, he's a machine and he knows it...why does he still feel like a person?

•Short story, he hates life. He hates being held captive and being used like a damn hound to hunt down those who were smart enough to run- those of which he envied and didn't even realize he did. Hey, he's just a machine though- it's his job and he knows better than to revolt.

•Violence is the freedom he feel he has. He can kill and track in any way he wants, so long as it is successful and what the Institute deem appropriate. It's horrible, but he doesn't realize it- and at this point he doesn't care. The death of another and the way they die by his hand is just his way of expressing who he is deep down.

In game experience...

•Oi, you don't like the institue? FUCK YOU

#fallout 4 #fallout #paladin danse #fo4 companions #fallout companions #danse #elder maxson #fallout shitpost #porter gage #curie #x6 88 #cait #deacon #hancock #fo4 #nick valentine #arthur maxson #brotherhood of steel #macready

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julieloveupstead · 3 years ago

Text

"I'm Never Leave You" - Upstead

Chapter 4

- "Detective Rollins," she heard a female voice on the other end.

- "Hello, this is Detective Upton with the Chicago Police Department." - Hailey called the detective who had handled two similar cases to the one she and the team were handling a few years ago.

- "Hello. How can I help you, Detective?"

- "Today we started on a double murder case, similar to the one we found that the state was investigating a few years ago." - she explained to the woman on the other end. In the meantime, Sergeant Platt brought her, the autopsy results of the murdered boys.

- "Which one specifically?" - the voice on the other side pulled her from her reading.

- "It's about the beating, sexual abuse and then murder of two young men. We found drugs in the building with a similar tag. We think the two cases are connected." - Hailey elaborated.

- "And that's how I remember that case. We had a case like that, but we didn't have a suspect. When the son of one of the diplomats was murdered, the FBI took over the investigation, but as far as I know they didn't even catch anyone either. Practically, the investigation came to a standstill." - Detective Rollins said. But listen, email us with what you've found so far, and we'll compare it with ours and let you know." - suggested the Detective on the other end.

- "Okay, we'll send you everything we have right away, and I look forward to hearing from you." - and after a brief goodbye, Hailey hung up.

She went back to reviewing what she got from Trudy and then decided to call the FBI some more, who as Detective Rollins told her had taken over the investigation.

At the same time, Jay in Voight's office. Since the Sergeant wasn't there, he figured nothing would happen if he stayed there for a while, and If the Sergeant returned unexpectedly, Jay didn't care. If anything, after what he found out, he didn't care what opinion he would have of him or how angry he would be with him. As far as Jay was concerned, Voight might not be coming back. Back on the case, Jay had just spoken with an officer from the LAPD, and they also arranged to share information.

After the call, he returned to the bullpen, where Hailey was still talking. He sat down at his desk and watched her. He may have looked like a stalker, but he loved watching Hailey passionately do every single thing, even when they weren't together yet, the passion with which she gave herself to her work was remarkable, and he always appreciated that very much.

Hailey could feel Jay's burning gaze on her from the start and had to really try to keep her attention on what Agent Anderson-Li was saying.

- Jay, don't look at me like that," Hailey whispered as she ended the call.

- How am I looking? - Jay asked in an innocent voice, getting up from his seat and walking over to Hailey's desk.

- Well, like this - she pointed her hand at him. Jay sat down on her desk as usual.

- What do you mean? - he asked again, leaning over her.

- Like I'm your whole world - she whispered huskily.

- I can't help it if you're my whole world, Angel. - he whispered back.

Hailey gazed into his eyes and saw the loving look in his eyes until her heart beat a thousand times more, and if it wasn't for the fact that she was sitting, she was sure that she would have fallen intimidated by such great affection. She felt like she would never get used to how much Jay loved her.

For many years, she thought she didn't deserve to have a guy love her for who she was. Her father had admirably proven that for many years of her teenage life, and then the guys she'd been with when they found out what baggage she had left her behind. The exception was Garrett, but before things could get serious with him, he died at the hands of Booth and now that she's with Jay she can't believe that after everything he's learned about her and everything she's done he's still here looking at her with the same tender, loving and lustful eyes.

Since the day they started being together, Hailey thinks she's been dreaming and doesn't for the hell of it ever want to wake up from it.

- Jay, please don't say that - she couldn't help but have fears in addition to all the wonderful emotions she was feeling. Because what does he really see in her? After all, she's no one special. And after what had happened a few days ago, and not only that, all her pushback to cross the boundaries of the law, it all didn't look to her advantage. She was broken, and she knew that Jay accepted her like this 100 or even 200%, but she couldn't quell the fear that someday Jay would finally realize that there was nothing to glue together, or would he just be tired of it all and just walk away?

She used to think that the thing that kept her from telling Jay how I felt about him was the fear that he wouldn't feel the same way about her, but now she thought it was the fear that she would finally realize how complicated it really was and his leaving.

- Hailey...

- Guys, I found the owners of the house where we found these two boys. - Adam entered the bullpen, preventing Jay from finishing. They both turned towards him and waited for further information from their friend. - The owners are Margaret and Joseph Tremblay. - He walked over to the board and pinned up a photo, then walked over to the two detectives and gave them some cards. - Two years ago Margaret died after a months-long battle with cancer, shortly afterwards Joseph left for a retirement home. They had no children. - He explained.

- And do you know who he sold it to? - Jay asked.

- No one, Joseph was just renting it out, not to some Richard West guy. - replied Adam. - And I checked that no one with that name had rented the house recently. - He added when he saw the questioning look from his friends.

- So he was cheated? - asked Hailey.

- It seems so. - answered Adam. - The only question is by whom - said Jay.

- 'Okay Adam, we'll wait for Kevin and for Sergeant Smith and Officer Wilson, and we'll be done for the day, because we probably won't find one today anyway. - Jay sat down at his desk.

- Adam, do you know anything about Kim? - Hailey dared to ask her friend.

- 'Mhmm, her parents are sitting by her, and her sister texted me that her condition is stable, but the doctors are afraid to wake her up yet. - He replied, sitting down in his seat. Jay and Hailey looked worriedly at Adam, who, though he tried to hold back, had tears in his eyes. - I'm so scared for her. - He hid his face in his hands.

The pair of detectives looked at each other. They felt very sorry for their friend. Hailey knew exactly what the friend was talking about. After all, it had been over a year ago that Hailey had been in his shoes, and she remembered well the fear when she found out Jay had been kidnapped, and then waiting in the hospital waiting room for him to get some information and for him to finally wake up. It was like a nightmare. For months, she couldn't shake the images of Jay full of blood lying on the concrete floor and even to this day in her nightmares reliving it all over again.

She stood up and put her hand on his shoulder and squeezed in a gesture of support that Adam needed so much right now. Adam nodded in acknowledgement, Hailey smiled some more and went to the coffee room with a mug in her hand.

However, instead of making coffee, memories entered her head. She thought she had gotten over it, that she had accepted what had happened and moved on, but apparently this whole thing with Kim had caused the unwanted memories to return.

When Jay went missing, the worst part was the fear of not knowing where to look and that going around in circles was awful, and then the thoughts of whether she would make it in time or see him again. She was also angry with herself that something like this had happened, and until now she could not forgive herself that she had let such a situation happen at all. And when she finally managed to find him and saw his battered face her heart was breaking, but the fact that she found him beaten and bloody but alive helped give hope that all was not lost yet, that maybe they still had a chance. When Jay said he still had to come back for Angel, she barely held back the tears that started to appear at the corners of her eyes because it was all him. Jay Halstead, a man with a huge heart who always thinks of others first and himself last, even if it would cost him his life. And just when she thought the worst was behind her, it got worse. And waiting in that bloody room in the hospital waiting for any information about his condition and the emerging thoughts that this would be the last time she would see him was even worse. That's why he knows exactly what he might be experiencing right now.

Because knowing that the person you love so much is suffering, and you don't know if this is the last time you will see this person, is indescribable. Those things that you were afraid to tell him about, you may now not even have the chance to say anymore.

She closed the door and sat down on the couch. She brought her knees to her chest and just let go. She doesn't know at what point tears started streaming down her cheeks, and she didn't know if she was crying because of the memories, or because of Kim, or because of what happened in that damn warehouse, or maybe because of everything at once. She had to admit to herself that she felt tired of keeping herself in check in front of everyone, but most of all herself. She was already sick of it all. She felt a complete confusion in her head and did not know what she should do now. She knew that she would not be able to stand this way for long, that finally, after so many years, she had reached the limit of her endurance and did not know how to turn back.

When Hailey closed the door behind her, Jay still looked after her for a moment. He was worried, and he was worried a lot. He knew that the memories from over 1.5 years ago had to come back to her now because of Kim. Until now, Jay couldn't forgive himself for what he had done. When he was sitting in that basement and when they beat him and then after he was shot, his only thought was Hailey and her smile and how she would be mad at him. After that, he promised himself that he would never let something like that happen, that he would never let Hailey suffer. That's why he was so hurt by what Voight had done to her.

- Is Hailey okay? - Adam pulled him out of his thoughts.

- Mhmm, this whole Kim kidnapping thing has cost everyone a lot. - Jay didn't know how much he should say or if he should say anything at all, so he answered evasively. Adam just nodded.

- I remember when you were missing and Hailey was losing her mind. If it wasn't for her and what she did, I don't know if we would have found you. - Jay was puzzled by his friend's words and didn't know what to say, just stared at his companion.

He had never wondered how they had found him, he didn't know the need to revisit the subject. He was afraid that it would bring back bad memories and for him and most of all for Hailey, who he knew was going through a lot. - I know Hailey won't dare to do this, but I know her and I know that she loves you very much, you know that? - After a moment of silence Adam spoke again and again the honesty of his friend's words clobbered him. Now that he and Hailey were together to know that this wonderful person loved him was surreal, but in a positive sense of course, but when he heard it from an outsider, a person who doesn't even know they're together, it made his heart beat harder.

- I... Emm - Jay didn't know what he should say now, not to give too much away, and he was tempted to say out loud that he knew and that they were together, but he knew it wasn't something he should say himself.

- Jay - Desk Sergeant Platt came into the bullpen, delivering Jay from further conversation. Both men looked in her direction. - Nathan Robertson's parents had just arrived.

- Adam, will you come with me? - Jay looked at his friend, who nodded without hesitation. Before going downstairs, Jay took another look at the door to the break room where Hailey was staying and then approached Sergeant Platt. - Trudy, can I have a request? - The older woman just nodded, waiting for the young police officer to finally say something. - Could you sit with Hailey for a moment? - he asked quietly so that Adam, who was waiting for him by the stairs, could come over. Although he knew Hailey wanted to be alone, he didn't know if that was a good idea.

- Did something happen? - The Sergeant asked herself, surprised by her subordinate's request and most surprised by his worried look.

- You could say that. Serge, Hailey probably won't want to talk and will want to push you away but ... - He paused and looked away from Serge and looked in the direction his girlfriend was and then again at the older woman who was looking at him with a worried look. He realized suddenly that he trusted the woman standing across from him more than anyone on this command, much like Hailey, for whom Trudy was an important authority figure, and that was the only reason he'd dared after asking the Sergeant. - There's been a lot going on lately, and I'm just worried about her and I know she trusts you Serge like no one else and I trust you too. Hailey needs someone like you right now. - It was the first time he dared to say such a personal thing.

- Of course I'll sit with her. - Sergeant Platt hadn't been as moved by Jay's words in a long time as she was at that moment. The way Jay was worried about Hailey was heartwarming. It was the first time Trudy had seen, Jay so in love, and she was so happy that both of her best men were now happy.

- Thank you - Jay was grateful and sent the Sergeant a slight smile before joining his friend.

- Jay - before they went downstairs, though, Platt stopped them for another moment. - She almost forgot, I managed to identify the other boy. His name was Harry Bartel. He grew up in an orphanage and then was sent to a reformatory for theft and battery, where he had just met Robertson. - Jay nodded his head in understanding in passing, and then he and Adam finally went downstairs to the dead boy's parents.

Left alone, Trudy walked up to the locked room where she knocked on the closed door, and when she heard a quiet "please" after a moment, she entered.

Hailey was sitting on the couch and when she looked at the Desk Sergeant entering the room, she quickly wiped her wet cheeks and tried for a warm smile, but unfortunately a grimace came out.

- What's up, Trudy? - she said in a voice hoarse from crying, which she tried to mask with a grunt.

- Hailey, what's going on? - Trudy immediately noticed that she must have been crying, which immediately worried her.

- I don't know what you're talking about. - Hailey tried her best to sound normal and hide everything, hoping that the Sergeant would let it go. However, seeing the expression on the older woman's face, she knew she wouldn't succeed.

- Hailey, who are you trying to fool? - Platt sat down next to her subordinate and watched her vigilantly, sitting down at the table so that she could look at her. - Your boyfriend said it would be like this. - The older woman laughed, causing a puzzled look on Hailey's face.

- Did you talk to Jay? - Hailey asked herself in disbelief at the Desk Sergeant's words.

- Chuckles just confirmed what I've been seeing for the past few weeks, and I'm not talking about you, I mean what's going on with you. - She looked at her with a watchful, bone-penetrating gaze, making Hailey feel as if the older woman was reading her mind.

- Serge, it's all right, really - Upton tried again to convince the woman sitting next to her, and above all herself, that nothing was going on, but to no avail. With all her might, she did not want to let on that it was wrong, that something was going on. It's enough that he sees her so broken all the time, and that shouldn't be the case. Hailey doesn't like to show her weakness, that something hurts her, that there are millions of demons swirling around in her head that she can't deal with.

- You're a lot like me, you know? - said Platt in reply to Hailey, who was surprised by her words and waited for her to elaborate further. - From an early age I was taught that emotions are weakness, that if I am not tough, that if I show even the slightest weakness I will get nowhere. So I was like that at work and at home, which meant I was alone most of my life, but I didn't care too much because I worked in the police force, which was my dream, so as long as everything was going well professionally I didn't care that I had no boyfriend, no friends. At work, this frigidity helped me to survive in a world dominated by men. But then it started to bother me and when Mouch came into my life, everything changed. - It was a surprise that the Sergeant entrusted her with such private matters. She didn't really know why the older woman was telling her all this. - Look, Hailey, I'm not going to get you to confess to me, but I do want to tell you that if you want to talk to someone, and you don't necessarily want to tell Detective Chuckles, you know where to find me. - she assured Trudy.

Those words touched Hailey deeply. She closed her eyes and let out two deep breaths to calm herself. She wanted to tell Sergeant Platt the whole truth about what happened that day in that damn warehouse, but she was afraid that not only would she lose her job, but that Jay and the rest of the team would get in trouble, and she couldn't let that happen.

- Trudy, I appreciate your frowning at the truth, but I can handle it. - She turned her face towards the Sergeant. - But if something were to happen, or I wanted to talk, I know where to report. - she sent the woman a grateful smile.

- Okay - Trudy nodded, knowing she wouldn't convince Hailey to confide in her.

- Oh shit - Hailey looked at the clock hanging on the wall - I should send the documents to New York. - She stood up abruptly and without waiting for the Sergeant, she left the break room to meet Jay and Adam entering the bullpen at the same time.

- Do you guys have anything? - she immediately asked the men while crossing her arms over her chest.

- Nothing in particular. - Ruzek was the first to speak up.

- 'I don't understand how you can turn your back on your own kid,' snorted Jay as he dodged Hailey and sat down in his seat.

- What do you mean? - Hailey asked, looking at her boyfriend.

- Robertson was 15 when he first went to juvie and since then his parents had forgotten about him, and now they didn't even shed a single tear. Disbelieving. - Hailey could see that Jay was angry, at these people, and she wasn't surprised at all. She herself couldn't fathom why parents did so much evil to their children, it was incomprehensible. She walked over to Jay and put her hand on his shoulder and squeezed it in a gesture of support. They looked into each other's eyes for a moment, Hailey smiled slightly assuring Jay that she was fine and that she didn't need to worry, Jay returned the smile.

- 'What about Kevin? - Hailey asked, stepping slightly away from Jay.

- And with me, two pieces of information - as if on cue, Kevin appeared in the bullpen. - First of all - he went straight to the board and started to explain what he had found. - There are no drugs in our warehouses with that tag, nor any narcotics cop any dealer dealing the same amphetamine we found in that house.

- But? - spoke up Hailey sensing that Kevin was not telling all.

- But one of my informants heard some time ago that a big player had recently appeared in town, but he doesn't know who it is. He said as soon as he finds out something, he'll let you know.

- And that's all you've agreed on for five hours? - said a sergeant from the Homicide and Burglary department with a commanding tone, appearing out of nowhere together with his subordinate, who Hailey thinks looks at Jay too often.

- I don't understand? - said a visibly irritated Jay, standing next to Hailey.

- I mean, detective, that ...

- Sergeant, is there a problem? - unexpectedly in the room appeared Sergeant Voight and in truth Hailey, really tried, but she couldn't stop herself from violently drawing in air and instinctively moved closer to Jay.

- 'Your people haven't established anything for five hours,' Sergeant Smith explained in a smug voice. She felt Jay's muscles solidify and then felt his hand on her back, at which she instinctively moved even closer to him. She needed to feel the contact with his skin, to feel that he was there because that was the only way she could keep from giving in to the impending panic attack.

- Okay, Jay get all the information together and then you and Hailey will come to me - at that word I swallowed my saliva nervously and felt Jay clench his fists tighter. I stepped back so that my back was touching Jay's chest, to calm my nerves, to keep from being plunged into panic.

She wasn't ready to face their Sergeant yet.

- Sergeant Smith, welcome to my office. - and with that Voight entered his office, followed by the Sergeant from Homicide, to talk behind closed doors.

❁❁❁

- Adam go to the hospital and sit with Kim. - spoke up Jay after some time of work.

- What? - asked a surprised Adam.

- You stare at that phone for 30 minutes - said Hailey, turning towards him.

- Go Kim needs you - added Jay.

- Thank you - Adam started to pack his things and a moment later he was gone.

- You too - Jay turned to Kev.

- Thank you, but I will stay and help you. - protested the officer.

- Okay, whatever you want - replied Jay, shrugging his shoulders. - Hailey - Jay turned to his partner, who looked at him with a questioning expression on her face. - We've already sent everything to New York, and we'll probably have to wait a few hours for an answer anyway, so you can go home. - Come on. I'm not leaving you guys. - she said confidently.

- Hailey - Jay walked over to Hailey and sat down on her desk. They looked into each other's eyes for a moment and communicated only in their own way, without words.

- Jay, Hailey come to me - a grey-haired man leaned out of the office and Hailey regretted her decision to stay on District. Jay put a hand on his girlfriend's shoulder and whispered to her to go home after all, then got up and walked over to the Sergeant.

- Hailey has to do one thing with Kevin, so I'm going to have to suffice you myself,' Jay said in an unobjectionable voice. Hailey could see how angry he was and how hard he tried not to show it in front of her and Kevin, who completely didn't understand what was going on.

Hailey didn't want to go out and leave Jay alone, but on the other hand, she was afraid that she would lose control of her emotions as soon as the door closed behind her and the three of them stayed in that office.

- That's how one of my CIs spoke up, wanting to meet. - Kevin spoke up, trying to support his friends.

- 'Okay, go ahead - Voight spoke up after a moment, then walked into his office, followed by Jay, who closed the door behind him and sent her a smile to let her know that everything was okay. Hailey tried to smile as well, but for some reason she couldn't do it and a grimace came out.

- Come on, Hailey - she was pulled out of the shock she was in by the touch of a hand on her shoulder.

- Yes, I'm coming - she shook her head to get rid of unnecessary thoughts. She quickly gathered her things and a moment later she was already in Kevin's car.

She didn't want to talk and Kevin didn't press the issue, although Hailey could feel his worried look on her and knew he had a lot of questions. She laid her head against the glass and watched the passing streetlights. She closed her eyes and let a few tears run down her cheeks. She knew this was the first time Kevin had seen her like this, but she no longer had the strength to pretend to be strong, and she knew Kevin was one of those people she wasn't ashamed to show emotion around, and she also knew he wouldn't ask any questions if she wasn't comfortable. So now they were driving to her house and in silence, punctuated by street sounds.

#upstead #upstead fanfiction #upstead fic #jay x hailey #jay halstead #hailey upton

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reallifesultanas · 4 years ago

Text

Portrait of Turhan Hatice / Turhan Hatice portréjra

PS before reading: Sorry that I did not use Hande Dogandemir as Turhan, but she is just not Turhan for me. She is an amazing actress and a pretty woman, but she was nothing like Turhan. Meanwhile Yasemin Allen in the ultimate Turhan for me, so yeah...:D

Origin and education

Turhan Hatice was a Slavic woman of Russian descent, born around 1627. She was captured by the Tartars from her homeland, the Russian steppes, so she came to Istanbul as a child in the second half of the 1630s. Here, of the many slaves, she had a relatively fortunate fate, for she was bought by a pasha from slave traders. Later the pasha gifted her to Burnaz Atike Sultan's service. We are un such a lucky situation that we know some hints about Turhan’s appearance. They say she was very white skin, had blue eyes, brown hair (others suggest she was blond), and was tall.

Atike Sultan, who was the daughter of Ahmed I, noticed the beauty and talent of the girl, so she paid special attention to her education. Based on the subsequent relationship between the two, we can guess that Atike treated the girl very well, and practically a very close, fraternal relationship developed between the two women. Atike was also almost a mother figure to Turhan’s child as well, which makes it clear that the relationship between the two women remained very close throughout their lives. Turhan, with such a background and education, was a very special gift to Atike's younger brother, the new Sultan Ibrahim I. According to others, Atike gave the girl to Kösem Sultan and eventually she introduced her to Ibrahim.

Her life with Ibrahim I

We do not know the order in which Ibrahim’s concubines were given to him, presumably the mothers of the three eldest children, Turhan Hatice, Hatice Muazzez, and Saliha Dilaşub became Ibrahim’s concubines roughly at the same time. However, Turhan was the first to become pregnant and give birth to a boy in January 1642. We would think that, as the mother of the heir to the throne, she received particularly great respect and special authority. However, none is true. The relationship between Ibrahim and Turhan soon deteriorated greatly. And in general Ibrahim's concubines could not really gain power for themselves because of their mother-in-law, Kösem Sultan. Turhan Hatice probably had another daughter shortly after Mehmed, Atike, but they probably had no more children together. This is not surprising, since there was an open conflict between Turhan and Ibrahim before or around 1645, after which both Turhan and her son were pushed into the background.

The wet-nurse of Prince Mehmed and her son were very much liked by the sultan, who constantly spent time with the nurse's son, Osman, considered him as his own son, while he pushed away Mehmed. Raising a slave’s son as his own caused a huge anomaly in the harem and triggered a lot of rumors. Turhan could not tolerate the humiliation of her son, the heir to the throne, so some said she directly questioned Ibrahim. Others say she sent the wet-nurse out of her service, who in turn complained about Turhan’s behavior to the sultan. Either way, Sultan Ibrahim became angry and his anger was directed at Mehmed. He staged a huge scene, then tore Prince Mehmed out of his mother's arms and threw him into a cistern. The child suffered severe head injuries but survived the incident without permanent damage after the servants rushed to his rescue immediately. For the rest of his life, Mehmed had a scar on his forehead due to this event.

The following years were about dread and humiliation, as Ibrahim became more and more insane, committed more and more inexplicable things, and married one of his young concubines, whom he raised above everyone else. Kösem Sultan and her followers at one point tried to dethrone the mad Sultan to replace him with his son, Mehmed, but to no avail. Lots of heads fell to dust after the rebellion, Kösem Sultan herself was exiled too. We don’t know how Turhan lived through this period, but given the events, she could probably have worried a lot about her son’s life. The relationship between Turhan and Mehmed was very close, perhaps one of the closest during the period of the Sultanate of women. This strong bond may have been formed in the period of common suffering from Ibrahim's madness.

The resurrected hope

In August 1648, Ibrahim was finally dethroned and locked up by the Janissaries and Kösem Sultan. Soon the statesmen flocked to the palace to take Prince Mehmed to the Janissary Mosque to be proclaimed Sultan there. Kösem Sultan did not allow this, did not hand over her grandson. She argued with the statesmen for hours before it was finally agreed that Prince Mehmed would be proclaimed sultan within the palace, as tradition requires. Turhan could finally know her son was safe, she might think everything would be fine, but it didn’t happen that way.

The statesmen asked Kösem Sultan to become a regent to Mehmed IV, as Mehmed’s own mother herself was too young for the role. The statesmen expected Kösem Sultan to prepare and educate Turhan and Mehmed for the task ahead of them, but Kösem Sultan thought otherwise. She wanted to lead the empire, like a monarch. The reason for this was presumably the execution of Ibrahim. The statesmen seem to have executed the former sultan without the consent and knowledge of Kösem Sultan. Kösem Sultan for that reason refused to work with the statesmen, and we can also deduce from the events that she may blamed Turhan also.

Kösem Sultan completely excluded Turhan from political life, but what was an even bigger problem that Mehmed was excluded too. In addition, she did not allow Turhan to act as a legitimate Valide Sultan either in the harem. Kösem Sultan, for example, did not allow Turhan to send away the mother of Ibrahim's other children (except Hümaşah, who herself also hated). With this, she further degraded Turhan's role as a Valide Sultan. She also did not give Turhan the salary of Valide Sultanas (3,000 aspers), she only received 2,000 aspers per day, while Kösem Sultan herself received 3,000 aspers per day as if she was the Valide Sultan. We can accept that the experienced Kösem Sultan did not want to let the inexperienced Turhan, whom she considered unfit, be near the political arena. However, it is undeniable that Turhan had the right to lead the harem, Kösem Sultan, however, refused to let her do so.

Turhan then began to stand up for herself and, with the support of Chief Eunuch Uzun Suleiman Agha, she created her own harem staff and began to control arbitrarily. At the same time, of course, Kösem Sultan did not leave the matter at that, and she also had a harem staff out of her own people. In the end, there was chaos in the harem, people didn’t know which leaders to listen to, to whom to obey. The harem thus split in two, some serving the "Great Valide," Kösem Sultan, while others served the "Little Valide," Turhan. There is no doubt that Turhan was in a better position in some aspects because the most influential eunuch, Suleiman, was on her side.

The rebel

There is a lot of legend and half-information about the year 1651. It is so certain that no one liked the monopoly of Kösem Sultan. Over time, all the statesmen turned against her and wanted to remove her from power. Kösem Sultan's only support was coming from some corps of Janissaries, who, whatever happened, supported her. Turhan took advantage on the fact that Kösem did not have any men in the divan. Turhan, with the help of Suleiman Agha, was able to contact the statesmen and immediately gained the support of some of them. Legend has it that Turhan herself directed the pashas against Kösem Sultan. In practice, however, we do not have sufficient evidence. Nor can we rule out that it was not Turhan who used the pashas against Kösem Sultan, but the pashas used Turhan. Either way, their common goal was to get rid of Kösem Sultan.

By then, Turhan was no longer just worried about Kösem Sultan humiliating her within the harem. The information came to light that Kösem Sultan wanted to dethrone Mehmed and replace him with Saliha Dilaşub's son, Suleiman. That would have meant Mehmed's confinement and death. After all, when Ibrahim I was executed, it was argued that if there was already a sultan (Mehmed), then the existence of the other sultan (Ibrahim) had become obsolete. Others say Kösem Sultan never wanted to do that, only the pashas made Turhan to believe it. Nor can we rule out that Turhan herself invented this excuse to legitimize the removal of Kösem Sultan.

Kösem Sultan was finally strangled during a coup in September 1651 and power passed to Turhan Hatice. Turhan’s role in the events to this day is questionable. I don’t want to go into the details because that alone is worth a post. So a post will be made soon where I will put together a bunch of information about the events around the assassination of Kösem Sultan. In any case, the Pashas and Turhan were able to twist the events so that the Janissaries who supported Kösem Sultan were used as scapegoats, and they were executed. Meanwhile, Turhan and the statemen quietly organized the funeral of Kösem Sultan.

The long-awaited role?

Given her son’s youth, Turhan Hatice became regent, at just 25 years old. She accompanied her son to every important meeting and followed the events behind curtains. More than once she spoke very wisely in the divan. Once Gürcü Mehmed Pasha refused to follow the proposals instructions of Mesud Efendi, appointed by Turhan. Gürcü Mehmed Pasha demanded that his words should be accepted because, as he said, his beard had also whitened in the service of the state so he knowns better. Turhan replied, "Really, pasha! White beards and black beards are not the issue. Sound policy comes not from age but from intelligence. Whatever [Mesud Efendi] says, do immediately; listen to him and discuss everything with him. I warn you, do nothing contrary to his views!" Turhan’s performance within the divan shows well that many did not take her seriously because of her youth, but she did her best to carry out her opinion.

Although she tried to look strong from the outside, Turhan never wanted to do everything by just herself, we know from her letters that before many important events she asked the opinion of the people she valued. From these requests for help, it becomes clear that Turhan was a very respectful woman who loved to keep the formalities as appropriate. In addition, it is clear from her letters that most of the time she was aware of exactly what she should do, she simply wanted confirmation before taking action. These little things suggest well that the image of a cruel and power-hungry woman painted by the world about Turhan may not be real.

Another case that well illustrated Turhan’s personality and political attitude was when the Crimean khan passed away. Turhan then wrote a letter to the Grand Vizier, “You’ve requested a sword and a robe of honor for his successor. From what I hear, it is customary rather for the Tatar Khan to send [gifts] to the sultan. It’s true I’ve never witnessed such a thing but that’s what I hear. Now you examine the kanunnames and act accordingly.” This case shows that Turhan was well acquainted with etiquette, yet she didn’t want to tell off pashas not knowing it. Instead, she asked for confirmation from an outside source so the pashas take her seriously. This also clearly shows the impression of a clever but conflict-avoiding person who, although in a higher position than anyone around her (except her son), did not act rude. In another case, the Grand Vizier did not buy enough wood for the Old Palace. Then Turhan wrote him that, "There is not enough firewood in the Old Palace to boil soup! What’s the reason for this? Is it not a royal palace?".

The greatest task of Turhan's regency was to find a suitable Grand Vizier. Due to the change in the geopolitical situation, the early 1650s were very chaotic, and the Grand Viziers were constantly dismissed because none of them were fit for the task. Many blame Turhan for the economic and political crisis, but this is not valid. Turhan tried to find the most suitable statesmen, but there were not too many suitable persons. Turhan finally resolved the crisis in 1656 at great risk. Köprülü Mehmed Pasha was an extremely unpopular pasha with few supporters but blessed with a genius mind and with a difficult nature. Turhan thought she would be able to break out of the chaos with the help of the pasha. However, Köprülü was well aware of how risky it was to take up the position of Grand Vezier, so he had a condition. He only took the position if he was given a relatively free hand. In practice, of course, this did not mean that he did not report or that he did whatever he wanted, but rather that he took over the regent duties from Turhan. He consulted with Turhan and Mehmed throughout and acted with their approval.

The beloved Valide Sultan

We don’t know what Turhan felt and what she thought with the end of her regency. However, events suggest that she preferred to perform the duties of the Valide Sultan over the duties of the Regent. She continued to support her son in everything, she paid special attention to his education and also consulted regularly with Köprülü, so contrary to popular belief, she did not completely withdraw from politics. In addition to administering politics and harem, she finally had time to embark on her philanthropy and her vast architectural projects. She did her first construction project back in 1652/3, but it was just a fountain in Beşiktaş. She began her first project of real significance in 1658 when she established two fortresses on the Dardanelles. These fortresses were very important from a military point of view, as it made it possible to defend the Bosphorus. This project has increased the popularity of both Turhan and Mehmed. This was soon followed by the construction of the deservedly famous New Mosque. The complex was started by Safiye Sultan in the late 1500s, but with the loss of Safiye's power, the project was halted, and then several fires destroyed its surroundings, so it was almost completely destroyed. So this is what Turhan Hatice started again. By 1665, the complex was completed, with a mosque, school, fountain, library, and market (now known as the Spice Bazaar or Egyptian Bazaar nowadays). After the complex, Turhan embarked on several smaller projects, one of which was the construction of a water network to help people on a pilgrimage to Mecca get water. In addition, the temples of several newly occupied/recaptured areas were converted into mosques and given the name Turhan Hatice.

With her constructions, charity, and because of the relatively peaceful period, Turhan became a favorite of the people. People loved and respected her and her son. Mehmed had grown up enough to rule for himself so far, but he continued to seek his mother’s opinion in everything and considered her an equal companion in both life and politics. Mehmed was not preoccupied with politics, he usually left it to the Grand Vizier and his mother. It is no coincidence that the people believed that the two pillars of the empire were none other than Köprülü and Turhan. The relationship between Turhan and Mehmed is considered one of the closest mother-son relationships in the history of the Ottoman Empire. Turhan never wanted to dominate her son, she never controlled him or interfered in his private life. Yet she would have had the opportunity to do so, as a rival soon appeared in Mehmed's life.

The combined presence of the Valide Sultan and an influential consort did not bring much good in previous decades, so one would expect that this was no different for Turhan. However, Turhan accepted her son’s chosen one, Emetullah Rabia Gülnüş, and tried to cultivate a respectful relationship with the woman. She never tried to limit Emetullah’s influence even in the political arena. And Emetullah thanked her mother-in-law this with similarly respectful behavior. Only one case is known is when Turhan confronted Emetullah Rabia Gülnüş. For the sake of Emetullah's sons, she wanted Mehmed to kill his half-brothers, who had lived in solitary confinement for years and tried to persuade the Sultan to do so. The sultan may have been inclined to do so himself, but Turhan's powerful action prevented the execution of Princes Suleiman and Ahmed.

Turhan also maintained a close relationship with her foster sons and never left them alone from then on. Fearing that Emetullah would eventually reach her aim, Turhan took the two princes with her everywhere when she left the capital. Turhan could also be similarly close to one of her foster daughters, Fatma. Since Fatma was buried in the Turhan complex, many believe that Fatma was the daughter of Turhan, however, this is unlikely. Fatma presumably orphaned and was then taken care of by Sultans Turhan and Atike. So when the girl died at the age of seventeen, Turhan arranged for her funeral as if she had her own daughter.

Turhan’s generosity is also mentioned infinitely many times by foreign sources. They were not persuaded to highlight how much she had done for the permanent abolition of the law of fratricide and that she had also stood up against her own son in favor of her foster sons. In addition, we are left with an event of much lesser significance that, regardless of its significance, gives us an insight into Turhan’s personality. The French ambassador reports that Turhan once went to Edirne with a huge escort, with her foster sons and part of the harem. When they reached a bridge, one of the ambassador's men was just there and saw that the door of Turhan's carriage was open. The man threw himself on the ground in fright, lest he be accused of trying to see the Valide Sultan. However, as he was throwing himself to the ground, his gaze collided with the eyes of the veiled Valide Sultan. Turhan then stopped the car and said to the man, "Don't be afraid, son," and gave him 160 aspers.

Last years

In 1681 Turhan's health gradually began to deteriorate. Ambassadors write as "her condition has greatly deteriorated and there is no hope of treatment." We don’t know exactly what Turhan’s illness was. She finally died in 1683 in her late 50s, in Edirne. Since Turhan had stipulated that she wanted to be buried in her own mosque complex, her body was transported to Istanbul. Along the way, the coffin was surrounded by ice day and night to protect the body. Alongside the caravan carrying the coffin of the Valide Sultan, the people cry out loud and the whole empire mourned. According to descriptions, people sobbed and said that the strongest pillar of the state had left the Empire. Turhan was eventually buried in her own complex. Her tomb is one of the largest and most classy of all, indicating that it was built in honor of a powerful Valide Sultan. Her son and several descendants were later buried here. With her death, she became the longest-serving Valide Sultan ever, with 34 years of reign.

Turhan is one of the most misunderstood characters in the Sultanate of Women. Most see her as a violent, willful, and power-hungry woman, blamed for the death of Kösem Sultan, even though Turhan was not like that. She was a mother who was forced to raise her son alongside a crazy, dangerous father; she was a woman who never received love and respect from her child’s father; still she became a powerful woman who always helped the fallen; the only one in the Sultanate of Women with whom her son shared his power equally and who, nevertheless, never tried to exaggerate or control her son. With the death of Turhan Mehmed IV's reign was also sealed. The sultan's reign and recognition were largely due to the character and presence of his mother. As Turhan was no more, Mehmed’s popularity declined, he made more and more bad political decisions. As a result, in 1687, after a rebellion, he handed over the throne to his half-brother, who could survive largely by the grace of Turhan.

Used sources: A. D. Alderson - The Structure of the Ottoman Dynasty; L. Peirce - The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire; N. Sakaoğlu - Bu Mülkün Kadın Sultanları; M. Ç. Uluçay - Padişahların Kadınları ve Kızları; C. Finkel - Osman's Dream: The Story of the Ottoman Empire; G. Börekçi - Factions and favourites at the courts of Sultan Ahmed I (r. 1603-17) and his immediate predecessors; S. Faroqhi - The Ottoman Empire and the World; C. Imber - The Ottoman Empire 1300-1650; G. Piterberg - An Ottoman Tragedy, History and Historiography at Play; F. Suraiya - The Cambridge History of Turkey, The Later Ottoman Empire, 1603–1839; Howard - A History of the Ottoman Empire; Öztuna - Devletler ve Hanedanlar; F. Davis - The Palace of Topkapi in Istanbul; Y. Öztuna - Genç Osman ve IV. Murad; G. Junne - The black eunuchs of the Ottoman Empire; R. Dankoff - An Ottoman Mentality: The World of Evliya Çelebi; R. Murphey - ‘The Functioning of the Ottoman Army under Murad IV (1623–1639/1032–1049):Key to Understanding of the Relationship Between Center and Periphery; M. Özgüleş - The women who built the Ottoman Empire: Female Patronage and the Architectural Legacy of Gülnüş Sultan

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Származása és neveltetése

Turhan Hatice orosz származású szláv nő volt, aki 1627 körül született. A tatárok ragadták el szülőföldjéről, az orosz sztyeppékről, így került gyermekként Isztambulba, az 1630-as évek második felében. Itt a sok rabszolga közül viszonylag szerencsés sors jutott neki, ugyanis egy született szultána, Burnaz Atike szolgálatába került. Valószínűleg egy pasa vásárolta meg a lányt rabszolgakereskedőktől és ő ajándékozta Atike szolgálatába. Turhan külsejéről annyi információnk van, hogy kék szeme volt, barna haja és az átlaghoz képest magas volt.

Atike szultána, aki I. Ahmed lánya volt, felfigyelt a lány szépségére és tehetségére, így kiemelt figyelmet fordított oktatására. Kettejük későbbi kapcsolata alapján sejthetjük, hogy Atike igen jól bánt a lánnyal és gyakorlatilag egy nagyon szoros, testvéries kapcsolat alakult ki a két nő között. Atike szultána szinte anyafigura volt Turhan gyermeke számára is, ami egyértelműsíti, hogy a két nő viszonya igen szoros maradt egész életükben. Turhant, magasrangú oktatása alkalmassá tette arra, hogy Atike egyenesen öccsének, az új szultánnak I. Ibrahimnak ajándékozza trónralépése után. Mások szerint Atike Köszem szultánának ajándékozta a lányt és végül ő mutatta be Ibrahimnak.

Élete Ibrahim mellett

Nem tudjuk, hogy Ibrahim ágyasai között milyen sorrendiség állt fenn, feltehetőleg a három legidősebb gyermek édesanyja, Turhan Hatice, Hatice Muazzez és Saliha Dilaşub nagyjából egyszerre lettek Ibrahim ágyasai. Turhan volt azonban az első, aki teherbe esett és fiúnak adott életet 1642 januárjában. Azt gondolnánk, hogy a trónörökös anyjaként különösen nagy tisztelet kapott és kiemelt hatalommal bírt. Azonban egyik sem igaz. Ibrahim és Turhan kapcsolata hamarosan nagyon megromlott. Hatalmat pedig Ibrahim ágyasai nem igazán tudtak szerezni maguknak, anyósuk, Köszem szultána miatt. Turhan Haticének valószínűleg Mehmed után nemsokkal született még egy lánya, Atike szultána, azonban valószínűleg nem volt több közös gyermekük. Ez nem is meglepő, hiszen 1645 előtt valamikor volt egy nyílt konfliktus Turhan és Ibrahim között, mely után Turhan és fia is háttérbe szorultak a háremben.

Mehmed herceg szoptatósdajkája és annak fia ugyanis nagyon megtetszettek a szultánnak, aki állandóan a dajka fiát, Oszmánt babusgatta, saját fiát, Mehmedet pedig csúnya kisbabának tartotta, eltaszította magától. Az, hogy egy rabszolga fiát sajátjaként neveli hatalmas anomáliát okozott a háremben és rengeteg pletykát indított útjára. Turhan nem tűrhette fia, a trónörökös megalázását ezért egyesek szerint kérdőrevonta Ibrahimot. Mások szerint a szoptatósdajkát küldte el szolgálatából, aki pedig elpanaszolta Turhan viselkedését a szultánnak. Akárhogyan is, Ibrahim szultán éktelen haragra gerjedt és dühét Mehmeden vezette le. Hatalmas jelenetet rendezett, majd kitépte Mehmed herceget édesanyja karjából és egy ciszternába hajította. A gyermek súlyos fejsérüléseket szenvedett, de maradandó károsodás nélkül túlélte az esetet, miután a körülöttük lévő szolgálók azonnal megmentésére siettek. Mehmed homlokán élete végéig ott volt az ekkor szerzett sebhely.

A következő évek a rettegésről és megalázásról szóltak, hiszen Ibrahim egyre őrültebb lett, egyre többször követett el megmagyarázhatatlan dolgokat, ráadásul feleségül vette egyik fiatal ágyasát, akit ezzel mindenki fölé emelt. Köszem szultána és követői egy ponton megpróbálták trónfosztani az őrült szultánt, hogy helyére fiát, Mehmedet ültessék, azonban nem jártak sikerrel. Rengeteg fej hullott porba, Köszemet magát is száműzték. Nem tudjuk, Turhan hogyan élte meg ezt az időszakot, de figyelembe véve az eseményeket, valószínűleg rengeteget aggódhatott fia életéért. Turhan és Mehmed között nagyon szoros volt a kapcsolat, talán az egyik legszorosabb a Nők szultánátusának időszakából. Ez az erős kapocs is talán a közös szenvedésben és hányattatott időszakban formálódott.

A feltámadó remény

1648 augusztusában végül a janicsárok és Köszem szultána trónfosztották Ibrahimot és elzárták. Hamarosan az államférfiak a palotához sereglettek, hogy elvigyék Mehmed herceget a janicsár mecsetbe, hogy ott szultánjukká kiáltsák ki. Köszem szultána ezt nem engedte, nem adta át unokáját. Órákon át vitatkozott az államférfiakkal, mielőtt végül megegyeztek volna, hogy Mehmed herceget a palotán belül kiáltják ki szultánná, ahogy ezt a hagyományok is megkövetelik. Turhan végre biztonságban tudhatta fiát, azt gondolhatta, minden rendben lesz, ám nem így történt.

Az államférfiak felkérték Köszem szultánát, hogy legyen ő a régens IV. Mehmed mellett, mert úgy gondolták, Mehmed édesanyja maga még túl fiatal ehhez a szerephez. Az államférfiak azt várták Köszemtől, hogy felkészíti Turhant és Mehmedet a rájuk váró feladatra, Köszem azonban máshogy gondolta. Maga kívánta vezetni a birodalmat, egyeduralkodóként. Ennek oka feltételezhetően Ibrahim kivégzése volt. Az államférfiak ugyanis úgy tűnik, Köszem beleegyezése és tudta nélkül végeztették ki a volt szultánt. Köszem ezért pedig nem volt hajlandó együtt dolgozni az államférfiakkal és az eseményekből arra is következtethetünk, hogy Turhant is hibáztatta.

Köszem Turhant teljesen kizárta a politikai életből, ám ami még nagyobb probléma volt, hogy Mehmedet is. Emellett a háremben sem hagyta, hogy Turhan jogos Valide szultána szerepében tevékenykedhessen. Köszem például nem engedte, hogy Ibrahim többi gyermekének anyját elküldjék a palotából - kivéve Telli Hümaşaht -, amivel Turhan szerepét tovább degradálta. Emellett nem adta meg Turhannak a Valide szultánák 3000 asperes fizetését, csupán 2000 aspert kapott naponta, míg Köszem maga napi 3000 aspert kapott, mintha ő lenne a valide szultána. Azt elfogadhatjuk, hogy a tapasztalt Köszem nem akarta a tapasztalatlan, általa alkalmatlannak ítélt Turhant a politika színterének közelébe engedni, azonban az tagadhatatlan, hogy Turhannak joga volt a hárem irányításához. Köszem azonban ezt megtagadta tőle.

Turhan ekkor elkezdett kiállni magáért és a főeunuch Uzun Szulejmán Aga támogatásával létrehozta saját háremszemélyzetét és önkényesen elkezdett irányítani. Ugyanakkor természetesen Köszem sem hagyta annyiban a dolgot és saját embereiből ő is rendelkezett háremszemélyzettel. A harc vége az lett, hogy a háremben káosz uralkodott, az emberek nem tudták, hogy mely vezetők szavára hallgassanak, kinek engedelmeskedjenek. A hárem így ketté szakadt, egyesek a "nagy valide szultánát", Köszemet szolgálták, míg másik a "kis valide szultánát", Turhant. Kétségtelen, hogy Turhan bizonyos szempontból előnyösebb helyzetben volt, mert a legbefolyásosabb eunuch, Szulejmán az ő oldalán állt.

A lázadó

Sok a legenda és félinformáció az 1651-es évről. Annyi bizonyos, hogy Köszem egyeduralma senkinek sem tetszett. Idővel az összes államférfi Köszem ellen fordult és el akarták őt távolítani a hatalom közeléből. Köszem egyetlen támasza a janicsárok néhány hadteste volt, akiknek bármi történt is, élvezhette a támogatását. Köszemnek nem lévén embere a divánban, Turhan előnybe került. Turhan ugyanis Szulejmán Aga segítségével kapcsolatba kerülhetett az államférfiakkal és néhányuk támogatását azonnal megszerezte. A legendák úgy tartják, hogy Turhan maga fogta közre a Köszem ellen lévő pasákat és őket irányítva kelt fel Köszem ellen. Gyakorlatilag azonban nem áll rendelekzésünkre kellő bizonyíték erre. Azt sem zárhatjuk ki, hogy nem Turhan használta a pasákat Köszem ellen, hanem a pasák használták Turhant. Akárhogy is, közös volt a céljuk, megszabadulni Köszemtől.

Turhannak ekkor már nem csak az volt a gondja Köszemmel, hogy a háremen belül megalázta. Olyan információk keltek szárnyra, melyek szerint Köszem szultána trónfosztani kívánta Mehmedet és helyére Saliha Dilaşub fiát, Szulejmánt akarta ültetni. Ez egyet jelentett volna Mehmed elzárásával és halálával. Hiszen Ibrahim kivégzésekor is arra hivatkoztak, hogy ha már van egy szultán (Mehmed), akkor a másik szultán (Ibrahim) léte okafogyottá vált. Mások szerint Köszem sosem akart ilyet tenni, csak a pasák hiteték el Turhannal. Azt sem zárhatjuk ki, hogy maga Turhan találta ki ezt, hogy legitimizálja Köszem eltávolítását.

Köszem szultánát végül egy puccs során 1651 szeptemberében megfojtották és a hatalom Turhan Haticére szállt. Turhan szerepe az eseményekben a mai napig kérdéses. Nem kívánok részletesen belemenni az eseményekbe, mert ez önmagában megér egykülön posztot. Hamarosan készül tehát egy poszt, ahol a Köszem meggyilkolása körüli eseményekről tudott információkat egy csokorba fogom fűzni. Mindenesetre a pasák és Turhan képesek voltak úgy csűrni-csavarni az eseményeket, hogy a Köszemet támogató janicsárok legyenek bűnbaknak kiáltva, ők pedig csendben megszervezték Köszem temetését.

A régóta várt szerep?

Fia ifjúkorára való tekintettel Turhan Hatice lett a régens, mindössze 25 évesen. Minden fontos gyűlésre elkísérte fiát és függöny mögül követte az eseményeket. Nem egyszer igen bölcsen fel is szólalt, melyekről leírás is fennmaradt. Egyszer Gürcü Mehmed Pasa elutasította, hogy kövesse a Turhan által kinevezett Mesud Efendi javaslatait. Gürcü Mehmed Pasa követelte, hogy az ő szavait fogadják el, hiszen mint mondta, szakálla is az állam szolgálatában fehéredett meg. Turhan erre úgy válaszolt, hogy: "Igazán Pasám? Fehér szakáll vagy fekete szakáll, nem ez a lényeg. Az igazság és a jó megoldás nem kor vagy szakáll-szín függvénye, hanem intelligenciáé. Bármit is mond Mesud Efendi, tégy annak megfelelően, hallgass rá és mindent beszélj meg vele. Figyelmeztetek, semmit ne tegyél Mesud Efendi szavai ellen." Turhan divanon belüli fellépése jól mutatja, hogy fiatalkora miatt sokan nem vették komolyan, ő viszont mindent megtett, hogy foganatosítsa szavait.

Bár kifelé igyekezett erős lenni, Turhan azonban sosem akart mindent maga intézni, leveleiből tudjuk, hogy sok fontos esemény előtt kérteki az általa nagyra tartott személyek véleményét arról, hogy hogyan kellene eljárjon. Ezekből a segítségkérésekből egyértelművé válik, hogy Turhan igen hagyománytisztelő nő volt, aki szerette, ha megmaradnak a formalitások, ahogy az illendő. Emellett az is kitűnik leveleiből, hogy legtöbbször pontosan tisztában volt azzal, hogy mit kellene tennie, egyszerűen csak megerősítésre vágyott, mielőtt lépéseket tett volna. Ezek az apróságok jól sejtetik, hogy a világ által Turhanról festett kegyetlen és hataloméhes nő képe talán nem valós.

Másik eset, amely jól mutajta Turhan személyiségét és politikai hozzállását az volt, mikor a Krími kán elhunyt. Turhan ekkor levelet írt a nagyvezírnek: “Egy kardot és ruhát kértél tőlem az új kán tiszteletére. Azonban abból, amit hallottam úgy tűnik, hogy inkább az a szokás, hogy a tatár kán küld ajándékot a szultánnak, miután elfoglalja a trónt. Igaz, személyesen sosem tapasztaltam ilyesmit, mégis ezt hallottam. Ezért beszélj a megfelelő tudósokkal, kérd ki a véleményüket és tégy javaslatuk szerint." Ez az eset iválóan mutatja, hogy Turhan jól ismerte az etikettet, mégsem akarta erre alapozva megmondani, hogy mit tegyenek az államférfiak. Inkább rávezette őket, hogy talán nincs igazuk és egy külső forrásból szerzett megerősítést saját szavainak. Ez alapján Turhan okos de konfliktuskerülő személy benyomását kelti, aki bár magasabb pozícióban volt, mint bárki más körülötte (kivéve fiát), mégsem utasított, hanem kért. Ismert persze olyan eset is, mikor hatalmát kihasználva szidott le egy nagyvezírt, miután az hibát követett el. A vezír nem intézett kellő mennyiségű fát a Régi Palota számára. Ekkor ezt írta Turhan: "Nincs annyi fa sem a Régi Palotában, hogy levest tudjanak főzni! Mi erre a magyarázat pasám? Az talán nem egy birodalmi palota?". Turhan tehát egyáltalán nem volt muja, ha szükséges volt hangot adott elégedetlenségének és vasszigorral is képes volt rendben tartani a pasákat, ha arra volt szükség.

Turhan régensségének legnagyobb feladata az alkalmas nagyvezír megtalálása volt. A geopolitikai helyzet változása miatt az 1650-es évek eleje nagyon kaotikus volt, a nagyvezírek pedig egymást váltották, mert egyikük sem volt alkalmas a feladatra. Sokan Turhant hibáztatják a gazdasági és politikai bizonytalanság miatt, azonban ez nem igaz. Turhan igyekezett a legalkalmasabb államférfiakat megtalálni, ám nem volt túl bőséges a választék megfelelő személyekből. Turhan végül 1656-ban hatalmas kockázatot vállalva oldotta meg a krízist. Köprülü Mehmed Pasa rendkívül népszerűtlen, kevés támogatóval rendelkező, de zseniális elmével megáldott pasa volt, nehéz természettel. Turhan úgy gondolta, hogy a pasa segítségével képesek lesznek kitörni a káoszból. Köprülü is jól tudta azonban, hogy mennyire kockázatos a pozíció elvállalása, ezért volt egy kikötése. Csak akkor vállalta el a pozíciót ha relatíve szabadkezet kap és senki nem szól bele döntéseibe. A gyakorlatban ez természetesen nem azt jelentette, hogy nem számol be arról, hogy mit fog csinálni, hanem inkább azt jelentette, hogy átveszi a régensi feladatokat. Turhannal és az egyre idősödő Mehmeddel végig konzultált és jóváhagyásukkal cselekedett.

A nagytiszteletű valide szultána

Nem tudjuk, hogy Turhan mit érzett és mit gondolt a régensség végével. Az események azonban arra utalnak, hogy szívesebben végezte a valide szultána feladatait, mint a régensi feladatokat. Fiát továbbra is mindenben támogatta, különös figyelmet fordított oktatására és Köprülüvel is rendszeresen egyeztetett, tehát a közhiedelemmel ellentétben, nem vonult vissza teljesen a politikától. A politika és a hárem igazgatása mellett végre volt ideje, hogy belekezdjen jótékonykodásába és hatalmas építészeti projektjeibe. Első építkezési projektjét még 1652/3-ban csinálta, ám ez csupán egy kút volt Beşiktaş-ban. Első valódi jelentőséggel bíró projektjét 1658-ban kezdte meg, ekkor a Dardanellákon létesített két erődöt. Ez az erőd igen fontos volt katonai szempontból, hiszen általa védhetővé vált a szoros. Mind Turhan mind Mehmed népszerűségét megnövelte ez a projekt. Ezt hamarosan a méltán híres Új Mecset építtetése követte. A komplexumot még Safiye szultána kezdte el építeni az 1500-as évek végén, azonban hatalma elvesztésével a projekt félbemaradt, aztán több tűzvész is pusztított a környezetében, így szinte teljesen megsemmisült. Ezt kezdte tehát Turhan Hatice újra. 1665-re a komplexum elkészült, mecset, iskola, kút, könyvtár és piac (ma Fűszerbazárként ismerjük) is találhatóak voltak benne. A komplexum után Turhan több kisebb projektbe is belefogott, egyik volt például egy vízhálózat kiépítése, mely segítette a Mekkába zarándokoló emberek vízhez jutását. Emellett több újonnan elfoglalt/visszafoglalt terület templomait is mecsetté alakították és Turhan Hatice nevét adták nekik.

Építkezéseivel, jótékonykodásával és a relatíve békés időszakkal Turhan a nép kedvencévé vált. Az emberek szerették és tisztelték őt, akárcsak fia. Mehmed eddigre felnőtt annyira, hogy maga kezdhessen uralkodni, ám továbbra is mindenben kikérte anyja véleményét és egyenlő társának tekintette mind az életben, mind az uralkodásban. Mehmedet nem foglalkoztatta a politika, ezt általában inkább a nagyevezírre és édesanyjára hagyta. Nem véletlenül vélte úgy a nép, hogy a birodalom két oszlopa nem más, mint Köprülü és Turhan. Turhan és Mehmed kapcsolatát mai napig az egyik legszorosabb anya-fiú viszonynak tekintik az Oszmán Birodalom történetében. Turhan sosem akarta túlragyogni fiát, sosem irányította vagy szólt bele a magánéletébe. Pedig lett volna rá lehetősége, hiszen Mehmed életében hamarosan felbukkant egy rivális.

A valide szultána és egy befolyásos ágyas együttes jelenléte nem hozott sok jót a korábbi évtizedekben, így azt várhatnánk, hogy nem volt ez másként Turhan esetében sem. Turhan azonban elfogadta fia választottját, Emetullah Rabia Gülnüşt és igyekezett tiszteletteljes kapcsolatot ápolni a nővel. Sosem próbálta korlátozni Emetullah befolyását még a politikai színtéren sem. Emetullah pedig ezt hasonlóan tiszteletteljes viselkedéssel hálálta meg anyósának. Egyetlen eset ismert, mikor Turhan szembeszállt Emetullah Rabia Gülnüşsel. Emetullah fiai érdekében szerette volna, hogy Mehmed megölesse féltestvéreit, akik már évek óta elzárva éltek és igyekezett erre rábeszélni a szultánt. A szultán talán maga is hajlott erre, azonban Turhan erőteljes fellépése megakadályozta Szulejmán és Ahmed hercegek kivégzését.

Turhan nevelt fiaival is szoros kapcsolatot ápolt és innentől kezdve sosem hagyta őket magukra. Tartva attól, hogy Emetullah végül célt ér, Turhan mindenhová magával vitte a két herceget, ha elhagyta a fővárost. Turhan emellett hasonlóan közel állhatott egyik nevelt lányához, Fatmához. Mivel Fatmát Turhan komplexumában temették el, sokan úgy vélik, hogy Fatma Turhan lánya volt, azonban ez nem valószínű. Fatma feltehetőleg elárvult és ezekután Turhan és Atike szultána viselte gondját. Így amikor a lány tizenhét évesen elhunyt, Turhan úgy gondoskodott a temetéséről, mintha a saját lánya lett volna.

Turhan nagylelkűségét a külföldi források is végtelen sokszor emlegetik. Nem győzték kiemelni, hogy mennyit tett a testvérgyilkosság törvényének végleges eltörléséért, és, hogy saját fiával szemben is kiállt nevelt fiai mellett. Emellett egy sokkal kisebb jelentőségű esemény is ránk maradt, amely jelentőségétől függetlenül betekintést enged Turhan személyiségébe. A francia követ számol be arról, hogy Turhan egyszer Edirnébe tartott hatalmas kísérettel, nevelt fiaival és a hárem egy részével. Amikor egy hídhoz értek a követ egyik embere épp ott volt és ijedten látta, hogy Turhan kocsijának ajtaja nyitva van. A férfi ijedten vetette a földre magát, nehogy azzal vádolják, hogy megpróbálta meglesni a Valide szultánát. Lehasalása közben azonban tekintete összeakadt a Valide szultána elfátyolozott arcából kilátszódó szemeivel. Turhan ekkor megállíttatta a kocsit és kiszól a férfinak: "Ne félj fiam" és 160 aspert adott neki.

Utolsó évei

Turhan egészsége 1681-ben fokozatosan romlásnak indult. Követek úgy írnak róla, hogy "állapota nagyon leromlott és nincs remény kezelésre". Nem tudjuk, hogy pontosan mi volt Turhan betegsége. Végül 1683-ban hunyt el Edirnében. Mivel Turhan kikötötte, hogy saját mecsetkompelxumában akarja, hogy eltemessék, testét Isztambulba szállították. Az út során a koporsót jéggel vették körbe éjjel, nappal, hogy óvják a testét. A valide szultána koporsóját szállító karaván mellett a nép lerótta tiszteletét, és halálakor az egész birodalom gyászba borult. Leírások alapján az emberek zokogtak és azt mondogatták, hogy az állam legerősebb pillére távozott az élők sorából. Turhant végül saját komplexumában temették el. Türbéje az egyik legnagyobb és legnívósabb mind közül, jelezve, hogy egy nagyhatalmú valide tiszteletére épült. Később fiát és több leszármazottját is ide temették el. Halálával ő lett a valaha volt leghosszabb ideig uralkodó valide szultána, 34 évnyi valideséggel.

Turhan az egyik legfélreismertebb karaktere a Nők szultánátusának. A legtöbben erőszakos, akaratos és hataloméhes nőt látnak benne, őt hibáztatják Köszem szultána haláláért, pedig Turhan nem ilyen volt. Egy anya volt, aki kénytelen volt fiát egy őrült, veszélyes apa mellett nevelni; egy nő volt, aki sosem kapott szeretetet és megbecsülést gyermekének apjától; egy nagyhatalmú asszony lett, aki mindig segített az elesetteken; az egyetlen a Nők szultánátusában, akivel fia egyenlően osztotta meg hatalmát és aki ettől függetlenül sosem próbálta meg túlragyogni vagy irányítani fiát. Turhan halálával IV. Mehmed uralkodása is megpecsételődött. A szultán uralkodását és elismertségét nagyrészt édesanyja jellemének és jelenlétének köszönhette. Amint Turhan nem volt többé, Mehmed népszerűsége csökkent, egyre több rossz politikai döntést hozott meg. Ennek eredményeképp 1687-ben egy lázadás követően átadta a trónr féltestvérének, aki nagyrészt Turhan kegyéből maradhatott életben.

Felhasznált források: A. D. Alderson - The Structure of the Ottoman Dynasty; L. Peirce - The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire; N. Sakaoğlu - Bu Mülkün Kadın Sultanları; M. Ç. Uluçay - Padişahların Kadınları ve Kızları; C. Finkel - Osman's Dream: The Story of the Ottoman Empire; G. Börekçi - Factions and favourites at the courts of Sultan Ahmed I (r. 1603-17) and his immediate predecessors; S. Faroqhi - The Ottoman Empire and the World; C. Imber - The Ottoman Empire 1300-1650; G. Piterberg - An Ottoman Tragedy, History and Historiography at Play; F. Suraiya - The Cambridge History of Turkey, The Later Ottoman Empire, 1603–1839; Howard - A History of the Ottoman Empire; Öztuna - Devletler ve Hanedanlar; F. Davis - The Palace of Topkapi in Istanbul; Y. Öztuna - Genç Osman ve IV. Murad; G. Junne - The black eunuchs of the Ottoman Empire; R. Dankoff - An Ottoman Mentality: The World of Evliya Çelebi; R. Murphey - ‘The Functioning of the Ottoman Army under Murad IV (1623–1639/1032–1049):Key to Understanding of the Relationship Between Center and Periphery; M. Özgüleş - The women who built the Ottoman Empire: Female Patronage and the Architectural Legacy of Gülnüş Sultan

#turhan hatice sultan #turhan hatice #turhan #ibarhim #ibrahim I #kösem #Mahpeyker #mahpeyker kösem #burnaz atike #atike sultan #Mehmed IV #emetullah #emetullah rabia #emetullah rabia gülnüş #emetullah rabia gulnus #saliha dilaşub #Hatice Muazzez #telli hümaşah

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josefavomjaaga · 3 years ago

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I still owe @northernmariette a post about the Tyrolean uprising of 1809. Let me state at the very first that, being a Bavarian and mostly studying sources close to the Wittelsbach family, I'm the last person who should comment on this. So, if there's any Austrian, preferably Tyrolean, here who would like to jump in, please feel free to do so. This is one of those events where legend has overpowered history; the figure of Andreas Hofer in particular during the last two centuries has been (re)interpreted and (ab)used by pretty much every political side, and he has been judged everything from a heroic martyr to an Alpine version of the Taliban. (No, that latter term did not come from Bavaria!)

I may in the past have talked »a little« already about this incident:

The marriage between Eugène de Beauharnais and Auguste von Bayern. Yes, I'm pretty sure that topic did already come up before. We can take it from there, because one of the things that Napoleon dangled in front of Max Joseph's nose in order to make him agree to this marriage was - Tyrol. He kept his word. After the war of 1805, Austria had to cede Tyrol to Bavaria.

And with that, Max Joseph had bit off a lot more than he could chew. Tyrol, a mountainous region including many Alpine passes connecting Bavaria and Northern Italy, was, except for its capital Innsbruck, a very rural, highly conservative and fanatically catholic region (that catholicism included plenty of regional and local customs and superstitions), plus they had, under Austrian rule, enjoyed certain special laws and law exemptions that I understand emperor Joseph II already had desperately tried - and failed - to get rid of. Now, after Bavaria took over, Tyrol as a region was dissolved into a couple of counties, to be governed like the rest of Bavaria, and there were no more extras for Tyroleans. In particular, this concerned conscription. Tyroleans under Austrian rule had been exempt from serving in the regular Austrian army, but were supposed to form militias and defend their mountains on their own. That, too, ended under Bavarian rule.

Tyrol also was among the first regions to seriously feel the effect of economic decline caused by French hegemony and Napoleon's policies. Situated in the mountains, a huge portion of its wealth came through trade routes, that after 1806 gradually declined: The usual trading partner, the vast Habsburg empire, was shut off for the Tyroleans, and much smaller Bavaria simply could not provide the same options. Plus, a large part of international trade simply disappeared after Napoleon decreed the continental system.

(In the Bavarians's defense, they did see the problem but were unable (and in some points simply unwilling) to solve it. When Max Joseph in December 1807 took his whole family to Italy in order to meet Napoleon there, he did not only want to see his first grand-child and take the queen shopping and sightseeing in Venice (but that, too!) but also to negotiate a trade deal with Napoleon's kingdom of Italy (conveniently governed by Max's son-in-law, so basically a family business). However, at this point Napoleon had already lost interest in all trade that did not directly benefit France.)

And then there were in Tyrol all the additional holidays and pilgrimages for obscure local saints and lots of local customs regarding religious ceremonies, all the tiny monasteries and hermitages and wandering monks peope considered a regular part of true catholicism, all of which was gone with the stroke of a pen. Montgelas, Bavaria's de facto prime minister, had grown up in the era of enlightenment and did not take kindly to all kind of religious superstition. Needless to say, the bavarian officials in Tyrol and their revolutionary French friends were seen by locals as harbingers of the Antichrist, after the first three years of Bavarian rule already.

Austria's renewed interest in war in late 1808 was mostly caused by anxiety. After having seen how Napoleon had deposed of the Spanish Bourbons, the whole of Europe panicked, counted Napoleon's siblings and marshals and wondered how many countries were still needed for them and who would be dethroned next. It was archduke Johann (= Jean = John), very interested in liberal thinking, who came up with the idea to start a people's revolt in Tyrol, where people were extremely pissed at their new superiors already. The idea caused lots of controversy at the Austrian court. Calling the people to rise up against their legitimate ruler ... one just does not do that among monarchs. I guess it was considered a serious breach of etiquette. However, times were desperate. Johann was allowed to secretely conspire with some Tyroleans who had come to Vienna, among them famous Andreas Hofer.

Hofer was a well-respected trader and owner of an inn in the Alpes, also a devout catholic, and other than that apparently a friendly, honest and simple guy. Even his enemies agreed that he personally had done nothing dishonourable throughout the uprising, in a war that often saw similar brutalities as the guerilla war in Spain.

The Tyrolean uprising started at the same time as archduke Karl/Charles leading the Austrian main army into Bavaria and his brother Johann taking a second army into Italy in April 1809 (that latter army was the one that defeated Eugène's forces at Sacile), effectively hampering French/Bavarian communications. Austrian troops also marched in. The small Bavarian force at Innsbruck had to capitulate. Austrians and Tyroleans occupied the region and managed to kick out all remaining Bavarian troops and even to successfully raid parts of the region north of the Alps.

As for the course of that war, I'll just refer to the Wikipedia page. Basically, it was a back and forth, back and forth. When the Bavarians proved unable (and in some cases, like that of crown prince Ludwig, unwilling) to quench the revolt, Napoleon sent in French commanders, in particular marshal Lefebvre, in order to restore order. Lefebvre retook Innsbruck, the Tyrolean rebels retreated onto the mountains and into the valleys, and as soon as things seemed to have calmed down and parts of the troops had left, they returned and renewed the fight. There were no less than three battles at Bergisel (mountain at Innsbruck), all won by the rebels who time after time succeeded in reconquering town and country from the French, Bavarian and Rhinebund troops subsequently called in. After defeating Lefebvre himself in mid-August 1809, Andreas Hofer ruled for several months as a sort of unofficial governor in Innsbruck (and was soon enough out of his wits with that task but that’s a different story).

Meanwhile, in Austria, the battle of Wagram (July 6) had led to the armistice of Znaim. History books usually just state that the battle of Wagram decided the War of the Fifth Coalition but that’s not quite true. It took another three months until peace was negotiated, and emperor Franz opposed the negotiations for quite some time. During that time the Tyroleans were encouraged to continue their resistance; Hofer even received a golden necklace and a handwritten letter from his emperor, thanking him for his service and loyalty und promising that emperor Franz would never ever give up Tyrol to those godless Bavarian and French enemies!

It was for that reason that, when in mid-October the Peace of Schönbrunn once more gave Tyrol to the godless Bavarian and French enemies, nobody in Tyrol wanted to believe it. And so they didn’t. »Fake news!« Eugène, in charge of the southern half of the Tyrolean mess since November, had a proclamation published that promised amnesty to all those who laid down their weapons and threatened dire consequences to all who didn’t. Useless. The Tyroleans had their own newspaper in Innsbruck after all, and that paper had stated long ago that Napoleon had lost the war, been killed in a battle, fled to Paris on foot, caught the plague and whatever dark fate the writers could come up with. Eugène, as to him, had drowned in the Danube, if I remember correctly. (Those newspapers are a fun read!) Anyway, that guy surely was in no position to publish any proclamations right now, the Tyroleans knew that much!

The French and Bavarian troops now moved into Tyrol in force, while the Tyroleans, oblivious to the fact that the war was long over, stubbornly continued to fight.

It actually needed an aide-de-camp of Eugène’s, on his way north to deliver letters to king Max Joseph and crown prince Ludwig, to be taken prisoner by some rebels, to finally change that. A priest who a) could read and b) spoke French (both rare among the rebel forces) understood the importance of these letters that all spoke of the peace as a fact, and managed to convince Hofer of their authenticity. Hofer, at this point truely worn-out by the useless fight and the responsibility that had been burdened on him and probably doing some heavy drinking, sent this priest and one of his officers to Eugène in order to conduct an armistice. (That was the occasion when Eugène’s entourage had so much fun listening to the priest’s tales of the latest Bergisel battle.)

However, while these negotiations were going on, some of the other rebel leaders managed to convince Hofer to go back on his word and to continue the fight, mostly using religion as an argument. So there was a fourth battle at Bergisel, but by now, most rebels had indeed convinced themselves that further resistance was useless, and those who still showed up were easily beaten. The Tyrolean uprising was mostly over. Hofer himself was not even at the last battle, by then he must have been a broken man.

He fled, mid-winter, up into a small mountain cabin, where he hid until January, when somebody told French authorities of his whereabouts. He was captured, brought to Mantua, and shot on explicit orders by Napoleon in February.

Tyrol, by the way, was then divided, the (more lucrative) southern half added to the kingdom of Italy, while the northern half was returned to Bavaria (it returned to Austria after Napoleon’s fall, and I don’t think the Bavarians, as much as they had wanted the region before, at this point still held many regrets 😜).

#napoleon #tyrolean uprising #war of 1809 #andreas hofer

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mistressemmedi · 3 years ago

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well, i’m trying to spread true information about nikita‘s situation. yes, i tried to talk about it with some other blog here but the chances i’ll get an answer are really low, so i’ll try here. i hope you will pay attention and try to look at this a bit differently.

i‘m russian. i know how do military and educational systems work here. another fact is i love my country with all my heart (it is not a crime, yeah?)) and wish it all the best. so i want to explain all of it in more detail than in all of these posts.

well, what we have. nikita is a 4th grade student at MSU (moscow state university, global process department) and also attends classes of military department (I will explain, what it is exactly, below)

let’s start with the fact that something is really wrong with this situation. like there’s more behind than it seems. like mazepin sr. wants to make some changes in country’s legislation. i’ll try to explain.

as it was said, it is not so hard to avoid mandatory military service in russia. for example some can hide themselves until they will be 27 yo OR illegal buy a document (военный билет, i don’t know how it would be in english but it’s very important, remember this) proving that a young man served in the army for 12 mandatory months. it’s really expensive for a middle class, but it’s nothing for billionaires. i bet mazepin sr. has necessary acquaintances. so if he wanted his son just to continue racing, he would have give him such an opportunity without telling anyone and speaking out. the most important and really WEIRD thing is the fact that he made a presentation about it at the international forum (a major international forum is taking place in saint-petersburg now, SPIEF, you can google it). like.... he wants to attract attention. but what for? the question is on the table, remember it.

the next thing - nikita was not drafted into the army actually. students can’t be drafted into the army like as mere male russians 18-27 yo during their studying period (or if they have health problems or a family to support but nikita of course hasn’t any of these). nikita is on his 4th year of studying.

but ALSO there’s a LEGAL option to get a военный билет while you’re studying at university. it’s called military department. like any other, history or mathematics, but military. during classes you make physical exercises, learn some military theoretical disciplines and finish the university with a speciality diploma and with a ВОЕННЫЙ БИЛЕТ so you have a military education and a military OFFICER rank. but this military department has such a thing like СБОРЫ (mandatory military practical training). it’s month or two of serving in real conditions of army. young men live in soldier's barracks, learn practical disciplines (how to handle weapons etc.). and nikita has problems with IT, with СБОРЫ and military department at the university. he can’t attend сборы for 1-2 month because he has RACES to RACE every two weeks. and he can’t miss сборы too because otherwise he won’t finish the university without it. he needs some kind of reprieve from сборы (because he can’t ask the whole f1 wait for him). but it is not allowed by russian education law even for a professional athlete, there’re no such an option to get a reprieve.

and there we remember our question: what for did dmitry mazepin speak out about this problem? because nikita is not only one. it is REALLY hard for young russian athletes to combine professional sports and studying at university and they have to choose. russian olympic team for example, or russian football players - they all have to make a decision if they want to get an education or do professional sports.

SO it seems like mazepin sr. want to change education legislation a bit. in his presentation he said that high education and professional sport should „play together“ and professional athletes that are studying should have an ability to do it simultaneously, get some kind of reprieve if they really need it because of regular competitions. i see it like that.

and also a bonus! there’re three probable options how will this situation come to an end except his serving for a year (as i said it’s impossible and unnecessary, some kind of misunderstanding from not-russian part of tumblr) and the situation when it all will be forgotten and won’t come to a logical end (it would mean that dmitry just bought nikita out)

1. the most likely option is nikita will be an exception and get a personal legal reprieve from MSU.

2. another probable option he won’t finish his military education and will have to serve for 12 month as a simple soldier as every mere male mortal in russia (i remind: military department gives a military officer rank).

3. and there’s another one. russian education legislation will be changed and i think it would be really GREAT for professional athletes studying at universities right now, like a real WIN against unjust system. these changes could really help young russian athletes to live.

i hope that it will be the third option because it’s seems like the next step for russian sport and education and a slap in the face of extremely powerful military system. sport and science are more important than a war. but we’ll see. hope i gave you a different point of view. mazepin‘s family is not saint and of course dmitry is doing all of this predominantly for his son but if he get success, it will be great for all russian young athletes.

thank you for coming to my ted talk about bright future of my motherland))

Ngl this was a long read and but interesting.

As much as I don't like Mazepin, it appears that the conscription law really does not favor athletes who are working consistently hard to get good results in their sport.

What are the chances that the government retaliates towards Mazepin's family for speaking out against them, and doubles down on forcing Nikita to serve the 12 month term? 👀

#anon #q&a #nikita mazepin

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five-rivers · 5 years ago

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Adoption

Based on a prompt by @fabnamessuggestedbytumbler for the Phic Phight! An excuse for Lost Time fluff? Don't mind if I do...

The Ghost Zone had a legal system. A court system. A prison system. A police system. A set of established rules. There were even lawyers.

In theory.

In reality the courts (Observants) refused to look at anything that wasn't world ending. Every group had their own, private prison. The police made up their own rules and, even then, broke them regularly. The actual rules had gone several hundred years without an update and referred to places, organizations, and customs that no longer existed. The lawyers were all clinically depressed. That's what happens when there's no active, unifying head of state for hundreds of years.

Still. Every so often a sufficiently foolish ghost, possessed of a brave purpose, would attempt to navigate the ruins of the legal system. Few made it out alive.

(True, being ghosts, they didn't necessarily go into it alive, but it's the thought that counts.)

But those who did make it out (metaphorically) alive, did so with prizes... well, not great enough, but something enough to convince others to make the attempt. Hence Clockwork's current location and headache.

"Sign the paper, Walker," snapped Clockwork.

"That would be against the rules," said Walker, leaning back in his stupid chair. Clockwork's nonexistent spine hurt just from looking at it.

Maybe he should give himself a spine, just so he'd have a reason to feel this way.

"How," he began, "would it be against the rules? This form needs to be signed by a law enforcement official that has seen or witnessed conclusive evidence the child in question being abused by their natural parents. That is you."

"Yes, but the law enforcement officer must first get a warrant approved by an appropriate court in order to collect such evidence," countered Walker.

"Not if the official came across the evidence or act of abuse while pursuing a different case or simply following standard operating procedure. You saw them shoot at him. His mother put a gun to his head. Have mercy, Walker. I know you don't like him, but he is a child who needs guidance. Not a criminal."

"He's a criminal in my books," said Walker.

"What he did was hardly a crime."

"Jailbreak is a crime!"

"Not if one is unjustly imprisoned," said Clockwork. "He was attempting to remove the foreign object." No matter that possessing material-plane items wasn't an actual crime.

"He let others escape!"

"And what were they imprisoned for?"

Walker grumbled. "Some of them are dangerous, and even he knew that," said Walker, nodding at the file spread over his desk.

"Consider it a cry for help. While you were watching him," stalking him, Clockwork did not say, "on the material plane, did he really strike you as criminally inclined? Or perhaps he was simply confused and scared? One thousand years is a very long time in human terms. The targets of his Obsession would have died. Even if he did commit a misdemeanor, he would have rightly been granted clemency, or at least had his sentence deferred."

Walker frowned.

"That's not what this is about, is it? You covering up a mistake?"

"No," said Walker.

Clockwork blinked, quickly running through potential futures. "No one will care that you crossed the veil without authorization. No one who can do anything about it, in any case."

"There'll be an investigation if I sign that there piece of paper. What's the big deal, anyway? Like you said, humans don't live that long. Just wait fifty years."

"They almost ended him," said Clockwork. "He's a child. Do you really want that on your conscience? With the knowledge that you could have stopped it?"

Sighing, Walker picked up his pen.

Danny went to school. Mainly, he went because he didn't know what else to do. He needed the routine, even if the routine was a lie and he felt like trash.

"You could have stayed," whispered Sam, as his hand inched towards the bandages on his chest for the fifth time that morning. "They wouldn't have noticed you."

Danny shook his head. His hand shook more. He put it back in his lap. "It wouldn't have been right. Besides, I need a passing grade in this class, right?" He couldn't get another F, or his parents would kill him, except- except- except-

They had already tried to kill him.

Everything had gone so much worse than he had ever imagined- No. That wasn't quite right. It had gone- It had...

At least he hadn't been cut open.

(Much.)

"Mr. Fenton?"

Danny jumped, banging his knees painfully on the underside of his desk. He looked up, wildly, tensing himself to flee, only the fact that he was currently human keeping his powers from activating.

(Well, that and... what had been done to him.)

When had Mr. Lancer gotten there?

"What?" he asked, breathlessly.

"Are- Are you alright, Mr. Fenton?"

"I'm fine," Danny said. He wasn't. His ghost half was urging him to go find a nice, dark, quiet, safe corner to hide in, preferably one in the Ghost Zone, his heart was hammering out of his chest, he'd spent the night not-sleeping in one of the guestrooms in Sam's house, and that was before even touching on his injuries.

He forced a smile. Mr. Lancer was one of the few teachers who hadn't given up on him, which was alternately touching and frustrating.

"You look sick," said Mr. Lancer. "Are you sure you don't want to call home?"

Danny's heart stuttered, his core painfully cold. "I'm sure," he said.

"Today is a project day," said Mr. Lancer. "You wouldn't be missing anything in this class, and I can talk to your other teachers."

"No, I'm fine."

The legal clerk for the family court was the kind of ghost who seemed to have fused with her role. The sleeves and collar of her shirt melded seamlessly with her skin. Her nails were brass pen nibs. The lenses of her glasses were part of her face.

She lived in either the basement or the attic of this particular building, depending on how one oriented themselves, among barely-organized stacks of books and papers. There were parchment scrolls and stone tablets, too, the later often re-purposed as elements of the room's furniture. Green-marbled filing cabinets grew out of the walls, and electronic somethings glittered out of the shadows.

The clerk had been reviewing Clockwork's paperwork for literal days. Rather, she would have been, if Clockwork hadn't surreptitiously dropped a time medallion around her neck and stopped time.

She hummed, thoughtfully. "In this document, you are using the pronoun tsai to refer to the adoptee. Are you certain you don't mean tusui? Or perhaps chahe?"

"Absolutely," said Clockwork. The intimation that he wasn't fluent in nchabhatsi was insulting. On the other hand, the requirement for that particular piece of paperwork to be in the language was also, in his opinion, rather ridiculous. Many ghosts, especially the recently dead, did not know nchabhatsi.

"The adoptee is liminal?"

"Yes," said Clockwork.

"Hmm." She stood up and flew from her desk to an inverted bookshelf anchored to the ceiling. From a box she took a huge sheaf of papers, and blew an amount of dust from them that was unhealthy even to a ghost. "It has been a while since we used these," she said, giving Clockwork a faded-ivory smile. "You'll need to fill these out and have them notarized by the proper officials before you can proceed. Liminal spirits are so rare, after all! They require special care. Oh!" Her hands fluttered. "And I'll have to get in contact with our liminality expert. That may take some time."

"If you can give me their name," said Clockwork, "I will take care of it." He gingerly took the stack of slightly-decayed paper. Had it really been so long since a partly-human child had been adopted? Probably.

"Oh, you're such a dear," said the clerk, not noticing the sudden absence of the medallion around her neck. "But that paperwork won't do itself, and-"

"It's done," said Clockwork. Fulfilling some of the new requirements had been more challenging than others and avoiding a paradox had taken considerable self-control, but what good were his temporal abilities if he couldn't use them for personal gain now and again? None at all.

"Ah," said the clerk.

Familiar, and very loud, voices spilled from the hallway near the office. Danny, one hand on his locker, trying to remember his combination, froze like a deer in headlights. His heartbeat picked up, his core buzzed frantically. He couldn't move. Grey crept in along the edges of his vision.

"... not him. It was never him! He's dead-"

"Mrs. Fenton, Mr. Fenton, I'm not sure what you're getting at, here, but your son has been at school all day, and we-"

"A ghost killed him and took his place! It's been playing a sick game with us this whole time!"

"Danny would never have gotten grades like this. We should have noticed the lower intellect right away, if nothing else."

"That's-" spluttered Mr. Lancer. "You- Daniel's work is exemplary, what little of it he turns in. I'm going to have to ask you to go back to the office-"

"No! Not until that piece of ectoplasmic scum is wiped from the face of the Earth!"

"Danny," said Tucker, much closer. "Are you okay? What's wrong?"

Right. Ghostly super hearing. Tucker and Sam, staring at him with concern, couldn't know.

"They're here," he managed, the words like sandpaper in his throat.

Sam uttered a word that would have sent her mother into a screeching fit. "We need to get you out of here," she said putting a hand on his back and pushing him down the hall.

"I'll run interference," said Tucker. "Make sure they can't follow you in the GAV."

"Good thinking," said Sam.

"Call me when you're safe," said Tucker, peeling off, presumably to hack the GAV.

"Danny, breathe," ordered Sam, as she propelled him through the double doors at the back of the school. "We're going to get you through this."

Clockwork had resorted to trapping the legal complex in a massive temporal bubble. Not the neatest solution, true, and it seemed to encourage the various functionaries, regulators, and bureaucrats to take even more time to process even the simplest request, but at least it would keep Daniel's suffering in the meantime to a minimum.

However, that didn't change the fact that he had been bouncing back and forth between the various floors of the building like a ping-pong ball, never getting closer to the solitary family court judge, for well over a subjective year. He was exhausted, frustrated, and he missed Daniel.

"You will be able to provide steady, stable access to the adoptee's preferred haunt?" asked his present interviewer.

"Yes," said Clockwork, dully. The room was ringed with runes that prevented deception of any kind.

"You will be able to provide shelter adequate for both his ghostly and human form?"

"Yes," said Clockwork. He had answered these questions so many times before.

"You have taken the mandated class on liminality?"

"Yes," said Clockwork. He was beginning to understand why other ghosts just gave up and sought extralegal solutions.

"You are aware of a liminal spirit's developmental and emotional needs?"

"Yes," said Clockwork. This was just so boring.

"And are you able to satisfy those needs?"

"Yes," said Clockwork. If only it would end.

The interviewer nodded. "Then we're done here," he said.

"Ye- What? Does that mean I can see the judge?" asked Clockwork, hopefully.

"No. That means that your adoption motion can move on to the next stage," said the interviewer. "Our liminality expert will examine your arrangements and determine whether or not they are sufficient, and we will contact law enforcement to follow up on your claim that the adoptee is being abused."

Clockwork bit back a groan. At least he was making progress.

They cut through the empty field behind the school, angling back toward the surrounding neighborhood. The grass came up to their chests, except where there were holes, mounds, and gouges from ghost fights. When there was one in the school, Danny tried to bring it out here, so people wouldn't get hurt.

He wasn't often successful.

Sam led the way. Danny felt- He felt ashamed. If his powers were working, he would be able to fly them away, or at least turn them invisible. This would all be so much easier. He could have taken care of himself, and Sam and Tucker wouldn't get in trouble, because they would definitely get in trouble for this. But he couldn't.

He couldn't even convince his parents that he was himself. He had to screw that up, too.

Before, he had thought, worse case scenario would be that they'd try to 'fix' him, to remove his ghost half, or maybe they'd think he was overshadowed. At least, he'd convinced himself of that, convinced himself that dissection would be off the table if he ever told them, that they would still love him. Maybe they might still want to do tests, but they'd love him. They wouldn't want to hurt him.

But he had been so, so wrong. They didn't believe him. They thought he had killed himself, replaced himself.

They had tried to cut him open.

(They succeeded.)

His core shuddered at the memory.

At least, though, there hadn't been any ghost attacks today. He wouldn't have been able to fight anything stronger than the Box Ghost. Heck, he might have lost to the Box Ghost. Like this, he would have to leave the ghosts to his parents, Valerie, or the GIW, none of which were particularly good options for the hunters, the ghosts, or the innocent bystanders of Amity Park.

His core pulsed uncomfortably at the thought of any of them getting hurt, including his parents.

He flinched. His core had been very jumpy, very active ever since... it... happened. Usually it only did this while he was in ghost form, and was otherwise almost dormant.

"Are you okay?" asked Sam. "Is it hurting?" She was the one who had bandaged him up last night.

"We can't stop now," said Danny.

Sam flattened her lips. "That isn't an answer. As soon as we get somewhere quiet, I'm checking you out, okay?"

"Yeah," said Danny.

When they reached the short fence, Sam gave him a boost to get over and they made their way into the suburb. There was a small library branch down the road a ways. It had a small family bathroom that Sam and Tucker had patched Danny up in before. It would be a good place to regroup before trying to put as much distance between them and Danny's parents as possible.

"We could take the city bus, I think," said Sam. "There's a stop outside the library. Maybe we could go to Elmerton?"

"Maybe," said Danny.

"Any ETA on Jazz since last night?"

Danny shook his head. "She couldn't get a flight. She's taking a Greyhound. Won't be here 'til-"

There was a beep. Danny stopped breathing. That could have been anything, a phone, a watch, a car, something from a building, but something about it tickled at Danny's brain as wrong.

"There is a ghost twenty feet in front of you."

The whine of a charging ectogun-

Sam slammed into his side, and they both fell. Danny felt the cut on his chest begin to bleed again, and he curled around it protectively. It hurt so much more than it should, and Danny wondered if that was because ghosts were ultimately shaped by their minds and his was in so much pain right now.

His parents had just shot at him. From behind. Not ghost him, Phantom him, either. Human him.

They hated him. All of him. Not just half of him.

His ghost sense went off. Because things could always get worse for Danny and the universe apparently hated him.

He struggled into a sitting position and blinked, confused. There were people surrounding him, protecting him, standing between him and his parents. Sam was shouting. Danny couldn't make out what she was saying, what anyone was saying, not with his heart pounding in his ears.

"Kid," said one man, shaking his shoulder. "Are you okay?"

Danny considered that. "No," he said, finally.

The man pulled a phone from his pocket and began saying something about calling the hospital. Normally, Danny would be worried about that, but he was looking for the ghosts. It was possible one of the more benevolent spirits that haunted Amity Park had happened across the scene, but, somehow, Danny doubted it.

His ghost sense went off again. He whimpered.

His people were in danger.

Ghosts usually came for him (he was leading them here, an evil ghost, causing all this trouble, murderer), or at least attacked him first, to get rid of him as a threat. He staggered to his feet. He had to get away. Still clutching his chest, he turned and bolted.

Almost at once, he was surrounded by ghosts in police gear. Walker's goons. Definitely stronger than the Box Ghost. Still, he was going to at least try to fight. He put his fists up. Maybe some of them would be dumb enough not to phase out of the way of his stupid human punches.

Then Walker himself descended from the sky.

"Daniel," he said, stiffly.

"Walker," returned Danny. A small part of him was grateful that Walker hadn't called him Phantom and spilled his secret. It was strange, but no ghost had ever seemed particularly inclined to do that, despite how easy it would have been.

"We have a court order to take you into custody," said Walker. "Someone wants to ask you a few questions."

Danny decided today's mood was 'pointless bravado and defiance.' "And why would I want to come with- whoa."

As Danny talked, Walker had taken a piece of paper with strange symbols written on it in green ink out from the inside pocket of his jacket. The symbols made his head spin... Or maybe that was just his injuries catching up with him. His left leg was trembling, and he wasn't sure how much longer it would hold out.

He shook his head, trying to clear it, and focused on Walker. "I have no idea what that says."

Walker sighed. "Just come quietly, son. Make it easier on yourself."

Danny swallowed his discomfort at being called 'son.' "You won't hurt anyone else?" he asked.

"I'm just here for you."

There really wasn't much of a choice. Whether he went quietly or got himself beaten up even more, Walker would win and carry him off. Anyone could see that. Besides, ghost prison might be a better alternative than getting dissected by his parents.

He raised his hands in front of him, wrists together. "Go ahead, then," said Danny, flatly.

Walker nodded, and the goons converged on him. The cuffs they put around his wrists glowed green, but they had weight in a way most purely ghostly things didn't. Danny doubted that he'd be able to phase his way out of them, human or ghost. Then they picked him up and the whole swarm started to fly away.

"Yes, this is my lair," said Clockwork. "I can, however, duplicate and be both here and at the secondary residence I acquired expressly for the purpose of ensuring continuity of Daniel's human life."

The 'liminality expert' grunted. "He's still been here, though, hasn't he?"

"Yes," said Clockwork. "He has."

"And he might be here again in the future."

"Yes. I do plan to have him here, for short periods of time."

"And later, when he sheds his human life?"

"Perhaps."

"Then I need to know, are these up to OSHA standards? Your entire lair needs to be up to OSHA standards."

"They're time viewers and tools for unraveling paradoxes. OSHA, even the OSHA of the far future, does not regulate these items," said Clockwork. "Why, in the name of time, do you even need to know? Surely, OSHA didn't even exist the last time a liminal child was adopted."

"Well," said the expert, slightly sheepish. "No. But regulations state that all residences must be safe for children by both human and ghost standards."

"Then OSHA is not what you should be using," said Clockwork. "OSHA is the set of rules for occupational health and safety."

"Ah," said the expert. "Then we can move right along to the next check mark, shall we?"

"Hi," said a cheerful voice.

Danny looked up from his contemplation of the examination room table and glared balefully at the ghost who had just entered the door. They didn't seem to be affected. But then, why would they be? Danny was handcuffed to the table and clearly not a threat.

"I'm the interviewer," said the featureless ghost. "Do you know why you're here?"

"No," said Danny.

"Well," said the interviewer, "I work for the eighth authorized family court of the Infinite Realms, we're actually the only one right now, but there used to be more, and a little while ago, an adoption request was filed on your behalf."

Danny blinked and made a face. "You mean, someone stole my identity in ghost court?"

"No, no," said the interviewer, waving one amorphous hand. "Not at all. I mean to say, I ghost filed a request to legally adopt you."

"Who?" asked Danny. "Not Vlad?" Vlad was the only ghost he could think of who had demonstrated any interest in adopting him.

"No, that's not the name listed here."

"Plasmius?" asked Danny, still cringing internally.

"No."

"Then who?"

"Clockwork."

"What, seriously?" Danny liked Clockwork, and he liked to think that Clockwork liked him back, that they were friends, but the older ghost always seemed somewhat aloof.

"Yes, he was very serious. Now. I have a number of questions I need to ask you." They took out a small, glowing crystal, and set it on the table. "Do you know what this is?"

"No?" said Danny.

"It's a record crystal," said the ghost. "But one of its other functions is that it can sense deception, and record when in an interview it is being used. Go ahead, say something you know is false."

"I... like toast?"

The crystal's glow dimmed slightly before returning to its previous level.

"There, see? Very useful, don't you think?"

"I guess," said Danny. He didn't know how to feel about this. Any of this. What would ghost adoption even mean? He trusted Clockwork, but this felt like too much, too fast. He hadn't even properly processed what had happened with his parents a few hours ago.

"Right. So. We'll start with an easy one, then. Is your name Daniel Janus James Fenton-Phantom, also known as Danny Phantom, or simply Danny or Phantom?"

"Yes," said Danny, eyeing the crystal warily.

"And what would you prefer to go by, for the purposes of this interview?"

"Phantom," said Danny.

"Alright then, Phantom," said the interviewer, "could you please tell me where you primarily reside?"

"Fentonworks," said Danny, "in Amity Park." So far, he hadn't really had a reason to lie. All of this was common knowledge for both his human and ghostly acquaintances.

"And what would you consider to be your haunt?"

"My what?"

"Your haunt. The territory that you have metaphysically claimed."

"I- I don't really understand."

"Is there an area that you feel compelled to defend against hostile persons? An area in which non-hostile ghosts defer to you?"

"I- Yeah. I guess. Amity Park. And some of the bits around it, too."

"The entire city?"

"I guess? I don't know," said Danny. "Is that weird?"

"It would be unusual," said the interviewer.

Danny really wished the interviewer had an expression he could read. Or even just something approximating a face.

"Now, do you feel safe in your home? In 'Fentonworks?'"

The correct answer to that question would be no, but he wasn't sure he should answer. What if this was some kind of elaborate trick?

"We can come back to that," said the interviewer. "Are there any other places where you do feel safe?"

"I mean, sure?" said Danny. He fidgeted.

"Would you please share some of those places?"

"School, I guess?" Except that he got beaten up there all the time and his parents had hunted him down there and he had to escape and... Yeah.

The crystal dimmed. Danny grimaced.

"Ah," said the interviewer. "Anywhere else?"

"My friends houses," said Danny. "And the Far Frozen." To his relief, this time, the crystal stayed bright.

"Have you ever been to Clockwork's lair?"

"Yeah," said Danny. He slouched in the chair as much as possible. He wasn't sure he should be answering these questions, but he was. Maybe he should stop.

"Do you feel safe there?"

"Not at first, but now I do."

"I see. Why not at first?"

"Clockwork and I didn't meet on great terms and we sort of got into a fight." Maybe that would get the interviewer to stop. They'd decide Clockwork couldn't adopt him and leave. Did Danny want that? He wasn't sure.

"That's more common than one might expect. But you feel safe with him now?"

"Yes."

"Alright, moving on. How old are you?"

"Sixteen."

There was a long, drawn out silence that managed to be skeptical despite the interviewer's lack of a face.

"I know I'm small," said Danny, insulted, "but I am sixteen."

"Excuse my indelicacy, but... how old were you when you died?"

Danny flushed. "Fourteen," he bit out.

"Then you're fourteen."

"It was two years ago. I'm sixteen."

"Fourteen is your natural age," said the ghost. "A ghost's natural age is the age they died at."

"Yeah, but I'm still half human. I'm still aging. So I'm sixteen."

The interviewer shook their head. "As a liminal spirit, your apparant age range is likely larger than a normal child's would be, but your natural age, your true age, is still fourteen. Based on records of liminals, the highest extent of your age range is most likely to be either twenty-one or twenty-eight. That's part of the reason we investigate official adoption request so thoroughly. The relationship may very well last for thousands of years, if not forever."

"Wait, are you saying I could live forever?" asked Danny, incredulous. This was not how he wanted to find out he was immortal. Heck, he didn't want to be immortal.

"I'll admit, my understanding of liminality isn't perfect, but I believe that is the case. Why? Is that problematic?"

"The results of the law enforcement investigation have come back," said the bureaucrat to whom Clockwork was currently assigned. "As well as an inquiry as to the opinion of the mortal law enforcement arm."

"And?" asked Clockwork. "Their findings?"

The bureaucrat, who had up until that point not displayed evidence that xe possessed any emotions whatsoever, made a face of extreme disgust. "When the officers found the child, the human parents were openly shooting at him. Other humans intervened for long enough for law enforcement to pick him up. Of course, they then felt the need to arrest him and carry him away in handcuffs... I have no idea why I keep at this job, really I don't."

Clockwork's core shifted in worry. His first impulse was to leap up and go comfort Daniel, but he suppressed it. If he left now, he would lose his place in line and have to start over.

"The public nature of the event means that the human police are now investigating the child's circumstances and may recommend that the child be removed from his human parents' custody. If you have a human identity and you are able to gain custody of him there, it will aid your case here."

"I am aware," said Clockwork.

"Well, then," xe said. "I believe this is all in order. Here is your ticket to see the judge. Just show it to the door. You know where it is?"

"I do," said Clockwork, rising.

He had walked by the door several times in his dealings with the various clerks and notaries. The room behind it lay directly in the heart of the family court building, all the other rooms and residents armor for this one.

The door itself was made of dark wood full of eye-shaped knots. As Clockwork approached the door, the eyes opened, watching him. He held up the ticket and the doors swung inward.

Inside was a courtroom, complete with benches, tables, a witness stand, a courtroom recorder, a judge's box, and a judge.

The judge was a one-eyed ghost in pale purple robes. She examined Clockwork.

"We had not foreseen this," she said. "Not until you filed the first motion."

"You were never able to see me clearly," said Clockwork, hoping this would not turn into a power play between himself and the Observants. "Did you receive the relevant paper work, your honor?"

"Yes," she said. "Take a seat, Lord Clockwork."

Clockwork flew to the front of the courtroom and settled himself in the applicant's chair.

The judge leaned forward. "Why are you doing this?" she asked.

"Because I love Daniel, and I believe he deserves more care and protection than he is currently receiving from his biological parents."

The judge waved a clawed hand. "Yes, yes. But you didn't have to go through all of this and get to me in order to do that. You could have just taken him. That's what most people do, nowadays. Ever since the King was sealed and our systems of governance began to decay."

"I believe it is the only way Daniel will truly be safe," said Clockwork, meeting her one eye calmly.

"You want to prevent us from 'interfering.'"

"That would be nice, yes," agreed Clockwork.

"You want this to be binding," accused the judge.

"You say that like it is a bad thing," said Clockwork. "But what else could induce him to fully remove himself from that situation? You see how they treat him. Have you looked at the medical report, yet?"

"I have," said the judge, looking at her desk. "Very well. All the paperwork is in order. I am approving you for a one-month trial period. At the end of the trial period, the status of the child will be assessed. If his state is found to be acceptable, the adoption will be approved and bound. If it is not, this court will take custody of him until such a time as an appropriate guardian can be found." She scribbled something on a piece of paper and then hit it with a stamp. "The probationary bond should be active. You may go."

"Thank you, your honor."

After the end of the interview, which had become much more distressing than Danny wanted to admit, one of Walker's goons showed up and took him away, to another room.

This room was different than any of the other rooms he had seen in Walker's prison. For one, the walls were a soft, pastel green with purple accents, not the harsh, neon pink of elsewhere in the facility. The chairs looked soft, and were arranged almost randomly, clustered in little groups, or around tables. There were colored pencils and crayons on and occasionally floating over the tables. A large basket sat in one corner, overflowing with toys of various sizes.

Alright. Danny was confused.

He let the goon- the... officer?- guide him into one of the chairs and put a stuffed rabbit on his lap.

"I- I don't understand," said Danny. "What's going on?"

"Didn't that interviewer guy tell you?"

"He said I was being adopted," said Danny, who still hadn't wrapped his head around that particular tidbit of information. "But I thought- I was under arrest?" He raised his cuffed hands. "You arrested me?"

"Those're just so you don't run away," said the ghost. He ruffled Danny's hair. "You're not under arrest. We're just waiting for the court to decide what to do with you."

"And what if they don't do anything with me?"

"Then it's up to the boss."

"Oh," said Danny, not liking the sound of that at all.

"But, if it helps, I think that the court probably will decide to do something with you."

It didn't really help, no.

"Do you want a lollipop?"

"Sure," said Danny. It wasn't like this day could get much weirder.

The ghost handed him a lime dumdum. Yeah. That was about what he expected there, honestly.

The sensation of a thick, weighted blanket being draped over his mind hit him with such intensity that he looked around, trying to see if someone had just wrapped him up in a blanket without him noticing. Tension bled out of his muscles, and his core finally stopped the angry/depressed/frightened/pained dance it was doing in his chest.

He felt... protected. Which was wrong, because he was in Walker's prison, and Walker would use any excuse he had to keep Danny imprisoned for a thousand years. Danny was not safe here. Not by any stretch of the imagination.

And yet, that feeling remained.

He brushed his fingers over the bandages over his chest. What was wrong with him? His parents hadn't even cut all the way through, but he was so messed up. He didn't understand.

This feeling... This 'safety'... It felt like a cruel joke more than anything else, only it was one he couldn't escape from because it was coming from inside him and he was calm but he was also crying.

"Oh, heck, do you not like lime? I think I have some green apples-?"

The door to the room opened, and Danny looked up. Before he could register who had come in, he was swept up into a hug.

He blinked into silky purple cloth. "Clockwork?" he croaked.

"I'm here," said Clockwork. "It's fine. You're safe now, Daniel."

Danny pushed away. Clockwork let him. "You're adopting me?" asked Danny.

"Yes," said Clockwork. "Unless you don't want me to."

"Why?" asked Danny. "I don't understand. I didn't think you liked me that much."

"I like you very much," reassured Clockwork. "I want you to be my family."

Danny sniffed. "Okay," he said. It wasn't as if he really had anywhere else to go. "Okay. But what about," he made an awkward gesture with his cuffed hands, "Amity Park?" The idea of leaving hurt, even worse than the cut on his chest.

"You won't have to leave," said Clockwork, soothingly. "You can still have your life there."

"I'll have to go back?" asked Danny, in alarm. Back to Fentonworks, where even the walls had it out for him with how much anti-ghost weaponry they had packed into them? He couldn't. Not after what his parents had done.

(A small part of him knew that wasn't what Clockwork had said, and that he was being irrational. That part of him was ignored.)

"No, no," said Clockwork. "I have a new place, just for you. If you'll let me show you?"

Very hesitantly, Danny nodded.

"Alright, good," said Clockwork. He turned to the police ghost. "Do you have the key for these? We really must be going."

"Yeah," said the ghost, producing the item. "The boss says that he expects you to teach the kid how to respect the law."

"Appropriately," said Clockwork, neutrally, unlocking the cuffs.

Danny felt an urge to hug Clockwork. So he did. Clockwork hugged him back, and rocked him back and forth, gently.

"Are you ready to go?" asked Clockwork.

"Yeah," said Danny.

With a gesture of his staff, Clockwork opened a portal.

Clockwork wanted custody of Danny. He wanted full custody of Danny. Legally. In both worlds.

This posed a bit of a challenge, as he did not legally exist on one of those two worlds. Thus, Clockwork had to establish a legal presence in the human world.

On the surface of it, this did not seem too difficult. Between his temporal powers, his minor shapeshifting abilities, and overshadowing, simply creating an identity was easy. The hard part was creating an identity that Daniel would not have encountered before, in order to avoid a paradox, while making it plausible that Daniel had encountered the identity before, for the purposes of dealing with mortal law.

In one timeline, the hill to the west of town stood empty of habitation, owned by the county but rendered unusable due to a dangerous failed mine on the site. In this timeline, however, the mine had never been built, and the property was instead owned by a reclusive hermit who went by the name of Charles Worth. The property had passed through many hands in the years before Mr. Worth had purchased it in his youth, and a stately, if somewhat faded, mansion sat at the hill's crest, overlooking Amity Park.

Charles Worth went to Amity Park only rarely, and for good reason. He was an albino, with red eyes, white hair, and even whiter skin, and superstitious people often thought the worst of him. In recent days, he had even been mistaken for a ghost.

'Mistaken.'

He rubbed Daniel's shoulders, and the child startled, pulling away from him again. Daniel had missed Clockwork's, admittedly minor, transformation, and now blinked up at his newly pale face, confused.

"Do you like my disguise?" asked Clockwork.

Daniel's eyes flicked up and down Clockwork, assessing, processing. He gave a tiny nod, and reattached himself. "Where are we?" he asked.

"Hickory Hill," said Clockwork.

Danny frowned, mouthing the words. "Isn't that owned by... Charles Worth. Charles- Oh. I get it."

Clockwork gave Danny a little squeeze. "Would you like to see inside?"

"Okay," said Danny.

The house, Danny had to acknowledge, as they approached the front door, looked haunted. As if some pale, frail, spirit might look out one of the lace-draped windows on the upper floor at any moment. As if there was a Gothic mystery just waiting to unfold. A murder mystery, maybe, full of forbid love and jealous lovers. Or the tale of a sickly heir to a great fortune.

Or that of an ancient ghost and his adopted half-living son.

Even before they stepped inside, Danny's ghost half had decided it loved the building.

The door, as Clockwork opened it, creaked in a loving sort of way, the tone low enough to be comforting instead of annoying. The entrance hall's floorboards did not creak under the weight of the ghosts, but Danny could tell that if a human tried to cross them, they would. He hoped the rest of the floors were like that.

He padded forward, daringly leaving the protection of Clockwork's cloak, examining all the dark nooks and crannies, the odd architectural choices arising from generations of additions, smiling at cold spots. Clockwork shut the door. Even then, there was a draft, curling around his ankles, cool and refreshing.

Danny smiled. It was small and strained, but it was a smile. "It's perfect," he said.

"Don't you want to see your room before you say that?" teased Clockwork.

"Yes," said Danny.

Clockwork led Danny to a staircase with an elaborately carved banister and began to climb. Danny followed eagerly. He had never thought his core would be so happy simply to have somewhere safe to exist.

It almost was enough to let him forget what his parents had done to him. He stopped, hand on his chest.

"Daniel?" said Clockwork. "Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine," said Danny, automatically.

Clockwork frowned, the expression both familiar and foreign on Clockwork's falsely-human face. "Why don't we take a look at that, once we get to your room, alright?"

Danny nodded, swallowing back his irrational fear.

They went up, and Clockwork opened the door to a large room, much larger than the one he had back at Fentonworks. The bed was similarly large and equipped with curtains and enough blankets and pillows to turn it into a nest at a moment's notice. The walls and ceiling were painted a deep blue, with tiny green-white dots picking out a star map. The room also contained a number of carefully curated hiding places, areas where the dressers wardrobe or desk created blind spots and deep shadows. The floor was carpeted, but still icy.

It was an excellent room for a ghost (or half-ghost) like Danny.

He was too nervous to enjoy it.

Clockwork pulled a chair to the side of the bed and sat down. It was a little strange to see Clockwork actually sitting and not floating or coiling. Actually-

"Can you have legs in ghost form?" asked Danny.

"I can," said Clockwork. "But typically I don't bother." He patted the bed. "Let's take a look at you."

Danny hesitated, holding his hands clasped in front of his chest. Clockwork's face went soft.

"I just want to make sure you are healing. I know this is difficult, but neither you nor I want things to get worse."

"I'm fine," said Danny. "I heal fast. It was just- It should be gone now. I've gotten worse."

"Is it?" asked Clockwork.

Danny could still feel it. "I don't know," said Danny.

Clockwork patted the bed again. Danny sat down and started fumbling with the hem of his shirt.

"Would you like help?" asked Clockwork.

"No," said Danny. He pulled his sweater off. Taking off his t-shirt was harder. Then there were just Sam's bandages. He bit his lip a the red and brown blotches staining them.

"Would you like to talk about it?" asked Clockwork, taking one end of the bandage and starting to unwind it.

"I don't know," said Danny. "I just- It's so stupid. I shouldn't have- They saw me walk through a door and- They don't even know I'm Phantom. They just-" Danny hiccuped. "They tried to cut me open. They pretended."

Clockwork pulled free the last layer of bandages. The long, shallow cut was still there, straight along his breast bone until the end, where it curved sharply right and tapered off. That was when Danny had jerked free of the restraints and ran.

"Why isn't it healing?" asked Danny.

"It isn't just a physical wound, Daniel. Ghosts are spiritual creatures."

"Oh," said Danny. It made a sick kind of sense. "So my core is really hurt? I thought I was just... That it was in my head."

Clockwork raised a hand to touch the bottom of the cut. "Your parents are important to you, and to your Obsession, your existence as a ghost. Of course their rejection would affect you." The cut began to knit itself together underneath Clockwork's fingers. Danny's core thrummed strangely at the touch. "I can heal your physical injuries."

"But not the mental ones, huh?" said Danny.

"You need time for that," said Clockwork, reaching the top of the cut.

"Good thing I have you, then."

"It is," said Clockwork. He leaned forward and kissed Danny on top of his head.

Danny ran his fingers up and down the newly healed cut. "So my powers aren't going to work until, what, I get over this?"

"That is one possibility," said Clockwork. "But everyone heals differently."

"Can't you tell?" asked Danny, reaching for his shirt.

"The more involved I am in an event, the more difficult it becomes for me to see its future," said Clockwork. "The timeline branches and splinters as I look at it. Also, it may surprise you, but you are fairly difficult to predict on your own."

"Oh," said Danny. He pulled his shirt on, ignoring how it caught on the dried blood on his skin. "So, what now? Should I just, I don't know, hide out here? I mean," he shifted, uncomfortably, "It's fine if I can't let anyone know I'm here, I get that, but I'd like to, um..."

"Live your life?"

Danny flinched. "As much as I can, yeah." He licked his lips. "Sam and Tucker didn't get in trouble, did they? They're fine?" He'd been so wrapped up in how miserable he was, he'd barely spared his friends a second thought, and now that guilt from that rained down on his head.

"They're fine. Due to the circumstances, they haven't gotten in any trouble at all, so stop that."

"What?"

"Feeling guilty. I know for a fact that the safety of others was your first consideration." Clockwork patted his shoulder. "As for your continued presence here on the mortal plane," Clockwork smiled, "would it surprise you to learn that I am in fact registered as a foster parent? I have even had a few children here, although not many stay for long."

"Really?" said Danny. "But... Wait, um. What about- What about Mom and Dad?"

"They were seen shooting at you in public after insisting that you were a ghost. They've been arrested."

Danny swallowed. "Are they going to be alright?"

Clockwork sighed and shifted so that he was sitting on the bed next to Danny. He put an arm around Danny's shoulders. "They'll be fine," he said. "But we should come up with a story about how you wound up here, hm? For the social workers."

During Daniel's periodic visits to Clockwork's lair, Clockwork had noted how tactile he was, how much he enjoyed hugs and other physical expressions of affection. After Daniel got past his initial hesitation concerning his new situation, that particular personality trait multiplied.

Clockwork suspected the Fentons were ultimately to blame. Their hostility towards Daniel's ghostly identity and their tendency to carry objects that could hurt Daniel precluded him from seeking comfort from them, and his friends and sister, while very remarkable, were children themselves. Their relationship with Daniel was different.

This meant that Daniel could and would spend long periods of time laying against Clockwork. Usually, he would be doing homework during those moments or talking to Clockwork about various ghostly things that he had never had a chance to learn about before.

Today, however, he was just sitting there, quietly, almost dozing.

"I'm not keeping you from doing things?" asked Daniel, abruptly. "Am I?"

"No," said Clockwork.

"You don't have to do time stuff?"

"I can make duplicates and also time travel. I can be wherever I need to be. But if you want space-"

"No," said Daniel. "This is good." He snuggled closer and startled as a ring of light flashed around his waist. He was, for the first time since before his parents had attacked him, a ghost. Clockwork, in turn, shed his human guise.

Daniel was blinking down at his gloved hands.

"What?" he asked.

"I think you finally relaxed," said Clockwork, ruffling Daniel's hair. The smaller ghost leaned into the touch, purring. "Your transformations might be a bit unpredictable for the next few days."

"Good thing it's a weekend, then, huh?"

Danny jittered nervously as he and Clockwork passed through the large, eye-covered doors. This time last week, strange ghosts had been in and out of Clockwork's house, asking questions, poking things, and staring. Clockwork said they were checking to see if everything was in order, if the adoption could become official.

Danny didn't really see why it being official mattered. The Ghost Zone didn't really have a government to speak of. Families that Danny had seen just sort of decided that they were families, and that was that. It seemed important to Clockwork, though, and Clockwork claimed that there were certain benefits, like strengthening connections... Danny didn't get it. Wouldn't their connections be strengthened anyway?

Clockwork guided Danny with small nudges, directing him to a seat in front of the judge, who stared down at them with her one enormous eye.

"I have decided to approve the adoption request regarding Daniel Janus James Fenton-Phantom," she said.

Danny felt Clockwork relax incrementally beside him. He smiled. The judge's pronouncement felt a little anticlimactic to him, but, well, whatever.

But the judge wasn't done speaking. "The child's familial bond with his biological parents will be severed. The familial bond will be established with his current guardian, known as Clockwork. On all levels legal, physical, metaphysical, metaphorical, emotional, mental, and spiritual, Clockwork will be the sole parent of Daniel Janus James Fenton-Phantom. Due to the child's status as a liminal spirit, the memories and associations stored in his human brain will not be altered, and he may still experience feelings, especially those of nostalgia, towards his former parents, however, this is expected to fade with time. Questions?"

Danny had rather a lot, actually. Clockwork hadn't quite explained it like this. "Wait, are you saying I'll forget my parents?"

"No," said the judge, in a rather condescending tone.

"You won't forget them," said Clockwork. "But your core won't recognize them as your parents anymore. It's so you'll be able to defend yourself." His tone was almost pleading. "Your relationship with your sister will, of course, be unaffected."

"Okay," said Danny. They clearly didn't see him as their son anymore, so... It wouldn't really change anything. He didn't like the idea of ghosts he didn't know messing around with his core, but he trusted Clockwork. Even if he was apparently really bad at explaining ghost adoption. "What about the other stuff? The physical, metaphysical part?"

"The severed bonds in your core are replaced with ones to your new parent. Similarly, new bonds will be established in your parent's core," explained the judge. "Are you satisfied?"

Clockwork gave Danny an encouraging smile.

"I- Yes. I'm satisfied," said Danny.

"Very well." The judge waved forward a seven armed bailiff who had been waiting in the corner of the room.

The bailiff carried two tall glasses and a large, covered pitcher. He set one glass each in front of Clockwork and Danny and poured a thick, white, faintly glowing liquid into each of them.

"What is it?" asked Danny.

"It is a potion designed to stop our cores from fighting the changes that are about to happen," said Clockwork.

Danny looked at the potion dubiously. "Like an anesthetic?"

"Like an anesthetic," agreed Clockwork. He had already picked up his cup. "Together?"

"Okay," said Danny, still doubtful.

He picked up the cup and brought it to his lips, watching Clockwork carefully over the rim. Clockwork tipped his cup back, and so did Danny.

The potion reminded him a lot of eggnog, except that it was thicker, heavier, sweeter, like it had been mixed with honey. Almost at once, that heaviness settled into Danny's bones, weighing him down, a sensation just to the left of sleep settled over him. He lowered the cup from his face, his grip on it going gentle. The bailiff caught it as it tipped over.

Clockwork reached over and gently, slowly, pulled him close. Then he went as limp as Danny.

Inside, Danny's core became open. Not open, as in vulnerable, but as in receptive. Listening. He felt soft. Malleable. Like someone could press their thumb into him, and it would leave an impression when he hardened again. It wasn't an unpleasant sensation.

The judge sighed with something like disapproval. "So mote it be." She raised a stamp up off her desk, brought it down, and things changed.

Or, at least, Danny did.

Clockwork, being the elder ghost, recovered faster from the potion than Daniel. There was no reason to stay at the court, so, after bidding a goodbye to the judge, he picked Daniel up and left, flying a polite distance before opening a portal back to their home outside Amity Park.

He settled Daniel down in his bed, phasing him beneath his covers and tucking him in. Daniel would need to sleep off the potion, as well as take time to adjust to the changes to his psyche, however minor they might be.

"I love you so much," said Clockwork, brushing Daniel's hair out of his face. Getting here had taken subjective years of work and planning but it was worth it, because now Daniel was his child, in every way that mattered.

Forever.

Yes, that ending line was a little bit ominous, but they're ghosts. They wouldn't be happy if it wasn't ominous!

#danny phantom #phic phight #phic phight 2020

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goldeneyedgirl · 4 years ago

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mcu xover: jar of hearts 3/?

Oh yes, my MCU x Twilight crossover is still happening.

And this chapter may even reference the MCU directly. SHOCKING.

Seriously, I’m so sorry this took so long. I’ve been writing a lot, across a lot of different fics and this one slid to the back of the queue. Also, I wrote myself into a corner and needed to get out again.

And yes, we’re inching closer to joining up the MCU. These things take time, but it’ll happen.

part two here

roadtrip.

They’re almost in Arizona when Charlie calls to find out where the fuck Seth Clearwater is, because apparently he’s been tangling up his story all over town - he’s told anyone on the Res who asks that he’s staying with Charlie. He’s told Charlie that he’s staying with Colin or Brady.

Alice scowls at Seth through the rearview mirror and begins to weave a tale of being told Seth had permission to join them to go see their cousins - in between lecturing Seth about setting them up for a kidnapping charge across state lines.

By the end of the conversation, Charlie’s trying not to snigger at Alice’s increasingly indignant rant at Seth, at law breaking in general, and at fucking son-of-a-bitch moron drivers, sweet Jesus. Emmett and Seth are howling at Alice’s cussing and even Charlie is a little bit shocked at her language (later, when the boys are picking on her about it, she rolls her eyes, looks over the top of her heart-shaped sunglasses, and reminds them both - quite primly - that she married a goddamned soldier.)

Seth’s favourite part of the whole ordeal is that Alice isn’t even driving.

But Charlie clears Seth accompanying them, so that’s one less problem. Of course, it means his Jeep stinks of human food, and that they have to stop, but they still make good time up to Alaska.

It’s a hard drive to make - closer to the cities and urban, abandoned cars have been moved off the road. But in the rural areas, cars are still scattered, seemingly abandoned or crashed. Most of the bodies have been removed, thankfully. But still, only most. And it’s been weeks - months - since it happened, so those bodies aren’t in good condition.

And not all of them are adults.

They start out burying the people they find (well, Emmett and Alice do - they both insist Seth stay in the damn car), but then only the children.

Then they just stop because they are both tired of handling rotting bodies who never should have died, let alone forgotten on the side of a long, empty stretch of highway. The graves they’ve already dug haven’t got markers or anything. Just a hole on the side of the road.

It doesn’t feel like enough.

The house in Denali feels wrong before they even get out of the car. The house has always had a sense of otherness, thanks to the fact that it’s the permanent residence of immortals. But right now, it feels more forgotten, lesser in a way.

Tanya’s walking out the front door the second the car pulls up, and she looks old. Tired and strained, and she walks straight into the hug Alice offers.

Seth gapes at the house - the enormous glass-and-wood lodge, tucked carefully in the wilderness where it is mostly forgotten. It might be on a map somewhere, might be noted down in some database, but it is mostly overlooked, a sanctuary in the middle of nowhere.

There’s not really much for them to say or do in Alaska, Emmett realises; Carmen and Tanya are more than capable enough to manage on their own.

Except… Carmen looks like a ghost. She looks disorientated and disinterested, and there’s a part of Emmett that is cold and dead that is perversely fascinated with all the different ways there are to fall apart after the loss of a mate. He’s walking around like a hollowed-out old man, Alice is… not quite there, a little unbalanced.

Sometimes he wonders if Rosalie should have stayed, should have taken his place instead. He would have given it to her, without question. Rose only deserved good things, easy things.

But then he wonders. If living through it all really was easy or good. It doesn’t feel like it, most days. It’s a heavy weight in his chest and a constant feeling of leaving something behind (he’s got one of her hair ties around his wrist; it’s dumb but he always had one on him just in case - at school, when they went hunting, everywhere; he’s also got one of her shirts in his bag. It won’t smell right, being crammed in with his stuff, but he brought it anyway).

Rose wouldn’t have been happy in this world. She wouldn’t have known what to do with Alice or Seth. She would have been angry at the disruption to her life. She would have been afraid and lonely and lashed out at everyone.

No, not good and easy at all.

Then he wonders how Jasper would have faired, without Alice, and that is a grim, grizzly train of thought. Thanos would have begged for death, if Alice had been taken and Jasper left behind. He’s only ever seen a glimpse of the monster behind the man over the decades since Jasper and Alice joined the family, and it’s enough to think that perhaps nature intervened and tried to protect everyone from what Jasper would become without Alice.

They stay in Alaska for two days; Tanya and Carmen are ill-at-ease with Seth, even after they explain who he is.

“But,” Tanya had frowned, “why is he with you?”

He didn’t have an answer for that.

Because Seth was… he was Other, like the Cullens. He understood what it was like to be special and expect to be strong enough to survive and to save; to be beyond the reach of petty mortal shit. He was a fucking kid, who’d lost his family, his friends, and most of his community. Fuck, at this rate, he’d lost his childhood too. He was the natural leader of what remained of the pack, and he’d done something fairly smart - looked for adult guidance.

A shame that the only thing he could find in its place was him and Alice. If someone had ranked his family by ‘best choice to care for a teenage boy’ he, Alice, and Jasper would have been dead last. Edward would have ranked higher.

(It still feels weird to think or talk about Alice without adding ‘and Jasper’. Like he’s mispronouncing a word.)

But it is what it is, and Seth’s still clocking more hours doing online school than online games on the laptop Alice gave him, plus there’s a bunch of food in the back of the Jeep, so they aren’t failing too badly.

Seth turns red when Tanya smiles at him, and Alice banishes him to a guest room, loudly forbidding any imprinting for the next decade, and that just means Emmett has to explain imprinting to Carmen and Tanya, and Alice has to read the riot act to Tanya about not flirting with the fourteen-year-old boy upstairs and it almost feels like old times.

They go hunting whilst Seth is asleep, and it’s obvious that nothing is the same. So much of the forest surrounding the house is just… gone. Empty, as if there was never trees looming over them, underbrush to push through. There are less animals to track and hunt, no excuse to be picky.

It was probably the same around Forks, truthfully, except there was that cloud of grief and horror surrounding him and Alice when they hunted - that was where Edward stumbled and fell. That was where Jasper couldn’t run any longer.

That was where he heard Alice scream when Rosie disintegrated.

In the harsh light of day, the situation feels much bleaker, much bigger outside of the insular forests of the Olympic Peninsula.

They don’t see a single bear.

He’s not entirely sure why they’ve come to Alaska, except he sees Carmen and Alice go off together, finds them sitting quietly together talking. On one hand, he wishes that he could sit with them; that he lost Rose just like they lost Jasper and Eleazer, but on the other hand, he doesn’t want to be a part of that particular club. Doesn’t have words left to comfort Carmen. Most of his platitudes have started sounding hollow.

Alice vanishes one morning, and leaves him to help Seth with school work, and he grimly realises they have nearly four more years of this until Seth graduates. But things will be different before then; they’ll be back in Forks and Seth can ask paid professionals to explain algebra to him.

When Alice returns, it’s time to go - she’s been off in the wilderness, trying to See around Seth, and deciding to go off on her own is, apparently, the best way.

“Call us if you need anything,” Tanya says, pulling all three of them into crushing hugs, and if Seth turns red and tries to look down Tanya’s top, Alice pretends not to notice.

“Where are you headed next?” Carmen asks, as Seth climbs in the back, clutching an energy drink they’re all going to regret.

Alice smiles. But it’s the wrong kind of smile; it’s sharp and sinister and looks wrong on her face. A Cheshire Cat smile, a Joker smile, and Emmett wonders if after all these years together, if Jasper’s reactive violence hasn’t bled into his wife a little.

“We’re going to Mexico.”

—

The trip to Mexico can be described as long.

If the Jeep wasn’t Rosalie’s last gift to him, then they probably could have run there faster, even with Seth in tow. But there won’t be anymore perfectly modified cars ever again, so he’s staying with the Jeep.

Alice gives up the passenger seat once they make it through to Alberta, apologetic that Seth’s been crammed in the backseat. But then Alice starts muttering to herself, tapping away on her phone, and seems distracted and irritated when Emmett tries to get her attention.

He can’t make out what she’s saying at all, it’s just an irregular hum, and he wonders if she’s having more of her one-sided conversations with Jasper.

The trip takes a week, winding through landlocked states. It shouldn’t take so long except everything is in chaos; they lose an entire afternoon carefully shifting some abandoned cars off the road to get the Jeep through in the middle of backwoods Montana. They spend hours waiting for gas every time they stop. And Seth might be a mystical shapeshifter, but he needs a proper bed, and hot food, and human moments; they have varying success at finding all three, but they try, and Seth is nothing if not agreeable and grateful for even the smallest attempt at making him comfortable.

They find an abandoned farm in Wyoming and they let Seth transform and run for a few hours at dusk, sitting on the front of the Jeep in silence until it’s dark enough for them to hunt, as well.

It feels like the world has ended, some days, and they are the only ones left - to him, at least. Maybe that’s why Alice is talking to herself - it’s the only sensible answer she’ll get.

Some towns are empty; no one for miles. The information that filters through the internet mentions people heading to the cities, to the larger towns, because the population is too small to keep so many different settlements functioning. There’s no money or survival if you’ve lost your entire farm, if the hospital or the school is unmanned.

And Emmett wonders if he’s been cured of human blood for good now he’s seen so much of it spilt, stale and rotting, on the backroads of the country. It feels like everything smells just a little bit like decomposition right now. He’s not sure if that’s him or if that’s everything.

And they get closer to Mexico.

—

They arrive just as the day turns to night, and he expects… he’s not sure what he expects, honestly. Maybe setting up in the motel they’ve found, that Alice has declared a safe distance from any of Maria’s plotting, and getting Seth some fresh food - he hasn’t complained, but even Emmett’s tired of the pre-packaged, long-life crap.

Instead, Alice slips from the car, clad in jeans and a leather jacket, tucking her phone in her back pocket.

“I’ll be back in a few hours,” she says, like she’s going alone.

“What?” Seth looks suspiciously at the pair of them, and it’s only later that he realises the kid is terrified of being left behind. That he’ll cling to their belt loops with his dying breath. His mom left, his sister left, his friends and pack left, and he took a chance on leaving everything else that was left to stick with them.

That makes Emmett feel guilty for no reason he can name.

“I can’t see with you around me,” Alice says gently. “It’s a simple clean-up job, it won’t take long.”

Seth frowns and looks at Emmett.

“You aren’t doing this alone, Alice. Even if we wait in the car,” he says with finality. This isn’t going to be an argument, because there’s nothing to argue about. He’s not letting Alice roam around in a city full of uncontrolled newborns, no matter how talented she is.

Alice scowls. “I know what I’m doing, Emmett,” her voice is sharp, and she never likes reminding them of how long she was alone before she found Jasper; what the family knows about those years is quite vague and patchwork - as far as Alice is concerned, nothing important happened before she met Jasper, as if she popped into being on a diner stool just in time.

Rose always suspected Alice’s real story was very lonely, very frightening, but no one asks when she so obviously doesn’t want to talk about it. He knows what it costs for her to bring it up now.

“I know. But that doesn’t mean I’m letting my only sister go newborn hunting alone,” Emmett says, and Alice sighs and nods - her visions have gone dark, obviously this is not a battle she can win.

Emmett ends up wishing that he and Seth had stayed behind.

Alice is like a laser, zeroing on her targets with a single-minded intensity. He hears that hum faintly, of her talking to herself and he wants to ask her what she’s saying, what thoughts are so important she needs to say them almost out loud but he doesn’t get a chance.

The first one of Maria’s abandoned acolytes is a girl around seventeen with matted black hair and a dress that Emmett mistakes for some kind of lace at first, except it’s the remnants of dozens of meals dried across the front of her, ripples of dried, stale blood that have solidified into a repulsive black and red mass.

She snarls at them, her face bloody, and the pale form of a man beneath her. Alice just walks up to her and backhands her with a crack that makes Seth jump; Emmett flinches but he’d never admit it.

The newborn snaps at Alice, and in one movement, the girl is pinned to the brick wall behind them, cracks spiralling up her neck from Alice’s tight grip.

“Who the hell are you?” the girl snaps in Spanish and Alice says nothing, just rips her head off by her neck, the screech sounding deafening so close. Moments later, her body is in pieces in a dumpster, along with her victim, and Alice has set the entire thing alight, her face blank.

Emmett makes a decision then, to leave Seth in a brightly lit burger place with a promise he’ll be back in one hour because this is nothing a kid should see.

And he’s so, so glad that he made that choice. Alice’s hunt is something that will be burned into his brain for the rest of his life.

The next newborn is a middle-aged male who reminds Emmett of his English lit teacher back at Forks, right down to the salt and pepper streaks in his hair and the slightly off-centre nose. He’s the worst of the night, Emmett silently decides, as he guards his hunt - a family of five that he’s only half-finished. The father is extremely, viscerally dead and there’s no putting him back together; the mother is choking and struggling for a breath that her torn throat will never give her as she bleeds out; the baby in her arms is long dead with its head taken up by a gaping wound. There are two young girls, clinging to each other in terror, and there is no way this ends well.

The newborn obviously thinks Emmett is more of a threat than petite little Alice, practically frothing at the mouth as Emmett approaches him, and grabs at one of the children. It all happens in seconds - the girls scream, there is a crunch of bone and more screaming, the rich scent of fresh blood, another crunch of bone and muscle, and then the newborn’s head is half-torn away before Alice can get better leverage and finish the job. The dead child dangles from his grip, bent the wrong way; her sister has her head half caved in, and the mother still chokes on her own blood. It all happens so fast.

He should have stayed with Seth.

He lets Alice handle the rest of them - she’s located six of Maria’s surviving nine, and after the family, she takes them down swiftly and wordlessly, just a diminutive blur and the sound of tearing metal.

The sweet smoke clings to them as they make their way back to Seth, Alice’s head down.

“I thought,” she began and just shook her head. And he reached out to squeeze her shoulder.

She thought it would be closure, would feel like an ending or an achievement. That there would be some peace in ending Maria’s life’s work. Instead, she’s just the same, but with blood on her boots and a tear in her jeans. The newborns barely got an opportunity to fight back, to give her the pound of flesh she was looking for.

Seth is waiting for them in the window of the store, a broad grin on his face when he spots them. Back to the motel for the night, now. And then tomorrow…

“So,” he says finally. “What now?”

#twilight fic #alice cullen #emmett cullen #seth clearweater #mcu crossover #my fic: jar of hearts #marvel #mcu fic #why yes we did need a twilight x mcu crossover #it felt necessary

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hitbythunder · 4 years ago

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Among the Gods of Asgard -1

A dark!Thor x Reader, minor Loki x Reader story with all the drama and angst you’re craving. Including Alexander Skarsgard as Balder. --> Read also on AO3

Summary: The gods are being loved and feared in equal parts by their subjects, more the latter by the thousands of slaves working for them. Ten feet tall, powerful and immortal are the rulers of all beings within the Nine Realms. You, the daughter of an Asgardian merchant, fancy the three handsome princes of Odin - like any woman does - and dream of actually meeting them instead of watching them at public events. That is until, as a consequence of Loki's tricks, you are being forced into slavery at the royal court. Amidst this harsh new reality, you catch the attention of the god of Thunder who then seeks to make you his alone. You are nothing but a toy, a puppet, in the god's eyes and he will use you as he pleases.

Do not hope for mercy.

**** WARNING: dark story, manipulative Thor, heavy rape/non-con elements, no happy ending in sight

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Asgard: the golden city at the centre of Yggdrasil, the World-Tree, where the Aesir - the gods - spent their immortal lives in noble estates and palaces. From behind the high walls of the golden palace, the royal family ruled over the city and all the other Nine Realms. Each god and goddess was gifted with special powers and enchanted weapons. Their subjects worshipped them, sacrificing their last penny if need be in the hope of receiving the blessing of the addressed god. Not all gods were inclined to help, however, some ignored the prayers of the common people and a few gods were even considered cruel. The king of Asgard and All-Father of the gods, Odin Borsson, was wise and just but he ruled with an iron hand over the Nine, his word being law to all beings dwelling in his realm. The gods lived in peace among the normal Asgardian citizens and apart from their might, which granted them a superior status, there was one distinct difference between these two classes: the gods were a lot taller than the ordinary people, each of them being at least ten feet tall – the males often taller.

Conclusively, their daily needs, desires and the amount of labor force necessary to satisfy all those were similar to their divine size. As were the pompous mansions and estates, with the royal palace leading the way. Behind its golden towers and walls, numerous chambers and salons housed the many gods and goddesses, the interior fittings matching the royal status of the resident. To afford all this luxury, slavery had become an adequate means and thanks to the many wars, uprisings or revolts within the Nine Realms, there was always ample supply of working hands. No wonder Asgard had become the richest city of all, its wealth being well accumulated over the centuries. Asgard, the city of gods and many wonders. That's exactly where _________ was born as the daughter of an upper-class merchant who traded various luxury goods across the realms. If the gods, or a member of the Asgardian elite, had any special wishes her father would make them come true – in exchange for a pretty penny of course. But money wasn't an issue for those customers.

Due to her father's skills the family had a very good life, absent any worries for money. While ________'s mother tried to teach her brother Einar and her that gold wasn't the only wealth worth striving for, the father succumbed to the former approach. His greed was growing each passing year. Despite being accustomed to the benefits of her father's income, the girl was neither haughty nor spoiled (well, maybe a little). Unfortunately, she didn't realize how the gold harmed her father - how it carved out his soul inch by inch - until it was too late.

xxx

When the celebrations for queen Frigga's name-day neared, prince Balder decided for a special piece of jewelry as a gift for his mother. The stones should be unique, reflecting her beauty and status as queen. But where would the god of light find a fitting piece? Luckily, he had already heard of the Asgardian merchant, Harald Leifson, who managed to obtain even the most exceptional objects for his customers. Thus, Balder summoned the man and stated his wish, stressing the importance of the punctual delivery as well as the quality of the item. The queen deserved only the best and anything less as a gift would bring shame upon the god himself.

Sniffing the sweet scent of a considerate amount of gold, Harald accepted of course and he already had a vague idea where he would get the desired jewelry. Soon later, the merchant returned from his journey across several realms having a splendid necklace with gems out of star-light in his possession. The following day at his shop, when Harald was polishing the necklace before he would deliver it, an unexpected new customer entered. Judging from the rich black silken tunic adorned with little gems and golden beads, the gentleman could only be a member of some rich family, probably pretty high up the society-ladder. “What marvelous piece you have there!” the man with brown short locks assessed as he spied the necklace between the merchant's hands, his emerald green eyes fixated on the glittering stones. “A beauty indeed and worth a good fortune too! 50,000 pieces of gold, hah, that's gonna be the deal of my life!” Harald mused and held the necklace up so that the other man could have a closer look at it.

“I wonder who can afford such a masterpiece... Your client must be truly bathing in gold to afford such like!” the noble man said, those mesmerizing eyes still focused on the jewelry in a fascinated and hungry manner. “Yeah, he better keeps up his end of the bargain. Otherwise he won't get it! God of Light or not, payment is due!” Harald replied in a very arrogant tone and carefully put the necklace into a box carved from ebony, fitting its exquisite content. The brown-haired man's face lit up at the mention of a god involved and with a cunning smile he made Harald an offer he simply couldn't resist. At first the merchant had refused but somehow the velvet-like voice of the eloquent gentleman could persuade him to take this even 'better deal': Harald sold the star-light necklace to the brown-haired man for 55,000 pieces of gold. Since the gentleman had to prepare the trunks of gold at his home estate, the payment would be delivered three days hence – after the queen's name-day celebrations. And as a sign of trust and goodwill, the new customer with emerald eyes gave Harald another necklace of gold and green-blue sapphires which he could sell on to the god of light. Hence, there would be another 50,000 gold pieces waiting for the merchant. A win-win situation.

If Harald hadn't been so blinded by the promised gold, he might have reconsidered this suspicious offer.

xxx

A few hours before the grand feast in the queen's honor, Harald was again summoned by Balder so that they could close off their deal. The merchant handed the ebony box containing the sapphire necklace to the god, eager to receive the awaited gold, but then it all went wrong. When Balder opened the lid he found the box to be empty and enraged he threw it across the salon. The wood shattering into thousand pieces against the wall.

Despite his begging and apologizing, Harald had been taken by the guards and brought down into the dungeons where he would wait for his trial in front of the king.

Later in the great throne room of the palace, the merchant's family watched as the gods presented their gifts to the queen, one item more precious than the other, and everyone wondered why Balder hadn't come up with at least something. Embarrassed and empty-handed, the fair god stood before his mother and had nothing to give except a tender hug and a soft kiss on the cheek. He would make it up to her and the merchant would pay for this insolence. The most stunning present, however, was given to Frigga by her youngest son, prince Loki, who held a marvelous necklace out of white gems that sparkled like star-light in his slender hands. The whole court present applauded in response and Loki, in full awareness of his brother Balder's stern face, proudly put the jewelry around his mother's neck. His trick had worked out just so nicely.

xxx

The very next morning, the king, his son Balder and a small number of counselors gathered once more in the throne room, Harald kneeling humbly at their feet. Never before had the merchant felt this much fear for both his and his family's well-being. Harald knew what the law had in stall for his crime.

Both parties stated their view of the case and the All-Father, being a just king, listened patiently to each. There was no need for him to heed his counselors, however, because the crime was clear and punishment was due. Harald hadn't kept up his part of a legal bargain and as a consequence he had tainted the honor of the God of Light, which was a grave offense against the gods and the royal family. According to Asgardian law, the merchant's reputation and wealth had to be diminished as well. Thus the fitting sentence was a fee of 25,000 pieces of gold for the deed per se. As for the god's offended honor, Haralds' children had to repay Balder for the not received worth of the necklace in hours of slavery. This way the family would be marked by shame for everyone to see, the children serving as a reminder of the deed for the next generations.

Unfortunately, Einar had already signed for the military service for the crown so the burden of the punishment fell solely to his sister _________. 50,000 hours of slavery, which equals 5 and a half years, at the royal court.

#dark!thor #thorxreader #lokixreaer #asgard #fanfic #gods and slaves #size kink #size difference #seidr #drama and angst #balder

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rk1kheadcanons · 4 years ago

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Angst? Near death angst?

Alright anon, time for me to serve up that angst, careful what you wish for! These prompts are super interesting because depending on who has the near-death experience makes for a good story.

It's a public event broadcasted live over the Detroit news station. A meeting between the Android ambassadors and Detroit's official local and state government representatives. The Jericrew is dressed to impress in Neiman Marcus and Armani, with Markus and Connor up front leading the pack. A crowd has gathered at the steps of the city council, thousands of androids from every walk of life next to their human allies, holding up signs spattered with red and blue paint reading "I am alive!" "We are equal!" And "Different blood same love!", among others. Hank, and Connor who stands next to the rest of his family, are handling security details in a joint move between the DCPD and the androids.

Someone makes it through the security checkpoint (The guard turned around, were there two of them?)

The gun goes off (Faster, faster, why wasn't he faster why was he moving so damn slow-)

Chaos erupts. The crowd begins to panic, people screaming and crying as security teams bark out orders (Don't move! Everyone gets down!) before they, and the perpetrator, spill out into the streets in a riotous uproar.

If Connor Gets Shot

Loathe as he would be to admit it, Markus is a mess. The love of his life just took a bullet for him and is currently bleeding out on the steps of the building, Markus is beside himself with fear. Josh and Simon are guiding the people outside to safety with the police, and he's pretty sure North has taken off after the shooter with a security team in tow. But Markus?

Markus is crying. Markus is begging. Markus is praying.

He's choking back tears as he applies pressure to the wound, hands stained blue and whispering pleas to ra9 to don't take him stay with me baby please Connor Connor Connor!?-

His composure is gone, replaced with alternating levels of fear and rage. Fear for Connor’s safety, fear for the love of his life, and rage at whoever did this. Markus doesn't leave Connor's side, screw everyone else this comes first right now. They come first right now. Markus spends hours at Connor's side, worry creasing his brow, murmuring prayers between his lips and pressing kisses into his knuckles. Hank has come and gone, stuck between the need to assert the fact that Connor is alive, and battling back a sea of emotions knowing he almost lost another son. Markus can't blame the man. Fingers tracing patterns over Connor's face, Markus presses a kiss to his sleeping lips.

Then comes the rage.

Markus dresses to kill and makes sure everyone knows it. The halls of Jericho grow quieter with every step he takes, the lines of his suit pressed as neat and sharp as his smile. The chaos of the DCPD screeches to a halt once the Android leader makes his way inside, as calm and devout as they have ever seen the man. The offices are a mess of paperwork and grisly photos, Hank looks ready to combust if the glare he is sending the SWAT leaders mean anything, and Fowler looks like he went three rounds with the rabid menace that is political media and can't tell if he has won or not.

Markus smiles, charming and mean,

"Good afternoon everyone, I'm sorry about the unexpected visit but given the circumstances we at Jericho thought it best to work together with law enforcement in order to find the perpetrator. I trust that all of you would be more than happy to comply yes?"

It's a systematic takedown. Markus may not have all of Connor's investigative abilities but he is thorough. Josh and Simon hold down the fort at Jericho, and provide online assistance. North starts an unofficial patrol and search party with the beat cops, who learn fast to stay out of her way. She's a wildfire on a good day, but with Connor lying in the Android equivalent of a hospital bed, North is an inferno of unbridled rage with no one to take it out on except the next poor sap who pisses her off. Markus works with Hank, and together they beat back the political red tape and ignorant special unit leaders, combing through security videos and run down bars.

They find him.

Hank drags the perpetrator, kicking and screaming, up the steps of the DCPD. Everyone knew not to get in his way.

Inside, Markus is a figure of almost saintly patience. When Hank, prepared to drag the man to his cell, pauses and allows Markus a "moment" with him, the temperature of the room drops. The perpetrator is struggling in Hank's grip, jerking and snarling like a caged animal. Markus smiles, serene and cruel, as he leans down to lock eyes with the man who had dared harm Connor. Carefully, tenderly, Markus cups the man's face and hisses "You will never touch my Connor, or anyone else, ever again."

Someone leaks the iconic moment to the press, and photos of Hank and Markus' with the shooter spread like wildfire. But Markus can't bring himself to care, waking up with his arms clutching Connor to his chest a little to tightly. His lips hush Connor's fears with tender, breathless kisses, and though the skin had been healed and replaced, his mouth lingers in the space where the bullet wound should be. He doesn’t think he’ll ever forget the fear that had gripped him, clutching Connor tightly, hands stained blue, and praying for his love. Suddenly emotional, Markus buries his face in Connor's hair and breaths him in, murmuring "I love you's" into the skin of his neck.

If Markus Gets Shot

The minute he heard the shock of gunfire, Connor's first instinct is to shield those closest to him, coincidentally this is Markus. Unfortunately, the shooter had a better aim than expected. It's a clean shot, in-and-out of Markus arm, lodging itself into a nearby wall. Through instinct and sheer mental focus, Connor tunes out the chaos behind him as the security teams are put on alert and the crowd begins to panic. In a few short moments, he learns that the bullet had avoided most of Markus internal structure, and instead had torn through the upper level of his synthetic flesh. Still painful, still bloody, but comparatively much less than expected. Connor blinks, forcing the built-in protocols back for a moment, and leans in to kiss his bleeding, but blessedly alive lover while his thirium pump whirs in his ears and the fear surges back with a vengeance. A heavy pressure builds behind his eyelids, and for a brief moment Connor feels engulfed in anguish.

“Not to complain sweetheart,” Markus grunts out, because yes, bullet wounds are still bullet wounds, “but I don’t think this is the place.” Connor can see him grimacing in pain, and clutches Markus hand tightly, stroking the skin of his palm.” I’ll be ok,” Markus assures him, because of course he would, “Now, I think you have something else you need to do” But Connor hears the pain in his voice and can’t bring himself to let go. For a moment they just lay there, in the eye of the storm, assuring themselves that they are alive, before Connor releases a breath and let’s the preconstruction algorithms do their work.

“Josh?”

“I’ll get Markus somewhere safe. The blood flow is already slowing, and we have some voluntary repairmen in the crowd who came from Jericho.”

“Simon?”

“I’ll help with crowd control. PD will probably want to question the one’s here in the building at least, and everyone is pretty shook up. I’ll start handing out water bottles and thirium to those who need it.”

“North.”

“I’m gonna muscle my way into that security room with the officers and those security guards. If I find anything useful I’ll let you know.”

“You do not have authority to be in there during an investigation North.”

“Don’t worry about me. I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to let me in on Markus behalf.”

“Great,” Markus broke in, “Game plan. Now can we hurry up cause I did just get shot here.” He reaches over and squeezes Connor’s hand, and though he’s hiding it well, Connor hears the quiver in his voice. Connor presses a kiss to his forehead. “Think you can catch him?”

“I will.” It’s a promise, sealed tightly with love and barely constrained rage. The Hunter is off, chasing down the gunman with Hank on his tail. He had let his preconstruction program run in the few seconds the crew had been planning, and follows the trail of haphazard bystanders out into the street. Connor vaults over the railing, and takes off tearing down the sidewalk. He bears his teeth in a particularly nasty snarl as he catches up with the security teams.

“Dark denim jacket, black beanie, about 5′6 and in a pair of grey sneakers.” One of the officers next to Connor, grunts out as they run, “One of the other units radioed us. Said he’s headed towards the park near the traffic stop.”

Connor nods, and takes off sprinting. A left, and Connor spots him, stumbling his way through across the road, the screech of tires and blaring car horns causing a traffic jam of angry Detroit commuters. Narrowing his eyes Connor races after him, sliding over the roof of a Ford Expedition, and nimbly dodging a beat up red beetle while doing so. Without the loss in speed, Connor comes of fast on the shooters tail. “Stop,” He commands, “Stop! Detroit Police!”

Something like rage builds inside of him. How dare this man, Connor thinks, how dare this man hurt Markus. How dare this man threaten his family. What gives him the right, Connor thinks viciously, to treat them like this? “Stop!,” And this time Connor reaches out, taking the man to the ground.

They fall into a pile of limbs, with the gunman spitting vitriol at him. The rage bubbles inside, barely contained, as the is yanked to his feet, “Stop,” Connor’s voice is shaking now, as he tries to clamp down on the viciousness inside, spitting like a cobra, “You are under arrest. You have the right to-”

“Damn piece of plastic,” The gunman hisses, and when he tries to jerk out of Connor’s grip something inside the android gives away. Officer Davidson, the one who had provided Connor the description, is headed their way with his partner. The others shouldn’t be too far behind then. Connor’s face goes blank, programming coming to the forefront of his mind like a crutch as he hands the man off to officer Davidson. But not before the man turns around, catching a glimpse of Connor’s face as the android stalks forward. The blood drains from his face at the sight of the androids rage.

“You are under arrest,” The venom in Connors’ voice is palpable, “Because now you cannot do this to us. You can’t do what you did to Markus. There will be consequences for your actions,” Connor sucks in a breath, keenly aware of his hands trembling, “And if you ever go near Markus again, I will deal with you personally.”

Davidson, wisely, doesn’t say anything, as Connor storms off. News spreads among Jericho of The Hunter, and the length he went to protect the deviant leader. But Connor doesn’t care, that evening ending with him clutching Markus hand, eyes closed as is seeking forgiveness for guilt that is not his to bear. It ends with him confessing his loss of control. And telling Markus, in his breaking voice, just how much he loves him.

#rk1k #rk1000 #conkus #marnor #connor x markus #ask #Anonymous #poe the 🐇#admin poe #notsureabouthisone #character injury #near death #bad ending?#I'm not happy with this one smh

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