#Victoria Grimes I: Found

[artemis-b-writes]

A/N: Hey yall! First and foremost: If you’ve read this before this no you haven’t. This is my first time posting this Anyways! This is my first long-form story so of course I chose the longest show known to man!

Thank you to my lovely beta reader: @ebodebo (go follow her) for putting up w my constant talk of rewriting (turns out you do need 5 chapters of filler lol) and being my all around soundboard. I’m so excited for the things we have planned! Enough yapping let’s get on with it!

TW: gore, violence, strong language, mature content

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Chapter one- The World Is Ending

August 26th, 2010-

The beeping of hospital monitors haunted my sleep. I’d been spending every night in uncomfortable, plastic, hospital chairs for as many nights as my mom allowed. My father Rick Grimes had been shot in the line of duty 2 weeks ago and had fallen into a coma from the blood loss.

I stayed with him when my mom worked so he wasn’t alone. I’d tell him about school, keep him updated on Carl and read to him, praying he could hear me. A fresh vase of flowers at least made the room bright for when he’d wake up.

But right now I was sleeping, or trying anyway. I could feel a thin hospital blanket on me. Theo, one of the hospital's CNAs, harassed me about taking care of myself and usually I fell asleep fully clothed in their shitty chairs without a blanket.

“Peaches?” The voice behind her made Victoria practically jump out of her seat.

“Jesus Shane….you scared the shit out of me. What are you doing here?” Victoria asked harshly. She never liked Shane, even as a little girl they butted heads. She couldn’t for the life of her imagine why Rick would hang out with him after work.

“Victoria we need to go. Now.” He spoke quickly, making his way to her dads bed and kneeling down beside him. “Rick, if you’re gonna wake up now’s the time man, shits going down and we need to leave.”

“Shane,” Victoria laughed half heartedly “what are you talking about?” Just when she thought he was finally losing it, gunfire started to ring out from outside the door. Shane pulled Nadia down under him as she screamed. Shane covered her mouth and she would’ve bit him in different circumstances.

I mean who the hell would open fire in a hospital?!

Victoria could feel the tears start to well as Shane begged her father to wake up so they could leave, telling him that if we stayed they’d all die. After a few minutes of bargaining Shane picked her up and dragged her out of the room.

“No!” She tried to push against his grip but he was incredibly strong. Victoria kicked and pulled until Shane pushed her into a hallway, begging her to be quiet or else they’d be found. She peaked around the corner, Shane pulled a gurney in front of Rick’s room. There was blood everywhere, screams and gunfire echoed down the hall. Shane grabbed her arm and they ran from the hospital, Victoria broke down when they got to his pickup.

“YOU MOTHERFUCKER!” Victoria hit Shane’s arm as hard as she could over and over and over until she didn’t have it in her anymore. She knew he was hurting too but didn’t care. He left her dad there to die.

“Peaches I had to.”

“Don’t call me peaches Shane. My dad is fucking dead.”

Shane sighed again, the truck roared to life as we peeled out of the parking lot. She stared out the window, thinking of her dad. Would he die? Would they leave a comatose man’s body to sort himself out? What if he woke up and everyone was gone?

Victoria and her father had always been close. She was the stereotypical ‘daddy’s girl’, hell as soon as she was old enough to hold a rifle without falling over she and her dad had gone hunting every season.

He taught her how to cook, she knew all his favorite bands and all the words to every corny song that he absolutely loved. Sometimes when Carl was a baby she and Rick would sneak out and go to the 7/11 down the block just to get candy and rent cheesy movies to watch together….and now they’d never share those moments again.

“We’re here.”

Shane’s voice broke Victoria from her daze, she looked out the window to see her mom and brother already packed up ready to hit the road. “Go’n and pack a bag, I’ll talk to your mama and Carl.”

Carl.

He was only 10…and now he’s going to find out he’ll never see his dad again and the world might be ending?? He’ll never get those moments hunting alone with his dad as the sun breaks the day. Or watch cheesy movies with her and their dad when Victoria would be home from college. She could feel the bile rising once again as she made her way past her family and into her room.

Victoria had a typical 17 year olds room. Honestly, the floor was littered with laundry she needed to do as well as some CDs she’d rummaged through that morning. Her walls were a neon teal, they’d mostly been covered with posters of movies and bands, and paintings she’d created out of boredom. She tried to soak in every inch of her room in case she’d never see it again. As she started to pack she took a Polaroid off her wall.

“Jeez Anthony….you should be at practice right around now. Please be safe.”

She tucked the Polaroid of her and her best friend into the pocket of her backpack and kept packing. Just the essentials: a couple pairs of jeans, some tee shirts, boots, hat, dads hunting jacket, socks…toothbrush? Definitely a toothbrush. A hairbrush and a few notebooks and pens (and some comic books for Carl). She also made the decision to pack her hunting rifle in case they got stuck foraging for food, as well as a heavy knife.

She threw her bag into the back of the truck so that no one would suspect how heavy it was. Her mom and brother were crying into Shane as he had just broken the news. Or however he’d spun the story…but Victoria knew the truth that Shane had abandoned his “best friend”. Shane loaded everyone up into the truck and said they’d be headed to Atlanta and that the military would help them.

“Are we going to die?”

While it was spoken barely above a whisper, the question jolted Victoria out of her daydreamed haze. She looked down at her brother Carl who was laying in her lap.

“No baby. Because I’m going to do everything in my power to keep you safe, and so will mom and Shane.” Victoria tried her best to reassure him, rubbing his back softly. She’d instructed him to lay in her lap so he couldn’t see the panic that the rest of the world was in.

Before they knew it, they’d left King County and were headed to Atlanta. Victoria fiddled with her cross necklace, Carl had fallen asleep leaving the truck uncomfortably quiet.

The Grimes weren’t really a religious family but Victoria did usually attend Wednesday night Youth Group with her best friend Anthony. The necklace was a gift from him.

Anthony. There he was on her mind again, she’d thought about calling him but Lori demanded she save her battery incase of emergency. Anthony Smith had been her best friend since middle school. They did everything together and were practically attached at the hip when they saw each other. He was a year older than her but that never mattered in how close they were.

Anthony was actually quite soft spoken, and smart as a whip. He was a tall kid, probably standing at about 6’3. He was built like an athlete, but he had to be with Track and field. They actually became friends at a track meet in sixth grade and kept up with eachother daily through AOL and Skype. And obviously only hung around each other at said meets. Anthony’s dad was a PE teacher and Coach so he definitely fueled the athletic fire in both kids. Anthony has always been a sweet kid and even when he was an asshole Victoria could never be mad at-

“Victoria! Get your head out of the clouds I’m talking!”

Victoria jolted in her seat, there she was daydreaming again. Lori was giving her daughter quite the concerned look.

“Where are we mom?” Victoria looked out the window to see full bumper to bumper traffic.

“Outside of Atlanta but as you can see we’re stuck in traffic” Shane answered from outside, with quite an annoyed tone Victoria noticed. She ignored Shane and hopped out of the truck so she could stretch her legs.

“Where’s Carl? I think I threw some comic books in my bag, I’m sure he’s bored out of his mind sitting here.” Victoria looked around and spotted Carl a few cars down playing checkers with a girl who looked to be about his age. She had a short blonde bob and a smile as bright as the sun.

Victoria smiled in amusement and made her way to the car with her mom. “Someone has a cru-ush!” She teased in a sing-song voice. She yelped when Carl turned around and smacked her arm as hard as he could.

“Mo-om!!! Carl hit me!”

“Don’t tease your brother then!” She laughed. Victoria rolled her eyes and fluffed her brother's hair before sitting behind him to watch the kids play. Right as she sat down a woman came from the front of the car with waters. She was a smaller woman with buzzed gray hair.

“Oh! You must be Victoria, I’m Carol!” She had a smile just as bright as Sofias, Victoria made a mental note that they must be related. She smiled and thanked her for the water, and as she took a sip Carl enacted his revenge.

“You say I have a crush on a girl I just met when you’ve been after Anthony since forever.” Victoria showered the back of Carls with the water she had just taken a sip of and was prepared to cuss him out when the commotion started. Bombs were dropping into Atlanta.

“WHAT THE FUCK?!” Victoria screamed as she pulled the kids down to the ground underneath Carol’s car. She moved her body over the both of them so they would be shielded if anything came down.

The rest of the night was a blur. Shane grabbed everyone’s bags from the truck, grunting as he lifted Victoria's particularly heavy bag. They ran into the woods with Carol, her husband Ed, and Sophia. There were screams in the distance and somehow Victoria and the kids got separated. She held onto both of them tightly. They ran until they came up on a high spot with a small clearing.

“Stop right there.” The shotgun barrel was aimed right between Victoria's eyes. They widened with fear as she put both her hands in front of her slowly.

“Sir, we’re just trying to get off the road…I have two small kids with me, please.”

The man’s aim faltered at the sight of the kids. Victoria rushed him, taking the gun and pointing it back at him. It probably wasn’t her smartest move but she had Sophia and Carl to look out for. There was a shriek behind her and Victoria whipped around just in time to shoot a man who was trying to get Sophia. Wait…what the hell?

Victoria slowly crept up to the man. He looked pale, his eyes were white and glossy and there was fresh blood around his mouth.

“Good aim kid. I’m sorry I pointed that thing at you. I just had to make sure you weren’t like him. The names Dale, you kids can stay with me and the girls tonight and we’ll look for your crew in the morning.” Dale smiled at her warmly, he was an older man judging by his white hair. But he had kind eyes and it was late so Victoria decided he could he trusted for the night.

She nodded, grabbing the kids as they headed into Dale's RV. There were two blonde girls sitting on the couch. One older one younger, Victoria figured they were probably sisters.

“Dale, who are they?” The older blonde asked, glaring at the three kids.

“Easy Andrea, the older one can take out those things like you wouldn’t believe!” Dale smiled back at Victoria. “They’re just staying for the night and…I didn’t get your name sweetheart?”

“Victoria. Victoria Grimes.”

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[andr0medafallen]

Legitimate

A/N: My baby. My masterpiece. Absolutely the most filthy thing I have ever written. This is a repost, but it must be said that this would not have been written if it weren't for @foxilayde 1. Telling me to watch For Greater Glory (not a great movie, but 10/10 grime boy) and 2. encouraging well...everything deranged that can be found in this fic (no regrets).

Pairing: Victoriano "El Catorce" Ramirez

Warnings: Smut, oral sex, p in v, inexperienced reader, innocence (?) kink, some religious imagery, lots and lots of spit (I won't apologize)

Description: "What is the name of your legitimate wife, if I may ask?" “Señor, every woman is legitimate.”

Word Count: 3.3k

Dinner is a silent affair in your household tonight. You were not there when the Cristero had arrived; You had been out with the chickens, collecting eggs on the small farm which you help your parents take care of. It’s small—both the ranchero town you live in and the barely on the right end of bankrupt farm where you had grown up—the sort of Jalisco affair where everyone and their grandmother have never even seen another county. Small farm, small town, small life.

If small farm town life is good for one thing though, it’s gossip. You have heard whispers of “El Catorce” all day, everywhere you turn. The fourteen. Named such for the fourteen federales who he’d defeated in Christ’s name when he’d been ambushed. It was all anyone would talk about, to the point that you had almost begged for a subject change while buying ribbons at the local depot. And now, here he is, El Catorce, breaking bread at your table.

You know that your parents support the rebellion, but if anyone had been so kind as to tell you that it was your very own parents harboring the fugitive during the market gossip, you would have laughed in their face. Evidently, this incorrect judgement was a misstep, but you could tell that your parents were praying for him to leave soon. There is a lot that your parents will do in God’s name, but apparently making polite conversation is not one of them. 

You consider breaking the silence, but ultimately decide that it is much safer just watching. Watching as Señor Victoriano Ramírez López tears into the bread that you’d baked this morning, each muscle in his forearm visible due to the rolled up sleeves of his dirty linen shirt. He breathes heavily as he chews, sharp jaw clenched and nostrils flaring. Everything about it is so… Animalistic. So feral.

It is clear that your father feels the same way, but you doubt that his own opinion of Catorce is clouded by a stirring of excitement.

“The rumors of your travels precede you, Señor Ramírez.” It is your father who finally breaks the silence. Your mother clutches her pearl rosary below the table as if she doesn’t think that you would possibly notice.

“If you’re hinting at something, it may help to be specific.” Catorce met your father’s gaze, strong and proud. Your mother kept clutching that damned rosary, and you were left as the only sane person at the table wondering what in hell had gotten into the lot of them, God forgive.

“What is the name of your legitimate wife, if I may ask?” Whether or not your father ‘may’ ask the question, he asks it regardless.

Your cheeks burn with heat at the shock of such an uncouth question, but Victoriano seems unphased, leaning forward to tell your father, “Señor, every woman is legitimate.” His new posture leads him closer to you, and you can smell him, his sweat mingling with the grime of the valley. It should disgust you, it would disgust any proper lady, but it only seems to leave you intoxicated and wanting more. It certainly does not help that his eyes flick to you, locking with your own over the flickering candle at the center of the wooden table when he utters the phrase; An admonition of his own sin.

When silence falls back over the table, you are quick to finish your stew and ask to be excused, but even in the comfort of your own room, you cannot stop thinking about him. Victoriano Ramírez López. El Catorce. You should just leave it. The man is a Cristero, a man of God, but even so, you could see it in his eyes. The forbidden desire which you desperately wished you did not share. The right thing to do would be to fall asleep now, and forget about his intrusion into your life beyond anything more than petty market gossip.

But you cannot. You have tried; Both falling asleep and forgetting about him, but neither seem to work very well. When twilight relinquishes its light to the stars of the night and you still find yourself unable to do anything other than twist and turn in bed, you decide that you will see him. After all, you would only be talking to him. Surely it would be better to satiate your curiosity now than to be distracted an entire harvest season by a man who has no right to distract you.

You can’t just go, though. He would think you naive; Eager. So you fold up your blanket, twisted in knots from your turmoil. You’d had no plans for sleep anyways, and you could stop by the closet on your way back for extras if you are truly cold. Maybe he will smell your own scent on it and become just as affected as you were by his. Maybe, when you leave, he will submit to his own iniquity with your scent in his nose and your image in his mind—Your face flushes at the thought. The idea that you would have such an effect on him as he has on you is ludicrous, but you cannot help but find it intoxicating nonetheless.

The walk to the barn is a short one, but it is dark, and the autumn wind chills you to the bone. Autumn may be a festive season, filled with mirth and fertility, but even so near the equator you sometimes wish for the warmth of summer. Of course the opposite is true come July. Still, given the drafty nature of the wooden barn, surely you won’t be spurned for the kindness of an extra blanket.

You don’t bother to knock. There is no need to risk getting caught before you even have the chance to reap your reward. You open the door, not trying particularly hard to hide the creak of the hinges as you enter. Catorce doesn’t announce himself as you climb the steep wooden stairs to the hayloft, but he meets your gaze when you are within sight of where he is sprawled against a bale of hay, cigar in his mouth, sturdy thighs spread, and boots abandoned in the corner of the small loft.

“Señor Ramírez?” You ask, stepping up the remaining steps and kneeling on the floor to avoid the stoop of the low ceiling. You are suddenly aware of your attire, feeling bare in the thin nightdress which you had changed into when your plans for the night had been to actually submit to sleep. “My mother noticed the draft and asked if I would bring you an extra blanket?” You curse yourself for how uncertain you sound, taking a deep breath to calm yourself.

Catorce takes a drawl from his cigar, blowing the smoke out without regard to your proximity. “You know, I used to be a ranchero from around this area. Do you know what allows a ranchero to become a decorated warrior in Mexico’s succeeding rebellion?” When you don’t answer, he continues, gesturing toward you with his cigar. “Ruthlessness, sure. Not many men can say that they’ve killed fourteen in an ambush waged against them, your Padre certainly can’t. But what really elevates your rank and ability is a low tolerance for bullshit.”

You gulp, shifting. If you could, you would bring your knees in towards your chest, but you fear that if you do so you will become much less covered than you are now.

“Now I’m no fool, I know that your parents are no great worshippers of mine, but your own mother told me that she gave me every spare blanket in the house. You aren’t calling your madre a liar, are you?”

You shook your head rapidly. “No, of course not.”

“So what was your plan then, hmm? Give me your only blanket? Are you truly so worried for my comfort that you would go cold tonight?”

You don’t respond. What could you possibly say? He has already caught you in a lie, there is no reason to dig yourself a deeper grave.

“Do you want to know what I think?” When you still remain silent, he prompts, “Say it. Say, ‘General Catorce, please tell me what you think.’”

He waits for you, dark eyes boring into your soul. You know that he holds all the power. If he tells anyone what you have already done tonight, you will be in trouble for ages, cursed to an unending purgatory of confessionals and isolation. So you do what he says. You quietly parrot, “General Catorce, please tell me what you think.”

“I think that you did not come here to make sure that I was warm. I think that you came here to get warm.” He advances on you, snubbing out the cigar which leaves a dark scorch mark on the wooden floor. You can feel his breath on your face when he nears you, your wide eyes looking up at him. You gasp when he pinches your nipple through the thin night dress, the calluses on his fingers providing a delicious and terrible friction; Your nipple was already hard and pebbled, and while you are sure that he is merely emphasizing his point about you needing the blanket more than him, it is all you can do to stifle a moan.

The cristero smirks, eyes fluttering down where your nipple pokes through the thin linen which covers the soft hills of your chest. He is gentler this time as he brushes his fingertips against your breasts, no longer goading, but curious.

“Oh, you liked that, didn’t you?” Catorce mumbles, low voice an intoxicating rasp. You can smell the tobacco on his lips, and wonder what they might taste like against yours.

“It’s a sin,” you insist, although the only person you seem to be trying to persuade was yourself.

“We can say our ‘Hail Mary’s’ after.” Catorce cups your breast in his large palm, and breath leaves your lungs in a weak moan as he squeezes you in just the right way, an unknown feeling washing over you. You should resist. Surely that would be the righteous thing to do—but it isn’t what you want. You want him. So when he presses his lips against yours in an anything-but-chaste kiss, there is nothing to do but to kiss him back, pressing your body against his, which is warm and hard in all the right places.

Catorce’s tongue is in your mouth, his hands roving against your body and pushing up the white fabric of your dress, gripping your thighs. You’re both kneeling—the low ceiling unable to accommodate either of your heights—but he eases you backward, legs swept out from under you until you’re near on your back, trying to remain upright. He does not aid you in your goal, instead shoving you down by the shoulders and breaking away from your mouth to trail down your neck.

“Catorce…” you moan as he sucks bruises into your skin. Asking him to stop doesn’t even enter your mind as an option, your body so desperate for more, more, more.

You whine when he lifts his head from your neck. Your eyes act of their own volition, tracking the trail of spit which still connects your body to Catorce’s lips, now pink from use. This is interrupted, though, when he grabs your chin and forces you to look him in the eyes. “General,” he commands, and you wriggle against him, nodding.

“General,” you echo, arching your back against him, wanting nothing more than to get closer, to feel his warmth against you. Catorce tuts, and leans back further, dark eyes gliding across your body as you pout below him. When he finally touches you again, you’re desperate and needy, like a starved man presented with food for the first time in his God-forsaken life. The general moves to spread your legs, but they remain shut in a self-conscious clouded panic.

Catorce’s palm meets your cheek, not in the slap you had been expecting, but in a cradling motion which you lean into. His voice is stern, though, when he says, “Behave.”

You obey, and he spreads your thighs, gripping at the soft skin and flesh. Catorce’s thick fingers prod at your lips, separating them and moving around the warm slick that has accumulated along your folds. When he leans in and inhales, nose pressed against your core, you think you might die and go to hell right then, and you’re not even mad about it. This ridiculous man is so deliciously sinful and carnally sacred.

Your face is hot as Catorce leans back, looking down at your spread thighs—parts of you which no man before him has ever seen—and you’re half tempted to hide in embarrassment and shock when he spits—spits on you, right at your mound. The act is blasphemous, but your hips involuntarily rut up, craving any touch that this man will give you. Any amount of disgrace which this man gives you is a boon to your unclean soul. Catorce is grinning up at you from between your legs and your hands find their way to his greasy locks, your chest heaving beneath your gown.

He pins you down against the wooden floor by the hips and starts lapping and sucking at your core. It is passionate and unrestrained in a way that you have never known, and though you know you shouldn’t, you can’t help but push against Catorce’s hold, doing everything you can to grind against his face and the delightful scratch of his mustache. You are pulling at his hair, hips pushing at his hands, and he slaps you on the thigh to bring you back in line, only causing you to become louder.

“General…” Your back arches against the floor, wooden slats and alfalfa digging into your shoulders.

Catorce breaks away for just a moment, lips glistening with your juices, to say, “You can scream, chiquita. They won’t hear.”

You do scream. You scream his name, you scream every swear that the boys at the market have taught you. “Señor Ramírez, I—I don’t—” An unfamiliar feeling washes over you, like a knot tightening in your stomach. Catorce loosens one of your hands from his hair, linking your fingers as he persists in his ministrations. He carries you up and through the pleasure; You feel like you’re flying, soaring above the clouds, and you don’t have a single coherent thought in your head as you moan and grind against the general’s face.

When he is satisfied that he has pleased you, Catorce removes his tongue from where it had been attached to your clit and leans up to kiss you, tongue dipping into your mouth. You can taste yourself on his lips, and you try to follow when Catorce leans up, but he breaks away.

“You did well,” he placates, sitting further back on his heels.

“I’m not done.” Catorce’s eyes light with surprise when you say this, but are quick to darken again when you sit forward, ignoring the ache in your body as you lean into him and press the flat of your palm against his cock; You can feel it throb, straining against the confines of his dark pants. “I did not think you were one to quit in the middle of something you’ve started, General.”

He chuckles darkly, eyes watching you with some mix of amusement and lust. “You’ve sure got a lot of audacity for someone with no experience.”

“I’m a quick learner.”

He grabs your chin, forcing your mouth open, tongue sticking out. For the second time this night, he spits on you, this time right on your outstretched tongue. “You’re desperate.”

You thickly swallow Catorce’s spit, holding his gaze. “So are you.”

It does not take long before you are back on the floor, frantically pulling at Catorce’s clothing. When he takes your night dress off, you are completely exposed beneath him. He sucks at your breasts as he pushes a finger into your core. The stretch stings, but he is sucking bruises onto your tits, and it isn’t long before you can’t think of anything other than how good it feels; How much more you want, how you will take any drop he’ll give you.

Catorce slides another finger into your wet heat. You gasp, hugging his face to your chest. Whining, you wrap your legs around the general’s hips, drawing him in towards you and fumbling with the clasp of his trousers.

“Be patient,” he commands, even while aiding you with his free hand, his other still pumping in and out at a leisurely pace. He doesn’t shuck his pants all the way off, merely enough to expose himself. He’s big. The ruddy tip and thick veins make your mouth water, even if you are a bit nervous. 

“Eyes on me, chiquita,” Catorce prompts, and you comply, bringing your gaze to meet his brown eyes. His hand stills at your core, before slowly sliding out.

“Please, please, please, please, please, please, please,” you beg, your mind a broken record. Your eyes are still on the cristero’s face; He makes sure of it, any time you try to look down, he tilts your chin back up. He seems to take pity on you—your body at his command below him and tears leaking out of your eyes—when he slides the tip of his dick inside you. The stretch is nearly unbearable, your fingers gripping the hay that you laid on as you breathed heavily. Catorce pauses, a hand on your cheek, wiping away your tears. “Keep–keep going.”

He pushes further into you at your request, and it isn’t long before you decide that he isn’t going fast enough and place your hands at his hips, pulling him further into you. Catorce grabs your hands, pinning them to the floor above you.

“You will take what I give you, understand?”

“Yes, General,” you agree, before smirking and continuing, “As long as you plan to give me what I want.”

He rolls his eyes at you, the snarky son of a bitch, and snaps his hips until he is fully and completely pressed into you. Evidently deciding that he’s had enough of your smart mouth, he presses his fingers against your tongue, and you suck on them, moaning against the digits with a furrowed brow. You can taste yourself on them, Catorce’s thick fingers that had been inside you only moments prior.

“So naughty, hermosa,” Catorce teases, speeding up his pace as you fall apart beneath him. “Are you going to show me how naughty you are, hmm? Are you going to come on my dick?”

You nod frantically, your lips still wrapped around his fingers, and when he rubs the thumb of his other hand against your bundle of nerves, letting go of the hands he had been holding in place above you, you feel your body begin to spasm and shake for the second time tonight. All thoughts exit your mind as you grab onto Catorce’s broad shoulders, clutching onto them like a lifeline as he fucks you dumb. All you can feel is pleasure, your head spinning as you come down from your high. Catorce doesn’t stop until you’re whining under him from overstimulation; Then he pulls out of you, using both hands to finish himself off, slowly twisting them along the shaft of his dick as you watch, mesmerized. You can see it in his eyes, in the curl of his lip, that he is about to come. Beads of pearlescent liquid spill over your chest and stomach as Catorce jerks himself to your image with a low grunt.

When he’s finished, he tucks himself back into his trousers and lowers himself beside you in a heavy thunk.

You lay there, naked on the hay and covered in his cum, before asking, “So… Will you be staying for mass tomorrow?”

“You are a very dirty girl chiquita.”

[y00h00]

Happy Hippy Mixtape 2023

To commemorate the passing of 2023, I’ve put together my nineteenth annual collection of the songs that made me happiest, that moved me to dance, that made each day a little better than the one before.

Download/Stream

Note that the Spotify version is missing two songs, including this year's bonus track. For the complete streaming experience, try YouTube.

Listen to Happy Hippy 2023 on Spotify (28/30 tracks)

Listen to Happy Hippy 2023 on YouTube (30/30 tracks)

Download the entire Happy Hippy 2023 MP3 mix in ZIP format

Download the Happy Hippy 2023 mix as a single MP3 file

Track List:

Thank You / Daði Freyr

Heat and Hot Water (Passion Pit Remix) / ARMS

Counterpoint / Delphic

This Head I Hold / Electric Guest

Angel Face / Gena Rose Bruce

103 / The Kills

Break and Enter / Hyper and Blue Stahli

Hate or Glory / Gesaffelstein

The Big Bad Wolf / The Heavy

Don't Let The Devil / Killer Mike ft. El-P, Run The Jewels, thankugoodsir

Dead Man Walking (feat. Virus Syndicate) / Milanese

Sing Me To Sleep / KING 810

Number 9 ft. Lil Yachty / Miguel

nihilist blues / Bring Me The Horizon ft. Grimes

Scream / Jake Daniels

Toy (#NotYourToy Remix) / NETTA

Slate / Model/Actriz

Cadillac (A Pimp's Anthem) / Victoria Monét

bullseye / girl_irl

Little Girl Gone / CHINCHILLA

Do It So Good / WARGASM

Pink Whitney / Scene Queen

Cha Cha Cha / Käärijä

Revenge Of The Orchestra (ft. Magugu) / Apashe

Wicked Game / Tenacious D

A House in Nebraska / Ethel Cain

Harbour (Song For Elizabeth) / Beverly Glenn-Copeland

The Magic Place / Julianna Barwick

Everytime We Touch / Electric Callboy

This year's bonus track is funnier on video.

As always, special thanks goes to Fluxblog and CPI for continuing their dedication to the art of the MP3 blog. I found most of these tracks through them.

This year's companion dance music mixtape, Dancey Hippy 2023, is available here: https://www.tumblr.com/y00h00/737189138978242560/dancey-hippy-mixtape-2023?source=share

You can browse all my mixes on Tumblr here: http://y00h00.tumblr.com/tagged/mixtape

The complete Happy/Dancey Hippy mixtape archive going back to 2004 is available for download here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1E2ZbJOv28bw1AYYjuu_FzcpIk8dPVgWj?usp=sharing

[bamby0304]

Victoria Grimes VIII: War

Ch.11: It Happened...

Series Masterlist

Summary: Daryl and Victoria have worked through her mistakes made at the Sanctuary and have decided to keep the truth between themselves. But with the war between their communities and the Saviours brewing, their bond will be tested all over again. Lies, death and the threat of defeat are coming for Vickie… will she be strong enough to come through in one piece?

Warnings: Angst. Slight violence.

A/N: I'm giving two chapters because this one follows the show really closely... and I got a really nice review on AO3 that made me want to post :)

Bamby

RPOV

We buried Carl. In the empty lot beside our home. We buried Carl.

I’d never felt a pain like this before. Never felt this kind of loss. I’d almost lost myself after losing Lori… this felt worse.

Things wouldn’t stop, though. There was no time to grieve. No time to mourn. Not yet. Not when we’d declared war and the Saviours were out there. Carl had to wait… the rest of my family, my people, they could not.

“Hey.” Michonne came to rest a hand on my shoulder as I packed a bag full of as much food as I could. “We got to go.”

Nodding, understanding that our town, our home, was beginning to be overrun by the dead, I grabbed the bag and followed her outside and onto the street. We’d found a van that hadn’t been taken or destroyed, and packed it with as many supplies as we could. Throwing my bag in the back of it, I noticed Michonne staring at something in the distance.

It was a gazebo. A small little outdoor sitting area. One I’d seen Carl by many times before.

It was on fire.

She looked at me with tears in her eyes. “He used to sit on the roof.”

“We have to go,” I reminded her, hating that we really had to choose right now.

There was only slight hesitation before she ducked into the van, pulled out the fire extinguisher, and then ran to the gazebo.

Not wasting any time myself, knowing she was going to need help, I grabbed the other fire extinguisher and hurried after her. This was important to her, and therefore it was important to me. The hell we’d found ourselves did not mean we were going to lose everything. I wasn’t going to lose all of my son.

The fire extinguishers weren’t going to be enough to fight the flames, though. Before long, the fire grew, and walkers began to crowd us.

“Michonne!” I called out, warning her that one was getting far too close. “Michonne.”

Knowing we were fighting a losing battle, the two of us cut down the walkers in our way before making a break for it. Jumping into the van, we drove off, out the gates of Alexandria.

Our home. I’d wanted to start this fight with the Saviours to save what we’d had. I knew we were going to lose people and things on the way. I never imagined we’d lose as much as we had.

Carl had, though. He’d told me on the road after I shot in the air to scar Siddiq away at the gas station. He’d known things were only going to get worse.

“What do you think he meant?” I looked over at Michonne briefly before turning back to the road as I drove down it. Now that I was thinking about Carl I couldn’t stop. “Did he want us to stop fighting the Saviours? Just surrender to Negan?’

“We could pull over,” she suggested. “We could read what he wrote.”

I started shaking my head in response before she’d even finished. “No. Not yet. Not me.”

There was a pause as she looked at the letter in her lap before she froze. “Rick. He- Carl- he wrote a letter to Negan.”

My grip on the steering wheel tightened. I wasn’t sure what he might’ve written to Negan. I wasn’t sure if he was going to try and tell him the same thing he’d said to me. Maybe he wanted the Saviours to stop, too? No matter what he’d written, I wasn’t ready to read that, either.

“I need to talk to Jadis.”

“What?”

I nodded, seeing a new path form in my mind that could help us and our people. “They have weapons… people. We can't just give that up.”

“Why now?”

“They went with me to the Sanctuary. The Saviours saw us there. They're gonna be a target, too. We still need them. They're ours, not theirs.”

NPOV

“Hilltop is covered,” I assured Arat over the walkie.

I’d tasked her and a few others to find Rick’s people. There was no way I was letting them sneak away like they thought they had. We’d find them, and then there’d be hell to pay.

“The roads and then some. They are out there somewhere, so let's get balls deep in every nook and cranny they might hole up in.” The door opened as Simon stepped in. I lifted a hand to tell him to come in and stay quiet while I finished up on the walkie. “Nooks, crannies, and holes, people. All that shit outside the box.” Tossing the walkie onto the table, I turned to Simon as he paced at the other end. “Appears our friends at Alexandria had themselves an escape plan. Rick's little one-eyed pride and joy played me.” I scoffed, shaking my head, impressed. “Damn. That kid… that kid is built for this shit.”

He was something else. Both Grimes kids were. The way they fit in the world today was like nothing I’d ever seen. He was ruthless, smart, always thinking outside the box. She was just like him, but damaged. It gave them character. Made them useful. Made them lucky.

I knew when people were worth saving, and those two were it. Sure, I would still kill the people they loved to teach a lesson, but they had a get out of jail free card. I could use them, and I planned to do just that.

“Let me go out and close this thing,” he offered.

“Arat's got it for now.” He was tense, I could see it. Antsy. He wanted to be out there, doing something, but Simon was a loose cannon sometimes. I needed to keep him on a short leash. “How'd the Hilltop go?”

“As requested.”

“Good job.” I nodded. “With an extra attaboy on top given I know you didn't want to play it that way.”

Ignoring my comment, he went on, “You hear anything from Gavin?”

“Not yet. But it's coming. Gavin may be perpetually pissed off, but he keeps his shit dry and tight.”

He paced, hands on his hips. It was amusing seeing him so frustrated and agitated. “If I'm not running down Rick and company, where do you want me?”

Gesturing to the seat on my right, I waited for him to take a seat. “Garbage people.”

“Good. Eliminating those who reneged might leave us a tad short on ammo, but it's worth it.”

My jaw ticked as I clenched it, pissed that he still didn’t get the big picture. “I need you to hear me on this, Simon. Those piss-stained double-crossers may have pulled a triple-cross, but it doesn't change the fact that they are still a resource. So you're gonna choke back whatever shit is stirring up inside you and remind them that a deal with the Saviours is a lock, stock, suck my barrel deal. Deliver the standard message, take one out, and the rest will fall in line.” I gave him a pointed look. “Just one, Simon.”

He did not like the plan, and I’d expected just that. He was bloodthirsty. Always had been, and I had come to the realisation that he always would be. That didn’t mean I couldn’t trust him, it just meant I had to be very clear.

“If you've got something to say, say it,” I told him, giving him the metaphorical mic.

“Maybe we should cut our losses here,” he suggested tightly. “These people can't learn the lesson, no matter how many times we teach it. Alexandria, Hilltop, Kingdom, these garbage rats they're not seeming to understand the situation. Not one little bit. So maybe we learn our lesson. Scrape the plates into the trash. Move further out. Find other communities to… save.”

Again, I clenched my jaw as I watched him carefully. “Oh, I am doing my best to hold it together right now. You wanna cut your losses, take your own advice. Killing everybody to solve the problem that is the easy way, not our way. What we do, saving people, it is hard. But it damn well works.”

“Not lately,” he argued.

“Once I clip Rick,” I grinned, “everything's aces again, Simon.”

I believed in the plan, and I knew most of my people did, too. Rick was leading the war on me and the Saviours. He was the one taking charge, making decisions, calling out orders. Killing him would show the others that there was no hope, no reason, no winning. Killing Rick would show them that we were untouchable.

A knock on the door pulled our attention to it.

“Yeah?” I called.

Gary walked in, carrying a nail gun as he waited for two more men. They were carrying a large box, and by the sounds of it… there was a walker inside.

Simon and I stood as they placed the box on the table and then stepped back.

Eyeing the box, I stepped up to Gary. “What the hell is that?”

“A delivery from the Hilltop,” he explained. “I brought you something to deal with it.” He handed the nail gun over. “It's charged.”

“Out,” I ordered.

Once the door was closed Simon stepped up to the other end, a knife now in hand, before he began to pry the lid off the box.

“Little bit more.”

Doing as I said, he lifted the lid a bit more. The walker reached out and grabbed for me, but I simply pressed the nail gun to its head and pulled the trigger.

Simon got a good look at the walker then, and he was pissed. “That's Dean. That means the other ‘38’ that the Hilltop are holding are from the Satellite Outpost. Those are my people. I'm gonna kill every last one of those farmers!”

I tried to remain calm as I reminded him, “You will do exactly what I asked.”

“We can't let 'em get away with this shit.”

Having had enough of his bullshit, I snapped, “You will do your job!”

With a tight nod, he stormed out of the room. I had no doubt, despite how much he clearly hated the plan, he would do as he was told.

DPOV

We were hiding under a bridge, all of Alexandria hiding in the bushes and long grass. I’d taken the lead, knowing the rest of us who could do the job on a normal day weren’t up for it now.

Saviours were above us, listening to a message being sent on their walkies. They’d been up there for a while, unknowingly keeping us from continuing on our trek to Hilltop.

“Patrols, we got an Orange Situation. Dr. Carson and the priest. Might've split overnight, maybe this morning. Jeremy's green sedan is MIA, so could be in that. Go for standard search and cover in our perimeter around Hilltop. Eyeballs open.”

“Patrol Four copies,” one of the Saviours above responded to the message.

“C'mon, let's hurry it up,” another called to their group before the sound of them pilling into the car was followed by the sound of them driving off.

Once I was sure the coast was clear, I gestured for the others to come out of hiding.

“Best to stay off the roads, head into the woods right there,” I told them. “Come on. Go. Go.”

They all followed my orders, keeping low and sticking to bushes as they did so. The large group slipped into the tree line without a word.

Not even Vic made a sound.

She wasn’t speaking. She wasn’t even looking at anyone, or anything really. I could imagine the pain she was in. I’d lost my brother. I’d lost Merle. But Carl was different.

Carl had been a good man. He had been a good son and brother. He’d been a rock for Vic their whole lives. Those two… there was a bond between them that I hadn’t understood in the beginning, had then grown to envy, and then had become grateful for it. I’d always known that if I couldn’t be there for her, Carl would always be by his sister’s side.

Vic had been through so much already. She’d lost so much. Her home, her friends, her safety, ever herself sometimes. She’d lost her mum, and she’d lost this family she’d built several times over the years. Losing her brother was going to hurt her like nothing else had. It could break her, and that scared me.

“Daddy.” Aly came over to grab my hand, pulling my attention from her mother as we walked at the back of the group, watching everyone as we made our way through the woods. “Are Pop and Michonne going to meet us at Hilltop?”

When things got bad, Aly tended to refer to loved ones as their title rather than their names. Hearing her call Rick Pop made it clear that she was scared and hurting, which broke my heart.

I couldn’t show it, though. I had to be strong for her.

“They’re just gonna be a little behind us.” I nodded at her. “They’re just gonna make sure Carl is-” I didn’t know how to finish the sentence. I didn’t know how to tell her what they were going to do without making it sound terrible.

“They’re gonna make sure he’s not hurting anymore,” she finished for me.

Looking back down at her, I met her gaze and had the wind knocked out of my lungs. She looked so mature and grownup. She understood what needed to be done, and she understood that I couldn’t say the words to her.

I nodded. “Yeah. They’re gonna make sure he ain’t hurtin’.”

The sound of a walker had our group scurrying away as it came out from some bushes. The children gathered behind adults, keeping safe. Others lifted the few weapons we had to defend themselves and those who couldn’t fight.

“I got it.” Tara stepped forward, pulling her knife out as she moved to deal with it.

“I'll cover you,” Dwight offered.

Instead of killing the walker, though, Tara threw it at Dwight.

“Tara!” Rosita yelled.

She shrugged. “What? It got away. He can handle it.” She watched as Dwight struggled to throw the walker to the ground before he stomped on its head, killing it. “See?”

“Hey. Just keep 'em moving,” I told all of them, gesturing forward.

Once again, they all listened as they continued walking.

Rosita turned to me once the others- including Aly- were far enough away that they couldn’t hear us. “Did you hear them talking on the walkie about Carson and Gabriel?”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “Probably heading to Hilltop, same as us.”

“Hopefully better than us,” she sighed.

The two of us started for the others then, making sure to catch up quickly. I couldn’t trust Tara wasn’t going to put her need for revenge before the needs of the others. No one else in the group could protect them, not in the state they were in. Not even Vickie.

Rosita and I needed to stay close if we were all going to make it to Hilltop together and in one piece.

RPOV

Michonne and I had walked through the unmanned doors to the place Jadis and her people call home. Honestly it was a dump, but it was theirs and they had it the way they wanted. There was no point in commenting, not when we had so much at risk, and they could be what helps us win this war.

Unfortunately, that assumption seemed to be wrong.

As we walked into the main, first, open area, junk from above the sea container that served as the entrance collapsed. The way out was blocked.

It was a trap.

The sound attracted dozens of walkers as they appeared to come from every way.

“Dammit.” I moved to get back-to-back with Michonne as we tried to find somewhere safe.

“Come on!” Grabbing my arm, she pulled me over to a mountain of garbage.

We fought our way through the crowd of walkers, pushing and killing anything that got in our way. When we reached the mountain, we started to climb, pulling things out of our way, and towards the walkers, so we could climb further, and they couldn’t follow.

As we made it to the top of the mountain, we looked down at the scrambling walkers. It was then that I realised they were all of the garbage people. There wasn’t a single stray walker down there. This wasn’t an accident. They’d been killed.

“Rick.”

Michonne and I turned and found Jadis sitting on the top of the mountain, stripped of her usual clothes and left in a dirty, flimsy, white night dress. Her feet were bare, her skin was dirty and sweaty. She looked nothing like the usual put together person we’d come to know as the look of her and her people. She looked a mess, frantic, and desperate.

“What happened here?” Michonne asked.

“The Saviours.”

It was pay back. I didn’t need to be told that to know what it was. They’d seen her and her people with me. They’d shot at us. Breaking a deal with the Saviours is a death sentence unless you’re prepared to fight. They were clearly unprepared.

Michonne didn’t make a comment or ask anymore questions about what had happened. There was only one thing that mattered now. “Well, how do we get out?”

The answer was simple. “Get out how you got in.”

We were going to have to fight through the walkers and dig through the junk in order to get out of here.

“These weren't heaps before,” Jadis went on. “It was just trash laid out, as far as the eye could see. I used to come here to find things to paint on. Metal sheets. Fabrics. And then after everything changed, I realised this whole place was a canvas. That we were the paint. We could create something new. We could become something new. We did. This was our world. Apart from everyone else. In every way.”

All her words meant nothing to me. She had double crossed us, caused the death of people, shot me, locked me up, screwed us over, and over, and over. If they had kept their word in the first place, then none of this would have happened. Our people would be safe and alive, and so would hers.

“You did this. This is because of you.” Turning my back on her, I grabbed a broken car door from the pile of crap.

Michonne watched as I bent the exterior detailing, so it stuck out. “What are you doing?”

“We're gonna run for it,” I explained, holding the door in front of me so that the bent handle could be used against the walkers.

Jadis stood, grabbing a broken chair to hold in front of herself. “Let me come with you. Just until they're gone.”

I didn’t even have to think about it. “Nah. I'm done with her games. She can't help us, anyway.” Turning my back on Jadis, I looked over at Michonne. “Come on.”

We started our decent then, heading down to the walkers as they continued to try and grab at us, and climb the mountain of trash. Using the door, I pushed back the walkers in front of us, while Michonne had her sword out, killing anything that reached for us from behind.

Getting closer to the exit, I held the door with one hand and pulled out my gun with the other to shoot a few of the walkers getting closer.

Michonne used her sword, covering the back of us as I cleared a path. Once we were close enough to the exit, I dropped the car door and started pulling things out of our way. Michonne was still behind, taking my hand once I offered it to help her into the shipping container that used to be the way into this community.

But the community was gone now. Now it was just a pile or rubbish and rubble, like it was intended to be.

“Wait!”

Just as I was about to leave, Jadis called out. I stopped and turned. She was no longer on the mountain of trash, now. She stood on the dirt, holding the broken chair she’d grabbed.

“Wait! Please!” she begged. “Just- just let me get out!”

I lifted my gun and aimed it at her, before directing it to the sky and taking a shot. The walkers descended on her then.

Whether she survived or not I didn’t know, and I didn’t care.

If she had kept her word in the first place, then none of this would have happened. Our people would be safe and alive. Carl would be safe and alive.

Bamby

[naturecoaster]

Youth Leadership Pasco Program Graduates Class of 2024

The Youth Leadership Pasco Class of 2024 celebrated their graduation at breakfast on March 15, 2024, at Timber Greens Country Club. More than 100 sponsors, school officials, parents and Leadership Pasco Board members were there to cheer on the graduating students. Youth Leadership Pasco Program Graduates Class of 2024 Youth Leadership Pasco is a leadership development program that informs, motivates, and increases the awareness of selected high school aged students (Sophomores and Juniors) through issue-oriented seminars and interaction with community leaders. Sessions include Orientation and Team Building, Law Enforcement, Health Care/Community Services, Government/Economic Development and Education. Leadership Pasco is able to keep the student fee at $35 due to generous support from our sponsors: the Law Office of Tara O’Connor, United Way of Pasco County, Pasco Hernando State College, Fred K. Marchman Technical College, Morton Plant North Bay Hospital, Olympus Limo, Pasco County Sheriff’s Office, Pasco Education Foundation and the Rotary Clubs of Dade City Noon, Holiday, New Port Richey, Seven Springs, Trinity, and West Pasco Sunset. Applications for the Class of 2025 will open for Sophomores and Juniors at the beginning of the school year. According to program co-chair, Barbara DeSimone, Leadership Pasco director emerita, "Each year, we eagerly anticipate the opportunity to welcome bright and ambitious young individuals into the Youth Leadership Pasco Program. It's truly inspiring to witness their growth, enthusiasm, and commitment to becoming the leaders of tomorrow. As organizers, we are thrilled to embark on another year of empowering these exceptional students and equipping them with the skills and insights needed toshape a brighter future for Pasco County." Youth Leadership Pasco Class of 2024 Graduates - Colt Blancher, Angeline Academy of Innovation - Katarina M. Boglino, Gulf High School - Isabella C. Bowling, River Ridge High School - Thomas Celotto, Jr. Hudson High School - Noah J. Downey, Sunlake High School - Vincent J. Farides, River Ridge High School - Dominic Fusco, Wesley Chapel High School - William C. Gantt, J.W. Mitchell High School - Jake Giber, Genesis Preparatory High School - Nadama N. Gilkerson, Pasco High School - Sophia M. Giri, Wiregrass Ranch High School - Nathan M. Grimes, J.W. Mitchell High School - Luiza Guryeva, Wesley Chapel High School - Allan Guzman, Kirkland Ranch Academy of Innovation - Elissa A. Hill, JW Mitchell High School - Liam C. Hornung, J.W Mitchell High School - Melodi Kazazi, Sunlake High School - Calina M. Levy, Wiregrass Ranch High School - Alina Manadyel, Dayspring Early College Academy - Ethan A. Mendez, Cypress Creek high School - Alyssa B. Mintrone, Land O' Lakes High School - Montana T. Montayre, Wendell Krinn Technical High School - Morgan T. Montayre, Wendell Krinn Technical High School - Alfonso E. Nava, Dayspring Early College Academy - Victoria Ogundeyin, Cypress Creek High School - Xiomig N. Ozorio Matias, Kirkland Ranch Academy of Innovation - Trinity Perry, Wesley Chapel High School - Justyce P. Rice, Anclote High School - Ethan Rubin, Hudson High School - Lilliana E. St Aubin, Hudson High School - Paul L. Steele, Land O Lakes High School - Hailey J. Suggs, Anclote High School - Gianna Walsh, Fivay High School Class Quotes The Youth Leadership Pasco program is truly one of a kind. Throughout the program I have made lifelong friendships, restored old ones, and got a much deeper grasp of what happens in Pasco County. My favorite part of the program was the sheriff's department. We got to see just how big the department truly is and the amazing technology they are incorporating into their line of work. I used to only want to leave Pasco County but throughout this program I have found a new love for it and all of the amazingopportunities it has to o ffer. I can truly see myself living here forever. - Noah J. Downey,Sunlake High School "As I reflect on my time in the Pasco Youth Leadership, a moment that stands out for me was when the program had economic day. That day I and many others in my group learned about how our leaders here in Pasco County work tirelessly to grow and provide new opportunities to all those who live in its community. It was that day that I realized it does not take someone who is in a high position to be a leader but someone who genuinely cares for their community and the people who reside in it. The program allowed its members to meet many leaders form doctors to business leaders and even our very own superintendent of schools Kurt Browning. In the end I am profoundly grateful for the privilege of being part of this amazing program, the Pasco Youth Leadership program. It has been an amazing experience that has given all who have joined new experiences, skills, and memories that can be taken further on the journey we call life." - Ethan A. Mendez, Cypress Creek high School About Youth Leadership Pasco Youth Leadership Pasco was founded in 1999 by the Leadership Pasco Class of 1998 and graduated its first class of youth in 2000. Youth Leadership Pasco is organized by Leadership Pasco in collaboration with local educational institutions, businesses, and community organizations, aims to empower high school students with essential leadership skills, civic awareness, and a commitment to community service. Through interactive sessions, workshops, and hands-on experiences, participants develop the tools they need to become effective leaders and contribute positively to the future of Pasco County. Website: https://leadershippasco.com/Youth_Leadership_Pasco_Program About Leadership Pasco Leadership Pasco, established 1988, is a highly respected leadership developmentprogram designed to connect, educate, and engage emerging and existing leaders inPasco County. The program focuses on fostering a deeper understanding of thecommunity, promoting collaboration, and inspiring participants to take an active role inshaping the future of the county.Website: https://leadershippasco.com Read the full article

[victoriadallonfan]

Speck 30.4 and Infrared 19.5

I NEED Fanart of Taylor and Victoria laughing like unhinged maniacs.

Taylor surrounded by portals and mind-controlled people.

Victoria firing a golden laser into a crack of shattered reality.

Laughing, smiling, covered in blood and grime and probably crying because things have gone to absolute shit all around them.

But at least, in this moment, they found it hilarious.

[heliosthegriffin]

The Adventures of Shota Jaune

Arthur Arc always knew his son was going to be special, it had been seven daughters straight that the Brothers had given him, he was due for a son. Good things come to those who hold strong and have faith.

His son would be amazing.

It was a given!

He didn’t expect how right he was.

How was he suppose to know his son would come out of the womb glowing like a disco ball!

The nurses were running around, his wife was crying, and Arthur had dick all of an idea what was going on.

Arthur winced has the doctor doctor cradled his broken hand while being escorted out of the room, all Arthur had seen was a flash of light and a cry of pain, before a nurse caught his falling son.

Now Arthur held his glowing baby boy as his wife was being loaded up with Morphine wanting to now what’s wrong with her baby.

Shit’s fucked.

Arthur looked at his baby boy.

“Your name is Jaune Arc,” The baby slept in his arms. “you’re going to be a trouble maker aren’t you? Well, that’s fine, we have plenty of trouble makers in the family. You’re going to fit right in.”

And so the Arcs were once again black-listed from another hospital, and Baby Jaune Arc had already broken a man’s hand.

-----------

Four year’s Later....

Arthur walked groggily to his son’s room, light bleeding from underneath the door.

It was midnight he should be asleep.

His son’s giggling told him otherwise.

He opened the door and called out to him. “Jaune, it’s midnight. Why did you turn your lights on?”

His son turn his head to him looking embarrassed as several floating orbs of light rotated around him.

Arthur felt his jaw drop. When could he do that?!

“Sorry, I just couldn’t sleep. I’ll go to bed soon.”

Arthur felt the words on in one ear and out the other, had his son found his semblance? 

“Jaune, what are those lights?” Arthur said weakly to his son.

Jaune looked confused for a moment looking around. “I didn’t turn on lights, though,” Then his expression brightened, literally as a orb went pass his face. “Oh that! You said I could have lights on at bedtime, and sometimes I got scared, so my Orra would make me flashy flash, but that just made more shadows. So, I tried to to make my Orra bigger, but it wouldn’t so I tried to make it move over the shadows, and it did!”

Arthur watched in fascination as the globes orbited around his son. His son really was special. This was beyond basic Aura manipulation, this was beyond anything an expert could do. Darkness be damned, even Arthur himself prided himself on his aura control couldn’t doing anything half as intricate as this!

“How did you get it to move like that? Your Aura that is?” Curiosity bled into his voice. It stung his pride a little bit to ask his son tips on Aura manipulation, but his pride as a father and his own want to know how won out.

Jaune looked at his father confused. “I just did?”

Arthur looked at his son patiently. “Could you show me how to then?”

“Um, ok.” His son said reluctantly. 

Arthur watched his son carefully, activating his aura and having it circulated into his eyes to be able to see his son on a auric level.

Arthur flinched back in shock and nearly blind.

His son had so much damn aura! It was like looking at the freaking sun at high noon.

Arthur could barely even see his son’s figure through the light, a barely visible shadow in the midst of a bonfire of pure white light that danced and waved on currents that could not be understood even by a expert like himself. Light filled the room and a revelation hit Arthur. He himself was under his son’s aura, the entire damn house was!

Even outside the room he could see the currents of his son’s brilliant aura circulating around the house and even leaking into the wood and stone! He was reinforcing the house, and it was even being absorbed into his own aura and he hadn’t even noticed.

His son had been subconsciously leaking aura and he hadn’t notice at all! It was so invasive and overwhelmingly aggressive, but deviously subtle that it took a hold on everything it was near.

His son was a walking talking breathing, Aura reactor. No wonder he lit like a disco-ball when he was born, no wonder he fired off the occasional flare of aura, no wonder his all of his sister had awakened their aura, no wonder the fucking cat did too!

His son was enhancing everything around him, Arthur himself hadn’t even questioned why his own reserves had enlarged, his son did it.

It was a open knowledge that reserves just increase with time and practice, but his had nearly doubled over the last four years.

Arthur shut down his Aura Sight, any more and it might give him damage his control.

Arthur no longer needed an explanation as to why his son could create light-balls. It was easy enough explanation to himself, he was just separating dense sections of aura and have them follow the auric currents he created.

Arthur knew what he had to do now, his wife was going to kill him for it, but Jaune not mastering his talents would be the graver sin.

“Jaune do you want to be a huntsmen like your dad?”

Arthur frantically cover his eyes as his son squealed and flash-banged him with happiness.

Even through his aura he could feel a sun-burn, well aura-burn, forming.

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

-----------

One year later....

Arthur’s eye’s twitched as his wife tried to get his son off the hill he made out of his sisters unconscious bodys.

“Jaune, please come down, they’re your sisters.” Victoria said trying to coax they son down.

“NO!” Jaune said with a stomp, pained groan coming from the sisters. “They’re mean and tried put me in a dress again!”

“They’re doing that because they love you and want to see how cute you’d look!”

Jaune groaned. “You’re in on it too!” He said with another stomp.

“Oww,” Another groan came from the pile.

“No, Jaune I just want to see my little man look pretty!”

“I don’t wanna be pretty I wanna be man’y man!”

“You can be a manly man,” A gleam came to his wife's eyes and Arthur groaned. “After you wear this dress!” Victoria said pulling out a dress and lunging at her son.

Arthur shook his head as his wife and only son tussled. “Jaune I’ll be waiting in the backyard when you want to practice.”

“No, Jaune no! Don’t use the back-breaker aaagggh!”

“NO, Jaune don’t suplex me into your sisters! Aggh!”

--------

One year later.

Arthur watched his son play in the parks playground, a nice day with a clear blue sky and a cool breeze that would come around with a the pleasant smell of evergreens and the clean lake in the park, Arthur taking a moment to admire the small waves going across the water to lap at the beaches edge.

Ah, it couldn’t get more relaxing than this.

‘Shink-Break.’

He hated when he was right. He had run across the park as fast as possible to stop the blade from hitting his son.

He really shouldn’t have bother though, as Jaune grasped a broken pocket knife blade in his hands.

An absolutely tiny little thing was holding the other end, a horrifically skinny child with brown, pink, and white hair was trembling as Jaune held her in the air.

Arthur nearly gagged in disgust as got within ten feet of the children.

The smell was nose-burning and made his eye’s water in pain.

Still though Arthur look at the child his son was holding in pity. The poor thing could have been much older than his son but probably didn’t come up above three feet, they were dress in what might have been clothes at one point but had been caked in so much filth, dirt, and grime that they might as well been wearing rags.

So skinny, so damn skinny.

Arthur grimaced at the sight, the child was on the verge of starvation. A fire then lit in his belly, if he ever got his hands on whoever left a child like this he would swear on his word to kill them, no excuses, he was a huntsman he had enough sway that he could get away with it.

“Jaune, what happened? Also, put the child down.”

Jaune shrugged. “Can’t if I do she’ll do her shiny thing and disappear again.”

“Her shiny thing? Does she have an Aura Jaune?”

“Yeah, an sembence.”

“Semblance, yeah. So, could you give her to me, so that we could talk about how this happened?”

Jaune shrugged and handed the child to him, who started thrashing violently as they were being handed over, then Jaune stopped and hugged her, even as they were thrashing, her broken knife chipping at his aura.

“Actually, dad, I think I’ll hold onto her.” Arthur sighed with pity, and nodded his head. It was probably better that she didn’t get pasted around it might give them a panic attack.

“That’s fine, so what went on for this to happen?”

Jaune started rocking the child in his lap, even as they stabbed at him, but the fight quickly left them. 

“Well, I was playing, and I got tumbie rumbles, and went to get an ice-cream, then my ice-cream went gone, and I was not happy, then I did a ohra thing, and could see that she was eating my ice-cream.” Jaune took a breath and Arthur absorbed the information.

“So, I ask her why she stole my ice cream and why she’s so smelly, she got mad, well actually she got scared, an tried to punch me, then when she hurt her hand she disappeared, so I tried to find her again, then I picked her up and she tried to stib me.”

Arthur nodded and sighed again. He got on the ground and looked at the child, he gave the friendliest smile he had.

“Hi, I’m Arthur and this is my son, Jaune. What’s your name?”

The child looked away.

Arthur frowned for a second before trying again. “Do you have any parents? Or a guardian? Could you bring them to us, or have them come here?”

‘So that I can beat them to death with my bare hands.’ Arthur thought. 

The child said nothing.

“Are you hungry? We can get you some food? You want to go get some food?”

The child still said nothing, but there was a slight tremble to them now.

“Hey dad, um.” His son said. “There’s a thing, on her, It don’t look so good?” Jaune said pointing at the girls neck.

Arthur leaned in closer and recoiled immediately.

A black leaking smile was gashed across her neck leaking white and yellow pus.

“We’re going to the doctor, immediately!”

-------

Two months later.

Arthur smiled as his newest daughter was following son around like a duck. It had taken a little while and a couple stab wounds, but Neo had finally given into the Arc charm and let herself be adopted.

She was finally gaining a healthy weight and color to her skin, and her hair was combed and cut properly. Dressed up in nice clean clothes. Oddly enough she was actually older than Jaune by about three years. That had only made Arthur more incensed to find her parents.

Arthur had also been true to his word. More than happy to keep it actually.

Vale may be down one councilwoman, but the world was a better place so it balance out. Shame they couldn’t keep his face out of the press, but he sent his message.

-------

Six months later

Arthur glared at Saphron as she fidgeted with her girlfriend Terra.

The tweens had lost not only Jaune, but also Neo. In the middle of Vale.

Arthur sighed and ran a hand down his face, then pointed at the ferry where Victoria and his other daughters waited.

“Go wait over there with the rest of them. I’m sure your mother and Gris will have words for you two.”

“But Dad-,” “Mr. Arc please-”

Arthur stared firmly at her and Terra. Two tweens vs a now world-class huntsman would never in a million years be a fair contest.

They bowed their heads with shame and sulked over to his wife and eldest daughter, Gris the only huntress out of his daughters.

Arthur tried not to smile, as his daughter and her girlfriend got torn a new one, but he could only try so hard.

To be honest, however. He wasn’t worried for Jaune that much or Neo if Jaune was there. With the boys Aura and her Semblance they were damn near untouchable even for him.

No, he was more worried about-

‘KAAAA-BOOOOOOM!!’

The colateral damage.

So, Arthur did what he always did to find Jaune, follow the sounds of destruction.

He found Jaune sitting and talking to nothing in the middle of what was probably at one time a nice three story building, along with what might of been a nice, friendly gang of Vacuon thugs judging by their skin tone and tattoos that led back to the Sand Devils Gang.

They weren’t much more than bone splinters, red mist and a little bit of viscera now.

If he wasn’t so proud of his son, he might be terrified.

“So, Jaune mind telling me what happened here and where your sister is?”

Jaune jumped at the sound of his voice, bringing his hands up the way he taught him and probably how he just annihilated those men.

He relaxed when he saw Arthur and smiled. “Oh, hi dad! You can drop the barrier Neo and Em,”

Em?

Arthur had a feeling that they had another one.

“So Dad, we met a new friend, and she wanted to show us her house, but a group of meanies where here and wanted to make us do things, so I made Neo and Em hide, while I took care of it!”

Yep, they got another one.

Neo shattered into existence along with green-haired mocha skinned girl who looked absolutely terrified.

“This is Emerald, she lives here-, Oh no! I wrecked your house, I’m sorry!” Jaune looked at his dad paniced. “Dad! She can stay with us, right?!”

Arthur nodded and sat down to get eye level with the children.

Neo was holding Emerald and soothing her, and Emerald looked like she might run away at any moment.

She looked around nine, less dirty than when they first found Neo, but still under-fed and probably a street kid.

“Ok, you can stay with us.”

Emerald’s eyes went wide with shock, but Neo and Jaune pulled her into a hug.

------

Two months later...

Emerald was following Jaune and Neo like a moody cat, she had taken to living in with them better than Neo, even if she still pickpocket them some times and hid in the crawlspace.

Turns out she had still living parents. Arthur had made sure to extract all in the child support she was owed, and made sure they left her in their wills.

Too bad they suffered such tragic accidents afterwards. But, who would miss some Vacuon Dust Baron, or some Atlas Upper-Class Trash. 

Plus who cared if he was wanted by Vacuo or The Ace Ops, he was already blacklist anyway in both kingdoms.

-----

Two Months Later...

“Happy Birthday to you, happy birthday Jaune Arc!”

His string bean boy had turned seven years old today.

He was so happy for him.

Arthur looked at his son blow out the candles.

A wind blew over the campfire as storm was on the horizon.

They were celebrating his birthday here in Shion this year.

Arthur had a special present for his son this year, something to celebrate starting to train him in earnest as a huntsman. Even if he was as powerful as some huntsmen in training.

Boy would he be a monster... Well, more of one.

Arthur slid a long rectangular package across the camp table to Jaune.

“What’s this?”

“Open it up.”

Jaune looked at it and then tore open the wrapping.

A stainless steel practice sword and a heater-shield made for his size.

Jaune looked at his father with tears in his eyes. “I love it!” He squeaked out.

Victoria did glare at Arthur along with Gris, but they and the rest of the family squeled athis reaction.

They were just jealous he got the best gifts.

Arthur looked at his son seriously. “You understand what this means, Jaune? You’re going to have to start being a real huntsman now, no more regular school, we’re going to home-school you, and anytime you’re not training you’re going to be learning, understood?”

Jaune looked nervous briefly, but nodded resolutely. “Yeah, I get it. Plus I didn’t like anybody at school anyway, they were always mad at me for some reason or the girls would run away screaming.”

Arthur drifted his gaze to Em and Neo, who looked away innocently. “I guess it’s time for you two to start huntress training too, Jaune could use some partners.”

“Yes!” Emerald said joyfully, as Neo cheered with her.

Victoria stilled glared at Arthur, but he ignored it. “Who wants cake?”

------

Later that afternoon...

Clouds were starting to blow in and Arthur was gathering his family into the fortified cabins. It was going to start a down pour soon.

That’s when Arthur heard it, a moan of pain.

Arthur sighed and walked into the woods. His son, his newer daughters, and some boy he’s never seen before, all circled around a black haired Grimm masked woman who was on the ground in pain.

“Alright, what’s up this time?”

Jaune kicked the woman in the gut, elcipting a groan from her.

“She’s mean, kept trying to make us go with her, then made Vern over there fight us,” Arthur looked at the boy name Vern, who was staring awestruck at his son. Vern noticed him and quickly nodded, Arthur then noticed a black eye on the boys face and several other wounds. 

“I beat him though, and Vern got all scared, the Lady then tried to make us walk through a portal, I said no. She got mad. So she tried to beat us up, so Neo and Em gave her the run around while I beat her up. Then she got flashy eyes and tried to blasted us, but Neo and Em gave her the run around and she hit herself, then we all gang up on her.” Arthur looked at his son and daughters in amazement, not even hunters and huntress-in-training and they took on a rogue huntress with a powerful semblance and dust capablities. He was so proud of them!

The his eyes drifted back to Vern.

Arthur had a feeling he knew this song and dance already.

Arthur on down on one knee.

“How do you feel about adoption?”

------

One month later...

Raven Branwen, Raven notorious coward Branwan, was the rogue huntress his children caught. Nobody believe him though and now he had the nickname Tribe-Hunter.

Team STQ was quite interested in handling her imprisonment. That was none of Arthur’s business. Ozpin had been quite generous on his bonus though and gave him plenty of vacation time with his family.

Oh, and Vern was actually named Vernal and a girl. He really should have expected that by now. She didn’t take to family very well, but once a pecking order was established she was better behaved, even if she challenged him or Jaune for leadership.

Arthur held his wife closely as they watched their children play in the backyard. Well, Jaune and the new three.

They were practically a little team. Vernal was even calling his son ‘Boss.’

Arthur though couldn’t help feel something inside him watching his children beat the shit out of each other. That this was only the start of craziness.

His wife then gripped his hand. “I want more.”

“I feel like we don’t have a choice anymore.” But the idea didn’t bother Arthur much.

[bowieandqueen11]

Lift Your Sorrows / Victor Van Dort Imagine

Request: Hey love! So I loooove the corpse bride and I was wondering if you could do a Victor x reader where it's Halloween night and they tell scary stories and the reader gets scared so he comforts her? Thanks love! And keep up the amazing work!! 

Yess my darling @denisethefangirl​ Corpse Bride is genuinely one of my favourite films of all time!

Comments and requests are really appreciated! 

Also warning, all these stories are based on true Victorian ghost stories!

Halloween seemed to come naturally to this town.

Upon every gnarled, bare branch that led down the town square and to the Everglot house seemed to sit a murder of crows, their cries warbling throughout the empty market. Children peered out from behind draped windows, gazing out through the frost and onto the street with a sigh, others being ushered into bed - those without children sitting down and getting ready for a night of supernatural games and festivities behind locked doors. As you walked by Victor’s side, away from the Church, trying your hardest to ignore the empty layer of inky cloud above you, you followed your sister back into the dim warmth of your home.

Somehow, as the three of you were walking home on this frightening night, Victoria had managed to convince the two of you in differing away from the usual fortune telling games to instead try telling stories of the supernatural - of ghosts. A chill sank into your bones as you heaved the front door closed behind you, running as fast as you could up the staircase to catch up with the lanky man in front of you, saying goodbye to the night of warm blankets and cheery laughter that you had so been looking forward to with him.

Sensing you had fallen a little behind, Victor stops for a moment, allowing your sister time to blow some cobwebs off the top of a candle holder left abandoned on a desk by the landing. She lights the stub of the candle, barely two inches long, and places the matches back on the table to turn to the two of you, being able to see only the orange glow light up the darkness of her eyes.

‘G-give me your hand, Y/n, Wouldn’t want you falling behind, tonight of all nights, of course. It’s dangerous to be alone in the dark.’

Victor smiles at you, petting the back of your hand as you intertwine it with his fingers, hesitantly leaning into his side and letting him lead you into the bedroom Victoria had just opened. Following the flickering light source, you felt the need to chide your sister as she placed the candelabra down on one of the bed side tables.

‘Victor, would you be a dear and start a fire for us?’

‘Of course, it would be my pleasure.’ He hovers slightly, almost unwilling to let go of your touch, until he finds Victoria raising an eye at his hesitancy and soon scurries away to kneel down on the dirty floorboards.

‘Do we really have to do this in one of the guest bedrooms, Victoria’, you complain, ‘or rather, do we really have to do this at all?’

Your sister only ignores you, swiping her pointer finger across the dusty piano lid that lies abandoned in the corner of the room. Blowing it off her finger, the grime clouds into the room almost in a ghostly haze, the specks nearly translucent as they fell through the air.

‘We want to set the atmosphere, do we not?’, she finally starts, settling herself down gently by one of the marble edges of the fireplace. ‘Besides, it’s not like our parents will mind, in fact I have reason to believe they’re not even here.’

Reaching her slender fingers up behind her, she giggles into her free hand as her finger dances over the ivory keys. She holds her fingers up to you once she stops, ‘see, we’re all alone. When was the last time mother and father would allow music in this house?’

‘Ah, all done! This fire should suffice for the rest of the evening.’

Victor leans back on his knees, dusting off some soot from the cuff of his suit jacket, before he takes his place beside the ample fire, its warmth and light falling far out into the darkened corners of the room, flashing red reflections and curious silhouettes onto the wallpaper. Jumping slightly at being the only one standing still near the walls, you sit down next to Victor, not noticing the way his throat moves with an anxious gulp, or the way his hands start fiddling with his collar, having seen the way your dress folded so pleasurably against his suit, your knee pressing against the side of his thigh. Thinking it rude to stare so intensely at a fine woman, he tried to stop himself from blushing by peering forward and staring into the fire.

‘I’ll start then’, Victoria chimes in, biting her bottom lip as she racked her brain for a true fright. ‘Have you heard the tale of the ghastly headless woman.’

You squeak, making Victor startle slightly and nearly knock over the poker rack as you leap and grab onto his arm.

‘The ghost was first seen by a farmer in Buckingham, I believe, during a frosty, pitch black winter night, all alone on an empty cobblestone street. There he was, near the end of his journey home from his fields when his lantern started to swing by his head, the orange glow settling enough only to show flashes of some strange, dark object lying by his turn at the crossroads.’

Your grip on Victor’s arm tightens so much, he’s afraid you’ll leave wilts on his skin if you squeeze any harder, but he’s enjoying the ever limited physical touch with you so much that he just swallows back the pain and smiles down at you.

You always found his eyes were like the colour of Swallowtail butterflies - so rare and soft, they had this look of wings flying through the sky, so quick, yet relaxed, at ease. Realising the two of you had been gazing at each other so affectionately for too long, Victoria coughed slightly, making Victor jump. He instead, as he turns back to listen to the story, shyly leans over and grabs your hand, letting it rest in the empty space between the two of you. 

‘He called out to the shape, to the strange motionless figure in front of him. There was no reply, only the braying of his horse as it flung itself away from the scene, loosening his grip on the reins, looking back at the figure in time only to see the woman slowly drift away from them, seemingly floating through the thick branches of a bordering hedge. It was only as she began to disappear, that he realised the darkness was not only the colour of her clothes, but in fact the night sky behind the space where her head should be.’

‘That’s horrible!’, you cry out, your sister only gazing into the fire in reply, and reaching up to place a stray curl of hair back into her bun.

‘Strange things do happen in this world’, Victor adds as he looks over at you, finding himself unable to break his gaze as your shaken eyes peer back at him. He feels his heart thunder against his chest in the familiar way it does every time you look at him, the only thing making him blink being the sudden strike of lightning that streaks the foggy sky outside the window. Sheets of rain began to hit upon the pavement outside, somehow chilling the air in a fraction of a second, and making you nestle closer into Victor’s side for warmth.The gloom of the autumn evening truly began to creep into your heart like the damp into bare timber, seeping into your morose pores. 

‘Victor, can we stop now?’

He didn’t have a chance to reply, before the shadowed face of your sister began its second tale of the night.

‘Another story I have been told is of a ghost, an apparition which rises from its tomb to warn men of danger. One man in Garstang, a small village far from here, was delivering letters on a deserted path leading away from the village, only to be stopped by a ghost of abnormal stature, pale as the sky above him, towering above the poor man.’

You felt your stomach lurch at her words, too afraid to walk over to the window and block out the lightening in fear of what ghastly reflection may be waiting behind you. 

Before she could continue, you finally mottled up the courage to call out a desperate, ‘Victoria, please stop!’, and to your surprise, your sister actually did. Shocked, she gave yourself a moment to collect herself by telling the two of you she would go down to the kitchen and find everyone a round of something warm to drink.

As soon as she had closed the door, Victor let go of your hand, choosing instead to settle himself fully beside you. His eyes twinkled as they settled on your face, his hand coming up to rest gingerly against your back. For a moment, you don’t move, but his breathing hitches when he hears slow, stifled sobs from your direction. With his free hand, he tries as gently as he can to try and tilt your chin up away from his shoulder so he can properly look at you in the fire light again. It breaks his heart to see your eyes so bloodshot, your cheeks so rosy and red from the crying. It only fills him with an uneasy determination as he rests his chin against the side of your head, his hair falling over your eyes and he chuckles nervously. He nearly gasps out loud as you tug on his blue tie, nearly choking the poor man until he was left gasping for breath as you pull him tighter against you. His lanky frame completely envelopes you as he composes himself, and places his other arm tightly around your shoulder.

‘It's alright, Y/n. I'll never let anything hurt you. I shall be with you, I believe, always.’

[self-righteous-idiot]

Four(ish) songs I have been blaring on repeat

Tagged by @aurlynd-halfelven, thank you for that!

1. Queen of the Castle, by Victoria Carbon. This song is just so darkly regal.

2. Whiskey Lullaby, by Alison Kraus and Brad Paisley. A song about a couple who end up the way this songs couple do doesn’t deserve to be as hauntingly beautiful as it. The chorus lives in my head far too often to be good for my mental health.

3. Across the Seven Realms, by Ged Grimes. Not sure how I found this song, but I am glad I did. I just really vibe with the story it tells.

4. Chasing Twisters, by Delta Rae. How dare the song have the lines, “Had an angel on my shoulder/But the devil always won!” There is an anger to this song that makes it beautiful.

Honorable mentions: See You Again, by Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth. Soldier, Poet, King, by The Oh Hellos. Warriors, by Imagine Dragons.

And just because I can, tagging @anti-cosmofangirl, @a-fifth-cellar-occupant and @bushmonkey140 again.

[songbvrd]

Event Starter Call

so i can draft them early lmao. hmu with any threads/plots you have in mind! feel free to request text/call starters too, but only 2 per character, as i obviously want mostly in person threads! their lil blurbs can be found here also!

group one

alfie gilani (3/?) - edward cullen, ariel, renesmee cullen

eliza schuyler (2/?) - anya, angelica schuyler

hope mikaelson (2/?) - klaus mikaelson, lizzie saltzman

hugo weasley (1/?) - fred weasley

kristoff (2/?) - benjamin, anna 

liam dunbar (2/?) - stiles stilinski, malia tate

lydia dixon (1/?) - carl grimes

mary macdonald (4/?) - marlene mckinnon, ewan mckinnon, frank longbottom, lily evans

peter parker (0/?)

group two

bow (0/?)

enid rhee (1/?) - tasha

eponine thenardier (0/?) 

erica reyes (0/?) - harley

iris west (2/?) - sebastian, barry allen

kiara carrera (1/?) - tinkerbell

rosita espinosa (0/?)

group three

alex claremont-diaz (1/?) - alex hamilton

alice fortescue (0/?)

brienne of tarth (0/?) - margaery tyrell

connie (0/?)

dean winchester (4/?) - feyre, malia tate, mary winchester, adam milligan

harry potter (4/?) - lucy weasley, hermione granger, rita skeeter, fred weasley

judith grimes (0/?)

katniss everdeen (1/?) - lyanna

rosalie hale (3/?) - edward cullen, victoria, jasper hale

[themostexpensiveboningknife]

2020

Failed party, money in drawer, communicate, move house, move boxes, drive in van, walk to shops, buy noodles, think it’s the end, see whole bus of soldiers in Beijing, new area, walk in darkness, think about leaving, leave, think its temporary, in taxi, post stupid photos, check and check again phone, think people with goggles on my plane are over reacting, take off my mask to eat, keep taking off to loosen, arrive back in London. Tube. Cold. Pub. Party at WeWork. Exhibition at Dulwich Gallery. Farringdon. Drugs and drinks. Brockley, South east London. DJ. Ethiopian food. Morley’s Peckham. Walking on the River. Photographer friend’s house. Canal cycle. National Gallery. Car crash, Dalston. Omar Souleyman. Corsica Studios. Meet girl, back to my friends, back to hers, sex. Morning up to mum’s best friends birthday, Covent Garden restaurant. In a van, Sunday roast. Chisenhale Gallery. arebyte Gallery. Getting worse in China, seems nice and easy and calm in England. Camberwell beers and more. Second-hand book shops, Charing Cross Road. Courtauld. Leafed through a book about a man who lived his entire 86.5 years in East London. Still talking to the same girl back in China. Both believe I’ll be back soon. Chicken wings. West London, meal. South London pub. DJing somewhere inside. Kent, see grandma. Rave, Bermondsey. Friends from Israel and Germany arrive. More drinks, more drugs. Mixing friends. Gay bar in Bethnal Green for old friend’s birthday. Acid, confused and hilarious. Tate Britain. Serpentine. Cranes on the bridge. Liverpool Street film screening. Feels shallow, but good. Begin regular E Pellici sojourns. Primrose Hill with Dad. Beer festival with Keaton and co. Peckham, school friend’s house, bad vibe. More drinks, more drugs. Working on first music compilation with Slowcook and Fafa. Begin watching all of the Studio Ghibli movies. Watching Breaking Bad. At some point have huge argument with my brother, it went like this: He came home from work and I was sitting watching Breaking Bad, he asks, “Have you been like that all day?” I either took it in the wrong way or picked up on a sly dig. It was probably me, but at this point I was pretty self-conscious and worried about going back to China and whether or not I would have a job back there. Was getting surprisingly pissed off with my brother mentioning his work, felt like an affront to me. Weird. He goes crazy (he has a short fuse), punching a wall, ready to fight me. My mum is pretty upset. A few days later I go into his room and try to patch things up. Turns into a deeper chat. He feels like I haven’t been a good brother to him, he gives the example of not looking out for him on his first days of school. I say I’m sorry, it’s because I’m a bit scared and insecure. In retrospect I regret a little laying so much weakness on the table, seems his interactions/ways of acting around me have changed a bit. Still not sure how I feel about it all. Considered getting a gold tooth with Matthew. Play with cats, enjoying them more and more. Rave in Dalston, good music from Asia and beyond. Looking at magazines. Not doing much work at all. Being out and about instead. Go to Norfolk. It’s beautiful, but get way too drunk on first night, sick everywhere, wake up naked in sick. Massive fucking shitshow. Majority of people there have no choice but to act weirdly around me now, which is understandable. Still some nice aspects. One girl there surely hates me a lot. Tate Modern. Art stuff by self is good. Corsica Studios, semi-art, semi-music event. Mr. Bao for first time of many. Radio in Tottenham. Take drugs. Pubs. Drive to Asda with brother to stock up on food. It’s March and the reality of the pandemic is hitting. More canal cycling. First and only group chat on Zoom. BH Funk. Probably have taken cocaine and messaged one of three or four girls numerous times by now. If there’s one, in the cold light of day, horrible and disgusting thing I’ve done too much this year it’s this. Incessant messaging of poor girls that I know will react (although increasingly they don’t, I manage to alienate even close friends in this way). Southbank and The Mall with Nick. Reading about Wuhan. List of good texts. Continuing to do some writing. Making WeChat posts for guī WeChat, including mix series and miniessays. Greenwich park with Matthew. Grime quiz online. Delivering food regularly for my mum’s school. Hackney Marshes with Luan. Epping Forest with Mum and Dad. By this point probably have woken up feeling sorry for myself in Ludo’s flat, after untold amounts of alcohol and cocaine. Online rave. Beijing artists only mix. Go to Switzerland, pass through Italy on the way. Its breath taking, the mountains, the expanse of scenery, not used to it. Climbing up mountains with no one around. Rolo and Patrick and Rita smoke too much weed. I really, really, really still hate smoking it. Feel a bit annoyed how long we spend sitting around while they smoke, but this is way outbalanced by the uniqueness of where we are and the beauty all around. Producing more and more, actually getting somewhere. Cooking more and more food. Reading more and more, like: Black and British, The Corrections, Real Fast Food, Bass, Mids, Tops, Zadie Smith, Olivia Lang, Graham Greene, JG Ballard, Monica Ali, Mo Yan, Jenny Zhang, John le Carre, Naked Lunch, Nabokov, Bukowski, Zora Neale Hurston, Wiley, Bitcoin, Murakami, Judith E. Butler, The Painter of Modern Life, Maupassant, Chekov, Video Art, Gravity’s Rainbow (couldn’t finish), Anaïs Nin, The Net Delusion (couldn’t finish), The Establishment and how they got away with it (couldn’t finish), Roddy Doyle, The Secret of Scent, General Intellects, Women In Love, The Intelligent Investor, Lyndon Johnson. Victoria Park more often than I can remember. To Chrissy’s house. Mile End Park. Very regularly sitting on the river in Wapping. Bring the chessboard and play Ludo sometimes, people smile and look at you differently when you’re playing chess and drinking beers versus just sitting and drinking beer. I May Destroy You. Industry. The beautiful wide expanse of Hackney Marshes. My incessant quest to reach 1000 followers in Instagram. More cycling, and I hate to say it but it really was: Here there and everywhere. Margate with my Dad to see my grandma in hospital and saw the Turner Prize exhibition. Light blue like scrubs, the sky and sun felt eternal. Swimming in dirty water. Make a DJ mix of old 2000s Road Rap. Eat cheese in Peckham. Cycle along the canal north, keep going and going through Tottenham, past Enfield keep going, it’s mad how quickly it becomes quiet fields on all sides, arrive to some kind of lake, swim and then back to the centre of town. Outside a Hawksmoor church in Shadwell ate chicken with Karim and Ludo. DJing. From my bedroom window saw a big crane in the middle of the night sitting on the canal. Begin developing the second DCCY compilation this time with BULLY magazine. Go to a house in an old school in Camberwell. Discover new secret riverside spots in East London. Finally give up my apartment in Beijing. Mile End park. Cycle further and further East to a pedestrian bridge I didn’t know existed. Get onto the beach and into the Thames water. Interview Akito. Begin writing more, after few months of wiling away the summertime. My friend Emmy gets married in Rwanda, I give him some money as a wedding gift which he tells me he used to buy his wife’s dress. Protests in HK always on TV. Get more into finances, crypto and trading, and just saving in general. Had sex with an old friend. Now meeting a girl I first knew years ago in Beijing. More secret river spots. Keaton has his baby, Noah. More times on Hackney Marshes. Barbican conservatory. Watching more films, try to watch all the films of some directors including: Jia Zhangke, Bong Joon-ho, Edward Yang, Wong Kar-wai, Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Decide to watch all of the infamous lauded series, go through Breaking Bad, The Wire and The Sopranos. Go to the seaside for a few days, camping also. Henry Wu album launch in a car park in Bermondsey. Go to visit Keaton’s baby for the first time. Good photography exhibition at Photographer’s Gallery. Go to Wallace Collection again. August. Go to Berlin. Swimming in Berlin lakes until I get an ear infection. It makes me drowsy and lethargic, but still seems to spend all my time cycling around the city. On one night cycle for hours to a rave on the outskirts of the city. Like a lot the abandoned airport in Berlin. Oh yeah, vaping. Found a dead bumble bee. Speak with Nevin about projects. Write a piece about the future of the art world for a magazine being started by Nevin’s friend in Canada. Go to Lithuania. Walk around Vilnius, get too drunk by myself. Get to the Curonian Spit and Nida, beaches and new friends. For the Nightlife Residency project. For a short while life is like on a desert island of new food, new people, new locations, quiet and new meaning. Go to the Russian border on the beach. Cycle to the road boarder and get stopped by the police. Go nude on the beach for the first time. Sauna, sand dunes and forests. DJ out for the first time in ages, this time with Nono. To Kaunus and try nice and stodgy Georgian food for the first time. Hackney Wick back for party. Meet a ginger girl online and go on a date. Wallace Collection again. Free beer and pizza. White Cube. National Gallery, Titian. On BBC Radio London with my Dad. Riverside beers. Saw a lost swan near my front door. Meet Keaton near his work, one of many times. Making more and more music, getting better. Decide I need more organisation and clarity, put everything I’ve done on a blog. More or less long since given up on my job at M Woods. But don’t really begin looking for anything new because it’s still sunny. At some point I start getting benefits money. Go to see La Haine in the cinema. Someone blocks me on WeChat because of me. Some pub somewhere. Sunday walks and breakfast with my parents. Go to an exhibition in Woolworth Road with Muzi. Realise how nice it is to run to Victoria Park along the canal. Vicky Park in general. Dinners at friends’ houses. Museum of London. Walking with Michael in some countryside near London, surprising how quickly things turn green. Break onto a pier in Wapping with Jack. Battersea Park. Tate, Bruce Nauman. Old Street Weatherspoon’s with Keaton, drugs. Central London cemetery. Chinese in Camberwell. Chinese in Aldgate. Italian in Camberwell. More and more exercise, running, weights and yoga with my brother. Sadie Coles. Nick, Central London. Gucci Mane. Hampstead Heath more because Ludo and his flatmates are nearby. Ludo’s now house more for days and nights of you guessed it. Borough Market more, with Emma. Alexandra Palace walk and famous sandwiches after. Tate Britian new lights. More time at Muzi’s. Signing up for cycle courier. LYL Radio show. Shave head. Take acid and it hurts my stomach. Camden Arts Centre with Muzi. Christmas party with friends. Birthday. Cake with Muzi, presents and Indian takeaway from family, walk in Vicky Park with Ludo and Karim plus battered sausage and chips. Christmas at home nice and warming meal. Evening to Ludo’s place with more friends. Boxing day with Matthew, pints and then more at his house in Peckham all night long. Next day is tough! Giant turkey sandwiches, turkey soup, turkey curry. Buy first NFTs. New Year’s Eve stay in at Muzi’s, one drink and a cake.

[sunmoonandeddie]

feelings are fatal (8/24)

pairing: bucky barnes x reader, past steve rogers x reader

word count: 4,647

summary: After the events of Endgame, you struggle to come to terms with what you’ve lost, though you’re learning that you still have something to gain.

chapter warnings: swearing

masterlist

a/n: I’m so sorry.  This chapter physically hurt me so I’m sorry if you feel hurt.  Let me know what you think!

This compound was weird.

Well, maybe not so much weird as different.  Like, everything in the kitchen was wrong.  The coffee maker was to the left of the fridge and not the right.  The silverware drawer was in the island.  The milk was on the top shelf and not the middle.  And in the living room, there were three couches, not four.

And it wasn’t a bad thing, except sometimes you stared at the empty space where another couch should’ve been and you remembered all the times your team would cram together on the cushions for dinner.

The one thing that didn’t feel different was the dance studio.

You’d found it within a week of moving in, though you hadn’t ever gone in.  You’d lingered at the door a few times, considered walking in and just sitting on the hardwood floor, but something stopped you.

Maybe it was some strange case of survivor’s guilt.  Because dancing had always been more her thing, something she was much better at than you.  You were a great dancer, sure, but you had never felt the love for it that she had.

Taking a deep breath, you pushed open the door and walked inside.  The sunlight pouring in through the floor-to-ceiling windows to your left was so bright that you didn’t bother turning on the lights.  No need to.  Dust swirled through the air as you tossed your duffel bag on the ground, digging out your pointe shoes.

The satin felt so soft against your fingertips.  Such a familiar, comforting feeling.

Without a second thought, you tugged the shoes on, relishing the feeling of tying the ribbons. Dancing had always been therapeutic for you, and you were wondering if it would help just as much now that the world had been put back together.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y.,” you said as you stood, shaking out your feet a little.  “Play Swan Lake by Pyotr Illyich Tchaikovsky.”

The smell of sweat still lingered in the dance studio, but then again, you supposed it never really faded.  The sun was sinking low beyond the horizon and you knew that someone would come along to fetch you for bed sooner or later.  The natural light coming in through the window was slowly fading.

And sundown meant being ordered onto a thin mattress, handcuffs keeping you from running.

After dinner, every girl had about an hour and a half of free time to do whatever she wished.  Most girls spent it in the showers, washing away the grime of the day.  If they didn’t get it done in the hour and a half, they wouldn’t have a chance until the next night.  The only time they were afforded in the mornings was ten minutes to brush their teeth and get on their leotards and tights.

And tights were a bitch.

You took in a deep breath as you reset your feet, determination clear by the way your brows furrowed.  Judging by the sun’s position, you had about forty-five minutes left at most and there was no way in hell you were going to waste it.  You weren’t as good as the other girls in ballet, and it was starting to become obvious.  You could only do single pirouettes while the others were doing doubles.  Your pas de chats weren’t as clear and sometimes, when your brain felt particularly fuddled, you did a glissade instead.

You absolutely could not fall anymore behind.  You had seen the way that Madame B was starting to watch you, a frown permanently etched on her lips.  Even though you were the youngest of the girls in the Red Room, you knew she held the same expectations she had for Rosemary and Victoria, the two six-year-olds.

Natalia frowned as she heard music drifting down the hall, turning towards the sound.  “Nobody should be in the studio,” she murmured softly, the man beside her stilling as she began to head towards it.

“Natalia,” he said gruffly, but she didn’t listen.  His metal arm glinted in the light as he followed after her.  She’d spent the past three hours in a training with him, working on her hand-to-hand with him, and while they didn’t have to report to Madame B after, she always walked with him to the room where his handler was waiting.

Her feet carried her to the doors of the dance studio, her heart softening when she saw you.  She vaguely recognized you, knowing that you were the youngest girl currently at in the Red Room.  It had been a while since they’d brought anyone new in, and she knew it was only a matter time before another one joined their ranks.

You looked up as you heard the door opening, stopping in the middle of an across-the-floor.  Your e/c eyes roamed over the sharp features of the redhead who stood in the doorway, vaguely recognizing that there was a man looming in the shadows behind her.

“You like Swan Lake?” She asked, slowly coming into the room.

You nodded, though you were still hesitant as you watched her.  “It’s my favorite.”

Her eyes lit up as she toed off her shoes, letting her bag fall to the ground.  “Mine, too.” But as she walked closer to you, you took a few steps back.  “What are you doing in here?  Shouldn’t you be showering and spending time with your friends?”

Frowning, you turned your eyes back to the mirror, watching yourself as you reset your feet.  “Madame B says that friends are attachments and attachments mean strings.  And those strings turn into a noose.”

And oh, how Natalia’s heart broke.

Because she knew what it was like to think that way.  Hell, she thought that way until she was about eight and one of the older girls offered to teach her how to braid her hair because it was a little thing that made life in the Red Room not so bleak.  Being able to do something with your hair other than a tight bun made you feel like less of a robot and more like a girl.

She bit her lip, trying to think of how to best approach you. You were trying to ignore her, though she could see the way your eyes would flit over to her every few seconds.  “But don’t you at least want a shower?” She asked.

You bit your lip, shrugging as you pushed up to relevé, your arms wavering as you tried to hold onto first position.  The only sound came from the tinkling of the radio, and she briefly noted that it was somewhere in act two.  “I’m not as good as the other girls.”

Nat let out a soft sigh, a little relieved that that was all. “But you’re a little younger than—”

“I can see how Madame B looks at me,” you said, worry etched into your face.  “I have to get better.”

And she realized that you knew what would happen if you didn’t. You were well aware of the fact that there was no room for imperfection anywhere, whether that be in how well you could take down an opponent and how straight your legs were during a jeté.

You would be put down.  Shot between the eyes like a dog.  There would be no funeral, no memorial service.  Just a quick shot and even quicker clean up.  One of the girls would be tasked with bleaching the floor until there was no trace of blood left while two others were ordered to drab your body outside.  You’d be buried in an unmarked grave somewhere behind the brick building all of you resided in.  Probably behind the shed.

“May I help you?” Natalia asked after staring at you for what she knew was probably much too long.  But you were so young.  So young, and it hurt her to know that you were so worried about dying.

For what seemed like the millionth time, doubts about what she was raised for came to mind.  She knew that within the next year and a half or so, she’d graduate and then she’d be passed over to HYDRA, but she just didn’t know if she could do it.  She didn’t know if she had the strength to be such a force.

You were clearly suspicious of her, but you nodded anyway. After all, she was one of the best dancers there and if she wanted to help you, it was most likely your best bet.

Her lips stretched into a wide, dazzling smile as she came to stand beside you.  “Great. But,” she stopped and couched down so the two of you were eye level.  “I need you to trust me, okay?”

“But—”

“No,” she said, raising up a hand. “I know what Madame B said about strings.  But…” She pointed down at your ballet slippers, tugging on the silk ribbon.  “Think of us as ballet ribbons, okay?  Tying us together.”

Bucky grinned as he slugged Sam in the shoulder, shifting the bags in in hand around.  He’d finally gotten around to going shopping for clothes that weren’t ‘Assassin Chic’ according to Wanda.  Sure, he had a few pairs of jeans and plain t-shirts, but nothing that was really his.

There was one outfit in particular he was excited about.  A suit, matte black with a matching button down.  Oxfords and a bowtie to go with it.  When he’d seen it in the store, he’d had visions of you smoothing your hands over the lapels, fixing his bowtie for him.  Standing so close that he could smell your shampoo.

But that would have to wait. It’d have to wait until you were ready and over your horrible breakup and he was more than willing to wait.  Regardless of the fact that it could take years, he was prepared.

He’d also have to get the courage to actually ask you on the date, but that was besides the point. The point was that he wanted to and he was embracing that now.  He was allowing himself to dream of a time when he could pull you into his arms, twirl you around the dance floor.  Confess to you how he felt without fear of you pushing him away.

Bucky’s eyes lit up as him and Sam got out of the elevator, finding a tiny Stark running straight for him.

“Uncle Bucky!”

“Hey, kiddo!”  He let his bags drop as the little girl careened herself into his embrace.  When she leaned back, he couldn’t help but laugh as he saw the flecks of paint covering her.  “Did you have fun with Auntie Wanda today?”

She nodded excitedly, not unlike a bobble head.  “I painted!” Morgan then grabbed his hand, giving him just a second to grab his shopping bags before dragging him over to the kitchen island.  Paints and brushes are still littered everywhere, little specks of blue and yellow and purple and every other color imaginable speckling the marble.  “Look!”

His heart swelled as he looked at the piece of paper she was shoving towards him, gingerly taking it in his hands.  “Who’s this?”

“That’s you!” She said, pointing towards a very distinct Bucky.  It’s a stick figure, sure, but it’s got long brown hair and a much bigger left arm that’s painted like the one he received from Shuri.  “That’s me, and that’s Auntie Y/N!”  And sure enough, there you are.  The two of your stick figures are on either side of Morgan’s.

“I love it,” he said, pulling her into another hug.  “It looks just like us.”  He frowned as he took in the rest of the kitchen’s occupants.  Wanda and Rhodey were standing at the stove, both working on their respective dinners as they chatted quietly.  Sam had disappeared to his room to put away his own purchases.  He could hear Pepper talking on the phone quietly in the living room, probably some big name client looking to go back over their contract with Stark Industries.

Wanda turned towards him, grinning as she spotted the bags.  She’d been smiling a lot more lately, even though there were still moments when she’d remember Vision was gone and it’d be back to her room until her tears stopped and she was ready to interact with everyone again.  “Are you finally embracing the twenty-first century fashion?” She asked as she spotted the bags from H&M, ASOS, Macy’s, and Zara.

“Something like that,” he said with a faint smile.  He looked around the kitchen again, making sure he wasn’t just missing you.  But, then again, he was sure he’d always find you in a room.  “Where’s Y/N?”

Morgan pursed her lower lip as her arms crossed over her chest.  “F.R.I.D.A.Y. won’t tell me.”

Well, that’s… concerning. Bucky looked up towards the ceiling, as though he’d see a physical form of the A.I.  “F.R.I.D.A.Y., where’s Y/N?”

“Agent L/N asked me to not give anyone her whereabouts.”

“I’m gonna go find her,” he said, ruffling Morgan’s hair before heading towards the elevator.  He knew there was no way you’d be in your room after giving F.R.I.D.A.Y. orders like that.  No.  You were somewhere in the compound, away from everyone else’s eyes.  And any other time, he’d respect your wishes.  He’d give you your alone time.  But something in his gut told him to find you, and his gut hadn’t led him wrong before.

Glissade.  Assemblé. Glissade.  Assemblé.  Echappé. Echappé.  Triple pirouette.  Repeat.

Glissade.  Assemblé. Glissade.  Assemblé.  Echappé. Echappé.  Triple pirouette.  Repeat.

Sweat dripped down your brow, but you ignored it.  You were too focused on going through the combination.  You weren’t sure how long it had been, though you knew it had been a few hours.  Enough time that Swan Lake had looped once and you were now halfway through act three once again.

You frowned as you heard the door opening.  You’d told F.R.I.D.A.Y. to not let anyone know where you were.

“Y/N.”

You fell out of your pirouette, wobbling a little as you turned to look at the intruder.  Bucky was frozen in the doorway, his sea blue eyes locked on your feet.  He looked like he’d seen a ghost.  “What?”

He rushed towards you, his hands reaching for your face.  “What the hell are you doing?”

It was only when he wiped at your face that you realized you were crying.  Trembling, you reached up and touched your cheek, your hand drawing back as though you’d been stung.  Your eyes focused on the bit of wetness that lingered on your fingertips.

Had you really been crying?

“Y/N.  Y/N, look at me,” Bucky said.  His hands were smoothing back the hair that had fallen out of your bun, blue eyes watering as he searched your face.  “Are you okay?”

“I…  I…”  Truth be told, you didn’t know.  You had no idea how long you’d been there.  It was long enough that the sun had almost completely disappeared beyond the horizon, F.R.I.D.A.Y. having automatically turned on the studio lights.

He took a step back, looking you over since it was clear that you were unable to give an answer of your own.  His eyes reached your feet and he cursed, dropping to his knees.  “Y/N, holy fuck.”

Your gaze drifted lethargically until you found yourself staring at your pointe shoes.  Your pretty, previously pristine pointe shoes. Little blotches of red were staining the pink satin.

“Y/N, how long have you been dancing?” Bucky asked as he coaxed you down into a sitting position.  His hands shakily began to unwrap your pointe shoes, desperate to take them off of you but terrified of the damage.

You blinked slowly at him, shivering.  “I don’t know.”  Now that you were aware of the fact that you were bleeding, you could feel the pain coursing through your toes and up through your legs.

He winced as he tugged off the first pointe shoe, a squelch resounding through the air.  The second one was just the same, and it took a lot in you to actually look at the damage you had caused.

Bile rose in your throat as you looked at them.  Blisters covered your feet, though most of them had popped.  Your big toenail on your right foot was half off, blood slowly trickling from the wound.  The skin was rubbed raw, red and angry and bleeding.  

“I…  I’m sorry,” you croaked, a fresh wave of tears coming on as you stared at your feet.

Bucky’s eyes flickered up to meet yours, his jaw slack.  “What? Malen'kiy, no.  No.” He pulled you close, his strong arms wrapping around you as you buried your face into the crook of his neck.  “You have no reason to be sorry.”

“I-I didn’t mean to.” You were outright sobbing now, fingers clutching onto his shirt as he rocked you back and forth.  Swan Lake continued to play in the background.  It was a rather dramatic soundtrack for a rather dramatic moment, you thought fleetingly.

The super soldier wanted nothing more than to be able to take your pain away.  Whatever had caused you to do this, he wanted to end it.  But he knew that more often than not, your battles were ones that he couldn’t fight for you.  He could only be by your side and offer you a shoulder to cry on, arms to hold you, while you worked through all of it.

Even though your feet hurt like a bitch and you knew they needed to be bandaged, you couldn’t bring yourself to stand.  You didn’t want to leave this place.  This place that reminded you so much of Natasha.  “I…  I couldn’t remember the combination anymore,” you said.

“What?”

Eyes glazed over, you stared out the windows at the retreating sun.  “She always did this one across-the-floor for warmups.  It was glissade, assemble, glissade, assemble, echappé, echappé, triple pirouette.  Or…” You trailed off, frustration rising in your stomach like curdled milk.  “Or it was glissade, assemble, chappé, glissade, assemble, echappé, triple pirouette.” You groaned, fingers gripping your hair. “I c-can’t remember, god damn it!”

And Bucky wanted to cry. He wanted to cry and sob for you because fuck, you’re realizing that as time passes, you’re not going to remember the little things, like what Natasha’s favorite ballet combination was.  One day you won’t remember what color the ratty t-shirt she always slept in was, or whether she liked pepperoni on her pizza or not.

And he knows why ballet hurt the most.  Why it would be the worst thing you could lose.  He had been there when Natasha first talked to you, all those years ago. You’d only been five years old and had stared at the redhead with such distrust that it was hard to believe that you two would become so close later on.  He’d watched in the doorway as Nat helped you perfect every move.  Every pirouette, every fouetté, every pas de bourrée.

Of course, he hadn’t known then how much you would eventually mean to him.

“Hey, Barnes.”

Bucky was surprised to see Natalia standing in front of him, so familiar after all those years.  “Hi.”

She took a seat beside him, crossing her legs as she handed him a beer.  It was strange, drinking at a time like this.  There were six of you cramped into a motel room with only two beds and a pullout couch, and with his best friend having his girlfriend with him and Wanda and Vision being a… thing, it would seem as though the Winter Soldier was going to have to sleep in the same bed as the infamous Black Widow.

Fantastic.

“How are you feeling?” She asked, popping open her own beer and taking a long drink.  Her gaze was locked on you, even though you were currently asleep with your head in Steve’s lap.  He’d noticed that she was incredibly protective of you, and had no desire to invoke her wrath.

Which would be easy if he didn’t know you.

For the past four days, he’d been trying his best to convince himself that he didn’t know you.  He didn’t know twenty-year-old you.  He knew seventeen-year-old you.  He’d known a girl who was trapped in the Red Room and was preparing to spend her life working for HYDRA, not the Avenger who was in love with his best friend.

Yeah, he definitely didn’t know that girl.

And if you recognized him, you hid it well.  Sure, you were friendly and held conversations with him, but never anything too long.  Never anything meaningful.  And yeah, it hurt, because it wasn’t like he’d been wearing his mask when he’d trained you.

Was he really that forgettable?

“What do you mean?” He asked, trying his best to appear nonchalant. Besides all the shit he was going through with trying to pretend as though you didn’t mean the world to him, he was also still coming to terms with the fact that he’d been used as a weapon against his own will for over seventy years.

“I mean, we went on the run four days ago,” Nat said with an eyeroll.  “You had your entire life uprooted.”

“Wasn’t much of a life, to be honest,” he said, briefly thinking back to the shitty one-bedroom apartment he had kept in Bucharest.  His eyes slowly slid back over to you, though he didn’t realize how obvious he was being.

The redhead followed his gaze, smiling a little.  “That’s Y/N.  Been on our team for about two years now.”  She suddenly turned on him, and he’s afraid that she knew he already knew her when she said, “You might actually recognize her.  The first time I talked to her, you were there.  She was this little thing I helped teach ballet.  You watched in the doorway when I first found her in the Red Room.”

And oh.  He actually hadn’t known that was you. And you know what, that’s even more strange because now he knew three versions of you.  He knew little five-year-old you, fifteen to seventeen-year-old you, and now twenty-year-old you.

“You’re close with her?” He said, though he already knew the answer.  Could see it in the way that Natasha was never too far from you.  Even if you were in Steve’s more than capable arms, she was always ready to take over.  It didn’t matter that you were also a highly trained assassin, you were her pseudo little sister.

She smiled, nodding.  “Yeah. I am.  And now, I think it’s time for me to do my ‘sisterly duty’ and get everyone to bed.  It’s been a long few days and I’m ready to sleep on an actual bed and not a quinjet bunk.” She threw back the rest of her beer as she stood up.  She clapped a hand onto his shoulder which threw him for a moment, but he tried not to let it show.  “Alright, Rogers.  I’m staying in Y/N’s bed so I don’t have to share with Barnes here.”

And oh.  That’s kind of nice.  Because as much as he didn’t want to admit it, he didn’t really want to share a bed with her, and he also really didn’t want Steve to share a bed with you.

Even though that made absolutely zero sense since you were his best friend’s girlfriend.

“I actually managed to get her out of the Red Room.”

His head whipped up to look up at the assassin, shocked that she was still talking and hoping that this wasn’t heading towards a conversation he really didn’t want to have at the moment.  From just behind the redhead, he could see Steve tucking you into the spot closest to the wall—the farthest away from the window and therefore, the safest in case there was an attack.  He was doing his best not to wake you, though he could hear you mumbling, still half-asleep.

Natasha hesitated before continuing, “I actually…  I rescued her because I got a message through a back channel, telling me that Madame B was going to kill her and I needed to get her out.”

Bucky didn’t reply, just swallowed down the lump in his throat as he moved to crawl onto the pullout bed, choosing the spot closest to the window.  Nat seemed to realize the conversation was now officially over and got into bed with you, Wanda and Vision crawling into their own bed in the middle.  He closed his eyes as the light went out, feeling the bed dip as Steve got in.  The only thing he could hear was the steady breaths as everyone slowly feel into a deep slumber.

You sniffled as you clutched onto the super soldier, the sobs slowing down as your body ran out of water to cry.  Exhaustion was quickly catching up with you as your eyes began to flutter shut.  “I-I’m sorry, James.  I’m sorry.”

“Shhh, it’s okay, malen'kiy.  Rest,” he murmured, lips pressing to your hair.  His own cheeks were stained with tears as he felt you relax in his arms, finally giving into your body’s needs.  “I’m here. I’m here.”

He waited until you were completely asleep to stand up, cradling you to his chest.  “F.R.I.D.A.Y., please turn off the music and lights,” he whispered, being careful not to wake you.  He left the pointe shoes behind as he carried you out of the dance studio and up to your room.  He knew that you’d have to have your feet checked over tomorrow and that he really needed to talk to you about seeing Sam, but that last thing could wait until you had a full night’s rest.

Bucky laid you ever-so-gently on your bed, hesitating before grabbing a washrag and a first aid kit from your bathroom and wetting it.  He didn’t want to leave you for a single second.  He knelt beside the bed and carefully wiped the blood from your feet, wincing as he saw the open sores left from the popped blisters.

“James?”

Cursing under his breath, he said, “Go back to sleep, malen'kiy.  I’m just wiping off the blood.”

You sat up on your elbows, blinking sleepily at him.  Your eyes were puffy, cheeks red, and yet, you were still absolutely stunning.  “James, will you stay with me tonight?  Please?”

And he might’ve said no, except for the fact that that you were you and that little please at the end wrung his heart.  “Okay,” he said after a long moment, feeling a little breathless.  “Just let me finish bandaging your feet, alright?”

“Okay,” you murmured, leaning back onto the pillows.

It only took him about a minute more to finish wrapping your feet in bandages, but it felt like an absolute eternity.  “Do you want pajamas?” He asked, clearing his throat as took in the leotard and leggings you were wearing.

It seemed that your hatred for ballet tights was still just as present now as it was back in the Red Room.

He turned around as you changed, having tossed you a t-shirt, shorts, and underwear like you’d requested of him.  He felt sweaty and disgusting as he listened to the soft sounds of your leggings and leotard hitting the floor, knowing that for just a moment, you were bare.

“You can turn around now,” you said, and when he turned, you were already under the comforter and pushing back the other side so that he could get in.

His heart hammered in his chest as he crawled in beside you, his mouth feeling like a desert as he pulled the comforter up.  As soon as he was comfortable, you curled into his chest.  It left him no choice but to wrap his arm around your waist.  He closed his eyes contentedly as he felt your hot breath fan against his neck.  “F.R.I.D.A.Y., lights off.”

The room went dark and his fingers splayed against your back, holding you steady.  “Goodnight, James,” you whispered.

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

[the--highlanders]

Lifeboat

On a trip to the Earth’s future, Victoria finds a piece of her past.

on ao3.

The towering buildings pressed in around Victoria, filling the sky and half-squeezing her breath out of her lungs. When the Doctor had said they had landed in a city from the Earth’s future, she had expected to feel something like the awe of a trip to London in her own time, a city bustling with the wonders of art and invention. But for all that this city was built of metal and glass rather than stone, it seemed ancient, half-held together by overgrown vines, full of smashed windows and rusted edges. Strange pathways that she could only suppose were roads crossed over each other above her to twist and turn at angles that were almost dizzying. The gardens and plazas that seemed to fill every inch of the lowest level must have been beautiful once, but they had fallen into disarray, and the few people she passed did not stop to appreciate them, hurrying about their business in a way that lent the whole place a sense of fear.

She turned a corner and found herself greeted by a long stretch of grass, interspersed here and there with patches of muddy water. A metal plinth sat in the centre of the largest pool, much like others she had seen around the city, though this one had no hologram above it. But something else had been built over it, and the sight was so achingly familiar that she could have sworn her heart failed her for a moment. The sandstone fountain seemed to call out to her, a lone piece of home set adrift in an almost-alien landscape, and she ran down the ramp towards it, her shoes clanking strangely on the battered metal. Forgetting the sodden ground beneath her, she all but flung herself towards the fountain, kneeling in front of the wall that ringed the plinth and pressing her forehead against its cool stone in relief.

“Hello,” she murmured. “Where did you come from?” Looking up, she studied the sculpture set in the middle, a stern-looking man clutching a strange object. He seemed familiar, but her examination of his face was interrupted by the realisation that his clothes could have been taken out of her own time. A soft cry escaped her, and she buried her face in the fountain’s rim again as if sinking into a parent’s embrace. The city seemed to have no sense of history, as if it had sprung up overnight, and the Doctor had even danced around giving her a proper answer when she had asked where on Earth they were. Being faced with something so heartwrenchingly close to home ought to comfort her, she thought. And yet an awful sense of dread was settling in her stomach at the knowledge that this city had been built and grown old since the planet’s ground had last felt her footsteps. Even this fountain seemed new, its stones pristine and smooth rather than weathered and stained with soot and grime, a mockery of the world she had known.

“Are ye alright?”

The sound of Jamie’s voice sent her scrambling upright, almost toppling into the water in alarm. She adjusted her skirts hurriedly, wincing at the dark stains on her stockings. “I’m fine.” Her words came out embarrassingly uneven, and the comforting expression that filled Jamie’s face made the knot in her chest bubble into frustration. “I’m just looking around. Alone.”

“Aye, aye, I can see that.” Jamie raised his hands a little, as if in surrender. “The Doctor an’ I were just getting a wee bit worried, ye know, ‘cause we’ve never been here before, an’ we didnae want tae lose ye.”

She hung her head, cheeks reddening, watching him from behind her fringe as he nodded towards the fountain. “Who’s this, then?”

“I don’t know.” Turning away under the pretence of studying the fountain, Victoria tried to surreptitiously rub the few traces of wetness away from her cheeks. “I didn’t see a plaque.”

“There’s one round here, look. E. Rockwell.” He read the name out slowly, as if rolling it around experimentally inside his mouth. “Looks a bit lost, doesn’t he?”

Victoria smiled to herself, small and bitter and carefully hidden from Jamie. “Yes, I suppose he does.” The name rang out in her mind, and she looked up at the statue again, searching the man’s face. “My father knew someone with that name. At the Royal Society. I wonder if it’s meant to be him.”

Humming an absent agreement, Jamie sprawled himself out on the metal ramp leading up to the fountain. “Or maybe it’s some great-great-grandson. We must be pretty far in the future.” He sat up, running his finger over the letters on the plaque again. “Hey, maybe it is him. This says he was born in eighteen twenty-two.”

A jolt ran through Victoria, as if someone had touched a lightning rod to her spine. “That can’t be right.” Her heart was pounding faster than it had any right to. It was a mistake, Jamie would shake his head and read out the right date, and then they would laugh about how silly it would be to find something of her own time here, of all places, in this timeless city. It was such a small thing, she told herself – just a fountain in an overgrown park – there was no need for her head to be spinning so violently. “You must’ve got it wrong. Read it again.”

Jamie was nodding away to himself, apparently oblivious of Victoria’s urgency. “Eighteen twenty-two. That’s what it says.”

“Who is he?” Every muscle in Victoria’s body was screaming for her to get up, to read the plaque herself, but she was frozen in place. “Why did they build a statue to him?” An awful thought sprung into her mind. “Is this London?”

“Dunno.” Jamie puffed up his cheeks, blowing out a sigh. “He died… No’ that long ago, it looks like. Hundreds of years after your time.”

“That’s impossible.”

“That’s what it says.”

“What else does it say?”

Jamie shrugged. “To the man we remember.”

“What else?”

“Nothin’.”

She wanted to scream, to rush over and tear the plaque off the fountain with her bare hands, to sink down to the ground and cry all the tears she had been saving since Skaro. But instead she stood, quiet and still and proper, and said, “I don’t suppose they could have written the date wrong.”

“No,” Jamie said flatly. “I don’t suppose they could have.”

“And I suppose they are his dates of birth and death.”

“Looks like it.”

I wonder who he was. She reached out to touch the edge of the fountain, the sandstone warm against her palm, almost as if it were alive. I wonder if he was as lost as I was. She opened her mouth to speak those words, wondering if Jamie would understand, but they stuck in her throat, stinging as she swallowed them down. I wonder what happened to him.

“Do ye think he was the same man?”

“Mm?”

“Ye know, the one your father knew.”

Victoria shook her head, squeezing her eyes closed. “I don’t know,” she murmured. “I don’t know, I don’t – I don’t understand this place, Jamie. He can’t be the same man.” She glanced up at the statue again, as quickly and nervously as if she was staring at the sun. His face could have been familiar – but she had only met Rockwell once, many years ago. The stone man before her was older, his face marred by a single scar that she could only imagine had been dealt to him by some wild beast in Africa. “How could he have been born in eighteen twenty-two and have died here?”

“Well, you’re here, aren’t ye?” Jamie wandered around the fountain to stand next to her. He bumped his shoulder against hers in a way that she supposed was meant to be reassuring, but she stepped aside, leaving a wide gulf between them. “Maybe he was workin’ on time travel, like Maxtible was.”

“That couldn’t be him,” Victoria said. “He was a chemist, not a physicist.” Jamie’s closeness was scratching at the back of her mind, and she bit down on the urge to snap at him. Instead, she straightened herself up, setting her shoulders back and mustering up the most detached, commanding tone she could. “I would like to be left alone, please.”

“Oh.” A flicker of hurt crossed Jamie’s face, but he quickly settled back into an easy grin. “I’ll go an’ find the Doctor, then.” He squeezed her shoulder, and she shook him off half-heartedly. “You’ve got us, ye know.”

“I’m quite alright, thank you.”

“I know ye are.” Giving her one last sad smile, Jamie strode off across the park. She watched him go, scowling when he reached the top of the ramp and the Doctor stepped out from behind one of the raised garden beds. They leant in towards each other, murmuring something and casting glances towards her, and she tossed her head, turning her back towards them pointedly.

The statue stared back at her, cold and lifeless, and she glared at it for a long moment before her eyes began to water and her resolve faltered. The knees of her stockings and the hem of her dress were soaked through with muddy water, and she felt small and bedraggled, like a small child caught making a mess in the garden by her nanny. Slowly, reverently, she knelt down at the fountain’s edge and let the burn of held-back tears rise in her throat. They dripped down her cheeks and tumbled onto the sandstone, sinking in and vanishing. She let herself cry until no more tears came, then reached into the fountain to splash the water over her face and rub away the salt left behind. “Sorry,” she mumbled, wiping her hand dry on her skirt. The statue gazed down at her, still proud and haughty, but for a moment she could almost imagine a kindliness in his expression. “Thank you.”

Curling up more comfortably on the ground, she pressed herself against the side of the fountain, clinging to it as if it were a lifeboat and she were adrift upon the sea.

[bamby0304]

Victoria Grimes VIII: War

Ch.10: Up in Flames

Series Masterlist

Summary: Daryl and Victoria have worked through her mistakes made at the Sanctuary and have decided to keep the truth between themselves. But with the war between their communities and the Saviours brewing, their bond will be tested all over again. Lies, death and the threat of defeat are coming for Vickie… will she be strong enough to come through in one piece?

Warnings: Angst. Violence. Death.

Bamby

NPOV

I jumped out of the truck and took in the sight of Alexandria as it burnt to the ground. My people had been making quick work, blowing up every thing and every building I had ordered them to. Anyone they found was to be brought to me, however I got the feeling they weren’t going to find anyone. Not after the convoy had left.

“Well, shit. We coulda used those. Solar panels.” I shook my head with a sigh as they burned away. “That convoy, they got away, huh? All of 'em? Kid's still gotta be here. I think he wanted to go down with the ship.”

The way he’d been talking… I wasn’t wrong when I said he wasn’t lying. The kid was ready to die. Didn’t want to, not saying that, but he sure as shit was as ready as I’ve ever seen.

“Search the place,” I ordered. “Find him, tie him up. Don't kill him. Blow up every other house. I'm gonna go to Rick's, make a little spaghetti. When he shows up, send him my way.” Swinging Lucille onto my shoulder, I headed up the road, whistling a tune.

MPOV

I slammed the car door as it came to a stop at the Hilltop and stormed towards the prisoners. I’d barely slowed down before Gregory hurried to the fence as I stopped.

“Margaret, I- I understand you putting me in here. Message received, but - you know I don't belong in here.”

“Shut up.” I scanned the group of people we’d gathered inside. The Saviours.

“What happened out there?” Kal asked from behind me.

Instead of answering I pointed to one of the Saviours. “That one. Get him out.”

Gregory was in disbelief. “He gets out?”

“Maggie, what are you doing?”

I didn’t respond to Jesus as I watched as two of our people walked in and gathered the man I’d chosen. I remembered him. Tara had told me about him.

“Kal, I need your gun.” Once it was in my hand the Saviour stood in front of me. I glanced at Jesus. “This one tried to kill you.”

“Maggie, you don't wanna do this.” It was the Saviour who had thanked me for sparing them. He seemed to be the only one with his head screwed on, but that wasn’t going to save them.

“Shut up, Al!” the one in front of me snapped. “If Cupcake wants to put on a show, let her put on a show.”

Without warning, I lifted Kal’s gun, aimed, and fired. The Saviour in front of me was now dead on the ground.

My eyes landed on the one they called Al. “You wanna be next?”

He stepped back, shaking his head. “No, I don't.”

Lowering the gun, I turned to my people. “Saviours killed one of our own tonight on the road. We aren't even, but that was a start.

“Maggie-”

I cut Jesus off, “Get more guards on duty. Start fortifying the walls and bury Neil. First light, everybody else starts tending crops.”

“I thought we don't give up.”

“No, we don't. Simon said the others are under attack, which means there's no more supplies going in, but there might be people. We have to be ready. Gonna be up to Hilltop to make the last stand.”

…

After everyone was caught up on the plan and what had happened, I organised what to do with the body of the Saviour I’d killed.

It was put in the box. The one that had been meant for me, and then Neil. I’d lied though. He was never going to be buried in it. No, I’d always planned to use it to send a message.

Pulling back from the box, I looked down at the message I’d left on the nailed down lid.]

          We have 38 more. Stand down.

“Leave it where they'll find it,” I told Eduardo and Kal, trusting they’d know what to do, before I headed back inside. There was a lot more work to do… it was going to be a long night.

DPOV

Alexandria was on flames. Explosions were still going off as the Saviours destroyed the place we called home. I barely gave it a second glance, though. Vic was right, it was just a place and that meant it was replaceable. Right now I just needed to know our family was safe. Our people. Especially the kids.

Sliding open the manhole outside the gates, I grabbed a rock and dropped it into the sewers before pausing, listening for any walkers. Looking up, I shook my head as Vic.

“Okay,” she turned to Tara, “go.”

One by one, we all headed down into the underground tunnels. Tara first, then Rosita. Dwight apologised to Michonne as she stared wide eyed at our community and the flames.

“Go,” I grunted, grabbing Dwight and pushing him towards the manhole.

He did as he was told, heading down to join the others and find our people amongst the maze under our town.

Once Dwight was out of the way I started down the ladder after him, watching as Vic got ready to then follow me. She was just a few steps above when she suddenly paused.

“Michonne? What are you-”

The sound of the manhole closing cut her off.

“No!” She slammed her hand on the heavy cast-iron lid, but it didn’t budge as something heavy was dragged on top of it. “No! Michonne!” Panicked, on the verge of tears, she looked down at me. “She’s gone.”

RPOV

Our walls were down. Alexandria was on flames. I hadn’t seen a single soul. Things had gone bad, and no I had no idea where my people were. When my family was. My kids.

“Carl,” I whispered into the dark as I crept into our home from the back. “Judith. Alyssa.” There was no answer. “Victoria. Michonne.”

As I rounded the corner my gun was knocked out of my hands before I was kicked to the ground.

Negan stood over me. “This shit isn't funny anymore.” Stepping forward, he kicked at me again. I groaned at the pain, crawling back. “Don't make me do this now, Rick.” Leaning over me, he pulled my weapons out from my belt and threw them across the room. “I got plans for you. Cut you up in little bitty pieces, feed you to the dead, and make you watch.”

He pulled Lucille back, getting ready to swing. Moving quickly, I rolled out of the way before she came down on the ground where I’d been seconds before.

“Then, when you're some sort of screwed-up, creepy stump with a head,” he continued as I got to my feet, “that's when I'm gonna kill you.”

I didn’t get as much warning this time before he swung Lucille out again. She hit my stomach, knocking the wind out of me as I crumbled back down to the ground.

“In front of everybody.” He grinned down at me.

“You ever shut the hell up?” I groaned, using the dining table to pull myself to my feet.

“Nope!” He laughed, bringing the butt of his bat down on me. “You know your kid volunteered to die? What kind of boy you raise, Rick? I'm gonna fix him. 'Cause I like him. A few years, he's gonna be one of my top guys!”

He went to swing her again but I moved first, punching him the face first. He lowered Lucille, giving me a moment to get in a few more hits before he started to fight back. We were closely matched on a good day, but I was injured. Even still, I wasn’t going down easy.

Pulling back he pushed me away and into shelves that fell under the force of the shove, sending me to the ground with them.

Scoffing, he stepped forward. “When I am done with you, nobody will ever try to do what you did. Not ever again! Not your friends, not your son-”

Not shutting up was his downfall.

While he’d been going on and on with his speech, I’d been feeling around for a weapon. That how I managed to find and grab a paperweight. Getting a good grip on it, I swung around and hit him square in the jaw. He fell with a heavy thud, giving me time to get the upper hand.

Snatching Lucille from the ground, I leaned over him and used the butt of the bat and hit him over and over like he’d hit me.

“Don't you touch her!” he yelled before kicking out and pushing me away.

As I tried to regain my balance, he managed to get himself to his feet. I didn’t have a chance before he charged forward, sending us straight out the window.

This time I recovered first, and this time I didn’t fight. I ran. I needed to find my family.

…

Running between houses, trying to stay unnoticed, I kept any eye out for anyone who might be alive. At the same time I kept pressure on my ribs, trying not to think about how they might be broken again. Negan had done a number on me but I couldn’t let that stop me.

The sound of a commotion and a woman grunting had me turning a corner. It was Michonne, standing over a Saviour she no doubt took down.

“Michonne!” I ran to her, grabbing her arm. She jumped, ready to attack until she realised it was me.

Tears ran down her cheeks as I brought my hand up to cup her face. She looked broken and lost. I just hoped that wasn’t because we’d lost everyone. We couldn’t be the last ones left.

“Where are they?”

“Oh God.” She took a moment to catch her breath before grabbing my hand and leading me away.

…

We found our people. I let out a sigh of relief, seeing them huddled in the tunnels of our underground sewers. They were safe.

At least that’s what I first thought.

Looking down the tunnel, I could feel something was wrong. At the end I could see Daryl, holding Vickie to his chest as she buried her face against him. Somehow, they’d managed to get Houdini down here and now he was laying at the feet of Tara who held Judith in her arms while Aly held onto her leg, softly sobbing.

The explosions continued above us as I walked through the crowd, heading to the end of the tunnel. That’s where I found Carl.

He was sitting on the ground, leaning against the wall, pale as a ghost. Beside him knelt the guy I’d scared off before. It appeared as if he was taking care of Carl.

“I brought him here,” Carl started, drawing my attention back to him. “That's how it happened.” He pulled away the bandage on his side.

My throat tightened as I took in the wound. The bite mark.

I fell to my knees. “I-I don't-”

“Dad.”

“How-”

“Dad,” he cut me off, “it's all right. It's gotta be. I wasn't sure if you'd make it back before… but just in case, you know I wanted to make sure I was able to say goodbye.” He pulled some letters out from his pocket.

The explosions above us had me look up. My mind was reeling too much for me to really think, but all I knew was that I wanted to place the blame on something. On someone.

“It's them. It's them. They- they don't- it wasn't-”

“Carl.” Michonne was crying as she came to kneel on his other side.

Sobs had me looking up as I watched Vickie clinging to Daryl as he held. Her whole body shook as she fought to stay silent, not wanting to catch the attention of our enemies above.

Everything was wrong.

“No.” I shook my head. “No.”

Carl sighed, “I got bit. I was bringing someone back.” My attention turned to the newcomer, causing Carl to go on. “His name's Siddiq. We saw him at that gas station, before.” In shock, I looked back to my son. “It wasn't the Saviours. It just happened. I got bit.”

VPOV

The tears wouldn’t stop. I was quiet now as I stood with my husband, who was now holding our daughter. She was crying against him, understanding things without really knowing what was going on. She understood we were in danger, we were hiding, the bad people were destroying our homes and looking for us. She understood that Carl had been bitten.

I’d felt pain before. I’d felt a world of pain and more. Physical, mental, emotional, I’d felt so much… too much. But none of it felt like this.

Carl had been bitten. Carl was going to die, and then he was going to turn.

Michonne helped him on to the foldable bed he’d brought down for Siddiq, the guy he’d helped. “Is that better?” she asked.

Out of breath, Carl nodded as best as he could. “Yeah. Thanks.”

Siddiq stepped forward then, offering some medication. “I, um, I got these. They're over-the-counter, non-steroidal anti-inflammatories. They'll, um… they'll help a little with the fever. They did for my mum and dad. Please take them. Your son… he should have them.”

Dad stared at the pills. “You're a doctor?”

“I was a resident before. Yeah.”

“Your name is Siddiq?”

“Yes.”

Dad turned back to Carl. “Did you know he was a doctor? Is that why you brought him back?”

My heart broke even more. He was doing everything he could to rationalise why Carl would have put himself in danger. Why he would have snuck out to help someone who could have put everyone else at risk. Dad needed things to make sense in order to accept and understand as best as he could. Unfortunately, Carl didn’t have the answers Dad was expecting.

“He wasn't gonna make it alone. He needed us. That's why,” Carl explained.

Slowly, Dad nodded. “He was the one at the gas station.”

An explosion above us went off, shaking the tunnels. Carl erupted in a fit of coughs, sitting up quickly as he struggled to catch his breath.

I pushed away from Daryl, hurrying over to grab my brother. My baby brother.

“Careful.’ Gently, I set him back down as I looked over my shoulder. “Get me water.” Michonne was quick, handing me a bottle. “Thanks.” I offered her a gentle smile before turning back to Carl. “Sip this.”

“Easy.” Dad leaned in, watching Carl. “You got it? Slowly, slowly.”

The two of us were focused on Carl, trying our best to ignore the commotion above ground. It suddenly felt as if it wasn’t going to stop as more explosions went off.

Michonne pushed herself to her feet suddenly, storming over to Dwight. “Make it stop. Make them stop!”

He simply shook his head at her. “I can't.”

“You can,” she argued, shoving him against the wall. “You're one of them. They'll listen to you. Please. Please!” she begged.

“You said that Hilltop's safe, right?” Rosita asked, causing me to look over at her as she looked at Dwight.

“Yeah.” He nodded.

“We need to get everybody there.” Her eyes met mine. “We can get Carl there.”

“And they think all of you got away in the woods. They're out there, looking.”

Tara stood, agreeing with Rosita. “They saw us go west, so we won't go west.”

Dwight wasn’t seeing it, though. “Your best chance is to stay here until they're gone.”

“No.” Wiping away at my tears, I stood tall as I turned to my people. “Staying here means they can find us, and then we’re all dead. Heading to the Hilltop is our best bet.”

“They're almost done,” Dwight countered. “They gotta be. It wasn't about destroying the place. They don't have the ammo for that. After they let up, after they're gone, that's when we go.”

It wasn’t ideal. I knew I couldn’t be the only one wondering how much time we had before it would be too late to take Carl. But our options were limited, and as much as I wanted to protect my brother, I had to keep in mind that there were others that needed protecting, too.

Rosita shrugged. “Okay. We wait.”

“You sure going to Hilltop's the best plan?” Dwight asked.

“You got a better one?”

“All of you in one place, together…”

Daryl nodded. “All of us together… we'll be their worst damn nightmare.”

RPOV

I watched as Michonne took care of Carl. She watched him, like a mother. She never replaced Lori, but she was good to my kids. I knew this was hurting her, too.

“You left. You were supposed to be resting.”

Michonne smiled down at him. “I'm not tired.”

He chuckled lightly. “Yeah. You look great.”

I wiped away my tears as Vickie leaned her head against me while we sat on the ground against the wall. We were watching, unable to do anything other than wait.

Carl grew serious as he whispered something to Michonne I didn’t catch.

My attention was caught by Scott as he spoke up, “Sounds like they're letting up.”

It was only then that I realised the noises from above ground had lessened. They’d been drowned out by my reeling thoughts long ago as my brain tried to get a grasp on what was happening. I tried to think of a way to fix it all, but everything I considered I knew would fail.

There was no coming back from a bite from a walker.

Rosita nodded, looking up at the roof of the tunnel that stood just a couple of feet above us. “Looks like you were right. They're leaving.”

“Maybe.” Daryl turned to me. “Want me to go take a look?”

I nodded without saying a word.

He stepped up to Vickie and me, handing my granddaughter over to my daughter. He pressed a kiss to Vickie’s head and whispered something before heading down the tunnel to go check if the coast was really clear.

Turning back to Carl, I watched him, hoping we hadn’t left it too long.

VPOV

Daryl stepped up to me as I stood with Judith in my arms, rocking her back and forth. Aly was sitting by my feet, with Houdini, clutching her stuffed deer to her chest.

“They’re gone.”

I nodded, clutching my sister to me a little harder. Daryl took notice in the change, stepping closer to pull my head to his shoulder. My chest and throat ached from repressed tears. I couldn’t let myself cry anymore. I wouldn’t let myself.

“The Saviours are gone,” Michonne told Dad. “We can get everyone to Hilltop. We can get Carl there.”

“Carl?” Dad shook his head. “No.”

Something inside me broke.

“Daryl can get one of the cars,” Michonne suggested.

But Dad was adamant. “Carl won't make. He can't leave here. I have to stay with him.”

My grip on Judith slipped.

Daryl was quick to grab her as I reached for the wall to hold me up. I’d been holding onto the idea of taking Carl to the Hilltop. I wanted to make things easier for him. Give him pain meds, a soft bed, surround him with everyone he loved.

It couldn’t end like this. Not with him in the tunnels of the sewers under our fallen home. Not without everyone who cared for him.

“He can't.” Dad shook his head. “I have to stay.”

Understanding, Michonne nodded. “We'll both stay.”

Dad turned to me then. “Will you- will you take Judith? She needs to be there.”

A sob broke through my lips. “You can’t… you can’t ask me to do this,” I cried. “I can’t leave him. I can’t… I can’t-”

He grabbed me, keeping me from falling. “You have to go. You have to be there for your daughter. For Judith. If anything-” His voice broke. “If… happens-”

Daryl was next to us then, grabbing Dad’s shoulder with his free hand. “I'll take ‘em. I'll get ‘em there. I'll keep ‘em safe. I got this.”

“Let me say goodbye,” Carl voice croaked.

I watched as Daryl took Judith over to him, setting her right by the edge of Carl’s bed. Aly scurried over, grabbing Judith’s hand as Houdini whined where he lay.

Carl smiled at the two little girls. “You be good, okay?” His gaze focussed on our sister. “You be good for Michonne. For dad. You gotta honour him. Listen when he tells you stuff. You don't have to always. Sometimes, kids got to show their parents the way.”

Judith let out a sound that broke my heart all over again at the same time Aly wrapped her arms around my baby sister.

“You do me a favour?” Car started, making Aly pull back and look at him again. She nodded, wiping away tears with the back of her hand. “I need you to take care of your mum,” he told her. “Need to you make sure she’s okay. Cause I know she’s strong and tough, but… but sometimes she needs someone to be strong and tough for her. Think you can do that?”

Aly suddenly wrapped her arms around Carl’s neck as she cried. “I love you, Uncle Carl.”

That’s when I crumbled. I fell to the ground as I watched my daughter say goodbye to my brother.

When she pulled back, he took his hat off and gave it one last look over before putting it on Judith’s head. “This was dad's before it was mine. Now it's yours. I don't know… just- just having it and… it always kept Dad with me. It made me feel as strong as him. It helped me. Maybe it'll help you, too. Before Mum died, she told me that I was gonna beat this world. I didn't. But you will. I know you will.”

Judith started crying then, the sound echoing off the walls.

“Here we go.” Daryl picked her up and set her on his hip while he grabbed Aly’s hand with his free one. His set his eyes on my brother then, a sad but proud look in his eyes. “These people. You saved them all. That's all you, man.”

“Take care of my sisters.”

Daryl nodded. “I will. I promise.”

As Daryl stepped back, Carl then turned to me. Tears streamed down my face as I pushed myself up, only to drop by his bed. I looked down at him as he grew more and more pale and sickly by the minute.

“I feel like I failed you,” I cried. “You’re my baby brother. I’m supposed to protect you.”

“Can’t protect me forever.”

I met his gaze then. “You didn’t tell me. All day… you didn’t tell me.”

“I’m sorry. I wanted to, but I couldn’t. I didn’t want to worry you.” Grabbing my hand, he gave it a squeeze. “Everything else I said was true. Mum really would be proud of you. I know I am.”

The dam broke inside me as I wailed, my head dropping to his chest as I cried my heart out.

“Come on, Vic. We gotta go.” Daryl’s hand landed on my chest. “We gotta go.”

Tara and Sasha helped me to my feet, holding me as I grew limp, unable to stop crying. I didn’t fight as I was led away from my brother. I didn’t have it in me to struggle. All I could do was cry, knowing I was never going to see my brother again.

CPOV

Seeing Vickie broke my heart. Watching as she had to be practically carried out of the tunnels… it hurt worse than the disease eating away at me.

“You were helping me honour my Mum…”

I looked to Siddiq, fighting the urge to cry. “Not just yours. Mine, too.”

“You brought me here. You gave me a chance. I know I can never repay you. But I can honour you by showing your people, your f-friends, your- your family that what you did wasn't for nothing. That it mattered. That it- That it meant something. Because it did. So that's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna honour you, Carl.”

I reached out, offering him my hand. He took it, holding it carefully as I smiled up at him. “Congratulations. You're stuck with us.”

Whether anyone else liked it or not, he was now family. I was just happy he got to be part of mine before I died.

RPOV

Michonne and I were doing everything we could to make sure Carl was as comfortable as possible. It pained me, but I knew I had to stay strong for him. If I was being honest, the only thing getting me through it all was my shock.

I wanted to best for him. I always had and I always will.

Looking around the tunnels, I shook my head and turned to Michonne. “I need your help.”

“With what?”

“Getting him out of here.”

He might not be able to make it to the Hilltop, but I wasn’t letting him die in the sewers.

…

With one of Carl’s arms over my shoulders and his other over Michonne’s we carried him through Alexandria, trying to find any place we could set him down. I wanted to find a working car as we could get him away from the fire, but I had a feeling there weren’t going to be any left.

Instead, we’d take him home. He’d be more comfortable at home.

“We need to stop.”

“The house up ahead,” I grunted, moving as quickly but also as carefully as I could. We can make it.”

Carl shook his head. “It's okay. Just put me down here. It's okay.”

“No. We'll make it.”

“Please.” At the sound of him begging, I stopped.

He was in pain. He didn’t have much time left. As much as I wanted to take him home, I realised I needed to listen to him. He couldn’t make it, so I couldn’t force him.

“There.” Michonne gestured to the church.

It had mostly burned down but it was still standing. The flames had died, leaving it somewhat safe. While it wasn’t home, or comfortable, it was better than being in the sewers or out in the open.

With another grunt, I turned towards the church and started for it.

Once inside, Michonne and I took him to the alter and set him down on the ground where there was minimal dirt and rubble. We were gentle and careful, making sure we didn’t cause him anymore pain than he was already in.

“Thanks for- for getting me here,” he breathed heavily.

“I'm- I'm sorry. I-I just I didn't I didn't want you out there. I-I-”

“No. No for getting me here. For- For making it so I could be who- who I wound up.” He paused, looking away before meeting my gaze again. “Back at the prison when we got attacked… there was a kid, a little older than me. He had a gun. He was- He was starting to put it down, and I-I sh… I shot him. He was- He was giving it up, and I- I just I shot him. I think about him. What I did to him and how- how easy it was to just kill him.”

I shook my head. “Carl, no. No. What happened what you'd lost- all those things you had to- all those things you had to do. You- you- you- you were just- you were just a boy.”

“And you saw it. What it did… how- how easy it got,” he told me. “That's why you changed. Why you brought those people from Woodbury in. You brought them in, and we all lived together. We were enemies. You put away your gun. You did it so I could change, so I could be who I am now. What you did then… how you- how you stopped fighting… it was right. It still is. It can be like that again. You can still be like that again.”

He was wrong. “I can't be who I was. It's different now.”

“You can't kill all of 'em, Dad. There's gotta be something after. For you and for them. There's gotta be something after. I know you can't see it yet… how it could be. But I have. You have a beard. It's- It's bigger and greyer. Michonne's happy. Judith is older, and she's listening to the songs that I used to before. Vickie has a family of her own- kids of her own. Alexandria's bigger. There's- there's new houses, crops and people working. Everybody living helping everybody else live. If you can still be who you were that's how it could be. It could.”

“Carl. It was all for you. Right from the start. Back in Atlanta, the farm… everything I did, it was for you and Victoria. Then, at the prison, it was for you and your sisters. It still is. It's gonna be. And nothing, nothing is gonna change that.”

“I want this for you, Dad.”

He needed this. My son was dying in front of me, asking me for this one favour. It felt impossible, but it was his last wish. His dying wish.

“I'm gonna make it real, Carl.” I nodded, feeling tears fall from my face. “I promise. I'm gonna make it real.”

My boy. My baby boy…

“Carl I'm sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't protect you. A father's job is to protect his son.”

“Love,” he corrected. “It's just to love.”

I watched as he then pulled out his gun. “No. No.”

Michonne could barely form a sentence as she cried, “Carl. It- It- It- It should be-”

He nodded. “I know. I know. Somebody you love. When you can't do it yourself. But I still can. I grew up. I have to do this. Me.” He cried then, looking up at her. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

He then turned to me. “I love you, dad.”

I choked on my sobs, looking down at my son as he held a gun to his head. “I love you, Carl. I love you so much. I'll make it real. I will. I will.”

Michonne helped me to my feet then, walking us away. She knew he wouldn’t want us to see this. Me to see this.

I stood outside on the porch of the church, when I heard the sound of his gun going off.

Carl was dead. My son. My boy. He was gone.

Bamby

[saleintothe90s]

399. The “Cats” round up

This week was Halloween, and this year I went as Jemima from Cats. Why did I decide on this costume? Well, seeing the trailer (and H3H3′s reaction to it) for the scary 2019 movie with those basic b’s Taylor and James made me want to see the original Cats, the good Cats. 

You can watch most of the direct to VHS 1998 edition on YouTube in parts. So far, its the only musical that doesn’t bore me to tears, even if the scenes where they perform a play for Old Deuteronomy makes no sense. 

You know what Cats sorta reminds me of, that old PBS show Zoobilee Zoo, especially Victoria the white cat, she reminds me of the pink kangaroo lady. 

Cats came to New York City in October of 1982 after beginning a successful run in London. It was announced at the end of 1981 that the musical would be coming to New York:

Anticipation was so great that copies of T.S. Eliot’s original work was selling out: 

(I’m mad I can’t find this commercial)

Tickets for the show were sold months in advance, with many bulk orders: 

More than six months before opening night, the Fresh Air Fund had already bought 500 seats. The Arthritis Foundation purchased 300 tickets, the Archives of American Art bought 300, and the American Red Cross bought 500 seats. Then there was the Burden Center for Aging with 300, University Settlement with 200 and the Social Service Big Sister League with 500 seats. Those are just a handful among many, but by the time ''Cats'' opened on Broadway last week such orders added up to $6.2 million in advance ticket sales. Of that sum, $4.5 million had already been collected, with only $1.7 million in contracts still to be paid in full. This could be the largest advance sale in Broadway history, according to many theater analysts. Orders began to come in more than a year before ''Cats'' - a big hit in London - finally arrived in New York, and tickets are now being sold as far in advance as next May. 2

The musical debut was also supposed to be a cover story in Newsweek, but the Tylenol murders prevailed. 2 

Someone defaced the copy at archive.org. 

I somehow found the cover though. I wonder if this was for Canada? There are people on sketchy websites selling this as a print? The library bound Newsweek from archive.org has the Tylenol cover. I believe the woman on the bottom row, right is Janet Hubert, who played Aunt Viv the first on Fresh Prince. In Cats, she played Tantomile in the first Broadway cast. 

(I made screencaps of the Newsweek article and uploaded the screencaps to the mirror site on wordpress)

As you may have noticed these Cats from the early 80s are kind of scary looking. There are several videos on YouTube of the cast performing at the 1983 Tony Awards, and there is this cat that is absolutely terrifying: 

It’s the one who sings “can you see in the dark?!”.  I think its Demeter, and Marlene Danielle is playing her? Marlene was an originally an understudy in 1982 and eventually played Bombularina until the end of Cats’ run on Broadway in 2000. 

Here she is on Today in 1999 discussing the role and she also performs “Macavity”.

The cats of Cats became so popular in the 1980s that they were even in a No Smoking commercial. 

And a seat buckle/child seat PSA! This one is really dark, I mean Memory plays at the end. 

In 1984, Rum Tum Tugger became the star of his own music video. 3 I don’t know how often MTV played this--maybe it played more overseas. I remember my choir teacher in high school, Ms. Forrest showing us a VHS once of music videos from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musicals, and she said that they were popular in the UK and shown on MTV over there. All I remember is a Phantom of the Opera remix and Requiem sung by his ex-wife. 

By 1987, Celine Dion (who was still a music star in Canada, but not yet America, and sung mostly in French) sang Memory on TV. 

In this clip from the short lived America’s Talking channel (later to become MSNBC) a reporter asks the cats what they did on their snow day during the 1996 blizzard. I can’t confirm this, but he says that it was the first time the show had ever been canceled. This reporter is peak 1996 in mens clothes with his bomber jacket and tie. 

By June of 1997, Cats broke the record previously held by A Chorus Line of longest running show on Broadway:

Along the way to its longevity record, which applies just to Broadway shows, ''Cats'' has piled up some big numbers. It has provided employment to 231 actors, two of whom, Marlene Danielle and Susan Powers, have been with the musical since it opened. (Nineteen cast members have died.) The magical tire that carries Grizabella heavenward has clocked more than 114 miles in its nightly voyage to the Heaviside Layer. ''Memory,'' the show-stopping song that ends the first act, has been recorded by more than 180 artists. The New York production has used more than 1.5 million pounds of dry ice and 2,706 pounds of yak hair for wigs. It has sold 390,000 T-shirts, 130,000 sweat shirts, 147,000 lapel pins and 1.14 million souvenir books. 1

Also, in 1997 an audience member because she thought Rum Tum Tugger was too aggressive with her. 

Related: 

Original review from The New York Times

Reading Rainbow segment on Cats

Another Reading Rainbow segment on Cats, similar to the first.

Stars of the Original Cats Share Their Favorite Memories

Los Angeles news segment series on the L.A. Production of Cats. 

Almost every time our boy David Letterman brought up Cats. 

The Cast of CATS (2016) Meets Shelter Cats | Cats the Musical

EVENT CAPSULE CLEAN - Grumpy Cat Visits The Broadway Cast of 'Cats' Facebook | Etsy | Retail History Blog | Twitter | snapchat (thelastvcr) |YouTube Playlist| Random Post | Instagram @ thelastvcr | other tumblr | Ko-fi donation | Honey Referral

1, Grimes, William, “ With 6,138 Lives, 'Cats' Sets Broadway Mark,” New York Times, June 19, 1997. https://www.nytimes.com/1997/06/19/theater/with-6138-lives-cats-sets-broadway-mark.html

2. Bennetts, Leslie, “ HOW TICKETS TO 'CATS' BECAME A 'MUST',” New York Times, October 13, 1982. https://www.nytimes.com/1982/10/13/theater/how-tickets-to-cats-became-a-must.html

3. Kaplan, Peter W., “TV NOTES; BROADWAY FIRST: 'CATS' DOES ROCK VIDEO TURN,” New York Times, November 10, 1984.  https://www.nytimes.com/1984/11/10/theater/tv-notes-broadway-first-cats-does-rock-video-turn.html

[handweavers]

so i think both the wheel and the carder were handmade by craftspeople in the 80s at the latest because neither have any company branding or anything on them and i found a receipt with the carder for a replacement part receipt and the original order slip from a small fiber company in victoria, british columbia that's dated july 1985. there are signs of wear and grime on them that clearly are not due to mishandling but age, and i suspect prior to their donation to the museum that they sat in storage or in a basement unused for several years. they likely belonged to someone's late grandma or great aunt and were donated to the museum by her family.