#Yes it glows under ultraviolet light

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 256

Look, Bruce had had no plans to be a cryptid, he swore. 

Vigilante? Yes. Dark abomination of the night? No. And he was, he was technically just a dude. A well trained (and maybe feral) human, but still just a human! Apparently not to the rest of Gotham, and he honestly should have nipped those rumors when they first started. 

But like, it was also perfect for his secret identity. No one exactly expected an undead shadow-beast to have a secret identity after all. Or an undead shadow beast and some sort of ghost child to have ones, as the small child- which turned to small children- he’d taken in discovered. 

Which, look, he had tried to get Dick (and later Barbara, and Jason, and Tim, and Steph, and by the time of Duke and Cass had given up) to stop. He had tried everything he could but no, nothing could stop them. Literally nothing that he had done could stop any of them, so he had trained them instead. 

And the children were all little shits. At least by the fact that Nightwing had lead the newly-made Justice League right where he was perching, continuing to chitter and giggle near hysterically as he ducked behind him. 

And somehow they were here to try and recruit him. Great. 

[girldragongizzard]

Chapter 15: Draconinity

What can I do?

The funny thing is, the police are actually holding my territory for me while I’m away. Whitman is likely in no shape to tangle with them while they’re there. And I can hear that they’re still there.

I can also hear that Wilhelm and Waits are not directly hurting each other, but still facing off, with low cries and calls coming from the direction of where I’d left them.

Maybe I can salvage this?

I’m at a loss.

And I’m hurting more.

I’m hunkered down in the garage, breathing as long and slow and deeply as my body will let me, which isn’t very, and I’m trying to make sense of the messages on my tablet. But there are too many words and I’m too discombobulated.

I can see, though, that more of my humans have joined the group. That’s a good thing.

And I get the gist that the Council sessions adjourned unresolved shortly after tonight’s action began, with notes of alarm and confusion from Council members.

Oh, shit, my back is starting to really sting.

I don’t think it’s as bad as what Astraia suffered at the claws of Loreena, but it makes me think of going to the vet anyway, and I reflexively let out a few nervous knocks of I guess it’s laughter.

Then I fall silent and still and wait for Waits and Wilhelm to zero in on me.

Which it doesn’t sound like they’re doing.

OK.

Shift.

Chapman’s still keeping tabs on me, if more slowly.

A couple moments later, a message from hir appears in our group chat.

“Meg. A child approaches.”

And then I hear the scrunch of gravel under sneaker.

Oh, no.

“What do?” I type.

And just as I hear and see the child come into view, the reply returns, “I’m not Morphius.”

“Oh,” a soft, low voice says, and I look up.

As I’ve gotten older and less human and further removed from my middle school years, I’ve had a harder time gauging the ages of, well, all humans. But if I were to hazard a guess, I’d want to say that this one was around 13 or 14. Voice just recently dropped from testosterone, most likely. Maybe that would be 15.

They’re small, still, though. Mousy brown shag cut for hair, and a T-shirt with a graphic I do not understand on it. Basketball shorts and some brand of garish sports shoes that are probably reasonably supportive and cost more than the amount of use they’re likely to see is worth.

In the night, even in the light cast by the bulb by the back door, they seem to glow to me. Not just the details that are in ultraviolet, but an overall lightness in color than the surrounding world. That’s their heat.

I’m used to that from whoever I look at now, and have been since I first really noticed it, but it’s a detail that really strikes me in the moment for some reason.

“What are you doing in there, little guy?” the teenager asks.

Little. I’m bigger than they are.

I look down at my tablet, hit home, hit the ACC app, and then hit the words, “Am girl.”

“Oh!” They say. “I’m a boy, uh, he/him. My name is Jeremy. You look hurt. Were you fighting those other dragons dad’s watching?”

“Yes,” I say.

Speaking of the other dragons, I hear that squabbling die down considerably. And then, as Jeremy continues to talk to me, I watch as Waits hops into view down at the intersection of the alleyway and the street, looks down at the two of us talking, and then continues on toward their home on foot without a word.

Both choppers are getting quieter, too, and there aren’t any sirens anymore.

“I didn’t know dragons could talk,” he says. “Though, I guess that makes sense, because some of you can in the stories the movies are based on. But, I don’t think anybody has said that real dragons can talk.” He squints and tilts his head. “You were a person once, right?”

“Yes. No,” I answer. Then take the time to type out, “Therian.” I’m making a pretty educated guess he’ll know what that means.

“Oh, yeah. I guess that makes sense,” he replies.

“Other dragons AAC?” I ask, and then point at my tablet and tilt my head.

“I guess? I don’t know what AAC is, but I’m guessing you mean text to speech?” he asks. “Obviously, yeah. I mean, the Prime Minister of the Czech Republic is literally still leading his country, and done interviews over text, so, yeah.” He shrugs. “Though, everyone says that’s not going to last. We learned that in school, anyway.”

That interests me. That gives me the idea that what I want to do locally should be possible, even if I have no real clear idea about how to go about it.

I want to talk to Jeremy a lot more, right now, so I go to start asking another question.

But he says, “Look, I’m supposed to close the garage door and get back to my dad. And you can’t be in there when I close it. He’s gonna wonder why I’m taking so long. You know what I’m saying?”

“Yes,” I say, and move to put my tablet away.

I don’t really need to interview Jeremy to do my research and thinking. It was just nice to be talking to someone who’s not trying to hurt me tonight, really.

“Can I ask you something?” he asks me as I start to walk out of the garage, with him backing up.

“Yes,” I say.

“What’s it like –”

I interrupt him by saying, “Stop.” Then I say, slowly, “Yes. No.”

“Oh,” he says, kind of glumly. Then cheers up a bit, “That’s why you were using the tablet for the other words. Me dumb. Got it. Um.. Do you like being a dragon?”

I give him a good cat smile and say, “Yes.”

“Cool.”

—

I don’t fly home.

I crawl by way of one of the bridges that Waits hasn’t claimed as their lair. And I’m quiet about it.

It takes me longer, but I manage to make it.

The only problem is that the police are still camped out on my block with lights flashing. Especially in front of my fire escape.

So, if I want to get back onto my roof, I’ve gotta fly. And if I do, they’ll probably see or hear me land. And I don’t know and can’t see what’s waiting up there for me. The heat of the day is still radiating off the top of it and giving me no clues.

Instead, I bypass my building by circling around it from two blocks away and head toward the parking garage that’s a street East and a street South of my building. Well within my territory. It’s not as tall as my building, but it’ll give me a decent lookout.

While I’m making this journey, I’m thinking to myself, “You can never go home.” Which sure is melodramatic, but it feels like it fits anyway. Too much of my life has been never-being-able-to-go-home before this, anyway.

And I’m also out of immediate contact with my friends, because I’m walking and I can’t chat on my tablet while doing that.

But I do feel a couple more shifts from Chapman, and in the process learn that they seem to have figured out where I’m going and plan to meet me there. And when I sneak in via the Southern-most entrance to the structure, from the alley and down a set of steps to the bottom floor, Chapman’s there.

“Don’t go to the roof,” sie says. “That’s where the helicopter that I altered ended up landing, and they’ve got people there guarding it. Please also don’t ask questions.”

“Yes,” I say.

“You’re injured,” sie leans in to look at my shoulder and back. “That looks really nasty. No wonder you didn’t fly.”

“Yes,” I respond.

“I’m worried about the injuries you’re all doing to each other,” Chapman says, almost poking at it. “It’s not good for any of you, and I doubt any doctors or vets will serve you, with the way things are going right now. Those gashes on Astraia looked like they should kill her. I’m hoping they don’t even make her sick, but all I can do is hope. For now.”

Now that I’m in the light of the entrance of the parking garage, which isn’t great, but works wonderfully for my eyes, I can see my injury clearly.

Oh, yeah, this is part of how I know what my markings look like! I haven’t mentioned that in the excitement of everything else, but I can preen myself almost like a swan. There are still a few scales here and there that I can’t reach with my tongue or eyes, but I can reach those with my wing claws. I mean, obviously, I can’t look at the back of my own head.

It’s a gnarly gash and kinda scary to look at.

It’s not muscle deep, though, I don’t think. Looks like it made it to my subcutaneous fat. There’s a layer of white visible that’s marked with red blood. And it did bleed a lot, because there’s dried blood all over my back. But it is bleeding much less now.

Astraia’s wounds cut into muscle, visibly from across the street.

“Yes,” I say again.

“I’m thinking you should go for the other parking garage that’s even further away,” Chapman suggests. “You’ll want a good place to do your morning calls, away from the police presence, with lots of escape options and decent visibility. But it’s still just barely in your territory. When you chased Hippoface out of town, you got their territory.”

Oh, that’s what I had thought might have been the case.

Sie holds up a finger and says, “That’s not like some dragon custom, either. Not from what I’m seeing globally. There is no dragon culture. You all work things out and are making your own cultures regionally, locally to you, based on who you were to begin with, from what I can see.” Sie looks at the floor. “Which is admittedly a lot more than most people can see. But I’m sure historians and dracopsychologists will look back and come to the same conclusions.” Sie looks pointedly back at me. “Most of you were all raised by humans. You have dragon feelings, but you think like humans. You interpret your feelings from a human cultural perspective.”

I tilt my head quizzically. I’m going to have to think about that. It feels like it matches some of my previous thoughts and observations, but now I’m not sure how to untangle it all. What is draconic and what is human?

“Come,” Chapman says and starts heading back up the stairs I just came down. “Let’s get you to your new spot, and I’ll fill you in on the way while I text everyone to update them on your status.”

“Yes.”

—

The next morning. Saturday. August 31. A full week since I first woke up as a physical dragon.

I lead the morning cries again, but this time from the southern parking garage.

And while I’m doing that, I’m thinking about the dreams I’ve been having for the past week. I know I’ve been having them. But I only remember them vaguely. Until last night’s dreams.

It had seemed like the dreams of Friday night a week ago, that ushered in my new life, had been the last vivid dreams of my life, but not anymore.

That night I’d dreamt that I’d gone back to school naked. College, I think. One of those nightmares. Only, when I looked down and discovered that that was the case, I solved the problem by tearing off my disguise, and spent the rest of the dream as the dragon I was always meant to be. And it was great!

Last night, on the other hand, I dreamt that I was touring the world and talking to dragons from different communities, and learning how they did things. It was like a continuation of Chapman’s discussion with me. Maybe like I was processing it, internalizing it, and making sense of it.

It was also, most of it, a really great dream. But it was clearly a dream, because no matter where I went I was able to talk to any dragon just as if we both spoke English perfectly fine. Only, it was dream speech, with no actual words most of the time. We were just sort of conversationally thinking at each other with our dream syrinxes.

I don’t think that itself was a breakthrough of any sort. Just a convention I sort of learned from shows like Star Trek with their universal translator, or other science fiction or fantasy stories where everyone just speaks the same language, which is usually English. I’ve had a lot of experience with linguistic barriers this past week, but it’s still all in the context of English for everyone around me, including myself. So, I haven’t been training myself to think outside of that language, obviously.

But it’s got me thinking about the morning territory calls.

I’ve been calling them challenging cries, or calls of challenge. And, yes, we’ve all been using them outside of the morning routine, and I used my own last night to terrorize two other dragons.

But it really feels different in the morning.

It’s almost more like we’re just calling out our own names to let each other know we’re still alive, still here, and to say something like, “Good morning, everyone!”

And it especially feels like that when every dragon I’ve met personally, plus at least one more, has been injured in some way.

Anyway, to hear it from Chapman, apparently a lot of dragons worldwide do fight upon seeing each other, especially when caught in one another’s territory. But not all of them. There are some corners of the globe where that’s not happening at all. Usually specific towns or small cities in the smaller countries. Where the population is big enough to still pack the dragons nearly as tightly as here, but in a smaller area. But where the local culture is just somehow conducive to not thinking in terms of the whole alpha/beta/omega garbage that got misinterpreted from wolves and spread around so thoroughly where European languages might be spoken, even in trade.

I’ve also read that that garbage is still kind of applicable to wolves. And some – lupologists? – people who study wolves still stick to that interpretation and provide lots of evidence for it from the wild. But then lots of other evidence is provided to counter various claims of the theory. And the general conclusion that is agreed upon is that some sort of anthropomorphization is going on that needs to be kept in check.

Anyway, dragons aren’t wolves!

We are the furthest thing from pack hunters entirely!

Most of us are very solitary ambush predators, from the looks of it. And our instincts tend to make us very decent guardians. Which matches all the myths.

I do wonder, for personal reasons that haunt the back of my mind, if some of those guardian instincts come from the need to protect clutches of eggs as much as needing to claim feeding grounds and chase competitors away.

I also wonder what my hoarding instincts are meant for. Collecting food for lean months? Or collecting something for mating rituals? Or, what?

I’d take the time to look it up for birds, like crows and ravens, that are known to collect shiny things. But less than halfway through the morning roll call, police sirens from around my building start up and, I presume, start heading my way.

Just as expected.

Now to try out escape plan A, as proposed and arranged by Chapman.

Without any humans around, sie felt much more free in introducing me to what sie can do. Sie did ask me to swear to secrecy as well, but not the same kind of vow. Not as verbally binding.

Hir vow isn’t bound by magic, by the way. It’s just a solemn promise to protect hir knowledge and sources of it, and to keep hir practices as secret and hidden as possible. With some strategic loopholes worked into the specific wording so that sie can still function and do hir practices without explicitly breaking the promise. But, failure to comply only leads to being found out.

And, sie figures that that can be bad enough.

For me, sie just asked that I don’t write any of it down, nor tell any human about any of it. Not immediately, at least.

And then sie gave me the most clichéd MacGuffin ever, which I’ve been keeping in my purse. An amulet. Or pendant, really. I’m using the word amulet because it sounds more magical.

It’s really simple looking, though.

It’s a silver chain with a big silver venus symbol on it. Like, woo, feminism!

With an emphasis on the “woo”, though.

It has Chapman’s signature style of sigils engraved all over the back of it. Which is why it’s as big as it is, because these ones are extremely complicated.

When sie’d handed it to me, sie had said, “A lot of my work takes a lot of preparation. And, I’ve been working on this one for a few years, specifically for someone like you.” Sie lowered hir head to look at me through hir brows. “I’m implying a lot there that I’m not going to explain. Suffice it to say, this might be the most vulgar craftsmanship you will witness from me for at least half a decade.” Then sie had looked over at the stairwell of the Southern parking garage and said, “I’ve also spent part of yesterday preparing this space for you, in case you needed it. And there’s a change of clothes in a duffel bag under the stairs back there. You will know when to use them.”

I had tilted my head, just as I am doing now as I pull the pendant from my purse with a single claw. I feel like putting it on is going to be really tricky, despite what sie had said. It’s not big enough to fit over my head, even without my horns. And I can’t work a clasp.

“When you need to use it, just hold the loop open with both your claws and start to slip your snout into it. It will take care of the rest,” sie had said. “It’s been pretty warm in the mornings, so it might not be so chilly. But, from what I understand, the sense of temperature might be a shock to you all the same.”

With that in mind, I do as instructed.

And everything happens exactly as sie had described.

And, realizing that, I run, slap slap slap slap, to the stairwell. On two feet. Thinking as I go, I should have done that in the stairwell!

And something feels wrong.

[the-living-soup]

Can I have a fun fact? :3

Absolutely yes!

Today we will talk about Bioluminescence!

So! Bioluminescence is light emitted by living organisms through chemical reactions in their bodies. Most bioluminescent organisms are found in the sea and in the ocean at great depths, where this little and soft light it's the only visible thing all around.

Bioluminescence it's often used by living beings to hunt prey, defend against predators and find mates.

Biologists and engineers are studying the chemicals and circumstances involved in bioluminescence to understand how people can use the process to make life easier and safer.

Green fluorescent protein (GFP), for instance, is a valuable "reporter gene." Reporter genes are chemicals that biologists attach to other genes they are studying to help them better identify the part of the organism they are trying to study or modify (a lot of OGM get injected with GFP), GFP reporter genes are in fact easily identified and measured, usually by their fluorescence.

This allows scientists to trace and monitor the activity of the studied gene—its expression in a cell, or its interaction with other chemicals.

Other uses are more experimental. Bioluminescent trees, for instance, could help light city streets and highways. This would reduce the need for electricity. Bioluminescent crops and other plants could luminesce when they needed water or other nutrients, or when they were ready to be harvested. This would reduce costs for farmers and agribusiness.

HAVING SAID THAT!

There are other types of bioluminescence, types that are not visible to the naked human eye.

Many animals, even mammals, produce other chemicals that make them glow, and it's possible for us to see it through UV light.

Scientists are discovering dozens of mammals that glow under ultraviolet light, from flying squirrels, to wombats, to African springhares, to other more common animals that we encounter on our everyday life.

And, as scientists are now learning, biofluorescence is more common in mammals than we realized.

AND! If you're thinking "wow, that's so cool! I wish I could do that, I wish I was bioluminescent", then my friend I have great news for you!

In fact, You Can't See It, But Humans Actually Glow With Our Own Form of Bioluminescence

According to a study conducted in 2009 by Japanese researchers, human bioluminescence in visible light exists - it's just too dim for our weak eyes to pick up on. "The intensity of the light emitted by the body is 1,000 times lower than the sensitivity of our naked eyes."

The team made this odd discovery using super-sensitive cameras to monitor five healthy male volunteers for 20 minutes every 3 hours inside a light-tight room for three days straight (in between sleep, of course).

They found that participants 'glowed' throughout the day, with the brightest spots appearing around the forehead, neck, cheeks in the late afternoon. The dimmest bioluminescence was recorded late at night.

And this wasn't infrared radiation caused by heat - despite how the images might appear. Those signals are actually from photons of visible light (light particles) not caused by heat:

(Images taken by Google)

☆☆So the next time someone tells you you're glowing, you'll know they're speaking the truth.☆☆

[wtfgaylittlezooid]

Question about the Nightlight RPG. Are nocturnal animals created by the Moon? Like I assume the answer is yes but most nocturnal animals don’t really resemble what we have seen what the Moon has made.

Also fun fact: Platypus fur glows a bluish-green under ultraviolet light.

Nope!

When I said the Sun creates simple life, it follows the "birth > life > death," cycle as well as the rules of physics, natures, etc. The only ones that don't are the Lighthouses as they are quite literally light but alive and don't really die.

The Moon's creations don't follow that. Animals and people can cheat death (the mellified man shopkeeper) by complete chance, people can cheat science (invisible man), and the Moon took inspiration from the Sun with how things go. And star life cycles are weird. Consistency is rare in the Moon's creations, even in the ones that take inspiration from the Sun's creations

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

i utterly adore this you cannot even comprehend, i am printing this out and putting it on the fridge.

for those who have yet to read the horror plucked from my mindscape that is the Grinch x Tony fic, this is in fact a canonical scene from Chapter 5:

“You’re not actually going to eat it. Please tell me you’re not really going to eat it.”

“I caught it, it’s mine.”

“You’re bluffing.”

“Smothered in onions, I say!”

“Grinchy, it’s green. It is green and it glows.”

“I’m green.”

“And do you glow?” 

“Under ultraviolet light, yes.”

“...Grinchy what?”

I am celebrating my BIRTHDAY and here is my WISHLIST!

5 dollars, i would like 5 dollars (paypal / kofi)

$2+ ko-fi subscribers! (to help me build monthly income, you are my bread my butter and my cheese)

$10+ = a lovely restaurant meal

$30 = one day’s rent

grinch x tony the tiger original fanart because it causes psychic distress and i thrive on that!

i would absolutely love if someone could find a photo of a featherless flamingo bc i've looked but all i could find was this photoshopped raptor chicken

[darnell]

Old News But New To Me: Platypuses Boast Ultraviolet Glow‽

National Geographic emailed me recently about Platypuses, & to my surprise there was more to this animal that meets the scientific eye.

The platypus is one of the planet’s strangest creatures on several counts. Though mammals, these Australian natives lay eggs and sport venomous spines on their rear legs. They also have beaver-like tails and duck-like bills, the latter of which they use to sense prey while hunting at night with their eyes closed.

Now, scientists have found yet another odd trait to add to the list: Fluorescent fur.

In a recent study published in the journal Mammalia, scientists found that when illuminated by ultraviolet (UV) light—a spectrum of light not visible to human eyes—the pelts of platypuses give off a blue-green glow.

This is incredible, as well as fascinating news! Yes, this is the first time I have learned about this, although this discovery was revealed to National Geographic readers in 2020.

Platypuses are amazing animals, & it is unfair that Australia is the continent that they call home (I wish every continent could enjoy watching Platypuses in the wild).

Image Credit: JONATHAN MARTIN/NORTHLAND COLLEGE; FROM ANICH ET AL. 2020

[astermacguffin]

What if the Mark of Cain manifests differently when it's imprisoning God and not the Darkness? If the Darkness makes the Mark bearer go insane with unbridled want for destruction, then what does sealing God make you do?

An obsessive desire for creation? Creation to the point of corruption? (Think of the Shimmer from the film Annihilation. Continuous reproduction to the point of begetting alien, cancer-like entities. A refracted, distorted notion of creation.)

Okay, so canon divergence from The Trap. They successfully seal away Chuck, then Castiel bears the Mark. (Jack won't be back until later episodes, so he's not here yet.)

At first, they think he's fine. Cas says he's not feeling any bloodlust just yet. (He does feel a certain itch under his skin. Not a desire to murder, but a desire to do...something. He doesn't tell this to anyone.)

His grace is getting stronger, almost archangel-like (if not more). It's incredibly helpful for hunts, and Cas is happy to feel his wings healthy again after a long time. Sam is happy for him, but Dean is suspicious of things (especially since he's a previous Mark bearer).

After a while, Cas starts feeling...burdened, almost bloated by grace. (After all, he does have access to an infinite supply of it.) He needs to have an outlet for it.

Cas tells them so and Sam suggests healing people. Dean gives the green light on the condition that he remains invisible and he doesn't go Godstiel on them again.

It's a great outlet, and for the first few weeks they start feeling normal again. But unfortunately, healing stops being enough to relieve Cas of his excess grace anymore. The mass healings start to pile up all across the globe and it catches everyone's attention. Some think it's a blessed miracle, some think it's a sign of the end times. They make him slow down on the healings after that.

Without an outlet, however, Cas starts feeling antsy and pained. They brainstorm on possible alternatives. Cas suggests going to Heaven and saving it from collapse by healing his brethren's wings and creating more angels out of consenting souls in Heaven.

He explains Heaven's endangered and dwindling numbers. Sam agrees that it would hit two birds in one stone: relieve Cas from excess grace and prevent the extinction of angels. Dean doesn't like the idea of more winged dicks so he shoots down the idea. Eileen says that since Cas is the one in pain, he should be the one to decide.

Ultimately, Cas defers to Dean's judgment (as always). Sam protests, arguing that he can't just shoulder that pain. Cas replies: "I've suffered worse, Sam."

Cas doesn't complain about the pain for about a week, so for a while, everyone believes him when he said he can shoulder the pain. One day, Dean finds him outside the bunker, groaning in pain as he bleeds himself out, his grace pouring into the ground and sprouting plants. Dean sees this and is finally convinced to allow Cas to make more angels.

What follows then is a series of escalating events:

While Sam and Eileen are practicing their witchcraft for spell they need in a hunt, Cas suggests to enhance Sam's physical and magical abilities using his grace. "It will make the process faster and safer," he reasons. He agrees, but Dean eyes this suspiciously.

During one of their hunts, they encounter a young and freshly-turned vampire. The boy begs them not to kill him, and Cas gives him a proposal. "Promise not to feed on humans ever again and I shall cure you of your hungers and your pains. Pledge your allegiance to me and you shall never be afraid of yourself ever again." The boy agrees, and before Dean could even protest, Cas slices his palm and feeds the vampire his grace.

They argue about the grace-feeding in the Impala. Dean notices Sam's pointed lack of complaints and figures it out. "You're in on this, aren't you? How long has Cas been doing this? He's going Michael behind our backs and you're letting him?"

Sam argues that it's different because Cas isn't making super monsters; he's making them less "monstrous" (whatever that means). Sam's obsession with his own "purity" is key to understanding him here.

One time, Dean catches Cas in his "garden" ("forest" seems more apt with how lush the greens already are) creating butterflies and bees out of thin air using his grace alone.

Reports of the miraculously healed people suddenly gaining new abilities like increased strength, heightened senses, and prophecy start popping up. Some are experiencing phantom limbs, talking about their sprouting "wings."

Sam is becoming addicted to Cas' grace to the point that he willingly lets himself be hurt in hunts just so Cas can cure him. Dean confronts him about this, but Sam just argues that he's "never felt this pure before." Eileenn shares the same concern as Dean.

Hunts are becoming less frequent the more monsters are being "cleansed" by Cas. The world is becoming disconcertingly quiet.

Cas' "garden" is starting to emit this strange aura. The plants and creatures growing inside it are starting to look more...alien.

One of the original angels goes to Dean and tells him of Heaven's affairs. The Host is stable again, but the angels he created are...not exactly angels. They're graced up and they sustain Heaven, but their true forms are "horrifying and incomprehensible, even to an angel." The angel adds that more than 60% of Earth's creatures have already been touched by Cas' grace.

The final nail in the coffin is when Dean catches Cas in the garden fiddling with his angel blade. It's emitting a strange glow, vibrating a subtle hum and looking as if it's liquid, flowing and distorting here and there.

Dean asks him what he's holding. "Oh, this?" Cas responds. "This is the Last Blade. Last, not in terms of time but in concept, for no other blade shall ever compare to it. The spark of creation. Fiat lux."

Dean's heart sinks. Of course. The First and the Last, Alpha and Omega. "Cas...the Mark, I think i-it's scrambling your brain, man."

"I know," he replies, eyes wet and apologetic. It's a small moment of lucidity amidst weeks and months of...whatever that was.

"Okay, okay, so you're still you, that's... that's good. Okay." Dean doesn't know how to approach this. Give him a fight and he'll know what to do, but this? Watching his best friend, the love of his life, be distorted into something incomprehensible? Yeah, this is totally beyond him.

"You know, I used to hate Chuck," Cas says. "How could the Father of All Creation be this angry, petulant child? But," he continues, "knowing what I know now, it's either regressing into a petty child or being reduced to insanity."

"Cas...what are you talking about, man?"

"No mind should bear this burden, Dean. No matter how infinite they are," he says, voice trembling in exhaustion.

(more below the cut)

He continues. "The awareness of everything is the awareness of nothing at all. Imagine perceiving every possible piece of information about the world all at once. Seeing light in all its forms all at once: ultraviolet, infrared, etc. Sensing all the neutrinos zip by, sensing gravitational waves, sensing the slighest bit of seismic activity."

Dean doesn't know how to respond, so he lets him go on.

"Knowledge can only ever be a slice of the Totality of Truth. Truth is absolute chaos, and Knowledge is the partial ordering of this chaos. One can sanely approach Truth only through organized paritions of Totality. Why do you think Chuck is so obsessed with stories? Stories are linear and finite; they're sensible snippets of the endless sea of possible worlds."

"So, what? Are you trying to—"

"I'm not trying to justify Chuck's actions, Dean," he interrupts. "I just want to contextualize them. Chuck's simplistic and repetitive narratives are what they are: manifestations of a chaotic Totality, gone insane trying to understand itself. Looking for simple things to hold on to."

Cas takes a deep breath. He speaks with a shaky voice. "I'm barely holding myself together, Dean. I can feel the universe beneath my skin."

He doesn't know what possesses him to ask, but he does it anyway. "What are you holding on to?"

Cas smiles at that. "You."

They stare at each other for a while, frozen where they stand. Cas, with unrestrained affection in his face. Dean, struck by shock and indecision. It's Cas who first breaks the silence.

"I think we both know what needs to be done, while I'm still lucid enough." Cas slices his palm and lets his blood drip down the soil. He then thrusts the Last Blade into the ground, lifting it when the soil glows.

Dean stared in awe as the ground erupts and a familiar shape rises from the hollow. "Is that.."

"The Ma'Lak box, yes. I also enhanced it with the Blade to be able to house things as powerful as me."

"Cas, wait, maybe we can think of another way to—"

"Dean," he says, calmly. "You know there's no other way. I wouldn't ask this of you if there was."

In any other scenario, Dean would've kept arguing, but even he knows that they're running out of time. Sam's grace addiction is getting worse and all the creatures touched by Cas' grace are slowly mutating into eldritch horrors. Dean offers a shaky nod. "Okay."

Tension visibly releases from Cas' body. "Thank you, Dean." He opens the box and enters it with ease. "When you lock this, bury me with the garden's graced soil. Once I'm under, my influence over the world should dampen."

Dean gives a wordless nod. For a while, they just stared at each other, Cas lying down and Dean trying to memorize every inch of his face while he can.

Cas presses his hand into Dean's left shoulder where his mark used to dwell. "My untainted grace," he whisper gently. "Some of it is still inside you. That's probably why you're not as affected by me."

Dean wants to say, I'll always be affected by you, but he holds himself back.

He takes his hand back, a bloody handprint now on Dean's jacket. "I love you, Dean," he says, breathless.

"Cas..."

"I probably would've built up to that if we had more time but," he makes a surprised laugh, "I am, as you would say, already 'losing my marbles', so."

The air quotes would've been funny and endearing in any other scenario, but it just makes Dean's vision blur up with tears.

"Thank you for everything, Dean. I know we've done nothing but repeatedly hurt each other these past few years, but I don't want to spend a deathless eternity with that as my memory of you. I forgive you, even for the things you haven't forgiven yourself for yet. And I'm sorry for everything, especially for ending things like this."

He should probably wipe away his tears to clear his vision, but Dean can do nothing but stare at Cas in awe, in fear, in grief, in reverence. They're both fully crying now.

"Goodbye, Dean."

"Wait, Cas."

Cas looks at him, waiting.

"Can you...can you say it again?"

He doesn't need to clarify what 'it' means. They both know.

With one last mournful smile, Cas says: "I love you, Dean."

And with that, Dean finally gathers all the strength he needs to shut the lid and lock the box. He stares at it for a while, unblinking. He forgot to ask, Can you hear my prayers down there? But it's too late now to ask.

The box automatically lowers itself into the hole it arose from. Now all that's left to do is to cover it again with soil.

Dean doesn't bother with a shovel. He gently buries the box with his hands deep in the soil, some of it getting trapped under his nails. He continues the mindless task, whispering a tireless series of I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I hope you're okay I'm sorry, over and over between his quiet sobs. Cas is quiet inside the box. No screaming or crying. Dean doesn't know if that's better or worse.

When the final clump of soil is pressed into the mound, he suddenly feels it: a visceral shift that echoes throughout the world. The alien glimmer of the garden dims, and the world corrects its axis. Dean screams his agony into the air.

That's how Sam finds him: sprawled over a mound of soil, crying his heart out. Dean doesn't need to say anything: he knows what happened. He pulls his brother off the ground and brings him inside the bunker.

For the first two weeks, Dean cycles through drinking and passing out in various places in the bunker. If he's not wearing the jacket, he's holding it with close to him. Sam gives him a considerable space to grieve while he monitors the world grace problem with Eileen. The grace mutations have significantly dropped since then and everyone's going back to normal.

Unfortunately, that means monsters are getting hungry again. Sam doesn't want to leave his brother alone after going nonverbal with grief and dysfunctional due to alcohol. Eileen assures him that she can handle hunts on their own and that the hunter network that they're building will lessen the workload.

Sam's attempts to sober Dean up finally work, mostly due to the latter having very little strength to protest. Dean remains sober an entire day for the first time in weeks, and all he can think about is: I haven't prayed to Cas in a while. The longing might have reached him, but never a coherent prayer.

The first time he goes out of the bunker in a while, he heads straight to Cas' garden. Sam's glad that he's finally going out because "the sun is good for you" or something, but he's really only here for Cas. He kneels in front of the burial mound (where a patch of an unknown species of flowers is already growing).

The first prayer he says to him in a while is: I love you, Cas. I should've said it while you were still here. Not saying it out loud and just strongly thinking about the words somehow bolsters him to get the words through.

He's crying again, and he knows he's losing coherency. In his mind, he's explaining about his hangups and his regrets and his continuous denial of his own joy, but one constant remains: he's beaming all his love and affection into this prayer.

He's halfway through explaining all the traits that he finds endearing in Cas when suddenly, he feels it like a snap. If the glimmer dimmed when he buried Cas, now it's as if it was never there in the first place. With an unsettling amount of certainty, Dean just knows that Cas is gone. For real, this time.

"C-cas...?" It's the first thing he's said in a while and it sounds rough in his long unused voice.

"CAS! CAS!!! " He's now screaming, ripping away the flowerbed with his bare hands and scratching the soil away. Tears are obstructing his vision, but he has no time to wipe them away. He needs to make sure that is really gone. His hands are bleeding and he doesn't give a damn.

Eventually, Sam comes running towards him. "Dean! Dean, stop!"

He tries to hold his brother back, but Dean just keeps on clawing away soil. "Sammy, Sammy he's gone, he's not there anymore, Sammy I have to see, please, let me see Cas again, I need—" he breaks into sobs again, and like a puppet with its strings cut off, he slumps into Sam.

"Dean, it's okay, it's okay..." he says softly to his shaking brother.

Eventually, when Dean calms down, he looks at the carnage he's done and starts sobbing again. The flowers, his last evidence of Cas being here, are all destroyed. Now Cas truly is gone.

. . .

When Cas first heard Dean's confession prayer, he was overcome with joy. When he realized what that means, however, his stomach suddenly sinks.

He hears before he sees the Empty arrive, slithering like black goo.

"Wow, were you excited enough for eternal slumber that you wanted a preview?" The Shadow teases in Meg's voice.

At first, he was dreading the Empty, but now that he thinks of it, it's actually the perfect prison for him: a vast, endless nothingness for him to fill with his creations.

And if Jack wasn't in Heaven, that only means that he's in the Empty, and he can't wait to see his son again. Even when blinded by the madness of the universe, he can never forget the joy of being a father.

"Yes," he replies, "I'm actually glad you're here now."

. . .

Somewhere around the globe, Billie drops Jack back.

"Don't worry, kid. You'l reunite with your father very soon."

(to be continued)

[eflen-n-reegee]

Field Trip to the Field Museum (Chicago, IL)

Hello! I recently went to the Field Museum, and I decided to write a little self-insert imagine fic where the reader is an age regresser and the author is their caregiver. I really liked doing this, so I’ll probably do it again next time I go somewhere fun! 😊 All pictures were taken by me, and there are two temporary exhibits that have only one picture each to respect that they aren’t permanent features of the museum. Also, heads up, this includes pictures of dinosaur bones, taxidermied animals and a brief, simple discussion about mortality. Under the cut ‘cause it’s a long post. Hope you enjoy! 😁

You’re right, sweetheart! There it is! Are you excited?

Oh, no, don’t worry, we’re not driving away. We just have to go around the museum to park. And that gives us time to listen to another song! What should we listen to?

My goodness, I always forget how big it is! What do you think, sweetheart? I know, it’s very busy today. Do you want to sit for a minute? Okay, but if you need a break, you can always tell me.

Alrighty, why don’t we look at the elephants? I know, they’re so big! Hm, I think the elephants would be a good meeting spot. So if we lose each other, we can both go to the elephants and find each other again. I know you have your phone, sweetie, this is just to be extra safe. I know, I know, I’m a silly worry-wart. Okay, where should we go first?

Ooh, we’re gonna learn all about sea creatures! Some of them are still swimming around in the ocean, and some of them are extinct like the dinosaurs. Oh, you’re right, my little smarty. The ocean’s so deep, we don’t know for sure what’s down there. But we THINK these creatures are extinct. I wish this great big salamander was still around, though. He’s so cool! Oh my goodness, look at this tooth! It came from a megalodon - the biggest shark that ever existed! How much do you think the Tooth Fairy would give her for one? Ha, this is a little funny. This little manta ray is extinct, but this great big one still lives in Australia. Usually it’s the little ones that are still around! And these horseshoe crabs are the same way! Now, what’s this? Oh my goodness, it’s a colossal squid tentacle! We’re lucky, very few people get to see one in real life. Ah, looks like this is the end. That was so interesting!

Are you sure you want to go to this exhibit? I mean, you already know all your colors, right? Oh, oh no, it’s okay sweetheart, I’m only teasing, don’t cry- Hey, where did those tears go so quickly? Were you teasing ME? Oh, you silly thing!

Look at all this beautiful red! So many red animals and red plants, just gorgeous… Ooh, and these orange things… I think I like this yellow area the best. It makes me feel like we’re out in the sun! Oh, you like the green? It DOES look like a forest, you’re right! But blue is still my favorite color - look, tiny little robin eggs! And the purple is just beautiful… Is that the end of the exhibit? Whoa! Ultraviolet? Really? Look, sweetheart, the black light is making the white parts of my shirt glow! Isn’t this cool? Here, press this button! You see, the scorpion is a dark color, but he glows white in ultraviolet light! I changed my mind, THIS part is my favorite! Over here there’s black, and white, and black and white together! And- oh my goodness, look at these rainbow colors!

Oh, that was amazing! I’m glad you picked it, sweetheart, I liked it very much.

Look how high up we are! Maximo could give you a kiss right on the nose if he wanted to! Are you having fun? I’m glad.

Oh, so cool! A little scary, too… Are you doing okay? Oh, I know you’re brave, sweet thing. Even brave people get scared sometimes. I bet even dinosaurs could get scared! Oh, not this one? Maybe. He does look pretty fierce, huh?

Ooh! The Apatosaurus swallowed the rocks and they helped digest his food! But that wouldn’t work for you, would it? So the rocks better stay out of your tummy! Yes, if you were a dinosaur it would be okay… Of course I’d still love you if you were a dinosaur!

Look how cloudy the city is! I’m glad we’re not outside right now. But maybe we’ll visit the city on a sunnier day. Would you like that?

This is my favorite dinosaur! I’m not sure why, actually. It’s not the biggest or the strongest or the scariest, but I still think it’s really cool. It’s got a funny name - think you can say Parasaurolophus? And scientists think it used the crest on its head to make noise! Do you have a favorite dino, sweetheart?

There she is! Sue’s one of the best T-Rex fossils ever found! Pretty cool, huh? We know from the bones that a lot of stuff happened to her - she got hurt a lot. But she was a fighter! Just like you, right? Here, lemme take your picture with her!

I think this is my favorite part of the museum. This is where the stuffed animals are- yeah, like your plushies! Only these are REAL animals, not cotton and fluff. They used to be alive, and now they aren’t. You’re right, it is kind of sad. But it’s also kind of happy too. These animals help scientists learn new things, and artists come from all over to draw them and paint them, and everyone who visits gets to see how amazing they are. It’s sad that they’re dead, but it’s happy to think about when they were alive. Are you ready to go in?

You’re right, they’re deer! Just like we see sometimes when we’re driving! The papa deer is watching for predators while the mama deer helps the baby find food. They take good care of their baby, don’t they?

Oh my goodness! It’s a good thing your teddy isn’t that big. There’d be no room in the bed for you! You’re right, he does look cuddly. But if we saw a bear like him walking around, we wouldn’t get this close. Because bears are very strong, and they might hurt us if we got too close. Oh no, it’s not mean, sweetheart. The bear wants to protect himself. He doesn’t know how nice we are. Well, giving him food wouldn’t be the best idea either… It’s okay, sweetie. Sometimes the nicest thing to do is give someone their space.

Wow, I always forget that moose are this big! Moose? Mooses? Hm, I’m not sure what to call more than one. What do you think?

Look at that bear cub riding piggyback! Isn’t that silly? And you’re right, the big bear’s face is silly too! What do you think he’s eating? Maybe bugs? No, not “ew”, it’s good for the bear. Everyone needs to eat, and sometimes they eat things that are a little different. No big deal.

Oh, speaking of eating, I’m hungry! What about you?

We can eat right next to the animals. Now, let me get the food out… Sweetheart, stay over here please. I know you want to look at the seals, but you’re going to get crumbs on the floor! We can look at them after we eat, okay? Thank you, sweetie.

Alright, it’s about time to leave. I know, honey, I’m having fun too! But the museum will be closing soon - and you look like you could use a nap. I promise we’ll come back again soon, alright? Yes, pinkie promise. Okay, let’s go, sweetheart.

~🐘~🦑~🌈~🦕~🪨~🏙~🦖~🦌~🐻~����~

[chimerical-creations]

BrACElets and neclACEs.

Get it? Get it?

lolpuns. sorrynotsorry.

Eight-strand braid is time-consuming as fuck and one hell of an exercise in dexterity keeping all the cords in the correct places, but the end result does look hella spiffy.

The longer bracelets may also work well as anklets for some people (lengths listed below). And yes, these do indeed fluoresce under ultraviolet light. Was difficult to photograph the glow, but with a little bit of editing I got it pretty close to how they look in meatspace.

They’re braided out of nylon cord, with silver-tone end caps and lobster-claw clasps, and the necklaces have 5cm chain extensions. The clasps and chains were labelled nickel-free but I can’t recall if the end caps were, so proceed at your own risk and all that jazz.

Bracelet measurements and quantities:

19.70cm (7.75") x2 x1

20.30cm (8.00") x2

21.60 cm (8.50") x1

22.90cm (9.00") x1

23.50cm (9.25") x1

Necklace measurements and quantities:

35cm (13.75") x1

40cm (15.75") x1 SOLD

45cm (17.75″) x1

50cm (19.75") x1

If anyone is interested, these are $15 USD each for the bracelets and $25 each for the necklaces, plus however much shipping costs. Obviously this means anyone who wants one needs to be okay with providing a mailing address. PM me if one of these strikes your fancy.

I currently cannot find the damn things, so any sales will have to wait until I dig them up again.

(Despite listing prices in USD I am in fact based in Norway. If I listed prices in NOK the majority of people would have no idea what I was talking about.)

[subterfugespecialist]

Led to You

As a child, everyone finds their "soulmate guide," an animal meant to lead your soulmate to you. And one morning, Janus and Remus wake up to see a stranger's guide in their homes.

Written for Day 3 of @dukeceitweek​ : snakes/bugs

AO3 link

Pairings: Dukeceit, Familial Creativitwins, Platonic Loceit, Moceit, and Dukexiety

Warnings: Some Remus-typical violent thoughts, scorpions/tarantulas/snakes

Word count: 4228

Janus woke up to something brushing against his hand. He groaned and batted Dusa away while muttering "Five more minutes"

But when it brushed against his hand again, he noticed it was definitely not the headbutt from a snake. His eyes snapped open and he glanced down to see a fucking scorpion on his bed holy shit-

If his roommate asked if that was him that made the high pitched squeal that morning, no it wasn't.

He scrambled out of bed to look around for something to try and trap the scorpion under, but he didn't want to get near it what the fuck-

Janus paused. The scorpion was staring at him. At least, it looked like the scorpion was staring at him. It at least didn't look like it was trying to attack him.

Did... did it wave?

Now that Janus had calmed down, he noticed the scorpion was a deep, emerald green. Janus didn't know much about bugs, never had a reason to, but he never heard of a green scorpion before.

Could it be...?

"Hey, Logan?"

Footsteps came from the kitchen down the hallway.

"I was wondering when you were going to call me in," Logan said as he opened the door, his deep blue raven perched on top of his head, "What happened?"

"Can scorpions be green?"

"Why would I know that, Janus?"

"Because you know everything."

"Why are you asking?"

Janus pointed to his bed, and when Logan looked down he jumped back with a startled shout, disturbing the raven on his head.

The scorpion turned towards Logan and, yeah, the scorpion definitely waved.

After calming himself (and his bird), Logan slowly approached Janus' bed.

"...While I have heard of scorpions glowing green under ultraviolet light-"

"Oh, so you did know, you asshole-"

"I haven't seen a scorpion that looks like this, no," Logan said, crouching down next to the bed, "Is Dusa here? She was not under her heat lamp."

"Dusa? Come here, darling."

Dusa didn't crawl out of hiding, and Janus' room and the living room under her heat lamp were the only places she liked to be first thing in the morning.

"I guess she isn't."

Logan's raven, Minerva, hopped off his head onto the bed to examine the scorpion. She leaned down and the scorpion gently bumped heads. Minerva let out a happy chirp.

"My soulmate guide is a scorpion."

"Fascinating," Logan muttered as the scorpion and Minerva playfully chased each other around the bed, "I haven't heard of a bug guide before."

Janus glanced at the clock and put his hand down on the bed. The scorpion immediately ran onto his palm.

"I have class in an hour," he said as he cupped his hands and lifted the scorpion, "So how do you feel about business, corporate, and commercial law?"

 ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧

Remus woke up to Roman screaming. After a moment of debating whether to go back to sleep or not, he decided that, yeah, he probably should go check on the well being of his brother. Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, Remus trudged towards the living room to see a snake curled up on the couch, with Roman's robin perched on its head.

"Peter, please come here!" Roman pleaded. But the little bird seemed perfectly content on top of the snake. The snake started to slither off the couch, making roman shout again. The robin flew onto Roman's hand and he relaxed a bit as he held the bird to his chest.

Roman took his gaze off his brother back to the snake and- oh look at that it. It was headed towards him.

"Remus stop standing there what is wrong with you-"

The snake was around four feet long with yellow-and-black stripes. Quite gorgeous, really.

Remus decided he wanted to pick it up.

He knelt down and outstretched his arm (as Roman continued to shout at him), letting the snake crawl up and around his shoulders. The snake nuzzled its head against Remus' cheek.

Roman stared at him, eyes wide and mouth opened.

"What?"

"You're insane."

"And you're a chickenshit. You've lived with a scorpion as a roommate your whole life and you're gonna freak out over a snake guide?"

"How was I supposed to know it was a guide!?"

Remus stepped over and placed a hand on Roman's shoulder. "...You're a moron."

Roman shoved him.

"Peter was fine. And we should be expecting to find strange animals in our apartment at this age."

"Oh, piss off to find your soulmate and stop bothering me for a while."

"Gladly."

Remus turned to go back to his bedroom.

"...I'm really happy for you, you know."

Remus stopped and groaned. "Roman, no sentimental bullshit before nine."

"But I mean it. You deserve this."

"...Thanks, you idiotic bastard."

Roman gave him a gentle smile as Peter hopped onto Remus' head and nestled into his wild mess of bedhead.

"Also you screamed like a little girl."

"Fuck off-"

Remus cackled as Roman shoved him again. Peter gave Remus a petulant little peck on the top of his head.

Peter flew back over to Roman while Remus held out his arms go guide the snake in front of his face.

"Are you gonna lead me to my soulmate?" Remus asked with a large grin, which only grew wider when the snake nodded.

✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧

Janus was very much enjoying having a scorpion on his shoulder. People instinctively stepped away from him, even more so than with Dusa, meaning he didn't have to fight his way through the crowded sidewalks.

The scorpion had been upset that Janus didn't follow its directions. It scuttled frantically from one shoulder to the other. It calmed only when Janus explained he had to go to class, but would follow its directions immediately after.

Janus was stopped in his tracks, though, by a corgi running up to him and jumping on his knees.

"Hi, Peachy," Janus said as he scratched behind her ears. The scorpion crawled down his arm in curiosity.

if someone's guide was a common house pet like a dog or cat, they were issued a special white collar to show they were a soulmate guide to be allowed in public places along with service animals.

But this dog didn't have such a collar. She was just a dog.

"Hey, Janus!" someone called out. Janus looked up to see Patton jogging down the sidewalk, his guide right beside him.

"Hello, Patton. Hello, Cookie," Janus said to his friend and the capybara standing next to him.

Patton had been Logan's friend first, and Janus hadn't been too keen on his... optimistic personality at first. But dammit, the guy's too sweet.

"Miss Peachy! What have I told you about running off?" Patton said with a light scowl as he reattached her leash. But of course, unlike a guide, she couldn't actually understand. She jumped off Janus' legs to go lick the capybara's face.

Janus didn't understand the appeal of keeping animals that weren't your guide, but to each their own, he supposed.

Patton's eyes fell to Janus' shoulder, and after the instinctive fear vanished a large smile took over his face.

"Oh! You've got your soulmate guide!!"

"Yep," Janus said as he resumed walking down the sidewalk. Patton followed.

"Ohmygosh, this is so exciting!" Patton exclaimed, practically bouncing as he walked, "How long have you been out trying to find them? Do you think you're close?"

"I'm going to class, actually."

"Really? Gosh, you've got more self control than me," Patton laughed, "I don't think I'd be able to wait."

"I've got exams soon, Patton. I can't risk missing anything."

"Oh, I'm not trying to change your mind! You do what you think is best. But aren't you excited?"

Janus was convinced Patton was smiling so hard his face was going to get stuck like that. But when Janus didn't answer immediately, his frown dampened.

"Hey, are you okay, Jan?"

"Of course I am. Why wouldn't I be?"

"Oh, honey. You're nervous, aren't you?" Patton asked as his smile turned empathetic, which Janus thought was almost worse than excited.

The scorpion nuzzled against his neck, which was an odd sensation for sure, but Janus appreciated the sentiment.

"Of course I'm not nervous. I have no reason to be."

Patton tilted his head down slightly and gave him that look. The soft-smile dad-friend look that meant you were about to be comforted, whether you like it or not. Janus sighed.

"Okay, fine. A little," he conceded. He probably should be worried about how close that scorpion and its stinger was against his neck as it cuddled closer. But he'd never heard of a soulmate guide killing anyone, so he chose not to.

"Oh, sweetie," Patton said in that annoyingly soft tone. He wrapped an arm around Janus' and led him over to a bench. Peachy promptly hopped up to sit on Patton's lap while Cookie plopped against Patton's legs, giving Janus a soft nudge with her nose.

"It's not a big deal," Janus huffed, "I just think its reasonable to be nervous about meeting some stranger I am now expected to spend my life with."

"You have every right to feel what you're feeling. Such a big life change can be scary. But I'm certain your soulmate will understand your reservations and will go at any pace you're comfortable with."

While yes, the idea of a soulmate was a pleasant one, it was also a bit... concerning, to say the least. Janus was quite happy with where he was in life, and he wasn't too keen on the idea of something changing it all completely.

He was a bit surprised Logan wasn't his soulmate. He was the perfect roommate: neat, consistent, punctual. And Janus felt enough fondness for Logan that he was sort of expecting to wake up one day and have their guides just push them into each others' arms.

Alas, apparently not.

Janus bit his lip, debating. It would be good to talk about his worries. And as much as Janus pretended, he was actually quite fond of Patton.

"Patton, what if we don't work?"

"What do you mean, hon?"

"This person is supposedly meant to complete me. To make me better. But I'm perfectly fine the way I am now. I don't feel like I'm missing anything. What if I meet them and they just want to... to fix me? Because I'm expected to change for them?"

"Janus, your soulmate is meant to compliment you. Not complete you. You aren't missing any parts of yourself, because you're already your own complete person. And you certainly don't need to be 'fixed.'"

The scorpion crawled down to Janus' hands, and Janus ran his thumb over its back to pet it.

"But what if... what if we meet and nothing happens? Everyone always talks about their 'immediate romantic connections' but I don't buy it. What if we're doomed to always be strangers? After all, I'm not particularly good with people, Pat. What did I call you when we first met? A-"

"An annoying, self-righteous, dependent puppy with no boundaries?"

Janus winced. "Yeah. That."

A gentle smile grew on Patton's face as he held his arms out for a hug. Janus hesitated for only a moment before accepting.

"You don't need to worry about anything. Soulmates don't always mean romantic. Even if you don't feel romance at first, even if you never do, you two are going to share a tight bond and a special relationship different from anyone else you know. Nothing gets to take that from you."

"...Thank you, Patton. For taking the time to talk to me."

"Of course! What are friends for?"

Patton gave him a soft smile, and Janus gave him a rare, genuine one in return.

"Oh! I hope I didn't make you late for class!"

Janus looked at his watch. "I'll be fine if I hurry. Thank you. Again. Goodbye, Cookie. Bye, Peachy."

Peachy didn't react. Cookie gave him one last gentle nudge.

✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧

The snake in Remus' arms couldn't guide in front of him like Roman's bird would or any sort of animal with wings or legs. While he could let it slither on the ground, it would be dangerous with how busy the sidewalk was. And Remus really didn't need to return the snake to his soulmate all squished.

So it was wrapped around his shoulders, reaching down his arms, and rested in his hands, guiding him down the street like a compass.

The snake turned back to look at Remus.

"What is it? What's wrong?" he asked as he kept walking, the snake shaking its head urgently. Only for someone to grab the back of his jacket and yank him back, pulling him off the street and narrowly missing oncoming traffic.

"Watch where you're going, asshole," the person muttered. Remus turned, ready to start shit, but instead broke into a goofy grin when he saw Virgil.

"Hey, emo!"

Besides Roman, Virgil was Remus' only friend. Most people were too put off by Remus', well, everything.

And Virgil had been too, at first. But the two bonded over their soulmate's guides being creatures most of the public feared and the stigma that came with that. And now he was used to Remus' bullshit.

"And hey, Helena," he said to the tarantula sitting on Virgil's shoulder.

"So. You found your soulmate guide," Virgil said. The snake reached over to inspect Virgil and he scratched under its chin, the snake then nuzzling against Virgil's cheek.

"On your way to find your soulmate?" he asked as the snake and tarantula started inspecting each other.

"Yep!"

"Are you nervous?"

"Nope!"

Virgil squinted at him, searching for any sign of dishonesty, but all he saw was the normal, excitable Remus.

"Shit, you're lucky, man. I've been psyching myself out over meeting mine."

"But aren't they, like, made for you?"

"Supposedly. But you know me. I can't stop thinking about all the bad things. Like what if they don't like me?"

"Well, that would be a them problem."

Virgil let out an amused huff. "Really? You wouldn't be bothered?"

"Well, yeah," Remus said as he watched the snake and Helena play peekaboo behind Virgil's neck. "But like, it's not like I'm not used to people not liking me. And if I don't know this person, what would I lose, really? So actually, this can only go up for me."

Virgil cast him a sad smile. Remus hated it.

"It'll be good for you," Virgil said as the two crossed the street. "You are a strange fucking creature, but you're a good dude. Mostly. Partially? Mostly."

"It'll be good for you, too, then. Cause you're better than me."

Virgil nudged him with his shoulder.

"Ultimately, I know it will be. My brain just hates me."

"You and me both, emo."

The snake curled back against Remus after booping Helena and resumed its role as soulmate compass.

✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧

Remus ended up on his old school campus.

Ew.

He had dropped out, and he had hoped he would never have to step foot back here again. Oh, well, C'est la vie, or whatever the fuck.

Though you needed to swipe a student ID to unlock the doors, Remus knew if he yanked hard enough the doors would give. He had managed to make it through a whole semester without his ID after he lost it.

A grimace grew on Remus' face as he walked back into the Taylor Building for the first time in over a year. It was named after his least favorite professor, and he had a lot of bad memories in this building.

Time to find his soulmate and get the fuck out.

He was just about to head upstairs when someone shouted at him.

"Excuse me! Only students and faculty are allowed in this building."

Yeah, Remus supposed he didn't look like the typical law majors that took up a majority of the classes here. Not with his spiked leather jacket and ripped jeans. He turned to see who had yelled at him.

And speak of the devil.

"Hey, you're Taylor!"

The man straightened his shoulders.

"Yes, I am. Were you a student of mine?"

"Yeah! I hated your fuckin' guts."

The man looked like he had been slapped before a sneering look of recognition appeared on his face.

"Remus Kingsley."

"Aw, I'm flattered you remember me. Especially since I dropped out. You encouraged me to, remember? Right after you called me a, what was it, 'moronic good-for-nothing- imbecile that would never amount to anything?'"

"You need to leave immediately."

Taylor had reached out to grab Remus but he bolted up the stairs, making sure he had a tight grip on the snake.

He wasn't about to give up on his soulmate that easy.

As they ran down the upstairs hallway, Taylor continued to shout at him. But Remus wasn't worried. He was clearly much faster.

He turned to see the disheveled man chasing behind him and laughed. This was kinda fun!

Then he had to turn around and run face first into the chest of a campus officer.

Well, bitchtits.

✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧

Janus' class was nothing out of the ordinary, except that his surrounding classmates had inched as far away from this as they could, and Janus was enjoying the extra space.

The scorpion had been still on his shoulder for the most part, settling in where Janus' neck and shoulder met. But now it stood, rushing down Janus' arm to the desk and running around in circles.

"What is it?" he whispered.

Right after he asked that, shouting was heard down the hallway. The professor and students all turned their heads in time to see someone running past the door, laughing, with Professor Taylor chasing after them.

"...Okay, then," The professor said, "Now back to your review material."

Janus hardly listened as the professor spoke. He was more focused on the scorpion that kept switching between running in circles and scuttling onto Janus' hand.

When the professor dismissed the class, Janus hung back. He preferred to let the crowd of students leave before him instead of trying to fight his way through.

By the time he walked into the hallway, it was mostly empty. Janus was holding the scorpion in the palm of his hands and it jumped to get his attention. It gestured with its body to go down the hallway.

"Alright, let's go."

The scorpion led him down a couple of hallways, and Janus heard shouting and the sound of running footsteps against the tile.

A man ran around the corner, his neon green combat boots skidding on the floor as he tried to stop. He had a mustache above a wild grin, with a streak of white through his hair.

He also had Dusa wrapped around his neck.

Janus stared. The man stopped in front of him.

"Fluffy!" he said to the scorpion in Janus' hands, who was alternating between running in circles again and hopping in excitement.

He looked up at Janus with a manic grin. "Hey! I'm Remus. I'd love to stop and chat but I'm afraid I've found myself wrapped up with something."

Two campus officers rounded the corner.

What the fuck.

Janus took the scorpion - Fluffy - in one hand and held it against his chest, grabbing Remus' wrist with the other and bolting.

Remus let out a delighted laugh as he let Janus pull him down the hallway and down a set of stairs.

Jesus, what did Janus get himself into?

He was heading towards one of the student parking lots, cutting through the Union. There would be lots of students and he hoped they could get lost in the crowd. But with two idiots running across the yard with a snake and a scorpion, people were parting a path for them. Which made them more obvious but at least let them through.

When Janus looked behind him, he couldn't see the officers, but he didn't want to risk it. It wasn't exactly hard to identify them: one with a large scar on the left side of his face and the other, with, well, a lot of fucking identifiable traits.

Logan would probably get mad at him for this, but Janus was sure he would be forgiven that same day if he made Logan thumbprint cookies. So Janus let go of Remus' hand to dig in his pocket, finding the spare key to Logan's car he gave Janus only for emergencies. Janus would consider this an emergency. Logan probably would not.

Janus unlocked the car and Remus got in without question. Remus hardly stopped laughing.

Great. So his soulmate was a maniac.

Janus pulled out of the parking lot and onto the street, gunning it out of there as Remus shouted in excitement.

"Fuck, yeah, dude!" he yelled. His seat-belt was not on, by the way.

"What the hell did you do?"

"Trespass, technically. But it would've been fine if that bitchass Taylor hadn't come along. And then I maybe assaulted an officer, but could it really be assault if I just whacked him when he tried to grab me? Anyways I already have three offenses - I guess four now - and I didn't want to go to jail or anything so I started running-"

"God, I'm going to miss my next class," Janus groaned, "What if they try to find me tomorrow?"

"How's your track record?"

"It's clean. Unlike someone, I don't get caught."

"Psh, then you're probably fine. you're a white law student."

Janus took a deep breath as he tried to collect his thoughts. What was even happening right now?

"...Okay, I may have fucked this up," Remus started, and he at least had the decency to sound sheepish, "I didn't mean to drag you into this mess, even though I was purposefully... searching... for you... Shit, I didn't even think about that. I don't think a lot, actually. I mean, I wasn't even paying attention on the way to find you. I almost got hit by a car. Could you imagine, Fluffy leading you to me only to find your soulmate and guide squashed by a car and our blood and guts everywhere-"

"Remus."

"Sorry, sorry," he groaned as his hands went to grab his hair, "I was really excited to meet you, and even when being chased by police my dumb brain only wanted to focus on finding you because I don't have many friends cause most people get weirded out since I can't control my thoughts or my mouth so, like, all the weird shit that pops int my brain just comes right out and I was really looking forward to meeting someone who wouldn't leave-"

"Remus, it's okay," Janus interrupted, "Deep breaths, okay?"

Remus took a couple deep breaths.

Then Janus let out a short laugh. He felt bad for laughing, but he couldn't help it.

"...What?"

"I'm sorry. I'm not laughing at you. The situation just caught up to me: You're my soulmate, we just ran from the police, and we just took my friend's car and wow. Can't say this is how I expected this to go."

Remus grimaced. "Sorry."

"No, actually. This is better than the sappy shit I was thinking about."

Remus perked up a bit. "Yeah?"

"Is it always like this with you? Am I sentenced to spend my life digging you out of trouble, now?"

"Yeah, probably."

Janus laughed again as he pulled into the parking lot of a shopping center. He had no clear idea where he was going, and at least this place had plenty of people and plenty of parking. When he stopped, the scorpion hopped off his shoulder and scuttled to Remus.

"Hey, Fluffy," he said with a smile as he put the scorpion in his lap.

"Hey, actually, let's talk about that," Janus said, "You named your scorpion Fluffy?"

"Yeah. I named him that to trick people. Scared the shit out of my mom when he first showed up. 'Hey, meet Fluffy,' then I pull a scorpion out from behind my back. It never gets old."

Janus couldn't stop smiling, and he was sure his face was disgustingly close to Patton's in terms of fondness, but he couldn't do anything to help that.

"I'm Janus. The lovely lady on your shoulders is Dusa."

"Janus. That's a badass name," Remus said as he scritched Dusa under her chin.

"Thank you for your help today, Dusa," Janus said with a grin as she slithered back over to wrap around Janus, "And you, too, Fluffy."

"Fuck yeah. Thanks guys. Shit, Dusa was awesome. I'm pretty sure that while I was running, she flicked her tail to open a door and it hit one of the officers in the face."

Janus glanced down at her. "You are an enabler."

She stuck her tongue out.

"Well, since we're already here, would you like to go on a date or something? It seems like you have stories to tell," Janus said as he gestured to the mall in front of them.

"Yeah," Remus said with a fond grin, "Are you hungry? I'm starving. Wanna go to the food court. On me. We'll have to be careful, though. I'm pretty sure I'm banned from this mall."

Janus stared at him before bursting out laughing again. This was his life now, and how exciting that thought was.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'd love to."

.

.

Thanks for reading! Requests are open in my inbox. Hope you enjoyed <3

[headcans-oneshots-and-stuff]

Club ‘Illusion’

Fandom: DC x Marvel Pairing: Avenger x Batfam | Reader x Loki Word count: 3k (yes I can still write things over 1.5k words) Summay: With your hero work taking up most of your time you decide to find an outlet - that outlet turns out to be your own soon to be opened club. On the V.I.P. list for that evening? Two of the most important groups of people in your life. The only problem: they have yet to meet each other, not to mention the little fact that you’ve been keeping not just the club a secret... Requested by a universal fantastic Anon: If requests are still open, can I request a BatBoys x reader x Avengers where both teams meet through reader and fight because they were talking about which team reader likes more? Pairing would be your choice.

“Where does this go, boss?” a man in a dungaree holding a box full of musical equipment, chords and the like asked you and interrupted the conversation you were having with the DJ. “Bring it up these stairs there and then set it onto the black clothed table, Marianne will be there in a minute, could you help her set it up? “Sure thing boss,” the man nodded and trudged over to the direction you had waved him to. You turned back to Marianne - the mentioned DJ - who had been your friend for years and she was the first person you had hired when you had decided to take the advice of your Avengers issued therapist and find an outlet for your creativity and passion outside of your time-consuming hero work all over the planet and the universe. So you decided to use your funds from years of getting paid by Tony Stark and Bruce Wayne (even though you continued telling them you didn’t want their money) to do something fun and - in the spirit of a certain green-themed archer - open a nightclub. You had kept everything under wraps, the only people knowing about it were the contractors, decorators and Marianne and they all pledged secrecy, but tonight you would lift the metaphorical curtain. With the Avengers and Waynes (including non-Wayne-named) invited and the news about this new club opening all over social media doing the rest you were positively sure that tonight would be a great night. “Y/N?” Marianne’s voice ripped you out of your daydreams and you had to shake your head free of other thoughts and focus back onto the matter at hand, with last touches still having to be made. “Uhm- yeah, sorry, I was lost in thoughts.” “Don’t worry, I’m sure everything will go just fine. Look around you, this place is amazing, everyone did such an amazing job,” she complimented and you couldn’t help but follow her advice and actually take a look around.The room was very spacious and even though it was almost empty except the worker getting ready for tonight and a few others who helped set some stuff up. In the middle was a lower dance area with small sets of steps leading up, the floor in a chess pattern, but neon techni-coloured instead of black and white, all around that area were booths to sit in and on the far end of the room, a bit off of the dance-ground were two circular bars that were fully stocked with every drink you could ever need or want. On the other end was a stage for life-performances and ten feet above that was a sort of balcony that served as the DJ-booth with a view over the entire club. And yet again on the other side, above the bars, was a V.I.P. room which was a bit more soundproof and where a conversation could be actually held, with a one-way-mirror facing the club. The way the lights reflected off the surfaces and the sound carried through the space really confirmed what Marianne had said, the place was pretty amazing. “You’re right, you’re right, I’m sorry,” you took a deep calming breath and smiled. “Yes I am, but now we gotta get going, I’ll be up in the booth if you need me. You better give the final briefing to the staff,” she instructed before turning around and walking away. Deciding that taking her advice was the best course of action you went to go to the staff room, when Marianne called out to you yet again, shouting after you: “Don’t forget that you gotta be getting ready in an hour, your special guest should be arriving around then.”

The evening was starting to greet the people and the sun had started to disappear a few minutes ago when a group of five and a group of six gathered before a clearly newly constructed building - a club - with the name ‘Illusion’ in enlightened letters on the front. A long line of interested people, mostly young adults around 25, stretched before what seemed to be the entrance, but it seemed to still be closed. Both of the groups looked around a little bit confused, but they didn’t notice each other, or at least found nothing suspicious about the other. Now, if you were to take a very close look at both of these groups beside each other you’d find a lot of similarities, like - for example - the redeemed ‘bad-guy’ who now acted as professional sarcastic commentator, the goofball with a history in circus, the genius, philanthropist, playboy billionaire and the bad-ass tech-savvy red-head. Not to mention all of their past-time ‘hobbies’. And yet, with all these great intellect and talent collected in front of the club, they did not seem to be able to figure out what they were doing there or that there was another group in just about the same situation. The doors to the club opened and a bouncer and two servers walked out, the bouncer stationating himself before the entrance and starting to check people in, and the two servers looking around for a second before catching sight of the groups. They exchanged a few words before each of them walked over to the collection of people. The group from New York was brought over to the front entrance, allowed to skip the line and enter the club, while the Gotham-group was brought in through the back-entrance, but even though the place where they entered the club was different, they were yet both stil led to the same room, up above the bars behind a one-way-mirror.

You had changed into your sparkle-y, y/f/c outfit with make-up that would glow in the ultraviolet light that would shine all over the club later and your hair in a fashionable hairdo, perfectly prepared for your great night, with Marianne’s outfit mirroring yours just in different colours. With a clipboard you made your last round through the different areas, checking in with your staff and manager to make sure that everything would go flawless and that they could come to you with questions or if they needed help - if necessary you yourself would change into the gender-neutral uniform and start serving people. In the end the last area you had to check before meeting your special guests in the V.I.P. area was the DJ booth. “Everything good?” you asked, enjoying the last moments of relative silence before the booming music would start as you leant over the balcony railing and eyed your own little business. “Yes, I tried it out during soundcheck earlier while you were getting dressed, it’s some sweet equittement you got here, a Dream,” Marianne sighed in bliss and you could see how happy she was to be able to work with this equipment that had certainly cost enough to deserve that demeanor from her. “You know, if you like it this much, I could use a full-time DJ,” you tried to mention as nonchalant as possible, but you could feel her piercing, unbelieving gaze in your neck. “Are you serious? I thought you had employed one over a month ago. I thought tonight was a one-time-thing.” “Oh well, I did talk to one but then I listened to some of his stuff and compared to you it’s like a ten years old project on garage band. But don’t worry, I get it, you’re right. I’m sure you have way better gigs lined up left and right, I’ll find someone,” you shrugged, a little bit disappointed that Marianne didn’t seem even remotely interested in working full-time, only to be stopped when she grabbed your shoulders and began to almost shake you. “Are you kidding, I would love to work here full-time!!! This job would be a dream: the equipment, the atmosphere, my employer! DJ’s would kill for an opportunity like this. That’s why I was so confused, I thought you’d have plenty of better DJs lining up for this job,” she gushed before hugging you close and almost sobbing with happiness and thanking you for this opportunity. You agreed that you’d talk the details over later before telling her to start the music since people started to walk in and you could see a certain group of Heroes being led by one of your bar-women walking towards the left stairs to the V.I.P. room and another group of vigilantes led by one of the security-members being brought to the elevator on the right side to exactly the same room. “Okay, I gotta go, Got me some guests waiting,” you winked at Marianne who just waved you off, too immersed in her element. With quick steps and a happy smile you walked along the side of the room and followed where you saw the Avengers walk up, a little skip in your step. Honoring your word, both groups had been brought into the V.I.P. area which was big enough for them to both sit inside it without having to sit together, with the security guard taking position at the wall and the bar-women at the small, private bar. Another calming sigh later you opened the door and walked into the room immediately catching the eyes of all occupants of the room and as you nodded at your two employees in thanks, both groups of superheroes had stood up to greet you, seemingly only now realizing the presence (or rather the reason of the presence) of each other. “Hello guys, it’s so nice to have you here,” you greeted all 11 with a big gesture before mentioning to the window, “So, what do you think?” Confused eyes found you and they looked between each other and you, only one pair standing out, but seemingly not ready to reveal themselves properly yet. “It looks amazing,” Stephanie, who somehow managed to look perfectly club-fitting even in her casual clothes with her blond hair laying over her shoulder in a braid, and jumped towards you and engulfed you in a sisterly hug like she always did, “How did you get us in? I saw the adverts for this place all over social media and the line was enormous. Do you know the owner?” You held back a chuckle and laid your head to the side. “You could say so,” you gave her a cheeky smile that she couldn’t quite decipher, before turning to face the complete group, “But first things first, introduction.” Since both of the groups were still standing separately enough to be distinguished between you motioned to the Waynes. “May I introduce my somewhat-adopted-not-legally-but-emotionally-family. This is Bruce Wayne - I bet you all have heard of him - these are his sons, Richard Grayson - you can call him Dick - and Jason Todd, and his daughter Stephanie - or Steph - Brown and close family friend Barbara Gordon,” you motioned to each of them in turn with their names and they nodded in greeting at the others, still unknown to them. Then you turned to the others and said: “And may I introduce to you my first ever superhero team slash found family group also known as the Avengers - or rather a view of them anyways. Here we have Tony Stark - I’m sure you heard of him too, Natasha Romanoff and Clint Barton, our two super soldiers Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes and the trickster god himself - Loki.” “Wait, Loki-Loki? The ‘battle-of-New-York’ Loki?” Jason asked in a surprised, but also amused manner and you could almost hear Loki roll his eyes. “Oh please, get over it Mortal,” he answered sarcastically, but before you could intervene Stephanie took her turn. “Oh you’re one to talk Jay, let’s not forget that.” You couldn’t help but giggle a bit at that and even though the Avengers seemed confused at how easily that shut Jason up, they accepted it as the end of that part of the conversation. For a few minutes the gathered people - a few of your favorite people in the world - started making their own introductions and you were happy that you saw them get along well. Waiting for a good opportunity to get into the conversation and get back to what you wanted to tell them, you were stopped from taking it when Dick motioned at Loki’s outfit. A deep-green suit, black dress-shirt under it, a golden tie, black hair slicked back and black asgardian armor boots - putting that certain touch to it - adorned him and you couldn’t blame Dick when he stated: “How comes none of us got a warning that we’d need to wear something fancy, but he did?” It was only now that the people who had come there with Loki had noticed his outfit and it was Tony who raised an eyebrow. “What happened to the grey jumper you said was ‘nice enough’ to be seen out with when you have to be out with us annoying mortals?” “Well, I can’t let Lady Y/N be the only one who shows that she has a sense of elegance and fashion in this despicable planet, can I now?” Loki answered sarcastically and now you wanted to roll your eyes at him calling you ‘Lady Y/N’, something you had told him to stop ages ago. “Loki isn’t actually wearing this,” you tried to clear things up, ignoring Loki’s remark, only to receive even more confusing looks, causing you to sigh. “Loki is a trickster god, he uses Illusions, he’s probably still in his Pajamas, he just makes it seem like he is wearing this.” Before anyone would start bombarding the god and you with questions, you took hold of  the conversation and used your stern hero voice to gain the attention. “Now I’m sure you’re all wondering why I invited my favorite people to a newly opened nightclub and like Stephanie has already mentioned, one that is hard to get into nonetheless. The reason is-” you made a pause to emphasize, “-that it is my club.” A wave of confused ‘what?’s hit you and you quickly explained: “Well, I needed to find another outlet than hanging around with other heroes and busting bad guys and after a talk with Oliver - he’s a friend from Starling city,” you explained for the Avengers, “I decided that opening a club was just what I needed. That’s the reason I was so absent the past few weeks, I was busy planning and employing and stuff, but from now on everything should run itself. I will be able to perfectly split my time into three for the club, hero work and friends and family.” “That’s so cool!” Stephanie squealed and gave you a high five and the others joined in congratulating you, telling you how amazing everything looked and that they were proud of you. “Boss?” a voice interrupted from behind you and you turned to see one of your staff members, “Could I talk to you for a second?”   “Excuse me for a bit, I gotta go and run my business,” you cheekily smiled and left your two favorite teams to make conversation as you and the women left through the door that lead to the stairs. “So what’s the matter? What can I he-” you were rudely interrupted when the women’s form morphed into a taller, sleeker one of a certain trickster and promptly continued to press you against the door you had just left through. “Well, well, look who’s getting impatient,” you giggled as he pressed a kiss to your jawline. That was another secret that you had kept from your teams and even from Marianne. Loki and you. If you were being quite honest you were not sure how the two of you became a thing, but somehow you did and now the two of you were waiting for the right moment to tell the rest of the team that you were a lot more than just colleagues. “Can you blame me? You should’ve told me about this, beloved, then I’d known that you were not growing sick of me. I was all worried when you kept on disappearing,” he muttered as he relished in the closeness with you. Slightly shocked at this you grabbed his broad shoulders and pushed him back slightly. “How could you ever think that, Loki? I love you, I could never grow sick of you,” you assured him and pressed a loving kiss to his lips. “That is very good to know, beloved, and I’ll make sure to remind you of that whenever you need,” he winked and you couldn’t help but giggle. “Okay, okay, but I think I have to go back now, we can pick this up again later.” You turned around and opened the door again only to catch what was being said. “We’re obviously her favorites, I mean this club is in New York, not Gotham, why do you think that is?” “Oh shut your mouth, that means nothing. You heard what she said, we’re her family, we’re her brothers and sisters. The Demon is the best proof of that.” “Which Demon?” “Oh please, she called us her family too. After all we got all the appeal of you, but we also have gods.” “She has dinner every second weekend with Superman, an amazonian goddess, the king of atlantis and a world-class magician.” “Well with us she has the world's strongest AI, a world class witch AND the sorcerer supreme, two timeless soldiers, the world's fastest man and the god of thunder.” “Oh please, our fastest man could beat your fastest man in his sleep, not to mention that we have multiple of them.” “Well then bring it on” After having heard enough you looked at Loki, back at the group - and the illusion Loki that was standing bored beside them - and back at Loki, before closing the door again. “You know what, I think I’ll just let them talk that over for a bit.” “Yeah, I think that would be best,” Loki agreed, but he was clearly amused. “What do you think they’ll do when they find out that I am actually your favorite?” he asked teasingly and snug his arms around your waist. “Honestly I’m not sure you’d survive that…”

[wolfsworld-bigender-chaos]

soooo i was thinking that i made “what if venom + zodiac sign scorpio = venom scorpion” i made a female so im really proud of it T^T i will make the other zodiac sign soon when my school is over im getting more tired and a lot to do things 

hope u like her i named her “venoma scorpion” cause shes a female i will make male venom scorpion and the other female and male zodiac signs like this

 i drew this! i made my own!! it really came up in my head (DONT COPY) it wasnt from the others!! i really made this up in my mind ok? so dont judge it - -

i love this a lot request me what zodiac sign are ya! then i will make ur character like cause ofc i was born on november -w- so im scorpio

u can reblog this if ur venom fans hehe 

DEFINITION : 

poison venom - can kill u just one sting and will let u die for 2 hours or 1 ofc its dangerous for humans and any animals she preys on 

hunger - can eat anything that she preys on (snakes, tarantula, etc.) actually shes can eat foods on base on such any thing thats edible (like eating a symbiote) case on her diet 

weakness/death - boric acid/borax 

zodiac venom sign - scorpion 

bite (no or yes) - no she doesnt bite she stings with her venomous sting (like a bee sting or a wasp but scorpios are deadly poisonous) 

chases - no she doesnt aggressively pursue humans scorpion stings occur when human or insects or little animal steps into scorpions or reach into an area where scorpions hiding

lives - Scorpion lives at least 2-6 years although many live much longer, especially in the wild. They are 2-3 inches long. Bark scorpions will glow a green color (fluoresce) under ultraviolet light (even shes a venom she cant die from now on) 

sting paralyse - yes she can paralyse in an inability to move or feel part of the body

she glows mysterious green with ultra violet light 

she can climb walls but glass no she cant cause shes a bark scorpion

[alexseanchai]

Fanfic 2020 in Review

I got tagged by @kasienda @noirshitsuji and @marvelousmsmol and I am tagging whoever wants to play!

1) List of fics completed this year in the order they were finished:

*filters own works to complete and updated in 2020*

1 - 20 of 57 Works by AlexSeanchai

nope. *adds filter to include only works of at least 1000 words*

unless otherwise indicated, these are all Miraculous Ladybug:

“don’t bake it lying down”, post-reveal Marichat vs Felix Graham de Vanily

“veracity”, canon divergence from “Ladybug” featuring Mister Bug and Verity Queen (so also Marichat, I guess)

“(no request is too extreme, if) your heart is in your dream”, in which Hawkmoth wins, for the thirty seconds or so before Emilie saves Ladybug and Chat Noir’s lives

“tell me you love me and make me believe it”, in which trans girl Chatonne Noire ropes Ladybug into helping plan her civilian self’s escape slash social transition

“kingmaker, oathbreaker”, in which Hawkmoth wins and Emilie watches her son remove himself from the family

“stay and let me watch you break it down” (Twelve Dancing Princesses), a modern setting

“set a course for winds of fortune”, in which trans girl Chatonne Noire has already escaped and Gabriel and Nathalie are trying to bring Gabriel’s son home

“we ground love in a hopeless place”, in which post-reveal Marinette’s attempt to remain resolutely not in love with her partner dissolves like sugar in coffee when they start a pun war

“ring the bells that still can ring”, in which Alya is deeply confused about why Adrien and Marinette are planning a wedding when last night both were single

“burning wishes at both ends (the cold wind and long loud wail remix)”, in which Gabriel made a monkey’s paw wish and Emilie makes another

“words cannot espresso”, in which Marinette’s OC roommate is justifiably worried for Marinette’s safety, and meanwhile Adrien takes care of Marinette

“the compromise of truth” (the chronologically second-earliest part posted to date of nine lives, snake’s eyes), in which Adrien tells his friends how he won some freedom and respect from his father

“At The Present Time”, the Ladrien/Ladynoir marriage proposal follow-up to @art-deco-shrimp‘s  “Your Presents Required”

“j'ai rêvé (so I don't have to dream alone)”, in which the events of canon must just have been a series of dream sequences, Marinette and Adrien both think, until they both arrive at Chloe’s Halloween masquerade dressed as themselves from the dreams

2) Number of words written:

ahahaha no. I am not counting all my scattered fic drafts and trying to figure out what I did and didn’t write in 2020. I refuse.

AO3 says I posted 162K in 2020. it is counting all of keeps you guessing (like any real love), which (a) I started posting in 2019 (b) is co-written by @galahadwilder​; it is counting all of my meta snippets collection, much of which was written in 2019; it is counting the Vimeo passwords for my vids. but I probably cleared 150K by a safe margin.

3) Your most popular fic:

“veracity” has a four-digit kudos count, wow, when’d that happen? this is also the 2020 work with the most hits and the most bookmarks, but “tell me you love me” has four-thirds as many comments as its nearest competitor.

4) Your personal fav:

“cannot break us, not with a thousand swords”, no question about it. this is the one in which Ladybug proposes marriage to Chat Noir via Princess Bride meme on Tumblr. (if you intend to download the work or otherwise to consume it with creator style off, you want the accessible version instead of the primary version.)

5) Your fav scene:

aaaaaaaaa

—okay so this is cheating and I know it, since Uncertain Humors (the one where Marinette/Adrien is both Orpheus/Eurydice and Theseus/Ariadne) is nowhere near finished, never mind posted (maybe I'll get “Sanguine” done to post on my birthday?)

but it is still my favorite of the year. as you might guess from that description of the story, this scene has content notes for character death:

Hell is a maze. Marinette walks.

This acrid passage has little to see but damp stone, seeming blood-stained in the dim carmine light. At about the height of her heart, the faintly glowing thread cuts through the not-clammy air; it ought to be pulsing at the same rate as the heart it's bound to. She might be able to see her own reflection if she looked down at the open sewage pipe, or at one of the puddles that now and again she splashes through, dampening the canvas of her shoes. She might see reflected what's behind her.

She remembers Mme. Mendeleiev lecturing on human physiology. In healthy humans old enough to have learned how, urination is a voluntary action: one may not know which muscles one tenses and relaxes in order to do so, and probably isn't paying attention to those details when one is doing, but one has conscious control over whether one does. Usually. Stress and anxiety mean some people are unable to relax the relevant sphincter muscle and others are unable to stop themselves. It's voluntary for cats, too: it's one way they mark their territories. Cat-boys have other ways.

There is a moment in every human life when all one's muscles relax at once. Some Parisians have had several such moments.

The thread is braided with itself around her left fourth finger, rows of tiny red half-hitch knots, and falls loosely over the back of her hand to loop twice around her wrist. She holds it wrapped between the fingers of her right hand to keep it at a constant tension, as though knitting with this insubstantial thread, so fragile for something two (two dozen, two million) lives hang from—too thin to sew with, no thicker than one strand of his hair. As she walks, she winds it around and around and around her wrist.

Between her ring finger and her right hand, it loops twice.

Marinette's shoe lands in a puddle she didn't see. The rainwater splashes soundlessly onto her bare ankle and on the stone.

(With cat-like tread, upon our prey we steal— It's a very loud song.)

She walks on.

6) A fic or scene that challenged you:

where the firelight fades, no contest. this is the second story I’ve ever been able to stick with more than a couple hundred words past the 20K mark, but it’s easily the twentieth novel-length I’ve begun. (though also, you know that kedreeva post? well, 90K later, I’m less than 15K from completing this 10K fic! I think.) and I have been learning so much about long-form fiction.

there has also been a lot of weeping and tearing my hair. case in point: I just trashed the chapter 15 draft because I figured out the reason it wasn’t going anywhere! I can probably keep the first few hundred words of that draft without any editing, and another few hundred with some revision...

7) A line of writing you’re proud of:

from “j'ai rêvé (so I don't have to dream alone)”:

Everything about their partnership is fragments of sentences in the dream diary Adrien writes in ultraviolet pen. Disjointed flickers of thought even when examined under the black light he hides in the snack cabinet under packets of Super Yoyo sandwich cookies and bags of cheesy Monster Munch potato chips and boxes of petit écolier butter cookies (chocolat noir)—none of which explains the gym-socks smell. All fleeting incoherent flashes, invisible between the mundane lines of La Modification shelved at his bedside between Leroux and Dumas. None of it is solid. Adrien has more proof his room's haunted.

okay let me break this down for you!

* Adrien started a dream diary to make sense of the memories

* in invisible ink, in a book that (according to Wikipedia) is thematically appropriate and won’t (if Gabriel sees it) look like anything other than Adrien developing an interest in French literature

* shelved between Phantom of the Opera and The Three Musketeers

* look I didn’t come up with the name “black light”

* or “chocolat noir” for what English speakers call “dark chocolate”, or “petit écolier” (that is, “little schoolboy”) for that sort of butter cookie

* also not my fault that “chocolat noir” sounds remarkably like “Chat Noir”, which, attentive readers may have noticed, is not a name that appears in the story after the header and before Miraculous Cure

* I found the website of a store in Boston, Massachusetts that caters to French expats, and the yo-yo cookies and the monster chips were right there in the photos, y’all

* the snack stash and the black light live in the cabinet where, in canon, the Camembert lives; yes, that cheese smells in the real world like gym socks

* this story’s akuma was not able to affect anything but squishy human memory: nobody affected remembers anything about Ladybug or Chat Noir or Hawkmoth, not in any solid way, not even when they read news articles about the subject, and this includes Marinette and Adrien not being able to see or hear or remember their own kwamis—but you know what Adrien’s Insta post about his poltergeist and Adrien’s Insta post with the floating sock don’t show and don’t explicitly refer to?

* I love this paragraph so much (my housemates may have been lovingly mocking me over it)

8) A comment that touched you:

there are people (y’all know who you are) who said y’all are studying my style. I ded of blush.

9) Something that inspired your writing:

by volume of fic drafts that can be blamed on any particular person, the winner is probably @norakwami​

10) Your proudest accomplishment (that one scene; finally finishing that one fic; posting your first fic; etc):

so that longest-story-ever-written record I set in 2007 with the 89.5K story that, till where the firelight fades, was the only story I’d gotten much past 20K?

I broke that fucking record!

and then I deleted the draft of firelight chapter 15 😭

11) Do you have any writing goals for the next year?

I’m starting work on a fantasy novel, a Sleeping Beauty retelling in which I explore (among other things) the economic consequences of the king’s ordering all the spinning wheels burned, and I want to make significant progress on that. and I want to not make my hands any worse; I kind of need those!

(breaking news alert: bodies fucking suck. so does giving yourself repetitive stress injuries in doing one and a half to two people’s worth of work for an organization that was never ever going to pay you more than one person’s worth of pay.)

[perditus-a]

                                  50 Headcanons Challenge

He has a unique bird language strictly specific to himself, but cannot understand other birds nor communicate with them. 

His feathers shift slightly as time goes on, so the ones on the ends and lower are older than the ones closest to the base. 

His two sword feathers are unique in that he usually uses them last if he can. They’ve been growing the longest, hence their size, and are his strongest ones. 

Keigo does rifle through his wings and clean feathers that get too old though, because if they become too strong and dense it makes it harder to fly. 

The larger the feather, the more it can carry and withstand. His two feather blades can handle several hundred pounds - but they’re slower to move so there is a limit to how big he should go. 

His wings are strong, but as a child he couldn’t really lift himself as easily. It took a lot of fluttering wings and tripping and falling to get to a level of flight that was respectable. 

His wings are trained not to react to his emotions, but when he isn’t trying they’re VERY emotional! They rise in excitement, droop in anger, and flutter with intense happiness and love. They also tense up in anger. 

Keigo’s visor nullifies the enhanced sight he gained from his bird-like qualities because it’s too much and causes eye strain. He also has contacts and glasses that do the same function. 

His earmuffs protect his ears during flight but also dull sounds so he can focus. Since he has his feathers and vibration sensing techniques, he can afford to lose it in exchange for greater focus on the field. 

Yes his eye marks are birthmarks! But he also adds on a little eyeliner to make them look smoother. 

He collects jewelry, especially earrings. He’s specifically fond of studs and has different sets. He even cheekily buys some to match his best friends as well.

Keigo can use JSL and ASL. He decided to pick it up so that he could communicate with deaf people on the field as well as vocal people. He thinks it’s important and advocates for it to be included in curriculum, though to little success. 

He also uses Morse code and has trained his sidekicks and interns to use it as well. He uses it in conjunction with his feathers. 

Keigo is well trained in hand-to-hand, but his specialty deals with swords and generally keeping his distance. 

Much of his training in his youth was geared towards flight. A lot of the little quirks about his...well quirk... were discovered along the way and then focused on if they proved to be useful ( his vibration sensing ).

He can play guitar sort of, he’s not specially trained or anything - he can recognize chords and play based off of that but can’t come up with much on his own. 

He has a pet falcon - their name is Kaze and they’re a TOTAL asshole to Keigo and everyone. But he trained them to deliver messages and do all kinds of things, so he’s stuck with them. 

Keigo is trans! He has opted to not do any surgeries and probably never will due to being comfortable enough as is. He does wear binders though! 

Keigo is bisexual - but tends to lean towards males. 

He despises the League of Villains, but does have sympathy for specific members and the MLA. 

He never went to any school before the commission picked him up, and learned things by reading newspapers and listening to people from the side. 

He never had friends before the commission - his father wouldn’t let him see anyone. 

Though he’s had social training, genuine stuff is actually a problem for him and more often than not he’s faking it. Completely. 

The spot between his wings on his back is a sweet spot, and feels relaxing to rub. It makes him calm down from a panic attack. 

Keigo is terrible at games unless they’re pay to win. Then he’s at least decent. 

Keigo actually makes nests when he sits around and stuff, and have blankets all over his office and stuff. It’s completely subconscious, and he just does it without thinking. 

He loves to kiss, it’s very very fun for him. 

His preference for pets is dogs, despite having a Falcon. He doesn’t have the time to take care of one...but he wants one BADLY. 

He can hold his breath longer than most due to his quirk, and it’s why he can fly in the air without requiring a mask. 

After the WAR ARC, his ability to hold his breath is severely weakened and he can’t fly as high anymore without a mask. ( if he ever even gets his wings back TO fly). 

His bones are dense but hollow and light, allowing him to take flight easier. It makes his body weigh a lot less than normal people his age, but it’s completely healthy. 

Keigo’s favorite food is chicken, followed by strawberries and peaches. He’s a big fruit guy. He makes all kinds of fruit smoothies during his own time. 

He has crazy balance, but losing his wings makes him stumble and fall a lot. Keigo is used to having a heavy weight on his back, and without it he’s clumsy and more likely to fall or knock in to things. 

Keigo’s wings actually glow under the right type of light! His wings are very much like normal bird wings, and thus have the same properties. The colors are red/blue/purple with dapples of white.

He can see ultraviolet things, when his eyesight isn’t being diminished by his equipment. He dislikes it though. 

He had always wanted a sibling as a kid, but has since grown out of that and desires a family instead. 

He hates his father, but he’s always loved his mom even when she neglected him or said mean things to him...he wanted her to love and want him. It’s why he left, so he could give her a better life and hoped that maybe she would finally love him. 

He didn’t start liking Endeavor until he busted his dad, though he grew more fond of him due to the plushie. He originally liked All Might, but he became more of an impersonal hero at best - Endeavor felt very real to him. 

He’s considered dying his hair, but decided to keep it the same. He would rather have something to resemble his mother. 

Keigo’s not really afraid of injuries and death because of his mom’s creepy quirk. It’s why it was easy for him early on to accumulate to it. 

He loves motorcycles and hate’s most normal modes of travel. He does have a car, but it’s specially modified to allow him to relax his wings and not feel cramped. 

Keigo only wears designer clothes while out and about, because it’s for his personal image as well as contracts his agency has. 

Speaking of which, he models on the side as well as hero work! It’s pretty fun for him, but he doesn’t do topless shoots unless it’s for charity aimed at supporting LGBTQ+ groups. 

Keigo can turn off his vibration sensing, but sometimes it’s difficult and he can get sensory overload. He usually counts under his breath when he’s feeling overwhelmed and needs a moment. He tries to hide this though. 

His feathers are also sensitive, and he doesn’t like them being yanked. They only remove painlessly when he uses his quirk to do so. 

He hates fire as well as storms. 

Keigo also hates swimming, because the water makes his wings heavy and it gives him a back ache. 

He has smacked in to a window once. Only once. He was a little intoxicated at the time since he very rarely drinks. 

Keigo can’t taste spicy food at all! So he tends to make overly spicy food and his friends suffer for it. Oops.

Keigo absolutely loves swords!!!

[n7punk]

i know u love writing about catra and her heightened senses/colourblindness, but do you have any little headcanons or facts about any other princesses? example: scorpia's carapace glows under ultraviolet light and she has enhanced night vision, mermista has thicker/insulating skin and denser bone and tissue to survive deep underwater when she is in her mermaid form and frosta's body temperature runs unnaturally low.

i know exactly 0 facts about scorpions, especially compared to cats, but i actually spent like 2 hours trying to research to figure out how much touch sensitivity scorpia has in her chitin and have come to the conclusion that she can feel pressure but not sensation/texture. basically like if you touch your fingernail. i also headcannon her as having some hearing issues from standing close to so many canons, but only enough to really be an issue when speaking at low volumes or indistinctly. i headcannon this for her specifically because the rebellion didn’t use them, she was a force captain for years, and catra clearly avoided/hated the loud equipment because of her already-sensitive hearing. ive also decided, for my own sanity, that scorpioni only need to shed their carapace as they grow and now she is an adult that’s her carapace for several years. maybe she sheds every like 6-8 years or something but for the most part thats what she has. ive googled the blacklight thing now that youve mentioned it and im 100% saying yes scorpia’s chitin glows because i love this.

for entrapta i have a headcannon about her having motor delay issues with her legs (its something that goes with autism sometimes) and her legs being a bit physically weaker because of the way she often walks with her hair instead. i headcannon her hair as both acting on its own/based on her emotions when she isn’t thinking about it and also (clearly) being fully under her control when she wants to use it, kind of like catra’s tail. most of my headcannons for entrapta are related to her autism rather than physical/magical traits, but she also isnt one of the elemental princesses.

frosta i 100% think naturally runs at a low temperature (she lives in a castle of ICE) and i headcannon her as getting overheated/heat stroke very easily as a results - so much so she has to be very careful visiting other kingdoms during the summer, and sometimes even the spring/fall. on the flip-side, she is obviously quite comfortable at temperatures too low for most people. she can use her powers to spring ice up near her to cool herself off, but she has to be diligent about it. when perfuma/scorpia kinda take her in i imagine they get real helicopter mom about it like “frosta we’ve been in the sun for 30 minutes and you havent cooled off are you sure you don’t need your ice?!” and frosta is really annoyed by it at first but they eventually have a talk about it and perfuma explains it is because they love her and just want to make sure she is healthy and safe, not because they think she can’t take care of herself. (honestly that could have been a fic but oops its spoiled now so just take it).

the flowers in perfuma’s hair cannot be removed. like you can pull them out but new ones will be there and you can’t keep up. she isn’t bothered by it, sometimes she purposefully adds more, but there will always be a certain number of petals in her hair. I also just imagine she has a lot of callouses and really rough hands from the gardening/physical work/natural way she lives. also perfuma is a trans woman but that’s not really a headcannon so much as something they were too afraid to try to put explicitly in the show. i love it and it makes perfect sense to me.

i don’t really have any biological mermista headcannons? which is weird because i love her but i guess ive always just accepted her at her surface level. i do like what you have proposed about the insulated skin, though, especially because going on hrt can change your skin thickness and make everything you touch feel weird while you adjust to it! it would be interesting for her to frequently go back and forth and kind of always be aware of that change in feeling. (psst. trans mermista. love that for her).

glimmer i call a “demi-mortal” because in canon she says she doesnt get sick because “having an immortal mother does have some advantages”. basically she doesn’t get sick, she heals quicker, and it takes more to hurt her. she also physically ages a bit slowly (she had such a BABYFACE at the start of the show  😭) but she doesn’t have an unnatural lifespan. noelle has also said that the wings on her back are markings (like a birthmark) and i headcannon her marks are a little more magic sensitive than the rest of her so they will like tingle when there is a lot of magic around her (like in the illusionary spikes on crytis). she can detect it other ways, but that part of her is just especially sensitive to it. also the glitter in her hair isn’t glitter, her hair has sparkles in it and it doesn’t like come out or leave a trail like glitter would lol. also just a reminder of the canonical information that glimmer tastes like glitter.

[faecaptainofdreams]

I kinda don't LOVE the art, but it's eh. I think it works though, maybe it'll grow on me. ^^ Keep in mind this is a head canon, don't like it don't look at it. MCU universe with me bending the rules a lot and taking inspiration from the PS4 game, bla bla bla.~ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~~Scorpion~~ McDonald "Mac" Gargan was a mercenary with a predisposition for cold, violent behavior, though he hid it well. But when J. Jonah Jameson ended up funding research to create an "anti-Spider-Man" to do "real good" and be a "real" superhero, Mac jumped at the opportunity. Of course, he never intended to do any good with it; all concerns were centered towards himself. He figured it would make missionary work easier to complete, not to mention the powers would be fun to wield, but since Jameson was so adamant on rivaling Spider-Man, Mac thought the concept of challenging the spider to be thrilling. And of course, it was no accident that the mutagen created for this process would be drawn from that of a scorpion, a cousin of the spider -- but more importantly, a predator of the spider. While the labs used to create this new "superhero" were government authorized (which is why Jameson felt safe enough to invest), the regulation over its work was not as good as it could have been. Moreover, the scientists working on the mutagen were not prepared for just how unstable their product would become when mixed with the DNA of a human being. They thought they did everything right, but upon infusing the scorpion-based agent with Mac's DNA, the mutation erupted and went far further than they'd intended. And with Mac already being a born psychopath with a near-total lack of conscience, the cold, self-serving nature of the animal hind brain we all possess became enhanced in him. After nearly a week spent in a sort of incubation period in a bizarre cocoon formed of hardened skin cells, Mac emerged totally transformed. He was bigger, and it was clear that the scorpion-to-human ratio was unbalanced. A hollow, blood-thirsty gaze and sharp, toothy grin adorned his face, as did armor plating all down his body. And, eerily enough, an enormous tail equipped with a massive, functioning stinger. In awe of their creation, the scientists took notes, of course, and they attempted to study Mac. Mac was patient for about an hour, but ultimately decided it wasn't wise to have so much information on him available at the ready. After destroying the lab and killing half of the scientists, Mac broke out and escaped into the city. Eventually, he had a run-in with Spider-Man, whom he easily overpowered and wounded during their first fight. But a few tries later, Spidey subdued the Scorpion, and Mac went to prison. He would be there for five solid years before being broken out by Otto Octavius, along with a few other top-tier villains and Spider-Man enemies. ~~Personality~~ Mac Gargan is a sociopath with none of his humanity left. He is ruthless and not shy to kill, and loves more to torture his opponents. He's not the most intelligent, having a bad habit of taunting even his allies a little too much and getting himself into trouble. He's basically his own worst enemy in that regard. Although he doesn't appear to think things through very well, he is clever, and enjoys snuffing out the weaknesses of his foes. ~~Physiology~~ Mac is almost twice the size of the average human. One would think that with his enhanced strength, he would be able to lift and manipulate far more weight than Spider-Man, but as it is his max weight is 5.7 tons, which is just a little more than half of what Peter can haul. Regardless, he is a powerhouse and a force to be reckoned with, and that armored tail is nothing to sneeze at. His tail is considerably stronger and more flexible than his full-arachnid cousin, and this is thanks to his human DNA. Mac is still a vertebrate; he just has a bigger, stronger musculoskeletal system now. His tailbone extends into the full length of his tail, ending with a thick joint just before the stinger, which is filled with contracting muscles that regulate how much venom he can inject into his victims. This tail is far more precise during attacks as well, and the entire appendage itself can be used as a major blunt-force weapon. The venom in Mac's tail is a potent hallucinogenic neurotoxin that, in its lowest dose, causes muscle pain and spasms around the injection site, and causes the victim to experience imaginary bodily pain as the brain's frontal lobe and sensory cortex go haywire. The amygdala, the brain's fear-processing center, kicks into high gear as "bad trips" and horrifying hallucinations begin, often in relation to the imagery of scorpions and monsters resembling Mac. Each experience is different for each individual, but more often than not, the gruesome vision involve the victim's worst fears, phobias, and even drag feelings and hallucinations related to the victim's past traumas to the surface. The brain creates nightmares that the victim's body thinks are real, causing pain and all sensory input to feel very, very real. There is a chance of surviving envenomation at a low dose, but the victim needs to be taken care of immediately. At a moderate and high dose, the victim doesn't stand a chance. Organ failure, paralysis and respiratory failure kill in roughly a minute -- and that's ignoring the wound Mac inflicts with the stinger itself. Cruelly, Mac prefers to kill or get by using lower doses, as he is fascinated with watching his victims squirm and suffer. But when patience is lost or a deed needs quick doing, a hard strike in the right place can kill his target in seconds, hardly needing venom at that point. Mac's grip is vice-like and impossible for the average person to get out of. His crushing hold on a victim is helpful, needless to say. He's not nearly as fast as Spider-Man, but he's agile enough and is an expert at concealing himself. Like the scorpion, he can climb up most surfaces, though he doesn't have scopulae hairs like Peter. Rather, he relies on his enormous claws. Mac is nocturnal, preferring to be up and about during the night. And, like a real scorpion, he glows under ultraviolet light. Scorpions are not picky eaters, but they are carnivores. They'll eat anything they can get their claws on, including other scorpions -- even their relatives. Needless to say, Mac isn't a sentimental person. During his first time out in the city, Mac first killed and ate a few farm animals, but Spider-Man stopped him while he was in the process of hunting a person. Yes, he will eat people if he gets the chance. It would be an extra nasty sight, too, as the enzymes in his saliva are designed by nature to start breaking down his food before it even gets into his mouth. It would be...unpleasant to be spit on by Mac Gargan, so to speak. Scorpions are tough animals that can survive immersion in water for up to two days, and can withstand being frozen solid. Once the ice thaws, the animal simply gets up and gets on the move again. They can also go months, even a year without eating! Yes, these durability traits apply to Mac, which makes him all the more horrifying. ~~Preference~~ Mac is straight, though understandably, has never gotten too lucky, and is very aromantic. One would think that, violent as he is, he would simply force himself onto victims, but with the scorpion instincts he possesses, that reflex is inhibited. Rather, he will attempt to sway a potential mate, and of course, it never works, much to his deep frustration. He may injure whoever turns him down, but oddly, he won't assault them. In the animal kingdom, the female scorpion gets her say-so, and that's the end of it. Even though the average female human doesn't stand a chance against him, his instincts (awkwardly) tell him that pushing it will somehow result in his destruction. Don't be mistaken, he doesn't care about the woman; he's only protecting himself. It's safe to say, Mac experiences bouts of sexual frustration...especially during mating season. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hm. What do ya know, already growin' on me ^u^