#also mike is still the leader of the party make no mistake

[mike-haters-dni]

Me when I’m a 13-year-old boy who watched the girl he fell deeply in love with die in front of him and then spent a year calling her everyday desperately trying to summon her back because he couldn’t go on without her when she miraculously shows up alive again and they finally get to be together: I’m sorry girl 😔 I love care for you 😔 but I had these friends first 😔 we can’t leave this get together even though we both want to 😔 I’ve objectively weighed my priorities and my friends have to be a little bit more important to me 😔 even though btw I’ve left you to go hang out with them before 😔 I hope you can understand 😔

Shit this is actually what y’all wanted him to act like isn’t it lmao

[cosmobrain00]

leaving this here just bc I've seen a LOT of awesome takes lately (im looking directly at all of my mutuals while saying this btw🙏) but can we all admit the whole 'mike "confessing" to will that he's not the heart but will is' thing was like. . . completely wrong?

no offense, but every character has a role in every story, and will's role is NOT the heart, it's mike no matter what you think. has will ever been in a position of leadership like that?? no, right? he hasn't. not to say he isn't important, he very much is! but throughout the seasons, we've literally been SHOWN how the party thrives under mike's leadership I mean come on.

s1: mike getting everyone together to find will in the first place, coming up with plans, making mistakes but ultimately still being the lead, not giving up and doing his best to protect who he can even though he's literally still a kid

s2: once again, making plans to save will, getting everyone together and pulling their heads out of their asses, paying attention to will and lending an ear, maintaining that role of someone 'steady' even though he himself is very much suffering. once again, he makes mistakes, and unfair assumptions, but that's bc he's human, and obviously we all have biases (and he's also barely even a teen like... come on)

s3: now we get to where things start getting rocky, but STILL even after everything he still manages to pull himself together (also bc of will calling him out in the garage yessir) and even with el being a big focus, he's still shown to lead and direct the party (while once again making mistakes, and yes that still doesn't mean he isn't a good leader)

s4: this is the season where he's unfortunately removed a lot from the action (coincidence? I think not) but it's still obvious in certain scenes, how he steps up after the whole thing with el, etc.

anyways, small note too, but it would also go against will's character to feed into mike's insecurities btw. like.. can u imagine that kid looking at mike after mike says he's not the heart/ the leader, and will going "yes ur so right king!!" haha. . . no. will constantly and consistently builds mike back up and stands with him, so why would he agree with something like that??

basically what I'm trying to say is that no matter what changes, mike IS the heart of the party, even though he does fuck up and make mistakes, he is undoubtedly in that role 100% and everyone knows it. as I said before, every character has their role in the story, so if not the heart or the leader, what would mike's role be? genuinely asking bc honestly I can't see anything else, but let me know if I'm wrong or got something wrong ig🤷‍♂️

[runninguplenorahills]

and last questions of my spam of questions:

1. thoughts on (platonic obv) Madwheeler? isn’t it funny how she hung up on Lucas in s3, but still kept on the line for Mike even if he treated El not great? i feel like they good friends. And she had his back when lucas was calling him out at the beginning. And overall I feel like they care a lot but won’t admit it.

2. what does your Pinterest look like? First 4 photos to show ur aesthetic.

3. last question. Who is your comfort character (pt.1) and who is your comfort ship? (Pt.2)

Thank you so so much for this ask!!!🌷💗

Question number 1:

Mike isn’t a self proclaimed leader, the whole party genuinely sees him as that and the heart of the group. They have an insane amount of respect for Mike even when they are in an argument with him/aren’t on good terms with him and Max is not an exception. She spent a lot of her time in s2 trying to get Mike to like her/his approval and her bad attitude was never a result of her not liking him, but thinking that he didn’t like her. Max really wanted to be friends with Mike and she’s also actually very fun and silly. Someone who obviously has something of a bad temper but isn’t generally rude at all. Most of the time she’s simply scared. She cares about Mike and respects him and I think this seeking for his approval bled into the beginning of s3 which is why she tried to defend him against Lucas’ jokes. We also cannot forget that Max was fascinated by El and wanted to be friends with her which El denied. So Max was out there not knowing a single thing about Mike’s girlfriend but wanting to as well as wanting to be on Mike’s good side and therefore maybe feeling like this wasn’t her place to joke around/criticize. Which of course all changed after realizing that she doesn’t have to be pro-melvin because Mike treats El like garbage (El also treats Mike badly but that, of course, went unnoticed). Mike’s behavior towards El was not okay and Max helped El to realize that she doesn’t deserve this kind of treatment. She stood up for her and supported her and while she was of course mad at Mike for his behavior it didn’t change that she still likes and respects him generally. He’s still one of her best friends and fighting, criticizing and calling him out for his mistakes doesn’t make her like him any less (every other party member has done it before and they obviously all love Mike). Mike and Max are good friends and they do care and respect each other even though they fight a lot. And if I’m being 100% honest I don’t even think that they wouldn’t not admit to that. There’s no “we hate each other”-image they want to keep up. Not in front of others nor in front of each other. They are friends and they obviously do like each other and especially to Max it’s really important that Mike likes her as it makes her feel like she’s a true part of of the group. I personally like Madwheeler a lot but it’s also very frustrating that a lot of people in the fandom only look at their friendship through a s3-lens and completely ignore how their dynamic was the season before. They literally only look at how their dynamic is when they’re currently in a fight which is ridiculous! Especially Max actually usually makes an effort to be nice to Mike! She is not shitting on him and picking fights with him for the shits and giggles! Their fights are genuine fights and yes, when they’re fighting they sometimes say mean things to each other but that’s not how their friendship usually is. A whole lot of people first seem to think that the whole party is affectionately rude to Mike and then settle on only Max being affectionately rude to Mike, but even though neither is true, even when Lucas and Will were joking about Mike’s relationship with El, Max doesn’t join in (as we already discussed). I’m just so over people pretending like the party sees Mike as a total loser and since they especially project that onto Madwheeler I really don’t enjoy the fandom content even though I do like the friendship.

Question number 2:

So this is just a screenshot from my for-you-board (this is what you meant right?…. Right!?) which is very easily influenced because I’m not all too much on pinterest. Pretty much only there to search for clothes for my character closet boards and st stuff in general. But as you see I’ve also been looking at strawberry shortcake stuff lately <3

Question number 3:

Mike is my favorite character but I guess Will is more of a comfort character to me? Idk, it’s generally both though. And my comfort ship is obviously byler <33

[truessences]

Mike Wheeler IS the Heart (part 2)

I had to split this into two parts because it was getting long but in this essay I will explain why I think Mike Wheeler is the heart of the party.

Part One Here

I do agree that Will's perspective of Mike will obviously influence the things he says, feels and thinks about Mike and that's including his "heart of the group" speech but I genuinely believe it past Will's perspective. I wouldn't even be writing this if people weren't calling Mike all kinds of rude names: Wet Sock, Wet Blanket, he's NOT the heart, he's the worst lol like I can't.

When I hear someone say "the heart of the group", what I think that means is someone who is depended on, someone who holds the group together, who may be the leader, who will do whatever they can to protect those they love. They aren't perfect and if anything, they may take their mistakes or things they couldn't succeed in doing the hardest. They are the ones that the others will look to in hard times or for answers and/or support. Maybe they make the final decisions or they're the ones who make the plans. 

Mike (The Paladin)- Mike IS the heart of the party, as well as the leader.

I think this is shown in every season in various ways. In the introduction, we see him being the Dungeon Master, just as we do at the end, which indicates his role in the group of being the leader. Even when he tries to appeal to his mom to let them continue playing, Lucas and Dustin tell Will not to worry about his bad roll because Mike didn’t see it. Mike watches as his friends ride away on their bikes, to at least make sure they start their journey safely. He meets Eleven and immediately wants to help her, he goes right into caregiver mode, develops a clear crush on her, but that doesn’t change his mission of finding and saving Will, he just now has another person who could be in trouble. When he finds out she recognized Will AND has powers, instead of trying to “send her back to where she came from”, he welcomes her into their party and shows her a love she’s never experienced before, kindness- without expecting anything back from her. He’s also more willing to accept the things that Eleven tells him, he’s the most open-minded of the group. All throughout S1, he’s trying to accommodate everyone. Even though he and Lucas argue a lot about Eleven, he continuously tries to pacify Lucas’ concerns by telling him that she can help them and he wasn’t wrong.

Mike also doesn’t hesitate.

This is shown when he was prepared and DID jump off the cliff to save Dustin, he yelled at Eleven for hurting Lucas, he confronted Troy and his friend for laughing at Will’s memorial at the school. He reassures Dustin that he is also his best friend, there isn’t a hierarchy in his friendships. He told the bad men that they would have kill him to get to Eleven and he never stopped fighting when they were being held back. Eleven called for him. While Mike tends to wear his emotions on his sleeve, he also doesn’t talk about them as much as he’s prepared to take in others emotions and concerns. Even talking about them is difficult, this is shown when Nancy asks him if he likes Eleven, whenever Lucas or Dustin would accuse him of liking her, and when he tries to tell Eleven about his feelings and the SnowBall dance. 

He has a hard time (this is a character trait) expressing himself sometimes. Being a creative writer, or a creative thinker doesn’t mean that the personal stuff is easy to share… As someone who is a creative writer, my emotions are internal and I don’t always share what I’m feeling but I’m the one that people do that with.

In season 2, Mike is depressed after seeing Eleven disappear before his eyes and he’s acting out but while doing that, he’s still attentive to his friends, especially Will, since Mike can tell that he is still being affected due to his time in the Upside Down. People like to use him doing this as this was when he was at best… So Mike was at his best when he’s supporting Will? Got it.

But no one cares that Mike was going through it, to see this kid, who is a good natured kid, acting out and NO ONE is trying to get to the root of it but here he is, giving all of himself to his friend who is also suffering. He needs someone to lean on but remains the person that others can lean on. He does share with Will a little bit and tells him they can go crazy together, meaning that Will is dealing with his issues of his "hallucinations" and Mike is dealing with sensing, missing and thinking he's seeing Eleven... they can go crazy together. That's all.

But he’s sidelined in this season because he’s playing emotional support. Remember when Will was possessed and Mike realized that he was tricking them to get those soldiers killed and without hesitation he tried to warn them? Remember how Mike covered his ears as his friend screamed that he was lying? Then in the shed sequence, which is one of my favorite sequences, he tearfully tells Will that meeting him was important to him, “the best thing I ever did”? Trying to find Will in the darkness, here is this 12-13 year old kid, trying to save his friend from the darkness while also fumbling through his own. THEN even after having a breakdown when he finds out that Hopper kept Eleven a secret (after that adorable reunion scene), he still is willing to fight the demodogs, it was his plan to lure the demodogs away from the lab so Hopper and Eleven could get to the gate. 

Finally, FINALLY, he gets the thing he's wanted... to dance with Eleven at the Snow Ball.

In Season 3, sure, Mike and Eleven spent a lot of time together, but I don’t think they’re wrong for wanting to. They’ve cared for each other for a while but they couldn’t be together in S2 because Hopper didn’t allow Eleven to talk to Mike in S2, so he didn’t even know she was okay. But now they’re together and they’re happy. Yeah sure, he was a little ass to Hopper but Hopper wasn’t helping the situation. He’s so yelly. Then instead of actually being an adult and talking to these teenagers, he threatens Mike, who then lies to Eleven and is mentally beating himself up about it the entire season, and MIKE is the bad guy? When he hurts Will’s feelings, he immediately apologizes even though Will doesn’t apologize for calling Eleven a “stupid girl that Mike swaps spit with”. Mike chases after Will in the pouring rain to apologize for not taking his campaign seriously. He even noticed when Will reacted to feeling the Mind Flayer again at the beginning. Mike was the only one to tell Max to get away from the window after HIS plan worked to see if Billy was indeed possessed. He was the ONLY one who tried to help Eleven when Billy was attacking them. Even though they were broken up, he was still there for her to hold on to.

In the cabin, he was rightfully angry at the others for carelessly pushing Eleven to use her powers and potentially overexerting herself, he tells her she doesn’t have to do this, he tells Max that she’s being careless, but no one is on his side. The only person on his side this season is Lucas.

Mike accidentally confesses his love for Eleven while simultaneously trying to make a case for the others not to just USE her. When Eleven is attacked in the cabin, once again he acts without hesitation and he’s always the one she lands on. He’s got her. During the battle of Starcourt Mall, he is literally by Eleven and Max’s side the entire time. Billy attacks Max, Mike immediately charges at him, no hesitation.

Let’s not act like Mike was out of character in this season because he wasn’t all up in Will’s business every 5 minutes. I was glad for that actually. But this seems to be the reason why people are like “S3 Mike is the worst!” But he’s literally the same character, he’s just changing and growing up, making mistakes and choices like everyone else. He’s a round character! Hey may not get all the attention I think he should but that doesn’t make him the worst. 

In season 4, Mike is in high school, his girlfriend and one of his best friends has moved away. He goe to California to visit Eleven and The Byers, but while there, he finds out that Eleven has been lying to him, trying to make him not worry about her, Will and Mike’s friendship seems to have drifted. Eleven feels unloved because Mike has a hard time SAYING it but he does it with acts of service, by bringing her the flowers she missed in her favorite colors while also WEARING her favorite colors. Without hesitation, he tells her that he says it. He even tells her without hesitation that he doesn't believe that she’s a monster, those people don’t know her like he does. When she gets arrested, he’s right there at the window, trying to get her to look at him, trying to reassure her that she’ll be okay, that he’s going to get her out. When she’s being taken away again, this boy senses the car with her in it (something that’s been shown many times), and chases after her without hesitation. When Owens sends his people, Mike is more worried about the ones in Hawkins, his family, and wants them to protect them, not the California crew. He and Will have a talk and he tells him that he didn’t mean to be distant, but having their group split up, having both Will and Eleven gone, it was weird. A nice small moment for Mike to share his feelings and for someone to listen to him. There are a couple of other times where we see Mike’s emotions clearly on his face but he quickly schools into a brave face when he notices he’s being watched. He’s trying to be strong. 

So since this is already long and the van scene has had a ton of great pieces written about it, ( I can give my thoughts on it another time), but all I will say is this… just because Mike didn’t say anything to Will while he was crying doesn’t mean he ignored him. Mike who has been pretty attuned to all of his friends, I think has a good idea of how they are.

In the past, when Will was hiding, people didn’t notice something was wrong. Like it’s been said, Will is good at hiding and he was intentionally hiding his sobbing from Mike, his fucking head was turned, he tried not to make any noise and covered his mouth. Mike probably didn’t realize he was crying and even if he did realize he was crying, Will looked like he was trying to hide it… what was Mike going to do? “Hey.. why Will are you crying??” out loud in front of Jonathan and Argyle? I bet you that if they were at the Byers house, Will would have went into another room, or his own bedroom to cry so no one would see it. If Will wasn’t trying to hide it, then he wouldn’t have turned away, he would have just cried. He’s done it plenty of times in front of Mike. NOT to mention, he probably didn't understand why Will would be emotional because as far as Mike knows, Will was talking about Eleven not her and himself. Why would he know that? BUT ALSO, Will just gave Mike a pep talk, one that he needed to help reassure Mike as he’s done for literally everyone else who needed reassuring. So maybe,  just maybe even though my heart breaks for Will, it’s not him that Mike HAS to be thinking about at that moment.

When Mike finds Eleven, after spotting her in the desert, he breaks when he gets to her. He’s been strong up to this point, dependable, he suggested going to see Suzie, he was the one reading the map… Now he can break. Only to go right back into being strong again, making sure Eleven has what she needs for her bath. Then of course his confession, no matter how cheesy, it meant something to Eleven and gave her the extra push she needed. 

Mike is the paladin, what are they? Knights. What do knights do? They protect those around them. They are sometimes the ones in the front, leading the rest of the army, helping without hesitation. Even though Eleven is the one with the powers and ultimately leads the charge, Mike is right there with her, leading the others as the paladin, supporting the hero. And even though Eleven is the one with the power, she still turns to Mike for help and he does without hesitation.

Mike may not make all the choices that YOU think are right at that moment, but I think he does a damn good job for a teenager. He does not hesitate. He’s been supportive and strong of everyone that we hardly got to ever see him talk to anyone about what he’s feeling, he’s just expected to be on 100 all the time for everyone else. ESPECIALLY Will, since people seem to think that he’s a precious baby who needs to be coddled.

It’s not fair to Mike that so much is expected of him and he has to act like he has it all together…  but because it is and he doesn’t… that’s what makes him the heart of the party. The others will look to him when they need to and he has found a way to support them, without hesitation. I think that is the epitome of being the heart of the party. He's the emotional center, the one that everyone can turn to and lean on and he's always there when he's needed the most.

It's long but I had a lot to get out. This can go hand in hand when people also say that Mike is useless which is also untrue. So... yeah... tldr... Will is the eyes. Dustin is the brain. Lucas is the arms/strength. Max is the legs. Eleven is the literal power. Mike is the heart.

[0aurelion-sol0]

I do find it funny (and concerning) barely anyone outside of the fandom is realising how OOC and inconsistent Mike has been through Season 1, 2, 3 & now 4.

In season 1, El is literally taken for a boy and could've been taken for Will apparently by some people who Mike desperately wants to find. She is not into D&D in any way, yet unlike Max, he completely allows her to be in his Party despite again having no interest in said game. He gets into a fight with Lucas about them having El with them and has to work with Dustin after that, Dustin who points out his complete obliviousness to the situation. They "get together" after meeting each other for a week and without proper build up or El having

In Season 2, Mike has arguments with his parents about why he doesn't want to give away his toys and is all about D&D and keeping the Party as what it is and not letting anybody get in like Max despite her being into the same thing as him. He is grieving about El and is extremely moody about it. He says he has a feeling that she is still alive but never goes look for her like Will. He passes most of his time with said Will for obvious reason related to the season but Will is also all about D&D. Like outside of Dustin, there's probably no one on his level. And again, which brings us back to his "Party members only" attitude and how he really acts like a leader around all of theme.

In season 3, he wants to grow up and pass most of his time with El making out to the point he ignores and is mean to all of his friends. He gets into arguments left and right particularly with El who breaks up with him and with Will, who he points out his sexuality after fighting about how he doesn't want to play D&D anymore. He passes most of his time with Lucas who is extremely similar to Mike in that moment about what he is experiencing and struggling with. Everytime they show Mike trying to make up for his mistakes with El, he fails completely or is super weird about it. (plus he doesn't hesitate and goes crawling back to Will after their fight unlike what Max said he was going to do with El) But he is also able to make up with Will over him leaving D&D behind and possibly forgetting about him. Despite never actuallt resolving their situation about said fight...

And now in season 4, he's back and is fully into a D&D club and clearly taking after their leaders vibe. He wants to keep most of the Party together apparently and even tries to recruit new people like Erica. He even seems to pass most of his time with Dustin who is like all about curiosity and D&D plus all the kid stuff he loved before he tried to move on from it. YET when he goes to Cali to see the Byers, he seems to ignore most of the Byers apart from El (we haven't seen the scene yet, he could give a quick hello to them but it looks like this is what is happening) including his best friend which meeting was the best he has ever done and was worried about him forgetting about him. But when he's with El, he doesn't seem as thrilled as he should be for some reason.

Like it doesn't fit. Something is wrong here.

Why would Mike go back to D&D after passing through an entire season where he tries to move on from it and than be worried his best friend might forget about him and join another party ? And why would he ignore him in such a way despite wanting to get the Party together and even recruiting new people when he is his best friend and the people he thinks meeting was the best thing he has ever done ? Especially if it's on his birthday, of all days ?

With Will, even if they haven't talked or given a resolution about their fight, there's still some consistency and why he was into D&D (escaping into the game and problems related to his identity), now that he doesn't have it anymore, he can't ignore it and is going to have to face it. Perhaps he has feelings for Mike (some reviews have stated it plain and simple), which would make sense about a lot of things but we don't know to which extent he is aware of it and if he understands most of his feelings for him. If he has any...

Dustin is the same as ever, if not is growing more and more into these things as time passes by. Plus he seems to be at the center of it this season and even seems to take the lead about this new campaign.

While Lucas is evolving beyong it and is starting to seperate from it due to his upbringing and experiences in Hawkins. He now seems to be a jock which is literally the most opposite thing at the time to a nerd. Yet his sister who was clearly against those things is now growing into it and even playing with his friends.

But Mike ? Mike literally flip-flops all the time and nobody seems to realise it...

So why does he seem to be ignoring Will that way ? Is it because he realised something after the Battle Of Starcourt as some of us have speculated ? Is it because he is back with El so he changes again ? So fast and completely ? In such a short period of time ?

Does he want to make up for last summer to the others but he realises it isn't working so he goes back to El ? Or is there more to it ? Does he wants to make things work between him and El ? Because he doesn't seem that thrilled to be back with El...

From El's POV, Will apparently acts weird and has a crush, if she tells this about Mike could he not be pleased about that ? After all Will made him a promise at the end of season 3, yet he would seem to move on from him from his POV.

So is he mad about that ? Just like he might be upset about Lucas ignoring the Party and D&D this season ? Yet he also ignored it and wanted to move from it last season, especially to get girlfriends. That would be showing a bit of his hypocrisy if he does or feel like that. Will might be doing exactly just that. Yet he is still here waiting for him at the airport compared to Mike who ignored him until he realised he couldn't anymore in season 3. So is he having guilt and he is realising now that everyone seems to be drifting away he didn't pass enough time with them ?

Or is there more to it that we have yet to discover ? Some form of jealousy perhaps ? 😏 But again why ? It doesn't fit with his arc last season which also didn't fit with his arc in the previous seasons. And why would he be jealous about Will when he has his own girlfriend that he looooves so much ?

The fact that unlike the others we don't have a specific idea about why Mike does certain things in this show compared to the others seems to prove something that no one wants to talk about for some reason. The fact that we have to try and explain his behavior every season should raise some eyebrows. There is clearly more to Mike than meets the eye...

I think it's pretty clear Mike has been going through a strong identity crisis for a long time now but no one has noticed it or they don't want to admit it.

Where that ends though is in The Duffers's hands.

[markosmate]

to the dark side

Pairing; Marko x Emerson!Reader

Summary; Moving to a different state with your younger brothers and mother just to live with your grandfather was hard enough, but falling in love with a vampire and then watching your brother do the same thing? Much different story.

Warnings; strong language + mentions of blood

au:// Part 5 losers, have the whole thing mapped out from here hehe I’m excited for y’all to read everything :))

Part 4   -   Part 6

“Be one of us.” David’s words echoed a couple of times through my head. My eyes flickered between Marko and Michael, wondering why drinking from this bottle initiated someone into the group - yet also wondering if Michael was going to accept this invitation they were giving him.

David held the bottle up and out towards my brother, in a silent sort of offering. As Michael stood to make his way closer to David, the other three boys started softly chanting his name in a mocking fashion. My brother grabbed the bottle from David’s hands, and slowly turned it in between each of his own. Star came up right behind him, and began speaking to him in such a low voice that I could barely hear her from where I was sitting.

“Don’t. You don’t have to, Michael.” She pleaded softly and I could my eyes roll involuntarily. Was this her way of trying to tell him not to be peer pressured? It sure didn’t seem like she cared about pressuring him when she was letting her boyfriend lead him to the edge of a cliff.

“Michael.” David whispered along with the boys, eyes piercing into the side of Mike’s head.

“It’s blood.” Star’s voice was louder this time, like she wanted everyone to hear what she had exposed to him. But, after the whole maggots and worms play - he didn’t seem to want to fall for another one of the group’s tricks.

He chuckled nonchalantly and nodded his head in a sarcastic manner. “Yeah, sure. Blood.” And then he raised the rim of the bottle to his lips and took a few big gulps of whatever it was. The boys let out a few scattered cheers, Paul even pumping his fists into the air in celebratory manner.

But the celebration was short-lived, as the four boys’ gazes turned back to me. Marko moved forward quickly, snatching the bottle away from Mike’s grasp before he could chug down all of it and moving towards where I was sitting. He crouched down in front of me before offering the bottle to me with a sly smirk creeping up on his lips.

“Drink some sweet thing. Be one of us, just like Michael.” I still hadn’t the slightest clue what that was supposed to mean - why would drinking some cheap alcohol out of a home-made bedazzled bottle make you automatically apart of the group? The way they were putting things wasn’t making any sense, but I could overlook that for right now. Because in this moment, Marko was looking at me with such hopeful eyes that I almost couldn’t pick up on the deceit hidden underneath it. But I felt like I’d do anything he asked me to, so I reached forward to take the bottle from his hand.

The boys watched on with excited eyes, eagerly anticipating my next moves. I glanced over towards Star, who had Laddie by the shoulder and was leading him away as she watched Michael with a disappointed gaze. Maybe it was blood? Maybe that’s why she looks so shaken right now? Because Michael had drank some even after she warned him not to? I pushed those thoughts to the back of my mind - I was probably just overthinking - and raised the rim of the bottle to my lips.

The substance came pouring into my mouth and it burned it’s way down my throat. It tasted nothing like any alcohol I’d ever drank before - it was so much stronger, but at the same time so much more addicting. I wanted nothing more than to keep taking swigs of whatever it was but before I could even process what was going on, the bottle was tugged gently from my lips.

The boys all cheered, their shouts echoing through the cave, as Dwayne and Paul began chanting Michael and I’s names. All of my previous rational thoughts of staying far away from these boys and any of the trouble that came along with them were long out the window by now.

The substance I had drank gave me a drunk sort of feel and all I knew was there was a hot dude giving me what seemed to be alcohol and all of his friends cheering my brother and I’s names around us. David yelled out a “Bravo!”, reaching over to take the uncorked bottle from Marko to hand back to Michael.

Paul let out a loud laugh and momentarily stopped his cheering to lean over and clap me on the shoulder. “You’re one of us, girl! Let the good times roll.”

I wanted to be by Marko’s side, but David had beaten me to it. “Give me a ride, Marko.” The curly blond sent me a quick, mischievous grin before standing up and making his way behind David, beginning to push him around the fountain on the wheelchair.

I didn’t know what they meant by that, but they all kept saying it over and over so it had to mean something other than a cheesy initiation. I ignore the feeling in my chest that I had somehow just made a horrible mistake, and continue on partying with the others. I’m just overthinking it after all, these dudes are cool, what could go wrong honestly?

-

The answer was a lot. A lot could go wrong. David announced that we all had somewhere we needed to be, and Michael and I blindly followed the boys out of the cave and back up to the top of the bluff. I’d gotten on the back of Marko’s bike without a second thought, and soon the five bikes were racing through the slim trails of the woods once more.

It didn’t take long before they pulled up next to some train tracks - David, Dwayne, and Michael parking their bikes on one side and Marko and Paul parking their bikes on the other. I climbed off with a little stumble, still feeling the tiniest bit dizzy from drinking whatever alcohol was in the bottle that they gave me. The boys began walking on the tracks, out and over the bridge. 

“Perfect timing.” David led in the front and Marko grabbed one of my belt loops to pull me into his side as he threw his other arm around Dwayne’s shoulders.

“What’s going on?” Michael’s voice echoed.

“Michael wants to know what’s going on.” David teased the slightest bit. Paul laughed a bit as we walked farther out onto the bridge. “Marko,” He spoke again. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know.” Marko grinned. “What’s goin’ on, Paul?”

“Wait a minute, who wants to know?” Came Paul’s genius reply - quickly followed by,

“Michael wants to know!” From Dwayne, who had finally spoken up for the first time that night.

“I think we should let Michael, and Ivory,” David paused slightly to begin including me in on their hazing. “Know what’s going on.” The platinum leader stopped a few feet ahead of the boys and turned with Michael at his side, before leaning forward the slightest bit to wrap a cold hand around my wrist. He tugged me gently away from Marko’s hip, bringing me to stand next to him and my brother to watch the three others of the group.

“Yeah.” Paul sung out, body practically buzzing with what I could only assume was excitement for what was to come. David tilted his head with a small mischievous smile and spoke once more.

“Marko?” I turned my head back to look at said boy once more with furrowed eyebrows.

He wasn’t looking at me however, instead opting to stare only at my brother. He lifted his hand and twirled his fingers in a small sort of wave before grinning wickedly. “Goodnight Michael.” Before he dropped with an echoing “Bombs away!” I gasped, my head whipping around to look at David yet his expression hadn’t changed a bit.

Michael’s jaw hung open in pure confusion, only confirming that he too had seen what I had. Paul stepped forward with a similar grin and looked between Michael and I quickly. “Bottoms up, man. Yeow!” He dropped just as suddenly, and was quickly followed by Dwayne who only shot us silent finger guns before dropping down the same opening in the bars that the previous two had. I stared, absolute shock and fear cursing through my blood. Had they just literally jumped to their deaths right in front of us? They couldn’t have, how would that make any sense?

David moved to step in front of us, and with a hand on Michael’s shoulder he leaned in the slightest bit to speak. “Come with us, guys.” Before he, too, stepped off the edge and dropped through the bars. With one short glance at my brother, who was too busy staring at where David had just fallen to notice I was looking at him, I rushed forward and kneeled on the edge to stare down into the fog. A huff of relief left my lungs and I laughed breathily as I stared down at the four boys hanging from the support beams.

The four cheered a bit, finally making some noise once Michael leaned down next to me, curiosity ultimately getting the best of him. “Hey, Ivory!” Marko called up with a grin on his lips, attention then momentarily taken from me as Paul swung his legs up to kick at the shorter boy.

“Michael and Ivory Emerson!” David’s rough voice cut through the other boy’s cheerful shouts. “Come on down!” He taunted, his laugh afterwards cause the nerves in my body to go haywire. I never thought I’d genuinely come face-to-face with the expression about all of your friends jumping off of a bridge, but here we were now.

I grinned at Michael and clapped him on the shoulder teasingly before moving to climb down onto the bar across from Paul. My arm strength wasn’t nearly as good as Michael’s, but adrenaline was coursing through my body at such a rate that I didn’t care. “There ya go, girl!” Paul laughed loudly kicking at my legs this time instead of Marko’s. I reacted just as quickly, kicking back at him in a competitive manner as the grin on my face grew. I saw Michael climb down in front of David out of the corner of my eye as Marko began to shout once more.

“Yeah, let’s play a game! Let’s play a game, baby!” He dragged out each syllable of the last word and my stomach flipped a few times at his voice, but I needed to focus more on not falling to my death than whatever it was he was getting at.

Paul laughed along with his friend. “Welcome aboard, Michael.”

David’s chilling laugh echoed once more, and the wind carried his voice to me though I could tell he was only really speaking to Michael. “Fun, huh?” Suddenly the tracks above us began to vibrate, and not long after they began to viciously shake as the horn of a train blared through the night. I felt my stomach squeeze uncomfortably as the boys continued their obnoxious shouts. I glanced over in Marko’s direction for some reassurance only to see him pulling himself up once through the bars before dropping down to hang once more with a mocking grin on his face. He wasn’t looking at me though, his attention was over towards Michael who I could vaguely hear shouting, “Jesus Christ!”

“Yeah!” Paul laughed, suddenly letting go of the bars and falling into the fog below. As if this entire thing wasn’t insane enough, I felt my heart drop. “Oh my God!” I cried, looking down to see if I could spot him but there was still only fog below us. My arms were burning, and I knew there was no way I’d be able to hold on much longer - never-mind try and pull myself up and over the bars to safety once the train passed.

Marko caught my eye and he sent me a wink, eyes sparkling as if he knew something I didn’t. “Don’t be scared, Ivory!” Then he let go as well, yelling out as he fell the same way Paul did.

“Jesus Christ!” Michael’s voice met my ears again, as suddenly Dwayne fell from my side as well, yelling on his way down.

“Guys!” David yelled to the both of us. “You’re one of us! Let go!”

“And do what?” I shouted at him incredulously, was he fucking serious? Were the other three dead right now? And now he was telling us to let go too?

“You are one of us, Ivory.” He assured once more before falling into the fog as well.

“David!” Michael screamed after him. The train finally passed, and the bars stopped shaking in our grasps. I looked over at my brother with wide eyes, how the hell were we supposed to get ourselves out of this one? I watched as he tried to pull himself up to no avail, and right as I went to speak to him I heard shouts from below us. It was the boys - they were alive! How the fuck were they alive?

I glanced over to Michael who was trying to pull himself up once more and felt my grip begin to slip drastically. “I’m gonna let go.”

“What?” His voice was strained and he glared straight into my soul. “No, are you insane? You’ll die!”

“I can’t hold on anymore, Mike. And they survived somehow, there’s gotta be water or something below.” And before he could even begin to protest more, my hands slipped from the bar. I screamed as I fell, the thick fog enveloping me completely and all my senses seemed to be blocked out.

I could vaguely hear my name being whispered over and over again and I was almost completely positive that I had blacked out and was just hallucinating this excruciatingly long fall. Right before everything went dark, a pair of arms cut my fall short as my eyes fluttered closed.

[untitled-byler-blog]

1 2 9 for the meme!!!!

1.Want a angsty, dramatic confession, or sweet and soft confession?

I want an angsty dramatic outburst; but to contrast Marmite, there needs to be a conversation after where Will (because Mike was the one who said it) is like “did you mean that?” and Mike has no hesitation or reservation about being like “yes, I love you” and Will starts crying so Mike puts his hands on his cheeks to dry his tears and they touch foreheads and he’s like “is it ok if I kiss you?” and then in response Will leans in and just does it (since the script is apparently straight-up fanfiction [affectionate]) – which also completely contrasts all the Milkshake kisses where Mike couldn’t be bothered do anything with his hands but leave them limp at his sides.

2.Sun and moon vibes- is will the sun and mike the moon, or vice versa?

Will is the moon and Mike is the sun; and I’m gonna get Shakespearean on you.

In the concept of the four temperaments + planets, someone who has the Moon as their planet is someone whose feelings and expressions match the room. They are selfless, and will put down whatever their feelings are to match the vibes around them – positive or negative. That’s Will. He puts everyone above him. He reads the energy of his surroundings and suppresses his emotions if he has to – and this is what leads to outbursts. Example: in 3-3 when the Boys™ are upset about getting dumped, Will tries to cheer them up, giving them the energy he thinks they need (despite his obvious annoyance) until he realises it’s not working and he can’t keep everything down anymore; cue fight and…

Mike as the sun: a choleric planet (moon is phlegmatic, go-with-the-flow – which I think would be Will’s temperament too.) But Mike is a melancholic choleric. He is melancholic because is grounding, he is analytical, he is tactical. He is an observer. He’s not the first choice for making plans, but he’s the bond – the heart if you will. And choleric is his secondary temperament because he can be a leader if he has to. Ex: All of season one, constantly saying “we should be looking for will” and such, and even instigating (though somewhat reluctantly) handling El when they first find her.

The moon is not a source of light, it simply reflects the light of the sun when we can’t see it; Mike is Will’s light (“you make [me] feel like [I’m] not a mistake at all”) but because Mike is more reserved than Will, Will is the one who takes the light – the love, the energy, the strength – Mike gives him and shares is with everyone else.

As for the rain fight: it happens at night, but the moon is hidden behind the clouds. The moon is (presumably) there – I’m not sure when exactly the fight takes place in relation to the rest of the season, but July 2, 1985 was a full moon, so it was probably there and would have been very obvious, if not for the rain. As more than a metaphor for the fight, the rainclouds serve to block out the moon’s light. Because Will (in this moment) is no longer able to project Mike’s light with the rest of the world (party); Mike is putting Will down, making Will feel inferior, unimportant, forgotten. But it's there. The sun is still giving its light to the moon, just as Will still wants Mike's energy, wants to share it. He can't. And he's mad at himself for still receiving that light – still loving him – despite the pain that he [Mike] is causing him. Hence, he tears up the picture and destroys his safe space; but note that there is a light on in Castle Byers as he does so – because Will wishes for a new source of light in his life, instead of staying stuck in love with his former best friend who doesn't seem to care about him anymore. And he subsequently gets pushed to the back burner in seasons 3 and 4 because we can't see the Moon without the Sun. Will can't truly be himself without Mike by his side. And it's not until Volume Two that we get that rekindling, subsequently setting up for Mike/Will main character energy in season 5 (hopefully).

9.Would you rather see byler get murray’d individually, or while they’re hanging out together?

Ohhh I’ve never actually thought about the individual option ??? I think it’d be fun if he was like alone with Will (comes over to do something with Joyce and it somehow ends up just the two of them) and he just Knows, but doesn’t know who. And then the next time he sees Will with Mike he’s like – “oh yeah this makes sense now” and Will’s like “shut uppppp” and Murray’s like “no no yeah you’re good” and then starts making very subtle comments to Mike that can have double meanings or whatever

Thanks for the ask (even if this is entirely incoherent) <3

Byler Ask Game

[princessanneftw]

How Princess Anne became the shining light of the beleaguered monarchy

Once seen as haughty and aloof, today her old-school approach has never been more in demand

By Camilla Tominey, Associate Editor of the Telegraph.

Visitors to the Princess Royal’s house, Gatcombe Park, are often surprised to be greeted with antique-display cases groaning with ornaments, bookshelves overflowing with hardbacks and piles of magazines dating back to the 1970s. According to one friend, the 18th-century Grade II-listed Gloucestershire stately has a ‘homely’ feel, thanks to the frugal Princess’s reluctance to throw anything out.

‘It’s quite a nice thing really,’ they said. ‘There’s barely a place you can sit down in her house. Every time the staff go in there they try to take something away.’ A surprising revelation, perhaps, about the Royal family’s resident stickler, whose decadesold ‘updo’ and penchant for wearing white gloves on royal engagements suggest a somewhat starchier outlook. But as the Queen’s only daughter prepares to celebrate her 70th birthday this month, it seems that appearances can be rather deceiving.

Now more valuable than ever to an institution not only trying to reposition itself in the wake of a global pandemic, but still smarting from the fallout of Megxit and the Duke of York’s association with Jeffrey Epstein, Anne’s old-school approach has never been more in demand. Despite describing herself as ‘the boring old fuddy-duddy at the back’, who keeps reminding the younger royals not to forgo ‘the basics’, the Princess Royal, who has always put duty first, is finally getting the recognition she deserves.

Her appearance in June alongside the 94-year-old monarch for Her Majesty’s first ever video call shows how much the Queen is coming to rely on the Princess. And the public response to her appearing to snub Donald Trump during a Nato leaders’ reception at Buckingham Palace last December suggests the nation is finally warming to her modus operandi.

Where once Anne was regarded as haughty and standoffish, she is now hailed as one of the great English eccentrics whose unparalleled royal work ethic, carrying out more than 500 engagements a year, has rightly earned her national treasure status.

And having allowed a film crew to shadow her for the past year, the Princess, who is usually reluctant to blow her own trumpet, has never appeared more at ease with herself. She was persuaded to take part in last week’s ITV documentary Princess Royal: Anne at 70 because its makers, Oxford Films, had successfully produced Our Queen and Our Queen at 90 about her mother. Shadowing Anne on her dusk-to-dawn engagements – and featuring interviews with her children Peter, 42, and Zara, 39 – the documentary revealed just how much the Princess is cut from the Queen’s ‘keep calm and carry on’ cloth.

Having been regarded as a bit of a royal renegade as a teenager – and chosen to forgo titles for her own children, despite her own HRH pedigree as a ‘spare to the heir’ – Anne’s life story is a contradiction of both protocol taskmaster and occasional rule-breaker. As one insider who knows the Princess well put it: ‘She can turn from laughing and joking one minute to being an absolute stickler for the rules the next. She’s extremely dutiful and would hate to be regarded as being on the wrong side of protocol. You’d never dream of asking her a political question and she’s not at all gossipy.’

Erin Doherty’s portrayal of Anne in The Crown, as the deadpan princess with the permanently raised eyebrow, certainly sums up her teenage years when the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh were apparently so concerned about their daughter’s lack of direction, they asked the late Dame Vera Lynn for advice. Prince Philip, who famously joked of his daughter, ‘If it doesn’t fart or eat hay then she isn’t interested,’ allegedly confided in the Forces’ sweetheart: ‘We are concerned about Anne at the moment, trying to get her to make up her mind about what she wants to do.’

According to her school friend, Sandra de Laszlo, who boarded with Anne at Benenden: ‘She was a very normal teenager – sensible and fun.’ Leaving school with six O levels and two A levels in 1968, Anne had already resolved to follow in her parents’ duteous footsteps. Less than a year later, she made her official debut on 1 March – St David’s Day – when she handed out leeks to the Welsh Guards at Pirbright Camp in Surrey. It was to be the start of one of the most industrious royal careers in modern memory – with more than 20,000 engagements clocked up since.

Soon after she started work, she began dating – and in 1970, Anne’s first boyfriend was Andrew Parker Bowles, the dashing young adjutant of the Blues and Royals, who went on to marry Camilla Shand – later to become her sister-in-law, the Duchess of Cornwall. The Princess and the brigadier – described as her ‘horsey husband’ – remain close and accompany each other to Royal Ascot and other race meetings every year.

Anne is also on good terms with her first husband, Captain Mark Phillips. A Sandhurst graduate with an equestrian streak, like Parker Bowles, Phillips met the Princess at a party for horse lovers in 1968 and reconnected at the Munich Olympics four years later, when he won team Olympic gold in the three-day eventing. They married in 1973. He was at the then 23-year-old Anne’s side a year later when she was threatened at gunpoint in an attempted kidnapping. The couple were returning to Buckingham Palace following a charity event when their limousine was forced to stop on the Mall by another car. When the driver, Ian Ball, jumped out and began shooting, Anne’s bodyguard, Inspector James Beaton, was injured, along with her chauffeur Alex Callender, and journalist Brian McConnell and Michael Hills, a police constable, who happened upon the scene.

But the attempt to hold Anne to ransom for at least £2 million is even more memorable thanks to the impervious Princess’s refusal to obey Ball’s order to get out of the car, replying with a trademark: ‘Not bloody likely!’ Eventually, she exited the other side of the limousine, as had her lady-in-waiting, Rowena Brassey (who is still with her to this day). A passing pedestrian, a former boxer named Ron Russell, punched Ball in the back of the head and led Anne away from the scene. Anne later told officers: ‘It was all so infuriating; I kept saying I didn’t want to get out of the car, and I was not going to get out of the car,’ according to files later released by the National Archives. ‘I nearly lost my temper with him, but I knew that if I did, I should hit him and he would shoot me.’

She was similarly sanguine about becoming the first member of the Royal family to have a criminal conviction after one of her dogs, a three-year-old English bull terrier called Dotty, attacked two children in Windsor Great Park in 2002. Pleading guilty to being in charge of a dog that was out of control in a public area, she insisted on no special treatment and took the £500 fine and £500 compensation on the chin.

The incident followed a number of brushes with the law for motoring offences, with Anne having twice been caught speeding on the M1 in the 1970s. She was also fined £100 and banned for one month in 1990 for two speeding offences and fined another £400 in 2000. On both occasions she pleaded guilty immediately, insisting she was late for an engagement.

As she said in the documentary, mistakes do happen when there is no ‘training’ for the job of being royal. ‘It’s just learning by experience. But hardly ever does anything go quite according to plan. You have to learn that.’ It wasn’t as if she didn’t feel the pressure of being the sovereign’s second-born, either – once describing the fly-on-the-wall Royal Family film, which followed the Windsors for a year in the late 1960s, as ‘a rotten idea’.

‘The attention that had been brought on one ever since one was a child, you just didn’t want any more. The last thing you needed was greater access.’

Famed for telling reporters to ‘naff orf ’, much of Anne’s mistrust of the media appears to stem from its rather uncomfortable coverage of Phillips fathering a love child, Felicity, with New Zealand art teacher Heather Tonkin in 1985. The Princess didn’t emerge unblemished either, having been revealed by The Sun to have received love letters from Tim Laurence, then the Queen’s equerry, in 1989, when she was separated – although still married to Phillips.

Anne and Mark finally divorced in 1992 and the Princess remarried eight months later, choosing Crathie Kirk in Scotland, as the Church of England did not at that time allow divorced persons whose former spouses were still living to remarry in its churches. The Prince of Wales had nicknamed Phillips ‘Fog’ on the grounds that he was ‘thick and wet’; but with his Royal Navy pedigree and impeccable manners, ‘quiet man’ Laurence fitted into the Royal family perfectly. One friend described the vice admiral as ‘a thoroughly decent man who never forgets a face’, before adding that ‘some may regard him as a little bit boring, but he’s a much safer bet than Mark ever was.’

Ever the pragmatist, Anne allowed Phillips to remain living on the Gatcombe estate, even after he married Sandy Pflueger, an American Olympic dressage rider, with whom he has a daughter, Stephanie, 22. As one equestrian insider put it: ‘The horsey set has always been very incestuous. Yes, Mark was serially unfaithful but there’s a lot of that going on – Anne just turned a blind eye.’

Now divorced from Pflueger, Phillips, 71, has vacated Aston Farm on the 730-acre estate, to make way for Zara, her rugbyplayer husband Mike Tindall, 41, and their daughters Mia, six, and Lena, two.

Peter also lives on the estate with his estranged wife Autumn, 42, and their daughters Savannah, nine, and Isla, eight. The couple are still living together despite announcing their divorce in January – an unexpected development that has left the Princess ‘sad and disappointed’, according to insiders.

One source said: ‘One thing about the Royal family is they are incredibly close. They are the most dysfunctional family there is, but the Princess and her children and grandchildren are as tight as anything.’

As ever, horse riding remains the tie that binds, with Anne – a former European eventing champion, BBC Sports Personality of the Year and competitor at the 1976 Montreal Olympics – passing on her enthusiasm for the sport to Zara. In recent years, Peter has taken over the running of the Festival of British Eventing at Gatcombe.

By her own admission, breaking with royal tradition by insisting that her children were called Mr and Miss ‘probably’ made life ‘easier for them’. ‘I think most people would argue that there are downsides to having titles,’ Anne said recently. Having initially been brought up, Downton Abbey-style, on the ‘nursery floor’, with her parents often away for months on end on royal tours, it was Anne who insisted she go to a ‘proper’ school – the first daughter of a monarch to do so – rather than be home-taught.

Both Peter and Zara were sent to Port Regis, a co-educational prep school in Dorset, before following in their uncle Charles’s footsteps to board at Gordonstoun in Scotland. Unlike the heir to the throne, who described it as ‘Colditz in kilts’, they thrived in the outdoorsiness of it all, excelled at sport and both ended up at Exeter University – Peter to study sports science and Zara, physiotherapy – despite university having eluded both their parents.

Zara also surpassed her mother’s equestrian achievements by winning the Eventing World Championships in 2006 and a silver medal at the 2012 Olympics – all while Anne was watching proudly from the sidelines.

One friend recalls how the Princess would think nothing of queuing up for the Portaloos at competitions like any other parent, much to the horror of Zara, who would tell her: ‘Mum, you can’t do that!’

Inconspicuous in her trademark Barbour jacket, tweed hat and sunglasses, Anne would regularly be stopped at events on her own estate by police not realising who she was. ‘I remember it happening a couple of times,’ said one source. ‘She was very good about it – she said: “Don’t worry, you weren’t to know.”’

After Zara collected individual and team gold medals at the 2005 European Eventing Championship in Blenheim, Anne invited the entire team, grooms and all, back to Gatcombe to celebrate, serving up ‘sandwiches and scampi in a basket’, in the courtyard. Very much a hands-on mother and grandmother, the Princess has a number of long-serving aides – but no large entourage. Along with Rowena Brassey (now Feilden), Lady Carew Pole has also been the Princess’s lady-in-waiting since 1970.

Unfussy Anne still insists on doing her own make-up and hair – which hasn’t been let down publicly in decades. Although according to one source who once witnessed the rare sight of her unclipping her bun and redoing it during an equestrian event: ‘It really is quite something. It’s still as long as it was when she was in her 20s.’

Part of Anne’s agelessness is down to genes. ‘She always says she doesn’t have very good role models for slowing down,’ Peter told the documentary. As Countryfile presenter John Craven found out when he dared to ask if Anne still rode, only to be rebuked: ‘Her Majesty is still riding, so come on!’ But as well as inheriting her mother’s DNA she shares HM’s strict adherence to style codes – and her aversion to profligacy.

Guests at the 2008 wedding of Lady Rose Windsor, the daughter of the Duke of Gloucester, were astonished when Anne arrived in the outfit she had worn to her brother’s wedding to Lady Diana Spencer, 27 years earlier. The size-10 Maureen Baker floral-print frock still fitted perfectly.

Quite what Anne must have made of Diana and Fergie’s wardrobe expenditure in the 1980s has never been disclosed – although it has long been reported that the Princess never thought too highly of either sister-in-law, regarding Diana particularly as ‘hogging the limelight’.

There were even reports that she viewed the pair as ‘lessening the stature’ of the Royal family, describing them behind the scenes as ‘those girls’. As royal biographer Penny Junor put it: ‘There was Diana on the one hand, who was incredibly touchy-feely, who hugged children, who put children on her lap, who even kissed people in public. And there was Anne, not touching anyone, not playing up to the cameras at all.’

As far removed from the suburban housewife as you can get, when Anne was once spotted mending fences at Gatcombe, she apparently retorted: ‘Somebody’s got to do it!’ ‘She’s never shirked anything in her life,’ said a friend. ‘She’s a real grafter.’

Weekends will invariably be spent with her four grandchildren. Revealing a surprising knowledge of popular culture – despite her dislike of indoor pursuits – the Princess revealed her familiarity with Catherine Tate’s stroppy schoolgirl character Lauren when she commented that Mia’s attitude to equestrianism was, ‘Am I bovvered?’

‘She’s superb with the kids,’ said a friend. ‘She’ll often be in the stables with the grandchildren. She’s got a tremendous sense of humour and is very likeable and kind. She loves Mike [Tindall, Zara’s husband]. He makes them all laugh.

The friend also pointed to Anne’s ‘surprisingly fruity’ sense of humour, adding: ‘And the Princess can swear all right. I’ve heard her use some quite colourful language.’

If the Queen instilled in Anne a love of horses then it was her father who encouraged her other great passion in life: sailing. Anne would regularly accompany the former Royal Navy commander to Cowes Week, and it is a testament to Philip’s infectious love of seafaring that Anne and Tim have kept their yacht Ballochbuie on Loch Craignish in Argyll, since 2012. The couple enjoy nothing more than cruising around the Inner Hebrides, where Anne indulges her passion of visiting lighthouses. She is patron of the Northern Lighthouse Board and is understood to have ‘bagged’ more than half of the UK’s 206.

But it hasn’t always been so easy combining work and pleasure. Anne was put to the diplomatic test when she became the first member of the Royal family to visit the USSR, at the invitation of the then-leader Gorbachev in 1990. In typical style, the Princess didn’t shirk the responsibility – and stayed for two whole weeks. Visits to war zones including Sierra Leone, Mozambique and Bosnia have been similarly taxing – with Anne once insisting after a particularly gruelling tour of Africa: ‘I don’t come here looking for trouble. I come to see if I can help.’

Her association with Save the Children, which dates back to 1970, has seen her slum it on camp beds and visit disease-ravaged Mozambique refugee camps. Once urged by photographers to hug an emaciated child, she refused, saying, ‘I don’t do stunts.’ And in response to a comment on her supposed lack of the maternal instinct, she said: ‘You don’t have to like children particularly to want to give them a decent chance in life.’

Yet her reputation as one of the most diligent royals ever has also been honed by her dedication to little-known domestic causes, like the Wetwheels Foundation, which provides ‘barrier-free boating’ for the disabled. One of more than 300 charities the Princess is involved with, its founder Geoff Holt, a paraplegic who was the first disabled person to sail solo around Britain in 2007, and then across the Atlantic in 2010, has known Anne for over 30 years. ‘I’ve got photos of us going back decades. I’ve got older and older and she’s stayed the same,’ he joked.

‘She’s got to be one of the most hard-working people I know. I’ve never known anything like it – the amount of engagements she packs in. She doesn’t do sycophancy, though.

Michele Jennings, chief executive of Hearing Dogs for the Deaf, of which the Princess has been patron since 1992, also tells staff ‘not to fawn’ when the Princess visits. ‘She hates that,’ she said. ‘We’re a pretty down-to-earth charity and when she comes she’ll have dogs jumping at her shins and crawling all over her, but she doesn’t mind one bit. There’s no awkwardness.’

Another source revealed how during one royal visit, Anne had joked about missing out on all the posh canapés – royals are discouraged from eating in public. ‘I’ll just have to put up with Great Western’s finest,’ she quipped, referring to her train journey home.

Although a ‘daddy’s girl’ growing up, since the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret died in 2002, Anne has become ever more devoted to her mother. Having helped to counsel the Queen through many royal crises over the years, the Princess has been HM’s first port of call when discussing recent tumultuous royal events. Although one can only guess what stalwart Anne makes of Harry and Meghan’s behaviour, she has made no secret of her opposition to royals trying to modernise the institution, seemingly referring to the Sussexes when she remarked recently: ‘I don’t think this younger generation probably understands what I was doing in the past and it’s often true, isn’t it? You don’t necessarily look at the previous generation and say, “Oh, you did that?” Or, “You went there?” Nowadays, they’re much more looking for, “Oh, let’s do it a new way.” I’m already at the stage [of ], please do not reinvent that particular wheel. We’ve been there, done that. Some of these things don’t work. You may need to go back to basics.’

When she turned 60, the Queen elevated Anne to the Order of the Thistle and there was a joint birthday party with Andrew, who was 50 that year. But Covid-19 – not to mention Andrew’s fall from grace – mean this year’s celebrations will be more muted. Indeed, she is not thought to have had much contact with her brother, with whom she shares a love of country pursuits, but little else.

With the Queen having been self-isolating at Windsor Castle since March, it is thought Anne will be reunited with her parents at Balmoral this summer, where she and Tim will once again take in Scotland’s sights by sea.

At a time when the monarchy finds itself somewhat cast adrift, it is the indefatigable Princess Royal who is proving to be its trustiest anchor. As she prepares to turn 70, showing no sign of slowing down after half a century of engagements, lighthouse-lover Anne has become the Royal family’s beacon of good, old-fashioned public service.

[trishasimma]

Addressing My Blackface Episode

While I have not shyed away from discussing this, I have avoided making an apology post specifically for this so as not to do the typical youtuber reaction of an apology. I instead wanted to show my regret and growth by having spent the past few years working on projects that include more and more black characters so that they no longer fall into the trap of having to be the token voice of my work. However this approach seems to have not sit well with someone, so it is time that I address this. So, as some of you may or may not know, as well as occasionally making conversions I also occasionally make episodes of a sims 2 series called Youth, and one episode in particular has caused concern due to its featuring of Blackface. For full context to those unsure of what I’m referring to, you can find that episode HERE.  For a TLDR; the episode takes place on Halloween and a few students thought it would be funny to come to school dressed in blackface, absolutely none of the main characters thinks this is funny or anything short of a threat towards the black students in attendance. As my main cast (currently) has two black characters I had one character, a dark skinned girl, use this to address how she feels that she is not allowed to have human reactions like her peers and always needs to silence herself and allow these type of acts to go unpunished because anything more than that and she ends up in the ‘angry black girl’ box. The other character, a mixed male, sees these characters at night and feels scared by their presence and gets a lift home in order to avoid being spotted by them.  At absolutely no point in this episode was the use of blackface there for comedic effects or displaying any type of feelings towards black people that I actually hold. This is not the first version of Youth that I have made, and in the original I also had an episode dealing with troubles that the black community faces, in this version, found HERE I tackle the death of Mike Brown as at the time of making this version the most prominent issue was the deaths of black people at the hands of the police. During this new version of Youth however I saw a lot of other media forms, such as the Netflix show Dear White People, tackling blackface still having a presence in the modern day, this new episode was made at the height of people online being exposed for blackfishing, political leaders being exposed for attending Halloween parties in blackface, etc etc, so I felt like addressing this issue in my own show would be okay.  My intention with this episode was to bring light to that issue, however I now understand that as a non black person this was not my issue to talk about, and despite my intention I did still at the end of the day display imagery that may have triggered the black members of my audience. I am sorry. Truly. It is an unfortunate trend in non black communities that we feel that so long as we are not being outlandish with our harm then no harm was ever actually done, but this simply is not true and it is something that I neglected to think about at the time of making this episode.  And just as a final side note since the discussion that’s being had about this over on a third party blog frequently mentions it, while 2fingerswhiskey also played a role in the creation of this episode (creating the costumes and editing the script) and I am confident that they also meant no harm, I can not speak on their behalf. Please do not take anything I have said here as their words or their apology, however/ifever they address this is up to them.  If as a black person you have read this and are unsatisfied please know that my inbox is open and I am more than happy to hear from you about how I hurt you and/or what I can do to further my effort in correcting this wrong. However please stop messaging my friend about this, they are trying to run a drama free out of context blog and it’s honestly getting a bit weird that someone is angrily messaging them about this issue but have still yet to say a word to me. This isn’t their fault, they didn’t even know me at the time of making that episode, and they shouldn’t have to be the middle man for my mistake. 

[jorahssquire]

Whether or not Trump successfully steals this election, he’s already stolen Biden’s victory -What it feels like to watch the challenge to Joe Biden becoming President Elect.

BY JOE BERKOWITZ

8 MINUTE READ

In my mind, the calendar always ended on November 3. Beyond some potential events and projects, that’s as far ahead as I dared imagine.

Whatever happened afterward would either be too horrible to contemplate in any depth, or would bring such tremendous healing relief that to consider the possibilities for even one second when they could still be taken away would be torture.

Only after the election would I allow myself to open the mental Pandora’s Box of what it would feel like to suddenly wake up each day in a world where Donald Trump is out of power and we could all take a breath and undo some of the harm he’d inflicted and maybe try to do some good.

I didn’t kid myself that a Biden administration would instantly solve the pandemic puzzle or bring the country together. At the very least, though, it would deliver consecutive days without a constitutional crisis.

It took until Friday, November 6, to understand that it was actually happening; that Biden was ahead by so much in Pennsylvania, his victory was all but assured. Some publications like Vox even called the election, though legacy outlets remained cautious. At that moment, I finally let myself comprehend the enormity of the moment and its attendant implications, but only a little.

I dipped a toe into a creek to test the water and ended up falling in entirely. All of what this victory meant finally started to truly dawn on me at once, and an ecstatic energy animated my very being. I let out an involuntary holler, and ran around my apartment, ending up on the balcony, where my joyous screams ripped through the calm of the day.

On Saturday, when the news finally broke that the win was official, my wife and I jumped and danced and made calls to family. We watched videos of New Yorkers and Philadelphians celebrating in the streets, and we went outside in Minneapolis to experience it ourselves, greeted by a cacophonous call-and-response of honking cars and applauding passersby. People were walking around in groups of five, brandishing glib and glittery homemade posters, drinking champagne straight from the bottle. There were the spontaneous revelers, mini-parades, and block parties of a rare religiously festive occasion. World leaders started congratulating Biden, who made a very normal if not particularly inspiring victory speech. It was a moment for the ages, complete with Rudy Giuliani’s Four Seasons Total Landscaping fiasco unfolding in the background, a reminder of just how ridiculous Trumpworld could be, and how it might feel to laugh at them now that they would no longer be in charge.

It was an ending and a beginning and it felt so amazing, I was glad I hadn’t allowed myself to imagine it when there was still a chance I might lose it. Then, by Tuesday, November 10—a week after the election—it was gone.

The victory hadn’t vanished entirely, but it was now tainted by the all too familiar crisis mode, another existential threat suddenly looming. I had expected Trump to be surly and uncooperative, and that he might not concede, so when those things happened, it was almost a relief to see how low and small it made him look. But my mistake was in thinking that the GOP didn’t really need him any more and would just let him twist in the wind.

Instead, by Monday it became clear that the bulk of the Republican party, including its leadership, were fully unified behind Trump. Everyone from Mitch McConnell to Ivanka Trump to Ted Cruz on down, all claimed a peculiar form of voter fraud that only affects the top of the ticket, and not the down ballot section, where Democrats lost as many as 10 House seats and failed to win the Senate. They’re all using the line that “every legal vote must be counted,” implying a surplus of illegal votes, only from Democrat voters. Bill Barr authorized an investigation into alleged electoral irregularities, causing a top lawyer at the Department of Justice to resign in protest. And finally, on November 10, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo assured the country that, in the end, Donald Trump would prevail and remain president.

It was as if America had survived the climax of a horror move only to find out it was actually the beginning of a two-season Netflix series. That release of tension was instantly reversed, replaced with a deep spiritual exhaustion, and the feeling of being turned inside out and wrung dry.

No matter what happens now, whether Trump and the GOP succeed at stealing this election, under the paradoxical guise of preventing it from being stolen, they’ve already stolen our victory, and so much more.

One of the most excruciating aspects of witnessing this attempted theft is that it’s unfolding in exactly the way that experts predicted. Trump alleged in advance that any outcome in which he didn’t win would be the result of voter fraud, something he also suggested back in 2016. He also discouraged his own supporters from using mail-in ballots, despite the pandemic, because in his framing, they were so easy to manipulate. Democrats called out Trump’s maneuvering, and the fact that his appointed Postmaster General Louis DeJoy happened to be slowing down deliveries just before the pandemic election. Pundits speculated that Trump would claim victory based on the early, in-person votes, and that mail-in ballots would later erode his victory and that he would refuse to concede.

It was all so predictable that Bernie Sanders called every shot in advance exactly.

Considering all the Trump-inflamed scrutiny on would-be voter fraud, the election was heavily and thoroughly observed, including by an international panel Trump invited (which is now calling his accusations baseless.)

This broadly embraced charade relies upon tremendous bad faith. No legitimate evidence of voter fraud has been found—aside from the one Trump supporter in Pennsylvania who got busted requesting a ballot for his dead mom—let alone enough fraud to account for anything near the margins by which Trump lost. All claims to the contrary tend to be based on hearsay and shadowy evidence to support a preordained hypothesis.

The GOP is acting only on unearned suspicions and hostility. They clearly started with the conclusion that Democrats  stole the election, and are now working backwards, throwing everything against the wall to see what sticks. They make broad statements that their observers weren’t allowed in, when they were, and that droves of dead people voted, when they didn’t. Disgraced scam artist James O’Keefe, who got busted in 2018 for trying to run a #MeToo sting operation on the Washington Post, is offering $25,000 rewards for testimony. All any takers have to do is lie and their voice will be worth more than the people’s voice, as long as enough soulless GOP jackals believe them.

So far, though, all of Team Trump’s cases are being laughed out of court. Either the judges outright toss them, or the hearings end with Trump’s defense admitting that they have nothing and are wasting everyone’s time.

Even the one “whistleblower” O’Keefe unearthed, and who set up a GoFundMe that raised over $120,000, has now recanted his testimony. (The personal fundraising appeal has since been removed.)

How on earth are we expected to accept, after four years of a presidency known for its dishonesty, that high-level officials can contest a legitimate election win on the basis of such amateur hour, fake fraud b.s.? Or that the GOP is owed the opportunity to kick the tires because of how unfairly they’ve been treated? Or that Democrats are just inherently suspicious and, according to Senator Lindsey Graham, can only win by cheating?

The nihilistic cynicism on display here is breathtaking. Trump decided the only way he could save face is to shroud his decisive loss in indecision, and delegitimize it in the eyes of his 70 million supporters. It’s the Birther conspiracy all over again, minus the racism.

The goal at this point might not even be to overturn the results, so much as just inject enough doubt into the proceedings that Trump voters refuse to believe the election wasn’t stolen. (Also, to raise money for Trump’s new leadership PAC and chip away at his debt.) Why would those voters accept the truth, when their leadership angrily swears otherwise? The best-case scenario now is that Trump supporters ultimately forego an actual street-level revolution for just angrily assuming the next administration is utterly fraudulent.

Some of their response depends on how this tumultuous post-game phase of the election ends. At the moment, Rupert Murdoch is dangling rumors of a historic book deal payday in front of Trump, which could cushion the blow enough to get him to go quietly. Or maybe he—in collaboration with McConnell, Graham, O’Keefe, and the rest—will find a way to invalidate the results. Or maybe the fraud allegations will only persist until a lawyer gives a damn compelling speech in a courtroom, and we get the full Aaron Sorkin ending.

Either way, Trump has stolen something from us that he can’t give back.

In addition to the fleeting feeling of victory, which already feels so long ago, and the sheen of legitimacy, he has stolen any naïve hope of Biden or anyone else uniting the country any time soon.

For a brief instant, I thought maybe if Trump was revealed as a bitter, sulking wannabe tyrant for all to see, we might start to agree on some things again. I had a modicum of optimism, which was bound to get crushed by the reality of a Biden presidency, but which felt incredibly refreshing.

It’s all gone now.

For the indefinite future, all those days in the calendar beyond November 3 now look identical to the days that preceded them: Constant chaos, frustration, lies, and irresolvable polarization.

Trump and his cohort have stolen this victory, stolen our optimism, and stolen Biden’s legitimacy.

Some of it can be restored, some of it cannot.

None of it can be forgiven.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joe Berkowitz is an opinion columnist at Fast Company. His latest book, American Cheese: An Indulgent Odyssey Through the Artisan Cheese World, is available from Harper Perennial.

[immortalitylostandfound]

Storming the Castle

A Princess Bride AU by @gideongrace​ and @immortalitylostandfound​

Starring:

Billy Hargrove as The Dread Pirate Roberts (Stable Boy)

Steve Harrington as Prince Steve 

Tommy H. as Prince Tommy (Humperdinck)

Carol Talmadge as Countess Carol (The Six Fingered Woman)

Dustin Henderson as the Leader of the Party

Will Byers as The Giant

Lucas Sinclair as The Swordsman

Max Mayfield as The Lab Assistant

Mike Wheeler as Miracle Mike

Jane Hopper as Eleven (Miracle Wife)

Robin Buckley as Steve's Lady-In-Waiting

Playlist here!

Full work also on ao3!

Chapter 1: Teaser

Once upon a time...

A love story started as all stories do; at the beginning. It started with a horse, with a stable boy and his magic touch, and with a little pining on Steve’s part. Okay, maybe a lot of pining. Whoever said ‘the course of true love never did run smooth’ really wasn’t kidding, were they?

Chapter Two: The Stable Boy

Steve only knows the new guy his father had recently hired as Stable Boy, but the sheer amount of want that fills Steve every time he sees the guy could fill an entire ocean, no, the grand canyon, no, the ocean—whatever. The sheer force of Steve's longing for this guy he barely knows, this guy who sneers at nearly every person he comes across but who is always so achingly gentle with the horses, even with the spooked, rough, dangerous ones—especially with the spooked, rough, dangerous ones—is too much to bear. This guy whose hands seem to exist on some plane where magic exists, they must, because every time he lays those hands on one of the horses, no matter how panicked, no matter how lost, no matter how out of their mind gone, that horse always calms down almost instantly, within seconds, with a simple touch, and Steve doesn't know what else to call that but magic.

So, of course, Steve talks to the stable boy the only way he knows how. He gives orders. It’s what he was raised to do. It’s what his parents demand. He’s high born—or will be if his parents have anything to say about it—and he doesn’t know how to communicate with servants except by command. He learns this the first time his longing drags him to the stables. He opens his mouth, wanting to say hello. Wanting to ask a million and one questions. Instead he tells the stable boy to make ready his horse.

He doesn’t even want to ride—it’s cold and raining.

But the stable boy answers his request simply. 

“No problem,” he says, and calm eyes blue as the sea, eyes that Steve has never seen except at a distance, meet his own. The stable boy nods. His eyes linger a moment too long. Then without another word he moves to fetch Steve’s horse. 

When the horse is ready, Steve orders his thick cape fetched. Stalling. Again, those eyes on his. Again the simple words. “No problem—” But this time a smile is tacked on after. “Princess,” the stable boy finishes, near mocking but some gentle quality in the word stops it just short. 

Steve gapes. No servant has ever dared talk to him with such insolence. His first instinct isn’t to punish the guy, though later he realizes it should have been, at least according to the rules laid down by society. His first instinct is to laugh. To grin. Maybe to blush a little, who’s to say?

“I could have you whipped,” he says, playfully. Can’t school his smile enough to intimidate.

The stable boy’s smile grows. Again comes the nod, this time exaggerated, carried on into a flourished bow. He speaks no more. Instead, Steve’s cape is fetched, quick as you please. And when the stable boy returns, that cape is fastened with the deft fingers of those possibly magical hands, is smoothed over Steve’s shaking shoulders with a touch that calms him instantly.

He mounts the horse with no more talk between them, dreading the rain. Takes one quick turn about the field and returns, possibly with the goal of testing this stable boy.

“Stable Boy,” he says, his horse clopping gratefully back into the barn, “Clean my horse. It’s filthy with mud.”

The nod again. The “no problem, Princess.” The grin. The stable boy whistles a tune while Steve watches him rub the horse clean, taking care to check it over thoroughly. He whispers secrets to it as he works. Sings low and melodious, just below hearing, as he walks it back to its stall.

Steve leaves before the stable boy can come back, lay eyes on him again. He longs for those lips to whisper secrets to him. 

Every day he rides, ordering the stable boy to ready his horse and always looking for other odd jobs he can order done to lengthen their time together.

These orders are always met with a knowing smile. A look that lingers just that small bit too long. A nod. Those words.

“No problem, Princess.”

This ridiculous behavior continues as weeks drag into months. The stable boy never tires. Steve’s orders sound more and more like pleas to his own ears.

Please know I wish I could just talk to you. Please don’t grow to hate me. Don’t mistake this for pettiness, haughtiness. Please.

One day it all becomes too ridiculous. There’s some tool hanging directly above Steve in the stable rafters, in easy reach, and he finds he’s running out of chores to stretch their time together.

“Stable boy,” he begins as he always does. “Fetch me that tool.” He points upwards. Swallows. They both know he has no need of the tool in question.

The stable boy regards him calmly. Walks over, slow, purposeful, and leans close to reach the requested tool, never once breaking eye contact. He holds out the tool to Steve. Brushes his finger briefly against Steve’s as he passes the tool over.

“No problem, Princess,” he whispers.

But that’s not what it sounds like. He says those words, that “no problem,” like most would say “I love you.”

And it breaks Steve’s social paralysis.

“Thank you,” Steve whispers back. And in this, returns an I love you of sorts as well. As close as he can manage at the moment. As fully formed. His love shown in this gratitude. 

“Thank you, Billy,” and the meaning is love, regardless of the words. Thank you for everything, he implies. For existing. The words aren’t enough to convey—

“You’re welcome,” Billy says, stopping Steve’s whirling thoughts. “Steve,” he adds with a half-grin.

And Steve laughs, something hard and cold in him breaking loose and melting away with the action. Melting away under magic hands that skim up to grip his arms as lips that whisper secrets come in close to brush Steve’s lips with half a kiss—wait for Steve to make it whole. Which he does. One whole kiss is born between them.

The first of many.

But a wise man once said that the course of true love never did run smooth.

So it is with their love. 

It isn't long before Billy decides that he has to leave. If they are to truly be together forever, like they plan to be, the salary of a stable boy isn’t going to cut it. 

It doesn't matter that Steve tells him he doesn't need to go, that Steve will inherit his father's land someday and he'll more than be able to provide for the both of them. No, Billy has to bring in his fair share of the money for the sake of his pride. To do that, he has to go out and find his fortune. It doesn't matter that Billy's little sister Max doesn't want him to go, either. Doesn't matter how Max begs or pleads. Doesn't matter that she cries. Billy is determined to go and he refuses to change his mind. 

So, after many long conversations and many promises that he will absolutely, without a doubt be perfectly safe and will come home before Steve even knows it, Billy gets on a ship bound for lands unknown.

It isn't three months later that word reaches Steve of Billy’s ship. Word of an attack by pirates. Word that there are no survivors.

Steve becomes inconsolable at the news and for days he barely sleeps, barely eats, barely does so much as leave his room.

To have had everything he'd ever wanted and to lose it—he blames himself. He should never have let Billy go and he knows it.

Life holds no meaning with Billy gone.

And with the arrival of Prince Tommy, acting ruler of Florin, things only get worse.

The prince meets Steve one sunny day while both are out riding. Steve still goes, every day, his one moment of solace. He remembers. Every time he enters the stable and speaks to Billy’s replacement, he feels a fresh cut to that old wound. The pain helps him to remember. Helps to keep him alive, or something close to it. 

On a ride, they meet. And in Steve’s beauty, in his utter lack of guile and gentle manner, Tommy sees a great opportunity. 

He sends word to Steve’s parents that he means to have Steve for marriage. Steve’s parents, of course, are overjoyed at the news. The union Prince Tommy proposes will serve to fulfill their fondest grasping wish.

When Steve refuses Tommy’s offer, that dream seems to shatter. Steve’s father, in his anger, throws Steve from the house, disowning Steve and ordering him never to return.

It’s not long before Steve is found—picked up by the prince’s men and taken to the castle where he’s put in a room that though gilded, is no less a cage. Tommy once again asks for his hand. Asks in a way that makes his threat clear. And Steve, caring nothing for himself and even with their betrayal worried for his family’s safety should he refuse, accepts Tommy’s proposal. 

Tommy, not feeling any true love for Steve, is glad nonetheless at the acquiescence. He has a scheme. Wants desperately to start a war with Guilder and in Steve, whose gentle manner and beauty will ensure the love of every subject, he has the perfect pawn to achieve his ends—or so Tommy’s trusted, six fingered advisor, Carol, informs him.

Killing Steve is such a simple, elegant means to his end. The death will enrage his subjects. They’ll demand he go to war to avenge him. It’s brilliant—he’s got to hand it to Carol. 

Now all Tommy needs are some reputable assassins to convincingly frame Guilder.

Dustin and his Party, in desperate need of coin and with a solid reputation to stand on, accept the job.

“But we’re not killing him,” Will says, giant in stature but gentle in nature as he waits with the others, blocking the road.

“We’re definitely probably not going to have to kill him,” Dustin assures him.

“Maybe just cut him a little,” Lucas says, always eager to make use of his blade.

They wait for their chance to kidnap the beloved new prince.

It doesn't take long.

Today, as every day, they know that Prince Steve will pass on his daily ride through the king’s forest. He will be alone, as he is every day. He will be an easy mark.

Dustin steps out into the middle of the path, hands raised, stopping the Prince as he nears. “Sorry to bother you, but we're poor, lost circus performers,” Dustin says. “Is there a village nearby?”

“There’s nothing around here for miles, Kid,” Steve says, taking the trio in cautiously, not at all suspecting the terrible fate that's about to befall him. 

“Cool,” Dustin says, grinning. “Then no one’s gonna hear you scream.”

And Will walks forward. Eyes closed, he knocks Steve out as gently as possible, then lifts him carefully from his horse.

They plant their evidence, shoo the horse on its way, and after that all that’s left is to set sail for Guilder’s coast, keeping an eye out for likely places to drop the body.

Will and Lucas make ready the ship, starting up a game that Dustin has had his fill of.

Rhyming. It had to be rhyming.

“Will, are there rocks ahead?” Lucas asks, grinning while coiling rope.

“If there are, we’ll all be dead!” Will calls back, hoisting the sail.

“No more rhymes now, I mean it!” Dustin complains.

“Anybody want a peanut?” Will asks.

It's going to be a long journey.

Chapter Three: Inconceivable!

Billy, fortunately, had been following after Steve all day and he follows the kidnappers to their ship, then follows as they head for Guilder, as they head for the Cliffs of Insanity and for once in his entire career as a Pirate, Billy finds himself glad to be without his usual crew, glad he'd taken this smaller ship alone to go and talk to Steve, to ask him why he was marrying that idiot Prince, why he hadn't waited. His usual crew would have asked too many questions and if he is to save Steve, there's no time to waste in answering them.

Slowly but surely, his ship gains on the kidnappers. His ship is smaller and sleeker (not to mention faster and better in nearly every way) so it isn't exactly hard to catch them but it is almost impossible to watch as Steve dives into the dangerous, eel infested waters and not abandon ship and dive in after him. From his spot at the ship's wheel Billy screams for Steve to get out of the water, even though he knows he's too far away to be heard, not that Steve would have listened to him anyway, even if he could have heard him, he's sure.

So he stands there, stuck behind his ship's wheel as he watches Steve get dragged back up onto the relative safety of the other ship. He watches as they continue towards the cliffs. He watches as the three men on board get off and two of them climb onto the shoulders of the ridiculously giant-sized one, watches and holds his breath as they grab Steve and watches as the giant starts to climb up a rope dangling from the top of the cliff to the bottom.

Billy watches all this, and he follows.

But not fast enough to catch up to the giant, even though the man was carrying three others plus himself. Again he finds himself forced to watch; watch as the man he loves is hefted, kicking and screaming up and over the wall where he can't yet follow.

“Inconceivable!” he hears someone shout.

Then, the rope falls away.

Well, that's inconvenient.

“Could you, maybe, I don’t know, climb faster?” a man waiting above calls down. If he was in such an awful hurry, he should have left the rope, shouldn’t he?

Whoever’s up there now isn’t the one he’d heard earlier. Which means that whoever had shouted the first time has probably already run off, probably with Steve in tow.

Well, who says a daring rescue should be easy? Where’s the fun in that?

Still….

“Could you maybe climb faster?” Billy mumbles under his breath. “Asshole.” 

He jumps for the next handhold.

But when another rope comes down, his arms are so spent that he doesn’t think, just takes it. 

Reaching the top, his impatient friend even allows him a breather. Descent of him. 

“Pity you aren’t a woman,” the man says. Billy raises his brows. Some small talk. He sees Billy’s train of thought, waves it off.

“With your tenacity, I’d almost wish you were the one—if you were a woman. A six-fingered woman killed my father, you see, years ago. Over a sword he’d crafted for her. After so long searching for her, training to beat her—” he shrugs. “Well, it’d be nice if it was a challenge, you know?”

He stands. Draws his sword and practices his footwork, loathe to sit still too long, it would seem.

“I know just what I’ll say, if I ever meet her, too.” He takes his stance, facing off against some unseen foe. “‘Hello,’ I’ll say. ‘My name is Lucas Sinclair. You killed my father. Prepare to die.’”

“To the point,” Billy says. “I like it.”

He stands. Stretches.

“Shall we?”

“You seem a decent fellow,” Lucas says taking up stance again, this time focused on Billy. “I hate to kill you.” 

He shrugs.

“You seem a decent fellow,” Billy says, smiling, taking a stance to match. “I hate to die.”

The cocky sonovabitch is pretty good with a sword, too, once they finally get down to business.

Too bad for him, Billy is better. Left handed or right.

But he doesn’t kill the man, who waits for death, unarmed and bested. Can’t kill him—skill like his is a work of art. However—

“Can’t have you following me,” he says over the unconscious swordsman’s body. “Nothin personal.”

And onward he rushes after Steve.

Only his catlike reflexes save him from the boulder careening for his head.

“I could’ve killed you if I wanted,” the surprisingly bashful rock chucker says. The giant wields another huge rock like a baseball. “I missed on purpose.”

Well shit, this is gonna slow Billy down.

“Let’s kill each other like men?” he tries.

“No weapons?” the giant says. “Sportsmanlike?”

“Sportsmanlike.” Billy nods.

The next five minutes include much rolling, ducking, and being crushed between a literal rock and the hard back of a giant that didn’t want to be strangled into unconsciousness.

Once the giant finally does drop, Billy takes a moment to rest, standing over the large snoring man. He rubs at his aching shoulder. Cracks his stiff neck.

“No weapons,” he mutters to himself. “Idiot. Ow, fuck.”

And onward he rushes, limping just a bit, after Steve.

till he reaches a clearing and a smug little man, sat at a makeshift little table, Steve blindfolded at his side. A stupid little grin rests on the man’s stupid little face, but Billy ignores it, more concerned with Steve and with looking him over carefully, assessing him for injuries as best he can. Steve seems fine, but it's impossible to tell without asking him and he certainly can't do that right now.

He watches as the fool's lips move, blathering on and on about... something to do with how smart he thinks he is, how Billy can never, ever, not in a million years ever hope to best him at a game of wits and Billy decides to suggest a game.

"This," Billy says, pulling a small pouch from his pocket, "is Iocane powder. It's terribly poisonous. I'll put some of it in one of these glasses of wine here—" he pauses as he grabs the two wine glasses that have been set out before them—though why anyone would stop to set up a nice picnic lunch with wine during a kidnapping, he'll never understand, not if he lives to be a hundred. "And we'll see if you're smart enough to figure out which glass it's in. If you win, you keep the prince and you get to watch me die. If I win, I get the prince and get to watch you die. Fair?"

The fool smiles, his long, brown curly hair bouncing as his head bobs up and down.

"Oh, this'll be fun," he says brightly, like he's excited, like stupid games of chance are what he lives for but also like he has no idea that's what's really going on.

Billy nods back once, succinctly, and turns around to pour the poison into the wine.

"Here we go," he says as he puts the glasses back on the table and slowly pushes one towards the other man. "Now which one has the poison in it?"

"That's easy," the man says. "It's clearly not in the cup you're pushing towards me, that'd be too obvious."

"So your choice is the one I put closest to me?"

"Not quite! I know I can't pick that one either, because—" the man keeps going but Billy stops listening. The man is terribly dull and Billy is already starting to regret not just stabbing him and being done with it. This game isn't nearly as much fun as he'd thought it would be. That and he can't keep his eyes off of Steve and the way he's just sitting there, silent and still, not reacting at all. Weird behavior, so unlike the Steve that Billy remembers, always so vibrant, so loud, so bossy. It's different even just from the way Steve had been kicking and screaming as the giant had dragged him up the side of the cliff less than an hour ago and Billy can't help but wonder if maybe Steve doesn't know who he is, if Steve can't recognize his voice after all this time. Which... might very well be the case. 

He wishes for it not to be true, but he'd be lying if he said that after the years they've been apart that there aren't some details about Steve that have gotten fuzzy for him, too. Like he can no longer remember the exact sound of Steve's laugh or the exact feeling of Steve's skin under his fingers. Because for all that he's dreamed and dreamed of both, those exact details as well as a few others have gotten hazy, like a painting that had been stared at for too long.

But this idiot. He's still going, just talking and talking in circles about which cup to choose. He's taking so long that Billy is just about to give up and stab him when the man finally picks a glass, gathering it up carefully in one hand and swirling it like this is some fancy wine tasting and not a game of choose-your-death.

"You know..." the man says slowly before sipping the wine. "It really was very foolish of you to engage me in a game like this. You have no chance against my superior intellect."

Billy smiles. "Is that so?"

"It absolutely is. You've—" the man's words cut off mid-sentence as the poison spreads throughout his body. One second he's alive—heart beating, lungs taking in air, mouth moving and emitting ceaseless noises and words like if it ever stopped he'd die on the spot and the next he's a corpse, skin losing heat and color as his body begins disposing all unnecessary wastes as that heart and those lungs stop moving. He gives one last shuddering breath and that's it. He's dead. Finito. Kaput. Worm food.

"Well," Billy says, his eyes landing back on Steve and drinking him in slow, like Steve is a drink he's been dying for for years. "I guess that means we can go." He waits, expecting... well, something, some reaction, anything, from Steve now that the kidnappers are all gone but instead he gets nothing. No reaction at all. With the worst sort of sinking feeling in his gut he realizes that Steve really doesn't have even the slightest clue who he is. Steve doesn't recognize him at all. He walks over and jerks the blindfold down to hang around Steve’s neck. Looks Steve in the eye.

“Who are you,” Steve asks, uninterested.

Billy keeps his face blank.

“I’m someone you ought not to fuck with,” he says. He hauls Steve up to standing.  

Maybe, if Steve doesn't recognize him, maybe he'd been wrong all along. Maybe Steve had never loved him. Maybe Steve had been glad to be rid of him. Maybe Steve loved his Prince. A Prince—much more suitable marriage material than a stable boy ever was or could be. 

With a hard glare and rage boiling over in his stomach, Billy grunts, “Move."

 Steve does as asked silently and without complaint.

Chapter Four: No problem, Princess

After some time and much running, they take a tense rest at the top of a great hill. Billy throws Steve down near a fallen tree and watches the royal bastard try to get comfortable. Sees that Steve’s eyes are still locked on him, full of hate. Steve had been staring as they moved, taking Billy in with hard eyes and Billy’s sick of that look on Steve’s face. He wants to tell Steve the truth. No, he wants to drag the hurt out a bit so Steve can feel one iota of the pain Billy’d had to endure at Steve’s hand. Betrayed. Betrayed so cruelly, after dying and being reborn a richer man, all for Steve, only to come back to find him marrying some prince. Impatient. 

It��s a torment. Steve here, staring at him like this, with such loathing, unable to recognize his voice, his touch. A torment.

“You’re him, aren’t you?” Steve accuses.

You’re him. Could Steve see after all? See, beneath the mask, some sign of the man he’d claimed to love so deeply?

“Possibly,” Billy says, annoyed, doubting, “Who’s him?”

“Oh, shut up, you’re The Dread Pirate Roberts. Admit it.”

Guess not.

Billy bows. “Proud to. At your service, Princess.”

“Princess,” Steve says softly, eyes drifting far before sharpening with his tongue. “Don’t call me that." 

It was worth a try. Still, nothing. No recognition. He’d stop playing this painful game if Steve would just give him one tiny—

“And if you’re at my service,” Steve says, “you can fuck off and die already.”

Billy clutches his chest. “Ouch,” he says solemnly. He tries not to smile, the hidden smile hiding real pain. “No really, that hurts.” He wanders closer. “What did I ever do to you?”

Steve tilts his head up, staring without seeing.

“Killed the man I love. How 'bout that.”

“Well,” Billy says, tilting his head. “I kill a lot of people. Have to be a little more goddamn specific, there, Princess. Was your love another Prince like this one? That your type?”

Billy has to try hard to keep the longing, the pain, the old reverence out of the word. Princess. He pins up a cruel smile. Lounges against a log, opposite. Steve doesn’t deserve to see his pain.

“Stop calling—” The words come out hot and hard but he deflates mid-word. Eyes travel leagues again as he stares off. 

"He was poor,” Steve breathes, suddenly sounding far away. “Poor. Perfect. But he thought I—” A small, sad smile blooms. “He had eyes like the sea after a storm. And he left, out across the sea, because he thought I—”

His eyes find Billy’s again. Flinty.

“Doesn’t matter. Your ship attacked his, out of all the goddamn ships on the ocean. And The Dread Pirate Roberts never takes prisoners.”

“Can’t afford to look soft,” Billy says, keeping his voice light, sharp smile in place. “People get word, start getting cocky, after that it’s nothing but too much work. Easier just to kill everybody.”

Steve stares, openmouthed, so much hurt in his eyes for a beat. But soon enough he swallows it down. Gets ahold of himself. Gets angry. 

“Oh, that’s cute. I’m in pain and you’ve got jokes.”

Billy clicks his tongue and all the humor drains out of his voice. “Life is pain, Princess.” Billy knows that all too well. “Deal with it.”

He gets up. Plucks a blade of grass and twirls it thoughtfully.

“I remember him, I think,” he begins. “This perfect, poor, idiot of yours.”

Steve refuses to look.

“He died like a man. Didn’t beg. What he did do was ask me to spare him.” Billy pauses, remembering. “Please, he said.”

And Steve’s eyes raise to his. Billy pushes the pain aside to hold that gaze.

“Lucky for him that I killed him when I did. He kept goin' on and on about his true love. Kept describing someone. Guess it had to have been you.”

Billy looks down on Steve, mouth hard.

“Guess I spared him a lot of disappointment, huh?”

Steve stands.

“You think this is fucking funny?”

Billy crowds up closer.

“Kept going on about how faithful you were,” he says, teeth clenched. “How you were waiting for him.”

“Shut up!” Steve yells.

“How long did you wait when Prince Tommy came knocking, huh? An hour? A week?”

“What did it matter?” Steve yells. Then he deflates. “I was already dead. I died that day, when he died out on the ocean I…”

Horse hooves galloping in the distance catch Billy’s attention. Fuck.

“…and you can die too, asshole.”

There's a shove from behind and Billy's tumbling hard down the hill.

And words slip out. The only words he can think to say.

“No—” Pain blooms in his shoulder. “Problem—” His head catches hard and he flips end over end. “Princess!” He wills his body to stay loose, possibly mitigate the damage.

“Billy?!” he hears. And the world is a violent green blur.

Chapter Five: The Fire Swamp

Without thinking, Steve rolls down the hill after Billy. By the time he's halfway down, he's certain he's going to throw up. By the time he reaches the bottom he's surprised he hasn't. 

"What the—" he spits as he finally, blessedly comes to a stop. "How the hell—" He raises a hand to his head and waits for the world to stop spinning.

"Why—"

"I think that just leaves out when and where," Billy says, already standing. Smirking like he hadn't just fallen down a giant hill mere moments ago. Like he isn't dizzy or disoriented at all.

"Were you ever going to tell me you weren't really dead or was I just supposed to mourn you for the rest of my life?" Steve yells, getting to his feet and getting right in Billy's face with it, his hands flying up to land uselessly on the blindfold still hung around his neck.

"You're marrying someone else," Billy says coldly, like that's all that matters, like he still thinks Steve had any choice in the matter.

“Would you just—" Steve says, pushing at the mask still covering the top half of Billy's face. "Take this off." He pushes and pulls at the thing, making little headway until Billy unties it at the back and it falls off, leaving them close enough, Steve leaning close, that they're sharing the same air and staring at each other full on.

And for a long moment, neither of them moves, they just stand there, chests brushing, breathing in the same rhythm, until finally Steve says, "I never wanted to."

Billy takes a step back. "Well, you are."

Steve steps forward, pushing himself up against Billy again, unable to stay away now that he knows the one and only man he's ever loved is alive, still and whole before him. "He heavily implied he'd make things bad for my family if I didn't." He runs his fingers up Billy's chest, unable to stop himself from touching, either, from making really and truly sure that Billy's real. That this is really happening.

Billy grabs his hands, looking like he's about to push him away and Steve could swear, would swear that he feels his heart stutter and roll to a stop in his chest before Billy drags him closer, trapping their hands between the crush of their bodies and Steve feels his heart trip over from silent to roaring as Billy's lips brush across his own. He can feel Billy's own heart rushing to match the accelerated tempo of his against the back of his hand as the kiss deepens and Billy leans up, his whole body stretching like its trying to engulf Steve's.

Steve feels the kiss and the press of Billy's body crest over him like a crashing wave and he lets it drown him, loses himself in the rough slide of Billy's shirt underneath his fingers, in the way Billy's heart crashes against his ribs like its trying to reach out and touch Steve's hand itself, loses himself in the soft press of Billy's lips. He moans into the kiss as Billy slips one of his hands out from between them to grip the back of Steve's neck and thumb gently at the hair there.

When they finally break apart it's only because they both violently need to breathe and even then, the space left between them is nearly non-existent. "I've never wanted anybody else," Steve whispers.

"Yeah, I can see that." Steve can feel the way Billy's mouth curves up more than he can see it. "Can feel that." The hand at Steve's neck drops down, trails along his spine to rest at his hip.

"There will never be anybody else," Steve breathes out, still just stuck on the way Billy feels, that he's real, that he's here. He inhales deeply—the way he smells—it's better than any perfume anyone could ever even dream up. "Never."

"Good," Billy says, voice low and deep, burning into him in a way Steve had forgotten it could.

Neither of them moves, both of them cool with staying frozen in this singular moment for the rest of forever and for a few days after that. Eyes locked. Smiles on their lips. Those magical hands of Billy’s touching Steve again and healing wherever they come to rest.

The sound of horse hooves shatters the spell, echoing down the valley.

“Shit,” Billy says, tracking their hunters with upturned eyes. “Your new boyfriend is a real pain in my ass.”

Steve’s hands go to his hips. He’s about to argue but Billy grabs up his hand before he can get a good start. Runs up the back with his thumb and then pulls it in for a quick, unthinking kiss.

“Lucky for us, we can go where they can’t track us,” he says, all cocky smile. “Come on.”

Like Steve’s not gonna follow.

Even if it does involve more running in his less-than-sensible palace shoes.

Billy slows as they enter a root-twisted, creepy-ass forest. They stop. Take the place in. Massive trees block the light out. Strange animal cries reach their ears.

“Hell,” Billy says. “For the dreaded Fire Swamp, this place doesn’t seem so bad.”

Steve gapes at him, eyebrow quirked.

“What? Not saying I wanna build a summer home here or anything, Princess, but the trees are kinda cool, you’ve gotta admit.”

Steve scoffs. Starts walking.

“Some rescue, buddy,” he mumbles as he passes. “Five star stuff, right here.” Gestures around them.

Billy shrugs.

“What was that?” Steve says, stood still and wary. 

The popping comes again. His pant leg catches fire—a great tongue of flame roaring up out of the ground and catching him on fire fire fire oh my god he’s—

He starts dancing wildly, waving his leg.

“I’m on fire! Billy, I’m on fire! Billy, Jesus will you—”

Billy tackles him to the ground. Digs up dirt and starts smothering the flames. After a few handfuls, Steve stops burning. They both sit in the silence after, panting.

“You know what?” Steve says, looking out into the unending maze of trees and woody vines they still have to get through. “It’s official. The Fire Swamp blows.”

He stands, brushing the dirt off of his clothes. Billy joins him on his feet. When the strange popping sound starts up again, Steve all but jumps into Billy’s arms and Billy swings him out of harm's way.

“Why is it only trying to set me on fire?” Steve asks, pissed. Billy sets him on his feet.

“Maybe it’s set off by noise,” he says absently. Holds out his hand to continue.

Everything goes fine for a while after that. Dandy. Billy fills him in on his death and rebirth as a Pirate. Steve doesn’t get barbecued. Billy full-on picks Steve up to help him across a fallen log, still talking, which is pretty freaking hot. Steve doesn’t get barbecued. All good stuff.

He should have known it was too good to be true because one wrong step later and—

—he's completely buried in the lightning sand.

But Billy will save him.

He’d been talking, hadn’t got a breath in before he’d plunged underground.

Billy will save him.

He starts to panic, lungs screaming for air. Begins to thrash and doesn’t even mean to. Doesn’t know what he means to do.

Billy will—

A hand closes on his arm, barely distinguishable from the grip of the ground. And Steve is yanked closer to Billy. Scrambles his arms around Billy’s body once it’s close enough to feel.

The first breath he grabs topside—Billy hauling them up—is the best breath he’s had since his first on this earth. Didn’t think for a moment there he’d ever have another.

“You know.” Billy gasps. “This is a good thing.” Gasp. Finally his breath gets somewhere back to normal. “We already know how not to get killed by two out of three of the worst things in this shithole.” He stands. Offers Steve a hand. “Good thing you’re so clumsy.” He grins.

“Oh, you’re hilarious,” Steve says, glowering.

Billy leans in and steals Steve’s lips briefly. Not fair.

“Had me scared there for a bit,” Billy whispers after, lips still brushing.

“Yeah,” Steve says back, wanting to hit Billy a little bit less. “Me too. Thanks for, you know, saving my ass. Again.”

Not even a little bit fair.

Billy smiles.

“No problem.”

His hand reaches once more for Steve’s.

And Steve can’t stay mad at the guy.

“So, two out of three,” Steve says. Counts them off, fingers getting involved. “Fire bullshit, sand bullshit, and—oh Jesus, so it’s just the ROUS’s left to tango with. That’s what you’re saying?”

“Rodents of Unusual Size?” Billy says, rolling his eyes. “Now those are some made up bullshit.”

He smiles his usual cocky smile.

Gets knocked to the ground by an ROUS.

Steve’s eyes pop wide as the giant rat goes in for the kill, long teeth bared.

“Bullshit, huh?” he says, involuntarily.

“You know what, Princess, I really don’t need any lip from you right now!”

Billy grapples with the beast, unable to gain the time to pull his sword and skewer it. Cries out as the ROUS bites down hard on his shoulder. 

The sight of blood snaps Steve into action.

He looks for a weapon but he doesn't find one so he barrels in with both fists and starts pounding on the monster's back uselessly, doing no damage whatsoever as underneath it, Billy screams.

"Fuck, the—" Billy grinds out. "The—there's a stick-" his hand flails in the general direction of a truly gigantic stick lying just behind him and Steve scrambles for it, wraps his hands around the thick base end of it and whacks the monster with it until the stick starts coming away bloody, until the monster goes limp, until the monster stops moving, until the monster stops breathing, until—

"Steve!" Billy shouts. "You got it! You got it! You can stop!"

Steve drops the stick and instantaneously his arms grow so heavy he almost can't feel them. He notices that his hair has become damp, sweaty, and is now sticking to his forehead. He pushes the monster's soon-to-be rotting corpse off of Billy and pulls Billy up, his breaths coming fast and heavy and not just from the exertion.

"And now we know we can handle those, too," Billy says, trying to put it off like it's a joke, but Steve isn't having it. He paws at Billy's good shoulder and under his bad one. Billy hisses but lets Steve draw him close.

"I'm not losing you again," Steve says, more deadly serious than he's ever been. "Not ever again." He sticks his face into the side of Billy's neck on his good side and tries not to start shaking.

"And you won't ever have to," Billy says, voice as calm as anything, even as his own hands wrap around Steve's back and rub up and down like Steve's the one that's injured instead of him. Like he's checking Steve over for injuries, rather than the other way around, like it's probably supposed to be after something like that.

They just stand there clinging to each other like that until Steve can breathe normally and Billy stops feeling the incessant need to check Steve over. 

It takes a while.

Chapter Six: Promise?

They don't talk much the rest of the way through the forest, either, choosing instead to look back at each other every few minutes, silently checking to make sure that they're both still here, both still real, both still alive, covered in blood though they might be.

And when they finally break through to the other side Steve lets out a long sigh of relief, then starts up with, "So what do you—" meaning to say so what do you want to do now? But he never finishes the sentence. He's cut off by the sound of horses approaching and the clank and clatter of armor.

"Shit," Billy curses. He draws his sword, wincing as he does so, in so much pain that he’s not likely to be much use in a fight, but bluffing out of habit.

Prince Tommy rides up to them with the biggest, smuggest smile on his face and it makes Steve want to spit as he says, "Steve," all fake concern and barely concealed disdain. "I'm so glad we found you!"

His smile brightens in the most practiced, staged way imaginable. "Let go of this ruffian and come here."

Steve snorts. "Actually, I'm good, thanks." Beside him, he can feel Billy tensing up, like he's going to fight Tommy even outmatched as he is. Even wounded as he is. Like he'd fight Tommy and his goons one handed and blindfolded if he had to.

Steve bites his lip.

He knows he can’t let that happen.

"What..." Tommy says slowly, his perfect, practiced smile slipping for just long enough to show how ugly his face truly is. "What do you mean by that, my love?"

"I am not your love," Steve says, hand reaching out for Billy's and squeezing it. "This is my love. This is the only man I've ever loved, so if you'll excuse us, we'll just be going now."

They make it about three steps before Tommy's horse is blocking their path, that smug, smarmy smile of his having gone fully dark.

The knuckles in Billy's other hand audibly pop as he tightens his fist around his sword hilt.

Steve sucks in a breath.

"Hmmm, no, I don't think so. See, that really doesn't work for me," Tommy says as he raises a hand then flings it towards Billy. "Guards! Arrest the man in black!"

Billy drops Steve's hand as the guards' horses draw closer. It only just barely gives Steve long enough to come up with a plan.

"I'll come with you!" he shouts just as the men start to dismount. "I'll come with you if you promise not to hurt him!"

Tommy smiles again, this time like the cat that ate the canary as Billy yells, "Steve, no!"

Steve turns to Billy, takes his hand, raises it to his lips and kisses it gently. "I'm not losing you again," he says, matter of fact.

Billy is silent as he walks over to Tommy's horse. "Promise," Steve says, the word coming out between his teeth like it's a threat. "You have to promise."

"I promise," Tommy says. He offers Steve a hand up and Steve takes it. "Your boy won't be harmed if you come with me."

"Men," Tommy calls out behind him as they ride away. "Take him wherever he wants to go."

Chapter Seven: The Six-Fingered Woman and The Pit Of Despair

As Tommy passes Carol he slows a moment, their eyes exchanging an altogether different communication.

“As long as he wants to be tortured and killed,” his eyes say.

“Oh, I promise,” hers reply.

Billy knows what comes next. He’s not as naive as Steve is. But God, Billy loves that glass half full outlook the guy works so hard to keep. Even if it does complicate the shit out of Billy’s life sometimes.

“So, you killing me here or do you have a special spot picked out?” Billy looks up into Carol’s cold gaze. “No need to lie about it.”

“Why would I bother?” Carol says. Nods to her men, her hand waving a gesture.

“You have six fingers on your right hand,” Billy says, smiling. “Oh, have you got some hurt coming your way.”

Carol frowns. There's a popping pain in his head. 

The next thing he sees is a root-snarled dungeon ceiling. He moves his eyes—about the only part of him not strapped down—to see who’s cleaning his wound.

“Max?” He strains against his bonds. “The hell are you doing here?”

“My job,” she says, frowning. Keeps cleaning his wound.

“Where the hell am I?” he tries. She’s still pissed at him for leaving. He can tell. She’s cleaning his shoulder pretty goddamn aggressively for someone who’s not pissed at him, for starters.

“The Pit of Despair,” she says. “What the hell did you do this time, Billy? You’ll never escape here, you know. No one will find this place to rescue you either, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“It’s not, believe me.” Billy stares. Never thought he’d see her again. “Guess you’re stuck with me tilll I die, then,” Billy says, even though what he really wants to know is how she ended up here of all places. But what right does he have to ask? After bailing like he did?

“Yeah,” she says, plunking a bowl down hard. “Till they kill you.”

“So why bother fixing me?” Billy asks, mostly just wanting to hear her talk to him again.

She looks down on him with hard eyes. “Why the fuck do you think?” 

“Cause they’re gonna torture me,” he answers himself. “Of course they are. Whatever.” He’d shrug if he could. “I'm sure I can handle whatever they’ve got planned.”

“Idiot,” Max says. She smacks his shoulder with stinging salve then rubs it in, gentler. Her voice grows gentler, too.

“I wish you were right.”

Her hand rests on his arm. Her eyes fill with resignation.

“They’ve got this machine—”

---

Steve bolts up to sitting out of another nightmare. Gasps and curls into himself and tries to get his bearings. For a moment he’d fooled himself into thinking he was home. In his own bed.

He isn’t.

He jumps out of bed and pulls a pair of breeches on loosely, half tucking in his night tunic. This has to end. He has to end this.

“I can’t do this,” he says, bursting into Prince Tommy’s study. “I won’t. I love Billy. Always have, always will. Too much for this to happen.” He gestures wildly, taking in everything. Tommy, the castle, the wedding, this whole scenario.

“So if you say we’re getting married in ten days, fine. Whatever. Just know I’ll be dead by morning.” Steve rakes his hair. Plants his hands on his hips. “Your move.”

Because Steve can’t take one more goddamn nightmare. He just can’t.

Tommy sets the paper he’d been holding on the table. Stands.

“Alright—“

Robin, his lady-in-waiting, always laces his clothes up too tight. Says it accentuates his figure, but Steve knows it’s on the Prince’s orders. Next morning she’s at it again as if nothing had happened last night. As if she isn’t worried. As if this whole situation isn’t completely impossible.

“He said he sent his four fastest ships to find Billy?” she asks as she finishes dressing him. “And you believed him? God, Steve, sometimes you’re just so—”

Steve sighs. Pulls at his too-tight vest.

“Yeah, well, I don’t have much choice, now do I?”

And if that isn’t the story of his life.

Robin just sighs along with him. At least he has one friend in all of this.

Chapter Eight: The Thieves Hideout

Will finds Lucas passed out in the thieves hideout in the forest.

“Okay, you need to get a grip,” he says as he drags Lucas over to a barrel of water and carefully dunks his head in.

It takes two tries but finally Lucas comes up spluttering, looking around wildly. “Will? What the—” he coughs before Will dunks him a third time.

“That time was for the smell,” Will says as he drags Lucas out of the water again. Lucas looks about as pleased as a wet cat but Will only shrugs before dragging him over to the nearest cabin and plonking him down on the ground so he can lean up against one of the porch pillars. “I’ve heard people talking about a six-fingered woman working in the castle. Other people on the brute squad have seen her. I'm on the brute squad now—cleaning out the thieves forest. What are you doing here?” Will asks.

Lucas peers up at him slowly. “I’m waiting for Dustin,” he says, his words dripping out of him as slow as the water drips from his hair. “He said to go back to the beginning, so, here I am.” He waves his arms about drunkenly. “At the beginning!” He looks like he might throw up any second and he can’t seem to stop his head from bobbing up and down like a puppet on strings.

“But…” Will says, unsure of how to broach this particular subject. Ultimately, he just goes for the direct approach: “Dustin is dead.”

Lucas smacks his head against the pillar behind him then groans.

“The Man in Black killed him,” Will says.

---

“I see you’ve healed up nicely,” Carol says as she strolls into the Pit of Despair.

In response, Billy grunts.

“I think it’s about time we got him started on the machine, don’t you?” she says, speaking more to Max than to Billy. Max says nothing and Billy stays silent. He’s decided he’s going to use the one bit of power he’s got left in this terrible place and not speak to Carol. Not at all.

He sees Carol walk closer to the giant machine placed somewhere above him and watches as she caresses it lovingly. “This machine is my life’s work,” she says and when neither Max nor Billy asks any questions about that, she goes on anyway. “It’s designed to suck the life from someone one year at a time.”

She walks closer to Billy and attaches some wires and other bits and pieces to him. He fights off a shiver at the cold press of her fingers on his skin. He tries to think of Steve, of the warmth of his touch, of his laugh, but the cold terror of this place chases away even the idea of a pleasant thought.

“Now,” she says, those cold fingers trailing slowly, delicately up Billy’s forearm to his shoulder before digging in there, trying to elicit a reaction and failing. “Please, when we go through this, be honest about how it makes you feel. Because I am, after all, recording this for science.”

She digs her fingers in deeper and Billy grunts like she’s annoying him rather than the truth—which is that she’s definitely freaking him out. Max is so quiet Billy isn’t even sure she’s still in the room.

Carol walks slowly to the machine, saying, “Now, to start you off, we’ll just go with one year. Make things nice and easy for your first try.”

Billy stays silent.

She flips a big, fat switch on the machine and for the first split-second it’s fine and Billy thinks it’ll be fine, it won’t hurt that much, but then the pain kicks in, starting in his toes and licking up his body like he’s being set on fire an inch at a time. He shuts his eyes to avoid knowing if he might be. Because he might be, it hurts that bad.

Some indeterminate amount of time later—it could be a minute, it could be an hour, Billy has no idea—he hears something click, thinks maybe she’s shut the machine off, but the pain doesn’t stop, it just reverberates, soaring and cresting inside of him, making him forget anything else other than this pain ever existed.

“Now tell me, how did that feel?"

Billy whimpers.

---

Lucas grunts. “Then we should get his help.”

“What?”

Lucas looks up at Will and tries to put on his best determined face but mostly he just makes himself nauseous. “He beat me in a sword fight.” He gets to his feet. He wobbles. A lot.

“He clearly beat you in a fight.” He takes a step and almost throws up. He considers it a massive victory that he doesn’t.

“And he beat Dustin’s brain.” He wobbles a bit more and reaches back to put a hand against the pillar he was leaning against. He closes his eyes against the way the world seems to tilt on its axis and buckle.

“If we’re going to get revenge for my father, we’re going to need his help.” He lets go of the pillar, takes three steps forward and falls flat on his face.

“Sure,” Will says. “But maybe let's wait until you’re sober, yeah?”

From his position in the dirt, Lucas mumbles his assent.

Chapter Nine: The Four Fastest Ships

“Double the guard.”

Keith nods from his position knelt at Tommy’s side. Tommy leans back, sharpening his dagger blade. 

“Prince Steve will be safe, Your Majesty.” Keith says. “The castle doors only have one key and that key stays with me at all—”

“Steve,” Tommy says, standing as Steve enters the room. “My love. What’s up?”

Robin elbows Steve in the side and pushes him, stumbling, into the room. He turns to glare at her. “Ask him!” she mouths before stepping out of sight.

Steve swallows. This is gonna end so badly, he can already tell. He can barely even look at the slimy fuck.

“Look,” he says, stepping forward. “I need to get some answers—“

“Tons of time for questions later,” Tommy says, walking over and placing his hands on Steve’s upper arms, squeezing. Steve has the sudden desire for a bath. He clenches his jaw. 

“Tonight we’ll be married,” Tommy goes on, ignoring Steve’s discomfort. “And tomorrow’s the honeymoon.” He winks at Steve, who throws up in his mouth a little. “You can ask all the questions your little heart desires once we’re on the ship.”

Steve’s stomach drops. Ship. He really might puke here.

“Ship?”

“Yeah. Every ship in my armada will be waiting in Florin channel to leave with us.”

“Every ship?”

And Robin was right. Of course Robin was right. Steve shakes Prince Tommy’s hands from his arms.

“Every ship, huh?” He backs away. “You’re a fucking terrible liar, you know that? You brag too much.”

Tommy gives some silent signal and Keith leaves the room after bowing uncomfortably.

“Watch your mouth,” Tommy says quietly. He walks over to sit at his desk like he doesn’t give a shit what Steve says. But he’s too tense to sit.

“Doesn’t matter,” Steve says, glaring down. “Billy’s gonna show up and save me from this wedding. Watch.”

Tommy scoffs.

“You really are an idiot.”

Steve glares.

“Yeah,” he says, stalking forward. “That’s me! Stupid, naive little Stevie.”

Tommy sheaths the dagger he’d unconsciously picked up. Throws the sheathed weapon to the table.

“What?” Steve goes on. “Scared of what’ll happen to you when Billy does show? Coward?”

“Watch,” Tommy says, jaw clenched, “Your mouth. Or you won’t like what happens, Princess.”

“Don’t you ever fucking call me that,” Steve says, eyes darting to the sheathed dagger on the table. “What are you gonna do to me? You’re not gonna risk hurting me before the wedding, are you, smart guy. And if I do somehow end up marrying you I’ll be happier dead.”

Steve plants his hands on the table. Leans in.

“Billy and I are tied together with stronger bonds than you’ll ever feel in your miserable life. Our love will survive death. True love always wins, in the end. And you are a coward. Pathetic. You’re probably the slimiest little shit ever to crawl the earth!”

Tommy stands, vibrating with anger. He walks slowly to the door. Turns and addresses Steve quietly. Ominously. “You should have watched your mouth.” He smiles like he knows something Steve doesn’t. “You really should have, Princess.”

Then he’s gone. Steve stands in the silence, gut aching.

He picks up the forgotten dagger from the table.

The wedding draws nearer.

---

Three hours to the ceremony and a long unnatural wail echoes across the countryside. It permeates the stone of the castle walls and Steve feels an ache in his chest for the poor creature that makes it. The sound seems to mirror the sound he feels his heart is making. It snakes, echoing, down a busy village street and finds Lucas’s ears.

“It’s him,” Lucas says, pausing to discern the direction it comes from. “I’d bet my life on it.”

“How do you know?” Will asks.

“That’s the sound of ultimate suffering,” Lucas says, remembering the echo of that sound in his own heart the day his father died. “The Man in Black surely makes it now. Nothing but true love would have let him best us for the Prince on that clifftop, Will. Against my sword, your strength, Dustin’s mind? No. It was true love against us that day. Now, the very same man that hired Dustin to murder that true love of his marries his love tonight. The new Prince isn’t likely to see the morning. So you tell me, who else has more cause?”

“I suppose…” Will says, scratching his head.

Lucas starts threading his way through the crowd. Throwing out desperate excuse-mes and pardon-mes as he struggles to gain ground.

“Will,” he says, straining against a large lady carrying a goat. “A little help, maybe?”

“Oh,” Will says, looking down. “Sorry.”

He raises his hands, cupping his mouth for more volume.

“Everybody move!”

The crowd parts. The lady with the goat glares and makes way. And Lucas turns to Will, nodding his thanks.

They hurry through the gap, off to find The Man in Black.

Chapter Ten: The Sound of Ultimate Suffering

The pain of it is worse than any Billy’s ever known, makes him scream louder and harder and longer than he ever would have thought possible and on top of all of that he can hear another, quieter scream flowing alongside his own, like the harmony to a melody for a symphony he’d never in his life wanted to hear and now will never be able to forget.

He thinks it might be coming from Max, could be, based on the look that showed up on her face when Prince Tommy had stormed in and set the machine to its highest setting—50 years—and flipped it on. Could be—

Could be, but—

But—

it could also be that the pain the machine is causing him has split his throat in half and both parts, the harmony and the melody are coming from his own throat. He longs to reach up and to feel it, to see if his throat has really split in half like he thinks maybe it has but his arms are still trapped by his sides in the leather restraints they’ve had him in since he got here and even if they weren’t—even if they weren’t—

He doubts he’d be able to move them anyway; he doubts he could so much as twitch a finger with intention just now what with the way his whole body is twitching, jerking and spasming in a violent and gruesome reaction to the pain.

Every inch of him is on fire, every inch of him is screaming all at once, his heart pounding like an engine that’s missing pieces but somehow is still fighting to try and power his body. And he keeps screaming, keeps screaming and screaming and screaming until screaming is all he has left, until screaming is all he is, but even that stops too as eventually his lungs become too tired, too heavy, the pain too great to carry on carrying on any longer.

It takes longer for the rest of his body to wear itself out and stop its twisting and its shaking, its roiling and agonizing spasms but finally, as his heart slows, so does the twitching and the shaking until eventually he’s lying on the table as still and as silent as he’d previously been loud.

Around him he hears the machine being switched off, hears the water that powers it stop running, hears footsteps, feels a cold and clammy hand press to his neck, hears Max’s fierce, furious voice call out, “You’ve done it. He’s dead.”

He doesn’t see it but he feels Prince Tommy's sneer when he says, “Good. Then I’ll leave it to you to dispose of the body.” Hears more footsteps and the door swinging open, then slamming closed as he feels his lungs fight for just one more breath when Max throws her body on top of his and cries, feels his slowly breaking heart struggle to keep up some sort of rhythm, like his body is trying to tell her not to worry, not to cry ‘cause he’s still here. He’s still alive, even if his mouth won’t move, can’t move to tell her so. 

And even if when she whispers, “Don’t worry, I’m getting you out of here,” into his ear, what she’s really doing is just preparing his body to move, even if what she’s really saying is, “You know you deserved this,” he’s going to pretend what he heard was the first thing because if he’s going to die here, like this, he’d rather think it’s with his sister forgiving him rather than her hating him so much the sight of his near dead body does nothing whatsoever to move her.

He feels the last of the breath left in his useless, battered chest float out through his lips as she moves him onto a cart. Feels the ground pass underneath them and hears the thick wooden wheels click and grumble as she starts wheeling his body out the door.

“I don’t—” he thinks he hears her say, “I don’t know where we’re going to go.” But it’s hard, the world went dark almost the instant the pain hit and now the sound seems to be cutting out, too.

“Billy,” she says, but it sounds like he’s hearing it through cotton, or through absurdly, impossibly thick wool. His head feels like it’s full of wool, too, like each thought has to pass through miles of the stuff just to reach him.

The cart stops and the whole world narrows to the feel of Max’s fingers on his cheek, or at least what his imagination is telling him is Max’s fingers on his cheek as he feels a different kind of burn spread throughout his body, the lack of air spreading to each and every one of his muscles in turn and in turn making them numb as his heart slowly, slowly, slowly rolls itself over, as Max says, “Please, don’t.”

His heart gives one last final thunk, giving Billy just enough time to wish that he could reach out and touch Max’s face and tell her that he’s sorry for everything and to ask her, to beg her, to plead for her to tell Steve what happened to him. Because more than anything he doesn’t want Steve to think that anything could have kept him from rescuing him other than this—than absolute death itself.

Chapter Eleven: Miracle Mike

Lucas follows the tip of his sword through the forest, weaving this way and that, eyes closed.

“Father, guide my sword,” he whispers as he makes his meandering way.

“Hey Lucas,” Will says.

“Not now, not now,” Lucas says, annoyed. “Can’t you see that I’m concentrating?”

He doesn’t dare break the spell by opening his eyes.

“But you’re about to—”

“Ah!” a girl shrieks. Lucas’s eyes fly wide.

“What the hell are you stabbing random people in the ass for?” the redhead yells, stalking toward him and batting his blade aside. “What is that? Oh, hell, I’m bleeding, too! Great! I just bought this dress!”

She’s crying. Had been crying from the look of it. She punches Lucas. It lands harder than he expects it to and he rubs his jaw afterwards, feeling a blush creeping up under his palm. What a right hook. What a girl. Why is she crying? What is happening?

“Sorry,” Will says when Lucas remains silent too long. “But we’ve been looking for him all day long.” He points to The Man in Black, whose still limbs spill over the sides of the small cart the girl had been pushing.

“Billy?” The girl says, her eyes squinting, defensive. “What the hell do you want with him?” Her voice barely trembles. She wipes her eyes and doesn’t let any more tears fall. But Lucas can see that she wants to.

He finally finds his voice. “Revenge," he says.

Good job. Not creepy at all.

“Well,” Max says, swallowing and doing an impressive job of looking like she doesn’t care one way or another, “he’s dead, so….” She raises her eyebrows. That’s that, those eyebrows say.

“Not on him,” Lucas says, raising conciliatory hands and waving her off with them, a little scared of her. “On Prince Tommy—actually on Prince Tommy’s six-fingered henchman, but—you know what, we don’t have time for this. We need The Man in Black—” He stops at her intensified glare. “Er, um, Billy. We need Billy here to stop the royal wedding.”

“Needed, I guess, now,” Will chimes in, hands clasped at his front and eyes downward.

“Needed,” Lucas nods. “No!” Everyone living jumps at his sudden shout. “Need!” He looks to Max. Grabs her shoulder and lowers his voice. “I’m so sorry for this.” He turns to Will.

“Pick him up. Do you have any money?”

“A little,” Will says. “Why?” He picks up Billy’s limp body, leaving the cart behind and not even seeming to feel Max’s blows hitting him, though he is careful not to step on her feet.

“I just hope it’s enough to buy a miracle.”

He takes off. Mostly because Max’s fury begins turning his way at his words.

“I’ve only got forty,” Will says, hurrying after.

He picks Max up and slings her over his other shoulder.

“Sorry,” he says to her, ignoring her yelling and still-pounding fists. “You keep getting in my way and I don’t want to hurt you.”

He walks on after Lucas.

“Wait for me!”

Not long later, Lucas is pounding on the door to a small cottage. After much fuss, a peephole swings open in the door.

“Yes?”

A young, pale face appears, already annoyed.

“Mike,” Lucas says. “I need one of your miracles.”

Miracle Mike takes in the group.

“Do you ever.”

He scratches his cheek.

“Too bad the King’s stinking son fired me, isn’t it?” Miracle Mike says, glaring. “Oh, and thanks for bringing that great memory back, too, Lucas. Really. Appreciate it.” There’s an awkward pause. “Well, it’s been nice chatting.” Mike says, breaking it. “Buh-bye now. We’re closed.”

He slams the door to the peephole shut.

Lucas pounds on the door louder.

“Beat it,” Miracle Mike says, the peephole flying open once more. “Or I’ll call the brute squad.”

“I’m on the brute squad,” Will says, shifting Max’s wriggling body to scratch an itch on his nose.

“You are the brute squad,” Mike says, craning his neck to look Will in the eye.

“It’s important,” Lucas says. He’ll beg the guy if he has to.

“I’m retired,” Mike says, sour. “Anyway, why would you want a miracle from the guy the King’s stinking son fired? I might kill whoever you wanted me to miracle.”

“He’s already dead,” Lucas says brightly, recognizing a selling point and flaunting it.

“Yeah?” Mike says, scanning the still form draped over Will’s shoulder. “Fine. I’ll take a look. Bring him in.”

Lucas smiles up at Will, who smiles back.

They enter the cottage and Will drops Max, but not before Max gives him one last obligatory pounding on the back; she crosses her arms over her chest and goes silent after that. Watches Billy’s body worriedly. 

“You got money?” Mike asks, palpating Billy’s chest.

“Sixty-five,” Lucas says, hoping to avoid haggling and keep enough for something to eat if he does live. He’d only had thirty, which brought their actual total up to seventy.

“I’ve never worked for that little,” Mike says. “Well,” he pauses. “Once. But that was a noble cause.”

Aha.

“He has a crippled wife,” Lucas lies. “His children—on the brink of starvation.”

“You always have sucked at lying, Lucas.”

Damn.

“I need him to avenge my murdered father.”

“You? Finding that six-fingered woman? Your first story was better,” Mike says. “Probably owes you money, right?” He looks around. “Where’s that bellows? He mutters. “Well, I’ll ask him.”

“He’s dead,” Lucas says.

“Oooh, look who knows so much. As a matter of fact, your friend here is only mostly dead. There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Please, open his mouth.”

Lucas does and Mike inserts the end of the bellows between Billy’s teeth and pumps up Billy’s chest. Once. Twice. Max starts to come forward, mouth open in protest, but Will stops her with a gentle hand. Shakes his head no. She frowns, but stays quiet.

“Buddy! Hey, hello in there! What’s so important, huh?” Mike asks Billy loudly, leaning in. “What have you got that’s worth living for?”

The miracle man pushes down on Billy’s chest.

“Truuuue Loooove,” Billy’s body groans out with the released air.

“True love, you hear that?” Lucas says, excitedly. “What’s a more noble cause than that?”

“Other than a BLT, I can’t think of anything,” Mike says. “But that’s not what he said. He clearly said—”

“Liar!”

A brown-eyed girl enters the room, her dark curls bouncing. “Liar. True love. He said true love, Mike. Friends don’t lie!”

“I’m telling you, I’m not—”

The girl holds out her palm and Miracle Mike rises a solid foot up from the floor, feet kicking feebly. Blood drips from the girl’s nose. She glares.

“Help. Or I dump your ass.”

“I like her,” Max says, smiling.

Chapter Twelve: Brains, Strength, Steel, Attitude and a Wheelbarrow

“Okay, so…” Mike says some time later as he’s putting the finishing touches on the weird, round, little chocolate-coated miracle he’s spent the past hour making. “Give him this, then wait about fifteen minutes.” He passes over it one last time with the little brush in his hand before blowing on it and putting it in a little cloth pouch.

He hands the pouch to Max with less fanfare than something like this probably deserves and she follows his lead by roughly shoving it into the pocket of her sweater.

“The chocolate makes it go down easier,” says the brown-eyed girl, the one who had, oddly, said her name was Eleven, though when Max had asked her why she had such an odd name she’d been met with a resounding chorus of, “Don’t ask!” coming from everyone in the room except for, oddly, Eleven herself.

“Right,” Max says slowly as they all start heading for the door, Will picking up Billy as he passes by the table and glancing over at Max like he won’t hesitate to scoop her up again if she refuses to go with them this time.

Which…

Well…

Max figures for better or for worse (and probably for worse) she’s in this now, so she’s going to see this through to the end, even if she strongly suspects it ends with them near the castle, huddled around the dead body of her brother, wondering why this “cure” didn’t work.

Because she doesn’t entirely believe “only mostly dead” is really a thing because she saw her brother die, she felt it happen, like she felt it in her bones and in her gut strongly enough that the feeling stopped her dragging that cart she’d been carrying him in and she’d had no choice but to scramble back and to check on him, to put her hand to his neck and to feel as his pulse crawled to a stop, to feel it as he died underneath her fingers.

And she sees his body now, has seen it get colder and colder each time she reached out to touch it, to touch him. And each time she wanted to see if some lingering echo was left inside, if there was some part, any part, of her brother left, but every time she tried all she was rewarded with was stillness and silence. And cold. So much cold.

Or in other words, she looked, she wanted to believe, but all she was rewarded with was the complete and utter absence of life.

And how could something like that ever be reversed?

No miracle, no matter how good, no matter how clever nor how chocolate-coated, could ever fix that.

Right?

Right?

But then Eleven reaches out and puts a delicate, soft hand on her shoulder and says, “This will work. Trust me,” and she says it with such deep sincerity and complete and total faith that Max wants to believe that maybe, just maybe, it can.

“Okay,” Max says and she doesn’t quite believe it still, she’s still terrified that there’s no way to get her brother back and that this great, big mistake she’s made is one she’ll have to live with for the rest of her life, however long that might be, but… she wants to believe it. She wants to, so she’s going to try.

Then she catches Lucas looking at her funny so she takes a deep breath, squares her shoulders and heads out the door before he gets it into his head to say anything to her about whatever it is he thinks he sees on her face.

She hears footsteps behind her and knows Will and Lucas are following close behind and she hears Mike and Eleven call out, “Good luck storming the castle!” loudly after them. Then, more quietly, almost quietly enough that Max misses it entirely, Mike says, “And you’ll need it, you idiots haven’t got a chance!” which is hastily followed up by the sound of a punch landing and Mike groaning loudly enough that Will almost turns around to see what happened before thinking better of it and continuing on.

They don’t talk much on the way to the castle. Well, Lucas tries to. He keeps asking Max about her favorite things, about what she does for work but Max isn’t in much of a mood to talk, less so about what she’s been up to lately and how it involved helping the people who killed her brother and how she’d known that was their plan, how she’d known and hadn’t cared, had been so busy with her own sense of self-righteous indignation over him leaving her alone with their parents that she’d been willing to watch him die for it.

That is, she had been until it had happened. Until he’d started screaming and she’d screamed with him, realizing entirely too late that what he’d done (or more like hadn’t done) wasn’t, had never, been worth his life.

Will, thankfully, doesn’t seem to be in much of a mood to talk, either, instead opting mostly for occasional grunts every time he switches up the way he’s carrying Billy, not that carrying Billy seems to be any great sort of strain on him at all.

And then, once they’re near enough to the castle they stop behind a big, brick building and Will leans Billy up against the wall and looks to Max. He looks to Max but he doesn’t say anything, just pins her with this important, soul-searing look that takes her a minute to fully get before she finally jumps to her feet, saying, “Oh, right,” and dragging the little pouch from Miracle Mike out from the pocket of her sweater.

“Well, here goes nothing,” she says as she fishes the chocolate-coated miracle from its little cloth pouch and Lucas holds Billy’s head back, elongating his throat so that swallowing will take the least possible amount of effort.

Max carefully presses the candy-shaped, candy-looking miracle past Billy’s lips and into his mouth. And she waits.

And she watches.

And she hopes.

“Is this going to take long?” Will asks, peeking over the castle wall at the armed guard in the courtyard below. “It must be only half an hour till the wedding.”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Lucas replies, staring at Billy for any signs of movement.

Max crouches down, face intent.

Nothing.

She turns to hide her reddening face and burning eyes. Pretends to check that their escape route is still clear.

Can’t stop the tears coming as the silent seconds drag on.

Shouldn’t have gotten her hopes up.

---

Billy tastes chocolate. He’s only ever tasted it once, when Steve snuck him a chunk on his Birthday, so it’s confusing that it’s in his mouth now.

Isn’t he dead? He opens his eyes.

Guy looking back at him seems familiar. Billy’s definitely fought him once before.

“Jesus, back for more?” he says, mouth awkward and hard to maneuver. He looks over the guy’s shoulder to see a strangely familiar giant. Great. “Fine, fine,” he says, stretching his jaw then continuing. “I’ll take you both. Come on.”

He hears a wet laugh.

Max?

Billy’s eyes find hers with some difficulty. He manages a weak smile at the sight of her.

“You weren’t fuckin' lying, Shitbird,” he says, voice softer than his choice of words. “That was one rough ride. About killed me.” Knows it had killed him, but she doesn’t need to— Hang the fuck on.

“Why won’t my arms move?”

“You’ve been mostly dead all day,” Will chimes in.

“We brought you back,” Lucas explains. “Took a miracle—an expensive miracle at that,” he mutters, mourning the weight of coin in his purse. “But then—”

“Okay, enough with the random exposition already, Jesus,” Billy says, clipped. “Just answer one thing. Who are you? I piss you off sometime or something—swear I’ve dueled you or something. And why am I on this wall? And where the fuck is Steve?”

Max gives one wet chuckle and finally wipes her face.

“Let me explain,” Lucas says, finger raised. He pauses a moment, thinking, then lowers it. “Nope, there’s too much. Let me sum up.”

“Fine,” Billy interrupts. Lucas glares. Max kicks his boot.

Billy scoffs and rolls his eyes, because that’s all he’s fucking got to work with apparently, and Mr. Let Me Explain starts up again.

“Steve is marrying Tommy in a little less than half an hour. So we have to break in, break up the wedding, steal your Prince and make our escape—after I kill Countess Carol.”

“We do, huh? Shit, that’s all?” Billy says. But his face says he’s thinking over the problem. More seriously he says, “doesn’t give us much time.”

“You just wiggled your finger!” Will says, amazed. “That’s wonderful.”

Billy throws him a put-upon glance.

“Always been a quick healer.”

Immediately back to the problem, he goes on. “What are we up against?”

“Only one way in,” Lucas says. Picks Billy up enough that his head can loll back over the parapet and he can get a look at the gate behind them. “And sixty men down there guarding it.”

He lowers Billy back against the wall.

“And we’ve got…?”

“Your brains. Will’s strength. My steel. Her.” Gestures at Max who glares to rival her brother.

“Yeah,” Billy says. “We’re screwed. If I had a month to plan, maybe, but this…” Shakes his head. No chance.

“You just shook your head,” Will says brightly. “That doesn’t make you happy?”

Billy flops his head around to look derisively up at Will.

“My brains, her attitude, his steel and your strength against sixty men and you think a little fucking head jiggle is gonna do it for me? Hmm?”

Will smiles. Billy jiggles his head again. So screwed.

“Now if we only had a goddamn wheelbarrow, I could maybe work with that.”

“Got you covered,” Max says. “Was hauling your heavy dead ass around in one when this stabby idiot and his friend found me.”

She shows him her bloodied dress then winks up at Will. The big guy blushes and scratches his neck.

“You stabbed my sister?!” 

Billy flops menacingly Lucas’s way. Gonna kill the little fucker. But he thinks of Steve—at least once every thirty seconds like clockwork and here it is. Cools it. Billy’ll kill the guy later. They’re under a time crunch, here. 

“Whatever,” he says. Rolls his head limply back to see Max. “Why didn’t you fucking say we had a wheelbarrow in the first place?”

“Oh shut up smartass, like I could have known it’d be useful.”

He raises his eyebrows at that. When the hell isn’t a wheelbarrow useful? But he’s only half invested. Half present. He’s thinking again.

“Give my right nut for a Holocaust Cloak right about now,” he throws out on the off chance.

“There we can’t help you,” Lucas says.

But Will pulls something that strongly resembles a Holocaust Cloak from inside his shirt. Dangles it in front of them.

“Will this work?” he asks.

“Where the hell did that come from?” Lucas says.

“Miracle Mike gave it to me. Fit so nice, he said I could keep it.”

“Alright alright,” Billy says, ready for action. “Come on, help me up.”

They stand, both Will and Lucas supporting his dead weight and Max supervising.

“Now,” Billy says, once they’re more or less upright, “we’ve just got to find me a sword.”

His head flops forward. Shit.

“Why? Lucas asks as Will casually balances Billy’s head back upright on his neck. “You can’t even lift one.”

“Sure,” Billy says, his head flopping backward this time. Will lifts it again. Fucking pats it before taking his hand away. “Thanks,” Billy says through gritted teeth. “But it’s not like anyone besides you three assholes knows that, is it? Anyways, It’ll be good to have once we’re knee deep in shit inside the castle. We’re gonna run into problems in there.”

His head flops forward again. Max begins giggling behind them as they finally get going. Will lifts it up once more and this time keeps his huge hand there holding it straight as they move.

“Problems. Chyeah, I’ll say,” Lucas says, ignoring Billy’s flopping head and Max’s giggling. All business. “How do I find the Countess? Once I do, how do I find you again? Once I do, how do we escape?”

“Don’t bug him,” Will says, turning Billy’s head to look his way while he talks.

Billy bites down the curses he wants to fling at Will for that shit. Jesus fucking—

Will’s oblivious. 

“He’s had a hard day,” the guy says. Billy snorts.

Max’s giggle turns into a full-on laugh that she’s forced to stifle with a hand. She’s gonna regret that shit once Billy can move again.

“Right,” Lucas says, looking back, Will turning Billy’s head to catch the response. “Sorry.”

Will makes Billy nod a few times and at this Max just fucking loses it, dissolving into a fit of giggles that are nearly silent as she runs out of breath. Billy listens to her back there, wheezing, slapping her leg. Bitch. Grimaces and endures his piggyback ride as they make their way off the wall.

“Lucas,” Will whispers as Max’s laughter begins to peter out. “I hope we win.”

And Billy laughs too, at that. Once. Darkly. Thinks of Steve and everything that lies between them. Minutes ticking by and him here just useless.

Yeah, big guy. He closes his eyes. Maybe prays. You and me both.

Chapter Thirteen: The Wedding

A voice calls out from behind Steve: "Excuse me, Prince." 

And it's a voice Steve knows all too well at this point—Countess Carol. 

"What do you think you're doing?" 

Steve climbs down from the window ledge he'd been climbing out of and turns to face her, red-cheeked and red-handed. "Oh, you know, just trying to get a better view," he says, casual as anything, even though they both know that's anything but the truth. 

"Yes, I'm sure you were," Carol says with a smile. She's clearly aiming for her words to sound kind, like she thinks maybe that will fool him somehow, but she winds up mostly face planting into disdain instead. She holds a hand out to him and he takes it, knowing he has no real choice. 

"The wedding is starting soon. Come, I'll walk you there myself, it wouldn't do for you to be late," she says, the razor sharp smile spreading across her face with these words only further illustrating the threat that lies behind them.

They walk out of his chambers and Robin joins them halfway down the hall, linking her arm through Steve's on the opposite side of Carol's. "I told you your stupid escape plan would never work," she whispers into his ear just before they reach the room where the wedding is to be held and all he can do is roll his eyes at her as she splits off from him to take her place in the back row. 

Billy is all he can think about as Carol drags him down the aisle towards Prince Tommy. He hopes Billy will come and rescue him, not that he ever should have had to, it should be Billy he's heading down this aisle towards right now; it never should have ever been anybody else. 

Tommy smiles brightly at him once Steve reaches him. Even reaches out to give him a delicate kiss on the cheek and calls him, "My love," again, like he believes this is real, like he believes any of this matters. Like this is anything more than a sham marriage he's forcing Steve into. 

Like he thinks they really love each other or something. 

Or maybe he's just really good at faking it, Steve doesn't know. Either way, Carol drops his hand as Tommy takes it, making Steve feel less like a human being and more like a parcel exchanging hands.

He basically is, though. Like that's what his life boils down to at this point - he's a thing to be used by someone else and that's it.

The tall, pale, buffoonish priest before them begins rambling the second they turn to face him and his voice alone makes Steve want to tear his own ears off. He has this weird thing with his voice where he pronounces all his r's as w's and also all his l's as w's and it makes him almost impossible to listen to.

And this priest he goes on and on and on about true love like, again, this is a marriage of true love, like Steve's not just standing here waiting for his real true love to come in and save him, like any of this really means anything at all. 

It gets so bad Steve starts to wonder if there's any way he could maybe, possibly just end it all right here, right now when outside there's a loud noise and someone shouting, "Hold the line, men!" and Steve sees the scowl spreading on Tommy's face just as he feels the smile spreading across his own. "Billy's coming for me," he says. "My true love is coming for me."

The look on Tommy's face sinks into something murderously angry, murderously angry but with just an edge of fear and that look of fear has Steve's smile growing bigger even as Tommy says, "He can't be, I killed him," because Steve knows better. He knows, without a doubt, that the noise outside is Billy coming for him. He just knows it.

"If you're so sure he's dead, why do you look so scared?" Steve asks, properly happy for the first time in entirely too long.

Tommy grips Steve's hand tighter and turns his death glare on the priest. "Hurry up!' he insists with a big, sweeping hand gesture.

The priest nods but keeps droning on, only seeming to just be reaching the real beginning of the ceremony proper as he says, "Marriage is about two people coming together in united harmony…" which only serves to make Tommy groan in frustration. 

Outside, someone screams. 

"Just say man and husband!" Tommy shouts. "Just get it over with!"

The Priest nods again only this time he does as ordered, stating: "Man and husband."

And that's it. The ceremony is over. Steve is married and Billy didn't rescue him. 

Next to him, Tommy smirks as Steve feels his heart sink down somewhere past his knees. 

Chapter Fourteen: Vengeance

“Stand your ground!”

Lucas heaves the wheelbarrow forward step by grueling step.

“I am The Dread Pirate Roberts!” Will bellows, standing cloaked atop said wheelbarrow. Billy dangles off of Lucas’s back and almost feels sorry for the guy. Tries to pinwheel his legs along to feel like he’s helping. Max just strolls behind out of sight, watching the scene. Billy can feel her repressed laughter.

Not the time. Jesus. Little sisters.

“There will be no survivors!”

“Now?” Lucas says, shoving one step forward.

“Not yet,” Billy says.

“My men are here! I am here! But soon you will not be here!”

“Now?” Lucas asks, desperate.

“Light him.”

“All your worst nightmares are about to come true!” Will says dramatically as the flames rush up the holocaust cloak. “The Dread Pirate Roberts is here for your souls!"

The castle guard scatters, fleeing this way and that, scared out of their minds by the ruse. Granted, Will’s bulk aflame and coming for you was definite grounds to lose one’s shit. Billy doesn’t blame the cowards one bit.

Max starts laughing outright as Will steps down from the wheelbarrow and smothers the flames from his cloak. Lucas hauls Billy toward the gates sole standing defender who tries to be smart by lowering the portcullis.

“Will!” Lucas shouts. No need. The giant is already lumbering toward the impediment. He gets a grip and hauls the portcullis back up. The castle-crashers all advance, crowding the man against the gate.

Billy stares the man down, partial paralysis be damned.

“Give us the gate key.”

Like he’s even intimidating at all just dangling here.

“I have no gate key.”

See? Fuck.

“Will,” Lucas says calmly. “Rip his arms off.”

And thank God for giants.

“O-oh,” the man stammers, swallowing. “You mean this gate key.”

Max snatches it from him. Curtsies before knocking him unconscious and turning to open the gate.

They stroll into the castle. They have done the inconceivable. Onto the next impossible thing on this evening’s docket.

They wander the halls of the castle. With no real knowledge of its layout, they’re basically counting on fate to send their feet in the right direction and Billy finds he doesn’t really mind that. He has a few good reasons to put his trust in fate. To believe he might come through this with love and limb still intact. Life still to live. He feels Steve close by here. That same connection he’s always felt with him. Steve, warm and his and out there somewhere in the castle. Separated as they are by twisting halls and stony walls, Billy can still feel Steve as if he’s standing here beside him.

Now if only Billy can only figure out how to stand and meet him, that’ll be something.

The unlikely group shuffles awkwardly on.

Countess Carol is the first life they meet, her and four armored guards storming the hallway, blocking their advance, and Lucas steps forward with a triumphant blaze in his eyes at the sight of her. Raises his sword to meet the guard she’s brought with her. Billy watches, dangling from Will’s brawny arm, his own sword dangling just as awkwardly as his body from his pathetically weak grip.

Useless.

“Kill the dark one, the girl and the giant,” Carol says. “But leave the fourth for questioning.”

Billy grins. Cocky bitch ain’t she?

Lucas makes short work of the advancing guard. Stands tall once the last one falls. Raises his sword to Countess Carol.

“Hello,” he says, soft. Deadly. “My name is Lucas Sinclair. You killed my father. Prepare to die.”

Carol readies her raised blade. Stares Lucas down. Then bolts suddenly, leaving Lucas standing dumbfounded for a beat in her wake.

He unfreezes quick enough and sprints after her.

Billy watches him go. Exchanges a glance with Will.

“What was that all about?” Max asks.

“Will!” they hear echoing down the hall, preventing explanation. “I need you!”

“I can’t leave him and the girl alone, Lucas.”

“He’s getting away from me, Will!” Desperate cries over echoing pounding. “Please!”

Will dangles Billy off a suit of armor.

“I’ll be right back,” he tells him and Max with a frown. Walks off down the corridor.

“Hey,” Billy says to Max as soon as Will lumbers out of sight. “Help me with something, will ya?”

Lucas speeds off after the countess as soon as the door flies from its hinges at the polite suggestion of Will’s fist. He rushes onward, heedless of his surroundings, his focus only on catching her. On forcing her to pay for what she’d done to him. To his father.

Serves him right when he bolts through a door and is stopped cold, stumbling back, when a flung dagger sinks hilt-deep in his abdomen.

Stupid of him. Lost before he’s even begun, his anger getting the better of him. Making him blind. Robbing him of thought.

“I’m sorry father,” he whispers to the ceiling. “I tried. I tried.”

“Ohh,” Countess Carol says, strolling forward. “I remember you. You’re that little brat whose father I taught a lesson all those years ago. Recognize my mark, you see.”

She gestures to the scars on his cheeks. Lucas is paralyzed with the pain in his gut. Can do nothing but listen. Can barely focus.

“Have you been chasing me your whole life only to fail now?” Carol asks, head tilting with interest. “I think that’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard.” She smiles. “Cool.”

Lucas’s paralysis breaks only enough for him to slide down the wall, legs failing him too. He cradles the knife for a moment, bracing himself, then slides it free. He stares up at Carol, full of hate and unable to contain it.

Figures he might as well use it.

He stands.

“Cute,” Carol says. “Still trying to win? Poor boy.”

She slips forward and stabs out with a smooth killing blow. Lucas is quick with his sword. Deflects it almost enough. His shoulder is impaled.

Carol frowns. Stabs out again. Gets only Lucas’s arm, his defense quicker this time.

She rains down a hard strike from above and he dashes it away, responding in kind. Clashing metal.

“Hello,” he says, stalking forward. “My name is Lucas Sinclair. You killed my father. Prepare to die.”

The pain seizes him up and he falls into a table to keep from losing his feet completely. Carol takes the opportunity to strike. Meets his steel. He rises, countering blow after blow. Clash clash.

“Hello,” he begins again. Repeats himself again. Says what he’s been waiting to tell this bitch for years. Lands blow after blow and has her on the defense now. Backing away from him now.

He says it once more for good measure.

“Hello—”

“Stop saying that!” she orders, desperation in her eyes as he deflects one angry blow from her sword and then recreates the wounds she’d given him moments before. Two serpent strikes that she can’t even react to. He drives her farther and farther backwards as those words, words formed and polished over long vengeful years come out again in one final roar.

“Hello!” he says, voice ringing triumphant. “My name is Lucas Sinclair!” Voice quick and sure as his blade. “You killed my father!” Voice eager. “Prepare to die!”

He corners her finally. Swipes her cheek with a gentle stripe to match his scar.

“Offer me money,” he quietly commands.

“Yes,” she hisses out.

He marks the other cheek. Nearly twins now.

“Power too, offer me that.”

“All that I’ve got,” she promises. “More. Please.”

Lucas takes up his stance for one last blow.

“Offer me everything I ask for.”

“Anything you want,” she says, clipped, angry. Strikes out in one final attempt to trick her way past death. He deflects easily. Catches up her arm on a rebounding downstroke and lets her skewer herself on his sword.

The end at last. At last.

“I want my father back, you bitch.”

He shoves the blade deeper. Clean through. Watches the realization of death form in her eyes then kicks her off his blade. She’s dead before she even lands. Her body tumbles, crumpled, to the stones.

Vengeance is his. At last.

Now what?

Chapter Fifteen: To The Pain

Steve walks down the hall in a daze, barely able to follow after the doddering old King and Queen. 

He doesn't know what to do with himself. 

Billy didn't come for him. 

Billy didn't save him.

And if Billy didn't save him there can only be one reason for that—Tommy wasn't lying. 

Billy's dead. 

Billy's dead and Steve has been married to Tommy.

He's actually married to Tommy and the man he loves is dead and now he has to do what he said he'd do.

He has to kill himself. He can't wait. Tommy could come for him at any moment. 

Killing himself now, right now, is his one and only option at this point.

They're almost at his room when he catches up to the King and says, "Goodnight." He almost says, "And I'll see you in the morning," but he doesn't. Because he won't.

The King smiles sweetly at him and says, "Goodnight, dear boy. Sleep well!" before hurrying off down the hall after his wife, not waiting to see if Steve has anything else to say, which is probably for the best as Steve might very well have let slip what he's going to do if asked. 

And so, with a heavy sigh and an even heavier heart, Steve walks into his room for what he knows will be the last time.

The first thing he sees is the dagger he'd stolen laid out on top of his desk almost like it's been waiting for him. Like this is meant to be. Like this was the way things were always going to play out. 

He sits down slowly, carefully, giving himself plenty of time to back out, to do something else, to do anything else, but he finds himself not wanting to. He can't stand the thought of being married to Tommy. Not for another minute. Not for another second. 

Not a life with no hope of rescue, no way out.

He takes the dagger carefully in one hand and pulls down the neck of his shirt to expose his chest with the other. The cold, cruel steel of it touches his skin and just as he's about to plunge it in and be done with it all, a familiar voice he never thought he'd ever hear again calls out, "I wouldn't be doing that."

Steve turns, excitement building in him so quickly it feels like he might just explode simply by moving around in his chair and internally he sort of feels like that actually happens, like something inside him has exploded and overflowed because there's Billy, lying in his bed like he belongs there.

"Billy!" Steve shouts as he flings himself at his love, wrapping his arms around him and kissing him desperately. He moans Billy's name and calls him darling but Billy makes no move to hold him or to run his hands through his hair or to do much of anything at all, really, and Steve can't stop himself from asking, "Why aren't you holding me?"

In response, Billy grunts, "Careful," like that's supposed to mean something, like Steve is supposed to understand what it's supposed to mean.

He doesn't, so he says, "Really? That's it? That's all you've got?" He sounds annoyed, he knows he does, but he can't help it. This is, quite possibly, the most romantic moment of their entire lives and Billy isn't really saying or doing anything about it. 

But…

It doesn't really matter, Steve decides as he dives in for another round of kisses. Billy's alive and nothing else in the whole world matters. He can feel Billy smile against his lips as they kiss, he can see the happiness sparkling in his eyes but still, all Billy says is, "It is for now." 

Steve shakes his head and settles in, his hands moving up and down Billy's chest, just taking in every glorious inch of him and revelling in each and every breath he feels Billy take. He's so happy, he's so overcome with joy that it takes him a minute to realize that none of this changes quite as much as he wants it to.

"Oh. But… I'm married," he says. "You're too late."

Billy smirks. "Are you sure of that?" 

Steve huffs. "Well, of the two of us I'm the one that was stuck standing there so yes, I'm pretty sure."

"And how do you know?" Billy asks, smirk only growing wider. 

"What do you mean, how do I know? I was there!" 

"Yes, but did you say your vows? Did you say I do?"

Steve pauses. Thinks it over. "No," he says. "I don't suppose I did." 

Billy's tongue flicks out over his lips. "Then that means you aren't married. If you didn't properly finish the ceremony, then you aren't married." He looks somewhere over Steve's shoulder and says, "Isn't that right, Prince Tommy?" 

Steve's stomach does a single, full cartwheel and crashes into his lungs, knocking the breath from him. He doesn't want to look and see Tommy standing behind them. He doesn't want to know.

"It doesn't matter," Tommy says, "We'll just do it again after I kill you." There's the sound of a sword being drawn from its sheath and Steve rolls away from Billy to see Tommy standing in the doorway just as he'd feared.

"But a fight to the death seems like the only way I'll ever truly be rid of you, so let's do this," Tommy says to Billy, ignoring Steve completely, like he isn't even here. Normally, Steve would hate that, normally he'd call Tommy out for it but right now it serves his purposes. Right now it gives him time to come up with a plan and to look for a weapon. 

"I have a different idea," Billy says, drawing the words out nice and slow and making Steve wonder if this idea is similar to his whole Iocane powder bit with the kidnappers earlier. He wonders what else Billy could possibly have up his sleeve. "Instead of to the death we'll fight to the pain," Billy says. 

"And that's supposed to mean what exactly?" Tommy says, looking almost… bored. Like this conversation is somehow boring him. Steve's eyes land on the dagger that's still lying on his desk and he wonders if he can get to it without drawing too much attention to himself. He sits up a little on the bed and neither Tommy nor Billy seems to notice.

"Since you are clearly too stupid to know, I'll inform you," Billy says as he pushes himself up against the headboard of the bed. 

"Did you just—" Something in Tommy snaps. "Did you just call me stupid?" 

"I did," Billy says. "But here's what to the pain means. It means that first, I'll cut off your feet, then I'll cut off your hands and after I'm done with that, I'll cut off your nose."

Tommy scowls and draws his sword up along with his chin. "Alright, well—" he starts but Billy cuts him off. 

"I wasn't done!" Billy levels a glare at Tommy, his voice rumbling out from deep within his chest as he says, "After your nose I'll take your eyes." 

Tommy is starting to look frightened, but Steve feels frightened. He knows Billy isn't strong enough to pull off what he's saying he's going to do and he only hopes his own plan, foolish and poorly thought out as it might be, will work.

Still, Tommy acts like he's not scared at all as he says, "Right and then my ears next I'm guessing?" 

Billy sneers and it's dark and it's feral and suddenly Steve knows without a doubt that this is how Billy survived as a Pirate. This look right here. 

"No," Billy says. "That's the point of all of this. I leave you your ears and I leave you your life so that every time someone sees you, every time someone screams in horror at the mere sight of your disgusting, mutilated, freakish body, you'll hear it and you won't stop hearing it. Not until the day you die."

Tommy blanches but still pretends to be unaffected. "I don't believe that. Not for a second. You're bluffing." 

With great effort, Billy pulls himself up so that he's fully standing up on his own and while Tommy is distracted watching this, that's when Steve makes his move. 

He grabs the dagger and has it at Tommy's throat before Tommy is even able to notice. "He might be, but I'm not," Steve growls. "Now put down your weapon." He presses the blade in his hand against Tommy's throat just firmly enough to draw blood and make it sting. 

Tommy's sword clatters to the ground.

Billy takes a step forward, sword in hand and smiles at Steve. "What do you think?" he says. "Should we tie him up?"

"Oh, definitely." 

Chapter Sixteen: The Kiss That Leaves All The Others Behind

“Tie him up tight as you like, Princess.”

Steve huffs a laugh, cinches the ropes till he gets a tight squeal out of Tommy, thinking of the months he’d spent cinched up in restraining palace garb not knowing if it was the cruelly laced clothes or his panic at the thought of life without Billy to blame for his inability to breathe.

A wounded man wanders in and raises eyebrows at the trussed up Prince.

“Going well here too, I see.” He nods to Steve. “Lucas Sinclair, an absolute pleasure, Your Highness.” Immediately he looks to Billy. “Where’s Will?”

“I thought he was with y—oh shit,” Billy says, taking a step too quickly and having second thoughts immediately as his legs turn to jelly beneath him. He hauls himself back to standing with help from the bedpost.

“Okay,” Steve says. “That’s it. What’s wrong with you?”

“He has no strength,” Lucas says and Billy winces. Nods. “He’s only been back from the dead for about forty-five minutes though,” Lucas goes on, “so I’d say he’s doing pretty good, all things considered.”

“Back from the—“ Steve begins, breathless.

“Ha! I knew you were bluffing!” Tommy yells. Swings his attention up to Steve, triumphant. “I knew he was…” He sees the dagger in Steve’s hands, tip inching closer to his neck and he peters off on “bluffing,” clearing his throat uncomfortably afterwards and blessedly shutting his mouth.

Max comes storming into the room already talking, like, “Better not be naked in here Billy I swear to god, okay? I know it’s a romantic moment and all but we’re in the middle of a raid here, and—”

“Max,” Billy nods to her, still hugging the bedpost for support.

She looks relieved. Nods back absently, taking a look around the room. Robin trails in after and raises eyebrows at Prince Tommy’s state before throwing him a sarcastic curtsy. “Your Highness.” And then she throws Steve a smile with a free wink included.

“Your Highness.” Grin playful. “Happily ever after, huh?” she says, motioning with a nod to Billy who’s finally standing under his own power again.

Steve sheathes his dagger and smiles back, swinging that smile over to Billy whose returning smile makes it glow up all the brighter. It's a stretch to hurt his underused cheek muscles. They’ve won. He can’t stop smiling. God, it really might be happily ever after for them. What a thought.

“Yeah,” he says, breath catching on a swell of love for Billy. Joy that he’s here, alive, when Steve had thought him dead. That he’s here and they’ve won. And he can’t stop smiling. And Billy’s eyes capture Steve’s like they always have, the blue of them, the intensity. Steve could stare into them forev—

“Right,” Max says, bringing Steve back to reality, because you can actually hear the eye roll when she speaks. “Well. That’s real sweet and all but can we maybe escape first? Where’s Will?”

“Lucas!”

A faint call drifts in through the open window.

Lucas looks briefly over, but turns his attention and his sword back to Prince Tommy.

“Want me to kill him for you?” he says, eyes darting to Billy. Quick to Steve.

And it’s so tempting. Steve almost says yes. Feels a hand gripping his shoulder and turns to see Billy’s understanding eyes. Billy slowly shaking his head.

“No,” Billy says, reluctantly turning his attention to Lucas. “Let him live a long life shamed by his cowardice. He’s not worth the time spent cleaning his blood from your sword.”

“Lucas!”

The call again, Will down there in the courtyard, trying to yell, but quietly. Like the loudest stage whisper, it cuts through the air.

Lucas shrugs. Knocks the Prince unconscious with the hilt of his sword.

“Hey!” Max calls back, first of them to reach the window. “Up here!”

“Oh, hello pretty lady!” Will calls up, waving a hand holding the reigns of two shining white horses.

Max waves back, blushing. Lucas frowns. Tries to play it off as a grimace afterward, holding his wounded abdomen. Jealous? Him? Please.

“I was looking for you,” Will calls up. “Wandered into the King’s stables and found these five white horses. Figured if we ever found Billy’s Prince there’d be five of us—hello Prince!”

The giant waves up at Steve.

Steve waves back, very confused. Hadn’t this guy kidnapped him before? You just don’t see giants every day. And that other guy too, he’d been there. And what had he meant by back from the dead? 

He sighs. Figures he’ll just keep smiling for now and demand answers later. With violence if need be. Billy so owes him some explanations.

“I call not sharing a horse,” Robin says quickly and quietly through her smile.

“Dibs,” say Billy and Steve simultaneously.

“Shit,” Max hisses, Lucas suspiciously quiet behind her. “Well, Will found the things so I guess that’s me sharing with…” She glares over at Lucas’s state, judgemental eyes scanning him up and down. “What’s your name again? You better not bleed on me, okay? That’s all I’m saying on the matter.”

And with that, she jumps out the window and lands in Will’s arms.

Robin follows, with only the gentlest push from Steve, and Steve jumps down after. Only Lucas and Billy remain above. Billy gestures Lucas to go first and he starts to. Then he leans back against the stone window frame and smiles wistfully.

“You know, I’ve been chasing after revenge so long, now that I’ve caught up, killed Carol, I don’t know what to do. Farm?” Lucas frowns, trying to imagine it. “I’ve never been bored, you know? What will that feel like, I wonder?”

“Well,” Billy says, clapping a hand on Lucas’s shoulder and catching his attention with a sly smile. “Have you ever considered piracy? Got this hunch you’d make a pretty good Dread Pirate Roberts.”

And with another clap on the shoulder, Billy rocks himself awkwardly out the window.

Lucas shrugs and follows after.

They mount up and ride to safety, not stopping till dawn, which they watch from a hilltop overlooking rolling fields for miles. They all pause at the view, Will’s jaw dropped in wonder, Robin wondering how to get off her horse, Max’s arms remaining tight around Lucas despite the blood. And Lucas notices. He smiles.

They’re safe. Free.

Billy’s been watching Steve’s profile or his back for the entire night’s ride, and now all he wants is a glimpse of Steve’s face in this perfect morning light. Wants to see the change freedom brings there.

As if hearing Billy’s silent wish, Steve turns back to him. Smiles. Holds a hand out, inviting. And Billy accepts that invitation; rides his horse up close beside. Whispers to it to stay and be steady.

“Still talking to horses, I see,” Steve says, his smile growing as soft as his lips. And Billy wants to kiss him. Wants to feel that softness again.

“Horses do what I say,” he says instead, pinning up a little grin, eyes still studying those lips.

Steve’s smile widens.

“And I don’t?” he says. Knowing the answer.

Billy chuckles.

“Not ever.”

“But you do what I say,” Steve says, soft, and that smile loses even more definition as his eyes focus in on Billy’s mouth. Catch up with where Billy’s been all along. Same page. Billy doesn’t see those eyes shift. Doesn’t need to. Can feel the soft touch of that new concentration brushing his lips.

“Always,” Billy whispers. Leans closer. Watches Steve do the same, moving to match as true as a reflection.

They’re meant to be this close. Closer.

“Then do what I say now,” Steve whispers back. “Kiss me.”

And Billy licks his lip in anticipation. Can’t refuse an order whispered pretty like that, now can he? Not from Steve.

“No problem, Princess.”

Their lips touch. Are meant to be touching. Together.

They kiss, the new day dawning before them, bright with possibility. They don’t really give a shit. Ignore the dawn and the trill of birdsong. Ignore everything. Exist on a plane of focus only large enough to encompass the press of their lips where they join. As one.

Since the invention of the kiss, there have been five kisses that have been rated the most passionate, the most pure. This kiss leaves them all behind.

The end.

[clericbyers]

I’m sure it’s been pointed out before—Mike’s lack of stripped shirts in ST3–but I was just looking to see how deliberate it is and yes, of course the wardrobe of the kids does matter. Details are everything! But looking specifically at Mike, it’s stated his wardrobe involves bright, fitted, preppy polo shirts in his effort to appear more mature and grown. Which brings me to 3x02 and 3x03 with his yellow polo, the only striped shirt he wears in the season.

Chapters 2 and 3 were wild for Mike. He lied to his girlfriend, yelled at his mom, tried to fix things by buying gifts like a kid would do instead of just, being honest, got dumped by his girlfriend, spent the rest of the day whining and passing blame without atoning for his mistakes which is why he even got dumped in the first place. And then the final kicker: being an absolute ass to his best friend later that night while trying to play D&D to the point of essentially getting dumped again.

If striped clothing is Mike’s marker of youth and, in turn, immaturity, the fact that his worst handling of various situations between the people he cares most about—El and Will—occurs when donning that shirt strikes a chord with me. He’s in solid colors beforehand (solid yellow, solid blue) when being grown with a girlfriend and afterwards (solid teal, solid green, and after three months, solid pink with blue sleeves) when trying to still be so but stripes don’t make a comeback. Not fully at least. He does have two yellow stripes on that green polo from 3x06 on, which are the episodes when he falls back into his childhood leader role in the Party, especially once the Party regroups in full. It’s also what he wears when he confesses to everyone in the cabin that he loves El in 3x06 (but also still gets reprimanded for not letting El be her own person and thinks the girls are conspiring against him), where he tries to tell her how he feels about her in the supermarket in 3x07 (but still doesn’t apologize for the original offense), where Hopper trusts him again to keep El safe in 3x08. It’s a mixture of maturity in his relationships with everyone and understanding that he’s still a kid in all of this.

(If stripes is also the marker of youth for everyone, then it’s equally telling that Will dons stripes the entire season.)

[serendipitous-magic]

AU: The Mind Flayer Possesses Will *and* Mike

-The Mind Flayer was only after the boy. The Shadow Walker. The one that survived; the one that could be useful. Very useful. So when the Hatchling saw this human boy in the school bathroom, calling an alert through the Hive Mind, the Mind Flayer zeroed in on his location right away. Pursuing him through the hallways. Reaching out with immaterial tendrils of shadow and dust, following his erratic flight patiently until he made the fatal mistake of running outside, into the open. It was then that the boy did something unexpected. This human pup - barely more than a hatchling, really - stopped running. Turned around. And yelled. Go away! Go away! Go away, go away! Admirable, really. And stupid. The Mind Flayer closes in promptly, and that’s that.

-But then - another presence. A half-way familiar one. All humans look the same to him, but the Mind Flayer recognizes this boy as one of the ones who stood in the way of the Demogorgon, one year ago. And the one who has thwarted the Mind Flayer’s attempts to take the Shadow Walker boy twice before, no less.  A leader, the Shadow’s analytical mind supplies, drawing on memories from the Hive. And there’s something else. A strong attachment, coming from the Shadow Walker boy. The Mind Flayer makes several calculations, scheming, weighing the options. This other boy has no real connection to the Upside Down... but that could be to his advantage. The others - the mother especially, the one that’s so annoyingly in the way all the time - they’ll be suspicious of the Shadow Walker boy. They’ll know something happened to him. All too quickly, they’ll wise up to the Mind Flayer’s presence and begin to fight back against his plans again. But, the other boy... No one would suspect him of having connections to the Upside Down, because he doesn’t. At least... not yet.

-Meanwhile, Mike is standing on the field, one hand clutching his radio and the other shaking Will’s shoulder. He’s staring into Will’s slack face, watching his fluttering eyelids, seeing only the whites of his eyes. “Will!” he’s calling, “Will! What’s wrong? Will!” And that’s when it happens.

-It’s a bit tougher for the Mind Flayer to take Mike. Will was already connected to the Upside Down; Mike is tougher to reach. But now the Mind Flayer has Will, who bridges the gap between the human dimension and the Upside Down. The Mind Flayer uses Will as a stepping stone to get to Mike.

-Mike doesn’t see it happen. It’s that fast. One second he’s shaking Will’s shoulder, calling to him, and for a fraction of a second he thinks he sees something, something like a flash of black, coming from Will - and then nothing.

-When the others run out onto the field, they’re a few minutes later than they were in canon (because this time they didn’t have Mike calling to them to tell them where to go). Joyce, Dustin, Lucas and Max run up behind Mike to see him with a hand on Will’s shoulder, but his face is turned away from them, so they don’t see that his eyes are half-closed like Will’s. The arrive just as Will (and Mike!) opens his eyes with a gasp - and they’re so focused on Will that no one really noticed that Mike was standing stock-still, too, and that Mike also gasped when Will did.

-When they wake up in the field, standing together with the rest of the Party surrounding them, panicked and shouting, they don’t feel anything yet - they’re both shuddering cold, and feel a little weird and slightly disconnected from the world, like after you’ve been reading a book all day, but that’s all so far. Mike thinks he remembers that flash of black, and he’s a little disoriented, confused - he doesn’t remember the Party running up behind him - but he ends up kind of brushing it off because he’s more worried about Will, and he figures he just ran too fast and blacked out for a second, or... something. It’s not a big deal. He barely remembers it an hour later.

-It takes until the next morning, when they wake up in their respective houses, that they can tell something’s definitely different. They’re going about their mornings, Mike getting ready for school (and Karen noticing he’s a little out of it but not knowing the real reason so not worrying that much), and Will with Joyce as she takes his temperature and runs a bath - and they can both very vaguely feel each other in the back of their minds, but they have no idea what it is yet.

-Through the morning, they keep getting little snippets of memories that aren’t theirs, and brushing it off as something they must have just forgotten and re-remembered. Like, Will sees a box of cereal and suddenly just knows, Mike knocked down a whole display of that cereal when he was five. It was an accident, but his mom scolded him until he cried anyway. And he has no idea how he suddenly just knows that - did Mike tell him at some point, maybe? And, at school, Mike opens up his planner and knows, Will has a paper due next Thursday that he hasn’t started yet. And they kind of just figure that the other must have told them at some point.

-Mike is in science class, learning about the body’s reaction to fear, and that’s when they first really connect - Mike starts picking up Will’s (the Mind Flayer’s) instinctive aversion to the heat of the water - they both get the Shadow’s wordless urge to get away from that, and Mike leaves class suddenly and without knowing the reason at the same time that Will drains the tub.

-It’s after Will says, “He likes it cold,” that their minds brush and they suddenly recognize what just happened. 

-They reach out to each other for the first time once they’ve realized what’s happening, and they realize that they can communicate telepathically. 

-Once they realize that it is, indeed, the other that they’re hearing/feeling in their head (as well as the Mind Flayer, but they probably don’t quite realize that yet), they’re both like, What the hell is happening to us? and they go to work at trying to figure it out, quickly connecting it to what happened the day before

-Will is scared Mike will “remember” all the secrets he’s been trying to hide, but it’s literally impossible to hide them - the very act of being afraid he’ll find out draws attention to those memories

-But Mike is curious, and observant, and Will can feel him go gently poking around in memories at random, testing out their mental bond - and Will follows his lead, flipping through Mike’s mind like records in a box, finding no resistance from his best friend - Mike seems almost eager to share his memories, opening his mind up to Will like a flower

-They see childhood memories, thoughts, past grudges, moments that stuck out to them, etc., but all in brief flashes, often without context

-Maybe Mike ends up running across Will’s memories of having a crush on him, and Will flips out and is like, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry -” but because Mike is literally in his head, he understands - and then Will starts getting Mike’s memories of his feelings towards Will, and just imagine the possibilities asacdscfdvsafcs

-They react to things that the other is seeing/feeling, confusing everyone - for example, Mike whacks his head on something and (halfway across town) Will randomly yells, “Ow!”

-They stick together even when the Shadow takes firm control of them, sticking with each other when they turn on everyone else - under the Mind Flayer’s influence, they try to hide that Mike is possessed too, using him to try to throw off the scientists, Hopper, etc.

-When the lab starts burning the tunnels, they both collapse in a seizure

-Optional dark!extra: the Mind Flayer makes Will kiss Mike to pass some of the Mind Flayer’s dark smoke/matter/gunk into his mouth, because Mike wasn’t as susceptible to the Mind Flayer as Will (he doesn’t have the same connection to the Upside Down) and needs intermittent “boosters” of the stuff to stay under control

-I just think this is a really cool AU with a lot of potential

[toonstarterz]

BECAUSE I’M NOT POPULAR, I’LL READ WATAMOTE: CHAPTER #154

The Sports Tournament Arc has come to a close (watch me eat my words), and while things may not have ended in the most spectacular or dramatic fashion, it does offer a healthy dose of retrospection after the flurry of emotions we’ve undergone during this whole thing. Tomoko’s world may be winding down for the moment, but as we all know, that just sets the pace for things to spring right back up. 

Chapter 154: Because I’m Not Popular, The Sports Tournament Will End

Watamote has always been relatively good at picking apart what it means to be female, and acknowledging their habit for casual grooming is just one of those times. But where this series shines is that it neither advocates or condemns stereotypical female behavior. Its stance has always been, “it is what it is,” and the reader is open to make their own opinions on that.

Well, I never expected them to win, honestly speaking. This ain’t no shounen sports manga after all, where the underdogs make a dubious comeback thanks to Nakama Power™. The obligatory homosexual subtext was there, though.  

Yeeeah, one of Yuri’s biggest flaws is that it takes her some time to admit, or even recognize her own responsibilities. Naturally, that includes pointing out other’s faults before her own. That being said...

Is Yuri being Bitchy or Awkward? An Analysis to Come in A Couple More Pages.

Tomoko, being the one to slightly raise up everyone else’s spirits? I’d be more shocked if her growth didn’t already make that actually kind of plausible.

This right here is the single coolest girl in the entire manga.

Side note: Komi’s rekt face is sublime. 

That hit had so much force, it burst through the panel borders. For once, poor Minami.

I see friendships all over the place.

In spite of (or perhaps because of) Komiyama’s overzealous nature, she can also be hit pretty hard with a sense of shame when her efforts prove fruitless. Maybe Itou plays the role of the “Lift Their Spirits” Friend in times like this.

At least the other girls are also taking their defeat in stride. Although, Minami seems particularly down for once. Perhaps she surprisingly feels some disappointment over their loss.,,

....or maybe she just feels jaded watching Mike and her Boyfriend make kissy-face. 

The thing about Kiyota is that he doesn’t seem like an especially capable guy. But from what we’ve seen, the dude’s got a pretty agreeable personality that sort of just makes it easier for people to follow him. It’s the same reason why he became the class representative. Kiyota may not be at the top of the class in any way (that we know of), but his likability makes him a natural leader.

Of course, his true friends will still give him hella shit for it.

Like many loners with self-esteem issues, no one cares about winning until they actually start winning.

Hey, hey, hey! It seems that the disastrous fallout between Tomoko and Ucchi didn’t the stop the latter from making good on her claim to cheer Tomoko on. We don’t know if the Emoji Gang ever intervened after those events, but if Ucchi still has the nerve(cluelessness) to cheer the girl she berated, that can only be a good sign.

It’s kind of weird seeing Hirasawa next to her though, considered how Ucchi cut her down that one time. Long-term grudges do not exist unless you’re Tomoko.

Fuuka, eh? The gap between a character’s first major appearance and their revealed name gets smaller each time.  

So these two are close friends, I see. They certainly give off those “alpha girl’ airs, but not in an unapproachable way. Contrary to what Western media has fed me, bitchy queen bees aren’t actually that popular. 

I’m sure many a shipper thinks that Katou chose table tennis to be with Tomoko, but I don’t that’s the only reason. It could just as well be that she’s into the sport. For the longest time, Katou’s personality has increasingly contrasted with her appearance. On the surface, she looks like the stereotypical beauty whose friendly, girly, and is super popular. But underneath, she’s also rather unaware, possibly perverted, not actually that good with makeup, and frankly, a bit of a weirdo. She’s all full of surprises, and it honestly makes her feel more human.

That was probably not her intent, but a mini party is definitely more up Tomoko’s alley. She just barely made it through the KBBQ party after all, and while Tomoko would’ve probably made it through another large-scale party even easier, small get-togethers are the introvert’s bee’s knees.  

It’s still hard to get a read on Futaki’s sociability, but she seems like a middle-of-the-road case as far as we’ve seen.

Yuri using Tomoko as a support beam is way within my expectations of her. It hasn’t steered too far into the Unhealthy Zone (yet), but I do enjoy that Tomoko’s simple company is all Yuri really needs to enjoy herself.  

Introvert Problems #092: Preoccupying yourself with your beverage to break the awkward silence without realizing the social cue of waiting to clink glasses before drinking. 

Smooth move, me Tomoko.

Good taste, my girl. Very good taste.

I love how the artistic license in this series is played completely straight. Girls with cat smiles are a dime-a-dozen in manga, but it’s usually a visualization only apparent to the readers. But not here. Emoji eyes and a feline grin are just as ludicrous in-universe as it is to us.

Yeah...I have no idea what to make of this. Guess Yuri has her own weird quirks, after all. What makes it extra funny is when you remember that Tomoko is strangely good at cutting things. Ironic humor at its finest.

Harking back to what I said about Katou being full of surprises, it’s easy to judge Katou sorely on her appearance, given how much more refined she looks next to the other “plain" girls. But when you look beyond what’s skin deep, Katou actually has more similarities to Tomoko than she let on. Being decently athletic, but not sporty; having a high tolerance for perversion, and socially naive at times. Katou’s affection for Tomoko had always felt out-of-place when we didn’t know her personality too well. But now that we’ve gotten a good look at it, her budding friendship with Tomoko feels all the more authentic.

Being the Nucleus Friend is never easy, Tomoko. 

Ah, Tomoko, regrets are natural. One of the more informed aspects about Tomoko is that she doesn’t dwell on the past too much. Her episodes of cringe hardly have everlasting negative effects on her personality, and the only times she does dwell are when she comes to terms with the mistakes she’s made. The twist now is that Tomoko puts a positive spin on it this time. Instead of bemoaning how she did something bad, she now reflects on how she could have done something good. It’s a layer of positive reinforcement that I think Tomoko has truly benefited from.  

Futaki coming through with the Nakama Speech™. It’s a pretty good one, too. Not heavy-handed or overly sentimental, but it’s from a place of earnestness that many can appreciate.

And I just realized that Futaki has been going through a quiet development from being a single-player gamer to multi-player gamer. Damn, that was slick, Nico Tanigawa.    

Hey now, those Spot the Difference games are totally legitimate critical thinking exercises.

It’s easy to think from first glance that Yuri is being purposely insensitive by the way she’s ignoring such a heartwarming speech, but I don’t think that’s really the case. It’s not that she doesn’t care about it, it just that those dining table games are too damn engaging for her introverted mind to resist. Yuri’s personality is a lot of things, but a lack of empathy is not one of them. 

Even though that’s true, it sounds vaguely hypocritical coming from you, Tomoko.

As I thought, Mako the Mom is also Mako the Enabler. 

Is Yuri Being Bitchy or Awkward?

Neither. She’s being a weirdo.

We all know by now that Yuri’s no sheep. She’s not going to pretend she’s something she’s not just to reciprocate the mood. But at the same time, she’s aware enough to adjust herself in situations where just doing anything she wants would be potentially hurtful. Of course, that’s only when she realizes she’s being hurtful. And there’ve been a number of times where she failed at that. Yuri’s behavior is very much circumstantial, and in cases where she’s expected to fit in with the crowd, she can be bitchy, awkward, or neither based on how well she can read the atmosphere. 

And that, my friends, is why Yuri’s a weirdo.

I don’t know about that, Tomoko. As absurd as her face and gaming skills are, Futaki’s personality has always seemed fairly normal to me.

Don’t judge an emoji by its emoji.

You may laugh at their apparent difficulty at finding them all, but I read up that these specific Spot the Difference games are a reference to the ones they have in Saizeriya restaurants, which are known for being notoriously tough. (Seriously, a dude called up the manufacturer because he couldn’t find the last one). Thanks as always, /r/watamote!

Eat your words, Tomoko! Just because you have more friends now, that doesn’t mean you’re hot shit and too good for “childish” games. Not that I can blame her too much, though. It’s understandable that Tomoko feels there are certain social conventions that come with increased popularity. But if there’s one thing that Tomoko still has to realize, it’s that popularity doesn’t equal maturity. No matter how high you are on the food chain, doing dumb kiddie stuff is present all across the board. 

Didn’t I tell you that, “Not that I care” was going to be this series’ tsundere line? 

When you think about it, Yuri’s come a long way from how she was at the start. At the end of second year, she lamented that her new friends might drift away from her. Compare that to now, where she’s actually more optimistic about her relationships. Sure, the fact that they’re now in the same class is the key difference, but the sentiment is still there, and feels a lot more impactful given that Yuri has never really been this open about her feelings. 

That’s what happens when you get the last word in.

As with most of these arcs, it’s the journey rather than the end that has the most impact on our characters. For some, like Ucchi and Yuri, it was a major game-changer in their relationships with Tomoko. For others, like Itou and Hirasawa, it was an exploration of what made them the way they are. And then there’s Tomoko, still fumbling around with a degree of popularity she was never fully prepared for. 

But for everyone, it was all about trying. Trying something new, putting in the extra effort, and reaching out to others. While the results were kind of a mixed bag, nearly everyone came out of this tournament with some form of victory.

[pickalilywrites]

It's that time of year~! Requests are open! The only type of fic want for this time of year is a modern New Years party of the veterans! Yes, this includes the MP and Garrisons with the Scouts. Main ships are: Rivetra, MikeNana, RicoIan and poor Moblit trying to stop Hanji from getting drunk before midnight.

the last new year’s request! thank you everyone for sending a holiday request in and please have a good new year :) 

ah i tried alcohol again today (it was the third or fourth time i think) but i rly hated it ^^” 

Something to Drink to

MikeNana. Rivetra. MobuHan. RicoIan. Canonverse. 

1488 words. 

Buy me a ko-fi!

There is seldom a reason to celebrate in the Scouting Legion. Seeing the birth of another year is something to drink to when tomorrow is so uncertain, but the liquor always tastes bittersweet going down because of the guilt of outliving their fallen brethren. Still, it would be strange not to celebrate at all and thus the Scouting Legion gathers for yet another New Year’s celebration with decent food and second-rate alcohol, congratulating each other on living another year and praying that they will be able to see each other next year. “How are you drinking so much?” Nanaba asks Mike. She tilts her head as she watches him down another drink. “It’s not even very good, is it? I don’t remember the last time we had good alcohol.” “I just make do with what we have. Hanji seems to be having a good time.” Mike stops drinking to gesture to the squad leader, who is busy on the other side of the room drinking like there’s no tomorrow while the rest of their squad tries to stop them. He reaches behind him, picking up another glass of gin that he’s already prepared. “Care for a drink?” 

Nanaba sighs, but there’s a smile on her face. “I might as well, right?” she says as she takes the cup from him. “So, what are we drinking to, Mike?” “Hmm.” He’s already drinking, a thoughtful expression on his face. After he had taken a sip, Mike raises his glass to Nanaba. “For luck.” “For the luck we had last year or the luck we’ll have for this upcoming one?” Nanaba asks, smiling when he clinks his glass against hers. He raises the glass to his lips once more, his eyes twinkling as he looks at her. “Both,” he tells her before taking a sip and draining the last of his glass. 

“I don’t see how so many people are making toasts,” Levi mutters, his arms folded across his chest as he leans against the wall. He’s only been there for a few hours, but he’s already itching to leave. He turns to Petra as she returns with drinks. “I suppose we have a lot to be thankful for this year, Captain,” Petra says as she hands him a glass. She stands next to him, moving closer to the wall but not quite leaning against it. “Having enough funds to have such a celebration in the first place, for example, and being fortunate enough to even attend this party this year.” “I guess you could call it luck,” Levi says, although he doesn’t think the word is quite right. He looks at his cup, observing the beautiful gold of the whiskey. “What would you drink to, Ral?” “Me?” Petra asks in surprise. She frowns, a thoughtful expression on her face. She could prattle off a list of things to toast to, but she should probably keep it simple. The soldier lifts her glass towards her captain with a gentle smile. “To a decent drink.” It’s probably a strange toast, but Levi finally nods and lifts his glass against Petra’s. “To a decent drink,” he repeats. He brings the whiskey to his lips, expecting it to be sweet and woody, but it only tastes bitter and overwhelming like charred wood. It’s so terrible that he nearly spits it out, but he manages to swallow it. He gives Petra a scathing look. “This is hardly even decent, Ral.” “You’re very right, sir. It’s pretty terrible,” Petra says, wrinkling her nose as she takes another sip. Ah, but it was worth it to see such a horrified expression on her captain’s face. 

“Is Squad Leader Hanji going to be alright if they keep drinking like that?” Nifa asks worriedly. As a newer recruit to Hanji’s squad, Nifa was not yet familiar with the squad leader or their annual tradition at the New Year’s party. “Probably not,” Rashad says, rubbing his chin, but he simply stands back and watches like most of the others gathered around Hanji as they down another keg of beer. “They’ll have a wicked hangover tomorrow and will probably spend the rest of tonight vomiting if they’re not careful.” “Then shouldn’t we stop them?” Nifa asks nervously. “Nah, this is what happens every year,” Lauda says, rubbing Nifa on the back. “Besides, Moblit is doing the best he can to make them stop.” Even though there are many people watching, only one person is actively trying to stop Hanji from making their first mistake of the new year. Moblit, Hanji’s second-in-command, is kneeling beside them, begging them for the hundredth time to stop. “Please, Squad Leader Hanji,” Moblit says, his hand on their back. It’s difficult to tell if his words are getting through to them because they continue to chug down the enormous container of beer. “If you keep this up, you won’t have a liver by tomorrow morning!” “Ah, the only way you’ll be able to stop me is if you drink the rest of the alcohol before I do, Moblit!” Hanji says, raising their head to catch a breath. They look over at Moblit, a wicked grin spread across their face. Moblit resists the urge to do just that, knowing that the reason why his squad leader had said that was because they want a drinking partner. He’s fallen for their trick for too many years in a row to be fooled again, but he worries when he sees them return to the keg of beer. How much had they drunk? A quarter? A third? Half? More? Their cheeks are flushed a bright red and it will only be a moment before their speech is slurred. It’s true that this alcohol is terrible – it’s far less potent than anything you could buy in the city – but he’s sure that drinking a whole entire keg would still destroy a person. “Squad leader!” Moblit says suddenly, his voice so loud that it startles the people behind him as well. He rolls up his sleeves, a determined look on his face. He clamps his fingers onto the straw that Hanji is using to drink from the keg, stopping the flow of beer. “Please allow me a drink as well!” Hanji is surprised for a moment, but then laughs as they slap Moblit on the back. “You’re a good man, Moblit!” Hanji says. They sit back, nearly falling backward as they do so. They gesture towards the keg enthusiastically as they invite Moblit to take the next drink. “Drink up, drink up!” “Will Moblit be alright?” Nifa asks, her brow knitted together with worry. She wonders if she should step forward and volunteer to help drink as well. “He’ll be fine,” Lauda assures her with a laugh. “There’s no one else that can hold their liquor like Moblit can.” “Ah, I see,” Nifa says, but she still watches with a concerned look on her face as the others cheer Moblit on while he takes a drink from the keg. Perhaps this is just another New Year’s tradition that she needs to get used to. 

“Not to your taste?” Ian asks when he sees Rico wince after taking a sip of rum. “It’s just very strong,” Rico tells him. She frowns at the white rum that half-fills her cup. She’s never been much of a drinker, which is a shame because Garrison parties are very big on drinking. She adjusts her glasses as she lifts her drink, observing the reflection of others through the clear liquor. “How is it that we always have such great alcohol? I hear the liquor at Scouting Legion parties are hardly passable.” “I suppose Commander Pixis just knows how to pick alcohol,” Ian says. He grins when he sees Rico roll her eyes. “Also, he always wins the poker game for the leftover alcohol in the storage at the end of the year. Erwin might be a genius on the battlefield, but he’s terrible when it comes to card games.” “I see,” Rico says. She wonders if Anka knows that Commander Pixis gambles in addition to day drinking. She raises her glass towards Ian. “Shall we have a toast?” “A toast?” Ian says, raising his eyebrows. He shoves one hand in his pocket, nodding as he thinks of a proper toast. “How about to another year of living?” “Hm,” is all Rico says. She was hoping that it would be something less, dreary. “Another year to working under Commander Pixis?” Ian suggests. “Warmer,” Rico says. Her glass is close to his, but not quite touching. “Then another year with each other,” Ian says with a warm smile, and she finally taps his glass against his. She’s a little too confident when taking a swallow, drinking too much of it at once and coughing once it burned down her throat. In the end, Ian has to fetch her a glass of water to help cleanse her palate.  

[cksmart-world]

 The Completely Unnecessary News Analysis

by Christopher Smart

Feb. 19, 2019

UTAH VALUES, A WOMAN'S PLACE & CABBAGE FOR ORRIN

The Dangers of Prop 4

Not to worry, the Utah Legislature has plenty of time to fix Proposition 4. It's true, our devout legislators knew it was their solemn duty to overhaul Propositions 2 and 3 — medical marijuana and Medicaid expansion. Yes, yes, the voters approved those measures but were — as usual — ignorant of unforeseen consequences, such as the availability of medical marijuana and health care for the poor. And frankly, fixing those voter screw-ups is a time consuming headache, what with protesters getting on TV and in the newspapers and everything. Fortunately, there is still time for our august lawmakers to fix Prop 4 — next year. As you recall, Prop 4 was approved by Utah voters to create an independent commission to draw voting district lines after the 2020 Census, rather than the leave the task to the party in political power. Well, like 2 and 3, Prop 4 is a big mistake by clueless voters and requires a little nip and tuck. Otherwise, how would Republicans be able to fulfill their inspired agenda to privatize public lands, nix sex ed and tax demon alcohol. Look at it this way: A one-party state is just more efficient and keeps adherence to Utah cultural values out of the hands of liberals, who would dole out marijuana to junior high kids and provide health care to people who aren't even legislators.

Urinals For Everyone

Hold on to your trousers, people, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints may have softened its stance on the Equal Rights Amendment. Back in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s a bunch of uppity women fought but failed to memorialize gender equality in the U.S. Constitution. See, they forgot to clear it with the brethren in the Tower of Power, who could have told them it was not in accordance with God's wishes. Women have a special place — and it's in the kitchen. Besides, the ERA would mandate they use urinals. But hold it. Stop the presses. The sleuths at The Salt Lake Tribune have a tingling sensation that church leaders might not be as uptight as they used to be. The Trib asked a spokesman for the church formerly known as Mormon how the old boys now feel about the amendment. His answer: No comment. Ah hah. There it is in black and white: Evidence that there is no collective shit-fit ongoing at Temple Square — at least not on the amendment. Dumbfounded, the crack staff here at Smart Bomb launched a deep investigation on Google to get to the bottom of the would-be ecclesiastical breakthrough. Alas, we discovered that The Equal Rights Amendment is dead — still. Oh well, as Jake Barnes said to Lady Brett Ashley in The Sun Also Rises: It's pretty to think about.

Stand Up Guys

One thing we've come to count on in this age of uncertainty is the steady hand of Utah's U.S. senators. No hemming or hawing with our guys. Gravity is gravity and the sun always comes up in the west. Here's Sen. Mitt Romney on President Trump's declaration of an emergency on the southern border: “This is a serious and complex issue and requires careful review. And I will be studying it in the coming weeks.” Well, after all, it is a slow-motion emergency. And here's Sen. Mike Lee: “My initial assessment is that what President Trump announced is legal. Whether or not it should be legal is a different matter.” As usual, Sen. Lee is wonderfully incongruous. But in reality — whatever that is — there is no mystery here, despite those lying statistics from federal agencies that say illegal immigration is down. As Our Dear Leader said in plain English before boarding Air Force One to Mar-a-Lago, “I didn't have to do this.” True leadership is not for the faint of heart and sometimes requires decisions that could make you look like a mad man. But there will always be golf. Fore — get out of the way you blaggards, we're playing through.

It's Only Taxpayer Money

What's a lousy $2 million, anyway. Our beloved Orrin Hatch, the longest serving Republican senator of all time, is in the midst of planning a monument to himself right here in Utah's capital. It's will include lots of cool stuff, including a replica of the senator's office in Washington D.C. with the piano where he wrote all those catchy tunes. Mausoleums cost a lot of dough, so Orrin and his Hatch Foundation are asking our thoughtful Utah lawmakers to help out history with a little cabbage. The Hatch Library of Civility is estimated to cost $40 million, which does not include the moat and drawbridge. But the historic significance of all that Our Orrin provoked in his 48 years in the U.S. Senate makes it worth every penny. He was first elected long ago before we had computers, cell phones or presidential sex scandals. It was back in the days of the gipper Ronald Reagan and that slut Anita Hill. The library, no doubt, will be a real boon to the Utah Travel Council. Along with “This Is The Place,” “Life Elevated” and “The Greatest Snow On Earth,” they can advertise, “Trump's Greatest Buddy Ever.” Priceless.

Post Script

The drugs and rapists pouring over the southern border is not the only national emergency, according to Donald Trump's Sunday morning tweet. Saturday Night Live is NOT FUNNY and is “the enemy of the people,” he tweeted after Alec Baldwin's imitation of the president's deranged Rose Garden rampage. SNL is “very unfair and should be looked into. This is the real Collusion!" Where are those treasonous FBI thugs when you really need them?

Well, that's it for another week here at Smart Bomb, where the hits just keep coming. Well Wilson, what have you and the band got to take us out of this historic week of fear and loathing: As I walk through this wicked world / Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity / I ask myself is all hope lost? / Is there only pain and hatred, and misery? / And each time I feel like this inside / There's one thing I wanna know: / What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? / What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?