#also technically the figs were the other morning

[liones-s]

04/01/23 Saturday morning. blank pages and raw figs

[abarbaricyalp]

I simply MUST know about the OnlyPaws WIP! Or the actors AU, if someone’s already asked about the other one.

Hi Zainab! WIP Game

I've been working on this fic for over a year now, but it's still so dear to me. A coworker and I were joking about a dating app that was centered around pictures of your pets instead of yourself and this fic was born from that.

Sam and Bucky (technically Figaro and Alpine) match on an app called OnlyPaws and Bucky falls desperately in love with 'Figaro's dad' as he's always calling him because they don't really know more about each other. But it's the little things, like how he talks about Figaro or the snippets of his apartment that Bucky sees when the cats are facetiming, etc. (Yeah, the cats have facetime playdates)

It actually gets to be a problem when he starts hanging out with this guy in real life who drives him nuts, but he also kind of likes. This half guilt is only exasperated by the fact that Sam also seems to be hiding someone too. A comedy of errors and fools.

Sorry, this excerpt is long, but I like it as an establishing idea.

.

But, even now, sitting at a bar with friends, he found himself pulling out his phone while they danced. He'd taken a picture of Alpine earlier chewing on his aloe vera and he sent that to Figaro now.

There was a reply almost instantly: an incomprehensible string of emojis with every single plant in the dictionary, including the trees. Then: Sorry, man, I'm not home. But Fig says hi anyway. 

Bucky sucked on his teeth, sent back the cat emoji and a waving hand, then pocketed his phone. His friends were all clumped together, dancing poorly to an equally bad EDM remix of an old 80s song. The group had grown over the night as each of his friends invited a few others. He didn't know most of the people he was throwing back shots with, but that was part of the fun, he supposed.

Yet another man had joined the group. He stayed next to Steve, even as he smiled easily with the people around them. He was handsome, from what Bucky could see across the floor and under the throbbing lights of the club. Tall and built, but not overly muscular like some of the gym rats Steve could pick up. He had nice thighs under short-shorts and Bucky could appreciate the mesh top straining over his chest. The lights looked good on him and he could at least keep time to the music. A feat, since even the music kept losing its own tempo. The lights and shadows made his cheekbones stand out, even across the room.

Bucky ran his fingers over his phone one more time before he finished his drink and strode out to his friends, sidling up to Steve’s side where the new guy was. Steve, already most of the way to drunk, threw his arm over Bucky’s shoulder with a laugh and pulled him into the group as he jumped around to still-bad music. It only took a few hops before his arm fell from Bucky’s shoulders and Bucky could step back out next to the newcomer.

“Hey,” he greeted in a shout. “I’m Bucky. How do you know Steve?”

“Is this an interrogation?” the guy shouted back. “I’m Sam, though.”

“Nah, just wanted to know which version of him you knew.”

“You’ve noticed that too, huh?” Sam asked with a grin. He had nice teeth. A cute gap between the front two. “I see all of him,” he promised. “I know him well enough to know about you.”

Bucky held a hand over his chest in a slightly sarcastic ��I’m touched’ kind of way. “You know, I’m just gonna ask him about you in the morning,” he pointed out.

Sam shrugged and went back to dancing, tugging Bucky closer to him with long fingers wrapped around his wrist. “Do you really wanna talk about Steve all night?”

And, yeah, Bucky could get with that. He wrapped one arm around Sam’s waist and dropped his prosthesis over his shoulder. Sam mirrored him after a studious few moments where he really seemed to be calculating how much closer that could bring them.

“How’d you lose your arm?” he asked. “Shark attack? Hiking accident? Cloning session gone wrong?”

“I worked for the circus,” Bucky joked back. “I was a lion tamer.”

“Not a very good one,” Sam answered and then beamed when Bucky laughed all full chested at him. “Sorry, usually I’m more polite than that. I don’t drink a lot.”

Bucky shrugged and pressed their bodies together. “I don’t mind. I have a lot of forgiveness for cute guys.”

“Only cute?” Sam asked. “A stoned guy in the bathroom thought I was a god. You’re gonna have to up your game.”

Bucky laughed again and dropped his forehead against Sam’s. Sam moved like he didn’t need to keep all of his body parts connected. His hips went one way and his legs did something else and his arms were so strong around Bucky. He was dizzying to keep up with and Bucky loved it. This wasn’t just a bump and grind. Sam knew how to move like a salsa dancer, found a beat for every second like a tap dancer, brought Bucky into all of it like it was second nature to have a partner.

“Are you a competitive dancer?” Bucky asked, because he was on his own way to drunk and he asked stupid questions in that state.

Sam laughed and did a complicated spin under Bucky’s arm just to show off. “Now you’re talking. That’s a good compliment. Nah, man. I just grew up doing it. You’re not so shabby either.”

“Yeah, I’m nothing like you,” Bucky disagreed.

Sam shrugged. “Who is?” he agreed, and then laughed brilliantly again. “Sorry, I really don’t mean that. I think you’re great. A great dancer, I mean.”

So they kept dancing. They’d both abandoned the songs above, grinding against each other to a mutually agreed upon beat that stayed steady. Sam was kind of grabby, which Bucky could get behind. He was also so warm, especially as he leaned more and more weight against Bucky. It was beginning to make Bucky slip off into a warm, weighted trance.

“Hey, you wanna get outta here?” Sam asked eventually.

“If we leave together, Steve will never let us live it down,” Bucky warned, tucking his face further into Sam’s neck and shoulder.

“Trust me, I don’t do anything specifically to impress Steve,” Sam chuckled. “Let me just go to the bathroom first.”

Bucky reluctantly let go of Sam. He left with a laugh and a squeeze to Bucky’s hip. The music came back all at once, loud and grating. Bucky let himself off of the dance floor, propping up a small doubles table as he pulled out his phone. Coincidentally, a message from OnlyPaws popped in right then. It was a picture of Figaro, as a kitten, curled up in a large potted plant, all of the thin leaves bent away from him. Sorry, I couldn’t leave you hanging. Here’s an old picture from one of the first days he came home.

Bucky stared at the picture with a pang in his chest that he couldn’t really name. He wanted to push it to the side and ignore it. Wished he hadn’t taken his phone out at all. But now that it was nestled in his chest, there was no removing it.

The restlessness made him want to dash right then, but he also couldn’t shake the warmth of Sam’s body from his mind. The guy at least deserved an in-person rejection. He made himself stand there, antsy and getting increasingly nervous, or maybe guilty. Regardless.

Sam came back a few minutes later with an easy grin, bumped his shoulder against Bucky’s to get him moving. Bucky let himself be cajoled outside and gave the cool night air a chance to calm him down. “Hey, man,” he said, grabbing Sam’s wrist after a block or so.

Sam turned to him with the kind of bright, but guarded grin that told Bucky he already knew what Bucky was going to say. “I am not coyote ugly,” Sam defended lightly. “What, you see me in the moonlight and changed your mind? Get outta here.”

“I don’t know what coyote ugly means,” Bucky dismissed. “It’s got nothing to do with you. Shit, man, you’re even more handsome out here, which is saying something,” he admitted. “It’s just…there’s this guy I’m talking to.”

Sam laughed, an edge in it but not in his face. “Isn’t there always? Hey, no hard feelings.”

“I could…still walk you home?” Bucky offered.

“That’s okay, man,” Sam dismissed. “I can walk myself.”

Bucky chewed on his lip and didn’t read too much into the way Sam’s eyes went to his mouth and then immediately away. “Alright. I’ll see you around.”

Sam gave half a salute before turning and walking away. Bucky let out a heavy breath. He spent the rest of the walk home debating what exactly it was that his heart was doing in his chest.

[princessconsuela120]

Chapter One: Summer —✰

Series Masterlist

Chapter Art by @clownfacepancakes120

Chapter Warnings: mentions of death, mentions of war, maybe cursing…?

Author’s note: and she’s here! Constance’s big debut!! I hope you all enjoy, and lookout for new content coming soon!!

—✰

Summer had ended as quickly as it began, before they knew it Connie and Sebastian were leaving the Sallow home in Feldcroft to spend the rest of the summer with the Weasley family. The Weasley family burrow was much more comfy and spacious as anything Sebastian or Connie were used to. It was all sort of intimidating. Especially for Sebastian who had been stressing questions about his uncle as the school year drew closer.

He knew it was inevitable; people would talk. Soon enough after Solomonms death, almost all of Feldcroft were discussing what could have happened to the man. It was only a matter of time before word spread to the rest of the world. No one knew the truth of what happened in that mine, no one except Sebastian and Connie. And Anne of course, but she didn’t have the heart to tell anyone. Sebastian was sure Anne had told Ominis about everything, he had been more distant than usual. At this point in his life, it was true that Constance Larkspur was his one and only safe haven.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Connie asked softly, causing Sebastian’s head to jerk over to her. He smiled softly at her, shaking himself out of his dreadful day dream.

“Just, thinking.” He responded, making Connie scoff slightly.

“Yeah, no duh.” She teased, making him chuckle slightly. It had been a common occurrence over Summer break for Sebastian to space out. Mostly, Connie would find, the Slytherin boy would be using these daydreams to replay the events of that night in his mind. She would be lying if she said she didn’t worry for him.

“About?”

He didn’t answer her, just continued to stare ahead. A small frown tugged at his lips and Connie couldn’t help but feel her heart ache at the sight.

“Hey. It’s over. You’re okay now, yeah?” She reassured. He didn’t say anything, just looked up at her and nodded. She knew there was nothing she could say to heal his pain. But she was damn sure gonna try.

“Yeah.. yeah I know.” Sebastian just shook it off, nodding as he walked ahead. Connie sighed to herself, jogging slightly to catch back up with the boy.

The two had been making a quick detour to Hogsmead, which was only a few miles from the Pitt-Upon-Ford Hamlet where the Weasley family was located. They weren’t going for their normal reason however, though they were sure to stop in Three Broomsticks for a butterbeer. But their reasoning for visiting the lovely village was actually for a much more gloomy reason.

Constance had been stressing as well about starting this school year. Not only due to the fear that surrounded the place, the memories of her gruesome defeat against Ranrok. But also because this was her first year starting Hogwarts without Professor Fig. Given it was only technically her second year at Hogwarts, it was still a troubling thought, to begin school without him. So she and Sebastian both agreed that before they arrived at the Weasley’s they would first make a small pit stop, to help ease the ache in Constance’s heart.

“Morning Professor,” Constance said softly, gently placing a single rose beside Professor Fig’s gravestone. It lay in the graveyard just outside of Hogsmead, beside his wife. His grave was littered with flowers and small gifts, likely from other students and professors. His stone read ‘Eleazar Fig 19 -19. Beloved teacher and colleague. Devoted his life to his students and to Hogwarts.’ It was a bittersweet title for Connie to read. There was no doubt in her mind Professor Fig had devoted the past year to her, and to the better of Hogwarts. She knew deep down there was no way she would have been able to do any of the saving she had done without him. He had saved her. If she was being honest, she had sort of felt like it was her fault he was dead.

“I know you’re in a better place, with Mariam.” She took a deep breath, stepping back slightly. Her back was now pressed against Sebastian’s front, but he didn’t mind. Instead, he grabbed her hand, and gave a light squeeze. “I miss you though. I know Hogwarts won’t be the same without you.” She felt a small tear trickle lightly down her cheek, catching itself in the fabric of her sweater. “I know that I’m safer there now, now that Rankrok’s gone. I can’t help but shake the feeling that something is awaiting me this year, something better than the fate I had endured before. I know that you didn’t want me to obtain the dark magic the keepers had warned me about. I know I’ve disappointed you. I’m sorry. But I truly believe that this magic I yield can be for good.” She felt Sebastian squeeze her hand at the mention of the ancient magic, the magic he had told her to peruse. “I promise that I would never follow the path Isadora had followed. Thanks to you, I see the dangers of it all now.” She knelt down, placing a hand on his grave. “I hope to see your painting at Hogwarts, I received an owl from Professor Weasley that your portrait is awaiting me there. Although our colorful headmaster refuses to hang it anywhere in the castle, I believe I have the perfect spot for you to keep up to date with anything new at school.” She explained, taking Sebastian’s hand to help her stand back up.

“You ready?” He asked, earning a nod from the girl, as she wiped a few stray tears on her sleeve. Sebastian offered his arm to her, which she happily placed her hand in the nook of his elbow. She didn’t mention Solomon. She wanted to, knowing Sebastian needed to be able to grieve for his uncle. Even if the travel to the cemetery was for Professor Fig, both teenagers were aware that Solomon Sallow was also buried in the same location. But she didn’t bring him up, didn’t ask if Sebastian wanted to visit his grave as well, they just continued their walking. It was one of those silent things that they both understood but neither dare spoke a word about it. So alas, they continued their walk to the Burrow.

—✰

“Is it always this crazy here?” Constance called out, yelling over the sounds of children’s laughter and screaming, the four of them entering into the chaos of the Weasley burrow. Griffin and Opehlia both chuckled, having been used to the mess in front of them.

“There’s five of us, what do you expect?" Griffing asked in a teasing manner, pushing his way through the chaos. Besides the twins, the Weasley family consisted of three younger kids, none of which had yet attended hogwarts. There was the oldest, Owen, who was ten years of age, almost ready to attend school. He sported the famous Weasley ginger hair and freckles, his eyes a deep green. Then there was Beatrice, the third oldest after the twins and Owen. She had the same hair and eyes, and the same sprinkled freckles across her cheeks. And lastly was Dorian, the youngest and purest of them all. Unlike the rest, his eyes were a deep green, similar to Ophelia’s. They all came together to create a chaotic scene, shouting at each other as they ran around the house wrecking havoc. It brought a smile to Constance’s face, one that felt like knowing that goodness exists. One that felt like maybe one day she could have a home like this.

“Not a zoo that’s for sure.” Sebastian teased, earning an eyeroll from Ophelia as she slung her trunk onto the table.

“Just make yourselves at home. Mum should be home shortly.” She explained, smiling at the couple before running after her younger siblings. Constance could sense Sebastina nerves by the way he stood, swaying slightly from side to side as he grabbed onto her hand.

“Great, more people to introduce myself too.” He whispered to her, making her frown at him as she sighed. She placed a comforting hand on his shoulder, sending him a soft smile as his shoulders relaxed.

“Hey, it's Ophelia and Griffin’s family, if they're anything like them you’ll be just fine.”

“Alright, yeah. Just don’t leave my side.” He pleaded, earning a look from Constance as she squeezed his hand.

“Where else would I be?” She said softly, making Sebastian nod at her, his nerves slowly fading at the touch of her hand.

“Excuse me mister?” Beatrice asked, standing in front of Constance and Sebasdtian with a pure smile.

“Me?” Sebastian asked, pointing to himself questioningly as the little girl nodded.

“Mhmm.”

“Con, what do I do?” Sebastian whispered to Connie, feeling his hands sweat at the thought of conversing with a child. Connie couldn't help but laugh at him, feeling soft at the fear he felt.

“Go on, she won't bite.” she reassured, making Sebastian take in a deep breath before kneeling down to her level.

“How do you know that?” He asked teasingly, earning a slight shove as Constance pushed him closer to the girl.

“I like your green tie mister.” She said quietly, squeezing the stuffed niffler she had in her arms. Sebastian smiled at her, fixing his tie with pride as he smirked back to Constance before looking back at Bea.

“Is that so? You know, green’s my favorite color.”

“Mine too.” Bea cheered, making Seb chuckle at her excitement. Constance could feel her heart swell at the sight.

“Really?” He turned back to Constance with a smirk. “We may just have another slytherin on our hands.” He teased, making Constance roll her eyes as Bea looked at him confused.

“I don't really know what a slytherine is, sir.” Sebastian and Constance chuckled at her mispronunciation, before Bea gasped and reached for Sebastians wand. He let her hold it as she stared at it in awe, practically drooling at the sight. “Mommy says one day I'll get to learn magic just like Griff and Ophie.” She explained making Sebastian smile as he took his wand back, doing a small spell to impress her. Soon, small fireworks erupted from his wand, making the young girl smile and clap.

“Yeah, well, magic is pretty neat if you ask me.”

“I love magic, I'm gonna be the greatest wizard of my time.” Beatrice explained, making Sebastian look back over at Constance as he stood up.

“We may have just found a mini you sebastian.” Constance teased, noticing the smug smirk on Sebastian's face as he joined her back at her side.

“I was just thinking the same Constance.”

They didn't have much time to talk to Bea more before Rosalind Weasley burst into the room with a giant feast floating behind her. She had been aware of Sebastian and Constances stay for the last week of summer, and was anticipating their arrival. It was nothing like Sebastian or Constance had ever seen before. There was an array of foods, from chicken legs to dinner rolls, and even fancy goblets to hold everyone's drinks. And it all floated perfectly into the table as Rosa released her wand, letting the table be made. She smiled at the group, hugging her children as they ran up to her.

“Mum’s home everyone!” She turned to Ophelia and Griffin, noticing their arrival with a smile. “Oh my twins, hello hello. And two unfamiliar faces. No don't tell me, Constance and Sebastian.”

“Right on the money Ma’am.” Sebastian said kindly, smiling at the older woman as she placed a hand softly on his shoulder.

“Oh please, call me Rosa. I’ve heard so much about you both.” She explained, making Sebastian raise an eyebrow at her.

“All good things i hope?” He said, masking her nod with a chuckle.

“Amazing things! Like how you both are at the top of your year! Congratulations!”

“Thank you Mrs Weas-Rosa.” Consdtance said, watching as Mrs Weasley pulled out a bag full of gifts. She began handing them out to everyone with a cheerful expression.

“I made you all gifts, everyone, take one pass it down.”

Constance carefully opened the packaging, smiling when she opened it. Inside was a yellow sweater with the letter c carefully stitched in the center. She looked around to see everyone with a similar sweater as they pulled the jumpers over their heads. It was an odd experience, receiving a gift, Constance had not gotten gifts from anyone really since her family split apart. Come to think of it, Constance didn't have much family experience at all.

“It's lovely Rosa, thank you.” She complimented kindly, pulling the jumper over her head as Mrs Weasley smiled at her.

“Of course sweetheart. Now everyone sit, it's time for dinner.”

They began dinner, everyone being asked different questions either about school, or their lives. Edmund Weasley, the twins' father had joined in as well. The meal was unlike anything Constance had ever experienced, maybe more food than they even have at Hogwarts. It was a nice feeling, getting to live in such a loved home. She could feel the joy just from sitting at the dinner table. But she could also tell just by looking at him, that Sebastian was thinking of Anne. He hasn't spoken to her since the war. Well, in all fairness, she hasn't spoken to him either. They were at a crossroads, and seeing a happy family only made Sebastian miss his own, even if it wasn't so happy anymore.

“So, you really saw Ranrok up close?” Owen asked, a look full of wonder occupying his face before Rosa gasped at his question. Constances entire body froze.

“Pardon?” She asked softly, nearly choking on her food as she looked at the younger boy.

“Owen honey, what did I say about questions? I'm sorry honey, he doesn't know.” Rosa said softly, turning to Constance who pressed her lips together nervously, before smiling to reassure the older woman.

“No, it's quite alright. Um, yes, I did see him up close. I fought him too.” she explained. And suddenly, she was back. She was infornt of ranrok, and she was losing. She nearly lost her life, and she could feel it,. All the pain, a;l the fear, all the heartache, it all came rushing back as she saw her friends surround her. It seemed as though she was trapped, here, trapped losing to ranrok forever. Trapped failing.

“Woah. What was it like?” Owen asked softly, making Constance sigh. What was it like? It was hell. It was war, nothing good can come from it.

“Excuse me one moment.” She pushed her chair out, leaving the house to go and pace outside, Sebastian following swiftly after her.

“Constance?” He called, searching for the blonde before he found her, pacing. He could feel the anxiety radiate off of her, standing in front of her to try and stop her pacing but it didn't work.

“Sorry, I just…remembering it was a lot.” She said with a sigh, finally stopping as Sebastian grabbed her cheeks. He frowned at her, making her mimic his expression.

“Do you need anything from me?” He asked softly, but she nodded.

“No, no this I have to face alone. Thank you, Seb.” He smiled at her, squeezing her hand gently.

“You’re alright now. He can’t hurt you anymore.”

She knew it was true, she knew he was gone. All the pain, all the stress, it was worth it, they had won. But now a much deeper darker war rooted inside her, one that she wasn't sure how to control, one that could take over her life if she wasn't careful. It was moments like these where Constance wondered what would have happened if she destroyed the repository, instead of taking its magic. She wondered what would be different, if anything at all could be. She wondered that alot, mostly when she was alone, and feeling the effects of it.

[irismfrost]

August 6 - Boat Ride, Tree House, Confucian Temple, Hayashi Department Store

We had some free time in the morning so after breakfast I went to a coffee shop and started working on my independent excursion project (see previous post). I had a caramel macchiato and it looked good and tasted good. However, there were no outlets near my seat, and there weren't many at the place in general. It was a cute shop though.

We had some awesome karaoke on the bus and it felt like we got to our first destination in no time. We did a fun boat ride through the mangroves. There were some mosquitoes out and there were some very low branches. We had to duck at certain spots and this one girl in our group who was getting seasick wasn't looking and got hit right in the head by a branch. It looked pretty painful. There were some graves and it was near a war zone back in the day. There was a Buddhist temple built on top after the fact. The lady doing to boat tour was speaking in Chinese but our amazing tour guide Peter translated some parts. We saw some mangrove crabs, an egret, and another bird that I didn't know. They gave us cool hats too but I was already wearing one so I did not participate in that part.

Next, we went to the Anping Tree House that used to be a warehouse for Tait and Co (a British company), but then it was abandoned and overgrown with fig trees. It was pretty and I got a cute post card. I also got a cinnamon roll because I was hungry and unfortunately, it took a long time to come out and was also burnt on the top. Another girl got the sundae which was soooo awesome and she donated some ice cream to make my cinnamon roll less dry and burnt. It helped tremendously.

Next, we went to a Confucius temple established in 1665 by the Qing Dynasty. It served as the first school of Taiwan. There is a "Dismount Monument" at the front of the temple that states you have to dismount your horse before you enter. This also applies to cars and scooters. It is meant to show respect. There were posts to honor all the 72 disciples of Confucian on the sides, a main hall in the middle, and more relic type things in the back.

Next we visited the Hayashi Department Store. It opened in 1932 in the business district and was an icon for modernization (Japanese origins, hence the name) - it had 5 floors and one of the first elevators in the city. To this day, the same elevator exists. It was very small and slow and could only hold up to 5 people at a time, but it was cool that it still worked. We walked through all the floors and on the roof (technically 6th floor), there was a shrine and apparently you could see damage from the US when we attacked Taiwan, but I could not figure out what the said damage was. Everything there was a little too expensive for me, but they had a lot of interesting things from hand made bags to pottery to jewelry to snacks.

Reflection

The climate and wildlife here is very similar to Florida, especially south Florida. Riding through the mangroves reminded me of all the times I've ridden through mangroves back home, especially at different summer camps or kayaking with my family. Even the weather here is similar, except it's a little more humid here (which is why Supau is so awesome). We've also gotten a bit lucky that it hasn't rained as much as I expected. In Florida, we have the daily afternoon showers and we haven't really gotten that here but maybe the Typhoon threw a wrench in that after we got to the south part of Taiwan. The plants are also eerily similar. I know that most of the palm trees in Florida are non natives, but they are native here and it looks the same. The ferns look the same. The only difference is that the trees are a little bit bigger and there are mountains. I've realized that there are also a lot of banyan trees/ fig trees here. Everything is very green. Florida has pine trees and oak trees which Taiwan doesn't have but most of the other stuff is the same. I even saw some Melaleuca trees, aka paper trees, at the Chen Chiang Shen house. When we first moved into our house in South Florida, there were so many and we had to take all of them out because they were non native and causing issues. According to Google, they disturb native wildlife, disrupt water flow, and alter soil conditions because they don't belong in Florida, and they technically don't belong in Taiwan either. They were brought into the island during the Japanese colonial era.

Another interesting finding is the power of the Confucian family. Throughout the rise and fall of different dynasties in China, the Confucian family has always remained in power and been protected because of the importance of Confucianism as a state religion. There are probably so many decendents at this point but I'm sure that those who really go into the faith have a lot of respect. Confucianism really was the backbone of the power structure of China for a long time because it taught the importance of respecting your leaders and built a very stable and rule following society. The fact that it was a state ordinated faith is no coincidence- they work together.

[kuroyurishion]

Let's talk about red fruits. ONEUS released a new image with them holding red fruits. What these fruits are, who is holding them, and what they symbolize may be clues to the monarch lore.

We start by determining what each fruit is. There are a lot of red fruits in the world, but not all of them belong to the clade Rosids.

1. Leedo is holding an apple. Apples, as previously discussed, are the forbidden fruit. Eve ate the apple and therefore betrayed God, committing the first sin, tempted to her by the serpent. Knowing what Malus means, Leedo's malus, which can also be read as the word malice, might have something to do with temptation. He did mention the serpent in No Diggity, rapping, "You're the serpent in our Eden, spreading bad vibes in our garden" and once again in Intro: Window, "You're like a serpent. Walk straight with a blindfold on".

2. Seoho is holding a pomegranate. Pomegranates are famously depicted in the myth of Persephone and Hades, Hades falls in love with Persephone and took into the underworld to be his wife. Persephone eats six pomegranate seeds and stays with Hades for one half of the year and with her mother Demeter for the other half. Knowing that, Seoho's malus might have something to do with love. In TBONTB, Seoho sings, "The end of the obvious break up. Even though I live, it's not really living" and "In my life, being with you was (Dead/Alive) the most regretful but the happiest moment".

3. Hwanwoong's fruit was a lot harder to identify. Contenders for this mysterious fruit include plums, peaches, passion fruit, and apricots, all of which are part of the clade Rosids. In Chinese mythology, plums were eaten by immortals to enhance strength, and are a symbol of perseverance and hope. Also in Chinese mythology peaches, known as "Peaches of Immortality", where those who eat them are bestowed immortality. Passion fruits symbolize the crucifixion of Christ. Apricots were believed to be golden apples in Greek mythology, and these apples were a wedding gift from Gaia to Hera and were guarded by a serpent.

All good interpretations, but here's another contender: the red pear. Pears were a favorite fruit of the Greek goddess Hera, and in Christianity the pear symbolizes two things. First, pears represent the love Christ has for mankind. Second, pears symbolic of the Virgin and the Child. Knowing all the contenders, Hwanwoong's malus might have something to do with the connections between people and the self. In TBONTB, Hwanwoong sings, "Just as morning comes after night passes, our relationship was a given" and "Why did I ignore the truth". In Come Back Home, he sings, "Out of fear I cover my eyes. Without you I am just a child. Please stop my blackened heart. I still hate myself, blame oneself".

4. Ravn is picking at a bowl of raspberries. Raspberries are seen in a Greek story about baby Zeus. The nymph Ida calms baby Zeus's sorrow by picking a raspberry, which were white at the time. However, she accidentally pricked herself near her heart (although some accounts say finger), staining the white berries red. Knowing that, Ravn's malus might have something to do with the heart. In No Diggity he's seen with a heart in a bear trap, and in Intro: Window, he raps, "I'm having the window of my heart opened in case she comes. I hope I still bloom in your heart" and "Would you acknowledge my heart? That would refresh my frustration".

5. Keonhee is holding a fig. Figs are interesting since they're technically not fruits, but rather a cluster of flowers inside a bulb. Figs, and by association fig trees, are seen in Christianity. After Adam and Eve ate the apple, they clothed themselves in fig leaves after realizing that they do not have clothes on. And in Greek mythology, Gaia turned her son Syceus into a fig tree to protect him from Zeus. Knowing this, Keonhee's malus could be related to loss. In Come Back Home, he sings, "Please come back home. To our familiar path, come back" and "I'm up all night waiting. Just walk few steps closer"; and once again in Luna, "Like one night's dream that disappeared all of a sudden. I won't go far following the stars".

6. Xion is holding a cherry. Cherries are also interesting because in ancient mythology, the fruit from the cherry tree was believed to have contained an elixir that gave gods their immortality. Symbolically, cherries are also seen as symbols of self-sacrifice because to get to the pit, or the soul in this analogy, you have to remove the outside, the body. Knowing this, Xion's malus might be about immortality or sacrifice, a choice. In TBONTB, he sings, "Dead or Alive" and "I'm standing at the crossroad", and in Come Back Home, "My miserable state I'm worried it will continue".

What does this all mean? The monarchs might be regretting the deal they made. With who? I’m not sure. But their story continues, for better or for worse.

[val-made-a-mistake]

i am in desperate need of some loki fluff 😫😖 what if loki keeps messing with and pranking thor just because he knows it makes the reader laugh and he would do anything to see her smile 🥺

YES

trigger warning for angst (particularly grief), fluff, snakes, and mentions of rats, i should really start putting trigger warnings on these lists just like i do for my full fics but i keep forgetting, i’m sorry

right so building off of this list of headcanons bc i’m too lazy to come up with something else, you’re teenage florist!reader, obviously a lot older than when you first met loki, your relationship is established, but you’re still in asgard

it’s been a lot since your mom passed, y’know? grief is a lot. when you look back on that time, all you can think of is being cold. like you were bathing in liquid nitrogen

you weren’t technically aware of it but you isolated yourself from loki and stopped visiting the royal palace

it’s a paradox. you can’t be around loki or thor bc you feel this indescribable weight when you’re around them, almost like guilt but worse, and you can’t be at the shop anymore bc it’s where you grew up and everything reminds you of her, so where do you go?

both the little apartment and the shop are yours now. you knew this would eventually happen, but not so soon

you still have to keep business flowing so you still order stuff for the incoming summer and try to be there as much as you can, but you’re definitely not there as much as you should be

your evening walks are twice as long now. the town girls talk about you behind your back, they say you walk the length of the valley

resist the hamilton reference

and loki? loki hates seeing you like this

loki said he doesn’t enjoy hurting ppl in the first episode of his series but let’s be real, he also doesn’t enjoy seeing the ppl he loves hurt like this

BUT HE WILL NEVER ADMIT IT

every time thor brings it up loki tells him to get out of his room lmao

mewling quim

it’s probably bc he’ll never admit it that he has a bit of trouble trying to find ways to cheer his loved ones up bc for some reason all he can (selfishly) think of is his reputation as the god of mischief

but for you? he’s going to try hard

he comes round the shop one day just before you’re about to leave for your walk and asks if you wanna come up to the palace

unsurprisingly, you say no

loki grins at you tho

“wanna see what i’ve got?”

you narrow your eyes, this can’t be good

“what do you have?”

he straight up procures a snake from midair

“i was thinking we go up to the castle, put it on thor’s bed, see how long it takes him to notice.”

you’re trying not to seem scared of the snake. “is it venomous?”

“of course.”

you narrow your eyes. “thor loves snakes though.”

“it’ll make it even funnier, i promise.”

“my idea of funny doesn’t involve dressing snake bites, loki,” you say, and although it’s not stern, it’s also not light hearted either. “i have an order of fiddle leaf figs coming in soon, i have to be here to receive it. maybe some other time, okay?”

loki starts to smile a little, getting hopeful again, but you correct yourself before thor’s health and safety can be compromised. “we’re not getting venomous snakes to bite thor, ever.”

i stg this practically grown man pouts at you

i picture you’re like seventeen in this btw

but he magics the snake away, thankfully

and leaves bc he’s tryna respect ur boundaries

after that he just starts suggesting pranks to you

“what if when thor goes for his morning shower, i make an illusion where the floor is swarming in rats?”

“absolutely not.”

“what if i pretend i’m odin and disown him from the family?”

“that’s not even funny.”

“what if i push him off the bifrost bridge, just for fun?”

“i have a feeling you might throw me under the bus when frigga finds out.”

it’s gotten to the point where thor half knows what loki’s trying to do and he wants to cheer you up as well

but he does, like, you know, actually human things with you

he comes to your village one day and accompanies you on your evening walk, and he gets you to talk about all the cool wildflowers that line the road the farther you walk

he actually ignores the swooning fangirls for once and insists on taking you out for ice cream

and it’s nice, you suppose, you genuinely appreciate him, but the happiness isn’t really substantial enough that you start feeling good about your life again

one day you actually confess to thor how sad you’re feeling and everything, like, how really fucking sad you are, you’re not even sure why you telling him this instead of loki. you know loki means well but he’s actually making you feel worse yknow

and thor, not exactly understanding but dumbly trying his best anyway, listens

and he pulls you into a tight one-armed hug when you feel your vision blur

thor, son of odin, god of thunder, fearsome warrior, future king of asgard, man that makes all the town girls swoon, is actually a really good hugger

does he run home and tell loki everything? yes

“lady y/n is perhaps more upset than we realized, we have to do something!” he cries, not even bothering to keep his voice down bc he notoriously sucks at whispering

“you think i haven’t been doing anything?” loki hisses back, preparing to stab him for the 859723th time

“what would cheer her up, do you know?”

and it’s then that thor and loki decide to form a truce literally just so they can see you smile again

they invite you over to the castle one day and they stage the grandest prank in history, which is…

uhhhh i don’t actually know, use your imagination

but by the end of it??? do you know what you’re doing?????

you can’t even feel it happening, but you’re beaming like an idiot

and when i say a tide of relief floods loki

you start cackling like a witch

“odin’s beard, what was that?”

VICTORYYYYYY thor wants to shout

unfortunately one of the royals calls thor away for something and this leaves you and loki alone

you’re still laughing lmao

“my love, i thought i would never see you happy again,” loki says, and he thinks of it as a risk but he pulls out the sappiness bc you’re finally happy goddammit

“what’s that supposed to mean?” you choke out through giggles, and he steps forward to take your hands in his

“i thought you would avoid me forever,” he says, half seriously, half teasingly.

“i wasn’t avoiding you!” you exclaim, going to tug your hands away from him, but loki hangs on

“then why wouldn’t you talk to me all throughout these past weeks?” he asks you.

this makes you stop and stare, wide eyed, and loki isn’t really sure what to say so he stares back

and it’s the same face hes been looking into for five years now but somehow it’s even more beautiful in that moment

“i didn’t want to contaminate something so good,” you reply softly, cryptically.

it’s a bit of a selfish move, but loki’s eyebrows raise teasingly. “you think i’m good?”

“i think you’re a dolt, loki odinson!” you snap back bc you haven’t forgotten about what he and thor just did, but you’re grinning again.

loki frees one of his hands and cups your face.

“you are the good in me, my love,” he says softly. “the only thing i want is for you to be happy.”

I KNOW IM THE NARRATOR BUT IM LIKE THIS CLOSE TO BREAKING THE FOURTH WALL JUST SO SOMEONE CAN HEAR ME SCREAMING DJFLFJSOSJ

you raise your eyebrow. “the only thing i want is for you to stop terrorizing thor.”

loki raises his eyebrow right back, and his voice is even lower as he says, “but what if it makes you-”

you grip him by the nape of his neck and pull him down onto your lips.

loki smiles into the kiss

[shiftytracts]

Stop Wanting More, part 1 of 2 (T/M/A fic)

In which season-four Jon tries to quiet his hunger for live statements by gorging himself on paper ones, and Daisy tells him what she used to do when she got shaky between hunts. Part two here.

…For almost ten thousand words (~5.1k in this half, ~4.3 in the other), beeeecause of course I did.

Content warnings:

Disordered eating (mainly of the statement variety, but mentions also the literal kind)

Nausea, and brief descriptions of prior vomiting

Brief but not-ungraphic description of Jon’s (canon) Boneturning incident—so, injury, very mild body horror

Vague discussion of Daisy’s passive suicidality (in part two)

Animal cruelty and death: Daisy talks about hunting rats for sport (in part two)

—

Jon paused the tape recorder, closed his eyes, and tried to breathe. A statement’s second-to-last page was the hardest to get down. The dull ache that had begun under his ribs twenty minutes before now stretched down far enough to converge with the one in his stiff hips. His pulse throbbed in his stomach; he could feel it swell and recede beneath his hand with every beat. Nausea boomeranged up from somewhere under his navel. He reminded himself he could stop for now, finish this later—and, as always, that thought made him feel even colder than the sludge of other people’s fear pooling in his stomach. With his free hand Jon pressed Record again, and turned to 0101702’s final page. Oh, god, there was barely anything on it. Just the rest of this paragraph and then one more. He kept his eyes on the page, didn’t stop speaking its words, but fumbled blindly for another statement with his fingers.

“Knock knock,” Daisy said as she entered. “Christ—you’re still recording?”

In a flash Jon folded his hands on the table, sat up a little straighter, tried to suck in his gut. “Er—”

“Thought you said you were gonna do one more.”

“I’m almost done.”

“You’ve got another one right there.”

“I…” he considered I’m sorry, but then she’d say For what. “I don’t know what to tell you. It is my office.”

“Yeah, and your home,” Daisy scoffed—“and mine. Sort of.”

“D—did you want…? You’re welcome, to. Sit down, or….”

She did, on the arm of his couch. “I know, Jon. That’s not what I meant.”

“Okay.” To show he’d meant his welcome, Jon pushed his chair back from his desk and turned in it to face Daisy. Hopefully she’d remember he couldn’t ask What did you mean.

“I mean, don’t pretend this is work. How many statements have you had today? You don’t think that one can wait til tomorrow?”

Seven? Or would this one be eight. Jon forced himself to exhale out the portion of gut he’d been holding back since she arrived; it hurt too much to keep sucking in anyway. “A lot. I’m just.”

“Hungry, yeah.”

“Even when I’m stuffed I’m hungry.” He snarled a laugh, and set a rueful hand over his stomach like a fig leaf.

At first he’d tried sating the hunger with garden-variety food. That didn’t help much. Way back when he’d first transferred to the Archives Jon had fallen back into the old habit of forgetting to eat—which, yeah, not great, but, it did mean he remembered well how amazing it used to feel to cram down even a stale biscuit after too many hours’ inanition. All the hidden notes he’d found in yogurt and dry toast. He even remembered tearing up once at the taste of a banana, early in 2016. Before that he’d been sure he didn’t like bananas; afterward, for a short while he’d eaten one nearly every day, hoping vainly to recapture the ecstasy of banana after 14-hour fast. No luck, of course. After a few weeks he’d concluded he still didn’t much like banana as final course of healthy lunch. He’d especially disliked peeling them: how sometimes the stems bent without breaking, and the more times you tried the warmer, softer, more flexible they got. How little strings of peel still clung to the banana after you peeled off its main body, like static when you pull off a jumper. Or like the lint it leaves behind on your shirt. And the way bananas bruise, like people do. All these vestiges of its previous life—reminders it had lived to feed itself rather than him.

Since the coma, all people food—er. That was, all food intended for human consumption—tasted like that chase after a faded spark. Cloying and mushy and… organic, reminding him too much of the garden it came from. And the way it landed in his stomach was far worse. The original banana, the one Martin had pressed on him in the Archives in April 2016, had gone down like nectar, ambrosia, manna from heaven, &c.; the ones afterward, like an unwanted dessert always does. (Cloying. Mushy. A biology lesson mildly tapping its watch.) These days, though, eating regular dinner on a stomach empty of other people’s trauma felt like trying to fill up on cake. Not like cake after fourteen hours of nothing; Jon was pretty sure his 2016 stomach would have welcomed that. But like cake at dinner time. When you’re expecting, you know. Dinner. It gave him the brief, fake-seeming energy of a sugar high, and made him sick before it made him full.

Especially when he was otherwise ailing, for some reason? After Hopworth he’d treated himself to a lie down and a sandwich. The rest had helped, but he’d squandered most of the energy it gave him on the effort to keep the sandwich down. At that moment nothing, not even the coffin, had scared him so much as the thought of what it would feel like to throw up when you had only ten ribs on one side. He hadn’t expected losing them to hurt, at least not for long—had expected the rib to flow out of his skin into Jared Hopworth’s hand like an ice cube through water, which in retrospect was stupid given the testimony of Mr. Pryor in statement 0081103, but he hadn’t had time to reread that one beforehand and at the time Jon remembered only that Hopworth didn’t break his victims’ skin when he pulled out their bones. Turned out that wasn’t much comfort: he’d still had to break the ligaments attaching Jon’s ribs to his spine and chest. It had felt like a bad dislocation (four of them, technically), only instead of the feeling of bone pressing on things it shouldn’t there was an equally violating sense of tissue wallowing in holes that shouldn’t be there. He’d had this horror that if he were sick the flesh would crumple and pop where his ribs used to be, like when you try to suck the remaining water out of a near-empty bottle.

A few months after that he’d caught cold. (A point in the still-human column, Daisy had called it.) You know the first day or two of a cold, before the encroaching mucus takes out your ability to smell or taste properly, how innocuous olfactory phenomena like cheddar and laundry soap suddenly become Bad Smells, on par with the olive bar at a posh supermarket? Well, in a similar way, this one seemed to sharpen the dichotomy in his body’s opinions of people food and monster food. His lack-of-ribs had mostly healed by then though, so either vomiting with only ten ribs on one side did not cause the anomaly he’d feared, or, if it did, it hadn’t hurt enough for him to notice it in the cacophony (pucophony?) of other sensations.

(Daisy liked to play on words, so he’d been doing it more lately. This project the Eye seemed happy to help with, though in this case the suggestion arrived in his mind at the exact same moment as a reminder that, technically, the word cacophony can apply to sensations other than sound only by synecdoche.)

And then, a few weeks ago, when the whole Archives went down with norovirus… well, it wasn’t a fun time. He’d at first mistook the lethargy, weakness, trouble concentrating for signs of hunger—the new kind of hunger. Ms. Mullen-Jones’ statement about the Divine Chains cult hadn’t seemed all that bad, when he’d first recorded it. Scarier than if he’d read its events in a novel, of course; that was just how statements worked. He experienced them more vividly than stories, though less so than the events of his own life. (Because the people they happened to thought they were real! he’d told himself when he first took this job. It’s empathy, that’s all. Nope, sorry—evil magic.) When he read a paper statement these days, though, the knowledge it wouldn’t give him nightmares never quite left him. And he’d thought he was growing desensitized to the kinds of horror most people came to the Institute to report. Coming back up, though—maybe it was the fever, but god, the visions he got on that statement’s way out, of Agape and the soft, sticky hivecorpse of Claude Vilakazi’s followers—the way it made the donut he’d shoved down that morning (in a show of team spirit, god help him) come back up tasting like rotten rice wine—it was worse than the dreams. Worse, he could have sworn, than even the first time he ever dreamt Naomi Herne’s empty graveyard.

While hanging over the bowl of the Archives’ toilet waiting to see if he’d got it all up or if there was still more to come, Jon remembered thinking again of the banana Martin had given him. A few days earlier Daisy had made him watch the video of the I don’t understand this meme and at this point I’m too afraid to ask man vore-ing a banana; Jon had confessed to her, in a conspiratorial whisper-laugh, that for him vore itself had been one such meme until that very second, when the Eye had seen fit to inform him. But when applied to a banana, the term apparently just meant eating it peel and all. In 2016 Martin had broken the banana’s stem and pulled back a section of peel before handing it to Jon, so as to brook no argument. Was it really the banana itself he’d cried over? Not the gesture of friendship, when Jon deserved it so little? The thought of someone caring for him enough that when he got hangry at them they handed him a snack. Martin had been living in the Archives then, like Jon did now. Sleeping in Document Storage—a guest in a room owned by pieces of paper. Those bananas may have been the only thing that felt like his.

A Guest for Mr. Spider was about vore, technically. Not an uncommon topic in children’s literature. Some surmised that was where the fetish came from, though others maintained kinks like that were inborn, and the stories merely alerted their hosts to them for the first time. Red riding hood, three little pigs, little old lady who swallowed a fly. The Leitner touch was only the part where he drew you to his real-life lair and real-life ate you.

Looking back, that was probably the first thing he’d ever admired about Martin—how easy he’d made it look to skin a fruit. Not at the time admired, of course, but in those weeks afterward, when every banana Jon ate made him claw at the peel til his finger joints throbbed.

That stomach bug had struck the Archives with serendipitous timing, though. If he’d not found out how thin abstinence from the Hunt had made Daisy on the same day he’d barfed up a statement, Jon might not have pieced together what their combined evidence meant. Until then he’d put down his own post-coma weight loss to the fact he rarely ate more people food than a donut in twenty-four hours. Lots of avatars were scrawny, after all. Jane Prentiss, Mike Crew, Justin Gough, Annabelle Cane, John Amherst, Simon Fairchild. Jude Perry and Jared Hopworth could mold their respective fleshes however they wanted, so he didn’t count them as exceptions. True, Trevor Herbert’s bulk had struck him as odd; surely a homeless man wouldn’t waste cash on food his body no longer wanted. And what about Breekon and Hope? Did butterflies and a quartermaster’s pen and tongue sustain them? But maybe, Jon had told himself, it was like with alcohol. Maybe the avatars with more flesh on their bones had worked to develop a tolerance for (air quotes, heavy sarcasm) people food, for the sake of their physiques, or. So they could, he didn't know, eat socially? Without feeling sick, like Jon did whenever one of the others brought donuts.

Preposterously stupid, this theory seemed in retrospect. The truth was much simpler. It was like Jude Perry’d told him. She was strong and he was weak, because she fed her god with her actions, while Jon’s had had to resort to eating his flesh.

He wasn’t going back to live statements! That wasn’t an option; he knew that. He couldn’t feed his god with his actions. But he could have more paper ones. Maybe they were like the candles poor Eugene Vanderstock used to bring Agnes—the ones she’d sat over for hours. Hours and hours, inhaling the suffering that made them. They’d kept her strong enough, right? At least in body. All those people in charge of her care, all so much in her thrall—if she’d looked hungry one of them would’ve mentioned it in a statement.

During Jon’s school days, back when he was still trying to learn how to be a girl, this brief window had opened up right around age thirteen where the girls around him had enough self-consciousness to start developing eating disorders? But not enough to keep them secret. Thirteen had been this phase of, like, I’m a teenager now, see? I’ve got the teen angst now—SEE?! Where after they’d finished the day’s maths assignment, or while setting up microscope slides, one could overhear girls swapping self-harm anecdotes and tips for how best not to eat. Anne, whom he’d been almost friends with, went through two packs of chewing gum a day for a while. She would shove three or four sticks at a time in her mouth, then spit them back out into their wrappers as soon as they lost their flavor. Eventually they made her sick, and she switched to chain-sucking butterscotch discs. (Most artificial sweeteners, as the Eye now informed him, had mild laxative properties—including those used in gum.) Other acquaintances had brought comically large thermoses of coffee to school every day, and scurried to the toilet between classes. But it was another polyurious crowd that Jon kept thinking of, these days—the kids who would chug water every time they felt hungry. Trying to fill up on paper statements felt just like that.

He’d never understood that urge until now. Hunger was already a bad sensation; why would it help to add the further bad sensations of nausea and stomachache and cold? But now it made sense: feeling better was not the point. The point was to stop wanting more. He couldn’t get rid of the hunger, exactly—not in a way that mattered. Not the shards of glass in his belly, not the itch in his esophagus like a finger tapping behind his gag reflex, not the way simple motions like soaping his hands made his whole body ache. Not the sharpening of his senses to such a fine point that he jumped whenever Thérèse in the office above him shut her desk’s sticky drawer. (He hadn’t known that was what made the squeaky noise until a few weeks ago when the Eye decided he might like some office gossip. Even now he didn’t know which of the faces he sometimes passed up there belonged to Thérèse. She had no statements to make.) Nor the fog in his mind, though he tried sometimes to blame that on the Lonely. He couldn’t sate his hunger with paper statements—couldn’t make himself full, in the rosy way we usually connote that word. All warm and carefree and pleasantly sleepy. But he could cram the hole inside him with enough stale horrors that the temptation to chase down a fresh one momentarily left him.

And that was the new plan—to stuff himself with paper statements.

Tomorrow would mark two weeks since the day he’d first tried it. Brian from Artefact Storage had a statement to give him, Jon could feel—either Stranger or Spiral, it was hard to tell quite which. Something that caused paranoia. Not a great fit for that department. Good fit for a temple of the Eye, Jon supposed, remembering Tim and Michael Shelley. But Artefact Storage? God help him. He wondered if Elias had done it on purpose, hiring a paranoid man to work in a room full of objects that wanted him hurt. If so it must’ve been this one—this purpose. And on Wednesday mornings Brian manned the place all alone. Poor soul was already clinging to this job by a thread, though (so, Web…? That could cause paranoia too, as Jon well knew). Surely if Jon made him relive his trauma that would break it. Though perhaps that’d be a mercy. And but besides, two weeks ago Melanie had still lived here, and sat all morning between Jon’s office and Artefact Storage. Until she went to lunch. But by that time the woman whose laugh Jon could sometimes hear through the walls (Pooja, the Eye had since told him her name was) would have joined Brian. And it’d just be too weird, too risky, to go in and ask him about it with a third person in the room. Even if it wasn’t also evil.

So he’d read 0132210—the statement of Sierra Talbot, regarding a swimming pool whose depth changed every time she entered it—in hopes that’d make him quit thinking about the paranoid man down the hall. It didn’t, not really; paper statements didn’t take up as much of his attention as they used to. But he couldn’t get up and walk to Artefact Storage in the middle of one. When he finished and still couldn’t think of anything but Brian, he dug out another statement (this one from 1938, regarding a bad penny). Just to keep himself chained to his desk til lunch. And then a third (Liza Ho, attack of the killer seagulls). And by the end of that one he felt too heavy and cold inside to want to go anywhere but the couch. It made his stomach swell until it hurt to sit up straight, and the thought of shoving anything more inside made him feel sick—exactly like chugging water every time he felt hungry.

Basira had said maybe the Web just wanted to keep them so afraid of their own impulses they sat and did nothing so they couldn’t be puppeted. Maybe she was right. He’d never felt more like a spider, with his weak, skinny limbs and bloated stomach. Lying on the couch massaging other people’s horrors into more comfortable shapes inside him. Thank god he’d already given up tucking in his shirts, when he came back after the coma. Jon had worn the same trousers for three days in a row, now—shucked them off at the end of the day, hoping if he left them on the floor that’d convince him they were too dirty to wear again, and then slipped them back on over clean boxers in the morning. They were the only trousers he had that stayed up with the button left unfastened.

(Technically, the noun bloat refers to the feeling of weight or tightness in the abdomen. To describe a belly which has expanded beyond its typical size, one should use the word distended. Though these phenomena can occur separately, most people conflate them under the single word bloated. This trivia had seemed worthless when Beholding told him of it. But now he knew better. Every morning he woke up feeling like he’d had his whole torso replaced with the aching void of space, empty but for silver glints of pain that were the stars. And then he’d look down and find his belly still distended.)

Melanie and Basira didn’t know—at least not officially. They both seemed to have noticed how much more often lately they’d walked in on him recording, but Jon was pretty sure they suspected him less of bingeing on statements, more of pretending to record so as to avoid talking to them. He welcomed this misapprehension.

It was also possible they knew but declined to comment, since. Well, it was kind of a pathetic habit? Physically, a bit pathetic. Morally, though, such a big improvement over compelling statements by force that maybe they figured they ought to let him have it. If so he should be grateful, he reminded himself. Their pity, after all, was humiliating only in principle; Daisy’s teasing and concerned questions embarrassed him in practice.

“Enough navelgazing,” Daisy scoffed, but when Jon looked over at her he could see a smile creeping its way onto her face. “Look—finish the one you’re on, then come over here and I’ll. Tell you a story.”

“I—what?”

“Don’t know if it’ll count as a ‘statement,’” she said, with air quotes; “not much fear in it, more just.” She looked at the floor, then shrugged. “But it seems worth a try, yeah? Might make you feel better.”

“I-I, er. I really shouldn’t?” He meant in case it had a taste of human blood effect, but set his hand on his stomach again in hopes she’d think he meant he was too full.

“Yeah, you should. I want you to hear it.” Daisy shrugged again. “Think it might do you good to know.”

Jon turned back to his desk, unpaused the recording and wrapped up the statement. He’d quit bothering to record end notes on most of these—told himself he could add them in later, like he used to when he’d first taken this job. How proud 2016 Jon would have been to see how many statements the 2018 Archivist got through in a week.

He paused for a moment before standing up, to take as deep a breath as he could manage when stuffed full of paper. The end of that statement had gone down easier, since he’d had that few minutes’ break talking to Daisy, but he still didn’t love the idea of standing and walking. Especially since he knew once he got to the couch he’d be glued there by fatigue. If he didn’t pee now, he’d spend most of the night far enough into sleep to be paralyzed, but not far enough to numb his bladder. He excused himself to Daisy, promising to come right back. Then hauled himself up, with help from his cane and one arm of his chair.

Six limbs it took to maneuver this body now. Two more and he’d’ve gone full spider.

Three quarters of the way to the bathroom—that’s how long it took before the ache in his legs outpaced that in his stomach. He arrived on the toilet seat shaky and out of breath, as always. Months ago he’d given up standing to pee. When you sat you could rock back and forth, and cross your arms tight over waves of quease.

Not much came out, as was also usual lately. As far as Jon could tell, his body now required only enough water to keep his mouth from drying out while recording. Dehydration no longer made his head hurt, so, why bother. Good thing, too, he supposed—the last two weeks he hadn’t needed much non-metaphorical water inside for his body to parse that as needing to pee.

He let his trousers stay pooled around his ankles until after he’d washed and dried his hands. Then pulled up his shirt, to judge from his reflection whether they’d stay up with the fly undone. If he kept his hands in his pockets, yeah. Could you tell the difference, visually, once he put his shirt tails back down? Not for such a short distance. They wouldn’t have time to get disarranged.

It didn’t matter; Basira didn’t even glance at him on his way back, and all Institute staff who didn’t live here had gone home.

Jon opened the door to his office, said hello to Daisy but didn’t manage to look at her, and sat himself down on the other side of the couch. From the corner of his eye (or someone’s anyway) he saw her rise to her feet. “I’m gonna pee too,” she told him, picking her way toward the door; “get yourself comfortable, like you’re going to bed.”

“Where will you sit.”

“I’ll squeeze in.”

“I don’t mind leaving room for—?” Finally he made himself look up at her, in time to see her shake her head. Daisy hadn’t been strong on her feet either, since the Buried; she held herself up now with a hand on the doorjamb, elbow bent so her shoulder leant against that wrist. He regretted quibbling. “Never mind; I’ll just.”

“Really? You’re comfortable like that? You look like a sheep in clover.”

The knowledge came to him before he could ask her what that meant—complete with a nasty visual of what happens in cases acute enough to require rumenotomy. Jon swore he could feel himself swelling to accommodate this tidbit. His eye twitched in discomfort.

“Think I prefer ‘windbag,’ if it’s all the same to you.”

She made a face like that was grosser than what she had said. “You ruined my joke. I was gonna say I won’t let you have any more leaves til you look less like you might explode.”

“Sheep in clover suffocate,” Jon frowned; “they don’t explode. You must be thinking of how they cure them when—”

“Leaves. In. A. Book, Jon. That joke.”

“Oh. Yes, I see.” He made himself chuckle.

Daisy sighed and shifted on her feet. “I’ll be right back. Just lie down, alright? Like you’re going to bed.”

Jon agreed to lie down, but couldn’t decide whether to face the wall (as he would to sleep), leaving her to slide in between him and the back of the couch the way she had a few times before when she’d walked in on him catnapping, or whether he should lie on his back, where he could see her as soon as she opened the door. It was important to make sure she knew he appreciated her offer to give him a statement. Or, no—to tell him her story, he meant.

Ultimately he picked the latter course.

“You sleep like that?”

“Sometimes."

“I’ve never seen you sleep like that. You always face the wall.” Daisy crossed her arms, blew hair out of her face. “That for the tummy ache, or for me?”

“Uh….”

“Would it hurt you to face the wall.”

“No, I just.”

“Turn around, then. I’ll squeeze in,” she said again.

“I-if you’re sure.”

He rolled onto his side, gritting his teeth as the cramps in his stomach swirled in new directions. What made it slosh like that, he wondered. While he fought to regain his breath Jon watched Daisy climb up onto the back of the couch on shaking elbows and knees, then avalanche down hands- and feet-first so she fit between him and its cushions. He’d never watched her do this before—always either startled out of a doze at the sound of her thumping down next to him, or simply woken up to find her there.

“You’re just like the Admiral,” he informed her.

“True words spoken in jest,” muttered Daisy. Too quietly for him to hear what she said over the couch’s tortured creaks, but half a second after she finished speaking the words appeared before his mind, in white, all-capital letters with a black background like closed captions on the news. “That’s Georgie’s cat, right?” she said aloud.

“Yes.”

Her knee jostled the cap of his; when it made him gasp she snarled under her breath. “Sorry. Can you move your leg?”

“Yes, it’s fine, just—”

“I mean would you move your leg.”

“Oh.” He did so.

“Thanks. Ugh—you’re cold,” Daisy accused him; “where’s that blanket.” He pointed behind her to the arm of the couch where it lay folded. She shook it out, and draped it over both of them. Reached around behind him to make sure it covered his whole back. Jon tried to ignore the way his stomach lurched every time Daisy’s weight shifted against the cushions. Finally she settled next to him to catch her breath. Their foreheads touched; her stomach pressed into his, though not as tightly as the last time they’d lain like this. “Can you breathe or am I crushing you?”

“Not at all, you’re fine—in fact, if the couch cushions are chafing you too much you can—”

Daisy huffed, and scooted herself in closer to him. “That better?” She set her warm hand down right where his belly diverged from pelvis. Jon tried to keep both voice and tremor out of his exhale. Since the coffin, Daisy’s hands and feet suffered at night and after any exertion from the same excess of heat his sometimes did. So the cold inside him probably felt nice on her hand, if not to the rest of her.

(Like snuggling up to a hotel mattress, she’d described it, after the first time she joined him for a nap when he’d just had a statement. Cold, hard, covered in lumps and dents, and creaks when you roll over on it. “I’d prefer you didn’t,” he’d replied, while praying her elbow wouldn’t come any closer to the crevasse where his ribs used to be.)

“Christ you’re stuffed,” commented Daisy. For emphasis she lifted her fingers, then set them back down on his gut.

“I don’t know what you expected.”

“You won’t pop if I tell you a story?”

“Not literally,” Jon said, blinking.

“Of course not literally,” she scoffed; “you know what I mean.”

“Do I?”

“Will it make you sick. Don’t want you throwing up on me; this is Melanie’s shirt. If you ruin it she’ll hit us with her cane, and I don’t trust you to hit as hard back with yours.”

“Mine’s shorter and thicker,” he mused. “I don’t have to hit as hard.”

“Stop. Avoiding. The question.”

Jon sighed to show her he capitulated. Then thought about it. He felt cold and sick, but the idea of saying no to a statement made those feelings worse, not better. And the sharp clusters of pain in his belly were harder to sleep through than quease.

“I’ll be fine,” he decided. “It’ll help.”

“Alright. When you’re ready, ask me what I used to do when I got shaky between hunts.”

--

Read part two here.

[jq37]

The Report Card – Fantasy High Sophomore Year Ep 12

Fig And Ayda Sitting in a Spiky Infernal Nightmare Tree

Welcome back to Fantasy High, where Brennan and Emily are giving the gays everything they want but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. For now, the Bad Kids have just arrived in Arborly which is this ancient, twisty, mysterious forest town with buildings kind of built into the trees in such a way that makes it hard to tell it’s a town at first glance. Anyway, they get to Hollyhill--the family home of Fig’s gnome business-friend--Grover Tillythatch--which is basically this very dope hollowed out tree. At the edge of the forest (maybe a 30 min walk away), there is a place where the trees grow and twist together into an 80 foot high wall, barbed with razor sharp briars and super ominous looking. Très Sleeping Beauty.  

They unlock the gate but then realize they have to do something with the Hangvan. Gorgug thinks there’s a way to, with his Artificer skills, give the Van the availability to shrink, but that’ll be a whole project for later. What we have to deal with now though is the fact that Gilear is caught up in the wheel well of the Van, apple stuck in his mouth like a roast pig. Through a series of insane and very Gilear events (not a teleportation mishap like I initially thought), he ended up stuck there and has been since they woke up. He fully missed Hilariel and this is the first anyone noticed he was missing.The kids help Gilear out and give him a little makeover, courtesy of Adaine’s jacket--very needed because he 100% pissed his pants while jammed up (and way too soon after getting stuck).

Kristen knows that the temple she read about is extremely close to where they are. Adaine does a quick Locate Creature and can tell the elf from her Scry isn’t within the 1000 foot range. Plus, the forest they’re in just looks different.  

Anyway, once they’re in Ragh starts grabbing food. Sandra-Lynn gives Gilear a massage because that dude needs some TLC. Tracker is sticking with Kristen and in a weird headspace over the Galakaya info. And, turns out Ayda didn’t just stay in Leviathan. She teleported with them to see them off so she’s around too. The gang does a little investigation of the house where Riz finds out Grover is abusing his company expense account and Adaine pings a crazy amount of infernal energy from the spooky briar wall. Adaine also senses a strong but old (300 year-ish) aura of druidic magic in Arborly--from the reclamation efforts that took Arborly back from being behind the wall that separates Sylvere from the outside. It’s really the only progress that’s been made and it seems like it took a lot out of whoever did it. One more thing: There is a real gnomish energy around town (similar to the vibe at Gorgug’s place), even though Arborly is supposed to be very wood elf heavy.

Throughout all I’ve been describing, there have been rumblings of maybe throwing a party and Fig invites Ayda who enthusiastically accepts. The adults go to bed in the Van for safety (Sandra-Lynn puts the Hangman in charge while they’re gone) and the teens do what teens do when they have no adult supervision: They wild out. But not in a Golden Gardens “Let’s get tattoos and do drugs” kinda way. In a real, teenager kind of way. In an “I’m making crab nachos because my parents never let me,” kind of way. But that “they” doesn’t include Fig because she is doing the other thing teens do when they have no adult supervision: Sneaking out. Specifically to look at the briar wall. She can hear these faint whispers coming from the wall and Emily manages to get jump scared in a D&D game by Ayda who is suddenly standing next to Fig, having followed her because the party got overwhelming. 

They have a talk which I can and will describe but that needs to be seen in full to really appreciate the intimacy and tenderness but also fumbling awkwardness that’s happening. So while the rest of the Bad Kids are drinking and doing crab-stands and pretending to be shrimp (go with it) Fig tells Ayda that she sometimes does stuff like pretend to be other people and indulge in loud nonsense to cover up negative thoughts, like the ones that come from your dad being shoved in a gem and then getting kidnapped. Ayda can’t understand the disguising as a coping mechanism: “If I were you I wouldn’t want to be anyone else because you are very exceptional.” She then offers to give Fig a better look at the wall and, when Fig accepts, she turns them both invisible and flies them to it. 

Fig, upon watching Ayda do that very dope thing says that there’s no reason for Ayda to think she’s special when she can do cool stuff like that. Ayda, as we already know, thinks Fig is super dope too, both in abilities and personality. Ayda analyzes the briar wall and finds out mostly stuff we already knew--it keeps people from getting in or out, including through magical means like Dimension Door and it’s keyed to powerful devils. When she reaches for the thorns, they grow out to stab her and she flinches back before they can. When Fig does the same, the thorns don’t grow out. And, when she does a less intense Burning Hands, a charred handprint is left behind and the heat and energy travels somewhere else. The aura the wall is giving out doesn’t seem to bother her as much as it probably would someone else. Ayda finds it very cool, as she’s found everything Fig has done. They dip back into heart to heart mode and Ayda reveals something that we already knew from Brennan on the Discord: Ayda is technically about 150 years old due to her Phoenix cycling and she’s been working on building the Compass Points Library across her lifetimes, aided by notes left to herself by her previous incarnations. Fig asks why she would do that instead of just reinventing herself and Ayda says she doesn’t have a lot of self confidence and doesn’t want to make mistakes. Fig throws up in anticipation of saying something sincere, says she thinks Ayda is perfect the way she is, and then--as she is wont to do--skateboards away (successfully and 80 feet down the briar wall with a 22 acrobatics check).

Ayda flies down, compliments her on the sick trick then asks her to sign a binding contract that says she has info that she will give Fig but Fig can’t make any assumptions based on it or judge her. (The cast at this point is losing their minds and has been for the past couple of minutes.) Fig signs it and then Ayda gives her the information which is as follows: “At any waking moment outside of combat that you and I have been together, if you had tried to kiss me on the mouth, it would have been received favorably.” Fig drafts a contract (as a lawyer I’m using that term extremely loosely) that says that if Ayda makes fun of her, Fig will give her a wet willy. Ayda says that it’s more of a threat than a contract and Fig abruptly kisses her and then skateboards away and hides. Ayda doesn’t really have a good frame of reference for how this is supposed to go and Fig is throwing out all sorts of mixed signals but Fig comes out from hiding and apologizes and says that she’s having trouble being vulnerable since she hasn’t really done this as herself before. Ayda asks if they can go again because she thinks she can do better. Ally and Lou howl and cheer and bless the Union. Murph is clapping. Siobhan and Zac are full gone. Fig says that she only wanted to have a party so Ayda would stay longer. Ayda says she only stayed to hang out with Fig. Ayda says this is the best moment of her current life. Fig says she’s going for best, period--past incarnations included. They make out some more until Ayda has to go. Ayda says she needs to go so she can research the Planeshift spell for Fig (for free!). She doesn’t even care about shrinking down the library. Before she leaves, Ayda pulls out one of her feathers and says that if Fig holds it up and says her name, she’ll hear it and be able to come and help. Fig does the same with one of her ear-cuffs but it’s more of a gesture than an actual magical effect (though the cuff is bloody and mark my words, this is exactly the kind of goof that becomes plot relevant later). Fig comes back to the insanity the house has dissolved to and goes to use the hot tub.     

No comment. 

They all eventually go outside to sleep on a mattress, by the Van to get the protection of the Hallow spell. It’s a little glossed over but we learn when Fabian gives Riz Bardic Inspiration to remember to sleep outside that he’s taken a level of bard! In the morning (by which I mean afternoon), they all wake up to see Sandra-Lynn and Gilear speaking to, like, 40 wood-elf rangers. They’re mainly talking to an intense lady who seems to have a pretty high rank and this older looking fox. Fig steps up to speak for the group since they’re there on her invite and the elven woman is instantly wary of her horns, plus the Hangman is right there. She clearly doesn’t trust the infernal. With Guidance from Kristen, she gets a 27 Persuasion which tells her this lady (whose name we learn is Mira) will never like her BUT that’s OK because she’s not in charge. The fox actually outranks her. 

Fig shakes hands with the fox whose name is Nuathra and who is very charmed. The Bad Kids follow suit with the politeness and Nuathra is won over. He fends off Mira’s suspicions and is so chill that Fig decides (after consulting with Adaine) to just tell him they’re going into the nightmare forest. That gets bows pulled on them and Adaine steps in and identifies herself as the elven Oracle and says that they have to do it for prophecy reasons. The elves start whispering and Nuathra, who believes she is who she says she is, asks if she knows about any other high elves who look like her slinking around. Adaine says that yeah, she does, but she’s not working with them. Kristen tries to cut in and it makes Mira super aggro--seems like she doesn’t like beings that are devil adjacent or humans either. She also makes a dismissive comment aimed at high elves in response to Adaine’s statement about morality being complex.

Nuathra tells her to cool her jets and says that things are kinda tense because for the past few months, a high elven woman (Adaine’s mom) showed up, took a room at the Owl and Harp (a gnomish tavern), and hired a local wood elf drunkard named Killian. She kept to herself mostly but did do some business at the local gnomish Tinkerer’s Hall (possibly for spell components). Two nights ago, another high (extremely gassy) elven woman showed up and then they vanished (figuratively) with Killian.

When Tinkerer’s Hall is mentioned, Gorgug cuts in to get more info on that. Nuathra says that there is a gnomish population in Arborly because the Druid who gave their life to reclaim Arborly (Crafty Rootdrinker) was a gnome so now gnomes kind of have protected status. Nuathra starts tearing up a little and we later find out (via Gorgug’s intuition) that Nuathra was their Awakened animal companion (Awakened means you give a plant or animal average human intelligence and the ability to speak a language). Nuathra asks why they want to go into the forest and Gorgug says it’s because the Nightmare King might be coming back. After being horrified to learn that the NK’s crown wasn’t in magical Fort Knox and instead was just in some dude’s desk, Nuathra says that all the town’s resources are at their disposal. He points out the three obvious places to check out: (1) the tavern, (2) the tinkerer’s hall, and (3) a shrine which is a possible entrance to the forest of the NK (the Shrine of Thorns which is just on the edge of the forest--mostly still in the forest--and dedicated to a mysterious goddess).

Adaine asks about the dude in her vision and realizes quickly it’s not Killian. Then, following a comment Fig makes about honesty being the right move and spurred by their out of character knowledge, start poking at Fig for an answer to what’s different about her today. Riz rolls a 28 Investigate and Fig burns 2 luck points and a guidance to beat it with like a 31. Wild. Then they split up like this:

Gorgug, Ragh, and Fabian (with the Hangman) go to the tinkerer’s hall.

Adaine and Riz go to the tavern.

Kristen, Tracker and Fig go to the shrine (ferried by Sandra-Lynn who wants to then scout around on Baxter).       

Gilear makes lunch.              

But before they leave, Adaine Scrys on her mom and sees her, Aelwen, and Killian with a gem embedded in his open and bloody chest (clearly a puppet after the ritual that almost claimed RIz) traveling through a forest so twisted it looks like it’s underground. Adaine clocks some curse scarring on her mom and on a 15 arcana check wonders if the curse her mom got broken by Garthy was actually the Crown’s curse or maybe something the Falinel put on it for security (which could mean that the Curse on the crown is actually the goddess’s sanctum mentioned last ep). Almost immediately, Aelwen dispels the Scry and it ends. Adaine on a 25 Insight realizes that Aelwen didn’t actually sense the Scry. It was like someone told her it was happening and then she reacted to that. Adaine thinks Kalina might be around.         

On a nat 20 Perception check, Kristen sees Kalina’s eyes in the shadows. Riz--and the rest of the group--can’t see her, but she steps out of the shadows. Kalina starts slinging death threats--at the group and Tracker specifically--and Kristen does her classic Kristen thing of staring down a life or death situation with an insane casualness. Kalina says the only reason the gang is still alive is because they haven’t gotten directly in the way of her and what she wants yet. What does she want? Kristen asks. For them to stay out of the f-ing forest. Kalina vanishes. Kristen immediately loses all bravado and makes her friends dog pile her for comfort which they happily do.               

Kristen gives an arguably Inspiring Speech to give everyone 16 temp HP. Riz on a 28 Investigation roll notices that the grass where Kalina was standing isn’t bent. (The background music goes *BWANG* like Brennan planned it). Riz thinks Kalina wasn’t physically there. In fact, she might not have ever been physically there. He remembers that, in the photo, Pok’s sleeve isn’t bent where Kalina is touching him and people who can’t see Kalina don’t see the wrinkled sleeve they way they would if she was just invisible. And she’s not holding a glass in the photo. She’s holding up her hand and pretending she’s holding one. She might not exist physically at all. He thinks that the thing Aelwen and Arianwyn are doing is to give her corporeal form. They also put together than even if Kalina is somehow in their heads, she can’t really by *in* their heads because she keeps asking questions she would know the answers to already if she could read their minds. Kristen wants to chain up Tracker in the Van to keep her safe from Kalina but Tracker puts the kibosh on that with a quickness (revealing things we kinda already knew about their sex life in the process).

Anyway, let’s split up!

Tinkerer’s Hall

The Owlbear group and the Hangman kinda freak out the gnomes who think they’re being mugged or something but Gorgug wins them over with his gnomish last name and cool Solesian gadgets. They find out Killian needed wax to make candles and some basic spell components.

Tavern

The two Bad Kids possibly least equipped to go to the bar go there and try to get access to Adaine’s mom’s room. They pay Arianwyn’s tab (she left abruptly without paying) and bribe the bartender with an amount of money that will for sure get them put on a watchlist, sweating bullets the entire time, but eventually make it up there to the top suite.

The room is blood spattered, full of candle wax and arcane symbols, and there’s an image Adaine knows her mom drew of a robed, skeletal figure, wearing a crown, etched into the wall. Yikes. 

Shrine

Sandra-Lynn drops off the girls. Tracker casts a light spell and then has to step out. It’s like a vampire at the doorway of a church thing. Kristen sees a religious symbol on the wall and an ancient depiction of a woman in a dark robe and cape, holding a book and a broomstick, next to a small dwelling, black cat on her shoulder. 

Fig sees a charred handprint on the briars in the shrine and recognizes it as her own. She casts Burning Hands on her handprint that’s here for some reason and the fire catches and spreads. Brennan has a lot of fun making fire sound effects. A fiery doorway opens and a woman in armor, with horns and skeletal wings (plus flayed skin under the armor from what they can see--except for her face which is intact and beautiful) walks out and asks for Fig. When Fig identifies herself, the woman says she’s Vraz the Mean from the Nine Hells and Fig has been served. As in legally. As in a subpoena. 

Wild. 

Detention

Fig for Using up Two Luck Points Pre-Excursion Into a Doom Forest to Conceal a Crush 

I adore both Fig generally and Fig in this episode specifically but, truly, what a waste of Luck points at the cusp what possibly could be such a dire moment. And she won’t get those back before a long rest. This storyline is going so slowly. I’ve written (as I’m writing this sentence) 48k words worth of Report Cards and it’s been like what? A week? Less than that? She might not get those back for a while.

Now do I wish she’d made a different decision? Absolutely not. Emily, as always, is ride or die for the roleplay and I both love and respect it. 

But I can high-key see this biting her in the ass.  

Honor Roll

Kristen for Holding her Own Against Kalina

I think this marks K-girl’s first appearance on the Honor Roll and in my opinion (mine being the only one that matters I guess since I have no oversight and am Czar of this arbitrary award) she really earned it. First that clutch perception nat 20 to spot her and then having to hold the entire conversation by herself with no backup because she was the only one who could see her. I think this was actually a really good time for her to use her wild downplaying attitude and she was able to keep Kalina occupied for long enough for Riz to gather some of the most interesting pieces of info about Kalina yet. Very clutch.    

Random Thoughts

For a closer look into character/location descriptions from this episode, you can check out @jamiebluewind‘s posts here and here.

“Has your girl ever not delivered?”/”Yes.”/”Multiple times.”/”I mean, it’s always entertaining when you don’t.”

Lou and Siobhan Re the Hangan: “Can it turn into a Gundam?”/”Is it a transformer?”

Shoutout to Brennan for heading off flying Van shenanigans at the pass. That would have been an Immediate Problem. 

“I have never touched my Dad’s butt, nor do I want to.”

Brennan breaking himself during his first Gilear line of the ep. I wonder if he goes into any Gilear sentence knowing where he’s going, or if it’s all freeform improvisational jazz.

I think it’s really interesting that Fig fully loves Gilear but also still calls him Gilear and not Dad. Not deep meta point or anything. I just think it’s an interesting quirk of the character.   

Fig fully intending to eat an obvious death mushroom and every other party member at the same time slapping it out of her hands. 

I think I’ve mentioned on several occasions that I’m not really a shipper. Which isn’t to say I don’t enjoy romantic relationships in media. It’s just that it’s usually pretty clear which relationship the narrative is setting up so I really don’t get the point in basically campaigning for something that’s clearly going to happen (in which case, just enjoy the progression) or campaigning for something that’s clearly not going to happen and then being disappointed. But I gotta say, this Fig and Ayda has been a ride, I think largely because there was really no way to see this was coming when Ayda was introduced. Like, Tracker for instance was clearly introduced with Kristen in mind, down to being the Moon Cleric to her former Sun Cleric. Not only was Ayda not set up as a romanceable NPC, she very easily could have been skipped as even an option for befriending at all. She didn’t really make herself super available for it and it wasn’t even Fig who struck up a friendship with her initially. It was Adaine. And then Adaine got kidnapped which pushed the two resident Adaine stans together and, what do you know? Sparks (and not just from Ayda’s hair). The organic-ness of the relationship really added something that makes it really interesting and special. 

Also, lol that Fig finally found an age appropriate relationship but she’s also technically 150.

“I’m not gonna mend your piss pants.” 

For Adaine, the peak of luxury is access to fluffy robes which, mood.

OK, just to explicitly state my current pet theory that I alluded to last week, it seems pretty darn likely that Kalina is the familiar of the Mystery goddess. I said that cats are the most iconic witch’s familiar and, this ep, we saw the goddess depicted with a black cat. Plus, Brennan casually but very specifically noted that Kalina isn’t a big-cat. She’s like the tabaxi version of a house cat. And we learned that Kalina seems to be intangible which takes away one thing that was a little off for me--it seemed more like she was spreading a virus but the fact that she is intangible and just visible to people who are “infected” makes it seem more like she herself is the virus. AND, we were introduced to the concept of an Awakened, Sentient animal companion this episode which would be a great thing to do if you’re setting up the fact that this witch goddess turned her cat into a full sentient being and then a tabaxi and then a virus.  

Lol at Tracker giving Sandra-Lynn a Shovel Talk re: Jawbone. 

Riz, upon being questioned by Kristen where he got the photo of her for the “Casual” conspiracy wall he’s making: Look, you take pictures you hang them.

I want the Bad Kids to keep the motto of, “Spring Break!” year round. I want them to use it forever. I want them to be in their 30s--well out of school--and run into a deadly situation in the middle of Winter yelling, “I believe in you! Spring Break!” while very, very confused bystanders watch them. That’s really what friendship is about. Confusing the hell out of strangers with your in-jokes. 

Between last week of Fantasy High and this week of CritRole, I think a lot of people just learned what the Hallow spell is. 

“Just by being here we’re stealing. I’m like Robin Hood.”

Hangman: No rules!/Adaine: Some rules!

Guys I was SO concerned that Fig was gonna pull a Fabian and do something Concerning without any party support. So happy she decided to just get her kisses in instead. And then at the end of the ep when the two most chaotic party members were given a hell door that it 1000% seemed like they were gonna jump through but were ust handed legal paperwork instead.  

Figs comment about one of the best parts of friendship being getting to be a “chorus of nonsense” together without regard for what’s being said is so real.

I love the D&D gag of the party members who are not at an intense moment interjecting with whatever nonsense they’re doing. 

Everyone holding their collective breaths and then breaking as Emily succumbs to the urge to Touch a Thing. “You simply must.”

Ayda thinks “Choke on grapes, bitch,” is an excellent threat, and I agree.

Who cares for Ayda when she’s a newborn? Or is she reborn old enough to take care of herself? Also, update: Aguefort even worse dad than initially thought. 

Fig skateboarding away and dropping invisibility so Ayda can see and then later kissing her and Ayda going full visible are such cinematic moments. Well, the second one is at least. The first is just extremely funny. 

“I’m not gonna kiss the shrimp, Kristen. It’s dead, and we killed it.”

“I desperately and only want you to stay. And the only thing I want to do more than stay is do something for you” Why does Brennan keep dropping these raw ass lines casually in his high school D&D game?

“Can I get a help action from the jets of the hot tub?”

One little moment I loved from this ep was Mira being confused by the concept of a rock star and Adaine translating that she’s a bard/troubadour. I also just love the word troubadour. We shouldn’t have ever stopped using it. 

“That makes me nervous. Everything makes me nervous. Sure, why not.” Mood.

Mira also makes a comment about how diverse the group is that did *not* sound like a positive or even neutral statement and, listen, I’m getting Daybreak vibes my dudes.

Very funny every time we’re reminded that the reason the Bad Kids are doing this is because it’s a school project. 

Interesting character detail that Adaine started off talking about Aelwen and Arianwyn with distancing language but eventually slipped back into just calling them her mom and sister. 

A note in case it’s relevant later: Nuathra said that Crafty--his druid companion--was not a fan of cleric stuff, thought it was nonsense, and tried to avoid it at all costs. 

Fabian re Nuathra: What did the fox say?

Kristen asks Kalina’s name and she says, “You can call me Kalina,” which is subtly different than, “My name is Kalina,” which is probably just a turn of phrase and not plot relevant but I’ve been reading a lot of Fae stuff recently and a hyper-aware of weasel-out wording right now. 

“You good?”/”Now that I’m being pressed into the grass by all my friends? Yes.”

Adaine to Riz’s earlier encounter with Kalina: That was all you? You did all that damage to yourself?

I love Fig’s outrage at Adaine joking that she uses Detect Thoughts. The idea of, “We kill people and break into places and Catfish adult men but we DO NOT Detect Thoughts on each other that is the LINE.”

Kristen giving herself a sexy roleplay promotions from Officer up to Colonel was killing me. That whole thing was such a good bit and Ally and Brennan were on the same page immediately.  

Can’t wait to see the demonic (or is that devilish?) legal system so I can tell y’all how accurate it is and use something I learned in law school for once in my life. (Note: I am a lawyer, but you’d be surprised how unhelpful law school is to actually being a lawyer). 

Wonder what that subpoena was for. Maybe something involving Gorthalax or the wall? I’m trying to think of what they’d have jurisdiction over. She said the dude she works under is on the Sloth level of hell. 

Siobhan mentioned she has good Portent rolls right now which is comforting to hear. Lol, imagine if she had also decided to go full teenager this episode and use them to ferret out Fig’s crush.   

I need you to know that, in this same week (all within 48 hours of each other), between CritRole, Naddpod, The Good Place finale, I was really just drowning in content and emotions. 

The only crit of the ep is a nat 20 from Kristen. 

[marithlizard]

Ace Attorney: Rise From the Ashes (Day Two, Trial Latter) (part 3)

Wherein I attempt to liveblog a mostly text-based videogame.  The trial continues!  Lunch is over and yet we’re still being fed indigestible statements. 

Court has recessed briefly for information-gathering. The clock says it's not even noon, but I feel like we've heard hours’ worth of (mostly untrue) testimony.

Lana has been called to the judge's chambers for reasons unknown.  Ema is realizing just how much of a, what's the polite word, “freewheeler” she's chosen to represent her sister.  But Phoenix is still flailing about when any other defense attorney in this world would have given up, so she'd best appreciate him.

It's the cowboy!  Who pointedly mentions Lana's scarf, which he saw her wearing on the day of the murder.   Since she wasn't wearing it in the photograph taken afterward, presumably the missing muffler is...in the car muffler?  Was she trying to hide something, or give Edgeworth carbon monoxide poisoning?  And just why is Marshall dropping us this helpful hint?

Court resumes with Edgeworth on the verge of some kind of conniption fit.   The judge lists off his symptoms concernedly - oh NO surely you didn't eat one of the lunchboxes, Edgeworth!  I've already been wondering how Angel Starr resisted the urge to give you food poisoning for two years, and that was before you verbally eviscerated her on the witness stand.

...Hello, who's this?

Peach suit, white hair, pink glasses and an avuncular folksy charm.  You. I don't like you.  

"Udgey?"  Is that the judge's name, or some sort of twee pig-latin nickname for Judge?  And "Wrighto" and "Worthy".  And he can get away with calling people slightly demeaning and offbeat nicknames, because apparently he's the district chief of police,  Damon Gant.  Phoenix is chastised for not recognizing him, which is probably fair.

Okay, that technique of taking away the dialogue box for several seconds while Gant cocks his head and blinks at us is quite effective.  This, we're silently being told, is a character so powerful they can interrupt the flow of the game itself. 

The judge notes that it's been "over two years" since Gant was in the courtroom.  That matches when Angel was fired.   This is all about one case, isn't it?  The case Lana and the victim worked on, the case that got Marshall demoted.

Gant has brought some false sympathy for Edgeworth and also Lana's missing scarf, which was indeed found stuffed in the car muffler.   (So the lunchlady was telling the truth about at least something.)  The scarf was wrapped around a switchblade with a tag on it. So, not a personal possession like Edgeworth's knife, but...an exhibit?  Something from storage? Like, evidence storage?

Edgeworth is justifiably upset that the police investigation didn't notice a scrap of red cloth hanging out of the car muffler inches away from the body.  Gant's initial sheepish admission that "this is embarrassing, even for us"  suddenly turns into that blinking Look again.   I feel like a trap is about to be sprung.

It's the envelope from yesterday, the one delivered by the hapless mailman!  Who told Edgeworth it wasn't related to the case, so he refused to take it.   Ouch.  It is Edgeworth's error, but there's something gleefully malicious about the way  Gant just set him up and then sucker-punched him.  There was no need for this to be a public humiliation.  In fact, it could've been discreetly sorted out before Gant got on the stand.  Or before trial started this morning.

(Why IS he on the stand? He's not a testifying witness. He just kinda...strolled in and took over. )

The judge asks Phoenix to examine the switchblade.  The knife tip is broken off and the blade and handle have bloodstains.    The tag, when I zoom in focus to max, says "S-L 9 2".   As for the envelope, it appears to be an autopsy report on Goodman, and doesn't mention the muffler or switchblade at all.  It also has a much vaguer timeframe than 5:15. 

Edgeworth tries to regain face by demanding an explanation about the missed evidence.  This is a bad, bad idea. I could've told you that even before Gant delightedly agrees  to testify.

Gant says the knife is special, but that he can't say how unless a  "connection is proven between the knife and Goodman."   Um. Doesn't the very presence of the knife, deliberately concealed at the crime scene, in itself mean it's not only connected but vital to understanding what happened?  I don't think you should get to withhold that information.

Nor do I think "we were having a bad day" is an acceptable excuse for not investigating the crime scene properly.  Cops get aggressively motivated when one of their own is attacked, everybody knows that.  Or was Goodman some kind of pariah?  

...wait.  What???   What Gant's saying is so bizarre I misread it.  There was a SECOND murder, at precisely the same time (and that's an awfully precise time),  at the police department?  "Not officially linked to this case" my aunt Fanny.

And Phoenix isn't supposed to ask about it in cross-examination?  I predict that will last about five seconds, because we're going to press every one of these statements hard enough to extract olive oil.

Starting with the knife.  Both Phoenix and Edgeworth push for more, but Gant refuses.  Can I make a connection that will impress the judge?  My inventory contains a phone, a shoe...and a note found in the trunk of the car that says "6-75 12/2".    Which looks a lot like "2/21 SL-9" if you turn it upside down.

Gant is acting as though this is a circus and he's never seen a clown before, delighted at everything Phoenix and the judge say.    This conveys an impression of total contempt behind a fig leaf of friendliness that can't be questioned.  It's a passive-aggressive masterpiece.  Somewhere in the audience Himemiya Anthy is probably taking notes.

And his facade barely flickers when faced with the memo.  The knife was evidence in a case (duh).  Stolen from the evidence room...and that's it? That's all we get?

Oh, this guy is skilled.   Edgeworth quite reasonably asks why he wasn't told about this impossibly coincidental murder, and Gant promptly insinuates that he's incompetent because he didn't proactively ask.  As though a proper prosecutor would have called the department every day with a checklist of possible events.  Why, I bet you didn't even consider a Godzilla attack contingency, did you?   Tsk tsk.

Gant continues to playfully refuse to give information on this second murder (except that a suspect has been arrested).  He offers to give Phoenix one data  point of his choice: where, how or when.  Apparently this trial has turned into a game show.

We already know when, so I choose where.  And Gant makes a curious distinction.  The crime took place in the evidence room (where the knife came from), but he won't say where the corpse was found.    Was the body moved?  As they say, he is playing a game and it is called silly buggers.   I'm absolutely assuming he is behind both murders (though sadly he can't have committed both, unless something paranormal or very complicated is going on).

Phoenix points out that a knife being stolen from the evidence room and then found at crime A, precisely when crime B is committed in the evidence room, is a pretty "duh" link.  Edgeworth supports by mentioning the note.   Whoever wrote it (Goodman, the murderer, or Lana)  presumably either stole the knife or was investigating its theft.    Even the judge agrees this has to count.  Gant just does his blink thing again.

And says his men took two days to assemble that logic.  In other words, he knew. And he STILL wants to play games.  He'll talk "unofficially", but not reveal the name of the victim.  (Why is that so important?)  When pressed, he offers  another one-data-point choice.   I choose ID number which should be easy to link to a name...although apparently Gant doesn't think so.

Victim ID number: 5842189.   The judge looks expectant.  I have a horrible idea, and check the court record.

Yep. It's Goodman's ID number.

Simultaneous murders of the same victim in different locations? That's an impressive level of silly buggers, chief.  And you didn't want this to come out in the trial? If I didn't already know Lana was innocent by video-game rules, I'd know it now.

Even this doesn't faze Gant.   (I really wanted to see him look thwarted. Damnit.) 

Edgeworth keeps on asking "Why didn't I hear about this?"  even though the answer is always "Because Gant has it in for you, and you just gave him another opening to attack."   It's as though he can't quite believe what is happening.  

Yep, there's that trap-springing look again.  With the first honest expression I think we've seen on Gant's face so far!  Just for one frame,  a flicker of anger and malice. This time he claims the police department sent Edgeworth all the information in that envelope delivered by Hapless Mailman Meekins, which Edgeworth didn't look at.

Hang on.  That's not even true.  We have that envelope in the court record, and...*scrolls up*...it's an autopsy report on Goodman.   It doesn't say which.  Even if Edgeworth had read it, he would have had no reason to think there was a second crime and victim.   Moreover,  Gant already raked him over the coals for not reading it,  in this same trial session!   No...as the trap unfolds,  Gant seems to be claiming this is an entirely different envelope also delivered by Meekins(?)  It doesn't make sense.

But truth isn't going to matter here.  This is a career-destroying maneuver, and it's uncomfortable to watch.  Edgeworth is helpless under the crushing accusations,  protesting vainly that Gant could have submitted all this evidence  when the trial started.   Well, yes, that's what anyone but your enemy would have done...    The flicker of malice is back as Gant rubs it all in with a technicality about evidence law.

(Ah, this detail might be relevant:  Edgeworth  apparently submitted a list of evidence to be used in the trial, which of course did not include things he didn't know existed.    That flies in the face of all Phoenix Wright games past and present, in which new evidence is produced about every five minutes during trial, this one included.)

This morning's Public Career Assassination, I mean trial,  comes to an end with Gant mentioning the rumors about Edgeworth, and even using his own brief status as a defendant against him.  Edgeworth can do nothing but formally grovel.  He begs for one more day of trial to investigate all this new information.   The judge grants it,of course, but joins in condemning him.

I don't know why Gant wants to get rid of Edgeworth, but it's obvious the plan is to fire him after tomorrow's trial no matter what happens.   The only way to save Edgeworth (and oh yeah, our actual client who's barely been mentioned lately) is to bring Gant down.  I am on board with this.  He's a mean lying stinkyhead and he's smug about it.   Get him, Phoenix!

(Rereading my notes from last time,  I'm remembering the moment when Angel Starr told Edgeworth "I might be able to save you".  Did she know this was coming down? )

[titanias-stolen-shoes]

Crossing Paths: Part Four

Summary: Something happened to Ayda—she just doesn’t know it yet. With her internship at the Cross Points Public Library, absent mind but ever-present father, nothing feels out of place. That is, until she finds a journal in the library she can’t read and soon after a wild assortment of kids come in, asking for her help.

Together they work together to figure out their dreams, the journals, and whether they can figure their way back home from our world.

Read on AO3!

-

Ayda laid awake, wondering why she had avoided letting Garthy know the truth. She hadn’t lied to him. She never lied. She did, however, not tell them the whole truth. Just that loud teenagers had come to the library right as it was closing. They had laughed and joked that she should steer clear of them. “They’re probably a bunch of bad kids,” Garthy laughed, hopping off the table. “I’m joking, love, I’m sure they perfectly fine. Don’t be afraid to talk to them if you want to.”

“They seem… normal. And I can’t always be sure that what I say or do is normal.”

“Oh, love,” they said, flipping their dreads over their shoulder. “There no way to really know if what you say or do is normal, but it’s not just you. Everyone is worried about if what they’re doing is normal. You just have to be yourself and if you’re worried about it, take cues from someone you like.”

They left after that, leaving Ayda to cook dinner for her Arthur. After an hour of waiting, she made him a plate in the microwave and went to her room. She had planned to sleep early so she could have enough energy for tomorrow, whatever it might bring. Instead, she tossed and turned, unable to sleep.

It wasn’t that she was nervous about meeting the other kids. In fact, she was excited. It would be nice to talk to other people her age. In school most people avoided her, saying she was “weird and hard to talk to”. She did her best not to talk as much after that. No, it actually wasn’t the kids. She was nervous about the journal. Not only did it incapacitate her, she learned nothing from the experience other than it was painful to try to read. And for them to come back to it, determined to figure out… she couldn’t imagine why they were after it.

The next morning, she walked to the library doors with heavy bags under her eyes, ready to call Rawlins to let her in. Before she could get to her phone, she saw a note on the door.

Ayda

Sorry for the short notice, but the library has been closed for the day. I will be back tomorrow afternoon. Enjoy your day off!

- Rawlins

She stared at the note, irritated and squinting. It didn’t make any sense to have the library suddenly be closed. As far as anyone knew, Rawlins didn’t do much outside of running the library. Unless it was library-related and he just forgot to tell her.

Behind her, a van rounded the corner into the parking lot, parking as close to the door as possible. All six of the kids she’d seen spilled out of the van, with two new additions (another tall man and a short girl with messy hair) surprised to see Ayda standing at the door.

Adaine shaded her eyes from the sun and said, “Are we too early?”

“Yes, but it doesn’t matter. The library is closed.”

“Really?” Her shoulders sagged in disappointment. “We came all the back for nothing. Do you know when it’ll be open?”

“Tomorrow afternoon.”

“Really?” Riz perked up, turning back to the van and grabbing his backpack. “Ayda, how do you feel about breaking and entering?”

“Ooh yes,” The punk girl clapped her hands, grinning. “I love it when we do illegal stuff.”

“Oh, hell yeah.” The new tall one grinned. “Do you need me to stand watch?”

“I don’t feel comfortable with illegal activity.” Then she paused, thinking about Garthy and how whatever it was they did, was probably very illegal. “Let me rephrase I am not comfortable with most illegal activity. Why are you all so interested in the journal?”

They were all quiet for a moment, exchanging looks then the tallest one piped up saying, “We’re not gonna get inside if we don’t tell her.”

“Yeah,” the redhead said. “There were letters that we found under Fabian’s house. We were just goofing around and there was a box hidden underneath a bunch of crap. Anyway, all these letters were addressed to us. There was a lot of weirdly specific stuff in them. Like how me and Tracker—”

“Babe, not that,” Tracker cut in. “It was weird, so we asked his parents about it and they both said the pages were blank. No one but us could see them.”

“And if we tried to read each other’s letters they wouldn’t make any sense. It would be a jumble of words that made no sense. And the only correlation any of them had was the Cross Points Library. So, we’re here to see if we can figure this out.”

“I see.” Ayda crossed her arms, quietly processing what they said. Much like the journal, what they said shouldn’t have been possible. And yet they were here, at a library in the middle of summer when they all (well, most) looked like they wouldn’t go near a library if they had a choice.

“Do you not believe us?”

“I do. I’ll overlook this transgression if you all introduce yourselves to me.”

They all stared for a moment before one by one looking a little embarrassed. Adaine smiled a little before pointing to each of her friends, “Tracker, Kristen, Riz, Gorgug, Fabian, Fig, and Ragh.”

“I’m Ayda. There are cameras pointed at this door. Follow me to the back.”

“So, Ayda,” Adaine said, doubling her pace to keep up with Ayda. “How long have you been working here?”

“A little under a month. I work an internship so I technically employed here.”

“Tell me you’re at least getting paid.”

“I am. I won’t work for free even if it’s work I enjoy. Equal exchange is important.”

“Hmm. Then our names were equal exchange for letting us break in?”

“Yes, I don’t know very many people my age and I’m also curious about the journal.” They stopped at the back of the building, less grand that the front and no cameras to catch what they were about to do. Ayda squatted down, feeling along the stone for a familiar carving. Almost toward the bottom, she pressed in on the one she’d carved an ‘A’ on and it came out of its place, leaving a perfectly size hole for her to pull the trick door open.

Riz looked far too excited as he picked up the stone and started to examine it. “How did you know about this?”

“Last year I spent almost all of my free time here.” She held her hand out and he gently gave her the brick. “A great deal of that time was spent wandering.”

They all shuffled in, watching their head on the low entrance and into the sublevel of the library. The door let out in the boiler room which was near inaccessible to people who didn’t know that the bookshelves on the far right didn’t touch the walls. Ayda wasn’t normally allowed in here for obvious reasons, but Rawlins had shown her just in case.

The room was as messy as the first time she had seen it. Boxes were haphazardly stacked against the far wall and an old workbench was shoved off to the right.

“Hey,” Fabian said, moving toward the pile of boxes. “This is the exact same box we found our letters in. The exact same.” He shifted the boxes on top and pulled out a small wooden chest with the same set of wings on the journal burned onto the top. Next to it, carved roughly, was a bass guitar.

“It’s locked,” Riz said, swinging his backpack off. “I’ll open it.”

“I’ll go get the books. Both of them are down here with us.” Ayda moved away from their group to the door. There was just enough space between the bookshelf and the wall that the door wouldn’t hit it. She grabbed Daya’s journal easily, always remember where it was. The second book was a little harder to find. Not that she didn’t know where it was, but every time she looked in that direction, she found herself looking elsewhere.

“Ayda!” Adaine popped out from behind the bookshelf, looking a little surprised. “I wanted to see where they were. The books.”

“Alright.”

“So… do you always spend your time here?”

“No. When I’m not here, I’m at home or helping my father with his research.”

“That sounds fun. Listen, I don’t have many… bookish people in my life.”

“Why? Are you hard to be around?”

“Uh, no, I— No? Are you hard to be around?”

“Yes. I’ve been told that many times.”

“Oh. Do you want a friend?”

They stopped in front of the shelf and Ayda turned to face Adaine. She looked sincere, fiddling with her crystal necklace. “Desperately.”

“I’ll be your friend. Would you like to hold my frog?” From her bag, she produced a small, plush frog. It was as spherical as one could make a frog without it being unrecognizable. It was cuter than it had any reason to be.

“I don’t take presents. I have nothing to give in exchange.”

“It’s not a present. I need Boggy.” She held him out and slowly Ayda took the plush. He was soft and Ayda felt calmer holding him.

“Magnificent.” Ayda gave him back and turned to the shelf, one her eyes had been scampering away from. In the very back of the autobiography section was the second book, but this one was three composition notebooks glued together. Messily written on the front was the name Iggy Fathe.

“Why is that so hard to look at?”

“I do not know.” Ayda frowned, trying to keep her gaze pinned to the name. It looked… wrong. Like it was missing something and she couldn’t place what.

“Adaine! Ayda!” Kristen’s voice called out from the other side. “We got the box open!”

“Maybe someone else will be able to look at it.”

Back in the boiler room, they were all crowding around the box, looking at a bundle of papers along with a few pictures. The pictures were blurry, but not in a way that would indicate whoever was taking them had been bad at it. No, the pictures were just blurry to her eyes and it made her not want to interact with them.

“Here’s your letter. No one but you can read it. And maybe Adaine depending.”

“Adaine?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know why, but I’m the only one who can sort of read everyone else’s letters. I can’t make out much, but I did make out enough to get us here.”

“Impressive.” Ayda unfolded the bunded of papers and felt… odd. Like something in her shifted out of place and back. Not like the journal, but almost a feeling of nostalgia.

She picked one of the boxes and settled down to read her letter.

-

Part One || Part Two || Part Three || Part Four

[alysses123]

@homoeroticsubtextinspace made me do it

1. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you?

Well now I do! But seriously, no not ever.

2. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you?

3 I’d say. Feel uneasy but not terrified

3. The person you would never want to meet?

Idk, no one in particular I guess

4. What is your favorite word?

In english I love arson, idk why. In french (my native language), couette

5. If you were a type of tree, what would you be?

I love oak trees but I’m not one, i’d say more of a plum tree

6. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought?

Shit I messed up my eyeliner

7. What shirt are you wearing?

Simple black one with long sleeves

8. What do you label yourself as?

Small

9. Bright room or dark room?

Bright room! With sun! or plenty of lamps!

10. What were you doing at midnight last night?

Definitely sleeping!

11. Favorite age you’ve been so far?

8. I feel like all of my childhood happened when I was 8. 

12. Who told you they loved you last?

My boyfriend I think. We’re quite cheesy actually

13. Your worst enemy?

Capitalism and how it makes us feel bad for being human.

14. What is your current desktop picture?

It’s Mtg art! Slimefoot the stowaway! Loooove it so much!

15. Do you like someone?

Plenty of people! I like my friends, most of my family, my boyfriend, the cat at my place, random people...

16. The last song you listened to?

Honestly no idea

17. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up?

I’d have said the orange blob but @homoeroticsubtextinspace said Bezos and honestly? Mood.

18. Who would you really like to just punch in the face?

Me personally I wouldn’t like punching someone. However I would love to see nazis punched in the face.

19. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do?

No slaves, bad thing to enslave people.

20. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional)

My hair! Love it! Especially when I dye it on shave it!

21. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do?

I would look like a very average guy I think, Not short nor tall, a bit on the skinnier side, brown haired… Well like me but as a guy.

Idk. I guess I would want to have sex because it must feel different when you have a penis.

22. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it?

Not really, I don’t want to hide my talents!

23. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of?

Slugs. Hate them.

24. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal.

Bread with some cereals, goat cheese, figs, honey, pepper. 

25. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it?

Buy useful stuff for our home. Maybe curtains.

26. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go?

I don’t want to travel by plane! but I’d say Iceland, looks beautiful.

27. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be? 

Uuuuuuuuh…. Idk. I like infused rum so I’d say HSE.

28. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place? 

Don’t hurt others.

29. What is your favorite expletive?

Fuck. I also use Putain in french but I don’t particularly use it

30. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno?

My teddy bear I think? Idk, I don’t have a lot of belongings so everything I have, I love and want to keep.

31. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

I don’t think I’ve lived a horrible experience. bad ones but not horribles ones. 

32. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world!

Uh… weird question but honestly it doesn’t feel very me, so I wouldn’t want to move out of France.

33. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back?

I think the deads belong with Death, it’d fuck up ones brain to see someone who isn’t anymore.

34. What was your last dream about?

A coat. I want to make myself one soooo bad.But idk how I want it to be, so it’s hard.

35. Are you a good….[insert anything you’d like here]?

porcupine? No, I’m a terrible porcupine.

36. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital?

Yeah 2 times I’d say. Once I fell off a horse and once I fell of a playground trapeze.

37. Have you ever built a snowman?

Yes! I like it but it doesn’t snow enough :(

38. What is the color of your socks?

Brown, they are handknitted by a friend!

39. What type of music do you like?

here are some stuff i like: 

Uuuuuuuh rap, funk, I really like the Cure, Florence and the machine, Devo, les Wriggles, Renaud (his old stuff because the new stuff is… bad. Really bad.), Zebda, Diana Ross, Earth wind and fire...

40. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets?

Sunrise! feels magical.

41. What is your favorite milkshake flavor?

I don’t really like milkshakes :/

42. What football team do you support?

None.

43. Do you have any scars?

A few. One on my cheeks looks really badass but it’s from my cat. One on my leg from when I fell off a bike. A few burn ones because I’m not careful around hot stuff, and my work involves hot irons. A new one from a dog bite. And three inked scars (okay, they’re tattoos but technically it’s a scar) 

44. What do you want to be when you graduate?

I graduated  a few weeks ago, so I’d say I want to work in my field. 

45. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

More confidence! That’s all n.n

46. Are you reliable?

I think I am.

47. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be? 

Am I cringy rn?

48. Do you hold grudges?

I can put up with a lot, but when I decide I’m done, we’re done.

49. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create?

A cat and a shark! 

50. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had?

I have no idea. 

51. Are you a good liar?

I have major anxiety if I don’t feel it’s the right thing to do but I think I can pull it off quite well, I’m a good actress.

52. How long could you go without talking? 

Talking? a day or two if there’s no one around, even though I’d probably start talking to myself. Expressing myself via text or something? A couple hours, not much more n.n

53. What has been you worst haircut/style?

Fringe. Very bad decision.

54. Have you ever baked your own cake?

Yes, of course.

55. Can you do any accents other than your own?

No, very bad at it.

56. What do you like on your toast?

Cheese

57. What is the last thing you drew a picture of?

pants. Ugly, it was to explain something.

58. What would be your dream car?

None, I don't like cars.

59. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain.

No, but after the shower, I need to get most of the water off my skin before using the towel. Otherwise the towel feels too wet.

60. Do you believe in aliens?

I think there’s very little chance we’re the only living (whatever that means) beings in the whole UNIVERSE. That shit’s big.

61. Do you often read your horoscope?

No. I say I don’t believe in astrology but I know a part of me is like “what if”, so I try not to feed it ;)

62. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet?

A because it’s the first letter of my name.

63. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons?

Oh hard one! Dinosaurs are cooler as in 90’s style cool, dragons are cooler as in badass col.

64. What do you think about babies?

Ugh.

[ask-de-writer]

DARING DO and the ADVENTURE of the X'IBIAN VASE! : MLP Fan Fiction : Part 3 of 21

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DARING DO and the

ADVENTURE of the X'IBIAN VASE!

by

De Writer (Glen Ten-Eyck) @ask-de-writer​

And

Carmen Pondiego @askcarmenpondiego​

Cover Art by

Doctor Dimension

52630 words

© 2020 by Glen Ten-Eyck

Writing begun 08/26/15

All rights reserved.  This document may not be copied or distributed on or to any medium or placed in any mass storage system except by the express written consent of the author.

//////////////

Copyright fair use rules for Tumblr users

Users of Tumblr.com are specifically granted the following rights.  They may reblog the story.  They may use the characters or original characters in my settings for fan fiction, fan art works, cosplay, or fan musical compositions, provided that such things are done without charge.  I will allow those who do commission art works to charge for their images.  

All sorts of fan art, cosplay, music or fictions is actively encouraged.

///////////////////////

Steeling herself, she approached the entrance.  As the black glass doors opened, they revealed a confidant looking khaki colored unicorn mare dressed in a stylish, near form fitting red outfit.  Carmen Pondiego.  Her true mother.

Carmen smiled that sideways smile that she always used when she was about to pull Daring Do’s chain by calling her by her birth name.  Daring Do beat her to it.

“Adora hasn’t been home in a long time, Mother.  Things have changed a lot.  You really meant that about hiding in the open, didn’t you?”

Carmen’s mouth dropped open. Feeling behind her for support, Carmen settled into one of the comfortable overstuffed leather chairs in the VILE foyer.

Softly, she replied, “Yes, dear.  I did mean it.”  She took a shaking breath and added, “You are in time for the lasagna.  I remember how much you used to enjoy it, Adora.”

Daring Do nodded and sat on the arm of the chair.  “I did, mom.  I still do.  I don’t order it often … It reminds me of you.

“I am going to admit that I am really conflicted about the name … and you … and VILE.  It is hard but I am here.”  She reached down and took Carmen’s hoof.

They sat in silence for several minutes.  “Mother, I am not going to ask you for forgiveness. There is too much that I have not forgiven yet.”

Carmen patted the hoof of her estranged daughter and said, “I do understand, Adora.  At least you are here and letting me call you by the name that I gave you.  That is a first step.  I hope, one of many.”

Daring Do nodded slowly.  In the Chineighese of Cantron she quoted the proverb, “The journey of a thousand Li begins with a single step.”

Without hesitation, Carmen replied in the same language, “Whether the journey be a thousand Li or a thousand of thousands, the welcoming door of home is the best place for it to end.”

Taking a deep breath, Carmen suggested, “Let’s go see if the lasagna is ready!  I had it out, cooling.”

“Now that is something that I hoped you would say, mother.”

They wended their way through the maze of the big building.  As they made yet another zig, Daring Do reflected that the Canterlot HQ of VILE was not the biggest nor most impressive of her mother’s organizational HQs. The true nerve center of VILE was the enormous floating island.

They finally entered a comfortable common room with a nice but not fancy dining table and chairs.  It was pretty big, which made sense.  The whole family was there.  Daring Do’s biological father, the alicorn Baron Von Nighthoof sat at one end of the table, space for her mother at the OTHER end showed that they were on the “outs” romantically … Again.

She and her step brother Blendin were next to each other at Carmen’s end of the table.  Her Uncle Marehem, or M for short, was down at the end by the Baron.  Next to him, at Carmen’s end was Kiros.  Technically, Kiros was not family, the others were some form of pony, or at least passing themselves off as one.  Kiros was a wolf hybrid with wings.  M was a changeling even if he was also Daring Do’s uncle.

This was the only part of VILE that Daring Do could accept, even marginally.  Family.  And she knew what was coming besides lasagna.  Snark.  

She was just reaching for her first big slab of some of the best lasagna in Canterlot when she felt it.  Virtually by reflex, Daring Do slammed an elbow back just above her saddle bag at the same time that she made a grab with her other hoof as she spun about.  The move nailed her half brother Blendin, with her map only half out of her bag.

Smiling sweetly she said, “Be glad that you are family, Blendin.  I use the hoof of the last pony to try that as a paperweight!”

Ignoring the comment, which Blendin knew to be perfectly true, he finished removing the map. “Why would you have one of these cheap  five silver X'ibian site maps?”

He spread it out and his jaw dropped.  “This is the original that you made when you were searching for the Darkling’s Tomb!

“Now it really makes no sense at all!  Why did you put that red X on top of Hong Wa?  Do you want me to remove it?  It is a really simple bit of Librarian’s Magic?”

Daring Do laid a gentle hoof over Blendin’s and said, “No, Blendin.  Thank you for the offer but that has become a delightful keepsake to the stupidity of ponies. They broke into my office at the RU and STOLE this.  They also broke many of the figurines of the Royal Darkling Collection being kept for study in my office.”

Baron Von Nighthoof’s brows almost hit his horn, they went up so far.  He clicked on the big Magic Net mirror for the evening news!  The story was not hard to locate.

“Agnes Wordspreader here with This Just IN!  Three divisions of the the Royal Guards, the Royal Heavy Armored Infantry and the Royal Armored Pegassi were mobilized today in DOWNTOWN Canterlot!  They surrounded the building of the lawfirm Robber, Overthrow, and Tyranny for a short while.

“When the Royal Negotiator emerged, she appeared to be none other than the world famous Antiquities Expert, Daring Do.  She spoke briefly with the Commander of the Royal Armored Infantry who, along with the rest of the military and Guard units, then withdrew.”

There were many pictures of the action, including Daring Do emerging from the R.O.T building.

Carmen, a bemused look on her face, pointed her horn at Daring Do and asked, “What were they looking for in your office, Adora, Darling?”

Wincing at the name, Daring Do ate a fork full of her mother’s absolutely heavenly lasagna before speaking.  “They expected to find the location of the tomb of Im Farst.  That X on the map?  It is the EXACT location of it!  

“All that I have to do is go to the Necropolis,” Daring raised her eyebrows and made a fair imitation of Tyranny’s voice as she added, “That’s like a graveyard, locate the appropriate tomb and dig it up!”

Blendin, like all the others around the table, was giggling so hard that it was difficult to speak.  At last he got out, “The only thing that could make that funnier would be if the 'IT’ that they want is the Heart of Discord!”

In a swiftly planned tactical strike, Daring Do said, “It IS!  They do want the Heart of Discord!”

As the whole table exploded in laughter, Daring Do craftily snagged the last two pieces of lasagna.

Uncle M was wiping tears from his eyes and commenting, “I blew lasagna out my nose!”

Sounding almost innocent, Daring Do offered, “Uncle M, I have something else here for your amusement!”  She hoofed over the folded sheets of R.O.T.’s offer.

M unfolded them and nearly choked.  Tears of joy in his eyes, he implored, “May I make a copy of this?  At Allstable we make custom policies all the time.  Some of this is the finest pure legal worm slime that I have ever read! Really good stuff!

“There is no way that you can win with this.  Even if you fulfill all the terms, the whole expedition cost to them is to be deducted from your payment.  You could end up owing R.O.T. thousands in gold.”

Daring Do smiled around her latest forkful of lasagna and swallowed.  “Feel free to copy it, M. What I need from you is a copy that actually says what this one purports to.”

M grinned and promised, “Piece of Lasagna, Adora …  My seconds!  You are eating my seconds!”

Carmen smiled.  “That gives you more room for the frozen Pomegranate Gelatto that I fixed for dessert.”

Relaxing with a few candied figs to fill up corners, Daring Do asked, “How did the bidding go for the Golden Necklace of Pharow Underrock?”

Carmen leaned back in a comfortably padded chair and steepled her hooves.  “We really only had a little time, Adora.  we could do better with more time.  The best that I could do on short notice was 1.5 million golden bits.”

She pointed an admonitiory hoof and went on, “THAT is BEFORE V.I.L.E.’s 20% cut.  That leaves 1.2 million for you.  The money can be deposited in your Equestrian National account by noon tomorrow, if that is satisfactory to you?”

Daring Do nodded, “The money is quite satisfactory.  Thank you.  I did mention that I had a concern about where the necklace was going.  What will happen to it?”

Carmen’s grin was huge.  “Our buyer has a project that needs a Royal sanction.  He will gift the necklace to Princess Luna for immediate permanent display in the Royal Museum with proper provenance and finder’s credit!”

Her own grin almost as wide as her mother’s at the neatly done cutting out of the Acquisition Committee and Count Umber, Daring Do handed over the simple but perfect wooden case of unmistakable Rom workmanship.  Carmen opened it reverently.  Her drawn breath was ample reward, really.  Daring Do knew that sound and expression on her mother’s face since infancy.

Baron Von Nighthoof leaned over to see it and suggested, “We could duplicate that.  Honor requires that the original be given as promised.  I can think of no neck in all of Equestria that such a copy would grace better than your own, Carmen.”

Daring Do knew that all would be done as promised. Her mother would kill before breaking the trust of her family.  She discreetly took her leave.

The next morning, Daring Do emerged from her room at the Adventurer’s Guild and took a refreshing dip in the Guild’s pool and a quick workout in the gym, followed by a few assorted practice workouts in the projectile weapons range.

Her appetite whetted by the light workout, she sat in the Guild’s dining room and ordered a modest breakfast.  The waiter who brought it was familiar.  She stopped him and said in X'ibian, “Listening to those with whom you disagree is the first step on the journey of understanding.  

“I have listened with care to those whom you and I agree are evil.  Now I wish to learn all that you will share.  It is clear that you know much more than you have said.”

The waiter stared carefully about before he bowed a formal Eastern bow and replied in X'ibian, “You are most observant.  You are also correct.  Sadly, most of what I wish to tell is proscribed by ancient oaths.  

“I will tell you this.  We would far sooner trust you to seek that ancient thing than any other. We know that you will treat where it lies with the respect that is due to our ancient land.  Not even we know where it lies any longer.

The Chineighese invasion and conquest a thousand years past destroyed many scholars and their libraries.  The hidden location of the tomb of Im Farst was lost and has not been refound.”

Daring Do nodded thoughtfully and divided her bowl of mixed fruits with him.  “Share with me the meal of friendship.

“I seek no harm to any ancient thing.  I try to find what is lost and restore it to living memory. Sadly, some things need to stay lost but NEVER destroyed.  I have provision made for that eventuality.”

He sat and ate his portion while Daring Do ate hers.  She divided her Alfalfa Waffle with him too.

Now deeply puzzled, she returned to the building of the R.O.T. lawfirm.  Greeting Horsetense, she spoke cheerfully, “I have the expedition agreement ready for the signatures of the partners!”

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Leica

By Vivian Darkbloom

Pairing: Mel/Janice

Rating: Mature

Synopsis: Janice buys Mel a camera. 

This Morning, The Bosporus

It has never occurred to me to keep a personal diary or journal of any kind. I’ve spend a good deal of my life immersed in reading and writing other people’s words, the vast majority of it significantly more profound than my own life and its accompanying mundane clutter, that my thoughts seem fairly trivial, not worth a written record.  Lately, however, I find myself wanting to write down the dreams I have at night, because they dissolve in the aperture of morning, and as the day fills with activity they’re gone, soon forgotten. They are vivid—at least I want to believe they are vivid. Otherwise I’m uncertain of why this compulsion has settled into me.

We’ve been traveling so much I forget at times where I am—another thing that abets the loss of the dreams is that as I wake I start wondering where we are. What city? Where are we headed?

This morning, however, I know exactly where we are: The Bosporus is outside the bedroom window. The Golden Horn, to be more precise, looking not so much golden as thickened with a gray mist that reminds me of London and hides the pearl of the Seraglio Point in generous folds of fog. And on the nightstand is something that wasn’t there last night when I went to bed—a sleek, black beauty, perfectly rectangular, crowned by a cheap pink bow: A Leica camera.

It must be my birthday—better yet, it must mean that she remembered my birthday.

The gravitas of the camera’s satisfying weight in my hand convinces me I could rival Cartier-Bresson as both an artist and a recorder of the human condition, and yes, I am still in some state of sleepy euphoria. Ignoring the bulky instruction manual (which serves as a humble ceremonial pillow for the camera on the nightstand)—not to mention my own rigid tendencies to properly research anything before undertaking it (sex, tennis, beef Bourguignon)—I explore, greedily. The lens cap pops like a champagne cork and the tip of my finger, careful not to smudge, runs a cautious lap around the rim of the lens. The ridges of the shutter dial and the rewinding knob nip my skin. The pebbled black body fits into my palm as I gaze through the viewfinder, touch another button, and commit to posterity the very first picture taken with my beloved new camera, a startling and intimate portrait of my bony ankle.

She’s in the doorway now, laughing at me—“You like it?”—hands in pockets, foot nervously bumping against the wood door frame, smiling with cocky shyness. And I wish this was the very first photo I’d taken.

Happy Birthday, Leica. It’s your day too.

Within the Circle of Memory

After two days of photographing everything in sight, she has lost patience with me, as the world of Istanbul is documented in my own mercurial way—alleys, bridges, mosques, men at coffee shops, women behind store counters, baskets of figs, mirrors in the marketplace, a cloud blurred in the reflection of a puddle (my artistic pretensions still exceeding my technical grasp at this point). I suspect, however, that lavishing the Leica’s attention for several long minutes on a scrawny, surly alley cat was the last straw—and so she decides to turn the tables: “Give me the camera. I want to take a picture of you.”

My grip tightens possessively around the Leica. “You already have plenty of photos of me.”

“Those old photos?  You’re always dressed up and have some sort of ape-man on your arm. No,” she continues, “I want something recent, where you look like you. Where you’re smiling.”

I’m usually on the opposite side of the camera, albeit not by choice. Smile! Say cheese! Pretend you’re happy to be clinging to that tuxedoed baboon’s arm, at least! In these photos I’m as graven as a life mask. She’s right, I never look like me in these pictures, and so I surrender.

The camera suddenly appropriated, she fumbles with it. The cigarette in her mouth darts up, down, side to side, as if an antenna seeking guidance from a distant satellite on the proper f-stop, and the burning ash a prism jockeying for the perfect angle of light. When the cigarette juts up in a classic FDR fashion, her jaw line tenses with disappointment and I want to kiss that angry, soft fault line right here in this very public street.

If I can resist the temptation to kiss, I cannot resist the temptation to meddle: “Let me.”

“I can do it.”

“I know. Just let me fix the settings for you.”

“If you’d give me a goddamn minute—”

I give her a goddamn minute, and more. Many more. Despite the anxious flutter of my stomach, I say nothing even when it becomes painfully obvious that she thinks the rewind knob will adjust the viewfinder. How on earth did she ever get the film into the camera before she gave it to me? She must have bribed the shop owner! Finally, I can take no more and hold out my hand: “Here.”

She relents, but not without a growl of “oh, fuck it.”

“You’d think it was trigonometry, from the way you’re going on about it. Honestly.” But perhaps there is a kind of trigonometry at work—calculating the triad of relationships among the photographer, the subject, the camera itself. The beloved, the lover, the conduit.  But where does the perfect sphere of memory, embodied in the photograph itself—an elegant proof of love—intersect all this? I almost begin blathering this aloud, but I look up and she is scowling at me. She never takes well to teasing about her intelligence.

We reach a détente when I return the Leica to her. “Go on, then.”

Her expression softens into contrition; she looks at the camera with a new wonder, as if thinking, Yes, why was it so complicated? “Okay now.” She clears her throat, aims the Leica. “Smile…”

I smile fraudulently.

“…and say…”

My face twitches anxiously.

“…‘fuck you, asshole.’”

I don’t. But I laugh, and that is precisely what she wants.

Where a Perfect Climate is to be Obtained

It all started with the postcards that, for a time, crossed my doorstep more regularly than my father did. If it sounds as if I blame him for something—well, that is how the truth slants, I suppose, but if not for his absences I wouldn’t have had a scrapbook of postcards from around the world. My favorite had been the one he sent back from Cairo, of the Nile saturated in vermillion sunset with one long, low skiff gliding along the river. “Spend this winter in Egypt,” the card proclaimed, “where a perfect climate is to be obtained.” On the back my father had written: We’re “holed up” in Cairo for longer than expected—Ralph has dysentery. Bad last week but he’s getting better and we should be off in a few days. Darling I hope you’re being a good girl and studying hard. I’ve grown a frightening beard and you wouldn’t recognize me!

In college, that postcard had been tacked up over my desk and whenever I tired of books and boys I would seek it out like a talisman—even if I were not in my own rooms at the time, I would see it clearly in my mind—to remind me I would not be in school forever, that perhaps like my father, I would travel, I would get away. Not from any place specifically, mind you, but from myself. I would get away from being me.

We are not in Egypt yet. Soon, she says. This one word from her encompasses in meaning any time period from a couple of hours to a couple of months. Days. Years. I’m not quite sure it matters, because I have achieved my freedom.

At Istanbul’s city wall a crumbling tower catches my eye and once again the Leica is in front of my face like a boxy Venetian mask. (“Oh Christ, here we go again,” she moans.)

I can hide behind the camera. It thrills me.

Within the rangefinder are the framelines’ decorous scars, a constant reminder of what will be severed from any given photo, of the seemingly simple fact that taking a picture is not merely about the image but also, its presentation. About what is not there.

So I swerve—pivoting the lens and panning away from the castle across a landscape of ruinous stone and moss, slowly, as if I am directing a film, rehearsing a shot. Like a director seeking out his leading lady, von Sternberg looking for his Dietrich.  

And there she is. Instinctively her eyes narrow and her lips tighten into grim beauty before she realizes I will not move away, and she relaxes into herself. The change is almost imperceptible, and the elegant proof of love almost incalculable, but it is there—plainly visible as I commit to the shutter release, which whispers the softest kiss I have ever heard.

[stardust-simming]

After the program ended, Orchid spent a few weeks with Calico at his parents home. Something major happened between them during the week before the program ended and they were delivering the news to his family first, as they were closer.

Orchid and Calico had eloped. It felt right to them... and Wisp may have pushed them into it a little bit. But they’re happy about it either way. 

When informed that they had news, Calico’s family immediately assumed that Orchid was pregnant. But were thrilled to hear that they’d only eloped. Though there was some concern to hearing they’d only known each other a year. Orchid and Calico responded that there was nothing to worry about, that they’d really connected, that marriage would be an adventure. Which was probably the most concerning thing that the young couple could have said.

Then they went to Orchid’s home. The sheer number of people in her house actually amazed Calico. What else amazed him was that they’d already known about the elopement when Orchid didn’t say anything. ‘Cumulus just had a feeling’ is what they heard from Orchid’s parents. And Orchid wasn’t the only SugarVeil to get married.

Azalea also married someone. Someone Orchid didn’t even know she was interested in. A man named Cranberry Fizz. He’s a single father with a young son named Twizzler Fizz. Azalea really seemed to love Twizzler as much as she did Cranberry. Being a step-mom seemed to treat her well.

Orchid and Calico spent the beginning of their marriage getting to know one another further, not actively trying to get pregnant. They wanted to take things slow as far as their marriage went. And it worked for the most part. Although it wasn't long before both of their mothers started questioning when to expect grandchildren.

They had fun, spending much of their time together. Calico got a job with Nimbus, as he was getting old and needed help in the kitchen. Orchid continued publishing novels. After finishing The Adventures of Captain Calico, she wrote a few other's to expand the universe before working on something new; The Luck of the Crimson Poppies, which is about a young woman named Maple and she was born under a blue moon in a town surrounded by crimson poppies. And, naturally, Maple takes it upon herself to try and find out what's going on when those poppies started to grow in wilted and dead.

Orchid loved working on something new.

Then, out of the blue, six years, three months and twelve days into their marriage Calico and Orchid were completely surprised to learn that Orchid was pregnant... with quadruplets. Orchid was genuinely spooked by it and Calico was worried about space, funds, typical first time parent things. Then there was the excited soon to be grandparents, Orchid’s siblings... well her little brother. 

Over time Orchid warmed up to being a parent and eventually Calico began to worry more about the genders of they’re babies. He was dreading the thought that they would have four little girls.

Around the same time, Orchid’s good friend, Wisp Vellum was also pregnant. However this was her second pregnancy. After the program ended, Wisp decided to take a break from writing, moved closer to Orchid and gave birth to a little girl named Rose. Oh and she dumped Rose’s father after he cheated on her with some berry named Cherry. She and her current boyfriend are currently expecting a boy and she selected the name Marmalade. Wisp’s raw purist parents are not pleased.

Orchid gave birth to two girls and two boys in a girl-boy-girl-boy order. She and Calico named them Autumn, Thistle, Poppy and Papaya. Similarly to Cumulus when Orchid was born, Orchid doted on Poppy despite the child’s independent nature. Now unlike Orchid, Poppy was not a single birth and Orchid know that she could not just devote all of her attention to the baby that felt like she came from Orchid’s very soul. She was also well aware that Poppy could manage on her own and would get a parent if she required help. 

Poppy did not require help very often but when she did she actively sought out her mother, which her siblings noticed. Autumn in particular was quite peeved by the special bond between her mother and little sister. That lead to Autumn doing a number of not so nice things to Poppy. Most of which were bug related. Poppy didn’t mind them too much at first. Then came the camping trip...

The camping trip happened when the kids were nine. It was an end of summer friends and family trip. It had been Calico’s idea. The SugarVeils, Wisp and her kids went to a campground with a large cabin that had belonged to Nimbus and Nebula SugarVeil. Wisp had dumped Marmalade’s dad and had three more kids, each with different dads, by that time and one of her e’s began to date Orchid’s brother Cordial recently.

Poppy tried to spend a majority of the trip with Marmalade as she wanted to have to quality time with her best friend, while Autumn was preoccupied with Rose.

Though before Autumn really turned her attention to Rose she felt she needed to do something big to Poppy. On the third night there she filled Poppy’s bed with worms and slugs. Poppy didn’t notice at first. Then the wriggling started up and Poppy screamed, much to Autumn’s delight. 

For the rest of the trip Poppy refused to sleep in that bed, choosing to bunk with her brother Papaya instead. The following morning though he complained that she hogged the blankets. So she switched to bunking with Thistle the next night... And he pushed her out of bed in his sleep. Poppy was going to sleep on the couch when Marmalade told her that she could sleep with him. She was really grateful for that.

Then she learned that he slept in a way similar to her, like a fucking mess. They each would spread out, take up the whole bed, hog the blankets. The two of them found it really funny.

Also during the trip, Wisp hooked up with Orchid's baby brother Fig. He'd assist with tending to the younger of her offspring; the four year old Meadow and one year old Cerulean. Fig and Wisp began dating and a few moths later they would learn Wisp was expecting...

The camping trip was only two weeks long and, for the most part, everyone enjoyed themselves. Autumn and Rose became the best of friends, which Poppy decided was good news.

Then school started up once more and Poppy was once again part of the 'SugarVeil Collective' which was the 'fun' nickname given to the quads by their school. While the four of them didn't hate it, per say, they wanted... to not be lumped together all the time. They wanted to be known for more than just the situation regarding their birth.

Autumn discovered a deep love for painting. Getting lines just right, finding that perfect shade, coloring inside the lines, creating something that was nearly flawless. She found it was the perfect pastime for her.

Thistle found that there was a lot one could do on a computer. Digital art, gaming, coding, discovering all kinds of new things.

Papaya fell head over heels for making music. But not just that, dance. He just couldn't help himself, he loved, for lack of a better word, how expressive it all was.

Then there was Poppy... she loved art, but not as much as Autumn. She wasn't technical like Thistle. Music was nice though she preferred listening to it over making it. Now physical activity that sounded fun. Dance felt like the gateway into it, an easy way to move the body.

However, Papaya picked dance first. Which mean it was a no go for Poppy.

So she landed on track and swimming. Although she did sketch a little when no one was around, she just couldn't help herself.

As they grew up and transitioned into high school, some of their interests began to shift as well. Autumn decided to take up digital art. While Thistle discovered programming and game development. Papaya found within himself a desire to create the perfect dance track, instead of actually dancing.

Then, once again, there was Poppy. Unsure of what she wanted. She still loved track and swimming but she wanted something else. She just couldn't put her finger on what that was. So rather than pick an activity halfheartedly she decided to hang out with Marmalade.

The two would typically hang out at a local diner or the library as his mom and her uncle were planning their wedding. Which, honestly made them uncomfortable... though the reasons were a bit different between the two of them.

For Poppy it was due to... Well she'd known Wisp her whole life. While she loved her almost like an aunt... the woman, in Poppy's opinion, had a terrible track record with men. In her observations, Poppy noticed that Wisp would date a guy less than a week, get pregnant, then for some reason or another they'd break up and that was just with the more serious relationships! So Poppy may just judge Wisp... but she also didn't want to see her uncle get hurt.

Then Marmalade... Oh sweet, sweet Marmalade. His reason was something his younger brother Narcissus teased him about. He thought he was subtle about it, but really only Poppy didn't notice. Well he's had feelings for his best friend for the longest time. In all honesty it killed him a little whenever they hung out as, to Poppy, he was just her best friend. He didn't think she even noticed he was a boy most of the time. So, for him, the wedding between Wisp and Fig was the final nail in the coffin, so to speak, they'd become step cousins, Poppy would never see him as he truly was and he'd have to move on.

Luckily for them, the happy couple decided on a long engagement. They wanted to save up as much as the could and really plan everything; what they wanted, a back up in case that wasn't possible, preparations for if anything went wrong. They really kept going back and forth over the guest list. Wisp couldn't decide whether or not she wanted to invite the other kids fathers. Then Fig wanted to invite Wisp's parents and Wisp thought it was a bad idea as they was raw purists and he was mixed. Not to mention that she had six mixed children. Then there was the fact that Wisp hadn't spoken to her parents in years.

Then birthday season hit. Birthday season was the month long period when the quads and most of Wisp's brood celebrated their birthdays. What happened during that time was that there would be a large party for the eight birthday berries at the beginning on the month. Then on the actual day of a kids birthday, a special dinner would he had for them. The quads, not wanting to be a collective , would each get their own nights where each could be celebrated individually. Then on top of the special dinners, the Vellum kids got to go visit their dads. Well three of the four birthday Vellum's as the fourth was Fig SugarVeil's daughter.

This birthday season, however, was not a good one for Poppy. She had a particularly bad feeling about it before it even began.

She didn’t know what to expect though. She didn’t expect that on the night after her fifteenth birthday she’d have to stay late at school to finish a couple of papers for a few classes. She didn’t expect that she’d end up walking home alone because Marmalade went to see his dad and none of her sibling’s would wait for her. She didn’t expect it too be so dark out at four thirty in the afternoon. She didn’t expect that someone absolutely reeking of alcohol would grab her from behind as she passed an almost impossible to see in alley. She didn’t expect the person to push her up against a wall and rip at her clothes before forcing himself on her. She did not expect that she would have her eyes tightly closed as she trembled helplessly like a wet chihuahua. 

Then, when it was over, he left and Poppy collapsed into a heap on the ground. Where she was frozen in shock for she didn’t know how long. 

When the shock faded Poppy was left cold, unsure and she did the only thing she could think of. She called her big sister and asked her to ask Rose, the only no questions driver she could think of, and ask if she come get her... and bring her a change of clothes. She also asked Autumn to apologize to Thistle for her as she ended up missing his special dinner.

Autumn went with Rose to get Poppy and it lead to a shift in the girl’s relationship. Autumn became quite protective of her little sister. She wanted blood for what had happened while Poppy just wanted to keep it between them and move on. What else could she do? It was dark and she never saw anything. And when she got home, she showered; scrubbing at herself almost aggressively.

Poppy found it difficult to move on though. She wanted to hide in bed mostly, she would panic when people stood behind her, and she found herself clinging to Autumn who was now nice to Poppy and insistent that they do things together. In fact the sudden closeness of the two girls surprised everyone, including Marmalade, who came back from his dad’s to find that Rose and Autumn had formed a sort of protective bubble around Poppy. Not knowing what happened, Marmalade didn’t ask, he just took his spot beside Poppy just because she asked they maintain some form of normality.

Orchid could tell something was off with Poppy. Well most people could tell that much. Poppy had gotten rid of most of her clothes, swapping the shorts and tank tops she found most comfortable for jeans and sweaters which she’d actively described as ‘suffocating’ in the past. But Orchid wasn’t one to question her children, she just wanted to ease the pain they wouldn’t express. 

So she took Autumn, Rose, Poppy and Marmalade to a Spa and Wellness Center as the four were practically inseparable. They got facials, went in the sauna and when Orchid suggested massages or foot rubs, Autumn got defensive for Poppy and counter-suggested  a yoga class. Autumn's words sent chills through Orchid all through the class. She had said, “Who needs to be felt on by strangers! Really mom... We’re here to relax.” Autumn had moved Poppy behind her defensively as she said it too. 

Poppy loved the yoga class and signed up to take a few more over the net few weeks. 

However the calm that the yoga had brought over her was ruined at lunch when her mother sat them down and demanded to know what had happened. Orchid presented Poppy’s odd behavior, sudden shift in wardrobe, Autumn and Rose suddenly including her in things, how Marmalade seemed out of the loop for once. 

Nearly a month had passed since what had happened and, honestly, Poppy hadn’t noticed how abrupt her changes had been. She’d been trying to maintain what she thought was normal that she didn’t want to admit to herself how abnormal her behavior had been. She’d decided over the course of three days that she wanted to start covering herself up more. Then, in protective big sister mode, Autumn had made a choice to include her more so she wouldn’t be alone that often. 

Then there was Marmalade... her best friend, son of her mother’s best friend. She’d begun to notice things about him. He was always there for her and sure she was the same for him but he never asked questions. Then there was the eye contact, he was fantastic about that which lead her to notice that there were so many shades of orange in his eyes. And he was so very much... a boy. A big handed, lean bodied, well mannered, kind-hearted boy. He’d been on the mat in front of her in yoga and she noticed the slight shifting in his muscles under his shirt as he stretched and how the waves of his orange hair looked so... fluid.

And while she was thinking on that she barely noticed Rose spill the beans, unable to keep it from Orchid any longer. What pulled her from her thoughts was Autumn’s outburst at Rose afterwards. Poppy didn’t realize what had happened until her mother, the one person closer to her than Marmalade, looked at her with a look of absolute horror on her face as she asked if it was true. All Poppy could do was glance around, seeing Rose’s apologetic face, Autumn’s angry glance at Rose and Marmalade making a face that mirrored her mothers. 

Then she just looked down at her lap and lamely replied that there was nothing she could do, she couldn’t see anything and she really just wanted to move on and not make a big deal about it. Orchid made an exasperated face at the girls at the table. 

After lunch Orchid took Rose and Marmalade home before sitting Autumn and Poppy down with Calico and made them explain there behavioral shifts to him. He was... not pleased about any of what he learned. But he wasn’t going to yell at either girl, that wouldn’t change anything. Instead he admitted that he didn’t know how to deal with this situation and he wasn’t really equipped to. 

So, also not sure how to handle this, Orchid took the lead. She scheduled a check up for Poppy and took her to the gym once a week were she was mentored by a scary looking lady. Poppy also did the yoga classes and Autumn would paint with her. Then she’d spend time with Marmalade, who wasn’t treating her any differently after learning what happened. 

The checkup happened a couple weeks later. In the week leading up to the appointment, Poppy was violently ill. She couldn’t keep anything down and while she wasn’t running a fever she looked a bit pale to those around her. Her brother’s who didn’t know about what happened joked that she and Marmalade finally ‘did it’ and she was ‘totally knocked up’. Uh-oh? 

[loudsuitlover]

Haze.

A/N: A little thing about Y/N not being ready to be a mom and Harry being clueless! 

“Yeah, I guess I’ve just been feeling weird lately.” 

You rested your back against the old, almost vintage, white metal chair of your mother’s garden. It was weird how in a matter of months, this place had changed from feeling like home to feeling like your mother’s house for you had been living with Harry for six months now and that feeling of comfort and safety you used to feel when you walked through your mother’s door was the one you felt now when you closed the door of your shared apartment in London. 

You had kissed him goodbye the morning before you headed back home to visit your mum for a couple of days and now there she was, sitting down on her own chair, with her reading glasses on as she went through some of her patient’s records. She stopped typing and turned her chair so she could have a good look at you though and you rolled your eyes playfully knowing the visit had just started. 

“What do you mean by weird, hon?” 

She pursed her lips, the wrinkles around her eyes deepening as she narrowed her eyes the slightliest bit. She had managed to keep the garden as green as it was when you and your brother were still home and the fig tree was bearing the brunt of many figs that were just about ready to be picked. 

“And sit down properly on your bottom, please.” 

Once again you rolled your eyes as a smirk tugged from your lips and you passed your legs over the armrest and sat down straight, just like Harry liked it as well you’re gonna hurt your back one of these days, m’love. 

“I don’t know.” You shrugged. “I mean I got a cold a couple weeks ago when I went to the beach with Harry but I think it’s been long enough for a cold to heal.” 

“It might be the flu, though.” She shrugged. “It’s not that time of the year but... The flu’s never out of the table.” 

She stood up, wrapping her stethoscope around her neck before she stood right behind you grabbing your shoulders so she corrected your position. You couldn’t stop smirking. She placed the stethoscope on your chest and asked you to take deep breaths. 

“Be careful though.” You warned. “My boobs hurt. I’m waiting for my period.”   

“Waiting?” 

“Uh, I should get it this week.” You nodded. “Or maybe last week? I’m not sure, I’ve been super stressed with work and Gem’s wedding so I haven’t been properly keeping track.” 

You couldn’t see your mum slowly nodding, as if she had just seen all the truth in the world, and she almost wanted to hit your head with the stethoscope because dear Lord how could her own daughter be so clueless? 

“And now you’re feeling tired?” She asked, standing now next you so she could look into your eyes. You nodded. “And funny like sometimes you just wanna sleep and some other times you would eat everything in the fridge?” You nodded again, opening your eyes wide because man, that woman was a genius. “And... You haven’t gotten your period this month.” 

You just looked at her, completely in shock at what you now knew she was going to say. 

“Then... I think it can only be two things.” So there’s still hope, there’s still hope... “A boy or a girl.” She chuckled, placing the stethoscope on the table before she turned at you. “Oh, baby, have you guys not been using protection?” 

“No, yeah, of course we do! I take the pill.” 

“Every single day, no exception?” 

“Yeah.” You frowned, standing up so you looked more serious and honorable, you thought. “I take the pill religiously. I mean I’m 21 years old, madam, I wouldn’t want to get pregnant and Harry’s like super busy with his second album and... and... Already thinking about the second world tour and... I mean half his mates have daughters or sons so we know what that’s like and I’m not... I’m not ready to be a mom.” 

You shook your head very fast and many times as if somehow you could get the pregnancy out of your mind if you moved your head enough. Your mum just smiled though and you hated that she wasn’t freaking out like you so you frowned at her. 

“Why on Earth are you looking at me like that?” 

She just laughed so you crossed your arms across your chest, completely flabbergasted at your mum’s reaction. How was this funny to her? Her only daughter might be pregnant at the age of 21 and all she could cook was like... pasta but like the easy type, with cheese or tomato sauce tops, or like... ready-made soup. You were in no shape to bring a baby into this world. 

“You’ll be allright, kid.” She placed her warm hand over your shoulder though and you just stayed there, looking ahead at the fig tree, watching a fig falling to the ground. 

Harry called you that same night, apologizing for having bein such a caveman about your friendship with Adam. It was really so silly, you thought, that he would get jealous of Adam. Yes, you were good friends but dear Lord he was a married man and he was so obviously in love with his wife, it was unbelievable that Harry would get jealous of him. You had talked it out the night before you came up to your mum’s house, but really his jealousy had been the reason why you needed to come up to your hometown for a while, because lately everything was feeling weird for you. He asked about how you were feeling too, concern evident on his voice, but you didn’t really cover the topic of your mum’s suspicion or the conversation at all. You laughed way too loud at his terrible jokes and even he frowned at your reaction, smirking and asking why you were acting so euphoric, baby; but you didn’t tell him anything because there was nothing to tell anyway. You hadn’t even taken the pregnancy test and why worry him when there was no need, right? You didn’t need to tell him just yet anyways... How did it go? Oh, yeah, that’s right. I’m having your baby, it’s NONE of your bussiness, right? 

You stayed with your mum for another day and even though you had rejected her many attempts of persuasiong for you to take the test, she had managed to calm you down about the whole possible pregnancy thing. She always did that- make things easier- and right then you thought if you were ever going to be a mum, at least you would have the best role model. As you drove back home, the indie playlist Harry had made for you filling your ears, you kept listening to your mum’s words as if they were written somewhere in the car. There are many options, love, and you can always decide not to be a mother just yet. Abortion is another valid choice, you know that, right? This is your life and no one has the right to judge you or act like they know better. You know Harry’ll be there for you either way- otherwise your brother will kick his ass. 

Yet Harry wasn’t home when you got there and as much as you wanted to see him, you were also glad you could have a moment to yourself so you could at least think about the way of approaching this. Throwing your dirty clothes to the laundry basket, you frowned when you grabbed a small carton in your duffle bag. A pregnancy test- smooth, mum- with a post-it note stick to it “You won’t have an excuse not to tell him after you take the test, love.” You rolled your eyes. 

But you guessed she was right... So you closed the bathroom door, even though you were alone, and you took it., your hand shaking as you held it exactly where you needed it to be. You were going to tell him anyway. If it was positive, then you would ask him to sit down on the couch and you would tell him- somehow, that you were carrying his baby; and if it was negative then you would have a laugh about it over a salad- now that he was acting like a health freak again- later tonight. 

Positive. 

Positive. 

Positive. 

You looked at yourself in the mirror. Positive. You covered your belly with your hands. Positive. It was now flat but in a matter of months it would be all round and swollen and there will be a baby in there- well technically, there was already a baby in there, but it must be so tiny they didn’t need any extra room just yet. And not just any baby but Harry’s, Harry’s baby was in your belly. You tried to swallow the lump in your throat as tears fell down your cheeks. 

You were only 21 years old. Looking at yourself in the mirror, for the first time you realized how much you still looked like a girl. You frowned. You imagined yourself sitting down on the living room floor trying to play with those small, colourful toys that babies had with a little boy, about 10 months old, with brown curly hair and green eyes. You imagined yourself feeding him in a high chair in the kitchen, taking him to the park, playing with him on the snow, swimming with him at the beach and then you imagined waking up in the middle of the night to a crying baby that wouldn’t settle with anything. 

You imagined Harry being gone, but he was just 24 years old, he was living his dream, having the time of his life and you were not about to ruin that for him with a boring family life, driving up to your mum’s house to have lunch with her every second sunday. And yet you couldn’t raise a child on your own either. Gosh, you didn’t even know how to properly iron your clothes, how were you going to iron onesies? And alone at that? Was that what you wanted anyway? To have a family and be alone half the time? What would you do when your son missed his daddy? 

You were holding the positive pregnancy test in your hands when Adam walked in. Harry had called him and he had said you would appreciate it if he popped over at home and have lunch with you or something for he was so busy with Gemma’s wedding he couldn’t escape to see you until later tonight. He wanted you to know he was okay with it, he wanted to train himself so he could be okay with it for real and Adam had come over to pick you up and had called for you around the house but when he couldn’t find you he had made his way upstairs and had seen you, sitting on the bed and holding a pregnancy test. Holy cow. 

He had promised not to tell Harry though. He had strongly encouraged you to tell him- to put it nicely- but you knew you could trust him and you knew he wouldn’t tell him if you didn’t want him to. He was your closest friend out of Harry’s band  but you knew your closeness with Adam was still a touchy subject for your boyfriend, it bothered him sometimes, so if it were to find out Adam out of all people knew about your pregnancy before he did, he would lose it, you were sure. You could get all arrogant again, and throw that speech at him that jealousy was just insecurities and that he had no fucking reason to be insecure because he was a Greek god, but then you would be being hypocritical because... Well because it had also bothered you sometimes how close he seemed to be with Ursula, his new hairstylist. It was stupid, but you couldn’t help it when he was away and you were home and you thought about the two of them laughing in playful banter before the concerts. 

You decided you’d throw the pregnancy test away before you and Adam left for lunch- last thing you needed was Harry finding it somewhere and freaking out. All throughout lunch, Adam couldn’t stop smiling as he coaxed you into telling Harry because he would be so happy, Y/N, damn it, that boy is so in love with you!  And after a lot of rolling your eyes and a lot of hitting his arm, you had decided to go grocery shopping so you could cook a nice dinner and tell Harry over a nice glass of wine. 

After a long day of walking around London with his mum and sister, he had come home in a rush to an empty house, expecting his hairstylist to knock on the door any minute now. He had called her over so they could talk about his sister’s wedding, see if he could count on her to do her hair, and now they were making lemonade as they went over the dates and stuff. Ursula froze on the spot when, holding the remnants of the lemons on her hands, she saw the positive pregnancy test lying there on the bin. 

“Wow!” She frowned. “Congrats by the way.” She raised her eyebrows, pursing her lips as she placed the lemonade in front of Harry. 

“On what?” He smiled. 

“On the child!” 

“What child?” 

She frowned. 

“There’s a positive pregnancy test on the bin.” She whispered. “I thought you knew.” 

“What?” 

He stood up from the table, frowning in bewilderment before he made his way towards the bin. He bent over, grasping the test on his hand and staring at it with impossible thoughts burning on his mind. You didn’t tell him anything? You sure had been acting weird but.. He never thought... Why didn’t you tell him? He started thinking about all the little things you had said and all the little things you had done but he didn’t see any hints on your part, or anything out of line really. 

“She didn’t tell you.” Ursula noted. 

He looked up at her. 

“Maybe... Maybe it’s not hers?” She bit her bottom lip. “Maybe it’s... a friend’s of hers?” 

“Maybe.” He shrugged, unconvinced. 

“Well it might not even be yours.” She laughed and Harry frowned. 

“Well if it’s a friend’s of hers is definitely not mine.” He joked along and she shrugged. 

“You never know these days.” She shrugged. “I mean with all the time we spend away... That’d explain why she hasn’t told you.” 

Harry glared at her, his jaw clenched and his shoulders tensed as his fist curled around the positive test. He had a feeling it was yours, how unlikely was it anyway that a friend of yours would come to your place to take a fucking pregnancy test? And what friend anyway? Nancy was single and Eve was a lesbian. Of course they could get pregnant still but it was less likely than Y/N... Even though she took the pill, didn’t she? 

“If it’s Y/N’s then it’s mine.” He was sure of that. 

“Hey, man, relax.” She chuckled. “I was just saying. I mean just... She hasn’t told you, has she? That’s weird. I mean I would tell you- I mean my boyfriend- even before I took the test, you know? I mean... Listen, H, I’m just looking out for you.” 

“Well, you don’t need to look out for me when it comes about Y/N.” It was clear he was mad. “What she and I have... You just don’t get it if you think for one second she would cheat on me. Now, I don’t want to be rude and gosh I know you didn’t mean it but... I think you should leave. I didn’t like the way you talked about my girlfriend.” 

“Well, I’m sorry but if the kid doesn’t look anything like you, don’t tell me.” She rolled her eyes before she left. 

She bumped your shoulder as she walked out the door and Harry rushed to keep the test on the cutlery drawer, cursing himself when he realized what he had done. You smiled at him before giving him a peck on the lips as you placed the bags on the counter. 

“Got you avocados.” You smiled. “What happened with Ursula by the way? I know you said she didn’t hate me but she-” 

“We had a fight.” 

“You... You had a fight?” You frowned, thinking he wouldn’t fight if he didn’t care. “About what?” 

“Uh, she... She said something she shouldn’t have.” 

“Alright?” You frowned. “Do you want to talk about it?” 

“No.” He shook his head. “She was wrong, it doesn’t matter. How was your day?” 

He kept the fruits and the yogurts on the fridge as you kept taking things out of the bags. 

“It was good.” You smiled. “How was-”

“Did you carry that bag all the way to the flat?” He closed the fridge, resting his hand on the counter next to the bags and looking closely at your face. 

“Uh, yeah?” You smiled. “I’m a big girl, H.”

“You shouldn’t be carrying that much weight.” 

You swallowed. You were surely just being paranoid. He couldn’t know. Adam wouldn’t have told him- he would have told you if he had. He was surely just saying that, just like he told you not to go to bed with your hair all wet or to eat something else when you had spent a week eating soup. His green eyes stared into your own before you turned around and started keeping things on the pantry. 

“Seriously, Y/N?” His figure followed you closely. 

You turned around and sighed, rubbing your forehead with your fingertips. 

“It wasn’t even that heavy-” 

“You don’t have anything to say to me?” 

He knew. For the love of God, how could he know? 

“Yes, I found your pink Gucci t-shirt. It was on the-”

“Baby.” He cut you short, his green eyes staring sternly into your own. 

You couldn’t read his expression, but he didn’t seem too thrilled about it. 

“I can’t believe he told you.” You snapped, covering your face with your hands. 

“He?” He frowned. 

“Adam!” You yelled. “Don’t play dumb with me now, Harry, I really don’t need you to-”

“Adam?” He frowned, raising his voice himself. “So it’s fucking true! Is it Adam’s? You’re having Adam’s baby?” 

“What?” You yelled. “How dare you say something like that?” 

“Oh, right, I’m not as stupid as you thought I was! You... Ursula was fucking right and here I was like a fucking idiot defending you!” 

“What in the world are you saying? Do you seriously think I would cheat on you? Is that what you think of me, really?” 

“How could I not?! You’ve been acting so strange lately, all distant and fuck and then I found a fucking pregnancy test on the bin and... How long have you known for?” 

“Why does it matter? You really think I would cheat on you with your friend! I can’t believe you think that of me, Harry. I thought you trusted me!” You snapped. “And yet here you are, believing fucking Ursula over me? And it just had to be her, hadn’t it? Just so you know Harry, I would never, ever cheat on you! You’re everything I’ve ever wanted and I love you, fuck,so knowing that’s what you think of me fucking hurts, Harry! The baby is yours! Of course is yours you idiot!” 

“Well then why didn’t you tell me?” 

“Because I was scared! I am terrified! And maybe I’m so scared because I don’t know if I want to raise a baby with you!” 

His frown deepened, his green eyes getting glossy as he tried to hold your gaze. Your jaw was clenched and you had never been madder in your entire life so you looked challenging, as if you didn’t regret what you had said one bit. He didn’t know what hurt him more, the words you had said or the fact that he had brought this upon himself. 

“And...” You got back at it “Maybe that is because I am not sure about a future with you!”  

“Then I don’t know what I’m doing here!” 

“Neither do I!” You finished. 

“Goodbye then!”  

[yunasightx]

Names and Puzzle Pieces( aka , give me the Mcmercy fam fluff!))

(Behold this monster that has literally been sitting on my flash drive for a over a year and a half. I have no excuse for this fic besides the fact that I’m a sucker for wholesome expecting family fluff— and that goes double for this pair. Literally.)

Disclaimer:

As I stated before, this fic has been sitting around for a while .. so I really did not go through it with an ultra fine tooth comb (( and is also the reason why there are some characters, like Moria, who are not mentioned even though they have a strong relation to members of the original Overwatch---  especially in regards to Mercy and Mccree’s past. They simply were not around at the time when I wrote the bulk of this. I added Brigitte in last minute though , because it was a bit easier to mention her....and i may also ship her with a certain rocket-jump gal ))I did try my best, but I really just wanted to get it over with. So, apologies for Iand grammar issues. I may go back to edit later if I see anything insanely obvious.

In the meantime, happy reading and enjoy! ))

Tornborjn,

I just looked over the schematics you sent me. So far, the upgrade looks promising – but I’m a little concerned about stress the additional weight and momentum might put on the joints in Fig 4.  Reinhart is not  as young as he use to be  ( despite what he might boast about) , and while an extra booster might help the Crusader Suit have a little bit more of the “OOMPH” the two of you are looking for …. Osteoporosis is not just something that is exclusive to women.   Which reminds me…. I believe you are overdue for your yearly physical as well, Bärchen  <3.

Angela

Ps. I highlighted the issues I think need a second glance.  Maybe we can get lunch next Tuesday to look them over?  I have been craving grilled fish and sriracha something terrible lately.

Angela read over the email one last time, checking for the usual typos and general grammatical errors, before hitting the send button.  The email blipped out of existence from her computer screen leaving only the  default Overwatch logo quietly staring back at her.

The doctor leaned back in her chair with a content sigh, “Well, one thing down…. Several more to go.” She had spent the whole morning cleaning out her (what always appeared to be) constantly full inbox; replying to and sending out correspondences to anyone and everyone who had questions and concerns for the Head Doctor of the reinstated global peacekeeping organization. Angela supposed she could have been fielding most of them off to an intern, or even asked Athena for assistance, but she liked being proactive in things ---- and truth was… she needed SOMETHING to do for the next couple of months.

Angela glanced over to her Valkyrie Suit which stood like marble statue between the two pristine white and glass shelves behind her desk  while her hand came up to rest on her still- rounding  stomach.   The lighting of the room gave the enameled white coating a soft iridescent glow and illuminated  rest of the black, orange and gold details.  The sight of it rising over the back of her chair, even with the wings powered off, as someone walked into her pristine office was something  that she knew bordered on spiritual

She’d be lying if she said she didn’t miss the adrenaline, the rush, and energy of being on the field ,or being actively involved in something ; but while the she would always be incredibly proud of her first child ---- at the moment she now had other lives she had to care for first.

And she knew the others were in good hands; Lucio and Zenyatta were newer to the life style of being a Overwatch Field medic , but so far they had shown enough promise that most of Mercy’s fears had been eased.  And dear darling Brigitte had taken the helm of that group in stride after dealing with patching up Reinhardt for years. They often came to her for advice, and she was very happy with how far all of them had come since joining Overwatch.

Angela actually had the sneaking suppression that donning the Valkyrie suit for so long was the reason why her pregnancy had been going so smoothly —for the most part— in the first place . The results weren’t completely definitive, but it seems wearing and handling experimental bio- nanotechnology over a long period of time had had some unforeseen side effects.  One of which  being what basically boiled down to slowing down the aging of Angela’s cells. It wasn’t much, just a under a decade in difference to her chronological age—-she would still age, she just wouldn’t have to worry about things like grey hair , wrinkles , mammograms, and arthritis as soon as everyone else.

Ana had joked the she should retire and just sell her product to  a home-shopping network  as the newest “anti-aging skin care line” --- then buy a nice little vacation home in Hawaii for her , McCree and the little ones ( with an extra guest house  for their favorite “Nana”, of course).

But, Mercy knew that at nearly Thirty-Nine years of age she should have expected a myriad of complications with getting pregnant, at least naturally ---- especially with both her and McCree starting to push forty. So, when it had happened after their first try… it had come as a bit of shock.  She and Jesse had talked about the possibility of children, the idea of growing their family just a little, but they had still had gone into the whole thing with a mindset of “if it happens, it happens”.

And when they discovered it they would be having twins….

Well, Mercy made a note to add gynecology and fertility research to her ever growing list.  After she had to pick McCree off the floor that is.

But, aside from three and a half months of nightmarish morning sickness and the never ending whiplash of weird cravings, everything had been progressing surprisingly well.

Well… almost everything.  

Angela’s thoughts broke off when she felt what was quickly becoming familiar fluttering of movement pushing against the palm of her hand.  She laughed and lightly rubbed her fingers over the spot, “I guess nap time is over , hmm?” She hummed. She felt another little persistent nudge and sighed, “Right..... back to work!”  

Angela braced her hands against the armrests and pushed away from her desk, before awkwardly hauling herself back to her feet; grunting as her center of gravity and new constantly-changing weight shifted back to her pelvis as her very round stomach curved out in front of her and her lower back arched in.

Angela knew she was surprising large, even with twins.  She looked more like she was nearing the tail end of her third trimester with one child, rather than twenty weeks with two.

She had given up trying to button her lab coat and pants weeks ago, and forgot the last time she had been actually able to see her feet (were her toes still painted sky blue?  Or was it lilac? Rustic orange ? The world will never know. )  Now, she just opted for breathable tunic dresses and a nice pair of stretchy leggings with her favorite pair of flats  ——and when she was home, she all put lived in Jesse’s flannel shirts ( but, she had the feeling even they wouldn’t fit for much longer either at this rate..)    

She thought about the closet of cute, but sensible new maternity wear Ana , Lena, Brigitte and Pharah had eagerly  helped her shop for  just a few weeks ago (with the former captain letting Mercy know she should be very thankful she didn’t have to be stuck with horrible fashion styles that were around when she was having Pharah… or the lack there of).  She felt a bit guilty that she was growing out of them so quickly.

Then again….. technically the twins were farther along than twenty weeks.  At least, from a gestational stand point.

That was other thing . The other unforeseen side effect of donning her Valkyrie suite for so long and so often.  Besides slowing down her ownaging, somehow the twins were growing at a slightly accelerated rate.  Not insanely or supernaturally fast, but every test her and Winston had run had proven they were consistently three weeks ahead of any  normal development.

Mercy had gone back and doubled, even tripled checked her math, but it was hard to mistake the night that led to all of this.  It was enough of an oddity that even though there had been no other complications, both of them agreed to err on the side of caution and treat her as a usual High-risk case and closely monitor her and the babies’ progress.  

Angela huffed and braced one hand against her lower back as the other started rubbing circles along her upper right side, hoping to dislodge whoever decided to jam themselves between her spleen and ribcage. She waddled over to her stainless steel work station by the large glass wall that ran the length of the room and looked out into the hallway between her and the panoramic windows that viewed  the deep shimmering blue waters of the Alboran Sea.  She picked up the tablet she had left there and pulled up her own medical file, along with half- a- screen’s worth of notifications of upcoming appointments and tests.  The lab results from her latest round of blood tests had just come in; most of her levels were fine, except her iron levels which were a tad little low (Angela rolled her eyes at that. Of course, Jesse’s spawn would be as obsessed with red meat as their father.)

She quickly scrolled through the rest of the results, then sent them and the reminded of her next ultrasound away with a flick of her fingers before pulling up several medical files and the list of Overwatch agents who she still had to hound down for the yearly physical.  Thankfully, a majority of the list was already highlighted in bright blue, but there were still a handful of names in red ---and most of those she didn’t even need to look at to know who was dragging their feet to the medical wing.

Let’s see…..Genji came in for his exam Monday, so he’s done. Hanzo was on time, as always.  Lena is tomorrow—I’ll need to remind Winston about that.   Mercy tapped Tracer’s name and informed Athena to let her fellow scientist know about his needed assistance.

“Shall I also remind Winston that it is time for his exam as well, Dr. Ziegler?” The AI suggested helpfully.

Mercy laughed, “No, I don’t think that will be necessary.  I’ll just recruit Lena to help me hold him down, you know how he can be.”

The AI let out a slightly computerized sigh, “Unfortunately, all too well I’m afraid.”

I will  probably have to drag Torbjorn here myself after lunch next week …And I will probably have to ask Ana , Pharah, and Brigette to help with Reinhart, The doctor sighed as she turned back to her list, her fingers  briefly hovering over the names that were blocked out in black---- the white lettering spelling out the identities as sharp and finite as a row of marble headstones on a dark lawn.  The files had been pulled over with the rest when Athena had backed up the old medical records from the original Overwatch.

Gerard Lacroix --- Deceased

Jack Morrison --- Deceased

Gabriel Reyes --- Deceased

Ana’s name had also recently been shrouded in the mournful color, but she had given her blessing to correct the outdated file. Her active status was now in the same bright cobalt blue as her daughter’s name near the top --- although, she had objected to also having her “Captain” title receiving the same treatment.

“I’m retired now, malak. These old bones aren’t fit to keep babysitting you brats all the time. Just leave me in the back with the rest of the old timers, and we’ll bail you kids out when you’ve finished having your fun.”

“76” on the other hand refused to go by any other name---- no matter how hard Angela or the others tried to convince him to reconsider, the old solider stubbornly refused to budge.

“The commander of Overwatch died at the Swiss base.  If you want him, you can find him six feet under his tombstone in Arlington.”

As for the last two names….. well… despite their best advancements and research even science couldn’t truly bring back the dead.

And even then……….. Angela was not sure she would ever cross that line.  She had toed it with Genji, even the very reasoning behind her own nanotechnology research flirted with that perilous edge …

But sometimes, the line between Man and God was drawn for a reason, and the price that asked was just too much to handle. You could make life, mend it, repair it if need be ----but you could not return light to a candle that no longer had a wick to burn.

Enough of that, Ziegler. Angela shook her head to clear her thoughts, and leave the past where it was supposed to be.  She scrolled through the rest of the names until she came to one very familiar name that she wasn’t surprised was still in red.  

“What am I going to do with him?” Angela sighed and tapped opened the file, so focused that she missed the metallic jingle of spurs and confident clomp cowboy boots sneaking up behind her.

“Boo.”

Angela jumped in surprise when two arms grabbed her from behind and that mischievous, honey-whiskey -warm voice smirked against the back of  her ear.  She shot a pointed look over her shoulder ( which lacked any real bite), but Jesse just greeted her with one of his charming smiles---- completely unapologetic as he leaned down and placed a kiss on the back of her shoulder as both of his hands drifted down to the sides of her stomach.  

“How’re y’all doin’?”  

Angela could feel his warm chuckle and smile against her skin when he felt one of the twins jab at the underside of his human palm,  “Well, that one definitely takes after me. Not even out yet, and already tryin’ to start a fight.”

Angela rolled her eyes, but there was smile on her face as she turned her head and kissed his cheek. He had trimmed his beard a little bit from the wild bush he had during his vigilante days, and his hair was back to the style he had it during the prime of his days in Blackwatch .  It was still unkempt and disheveled as ever, but Angela has always liked that length on him. And Jesse said he finally got sick having it stick to the back of his neck in the blistering heat and finding beard hairs in his whiskey.

“Did you just get back?” She could still smell the salt, sea spray, and limestone of Ilios on him, along with a bit of gunpowder and a little bit of nicotine.   Jesse had reluctantly agreed to cut back on the smoking when they decided to try to start a family (only because she had  threatened that he would have to bunk with Genji , Hanzo and Zenyatta  for the next  eighteen  years  if he so much as thought about lighting up around her or the children) , but when he was out on assignment he still smoked at a cigar or two. Mercy was at least grateful he wasn’t smoking a pack a day anymore.

He had cut back on drinking too. Genji had mostly been the one to thank for that----he and Zenyatta had been helping Jesse slowly deal with his demons over the last year and a half.  For the youngest Shamada, it was the least he could do for his former Blackwatch brother and very dear friend, and the two now had a bond that went deeper than just former coworkers.

It was nice to see both of them smile so easily again.

Eventually, the two of them ganged up on her;  and while she originally dug in her heels and refused to acknowledge the parts of  her that she shoved and locked away in deep  into the shadows, far away from anyone else (her failures, her regrets , guilt and blame and what ifs)  ……it didn’t take a neuro scientist to know that something besides her work or adjustments to her suit was keeping her awake all night. And her heart was so much lighter for it.

“Just docked”,Jesse pressed another kiss against her shoulder before lifting his head a bit and resting his chin there with a deep content hum, “Figured I’d hide out here for a bit before having to face the paperwork.” He wrapped his arms under her stomach to pull her into his warmth, “Don’t think I’ll be able to keep doing this for much longer. What are ya feedin’ these kids ,Angie?”

Angela smacked his arm ,”Burgers and sriracha. And I wonder who I can thank for that.”

“Hey, don’t pick on me. I remember those paper bags you tried hiding under your desk,’ Miss McDonalds’.”

“It was Wendy’s.” Angela said automatically, not even phased about Jesse calling her out on her old guilty pleasure.

“Yeaaaaaaaahh,” Jesse drawled out with a lazy smirk that she could feel curl against her neck , “ but you’re gonna be stuck with a bunch ol McCrees so I figured it was more fitting.”

“Who said they were going to be “McCrees”?”

Angela had to bite down on her tongue from laughing as the charming “I’m winning this round” smirk slipped right off the gunslinger’s face.

“That ain’t very nice, Angel. Don’t be mean.”

“I am not being mean,” Angela had to try very to keep her voice clinical and matter-of-fact , instead of breaking out into the giggles that tickled in her throat. She knew it wasn’t nice to tease him like this, but it was cute when he pouted. “Technically, we are not married so—“

“And you told me you didn’t want that right now,” Jesse pulled away, and Angela knew instantly that she went too far.   Frustration mixed with the jet lag and three sleepless nights of clearing out stubborn Talon agents from Greek ruins that lined the cowboy’s shoulders, giving him a wounded look that was worse than any bullet to her heart.

She knew without asking what his plan had been the moment he stepped on to the helipad---- a nice cold drink, kick off those dumb boots, and to spend the rest of a quite afternoon with the woman and mother of his children who had basically stolen his heart almost twenty-two years ago.  

“ I offered it to you, but you said it wasn’t necessary. That is just a dumb piece of pa----“

Angela swallowed the rest of his argument by reaching out and pulling his head down to kiss him sweetly, putting a cooling balm on his temper.  He seemed to have gotten the message because his shoulders instantly relaxed under her hands as his went to her widened hips and he shook his head with a gravely sigh, “I really don’t like how easily you can get under my skin like that sometimes, woman.”

She shook her head and gave him another kiss before pulling back and reaching up to apologetically smooth back his hair, pushing back a laugh when he tried to puller closer but her stomach got in the way, “ No, that was a terrible attempt of a joke. I shouldn’t have said it.”

Jesse had always been the more emotional one between them; the sentimental, passionate, and sweet parts of their relationship --- a simmering slow southern day outside of Sante Fe. Even after all these years, she still had trouble accepting that when Jesse McCree loved you  he did it absolutely, openly,  and without holding anything back----it was all or nothing for him.

When she thought back on it, Angela realized she never stood a chance.

For Jesse, a ring and wedding was more than just a tradition.  It wasn’t a claim on her, or a way “to keep her an honorable woman” and their children from being born under questionable circumstances or the hundreds of other reasons people have married for over the thousands and thousands of years of human history.

It was a promise. One of the most important ones he could ever give, besides his oath to Reyes and Amari when they offered him a rank in Overwatch ----a chance to do something worthwhile and good.

Angela just didn’t know if she was worthy of that promise just yet.  

She still had moments where she worried if she could do this.  If they could really could do this. That whisp of doubt that had spread and thrived in the shadow of the ruins and rubble of the old Overwatch.  In the shadow of her every regret and helplessness and weakness when everything she held dear crumbled right through her fingers. The one thing she could never heal and fix.  

Those names flickered in her mind again.

....The names of those she failed to support.

But, she was more than willing to try.

As silly, confounding, confusing, reckless, and dramatic as her cowboy was ----she never really thought the idea of spending the rest of her life question her sanity around him sounded bad. Even back before the old Swiss base had been nothing but a pile of bitter-sweet memories, secrets, and rubble. Before they had answered Winston’s recall……and then decided to try to pick up the pieces each of them had been carefully tucking away during the years in between.

They weren’t puzzle pieces that fit together, but------

“ I think McCree is a lovely name,” Angela hummed as she pressed her lips to his cheek, just along the curve of the dark circles under his right eye, “ I also think you should have gotten more sleep. No offense, Jesse, but you look dead on your feet. And I am the doctor who is pregnant with twins.”

The cowboy gave a resigned sigh and sank down into a nearby chair, pulling her with him and across his lap since his arms had tried to find their way around her waist again. She placed her tablet down on the counter and shifted to make herself more comfortable, placing her hands over his as they followed the faint movements of the twins hands, knees, elbows, and etc  pressing against her sides.  “Just give this old cowboy a few minutes, Ange.  I missed you somethin’ fierce out there,” He muttered against her skin as he rested his forehead against her shoulder again.

“You really should be taking better care of yourself.”

The gunslinger gave a soft chuckle at the old scolding that had lost its intentional bite years ago, “Acknowledged”.

Angela knew Jesse had a terrible time sleeping when he was away on assignment these days;  which was more than unusual because she couldn’t think of a place at the Swiss base where someone had not seen him napping with his hat over his face and his boots probed up on a random surface. It would not have  be long before said hat was slapped off, and he was dragged off by his ear  for laps by a very grumbly Gabriel Reyes to burn off all that extra energy he had obviously been storing up.

“And just what are you smiling about?”

Mercy came out of the past, and shook her head at Jesse who was watching her with an amused smile before she settled against his him with her head on his shoulder, “ Nothing, just some silly memories. I can prescribe  you some minor sleep aids if you think that would help.”

The main reason for Jesse restlessness out on the field was because when his mind didn’t have to be focused on a gunfight, it was right back here with her and the twins.  It wasn’t so bad in the beginning, but as her pregnancy progressed the little fear of something happening when he might be several time zones away kept knawing itself a nice little home at the back of his mind---- like a mouse chewing its way through a baseboard.

Nightly phone calls and face -time sessions helped reassure him that Talon had not attacked the base,  Hana had not accidentally shut down the entire power grid by rigging up a super computer for gaming, and Winston did not turn her or the children into a tubs of peanut butter ( “………have you been drinking with Winhelm and Torbjorn again?”  “……No, but I did have some kind of weird Japanese fish dish Genji made.” )

Even then ,Hanzo had taken up  Mercy’s position of McCree’s common sense out on the field --- taking away the gunslinger’s phone so the bright LED screen didn’t give away their position when he kept checking in every five minutes as bullets whizzed by their heads.

Jesse gave a tired sigh as he raised his head and rest his chin on the crown of her head as he drew in closer, “I’ll be fine. I just need you and our bed , and maybe a hot toddy to dull the edge. I’m home now, that’s all that matters.”

Home.  After how many years that word did hurt to think about anymore.  

The two of them stayed like that for a while. Forgetting about emails and exams and desks full of paperwork, and just trying to enjoy this moment of absolute suspended moment of peace like a sip of Angela’s homemade hot chocolate or Jesses favorite aged whiskey.

If she closed her eyes she could almost smell the air of the Swiss alpines again, feel concrete lightly bite the backs of her thighs and the warm weight of a young gunslinger’s arm and serape around her shoulders as her knees dangled over the side of roof while  she and Jesse watched the sun rise over the base.  Watching as the light and sky started out deep and rich and slowly turned golden, blinding and bright.

Almost….. if it weren’t the constant movement jostling her insides.

“They don’t like keeping still, do they?”, Jesse grinned, his hands were tracking them across her stomach again,  eagerly moving from her sides and resting just below her navel now. He looked down at her, eyes lined with jet lagged and some residual signs of his drinking and smoking lifestyle--- but still the same soft and lively molten brown she first seen at seventeen.  

“Sounds like someone else I know,” Angela tilted her head up and teasingly nipped the tip of his nose.  

“ Hmmm….. How long are you goin’ to be cooped up in here? I was thinking you, me, some nice seared steak and pasta, and ---“

“If you even think about mentioning another one of your western movies again, Jesse, I am just going stay here and sleep in one of the med bay beds tonight.”

“…….Well, now who’s jumping the gun? I was goin’ to suggest that one old timey pirate movie Ana use to play all the time during break nights.”

“…….I’m sure you were, cowboy.”

Jesse held his hands up in surrender, “Alright, alright. You get to pick the movie tonight. Just don’t make it one of those boring educational flicks again. I’d like to be able stay awake with you tonight.”

“You liked the last few I’ve selected,” Angela pointed out, rubbing at her side to calm down whichever twin was unhappy bout suddenly being ignored.

“Yeah, well one of those was about those murders in Victorian London.  Of course that’s going to keep my interest.  But seriously Angie, as much as I want to know about what’s going on with you  and the kids, “ The Gestational Process and Bonding  of the Human Species  ; From Conception to Birth And Beyond”  isn’t exactly what I would call a “date night movie”.”

“……That is a fair point,” Angela relented, “ I just thought you would like it since you have pretty much checked out every single book we have about pregnancy in the library, and have  hounded Ana,Torbjorn, Winston and I with questions.  You even had Hanzo buy them for you in town.”

She watched as her cowboy turned a nice shade of pink under his beard, “ ….You weren’t supposed to know about that.”

“Jesse….” Angela chucked endearingly as she brushed his hair out of his eyes, “ Libeling, it’s been kind of hard not to.  But, it is sweet ----- a bit annoying sometimes, but it’s been a pleasant surprise.”

Jesse looked down at his hands, which had gone back to her middle, gently circling his thumb over the back of her hands. His voice was soft, almost unsure, like he was slowly trying to figure out an new language and did not want to mince up the words “ …..I’m just a fish out of water with all of this. I never thought I would ever have a shot at something like this. That it wasn’t in the cards for me with the shit show our lives became after everything.   But, God, did I want …… I don’t deserve an inch of you ,Ange. I  sure didn’t back then and I’m not sure I do----“

Angela kissed him before the raw emotion leaking into his voice broke both of them in two.  It was safe to say this was uncharted territory for both of them; two orphans who only had faded fragments of their own parents and a mismatch patchwork quilt they called family that had been made, ripped and repaired over the years as a reference.

There were a thousand things she wanted to tell him right then, but she would save that for when they were not surrounded by the cold, sterile, and professional environment of the med bay and her office.  She wanted to be wrapped up in one of his flannel shirts and his arms first.

“I do have something for you,”  She reached for her tablet and pulled up the file she had been saving for when he got back.

Jesse groaned the second end moved her arm, “ Angel…look, I know I’m due for that blasted checkup, but do you really—“

“You can relax, it’s not your physical. ..Yet.  I will be getting you for that later,” Angela handed him the tablet and watched as one of his eye brows raised at the sight of her name and date of birth at the top of the page. She offered him a sheepish smile, “ I know you wanted to be there, but I’m afraid Winston got the dates mixed up.  No one else knows about it yet…..but I thought it would be a nice surprise for you when you got back.”

She could barely hide her excitement  as his eyes flitted down past all the medical information and jargon the he did not understand, and landed on the one part of the report that was impossible to mistake.  She had to bite down on the corner of her lip to keep from beaming at him when his brown eyes went wide and looked between her, the tablet and back again. It was one of the few time she had seen the bombastic cowboy struck speechless,  “ …Both?”

Angela nodded, finally letting herself smile,“ Both. One of each. I guess that means we’re done after this.”

But,Jesse seemed to have missed her joke as he quickly set the tablet back down and demanded to know which twin was where. Angela laughed as she guided the one hand to where their son was trying to cozy up to her ribs again, and the other to where their daughter has kicked his hand earlier.  “ They do move , but I think that’s where they are for the most part, “ Angela titled her head as she took in the suddenly  serious look crossing on Jesse’s face that he only got when he was trying to whip a strategy during a mission , “Is something the matter, Libeling?”

“….. Figuring out how much I’m gonna have to stock up on ammo for when they get older. Maybe finally talk Torb into installing that finger gu-”

“Jesse Leon McCree!” Angela’s glare cut through his thought faster than one of her laser- guided scalpels, “For the last time, I am not installing finger guns into your prosthetic!”

“I didn’t say you, now did I?”

“ Torbjorn won’t do it either. I already warned him I would revoke his honorary grandfather card if I ever caught him with schematics.”

“ Awwwww, come on! That ain’t fair, Angel!” Jesse whined. “ How else am I supposed to scare idots away from little Annie when she gets older?”

“Are you thrity-nine or nine…? And I am sure you will come up with something. Also, we are not naming out children after wild- west outlaws.”

“…Dam.. I was sittin’ on that one for a while,” Jesse looked at her again, “ What about-“

“No.”

Jesse jutted out his lower lip and looked at her with those big puppy gold-brown eyes that had been bane of her existence for the last twenty- something years.  ….But, she would be lying to herself if said she wasn’t at least a little bit happy that genetics promised that there was a very good chance at their children would have his eyes as well.

“Fineeeeeeeee,” Jesse sighed when he realized he wasn’t going to win their  little stalemate, although there is more than a hint of a whine to it, “What about “Fenrir” for the boy then?  That’s something you’ve always liked.”

“Oh mein got!” Angela rolled her eyes, “Out of all the Norse myths I have told you, of course that’s the one you remember.”

“What? We could call him “Fen”,” Jesse pointed out innocently.  

“You do remember that Loki is the one who gave birth to him, don’t you?”, Angela pointed out with a sigh, “ Only you would want to name your son after the eater of the world and killer of Odin? How about “Tyr”?” She tapped  her finger nail against the scared- up skull engraved into the metal plating of his bionic arm. “The god of Justice. That seems a bit more fitting. “

Jesse watched her hand with a little smirk as he leaned his head against her shoulder again. They might have been playfully arguing about names, but she had never seen him look so content.  The look in his expression said it all… ….he held his entire world in his arms.  “Eh, it’s not as cool. Any kid of ours is going to be hell –in- a- hand basket and an angel all-in-one, they need a name goes with it.”

“I think it’s just in your nature to -- how do you Americans say it----“  Go Big or Go Home”?” Angela laughed as Jesse gently, but playfully pulled her closer against his chest, his hands resting on her hip as his lips grinned against her forehead and his beard tickling between her eyes

“Yep ,sounds like me. I’ve always dreamed big---- how else could I have gotten as lucky to end up with someone like you? You don’t get chosen by an angel just by waiting around and twiddling your thumbs.”

Angela rolled her eyes as she shifted in the cowboy’s lap as their daughter let her know she didn’t like being squished between them by trying to kick elbow her pancreas. Jesse’s hands instantly went to the spot and circled his fingers to apologize.

They were going to be fine.

“Well…..I do have one name in mind… ,”Angela hesitated.  She wasn’t quite sure how Jesse would react to her suggestion. She still didn’t know how she completely felt about it.  

It had started as a little idea that had just popped up in the back of her mind the moment the blood tests had confirmed everything, like one of the single little cells their children had started out as.  At first, she just shook it off as an impossible notion, just the increasing hormones her body being annoying ; but like Jesse, it just hunkered down and refused to budged until she begrudgingly paid attention to it.

It was name that had weight to it, memories and heartbreak. But, she knew it was a name that meant a lot to Jesse… and even herself and many others in their little rag tag family.  And the more she had thought about it, each week the name just sounded a little more right.  Her mind went back to the list of names of those she had failed to save.  

You could not return life to can candle that no longer had a wick , but the scent of the wax would always linger.

“Gabriel.”

She carefully watched his face as her stomach squirmed in a way that had nothing to do with her tumbling twins or morning sickness.  It only took a few moments, but it felt life time as she watched the confusion on his face melt into surprise then something so soft and speechless that she wasn’t sure if she wanted to smile or cry herself.

For now she would blame it on the hormones.

“I like it, Darlin’,” His voice was soft, like a warm camp-fire on a cool night as he reached up and tucked her side swept bang behind her ear. “ … Thank you.”  

She closed her eyes and leaned into his hand as his callused and tanned finger s trailed over her cheek, still the same as they had always been despite all the years.  They still felt like home.

“There is nothing to thank me for, Liebling. “

“…. I still want Fen as a first name though.”

Angela gave a heavy sigh, Andddddddd there went the moment,“ Do not make me kick you out of my office .“

Jesse just gave her another smug and charming smirk that made his right eye twinkle, “Gotta come up with a better bluff than that, Sugarbee. I’m your favorite pillow.”

“Well, since you are here ,Darlin..” She drawled a little too innocently , “ I do have a long list of overdue shots with your name on it.”

The cowboy blanched and Angela just gave him his smirk right back before breaking down into a smile and leaning forward to kiss him as he huffed against her mouth and pulled her as close as her stomach would allow. “ Woman, I swear there is devil in those angel eyes sometimes.”

No, they were not puzzle pieces that fit perfectly together ---  there were too many broken edges that had been worn and dented over the years.  They were more like pieces of a shattered glass that had been put together into a mosaic.  Something that was a little old and new at the same time , fractured and whole…  and made something  wonderful and beautiful when the light shone through.