#and “what are you hungry for?” is SO Marie through her arc | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

xoruffitup · 8 months ago

Text

The Complementarity and Divergence of Furiosa & Dementus, A(n Obsessive) Meta

Fresh off Furiosa Round 4, I’m full of thoughts about how the film mirrors and contrasts Furiosa and Dementus’ hero/villain journeys. We see both characters evolve and grow through the 5 chapters of the film, moving through distinct phases of change. We see them each fighting a similar struggle to keep not just their lives, but some shred of humanity amid the ravages of the wasteland.

Their journeys are intimately intertwined, their decisions wreaking profound effects on the other. Their parallel arcs explicitly converge in their final confrontation, not just physically but thematically:

(Forgive the vaguely remembered dialogue lol)

“I was just like you, craving a belly full of vengeance after my beauties were taken from me so cruelly, immutably.” “I’m nothing like you.” “You are. Searching for some sensation to push away the inky black. We are the already dead, Little D.”

Dementus’ color-changing cloak and the teddy he and Furiosa each, at some point, possess are the physical symbols of their progression along what is ultimately the same character trajectory.

Dementus is coded first in white, then in red, then in black. Though more subtly, Furiosa progresses through the same three stages: innocence -> trial -> temptation/corruption. The question, however, is exactly when, where, and whether Furiosa is able to disentangle herself from the example Dementus has laid before her.

So let me break this down one movie chapter at a time! I’m going to try to hit their key qualities at each stage, and explore how they move in ways both in complement and opposition to each other as the film progresses.

1. The Pole of Inaccessibility Consider two lesser-used definitions of “pole”: 1) "each of the two opposite points on the surface of a magnet at which magnetic forces are strongest"; 2) "one of two opposed or contradictory principles or ideas." This first chapter is where the two mighty opposing forces of Furiosa and Dementus are introduced. Furiosa: Youthful, innocent, brimming with a vibrancy of compassion. The first shot we see of her, she’s taking a risk to pick a second peach – the peach meant for Valkyrie. Even as Valkyrie whispers “We should go,” Furiosa is resolved to carry through this act of altruism.

Dementus: Maybe, once upon a time, he wasn’t The Worst. :) Even though in Chapter I he’s already halfway there, there’s a distinct difference between who he is at the start of the film vs its end. No question, he’s already power hungry and reprehensible. What he does to Mary and Furiosa is plenty proof of that. However, we meet him as a man in control. Control over himself, over his people, over his rage and his passions. We’re first introduced to him as a pseudo-scholar, even, as he sits in his white cloak listening to the History Man’s oral treatise. He is the single calm, steadying presence in the tent, as his men whip themselves into frenzy trying to find a bearing to the Green Place. He’s a self-assured, calculating figure, set on achieving his goal – no matter the gruesome means.

Convergence: Dementus recognizes the strength and fire in Furiosa, in her determination to hide her home. He then inflicts Furiosa’s character-defining loss and trauma. (“You must not look away.”) It bears noting, though, that his torture of Mary is not for its own sick sake – he does it in attempt to get information out of her, or out of Furiosa by forcing her to watch. He has a practical goal in mind. But later, he will become increasingly willing to engage in sadism for lesser justifications.

2. Lessons From The Wasteland Furiosa grows up exposed to Dementus’ ‘lessons’ of what constitutes strength in the wasteland. Will she adopt his teachings?

Furiosa: We cover a lot of ground here. Her captivity in Dementus’ horde, her being traded to Immortan Joe, and her slipping out from both her captivity and her female-presenting gender as she begins her rise through the power hierarchy of the Citadel. Without doubt, her time in Dementus’ horde refines her hatred towards him (recall that shiver-inducing moment when she’s sitting in her cage and muzzle, glowering at Dementus with absolute abject hate in her eyes), but her defining trait at this point appears to be apathy as a pointed form of resistance.

She never responds when Dementus speaks to her. When he first tries to give her the teddy, she drops it in the sand. She turns away even from the History Man, when he offers to teach her. Her silence, her refusal to acknowledge her situation or surroundings, is a constant and restless rebellion. She does not and never will accept these people as her own, will never allow herself to become part of Dementus’ world. She builds invisible yet impenetrable walls around herself – in self-defense, to some degree, but also to make sure Dementus never forgets. She does not and never will belong here, nor will she belong to him. She��sure as hell will never forget. This sense of self-separation from her surroundings as a form of internal resistance continues once she enters the Citadel. She draws resilience from her seed, holding it against her forehead and hardening her resolve to become whoever and whatever it takes for her to escape this place. She cuts her hair, slips away into the ungendered shadows of the Citadel, and then begins her rise from invisibility to dogman. She may be willing to strip away all outer signs of her true self, but all is in service of ultimately returning to that identity in the only place where it will be safe to do so – back home in the Green Place.

Dementus: The first scene of this chapter (the five-bike teddy), establishes two crucial aspects of his character. 1) This man looooves to put on a fucking show. He loves to yap in as theatrical and over-the-top a manner as possible. He thrives on having an audience, and will gas up both his charisma and brutality as much as necessary to hold it. 2) He once had and lost a family. The first time he hands the teddy to Furiosa, he tells her it once belonged to his little ones.

Then, the scene where he meets the lone war boy and learns of the Citadel. The moment when the true games of power commence. Here, Dementus ascends into a new playing field – a grander, more high-stakes cause. His formerly white cloak is dyed red by the flare of skyblood, as he thrills at the idea of a new class of power, as he tastes a new form of greed. The corruption takes him quickly. To besiege Gastown, he’s willing to sacrifice his own men. The Octoboss’ outrage (“You’re scum, Dementus!”) shows this to be a decisive break from whatever level of collateral damage Dementus accepted up to this point. Then, with Gastown under his thumb, he seizes his place among the rulers of the wasteland fortresses. He wants to be called “the great Dementus” now.

Convergence: Dementus doesn’t just try to claim Furiosa as his daughter, he tries to remake her in his own image. In giving her the teddy he carries as a memento of his own children, he attempts to saddle and shape her with the same mantle of loss. She’s lost her family, just like he has. In a twisted way, he thinks that by tearing her mother from her, he’s helped strengthen her. (“It made this one tough enough to survive whatever comes. I did that for her. I did that for her,” he says to Immortan Joe and partially to Furiosa herself, admitting that he did, as Furiosa clarifies, “slaughter my mother.”) He knows what havoc that loss wrought on him, and expects it to warp Furiosa in the same way. He calls her “Little D” not really because he sees her as his child, but as a burgeoning version of himself. Yet despite all his alleged suffering, he’s resolute and powerful enough to command his horde. He holds himself in high regard, and seems to think that in time Furiosa will come around to see things his way. In time, she will become like him – a bit unwound, a lot formidable. She’ll rise to the mantle of “Little D,” no matter how viciously she rejects and decries the name now, along with any association with him at all.

But this changes when she at last speaks – as she voices her firm “No” when Joe asks whether Dementus really is her father. With one word, she decries and rejects the path Dementus has tried to lay before her – the path mirroring his own. While it’s clear that Dementus, to some extent, entered the negotiations with Furiosa as a back-pocket bargain chip (why else is she swathed in bridal-veil white, like an offering), I’m not convinced it was all a negotiation tactic when he objects, “No, she’s not for sale. She’s mine.” But after she speaks, after she rejects his claim on her, his resistance evaporates. He trades her without a parting word, and snatches the teddy back from her hands – the mantle of his grief and his struggle; the symbol of lost innocence, replaced with demented, heartless violence.

This is a burden she rejects. She will grow from her loss and her trauma in her own way. She’d rather throw herself into unknown dangers, onto the questionable mercy of Immortan Joe, than remain under Dementus’ influence. In this, she will not be apathetic or distanced.

3. The Stowaway In a sense greater than just stowing away under the war rig, Furiosa stows away amid the operations of the Citadel itself, waiting until the time is right to steal away from this society completely.

Furiosa: This is her crucial period of independent growth, separate from any warlord’s influence. By escaping from the vault (and from Rictus), she begins to define survival on her own terms. By working her way steadily, stealthfully up the Citadel’s ranks, she strives for the access to resources and freedom of movement that will enable her eventual escape. Everything she does is calculated, everything serves the long-term utility of making her way home.

She becomes a part of the hierarchy and ecosystem of the Citadel, now, breaking from her earlier self-isolation. Yet her driving force, her values, her purpose never waver. She remains steadfastly fixed on her goal of escape. She cares only for ascension and status if it serves her ultimate purpose of returning home. Her loyalty is first and solely to the Green Place and the sisters she left behind there.

This does not change, per se, when she makes her deal with Jack and becomes Praetorian at his side. What draws her to Jack, what inspires her trust and devotion to him is the way he embodies the very qualities of her home and her people – the very things she’s fighting to return to. In Jack, she rediscovers a bit of that comfort, that compassion and selflessness that has been her dream for so long. He brings a piece of the home she’s fighting for into her life at the Citadel, and with this reminder comes reassurance that her dream is real, her dream is possible.

He wants to help her while asking nothing for himself in return. He is the first to see her for the true version of herself – the version that belongs not to the Citadel and Immortan Joe, but to some distant, unknown place of promise. He believes in this true version of her even before she confides its evidence in him, when she shows him the peach pit. Her loyalty doesn’t become split between Jack and the Green Place; they reinforce each other. She cherishes him and their bond because he represents all that she’s been fighting towards all this time: the truth that there is moreto her existence, more to the human heart than the raw, selfish lust for survival and sustenance.

I saw a brilliant post that contrasted Dementus and Jack’s influences on Furiosa. On one hand, there’s the narcissism in which Dementus tried to “train” her as a child into his same brand of hatred and violence – how Furiosa had to become “indispensable” to Dementus if she wanted his protection. By contrast, Jack trained her in road war so that, one day, he would become dispensable to her. (hahaha kill me please. ;__;)

With Jack at her side and his presence reminding her that what she seeks is something real, something tangible, she is driven by hope more powerful than ever before. Her return to the Green Place – to its physical abundance but also the altruism, compassion, and kinship it represents – feels closer at hand than ever before.

(No Dementus or Convergence section here, this chapter belongs to her and Jack alone <33)

4. Homeward Bound More than just her and Jack’s plan to make for the Green Place together; forging her bond with Jack already brings her closer to the memory of the Green Place (closer to home) than she has been since she was taken.

And now…. THE PAIN. Furiosa: I would argue this is the chapter of the film where her character arc is most sharply and deeply altered. As she and Jack approach the Bullet Farm, their joint purpose is clear: leave all of this behind and drive off together to something better, something kinder.

But then, Jack is trapped inside, she outside, enemies between them. Furiosa is immediately torn. She has her escape vehicle, bikes, food and supplies all ready for the leaving. Her route back home is literally laid out before her feet. But driving away would mean abandoning Jack behind that gate, leaving the person who made it all possible to certain death.

He fires the green flare in a bid for her to leave him behind. He’s going to stay, he’s going to keep Dementus and his horde occupied while she escapes, he’s going to fight for her and her Green Place in his own way.

But seeing that green flare is what makes Furiosa realize she couldn’t possibly drive away. Because what would she be driving towards, if she abandoned him? If she leaves behind the one person in whom she’s confided her true self, her greatest secret – wouldn’t that mean that the part of the Green Place she’s carried with her all this time has finally died away?

We’re reminded of Mary choosing to spare the woman’s life when she rescued Furiosa in Chapter I. This post beautifully pointed out that the narrative never frames such acts of mercy as wrong or foolish, no matter their tragic consequences. As the audience, we want to see Mary’s essence live on in her daughter. We want to see that mercy survive – that belief in the inherent good in people that separates the Vuvalini from the wasteland warlords. That is the mantle we want to see Furiosa carry with her as she grows.

What Furiosa chooses here isn’t about the pragmatism of survival. This is the wasteland. Stupid, reckless, suicidal decisions are made every single day without a moment’s hesitation. When she makes her choice and backs the car up, she shows a kind of strength most in the wasteland have forgotten. She proves that she remains faithful to all the Green Place represents – she proves that she is incorruptible, indominatable.

Dementus: Meanwhile, Dementus is having a rough week. While he might excel in the kind of kamikraze maneuvers that won him Gastown, turns out he’s not so great at running things. When Furiosa sees him through the window of the rig during the nearly-disastrous supply trade at Gastown, it’s the first time she’s seen him since childhood. He’s grey, grizzled, and worn down. As then becomes clear through his behavior in the Bullet Farm fight and ensuing chase, his hold on reason and control is becoming ever more attenuated.

He has little to no boundaries anymore – everything is acceptable collateral. He uses one of his men as a human shield against Furiosa’s sniper rifle. He taunts and mocks his own henchman. (“The other arm! Have you lost your touch!?” when his people string up Furiosa by her uninjured arm.) His grandstanding evil-villain speech once Furiosa and Jack are caught no longer feels commanding or delightfully bombastic – now it rings of the desperate ravings of a mad man on the edge.

He knows he’s losing control – of Gastown, and his ever more tenuous hold on his position in the tripartite trade route. He needs to bargain for more food and water for the people of Gastown if he wants to avoid a full-scale riot, but can’t increase guzzoline output to get it. In taking over the Bullet Farm, he’s made a desperate move from which he knows there’s no going back. Either he consolidates his hold on two fortresses of the wasteland and forces the Immortan to agree to his terms, or he’ll be destroyed by Joe and the Bullet Farmer in alliance.

Convergence: And then Furiosa and Jack arrive, and blow the Bullet Farm sky high. (“The day I take over the Bullet Farm, these two destroy it!”) Dementus’ risky new conquest is worth nothing, and he’s left with nothing but the consequences – an army surely soon bearing down on him.

But then, even after being caught, Furiosa and Jack commit what is, to Dementus, an even graver crime. They strip him of the power on which he relies most: his eager, fearful audience, hanging on his every word. They render him invisible, utterly inconsequential as they refuse to listen or even look at him, as they refuse to break down in the misery and hopelessness he so desperately tries to instill in them. They are beyond his reach, absorbed in only each other. Dementus captured them, yet he finds he has no power to disrupt, destroy, or even to intrude into their final moments together. (What’s that on my keyboard? Oh just TEARS)

He makes a big deal out of the bond that clearly exists between them, yet does not show contempt towards their shared devotion. Instead, it is an ugly, raw kind of envy. They remind him not only of what he once had and lost in his family, but how bleak of a destination the path he forged through his loss has led him to. (“Look how they fought for each other, this army of two. Where were they going, so full of hope? There is no hope!”)

For him, loving another person leads to only one thing: loss, darkness, hopelessness. All that remains to him is his crusade for conquest, growing more empty, more futile by the day. But now, even as Furiosa and Jack face certain death, even as they find themselves at the end of their shared road, they don’t succumb to the inky black. They’re untouched by it, invulnerable to the ravages Dementus is so convinced await anyone foolish enough to love. How dare they continue to believe in their love, continue to draw strength from it, even when its life has been cut short?

“You two break my heart. You make me the dark Dementus,” he says, sounding not only enraged but distinctly mournful. And so he descends even deeper into his own darkness. We were first introduced to him shrouded in white, then witnessed his transformation into the Red Dementus, as his lust for power took a taste to warlord status. Now, his cloak accumulates more and more black, his soul growing more tarnished by the day.

But what of Furiosa? Her moment of resolve at the gates of the Bullet Farm was her strongest commitment yet to the values and compassion she’s secretly harbored in her heart all this time. Those final moments she shared with Jack were also proof that acting in love and tenderness grants a singularly invincible kind of strength - a kind the wasteland cannot touch (even if only for a moment).

But something happens to her here, as she witnesses Jack’s torment, as she watches her dream of escape broken across the sands.

“Rage, fueled by grief,” says the History Man’s voiceover, as Furiosa cuts her hair (with Jack’s knife, stab me plz) back at the Citadel, reborn as the avenging angel she’s about to become.

Before this moment, though, we see her choose to return to the Citadel. She’s out in the desert on her own, with a bike, and she conceivably could have gone anywhere, even headed east as she originally planned. (Though the blood loss from her arm and lack of supplies considerably narrowed her choices…) Even after she crawls out from the maggot den, she could have easily blended into the anonymous mob and slipped away forever. Immortan Joe would never know what happened to her and Jack on that ill-fated supply run, after all.

Instead, she makes her way to the platform and demands entry to the Citadel. “I am the Praetorian Furiosa!” she screams. This moment is the first time she lays iron-clad claim to her identity within the Citadel’s ranks. This is the first time she vocally embraces her status within its power structure. As a dogman, she was silent and efficient, earning her keep while doing her best to avoid undue notice. Even being Praetorian was merely a disguise for what she and Jack both knew to be her true motives, her true allegiance. After being ambushed and losing Jack, she could have walked away from the disguise and this whole world for good. She could have decided that there was nothing here worth fighting for, and let herself wither away beneath the weight of all her loss.

She decidedly does not. Dementus’ attempts to break her, to crush her spirit and her hope for good, had the exact opposite effect. He gave her a reason to put her own skin in the game at last, a reason to finally leverage the influence she’s slowly accumulated over all these years towards a new goal – to take her place shoulder-to-shoulder with the men who claim dominance over this land and its resources. But unlike them, her goal is not hegemonic control and enforced subservience. Her goal is vengeance.

At this juncture, she stands on a razor-thin precipice between finding and losing herself. Jack’s death has tipped the scales towards tying herself, in some way, to the power struggles of the wasteland. But remember, her love for Jack is one and the same as her enduring love for the Green Place and all it represents. They are each borne of her compassionate heart. But it is now that same heart that craves glorious and bloody vengeance for the loss of all that was dear to her.

Now, after this devastating blow to her fragile, ever-threatened faith that people can be different from the cruelty of the wasteland, will that faith endure? Or will it be snuffed out for good – leaving her a dark, revenge-ridden fury who decries feeling as weakness, just like Dementus?

5. Beyond Vengeance The final stage in Furiosa’s journey – transforming into someone driven by, yet neither defined nor consumed by vengeance. She is strong enough to control its force, and to discover a new life beyond it.

Furiosa: This post brilliantly pointed out the parallels between chapters I and V. Furiosa grows from captive to huntress. Like her mother before her, she pursues a lone group of bikers across the sands, sighting them in the scope of her sniper rifle. Like in chapter I, the chase ends with Furiosa coming face-to-face with Dementus. Only this time, she is the one in control and he rendered powerless.

She appears as a vengeful, righteous force – the darkest of angels. Her pursuit will not be stopped, her hunger for retribution will not be slaked.

Dementus: “I have nothing. I am nothing,” he tells the approaching Furiosa, holding his hands in the air. And it’s true. He’s lost his fortresses, lost his horde. He’s even, by his own doing, lost the most loyal of his former followers. Without a second thought, he offered them each up as bait in effort to escape the justice he knew was coming for him alone. He has no morals, no scruples, no power, no defenders, and no heart.

Convergence: Furiosa first appears to Dementus swathed in his own blackened cloak. For all that she refuted his attempts to shape her in his own image as a child, his murder of Jack and destruction of her dream of escape have awakened in her the exact kind of ravenous, pitiless black hole Dementus was convinced lay in her future after her mother’s death. The black hole of vengeance to whose edge he tried to drag her to, right along with him. Now, she removes her face covering and looks down at him with eyes brimming with all the fervor of that black, icy hate he once tried to instill in her. It’s a satisfying kind of poetic justice, perhaps, that he himself becomes its target in the end.

Here, appropriating his blood and shadow-soaked cloak, she becomes the dark Furiosa – complement to his dark Dementus. But will that darkness consume her, the same way it has him? Or will she become its master, tempering its edge and its fury to serve her own ends?

It bears remembering that it is only after Jack’s death that her path shifts from escape to retribution. Her hatred for Dementus never faded, but she long understood that to pursue vengeance against him would be to tie herself to the hateful, heartless ways of this wasteland world; it would threaten not just her physical but her spiritual escape – it would jeopardize her ability to reawaken a softer, kinder version of herself that knew the love of the Vuvalini.

But now, Dementus has foreclosed that choice to her. She can’t return to who she used to be, because of all he’s taken from her – not just her loved ones, but the heart that loved them in the first place. “My mother, my childhood, I want them back.” Her heart and soul are world-weary; her faith in the promise of the Green Place struggles to endure. For how can such a place, in all its beauty and abundance, truly exist in a world where both her mother and Jack were tortured to death? How can she keep her faith in a world where the kind-hearted meet such grisly ends?

But then: “I’ll hear it. I’ll hear it for the rest of my days. I’ll feel the kickback in my hand.” Her course is set. There is no question that she’s going to kill Dementus, right here and now. But the larger question begins to come to the fore: what will killing him do to her? Will it heal her or only further hollow her heart? Will this vengeance be what defines her forevermore?

She sheds the cloak. She cuts the teddy from Dementus’ belt and holds it in her hand, regarding it. And this is the moment where she must confront her future. When Dementus at last recognizes her as the girl whose life he destroyed, and she must choose her path: to follow his or to leave it, for good.

“I’ve been waiting for you, for someone worthy of me,” he says, seeing himself in her, at last. Trying to wrest some small victory from this. He is in awe of her, but only as an extension of himself.

“I am nothing like you,” she spits. She says the words with blistering conviction, but the tear that slips down her face belies her certainty. Because she knows that he has chipped away at her soul, that she stands before him, tormenting him in her own way, only because of all he’s done to her. She knows, in truth, that there’s no possible way for her to claim victory from this confrontation. Whatever she does to him, whatever “righteous perversity” she inflicts on him in the name of justice, it will have been his influence that made her capable of it in the first place. She hits him again, again, again, and with each blow she only chips away at herself a bit farther; her soul only becomes a bit more enervated.

“You can never balance the scales of their suffering. … You’re never going to get anything close to what you want,” Dementus taunts her. Inescapably, he’s right. Furiosa’s strength lies in her difference from the violence-hungry men of the wasteland, who dole out only savagery and hoard all else for themselves. No matter how much Dementus deserves torment and execution, killing him will only draw her deeper into the midst of such men.

She drops the teddy into the sand. She steps off the path he tried to set for her. She glares down at Dementus for the last time, her eyes at once hard with hate for him and soft with tears for herself.

And here: the film’s masterstroke of a conclusion. The film’s core premise is not simply a matter of warmongers vs pacifists; male violence vs female nurture; good vs evil; justice vs chaos. This world is not so black-and-white as all that. In the end, Furiosa’s moral convictions are treated with the same mercurial fluidity and indefinability as her gender presentation. In the film’s final minutes, in the way her final vengeance takes on the elusive shape of myth, she is transformed into a being superior to all such reductive classifications.

She need not choose between the ways of the Vuvalini and the men of the wasteland – she can be both. Her presence and power are vast enough to harness the dichotomy for her own empowerment, her own self-determination. She can harness her rage, her blistering fury, her spitting hate – and she can channel it towards a cause of protection, even an act of creation. She can inflict a singularly gruesome, twisted form of torture on Dementus, and from it grow fruit to nourish faith in the future. She can seize and co-opt the male-dominated levers of power, and turn them towards her own ends. She can wield savage “male” strength to challenge all that makes it “male” to begin with.

And yet, for all this bold indeterminacy, one thing remains concretely unquestionable. Her faith and her love endure. More than that – they are her driving force. They are what sets her apart, what makes her singularly formidable even beneath the weight of loss and heartbreak. Such is her final triumph. At heart, she ends the film unchanged from how she began: plucking a piece of fruit, the priceless treasure to be gifted to another.

#Furiosa #Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga #furiosa a mad max saga #Furiosa meta #Furiosa analysis #Mad Max

50 notes · View notes

otakween · 8 months ago

Text

One Pound Gospel - Volume 4 (Final Volume)

Man, all the cover art in this series is so samey. Kind of a shame. Maybe they should have incorporated side characters into the covers?

Ch. 29

So apparently Angela's family is super rich and judgy, that sucks. Maybe that's part of why she wanted to join a convent to begin with lol. As an aroace person, I somewhat understand her struggle being pressured into a relationship by society.

What do you MEAN Angela isn't her real name?? I didn't know that nuns adopted new names! (So I guess I did learn something new after all). Is her real name pronounced "Mari-eh?"

The chef literally made "Tyler's Bullshit" from The Menu lol

Great another dumber than bricks character who is so dumb that no one could possibly be that dumb in reality. New guy's gimmick is that he just adds random sauces to his dishes without knowing what they are. Riiight

Ch. 30

Well, that was a tiny arc. It succeeded in making me hungry.

This was just the Kana arc but in reverse (Kosaku is jealous instead of Angela). I can feel Takahashi running out of ideas for the characters.

Ch. 31

What is this, the dying of over work chapter?? Both the bento guy and the cram school teacher are going through it.

Kosaku threatens to quit boxing for the 9 millionth time. I don't buy that he's serious about becoming a chef. These kinds of flaky people are the worst irl.

Ch. 32

I appreciate the different fighting styles we've seen through the course of this series. In this one we see one of the lazier options that boxers can use to earn points. I thought it was funny that the nuns referred to it as "hugging" because that's what I was thinking it looked like lol.

Ch. 33

Okay, I feel really silly that I didn't pick up on the fact that Ryusei was Kosaku's next opponent.

I respect Angela's immediate disgust for the dudes at the host bar. I have heard stories of how they can be pretty extortionate and phony. I'd be scared to go to one. Kosaku's reaction to finding out she went to one was funny. That is pretty wild out of context lol

Ch. 34

I liked the use of overlapping speech bubbles to show Kosaku ignoring his coach, that was clever.

They're implying that the guests at host clubs are often female employees from similar industries. IDK if that's true, but that's pretty interesting...

This chapter made me google whether or not male customers are allowed at host clubs and I got mixed results. I guess it depends on the club!

Woah, host club dude gets 3 chapters instead of 2? What makes him so special...?

Ugh, I just googled what a "bait dog" is and learned some very disturbing info about pitbull fighting 😭 couldn't find anything about the term being used in boxing

Ch. 35

All the guys at the gym cringing at Ryusei's phony TV interview was funny. Kosaku's so cute saying "yeah he's cringe, but he's not a bad guy!" (paraphrasing)

Oh snap, Kosaku got angry! Honestly, Angela deserved to be yelled at a little bit. I know it's because she cares, but she's a little too hard on him sometimes.

Ch. 36

Wow, these final chapters are so short! It kinda feels a little rushed actually, oh well.

Ryusei's host coworkers coming to cheer him on was cute.

Ch. 37

Aww, that was really wholesome :) <3 Marie (Angela) gave up being a Sister to be with Kosaku at last and Kosaku won the title.

I loved that Kosaku said he was fighting for Marie AND himself. It's important to be a whole person outside of your relationships!

This was a sweet little, fluffy romcom. Very easy to get through. Looking forward to the adaptations!

#one pound gospel #manga

3 notes · View notes

katakaluptastrophy · 4 months ago

Note

The thing about TLT being "a Catholic book" isn't really to do with it making references and gestures to Catholic figures or ideas (though it does that), or that characters reflect different experiences of being queer and raised Catholic (though it does that too), but rather that the fundamental mechanics of the plot draw upon and play interesting games with a specifically Catholic understanding of metaphysics. Gideon isn't "meant to be" Catholic, or in some way endear us to Catholicism. But her conception, the arc of her life, and the outworking of her death are all underpinned by an engagement with Catholic sacramentality and its implications.

In very general terms, the Catholic understanding of how the universe works is bound up in the physical outworking of sin and redemption: the sin of Adam and Eve is transmitted from generation to generation, God acted out of time and space to preserve the Virgin Mary from that sin so that she could conceive and bear Jesus, who died and rose again and repaired the breach that first sin made in the universe. But also the belief that God saves people from sin and death through consuming Jesus' body, blood, soul, and divinity in the eucharist; and through the literal effect that baptism and confession have upon the human soul: that is, to put it in a state of grace, untarnished by either Adam's sin or their own, on a wavelength with God, as it was in the beginning.

The logic (if very much not the magisterial interpretation of) Catholic metaphysics is one of the key drivers of the overall story of TLT. How the nun urged John to aim for a state of grace, but how he instead chose an indelible sin that tainted everyone in the world he re-made in his own image. How his daughter, conceived by a woman oppressed under empire but untainted by that original fault, chose differently when she too was confronted by a nun with a terrible truth (and achieves that elusive state of grace). How Gideon is consumed body and soul by Harrow to fuel her immortality, and how it transpires that Lyctorhood is a terrible transgression that cries out for restitution. How Harrow faces the awful truth of John's falsehood and walks backwards into hell to harrow it, in what one has to assume is the beginning of the end for necromancy and the putting right of the world, whatever that may look like.

This is absolutely not to say that you must interpret TLT only through a Catholic lens. For a start, death of the author is a thing (properly understood, that is, not as authorial intent being irrelevant, but as readers as individuals interpreting that text through their own knowledge and experience as a valid mode of understanding), and I think the fandom would hugely benefit from hearing more perspectives from people who can bring a diversity of knowledges and experiences to the interpretation of these stories. But also, these stories draw on such a rich and varied spread of sources: for example, the River is Catholic purgatory, but it's also the rivers of the classical underworld, full of mad hungry souls. There's Orphism and the Eleusian Mysteries in there too, alongside the sort of things you'd find in Papal encyclicals. Characters are entangled by relationships that apparently only fully come to light in the context of the extended lore of Homestuck (this is a chunk of context I'm terribly aware that I'm missing). A huge swathe of literature and media cuts through the story.

TL;DRN version: TLT is a deeply Catholic book series in a very weird way, but that's a starting point, not a restriction.

I honestly never read TLT as being a Catholic book series. It has some Christian imagery but as a practicing Jew I saw a lot of myself reflected in Gideon specifically - but I see what you mean about the sword being like a cross, about the sin and the guilt. I propose a new argument: Harrow is the Catholic in this series and Gideon is the one being like "stop being such a Catholic"

that’s interesting!! obviously there’s confirmation bias at play but to me a lot of elements of the series read very specifically as catholic - i.e., references to the sacraments (baptism = pool scene, eucharist = consuming flesh for lyctorhood, etc), notions of hell and the afterlife, and especially wake as the virgin mary (and other references to marian devotion). but i don’t think that catholicism is the only “right answer” to the series and you’re 100% real in saying that gideon is absolutely opposed to all of that lol

#the locked tomb #tlt meta #gideon nav #john gaius #harrowhark nonagesimus #I should probably add the disclaimer that I am not Catholic nor do I play one on television

293 notes · View notes

the-witches-you-couldnt-burn · 4 years ago

Text

Should have known better

Prompt: when ur reading fanfic and one character was cooking and the other comes up to them and they start making out and everyones like starting to take their shirts off and the author STILL hasnt mentioned anyone turning off the stove

My first attempt at Dickinette. I hope I did it justice!

Here’s my favourite ratatouille recipe! It’s amazing!

Ao3

—————————

Warnings: mild sexual content & mentions of gun violence, gangs, bullet wounds, fire hazards and unplanned pregnancy

The keys jangled as he took them out of his pocket, the lock clicked open and the old apartment door creaked. He took two steps into the hall, dropping his bag with a thud and closed the door behind him. Running a hand through his long, sweat slicked hair he sighed. Today had been a long day.

A deep inhale inflated his chest, but the black police vest he wore restricted it’s full extension. The smell of a wonderful home cooked meal made his stomach growl. Ratatouille, his favourite.

His heavy boot laden feet created echoing footsteps as he walked into the grey tiled kitchen. His wife stood at the stove humming, the google pad’s screen was lit with the ingredients list. She scooped and flipped the squared vegetable mix before putting the lid upon it for the meal to soften. She turned to her sketchpad, inspired by something unknown. Drawing captured her full attention, her brain’s need to replicate the idea on paper outweighed her focus on her surroundings.

He should have known better. He grew up with vigilantes and superheroes. He should have know never to sneak up on someone, especially if they knew how to fight; although this rule doesn’t count for villains (they know what they did).

For Marinette, it had been a long day of ripped seems and designer’s block.. It was nearing on eight when she finally started dinner. Looking at the clock she sighed, ‘Dick’s working late again.’ She hoped he wasn’t caught up in the shooting across town. Two gangs had a disagreement over territory and many civilians got caught up in it. She wanted to help but she had been banned from heroine duties for the time being. Her last ladybug adventure resulted in a bullet to her leg, which was still healing.

Dick took her to the hospital stating she had gotten caught in the crossfire (which now reminds her they need to restock the medical supplies), and they discovered that she was four weeks pregnant.

In present time she was still well within her first trimester, just starting her second month; and she was feeling it too. Vomiting each morning wasn’t fun, more so when it started happening more frequently throughout the day. Their midwife reassured the young couple that it was completely normal, but if it keeps up to come back as it may become hyperemesis gravidarum which will harm the baby.

Baby.

She was still trying to wrap her head around it. She had turned twenty-four last July and Dick was only older by a year. They weren’t planning on this and they had taken all of the precautions to prevent it. Yeah sure, they were married but it hadn’t even been two years! Her worry for the future faded as she reminisced on her husband’s reaction to the discovery. He was shocked for a few seconds before jumping up and down like a toddler who got a toy, beaming with joy. Tears of happiness pricked his eyes, threatening to spill on a moments notice.

Another symptom that weighted upon her was fatigue. She was no longer a teen who could challenge the world with a pen and a cup of coffee. She was a tired, pregnant adult who had to give away her coffee maker due to the temptation being too strong. No more late night or all-nighters designing clothes and completing commissions. She had to lessen her commissions due to the stressful nature of them but working from home, in her own studio helped. It had been a month since she found out and now she just wanted to hibernate due to lack of energy.

Putting down the spatula, she scooped up the pen, suddenly inspired by the mix of colours; an autumn playsuit came to mind. Biting her lip as she drew, neglecting her surroundings, the blare of the news channel becoming white noise.

She should have known better. She was a superhero, albeit she was benched at the moment, but still! The first rule of ‘herodom’ was to always do the right thing, but the second rule was to always be aware of your surroundings.

Arms wrapped around her waist, a small gasps left her mouth and her elbow drove straight back into her captor’s chest. A masculine groan came from behind her, but she paid it no mind as she tried to get out of the man’s strong grip.

“Mari, Mari! Calm down it’s me” Her husband said breathlessly. Her jab winded him, although it was softened by his police uniform, Marinette’s miraculous strength was powerful to say the least. He just wish he didn’t have to be on the receiving end of it.

“Ma moitié! Why would you do that!?” Her anguished cry caused him to hide his chuckle in her neck. Her heartbeat made its presence known within her chest and her breathing was still shallow. Turning within his embrace, she faced him with a pout on her face, “You jerk, you scared me!” She whimpered, her pregnancy hormones had blurred the line between her emotions causing her mood to flip like a switch.

Dick looked down at her with a guilt riddled face. “Shoot Mari, I’m sorr-“

Before he could finish apologising Marinette tugged him down and connected her lips to his. She leaned back into the countertop, cupping his cheek and jaw with both hands. Dick eagerly followed her lead.

He picked her up, his hands moulding the flesh of her thighs. He had done this before, but took extra precautions this time due to her still healing leg injury. He moved her away from the countertop and sat her upon the plush couch. He hovered above her, lips only splitting for a millisecond for air before closing the gap once more.

Marinette pushed on his shoulder and swiftly flipped him so that she was on top. The quick motion caused his head to slam back into the wall, the noise halted their make-out session. Her eyes widened, the cloud of lust had evaporated and rained down on her parade. She apologised multiple times to him, eyes watering in the process.

Dick just laughed before pulling her back in for another kiss. In contrast to the sloppy wet kisses before, the gentleness off Mari’s lips now made him feel like he was made of glass. She filled it with her remorse over hurting him. But as the kiss continued it shifted back to the momentum and passion they had before.

Her hands trailed up his chest, she shivered into the kiss; he had just taken off her shirt, leaving her in her bra. His thumb brushed under the mound of her breast, he felt her furious heartbeat through he skin.

Her focus lowered to his bare neck. Placing kiss upon kiss there and biting occasionally, leaving a trail of pink marks for his colleagues to see during his neck shift. A hand ran down her back as it arced, pushing her bosom into his chest.

They broke apart, foreheads pressed together, bodies flushed against each other’s. She peppered his face with kisses, “I love you”s were stated after each. He returned this action with the same fervour.

Something was wrong though. It was a sudden onset plaguing thought that something wasn't right. They had tried to ignore it but it had become like a tugging string tied around their hearts, signalling an oncoming danger. Wordlessly the two scanned the apartment, neither wanting to part from their entanglement.

Confused the two looked back at the other. Neither finding what set off the warning sensation. As their eyes connected, realisation washed over them like a bucket of ice water. They inhaled the burnt air and scrambled apart; both exclaiming “Fuck!”

Running into the kitchen, the tiles were cold against her bare feet. Dark unventilated smoke hung in the air. Upon entry to the room it was a wall of heat, it was a wonder the smoke alarms hadn’t gone off yet. Dick grabbed a nearby tea towel and swatted at the smoke, he shuffled towards the burners, mouth and nose hidden within his elbow.

Marinette opened all nearby windows, she hoped that the neighbours on the floors above didn’t question the smoke. The couple worked together to set up a system of fans to push out the smoke from the kitchen.

“If Alfred were here he would kill us.” Dick solemnly nodded in reply, ‘we should have known better’. He scraped the burnt black char into the bin, while Mari held the pan. Once the pan cooled down enough it went into the bin too, there was no saving it.

Dick tied up the yellow bin bag and placed the spatula into the sink. “Soooo... want chinese? If you’re up for it, it’ll be my treat.”

Her stomach growled as her eyes flicked to the clock, it was almost nine and she hadn’t eaten since breakfast at seven. She nodded, “sounds good let’s go!”

She walked towards the door, hand on the handle when she realised that he hadn’t followed her. Turning back around she saw him staring at her, cheeks flushed, unmoved from his position next to the bin.

“Um babe?”

“What’s wrong Ma moitié? I thought you wanted Chinese.” Her head tilted, confused at his actions.

He cleared his throat, eyes flicking away. “Babe you’ve forgotten your shirt.”

“Shit” left her lips as she bolted back to the couch, vaulting over a counter much to Dick’s disapproval. She heard him scolding her from the other room, but was too hungry to care.

Walking back to him, now appropriately dressed, she grabbed his hand, pulling him out the door. He just sighed, following his crazy wife, throwing the bag into the complex’s dumpster on the way to the car.

No one was getting in between her and her noodles.

#maribat #mlb x dc #dc x mlb #marinette x dick #dick x marinette #dickinette #Alfred shivered at the sensation of burning food #Alfred would be disappointed #never get in the way of Mari and her noodles

61 notes · View notes

lucianalight · 4 years ago

Note

Your EQ post made me think I wished so much OUAT authors got the Loki show instead of the buffons we got. K&H did a good job, especially the early seasons, with characters struggling with identity and family issues, I wish Loki could have gotten some of that, or at least some of the decent therapy we saw in Lucifer. But we got a Mary-Sue creator and the Rick&Morty guy.

Also, I'd love to see TH work with Lana Parrilla, they're both such amazing actors and good people, they'd work amazingly together.

Pity it's just a dream.

*Major spoilers for OUAT and Lucifer*

OMG YES! I mean OUAT had lots of problems. It started good until S3 and then it went downhill after that. But it had the best redemption arcs for villains. Almost all the villains, characters who did far worst than what Loki did, got redemption and in a way that they didn't lose their dignity or characterization and they certainly weren't humiliated and beaten up constantly.

One of their best arcs was Regina's self-acceptance and self-love. When she hated herself so much that she ripped herself in two to try and destroy her dark side. The way they handled that arc left me awestruck. I didn't see it coming. I thought Regina was going to kill the Evil Queen and the thought of that left a bad taste in my mouth. But at the last moment Regina remembered when she'd looked at her reflection in the mirror, realizing she was the person she hated the most and how it broke her. She remembered her pain. And she realized she wasn't that person anymore. She didn't hate herself. She understood that what she always needed to heal was love. Loving herself more than anything and she shared that love among her love for others with the Evil Queen. I love that episode! And yes, I'd love to see Tom and Lana work together!

Lucifer is one of the best shows I've ever seen. With the exception of S3, every season was absolutely wonderful(my fave is S4). Lucifer is not even evil in this show. Yet from the start the show acknowledged his flaws and instead of scapegoating him, the way humanity did, showed how that affected his mental health. Explored his issues and how he hurt people sometimes because of them, and without putting him down created an arc to heal and redeem him. One of the arcs they handled beautifully was Lucifer's self-acceptance, or rather forgiving himself. Lucifer self-hatred was manifested as his devil form, without his control, covering all of his body(did you see how he cried that he didn't want to be a monster when he saw his devil wings the first time😭). When he decided that he wanted to forgive himself, his devil form went away and he was able to control it later as a means to save Chloe. And when he wanted to sacrifice what he loved, in order to protect Chloe and humanity, when he was able to saw the good in himself, his angel wings returned. (I really want to see the two Toms work together! :D)

Also notice in both of these arcs, their romantic relationship had nothing to do with it. Robin and his love didn't made Regina love herself. It helped her along the way but he wasn't the main reason for it. Chloe straight out told Lucifer that this isn't about her. That Lucifer has to forgive himself. Because the writers knew that romance, having a love interest, won't magically make you to accept and love yourself.

Now compare these two arcs to how Loki show handled the theme of self-acceptance and self-love. The narrative portrayed Loki as an incompetent attention seeking narcissist who needs a good beating up and humiliation to realize and confess that about himself. All of his tragic past and identity issues are ignored in favor of showing him a power hungry betrayer. His reaction to other Lokis is calling them monsters and he generally couldn't stand them. And his self-love and self-acceptance is handled through romantic love for another version of himself who is nothing like him btw. It's so disappointing. It takes lots of effort to have a beautifully written self-acceptance arc like Agent of Asgard for inspiration and manage to make sth so bad. It's truly baffling.

#sry for the long answer #i just really love those arcs for regina and lucifer #and they are two of my absolute favorite characters too #loki tv show negativity #regina mills #evil queen #ouat #lucifer #lucifer morningstar #anon #messages

38 notes · View notes

writinglizards · 4 years ago

Text

Make me Happy

Summary: "I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous." - Mary Shelley's Frankenstein He is created. He is abandoned. He is found.

Read on Ao3

The first thing he knows is agony.

He feels set on fire from the inside, bright white pain arcing through his veins. He cries out, voice hoarse. The sharpness of it ceases as quickly as it came, but the ache persists.

A clatter to his left draws his attention. He shifts. Distantly, he’s aware of the scratch and shift of the rough-hewn shirt and trousers he’s dressed in, but there are larger concerns, at the moment. His limbs feel awkward but otherwise cooperative, so sits up.

There is a man across the room with his back pressed against the counter. White hair, a beard. The man’s face is drawn in an expression he can’t parse. Beneath the man’s feet are shards of glass.

He doesn't understand where he is or what's going on. He opens his mouth to speak--and finds he doesn't know the words to communicate this. He makes a quiet, wordless sound, questioning. He hopes it's enough for the man to understand. He so wants answers.

In response, the man jolts for the door.

He starts at the abrupt movement, makes another quiet noise of surprise, reaches out a hand toward him, wait, please--

The man makes a shrill noise, "Stay away, you, you--" he flings the door open after a brief scrabbling with the lock and bolts, a high pitched terrified noise leaving his throat. He throws the door closed behind him, but it hits the doorframe and bounces back, hard.

He follows because he doesn't know what else to do. The other man is scared. Should he be scared?

He lets the smell of terror, sickly and awful, lead him down a spiral staircase and out a partly concealed door onto the street where he's abruptly hit with an overwhelming wave of scents and sounds. It's too much for him to understand; all he knows is he needs to find the man again. He hopes he can help.

He sees someone, not the man from the room, on the street a few feet away. He approaches, timid. He's trying to work out how to ask what he wants to know--where did the man from the room go?--when he catches the other's attention.

"What the--what the fuck?" He doesn't understand the words, but the tone--the man spins on his heel and sprints away, terrified. It catches the attention of several people up the street. The first man was scared, but these men--help, maybe?

He takes a few slow steps in their direction, still trying to figure out how to ask what he wants to know when he catches the glint of steel. He freezes. He takes quick stock of their expressions, the naked weapons in their grips, and hesitates.

"You'll get the fuck out of here if you know what's good for you, monster." He doesn't understand, doesn't know how to respond in a way that will ease the aggression of their posture. He just wants help.

"Well? Get," one of the men shouts, rapping the flat of his blades together. It makes a harsh sound, makes him whine with how the sharp noise hurts. He ducks his head, cups his hands over his ears to try and make the hurt stop. "I said get," the man shouts again, repeats the movement of his weapons. He keens, a low, quiet sound full of pain. He doesn't understand--

"You got to the count of fucking three," another says, and he doesn't wait for them to make the noise again. He runs.

Every person he sees in his mad dash down the street and away from the pain reacts similarly. Either they flee or they bare steel and make threats, loud and angry. The mixing scents, the noises, his own fear, it's all too much. He doesn't know where he is or where he's going. He just runs.

------------------------------

By the time the sun is beginning to rise, he's finally broken out of the rows and rows of buildings and into the trees, where he runs until his lungs burn and his feet hurt before he collapses in the shade at the base of a tree. He doesn't know where he is or what's going on, doesn't understand the fear and hostility of the people he'd seen. He sits there, somewhere in the middle of the forest, and finally feels it hit him. He doesn't know, he doesn't understand. He sits and he cries, deep chest wracking sobs, until he's too tired to keep his eyes open. He curls himself up small and tight in the roots of the tree, and sleeps.

------------------------------

He's woken some indeterminate time later, to the sound of footsteps. Lots of them. The sky is going grey at the edges, so he knows he must have slept a while. There's shouting coming from the direction he came from yesterday, words he can't understand in a tone he can--they sound like the men who made the awful noise.

"If you see that fuckin beast, just kill 'em. No need to leave him loose to terrorize the city again."

“Nah, the mage wants ‘em. Said--”

“I know what he said and I’m saying just kill ‘em.”

They're not that far. He knows enough now that he doesn't want to run into these people, doesn't want a repeat of last night. He rises very quietly, and treks farther into the forest, away from the sounds of the approaching men. He'll walk all night if he has to.

------------------------------

He walks until he can't hear them any longer, and then he keeps walking, for good measure. He walks until he stumbles across another group of buildings, much smaller than the one he'd fled last night. He lingers at the edge of the trees, watching a trio of young women leaning against a wooden fence not far, talking. One of the women has something she appears to be eating in her hand, and his own stomach growls loudly in reminder that he has eaten nothing since...he doesn't know when.

These women look nothing like the men with their weapons, which is the only reason he steps out of his hiding spot in the trees, starts towards them.

"Sara, look--" one of the women catches sight of him and goes pale. She steps backward, hands shaking, and he freezes. He doesn't want them to be afraid. He only wants--

The one eating turns to look back over her shoulder and their eyes meet. She drops the thing she'd been eating. There's a shriek--the third woman--and then all three of them are running pell-mell back towards the rest of the buildings.

He tamps down on his hurt and darts forward to scoop the food off the ground--an...apple?--and then he's running again, farther into the forest. He knows better than to stick around for the angry men and their weapons.

------------------------------

He doesn't pause until he feels he's far enough away he'll be able to hear anyone coming with enough warning to escape. He settles at the base of a tree and gnaws on the apple slowly, trying to savor the small thing. It's a little better than nothing, but it reminds him he's hungry, sets his stomach to rolling uncomfortably. When he's gnawed the thing down to its core he finally sets it aside, disappointed.

He’ll have to see if he can find more food, or venture back towards the buildings to see if there’s anything he might be able to take that won’t be missed. But not tonight.

------------------------------

In the end, he ends up doing quite a bit of stealing from the village at night while he hides in the trees during the day, watching the way the people interact with one another. He feels bad about just taking, but there’s nothing much that can be done for it--there’s no easily accessible food in the forest and the people still spook and run at the sight of him.

So that’s the way he survives, for a bit. It's not a comfortable existence and he knows the people of the little town both know he's there and are upset by it. He tries not to scare them, only slips down into their fields at night, when most are asleep, only takes as much food as he needs to quell the emptiness in his stomach.

Watching the people interact with one another is helpful, though, even if he can’t approach them. The field workers do a lot of talking to one another as they work, and over time he starts to pick up what the words mean, in a roundabout kind of way. So he lingers and he watches and he hopes for...something he can't put a name to.

He's finally forced to move on when he tries to slip down into the town about three weeks later and there are men with swords again, lining the outskirts of the village. He knows enough about people at this point from what he's observed and he doesn't want problems. He moves on, just picks a direction and starts walking.

------------------------------

When he stumbles across a tiny cottage out in the woods all on its own, he assumes it must be abandoned--people don't live alone, after all. He would investigate further, but the sun is already peeking over the horizon, sky dusting pink, and he knows he needs to find somewhere to settle before daybreak.

There are several little shacks sprinkled around the clearing that he doesn’t know the purpose of so he picks one--the shack behind the cottage--to test the door and finds it unlocked. It's a storage shed and moderately well-stocked, despite how the little room seems to be on the verge of collapse. He settles to the ground on the far side of a crate and tucks himself into a tight little ball. He'll stay here today and investigate more closely tonight.

Shortly, he dozes.

------------------------------

He wakes much too soon to the sound of...something. He's never heard it before, this softly twanging noise. It's good. Nice.

He knows it must be well past mid-day from the way the light slants in through the chinks in the walls. He's just thinking it's too early to try venturing out when the singing starts, soft and lovely and he thinks, oh, It's a person.

He rises very slowly and quietly and crosses the tiny storeroom to the wall that's shared with the cottage. The music is a little louder here, and he can make out the words, a story of a knight saving a fair maiden and true love's kiss. He can understand what those words mean a bit now--language has come slowly, but he's getting better at piecing together bits and pieces from the things he's heard, although not all of it makes sense all the time. And well, some things just feel right, like he's known them all his life. Language has been a little like that, even if speaking is a challenge.

So he can follow the story, vaguely, even as the song ends and another quickly takes its place. He hears no other voices or movement in the adjoining room, just that smooth tenor singing of heroics and heartbreak. He settles down beside the wall, rests his temple against the rough wood grain, and listens.

------------------------------

He wakes again an indeterminate time later. It's late, the sun is down and the man in the cottage sounds as if he's retired for the night. It's quiet. He...probably shouldn't stay here, but it's warm and quiet and the man sings so beautifully. He borrows a small meal of hard bread from the stores and tells himself he won't be back when he slips out of the storeroom to stretch his legs.

By the time the sun rises, he's tucked back into the storeroom anyway, curled up against the wall that joins the cottage. What's one more day?

------------------------------

One day becomes two days becomes a whole week. He's reluctant to leave the security of the little storeroom, the pleasant singing. A few days in, he finds a chink in the wall that lets him see into the cottage room and he now spends his daylight hours pressed to that wall, watching, listening. The man is...beautiful. He looks like they would be of a height, even if the man is a little leaner than he himself is. Despite that, the man is still broad-shouldered and strong looking, with brilliant blue eyes and a sweep of brown hair he can only think of as pretty. And he can tell the man is not just beautiful; he’s also intelligent, witty. He talks to himself constantly, sings, reads, dances his way around the room. The man moves through life as if he has not a care in the world. He wants so badly to be a part of that.

Despite how much he yearns to join the man, he still won't reveal himself, too afraid of the potential reaction to him. He finds himself growing attached, despite how much he shouldn’t. If this soft and delightful man is as afraid as the village people were, it will break him.

So he watches and he dreams and he tries to help around the cottage, at night. It starts with some chopped wood when the woodpile gets a little too low, which the man reacts to with delighted confusion. Then it's a few rabbits and other small animals, here and there, to replenish some of the food stores he's been dipping into to feed himself.

"Well, looks like we've got ourselves an admirer," the man says softly the morning he finds the first rabbit. He'd been...nervous about leaving the little thing. Nervous it might upset or scare the man. Instead, he looks...pleased. He smiles all day, even when he comes back in from caring for the chickens, which he knows the man dislikes. It's nice, kindles a warm feeling in his chest.

He wants to be the cause of that smile more often.

------------------------------

A few days later, he wakes to the sound of more than just the man in the yard out front. There are several people he can't see but he can hear them, carrying things to and fro.

"Jaskier, where do you want this?" one of them asks.

"Oh, that's fine there," the man says. Something flutters in his chest. Jaskier.

There's a few more crates the other men bring into the cottage that he can see through his chink in the wall. The man, Jaskier, watches the stacking of these crates on the far side of the cottage along with another man who stands at his elbow. Compared to Jaskier, the man is very broad and well built with short cropped dark hair. He carries a sword on his hip and stands like he'd be ready to draw it at a moment's notice. He reminds him of the men who'd threatened him the first night.

"I should also warn you there's been sightings of some kind of monster lately." Jaskier turns to the man with the sword, effectively presenting his back to the chink in the wall. He wishes he could see his face.

"What kind of monster? Monsters have been gone for almost a hundred years."

The other man is already shaking his head, "not a monster, monster, no. This is some kind of abomination. Looks like a man but...not. Wrong. He's been spotted at one of the nearby villages as little as a few weeks ago."

"And? How do they know he's a monster then?"

The man puffs out a tired sounding breath, "I'm just relating what I heard, Jaskier. I don't know."

"Of course not," he says, tetchy. There's something beyond the words that have upset him.

"Look, I--"

Jaskier pulls away from the hand hovering over his shoulder. "I don't care, Vincent."

"Jask, you know I didn't--"

"We're not talking about us," Jaskier says, tone sharp in a way he's never heard, "just...let the men finish and then you can run on home to father and tell him what a good little disowned son I've been, hm?"

Jaskier doesn't give him a chance to respond, just steps over to watch the men bringing in the crates more closely, steps just a little too heavy.

When they're gone, he watches Jaskier cry, head in his hands. It makes his chest uncomfortably tight but there's nothing he can do.

------------------------------

When night falls and he's sure Jaskier is asleep (and he feels a little flutter of delight in his gut when he thinks the man's name, elated that he knows it after all this time), he slips out of the storeroom and into the pooling moonlight of the little clearing, stretching his legs. His goal tonight is to chop some more wood so Jaskier will have enough to stay warm tomorrow. Then...maybe a walk. He'd seen some blackberry bushes a few nights ago. Maybe he'd pick some, leave them for him in the morning.

The wood chopping goes quickly and he stacks the split logs nicely with the other chopped wood against the wall by the front door. He does so quietly, not wanting to rouse his sleeping friend. Not that he thinks it likely the man will rouse tonight. He'd been somber the rest of the day and he'd cried again, curled in his bed when he should have been sleeping. He finds he wants to do something to ease the unhappiness that's settled over him since the men had come by.

It's with that thought he wanders off in search of those blackberries. He takes one of the wooden buckets Jaskier usually uses for gathering eggs and sets off to find the blackberry bushes.

They're right where he remembered them, just a short walk from the little pond where the ducks gather from time to time. He goes about picking them to fill the bucket, careful of their little thorns. He gets the bucket three-fourths or so full before he calls it good. By then, he's covered in sticky juice and the sun should be up soon. He's got just enough time to visit the pond, wash off his hands and leave the bucket out front before he’ll settle back in the storage room.

The pond is silent and still when he wanders up, the bucket dangling from one hand. He sets it aside on the shore and kneels at the edge of the pond. He tries not to peer into his reflection in the water, even as the moonlight reflects back off its surface.

Unbidden, then man's words resurface in his mind. Like a man but not. Wrong. He knows he looks...different. There are harsh scars scattering his face, his temples, his arms, his torso. His eyes are wrong, too bright, too strange a color. His hair is unnatural, too pale, too wild. He understands why the villagers are startled by him, understands why they react with fear. He's...wrong. He just doesn't know what to do about it.

He pushes the thoughts from his mind and doesn't let himself linger. Instead, he washes up quickly and treks back over to the cottage. He leaves the bucket of berries on the doorstep and retreats to the storeroom.

------------------------------

He rouses just a little when Jaskier rises. He listens to him sing and go about his morning routine with half an ear, still mostly asleep. The sound of his friend awake and back to normal is a comfort, so it's disturbing the way he abruptly goes silent when the door creaks open.

"Oh--" he's obviously found the berries. The quiet stretches out for a beat too long and then there's a sniffling noise. "Shit," Jaskier mutters. The door clunks back shut. He hears the noise of the bucket being sat down somewhere in the cottage. "'s stupid to fucking cry over berries, Jask, pull it together," he tells himself, voice thick with tears.

He can't help the surge of alarm that rolls through him--he didn't mean to make Jaskier cry. He presses his face to the wood, eye at the chink in the wall, and is surprised to find him smiling despite the tears, gazing down into the bucket of berries as if they are something far more precious as he wipes aggressively at his eyes with the heel of his hand.

"Blackberries," he repeats, once his breathing is a little more under control, "I'll have to make a pie." He's still smiling. Maybe they weren't such a bad idea, after all.

------------------------------

Jaskier continues with his daily routine after that, and he lets himself sleep again, after a time. He's fairly attuned with the noises of Jaskier going about his day, so he doesn't startle when Jaskier begins going through the crates of supplies the men brought yesterday. By the time he realizes what that means, Jaskier's already at the door of the storage shed, dried goods tucked under his arm.

He lays very, very still where he's curled in the corner, pressed against the wall of the cottage, eyes squeezed shut, and waits for the inevitable.

The gasp is expected. The sound of the bundle Jaskier is carrying hitting the ground is as well. What is not expected is the hands that land on his shoulder, tug him over gently. He blinks up at the face of the man he's only watched from a distance, startled. He expected revulsion, fear, the sound of footsteps fleeing. Instead, he's peering down at him with concern.

"Oh, thank the gods you're alive," he sighs out on a breath, patting reassuringly at his shoulder where his hands still rest. "What are you doing in my storage shed, darling?"

And oh, this is...not something he'd been prepared for. He swallows hard and can't seem to force words out.

"You don't have to tell me," Jaskier says softly, "but let's get you inside, alright? It can't be comfortable out here."

He follows in a daze when Jaskier tugs him gently upright and leads him into the cottage. This doesn't feel real. He must be dreaming. Why else would Jaskier be looking at him like that?

"Have you had anything to eat? Are you hungry?" Jaskier asks once he's settled at the table. He at least can follow that much so he shakes his head, still afraid to speak. Jaskier jumps to preparing him a small meal of hard cheese and fresh bread. “Sorry, I haven’t had the chance to make that pie yet,” he says as he sets the little plate before him and settles across the table from him, smiling. "Go on, eat," he says, and he doesn't have to be told twice.

The food is the best thing he's ever tasted. The pleased look never falls off Jaskier's face. "Thank you," he whispers once the plate is empty, wincing when the words fall rough like gravel from his disused throat.

"Oh," Jaskier breathes, freezing with his hand outstretched to take the empty plate. He thinks maybe he's made a mistake, but Jaskier's smile stretches impossibly wider, eyes sparkling, "you're very welcome, dear heart." The look on Jaskier’s face, that tone, settles something warm in his chest.

Jaskier puts the plate on the counter and resumes his seat. He doesn't know what to do with himself in the face of Jaskier's kindness and keeps his eyes averted. Jaskier doesn't give him time to start feeling self-conscious, though.

"I'm Jaskier. Do you have a name, darling? Something I can call you?" And he knows Jaskier’s asking a question but--

Jaskier can tell his mistake almost immediately. “Oh! Um,” he fumbles to press his hand to his chest, “Jaskier,” he repeats, and he nods. Then, tentatively, Jaskier holds out his hand to him. He doesn’t move, not quite sure what Jaskier means until his palm makes careful contact with his chest. His breath catches. “You?”

He shakes his head, understanding that Jaskier is asking for his name. He feels a bubble of shame rise in him. It's not his fault he doesn't have something to go by like everyone else, he knows, but that doesn't lessen the feeling he's let his friend down.

"Oh, sweetheart," Jaskier breathes, and he doesn't sound upset. Or at least, not at him. "What should we call you then?” He looks thoughtful for a minute before, “Hold on, I’ve an idea.”

Jaskier rises and crosses the room, bringing back something from one of the shelves. “I’ve got a book here,” Jaskier says, settling it on the table in front of him, “It’s a storybook, but I could read you the names of the characters here until you find one you like?” and that was a lot of words but…“Just nod if you hear one you like, yes?” He can do that.

So Jaskier flips through the book, stopping periodically to read out the names as he finds them. And they’re...fine. But none of the names sound right to him.

“Hm, Eric?” He shakes his head, “No, I agree, too bland. Jakob? No? Alright then, Alice? That’s typically a lady’s name but--nope okay, um, Geralt?”

And that’s--“Yes,” he says softly. Something about that feels right.

The smile on Jaskier's face is small and delighted. "You want to be called Geralt?"

"Mm." And something about choosing the name makes his face hot. He ducks his head.

The grin that stretches Jaskier’s face looks like it hurts it's so wide. "A good name. Heroic. Kind." His gaze softens as he reaches across the table to rest his palm on Geralt's forearm. The touch is reassuring, even as he burns hot under Jaskier's fingertips. "It suits you."

------------------------------

He doesn't pressure Geralt for an explanation of anything, but he reassures him several times that he can stay, that it's no trouble. He even sets him up with new clothes, soft cotton that isn’t as scratchy as what he’d been wearing.

"Really Geralt, I have to insist. I won't be able to rest knowing you're out there somewhere with nowhere to stay. And," he continues, “if you stay long enough, I’ll even send for some clothes of your own, if you’d like.” And well. He can't let Jaskier worry (and the new clothes would be nice, too).

He sleeps on the little divan and marvels at how quickly Jaskier drifts off, breaths evening into sleep. The trust inherent in the action shakes him to his core. He follows a while later, chest overly tight.

------------------------------

They settle into a habit surprisingly quickly in the weeks that follow. Geralt picks up many of the tasks he'd already been performing for Jaskier in the twilight hours and Jaskier provides excellent company. He still sings and plays his lute in the evenings, preening to have an audience that Geralt is happy to provide.

He's thankful Jaskier asks no questions, although it's obvious Jaskier would like to know more about him, about what happened. He catches him staring at the scars when he thinks Geralt isn't looking, but it's not with revulsion. Geralt can't name the emotion on his face, but it's not a bad one necessarily.

There's only one question he does ask.

"So, do you know who my admirer is?" he says finally. Geralt’s just starting to feel truly comfortable here with Jaskier and is less worried about Jaskier changing his mind about keeping Geralt around. He’s proven he’s helpful and he’s trying very, very hard not to scare him (he’s beginning to think Jaskier can’t be scared, actually).

Geralt's in the middle of chopping wood when he asks. "Because you know, it was really very sweet of them." He's grinning.

"Uh," is the very elegant response Geralt comes up with, cheeks hot. He’s not sure why he’s embarrassed. Jaskier obviously knows it was him. He chops the next piece of wood with a singular focus, doesn't shift his gaze back over to Jaskier.

"He must have very fine arms. He chopped all my wood for weeks, you know," Jaskier says offhand, and oh. He's teasing. His tone is friendly. Geralt only flushes harder. He’s not sure why Jaskier can fluster him so quickly. "Not as good as yours, I'm sure," he continues, and Geralt nearly jumps when Jaskier's hand settles on his bicep, squeezing. "Mm, not sure anyone's as deliciously built as you are, darling."

"Jaskier," he finally bites out, mortified. He feels--he feels--he doesn’t know the word for it, but he’s pretty sure it’s not appropriate. Jaskier laughs.

"It's alright sweetheart," he grins and shoots him a wink, "your secret's safe with me." And Geralt doesn't know what to do with himself, but he likes the way his stomach clenches when Jaskier touches him, the soft way he speaks. And he does trust that he's safe with him. It's...reassuring.

------------------------------

Despite how safe Geralt feels, he still can't bring himself to tell Jaskier how he ended up hiding in his storeroom. He's fairly certain Jaskier won't care at this point, but every time he tries to say something, he finds the words have abandoned him. Unlike Jaskier, he struggles to voice his thoughts, even when he has the words neatly arranged in his head. Jaskier reassures him that it's fine, not everyone is gifted with their speech and it's normal for words not to work the way you'd like, but it frustrates him anyway. He...cares...about Jaskier. He’s…different. He wants to share this part of himself with him. He just doesn't know how.

His efforts are further complicated by the way his stomach flips uncomfortably every time Jaskier is close. He's not an idiot, he knows what it means (Jaskier is a big fan of love ballads, the raunchier the better, he says and it’s…that) but it feels...dishonest to entertain Jaskier's subtle flirting, especially when Jaskier knows nothing about who he really is, how he came to be. After all, who could love a monster?

------------------------------

"Geralt," Jaskier calls from his mound of blankets as Geralt stokes the fire for the last time that night, "come to bed with me, darling."

Geralt can feel himself flush. "Jaskier," he admonishes, but Jaskier only laughs, lifts the corner of the blanket invitingly.

"It's been cold at night and it will only get colder. Come on, Geralt." He bats his eyes enticingly, pats the corner of the mattress again.

"I can't," he says, quiet, and something in Jaskier's expression softens.

"Alright, darling," he says, letting the blankets fall closed around him, "but that's a standing invitation."

"Hm."

Jaskier doesn't press further, but Geralt lays awake thinking about it for far longer than he should.

------------------------------

"I'm a viscount," Jaskier says apropos of nothing a few days later. It's early morning and they're outside, returning from the chicken coop. Geralt turns to where Jaskier's stopped in the middle of the yard, bucket of chicken eggs forgotten on the ground beside him. "Or at least, I used to be. My father disowned me about a year ago now."

"Why?" Geralt asks, because Jaskier seems to need the encouragement. He wouldn't have brought it up if he hadn't wanted Geralt to know.

"I...embarrassed him. With who I chose to take to my bed." He's staring hard at the tree line opposite the cottage. He's not even facing Geralt. "My father's head of the guard. Vincent."

The name brings to mind the day the crates were delivered. The man with the sword who stood too close.

"I was disowned either way and I knew that, but Vincent..." he trails off.

"Thank you, Jaskier. You don't have to tell me." His eyes meet Geralt's finally and he smiles. It's a tiny, watery thing.

"No I--he chose to stay. With my father. And I'm...here. It bothered me. For a long time." He's quiet so long Geralt thinks maybe that's the end of it, but when he steps forward to stand shoulder to shoulder with Jaskier, he keeps talking. "I thought...who would want a disowned viscount? Vincent certainly didn't. I'm damaged goods."

"Jaskier, you're not damaged," Geralt says, horrified at the prospect. Jaskier is...wonderful (even if he talks a little too much for Geralt's taste, sometimes). How could anyone think him lesser for loving who he loved?

Jaskier extends his hand to catch Geralt's and squeezes tightly. Geralt squeezes back, stomach fluttering when Jaskier smiles at him. "I know," he says softly, "and I know you’re not ready to talk about yourself yet, but whatever it is, it’s okay, okay?" And when Jaskier says that, looking at him the way he is, Geralt can almost believe him.

------------------------------

They settle deeper into their routine, something Jaskier calls "disgustingly domestic" with a smile that nearly splits his face, so Geralt's pretty sure he doesn't think it's a bad thing, actually. Geralt certainly enjoys it.

Jaskier talks incessantly about anything and everything and Geralt likes listening.

“You know,” Jaskier says one night, after he’s wound down his playing and put the lute away, “I haven’t had many guests out here since I was disowned. It’s been...nice.”

“Why not?” Geralt asks, stoking the fire before settling back on the fur rug. Geralt can’t understand why someone wouldn’t want to spend time with Jaskier.

“Being disowned is…” he pauses, obviously searching for the right words, “it’s not something that’s done lightly. It means the people I grew up with, the people who were close to me, they can’t see me anymore, or risk having their own reputation tarnished.”

Geralt feels his lips twitch in a frown. Jaskier laughs.

“Oh, don’t make that face, I know. But that’s how it is. I’ve spent some time with the village locals, but it’s...not the same. I’m still nobility to them and I’m no longer nobility to the actual nobles.” He shrugs, but Geralt can see the thought still bothers him.

“You were lonely,” Geralt says. He’s not sure he should have pointed it out, but Jaskier doesn’t seem angry.

“I was,” he agrees softly. Something in his eyes pins Geralt to the spot, “until you.”

And that’s...too much to think about. “Hm.”

The smile that creeps over Jaskier’s face is blinding. “Yes,” he agrees, “hm, indeed.”

------------------------------

"My father's men should be stopping by in the next few weeks," Jaskier says on a morning like any other.

"Did you want me--"

"No," Jaskier corrects hastily before Geralt can offer to hide, "No, I want you here. I just--wanted to give you a heads up."

"Oh."

They don't talk about it again. They probably should have.

------------------------------

"Jaskier?" Geralt calls across the small space of the cottage, sitting up.

There's banging outside. People. Jaskier shifts in his cocoon of blankets that is his bed, only the top of his head visible. "No," he mumbles fuzzily, "don't wanna." He's...not really awake.

"Jaskier," Geralt rumbles, voice still thick with sleep himself, "we should--"

He doesn't get to finish his sentence before the door is swinging open and a man is striding through. When he sees Geralt, his hand lands on his sword.

"Jaskier, what the fuck--"

"Vincent," Jaskier gasps, nearly tripping in his haste to extract himself from the blankets. He’s eyeing the space between Vincent and Geralt with panic, "ever heard of fucking knocking?" he bites out, shifting to put himself between them as much as possible.

"Jaskier, you've got a--"

"Don't finish that sentence," he says, tone flat and threatening, "and I'd appreciate it if you'd give my companion and I some fucking privacy. I'll meet you in the yard in a moment."

Vincent's hand tightens around the pommel of his sword, "I don't think--" he starts, but the look Jaskier pins him with is cutting. He hesitates, but he leaves without another word, pulling the door shut behind him.

"Fucking prick," Jaskier growls, stalking over to his wardrobe to put on some clothes before facing their company.

"I should--" Geralt starts, but Jaskier cuts him off.

"You should get dressed and let me drag you around the yard to hang off of while I make sure my father hasn't fucking shorted me on supplies. I'm already disowned, what more can he do to me?" The grin on Jaskier's face is brittle.

When they exit the cottage, Vincent is hovering by the door, obviously nervous. He's still got his hand wrapped around the pommel of his sword like a lifeline. Jaskier scoffs at it, but Geralt stays carefully back and works to make his posture non-threatening.

"Jaskier," Vincent says the minute he's out the door, "what is--"

"This is Geralt," Jaskier cuts in smoothly, "my companion." Vincent winces.

"He's--"

"My companion," Jaskier reinforces.

"The mage in Novigrad is looking for him." Geralt stiffens.

"I assure you we have no idea what you mean," Jaskier bites out, even as Geralt feels his stomach drop uncomfortably. The mage. The man from the room. He no longer cares one way or the other who the man is or what he wanted from Geralt. He’s happy here, he doesn’t want to leave. Vincent opens his mouth to respond, but he snaps his jaw shut a moment later with no protest.

"Okay," he sighs. Then-- "Where do you want the supplies?"

The men don't stay any longer than they need to, but it's a tense affair for everyone involved. Jaskier takes Geralt's hand in his and doesn't let go until long after Vincent and his underlings have left.

------------------------------

The rest of the day, Jaskier’s filled with a frantic sort of energy. He breezes through chores, drags Geralt on a walk with him out to the pond where he paces the water’s edge for near an hour before they head back. And it doesn’t dissipate even after they’ve returned to the cottage and had dinner.

The fire’s lit and Geralt is settled on the fur rug before it the way he normally does. Usually, this is about the time Jaskier would fetch his lute, or perhaps a book to read from. Instead, he’s still pacing.

“Jaskier,” Geralt finally says, breaking his focus as he comes up short in another circuit of the room, “come sit. Your pacing makes my head hurt.”

“Sorry,” he huffs, flopping down beside him with a heavy sigh. He leans against Geralt’s side for a bit, but he’s still restless, still shifting.

“Jaskier,” Geralt says again and Jaskier sighs hard. He pulls away only to lay beside him, pillowing his head on Geralt’s thigh. Immediately, Geralt slips his fingers into Jaskier’s hair, soothing.

"So that was awful," Jaskier mutters.

"Mm."

He rolls so his face is pressed to Geralt's stomach. Geralt's fingers stay tangled in his hair, gently petting.

"I don’t want you to go," Jaskier says into the silence, muffled against Geralt's bulk.

Geralt’s chest siezes.

“I know you aren’t ready to tell me anything and that’s okay, but I--” his breath is warm against the thin cloth of Geralt’s shirt, “If that mage really is looking for you, I don’t want you to go,” he repeats, voice small.

Geralt feels as if his throat has closed. "I'm--I want to stay here,” he forces out, swallowing roughly. He should explain because Jaskier doesn’t know, but Jaskier sags with relief, presses his face closer to Geralt's stomach, fingers digging into his side and Geralt doesn’t want to take that relief from him, not now.

"That's--I'm glad." They don't say anything else for a long time as the fire burns down.

------------------------------

Geralt can’t stop thinking about the fact Jaskier doesn’t know, though. He needs to tell him. So that he’ll understand. Geralt owes it to him to tell him, whether he wants to or not. And if Jaskier wants him gone after? It will hurt, but he’ll go.

"Jaskier, do you have a minute?" he asks while Jaskier's tuning his lute that evening. He'd been getting ready to play, as he usually does.

"Of course, sweetheart. What is it?" he asks, strumming through a simple, uncomplicated tune. He meets Geralt's eyes with a playful smile, but his expression sobers when he sees the seriousness in Geralt's gaze.

"You asked me," he says carefully, "about before."

"Only if you're comfortable, dear. You don't have to--"

"No," he says, "I do." He needs to understand. He drops his gaze to his lap where he's wringing his hands together nervously. He stills them with effort, but that only makes the scars there stand out more starkly. He startles when Jaskier catches his hands in his own, traces those scars tenderly with lute-calloused fingertips.

"Well then, I'm listening," he says and smiles, small and encouraging when Geralt's gaze flickers back up to his face. It makes his chest tight. He doesn't deserve this. Jaskier. He tries to take in his face now, that tender care, that concern. Just in case it’s gone, after. So he knows. So he can remember.

Despite the fear churning in his gut, he takes a deep breath and starts talking, gaze glued to their still joined hands.

"My earliest memory is--uh. I. I woke up in a...room. I didn't know where I was. There was...a man. The mage, I guess." Jaskier is very, very still but his thumbs rub soothing circles against the back of his hands, a grounding point of contact.

"I tried to ask him what was going on, but I--" he trails off, unsure how to phrase what he means. He shakes his head. "--I didn't know how. I didn't have the words. And I--scared him. I think. He ran."

Jaskier sucks in a noisy breath and squeezes his hands briefly. "Go on," he encourages when Geralt glances back up.

"I followed him. I didn't know what else to do. I was in a town, I think."

"Novigrad," Jaskier interrupts before wincing. "Sorry, go on."

"The people there--I tried to ask for help but they--" he can feel the tears burning in his throat and tries to breathe through it, keep going, "they either ran or they threatened me. I didn't know what was going on." He feels the tears spill and ducks his head. If he stops now, he won't be able to continue. "I ran."

"Oh, Geralt," Jaskier whispers. He lets go of one hand to bring his palm up to Geralt's face. His fingertips brush the corner of his eye, wipe the tears away gently.

"I ended up in the forest. There's a village not too far from here," Jaskier makes a quiet noise of acknowledgment. It’s the village Jaskier goes to sometimes when he needs things his father won’t or doesn’t send. "I stayed around there for a few weeks. Until the men with the swords showed up." Jaskier makes another small noise, rubbing his thumb along Geralt's cheekbone. Geralt closes his eyes. "So I picked a direction and started walking. And I found you."

"And I'm glad you found me, love. Sounds like you've had quite the rough go of it."

The calm acceptance is...too much. Does he not understand? He's a monster. Not natural. The mage wants back his creature. "Jaskier, I'm--"

"Shh," he cuts him off, grip still tight on his hand as he caresses his face, slips his fingers back into his hair, "I'm glad you told me, darling, but it doesn't change how I feel about you. You're a good person." He tugs him into his arms, gentle. Geralt goes, feeling like he did when he woke--unmoored, lost. He feels the tears slip down his cheeks, feels the way his breath catches on a sob. "I love you."

"Jask--" he can't get the words out past the lump in his throat so he just tucks himself a little closer, presses his face into Jaskier's neck. His lute sits forgotten beside them.

"You don't have to say it back, sweetling. It's okay," he says, stroking his free hand through Geralt's hair, the other tucked around his waist.

"I do, though," he whispers, lips brushing his throat, "I do." Jaskier sucks in a shuddering breath and holds him tighter, presses his lips to Geralt's temple, right over the mass of scars there. It's gentle, reverent.

That night, Geralt sleeps in Jaskier's bed, curled against his chest. He’s nearly asleep when the gentle tenor of Jaskier’s voice cuts through the soft haze of near-sleep. “--don’t know where I’d be,” Jaskier is saying softly, lips pressing intermittently to the top of his head, “gets hard being alone out here. And you’re so--” he cuts off, presses a kiss to Geralt’s hair again. He obviously thinks he’s already asleep. “You keep me grounded,” he says. “This is the happiest I’ve been in a long time.” He breathes it like a secret.

As Geralt lets sleep finally pull him under, swimming in Jaskier’s quiet confession, it's the most cared for he's ever felt.

------------------------------

And that’s how things continue, for a long time. Jaskier frets over who may or may not be looking for Geralt and vacillates wildly between stressing himself out about it and pretending it’s not a problem. Vincent and his men show up about every eight or so weeks with supplies from Jaskier’s father and Jaskier drags Geralt out with him to watch every time. Vincent eyes Geralt skeptically still, but he no longer comments or reaches for his sword. And as Geralt begins to experience what contact with other people is like when they’re not running from him or threatening him, he’s further convinced that Jaskier is special. He doesn’t feel this way about Vincent or the other men who deliver their supplies, or the people in the village who Jaskier’s taken him down to meet a few times now (they still won’t come anywhere near him without Jaskier around, but Jaskier is insistent they treat him like anyone else and it’s...it helps).

But Geralt doesn’t know how to make it clear to Jaskier that he’s interested in more. They share Jaskier’s bed, they touch frequently, but things are...remarkably tame. They already say “I love you.” At some point, Jaskier’s flirting had tapered off and now he’s just...sweet. And Geralt loves it, but he also wants...that. The raunchy flirting and the...the things that come after. And the happy ending, like the ones from the fairytales Jaskier readers, sometimes. He just doesn’t know how to let Jaskier know that he wants everything.

It turns out he doesn’t have to ask at all.

"So I know this is a dumb question but," Jaskier's paused over making their eggs one morning, gaze downturned and intense, "I'm--uh. I mean, you--fuck. I have no idea how to say this," he huffs, taking the pan off the open flame and tipping the egg onto a plate. "You want to stay. Here. With me." It's obviously supposed to be a statement, but it sounds like a question.

They’ve already talked about this, haven’t they? "Yes, Jaskier," he says softly, "as long as you'll have me."

Jaskier lets out of a gust of breath, "Fuck okay, so--" he turns to face Geralt, egg abandoned, to take his hands in his, crouching at Geralt’s knees, "I want you here with me, too. More than I, uh, probably should."

Geralt makes a quiet noise in the back of his throat. This sounds like--

"And I know there's no real practical purpose for it since I have nothing but this--" he gestures around them at the cottage, "--to give, but, um. I'd--If you'd be so inclined I'd like to marry you, Geralt." He pauses, eyes downcast and face flushed. Geralt for his part can't seem to put words in any order that might allow them to come out of his mouth and communicate just how much Jaskier's offer means to him.

"It's, uh, a little bit of protection. If the mage does come back for you, or something. But," he's rambling now, words falling from his lips so quickly his tongue is almost tripping over them in an effort to get them out faster, "but it's not like I don't want to marry you, or anything like that. I've been thinking about it quite extensively and I--"

"Jaskier," he cuts in, and he shuts up immediately, wide eyes focused on Geralt's face, nerves pouring off him. "Yes," Geralt says simply, and Jaskier gives a giddy little laugh, tips forward to hide his face in Geralt's lap.

"That's--yes. That's good. I'm glad." When he pulls back to look up into Geralt's face again, his eyes are shining. "Thank you, Geralt."

Geralt's not sure why Jaskier is the one thanking him when Geralt's the one who will most benefit from the arrangement, but he’s not about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

------------------------------

Jaskier makes a special trip to the village to bring the priest of Melitele back to their cottage to officiate the hand fastening less than a week later. Geralt's nervous the man will balk when he sees him, but other than going a little pale at the sight, he stands fast. Even the temple boy that he brought with him doesn't do more than flinch when Jaskier levels him with a look.

"Are you sure--" the priest begins, but Jaskier cuts him off quickly.

"We are. And we want a small, private affair. No fanfare. I'm disowned, remember?" he says sardonically, and Geralt knows it's a tactic to keep the man from asking too many questions, they'd talked about it beforehand, but it still makes his chest ache. Jaskier is so good, he doesn't understand why everyone isn't as drawn to him as Geralt is.

"Now?" The priest asks, fiddling with the cord he's brought with him.

"Geralt?" and Jaskier's expression is so cautiously guarded--

"Yes," he agrees, stepping forward to stand shoulder to shoulder with him in their little clearing, just outside the door of the home they've already shared for months. The priest heaves a gust of breath.

"You'll need to kneel," he says, "Jaskier, give him your right hand. Uh--"

"Geralt," Jaskier supplies, eyes hard.

"--Geralt, give Jaskier your left." They kneel before the priest, hands clasped and held up in offering. The priest slips the cord around their joined hands, talking all the while. "Now, you don't untie this once it's done. Bad luck and all that. Ready?"

"Yes," Jaskier says, and Geralt nods.

"Alright." The priest waves the boy over to watch and serve as witness, and then he begins.

"As this knot is tied," he says, twisting the cording together in the first of several knots, "so are your lives now bound."

Jaskier squeezes Geralt's hand so tightly he can feel how he trembles.

"Woven into this cord, imbued into its very fibers, are all your hopes for your new life together." Another knot.

"With the fashioning of this knot do I tie all the desires, dreams, love, and happiness wished here in this place to your lives for as long as love shall last." He ties off the third and final knot and leans backward.

"Hold tight to one another through both good times and bad, and watch as your strength grows." The silence that rings out after the priest ceases speaking is deafening. Geralt can hear the blood rushing in his veins. "It is done."

"Geralt," Jaskier whispers as their joined hands fall to rest on Geralt’s thigh. He can't help but follow the movement of those lips with his eyes. "Kiss me, Geralt." And who is he to deny Jaskier anything?

He squeezes their joined hands, free hand rising to cup Jaskier's cheek. The look in Jaskier's eyes, the tenderness, the love, the thinly veiled excitement, twists his chest. How could he have ever feared this man would reject him?

"Geralt," Jaskier says again, and Geralt doesn't make him ask twice. He leans forward and presses their lips together in a tiny, chaste kiss, hardly more than a brushing of lips. It's still electric, especially when Jaskier makes a tiny, wounded noise and presses in closer, nearly in Geralt's lap.

Somewhere behind Jaskier, the priest clears his throat and Jaskier draws away reluctantly.

"You'll make it official in the books?" Jaskier asks without actually moving from where he’s perched on Geralt's knees.

"Of course. Should I send word to your father?"

"No," Jaskier scoffs, "don't bother." Geralt sees the priest nod behind Jaskier's shoulder. "Thank you."

"You are very welcome, son. May Melitele bless your binding. Come, boy." Before Jaskier or Geralt can say more, the man is hurrying away with the temple boy who's eyes are still wide and fixed on Geralt.

"I'd like to see them take you from me now," Jaskier says once the man's footsteps have faded from hearing, "husband." Something in Geralt trembles at the word.

"Husband," he repeats slowly, testing out the word on his tongue and finding it to his liking. Jaskier grins, wide and bright.

"Has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?" He leans forward to kiss Geralt again, as if some dam has broken and he can't help himself. "My beautiful husband," Jaskier breathes against Geralt's lips.

When he pulls back, breathing hard, Geralt brings their still bound hands up to his lips to kiss Jaskier's knuckles, tender and reverent.

"How could anyone not look at you and see how sweet you are," Jaskier breathes, pulling his knuckles away from Geralt's mouth to give Geralt's scarred fingers the same treatment. "So beautiful, so full of love, my husband is."

"Jaskier--"

"Shush, I'm basking," he teases, giving another deliberate kiss to the back of his hand.

"I'm not--"

"No," Jaskier corrects immediately, "you just don't see yourself the way I see you. You're beautiful, Geralt and I love you very, very much."

He feels his face heat, ducks his head so his hair falls in the way, hiding his eyes.

"And I'll say it as many times as you need to hear it. I love you and I'm not going anywhere. And--" he continues, slipping the fingers of his free hand under Geralt's chin and tilting his head up until their eyes meet, "--I'm not letting anyone else have you. You're mine, husband dearest."

"Yours," Geralt agrees easily. The mage may or may not be looking for him, but it doesn't matter. Geralt wants nothing to do with him anyway.

"And I'm yours, darling. As long as you want me."

"Mine," Geralt echos, "Always."

And that's enough.

#witcher #witcher fic #geraskier #lizard writes #my baby! she lives!#a love letter both to geralt as a character and frankensteins creature

181 notes · View notes

buterflies-and-ladybugs · 4 years ago

Text

Little Bug vs. The League of Assassins

Hi. This is the third chpater of this series I really hope you enjoy it! This does have some tiggering scenes in it but they are labled if you want to skip over it.

A03 1/2

Triggering Scene:

Just Die

Bully

Lier

Words flashed through her head suddenly she was trapped. She could feel her broken ribs every time she breathed. Sticky, Red … Blood everywhere choking her.Suddenly it was white. White was bad. White ment uncontained destruction. White means Chat Blank. White was everywhere hurting her, mocking her. Then everything was Black.

Triggering Scene End

Little Bug woke up with a silent scream or her lips. Again. Damian was probably asleep but, there was one other option a special jewelry box came to mind. It was red with black polka dots that were hidden compartments. They had no visual trigger to open it mostly because it was magic. She hadn't opened for days after … She moved. Would they be mad? Well there was only one way to find out. She decided to go with a ring. When she put it on it became a silver ring with some small embedded emerald paw prints and with a flash of light, Plagg materialized.

“Hey Pigtails are you ok?” said Plagg once he saw her red eyes and deep bags.“Do you want to talk?”

“No,” she replied. “Can you just stay with me?”

“Ok, but don’t tell the others we wouldn’t want anyone thinking that I am going soft” he replied in a joking tone.

“ I wouldn’t dream of it “ she said with a giggle as she began to design.

Soon Plagg settled in her hair and began to purr as they waited peacefully for the house to wake forgetting their troubles if only for a moment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Damian POV~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Might be slightly triggering:

Damian still remembers the day he met Marinette, or Little Bug. He was in Paris when he was planning a prank to play on his brothers when he found himself in what could only be described as a wasteland. He found her trapped and dying under rubble. She had so many injuries on marrying her pale skin it looked the same blood red as her suit though not all the blood was hers. And then …

End of Triggering scene

A knock at the door brings Damian out of his memories. The door opened to show Bug with red, puffy eyes and deep bags. Another set of nightmares.

“Here” she said, handing him a newly designed and sewed shirt with geometric white,red and black designs on it. The black formed circles always overlapped by the white triangles. The red formed overlapping cuts the same color of blood. These designs flowed together in a cacophony of color over a base of purple. This meant one thing was in her nightmares Blanck.

“ Are you hungry?” he said

“I guess.

So they walked downstairs to start another day together.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Alfred POV~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Flashback:

Alfred was more than a little surprised to see another true Miraculous holder enter the manor. Especially since she was so young and she was covered in blood. Not to mention the fact that she was a Guardian Ladybug something so rare that there hasn’t been one in recorded history. While some ladybugs are famous like Joan of Arc, Hippolyta, etc. Once she recognised him she went up and traditionally greeted him especially to the continued surprise of most of the family members.

Present:

When Damian and Mari Bug walked downstairs he could tell she had another sleepless night. But if he saw Plaggs ring on her index finger, who was he to tell. What did Dussu say Plagg liked. It was cheese, camembert maybe?

#maribat #hurt marinette #miraculous ladybug #ml x dc #alfred pennyworth #platonic damianette #damian wayne #marinette deserves better

41 notes · View notes

christinaroseandrews · 4 years ago

Photo

The Regency period of British History has long fascinated pop culture -- most notably in the form of Regency Romances a sub-genre of Historical Romance that can and does dominate the marketplace. Perhaps it's for that reason that Bea Koch, the owner of the Ripped Bodice bookstore (a store that only sells romance novels), wrote this book.

Mad and Bad is a quick trip through a few luminaries from a broad spectrum of "types of women" like Mistresses or Artists or the Patronesses of Almack's. And I do mean quick trip. Essentially this book features a bunch of snapshots of some of the more prominent historical women of the time period. The biographies of these women are brief... about the size of a Wikipedia article... and don't go into a lot of depth. What you get is a taste, an amuse bouche, of these women's lives.

But it's not really a filling meal...

As a lover of both history and Historical Romance, I was really looking forward to reading this book. There are so many fascinating women in the regency featured in this book including two of my personal favorites: Mary Anning and Emma Hamilton.

I was happy with their inclusion along with the inclusion of other awesome women who I've only a passing familiarity with, but I found the execution wanting. As in I wanted more. For example, I was excited to read about the patronesses of Almack's -- these monoliths have appeared or have been mentioned in many a Regency Romance and I have long wanted to learn the truth. And while I enjoyed this section, some of the Patronesses were left out and some of those who were featured didn't get much more than a quick summary of their life. It made me hungry for more.

I appreciated that the author acknowledged that the Regency was less white, less straight, and less Christian than most people think. But again, I wanted more. Her section on Jewish Women in the Regency was one of her best, and I'm definitely going to be looking into more of these awesome Jewish Women. But it wasn't the meaty morsel I want out of my non-fiction. And in the case of Mary Anning, Rejected Princesses did it better.

But that's not the only problem I had with this book, in her section on Women of Color in the Regency, the author, I feel, made a large misstep. The section only focused on three women: Dido Elizabeth Belle, Mary Seapole, and Princess Caraboo. The last one isn't even a woman of color, but a con-artist who pretended to be an "exotic foreign princess" to make money and mooch off of people. It didn't leave a good taste in my mouth. I'd have liked to have seen more women of color, including those from the Indian Subcontinent, featured rather than the Rachel Dolezal of the Regency.

On top of that misstep, the book wasn't laid out in a logical fashion. In many instances, the book would interrupt it's quick dive into its featured woman to talk about someone else... most of the time another woman, but in one instance a man. I found it confusing... more suited to a footnote than a large interruption. I don't know if the final book will feature a Bibliography, the ARC I was provided was clearly unfinished and didn't have one. There is at the end of each section a list of Recommended Reading/Watching at the back, but it's not a bibliography. Not really. It features Movies, TV shows, and Romance Novels in addition to non-fiction sources.

The table of contents didn’t include who the section was covering and it wasn’t always clear what the subject was going to be about. Basically, this isn’t a good reference book. It’s barely a good jumping off point for people looking for more information on Regency women. Heck for some of these women I wouldn’t call them Regency women. They either were the most active before the regency period -- like Queen Charlotte -- or after the period -- Like Anne Lister. Sure they were alive in the Regency... but some were definitely on their way out or children.

So did I learn anything? Yes, I absolutely did. But was it more than I would have gotten from a Wikipedia Article on the subject, I'm not sure.

I wouldn’t recommend this to other Editors of historical romance, romance authors looking for a source, or even romance readers. So because of that, and because of the other problems I did have with this text. I'm going to give this:

Two Stars.

If this is your jam, you can get it here.

If you like these kind of honest reviews, please consider supporting us here!

I received a copy of this book via NetGalley.

#book review #non-fiction #Regency #woman in history #women's history #Some of the wikipedia entries for these women are better than this boo #and that's a typo and I don't care #the book is not a good resource #it's a puff piece #disguised as good history #I liked the cover though #not enough to rate it higher though #bea koch #two stars #Rose and Lark review books

26 notes · View notes

spaghetti-machete · 5 years ago

Text

TMA season 5 ending predictions

if everyone was jumping off a cliff would you do it? the answer is, I don't have a choice, Mother "Eight Legs McGee" of Puppets wants me to and therefore I also want to. everyone else is doing predictions why not throw my hat into the ring I'm callin this bad boy the "spider down the drain" theory. lemme give you a run down: - Anya Vilette being sent through the ripped seam in the shit $3 leggings fabric of reality in the basement of Hill Top Road? mama spiderlimbs just testing out the reality rip to see if it worked. sends Anya to the Institute as a gift and proof of experience. take that jonah. there's your blessing from the Web, stick it in your piehole - the Gang™ clamber up/crawl sobbingly to Hill Top Road and use it as a refuge. and it's weird, it kind of works but also it messes with them in a way that's not really better. outside is dangerous. inside is just another form of more concentrated, more scary dangerous. theyve walked into a spiderweb because everywhere else is taken. im not saying Jon is the Virgin Mary taking shelter in a stable to give birth to the Anti-Apocalyse, but im not not saying it - they start accidentally going through the crack in reality. at first its just jon, by accident, because he thinks he can control it. almost. he's wary but Basira is less wary, and decides to go through without him finding out. she comes back and this is when we, the listeners, find out - but it fucks her up, somehow, it messes with Basira, she's not really Basira Proper anymore. it's not the NotThem, but it's clear that she's evidently aware enough of her difference, and how she is supposed to be, and how she isn't that right now, for it to be distressing - eventually the climax of the story is (this is 3am im writing this cut me some slack) that the answer to Gerry's question - "are [the Fears] something we created, or are they the reason we're afraid? maybe they've always been here, maybe they turned up the first time something felt afraid" (paraphrased it is 3am) gets answered - the answer, to every single one, is yes. Jon gets sucked through the crack, he's closed off from the other side completely, and he's in this new world where the Magnus Institute doesn't exist because it doesn't need to exist. People are afraid but nothing feeds on that fear. There are no entities, no Avatars, no nothing. And what happens to a very very hungry Archive? An Archive that has a documented record of all the world's worst ebbs of every single fear a person could have? He starts bringing those fears to life himself. I don't know how, but seeing as Elias came out with the line "a living testament to people's fear" or some bullshit, it's clear that Jon isn't a passive record of these fears, he's actively involved in every single one of them. I mean - "the job I put everything into had trapped me into spreading evil" (Martin, Panopticon) - even the Archivist's assistants recognise that this is a thing that's happening and is possible. And what better, more satisfying end for Jon's emotional character arc than for him to be trapped in a new world, to have saved the old one somehow, but to have finally realised that the whole reason for his very existence is basically an ouroborous of fear that he cannot escape? that his timeline in space and reality is essentially self-perpetuating, that he'll never truly learn what the Mother of Puppets is, only that the Fears he chased for so long were ones he now brings himself to another world? I mean I almost feel like the Spider is nearing God in this situation. Every time an entity or an avatar talks about the Web, they downplay it so fucking hard that it's almost inconceivable that the Web wouldn't be pulling the strings of literally every entity at this point. The Hunt? trap you can't escape. "It didn't make me want it... just made me...need it" (Daisy, in the coffin) The Lonely? Peter Lukas describes falling into it (not literally) as if everything lined up so utterly perfectly. "I could scarcely believe that any God could line up so perfectly with my heart". The Vast? Very obviously everyone's Favourite Gay Uncle with Pizzazz Simon Fairchild literally fell into it. And it caught him. The sky caught him...like a web. it just kind of did. I mean, have we ever heard from a failed Avatar? one that didn't quite pass their SATs, their GCSEs, even the equivalent of a Fear BTEC PE? I don't know if it's simplifying it down too much, but in every instance, Avatars and their Kinder Horrific Suprise Happy Meals are the equivalent of spiders, webs and prey. And not always direct and unchanging comparisons, either. In this instance, was it Peter Lukas who was preyed upon and drawn in? Or was he the spider, when he made his very first victim disappear? Simply searching for a meal to feed another God without realising, or feeding himself? Did his desires and needs for Utter Loneliness develop from Shitall, Middle of Nowhere, Nonexistent Country? Or were they a gift bestowed upon him by the Mother of Puppets, ensuring she had enough playing pieces in the right colours to serve her endgame? As Oliver Banks said - easier to just do what she asks.

60 notes · View notes

yourdeepestfathoms · 5 years ago

Text

Born a Rat, Burn a Rat

[2002]

Word count: 4561

Prompt: You need to stop making her laugh! You’re ruining her makeup!

--------------------

“You need to stop making her laugh! You’re ruining her makeup!”

All the laughter that had once been rebounding through the locker room stopped abruptly. Everyone turned their heads slowly to face Carrie White, who was blinking innocently at them from her locker. She looked absolutely clueless, as she always did when she wasn’t dead-eyed or spazzing out. She didn’t seem to understand why she was being stared at.

“What did you just say?” Tina said.

“H-her makeup,” Carrie stammered, suddenly very uncomfortable under their gazes. “Chris’s. It’s--going to run. If she keeps laughing. I’m trying to save it.”

“Oh, so you think I’m ugly without any makeup on, huh? Is that it?” Chris strode up to her, eyes flashing like a hungry puma’s, and Carrie backed up against the lockers, blinking dumbly.

“What? No!” Carrie said. She gripped her fingers in the locker air holes tightly in some sort of scrabble for grounding.

“You hesitated,” Fern put in helpfully.

“I didn’t!” Carrie cried, eyes wide.

“Maybe I should try out some new makeup,” Chris mused. “Your blood will be a nice shade!” A second later, she raised her fist and sent it flying at Carrie’s face.

Carrie barely had time to react. She ducked and dove left, stumbling awkwardly through a pair of girls. There was a loud clang of metal from behind, followed by a shout of pain and a few gasps and snickers, and she spun around on her heels to see Chris rubbing her reddened knuckles tentatively with a look of murder on her face.

“You goddamn bitch.” She seethed.

Carrie tried to stutter out an apology, she really did, but then the entire left side of her face exploded into bright, colorful bursts of pain as a fist that seemed to be the size and solidity of a small boulder came smashing upwards and her whole body popped backwards in a fashion that was almost cartoonish. A near-perfect arc, like those old animated shorts she’d been deprived of as a little girl where Daffy Duck or Wile E. Coyote were getting nailed in the face with spring-loaded punching gloves left and right.

However, there was a very significant difference between those cartoons and real life, and the difference was that in real life, it hurt. It hurt a lot.

The punch had such force that Carrie thought for one petrified instant that she might do a full flip—but then her back met the floor with an unforgiving THUNK.

She barely had time to clap a hand to the smarting flesh on the side of her face, which she could already feel starting to get puffy, before she heard sneakers squeaking against tile and looked up to see that she was surrounded by all her gym classmates in various stages of dressed. She swallowed down a mouthful of blood thickly and awkwardly scooted backwards, only to have Chris reach down with alarming swiftness and wrap her perfectly manicured fingers into her shirt-collar, gathering a crimson-knuckled fistful of fabric and sending cuts scattered across the girl’s back alight with pain once more as they were exposed to the cool air when her lightweight body was effortlessly jerked to its feet.

“You just made the biggest mistake of your miserable little life, pig.” Chris spat.

“Chris,” Sue hissed cautiously. She cast an uneasy glance towards the front of the locker room, expecting Miss Desjardin to suddenly materialize inside and blow her ear-piercingly loud whistle before raining hellfire on them all.

“What?” Chris snapped. “She DESERVES this! If you’re that worried, then keep watch or lock the door or something!”

“Chris!” Sue said again, but this time as a much more alarmed warning. Because Carrie is tugging backwards and snapping at Chris’s hands around her collar like a contagious rat in the midst of the Black Plague.

“What the fuck!?” Chris yelled, startled.

Carrie’s hands shot up and they’re like the skeletal fingers of death around Chris’s wrists. She had exactly zero muscles in her arms, so it was pretty impressive that she was able to pry the grip off of her pale yellow sweater’s collar and totter backwards into safety.

And then there’s a hissing sound, like the warning of a rattlesnake.

Something splatters against Carrie’s face and neck and open mouth, and she flinched in surprise. She raised a hand to wipe her eyes, but it only got halfway up before it suddenly felt like she got a red hot fire poker jammed into her sockets.

Then, she screamed.

------

Rita Desjardin has heard screaming before. In her senior year of high school, she vividly remembers watching a school football game and one of the players from the other team, she believed they were the Pumas if her memory was correct, broke his arm so savagely it almost looked like it was on backwards. He had dropped to the ground in a blur of black and maroon, bellowing in agony, and at the time Rita had thought that it was the worst sound she would ever hear in her entire life.

And then she heard the ricochet of a cry rattle from the girl’s locker room, so loud that she could hear it from outside in the gym, and the first place spot for “Worst Noise She’s Ever Heard” was quickly snatched away from the football player.

He had screamed. But not like this.

This scream was piercing, bloodcurdling, and memory-haunting, and it only got worse when Rita charged into the locker room, leaving a gaggle of wide-eyed students already dressed out behind in startled shock.

Opening the door and passing through the doorway was like coming out of water in the midst of a war- the scream suddenly became ten times louder and much more ear-splitting. She actually had to clamp her hands over her ears and stop her forward stride to shudder in pain at the intensity of the noise that made her feel like she was going deaf. What could very possibly be 140 to 150 decibels of volume jammed its way directly into her eardrums, stabbing over and over and over again until a ringing was sent jangling through her skull like the aftermath of an explosion.

To be in the same room as such an outburst of agony, so close to the cause of deafening distress, was so much more bone-chilling than listening to it from stadium bleachers.

Rita staggered forward, pulling her hands away from her ears and crossing the corridor threshold into the open space of lockers. There, her current class was huddled in a group of abstract horror around one row, eyes so wide they were nearly popping out of sockets and shaking in abject pant-pissing fear. Rita wasn’t quite sure who looked more terrified: them, Helen Shyres holding a can of pepper spray, or Carrie White frenzying around with her hands over her face, screeching.

“WHAT IS GOING ON IN HERE?” Rita roared over the commotion, and everyone except Carrie whirled around to face her with ogling bug eyes. They apparently hadn’t heard her come in over the noise. Carrie keened again, a loud, drawn-out sound like the cry of a crow being gutted alive.

“Sh-she--” One girl tried to say, but the words got stuck in her throat when she glanced back at Carrie writhing, slamming into the lockers, and scratching desperately at her face.

“WHAT HAPPENED?” Rita demanded.

“I--got startled.” Helen choked out.

“Is that PEPPER SPRAY?!” Rita shouted.

Helen looked down at the canister in her hand as if it were an active bomb and suddenly appeared very sick. She doesn’t answer- she can’t. She’s shocked into silence.

“WHY do you even HAVE IT at SCHOOL?!” Rita bellowed. Her eyes are wide now, too, as she put the pieces together.

“I’m sorry!” Helen said.

Carrie wailed tumultuously. She dropped to the ground, screaming helplessly at the ceiling and squirming like she was trying to wriggle out of her own skin. Her hands are still fervently clawing at her eyes as if she were trying to scoop them out of their sockets, and there’s spots of red mixed in with the translucent sheen of pepper spray spattered across her pale face. Rita quickly pushed Helen aside, practically throwing the other girls out of the way to get to the panicking student rolling on the floor.

“Carrie! Carrie!” Rita called over the screaming. Carrie doesn’t appear to hear her- she just continued to caterwaul and claw like a burning black cat. “Carietta White!” Not even that got through to her, and if it did, it only made her even more distressed. “Carrie!!”

Rita finally grabbed the girl by the wrists and yanked her hands away. Without the spindly fingers itching incessantly, she could see her reddened face, gashed skin, and eyes filled with blood.

“Oh my god,” Someone from behind, Sue Snell, maybe, muttered.

“IT HURTS!!” Carrie’s screams have finally morphed into words, and Rita isn’t sure which was worse because the screams may have been nightmare-inducing, but the words were like a punch to the stomach with a spiked iron gauntlet. They come out hoarse and high pitched, vowels stretched out in whines and keens of pain, and Rita’s heart clenched tightly in her chest when they reach her ears. “IT HURTS!! IT BURNS!!!!”

Carrie writhed beneath Rita, flailing her arms in the grip that holds them. Her dark eyes are upturned in their puckered sockets, saturating in blood, and the whites weren’t even white anymore, rather an awful crimson color with throbbing scarlet veins lacing through them like smoldering snakes. The shredded, bloody eyelids soon slam shut and remain shut, swelling so badly that Carrie was temporarily blinded, and that makes her panic even harder.

“It burns! It burns! IT BURNS!!!” Carrie screeched. Her voice became garbled after her final cry and she dissolved into body-breaking coughs that manage to rock Rita’s own frame from where she’s crouched over her.

“What do we do?!” Another girl, Frieda Jason, yawped. She flinched backwards in fright into the arm-locked duo of Mary and Donna Thibodeau when Rita whipped her head around to her, icy blue eyes flashing like jagged glaciers in the arctic sunlight.

“NOW you care?” Rita snarled, loading her voice with as much venom as possible. “Now you care about her? When she’s been fucking pepper sprayed?”

All the girls flinch this time. It’s obvious that they’ve never been cussed at by a teacher before, and it gives Rita just a tiny swell of pleasure. But then Carrie sobs audibly again and it’s replaced with seething rage.

“It- it was an accident!” Ruth Gogan tried to defend. “R-really! Helen didn’t know!”

“Oh really?” Rita said. “I’m sure spraying a kid with fucking pepper spray, which shouldn’t even be brought to school, by the way, is really easy to do om accident!” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Chris Hargensen clench her jaw and she rounded on her. “Do you have something you want to say, Hargensen?”

Chris opened her mouth as if to snark, took one look at Carrie’s bloody, burned face, and realized this was not something her father could fix with his lawyer status. Even if she told him that Carrie had snapped at her, he would have to agree that being pepper sprayed for it was much, much worse. She grit her teeth and looked away.

“It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts,” Carrie wept. Rita looked back down at her and felt a sharp stab of guilt when she realized how much time she had wasted scolding the other girls when she should have been treating Carrie.

“It’s okay, Carrie,” She told her softly, smoothing down the barbs and thorns in her voice until it’s more like warm honey or silken velvet. “It’s okay… You’re going to be okay.”

Carrie’s lolling head froze in its process of sweeping back and forth across the scuffed locker room tile. Her brow twitched and her eyelids flutter like she was trying to open them but can’t, and only bloody tears are able to squeeze their way out of the scrunched up sockets. She ‘looked’ in the direction of Rita’s voice, lips quivering.

“M-Miss Desjardin?” She whispered hoarsely.

“Yes, it’s me, Carrie. It’s just me.” Rita moved to hold both wrists in one hand and used the other to brush Carrie’s cheek tenderly--which was instantly the wrong thing to do because she grazed over a spatter of pepper spray and tiny burning teeth latched onto her fingers and began eating away at her flesh. She bit back a hiss of discomfort to avoid stressing out Carrie even more. “It’s okay. You’re going to be okay.”

“It hurts,” Carrie sobbed. Her eyes screwed shut even tighter, like she thought that it may help block out the pain. “I-it hurts, Miss Desjardin. M-make it stop!”

“I will, Carrie, don’t worry,” Rita assured her. “Just take deep breaths for me. Can you do that? Deep breaths, sweetheart.” She swiveled her head around to the group of quavering onlookers. Helen backed up behind Tina Blake and Norma Watson when her glaring eyes skim by, still white-knuckling the canister of pepper spray. “Sue.”

Sue jolted, but raised her head in an obedient, listening way.

“Make yourself useful and get a bottle of water and a rag from the showers. Wet it.” Rita ordered.

Sue nodded, but didn’t dare speak up. She scurried off, clipping her shoulder on one of the lockers and tottering sideways for a moment before regaining her balance and continuing with her task. Rita can hear her tinker with the padlock of her locker in another row, open the door, pull something out, and then hurry into the bathroom area without fully closing the door. She stopped listening after hearing the running water of a sink to glower at the rest of the girls.

“Get to class.” She said coldly.

The girls exchanged glances. They seem surprised that they hadn’t been struck dead or something (although Rita really, REALLY wanted to do so). Then, they disperse without another warning, with Helen hightailing it out the door first. Sue returns shortly after with a folded, pulpy paper towel that drips water on the floor and a water bottle. She looked down at Carrie as she passed them over and Rita saw that she was genuinely worried.

“Is she...going to be okay?” She asked.

Rita was conflicted- she wanted to say yes to make them all feel better, but she really didn’t know. Carrie had rubbed her eyes viciously enough to smear the pepper spray further into her sockets and the open cuts she carved into her skin was probably exposed to any lingering residue, too, which would only deepen her anguish. But she didn’t want to say no either because that would just induce panic, so instead she just said, “I’ll take care of her.”

Sue seemed to catch her avoidance of the question by the pinch at her brow and frown on her lips, but she just nodded instead of pointing it out, much to Rita’s relief.

“Okay,” She said. She cast one more glance at Carrie, who appeared to be trying to figure out where she was, then turned around, gathered her belongings, and walked out.

“Okay, Carrie,” Rita looked down at her student. “I’m going to pour some water over your eyes, okay? Just keep breathing for me. You’re doing so good.”

Carrie whimpered. She jolted when the contents of the water bottle were poured over her face, crying out in shock and pain, and a light bulb overhead shattered in millions of burgeoning pieces. Rita jumped and looked up at it, then back down at Carrie, who was now panting and wheezing heavily.

“H-hurts to b-b--reathe,” She uttered.

“Oh, Carrie…” Rita murmured. She carefully wiped away the pepper spray residue on Carrie’s face with the paper towel, finding that the girl’s skin was suddenly very cold. Her breathing wasn’t normal anymore. She can feel her heartbeat thump heavily beneath her flesh; it’s too fast for even someone in the midst of a panic attack.

Something was sizzling in Carrie White’s skin, and it wasn’t just the pepper spray.

There’s a clamor from the front of the locker room- Rita’s next period class started to bustle inside to change out before their minimal time limit was up. Rita jumped up, causing Carrie to whimper in distress at the loss of her presence, and stormed to the entrance corridor. The girls inside stopped, easily picking up that she was on edge, and took a small step back in near-perfect synchronization.

“You don’t have to change out today.” Rita said hurriedly. “Or do anything. Just sit in the gym and do whatever. As long as you don’t kill each other or set something on fire, I really don’t care what you do.”

The girls blink and exchange looks.

“Everything okay?” One asked.

“Fine.” Rita said, squaring her shoulders and straightening her shoulders. Her posture nearly faltered and crumbled when she heard Carrie whimper again. “Go on. Out!”

The girls obey, quickly exiting in a flurry of binders and backpacks. Once they’re all gone, Rita hurried back to Carrie, who was trying to get up. She yelped and flinched so badly she knocked herself back over when Rita touched her shoulder, and another light in the first aisle of lockers popped and fizzed out.

“It’s just me, Carrie.” Rita said. “It’s Miss Desjardin.”

“Miss Desjardin,” Carrie repeated to herself in a voice that was barely above a whisper.

“That’s right,” Rita nodded, although she knew Carrie couldn’t see it. “Carrie, I’m going to help you stand up and we’re going to walk over to the showers, okay? The water bottle isn’t working as well as I had hoped. Running water will help flush out your eyes better.” She gently touched Carrie’s face and she ‘looked’ up at her. “It’ll make it hurt less.”

Carrie nodded. She grit her teeth as she’s helped to her feet, staggering, but staying upright. A jewel of blood welled up from a scratch dividing her left eyebrow in two and lazily made its way down her face. She twitched when it tickled her skin and she reached up to swipe it away, but Rita snatched her hand before she could make contact. Carrie jumped and instantly tried to jerk away.

“Don’t touch your face.” Rita scolded lightly. “It’ll only make the burning worse.”

Carrie swallowed thickly, but didn’t say anything. She just nodded silently and obeyed.

The short walk to the bathroom and shower area was much clumsier than it should have been, with Carrie stumbling over her ankles and hitting every outcrop of lockers, even with Rita guiding her. Lack of sight was numbing her senses and making it hard to listen. Rita didn’t ever get mad at her, though; blindness, even temporary blindness, would make her a complete nervous, bumbling wreck, too.

“M-Miss Desjardin?” Carrie croaked as Rita cranked the nozzle to a middle-row shower. She turned her head in the direction of the sound of spraying water.

“Yes?” Rita gently touched her shoulder to let her know she was there. “I’m right here, honey.”

“I’m sorry,” Carrie whispered.

Rita’s heart sunk into her stomach. Oh, Carrie, please please don’t--

“I-I didn’t mean to.”

A wave of guilt slammed into Rita, alongside a rumbling riptide of pure rage that roiled through her insides like a storm at sea. She clenched her teeth until she thought they may shatter and wished that she had exacted punishment on all those girls, especially Helen, instead of sending them to their next class to deal with them later.

“I’m sorry,” Carrie said again, this time much more choked up. Her skin was frigid cold. “M-Miss Desjardin?” She reached up a blind hand and lightly touched Rita’s, which she must have forgotten was on her shoulder. She grabbed it in a way that sent shockwaves of desperation up Rita’s arm. “I’m sorry…”

“Don’t apologize, Carrie.” Rita said firmly. “This wasn’t your fault.”

“Okay,” Carrie said, but Rita knew she didn’t believe it. She lowered her voice and rasped out, “It really, really hurts…”

“Come on,” Miss Desjardin lowered Carrie to her knees and tilted her into the warm rain of water shooting from the showerhead. She lifted her chin so the spray would directly hit her face. “There we go... Good girl.”

Carrie took a deep breath, spitting out water. Streams ran red when they touched her numerous cuts and the blood oozing from her tightly shut eyes turned into puffing clouds of crimson along her cheeks, but at least everything was getting flushed out.

Rita risked getting wet when she reached over and began to rub soothing circles against Carrie’s back. She swore the girl arched her spine into her touch, exhaling a soft sigh of relief--or maybe contentment. She wasn’t quite sure, but at least it wasn’t a sad or angry sigh, although Carrie had every reason to be sad and/or angry.

“It felt like a hot knife.”

Carrie’s rough, husky voice jarred Rita out of her thoughts. Silence had descended upon the two of them for about five minutes, the only sound being the hiss of the overhead faucet and the low creak of pipes. Rita blinked a haze of black spots out of her vision; her hand was still on Carrie’s back, no longer rubbing, but the fingers were still grazing up and down tenderly, with the thumb gliding in soothing strokes.

“Or a fire poker. Like the ones you use for fireplaces.”

“What?” Rita said.

Carrie craned her neck to look at her, and her eyes were open. They were reddish-brown jewels in a nest full of restless red snakes. Trails of water cascading over her face cause the dozens of cuts around the sockets to glow in hues of neon pink and burning scarlet. She tilted her head at Rita.

“When I got sprayed,” She specified. “And you know what I thought when it happened?”

“What?” Rita said again, this time with dread pooled in the pit of her stomach like a dark oil spill.

“‘Thank God,’” Carrie said. A small, weak smile twitched at the corner of her lips and she looked down at her hands, where bits of her flesh still clung beneath her nails. “I wasn’t angry. Or upset. It did hurt, though. Really badly. But after everything--after everything I’ve been through--” Her arms dropped limply to her sides and she turned her head back to Rita. “It felt good to not have to see.”

Rita was silent. Her breath is caught in her throat in horror.

How could a child think like that? How could they be treated so poorly that they have to think like that?

“I’ve never been blinded before,” Carrie went on, musing her words like she didn’t realize how traumatic they were. She lifted a hand and gently touched one eye, as if she were reminding herself that it was still there. “It was--scary. Really scary. I’m--used to darkness, but--that was different. It wasn’t black, but really, really bright. So bright my head started to hurt--still hurts--and there were these flashes of color and it all mixed together into this big mess. But still-” She shifted on her knees, sloshing water around her. “I thought that not seeing anymore would make things better. Somehow. Maybe then I would be pathetic enough for people to leave me alone.” Her eyes gleam; Carrie is crying. “But it wouldn’t end up being like that, would it? I’m never granted such mercy.” She flicked the water around her bitterly, then had to scrunch her eyes shut again when the pain registered again.

“Were you--” Carrie cocked her head in the direction of Rita’s head to let her know that she was listening. Rita’s hand on her back clenched a fistful of soggy pale yellow sweater. “Are you happy?”

“Now?”

“Ever.”

Carrie ‘looked’ up at the ceiling like she was deep in thought, and Rita already had her answer.

Fury bubbled in Rita’s stomach, while pity and grief squeezed her heart to the point of nearly bursting apart. It wasn’t fair. It was so unfair for a child to have to live like this.

Carrie had tipped her head down and apparently stopped thinking by the time Rita was finished stewing in anger and conflict. And that’s when Rita realized that Carrie didn’t look even a little angry or conflicted. Or upset or sorrowful or anguished or vengeful.

She just looked tired.

Not just tried, though- Jaded.

“How are your eyes?” Rita asked.

Carrie gently touched one. “They still burn. Badly. But not as bad as before.”

“Yeah, they’re probably going to hurt for awhile.” Rita frowned. She cupped Carrie’s cheeks, which felt so hollow and sunken beneath her fingers, and she cradled her head. “Can you open your eyes, honey? So I can see them?”

Carrie struggled, but managed to pry open her eyelids and keep them open for Rita to inspect. They were bloodshot and definitely looked like they were hurting, but at least they weren’t bleeding anymore. Rita gently stroked her thumb across her cheekbone.

“Maybe I’m not happy,” Carrie blurted.

Rita frowned at her. Carrie flicked her gaze to examine a cracked piece of tile flooring. She clenched her hands in the hem of her sweater.

“I don’t--blame you.” Rita said. “You’ve been through a lot.”

Carrie just nodded silently. She’s crying again. Hot tears seep through Rita’s fingers.

“I’m sorry.” Rita said. “For everything you’ve been through. You don’t deserve any of that.” Carrie’s eyes went wide at that and she blinked at Rita in shock.

“You don’t...you don’t think I’m a freak? Or a pig? Or the devil’s child?”

“Oh no, honey, no.” Rita said. “Not at all. You’re a smart, wonderful girl.”

Carrie’s eyes are hungry, now. Rita has never seen that look before, but she instantly knows what it means: “Do you love me?”

Rita pulled Carrie against her and the girl began to openly weep into her chest. She rocked her back and forth in the shower stall, whispering sweet things in her ear and stroking her messy hair (which really needed to be brushed). And Carrie clung to her in return, blubbering and sniffling and whimpering until she’s exhausted and can only hiccup weakly. Rita smoothed down a stubborn cowlick on the top of her head.

“You’re going to be okay, sweetheart,” Rita cooed to the girl in her arms. “I’ve got you.”

Carrie nuzzled closer, curling her knees in until she was a soggy ball in Rita’s lap. She breathed out a sigh, and this time Rita knows it’s of contentment.

“Don’t let me go,” She whispered. “Please.”

“I won’t.” Rita promised.

But she did.

To move Carrie into her office, where she signed a pass for her to skip her remaining classes for ‘mandatory physical health workout’ and spent the rest of the school day brushing out her hair and letting her relax. It’s the first time she thinks she’s seen Carrie really smile, like she thought this was the most delightful thing in the entire world, and Rita’s heart melted.

“Thank you,” Carrie whispered. The tune of smooth jazz is playing from the small speaker on Rita’s desk. A dark purple brush glided through her long hair and she gave a soft coo of bliss at the sensation. “You’re--more of a mom than mine ever is.”

#carrie #carrie 2002 #carrie fanfiction #carrie white #rita desjardin #sue snell #chris hargensen #helen shyres #tina jason #norma watson #my writing #born a rat burn a rat #slasher #stephen king

24 notes · View notes

jesslivesau · 4 years ago

Text

jess au @iloveeverythingwaytoomuch

pre show jess: doesn't know anything except that sam told her some fucked up shit and she didn't really believe him much like amelia didn't believe jimmy but what's clear to her is that sam's upbringing was deeply fucked up in what might've been some kind of apocalypse doomsday cult and she can say "sam, it wasn't real" as much as she can til she's blue in the face but it isn't going to change the fact that sam is Deeply Fucked Up by Shit. and it upsets her and confuses her but he does a good job of setting it aside or knowing when to give in and he's such a sweet and Loving Dude otherwise so she just files it away in her bf trauma bank and keeps cheering him on

s1 jess: your bf's CRAZY brother shows up says he needs help finding your bf's CRAZY dad who may or may not have been part of a doomsday cult and you say, bitch i watched the heaven's gate documentary there is NO WAY i'm letting you leave with him, but he's not gonna Stay cuz he insists it's just for one night (and his brother DOES seem relatively stable, like, as a person), so jess insists she'll go too. while she's in the back seat sam tells dean he told her everything dean's like lol. sure. you believe in ghosts, sweetheart? and jess is like no but i do believe that i'll kick your ass if we don't get home in time for sam's interview tomorrow morning. and then the whole white woman thing happens and she's like oh fuck it's REAL but they DO GO HOME and instead of jess dying on the ceiling there's like idk ghost mary on the ceiling or some shit and they NARROWLY escape the fire together andddd idk they can't go back to stanford cuz it's not safe and their apartment complex literally went up in flames. there’s a more complex reason here but idk what it is. maybe it was brady (demon brady) who died or something IDK LISTEN ITS JUST AN AU

anyway all of season 1 when they’re trying to track down john jess is the voice of reason asking why do they need john in the first place? And eventually sam is like listen we don’t need HIM but if he’s got research on where yellow eyes is, that’s what we need. and dean is mad about that and he’s mad at jess and they bicker like crazy. and sam sleeps on the floor because dean is like dude cmon. don’t make me sleep in the same room as you and your gf together. maybe meg gets replaced by meg possessing jess, and she doesn’t get thrown out the window so when they exorcise her she just needs a hospital and then she’ll be ok. and that would explain why she’s in the hospital and not there for the finale, but can meet up with sam & john & dean in the hospital after

s2 jess: sam is so consumed by grief and fear that jess is actually the first one to notice that dean’s spirit might still be still Around. i’m imagining a scene where sam is asleep next to dean’s bed and jess is awake, and she slowly looks around towards dean and you see ghost!dean Connecting with her for the first time

obviously, all the grief episodes keep happening. maybe jess got seriously hurt as well tbh so she goes back to her parents house to recover; there’s an episode where the boys go meet her parents and dean and sam’s Daddy Issues come out in full force. eventually jess is back and kicking ass and slowly getting along more with dean, partially perhaps because of dean’s Grief Response to john’s death, which is that all the anger and hate comes bubbling up, and jess is like i don’t fucking know this dude, but from what sam’s told me, i hate him, which is not something that sam is in a position to Deal With right now. things proceed pretty much along the course

i am considering now if jess could also be a special child. she also has some kind of psychic abilities but i’d have to choose something cool for her. anyway if she IS then that gets her in the town with sam in all hell breaks loose which i think is the best place for her during that arc? i know all the other special children supposedly had to die but maybe her psychic power was to go inviisble or something lmfao i don’t fucking know. anyway dean has his sad monologue but jess either (a) fully shuts down or (b) just goes STRAIGHT to hunt down whatever the fuck his name is. jake? leverage man? that would be dope actually. and then actually dean, sam, bobby, and ellen actually meet her at the hell’s gate

s3 jess: truly does not understand why they’re hunting. gets into arguments with the boys all the time about how this is pointless, if you’re not gonna try and save yourself then why can’t you just put it down and let yourself have this year?? and dean’s a little bit like you know what jessica that makes a lot of damn sense. but it makes sam mad and they argue a lot about it and jess probably takes off halfway through the season. maybe after malleus maleficarum? partly cuz that’s the ep where ruby more or less becomes part of the team and also when she confirms that she can’t save dean from hell. and i just feel like jess would be like i cannot.... Sit Here.... and watch you both drive yourself into the ground. dean, if you’re gonna die, sam’s coming after you. you knew that. you just didn’t want him to go first.

maybe dean hits her lmfao and sam screams at him for it and jess just Walks Away, tearfully

s4 jess: so jess bailed midway through s3, but when dean wakes up and starts making calls in that phonebooth, he calls bobby and bobby hangs up, so he calls jess. and she comes and gets him.

jess and sam are obviously not together anymore, but jess is totally civil with sam and even with ruby. she’s like we can work together, it’s fine, whatever. and this is the season where dean and jess really bond and become a good Team. and cas is just usually confused why jess is Around but eventually gets used to her. i’ve toyed with jess being jewish which would lend a good and also funny perspective to all the heaven and hell stuff

jess heard about hell first from dean, but not the specifics of the stuff that dean told sam, not until after on the head of a pin. she’s their Lore Expert on seals and is trying to identify as many of them as possible so they can put in place safeguards, and maybe that bumps her up against angel priorities for an episode. maybe we get an episode where cas has to Threaten her 00 and he can say something like sam and dean are important..... you are not. remember that. and then [flappy wings vanish]

uhhhh jess’s siren in the siren episode....... is just like a carbon copy of sam lmfao. which is extremely funny and sam and jess will both kind of awkwardly clear their throats and not address that. i guess jess is just fucking stuck with bobby during the finale because the point of her presence is that she’s so USELESS to both demons and angels

s5 jess: i’d probably add in an early episode where her parents are killed, probably by demons because the demons know they can’t touch the winchesters due to angel shit but they can fuck up jess as much as they want. then when sam and dean temporarily split up jess would go with dean cuz she’s a hunter now and has nowhere else to go and it doesn’t feel right to just sit around with sam. or maybe she also leaves and splits up and doesn’t stick with dean cuz she’s processing her own traumatic shit. at any rate, early in the season there’s a moment where sam is Gone and dean and jess are drinking together and talking about their feelings and they have a moment where they gaze at each other in the eyes and almost lean towards each other.... then jess goes you know what? this is fucking weird and dean is like oh thank god you said that absolutely this is too weird

in The End, it’s revealed that jess was killed and no one will tell dean more information or talk about her until he finds out that she was pregnant when she was killed (presumably with sammifer’s baby)

in changing channels they get put into a telenovela and sam and jess have an tearful emotionally charged confession scene in spanish. this is about when sam and jess finally get back together [cue cheering]

in the chuck eps it’s revealed chuck rewrote it so that jess died on the ceiling in the first book cuz he was like “i just didn’t think it made sense for her to be alive! it was literary symmetry that’s all!”

in sam, interrupted when sam is all high on meds that’s when he says lots of kooky sweet shit to jess about wanting to MARRY her and have a FAMILY together and it’s sweet and also dean throws up in his mouth a little bit having to hear it

in my bloody valentine the thing that jess is hungry for is Family but i do not know the logistics of how

in dark side of the moon jess does die with the boys but it takes a while to find her, tho they eventually do in one of sam’s favorite memories (probably from the first time they met or something). she’s like what the fuck i’m jewish

no, i have no clue how she factors into swan song. she just does, ok. lucifer can snap her neck along with bobby’s

s6 jess: she tried to check in with dean occasionally at the braedens, and actually had dinner with them once but started checking in less and less as the year went on, and it turns out she knew that sam was back and she’d been hunting with him + the campbells and a couple things

when dean finds out he is truly FURIOUS, but jess is like dean i saw you with lisa and ben! i saw you getting better! i saw you happy, i saw you ok, and hell i’ve only known you since you showed up in palo alto five years ago but it was the most at peace i’ve ever seen you, and i couldn’t take that away from you, and neither could sam.

she’s also like yes, dean, he’s different, he’s colder, it makes me sad but who was the one who put up with YOU when you were spiralling after your dad’s death? or when you were all buttoned up after you came back from hell? he did! so show him a god damn OUNCE of empathy, would you!

and when they find out he’s soulless jess is like. hm. and dean is like i TOLD you there was something wrong with him!!! and jess is like i mean.... yeah....... and maybe i didn’t really want to admit it... cuz.... the sex was So good.........

[soulless sam winks at her]

anyway, s6 happens the way it happens and that’s fine

s7: the only important thing that happens in s7 is that Season Seven, It’s Time For a Wedding! is actually about some sort of monster and the only way to kill it is to cast a spell but the spell must be cast by “two warriors joined before god” which means married and cas is awkward about it cuz he doesn’t want to Presume Anything

and the whole episode is lots of sam and jess being like “i mean, of course, if you want to..... .like, but if you DON’T, that’s also totally fine, of course.... you know.... whatever you’re comfortable with” until finally they’re in the final battle and cas has to marry them the way barbossa does for will and elizabeth in potc and when dean is pinned against the wall by the monster he goes “DAMMIT JESS WILL YOU KISS MY BROTHER ALREADY” and then sam dips jess in a kiss and the monster is instantly obliterated [heart eyes]

i truly genuinely do not remember anything that happens in s7. anyway jess and sam are married now

s8: sam was with jess the whole year dean was in purgatory. they were struggling to get back to normal life after everything. dean is still fucking mad that sam didn’t go looking for him. i assume everything else goes pretty much according to whatever the fuck happened in s8 except jess at one point has to go to bat for benny cuz sam for some reason hates him so much

i’ve been toying with the idea of jess doing the trials not sam but i mean how can i take that away from my Boy

s9: i do not know anything that happened in this season ):

s10: see above

s11: see above

s12: now i never watched s12, but in this au there is no lucifer’s son jack. instead jess gets pregnant midway through the season; cas finds out first because he can sense it and he’s like why does it feel like there’s an extra being in the bunker, and then he spills to dean cuz he can’t keep a secret, and then dean is like “oh shit what are you gonna do” and jess is like well!!!! sam and i.... talked about this. we were.....open to the possibility. and dean is like wtf how could u possibly bring a child into this world that’s fucked up adn cas is like [wipes tear] that’s beautiful

anyway when they come back from some kind of hunt (probably something that involved claire) and sam and jess are in the bunker, sam goes “jess, seeing claire, seeing jody and the girls.... it makes me think.... i wanna have a family with you” and jess hugs him and then cas walks into the bunker with dean and is like “oh, have you told him about the baby?” and everyone SCREAMS at him

and cas uses his annual miracle allowance to just reverse time about 30 seconds so when he enters the bunker he just goes “i have nothing to say” and Fucking Leaves

the baby is born in the back of the impala in the s12 finale, on the way to the hospital. dean is devastated. he’ll have to reupholster the WHOLE THING. sam accidentally names the baby john but they don’t want to tell dean that so they decide to call him jack.

s13-15 gets to be mostly about how cute it is to have a wittle baby in the bunker. cas is the best babysitter because he loves babies and is very powerful so he can protect him. the occultum nonsense in s15 can be about finding a Safe Place for baby jack, no matter what happens to the rest of the world. sam tells jess, you go with him, you’ll be safe there. dean tells sam, you go with them, you’ll be safe there. all of that good good cute family stuff. was it the best idea to have a baby in the middle of constant apocalypses? maybe not, but like, they are ALWAYS in constant apocalypses, so at some point you just have to bite the bullet

anyway. please clap

#au

1 note · View note

fanficsaremylifeline · 5 years ago

Link

Fandom: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Steve Rogers & Tony Stark, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Tony Stark Summary:

Tired of Tony and Steve's constant fighting and bickering, the other Avengers sentence them to couple's therapy.

***

“DAMN YOU, STARK!”

Ugh, it was way to early for this, Tony was only two coffees in and dealing with Steve required at least two more cups. His holy coffein intake didn't seem to matter to Steve though, as he came storing into the living room, interrupting Tony and Rhodey's highly intelligent discussion about Jeopardy.

“What?”, Tony shot over; he was however pretty sure that he didn't want to know and most certainly didn't care.

“When the milk is empty, just throw the damn carton out! Is that so hard?”, Steve moaned and gestured around with the empty carton.

“And who says it was me?” Steve was completely right, it had been Tony. But before he'd admit to that, hell'd freeze over.

“Please, can we not argue about it like five-year olds? Just throw out the milk so I know to get a new one.” With a sigh and an exasperated and frankly quite condescending eye roll that Tony did not miss, Steve turned and walked out again.

“For fuck's sake”, Rhodey groaned, once the door had closed behind the super soldier. “Correct me if I'm wrong, JARVIS, but that puts the milk-fights somewhere in the mid-twenties, right?”

“It was indeed the 26th time Stark and Rogers have fought over the milk”, JARVIS reported. “Add that to the 19 discussions about profanity, 23 about appropriate levels of music during night time, 11 about Star Wars, 17 about Star Wars before Captain Rogers had seen them, 28 about how to make proper coffee, 24 about cars vs motorbikes, 16 about Monopoly and 8 about how to pronounce GIF. Together that makes 172 in the last 16 days.”

“You kept fucking count?”, Tony groaned. “you Rainman...”

“No, not Rainman. I currently feel like something between Ms Doubtfire and Mary Poppins. So either you two get your shit together or I'll turn all Nurse Ratchett/ Ms Trunchbull on your asses, capiche?”

“Yes, Mum...”

“Just get your damn coffee”, Rhodey grumbled and turned his attention back to the rerun of Jeopardy.

“Ok, but hear me out.” Tony pulled up the holographic model to show Bruce what he was talking about. “If we manage a miniscule version of the arc reactor, the Hulkbuster wouldn't be just some giant armour, but could fulfil some minor automated functions.”

“What kind of automation are we talking about here?” Having that powerful a reactor comprised into something that was supposed to take down Hulk, without blowing up an entire city block... Bruce wasn't too sure about that.

“Mostly for movement. We're talking about copious amounts of weight here, and without some form of automation, Thor'll be the only one who can actually move in it.”

“Yeah, I get that. It's just... Does it have to be arc-technology? Last time it was Hulk against Ironman, I almost blew up half of New York and was this close to giving you a heart attack.”

“But that's why we need to make it smaller so...”

“TONY!”

Ugh, not again. Steve stormed into the workshop and stared Tony down.

“Steve, please. Me and Tony are very busy and...”

The super soldier barely graced Bruce with as much as a fleeting glance and pointed right at Stark. “Next time you're hungry, stay the hell away from my leftovers!”

“Right, because I would voluntarily eat your sprouts with cabbage and shit”, Tony scoffed and turned back to the Hulkbuster model.

“Every time I put my name on it. And of all the Avengers you're the only one disrespectful enough to ignore that.”

“Oh, so now I'm disrespectful?”

That was it for Bruce. Those two could continue for hours like that and Bruce was not gonna do that to himself. And, as much as hulking out might help to get those two idiots in line, Bruce really was not keen on doing that either.

Neither seemed to notice him leaving the lab and after the door had closed behind him, Bruce leaned with a heavy sigh against the wall. “JARVIS? What's the count?”

“193.”

“Boss, your presence is required in the briefing room.”

“Oh, come on.” Tony hated being interrupted mid-project with a passion. “Scale 1-10 how important is it?”

“According to Agent Romanoff it is at a 17.”

“Fine”, he groaned, put the wrench down and trudged upstairs. It couldn't be an imminent mission, JARVIS hadn't sounded any alarms, so there was probably no need to worry.

Or maybe there was, at least judging how all the Avengers stood around the table, eyeing him sternly.

“Where's the fire?”

“For weeks, you and Rogers have been at each other's throats”, Clint began, and Tony was already done.

“Right then.” Tony turned on his heel and walked back towards the door. The locked door. “What the fuck, J? Unlock the door!”

“I am not authorized to do that.”

“Excuse me?” Tony stared at the camera. “You are my AI. My command trumps every other command you're given.”

“Not if I deem it crucial.”

“Traitor!”, he hissed before turning back to the Avengers. “Taking over my AI comes with dire consequen...”

“Shut it, Stark”, Nat interrupted and motioned for him to sit back down next to Cap.

His hands raised in mock-defense, he complied.

“And now listen, both of you. Your bickering is making everybody miserable.”

“Amen to that”, Wanda threw in.

“We're not that bad”, Steve stated, and Tony nodded along.

“JARVIS?”

“In the last 4 weeks alone have been 256 incidents. This number accounts only for altercations within proximity to the tower and all tech linked to my server.”

Granted, Tony got how that might be annoying. However... “That is so not on me.”

“Excuse me?” Steve turned to Tony, pure offence written all over his features. “Clearly the team cannot excuse your behaviour or they...”

“It's on you both”, Natasha made clear. “And everybody suffers for it. So you left us with no choice: you're being sentenced to couples therapy.”

“No.” Both Tony and Steve stared at her with wide eyes, their jaws on the ground.

“You can't be serious”, Tony protested once he caught himself again. “We do not need therapy!”

“Tony's right”, Steve nodded.

“See?” Tony gestured between himself and Rogers. “We're agreeing on something! There's absolutely no need for any type of counselling.”

“Your opinion doesn't matter”, Banner made clear.

“Yes, it does! I run this damn team.”

“And I finance this damn team”, Tony finished Steve's reasoning.

“As your doctors, me and Helen already signed off on it. And so has Fury. You're going and that's it.”

Fuck. Tony slumped back in his chair. Therapy. With Rogers.

“Everything is handled with utmost discretion”, Vision explained. “The SHIELD-approved psychologist has already signed a NDA and should arrive at the tower as we speak.”

“THE FUCK?”, Tony yelled out, “our appointment is NOW?”

“So neither of you can weasel out of it”, Rhodey shrugged.

That was the worst part about all this: his honey-bear being part of all this. It felt even worse than JARVIS being part of this conspiracy.

“Fine”, Steve just groaned, “Let's get this over with.” With that he got up, looking at Tony all expectantly until he too, followed suit.

“Conference Room C”, Nat fake-smiled and waved them away.

Tony was in no hurry to get there any time soon and inspected the spectacularly unspectacular white walls of the hallway.

“Come on!”, Steve complained.

“Why?”

“Because we shouldn't let the doctor wait!”

“I couldn't give less of a fuck about that doc or your annoying need to be perfectly on time.”

With an eye roll, Steve just turned and strutted off towards the conference room. Fine with Tony; he could very well do without the nagging.

He was gonna get them back; Nat, Rhodey, Clint, all of them. And if it was the last thing he'd ever do; Tony was gonna get his revenge.

Mark was nervous, immensely so. He was about to start counselling Captain America and Ironman! How in the name of everything that was good and holy in the world was this real life?

It was incredibly bizarre; as a kid he had collected the Captain America baseball cards and just two weeks ago he gifted his son the newest Ironman action figure; his daughter never went to sleep is she didn't have the Avengers-blankie.

But there wasn't time for more than two deep breaths, the door opened and in walked Captain America. Keep it together!

“Hello, Mr Rogers, the name is Mark Simmons; it's a pleasure to meet you.”

“Likewise”, he smiled and shook the outstretched hand. “Please excuse my partner's tardiness; it's his form of protest.”

“Don't pretend like you want to be here”, Stark scoffed as he walked through the door, before he turned to Mark. “Good day, doctor. Just so you know, up until ten minutes ago, neither of us knew about this...” - he waved his hands around, gesturing between the three men - “arrangement. And to be perfectly honest, neither of us really fancies the idea of therapy.”

“Your honesty is appreciated”, Mark smiled. “Since I'm already here though...” He motioned for the two to sit down and, less willingly than anything else, they complied.

“Well, since neither of you know what to expect from me or our meetings, let me explain what it is I do. My name is Mark Simmons and I specialize in business psychology; you could say couple's therapy for a co-workers. What I'm here to do, is to get the communication going.”

“Oh there is no issue there”, Tony rolled his eyes. “This one's more than vocal about what I apparently keep on doing wrong.”

“Not apparently”, Steve hissed.

“It doesn't seem to bother the others.”

Oh dear. Not even five minutes in and Mark already feared the worst; this would be a tough one.

“I understand that your situation is a difficult one”, he commented, when he finally got a word in, “since you not only work but also live together. But that's why it is important for us to get to the bottom of it all, of where all this tension stems from.”

“We don't like each other”, Stark shrugged”, what more is there to it?”

“More than you'd think. I do need to say right away that this will only work if you are honest with me and each other. In return I assure you that I will be transparent about any and all methods and intentions.”

“That does sound reasonable”, Rogers nodded. Still, even though he seemed to be more open to the whole idea than Stark, the Captain was just as apprehensive; he just tried to hide it.

“No promises”, Stark made clear and Mark could only smile.

“Thank you for your honesty, Mr Stark.”

“Tony.”

“Right then. If you'd be willing I would like to hear some of the typical arguments you have, so I can get a better picture of the situation.”

“Ask JARVIS, he keeps a log”, Tony snorted.

“It is not my job to counsel JARVIS” - whoever that was - “you two are my clients, so it's from you I'd like to hear it.”

“He's just got one to many sticks up his ass”, Tony shrugged and toyed around with a screwdriver he got out his jeans pocket.

“No, he's just a sloppy and spoiled prat, who never learned how to share and live with others.”

“I am not sloppy! I mean sure, I can get sloppy in bed...” He left the rest unsaid, and a smug grin played over his lips.

“You see”, Steve groaned, “everything is a joke to him! I – honest to God – can't remember if I've ever had a serious conversation with you.”

“Well, maybe I don't want to have a serious conversation with you”, Stark shot back.

“Well, doctor”, Steve forced a smile, “I guess there you have it.”

Wow. This was gonna be just great.

“Hey Tones.” Rhodey, that traitor, walked into the lab and shot Tony the smuggest grin. “How was your first session with Dr Simmons?”

“You're an asshole”, Tony grumbled and turned his attention back to the motor he was repairing.

“Thanks dear, I love you, too.”

“Seriously, what the fuck were you thinking?” Tony must have looked sufficiently pissed off, since the smugness in Rhodey's look changed to something sombre.

“Me and the rest of the team were thinking that whatever is going on between you and Rogers can't continue like this. It's breaking the team and it's breaking the two of you as well. So you're gonna deal with it.”

“And what if I don't?”

“Then we're gonna lock you two in a room with Hulk.”

“Proactive choice. Just gotta warn you: this is gonna end in disaster.”

“Can't be worse than it is now.”

“So why don't you just throw the empty milk carton out?”

It's been thirty minutes and the two Avengers were still fighting over the damn milk. But, instead of giving Mark the chance to dig a little deeper and guide the conversation towards what really upset them, they kept on talking over him. If their last four sessions were anything to go by, they probably forgot Mark was there.

“I have more important things going on in my head to check if I finished the milk or whatever.”

“Right because it's too much to ask for you to take these three seconds to check that.”

“Yeah, but guess what, Rogers: I don't owe you shit.”

Ah, finally, they got to a bigger issue. For a few moments they just stared at each other, Tony's defiance head-on meeting Steve's confusion.

It was the super soldier that broke the silence. “That has nothing to do with me wanting you to do this for me. It's just the proper basis for a bunch of people living together.”

“And why am I the only one that gets your speeches? Clint drinks the juice right out of the container, Vision has zero instinct about privacy and walks right through walls, Thor eats everybody's pop tarts and I don't think I can recall a single time that Wanda cleaned the microwave. So please, Captain, what is it about me that is so unbearable or well, more so than the others?”

“Because you do it on purpose!”, Steve cried out. “All that bullshit didn't start until about two or three months ago. So what the hell changed that you felt the need to be such a pain?”

“Because I can't allow myself to like you.” Tony all but spat the words in Steve's face, got up and turned to Mark. “Thanks, doc. For everything.” Not sure whether it was meant sarcastically or not, Mark just stared after Ironman as he walked out.

“Well”, he eventually cleared his throat. “I guess we can stop talking about milk, leftovers and swearing.”

“Yeah...” Until now, Steve had stared at the closed door, only now he turned to Mark. “Let's just hope he shows up next time...”

He didn't.

But Steve hadn't really expected anything else. All week, Tony had kept away from Steve, not once did they run into each other.

After Tony missed another appointment, Steve got worried. Fine, he had been worried ever since Tony had told him that he couldn't like him, but now he allowed the worry to come through.

“Bruce?” The scientist was – as he had been for the last few days – by himself in the lab.

“Steve, hey”, Bruce smiled and waved for Steve to come inside. “What's going on?”

“Have you seen Tony these last few days?”

“Of course not”, Bruce chuckled, “he's in his house in Malibu.”

“Wait, what?” Steve couldn't help his face from dropping.

“Yeah, he said something about some issues with the LA branch of SI.”

“Oh. Right then. Thanks.” With an awkward wave, Steve turned and walked out, as Bruce's concerned looked burned into the back of his head.

Right, SI LA needed its boss every now and again; it made plenty of sense for Tony having to go there somewhat spontaneously.

Something in Steve's gut felt so very off about it though. Disappearing from one moment to the next, not even cancelling their sessions with Dr Simmons... Something was not right and Steve felt somewhat responsible.

Unfortunately, very impulsively so; as much as he hated flying, Steve found himself in the next machine to California.

All through the flight, he had thought about what he wanted to say, but now that a cleaning lady, Miriam, led him through the villa, his head was pretty empty.

In a wide light-filled room, Tony sat on the floor, screwing around with something that looked like it had once been part of an Ironmansuit.

“Tony.”

“Rogers, what the fuck do you want?” Stark didn't even look up.

“I want to check on you.”

“Could've just called.”

“Would you have picked up?”

“Probably not”, he admitted, still not gracing Steve with as much as a fleeting glance. “Thanks for flying out though and have a safe journey back to New York.”

“Tony, I'm not leaving until you talk to me.”

“What do you want me to say?”, Stark groaned, threw the wrench on the ground and glared at Steve. “Seriously, what do you need to hear to fuck off?”

“The truth.”

“How original.” With a roll of his eyes, Tony got up and wiped the oil off his hands. Steve doubted it was of use, the rag that had probably once been white was almost black by now.

“Tony, please.”

“Why?” He strutted right up to Steve but he wasn't about to let himself be intimidated. “Why do you care?”

“I care about you and our team. And I thought we have gotten close, I do consider you a friend. And that's why I care about you.”

After staring at Steve for a few moments, Tony dropped his head. “Fuck”, he mumbled. “Right here goes. I'm sorry for screwing with you these last weeks. It was all my fault and I'll be good from now on and we no longer need to deal with the shrink. Deal?”

“No”, Steve made clear. “I flew to LA so we can work on what has the entire team upset and isn't good for the two of us either. So tell me, what I can do to make you more comfortable around me, and I'll gladly do it.” He took two careful steps towards Tony. “Please.”

“I appreciate that, but there's nothing you can do.”

“You said you can't allow yourself to like me.”

When Tony stayed silent, Steve continued: “Is it because of Howard?” It had to be, Tony's Dad was the only thing that connected them profoundly enough for Tony to hate Steve.

“What do you think?”, Tony scoffed. “The great and amazing Captain America, Howard's greatest ever creation, I just never could measure up to.”

“Tony, I'm so sorry...”

“Can it”, Tony interrupted him, “because it's not your fault. You were dead then, it had nothing to do with you and everything with Howard being the worst.”

Wow.

“But you don't want to end up like your Dad, so you forbade yourself to like me”, Steve finished the explanation and interpreted Tony's shrug as affirmation of his assumption. “So why be a pain in my ass then?” This part, Steve didn't really get: Tony could just stay away from Steve, the Tower gave more than enough opportunities for that.

“Just because”, Tony mumbled, as he actually blushed. What the hell? As hard as he tried, Steve couldn't remember Tony Stark ever being flushed.

“That's not an answer.” Steve was aware that he was entering dangerous territory; a cornered Tony was even more dangerous than he normally was. But what was the alternative? Him and Tony just avoiding each other, pushing it all way down until it all blew up in their faces?

“Rogers, please...” Tony's voice went softer, almost a whisper, the exact opposite of how Steve had expected Tony to react.

“Tony, you're seriously worrying me.” Steve took another step towards Tony, who looked like he just wanted to bolt. “Please, what's bothering you?”

“You are, damnit!”, Tony yelled out. “The fact that you're nothing like the damn asshole I pictured you to be throughout my childhood. The fact that you're actually a pretty great guy. The fact that I like you, no, that I like you too damn much.”

Steve couldn't follow. The part about Tony's childhood and Howard, he got. But the almost desperate look in Tony's eyes... “I get that all that, with me, Howard was, or still is...” At Tony's exasperated face drop Steve halted mid-sentence. Was he missing something? Judging by the way Tony looked at him, he probably did.

“You really don't get it, Rogers, do you?”

His meek shrug was only met with a Stark-typical eye-roll.

And then everything seemed to happen at once. With two big steps, Tony closed the last bit of distance between them, grabbed Steve by the shirt collar, pulled him down and pressed their lips together.

And Steve's mind just went blank. Of all the things he'd expect Tony to do... This was not one of them. Frozen in shock, Steve could do nothing but let Stark kiss him.

“Here you go”, Tony shrugged, once he broke away and took two steps back. “Now if you'd please fuck off, I'd be very grateful.” With that he turned and motioned to walk off.

“Tony, wait.” Steve heard himself speak, before he realized he had done it. But it was all so very much in a haze, and Steve wouldn't bet a lot on this being real life and not just a dream, so before he knew it really happened, he grabbed Tony's arm, pulled him back and immediately their lips met again.

After a few shocked moments, Tony's arms wrapped themselves around Steve's shoulders.

Steve had no idea what was really happening, but he didn't care, because it felt amazing. It was electrified, passionate and all the little things that irked them about each other seemed to vanish, making room for desire to run wild.

“Rogers”, Tony mumbled after a while, “what is...”

“Shut up”, Steve shot back, not in the mood for talking.

“Works for me”, Stark chuckled, and, with his hand on Steve's neck, he pulled him down and deepened the kiss even more.

Was this a good idea? Probably not. Did Steve care? Fuck, no.

When Steve woke up the next morning, he wasn't quite sure where he was. He definitely didn't know this enormous bed, and these silky bed sheets were not to his taste.

Oh. Right. He was in LA. In Tony's bed. And very naked.

Shit.

What was more, he was alone in Tony's oversized bed. There was no genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist, but a note.

Steve,

sorry, had to dash. Help yourself to whatever's in the kitchen, if you want.

I'll see you in New York.

Shit. With a loud groan, Steve fell back into the cushions. What did he think? He didn't, that was just it. Or he thought with the wrong body part. Sure, it felt good, very much so. Kissing someone hadn't felt that good ever since he kissed Peggy. And then... Passion just took over.

That was admittedly the weird part, Steve wasn't someone who just let himself run over with desire and just jumped right into bed with whoever kissed him. Well, he and Tony had a lot of pent up tension between them and now they just had the need to get it all out.

I'll see you in New York.

Well, maybe things would be a little more relaxed between them from now on. But Steve doubted that.

“Omigod”, Nat sighed, “I can't believe I'm saying this but I liked it so much better when they were fighting.”

“Tell me about it.” Clint fell down next to her on the couch. “The way Cap just silently stares at Stark is seriously creepy and so awkward.”

“And Stark barely ever talks any more when Steve is in the room and flees as soon as he's got the chance”, Wanda observed.

“If it weren't those two, I'd say they're boning”, Clint giggled, until he stopped dead. “Omigod. Do you think that Steve and Tony...”

The assembled Avengers just looked at each other with wide eyes.

“It would explain so much”, Nat eventually broke the silence.

“All that bickering and fighting is just unresolved sexual tension”, Bruce commented.

“We gotta fix them!”

“Right”, Nat scoffed, “because they both would react so positively to us walking up to them and telling them to bone.”

“Maybe we should stick them back in therapy.”

“Because that went over so well the last time.”

“What then?” Rhodey looked around the group. “There's gotta be something we can do!”

“We'll leave that to you”, Nat suggested, “you're the only one who can get through to Tony.”

With a ping the elevator doors opened and Rhodey walked into the penthouse, already dreading in what state he was about to find his friend. “Tones? You in here?”

“Platypus!”, Tony beamed and staggered towards him with wide open arms. Shit. He was really hammered.

“Here”, he handed Rhodey a bottle, clearly not realizing that it was already empty. “Drink with me!”

“How about we switch to water?”, he suggested and took the still half-full bottle of whiskey out of Tony's hand.

“You're so boring”, Tony moped and walked over to the kitchen cabinet, where he got another bottle. “So boring”, he repeated after a generous sip. “Just like Steve. He's so stupid and boring.”

“Yeah, I know.” Gently, Rhodey guided Tony to a couch and all but pushed him down. “I'm not worried about Rogers, though.”

“You should...”

“Nah, I'm only responsible to look after you.”

“I'm fine”, Tony claimed, however swaying and slurring a lot more than fine would suggest.

“I know you are. That's why you ran off to LA, avoid Steve since you're back, lock yourself in up here and drink that much again.”

“I'm really fine”, Tony repeated. “Look!” He T-posed and shot him a kissy-face. “I'm so good.”

“Right, then you won't mind talking to Steve, would you?”

“But I don't want to.” Not unlike a child throwing a hissy fit, Tony crossed his arms in front of his chest; all that was missing was Tony sticking his tongue out at Rhodey.

Well, if Tony was gonna act like a four-year-old, then Rhodey'd pack out his parental voice. “And why don't you want to talk to him?”

Thankfully, he was too drunk to pick up on James' condescending tone. “Because he's stupid.”

“And why is he stupid?”

“Because he is.”

“Tony.” This was gonna be a tough one.

“Rhodey”, he mocked him.

“Well, if you're fine, then I can go.” He got up off the couch and, as he had expected, he couldn't get two steps until Tony stopped him.

“Don't go”, he mumbled, grabbed his arm and pulled him back on the couch.

“Alright, I'll stay”, James smiled. “You gonna tell me what has you upset though?”

Tony clutched a pillow and looked down on the floor. “We... we had sex.”

“You did what?” Oh damn. They were right, the Avengers were damn right about them.

“He... He just didn't get it, so I showed him. And then he kissed me back. And then...” Instead of finishing his sentence, Tony took another sip from his bottle.

Well, damn.

“Sounds to me like you and Steve have quite a bit to talk about...”

“Talking fucking sucks”, Tony groaned and slumped against Rhodey's side.

“It helps though”, he shrugged and put his arm around Tony's shoulder.

“Still sucks”, he mumbled and snuggled into the embrace.

Rhodey had lived through enough of Tony's drinking sessions to know that a) Tony was about to fall asleep, that b) Rhodey would not be able to move until he woke up again, that c) the chances of getting thrown up on were at least in the high seventies and that d) this disaster human being was his absolute favourite person in the entire world.

“I love you, Tones.”

“I love you too, Honey-bear.”

5 days. 5 days since Steve had flown to LA to confront Tony about their 'situation'. 5 days, since Tony had grabbed his shirt and kissed him. 5 days, since Steve kissed him back. 5 days, since Steve had just about the best night ever. 5 days, in which Steve couldn't think about anything else than the surprisingly soft lips, the taste of coffee, the strong hands on his body and most of all, how good being with Tony had felt.

And with all that came a realization: that flutter in his stomach that came every time Steve was around Tony was not dread, awkwardness or anything like that, it were the butterflies in his stomach going into overdrive.

When Steve finally gathered enough courage to talk to Tony, he ended up standing in front of a locked door.

“I'm sorry, boss has restricted access to anyone.”

“JARVIS, please.” In the worry about his friend, Steve didn't give too much thought to him currently trying to reason with a bodiless robot. “You can't tell me that he's doing alright. Let me please talk to him.”

“Since he is not in imminent physical danger, I am not authorized to ignore boss' orders.”

“Is he drinking?”

“Yes.”

“With his history, it's more than dangerous for him to be locked up all by himself with these amounts of alcohol, don't you agree?”

“I do”, he admitted and the door opened for him.

“Thanks, JARVIS, you're the best.”

“Tony?”

Damnit. JARVIS was really keen on disobeying all of Tony's orders, was he? “One of these days”, he groaned towards the general direction of the camera, “I'll donate you to a high school.”

“I believe my fosterlings there would be less determined to kill themselves and be more grateful for my unwavering support.”

“You sure as fuck aren't supporting me”, Tony hissed, as Steve walked all through the penthouse in search of him. If Tony was lucky, Rogers would respect the sanctity of the bedroom, where Tony had created a make-shift workstation on and around the bed.

“I have your best interests at heart, even if you might not realize it.”

For fuck's sake.

“Tony?”, Steve called again, closing in on Tony's location.

“He is in the bedroom”, JARVIS announced and boy, if looks could kill, Tony would have to install new security cameras.

“Can I come in?”

“Whatever”, Tony grumbled and the door opened to the sight of a nervous Steve.

“Hi.”

“Rogers, I don't know what went wrong with you that you can't seem to get I don't want to see you.” Tony didn't even bother with looking up at Steve and hoped to whoever was in charge of hurried prayers that the super soldier would see it as nonchalant and not recognize the pained insecurity. Which, by the way, fucking sucked.

All of this, of what happened these last few weeks, months, fucking sucked.

It started to suck, when Tony got to know Steve for who he really was: not the absolute pinnacle of American perfection who Tony would never be able to measure up to, but instead.... Sure, Steve was all that, but so much more.

As much as Tony pretended to be exasperated and annoyed by his in all honesty at times pathetic tries to catch up to modern technology, his determination was really commendable and quite adorable. Same with his annoying righteousness; knowing about Steve what Tony knew now, he could recognize and appreciate how passionate Rogers was about the things most important to him. And that undying loyalty... But not – as Tony had thought – to the US army, the government and blindly following orders, but to the people closest to him. Even to Tony. Who had been quite the dick. But even though he didn't understand a word of it, Rogers often listened to Tony's engineering rants. And listening to Steve going on and on about injustice or whatever, Tony just got roped in by that seemingly boundless passion.

And with all that wrapped up in *that* package... Yeah, Tony really had fallen for Steve. And he hated himself for it.

Why of all people did it have to be Captain America that made Tony's heart skip a fucking beat? And why in the name of Edwin Jarvis did Tony 'confess'? Why couldn't he have just stuck to the fucking plan, ride these damn feelings out and be enough of a pain so Steve would hate him?

But no, Mr Impulsivity just couldn't leave well enough alone and keep it in his damn pants, could he?

“I'm sorry, Tony”, Steve eventually apologized.

“For what?” For being a giant idiot, who didn't get what was going on? For pushing what should have been left alone and thusly making everything a million times worse?

“Yes, to all of those.”

Tony didn't even realize he had said all this out loud, but whatever. Not like all this could be even more fucked up...

“But there's a bit more I need to apologize for.” Almost cautious was Steve's movement as he walked up to Tony, who sat on the bed. “I'm sorry that I'm so slow and dumb when it comes to feelings. I'm sorry I brushed all of your actions off as you being nothing more than a childish pain in my ass and some other choice words I feel like leaving out of this right now”, he chuckled and yes, that was indeed a blush creeping up Steve's face. “Because I know you're not like that.”

“Oh?”, Tony shot over, rife with sarcasm. “Then what am I like?”

Steve locked eyes with Tony, sincere and earnest. “You're so generous, intelligent, caring, admittedly quite funny and supportive of everybody important to you. I know you like to play all that down, hide behind the genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist tag, but that's all it is. A tag. But that passion, that fire... You light up every room you enter and that's not because of your genius-billionaire-bullshit, it's because of your big heart.”

Huh.

As much as he hated to admit it, Tony was speechless and could only stare at Steve with wide open eyes.

“And I'm especially sorry that it took me so damn long to realize that all that has roped me in long ago.” Steve scooted closer, bringing them mere centimetres apart. “It took LA to make me understand that this weird feeling in my stomach whenever you're around, had nothing to do with dislike or annoyance. More like the exact opposite.” As he spoke, Steve's voice went quieter as he leaned in closer, and before Tony could compute any of this, Steve's lips were on his.

“What the fuck?”

When Nat opened the door to the kitchen, she couldn't quite believe what she saw: Tony, making coffee and Steve's arms wrapped around his waist, with his head rested on Tony's shoulder.

“Hi Natasha, want a cup?”, Tony asked, barely looking over.

“I'm good”, she waved him off and pulled Clint, whose jaw was still on the ground, to the table. “Let me guess, therapy did you two a world of good.”

“We might not be that pissed about it any more.” Tony turned around, and leaned against the somewhat blushing Steve.

“Thanks for forcing us to go”, he grinned.

“We told you.”

“Yeah... Guess that wouldn't make you the smartest person in this building after all...” Steve grinned over at Tony, who smacked Steve's side.

“It's definitely not you, I could have told you that long ago”, he shot back with a smirk.

“Oh really?” Steve raised his eyebrow and Nat felt like she was about to get sick.

“Oh god, what have we done”, Clint hissed over, staring wide-eyed at Tony and Steve. Flirting. Actually flirting.

“We've created a monster, that's what we did.”

#tony stark #ironman #steve rogers #captain america #rhodey #james rhodes #war machine #iron patriot #bruce banner #hulk #natasha romanoff black widow #clint barton hawkeye #wanda maximoff #scarlett witch #stony

14 notes · View notes

p-artsypants · 5 years ago

Text

Much Obliged (2)

Based on @bugaboo-n-bananoir‘s amazing Cowboy!Adrien and Witch!Marinette AU.

It’s important to know that almost everything is the same in this AU. I’m just changing them from superheroes to a witch and a cowboy. (A magically enhanced Cowboy, but I digress.)

Ao3

Part One

—

“I’m not crazy, am I Tikki?” Marinette asked.

It had been a week since school started, and every time Marinette made eye contact with the sweet Cowboy, she felt her face flush. He was just so kind, honest, and smart! Not to mention adorable!

She had collected an array of photos from his modeling career, but it almost seemed like looking at a different person without the Cowboy charm.

“Not crazy, just in love.”

“Oh please,” Marinette waved her off. “I would hardly call it love. But…I can’t stop thinking about him.”

“That’s normal. Especially when you spend 8 hours a day with him and his boots.” Tikki giggled.

“But I’ve been stuttering and stammering around him all week! He probably thinks I’m a weirdo!”

“Marinette...he thinks he’s a Cowboy.”

“What? No, he is a Cowboy. Just like I’m a witch. We went over this.”

“Okay, if you say so. If you really want to get over your stammering, you just need to talk to him. Invite him to hang out!”

“What? Like a date?”

“Not necessarily. A strong friendship is often a great place to start a relationship. Who knows, you might like him more as a friend anyway!”

Marinette put a finger to her chin. “Hmmm...I suppose so. But what would we do? I don’t know how much we have in common yet!”

“You could take him for a flight! He seemed really interested in it!”

“Hey yeah!” She looked to her window, where the full moon was shining through. “I’ll go now!”

“Now??”

“Yeah! It’ll be a surprise! And it’s a Friday night, so we don’t have school tomorrow.”

“You’ve talked me into it! Let’s go sweep that boy off his feet!”

Marinette grabbed her broomstick, which was propped up by the door to her balcony. Instead of putting on her new hat, she put on the Cowboy hat Adrien had given her.

“How do I look?” Marinette twirled.

“Mighty purdy!” Tikki giggled.

“Don’t make fun of him!”

“I’m not! I think it’s cute!”

After that, they flew together out the window.

Marinette didn’t actually know where Adrien lived, but in the era of GPS, she could look up his address for fan mail and find his house.

It was only around the corner from her! Small world!

A huge mansion, with a tall wall all the way around it, Marinette was surprised that she hadn’t guessed it first.

As she floated around the house, she found a wall of windows, the lights out inside. But there was a light on over the desk, and a boy hard at work.

The same boy she had been looking for.

He was doing his homework, likely so he could have the weekend free. His hat was on the coffee table, his boots kicked off nearby. And his flannel was untucked and unbuttoned.

A black cat sat on his lap, which he stroked absently.

Delicately, Marinette tapped on the glass.

Adrien perked up at the noise, startled. Then he turned to look at the window and his eyes lit up with joy.

He shoved the cat off his lap and went to the window.

“Well! I’ll be! A little witch has appeared at my window! To what do I owe the pleasure?”

She blushed at how happy he sounded to see her. “You sounded interested when I brought up flying the other day. The moon is beautiful out. I thought you might like to take a spin?”

“You’ve come to sweep me off my feet?” His eyes twinkled with mirth.

“That I have, buckaroo.”

He took her in. “My, you ride side saddle like a pro! But cha ain’t got no saddle!”

She giggled. “I don’t need a saddle! It’s a broom!”

“Sure you do! Every self respecting steed needs a saddle, come on in, and I’ll see what I can rustle up!”

Marinette floated through the open window and hovered over the plush carpet.

His room was huge. Her parents entire apartment could probably fit inside it. Despite Adrien’s proclivities towards the American West, the room wasn’t quite as rustic as she imagined. Though, much more rustic than any other place in Paris, she assumed. He had a rock wall, and a skateboarding ramp. And on the second story, yeah, he had a second story, there was a collection of movies.

She assumed most were westerns.

As for the decor, well...there was a mechanical bull in the corner. She also spied a genuine cattle skull and a cow skin blanket over the bed.

Wait was that a wagon wheel?

Adrien returned from the closet. “Ah ha! Here we are!” He held a thick wool blanket over his arm. “I knew my actual saddles wouldn’t fit on the stick. So let’s give this a try.”

“It really is sweet of you, Adrien. But I don’t really need it.”

“Ya sure? Don’t want cha gettin’ splinters in your cooter.”

Marinette doubled over in laughter, loosing her balance and falling off the broom, right into Adrien’s arms. She didn’t even have the mind to be embarrassed. She just hugged him and laughed harder.

Adrien laughed right along with her, wrapping his arms around her waist.

“Golly Marinette, your laughter sure is contagious!” He giggled, looking down at her.

She looked up, meeting his eyes. Her laughter faded, seeing how close he was. Their noses were almost touching.

“I-I-I couldn’t help it...you just make me laugh.”

“That’s swell!” He squeezed her and put her on her feet. “Well, I don’t want to pressure you into takin’ this if it’ll make things harder for you.”

“I’m willing to give it a try. May I?”

“Shore!” He handed the blanket over.

The broom still levitated, and Adrien watched as she wrapped the blanket around the handle once, and then draped the remaining over the edges. Then she sat down again.

“Oh! This is nice! A little more surface area to sit along with the cushion!”

“Glad I could be of some service!”

“Want to try it out?”

“You’re sure I won’t be too heavy?”

“Positive!”

A new voice spoke. “It’s powered by magic after all!” A red fairy-bug-thing flew out of her hat.

“Ah! A Flying varmit!”

“No no Adrien!” Marinette waved her arms to calm him down. “This is my familiar, Tikki. She’s the embodiment of my magic.”

Adrien rested a hand on his heart. “Beggin’ your pardon ma’am! You just spooked me!”

“Tikki has a tendency to do that.”

“Is she always with you? I ain’t never seen her before.”

“Yes, she’s usually in my purse.”

“Boy, I wish I had a constant companion. All I got is Plagg, but he’s more of a bully than a friend.”

“Plagg?” Marinette asked.

“My cat.” He pointed at the black blob that had taken up residence on his chair.

Marinette rolled up her sleeves. “I think I can help with that!” She raised her hands, as her eyes glowed blue.

Plagg flashed blue as well, but didn’t seem harmed.

He stood, stretched, and trotted over to Adrien. At his feet, the cat simply stated, “I’m hungry.”

Adrien busted a gut, laughing too hard. “I knew if you ever learned how to talk, that’d be the first thing you’d say to me!!”

“I want cheese. Camembert. Microwave it for 5 seconds.”

“Well hot damn Mari, I knew you made him smart, but did you have to make him picky too?”

“I’ve always been picky. That why you’re the only one who can pet me. And now this girl too, because she has made my demands known.”

Marinette didn’t respond. She was too busy freaking out because Adrien had called her a new nickname.

“Did you just call me Mari?”

“Oh shoot, darlin’! I’m always giving you nicknames.”

She blushed. “Well, Mari just seemed...I don’t know. Special?”

“Cause you’re a special girl! Shucks, and that’s besides your magical-ness!”

“Stop! You’re making me blush!”

“Well, I happen to think you’re mighty purdy when you blush. That’s all.”

Her face was crimson as she cupped her cheeks.

He snickered after her, his own cheeks coloring slightly. “Are you going to be good to fly? Or do you want me to take the reins?”

She elbowed him gently. “If you stop teasing me, I’ll be perfectly fine to fly.”

“Shore thing, ma’am.”

She sat down daintily, the broom moving to the perfect height automatically. “Your turn.”

“Hold on.” He grabbed his hat, and slipped on his boots. “Just in case we run out of juice.”

“Fair.” She grinned. “We won’t, but what’s a Cowboy without his hat and boots?”

He put a finger in her face and spoke sternly. “Not worth a hill of beans. You remember that.”

“Alright.” She blinked.

“Okie dokie, how do you want me to do this?”

“Can you try riding sideways like me? But have your legs over the other side to counterbalance.”

He dropped onto the broom, sliding around until he got his balance. But the handle was kind of short for two people, so he had to sidle right up to her. “This is kinda—here, is this alright?” He reached an arm around her and rested his hand in the front to brace himself up.

She blushed again. “Do you feel safe?”

“Don’t know how I couldn’t with you around, My Lady.”

She beamed at him.

“You know we Cowboy’s have a phrase—“

“You have a lot of phrases.”

“A-HEM. We have a phrase that goes, ‘Jumping the broom’.”

“What does it mean?”

“It’s another way of saying gettin’ hitched. Married.”

She snorted.

“I can’t wait to tell everyone you and I jumped the broom over the weekend.”

“They’ll probably all look at you like you’re insane.”

“Well, it’ll be our own private joke.”

“Our first inside joke! This friendship is coming along beautifully.”

“I’d say it’s a huckleberry above a persimmon!”

“I don’t know what that means, but I agree with you.” She giggled.

“It means good, no sweatin’.”

“Good! You ready?”

“Shore thing!”

“Alright, here we go!”

The broom lifted into the air, and Adrien rocked slightly, but he regained his balance quick enough. Then it took off out the window, and lifted into the sky.

“YEEEEEEE-HAAAAAAWWWW!” Adrien cried as they cleared several buildings in seconds. “Marinette, this is funner than switching your enemies piñata with a bee hive!”

She guffawed, the broom dipping slightly. “Have you done that before!?”

“No, but I assume it’d be pretty fun!”

After they did a fast lap around Paris, weaving through the Eiffel Tower, and the Arc de Triomphe, they came to a coast, just enjoying the night.

“My oh my…I could do this everyday for the rest of my life and never get tired of it.”

“I feel the same.” Marinette admitted, gazing over the city lights. “When my grandfather taught me to fly when I was little, I told myself I’d get out as much as possible. And I do. Except when it rains. It’s just no fun then.“

“Your grandpappy? Was he a witch too?”

“A sorcerer.” She replied wistfully. “Master of all schools of magic. He’s the one that taught me what I know. I have his spell book too, I’ve been trying to learn from it.”

“He’s not around no more?”

“Not in Paris.” She said fondly. “He decided to get into a school of magic that my parents weren’t comfortable with, so he went back to China.”

“What school is that?”

“Necromancy.”

He tilted his head. “Which is?”

“It has to do with the dead. Raising the dead, communing with the dead, avoiding death, and other things that fall into the category, like possession and mind control.”

“That sounds like some spooky stuff. No offense to your pappy.”

“No, I think he’d agree. I think it intrigues him. That’s why he became a Lich.”

“Lich? Is that like...a love witch?”

“No,” she giggled. “It’s a magic user that rejects death. But they lose their humanity. He’s basically a living skeleton now.”

“That’s awful!”

“It would be. But I video chatted with him a few days ago. He’s the same person, just without skin. It’s kinda funny. My dad calls him Skeletor.”

“Are your parents witches too?”

“Nope! Just me! My mom knows a few healing spells, but that’s all she ever cared about. My dad doesn’t have a magical bone in his body.”

“Wow! So you’re going at it alone now, huh?”

“Well like I said, I have my grandfather’s spellbook. But yeah, I’m my own mentor. What about you? Anyone else in your family that’s a Cowboy?”

“Not really. My uncle, my mom’s brother, he owns a cattle farm out in the country, but I wouldn’t call him a Cowboy. He taught me how to ride a horse and how to shoot a gun though.”

“So did you grow up there? Or...?”

He shrugged, timid. “Naw, I grew up here in Paris, don’t really have a rhyme or reason why I am the way I am. Just comes naturally, I reckon. In my blood or somethin’. Don’t know fer shore.” He swung his legs, swaying the broom slightly. “My old man, he doesn’t like it much. Thinks I’m actin’.”

“Well, if you say you’re a Cowboy, you’re a Cowboy. Ain’t nothin’—er, there’s nothing wrong with that.”

He smiled at her, leaning in slightly. “Say My Lady, you know any love spells?”

“Why?”

“Hmm, just wonderin’.”

“Well, I haven’t memorized any, but I know there’s some in my book.”

“You know, I was thinkin’ ‘bout it...maybe it’s none my business. But, on the first day of school, Chloe said you were pretending to be a witch and even Niño—“

“Nino.”

“That’s what I said. Even he said you were just good at slight of hand. Why don’t they believe you?”

Marinette sighed, allowing the broom to coast over the Seine. They floated just above the water, which was still in the evening.

“I’ve gotten better as I’ve gotten older. But when I first learned a spell, I was so excited to show my classmates. It was really easy, just snap your fingers to get a little flame.” She snapped, demonstrating the spell.

Adrien’s eyes lit up with excitement.

“When I got to school, I gathered everyone together, and when I went to perform...I couldn’t. Too many eyes. Chloe ridiculed me. While everyone else has let it go, she likes to torment me about it all the time. I think I encourage her by perpetuating witch stereotypes. No matter how hard I try, I can’t perform magic around our classmates.”

“Oh golly gee, My heart breaks for you darlin. But it’s mighty brave of you to continue studying even though you were hurt so badly. Takes real guts, honest!”

“Thanks Adrien. I think you’re pretty brave too.”

“Why ya know, I bet I could help you out yer magical constipation!”

“How do you figure?”

“I’m thinking perhaps if we plan it right, and I’m there with you, you might get the confidence you need to wow them school kids! What sorts’a spells you know?”

She laughed. “Oh my gosh! I don’t know any good spells that would work! I know plenty of slight of hand tricks, minor hexes and illusions. But my show stoppers are all dangerous, like lightning bolts or fireballs.”

“Whyja learn stuff like that?”

“I thought it would be fun?” She said, nervously.

“Well, I’m sure we could come up with something. Don’t you worry, Darlin.”

“Well, thank you Adrien! I think that’s—“

She was interrupted, however, by a figure in black, rocketing across the ground. It moved faster than any vehicle should in the city.

“What in tarnation is that?!”

#much obliged #cowboy adrien #witch marinette

21 notes · View notes

boarix · 5 years ago

Text

Wraith in the Ruins: A Fallout 4 Story Part XVIII

Lighthouse

Trigger warnings: canon violence/language/gun, alcohol and drug use. Mature/sexual content - not explicit

Bloody Mess warning!

Please Enjoy!

Marie stood in the doorway, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. After about five minutes or so, she began tapping her foot in a staccato of irritation, “Did you want something or not? I’m very busy.”

Atom’s Assassin didn’t bother to turn around, “You are massing in Crater House, yes? We had agreed to wait.”

“My followers are impatient.” Despite not having been invited, she briskly walked around the chair the ghoul was lounging in to fold her arms and glare down at them, “This is taking too long. You are taking too long.”

Infamy’s leader was toying with their favorite weapon: a combat knife with a serrated, wicked-looking blade. Flipping it around the back of their hand and thumb with remarkable speed, they locked eyes with her, “You have no followers. Those with you follow Atom. Atom rewards patience.”

“Yes, well, while you sit here and patiently wait for this church’s roof to cave in, my followers and I will take back Kingsport Lighthouse!”

“You will be annihilated.”

Anger caused her to react without thinking; swatting the knife out of the ghoul’s hand and sending it spinning to a dark corner. In the space of a heartbeat the ghoul was out of their chair and lashing out with a backhand that sent the young woman crashing to the floor.

“You will bring those Children back to this church. You will all wait.”

As the glowing one moved to retrieve the knife, their radiance illuminated the room which revealed a large number of ferals, standing perfectly still, in arcing rows around the chair. Marie hadn’t even noticed their presence and felt the whole thing to be incredibly unnerving.

“But, what are we waiting for?!”

Turning, the ghoul went to the doorway just as an Infamy runner stepped through. There was a brief, whispered conversation before Atom’s Assassin turned back to her.

Cackling madly, they brandished their knife and spun in a circle, “They are here! Ahahaa!”

“Who? What’s happening?!”

The mad ghoul roughly pulled Marie to her feet and shook her, “It won’t be long now; the Pretender’s doom has arrived in the Commonwealth!”

“Did you make those pants?”

Shaun looked up from the workbench, “Yeah why, are they weird?”

“No, I like the color. Green is a good color on you. They look like they fit nice…”

He favored her with an indulgent smile, “Grandma, do you want me to make you a pair of green slacks?”

“Oh ho, not pants but slacks?” Her smile broadened when he rolled his eyes, “Yes, please make me a pair of slacks.”

“Are you coming back home after ghoul training?”

Wraith didn’t answer at first. She wanted to but since she had no idea how long learning to influence feral ghouls would take, let alone if she was even capable, she didn’t want to make promises she couldn’t keep.

She had intended the past week to be a vacation of sorts, but found herself elbow deep in reports and meetings instead. In addition to the seemingly random attacks, Infamy had taken to raising radiation levels in some of the southern settlements.

She also spent as much time as possible with Danse; helping Curie with his rehab and his occasional skips in memory. Now, with it being her last day, she was spending it with Shaun and found that she really didn’t want to leave at all.

“Oh, honey… I don’t know… There are too many variables to give you a definitive answer.”

“You’re using lawyer-general speak again,” He stuck his lip out and nodded, “I could go with you…”

“No. Absolutely not.”

His caramel complexion couldn’t hide his flush, “Why not. Is it because I couldn’t defeat Infamy? Do you think that I’ll be a burden?” He had balled up his fists, “I know I screwed that up but…”

“I don’t find you to be burdensome. You didn’t screw anything up! I need you to stay and help Mac…”

“That’s brahmin shit! That’s what YOU TELL LITTLE KIDS WHEN THEY WANT TO HELP YOU BUT YOU THINK THEY’LL BE IN THE WAY!” When Wraith didn’t cut him off and start yelling back he lost some of his momentum, “I’m sorry I let Danse and RJ get hurt!”

“You three were a team. Not one of you failed to fulfill… ugh… Okay, no more lawyer speak.” She got up from her stool, “I can’t lose you. And it’s not just you! I’m keeping Mac, Danse… I’m being completely selfish, I know… If I can keep all you strong fighters together, you will be able to keep each other safe, when I’m… gone.”

“Are you going to let the Valentines leave?” Her honesty had taken the wind out of his anger, “I’m surprised you let Grandpa John go.”

She furrowed her brow, “For the last time; I’m not a tyrant! I’m not going to hold innocent people against their will! I want them to stay and I already made my case, plus Curie wants to study Ellie’s pregnancy… wait… Grandpa John?”

Shaun’s blush deepened, “Cause you two… you know… he asked you to marry him. What the heck am I supposed to call him?!”

“I’m sorry, you’re right. Are you going to start calling Mac ‘grandpa’ too?”

“No, that’s weird.”

She nodded after a couple seconds of rapid blinking, “Okay, I guess that tracks.”

MacCready opened the door and stuck his head through, “Hey guys, Danse, Curie, the Valentines and dinner are here so stop yelling at each other and come in the house.”

“Technically speaking, RJ, the workshop is still in the house.”

“Who’s ‘Dinner’, they sound nice.”

MacCready sighed and slumped his shoulders, “Hilarious. You two done?”

“Did Dinner walk here on their own?”

Shaun started giggling, “How many legs do they have?”

Dinner was very nice and the conversation pleasant. Although space was limited the group squeezed together amicably and Valentine, a wonderful story teller, was regaling them with child-friendly versions of the behemoth and alien artifact cases.

“… climb the whole way up with me tied to her back! Of course, I told her she’d do just as well building castles in the air…”

“Mr. Colonel Garvey Minuteman has a castle! He said that grandma Wraith fought a monster there this one time and it was really big!” Duncan threw his arms out wide, knocking his cup off the table. His father neatly caught it however, and not even a drop was spilt. His excitement turned to dismay at the near loss of juice and he hung his head, “Sorry, daddy.”

MacCready tousled his hair, “Don’t be sad, Dunk. Spilt drink never hurt anybody; just work on your aim.”

“I still say I could’ve pulled us up and out with no problem.”

Valentine smiled and shook his head at her, “You are aware of a distinction between could and should.”

Wraith stuck her lip out in much the same way Shaun had, “You never know unless you try.”

“I tried cheese today!” Duncan’s confidence had returned.

Danse grimaced, “You’re a braver man than I. The smell reminds me of the training mats in the Citadel…”

As Valentine finished his tale, with he the unfortunate ending of Imogene, Curie leaned slightly forward and her eyes tracked his mouth with a hungry intensity.

“And this alien artifact, where has it gone?”

“Well… I’m not sure, actually. I was in and out at the time.”

“It’s put away.” There was a warning edge to Wraith’s voice. “I’d have destroyed it if I could.”

“Oh, but why? Surly this item would be of great use, not only to the scientific community, but to the studies of medical…”

“No!” Wraith gentled her tone, “No, Baby Bird. It is evil and cannot be used for anything but.”

“It’s like the One Ring!” Shaun deliberately directed his comment at MacCready.

“Oh, jeez. Not you too! I’m surrounded by nerds.”

“What’s this now?”

“Oh, Danse, it’s from this great book grandpa John let me borrow. You hav’ta read it!”

MacCready smirked, “Yeah, just when you’re finally starting to feel better…”

Shaun took the snide remark rather personally and so his retort had real venom, “You’re face looks better, now that you shaved that beard!”

Danse’s eyes snapped up to lock with the sniper’s, “You grew a beard? A full beard?”

“Yeah, so what?” His shrug was meant to be nonchalant.

Danse expression was unreadable, “Nothing, just surprised.”

“You’re surprised that I grew a beard? I’ve had a goatee…”

“Surprised that you’re physically capable of growing more than those rat whiskers you normally sport.”

Normally such banter would quickly degrade into actual bickering, but after giving Danse the One Finger Salute, (making sure Duncan didn’t see) MacCready laughed and flashed a bright smile.

After dinner, the group settled in to play cards: the children, Danse and MacCready playing Go Fish while the other four grown-ups indulged in Euchre. After a couple of hands, Wraith began making a conscious effort to memorize the evening. She planned on using bright-spot memories like these to battle against future bouts of her berserker rage.

Acknowledging her addiction to Buffout was only a small step in combating her tendency to slide toward madness. She had publicly denied, on more than one occasion, that she was a tyrannical monster but didn’t want to fall into the trap of declaring yourself a savor to the people whose house you’re burning.

“I’m sorry I scolded you, Curie.” Wraith had followed Danse and Curie out the door and across the yard. Watching Danse use a cane made her feel all the more guilty over the decision to keep the artifact’s location secret. “I shouldn’t have spoken to you like you’re a kid…”

“Ah, Madame, please don’t worry about it. Forgive me for saying so, but I feel you have been treating me as your daughter since almost the first time we met.” She arched her arms out to mimic her Miss. Nanny silhouette, “Even when I was just a metal egg.”

Wraith chuckled, “Well I guess it’s reassuring to know that I have at least some maternal instinct.” She took her by the shoulders, “I know why you would want to study it. I don’t blame you but… it has a way of… pulling at you. Shaun’s analogy wasn’t that far off.”

“I… understand. I was only, so excited! Here was a thing from another world! A… a science beyond the capabilities of the one I am only barely familiar with. One with an almost unlimited capacity for healing…” She looked at the clinic door that Danse had just struggled to open, “He gets lost in his memories and he’s still, so very thin…”

“Time, Baby Bird. With you caring for him, maybe not as much as you think.”

“It was a group effort that saved mon amour. Even Monsieur MacCready, with his Beard of Solidarity…”

“His… what?”

She laughed, “Danse had told me a story of how, when a member of your unit is badly damaged, so that they cannot shave their chins, the rest of the group stops this as well. This is done regardless of the team member’s gender, of course. Those who cannot grow a beard will sometimes shave their head… the focus on hair in this instance is rather fascinating, don’t you agree?”

Wraith felt a surge of pride in MacCready, “He takes such care with his goatee. They bicker so much I had no idea that they were that close.”

“Perhaps it is like siblings, oui?”

“How did Mac find out about the hair thing?”

“He came to me and asked what he could do. For some reason telling him the story that mon ours told me made me feel a little better. And when I saw that he was honoring him this way, why, I felt… I’m not sure how to put it…” Curie’s face lit up, “Robert is a protector, and this act was very much him shielding and bolstering my resolve. Which, is what I believe, it is meant to do.”

She could feel the heat of climax pooling below her navel even as MacCready began to shake beneath her. Bearing down as he thrust upward, the breath was driven from them both each time their hips came together.

Their lovemaking would appear a desperate, clinging act; exciting and needful as their first. Yet, it was practiced and refined with each moving in concert toward and against the other. They fought to hush their moans and gasps of pleasure, as to not disturb the sleeping household.

The realization that they might finish together heightened the anticipation of release and Wraith couldn’t stop her cry of passion at the mere thought.

Pushing himself to an almost seated position, MacCready attempted to silence both their cries by kissing her fiercely. Head swimming, he came almost as soon as he felt her muscles contract, somehow maintaining enough control to last until she finished.

Collapsing back to the bed, he kept his arms around her, holding her to him to feel that wonderful sensation of oneness that was almost better than the orgasm.

Almost.

“Shit, Wraith… That was amazing!”

“Ah ah ah, potty mouth. You’re lucky Hancock isn’t here to punish you. Not that you’d mind.”

“Not that I’d mind.”

Wraith nuzzled his chest, “I wish the three of us could be together more. Not that I mind havin’ a bedfellow at every port…”

“Every port?!” He raised his pitch in mock indignity, “Are you sleeping with jabber-jaw?”

She pushed him playfully as she rolled away, “That’s not nice!”

“Ha ha! Doesn’t change to fact that you knew who I meant!”

“I’m gonna tell Piper on you!”

After a bit of cleanup, a check on the children and MacCready settled in her arms, Wraith let her perpetual exhaustion take hold and settled into a light doze. She entered a dream almost immediately.

The cave was dark and full of the echoes of dripping water. At first random and natural, it swiftly changed to a rhythmic percussion.

Voices. No longer was it mere water. A multitude of vaguely familiar voices, chanting her name.

“Wraith! Wraith! Wraith! WRAITH!”

Then, like smaller streams coming together to form a great river, the cries became a defining torrent.

“WRAITH! WRAITH!”

It was cold! And the voices swirled around and through her. She desperately tried to ask them what they needed but when she opened her mouth, their chant poured forth.

“WRAITH! WRAITH! WRAITH!”

Then, with a flash of light, the voices ceased. The darkness returned, this time heavy and oppressively hot. There was a sizzling noise, like a burning fuse. The outline of a figure materialized from the inky black.

“Pippa…” Deacon lifted his face; glasses gone, his eyes shone, as if from within, “Pippa please…”

“Yes! Tell me! Anything. I’ll give you anything! Please, tell me what…”

“Please…” The light from his eyes spread until his whole body glowed.

“DEACON!”

“Please, don’t; you’re killing us.”

The following morning dawned grey and the clouds in the east were leaden with the promise of rain. Wraith didn’t want announce her departure to anyone who may be watching and so planned to use the settlements back, secret door. She had extended a tunnel she found in the basement of one of the original houses, so that it led further into the hills north of Sanctuary. Doubling as Bear’s tannery, it was rarely used by the community due to the odor and its true purpose known by only a select few. After saying her final goodbyes in the kitchen, Wraith, dressed as a male settler, left by the office door and walked briskly to the last northern house on the left.

“I still say this is crazy,” Bear’s deep, rasping baritone rolled like thunder from a dark corner, “like something from Astoundingly Awesome Stories.”

“It’s ‘Tales’, Bear. I thought you were just going to drop off my kit, whatcha need?”

“I never gave ya yer present. Catch!”

Wraith easily caught the object the large ghoul tossed to her. Turning it over in her hands, she gasped in appreciation of the artistry: using the pale hide of the albino deathclaw she had slain on her way to D.C, he had created a helmet in the likeness of her defeated foe. There were a pair of horns, beautifully intricate scales and a visor sporting a pair of faux eyes outlined in blackened steel.

“Oh, Bear! This is the coolest thing I think I’ve ever seen! It’s so light!”

“Light in weight but super heavy-duty, thanks in part to the ballistic weave. There’s some in the suit too.”

“You made a whole suit?!”

“Yeah, I wanna see you in it before you leave. I couldn’t do a final fitting cause it was a surprise, so haveta make sure it fits ya.”

It fit perfectly, of course. It came in four pieces: a vest, jacket, pants and over-the-knee boots. And it wore exactly like her modified wet suit; allowing her a range of motion as if she wore nothing at all.

“I suppose it’s fine.” Bear’s overly critical eye scanned her from toe to crown, “Ya lost weight again.”

“Tch. It’s your imagination. This is so awesome!”

“One more thing,” Not wanting to risk injury, he passed her a wrapped bundle. “I found this in the armory. It was a little bit beat up so I replaced the fittings for ya.”

When Wraith returned the stolen egg to a distraught deathclaw parent, she had found a gauntlet festooned with the sharp, blade-like claws of a deathclaw near the nest. Picking it up, she considered it a consolation prize, but had never once used it. Now, she slipped it over her hand and struck a dramatic fighting pose.

“How do I look?”

“Not too shabby, if I do say so myself. Start calling you General Deathclaw.”

“Ugh, don’t I have enough nicknames?” She embraced him carefully.

“There’s throwing knife pockets throughout, even in the boots, a belt with clips and compartments for extra storage and the jacket should fit over your shoulder holster… are you wearing it out?”

“I sure am! This is perfect; I’ve used Phil the Settler too many times anyway. And if anyone should happen to see me, they’ll probably think I’m a raider boss.”

“Well, I’m happy if yer happy, Wolf.”

The midmorning rain beaded on the armor and rolled into the channels that Bear had strategically crafted; wicking the water away from her eyes and face. She had greatly lamented the loss of her original custom Marine helmet to the ruin of Gunner Plaza, but found that the range of peripheral vision in this new one to be far superior then even its replacement. With the horror of the previous night’s dream forgotten and delighted by the sense of freedom, she flew through the bush unimpeded by the weather and almost completely invisible to any of the Wasteland’s people or fauna.

Just as the warehouse and fence of Wicked Shipping came into view, she felt an odd prickling sensation and instinctively dodged to her left.

A trio of feral ghouls rose from the underbrush.

“Well, Zen time’s cancelled.” She crouched slightly and waited for them to rush her.

“Not to worry, General,” The echoing and otherworldly voice belonged to a glowing one. Dressed in the humble robes of the Children of Atom, he beckoned to her from the shop roof, “come along inside, sister. They surely will not harm their friend.”

Harkness yawned and waved at her by way of greeting. He was sitting in an office chair with his feet up on the desk of one of the former Flynn brothers. “Those are some fancy duds there, General Dragon-Lady.”

She removed the helm and wrinkled her nose at him, “Nice. You two just get here?”

“Nope.” Groaning, he stood, stretched and removed a pot of steaming water from a hotplate, “We headed out from Goodneighbor as soon as I got back. Sun called ferals to him the entire way; it was pretty surreal.” He waved a mug at her, “Tea?”

“Actually, yes, thanks.” She accepted the mug and idly played with the steeper. “You said he called to them?”

“Not very many and not out loud. He says that when you’re done, he will lead them to the Glowing Sea.”

“Like a Pied Piper, huh?”

“I actually think I know that reference.”

“As do I. And I approve.”

Sun of Atom swept into the room with a floating grace that left Wraith green with envy. Almost immediately the prickling sensation returned and she outwardly flinched away from the ghoul.

“Apologies, Mother’s Chosen One; I’ll turn down my intensity.” He smiled warmly at her, “It is extremely gratifying to learn that you are so receptive. Perhaps this training will go swiftly and we each can return to our chosen paths.”

She forced a smile of her own, “I’ll bank on your optimism, but please refrain from using that title,” The forced grin had started to make her cheek twitch, “if you must be formal, please call me General Wraith. Although, I’d prefer you refer to me as…”

“Wraith the Undying?” Harkness had a stole-the-last-cookie grin, “Or maybe, Death in the Shadow?”

Determined not to let him nettle her, she continued as if he hadn’t spoke, “as Wraith. Just ‘Wraith’ is perfect. How may I call you?”

“You may use ‘brother’ or ‘Sun’ as you are comfortable, sister Wraith.” He accepted a mug from Harkness, “Will you be leaving us, brother? I know you are resistant to rads, but it may yet be too dangerous for you to stay.”

“Oh no. I’m not going anywhere. I haven’t finished fixing the fencing and besides I’m going to stay and make sure things don’t get out of hand.”

The ghoul laughed, “I am well practiced, and I can assure you that no harm will come to your friend.”

He leveled a stern gaze at Wraith, “I’m not worried about you harming anyone, Sunny.”

She wanted to argue, but considering their past encounter, felt she couldn’t blame him. Her guilt must have made a clear mark on her face because Harkness’s softened almost immediately and he brought a hand up and rubbed the back of his head.

“I’m sorry. I’m really tired and it’s made me a grouch. Are you two going to start right away? I kind of wanted to watch.”

“I’m afraid there won’t be much to see until the fence is done. I’m holding them here for now but as soon as I let go they’ll either attack or wander off.”

“What about the glowing one in the warehouse?”

“She’s pushed me away every time I’ve asked her. She is very strong and I may be unable to hold her.”

“Was she here already?”

Harkness frowned and shook his head at her, “She came yesterday; just sort of appeared in the yard outside. We left the warehouse doors open and she went in by herself.”

“I believe she heard me and was curious. And now I am feeling that she’s waiting for something.”

Harkness washed his face with his hands, “That sounds really ominous.” Letting his hands fall to his sides, he shook his head to crack his neck, “I guess I’ll go finish up the fence.”

“It’s still raining…”

“The wet fence, then.”

Wraith frowned at his back, “How many ferals are out there?”

Sun crouched over a pack in the corner and began rummaging through it, “I managed to call twelve on the way here…”

“And Our Lady of Perpetual Radiance makes thirteen.” Harkness’s shoulders sagged as he stepped out into the drizzle.

“Lucky thirteen.”

Having found what he was looking for, the ghoul waved Wraith over to him, “We can use this to sit on…” He spread a woven, padded mat on the floor, not unlike a picnic blanket, “no sense in being uncomfortable, any more than we have to.” In one fluid movement, he descended to a seated, cross-legged position and motion for her to sit across from him.

Wraith set her jacket over the back of the chair and removed her boots before joining him. “It’s been a while since I’ve meditated. Over two hundred years, in fact.”

Probably something that would have helped me. I could teach Shaun and we could make mats!

“I think that you will find this to be a very similar practice.” He looked into her eyes, his omnipresent smile warm and disarming, “Why don’t we start with your overall impression of feral ghouls. What was your first reaction?”

She frowned, “Unfortunately the first ferals I came across were some of my neighbors from before… Ms. Rosa and… and her son. They rushed me and… well… I honestly didn’t know it was them until after. Her dress… I recognized her dress.”

“I’m sure, at the time, you had no alternative.”

“I didn’t understand what they were at first. And now; as much as folks think they’re mindless… sometimes I can see a glimmer… when they pick up a teddy or even a pencil, and put it in their pocket,” She lifted her hand and closing it, made a fist around an imagined object, “I can see the flash of memory, of a time when they were people, and not monsters.”

Sun’s smile faltered but he held up his hands when, assuming she had offended him, Wraith attempted to apologize.

“It is alright, sister. I myself am no longer human and because of my glow, am considered to be a monster, even amongst non-feral ghouls. But, having witnessed horrific calamities that those still yet named human have done; I count myself instead as, not a monster, but closer to Atom. And there is a domain that I happily occupy, no matter what others deem me as.”

“If you and Infamy are closer to Atom and doing his bidding, then I say you are well within the realm of monsterhood.”

His smile went out like a candle, “I cannot abide Infamy’s tactics. Their use of ferals as fodder is unforgivable! I would rather see them mercifully slain than used as soulless killing machines.” He steepled his fingers, “When Brother Harkness came to me for help and described who you were, I took it as a sign. I came without hesitation because I knew that it was His will.”

“I can admire your conviction to your beliefs, but they aren’t mine. I’m having a real hard time with this whole plan. I question the idea of assuming the identity of a religious figure. No matter what good I might do, it’s still a lie.”

“I’m not here to convert you. But, I know that you are part of Atom’s plan.” His smile had returned, “Ask me anything. I embrace questioning my faith. After all, what credibility would it maintain if it couldn’t stand up to scrutiny?”

She narrowed her eyes, “Give me one truth.” She leaned away and folded her arms, “Let’s start there.”

“I too have traveled to the Sacred Spring, drank from its waters, seen visions provided by the Mother. Among some that were terrifying I was struck by a singular image,” He abruptly stood up and went to his pack. “I made a sketch as soon as I was able to hold a pencil.” He handed her a piece of paper as he sat down, “The Mother spoke to me; she named them ‘Harbinger’.”

The crude drawing was of an upright, humanoid deathclaw.

“The Mother showed me you.”

“Hmm. That… does look a little like my armor.” She wrestled with the fact that she had just received her gift that morning and no one apart from Bear had seen her in it.

“I left the Capital Ruins because Harkness is a good, trustworthy friend. I had a suspicion of your significance but wasn’t sure until I saw you today. You and the Harbinger are one and the same. I came here to help him, but it has been revealed that I am meant to help you!”

“Okay, Sun. I will agree that you came here with good intentions. And whether or not that,” She tapped the drawing gently, “is me, shall remain to be seen.”

“It is a place to start.” He returned his sketch to his pack and returned himself to the mat. “When you are ready, I’m going to reach out to you, and I want you to describe how it feels.”

Telling herself not to flinch, Wraith closed her eyes and nodded, “A little like a static charge; doesn’t hurt but it feels a little… zappy.”

“Do you feel any impressions? See any images?”

“Nope.”

“Very well. This time I want you to try and push back. I want you to imagine a wall or shield, blocking the zappy feeling. It may help you to think of it as an attack. Find where it is hitting you, and try to stop it.”

For several minutes the two sat across from each other, quietly waging war.

“We should stop for now.”

“Oh, thank god. I have to pee so bad…”

Sun tilted back his head and laughed, “Is that what it is? Your attention was very strong up until about fifteen minutes ago, ha!”

“You mean I’m actually doing something?”

“Certainly. Your light is very bright, even at rest. It is no wonder you’ve been able to ask them for help without any training.”

“My light?” She shifted her weight, uncomfortable but stubborn in her excitement for knowledge.

He laughed again, “Go to the latrine!”

On her way back, she spotted Harkness. At that moment he happened to pull his arms up over his head, stretching and yawning, affording her an opportunity to size him up and watch him move in the light of day.

He really is a big one. At least as big as Danse… he moves a little lighter though…

“You know, General Death in the Shadow, most people would get pretty excited, having someone as important as you, eye them up and down like that.”

“And what? You’re not most people?”

Jeez! He irks my very soul!

“I don’t see wanton eyes filled with lustful assessment. It’s not flattering; it’s scary.” He came to stand directly in front of her. Almost toe to toe, “I see you deciding how best to kill me.” He folded his large arms and glared down at her, “How did you put it? Ah, yes; ‘rip me in half’.”

“Ouch.” Reminding herself that he came a very long way to help and that she did in fact threaten to kill him, Wraith tried hard to be peaceable, “I truly apologize for both my actions and demeanor when we first met.”

He tilted his head to the side and squinted, “That’s it?”

“I’m sure that I would find ripping you in half to be… at least half again as difficult as I may have suggested.”

Letting his arms fall to his sides, his blue eyes widened before he erupted in bombastic laughter. Shaking his head, he patted her none-to-gently on the bicep, “Harley’s right; you are the scariest person ever!”

He had no idea how much those words hurt her.

“Yeah, that’s me; the Commonwealth Monster.”

“Tell Sunny I’m just about done with the fence. I’ll come in and make food when I’m finished.”

Noting the grim line of Wraith’s mouth, Sun turned up his glow and literally gave her his brightest smile, “Harkness is a moody sort of person. He fusses at me a great deal as well.”

“It’s not all on him. I just wish… nope… We need to focus on the ‘here and now’.” She forced a smile of her own, “Tell me about lights.”

“The lights of the soul,” He settled back to the mat, “you may see them in your mind. You’ll call out to them, guide them and push them.”

“So, when you’re pushing at me, my light is where you… aim?”

“If that analogy helps you, then yes.”

“So if I can see your light, can I talk to you? Make you do stuff?” A horrible thought had crept through her mind, “Even if you don’t want to?”

“Ah, yes. This brings us to something very important. Wraith, you must always be the brightest light.” He set his hands together and briefly touched their tips to his scarred lips, “Most sentient beings carry a light inside them and most of those are strong enough to withstand any attempts at manipulation. It is possible to be overwhelmed however, so think of yourself as a lighthouse. Your radiance is a strong beacon of hope and you gather the smaller lights to you. You offer them peace, direction, safety and tranquility.” Separating his hands he waved them in a gesture of dismissal, “You do not ever go to them. Don’t follow the lights!”

“I’m sorry, but why? I know that they aren’t just…”

“Infamy and I are not the only Children who have herded feral ghouls.” Sun’s eyes filled with pain and sorrow, “Some of the other parishioners started to call us The Necromancers.” His smile was sad, “I’ll admit, I thought it was very cool and along with our friends, I began to act like… well, rather high and mighty. Some of us, rather than simply move ferals to more convenient and safe locations, started aiming our small collections at wastelanders who might have offered us some slight.” Now his eyes filled with guilt, “It went too far, of course. People died; people who didn’t deserve that level of admonishment.”

“So, the Necromancers became infamous… then Infamy?”

“Yes. At this point I was still a member, but I was having problems reconciling the deaths… and I wasn’t the only one.” He leaned toward her, “There was a power struggle within the group; those who wanted to return to The Necromancers and those who chose Infamy. Each faction had a leader and when the two faced off, Atom’s Assassin came out on top. Multiple ferals were used in their attack, and once their opponent was lost in a sea of overwhelming lights, Infamy took hold of what little of their mind was left and bent them to their will.”

Brow furrowed, Wraith stuck out her lip, “Wait… and you… you all think I’ll somehow be able to…”

Leaning back, Sun waved his hands dismissively, “Oh, no. This isn’t a coup d’état; it should be sufficient for you to simply demonstrate your ability to herd fearls. We are seeking to establish credibility to the claim that you are Chosen and therefore not a pretender as Marie has claimed.”

Suddenly overwhelmed, Wraith surged to her feet and bolted for the door. At that moment Harkness was heading inside to prepare a meal and so the two nearly collided. Near tears, she muttered an apology as she ducked under his arm and twisted away.

She didn’t get very far. Just past the remains of the semi-trucks were the three feral ghouls she had seen that morning. She stopped and crouched, instinctively preparing for battle. They all but ignored her, continuing to pick unknown detritus from the grass and putting it their mouths. As she watched them she patted herself down, stopping when she realized what she was searching for.

“Need a cigarette?” Harkness, seeming to appear from midair, leaned against a truck cab and offered her a pack.

“No, thanks. I’m after something a little stronger.”

“Oh, yeah. Buffout, right?”

“Christ! Does everybody know?!”

Pushing himself away from the vehicle, he folded his arms and gave her a pitying smile, “Hancock didn’t tell me, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“Let me guess…”

“No, it wasn’t Harley either.” He watched as the ferals shuffled away toward the warehouse, “I figured it out on my own. When we met you acted so out of character from what I was expecting that I knew something had to be off. That and the ability to lift me off the ground with one hand…”

“It’s been getting steadily worse; every time I got scared, or even nervous, I’d pop a Buffout ‘just in case’.” It was easier to watch the ferals then meet his eye, “I’d take one and I’d calm down because then I was strong enough to handle what was coming. The times that I’ve lost control… I didn’t take it because I wanted to… no matter who they are or what they’ve done the people I’ve killed are, well, people. When I go berserk there is a good chance I won’t remember the little details of the murders I’m committing. Curie has warned me that it was all psychosomatic; I thought I was controlling myself with the chem when it was actually all in my head.”

“Let’s fight.”

“I don’t wanna fight with both myself and you.”

“No, I mean spar.” He widened his stance, bent his knees slightly and raised his fists, “Harley says you used martial arts to help Cait overcome her lingering cravings. Maybe it’ll help you too.”

“That’s not a bad idea, actually.”

Plus, I might get to sock you one - guilt free.

They spent the next few moments testing each other with quick jabs and minor kicks. Nothing connected as they each skillfully deflected the others probing attacks. Wraith found herself thoroughly enjoying the exchange and let herself relax and focus on the movements of her opponent.

He’s really quick! He may have Danse’s frame but he moves like Deacon. I wish the two of us could’ve done some exercises like this. Although, if it was anything like sparing with Hancock then other things would have… No, he never thought of me that way… What a thing to think about now!

Sensing her distraction and hoping to capitalize, Harley stepped in close and aimed a knee at her midsection. Dropping her hips to guard, she wrapped her arms around his torso and hefted him into the air while swinging him slightly forward. On the backswing she used his body’s momentum to pop him up and over her back and slam him to the ground.

“OOOFFFHA!” Utterly defeated he made the time-out signal with his hands and attempted to gain air into his lungs.

“Ooo! Gotcha good that time.” She hoped her smile wasn’t too obvious, “You let me know when you’re ready for round two.”

Wheezing, the large man took her offered hand and let her pull him to his feet, “No thanks! I don’t want to wrestle anymore today.”

She held on to his hand, “Thanks for this, really. I was freaking out and… you made me feel better.”

Laughing ruefully he placed his other hand atop hers and gave it a pat, “I’m glad you tossing me around made one of us feel better.”

Sun had come to look for Wraith and was confused by the juxtaposition of fighting and laughter, “Are the two of you… well?”

“She’s better and I’m going inside to cook because my ego and I need to prove that there is something I’m capable of being successful at.”

“The… fence looks… complete…”

“Thank you, Sunny. I can always count on you to be mildly complementary.” He lifted a cautionary finger, “Don’t let go of the ferals just yet, I want to make another circuit before you do.”

As the three of them headed back to the office, Wraith felt the now familiar sensation of a mental intrusion. Sun, who was slightly ahead of her, felt it as well and he stopped and turned toward the warehouse. The three feral ghouls had stopped feeding and were standing perfectly still; staring intently at the building that contained the feral glowing one.

“She’s calling us… she… ah, she’s lost interest.”

“Are you sure it’s a good idea to keep her in there? If she’s that powerful…”

“Not to worry, sister Wraith. I am quite proficient in my craft. Even if I cannot move her as I like; I’m confident I can keep her in a state of peacefulness.”

Wraith’s tone was grim, “And if that fails, I am confident in my proficiency of my craft.”

After they ate, (Sun more out of polite interest than necessity) Harkness asked the other two to clean while he made a final check of the fence, “I’m going to circumambulate one last time before you take off their mental leashes. It would be less than polite to let them wander off into someone’s tato plot.”

Wraith and Sun spent the remainder of the day cross-legged on the mat, quietly sparing until the sun made the western hills its grave.

Exhausted from the training, Wraith fell asleep almost as soon as she lay down for the night.

She was back in the cave.

“I have to find the source!”

The dripping water proved directionless; echoing through her ears and reverberating from the rough, pitted walls. She spun in a circle: searching, searching, searching… Drawn to the faint light cast by glowing fungus she moved as though floating. A faint flicker at the corner of her vision caused her to flinch and spin away.

“Pippa, you need to stop.”

Deacon phased in and out of focus, as if he was using a glitching Stealth-Boy, and no matter how she twisted and turned, she couldn’t see him but from the corner of her eye.

“Please stop or we’ll die.”

His voice came from directly behind her. She spun around; putting her back to the mushrooms to see him fully. His tear-streaked face was a pallid green from their illumination.

“Stop what?!” She tried to go to him but could no longer move, “Stop how?!”

As before his eyes began to glow, brighter and brighter it spread until his whole body shone. It created a strobe-like effect when combined with his flickering in and out of sight. Then, ever so slowly, he raised a hand. Clutched in his fist was a single glowing fungus and he offered it to her as if it were a rose.

“This one is yours.”

Wraith’s next three days followed a pattern: breakfast, meditative combat, lunch, meditative combat, sparing with Harkness, dinner, meditative combat then bedroll. Thankful that the cave dream didn’t manifest again, she got some much-needed sleep each night.

On the fourth day she had a breakthrough.

“HA!” Her forceful shout corresponded to a particularly successful mental push. The result of which knocked Atom’s Sun over and made Harkness jump out of his chair.

“What?! What’s happening?!”

Scooping the ghoul from the floor, Wraith spun them round, “Eeeeeeeee! That was awesome!”

“Please!” The glowing one somehow managed to look even more green, “I’m about to be sick!”

“I take this to mean that progress has been made.”

“Yes, very much so.” Grateful to have his feet touching the floor, he wobbled slightly but was smiling, “Congratulations, sister Wraith. Now we will work on refin…”

As if in response to their celebration, there came an incredible psionic pulse from the warehouse’s glowing resident. It was so powerful in fact, that Harkness turned along with the other two to stare toward the building next door.

“Whoa!” Wraith’s voice was hushed in awe, “Radiance just threw down the gauntlet.” She pointed toward the ceiling, “Let’s go check up on her.”

On one of her previous ghoul-problem checks, Wraith had created a makeshift bridge between the roofs of the two main buildings. Once the trio crossed over they quietly moved around the catwalk until they could see the feral glowing one.

And what a sight she was: bathed in light of her own making, Our Lady of Perpetual Radiance stood perfectly upright with her arms slightly raised and palms facing her hips. Sensing them, she turned and took several elegant steps in their direction. Her poise and grace called to mind an expert ballerina. Further, rather than the normal growths, welts and malformed lumps caused by ghoulification, she was adorned in glowing funguses of varying pastel hues. There was a large concentration trailing up her spine to encircle her scalp which made it look as if she had been crowned by luminescent jewels.

“She’s a queen.” Breathless, Wraith couldn’t take her eyes off her.

Tilting her chin slightly downward, Radiance gave the other woman an intensely scrutinizing look while sending out another powerful mental challenge.

“She’s here… for me…”

“Wraith!” Harkness stepped between them, “Hey! Snap out of it.”

“Sister Wraith, we should return…”

Nodding wordlessly she followed behind them in a haze.

The next 3 days passed with much the same routine. The difference being that after her sparing with Harkness, Sun would take her to the warehouse roof where they would alternate trying to connect with Radiance and the other feral ghouls.

This made Harkness very nervous and he made several comments to that effect. When asked “why” he couldn’t properly articulate his forbearance, “It’s dangerous. The other ferals… that is what you came here to learn but her… I don’t know. We didn’t bring her, she brought herself.”

On the ninth day, Wraith awoke with a start and leaped to her feet. She could hear voices, raised in anger, coming from outside. One of them was Marie’s. Quickly donning her new armor, she slipped out a window while activating a Stealth-Boy.

Once outside, the early dawn light shown over a grim scene: the bodies of several ghouls, both feral and clad in Infamy’s darkened Children’s robes, lay across the grass in between two of the semi-truck trailers. A few living members ringed a kneeling, and obviously injured Harkness while Marie held Sun of Atom at gunpoint. A glowing one, whom Wraith presumed to be Atom’s Assassin, sat on the top of one of the trailers, letting their feet swing in and out of the opening.

Marie’s voice was shrill, “How could you?! How dare you kill your own people?!”

“Tch. Don’t waste words on that foolish, old Necromancer.” Infamy’s leader had their dagger out and was playing with it in a way that was clearly meant to be menacing. Pitching forward, they did a perfect flip and landed lightly on their feet. Purposely bypassing Marie and her hostage, they held their blade under Harness’s chin, forcing his eyes up slightly to meet their own, “Where is the Pretender, hmm? Where is Death in the Shadow?”

“She’s no pretender, Infamy. I promise you; Wraith’s the real deal.”

Infamy was intrigued.

“Don’t listen to this… blasphemous lout! He himself aided Morningstar in infiltrating the Apostles of the Holy Light by acting as a member! He is no less an enemy than she is!”

Marie had taken to waving her pipe pistol around as if it was a visual aid. Distracted by her wrath, she was easily disarmed by Sun who, in turn, put her in a headlock with the muzzle at her temple.

“Oh! Unhand me you… bastard!”

Infamy was amused.

“Hear us out. Please, my… please.”

Arching a hairless brow, Atom’s Assassin sheathed their weapon and folded their arms, “I’m all ears. Oh, hahaha; that’s funny cause I haven’t any! Ha ha heeee!” They gave Sun a dismissive wave, “By all means, kill that obnoxious psychotic. Ha! We only need one in our party and I am more than sufficient! Hahaha!”

Instead, Sun released her and backed away with his hands in the air, “She’s barely more than a child.” He directed his emphatic smile at her, “You have your whole life in front of you. You can be anyone and do anything. You can stop this right now; by telling the truth!”

She spit in his face.

Wraith flinched. She was unwilling to act because she couldn’t figure an attack pattern that would guarantee the survival of her friends. At war with herself, her patient side was winning, but the berserker would not be silent.

In a gesture of good faith, Sun returned the pistol to Marie. Raising his hands he turned back to Infamy’s leader. “Wraith is by no means a false profit. In fact she makes no claims of prophecy herself. High Confessor Tektus proclaimed her Chosen because she, being granted the Mother of the Fog’s holy Icon, aided in the preservation of our sect in Far Harbor.” He placed his palms together as in prayer and brought his hands to the ruin of his nose. “I too have made the pilgrimage to the Sacred Spring. Atom has not yet granted me the clarity to fully understand the visions I received, but ultimately, I believe Wraith to be our friend and ally.”

“Lies!” Marie returned to waving her weapon, “She is the destroyer of Crater House! She has slain countless of our brothers and sisters! She is no friend; she is a heartless killer!”

Infamy fixed her with a withering glare, “Be quiet for now or I will silence you forever.” They set a finger to their lips and shushed her. Then bringing the digit away from their face they shook it back and forth in the air, “Ah ah ahhh, Sunny boy. I myself have heard the settlers speak of their leader as a ‘master over ghouls’ and they call her ‘priestess of Atom’ awayyyy up north. If she didn’t start this herself, as you claim, then she certainly didn’t stop it, as I know.” They put their hands on their hips and leaned toward their fellow glowing one, “Infamy doesn’t care much for those to garner fame at Atom’s expense!”

“She is no self-proclaimed priestess, and is prepared to denounce this publicly over Radio Freedom.” Sun smile was sly, “As for her ghoul mastery; we are prepared to give you a demonstration of her abilities… as a Necromancer.”

Marie, in an attempt to hybridize scoffing and laughter, ended up chocking and coughing instead.

Infamy was confused.

“How? Unless my mother was right and I’ve finally gone blind, she is no glowing one; feral or otherwise.” They folded their arms and turned to where Wraith was hiding, “Please, by all means, show me your power.”

Wraith deactivated her Stealth-Boy and walked out to them with her hands in the air, “I’d say you’re far from blind.”

Marie hissed.

“I don’t know how you put up with her.” She gave Harkness a searching look, “How bad are you?”

“I’m fixing to live.”

Atom’s Assassin closed the distance between them remarkably quickly, “Take off your helmet, if you would, General. I’d very much like to see your eyes as we speak.”

Wraith refused to flinch away from the heat as the ghoul placed their face less than an inch from her own. She couldn’t prevent the involuntary gasp of air however, and was once again amazed that a being capable of generating that much heat and light would do so with a complete lack of body odor.

“You’re defiant of Marie’s claim that you are a heretic of the Church of Atom? That these rumors of your prestige are in fact, the propaganda of others and not of your making or design? Do you have the ability to call and control feral ghouls? Did you lay waste to the settlement of Crater House and slay the Holy Guardian at Kingsport Lighthouse?”

The rapid-fire questions put Wraith back on her heels, “Yes.” She lifted her chin defiantly, “I didn’t know that Kingsport was a claimed site. Outside of the… guardian, there wasn’t anyone there when I scouted it for a settlement. I destroyed the war camp at Crater House due to repeated attacks of the established Minutemen settlement, and only after my attempts at diplomacy…”

“I care not for your reasons.” They leaned away and waved Sun over to them, “What exactly did you see on your pilgrimage?”

“A figure with a remarkable resemblance to General Wraith, named as ‘Harbinger’. I know not of what she proceeds.”

“All Atom’s knowledge is granted to the patiently devout.”

The now familiar sensation of a glowing one’s summoning buzzed in Wraith’s mind. Shortly, a quartet of feral ghouls shambled their way over to stand in a row in front of the group.

“Now, I shall release them…”

“Wait! She is but a novice…”

Infamy’s eyes blazed at the interruption, “Atom will protect her, if that is his will. That being said; you have five minutes or I’ll kill you all.” They clapped their hands, “Isn’t this fun?! Wheeeee!”

Marie snorted.

“You can do this, Wraith.” In pain, Harkness’s voice was strained and horse.

Almost immediately the ferals rushed her. This fostered suspicion that they had been ordered to attack rather than simply “let go”. She stayed ahead of them; happy to move them away from her friends.

During her training she had found that tapping into her berserker side had actually helped her when connecting to the ghouls.

Two sides of the same coin, it seems.

Donning her helmet and relaxing her mental self-restraint, she sent out a tentative greeting to her pursuers. As soon as she saw their lights she knew that these were reavers. Atom’s Assassin had deliberately chosen some of the most powerful of his arsenal to test her. Little did Infamy’s leader know that she had been practicing with a feral of Radiance’s caliber.

Come to think of it; why hasn’t she been throwing challenges at Infamy? Maybe I just piss her off…

As she wooed the ferals she felt what could only be an attack from Infamy. Distracted, she stumbled and was hit hard on the side of the head by one of the feral ghouls. Thankful for her armor, she spun away from the reaver unhurt.

Infamy’s attack made her angry, but she channeled it into an attack of her own and broke through to two of her assailants. These immediately rounded on their allies and pinned them to the ground.

Infamy was shocked.

“Well… well...” They snapped their fingers and the guards surrounding Harkness immediately broke away and retreated through the hole the group had cut in the fence. “It seems as though Atom has seen fit to grant you special abilities. We will be returning to the Capital Wasteland now. Once there, I shall meditate long and hard on this Holy Lesson…”

“You CANNOT BE FUCKING SERIOUS!” Spittle flew from Marie’s mouth as she shrieked, “YOU PROMISED ME YOU WOULD DESTROY HER! SHE IS A MONSTER! I WILL NOT LET HER GET AWAY WITH THIS…”

She shot Atom’s Sun, point blank, in the temple.

Infamy, Harkness and Wraith all ran to them but Wraith, already lost in her berserker’s rage, reached them first.

She ripped Marie in half.

At that exact moment the garage door of the warehouse burst open in a white-green blast of radiation. Surrounded in a nimbus of prismatic light, Our Lady of Perpetual Radiance seemed to float across the grass as she came to Wraith’s side. The two of them together was an image out of the darkest of nightmares: Wraith in her blood and intestine draped deathclaw armor and the apparent queen of all radioactive monsters.

The others could only stand back and watch as Radiance reached forward and grabbed Wraith’s head in her scorched and twisted fingers. She pulled her forward until their foreheads met, then spun away toward the south east. Not even slowing down when she met the fence; she simply melted her way through and continued on at a swift pace. All the remaining feral ghouls followed her through.

And Wraith followed with them.

Thank you so much for reading! Like what you’ve read? Looking for more? Please see my master link post in my tags under Wraith in the Ruins. As always, my ask is open for questions/comment/concerns. More to come! =^..^=

#wraith in the ruins #fallout 4 companions #fallout fan fiction #fallout fanfic #fallout companions #rj maccready #maccready #nick valentine #fallout 3 harkness #fallout curie #danse

7 notes · View notes