#and as someone with two older brothers I can confirm the accuracy of this

[phoenixinthefiles]

Dick telling Jason “if you don’t move your finger I’m gonna break it”

And “get in the car or I’ll tie you up and throw you in the trunk”

Also “next time I trip over your shoes, I’m burning them.”

And all Jason hears from his siblings, when he comes back from being dead, is how patient Dick is

[slugtranslation-hypmic]

Idk if someone has asked this before, but did DoD 13 technically confirm that ramuda is 4-5 years old?

I believe you're referring to DoD chapter 12, and not exactly. Spoilers under a cut

DoD chapter 12 shows the moment when Ramuda is first released from the test tube he was created in, but I wouldn't say that makes him 4 - 5 years old for two reasons.

To begin with, we don't know exactly when this chapter takes place. Rei and Ichijiku appear in this chapter and don't look noticeably younger, so it's presumably only a few years before canon begins with the first battle season. The only concrete mention of time is a flashforward of "half a year" (which isn't being used as an exact measurement of six months) when Ramuda goes for a walk in Shibuya and happens to pass Gentarou and Dice. Gentarou (if that even is Gentarou and not his brother) looks the same as he does in main canon and Dice, while drawn in a different outfit and hair style, still looks like a teenager/young adult. There aren't any other clues on Ramuda's person about what time this may be apart from the fact that he is not wearing his TDD outfit yet, meaning this is before the H Age. How far before the H Age is it? Couldn't tell you. Combined with the fact that we don't know the date for where canon's at right now - we haven't had a date since the first DRB, and we don't know how much time has passed between first and second DRB - there's really no way of knowing how long it's been since Ramuda was released from the test tube. Probably no more than six years ago but hell, this is Hypmic. They never work out the dates with any exact accuracy. It could have been forty-five years ago for all I know.

The second reason is more of a philosophical one. It's easy to say how old a naturally born person is, but Ramuda is a clone born from a test tube. Labeling his age based on when that birth happened is a pointless exercise, because he is clearly depicted being born in an adult's body and with a sizeable portion of an adult's skills and knowledge. He is able to walk, talk, smoke a cigarette, and use the Internet to search up and understand scientific articles within (presumably) a short period of time following his birth, which even the most precocious baby is unable to manage. So, he's clearly not a child. But is using the test tube birth as the starting point for counting Ramuda's age even a good measure of accuracy? His genetic material should be much older than that. Sure, you could argue that the specific set of cells he has when he's born are completely new, and so the earlier genetic material can be ignored, but by that argument, every time the cells in a naturally created human body replace themselves, we should start the clock over and count that as a new person. So that doesn't make for a great way to determine it either. We could ignore biology and focus purely on when his consciousness forms, but Ramuda himself says in the same chapter that he isn't sure if his consciousness - his sense of self - is totally unique to him or is also from the older "self" that was the source of his genetic material. So wouldn't that make him as old as the source, however old they are?

All in all, it's simplest to consider him as his canon age of 24. He most resembles a 24-year-old mentally and physically, so I consider it the best metric for viewing him.

[americancowgirl19]

Initials

Summary: Bucky and Steve finds their third soulmate in Wanda’s sister. Only problem is that she’s supposed to be dead, not Hydra’s new prized possession.

Warnings: fluff, angst, violence, slight gory details,

Reader: Female Enhanced Reader

Pairings: Stucky x Reader

Word Count: 2,845

A/n: This is a soulmate one shot where your soulmates initials are imprinted on the insides of your wrists.... Might do a part two, not sure yet...

Masterlist

“We’ve got a new threat,” Maria says, entering the conference room. She tosses a thin file onto the table. The Avengers sitting at the table look at the file before Steve reaches for it. The only contents within the folder is a blurry picture and a list of confirmed kills.

“This is all we know?” Steve questions, his eyes flickering up to Maria. 

“That and this,” She says, motioning toward the screen. A moment later a grainy video plays. They observe the feminine figure completely take down a building of armed agents single handedly.

“Wait...” Wanda whispers, shifting to the edge of her seat. Maria replays the videos while others glance towards the her. “I know her,”

“Care to share with the class?” Tony questions. Wanda doesn’t respond right away, simply looks at the screen with misty eyes.

“Wanda, if you know who she is, we need to know,” Natasha explains lightly. Wanda blinks away the tears and clears her throat.

“She’s my sister,” She responds in a quiet voice.

“Excuse me, did you say sister?” Tony asks. “How many of you are there?” Everyone ignores him.

“Her names Y/n,” Wanda begins to explain. “She’s my older sister, she looked after Pietro and I when our parents were killed,”

“What happened to her?” Steve questions, while Bucky glances at his wrist wondering if his partner has the same feeling in his chest.

“She died,” Wanda says, glancing toward him. “Hydra approached the three of us about the experiments. They made all these promises and while my brother and I were quick to agree Y/n was more hesitant. Pietro and I wouldn’t listen to her concerns, we made it clear we were going to continue with Hydra with or without her,” Wanda admits regrettably. “We weren’t the only ones to be experimented on but Pietro and I were the only ones to survive,”

“And your sister?” Natasha questions.

“We were told she had died,” Wanda says. “Obviously they lied to us. They must have moved her to a different facility,”

“Do you have any idea of what she can do?” Steve asks.

“Before we were told she died she could heal quickly. When I say heal, I mean you could cut her arm off and a new one would grow back,” Wanda explains.

“Must be nice,” Bucky mutters. Steve continues to stare at Wanda but rests a hand on Buck’s thigh.

“It’s been years since then, I doubt that is all she can do now,” Wanda warns them. “I also know that she never wanted any of this. The only reason why she agreed was to try and keep the three of us together. Whatever she’s done, it’s not of her own free will,”

“We’ll find her and try to bring her in,” Steve says.

“We have experience with forced Hydra assets,” Bucky mentions. Wanda glances toward him. “We’ll help her,” He assures knowing Wanda’s worry about her sister getting hurt. She sends him a small smile.

Finding Y/n and bringing her in sounded much easier than it ended up being. Wanda had been right, advanced healing wasn’t the only ability she possessed. 

“Hey, guys,” Natasha breathes, through the coms. It had taken a few month to figure out how to find Y/n and now the team is trying to fight her in the middle of the woods. Trying. “You sense something familiar in her abilities?”

Once Natasha had asked the question, everything clicked. Hydra had found a way to replicate any ability the Avenger’s had and give it to Y/n. She had Thor’s lightening, Clint’s wicked accuracy, Natasha’s skill in combat, Bucky and Steve’s strength, Wanda’s magic, and even Pietro’s speed. None of them knew if she had the ability to turn into a Hulk and honestly didn’t want to find out. They had enough to deal with without having to add the Hulk to the equation.

“How are we going to stop her?” Clint groans, slowly pushing himself back on his feet. “She’s going to tear us apart one by one if we don’t figure something out,” He comments looking around for a silver streak.

“Steve,” Bucky mutters, standing back to back with his partner. “Maybe we could get through to her,”

“We don’t know if we’re right,” Steve replies.

“We’re right,” Bucky states, confidently.

“Even if we are we can’t get close enough to touch her,” Steve mentions, his head snapping to the side as Tony falls out of the sky and to the ground. Luckily it wasn’t a far fall. By the time Steve and Bucky got to him, Y/n was nowhere in sight.

“I know this chick is Wanda’s sister but I really don’t like her,” Tony groans as F.R.I.D.A.Y. gives him a run down on everything that’s damaged with his suit.

“I got an idea,” Bucky says, sharing a look with Steve.

“Whatever it is, hurry up,” Natasha whines, after being throne violently into Clint. “She’s play with us right now, sooner or later she’s going to go in for the kill,”

“Wanda, what’s your location?” Bucky asks.

“Half a mile to your right,” Wanda responds. Bucky spots her.

“Can you stop her?” Bucky asks. “Hold her in place long enough for Steve and I to get to her?”

“It will not be easy,” Wanda warns.

“Can you do it?” Steve snips, a bit. Wanda looks conflicted but slowly nods. “Then do it,” He orders.

“We have to get her to Wanda,” Bucky says.

“We’ll start luring her to her,” Clint grumbles, nocking another arrow. Within a couple of minutes, Y/n speeds past Wanda before forced to stop. Wanda grinds her teeth as she holds Y/n in place.

“I can’t hold her for long,” Wanda warns frantically. Bucky and Steve both race towards her. When they’re close enough, each of them grabs a wrist. A tingling feels waves through both of their bodies as their souls recognize their mate.

The sensation of Bucky and Steve initiating the bond with her along with the extensive use of her abilities causes Y/n to pass out in Bucky’s arms. The super soldier easily scoops her into his arms and holds her close.

“Couldn’t have done that earlier?” Clint breathes, pressing his hand against his side.

“Let’s get back to the jet,” Steve orders.

“We just going to ignore the fact that she’s your mate?” Tony asks.

“Not now,” Bucky barks. Tony raises his hands and follows them onto the jet.

“Bruce will be waiting to check on her,” Natasha tells them. The two soldiers nod before taking a seat. Bucky refuses to let her go and places her feet on Steve’s lap.

“I thought she was dead,” Wanda whispers, staring at her sister. “Yet all this time she’s been through god knows what with Hydra,”

“Well, she’s here now,” Steve tries to comfort her. “She’s safe,” Bucky rests his head atop of her head. He buries the anger he feels towards Hydra at what they’ve done to her. “She’s safe,” Steve repeats, this time staring at his boyfriend. Bucky gives him a small smile.

When they landed Bruce took her to medical and checked on her. He took blood samples and scanned her body. The entire time Wanda, Steve and Bucky hovered.

Bruce tried to explain what was going on with her cells but they didn’t exactly understand what he was saying. All that mattered is that she’s safe and healthy.

It took an additional two days before she finally began to wake up. At this point only Steve and Bucky sat by her bed. Wanda had gone off to get them food.

Almost immediately Y/n began to panic not recognizing her surroundings. Steve and Bucky quickly calmed her down with a simple touch and soft words. While it helped calm her movement it was obvious she was still on high alert.

Now that she’s awake, Bruce was able to do more tests. However, the moment he entered Y/n reacted protectively of not only herself but of her mates. Her powers lashed out and successfully knocked the doctor out before Steve and Bucky were able to explain that Bruce just wanted to help and that he wasn’t going to hurt any of them.

When Bruce woke up, Y/n was still weary of him but didn’t attack again. She trusted her mates and only relaxed when the tests were done and he left. 

“Where are we?” She whispers.

“New York,” Steve explains. “The Avenger’s tower,” She winces at the word ‘Avenger’.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Bucky asks, hesitantly. She doesn’t answer for a few minutes.

“They wanted a weapon to defeat the Avengers,” She explains. “Someone strong enough to kill all of you,”

“You could have easily completed that mission, why didn’t you?” Steve asks. Y/n glances at him. The conflict is clear in her eyes.

“I don’t like killing,” She whispers. “I try to stop myself but I can’t do it all the time,” Bucky instantly picks up on the fact that Hydra had instilled the same compliance protocol in her as they had him. “When they sent me to kill you all, I tried to hold back. Give you a chance to... stop me,” Bucky grips her head knowing that ‘stop’ isn’t the word she had wanted to use.

“You’re strong,” Bucky tells her. She glances to him. “Not everyone can fight the control Hydra has. I couldn’t,” She frowns her eyebrows. Bucky shares a look with Steve before explaining his story to her. Steve chimed in here or there as well as going off on his own tangents with his own background stories.

At some point while talking, the three of them moved to Bucky and Steve’s floor within the tower to be more comfortable. The both of them knew the rest of the Avengers are hesitant to have her around, not knowing if she’s in control of herself or not. They all know that if her mind were to switch again and she tries to kill them, they’d be very lucky if they could stop her.

For almost a month, Y/n stayed on their floor. Bucky and Steve stayed with her, only venturing out if they needed something like food or clothes for Y/n. Throughout the month they learned about each other. Bucky and Steve were very open with her while she was more reserved with the details of her life.

What she did decide to explain were watered down stories of what happened to her in Hydra. She didn’t want to tell them all the gory details. 

She didn’t want to tell them that Hydra had tested how well her healing ability was by putting her through a meat grinder and watched her body slowly, and extremely painfully, put herself back together.

She didn’t tell them how they would electrocute her body for hours on end with no break in order to test how strong her abilities mimicking Thor were. Nor did she tell them about the grueling sparing matches that would have killed her should she have been a normal human.

Bucky had questioned her if they had tried to wipe her memories. She had to think for a moment before answering.

“They tried,” She remembers. “Multiple times but my mind would heal and bounce back too quick. It wouldn’t work. They had to find a way to get me to stop thinking about the past, to give up the little hope I clung too... They did it through the pain. They broke me to the point where all I would think about was how to live to the next day instead of reminiscing how I lived in the past,”

The anger Steve and Bucky felt whenever she explained anything about Hydra could not be measured. How they kept themselves from destroying the room is a mystery. Steve thought his anger towards Hydra was bad after everything that happened with the war and then with Bucky. But now it was amplifying as Y/n explains her story.

“I know I had a past... It’s just hard to think past the last few years,” She whispers.

“It’ll come to you,” Bucky promises, kissing the side of her head. She instinctively curls into his lap and he holds her to his chest. “The good memories will come, I promise,”

“What if I don’t have any?” She whispers, her eyes misting over.

“Then we’ll make some,” Steve tells her. He wraps both Bucky and Y/n in his arms. “We’ll make so many good memories you won’t think to remember the bad ones,” Y/n smiles, snuggling deeper in Bucky’s embrace.

It wasn’t until after several evaluations through Bruce, did Y/n leave the floor that had become her home. She started spending more time around the other’s but not without at least one of her mates right next to her.

There is one Avenger that seemed to be avoiding her.

“Do you mind if I come in?” Y/n asks, lightly knocking on Wanda’s door. At this point Y/n has been within the Avenger’s tower for about four months. She was slowly adjusting but it was happening.

“I shall give you two some privacy,” Vision states, standing from the bed he had been laying on with Wanda. Y/n gives him a polite smile and moves to give him room to walk out the door.

“You look better,” Wanda comments, sitting at the edge of the bed.

“I doubt I could have looked any worse than when you found me,” Y/n jokes. Wanda smiles a bit before patting the spot beside her. “You look so beautiful,” She whispers. “A little older than when I last saw you,” Wanda smiles, her head hanging a bit. “I’m sorry,” Wanda’s head snaps towards her.

“Sorry?”

“I couldn’t keep us together,” Y/n whispers, tears brimming her eyes. “I left you in that facility... I left you and Pietro,” Y/n’s voice chokes at his name. “I left you to deal with his death alone,”

“No, no, you didn’t have a choice,” Wanda reaches to pull her into a hug and Y/n clings to her. Both of them being to cry in each other’s arms. “It’s my fault... If we weren’t so damn stubborn non of this would have happened,” Wanda laughs pitifully. Y/n hugs her sister even tighter. “We thought you were dead... If we had known-”

“I know,” She whispers, puling from the hug. They both wipe their tears.

“He missed you so much,” Wanda whispers. “We both did,”

“Well, I’m here now... And I have you to thank for that,” Wanda smiles, shrugging slightly.

“What are sister’s for?” They smile at each other and quickly go in for another hug, this time neither of them pulling away for some time.

While mending her relationship with her sister was a large step in the right direction, Y/n still had a long journey a head of her. It wasn’t until 7 months in the Avenger’s facility did she realize that she’s not the only one trying to heal from her past.

In the beginning, when Y/n was cleared to leave medical, she had been offered her own space. Her fear of being left along meant that her own room was being used as a large closet while she spent her nights safely tucked between two large super soldiers. 

Usually, her whimpers and moving around is what wakes the other two up. However, tonight it’s not her nightmares that are causing problems.

“Bucky?” Y/n groans, slowly waking from her sleep. A moment later Bucky’s body is shooting up and his chest is heaving violently. “Bucky, baby?” Y/n sits up, shoving Steve’s arm off of her. “Honey, look at me,” She whispers, gently caressing his chin. His body tenses as he involuntarily flinches from her. “It’s ok... It’s alright,” She whispers, not forcing him to look at her but encouraging him.

“Hi,” He whispers, sweat dripping down his forehead. She sends him a calm, comforting smile as she wipes the drops away.

“Hey,” She whispers back. “It’s ok... They’re just nightmares... I won’t let them hurt you,” She promises. Bucky stares at her before pushing their foreheads together.

“I’m sorry for waking you,” He mutters.

“Don’t,” She shakes her head, bumping their noses together. “I’ve woken you both up countless times, it’s nice to help you for a change,” Bucky smiles, slithering an arm around her waist. He hauls her on top of him as he lays back down. She props her head up and gently rubs his chest. “Do you want to talk?”

“No... Just wanna look at ya, doll,” He whispers, his hands gently gliding up and down her sides. She smiles, her head nuzzling into his neck as his hands slip under her shirt to caress her skin. It’s only a couple of minutes before Steve is rolling closer in his sleep, his need to be as close as possible to them shinning through even while in dreamland. 

“We’re going to be ok, Buck,” She whispers to him. His arms tighten around her.

“That’s right, baby doll,” Bucky mutters, kissing her head. “We’re going to be just fine,”

[fridayfirefly]

Virtual Sleepover

Read Virtual Sleepover on AO3

Masterlist

Written for Maribat March Day 4 - Internet Friends

Quarantine had been rough at Wayne Manor, but for Tim Drake, Marinette Dupain-Cheng was a bright light through it all. Tim was getting ahead of himself, though. The story of Marinette Dupain-Cheng started on March 20th, 2020. Panic over coronavirus was sweeping the nation. Bruce had gathered all of the members of the Wayne family into the dining room to explain the new rules of the house. No one was to go in or out. Groceries would be delivered to the house. There would be no superhero outings for at least two weeks. Tim didn't think his family would be able to survive, trapped in a house together.

So to preserve his sanity, Tim turned to the internet. There were hundreds of cold cases that he had put on the backburner and hundreds of forums and websites dedicated to solving cold cases. Tim turned to the most popular website and started dumping information, hoping for someone to show up and work through it with him. That's how Tim met Marinette. @MarinetteDC showed up on his page with a friend request, a wide range of technical knowledge about textiles and designs, and about seven different theories on a murder case Tim considered all but unsolvable. Her sleep schedule was just as chaotic as Tim's and she also drank a near-inhuman amount of coffee. Marinette Dupain-Cheng enthralled Tim. And when the chaos of his house threatened to make Tim lose his mind, Marinette became his lifeline.

"Can you hear me?"

Tim nodded. "Yep!"

"Nice!" cheered Marinette. Tim relished the opportunity to see her face, even if it was through a zoom call. "So what do we want to do first? I don't have class until Monday, so we have the whole weekend ahead of us."

"I think we should start with the iconic sleepover classic: truth or dare," suggested Tim.

"Alright. Truth or dare, Tim?"

"Dare." Tim was confident in his abilities to pull off any stunt she might come up with. However, his confidence started to fade as he watched a devious look grow on her face.

"I dare you to bake a batch of cookies - any kind of cookies you want - without using a recipe."

Tim blinked, trying to recall the last time he had baked. Besides a few times helping Alfred out in the kitchen, Tim wasn't certain that he had ever used the Wayne Manor kitchen for anything other than brewing coffee and heating frozen pizzas. "Could I have a new dare?"

Marinette shook her head, the grin on her face demonstrating exactly how much fun she was having, watching the panic in Tim's eyes. "I'll give you one hint on how to make them, but only one, so use it wisely."

Tim groaned, unplugging his laptop from its charger so he could move it to the kitchen. "I'm not actually certain I know all of the ingredients in cookies. Or how long you bake them for. I feel like an hour is probably too long, but I feel like half an hour might not be enough time."

On the other side of the screen, Marinette tried to stifle her giggles but was unable to keep them all in. "No offense Tim, but this is going to be a disaster. I can't wait."

Tim let out another groan. "Must you torture me?"

"How about you keep the laptop camera pointed towards the oven, that way I can tell you once something starts to burn?" Marinette joked.

Tim knew that she was teasing, but honestly, he knew he could use all the help he could get. Still, he wanted to preserve at least a little of his dignity. "Very funny," Tim said sarcastically, setting the laptop down on the kitchen counter.

"Start with ingredients," Marinette advised.

"What all goes into a chocolate chip cookie..?" mused Tim. He got out the flour, white and brown sugar, eggs, butter, vanilla extract, and three different types of chocolate chips that Alfred kept stocked.

Marinette raised an eyebrow. "Is that all?"

Tim cast a wary gaze upon his ingredients. It didn't seem like enough, but at the same time he couldn't figure out what he was missing. Tim sighed. "I'm ready to use my hint. Tell me what I forgot."

"You forgot to get out the salt, and more importantly, the baking soda," advised Marinette.

"Can I have a second hint?" asked Tim as he gathered his two missing ingredients.

"That depends on what you're asking," teased Marinette.

"I'm going to start listing measurements, and you tell me if it's too much or not enough."

Marinette pretended to think it over before replying, "I'll do it, but only because I want the cookies to come out edible, not because we're friends or anything like that. There are no friends in the Dupain-Cheng kitchen," said Marinette, her voice filled with faux seriousness.

"Lucky for me, these cookies are being made in the Wayne kitchen, and we're all very nice here, and we don't let Tim burn his cookies."

Marinette giggled. "You have a point there," she acquiesced. "Start listing your measurements."

Tim grabbed the measuring cup and starting approximating. "Two cups flour?"

"That will make about five dozen cookies."

"One cup of each type of sugar?"

Marinette shook her head. "You'll want a 3/4 cup of each."

The rest of the measuring process proceeded smoothly, with Tim guessing measurements of fluctuating accuracy (he correctly guessed that he would need two eggs, but his guess of a half-cup of baking soda led to Marinette questioning whether he had ever been in a kitchen before).  Once Tim got the cookie dough mixed, spooned out onto a tray, and put in the oven, they resumed their game of truth-or-dare.

"Your turn, Marinette. Truth or dare?"

"Truth."

Tim tried to think of a good question to ask. "Since you've now seen how abysmal I am in the kitchen, I want to know one thing that you're terrible at."

Marinette scrunched up her brow. "It's nowhere near as bad as you're inability to crack an egg-"

Tim winced a little, remembering the painstaking process of digging out fragments of eggshell after he completely shattered it in his attempts to crack it.

"-But I have really bad depth perception. I trip over every little crack in the sidewalk. I'm probably the clumsiest person you'll ever meet."

Tim chuckled. "And here I thought you were perfect."

Marinette grinned. "Almost perfect. Truth or dare?"

"I'll pick truth this time, and hopefully avoid being humiliated again."

"I'll go easy on you this round. When was the last time you lied, and what was it about?"

Tim combed back through his memory of the past week, trying to pick out the last time he lied. "I think it was yesterday morning. Dick asked me if the coffee I was drinking was my first coffee of the day. I said yes, but really I hadn't slept that night so I just decided to arbitrarily count my start of the day at the time I would have woken up had I actually gone to sleep."

"So how many coffee's had you had yesterday?"

Tim shrugged. "Since midnight? Probably three or four. I've gotten away with a lot more coffee since I modified the Keurig in my room to stop making so much noise."

"I'm lucky," said Marinette. "My parents sleep so far away from me that they can't hear my Keurig."

"Truth or dare?" asked Tim, continuing the game.

"Truth."

"What's the most embarrassing thing you've ever done because you had a crush on someone?"

Marinette flushed red, and Tim immediately knew that this was going to be a good story. "Once I accidentally sent a text to my crush so I stolehisphoneanddeletedthetext." Marinette rushed the last few words, so fast that Tim couldn't quite make them out.

"What was that?"

"I stole his phone and deleted the text before he could read it. In my defense, I made a lot of questionable decisions at that age."

Tim burst out laughing. "How old were you?"

"I was thirteen," admitted Marinette.

Tim couldn't stop laughing at the absurdity of her claims. "You couldn't have asked him to borrow his phone and deleted it then?"

"I was in panic mode. It was between steal his phone or destroy his phone."

"Those were your two options?!" exclaimed Tim.

Marinette blushed even more furiously. "It's your turn. Don't expect me to go easy on you this round. Truth or dare?"

Tim kept up the trend. "Truth."

"What was the worst thing you did at thirteen?"

Tim thought back to his days as Robin, and the many, many stories he could tell. In the end, he settled on one that Jason still brought up when he needed leverage over Tim. "It's not as bad as phone thievery, but it's still a pretty funny story, looking back on it. You know how I have two older brothers, right?"

"Dick and Jason," Marinette confirmed.

"Well, one night I managed to convince Dick to let me drive Bruce's favorite car. Now, keep in mind, I had never actually driven a car before. Surprisingly, I wasn't that bad at driving. I made it home without incident - that is, until I tried to park the car back in the garage and accidentally crashed into Jason's motorcycle. For years after that, Jason used the threat of telling Bruce about my little car crash to keep me in line."

Marinette snorted. "You think that borrowing a phone to delete a text message is worse than borrowing and crashing a car?"

Tim shrugged. "It's a matter of opinion. Truth or dare?"

With a roll of her eyes, Marinette said, "Truth."

"What's one thing you would never tell me?" It was the sort of question that could only be asked during a game of truth or dare. In Tim's opinion, it was this sort of question that made the game worth playing.

Marinette pouted. "I don't like that question."

"Too bad. The rules of truth or dare state that you have to answer it."

"Fine." Marinette looked up at the ceiling, deep in thought. Just as she turned back to face her laptop, her face lit up. It was evident that she had an answer. "Usually I let people learn from their mistakes in the kitchen. However, I will now tell you - because I have to - that your cookies have been in the oven for too long. They're going to start burning if you don't take them out soon."

Tim jumped up to get his cookies out of the oven. They looked a little burnt, brown rather than the golden-brown that Alfred would make, but they still looked edible. "I'll accept your answer, but only because you saved my cookies."

"Now that your cookies are done, do you want to finish up our game of truth or dare?"

"One last question," decided Tim. "And I'll pick truth, to make it easy for you."

"What's the biggest secret that you've currently keeping from your family?"

After Tim's last question, he had expected Marinette to follow it up with an invasive question. Luckily, her question had a very simple answer.

"Easy question - my friendship with you."

Marinette looked confused. "What do you mean?"

"Most of my friendships begin through the connections they have to my family. Because of that, I've never really had serious friendships that my family wasn't actively involved in."

"It's not because you're ashamed of me, right?" Marinette sounded unsure of herself. Insecurity was a side of her that Tim had never seen before.

"Of course not," Tim assured her. "You're the best friend I could have ever asked for, Marinette."

"Good, because you're not getting rid of me that easy. I still have a lot to teach you about baking. I think we might try cupcakes at our next sleepover."

Tim laughed. "We'll see about that." He had no doubts that there would be sleepovers to come, and shenanigans involving baked goods to go along with them.

@maribatmarch-2k21

[iwritethat]

Dick Grayson: Fine Cuisine

Summary: Fluff

• Dick is unprepared for a family meal but your offer your fine expertise and have the whole family asking questions about you.

Warnings: Mature language

A/N: Hello lovlies! I’ve missed you all so much, I hope this helps a bit and there’s so much more I could add onto this so please enjoy and lemme know how you all are~

>>>>—————————>

It started with a family dinner.

As many curious situations do in retrospect, but with a family of vigilantes whose relationship ties have frayed, intermingled and been resewn makes for more interesting get-togethers compared to most.

One thing they could all agree on though? Dick Grayson cannot cook.

"I can't believe that, they just assume it's going to end in a takeout?" Came your amused voice as you placed a coffee on your kitchen island that Dick was currently seated - or rather slumped at.

"It's because the last two times I've hosted something like this, takeout has saved my ass." The ravenette embarrassingly clarifies, voice trailing off toward the end and did his best to avoid looking at you.

Dick Grayson was technically a neighbour, albeit living a few floors below your more lavish (and expensive) apartment suite. After moving into the complex on the same day, you quickly excavated the common ground to build a solid foundation for friendship - as such, meet-ups like these became a regular thing, switching apartments each time.

"Then, I'll help you out." You proudly confirmed, gesturing to your grand kitchen which was the sole reason you’d brought the place - one of the many things Dick envied about your luxurious living area compared to the standardised version of his own, though on an Officers salary he couldn’t afford something like this.

"Ah (Y/n) no, I can't let you do that!” Came his instant reply, hands waving defensively as he adamantaly brainstormed another excuse. “Plus you'll be working that night."

"True, but that doesn't mean I can't set you up beforehand. We'll start tomorrow, I'll teach you a recipe."

———

As previously planned, Dick turned up at your door rather nervously even though he’d been around you many times - not once had he demonstrated a serious negative flaw to his character in order to impress you, but cooking was one of them and you were about to witness chaos that’d likely dispel any romantic inclination he hoped you held for him.

“Ready?”

“No.”

With a playful laugh, you rolled your eyes and pulled the male into your kitchen noting how he was likely tired from his shift at Blüdhavens Police Department earlier that afternoon so a good meal should do wonders. Maybe it’d give him a better nights sleep too? The acrobat never seemed to obtain many of those for some unknown reason, apparently it’s ‘too noisy’ in the city.

“Oh and you can host in my apartment, it’s bigger and I’ll have all the equipment you need. You already have a spare key anyway.”

“You’re really amazing, I don’t deserve you - y’know that?” There were deeper feelings involved in that seemily offhanded thank you, ones relating to his role as Nightwing and his past mistakes which all remained a hated secret from you.

It started well, Dick following along with ease and you concluded that he picked things up fast with how observant he was which sped up the process. The main course he’d nailed with your guidance and so, you decided to move onto dessert.

“Now we add cocoa powder to th-“ You’d froze, mouth open out of surprise with the substances dusting your lips, cheek and part of your left collar bone - the offender in question mirroring your expression, albeit holding back his laughter due to his colossal misjudgement.

“I - I didn’t think it’d go everywhere when I ripped the packet open...”

“You don’t ever rip the packet, you tear it gently!” Came your dangerously mischievous correction, licking the sweet substance from your lips before flicking the currently non-chocolate brownie covered spoon at him with flecks landing on the side of his face.

“Oh, it’s on!”

This ensued an all out war, the two of you ducking and dodging oncoming attacks as you danced around the kitchen island with varying results of accuracy until Dick decided to slide over the marble surface and capture you in his arms.

His embrace faltered slightly as your back hit the island during your feeble attempt to get away, finding yourself trapped between him and the cool surface too enthralled in the carefree antics to notice the proximity. A beat of silence passed once the atmosphere had settled, Dick releasing a breathy chuckle with his grip around your waist loosening slightly as you looked up with a victorious smirk - he took the opportunity to lean forward slightly as if testing the waters and careful to note any kind of reaction you replied with.

However, there was a lack of trust as all is fair in love and war, hence your devious reasoning to close the gap some more and with the softness of his warm breath dancing on your lips you swiftly leaned past his whilst dragging your tongue across his cheek. Dick pulled back instantly, a mix of disgust and offence in his eyes as you spoke.

“Needs more sugar.”

“I’m sweet enough as it is thank you, you’d know that if you’d have just kissed me instead of betraying me like that!” Dick wittily snapped back, admiring the melodious laughter that escaped you at his response.

“I’m sure you do, speaking of - these brownies should last until the dinner so you won’t have to make them again on the day alright? I’ll get everything ready so you don’t have to worry about a thing.”

“I guess you’d taste pretty sweet too.” Though referencing your kind nature, you couldn’t help but lightly punch him in the shoulder.

———

Regardless of Dicks wistful prayers, the deadline had finally arrived and his family would be sporadically arriving in a matter of hours - so help him.

"All the ingredients are on the counter - do not use anything else - and I've detailed the instructions on the whiteboard in case you forget anything." You pointed to each item as you spoke, donning a jacket before barely making it past the kitchen doorframe due to your neighbours dramatically desperate pleas.

"Can't you just stay? And do it with me?"

"I have to go to work." You laughed at his antics, the man looking like a lost puppy amidst your vast collection of kitchen utensils.

"Work will survive without you, c'mon you wouldn't lose out on much - I'll even pay for the trouble."

That, truly caused you to hesitate with a look of sheer bemusement, a mischievous glint dancing in your irises that mocked his claim almost as much as your sardonic tone.

"If you truly knew my job and paycheck then you'd take that back.” With that, you were quick to flip to a more cheerful voice as you waved goodbye to a pouting Grayson. “Anyway, you'll be fine and tell me how it went once I get back~"

"Wait (Y/n) h-"

The slam of the front door echoed your departure leaving a Dick feeling more lost than ever, the kitchen seemingly quadrupling in size now.

Bruce arrived first along with Damian, Cass, Duke and Alfred. Then there was Tim who’d apparently travelled from Titans tower and finally Jason who’d sauntered in fashionably late as predicted but only by 5 minutes. Each baffled by the sudden change of location which only intensified when the host brought out plates of home cooked dinner.

"..."

"This... this isn't take out..."

"No, it's actual food.” Dick confirmed almost offended and words laced with a hint of underlying sarcasm. “That I made myself."

"Okay, so uh - is it edible then?" Jason quipped back, smirking at his elder brother in a smug manner that only he could achieve.

"Would you just eat it? I went through a lot of stress and effort for this."

Dick encouraging everyone as he sat down, the action only bemusing the members of his family more as they complied to his wishes with varying degrees of hesitance from each of them. Damian trusted Dick the most, but he patiently waited for his father to finish his mouthful before even touching his own dish.

"Wow, this is incredible, the flavour and everything - Dick what happened to you?!" Duke enthusiastically mocked and continued to devour the meal with a sense of radiance which contrasted to Cassandras pure silence as she savoured every tasteful mouthful.

"Grayson, there is no way you are solely responsible for this cuisine." Damian suspiciously raised a brow at the older hero, tentatively laying his cutlery elegantly on the now clear plate.

"Thank you, and maybe I had some assistance from my neighbour."

“Thank you for dinner Dick, it was surprisingly delicious and please give our thanks to your mysterious friend too.” Bruce knowingly added, proud of his protégés accomplishments - though minor in comparison to Alfreds glowing exterior.

“I told you there was hope Master Bruce.”

"Bro, they left a whole list of instructions so you wouldn't mess up and hey, call if you need anything. Sounds like a plan -" Jason, who had waited until everyone was finished explored your kitchen in hopes of finding some evidence as to who their saviour was.

"Jason no! They're working!"

"It‘s an emergency, you’ve been replaced by a clone with adequate cooking skills!” Tim wittily added once leaning against the kitchen doorframe to observe the scene with Damian inspecting the whiteboard before questioning it’s purpose.

“Why leave this if they couldn't answer then?"

"That's the point, she will answer and I don't want to disturb her right now. They've done enough for me already." Dick painfully sighed, strategically slapping Jason’s phone into the air and catching it with his other hand in one swift motion much to the irritation of the latter.

"Hold up - she?" Duke cut in now, holding his hands out for emphasis and subtlety fishing for elaboration.

"Are you dating...?” Jason hummed, taking a moment to analyse Dicks reaction prior to cementing his assumption. “No, but you want to, right?"

“We are not -“

“You want to date someone?” Cass innocently inquired now walking in with a pile of plates, Bruce and Alfred following in afterwards with clean up of their own.

“I mean I -“

“I’ve seen enough of your crushes to know you have one, you’re already flustered by thinking about them romantically.” Bruce effortlessly deducted, Alfred nodding in agreement whilst commencing the washing up.

“You can’t just call me out like that Bats, after everything with been through too.” Dick feigned betrayal, a hand on his heart whilst Bruce shook his head.

“Oh yeah, how long did he wait for Starfire and Barbara though?” Tim jokingly nudged Jason who chuckled at the small dig, though charismatic and charming - when real feelings were involved, Dick Grayson wasn’t one to straightforwardly act on them.

“Real mature guys.”

“I think you should tell her.” Was the sincere voice of reason, Cassandras kind smile enough to silence the devilish remarks of his brothers who now shrugged in defeat.

“We could help...”

———

Miraculously, you'd attained reservations at the most eloquent restaurant in Gotham, located in the more luxurious district of the wealthy. As a result, it served only the finest gourmet cuisine and had waiting lists longer than any other, so much so that even Bruce Wayne had yet to successfully book a place at the establishment.

You had given him the news when he’d recounted the events of his family dinner (skipping over certain discussions) and how they were grateful for your generosity.

Now, you'd asked Dick for how many he'd like seated at the table so you could finalise the arrangements - he knew you worked there, meaning staff privileges were likely applied in this situation but he was still left speechless.

Gawking at the skyrocketing prices, Dick now understood how much missing one day of work would seriously cost you - he definitely couldn't have afforded your time that night after all.

"So, you say you're paying for this?"

With a painstaking hum of agreement, the eldest nodded with a hint of concern detected on his features, fortunately Bruce had come prepared with his own credit card (just in case). Although his family could be provoking and frivolous toward one another, they were also respectful in situations like these and wouldn't run the bill up too high like certain members would if Bruce had been footing the bill. Dick had a charismatic bond with all of them in that sense.

Meanwhile, you handled everything in your kitchen of organised chaos as the orders came pouring in, including that of Dicks table who you had yet to formerly greet.

"This is cereal..." The head waiter meant it more of a question than a statement, looking to you with upmost uncertainty due to the simplicity of the dish compared to those on your signature menu.

Did they even stock Lucky Charms with the ingredients? The answer was no, you’d intentionally bought them purely for this very day and scenario.

"I know, I know - please serve it to my neighbour on Table 12, he'll get it." You humourously assured the man who seemed to have more to say but didn’t wish to argue with higher authority.

"Ah, Chef..." Your sous chef called moments later, overlooking the scene with mild skeptism before realising the nature of your scheme.

"Hm?"

"You do realise he is currently seated with Mr Bruce Wayne, don't you?" Upon processing that unprecedented information you immediately bolted - hot on the trail of the waiter with a weak promise in your wake.

"What?! I thought he'd bring his friends along not his- oh god, I just sent them cereal- shit, I'll be right back!"

With strategy and precision, you carefully intercepted the tray only seconds before it’d be placed in front of the empty seat of Dick Grayson - the man in question probably taking a bathroom break.

"Aha, pardon me, this was an incorrect order on my part, please forgive the interruption." You bowed with an apology, disappearing in hopes the remainder of the party hadn’t the time to fully decipher the mistake.

Of course, unbeknownst to you, this was a table full of detectives who constantly observed even the most trivial of details.

"Was that... cereal?"

The night followed on as planned, yourself wrapped up in cooking and supervising throughout the night with the only interruption coming from the waiting staff informing you that Table 12 would like to meet the Chef. Such a gesture was commonplace for you, customers regarded as strangers being much less intimidating than your neighbours family - you couldn’t comprehend why, it’s not like you were dating him or anything but their auras just radiated strength.

"Good evening, I'm glad to hear you -" Arriving at the table, you weren’t given the chance to finish before Dick had stood to greet you with a warm smile gently brushing your upper arm once deciding against hugging you out of habit.

"Hey, (Y/n). You didn’t come over this morning, everything alright?"

"Yeah, it's fine Dick I just had to readjust a menu." You waved his worries off with a grateful nod, hands on your hips in accomplishment as you expected to resume natural conversation with him.

"Okay okay, compliments to you, the food was immaculate - but how do you know our brother?" A youthful male bearing a white streak through his hair cut in, genuine sincerity in his tone when offering his praise before incredulously gesturing to Dick.

"He's my neighbour."

"I - he's a what now?" Duke shook his head in disbelief, looking between you both rather unconvinced.

"Are you kidding me Grayson?!" Tim was next, the most exasperated out of the whole table as he pinched the bridge of his nose whilst Dick quizzically scanned each of his company for insight.

"What...?"

"You got cooking lessons from one of the top Chefs in the whole damn country, you're friends with her, and you didn't even know who she was?!" The slimly built youth exclaimed, apparently knowledgeable in regards to the culinary world and had read of your famous reputation.

“(Y/n) (L/n) owns this restaurant Dick. Also, thank for the other week, the recipe was lovely.” Bruce politely added, nodding to you with a smile.

“You didn’t say that, you only said you worked here.” Dick turned to you now, in a feeble attempt to justify his lack of acknowledgment to your renowned status.

“Well, I do. In my defence you never asked, I mean my apartment and kitchen are rather fancy - that didn’t come on minimum wage.” You replied a matter-of-factly with an air of confidence to your voice.

"Are we forgetting that this is also the chef who was going to serve Richard cereal?" At the remark from Duke, a heated flush adorned your skin due to the embarrassment of being caught - the whole table breaking into collective chuckles.

"You were? - Wow that's such a dick move!" Dick was openly laughing at your failed attempt at humour, lightly nudging your side as you pushed him away in playful defence.

"Shut up! I didn't realise you were with your family, or else I wouldn't have done it."

Jason immediately waved that claim off, cheekily smirking at you as he spoke. “Oh no, I'm so glad you did, honestly it's the main reason I like you right now."

“That and you spared us the horror of Graysons cooking.” Damian conviently inputted, conniving grin sent to his favourite brother.

“You’re welcome, ah I apologise but I should get back to work so please excuse me. It was a pleasure meeting you all.” Taking a calculating glance over the expanse of exquisite tables and order exchanges you thought it best to return to your duties with a gracious smile and started toward the kitchen.

“Can I drop by tonight, I won’t be able to afford any thank you gifts after this but I’ll bring you a coffee?” Dick cheerily inquired, causing you to spin on your heel with a shy laugh and confirmation of his proposal.

“Don’t worry, this is my treat. You guys don’t have to pay for anything so enjoy the rest of your evening.” With that you were once again swept up into the busy atmosphere beyond the kitchen doors.

The table remained quiet for a few moments, Dick sitting down and looking to them almost as if searching for their impressions of you only to be met with bemused, impressed and mischievous gazes.

Not for you, oh no - these were shamelessly directed at a now enamoured Dick Grayson.

“Please marry her.”

[ofmorninglory]

For some reason, @teatitty said “Clint and Barry could be brothers” and the only goddamn thing I could think of was Anastasia AU where Clinton Francis and Bartholomew Henry are the only two survivors from the palace seige when the Revolution broke out (and let’s pretend this is somewhere in some country that we will invent for the sake of accuracy, which doesn’t have to exist because it’s a non-existent country) and while Barry got out of the castle with his best friend Hal and their cousin Steve, Clint wasn’t all that lucky. 

He was almost caught trying to run away, and while trying to make it out of the crowds without being stepped on, the poor boy hits his head somewhere pretty roughly. When he wakes up, he’s at a hospital somewhere, can’t hear very well, has no idea who he is, and is frightened beyong belief. He vaguely remembers the name “Clint” but nothing besides that, and he’s wearing this ring that hangs around his neck in a silver chain, engraved with the words “Every light is a promise”. Clint doesn’t know what it means. 

So, he starts getting moved around orphanages. He never manages to stay in one place too long because he’s rambunctious, makes too much trouble and can hardly communicate with the other kids because of his hearing problem. He is an outcast, usually, and sometimes he’ll feel so lonely that he’ll feel there’s nothing more than that emptiness he feels. When he’s feeling like this, Clint will thumb absentmindedly at his ring (the one he’s growing into) and think about, whoever gave it to him, probably loved him very much. 

When he’s old enough that the orphanage he’s managed to stay in doesn’t want to support him anymore (18, 20? Something like that), he leaves to the city in a feeble attempt at searching for a life for himself. He doesn’t have much of anything, and he knows his hearing is going to be a problem, but Clint has faith, at least, and hope that he’ll find his family one day. 

Cue in Natasha and Tony. They’re known around the city as the greatest conpeople known to history, and mostly everyone has been screwed over by them at least once. Tony used to be part of the noble-folk, back when “royalty was in”, but he’s since let go of his previous life. It’s not that he doesn’t miss his family (who he lost a long, long time ago) but it’s safer for him to exist simply as Tony and not as Anthony Edward Stark. Natasha, on the other hand, has always been a nobody. She has no idea who her parents are, and she doesn’t particularly care about finding out. She’s found a family with Tony, even though they fight a lot and food is hard to come by, and she wouldn’t have it any other way. 

They start hearing the rumours. Everyone is talking about the lost prince that’s supposedly still in the country. They know about Prince Bartholomew and Duke Stephen getting out of the palace with the help of Harold Jordan (known palace guard and family friend), but they’re out of the country now, safe as refugees in Paris (sue me, Paris is nice). Rumour is out that Prince Clinton is alive and well, somewhere in the country, and the Prince and the Duke are offering a whole lot of money for whoever can bring their last family member to them. 

Natasha wants an out, so does Tony. They see this as the perfect opportunity. 

They meet Clint on an accident. The man was looking for a place to hide from the thunderstorm raging outside and had bolted inside the palace (that Tony and Natasha had been staying at for months now) only to be met with a set of menacing people pointing at him with guns that Clint had never seen before. 

Tony sort of kind of thinks about it first. Sure, he doesn’t believe the rumors about Prince Clinton Francis being alive, but if they were true, Tony is pretty sure that the boy would look like this street-rat. Provided the street-rat had a bath. And a hair cut. And new clothes. 

Natasha sees it too, although a little bit slower. Clint’s eyes are what buys her--they’re the royal family’s blue, almost identical to Prince Barry’s or Duke Steve’s eyes--and she’s quick to try to convince him. She has to be smart about it, too. Clint doesn’t look like the kind of man who would lie to a grieving family who lost everything, but he looks like the kind of man who is lost and in desperate need of some hope to hold on to. If she feels a little shitty about lying to him, Nat doesn’t let it show. 

So, they travel to Paris. 

Well, at least they try to, it’s not as simple as it looks. First they have to get Clint ready to be Prince Clinton Francis, and try not to get caught by the city police, who are getting closer on their trail. Tony tells Natasha several times they should leave before all the borders are closed, but their papers aren’t ready yet and they have to be very careful about how they go around this. It doesn’t help that Clint somehow manages to bring attention to himself (like a fool) and there’s this soldier that keeps butting into their business when they’re out and about. Natasha hates James Barnes with a burning passion because he keeps getting in the middle of all of her plans. 

When they finally make it on a train out of the country, the goddamn train is searched, of course, right before it goes over the border. They’re looking for Anthony Stark, the police got word that the last noble Stark was trying to flee the country, and that just wouldn’t do. Tony pleads them to leave without him. Natasha is having none of that shit.

Someone in the train aids them--an older man Tony recognizes as Bruce Wayne, who hadn’t gone into hiding like all the other nobles had, who had remained prideful until the end and who had only gotten his children out of the country, staying behind himself to help others escape--and they manage to jump out of the train and into the forest. After that, it’s the huge trek to Paris, where Tony is already in contact with Oliver and Dinah Queen, a couple of nobles who managed to escape the country before Revolution broke out. They’re old friends of the Starks and agree to help the runaways for a little while until they can get to the Prince and the Duke. 

There are a lot of those cute moments with Natasha and Clint. She tells him about how it was growing up in the street, about how finding Tony had been sort of a life-line for her. Clint, in turn, asks her if she’s going to miss her homeland. She says that she won’t, but then continues on saying that it’s the only thing she’s known for her entire life. Clint thinks maybe she is going to miss it. They dance, of course, because dancing is explicitly created to fall in love, and Natasha kicks herself over and over because this wasn’t supposed to happen. 

When they get to Paris, Oliver literally can’t bow fast enough because he’s sure that this is Prince Clinton. He had known the little bugger (his noble family had been closer to the royals) when he was only a boy, and he was sure he was looking straight at a ghost. Clint is embarrassed and tells him not to do it, that he’s not even sure he’s the Clinton everyone seems to be looking for (Dinah arches an eyebrow: “you’re literally called Clint”). 

Natasha sees how much he’s grown over the past couple of months of travel, how much he seems to remember from their lessons on the royal family. There are things Tony and he never taught him and he still knows them. For no reason. Natasha really tries to remain skeptical about actually finding the Prince Clinton Francis, but then one night, Clint wakes up from a nightmare, and Natasha tells him a story. 

She recounts one summer day, when she was younger, and a parade on the streets, celebrating the royals. She tells him about Prince Clinton, how she’d had this horrible urge to run to him and talk to him. He had seemed like such a charming child (he was, in fact) and she does actually go up to him against better judgement. Natasha had dogded right through the palace guards, bolting towards the place where the royal family were sitting inside their cart. She’d looked up at Prince Clinton, blue eyes meeting green, and he’d smiled at her. He’d smiled at her and Natasha never forgot that. 

Something tickles in the back of Clint’s mind. Natasha tells him to make that story into his, to make it part of his Prince Clinton persona, maybe it’ll help. And Clint starts telling the story back to her, in full detail, from Prince Clinton’s point of view. As he nears the end, he stands up from his bed, confused, and finally finishes Natasha’s story. 

“And then she bowed...”  “I never told you that, Clint.” “You didn’t have to,” he says, voice soft, “I--I remember”  Natasha was already in love with Clint, and now, as she realizes this is, in fact, Prince Clinton Francis, he can’t help but feel like her entire world has been ripped from her all at once. She’s never had a family, had never known love other than Tony’s friendship, and now that she’s found Clint, and she has to lose him again? She doesn’t think she can do it. 

But Clint deserves a family. She tells Tony what she knows, confirms with him that Clint is actually Prince Clinton, and they both decide their plan has already gone wrong anyways.

They eventually make it to Barry and Steve (Steve, who Tony desperately tries to court, except Steve is simply uninterested or is playing hard to get; Natasha has a thrill watching Tony trip over himself for this Duke) and of course we get some angst because Clint finds out Tony and Natasha were simply using him for the money. He storms out, doesn’t even get to talk to Barry and Steve, and goes back to the Queen’s house, angry and hurt and feeling so, so stupid. He couldn’t have been Prince Clinton. He was only an orphan, with no name, no past and no future. 

Then, as we near the end--did you think we forgot about Sargeant James Buchanans “Bucky” Barnes? We did not, we were just biding our time. 

The solider comes to Paris, to the Queen’s house, when Clint is there all alone. The man has been following them for a while, and he’s here to bring Clint back home. He doesn’t believe Clint to be the Prince, and Clint doesn’t anymore, so he’s almost ready to go with Bucky. He doesn’t care what’s waiting for him back in his homeland, he just wants to stop hurting so much. 

But just as Barnes is about to take him, Barry and Steve come looking for Clint. Somehow, Tony and Natasha managed to convince them to actually go meet their friend (the man they conned) because he hadn’t had anything to do with this entire scheme, he just wanted to find a family, and they’re both sure that he really is Barry and Steve’s family. 

(Maybe there’s a tid-bit of how Barnes used to be a palace guard, too. How he used to be Steve’s best friend before the revolution. Maybe there’s a lot of angst and anguish here, when Steve comes to the Queen’s house, expecting to find his cousin and finding his best friend instead. Barnes doesn’t say anything. Simply sighs, let’s go of Clint, and leaves the place. There’s not anything else he can do. He’ll go home and explain to everyone how Prince Clinton wasn’t alive and the rumors had been false. He’d tell everyone Clint had died. He’d find a way. He’s sparing this family’s life. He’s not like his father.) 

And then there’s this reunion, where Clint doesn’t know how the fuck to act, and he just kind of fumbles around with his ring, which now officially fits him, and Barry takes one look at it and just breaks. 

“Every light is a promise,” Barry says, softly, coming to sit next to Clint on the bed, blue eyes staring into blue, “My brother and I--we’d use to promise each other things during thunderstorms. When lightning struck, we’d give each other one more thing to hold the other, too. Mostly, they’d be stupid things, like how next time I’d give Clinton my dessert or how he would cover for me when I wanted to sneak out of the palace with Hal.” 

Clint stares at him, eyes wide, heart open. 

“The last promise I made to my brother,” Barry continues, and takes off his own ring--one that’s almost identical to Clint’s, “was during the night of the seige. It wasn’t lightning that time, but fire, and I promised him we’d always find a way to each other.” 

He’s crying. Sobbing, actually. Clint doesn’t know what to do, but then--then he remembers. 

“You held my hand,” he says, shakily, “while Hal was getting us out--you held my hand so tightly I thought it’d come right off. I tried to hold on to you, Bar, I did. I was so small, my hand slipped yours--I saw you being taken away by the crowds. I was so scared, Bar. So frightened. I let go of your hand. I was an idiot.” 

They’re both hysterical now, and Barry finally breaks completely, wrapping Clint in a tight hug while he repeats his name over and over--Clinton, Clinton, Clinton, my brother--and Clint can’t believe he’s found his family. What’s left of it. He’ll take it all. 

Days later, after Steve and Barry have caught up on whatever Clint has missed (they’re moving to London, soon, it isn’t safe for them anymore; they don’t know what Barnes will do), Clint starts missing Natasha and Tony. They were his first friends, after having no one for the longest time, and now that they’re gone, even when he has gotten his brother and cousin back, he can’t help but feel a little bit empty. 

Natasha isn’t faring much better. Tony probably isn’t either. Everyone is miserable. Natasha can’t take it any much longer after Dinah (who is now her self-appointed best friend, Nat doesn’t understand) continues hounding her about going to find Clint. 

“He’s not a prince anymore! It doesn’t matter! Go get your man!” 

So, she does, eventually. She does this whole grand gesture about going to find him and telling him how stupid he was, how much she truly started caring about him, and how she’d take a chance with him if he was willing to give it to her. 

It’s only Barry listening to her from up the balcony, sure, but Clint’s brother tells her that Clint himself went looking for her. 

Once they finally get to tell each other they’re in love, it’s wonderful and Natasha thinks, for the first time, she found her home. 

[ladydragonhawke]

The Lesser of Two Evils

Season 15 fanfic starting exactly at the ending of Season 14.

For anyone who would like to have an easier reading experience here’s the link to the story

https://archiveofourown.org/works/20647562/chapters/49157945

SPOILERS FOR SEASON 14

CHAPTER 3/? WIP

Summary: Cas has an itch that needs scratching, but to do so requires the help of someone he would rather not involve.

Chapter 3: Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door

In the war room alarms were sounding loudly again as the lights on the walls and table blinked frantically.

“Um, what does that mean?” Claire asked gesturing to the light show that was happening.

Sam was already on top of the computer and the readouts it was giving, while Dean searched for the off switch. Two headaches in two days is just too much at this point. After finding the correct group of switches Dean flicked them on and off, thereby shutting off the alarms. Alex ran past him to what he assumed was to check on the patient. Dean sauntered to the side of Sam as he tried to make out just what the computer was freaking out about.

“According to this, there was a massive celestial event that just happened. Let me compare it to the readouts from earlier.” Sam grabbed the pile of printouts that were near him on the desk, good thing he didn’t throw them away yet. Dean started up the stairs leading out of the front door.

“Hey! Be careful! I can’t make out what happened yet!” called Sam as he was torn between going with his brother or trying to make sense of all the numbers and degrees printed on either paper. Without even a moment passing by Dean came running back into the main room like a kid at Christmas.

“THE SUN IS BACK!” Dean shouted at the top of his lungs. Sam dropped the papers and ran up the stairs behind Castiel and Jack who were already halfway up themselves. Everyone filed out of the door in front of the Bunker to look up at the sun. Castiel glanced at his watch then back up as if tracking its accuracy. The rotation of the Earth was back to normal as well.

“Why would he do that?” pondered Dean, “Why would he bring it back?”

“So soon too?” Sam added.

“I have no idea. Let’s just be glad it is back, for now.” Castiel grumbled as he turned to return into the Bunker. One by one everyone filed back into the Bunker leaving only the older gentleman, the young clerk from the gas station, Sam, and Dean.

“Do you think it’s safe to go back?” asked the older man.

“Not sure, but you’re welcome to stay if you like. You and?” Sam gestured toward the young lady to reveal her name.

“Sarah. Sorry, it has been kinda hectic, what with God and all.” She stared at the ground realizing the ridiculousness of what she’s saying, and how it sounds.

“I have a grandchild I need to check on. Can’t leave him to this mess. He has his father, but he ain’t worth more than two pennies to rub together.” The old man grumbled.

“I need to get back too, I’m worried about my brother Ben. Our dad was in the Marines and I’m sure the ‘fort’ held but…” she trailed off in thought as she looked out toward the main road.

“Well, we’ll give you some supplies and a car you guys can have to get back to town. If you run into any trouble with those zombies, run. Don’t fight them.” Sam made it a point to look directly into each of their eyes to further drive the point home.

“Trust me, after what happened earlier, we won’t. Fight I mean.” Sarah corrected. She was justifiably nervous, but Sam was hoping with a bit of light instruction and some quick pointers she should be ok. He hoped. He guided them back inside leaving Dean outside thinking to himself just what in the hell happened. He couldn’t quite get over how in one minute the sun was completely gone, and within a few hours it was back again as if nothing had happened. “What is Chuck planning?” After about ten minutes or so to think to himself, he decided to worry about it later, right now he wanted to pop in on the invalid and see where she was at for recovery. She seemed like the fighting type; Dean liked those with a bit of backbone.

As Dean shut the door behind him, he could hear a crackling noise coming from the war room and as he looked out over the bannister Rowena popped into view holding onto quite a few of her precious tomes. It seemed she had escaped quite a kerfuffle wherever she blew in from.

“Rowena, how’s tricks?” Dean asked with a slight smile. He liked ruffling her feathers when he could. She turned to give him a sneer but thought it best to fake a smile as she set down her tomes onto the center table.

“I was…” she gasped as she laid down her largest tomes with a thud, “Bombarded at my flat!” She exhaled forcefully as another wrapped stack thudded onto the table, leaving a small bundle under her arm as what was left. “Did anybody bother to warn me the dead were rising from their grave?” She set the smaller bundle on top of the larger set as she flopped into the nearest chair, looking exhausted. “Not to mention the sun disappearing, and then reappearing before our very eyes?” She raised her hand to shake a boney finger at Dean, “Please don’t tell me you boys are the cause of all this?” Just then Sam walked into the room seeing Rowena pointing a long finger at Dean.

“Hey Rowena, didn’t hear you come in.” Sam stuttered.

“Aye Sam, nice to see you too. Now will someone please tell me what is bloody going on?” She looked back and forth between Sam and Dean. Dean coughed and tapped Sam on the shoulder. “I’ll leave her to you, I’mma go check on our wounded.”

“Right.” Sam scoffed.

Dean escaped from the room as quickly as he could, he did NOT want to receive the foul words she was bound to spew when she heard it pretty much was all them. Kinda, sorta, not really, honestly if Chuck planned on it going this way was it really their decision? He shook his head to rid himself of going down that rabbit hole. That was one hole he didn’t like exploring. He entered the infirmary to find Alex using a stethoscope to try to find a heartbeat.

“Whoa, whoa. Did she die?” Dean stopped halfway between her and the door waiting for an answer.

“No, her heartbeat is just so…. faint.” She removed the pieces from her ears and returned the stethoscope to dangle around her neck. “Frankly there’s not much else I can do for her. She’s got another blood bag and a few more saline and the wound should be better soon. But it’s like…” she paused not quite sure if she wants to say it out loud.

“Like what?” Dean inquired giving the stranger a look over. She was pale and seemed at ease in her sleep.

“Like… she’s in a coma.” Alex whispered.

“How long do you think?” Dean asked taking a seat on the bed next to the patient.

“Not up to me. I don’t think it would hurt to have Cas or maybe Jack…” she stopped at the sight of Dean giving her a hard look of no, “or not Jack.”

“Rowena is here, maybe we could have her give her a once over.” Dean proposed.

“Sounds good to me. Well, I’m going to have a long shower, care to watch her for a bit? If she wakes up just come get me, ok? Not that I think she’s going to wake up right now but…” She sighed, “you never know.”

“Roger that. Enjoy your shower.” Dean took out his phone to find one of the many games he had installed on it, the internet and phone services may be down but that wasn’t going to stop him from distracting himself from his thoughts. He pulled up one of the many iterations of Candy Crush and began his latest level. He didn’t get too far till he heard light heels tapping on the floor toward him. He turned to find Rowena walking slowly toward him, eyeing both him and the unconscious lady in the bed in front of him.

“So, this is her. The odd woman.” Rowena straightened as the reached the foot of the bed of the woman in question.

“Yep.” Affirmed Dean as he tucked his phone back into his back pocket. He’ll finish that level later.

“Sam mentioned what might’ov happened to her. I suppose you boys think I should give it a go?” she looked at Dean for confirmation.

“Alex did mention, before she took off to take a shower, that it seems like she may be in a coma.” Dean recited, albeit a bit haphazardly.

“I’ll start with scrying then. Get the general idea of what’s going on.” Rowena rubbed her hands together as if to warm them up, then when she felt she had sufficiently raised her awareness she floated her hands above the strangers’ body starting at the feet. Dean had watched her preform this action a few times with Jack in place of the invalid. Dean didn’t want to think about that, so he focused on the slight humming sounds and slight twinges of movement from Rowena. Her humming started out calm and collected then as she neared the head, she sounded a bit frazzled and the notes sounded off-key.

“What’s up?” Dean wondering just what was with the odd humming.

“Well, I’m not quite…” she slowly breathed out as she searched a bit deeper “sure dear. Usually I can find a persons’ soul or being rather quickly, but…” she moved her hands to hover over the strangers’ heart, “it’s almost like I’m at the door knocking to be let in but, no one is answering.”

“So, she has no soul?” Dean questioned, confused with her analogy.

“Oh, she has one dear it’s there, but it’s just completely blocked off for some reason.” She moved her hands back down to her feet to finish the ritual. “Like she doesn’t want anyone poking their nose where she won’t want.” She held her hands in each other as she gave the girl another once over with her eyes. “The only thing I can do is give her a healing spell for the wound. I could try a waking spell, but I fear the after-effects may upset her more.” She looked at Dean who didn’t seem too pleased at the sound of that and he sighed as he rose to his feet.

“Well do what you can. Make sure if she wakes up to let Alex know. I’ll go tell her you’re on top of it. See if she needs a nap or somethin’.” Dean patted Rowenas’ shoulder lightly and walked out of the infirmary through the other door.

Rowena sighed as she looked at the strangers’ face that was starting to show some color. “Now it’s just us girls.” She sat on the bed next to the stranger as she prepared herself to preform a healing spell that rose in intensity as long as the caster was willing to pour as much energy as they wanted. She breathed deeply for a few minutes to quell any insecurities she may be harboring. The issue that this woman was able to completely block her from even getting a general feel of who this person is, was more than aggravating to say the least. This just made her more interesting to Rowena, like a rubix cube that looked nearly complete but with only one square out of place. The solution would be roughly simple, but it would take some time. Rowena extended her hands outward from her body hovering just a few inches above the area where the wound was. She could see it in her minds eye, the rough stitch work that was holding quite a few flaps of skin onto each other. The small holes that couldn’t quite be stitched due to the lack of skin in those particular areas. She probed a little deeper, the muscles in her entire lower side were a complete mess, a large chunk was missing entirely and some of the sinew was connected to nothing. She pushed deeper, but for some reason she couldn’t, as if the body was rejecting her, forcing her to return to the muscles. She took a deep breath and delved against the force of whatever was barring her. Without too much pressure she was finally able to see some of the damaged organs; a kidney was nearly on its last legs, a badly bruised hip bone, and large chunk of her colon was missing, but other than that she couldn’t see too much else.

“There, was that so hard?” She sighed content with herself and her abilities. She still couldn’t figure out how or why this persons’ being was fighting against her so much. She added that to the list of questions she intended to ask her when she awoke. Starting from the kidney she began the healing process; it didn’t take too long to get it into acceptable standards. When she returned to the muscles to try to mend them back to their original places, she could feel a slight pull on her shoulder. She opened her eyes to find a young black-haired woman standing next to her.

“Alex, I presume?” Asked Rowena, never fully dropping her healing spell. The distraction could hinder it, but she was more than capable.

“Guilty as charged. How’s she doing?” Alex asked while pulling up a chair to the end of the bed.

“She’s… interesting.” Rowena teased.

“I’ll say. Any other person with wounds like this would’ve died from the blood loss alone.”

“It’s odd…” Rowena started, pausing as she mended the majority of muscles leaving some of the other ones to heal by themselves. “I’ve never had to fight this hard to heal a person.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well…” She slowly tapered off the healing aura thinking this was enough for the moment. “when I try to do anything, I get forced back. Under normal circumstances this is an entirely somewhat easy process.”

“But she’s not normal.” Alex gave her a knowing look, as if someone finally realized something she’s known for a while now.

“Quite.”

Rowena looked at the strange woman in wonder, she’ll have so many questions for her. As night fell everyone was exhausted from what a nightmare of a day they all equally shared. Alex resigned to let Rowena babysit the comatose stranger while she went and got some shuteye. Claire, Donna, and Jody all went into their respective rooms and crashed. Dean and Sam were left alone with Castiel and Jack in the main room continuously trying to get any news from the outside. Castiel was trying in vain to reach anyone in heaven, but it was as if no one was left to answer him. He was beginning to feel extremely uneasy; he knew if there were no angels left to keep heaven functional, the souls would be lost. He looked at Sam and Dean as they were trying to get the router working for the fifth time to see if they could get any internet. He needed to check on things, but he didn’t want to leave Sam, Dean, and Jack. He took a deep breath as he steeled himself for the inevitable pushback he was going to have.

“Guys, I need to go to heaven.”

Dean dropped what he was doing and spun around to face Cas with a mixed look of confusion and annoyance. “Um, what?”

“Look, I still can’t get anything from anyone up there, if there aren’t any angels in heaven, we won’t have just the souls that broke out of hell to deal with.” Castiel sped through every word knowing if he didn’t get it out it would never get a chance to again.

“Right, did you forget about the massive hoards of undead that are out there?! Not to mention the demons from Hell that are loose all over the frickin’ world! You’ll get torn to shreds!” Dean half-shouted, having to stop himself realizing people are trying to sleep.

“I realize that, but this is something I can’t just leave alone. Not when…” He paused looking to Sam for some kind of backup. “not when I can do something about it.”

“I’ll go with you.” Jack interjected, jumping out of the chair he was lounging in.

“No. Out of the question.” Castiel stopped him with an outstretched arm.

“I can help! I know where the door is.” Jack was beginning to get justifiably frustrated. He couldn’t stand being treated like a child. “I can fly us there and back.”

“That’s actually not a bad idea.” Pipped up Sam. Dean did a double-take and gave him a look of shock then disgust.

“We still don’t know if he’s even capable of doing all that. He was dead today, not like that stops us much anyway, but still. I say no, it’s too soon.” Dean folded his arms onto his chest. “We’ll come up with something else.” Sam knew this was his usual signal that he wouldn’t budge, but Sam knew if anyone could change Deans’ mind it was him.

“Dean, he’s already shown that he can use his powers without injuring himself. He healed me and blasted all those walkers when we picked up the girls.” Sam knew the implications of what could happen if they left the bunker, but he had faith in Jack and Cas. He knew if things went south in any way, they would fight like mad to get out and back to them. “They could just fly to the door and if things look sour, they’ll just fly back.” He looked Castiel in the eyes as if saying this to him as an order, of which Castiel and Jack both acknowledged.

Dean keeping is arms crossed and his head held high was trying not to show outwardly that he was actually considering this half-baked plan. But they’ve done more with less. And as much as he hated the idea of Castiel and Jack leaving his side so soon he was very concerned about the souls in heaven, including Mary and John. He mulled it around in his head and gave a look to Sam that meant, I’m weighing my options here.

“Fine, but if things look bad. At all. You come right back. Got it?” Dean pointed a finger at Jack that was between anger and love. He wouldn’t dare admit the ladder at the moment.

“Yes sir.” Jack replied, trying to hide a smile at finally being allowed to do something. He and Castiel stepped back from the center table and gave Sam and Dean one last look before disappearing.

“If he so much as gets a papercut I’m…” Dean started but didn’t dare finish, the thought of him being hurt at all was a thought he’d rather not address.

“I know, me too. Let’s get some rest huh?” Sam gave Dean a comforting pat on his shoulder to break him away from his thoughts.

“Sounds good.” Dean grunted as they both made their way to their respective rooms. Leaving the main room silent besides the few blips and beeps from the computers still running and collecting data.

 Castiel and Jack jerked into reality in front of the sandbox that masqueraded as the door to heaven. The evening sky was dark, nearly devoid of stars either due to the light pollution, or the fact it was The End. Castiel did a quick sweep of any and all possible life forms in the area that could interfere with entering into Heaven. It seemed odd, there weren’t any undead or demons that he could sense. “Are they being deterred by the door of Heaven?” Thought Castiel as he stepped toward the sandbox. The hidden runes in the sand lit up, leaking an inviting glow into the air around them. Jack was just as confused about the lack of evil dead in the area and decided to try his own search, which came up fruitless, yet there was this nagging feeling that something was off.

“Come on Jack, let’s make this as quick as possible.” Castiel held out his hand inviting Jack to join him in the sandbox, only they weren’t going to be building sandcastles.

Within a flash they were sent up into the winding hallways of Heaven. Immediately things seemed bleak. The lights were flickering on and off frantically leaving hardly a second of light to be shown. The hallways themselves seemed like some beast comprised of dark smoke writhed against the walls. Fearing the worst Castiel ran to the throne room, with a confused Jack in tow. Upon entering the room, he found Naomi sitting in one of the chairs next to Chucks’, her head in her hands but seemingly alright.

“Naomi, what happened here?” Castiel asked knowing his presence wasn’t exactly welcomed still within Heavens’ circle. He kept his distance to the doorway.

“It came to deliver a message.” Naomi muttered, not raising her head.

“What came?” Jack asked.

“The Shadow.” Her head slowly raised to look at Jack with a face bursting with a whirlwind of emotions. Anger, fear, hate, love, there wasn’t one you could pinpoint but it pained Castiel to see her in this way.

“It wanted me to deliver a message to you two.” She rasped holding everything within her to not lash out at the two of them.

“What was the message?” Jack asked. Castiel already feared he knew the answer but there was something else driving this emotion she was carrying, and he was afraid to dig any deeper.

“This. Changes. Nothing. Not even THE END.”

The room fell eerily silent, Castiel swallowed the lump in his throat. He already figured that, but what drove The Shadow to deem ravaging Heaven as a necessity? Was it because it is The End?

“Where is everyone?” Castiel finally broke the static that was starting to grate on his ears.

 “Dead.”

 “How?!” His hands balled into fists… All my fault.

“Did you not see the hallways? How do you think?!” She choked back a sob.

  I let this happen, how could I let this happen?

  “It’s over.” She returned her face into the palms of her hands. “Heaven is done.”

“I could make…” Jack was interrupted with a terse glance from Naomi.

“It wouldn’t be enough.” She hissed.

Mustering up all the courage he could Castiel took a step and knelt in front of Naomi, and softly placed a hand on her shoulder. She didn’t flinch or shy away, what would be the point?

“In the few years that I’ve been able to spend living with the humans, and the family I gained from joining them. I wouldn’t trade it for anything in existence. You are family to me as well, always have been and always will be. And with my family on earth there’s something one of them said when things were at their bleakest, when the sky was raining down and we felt all hope was lost.” Naomi raised her head to look into Castiels’ caring eyes, she was so tired and should hate him with every fiber of her being. He was the one who left. Yet in this moment she didn’t feel hate, or fear, or loss. She felt broken and numb as if everything inside her wanted to give up and let the pieces of her scatter into nothing.

There’s a tradition with Japanese pottery that has been handed down for generations. When a teapot or cup is broken, rather than throwing it away and purchasing or making a new one, they affix it back together. They use a method called Kintsugi otherwise called “golden joinery.” This technique employs a special tree sap lacquer dusted with powdered gold, silver, or platinum. Once completed, beautiful seams of gold glint in the exposed cracks of ceramic, giving a one-of-a-kind appearance to each “repaired” piece. This unique method celebrates each artifact’s unique history by emphasizing its fractures and breaks instead of hiding or disguising them. In fact, Kintsugi often makes the repaired piece even more beautiful than the original, revitalizing it with a new look and giving it a second life.

“Keep grinding. No matter how much it hurts, no matter how hard it gets, you gotta keep grinding. And that’s how we’re gonna win.” Castiel took her hand in his and helped raise her to her feet. “We keep fighting, together.” They weren’t quite the perfect words he was aiming for, but a dear friend… no, a family member had said it, it quelled his dark thoughts in his time of need. He hoped it had done the same for Naomi.

As Naomi stood slowly taking in the words Castiel said while gripping his hand tight, a little piece of her that she thought she had lost in the chaos seemed to reappear. A sense of duty, no… it was rather a sense of longing, for what she wasn’t sure. To make things right again? To get the angels back somehow? To get Heaven in working order again?

“What do I do?” She asked still unsure if she was even allowed to ask such a question.

“What’s the first thing that needs to be done here in order to keep the souls of Heaven from falling back to Earth?” Castiel inquired.

She looked at him in confusion, he knew the state of it all and what was to happen next. Why bother asking a question that he already knew the answer to?

  Wait!

   “Come with me.” She stood up straighter. Her vessel was an utter mess, but she couldn’t bother to give it a thought now. This task was more important. Hell was already loose upon the Earth, measures needed to be taken to ensure the souls of Heaven weren’t lain waste to the beasts from below. There was only one option left and there was only one being capable but the only way to find said being was through a rather large magnifying glass, one only God or his angels could access. “It’s a long shot, but if anyone can do it, it’s these two. I’ll assist in anyway I can, even if I have to…” She led them winding down multiple endless hallways, Jack was doing everything in trying to keep up with them. Then without warning the hallway suddenly opened up into a massively expansive stark white room, it had no windows or doors, but judging by the minimal shadows that their vessels gave off one could tell the walls were not 90-degree angles. The floor slopped downward toward the center where it flattened out making it easier to stand. It was as if they were inside a dewdrop.

Naomi turned to face the two boys as they were getting their bearings.

“I haven’t seen this room since…” Castiel started, “But why are we here? This is just the Observatory. And if I recall correctly this room requires a massive amount of energy to function. The last time it was on was…”

“Just after creation. When God disappeared.” Naomi finished. “I’m well aware.” She paused knowing what needed to be done next. “Stand there Castiel, Jack I may need your assistance.”

“Wait!” Castiel raised an arm to stop Jack. “First you have to tell me why. And another thing, I will not allow him to die for this.”

“He won’t Castiel, you have my word.” She reached a hand toward Jack giving him a loving smile. “Castiel your job will be to find Amara.”

“What!?” He shouted, “How will that even be possible? We couldn’t even find Chuck with this, and you believe it will find Amara?”

“I have faith.” She smiled, still extending her arm as she patiently waited for Jack to be released from his fathers’ grip.

Slowly Castiel released his grip on Jack, but not before pulling him into a fast embrace.

“No matter what happens, do NOT use your soul. Do you understand me?” Castiel pleaded fighting the urge to pull himself and Jack and run back to the Bunker.

“I won’t. I promise.” Jack said shakily, the shock from the sudden embrace raising his apprehension as to what will happen next.

Castiel released Jack lingering one hand on his shoulder until Jack left it entirely, taking the hand of Naomi who was still smiling brightly. Together she led him toward the opposite wall and placed a hand on a hidden pad. A door-shaped portion of the wall instantly evaporated away, she led Jack into the small room with her. It was a touch cramped but it soon expanded after realizing there was more than one being inside it. With a click two white rods appeared on opposite walls that jutted out horizontally.

“What are these?” Jack looked on them with amazement, but he wasn’t sure if he should touch it.

“They’re power cores. It takes one or two beings with a rather large amount of power to call the Observatory to function.” She informed while touching hidden buttons on her side of the wall that remained unseen to Jack. “God doesn’t even need the use of this room; it was made specifically for us. But only Archangels alone, or ten angels could offer enough power to use it.” She turned to face him as she finished pushing a few buttons. He was looking at the wall that separated them and Castiel. With one button push she made the wall sheer, so they could see him, and him them.

“Are you ready Castiel?” She spoke softly, Jack was wondering if Cas could even hear...

“Yes.” He replied quickly.

“You have her in your frame of mind? Her sense of presence?” She clarified.

“Yes.” He replied flatly, looking at Jack at first with concern but broke it with the sense of duty that needed to be done.

“Then let us begin.” Naomi raised a hand above her power core, turning to look at Jack. “When I say three, we both touch the cores at the same time. This device runs on grace, spend it sparingly, don’t let it pull you in. If you are pulled in, I won’t be able to help you and you will die. Do you understand?” She gazed into his eyes looking for a sign of understanding.

“I understand. Don’t let it pull me in. But what about you?” Jacks’ face changed from readiness to concern.

“Don’t worry, this isn’t my first time.” She winked.

Jack smiled at her content with the answer.

“He’s a Nephilim so his amount of grace surpasses even Archangels, but I can’t let him use the amount they do. Even Michael was a mess after one go on this for only two minutes. I don’t know how long it will take to accurately find her…”

“One…”

“But I have faith in them.”

“Two…”

“All of them.”

“Three!”

[winryofresembool]

EdWin ice skating AU, chapter 5.5

A/N: Tadah, here it is! And yes, you read that number correctly. The reason I’m giving this chapter that number is because it DOESN’T continue from where we were left off in chapter 5. Instead, I’m showing Winry’s point of view of the events between Ed leaving his hotel room and running into Winry at the gym in chapter 5. Also, let’s pretend for the sake of this fic that it’s actually normal for the skaters to hang out together :D Please enjoy, and remember that feedback is the only payment I get for this :)

Previous chapters:  1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Next chapter: [x]

Words: 1929 (is this the longest chapter yet?)

Genre: this chapter probably goes under ‘general’.

Warnings: Ed’s injury mentioned but nothing else I think?

”I just remembered I need to be somewhere.”

Those were the last words Ed said before leaving Winry to stand alone in the corridor, entirely dumbfounded.

Winry knew that was the lamest excuse he could have come up with, since he had said only one day earlier that the hours after lunch were dedicated to rest. Besides, he didn’t seem like someone to forget his meetings just like that. Had she done something wrong? Had she pushed Ed too hard by asking him to tell about the incident? Those questions ran through her mind as she tried to process everything that had just happened.

“Winry?”

The girl turned around, seeing the dark-haired captain of Ed’s hockey team approach her.

“Huh?” She was still too confused to form proper sentences.

“Why are you standing there? Where did Ed go?” Roy asked.

“I… don’t know. But why are you here?” Winry tried to counter. “I thought it’s a habit of yours to take a nap at this time.”

“I had some plans but someone canceled on me…” Roy smirked like it was not a big deal. “Apparently they had forgotten they have a team photo shoot today. I thought I’d go out for a walk because I couldn’t sleep.”

“Why do I have a feeling I know who that someone is?” Winry smiled mischievously, glad to distract herself with Roy’s relationship issues instead of hers. “Why are you so mysterious about it, it’s not like you aren’t allowed to date female hockey players, right? Is she taken?”

“No, that’s not it… It’s just that our coach set us a no-dating clause for the Olympics – stupid, I know, but apparently he thinks we have more energy in the games if we don’t ‘go around sleeping with all the ladies we meet’ so I’m trying to keep a low profile…”

“What about the other players though?” Winry asked, trying to think about Maes Hughes and his Gracia instead of Ed. She and Ed weren’t even dating, they had just hung around a couple of times! “I mean, Gracia is getting married to your teammate pretty soon…”

“Somehow I have a feeling our coach doesn’t really care about them. Besides, Ms. Hawkeye’s (Winry didn’t miss how Roy mentioned Riza’s name for the first time) grandfather is a general manager on our team and I swear he knows everything. He would immediately tell our coach.”

“Wow. Touch luck.” Winry laughed.

“You are avoiding my question though,” Roy noted. “What happened with Ed?”

“I have no idea,” she shrugged, her expression turning back to serious. “He just left.”

“He didn’t say anything?” Roy raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“No, not really… He just claimed he had some place to be. He was lying, clearly,” Winry stated sadly.

“I’m gonna go talk to him,” Roy said suddenly.

Winry hadn’t expected this kind of reaction from him. Every time she had seen Roy and Ed together, they had been making fun of, borderline insulting, each other, and she hadn’t gotten a picture that they were close. But acting this way implied Roy indeed cared about his teammate more than he let on, as if he saw himself as some kind of a father figure to Ed.

“Wait… I don’t even know where he…” but she didn’t even get to finish her sentence before Roy was already gone.

Shaking her head, Winry decided she’d go out too to get some fresh air and to sort out her thoughts. It seemed almost as if Roy knew something she didn’t…

Suddenly it occurred to her that her first performance would be in only two days and here she was, thinking about something irrelevant. It wasn’t like her to get stuck into relationship drama like this. Luckily she’d have her next practice later that evening, and she’d get to focus on things that made sense, like spins.

After returning to her room to get her warmest and most water-proof coat, she headed out. She regretted her choice to take a walk pretty soon after stepping out of the hotel, because it was snowing and winding rather harshly. It made her thankful she wasn’t a snowboarder, cross country skier, ski jumper or anyone else who had to compete outside.

At some point she found herself in front of the arena in which Amestris’ hockey women practiced, wishing she had an excuse to go in. As it happened, she got one when Riza Hawkeye showed up by the door, apparently planning to get something from the team bus.

“Riza, hey!” she greeted happily.

“Hi, Winry! Why are you here on this weather?”

“I just needed to get out of the hotel for a moment… But I didn’t realize the weather was this bad.” Winry rubbed her neck awkwardly, a habit she had picked from a certain hockey player…

“Right… I hope it gets better soon, I don’t even want to think about how dangerous it would be to compete right now,” Riza noted. “Anyway, do you want to come in? We just had our team pictures taken, we are only having a short ice practice now before the afternoon break.”

“Sure, why not. My practice isn’t for several hours, Gracia’s with her fiancé right now and Rose and Paninya are probably goofing around somewhere so it’s not like I have other places to be…”

Winry suddenly realized she hadn’t really seen her fellow figure skaters outside the practice sessions during the entire time she had been at the Olympic venue and made a mental note to catch up with them when she got a chance. The girls were nice, but ever since Rose and Paninya started dating, Winry felt like a third wheel in their company, ending up spending more time with Gracia. But now that the hockey players were in the same area, both of them had become distracted, something she hadn’t expected at all before the Olympics. Well, she knew Gracia’s future husband was on the team, so she wasn’t surprised about her, but she hadn’t imagined herself getting interested in anyone. Even though she had known Ed in her childhood, she didn’t understand why she was suddenly so drawn to him. Still was, despite his weird behavior, she admitted to herself.

“Hey,” Riza pulled Winry out of her thoughts as she opened the arena door for her, “have you seen Ed today? He took my headphones earlier when his own got broken, but I haven’t gotten them back yet. And I enjoy working out way more when I can listen to something while doing it.”

“Um…” Winry started awkwardly, “I might have.”

“What’s that tone?” Riza immediately noticed. “Did something happen?”

“I was supposed to… have a meeting with him, but he left early.”

“Left early?” Riza asked. She crossed her arms on her lap, urging Winry to tell more. “Why?”

Winry was relieved she wasn’t asking why she had had a meeting with him. “I wish I knew,” she repeated the same mantra she had with Roy. “I asked him about something personal, and he started to answer but suddenly freaked out about something… and just left.”

Riza seemed to think about something for a while and then answered:

“Winry, I know Ed better than you probably realize. He used to visit me with one of his teammates who often looked after him because his father was always absent.”

Winry couldn’t help but roll her eyes at Riza’s obviousness but said nothing. The older woman continued:

“The men’s team works with us quite often, because hockey isn’t that big a sport in Amestris. That means I see him rather regularly, and I think he sees me as some kind of a motherly figure. He seems tough on the surface but has gone through a lot, and my guess is that whatever you were talking about triggered some bad memories in him, and he didn’t want to show you he was upset.”

“Oh. I mean, I figured it might have been something like that but hearing you confirm it makes me relieved.”

“He’s told you about his automail, right?”

“Yeah. Actually, that’s kinda why I was with him today. I asked him if I could take a look at it because as you know, I want to become an automail mechanic one day. Um…” Winry decided to ask the question that was bothering her, “do you know how he got it? I probably shouldn’t ask about this, but it was why he freaked out today.”

Riza seemed to consider her answer for a moment, observing her friend as she sat down on a bench to watch the practice. “It’s probably better if you know. I don’t know everything myself, but here’s what I know through Mr. Mustang.”

Winry smirked slightly. Now both Roy and Riza had mentioned the other one by their name without noticing it. Riza didn’t notice her reaction, instead continuing:

“Someone tried to attack his brother, and he went between them, taking a bad hit from a skate.”

“Oh my god.” The amusement on Winry’s face turned into horror and she covered her mouth with her hand. “That’s… awful… It’s pretty amazing he’s able to play after that.”

“Yeah. Unfortunately, that isn’t the only big obstacle he’s had to overcome, though,” Riza said as an afterthought, not realizing at first she was revealing too much.

“What do you mean?”

“Hawkeye!” Riza’s coach yelled suddenly, stopping Riza from answering. “We are having a practice here, it isn’t like you to just chat with other people when you should focus on hockey.”

“She’s right,” Riza sighed. “I should go. But hey, let’s talk more later.”

“You bet,” Winry agreed, smiling although she still felt a little troubled by Riza’s revelation. She watched as the older woman hit the ice and shoot the puck right in the top left corner of the goal net with accuracy that made justice to her last name.

Seeing Riza’s enthusiasm and hearing about the obstacles Ed had had to overcome to continue playing made Winry wonder why she had chosen figure skating instead of hockey. Maybe she had just found the chasing the puck part silly. Or maybe she hadn’t wanted to continue because hockey was a contact sport and hurting someone or getting hurt herself wasn’t definitely something Winry wished. Hearing what had happened to Ed made her flinch, and she couldn’t help but admire him for continuing playing despite all that. Of course figure skating had its own risks too (even more so on the mental side; Winry was constantly self-conscious about the fact that she was ‘normal sized’, whatever that meant, and busty instead of nearly anorexically thin like some of her rivals), but at least she wasn’t going to hurt anyone else when skating, spinning and jumping on her own.

Eventually Winry got bored of sitting around while the others were having “just a short practice”, which in reality meant a rather tiring looking session; the coach Armstrong didn’t go easy on her players even right before the Olympics. She waved at Riza to sign that she was off and decided she would go to do some training too; she may not have had access to the ice at the moment, but truth to be told, she hadn’t been spending as much time at gym as usual lately.

She was in the middle of her mental practice, going through her moves in her mind, when she reached the gyms the Olympic athletes used. When she realized who was coming towards her, she quickly forgot which jump she was going to go through next.

Edward.

[looselucy]

July

On the Sunday morning, it was the dire sound of raindrops pattering down on my tent that had woken me from my slumber. On the Monday morning, it was the beautiful sound and feel of Harry’s lips pattering kisses against my forehead that woke me.

Instinctively, I shimmied closer to him, my hands pressed against his chest as he closed his arms around my frame, still kissing my forehead. I hated the thought of waking up without that, without his tender lips embracing my forehead that way. How would waking up ever be satisfying again after that? I slowly opened my eyes, my eyelashes catching the bottom of his chin and causing a huge grin to spread his tender kisses, before he eventually stopped and pulled so he could see my face. “Mornin’.” He greeted. “Hi.” I breathed out. “You sleep okay?” “Amazing. Did you?” “Really good.” He nodded. “The best I’ve had for weeks.” I knew it was early, because we were supposed to be packed up and out the gates by 10:30am, and there were only a few noises coming from outside that signalled people were awake and packing their things. Harry took my small hand from his chest, and wrapped his own around it, his thumb rubbing smooth lines over my skin, his eyes searching every line of my face, as though trying to find some kind of sign that I was regretful of what had happened with us the evening before. It didn’t exist. Because no matter how complicated, no matter how stupid it was, really, I wouldn’t have changed that evening for the world. “I don’t want to go.” I whispered. “I thought it would be nice to have just a few minutes relaxing, just us two, before Zayn wakes up and starts yelling that we need to clean up after ourselves, cause it’s a small festival and they shouldn’t have to clean our shit.” He mimicked. In the few minutes before I fell asleep the night before, I wondered how things would be in the morning. I half expected to wake up in an empty tent, that me and Harry would barely acknowledge each other as we packed up our things in silence, pretending what had happened, never had. But Harry’s body clock had woken him early, just in the hope of having some more time with me. I had woken in the sweetest way imaginable, still in his arms and reeling in the evening before, and that was down to him. He could have left, and I wouldn’t have blamed him. But he hadn’t. I was kind of lost for words. Suddenly I didn’t know how to hold a conversation with him. I decided the only thing I could do, was nuzzle closer to him, to breathe him in and enjoy being that close with him whilst I could. “You missed Liam?” He asked me from nowhere. “Yeah. Which is weird, because I went so many years without him. But… I dunno. He’s not just my brother, he’s my best mate.” “I wish I had a brother.” He shrugged. I cracked my neck so I could look at him and his face more clearly, and I always loved little moments like this where I realised there were still things about Harry I didn’t know. There was still so much of him I had left to uncover and reveal. “Really?” “Yeah.” He continued. “I always wanted an older brother.” “Well, you can’t have mine!” I smiled, but he didn’t. “Um. Did your mum never... Was it always just you?” “Yeah. Then it was just me, Kev and Ben. I remember when I was thirteen, going through my grotty teenager stage-” “When are you going to leave that stage?” I smirked. ”Shut up, idiot.” He pinched at my side, causing me to squirm and giggle. “When I was thirteen, I went absolutely mad at my dad’s. Like, a proper little brat. I fell out with them for about a week because they never adopted anyone else.” “Seriously?” I could have listened to Harry talk about his life for weeks, months, years on end. I wanted to know all of those tiny little things about his life, all the irrelevant pieces of nonsense that had added up and created this boy I was completely besotted with. “Yeah. I asked them to adopt Niall.” He grinned. “Nice. How did Niall’s parents take that?” “Did I not-? Shit. Niall... Niall lives with his uncle.” “What?” “His parents died in a car accident when he was six. He-he lives with his uncle. Didn’t I tell you that?” “No. Fuck.”

I often forgot that learning about someone meant that you would also learn facts about other people they were tied with, and those facts weren’t always going to be innocent or mundane. I wished I had known that about Niall. I was racking my brain trying to remember every single conversation I’d had with Niall, and I just knew at some point, I had fucked up completely and started talking about families or whining about my parents’ divorce or something else completely ridiculous. I cursed, and buried my face into his neck, groaning and loving that my place to hide was against his warm skin. His arms tightened around me once more. “What?” He chuckled.

“I bet I said something so stupid.” I bawled. “I bet I said something totally inappropriate and condescending. Fuck. I wish I’d known.” “You won’t have said anything stupid.” He tutted. “Of course I’ll have said something stupid. It’s me!” “Listen, Niall won’t have taken anything badly. He’s all sunshine.” He comforted, rubbing his fingers down my spine with one hand, and still gripping my hand with his other. “You could have said something really, really bad, and he wouldn’t have thought anything of it. I promise.” I barely knew Niall, but that was probably true. I still felt like a royal tit though. “I guess so.” I tried. “Well, I know so. So cheer up.” We heard a tent unzip in our proximity, and our automatic reaction was to whip our heads up to see that it wasn’t my tent, both of us slightly panicked. But thankfully, no one had let themselves in my tent, but it did mean someone was awake. We both flopped back down at the same time, breathing a sigh of relief, and then laying apart for the first time in hours, but still looking at each other. “BOYS AND GIRL!” We heard Zayn yelling from outside. “I’m giving you ten minutes before I personally climb into all of your tents and drag you out! LET’S GO! We need to tidy up a bit. It’s a small festival, they shouldn’t have to clean our shit!” Harry clicked his fingers and pointed outside as I started laughing, muffling the noise with my sleeping bag as Harry grinned. “See! I fucking told you!” He chirped. I hid my face beneath the covers as I tried to stop giggling at Harry’s accuracy when it came to Zayn’s words, a little wary we would get caught, Harry still completely nude beneath my sleeping bag, and only a tiny bra covering my frame. Once my laughter died, I knew me and Harry were going to talk, whist we had the chance. I was dreading it before anything had been said. We went back to staring at one another blankly before we said anything. “So...” I sighed. “We’ve got ourselves into a bit of pickle.” He cooed. “We have.” I agreed. A bit of a pickle was putting it lightly, to be honest. I wasn’t entirely sure where Harry stood when it came to his feelings for me, but as far as I was aware, for him, it was just sex. Sex with a friend. That was all I knew from the information that had been given. For me, my feelings were all over the place, and they had been for months. What had caught me off-guard, was that I’d woken that morning and immediately realised the sex didn’t complicate my emotions any further, yet it did seem to put them under a magnifying glass. It intensified them. Then on top of that, we were going to bloody live together, until May at least. I wasn’t even sure what I wanted. But for once, I was actually thinking about the complications rather than just wanting to burst and tell him how I felt. I was 100% sure on my feelings for him, but I wasn’t 100% sure what would become of those feelings now we’d finally had sex. I didn’t know if the sex was all I’d needed from him, and that maybe after that, our spark could fizzle and fade into nothing. It didn’t seem possible, but also, it wasn’t implausible. I was thinking logically. “What should we do?” He quizzed. “I dunno. I... I don’t know.” “Can we make this less complicated?” “No.” I chuckled. “I just... Maybe we need to take a step back.” “Um… Okay? What d’ya mean?” All I could think about clearly, was how much I cherished him. I was thinking about Mike and Grace. The way they were taking steps back from one another, really taking in their feelings. Giving themselves a chance. The break I thought I was going to have from Harry when we finished our first year, was now something I knew I needed. I could clear my head, one final time. I could finally figure out, once and for all, if I had just been feeling a vivacious lust that I’d never truly been able to riddle, or if my feelings were absolutely tangible. I needed a breather. That’s all I could think. To save my sanity and to save us, I really needed some time out.

“Maybe we should, just stay out of touch. Until we’re back at uni.” I breathed. “O-okay...” He lowered his brows. “I dunno. Then we can get back to uni and we can catch up and just... see how we feel. See where we stand.” It felt like those words should have been coming out of Harry’s mouth, not mine. I didn’t want to chew more than I could swallow, to lose myself in him when I only had two months to just breathe and wrap my head around everything before going back to being constantly in his company. The evening before, it was like we had to completely remove ourselves from our real lives just to be together once. We had to create a fictional world, just so we could share in that moment and ignore the complications. There was something still missing. There was something still unclear, and I needed some space to calm down, and contemplate making those two worlds collide. It felt like the smartest thing I had done in months. I knew I would probably find it hard, but it was smart, because the harder I found it, the more it would confirm my feelings. And if September rolled around, and nothing had changed, I knew it would be time to stop biting my tongue and actually tell him how I had been feeling. “So you just wanna... Not talk?” His eyebrows were getting lower and lower. “I.. Umm. Well, I don’t want to not talk. But, I think it’s wise.” “You sure you won’t miss me?” His eyes twinkled. “I’ll have enough of you from September onward. I’ll be bloody bored of you.”

It felt good. I wasn’t fully sure why, or how, but it did. If you had told me that I would be making a decision to keep me and Harry apart, to go just under two months without speaking, I would have said you were totally mad. Completely insane. Why would I decide that? But it was time. It was time I figured myself out, to step away from him. That’s when I made the final promise to myself. If I went back to uni in September, after two months of absolutely no Harry. If my stomach still flipped, if my pupils still dilated whenever my eyes were blessed with seeing him, then I would tell him. I would tell him I did not see him as just a friend, and I would deal with the consequences of such an action. If my feelings hadn’t shifted, I would pluck up the courage and just let him know. It was easy, promising myself that there and then. I had to wonder, that if and when the time came, would I actually find the courage and do it? I didn’t need to think about it then. All I had to do, in that moment, was be with him. “Hm.” He mulled. “But what if I miss you?” Words like that, were what I needed a break from. Harry saying ridiculously sweet things to me and them amounting to nothing but me feeling even more confused. “It would be weird if you didn’t.” I smiled. From outside, we heard Mike and Louis retreat from their tents, greeting the morning with groggy voices. I wished we had longer. “I guess it’s time to put the tent down.” Harry sighed. “Urgh. I hate this part.” I groaned. I moved closer to him again for these last few moments, pressing my nose into his chest and dancing my fingertips over his butterfly. He kissed the top of my head, holding me close and tight. “Ready to go back to the real world?” He asked me. “No.” I uttered bluntly. “No… Me neither.” He moved and stroked at the beds of my eyes as I way of catching my attention, and the very second he had it, he slowly pushed his lips against mine. It was intense, drawn out. It felt like a lifetime before he licked at my bottom lip and I widened my mouth to welcome him. His hand was wrapping tightly in the hair at the back of my head, his breath was deep and drowsy as we melted into one another. The kiss didn’t last too long, but in my heart, it dragged out for an eternity spent in his arms, the feeling of his kiss enchanting the blood that coursed through my body and creating a new life within me that almost guaranteed that I would feel the same way two months down the line. It was unforgettable. I was breathless when he pulled away, and it was almost like my lips swelled just so they could remain a little closer to him than usual once he had distanced. He brushed some hair from my forehead, kissed it tenderly, and then sat up and started dressing himself, so I did the same. We didn’t talk as we got dressed and rolled up our sleeping bags, but it wasn’t uncomfortable, it was almost reflective, like we were packing away this world we had created for ourselves, reality looming just outside my tent. But it was okay. Reality was okay. Just okay. Not long after, we both retreated from my little pink tent, everyone smiling our way, questioning looks on their faces. “Mornin’.” Zayn greeted. “How come you’re in Pippa’s tent?” We both stood upright and stretched in the morning, and I was grateful to hear how innocent Zayn’s question seemed to be. He didn’t sound suspicious at all. “My tent started raining in last night,” Harry shrugged casually. “So I kipped with Pip.”

“That’s weird.” Zayn mulled. “We just checked in your tent and it’s bone dry.” Suddenly Harry was choking over his words and stumbling over himself a little bit just trying to think of a reply. It hit me then, that his tent had never leaked. Harry had used that as an excuse to climb into my tent with me. I couldn’t quite believe it. Had he planned on sleeping with me? Had he just planned an innocent evening of cuddling? He obviously had some kind of intentions, or else he would have just stayed in his own, dry, tent. I couldn’t say anything. Harry couldn’t bloody say anything. Thankfully, someone did. “Well, it stopped raining not long after we got back.” Louis shrugged. “I bet it just dried up.” “Yeah, probably.” Harry coughed. “Better take it down.”

Mike had barely been listening in the first place, and then Zayn just shrugged it off, mainly because he didn’t think there was anything to shrug off. Harry wandered over to his tent and started un-pegging it, and Louis darted his head to me when no one was looking. We both had wide eyes. He knew. “Want some help, Pip?” He asked me, signalling to my tent. “Sure.” I gulped. We both automatically moved round to the back of my tent so that we could hide our faces as we crouched down on the floor and started taking the pegs from the ground, with great difficulty. “Oh my god!” He whispered harshly. “SHHHHH!” “Did you-” “Yes.” “Oh my god.” He whelped. “What the hell? Are you okay? Is everything okay? Does he like you?” “No!” I whelped. “Well, I don’t know! I’ll text you, or something. When I’m home. I can’t talk about this right now.” “Are you okay? Do you regret it?” “No. I’m fine. Everything is fine. Seriously, don’t worry about it. It’s good. I promise.” I just hated the thought of Zayn finding out, because he was so happy once me and Harry finally started getting along, it made everyone’s situation better and it meant he could live with the two people he really wanted to, without there being any awkwardness. If he knew that me and Harry had slept together, there was the possibility of him getting angry and worrying that we had ruined that for ourselves. Zayn being blissfully unaware was what we needed. I pressed my finger against my lip in an attempt to shut Louis up, and he just nodded, and helped me take down my tent. Thankfully, it wasn’t quite as testing at putting it up had been. The only thing that was difficult was trying to fit it back into the tiny bag I had gotten it out of, but with the efforts of me, Louis, and Mike, we managed. Harry did his all on his own. Zayn had gone and grabbed us all a bin-bag each during our efforts, and we cleaned up some of our mess, cans and food packets we had carelessly thrown on the floor over the weekend, so that Zayn couldn’t moan at us. But in a way, I didn’t mind. I liked being there so much, dragging out our time was nice. I really didn’t want to leave. But all too soon, it was time. We were swinging our bags over our shoulders, and looking longingly at the dry patches of grass that had been sheltered and squished beneath our tents the whole weekend. It was time to go home. “How’s everyone getting home?” Zayn asked. “I’m driving.” Louis raised his hand. “Does anyone need a lift? I’ll go wherever, I don’t mind.” “Can I have a lift?” Mikes voice was close to gone. “I’m not far from here.” “Sure, man. Harry, you good?” “Yeah, I’m fine. I’ve got my car here.” “No shit. You drive?” “Everyone bloody drives, Pip.” Mike tutted. “We need to get our shit together.” “I know.” I sighed. “We ready?” Louis asked. “I guess so.” Harry shrugged. With that, we started walking away from our spot, and with every step I took, I felt sadder. I was already counting down the days until the next year, when hopefully we would return. I then started thinking about what things might be like in a years time, what might have changed, how I might feel. It gave me a headache, so I stopped those thoughts pretty quickly. I need to stop thinking. No more thinking for me. We were all relatively quiet as we walked out of the festival and towards the car park, and the closer we got to the real world, the more hungover I felt. Everything was going majorly downhill. Louis got to his car first, and we bid goodbye to him with hugs and smiles, and I was thankful he didn’t say or whisper anything about me and Harry. He was doing very well at keeping my secret hidden. I was pretty thankful it was him I had opened up to. I spotted Harry’s car from miles off, because I had been looking for it, dreading how this goodbye would go because I genuinely didn’t have a clue. What I would have loved to have done was kiss him one last time, but that definitely wasn’t an option. Once we reached his vehicle, we stood waiting as he threw all his things into his boot. I questioned if Harry’s thought process was similar, if he was hesitant for this goodbye because what the hell were we even supposed to do? I was painfully transparent 90% of the time. What if he hugged me and I just burst into tears? Or what if I couldn’t control myself and just started kissing him like a lunatic. Holy shit. I can’t do this! As my breath started to pick up amidst my frenzy, Harry stepped to me and just started casually hugging me. I barely even noticed. I was so busy worrying about our goodbye, that I was half way through it before I even took note. He gave me a friendly kiss on the head, before he moved onto Zayn, the two of them hugging it out. “See you both in September.” He grinned. “Thanks for bringing us, bro.” “No worries. Drive safe, man.” Zayn replied. Then it was over. As I watched Harry clamber into the front of his car, it was officially over, and a wonderful world I had known for one short night, and one blissful morning, was drifting away in front of my eyes. I wasn’t sure I would see that world again. + + + Rather than traveling home and coming back a month or so later, on our way home from the festival, me and Zayn decided it would be a good idea for him to stay the night then. So there we were, eating crisps, both freshly showered, sitting on my bed and reflecting over the weekend. “Who do you usually go with?” I asked him. “It varies.” He shrugged. “Obviously it started as a family thing. My mum took me, and then when my sister turned two, she started coming as well. It was like that until I was sixteen, that’s when my mum and my sister stopped coming.” “Your sister doesn’t go?” I gawped. “She thinks she’s too cool for it.” He pfft. “Wait til she’s eighteen, and she’ll start going again, I guarantee it. But since then, my mum always gets me and a few friends tickets for my birthday. So, for the past four years I’ve took loads of different people.” “And obviously, you know my next question...” I smirked. “Were you the most fun?” He rolled his eyes. “Well were we?” I chirped. “Don’t tell my mates from home, but yeah. You were.” I tussled the wet hair on top of his head, and shovelled some more crisps into my mouth. Anyone would have thought I’d have had my fill of Zayn after the weekend, but it was impossible to be around Zayn too much. I was sad that the day would come where it would no longer be acceptable for me to live with Zayn. He lay down at the foot of my bed, hands on his chest, facing the ceiling as he mimed along to the Arctic Monkeys song that was playing in the background. I gently kicked his hip. “Oi.” I smiled. “What?” He chuckled. “If neither of us are married by the time we’re forty, shall we just do it?”

“Give me till fifty.” He nodded, closing his eyes. “I believe in late love.”

“Deal.”

I was hoping things wouldn’t get to that stage, but it was always nice to have a backup plan. On top of that, I had Zayn bloody Malik as a backup plan! I felt lucky. “You’ll be fucking married anyway.” He huffed. “How do you know that?” “Because it’s what you want!” He whelped. “And I just... I see you as one of those people who gets what they want.” I couldn’t see myself as that person. Not at all. I decided not to voice my thoughts, but all that was going through my head was how I would be going back to uni in September, to do a course I didn’t even really want to do. Back to a boy who I desperately wanted to be with, but didn’t even have the guts to tell him. I was sickeningly stubborn sometimes, but there were steps that even I couldn’t take, things I didn’t dare to do. I wasn’t even flattered that Zayn saw me as someone who would just go out and get what they wanted, more embarrassed that I seemed that way, but I wasn’t. “I suppose.” I shrugged. Almost like he knew I needed a saviour, there was a little knock on my door, and then Liam poked his head in, with an innocent smile on his face. “Hey.” He greeted. “Mind if I join?” “Course not, man.” Zayn said what I was thinking. I shuffled a little further onto my bed so he had room to sit with us. Nothing was better than spending time with those two. “I’m glad you said yes, cause I’ve ordered us pizza.” He grinned.

“You’re my fucking hero.” Zayn cheered. That was the first time it happened. I wanted to talk to Harry. I just wanted to send him a text, a picture of me Zayn and Liam just hanging out together. I wanted to send a picture to make him jealous, because I really wished he was there with me and I knew he would want to be there with us too. That’s how long I lasted. It had only been a matter of hours since we left the festival, only a matter of hours since I got home, less than an hour since I had finally had a shower. I wasn’t caving, there was no way in hell I was going to text him, but the point was that I really bloody wanted to. I rest my head on Liam’s shoulder as the weekend started catching up with me. My bones ached, my head seemed to be constantly spinning, but I was still in a euphoric state. “I’m coming with you, next year, by the way.” Liam told us. “How you coping?” Zayn asked him. “What d’ya mean?” “Well, we’ve been at a festival for three days, and getting back to reality sucks. I’m struggling.” He breathed. “How long were you traveling?” “Umm... Like... Five years.” He sighed. “Is reality ugly or pretty?” Zayn asked him. I had been wanting to ask him how he was feeling to be back at home myself, but I knew the main reason he was home was to comfort my mother. If my parents’ marriage was still in one piece, I knew for a fact that Liam would have been in another country I had never heard of. There were home comforts here that he would never experience on the road, but there were a million things our home town could never offer him, which traveling had. I just hadn’t asked him, because I felt like reality had slapped him in the face enough. In a way, I didn’t want to rub salt in the wound. “I don’t really know.” Liam ran a hand through his short hair. “It feels good to be here with my mum. It’s nice. But... I dunno. It’s not ugly but... I’m not attracted to it, if that makes sense.” “Yeah, man. I get that.” I suppose it was a better reaction than I was expecting. At least it wasn’t ugly to him. I decided to comfort him in one of the only ways I could. “Well, I’m glad you’re here.” He rest his head on top of mine, and I could feel his cheek plump up as he smiled, wide and real. “See, it’s tiny little moments like this that make it attractive.” He said truthfully. “As long as I can ignore working tomorrow.” Liam was lucky that he had the option of working with our father, but at the same time, I imagine that made work even more unappealing every night. At least he was speaking with him. That’s when Harry crossed my mind again. I knew what I needed to do. “Back in a minute.” I mumbled. I rushed downstairs with my phone in my hand, shaking already. Harry had told me he thought that I should be the one to take the first step when it came to rebuilding my relationship with my father, and I knew he was right, even if at the time it did make me throw up. I thought now was a better time than ever. Still high on the festival, freshly showered, and reeling in the company of two people I loved more than anything. I had to try and get in contact with him. Because ever since Harry mentioned it to me, I couldn’t help but think about how scared my dad must have been; how horrifying even the thought of talking to me must have been. I was still so angry with him, and I was still hurt, but I had to do something or else we would be stuck in limbo. I refused to do that when the situation, and my phone, was in my hands. I had to try. I went out into my backyard, and without giving it too much thought, without giving myself the chance to cop out and change my mind. I found my old house phone number, and pressed dial. The dreaded dial tone dragged on and on, like I knew it would, and with each passing second, I felt sicker. But nothing prepared me for what I heard. “Hello?” It wasn’t his voice. It was hers. Jennifer. The woman he had been cheating on my mother with. Her best friend. The bitch who had gone behind my mother’s back for years, and finally tore our family apart. She had obviously moved in. I hung up. Without any more thought than that, I hung up the phone, and I just cried. I really wanted to pluck up the courage, press dial again and ask the devil woman to pass the phone over to its rightful owner. But instead, I cried. I cried for my mum. I cried for Liam. I cried for myself. And I cried for every family that had ever been through anything remotely similar.

[baby-prince-oppa]

[NOTE: Like a dumbass I was, I accidentally deleted the original post of the Descendants Family Tree while I was updating it, so I’m posting this again. Please show as much love with this one as you did with the first by reblogging! Thanks!]

♔ ♕ - Disney’s Descendants - Family Tree  ♕ ♔ 

Note: I may update the chart once there are new characters that will be introduced in any upcoming books, movies, spin-offs, etc.

I made this chart so I can group the characters in their respective movies and whom they descended from. Most of the information I got was from Disney wiki. There are possible cases where some characters only adopt their children and raise them as single parents (hence the ??? at the opposite side of their name). If you know any other information that I have overlooked, please let me know.

There are some things I want to point out (and thoughts I had while making these charts) so here’s an explanation under the cut.

Beauty and the Beast

The fact that there are Descendants characters who are named exactly/closely similar like their parents really irritates me to no end. Like how lazy can Disney be anyway? But let’s be real though; Gaston would definitely name his sons after him because he’s that much of a narcissist. However in Descendants 2 and Rise of the Isle of the Lost, Gaston has a third son named Gil. This raises two questions: Does Gaston have any more kids other than these three? Do they share the same mother or not?

The Beast doesn’t have an official name according to his character wiki (although I was really tempted to type “Adam” since that name stuck with me out of nowhere throughout my entire childhood).

Sleeping Beauty

I’m really curious as to who is Mal’s father (like seriously. As said from someone else in some other post, “WHO WAS BRAVE ENOUGH TO BANG MALEFICENT?!” which to be honest, sounds like a game show title. LOL). According to the novel, The Isle of the Lost, we definitely know for sure that he is human. When is he gonna make an appearance? Along with the other missing parents of the Rotten Four?

Snow White and the 7 Dwarves

We can see here that Evie and Snow White are stepsisters and Prince Florian is her brother-in-law.

I’m wondering if Snow White and Florian have any children yet at this time. If so, this would’ve make Evie an aunt. :D

Doug has 3 other cousins, Bashful Jr., Sleepy Jr. (both in School of Secrets), and Gordon (Return to the Isle of the Lost, chapter 43). 

Aladdin

Two things are mentioned in The Isle of the Lost: Aladdin and Jasmine had a son named Aziz and Jay mentioned he has a cousin named Jade. Since Jafar has a twin sister named Nasira (who appeared in the video game Aladdin: Nasira’s Revenge) it would make perfect sense for him to have a niece.

Another thing mentioned in Rise of the Isle of the Lost, is that Aziz is the eldest son, implying that Aladdin and Jasmine may have more than one child.

In Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams, Jasmine has a cousin named Sharma who was a schoolteacher, but it wasn’t clear as to whether she’s her maternal or paternal cousin.

Genie is in a loving relationship with a female djinn named Eden on the show Aladdin: The Animated Series. With that much devotion to each other, I’d be pretty surprised if they don’t end up having a child together in the Descendants verse (unless Disney happens to overlook that fact as well. Just like everything else. -__-).

There’s also another unknown fact (not sure how many people know about this) that Aladdin has a canon father, Cassim, who appears in the movie Aladdin and the King of Thieves.

In the live-action Aladdin (2019) movie, Genie had 2 children with Jasmine’s former handmaiden, Dalia; a daughter named Lindy and a son named Barro. It seems that Genie’s other daughter, Jordan, doesn’t exist in this particular universe.

101 Dalmatians

“Who was brave enough to bang that crazy bitch, Cruella de Vil?” would’ve been added to the list of questions that will probably go unanswered. Although someone did pointed out that in the original novel of The Hundred and One Dalmatians, Cruella was married to a furrier but that detail was omitted in the Disney verse. (Discussion about that can be found here: 1 2 3 .)

There is official info on Cruella’s relatives, so her having a nephew named Diego seems plausible. I tried to fit them in with what space I had. Looking at it however, I’m pretty sure either Cecil B. de Vil is Diego’s father or Cruella has some other unknown sibling who is the parent of Diego.  

The Dalmatian puppies listed on the chart are the ones that Perdita and Pongo have naturally. The other 86 puppies are adopted (like hell I have the energy to name every single one of them LOL).

It has been confirmed that Carlos’s middle name is “Oscar”. Carlos Oscar de Vil.

Cinderella

Anastasia have just entered in a relationship with the local baker in the sequel Cinderella 2: Dreams Come True (he even made a small cameo at the end credits in Cinderella 3: A Twist in Time). I had a discussion with a few other friends that the baker might have went with Anastasia to the Isle willingly and if that’s not the case, then Anastasia might have had children with someone else (which made me sad to think about, since she and the baker seemed to genuinely love each other). I’m willing to bet that Anthony Tremaine (who appeared in The Isle of the Lost) is Anastasia’s son, if we are to follow the “first name alliteration rule” that applies to almost every Descendants character. He also seems to be Lady Tremaine’s only grandson.

In Descendants 2, Drizella has a daughter named Dizzy (another stupid name). Might appear to be her only child if we were to disregard the Isle of the Lost novel.

The novel doesn’t specify how many granddaughters Lady Tremaine has.

As we can see here, Chad Charming is cousins with Anthony and Dizzy.

There are questions whether Jane is either a full blooded fairy or a half blood. This post addresses that.

Mulan

The only thing I have to say about this is; I wonder if Shan Yu has a kid in this universe too? (Even though I don’t really agree that every single Disney character should bear a child.)

The Princess and The Frog

Tiana’s and Naveen’s child(ren) has got to exist somewhere.

I have this headcanon that Freddie was actually reborn from another life by the help of Dr. Facilier (or somewhere along the lines of being resurrected from the dead), but due to some complications from knowing the facts (i.e. magic can’t be used on the Isle and voodoo probably doesn’t work that way) that headcanon is pretty short lived.

Dr. Facilier happens to have another daughter named Celia who appears on Descendants 3.

Tangled

So I’m really confused as to who Rapunzel’s and Eugene’s daughter is. From the web series, “School of Secrets”, there’s a girl named Anxelin who was said to be Rapunzel’s daughter, yet in “Wicked World”, a girl named Ruby was also confirmed to be Rapunzel’s daughter. It’s still unknown whether or not they are sisters or if it’s the same character renamed.

Ginny Gothel is a character who appeared in The Isle of the Lost.

The Little Mermaid

Ariel is the first Disney princess to have a child in canon (The Little Mermaid 2: Return to the Sea), so shouldn’t that count for something? But knowing Disney, they would probably throw in a redhead girl whose first name starts with “A” just to fit in with the criteria.  -___-  Either that or Melody would only be mentioned as the “older sister” of this girl.

In “School of Secrets”, Ariel has a niece, but it’s not clear as to which of her sisters is the mother of this girl.

In Descendants 2 and Rise Of The Isle Of The Lost, Ursula’s daughter, Uma, was introduced. 

Ursula has a sister named Morgana (The Little Mermaid 2: Return to the Sea). Morgana is often very jealous of Ursula because their mother always considered her to be her favorite daughter.

Thanks to @auradone who pointed it out, there’s a musical that portrays Ursula and Triton as siblings. This means that Ursula (and Morgana) is Ariel’s aunt and Melody’s great aunt. Although to me it’s kind of confusing since they’re both a completely different species. (Honestly I’m not exactly on board with this story line since Ursula and Morgana’s mom was shown above. Definitely doesn’t seem like she’d be related to Triton.)

Peter Pan

Before, I thought Harriet and CJ were the same person but the confusion was cleared in Rise of the Isle of the Lost that Harriet, Harry, and CJ are apparently siblings (oldest to youngest in that order). Still unsure as to whether or not they all came from the same mother.

I strongly disagree that Peter Pan would have any kids himself. He’s a child and will always be a child, so I highly doubt that he would take on the responsibility of being a parent. EVER. If Disney ever try to shove that bullshit under our nose, I will completely lose ALL faith that they’re going to put any effort into accuracy.

Mr. Smee had a son named Sammy in the 1st novel Isle of the Lost, but has 2 other sons in Descendants 3, Squeaky and Squirmy.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Thanks to @72crowe89 for reminding me that Phoebus and Esmeralda had a son together.

Quasimodo and Madellaine had a happy ending in The Hunchback of Notre Dame ll, so I’m pretty sure they have to get married at some point.

I guess since Frollo was so used to have Quasi as a personal slave (and so abusive towards him), he had to assign that same fate to his daughter (hence her job as the bell ringer at Dragon Hall, the school on the Isle). How sad…

Others

Again, who’s in charge of naming the kids of Disney characters when their “originality” is as dull as a brick?

Clayton has a sister named Lady Waltham who appeared in a spin-off TV show, The Legend of Tarzan. 

Alice’s sister doesn’t have an official name (it wasn’t even mentioned in the credits), but in a few sources, her name is Mathilda. I just went along with it, because it would look weird if I only put in a nameless sibling.

Pin? JUST PIN?!! THAT HAS GOT TO BE THE LAZIEST NAME EVER. They couldn’t even give him a legit Italian name that starts with a “P”? Are you serious right now?! I pray to God above, that better be just a nickname. This was mentioned in the second novel Return to the Isle of the Lost.

Yzma apparently has her own little family; her mother, Azma, and her two nephews, Zim and Zam, who all appeared in the TV show spin-off The Emperor’s New School. Yzma’s daughter, Yzla, appeared in the books Isle of the Lost and Return To The Isle Of The Lost, while her son, Zevon, appeared in Wicked World.

[scarwasright]

Fullmetal Alchemist (2003) Special Edition guidebook transcript, including Ed’s decoded notes

What it says on the label. The Blu-Ray special edition of FMA 03 came with a ton of cool shit, including a hardcover artbook with the character profiles originally from the DVD booklets as well as some other, “handwritten” notes from Edward. Since I know not a lot of fans got their hands on this set, I promised a WHILE ago that I would transcribe it! Someday I’ll have scans, but I don’t have access to a scanner atm.

I’ll be listing the character notes by 3 categories: Profile Text, Edward’s Notes, and Edward’s Coded Notes.

Profile Text- the brief character blurbs that were already published in the DVD guidebooks that came out in Funimation’s original localization. Most recurring characters got one.

Edward’s Notes- The book’s title page indicates that it was issued by the Amestrian State Military, and that it belongs to Ed. Little handwritten notes, presumably from Ed, are scattered throughout the character profiles. Some are silly, some are... very not silly.

Edward’s Coded Notes- Some of Ed’s notes are written in a very simple code that replaces the English characters with symbols. It’s straightforward enough that I was able to break it in about an hour - I posted a key over here.

Not included in this text are the image captions associated with the characters’ model drawings, since they don’t make any sense without context. Stuff like “Al age 7, Ed age 8.” There are also many artist notes in Japanese, and I am anything but a Japanese speaker, so no luck there.

Fair warning, there are Royed, Royai, and if you squint, Edvy jokes in the coded text. I’m just writing what’s in the book.

Full transcript behind the cut!

THE TITLE PAGE indicates that the book is military-issued, and Edward has signed his full name on it. The following page is printed with a torn page from a smaller, obviously older book. In ornate letters, it reads the verse that was written in part in the Transmutation Circle the boys tried to use to bring back Trisha:

Pale and black with false citrine, imperfect white and red, The Peacock's feathers in gay colours, the rainbow which shall go over, The spotted panther, the lion green, the Crows bill blue as lead. These shall appear before you perfect white, and many more others. And after the perfect white, grey, false citrine also, And after these, there shall appear the red body invariable, Then you have a medicine of the third order of his own kind multipliable. 

Edward’s Coded Notes: Written into the margins of the “original” military book, “Sir George Ripley,” with an arrow pointing to the pressed page. Along the side margin, he’s written “thhe* recapitulation of thhe* twelve gates.”

Explanation: Sir George Ripley is a famous British alchemist whose verse appears on this page. The full transcript of the poem Edward pasted in his book can be found here! It is also, notably, the incantation recited by Eckhart in Conqueror of Shamballa when she sought to open the Gate using Envy.

       *Two people seem to have worked on the coded notes, one on the title and transmutation circle pages and the other on the character pages. The handwriting is a bit different, and the title+circle pages are noticeably sloppier than the character pages as far as adhering to the cipher goes. The symbol used for TH in the character pages is used only for a T which is followed by an H on the title pages. In the character pages the standalone H character is absent when the TH character is used, so the inconsistency makes for an obviously unintentional duplicate on the title page.

Edward’s Notes: There are twelve tally marks in the margin of this page, as well as some scribbled equations that are difficult to make out. Ed has awful handwriting.

EDWARD ELRIC

Profile Text: Edward Elric is the Fullmetal Alchemist. He is a prodigy, becoming the youngest State Alchemist in the Army’s history. Edward stunned his superiors by using alchemy without an array, a miraculous feat never witnessed before. Ed despises being a “dog of the military,” but it grants him the opportunity to seek out the legendary Philosopher’s Stone, a crimson crystal rumored to increase the power of the alchemist who uses it.

Edward seeks the stone so that he may restore his missing limbs, and more importantly reunite his younger brother Alphonse’s body with his soul, which was tragically trapped in a suit of armor after a failed attempt through alchemy to revive the dead Trisha Elric, the boys’ mother. Edward realizes he has a gift, a gift that most State Alchemists could only dream of having. But he knows that with that gift he becomes a high profile target.

As Edward reluctantly fights off a crazed assassin who vows revenge on all State Alchemists, Edward begins to unravel the clues that reveal not all is as it seems at the highest levels of the State Military. And, that there is a terrible secret behind the precious Philosopher’s Stone.

ALPHONSE ELRIC

Profile Text: Alphonse Elric was but an innocent young child when a tragic chain of events changed his life forever. First, his father mysteriously vanished while Al was too young to remember. Then, after battling terrible illness, Al’s mother succumbed to death. Finally, during a horrific accident performing forbidden alchemy, Al’s soul was sealed inside a suit of armor.

Undaunted and unashamed by all that has happened in his short life, Al carries on, eternally supporting his older brother, Edward, in his search for the Philosopher’s Stone, a legendary gem with the power to restore Al’s body and Edward’s lost limbs. Al knows that he and his brother’s actions were wrong. He only wishes for a chance to make things right.

Edward’s Notes: In smudged, barely-legible pencil, “Brother, don’t sell me short!” (thank u @gryphcat cross-referencing your own book to confirm that it does NOT say “Brother, don’t call me short!”)

Also notable is the circled “???” with an arrow pointing to that adorable picture of young Al enthusiastically ripping off his shirt.

Edward’s Coded Notes: FYI, there isn’t anything under the loincloth, [indecipherable*]!

       *I think the letters were flubbed a bit, here. The characters read “[y/i]n[u/v][f/p]er[u/v]s.” I get the feeling it was supposed to say “Impervious!” buuuut someone messed up.

HOHENHEIM ELRIC

Profile Text: Supposedly lost to the ages, Hohenheim Elric, the father of the brothers Elric was close at hand after all, lurking in the shadows of history as the momentum of the search for the Philosopher’s Stone reached fever pitch. Hohenheim reappears in Resembool allowing the final pieces of this mad puzzle to begin falling into place, as he bears the secrets of the Philosopher’s Stone in his weary heart... A heart beaten down by lost love, a heart full of loyalty to his boys*. Destiny has delivered Hohenheim to a crucial point, a spot in time when all that is good prepares to unravel. Perhaps he will be strong enough to move forward and rise above his shady pas, nad push his shoulder against the wheel of fate that threatens to crush all he ever cared for.

       *We watched two very different series, apparently

Edward’s Coded Notes: That bastard [arrow pointing to his portrait]

TRISHA ELRIC (who shares a page with Hohenheim)

Edward’s Coded Notes: Why did they both have to die?

ROY MUSTANG

Profile Text: Roy Mustang is the Flame Alchemist and a veteran of many brutal battles. He personally knew Edward and Alphonse’s father, which sparked his curiosity once he discovered that Hohenheim’s sons were dabbling in alchemical arts. Mustang is eager to climb the ladder of success and hopes that discovering the immense talent within Edward helps him ascend the ranks. Still, Mustang’s soldiers are the most loyal in all of the State Army, insinuating that there is more to this man than his thirst for power.

Edward’s Coded Notes: Roy Mustang is dead sexy in a miniskirt!* [T]ake that [y]ou smug [b]astard!** Why does he have to be so attractive

       *Most likely a reference to an old convention gag. Back when FMA was big enough that it had dedicated cast panels, fans would almost always ask Vic Mignogna to say this line.

       **The bracketed letters are cut off, but it’s fairly easy to assume what they are given the context.

RIZA HAWKEYE

Profile Text: Riza Hawkeye is quite possibly the most perfect model of a soldier in the State Army. Although Hawkeye is Roy Mustang’s subordinate, she is also his right hand woman, acting as an advisor and, based on the circumstance, devil’s advocate. Her no-nonsense attitude demands respect from everyone she meets, military and civilian alike. She is cool, calm, and collected, and exceptionally skilled in the use of firearms.

Edward’s Coded Notes: [bridging the gap between Roy and Riza’s facing pages, underlined with an arrow] Just get married already!

MAES HUGHES

Profile Text: Maes Hughes is a Lieutenant Colonel in the Investigations Division of the State Army. Hughes is obsessively in love with his wife Gracia, and only child Elicia, who from birth shares a strange connection with Ed and Al. Hughes is friendly and extremely casual, sometimes to a fault. He can quickly lapse back and forth between discussing State matters and going on and on about his family. As a high-ranking official in the Investigations Division, Hughes is privy to plenty of top-secret info, which he shares with Ed on the sly. When Hughes is nudged into physical combat, his weapons of choice are small throwing knives, which he wields with incredible and deadly accuracy.

Edward’s Notes: [slightly obscured by water damage] I’m sorry, I never meant for any of this to happen

ALEX LOUIS ARMSTRONG

Profile Text: Major Alex Louis Armstrong was given strict orders from Mustang to protect Ed. But, don’t let his civilian clothes fool you. With his strapping build and gutsy bravado, this Strong Arm Alchemist will give his life to ensure he completes his mission successfully. If on thing’s for certain, Armstrong will make sure that Ed’s within arm’s protection.

This straight and narrow man won’t even give Ed as much as a loss in an argument. He’d rather use his genteel decorum to kill improper manners with his heroic kindness. Even during their down time in Resembool, there’s not a moment to lose. Armstrong is committed to his life as a soldier, and knows daily training is essential - even if that means cutting firewood with his bare hands.

Edward’s Notes: [circled] Why are there so many sparkles?!!

JEAN HAVOC, HEYMANS BREDA, VATO FALMAN, KAIN FUERY

Profile Text: In a world where loyalties change with the tides, good subordinates are a premium. Roy Mustang has this luxury with Havoc, Breda, Falman, and Fuery. These four loyal officers will do anything their commander requests of them and do it well, to boot. However, these four couldn’t be more different. Havoc is the tragic playboy of the group, always wishing he had that special someone to share the rest of his days. Breda may be called a “dog of the military” from time to time, but Breda would rather stare down an entire army than get anywhere near a real dog. Falman is overly formal, causing some of his comrades to wish he would lighten up. Fuery is the soft-spoken technical wizard under Mustang’s command. He isn’t used to much hand-to-hand combat, but is handy enough in a pinch. As with all of Mustang’s men, these four would follow him until death.

DENNY BLOCH AND MARIA ROSS

Profile Text: Abrasive in demeanor, Lieutenant Maria Ross is always determined to do the right thing. Sometimes, she has trouble distinguishing between her actual duties and the chance to deliver a lecture. Sergeant Denny Bloch, along with Lieutenant Ross, was given the responsibility to keep the Fullmetal Alchemist under close supervision. Regardless, they fall behind when danger approaches.

Edward’s Coded Notes: Watch out for her slap!

IZUMI CURTIS

Profile Text: The stern Izumi Curtis is more than just an alchemy teacher to the Elric brothers. As the passionate matriarch of a two-person family, Ed and Al may be the closest thing she’ll ever have to children. Resurfacing after hearing rumors about her former pupils, it is quite possible Izumi may know more than she lets on about the true nature of alchemy and the sinister homunculi.

Edward’s Coded Notes: [circled] She always looks like a pissed off housewife!

SCIESZKA

Profile Text: Scieszka is the prototypical, scatterbrained librarian. With her impeccable retention of facts, the clues that others miss quickly slide into place for this unlikely hero. Hopefully, her pleas for justice will not fall on deaf ears.

Edward’s Notes: [circled, pointing to Scieszka’s distressed portrait] Did they run out of books?

ROSE

Profile Text: The once vibrant Rose has wilted due to a hard life of tragedy and turmoil. After suffering the harshest of injustices at the hands of the State Military, Rose finds herself a mute and a mother... The mother of an infant, and the mother of a movement. Now the spiritual leader of the Liore revolutionaries and advised by the ever-present Lyra, Rose must struggle to lead her people to peace. With her beloved Liore in the crosshairs, she can only hope to find her voice in time to half the demise of everything she cared for.

Edward’s Notes: “You’ve got a good, strong pair of legs, Rose. You should get up and use them.”

RUSSEL & FLETCHER TRINGHAM

Edward’s Notes: Ed himself has drawn in the boys’ transmutation circle for plants, and has labeled it as such. He has also sketched one of their flasks and written next to it “For red water?”

Edward’s Coded Notes: Why is he so tall?!!

#48 & #66

Edward’s Notes: He has drawn the Slicer Brothers’ blood seals and labeled them. The secret behind Lab 5... ???

Edward’s Coded Notes: Prisoners!

FRANK ARCHER

Profile Text: His heart as cold as his flesh is pale, Frank Archer is willing to embrace corruption for a cause... especially if the cause is blatant self-promotion. Looking to bolster his reputation by crushing a revolt in Liore, Archer sets fate in motion with little regard for anything other than pleasing himself and the Fuhrer. His lust for war and his hunt for the infamous Scar may cloud his vision, however, as he potentially confuses sacrifice for suicide.

Edward’s Coded Notes: You [m]ight want [s]ome [s]unscreen* [indicating the image of his mech form] The Terminator?

ZOLF J KIMBLEY

Edward’s Coded Notes: Mullet?!

SHOU TUCKER

Profile Text: Shou Tucker earned the title Sewing Life Alchemist thanks in large part to his masterful work creating Chimeras for the State. In fact, Tucker was the first alchemist to produce a Chimera capable of speaking and understanding the human language. Tucker is a man with incredible brilliance and immense talent. The irony is that he can create life, but that his own is being controlled is not lost upon Shou Tucker. With his execution staged by the Military, Tucker has spent all of his time devoted to research and experimentation, with one purpose in mind: bring back the daughter he once readily destroyed.

Edward’s Notes: Because we’re not Gods, we’re humans, tiny insignificant humans. Who couldn’t even save a little girl...

Edward’s Coded Notes: I’ll never forgive that bastard.

SCAR

Profile Text: Like Ed, Scar is able to use alchemy without a transmutation circle. Scar both hates and embraces his “curse.” He has a special grudge against State Alchemists because of past atrocities towards his homeland of Ishbal. The Ishbal Massacre was a vicious military offensive against Ishbal due to conflicting doctrines because the citizens would not put aside their traditional beliefs and embrace alchemy. Scar believes his god has instilled in him the right to kill State Alchemists at will for what they have done to his people. He truly believes his cause is righteous, no matter what it takes. 

Edward’s Coded Notes: [indicating Scar’s hair] Frosted tips are over, dude... Those glasses are so dated...

LUST

Profile Text: The beautiful homunculus Lust desires to become human through the massive power of the Philosopher’s Stone. She dreams of finally finding out who she really is inside, and to discover what will happen to her after death. These are all very human traits for a being that supposedly has no soul. Lust uses any means necessary to traverse the dilemmas of her existential crisis... She is able to corrupt the minds of the weak, forcing them to follow her every whim. Like Scar and Ed, the gorgeous and sad Lust is traveling down the same whirlpool of misery and darkness that sucks away all who quest for the Philosopher’s Stone.

Edward’s Notes: [smudged, almost beyond legibility] I just hope Havoc doesn’t meet her... Edward has drawn an arrow from Lust’s locket to Scar with ???, as well as a two-way arrow between the facing pages with the writing What’s their connection?

Edward’s Coded Notes: Maybe she and Roy* should go on a date with Roy* - I heard she’s a real screamer**

       *Another seeming typo.

       **Probably a reference to Laura Bailey’s marriage to Travis Willingham, as they play Lust and Roy in the English dub. Roy is responsible for Lust’s death in the manga and second anime, and she does not go quietly.

GLUTTONY

Profile Text: Loyal homunculus companion to Lust, Gluttony, eater of anything, might be the saddest example of the cruel nature of the hunt for the Philosopher’s Stone. Simple and savage, Gluttony operates at once like a child and an animal, a creature of pure instant satisfaction. He simply knows one thing: Hunger. Not for power of prestige, but only to satisfy his reason to be... this only adds to the wretchedness of his tragic existence.

Edward’s Notes: I-DCCC-DCCI-VM?*

       *I have absolutely no idea what this is in reference to, so if anyone knows, I would LOVE an answer.

ENVY

Profile Text: Envy is one of the homunculi, a group of pseudo-humans whose creation is still an enigma. Some say they were created in a lab. Others believe they’ve always been among us. But no matter where they came from, their intention are nothing but evil. Envy has the ability to become a perfect physical replica of whomever he or she desires. Envy is without gender. In fact, Envy’s mind is so far gone that he or she can’t remember who he or she used to be. Envy’s power is truly amazing.

The shape-shifting homunculi Envy could be anyone, utilizing the ability to take on the physical appearance of any being at will. Envy will morph into a stranger behind you in a smokey cafe, or the trusted ally that works with you to uncover corruption and twisted abuses of power, or even your loving spouse. And beneath the familiar surface pure evil waits. Never turn your back on Envy. Even after you’ve slit the creature’s throat.

Edward’s Notes: Areca triandea Phoenix canariensis, Ceros nucifera Sabal minor Syogrus romanzoffiana* [next to this, Edward drew a little palm tree with a ?]

       *the binomial nomenclature for a queen palm tree

Edward’s Coded Notes: I’m not into palm trees

GREED

Profile Text: A thick-skinned enigma even among the mysterious homunculi, Greed wants it all... money, power, women, and the greatest prize of all: eternal life. Greed leads a band of outlaw chimeras and instructs his freakish minions to kidnap Alphonse Elric, believing the young alchemist is the key to the door of immortality. Headed for a brutal showdown, Ed will test the homunculus’ reputation as the Ultimate Shield. In return, Greed will test every notion Ed ever held to be true and real.

Edward’s Notes: [smudged] I wonder why Dante made him...

SLOTH

Profile Text: Draped in the appearance of the late Trisha Elric*, the water abomination Sloth was created on that fateful night of lost innocence; the night when the Elric brothers first set out in search of the Philosopher’s Stone. After being nursed and groomed by Dante and Pride, and her involvement in the slaughter of Maes Hughes, she is forced to confront Ed and Al. While cursing them for her fate, Sloth’s seemingly maternal memories and longings may provide the homunculus with her downfall... nothing in the universe is more resilient than a mother’s love. Something stirs in Sloth, where a soul once rested.

Edward’s Notes: [a two-way arrow, pointing from Sloth’s name to hand-written Juliet Douglas] [*above this line in her bio, Ed has aggressively written NO!]

Edward’s Coded Notes: [circled, with an arrow indicating the bio] She is not my mother!!!

WRATH

Profile Text: The homunculus Wrath might be the most mysterious of all the dark creatures. A volatile combination of childlike mischief and soulless evil, Wrath was discovered on a treacherous island by the Elrics and their teacher Izumi. Timid at first, Wrath’s demeanor soon shifts as layer upon layer of intrigue is peeled away, uncovering a core of supernatural madness. Able to perform alchemy, at times even in ways that Fullmetal himself doesn’t understand, it becomes clear that Wrath is a monster. His connection to Ed and Al’s teacher could provide answers to questions that are too shocking to ask.* Suspicious of the boy, Ed will give an arm and a leg to uncover the truth about the wild child.

Edward’s Coded Notes: [with an arrow pointing from the bio text Ed has underlined] It’s hers!

KING BRADLEY (PRIDE)

Profile Text: The Fuhrer King Bradley commands both the State Government and the State Army making him seemingly the most powerful man in the entire world. Known as one of the most cunning and vicious warriors in history, the homunculus Pride, the Fuhrer himself, has orchestrated countless bloody conflicts in his search for the Philosopher’s Stone. Calm, cool, collected and created by Dante... Bradley moves his pieces into striking range. Is it possible, though, that the Ultimate Eye is blind to his own role as a pawn in someone else’s sinister plot?

Edward’s Notes: He’s a homunculus that can age?!!

Edward’s Coded Notes: How did no one figure it out?!!

DANTE

Profile Text: Dante’s actions, her attempts to control the uncontrollable and manipulate innocence, have carried her through the centuries with a singular goal... immortality. At times seemingly aligned with the powers of good, while dipping her toes into the red pool of evil, Dante’s path has been one clouded by murky intentions. At the end of the quest for the Philosopher’s Stone, as all of the players look up past the strings that carried them through this desperate dance, whose face will they see?

Edward’s Notes: an arrow connects Dante’s name with Lyra, which is circled

Edward’s Coded Notes: So glad she isn’t my mom!

After the character pages, there are four pages of alchemic arrays. The writing here gets really vague, as all of it is written in Ed’s code and there are many mistakes.

The Thule Society’s array has a four letter word with an exclamation point that begins with NA, followed by the character for X and a sloppy character that is probably I/Y but looks more like a J. There are no other instances of a Z to confirm, but I think X and Z may be the same character, and it was intended to say “NAZI!”

Majahal’s array is noted with I wonder what happened to Lebi? This probably refers to Carin, Lebi being the name she took on after forgetting her past. This, too, is a bit confusing because the I/Y character also looks like a J.

Trisha’s human transmutation circle just says Sorry Mom I’m sorry...

The circle for the Underground City is noted with To open the Gate?

The Grand Arcanum Philosipher’s Stone circle is labeled “Ishbalan?” and Ed has circled it.

AND THAT IT’S FOR THE NOTES, hopefully this is of some value to... someone out there, lmao.

[jasonwentcrazy]

Belief Ain’t Enough

Just because it’s true doesn’t ever mean it’s the truth.

One of the choices you have when faced with a problem is to change your perception of the problem. People sometimes resist altering their perceptions, believing they are right in what they see, hear, and remember. The truth is that your perceptions are often inaccurate, particularly in emotionally charged situations. So one way of being more open to  changing your perceptions is to consider the ways your perceptions may be inaccurate.

How you focus your attention affects your perceptions.  

When you have an idea in your mind you tend to look for evidence that supports that idea and not pay attention to evidence that says the idea isn’t accurate. This is called confirmation bias. If you believe you are lucky whenever you wear your red sweatshirt, you are likely to focus on the times that is true and discount the times you were lucky when you weren’t wearing the shirt and when you weren’t lucky when wearing the shirt.  Democrats will look for evidence they are right and Republicans are wrong and vice versa. You tend to look for and pay attention to evidence that supports your beliefs.

So one way of changing your perception is to check the evidence.  Is the way you see the situation factual?  Find a way to count or otherwise test out your thoughts in a more objective way.  Maybe your brother actually spends as much time talking with you as he does your older sister. Maybe your husband puts his clothes away one out of three times instead of never.

Most people don’t like uncertainty so they classify people and experiences into categories. People also learn to associate outcomes with cues when they may not be related.

If a sexy redhead wearing tight pants and stilettos flirts with your husband and ignores you, you may tend to be suspicious of the next woman you meet who wears high heels.  People tend to believe that when people are similar in one way, they are likely to be similar in other ways and this is often not the case.

Not only that, but because you have the idea that she is going to behave a certain way, you may be overly sensitive to any actions on her part that support that view (confirmation bias).

In addition, you may have learned to associate attractive redheads with being abandoned or teased. You may or may not be aware of the reason for your immediate fear, dislike and distrust of redheads wearing heels. Either way it will influence your perception of the person.

Be aware that humans tend to group and classify people and interactions in ways that aren’t correct. People can respond emotionally to subtle cues such as the sounds or lights or smells without any awareness of their emotions coloring their thoughts. Mindfulness can help you be aware of your reactions and pause to consider all factors before responding.

Your first perception affects your later perceptions and decisions.  

In some cases, buying a car is a good example of how this works. The sticker price for the car is $25,000 but the salesman gets you a special deal. You can drive off the lot for $20,000.  At this point, $20,000 looks great. What a bargain. This is called the anchoring effect.  Your belief in the car’s value is anchored at $25,000.

If you “anchored” at a reasonable cost that would be okay. But you don’t. A couple of researchers (Ariely) looked at the anchoring effect by having students bid for items in an auction. They held up a bottle of wine, a textbook or a cordless trackball and described how wonderful the item was. Then each student wrote down the last two digits of their social security number. The digits represented the price of the auction items. If the last two digits were 33, then the textbook was $33.  If the last two digits were 15, then the wine was $15.  After writing down the pretend price, the students bid for the items.

The students who had high social security numbers paid up to 346% more than those with low numbers.

When you have negative reactions to situations or to yourself, how much is an anchoring effect influencing your view?  For example, if your first experience with learning or going to therapy was negative, think how that might influence your later experiences. If your first experience with your neighbor was negative, then maybe that has colored your later interactions.  That saying about the power of first impressions seems to have some truth.

If you imagine an event occurring, your view of the likelihood of that event actually occurring increases. 

If you worry and ruminate about awful events, such as your spouse cheating on you, you are also increasing your sense of how likely it is that the awful event will occur. That of course will add to your misery, though it’s only a change in your perception.

Stopping rumination is difficult. If you ruminate, consider that your perception of the likelihood of the dreaded event actually occurring is skewed. Consider letting the ruminating thought pass through.  Perhaps replace it with visualizing yourself behaving effectively with problems that come your way.

You don’t see all that happens right in front of your eyes.  

Would you believe that you could be talking with someone about checking out a video and not notice that a different person brings you the video?  (e.g. http://www.theinvisiblegorilla.com) You often don’t notice major details in your environment.  You miss information.  So when you are upset about an interaction or a situation, consider that maybe you don’t have all the facts. It’s at least a possibility.

Sometimes making a decision that you aren’t the kind of person who does something helps you stop doing that behavior. 

Deciding that you aren’t the kind of person who eats sweets or who smokes will help you change your behavior. It’s like changing your perception of who you are helps you make different decisions.

Consider how your view of yourself could affect your perceptions. If you perceive yourself as a caring person, you might discount others’ complaints about you being selfish because that’s not who you are. If you view yourself as an angry person then you may respond with anger in an automatic way without checking to see if that is what you are actually feeling.

Being mindful of your emotions and actions and the effect of your actions on others can be helpful to increasing the accuracy of your perceptions.

When you’re in a negative mood you tend to expect more negative outcomes and see yourself and others more negatively.  

When you are sad or depressed, you are likely to see yourself as having little to be happy about or that you have little to look forward to. You are more attuned to painful events. When your mood changes your view of your future is more optimistic and your see the many reasons you have to be grateful though nothing changed other than your mood.

Keep in mind your perceptions may be mood dependent. Remind yourself that when you are in a different mood your views change.

Sometimes you let myths govern your responses.  

Imagine you’re at work. You see a man with a few tears running down his cheeks. If you believe that tears are a sign of weakness, you’ll perceive the gentleman differently than if you believe that expression of feelings is healthy or a sign of sensitivity. You may have the judgment without even thinking of the reason you are making it.

Consider writing down your beliefs about friendships, the opposite sex, relationships or any area of conflict you might have.  Then consider whether you are behaving according to rules and expectations that are actually myths.

It’s really difficult to have the whole truth. 

The man who cut you off in traffic may be trying to get to the hospital for the birth of a child.  The supervisor who didn’t give raises may have saved the department from layoffs and the friend you believe ignored you may not have seen you.

Sometimes you are upset because you interpret or give assumed meanings to events rather than staying with what you can actually observe to be true.  Sometimes your perceptions, and thus your reactions, are based on assumptions. You can observe that the man cut you off in traffic and you know that you were scared of an accident. You cannot observe that he did so because he is rude or has some other negative personality characteristic.

You reconstruct your memories. 

Your memories of the past can be influenced by interactions and situations that occur after the original event. The language that someone uses to ask you questions about the event can influence your memory. If you have gaps in what you remember, you tend to them in to make the memory “whole.”  And circumstances that occur after the original event affect your memory. For example, if you were best friends with someone at the time of the original event but have an argument that severed your relationship in the years after, then you will not remember being as close as you actually were.

Thus your memory/perception of what happened five years ago might not be as accurate as you think. Consider that others’ memories may have some validity even though their memories are likely flawed as well.

There are many ways our perceptions are actually inaccurate representations of reality. Keeping in mind that your perceptions may be faulty or incomplete may help you be more flexible in your views, giving you more peace and contentment.

[This is from some pasted text I had saved in my documents and I figured I’d post it here to remind me of it. Since it’s important.]

[tumblunni]

Bunni plays more monster rancher advance! Woo!

* I decided to go with Jade the golem. And I love her immediately. And she is my new daughter. LOOK AT HER

* Its neat that monsters now have traits! Its kinda like the abilities from pokemon, but you can have several of them and pass them down through breeding to get useful stuff on unexpected monsters. Jade was lucky enough to start off with one of those in her randomly generated stats! I’ll imagine that water resistance will really come in handy! And the other one seems to be the golem monster’s default ability, which looks like it’d be really good on a young monster and potentially critically awful in the big leagues when everyone starts bringing out one hit KOs...

* Also apparantly the super sparkly jade golem comes from crossbreeding with a Lesione, which is basically Nessie: The Monster. Its one of the cutest new ones added in this game! There’s also a kinda ridiculous action figure octopus thing with dog ears, and the chubby acorn-hugging cat creature i showed in my last post, and probably some more ones I’ll discover later. Its quite fun as someone who only ever played the early PS1 games! How many monsters did I miss???

* Tho it is WEIRD that now the status screen completely lacks mood and care style meters! this is gonna be tough! Seriously, they still have the items to reduce stress and raise discipline, but now there’s no way to even know what your current level is. Care style meter was CRITICAL, you had to constantly make sure you weren’t raising your monster too tough OR too spoiled, otherwise it can lose lifespan or training efficiency... Also its odd but neat that now the shop has a bunch of high priced key items you can buy that increase training efficiency, decrease fatigue, etc. In MR2 you had to find those very rarely in dungeons. Its a good change, now its more directly linked to how good you are as a rancher, not just how lucky you get. I have a nice goal to work towards!

* Also I LOVE THE SHOPKEEPER FOR THIS COUNTRY I still love the FIMBA region shopkeeper too tho, cos she was a nice older lady who was apparantly either Colt’s actual auntie or just a friend of the family. It was nice to have a bit of minor backstory to your assistant, and some relationships between the npcs. BUT STILL I ADORE MYSTERY SHOPKEEP What a cool design!! I hope we get some sort of sidequest to learn more about Crow (EVEN THEIR NAME IS BADASS) And its just kinda comical and endearing that all their dialogue is super polite and normal even though they look like this POST APOCOLYPTIC DOOM WARRIOR Crow is best npc aunt/uncle/mysterious nonbinary headcanoning person of awesomeness

* I found concept art of the npcs! I haven’t even met Ayase yet, she looks cute! Crow looks even more adorable badass when you can see their full costume. I do wonder why on earth they changed the name though? I would have thought that Karass would be rendered as Cross in english. That would have been badass too! It doesnt seem like anyone else got a name change, except Shamoa -> Chamois which would be pronounced the same.

* Also have a look at this random cute wallpaper from the japanese site! I wonder what festival they’re celebrating? I don’t know very much about japanese holidays but it looks really fun! Also: Aroma stop being a dick to your brother XD And it seems AGIMA is confirmed as Age Island Monster Association, tho its funny that the writing is a weird mix of english with russian letters thrown in at absolute random. O_O And I just found out that apparantly FIMBA stands for Fraternal International Monster Breeders' Association according to the wikia. Thank you, whoever added this ultra hard to find fact! I’m not really sure what it MEANS, though XD I guess its just an awkward japanese writer being like ‘fraternal = twins’... probably...? But that doesn’t even make sense cos FIMBA is supposed to be the first monster guild, and IMA is the one that split off from it, instead of vice versa...

* Look at this cool more detailed concept art of Crow from the sequel:

(I dunno why its split into two pictures, it was like that on the website)

Oh and apparantly Karasu is the japanese word for Crow, so the name actually is the same between languages! I feel dumb now XD I wish i could learn another language someday.

* ANYWAY BACK TO THE ACTUAL GAME ITSELF LOL Another change seems to be that now instead of training being split up by different exercises or jobs, its different monsters that tutor you. Whenever you retire a high level monster they can be registered as part of the interface here, and get to stay forever as part of the bakground animation. Thats actually really sweet, I hope I succeed in making Jade a trainer so she can watch over the next generation ^_^

Tho it is a bit of a shame that now all the exercises are more generic and unanimated, I guess they couldnt manage it with these really awful faux 3D models. And GAH, Golem seems to have an even lower framerate than everyone else! its just so visually awful, it looks okay in screenshots and falls apart completely in motion, its like friggin rotoscoping! Also wtf is up with this odd misalignment on the default monster trainers? I thought this was a sign someone else had already played the cartirdge, but I mean.. I started a new game and all...

* ALSO! This game’s obligatory ‘we translated Errantry as something entirely different’. It’s just called SPECIAL in all caps. At least training is called training and shop is called shop this time...

* I got lucky and Jade’s personality means she likes the one food nobody ever likes, lol! Apparantly her biggest dislike is battles, tho. I’ll try and not fight too much with her, I’ll just keep it to the mandatory test battles to rise in the ranks, and like.. as an absolute last resort when we’re running out of money. I wanna be a considerate pet owner!

* OH MAN MEGA UNLUCKY! She also dislikes the fatigue recovery item. I cant even tell if its reducing her fatigue at all, but i expect the effect is reduced a lot.

* WELL I FUCKD UP I immediately ran out of money and had to enter a tournement, which poor Jade lost awfully due to my fail technique as a mom T_T She has really good attack and defense but like ZERO accuracy! So enemies couldnt do much damage to her, but they were winning for doing ONE point of damage to her while she kept missing them til the time limit ran out... I made the same raising mistakes the first time I played the first game as a kid, I guess its been so long that I totally forgot... IM SORRY MY SPARKLE CRYSTAL BABY I’LL DO BETTER AAAAA

* There are some cute occasional random events to spice up your monster raising. Yay! I just got this one where your assistants are arguing over whether the AGIMA official boss wears a toupee, and he’s like ‘pull my hair if you want to prove it!’

Ilu grandpa chill bossman

* Also I ended up passing Jade’s first birthday without any sort of progress at all, I’m just desperately trying to not go bankrupt while I spam accuracy training til she can actually hit something :P I’M SORRY JADE aaaa i hope my dumb decisions in the first damn week havent doomed her to eternal failure now!! ive wasted so much time trying and failing at tournements just to make enough money to keep training her, she’s so behind on all the training and she’s so stressed and i’m SUCH A BAD DAD T______________T

[jovialbouquetgardenerworld-blog]

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