#and funny enough it’s always the same god damn user

[schnoodlestein]

For the love of god can people please tag or put content warnings or something on pictures of a man with a highly visible, profusely bleeding, and open self harm wound before sharing it around willy nilly, thanks

[sup-hoes-its-me]

Emotion (Kakashi x Reader)

A/N: Kakashi again...can't get enough of this mans tbh. U r an empath due to your kekkei genkai and Kakashi has always been difficult to read. Friend to lovers. Sharing one bed folks, we got some steamyyy shit here. Angst warning as well.

Word count: 6000

He was always alone. Ever since his childhood, he walked the world completely alone with only a few people there to support him. No mother, no father, no mentor, no teammates. He was at the mercy of fate his entire life, things being stolen from him time and time again. 

He just prayed that he could keep her. Y/N L/N, the only woman to have wormed her way into his heart and made a home there.

When they first met, Kakashi and Y/N, she cursed him for being such a weirdo. Apparently his mind was empty and his heart was seemingly full of sand. He was conditioned that way, and that is how he lived for the longest time. It wasn't a surprise for him to hear that.

But she thought it was stranger than anything she'd ever seen, and so she followed him. She would figure him out, bring him back down to Earth from his supposed high horse. That woman was determined, and frankly he didn't mind her being around. She was quiet enough that it didn't matter. Not to mention on the missions they had together, she was quite the partner.

Over time, she'd learned to read him like a book. It was part of her clan's kekkei genkai. The ultimate empath, I suppose. The ability to read a persons every single emotion and then turn that, if they so choose, into power. 

She was never the greatest fighter, but her negotiation skills were the best they could possibly be. She would dive into the emotions of another and manipulate them backwards and forwards to get what she wanted. 

It was overwhelming, walking into a room of people and immediately being bombarded with so many feelings coming at her all at once. Occasionally, if the situation was bad enough she'd have to take a seat and clear her mind, organizing each person in her mind like a filing cabinet of empathy.

But damn, did she try to weasel out every bit of feeling she could. It was just something that came so naturally, she couldn’t help but instigate whatever was brewing up inside him.

"Kakashi, if you're happy, you know you're allowed to express it. You don't have to hide it away," she told him, staring at the masked man sitting across from her at the table. He was watching as she sharpened her kunai, and she could feel the content running off his body in small bursts. He was feeling better. Better than he had in a little while. Of course she picked up on it.

He sighed, rolling his eyes. She was always reading him, he knew that. He just preferred when she refrained from mentioning it. It did, most times, feel like a bit of an invasion of privacy, how she could deep dive into the corners of his mind. There were things no one else could ever possibly know that she did. It was strange, but he was used to it.

"What? Want me to smile or something?"

"No, but you should let yourself go. Just drop the facade."

"Stop doing that. Getting into my head."

Quietly, she set down her blade and picked up the next one, taking a cloth and softly wiping away any dirt. Her eyes slide up to his for a moment, her all knowing gaze filling his vision. "It's basically impossible. Especially if you're the only one around. There's nothing else to focus on except you." He knew that. It wasn't like she had an on or off switch. That was the downside of this dojutsu. Unlike sharingan and byakugan users, hers was always pulling the strings of her brain.

"You've got that mission next week. With Naruto and a few of the other kids, right?"

"Yes."

"It's A rank, isn't it?"

She hummed in agreement. He had a habit of knowing about all her missions, more importantly being the dangerous ones. He wasn't necessarily scared for her, probably not. He was more cautious than anything. There was this nagging feeling in his head that he shouldn't let her go on these missions alone. That it was too dangerous for her to handle. 

But he was wrong. She was stronger than he thought, and could hold her own in battle. He was just a worrier. He'd just lost too many, seen too many bodies in front of his eyes to trust. God, he wanted to trust her, but he couldn't. She was too vulnerable. His friend, one of the only ones who hadn't died yet. For all he knew, her days numbered, that's how paranoid he was about everything.

"You'll be careful?"

"That's a silly question." He gave her a look that said he was more serious than anything, and she sighed. "Of course I'll be careful. I have people that would miss me if I wasn't." He was one of them. She could sense his fear whenever she said goodbye and his relief when she returned. He really tried to remain objective, but his heart said otherwise. 

And she would be a liar to say that she did not experience the same relief seeing him come home from missions, even if he was beaten and bruised to the bone, she was just happy he made it back. So many never got to come home. It was a sick world, they lived in, but she could relish in the little comforts.

"Don't worry about me. I'll always turn out fine. It's you and your dumb students we have to worry about."

"I hear you. Those kids are enough to drive a person mad." He rested his chin in his palm, the mere thought of those kids causing his blood pressure to rise.

"Thankfully my students never gave me any trouble. Sweet little things."

"Well, aren't you just lucky, Y/N?"

"What can I say? Kurenai and I got the luck of the draw with our students. You men had it rough, I have to admit," she laughed. It was funny that he was so unfortunate to have gotten assigned the Uchiha and the Uzumaki, two completely opposite but persistent forces. "Despite your perverted tendencies and your perpetual lateness, you still did a great job teaching them."

"Thanks. But do you really have to call me a pervert? I'm really not."

"Yeah? That explains why you read porn in public. Admit you're a pervert, you dumb old man."

"We're the same age-" he began to argue, but she just cut him off with her harsh words.

"Creep," she muttered, running the sharpening stone along her blade. He narrowed his eyes. She was being awfully annoying, and he knew she could sense his irritation building up. Yet she continued just to be a pain in the ass.

 He warned, "Hey. Watch it, L/N."

"Okay, okay, I'll stop...Pervert." She ducked her head when his hand reached out to wring her around the neck for being so frustrating, and she continued to laugh. It was nice, having a friend she could joke with and be around without having to worry about what she said. He might pretend to be mad, but she could feel the happiness still rolling off his body thickly under all that fake neutrality. 

He was happier than he'd been in a long while, and she found herself swelling with pride knowing that she might have helped make that happen. Her lips curled into the gentlest of smiles as she peered back up at him, and he found himself smiling back even if it was just through the mask. 

He swore in that moment, he'd make sure Y/N didn't end up like all the others. She would live. He'd break this wretched curse just for her. He was sure of it.

______

"How could you be so reckless?! Do you want to die?" Kakashi shouted at his friend who could only stand there angrily, arms crossed over her chest and one foot in the other direction. She didn't need to be lectured by someone who took just as many risks every single mission as she did.

"Kakashi, I really don't want to hear it. You have no idea how it went."

"Yeah but Naruto does, and we were just talking."

She placed her free hand over her chest and exclaimed even angrier than before, "You're going to trust a kid over me? Naruto even?" It was just low to trust Naruto when she was right there to explain herself. Just let her speak for once, she wanted to say but he of course, had something else to say.

He waved his arm toward the ramen shop, eyes glaring. "Don’t be rude. He's right there. What is wrong with you?"

Indeed, Naruto was sitting inside Ichiraku with Jiraiya at his side, munching on pork ramen while the pair fought outside. Kakashi was eating with them, taking a break from his work to just relax with his master and student when out of the corner of his eye he noticed Y/N stumbling down the street on her crutch. 

He heard when she got back home that she was in the infirmary for a couple days. He had no idea for what reason until Naruto explained to him what happened. She was being needlessly reckless on the battlefield, relying too much on her kekkei genkai and not enough on her brain. She threw herself right in the way of an enemy, for what reason, he didn't know. All he knew was that she could have died and she didn't seem to care one bit.

Rightfully so, he was mad. Normally he preferred not to make a scene in the open like this, but there wasn't anyone else around and he was red-hot.

She huffed. "He knows I don't mean anything bad by that. How could he not? I'm also his sensei, you know."

"Doesn't matter," Kakashi brushed off her words. "What you did was dangerous and you don't seem to care. Next time what are you gonna do? Run right into the arms of the enemy?"

"No, I would never. Kakashi, you're just being a jerk right now. I'm literally injured from the hip down and you have to yell at me? Jeez, just be grateful I'm alive, okay? Things happen," she tried to reason with him, but he didn't acknowledge it. He wasn't exactly feeling all that rational.

"Things don't just happen like that."

She groaned, "Well apparently they do, because it happened to me."

His eye narrowed and she noticed the way he clenched and unclenched his fists a couple times by his sides. Clearly he was just trying to channel his anger, but he really had no reason to be so upset. She hadn't done anything to him. He really needed to relax. "This is so like you L/N's. Always so emotional. Always thinking you're stronger than you actually are."

"Excuse you-"

"Get a grip, you aren't going to live forever."

"First off, don't interrupt me. Second, don't talk about my clan ever again, you hear me, Hatake? We don't live to please your dumbass," she cursed, how dare he say shit about her clan. That asshole. He was just being so...so unlike himself. She had no idea what had gotten into him, but she hated it and just wanted to continue on her way before he said something else stupid. 

Normally, she didn't expect to be bombarded in the street nearly the second she leaves the hospital, but Kakashi never fails to surprise her.

"I've got to go. Don't bother following me." With that, she took off past him, rushing as fast as she could on her crutch, which was pathetically slow. Silently, she cringed at how ridiculous she must look waddling around like this in a fit of rage. Nevermind that. She had better things to do.

He huffed out the breath he had been holding to walk back into the ramen shop, taking his seat beside Naruto and slouching down into the stool. Immediately, Master Jiraiya met his eyes, wisdom about to drip from his tongue once again. "You need to go apologize."

"Why? She clearly doesn't want that right now."

"Well, to start, you insulted her clan which is a big no-no. Imagine saying that to an Uchiha. You're lucky she let you off so easily."

"Yeah, Kakashi. You kinda just attacked her out there in the street," Naruto added.

Jiraiya continued, "Mainly though, the longer you let her stay angry, the worse it'll be for you in the end. Trust me."

"She said don't follow her."

"And you're actually going to listen?" The older man laughed. "You and her fighting reminded me a lot of young Tsunade and I. And let me tell you, you don't just let a woman like that go. I sure did. It’s not a fun time."

"Yeah, Kakashi sensei, go find Y/N."

The jounin stood from his stool and slapped a ramen voucher onto the counter top to pay for his meal. This really didn't seem like a good idea, he had to admit. But he would trust the process. This was the author of his favorite romance series, after all. How could he get something like this wrong? To put blind faith into Jiraiya on realistic romantic matters was probably the not the wisest thing to do, but it was the only thing he had to go on. "I'll go, but this doesn't sound like good advice."

"If you let this go, she's might run into the arms of another man for comfort. Do you want that?"

Tch, there was no way she was gonna do that. She barely had any friends. If anything she would go see Kurenai. Still, he pulled back the cloth at the entrance and muttered, "I gotta catch up to her."

"'Atta boy," Jiraiya cheered, waving off the copy nin. "Another bowl, Naruto?"

"Yes, please!"

Kakashi walked down the streets, looking for the woman he was sent on a mission to find and apologize to. He searched through the shops and the stands for her, walked by her apartment no sign of her. It wasn't until he stumbled by the bookstore that he found her eyeing down the display out front, leaning comfortably on her crutch.

"Y/N," he called to her, and he watched as she tensed up without a second. He caught up to her, walking to stand beside her in front of the store windows. "I need to talk to you."

"What do you want?" She questioned, peering over at him with a quirked brow. He seemed calmed down by now. Thankfully. "Also, didn't I tell you not to follow me?"

"You did, but Jiraiya told me to apologize."

"So this isn't even on your own accord, you're doing it because Jiraiya told you so." He groaned. Of course she would twist his words and find some way to make things bad on his end. She was angry with him, what did he expect to happen? Her to accept him with open arms?

"Listen, I'm sorry for yelling at you. I was just overwhelmed."

"With what? I wasn't paying attention to anything but the anger." She picked at her finger nails in an attempt to remain casual, but really she was just itching to hear what he had to say. She was willing to give him a second chance, only because he was normally so sweet. This was just out of character for him.

He replied, "I was scared for you. Naruto told me about how you nearly died, and I was upset that you did that. I was upset because I could only think about what if you had been overpowered and the enemy killed you." His explanation was weak, but he hoped she would accept it as truth. He really wasn't lying. When he heard she was in the hospital indefinitely, he nearly had a heart attack himself. He worried for her every time she left on a mission without him. It just meant that if she failed, he wasn't there to protect her himself. He couldn't handle that thought.

"So you were worried?"

"Yes."

"Well, that's sweet of you, isn't it?"

"I'd miss you, you know. If you died."

She froze. That wasn't what she expected him to say. When she looked over at him, he was just staring into the storefront window, but she could feel the sadness in waves running off his body. She wobbled around on her crutch to face him, a hand getting coming up to rest on his shoulder. "It's okay."

"I don't want you going on missions without me because every time it scares the shit out of me thinking they'll bring you back dead. Every time. I don't know why."

"It's normal to worry for your teammates."

"It's not the same, and you know it."

"Ah." And she felt it. Even if it was just a little hint of something, she felt his infatuation roll off his body and she took it in like a drink of cold water. So refreshing. Was he attracted to her? She had no idea before this that he cared so much but from the sound of it, he had some strong feelings attached. She wanted to reach out and hug him, tell him it was going to be okay, but that felt too personal. Instead, she leant back and muttered, "You know, Kakashi, I worry about you too."

"It's good we both have someone who cares, right?"

"Right."

"Well, I should be on my way, but, uh, if you need some help getting up to your apartment-"

"I should be fine."

"Okay, good."

"Yeah, so uh, see you," she turned on her heel and started heading in the other direction toward her home when suddenly, his hand reached out to stop her. 

"Wait, Y/N. I think..."

"What is it?"

"It's just that I need you. Please be careful from now on."

She stopped, turning around just enough to get a good look at his face. He only watched her, a glimmer of something she didn't recognize in his eye. 

"As long as you take care of yourself too, Mister."

"Y/N, I…"

All she could feel was a rough fabric rubbing against her face for a second before the full picture came into view. 

Mask to lips. I repeat, mask to lips.

She stared at him, as he kissed her right there in front of their favorite bookstore. When he pulled away after a second, he seemed just as shocked as she was. She pressed a hand to her forehead and struggled to find the right words to say. 

Kakashi Hatake just kissed her. 

And she definitely liked it. More than any other kiss she’d ever had before. She loved it. Mask or not, that was one of the best surprises of her entire life, and she honestly had no idea how to react. She settled for the easiest possible thing, running in the opposite direction, give herself time to think over what that meant for the two of them if anything at all. Kakashi wasn’t the type to have a girlfriend, he was always single. There just wasn’t room in his life for her.

There was plenty room in her life to fit him in comfortably. And there was more than enough room in her bed as well. 

Flustered, with heat coming to sit in her cheeks and run up her neck, she turned and motioned in the direction of her home. She just had too many thoughts to sit here and pretend she wasn’t dying inside from the tension.

"I've got to run home now," she managed to say. "Well, not run, with these crutches and all, but you know what I mean."

"Yeah, I should be going too. I'll see you around,” he mumbled, running his hand through his hair and down the back of his neck. 

"See you."

And into separate directions they went, just as confused as ever.

______

"Kakashi, I swear to God, if you don't stay on your side of the bed, I'm gonna-

"You'll what? Hit me? Go ahead. You're the one that keeps snoring."

"Shut up!" she exclaimed, rolling over in the bed and planting her fist directly in the middle of his chest. He didn't even flinch, she hadn't meant to hurt him anyway. She was just so annoyed. You would think that the stoic Hatake would be easy to sleep beside but no, he was a pain in the ass. He was rude. He was way too hot under the sheets. He still smelled like dog even after taking a bath. Just overall a bad experience, definitely 0 out of 10.

"What? It's the truth."

She groaned, throwing one of her arms over her eyes, burying her nose in the crook of her elbow. "Whatever. Don't ever mention my snoring again. It’s embarrassing me." She was self-conscious. She was usually so good at maintaining a cool and calm presence and now Kakashi was seeing that all crumble. Great. 

"Fine."

"Can't you just stay on your side so we can both sleep comfortably?"

"Can't you just stop snoring so I can sleep comfortably?" 

What a bastard. She could practically feel him snickering beneath his mask, and she felt frustration bubbling up in her chest. He was annoying. The audacity of this man, laughing and causing trouble in the night when they clearly had a mission to continue tomorrow. She could actually feel the delight radiating off his form.

She jumped up from her spot and threw herself onto the man beside her, attempting to make a vicious grab for the throat so she could maybe shut him up for just a few seconds. He dodged easily, taking her wrists in his calloused hand and lowering them to rest on his chest. Still, he continued to laugh at her. She felt like an utter joke sitting there on his stomach, looking at him through loose strands of her hair. 

She grumbled under her breath, her cheeks puffing out full of embarrassment, "Stupid."

"Me? Stupid? Look at you."

She replied swiftly, "What about me? You're the one with that ugly grin on your face." Quickly, she snatched her hands out from under his to cross her arms over her chest. She rocked back a bit on her knees to get a better look at his indeed ugly face. 

Except he definitely wasn't ugly, and that grin was more devilishly handsome than anything else. And honestly, she felt herself starting to get flustered in the position she'd put herself in. Of course she didn't hate Kakashi. He was one of her friends and coworkers. It was just that sometimes he could be casually attractive and she found herself falling under his spell. 

He just looked so fucking good lying there, staring up at her with a glimmer in his dark eyes. She could see the smile outlined under his mask. His hands had felt warm and firm around her own fingers. She missed his touch, there she said it, any touch on her body from Kakashi Hatake felt like heaven. He was far too cute, and the soft contact between them drove her crazy.

She wanted to punch herself for thinking such silly things. This was Kakashi, one of her frenemies. Not boyfriend material. Stupid. Silly. 

If only he didn't look so good, Jesus christ. Get your brain out of the gutter, Y/N.

Little did she know, his mind was already waist deep in those damn gutters and he was loving it.

"You really think that?"

"What? That you're ugly?" She asked, tilting her head to the side just a bit as if to think about it. Only a second later, another mischievous smile crossed her lips. "Of course."

He lifted his fingers to slid along her waist and down to her hips, fingers curling ever so slightly around her curves. She shuddered as his hands slid down to hold the sides of her bare thighs in his hands, his warm, strong hands with the softest fingertips. She wanted to die.

Had they kissed before? Yes. We're they somewhat romantically involved? Maybe. Did that give him any good reason to rest his rough hands on her thighs like that? Probably, and her thoughts were running a mile a minute at this point. 

"Kakashi...stop that," she said softly, her voice lowering from how it was before. She suddenly felt a lot smaller, scared even. Hooking up with Kakashi wasn't something she planned on doing anytime in the near future, if at all. He was her friend, and she felt strange sitting in his lap with his hands all over her. It felt so right but wrong at the same time, like she was breaking the law. Well, laws of friendship that is.

She cared about Kakashi, more than she wanted to admit. He wasn't just a friend, he was something weirdly in between and she couldn't exactly put her finger on how she felt about him. All she knew was that if she was going to have sex with this man, it would be the right way. They would have to date first. She wasn't just gonna sleep around this time. He was different. 

She wanted to impress him, to make him smile and laugh, to take him out to dinner and hold hands on their way home, to kiss at her doorstep. She wanted all of that before any of this.

His hands dropped from her sides and she crawled away from him, grabbing her blanket and cradling herself in it. "Listen, Y/N, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"I know, it's not your fault. Don't worry about it."

It was quiet. Just the sounds of both their breaths filling the air and the crickets chirping in the darkness outside. She shifted in her blanket to rest her head on the wall, leaning against it with her shoulder. He remained on his back, staring up at the empty ceiling tiles. 

It was now so terribly awkward. Thanks, Y/N.

Finally, he broke the silence. "You, uh, don't snore all that much. I was just teasing you."

"Thanks," she exhaled. "You're not as ugly as I said."

"I know."

Wow, Kakashi. So modest.

Her words fell right into place as she spoke, emotions slipping out with each breath. She looked at his profile in the dark, the way his bedhead stood on end, his nose pointed upward and his lips sat calmly, the curve of his chin under the edge of his mask, the way his eyes just sat there unmoving and gentle, brows soft above the eye. She took in all of him as she confessed, "I just don't want it to be like this. I don't want to fall for you this way."

"I get it."

"I just think that you and I could be something different. You're not like the other guys to me, at least, I don't think of you that way," she took a deep breath. He still stared deep in the ceiling, and somehow it made her comfortable enough to confess everything she'd been feeling. It was as if he could just lay there and listen without words forever. "I don't want you to just fuck me before we really...well I don't know, we've never even been on a date. I...I think I'm ready to fall in love with you."

"Then let's do it."

She peered over at him, lips agape with surprise. She hadn't expected much at all, but certainly not that. "What?"

"When we get back to the village, I'll take you on a date, more if things go well. We can take it as slow as you want," he told her, turning to lay on his side, facing her. He watched as she cuddled further into the comforter, only a peek of her face in his view. She was actually kinda cute through all those worn and torn layers. "I don't think I can let you go this time."

"Really?"

"Anything for you."

She ducked her head down to stare at the hardwood beneath her feet. She was overwhelmed by how nice he was being. Normally, it didn't go like this. Things normally got sexual so quick there wasn't even a chance for these sorts of conversations. It was just different with Kakashi. She could say no to him and expect better, because she knew he could deliver. "No one has ever treated me like this before."

He smiled. "Well, it's about time someone did."

"Can you hold me?"

"Come on." He lifted his arm up with the covers attached so she could crawl over and burrow herself next him, tucked right against his side. He rested his arm around her shoulders and held her close to his chest. Things were looking good for the both of them. Better than they had in a long time.

He wished this kind of thing could last forever. The beating of her heart, the laughter in her voice, the shine in her eyes. He just wished he could have bottled it all up and held it close to him for the rest of his life. 

But he waited too long, and the opportunity slipped from his grasp.

______

The pair fought hard. Kakashi was better than her, everyone knew that. The enemy targeted her for that reason. It was clear as day that she was important to Kakashi, and the enemy quickly caught onto that. He was quick to bring the knife to her neck, pressing the woman’s back tightly to his chest. The blade stung her skin, already piercing the flesh from the bit of pressure he applied.

She cried out, feeling a trail of blood begin running down her neck. Her nails clawed at his arm, desperate to get him to release her from his clutches, but he persisted. One hand held onto her chin tightly, keeping her face from thrashing, and the other continued to apply more and more pressure into the blade. 

For the first time in a long time, she found herself feeling unrestricted fear. She was scared. Scared for her life. She’d never been in this situation before, feeling so completely and utterly helpless like a deer caught in the headlights. Kakashi was right there, she should have known everything was going to be okay. After all, she had the village’s strongest veteran on her side.

It wasn’t the pain that caused the tears to bubble up in the corners of her eyes, no, it was Kakashi. The way his eyes darted over to the them, and she could feel his heart beginning to race, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end, and the fear creeping up into his heart. He never wore his heart on his sleeve. He was so closed off, sometimes she could only get a wisp of emotion from him, especially the ones that showed such vulnerability. 

Now it all seemed to come tumbling out like a landslide. She was drowning in fear, his and her own. 

“Let her go,” he called out, practically pleading with the man across from him, but it was in vain. 

“Like I’d listen to some filthy leaf shinobi,” the spy replied angrily. He felt so hot, burning up with so much anger she wanted to throw up. What had they done to upset him this badly? Her jaw was starting to ache from being held so tightly, and she swore she could taste blood running down her throat. This was bad. This was so terribly, miserably bad. 

Kakashi stood there, his hands hovering at his sides, unknowing of what to do. She was already bleeding out all over the collar of her shirt. If he made a single move, the man could easily finish the job with one fatal swipe. The copy nin felt cornered. Hopeless. What was there left to do? He’d let the love of his life fall in the hands of some petty criminal. 

Come on, think of something. Anything. Just think of something.

“What? You upset I’ve got your little girlfriend here?”

God, he was so desperate. The man taunting him didn’t help at all. He just felt himself spiralling deeper into hopelessness. He bargained, “Please, just let her go. I’ll give you whatever you want.” 

It wouldn’t work though. This man was set in his ways, and there was no changing that. He came into this fight knowing exactly what he wanted to do. And he was going to finish the job. 

“This is for what you shinobi have done to my people,” he sneered before she felt the knife dip further into her neck, sliding painfully across her throat. He dropped her head from his grasp, and as soon as he had, her body crumbled down to the ground. She collapsed in a bleeding heap on the dirt. 

The criminal quickly ran into the forest behind them, getting lost among the trees and the bushes within seconds. None of that mattered though. Kakashi could only run over to her limp body lying there on the ground, sputtering and coughing on thick blood filling her throat and lungs. Her cheeks and lips painted red now from spitting so much up. He fell to his knees beside her body, and for the first time in a long time, he felt a tear drip down his face.

She cried, hot tears running down her cheeks into the dirt on either side of her head. She cried for her pathetic self, having been attacked and injured in this way. She cried for Kakashi, feeling the pain and sadness, the panic, radiating off his form. She took in every emotion he was feeling, wanting to savor being with him for as long as she had, to fully take him in one last time. 

“Y/N, it’s gonna be okay,” he whispered, his hands running over her hair and cheek, smearing blood on her skin and his fingers. “We’ll bring you back to the village. The Hokage can fix you.” His words were so soft into the air, like if he spoke any louder he would hurt her.

They both knew that none of what he was saying was true. She was as good as dead.

She lifted her hand weakly to sit on his other hand. “I…” The woman took a labored breath.. “Love you, Kashi.”

“No, no, no. Don’t say that,” he hushed her, feeling his heart grow heavier in his chest with every second that passed, every look at her bloody neck and face, her laboring chest as she took hopeless breaths. He was falling apart in this moment, desperate for fate to change, for her to magically be better. He choked, “You can’t die, Y/N.”

“It’s okay.” Her words were slurred and hard to hear, liquid bubbling up in her throat to the point she was almost incomprehensible. “I love you,” she confessed once again. She wanted those to be her last ever words to him, the words he would remember for the rest of his life. To know someone out there loved him more than anything else.

He had to know that he was her everything. He was the best thing that ever happened to her, and she was going to miss him so terribly wherever her soul went after this. She just wished there was more time to tell him everything she felt. Yet, time was passing faster than she thought, and all those words felt impossible.

“I love you, too. You have to live for me. Just keep breathing, it's going to be okay.”

“It...hurts.”

More misery erupted his chest, and he found himself wanting to scream. Tears dripped steadily down both his cheeks now as he watched this woman die in front of him, one of the only people he truly needed in his life. “I know, baby, I know. I’m sorry I let this happen to you.”

She nodded faintly, her eyes beginning to close. He was starting to panic. Was this his last moment to say goodbye? Their time together was so short, how was this fair? He’d already lost everyone he ever cared about, and now this? He felt like the gods were laughing down at him and his misfortune. 

“You were the best thing that ever happened to me. I don’t know how I’ll do this without you.”

She didn’t respond, but she was still breathing. 

“Y/N, please.”

And he watched as her chest fell still and her labored breaths were silent on his ears. He found himself gathering her form up against his chest, her head cradled in the crook of his neck, just sobbing into her hair, weeping for a long lasting love gone in an instant. 

 He carried her body home that day himself. Something he never anticipated happening, but should have prepared for. He always thought he was going to watch as someone else carried her home to him, death long gone before he had the chance to see. He never thought it would be right in front of him. He thought he could protect her, save her from the clutches of fate. He was so wrong.

Kakashi was alone once again.

[cruecifymesixx]

Love and Leather /part eighty nine/

Word Count: 4.9k

A/N: Hi! Enjoy the update!

Warnings:major angst

Taglist:   , @miserablecunt , @dangerous-like-a-loaded-pistol, ,  @a-simple-salmon,  @hi-my-name-is-riley, @extremesadnerding, @thatbandchick39, @awkwrdcait, @countrygirlswonderland, @awesomealmostdopestudent, ,  @krazykatkay456, @terror-triplet, @shouttatthedevill-blog @beachystars, @rodriguez025, @kickstart-myheart-sixx, @s-outhie, @anxious-diabetic, @awkwardblackgirls-blog,  @shamelessobsessions, @jerseytaint, , @criminalyetminimal, @motley-queen, @trapt-in-a-dream,  @broke-n-bitchy​,  @lovesick-heart0, @keepcalm-and-beyou, @miriampraez, @teenwolflover28, @lilyhw1, @herbertweeest, @random-internet-user-4471, @falcon-arrows, @talranocchia2001,  @waywardprincess666, @iluvmesomemarvelndc, @vamprlestat, @supersoldierballerina, @electradestiny, @marshbev, @n0-sh0rtage-0f-faults, @cruebaby, @ggorehorror, @valentines-in-london, @nassauartist  @cmft-jr-winchester, @bokkie92, @notworthyofyou1120 @xrosegoldwolfx, @mgkobsessed, @chaoticvybe,  @kellysimagines @thoughtsoftheantagonist @marvelismylifffe, @sleepyjunhong  @meetthesixxter @sparxx27 @gingerspicetalks @kaitieskidmore1 @unknownoblivion @nevergoodenuffbutokaaayyy @sublimeprincesswasteland @kylieinwonderland @haileynicoleseavey17 @lavendersoundbarrier @xxisxxisxxis, @dogmom2014, @cruesixxlover1991,  @m0rnlngstar,  @findingmyths,  @i-want-to-shoot-myself, @arianareirg, @fentitrbl, @patheticgay69 , @redlipscrystalskies14, @samanthadegaro @jd-johndeacon-or-jackdaniels @thechangingme, , @makaelahdelvalle

*Nikki’s POV*

I sighed heavily through my nostrils, resting my head against the couch as I sucked on a hard piece of watermelon flavored candy. Dr. Peterson left a few very persistent voicemails on my phone as well as pages on my pager, attempting to get me to come to the therapy office. Reluctantly I agreed, but I wish I didn’t as I assumed Vanity would be here too, however she’s not.

“Hey Doc…” I speak lightly when she walks in, sitting directly across from me in the leather chair as she crosses one knee over the other.

“Thank you for coming in Nikki, I’m sure you are a very busy man.” She eyes the handful of empty candy wrappers on the oak coffee table, “It’s new candy, I just put it there today…and looks like I have to add more.” She smiles as she jokes.

“I like the strawberry ones better…and it’s okay, I wasn’t super busy today. Sorry for taking long to get back to you.” I sit up more in the chair as she opens up her folder and takes out the good ‘ol notepad.

“So how’ve you been? Anything new?”

I shake my head, “I’m okay, just been busy. We finally wrapped up the album, then we do some promoting and then we hit the road for tour.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that it’s hectic and time consuming. Have you taken anytime for yourself to relax recently?”

My lips pull into a small grin, “Is this where you poke my brain and tell me I’m putting myself into work too much?”

Crystal chuckles a bit, “Do you think you’re putting too much of yourself into work?”

“It’s my job? I kinda don’t have a choice. Not like anyone else is writing songs, well good ones for that matter.”

She nods, “So you’re the one in charge? excuse my ignorance, I don’t really follow your music. I’m sure that’s stressful having everyone depend on you. Do you deal with stress well?”

I shrugged, “I don’t have to write all the songs, it just happens that way.” I chuckle a bit under my breath, “Too loud for you? I mean, yeah it’s stressful. I used to go out and get high, but then that overtook everything. Now I just work out or take my camera out or write more songs to relax.”

“Just not my cup of tea, Nikki. Have you done any of that recently? Vanity mentioned shopping helps her relax.”

I roll my eyes and laugh, “Anything that revolves around spending money sounds good to her. And no, I haven’t had the time. Stuck at rehearsal with the band and when I’m not at rehearsal I’m hanging out with the band at a bar.” I stare when she writes something down, “Taking notes already?”

She glances at me, “I do it with everyone, you know that. So you only hang out with the guys? The same guys you’re around all day? You never really escape work, do you?”

“Well…I mean no…but I have fun when I’m with them. Tommy and I are like practically married and Mick is fun and John is cool too. I see Tommy constantly cause Van and Clementine are best friends. Sometimes it’s a little much. At times I just want to take a break but I know I can’t because it’s my music and it keeps the nice things flowing and Arianna’s school.” I explain to her, “I mean…I would have enough to take a break for a long time but still…I don’t want too.”

“Tommy, right…Vanitys mentioned him a few times, same with Clementine. But why are you so worried about money? Vanity has money does she not?”

“Yeah…god mother of the year.” I roll my eyes, “Yeah, yeah…Van has plenty of money for her, she’s a great mom. I missed out on a lot the first few years of Arianna’s life so I just want to make up for that.”

“Well…as you know, everything you missed could have been prevented. Kids don’t remember a lot from their childhood anyways, with the exception of a severe traumatic even happening. They usually won’t start remembering moments until the ages of 7 and 8.”

I glare a bit, “I don’t need to be told the same thing I already know. If I had kept my dick in my pants I wouldn’t have missed anything, I know.” I lean forward reaching for another piece of candy and shoving it in my mouth.

“Theres no reason to jump to the defense Nikki. We’re just talking.” I would think she was being condescending if she wasn’t a damn therapist.

“Right-“ I roll my eyes, “Talking? You’re blaming me for it.”

“Well who is to blame them? Vanity? You’d be surprised to know she never wants to talk about this.”

“Wait-no, no. You’re twisting my words. No, it’s not her fault, it’s mine. But still, she could have called or retuned my letter letting me know.” I defend myself as she looks at me.

“Nikki, we can spend all day talking about the things Vanity, should’ve or could’ve done differently. We can talk for hours about how things were suppose to go differently.”

“Then why the hell did you bother me? What could you possibly want to talk about if it’s not that?”

“How are the dates going? Let’s start there.”

I stare at her a moment, rubbing my knees as I take a breath, “I don’t know…Donna, she’s great but she’s just…she’s just not Vanity.” I look away feeling disappointed, not because it wasn’t working, but in myself. That it took me seeing someone else to figure out what I wanted, “Donna’s hot and funny, well tries to be funny. But she hangs on to every word I say, thinks I’m right about everything, doesn’t ever disagree with me…it’s…it’s boring. I don’t know if it’s just because I’ve been with Vanity for so long, that nobody else can compare or what. But I just…it’s not working. Donna’s too clingy anyways.”

“Really?” Crystal sounds surprised, “You were so vocal about seeing other people.”

“Well…I wasn’t excited about it. I did it because I thought thats what Van wanted. I just wanted to help fix us. I would do anything for us, for her.” I sigh as I lean back against the cushion.

“You thought.” She pointed out, “You assumed and didn’t really ask what would have helped, did you?”

“Well…I-“ I stumble over my words before sighing, “No, I didn’t. I just took the first suggestion that was brought up. I wanted to get out of the office before I was ganged up on.”

Crystal chuckles, “Nobody thought about ganging up on you Nikki. You just don’t like when you aren’t in control, that is both of your issues.”

“I don’t have control issues.” I glance at Crystal as she stares at me, “What? I don’t.”

“Yes you do, wether you like to admit it or not. You mentioned earlier it’s always you writing songs because nobody else will do it.” She says, using air quotes might I add as I glare in return, “I’m sure they would if you backed off and gave them a chance.”

“I just like to make sure things are perfect, there’s nothing wrong with that. Mick isn’t interested and Tommy wouldn’t even know where to start.”

“Nikki, maybe if you gave them a chance they would shine and pressure would be taken off your shoulders. Nothing has to be perfect, there’s no such thing as that.”

I roll my eyes, “Okay, so maybe I have a slight control problem but this, the band, has been the only thing in my life I actually have control over.”

“And the other parts you don’t? Can you tell me about it?”

I groan in annoyance, “Oh come on. I’m sure Vanity has mentioned a thing or two about me. I’m sure she’s told you all about the reason why I’m fucked up is because of my childhood.” I reach for a candy disk, unwrapping it before popping it into my mouth.

“The subject has came up once or twice but Vanity never dived deep, she said it wasn’t her place to talk about it. Do you want to talk about it?” She asks softly, like how every other therapist in the past has done.

“No, not really. But I just moved around a lot as a kid…”

“Oh, well I’m sure that had an affect on you. Always being the new kid and what not. Are you parents still together? They must be so proud of you.”

I laughed, probably a little too loud “God no. My dad split when I was a kid and my mom and I don’t talk, at all. Every time we do it explodes into something bigger.”

“I’m sorry for that, I’m sure it was hard without a dad in the picture. So your mom raised you?”

Again, I laugh, “Here and there when she wanted me. Half the time I’d be with my grandparents.”

She glances at me, “Is this why you’re so scared of failing as a father?”

I stare at her a moment, “I’m not like my dad. I didn’t just abandon the girls. I begged her to move here so we could be a family.”

“So…they had to uproot the life Vanity had built for them in New York to make you comfortable? Which is essentially what you had to do every time you moved as a child?”

I shake my head “You’re twisting my words. I just wanted them close. Vanity hated New York, she basically stayed for Clementine.”

Crystal shakes her head, “Are you assuming she hated it because she told me she loved it there.”

I chuckle l, “Loved it? Of course she loved it! She was nose deep in fucking coke when I got there.”

“And that’s a problem she’s been working on has she not?”

I sigh, “Yeah, yeah. And I’m proud of her. I know it’s not easy. But I’m not like my parents alright? I’m not just leaving Arianna high and dry nor am I leaving her alone in a run down fucking house okay?”

Crystal looks at me, her head slightly turning to the side, “If you know that, then why are you so worried about messing up? You sound like such a great dad Nikki, from what Vanity tells me. That little girl is lucky to have you.”

I exhale deeply as I nod a bit and lean back against the chair, “Because something always happens…”

“If you spend all your time waiting for bad things to happen you’ll miss out on everything life has for you. Can you give me an example of something happening?”

“I don’t know…I could relapse, Vanity could relapse. We could break up, she could fall in love with someone else and leave me…” I mumble the last part “..and I don’t want her to leave me.”

“You both work hard on your sobriety right? Then what is the worry?” Crystal looks at me, taking off her glasses as she leans forward a bit, “I think you need to spend less time worrying about her being with someone else and only worry about her being with you. Like I said earlier Nikki, we can spend all day talking about the what if’s but it doesn’t help anything or anybody in the long run.”

I frown a bit, “I guess you’re right…it doesn’t do me any good, just drives my anxiety up the wall.”

She smiles a bit, “See…I knew I could get through to you. Is there anything else you want to discuss? You said the dates you’re going on aren’t fulfilling?”

I nod, “Yeah they aren’t. I’d rather be at home with the girls.”

“So…now I’m gonna assume you and Vanity are going to sit down and talk? If this is how you’re feeling, plus with how she feels..”

“I want this to work with her. I need it to work. I can’t picture myself with anyone but her. I hated my ex wife because she wasn’t Van. I just forced myself to pretend that I tolerated her, let alone love her.”

“Then I think you two need to sit down and discuss what you both want from each other and what it will take to make it work. You can’t always blame your issues on your childhood, just like she can’t blame everything on her temper and how she reacts to stressful situations.”

I laugh under my breath and grin “Yeah, she does get mad at the slightest thing.”

She cracks a smile and nods, “That she does. But just like you, Vanity also needs the control. I think you two need to find a solid ground and share it evenly, 50/50. Not 25/75 or 60/40. But right down the middle.”

“And what if we can’t?”

“Nikki.” I sigh and let my shoulders fall back, “As long as you two actually talk about your problems instead of holding onto the anger and grudges. I think both of you also need to learn how to let certain things go.”

“Like the cheating?” I look at her, “She throws that in my face any chance she gets. I just don’t know how many times I can say sorry for it.”

Crystal nods, “I understand Nikki, I do. But put yourself in Vanity’s shoes okay? It’s a traumatic situation for anyone. Just think if the tables were turned. How would you feel? How would you’ve reacted? I believe what bothers her is the principal of it, if you being with someone else. She didn’t want to see it, just like mentioned earlier, you don’t want to see her with another man.”

“Okay, okay. I’ll work on being understanding and sharing control. I need to be home more, hopefully after this album I can take a break for a while and we can get to know each other again.”

“It’s not a bad thing to get to know one another again, you aren’t kids anymore.”

*Vanity’s POV*

“It’s okay Ari! Just brush it off and keep going!” I yell, cupping my hands around my mouth as I sit back down on the folding chair. I wince when I see Arianna trip over the soccer ball again and get a mouth full of dirt, “You’re doing great, sweetie!” I give her a smile when she looks over, glaring as she brushes the dirt off her knees.

“Come on Van, she can barely kick the ball without eating shit. Maybe soccer isn’t for her.” Nikki states, flicking a peanut shell at me. I glance down, seeing him laying on his side on the blanket, “We could try gymnastics. Or cheerleading.” He points in the direction of coaches surrounding a little league team.

I sigh as I slump back in the chair, groaning when Arianna falls again, “It’s only the first day of practice, Nikki. She’ll get the hang of it.”

“Or she’ll get kicked off the team.” Nikki laughs before sitting up and leaning against my leg, “However, it is pretty entertaining to watch.”

I roll my eyes and tap the back of his head, “She has to start somewhere, she can’t just be great over night. I know it took you some time to get good at bass playing.” I smirk a bit as he tilts his head back to look at me.

“Don’t go there. She clearly has no coordination at all and she’s kicking way to hard at the ball and that’s why she keeps falling.” He shakes his head when Arianna kicks the ball and hits another kid in the gut, “See? And she’s being a ball hog.”

“A ball hog? Maybe you need to coach this team instead, Sixx.”

“Well I do look good in stripes.” He laughs but it quickly stops when his phone starts ringing. I watch him dig it out of his pocket as he shakes his head and shoves it back in his jeans.

“If it’s a work call then take it.”

“No, no it’s fine. It’s just Donna, she can wait till later.” He tells me, glancing in my direction as we look at each other for a moment. I watch as he scratches the back of his neck before he looks back at the field, mumbling something under his breath.

I chuckle to myself when his phone starts ringing once more, he digs out of his pocket again before shoving it away, “I’m sure you wouldn’t want her upset with you since you’re ignoring her calls. It’s okay Nikki, you aren’t missing much, it’s just practice.” I explain to him as I see his back raise with a deep inhalation of a breath before he exhales.

“No. This is important, unlike making plans for another expensive restaurant or some stupid high end club.” Nikki spews out, I can hear the annoyed tone.

I clear my throat a bit, “Is everything okay with you..and her?” He side eyes me from the corner of his black shades as I see the corner of his mouth pull up a bit.

“Just...she’s...she’s just making it complicated. She’s asking for too much. Always wants to talk on the phone or hang out or meet up for coffee. She doesn’t grasp the idea of space. Donna wants to be a girlfriend and she’s not girlfriend material, at least not for me.” Nikki leans back on his hands, his legs stretched out on the blue and black flannel.

“Girlfriend material?” I question him as he turns his head to look at me.

“Yeah? You know...girlfriend material? She’s a great women but she couldn’t handle being with a rockstar. Grew up catholic and has all these beliefs that just make me want to gag. She’s hot but she can barely talk about anything other than the modeling and acting. I like someone that can at least tell me what they’re thinking at any given moment.” I feel him nudge my leg as he rests a dandelion on my knee, “I don’t know...it’s just fizzling out.”

I fumble with the yellow flower between my fingers as Nikki cheers for Arianna. My eyebrows pull together in confusion. He was just spending this whole past week with her so I wonder what could have changed. I was still thinking about everything Dr. Peterson had told me last week, I was nitpicking the pros and cons of the situation. Nikki had apologized the next day after our fight like always and then that turned into me being under him...like always. And then it was back to ignoring the problem.

“Hey Nik? Can we talk-“

“Mom! Mom! Did you see how good I’m doing?!”Arianna runs to me, exuberant as always before she’s taking the juice box Nikki hands to her.

“Of course baby! Daddy and I are so happy you’re enjoying it.” I smile at her, smoothing her hair back and wiping some dirt off the side of her cheek, “Just try to be careful okay? And let some of the other kids get the ball.”

She nods feverishly, “But coach Taylor said I’m doing a really good job!”

“And you are princess, but it’s a team sport. So you gotta let the others play with the ball too.” Nikki tells her as he ties the laces on her cleats and tucks them into her shoe, “Sixx’s always play as a team babe.”

“But Blackwoods know how to get the job done themselves.” I wink at her as she giggles and hands me her juice box, “Go finish and then we’ll grab some dinner and maybe ice cream.” Arianna nods before she gives me and Nikki a hug and runs off to the field again.

“So...how are you and Jon?” Nikki questions, almost uncomfortably as he glances at me for a split second.

I shrug, “He’s been busy with studio stuff so

I haven’t really talked to him that much. He calls every few days or so just to see how I’m doing.”

Nikki nods as he leans back on his elbows, “Oh…well that’s good at least…”

“Yeah, I guess?” I chuckle a bit and shake my head, “It’s not like you really care.” 

“Yes I do..” I glance when Nikki mumbles, picking blades of grass and flicking them away. I chuckle at his words and shake my head, my eyes going back to soccer practice.

“Yeah, okay Nikki.”

“I’m gonna go get a drink at the concession stand.” He mutters quietly, getting up as his bangs fall over his eyes. I glance at him as he shakes his head and runs his hands through his hair as he walks across the field. I look down, noticing the unopened bottle of Coca Cola from earlier.

*A few days later*

I took a deep breath in and exhaled as I paced nervously outside of Nikki’s office door. Why was talking about how we felt so scary for us? My heart was racing as I hear the light hum of bass strings being pulled. Nikki had came home from having lunch with Donna an hour ago and slammed every single door he went through, so I wasn’t sure what had happened. I said hi to him but he brushed me off and went straight up the stairs.

I crack my knuckles as I try to find the courage inside of me to knock on the door. I just wanted to talk and I figured with Arianna being at school still, it would be the best time to do so. Ya know, in case of it getting ugly.

My lips puff up as I exhale deeply, glancing at anarchy as she’s sprawled out on the floor watching me, “Wish me luck.” I knock on the mahogany door, not hearing any response to come in. I wait a second before reaching for the doorknob and slowly cracking it open, seeing him hunched over in the usual position when he plays his bass with headphones on. I watch him for a moment as he reaches for his journal and writes something down. He notices me through the reflection on the blank computer screen.

Nikki turns around in his chair as he takes off the headphones and smiles “Hey sorry. I just had an idea and I wanted to play it while I had it.”

“No, no it’s okay. I get it. I uh just wanted to talk but you’re busy so we can just talk later.” I stay by the door, gripping the handle as I swallow the lump in my throat.

Nikki stares at me for a moment “No, come sit.” He motions to the futon, “What’s going on?” He sounds concerned as he rolls his chair closer.

“Okay..” I mumble as I sit criss cross on the cushion as I hold the pillow in my lap, “I went and talked to our therapist the other day to get some things off my chest and now I want to talk to you about them.” I take a breath as I look at him, he looks as worried as I feel, “I-I just feel like we aren’t getting anywhere. That this-“ I motion between us “..isn’t going anywhere.”

“You think that?” I notice the slight frown playing on his lips “I took the advice the therapist gave, Van. I didn’t want too….is this about me locking you out? If it is I’m sorry, I was just messing around.”

“Yes, I think and feel that. Like we’re just not letting go and we’re trying to stay together for the sake of Arianna. No, no it’s not because you locked me out. I’ve been feeling like this for a while now..”

“Is that what you want? For this to be over?” Nikki stares at me as he gnaws on his bottom lip, “Are you breaking up with me?” It’s faint but I hear it and it makes my heart heavy.

“I-I I don’t know..”

“My dates with Donna haven’t been that fun, not like how they are with you.”

I smile a bit before it fades, “I just feel like it’s me that’s trying to save our relationship, or what little is left to save. I’m just confused Nikki.”

“What’s there to be confused about Van? You either want to be with me or you don’t.” I stare at him, I wish it was as simple as that but it’s not. 

“Do you wanna be with me?” I ask him as he chuckles a bit and rolls closer to me.

“Vanity, of course I want to be with you. You should already know the answer to that. It’s always going to be you every time.” I look away at the painting on the wall as he touches my knees, his thumb gently rubbing back and forth.

“I just feel like our relationship is one sided now. I told you from the start I didn’t want to do this, seeing other people. I vocalized how much I was against it and you still wanted to do it anyways.”

Nikki nods as he lets out a deep breath “I know, I know. I should have listened to what you were saying. It put an even bigger strain on our relationship. I broke things off with Donna today. She was just getting on my nerves. I was only going out with her because I saw how much fun you were having with Jon and how happy you looked. It made me jealous because the whole time I was miserable.”

“You didn’t seem like it..I don’t want to break up. I just wish it wasn’t so hard all the time. We aren’t kids anymore, it feels like how it did 10 years ago and I feel like it shouldn’t be. It should be easy for us by now. Do you think other couples have it this hard?”

Nikki chuckles as he gets off the chair and sits down next to me, “No baby, I don’t. Because not everyone is as complicated as you and me. What do you want from me Van? You want me to actually work on us instead of finding excuses not to?” I glance at him as he smiles at me.

“But that makes me feel like a bitch when you say it like that. I feel selfish. Do you want this?”

“Vanity, you may be a temperamental brat and a pain in my ass sometimes, but you aren’t selfish. You’re far from it.” He reaches for my hand as he brings it up to his lips “I want this. I want you and only you. We shouldn’t be doing this because of Arianna, we should be doing this because we love one another and cause we want this to work. I do love you Vanity.”

“I know you do and I love you too.” I feel him kiss my knuckles again as he’s gently pulling me closer and into his lap. I feel him wrap his arms around me as he lays his head against my shoulder. I sigh as I lay my cheek atop of his head and let my nails run over his neck and back.

“I’m sorry for making you feel this way. Like we weren’t gonna have a chance. I never wanted to do that.” He tells me as I nod and kiss his temple.

“I know you didn’t do it on purpose, it’s okay. I just worry and overthink sometimes because you’re you. You’re Nikki Sixx. You could literally have anyone you want and I could be so easily replaced at any moment. It just scares me.”

Nikki looks up at me and laughs, “You? Oh come on you’re joking. Doll I love you just the way you are. Sure, models and playboys are hot but they couldn’t even touch you. They’re not the ones running out of the house applying make up and dragging a kid behind them because they’re running late. Or throwing water on dinner because they forgot they were even cooking. They don’t have eyes that remind me of the ocean when the sun shines. They don’t have soft lips for me to kiss, even when my breath is so fucking rancid in the morning.”

“Hey I haven’t set dinner on fire in a few months alright?” I laugh a bit as I lean forward to give him a kiss, “Thank you for saying that.”

Nikki licks his lips as he leans back against the couch to look at me, “Plus who else on this planet is able to make me cry? Besides Arianna, she’s just harsh.”

“Yeah she has been pretty mean to you lately hasn’t she?” I chuckle as I move pieces of hair back and out of his face.

“Yeah all because I wouldn’t let her crawl into the that claw machine at the arcade a few weeks ago. You know she put her blue goo in my boots? That’s not something I ever want to feel again.” He shudders as he looks at me and smiles “I’ve also been trying to meditate and write my feelings out instead of keeping them inside.”

“Oh! So that’s why you’ve been sitting at the pool every morning? I thought you were just having a mid life crisis or something.” I grin and laugh when he pinched my hip.

“Hey just because I’m getting closer to 40 doesn’t mean shit.”

“Kinda does a little bit, Nikki.” I lean forward and squint “is that….is that a grey hair?” I tease him as I pretend to pluck it out of his hair.

“Oh shut the hell up. You have them too probably.” He rolls his eyes as he pretends to pout.

“Oh no no baby. Not on this head of hair, you won’t find a single thing.”

Nikki leans forward as he gives me a quick and simple kiss, “Well whenever it happens, I’ll still love you when you’re old and grey.”

[batarangsoundsdumb]

hae interrogationes multae respondeant quia demens .

if you read this entire ask post you deserve a gold star and financial recompensation

Um, Obviously because when you’re adopted by a white guy you automatically become white duhhh

this is about this post lmao and yeah youre absolutely right, you have to hand your poc card in when you get adopted by a white guy.

Do you think Cass would listen to Yanni, the YouTube channel epic symphonic rock, or some other stuff? There's some cool mashups but idk if that's up your alley, I kinda feel like I'm pushing it with my weird taste of music by recommending an orchestra cover of metal, but i just love that sort of thing and mashups :P @harvestyourcherries 

i haven’t heard of that? but in my personal (correct) opinion steph listens to classical music, and then both modern and older, and then also stuff like black sabbath, iron maiden, but also hardrock and hardcore. i like the idea of cass just liking the most extreme screaming songs full of noise and then also listen to pachelbel’s 370th sonata yanno? THANK YOU for the rec tho

speaking of ur cass playlist hc...reminds of the time (yesterday) i found 2 playlists randomly on spotify from the same user. one was abt 3 hours of instrumental/classical "dark" & "nostalgic" music. the other almost 11 hours of nothing but hardcore bass/synth/electronic music. just an incredible tightrope act to put on in public. the synth one was also called like "psalms for synth sluts" which is Also incredible

tbh i LOVE synth SO MUCH like for no reason at all but then also cannot handle a poppy electronic beat lmao. but this seems like the kinda thing i’d do but just in one (1) playlist bc i just sort songs by vibe instead of genre? that’s how i end up with britney spears and billy ray cyrus in the same playlist. 

Oh, I want Kate Kane playlist next! It would be amazing if you could do one when you have time and will 🙏

how rude would it be of me to just say no? like sorry kate but idk you and also you seem way too keen on the us military for an institution that homophobically targeted you? (and also commits war crimes) but let’s unpack the fact that the institution that caused the death of your mom and sister and also got you blacklisted for being gay is still one you align with???

'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' --- when i tell you i fucking screamed LOL!!!!!!! i can imagine the cameraman not knowing if he should cut to commercial or keep it on these two weirdos fighting on stage (bruce definitely ruffled dick's hair/noogied him right?? 

about this post but yeah lmao. this cameraman just turns to like the audience to get a reaction and it’s just multiple moments of CLEAR shock.

you are the only funny person on this hellsite

how egotistical is it for me to say that i get this ask multiple times a month? bc it literally happens so often it’s hilarious to me.

Wish there was more john/Bruce content 😔😔😔 was so hungry I actually looked at canon media 😔😔😔 (Justice League Dark babeeeyyyyyy)

check out batman: damned for some mediocre content but at least it’s john/bruce (also very interesting story and stuff, just got very >:( over this weird part where harley quinn tried to r*pe bruce or something? it’s not for everyone)

dick grayson but he's nicki minaj

his anaconda don’t want none,,, unless...... 

Dick Grayson was never a cop, he played Marshall on Paw Patrol

you are SO right. also paw patrol is a fucking good show idc. that shit could’ve been the new steven universe on this hellsite.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CS1lI0bLI7-/?utm_medium=copy_link

...

why do people keep reposting my CONTENT. if you are not funny yourself don’t just grab shit off of tumblr and post it on insta,,, get a life. sidenote: should i start an insta and get all these ppl to take my content down that would be funny as hell.

Might I suggest for a Gotham City Meme: something about the true crime fandom thirsting for the rogues gallery

ok can i just say something slightly controversial?? no? i don’t find true crime ppl who are into criminals funny, that shits disturbing irl im not gonna bring that into my very chill universe.

i may have never seen a 'jason cleaning guns in sink' fic but i do know he WOULD

THANK YOU

bestie im sorry to say this to you but while you can, and people do wash their guns in the sink, that is a lot of lead in a very vital part of the kitchen.

people tend to do it in the bathtub.

WHY???? like damn why do you even have guns

i dont think i read many gun sink fics exactly but i have read lots of fics where jason cleanes his guns in the living room. usualy dissembles them and cleans them with a rag i think

lmao fair enough, like i think that’s a large part of what i remember as well.

if you say you've seen/read gun sink fics I believe you. I think those of us who didn't see them are lucky or maybe didn't search for fics by tags or something idk

i mean ive never sought them out but i HAVE seen them,, like definitely i know almost for certain.

saw your tags and I'm interested in Steph/Kara now. They would be the most chaotic couple <3

literally thoooo, i have a wip where they get together in a zombie apocalypse and like UGGGHhhh i am so in love with them.

I am the Breece anon. Thanks for the recommendation; am reading now. I’ve always been a hardcore Superman fan because I love my pure himbo farm boy. My logic is, if one Bruce is a Broose, then multiple Broose are a herd of Breece. And this is a hill upon which I will perish.

fair enough,,,, like moose, meese, goose, geese, bruce, breece. i get your logic and i stand by it as well. (glad you enjoyed the comic recs!!!!)

It's a beautiful day in Gotham, and you are a group of horrible Breece

OH my god dude lmao

there only being 42 fics on ao3 for tim and bernard is honestly so sad i need more

it’s like twice that now!!! we did it lads. (tho very sad that my fic isnt number one but like number 4 :((((  )

i'm too late you already did the poll lol but may i suggest bethy (bernard + timothy)

shit dude that wouldve been so fucking funnyyyyy. think ppl have just stuck to timber tho, tim/bernard kinda died down recently and i think it’s too bad, they’re a great couple and i love them.

Wait, hear me out

Bernothy @redlightofdawn

great recommendation (lmao this ask is from like a month ago) but very sorry to announce that NARDTH is the superior shipname

Wait, we know that bernard likes milfs (Tim's step-mom) but what about dilfs? gilfs?

Wait no, I regret sending that ask

these were two seperate asks and they’re HILARIOUS. in my personal opinion tho,,, milfs, gilfs, dilfs are just about vibes and bernard is just attracted to sexy ppl who may sometimes be milfs, dilfs, or EVEN gilfs.

crime in bludhaven would drop to half if nightwing had a boob window. in this essay i will-

WHERE’S THE ESSAY ANON, WHERE’S THE FUCKING ESSAY

Wait if Barbra and Tim r at opposite ends at all times what happened to Barbra once everyone’s Tim’s ever love before started dying lol

she won a lottery ticket and spent 2 weeks on a resort in the bahamas before returning home and finding out that the joker was arrested for tax evasion and then spent a month staying at her big tiddie goth girlfriend’s house before conner came back to life and she broke her pinkie playing table hockey.

Why is the opposite end thing so funny and compelling to me. Tim comes back from his depression quest for Bruce and Babs is now a literal god

lmao when tim loses his spleen barbara reaches nirvana.

Are you still taking music recs because I have three songs that remind me of Jason that I think you'd like

send to me or lose a toe

🌸 ⭐ put this star into the inbox of your favorite blogs. it’s time to spread positivity! ⭐🌸😋

thanks, i wont tho on account of i wont.

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMduBy3Sr/

⬆️

This is the whole of Blüdhaven and everyone anywhere.

Nightwings ass alone saves more people in a calendar year and does more for so society than most heroes do their whole career.Also u are one of the funniest tumblr pages out there. The vibes are unmatched and the memes and tags ✨send me✨.Thank u and goodnight @julia-flow 

fanksss also lmao.

That's going to be a little bit difficult to explain, but

There's some music that you listen to and you think, "oh my gosh, I can perfectly imagine Dick Grayson singing this song, with the same voice as the singer because that voice matches with Dick Grayson"?

oh yeah totally lmao. i have a lot of songs that i think are just entirely dick grayson yanno? kind of all of my playlists have that vibe, but i really find bleachers to fit with dick? idk.

"Lois lane/Superman" fics this, "Lois lane/Clark Kent" fics that, (/lh) let's get into the real good stuff. Some people ship Lois, Clark, and Superman as a throuple. Most popular fic tag for sure

yes totally, i think they’d be absolutely killer on ao3 and clark gets so fucking embarassed about it.

I miss your post, hope you’re doing okay!!

haha this was like 2 months ago, but i was doing fine then too! just didn’t have a lot of inspiration in terms of content.

Doot doot!

noot noot

I’m confused. What did DC do now? Like with nightwing? And another sibling? Please spoil everything for me

lmao they gave him a secret sister plotline where they had his dad cheat on his mom with tony zucco’s wife, bc dick’s life wasn’t traumatic enough yet.

sorry but it's so funny that batman is called "the dark knight" when the gotham city baseball team is called the gotham knights. it'd be like if a vigilante was running around new york called like "the scary yankee"

lmaooo no. but like yankee comes from dutch names or something so wouldnt it be HILARIOUS if gotham knights came from like german names and bruce would be running around called the dark KLAUS UND NIEK @graysonnightwing 

(not a batcest shipper) it’s so funny to me that the responses are “i’m a batcest shipper because i can differentiate fiction from reality and and it doesn’t bother me personally, but i understand why you oils think it’s weird” to “i wish all batcest shippers a very fucking die”

yeah lmaoo. i personally basically flipped my entire stance around to ‘i dont care please leave me and everybody else alone’ bc i think there’s really no point in starting a moral dillema over some fucking fandom bullshit. Please just,,, go home,,, log off, find a nice forest to have a little walk in and remember that somewhere in history, somebody probably died in the place you’re standing. and you will also die someday, and somebody will have to look at your internet usage and see you fighting multiple people anonymously while being named ‘nightwingsbuttchin200186′ like... calm down, we’re all gonna die this is not the thing to worry about.

so since like "wards" don't really exist in modern society almost all the batkids are foster kids, right? i used to work in the system and imagine: monthly visits from social workers and guardian ad litems, bruce having to get permission to take the boys anywhere out of state, calling their social worker at like 8 a.m. like "yeah dick broke his arm again... a gymnastics accident this time...." their poor social worker. bruce send her a huge bouquet and box of chocolates every month to stay on her good side

i imagine the social worker just getting into the case like ‘yeah let’s get this kid a good guardian’ and then ending up having to work with 22 y/o bruce wayne and his 50 y/o dad. and so this social worker is like ‘okay we can work with this, this is the best home i can find’ and then like it ends up landing on its feet and then the kid gets adopted and then they get a call a year later like ‘uhm so hi, this kid tried to steal my tyres can i adopt him?’ and like 3 years later. ‘okay so basically, my neighbours’ kid imprinted on me and now they’re dead, can i keep him?’ two years later it’s like ‘okay so this assassin child-’

ever since I saw that one post of yours, the meme that's something like "I know that abba's backup dancer got me" with a picture of discowing, I've been haunted. Every once in a while I'll be minding my own business then the image of abba's backup dancer dick grayson aka nightwing aka discowing will flash in my mind and I'll be frozen in place. Today at work I was in the middle of folding clothes and suddenly once again discowing entered my mind and I suddenly lost the ability to see anything except He. Thank you.

wow. the IMPACT.

Braver than any US marine man props to you🤝

this shit is about the time i wrote an article on batcest, like man,,, the fact that i didn’t get cancelled is MIRACULOUS. also like,,, uh if anybody on here did gossip on me,, send screenshots i’d love to see it.

Hello, just wanted to say your article was great. Thank you for taking the time to provide an unbaised answer. It should provide people with nuances they couldn't possibly conjure on their own.

May I ask where your username originates from?

yes you may (also thanks!!!) i thought it up when i was trying to find an original username bc i didnt want to be called like ‘timdrakes something something’ or ‘jason todd something smoething’ or ‘dick grayson something something’ yanno? so i thought batarangs, they sound so dumb and that’s my username story... now it’s my whole entire brand lmao.

yno that bit in kick ass where red mist asks kick ass if he wants a hit of his blunt, was that the inspo for stoner tim

no? it’s bc i think stoners are hilarious and drugs are great. (dont do drugs tho) 

How would u feel if someone actually wore one of those bruce or ollie pride shirts u edited

fenomenal next question.

Dick as lil huddy and Jason as James gave me radiation poisoning and now I’m screaming crying throwing up so thx for that

(Rico suave as Tim is perfect tho literally no changes needed)

i was so funny for that shit wasn’t i??? lmao i loved those weird ass fancasts

You're doing the Lord's work by providing us with all these Gotham/Metropolis citizens memes, thank you for being so relentlessly funny @nellethiel-aranel

you’re welcome!! i really enjoy making memes, but getting validation for my content and my memes is REALLY nice.

Bruce is such a slut in your memes and honestly i love that for him @rhodey-rhudert-rhodes-main 

he’s that much of a slut irl too dw.

Bruce and Alfred have an emergency pride flag for the batkids. Oliver Queen printed an emergency "I love my gay son" t-shirt and as soon as Roy told him he was dating Jason, Oliver started wearing that shirt everyday and Roy always cringes when he sees it. Oliver also has an emergency "I love my lesbian daughter" shirt just in case for Cissie.

lmao YES i had a post like this bc like all of their kids/family members are so gayy

stop bringing back batfam fancasts it is not real it is not real it is not- 😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀

oh yes it is my darling.

did discowing burn down the notredam because he hates the bees? @allulily

no he did it bc fuck the french.

im gonna beg for 1 thing and 1 thing only. please please please put physical by olivia newton john on dick's playlist

okay then beg. bc i wont. physical reminds me too much of glee and that hurts me mentally.

your playlist is sorely missing some Madonna. Specifically Into the Groove, Like a Prayer, and Vogue

i’m scared of madonna that’s why she’s not on there. she haunts me in my dreams.

suggestion: son of batman by aaron dews for dick’s playlist🤩

sorry, i listened to it and the vibe didn’t agree with me.

Hear me out, metropolis citizens sending rare pair fics of Clark Kent x Superman fics to Lois to edit

yes, absolutely hilarious. even more funny if they send like physical copies, no address attached and lois sends it back marked with red ink, SOMEHOW

Imagine all the smut Clark must of read editing the fics

clark reads smut confirmeeed

NOT LOIS READING SUPERBAT PORN AND EDITING IT A 2AM 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

hc that alfred is a meta that boosts healing factor of the people around him. if the bats are injured as much as they seem to be they would be doing bat stuff MAYBE half the year. no one including alfred knows about this. whenever the kids move out they inexplicably dont recover from injuries as fast and feel better whenever they visit the manor they just chalk it up to homesickness. bruce just thinks he heals really fast. alfred thinks everyone doesnt take care of themselves properly @finchcollector

that’s actually such a great idea, but i think that alfred would find out and learn how to concentrate it better so he can help more people, bc he’s great and i love him.

One of your dickfast posts reminded me of that tweet that goes: 'so you've had sex how many times? Yeah technically that's not a bromance' lol that's dickwally or dickroy

literally tho. like that’s all of dick’s friendships. once it gets past a certain time dick is like ‘wow i wonder what it would be like to make out with wally, wally come make out with me’ and wally’s like ‘we’ve done this like 40 times, dick, you know what it’s like’ and dick is like ‘sorry are you complaining?’ and they just make out.

superfam and batfam associations??

-batman and superman

-dick/barabara and supergirl?

-conner and tim

-jon and damian

pls enlighten me I am confused

nope,,, uhm batman and superman, but dick and superman as well, and then conner and tim, jon and damian and steph + babs with supergirl

I came across a fic in which Wonder Woman calls Batman "Stella" (like Stellaluna, the children's book) and I can imagine the batkids hop on the trend and maybe copies of the book appear at random places (aka, everywhere Bruce frequents)

sorry can’t reciprocate that was the name of my high school chemistry teacher and it gives me nightmares to think about.

good human what are your pronouns?

wouldn’t you like to know?

I need me some gothamites preferring harley over joker memes

everyone prefers harley over joker youre just very fucked up if you dont

don't understand why people try to add like veteran policy to the batfamily

dick pulling out his veteran batfam member card so he can eat first: step aside, peasants

Do you know the song Simmer by Haley Williams? It (the first verse anyways) reminds me of Jason? It's about rage.

damn yeah i LOVE HAYLEY!!!! youre right thoo

Okay so I like listen to your stoner Tim Drake playlist 24/7 but would he listen to skegss? Also I keep adding songs mentally it’s killing me 😩✋🏼 Anyways,, I literally love and worship your playlist 😃🤞🏼 And uh yeah have a good day ✨

stoner tim drake playlist is lyfeeee. also dont know who skeggs is? i’m stupid? have a good day!!

All the Robins (and Batgirl) decide to trade costumes for one night just to fuck with Batman and all the villains in Gotham. @subspacecadet 

batman knows it’s them youknow but like,,, what does he call them? he’s like ‘red hood?’ and 3 people answer and he’s not about to compromise some identities so he’s just Pissed.

I aspire to treat cops the way my dad treats them. This man is a 45 year old Asian immigrant to the US and the treats them like his pets. He talks about them like unruly children. Sometimes he pays off local cops to shut up and stop acting racist. And usually it works. I don’t know why but I can see Oliver Queen doing this

vibes... and also yes? oliver queen handing a local cop a donut to shut the fuck up lmao. but yanno i commit enough crimes to not really want to ever see a cop ever, so they kinda scare the everloving fuck out of me.

seeing as tim hasn't aged in years, that means he was 17 at peak emo tumblr era. im back on my emo tim bullshit and im not letting it go

emo tim had a wattpad account send tweet

People seem to think that batman is so dark and serious when the rainbow batsuit is right there. He wore it with no shame.

dude the 60s were a DIFFERENT TIME

dick grew up in a circus, jason grew up on the streets, and tim was probably raised by the internet

all of them cuss every other word and you cannot tell me otherwise

bitch i KNOW but dc has to change to an 18+ rating if they want to sell comix with swear words in them so we gotta deal with imagining the swear words in ourselves

thoughts on teen titans and young justice

haven’t seen teen titans on account of havent seen it and young justice was LITERALLY my favourite thing ever, tho i do gotta admit it’s not at all similar to the young justice comics unfortunately. i really wouldve liked to see timmy bart kon cassie and cissie animated on tv!!

ew ew ew how to delete batcest shippers I genuinely digust them

log off tumblr?

Okay as poc who was called racist for calling an Italian pastabrain: in the batfam are Italians bit Damian just yells various insults about the others being Italian. Just him yelling “What are you doing you moronic spaghettihead!” At steph etc

huh? i meant real italians. homeboy is telling steph he hopes she chokes on her fucking garlic.

I think it's dumb as hell to pull the batman is the best fighter in the batfam argument because like it's just irresponsible of Bruce to let his kids fight when they couldn't possibly be on his league or something

fair enough, but also like who cares they could all kill you just sit down and take a beating.

lady shiva, thalia al ghul and Selina Kyle are all milfs @notanothertimburtonenthusiastugh 

unfortunately, i have to admit,,, you’re right

why tf didn't someone give joker a death sentence already? like he's a mass murderer...give him the electric chair treatment wtf

idk i think plenty of people would have tried to murder him already (boring answer is: he is a popular character so they can’t kill him off bc he brings in lots of money)

There’s no such thing as “ copaganda”.

all american media is propaganda. happy to clear this up for you

is it bad that I find lady shiva owa owa

no. find her as owa owa as you want.

aight I'm guessing the order of your favs in batfam:

1. tim

2. Steph

3. dick

4. Duke

5. the rest

you’re wrong but it’s cute that you tried, i generally don’t have favourites, but i have a special place in my heart for steph, tim, dick and cass. bc they were like my introduction to batfam. but damian, jason, duke, bruce, babs and alfred are NOT FORGOTTEN OR UNLOVED

oh my god i was literally just readily willing to believe that italians werent white ty for clarifying it was a joke im so dumb sdkvjskdfs

i mean some italians aren’t white? italian is a nationality as well as an ethnicity, so like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

since I saw so many people doing headcanons about the nationalities of batboys, I see Dick as an Italian.

dont know if youre serious or not, but sure.

super random but

jason 🤝 damian

old english

lmao fair enough.

tim absolutely has 1 gay uncle and his parents shit talk said uncle all the time so after bruce adopts him he specifically reaches out to this uncle to be like "heyyyy just so you know you majorly influenced my life yes i know i havent seen you since i was 5 and at the family reunion yes i know you dont remember my name idc thank you im gay too" and then they never talk again.

yuppp lmao that’s definitely something that could happen. i can also consider tim having no family members, like none. until he does like a dna test and he realises he has like an aunt living barely 2 miles away from him who’s like some illegitimate child of his grandpa.

I dare you one of them sends clark superman/clark fic and clark corrects the shit out of it and then goes like ps his dick is not that big, just telling as someone who has seen it. internet either explodes or goes who tf did he not fuck at this point.

i think everybody would call clark a buzzkill and try to cancel him over that.

so you're telling me Tim Drake wouldn't buy Starbucks?

no. dunkin donuts all the way

One of my favorite things is imagining people finding out jason came back from the dead and being like "oh no does he have magic powers now?!?!?" and he just pulls out a gun and tries to shoot joker

now he doesn’t even have the gun :) lmao

my favorite batfamily fanfictions are the ones where they use their shitty codenames, unironically, in any context

bruce gets codename ‘ugh’ everytime. he hates it.

crazy that tim being a 17 y/o ceo and a stoner who does brand deals are all actual canon things written in detective comics comics and not made up for shits and giggles by you, tumblr user batarangsoundsdumb @rowdeyclown

SO CRAZY HUH?

batman au where everything is the same but his utility belt is bright pink

absolutely, but i raise you, his boots light up like sketchers when he kicks people.

unbeknownst to the superhero fandom writers in the dcuniverse, clark and BRUCE are one of the most prolific fanfic writers in the superhero rpf tag on ao3. clark writes the best lois x superman angst, full of unhappy endings and scenes that are a so detailed you'd think you were in the middle of a superhero beatdown. bruce made an ao3 account to fuel "the do the butts match" thing, and makes batman/bruce fics from time to time. he wrote a superbat fic as a joke but ended up making it REAL porny. @concrastinator

dude they’re WAY too busy for that. Oliver Queen and Hal Jordan on the other hand are the most prolific fanfic writers in the superhero rpf tag writing what is Mostly porn.

When the dining table topic gets to politics, Steph says "eat the rich" as the solution

bruce just silently takes away her fork and knife while she’s talking.

[chaos-in-the-making]

So what you do is, ya look at the upper right hand side of another users page who you don't like ya see, and then ya click that little person shaped icon there, and then you select block, and that's how you don't have to see things in the tags from people with opinions you don't like. Instead of harassing people like the shitty fan police you are, and acting like you have any right to tell people what they can post on their own god damn blogs!

🎶Look here comes a consequeeeence, consequeeeence, consequeeeence, consequences of my actions chasing me right now🎶

I don't keep a block list. I have the maturity to leave people with differing opinions alone.

You see that # sign on the bottom on your post? Back in the day we called it the pound sign (as in go pound sand), but kids these days call it a hashtag. That's a funny thing that we use to group posts of the same genre and type together. It's great! It doesn't always work the way we want it to, but we use it to search for content of the media that we LIKE, ENJOY, AND PARTICIPATE IN. By your own words, you don't enjoy the show. Therefore you are not a fan. THEREFORE your posts shitting on the show should be tagged with the 'anti-blank' so it is grouped with the other crybaby posts.

That room over there is yoooours and this room over here is ours!

You throwing a fit about being asked to follow proper tagging guidelines just proves that you're not mature enough to participate in grown up spaces. The ONLY posts I'm calling out are the ones I find in the tag meant for fans. You don't like it? Stop using the regular tag.

Ok class dismissed!

Post whatever you want on your own blog, I wouldn't touch it with a 39 and a half foot pole. Just tag properly and we will be square! (That's old people talk)

[vaguely-concerned]

The Mandalorian Chapter 14 rewatch thoughts, in which there is much ado about Looking

let’s get the most Look heavy out of the way first lol

- the scene of din holding the silver ball is shot from below, like we often get when we’re in baby’s POV because grogu’s almost always gazing up at him. so the camera/audience is looking at him through the child’s eyes still, in a way, just to emphasize the connection even more. h e l p  m e

that firmly established ‘din looks down, baby looks up’ rhythm paying for itself yet again 😭😭😭 also I love the effect that because of the smoke it looks like he’s standing in a serious thunderstorm, while the sky is actually really bright and lit up with only light cloud cover from other angles. it plays into this thing that... this is basically the end of the world for him, and barely anyone else knows or cares. he or the baby never appear in the sequels, din doesn’t have a huge ~*destiny*~ within the Force, his world is so much smaller than what we’re used to in star wars -- his grief at having it come crashing down around him is only a black cloud around him, it doesn’t block out the sun on a galactic scale ala anakin skywalker. he’s not Important. except actually he’s the MOST IMPORTANT, perhaps exactly because of that. (he certainly is to me) y’know? well I wouldn’t blame you if you don’t, I’m not sure I know. but my heart is so full.    

- for a good portion of the scene where din is picking through the ashes of the razor crest (;_____________; still not over it) boba is actually looking at fennec looking at din

more precisely he seems to be looking at her while din is looking at the silver ball, and is looking at din and having some kind of Emotion while din finds the beskar spear

hm. I am now exTREMELY curious to know what boba and fennec’s relationship is actually like in more detail. strictly canonically I’m pretty sure there shouldn’t be enough of an age difference that he could sort of be a father figure, but... there’s something here, some parallells being drawn

the shots of them right before din finds the ball is interesting too -- you have fennec looking at din with a pained flinching sort of sympathy

and then she looks down and glances half towards boba like she’s checking in with him out of the corner of her eyes, but she’s not seeking gaze contact at all, she’s not asking him about anything or even initiating contact (it comes across better in motion but this was the best I could do to show it)

presumably they’ve already decided they’re going to help din, from the matter of fact way they inform him about it right afterwards, but there’s something complicated going on here within fennec at least, I think, it makes me want to know more about her backstory. (boba does look at her when he says they’ll help, and he’s trying to meet her eyes even if she doesn’t reciprocate)

and then at the very end of that scene boba is looking at fennec again, and she’s finally meeting his eyes and they both seem pretty satisfied and pleased (I guess doing the right thing has not necessarily figured hugely in either of their careers lol)   

sideline but boba has so many excellent Stances in this episode, it’s wonderful. he looks so steady and grounded

- also boba and fennec are close enough that the smoke actually affects their point of view for now and darkens their world too. how’s that for a metaphor for empathy hahaha 

- it’s actually quite sweet of boba to take the time to explain his own state of mandalorian-ness to din, like he’s at least eliminating the one source of uncertainty and tension that it’s in his power to remove haha  

(I wonder if he’s also gauging din’s reaction to the concept of foundlings? I’ve seen some people theorize that it might not be a recognized tradition across all of mandalorian space (then again... what even is, the only true mandalorian trait is accusing someone else of not being mandalorian right) and that it was one of the apples of cultural discord in the civil wars)

- the whole journey boba’s face goes on as he watches din with the spear... I do not understand what it is exactly but I am OBSESSED with it, his eyes are doing some things and it makes my heart feel funny

he pretty quickly glances away with a sharp inhale of breath that’s some shade of ‘well. fuck.’, but I can’t quite tell you exactly what’s going on there haha

- okay so honestly -- maybe we find a force user to train the baby and maybe we don’t, but not having din be an active part of that training either way would be a fucking CRIME. din clearly just has so much fun being able to engage with him like that, as does the baby, and it gets results. if someone shows up to help with this I hope they have the insight and flexibility to understand that. (listen to baby’s excited squeal and din’s breath of laughter before he encourages ‘come on, you can do it’! it’s consistently the most engaged and happy we see din and baby obviously feels safe doing this with him when he doesn’t with anyone else, come ON)

- the soft soft mando and baby music kicking in when din gives grogu the silver ball back and tells him he’s special T_______T oh my actual god  

- I love the way boba’s just... studying din all the way through their first meeting, it’s such a look of cold, dispassionate but not necessarily unkind evaluation. that’s the gaze of a bird of prey or something, it’s perfect (his eyes have softened significantly when looking at din towards the end of the episode, I guess that whole father son situation hit a tender spot huh lol)

- din’s shoulders rise up immediately when fennec starts talking about the bounty on grogu :’)

it also seems he’s a little 😬 about being in such a hurry back in chapter 5 that he missed that she wasn’t actually, y’know, dead haha, he slumps a bit uncomfortably and there’s also the “I owe you one” later on

- oh to have the utter yet unwarranted confidence of this storm trooper behind a minigun, still blasting away as the boulder crushes me

- I want to say something to gideon about what sorts of things a man must be compensating for to take the time to gleefully gloat at AN ACTUAL BABY, but thankfully I’m way too classy for that

- fennec shand using her entire strong but slender sniper’s frame to push that boulder off the cliff... poetry

I love that one pose she does jumping backwards off the stones at one point too, it’s so graceful, she looks like a dancer

- this entire scene of boba fett fucking eliminating storm trooper after storm trooper is doing some stuff to me, I can’t lie

it’s so AWESOME to see a mando interact with their armour in the same natural and expert way as din -- bo katan & co didn’t really have that many surprises and tricks to theirs, it’s more sleekly functional, boba and din’s have a different feeling to them, more personal to them and lived in, in a way (probably because they work alone much more often and need some tricks up their sleeves)

bo katan’s armour is for War and has been for generations, theirs is more just to Live as themselves? does that make any sense?   

- I wonder what it feels like for din to try to push through the force barrier - he’s making sounds not just of exertion but with a little bit of pain to it?

- I really like that when boba says “I was aiming for the other one” fennec clearly knows he’s not joking, she doesn’t smile or anything. it makes it feel like they actually know each other quite well at this point

- grogu makes small sleeping baby noises when he’s passed out on top of the stone Y____________Y  

- genuinely touched by how much better boba’s armour looks in the next episode, after him having it back for like a week max. LOVE what this show does with the relationship between a mandalorian and their armour and how it’s almost a living thing when it’s with them, and dead when it’s taken away

- the way boba leans forward a little in his seat when he spots the big ship *chef kiss* it so instinctively reads as him watching something dangerous, and after seeing the way he went through all those troopers like a hot knife through butter you fucking KNOW that if he’s unsettled you’re damn well unsettled too haha

[finsterhund]

Hey I fucking broke my ankle lmao

“I could really use a break right now” I say as I struggle with my dog having terminal cancer, my roommate pushing my limits, my money being nonexistent, and barely getting one meal a day.

A finger on the monkey’s paw that is me ever wanting anything in life curls again. Must have been a pretty fucked up monkey because there’s a lot of fingers on this thing by now.

So yeah, life thought I wasn’t going through enough already so it added broken fucking ankle to the list of Finsterhund suffering hours.

“I wish I wasn’t broke” is another good one. “here have a different broke then lol. go fuck yourself you rotting corpse of a victorian boy piece of shit”

here’s the goods. Got ex roommate to take photo of the screen. Doctor did not let me email the high res version to myself.

I did not go “waaaiii” on the way down, unfortunately. Life just isn’t like a video game. Probably didn’t look funny either. In reality I am a silent faller/injurer/whatever. Survival instincts of child abuse survivor I land and stay there as quiet as possible. I “grew out of” signals for help before teenage years. Which is a blessing in disguise because I don’t like people looking at me when I am hurt. it’s the “baby deer waiting for mom to come back instinct” I hide from predators.

My brain didn’t really process it when it happened. I just fell and heard a SNAP. If I had watched a video of it happening to someone else I would have found it gross but fortunately my brain just let me ignore it.

I was mostly immediately scared that I had somehow damaged the FIFTY DOLLAR dog calming aid that I got for Cazza in the pet store. I needed something like it for her and just seeing it in person and not having to pay 30 dollar shipping I was like “yeah. getting it here” fortunately the only fragile part is a little plastic capsule that imitates a heartbeat, which was packaged inside the toy inside the box. I hope. I have not opened it.

But the reason I fell is because I was also carrying giant bag of dog food. You see my vet recommended I switch out her food in light of the potential heart disease link. So I got the biggest bag of the best chicken stuff they had. My roommate might try saying that it was because the bag was too heavy. It wasn’t. I could lift that shit just fine. Bag was impossible for my impaired depth perception cringe fail line of vision to see around. The same visual impairment that prevents me from being able to drive a car made me think that I could put my foot down on the curb of the sidewalk. Dumb ass thought I was stepping OVER the curb.

Fortunately the bag of dog food broke my fall. Otherwise I’d have probably smashed my nose and teeth on the pavement. I really hope the expensive puppy calming toy is unharmed :( I say as I have a fucking broken leg.

So yeah. If you’ve seen labyrinth where David Bowie playing Jareth the Goblin King walks over all those weird ass fucked up stairs and ledges that are all a manner of odd angles? Specifically where he just takes steps that are at an angle that you cannot actually walk? Yeah I fucked up Jareth platform stairs walked over the fucking curb and snapp my legs

yes, I said legs.

Only my left is technically broken. It’s a Webber A something or other. I have a sick as hell photo if you wanna see. It’s included in this post.

But my right foot also got fucking fucked up. That one it snapped a tendon or a ligament or whatever the fuck. Get this, it snapped off a small piece of the gottamn bone. It’s not a break but it’s like it came off like a splinter. I made a joke in the hospital about how it’s like when you throw a sticky hand at the wall and when you pull it back a piece of the paint comes off with it. That was really fucking funny but nobody laughed. My friend’s group chat thought it was funny though. I did not get a photo of that foot and the tiny cringe sticky hand paint sliver bone.

I am on pain meds better than my normal pain meds. I can barely feel the legs in bed now.

So back to the parking lot. I landed on the dog food bag. I am hoping the calmeroos puppy is not broken or damaged in any way, I heard the snap but my brain is not registering the snap. This hurts “like a normal fall” I think at first. It hurts a lot of course, but I have the pain tolerance of a truck (thanks for this one Will) and a “heartwarming�� story from my youth is that my mom didn’t believe my arm was broken both times it happened because I wasn’t “in pain enough” so I’ve got the firsthand experience to back that up.

Yeah then I try to fucking move my goddamn legs. Left one, broken one, there’s noises. Like cracking pop sounds. And pain. God fuck. It feels like the foot is loose and it’s only connected by fleshy flesh and muscle and skin. Aka like how my dislocated shoulder (that my mom also dismissed because I didn’t scream enough... after the lifeguard had alreayd put it back in...) had felt when I was 12.

So I’m like “oh god oh fuck oh god oh fuck I can’t get up or move” yeah my first response was “how the fuck am I going to escape?” I attempted to better myself to get up but absolutely not. Right foot feels like when I roll the damn thing which happens a lot. That *WAS* my bad ankle. sidkfjsdkfjskdf not anymore!!!!!

So an important note is that I’m technically better about my severe agoraphobia that my roommate can let me go into a store by myself provided he’s no more than a couple stores away. So while I’m waiting for a predator to pick my weak ass off outside the petstore he’s in the dollar store next door where I was supposed to meet him after putting the dog food in the car. The car I am now sitting next to. I have no way to get his attention because my phone is dead and also in my bedroom because it’s useless when not plugged into the wall.

Luckily the people parked next to us come out the store and see Mr fuck leg the fucked leg boy sitting on his bag of dog food between the cars and bless this family they help me out. By trying to get roommate out of the dollar store. Which doesn’t work. So they get the dollar store manager. Who then gets roommate out of the store. I was probably sitting there for 10 minutes or so. They had kids so I’m really trying not to let them see how fucked up the rapidly growing ankle balloon is.

But yeah. Eventually roommate come out the dollar store. And get this, he does the same shit my mom did every time anything ever fucking happened to me and is all “okay if it were really broken you’d be screaming right now” as I’m finally able to prop myself up enough to get into the car. That fucking triggered me real bad and I had a breakdown in the car while he went back into the dollar store to continue shopping.

Then we went to get food.

Then we went to costco.

He said that he would take me home and then if it was “still bad tomorrow” he’d take me to the ER.

So he tries to help me out of the car to the house.

I cannot put weight on the right leg either. It is agony. He’s trying to support the bad leg but the other leg need support too. A weaker man would have screamed but I just dropped to the parking lot ground and cried.

Made an attempt to crawl to the house but the gravel on my knees was just too much on top of everything else.

So FINALLY the ER is back on the menu. Ex roommate comes out because I need someone to support each foot. And they take me to their car and they drive me to the ER and I’m trying to eat a baconator while my foot is reminding me that we should have stayed as tiktaalik. you know, not fucking biped I want semi aquatic too please please please youre nothing

The wheelchairs in the ER are designed to offer full body support but the damn things are so hard to maneuver around and cannot be user operated. So I was sitting there having to get pushed around feeling like a dumb fuck because I hate needing assistance to move I hate it I hate it I hate it. I kept reaching down expecting to find the wheel handles but they weren’t there.

ER was... fun. There was a cool cartoon I’ve never seen before “Craig of the Creek” playing on the TV. I really want to see more of it I really liked it. But a fucking anti vax guy (YEAH REALLY) was swearing and bitching because there were kids shows on the TV This show was the only comfort I fucking had. Craig was spoonfeeding me comfort with his little freeze to death without your winter clothes adventure (RIP to him but I’m different)

But yeah. Once being treated it was all really nice. My ability to make constant jokes about fucked up injury death and suffering is a really good stress relief. Shout out to the xray tech who totally understood I use dark humor to cope and in response to my joke about how if I was a horse they'd just shoot me that I would “make wonderful glue” the other people were also very kind but I kinda felt they were intimidated by how “jovial” I was about the whole thing. Like yeah. I’m “handling it well” because that’s my whole strategy. Inside I’m screaming “please not the plates please not the plates please not the plates” (I am scared of having metal plates and screws.) Fortunately the stupid little cringe bone broke just low enough on the bone that I don’t have to get the plates and screws. I was literally begging Spot and she answered.

In my moment of weakness I decided that the true nature of the “Spot Power” is that she makes it so that when I’m going through shit I’m always “being so brave about it”

I kept thinking about how Cazza thought I had abandoned her though and while roommate did give her her evening walkies she was stressed and puked on the walk. Which fucking ruined my life and I cried more hearing that than the fucking leg.

So yeah. In canada crutches and the foot boot actually cost money. I’m out like 100 dollars. Plus like 30 because roommate wanted gas. I’m just used to it by now. I definitely need to plug Cazza’s gofundme again now though. Have no clue how I’m even going to take her to her appointments. I am hesitant to hope that roommate will give her as good walks as she needs.

There were more tears over the fact that I was going to fail Cazza than that I actually broke my fucking ankle.

This shouldn’t be a shock. I knew that eventually my visual impairment and my physical disability were going to team up on me and fuck up my body even worse somehow. Always thought it was going to be stairs though. A small comfort is apparently the x ray department has had four other people come in about the exact same curb. Yeah I kid you not. The curb between the redacted dollar store and the redacted pet store confirmed for Heart of Darkness 2: Andy Ankle Adventure

They were supposed to give me more pain meds but I guess I didn’t pick them up or they forgot or something. My brain is fried so i have no idea at all.

Crutches are a massive learning curve for someone with depth issues and balance issues. I almost fell face first on the goddamn crutches several times. If I wasn’t broke and you know, if I couldn’t fucking not leg broken walk leg I would go to hardware store and make a wheeling seat thing like those scooters in gym class and then I’d have Cazza pull me on walks. That would work.

Big issue is in and out of our place is fucking stairs. Yeah. I crawled up them on hands and knees. No way in hell with my already fucking broken mobility could I go crutches up them. I have to hold onto railing or I fall down stairs so crawling it was.

I can technically take the boot off to sleep but the tightness makes it so much better so fuck that. Wish I had the rolling elementary school gym class scooter so I could drag myself around the house.

Cazza doted on me like nothing else. She tried to brace me going up the stairs but she’s not big enough for what I’d need with this fucking leg problem. She helped me change out of my clothes though. Even though she’ll never be certified she’s still my everything.

The she cuddled close to me until I had calmed down and now she’s fast asleep in her bed. I am so glad I ended up giving her her bath before going out.

I am going to attempt to make it to my bloodwork appointment tomorrow. I have rescheduled that due to chemo appointments too many times.

I can’t remember if I’m forgetting anything else. Honestly my roommate telling me the exact same shit my mom did just fucking hurt so bad. I think I know my own body better than you do. Like I’ve told him about how she didn’t believe me and I had to beg her to take me to the hospital and he ended up doing the exact same shit. All because I didn’t outwardly exhibit being in enough pain apparently.

I just hate how being disabled you always have to fucking prove you’re disabled. Like I was expected to somehow walk back to the house and up the stairs but when I got to go to the ER yeah fucking broken lol.

I just wish I had parents. I need taking care of. I always did and I never got it.

I’m scared for the future. I don’t know how I’m going to manage or how I’m going to provide for Cazza.

I wish breaking my ankle could have made Cazza’s cancer go away

[mosylufanfic]

Closing Time

Happy Killervibe week, y’all! This first story is for the Coffee Shop theme.

Closing Time

Cisco shut the door behind the last wifi hound, locked it, and raised both fists in the air. "And we're done!"

Done for the night, done for the pay period, done forever. In two days, he'd be starting his grad program at the university and a TA-ship with it, and he'd never have to make another latte unless it was for himself.

"Not quite," his manager said. "We've still got to finish the closing."

"But done with customers," he said, coming around the counter. He started to clean the espresso machine, singing, "No more frothers, no more cards, no more Karens' dirty looks -" He paused. "Huh, you got anything that rhymes?"

Caitlin, already pulling the drawer, rolled her eyes at him and turned to go into the office where she would count the money and deposit it in the safe. Also her last time. 

Cisco hit the button for the cleaning cycle, shut off the canned Jitters-approved music on the overhead speakers, and pulled out his phone. "Requests?" he called into the office.

"You pick!" she called back, as she always did.

He decided it was an old-school cheesy hair band kind of night and put on Aerosmith as he started emptying the dishwasher, stacking all the cups and plates up for the next morning. 

He liked closing with Caitlin, because she always had them do all the little tasks and chores way before closing. He knew some of the other baristas bitched and moaned, saying there was plenty of time to take out the trash or do the pastry inventory after they were closed and she was just cracking the whip because she could. But Caitlin always got them out on time and also never left anything undone for the openers if she could help it. 

Also, it didn't hurt that he was kind of head-over-heels in love with her.

" - jonesin' on love, yeah, I got the disease," he sang as he wiped down the table where the last wifi user had been sitting, dropping crumbs into his keyboard until the bitter end. "Falling in love is so hard on the kneeeeeees -"

She was pretty and smart - she was going to med school! How hot was that? - and kind of funny, once you got her talking. In his year behind the counter, every single one of his favorite shifts had been with her. He'd even agreed to work closing on Saturday nights because that was her closing night, and nobody else ever wanted that shift so it was always just them hanging out as he cracked jokes and told stories and made up alternate lyrics to the music on the loudspeaker and generally acted like a third-grader trying to get the attention of his first crush.

Not that she'd ever reciprocated. Oh, she was friendly enough, in her reserved way. But though she would banter with him if there was nobody in the store, she'd never flirted back or texted outside of work, even when he would shoot her a what's-up every now and then to test the waters. She'd never even given him the look when they were alone and the store was locked up and he'd just made her laugh, and . . . 

Clearly he was a fellow Jitters employee and nothing more. 

He sighed, tossing the cloth into the laundry bag. It was probably good they were both leaving. Unrequited love was probably great for radio hits, but terrible for his self-confidence. Maybe he'd get lucky and lock eyes with a hot fellow TA during orientation, and if he ever ran into Caitlin around campus, he could smile and catch up without that tinge of longing pressing on his chest.

He checked the bathrooms, just in case that one last "no, I'll be five minutes, I really need the bathroom" guy had left a horrible present behind. 

Luckily, they were spick and span. Caitlin had cleaned them a couple of hours ago, so he could probably eat off the floors. He narrowed his eyes at the toilet paper holders and opened one. "For Chrissakes," he muttered.

Caitlin was rolling coins when he knocked on the door jamb. "Hey, Charmin' Hal hit us again," he said. "I need the keys."

She looked up. "What? When did he get in?" She handed him the key to the supply closet.

"Maybe when we had that drive-thru rush around nine? He got all three spare rolls." 

She shook her head. "What does he use them for?"

Cisco shrugged. "We don't have to care in -" He checked his phone. "About thirteen minutes."

By the time he'd replaced all the spare rolls, Caitlin was signing the deposit slip. "We good?" he asked.

"Just about. I have to lock up the safe.  Can you grab the pastry cart?"

"On it." He tossed her the keys to the supply closet, and she caught them. "Wooo!" he cheered. "A stellar catch from Snow on third!"

She smiled in a way that made his stomach all warm, but turned away and started gathering up all the stuff to go in the safe. He grabbed the cart and wheeled it out front to start filling the ruthlessly cleaned pastry case so it would be ready for the openers.

After a few moments, the safe thumped closed, the light in the office switched off, and she came out to help him with the last pastries. When they'd filled the case, she handed him a roll of bills, his share of the tip jar. "Oh, and this. It came on the truck today."

It was an envelope with something stiff and plastic inside. He ripped it open and found a gold Jitters membership card. "What's this? Some kind of comment on how much free coffee I drank in my tenure here?"

She smiled. "Every Jitters team member that leaves on good terms gets a lifetime membership in the loyalty program." She nodded at the card. "You were here for more than a year so you get gold."

And fifteen percent off Jitters drinks and food. "Nice!" Discounted caffeine was not to be sneezed at, especially in the program he was going into. "What'd you get? Titanium? Diamond-encrusted?"

"Managers get platinum," she admitted.

"For the kind of crap you put up with, you should get free Jitters for life, not just twenty percent off," he said. He'd personally seen her smack down entitled Karens, kick out jerks creeping on baristas, and call the cops on a dude who was flashing people in the drive-thru.

She shrugged. "It's still a good deal." She reached out and hit the lights, so the lobby went dim and quiet. 

More than once, he'd wondered what she would do if he leaned over and kissed her in the soft after-close darkness. The thought came up again. Why not? Last chance, right? She was so close he could smell the hazelnut syrup she'd spilled on her apron earlier. What if he just - 

But her silhouette had already turned and started walking to the back, and her voice floated to him. "Come on, let's clock out."

He cleared his throat. "Right. Yeah. Let's do that."

He'd cleaned out his tiny locker earlier, so all he had to do was whip off the apron and toss it in the laundry bag. Caitlin's landed on top of it, and she picked up her purse and the bag of things from her own locker.

"Have you got everything?" she asked. "I signed my key back to Tina earlier, so I wouldn't be able to get us back in."

He patted his pockets. Wallet, keys, phone. "Got it all," he said, grabbing the bag of stuff from his locker.

He clocked out, approved his time card, and then stepped back to let her do the same. The staff door shut behind them with a heavy, final thunk, the lock clicking. 

"End of an era," he said. "The Cisco and Caitlin closing show is no more."

"Yep," she murmured.

They stood in the tiny parking lot, the lights spilling down to form a pool around them, keeping the darkness back. On the other side of the building, traffic rushed by.

He stuffed his hands in his pockets, suddenly awkward. "So, uh. This . . . this was cool. I liked working with you."

"Me too."

"Good luck with med school and all that. Maybe I'll, um, I'll see you around campus."

"Probably not," she said. "The med school is on the other end of campus from the engineering building."

He looked at his shoes. "Yeah, I guess it is."

"So maybe we should arrange to meet up sometime," she said.

It took a moment for the words to percolate, and then he blinked at her. "To - "

"Meet up," she said again. "For, um, for coffee or something."

Hang on, was this like a post-employment thing? Meet up with your manager afterward? To what, like, talk about work stuff? She was aware that they worked (had worked, past tense) at Jitters, not a Fortune 500 company, right? 

"Sure," he said slowly. 

She put her hands behind her back. "Only if you want. I know you'll be busy."

Something pinged in his brain. Maybe it was that bashful motion, maybe it was the angle of her chin as she looked away. Maybe it was the trace of a blush across her cheeks. 

He held up a hand. "Are you asking me out on a date?"

Her eyes went big, and her cheeks went pinker. She bit her lower lip. 

"Oh my god," he said in wonderment. "You are. You're asking me out."

She looked utterly crestfallen for a split second, then rallied. "Okay, I can see I might have misinterpreted certain -"

He almost yelled, "I didn't say no!"

They both goggled at each other for a moment.

"What are you saying then?"

"I - yeah, absolutely, yes, let's -" Hook up? Date? Have a torrid love affair? Get married and have a succession of fat happy babies? Yes please, all of the above. "Let's do that. But - you - you knew I liked you?"

"You were kind of flirty," she said. 

"But you never - You acted like you weren't even the tiniest bit interested!"

"Cisco, I was your manager up to three minutes ago! That's like the definition of sexual harassment!"

"Not if I'm cool with it!"

"Okay, but if we'd started dating a year ago, every time I made a schedule, people would have said I was giving you more hours or better shifts or not making you do the icky jobs, even if it wasn't true. You know they would've."

"A year ago," he said. "You've had the hots for me for a year?"

She primmed up her mouth. "As you well know, you're very cute."

He felt his grin spread all across his face. "Damn right I am. I'm such sizzlin' hot stuff that you couldn't wait three minutes after you were officially no longer my manager to hit on me."

She went pink to her hairline. "I - I just - it seemed like a good -"

He almost collapsed into laughter. God, why had he never taken that into account? All his pining and longing and yearning, and he'd never once considered how conscientious Caitlin was. Of course she wouldn't have acted like the other manager, Ralph, who was nice enough but went through the cute new baristas like a hot knife through butter. And yeah, people did say that about whatever newbie he was swapping spit with.

When Cisco had chortled himself into silence, she stood shaking her head. But not in a "I changed my mind, you're a complete goober, no fat happy babies for us." More like, "I knew what I was getting into and I still think you're cute, God help me." She had a little smile on her face.

He wheezed out a breath. "So," he said. "We're doing this?"

She nodded, and her smile widened. "Sounds like."

"Just one request, okay?"

"What's that?"

He reached out and took her hand. It slipped into his shyly, but she didn't pull away. He said, "Let's do Slurpees and mini-golf, or hit the pizza buffet, or something. Just, anything but coffee." 

FINIS

[89tczier]

the losers and their tumblr blogs

ik there’s already a billion hcs out there but none coming from my niche hellbrain soooo

richie (tttrashmouth)

his blog is one big ADHD mess, he has a new interest every few weeks and his blog changes accordingly, though there are several common ones 

he never seems to lose many followers for it though

his original posts are funny enough that people put up with it

he’s that user that you start following out of genuine interest and then realise that you’ve already rbed a lot of their popular posts and you’re like

oh shit, i know this fool

he has tags dedicated to each of his friends, they’re usually filled with shitposts or one of their Big Interests 

eddie has two tags, one he knows about, one he doesn’t, and gets mad at richie for not telling him who the tag is for 

the one he doesn’t is full of really gay shit

stan (corvid-company)

stan’s blog started out as a big vent but it was starting to get Unhealthy™ so they switched up their content 

stan knows about richie’s secret tag for eddie and constantly gives richie shit for it like they vague posts about it all the time to get under richie’s skin

‘the intricate rituals of creating a seperate LoveCore tag for the best friend ur pining for....... like the richard siken of it all.......’ ‘THIS IS BIPHOBIA STAN’

it’s 70% bird watching stuff, 20% posts for mike, 9% vaguing about richie’s gay shit, 1% abt being nb (because i fucking CAN ok)

they also have a pretty impressive following, some of it is due to being mutuals with richie, but a lot of it is due to the Wholesome Bird Content

its a surprise to them but they get so damn happy when they receive asks and stuff about their favourite bird watching spots or how to distinguish between different subspecies 

‘i dont know who this guy is, nor do i have a particular interest in birds, but what kind of fucking person would i be if i DIDN’T follow them?’

their tag for mike is pretty cute too, usually its just FarmCore but Romantic stuff they finds, other times its little thoughts they has about them

bev (marsh-makes)

initially set up to advertise her store and products 

she makes things like pins and sew on patches that are really fucking good

she gains a pretty big following from that, people like her stuff and she has a really good quality track record

richie models for her sometimes and everyone kinda loves it

she has a lot of stuff about ethical fashion and makes a lot of posts about the problems with the fashion and clothing industries (eg fast fashion and sizeism)

she also has some quality shitposts

‘i dissociated for like five hours one night and woke up with the best skirt i’ve ever pleated and a top to go with it. my power is unmatched’  ‘op are you ok????’   ‘ye i got a kickass outfit why wouldn’t i be’

eddie (kaprisun)

his blog is pretty simple: things he’s interested in, whatever his friends tag him in, and roasting the shit out of richie

‘tttrashmouth will never be content because he knows im funnier than him’   ‘ur not wrong, eds’

a lot of richie’s popular posts are shittalk between the two of them

he also gets into a lot of discourse because he’s feisty like that, usually about comics or comic book movies

‘imagine thinking marvel is better than dc based on 3 movies’

yes he’s a dc fanboy

he’s not as anti-marvel as he can come across he just really doesn’t get the hype around it 

he Also has a secret romance tag for richie and its half stuff of his own, half rbed from Richie’s Secret Eddie Posts unknowingly (and a bit of bens)

he tags them with ‘mood’ and it gives richie a heart attack each time

mike (hearth-and-heart)

farm core!!! original farm core content fresh from the oven!!

he takes photos around his farm and posts them and ohhh everyone loves them

same energy as stan’s blog (he has a lot of photos of them and the two of them together as well)

he also writes important dates down as well as books he likes

a Solid shitpost now and then but it’s mostly Pure and Wholesome content

people love his photography and unfortunately it gets stolen a lot but other aesthetic blogs but he doesn’t mind so much

he also is the only loser other than bev with an actual Impressive theme: it’s sleek and really fits the vibe

though every now and again he’ll rb one of richie or bev’s shitposts just for a little variety 

bill (deadbrgh)

he posts horror stuff (both from other people as well as his own art/writing) and little bit of vent/rant stuff

his rants are about tropes in horror he hates (eg: ableism and other general bigotry)

his vents are usually about grief or trauma, and he keeps them properly tagged and under a cut

his horror stuff too, he makes sure to keep everything tagged properly and has a link to the tag list in his description 

he sometimes makes a Spicy addition to richie’s posts, and people are like ‘wait why does this Super Serious and Talented creator follow that goblin??’ 

he also rbs a lot of ben’s stuff, people think they’re the same person for a hot minute because ben also writes and draws, but their styles and aesthetics are totally different 

‘people thinking me and eggboy are the same person is really flattering but unfortunately im nowhere near as ripped as he is’ ‘luv u bb’

then people think they’re dating, but also think the one of them is dating bev

they never clear it up

ben (eggboy)

all of his poetry and drawings 

he also makes a lot of lovecore posts that are definitely not for beverly at All

his a few of his poems get really popular so he kinda blows up a bit and he is Unsure How To Handle it

his first haiku for bev is his most popular like people go crazy for it

where his drawings are more stylized, bill’s are more realistic and gritty

people always think he’s straight tho and he’s like ‘could a straight person do this??’ *proceeds to capture the Essence of adoration and devotion*

bev rbs every one of his original posts and hypes him tf up, they collab on a few things and bev puts some of his Iconic lines on patches

the january embers line,,,,,,, people lose it

a lot of his stuff ends up in mike, richie, eddie and stan’s respective Love tags which he finds Perfect

he writes a poem about richie and eddie’s obliviousness and they’re both just like ‘god i wish that were me,,,,,, sounds familiar tho,,,,,,’ 

[iron--spider]

not at all funny (whumptober - asphyxiation)

“Peter,” Tony says, watching as Friday tracks the kid’s trajectory, following his arc as he flips through the air. “Peter Parker.”

 “Uh oh, full name time, what’d I do?”

 Tony watches him do another outrageous flip, spinning at least three times in the air. The web he lets go of soars like a party streamer. He shoots another one, swings from it, and quickly shoots one more, launching himself high.

 “What the hell is with all the acrobatics?” Tony asks, flying up higher. Peter shoots more webs, completely unnecessarily, and they firework all around them. “I know you’re a part of the circus, but you’re at your day job right now, bud—”

 “Part of the circus?” Peter laughs. “I’m just happy, okay, aren’t you happy?”

Tony snorts, watching as Friday lays out their path back to the compound. He’d considered bringing a jet, but he knows Peter likes the long swing and fly back. 

 “Of course I’m happy,” Tony says, as Peter does another couple flips, more webs flying all over the place. “Always a good feeling to save a bunch of kids.”

 “They were so excited to see us!” Peter exclaims. He spins sideways in some kind of double helix, rolling out into another long swing. “And that puppy? I mean—the situation could have been real bad, but it was real good! Because we were there! And now everybody’s safe!”

 Tony shakes his head—Peter has no business being this endearing. They’re flying through town now, a little low for Tony’s tastes, but the buildings aren’t as high over here and Peter’s gotta have something to latch onto. He’s certainly giving people a good show, and everyone on the ground that Tony can see has their phones out to film his antics. “Listen, I get the spider celebration, but don’t your webs take a lot to make? Don’t you slave over that shit? Let’s settle down, Crockett, or you’re not gonna make it home.”

 “Ugh, fine, always spoiling my fun,” Peter says. “Lemme just—”

 He lets out what could only be called an explosion of webs then—some of the web bombs, the super bursts, the works for big battles, and Tony rolls his eyes at the wastefulness, but he can’t help but smile. 

 It feels like something inside of him knew what was coming next, and he watches as the kid flips and spins and drops directly into the powerlines, landing stagnant amongst his mass of webs. Tony’s heart sinks a little—Peter’s limbs are all tangled, his arm sticking out up by his head, and Tony’s just about to break into full blown panic when he hears Peter laugh in his ear. 

 “Wow, wow, okay,” Peter says. “That was—that was unexpected.”

 Tony hovers there, glancing down to see everybody watching. “Uh, really? Really really? Because even if I didn’t see it coming, I saw it coming. Because you attract these things, buddy boy, with all your crazy flipping and excess webs.”

 “I’m a little stuck, just a little stuck.”

 “Uh, you think?”

 Peter laughs again, too delighted for someone in his situation. “Well, aren’t you gonna help me?” he asks, twisting around a little bit, slipping his left arm out of the hole it’s trapped in and through another part of the webs. 

 It reminds Tony of jumbled up string or headphone wires, and it drives him a little insane looking at it. “Nah, I’m gonna see how you handle this one for a few minutes here,” Tony says. He clears his throat, going off com so Peter can’t hear him. “Uh, Fri, give me a good way out of those webs for Pete, please.”

 “Right away, Boss.”

 “And, uh, he’s not gonna electrocute himself, right? We built in shit to keep that from happening, right?”

 “We did. And he should be safe, unless the line gets severed.”

 Tony nods to himself. Peter’s almost like one of those damn pigeons. Tony moves to hover a little closer, and he can’t help but laugh as Peter methodically moves in and out of the webs like a goddamn spider, ducking and tugging his legs in and out. Tony wonders if he could just break it all if he pulled and pushed hard enough, but clearly, that’s not an attempt he’s gonna make.

 Tony goes back on coms. “Good lord, kid,” he says, laughing harder. “What a mess. You’re ridiculous.”

 “Yeah, well, I—”

 Peter moves the wrong way and falls. But he doesn’t drop all the way to the ground, and when Tony looks closer, to his horror—the kid is hanging by his fucking neck. He’s kicking and struggling and grasping at the offending web, and there’s a gasp from the crowd below.

 Tony swoops over, his heart in his throat. He grabs Peter around the waist with one arm, holding him up so the web around his neck isn’t strangling him. But it’s tight as hell when Tony grabs at it with his free hand—Peter’s webs are some of the strongest material Tony’s ever come in contact with, and he can’t just snap it off, despite the fact that he’s wearing the suit.

 “Kid, can you breathe?” Tony asks, right up close to him now, and he flips up the faceplate so Peter can see him, even though he’s still wearing his own mask. “Tell me.”

 “Oh—like, barely,” Peter gasps, voice ragged. 

 “Okay, okay,” Tony says, holding onto him tight and hoisting him up a little higher. “Okay, uh—” He’s stuck between cutting it off and burning it off, knowing both aren’t the best case scenario and both will absolutely hurt Peter. But it’s less likely that he can actually cut through the webbing with anything he’s got right now—damn Peter for being so damn smart and so dumb at the same time. Create an incredibly strong material. Strangle yourself with it.

 “I have to burn through it bud,” Tony says. “Gimme a sec. Just one sec.” He aims his pointer finger at the webbing around the kid’s neck, listening to him wheeze, and Friday quickly selects the right tool and power level. Tony starts before he gets any sort of permission because Peter is still actively being strangled, and Tony feels him jolt a little bit when the laser hits his suit.

 “Tony—” Peter gasps, clearly in pain, voice already breaking.

 “I’m sorry, kid, I’m sorry,” Tony says, wincing himself, barely able to look at the brightness of the laser. He should put his faceplate back down, but he wants to offer Peter some kind of familiar comfort. He hopes he doesn’t look too horrified. He can’t control his face. “I’m sorry, I’m gonna fix it, I’m gonna fix it, just a second—”

 The first layer of webbing snaps, and Tony can see Peter’s suit going black. 

 “Just a little bit more—” Tony says, and Peter tries to take a big breath, the web still cutting off his air supply. Then the second layer snaps, just as the laser comes in contact with Peter’s skin. Peter gasps, and Tony bats the webbing off of him. He puts his faceplate back down, and then he takes off without another word, still holding Peter.

 “Oh my God,” Peter rasps, coughing, as Friday boosts thrusters by fifty percent. “Oh my God.”

 “Yeah, oh my God,” Tony says, as his own heart rate flashes on the screen. “You’re such a moron sometimes, Pete. It’s too much for my damn—you’re gonna give me a heart attack.”

 Peter sticks to him, holding on tight. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

 Tony sighs, instantly feeling bad for the moron comment. “Don’t be,” he says. “Shit, just—you need—you’ve gotta—”

 “I know,” Peter says, and he reaches up with one hand, patting the burn on his neck. “I know, I know, ugh, I know.”

 ~

 “The video went viral,” Happy says, standing behind the two of them as Tony deals with the burn on Peter’s neck. There are horrible red rings around his throat, which Tony hopes heal up real quick, because they make him feel dizzy and sick. Happy keeps talking. “It’s already got 6.7 million views on Twitter, uh, user shootingwebs says WHOA SPIDER-MAN BE CAREFUL DON’T HANG YOURSELF WE NEED YOU—”

 “Very nice dramatic reading,” Tony deadpans. “You should be on the stage.”

 “I’m just telling you the news,” Happy says, with a sigh. 

 “No one genuinely thinks I did that on purpose,” Peter says. His voice sounds like he screamed til he lost it, and Tony wishes he just wouldn’t talk until he doesn’t sound like that anymore. “Right? I mean—”

 “No,” Tony says, opening up the bandage and pressing it carefully over the new wound. Thankfully, it’s small, and it’ll be gone soon. “No one genuinely thinks you did it on purpose. Everybody saw you flipping around like a flying Bruce Lee with your stupid web streamers.”

 Peter snorts, and reminds Tony of his own laughter before the kid made the whole thing Not At All Funny. 

 “Uh, a mom of one of the kids from that weird collapsing building thing you were at—right before this,” Happy says, glancing back and forth between the both of them. “She, uh, tweeted out her thoughts, hoping...Spider-Man is okay.”

 Tony rolls his eyes, heaving a sigh.

 “That’s nice,” Peter says, squeaky voice still intact. “That’s really nice of her.”

 “We’re gonna have to make a legitimate statement,” Tony says, rubbing his eyes. “I’ll have to think up the right thing to say…” Even though the whole thing was literally like a Three Stooges skit, Tony feels shaken down to his core. Watching Peter nearly hang himself, having to hurt him to fucking help him—he wasn’t exaggerating, about the heart attack. Peter is gonna give him a heart attack.

 He slaps his hands down on his knees, and looks at Peter hard. “Your webs are too strong. Never thought I’d be saying that. I could barely burn through that shit without literally cutting through you.”

 “Good!” Peter says, brows furrowed. “Listen, this isn’t—an everyday situation—”

 “Uh huh, uh huh,” Tony says, nodding drastically. “Never again. No more web streamer celebrations. No matter what we did previously. I love when you’re happy, I always want you to be happy, but clearly, too much happiness means you’re gonna get tangled up in your own webbing and the power lines and almost goddamn hang yourself.”

 Peter pouts, looking away, and Tony sighs again.

 “Don’t worry,” Happy says, looking at the kid. “Before the whole Iron Man gig, Tony once fell off the side of a building while he was at a rooftop party and firefighters had to come and get him.”

 Tony rolls his eyes. 

 “He wasn’t even drunk,” Happy says, grinning.

 A wide smile splits across Peter’s face, and okay, fine, that’s worth Happy sharing that incredibly embarrassing story. 

 “This’ll blow over,” Happy says. “We just gotta get Clint out there and make him do something stupid and we’ll be golden.”

 “You work on that,” Tony says, pointing back at him. Then he points at Peter. “You—promise I never have to see you with a noose around your neck again, whether it’s made of your own webbing or not.”

 Peter presents his hand, and sticks his pinky out towards Tony. “Pinky swear,” he rasps. “The most powerful kind of promise.”

 Tony scoffs, overwhelmed, for a second, with fondness. Then he locks their pinkys together, and they both squeeze. “Good,” he says, when they let go. He hops down off the counter. “Now I’m gonna go call May and explain Spider-Man’s latest viral incident.”

 “Have fun!” Peter says, voice breaking.

 “Uh huh,” Tony says, walking away from him, trying to suppress his smile.

 Jesus, this kid.

[gevejsbvdj]

Pt. 2

the continuation of what inspired my leave beneath the cut

I have a friend, who I got along with really well because we are both Afro Latinas (only she can speak Spanish. I don’t, not really) and we are black kids who had an interest in unconventional topics. I messaged her before disappearing about the ending of the server. I was keeping her updated all throughout, but after telling her the ending, I left her on read

I won’t disclose what I got up to during my absence. But again, don’t think that I had a breakdown because of the server ONLY. It was the final straw. I had so much going on in my life and I couldn’t take it anymore. 

Anyways, she took it upon herself to send hateful messages to Ley’s account and thought it was something to be proud of and told me. I...wasn’t impressed. But I still didn’t respond to our chats. Then she (her name is Rex. I’m gonna call her that) dmed Ley and was actually pretty aggressive towards her in an attempt to get answers. Again, not impressed but it was enough for me to actually come online. I feel like that’s why she acted out, to get me online. I don’t think she cared about me and used my pain to hurt others.

I had extremely brief, passing conversations with people who weren’t involved with the situation at all right before I messaged Rex. 

Ley was special to me before her message. I was always very defensive and protective of her like I was everyone else, but her especially because I thought she was nice. And I remembered when people were being mean to me, she reached out. And I still appreciate her for doing that. 

Which was why it was so confusing when Rex told me that they were all mad at me because I ACCUSED JOANE OF GROOMING PEOPLE. They wanted a reason to make me the villain so badly that they made shit up.

Notice how here, she says that I called Joane a FUCKING PEDO. Not even just a groomer but an outright PEDOPHILE. 

I’ve been raped. I’ve been sexually assaulted, groomed, all of that. I don’t say shit. I never say anything. I’ve even been accused- yes, ACTUALLY ACCUSED unlike Joane- to being a paedophile. I’m 19. Not even just that but I’m freshly 19. I got accused when I was 17. But I would never just- ughhhh moving on I don’t wanna get into it. 

When Rex asked for proof, this is way Ley sent her:

In this screenshot, I’m literally discussing how Joane’s childish behaviour could get her killed. I was concerned. Again, where’s the bullying?

Rex told me that Ley said she was wrong for not having proof, and I understand. Ley wasn’t present when it all went down

But really Ley? 

I heard a quote from someone that said something like “if someone believed a lie about you without checking up on you first to see if there was proof, then they were already looking for something to destroy you with to begin with” or SOMETHING like that. So I thought back to that quote and felt awful. I always suspected that they didn’t really like me, but always marked it up to my depression talking nonsense. But after all of this...maybe it was true. Why did I come out the most damage? Why were they making up lies about me? Me, out of all of them. Why was I consistently being seen as the bad guy overall? No really tell me. 

Anyways, this was Ley’s justification to believe that I would say such an awful thing:

Okay. Let’s just say that- Joane WAS a groomer. That she actually is a paedophile and I commented on it. She’s obviously not but I’m pulling a Ben Shapiro here. Everything else is the same only Joane is a paedophile. 

That motherfucking “it’s weird that he only spoke up when they were arguing” argument, and other arguments like that are so fucking toxic. As well as “well it wasn’t a problem that never came up before” so??? That’s what the fucking #metoo movement was all about. Timing means NOTHING when it comes to that. It doesn’t matter if it’s Joane or fucking Bill Cosby. The fact that thought came to Ley’s head is so fucking upsetting and DISGUSTING.THAT mentality is why people never want to believe victims of assault. Same goes for “they could have said that privately” guys she’s talking about that user who said they were uncomfortable with Joane coming onto him. Privately? It was private to him. In that server, we’ve made it known that it’s a very homey and comfortable environment. And who the fuck are you to tell someone where and when they can speak up about something like that???

Also, she accused me of calling her a pedo again. Good for me right? I’m a bully and I’m someone who just blindly calls people paedophiles. Good for me, damn. 

No, you shouldn’t believe someone right away when they call someone a groomer. God don’t I know that. But you definitely don’t say THAT what the fucking fuck. 

Jesus. Okay, moving on. 

Rex aggressively messaged Mel who had something similar to say:

uggh, you WERE the toxic environment i wanted to flee from,.

It hurts. It hurts a lot to see another friend you looked up to call you a bully. And that they just say that you called someone a groomer when you didn’t. 

Mel couldn’t provide proof either. 

Mel also tagged her post with someone kinda ignorant. 

Imagine if (thinking of someone I and others don’t always agree with) someone like James Charles made a post broadcasting all the homophobia he dealt with during his career, and I or some other asshole said something “while I don’t always agree with James…” like now isn’t the time. Now isn’t the time to let people you know you disagree with me ESPECIALLY on a post where you agree with me 100%??? What is the point then? You agreed with me, so agree with me. There. No one is saying that you have to agree with everything I say lord fucking knows I don’t always agree with you guys. fucking DUH. It makes me think you just wanted to put that in to lesson me and my words, even only slightly. Why? That hurts a lot, Mel. It really fucking does bruh.

When Rex called her out on it, she deleted the reblog. Not just the meagre little tag but the whole post. If she couldn’t be slick with me, then she wasn’t going to support me at all. It isn’t worth it if she can’t be shady. That’s the message I got from that. Tells me a lot. 

I am not friends with Rex anymore. She’s always been really aggressive and drama craving and I can’t take it. It’s impacting me negatively as well. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t somewhat happy with the screenshots she gave me. Told me a lot about these people I was still willing to talk to. 

Now? I won’t even waste their time.

After all of that. I made the post. The big announcement post. It was too much. I can’t escape the racism in my hometown or in the country in general, but I can leave and distance myself from the fandom. 

I was talking to someone today, and she, as a white woman, admitted that white people act so shitty when it’s implied that they’re racist. Which is so true. 

As I said, people make mistakes. No white person EVER is 0% racist or biased. I’m sorry but it’s not true unless you’re a baby or something. Same goes for other races, but mainly white people who have always had the upper hand, the privilege, the money, the chances, the power, all of that. 

Listen to me. 

When a person of color tells you that you are being microaggressive, biased, ignorant, or prejudice, or straight up RACIST, YOU FUCKING LISTEN TO THEM. Why do you guys get so AGGRESSIVE AND MAD?? That is so fucking WEIRD. 

And yes. I’m talking to you Vulture. 

I really had no ill feelings towards you prior to your comments.

Or your posts. 

peep that clumsily used aave. never fucking talked like that to anyone but me. either way, you sound dumb.

Why?

Why so...mad?

You felt guilty? Why did you feel guilty? 

...I’m gonna let you answer that. 

Moving on. I know that not everything has to be about race. I hate making things about my race. I do, even when I should! But you can be racist unintentionally. Does that mean you’re racist? No! I have yet to receive a genuine apology from any of you, meanwhile, I’ve been over here grovelling and hoping that you like me again. God. Why is it so hard for you to apologize and move on??

No, in that same fucking server, someone sent a racist meme after joking about slavery all day:

And yes, the people in the chat at the time laughed at it... 

I told them that WASNT funny and they freaked out all “WHY CANT I TALK TO PEOPLE IM SO FUCKING STUPID I SUCK” like oh...my god. You guys make it so awkward being black oh my GOD. I- like it makes me never want to say ANYTHING but I know I have to but god what the hell guys???

I wouldn’t really think that the members of the server chat were racially biased if they just accepted the fact that they were micro aggressive and didn’t flip out about it. Not really, at least. That reaction is so- well it’s sus as fuck. People who aren’t prejudiced will apologize, correct themselves and move on. Not dismiss me constantly and DEFINITELY not freak the fuck out. 

I also wouldn’t assume they were racially biased if this SAME EXACT SITUATION DIDNT HAPPEN TO ME BEFORE. 

Yep! On the Beatles Amino, I was called a bully and was reported by the LEADERS. Why? Because I told a curator she was inconsistent with her rules… that’s it. And that was back when I was sugary sweet all the time and was deemed to be a cinnamon roll. Nah. They knew I was black and I got told that people were scared of me and that I was bullying people. Yeah okay. Messaging ONE curator about her rules is the same thing as bullying people. Chile I can’t. And it only happens in the Beatles fandom. But no when someone calls John Lennon a racist it’s all “Zach! Zach! Tell them they’re wrong.” Ugh...

So that’s that on that. I have nothing else to say. Don’t message me about this post if you didn’t read all of this. I’m an idiot and I’m honestly still willing you hear you all out but don’t expect me to ever want to have anything to do with you. Out of the what- 50 people from that server, only two stood up for me? And two separate people APOLOGIZED TO ME. AND THEY HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH ANYTHING. That’s a shame. Thank you Johnny, Lenny, Laurie, and Remy. All of your names rhyme and you didn’t make me feel like I was CRAZY, unlike those I mentioned. There’s so much shit going on in the world rn, especially to do with racism. I know that you guys know. But some posts really....really tried me. oh well. I’m black. I like The Beatles. And I’m a victim of microaggressions, false accusations, gas lighting. I’m also out. bye.

black lives matter resources

[legacyofabsolutewalnuts]

@swtorpadawan tagged me in this meme, and I am hella into it. This is my favourite musing bc swtor in the canon of star wars is fucking hilarious. On a side note, for anyone who does this and chose only one oc, but has thoughts about the others oh my god do and let me know. Im a snoopy bish give them all to me. In this case I’m going to try to keep it brief while covering my main four, Viticalia, Thomsyn, Belville and Montym. Partly bc I’ve been thinking about their dynamics for a joint Alliance Commander AU lately

This got really long, bc I couldn’t choose one, and Im a wordy bish, so I’ve put the actual answers under the cut, so as not to kill everyones dashes

What would your OC do if they were thrown through time and into Star Wars the Clone Wars:

1. Who would they fight for?

I think most of them would either end up going independent or siding with the Republic. Montym and Belville would actually be the most likely to commit to the Republic, they’re both two people who value loyalty and understand that sometimes things need to be changed from the inside out. Thomsyn I think would stay with the Republic, but may end up with the Grey Jedi. She isn’t inclined to this whole “just peacekeepers” deal and would want to take the fight to the Sith directly. Viticalia would be an independent, committing to neither except for who would pay her most, or just destroy the CIS and take her place at the top of it. She would not be willing to submit to being ordered around by Dooku, or lord forbid Grevious or Ventress, and she definitely wouldn’t appreciate Sidious being unwilling to step up on the frontline with his troops.

2. If not a force user, would they keep their job (Would a trooper still work for this new Republic and would an Agent be loyal to the Separatists?)?

Bel would probably make a play to join the SIS. And then immediately question how the SIS went from agents like Theron to seemingly having the capabilities of two people and paperclip. I’m just saying how did no one put any of the diddly dang dots together. He’d be the type to pull off an op and then basically drop it at the Jedi’s feet like “here, give me a job.” I’ll get into why he would go to the republic in a bit.

3. Who would they hate?

Vits would despise Dooku and Sidious. She would like Ventress but find her training considerably lacking. She understand some cunning, undercover work, and what it can do, that’s why she and Bel get along, but the lack of commitment to stand beside your men and fight with them is something she despises.

Thomsyn would have some problems with the way the Jedi, but she and Montym would both have a much bigger problem with Senate oversight. They’re both used to working with politicians, but the inability to work without that oversight would bother them. Neither of them think the Jedi are infallible, but they both have a big problem with the idea of needing politicians to greenlight things like humanitarian missions. 

Bel would have a huge problem with the Jedi that he keeps under lock and key. Part of it would be due to Kothe. The other part is...well he’s seen what happens when Sith lead, he doesn’t really think the Jedi should be given military power for their ability with the Force either. 

4. Who would they get along well with?

Bel would actually get along really well with GAR Specforces. I think he’d adjust pretty easily to them, and people like Skirata and Vau would be comfortingly familiar as Bel actually got along really well with Shae and Torian. And he would very much enjoy the troopers, he understands their mindset, and especially with the Commandos, they understand the importance of intel people like Bel are meant to provide. He’d also be all in to spar with the ARC’s, and hone his skills against theirs.

Montym would have had a romantic crush on Obi-Wan within five seconds of the man dramatically dropping his cape and that’s really all there is to it. He would also get along well with Senator Organa.

Like I said earlier, I think Vits would have liked Ventress, and probably tried to poach her as an apprentice in a damn second. Thomsyn I’m not really sure who she’d get along with best.

5. What would they think of the Jedi Order?

Viticalia has, and always will be fascinated by the Jedi in that sort of detached, research-esque way. Otherwise she doesn’t care about them much, although she does find it a bit amusing to watch some of them tout the ideals of the Republic as things go down hill. She at least never had any misconceptions about the Empire. Thomsyn and Montym sort of understand how the Jedi could have come under such heavy control of the Senate. They both would have hoped for better, but aren’t that surprised, not after Saresh.

Bel could not care less about the Jedi. Likes them well enough individually for the most part, but that’s his approach to any and all force users really.

6. What would they think of the “rule of 2” Sith?

Viticalia thinks its the stupidest thing ever. Probably starts taking on as many slightly sensitive people as she can and calls them her Apprentices just to piss off these new “Sith”. Really she’s just adopting herself a bunch of children, but it counts and that’s all she cares about.

7. What would they think of having a clone and droid army fighting instead of typical soldiers?

Bel understands what its like to be treated as less than a person. As an asset only. It’s still something he does to himself, thinking about himself as only an asset or a liability, which is a mindset Theron’s working on having him get rid of. So he would sympathize pretty heavily, which is part of why he’d go to the Republic. He’s turned the tide of a war and saved countless of his coworkers in the military before, he would try it again.

Viticalia and Thomsyn would have more practical issues with the idea a droid army. They aren’t creative, they can’t interpret, and they aren’t built for every situation. Thomsyn however would have a lot of problems on the legality of clones, whereas Vits is used to slavery and is prone to forgetting about how that works.

Montym thinks the whole idea on either side is terrible, for various reasons, but cannot stand that clones are not legal citizens but the Republic uses them anyhow.

8. If Republic - if they became a general in the army what would their relationship with their clones be like?

I think Montym would accept a position as a General, Thomsyn...maybe for a while. Montym is a little better with handling the cost of war, whereas Thomsyn counts on herself to keep everyone around her alive. I think they’d both be on good terms with their troopers, Montym would take a bit longer, he’s quiet and a bit...odd, but when he likes people he makes it clear. Thomsyn would get close to them quickly, and each death would hit her pretty hard.

9. If Imperial - what would they think of the complete lack of sith and excess of droids in the Separatist army?

Viticalia has soooo many problems about tradition with the way the Sith operate, but in particular thinks the CIS is...stupid. The idea of a civil war is fine, sure, but their execution is lacking. Bel thinks they’re stupid but also finds it very funny. Terrible tactics, questionable leadership, not a good spy in sight... but he also thinks the way the Republic has alienated so many of their own...well he’s seen it before with Imperial worlds, and after Saresh it isn’t surprising. He’s largely disillusioned and just wishes someone would learn from their mistakes already. Part of what would push him to join the Republic in this case would be that he values peoples lives a lot more than droids, and he hasn’t valued the Sith as leaders in a long time, so he has no reason to go to the CIS and as far as he’s concerned, Republics got the better chance. 

10. Consider they were born in this era - where would they fit in Clone Wars canon?

This I’ve actually thought about this a bit. Thomsyn and Montym would be still pretty much the same, Jedi, although Thomsyn would not have joined the Grey Jedi in that AU as she would be more accustomed to what this Republic is like. Viticalia I would go with a Jedi who leaves the order eventually, simply because it would be really fun to explore a much more light-sided Vits. Bel’s a bit more difficult to place, in a society that doesn’t put as much importance on genetics and perfection, he would have the chance to do whatever he liked, which he didn’t in the Empire. In an au that follows his canon life a little better, he would probably join the SIS, but more likely as an anaylst or undercover agent, not as a sniper and agent. 

Honestly time travel and born in that era, they’re def aus I’ve thought about writing

[sillyfudgemonkeys]

I feel you with that “Joker killed a god” stuff, but what gets me as well is whenever I see those discussions over “strongest group btwn P3-P5” I’ll see some comments saying Futaba could hack into Aigis and defeat her that way. And idk... that always really bothered me. Sure P5 already treats Futaba like a hacking god, but could she really hack into Aigis? I personally don’t think so, and even if she could, I doubt it would be for very long. Unless Futaba really is just that good *rolls my eyes* but what do you think?

Welp this one is new for me ;w; Welp, I can add it to my list of other takes I don’t like when it comes to hypothetical fights (under the cut for length):

Joker killed a god (so much wrong there)

SEES has Aigis so they win (I’ll def talk about this one since it’s relevant)

PT are more physically capable/have had more training so they win (I’ll explain this one too) 

P1/2 can use real guns and Personas in the real world so they win (usually when P1/2 are in the mix, I do think they could have a surprise advantage, but its not like P3-5 can’t use Personas IRL....it’s just that they’ve never had a chance....also the gun thing.....which I’ll get to, also they forget Aigis/Naoto have real guns dfklsjafjal)

P5 kids can use guns so they win (it’s similar to Aigis I’ll get to it, also did we forget about Naoto and Aigis????? ksldjfa;kjdfa;jf also those aren’t real so they are SOL if they aren’t fighting in the Metaverse)

Now I can add “Futaba hack win” to this list DX

Never stating if we are doing it ala PQ style (aka we’re ripping people out of their main game timeline, aka teens vs teens), or if it’s Arena style (aka we’re doing it as a sequel and it’s adults vs teens),I mean their strength is different between PQ and Arena so it’s fair (plus Labby and/or Sho might choose to side/help on P4′s side which is also important), basically there needs to be some kind a rules/basis of P3/4 chars so we know what version to pit against the PT otherwise it’s anarchy and we’re getting nowhere

Not stating which terrain they are fighting on (it is kiiiiiinda important, hometeam advantage)

Assuming a certain terrain is an insta win for a certain group (reality/Tartarus is a bit more of a struggle without evokers but not impossible, also SEES is kinda honorable and wouldn’t like the disadvantage even if it was still doable without evokers....except maaaaybe if lives are on the line that is kfljsafdajf, TV world is the most neutral but it really depends if it’s Arena style or not cause that determines if there is fog or not)

For reference, personally I’d put it at P2IS/P2EP>P3/P4>P5, still working on where P1 goes tbh so there are def gonna be changes, same with PTS, P2 manga is probs gonna be with the other P2 cast. And this list is my personal opinion AT THE MOMENT (cause I just know Atlus is gonnna screw over P3/4 in Arena 3, either cause they need to weaken them with it not making sense or they are gonna nerf them cause they haven’t been active in a long while >.> which def shouldn’t have been the case after Arena or at least Ultimax but nope still tier 1 Personas 8U) regardless if it is PQ or Arena style. It’s mostly cause 1) fusion spells (P2/3/4 have them, even tho P4 doesn’t call it that, it operates EXACTLY like a fusion spell so I’m categorizing it as such) and 2) P4 kids.....are pretty strong to hold their own/beat people who have upgraded Personas.

.......sorry side tangent there’s gonna be like 1 or 2 more but they are in relation to the topic (and it’ll be at the end) falkdsjakfj. But yeah that’s BS. And def something Atlus would do except they forget that the teams have hard counters against that. >.>

(might change if I remember something but atm I’mma just say it) Iirc Futaba’s Persona doesn’t usually hack people, her only two hacks in battle are against her own mother (”hacking my cognition” my ass, you just imagined it there, how about you imagine your mom away???? oh wait that should’ve happened before the damn fight and thus us not needing a fight so stupid!) -ahem- and when we get a insta hold up (which is really just her blinding the damn enemy it’s nothing hacky about it....so stupid)

Aigis literally willed her way out of someone remote controlling her, not even hacking, like a literal remote designed to control her and kill SEES....and she broke free of it. 

Arena style wise, Fuuka was able to break Labby free of control too, tho that was non-hacking and against a weakened god (would not be surprised if she trained that to Rise, and/or because it’s Futaba and not a god, Rise could probably do it as well.....since Rise knows how she just wasn’t strong enough against Kagu...but Futaba isn’t Kagu 8U). 

If it’s non-Arena style, it’s possible that Fuuka (and by extension Rise) could be susceptible to someone interfering with their Navi-ing, as seen with Chidori messing with Fuuka (even after she’s evolved)......but only Chidori has shown to have that type of ability not Futaba (and Chidori isn’t even a hacker so “hacking” isn’t really what’s going on ksdajf;a). It’d probs only work pre Arena (cause Fuuka is supposedly super strong in Arena), but it’d require Atlus to create a damn ability for Futaba that doesn’t exist yet. Also iirc Chidori’s really was just used to mask her/team’s whereabouts and used to relay a message (not mine control Fuuka)

if Futaba HAD this type of power, A) P5 would be a walk in the park, B) she would’ve used it iirc

In case Sho/Labby are allowed, Labby was also able to break free of her own remote control in Ultimax (thanks to S!Labby)

Fun fact, not a point, but apparently Aigis can possible reach her sister’s but not if they are being mind controlled (or “hack” as she said in Arena). I dunno something to note kfsljda;jf

So like.....no......I don’t think she could “hack” them. Hell, I don’t even think Sho was hacking Labby, I think he just has a similar remote control that his dado had (which he probs got what he needed from hacking the Kirijou/or his dad giving him info....need to replay Ultimax a bit tbh, but low key I think they just like using the word “hacking” fksdlajaj;fdjfkd), and Futaba would need to do that prior to the fight. And that’s not even counting that it’ll actually work (because of reasons listed above).

Now for the side tangent, it’s funny people think her hacking Aigis means insta win (or that Aigis is an insta win), and that the “PT are better cause they trained and are more physically fit plus they have the outfits that help them” and like no????? P3/4 (freaking they train too sakdljfa;jf what the hell?) but they also have crazy physical abilities. You think Chie can just punt a giant robot and not have her leg broken? Or Mitsuru can crotch shot a shadow with her boots and walk away fine? Like an 80 ft robot is a normal enemy for the IT, both SEES and IT are taking face shots from TANKS on a daily! Why else do you think SEES/IT can survive Takaya/Adachi’s bullets (or Jin’s bombs)? It’s because of their Personas that ANY team can survive being set on fire or electrocuted! XU The PT’s outfits are just a physical representation of their status as Persona users in the Metaverse tbh, it’s a cosmetic symbolism, doesn’t mean SEES/IT don’t have it too (and they should if they go into the Metaverse).

So yeah Aigis, or even guns, aren’t a deciding factor, esp when SEES/IT are shown to be able to handle/beat Aigis/Labby just fine klfjsdajfa Hell iirc they HAVE to beat (at least Shadow) Labby to even continue the series sdkaflajfja And she was tortured to be a literal fighting Machine! 

So yeah, hacking isn’t an isnta win (also forgetting Fuuka is a hacker too fkdasjfl;), Aigis/Labby isn’t an insta win, guns aren’t an insta win. 

“But Shinji died from a bullet” but Shinji nothing. 1) He didn’t have any armor on, and most IMPORTNATLY 2) He was willing to die, and considering P3 really puts an emphasis on will to live being a crucial part to summoning a Persona......and thus him not having his Persona activated at all made him not get the nice Persona perk that we usually have. 

But will Atlus do it despite it not making sense? Probably! Cause the PT are oh so special! uwu Even tho they’ve yet to prove themselves in being better than at least SEES/IT, let alone P1/2 cast. .....stupid temp buffs..... >.> can’t do anything without your stupid deus ex machina temp buffs can you Joker? Tbh, other Persona chars beating “Full Cognition Joker” would be the most Persona thing out there, so I don’t even think FC!Joker would win (not that there’s really a good organic way for him to get that back). “Full cognition Joker is like god level!” oh didja hear what other Persona chars like to do to these so called “gods”? 8U

[cruecifymesixx]

Love and Leather /part thirty/

Word count: 1.7k

A/N: omfg were at 30!! I can’t believe it! Thank you everyone for the continuous support! Nothing to special for the big 30, it’s mainly just a filler!

Warnings: Language

Taglist: @brideofdraculana, @xstarryeyes, @aryssav, @miserablecunt, @dangerous-like-a-loaded-pistol, @inthebackofmycarlaytheirbodies, @fandomshit6000, @anntheboneless, @venus-calum, @justjodeye, @supernaturalvikingwhore, @are-we-real, @hi-my-name-is-riley, @extremesadnerding, @thatbandchick39, @awkwrdcait, @countrygirlswonderland, @dillightfulpickle, @baiabouk, @awesomealmostdopestudent, @madsthegroupie, @martabastic, @romanticvengeance, @tashy-bear, @krazykatkay456, @terror-triplet, @shouttatthedevill, @rodriguez025, @kickstart-myheart-sixx, @s-outhie, @anxious-diabetic, @awkwardblackgirls, @motlycrue, @brooklyn-antiques, @shamelessobsessions, @jerseytaint, @lilytalebi, @criminalyetminimal, @motley-queen, @trapt-in-a-dream, @lunamadhatter99, @broke-n-bitchy, @thanks2pete, @slowandangry, @lovesick-heart0, @keepcalm-and-beyou, @miriampraez, @teenwolflover28, @lilyhw1, @swoopygorl, @motherloovebone, @random-internet-user-4471, @falcon-arrows, @talranocchia2001, @wheresmyvodkabitch, @waywardprincess666, @nikkisixxsixxsixx, @iluvmesomemarvelndc, @marvelismylifffe,  @zoenicoles, @pfft-halsey, @vamprlestat, @supersoldierballerina, @primal-screamer, @electradestiny, @n0-sh0rtage-0f-faults, @cruebaby

“Dude! We’re gonna have so much fucking fun!” Tommy shouted, as I walked up with my bags in hand. Without warning, he picked me up in a giant bear hug. “Were gonna fucking drink till we pass out, snort until our noses bleed, and fuck until we can’t!” My eyes went wide as a giggle left my lips, “T-Bone” I said, fixing his half buttoned plaid shirt. “Not each other! Shit, I mean we can find you a nice guy for the night in every town or something.” Tommy corrected himself as he ran his hand through his curly locks.

“Don’t scare her already kid, we got a few long months ahead.” Mick butted in, “Glad you could come, sweetheart.” He said, kissing my cheek then slowly making his way up the stairs of the tour bus.

“I also have games we can play too! I got cards, battleship, checkers, you name it.” Tommy gleefully explained, “I also have an extensive horror movie collection that the others never want to watch.” He added on, I smiled and leaned my head against his arm, “Sounds fun to me.” I said, looking over at a limo and Vince stepping out.

“Well look at this blonde haired bitch!” Tommy addressed Vince as he walked up to us. “Yeah, fuck you too, man.” He retorted, then turned his attention to me, “You ready for me to keep you company on those long drives, Princess?” I rolled my eyes, scoffing in return.

“Watch it.” Nikki snapped, as he handed his luggage to a roadie, “I thought that thing was over and she was fair game, since you went and got yourself a girlfriend?” Vince asked, “No she isn’t.” “Yes I am.” I fought back, earning a glare from Nikki in return.

“I’m still not fucking you though.” I said, patting Vince’s shoulder, our attention being taken as Josie pranced up with two suitcases, “You didn’t say she was coming?” Vince said, “Yeah, well, surprise.” Nikki responded, rolling his eyes in return.

He seemed very moody today. His hair was particularly flat compared to usual, and it looked as if he hasn’t showered in a few days. The clothes he was wearing were the same clothes I saw him in four days ago at a party. He seemed fidgety too as Josie was in his ear whispering. I looked away when her and I made eye contact.

“Alright, everyone’s here. Let’s go over the rules.” Doc walked from around the bus, making the boys groan.

“We have some guests this time, nothing changes. Music comes first, partying comes second. I don’t want a repeat of London and we have to cancel the shows.” Doc said, sending a glare towards Nikki, he smirked back at him.

“No groupies on the bus Vince, they stole shit last time. Keep them at the hotel or at the concert.” Vince groaned.

“Tommy, no fireworks on the bus.” Tommy sighed like a disappointed child.

“And Vanity...” I looked at Doc, “What?” I was confused as he spoke to me, “I have heard you have a temper-“ “I do not!!” I shouted, jumping down his throat. The boys snickered as Doc took a step back away from me.

“I’ve been informed you have a temper, no fighting with Nikki, and no destroying anything on the bus, or you’ll go home.” I scoffed as the boys chuckled, “Do you understand me?” He asked again.

“Well tell Nikki not to be an asshole and I’ll be good.” I told him “Nikki don’t be an asshole.” Nikki dropped his arm from around Josie’s shoulder, “Tell Vanity not to be a bitchy brat and I won’t be an asshole!” Nikki argued back.

“I’m not a brat!” I yelled back at him, “Yes you are!” I rolled my eyes, “Enough!! We aren’t even on the road yet! Both of you shut it! And let’s go! I will see everyone in Phoenix.” Doc dictated as we all got into the bus.

“Where do I sleep?” I asked Tommy, “Well you gotta bunk with us cause someone-“ T-bone looked over at Nikki, “is a spoiled drama queen who throws a temper tantrum when he doesn’t get the big room.” He explained, “So you can have the top bunk if you want.” He said, pulling back a curtain and patting the bed.

I muttered under my breath, trying to get myself up on the top bunk but I was a tad to short, “Here, let me help.” Vince said, placing his hands on my ass and giving me a boost. I glared at him when I got my ducks in a row, “Don’t touch my ass again.” I warned him, but he smiled cheekily and nodded.

I watched as Nikki and Josie went into the back bedroom, closing the door and locking it. “Probably gonna have to invest in ear plugs.” Mick said from the bunk underneath me. I leaned over and looked down at him. “Huh?”

“The boys never follow the rules and always bring the girls back. It gets loud...messy sometimes too.” I gagged when he said that, “I have a pair, they work wonders.” He suggested, “Thanks Mick.”

“It gets overwhelming sometimes, I’m here if you need me, alright?” I nodded, “If you want to say no to the partying it’s alright as well. It gets tiring doing the same thing every night.” He continued to give me advice.

Nikki walked out the bedroom door, stopping in the walk way that divided the two bunk beds. He stopped and looked at me, “You’re not a brat all the time.” I rolled my eyes at his half assed apology. “Well you’re an asshole all the time.” My wit was once again to fast for him as he didn’t say anything in return. “Cat got your tongue?” I asked, giving him a wink.

Josie walked out, glancing over at us as she had a box in her hands, “Vanity?” She quietly asked for me, “Yeah?” I looked at her, then at Nikki who gave me a shrug.

“Do you want to help me paint my nails?” She questioned, opening up the box that had different colors of polish, “Uh...sure.” I hesitantly said, rolling off the bed and landing on my feet with a thud. “ ‘scuse me.” I said, my chest brushing against Nikki,

I sat down at the table with her. She smiled at me as she took nail tools out of the box. I gave her a weak, unsure smile as I noticed the boys looking at us and talking amongst themselves.

*Nikkis POV*

“I smell a threesome.” Vince said, “Dude, that would be fucking insane.” T-bone added, giving him a high five, “Vanity would never be okay with that.” Mick spoke up, finally someone talking with some god damn sense.

“Are they friends now?” Vince asked, “I mean my sister and her friends always painted each other’s nails, and when they do they would talk shit about their boyfriends.” Tommy added on, but we quickly looked to Vanity and Josie as they laughed together.

“I think they’re just blood sisters.” Vince blurted out, “What in the fucking world is that?” I asked him, “God, You’re an idiot.” Mick said, looking at Vince

“No man, just here me out! I was reading my moms magazine once and I read that when girls get together, their periods like match up or some shit like that, and the alpha female always gets the period first and then the other is the beta, and that’s how you know which one is more dominant, its pure biology.” Vince wrapped up his monologue as we all, minus Mick started laughing our asses off.

“That’s the most stupidest thing I’ve ever heard in my life!” I said, trying to catch my breathe, “I got fifty that Van is the alpha.” Tommy said, pulling out his wallet.

“Dude I’m not even fucking betting cause I already know that’s true.” Vince said.

“I think you all are idiots, and they’re just getting to know each other.” Mick butted in, “Since they both share lover boy over here.” I rolled my eyes.

“Dude.” Tommy slapped my knee, “Who’s better at head?” He asked, “No, whose got the better pussy?” Vince changed the question, “Whose got the better tits?” Tommy changed it again.

“Vanity does, I’ve seen them both naked.” Vince laughed as I sent daggers his way, “I wasn’t trying too! It just happened by accident.” Vince defended himself, “Dude.” Tommy slapped my knee again.

“Hit me one more time and you’re out of a drumming gig.” I snapped at him as he defensively put his hand up, “Why won’t you let us get into Vanity’s pants? You’ve let us with Josie and she’s your girlfriend.” Vince questioned, his arms crosses against his chest as he leaned back into the chair.

“Oh that’s because Nikki-“ “Mick!” I quietly shouted his name, cutting him off. “Dude! Do you know something we don’t!?” The boys started pestering him as I took it as my queue to leave.

I decided to join the girls, “What are we talking about, ladies?” I said sitting down next to Josie, wrapping my arm around her shoulders as Vanity painted her nails.

“Oh, nothing.” Josie said, placing a kiss on my cheek. A giggle came from Vanitys direction, “Whats so funny?” I asked confused, my eyes glancing back and forth between them.

“Relax, Sixx...were just getting to know each other.” Vanity said, smirking at me in return as I cocked my head to the side. “Oh, really now?” I asked, as I raised an eyebrow.

“Yep.” Vanity said, quickly going back to painting her nails, “Well what are you girls talking about?” I asked again, “Don’t worry about it, babe.” Josie purred, resting her head on my shoulder. I kissed the top of her head, noticing Vanity glance up at me quickly.

“You want yours done too?” Vanity asked, motioning to the chipped black paint on my right hand. “Well, if you insist.” I said, as she took my hand in hers and began painting over the messed up paint job I did before.

Maybe this wouldn’t be such a bad idea, having both of them here with me at once. Maybe I was just over thinking as usual, and maybe it would be a good thing. Everyone could have fun if we just let it.

[vannahfanfics]

Like Father, Like Son

Author’s Note: Hi all, this is a rewrite, with permission, of FanFiction user AwarenessBringer’s story, A Different Partner. I found it to be an interesting take, so I hope you all enjoy it as well. :3

Category: General Fluff

Fandom: Bleach

Characters: Rangiku Matsumoto, Ichigo Kurosaki

Requested By: Awareness Bringer (FanFiction)

The cold night breeze ruffled the loose fabric of Rangiku’s death-black robes as she stood perched on the peak of a tall utility pole that cut through the charming but sprawling mass of Karakura Town. Though the diameter of the wound wooden structure was only a few inches or so, she balanced perfectly atop it, scanning the labyrinthine array of neighborhoods and business districts with hawk-like eyes. If one could see her, she wondered if they would mistake her for an assassin searching for her kill, or figure her a stoic sentry guarding over the sleepy little town by the river. Regardless, it did not matter, for no one could see Rangiku; she was a ghost, a specter, an invisible god of death. Rangiku did not come to this unassuming town for either purpose. She had come to find a man long missing- Isshin Shiba, her former superior in the parallel world, the Soul Society.

Isshin’s reasons for spiriting away to the world of the living had never been divulged to Rangiku. One day, he had just never returned, leaving the young, impressionable honey-haired girl to wonder of his absence. Rangiku could not imagine his motives for doing so. Being a captain of the Soul Reapers was but the highest honor, and yet he had seemingly tossed it aside on a whim. Rangiku had been searching for him for the longest time and had finally caught whispers of his residence in Karakura Town. She had never regularly patrolled here, but if she had, she would’ve known in an instant. As soon as she had traversed the gap between her world and this one, his massive spiritual energy had greeted her like an old friend, overwhelmingly strong but nevertheless gentle and embracing. Blue eyes narrowing slightly, she crouched down on the pole once she had homed in on the source of the emanating spiritual energy.

Isshin… Why did you leave without saying good-bye?

With a single bounding leap, Rangiku shot into the sky. Her light, unseen form landed softly in the grassy yard of a quaint medical clinic. Rangiku’s eyebrows crept up her head at the thought of the irresponsible and free-spirited Isshin handling the responsibilities of being a physician. It seemed the clinic also doubled as a residence, given by its layout and the soft yellow light burning in the windows. Rangiku’s sandals scraped against the asphalt driveway as she approached the dwelling, peering through one of the windows to see a tastefully decorated living room. No one was currently there, prompting her to phase through the wall to step into the room. Curious as to how the man was now living, she poked around the room a bit, stopping by an end table when a photograph seated there caught her eye. She put her hands and leaned over to inspect it.

In the photograph was unmistakably Isshin, with a big, beaming grin and that thick dark hair and beard that always suited him so well. Seated beside him was a beautiful young woman with soft, motherly eyes and wavy caramel hair. Seated on her lap was a little boy with a shock of unnaturally orange hair, while Isshin was holding two baby girls, one who favored her mother and one who favored her father, in his big, muscular arms. Rangiku smiled forlornly as she brushed her fingers over the smooth glass of the photograph.

“I see… So you fell in love.” Rangiku’s bittersweet mood was instantly overtaken by the cold rush of adrenaline as hostile intent invaded the small space, and she was only just able to throw up her arm to block the savage kick that was about to be delivered to the side of her head. The force still sent her sliding several feet across the wooden floor of the building, and her forearm stung numbly at the area where the sole of a shoe was imprinted in dust into the fabric of her clothes. She lowered it slightly to see that same orange-haired boy, only a tall, scowling teenager now with his long leg still hoisted up from where he had kicked her.

“Who the hell are you and what are you doing in my living room?” he shouted with an accusing point of his finger. Now that the initial shock had worn off, the gears started whirling wildly in Rangiku’s head. She was in her spirit form; there was no way that this boy could see her, let alone kick her! Yet, his ferocious glare was directed at her and her alone. Could it be possible that he somehow inherited some of Isshin’s monstrous spiritual energy? Sure enough, if she concentrated, she found that the amount contained in that lithe frame of his was much greater than a normal human’s. With a lofty sigh, Rangiku brushed the dusty imprint from her arm.

“So, you see ghosts, I take it? That has to be a right pain in the ass, I imagine.”

“You damn right, and it’s an even bigger pain in my ass when they invade the sanctity of my own home to beg me to sort out their unfinished business!” the boy groused hotly. It seemed he had realized that she was a spirit of some sort, so he lowered his foot to the floor. “Whatchu want, lady? Can’t it wait until after dinner?”

“Who’s Ichigo talking to in there?” chimed a sing-song girl’s voice from what Rangiku surmised was the kitchen.

“He’s probably being bugged by some ghost again. Let him handle it,” came another girl’s voice, more monotone and grumpier than the other’s. Ah, so those must be Isshin’s daughters…

“I’m here to see your father, actually, Isshin Kurosaki. Can you bring him in here to speak to me?” Rangiku had learned pretty much all she needed to know, but there was no way she was leaving without speaking to him a little. The boy frowned in befuddlement at her as he dug into one of his ears with his pinky finger. He reminds me a lot of Isshin…

“My old man can’t see ghosts.” This made Rangiku’s eyes take on the form of dinner saucers. Had something occurred to rob Isshin of his spiritual powers? She had been sure that she had felt his spiritual energy… Rangiku momentarily wondered if it had been the boy- Ichigo’s- spiritual energy instead, but surely that could not be possible; a human simply couldn’t contain enough spiritual energy to rival a Soul Reaper’s, especially not a high-ranking officer’s! Rangiku considered leaving for a moment, but luck was on her side; with a deranged howl, the man she had come to Karakura Town to see came flying through the entryway, poised to drop-kick Ichigo in the back of the head. With an angry shout, the boy just narrowly ducked, and Isshin flew the rest of the way across the living room to bury himself calf-deep into the drywall. He hung there awkwardly for a moment while Rangiku gawked in utter disbelief. Who the hell tried to casually drop-kick their son?! “You crazy old man!” Ichigo shouted from where he was crouched shielding his skull. “You’re gonna kill me one day, you know that?!”

“Well, who else is gonna keep you one your toes?” the man laughed good-naturedly while extracted his leg from the large, gaping hole he had just put into the wall. He sighed lightly as he began brushing sheetrock dust from his pressed slacks.

“Who says I need to be kept on my toes?! And who the hell is gonna fix that hole in the wall, ‘cuz it sure ain’t gonna be me!” Ichigo continued yelling as he straightened up and crossed his arms in a downright furious glare. His eyes flashed to the shell-shocked Rangiku before returning to his dumbass of a father. “Oh, by the way, there’s a lady ghost here to see you. She’s a blonde, dressed funny in this black robe thing, got a katana hangin’ at her waist.”

“Hey!” Rangiku cried indignantly at his less-than-flattering depiction of her. The boy just shrugged and waved a hand dismissively.

“Oh?” Isshin asked and looked at the area where he surmised Rangiku was standing, but it was so spot-on that for a moment, she couldn’t believe that he couldn’t see her at all. He looked back at his son with a positively devilish grin and said no words, only juggled his hands in a gesture that very obviously commented on her gracious endowments. Ichigo turned a bright shade of pink and began yelling at him again, while Rangiku wished dearly that she could clock him into next week.

“I can’t hit him, so do it for me, will you?” she requested grumpily of his flustered and mortified teenage son while rubbing her temples.

It wasn’t like she could spill everything about Soul Reapers and the Soul Society to the young human boy, so she explained just enough for his own curiosity to be satisfied. It was quite obvious that Isshin did not wish for his son to know about his former Soul Reaper status, so Rangiku lied, stating that she had known him in human life and she was simply here to see how he was doing. With Ichigo serving as her interpreter, she conversed amiably with Isshin. Ultimately, she was content with his current state of being. He seemed genuinely happy and loved his family very much. His happiness was plenty enough for Rangiku.

She was about to bid adieu to the young man and his father when her Hollow tracker suddenly began beeping alarmingly in her pocket. When she whipped it out to find it quite on top of them, she hadn’t even the time to warn Isshin or Ichigo before the living room wall exploded into splinters. Isshin scrambled to protect his terrified and screaming little girls while Ichigo bowled over the couch, knocking it over and landing roughly to just narrowly avoid the creature’s sharp claws as they tried to rip his bowels open. Rangiku whipped out her sword and managed to take the fight with the Hollow outside, but she very soon became unmatched. Lying in the street with blood gushing from an open wound in her abdomen, she groaned and crawled towards the wrecked house as the Hollow sought to devour Ichigo’s monstrous spiritual energy. The orange-haired boy came crashing out of a bedroom window into the street, panting wildly and running over to Rangiku.

“What the hell are you gonna do now?!” he hissed as he helped the weak, bleeding woman to her knees. “Get up and fight, or my family is gonna die! I don’t have the power to fight that thing!” Rangiku’s eyes were heavy and lidded as she struggled to remain conscious.

“I can’t,” she moaned as she pressed a hand into her wound. Hot, sticky blood gushed through the gaps of her fingers to paint her hand in the crimson substance. Her blue eyes flickered to Ichigo. “I’ll loan you my powers, just long enough for you to take out that monster! There’s no time to think; either you will or you won’t!” Ichigo swallowed thickly, staring at her with wide eyes, before nodding firmly.

“Your name, first.”

“Hehe. It’s Rangiku Matsumoto.”

Things didn’t go according to plan. His spiritual energy was far higher than anything she could have imagined, so he ended up stealing all her powers right then and there. They would return, with time, but there was no way that Rangiku could return to the Soul Society in such a state. Thus, she was forced to remain in the human world for the time being. It wasn’t all bad; since Ichigo had her powers now, she was all but forced to train him to be a Soul Reaper, but he really had a knack for it. In addition, she transferred to his high school and was gushed over by all the cute little high school boys (much to Ichigo’s chagrin).

Still, despite everything, Rangiku really liked having Ichigo as a partner, even if only temporary. It reminded her very much of her hayday with his father, who was so like him but so different in many ways.

Enjoy this oneshot? Feel free to peruse my Table of Contents!

[tanadrin]

Reordberend

(part 29 of 30; first; previous; next)

Leofe woke perhaps an hour later; Katherine heard her roll over, then a groggy question emerged from the bed behind her.

“What are you doing?”

Katherine finished tying her hair back; it was shorter now, but still too long for this. But she didn’t have time to cut it. She felt with her fingers down the back of her neck, trying to figure out where to press the awl. It was a shitty substitute for a proper neural probe, but it was all she could find at short notice in the hall.

“I’m just--shit!” She pushed it home, and there was a dull thud inside her skull as the emergency reboot protocol started. She pulled her hand back; her fingertips were covered in blood. Nothing for that now, unfortunately. “Just rebooting my cybernetics.”

“Isn’t that a bad idea?”

“Yes. It’s a very bad idea. It’s the sort of thing you only do in life or death situations.” Katherine stood up, and went over to the door, where Hraefn’s shield was leaning against the wall, next to one of her hunting spears. Leofe’s eyes went wide.

“Katherine, what are you doing?”

“I’m going--I’m going after the dragon. I talked to Eadwig. The bird I gave him, do you remember? I took it from the corpse of the second dragon. It’s likely… it’s likely it was a lot less damaged than its brother. And I think, whatever it is, the dragon has some way of tracking it, and wants it back. I think whatever tracking device it has built into it was meant to help recover the memory core, and I think I fucked up by removing it. And I got people killed. And I’m so, so sorry Leofe. I want you to know that. And I want you to tell the others. I’m going to go down to the Lower Settlement, and take the bird back. Then I’m going to go find the dragon. If I can’t find a way to reattach it, I’ll just have to find a way to kill it.”

“Now wait, you can’t--” Leofe tried to sit up, and that’s when she realized Katherine had tied both her hands to the bedpost.

“I’m sorry. You can’t stop me. Stubborn, remember? You can yell, but I don’t think anyone will hear you from outside the hall. And by the time someone comes looking for you, I’ll be in the hills.”

Katherine hefted Hraefn’s shield, then picked up the spear. Leofe’s eyes were wide; funny, Katherine thought she’d be more pissed than surprised at this point. 

“Listen, you can’t--”

“Shh. Leofe. I caused this mess. I came here, I disrupted your people’s existence, I got some of them killed. Before anybody else dies, I have to do everything in my power to make that right.”

“You’ll be killed!”

Katherine looked down at the ground.

“Then I’ll be killed. But at least I tried. Please tell the others I’m sorry. If you can get a message to the outside world--have somebody tell my parents I’m sorry, too.”

“Katherine! Don’t you dare leave without untying me!”

Katherine pulled her hood close about her face, and strode out of the room.

“Katherine!”

* * *

She slipped out of High Settlement and made the two-hour walk to the Lower Settlement in the dark. Eadwig’s house was easy enough to find; the bird was still sitting on a workbench, next to his stoneworking tools. She slipped it into her pocket, and was gone before anyone noticed her. From there, it was another two hour walk back up the valley, and when she was almost at the place where the path turned off toward High Settlement, she turned left instead of right, and headed up into the hills.

It was only then, stepping off the road, that something turned over in her brain, the adrenaline began to fade or whatever, and she started to feel her hands shake. She really should have eaten breakfast. Her mother always said it was important. Don’t go to school without breakfast, dear. Don’t go slaying dragons on an empty stomach.

The little observer inside her head, the little voice that was always watching her actions and critiquing what she did and telling her what she could do better, was screaming at her now, asking her if she was crazy, if she was suicidal, if she was stupid. She ignored it. She might be crazy. She certainly didn’t want to die. There were, in fact, few things in this existence that scared her more than the possibility of it ending, of plunging headlong into the great void of nonexistence, of contemplating what it would be like to be one with Unbeing, to be not, to become nothing. There were times when the certain knowledge of her one day death filled her with an icy cold terror. Today wasn’t one of those days, which was funny. Because she was pretty sure she was going to die.

She should turn back. It was the only reasonable course of action. But the one thing that scared her more than dying at this point was what would happen to the others if she failed. If she couldn’t reattach the bird to the thing, or at least get her to recognize she had given it back, it might keep looking. It might stomp all up and down the Valleys, until it had ground every village to dust, and it might keep going until it broke down. And she couldn’t have that on her conscience. She couldn’t be the one that destroyed them.

So she kept climbing into the hills. As she climbed, she did her best to hack together a self-diagnostic. Already, her head was starting to hurt in an ominous way. But if she had any chance of surviving this, she needed every edge she could get, and barely-functioning cybernetics was better than nothing.

She needed three things, she decided. She needed a way to mute pain signals. A headache was fine. Even a bad one she could live with. But burns, broken bones, anything truly incapacitating, needed to be reduced or eliminated. She also needed to get every last ounce of strength out of her muscles, even if she risked damaging them. She knew if you pushed your muscles too hard you could damage them, and that could cause kidney failure, but it would take a lot longer for kidney failure to kill her than a laser borer, or getting crushed to death. And the other thing she needed was better reflexes. That was probably gonna be the least likely to get working, because it involved core neurological function, which seemed to be exactly the part of her neural lace that was most damaged. But she had to do her best.

Finally she cape to the top of a ridgeline, and leaned against an outcropping to catch her breath. Damn, she thought. I wonder what my friends would say if they could see me now. She’d like to think they’d think she was a badass. They’d probably side with Leofe, though. If anything, she probably looked a bit ridiculous in the heavy coat, with the hunting spear and the shield. Like a squat black shrub with delusions of martial grandeur. She made a mental note, for if she survived this. Tell Hraefn to make her a bitchin’ suit of armor. Something with pauldrons and spikes. Something you could airbrush onto the side of a van.

She thought of a large green pyramid on the ground. The emergency startup sequence for her prosthetics engaged, and her headache got a lot worse. She gritted her teeth. “Neural lace console mode,” she said. A flashing indicator appeared to the left of her vision, and a shimmering, ghostly outline of a keyboard in the air in front of her. She raised her hand and made typing motions.

God, she felt like a dumbass. At least none of the others could see her right now.

Katherine was no programmer, and she was no neurologist. She did remember a few commands from the user manual of the salvaged dragon. Dampening pain signals only took about a dozen keystrokes. A loud warning tone sounded in her ears--well, probably her auditory cortex--warning that what she was about to do overrode almost every safety built into the lace, and its warranty. She hit confirm. Then she did the same thing with the musculoskeletal support system. More loud, horrible warning tones, this time with messages that featured the word “DEATH” in flashing letters. Literally, neon-green flashing letters. Yes, yes. Get on with it. She tried get into the actual neurological support system, but this time a big yellow ACCESS DENIED message stopped her cold.

“What the fuck?”

User access to the neurological support system is denied. Please consult a medical professional if you desire to… god dammit. Okay, so that option was out. She had her wits. She had a weapon. She had a shield. And she had every last ounce of physical strength she’d be able to muster. God, she hoped it was enough.

* * *

An hour later, she crested another ridgeline, and she saw it, hunkered down in a hollow below her. The dragon.

She exhaled slowly. She wasn’t sure what she had imagined. Lying on the valley floor, half buried by the landslide, they had looked so mechanical. Inert. Obviously the work of human hands; and, if she was honest with herself, she had thought that the People’s insistence on calling them “dragons” was kind of stupid. But now she could see why they did. This thing--hunched on four enormous legs, curled around an enormous stone outcropping like a beast of mythology--did not look like a machine any longer. The hundreds of metal plates that formed its skin slid neatly over one another as its head swung one way and the other; the instruments and receivers along its back bristles, like spines or the outlines of skeletal wings, and, yes, there was a furious red glow from deep within its belly. It was enormous--easily two hundred meters long. It moved forward slowly, almost glacially, testing the ground with each foot.

Well then. Maybe she could sneak up on it. Niiiice and easy. After all, somebody had to do maintenance on this thing, right? It was designed with that in mind? Maybe it would let her climb right up on top of it, find a nice hatch she could pop open, and she could drop down inside, plug her brain into a control panel, and press the “off” button. Yeah. That sounded like a great plan.

Katherine took a step forward. She looked down. Something was glowing inside her coat. She pulled it out; it was the bird. The flaw in the middle, that seemed to be where the homing device was. It glowed with a sharp, almost radioactive blue light. Katherine looked down at the dragon.

Well, shit. Its head, if that was what you wanted to call it, was looking right at her. She slipped the bird back into her coat and picked up her spear. She waited to see what it would do next. Metal plates began to slide past each other, and something not unlike a maw began to gape. And there was a grim red light shining from within it.

“Ohhhh fuck fuck fuckfuckfuckfff-” Katherine took of sprinting down the ridgeline, as an enormous blast of something hit the spot where she had been standing a moment ago. There was a spray of rocks and dirt, and the force of the blast knocked her forward, but she did not fall. She glanced back over her shoulder, and caught a glimpse of glowing red rocks.

“Whyyy,” she screamed down at the beast. “WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT. I’m trying to give this BACK to you!” She fished around inside her coat, and then held up the bird, so it could see it.

“Here it is! Take it! Take it and go! Leave these nice people alone!”

The dragon looked at her dully. She had a thought, an insane one perhaps, but she was having an insane kind of morning. She stood up, reared back, and pitched the bird as hard as she could down toward the dragon. It arced through the air, and fell hilariously short, skipping down the slope until it came to rest about half way between her and it.

“There! All yours!” she yelled. The dragon did not look at it, though it glowed as brightly as before. It just started opening its maw again.

“God DAMMIT,” Katherine screamed. She jumped down the slope, just as the boring laser blasted another Katherine-sized hole in the landscape, and slid down the scree toward the bird. She stumbled, fell, rolled, and tried to stand before falling again. The dragon’s head was tracking her, but it was slow. She could hear the machinery inside it whirring from where she was. She finally got close enough to the bird to pick it up, and took of running parallel to the dragon again, hoping she could move faster than its head could turn. Another hideous glare lit up the landscape around her; another blast hurled fragments of rock into the air.

Katherine needed to think, and she couldn’t do that very well while running. And her headache was getting worse and worse and worse and the last thing she needed was a critical failure of her cybernetics while eighteen hundred tons of pain had her classified as Threat Numero Uno. There was a larger stone outcropping ahead; she skidded to a halt behind that, and considered her options.

One, try to get closer. Running directly at it was suicide, but if she could get on its back, she was pretty sure it could not reach her. Maybe then she could get inside. Maybe. Two, try to get away. Ha ha, fat chance, and that didn’t solve her original problem. Three, try to… she looked down at the spear in her hand. Poke it? She considered throwing it away, but she couldn’t bring herself to. God you’re an idiot, Katherine, she thought to herself.

She had to get closer. She glanced around the side of the outcropping. The dragon was opening its jaw again. She took off running. It was a good thing, too; the outcropping exploded into fragments and the borer tore into the side of the mountain like it wasn’t even there. Some big chunks of rock hit Katherine on the back and head while she ran, but they weren’t big enough to knock her down, and the pain suppression was doing its job.

Now she ran down the slope, at a forty-five degree angle toward the base of the monster. Its feet were massive, nearly the size of one of the houses in the village, and the nearest one began rising in the air as she approached, as the creature took another slow step toward her. Crunch. It smashed the earth flat below it as it came down, but Katherine saw what she needed in the glow of another laser blast: an access ladder, reaching down to ground level.

It took a good seven or eight seconds at least between laser blasts. If she could escape one more, she could probably run straight at it and close the distance in that time. She began running parallel to the thing again, this time in the opposite direction; it fired, she pivoted ninety degrees, and fell flat on her face.

She scrambled to her feet; its mouth was already open again. A wild, elemental terror filled her body, and she sprinted blindly; there was another explosion, and she felt something go into her right leg. She stumbled again, but did not fall; but now her right leg was only halfheartedly obeying her commands.

Nothing for it, she thought. Just fucking run.

She made it to the leg just as it was rising into the air again, and leapt up to grab the handhold; the dragon froze, its leg in the air, as if confused, and Katherine scrambled up onto the ladder, and started climbing as quickly as she could with her shield and spear. She remembered where the access hatch had been on the other one: middle of the back, high up, near where the neck met the shoulder-ish part. The dragon’s head swung right, then left; haha fucker, she thought. Can’t laser me now. What she had not counted on was that the motion of the thing’s body made it extremely difficult to keep her grip; even as she came to the almost-flat part of the back, she had to cling to the ladder to keep from being flung off.

Finally, she found the hatch and the access panel. She used the end of the spear to pop it open, and found the neural interface on the first try. Then she saw the readout on the panel.

THREAT ELIMINATION MODE ACTIVE - DO NOT ATTEMPT ACCESS

Katherine froze. She’d heard stories--back before these things were more strictly regulated--of security protocols that could fry neural laces, even induce crippling brain damage. It wasn’t hard, if you had complete, unfettered access to someone’s brain and you were an epic asshole, to do them real harm, or just straight up kill them. That kind of thing was usually banned now. But it hadn’t always been. Katherine frowned. She tapped the physical interface of the control panel.

“DO NOT ATTEMPT ACCESS!” flashed more brightly.

“Fuck you,” she whispered to herself. She tapped it again, to see if she could get some sort of override input to come up.

PROXIMITY DEFENSE SYSTEM ENGAGED

A smaller hatch opened nearby, and something popped up out of it. Something that looked suspiciously like a miniature version of a laser borer. It swiveled to face Katherine.

“Oh come on!”

She let go of her handhold, sliding back down the side of the dragon as a second laser sliced the air above her. The dragon bucked, and she went flying off the side. There was a crunch, and a sharp pain signal, quickly muted, in her left arm. She groaned, and rolled over; the shield was still strapped to it, but her left forearm was definitely broken. She looked down at her leg. Her calf was sliced open, a deep, jagged cut. Her spear had fallen to the ground perhaps twenty feet away, and the dragon was turning, slowly, to face her.

I tried, she thought to herself. I really tried. At least it will be a quick death. The bird will probably be destroyed. I don’t know what the dragon will do after that. And I don’t know what idiot designed this thing, and what stupid fucking regulatory agency got bribed to approve it, but perhaps maybe then it will back off. And I can’t say I didn’t try.

She swallowed a lump in her throat. Fuck, was this really how it was going to end? She had survived the water and the ice and the darkness and all the rest, just to die in a flash of fire? The jaws of the dragon opened; a red glow filled the air.

It wasn’t even really a conscious decision at this point. Pure instinct. She curled herself up behind her shield, and did her best to make herself as small as possible. There was a terrific noise, a sensation of terrible heat and then--nothing. She looked up. She was alive. She looked down at her shield. It was glowing red-hot in the middle, and there was an awful stench of burned meat where the back of her hand was touching it; she flung it away, and looked up at the dragon.

The mirror finish had reflected enough of the laser to score a deep gash in it, running from the side of its head, back through its shoulder, deep into the machinery of its belly. Its jaw was shattered, hanging limply, even as its head swung left and right, like it was trying to make sense of what had happened.

“FUCK YOU YOU OVERGROWN POSTHOLE DIGGER!” Katherine screamed. She ran over to her spear and snatched it up. She could see, as the beast moved now, the way the machinery in its belly held it up, pistons moving back and forth to balance it, what looked like a supply of hydraulic fluid to move its legs. Most of it was solid metal, nothing she could do anything about, but there was one spot, exposed by the blast of the laser, still glowing from its heat, where she could see what looked like an important tank of something made out of plastic. And maybe, just maybe, she could immobilize it if she could cut it open.

“Okay, asshole,” she said to herself. “One last go.” She broke into a run straight toward the dragon. Its head swung in an arc directly down toward her, as if trying to flatten her into the stones; she turned, avoided it, but her foot caught a rock and she stumbled--but did not fall. As she came up underneath it, it began to move its legs apart, bringing its body down as if to flatten her; but this worked to Katherine’s favor, dropping her target until it was almost directly above her head. She leapt directly up, using every ounce of her cybernetically enhanced strength, and drove the spear home as hard as it could. For a brief moment, she thought it would bounce harmlessly off; but it caught some imperfection in the molded surface, and sank deep inside. The pressurized tank exploded, and a reeking, slick, chemical solution gushed out, drenching her from head to toe.

She fell to the ground, as the dragon loomed over her, and staggered. Something was terribly wrong now; her eyes were burning, and her nose, and the headache from her neural lace felt like it was going split her skull open. She watched the dragon flail for a moment, then slow--then still.

Oh God, she thought. Was it enough? Is it over? Are they safe?