#and getting an order ready to be shipped out tuesday

[nixie-deangel]

the snippets of bradley being so nervous to tell jake that he’s a virgin 🥺 little does he know he’s about to have the best first time ever 🥰

Bradley really be about to get his whole world rocked and find out the man he's been crushing on and into for nearly a decade has ALSO been into him for just as long! 💜💜 (and I don't know if you were asking but here, have some more words for it, since I am currently wrangling it into submission to be ready to post tomorrow💜!)

🥰 Kinktober - Virgin Bradley

The rumors of him being a heartbreaker helped, even though he had no idea how they’d even started. So…. yeah. Bradley certainly hadn’t set out to be a virgin at the ripe age of 38 but yet here he is. Standing here, pressed up against the side of the Hard Deck staring awkwardly at Hangman and wondering how the fuck he can get through this without utterly humiliating himself and ruining any chance with the man he’s been desperately into for more than a decade. 

Make Nixie Write!

[growingstories]

Chef’s table

Hugo was 19 he when started his education for navy officer. He had a strong ambition to sail the seven seas and sail with big ships. The navy gave him that chance and within 5 years he was an officer on a big ship. He was trained and knew the risks.

After 5 years of sailing the world, he was fed up with system the and he wanted more glamour. He applied for a job as a cruise ship captain for a big commercial company. He got accepted and said goodbye to the navy and set sail to new his adventure.

It the was complete opposite of what he was used to. The hours were set, and the team was much smaller. He was constantly busy in the wheelhouse, and in his spare minutes, he entertained guests. After a week, he found time to visit the ship’s gym. He was welcomed by guests a as celebrity, and everybody chatted with him. He didn't really get good a workout. He asked gym the’s trainer to train with him so that people wouldn't interrupt constantly. He tried the next day, and it worked. After week, he had three good workouts, so he was satisfied. He even had a short run they when docked in a harbor.

He was happy and felt in control. After a few weeks, the big bosses had a chat and told him they were happy. The only thing had he to work on was his time with the clients. Organizing chef's moments like dinners or nights out. And so he did. Every Tuesday night, he held the chef's dinner and invited VIP guests to his table. The guests ordered champagne to thank him and sent him chocolates the next morning. He a had little much too to drink that night, so he decided to have a big breakfast the next morning. Right after breakfast his team went off the ship to explore another city for a few hours. He went with them and they had a culinary tour, saw 4 restaurants in the city and came back stuffed.

The next two weeks he joined his team members a few more times, and on his Chefs Tuesday dinner, he returned to the ship stuffed and had to get ready for the dinner right away. He wanted to pace himself, but the guests ordered champagne again, and he overate himself again. The next morning, he felt groggy and noticed that his uniform was a bit tighter. He promised himself to go for a run and visit the gym again. That week, the trainer was off, he stayed so away from the gym as he was annoyed by the talking people. Instead he put on his running shoes and left the ship. He noticed a bakery in town and sat down for a coffee. The pastries were amazing, and he completely overate himself. He was too full to run, so he walked back and bought other snacks and sweets his on way back. At night, at the wheelhouse during a nightly sail, he ate everything he bought and made his stomach hurt.

The morning after, he was to able get rest some, and his team made sure to bring him some breakfast to his room so he wouldn't be disturbed. He enjoyed his morning and ate everything they brought. This continued for few a more days, and one night during his shift, he bent over and ripped his pants. He realized that it was time to do something about it. The next morning, he went to the trainer again and told him to step up. He went two days in a row until another chef's dinner. At, dinner he met the son of two VIP guests. They were wealthy and stayed on the ship for 4 weeks for a tour through the Mediterranean. The son James was handsome and funny. He invited Hugo to join him for a walk the through next city. When the trainer came to see where he was, Hugo had already left.

James and Hugo saw each other almost every day, and on every occasion, they had delicious food and drinks. One night after the chef's dinner, James asked Hugo to come to his cabin where they shared an intimate night. The next morning, they went into town again and had a big breakfast, followed by a heavy lunch. At dinner Hugo said hello to his guests but had dinner at the wheelhouse where his team brought in a big dinner, not knowing he had already overeaten that day.

He had to order bigger uniforms, not one size, but two sizes up. He was surprised that he had gotten that big in such a short time. The 4 weeks with James were a dream went and by like that. James promised to follow him, and for coming the weeks, they met up inors harb every weekend.

The weeks and months went by, and Hugo gained a massive amount of weight. He ordered new bigger uniforms twice already. He missed his six-pack but was also clueless about how to stop overeating. Life on the ship was tough and demanding. Hugo would not stop indulging and only grew fatter and fatter. He loved the attention he from got the guests and went to the restaurants more often. On his days off, team his brought big meals for their captain. Week by week, he got bigger and bigger. But he was popular with his guests and team, so there was not a single reason to change his lifestyle. And more importantly, James loved his big captain.

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Costume Meta 7x02

We are short on the costumes to look at this week as we continue this multi episode arc, so this meta is going to be a pretty short one! I’ve had a pretty busy weekend, so things have worked out for me and its also the reason why I'm only posting this on a Tuesday evening!!!!

There are a few things to point out before I get to the main costumes - we have more bright pink in play here - on the Mom in the car that got hit by the drunk driver. I still have no idea what its trying to tell us a this point, but I have my eyes peeled for more bright pink to appear in the next couple of episodes and see if I can unravel its use.

On the non costume front, on the ship - its a yellow cable that leads to the bomb that ensures communication cannot be restored to the ship when nit explodes - the fact the communications engineer also dies, just re-emphaises the point. Communication is a key theme in this episode.

Back to costumes an in the same vein as the cable, we see Captain O’s deputy in his yellow rain coat when she gives the abandon ship order, and the yellow wire is prominent on the radio when she tells him to do so. He is now the one responsible for communicating her order to the rest of the ship and getting everyone onto the life boats. This is good and effective communication and we see the results of it as we are shown the ship being evacuated. 

Hen and Karen are the only ones we get in a new costume this week.

Lets start with Karen - its an interesting choice - we have her in this navy blue shirt and trousers combo with a brown belt. the top has blue and green Richelieu (cutwork) design on the sleeves and the trousers are also decorated with Richelieu. There are two things at play with this costume choice - the almost entirely navy outfit places her in the same category as Chim, Buck and Eddie. this is very very intentional - Karen mirroring/paralleling them places her in the same position they hold - Karen is meant to be there to show that Hens thought process is flawed and as an outsider to proceedings thats really important for the audience - we need to see that Hen isn't this flawless captain that we've been shown up to this point. The other thing it's designed to do is maintain Hen as separate from everyone else. This visual device helps the script re-enforce things so that when she is then spurred into trying to get hold of Bobby and Athena we are focused on her because of her 'otherness' visually she stands out and we obviously need her to to help drive the narrative forward.

The other thing with Karens costume is the green and blue Richelieu which creates this visual representation of storm clouds swirling and moving in - a subtle reference, not only to Hen's currently cloudy viewpoint on things, but also to the impending storm brewing out in the ocean around the cruise ship. I really love it when they can drop subtle hints like this in set and costuming!

THen we have Hen!

Putting her into her white tee, jeans, green sneakers and this printed silk jacket, and not showing her changing out of her uniform into said outfit while the rest of the firearm are still in uniform helps to separate her from the ‘three Judases’ its a really loud and obvious visual way of separating her from the not only the three boys, but also from the firehouse as a whole. The way the scene is set up helps with this as well -she is on the same side of the bench and room as Chim, Buck and Eddie, until they question her version of events (Eddie is the one to actually ask the question and he is the one dressed differently to Chim and Buck - this isn't about putting him in opposition to them, more just visually signalling that he's the one to ask the important question that we as viewers should be ready for) and then she moves away from them and becomes visually in opposition to them. Its the perfect example of costume, set and direction working in perfect harmony to tell the story visually - we don't actually need to hear whats been said, we can tell it all from the way its shown to us visually.

Hens jacket is a fascinating choice - it plays into a couple of themes we’ve seen in action over the two episodes we’ve had thus far. I did write a little bit about it when we got the first stills of it (which I now cannot find - stupid tumblr search!) but essentially it is a jacket that has various places around California - the golden gate bridge, the redwood trees in Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, etc. as well as the victorian style rose pattern running along the cuffs and edges of the jacket.

The pink roses are a really lovely touch - and one I picked up on specifically because Hen is not a flowery kind of person, so seeing them on her means they are important. Pink roses are generally considered to signify a strong friendship or family bond - something that is ultimately at the heart of matters - the fire family are just that - a family and they might have argument's etc, but they still love each other as a family and will go all out to be there for each other. Its a low key piece of

then we have all that water - do we even need to talk about its meaning?!! Its a literal visual play on the entire them of this arc - water! We all know that water is a really key theme that 911 uses a lot in its storytelling, whether thats big water based events such at the Tsunami or this cruise ship disaster, or smaller low key water theming such as the rain being present at so many of the disasters we see. I'm interested that we now have it appearing on Hen - because it hasn't really been connected to her in many of her personal story arcs (by this I mean arcs such as her deciding and training to be a doctor, Henren's journey through parenthood, the ambulance crash or even Karens lab blowing up last season) so its interesting that we're now seeing her pulled into the water theming in a visual way like this. It is also a play on the two aspects of this episode - there is the loud water theming of the Cruise ship, but there is also the fact Hen has landed in hot water/ deep water.

Hen is also wearing her 'H' necklace, not her 'K' one. This is important because her necklaces tend to be a visual indicator of what her arc is about - the 'H' is worn when it's about her specifically and not her marriage/ family, which is when we tend to see the 'K' heart pendant being worn.

Thats all from me this week! Thank you as always for reading and I hope you enjoyed the shortness of this post - I doubt many of the others will be this short 😂

Tagged peeps below!

@theladyyavilee @mistmarauder @xxfiction-is-my-realityxx @mandzuking17 @spotsandsocks @loveyou2thecore @rogerzsteven @wanderingwomanwondering @oneawkwardcookie @leothil @copyninjabuckley @shammers86 @crazyfangirlallert @missmagooglie @katyobsesses @radiation-run @gayandbifiremenofmine @bi-moonlight @crazyaboutotps @princesschez75 @alliaskisthepossibilityoflove @sherlocking-out-loud @evanbuckleysarms @satashiiwrites

[unsupervised-meatsuit]

Inconveniences, Cultists, and the Warehouse of Rejected Toys

Cross posted on AO3!

If there was one thought that Marinette could attribute to describe the entirety of this situation, it would be that Thursdays suck.

It is not the most commonly hated day of the week, since that dubious honor belongs to Monday, for rather obvious reasons. Since it is so universally hated, however, it never comes as a surprise when the bad things come out to play. Oh, there was a fire in the office next door over the weekend, and now the air conditioning smells like burnt rubber and brick dust? That's just Monday for you. A villain attack in the warehouse district caused a shipping delay and that package you ordered got lost somewhere? Disappointing, yet unsurprising. The subway is so packed that a sardine tin would be spacious in comparison? Well, that's the subway every day, so it doesn't really count.

Tuesdays and Wednesdays are just that, days. Nothing exciting, nothing awful. Middle of the line, going through the motions, monotonous. Whether trudging through or in the zone, things get done and nothing exciting happens. Fridays are, of course, celebrated as the finish line, the checkpoint in the marathon of life that says 'you made it! You can take a rest now'. The final stretch before the glorious work-free weekend. The one where you can go home with the comfort of knowing there are no alarms coinciding with dawns break, just waiting to sneak up on you too soon. No annoying coworkers waiting with their metaphorical talons and too-cheerful-to-be-real attitudes, ready to interrupt your flow at the worst possible moment. Fridays are the tantalizing breath of freedom, just awaiting for the clock to strike.

But Thursdays? Thursdays are the worst.

They are the day you always forget. The one that sneaks up on you, where you wake up with the inkling of hope and relief that the end brings, only to have the crushing realization that it is not, in fact, Friday. Like seeing a finish line on the crest of a hill in front of you, only to watch as the closer you get the further away it seems. The one where you cram every ounce of procrastinated effort into the projects you have been putting off until right before the deadline, wishing for nothing more than an IV drip of straight espresso into your veins, followed by a three century long nap.

The day where you get kidnapped by an evil cult and strung up from the ceiling next to an unconscious vigilante, simply for the crime of being a nice person in Gotham.

Or maybe that is just Marinette.

'Embodiment of good luck and creation my ass,' she thought bitterly, rope digging painfully into her elbows and just below her ribs. 'Oh yea, let's go to Gotham. The city is unbalanced and needs a Guardian to fix all of the curses. That is such a great idea. Nothing bad will happen! Well what do you call this then, Tikki?!' Marinette sighed, the feeling of pins and needles creeping down towards her bound wrists as she swung precariously some twenty-five odd feet above the concrete warehouse floor, trying to ignore the worry she felt being separated from the little deity. Beside her was none other than Red Hood; former(maybe? she's not sure) crime lord, gunslinging vigilante, and too freaking heavy for his own good. Seriously, for someone who uses firearms almost exclusively, there is no reason for him to be so damn muscular. Or tall. Completely unfair for someone to hog all the height like that. It's what got them into this whole mess to begin with!

Well- That wasn't entirely true, but still. If he didn't weigh so much, Marinette could have easily grabbed him and run from the masked, potato-sack-wearing, nonsense-spewing, second rate fanatic occultists before they even knew she was there. But no, Red Hood just had to be the size and weight of a small bear, and now they were both in this mess.

"I should have never gotten out of bed this morning..." She muttered despondently, hearing a groan come from the limp figure beside her.

"Son of a bitch..." Red Hood murmured, voice changer in his helmet distorting the words to be near incomprehensible. The following string of curses as he presumably opened his eyes and took in their predicament was much more audible, however. Looking down, Marinette couldn't even begrudge him the swearing.

The two of them were currently hanging from a catwalk suspended in between two of the six total concrete pillars and directly above where the aforementioned potato-sack-wearing cultists were busy drawing out chalk guidelines for some kind of complex ritual circle. She couldn't quite make out what it was meant to be yet, seeing as it was in the early stages, but she could assume that it wasn't anything good for their would-be sacrifices. They were really dedicated, too, not even glancing up at the vigilante that was giving his best impression of an angry drenched cat. One of them even had a protractor and was double checking all of the angles in the twelve pointed star. Clearly, whatever this ritual was meant to be, it was going to take a while to complete.

Red Hood clearly didn't appreciate the attention to detail, which honestly? Fair. But the way he showed his displeasure at the situation involved thrashing around in the cocoon of thick chains wrapped securely around his whole body. (Marinette was only a little bit jealous at the differing treatment, since if she had more than a single rope wrapped around her torso, it wouldn't hurt nearly as much, but also it would make escape harder.) The thrashing wouldn't bother her if it weren't for the fact that A) they were both tied to a rickety catwalk, and B) every time there was movement on said rickety catwalk, it caused Marinette to bounce around and dug into the already forming bruises on her arms and abdomen.

"Hey, could you cut that out?!" She snapped, wincing in pain. Her voice caused Red Hood to whip his head in her direction and freeze, "You aren't the only one here strung up like a pinata, and unlike you, I'm not wearing any armor. I would personally rather not be split in half and spew my intestines all over the place like a macabre birthday celebration, thanks!" There were several long moments of silence while he stared at her and she attempted to alleviate some of the pressure of the rope. She was unsuccessful, sadly, but at least she was no longer bouncing. After a few moments, the swearing started up again, much more vehement than the last time, though without the accompanying thrashing, thankfully.

Marinette huffed, turning her attention to the warehouse below, allowing him to get it out of his system. It was very clearly disused and permeated with the smell of dust, but not quite abandoned as she would expect. Various sizes of wooden crates were scattered and stacked all around the stained brick walls along with stacks of empty pallets and cardboard boxes. The center of the large building was a two stories tall square, held up by four concrete pillars fading into darkness and broken windows. The empty space was only broken by the catwalks that were claustrophobically close to the exposed, rusty rafters, and a disused... crane thingy on an I shaped track above the two truck-sized doors to the right. In front of and behind them were what she guessed to be offices with windows that overlooked the main floor and connected to the catwalks through discrete side doors. The bottom floor continued underneath the offices where there were stairs resting against the back wall, though they were barely visible through the deep shadows and pallets of stacked boxes.

Directly underneath them, the cultists had cleared out a large area and hung up bright florescent floodlights that cast stark shadows pointing down towards their try-hard craft project. They had a cheap table set up to the side covered in candles, chalk, various liquids, jars, and bowls of different white powders, which Marinette guessed was salt or bone dust or something of the sort. Oh, and rumbling minifridge full of blood bags. There was that, too.

"-toe-eyed shit monkey fuck-tard motherfucking piece of-" Red Hood was still going, but seemed to be somewhat running out of steam. Or different ways to say the same swear words. Or maybe breath, Marinette wasn't quite sure yet.

Down below, the cultists remained focused on their ritual. Or, at least most of them did. Only about four total were actually doing any drawing or plotting out, with exactly twelve seated a little ways away from the star's points, all meditating. There were three more that Marinette could see, and from what she could tell, they weren't very focused on anything work related, if the one holding the weird, green-haired doll was any indication.

Marinette squinted in concentration, calling on her connection with the Kwami to sharpen her senses and hear past the still-swearing Red Hood.

"-whole box full of the creepy little things." The one holding the doll said, her voice disdainful. I hereby name you Dolly, Marinette thought, eyes flicking to the medium sized crate she had pulled the doll from. It had some kind of toy company logo on it, though not one that she recognized.

"Why would you even go looking through those?" the other cultist asked, somewhat judgmentally. And I hereby name you Judgy.

"I was bored." Dolly replied flatly, inspecting the green haired doll in her hands.

"Aren't you supposed to be watching the sacrifices?" Marinette squinted, tensing slightly despite the flare of burning pain it caused, but the cultists didn't even bother looking in their direction.

"No, that is Mark and Jacob's job." She waved dismissively, not glancing up from the doll. 

"Ah." He paused for a moment, before letting out an exasperated sigh. "Who thought it was a good idea to put those two together?"

"No clue. Better them than me, though. I hate watching sacrifices. They always cry and yell at me, or try to beg their way out. It is so annoying. I'd rather just be bored." Judgy nodded in agreement, shifting his weight and crossing his arms. Marinette couldn't help but scoff quietly. As if.

"Well, at least you get to look through dusty crates and find creepy dolls this time." They both stared at the doll for a few moments as Dolly scoffed.

"Yeah, and that totally makes up for the fact that we are a day early. I had to call out of work for this shit." She said sending a small glare at the cultist with the red trim decorating their burlap 'robe' before looking back at the doll. Dolly turned the thing over in her hands before finding something on the back of it. "Oh hey, there is a switch here." 

Marinette could barely hear a tiny click as the switch flipped and the two went quiet as they waited for it to do something. Dolly shook it, but got no response aside from the sounds of chalk scraping concrete, plastic rulers clattering, the constant drone of the minifridge, and the sound of moving cultists that overlayed the faraway screeches and honks of the city outside the warehouse walls. The two(plus Marinette) waited to see what the doll would do for several more moments to no avail.

"Does it need batteries or something?" Judgy asked. Dolly opened her mouth to reply, but didn't get the chance as the doll's eyes lit up and laughed, long and loud, to the cadence of Judgy's voice. It was unsettling, and very clearly reminiscent of a certain clown. The way it echoed around the warehouse amplified the creepiness. It was somewhat comical how Dolly jumped and scrambled to flip the switch back off as almost everyone stopped what they were doing and turned their heads towards her in unison, though. Or, well, it would be if it weren't for the fact that these people had strung her from the ceiling up and were waiting to sacrifice her to whatever entity they worshipped.

Marinette was jolted out of her concentration by a throat being cleared, and her head snapped towards the source. Beside her, Red Hood was looking in her direction(or at her, it was hard to tell with the helmet) and very clearly no longer swearing.

"You done, now?" She sassed, glancing back at the cultists she was so rudely interrupted from eavesdropping on. Dolly and Judgy were looking sheepish(as much as one could look sheepish, wearing *that*) as most of the others glared at them(presumably). The one with the red trim on their potato sack seemed to be scolding them, and about half of the ones sitting at the star's points weren't looking, continuing to meditate unbothered after the initial interruption. Interesting.

"Yeah. Sorry about that." Red Hood said, sounding somewhat uncomfortable, though it was difficult to tell through the voice changer. Marinette didn't look back at him, scanning the warehouse for the two that were supposed to be watching them.

"No, it's fine. Not everyone can be cool under pressure." She said smoothly, squinting into the deep shadows on the ground floor, sharpening her vision with as much of her magic as she dared, though there weren't any people hiding that she could see. They will be somewhere that they can easily see us, but won't have to pay much attention...

"Excuse me?" He asked, taken aback. Marinette began scanning the catwalks above them, craning her neck and analyzing them for hiding spots. Or rather, for comfortable areas to hang out and pretend to be working. Clearly, these cultists have gotten too used to their routine. Which is a bad sign for all the previous sacrifices, but good for us.

"I mean, it's not every day that you get kidnapped and hung from the ceiling, so your reaction is understandable." She turned her head to the vigilante after determining that the lookouts were not visible, who was looking at her, the feeling of incredulity coming through loud and clear.  "Though I would have expected you to be a bit more used to this kind of thing." She spoke with a note of scorn in her voice. He was the one to lead the cultists outside her apartment in the first place. She was just trying to take out the trash when he flopped over unconscious right in front of her. And Red Hood was unnecessarily heavy. And muscular. And well proportioned. And tall. Is that a tailored leather jacket? It looks well made, even through the chains. He would make a great model, honestly. Broad shoulders, long legs, nice chest- Gah! No! Focus!

"Wh- it-, no I am not used to waking up chained to the ceiling." He said with a growl in his voice that she could almost feel in her chest. Marinette suppressed a slight shiver. Why do warehouses always have drafts?

"Really? Huh." She said absently, looking around the grimy and broken windows that lined the upper wall above the truck doors. Unloading dock, I think it's called?  "I got the impression that Gothamites were unfazed by stuff like this." Beside her, Red Hood scoffed, head turning to look below them and presumably analyze the cultists.

"Being kidnapped, sure. Happens all the time. Sometimes, it's even on purpose. Being tied to the ceiling, not so much." The obnoxious red helmet ticked to the side, eyeing her presumably. "What, is this normal where you come from?" From the small huff she could tell the question was clearly meant to be rhetorical, but Marinette answered it anyway.

"Eh, it's not my first time." she looked down at the ritual circle and 'bored' cultists who were completely ignoring the two, having opened up another box filled with what seemed to be... bags of gumballs? Interesting..  "At least it's just cultists and there is no swimming pool full of boiling soup." Marinette shifted, attempting to regain feeling in her fingers without putting her full weight on her bruised ribs. She had never wished to be transformed more than she did right now. Heck, she would even take the old onesie she used to call a superhero suit. She really did feel like she was about to be split in half. "Though whoever tied this rope did a much worse job than Kung Food." She said with a grimace, rocking from side to side and scooching the rope downwards a little bit. It stung, and the balance was a little more precarious now, and she just knew it was going to be hell on her back and core muscles, but at least it didn't hurt as much, so she took that as a win.

"... please tell me you are joking." Red Hood asked with a note of desperation in his voice. She grimaced, thinking back to the wafting steam and the smell of the since renamed 'Marinette Soup'.

"I wish I was." Marinette said, resigned. The thought was sweet in theory but thinking back, having a soup that you almost got cooked into renamed after you is pretty morbid.

"Jesus fucking Christ." He muttered with what she could only assume was mild distress. She knew the feeling.

"It's fine." She said, stretching out her fingers that wanted nothing more to curl in on themselves from the lack of blood flow. Marinette twisted her wrists and reached her hands in a way that just barely let her nails latch onto the poorly tied knot of the hemp rope. Seriously? This is just sad. I don't even need help from the Kwami to get out of this.

"It is very much fucking not." Red hood said pointedly while, assumedly, pinning her with a glare. Not that I can exactly go anywhere yet, anyway.

"I would shrug if I could, but as you can see, I am physically disinclined to do so." She looked at him with a sardonic smile, vaguely gesturing with her head at their general predicament. Eyes unfocusing, she concentrated on the feeling of the rope latched underneath her fingernails and started pulling at it.

"Could you be any more nonchalant about this? That is supposed to be my job." The deadpan response so monotone it sounded nearly robotic through the voice changer caused her to let out a small huff of a laugh. Ow, that hurt. Come on, you stupid rope, work with me here!

"Would you rather I be freaking out, screaming and crying about how we are going to die tragically?" She asked, pulling a face as one of her hands started cramping from the curled position. Ow ow ow ow-

"Absolutely not." Hood said without hesitation. So close... YES!

"Then I don't see what you have to be complaining about here." Marinette smiled triumphantly as she finally felt the rope around her wrists loosen, stretching the discomfort away as much as she could. Red Hood was silent for several long moments as she took in a few deep breaths, attempting to shake the few strands of hair that had escaped her high bun out of her face. Okay, wrists are free. Next are the ankles, then I can slip out of the rope and climb up onto the catwalk without falling to my death/serious injury in the process. Easy peasy. I just need to-

"You are something else, you know that?" He said in a tone that she didn't quite know how to name, distorted as it was. Marinette paused before she could start to move onto the next step, looking into the expressionless helmet of Red Hood that somehow still failed to hide that she had his full attention. She blinked several times, confused. "I don't think I have ever seen such a pretty smile, especially not in a situation like this." He clarified. Marinette couldn't stop the pink rising to her cheeks, and she had absolutely no idea what to do about the sudden flutter in her chest, but what she did know was that this hot vigilante/crime-lord had just(maybe?) given her what sounded like a compliment, and she needed to say something.

"Why thank you. You aren't too shabby yourself." Marinette said, realizing as soon as the words left her that her automatic response might have not made sense.

"... Thanks?" Red Hood said, tilting his head slightly. And then Marinette opened her stupid, stupid face hole.

"I mean- you have quite the impressive mouth on you." She said, followed by a long moment of silence as he stared at her. "WAIT- NO! I didn't mean that! I meant- well- I didn't not meant that, I'm sure your mouth is just fine- but not like fine fine, or it could be, I'm not saying it isn't, it's just with the whole bucket-head thing I can't tell either way so like- I'm not commenting on how nice your mouth is- I just- What I am trying to say is that your ability to use your mouth is what is impressive." The vigilante made a faint choking noise, and Marinette had approximately the half a second it took for her to register what she just said before wishing that she could cataclysm herself in the face. "NO! WAIT! NO! That's not what I meant! It was- talking- using mouth, but not like-" she started sputtering, words tumbling out of her without control, and the faint choking noise coming from Red Hood turned into full blown coughing.  "SWEAR WORDS!" She finally shouted, face bright red and a shrill note in her panicked voice echoing faintly through the warehouse. None of the cultists so much as looked up, clearly ignoring them, for which she was thankful. Oh my Kwami, kill me. Please. Right now. Strike me down without remorse.

Red Hood was gasping for air beside her in between wheezing laughter and coughs that rattled the catwalk above. Marinette honestly couldn't remember a time she had ever been more embarrassed. Not even in Lycée. Honestly, if Hawkmoth were still around, she might be in danger of being akumatized out of pure embarrassment. A high pitched whine escaped from the back of her throat as she glared at the vigilante, trying to hide her misery behind anger.

"Don't laugh at me!" She tried to sound intimidating, but it came out more petulant.

"Fuckin'," he said in between wheezes, "swear words!" If he were standing, rather than hanging, Red Hood would undoubtably be doubled over in laughter. As it was, he was curled up in the air in the shape of an unnecessarily beefy shrimp. Marinette was just thankful that he wasn't looking at her, or she might just explode. In an effort to distract herself, she quickly kicked her legs up behind her and began untying the rope around her ankles, putting her focus into remaining balanced rather than the laughter beside her. Unfortunately, it only took a few seconds and a couple precarious wobbles to free her legs, leaving the loop around her torso and the two free strands in her hand. Oh, and the Red Hood who was taking in deep breaths like it was an Olympic sport.

"I will fight you." She said, something burning in her chest as she glared at him.

"You're adorable." he said, getting his laughter under control.

"I will fight you, and I will win." Her scowl deepened as she glared into the lenses of his helmet.

"I appreciate the threat," he quipped back, voice filled with mirth, "but no offense, you look about as dangerous as a feather duster." Face still bright red and heart still pounding painfully, Marinette's eyes narrowed. Then, she smiled sweetly.

"I take full offense and I will make you eat those words." She said with the full confidence of a Ladybug.

"Uh huh. And how exactly are you going to do that?" Hood said teasingly, sounding as if he were just entertaining her. Her only response was to grin toothily, tip forward, and then fall.

Marinette allowed the precarious balance she had carefully kept for the past however-long it had been to fail and slide through the single loop of rope. The friction of the rough hemp fibers burned as it scraped along her arms, but it was worth it to hear his panicked gasp and the rattle of chains as her bent knees caught the rope(ow- that'll bruise), the only thing keeping her from plummeting two stories. She swung back and forth a couple times, building momentum as she allowed her muscles to relax for the first time since she got kidnapped and Red Hood hissed out something unintelligible from above her. With one last swing and a flex of her poor, abused core muscles, she sat up and grabbed the rope, climbing her way onto the catwalk with little trouble. She let out a small sigh of relief at finally having semi-solid ground underneath her feet. She hasn't exactly been afraid of heights since before her time as a superhero, but being in the air for so long get stressful, especially without her transformation.

"What the hell were you thinking- Are you okay?!" He asked somewhat frantically, the catwalk under her feet swaying as he twisted in an attempt to look up at her. No. That fucking hurt. She smiled before replying cheerfully.

"Of course I am! What, worried for my little feather duster arms?" She dropped the two rope pieces on the catwalk and then reached up to undo her bun which had become tragically loose from the kidnapping.

"Oh, ha ha." he muttered with a sigh of mild relief, "Point made. Okay, so it looks like there is an exit near the stairs which you can go through those offices to get to. It is really dark, so if you are careful and stick to the shadows, you should be able to get out and find a way to call Commissioner Gordon and tell him to-"

"Nope." She interrupted curtly, holding her hair-tie in between her teeth and running her fingers through her hair a couple times.

"-What?" Red Hood asked, tensing. Marinette grabbed the hair-tie before responding.

"I said no, I am not going to do that." She took a deep breath, shaking her head side to side to test the security of her new high ponytail. Good enough. "First of all, you weren't awake when they brought us in here, but those doors sound like hell itself trying to escape into the mortal realm via rusty hinges, meaning there is no way that I can get out without being noticed." Hood grunted disgruntledly, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. Marinette took the opportunity too look over everything from this new vantage point, now just barely able to see into the dirty windows of the offices behind them, one of which had faint light coming from within.

"There are other doors and windows, you could find a way out." he said pointedly, head turning briefly to glance at the rope she had been hanging from previously. She couldn't quite see any movement in them, but the farthest one had a broken window, so she could only assume that the office with the light was where Jacob and Mark were.

"Second of all," she continued, "there are two cultists who are meant to be watching us, and no matter how negligent they are, they still managed to catch you. From what I have overheard, they have done this enough to have a solid routine, so they can't be all stupid. If I were to leave, we would only have a limited amount of time before they noticed." Down below, Dolly and Judgy seemed to have gotten bored of looking through crates and were both hovering over a phone while leaning against the foldout table, watching something. The third cultist that appeared to be on watch had tucked themself into a dark corner and seemed to be taking a nap against a pillar. Perfect, let's hope they stay like that.

"You would still have time to get away and call for help. The streets are a maze, they wouldn't be able to find you once you got away." Red Hood said with a light growl. Marinette could feel the catwalk move underfoot as he shifted slightly, swaying back and forth like a cranky pendulum. Her eyes flicked to each of the cultists down below, all looking consumed by their respective tasks.

"Yes, however, the chances of them just continuing with their ritual and ignoring the missing sacrifice are not great. They could panic and scatter, rush through and sacrifice you with a half done ritual, or any other not great outcome. So again, a time limit. Which brings me to point number three," She said, holing up three fingers. "We are currently in the warehouse district, which is a forever-and-a-mile walk away from anywhere I could find someone willing to lend me a phone. Even if I were to walk right out of here and they don't notice, they would have plenty of time to finish up their evil scheme and get the heck out of dodge before help arrives."

"Drive, then." Hood shot back. Marinette held back a wince, her eye twitching instead, thinking about the last time she drove a car. Or, tried to drive a car.

Marinette and Grandma Gina looked into the turbulent lake, drenched and covered in mud, listening to the slowly approaching sirens, smelling of burnt rubber and smoke. The previous panic fueled screaming echoed in her ears now that it was silent. Her Nona turned to her, pale and somewhat shaky, but with a smile on her face.

"I won't tell your parents if you don't."

"Deal."

"Do I look like I know how to hotwire a car? Or how to pick pocket someone's keys?" She asked rhetorically, already knowing what he thought she looked like. 'Adorable.' 

I'll show him 'Adorable.'

"Then," he said slowly, posture wary and tone frustrated, "What exactly are you going to do?"

"I already told you." Marinette replied, leaning down and looking directly into the glowing eyes of the Red Hood's helmet with a smile, "I am going to make you eat your words." Marinette didn't allow him to respond, standing in one swift motion and walking quietly across the rickety metal and towards the open archway of the offices behind them. 

Time to get to work.

Marinette was careful to keep her steps light an even, hand ghosting over the steel cable railing that ran along the side as she made her way towards the office with the intact, if filthy, window. She was fairly confident that was where the two cultists that were meant to be watching them, Mark and Jacob from what Dolly said, were hiding based off of process of elimination. Once she took them out, she could take her time with the rest since it will be less likely that they will notice her missing. With how adamant these cultists were about not looking up, she could almost think they were video game characters. The time she had spent hanging from that damn rope wasn't completely wasted, as she was able to put together the beginnings of a plan for how to do that without outing her superhero abilities or skills. Sure, what she had said to Red Hood wasn't *completely* truthful, as she was certain she could find a phone and call for help in ten minutes if she really wanted to, but...

"-no offense, you look about as dangerous as a feather duster."

That's not happening. She had something to prove.

Okay, so steps. She thought as she reached the wall of the office and creeping towards the window in a crouch, trusting the darkness and the cultists inattentiveness to hide her. First, take out the lookouts.

Marinette looked over her shoulder and out into the shadowed building, finding the darkest place from the perspective of the window and shifting herself into that space before slowly lifting her eyes over the dusty window ledge. Her gaze flicked quickly through the room, dimly lit by a small camping lantern on an old desk situated just in front of the door with a chair on either side. On the opposite wall was a couch where the two cultists were-

Marinette jerked downwards, flattening herself against the filthy brick wall with a newly bright red face. That was a lot of- Where did they get the- Okay! Not thinking about that! That's fine. This is fine.

…

"At least they won't notice I'm missing..." She took in several deep breaths, staring intently at the patterns of rust on the catwalk's railing. 

"I am never going to unsee that."

After a few long moments, Marinette crept her way around the edge of the office, through the arch and into the hallway. The door to the office the cultists were in was closed, *thank the Kwami*, but the empty one was cracked open. The stairs downward were straight ahead, swathed in darkness and shadows. There was less echo, and it was in general quieter in the hallway except for faint- not thinking about it. 

"Step one, focus on step one." She whispered to herself, straightening up and slipping through the cracked door into the empty office, careful not to catch her clothes on the door handle. This office wasn't as empty as the other one, and seemed to be much more dusty, though that might be attributed to the broken window more than anything. There was a desk in this one as well, though it was pushed against the wall on the far side with paper scattered all over the floor on front of it. Instead of a couch(Not thinking about it), this one had a stack of chairs, a duffle bag, and a hefty looking toolbox. Dumped dead center in the room was a frankly ridiculous pile of guns, knives, and what looked like a miniature version of a harpoon. In a much smaller pile next to it was her purse.

"Tikki!" She whisper-shouted, diving forward and scooping up the bag.

"Marinette!" the small Kwami excitedly yelled back, muffled through the fabric. Once it was opened, she whizzed through the air to hug her holder's cheek.

"Are you okay? Did anyone see you? It's not another Chloe situation, is it?" She blabbed with worry until the Kwami pulled back and smiled reassuringly.

"No. I'm okay, no one saw me." Marinette let out a sigh of relief, slouching where she stood. "Are you okay, Marinette?"

"A little bruised, but fine." She replied, examining her arms for a moment to see what was going to be a line of ugly bruises and some serious rope burn, before turning back to her friend with manic energy. "But, Tikki, I have been challenged!"

"Challenged?" She echoed with a tilt of her head and a sparkle in her eye.

"Red Hood thinks that I am 'as dangerous as a feather duster' which is frankly ridiculous- just because I am small does not mean I am not mighty!" Marinette said with a pout and a defiantly raised fist, to which Tikki giggled.

"So what are you going to do to meet this challenge?" the little goddess asked, floating higher in excitement. In response, Marinette bounced on the balls of her feet with a near feral grin.

"Here's the plan-!"

"Hey, Oracle, have you heard anything from Hood tonight?" Nightwing asked as he swung between two of Bludhaven's buildings and away from a foiled break-in. He was still catching his breath from the quick but brutal fight. He managed to leave unscathed for the most part, barring one lucky hit the woman with a crowbar managed to get on his bicep that left a shallow, if jagged, gash and was already forming a nasty bruise. It was going to make his night job rather unpleasant the next week or so, which wasn't great, seeing as he and Red Hood were meant to bust up a cult that had had been causing trouble tomorrow.

"Last I herd from him, he was chasing you through the house with a serving plate." Came Oracle's quick reply, the sound of clacking keys hiding under her flippant and amused voice. Nightwing rolled his eyes with a fond smile as he alighted upon the edge of a building, taking a moment to sit down and rest.

"Oh, har har. He was supposed to be doing recon for our bust tomorrow, I want to make sure he hasn't gotten himself in trouble." He said, settling down and kicking a leg out over the edge of the roof.

"From what I heard," Red Robin chimed in, "There was no 'our' about it. Hood made it very clear that he was going to go after them without you."

"Mhm," Oracle hummed in agreement, "I distinctly remember something being said about 'forsaken bonds of siblinghood' and that you are 'beyond dead' to him." Nightwing remembered that. He had been so excited at Jason actually referring to them as family out loud that he hadn't really paid much attention to what was actually said beyond that until afterwards, though.

"Oh, please. He was just cranky because he was too slow and I got the last of Agent A's cookies." Nightwing said with an eye roll. "He wouldn't go after a dangerous cult by himself just because of that."

"Are you sure about that? This is Hood we are talking about." Red Robin said skeptically. Nightwing opened his mouth to respond, but was cut off.

"Chatter on comms." Came Batman's gruff voice, silencing everyone. "Oracle, check in with Hood."

"Already done. His comm is off and all of his trackers are showing that he is in his safehouse on the border of the Narrows." She replied promptly, there was a pause as more keys clacked in the background.

"His security system is armed, too, with a window having been opened and closed at around eight forty-seven pm and no activity since." The silence between them was loud as the vigilantes digested the information.

"I'm on my way." Nightwing said gravely as he sprung up from his spot and shot his grapple gun in the direction of his motorcycle.

"Enroute." Batman grunted over the sound of revving engine.

"I'll try and track down his location." Oracle said, her amusement from before gone.

After a few seconds, Red robin chimed in with a deadpan voice.

"Even after all these years, you still underestimate the pettiness of this family."

Nightwing's sigh was lost to the buffeting wind as he swung down to the streets below.

Locking the two lookouts in the office was probably the easiest step of any plan that Marinette has had in years, being able to check that off after simply sliding a chair underneath the handle in order to lock the two inside. Thank all the Kwami I don't actually have to go in there and interrupt whatever it is they are doing... Still not thinking about it!

The next step, while still relatively simple, wasn't going to be nearly as easy.

Step One: Take out the lookouts, Check. Step Two: Gather Supplies.

Which means finding supplies, which means sneaking past the 19 remaining cultists on the main floor without being caught or seen. Simple as can be, but not exactly easy. Add in pilfering through and opening the many crates, some right next to the main area for the cultists? Not easy in the slightest. Thankfully, Marinette wasn't exactly someone to give up that quickly, and she wasn't alone.

There was a quick glimmer of light that burst through the dim room and a tingling feeling in her fingers as the summoning spell completed, burning up the small sticky note she had drawn on and replacing it with the inert foxtail pendant, dark orange fading to a white tip separated by five segments, hanging off of a delicate gold chain. As she pulled on the necklace however, its appearance changed to be purely silver with the segments disappearing, the bright glow of another Kwami appearing before her flashing through the shadows.

"Guardian." the Kwami greeted, bowing respectfully in the air before looking around with his bright purple eyes, taking in the dirty office.

"Hello Trixx." Marinette responded with a smirk, "Ready to cause some mischief?" The Kwami's ears perked up as he smiled brightly.

"I always am, Guardian! What did you have in mind?" He responded eagerly, following Marinette as she crept to the cracked office window.

"Okay, down there are nineteen cultists who we need to take down before they manage to activate their ritual and sacrifice the vigilante who I got captured with." she began, pointing out the shifting shapes moving through the harsh brightness of the floodlights and Red Hood, who was mostly obscured by the rusty catwalks and shadows. "We are going to need to get them all at once, or else we will be caught, and I can't transform without revealing my identity."

"I am happy to lend my Illusions to keep you hidden from their senses until it is time to pounce!" Trixx said eagerly, twirling around in the air, illusory sparks dancing in between his paws.

"Thanks Trixx, but I will be channeling your magic this time, we don't want another dancing Eifel Tower incident." The Kwami pouted, but agreed, diving into the inside of her jacket and joining Tikki in the small pocket dimension sewn in there. Marinette took in a fortifying breath, strengthening her connection to the two Kwami and feeling the magic course through her. She *probably* pull this off without it, but there was no way that she was going to let any opportunity pass her by. She promised Red Hood that he would eat his words, and she was going to serve them to him on a silver platter. With a final exhale, she turned away from the window and went to examine what she had in the room that she could use.

The first thing she checked were the drawers of the desk, pulling them open slowly to make as little noise as possible, despite the rusty ball bearings. It was well worth it too, for the sight that greeted her.

"Yes!" she exclaimed in a whisper, pulling out one of the three and a half rolls of duct tape and an unopened reel of fishing line, ideas already springing to mind. "This couldn't be more perfect!" she whispered with a grin, looking in the remaining drawers. Aside from the various bits of paper, she pulled out a container of thumbtacks and paperclips, six carabiner clips(two of them being broken), an unopened packet of yellow sticky-notes(she already had some light pink ones in her purse, but she wasn't going to pass up more), and an oily can of WD-40.

At the opposite end of the room, were the duffle bag and the toolbox, which aside from the pile of weapons that she assumed to be Red Hood's, seemed to be the only other potentially useful things here. Marinette started with the toolbox, finding a couple of hammers, a mallet, a huge red monkey wrench, some screwdrivers, a jar of assorted rusty screws and nails, and a thing of Allen wrenches. Out of everything, she only took the monkey wrench and set it with the other useful objects on the desk. Next was the duffle bag, which when she opened it, revealed itself to be full of a bunch of other duffle bags.

"Huh..." she muttered, staring at it and running her fingers along the hefty cloth. It's a good thing that it is cloth, and not plastic. Though this does feel like polyester, it won't have that crinkly sound whenever it is moved, so I can use it to transport things from the crates downstairs. With a definitive nod to herself she stood, dumping the extra bags on the desk and pulling the now empty bag's strap over her shoulder.

"Okay, here we go!" she whispered to herself before slipping out of the room and towards the dark stairs.

Jason didn't know whether to be amused, pissed, or suspicious, so for the moment he was settled decidedly on 'bewildered'.

The cult had been somewhat out of the ordinary from the beginning. The string of disappearances that led to him finding them were, sadly, not too uncommon. The cult aspect of it however, was a bit of a shakeup from the usual human trafficking, territory disputes, or straight up murder cases they normally take on. Just different enough to make it interesting. What *hadn't* been ordinary was the glowing tranquilizer darts that could go through his Bat-approved armor. Bruce was not going to be happy about that when he found out. Hell, Jason wasn't happy about it now.

All of his memories from that point on were fuzzy in that familiar way that could only be caused by drugs, but he remembers getting away. At least, he thinks he remembers getting away, but clearly he didn't seeing as he woke up dangling from the ceiling next to some tiny, blue-haired French woman.

A tiny, blue-haired French woman who Jason was stuck watching sneak around the shadowed edges of some warehouse with a duffle bag slung over her shoulder and a smile on her face, surrounded by murderous cultists.

He was surprised with the skill she moved around with. Despite her confidence, he had expected her to get caught near immediately, and was mentally preparing himself for a whole slew of situations that could arise from that inevitability. But, much to his chagrin, she practically waltzed right past the cultists without so much as a curious head turn in her direction. Her style of stealth was much different than what he was accustomed to. She didn't meld into the shadows like the bats did, but she moved silently and with a confident sort of grace, using her surroundings to their fullest. Her path around the edges were calculated, he could tell, keeping obstructions in between her and the cultists as much as possible. She even climbed over and across a few crates to stay out of the peripheral of the two occupied with their phones, keeping her weight on the corners and junctions to avoid making noise or breaking the old wooden boards. It was something that Jason himself wouldn't have been able to do(not that he would need to in the first place), and it spoke of either years of practice sneaking around, or a lot of talent. All in all, he couldn't help but be grudgingly impressed. Not to mention suspicious.

She was clearly more experienced in these situations than he first thought, even including that concerning comment about some ridiculous food based(and possibly cannibalistic, which is a red flag for multiple reasons) villain she mentioned, and the damn Bat Patented Paranoia that Bruce managed to instill in every one of his wards was coming to light. Who was she? Is she a threat? An ally? Or just some random girl with more skills than sense? He didn't know and that was bothering him, so he watched.

It's not like I can do much else.

And he had tried. Despite how easily she had slipped through the rope they tied her with and climbed up with a strength and fluidity unexpected from her tiny frame, Jason remained stuck in his swaddle of chains. After searching for his hidden weapons when he had first woke up and finding them missing, he had reluctantly reached for his backup comm, before remembering the small argument with Dick he had that led him to stupidly spitefully take on this cult by himself in the first place, as well as leaving his comm and trackers in a safehouse along with a rather heartfelt 'fuck you' note. So, there was no way for him to get out, no way to call for his fam- the bats. His whole escape rested on the shoulders of the four-foot-tall-at-best, blue-haired girl with a smile too carefree for Gotham's rough edges and baked-in soot. The girl who was currently carrying around an empty duffle bag doing god knows what as she somehow silently pried open a large crate with confident motions and said mischievous grin, as if there wasn't a cult of psychos one mistake away from catching her.

No, he wasn't worried about her. He was frustrated that he was currently damseled. There is a difference, Dick.

"I already told you. I am going to make you eat your words." 

And... maybe a little intrigued.

Though, despite his years of vigilante experience, time on the streets, growing up in Wayne manor, and his training with the League of Assassins, he had absolutely no fucking idea what she was going to do with a duffle bag full of Harley Quinn inspired rubber chickens.

It took nearly all of Marinette's willpower not to giggle with glee when she found the crates of rubber chickens in her search for the Joker-inspired dolls(Which, seriously, who's idea even was that??). They were about three crates full that she could identify, all with the same logo as the boxes full of creepy-laughing-fake-clown-things and they were all fortunately placed near-ish to the opposite staircase that she came down from. This side of the warehouse was more crowded, mostly covered in pallets of cardboard boxes and some crates interspersed throughout.

This is perfect!

It took her a few trips and a couple close calls to get enough of the rubber chickens up to the office without accidentally setting them off, but thankfully she didn't have to sneak around the main floor for it, using the catwalks above instead. Admittedly, she used a bit of Luck to avoid the overly creaky paths and get away with it, but no one else needs to know that. Gathering up the neon-green-haired-monstrosities was quicker since she already knew where they were, but a tad more difficult seeing as the boxes were just behind and to the side of Judgy and Dolly(She could practically feel Red Hood's stress while she was doing that). For that, she called on more of Trixx's power to stay as silent as possible. Next, she went though the boxes farthest from the cultists, sifting through them quickly and making several trips up to her designated storage office.

Step four of The Plan had gained some wonderful additions in the form of metal BB-gun pellets, jacks, bouncy balls, and the gumballs that she had seen the cultists looking at as well, but she was getting ahead of herself.

There was one thing that she almost passed up, though, but the smallest of tugs from her Luck caused her to take a second look.

And by the Kwami, is she glad she did.

If the abundance of warnings on the package hadn't peaked her interest, the bold lettered label she read afterward sure did.

'FAST ACTING, WATER ACTIVATED SUPER GLUE POWDER'

"Hehehehehehe" Marinette couldn't help but giggle near breathlessly from where she crouched, shrouded in the darkness of the stairs, holding onto the sturdy plastic container with an evil grin.

Bruce loved his kids, he really did.

If he for some reason, in some way, ever lost all of his memories or sense of self, he would remember that. If there were nothing else left of him, be it from mind control, magic, head trauma, or for whatever reason, having to sell his soul to some malicious entity, all it would take is just looking at one of them and he would know.

Bruce loved his kids.

He loved them when it wasn't easy. Through all the fights, be them together against criminals and supervillains, or against each other with harsh words and silent treatments. Through moral differences, his failures and communication issues. He loved them when it was stressful. Through all the injuries and sickness, tough nights on patrol, prank wars that cost him thousands of dollars in repairs or teasing that ends in brawls over the dining table. He loved them when it was easy, too. Family dinners, game nights, public outings, or just working quietly in the same space.

Bruce loved his kids, and wouldn't trade them for anything.

But sometimes?

Sometimes he really wished he could give them back.

"This is Red Hood speaking, bringing you your top of the hour weather report," came the all too glib sounding voice from the speakers mounted in the corners of the warmly lit room. "Be careful out there tonight folks, because it looks like the clouds are heavy with betrayal and the threat of tyrannical and patronizing vigilantes!" The fake newscaster voice called out, echoing around the bare off-white walls that were splashed with black paint. Some were splotches or droplets, abstract Rorschach-esque compositions surrounded by messy and dripping quotes. The section directly opposite the window where he stood read 'Et tu, brute?', surrounded by twenty-seven kitchen knives, stabbed into the drywall.

"Condescension is an epidemic, easily spread through contact of those near you, so he careful to keep limited contact as to not fall prey to it's effects," Hood's voice spoke, glee very clear in his tone. Next to the circle of knives there were two more quotes on either side; 'Stab the body and it heals, but injure the heart and the wound lasts a lifetime', and 'For there to be betrayal, there would have to have been trust first.' The second quote he recognized to be from the hunger games, though Bruce couldn't quite pinpoint the origins of first.

"If you are hearing this, you clearly didn't take my message to leave well enough alone seriously," the newscaster voice dropped, leaving Red Hood's sounding all too proud of himself. "To whom it may concern; consider all future collaborations null and voided, you are all dead to me, I never had a family, yada yada, etcetera etcetera. Any who enter my territory are personally liable for any and all actions or damages against them, including but not limited to inconveniences and humiliation via glitter, slime, paint, and dye. Please vacate the premises or suffer the consequences. Have a pleasant day."

"Oh, and tell Nightwing that he is a little bitch."

Bruce spent several moments to just stand in the empty apartment, staring at the pile of trackers on the table laid out in the shape of a middle finger. He sighed.

I love my kids.

Step two of Marinette's plan was coming together well, and she was close to moving on to the next phase.

The good part of hanging from the ceiling for longer than was even mildly comfortable was that she could see a lot with the bird's eye view. Many parts of her plan had gaps when she first started out, since she didn't know all of the materials available to her, but step two fixed that quite easily.

If there was one thing that Marinette had learned from her years as a Superheroine, especially one who fought a villain that preyed on people's emotions, it was how people reacted to sudden danger. Adrenaline does funny things to a person, taking perfectly rational thought and turning it into blind action. Fight or flight is a strong, instinctual reaction for all kinds of creatures, not just humans. When there is nowhere to run? You fight. When there is nothing to fight? You run. And when you run, what is it that you look for?

Step One: Neutralize Lookouts, Check. Step Two: Gather Supplies, Check(mostly). Step Three: The Path of Least Resistance.

There are four main exits and nineteen total cultists on the main floor. Two normal doors on each side underneath the offices that lead out of the building, and two large truck doors. With no real way to predict exactly who would go where, she has to assume that the best case scenario is each door having four or five cultists exit through them, and her traps being able to take out all of them at that number. Realistically, that isn't feasible. It could be all of them go through the same path, and most escape, or it could be that they scatter so far, they bypass the majority of her traps, leaving all of her work to be for naught. With how things were now, there were too many variables, too many obstacles, and too many unknowns. 

But this was Marinette. This was Ladybug. And it was time to do what a Ladybug does best; even the odds.

Marinette crouched on one of the catwalks that was hung in the direct center of the warehouse, just to the side of the cultists' ritual, her small travel sketchbook in hand. She was drawing out her plan and doing her best to ignore the prickling feeling of Red Hood's eyes on her as she marked out the best way to do this.

Two pillars on either side of the circle with the table and minifridge set nearest to the one towards the back side of the warehouse. The other one is down and to the side of the right most truck door, giving the least amount of room for error. To the left, further out and underneath the offices is the door we came in from, and it is the most likely exit that they would choose, seeing as it is at least marginally familiar, easier to open than the truck doors, and second closest. On the opposite side of the warehouse is the other normal door, which has the benefit of being in the darkest section of the warehouse and having a much longer path to set traps up on, but less likely to be chosen...

She leaned forward against the thin railing of the catwalk, staring down at the activity below and tapping her pencil against her chin as she thought. She heard a rattle of chains and couldn't help but lift her gaze to look at the source. The faintly glowing eyes of Red Hood's helmet stared at her intently from where he hung. She smirked at him, giving a little wave with her fingers, before an idea came to her and she looked back to the rightmost truck door.

If I block that one off and make a longer curved path from the side of the circle, it gives more of a chance to take out a few on the path. I could... Yes, that'll work.

Marinette quickly doodled a whole bunch of little boxes on her paper.

Then I could use the fishing line here and here, then all of the jacks, pellets, gum and bouncy balls on this side, then- hmm...

She looked up with narrowed eyes, examining all of the rafters and catwalks above where she was planning for the paths to go. Then smiled. That would work perfectly. Within another minute or so her sketches were finished and she stood, feeling giddy to see the end results of her plan. Before turning back to head down she looked again at Red Hood's intense stare, and gave him a wink.

Marinette spent the next half an hour moving boxes from one pile to another, shifting crates, and pushing pallets to create solid looking barriers, all while trying to remain as silent as possible, and there had only been a couple hiccups along the way. Along with a couple interesting discoveries. The first had been while she was creating the longest path, creating a good number of empty pallets for one of her planned traps.

Marinette had stopped as she brushed up against a solid feeling thing wrapped in plastic, and took a moment to examine the pallet next to her. It was hard to see in the dark and with the little light there was reflecting harshly off of the plastic wrap, so it took her a few seconds to figure out what it was she was looking at. Two adjacent pallets stacked taller than she was(Not that that was difficult, but good luck to whomever mentioned it cough cough Red Hood), completely made up of heavy paint cans. Marinette looked around, noticing that the path she had been making came directly toward the paint can pallets. There was no way in hell that she would be able to move them out of the way, let alone without being noticed, but... She looked up at the catwalk directly above, to the sides where she could curve the path around the bend and at the conveniently placed pillar, and back at the straight stretch of space she had been making. She smiled as another trap added itself to her list.

The second discovery was while she was clearing the shorter pathway towards rightmost door. To counteract the small amount of distance she had to work with, she decided to split this one in half with what was essentially an island of boxes that tapered off just before the doors. She was doing the shorter path first, despite it being closer to the cultists, because where the longer path was meant to go was filled with heavy crates of what she thinks are car parts which, for some reason, smelled faintly like smoke. Add the fact that Nappy was napping against the pillar over there, she didn't want to risk getting found this early. Needless to say, she was working extra hard to make as little sound as possible.

Marinette's heart had leapt into her throat when something shifted under her foot with a faint metal clank sound, very clearly not the solid concrete ground she had been expecting. Her head snapped up as she froze, straining her ears and glancing around her hidden spot in the shadows to determine if anyone heard. She was still for several long moments, sounds of the cultists washing over her, before determining that it was safe. With careful movements and a momentarily stronger draw on Trixx's power, she moved back slowly. Looking down, she found a slightly warped metal plate that was about the same size as her with a handle in one side. Curiously, she shifted the box she had been moving out of the way and gently pulled the metal plate up.

A shadowed abyss. An all consuming void. A dark, dank hole.

It was a maintenance tunnel, right in the middle of her path.

Marinette gently set the metal covering back down, mind racing. What could she do with this? It was much too good of an opportunity to pass up, and thankfully, she had an idea. Near the back of the warehouse, she could remember seeing a pile of cloth tarps. She could use those if she could just find something stronger than the fishing line...

An idea popped into her head. Very likely a bad idea but... well, she's sure Red Hood couldn't be too mad about her taking apart his weird harpoon-gun if it is to save him from being sacrificed, right? He probably has extras anyway.

She glanced up at the vigilante, then went back to moving boxes with a quiet snicker.

Jason still had no fucking idea what this woman was doing, and it was stressing him the fuck out. His escape rested solely on the shoulders of a woman playing high stakes ring-around-the-cultist instead of calling the cops like any sane person would do!

Jason wasn't as stupid to think that she couldn't have found a phone like she claimed. In face, he was certain she already had one in her purse, which, had to be some kind of pocket dimension to fit all that shit inside of it. Why would someone carry around a whole ass sketchbook and unopened roll of fishing line of all things?

(Jason was ignoring the fact that he knew several people who would, could, and have carried around that and much weirder. In all honesty, he just wanted something to be annoyed about. It was cathartic.)

It had been about an hour or so since she practically skipped her way out of being kidnapped like it was no big deal, and he had spent it with nothing to do but become more appalled and concerned by the second. If it weren't for the fact that he was watching this happen live and in the flesh, he wouldn't believe some of the stuff she managed to get away with. 

The blue-haired woman(he really needed to find out her name) had nearly gotten herself caught already. Not by climbing up one of the support pillars like a spider which the ones on watch missed by conveniently turning away from at the right moment, or making a frankly ridiculously sized pile of boxes in front of the truck door which the sound of was drowned out by the fridge seemingly having a mechanical seizure, or even moving a crate right fucking behind two of the cultists who somehow didn't notice because of a supposedly funny video on their phones! No, she almost got caught by a fucking sneeze.

She had been picking up some pile of cloth from a dark corner that she was undoubtedly going to use for some weird-ass thing that would make perfect sense well after he finally managed to finally get the fuck down and out of this god damned warehouse. But, from his vantage point, Jason could see that in getting so comfortable moving around in enemy territory(helped by the fact that she must be the luckiest person in Gotham. Seriously, share some of that with the rest of us, would ya?) the blue-haired woman had gotten complacent.

He winced as the fabric slipped from her fingers and sent a massive cloud of dust right into her face. Both he and the woman tensed as a long moment passed, Jason in anxiousness, while the woman seemed to be winding up, holding her hands tightly over her face. Then, she sneezed, full body convulsing and letting out a squeak that even he could hear from his vantage point.

…that was adorable.

One of the cultists blow looked of from their phone and looked in the direction of the noise, then asked their partner something.

Oh shit-

"Hey, did you hear squeaking?" Dolly asked, head raising from where she was hunched over her phone. Marinette felt panic rising as she dropped into a crouch as fast as she could, pressing her side into the heavy crate beside her, holding her nose and blinking through watery eyes, the dust making her entire face feel as if it were being attacked by tiny, sword-wielding specks.

"No? What are you talking about?" Judgy responded, looking up from his phone, pausing some video that she could faintly hear playing through their earbuds. Marinette's sinuses stung and eyes watered as she took deep breaths through her mouth, full body seizing several times with the force of holding back the sneezes. She made as little noise as possible, slowly crawling around the edge of a box to be out of sight of the cultists. Owowowow, my everything-

"Dude, are you deaf? That sounded like a mouse getting stepped on."

"Why do you even know what that sounds like?"

"I had cats as a kid."

Taking one hand away from her face, she pressed it to the ground to help her do an awkward crab walk further down the line of pallets to a mostly empty one that lead to an enclosed area where she could die in peace.

"So you've stepped on a mouse before?"

"No I- just- shut up and come check it out with me."

"Hell no, I don't want to see any mice. They're like, the size of rabbits in this city."

"Those are rats you fucking dumbass-"

Marinette crouched next to the pallet, taking more careful deep breaths and wiping the tears from her eyes. She watched carefully from her place in the shadows until they were both fully turned away. She was mostly obstructed by boxes but not willing to risk it. After what felt like an eternity, but was likely just twenty seconds or so, her chance came in the form of Dolly opening a box. She practically dove through the gap left for her and curled up on the floor for a while, recovering her senses as Dolly and Judgy talked. Marinette was only half paying attention, lamenting the existence of dust and wallowing until her half-formed bruises stopped stinging, when the shifting of cardboard and something Judgy said caught her attention.

"That is an unholy amount of glitter."

Marinette paused, a grin pressing against her hands.

I take it back. Worth it.

Marinette can't say that she had ever been particularly talented at sneaking around. It just never came naturally to her. Disguises and hiding in plain sight? That's just like an extension of sewing or acting, easy peasy. Hiding? Sure, she's great at picking the right spot and fitting in tiny spaces, it's just an extension of luck and strategy. Sneaking? That's a different story all together.

That isn't to say that she is bad at sneaking, she's just not talented at it. It means that every bit of skill she has was hard earned through extreme situations and years of practice. Being a superhero made her learn a lot of things, sink or swim style, with no safety net to fall back on. So, despite how... unusual and high stakes this situation is, Marinette isn't quite out of her depth yet.

That's what she told herself at least, standing fully upright with a wooden pallet hanging from her shoulders as she walked with it to a dark corner of the warehouse where another fifteen wooden pallets lay stacked, silently begging the universe that none of the cultists look over at this exact spot. Of course, she planned for this particular trap to be set up just before the leftmost exit, meaning she was as far from the cultists as she could be and had many obstacles in between them, making it very unlikely to be seen, but still. The chance was there.

Luckily, this was the last pallet she needed to set up this trap in particular, so she didn't need to haul any more all across the place. And extra luckily(Thanks to the magic she borrowed from Tikki and Trixx, no doubt), no one saw her walk around the edges of their circle and through the now complete pathways. Well, no one except Red Hood, who had been staring so hard at her this entire time, she wondered if he was trying to spontaneously develop the ability to shoot lasers from his eyes. Or maybe telepathy so he could yell at her for 'unnecessary' risk taking, she could only guess.(Well, he may have a point about the risk taking, but there is no way in hell she would ever say that. She was doing this to prove a point, practicality be damned.) She ignored him, as she had been doing since the beginning, setting the pallet down as quietly as she could despite the two stacks both reaching above her head. After a moment to breathe and admire her hard work, she pulled out the roll of fishing line and her extra pair scissors, tying the two stacks of pallets together and then working her way back through the slightly curved path until she reached the pillar.

Trap list;  Web of Ouch, Check.  Series of Unfortunate Tripwires(1), Check.

Onto the next!

Time flew by as Marinette gleefully set up the rest of her planned traps. A grapple gun, disassembled for its wire, and a cloth tarp carefully placed in front of a slick patch of WD-40. A block of wood suck in the opening mechanism of the truck door and a huge, precarious pile of various sized wooden crates that really tested the limits of her Tetris skills. A person-sized mat of duct tape woven together and placed sticky side up after another Series of Unfortunate Tripwires along the winding path to the leftmost door. A wooden wedge carefully positioned underneath the back edge of the two huge pallets of paint cans to slightly tilt them forward, and another paint can tied to the I-beam above and held to the underside of the catwalk by a thin string. Boxes filled to the brim with bouncy balls, gum balls, BB gun pellets, and metal jacks tied above two of the four exit pathways, a stolen steel-toed boot filled with rocks ready to swing at the turn of a handle. And, her personal favorite so far, a wooden plank positioned just above the cultists' plastic table and mini-fridge, piled with the superglue powder and the wonderful addition of rainbow glitter.

She had managed to test the superglue powder on Nappy, using it to fuse his clothes to the concrete he was resting on, and it was wonderful. There is no way that he is getting up with his clothes still intact. She kind of felt a little bad for the ones who are going to get this dumped on them, but oh well. She's sure the hospital will take care of it.

Probably.

She had managed to find a working water spout and long hose, complete with attached nozzle, that would reach all the way to where Red Hood was hanging, so that was one less thing for her to worry about doing herself. The last thing she set up was the discount Joker Dolls and the Rubber chickens while sitting in one of the disused offices. The whole room had become a sort of base of operations, and looked just about as chaotic as the end product of her plan was going to, but Marinette didn't care all that much. To get the effect she was going for just right, she had to be very careful in how she went about it. Packing in the rubber chickens at the bottom of the crate as precisely as possible then slowly lowering heavy bags of all the black and red glitter she could find to make the chickens stay in their deflated state. She carefully poked holes in the tops of the bags with one of the thumb tacks she had found, before carefully switching on all the joker dolls and placing them in the box.

Marinette will admit to using a lot of magic to make sure this step didn't go wrong, but once the four boxes were attached at their points on the catwalk and connected to her activation pull cord, she couldn't help the little giddy happy dance. It was ready!! The only thing left was letting Red Hood know his part, then the trap is set!

Jason wanted to throw his previous resolve to just wait and see how things turn out through the fucking window, because this was getting ridiculous. Patience has never really been his thing, which is becoming more and more apparent to him the longer he is forced to watch the sheer, unadulterated audacity on display.

He will admit to being mildly entertained in the beginning, watching the woman doing whatever the hell it is that she's doing like it was some kind of soap opera. When The Sneeze(TM) happened, he had been near certain she was caught, but seeing as she somehow had to be the luckiest person in the whole god damn world, she got away scot-free as the two cultists with the same skill level and attention span as low level videogame characters got distracted by industrial sized bags of glitter.

Which of course she later took to use for whatever unholy Rube Goldberg Machine she was making, alongside with a mysterious white powder that came from boxes absolutely covered in warning labels.

But the craft herpes and unprecedented luck were not what made him want to scream at her from two stories up and eighty feet away, cultists be damned. No, that urge came from the very familiar line of cordage she had looped through some kind of tarp and tied in knots, knots!! She took apart his grapple gun and used it for some kind of dirty picnic blanket! HIS FUCKING GRAPPLE GUN! The AUDACITY! He was fuming, glaring as she wrapped a hose over her shoulder and started trekking up the stairs and over the catwalks towards him. 

Finally!

"My fucking grapple gun?!" Red Hood hissed with indignation as soon as she was withing earshot, if barely. Marinette huffed and rolled her eyes, adjusting the hose wrapped around her shoulder to let more slack down.

"Well hello to you too." She said, tone filled with sarcasm and sass in equal measure, but internally she was beaming. He's not ruining her good mood when she is so close to success. She gently laid the hose wrapped around her shoulder down onto the catwalk as she crouched, careful not to make any suspicious noise. Not that the cultists would be likely to look up even if they heard it(After being subjected to the eye-searing glare of the floodlights herself, Marinette didn't exactly blame them, though still...), but it doesn't hurt to be careful.

"You took apart my fucking grapple gun?!" He repeated, voice inching higher. Clearly, some people don't think the phrase 'better safe than sorry' applies to them. She looked up at the rafters, rolling her head back in mild annoyance, as she drew on more of Trixx's power to muffle their conversation before taking a dramatic pose and poorly mimicking Hood's voice.

"'Oh, hi Marinette, thank you for risking your life to save me from being sacrificed by these scary cultists, I really owe you one.'" She shifted her stance and changed back to her own voice. "'No problem, Red Hood, I'm glad you understand that sometimes sacrifices must be made for the continued freedom of the innocent.'" She crossed her arms and looked pointedly in the faintly glowing eye of the Vigilante's helmet with a slight pout. She couldn't see it, but Marinette imagined that he took a split second to blink.

"Was that a pun?" Marinette tilted her head, thinking back over her words before silently grinning. "So not only do you take apart my god damned grapple gun, you fucking pun at me about it?!" Marinette chuckled, uncrossing her arms and going back to carefully untangling the hose.

"You can get another one, cant you?" She asked flippantly, Red Hood grunted in displeasure.

"Ugh... Yeah, but that is so inconvenient." If it weren't for the voice modulator, Marinette would *almost* call his tone petulant, but for now she simply thought of it as pouty.

"Welcome to the club." She responded, to which he huffed.

"What, the club for inconveniences and cultists?" She could hear the smirk in his voice, and had to hold back her own.

"Yep." She responded cheerfully instead, "Meetings every Thursday in the warehouse of rejected toys."

"Why Thursdays?"

"Because Thursdays are the worst day of the week." She said with certainty, staring off into the middle distance as she remembered all the bad things that happen on Thursdays.

Well, at the end of it all, this might not end up being one of the bad things after all...

"Isn't that supposed to be Monday?" Marinette rolled her eyes and huffed in exasperation before shaking her head.

"I'm not going over this again." Red Hood leaned his head back, seemingly nonplused.

"Again?"

"Anyway," Marinette continued, cutting him off from speaking further. "I have everything ready except for this one last thing, which I will need your help for." Hood straightened(as much as he could anyway), as if remembering something and his voice pitched slightly deeper in a commanding kind of way. As a former superhero herself, she was very familiar with it.

"Yeah, actually, I'm going to need you to exp-"

"Shush shh shh." Marinette said, waving a hand at him while distracted with straightening the rest of the hose and turning the nozzle to 'shower' mode in preparation to lower it to him. Despite this, she could feel the affront radiating off of the vigilante. She fought down a smile as she continued. "Don't interrupt people, its rude."

Red Hood made a strangled noise, like he was trying to start several different sentences at once but nothing managed to make it past the first syllable, very effectively cutting off his demand for explanations she absolutely wasn't going to give him. She wished that she could see what his expression looked like right now, it would keep her giggling for weeks.

"Okay, so I don't know how much you were paying attention-" That's a lie, she knew he has been watching her like a hawk this whole time, "but you see the boards I set up with the piles of white powder and glitter above their supply table?" she asked, pivoting on the balls of her feet to look at him, wrapped in chains and hanging above a half done ritual circle.

"Yeah?" The word sounded like he wanted to growl it, but was too off kilter to fully manage. She held back a laugh, but couldn't help the smirk that slipped through.

"Well." She said, holding up the hose next to her head for him to see, "What I need you to do, is spray water on the cultists that powder drops on." She finished with a sunny grin. There was silence for several long moments as they stared at each other, sounds outside their little bubble left ignored. Marinette didn't falter, expression as solid as Hood's helmet. When he finally spoke, it was loaded and laced with emotion and demand.

"Why."

Marinette blinked and tilted her head. There were a lot of ways that she could answer him, ways to interpret what exactly he was asking about. Why the water, why him. It could be why she insisted on being so... Cavalier about this whole situation, or why she stuck around to help instead of running. Or, most likely, it could be why go through all this trouble? Why spend hours setting all this up when a single phone call would have gotten them out of this mess in minutes? And yet...

She felt the magic in her chest swirling, Luck and Misfortune dancing across her shoulders. Creation and Destruction chasing each other through the blurry seams of the world around her. Her connection to the Kwami hummed in her ears, and she felt the Balance on the verge of a Shift. Her words here could change the Fate of this city. A small action could tip the scales of Order and Chaos.

No pressure.

"Because," she said slowly, earnestness in her eyes as she stared through Red Hood and into the Destruction and Misfortune clinging to him like leaches, tainting and feeding on the Hope and Safety in his Soul. Magic seeped into her voice, spreading through her like invisible veins of sunlight and guiding her words. "When life takes you down a path that gives nothing but blood and darkness, the only way to make it to the other side is to create your own light."

She got no response, the vigilante seeming frozen by her words, staring intently from behind glowing lenses. She herself took a few moments to collect her thoughts as the Magic dissipated, the feeling of Balance fading to the background, leaving behind no indication on if she said the right thing. 

But she did, she knew she did.

With a comforting smile loaded with memories of long nights, suppressed feelings and more responsibility than any child should ever have to shoulder, she reached down and handed him the hose. He took it automatically, still processing her words. Marinette stood to leave, before looking over her shoulder and saying,

"Enjoy the show, Hood." She smirked at him, turning and walking away. "Maybe you'll learn a thing or two about how dangerous 'feather dusters' can be."

"I got something." Oracle's spoke suddenly through the uncharacteristic silence of the coms.

"Report." Batman ordered, the speed of his reply being the only indicator of his worry, but after knowing him for so long Oracle could read it very easily. Keys clacked rapidly under her fingers as she hacked into phone satellites and pulled up tracking software.

"A phone call, asking specifically for Commissioner Gordon." She paused for a moment, skimming over the auto-generated transcript from the audio file.

"Hn." Batman grunted impatiently. She could almost feel his signature stare through the computer.

"Hold your horses." She muttered quietly, speaking up again shortly after as several blue dots started appearing and disappearing on the map of the warehouse district on her other screen. "Someone called in to report cult activity and kidnapping approximately two minutes ago."

"Is it Hood?" Red Robin asked, voice calm if slightly winded. A quick glance at his body cam footage showed him finishing up a fight with a couple muggers.

"It seems likely," she said, refocusing. "The video feeds I managed to find earlier put him near the reconnaissance point N gave me before he disappeared, and the call claims two people were kidnapped." Her eyes narrowed at the screen, the tracking software taking somewhat longer to pinpoint the origin of the call than normal, only giving her the general area, but...

"But?" Nightwing interrupted, much more subdued than earlier in the night. Barbara smirked a little at his words aligning with her thoughts. She started combing through traffic camera feeds from the estimated time of the kidnapping to pinpoint the location manually as she spoke.

"It was a woman with a French accent who called it in, and from the sound of the audio, she was suspiciously calm. Almost excited sounding, even." Barbara frowned, finding a suspicious looking beat-up brown van and several cars all driving to one warehouse approximately 3 hours and 28 minutes ago. "There was no mention or description of who exactly the kidnapped people were, though the caller implied she was one of them." There were no cameras pointing towards where they parked, and any security the disused warehouse had was either completely broken on or a closed circuit. She started back tracking the path of the van while she ran the license plates she managed to get from one of the higher quality traffic cams.

"Think it's a trap?" Red Robin asked. She hummed, chewing on the inside of her cheek for a moment. She started looking into the warehouse's utilities, searching for any any weirdly high power draws that would indicate a villain lair, but didn't find anything on that scale.

"I'm sending you the address, B." She said quickly, inputting it to the Batmobile's navigation system before answering Red. "There's not enough evidence to say, but I don't think it is a trap, exactly. All the information we have about the cult from previous reconnaissance doesn't indicate them being a setup, and the call, despite specifically mentioning the Commissioner, was for the police, not us." She checked the rout on the Batmobile's map against hers, looking it over for roadblocks.

"But it is suspicious." Red Robin replied, a calculating edge to his voice.

"But it is suspicious." She confirmed. Construction blocked off the block with the most direct route from Batman to the warehouse, looks like a fire in a machinery overlay facility that took out a corner of the building. The traffic cones and interspersed equipment would be little obstacle for Bruce the Broody Dad-Bat, though.

"Enroute, eleven minutes." Said the aforementioned Overprotective Flying Marsupial. Oracle looked at his tracker.

"Take a left in two blocks and you'll be there in eight." She typed in several commands and a new path showed up on his map. "Careful for the piles of bricks." A flash from another screen caught her attention and she turned her head.

Ah, good.

"Red, I'm sending you the address of where it looks like Hood was taken from. N, I'm sending you files for the owners of the cars that the cultists used. None of them have been reported stolen, so see if you can confirm or find anything incriminating we can give to the police." From their body cam footage, she could see Red pulling out his grapple gun and shooting off while Nightwing quickly looked through his wrist computer.

"What would we ever do without you, O?" Nightwing asked with a laugh, the first one since Hood turned up missing.

"Die, probably." Red Robin responded as he leapt off of a building. Oracle snorted.

"Probably." She agreed

Marinette was in position, crouched behind the cultists' table of junk and fridge of dubiously sourced blood. All of her traps were set and ready to go, the few she needed to activate all connected back to this one spot. She went over her mental checklist with a feeling of satisfaction.

Step One: Neutralize Lookouts, Check. Step Two: Gather Supplies, Check. Step Three: The Path of Least Resistance, Check. Step Four: Traps, Check.

It was a simple plan, though by no means easy. The bruises and rope burn had made friends with the muscle fatigue and aching joints from all the crawling, climbing, and carrying that she had done to get to this point. The close calls that made her heart race with adrenaline bled into giddy anticipation for the payoff. Finally, the culmination of all of her hard work was here.

Step Five: It All Falls Down.

She looked up, past the eye watering glare of the floodlight and directly at Red Hood. With squinting eyes and a toothy grin, she shot him a thumbs up. After a moment, he responded in kind, holding up the hose. Marinette looked back down, blinking a few times to clear the spots from her vision and then steeling herself with a deep breath.

Go time.

Creeping forward, Marinette reached the extension cord that powered the mini-fridge. The very same mini-fridge that filled the warehouse with the constant gurgling drone of an appliance on the edge of complete and utter non-function. With a quick and simple yank and a careful dive back behind cover, the warehouse suddenly descended into silence.

"... The hell?" One of the cultists that had been drawing runes into the edge of the circle muttered, looking up at the sudden quiet, quickly followed by the other three.

"What happened?" Dolly called from the other side of the circle, voice echoing as she stood up from where she rested against a large crate with Judgy.

"The fridge just turned off." Drawing Cultist number two said, setting down her protractor.

"Well no shit-" the third one said, before being cut off by the one in the red-trimmed potato sack.

"Figure it out without disrupting meditation, lest our hard work go to waste." He said in an excessively haughty voice that gave her flashbacks of a certain blond. Marinette couldn't see their faces, but from their posture she could deduce that the four drawing cultists and Dolly weren't too happy about this guy. If she had to guess, it would probably be because his version of 'hard work' consisted of sitting with his eyes closed and bossing people around.

Oh well, that's what you get for being in a cult that kidnapped people, I guess.

The four Drawing Cultists made their way over, two stopping next to the table, one going directly to the fridge, and the last hung back with their arms crossed, just beside one of the meditating cultists. Marinette shifted, hand wrapping around the first fishing line, pulling it until it was just taught.

"Hey, who unplugged-" the cultist never got to finish their sentence, as Marinette *yanked* the fishing line and four crates balanced on top of the catwalks above tipped. Then spilled...

Then it all fell down.

----

Jason had never been big on the Internet. Sure, it was beyond useful for investigative work, but from growing up poor, to living on the streets, to being dead, there wasn't much time for him to get immersed in 'internet culture', as Tim called it. But, he did remember one of Dick's attempts at 'brotherly bonding night' where he spent several hours putting up with far too many compilation videos meant to 'catch him up on what he missed while dead'. He remembered them, at this one very specific moment, because of the one 'Vine' Dick showed them of a rubber chicken falling off a roof. It had been mildly amusing at the time, enough keep him around longer than he otherwise would have stayed. He had even laughed a little, and made a joke about it being accurate to what Dick sounded like when pushed off of high places. The responding squawk from his adoptive brother proved his point perfectly, to the amusement of the rest of the room.

Jason was not laughing now.

If he had been asked before to imagine the bone chilling sound of hundreds of screaming rubber chickens falling through a warehouse like an unholy rain, nothing would have come close to the reality. He doubted anything could come close to reality; the single most unsettling sound he had ever heard freezing everyone in place with held breath as the screaming and thwaps of rubber hitting concrete stopped. That was, until the dolls activated.

From inside the dispersed mounds of toys and clouds of glitter slowly spreading over the floor in a way that reminded him of fear gas, more pairs of red eyes than he could count lit up like beacons, followed by laughter.

Screaming laughter.

Jason knows that if he wasn't hanging from chains at this moment, he would either be running or shooting. His fist clenched around the hose in his hand, and water started raining down below him. At the same time, he heard two separate thunks, followed by what sounded like a rain of vaguely spherical objects and confused screaming from below him.

White powder fell in a heap, coating the cultists and spreading over the floor near the table they had set up, and he remembered what the woman- Marinette- told him. Swallowing down the adrenaline induced haze, he aimed the water as the cultists scattered.

It was chaos.

The three cultists closest to the table had the most powder on them, and when they ran directly under the path of the water, something unexpected happened. The first one fell, foot stuck to the ground, and the other two tripped over them and didn't get back up again, writhing where they had ragdolled against the floor, stuck to it like a glue trap. The white powder got on two more, one of the people who were meditating and the person standing next to them. They ran, only getting partially soaked before they were out of range. They ran for the door behind Jason, clothes becoming stiff and sticky with glue, but not managing to fully stop them. They didn't get far, because as soon as they got to the border of the boxes they tripped over the balls of various sizes scattered over the floor. One fell to the side, catching themselves on a heavy crate while the other fell face first into the floor. Neither got back up, despite how much they struggled.

On the path next to them, two more cultists had tried to escape, but instead of sticking to the floor like the others, they slid on it. Crashing into each other, they both fell head first into a dusty tarp that seemed to swallow them whole as they fell into a pit. The cord of his mutilated grapple gun pulled taught, closing around the edges of the tarp, leaving only a single flailing leg sticking out of the top.

Across from him, on the longest and darkest path, the two cultists who were meant to be on watch followed behind a third at a dead sprint. They gained speed unhindered, until they were around twenty feet away from the door when the one in front hit a tripwire, stumbling but keeping momentum. But then they hit another tripwire.

And another tripwire.

And then another tripwire.

They managed to dodge by jumping over the last tripwire, only to miss the clothesline that hit them directly at neck height. The cultist fell, slamming their head on the ground, knocked out cold with a muted thud.

The two behind didn't stop for their friend, simply jumping over the prone form and ducking past the clothesline, speeding up for the last stretch to the door. They almost made it, but we're stopped dead by the web of fishing line and stacks of pallets that collapsed around the two, trapping them in a tangle of limbs and splinters.

Just behind them, almost at the same time another cultists barely dodged a paint can swinging down from the rafters, only to be buried under the resulting cascade of paint cans that spilled from two huge pallets. The one behind skid to a stop and backpedaled, watching four of their companions go down trying to get out that way. They then turned around, seeing a fifth person groaning on the ground stuck to a mat of tape they fell on after running through another series of tripwires and singular clothesline. In a panicked haze, they looked around until spotting a couple of others at the truck door that wasn't blocked off, trying to open it. The panicking cultist rushed over just as they managed to crack it open, incidentally causing a veritable avalanche of boxes and crates to fall on all three.

There were three left standing. The one with red trim, who was yelling obscenities while standing in the middle of their half done ritual, and the two who were walking through the minefield of tripping hazards that got the ones half-covered in glue. They reached the other side without falling within just a few seconds of each other, the one who got there first sprinting forwards and throwing open the door with a screech of rusted hinges.

Then was promptly knocked the fuck out by a boot to the face.

The last one made it out the door, then screamed. Their footsteps fell silent.

Jason was gaping.

Holy... Fucking... Shit...

Below him, he heard cackling. Not the unsettling, mechanical and screaming laughter of the joker dolls, but the nearly evil delighted glee coming from the small blue-haired woman dancing around with a monkey wrench the size of her arm held in one hand. Her high ponytail bounced behind her, covered in cobwebs and dust. Her clothes were rumpled and dirty, and even from this distance her arms looked like she went ten rounds with an octopus and lost. But despite this, she was practically glowing.

"IT WORKED, YES!!! HAHA!" She shouted out, twirling out from behind her wall of boxes, head whipping around in every direction, taking it all in. The lead cultist whirled around, gaze locking onto her.

"YOU!" He shouted in outrage, immediately charging at the much smaller woman. Jason sucked in a breath, whether to warn her or just shout, he is not sure, but the sound never left his throat.

Marinette turned her feral grin on the charging cultist, and when he was in range, swung her heavy monkey wrench and hit him right in the shoulder. Jason could hear the bone snap. She hit him again, this time in the stomach with a forwards jab, then another swing to the knee with a sickening crunch, taking him down completely and then stepping far enough away he couldn't reach her, just in case. She spun, turning to look directly at him.

"You still think I'm adorable and harmless, Hood?!" She shouted up at him, dropping the wrench with a heavy thunk. "I told you that you would eat your words," she threw her arms out wide "Now eat them and weep!" She cackled madly, not waiting for an answer as she turned and skipped away. Skipped.

Jason was left speechless, open mouthed and hanging above the groaning and unconscious cultists who had kidnapped and were prepared to sacrifice him with only one thought.

I think I might be in love.

The Batmobile skid to a stop in front of the warehouse and he practically flew out of it. The outside was dark, but he could see light seeping out through broken and dirty windows and hear a commotion coming from the inside. He ran towards the closest door, only to be mildly surprised as it was thrown open with a near deafening screech of the hinges when he was still a few paces away. The surprise didn't stop, because even as he was getting into a fighting stance, the person(whom he identified as one of the cultists his sons were investigating) was knocked out by a boot swinging down from the crude mechanism he only barely had time to noticed before it activated.

… What?

Pushing his confusion and surprise away, he focused on the second cultist that came running through the loudly closing door. They made it a few steps out before noticing him in the dim lighting. Expression already contorted in fear and panic, the shock of seeing Batman standing in their way was too much, and they screamed.

Bruce punched them in the face, then spent a few precious seconds zip tying their hands and feet so they couldn't escape when they woke up. Creeping forward to the door that was held open by the unconscious body of the first cultist, he peered inside to where he could hear a woman's manic laughter. Once he did, he stopped to take it all in.

His son, in full gear, was hanging from the ceiling, wrapped in chains and holding a leaking garden hose. Below him was a small woman covered in dirt and injuries, laughing maniacally as she stood above an even more injured cultist who was trying to crawl away with one arm, and another pile of people somehow stuck to the ground. He could see a hole of some kind to the left with a single still-moving leg sticking upwards, and to the right two people splayed out like ragdolls. He could hear muffled arguing and curses from the other side of the warehouse, along with creaks of pallets and groaning from underneath piles of boxes. Bruce felt a very familiar feeling creeping over him, one his kids loved to induce for the sole purpose of causing grey hairs.

What the hell happened?

But this time, it wasn't one of his kids who were responsible. He watched as the woman turned, looking directly at Jason and yelling up at him.

"You still think I'm adorable and harmless, Hood?! I told you that you would eat your words, now eat them and weep!" Then she cackled madly, turned, and skipped through to the opposite side of the building.

Well, Bruce thought with a restrained sigh, maybe he was at least a little responsible.

Bruce slid through the door, creeping around the edges of the circle before emerging from the shadows in front of his son. Hood jerked, whipping his head from where he was staring after the woman to Batman. He grunted, clearing his throat before speaking.

"Uh, hi- hey." Jason cleared his throat again, attempting for casual and failing miserably. "How's- uh, how's it goin'?" he stammered, glancing back to where the woman disappeared. Stammered. Bruce didn't answer, tilting his head and scanning the carnage again, before spotting the loop of rope hanging next to his son.

"...How long have you been here?" His tone was harder to decipher with the voice modulator, but Bruce would recognize it easily from any one of his children. Jason was flustered.

"B?" Hood asked, unsettled as a small grin grew on The Batman's face. Whoever that woman was, whatever Jason said to her to cause this reaction, Bruce would likely thank her for the opportunity to get back at one of his children for all the grief they cause him. Uncrossing his arms, Bruce pulled a phone out of his belt pouch. "B? B don't you fucking dare-" He still didn't respond, holding up the device with one hand, and snapping a picture. Ignoring his son's vehement protests, he sent the photo to Alfred with the attached message:

B: please print and frame this for display in the cave.

A: Of course, Sir. I suppose the bulletproof frames will come in useful after all.

Red Hood continued to swear, attempting to spray him with water from the hose he still held tightly in hand. Bruce just put the phone away and reached up to tap his comm with his small smile still in place.

"Oracle, please send Nightwing and Red Robin to my location." He said calmly, concerned exclamations immediately coming through only to be drowned out by Hood's booming voice.

"B, DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE!"

[bekkathyst]

Mega Crystal Clearance Sale - Starting Nov 22nd 2024 Rules & Procedures

Hello friends! Everyone planning to participate in the sale today, please read. This is how everything will work. We need to downsize and make space, so we’re posting our available inventory at a discount. I will likely break up the posting between the next few days and invoices will get sent out after the last day of posts.

I will start posting items for sale directly here on Tumblr. To claim an item and place your order, do the following:

Reply to the post (those who are unable to reply for whatever reason can reblog) saying “sold” or “mine" with the quantity you’d like to claim. It’s important you do this so we can see who claimed something first in case something sells out.

Keep a list of everything you claim (with the item number for each item). Once you’re done claiming, please message me over the instant messenger.

Include the following information in your message:

Your email address for the invoice, the country you live in (for shipping purposes - we are shipping from Austria), and the list of what you claimed (with the item numbers). Also please let me know if you want your order to be *open box* or *ready to ship*. “Open box” simply means you want us to hang onto your items after you pay so that you can continue to add things from future sales so everything can be shipped together for convenience 😊

Shipping to Europe is $12

Shipping elsewhere is $15

For extra-large packages (over 1kg), shipping is $20

Be sure to send your info at the end of the sale or whenever you’re sure you’re done claiming.

Invoicing will be done through my online shop “Bekkathyst” - the invoice gets sent to your email and you get the option to pay with a PayPal account or with a credit or debit card. You don’t need to have a PayPal account to pay.

Payment will be due by the end of Tuesday, November 26th. Please pay as soon as possible.

Unfortunately due to problems we have encountered before - if you claim items and then at the end of the sale and either don’t respond to your invoice or never message, you will be blocked.

If you decide you’re backing out of a claim before the sale is over, message me so that I can delete your comment. Please try to avoid doing this. Thank you!

We now offer an “open box” option in which you can continue to keep your order open (aka have us not ship it yet) for future sales so everything can be shipped together once you’re ready. When you send your info please don’t forget to let me know if you’d like your order to be *open box* or *ready to ship*. Thank you!! 🙏

For all items that are marked random selection, you may make a request for a specific piece and we will do our best to honor your request, but it is not always possible. Please keep that in mind :)

Any questions? Feel free to ask! I hope you’ll join us and have lots of fun!

[mara-tevith-solo]

Sing a Little Song For Me

Part 1 of at least a few drabble-esque fics? They aren’t really in any particular order as their from a larger fic I’ve been writing that I’m afraid my brain won’t let me finish, so I’m sharing as much of it as feels completed. Photo also not mine, obviously.

Warnings: Talk of death, Canon levels of Violence, Canon levels of hunting, Quaritch is his own warning let’s be fair, beginnings of a relationship, enemies to lovers, they’re kinda idiots 

Pairing: Colonel Miles Quaritch x named Na’vi/Avatar reader/OC depending on how you want to see her. I never truly describe her. 

Rated 18+ so if you don’t meet that, kindly gtfo, I don’t write kid appropriate material. 

Words: 2.1k+ 

I'd forgotten how freeing flying on a Toruk was. The wind whipping through my hair as we sliced through the air. It felt like freedom, true freedom. I whooped loudly, clicking my tongue a few times afterwards as we passed over the ship, waiting as the Recoms and their Ikran joined us in the air. Zdinarsk was the first to join, followed closely by Quaritch and then Wainfleet, Mansk, Ja, and Prager. Spider cheered happily from his place in front of me, pumping his fist in the air like a victorious warrior coming home. Our next classroom island was in the middle of seven spire islands that made it inaccessible by the ship, and the water was too shallow between the spires for the boats, so by air was the only way to get in.

Our island getaway was bigger than the last, but was not a very desirable location for a village because it could only support a small fruit grove and not anything near enough for a group larger than ours. Even our group was going to push it if we stayed longer than a couple days. As soon as we landed I unpacked the tent poles from Thor and began to set up our shelter, a storm brewing on the horizon that didn't look entirely inviting. Quaritch and Wainfleet immediately stepped in to help, the two easily the tallest of the group, easily getting the canvas over the center pole as the rest of us worked on securing the edges to the bases of trees so that the canvas wouldn't have a chance to fly away if it got windy. Once the main part of the shelter was done, we all unpacked the interior bits like the sleeping mats and the cooking implements before letting the Toruk and the Ikran leave for the spires to weather out the storm. "Well this puts a dampener on the evening." Wainfleet yelled over a crack of thunder.

I picked up my spear from where I'd left it in the sand, breathing in the charged air with a soft smile "Don't have too much fun while I'm gone!"

"Are you out of your damn mind?" Prager yelled after me as thunder cracked across the sky again "You'll drown!"

"I'm from Hawaii! This is just another Tuesday!" I laughed back as I entered the water, instantly calling for an Ilu the moment my head was under. It clicked and danced around me in greeting, smiling in that uncanny but adorable way that they did before it offered a kuru. We hunted until the sun set and the storm passed, only an hour in reality, a string of fish slung over my shoulder as I brushed wet hair out of my face "Sorry that took so long, the fish went deep." I apologized with a bashful smile as I replanted the spear in the sand near the tent "They're already cleaned, and ready to cook."

"Hell ya." Wainfleet cheered while taking the string from me, taking it back to the cook fire in the middle of the tent.

"What was that you rode? Looked like a dinosaur." Zdinarsk asked, motioning vaguely towards the water from her seat in the doorway.

"That," I smiled as I began wringing out my hair in sections, twisting each one tightly before letting it go and moving on "is an Ilu. They are amazingly friendly creatures. A lot like dolphins, but much, much less homicidal." I stopped to think on her comment for a moment, smiling absently when I realized she was right "Huh, I guess they really do look like plesiosaurs. Good eye."

She smiled with pride as Prager clapped her on the back before going to help Wainfleet with the fish as a curse sounded from inside the shelter. "Where'd you get a fur pelt? I thought there wasn't a creature alive on this moon that bore fur." Ja asked suddenly, leaning against the center pole on the opposite side of the fire.

I twisted all of my hair together as I looked to him, ignoring my reflection in his glasses as I worked "It was a gift, just before the battle of the Tree of Souls. There's only one animal I know of that has fur, and they're very highly prized by the Plains Clans." I began making my way inside when my hair was sufficiently wrung out, though it was still a little wet. I didn't want to talk about those days, knowing that they were a sore subject for most involved.

"Got an admirer back home?" Wainfleet teased lightheartedly, like he was ignoring the elephant in the room and encouraging all of us to do that same. I didn't miss Quaritch scowling out the door as soon as the question left Wainfleet's mouth.

I laughed, taking the bait and happily running with it "Nah, no one waiting on little ole me." Quaritch's attention snapped back towards me, though he quickly looked away as soon as our eyes met "It was a courting gift from a Chief of a Plains Clan. He wanted the chance to get to know me after the battle." I shrugged with a smile, sitting on the pelt that made up my bedroll.

"So he was trying to buy your affections?" Zdinarsk asked, shifting in her seat to face the interior of the tent.

"No," I shook my head "A courting gift is meant to show interest and respect. At no point during courting are the two parties obligated to the other. Either one of them can break the courtship at any time, for any reason, with no ill will." I stretched in my seat, not paying any of the others any mind "After dinner we'll do a night exercise, just a little light exploration of our safe haven, nothing big."

"Isn't it dangerous to swim at night?" Prager asked, looking around everyone nervously.

I smiled softly, trying to reassure him, all of them. "On Earth, yes. Here, the planet does not sleep. Daylight hides the true beauty." The moon was higher in the sky after the fish were done cooking and everyone had eaten their fill, Spider going to sleep instead of exploring with us "Come." I encouraged, shifting to Na'vi with a warm smile, up to my knees in the water already. They all followed with much less hesitation, trusting me completely. As soon as we were all submerged, their eyes were wide at the wonder of the bioluminescent world around them, turning this way and that to take in as much as they possibly could.

I motioned for them to fan out and explore, they were all adults, they all knew how to mind their air. I made my way to the barrier reef, wanting to explore it more thoroughly. Right as I reached it, a hand closed around the tip of my tail, tugging at it gently, just letting me know that someone was there. I turned over, smiling widely at Quaritch as he continued following me, his own expression relaxed as we swam. At the barrier reef I motioned for him to follow me up to the surface for air, the man staying a respectful distance away as we both breathed in the crisp air before diving back down. I was inspecting the bottom of the reef, having seen a gap that we could have potentially fit through on Ilu, measuring it with my height until Quaritch was tapping me on the arm and pointing towards an opening in the reef. Curiosity no doubt got the better of us both in that moment, neither of us really thinking about it before going inside. It was large enough for Quaritch to swim comfortably, and stayed that way the entire way through until it suddenly moved upwards and opened into a small cavern. We were in sync as we breeched the surface of the water, breathing in the damp, murky air of the cavern. The walls and ceiling were covered by twinkling grubs and fungus, all emitting blue or green light into the darkness "Beautiful." He murmured softly, eyes soaking up every single detail that he could see.

I turned to him, my face pulling itself into a smile that I couldn't gauge as I watched him "It really is." I hummed softly, afraid to break the moment. He turned to me, a word dying on his tongue as soon as our eyes met, his pupils dilating further as he licked his lips. It was suddenly like he had his own gravity, some force pulling me closer to him until I could feel his heart beating against my flesh, feel the heat he radiated envelop me like a comforting blanket. Feel his skin against mine. I moved slowly as I placed my hands against his chest, afraid that we would both wake up, that he'd rebuff me with thunderous anger. He didn't, one of his hands closing around the small of my back delicately like he was afraid I'd bolt, the other continuing to tread water. Slowly, so painfully slowly, he began leaning in, his eyes half lidded as he watched me, watched as I leaned up towards him as well, just as slowly. The moment our lips touched it was like a bolt of lightning was lighting up my nervous system, everything felt so alive and tingled so good and I wanted so much more of him. I groaned against his mouth as my hands drifted up from his chest and to his shoulders, one of them cupping the back of his neck. His own grip increased, his hand splayed wide on the small of my back, pulling me into him as tightly as he could without causing pain. My heart was beating so fast I was almost sure it would explode as he deepened the kiss, giving up fully treading water to tangle his fingers in my hair to pull me in further. I reciprocated, wanting everything that he was willing to give me as I became slightly dizzy from the blood rushing around. I thought I was going to faint when his tongue brushed my lip oh so lightly, begging entrance that I wasn't going to deny him. He tasted like fish and salt and something entirely just him, and it did the last bit of competent thought I had in my head in.

He pulled away after a moment, just gazing down at me like I was something he'd never seen before, watching me blink away the kiss drunk haze that was trying to swallow me whole. "We should get back, before the others think we've drowned or something." He frowned in regret as he spoke, his tone hesitant and unwilling as he watched my expression shift.

I knew he was right, I knew it to my core. The others would think something bad had happened, and would do something stupid to try to find us. But that stupid part of my brain, that tiny bit of hopeless romantic moron, decided that his words were a rejection. That, despite kissing me like that, he didn't actually want me. That I was still his enemy. And always would be in some way. "Ya," I nodded, trying so hard to not look upset, fighting irrationality with rational thought, but my emotions were having little of it. I held my tail out to him before he could ask why I was blinking so much "So we don't get separated." I explained, beginning the swim back as soon as his hand closed around it.

We were the last to arrive at camp, and the others were sure to take the piss out of us "Find somewhere nice and cozy?" Wainfleet teased with a knowing wink, the Recoms obviously knowing something that I didn't have a whole idea of.

Quaritch just half-heartedly growled at him, waving him off to go dry off in the tent "We found a cavern off the barrier reef, its filled with glowing grubs and fungi. It's absolutely stunning!" I smiled warmly, beginning the whole process of wringing out my hair again. The thought of cutting it short entered and exited my mind quickly, knowing I'd never have the heart to have shoulder length hair ever again.

"Was there a nice sandbar in it?" Zdinarsk asked with a wiggle of her eyebrows, furthering the teasing of the others.

I raised a brow at her but decided not to entertain their antics, rolling my eyes when I realized what was going on "Nope. Not a scrap of dry land in there. I'd wager it floods, judging by the smell." I wasn't going to give them shit, and I was going to enjoy it.

"You're killin' me." Wainfleet pouted, catching on pretty quick.

"I live to please." I grinned as I twisted "We should catch some rack, we've got a long ass day when morning comes." I blinked at my words, wondering when the reversion had begun, but I didn't comment on it, and hoped they didn't either.

[brienneoftarth1989]

Yes Captain part 4

Captain Phasma x fem reader

Previous / Next / Series

Summary: After your spicy session in Phasma’s room she starts to ignore you. You were worried that you had done something to upset her but she said she was just bored. You were angry and hurt.

Warnings: None

Requests open

———————————

You awoke the next morning to a cold empty bed. You looked around hoping to see Phasma somewhere in her room but she was nowhere to be found. You looked at the time and it was only 8:30 in the morning.

She might have gone to work already and didn’t want to wake you up, you thought to yourself. That definitely had to be the case. You definitely didn’t want to intrude on Phasma's personal space so you just got dressed and headed back to your own room to get ready for the day ahead. You couldn’t wait until you gotta see her again.

It has been two weeks since you spoke to Phasma! Two whole weeks! You didn’t understand how you could go from spending two amazing days together to then not even speaking to one another. You thought you had done something to upset the captain and you were trying your hardest to find her around the ship but it was proving more difficult than you thought.

There was only so much you could do and until you found Phasma there was nothing you could do. So you did the only thing you could do and that was work and train. When you weren’t training you were busy doing your job which was one of the most enjoyable things you did. You were a mechanic and anytime the main ship or the aircrafts had a problem you were there to fix it.

The day started just like every other day so far this week. You got out of bed at the crack of dawn, got yourself dressed into some gym clothes and headed down to the gym. You had hoped to have bumped into Phasma down at the gym but you had no such luck.

You had a workout plan everyday of the week. Monday was chest and arms. Tuesday was shoulders and back. Wednesday was a cardio circuit. Thursday was strength day and Friday was legs. Saturday and Sunday were rest days but if you ended up in the gym then you just did whatever you felt like doing.

It was Wednesday today so you were going to do your cardio circuit. You started with 10 burpees followed by 10 push-ups. That was followed by 15 crunches and 20 squat thrusts. That was then followed by three sets of hanging leg raises and three one minute rounds of planks before finally ending with a 20 minute low intensity cardio on the treadmill.

Some days that was enough but when you had some extra energy you would repeat the first four activities a second time. Today was one of those days. The frustration that had built up was enough for you to repeat your circuit three whole times. However you knew that if you did that you would overwork yourself and be exhausted.

So you finished your workout in the gym before heading to the shower block to get yourself cleaned up and ready for the day. You got undressed and hopped into the shower closest to you. As you stepped in you realised it was the same shower cubicle that Phasma had fucked you in. You sighed to yourself as you felt the pain build inside of you.

As you were showering you heard the door to the shower block open. You felt the butterflies return to your body hoping that it was Phasma. Maybe she had seen you come in here and she wanted to have round two in the shower. You had a look over to where you could hear the person moving around. You were disappointed to see that it wasn’t Phasma and just one of your friends.

You sighed to yourself. Why is she doing this to you? You finished up your shower before getting ready and heading back to your room. Once back in your room you got changed into your work clothes before having a quick breakfast and heading off to work.

Once you arrived at your office you grabbed your work orders for the day and headed off to work on the aircrafts in order of urgency. You normally enjoyed working but today you just couldn’t seem to find the motivation. Everything seemed to be taking 10 times longer than it normally did. You knew exactly whose fault this was and you couldn’t even find her to confront her.

You did wonder if she was out on a mission but when you confronted one of your colleagues about her whereabouts they had told you that they had seen her everyday this week. That meant she was actively ignoring you and trying to avoid you.

While you were working on your final aircraft of the day you heard that familiar voice once again. You quickly snapped your head in the direction you had heard her voice. It was definitely her in her chrome armour. You didn’t care what you were supposed to be doing, you stood up immediately and chased after her as she was walking away.

“Captain!” You shouted hoping that she would hear you. No response but the pace she was walking seemed to pick up. She was trying to avoid you. “Please Captain, I need to have a quick word with you. It’s important” you said, trying your best to catch up. You watched as she rounded a corner.

You had to start running. Her tall legs and her fast pace made it impossible to walk quickly after her so running was the only option. As you ran round the corner she was gone. She must have sprinted away because there was no way she could have gone anywhere as it was a bare corridor.

All you could do was just stare down the empty corridor. How could she do this to you? Did you mean nothing to her? Were you just a quick fuck? You rested your back against the wall and slowly let your body slide down to the floor. You curled up into a ball and just started sobbing.

It was at that moment you decided you weren’t going to give a fuck anymore. You weren’t going to give her the satisfaction to her, chasing her down like you were desperate for her. There was no way you were going to sink that low. After your little cry you picked yourself up and went back to work continuing on with your day like everything was fine.

Another whole week went by of not seeing Phasma and you no longer cared. Well you did care but you weren’t going to show her how much it really was affecting you. Most evenings you would go back to your room and cry yourself to sleep. How could you be this stupid to have let her use you the way she did. Why did you even think she would’ve wanted something more to have come out of this?

You had decided that from now on you would just avoid Phasma as much as you could and so far it was going great. Any time you saw Phasma you did your utter best to end up walking in the opposite direction. However part of you did want to just confront Phasma and ask her what you did wrong to now deserve this kind of treatment.

It wasn’t until one afternoon you heard your name and a few others over the intercom asking you to meet with your Captain to go over your progress report from the mandatory training. Unfortunately you knew there was only so long you could go avoiding Phasma.

Everyone else who had been called were from a different unit which meant Phasma was free now and that she would be expecting you in her office. You sighed to yourself reluctantly pulling yourself from what you were doing and taking yourself to her office.

You made sure to take a long and slow walk to her office as you were in no rush to go and see her. If things hadn't taken such a drastic turn then you could’ve seen yourself practically running to her side but it was a shame it took so much of a drastic turn.

When you finally arrived outside her office doors you didn’t even want to knock. You could’ve just stood there forever and hoped that the ground would have swallowed you up. However, that never happened. You stood there for about 5 minutes waiting for something to happen but it never did.

You eventually decided that you should just get this over and done with so you took a deep breath and knocked loudly on her doors. “Come in” you heard her say from the other side of the door. You once again took a deep breath and entered her office.

There she was sitting down at her desk and she didn’t even have the decency to look up and make eye contact with you. You sat down in one of the chairs opposite her desk and waited for her to say something to you. You watched as she flipped through her paperwork before finally stopping assuming it’s yours.

She has a quick look over the paperwork before finally looking up and making eye contact with you. “Well this all looks to be in order and you did great with your training so you are free to go” she said sternly.

That was it? Could they have not just sent an email or something rather than for me to have to come down here and deal with this. “Phas…”

“It’s Captain” Phasma interrupted you. “Sorry. Captain, are you sure it’s just that? Is there not anything I need to work on? I’m not that good that there are no improvements for me to make” you stated. “Look I’m just following what’s on the paperwork. It says your scores are perfect. What more could you want? Your dismissed y/n. I’m sure you have more aircrafts to fix” she said quite harshly.

You stood up quickly and made your way to her door. Just as you were about to grab the handle of the door you felt this force stop you. You turned around and looked at Phasma who was now looking back down at her paperwork. “Just answer me one question,” you said to Phasma.

“Yeah and what is that?” She asked as she looked up at you once again. “Did I do something to upset or offend you? You have spoken to me since that night in your bedroom. I really want to fix whatever happened” you said as you walked closer to Phasma.

“Well there is nothing to fix” she said to you blankly. “What do you mean?” You asked her. “I was bored and wanted to fuck someone. I thought you were down” she said to you not really giving one single fuck. You wanted the ground to just swallow you up and take you somewhere far away.

How could you have been so stupid? “A quick fuck. That was all I was to you. If I knew that was all you wanted then I wouldn’t have fucked you at all Captain Phasma!” You practically yelled at her. You didn’t care what she had to say anymore. She had told you all you needed to know. You meant absolutely nothing to her.

You grabbed the door handle and stormed out to your bedroom. You never wanted to see that woman again. You knew it was way to good to be true. That night you spent the whole night crying to yourself. You had never felt so many emotions at once.

You were angry and hurt and the only thing you wanted to do was cry and sleep and that was basically what you did for the next couple of weeks never once leaving your quarters for anything.

[deadringers2023]

tag 9 people you want to get to know better!

tagged by treena @rosamndpike, ty <33

list 3 ships you like: i had to think on this for a minute because i tune out shipping sometimes for plot but uhhhh bobby x athena, geto x gojo, kate x may (monarch lom)

first ship ever: ................bamon. i was garbage for damon and bonnie season 6 and beyond. honestly, if damon didn't start out that way, i really think he and bonnie could've been really good for each other

last song you heard: ready or not by the fugees

favorite childhood book: idk if it's a childhood book but i really did love fahrenheit 451 back as a freshman in high school

currently reading: like three books rn LOL but take my hand by dolen perkins-valdez, tender is the flesh by agustina bazterrica, and giovanni's room by james baldwin

currently watching: always catching up on 911 (i'm a new watcher), tuesday night is fbi night, thursday is law and order night, black sails, house of the dragon (rewatch/actually finishing it lol), made in abyss, spy x family (rewatch), slow horses (starting s3),

currently consuming: a lot of iced tea whether sweet, peach, pomegranate, just A LOT of tea (i'm trying to phase a lot of soda out of my life)

currently craving: a riceless sushi roll, a coke (see above rip), and a best friend

tagging @kimdokjas @torturedpoets @katherines @pascow @kizzyedgelll @bladesrunner @connie-rubirosa

[twinsunstars]

Thoughts on Ahsoka Episode 3 - Time to Fly - A Discussion Post

This week's episode was a bit short, but there was a lot of content to take in. So let's dive in.

To start off, we got to see the PURGILLS! I screamed when they showed up. I remember we had heard a purgill flying overhead in one of the previous episodes. The majestic creatures flew overhead as Ahsoka and Sabine ran from Shin and her crew.

Sabine reflected upon seeing the creatures, saying that she hasn't seen them since the day Ezra disappeared. Seeing the purgills again was like a rush down memory lane for her.

We finally got to see the young Jacen Syndulla! Gosh, he looks just like his dad. And they really did redesign him, his hair is a darker green. I wonder what his ears look like, as in Rebels, his ears had this green addition on the top of his ears. He is half Twilek after all. He is just so adorable!

Jacen had run over to his mom, asking if his Aunt Sabine is going to be a Jedi. I love how he calls Sabine "Aunt", I want to hear him call Zeb and Kallus his uncles. His and Chopper's friendship is just the best, I want to know what mayhem they cause together wherever they go. (Chopper definitely teaches him.)

Ahsoka and Huyang helps train Sabine in the Jedi arts. I loved how Huyang was so straightforward about Sabine's abilities, it's so funny. Ahsoka tries to train her while having Sabine "blindfolded" with a helmet she can't see out of, and Sabine definitely tries her best and her hardest. Let's just say it didn't go too well.

Hera speaks to a crew of senators and the Chancellor of the New Republic, Mon Mothma. I was delighted to hear that Mon Mothma became the New Republic's chancellor after all she's done in the Rebellion. Unfortunately, that now means she has to listen to all these senators for approval to do anything. Hera tries to convince the crew that Thrawn is alive, but they seem convinced that both Thrawn and Ezra died on Lothal and do not want to waste their resources searching for them. Mon Mothma seemed to agree with Hera, but she can't do anything if the senators don't agree. Hera is a mother, and if she feels Ezra is alive, then he's definitely out there somewhere. And if he survived, so did Thrawn.

Shin Hati, along with Marrok and a few unnamed people with helmets chase Ahsoka and Sabine's ship, trying to get rid of them. They certainly put up a magnificent aerial fight. As Sabine ran the cannons, she proved to be a good shot and fought back valiantly.

Ahsoka had seen the Eye of Sion for the first time and she had this look of concern. Huyang had scanned and explained the Eye of Sion to Ahsoka and Sabine, and this project definitely will have some kind of big impact once it is done with construction.

Towards the end of the episode, Baylan stands with an army, ready to hunt down Ahsoka and Sabine in the forest. One of the guys wearing the same helmet as the others stands near Baylan, ready to follow his orders.

I remember this guy had gotten quite the screentime in the trailer, and everyone theorizes that this is Ezra, and I kind of do too. We know Sabine will catch one of these people using her Mandalorian vambrace, and the item is know for combatting Jedi. We'll see what happens. (I had made a post saying that I headcannon Ezra will come home next week because of this, but I might be clowning myself again 💀.)

I'm excited for next Tuesday's episode, it'll definitely be a blast. And I hope it's a little longer. That's all for now folks.

[profoundlyscreechingchild]

I'm not happy Bob, Not. Happy.

TLDR; TFsource needs to get there shit sorted, or I am going to the better business bureau.

Pardon me while I set up, I generally don't like conflict but I was engaging in good faith for about a month until I realized that it was not being returned on the other end and I want to make clear exactly what happened.

My most recent irresponsible hobby is transformers model kits. I've been doing them for about two years now and its great fun putting them together. Sadly one of my favorites, IDW Drift, came out in 2019, before I got into the hobby, and is sold out everywhere. Occasionally I'll poke around for him but I've been unsuccessful. (I was able to get a interesting metal kit that you fold into shape but it was miserable to put together and the motherfucker fell off of its self once and stabbed me in the back with its sword.) Until this January. I happened to see one in-stock on TFsource, perfect, mint-in-box, ready for assembly. I excitedly clicked the buy button and waited with bated breath. Its important at this moment I point out the collection of links at the bottom of the order received email I got. It's a surprise tool that will help us later.

I also think its notable that this is my first order I have ever made with TFsource. Spoilers: there will not be more after this. I waited a few days. There is no 'your order has shipped' email in my inbox. I check the order. Everything seems fine, but weirdly its listed as a preorder? Did I buy the wrong model kit? I assumed this was a resale. I double check.

Its the right model kit. It came out in 2019. This should not be a preorder. (Important to note at this point that there is no longer a clickable order or preorder button, despite this item now being falsely labeled as a preorder. Not to mention the estimated arrival is a price and not a date.) I check the forums for the average amount of time it takes them to ship. Its about a week. I shake off my misgivings and wait a week. I wait another. Still no shipping notification. I hate sending in tickets or calling or generally being a nuisance in any way but its been two weeks on an item they had in-stock and the order has it listed incorrectly. Its time to talk to someone.

I send an email. I made my order on January 30th. My first email goes out February 16th.

I get a ticket received notification. It says I should get a response in a day or Monday to Tuesday if I sent it Friday.

I don't get a response until the next Wednesday, but whatever. That's still totally in the bounds of reasonable. But the response itself is very weird. Starting with the fact that I get two responses at the same time from the same person outside of their business hours.

This reeks of automated response, which, honestly fine, I expect the first round of a ticket to probably be a bot simply to weed out the people who didn't just check the QA page. BUT if its an automated system why did it take so long to answer me? And if its not a bot why did I receive two emails, each feeling like an automatic response to a keyword found in my email? Okay whatever, they still aren't answering my question and are under the impression that this is a preorder, which again. Its not. I respond.

At this point I'm a little disappointed, I reaaaally wanted that kit, but I mostly just want answers. If someone else got it that's fine. I'll just cancel my order. But I want to be sure that I'm not missing out on my chance to snag this kit.

This time it does take a full, proper week for the response.

"Most Probably"?! Its your job to find out and I figure the second round of a ticket should be a human, but this still feels vaguely bottish. Why are you just regurgitating the order details at me? I would have at the least expected them to ask me directly if I wanted to cancel. Okay so its time to be a big girl and call them, just to be absolutely sure I'm not missing out on the model before I cancel, but I want to have all my ducks in a row and make sure everything is in front of me for the call. This is where shit hits the fan for me because of several facts I had hither to been unaware of.

I checked my credit card. They had already charged me for the kit. The kit, that according to them they did not have in stock and according to their system, was a preorder. This is where I learn that unlike the other sites I have used, they charge you for a preorder before they ever even get it in stock. What the Fuck.

okay well, I want to make sure before I call I know how to cancel the order myself.

Okay, that's weird, no way to cancel. Maybe the view details?

Huh, that's fucking weird. You have literally no way to guarantee I get my product and you already took my $80, and there's no way to cancel the order. (I feel its important to note the other site I use does let you cancel preorders and does not charge you until they come in, you know, like a respectable fucking site.)

I am fucking livid at this point. How am I not able to cancel my order. You labeled this a preorder and your email tells me I can cancel those anytime.

Funny that. In fact, if you go to their front page, they have all those same little link badges...except for one very important one. Can you guess which one?

Something sure seems to be missing there sport. If you click the link in the email it takes to you a page that also says you can cancel preorders at anytime. However. I checked the QA page.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU CAN'T CANCEL A PREORDER. YOU SAID YOU COULD IN TWO SEPARATE PLACES.

I call. I call with the flames of Hell in my heart. I was so excited to get this model kit. If I had simply missed my chance I would have accepted it. But their system has blocked me from getting real answers. Lied to me about my options and stopped me from solving the problem myself. I am answered by a robo voice cuts out every other word and I select the option that takes me to customer service. I am briefly put on hold and then told nobody is home would I like to leave a message. I wait a while and call back again in an hour. Its the same thing. I leave a message with my number. I just wanted to spend my money on a silly little robot. If they don't call back by Friday. I'm contacting my credit card company for a charge back and the better business bureau for their misleading preorder policy (WHICH SHOULD NOT EVEN APPLY SINCE THIS WAS NOT A PREORDER). Eat my Shorts TFsource.

[labellerose-acheron]

track list – SwynWriMo 2023

Wednesday, November 1 -- Villanelle Poem: [In Crumbling Castle with Ivy Wall]

Thursday, November 2 -- Community Flyer: [Town Hall Community Centre Art Classes]

Friday, November 3 -- Everyone’s a Critic: [Evangeline's Letterboxd Account]

Saturday, November 4 -- Crack!ship AU: [Black is the Colour of My True Love's Hair]

Sunday, November 5 -- Family Ties One-Shot: [Twelve Havenhall]

Monday, November 6 — Daylist: [rage religious monday morning]

Tuesday, November 7 -- Community Togetherness Thread: [I'll Huff and I'll Puff]

Wednesday, November 8 -- 160 Characters or Less: [JustAHotGuy2094]

Thursday, November 9 -- SwynRPVision: [Sparks Fly]

Friday, November 10 --  Love Is Stored In The Garlic: [The Crows Eat First]

Saturday, November 11 -- Short and Sweet One-Shot: [Elinor Aisling DunBroch: Medical Records]

Sunday, November 12 -- Background NPC: [Foundations Forming]

Monday, November 13 -- #OOTD: [Belle's Fashion Intervention]

Tuesday, November 14 -- Neighborly Plotting: [Trading Favours]

Wednesday, November 15 -- NPC Playlist! [i told the stars about you -- lionfish]

Thursday, November 16 -- Character #Inspo: [Kleopatra Schreiber's Character Blueprints]

Friday, November 17 -- Choose Your Own Swyn AU: [Christmas in Swynlake]

Saturday, November 18 -- Which Character Are You?: [get ready for a FIRST date and i'll tell you which of my characters you're going out with]

Sunday, November 19 -- Five Times X, One Time Y: Five times your character did a thing and one time … they didn’t. [In Your Dream]

Monday, November 20 -- Personality Playlist: [are you human?]

Tuesday, November 21 -- Back to the Future Thread: [I Can Hear the Bells]

Wednesday, November 22 — Enter the Metaverse: [Isabela's Computer]

Thursday, November 23 — Instagram Stories: [Simba's Instastory Goodbye]

Friday, November 24 -- Relationship Aesthetic: [Male + Female Friendships]

Saturday, November 25 --  SWYNRP Memes: [textposts from my personal blog’s #about me tag – for swynlake residents]

Sunday, November 26 -- The Final Labor: [The 23rd Annual Swynlake Games!] 

Monday, November 27 --  Fairy Talent! [pinterest boards for characters]

Tuesday, November 28 -- Around the World in 30 Days: [Encanto, Isle de Silvia, Avalor]

Wednesday, November 29 -- Wordy Web-Weaving: [Tom and Missing the Sea]

Thursday, November 30 -- SWYNRP Character Wishlist: [The Muses of the Order of Hesiod]

[theculturedmarxist]

The U.S. is deploying a rapid response special forces team to the Middle East as tensions continue to flare up in the region amid a major war between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

The Pentagon announced Tuesday that the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), a special forces unit capable of carrying out a wide range of missions, is moving to the region.

Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said the Marines are there without any specific orders.

“They are there so the secretary and the president can make a decision if they are needed,” she said at a briefing.

The MEU specializes in amphibious operations, crisis response and limited contingency operations.

The Marines are also trained in evacuation responses and could technically assist with getting any Americans out of Israel after they are rescued from a hostage situation. Hamas took up to 200 hostages, including some American citizens, after militants attacked Israel earlier this month.

The response force adds to a bolstered U.S. presence in the eastern Mediterranean, where two carrier strike groups have already been deployed.

The USS Eisenhower is now headed to the region to meet up with the USS Ford, which arrived last week.

Both aircraft carriers are leading a fleet of naval ships that Washington hopes will help deter the conflict from growing outside of an Israel-Hamas clash.

In another move this week, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told some 2,000 U.S. troops to be ready to deploy.

Singh on Tuesday said the specifications of the ready-to-deploy orders, including which units specifically will be on standby, have not been decided yet.

[youcanfacethis]

My computer broke on Friday.

I ordered a new one on Sunday to be delivered.

It was delivered and subsequently stolen on Monday night.

I called to get a replacement that same night, waiting for a confirmation.

Never got any confirmation on that Tuesday.

Then they said today: ‘Actually hey, you can pick it up at Walgreens here instead but we’ll let you know when it’s ready.’

I was never notified and found out they didn’t even ship it to the Walgreens.

I finally have a working computer but also had to file a police report.

[nscafe-firehose]

Story time.

There I was watching that Gal Gadot episode of Hot Ones and there was a quick comment about her being a co-founder of a mac and cheese company.

This led me to finding Goodles.

And knowing my beloved partner has been looking for a good mac and cheese for like a solid 15 years ever since Kraft changed the way they did theirs, I made a point to show her.

Her first reaction was "It's the right colour!" when watching a preparation video.

So, we took a chance since they ship to Canada... and on Tuesday our order arrived (the Variety Pack, 12boxes, 4 flavours).

Last night (Wednesday) we did the Cheddy Mac (with a pan fried smokey that was cut up into coins [that was then added to the mac and cheese when ready to be served], added a fresh kaiser bun with butter and some rippled sour cream and onion chips to round out the meal).

It was worth it the experiment!

A good flavour and some nice noodles. 

It was worth taking the time order online and wait for the shipping (left on the 11th, got here on the 22nd... not too bad really) and the price is still within reason for a premium mac and cheese brand that you can otherwise get.

But yeah, looking forward to trying the other flavours and I can see us picking up more pretty easily. No special instructions (and follow the suggestion of adding butter... it really makes it better I think).

[silver-tooth-the-panther]

This is a request from my friend @bandicootofindiana This is a ship fic of Monika x him. Again I don’t usually put real people in these fics unless it’s for personal friends, but I do write reader inserts! Anyways enjoy the fic!

A Cafe Visit

(A DDLC Fanfic)

“Thank you for coming, Variety.” Monika greeted the young man as she stood in front of the cafe doors. “Of course! The sooner we figure out how to get out of this game, the better.” Variety gave her a soft smile.

Monika nodded as she opened the cafe doors. “Follow me.” She said calmly. It had been a few weeks since Silver and Variety landed in the world of Doki Doki Literature Club and the search for an exit was still ongoing. Luckily, they were able to make the most of their time and they found an unexpected ally in Monika.

Variety followed her through the cafe. Today seemed like a slow day for the establishment as there weren’t many customers. Granted, today was a Tuesday. “How come you didn’t call Silver here?” Variety asked as he continued to follow Monika.

“Oh, Silver’s on a date with Natsuki.” Monika gave him a reassuring smile. “I’m glad that Natsuki could find someone to rely on.” Her tone became more grim as she said that. “Me too…” Variety replied.

“Here’s our table.” Monika shook her head to get rid of her thoughts. She then pointed to the table right behind her. Variety, trying his best to be a gentleman, pulled out a chair for Monika to sit in. “After you.”

Monika chuckled. “Thank you.” She sat down in the chair and Variety took his place at the other end of the table. “Did you find anything new?” Variety asked curiously. Monika nodded. “Yes, but it isn’t too helpful.”

“Oh, how come?” Variety said with a hint of disappointment in his voice. “Well, all I figured out was the boundaries of the game. The world doesn’t go on forever and it does have a limit.” Monika sighed.

“Where is the boundary?” Curiously creeping back into Variety’s voice. “It’s a little past Sayori’s house. When you arrive there, it’s like an invisible wall that stops you.” Monika seemed to be a little frustrated. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t find anything more useful..”

“Hey don’t beat yourself up about it. Any information will be helpful to us. I’m sure of it!” Variety’s encouragement seemed to lift her spirits. Monika’s face lit up as she spoke. “Thank you..would you like us to just talk casually for a little while? We just got here.”

“Yeah, I’m fine with that.” Then, they continued to talk for a few hours. Monika asked Variety how the real world was doing and Variety was curious on what she truly thought of the game world. They ordered coffee and a few muffins and they continued to talk. Finally after three hours, they finally thought that it was a good idea to leave.

“Alright! Ready to go?” Monika smiled at Variety as she stood up. “Yup. It is getting late.” Monika nodded as she led the way out of the cafe. It was late into the evening and a twilight shy was shining above them.

“This was actually a lot of fun. You’re a very interesting person to talk to.” Monika said sweetly. “Uh, thank you.” Variety’s face began to blush heavily. They stood on the sidewalk, staring off into the sky.

“I hope that we can have more days like this. Maybe even in the real world.” Monika’s voice was soft and warm. “Don’t worry. We will! I promise.” Variety said with warm enthusiasm. Monika chuckled softly. “Okay, but you bet keep your promise.” She then gently kissed Variety on the forehead and started to walk away.

Variety’s face was as red as a tomato. “Y-y-yeah! I’ll keep my promise!” He watched as Mokia walked into the distance. He let himself be entranced by her. Maybe it wasn’t so bad here after all.

[bekkathyst]

Crystal Clearance & Lot Sale - Starting Sept 28th 2024 Rules & Procedures

Hello friends! Everyone planning to participate in the sale today, please read. This is how everything will work. We desperately need to downsize and make space, so we’re posting our available inventory at a discount- in lots and individual items. I will likely break up the posting between the next few days and invoices will get sent out after the last day of posts.

I will start posting items for sale directly here on Tumblr. To claim an item and place your order, do the following:

Reply to the post (those who are unable to reply for whatever reason can reblog) saying “sold” or “mine" with the quantity you’d like to claim. It’s important you do this so we can see who claimed something first in case something sells out.

Keep a list of everything you claim (with the item number for each item). Once you’re done claiming, please message me over the instant messenger.

Include the following information in your message:

Your email address for the invoice, the country you live in (for shipping purposes - we are shipping from Austria), and the list of what you claimed (with the item numbers). Also please let me know if you want your order to be *open box* or *ready to ship*. “Open box” simply means you want us to hang onto your items after you pay so that you can continue to add things from future sales so everything can be shipped together for convenience 😊

Shipping to Europe is $12

Shipping elsewhere is $15

For extra-large packages, shipping is $20

Be sure to send your info at the end of the sale or whenever you’re sure you’re done claiming.

Invoicing will be done through my online shop “Bekkathyst” - the invoice gets sent to your email and you get the option to pay with a PayPal account or with a credit or debit card. You don’t need to have a PayPal account to pay.

Payment will be due by the end of Tuesday Oct 1st. Please pay as soon as possible.

Unfortunately due to problems we have encountered before - if you claim items and then at the end of the sale and either don’t respond to your invoice or never message, you will be blocked.

If you decide you’re backing out of a claim before the sale is over, message me so that I can delete your comment. Please try to avoid doing this. Thank you!

We now offer an “open box” option in which you can continue to keep your order open (aka have us not ship it yet) for future sales so everything can be shipped together once you’re ready. When you send your info please don’t forget to let me know if you’d like your order to be *open box* or *ready to ship*. Thank you!! 🙏

For all items that are marked random selection, you may make a request for a specific piece and we will do our best to honor your request, but it is not always possible. Please keep that in mind :)

Any questions? Feel free to ask! I hope you’ll join us and have lots of fun!