#and god i guess i wanna be a rat sorta guy

[mx-piggy]

my name is earl gender envy-

[toastiecakes]

An Introduction to Ivilia NPCs

(aka this is the master post for my silly little ocs)

I'm going to put most of this under a read more just because there will be pictures and I wouldn't wanna clog up y'all's feeds with the sheer amount of stuff.

I'll make a small list of characters I really want to get into, at least so that I can remember to talk more about them myself aha.

In this post you'll find information about:

-Magnus and Magan Deyvet

-Lockeland, Kitril, and Cedith Puckett

-Lucien Ancrum and Milo Ancrum-Buckley

-Helios the Bard

-Christopher and Loulouche Sunsinger

-Raiden the Wanderer

-Ghost

-Knox Odikonn the Mad Wizard

-The Glazastov Family

Continue reading at your own risk I suppose?

Okay so. Starting off strong with the twins.

Magnus Deyvet

Pronouns: he/him

An asshole to put it plainly. This little rat bastard will ruin your day he's such a a little shit oh my god. He used to be worse but I can apparently Not Make Sympathetic Villains so I'm just sitting here with a kind mean little bastard boy who's also immortal and can't stay dead so yeah that's fun! He's old and tired and wants to be left alone kinda sorta but he also wants to be in everyone's business. How dare you NOT let him be in your business you MUST tell him all the things. An aggressively gay little man. Absolutely can and will bite. Also he's a changeling so he can shapeshift too and that's cool I guess. Did I say who awful he is

Magan Deyvet

Pronouns: he/she/they

My silly little BLORBO. He is my little bean my precious dogboy the BEST EVER. NOTHING like their brother nope not at ALL. In reality she's actually probably just as bad, but his moral code is far more defined than Maggie's is I suppose. He's a fairly friendly person, she spends a lot of her time working on their prosthetics and stuff like that. Big robot nerd basically aha

Lockeland Puckett

Pronouns: they/them

Scribgly scrimblo!!!! My screembl. My little BASTARD!! I love them y'all I can't understated how much they rotate around in my brain with their funny little accent! Just a silly guy they're so traumatized it's so much fun dude. They're missing an eye btw!! And an ear and half their tongue ahahaha. But they have a cat and three dogs and a silly accent so it's okay :)

Kitril and Cedith Puckett

Pronouns: he/him and they/them respectively

Locke’s father and auncle respectively, they hate each other for some reason I haven't quite determined why lol. But they're both silly old fey and I like them a lot. If I had to describe each in short terms I'd say Kit is a crazy cat man and Cedith is a bog witch. Great little guys. You should definitely trust them with your name

Lucien Ancrum

Pronouns: he/they

The guy ever!! He's so soft and big and sweet and will give everyone hugs. This man loves everyone he's literally just here for the hugs. He will become ur dad he will let you lay on a fluffy highland cow. He is just the best, I have no complaints he is so pure and good. What a man

Milo Ancrum-Buckley

Pronouns: she/her

Lucien's sister! She got the "short" end of the straw in genetics because she looks way more human than her brother but that's ok. She's strong and also big and will beat up anyone that misgenders u. She also owns and runs a tavern!!! Pretty sure she's a lesbian too but I haven't given her a proper love interest so if you have suggestions please tell them at me

Helios the Bard

Pronouns: he/him

Clown ahh MF. This man is goofy as hell but he's also the organizer behind 99% of the riots and strikes in one of the primary cities so there's that I guess. He has a wife he loves VERY much dude he's so so SO dedicated to her. Literally just hanging off her every word. But he's a lot smarter than he presents, he's just gotta keep it silly or he'll be consumed by the narrative

Christopher Sunsinger

Pronouns: he/him

Literally gay as hell. Gayest man I know. He's short and gay and gay. He's also strong as hell and could throw a person. He's completely blind but he keeps making sight-based jokes and thinks he's funny for it. Also a good therapist! Probably.

Loulouche Sunsinger

Pronouns: he/him

Angry and small. Christopher's little brother. Asshole. Highly traumatized and very very temperamental he may as well be your mortal enemy if you so much as look at him the wrong way. Kinda a space cowboy tho so that's cool! He likes to fight god

Raiden the Wanderer

Pronouns: he/him

Silly bird man who makes soup and studies ancient ruins of long lost civilisations in the desert! He doesn't have a quarrel with anyone and nobody has a quarrel with him. He knows the tunnels under the desert well and knows how to avoid sandworms. He's also a guide for lost travelers trying to make their way through a hopelessly large desert.

Ghost

Pronouns: they/them

Silly Creecher, Ghost is my little blorbo bingus. They are a cryptid and a spooky little guy and they will look at som1 and think "that is friend". Just my tall Eldritch beastie that likes to hang out with people and sit in their forest

Knox Odikonn the Mad Wizard

Pronouns: it/they/he

Really fucked up little guy. Kinda more fucked up than Maggie if I'm being honest. A real piece of work, it created a nightmarish hell-dimension called Wiz-Mart for fun and watched people actually try to utilize it as a proper grocery store. They find it HIGHLY entertaining to watch

The Glazastov Family

Pronouns: see below

I'd make individual blurbs for this family but none of them are that important aside from Vitaly, but he's also a very minor character in this (I still love him a lot though). The Glazastov Family is a (you guessed it) family of morticians and funeral directors. They are a family of five, consisting of the parents (Konstantin and Olga) and their three children (Vitaly, Sasha, and Polina). Konstantin (he/him) and Olga (she/her) are happily married and getting up there in years, but they tend not to go out much. Not very social at all. Vitaly (he/him) is the most social out of all of them and that's saying a lot. He's not very keen on speaking to others outside of work, but he has a soft spot for kids and does a lot of the talking for his family. Sasha (he/him) is an asshole. He was quickly driven out of the family home for trying to kill his brother. Polina (she/her), or Polly for short, is the youngest and very very sweet. She often plays with the children outside the morgue, and her responsibilities in the family have yet to be passed down, since she's quite young still.

___

Okay- I did it, I wrote the things down. I'm sure there will be plenty more characters and NPCs to come, I definitely haven't covered all of them, but this is the basic stuff for the moment. God it's exhausting making this long of a post how do y'all do it this took me like three days

Anyways enjoy, if you have questions my asks are open or you can just. Rb or comment or whatever idm either way. I hope you all derive much joy from my little blorbos

[mcustorm]

45 M/M Gay Movies, Ranked

The other day I bit the bullet and decided to watch Brokeback Mountain for the first time. All I knew about that movie was that it was basically the CMBYN of yesteryear and somebody got killed with a tire iron. Anyways, so I finish the movie and realize that I’ve seen a *lot* of gay movies, especially in the last couple of years. So here are my rankings according to nothing but my personal preference. I won’t write about all of them, but you can ask about something if I leave it out.

I wish I could give you a rubric for this. The reality is, there are some radically different movies on this list with different tones and intentions. There’s buddy comedies, tearjerkers, small indie features, big theater releases. So trying to rank them all is TUFF.

The Way He Looks - Such a beautiful coming-of-age movie. Maybe the 2nd one I saw on this list? Perfect length, perfect characterization, simple yet compelling, clever. And nothing feels better than reaching a happy ending (for once, because some of these movies’ endings-- SHEESH) that’s been earned. It just hasn’t been topped.

2. God’s Own Country

3. Pride

4. Kanarie - Yea, we don’t talk about this movie enough. It’s one of the most recent that I’ve seen. Beautiful. The way that it references apartheid and the war to reflect the protagonist’s feelings? Flawless.

5. Jongens - The first movie that I saw on this list, gets many a bonus point for that.

6. Moonlight - Yes, I am black. Yes, I understand this movie may be too low. Moonlight kind of scares me. In general, there’s not nearly enough discourse surrounding this one for me. But while it’s not exactly a popcorn-muncher, to me it’s the most personal movie on the list. When I look at Chiron and all that he’s been through, I can’t help but draw parallels to my own story up to this point. It holds a mirror up to me in a way that no other movie on this list does. That makes me uncomfortable.

But it is so poetic. Have you guys seen the script for this? The directing, the SOUNDTRACK, the acting. Phenomenal. 

7. Weekend

8. Call Me By Your Name - Yes, I am aware of people’s beef with this one. Yes, I understand a lot of people may feel this one is overrated. While I do think this one gets worse on rewatch, the truth is, it’s not really *that* overrated because hot take: most (meaning over half) of the movies on this list range somewhere from “just okay” to “painstakingly bad”.

It’s the score, the cinematography, the subtext in most all of the dialogue, the acting, the way that you can smell the apricots through the fucking screen. People who say this movie is a vacation ad are fucking CORRECT. One of my biggest gripes however is that it’s too fucking long. And uh, that age difference...

And Armie Hammer’s a weirdo...

9. Dating Amber* - Dating Amber has one of those “Duh” premises that sounds like it could’ve been done like 30 times before yet I can’t think of any other examples of it. So what you’d think would be a wacky premise actually turns out to be a frankly poignant movie with an emotional story arc for the main two characters.

10. Hello Stranger: The Movie* - This movie, which is the first sequel (sorta) on the list, frankly had no business being as good as it was. Even though the web series is required viewing, I felt the movie fixed like all of the series’ issues: pacing, lack of compelling drama, the awkward quarantine format. The drama and stakes are there without us having to visit Angst City. And the theme and the ending reprise is HEAT.

11. Uncle Frank* -  Uncle Frank is like The Help of gay movies. Like The Help, it’s *overall* a short, sweet and fluffy movie set decades ago. Like The Help, you’ll still come out of it feeling pretty good even though it has some dark moments. Also like The Help, you’ll wonder after the fact if the central white girl absolutely needed to be so...well, central for this story to be told. Bonus points for Paul Bettany and Character Actress Margo Martindale.

12. Brokeback Mountain - Tragic.

13. Moffie - Set during the South African border war, same as Kanarie. You even hear the word “moffie” throughout Kanarie. Anyways, this is a war movie for the gays, and a very intense watch. I liked that it was a much more realistic view of what a soldier endured during that period, and of course on the flip side I thought it was more thorough in its depiction of the rampant racism. I gotta find a good book on this era.

14. A Moment In the Reeds

15. Get Real - Maybe the most out of place movie on the list. I need to rewatch it. I do recall absolutely loving the score, however. Like, I fucks with this:

16. Freier Fall - When I finished Brokeback I was like, “Wait, wasn’t that just Free Fall with extra steps?” And yea, it kinda is. But even discount Brokeback is still pretty good.

17. Beautiful Thing - There are few things to like about this one, the relationship between the two guys, the mother’s love for her son even though it’s not all rainbows, that nice little final scene. I did not care for the dark-skinned woman being portrayed as, you know, the drug abusing, school dropout, gossipy, butt of jokes neighbor. But that guy really looks like Tom Holland tho.

18. Love, Simon - It’s at this point that I move from “Yea, that movie is good, you should watch it!” to “Look, you may like it, you may not.”

19. The 10 Year Plan - This movie is so fucking cheesy that there was cheddar coming though my speakers. But when I think of “Hallmark/Lifetime, but for the gays” this is the crown jewel. There’s some other movies on this list that could’ve taken some notes.

20. The Christmas Setup* - The trend of fluffy-white-gay-cable-network-movie continues and in good form. It’s not deep. It’s not really thought provoking. It’s cute. Fran Drescher is there. You should watch it.

21. Giant Little Ones

22. Hidden Kisses

23. Alex Strangelove - In a unique twist, the emotional core of this one is arguably between Alex and his girlfriend. All that ends up happening, however, is we the viewer keep wanting more Alex/Elliott scenes; those are the most electric in the whole movie. The end result is a hot yet endearing mess.

24. Fair Haven

25. The Thing About Harry - Freeform’s attempt at making a cheesy rom-com for the gays. It’s...okay. I personally feel like the main character’s friend is highkey trifling but it’s whatever.

26. Your Name Engraved Herein* - So I guess I’ve decided I officially hate angst. I mean, I get how it’s often necessary to tell an effective story, but I’m just not here for 2 hour indie angst fests that get passed off as “high art” anymore. I cannot do it. Somehow this is Brokeback’s fault...there just has to be a better way to tell gay stories in the 2020′s. Anyways, the last song was fuego.

27. The Perfect Wedding - Easily the most bizarre movie on this list. It’s so bad, I liked it a lot.

28. Naz and Maalik - The first half of the movie with the two leads just riffing is some pretty great stuff. The back half starts throwing plot developments that are just less than interesting.

29. My Best Friend

30. The Curiosity of Chance

31. Being 17 - Boring. Angsty.

32. And Then We Danced

33. Center of My World - Has some of the most trifling characters EVER. I was so angry. This movie for me has *0* rewatchability.

34. Just Friends

35. 4th Man Out - This movie was basically “a bro/Hangover-style movie, but for the gays.” I absolutely love the intention, but the execution was a little shoddy. One day we’re gonna get a flawless movie that nails what this movie was going for. I hope we remember this movie whenever that day comes.

36. Latter Days - So fucking preachy. 

37. GBF - Another bizarre one, but at least this movie gets how wacky it is.

38. Beach Rats

39. Shelter - I’ve noticed a lot of people like this one. To that I say...yikes. Remember that scene from Family Guy where Peter says he doesn’t care for The Godfather? I did not care for Shelter. It insists upon itself (not really, but still).

40. Handsome Devil

41. Esteros - It’s at this point of the list that we shift from “Movies that are the definition of ‘ight’ “ to “These movies are bad. Bad. BAAAAAD.”

42. Monster Pies

43. Were the World Mine - I couldn’t even finish it. Wanna watch a better musical? Go watch Kanarie. Wanna watch a better Shakespeare adaptation? The Lion King is the movie for you, or even fucking She’s the Man.

44. North Sea Texas - So boring. I actually think this one may need a rewatch, because I swear it shouldn’t have been as terrible as it was.

45. Salvation Army - I have no idea what this movie was going for. I understand that it is autobiographical, however...it simultaneously barely has any plot or character developments. This one has shades of Beach Rats, but it’s significantly worse, and I didn’t even like Beach Rats that much.

So that’s it, thanks if you made it down this far. I guess I’ll update the list as I inevitably watch more of these. I would love movie recommendations! 

[teetlesandnimjas]

It’s 4 in the morning. Want a monologue of me watching the TMNT 2014 Bay Movie? Of course you do. I hate this so much

I watch the god awful TMNT 2014 movie- a monologue. If you find this, I’m sorry.

Oh the intro’s wicked. It’s like 2d and shit and the detail

Oh wtf is that the character models??? Wait are we gonna see them or???

Who’s this bitch? Is that supposed to be April?

Oh fuck she’s played by Megan Fox. WHY WOULD YOU HAVE APRIL BE PLAYED BY MEGAN FOX???

Oh oh wow okay so there’s an Asian girl with multicolor hair and she’s evil. I love her, how could I not.

Will say- cinematography is good. I feel sorta immersed and shit. And it’s also like really interesting

Okay so she followed them to a subway... and got taken hostage by the Asian lady. Who’s the Asian lady again??? Who are you??? You’re hot that’s all I know

Okay how tf they gonna ninja this shit it’s completely illuminated?

“All aboard” Oh so these motherfuckers riding the train oh the lights went out oh that makes sense

Oh this is a cool shot. Almost makes up for MeGAN FUCKING FOX WHY???

Oh these motherfuckers are so loud- you can hear them from the street while they’re on a rooftop while also in fucking NEW YORK?? How???

Dumbasses

“He’s doing his Batman voice” “I only watched Batman once” heh funny Batman crossover reference because that was a thing

Y’all these motherfuckers terrifying wtf

“She’s looking at us like we’re freaks” bitch IM LOOKING AT YOU LIKE YOUR FREAKS WTF ARE THESE CHARACTER MODELS

Ew I hate it I HATE IT

THEY HAVE T E E T H??? AND N O S E S??? This is CGI you didn’t HAVE TO DO THIS WTF

Is this motion capture? This is motion capture isnt it? Well I guess that explain the... yknow this whole situation

God the adult jokes wtf is this rated

Idk what this is rated but I am uncomfortable wow

OOP OKAY ANOTHER COOL SHOT WOW

Oh so they snuck out

Shit man Splinter is ugly but got skills

“Uh- I forgot to sanitize my retainer” Your WHAT? Okay I wheezed not gonna lie. But only because my brain like immediately went “your WHAT?” Like that one meme of the blonde lady yeah that and it made me laugh idk

The fucks a oh shit okay

Pft okay who’s gonna say fuck first? Someone’s gonna say fuck. My bets on Mikey.

It’s PG-13, right? So they can say fuck at most once. So who’s gonna say it? It’s a Bay movie cmon who’s gonna say fuck.

My life would not be rated PG-13

They were her PETS AS A CHILD??? I’m very close to nope-ing the fuck outta here

Project Renaissance? Fuck off this is too detail I just wanna see people get punched. That’s all Bay movies are good at anyways

WHY IS THERE SO MUCH MEGAN FOX SHE APPEARS MORE IN THIS MOVIE THEN THE GOD DAMN NAME SAKE DO

Dumbass

They KIDNAPPED MEGAN FOX

Cool boom box wall. Motherfuckers have a boom box wall. Like it’s a wall... entirely made out of boom boxes. It’s cool but W H Y who would have the time to MAKE THIS??? DID THEY STEAL ALL OF THIS??

UUUUUGH more flash backs this is bullshit STOP TRYING TO MAKE THE GOVERNMENT INVOLVED

lol drugs

RAT MAN

Oh my god this backstory

SPLINTER IS SO UNIMPORTANT IN THIS BULLSHIT LIKE HE’S NOT EVEN A TRAINED NINJA??? FUCK OFF. He’s so ugly tho holy shit

OOOOOH finally more fighting

Shredder looks wicked oh my god

WOW OH MY GOD I LOVE SHREDDER BUT THIS BACKSTORY

Bullshit

Oh they blew shit up nice

God the product placement

Oh my god this is bullshit

This bitch again fuck I don’t even know his name

Impatient bitch

Oh NOW WE’RE BRINGING IN THE MUTAGEN. TOOK A W H I L E

bitch

Oh you’re ugly I hope you die you old greedy man

Okay boomer

Classic “Villain gives away their whole scheme” LILE dude I spaced out what??

Fancy mansion oooooooh

HE NUST BROKE THROUGU THE VAN

S H R E D D E R OH FUCK

dumb bitches

Lol adrenaline drugs

Wow dumb bitches

THEYRE B U L L E T P R O O F???

Heeeeey got Asian girl is back

Again with the cinematography that’s too good to be in this train wreck dumpster fire of a movie wtf why is this

B A Z O O K A ????

OKAY NO MORE BAZOOKA WHY???

More cool shots wow

Ass shot of Megan Fox. Because.

THESE FUCKERS CAUSED AN A V A L AN CHE

You guys are so fucking stupid but I’ll be damned if this isn’t a cool scene wow

Okay that’s pretty cool he just flipped a car through the air fuck yeah you go my boy

Fuck did I really just say my boy about this shit no stop fucking hell iM NOT GETTING ATTACHED STOP

This bitch just stuck her whole body out a window in the middle of a chase scene WITH AN AVALANCHE WTF MEGAN

I’m not calling her April, this is not April. This is a husk, a shell devoid of personality other than being moderately attractive and plain. Her entire character is based around reacting to shit.

Oh god no wonder the people who like this are horny teen girls tHATS WHY THEY HIRED MEGAN FOX OH MY GOD BECAUSE ITS OH MY GOD I GET IT ITS LIKE WHAT THEY DO FOR THOSE ANIMES WITH THE GUYS BEING COMPLETELY BASIC SO THE VEIWER CAN PUT THEMSELVES ON THE CHARACTER OHHHHHH yeah that’s bullshit

Drop off??? Shit man

OH HE FUCKING DIED

OH HES NOT FUCKING DEAD OKAY

I don’t care about the other fuckers

Haahahshshshshwb big hands tiny keyboard

AgAIN WITH THE CINEMATOGRAPHY WTF ITS SO GOOD

y’all need a nap stfu

Oh fuck they’re gonna poison New York.

OH HE MURDERED THE F A T H E R

OH AGAIN WITH THE CINEMATOGRAPHY AJSJSJSJSSJSJ ITS SO GOOD

Wow

OKAY THE BO STAFF LIKE POPPED OUT OF THE SCREEN I WOW I JUST WOW OKAY THIS CINEMATOGRAPHY THIS IS SO GOOD but everything else is awful

Bullshit

S W O R D S? JUST SLICE THROUGH THE TOWER??? O K A Y???

Oh fuck y’all about to fall to your death. He’ll yeah. DiE MEGAN F O X

Oh that’s right we have emotions. Wow.

Bullshit.

B U L L. S H I T.

They should NOT HAVE SURVIVED THAT THAT WAS THOUSANDS OF FEET. YOU WOULDVE BEEN CRUSHED.

Cool van.

NSJSJSJSJAJ V I C T O R I A S E C R E T A D? WTF???

And that’s it. Wow. Awful outro. Imma go vomit now. It’s 4 AM OH MY GOD

[cami-chats]

Gotta Get Brooklyn

Fandom: Newsies (1992)

Pairings: Spot Conlon/Jack Kelly

Warnings: References to canon newsies stuff

"So what about Brooklyn?" Jack called, and everyone averted their eyes. Aw you've gotta be yanking him. He wasn't s'posed to go to Spot's territory for the official stuff. That was the deal they'd made when they started; Jack would keep to his places, and Spot would keep to his. No more overlap for newsies business after that. "Come on, Spot Conlon’s territory. What’s the matter? You scared of Brooklyn?" 

"Hey!" Boot protested. "We ain’t scared of Brooklyn. Spot Conlon just... makes us a little nervous." 

Jack snorted. There were some good stories out of Brooklyn, and he thought at least half of them were true. "Yeah, well he don't make me nervous. Hey Dave, you nervous t' go to Brooklyn?" 

Dave's wide-eyed look said he was real nervous, but he said, "Uh, no. Sure, I’ll come with you," like he wasn't. Then he added, "Just as soon as you deliver our demands to Pulitzer." 

This kid was going to be the not-fun kind of trouble, but Jack wasn't about to lose face when they were already working to put it together. Talk to the big Joe? Yeah sure, why not. It'd be worth it for Dave not ratting on him when him and Spot were a little too comfortable around each other. 

*

"I've never been to Brooklyn before," Dave said when they were on the bridge, crossing over to Brooklyn. "Have you?" 

"Yeah, all th' time." 

"Why?" 

"Better games," he said with a twist to his mouth that was going to pass for a smile. 

Dave frowned at him. "So if you're here all the time, why didn't you volunteer to go? Besides, Brooklyn's the most important that we recruit, aren't they? It should've been you coming here the whole time." 

"Wanted to give some of the other guys a chance, but they got better things to be doin', don't they?" 

Instead of that clearing it up for him, Dave's frown deepened. "They said this Spot Conlon made them nervous. Is he really dangerous?" 

Jack laughed, and it sort of echoed around them. Everything sounded different on the water. "Yeah, but don't worry about it, you'll be fine." 

"Because I'm a newsie?" Dave guessed. 

"Nah, 'cause you're with me. And Spot don't like new folks very much, y'know? Don't wander off," Jack said, pushing at Dave's head-- all it did was move his hat a little and make him puff up like a pigeon before fixing it. 

Dave spent most of the walk talking about his family and worrying that something bad was going to happen to Les-- Jack tried to tell him that Les was with the newsies so he'd be fine, but Dave started harping about all the ways 'their kind' weren't any good for him to be around. The other part of the walk was Dave getting a stick in his eye over if they were going to live through their visit to Brooklyn. 

They finally made it to the dock where Spot had set up shop, and it was pretty clear that some of the guys were noticing that Dave was there and not liking it. One them pulled himself up out of the water and landed right in front of them. "What's with the side-piece, Kelly?" 

Jack breezed right by him, and Dave followed at a slower, more confused, pace. 

"Spot ain't gonna like that," he heard the Brooklyn newsie mutter, but then he was jumping back in the water and Jack didn’t have to worry about it. 

Spot was lounging on top of some crates, hat on his head and cane dangling over the side held loosely by his fingers. He rolled his head to look at them lazily. "Well, if it ain't Jack-be-nimble," his eyes darted to Dave accusingly, then back to Jack, "Jack-be-quick." 

"How you liking the river, Spot? Better view from all the way up there?" 

"Call it a bird's eye," he said, pushing himself up so he was sitting like normal. Spot put his club in its usual position on his belt. "You wanna hear what the other birds are sayin' 'bout you Manhattan boys?" He jumped down. "Queens, Harlem, Bronx, all of 'em been saying that Jack's newsies actin' like they playin' at a strike." 

"Yeah, cause we are." 

"But- but we're not playing," Dave insisted, all big eyes straight out of his apartment with his whole family that loved him and stuck together. "We are going on strike." 

"Oh yeah?" Spot said, nodding like he was earnest and getting a little in Dave's face. "Yeah?" 

"Um, yeah." 

Spot sneered, backing up again. "What the fuck is this mess, Jacky-boy? We had a pretty good arrangement goin'. I don't remember invitin' your boy here. What's he good for, anyway? Talking? Talk at you all day, Jacky-boy, like he's some kinda walkin' mouth?" 

"Yeah, he's a mouth. A mouth with a brain attached, and he's why our strike ain't fallin' apart. You gotta give him a chance, and you'll hear what everyone else hears, and not just from the birds." Jack was testing Spot's patience, and he knew it. But what else could he do? They needed Brooklyn on this. Brooklyn knew what they were doing, they had it all worked out, so Jack saying it again wouldn’t do any good. They needed to be persuaded, and that wasn’t what Jack was good at. 

Spot clenched his jaw, then relaxed it, and made a big show of leaning back to listen. He looked at Dave and raised an eyebrow. 

Dave didn't take the hint though, and Jack hit his arm to get him to start yakking. "Well uh, we started the strike, but we can’t do it alone. So, we've uh- we’re talking to newsies all around the city." 

"Yeah," Spot said flatly. "I heard that already. What did they say to you?" 

"They're waiting to see what Spot Conlon is doing," Dave said. Jack didn't know if Dave knew it was smart to play to Spot's ego, or if he thought it was the truth. Didn't really matter because it was their best chance at getting Brooklyn in. “See, you’re the key. Spot Conlon is the most respected and famous newsie in all of New York, and- and probably everywhere else." Dave's eyes darted to Jack, but it's not like Jack could do anything to help him right now. Dave was the one good at talking, Jack was here to make sure people listened. "And if Spot Conlon joins the strike, then they all join and we’ll be unstoppable. So you gotta join, I mean..." Dave glanced at him again. He was stumbling, but there wasn't anything Jack could do about that. "Well I mean, you gotta!" 

Spot was nodding a little, but Jack knew that look on his face didn't mean he was in. "Well whaddya know, Jacky-boy. It's like you said: a mouth with brains." He straightened from where he'd been leaning. "But I got some brains too. How do I know you punks won’t run the first time some goon comes atcha with a club?" He looked directly at Jack and said, "How do I know you got what it takes to win?" 

"Because I'm tellin' ya we do, Spot." Right after he finished saying it, he knew it wasn't going to work. Spot had to look after his people, especially since they had more to deal with than a strike and the rising cost of papes. 

"Yeah, that's what you're tellin' me," he repeated lowly. "But it ain't good enough. You want me to believe you can win? You gotta show me. Why don't you go back to Manhattan and think some things over, huh?" Spot's eyes darted to Dave. "And next time you come to Brooklyn, it's gonna be alone." 

"Anyone ever tell ya you're paranoid, Spot?" 

"Ain't paranoia, Jacky-boy. Get th' green ears off my dock, 'fore we toss him in." 

"Yeah yeah, we're leavin'." 

They turned to leave, but Spot caught Jack's arm before he could get far. "You shoulda sent somebody else." 

"Yeah well nobody else was willin' to talk with you. Said you make 'em nervous." 

Spot snorted, then leaned in for a kiss. 

It was real obvious when Dave turned back around to see where Jack was because he gasped and sorta stumbled on himself. 

"Your boys are a lil too straight-laced for these parts." 

"Yeah, but like I said, he's the brains." 

"Mm." Spot gave Jack a small shove to get him moving. "Gotta be serious, Jacky-boy." 

Dave didn't say anything for a while, not until they were out of sight from all the Brooklyn newsies. "So... that's Brooklyn." 

"Yeah. Listen, 'bout me and Spot, the other guys know, but they don't like hearin' 'bout it." One little lie wasn't going to hurt nothing, not on top of all the others he had. ‘sides, it was a topic that would really make them all nervous. "Keep it to yourself, yeah?" 

"Yes, um- sure. Of course." God, Dave was so twitchy. As long as he was twitchy with his mouth shut though, they'd be fine. Not like anyone in Brooklyn cared; it's what they were used to. 

*

"You came," Jack said, smirking. 

"Yeah. Couldn't let your face bashed in when it's the best thing about ya. 'Sides, maybe that brain of yours had a point. Stronger together, all that shit." 

"Y'know how strikes work, Spot. Gotta get together or it all falls apart." 

"Damn shame," Spot said, but he wasn't thinking about it anymore. "Got a wall we won't get caught at?" 

Jack snickered. "Yeah, over here." He pulled Spot to it, and got pushed up against the hard brick for it. Spot was on him in an instant, ripping off his hat so he wouldn't be as quickly recognized if someone saw them. 

"You were right about the strike, but don't you ever bring that brain back to my place." 

"Marking your territory there, Spot?" Jack asked with a snort. 

"No complaints, Jacky-boy," Spot said, hands rucking Jack's shirt from where it had been tucked into his pants so he could get his hands on skin. "Ya knew I was like this." 

[kariachi]

We are finishing! Season! 3!! Today is Roundabout day. Season finale, I’m finally gonna be something approaching up-to-date, at least with regards to Kevin, who is the only thing that matters

I’m just going to preemptively say Fuck the Forever Knight sideways with a pineapple

That house looks like something out Dexter’s Lab, if Dexter had been into shoddy constructionwork.

Goddamnit! Think of your neighbors before you build shit that fails that explosively in your garage!

Billings. I should’ve fucking guessed. Your constructionwork sucks and you suck.

Did that man just take a break to build a lightsaber? Stay on track, Billings!

Ben vanished and Max and Gwen had to turn to Phil, those poor two, they don’t deserve this.

(btw is case you haven’t picked up on it, I still don’t trust Phil further than I could throw him. He spent four series being a sack of shit and now suddenly he’s a good guy? I think not.)

Don’t go in there, that machinery looks like it could collapse at any moment!

Max acknowledges the ‘hunk of junk’, does not acknowledge that it’s a danger to everyone and thing within 60 ft of the damn house. We had a pumphouse in better shape that wasn’t half the size and we had it torn down as a safety hazard

“Sure brings back memories though, right Max?“ I’m with Gwen, wtf does that mean?

Max is hiding shit, of course he is. Is it Plumber shit? Immortal shit? He and Phil used to be supervillains shit? Who the fuck knows

“Ever since Ben fought Vilgax, I’ve been tracking the Omnitrix to further study it’s abilities.“ Because that’s not suspicious at all. Especially given who else has been tracking the Omnitrix and it’s bearer for a good while now

(am I saying Phil has ties to the FN? No, I’m just not not saying it)

Yes Phil, many machines work like that, most with any sort’ve radio or wifi whatever do, which we already knew the Omnitrix had by the time Ben fought Vilgax because that’s how the fucker tracked it down. You didn’t find out shit, you’re just taking credit for information that was handed to you on a plate.

Okay, this map on this show is a disaster, but I’m going to estimate Ben is in the Germany/Austria/Switzerland region. But anything could be true given this is the least accurate to real life Europe map I’ve ever seen as far as landmasses

Okay, Phil says Switzerland, I say we head to Austria.

Max he’s already grounded.

Also who the fuck is calling? And why does Phil ‘I’m tracking the Omnitrix’ Billings still have a landline? You’re in the suburbs, man, are you even legally allowed a landline?

Oh look, we cut to the FN, or at least one of his stupid jets. More openly evil than Bezos

Oh my gods that is the smallest round table I’ve ever seen! And if way too big a space that’s clearly not even set up for it! FN you fucking loser!

Okay though, okay, backing up, entering ‘pick at details mode’. The table looks like it’s set to seat eight and it already has at least six. Counting out the FN we have, going clockwise- Kevin, then Vin, then Charmcaster, Billy, and what is probably Simon though if it is I will have to slowly kill a bitch. So, I gotta say, smart move putting Vin between Kevin and Charm, because if those two were next to or across from each other it would probably be unsafe for everybody. Having Vin in particular in that spot is smart because 1) he’s managed some sort’ve management of Kevin before (which is better than FN has managed even if it didn’t last) and 2) he’s bigger than both of them put together so Kevin would have to go through or around him to get at Charm’s throat.

But, on Vin in particular- what the fuck dude?! You get into the evilest looking vehicle in the show so far, owned and run by a creepy adult corporate nasty, see a bunch of kids are involved, why the fuck are you and the children still here? This better get touched on because if you’re actually okay with this set-up you are not half the man I thought you were

If Kwarrel were here the FN already would’ve had his gear wrecked and been thrown out the jet, woulda happened as soon as he saw even one of the children “Why are there kids here?“ “They’re your coworkers“ and out the jet he’d go

Charmcaster, unimpressed

Seats to either side of the FN are empty

And because there is no adult in existence with any of the skills the children have, apparently.

Kevin, also unimpressed and glaring off in the direction of Vin and Charm, presumably at Charm specifically

Oh gods, Vin’s special skill is ‘loyalty’ what the fuck is he a digidestined?! Although I guess when you’ve specifically gone out and gathered up the children least likely to do a single thing you say the way you want it done...

Charmcaster’s spells, if she can manage to cast any decent ones without a copy of Shel Silverstein involved

Billy’s skill is money. Bitch you own three major franchises you do not need the 10-yo for his money. The most dumbass golddigging attempt I’ve ever seen, and I watched OV!

Also nobody is impressed so far. Nobody.

Okay 1) they gave Simon a helmet and he is adorable. 2) I am going to kill every adult in that room. Painfully.

Kwarrel wouldn’t stand for this!

oh my gods Simon is too damn precious how did I not like him in his premiere?

Oh look, it’s a Ben. Welcome to the cesspit, Tennyson

Kevin, not fucking having it

Simon is happy though

“What are you thinking?! He’s obviously gonna betray us the first chance he gets!“ Kevin talking sense. He watches tv, he knows how this goes.

Honestly even without the betrayal risk, you wouldn’t be able to blame Kevin for not wanting Ben involved here. They’ve got the same skill set, as far as FN is concerned, and Kev already very clearly has issues about being seen as the lesser option, which FN has previously played into.

Vin trying to talk sense, it’s not working especially because I’m still angry with you

Kevin demanding Ben’s reasons for being here.

Ben’s reasons being ‘because my family thinks I’m the boy who cried FN’

“Why should we trust you?“ “Because Grandpa and Gwen don’t.“ “What? What does that even mean?!“ Kevin looks about this close to throwing in the towel and quitting right here and now. ‘Fuckit, I’m leaving and replacing you all with a rat’

FN stopping shit before it gets too out of hand

And we cut back to the Tennysons with still no sign from Vin that he has any problem with kids being involved in this mess

“We’ve been tracking the Forever Knight’s movements over the last few months“ “Who is ‘we’?“ “Best to just focus on the task at hand, Gwen“ Max pls

‘We came to the conclusion he was recruiting some sort’ve team’ what was your first clue?

Phil made Gwen a magical girl armor transformation.

Gwen is Pleased. Also dangerous.

The fuck sorta ugly-ass building is that? Did they hire a weaverbird to build it, what the hell?

Kevin, continuing to be a little shit, as per the norm

I’ll admit, I appreciate the transformation sequences if just because they’re nothing special enough for me to note and so it takes seconds off the time I have to liveblog. It adds up when you’re stopping to type every few seconds.

Ben pls

Ben- runs in to intimidate researchers into giving them access to whatever Billy- already got his father to pay the people to let them in

Again, may I say, the FN has money. He doesn’t need Billy’s! He has his own! He’s just cheap!

Kevin is just gonna spend the whole of part I giving Ben shit

The fuck we looking at

It is becoming more and more blatant that the FN got Simon here by inviting him to a fake birthday party and have I mentioned I want this man to smolder down to ash?

Time portal. We’re constructing a time portal. If this is Paradox’s premiere I’m cancelling this damn series. We can try again when people learn to fuck off on the time travel plots (they’ve been done well three times and all of them were in Pern books)

He is having Kevin and Ben construct a time portal. Together. Kevin does not look impressed by his coworker.

1) Ben you’ve been the dweeb forever. 2) Finally somebody on this show acknowledges Kevin’s mullet. 3) I’m with Kevin on the ‘let’s see if he can keep up’ thing, given one of them built an Omnitrix and the other I’d be surprised to see set the time on a vcr

“You’re the one with a mullet!“ “Yep.“ Oh gods! Oh damn! The fact he just looks so damn smug as he says it, like ‘you can’t get under my skin about things I’m actually cool with’, this little disaster! And Ben just looks like he’s gonna punch him. Are we sure they didn’t swap bodies prior to this or something?

FN starts pulling the ‘you will do as I say’ and that’s when Kevin starts getting prickly. Of course it is. Again, this is why I keep giving him rankers, do you really wanna see how long a Weyr would last if he was on a chromatic?

These boys today. Ben is just itching for a fight and Kevin is... The change between Kevin before the FN threatens to start putting them in their positions his own damn self and after is very pronounced. One he’s being a little shit and enjoying it, the other he’s very... I’m really not sure how to word it, distanced maybe? Like he emotionally stepped back from the situation

Simon you precious little bean, put a happy birthday sign and some balloons on a piece of machinery. And a little party hat.

Billy was not prepared for Simon. He doesn’t deserve Simon.

Well, Gwen is infiltrating shit at the fucking 6 minute mark, which is a shame because I was hoping to have more of her and the adults doing their thing so we could get some more interactions between the child antagonists.

This child

And of course she ends up in the vent right above the lab the others are working in, it’s not like we’ve got another episode and a half to fill.

Seriously, I love her, but I was really looking forward to seeing more of the dynamic between the characters that are already present in the lab and adding her changes the odds there. If they’d waited another fur minutes with her I’d have been good, but this feels too early and is setting my hackles up that they’re going to throw a load of Gwevin into what was shaping up to be a full marks episode so far

1) Yes Gwen, wtf are they doing, 2) I see everyone but Kevin and Ben so wtf is going on there?

Well, she seems to be leaving to regroup with the adults, so there’s hope there

“Watch wearers“ I’m gonna throw that man off something tall

Ooo, Ben’s been promoted to ‘Loser-son’ and also might be losing his nerve? Either that or the just ran out of ways to shoot back at Kevin verbally.

Rush and XLR8

Boys both going at 456 mph through a fucking tube

‘You boys are gonna have to hit 888 miles an hour’ Vin, have you considered fucking right the hell off? Has the FN? I’m with the boys that’s fucking insane

They pass each other in the tube and Kevin finds the energy to still joke on Ben, because some things just matter

SImon and Billy get distracted from doing their jobs by Simon drawing a picture of them and Ben in which Billy is taller than Ben. Billy is pleased. Simon is precious.

Ya kniw what I need? I need a fic where this time/space portal opens up and UAF/OV Kevin tumbles out, judges the shoddy construction, and then fucking handles this mess. I don’t know what FN wants, but I’m fairly certain a bigger, meaner, stronger, more violent Kevin is not it. And so it would please me.

When there is enough speed and lasers going around to cause earthquakes

Gwen has successfully let the rest of her team into the Weaverbird Nest

Gwen that is not a shortcut that is a vent. A vertical vent.

Charmcaster magicking up a portal, for extra specialness

So she stabilized the rift and also made FN a fuckign space/time cuff.

Simon got to her, she’s in a party hat

This child really needs to stop talking like she’s the fairy that blesses/curses the king in a 90s fantasy film

“I will only require on of you to accompany me into the rift. It’s your time, Ben.“ Fucking welp.

Everyone except Ben, Kevin, and the FN has a party hat

Kevin, baby, this is not safe or fun let somebody else go do not let your well-battered pride and your issues get your hurt or worse

“I’m sick of him getting everything when I’m obviously better!” My son. My dearest son. My precious child.

“Are you questioning me?“ Said in the most intimidating voice FN can manage and all I can think is, dude, how long have you been working with this child? Did you not actually meet him in all that time? Was he dealing with a body double. Did you think opening a rift in space and time would somehow change the fundamental aspects of his being that resonate throughout every Kevin that has ever been?

“The grease child is right!“ Okay, it’s official, somebody needs to find Kevin a shower and some soap

Kevin and Billy all for kicking Ben’s ass

And then Charm joins in the fun, because why not

“All this pettiness proves that Ben is worth more than all of you combined“ I’m gonna kill ‘im.

Charmcaster just looks defeated at that line. Like, honest to fuck, stick a fork in her, she’s done.

Kevin, on the other hand, doesn’t, not even a bit. He is straight up trembling with his anger. Or hurt? Both most likely, though I think the anger is in the lead.

Billy, meanwhile, looks shocked and angry at being called out like this.

And Simon looks just straight shocked.

And no response shown from Vin.

Ben, no, this is a very bad idea.

And we cut to the old folk and Gwen.

Welp, looks like everyone is all together

The ‘good’ news is half the children really wanna hit something right now. Especially Kevin.

‘Take out the Tennysons to prove your worth’ Welp

And there our hero goes with our Big Bad

I think we’ve hit part II and it only took like 3.5 hours. I’m gonna be a while longer I think.

Ancient Egyptians telling ancient Egyptian bad jokes

Gotta give the show one thing- at least it’s Egyptians are black

Also too drunk to be impressed by two weirdos stepping out a glowing purple portal. I can’t even roll my eyes because somebody needed to laugh at the FN

Ben: Unimpressed by FN’s taste in vacation spots

FN is using Ben to track alien attempts to contact Earth. The first of which was here, apparently.

Also this adds a whole new level of jackass to his behavior towards the other kids, given he could’ve very easily and truthfully pointed out that he needs a feature on the Omnitrix that Kevin’s watch presumably doesn’t have, but instead used the whole thing as an opportunity to tear the other kids down further. tl;dr: I cannot wait to see him become reboot!Kev’s first kill

We want to prevent the alien contact. Why? Who the fuck knows. Who the fuck cares. I want to stop him just out of spite.

And so we learn that he wants to get rid of all Omnitrixs so that he can take over Earth. Wonder how that would play out with regards to Kevin’s watch though. Because his didn’t come from space, to my knowledge we don’t know where it came from. Fuck, it could be contact from another dimension that lead to it (I mean, you saw OG!Kevin, whose to say Reboot!Kevin doesn’t also have some serious weirdness going on there that, combined with the fact his house has two radio towers in the backyard, that could lead to him getting messages from other dimensions like that). tl;dr: If FN succeeded, would that just lead to him having to worry about a Kevin he can’t use Ben against, rather than Ben himself?

‘Forever Nut’ that’s a good one, nice job Ben!

‘Forever Losers’ Ben’s on a roll

Ben out to kick this man’s ass

“I’m too powerful“ I really wanna drop OG!Kevin on this dude, I really do. Or fuck, can you picture him vs Kevin 11k? He’d be drawn and quartered, possibly eaten, within a minute and a half.

Well, there goes the Sphinx

Timed out and still raring to go

FN comes all the way out to ancient Egypt to stop aliens making contact, turns out they didn’t even do it

Kidnapping the child

Back to the present day, in the lab, with the fighting about to begin

Charmcaster and Kevin v Gwen. Charmcaster is already smug. Kevin, meanwhile, is offering her the chance to back down and not get hurt. Which, for Kevin, is pretty nice.

Billy and Simon v Phil. Is certainly a thing, but nothing interesting

Vin v Max. Both using the concept of ‘family’ against each other. Forklift v forklift. I wish I was surprised.

FN and Ben are in renaissance Italy now. Florence specifically.

Ben: I will stop you! FN: Kid I already kicked your ass. Ben: Well you’re gonna have to do it again!

Oh look, it’s the descendants of those two guys from ancient Egypt. It’s nice to see that their friendship has carried down through the ages.

“Serve your leader” has that worked on any of the people you nabbed? Besides maybe Vin? Because I’m fairly certain if you called yourself Kevin or Billy’s ‘leader’ to their faces they’d come at you harder than Ben is

FN, so far you have gone to two places and times, neither of which was where aliens made contact. Have you considered, quite possibly, that the problem is you?

You know Kevin is in a foul mood when he’s down to destroy Gwen.

Gwen, trying to give the ‘FN is a using pos’ realization to at least Kevin

Charmcaster interrupting her and also do you really think you of all people are the one who should be trying to bolster Kevin’s confidence? I mean, your history with him is enslavement and reading his private poetry to a crowd. You should be glad he’s not going after you.

Vin v Max, moved on to segway racing. And slapfights.

...small Phil and Max. By which I mean like, late teens. Apparently this is the third ‘alien contact’ option. Also Phil built that deathtrap as a teenager and he’s living in his parents’ old place. That is an old-ass suburbs given we don’t know how the fuck old these two are

Oh for fuck’s sake, have you considered getting a fucking hobby Forever Bitch? Take up scrapbooking or something, get into Minecraft

We’ve still got 7 minutes btw. We’re going faster in this half, but we’ve still got a third of the episode to go

Ben Shockrocking it up

Vin vs Max take 3- racing matchbox cars

Max decides to have a conversation with Vin, find out why he’s working with FN despite the latter being about as pleasant as a rabid zombie skunk in your pillow.

...1) Vin has a child. 2) That child is grown. 3) That child is a lawyer (congratulations Mr. Vin’s Kid) 4) Between said lawyer child moving on with their life and LaMoron being a dick Vin was lonely so he joined up.

“This is the closest thing to a family I have now“ One would think the fact you have a child would say otherwise, but if the fact that you seem to be totally fine with a bunch of kids being drug into this mess, including a 6-yo, says anything about your parenting then I’m not really surprised.

Max offers to let him become a Tennyson, which, if the family reunion episode is anything to go by, he may already be

Max and Vin are friends now. Phil is still being pursued by children. And Charm and Kev are still trying to take Gwen out.

“Once I finish you off, Forever Knight will easily choose me over Tennyson“ Oh Billy no... Have I mentioned I really wanna kill hat man? Painfully?

Simon is about to obliterate a man for the chance at being best friends with Billy. I would be even more concerned if he wasn’t FUCKING SIX-YEARS-OLD, VIN

Phil is going to survive via appealing to Simon’s inner and outer juice-loving six-yo

Welp. Sorry Billy.

Ooo, Gwen almost blasted Charm before Kevin deflected it, good job son!

“Kevin finish her off“ Bitch you finish her off

“Why? All we were supposed to do is keep everyone away from the portal.“ My son talking sense and also notably sticking only to orders. Out of spite, because he wants to, because the last time he tried to bend orders the FN nearly killed him? (and do any of the others know that that’s a risk I wonder, that if the FN doesn’t feel you’re doing your job ‘right’ he’ll decide to just off you)

“You’re soft“ You’re the one that wanted him to do the dirty part, Charm

Charm tries to kill Gwen and Kevin just fucking, shatters her amulet in retaliation.

Charmcaster: This is why you’ll never be Forever Knight’s right hand! Kevin: I handle things my way.

I love my child.

Kevin literally just used his last second before timing out to vine Charmcaster to the ceiling

That moment when you have a crush but hate that you have it, I recognize the look. Been there.

“Well yeah, I’m not a monster.“ On the topic of saving Gwen. My precious child

Gwen: *heading for portal to figure out what’s going on* Kevin: *heading for the portal because he’s got revenge to take*

Somebody needs to kick FN’s ass. And then eat him. Slowly. Painfully.

FN damn near killed Ben before Kevin fucking saved his life! Literally, man was gonna strike Ben down!

“I’m here for that ungrateful tin can!“ Yesss!!! My son!! Kick his ass!

Gwen is helping!

“You wanna know why I didn’t choose you? It’s because you’re just a cheap Tennyson knock-off.“ .....

.....

......

........

..........this motherfucker gotta go

Ben joins the fray!

“Cheap knock-off, huh?“ I, for one, am proud to be here for my son’s first kill

FD does not get to stop alien contact because he’s being dogpiled by a bunch of pissed-off preteens. Good.

The children got a hold of FD’s portal control. Gwen is gonna be working portals, Kevin is on ‘keep the FD from killing Ben’ duty. This was his decision. Which says a lot about how he feels about the FD

Kevin, looking for some sort’ve explanation for the fact FD is a dick and will always be a dick, because this is what abused children do

“I was the best fighter you had.“ “You were only a useless pawn.“ “I’m nobody’s pawn!“ My son

Battle in the rift

FD demands Kevin hand over the Tennysons “and make yourself for once“. Gwen is concerned he may do it when I believe anyone who can read facial expressions and/or a room knows who he’s growling at

“Kevin, think about this, you’re not a bad guy!“ “See, that’s where you’re wrong“ At which point Kevin lets go of the Tennysons and fucking dives at Forever Dipshit

Kevin sacrifices himself to take out FD and what’s Ben’s reaction? “Kevin, no! I’m the cool one!“

These fucking children.

“And Kevin steals the spotlight again“ “You really wanna be trapped in the past?“ “Alright, I’ll let him have this one“

Glad to see Ben recalling the tale. Glad to see he’s still grounded. Gwen is Good. Fuck off Vin.

1) the portal is still open 2) FD’s helmet came through it. Whether that’s because Kevin threw it through it as he beat the living hell out of him remains to be seen

And season 3 is over.

11/11, because my son fucking deserves it no matter what else goes on

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 198: A Pair of Chuunis

Previously on BnHA: Shinsou, Tsuyu, Kaminari, Kirishima, and Kouda (henceforth known as Team A) faced off against Shiozaki, Tsuburaba, Shishida, and Rin (Team B). Kiri, Kouda, and Tsubu were captured, making it 3 VS 3. Tsuyu covered Shinsou and Kami with her disgusting frog mucus in order to mask their scent so class B wouldn’t be able to track their movements. They then purposely allowed Kaminari to get captured as a distraction to let Shinsou get close enough to Shiozaki to ensnare here with his quirk. Realizing what had happened, Shishida stopped talking so as not to fall under Shinsou’s control himself. However this also left him unable to communicate with his remaining teammate, and Rin was shortly thereafter taken out by Tsuyu. Shishida was knocked out shortly after that, and so Team A ended up winning the match, giving class 1-A the lead as we enter the second round.

Today on BnHA: Aizawa and Vlad provide their respective students with constructive criticism following the match. Meanwhile the remaining 8 teams begin to plan out their strategies, including Monoma who is excited to have the chance to work together with Shinsou, particularly after witnessing the first match. It turns out he’s not the only one interested in what Shinsou can do, as Aizawa and Vlad reveal to All Might and Midnight that today’s exercise is doubling as Shinsou’s exam determining whether or not he should be admitted into the hero course. The second round of battles begins, with Team MomoYamaTokoKure facing off against Team KendouKuroMangaToadette. Kendou is excited to be battling Momo, as she considers the two of them to be rivals, and feels that up until now Momo has been outshining her. Meanwhile Kuroiro from class B bonds with Tokoyami over their mutual goth aesthetic before the two teams split off to get things started. Toko sends out Dark Shadow to do recon, only to have Kuroiro -- whose quirk allows him to move freely within the color black -- hitch a ride back to Team A’s location. The two prepare to clash, and Toko gets ready to show off a new technique he’s apparently learned from Hawks.

(As always, all comments not marked with an ETA are my mostly-unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter. I’m caught up with the manga now at chapter 222, so any ETAs will reflect that.)

my man Aizawa out here making sure I continue to stan him

this is school after all!

and oh my god this title

you know it’s the Momo chapter when...

goddammit Kirishima’s self-esteem issues are acting up again

does anyone know if that “staring at yourself in the mirror and psyching yourself up by reminding yourself that you’re cool and awesome” thing actually works? maybe he should try that. he’s so good at complimenting other people but he’s so damn hard on himself. why are all shounen characters like this

Kouda says he needs to get better at issuing detailed orders to insects

good god Kouda, if you improve on your quirk you’re going to be fucking terrifying aren’t you

and I know I just said all shounen characters are too hard on themselves, but then along comes Kaminari to prove me wrong!

you were great, buddy. 10/10 I stan one adaptable and clever electric boy. I would pit you and Mina up against Rat Principal all over again because I bet you two would crush it now

(ETA: not to mention that as Jirou will shortly point out, he’s skirting on the edge of falling into his usual derp mode here -- but he’s managing to retain his senses for the most part, which is extremely impressive given how much electricity he put out in that fight, first against Shishida and then later against Shiozaki. Kaminari!! you’ve become stronger!)

Tsuyu says she wanted to win without any casualties and she regrets losing two of her teammates

Shinsou, who did amazing for his first time, says it was “incredibly frustrating” and that he wasn’t able to apply even ten percent of what he’s learned

kid, take that frustration and channel it into becoming even more determined to fulfill your dreams! that’s the upside of being a shounen character who’s too harsh on himself! you learn and you keep getting stronger, okay?

see, and Aizawa’s telling him the same thing

wow so he didn’t master it until he was out of school, then? or did he start on that before he entered U.A.?

say, aren’t we due some Aizawa flashbacks soon? this is the arc the manga was on when I first started reading, so it seems to be about that time I’d say

(ETA: so what is it exactly that made people have all these headcanons about him knowing the Iida family as a kid? I know he and Tensei are both in Vigilantes, so I’m guessing now it has something to do with that. lol and here I thought we were going to get a whole backstory. instead we’ve had all of one panel’s worth of flashbacks, and that was very recent and we apparently don’t know what the deal is with that yet except that he had some sort of cloudy friend that he doesn’t want to talk about. not that I’m not loving that, mind you; it’s just not what I was expecting. I really gotta start Vigilantes don’t I. maybe this weekend)

oh my god

I’m a simple girl, I see Jirou losing her damn shit over Kaminari and I hit like and subscribe for more great content

and yes, Aoyama, they do seem to be taking this much more seriously than the others. thinking about what would have happened in a real life situation. and I mean, that’s not a bad thing per se, but it’s just... they’re still kids. and already thinking about death and other worst-case scenarios because they’ve experienced it firsthand now. and man but that’s rough

now Aizawa is giving them his own pointers

he’s such a good teacher I love him so much

meanwhile Vlad is chewing out his own students

didn’t Horikoshi describe his teaching approach as being gentler than Aizawa’s? was that just because he doesn’t expel entire classes at the drop of a hat? sure not seeming real gentle right now lol

(ETA: strut strut)

excuse me Monoma who is the teacher here

but he says that despite the loss, he’s satisfied because they showed the rest of them “something marvelous”

(ETA: strut strut)

yeah, I’ve been wondering about that. he probably can’t wait to try that quirk out for himself

man if Monoma bonds with Shinsou and then Shinsou ends up joining 1-A I am going to laaaaaaugh

(ETA: lol except for the fact that I sorta kinda ship it now oh shit)

and they have an advantage over the class A Shinsou team since they actually have some time to prepare

wow they’re all strategizing now

friendly reminder that I love all of these kids and would die for them

and yes you, Todoroki. humility is all well and good but let’s not kid ourselves. you’re a powerhouse and you need to own it

I have no doubt that Team BakuJirouSeroSatou is going to crush this and I can’t waiiiit

(ETA: THEY SO CRUSHED IT)

and who fucking asked you, C-3PO. maybe they can’t have spare parts installed, but human bodies literally heal themselves given just a bit of time and rest. we don’t need to sit here and be dragged by someone who can’t even pass a damn turing test okay

All Might is reflecting on how much everyone has grown. he sure does that a lot

I guess. and also a way to finally introduce the other 20 U.A. first years after 200 fucking chapters lol

hey what

what is it. what’s with those faces. y’all wanna throw down or what?? bring it

oh they just want to know what they thought about Shinsou

All Might is so good I love you All Might

!!

oh shit. so spoiler alert I guess he passes lol

is he aware that it’s a test? is this another one of your Logical Ruses you deceitful hobo

yessssssssss!

I honestly can’t fathom how a team with both Momo and Tokoyami could possibly lose. they’ve even got Aoyama “saving the day in the clutch” Yuuga and Hagakure “I’m the friggin’ traitor” Tooru for fuck’s sake

by the way, Hagakure’s right fist is facing out but isn’t that weird? wouldn’t it make more sense to have your fist facing toward you for this kind of “pumped and ready to go” gesture? idk why it bothers me. maybe because she’s literally only hands so you could at least get that one detail right lmao

and have I mentioned how much I love Momo’s cape. now if only they’d get her a fucking zipper good grief

that kid from class B who speaks in literal dialogue bubbles is freaking named Manga and I can’t you guys

I have no problem with calling Kuroiro by his name, but I’m pretty sure that legally I have to continue referring to Komori as Toadette. I don’t make the rules you guys

Kendou is asking Momo why she didn’t enter the beauty contest during the cultural festival

have I mentioned lately that Aizawa is the best dad? I have? well it never hurts to say it yet again. Momo had more important things to worry about than participating in the least rational annual event this school puts on

oh right, somehow I forgot that these two did their workplace experience together. actually can I just call it a fucking internship even if it wasn’t an internship internship? y’all still know what I mean anyway so come on

this is an odd thing to bring up now and I can’t help but think Kendou’s trying to get into Momo’s head somehow

(ETA: nope. just bein’ rivals)

oh, Hagakure’s bringing up that one guy at the festival who kept cheering for Momo. I had been wondering about that. so he was a fan of theirs from the commercial they did then? who the hell stans someone from just a single commercial

yes

ooh, hidden dark side from Kendou all of a sudden!

I mean, on the one hand I don’t like Kendou getting jealous because these badass ladies should be supporting one another, not harboring jealous thoughts and insecurities

but on the other hand she’s not wrong about Momo though trufax

okay good, this seems healthy enough

A WHOLESOME LADY RIVALRY, EH? BRING IT

oh my god

imagine going from drawing Shiozaki to drawing this guy. Horikoshi must be filled with relief right now

oh my god Kuroiro’s quirk is apparently amazing!?

holy shit?? WHIP OUT THAT DARK SHADOW AND TEST IT OUT! WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR

lmao

if these two don’t watch it they are gonna cut themselves to ribbons on ALL THAT EDGE

so then is Hagakure gonna clash with Toadette. or Manga

so now round two is officially starting, and Sero is asking his friendly neighborhood Tetsutetsu about Kendou, Tetsu’s crush

I ship these two kids so hard. he adores her

lol he says that if she wasn’t around the whole class would have been “indoctrinated” by Monoma

he says she’s the big sister of class B

yeah, so basically the Momo

and now Todoroki is thoughtfully chiming in

you know, operation? as in scheme? as in whatever plan Momo’s thought up using the intellect that’s put her on at the very top of what is probably the most brilliant class in U.A. history?

so now we’re cutting to Team B, and Kendou is saying that they should wait and see what Team A has in store first, since even though they know their basic quirks, they don’t know what improvements they’ve made and what special moves they’ve come up with

go fuck him up Kuroiro! I know I shouldn’t be rooting for you, but I’m so fucking curious to see if you can use Tokoyami’s quirk against him omg

meanwhile we’re cutting back to Team A, and Tokoyami is reporting to the others that Dark Shadow has located Team B

oh shit

TOKOYAMI THEY GOT YO BOY

Dark Shadow’s zooming toward them now and Tokoyami’s shouting at everyone to disperse

HE LOOKS SO SAD OH NO

KUROIRO YOU ASSHOLE WHY ARE YOU MY NEW CLASS B FAVE

Hagakure is all “Kuroiro popped out from inside Dark Shadow!” as though everyone else didn’t just watch that happen right along with her

Momo’s flinging some ninja nets at Kuro but he’s dodging!

I LOVE IT

HOLY SHIT TOKOYAMI IS RIPPED. WHEN DID THAT FUCKING HAPPEN. WHERE WERE THOSE ARM MUSCLES DURING THE POOL EPISODE, JESUS

(ETA: and I’ll have you know Horikoshi even specifically described his arms as “fairly thin” when he did his little bio in chapter 101! so this is a recent fucking development. bird boy been hittin the gym)

also he sure does have a lot of natural enemies doesn’t he. his quirk is so powerful but it has a lot of weaknesses

and lmaoooooo at “a pair of chuunis” holy fucking christ

how is this chapter over already?? oh well, we’re almost at 200, let’s keep going and check out Toko’s new technique

[polygon-streams]

April 21st, 2019 - Pat’s Easter/Post 4/20 Donk Souls Stream

Pat played another stream of Donk Souls, back again with Magnum Jr. Stream went on for a little over 3 1/2 hours, so there’s quite a bit to note

Recaps a bit on yesterday's stream, telling the story of Magnum Jr.

Is interrupted by piss as he explains how he wants to find a loincloth for Magnum Jr, we are still on the fight for as naked of a Kong as possible

"Suns out guns out here in Lothric" - Pat, 2k19

Thanks some good subbers

Waluigi subbed up, thank you Waluigi

Vordt of the Boreal Valley is a fun name

"Hey.. hey, man.. hey.... alright bye, guess I'll see you later, man." - Pat @ a skeleton lookin’ enemy who walked away from him

Magnum Jr. has an arrow through his neck is he ok

4/20 was successful because he didn’t do weed due to it being an illegal criminal activity

"I don't want to perry.. what do i look like... Matthew?"

Has a very long stare at the chat ".................Matthew Perry"

Bonk bonk bonk souls

Gives a few more gifted sub shoutouts

Half-logan?

( Chunk of the stream is missing about right here. Only about 30 minutes, sorry about that )

He doesn’t drop pants

Beeline for vort

Memeshart is giving good gamer advice ( I’m sorry Pat, we all know Memeshart is the supreme gamer here )

“I got vorted” - Pat Gill, 2k19

Let’s fucking go, Pat can do it, we got this

Pat has fought this Vordt X times

“Juice time, baby, juice me” - also Pat, 2k19

He’s having more trouble than usual bc his other characters wore clothes

Vordt Souls

RP: do you guys know my dad?

Hums to konkey dong

X is your uber ride, am outside

God dammit, dogs. He’s killing the bone dogs.

One of this weird turtleback men is actually my friends that wants to hang out with me

Does that make me into beef jerky? I want my Kong to be fresh

More dog hate. He’s getting mauled by dogs. “Please lord of Dark Souls don’t let these dogs kill me”

“Why can’t I use ember? Is it because I already am bird shit?” nice joke.

Tropical freeze is such a good soundtrack. He’s done into the past and he may switch to it towards the end

He wants to bottle feed the kittens. He feels the best way to get a kitten to drink out of the bottle is by convincing them they really don’t want it to drink out of the bottle

Just realized he doesn’t know what the fuck is going on in this game after noticing for the first time a person is growing into a plant. Now he’s wondering why the people in this town are turning into trees. Angel b: they’ve commited treason greatest victory : they’re turning over a new leaf

He wants to make today and tomorrow pizza days. And he’s got a big thing of lactaid so he’s set to commit this mistake

He’s working on the environmental storytelling. That’s why he likes it, you have to put it together

If Ken Levine made this game he’d had made it clear by writing on a wall or something but not here

Dark Souls II: spooky stuff here in dark souls. That’s why the game is not called light and breezy souls

He got box stabbed, but he’s having a nice time souls

“This is my friend, Johnny, get it?” - We didn’t get it

“This is my friend, David”

“This is also my friend, Nick”

“Johnny cage.. because it’s a bunch of people in a cage” ( can confirm joke landed only for like two people )

This area gives Bloodborne vibes. Sorta medieval Bloodborne

“I’m not gonna use the whip”

jk he might try

Important update: Charles is sneezing

Camera angle is not in Pat’s favor up in this ruins and he hates it

He doesnt wanna fight anyone called Hodrick

We’re gonna avoid Hodrick and go fight a giant shooting arrows from a tower

22.32 Bijan is here

Memeshart is a consultant-- Pat is calling on memeshart like an Alexa

“Memeshart, play Despacito” Another great joke, Patrick

We’re testing Memeshart’s knowledge boundaries

Memeshart lore: They were picked up from a shipwreck by the current memeshart

Pat doesn’t remember this part being so annoying ( he also doesn’t remember he had clothes for the other characters )

Again with the Johnny/David/Nicholas Cage joke ( but now we all got it )

He’s avoiding killing non hostiles ( he definitely killed them in his main files, though )

Grim Acceptance: The emotion that bopping to The Entire Buck Bumble Theme for 3000 Bits elicits

He’s not particularly excited for the Sega Genesis mini. He didn’t have a Sega so he’s not particularly nostalgic

Bastard Sword: “I am kind of a bastard.”

22.48 Faith’s here

X i s one of hs favorite tracks in the Donkey Kong Country soundtrack

dumbassrights was gifted a sub. a good username, we can all agree

Unspoken chat rule: You aren’t allowed to say you got pizza without also saying the toppings

“He- he packed a bowl, but it was 420 yesterday!” - Pat

Very close to having the loincloth

“Love a big rat”

He doesn’t lock on a lot of enemies, especially big enemies, with enemies surrounding

Even more dog hate. Sorry, can’t relate.

Onion man is with us. he did not help with dog enemy.

“This guy sounds like Paul F. Tompkins doing Alan Thicke”

He’s good friends with the big archer giant. Friendship goals.

Bijan: “Can anyone explain the plot of Dark Souls?” Pat: “No.”

“It’s time to probably die”

Onion man is sleeping, chat decides to spam z for good slumbers

Lore check: this is the son of Magnum Kong , Magnum Kong Junior and he’s trying to find his dad, his papa, his daddy.

Went full “That’s rough, buddy” with “They really just tied a bunch of people to these burning wheels, huh….. rough..”

“I’m not good at archery, but the point is not about doing well, it’s about having fun.”

( sees enemies ) ( gasp ) two of them! ( dies )

Memeshart comes in again to say Pat missed a chest. Thank you for your service, Memeshart

Memeshart was right ( as always )

enemies: throw orbs pat: Is that allowed??

Still hasn’t seen the bone ball. Boneball watch 2k19

“Perfect for us whomst love to hate wear pants”

Spitballing this part because he hasn’t played it.

( picks up a reinforced club ) “I’ve joined the reinforced club. The club is me. I am the club.”

“goin’ on a quick loin cloth quest”

“I’m not sure what burning an undead bone shard does, but 420 was yesterday.” - I am not sure what this means but he isn’t wrong, I guess?

We’re gonna go burn an undead bone shard in a loincloth

“Loincloth is a bit more modest than previous ones but we got the legs exposed which is important” - good fashion advice from pat

“I do like the swing of the cloth it makes you think you might have a little peek if you get lucky”

“I’m touching a lady hold the fucking phone dude. Did I fail the touch?”

Young Man Charles was in the background for like 5 seconds and chat went absolutely nuts. As they should.

“I just wish we could get the ass out more in this game. I guess they cut down on the ass.”

Pat yeeted the sword master.

We’re gonna fuck up a tree. He’s the first or second big boss in Dark Souls 3

Content Warning: Nasty Boss. Pat’s gonna smack this tree’s groin area.

Faith is somehow not fond of this boss. I wonder why

Charlie showed up but Pat is busy busting these veggie’s nuts

Pat’s still adamant about not using the whip: “I’m not gonna whip this tree dude’s nards”

“Watchin’ Highlander on 4/20!”

Does not want to be hollow, would rather be ‘plump and svelte’

“I love when my elaborate attack doesn’t hit.” - A relatable gamer feel by Pat

Pat is having a sweaty one today

“We should clay-less…. We should mackle-less ( old man groaning noises )”

“I think the gentleman doth mackle too much.”

Oh, it’s drag JK Rowling o’clock! sipping_that_tea.jpg

According to Pat you psychologically cannot poop standing up

“Why did she say that? why did she do this?”

Chat says that babies poop standing up. Pat responds with, “Babies aren’t like us.”

“I’ve had enough poopoo peepee talk for today. Fuck JK Rowling.”

Chat is going full trans rights for seemingly no reason, it’s beautiful.

Was that little man always there? We may never know. Pat definitely does not remember the lil dude though, but seems to appreciate his presence nonetheless.

Here goes the french champagne

c h u n k y  r o l l i n ‘

admin duderave put that he spilled cottage cheese on himself in chat, “duderave… how much cottage cheese was spilled…”

admin duderave was laughed at for spilling cottage cheese on himself. it be like that sometimes.

Aerospoon back at it again gifting about 10 subs today. Nice goin’, buddy, doing God’s work on this fine Easter

He was talking about his next stream and got distracted by Charlie, as you do ( the next stream is tuesday at 8pm est )

He’s got the whole day off on Tuesday bc he worked pretty much all week due to traveling

After clicking around for a minute, decided to raid thatguyTagg, and said goodbye

End of stream!

[write-havoc]

The Glasswing Butterfly Part 15

Summary: Chuck has never thought of herself as anything special. Just an average beta living her life next door to a womanizing alpha named Negan. But her life, and Negan’s too, are turned upside down when Chuck suddenly presents as omega.

This is a non-zombie AU featuring A/B/O dynamics.

Fandom: The Walking Dead AU

Pairing: Negan/Original Female Character

Status: Ongoing

Contains: swearing, smut

Intended for readers 18+ of age only

Masterlist in my bio

Negan glances at his watch, his impatience growing with every minute. “What the fuck is taking so long?” he mutters.

Chuck, from the seat beside him in the waiting room, lets out a little huff. “Shush. I’m the one that should be cranky. I can’t wait to get this cast off so I can use my arm again.”

“Your arm’s gonna be fuckin’ creepy as shit.”

Chuck giggles. “What do you mean?”

“It’s gonna be all skinny.”

“Well, yeah. My muscle is gonna be weak.”

“I broke both my arms when I was a fuckin’ teenager. Fell out of a goddamn tree.”

“Really? How old were you?”

“Fifteen. It was right after I presented alpha and I was being a fuckin’ idiot trying to show off.”

“I bet that was fun,” Chuck jokes.

“Real fuckin’ fun. Especially since I got my casts off at the beginning of summer so I had to walk around with two spindly ass arms on display. Unless I wanted to wear fuckin’ sweaters in 100 degree weather.”

Chuck laughs. “Poor boy,” she jokes sarcastically.

“Thanks for the support,” he throws back.

She chuckles at his response. “Oh, I’m sure you did just fine in high school. Even with spindly arms, you still have this face.” She squeezes at his chin. “I bet your dance card was still full.”

He laughs. “‘Dance card’? When did you turn sixty?” he jokes.

She slaps his knee as she giggles. “It’s better than saying you got around.”

He puts his hand to his chest in fake offense. “How dare you.”

A nurse peeks her head into the waiting room, interrupting the couple. “Charlotte? This way, please.”

Over the next week, Chuck gets used to having full range of motion in her left arm again. The doctor had given her some exercises to do to get her strength up, which she does diligently. Being in the cast for six weeks had left her fairly stiff, which isn’t ideal for her new employment.

Chuck had found a job similar to what she did at Ad Astra. The only real difference is that instead of going into the office once a month, she’s expected to video chat with the rest of her team every week. Given her experience at her last job, she’s a little relieved to be able to stay at home this time around.

Despite working from the comforts of home, typing for a few hours at a time leaves her wrist sore. The doctor told her that would get better in time, once her muscles get stronger in her left arm. At the moment, though, it’s rather annoying.

She gets a little break from her work when the bank calls to have her and Negan go over some paperwork for the house. With the money Negan had saved plus some of Chuck’s severance from Ad Astra, they make a pretty hefty down payment. It doesn’t cover the entire cost, though. They still need to take out a loan for the difference, but it’s completely manageable. Especially if Negan starts teaching again.

“So?” Chuck asks expectantly as Negan enters her apartment.

“So?” he repeats, pretending he doesn’t know why she’s asking. Of course, he does. He had just been on the phone with Alexandria High School about possibly getting a job.

She walks over to him. “What did they say?”

“They said they’d talk to me after New Years.”

She scrunches up her face. “That’s it?”

“Yup.” He walks over to the refrigerator and pulls out a bottle of water.

“So... what does that mean?”

He takes a drink, wiping his mouth before answering. “They’re not gonna fuckin’ talk to me until after the holidays, I guess,” he reiterates.

She rolls her eyes. “I mean, was that a ‘don’t call us, we’ll call you’ kinda thing? Or did they sound hopeful?”

He puts the water away and turns to Chuck, pulling her into him by the hips. “It was a ‘you caught us right before Christmas break and we don’t wanna fuckin’ be here a minute longer, so this is gonna wait ‘til after we get back’ kinda thing.” He gives her a kiss and a smirk. “It’ll be fuckin’ fine, baby girl. If they don’t want me, I’ll look around.”

“Alexandria High School would be perfect, though. It’s only a fifteen minute drive from the house.”

“You know what?” He kisses her again. “I’m thinkin’ I’d make a good fuckin’ house husband. Just sit on my ass all day and let you take care of me,” he announces in fake seriousness.

She gasps, feigning shock. “In this economy?!” she jokes back.

He laughs. “You’re right. We’re in fuckin’ debt, as it is.”

“The house’ll be paid off in a few years, though,” she replies more seriously. “We’re starting off better than a lot of people.”

“You know what? When the mortgage is paid off, you can quit your job and for the rest of our days, I can take care of your fine ass.” He punctuates his point by grabbing that particular part of her body.

She giggles. “Negan!”

“What?” he replies as innocently as he can.

She pushes him away a little. “Since you sorta mentioned the holidays... This is gonna be our first Christmas together,” she changes the subject.

He gives her a smirk. “It will be.”

“Well, I don’t want you to get me a gift.”

He raises his eyebrows in question. “You don’t?”

“No. With the house and all... That’s gift enough for me.”

He gives a little shrug, knowing full well that he already has a present for her. “So we’re not giving gifts this year?” He really doesn’t care if she gets him anything or not. Even if Chuck never gives him a single gift, he’d still be happy just being with her.

“Yeah,” Chuck agrees, even though the gift she bought for Negan is already sitting in Aaron’s garage waiting for Christmas morning to come. “No gifts this year.”

When Christmas Eve comes, Chuck and Negan head out to Aaron’s to spend the holiday with him and Diane. After his house was cleared as a crime scene after the whole Eldritch thing, he remodeled the living room with new floors and all new furniture to get rid of the memories of the event. He thought of selling the place outright, but he couldn’t go through with it. That was the home he had built with Eric, after all. Besides, Chuck and Negan told him that they didn’t want him to sell.

As Chuck and Negan pull up to the house, Aaron and Diane meet them at the door.

“Hello!” Diane calls out and brings Chuck in for a tight hug.

“Uh.” Chuck returns the hug. “It hasn’t been that long since you’ve seen me.”

Diane pulls away. “No, but...” She gives a quick look to Negan. “I’m just excited about Christmas!”

Negan bends down to give Diane a quick hug. “Reel it in,” he whispers into her ear so Chuck won’t hear.

Once they enter the house, Chuck and Negan take their bags into the guest room then meet Diane and Aaron in the living room.

“The place looks fuckin’ great, Aaron,” Negan comments.

“Thanks. It just needed... new energy, I guess,” Aaron replies.

Diane jumps in. “You guys are sure you’re okay staying here? We can do this at my house this year.”

“Mom, we’re fine,” Chuck answers. “If we weren’t, we would have told you already. Besides,” she looks over to Aaron, “it’s our first Christmas without Eric. I want to spend it here.”

Aaron walks over to Chuck and gives her a hug. “Thanks, Chucky,” he whispers into her hair.

They all visit for a little bit in the living room before Aaron stands. “Well,” he stretches out his arms above his head, “I guess I better go get the pizza.” He grabs his keys and heads out.

“Pizza?” Negan asks to the two women in the room.

“It’s our Christmas Eve tradition,” Chuck answers. “We always get pizza, look through old pictures, then go to bed to wait for Santa to come.”

Negan bites back the dirty joke that pops into his head about hoping that Santa gets to cum tonight. “So I’m gonna get to look at baby pictures?” he says instead.

“I should’ve asked you to bring your old pictures, so you can join in on the embarrassment,” Chuck comments.

“Don’t have a lot of pictures, really. My parents weren’t the type to document all my birthdays and shit.”

“Are they still with us?” Diane asks.

Chuck knew a little about Negan’s parents, but it wasn’t a subject that he brought up freely most of the time. She wonders how Negan will react to her mother asking about them.

“My folks?” Negan shakes his head. “No. My mom died when I was a teenager and my father died a few years ago.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Diane comments.

“I’m not,” Negan says simply. “I mean, I loved my mom, but my father was a violent son of a bitch. One of those alphas that thought they owned everyone and every fuckin’ thing under them.” He shakes his head. “I wish he had fuckin’ died first.”

“Your mother was omega?” Diane assumes this to be true, since most betas can’t get pregnant with an alpha. It’s not impossible, but it’s unlikely.

“Yeah. She was omega. The submissive omega that never raised a hand in her own defense,” he says bitterly. “My father beat all the goddamn fight outta her.”

Chuck lays her hand on his knee. “You don’t have to talk about it if it hurts.”

“There’s not really much more to tell.” He looks over to Diane. “I left home at eighteen and never looked back. I promised myself I wouldn’t be the kind of alpha my fuckin’ father was and I intend on keeping that fuckin’ promise.”

Diane nods. “I know you’re not like that, Negan.”

Once Aaron comes back with the pizza, they sit down on the floor of the living room to eat as they watch classic Christmas movies. Once the pictures come out, they all gather around so everyone can see.

“Oh my god,” Negan calls out when Diane shows him one of Chuck’s newborn pictures. “Look at that fuckin’ red hair!”

“She’s always had a head full of hair,” Diane comments. “It was such a pain in the ass when she was little and I’d have to try to comb out the rat’s nests.”

“That’s why I cut it off short.”

“Oh yeah.” Negan grabs a lock of her hair, which is well pas her shoulders now. “Your hair was a lot shorter when we met.” He pauses. “Well, not ‘met’, I guess.”

“When I went crazy and made my presence known, you mean.”

“You didn’t go crazy. I fuckin’ deserved that shit, anyways. I was a dick.”

“Don’t bring that stuff up or I’ll have to get mad at you again,” Diane half jokes.

Negan holds his hands up in surrender.

“This is my favorite picture of Uncle Aaron!” Chuck points to a picture of Aaron as a chubby teenager with a horrible bowl cut, wearing short shorts and a neon T-shirt.

“Oh god,” he groans in embarrassment. “That was before puberty,” he explains to Negan. “Like a year after that I grew into my weight. And started picking out better clothes.”

Negan chuckles. “Adolescence is fuckin’ awful for everyone.”

The three other people all shoot Negan a look of disbelief.

“Really?” Chuck questions. “You couldn’t possibly have been that bad,” she points to the picture of Aaron, “before you presented as alpha.”

Aaron scoffs. “Thanks, Chucky.”

She giggles. “I’m just saying, Negan’s like the best looking man.” She looks to him. “I bet you came out of the womb ruggedly handsome.”

He laughs. “I had some awkward years. Braces, pimples, all that.”

Diane turns to a picture of Chuck when she was thirteen, hair in a messy pony tail, wearing a T-shirt with kittens on it and pink cotton shorts standing beside one of her classmates that always looked like she stepped right out of a catalog.

Chuck groans. “Thanks, Mom, for punctuating my point. How did I even leave the house back then?”

“You’re fuckin’ adorable. How old are you there?”

“Thirteen.”

“Shit, really? I thought you were like nine there.”

Diane adds, “The girl next to her is thirteen, too.”

Negan looks surprised. “Are you fuckin’ kidding me? I thought that was like a twenty year old babysitter.”

“Yeah. That’s how, like, all the girls were in my class, all makeup and abercrombie clothes. Meanwhile, when I was a senior, everyone thought I was a freshman.”

“At least you didn’t get pregnant in high school like some of your classmates,” Aaron comments.

“I guess. But I also sat out my prom to have a Lord of the Rings marathon, so...” She shrugs a shoulder.

As the night moves on, Diane and Aaron go to bed, leaving Chuck and Negan curled up on the couch in front of the fireplace.

He squeezes her into him more. “I cannot fuckin’ wait to sit by our own fireplace in our own house.”

She snuggles into him. “Me, too.”

“I was thinking... no offense, but my mattress is a lot fuckin’ better than yours and it’s only like a year old. I think we can use that and my bed frame for our room.”

“Oh, yeah. I agree. My bed can go in one of the spare bedrooms.”

“And we can turn the extra room into an fuckin’ study. Since you work from home, you need a fuckin’ proper place to do it.”

“That sounds good.”

“And I’m gonna get you a proper fuckin’ chair. That shitty ass thing you sit on now has to fuckin’ wreck your back.”

She giggles. “I’ve had that chair since college!”

“Exactly. You need one of those ergonomic, lumbar support chairs. Real leather and shit.”

“Have you ever bought a nice office chair? They’re crazy expensive.”

“That’s what my baby needs.”

She laughs. “I don’t need a thousand dollar chair when mine works just fine.”

He pulls her in to kiss her. “Only the best for my mate.”

“Oh, I see.” She pulls back and gives him a raised eyebrow. “This is an alpha thing,” she says without complete seriousness.

“An alpha thing?”

“You gotta be the best provider.”

“Damn right. How is that a bad thing?”

“It’s not a bad thing. It’s just,” she shrugs, “you alphas are weird.”

He chuckles. “Weird?”

“Yeah. I guess.” She shakes her head. “I don’t know. Wanting to protect someone, provide for someone as much as you do... It just seems so foreign to me.”

“Because you’ve never had anyone take care of you before. That doesn’t mean you don’t fuckin’ deserve it.”

She smiles. “It is nice, though.” She cuddles back into his side and closes her eyes in relaxation.

Negan glances at his watch. Four minutes until midnight. “Don’t fall asleep on me.”

She giggles, though she doesn’t open her eyes. “Stop being so warm then.”

“Aren’t I getting any tonight?”

She laughs. “Absolutely not.”

“Why not? It’s Christmas.”

“Because we’re in the same house as my mom and uncle and I’m not risking them hearing us.”

“Fair enough.” He looks at his watch again. It’s time. “Do you hear that?”

“Mm?” She doesn’t even lift her head.

He shoves his hand in his pocket and pulls out what’s inside. “Sounds like... hooves on the roof,” he continues.

She giggles, choosing to go along with it. “Is Santa here?” When she opens her eyes, she sees Negan’s hand close to her face, his pointer finger and thumb delicately holding onto a gorgeous diamond ring. She instantly sits up straight to get a better look at it. “Negan,” she gasps.

Holding the ring out to her more, he swallows hard as his heart rate actually picks up a little. “I know this is a little unnecessary, since we’re already fuckin’ mated, but I wanted to do this.” He pushes off of the couch and gets on one knee in front of Chuck. “Will you marry me?”

Her eyes focus on the simple platinum ring, one round diamond set by four prongs accented by two small bead set diamonds on each side of it. She’s utterly gobsmacked, having not even an inkling that this would happen.

Her silence has Negan actually getting more nervous. “The ring was my grandmother’s. My mom’s mom,” he explains. “My mother always hid it away from my father. I, uh, asked your mom if you’d like it. She said you would.”

Chuck continues to stare, unable to voice what she’s feeling.

“If you don’t like it, I can by you a new one. We can pick it out-“

“It’s beautiful,” she blurts out, tears welling up in her eyes. “I love it.”

He lets out a sigh of relief. “You do? It’s not too simple?”

“You know me; I’m not flashy.” She takes the ring from his hand and slips it on her left ring finger before he can do it himself. “It’s absolutely perfect.” Her genuine smile lights up her entire face.

“Fuck, I’m so glad you like it.” He pulls her chin toward him gently to kiss her. “Merry Christmas, baby girl,” he whispers into her lips.

The next morning, before Chuck and Negan can even sit down for breakfast, Diane grabs at Chuck’s hand to see the ring.

“It’s even more beautiful on her hand!” she practically squeals.

“God, Di,” Aaron chides. “You’re acting like you didn’t know this was gonna happen.”

Chuck looks to Negan, her hand still being clutched by her mother. “When did you tell them?”

“Right after we saw the house. I wasn’t fuckin’ sure if I should buy a new ring or give you that one.”

“I told him the antique was more romantic,” Diane explains. “And it’s perfect.” She throws her arms around Chuck and squeezes her. “I know you’re already legally mates, but I’m so excited to see you walk down the aisle.”

“You never thought that would ever happen, did you?” Chuck jokes.

Diane pulls back. “I always knew the right man would come along.” She walks over to Negan and wraps him in a hug, too.

Negan returns it happily, loving how accepted he feels into Chuck’s family. It’s in stark contrast to how Lucille’s family treated him. Her parents hated him from the get and never warmed up to him. Ten years of marriage to their daughter and neither of them ever hugged him. Not once. And holidays? Those were just awkward dinners, no traditions, no laughs, and they barely even included him.

He tried for years to impress them. Instead of using that old ring of his grandmother’s, he went into debt buying Lucille a big rock, hoping her parents would finally see that he would be a good mate for her. But they never did. And in the end, Negan supposes they were right. The infidelities, all the times he left her alone, not seeing that she was sick sooner...

Aaron’s voice breaks Negan out of his thoughts. “Breakfast is ready.”

After they sit down to eat, they move into the living room to sit in front of the tree for presents. Chuck and Negan mostly get things for the house from Diane and Aaron, which is practical. There are a few fun gifts, though. A nice bottle of scotch for Negan from Aaron, a Game Stop gift card for Chuck, some books and movies, too.

When all the packages are opened and the ripped up wrapping paper is cleared Chuck breaks the silence. It’s time to reveal her own surprise.

“I think I might’ve overheard Santa last night saying he left a present in the garage,” she continues the joke from the night before.

Negan smiles. “Is that so?”

“We’ll have to see.” Chuck can’t help but smirk. “I don’t know who it’s for so we’ll have to find out.”

Negan chuckles, knowing full well that whatever is out there is going to be for him. “Well, let’s go see.”

The four of them go out to the garage where there’s a large wrapped box in the middle of the floor. There’s a large tag hanging off the corner that says “To Negan From Santa”.

“Looks like it’s for me,” he says, acting like he didn’t already know that it would be.

Aaron clears his throat. “Santa might have mentioned that you just need to lift the box instead of open it.”

Negan laughs a little. “Alright.”

“I’ll help.” Chuck gets on one side of the box and Negan takes the opposite. “Alright. One, two, three.” They lift the box up and toss it to the side so Negan can take a good look at what was concealed underneath.

“Holy shit.” Negan’s eyes scan the body of the 1971 FX Superglide Harley Davidson before him. It’s not in pristine shape, but it still looks gorgeous to him. “Holy fuck.”

“Me and Mom tried to find your old one, but we don’t know what happened to it,” Chuck starts to explain. “Me and Aaron found this one, though. I thought you could work on it like you did before. Make it your own.”

“The frame’s in real good shape,” Aaron jumps in. “It needs a lot of work, though. I can help you rebuild it. If you want. Unless you want it to be your project...”

“That sounds fuckin’ amazing!” Negan responds immediately. “We can totally work on it together,” he adds with a huge smile on his face.

“You like it?” Chuck asks.

“Are you kidding me?! I fuckin’ love it!”

Diane clasps her hands to her chest. “Oh, I’m so happy you like it.”

The realization suddenly dawns on Negan. “You all did this for me?” he asks to the trio in the room.

“Chuck came to us about a couple months ago,” Diane starts. “She wanted to get you a bike but she didn’t know where to start.”

Aaron adds, “We were all looking for the perfect one for a while. I drove up to Pennsylvania to pick this one up a few weeks ago.”

Negan swallows hard for a few moments trying to rid himself of the lump in his throat. “No one’s ever done anything this fuckin’ nice for me before.”

Aaron pats him on the shoulder. “You’re family now. And we take care of our family.”

Negan just nods, afraid that if he’d speak again, his voice would give away his emotions.

Chuck can feel it, though. It’s confusing, like a bunch of feelings all jumbled up together. Considering Negan usually isn’t very emotional on any given day, Chuck is mostly used to just feeling contentment around him.

She grabs his hand and squeezes it. He action causes him to turn his head to look at her. Once he sees her smiling face, he can’t help but smile back.

“Are you okay?” she whispers.

“I’m so fuckin’ good.” He wraps her in a tight hug and all they both can feel is love.

After dinner, (which Negan felt compelled to do most of the work for) the family gathers in the living room.

“Are we playing Risk now, cuz I can’t fuckin’ wait to kick everyone’s asses,” Negan calls out.

Diane throws him a look. “You know what comes first.”

He was hoping they’d skip this part. “You don’t want me fuckin’ singing. Besides, singing around you guys is like playing fuckin’ basketball with Michael Jordan.”

They all laugh.

Chuck swats at his arm. “We’re only good because we sing a lot. You just need to practice. Besides, you had fun at Thanksgiving.”

“I’ll grab the guitars.” Aaron disappears then re-enters with a guitar in each hand. “Who wants it?” He looks between Chuck and Diane.

Chuck stands to take the offered guitar. “I know a song Negan knows.”

“You’re not fuckin’ helping me, here,” he says to her. “You’re supposed to play something I don’t know, so I have a goddamn excuse.”

Chuck laughs as she tunes the guitar. “I like your voice.” She strums the guitar once and starts to sing. “So. So you think you can tell.”

Aaron and Diane join in. “Heaven from Hell. Blue skies from pain.”

Negan just nods. “That’s a good song.” Reluctantly, he joins in. And he does have fun, though some of the time he just mouths the words so he can hear them sing, not wanting his own voice to ruin the harmonies.

After a few more songs, they sit down at the dining room table to play Risk.

“Chuck wins every year,” Diane informs Negan. “Just so you know.”

“Well, she’s never played me,” He replies cockily.

“I’d never take you for a board game type,” Aaron comments after he takes his turn.

“Risk is the shit,” Negan replies. “I used to hustle people with it in college for beer money.”

“Really?” Chuck giggles.

“Yeah. All the nerds would think I didn’t know my shit because I was an athlete, I guess. But I showed ‘em.” He finishes his turn. “It’s about fuckin’ strategy and I’m all about that shit. Like chess. You gotta plan shit out. Read your opponent. I won my fair share of money at chess, too. And table tennis. No one ever thinks anyone will actually take ping pong seriously.” He laughs to himself at the memories. “Shit, I hustled a lot of money back then.”

“You would’ve hustled me, for sure,” Chuck comments. “I never would’ve thought you’d be good at this just by looking at you.”

“I wouldn’t have hustled you. I only went after the assholes that thought they were top shit.”

Aaron scoffs. “Chuck’s pretty cocky about this.”

“With you guys,” she explains. “I would never be this cocky with strangers. Especially in college.”

As the game progresses, it becomes apparent that Chuck and Negan are fairly evenly matched. A few bad rolls of the dice by Chuck has Negan clenching the victory, though.

“Did Chuck just lose?” Diane exclaims with a laugh. “She’s never lost!”

Chuck rolls her eyes. “Whatever. I guess I can’t win them all.”

“Especially against me,” Negan rubs it in.

“It was a fluke,” Chuck bites back in a teasing way. “Best two outta three.”

“It’s getting late, sweetie.” Diane stands from her seat. “And I gotta be at work early tomorrow. I’m gonna get ready to head out.”

“Yeah. It’s getting late,” Negan agrees with a smug look on his face.

Chuck shakes her head, knowing that Negan just wants to leave the victor. “Fine,” Chuck concedes. “I guess we should get going, too.”

Chuck and Negan pack their things and say their goodbyes to Diane and Aaron. A couple hours later and they’re laying in Negan’s bed, ready to go to sleep.

“Did you have a nice Christmas?” Chuck whispers into Negan’s chest as he holds her to him.

“That might’ve been the best fuckin’ Christmas I’ve ever had.”

“Even though my family has crazy traditions?”

“They’re not crazy. I kinda love all that shit. And I cannot fuckin’ wait ‘til we get our own garage so I can start working on that bike.”

Chuck giggles. “Aaron was excited looking at motorcycles again. I wouldn’t be surprised if he buys his own to fix up.”

“Shit, I’d ride with him. Absolutely.”

“That can be, like, your guys’ thing.”

Negan smiles. “Your uncle’s a good guy. I wouldn’t fuckin’ mind hanging out with him at all.”

“I’m glad you guys get along.”

They’re quiet for a few moments. “You know,” Negan breaks the silence, “you kinda promised we’d get our fuck on when we got home.”

She laughs at him. “Is that how that conversation went?” he replies sarcastically.

“Pretty sure it was.” He’s not really being serious, though he certainly wouldn’t turn down sex.

Though Chuck is teasing him a little, she has something particular in mind. “Well,” she trails her hand down his bare torso, “if you insist.” She slides her fingers under the waistband of his boxers to wrap them around his cock, pumping him slowly as he grows hard.

“Shit,” he hisses. “That feels fuckin’ good.”

Chuck stops her motion to throw the blanket off of the both of them.

Negan groans at the loss of her hand on him as she pulls it away. When she moves down the bed, pulling his boxers completely off, he asks, “What are you doing, sweetheart?”

She places herself between his spread legs, her face hovering above his pelvis. “What do you think?” As she leans her head down, she grasps his cock, leading it to her lips.

“Chuck.” He takes her chin in his hand and pulls her face up. “What are you doing?” he asks again, this time more seriously.

She’s confused. “You don’t want me to...”

“Do you want to do this?”

“Yeah.”

“You’ve never wanted to suck me off before.”

“I just,” she shrugs a little, “I want to make you feel good. I’ve just been scared that I don’t know what I’m doing.” She looks up to him. “But I want to try. Learn how to do it.”

The jolt of arousal travels through him before he can even think about it. “Alright,” he agrees, trying not to sound eager.

Remembering what the women did in the porn she had watched before, she licks a long stripe over his shaft to the head, placing a kiss right on the tip. She’s pretty sure she’s not going to be able to deep throat him, so she only takes in the end, using her hand to stroke the base.

“Swirl your tongue, baby,” Negan instructs as he snakes his fingers through her hair.

With the pad of her tongue, she caresses the underside of the head, finding a particularly sensitive part.

“Fuck,” he groans and inadvertently clenches his fist into her hair. “Shit, sorry.”

Since that got a good reaction, she continues doing it until her tongue gets tired.

Negan realizes what’s happening and pulls her face away gently. “Spit up your palm and use your hand more.”

She does as instructed, stroking him from base to tip with her hand. When she decides to speed up, Negan lets out a low groan. The fact that she’s giving him this pleasure brings a smile to her face.

Negan leans up to tug at Chuck’s tank top. “Take your shirt off, baby. Let me see you.”

She pulls back to lift her shirt over her head, leaving her torso bare for him.

He takes the opportunity to cop a feel before you lays back to rest on his elbow. “Fuck, you got the best tits.”

She giggles a little at his praise then takes ahold of him again, his tip now swollen and leaking freely.

“Suck on it, baby girl.” He gently leads her head back down to him, trying hard to hold himself from bucking up into her mouth.

Putting her lips back around him, she hollows her cheeks and bobs her head as much as she’s able to. What she can’t take in, she strokes with her hand, in time with the motion of her head.

Negan throws his head back, his breathing starting to labor. “Oh, fuck, that’s good.”

Chuck notices when he moves his hand to cup his balls, so she brings her free hand up to replace it. If that’s what he likes, then she wants to be the one to do it. Her neck and jaw are starting to tire again, but she pushes through, wanting to get him to his end.

“Shit, I’m almost there,” he groans with his eyes shut tightly and his brows pinched together.

As soon as Chuck feels him twitch, she pulls her mouth off of him, continuing to stroke him through his orgasm with both hands, milking him of everything that he has.

“Fuuuuck.” He takes in a deep breath. “Shit, that was awesome.”

She giggles at his breathless voice. “It was?” She wanted it to be good for him, so she’s happy that he enjoyed himself.

“Yeah, baby girl.” He pulls her up to lay beside him and gives her a smirk. “But now it’s your turn.”

Just over a week later, Chuck and Negan move into their new house in Alexandria. With their rented moving van, they get all of their belongings into their new home. Most of Negan’s furniture is much better quality than Chuck’s, so they use his table and chairs for the dining room, his couch and arm chairs for the living room, and his bed for the master bedroom upstairs. Chuck’s bed goes to one of the guest rooms and their pair of desks go to the spare room as an office/study along with Chuck’s couch. Chuck’s tv goes in the living room, with Negan’s smaller one taking up residence in the study. Overall, they don’t really end up with a bunch of extra stuff somehow, just one microwave, Chuck’s kitchen table and chairs, and a coffee table, which all get sold to some college kids.

Aaron and Diane stop by in the afternoon to lend a hand, which makes the task of getting all that stuff situated a little easier. When dinner time comes, Rick, Michonne, and Rick’s son Carl stop by with pizza for everyone. The food is certainly welcome, considering everyone has worked up an appetite getting everything moved in. By the time everyone leaves and Chuck and Negan actually get into bed, they’re pretty much asleep before their heads hit the pillow.

The next morning, Chuck wakes up to the smell of bacon, coffee, and waffles wafting up the stairs. She makes her way to the first floor, through the living room, and into the kitchen where Negan is standing at the counter in front of the waffle maker.

“This shit’s almost done. Go sit down in the dining room ,” he stresses.

Chuck giggles as she hugs him from behind. “We have our own dining room,” she marvels.

“We sure fuckin’ do,” he responds with a grin, ear to ear.

A few days later, Negan makes the short drive to Alexandria High School to meet with the principal, a woman named Joanne Delaney. They had talked on the phone before, but now it’s time for a face to face meeting. He’s led through the halls and to her office.

“Sit, Mr. Negan.” The beta in her early sixties holds her hand out to one of the chairs in front of her desk.

“Just ‘Negan’ is fine.” He unbuttons his suit jacket and takes his seat.

“You can call me Jo.” She smiles warmly at him. “I contacted Massapontax High and they gave you a glowing recommendation.”

“That’s fuckin’ good to hear.”

She looks at him completely serious. “You know, I was warned about your colorful language.”

Oh shit Negan thinks. He had done so well to keep it in check on the phone with this woman, but he pretty much immediately fucked it up in her presence.

Jo can’t keep up the ruse and her expression breaks into a smile. “You know, ten years ago, I wouldn’t have even met with you because of that. But I’m old now. I’ve spouted off my fair share of four letter words.”

Negan lets out a sigh of relief. “I was about ready to say I’d try my best to be a boy scout, there.”

She chuckles. “Well, I like you, Negan, and you’re good on paper. Unfortunately, we don’t have any place to put you this year.”

He nods sadly. “I figured as much.”

“ Fortunately , however,” she adds, “our current gym teacher is set to retire at the end of the year. So if you want the position, it will be yours next fall.”

“Yeah!” he agrees enthusiastically. “Of course I want it!”

“Until then, would you consider being a substitute? We are very low on substitute teachers right now and that’d be a great way for you to get back into the swing of things. You’ve been out of the game for a decade.”

Negan is all smiles. “Yeah, of course I’d come in when you needed me.”

She nods, then clears her throat nervously. “Could I ask you a more personal question?”

“Uh, sure.”

“Why did you walk away from teaching? All I heard was how great you were at your job. How much the kids loved you.”

He lets out a soft huff, not exactly wanting to go over this. “My wife died. It, uh... I ran away from shit after that. For a long time.”

Jo nods in understanding. “I lost my husband a few years ago. I took a year to myself. I thought about retiring, but I found that I really wasn’t ready to hang this all up yet.”

“Yeah,” he chuckles a little at himself, “I needed a nudge in the right direction, I guess.”

“Whatever got you here, I think you’re going to be a great addition in our physical education department. I do have to add, though, that our baseball coach is here to stay. I know you coached at your old school.”

“That’s fine, really. I’m just fuckin’ excited to start teaching.”

She stands and extends her hand. “Welcome aboard.”

Negan parrots the action and shakes her hand. “Thank you for this.”

She leads him to her door. “We’ll call you about the substitute teaching. Probably in a few weeks.”

“I’m ready whenever you need me.”

The entire ride home, Negan can’t help but smile as he thinks about teaching again. Sure, he made good money at the dealership, but that was literally the only good thing about it. When he was teaching, he was able to see the impact he made in those kids’ lives. He used to live for that. And the prospect that he’d be able to do that again has him positively giddy.

When Chuck hears the garage door open, she knows the Negan is home. She jumps up from the couch to wait for him at the door that leads to the garage. Once he comes through the door, she greets him with a kiss.

“Well?” she asks expectantly.

He shrugs, trying to act disappointed. “There’s no fuckin’ openings this year.”

“Oh.” She gives him a hug. “I’m sorry.”

He holds onto her like he needs the comfort. “But I’m hired for next year,” he adds on quietly.

She pushes back immediately to look at his face. “What!?”

“Yup.” He smiles wide. “The phys ed teacher is fuckin’ retiring this year. And I’m gonna substitute for the rest of the year.”

She slaps him on the arm. “You had me worried.”

He pulls her in for another hug. “I know. But shit worked out.”

“I’m so happy, Negan.”

He kisses her on the head. “Me, too.”

They settle in more to their new community in the coming days, talking to new neighbors, visiting the shops in town, and familiarizing themselves with the rules of the homeowners association (since Negan is excited to work on the yard when spring comes.)

One day, Negan and Chuck head to the grocery store to restock their pantry. As they peruse the aisles leisurely, they check off the items on their list.

“We need your cereal,” Negan says with a smirk.

“Don’t even act like you didn’t eat any of the Froot Loops we had.”

He just shrugs and turns down the aisle. They see a short woman in her mid thirties struggling to stretch up to grab the Raisin Bran she wants.

“Need some help there, honey?” Negan asks.

The beta woman turns around and gives him a smile. “Oh, yes. If you could, please.”

As Negan easily picks the box up from the shelf, the woman only has eyes for him. It makes Chuck want to roll her eyes at the way she’s blatantly checking him out.

“There you go.” He hands the box to the woman.

“Oh, thank you so much!” She places her hand on his arm.

Now Chuck really does roll her eyes.

“Don’t worry about it.” Negan gives the beta a smile and moves back behind his cart.

Chuck quickly finds what cereal she wants and drops it in with the rest of their groceries. “Alright. What’s next on the list?”

“Meat,” Negan answers.

When they step up to the busy deli counter, Negan groans.

“Of course the line is fuckin’ backed up.” He rolls his eyes then turns to Chuck. “Why don’t you just take the cart and get the rest of the shit while I wait here.”

“Alright.” She takes the cart and heads off to pick up some produce.

After several minutes of looking for what she needs, she hears someone come up behind her.

“Charlotte?” the male voice says.

She turns around and sees Casey, one of the alphas from Alpha for You she met with all those months ago.

“Casey?” is all she can think to say.

“Yeah. That’s me. Was it ‘Chuck’ you went by?”

“Oh yeah. Chuck.”

“I remembered it was an unusual nickname. How have you been?” He asks politely.

“I’ve been good,” she answers, not wanting to go over all the craziness she has actually been through.

“I guess I know why you never called any of us.” He points to her neck and the faint mating scar there.

She giggles a little. “Yeah. I met my mate, so...” She laughs nervously, not really knowing what to say.

“Well, that’s great!” he responds genuinely.

“Thanks.” She smiles at him. “I’m sure you guys were veerrry upset I didn’t require any of your services,” she jokes sarcastically.

He laughs. “Actually, I was a little disappointed. With your illness, of however you want to call it, I wanted to help you. But I’m happy you found your mate. That’s really awesome!”

“That’s really nice of you to say.”

Even though Casey is an alpha, he’s not your typical one.  At 6’ even, he’s an inch or two shorter than average and where alphas are typically muscular, he’s a little more doughy. He also has a gentleness that alphas don’t usually possess. Casey is just a genuinely nice guy.

If Negan hadn’t been there for Chuck, she would have chosen Casey to get her through her heats. She’s not exactly attracted to him, but his soft demeanor put her at ease more than any of the other alphas.

“So what brings you up here from Charlottesville?” he asks.

“I live in Alexandria now. My mate and I moved in a few weeks ago.”

“Small world! I grew up in Alexandria. My mom still lives there. I like to visit her a couple times a month and make her dinner.” He holds up the half full basket in his hand. “I just needed to pick up an onion.”

Chuck looks back to the shelf behind her and the varieties of onions there. “Oh.” She moves away to give him the space to pick what he wants. “Sorry.”

“No. No. It’s alright.” He chuckles. “I’ve enjoyed catching up with you.”

As Chuck turns back to Casey, she can see just over his shoulder that Negan is approaching them. And he doesn’t look happy. “Negan,” she calls out, hoping that maybe the oncoming interaction will be much friendlier than she thinks it might be.

The man in question continues on his trajectory, swiftly putting himself between his mate and this new alpha, glaring at him all the while.

Casey takes a few steps back and puts his hands up in a placating motion. “We were just talking,” he says quickly, recognizing the look on this alpha’s face.

Chuck steps out from behind Negan, hoping to calm this situation. “Negan, this is Casey.”

“I know who the fuck he is,” he bites back. He recognized his scent almost immediately as one of the alphas that Chuck had in her apartment. “He’s an alpha whore.”

“Negan,” Chuck chides, fully mortified that he is acting this way.

“It’s okay,” Casey replies diplomatically. “I get it. I’m a strange alpha around your mate,” he says to Negan. “But you don’t have anything to worry about. I’m actually in a committed relationship.”

“You expect me to believe that would fuckin’ stop you.” Negan takes a step toward the other alpha.

Chuck grabs ahold of Negan’s arm and tugs him back. “Stop. Everything’s fine. Let’s just pay and leave.”

With a final growl in Casey’s direction, Negan turns to Chuck. “Fine. We’re leaving.”

Thankfully, there’s not much of a wait at the checkout lines, so they get their groceries paid for and bagged up pretty quickly, though the air is tense between the two of them. Once they’re out in the car alone, they let it all out.

“You’re fuckin’ pissed at me,” Negan comments.

“Yeah. I am,” Chuck bites back.

He turns as much as he can in the driver’s seat to face her. “Well what the fuck did you expect me to do?”

“ Not be a dick about it. Casey didn’t deserve that.”

“Oh, didn’t he?”

“No. He didn’t. He’s just a nice guy that was being friendly.” She lets out a huff. “Besides, did I say anything when that woman was flirting with you?”

He scrunches up his face in confusion. “What woman?”

“The Raisin Bran woman! And you didn’t do much to tell her off, either.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah!”

“That’s different and you know it!”

“You’re right. It is different. Because Casey was just being friendly and Miss Raisin Bran was checking you out!”

“Women are gonna flirt with me, Chuck. I can’t fuckin’ stop them!”

“And men are gonna talk to me!”

“I don’t give a shit if men talk to you, but I sure as fuck care if alphas come sniffing around. Do I have to remind you what happened with the last alpha that had an interest in you?”

Chuck is taken aback that Negan would bring Eldritch up this. “Really, Negan?” she responds almost sarcastically.

He lets out a heavy breath and scrubs his hand down his face. “I’m sorry. That was fucked up.”

“Yeah. It was.”

Negan reaches over to take her hand in his. “I fuckin’ worry, okay? I worry about keeping you safe.”

“It’s okay to want me safe, but you gotta be sensible about it. Nothing is going to happen in a grocery store in the middle of the day.”

“Yeah. I know,” he admits as he hangs his head.

“Is this really just about... you being scared that something might happen again? Or is it... alpha stuff?”

He looks over to her. “Alpha stuff?”

“You know. Alpha...” She doesn’t know how to say it, though he figures it out on his own.

“Possessive?” he completes her thought.

“Yeah.”

“You know I would never hurt you.”

“I know, but...”

He shakes his head. “You are my mate. So, yeah, I guess I’m a little possessive. But I’m not gonna fuckin’ lock you up or keep you home as a goddamn brood whore. Or anything else fuckin’ knothead alphas you see on the news do to their mates. I just...” He lets out a breath. “I overreacted. He was the first alpha to be around you since...” He shakes his head. “And we’ve only been mated for two months. You know the doc said shit could be more intense before we go through our first cycle.”

“Yeah. But I don’t want us getting a reputation around town already.”

He brings her hand up to his moth to place a kiss on her knuckles. “I’m sorry. It won’t happen again, baby girl.”

“You’ll keep your alpha in check?”

He chuckles. “I will certainly fuckin’ try.”

“Okay.” She leans over to kiss him. “Let’s get this food home so you can make us dinner.”

He laughs as he starts the car. “You’re fuckin’ helping me.”

She giggles. “I can supervise. Like management.”

“So I do all the work and you still get to eat?”

“Yup.”

He gives her a smile. “Sounds good to me.”

[im-fandomtrash]

I'm just gonna go ahead and make a big boy post of the matsunos (feat. teeny tiny bit of Totoko and atsushi) saying things ive heard, and said, but with 0 context

Karamatsu: you guys are seriously ruining my country vibe

Ichimatsu: Bitch you don't even listen to country music.

_______________________

Choromatsu: if your house was burning down and you could only save one thing, what would you save?

Karamatsu: hmm.....

My dear burazzas~💕

Todomatsu: I'd save my fucking house??? What you tryna save a damn pencil????

__________________________

Some random teacher: *doing rolecall* uh... Matsuno?

Literally any of them: Yea all six of us are here

Teacher: what

__________________________

Ichimatsu: whats lighter, 100 pounds of feathers or 100 pounds of dead babies

Choromatsu: Why babies,,,,,

Ichimatsu: *menacing glare*

__________________________

Choromatsu: why do people?? Hate kanye so much??

Karamatsu: Cause he's such a fucking hoe

Osomatsu: hes a sick fuck he likes to quick fuck I guess

Osomatsu: ...

Osomatsu: hey what if Kanye was a slav- oh hey mo bamba is playing!!

Choromatsu: WHAT IF KANYE WAS A W H A T??

__________________________

Osomatsu: *has his mouth covered with tape*

Osomatsu: *starts writing down on paper*

Osomatsu: *lifts the paper up*

Paper reads; Karen I wanna see the kids, Karen please I miss the kids

__________________________

Karamatsu: aaah... the fish are nibble me... its so tickle~

Choromatsu: oh my god that english was so bad...

Todomatsu: not only was it BAD, but it was HORRENDOUS

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: lickle my wickle tickle my pickle

__________________________

Osomatsu: IM GONNA FUCKIN PUT MY DICK IN THE OWL!!!!

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: playdough, but backwards

Osomatsu: I agree

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: *throws apple seeds at karamatsu*

Karamatsu: I just got seeded......

Choromatsu: what the fuck

__________________________

Karamatsu: I don't wanna go to the gym, I even do physical activities, the only physical activity I do is uhhh *thinking*

Osomatsu: Sex.

Karamatsu: shut the fuck up. I do. but shut the fuck up

__________________________

Todomatsu: you ever go in the kitchen just to find out youre the only snack in the house?

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: there's no balls in my hosue. Except for my little brothers balls

Todomatsu with the deepest voice you could ever fucking imagine: Sup bitch whatcu tryna do?

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: its slick backage

__________________________

Totoko: *shows picture of cheese* doesnt this look like james fucking charles??

__________________________

Choromatsu: hey ive like, never seen a person of color working at any of the cracker barrels around here... Like,,, its ALL white people, do they even hire people that arent white??

Osomatsu: Well I guess the first word is cracker for a reason

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: God, I just love me some SHRIMPIES

__________________________

Atsushi: Totty is good at soccer because hes gay

Todomatsu: You're right, I love kicking balls

__________________________

Karamatsu: burazzah?? wheres the trash can??

Ichimatsu: Over there

Karamatsu: thank you, I owe you my life

Ichimatsu: Hop right in there while youre at it

Karamatsu: Ichimatsu.

__________________________

Choromatsu fapping to porn: Gamer girl piss is so good...

__________________________

Osomatsu: *driving a car* shut up I know where I'm going btich

*literally 2 minutes later*

Osomatsu: Where the fuck am i

__________________________

Choromatsu: Its sorta like a mix of moses and Crocker

Jyushimatsu: muslims and crackers????

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: okay have/take a sit

__________________________

Ichimatsu @ karamatsu: he looks like a rat

__________________________

Osomatsu: shut up whore

Totoko: Don't call people a whore you stupid whore

__________________________

Jyushimatsu: he doent even KNOW the circumference and radius of the sun!!! *stereotypical nerd laugh!!!!*

__________________________

SORRY THAT WAS SO LONG FRENS. BUT IVE BEEN WAITING TO USE ALL THEESE QUOTES FOR SO LONG.. THEY WERE ALL STASHED AWAY IN MY PHONE

I wanna draw some of these out tbh,,,

[jo-the-schmo]

It Smells Like Rain. Part 1

A/N: This is the first fic I’ve written for MCU, so honestly a lot of stuff is gonna be weird. I kinda mixed universes and make mentions to things that have happened because those movies are too good to not? I promised my friend @aurasphereriolu2 I would write this so I hope you enjoy this Thor x gender neutral reader. 

Warnings: Swearing, puns, not much else honestly?

Word count: 6,855

Your nose instinctively scrunched up when you stepped out of the sleek, nondescript, black car that took you into the city. The driver stepped out as well, along with your new sorta boss, Nick Fury. “It smells disgusting here.” You almost felt like gagging, the swirling scent of smog screamed into your nostrils. Nick let out a chuckle that didn’t really suit his character. “You’ll get used to it.” He motioned for you to follow him and the driver into the Avengers tower. You adjusted the band on your fingerless gloves as you all made it past security and into a reflective elevator. You decided to break the silence, “So, got any tips for a newbie?” You said with a hint of sarcasm. But Fury seemed to actually ponder that question. “If you don’t break anything and are okay with dark humor, you’re in with Tony. Just be nice to both of our local spiders and neither should have a problem with you. Don’t be an asshole to Cap. Keep it calm with Bruce and Barnes. And just exist around Thor, then you should be fine.” “Wow, last one sure sounded easy.” You snorted. “He is.” The elevator dinged, sliding open its doors to reveal a spacious room. Extremely modern, stylish, and only semi professional. You were surprised the room was empty, that’s a rare sight for a place that’s supposed to be extra protective. “Alright kids, you know I called a meeting, get your asses in gear.” Fury’s voice shifted to being almost as dramatic as his jacket. Seriously, that thing cannot be too practical. It sure looks cool though...I kinda want one. It only takes a few moments for the room to fill with people. The first of which being the famous Spider-Man. “Sorry! I had to find my mask!” He lets out a charismatic laugh. Why do I feel the strange urge to protect him with my life? Next is the Captain himself, with a sweet grin and some semblance of facial hair going on. “Hello! I’d like to welcome you to the Av-“ he’s soon cut off by another man, Tony Stark. “That would be my line, Colonel Purple Mountains Majesty.” He takes a bite of a...peach? Is that just a straight up peach? “Don’t steal my thunder.” “And you shouldn’t steal mine!” A booming voice echos from down the hall as a tall, blond man comes behind Tony and puts a strong arm around him. You recognize him as Thor. He’s bigger? In person? Weird. “Can we stop doing this cheesy lead up as a way to cleverly introduce ourselves? You all are giving me a migraine.” Black Widow says with disdain as she strolls in through a different hallway, reading something on a hologram tablet. “I’ll second that.” Bruce Banner mumbles as he adjusts his glasses. Has he...slept? Recently? He looks like he’s dying a little bit. Bruce looks around. “Where are the others at?” “Probably getting into trouble.” Thor sighs with a smile on his face. You cannot read what emotion he’s feeling. “Hopefully the good doctor isn’t.” Tony rolled his eyes. “Alright, enough of family sitcom intro sequence, I don’t care where the hell the others are because they aren’t my responsibility. We have important matters to discuss.” Fury gesture a hand towards you, as if he were presenting you. “I’d like for you all to welcome our newest agent. On normal circumstances, you all would’ve met her already. But unfortunately, those aren’t our circumstances. This is Agent L/N. They’re here to help deal with our recent conundrum...” Fury trails off. “Oh! You mean Metalhead?” Spider-Man suggests. “That is...not the name we were going with but yes, Metalhead.” You can’t see the facial expressions on whoever is wearing that mask but you can feel him smirking. Tony walks over to you in confident but effortless stride. Everything about him seemed very natural and blasé. You were surprised by the fact that apparently he enjoyed Metallica, at least that’s what his shirt suggested. “So what’s your deal? I need to come up with a clever nickname.” And apparently he’s extremely self aware. He extended his hand to you. “Got a name?” “Y/N.” You shook his hand with a firm grip before Fury answered his earlier questions. “Agent L/N is going to aiding you in your pursuit against ‘Metalhead’. I picked them specifically for the job because- well, maybe I should let them show you.” After hearing multiple people agree, you were ushered over to the center of the room with everyone surrounding you in a circle. You took the glove off your dominant hand and let in a deep breath. At least the air in here is a little cleaner... You looked around the room for a good place. Thor took especial interest in what you were doing. Finally you found something that wouldn’t break.   You spotted a bonsai tree by the large window and gently showed your hand in its direction. The veins in your arm began to glow and in an instant, the bonsai began to grow rapidly. Spider-Man latched onto the wall near the elevator as he gasped in surprise. You took slow steps  toward the shaping tree. A branch lowered itself down to you and allowed you to step onto the trunk. It didn’t buckle under your weight because of your infused power. You waved your hand and the tree extended, moving you back to the center of the circle. Everyone was thoroughly surprised by the realization. “You’re a mutant?” Widow asked. Banner seemed confused. “Wait, why a mutant? Aren’t they kinda a different department or something?” He asked, eyes squinted. “Well I’m not a teenager anymore, and let’s just say that the whole setting doesn’t fit me anymore.” You could tell everyone wanted you to elaborate but instead you hopped off the bonsai and waved it away. The tree twisted and shrank back down to its original size, looking completely untouched. “Looks like we got a second green thumb around here.” Tony pointed out. “I hate that.” Cap said with a grimace. “Get them accustomed to the area and I’ll check back in tomorrow so we can go over plans. Tony, play nice, we need them for this.” With that, Fury left with the elevator. “I’d offer to show you around but Bucky asked to train with me after the meeting. Call me Steve, by the way.” I’m gonna call him Rogers. You thought as he quickly left the room.

“Same here, the big guy and I have some-“ Tony pauses. “Spidey, cover your ears.” You raise an eyebrow when you actually see Spider-Man cover the sides of his head with his hands. “Some science shit to work on.” He signals for the ear covering to stop.

“You don’t have to do that y’know? Swearing isn’t a big deal.”

“The fact that you call it swearing means I’m right in my decisions.” Tony pays Bruce’s shoulder and the both of them turn around and open the door to an all glass lab.

“It was nice to meet you, Y/N! I have to go work on my suit for a bit, but I’ll be back later to pick your brain!” And with that, he bounced out of the room. He sure is enthusiastic. You turned your attention to the blonde woman in the outfit that matched her personality.

“I just don’t wanna do it. Big, dumb, blonde idiot, you blabber to her for a bit.” She barely looked up from the screen. Thor let out a hearty laugh.

“Don’t mind her, you get used to her.”

“She’s charming.” Though I suppose I’d be in the same mood if this was my everyday. Thor gave you his hand. You slid your glove back on before shaking his hand. His grip was surprisingly gentle for someone so...that.

“My name is Thor Odinson. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

“Likewise.” You took a deep breath through the nose and suddenly were caught off guard. What’s that...smell? “Rain?” You pondered out loud. Your hand fell back to your side as Thor clapped both his together with a bright smile on his face.

“Ah, you smell that? You must have a good nose, I never hear people comment on that.” He seemed almost excited that someone caught on. “I’m the god of thunder, the scent comes with the deal.” You fell silent for a moment.

“Oh, I’m gonna have to be around you A LOT!” You allowed yourself a sigh of relief. “Do you know how bad the city smells? I hate it! I’m gonna need to set up a greenhouse here or something.”

“Well I can provide the rain if you have an open roof.” Thor spike with delight

“Think Stark will be okay with this?”

“I’d wager so, he’s usually fine with most of our antics.”

“Well I need one anyway, can’t really sleep in a stuffy room with chemicals spilling around me.”

“Let me show you around, it’ll give you an excuse to figure out where your choice of stay will be.” You followed him around for a majority of the day, incidentally learning a lot about him with every floor.

“You seemed the least surprised about my whole, plant thing. Guess it’s not too weird in comparison to being a god.”

“That, and someone in my realm has that exact skill set. Asgard is quite the place.”

“Why is there a hole in the wall there?”

“That would be my brother, Loki. He had a bit of a rat incident, got stuck in the wall.”

“Wow…”

“Yeah, that’s my brother for ya.”

You were able to understand a general layout of the building and knew where your room was supposed to be. But you refused. You didn’t have much sent with you so managed to convince Thor to grab a few bags while you got all your potted plants and made your way to the only space that connected with the outside other than the ground itself. You were fully aware that this area was meant for the helipad but you didn’t care. Thor seemed rather confused, examining you as you flitted about the open, outdoor space.

“You...plan to sleep outside?”

“Fury obviously didn’t get the memo…”

“What memo?”

“I can’t exactly stay inside for too long.” You had him put all the stuff down so he could focus on what you were saying, since he was obviously still perplexed. You ungloved your hand once more to demonstrate. You usually tried to let nature take its course with your plants but for the sake of explanation, made an exception to your rule. With the opposite hand, you carefully extracted a piece of a succulent you were trying to propagate.

“My body is heavily in tuned with the natural world.” You paused and made sure he watched as you placed the small shred of green onto your naked palm. In an instant, the succulent began to grow, and it wasn’t long before it came to its full size. It took 2 seconds. “So much so that I can bring life to something that has long since past. But that comes with a few setbacks on my end.”

“What do you mean?”

“My body itself acts more similar to a plant than a flesh person. I need to be outside a surprising amount. I actually did sleep in the court yard back at Xavier’s. And if I’m being completely honest, my presence out here might help clean the air a bit.” Thor nodded along, he didn’t seem confused anymore, he actually looked quite pleased with what he learned.

“Well, that certainly is a wonderous ability to-“ his hand reaches for your own, the one that held the succulent. You panicked and dropped it to the ground, pulling your hand back just in time to escape Thor’s touch. You hastily put the glove back on as his own hand reeled back in surprise. “I apologize, I certainly did not mean to-“

“No, no! You’re fine, you are all good! Just...just don’t touch my bare hands. My fingers are okay but not my palms or the backs of my hands. Just a safety precaution.”

“Do you mind me asking why exactly?” His words were soft and curious.

“Well, my power generates from certain points on my body. My palms and the soles of my feet. I can pull the power to my fingers and stuff like that, but there’s no guarantee that bare contact won’t just turn whatever I touch into something more...organic? It isn’t intentional, it just happens and I never know when it’s coming so I always cover my palms.”

“That seems rather stressful…”

“Pfft, mine’s a summer breeze compared to some other mutants. As long I’m not stupid and you’re not stupid, it should be okay. Which neither of us are, nor anyone in this building from what I’d guess.” You laughed at your own statement. After all, some of the world’s greatest geniuses are here. But Thor seemed rather surprised by your statement. He quickly shook it off and his usual smile was brought to his face.

“Well, let’s go bother Stark in his lab, you do need somewhere to sleep!”

…

…

…

Your stay with the Avengers has been interesting to say the least. In the time you’ve been there, only 3 days, you have seen 5 windows shatter, a coffee machine literally implode, and have gotten stuck to the wall because Clint (who had just come back after some time off) decided to scare poor Spidey while you got caught in the crossfire of his reaction. There were plenty of good things to come of it though.

You did in fact get your greenhouse, that night actually. You didn’t expect Thor to be so persuasive, but you suppose it’s not too outlandish to see that. Spider-Boy (name pending) also kept to his word. He did find you the next day and ‘picked your brain’ for a bit. He was a nice kid, a smart one too. He never ran out of questions to ask you, but was always very polite about it.

Today, you were in your greenhouse. It wasn’t, gigantic or anything. Not nearly as grandiose as your one back at Xavier. You were glad they kept their word when you requested someone still take care of it. But you were just happy that you had something to work with. You took off your gloves and slid them into your back pocket. With a wave of your hand, two tree limbs exuded from your arms and pushed open the folding roof, careful to not break the glass. This by far was your favorite feature. The glass panes were good enough to allow proper sunlight but something about letting the sun into the small structure whenever you wanted was very nice.

As you got yourself busy, you became lost in thought. You were supposed to come here to help solve the ‘Metalhead’ problem but it hasn’t been talked about since your first day. Furthermore, he’s been keeping a low profile ever since you arrived, it was making you a bit anxious. You wondered what he could be planning. I should talk to Tony and Rogers about it when I get the chance.

“You’re up early!” You heard the voice of the young Spidey as he perched himself on the edge of the greenhouse.

“Early Bird gets the worm, yeah?”

“Oh, worm?” You facepalm. He laughs at your reaction.

“Are you ready to get to work?” For the past 2 days, Spidey has been dropping by to help you with your plants. Apparently he can’t take care of a regular plant to save his life.

“You bet!” He hopped down and put a pair of gloves on over his already covered hands, which never stopped being funny to you. You tried to change up which bed he took care of so that he would learn different things. Today you instructed him on how to care for the few small trees you had inside. One being a peach tree (under Stark’s request). Man likes his peaches, I guess.

The two of you were oddly silent when you worked. This was unusual for him at least because he always had a question to ask. Can you sleep inside? Yes. Why don’t you? Well, my body gets a lot of its energy from being outside in general. Are you telling me you go through photosynthesis? Sort of, the sun does play a part in it but being outside in general keeps me working. Winter is a bit of a struggle but I make it work. Do you need to eat? Yes, I do. Most of my energy comes from being outside but I am still a person. He’d ask a lot about your powers but also about your favorite movies and shows. He was happy to hear that you plan on sticking around in the city to help with air quality. How much clean air do you generate? Hmmm, last time I checked it was about the same amount as 10,000 trees. That’s a lot of damage! Yeah, it is. How exactly does that work? Well, trees can absorb harmful gases and pollutants in the air and filter clean air back out. My skin does the same thing. You almost didn’t notice him finally start talking while you pondered.

“Why do you do this?”

“Hm?” The question was vague but genuine.

“Why do you take care of plants by hand when you can summon them whenever you want?” That was a question nobody had really asked you before. It took you a second to find the right response.

“Well… Where’s the fun in that?” You paused what you were doing and turned to look at him. “There’s no satisfaction in just making something happen. You have to work for it, understand it, create it. My powers are in tuned with nature but I am not nearly as wondrous as the natural world. I just…” You turned back to the amazon lilies.

“Just what?” He asked shyly. You looked at him but continued to plant the lilies.

“You’re a smart boy, Spidey. Why is a smart guy like you asking so many questions?” This is what was really getting to you. Even with his mask on he looked nervous.

“So many of the Avengers are fantastical in some way.”

“Are you telling me you aren’t special right now? Because if you are, I swear, I WILL turn you into a willow tree!”

“I’m sorry! I guess it just...kinda gets to me sometimes? Please don’t turn me into any sort of non sentient organism.”

“Alright...but this is your only warning boy, I’m watching you! You better like yourself or I’ll get upset and you won’t like me when I’m upset!” Spidey made a pfffffffffft noise and laughed.

“You can’t just steal Bruce’s thing!”

“Shhhhhh, don’t tell me what I can and can’t do.” You smiled. He’s a good kid, he shouldn’t feel let down. You made a note to talk to Tony and Rogers about this too. Something made a frantic beeping noise.

“Oh! Sorry! My Aunt is calling. Think we can continue this later?”

“Sure thing, kiddo.” And with your go ahead, he did a sweet flip out of the greenhouse. Can he just not use doors? The curse of being Spider-Boy… you heard a knock on the glass door adjacent from you. In the doorway was the other reason the past few days had been so pleasant. “Visiting my cabin in the woods so soon, Goldie Locks? Figured you’d at least wait till noon.”

“I could say the same for you.” Thor grinned. Thor was...an interesting guy. You weren’t expecting the guy you saw on TV all the time to be quite like this. He was big, loud, and a bit on the dramatic side. But he was also the most gentle person you had ever met. At least around you he was. His voice was always more soothing when it was just the two of you. But this time he sounded a bit more concerned. “I heard what you said to the spider boy.” I knew that name couldn’t be original!

“How much?”

“All that I needed to hear.” He came closer to you, leaning his hip against the desk that converted into your bed. “Why were you up so early?” Nothing seems to get past him. He’s very intuitive.

“I’m...anxious? That’s probably what it is. Sleeping has been a bit of an issue.”

“Why so anxious? Anyway I can help?”

“You’re too sweet.” You sighed and thought for a moment. “I feel like I’m not getting anything done. This is my third day here and the whole reason I’m here hasn’t been brought up once. I feel like I’m just sitting around.” You turned around, resting yourself partially of the edge of the wooden flower bed support, staring down at your hands. You were so lost and thought that you didn’t catch what was happening until the last second. Thor was standing in front of you. Your hands shot back and hit the board, gripping into the clean wood, while he leaned in close.

“Need to stretch your legs for a bit?” The smirk on his face made you blush but also slant your eyes.

“Can you be more specific? Context would be important here.” You gave a forced chuckle.

“Training! I’ve been dying to see you in action and I think I could convince some of the others to come along!” He’s so pretty when he’s enthusiastic.

“I guess? I mean, I’ve got nothing else to do!” Your lips tightened into a thin smile. He pulled himself away and clapped his hands together.

“Excellent! I shall inform the others, see how many participants I can gather. Will I meet you back here?”

“I suppose so…” And with that, Thor left with a little more bounce in his step. You let out a heavy breath and managed to unferel your hands from the planks of wood. You hesitated, but knew you had to see. 2 patches of moss in the shape of flustered hands. “Damnit…”

About 30 minutes pass by the time Thor meets back up with you. He changed from his casual clothes into his battle attire which you had never seen in person. You weren’t entirely sure why your anxiety had gotten worse. This was supposed to be at least a little fun. It was supposed to NOT make you anxious. Maybe I just need to wait till we get there.

“You ready to go?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be!” You literally followed that up with saying ‘ha’ three times. “Who’s coming along?”

“Barnes, the boy, one of Stark’s suits, and I believe Banner is coming as well!” He sure is excited. “Can you fly?”

“What?” You heard a light thud, and suddenly another voice had entered the conversation.

“Mr.Barnes and Mr.Bucky are taking one of the aircrafts. Are you going with them? Because Thor will be hopping around and I’ll be swinging.”

“Yes, what he said.” Thor chuckled and scratched the back of his head.

“Hm, I think I’ll make it just fine if you guys lead the way.” Thor could read the mischievous glint in your eyes. You closed the door of the greenhouse behind you and walked over to the edge of building. You took off your gloves again and attached them to one of your belt loops.

“What are you doing?” They both asked in unison, which was kinda weird.

“You’ll see.” You sang. You shot Thor a wink before you leaned forward and let your body free fall. You heard Spidey exclaim ‘oh shit!’ as you fell. This was one of the benefits that your powers gave you. You smiled as the air built around you. You watched in bullet time as ivy began to coat the ground and up the wall of the Avengers tower. And then the falling stopped. You were completely relaxed as you hung motionless in the air. That is, until you felt something whiz past you and land on the sidewalk about 10 feet below you. Worried eyes looked up at you.

“Are you al-“ he stopped as he noticed what was going on. A cottonwood tree had grown on the side of the structure. The roots sprawled, none going through the building. You hang from an ivy vine that coiled around your left ankle and up your leg, the other one bent as if you were trying to hug your knee. Spidey landed on the trunk above you, clearly stunned.

“How do you stay upside down so long? My head is already starting to hurt.”

“That was so cool!” He exclaimed.

“Thanks kid, you need to teach me how to swing around without the blood rush.” You looked back down at Thor. “You alright down there big guy?”

“Yes, you just gave me a bit of scare.” He brushed off the worry and continued. “At least I have an idea of what to expect during training.” You heard the click of camera and phones going off, people around you were taking pictures. You waved politely for them.

“Lead the way, boys. I’m ready to go!” More vines crawled over the trunk and managed to pull you up, but instead of Boston Ivies, these were littered in yellow flowers. “Black-Eyed Susan’s? Huh, that’s a good one.”

“I could just carry you. Don’t want to waste any energy for training.” Thor suggested.

“Ha! That’s just what you want, buddy. Spidey, lead the way!”

“You got it!” Without skipping a beat, he began to swing away. You took a running start down the winding branches of the tree before they began to carry you. Then you ran again. Your body and powers already sensing your next move, a white willow shot out of the ground. The tall, branching trunk wrapped around a lamp post in multiple directions and caught around your leg, keeping you still for a second. You felt the white and gold specs of energy blow past you, like leaves and petals do in anime and cartoons for some reason that no one talks about. The cottonwood tree and boston ivy on the tower was gone.

“That’s certainly impressive.”

“Just wait until we get to our destination, tall, blonde, and handsome.” You took the opportunity of Thor’s shock and got the fuck out of there. It only took less than an hour to get to an open field where Spidey was waiting since you were essentially running from your consequences.

“Took you two long enough!” The boy said just as you jumped down with Thor following close behind.

“You always need to properly stretch before you do anything physically exerting.” It wasn’t long before you heard a helicopter coming by in the distance. You decided to take a look at your surroundings while it landed. Guess I should’ve figured they all don’t train inside...that wouldn’t really make much sense with their skill sets.

“Sorry we’re late, had to pick up some equipment.” Bruce explained as he came closer to your small group with Bucky in tow.

“Equipment? What do you need equipment for? We’re training.” Thor questioned.

“You all are training, not me. I’m here out of curiosity.”

“He wants to see what they can do.” Bucky pointed at you.

“Exactly. I’ll be over here…” he pointed to the side and began to walk in the direction. But before he made it to his destination, be pulled out something that looked like a beeper, pressed it, and threw it behind him. Thor smirked and said-

“In 3...2...1…” And there it is, pieces of one of Stark’s suits flew in, building itself over where the beeper landed.

“That’s super neat!”

“Eh, that’s an older model that remade for training. Not nearly as cool as his normal suits.” Spidey punctuated.

“Well, let’s not waste anymore of Banner’s time. He’s just as curious as the rest of us.” He smiled at you before raising his voice to everyone else. “Spread out! It’s time to get to work.” Everyone nodded but you had another trick up your sleeve.

“Good luck, boys. I’ll be keeping a BUCKeye on you!” You clapped your hands and pushed them into making circles reverse of each other. The grass on the ground grasped at your feet. Dandelions crawled up your form. Then, you were nowhere to be seen. Because you were literally underground. Last time I used that was to get out of a reeeeaaaaalllly awkward conversation. Quick moves!

You never know where your powers will take you, they do their own thing sometimes. You shot out of the ground and onto your feet, surprisingly not dirty. Nice job roots, you’re getting better at that. The first thing you noticed was a pond. Cool beans! It’s like a little park here! Why the hell is their a pond in the training grounds? Ooooo! Creeping Jenny! A sneaky gal!

“Don’t let your guard down, bud!” You heard Bucky charge at your from behind, a wall of roses sprawled an inch from your back.

“The only things down are my serotonin levels, Buck!” Making a sharp turn, you lunged and dragged your hand across the spotty ground, making a semi circle around where Bucky had to slow down. Even though he tried to jump out of the way with those good, good reflexes, you anticipated him. Three roots pulled him back into a sort of hug with their buckeye tree. One caught him on his waist, his still people hand, and his left leg. “Get it? It’s a both a pun on your name and the one I made earlier.”

“You’re a clever little shit.”

“Yeah I am, you can easily break that so I’m gonna bounce and have you catch up with me in a sec but I just got one more question.” He looked confused. “Who the fuck names their kid after the most irrelevant president?” And with that, you straight bounced out of their. Meaning a shit load of bamboo shoots punctured through the ground and shot you in the air. Your curled yourself into a ball while zooming through the air and felt something soft and fuzzy wrap around you. You felt yourself land but it didn’t hurt. You relaxed your muscles and realized you were covered in Lamb’s Ear and under you was a round patch of Irish Moss. So soft! You gave them both a little squeeze before getting up and going into a sprint. You heard a familiar ‘woosh’ noise and quickly phased into a nearby tree. Red and Blue were heading your way, and fast. Better think faster! You were pushed back through the air, your back bending and until your feet hit the surface of a another tree across from the original one. The motion caused the white glimmers of energy that you focused on to form into a cluster of bengal clockvine. Of course, Spidey would be able to sense this coming, so your only option was to overwhelm him with numbers. The entirety of the 2 trees you moved between and the space in between were saturated by a mass of thin green vines, leaves, and purple trumpet shaped flowers.

“NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO N-“ he was almost able to avoid them, which was extremely impressive. His foot got caught on the top, making him trip in the air, and slam back onto the opposite side of the wall. You climbed around and jumped onto a branch a few feet away that gave you a good look at your handy work. The boy was literally upside down.

“Oh look, a spider in my web! You doing okay there? I almost didn’t catch you, kiddo!”

“Yep! I’m fine, nothing wrong here!” He groaned.

“Where’s the suit at, kid?”

“I’ll never tell! No snitches in MY Avengers!”

“Good looking out. Barnes is probably on his way, tell him I said sorry about the puns when you get out!” The branch bent and lowered you to the ground, you ran as you waved bye to the kid.

Alright...now if I was a suit worth more than my life, where would I be? You saw dark clouds rolling in at a strangely quick pace. Probably trying to fight a literal god to prove a point, yeah that sounds about right. Grand entrance time!

You slowed down to halt and scooped up a handful of dirt, squeezing it against your bare palm. You felt the ground shake under your boots, cracks pooled through the dry soil. Your hand felt the prickle of dull needles as your eyes saw the world spin. With loud, gnarly cracks, you stood near the top of a Sugar Pine, you estimated roughly about 200 feet tall. You could’ve made it taller, or manifested a different species of tree entirely. But you didn’t want to waste all your energy on being showy. Only waste SOME of your energy of being showy! Good plan.

You stayed still as the roots...uproot. It was less like the pine was walking and more like it was slithering. The roots acted like snakes, but the snakes were carrying a 2 liter container of water...or something similar to that. For most people, they’d be freaking the hell out, but you were accustomed to this. In fact, you barely held on, there wasn’t a point in being nervous about this. Is it weird that I’m less bothered by this than being really close to a one-eyed god? Eh, probably not, right? You felt the air chill around you and shivered, but it wasn’t unpleasant. The feeling of soft electricity hit you first, then the voices faded in.

“Come on, Stark! You can be faster than that, even if that’s just an empty shell!”

“Hey! My suits are not empty, I’ve got AI in there! You better watch yourself, pretty boy!”

“Aw, that’s sweet, you think I’m pretty?” Thor taunted.

“Am I interrupting something? Should I come back later?” You shouted. 4 explosives locked on and fired toward you. “Whoops!” You dropped down and let a lower branch catch you, the top part of the pine was blown off and on fire. These were just the baby bullets. He was going easy on you. “Well damn, if you’ve already got the wine out, I might as well stay for a glass!”

“Dumb one-liners are my thing, Justin Timberlake.” This will truly be a battle of puns.

“Sorry to steal your game, rich boy.” The branch flung you up into the air. The suit aimed its palm at you, radiating with energy. And just before it was able to lock on to you, gravity was getting ready to pull you back down. You had essentially done a flip in the air and were nearly hovering over the Iron Man suit. Human eyes meeting robotic ones. You let the dirt in your hand go. The granules slipped from your fingers and trickled over the suit.

In that moment, you realize some things. First, Tony was controlling the suit, not letting one of his AI’s handle it as he earlier suggested. Next, there were at least a few gaps in THIS suit, not totally airtight. Finally, that pun he made was really good and you’re gonna have to think for a little bit to find a comeback. The suit reacted to what you did.

“Did you just throw dirt at my suit? You’re cleaning this!” You landed on a Lawson cypress that was only about 150 feet tall. Damn, am I getting tired already?

“Oh that shit’s never coming out.” You called with a smirk on your face. It was faint but you could see some green peeking out around where the joints in the suit would be. It’s arm twitched.

“What the hell did you do?” Tony’s voice was starting to sound crackly.

“Just a little gardening!” You sang. “Sheet moss is really good for covering almost any material, and is super soft too!” The suit started to convulse. “Sorry for hacking into your system with literal dirt. Imagine if that were someone’s intestines, gross right?” The lights went out and it began to fall. You whistled as it went. You looked back at Thor who was gripping Stormbreaker. “Think he’s gonna make me pay for that?”

“Doubtfully. Stark is a complicated man but he’s not heartless.”

“Good, didn’t think he would be. So...wanna do a quick round? You barely got to match with the suit before I spoiled your fun.” You moved your hand softly, making the branch you stood on raise and move closer to Thor until you were only a foot apart.

“I don’t want to fight you, even in training.”

“Why not? Is it because I’m a gentle little flower?” You teased. That’s what most people thought of you but you didn’t blame them. Your powers were more defensive than offensive.

“Quite the opposite, actually. You scare me a bit. I know when to pick and choose my battles.” He snickered. “I’d rather fight someone who can beat me in strength than someone who can outsmart me. Though, either impressive.”

“I mean, yeah, you ARE a god with superior strength and intelligence...isn’t that you thing?”

“Ah, you flatter me.”

“I THINK YOU MEAN FLATTEN!” You hardly had time to register the voice of Spidey before the cypress beneath you started to bend into a cocoon around your body. You couldn’t move but felt yourself get hit and thrown back.

You weren’t sure how long you were in the air for but you sure felt the landing. Your body rattled against the wooden shell, feeling dizzy and your head aching from what might have been a mild concussion. The cypress faded into specs of light absorbed into the air. Your muscles strained as you attempted to sit back up, but what you saw horrified you.

“What the hell…” Chrome blinded you with the mid afternoon sun, making the site serene in a grotesque manner. You weren’t sure how much of the crime lay before you but that didn’t manner. Coated in a metallic sheen were at least a dozen of what looked like Green Ashes and two stationary, humanoid figures.

Mouths were open in a silent scream, arms outstretched. Their metallurgic layer almost looking ghostly. You sat motionless for a few moments and drank in the scene. Adrenaline boiling. Then you came to your senses.

“Fix it! I can fix it! Fix it…” You tried your hardest to break through your fears and generate all the power you had left in your system. Push it back, I just need to push the particles back and do it fast enough for them to not react. Simple stuff! You slammed your hands into the cold earth and imagined your energy flowing back into it. It would be like a defibrillator shock on a dead corpse. Your body felt lighter and more weak, something was definitely happening.

But you saw nothing. Your tried again, and again, more energy, more violently, until your hands shank into the ground just to TRY and make something happen. The metal was spreading, it was still a few feet away from you. It was slow if anything else. You felt no life in this area, despite all the blades of grass and trees in front of you. Everything coated was dead, or so close that it almost didn’t matter. Your head ached and begged for you to stop. But you had to do something.

“Y/N? Where are you? Are you hurt?” An accented voice called out, but you didn’t have the strength to answer. Trap it, I can trap this patch until we find a way to contain it and reverse it. Grass scraped under a quiet but firm step. “Do you need medical-“ but he was cut short by what he saw.

With trembling hands, your nails scratched into the soil, your body screamed in pain. You had never exerted this much energy before, you never needed to.

“Just trap it, hold it, trap it, hold it, make it stop.” A few dozen stalks of white bark stained with grey patches erupted around the patch of land, shifting all the natural trees back. Yellow leaves sprouted quickly and dotted the sky from what you could see. They were unnaturally close together and made somewhat of a dome shape but that’s exactly what you needed. Something dense that would save time. A strong hand gripped your shoulder.

“Can you hear me? I’ve been calling out to you-“

“Pando, the trembling giant. They share a root system so I’ll be able to have it circulate a little longer than it’s supposed to. I can’t push it back.” You had panic in your heart but a numbness in your brain. The voice was quieter than before but it didn’t sound intentional.

“We need to get back to the others-“ your mind cut something out. “Just hold on, I can-“ your eyes shut, you something support your back and behind your knees. “We’ll find him.”

[yourplayersaidwhat]

We had just finished our first quest, where none of us really were experienced DnD player, and I did some feeble attempts at solid DM'ing. The goal of the quest had been to find an antidote for a farmer’s son who had gone into a magical coma.

(ps: due to an inside joke, Winnie the Pooh is in the party like, just there. Christopher Robin is the farmers son who fell ill. The party coloured winnie the pooh neon pink. I don’t know why.)

DM: You reach the farm. You don’t have to roll shit to figure out these peeps are poor. They have a cow and a goat in a small pen that don’t look too hot. Oh, and there’s a donkey tied by the door to their shedlike home.

Elf Ranger: guys i think these peeps are super poor.

Half-Elf Cleric (only good aligned partymember): oh my god really????

DM: just as you say that, the door creaks open, and a thin, a bit aged man peeks out, and when he sees you, his eyes go wide and he steps fully outside, and he says “Are you the ones my daughter sent to- have you found it? Did you find the antidote for my son?”

Half-Elf Cleric: Hello we are here to speak to you about Jesus Christ- I mean, Njord. That’s my deity, right?

Elf Ranger: Yeah, the word of Njord.

Dward Fighter (whose alignment is sorta fuzzy): Yeah we got some antidote dude but uhh time cough up some gold pieces, aight

DM: So- these news fills him with both glee and fear. He sinks down on his feet-

Half-Elf Cleric: What was he on before

DM: -His knees. He sinks down on his knees, and he brings his hands together in your typical prayer like- he’s begging you. “Please, we have… nothing.”

Tiefling Warlock (Chaotic Neutral): sad trombone

DM: “Please, I- I have but one son, he and my daughter are- we won’t be able to do the amount of work- we need him!”

Tiefling Warlock: “Shall we move on, my fellows?”

DM: As you guys speak about this, Winnie the Pooh slides down from /Half-Elf Cleric/’s shoulders, where he’s been perched, and sort of waddles forward, past the begging father, and into the house, to join Christopher Robin.

Half-Elf Cleric: AWWWWWW

Dwarf Fighter: Ey he didn’t swipe the antidote from us, did he?

DM: No- no, you still got that.

Tiefling Warlock: I would’ve Eldritch Blasted his ass if he had.

Half-Elf Cleric: I think we should just give them the antidote.

DM: Like- just to clarify: the antidote is not like- a valuable thing. It’s just this one specific conconction for this particular- you won’t get more cash out of this anywhere else, nobody is gonna run up to you and go “oh, my father is in a magical coma and needs an antidote that-!” like. It’s literally worthless except for these people.

Tiefling Warlock: But we won't have to help someone pro bono.

Half-Elf Cleric: *annoyed sigh* I don’t give a damn about money.

Everyone except her: *horrified gasps*

Dwarf Fighter: … well, you guys do got a nice ass-

Everyone: WHAT

Dwarf Fighter: the donkey. You got a nice donkey.

DM: You… want the donkey.

Half-Elf Cleric: IS IT EEYORE

Everyone: YES we want the donkey.

DM: … The man looks at the donkey and then at you, and he goes “I- If it is a trade between the life of my son and my donkey, it’s- then it’s yours.” And- and Eeyore looks up at you all-

Everyone: YES IT’S EEYORE

DM: -and he goes “I figured I was going to get sold anyway…”

Half-Elf Cleric: AWWW

DM: and the farmer goes “AAA” cus he didn’t know he had a talking donkey

Dwarf Fighter: eyy hasn’t he seen Shrek talking donkeys means cash

DM: yeah well that doesn’t matter now cus he’s giving him to you guys

Dwarf Fighter: right you are

DM: and the man unties Eeyore and he sighs deeply and he goes “this surely won’t make things easier for us… but in exchange for my son… *sigh*”

Tiefling and Dwarf: oh stop moping around jesus hell

Half-Elf Cleric: EYY if I have a ‘set of commoners clothes’ can i give them to them cus they look poor right

DM: I guess

Half-Elf Cleric: EYYYYYYYYYYYY

DM: but then you’d be naked

Half-Elf Cleric: NÄÄÄIJ in that case fuck it you don’t get shit i’m sorry i tried

DM: -and you just start taking of your clothes to give them to the man, but you realise halfway through what you’re doing and you get dressed again

Tiefling: cover yourself, woman

DM: so- let me get this straight. You guys literally have a box on wheels that you pull along with you, and it is filled… with the golden heads of a pair of statues AND YOU WANNA TAKE THIS POOR FAMILYS DONKEY.

Tiefling: survival of the fittest, honey *grabs rope with Eeyore on the other end*

-they go inside and give Christopher Robin the antidote-

Christopher Robin: what the fuck

DM: And the family all rejoice at the awakening of their son, and they turn and thank you, and they’re in the middle of hugging you all when the farmer murmurs “They… they took the donkey.” and the whole family just. Goes quiet-

Dwarf Fighter: fucking tattletale?

DM: - and the mother sort of sinks down on her chair and she whisperes “How will we surviv-”

Tiefling: Oh for fucks- “look, woman, if you don’t shut up I’ll Eldritch Blast your ass-”

Half-Elf Cleric: “HEY WHAT”

DM: The woman gasps loudly and pales-

Dwarf Fighter: “Yo what’s the problem don’t you want a talking donkey”

Half-Elf Cleric: “I meant the whole threatening to KILL HER actually”

Tiefling: “I wasn’t threatening her, I was just stating a fact”

DM: That if she wouldn’t shut up you’d kill her?

Tiefling: It’s a very known fact.

DM: Winnie the Pooh is looking at Christopher Robin with such glee; it’s really indescribable how happy he’s looking, and he’s hopping around happily and he’s climbing up on the bed to give him a big old hug, and Christopher Robin, he goes- “What the- could you guys like take the bear away from me.”

Everyone: “WHAT”

Half-Elf Cleric: “Isn’t he like with you?”

Christopher Robin: “Wh- no? I just went into the woods and he just came up to me, and I found this ruin and he just followed me? And then I got stung by something and that’s all I remember? Could you like take him away he’s a bit creepy. And why is he pink?”

Half-Elf Cleric: “Well uhh he’s yours now. You don’t have a donkey anymore, so-”

DM: And this sorta comes as news to him cus when the father told the fam he had just woken up so he was a bit disoriented so now he goes “Wh-Why is-? What happened to our donkey?” And the father, he goes “Well, son, it was their demand to give you the antidote… and-”

Tiefling: “By the way… can we get this transaction on paper?”

DM: - and the boy turns to you incredulously, and he goes “But-! You can’t! We need that donkey, without it we’ll die!”

Dwarf: “You’re young and strong, boy, time to saddle up.”

Tiefling: “You got a bear now.”

DM: - And Christopher Robin starts to cry too, and he goes “You might’ve saved our lives, but you’ve killed our family-”

Dwarf: “Anywho, gots to go.”

DM: So, you go to leave the shedlike home, and the athmostphere is next to devastated-

Dwarf: “Okay, okay, I ain’t okay with this. We go here and save your life, and you guys are devastated? Really?”

Tiefling: “I agree entirely. Ungrateful runt.”

Cleric: “I-”

DM: “And Chrisopher Robin slams the door in your face.”

Cleric: “No, I was- I was gonna whisper to him "I didn’t want this, I wanted to let you have it for free-”

DM: -Okay, so you whisper that, and he just stares you down, and he shakes his head, and tears are falling down, and he just spits out “You’re just as bad as them for letting it happen anyway,” and he throws the door shut in front of your face after doing that.

Cleric: “GODDAMNIT”

DM: okay so like just to state- like, you guys are super welcome to just. give them something on your own accord, like, out of your own pocket, you picked up som gold in that temple, so if you want to-

Cleric: I WANNA GIVE THEM 100 GP

Tiefling: WHAT “NO, NO, DON’T” ok so I try to pursuade /cleric/ not to do it.

DM: You- you can’t roll to make another player do stuff they don’t wanna do.

Tiefling: Okay, uh “Hey, /cleric/. Don’t do it.” There, you’re pursuaded.

Cleric: … yeah, nah. I give them the gold.

DM: So- you hammer on the door and you shout “I GOT GOLD FOR YOU” or something like that, and Christopher Robin opens the door, and once he sees the gold you’re extending, he- he is so happy. He takes the gold and he goes to hug you, and the entire family comes out and does the same, they can buy like 3 donkeys now i dunno how GP works in dnd yet uhhh so-

Tiefling: Fuck this, I eldritch blast Christopher Robin.

Cleric: NO YOU DON’T i stand in the way.

DM: -Fine? Uh, roll an attack roll.

Tiefling: Twelve.

DM: You miss. You hit the ground.

Tiefling: … don’t I hit the house at least?

DM: NO YOU- WHY DO YOU WANT TO BURN THE HOUSE DOWN

 Cleric: WHY WOULD YOU STILL ROLL WHEN I WAS STANING IN THE WAY- YOU TRIED TO KILL ME

Ranger: All of this for a donkey

DM: Nah, dude, you got the donkey. This is because /Cleric/ gave them 100 GP

Ranger: Oh okay

Dwarf: Yeah, but they’re super ungrateful. Bastards.

Cleric: Yeah but we can’t KILL THEM for that??

DM: so the family, they- after the attempted murder, they run back into the house. 

Dwarf: Did they take the gold?

DM: Yeah.

Dwarf: Rat bastards.

DM: Does /Tiefling/ want to keep his spree of 'teaching people some manners’ going or?

Tiefling: Nahhh. But he does cast sleep on /Cleric/ cus he’s pissed.

Cleric: haHA i’m a half elf and I can’t be magically put to sleep!

Tiefling: Nvm then I’m tired.

DM: So- you guys walk away from the house, and just for a moment you hear the door opening and then quickly closing-

Ranger: No

DM: -and you turn, and- Winnie the Pooh has been tossed out of the house.

Dwarf: THIS IS WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT when Njord taketh a donkey he giveth thee an illuminescent bear, and they just TOSS HIM OUT

DM: - and Winne the Pooh sits on the ground very- very sadly. Had he had tear ducts, he would cry a single tear. He is on the ground-

Ranger: Still pink?

DM: Still pink.

Cleric: :’(

Ranger: ugh FINE let’s take him with us.

DM: You go and pick him up, and he is so happy. So, so happy.

Dwarf: what are we, collecting Winnie the Pooh characters?

DM: He’s on /clerics/ shoulder again-

Tiefling: Can’t we put him on Eeyores back?

Dwarf: Can’t we put EEYORE on WINNIE THE POOH’s back?

DM: You put Eeyore on Winnie the Pooh back, and you now have a donkey on top of a bear on the ground. They are not moving.

Cleric: Oh dear.

DM: And Eeyore sighs and goes “I knew I’d be too heavy”

Everyone: “AWWWWWW”

[thelastspeecher]

The Six Senses - Chapter 1: Shake the Blinds

Chapter 1   Chapter 2   Chapter 3   Chapter 4   AO3

I actually posted a snippet of this first chapter on here, but didn’t really do much with it after.  Yesterday, I randomly got inspired to work on it again, and ended up finishing this chapter, coming up with a title, and even working on chapter names.  Don’t worry, I’m still working on “Stan-at-Home”, but I thought you guys deserved a fic chapter of some sort while I slowly chip away at it.

---

Summary: A shady company turns its eye towards the rare humans born with psychic abilities, and kidnaps them as infants on the day they are born. Only three people have ever escaped. On August 31, 1999, two newborns are taken from Piedmont, California. Two men, determined to bring the newborns home, find themselves back at the company that stole their childhood. Their names: Stanley and Stanford.

The evening wind will shake the blinds You're stirring from your slumber We've got something hateful on our minds - The Mountain Goats, “Alpha Rats Nest”

1999

               The phone rang.  Stan let out a loud groan.  He blindly slammed his hand down in the general direction the noise was coming from. His fingers finally grabbed the phone, and he put the receiver near his ear.

               “Uh-huh?”  His voice was thick from sleep.  

               It’s a miracle I was even able to get out those two syllables.

               “Stanley, sorry to wake you.”  Stan frowned.  He recognized that voice.

               “Stanford?  Surprised you’re actually using a phone,” Stan said, sitting up and rubbing his eyes tiredly.  “Instead of getting ahold of me through the usual way.”

               “Yes well, the usual way has its downsides.  One of them being that I can’t let others talk to you.  And there is someone here that you need to speak to.”

               “Uh-huh?  And who’s that?”

               “Our older brother.”  Stan’s heart suddenly began to race.

               “Wait, older brother?  You- you actually managed to track down our family?” Stan asked, startled out of sleepiness.  Ford chuckled softly.

               “It certainly took me long enough.  By the way, found out our last name, too.”

               “What is it?”

               “Pines,” Ford said, in a tone that suggested he was still getting used to the concept of having a last name.  Stan mouthed the name himself, hoping for yet at the same time dreading a connection to this, one of the few remnants of the life he could have led. “Regardless, Mr. Pines-”  Stan snorted.

               “Can’t really take you seriously there Sixer.”

               “Mm, it doesn’t feel familiar, does it?”

               “Nope.  Not at all.”

               “Well, regardless, Stan, our older brother wanted to talk to you. Here he is.”  There was a shuffling over the line.  Stan swung his feet over the side of the bed, putting himself into a bit more formal position.  Something that suited meeting a long-lost brother better.

               Not wearing pants, though.  

               “Stanley?” a voice said.  Stan’s heart, which had slowed down somewhat, began to pick up in pace again.

               “Yeah, it’s- it’s me.”

               “Holy Moses, I- Mom and Pops, they told me that you and Stanford were lost. Stillbirths.  Never thought I’d hear your voice.”

               “I’m in a similar boat here.”

               “Yeah, I suppose you are.  Anyways, my, uh, my name is Sherman.  But please, call me Shermie.”

               “Shermie.  You got it.”

               I have an older brother named Sherman Pines.

               “And this- this is all going to sound awful but, uh, Stanford got a hold of me at a pretty pivotal moment.”  Shermie let out a dry laugh.  “I mean, the first time I meet you guys, and it’s to ask you a favor.”

               “Uh, I dunno what sorta favor I could do for you.  Not exactly rolling high here,” Stan said, eyeing his too-small apartment.  

               “This doesn’t have anything to do with money.  It has to do with, well, the way you grew up.  Both you and Stanford.”

               “Whattaya mean?”

               “The company,” Shermie said quietly.  Stan’s blood ran cold.  “You and Stanford, you know them better than anyone.  Hell, you’re the only people that ever managed to get away from them. I need your help to find them.”

               “You don’t wanna find the company,” Stan said in a low tone.  He could feel the hairs on the back of his neck standing up.  Even mentioning the company made him feel like there were eyes on him.

               “No, I do.  I have to.”

               “Why?”

               “They took my grandkids.”

               “Your…what?”

               “My grandkids.  Mabel and Mason.  Twins. They were born a couple days ago. And now they’re gone.  Caleb – my son – he says he saw a suspicious van leave the hospital, around the same time his kids disappeared.  I talked to Stanford, and he says that the description of the van matches what the company uses.  I need to find the company.  I can’t let Caleb lose his kids.”  Stan rubbed his face.

               “I- I get that.”

               I have a niece and nephew?  Well, I’ve at least got a nephew, as well as whatever you call your brother’s grandkids.

               “But the company, it-” Stan started.  He broke off upon feeling a familiar nudge in the back of his mind. “…Stanford agreed already, didn’t he?”

               “Yes.  He said he wanted to take down the company anyways.  This way, he could kill two birds with one stone.  And he says he needs your help.”

               “No shit he needs my help.”  Stan groaned. “Okay, fine.  I’m not gonna promise anything, but I’ll at least come to talk to you guys in person.”

               “Thank you, Stanley.  Thank you so much.”

               “Yeah.”

               “It- it was really nice to meet you, even if it was just over the phone,” Shermie said.  Stan smiled despite himself.

               “Yeah.  Nice to meet you too, Shermie.”  There was more rustling over the line as Shermie handed it back to Ford.

               “Thank you for agreeing, Stan,” Ford said quietly.

               “Nuh-uh.  All I’ve agreed to is to meet you guys.  We can talk whether I’m actually gonna do anything after. But, uh, Ford, we won’t be able to take on the company on our own.  We’ll need the kid, too.”

               “I already spoke to her.  The usual way.”

               “And what’d she say?”

               “That there’s no way in hell she’d ever go back to the company.”

               “Can’t really blame her,” Stan said quietly.  “She found everything she was missing, right off the bat.  I wouldn’t be willing to give it up either.”

               “Hmm, well, you knew her better, that’s for sure.  I thought she’d jump at the opportunity to take down the people who took everything from her.”

               “Well, yeah.  Just not in person.  You know how she is.  She won’t do shit that could draw attention.”  Stan leaned back.  “I could get a hold of the geek, though, if you think he could help.  I mean, he’s not the kid, but he still led the prison break.”  He rubbed his forehead.  “And he and the kid are pretty close now, right?  Maybe he can talk her into helping out.”

               “Maybe.  If you want, Stan, I could talk to him.”

               “Whatever floats your boat, Sixer.  But don’t do it the usual way.  That freaks him out.”

               “Yes…I recall.”  There was a pause.  “I’ll let you know if I have any updates.”

               “The usual way?”

               “Yes.  The usual way.”  Ford hung up the phone.  Stan rubbed his eyes.

               Let’s see if I can talk any sense into the kid.  He dialed a number.  The phone rang two times before it was picked up.

               “‘S Wendy, who is this?” a high-pitched voice said.  Stan felt a grin creep across his face despite his tiredness.  

               “Wendy, it’s me.  Uncle Stan.”

               “Uncle Stan!”

               “Yep.  Is your mom around?”

               “No.  Yes.”

               “Which one?”

               “Yes.  But Daddy says she needs sleep,” Wendy said.  Stan sighed.

               “Is the baby being mean to her again?”

               “Yeah.”

               The issues she’s been having with her pregnancies…did they mess with stuff other than her head?  Stan felt that familiar nudge again.  No.  I don’t wanna know.  The nudging grew stronger.  Fuck off!  The nudging gradually faded away.  Damn clairvoyance.

               “Uncle Stan?” Wendy said hesitantly.  Stan suddenly realized he had been quiet for a while.

               “Just tell your mom I called, okay?  I wanna talk to her.  It’s about- tell her Ford found our older brother, and he needs help.”

               “Mama can’t help.  Not supposed to walk.”

               “That bad, huh?”

               “Doctor says the baby is safe.  But Mama has to be really careful,” Wendy said solemnly.  Stan punched the bridge of his nose.

               So even if she was willing to help out, she couldn’t.

               “Okay.  Just tell your mom I called then.  And I said good luck, or congratulations, or whatever.  You can pick.”

               “Okay!”

               She sounded way too happy about that.  God, she’s going to tell her I said something weird, isn’t she?

               “You take care, kiddo.  Have your mom call me back when she gets a chance.”

               “‘Kay.  Bye, Uncle Stan!”

               “Bye, Wendy.”  Stan hung up the phone.

               The kid’s a no-go.  But the geek…  He was always pissed about what they did to the kid.  Stan chewed his lip thoughtfully.  He might be down.  He’s got more anger in him than you’d think.  Stan rolled back onto his bed and buried his head in the pillow.  Whatever. Ford’s gonna handle that.  Just get some more sleep before-  The alarm clock on his bedside table began to screech.  Dammit.

-----

               Stan nursed his beer, watching children play in a park across the street. It had been about half an hour since he’d arrived and sat down at the outdoor table like planned.  He was supposed to be meeting Ford and Shermie at this restaurant in Piedmont.  But so far, he hadn’t seen either of them.

               I mean, maybe I saw Shermie and just didn’t recognize him.  Never met the guy, so I don’t know what he looks like.  A small girl in the park let out a screech as she tackled another child. Stan felt a smile play at his lips. Cute kids.  He let out a sigh.  Don’t go down that path, Stan.  It’s for the best you didn’t have any.  You’re too fucked up to take care of ‘em right. Stan was thankfully brought out of his negative thoughts by a shout.

               “Stanley!”  Stan looked over.  He grinned.

               “About time you lazy bums showed up,” Stan said airily.  Ford and Shermie finished approaching the table.  Stan looked Shermie over.  “Since you look just like me and Ford, I’m guessing you’re Shermie?”

               “The one and only,” Shermie said jovially.  Stan raised an eyebrow.  “What?”

               “You seem kinda…what’s the opposite of intense?”

               “Stanley, don’t be rude,” Ford chided.  Shermie chuckled.

               “It’s fine, Stanford.  I know I can be rather mild-mannered.  Although I imagine I seem even more so, compared to the two of you,” Shermie said.

               “I mean, yeah.  You’ve never staged a breakout in your life, have you?”

               “No, I haven’t,” Shermie confirmed.  He swallowed nervously.  “But I want to.”  Stan nodded.

               “Take a seat, then.”  Ford and Shermie sat at the table.  

               “I have to ask,” Shermie blurted out.  Stan rolled his eyes.

               “Yes, Shermie, it’s true.  I can see the future.  And I know stuff I can’t possibly know.”  Stan huffed. “It’s more annoying than anything.”

               “You try being a telepath, surrounded by people 24/7,” Ford retorted. “You’re never alone when you catch glimpses of everyone’s thoughts.”

               “Sorry, I just- I know you’re my brothers and all, but, I-”

               “We’re legit, Shermie,” Stan interrupted.  Shermie opened his mouth.  “Proving it will have to wait.  Business first.  Gimme the rundown of the situation.”

               “My grandkids were kidnapped by the company,” Shermie explained.  “I need to get them back.  But I’ll need your help to do so.”

               “Yeah,” Stan said, glancing back at the children playing in the park again.

               “…To what?”

               “Yeah, you need to get them back.”  A sour expression twisted Stan’s face.  “The company can’t be trusted with ‘em.”

               “What did the company do to you?” Shermie asked quietly.  Ford looked away.  Stan took a sudden interest in his drink.  “Was- was that rude to ask?”

               “I don’t think you really wanna know what the company does to the kids it takes,” Stan said in a low voice.  Shermie sat up a bit straighter.

               “I do want to know.  I need to know.”

               “Fine.  But you asked.”  Stan rubbed a thumb along the label on his beer bottle, trying push back that familiar nudge at the back of his mind.  “They weren’t so harsh on me, when they figured out my whole deal.  Ford got it rougher.  But since he was quiet anyways, didn’t do much other than the telepathic equivalent of passing notes in class, they weren’t as bad as they could have been. Not as bad as they were to the kid.”

               “The kid?”

               “This girl.  They brought her in as a baby, like they always do, when we were about, oh, six or seven?” Ford said.  “I was able to communicate with her some before meeting her face-to-face.  I knew she started out as a regular, hyper little girl.  Stubborn and excited and happy.  But then, when she was four, it started.  Any time she had a temper tantrum, the lights would flicker.  When she cried, things would hit the walls.  Her room was next to ours, so we could hear it.  They took her away from her room, and hid her behind power dampeners.  I couldn’t communicate with her anymore.”

               “She was six the first time we actually saw her,” Stan said quietly. “They took us to the playroom.  We were basically teens at that point, and didn’t want to spend time in the room with the building blocks and coloring books.   But they made us go.  And she was in there.  Sitting in a corner, holding onto this stuffed animal rabbit like it was the only thing in the world keeping her safe.  We were told to talk to her, to socialize.  That it would be good for all of us.”

               “She didn’t look us in the eye for weeks,” Ford said.  “Didn’t say a word for months.  It was the same girl that used to live next to us, but she sure didn’t seem like it.”

               “Never showed a lick of emotion aside from being scared until the day her family tracked her down and rescued all three of us,” Stan said.  “I don’t know what they did to her.  I don’t want to know what they did, to break a little girl’s spirit like that.”

               “She’s free then, like you?” Shermie asked.

               “Yeah.  More well-adjusted than either of us, if you’d believe it.  Got an education, found herself a family, settled down in some town in Oregon.  Lotsa therapy went into fixing things for her.  But she’s still not who she should be.  Don’t know if she’ll ever be.”

               “I take it you’ve been staying in touch,” Shermie said.  Stan nodded.

               “The kid’s basically our little sister.  I care about her.  Drove up to visit her a few times even.  She’s got a good life now.  A husband, a daughter, and a son on the way.”

               “They found out the sex?” Ford asked.

               “Yup.”

               “I’ll bet Dan’s excited it’s a boy.”

               “Yeah, he is,” Stan confirmed.  He picked at the label on his bottle again.  “But the doc put her on bed rest for the rest of the pregnancy. This one’s been rough on her, just like the first one.”

               “Do you think the company-” Ford started.  

               “Don’t go there,” Stan said quietly.  “I don’t wanna know, and if you ask, I will.”

               “You can’t control it?” Shermie asked.  

               “Sometimes.  Most of the time, if it’s something I don’t wanna know, I can push it back.  Visions…I don’t get ‘em very often, and when I do, I can’t even move.  I just see whatever I’m gonna see.”  Stan smiled faintly.  “The last vision was nice.”

               “What’d you see?” Shermie asked, leaning forward.

               “It was before the kid’s daughter, Wendy, was born.  She called me all excited to tell me she was pregnant, and she wanted her baby to call me Uncle Stan.”

               “That’s sweet,” Shermie said.

               “Yeah.  When she told me, I got a vision, of her in a hospital bed, holding her baby, and introducing the baby to me.  She said ‘Wendy, this is your Uncle Stan.’  Everything felt right during that vision.”  Stan’s expression soured.  “Most of the visions aren’t good, though.  And even if I try to push back knowing something, I can’t do it forever. The more it comes up, the more difficult it is to ignore.  Or, like when we escaped, if I haven’t used my powers in a while, it all shows up at once.”

               “How did you escape?” Shermie asked.  Stan looked at Ford.

               “The kid,” Ford said.  “Her family came.  Apparently her twin brother found out he had a twin sister who disappeared from the hospital when they were born.  Her twin and her older siblings did research and hacked records, trying to find her. Her older brother, Stan calls him ‘the geek’, finally tracked her down.  They got in the family truck and drove over.  They came back home the next morning with their baby sister and the two of us.”

               “…Some teenagers broke you three out?” Shermie said, confused.  Stan shook his head.

               “The kid’s got five older siblings.  All of them were adults except for her twin.  They’re scary smart, and stronger than they look, from farm work.”

               “…Wow.”

               “The kid had an army to break her out.  If we do this, we won’t.”

               “Fiddleford agreed to help,” Ford put in.  

               “Who’s Fiddleford?” Shermie asked.

               “The geek,” Stan said.  “Did he finish that techno-whatever he was working on?”

               “Yes,” Ford said with a nod.  “He feels confident that he can help us rescue Mabel and Mason.”  Ford looked at Stan with a careful expression. “What do you think about that?” Stan closed his eyes, waiting for the information to wash over him.

               “We probably won’t die gruesome deaths,” Stan said after a moment.  “I’d put the odds at 3-5%?”

               “What are the odds of success?” Ford asked.  

               “25%.”

               “The kid said she has the schematics of the building, and Dan can get us there and keep the car running,” Ford added.  Stan nodded.

               “75%.”

               “With this, whatever you’re doing, are you having me be part of the crew that breaks in?” Shermie asked.

               “Yeah,” Stan said.

               “Remove me from the equation.”

               “Are you sure?” Ford asked.  

               “Yes.  I’m a middle school English teacher.  I don’t have any sort of powers.  I know I’ll just slow you down.”

               “92% chance of success,” Stan said.

               “That’s above your minimum of 80%,” Ford pointed out.  Stan glanced at Ford.

               “I knew telling you about the minimum was a bad idea.”

               “So, you’re in?” Shermie asked.  Stan let out a sigh and downed the rest of his beer.

               “I’m in.”

[did-you-fall-or-did-you-let-blog]

Cabin Fever (Tree Bros)

Authors Note: This sucks so bad wow. Sorta wanna continue this story and make more parts of it, but only if some people want it, I guess. ALSO I DIDN’T KNOW IF YOU WANTED TREE BROS OR NOT BUT I’M A SUCKER FOR THEM SO I DID IT ANYWAYS SORRY.

Prompt:  Connor and Evan fanfic or head-can where they met at a summer camp or something like that and they were roomies idk :)

WC: 1861

CW: Swearing, Drinking, Smoking, Brief mention of throwing up

_____________________________

Evan knocked on the door of what was supposed to be his dorm. It was made of all wood and looked like it would fall down any day now. It had a single window on the side of the house, which was covered up by curtains on the inside. Music blasted from the house so loud you could hear it all the way from a solid quarter-mile away. With no response, He knocked again. And again. And again. There seemed to be no hope of whoever his roommates were to hear his knock over the deafening music. He hesitantly opened the door on his own. He took a step in and was greeted by an awful smell. He coughed from the smoke that was blocking most of his view. 

 "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" A voice shouted out from the corner of the room. The smell, Evan realized, was weed. This boy had been smoking it, and with only one closed window, there was no chance of the smoke exiting the stuffy, small building. 

"I... um I'm you're roommate?" Evan stuttered, terrified of this boy; Dressed in all black, smoking weed, unkempt hair. 

"Is that a fucking question?" He stood up, blowing out a big puff of smoke and letting out a sigh. 

"Um, what, what I’m sorry? I don't understand?"

"Is every sentence a question to you? Fucking hell." He sighed. He attempted to walk over to his bed, but he ended up stumbling and dropping his lighter on the wooden ground. 

Evan looked at the lighter drop with terror. "You should really be careful, you know? This place could easily catch on fire and that would be extremely bad I mean it would probably spread to all the other dorms and the office and then we'll all have none of our things, nothing, and that would be bad and maybe we'd go to jail for arson, I'm not really sure how that works, but maybe-"

"Jesus Christ dude. Calm down. I'm not gonna light this shit show camp on fire." He snapped. "You should take a hit. It'll help you calm the fuck down.” Evan took a step back as the boy stepped forward, holding out the sloppily rolled joint. "No, no thank you. Really um, it's really okay. All yours." He walked over to what he decided would be his bed. None of the other 2 beds seemed to be taken. 

"Dude, okay before you put your shit everywhere, I told the ancient desk lady that I don't want roommates. So I think you read the number wrong because you're not supposed to be staying here. So you should probably fuck off." He went to go open the door for Evan. Surprised by the smell of fresh air, he coughed a bit. 

Evan looked down at the paper that told him his room assignment. "No, I'm. I'm pretty sure this is right."

The boy grabbed the paper out of Evans hands, startling Evan a bit. He looked down at it, read it, crumpled it, and threw it on the ground. "I'm gonna go talk to that bitch. She said okay. I told her and she said okay. God damnit."

"Maybe she was being sarcastic." Evan whispered. 

"What the fuck did you say?" Connor yelled. 

"I'm... I'm sorry I said nothing. Nothing at all." Evan refuted, playing with the string of his sweatshirt and turning red. "You know, um, I'm really good at pretending I don't exist. I'm usually pretty quiet and I'm neat and I always make my bed every single day. If I stay here I promise you won't even notice I'm here. I won't rat you out for smoking or bringing girls over or staying out past curfew and I'll make up excuses for you so you can sleep in, I promise you won't even notice that I'm here. I'll be completely invisible. I do it on a regular basis, actually, so I've become quite good at it."

The boy plopped onto his bed, almost hitting his head on the bunk above. "Who said I like girls?" He smirked at Evan. "Fine. But you better mean that or else you can sleep on the bench outside." He took a swig of something out of a metal flask hidden underneath his mattress. "Connor."

"Um, I'm sorry what?"

"My name. Jesus Christ get your life together, man. You sure you don't want a hit?" He walked over to Evan and grabbed his hand to shake it. His handshake was weak and loose. He was wide eyed as the boy shook his hand hard and dropped it suddenly.

Connor wiped his hand on his pants. "You're hands are dripping sweat. That's disgusting." He walked past Evan, opening the door. 

"Oh. Um, I'm pretty sure lunch is starting soon?" Evan stuttered. 

"You said you'd cover for me, didn't you?" Connor said, walking out the door. "See you tonight. Probably late."

Evan followed him onto the porch. "You... you never asked my name?"

"Yeah. I didn't. Because you don't exist, remember?" He walked into the woods located only a few yards from the side of the dorm, meeting up with a few more guys. 

  _____________________________

 Evan sat on his top bunk reading. His bed was made and all of his things were organized neatly below. He bit at his fingernails, trying to distract himself from the fact that it was 2 am and Connor still wasn't back. He said he would cover for him, but Evan was starting to worry that Connor got too drunk and passed out in the woods. Maybe he got caught by a counselor and is being sent home? Maybe he got eaten by wolves? No. Evan shook that out of his head. That one can't be right. 

Evans internal debate with himself was interrupted by laughter from out front and slamming fists on the door. Crap. Was it a counselor taking count? What would happen if they realized that Connor wasn't here? Evan quickly turned his light off, got under the covers, and pretended to sleep. 

 Evan did this a lot back home. His mom would come into his room late at night, thinking she heard something, but he seemed to be asleep. He was good at hiding his breakdowns. He waited them out until the middle of the night so that his mom is asleep. But, the occasional peek in does happen, so Evan hides and sometimes lets out a little snore sound for dramatic effect. The second she left the room, Evan was back up, shaking and crying. 

 The door was violently pushed open so hard that it hit the wall aside it, for sure leaving a chip in the crappy old wood. It was dark, but by the smell of smoke and the meaningless mumbling, he knew it was Connor. Evan turned his light on, scaring Connor. He squinted in Evans direction. "Fucking hell you're just like my mom." He hopped onto his bed without taking his shoes off. Evan climbed out of his covers. "I was... I was worried." He played with the hem of his shirt, pulling at a loose string that had appeared out of nowhere. 

"Why the fuck do you care?" He slurred. "Judging me for living my life definitely does not count as being invisible. So just fuck off." Connor laid down, still fully clothed. He coughed violently a bit, obviously incredibly drunk. 

 Evan returned to his book, trying to block Connor out of his thoughts. He was used to getting pushed around by people, usually at school. But, it never followed him home. Evan couldn't even go to his bunk without being treated like crap. 

He didn't really have any friends other than his mom, and maybe a girl named Alana from school. They were more like acquaintances, though. She stood up for Evan when the other boys at school would call him gay. He didn't understand why that was an insult. Sure, he didn't really understand what it entailed. He had never thought about that stuff before. 

 Connor coughed once more and ran into the tiny bathroom at the speed of light. It was basically just a porta-potty, except in room form. There was a shower that barely fit Evan, let alone Connor, who was incredibly tall. Evan hopped off his bunk to see if Connor was okay. He heard the sadly familiar sound of throwing up. There was one boy back home, Jared, who his mom made him hang out with. Jared drank all the time and he always overdid it, every.single.time. Evan was almost used to it by now. 

He hesitantly walked into the small bathroom to see Connor knelt down over the toilet. Praying that Connor wouldn't snap back at him, Evan pulled back Connors long hair out of his face. It usually hangs perfectly over his shoulders. A lot of people give shit to boys with long hair, but Evan decided that it looked good on Connor. He looked good. 

When Connor finished, Evan brought him a cup of water and his toothbrush and toothpaste. "Thanks..." Connor mumbled. He brushed his teeth and gulped down the water slowly. "I'm really gonna be fucked tomorrow morning, aren't I?" he chuckled gently.

"Probably." Evan stuttered. "You should maybe... you should get some sleep." Evan helped Connor back to his bunk after seeing his failure at being able to stay upright, let alone take steps. There was an awkward energy in the room. Connor didn't even know Evans name and he didn't seem to have any interest in learning it. Why was Evan helping him? 

Connor finally flopped onto his bed with help from Evan. "Are you... are you going to be okay?" Evan stammered awkwardly, sort of wishing he had just gone to the office lady right away to switch bunks when Connor told him to. He couldn't do that now,he thought. Connor would hate him and ruin his entire summer. 

"Yeah, maybe. We'll see." Connor whispered. Evan passed him another glass of water and he took it and downed it within seconds. Evan didn't know what else to do. Connor laid back as Evan just stood there, playing with the hem of his hoodie. "I... I should um," He motioned his hand towards his bunk.

"Yeah." Connor agreed, pulling his hair into a ponytail holder that had been sitting next to his bed. Evan started to walk away, but Connor grabbed his wrist before he got too far. He pulled Evan closer to him until he basically tripped onto the ground next to Connors bed. Connor used to strings hanging from Evans hoodie to pull him close. Closer than Evan was comfortable with. "Thank you." Connor managed to mumble out.

“Evan.” 

“Huh?” Connor questioned.

“Um, my name. I thought maybe I would tell you since- I dunno I just thought that this might make us cool or something but probably not I don’t really know sorry I’m just not used to-“

“Shut up.” Connor cut him off. His tone was surprisingly unhostile. He pulled on the strings harder this time towards him until Evans lips were pressing against his. 

  "Oh." 

[melchixr]

Apartment

Anon said: Ok so I read your bowling alley fix and I'm guessing that when Ernst was talking about his friend that Melchior would be perfect with he meant Moritz, so I started imagining the awkward melchritz introduction and I was DYING. Could you please please write a sequel about it? 

So this is in reference to my sorta mini series???? including Hanschen the Edgy Dropout Photographer and Ernst the Naive Bookstore Cashier & Neon Bowling Alley

Song: Apartment -Modern Baseball

Words: 14111

The first time I saw you was in your apartment I had followed my friends single-file through the darkness I looked your direction for excessive inspection And I could not muster the courage to say a single word

Melchior was unsure how many times he had wiped his sweaty palms off onto his jeans in the three minute walk from his car to the door. His stomach was tossing and turning, his hair a mess from running his hands through it over and over. But worst of all, the light bulb at the end of the hallway was burnt out. The last few feet was in shadow, with the front door to 214 at the very end of the narrow hall.

“You sure he’s not gonna be mad that I came along?” He asked in a nervous voice to the back of Hanschen’s head. His best friend turned to flash a smile.

“Oh yes, quite sure,” He stated to try and calm Melchior’s anxious mind. “I told Ernst to tell him and he said he’d love to tell you over.”

He had seen about a million pictures of this guy and practically knew everything about him, all thanks to Ernst. He was grateful that Ernst and Hanschen were dating. Only because whenever Ernst was around, he’d insist on setting up the newly single Melchior with someone.

And not just someone. Always ‘Moritz’. ‘Moritz’ who had never even been on a date. ‘Moritz’ who ‘isn’t all that shy when you get to know him’. ‘Moritz’ who, apparently, held game night at his house every Thursday.

Hanschen was knocking at the door before Melchior could think up an excuse to go home, eat supermarket sushi, and watch Seinfeld until the early hours of the morning.

But it was too late. The shadows of the hallway was broken by the door opening and yellow, incandescent light. It blinded Melchior momentarily before he saw a thin, bony frame of a boy. The first thing that came to him was the absolute rat’s nest of jet black hair, sticking out at all angles.

“Hey, Hansi. What’s up.” A shaky, almost whiny voice said from inside. “Oh, this must be Milk-ee-or.”

“Oh….Uh….No….But...Hi.”

For a while we were playing this game that your friends bought But everyone cheated and no one could spell You didn't say much of anything I must have come off annoying, cause you went to bed

“HAVE YOU NEVER PLAYED SCRABBLE IN YOUR LIFE, HANSCHEN WHATEVER-YOUR-LAST-NAME-IS!” Ilse yelled, slamming her hand down on the board for the third time that night.

“It’s Rilow, for fucks sake,” He said and took his misspelt ‘Hefty’ off the board. “It’s not like I’ve been coming here for the last four months.”

Martha sighed and went to work again setting up the now scattered letters.  “I swear to God, you are both so extra.”

The small circle around the coffee table laughed themselves silly, all except Moritz.

The host sat in the arm of the couch cross-legged. He had a cup of sparkling water between his legs, seeing as he didn’t drink. And he was being a great host, making sure all their glasses were full and there was good music on and he kicked the heather behind him every once in awhile to stop it from making weird noises. But not a single word. He smiled sometimes, which made the whole room seem to light up. Occasionally, he’d giggle quietly and made Melchior’s stomach seem to twist and burst.

But still, no words. He just observed the whole group with a content look.

Melchior sipped his beer slowly, sitting adjacent from the beautiful boy in question, admiring his ripped jeans and baggy gray hoodie. He then noticed, when he his green eyes finally met with Moritz’s hazel ones, that he had been staring for at least five minutes. And Hanschen had been trying to get his attention for some time.

“Melchi!” he boomed when his friend had snapped out of it and noticed everyone looking at him. “Jesus Christ, earth to Gabor!:

Melchior felt himself go bright red and cast his eyes back to the ground. Both the eye contact and everyone staring at him had been the most embarrassing thing he’d ever lived through. “Oh….yeah….Uh...sorry…..” He muttered, his cheeks practically bursting into flame.

The room was quiet as they all realized what they were witnessing, seeing the pink now on Moritz’s cheek as he stood.

“I think I’m gonna go to bed soon. You guess leave when you want. Or don’t. Food is in the fridge and make sure to close the windows.”

He shuffled off down the hall, hands in pockets, before opening his bedroom door and disappearing into into it, leaving Melchior in his shame and a room full of giggling young adults.

I walk home with my eyes low Dreaming up conversations we'll have tomorrow Your loose ends, my new friends All the classes in high school we fell asleep in But now I can hardly close my eyes

“Are you sure,Melchi?  It’s really late. We’ll drop you off at your place, it’s really no problem.”

Melchior looked into the old bug from the passenger side window, where Ernst now occupied the seat. They were heading to Hanschen’s apartment, which they had announced that night would now become he and Ernst’s apartment and they’d be moved in together by the end of the month. But Melchior really didn’t like the idea of sitting in the back of Hanschen’s car and replaying that night’s events over and over.

“Nah, man. I think I’ll just walk. I need to clear my mind.”

The blond leaned over to look Melchior over, his expression sincere. “You’re not mad about the whole thing with us laughing at you, right?”

Melchior shook his head, brown curls falling into his eyes. “No. Not at all. I just wanna go on my walk. I’ll be careful. Promise.”

“Okay. If you get mugged, don’t complain to me.”

“Never would. See you tomorrow.”

And so the pair took off down the empty street, the car making odd noises as they moved out of sight.

Melchior knew he was going to sit there and rethink the night over and over. He wouldn’t be surprised if he wouldn’t be able to look Moritz in the eye again after tonight. Hell, he’d probably show up to Ernst and Hanschen’s wedding in a few years (or a few months, who is he kidding) and would have to look away from the other side of the aisle the whole time.

Maybe he’d just live the rest of his life without ever speaking or leaving his room again.

He knew he wouldn’t be sleeping tonight as he began the walk home at one am.

The next time I saw you was in your apartment Oh, why do I keep ending up here on starlit evenings? I should be home sleeping But this time you sat next to me on the couch

Although the entire ride there, Melchior had been fighting tooth and nail. He begged that they would just pull over and let him roll out onto the street before he dare face Moritz again.

But Hanschen had promised that Moritz wanted Melchior back over. And he had completely forgotten about the incident. Melchior was still embarrassed, but still, some part of him turned into fireworks when he heard that Moritz wanted him to come over.

The light was still out in the hallway when they arrived, but this time when Moritz opened the door, his smile could’ve lit up the whole apartment building.

“Hey, Hansi, Ernst…Melchior. Come on in.”

This week was Uno, which was even more violent than Scrabble. Martha was out for blood, Ernst had already won four games in a row, and for some reason, Moritz had decided to sit next to Melchior.

His legs were crossed and he still hadn’t said anything, but he was still sitting right next to Melchior on the gross, stained pull out couch and he was smiling. Pretty pale lips twisted up into a soft smile whenever anyone made a joke, and now, sometimes just when he was just staring into space. But it was a lot more than he was last week.

And it was so so so so pretty.  

He was so so so pretty.

But Melchior didn’t dare stare this time. He would glance over every once in a while to see him looking at his hand of cards, puffy and slightly greasy hair falling into his face. And fuck, he was so gorgeous it was hard to look away.

And he prayed that Moritz wouldn’t realize the heavy beating of his heart or the sound of his breath stopping short in his chest when he felt Moritz shift in his seat and rub his shoulder against Melchior’s.

I stare out the window Hands glued tight and sore Praying to God-knows-what That you would sever what's stuck With something shiny from the kitchen drawer

“Hey, you awake?”

Melchior opened his eyes to see a familiar face looking down at him. “Uh….no….” He muttered  in a sleepy voice. “Oh I mean...yeah…. I’m up….”

Moritz down at Melchior with big, doe-like eyes. He nodded and took a step back, letting Melchior now take in the full view of the room. He had fallen asleep on the couch with Ilse sitting across from him, passed out on the recliner. Coraline was still playing on the TV, seeing that they had been about halfway through it when everyone passed out and it kept replaying.

Moritz was still up though. Now in a pair of baggy gray sweatpants and an old tee shirt. He looked exhausted, the dark circles under his eyes seemed like canyons in the dark room. The only like was the blueish tint coming from the screen of the old TV. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you. Hanschen and Ernst just woke up and left and they wanted me to be sure that you got a ride home.”

“Oh thanks….I guess I’ll head out then and-”

“I mean, you can stay if you want!”

Moritz cut him off abruptly, probably a bit too loud than he should have been. He shifted his weight from left to right, nervously tucking his hands into his pockets. “Well….You already...I mean…. Fell asleep and I don’t wanna stop you. I don’t mind at all.”

“Ugh, thanks Mo…..”

Melchior rolled over, slowly fading back to sleep in an odd fetal position as Moritz stared at him with big eyes. “Oh… Mo.... You just called me.... Mo…” he whispered under his breath as his cheeks turned a soft pink. He raised his voice a bit so Melchior could hear before he passed out  with his wire rim glasses falling off of one ear. “Did you just…call me ‘Mo’?”

“Mmmwhatmm?” He whimpered, rolling onto his back. In the pale moonlight coming from the window, he could practically see in bouncing off of his pale pink skin. Little freckles and moles dotted over his skin. Moritz couldn’t help but feel like stomach tighten at the sight of it.

“Nothing….Shout if you need me.”

I walk home with my eyes low Dreaming up conversations we'll have tomorrow Your loose ends, my new friends All the classes in high school we fell asleep in But now I can hardly close my eyes

“Only two blocks away, Jesus, how haven’t we seen each other before?” Moritz chuckled and fumbled to light a cigarette even as the cold air kept blowing out his flame.

“It’s a pretty big city,” Melchior shrugged, closing the door to Moritz’s building behind him and stepping out onto the sidewalk. The streets weren’t too busy seeing as it was eight am. But Moritz had to get to work at nine and Melchior woke up at seven and was unable to get back to sleep. “I wouldn’t be surprised if we did run into each other before.”

“No, I would have remembered if I’d seen you before,” He scoffed and finally got the cigarette lit and took a drag as Melchior just stared at him, the tiniest smile on his lips.

The two began the walk down the street,side by side. Melchior in his jeans and jacket from yesterday, and Moritz’s hair still unshowered and pretty gross. But neither even seemed to notice. They were too busy doing a mixture of nervously glancing at each other and also nervously looking anywhere else but each other.

“I uh…..” Moritz cut himself short of offering to buy Melchior coffee. Too soon. “So...like….how do you know Hanschen?”

Melchior shrugged, stuffing his hands into his pockets to nervously fiddle with some string. “Oh we met back when he was still in school and hit it off. I stayed at his apartment for a while when my ex-girlfriend kicked me out and we’ve been really really tight since then.”

Moritz nearly tripped over a homeless man as Melchior spoke. He almost immediately felt his heart sink into his stomach. “Oh...I didn’t know you had a girlfriend!” he chuckled weakly, attempting to play it all off. But as his brain told him to stop, his mouth kept going. “I was just thinking by what Ernst said that you...like….”

As Moritz felt himself cringing into the abyss, hoping his dumb mouth would stop talking for once, Melchior couldn’t help but light up. “Wait...So...Ernst told you about me?”

There was a pause when both of the young men stopped in their tracks. Turning to each other, Melchior’s grin was so pure and light and brimming with an unspoken joy. Moritz thought that ‘sparkling eyes’ was a thing only in shitty fan fic and romance novels. But here he was looking into the biggest, ‘sparkling’ eyes he’d ever seen.

“Yeah, he practically sold you to my like a used car salesman,” Moritz chuckled and took another drag of his cigarette. “Gave me estimated penis size and everything.”

Melchior giggled like an idiot. He didn't remember ever being this happy in the middle of a street. Or with another greasy, pretty boy. “Oh wow. Didn’t know he had so much info on me. Don’t know how he got it but….”

Moritz grinned and sighed to himself before putting his cigarette out on the concrete. “So uh….Did we get set up on a date without knowing about it?”

“Oh I knew. I just didn’t know that you knew.”

“This is some Brady Bunch shit, I swear to God.”

I was wondering if, maybe, you wanted to hang out tonight We could make dinner or something

“So when do you get off of work again?” Melchior asked for the fifth time, making sure he had the time ingrained into his mind.

“I get off at four,” He stated, “And I’ll be here to pick you up at five.” He looked up at the tall apartment complex Melchior lived in that he now realized he could see through his bedroom window. Probably something you don’t bring up before your first date.

“Rad. Really, really rad.”

There was a pause where the two men stood, unsure of how to say goodbye after a walk like theirs. A pat on the back and a ‘see you tonight’ felt too casual. But a kiss was far too much.

Maybe just a gentle smile as Melchior opened the door. “I’ll see you a five then….Mo.”

“Oh fuck you heard me last night, didn’t you?” Moritz’s eyes blew up like saucers.

Melchior didn’t reply, just closed the door behind him walked into the lobby with a giant grin.

[ts-nightingaleislands]

Episode #5- “I forgot Austin has a date with Mary Jane daily so Im gonna have to cut him some slack”- Chris

holy fucking shit! i cant believe i jumped ship like that! it could be a great game changing move or i could be the next damn boot . gotta play hard or go home....just hope i dont go home lol

GIVE ME A R, GIVE ME AN A, GIVE ME A T I N G S! The ratings jumped out last night! I literally slept on the craziness and had to get a skype call from my pal Gwen to get up an hour after the challenge. We quickly felt that it was best to just throw the challenge but that didnt stop a lot of unexpected ish happening: Steven jumping ship, AnnMarie/Sara/Kyle/Steven alliance chat expose, Austin coming to our tribe pleading for a hero like he was the reincarnation of Bonnie Tyler, Rizo making the Friends chat I kept forgetting to with Gwen/him/me/AnnMarie/Sara/Liam, us deciding to blindside Tim, Liam telling Austin about it who then proceeds to tell Tim and Kyle, Liam getting exposed for having connections to the other tribe, Liam in the hot seat, Austin in the hotseat, and the realization that we finally get to start playing woo.

So I'm feeling a lil better now with time passing.  I have talked with everyone at least some and I think I made a few strong connections that will carry me through this first tribal . I trust chris , gwen, and annmarie the most but who knows if they are blowing smoke up my ass . Only way to find out is wait for tribal tomorrow . Tumblr survivor gods be with me

So Im in the chat with Rizo/Kyle/Gwen and it seems the target has shifted completely off of Tim and its just like huh this was convenient. Gwen/Rizo and I talk of how we kinda control this but that maybe a split vote is better because of the idol and it seems to be a go...then it is shot down. See, I don't see why its not as beneficial. Even if Austin got votes we have the numbers. Its kinda interesting that these guys do not want to maximize safety supposedly but I also notice they arent as like flexible as they should be

I think this went well. We finally won a challenge, which I lowkey never expected. Austin mutinied, but he did what he had to do for us to win. I think he'll be ok on Petrel, after all this time they have to have some sort of target. Steven mutinied here bc Austin put in a good word for us (as is my understanding), so operating under that assumption means voting him out is a bad idea. As everyone now knows (bc my last cf was leaked), voting out Noah is still a bad idea, so it's between Cheatham and Amy (if we lose again!) Amy knows she's on the bottom. Can't be any more explicit than having an alliance with literally everyone else in the game leaked. So if I were to be loyal to my alliance, obviously she goes next. However, Cheatham probably got an idol from the pool. And he lied about it. So maybe not the most trustworthy ally. If he didn't tell us about the idol, then what's he got planned for it? He has plans for the future, and those plans don't seem to involve me. Also he has a very acerbic attitude, and if we merge having him would make us much less appealing to work with because he makes it very obvious whether or not he wants to work with someone. So if we lose again (which i lowkey hope we do), Cheatham is hopefully being blindsided! (has to be a blindside bc he has an idol)

I know everyone is trying to act oblivious now but come on now lol Austin saying he hasnt heard a name? Boy we all heard names 24 hours ago, its just a question if those same names are still out. I just claimed I made little progress for the tribal so he tells me to inform him and Im like? Inform what? That the ground is now wet when it used to be dry? This sleep schedule sucks

(LATER)

I forgot Austin has a date with Mary Jane daily so Im gonna have to cut him some slack

(LMFAO)

So tbh Austin, Liam, and Tim have reasons to go but I also notice Kyle and Tim didnt want me and Gwen in until after we lost, and now they have us wanting Austin out. Again timing is important in this game. If we won I doubt this would happen. Right now Im not decided yet but I see the gears shifting, its just a question of where

(OMG CONFESSIONAL KING)

In my talks with Austin I kinda feign ignorance but I notice EVERYONE is doing that so I dont think that stratrgy is gonna work longterm. I know for a fact Austin has talked game to people so when he says he hasn't then oop. Id say a strength of mine is reading people at times and that is why I feel I can't do it as much unless I play dumb with these people. Too bad they seem to be doing the same!

Tim is a sneaky motherfucker and needs to be voted out like, yesterday. Getting the target off his back so fast. Ha. I’m onto you Timothy! Austin said that Tim said to watch out for me. I knew it. Thank you leaky Austin!! If I get voted out at tribal, let the record show that I did everything in my power to get Tim out. And if I go and he stays, these people are screwed. Love you all (especially my #1 Chris)!!

So I dont really think being in a group which has Tim and Kyle is gonna work. We were literally the only ones (Tim, Kyle, Rizo, Gwen) who talked of voting Austin in that chat and all of a sudden, Austin knows his name is out and Rizo/Tim/Kyle want us to not be "paranoid" and just split? Uh insert Tasha 'we got a rat' gif because WE GOT A RAT

This is so damn stressful! I really have no clue if I'm going tonight or what . I really like the tribe tho and hope I can make it past this first tribal . Find out in a few hours 😥

Oh my this is really messy LMAOO. I’m doing exactly what I wanted to do build a relationship with everyone and get included into multiple groups. Now I can pick which way I wanna go. I’m in 2 trios Chris and Gwen then Tim and Kyle. I also have Sara and Annmarie that trust me so I can do what I want. It’s crazy cuz I was the first person to suggest Tim to go and it was in fruition until Tim and Kyle came to me. I realized why vote him out when I’m getting info from him and he wants me to stay. So boom change the target to Austin because he is talking to everyone and told Kyle Tim name is brought up. So Tim got scared so then I changed my target to Austin and majority wanted him gone. But Kyle and Tim want Liam gone and I don’t mind him leaving it’s just he is a nonfactor. I lowkey want annemarie gone because she is leaking info and seems close to austin. Preferably I want austin gone but we are scared he has an idol so I want to split votes but Tim is scared. So Kyle recommend Annmarie and I’m going to make sure she goes cuz I was going to do Liam for the split. But then I worried annemarie would reveal to Tim I wanted him out and that would be bad. So I would like austin to go hopefully he misplays his idol and Annmarie goes home. And I will be in the majority. Out of the trio I’m more loyal to a Chris and Gwen but I do like Kyle a lot. Let’s see how tonight plays

The lil snakes Tim & Kyle threw my name out so one of them has to leave, it's just that simple folks. I'm confident I've got a majority behind getting Tim to leave so I'm faithful that he's gonna be gone tonight.

Something smells sorta fishy... That first hour or so after losing the comp was utter chaos. Chats were everywhere and I had no clue who I was even talking to half the time. Now lately, it's been quiet so that's nerve wrecking. Anyway...Austin. Bruh, he told me at first that Amy was in the pool and then a day later that cheatham was. This honestly a mistake or?! I know he's talking a lot to others and spreading info because Kyle told me that he told him that Liam knew he mentioned his name. Honestly, this was great because now Kyle thinks that AnnMarie leaked..which is true..she did. Lulul! So anyways, Austin mentioned making a majority alliance after this of me/Gwen/Rizo/Chris/AnnMarie...which is odd because that's already a group. Coincidence or?? Regardless, that group is way too powerful and something's gotta give at one point here!

I just made a massive move And it couldn’t have worked out any better I decided to mutiny to the other tribe. I somehow managed to convince my tribe to let me go without anyone realizing that I would be bringing the victory with me to Thrush. I talked with Austin after he came over Petrel before I left,  and we made a plan for me to work with Noah and cheatham to take out Amy. Things started great with those two, and we had an alliance chat within 15 minutes. Cheatham even revealed to me that he was the one in the pool, which he hadn’t even told Noah. I also found out that Amy has the self vote, which works out perfectly. Things are looking good. I just made possibly the biggest move of the season so far, and things seem to be working out great

(LATER)

SO WOOOOW. I am truly shocked by what is going on. So obviously we threw the challenge, but afterwards, things went insane. I was up for at least an hour, talking to everyone in the tribe. We threw to get Tim out. He is definitely someone I don't want to keep, he could really mess up my game. Kyle and Steven were way out of the loop, and honestly, it was sorta obvious that Kyle and Tim were working together. Both Tim and Kyle threw out the name liam due to their inactivity, which sucks, I hate when that is the reason for someone getting voted out. Surprisingly, Tim doesn't know his name is out there, or at least I don't think so. He is suspicious that he's missing something, but I won't be the one to tell him. I am working with austin. He's lovely and we click well. That is all I can think to say.

I wish there was a swap. If I'm gone I'm gone, i guess 4 people are voting me so my best hope is if gwen rizo kyle chris dont vote me ;(

i just have been listening to noah tbh

5 votes Tim, 4 votes AnnMarie.