#and it misses the mark so badly with them. i could do a full rant JUST about how misused the trickster archetype was

[thorarms]

The loki series is fascinating to me in that it says so much more about the writers than it ever could about loki himself

[aeolian-mode]

A rant I wrote in a Discord server but because of the recent BNHA chapter I thought I'd post it here. TL;DR it's about "All Might slander" in the fandom and why I find it a bit trite.

I feel like the "All Might slander" side of the BNHA fandom is comprised mostly of young kids or people who just aren't good media critics. They want BNHA to cater to their own personal interpretations and headcanons, and often their interpretation doesn't have citable support from the actual content of the story. Horikoshi missed the mark on a lot of BNHA's storytelling but there are a few themes and symbols that he's extremely intentional about. All Might's character arc and what he represents, juxtaposed with Midoriya, is one of those things he's clearly planned out very well. The All Might critics often fail to take into consideration the medium of BNHA. for example: yes, on the surface, in a real-world setting, a responsible 55 year old adult shouldn't leave a middle school child stranded on the top of a roof after telling him that his dream for the future is unrealistic. What actually happened: All Might is a superhero who just launched himself flying through the air with the sheer force of jumping and a middle school child clung to his legs and went sailing through the sky like a slapstick bullet before somehow landing unharmed on a rooftop. He immediately tells this overworked superhero (who just captured a dangerous villain in his pocket and needs to immediately get to the police station) that he also dreams of being a superhero even though he doesn't have a superpower. This superhero then reveals that he's missing half of his internal organs because of ridiculous superpowers in this world and warns (wisely) that Midoriya's dreams will lead him, a quirkless kid, to absolute annihilation. He then leaves Midoriya alone, which is admittedly a bad choice on his part, but it's probably the worst decision he made here- NOT telling Midoriya his dream is unrealistic. Because: none of this that I just described is feasible in an average, realistic, slice of life, run of the mill Earth setting. BNHA is a manga/cartoon for children that takes larger-than-life, exaggerated anime slapstick in a world full of superpowers that would realistically destroy any normal human upon use. (Like, come on. Nitroglycerin sweat??? Bakugo's skin would ignite or explode upon contact with any open flame throughout his life. Sure you can use an excuse that maybe his superpower specifically compensates for this by providing him with some sort of self-protection mechanism, but at that point you can make the "superpower" excuse for virtually any observed loophole.) We're dealing with cartoon physics here, and a cartoon world often creates a wider barrier for suspension of disbelief between the audience and the media.

Some major themes of BNHA are: the definition of heroism, friendship, and the power of community/working together to achieve a common goal. They're very common themes in shonen anime, and the way BNHA handles it offers a few unique perspectives, but ultimately what we have here is a shonen cartoon for teenagers. so yes: you're going to have slapstick, exaggerated cartoon violence, characters behaving badly without realistic consequences, and unscientific/unrealistic super powers.

(such as: there's SEVERAL instances where Aizawa takes his scarf and briefly chokes one of his students. If this happened in an actual real life setting, Aizawa would be criminally charged with child abuse, lose his teaching license, probably go to jail. Also, he regularly naps during class and is still somehow a respected teacher at UA.)

So a whole lot of the All Might criticism can be viewed in the same way: you can't really keep 'calling out' this cartoon superhero for his perceived missteps on the standards of what would happen in real life. We are already dealing with a cartoon universe where the laws of reality don't apply.

One of the common criticisms of All Might is the fact that he gave Midoriya a superpower knowing full well that if Midoriya used the power before he was ready, he would explode his bones and potentially kill himself. Like, no, in real life: don't give a child a loaded gun. Anything that they could kill themselves with if it was misused. That's Bad.™️ I don't think ANY All Might fan is arguing that he made a good decision if we were judging him on the grounds of reality.

When Midoriya uses the power during the entrance exams to explode the 0 Pointer robot, All Might looks on at his student with pride, instead of abject horror at watching the boy explode all the bones in his arms and legs. Because BNHA's storytelling is not operating in the realm of reality! At all! The scene where Midoriya explodes his bones by using All Might's power is directly correlating to the main theme of BNHA's storytelling: the definition of heroism. Cartoon physics aside, it's about being selfless. Midoriya exemplified selflessness here, a virtue that All Might also exemplifies and values in his disciple. But: watch this show and try applying real-world consequences to every single character's behavior and you'll find something "callout worthy" in virtually every scene, from virtually every character. People who hate All Might just want to hate All Might (and often do so divorced from context). Disliking a character is completely fair, everyone's got their tastes in characters and stories. And you don't have to justify your reason for disliking them. If you want to write a 20 paragraph dissertation on why you don't like them, totally go for it. That's why I'm writing my own 20 paragraph dissertation on why I do. :P Anyway all I'm doing with this dumb rant/post is to just point out that folks are arguing over a colorful superhero cartoon for teenagers. Instead I prefer to take a peek at the core values of what Horikoshi wants to show us with this story and examine whether or not he's successful with that.

[obabyobeymeme]

Resting with the Boys[TM]

summary: what i think falling asleep with them around would be like. that- that’s it, that’s the post note: yayayayy first post! this has been in my notes app for a Long time, so.. buckle up, this is going to be kinda long no matter what i do, thoughts went brrrrrr, sorry lmao.

Lucifer ➛ Good luck getting a moment alone with him. With all the work he has assigned by Diavolo, the time he spends cleaning up after his brothers’ shenanigans, and his duties as the eldest, it seems like he never has free time. ➛ When you do catch him alone, he’s either not in the mood for any sort of interaction or he’s taken the liberty of passing out at his desk, pen still in hand as he rests. ➛ You aren’t doing so well yourself, being a human exchange student doesn’t mean R.A.D. will go easy on you. Classes, assignments, and sometimes even just having to deal with the rest of the student body can be pretty tiring. ➛ Your patience pays off when the day finally comes that he’s mostly free of duties and your assigned tasks at the moment are all finished as well.

➛ You two don’t really do much, you spend the time talking over hot beverages and enjoying each other’s company in his office. Just having you around and not causing a ruckus is already more than enough for him. ➛ Lucifer ends up going on a halfhearted rant about his brothers as he organizes some papers next to you. How he found out about another one Satan and Belphie’s plots to inconvenience him and how he’ll turn it against them, wondering how the house hasn’t been decimated while he went on business trips sometimes... It’s nice seeing him not as uptight as he usually is. ➛ You end up getting a little drowsy despite your best attempts to listen to what he’s saying. Eventually your drowsiness wins over and you kinda.. nod off. Hopefully he doesn’t mind. (He does mind, actually. Sleeping sitting down may sound like a good idea at first, but Lucifer knows your neck will hate you for it when you wake up.) ➛ He doesn’t want to wake you, so he carefully nudges your head onto his lap before finishing up with the papers, occasionally running his hand through your hair. ➛ Once he’s done, he carries you to your room and makes sure you’re comfortable before leaving a kiss on your forehead and leaving, closing the door softly behind him.

Mammon ➛ When you suggest a lazy afternoon to him, he’ll act as if he has no time for a silly activity like that. Why would he? The Great Mammon has better things to do with his time than spending it lazing around with some- ➛ He trails off once he sees your slightly disappointed face. When you say you’ll find someone else to nap with, he changes his tune almost instantly. ➛ He just.. takes your wrist and goes “W-well, if ya want it THAT badly... but just this once, got it??” as he sorta tugs you along to his bedroom. ➛ This is where you learn that he has no idea how to share a bed with someone else. He seems torn between wanting to scoot closer or give you as much space he can without actually leaving the bed. ➛ You decide to make the decision for him, resting your head on his shoulder as you start rambling. Mammon warms up eventually and slings an arm around your shoulders, pulling you a bit closer. ➛ You drift off during a lull in the conversation, unintentionally leaving him hanging for a full minute before he realizes you’re asleep. ➛ He watches you for a while and makes sure you’re really out, then reaches for his phone and takes a picture (or five) of your sleeping face. What? You’re cute even when you sleep apparently! He’d rather go through one of Lucifer’s scoldings than admit that to your face in the near future though. ➛ You know that meme where people say they can't do anything because a cat fell asleep on them? Yeah, that happened to Mammon because of the arm he placed around you, he ended up falling asleep with you wrapped in his arms. ➛ When you wake up, you cannot move without his grip getting just a bit tighter. Greedy even in his sleep, it seems... rip if you have to go to the bathroom lmao

Leviathan ➛ You two spent pretty much the whole day in his room, geeking out over shared interests, catching up on anime Levi introduced to you, trying (and occasionally failing) at the games you both play ➛ You don’t even notice it’s well past 1 AM until you feel like you’ve been staring at a screen for an awful long time now, what time is- oh. ➛ Levi’s slightly disappointed that your hangout has to end, but yeah, he gets it. Everyone needs their sleep, even hardcore otakus. He’s about to tell you that you can leave when you flop into his bathtub bed, saying you’re too tired to walk all the way back. ➛ He short-circuits at the sight of you wrapping yourself around one of the many body-sized pillows, and when you realize he still has to get in the tub to sleep? And instead of getting out, you sit up and insist on him getting in with you??? ➛ A system error has occurred. Please restart your Leviathan. Come on, this is like that one scene in this shoujo anime he’s found where the main character and the person they’re pining for share a bed! ➛ He doesn’t say anything, but judging by the expression he’s making and how he’s clambering in behind you, you don’t think he minds too much. ➛ You two end up with his upper body propped up by the pillows and you kinda laying on top of him. It's a bit awkward considering the unconventional sleeping area, but it’s honestly more comfortable than you expected. ➛ Levi actually ends up falling asleep before you. You thought you were tired? Try being awake for 22 hours straight waiting for an exclusive merch drop you just couldn’t miss. He is out, and nothing you do can wake him. ➛ You both end up waking around noon thanks to your little late night stunt. Consider yourselves lucky that Satan saved you guys a plate before Beel got to it.

Satan ➛ He finds you in the House’s library, bent over at a table studying three textbooks at once. Understandable, given that it’s exam season, but it doesn’t look like you’re doing yourself any favors. ➛ And he’s right. You can’t make sense of anything in the books and you can feel a small headache coming on ➛ Satan offers to give you some help with your studies... after you’ve rested. He won’t take no for an answer, and since his room is much closer, he thinks it’s fine if you crash there while you take a break. ➛ He just has to... actually make space for you to rest first, though. He can navigate the chaos that is his room just fine, but you could easily trip on something, or worse, accidentally activate something cursed. ➛ Once that’s taken care of, you take a seat on his bed, scrolling through your D.D.D. as he takes one of the chairs, picking up a novel he bookmarked.  ➛ The scent of the books and the occasional sound of a page turning as Satan reads, along with his occasional hums of interest really helped put you at ease. After a couple of moments, despite yourself, you curl up and drift off. ➛ In between page turns, Satan would turn to check on you. When he realizes you’re asleep, he marks his novel and sets it down, turning to face you instead.  Since he knows his room can get a bit drafty sometimes, he drapes a blanket over you, smiling softly as you wrap the blanket more around yourself. ➛ You looking so cozy almost makes him want to join you, but just seeing that you’re comfy and much less stressed than before is enough right now. He instead gives you a head pat and goes back to his novel, the smile never quite leaving his face.

Asmodeus ➛ You know Asmo loves spending time together, from shopping trips to going to new places to even simple things like a tea spilling session every other night. ➛ So when you come to his room one evening to tell him sorry, you don’t really feel like a night on the town right now and would rather stay in and recharge, he’s not even as disappointed as you’d thought he’d be. ➛ He insists on pampering you both tonight, that way, you get to rest and relax with him, and he gets you all to himself for at least a couple of hours, uninterrupted. It’s a win-win scenario, in his opinion, and who are you to decline? ➛ You let him work his magic with whatever he has laying around, falling into your usual routine of talking as he does his and your nails and readies a face mask for the two of you as ambient music from his D.D.D. fills the air. ➛ When you find yourself getting sleepy, Asmo doesn’t mind at all! He puts away the stuff he used and suggests a little impromptu sleepover. ➛ You shouldn’t have been that surprised when he climbs into the bed after you, and you should’ve realized he’d be just as clingy in bed as he is normally. He can and will be all over you if you let him— running his fingers through your hair, cuddles like there’s no tomorrow...  ➛ His ridiculously soft and comfy bed definitely isn’t helping matters, and you drift off in record time. ➛ He’ll make sure you’re all tucked in and maybe internally squeal at how adorable you’re being, leaning into his touch in your sleep makes his heart do a flip ➛ You wake up the next day feeling like a new person, and next to you, looking surprisingly photogenic for someone half-asleep, is Asmo, tugging you back under the covers because it’s warmer with you in there. 

Beelzebub ➛ He’s been waiting at R.A.D.’s entrance for 20 minutes now. You were supposed to meet him so you could head to Hell’s Kitchen and hang out for a bit, but there’s still no sign of you and you haven’t read any of his texts. ➛ He gets a text from you then. Turns out your phone was on silent, because you felt a little burnt out from school and juggling hangout times with everyone else and went straight back to the House, wanting some quiet time. ➛ You send another message apologizing for the sudden change of plans and for not seeing his messages sooner, but Beel is pretty understanding. ➛ He isn’t letting his chance at being with you go that easily, though. He drops by a store to get you a little care package (and a handful of snacks so he still has something to give you by the time he gets to the house) and heads home. ➛ A few moments later, your door opens to reveal Beel. He leaves the food he brought on your table and sits down on the edge of your bed. You decide a cuddle buddy doesn’t sound too bad right now. After all, you already had the experience of sharing a room with Beel, surely sharing a bed will be similar? ➛ ... Not exactly. He’ll unintentionally take up half your bed no matter what you two do; you’ll either be searching for space or be pulled into the space he’s occupying like some sort of demon-shaped black hole. ➛ The solution: lay on his chest. He assures you that you aren’t too heavy for him, and if he’s being honest? Your weight is actually kinda comforting. ➛ You stay like that for a while, listening to his breathing and heartbeat, and eventually the stress of the past few days melts away, and you fall asleep with your arms draped over him like a pillow. ➛ He doesn’t mind, since you’re pretty much a living teddy bear to him, and he lets himself relax, a hand resting on your back. He just hopes his stomach won’t wake you both up...

Belphegor ➛ Let me get this straight. You want Belphegor, the literal Avatar of Sloth, to take a nap with you? Chances are he’s already half-asleep and all that’s left to do is join him... if he lets you. ➛ He’ll look at you, slightly irritated, but he’s too tired to argue, and you’d be warmer than a pillow, at least, so he motions for you to get in next to him. Just don’t move around too much or he’ll hog all the blankets in retaliation. ➛ If you’re close enough with him, either one of you has unspoken permission to join the other while they’re resting, no questions asked.  ➛ Probably has a bunch of pillows and blankets stowed away in various parts of the House, so nap supplies are readily available. Saves him from having to drag his stuff from place to place. ➛ The one downside to sleeping with Belphie is that he doesn’t need any time to unwind. He can go from full attention to catching Zs in minutes, leaving you no choice but to follow him into dreamland. ➛ He does cuddle a lot, though he’ll brush it off as using you as his personal heater. He’ll complain if you try to do it first, but he won’t make any moves to actually stop you. He actually might lean into you, making up an excuse about your side being comfier. ➛ If he really, really trusts you, he’ll lend you his beloved cow-print pillow. Only five minutes tops, though, then you have to give it back. ➛  When nights are bad and he doesn’t want to wake Beel up, he used to head to the planetarium to calm himself down. Now he slips into your room and takes comfort in knowing that you’re still safe and sound. You’ve woken up several times finding Belphie nuzzled into your blanket. ➛ If he feels especially clingy, his demon form’s tail will appear, slowly but firmly wrapping itself around your waist. Good luck getting out of bed without him knowing.

[jaedreaminn]

Desperate Much?

Pairings: Ten x Reader.

Theme: fluff, angst, hurt, comfort, family, sad, happy ending. (Life is still going on)

Characters: Ten, Taeyong, Mark, Donghyuck, Jeno.

Word Count: 2k

~~~

Ten wasn't like his 'brothers'. Infact he wasn't ever their brother, he was their cousin. His dad was the one who inherited the family business and had settled with him and his mother in Thailand to branch out.

He had a happy and perfect life with both of his parents, but that was untill they both died unexpectedly in a car accident when he was eleven. And suddenly everything in his life was changing. He had to move to Korea to live with his uncle and his children, his father's buisness was now his uncle's buisness until Ten was old enough to take over. Until he could legally take over. He had to learn a different language, make new friends and start his life all over again in a very dysfunctional family.

He remembered the constant yelling between Mr.Lee and Mrs.Lee, having to sit by himself during those times when Taeyong would take his younger brothers Mark and Jeno and hide in his room, he remembered how Donghyuck would cry under the scrutinizing gaze of Mrs.Lee as she fought with Mr.Lee and the boy was stuck there not able to escape, the loss of the joys of family dinners that he was used to, the loneliness he felt. That was when he met you. You were his only friend in this country and even though he could barely talk to people you tried your best to talk to him despite the language barrier.

You were cheerful and jovial and very very clingy but he didn't mind that. You ate lunch with him and helped him with his Korean. You even made sure to stick by his side with the excuse of him being new here so he wouldn't get lost months after he arrived.

You were a blessing in disguise to him especially since it was so awkward with his cousin Taeyong at home and at school.

Time flew fast and a year had passed and he could speak and write Korean way better than before and lucky for him you were still stuck to his side.

In those trying times you were his only semblance of joy. The times in which Mark wouldn't talk at all, the times in which Taeyong would go around at the ripe age of twelve and hurt people with words so sharp that they would leave the school, when all Jeno did was look upto Taeyong and when Donghyuck started to act out getting himself in trouble so bad that he could have almost lost his life but no one cared.

It hurt Ten to watch all this happen but not being able to do anything about it because no matter how well he got along with the youger two, Taeyong would always pull his brothers away from him and take them to his room and well Donghyuck, he wouldn't talk to anyone at home.

But unfortunately all he could do was get used to this awful life, glad that you would quietly listen to him rant and then lighten his mood up with something silly.

He was mid rant one day when he spoke about how much he missed 'family dinners' that you interrupted him, "Why don't you have a dinner with your cousin's?" Ten scoffed at you and shut that idea down immediately but when he came home and saw how far apart everyone was he decided there and then that's what was needed.

So he forced Mark out of his room and away from his books, he pryed Donghyuck away from his bed, he bribed Taeyong and Jeno just followed his eldest brother and thats how he found himself at the diner table for the first time ever since his parents passed away.

"I used to eat dinner like this with my parents" he spoked but Taeyong glared at him, "I don't care"

"Look you want to be a brat be a brat but at the dinner table all feuds are forgotten and all hatred is gone, food is supposed to be consumed happy"

"What did your parents say that?" Taeyong asked, rolling his eyes.

"Nope y/n did!" Ten said with a cheeky smile, "Now c'mon dig in"

And so there started their first meal together with everyone silently serving themselves, "So we usually talk about our day at the dinner table" Ten smiled his eyes crinkling into two half moons. "I know none of you will say anything so I'll start, Teacher Park yelled at me for correcting him on his Korean today. I was so pissed" Taeyong snorted at that, "Yea that old geezer is weird"

"I know I don't like him either" Donghyuck spoke and Taeyong glared at him but Ten cleared his throat loudly and Taeyong sighed muttering an inaudible apology.

"I placed a fart cushion on his chair today" Donhyuck grinned proudly and collective snorts were heard across the table and Jeno chocked on his food as Taeyong patted the younger boys back. Mark was still eating quietly. Then Donghyuck frowned, "But he didn't like that..." He then put out his hands showing everyones his palms, "So he took me out of the classroom and hit me" Tens heart sank at the red bruises on the boys hands and Taeyong was glaring again but this time it wasn't at Donghyuck, "How dare that old rat hit a seven year old child like that" the eldest growled. But Donghyuck only smiled, "It's okay I'm used to it" he said and Tens heart broke at that statement and by the looks of it so did Taeyongs.

Something shifted between the boys that night and they all knew it. Ten came to school the next day boasting to you about the success of his first family dinner and how excited he was for the next one tomorrow.

He even told you the story Donghyuck had told him not knowing what to do and that very day you got detention for throwing your thick Oxford Dictionary at Mr.Parks face.

Ten still smiles at that memory, a tiny you standing on your bench, yelling out a swear word and launching the book right at the unsuspecting teachers face, nevertheless what you did got the principal's attention. And without making a big deal of it she started an investigation on the teacher.

You chatted excitedly the next day about how exhilarating it was for you to throw a book at that man's face and Ten smiled listening to you talk with animated gestures.

That night he was greeted by the sight of Taeyong silently treating their youngest brothers wounded hands while avoiding the younger boys adoring gaze.

And so life moved forward and Ten had new friends and family here in Korea. And of course you. At this point he wasn't sure if you were his friend or family or both. But you were you.

You were known in school as- The y/n. The y/n who had all of Ten's attention leaving zero for his admirers.

To Ten you were the y/n who made him happy, the y/n who made him laugh, the y/n with a beautiful smile, the y/n who held him as he cried, the y/n who would nag him endlessly when he didn't eat properly, the y/n who would latch pinkies with him and walk everywhere, the y/n who was exceptionally smart and savy.

His life was finally looking up, with you by his side helping him through it all. And slowly he was making new happy memories, like the day he got you all flustered for the first time, or the day Taeyong had put his foot down and finally dragged Donghyuck away from the fighting couple into his room along with Ten, the day he took you to the amusement park you wanted to go to so badly that you kissed his cheek and went running off to the roller coaster, the day Jeno who only looked upto Taeyong had asked him for help, the day he snuck out of the house at night to watch the stars with you, the day Mark spoke at the diner table for the first time, the day you tripped and fell and he got it on camera, the day Taeyong called him his brother, the day of their class picnic and many more.

But there were also bad days like they day he had his first big fight with you or the day Donghyuck had come to him crying and crying without ever telling him why or the day where both the adult Lee's decided to join the family diner and ruined it.

But even those didnt last because his fight with you ended with the two of your crying in each other's arms promising to never have a fight this big again, because the day Donghyuck cried so bitterly that it shook the entire house Taeyong, Mark and Jeno rushed in and it turned into a mini sleepover as they took care of the youngest who soon forgot why he was crying and promised to make sure he only laughs in the future. And the day that Mr. And Mrs. Lee ruined the family diner was the day all five of the boys snuck out to eat marshmallows and chocolate in the park. The initial idea was to make smores but none of them knew how to make a fire and they were all out of crackers.

Those were just a few happy moments with many more to come like the day he asked you out, or the day he and his brothers went camping together, or the day Donghyuck smiled a smile so pure as his eyes shone with genuine happiness or the day Jeno started to think for himself and made friends who were a good influence on him. And the day Mark started dating someone. (Ten genuinely thought by how quite the boy was he would have to force him to talk to people let alone date someone), the day he got his father's company back and the day he proposed to you on the banks of the Han river, under the stars with his family and closest friends there to witness the moment.

"Why are you smiling so big?" your voice interrupted his thoughts and his smiled widened even more at the sight of you. "Did you fart?" You asked him and he chuckled grabbing onto your arm and and pulling you down to sit on his lap, wrapping his arms around your waist. "Nothing I'm just happy"

"Ten Lee I swear to god if you're on drugs then I want a divorce even before I marry you" you scolded playfully and Ten chuckled, "My only drug is you baby" he cooed and you gaged "Eww gross get a room" you said and he deadpanned.

"You're weird you know that y/n?" He asked with a small chuckle.

"Clearly you knew what you were getting into" You smiled, teeth on full display with how wide your grin was.

"Obviously"

"Oh by the way, I handled your little mishap at work today and got a few things you were supposed to do tomorrow scheduled for later and the rest got done today so your free tomorrow the entire day" you said and he smiled at you looking at you so lovingly. He doesn't remember that one moment he realised he was in love with you, maybe there wasn't just one lightbulb moment where her realised he loved you. Maybe he always knew or maybe he gradually figured it out. But that didn't matter all that matters is that he loves you and you love him.

"Ahh what would I do without you?" he asked snuggling into your neck and you chuckled, "Let's never have an answer to that question okay" you said and he nodded, you were right. You were there through evey step of the way after his life turned upside down and he's sure as hell he doesn't want to find out what it would be like without you so Ten grinned placing a small peck on you neck, "I'm gonna take you on the best date of your entire life tomorrow"

"Desperate much?"

"Y/n I'm literally engaged to you!"

~~~

Lee brother's- A mini series

Previous Part: Lee Mark

Next Part: Lee Donghyuck

[rekrappeter]

Moments || s.r

pairing: spencer reid x ssa!reader 

warnings: child abduction case | swearing maybe ?? | lmk if I have missed anything ♡

word count: 2.4k

a/n: this is my first one-shot involving any members of criminal minds. i have slowly fallen down the rabbit hole of being complete obsessed with spencer reid hence the reason for this new tumblr. lmk if you have any recommendations of other writing pages/criminal minds pages! Also if you have any requests, hit me up♡

This was the moment that you dreaded. The moment after you had the chance to clean yourself up; after you made a nutritional meal; after you made a cup of tea in your favorite mug and after you decided on a movie to spend the night watching. It was the same routine, the only differential factor was the case that happened before it. It was the moment that you were able to take a deep breath and look around your empty apartment, and each time, the sudden feeling of dread suffocated you. 

It was the moment that you used to look forward to but years had past and despite loving your job and the people you worked with, realization dawned on you that it had started taking a toll on your social life. You couldn’t even recall the last time you went out on a date. Was it two years ago or more? Every time you got back from a case, you slowly started falling into a state of loneliness and your mind would keep you preoccupied with the thoughts of never finding someone to love you. 

You stared at the steaming tea in the mug, watching it dance through the air and you felt your eyes starting to tear up with the heavy thoughts in your head. Sighing, you stood up and placed the cup on the coffee table. “That’s enough now..” You mumbled to yourself, grabbing your phone and opening the app store. You flickered through the multiple dating apps that were available, your mind boggled by the amount of them and just as you agreed to install one, your phone buzzed in your grasp.

Hotchner: We have a new case. 

A sigh of relief escaped your lips and you suddenly forgot about the dating app that was installing itself into your phone. Another routine that you were too accustomed to was changing from your loungewear to something more appropriate for work and grabbing your travel bag in less than ten minutes before you were out the door on the way to your second home. 

As you walked into the bullpen, you spotted each member of your team, and a feeling of security flooded over you. “Ah, there you are.” Derek grinned, dressed in a leather jacket and fitted jeans, as he leaned against your allocated desk. 

“Missing me already?” You teased. You could tell that the spark in your smile didn’t reach your eyes but you had to try your hardest to hide your negative thoughts in a room full of profilers. You placed your bag underneath the desk by Derek’s feet and he reached an arm out for a side hug.

“You ok?” He whispered, making it look as if he just kissed the side of your head. 

You knew you couldn’t trust your voice so you just responded by nodding at him, returning the friendly gesture. Derek was your closest friend in the BAU, you enjoyed his energy and could tell there was more to him than just pretty looks and a funny demeanor. Your attention was pulled away from him when Hotchner walked into the room, his confidence stride going towards the conference room. “Let’s go.” 

Garcia debriefed everyone on the active case that we were going to cover and the moment you heard the words child abduction, you sucked in a deep breath. They were always the ones that had the biggest impact on you and it took a while for you to recover from them, depending on the outcome. As you looked around at the team, you noticed that everyone looked exhausted from the previous case you had just closed; you caught Spencer’s glance and returned the empathic smile that he gave you. 

“Wheels up in ten, we’re already four hours behind. We can rest on the jet.” Aaron said before everyone fleeted from the office. 

Over the course of the next few hours, you slowly started to feel yourself slipping away from being hopeful that you were going to find this child. Two other children have gone missing from the area within the past six months and they still haven’t been found. You sat on a chair, your eyes scanning the information board over and over; there had to be something someone missed. Three young boys stared back at you, and time was ticking away. 

A knock on the door pulled your attention away from them and you looked at the door, seeing Spencer there. “Sorry, I didn’t want to startle you.” 

You stood up from the chair, shaking your head and fixing your shirt. “No, no, it’s okay. I should actually be out there. Just thought I might see something different.” You forced out a chuckle when you realized it was Spencer that was in charge of this board. Of course, if he couldn’t see anything, you wouldn’t be able to. 

“How are you holding up?” Spencer asked, walking into the room and taking his rightful place at the board. Spencer had noticed how you were more reluctant to leave the offices at night; how you were always trying to hold onto that last conversation. He could see that empty look in your eyes in the morning, noticing how your cheerful demeanor would come out after you spoke with people. 

“I’m okay, Dr. Reid.” You teased gently, watching the light blush flutter across his cheek. “It’s just... cases like these are tough, especially when we have three missing boys and no leads. It just seems all too strange….” 

Spencer listened to you rant on about the case, watching you sigh in frustration and he admired the way you spoke with your hands. He wanted to ask how you were feeling despite the case, he wanted you to open up to him like you do with Derek and JJ but he just couldn’t get past that wall. He wasn’t too sure if it was him or you that kept rebuilding the wall between you, was he afraid to admit that he has slowly started to fall for a colleague… again? 

“That’s it.” You whispered, rushing over to where Spencer was standing and examining the photo of the second child that went missing. “When I went to speak with Mark’s parents, they had a photograph on the wall and his father was wearing this exact shirt, it’s from a boy scouts association.” 

“Do you think it was his father?” Spencer questioned, trying not to get distracted by the fact that you were centimeters from him. He could smell the lingering scent of your shampoo and he could almost feel your heart racing. 

“N-no, I don’t think so. If you look at the photo, you can see that the shirt is too big for it to be his. What if someone had some kind of grudge…”

“Over the fathers and his way to get even is to take their sons.” Spencer finished your sentence. 

You looked up at him, his body closer to yours and you felt your skin getting red. “It could be a long shot but it could also be worth it.” You mumbled quietly, very aware that Spencer hasn’t made any objections to you standing this close to him. You took your phone out to call Garcia, and inwardly groaned when you unlocked it and Tinder was the page that was exposed. Glancing at Spencer, his face looked defeated and he took a step back from you. You couldn’t understand why regret and panic swept over you, and you started blabbering excuses out to him. 

“Don’t worry about it, Y/N. Your secret is safe with me.” Spencer chuckled softly before he turned his back to you and you could see him running his fingers through his hair. When you got through to Garcia, you explained your theory to her but your mind was distracted by the tousled brown-haired man in front of you. As you waited on the line for Garcia’s confirmation or rejection of your theory, your eyes kept glancing at Spencer. You so badly wanted to be able to explain to him that you haven’t even been on the dating app, that it was a moment of weakness on your behalf. 

“Y/N Y/L/N, if you were here right now, I would kiss you! I’m going to call Hotch, I’ll send the address your way.” You released a sigh of relief when she hung up, and you smiled at Spencer. 

Spencer returned the smile, “Who’s the genius now?” 

“Come on, let’s go get ‘em.” You retorted, ensuring that you had your gun and left the precinct with Reid hot on your heels. The hope was finally started to come back. 

It was always good closing cases that had a happy ending but unfortunately, not all of them ended like the one today. But you were going to take advantage of the blissful feeling that you were feeling while it lasted. You were back at Quantico now, filling out the last of the paperwork. It was just past eleven in the evening and you had said goodbye to the team merely two hours ago. On your way to the storage room, a light caught your eye in one of the conferences room. 

Peeking through the half-open blinds, your stomach twisted when you spotted Spencer there, flicking through an unknown file. The feeling was strange, it was as if you had the sudden urge to want to go talk to him and there was no doubt that he has been on your mind the last few hours. You knocked on the door, opening it and leaning on the doorframe. “What are you still doing here?” You smiled, and when he lifted his head, his hair danced around his face. 

“I-just catching up on some research,” Spencer replied, placing the chart on the table in front of him. But the truth was, Spencer just picked some random file to read so that he had a reason to make sure you weren’t going to stay here all night by yourself. “What has you here?” 

You shrugged your shoulders gently, walking further into the room. Nibbling on your cheek, you wanted to open up to Spencer but you didn’t want to bore him with details of your life that he had no interest in. Before you could reply though, Spencer started talking again. “When I asked you earlier about how you were feeling, I didn’t mean at that moment. I couldn’t help but... but notice that you have been acting strange recently, it’s as if your mind is always elsewhere and you’re always the last person here. Is everything okay at home?” 

You couldn’t hide the shocked look on your face but you knew someone was going to pick up on it eventually. Spencer was the last on your list though that you’d expect to notice unless he has been watching you. And what would that mean if he was? Did he like you more than what you thought he did? “I-I… Spence, I don’t know how to explain it.”

“You feel as if your whole life has been dominated by this job? That it’s not giving you a chance to live how you would like? That you might end up being alone because of how intense this job is?” Spencer spoke softly, as if he knew exactly what he was talking about. 

You shook your head, a light smile on your face and you scoffed in disbelief. “Exactly like that. That no matter how much I give to this job, I’m not getting anything back from it. I could agree to go on a date with someone, but I could never be 100% sure because at the last minute, I might have to leave for a case. No one would understand that.” You sighed, leaning against the table.

“I would.” Spencer whispered, and you whipped your head to look at him, noting how he was suddenly avoiding eye contact with you. 

“What?” You asked, your heart beating against your chest. 

Spencer looked around frantically before standing up from the chair, “Noth-Nothing, it doesn’t matter. Do you want me to walk you home?” He asked, his beautiful brown eyes avoiding yours still. You stood straight and walked over to where he was, his adam’s apple gulping.

You reached your hand to rest on his cheek, testing the waters at first. He didn’t flinch away as you expected, instead his eyes flickered closed for a moment and he rested into your touch. This was a moment that you could get used to; you watched his all the worries left his features and when his eyes opened, they were soft and swirling with unexplained motions. “Can I try something?” You asked quietly, not wanting to make any sudden movements. He nodded slowly, and his eyes widen slightly as he watched you move closer. 

“Are you sure?” Spencer whispered, knowing that what is about to happen is something that you can’t take back. 

“Yes.” You replied, closing the gap between yours and Spencer’s lips. The kiss was hesitant at first, neither of you wanting to scare the other away. His lips were soft, but as second passed, his confidence built and he wrapped his arms around you slowly, pulling you to him. Your lips moved in sync, savoring every moment and broken touch. Your fingers swam through his hair and your heart felt as if it wanted to explode with happiness. An emotion you haven’t felt in so long. 

When Spencer pulled away, your eyes remained shut for a second wanting to remember every moment of it. You wanted to replay the kiss over and over again. His breathing was heavy and the air was fawning your face. “I have wanted to kiss you for so long.” He broke the silence, and your eyes connected with his. 

“Really?”

“Really.” He whispered, leaning in to peck your lips again. 

“What took you so long?” You asked. 

“It was never the right moment.”

           🌻 🌻 🌻 🌻 🌻

please please please let me know what you thought of this! It’s my first s.r fic so I would love some feedback! also I have 0 followers, follow me and I’ll follow you back! <3

[sehunniepot]

i like me better (when i’m with you) / 1.2 ✎

the fluffy strangers to lovers college!au in which your friends are tired of you complaining about being single and find your perfect match in the one and only campus dj, jaehyun jung.

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You sighed as you slid into the car. Always the observant one, Johnny shot you a worried glance as he started the engine.

“What’s with the heavy sighing?” he asked, shifting the car into drive.

“I just...I don’t know?” The confused lilt in your voice stopped your best friend from interrupting you. You clearly had something to let out and he was going to give you the space to do so. That’s how it always was during these deep car talks. You would talk and Johnny, being the great older brother figure he was, would listen. 

“I’m definitely happier than before. I’m satisfied with where I’m at. A lot healthier, in a major that I actually enjoy compared to last year. I’ve worked on myself for the past year and I like who I am now. I have a great group of friends—”

This time, Johnny couldn’t help but say something to lighten the mood. He smirked and said, “Yeah, I am pretty great, aren’t I?” 

You playfully shoved him in reply. 

“I’m sensing a ‘but’ in that sentence, though.” And just like that, the driver pulled you back into the serious conversation you were having.

“Yeah.” You ran your fingers through your hair while trying to gather your thoughts. Glancing at you, Johnny caught you nibbling your lip and playing with the ends of your hair. You always did that when you were deep in thought or something was bothering you in some way. He guessed this was deeper than your group of friends thought it was. And that bothered him.

As a true friend of yours, Johnny wanted you to be comfortable with them. To be happy in their company. But lately, the happiness he noticed was fading. There was something preoccupying your head. He needed to get to the bottom of it so he could help you in any way that he could. 

The oldest of the group always doted on you and you two knew it to be true. There was no denying it. However, there was never a hint of romance behind that doting. It was similar to and older sibling choosing his favorite younger sibling and putting extra care to make sure they turned out alright. 

Johnny Suh, the caring man everyone always knew him to be, just wanted you to be okay. 

“I don’t know. Seeing Mina and Mark sometimes makes me miss having a partner. It’s weird, like, really weird. At times, I wish I had someone to share this happiness with. It gets me in a mood and I know how to pull myself out of it.”

Dating, you mean. You know it. You’re sure Johnny knew it too by the way he hummed in response. But that’s all he did. Hum with no other words to say. Johnny’s silence allowed you to continue on. 

“But I’m scared of putting myself out there. Sehun...I know he was your friend but he hurt me pretty badly. I don’t think I could trust anyone with my heart again.”

You fiddled with your fingers anxiously—the topic of your past relationship was something you hated talking about.  If you could even call it that to begin with. Maybe situationship was a better word for it.

“I don’t think I’ll ever be ready to put myself out there again. I’ve tried once or twice and it always ended up with me backing out because I got into my own head.”

Your friend called your name and you shook your head, trying to stop the pity from slipping out of his mouth. You didn’t want it. You didn’t need it, either. “Munchkin,” your friend tried again with that nickname of his that made you break down your walls. 

You let out a bitter chuckle in return. “Am I just going to be someone’s plaything for the rest of my life? Because that’s what happened with the past two guys? Or are my standards just too high that I can’t meet a person to match them?”

“Munch, you need to stop doing that,” Johnny warned you, his voice growing sharper with each word. The upset dad voice was starting to surface. That’s how you knew he really cared, when that tone of voice would appear. “You know that’s not true.” 

Sending him a hint of a smile, you were glad you had someone like Johnny as a close friend. He may be a goofball at times but the man always knew what to say when you needed it the most.

“Look, the guys you met in the past? They were trash, including Sehun. But that shouldn’t stop you from putting yourself out there! And who knows, maybe you’ll find someone when you least expect it,” he reassured you, a warm grin gracing his full lips. 

Eyes still training on your friend, you wondered why you couldn’t fall for a guy like him or Mark. Why did you waste your time with assholes?

Johnny turned into the parking lot of the shopping center, startling you out of your thoughts. You were so invested so into voicing what was shaking you up, you hadn’t realized that you were reaching the bakery.

Getting out of the vehicle, you both grabbed your cell phones and wallets. Johnny came around to shut the door for you, a little thing he always did that made you smile. Gathering you in his arms, your best friend gave you a comforting hug. “Hey, Munch?”

“Hmm?” you hummed, inwardly groaning at the long line of customers waiting to get their treats as you entered the bakery.

“What would you consider boyfriend material anyway?” Johnny questioned. You gave him a weird look to which he shrugged in return. “Just curious. I mean you already know my type.”

“Ummmm,” you had to take a moment to actually think about it. Johnny smiled at you patiently, waiting for your answer, “A guy who’s incredibly sweet and has no problem making me laugh. Caring. Has the same interests as me? Music, movies, whatever; so we have something to talk about, you know? Or at least, understands and listens when I talk about something I’m passionate about—”

You started to run off at the mouth as the line moves up. Again, Johnny did nothing but listen. As you listed the traits you looked for, he was mentally making a list of them and filing through his friends to see if anyone fit the bill.

“—Speaking of passion! They have to be passionate about their goals! And respectful of boundaries. Patient. And I don’t know—someone who’ll do cheesy things with me like dance around in the kitchen?”

Noticing that you were starting to drift into a rant, you stopped yourself with a sheepish smile. Almost embarrassed that you were going on without end, you began to fiddle with your fingers again. “I’m rambling, aren’t I?” 

“You’re fine, Munchkin! And those really aren’t high standards at all. A bit cheesy though, but it fits you. I can see you dating someone like that,” he reassured you, ruffling your hair. You squeaked at the sudden action and failed to slap Johnny’s large hands away from your head. A grumble left your lips as you used the glass windows as a mirror t fix your appearance. 

Completely fits someone I know, Johnny thought to himself.

You both stepped forward in line. Squinting at the menu plastered on the wall, you skimmed through it and jokingly asked, “You’re just saying that cuz you’re practically my brother. Know anyone that fits my ideal type though?”

“Maybe, why? Want me to set you up?” your tall friend teased. “I might have a couple of friends who fit the type.”

“Oh yeah, totally interested if you could actually find someone. Highly doubt it though,” you shot back, sarcasm dripping from your words.

“Eh, I wouldn’t be too sure about that,” Johnny said with a knowing grin. Shooting him a confused look, the boy just shrugged his shoulders, revealing nothing else. 

Then, there was this sudden need to relieve yourself. Glancing at how many people were in front of you, there was still a bit of time before your party reached the front. “I’ll be right back, I’m gonna the restroom real quick. You already know what I want, right? Just in case?”

Johnny nodded, waving you in the direction of the bathroom. As soon as you were out of sight, your friend pulled out his phone to a string of texts from Sejeong, Mina, and Mark in a new group chat that for some reason, didn’t include you. He skimmed through it and chuckled—what amazing timing.

© sehunniepot / sehunniepotwrites, 2020-2021

[emospritelet]

Desperation 15/16

Oh, don’t mind if I do! As soon as you sent me this prompt I knew how I was going to write it :))

This chapter is also dedicated to @timelordthirteen​, who made this wonderful aesthetic post for this fic and has been patiently waiting for these two to touch :)

[AO3]

Oh, the rating went up 

x 

Belle wrapped the robe she was wearing around herself a little tighter, looping the belt tight as Gold closed down the laptop and shoved the pad containing his budget notes into one of the kitchen drawers. She took two wine glasses from the cupboard as he rummaged around on one of the higher shelves in the larder, finally taking down a bottle of red wine. He held it up, looking uncertain. A stylised black cat with a curling tail was on the label, looking out with tilted green eyes.

“I’ve no idea what it’s like,” he said. “Not exactly a connoisseur. I’m guessing it’ll be red and fairly alcoholic. Aftertaste of wine.”

Belle giggled.

“Can’t ask much more than that,” she said. “Besides, it has a black cat on it. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Gold’s eyebrow twitched, and she felt her mouth drop open as she realised what she’d said.

“Uh - I - I meant with the taste,” she said lamely, and his eyes gleamed as he tried to hide a smile.

“Well, let’s hope so.” He stepped past her, reaching into one of the drawers for a corkscrew. “Come on, let’s take this through to the lounge.”

She waited for him to uncork the bottle, following him through to the lounge and setting the glasses on the coffee table before turning on the lamps. Gold eased himself onto the couch, picking up the glasses one by one and pouring wine into them.

“Cheers,” he said, raising his glass, and she smiled, sitting down next to him and picking up her own.

“Cheers.”

They clinked glasses, and Belle took a sip. The wine was pleasant enough as far as she could tell, its warmth spreading down her throat as she swallowed.

“Considering my sense of taste has all but disappeared, it seems pretty good,” she said, and Gold nodded.

“Honestly, it’s so long since I had a drink, anything would taste good,” he said. “But I’ve definitely had worse.”

He took another sip, and settled back against the cushions with a sigh as he relaxed a little, stretching his legs out.

“How long is it since you just kicked back with a glass of wine?” she asked.

“Probably New Year’s Eve,” he admitted. “Didn’t stay up until midnight, or anything. Bae and I had been to Granny’s New Year’s party, but I had a glass of wine when  he went to bed, and I drank the last of the whisky I had. Sat here in silence and thought about the year that had gone and the one that was to come.”

“I have to say that my New Year’s Eve was similar,” she remarked. “Only with far more alcohol and many more regrets.”

Gold chuckled, taking a sip of wine.

“I was thinking it would be a good year,” he said. “A better year. Didn’t see any of this coming, of course.”

“None of us did,” she said. “Although I have to say this whole experience has made me reevaluate things. Think about what’s important in life.”

“Has it made you regret coming to Storybrooke?” he asked. “You would have had more freedom to move around if you’d stayed in the city, I imagine.”

“Oh, I could never regret coming here,” she said at once. “It’s a wonderful town; admittedly I haven’t seen all that much of it yet, but it certainly seems wonderful. And coming here just before a crisis hits, being a relative stranger in this place - well, it’s made me realise how much strength and compassion there is out there. And how important it is to have a community. To belong.”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “This town certainly pulls together in a crisis. And you do belong, Belle. You’re one of us now.”

She smiled at him, and there was a comfortable silence as they drank their wine. It had made her cheeks flush a little, and by the time she finished the glass she was feeling a gentle buzz from the alcohol. Gold took her empty glass, setting it on the table beside his own and pouring them another. 

“Did Bae say anything to you earlier?” he asked. “He seems a little down today.”

“Oh.” Belle chewed her lip. “Yeah. He was talking about his mom.”

“Ah.” Gold nodded. “Yes. He mentions her less than he once did, but I’m sure he still misses her.” 

“He told me about the last time they spoke,” she said, picking up her glass. “He said she promised to visit and bring presents, but she never showed up.”

Gold gave her a thin, bitter smile.

“No,” he said. “He must have asked me when she was coming fifty times over that Christmas period. I didn’t have an answer.”

“And you haven’t heard from her since?” asked Belle.

“A couple of postcards, gushing about how wonderful it was to travel,” he said dryly. “Full of empty promises about how she would come and see him and tell him all about what she’d been doing. The last one of those was over two years ago. I don’t even know if she’s still alive, and frankly I don’t care.”

He hung his head a little, his mouth flattening as he turned the glass between his fingers.

“That sounds bad, doesn’t it?” he said quietly. “I don’t - I don’t wish her harm, I just - she hurt Bae a lot by breaking her promises all the time. She always said she loved him, and that she’d keep in touch, and it just - never seemed to happen. I’d get him ready for a weekend with her, and she’d be late, or she just wouldn’t show at all.”

“Ugh, I’m sorry.” Belle wrinkled her nose. “Poor little Bae. That must have been so hard on him.”

“Sometimes I think it might have been better if she’d said straight out that she didn’t want any access,” he said. “Just left him with me when he was born and gone and lived her own life. At least then he wouldn’t have missed her. Still. Hindsight, and all that.”

“Maybe she wanted to try to do the right thing,” ventured Belle, and he shrugged.

“Maybe,” he said. “She made enough of a point of wanting access in the divorce, but perhaps that was just because she wanted to create some drama, I don’t know.”

“So she has your address?” she asked.

“Oh yes,” he said dryly. “I made sure she always knew how to contact him. As much as I could. Last time she wrote to him, she said she was taking a boat out to the Caribbean. God alone knows where she ended up.” 

He ran a hand through his hair, huffing air through his lips.

“God, I’m sorry to rant about my ex. I’ve never really had the chance to do it before. Wouldn’t be fair to do it in front of Bae.”

“I think he’s forming his own opinion of her, anyway,” said Belle, and he nodded.

“Perhaps he is. Not much I can do about it either way, it’s up to her to make their relationship work. If she’s interested.”

“You think she’ll ever come back?” she asked, and he pulled a face.

“In the absence of needing a kidney or something?” he said, making her grin. “If I had to put money on it I’d say it’s unlikely.”

There was silence for a moment. Gold took a swallow of wine, shaking his head as though freeing himself from the ghosts of his past.

“What about you?” he asked. “Any depressing relationship failures you want to tell me about?”

Belle pulled a face.

“Mostly a long list of failed first dates,” she said. “A couple of relationships, but nothing that got too serious. Sometimes I think I’m cursed. Or too picky, one of the two.”

“You should be picky,” he said. “No sense in settling for less than you deserve. You deserve the best, Belle. You deserve to be happy.”

“So do you.”

Gold inclined his head.

“I am happy,” he said. “Most of the time. You know, when there isn’t a deadly pandemic and the threat of financial ruin hanging over the town.”

He sent her a grin, to lighten the statement, and Belle smiled, taking another drink.

“Have you dated much since you got to Storybrooke?” she asked, and he snorted.

“No. Haven’t had time to think about it. Despite Granny doing her best to set me up with every single woman that visits the diner.”

“Sounds like the potential for a bunch of dates as awful as mine was,” she said. “My friend Ariel kept arranging blind dates for me back when I was living in Boston. Unfortunately Ariel’s idea of a hot date and mine just - well, they don’t really match up.”

“I daresay she and Granny would get along well,” he remarked, and Belle giggled.

“Well meaning and wonderful but really missing the mark,” she said.

“God bless ‘em.”

He raised his glass, and she clinked her own against his, still chuckling.

“It hasn’t put you off relationships entirely, then?” she said. “Getting divorced?”

Gold eyed her for a moment, and shrugged.

“No, I wouldn’t say that,” he said. “I haven’t become bitter and cynical, no matter how badly things ended with Milah. No matter how badly they began.”

Belle turned towards him, drawing her knees up onto the couch.

“You were married,” she said. “You must have cared about each other once.”

“We married because of Bae,” he said wearily. “I wanted to do the right thing, give us some stability. But yes, I suppose we did care. She told me she loved me, anyway. In the beginning.”

“Perhaps she did.”

He gave her a tiny, twisted smile.

“Perhaps,” he said. “For a time.”

“What happened?” asked Belle softly, and he sighed.

“We wanted different things out of life,” he said simply. “And the things she wanted, I couldn’t give her. Things weren’t great to begin with, but then I did this.” He tapped his bad leg. 

“How did you do it?” she asked curiously, and he pulled a face.

“One of my jobs in New York was a courier,” he said. “Motorcycle courier. Had an accident. Caught a wheel on a patch of fuel and took a trip under a truck. Lucky to come out of it with just a busted ankle.” 

Belle winced.

“God, that sounds awful. I’m sorry.”

“Is what it is,” he said, and took another swallow of wine. “Made things impossible between us, though. I hadn’t been much of a catch beforehand, but with a limp and a cane…” He gave her a self-deprecating grin, shrugging.

“You broke up, huh?” said Belle, and he nodded.

”She grew - resentful,” he said. “Restless. It was only a matter of time, really, the accident just made it happen sooner. She wanted money, good times, new places and new people every month. She never wanted the life I could give her. Such as it was.”

“You’re a very generous person,” she told him, and he smiled.

“With what?” he said. “I have nothing to offer. As she told me repeatedly.”

“Don’t say that,” she said firmly, and he shrugged.

“It’s true,” he said. “Milah wasn’t wrong about the facts, however cruel she might have been in the delivery. I have no money. No prospects. Nothing but the skills I’ve taught myself.”

“And a kind and generous nature, and a sense of humour, and a selfless heart…”

Gold chuckled, eyes glinting in amusement.

“You make me sound like a Jane Austen heroine.”

“Take it as a compliment.”

“Oh, I will,” he remarked. “I suppose there’s a lot to be said for trying to be kind in the face of adversity. However unheroic and unmasculine it might be considered by some.”

“As a librarian, I’m qualified to tell you that here are many different types of hero,” she said. “Besides, who cares about money and - and wild parties and things? None of that means anything. Not compared to family and belonging and making a life together. Milah was wrong to think it did.”

“Well, like I said.” His tone was wry. “We wanted different things.”

There was silence for a moment, and Belle took a drink, watching as the light caught on Gold’s hair, picking out gold and silver threads in amongst the brown. He glanced across at her, licking a droplet of wine from his lip, and she thought how handsome he was in the warm light, with his high cheekbones and his soft eyes, long fingers tapping against the wine glass. 

Another drink, the heat of the wine in her mouth, on her tongue. Gold took a sip of his own, lean throat bobbing as he swallowed. There were tiny flecks of new stubble on his jaw, and she licked her lips, wondering how rough it would feel, enjoying the sudden tug of desire deep in her belly. She had been analysing what she felt for him for several days, the growing fondness for his gentle ways and his kind nature, the attraction that pooled and swelled and made her heart thump. She wondered how it would feel to have him touch her. How he would taste if she kissed him.

Belle put down her glass, taking a deep breath, her skin tingling.

“So you said Milah left when Bae was four,” she said, and he nodded, glancing across at her as he took a drink.

“That’s right,” he said, setting down his glass.

“And since then, you’ve loved no one,” she said softly. “And no one has loved you.”

Gold stared at her for a moment, as though he was unsure what she had said, then slowly leaned forward, the couch squeaking a little as he moved. He was very close, and she could feel her breath quicken as his eyes bored into hers.

“Why did you stay with me?” he whispered, and she swallowed, the tip of her tongue wetting her lips.

“I - I wanted to help,” she said. “I thought - I thought you needed me.”

He lifted a hand, his movements hesitant, seeming to catch himself momentarily before gently cupping her cheek, his fingers sliding across her skin. Belle sucked in a breath at his touch, her heart thumping, and as uncertainty flickered across his face she put a hand over his, holding him there. He leaned in a little closer, until she could feel his cool breath against her lips.

“I do need you,” he whispered. “I need you, Belle.”

“I need you, too,” she breathed. “And - and I want you, Rum. So much.”

It was as though sparks were dancing between them, making her skin prickle and her lips part. His breathing had hardened a little, and his eyes were dark and deep, staring into hers. She could feel her pulse throbbing high in her throat, and she leaned in and briefly pressed her mouth to his, a gentle brush of soft lips. Gold sucked in a breath, a shiver going through him, and she kissed him again, lips pressing a little harder before she pulled back. He was staring at her wide-eyed, his palm still cupping her face, and he reached up with the other hand, fingertips brushing stray curls back from her face as he leaned in to kiss her again.

He was hesitant, a little breathless, his lips brushing gently against hers, his fingers sliding into her hair. Belle shifted closer, hands dropping to slide around his waist, and she moaned as the tip of his tongue gently parted her lips, pushing inside to stroke against hers.

Belle shifted closer, pushing him back against the cushions as the kiss deepened. Her heart was thumping, her cheeks flushing as their lips slipped and slid, Gold’s fingers stroking against the nape of her neck, tangling in her hair. She slid a knee across his legs, straddling him, and his hands moved down her back, tugging her close against him as he let out a groan of pleasure. She could feel the edge of his belt buckle against her lower belly, and she rolled her hips, sinking down a little and feeling the hard line of his cock pressing against her core. Gold gasped into her mouth, hot breath and wet lips against hers, and pulled back a little, breathing hard.

Belle nuzzled her nose with his, and he reached up to stroke her hair back from her face, running his thumb over her lower lip, his hands trembling a little. She kissed the tip of his thumb, catching his eyes with hers, her chest heaving as she slid her hands up his chest. He shook his head.

“I feel like I’m dreaming,” he whispered, and she smiled.

“Did you dream about this?”

“Too many times,” he breathed. “I never thought - never hoped you might—”

She kissed him again, and he let out a low growl, his hand clutching at her hair as the kiss grew hard and messy. His chest was hot and firm beneath her hands as they slid upwards, his hair just as soft as she had expected. She pulled her mouth from his, sitting back a little as she tried to catch her breath.

“Take me to bed,” she whispered.

He stared at her, his mouth a little slack, and she caught her lower lip between her teeth, suddenly uncertain.

“Do you - not want to?” she asked, and Gold’s eyebrows flicked upwards.

“Oh - no no, of course I do,” he said quickly. “It’s just - well - you’re sick.”

“I’m fine,” she insisted. “Just a little tired, that’s all. Going to bed would be the best thing for me, in the circumstances.”

He grinned at that, and inclined his head.

“I can’t argue with that,” he said. “But I didn’t see any condoms in Mayor Mills’ grocery box.”

Belle giggled, and kissed his nose.

“I take birth control,” she said. “So - so we could. If you wanted.”

He smiled briefly, his eyes glinting.

“I want,” he breathed, and kissed her again.

Belle undulated against him, pressing her body to his, feeling the heat of him through his shirt, and his hand dropped to her thigh, sliding upwards, moving over her hip to squeeze her rear. She pulled her mouth free, pressing her forehead to his.

“Bed,” she whispered, and slipped from his lap.

They left the wine, Belle grasping his hand in hers and pulling him with her up the stairs. The lamp was on in the bedroom, a pleasant, warm light, and she shut the door behind him, hoping that Bae was sleeping soundly and wouldn’t decide to wander around in the middle of the night. She stepped forward, reaching for him, and their mouths met, her hands grasping his belt and tugging it open as his hands stroked over her shoulders. Gold pushed the robe from her, and she quickly pulled the belt open and let it fall, stepping closer and rising up on her toes as she pulled her mouth from his and kissed down his neck.

He let out a low groan, head rolling back, and she reached for the buttons of his shirt, eager to open it up and bare his skin. Her hands shook a little as she unbuttoned him, and she trailed her mouth around his throat, breathing in the musky scent of him, feeling the scrape of his stubble against her tender lips. She got the shirt open, tugging it from his jeans, hands sliding over hot, firm muscles as she pushed it from him. Gold shrugged out of it, and she bent her head to his chest, letting her tongue swirl over a taut nipple and making him groan. His skin tasted of salt and very faintly of the shower gel he used. She breathed him in, nuzzling his skin with her nose, and tasted him again, sucking the nipple in between her lips.

Gold ran his fingers through her hair, rumpling her curls as she sucked at him, her tongue circling. His fingers gently scraped against her scalp, making her shiver deliciously, and she slid her hands down his sides, feeling the lines of his ribs, drawing her fingertips around the waistband of his jeans. She let his nipple slip from her mouth and raised her head, breathing hard as she plucked at the button of his fly. Gold cradled her face with warm hands, kissing her tenderly, his lips soft and wet.

She got his jeans open, breaking the kiss as she pushed them down over his hips, and stepped back as he kicked them off. Gold reached for her, hands gently grasping her hips and pulling her a little closer. His thumbs slipped beneath the shirt of her PJs, brushing against the skin of her waist and slowly pushing upwards, lifting the shirt. Belle raised her arms to let him pull it over her head and toss it aside, and she shook out her hair, watching him study her, his eyes roaming over her curves.

“You’re beautiful,” he whispered. “So beautiful.”

She smiled, reaching for him, stepping close and sliding her hands around his waist as she raised her head to capture his lips with her own. Gold groaned, hands sliding down to cup her rear and pull her close, her breasts pushing against his chest, his skin hot against hers. He pulled his mouth from hers, kissing down her neck, and Belle rose up on her toes with a moan of pleasure. The sensation of his lips against her skin made her shiver, and he pulled back, nuzzling her nose with his as he pushed her pants down over her rear.

Belle stepped out of them, turning and pulling him with her as she lay down on the bed. He stumbled a little, kneeling heavily on the mattress beside her before lying by her side, and Belle shifted over a little, reaching up to kiss him, hands stroking through his hair as he pulled her close. He rolled her onto her back, kissing down her throat, his hair brushing against her chest as he kissed lower, his tongue painting circles on her skin. His hands cupped her breasts, and Belle moaned, arching upwards as he sucked at a nipple, a low groan coming from him.

She let her head roll back against the pillows, eyes closed, enjoying the heat and weight of him pressing down on her, and the feel of his lips against her skin. He kissed lower, his fresh stubble scratching at her belly, and she sucked in a breath as his tongue swept over her navel, lips pulling at her skin. His hands slid down to her thighs, pushing them apart, and she opened her legs wider as his nose brushed against her tender flesh. Gold let out a low growl as he kissed her, and Belle answered him with a tiny cry as his tongue dipped in between her folds. She let her hands drop to push through his hair, moaning as he licked her, his tongue swirling and stabbing, brushing over her clit and making her skin hum with pleasure.

“God, Belle!” he whispered, his breath hot against her skin, and put his mouth to her again, his tongue circling, soft and wet. 

Belle moaned, arching her back, pushing against his mouth. He had settled into a rhythm, his tongue moving in slow circles, and she lost herself in the feel of it, letting the pleasure build deep in her core. His hand moved, a finger teasing her before sliding inside, pushing deep, and Belle gasped at the increase in sensation, her fingers tightening in his hair.

“God, that’s good!” she breathed. “So good.”

He was sliding the finger in and out of her, his tongue stroking against her, and she could feel the heat rise up through her body, flushing her cheeks and making her breath quicken. She whimpered, clutching at his hair, pushing her hips upwards, her body rocking against the bed in time with his thrusts. He had quickened his pace, his tongue flickering over her, and she could feel her muscles tense, her body tightening as her pulse seemed to pound in her head.

She came with a cry, shoving a forearm over her mouth to muffle the noise as a wave of pleasure broke over her. Gold groaned, drawing the finger out of her, his mouth covering her, devouring her, and she moaned as her hips jerked in tiny, rapid movements. He pressed kisses to her, lips trailing over her inner thighs before making his way up over her belly, and she slid her hands over his shoulders as he reached her breasts, his hands cupping, lips gently pulling at a nipple. His body was pressed against hers, and she could feel him against her thigh, a hard, heavy heat that made desire surge within her.

He pushed up on his elbows, breathing hard as he gazed down on her, and she reached up to push his hair back from his face, his skin damp and sticky.

“That was amazing,” she whispered. “You see? Very generous.”

He grinned, his eyes glinting.

“I could be even more generous, if you like.”

“Maybe later,” she said, sliding a hand down between them. “I’m in the mood for something a little more - mutual.”

She grasped his cock, feeling the hot, rigid length of him in her hand, squeezing gently, and Gold groaned low in his throat, a bass, rumbling growl. Belle ran the pad of her thumb over the head, spreading a bead of slippery fluid, and opened her legs a little wider, guiding him into her. His breath caught, the muscles in his arms tightening, and he let out a shuddering sigh as he pushed slowly inside her, sinking deep. She moaned, lifting her knees, sliding her feet along his thighs and up over his rear, wrapping her legs around his back.

He felt good inside her, and she lifted her hips, feeling the heat of him, the friction of his skin against hers as he began to move with long, slow circles of his hips, a rhythmic grinding motion. His hands pushed into her hair, fingers still sticky with her fluids, and he kissed her, his tongue gently pushing between her lips. Belle caressed his shoulders, running fingertips down his sides and up the groove of his spine to stroke through his hair. He shuddered, gasping into her mouth, his hands cradling her face, his lips brushing against hers as he thrust into her.

Belle moaned, head rolling back against the pillows, and he drew his tongue up her throat, sucking at her skin. The feel of him inside her was incredible, heat and wetness and the friction of his body against hers sending bursts of sensation through her. She kissed along his jaw, feeling the rasp of his stubble against her lips, drawing the warm scent of him in through her nose. She could feel bliss rising through her once more, swelling upwards and making her skin hum. Her thighs gripped his sides, sliding against him, holding him tight, and he groaned against her neck, his movements quickening, his cock pushing deep inside her. 

She could feel him tense, his muscles hard and taut beneath her fingers, and she bucked against him, tugging at him, a moan bursting from her throat and becoming a cry of pleasure as she came, stars bursting in her vision. Gold let out a deep groan, his cock pulsing as he followed her, his thrusts rapid and shallow as his hips pumped. She clung to him, letting out tiny moans in time with his thrusts, and he slowed to a stop, breathing heavily, hair brushing her face as he pressed his forehead to hers.

Belle tried to catch her breath, feeling the heat of him against her, perspiration making their skin slippery where their bodies joined. She tilted her head, gently brushing her lips against his, and Gold smiled, nuzzling her affectionately.

“Hey,” he said, and she smiled.

“Hey.”

He kissed along her jaw and down her neck, slowly pulling out of her and rolling onto his side with a heavy sigh. Belle turned with him, sliding a hand over his waist and down over his hip. She felt wonderfully relaxed, her skin still tingling from her orgasm, and Gold was watching her with a tender expression, his eyes heavy with sleepy contentment. She walked her fingers up his body, laying her hand over his heart and feeling its heavy thump against her palm. Gold smiled, putting a hand over hers.

“I’d forgotten how good it feels,” he whispered, sliding his fingers through hers. “To be touched. To touch like this.”

“It’s been a while for me, too,” she said, and his mouth curved in a lopsided grin.

“Has it been six years?”

“Well - okay, maybe not that long,” she admitted, chuckling. “But this was worth the wait.”

“Indeed.” He kissed her gently. “It was perfect.”

“Not bad for a couple of invalids,” she added, and he chuckled, his eyes gleaming.

“I’m still not entirely convinced this isn’t a wonderful dream,” he said. “And when I wake up, I’ll be alone again.”

“Well, I wasn’t planning on sleeping on the couch again,” she remarked. “Your bed is too comfy. And way better when you’re in it with me.”

“Good,” he said softly, and kissed her again. “Stay with me tonight, Belle.”

“I’ll stay,” she whispered. “I won’t leave you, I promise.”

[ghostmartyr]

how a life can move from the darkness [5/?]

| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |

Summary:  Two drug addicts (Eren and Historia) meet in group and decide to be roommates to make their  living situation slightly less weird. From there we do the slow burn  found family dance mixed in with the struggles and agonies of recovery.  Heavy on friendship feels, especially EMA. Eventual yumikuri.

Eren had lunch plans for the weekend. An appointment. Specific time and everything. It took a lot of debate, stress, one meeting and several more confirmations from Historia that it was fine, but there was a plan, and Mikasa and Armin had agreed to it. Sunday lunch. Dinner reminded Eren too much of his mother watching every twitch of his hands at the table. Lunch’s only association was with forgetting it.

He couldn’t forget this one.

Of course! the happy letters from Armin’s latest text spelled out. Mikasa had been more formal, which was easier. He could tell she didn’t really believe the offer either. He should have felt like crap over that, but it was too nice being back on the same wavelength.

He was going to see his friends again. And try like hell not to screw it all up this time.

Petra had said, many times, that one of the best things they could do to aid their recovery was keeping their minds engaged in something besides sitting around wanting drugs. It was important to keep life going instead of hiding in its cracks.

The first time she’d said it to him, directly, had been when he’d gone off on a rant about Zeke’s damn baseball games. He couldn’t even remember why it came up, except that Petra thought maybe going to a few would be good for him, and he’d still been in the yelling stage of everything.

Now locked in the stage where he took people’s advice and did something with it, he was doing what he could to distract himself. Benjamin was accepting food that wasn’t wriggling now. His tank still needed regular checks and cleaning. Several bouldering groups were lined up for the week.

He’d mentioned it to Reiner, since Reiner knew more about keeping busy than anyone he knew.

What he got was a copy of one of Ymir’s books.

“This one’s not about the porn,” Reiner had assured him, like that was a mark of quality.

Ymir had rolled her eyes loudly when he said it, snagging Eren’s toast off his plate. “Great review, Reiner. You should be my new marketing team.”

Eren was fifty pages in, and except for the very disconcerting moments spent realizing that Ymir’s insights about human emotion could translate to something painfully earnest when they had nothing to do with an actual person, it was okay. Mostly.

The two characters who were the focus of the romance were starting to spend a lot of time together. On purpose, instead of being forced into it. The narrator kept denying that part, but the narrator was also starting to spend an uncomfortable number of paragraphs being distracted by the other character’s physical appearance.

It was a lot of hunger. Wanting. Not being allowed to have.

“Historia?” Eren called out, flipping a few pages ahead. He’d forced her to the couch with her homework by stealing her usual spot under Benjamin’s tank.

“Yes?”

“You’ve been in love, right?”

The vibrations of a very heavy textbook hitting the floor were followed by a hiss of pain. Eren’s head swiveled around to catch Historia sucking a paper cut. Her face was an uncomfortable red.

“I—why?” she asked.

He brandished the book into the air. “One of Reiner’s friends is a romance novelist, and he gave me this to read.” Historia knew one or two things about Reiner thanks to awkward questions about whether or not it was okay to mention his roommate was a drug addict to other addicts. “And I was wondering if it’s normal for it to all sound like…”

Historia picked up her textbook, continuing to look at him with the kind of paralyzed horror he would have reserved for one of their talks about dead people. Eren cut to the chase.

“Is it supposed to sound like addiction?” he asked. “Is that what it feels like?”

Because every single page was taking him further and further away from the kind of want he knew Ymir had been intending and tossing him back into the hazy memory of needing a fix so badly that he talked to the man behind Zeke’s batting cage and staggered into Armin’s granddad’s bathroom and—

He didn’t know how Reiner had gotten through the full book. Eren didn’t think he could.

Petra read romance novels. She enjoyed them. Was it just him?

“No.” Historia stopped rubbing at her finger. “It—they’re not the same. Whatever I…” Her eyebrows knitted together. Carefully, with a precision that was at odds with the panic that had somehow been unleashed, she placed her book on the other side of the couch. “I don’t know if it was love, but it was nothing like… that.” She looked at the offending manuscript like it was one of Petra’s cookies. “Why are you still reading it?”

Eren shrugged, flipping through more pages. “Trying to keep busy.”

Trying not to think of what Ymir would say if she found out he couldn’t stomach the tamest book from her shelf. He could picture it pretty easily. He had no interest in living it out.

Hell, though. Did this character ever bother doing anything about all the wanting? Fifty more pages, and the obvious conclusion was that this was the only one Ymir wrote that wasn’t pornographic because she’d picked out a main character who couldn’t figure out how to communicate her feelings to her love interest, so there was nothing to be explicit about. No wonder the project had stuck out to Reiner. Someone like Ymir writing someone with a sense of embarrassment or insecurity was jarring.

“’Crystal Wick’?”

Historia had left the couch, and was investigating the book’s cover. She looked halfway alive, which was about as good as Eren had come to hope for lately. The shadows under her eyes had stopped darkening each morning.

“It’s a penname,” he said. “Bertolt says she mostly writes porn.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Reiner gave you porn to read?”

“He specifically said this one wasn’t.”

She peered closer at the cover, reading the quotes on the back. “Reiner gave you a romance novel that ‘Speaks to the truest soul of melancholic love’?”

Eren turned it over. “It says that?”

“Yes,” Historia said. “Crystal’s a ‘genius.’”

It did say that. Eren looked at the innocuous bits of text with a growing nausea the came from the book’s content, but felt appropriate for the glowing praise Ymir of all people had somehow earned. “If you ever meet her, you can’t say things like that,” he said. “Her head’s big enough already.”

Reading her reviews had probably paved the way on that. Ymir seemed like she came by most of it naturally, though. The reviews probably just confirmed what she already thought about herself.

“You don’t think she lives up to her accolades?” Historia asked. “She isn’t the—Eren your thumb’s blocking that one.”

Eren rolled his eyes and opened the book back up, pretending to read more about addictive, repressed lust with more of a smile than he’d managed all day. “Do you want to trade books?”

Historia stepped over his feet and grabbed the hardback Frieda had left on Benjamin’s table, pausing to give their fish a moment to say hello to her. She dangled his namesake’s volume over Eren’s head. He took it before he ended up with another black eye, handing over Ymir’s paperback.

“Frieda screens everything she reads around me,” she said. “She’s—protective.” Concernedly so, if it were over anyone besides Historia, but Historia didn’t need Eren voicing that. “You’ll probably have better luck with one of hers. It’s longer, too.”

Along with heavier. Eren rolled onto his stomach. “Thanks.”

Historia shrugged, returning to her couch vigil. Eren cracked open his Frieda-approved reading. Sci-fi, based on the cover. Armin had probably read it. He liked going through the bestseller’s lists. He liked sci-fi. They’d have something to talk about at lunch.

“It’s going to be fine, Eren,” Historia said, a minute into the author’s foreword.

“Yeah,” he said.

----

Not sleeping was marginally better than nightmares. He was supposed to look at the positives of his life, not focus on the negatives. Tossing back and forth between walls before settling for a few minutes at a time on the ceiling meant he wasn’t waking up in a cold sweat.

Frieda would be around soon, if she was having a sleepless night. He could make himself useful and start the hot chocolate early.

Mikasa and Armin would be showing up in a few hours. Their first time in an apartment he hadn’t shared with either of them.

Rivaille was coming with Mikasa. A neighbor hadn’t been watching their dog, Rivaille had no tolerance for non-human mammals breathing in his presence, and Mikasa didn’t trust him not to tear off his bandage if she left him alone. Armin and Mikasa had coordinated letting Eren know. They didn’t say that outright, but Armin had told Eren Rivaille was coming instead of Mikasa asking. They hadn’t wanted to give him the option of taking back his invitation.

He could see that conversation happening. It played out in his head until his worry about how things would go was smothered by how much he missed being there for those conversations.

He wouldn’t have taken back the invitation. He wondered how weird starting out with that point would be.

Eren swapped over to his side again. The streetlights several stories down barely winked at him through the blinds. He pulled the edge of his pillow up to block it out. He lowered it.

He snatched the blanket by his feet and swung off the bed. He’d make hot chocolate and keep a sleeping Benjamin company. If Frieda showed up, he’d keep her company too. That was better than lying awake all night wondering how he was going to screw everything up again.

He stepped out into the hallway, blanket over his shoulder, and there was no sign of anything but him being wrong.

He was thinking about hot chocolate and kitchen pans.

Down the hall, a thump sounded from Historia’s room.

Eren used to beat up his mother’s walls. And people. He’d heard worse.

It was just a noise. It was just a dark apartment.

It was just the sound of something hitting the floor in his suicidal friend’s room in the middle of the night where no one would be around to—

Eren’s blanket dropped to the floor, and Historia’s door appeared in front of him with a snap of motion he knew best from Armin’s toy magnets he’d got for his seventh birthday. The juxtaposition didn’t do anything to settle his nerves.

“Historia?” he asked the door. His voice came out loud and distant. One of his fists found the wood and knocked. “Is everything okay?”

Several more heartbeats of silence confirmed that to be the stupid question it was. Eren cleared his throat and tried to think of something besides how Frieda, who didn’t even have the full story, couldn’t sleep some nights until she saw her little sister breathing.

That was supposed to be weird. Kind of creepy.

“Historia, I’m opening the door,” he said.

He pushed it open more roughly than intended, and there wasn’t really a noise that came with it, but the door’s swing had some definite resistance that put his head in all the wrong places, and the random thought hit that he’d never been in her room before, and he was three steps in before his eyes even tried to pick anything out of the shadows, and for an insane moment he was so sure that this was the start of another nightmare, just in time to break Armin and Mikasa’s hearts all over again, and Historia was on the floor next to her bed.

Eren’s hand snapped out and hit the light switch.

The searing brightness hurt, but relief made up for it when it illuminated Historia’s tearstained face.

Eren almost fell to the floor. “You’re okay,” he said.

Historia, in a state of much less alarm over the last thirty seconds, stared at him with tears still actively falling, listless shock and a force that threw tennis balls taking in Eren’s presence under the spotlight that lit up her room.

“I don’t think so.”

Eren shook his head. “I meant you aren’t dead,” was the only thing he could think to say. He slid down into a more comfortable position on the hard floor. “What was that noise?”

Historia continued staring at him. She was in her pajamas, holding her flannel top tightly around her nightshirt. Like she’d tried to hide herself in it, and realized somewhere in the middle that there wasn’t enough room, so just left her hands frozen stiff.

One moved. Rigidly. She pointed at the floor behind him.

Somewhat wedged between the door and the floor was a book.

Ymir’s.

So he wasn’t the only one.

The comprehension wasn’t the gentlest place to land, but it was tinged with enough relief to pass.

“Too real?”

Historia nodded.

Eren smiled. Shooting for comforting. “Yeah, it didn’t work for me either.” There was a review to take back to Ymir. ‘Two out of three drug addicts agree your main character reads like a junkie.’ Maybe Reiner just read enough of her stuff to be inoculated.

But Historia was shaking her head. Not in a definitive motion, just back and forth. She whispered something Eren didn’t catch.

“Sorry?”

Historia swallowed. Visibly. “She left.”

Eren’s eyes drifted back to the book. It was the only thing on the floor. The only spot of color in the entire room, really. The furniture was all bare, left staged and sterile. One book, hurled at the door, was the only indication that someone lived in the space. The romance novel Historia should have had more of an interest in anyway, that the words on the back cover and that he’d skimmed near the end dubbed a tragedy.

“She doesn’t say anything,” Historia said. “She spends—she spends half the book wanting this girl, loving her so much it sounds like—” one of her sleeves pulled up, and the scars popped. “She spends all that time, but then she never says it. She leaves and never says it.” A new fount of tears started, and Historia whipped them away with the back of her hand.

Her voice broke. “If she doesn’t say it, how’s she supposed to know?”

Eren moved to the bed, sitting next to Historia on the floor. After a moment’s hesitation, he carefully put his arm around her shoulders. She curled inward, but not away.

“If she doesn’t know, she won’t know to…” The sleeve pulled further up, drawn by Historia’s hand raking through her hair. “She left,” she repeated. “She loves her, and she leaves anyway, over some stupid, idiotic, self-righteous—”

More tears. Eren had never been great with them. When Armin cried, it was usually after someone had hit him. Eren’s job was to go hit them back so Armin wouldn’t have to anymore. Mikasa had been better at that. She’d also been better at making Armin feel better. She was better at just about everything.

Eren wished Historia had one of the better ones in her corner. But she was stuck with him.

“I left too,” he said, the truth of many, many hours of guilt and hatred clawing its way into words that sounded halfway human, and like maybe forgiveness was okay to want. “People don’t always—”

“But you’re getting them back!”

The shout was hoarse and broken, and much louder than the rest of the conversation.

Historia continued on, savagely tearing through the words. “You never reached out, and never said anything, and you needed them. More than anything.” Her voice caught. “I… She was so… I always thought she didn’t need anyone. Even…”

Eren was five and Armin was the coolest kid on the playground. He mouthed off to everyone he disagreed with, even after he took a beating, because it was right.

Eren was seventeen and hearing for the first time how little Armin had thought of himself back then.

Eren was ten and Mikasa was winning all the fights he started.

Eren was nine and Mikasa would not let go of his hand.

“She left,” Historia said, “and all this time… but I’m the one who…” She stopped, and Eren could see the cords in her wrist tighten before she started again.

When she did, the words were slow and agonized. “I’m not like Armin and Mikasa,” she said. “I didn’t wait. I didn’t keep trying. I took it for granted that she didn’t want me and gave up. She left. I never chased her. I want her but I never—”

Eren was probably holding her shoulder too tightly. He knew his jaw was too tight. He could hear Armin tutting at him, flicking a spilled cheerio from the kitchen counter at his forehead. “You were stuck in juvie,” Eren said. “You’d have to be an idiot to expect someone to chase you from there.”

“She is!” Historia shouted at the floor.

Eren kept the half-hug stable through the laugh that choked out a sob. He thought he heard the click of their front door unlocking. Hot chocolate felt very far away. Historia was shivering. She could use some.

He hoped her girlfriend felt half as bad about everything as he had when he’d flamed out and abandoned everyone who loved him. Whatever had happened, there was no way this didn’t earn her at least that.

“I don’t know what went on between you two,” he said, not adding that he didn’t think Historia did, either, “but I never wanted Armin and Mikasa to stick this through. I’m—” hell “glad they did, but I was a jerk. They deserved better. I wouldn’t have blamed them if they never talked to me again.”

“But you would have wanted them to.”

And hated himself all the way through his bedroom wall for it. “Yeah.”

“Because you love them.”

“…Yeah.”

Those were definitely footsteps. Eren didn’t want to listen for the moment they spotted the extra light in the hallway, or his blanket on the floor. Historia’s eyes were peeking out from behind her hair again. They were trained on Ymir’s book.

“I don’t even know if she loved me back,” she said.

Eren couldn’t give an answer to that. All he really knew about Historia’s girlfriend was that all the flashbacks in the world wouldn’t be reason enough to shrug off a chance to punch her in the face, and if that needed to happen, Historia had first claim.

The footsteps stopped. Eren winced when they started again, slapping the floor, and he caught the second when Historia’s confusion at the noise turned into horror.

Frieda appeared as a breathless shadow in the doorway, and Eren didn’t even have a chance to spot the panic her body was screaming on her face before she swooped in. A blur of older sister dove on both of them, and shock and a welcoming thud of a heartbeat stole the breath from Eren’s lungs. Frieda’s fingers caught his head and pulled him over her shoulder while Historia was simply dragged bodily into her side with a surprised croak.

“You’re both okay?” Frieda asked, squeezing more air out of them. She sounded faint. Fear bled through her grip, and Historia had gone suspiciously still.

Eren had wanted her around for these late-night encounters, once. Right now it felt cruel to both of them.

“I’m good,” Eren said.

Frieda nodded, and Eren felt her pull away just enough to look down properly at her sister, who was still clutched to her like a limpet.

“Historia?”

Both of her sleeves had rolled up. Her fingernails were digging matching imprints into her scars, and every person in the hug could feel the flinch Frieda tried to hide. Historia buried herself closer. Shaking like it was her first night off the hard stuff.

“I—” she started through a new sob. “I’m sorry.”

Eren disentangled himself before Frieda’s hand decapitated him on its way to hold her sister more tightly, soft words and reassurances brushing by his ears as Frieda told Historia not to apologize, she had nothing to apologize for, and Historia dissolved further into tears.

“I’m going to go get started on the hot chocolate,” he said.

Frieda’s gaze shot over him, and Eren almost stopped in the middle of standing at the unadulterated terror dampening her eyes, but she only mouthed her thanks, pulling Historia fully into her arms in the midst of another litany of sorrys, one after another.

The one thing Historia had never wanted was for Frieda to know how bad things were. Eren doubted any of them wanted to think about how long she had guessed at it.

“Does it ever help? Talking?”

Eren patted Historia firmly on the head on his way out.

He also grabbed the book off the floor.

----

Eren was cleaning the apartment, which was stupid. They had maid service. They did a superhuman job of cleaning. Short of making a deal with the devil, Eren wasn’t going to be able to match their work. He was leaving streaks on the counter. It didn’t matter how many times he dragged the washcloth over the spots. The streaks just moved.

Armin had shared an apartment with him. He knew how Eren lived.

Right, and his last memory of what that was like was forever linked to digging through Eren’s bedroom and finding all of his drugs.

The streak moved from the edge of the counter to the center. Eren was chasing it around the way Benjamin swam after their hands when they were over his tank. With about as much success.

Lunch was takeout. Takeout plus a few mangled apples.

Historia had been nice enough not to say anything. Her face had handled that.

A night of no sleep and hysterics had peeled off some of the darkness in her eyes. She looked almost human again. By their standards, but their standards had improved lately. She’d stopped Eren’s jittery hands from costing him a finger and spun her phone over the marble at him, several restaurant tabs already opened.

Eren had texted Armin and Mikasa. Everyone had ordered. It was all fine. They had enough chairs. Frieda had double-checked before she left. She’d spent the night.

“You don’t want to stay?” Eren and Historia had asked in perfect, frantic unison when she announced her departure over breakfast. A breakfast she’d cooked for them, smiling through her yawns the whole time.

For a moment he’d thought Frieda might cave, with both of them asking. Instead, she’d given them both a perfunctory pat on the head. “You two are all grown up. You don’t need me to supervise your play dates.”

Frieda was the only one with that confidence. Historia had come back from feeding Benjamin dripping dread, and Eren was left wondering if sleep deprivation and drug addiction looked anything alike and how much it would worry Mikasa and Armin that he could barely walk in a straight line.

“Sorry,” Historia said, joining him with a washcloth of her own. She didn’t leave streaks.

“Stop saying that,” Eren said. He wiped down a dried spot of water he’d left earlier. “I was only up because I couldn’t sleep.”

“Still.”

Eren yawned into his hand. “If you’re sorry about that, I’m sorry for giving you the book.”

Historia’s mouth thinned.

They worked in silence for several minutes, contributing very little to the overall cleanliness of the apartment. Eren could hear a clock ticking. None of the ones either of them owned ticked.

“What are they like?” Historia asked in a blurt.

“Huh?”

“Armin and Mikasa.”

Eren stopped scrubbing. “They’re… Armin and Mikasa.”

“Your friends,” Historia said. She made the term sound alien.

Eren glanced at her. She was frowning at her rag. Tiny, blond, and maybe looking for the words instead of being too stubborn to share them, but the blast of nostalgia wasn’t pulling its punches. Eren slowly renewed his swipes at the counter.

His friends. The two people who made him get it a little when clients chattered on about their other halves. The foundation of everything he was that he’d bombed halfway to hell when everything he was turned out to be pain.

Armin and Mikasa.

“Mikasa’s good at everything,” Eren started. He remembered jogging to one of Zeke’s baseball practices, skipping over the cracks in the sidewalk and trying to keep up, whining those same words because his big brother would never tell anyone. “She’s strong. I—not just in things like sports, or fighting. I could never win against her when we sparred, and she has better times than I do on all the mountains nearby, but that’s not it.” His reflection blinked emptily from the shining counter. “She’s reliable. The responsible one. Always there, even when you don’t want her to be, because she knows more about when you need her than you do.

“It’s annoying,” he didn’t say. It used to be. It would have his head full of steam and his feet stomping cross the sidewalk. It had leaked into the things he’d said when withdrawal hit and he hated everyone.

“Armin’s… an optimist. He doesn’t think he is, because he’s always thinking about the most depressing stuff, but it’s always about… ways to make them better. To fix them. He doesn’t lose it when it’s hard or looks too difficult. He just does it. Like it’s nothing. He’s tough. The toughest person I know. And the smartest. He—I don’t know how many things he’s tutoring by now, but he picked up as many jobs as he could to pay for every college course he could stay awake for.” And then some. Eren had seven different alarms set for each day of the week to go and collect Armin for his classes. There were days he ended up carrying Armin to class. That was what finally got him to change up his schedule. “He’d be an expert in all of them after a semester. Sometimes less. He got a free ride to several places, but—he stayed behind. He cared more about staying with us.

“He lied about that,” Eren added. “He’s not usually good at it, but he was then. We wouldn’t have let him lose out on something like that. We both tried to get him to go when it all came out, but he wouldn’t. He—we kept trying, but he just wouldn’t. He staged—” The flash of the kitchen lights flashed against the counter, hiding the reflection he knew was smiling. “He staged an intervention for us. A whole PowerPoint on why we had to stop, because the only one who knew what was best for his education was him.”

Historia walked over to the sink, squeezing her rag dry. “Did it work?”

“Of course it worked,” Eren said, grabbing a fresh towel. “You can’t argue with the smartest person you know.” That was why people always tried beating him up; that was the only thing they could come up with.

For a while, that was the only thing Eren could come up with for dealing with himself. Mikasa would have thrown him over her shoulder and told him to stop hitting things. Armin would have devised his own twelve-step program, devoted to all facts about Eren he’d picked up throughout their years of friendship, and handed him a copy.

Historia took the paper towel roll off the counter, watching him with the subterfuge of someone who’d maybe read a summary of the concept in a book.

Eren balled up his washcloth and landed it in the sink, giving up the pretense for a moment. “What do you think I should say?”

Historia’s gaze took a small detour to Benjamin’s tank. “You’re the one who knows them.”

“You’re the one here who knows what it’s like to be screwed over.”

The storm cloud darkening her countenance was very specifically aimed at him, but it cleared fast. Historia sent her rag into the sink after his, frowning. She waited on the words for a few moments. “They still love you,” she said, “so… love them back?”

It sounded like a nicer version of what Ymir said, and he was about to say so when it struck him that comparisons to Crystal Wick were the last thing that would be helpful today. Or any other time.

“Would that be enough for you?” he asked.

Laughter barked out of Historia, surprising both of them. She shook her head and leaned against the island. “Eren, seeing her again would be enough for me.” She reached out and tapped his shoulder in an odd, noncommittal pat. “Just be you.”

Eren watched Benjamin’s lazy circles. “I’m not sure he’s around.”

“Oh,” Historia said.

“Oh,” Eren echoed.

Historia turned around to lean bodily over the sparkly clean marble, nudging Eren’s elbows with hers. Benjamin reacted to the extra viewership with a flourish as he rounded the rock he had decided was this week’s favorite.

“…You could try smiling more?”

Eren looked over at Historia’s unsmiling face. “You think?”

“Maybe?”

It was the sleep deprivation, maybe, that made him smile.

They both still sucked at this.

----

When Eren was little, there were few things in his life he enjoyed as much as sci-fi B movies. Zeke would let him and Armin watch the worst, implausible action adventures, all about mutated sharks that were part dinosaur and sludge beasts that lived in the Arctic. Horror movies were bundled in, but Armin wasn’t allowed to watch those because he’d keep his parents up with existential life questions about good and evil that they hadn’t wanted to discuss with their seven-year-old.

Eren didn’t have that problem with his parents. He would sit in Zeke’s lap while they went out wherever, chattering loudly about all the things the monster’s victims were doing wrong, and how he’d do it better. He’d be a good monster slayer, he told Zeke. He wouldn’t die first.

Zeke had always said if the scientists hadn’t been so careless, and the other humans hadn’t bothered the monster so much, none of them would have had to die.

He was the worst person to watch movies with. He’d also been the only babysitter Eren had who would let him watch those ones.

Some of Eren’s chief complaints about the screaming people in the movies had been how they handled doorways. They’d run into places and open doors without a second thought about where it would land them.

There was a knock on the door.

Eren dropped the plate he was fussing with and almost tripped over Historia bolting for the doorknob. He threw it open before any sort of sense had a chance of reestablishing itself, and met the alarmed eyes of the delivery girl with heavy breathing and

Historia pulled him back by his shirt. He stumbled back into the apartment, socks sliding on the wood.

“Sorry,” Historia said, plastered, rigid fake smile in place. “We’re expecting—”

Mikasa.

Armin.

Sound fell away to only Eren’s heartbeat. Historia pulling out her wallet and overpaying the delivery girl was barely a blip.

They were standing in the hallway. Behind the bright uniform. Standing there. Outside the door, like they’d never been anywhere else. Like he’d never left. Like Armin had forgotten his key when he brought Mikasa over for game night.

Ten steps away. Nine. Five.

“Ah,” Historia said, loud and echoey, “you must be Mikasa and Armin?”

A hiss came from the space below Mikasa’s elbow.

“And Rivaille,” Historia said. “Hello.”

No one said hello back. The cat’s perturbed mreow could have counted in another life full of hallucinogens. This one had Mikasa and Armin, standing in a doorway as the heavy apartment door heaved itself shut in their faces. Historia hurriedly blocked it with her foot, attention darting between the human statues she was surrounded by.

Eren wasn’t even sure which one he was staring at. Armin, caution and hope bursting like a newborn star all over his face. Mikasa. Mikasa. Somehow still standing and still there despite every horrible thing he’d thought and shouted and thrown.

“Mreow,” Rivaille said again.

Historia, having abandoned the bags carrying their lunch to the floor, pushed the door open more properly. “I could—take him, if you would like?”

Mikasa’s eyes snapped to Historia with such mechanic efficiency that Eren’s blink missed it. Her iron stare added one more statue to the scene as Rivaille continued to prowl about his enclosure. For an eternity, she and Armin were both staring at Historia. Slowly, that stare turned, very directly, back to Eren. Eren felt halfway to blitzed. Being all the way there might have been the only thing that could help to decipher the new looks they were giving them.

“Thank you,” Mikasa said at last. Talking like a Mikasa who hadn’t lived through the last year. She handed Rivaille’s carrier off to Historia. “He’s very well behaved. It should be safe to let him out. As long as you watch him around—Benjamin?”

Eren nodded. His head felt like it was on a string.

She nodded back, and addressed Historia. “I don’t know how he is around fish. He also shouldn’t be jumping, but I can… I will take care of supervising him.”

Historia held the carrier gingerly, and miraculously, Rivaille wasn’t screaming at the loss of his stable pedestal that was Mikasa’s arms of steel. “He hurt his paw?”

Armin interrupted before the storm cloud on Mikasa’s face could start thundering. “The neighbor’s dog did,” he said.

“Right.”

“Rivaille prefers his space.”

“Okay.”

Mikasa and Armin still hadn’t stepped inside. Their food was going to get cold if they left it on the floor. Rivaille was only a moment’s distraction as long as he was in his carrier. Eren felt like he was in the center ring of that circus Armin’s parents had taken them to when they were small enough to need to climb up on their shoulders to see anything.

He didn’t have a script or any pies to throw in his face. Just him and whatever that meant.

He was reminded, and he didn’t want to be, of another family meal. Back when his father had been alive, and there was a family. Mikasa, Armin, and Eren, all sitting around the table with his parents, candles lit, fancy tablecloth set out.

Someone had knocked on the door.

Zeke. Uninvited, unaware that anything was going on, and wondering if Eren would like to go see a movie.

Eren found himself echoing their father.

“Do you—want to come in, maybe?”

He hoped he sounded more like he wanted his guests to say yes.

Mikasa and Armin both relaxed their shoulders so much, for a moment, it looked like they were melting. Armin’s instant smile was so heartfelt and earnest that Eren wanted to scream, and he didn’t know how he was going to exist with Mikasa one step closer when all he could think was how many apologies he owed and how many they’d never let him finish because his friends were too damn kind and too damn perfect and he had missed them so much.

They hadn’t been here five minutes and he already felt like crying. He was fucking this up right out of the gate.

But everyone else knew that, too, so they were going to keep talking around him. Door collapsing shut, closing off the one path of retreat, Mikasa briefly stopped dissecting him with her eyes and turned her focus squarely on Historia. “You are Eren’s new roommate.”

Not really new, anymore. Just not Armin. Eren reached to the floor and picked up the food bags. At the same moment Armin stepped forward to reach for one. Their hands bumped and snapped apart.

“Yes,” Historia said. “Hi. I’m Historia Reiss.”

There was a pregnant pause of evaluation and judgment before Historia seemed to think to stick out her hand. It shot out from its place on Rivaille’s carrier like one of Zeke’s pitches.

Mikasa took it. “How is it you two know each other?”

Fussing with the food was suddenly a really convenient way to not be looking at any of them, but Armin had never been great about hiding his sharp draws of breath when he thought one of them was throwing a first punch. “Mikasa, that might not be the—”

“NA,” Historia blurted. “I’m a heroin addict.”

Eren didn’t know why he looked at Armin, but Armin was already looking back, dismayed panic as clear in his face as all his emotions always were. No one really wanted the door to drug-addled pasts thrown open. Not today, not now, not ever until they were all sure they were sticking around and not running off again to live with strangers.

“…You have a lovely apartment,” Mikasa said.

Historia was nodding in his peripheral. “Inheritance. From murdering my father. Self-defense,” she clarified in a hurry. “Maybe. I’m not—I am a murderer, but it was only that one time. I’m not going to do it again.”

Frieda should not have left the apartment.

Eren froze in the middle of setting the boxes out on plates. Armin, gathering the bags and folding them into a neat pile, mimicked him, and they both silently waited for the next thundering shoe to drop.

“I moved in because we had that in common,” would have been an honest response, and saved them all some of the silence, and it was at the tip of his tongue, but he didn’t want to start that. He didn’t want the shock or the tears, or the long argument that would all be kicked off with, “You didn’t kill Dr. Yeager.”

Maybe. Like Historia had maybe killed her dad in self-defense. Eren had still felt his heart stop. Eren’s hands had helped that along, and no one ever wanted to hear it.

Mikasa saved the moment. Calmly, like a modern day superhero whose qualities were eternally called out to balance Eren’s failures. “I have a cousin who went through something similar,” she said. Smiling. With her eyes, but that was where her best smiles were. “He’s less reluctant about repeat offenses.”

Armin coughed a chuckle, catching Eren’s eye. Another knot in his chest loosened.

“We should eat before it gets cold,” he said.

“We should,” Armin agreed, handing Eren one of the napkins set out.

Eren took it quickly and gratefully, swiping away his tears before anyone else could see.

----

“He’s gorgeous, Eren,” Armin said softly, peering so closely at the aquarium that with his old haircut, he would have already been drenched. Benjamin wasn’t swimming as close as he did with Historia, and not used to people saying hello from up above unless they had food, but he wasn’t hiding away in one of his caves, either. “Have you thought about adding to the tank at all?”

“Some. There are a few eels that might be a good fit, but he should have some more time to settle and grow before we give that a try. The tank could also use a sturdier hood first.”

“I’ve read they can be escape artists.”

“Yeah. I told Historia nothing that can get out and crawl around, but—” he wasn’t going to relapse, and Armin didn’t need to hear about how recently he’d doubted that—“it’s a big tank. Benjamin could use some company.”

“A predator tank suits you,” Armin said. He floated his fingers above the water, clearly tempted to give petting Benjamin a shot.

Eren shrugged, leaning his hip on Benjamin’s table. “If you say so. I can’t handle the live feeding. Too squeamish. I’ve got tank duty on the chore wheel while Historia does the heavy lifting.”

Armin was quiet. A thinking sort of quiet where he was about to say something that made more boring people want to hit him. He glanced at the kitchen counter. Mikasa was sitting on a stool. Historia, with Rivaille’s prompting, had been encouraged to sit on top of the counter.

The cat hadn’t left her lap.

He’d hissed when Eren had tried to say hello.

With Historia, he nuzzled her cheek and purred like a chainsaw. Only less literally than what Eren had seen from those claws. Even Mikasa was taken aback by how gently Rivaille was behaving.

They were getting along. They’d all survived lunch past Eren asking who had won Levi’s MMA tournament this year (Annie, and Armin had immediately switched the topic to movies while Mikasa stabbed the floor with her eyes), Eren had a few lines on his hands from where he’d grabbed his knife and fork too hard, but none of him or the silverware was broken.

“Moving out helped after all, didn’t it?”

Eren’s hands gripped the edge of the table. “Armin…”

“I’m happy,” Armin interrupted. “I’m really glad, Eren.”

“Don’t.”

The low hum of conversation from the kitchen stopped. Rivaille’s warning meow was quickly stifled by Mikasa getting up from her stool. Historia grabbed her arm before she could take a full step. It was a surprise to everyone that Mikasa let that be enough, but Eren couldn’t think about that right now.

He wanted Armin to be hurt. Betrayed. Upset.

Not relieved that the person who caused all of that was better. Not putting some piece of disloyal garbage over—

“Don’t act like it’s all okay now,” Eren growled. Speaking to the floor because the floor did the right thing when he fell on it and gave him a damn bruise. “I—” he wasn’t supposed to do this Petra had told him to take it easy it didn’t need to come out all at once to be progress—“You can’t just be happy I’m not breaking everything I touch anymore and act like that’s the end of it.”

Armin was the weak one, in kindergarten. That’s what everyone thought. Lied to about themselves so they didn’t have to think about why this one kid made them all want to beat him silly instead of listening to him.

He was the bravest person Eren had ever met. “Well, why not?”

“Why—what?”

Armin pulled away from Benjamin’s tank. He patted his hands with the towel Historia had started leaving out. “If you think you messed up that badly,” he said with a forced, careful steadiness, “why do you think it’s up to you to say how we feel about it? Isn’t it more important for us to get a say?”

Eren had fallen back into looking at him. Armin looked back earnestly, months upon months of frown lines meeting his words and promising that this wasn’t someone who said things he didn’t mean. Someone who didn’t think for hours on end before he worked up the nerve to blow everyone’s mind with his confidence.

He’d had months of Eren not being ready to be his audience.

“Eren I don’t think—” Armin shook his head, his shorter hair not flurrying the way it used to when he did that. “I don’t think anyone here would say things went well. It was awful.” Understatement. “As happy I am that you’re doing better, I think I’m even happier none of us are back in that place.” Nothing gave Armin the right to say things Eren agreed with even when he was so angry he could barely see straight. “But if you’re going to be angry over us wanting you back—you should understand, shouldn’t you? How painful it is that you don’t blame us for missing everything you went through?”

“That’s ridiculous,” Eren said. “Those are still my mistakes, Armin. You can’t take on the blame for that.”

Armin kept shaking his head. “You’re my—you’re our best friend, Eren. That should mean you never have to go through anything alone, but you did,” he said softly. “We were right there. We saw you every day. And we missed… everything.”

He smiled his crooked, unhinged smile that their middle school D&D club had voted to ban. “You’re so busy being angry at us for being happy we didn’t ruin you that you’re letting us get away with being really selfish. Of course we want things to be fixed. We’re the ones who let them break.”

Eren could feel more tears waiting and burning under the pressure of his own heartbeat building up behind his skull. He’d heard that kind of blame in his head, once. Right before he screamed it at Mikasa. Hateful and full of everything he never wanted to be while he threw up his organs.

They were crap. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” he said.

“We wanted to do more right,” Armin said. “Didn’t you?”

“You can’t argue with the smartest person you know.”

Hell. Oh hell.

Historia had said just seeing that girl of hers would be enough. Even after she broke her heart. She still thought about her all the time. They couldn’t have known each other that long if they met in juvie. Not anywhere near as long as Eren had known Armin and Mikasa. They had years of friendship backing up one really, really inexcusably awful year.

They wanted him back.

He’d known that. That was why he was so pissed. They deserved so much better.

Armin was standing right in front of him, earnest, brilliant eyes telling him that all over again. Staring at his idiot friend who’d ruined their lives and hoping, more than anything, the idiot would take him back.

He had known that’s how they felt, right?

This whole time?

Eren didn’t want to start sobbing in front of Mikasa. Not again. He thought that every single time it happened. It was maybe the one thing about him that none of this had changed.

Armin, his first friend, the guy who’d taught him all about why dinosaurs were the best and how to stick to a study plan, took pity on him, and moved in to grab him before the crying could really start, catching his shoulders and head in his hands and not feeling, or not caring, that this was closer than they’d dared to be for over a year.

And Eren hated crying, hated that he spent so much of his life now doing it, but Armin’s tears rolling down his neck felt too much like home to hate anything properly. He grabbed Armin right back and held him as tightly as he’d never let himself after the funeral.

He had missed him too. So much.

----

Lunch had technically been over for hours by the time Mikasa and Armin left.

None of them wanted it to be. That was why Armin had finally said they should get going.

“It won’t change just because we head out the door,” he said. “We’re doing better than that, now.”

None of them wanted to talk about how that was still a hope, not a fact, either. Eren felt more clingy than he ever had in his life. For maybe the first time, he fully understood why Mikasa had to be talked down from looking after him all the time. Some hurts didn’t ever let you think things could go back to being okay.

Armin was still the smart one.

Historia was helping to coax Rivaille back in his cage. Eren didn’t make the repeated mistake of trying to be friendly with the cat. His hand still hurt from earlier. Armin was standing out in the hall. Ready to go.

Mikasa was lingering in the threshold. Halfway between helping Historia with her cat and not leaving Eren.

Eren had only had half the talk that needed to happen so far today. Drilling Armin on his studies and Mikasa on her judo students and Historia on anything that wasn’t her family or drug habit had soaked up the time. Maybe too much. Armin and Mikasa’s questions about school had sounded very sincere and gentle, but Eren wouldn’t be surprised if Armin already had another PowerPoint project playing out in his head about what they now knew about Eren’s new friend.

Armin caught his eye as Historia finally, without a mark on her, convinced the devil cat that he wanted to be back in a box.

Eren couldn’t help one last scowl at the golden eyes leering at him. Rivaille returned the expression with interest. “He’s never done that for me.”

“You’re too rough with him,” Mikasa said.

“You used to pick me up like that all the time.”

“You are not a cat, Eren.”

Armin laughed and even the appearance of a grudge had to fall away. Mikasa smiled softly at him. Eren doubted his expression looked much different. “We should take him back downstairs while he’s still settled. Historia, would you like to carry him?”

Eren did his best to roll his eyes at Armin. The attempt wasn’t great. Ymir or Annie would have laughed themselves silly at him. …Ymir would have. Annie probably would have kicked him and told him to work on it.

Historia followed the leading question and flicked her eyes between Eren and Mikasa, catching on way too fast. “Of course,” she said. “I’ll… follow you down, then.”

To her credit, she raised her eyebrows questioningly at Eren before she actually followed Armin. Eren shrugged a shoulder, which she took to be good enough reason to abandon him to be an adult on his own. Petra would probably hug both of them if she ever got the full story out about today.

He and Mikasa watched their friends trot off.

The renewed silence wasn’t that awkward, but Eren was starting to feel it. Armin was the talker of the three of them. He took all of the twists and turns of Eren’s temper and made sense of it.

Mikasa didn’t talk as much.

They’d had a long time of not talking. Even the old kind didn’t feel right. He wanted to say something. Anything. As long as it included an apology.

“She’s very pretty.”

Eren’s readied words stopped short. “Huh?”

Mikasa had her scarf pulled up over her mouth. It didn’t quite cover the red in her cheeks. She wasn’t looking at him. Her gaze was still on the now empty hallway.

Comprehension, hitting Eren over the head like a loud, embarrassed gong, rang out in his mind. The expected start would have been bad enough.This was different. This was Mikasa confiding in him, and he’d had too many talks about his and other people’s feelings to miss a cue like that. It wasn’t a year ago where he could be confused and move on with his life while Armin came back home five hours later and told him that his people skills needed work.

They did still need work. But Mikasa was his friend, and deserved the effort.

“I could get you her number,” he said hesitantly, “but she’s pretty hung up on this girl she knows.”

Mikasa’s face went so red that he knew for a fact that they both wanted anything else to be happening.

“I—see.”

He had to try. For Mikasa, he could do that much. “You two got along really well.” Or Historia got on well with her cat, which was like the same thing. No wonder Mikasa was asking. “I don’t know—she’s not… she’s really not available, but you could probably be good friends. Or hang out at Zeke’s games; he conned her into subbing for a few, and she could use someone besides me to practice with.”

He couldn’t tell if he was helping. He and Mikasa didn’t do this, and the unfamiliarity alone would probably be enough to make her face that color, because she knew as much as he did that this was not how they were them.

“Zeke stopped asking for my help,” Mikasa said, picking the closest side of normal to engage with.

Normal wasn’t safe. Pins and needles ran all up Eren’s spine before he went for it and took the damn plunge. “He was trying to be considerate, I guess. His version,” Eren added, more than aware what Mikasa thought about Zeke’s considerations. They were about what he thought, after all. “I… I’ll tell him he doesn’t need to do that anymore. It’s… better with you around.”

“…Thank you.”

The oppressive quiet came back. Eren’s fingernails were fighting to dig into his palms. The door was propped open by his back. He could imagine hearing Benjamin’s water filter if he just gave himself a second.

He didn’t want to put something this important off for any more seconds.

“Mikasa,” he said, “I’m sorry.”

Mikasa didn’t move. “I know.”

“The things I said…”

“Eren.”

“No one should ever talk to you that way,” Eren said. “I shouldn’t have—” He stopped short. His problems could stay with a different step. One that mattered less than his friends. Only one piece of it all really belonged here, and he said it again.

“I’m sorry.”

Mikasa had one hand buried in her scarf. Her blush had faded, as well as the gentle smile Armin had won out of her. There were tired lines in her forehead that only Eren could claim complete responsibility for.

“You wanted Armin to be angry at you,” she said.

Then cried all over him for sparing him that. “Yeah.”

Mikasa adjusted her scarf, pulling it tighter, but lowering it from keeping her mouth hidden. “It hurt,” she said. “You never say things you don’t mean, even if you only mean them for a moment.”

His mom had yelled at him for that. Many, many times.

He’d yelled back that moments were important.

That was another thing he and Mikasa agreed on.

“None of it was your fault,” Eren said.

“But you were right. We didn’t see it.”

“You were trying to give me space.”

“We didn’t.”

Mikasa had moved in for several weeks under the guise of helping Eren since his leg was broken.

“Your version of space.”

Another life would have seen that as a very strong complaint. Silent hovering was annoying and if Eren had been on a lower dose of painkillers or been less insane, it would have driven him nuts. But it stayed at silence. It stayed at a quiet hand helping him through the day and never asking how he was feeling because how he was feeling was so obvious.

“That still should have put us close enough to notice,” Mikasa said.

How she was feeling during all of that was pretty obvious, too. Even through the drugs. Eren just hadn’t been able to care. “My dad died,” Eren said, like it really was the accident Mikasa had never had any trouble seeing it for. “You knew something was wrong. You didn’t know I was making it worse.”

Mikasa wasn’t looking at him.

That should have made it easier than facing Armin, but he’d had too many years of getting annoyed over Mikasa always looking at him to finish the comparison just inside his head.

“It hurt,” she repeated, softly. “But what hurt most was thinking you might stay that way, and there was nothing I could do to help. Armin was right. We wanted to do more.” She frowned, a touch of irritation through the melancholy. “Zeke did more for you than we ever could.”

“Zeke didn’t stick around long enough for me to shout at him to leave,” Eren couldn’t help pointing out.

It almost got her to smile. The shadow of it faded too fast.

She did look up, and extensive cardio training as a way of life kept him breathing.

“No matter what happened, what matters to me now is that you’re okay. As long as that’s true, the rest is easy to forgive.” She closed her eyes and pulled her scarf tight. When she opened them again, they were the same eyes he’d seen when he woke up in the hospital.

“Are you okay, Eren?” she asked.

“Are you really?”

He’d gotten sick of that question long before he’d been anything close to the angry yes he kept snapping at his family. His mom had kept asking. Petra had always known better than to ask, but only because she’d been there. She had almost bit her lip through when he and Historia showed up with his black eye.

Who wanted okay, anyway? What kind of life was an okay one? Why would that be worth anything? He’d always been just okay. Armin was brilliant, Mikasa was perfect, and Eren was okay enough to lag behind them.

Until Eren wasn’t.

Until he couldn’t remember what okay or being a person even felt like, and someone had decided that the worst thing about him made him the best choice for a roommate. For a friend.

Armin had hugged him today.

Eren looked Mikasa straight in the eye, the weight of all their baggage nothing next to her being a few steps away and still caring. “I’m getting there,” he said.

She did smile, then. One of her real ones, with too much warmth to be anything but embarrassing when they were young. The step between them almost vanished, all of her starting to move forward before she remembered how many times Eren had actually called her embarrassing.

Armin had moved first with him. Fair was fair.

Eren took the step and wrapped Mikasa in the best hug he knew how. His chin bumped her forehead and their shoes snagged together, but he tried to hug her like he was never going to let her go again, and she hugged him back so tightly that his ribs creaked.

“I’m glad,” she whispered into his shoulder. “That you aren’t alone.”

He was not going to cry again. He squeezed her tightly. “Me too.”

----

Hours later, Eren was on the couch. Breathing into a cushion. Not on purpose, that was just where his face had landed after everything wound down.

“Thanks,” Historia said at some point.

“What for?”

“Letting me meet your family.”

Eren flopped his cheek against the side of the pillow. Historia had done her collapse under Benjamin’s tank. She looked as exhausted as he felt, drooped against the table. Benjamin blubbed away over her head.

Frieda had offered to drop some of her dinner off on them. She said she made too much for just her, and she had no room in her fridge. They’d have to help with the leftovers. One last visitor for the day.

“Yeah,” he said. “No problem.”

[next]

[cartoonfangirl1218]

Love in a Fiery Place or Hot and Bothered

Summery: Lisa tries matchmaking. Never let her matchmake. See my (shamlessly self promoted) other fic, Just like Fire, for who the heck Volcana is.

It's been months since Lisa had seen her brother or Mick ever since they went on their time travel, earth saving mission and she was bored.

Sure she had pulled off her share of heists and gone on a few dates with her favorite, babbling engineer but jewelry and sex had it's perks for so long. Especially with Cisco having a job.

She really needed a hobby, but one evening after too much beer and watching Love Actually on Netflix she thought of a brillant idea.

Matchmaking! 

She could matchmake someone she knew and watch them act all blushy and idiotic. It would be definitely entertaining.

She could match up her brother, but Lenny would never go for it. Besides she couldn't exactly see her brother in an attractive way. The guy made cold puns and read Kant during his spare time. Who would go for such a nerd like that!

But Mick. Mick was an equally challenging prospect with his unhealthy obsession with fire, alcoholic tendencies and general unpredictablness. But there were lots of the pyros in the world, she just had to find one who would be willing to date him.

Unfortunately that was a lot harder than she thought.

After checking most dating sites, she found that most Pharos were either dead, in jail, old or jailbait or that they weren't super into it. Just a few trash can fires.

She needed someone who would be just as willing to burn a building down.

So she had to up the search a notch. And what better way was to hack into S.T.A.R. Labs. More specifically, Cisco accessing into S.T.A.R. Labs.

"Please..." Lisa pouted. 

"No no no. I'm not helping you find MICK of all people a date,” Cisco protested.

"Why not? Don't you believe in love conquers all? You redeemed me,” Lisa purred. 

"Hardly." Cisco snorted. 

"Very true, my corrupt little scientist," Lisa smiled, leaning over his chair and basically falling into his lap. "But love could get him off the crime paths he's been on.” 

"Then he can fall in love with a psychiatrist. Putting him with another pyro will only cause more crime." Cisco stammered as Lisa caressed his long hair

"Pyros can handle pyros. Psychiatrists are suicidal and it won't do any good if the girl dies of fear after two dates." Lisa pouted again, bringing her lips closer to his, ending with a nice smoldering kiss.

Plus three more after that.

"Umm what we're talking about?" Cisco asked dazedly coming up for air

"Files. I'm not going to let this go Cisco. I always get what I want,”  Lisa smirked

Cisco paused, "If I do this, I'M choosing the movie and the restaurant for our date."

"Fine! We'll go to that disco bar." Lisa rolled her eyes.

"Alright!" Cisco started humming Bees Gees as he typed away on the computer for pyro meta criminals.

"There's none. That's impossible. There really aren't ANY pyros in Central City besides Mick?l Lisa cried

"Guess they didn't want to steal his gimmick," Cisco shrugged, looking relieved

"Do you think there are any in the Starling city?" She asked "Don't know, it's more mercenary and assassins then metas." He answered

"Maybe there are fire aliens?" Lisa thought out-loud, 

"Only Earth 3,” Cisco shook his head.

"Earth Three?" Lisa froze. 

"Shit!” Cisco eyes widened "No, no, no. That's just some crazy dream I had. There's no such thing as Earth Three is like there being Earth Two. Totally stupid" Cisco babbled

"Take me." Lisa demanded Cisco started taking off his shirt.

"I like how your mind works. But no. Take me to Earth Three. Tell me all about it. Are there really such things as fire aliens?" Cisco groaned

"I'll do it myself. You know I will. So you can come help or I'll trash this place doing it myself" Lisa insisted

"We are so lucky that Caitlin and Flash are out today" Cisco groaned again "Yaaas"

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- They had entered to Earth Three just as Supergirl finished saving a bus full of children. Once the reporters left, Cisco introduced himself and her as friends of the Flash. Lisa explained her mission to help Mick find love. 

Supergirl had been just as convinced as Cisco at the idea that love redeems but with a lot of wheedling and encouragement about second chances, Supergirl had allowed the idea of helping them.

"I think I know the girl perfect for Mick" Supergirl explained enthusiastically as they walked to the government building, DEO. "Claire Selton, code name Volcana. Born with pyrokenesis and trained to be a weapon by the government. She went rouge on them and used her powers to steal and cause crime. Superman had to put her on a deserted island in hopes not to harm any more civilians. But stay here. I'll be back soon." She left them in a plain white room, suitable for a noir style interrogation scene and waited. Five minutes later, Supergirl was back with a young thirty year old. The girl in question had long flaming orange hair that reached to her ankles in a messy braid. Her tan skin glowed brightly against her white bikini, her ambers eyes sparked with confusion and annoyance.

"No" Claire hissed, sitting down on the table. Lisa noted with pleasure that the metal table steamed and let out drifts of smoke when Claire touched it.

"No what?" Cisco asked.  "Supey told me what you want. My answer is no. I am not going to a totally different Earth for a guy I never even met. What is this? 1689? Supergirl take me back to the island I am missing my afternoon tanning" she demanded. "Oh oh well that's understandable but did Supergirl mention that this guy has a heat gun that radiates about 220 tons of fire power in a single shot" Lisa rattled off.  "It's 225 tons of fire power btw. Plus how many guys here can say they burned a house for the sake of watching it burn" Cisco added.  "And he's been practicing flame swallowing,” Lisa added.  "Claire.." Supergirl started calmly.  "It's Volcana to you.” Claire scowled.

"Volcana. You're not going to get married to him. Just one date and if you don't like it you can come back here. Besides aren't you tired of being alone in your little island?"

"I wouldn't be there if it weren't for you!" Volcana shot back.

"You were hurting innocent people!" Supergirl retorted.

"Well those "innocent people" we're hurting me. I didn't want to be a weapon but you all treat me like a bad guy because I am what I am.” Volcana ranted, flames suddenly burst from her hands.

Lisa and Cisco jumped back and Supergirl put on a defensive stance.  "And he will love you for it" Lisa put in.

"We have a lot of metas. They get what it's like to be used for their powers. Now Mick will get you even more because he understands how pretty the flames are. It doesn't have to be a date, just two adults talking, fellow pyro to pyro." Cisco said

Claire glared at them in silence, contemplating. "Fine, only for the sake of watching something burn."

The three nodded eagerly at each other. --------------------------------------------------------------- Claire changed into a more appropriate outfit of red leather top and black leather pants with combat boots as they left Smallville.

"Good luck," Supergirl gave a tentative thumbs up and left.

As the three went through the portal, Lisa interrogated Claire and was pleased to find out that she and Mick had a lot in common. Love of alcohol, way too graphic descriptions of explosions and fiery deaths, and had no filter when it came to humor.

"They are practically soul mates!" Lisa whispered giddily in Cisco's ear as they left the Earth One S.T.A.R. labs to Mick's abandoned apartment.

"Oh joy," Cisco muttered sarcastically. --------------------------------------------------------- Cisco had left immediately, stating he didn't want there as a witnesses for future villainy. 

Lisa settled Claire to the guest room of the apartment and waited for the boys to arrive. Claire had gotten bored so she sat down, turned on the oven and stared. Another pastime she shared with Mick. Lisa swore her face was going to break open if she smiled anymore. 

Oh this was going to be so good, and if it ended badly damn it was going to be more entertaining than the firework bomb Mick had set up for April Fool's Day. Leonard and Mick arrived at 7 pm. They didn't say anything about where they had been, they were just so exhausted and about to fall asleep but Lisa insisted on keeping Mick awake, slapping his cheek the whole time as he walked to the kitchen. 

"What do you want?" Mick scowled, shoving her hand away from his face.  "I'm about to change your life, Mick this is Claire" Lisa introduced "Claire this is Mick.” 

Leonard gave a questioning look to her but she just grinned. 

"Oh you gotta be kidding me. Look however she suckered you into this I'm not interested. Leave." Mick instructed Claire.

"Aren't you a charmer? I've seen midgets more handsome than you" Claire spat. 

"She's a pyro. Claire, show him" Lisa said.  Claire sighed but showed off anyway by blowing a kiss as her hand spouted fire like a dragon. "Where's smoke, there's flame. That's me. Volcana" Mick just stared in awe. 

"Heatwave" he lifted the gun from his belt, "Do that again, I need to try something.” 

Volcana complied, Mick shot his gun at the same time and it set the table on fire, and quickly spread to the oven. 

"Holy Shit!" Lisa screeched and grabbed the fire extinguisher taped to the door for emergencies like this, spraying it everywhere. 

"What the hell are you two doing" Leonard yelled but the two heat villains ignored. 

"Volcana huh?" Mick grinned maniacally, leaning against the charred table. "I like your heat gun. Sure could have used it on those cold Metropolis nights" Volcana flirted back, staring up at Mick. "I'll leave you to it. C'mon Lenny," Lisa shoved Leonard out the door. When she stopped by the apartment to drop off a six pack and to get her golden bra for her date with Cisco, she saw the living room an absolute mess with scorch marks in random places, a torched smoke detector on the ground, pile of clothes and the smell of smoke in Mick's room. 

She was good. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- The following weeks just reeked of success. Claire stopped by the apartment regularly. There was a new headline everyday as the couple started fires and explosions around Central City for their dates, and Lisa had overheard their nicknames for each other. Fireball and Spitfire. 

Since it went so well she was even thinking of setting up the other Rogues like Trickster II. Maybe with some Metahumans that Cisco watched like Peek a Boo. She was once again considering setting up her brother but she had pick pocketed his phone earlier and saw that he seemed to have sort of "thing" with White Canary from his Legends team. Which prompted her to stalk any information about Sara. Purely for research, not that she wasn't worried about him getting hurt. Please Len was way too cautious for that to happen. 

At the same time the success of her match had come with a price. Due to their fire kink, the two had burned Mick's room, her room, the guest room, the living room and the kitchen was beyond repair. 

She had to crash at Cisco's place which was nice, but Leonard came also because his cold gun was in the threat of being torched at any second. Nor could he get any piece of quiet with the all the fire puns. "Not fun to hear them," Lisa taunted. 

"That's different. Mine are clever. Theirs are just about fire and sex. Some things I do NOT need to know about my partner." "Thanks for the nightmares," Lisa sighed as a "lovely" mental image entered her head. With them crashing at Cisco's place, Leonard resigned to glaring from the love seat while she and Cisco were on the couch. It was not helping date night. So it was up to her to save the apartment. 

She had entered the apartment expecting another scene of quite literal hot love but found more burning rage.

"You are weak!!!" Claire screamed, "You don't even have pyrokensis you just have a gun huh. I can start a fire whenever I want! You are nothing!" "You're just a hypocrite! Oh the government just wanted to use me" Mick mocked with a falsetto "Screw that. You're just as selfish as me. You just use your powers for petty thief but you could be better, so YOU ARE WEAK!" 

"You have nothing. No brains, no strength and yet you think the world would bow to your awesomeness. And you are the most impulsive idiot I ever met. You just forge along with no regard for logic or what we are suppose to be doing on our date. Honestly what am I suppose to do with you, tell me!" "You think you're so hot. Well I'm hotter, hotter than Cold." Mick sneered.

"I thought you didn't care about that!" Claire protested.

"In the middle of sex, yeah I do." Mick retorted.  "Well the TV was on, I happened to mention he was cute get over it!" 

Lisa cringed, ewwww!

"You also said the same about the police officer, Scarlet, the bartender..." 

"You are just jealous." Claire scoffed.

"JEALOUS! I'll freeze your ass in a place where fires die!" A loud crash sounded through the apartment followed by a explosion. 

Lisa scrambled out of the apartment and never looked back. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- After that incident, Lisa rationalize it was a natural lovers quarrel and that the two would work it out, therefore there was no need to tell anyone. That because of her honest assumption it was a lover's quarrel or her pride not letting her admit that her match might not have been as successful, it was up to anyone's guess but a phone call three days later confirmed the worst case scenario. 

It was the middle of the day and Lisa was online shopping using the money she stole from a heist earlier that month when Cisco called.

"Lisa, have Mick and Claire been having any trouble that you know of? Any that you feel like warning us about?" Cisco asked, calmly with a slight edge that gave Lisa a sinking feeling. Best to play it dumb.

"Uh just some spats but you know. Couples fight, they fight. Why do you ask?" Lisa chirped. 

"Well you should know that you're little pet project has gone up in flames." Lisa rolled her eyes. Wonder how long he was waiting to use that pun? "Heatwave was stealing from the Central City bank when Volcana stopped by, something about how "she was better than him" and was trying to one-up his heist. Thankfully we were able subdue them both. Mick's back with the Legends and Claire was sent back to Earth Three. No one knows she came from Earth Three except you, me and the Flash. You and I are the only ones that know how she actually got here." 

"All's well that ends well," Lisa weakly smiled.  She could just feel him glare through the phone. "We're going to talk when I get home." ---------------------------------------------------------------- "So what are we not doing?" Cisco asked pacing in front of her as she sat on his couch. 

"Match making Mick with a pyro." Lisa muttered.  "And...." 

"Match making Mick with anyone." 

"And...." 

"Match making in general." "Ever.” Cisco said.  "Ever," Lisa repeated. 

[jenomark]

Howdy~! So, I have been feeling extra soft for some reason and I have a request that I have been thinking about for a while and wanted your take cause I love the way you write 😁 So! Can I request 127 + YangYang × best friend!reader going for a late night drive? - ChenJi anon ❤

Taeil: You loved sitting next to Taeil as he drove. His eyes were clear, his thoughts focused on the road mapped out before him. You could see how burnt out he was, his eyes slightly red-rimmed, and his cheeks puffy. Though he could sleep for days, he agreed to the nighttime drive. “Just like old times.” he had said, his words touching your heart. Taeil asked if you wanted to go anywhere in particular but you didn’t. Being there with him, music playing softly, and the sound of him humming to the music was enough. You felt weightless as Taeil drove, the windows rolled down, your hair whipping against the glass. “It’s been awhile since we got to do this,” you said. “It makes me happy.” Taeil looked over at you and smiled. “I have missed this,” he said. “We should do this once a month to clear our minds.”

Johnny: You stepped on the gas pedal for fives seconds before you freaked out. “Johnny!” you screamed. “I’m scared.” The car lurched to a halt, both of you moving forward in your seats. Johnny laughed like your fear was inconsequential, but he was worried about you. You had asked him to teach you how to drive. Johnny took you to a parking lot in the middle of the night to practice. “Stop second guessing yourself,” he said. “You already know how to drive, just do it.” You looked over at how warm and genuine the expression on his face was. Johnny had a lot of patience for you, and you trusted him to guide you through. “I don’t think I do.” you said. Johnny removed his seat belt, got out of the car and came around to your side. He made you slide over in the seat so that he could sit in the drivers seat. “Watch me, okay?” he said. “We’re going to do this. You’re doing to do this.”

Taeyong: You park the car and follow Taeyong’s lead, sticking close to his side as he strides across the cement. This late at night, the gas station is drained of humanity. The lights above cast your skin in a blue haze, but it makes Taeyong look even more handsome. “I like being outside at this hour,” Taeyong said. “It feels like I’m in another dimension.” He holds the door to the convenience store open for you, the little bell at the top of the door making a sound to announce your arrival. Walking through, the cashier gives both of you a tepid glance before turning back to watch the television behind them. “What do we need from here?” you asked. Taeyong plucks a bag of gummy worms from a hook and dangles it in front of your face like it’s the answer to all of life’s problems.” It’s not a road trip experience without gummy candies.” he said. 

Yuta: You felt something poking you, so you opened up one of your eyes. Yuta was standing in front of your bed, in his pajamas. “I can’t sleep, “ he said, jumping up and down. “Do you want to go for a drive?” You tried rolling over and going back to sleep, but Yuta came to the other side of the bed to poke you again. Grumbling, you got out of bed, grabbed the keys to the car and tossed them to him. “You’re a good friend.” Yuta said, after you made it to the car. You buckled yourself in and glared at him. Though all you wanted to do was sleep, being with Yuta in the early morning felt nice. There wasn’t anyone on the highway late at night, so driving felt serene. You watched the overhead lights fly by as Yuta drove on, all the colors threatening to lull you back to sleep. “You could have did this alone. I didn’t have to be here.” you said. Yuta patted your knee and laughed. “I could have,” he said. “But, honestly, doing things with you makes me the happiest.”

Doyoung: You broke down on the side of the road, your car sounding like it took its last breath. “What do we do now?” Doyoung asked. For someone usually so controlled, you could hear the panic rising in his voice. Doyoung had never been stranded, especially not so early in the morning. There was no one around, and the air was too quiet. “We wait here for someone to come kill us.” you joked. “That’s not funny.” Doyoung said. He leaned his head against the headrest and folded his arms across his chest. “Relax, “ you said. “We’ll be fine. I’ll call Taeil”. Taeil answered on the second ring, his voice heavy with sleep. You hung up the phone and explained to Doyoung that Taeil was coming as fast as he could. Deciding you had a lot of time and could make the most of it, you took off your shoes and placed your feet on the dashboard. Doyoung looked at your bare toes and winced. “Do you have to do that?” he asked. You wiggled your toes, which made him shake his head in disgust. Though he would rather be anywhere in the world, you could see traces of a smile slowly creep onto Doyoung’s face.

Jaehyun: He dangled the keys just out of your reach. You jumped up to grab them, your fingertips barely catching the metal. The smirk on Jaehyun’s face made you want to squeeze his cheeks together. “I want to drive! It’s my turn. You drove last time.” you said. Jaehyun opened the door to the drivers side and slipped into the seat like it was always meant for him. Feeling like a petulant child, you went to the passenger side and sat down heavy, the car moving on its tires. “You can drive next time,” he said. “I promise.” You didn’t look at him. Knowing you would hold this over his head forever, Jaehyun stuck out his pinky finger. “Pinky promise?” he asked. You looked at his hand and linked pinkies before you became really angry with him. Jaehyun drove on, the confidence he had in himself palpable. When he reached his hand up to put his playlist on, you slapped his hand away. “Since you’re driving, “ you said. “ I pick the music.”

WinWin: He fell asleep halfway through the drive, his mouth hanging open and a little sigh escaping between his lips. You stopped at a red light and watched him shift in the seat. WinWin looked peaceful when he was sleeping, and you felt envious. As you navigated the streets, he opened his eyes and watched the lines in the road flying towards him. “Where are we?” he asked. You kept your voice as soothing as possible when you told him which road you were on. WinWin shifted his body again to look at you, a little satisfied smile at the corner of his lips. At another red light, you reached into your backseat and pulled out a blanket. WinWin grabbed it from you and tucked it underneath his chin. “I’m sorry for falling asleep on you,” he said. “I’ve just been so tired.” You fixed the blanket so that his body was completely covered. “It’s okay,” you said. “Dream well, Sicheng.”

Jungwoo: He was excited. Since you picked him up, Jungwoo couldn’t stop talking. He looked happy, so you just let him rant and ramble. “I bought snacks.” he said. He pulled out a convenience store bag bigger than the size of his head. He rooted around in the bag and pulled out a thick rice ball. It didn’t take much for Jungwoo to strip the plastic and shove the whole thing into his mouth. “Is it good?” you asked. “Good.” Jungwoo said, his voice muffled by food. He offered you something from the bag, but you declined, so he set the rest on the floor. “I like this, “ he said, looking at the passing trees. “This is my vibe.” Taking late night drives with Jungwoo was a new routine, something both of you did to pass the time during the summer. It was disappointing to have to turn around once you reached the city limits. Both you and Jungwoo wanted badly to roam free, driving until the sun came up, living a life full of rice balls and new opportunities. “It’s nice, isn’t it?” you agreed. “Yah.” he said, opening up another rice ball. 

Mark: He was so happy to finally get his licence, but he was scared of driving the streets during the day. He wanted to get your opinion on his driving skills, so you agreed to go for a late night drive around the city. Mark arrived around midnight, a backwards hat on his head, and his round glasses perched on his nose. As soon as you sat down in the passenger seat, Mark gave you a devilish look. “You know what time it is.” he said. Before you could protest, Mark turned the radio on, put the volume all the way up, and let the feeling carry you both through. “Let’s go.” he said, shouting over the music. You drove until the sun rose. You sang along to your favorite songs, belting out the tunes loudly enough to drive your tiredness away.

Haechan: He barely waited for the car to stop before he opened the door and got out. He spun around in circles, his head titled up to the inky sky, his arms raised outwards like he was in a free fall. You got out and watched him, your mood lifting higher and higher. Though your arms and legs begged you to join him, you couldn’t seem to move. It was his idea to take a late night drive out to the lake to see the stars. “Donghyuck,” you said. “It’s so cold.” Without arguing, like he normally would, he stripped off his hoodie and threw it to you. Haechan jumped on the hood of the car and laid back onto it. “Do you ever look at the stars and think about the rest of the world?” he asked. “Not earth but the universe.” After shrugging on his hoodie, you laid next to him and looked at the same stars. “Sometimes.” you whispered. Haechan sighed and closed his eyes. “Wake me up in a little while,” he said. “I want to dream.”

YangYang: In typical YangYang fashion, he was late. You almost fell asleep waiting for him, your head leaning against the railing to your front step. When he pulled up in his car, YangYang punched the steering wheel to make the car horn honk. You opened your eyes and watched him banging his head to a rock song you couldn’t hear. “You’re late.” you said. YangYang hit the horn a few more times. The sound echoed up and down your empty street, loud and obnoxious. “Time doesn’t exist.” he said as you got in the car. He pulled away without looking back, his facial expression a mix of concentration and wild abandon. “Where are we going?” you asked, looking over at him. YangYang smiled widely, which, you knew meant he was hoping to find some trouble. “Where aren’t we going, my friend.” he said.

[frenchtoastpanda]

The Leverage finale

Gonna rant in public because @rainaramsay expressed interest. I have no theme this is just my thoughts as I rewatch this episode. Idk why I’m doing this. (Also I don’t know how to format, so sorry about that)

Oh right I forgot that this is a fucking sad episode why am I doing this to myself

Ooh the return of the Steranko! I am very glad they brought that back

I just love when they bring things back in general, like in the white rabbit job all of the companies looking to buy dogson are previous marks and how they have like three brand names for safes that they reuse a lot. It just makes it feel like a real world that people live in.

The theater! Perfect for Sophie! And the mentioned the tunnels, which I believe we encountered in the gold job

Sophie says “I have just the thing” and my immediate response is always “the play’s the thing” even though I know it’s from a different play than the one they are doing

And can we talk about how they are doing the same play as the pilot? Actually I will probably yell about that closer to the end

Parker being all emotionally cognizant and Nate just reciting physics formulas in response

God I love this bit (and I love that they are still including references to Nate’s alcoholism)

Just, Parker, the new mastermind, who doesn’t “let feelings get in the way” (like Hardison - this is the reason he can’t be the mastermind, much to his chagrin. He’s too much of a cinnamon roll)

Nate says she spins problems like puzzle pieces until they click, but I think it’s more like juggling all the fiddly bits inside a lock until it clicks open

HE TRUSTS HER HE TRUSTS HER HE TRUSTS HER!!!!!!!

Zachary is the lead! Love him!

Sophie saying she doesn’t miss acting at all 😏

She is a good director, though

"I'm exactly where I belong" I'm gonna die I am so happy for all of them

Oh no here we go

Cut right to Nate covered in cuts being interrogated about the mistakes he made

"Mr. Ford, how did your friends die?" CUT TO COMMERCIAL

This must have killed me the first time around

I do love this investigator though. I think I remember from the commentary that it wasn't originally supposed to be her, but it worked out really well

Nate looking around like he's confused (and trapped) while not being able to put together a full sentence (I'm not sure if I ever developed a solid headcannon for how much of this scene was him faking and how much was actual injuries from the actual crash) (I'm open to ideas!)

Ellen giving a vicious predatory little smile when she says that she's here to help him

I wish I could do gifs or screencaps or something. This is one of my absolute favorite callbacks! Parker in that little black bonnet thing jumping off a building having the time of her life and the boys do their "twenty pounds of crazy in a five pound bag" thing (whuch my autocorrect recognized as a phrase for some reason? Do I really yell about that but enough for it to suggest those words in that order? Fantastic)

But this time their faces and voices are full of affection. She may be an insane thief/mastermind, but she's OUR insane thief/mastermind

And coming after the white rabbit job where we had that line about how she's not and never has been crazy, the fact that you can tell they are saying this as a callback without meaning the crazy part is just perfect

It makes me wonder how many other times they have repeated this, because you can't convince me they haven't

Aah Sophie's horrible rendition of Lady Macbeth! Same speech, different ways of doing it just as badly (props to Gina Bellman)

Is this the same outfit? Hold on I need to check.

Y'know, I didn't think they changed that much physically over the years, given that they are adults, but going back to the pilot, I keep going awww look how tiny they were! (Especially Aldis. Like I know they had problems because he was getting too hot and ripped, but Damn)

Anyway, the dress is very very similar, same color and pattern, but it very slightly different. I will maybe post my very very horrible pictures after I finish this

Parker is so good at computers now that she has this adorably bored face when hacking! I love that they taught each other their stuff!

Using chaos as a distraction and co-opting the expected response as a cover! One of my favorite tricks!

Parker changing in the elevator! And the boys turning to give her privacy! And this isn't even the first time they did a callback to this! I love my respectful boys! Remember when Hardison turned the David around? So pure!

Ah, we are setting up for competency porn and then it all goes bad! Aah!

I love Eliot's little "wassup?" Before fighting the guy. Points for intimidation, Spencer

My stronk babies opening an elevator with their fingertips

And Hardison's recurrent fear of heights combined with Parker's love of them

She says "I got you" (twice)

Oh god Beth's acting in the elevator shafts

Oh I'm gonna cry

Oh and a "dammit Hardison"

Oh Gina's face

Even in a situation as tense as this, Eliot still takes the time to empty the gus and toss it away

I don't think I've ever seen him check for an ankle piece, actually. How has that not come up before now?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

"Age of the geek, brother" I'm sobbing

I mean, so is everybody

Look at this acting!

I love that they didn't go for the clichéd established couple dying in each other's arms, but instead put Eliot in the middle, giving us our yummy hurt ot3 goodness

And Parker sitting up so she sees the other two go

Ugh. Where's that poetic cinéma image when you need it?

Anyone remember the perfectly timed bridge from the pilot?

What number Lucille are they on?

I love that they actually stop in from of the barrier at the bridge, then take a moment to decide before just going for the crazy impossible stunt because why the hell not at this point

Ah Nate and Sophie are holding hands on the way to death too!!

And cut the scene before they reach the top of the bridge. Time to see Tim show us why he's an academy award winner

Ooh and here's where we find out she was lying! (Should this be the part where I started wondering if Nate knew? Probably. Did I? Not even a little)

There was a big twist where the person Nate was facing off against was playing him in the pilot too

But John fucking Rogers didn't play ME in the pilot. I take that personally.

Ooh hints at the true story are being dropped

Ellen is almost adequately suspicious

JUST WALK TWO FEET FORWARD ELLEN! LOOK AT THE STAGE! COME ON!

"You loved them very much" Yeah he did. They all did! Aaaaaaahhhhhhhh!

She knows he's lying, I love that (just like Dubenich knew Sophie was manipulating him)

"The only thing I ever had"? That's intense, Nate

God Tim is a good actor

(Like I low-key don't like Nate at all, but Damn he is well acted)

And he just turns it off, just like that

Wow

I am really into her little impressed face when he goes all Sherlock and explains how he knows they are at interpol

The glass! Of course Sterling brings him the glass! Not a pilot callback, but a good callback nontheless. The commentary says it's literally the same exact glass every time. I will have to go back and verify that at some point. I swear it didn't have those ridges around the bottom in at least one episode, but I also trust John Rogers, so idk

I love how sterling knows everything from the moment he appears, and Ellen doesn't even know what the black book is

"That's why you joined Interpol? Screw justice. You're the order guy?" What a good line for Nate and Sterling's relationship

Nate's not even interested in hearing Sterling's evil speech of evil about the bailouts

I actually really love the little exposition flashbacks

Her look of horror and dawning comphrension when he explains why he is there is fantastic. If we bring this show back, can we have more of this lady?

Yeah, Ellen, why IS he still lying to you??

Sterling remembered to be cautious about the coroner's van, but not cautious enough!

That's some timing. How did Nate arrange that ? Oh right, this was triggered by the arrival of the van, which he probably set the timing of

Nate's face after "Parker's still in the server room." Yes, sell that fear to Sterling! Make him believe he's right! I wouldn't have thought to fake a reaction to that. But that's why I'm not a griffer

And he trusted sterling to have a snark remark so that he could have an attention-stealing reaction to distract him

I try every time to see the kids going in, and I never manage to catch all of them

Why does Nate turn away here?

God, that really is a terrifyingly lifelike Hardison face

I gotta say, the first time I saw sterling shoot the Hardison corpse, I was really convinced that he was right and he was really killing Hardison for the first time

"Second question... No, Nate, why don't you tell her what my second question is?"

Honestly, the first time around, I had forgotten about that secret meeting between Nate and Hardison

"The plan's the thing" A callback to earlier in this episode. I'm dying. I love this show so much

And they can do that without being annoying because every leverage episode is like three or four episodes rolled into one. Sometimes more!

That's one of my favorite parts, but also one of the very few downsides

I get so excited watching the flashbacks that show how it all happened

Omg I love the thing where they stack! Parker crouching, Eliot just above her head, Hardison looming tall! It reminds me of the princess bride for some reason

Sterling is the Trojan horse, the way out is the way in...wait, didn't they do that with at least one other episode, where the floor was a horrible way in, but last minute they used it as a way out?

Are these callbacks or parallels at this point?

Sophie taught Nate how to act! "She found her calling." Yeah she did! So proud of her!

"Your ride to a life sentence in a secret prison has arrived" So dramatic for someone who knows Sophie is behind the wheel

Ooooooohhh he called him James!

"You and I are not the same" okay sterling

"Justice is always easy" YES GO STERLING wait that's a callback to the justice vs order thing earlier in this episode. I just got that

I have seen this so many times and I still notice something new every time I watch it

Does John Rogers have a tumblr? I want to tag him but I don't think he does

What is Parker wearing? Why is one sleeve randomly yellow?

I can't believe Nate is proposing in a hoodie

I love how the kids pop in with insults and Nate just agrees. He knows it's true

That's a huge fucking rock

"Did you steal it?" "No." "Oh, cause that would have been more romantic"

"I'll steal the first anniversary ring" lol I love these guys

Parker insists he follow the proper procedure

Oh wait, the ot3 are gonna branch out with other crews?

Y'know, in an alternate universe I could have shipped Eliot and Sophie

GOD

I'M CRYING AGAIN

"You're the smartest man I know" where have we heard that before?

Parker recognizing her feelings! (And they've been preparing her for this the longest)

Aah, the circle shot from above and the breakaway, but this time not everyone breaks away!!!!!!!!!!

"You do know that Laura is not my real name, don't you?" Sophie I'm gonna kill you

And then the big obvious callback to the pilot, where Beth meticulously studied Tim's acting to recreate it

Loving the look of this scene. The costumes, the blocking, all of it

And they made sure to switch which parent was crying

Very excited for leverage international. Gimme!

[ettadunham]

A Buffy rewatch 7x09 Never Leave Me

aka tired of subtle

We did it, guys! We made it to the last season! Also, hello if you’re new, and stumbled upon this without context. As usual, these impromptu text posts are the product of my fevered mind as I rant about the episode I just watched for an hour (okay, sometimes perhaps two). Anything goes!

And I prefer today’s episode to Sleeper as a post-Big-Bad-reveal kick-off to our season’s main arc in multiple ways. Also, Willow drags Andrew. Literally.

Season 7, as a whole, struggles from the main story arc taking up too much of its time. People often hate on filler episodes, but the truth is, you can’t fill out 22 episodes of television with a singular, focused story arc. And you shouldn’t.

Not to mention that fillers are a great way to explore characters without being bogged down by an overarching plot. (So stop hating on their concept, just because some shows do them badly.)

Buffy at its best realized that these things – your main arc, your character stories and your fillers – can coexist in the same episodes. Some of the best episodes of the show are one-off stories, using a unique set-up or villain of the week while focusing on characters and pushing the season arc on some level.

Unfortunately, the structure of season 7 makes it much harder to tell these kinds of stories. Our Big Bad is ever-present, and the battles and confrontations with it are constant throughout the season, once the reveal happens in episode 7.

I’m pointing this out not to criticize Never Leave Me, but to emphasize how good it is, and why the issue of the season has more to do with trying to keep up with the pace this episode sets.

Oh, yeah. Hot takes I guess about the episode that ranks 98th on iMDB. Never Leave Me is pretty good.

(I kinda wanna look up each episode’s iMDB ranking at this point before writing up on them, just for funsies, but I also don’t want to be influenced by the popular opinions? The struggle.)

To be fair though, part of my fondness for this episode comes from my feelings regarding the previous one. Watching it, I felt like I was seeing a much better version of what a follow up to Conversations with Dead People would look like.

And a lot of that has to do with Spike. And Buffy.

I spent the last time ranting at length about how I just don’t connect with Spike, and that’s okay. Pretty much all Buffy characters are incredibly flawed, and we all relate to and/or gravitate towards different ones, based on our own experiences. I love that. I love that these are well-rounded characters who change and grow in both surprising and consistent ways.

I also like Spike much better in this episode, because his story relates to Buffy much more strongly. Which does seem to be the best way for me to find a connection to Spike in any given episode (see also: Fool for Love).

I guess another aspect is that unlike Sleeper, this episode focuses much less on his romanticism. He instead talks about his past. About the horrific things he’s done. About his and Buffy’s self-hatred. About how he understands it and that she used him now, and how he didn’t back then.

More importantly, Buffy gets to fire back. She did tell him all those things last season. It’s why she ended things with him in the first place. She also challenges his assumptions about that self-hatred as a current motivation in what’s decidedly my favorite scene of the episode.

SPIKE:  “Have you ever really asked yourself why you can’t do it? Off me? […] You like men who hurt you.” BUFFY:  “No.” SPIKE:  “You need the pain we cause you. You need the hate. You need it to do your job, to be the Slayer.” BUFFY:  “No. I don’t hate like that. Not you, or myself. Not anymore. You think you have insight now because your soul’s drenched in blood. You don’t know me. You don’t even know you. […} Listen to me. You’re not alive because of hate or pain. You’re alive because I saw you change. Because I saw your penance. […] You faced the monster inside you and you fought back. You risked everything to be a better man.”

I love this scene, because Spike posits something that’s in line with Buffy’s own fears about her relationships, something that she voices as far back as season 4. That maybe she herself seeks out these painful, dramatic romances.

…But this discussion isn’t really just about that, isn’t it? And even if Buffy hasn’t quite landed yet on how to approach her romantic history, she has plenty of self-knowledge. She knows why she hasn’t and won’t kill Spike now.

Buffy sees and believes in the best of people. Even when they don’t. And here she shows the same compassion to Spike that she did to Angel as far back as season 1.

See, she’s a protector, not a killer. And one with a huge fucking heart at that.

That’s why she didn’t kill Spike. At worst, she saw him as non-threatening to others after his chip debacle, at best, she saw a potential for him to become better.

Still. How does one reconcile this characterization of Buffy with what we see in Selfless? Has Anya not proved more than enough times that she can be better? That she’s more than just the vengeance demon she used to be?

Worse, when Buffy and Xander argue about the difference between stopping Anya then, and Willow at the end of season 6, Buffy’s argument doesn’t really make sense once you think about it. She says that they weren’t planning on killing Willow, because Willow’s human. But from everything we know of vengeance demons, there really isn’t any distinction between them and a human with powers. They still have their souls.

So the distinction Buffy makes between Anya’s and Willow’s case feels arbitrary. And so does the decision to not kill Spike at certain points of the story.

But that’s what Buffy says in Selfless, isn’t it? “Someone has to draw the line.” And in a world with no clear-cut black and white morality, that line is arbitrary.

Buffy’s been acutely aware of the fact that the world she operates in is full of grey areas ever since Lie to Me. There are no easy answers or choices, even when you’re fighting literal creatures from hell, but someone has to makes these decisions regardless. Someone has to draw the line. And that’s Buffy.

But I think that’s why she finds it all the more important to choose hope sometimes. She has to be prepared, yes, and she can’t rely on the power of love alone, as discussed before. Her responsibilities come first. But she can offer a choice.

Even in Selfless, one of the most important moments for Buffy is when she implores Xander to find her another way to deal with Anya. Which is what Willow ends up doing, by asking D’Hoffryn to offer up the same kind of choice to Anya, that Buffy felt unable to in this situation.

Never Leave Me is also the episode where the gang meets Andrew again. More accurately, Willow runs into him, and he’s terrified. As he should be.

ANDREW:  “Warren killed Tara. I didn’t do it. And he was aiming for Buffy anyway.” WILLOW:  “Not making it better.”

In case you missed it, this was a direct callback to another scene:

WARREN:  “It was an accident, you know.” WILLOW:  “Oh. You mean, instead of killing my best friend, you killed my girlfriend.”

Listen, all I’m saying that if Willow flayed Andrew after that line? I wouldn’t have blamed her.

But Willow these days is less about the murder, so instead she just stares incredulously at Andrew after that little moment of rage-inducing blunder. And they both nerd-monologue at each other, I guess?

(Sidenote: I don’t think I ever got around to mention this with the last season, but there’s an interesting and somewhat uncomfortable interpretation of the Trio, as a mirror to Willow’s own character. Mostly the worst parts of her at that of course, but there are definitely some parallels here; particularly to Warren and his tech savviness, and Jonathan and his magical abilities. Andrew is probably the least obvious example though – unless we take his relentless gay-coding as a nod to that.)

This whole storyline of course ends up being played mostly for comedy, as Anya and Xander take it upon themselves to test their interrogation techniques on Andrew. And it’s fun, too, seeing them work together without the added baggage that was their romantic relationship. It makes me both root much more for them to get back together, and wish that they wouldn’t, because they work so much better like this.

Even if Xander’s speech to Andrew is obviously supposed to be about himself, and how he’s still not over Anya.

XANDER:  “There was this one guy, her hurt her real bad, so she paid him back. She killed him, but she did it real slow. See, first she stopped his heart, then she replaced it with darkness, then she made him live his life like that. But he still had to go do his job, and see his friends, and wake up in the morning, and go to bet ad night, but he had to do it all empty. Without anything to look forward to. Ever.”

Honey… I know you know this, but you did this to yourself.

Oh, and isn’t it fun that when the Harbringers attack, one of the first things they do is knock Willow unconscious? It’s almost as if the show is trying not to call attention to the fact, that she could probably take these guys out in a second with magic.

But at least this gives Dawn some chance to kick ass, so that’s always a plus.

Another side-plot that’s happening is with my boy, Robin, who finds Jonathan’s body in the basement. And decides to bury It instead of telling anyone about it.

I’m sure there’s an explanation to this other than making us believe that he’s a bad guy, but I honestly can’t even remember. We’ll see, I guess.

The episode ends with Buffy making the connection that they’re up against the First, and the First itself monologuing at Spike about how it’s tired of being subtle. Which feels very meta in an ironic kind of sense from the show, but also marks a questionable turn in the season arc.

There’s a lot of cool concept and potential (hehe) in the First as a Big Bad, that we’ve seen demonstrated in Conversations with Dead People. It knows things. It can appear as anyone you know who died. It can mess with you in infinite ways.

In this scene though, the First is talking about bringing these Uruk-hai vampires to the surface, and that’s just not as interesting as those other tactics. Even if Buffy gets to have cool fights with them.

But that’s still to come. Who knows, maybe I’ll appreciate the super vampires after all.

Also appreciated – those scene of Quentin and the Watcher’s Council being their usual, holier-than-thou selves, keeping information from Buffy, and relying on empty platitudes... immediately followed by them getting blown up.

Yeah. This show’s anything but subtle, that’s for sure.

[travllingbunny]

The 100 rewatch: 1x02 Earth Skills

I’m a new fan of The 100, who first binged it last year, August to November. This is my first full rewatch of the show. I was planning to start it anyway and finish it before the season 6 premiere on April 30, and when I saw that Fox Serbia was airing a rerun (Monday to Friday, 40 min. after midnight, with repeats the next day), starting on 1st February, it was a great opportunity to start my rewatch in HDTV on my beautiful new TV. I decided to do write-ups and tag other fans on SpoilerTV website, as I did when I was first watching the show. But my posts turned into full blown essays. So, finally, after over a week, I’ve realized: Why don’t I post them on my Tumblr blog, too? I’ll copy my write-ups of the first 7 episodes, and then I’ll post my rewatch posts after I watch each episode. (The next one, 1x08, is on Monday’Tuesday.)

Spoilers below for all 5 seasons of the show. I go of on a tangents and make a lot of references to future events.

...........................

The first 2 episodes of season 1 are its weakest, just as I remember them. But initially I thought episode 1x02 was worse - I had mixed feelings about the Pilot, but then really disliked the second episode. This time, however, the Pilot was much worse than I remembered it, while this episode was... well, pretty much the same, but I enjoyed it more this time. Because, when I first watched the Pilot, I focused on all the new info on the show's premise, the setting, the universe, the SciFi stuff, and pretty much ignored all the cringey early teen soapy stuff (which I didn't even remember). But then the second episode came, and all the cringey teen soapy stuff in that episode just came right at me and annoyed the heck out of it. So this time, I already remembered it, so I could focus on other things.

BTW, I need to have good laugh at the often stated claim that The 100 doesn't focus on romance or do much romance or set up ships. The show does romance all the time. There are ships all over the place, but most of them pretty much suck, especially since most of them are poorly written insta-romances. And these early episodes are full of various romances and potential romances, and love triangles (which some people say the show has stopped doing... except it never did - *cough season 5 *cough* - but at least it scaled back on it a bit). 

Now don't misunderstand me - I don't mind that there's a lot of that, what I did mind is how badly all of that was written in these early episodes. Later, the show did lose most of its early CW-ness and start doing romantic plots better, in some cases at least. (But it also started doing them even worse, in some other cases.)

Rating: 4.5/10

First introduction of Raven, and she immediately shows that she's smart, capable and awesome. At this point, she seems almost perfect, but we know she was just initially meant to be a temporary supporting character and romantic obstacle for Finn/Clarke. We find out that she's the youngest zero G engineer in 52 years. She's also the first person to figure out that the Delinquents aren't dying, but simply taking their trackers off. How come this never crossed the minds of any of the Ark leaders? They came off a bit dumb here.

First meaningful interactions between Abby and Raven - the start of their friendship/pseudo-mother daughter relationship. Abby enlists Raven to fix an old escape pod so she(Abby) could get to the ground. Raven insists she will go, too, since she also has a loved one there. Multiple mentions of her boyfriend, and I can now see the big hints with the origami that Finn is that boyfriend. I missed that the first time, which is lucky, or I would have hated this episode even more, for trying to set up more than one annoying insta-love-triangle involving Finn and Clarke. I think this is the first time we get a mention of a year? But not the year when the show takes place. The escape pod is a 130 year old piece of junk that was found when they rescued MIR-3 in 2102. At least that gives us an idea of what century it is. ( The 100 wiki has a timeline and says the year is 2149, IIRC, but I don't know where that info is from.) I remember that Clarke, Abby and Raven were my favorite characters by far, followed by Monty, and pretty much the only characters I really liked (I was intrigued by Bellamy, and to a lesser extent Octavia, but I didn't exactly like them), since they were the only characters doing smart and good and pragmatic stuff and trying to save people. Then later, during season 1, Raven fell down a few places in my rankings, because I was so frustrated with her moping over Finn. Well, Wells was OK, but I didn't like some things they were doing with him here. One of the things I remembered best from this episode is that it clumsily tried to set up a Wells/Clarke/Finn love triangle, and that it made me roll my eyes so much. And for whatever reason, Bellamy was the one to talk about it to Wells and go on about how Clarke supposedly doesn't see Wells next to Finn, blah blah. Octavia isn't the only Blake with cringey dialogue anymore. Sorry, I'm gonna go on a mini-rant. Why was it necessary for the show to imply that Wells was in love with Clarke? You know how some people claim that the show is so into platonic male/female friendships (which somehow always is all about Clarke and Bellamy, because other male and female characters on the show aren't ever friends or something)? Yeah, right. Clarke and Wells were BFFs from childhood, grew up together - if you're looking for a "sibling-like" relationship between people on the show who are not related, that's the closest thing to it, but apparently, Wells couldn't have done all those sacrifices for Clarke if he wasn't in love with her. Right? But Clarke only sees him as a BFF, and he is so important to her... that the show had her mourn him for about 10 minutes in episode 4 after he was killed, and then never mention him again. If they ever actually wanted a great completely platonic, sibling-like close relationship between a man and a woman, that was a great opportunity. But they obviously didn't care. And speaking of people who grew up together and refer to each other as family, so they would therefore fit the idea of sibling-like relatively well (unlike Clarke and Bellamy, who didn't even know each other or interact with each other till they were 23 and almost 18, respectively)... well, there's also Finn and Raven. Who are also boyfriend and girlfriend. Kinda weird. I wonder when the writers decided to kill of Wells. I think it definitely was only after this episode, because this episode spends a lot of time building up Wells as a heroic character and setting up that love triangle that never goes anywhere, because Wells dies in 1x03. I think that, if the writers were at all planning an "endgame" (though I hate that word) love interest for Clarke, it was probably Wells at this point, because I don't think they were considering Bellamy that way at this point, and Finn, while clearly meant as the initial love interest, has False Romantic Lead written all over him. I sometimes wonder what the show would look like if they hadn't killed off Wells. I think Finn's "peacemaker" role in season 1b was probably planned for Wells. But I'm really relieved that we didn't get a love triangle that's all "Unlucky Childhood Friend/nice guy in unrequited love with a girl who is into another guy who is charming but kind of a jerk/cheater, until she finally realizes he's the one for her", because I hate that trope so much. Sorry, Finn lovers, if any of you are reading this - but Finn comes off even worse on rewatch than he did when I watched it the first time. He was always a guy who's just there and whose only interest seemed to be following Clarke around and flirting with her, but his time I'm noticing things like, even when he does good things, he only does them after he's realized Clarke would like him to do it, and tries to make himself look good and be the guy that she needs in her life. When I first watched this, I just had profound indifference towards him, which grew into active annoyance in this episode. And I didn't even realize at the time that he had a girlfriend on the Ark. Or that, after Clarke shamed him for not wanting to come and help rescue Jasper, he only changed his mind and came after Clarke had made Bellamy join the rescue party. My annoyance was initially mostly because of the scene where they are on the way to finding Jasper and saving him, and Finn decides to instead convince Clarke that she's wound up too tight and should just relax and they should splash each other with water. Which would be OK, if Jasper wasn't potentially dying. Priorities? And there was also his pop psychology where he tells Clarke that she is so desperate to save Jasper because she couldn't save her father, and we're obviously supposed to see it as super--meaningful. Is it just me that thinks that wanting to save people in general, and especially those you know, is a normal human reaction? Which is why Clarke was the character I immediately liked and related to. And also why this scene annoyed me so much. My feelings on it are exactly the same now, except maybe now I'm not sure that the show ever even meant for the Finn/Clarke pairing to be seen as an especially good one. Meanwhile, it seems that the show staff had realized between the Pilot and the second episode that Bob was super hot, so now Bellamy gets to be shirtless and with ruffled hair that looks much better on him, and is just friendly parting from some random Delinquent girl he's had sex with and who never appears again. I guess the casual sex (and later threesomes) were supposed to be a part of his 'bad boy' persona, since it pretty much stopped once the show started making him into a more heroic figure. Even though there's actually nothing wrong about single people having casual sex for pleasure, so it's not like that marks him as 'bad'. (The show, however, seemed less judgy about casual sex in later seasons, so I don't know.) However, he does a lot of other thing in this episode that are actually bad, like making the kids take off their wristbands so they'll have food, or acting dictator-like ("I will not be disobeyed") and over-protective of Octavia, including punishing Atom for making out with her. I didn't hate Bellamy early on as many did, but he frustrated me a lot, and was definitely at his most annoying in 1x02. However, I always had a lot of leeway for both him and Octavia, no matter how annoying they acted at this point, because of their backstory. And now I can even understand his over-protectiveness a bit better, knowing hat happened the last time he tried to let Octavia enjoy life. Much of the episode was about Octavia trying to find a guy to make out with, and specifically trying to make Atom (the guy Bellamy charged with protecting her). make out with her. She's being a huge brat at this point, but it's understandable - she was isolated, under the floor and locked up, all her life, and now she wants to be free and enjoy it. One interesting moment is when she told Atom: "Wall won't stop what's out there, we need weapons" - which is the first time she sounded like later Octavia. But her later love of fighting also makes sense for her character - fighting, especially with bare hands or cold weapons, is an energetic activity that produces an adrenaline rush, kind of like sex/making out. The scene where she chases butterflies in the woods and then makes out with Atom was one of the most visually beautiful. It looked very romantic, in the sense of enjoying life and nature. Not in the sense of actual romance, unless by 'romance' one means 'making out with a random person you met a day ago and barely know.' But to be fair, even Octavia's upcoming big OTP romance with Lincoln began with little more than physical attraction, and she knew him even less than Atom by the time they hooked up. The best interactions Ocfavia had in the episode were with Monty - the start of one of the better, underrated m/f genuinely platonic friendships on the show. This exchange was quite interesting: Monty: "Living under the floor all your life, it's amazing that you're not a complete basket case". Octavia: "Who says I'm not?" Monty was really cool in this episode - while Octavia was having some drama with Atom and some other guy, he was like "quiet, guys, I'm working" and was just calmly working on trying to make radio communications with the Ark possible. A bit more backstory on him and Jasper: they obviously have known each other for a long time, and Monty compares his relationship with Jasper to the Blakes, saying that Jasper may not actually be his brother but they are just as close. However, the Blakes aren't really like a regular sibling relationship, it's one of those sibling relationships (like Katniss/Prim in The Hunger Games) where the elder sibling had to grow up early and take care of the younger, so it's more like a parent/child relationship. Which is really one of the main problems of their relationship - Bellamy sees Octavia almost as his child and is extremely protective and sacrificial (the way we otherwise see parents act towards their children in The 100), and Octavia is constantly rebelling against him as kids rebel against authority. First significant interaction between Monty and Clarke, too. When Wells and Monty volunteer to save Jasper, Clarke tells Monty to stay behind because he's too important for the group's survival - he was raised on a Farm station, trained as an engineer. "food and communications. What's up here (*touches his head*) is going to save us all". (And how right she was!) That's some good, smart, pragmatic thinking - and she also managed to convince him without having to say that he also wouldn't be the most useful in a fight. I notice so many gender stereotypes in how the characters are written in these early episodes, more than the show usually has afterwards. Jasper and Monty were constantly talking about impressing girls in the Pilot, Jasper thought Finn had "game", and in this episode, we constantly have women shaming men into doing things by implying they would look weak or cowardly otherwise. Octavia tries to make Atom let her make out with guys/make out with her by saying he would be her brother's "bitch" otherwise (when did she learn to talk like that? I guess, during those two-three days on Earth?). Clarke tells Finn how disappointed she is that he refuses to join the rescue party, calling him a coward. (Though Monty shames Finn, too, saying "Jasper looked up to you". Which doesn't mean much, since the reason Jasper looked up to him is because he thought Finn was good at impressing girls.) And then Clarke makes Bellamy join the rescue party by implying he will look scared in front of the others/less brave than she is, otherwise (though that was more about Bellamy having to maintain authority in the group - which he needs for his own reasons), Then Bellamy enlists his sidekick Murphy to come, too. Murphy: "What are we doing? I didn't think we were in the rescuing business." Oh, you have no idea. The interactions between Bellamy and Clarke in this episode were quite interesting. I didn't ship them at this point, but I know now that some people already did, and I can see why. The scenes where they are into each other's faces and being antagonistic... well, this is the scene where Clarke says she will never take off the wristband, and Bellamy calls her "Brave princess" sarcastically (?):

What are you doing here, Bellamy? If he means to try to be snarky or antagonistic, he's not doing a good job, because "Brave princess" is not an insult, it sounds like he's impressed by her. (Which he probably is, though I'm not sure he's aware of it yet.) I'm sure he thinks she should hate her, because she is making things difficult for him and she's one of the privileged high class people from the Ark. That's what Bellamy means, at least at first, when he calls her "princess" - he's not using that nickname to flirt with her, like Finn. At least, I'm sure he does't mean to flirt. But... he kind of looks like he's flirting. I think, at this point, he's really, really confused.

And that's exactly the moment when Finn comes along, finally having decided to join the party, and says "Come up with your own nickname". Finn seems very possessive over... that nickname.

Later when they find Jasper, he gets all take-chargey and tells Wells to keep an eye on Bellamy, and Murphy to come help him take Jasper down from the tree. I can't help but think of another, far less successful and very unfortunate rescue mission, in season 2, where Murphy will also end up as Finn's reluctant sidekick.

I love the way that Bellamy acts like he's so ruthless (which he probably believes himself to be, much more than he actually is), when he tells Murphy he will take Clarke's wristband off even if he has to cut off her arm to do it...but then later, when she almost falls into the pit full of spikes, he instinctively grabs her arm and saves her life - and then has the look on his face "What did I just do? What am I doing? Why I am doing this?" He really is confused.

Early season 1 Bellamy is such a hot mess. Kind of like Clarke will end up being a hot mess in season 5, and similarly impulsive, emotionally damaged and preoccupied with just protecting their "child" while ignoring the big picture, while season 1 Clarke/season 5 Bellamy are acting pragmatically while trying to save everybody. They've really switched roles. And I expect season 6 Bellamy to help Clarke to get back to who she used to be, just as Clarke helped him find himself in season 1.

I love the song "Can't Pretend" by Tom Odell, which closes this episode. (I'll be seeing him in concert in a week.) But I didn't initially even notice it in the episode - I only paid attention to it when I saw some The 100 fanvideos with it. It's too emotional and the lyrics don't really fit either of the rather shallow romances (Finn/Clarke and Octavia/Atom) whose scenes it covers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUmtXzuSGu8

[purplerosesbloodythorns]

I Would Never Ask You To

A/N:

This is a story that I half wrote about 8 months ago, and despite having the whole story in my head I never finished it. So this is just a warning that read knowing this likely won’t ever be completed. Also, it’s not good but it’s what I got in this head of mine soooooo...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Harry followed the Slytherin as he had been doing for quite some time. He kept the Invisibility Cloak that once belonged to his father wrapped tightly around him, his steps quiet. Malfoy’s back was stiff as he walked, his body tense and thin. He ducked into Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom, and Harry rushed in before the door closed so he wouldn’t be detected. He watched as Malfoy splashed his face with water, his sleeves pulled up. Malfoy looked like shit, and it ate at Harry’s insides. Draco was pale, more so than usual. His cheeks were hollow and the dark circles under his eyes contrasted with the almost white hair that had been knocked loose and was falling on his forehead. Harry glanced down at Draco’s rolled sleeves and inched closer, hoping he was wrong. He wanted to be wrong so badly. His eyes shot to Malfoy’s left arm, and he felt like lead had dropped in his stomach.

The mark was stark against the cream skin, and it looked like the snake curled around the skull was slithering beneath Draco’s flesh. Draco watched the snake move with disgust, a sob shook his body as he breathed heavily. Draco scratched at it until it was red and swollen, as if the Mark was an itch that couldn’t quite be scratched. Harry figured it probably wasn’t comfortable, and the look on Draco’s face confirmed what Harry already suspected. Draco had never wanted it. Finally, out of frustration, Draco dug a clean nail straight through it, blood pouring from the thin cur he left. He let out a pained sound as the skin automatically healed itself, the mark preserved perfectly. He immediately went to do it again, and Harry forgot everything he was meant to be doing. He reached out and gripped Malfoy’s hand, stopping it from torturing the marked skin any longer. Malfoy gasped, jerking his arm away and pulling his wand, pointing it in Harry’s general direction. Harry muttered a curse at his own stupidity, and dropped the cloak from his shoulders.

The silence was deafening, and Draco quickly pulled down his sleeves. Harry watched the mark go and breathed deeply. Draco never dropped his wand, and Harry never pulled his.

“They wouldn’t believe me,” Harry murmured, staring at Draco’s sleeve right where the mark was ingrained, “all said I was crazy, that you weren’t a Death Eater.”

Draco breathed heavily, anxiously waiting for Harry’s attack. Dreading the moment he had to attack back. Harry tore his eyes from the sleeve of Malfoy’s robes, and looked up into the tired face of his rival.

“I wanted them to be right,” Harry whispered like it was his greatest confession, and Draco squirmed under his gaze, feeling like a scolded child. He wanted to protest, argue that he wasn’t one of them. That he didn’t want this, but the mark was a dull pain underneath his skin, constantly reminding him of what he was.

“Sorry to disappoint you, oh Chosen One.” Malfoy snapped as haughtily as he could, not meeting Potter’s eyes. Because he was sorry, so sorry.

“It doesn’t have to define you, you know.” Harry whispered, his body wired tight like a string. “You don’t have to, Malfoy.”

Draco scoffed, “Have to do what, exactly, Potter?” And Draco’s skin crawled, because Potter couldn’t know what he had been tasked. There was no way. He flushed with shame just thinking about it, but the fear of the Dark Lord quickly overcame that shame, leaving him with determination.

Harry shrugged awkwardly, “Whatever you’ve been sneaking around planning, I reckon, or anything you don’t want to, really. You never have to do anything you don’t want to.”

And Draco could almost believe it, the way Harry said it. Determined and steadfast, and Draco knew then exactly why people would follow Harry Potter into battle. He believed in you, and it made you believe in yourself. But Draco was anything but a fool, and Potter could believe whatever he wanted. Draco was going to make it out of this war alive, and if taking the Dark Mark and killing Albus Dumbledore was what it took, then so be it. He wouldn’t allow his mother to bury her only son, and he would not let his father down. When he looked at Harry’s green eyes, open and earnest, a part of him wished he wasn’t a coward. But he was, and what do cowards do? They run. They run, and they lie, and they crush every ounce of hope to be had.

Draco laughed coldly, “If you knew what I wanted, Potter, you would be nowhere near me right now. You’d be hidden behind the old man that holds you so dear, Because I want to See you dead. You and all your little friends, and frankly if I can do anything in assisting the Dark Lord In getting your head put on a stake then I will.”

He glanced at Potter one last time, taking in the stricken look before he turned on his heels and strode into the wide foyer, steps leading him back to the dungeons. His face crumbled with each step, remembering the hurt on Potters face as he left.

“Malfoy!” Potter called, quick footsteps approaching as Draco walked on. Draco resolutely ignored him, not granting him attention. “Malfoy stop!”

Potter’s footsteps came to an abrupt stop, and Draco could hear his labored breathing. Draco kept walking, but he heard one last plea that made him stop in his tracks, the breath knocked out of him with two words.

“Draco, please.” It was said with such solidarity, and Harry wasn’t following him anymore. He was asking, allowing Draco to make the choice on whether or not he acknowledged him. Draco couldn’t remember the last time someone let him have a choice in anything.

Draco didn’t turn to face him, but he did stop. He dropped his head, and listened to Harry’s breathing down the corridor. After a moment, once Harry realized he had no intention of running, Steps echoed on the cobble floors. Potter stopped a few feet away from him, as if he was a dog that would bite.

“I don’t believe you,” Harry whispered, “I don’t believe you want me dead.”

Draco huffed out a breath, almost a dull chuckle, “And what does that change, Potter? What I want or don’t want?”

“Not much when it comes to my death, but a lot when it comes to my life.” Draco’s head tilted in interest,

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

Potter took a deep breath, “I’m probably going to die,” He said it monotonously, as if it was a fact. Draco shuddered, even though he knew it to be true, hearing it from the Golden Boy himself shot an icicle through his heart, “I’ve accepted it, you know? Im not as scared of it as I used to be. I’m kind of reckless, really.” Draco snorted, because boy was that an understatement, and he could feel the glare Potter shot him.

Draco felt a hand on his shoulder and Harry turned Draco’s body to look at him,

“And I’ve always went after what I want. I’ve thrown myself into dangerous situations to get what I want. And I’ve fought for everything that I want. Except you. I’ve never fought for you. I don’t think I realized exactly what I’d be fighting for.”

Draco sucked in a breath, looking at Potter’s determined expression, his jaw set as he looked over Draco’s face. His green eyes were open and raw, and absolutely terrifying. Draco took a moment to collect himself, “What in hell are you going on about Potter?”

He went to take a step back, but bony fingers on his shoulder kept him in place. “I should have fought for you a long time ago, before you had that mark on your arm, and before I was a walking target. But I didn’t, and you are a Death Eater, and I’m destined to die. And that should really make a difference to me. I’m cut and dry. What’s good is good and bad is bad and that’s the way I see things. The way I see everything. Except you. It should be black and white, and you’re the evil and I’m the good because that’s how it’s always been. Its how I’ve kept myself sane.”

Potter sucked in a breath after that long rant, and Draco’s pulse sped with every moment of silence.

“But... I’m going to die. And all I can think about is how I don’t want to die without knowing what your lips taste like.”

He felt a calloused hand touch his cheek, rough where scars marred the skin. Draco closed his eyes, his breath shallow, “It’s up to you, Draco.” Harry whispered, and he sounded so earnest. Draco couldn’t miss the plead in his voice though, Potter wanted him. Potter just wasn’t capable of acting that well, Draco knew for a fact.

A needy sound escaped his own lips, half a sob, because Potter was doing it again. Letting Draco decide. “Why?” He finally asked, his voice broken.

Potter pushed Draco’s hair out of his face, “Maybe because you’re the one thing I can never have?” He said it like a question, like he wasn’t sure himself. “Or maybe I just don’t believe you’re what you pretend to be. Maybe I believe you’re more, much more.”

Draco laughed wetly, “You are so full of shit Potter, and you are so so wrong.”

Harry shrugged, but stepped directly in front of Draco, chest to chest, “Maybe so, but either way, It’s up to you.”

Draco let out a choked sound, and he jerked Harry forward before he could change his mind. Their lips collided roughly, and the sound Harry let out was desperate. Draco was on fire and not just from the passion of the kiss. As their lips moved, the mark on his arm felt like it was burning from the inside out. Like Potter set it on edge. Draco couldn’t bring himself to care, even as the pain seared through his nerve endings. He bit at Potter’s lips, and enjoyed the slide of Harry’s tongue again his own. Harry’s hands slid back into the blonde hair that was still gelled back, tugging at the knots it made. Draco clung to Harry’s back, his fists gripping at the robes. Harry pulled at his hair and latched his mouth to the underside of Draco’s jaw, holding Draco’s arms against the stone, his hand landed directly on top of the mark. Draco let out a pained cry as the skin burned so hot it was impossible to ignore and he jumped away from Harry like he’d been shot. He jerked his sleeve up, and the mark was red, irritated, and swollen.

Harry looked terrified and ashamed, a blush on his cheeks. “I-I’m sorry, Malfoy. I didn’t, I didn’t know it would.. “ Draco held up a hand, silencing Harry. He watched expectedly, expecting the mark to heal itself, but it didn’t. The pain lingered, and the whelps stayed. The snake had opened its mouth and arched into a striking pose, angry. The mark appeared to be trying to get as far away from Draco’s skin as possible, away from Harry.

Draco glanced up at the flushed boy in front of him, a rare fondness in his chest when he saw the distressed and worried look on Harry’s face.

He leaned and grabbed Harry by the shoulders, pulling him back in. He bit and sucked at Harry’s lips roughly, and the brunette moaned heatedly. Draco pulled back before things went too far, well farther than they already have. He honestly was unsure what continuing to touch Harry would do the mark, and how long the effects would last. If he were to return home with the mark truly defaced, he would have hell to pay.

Harry looked down at the mark, ran his finger over it causing Draco to hiss in pain as the snake reared its head and strikes at Harry’s finger. He glanced back up at the steel grey eyes watching him curiously, “I’m going to win this, Malfoy.”

Draco’s eyebrows shot up, and he looked down at the angry red Mark on his skin, and for a moment he believed it. If Harry Potter could damage the Dark Mark with nothing but a touch, a warm welcoming touch, Draco could only imagine the damage he could do when he wanted to. But then Draco thought of red irises, and slit nostrils, and terror poured through his veins. For once, the terror wasn’t for himself but for the boy in front of him.

“I believe you’ll try,” Draco whispered, and it was all he could offer. “And if it’s worth anything, I hope you do. I hope you win.”

Harry smiled softly, “Have something to fight for now, don’t I?” He quickly turned on his heels, heading in the direction of the staircase that would lead him to the Gryffindor tower, slipping the invisibility cloak back over his shoulders.

“Oh and Potter,” Draco called, and he could hear Harry’s footsteps stop to listen, “Don’t expect me to put my neck on the line for you.”

Harry continued walking, a smile on his face, “Would never ask you to, Malfoy.”

———————————————————

As Harry watched Dumbledore fall from the Astronomy Tower, a deep anguish filled his chest. As he glanced at Snape, anger filled his head. As he stared at Draco Malfoy, relief filled his heart.

He watched Draco’s face crumble, a distraught cry escaping his lips as the headmasters lifeless body fell. Harry could feel guilt boiling in his core. How could he feel relief after someone who he loved, and loved him in return, had just been murdered before his very eyes? He knew the answer.

He was relieved because It had not been Draco’s wand that cast the killing curse. Harry wasn’t sure if Draco would have been able to complete the task given to him, and the task, no matter how horrible, was the key to Draco’s survival. The task was completed, and although the youngest Malfoy had played a giant part, it was not at his own hand that Albus Dumbledore died. That didn’t make Draco innocent, but it didn’t damn him either. At the end of this war, Draco could still redeem himself. For that, Harry was thankful.

Tears poured from his own eyes as he thought of the headmaster that had done so much for the wizarding world, and he watched as Snape put a hand on Draco’s shoulder. A part of him wanted to be the one to comfort Draco, for Draco to comfort him in return.

He couldn’t make himself be angry with Malfoy, although he knew he should be. Draco had played with fire, and as usual it was Harry that got burned. Despite that, the only resentment Harry could find was toward Snape. Even through the anger and resentment, Harry couldn’t place the blame on Snape either. He was a good for nothing parasite, a spy, but as Harry thought about what he had overheard about Snape taking the Unbreakable Vow to protect Draco, he had a realization that terrified him to the core. He would have never needed the Vow to kill Albus Dumbledore if it meant keeping Draco Malfoy alive.

He stared at Draco’s face, watching as the blonde tried to pull himself together, listening closely to whatever Snape was whispering in his ear. In that moment, he knew his thought to be true.

If it had came between Dumbledore and Malfoy, there would have been no question as to who would be at the wrong end of Harry’s wand. He loved Dumbledore, but a world without Draco Malfoy was one Harry couldn’t fathom.

He would do anything to protect Malfoy, and that was a dangerous, dangerous loyalty. As he watched the group of Death Eaters flee, Draco along with them, Harry realized he was in far too deep.

———————————————————

Over the course of his 7th year, as Hogwarts became a mere shadow of what it once was, Draco Malfoy found himself in his dorm with a radio in his lap listening to the rantings of Lee Jordan and the Potterwatch team. He always made sure no one would disturb him on those nights, as having the Dark Mark on his arm could be a strong persuasion to be obeyed. The fact that Draco hated being feared for the mark was trivial when it got him what he wanted. Listening to Potterwatch was still dangerous, Draco knew. He took extra precaution by casting a Silencing Charm.

He learned a lot from Potterwatch, although very little about what he actually wanted to know. All of the information that was spouted through the radio was important for the Dark Lord’s resisters side, but held very little meaning to Draco in his position. Still, he acknowledged that under no circumstance could any of the Dark Lord’s followers find out about the radio show, or all would be lost for the Order. Frankly, Draco didn’t care much about the Order or the people involved, but they mattered to Potter, and Potter couldn’t make it out alive without them. It wasn’t likely he could survive even with them.

After all, Harry bloody Potter was the only reason Draco was listening to this god awful show to begin with. It was pointless it seemed, because even those in the inner circle of the Order didn’t know where Potter was. There was speculations, of course, but it was everyone’s best guess. Some of the Death Eaters, and The Dark Lord himself, were believing that Potter had went into hiding, that he was a coward. Draco didn’t believe that for a moment, of all the things Draco knew about Harry Potter (and he knew a lot, mind you), it was that he was always up to something. Draco knew this disappearance was no different. Knowing this didn’t calm his worried mind. His only comfort was knowing that if Harry was dead The Dark Lord would know. He would know, and he wouldn’t shut up about it. So Harry wasn’t dead, and Draco figured that would have to be enough to settle his mind.

Draco wasn’t sure why he even cared at this point, by now everyone knew that Draco had played a part in Dumbledores death, and he knew that Harry hated him. He wanted to pretend that the thought of Harry knowing that His original belief in Draco being more than a lowly Death Eater was wrong didn’t break him, but it did. Potter hating him, true hatred, not just a petty rivalry was a consequence of being a good for nothing coward, Draco knew. I’m didn’t make it hurt any less.

Despite knowing that Harry probably though of him as scum beneath his shoe, it didn’t stop Draco from praying to the gods that Harry was okay. He needed Harry to be okay. As he sat week after week listening to the static filled radio, Draco’s desperation was strangling him slowly. He just needed a sign.

———————————————————

The sign he so desperately asked for came during Easter break, but not in the form he wanted. No, he never wanted this. It came in the form of prisoners, and a mutilated, puffy faced teenager in the drawing room.

“They say they’ve got Potter,” he heard his mother say, and his heart dropped to his stomach. A mantra of ‘no,no, no please no’ echoed in his head, dread rising in his chest the same way bile was rising in his throat. “Draco, come here.”

Draco felt like a puppet on a string, no real control over his body as it rose from the chair he was in, and he fought to keep his face completely neutral as his eyes immediately found the bloated red face of Harry Potter. Draco didn’t even need to look at the other prisoners to know it would be the remainders of the Golden Trio. He approached prisoner, panic rising in his chest as he desperately scanned Harry’s body, looking for any signs of harm other than the obvious distortion. And it was terrible, making Draco’s stomach twist and turn because the boy was almost unrecognizable. It had to be painful. Harry met his eyes, fear in the little he could see of the slitted orbs.

“Is it? Is it Harry Potter?” His father asked, barely concealed excitement in his voice. Gods that was a stupid question, because of course it was. Draco’s heart was beating a hundred miles a minute, and not just out of fear. He could see the shocking green of Potter’s irises even through the jinxed features, and he would know that color anywhere. He would know Harry anywhere. And here he was, being forced to choose. Turning them in would be an immediate death sentence, and the greatest betrayal. But, not turning them in was the betrayal of his family. He was torn, but looking in Harry’s eyes decided it for him.

- [ ] It was clear Harry didn’t expect anything of him. Harry was scared, terrified, but as he looked at Draco he had already accepted his fate. His eyes were soft, even adoring to a point, as he tried to relay to Draco that it was okay. Harry should hate him, but it was clear he didn’t. All Draco could think of was that night in the foyer, when Draco told him he wouldn’t put his neck on the line for him. “I would never ask you to,” Harry had said, and here he was letting Draco know that he still wasn’t asking him to. He wouldn’t ask him to put his life on the line to save him. That this was Harry’s fight, not Draco’s. And that tore Draco apart, because Harry was letting Draco choose again, and he felt that Draco would choose to let him die. If there was anything Draco was sure of, it was that he would not be the reason Harry Potter didn’t live through this war.

[iluvsexyvoltageguys]

The Last Time

Leon x Reader

“This is the last time, Leon!” You breathed out between his messy kisses. Your lips were full and swollen from the aggressiveness of your lips smashing together. You were not sure how you ended up with him this time. Leon had probably said something smart that ground your gears, it always started like that. All you remembered was that you were walking down the hallway in the gods mansion about to head home after a brief chat with Zyglavis and before you knew it his hand was gripping your hips and his tongue was fighting against yours. Leon growled at you, wrapping his fingers tightly around your wrists, backing you into the empty room. He didn’t bother to lock the door behind him, not caring if you got caught, this was all part of the game. He wanted the others to catch you submitting to the man you claimed so passionately to hate, catching you at your weakest moment with his cock buried deep inside you. “Pretty sure it’s the fourth time you’ve said that to me, _______.” Leon tangled his fingers into your hair, taking a deep breath to inhale your scent before yanking your head to the side and running a line of sloppy kisses over your collarbone.

Leon picked you up and placed you on the table in the corner of the room. His lips found yours again, kissing you with such ferocity as his tongue darted into your mouth. In retaliation you bit down on his lip, hoping that it would break the skin, instead he moved his mouth to your neck, sucking light bites on the currently unblemished skin. He always left his mark on you and you never stopped him, despite complaining about it non-stop after. It was worth every endless complaint seeing you with his marks littering your body, no matter how much you tried to cover them, he could still see them. He pulled your knees apart and pressed his thick, hard cock into your core through his pants. It caused you to let out a muffled moan right into his mouth. Your hands found themselves instinctively reaching out towards his belt buckle, but he batted them away, pinning them back down to your sides. “Leave them here.” He ordered. He wanted to be in control and you were too turned on to protest right now. “I don’t have time to fuck you before my meeting, but I am going make you cum.” Leon smirked at you as he admired you. His eyes darted all over your body making you feel like a prize for him to corrupt and ruin. It made you feel so dirty when he looked at you like nothing more than a sex object, but it was degrading in the most thrilling way.

Roughly he licked a stripe down your cheek. “I’m going to make you moan my name so loudly that the other gods will know just how much you hate me.” He smirked again at you lifting your chin, fingers lingering over your jawline. He hastily removed your skirt and knelt down in front of you, spreading your legs wide. “Did you wear these for me?” He mocked, twirling thin pink lacy silk panties in his fingers, considering for a second about ripping them off just to vex you. “Why would I bother dressing nicely for you, you don’t care!” You spat out aggressively between ragged breaths. “I could wear a trash bag and you would still try and get into my underwear! You look at me like I’m a piece of meat…” Leon’s tongue traced around your clit slowly, mainly just to shut you up before you went off on another rant about how much you hated him.

Leon licked his lips in anticipation before dipping his tongue between your soaking folds. Groaning to himself as he tasted the sweet nectar that was leaking down your thighs. His tongue moved over your sensitive bundle of nerves with a carefully calculated amount of pressure, enough to make you moan but not the way you normally liked. He didn’t have the time to tease you but he couldn’t resist doing it a little. “Stop teasing me!” You hissed, impatiently kicking your heels into his back and tugging on his hair. Leon chuckled, relishing in the pain radiating from his scalp. He liked you best when you were all needy and demanding, especially when you tried not to beg. As he licked, sucked and nibbled at your flesh between your legs you shook around him. Moans and profanities escaped your mouth with every flick of his tongue, the noises you made always made his cock throb wildly. You tried to suppress each gasp escaping your mouth, with each second you found yourself more and more under his spell.

“More, More!” You cried pushing his head closer and arching your back, immediately regretting begging, but it was the only way you were going to get what you wanted from Leon. “Oh ho, you want more? Hmm?” He removed his tongue from your pulsing clit, you were so close and he could tell. Instead of stopping he continued to slowly pump his fingers inside you, kissing your thighs. His fingers grazed your sweet spot every time, causing you to shudder every now and again between frustrated mewls. You had your eyes closed tightly. Leon noticed you always did this in a vague attempt to avoid eye contact with him. His voice was dripping with arrogance and despite your intense loathing for him, you were currently being betrayed by your body as your hips rocked against his fingers deep inside you. Silently begging for stimulation since he had removed his mouth from you. “P-Please…” You whined so quietly he barely heard it. “You’re the neediest goldfish I’ve ever met.” He said, slapping you across the thighs so you would open your eyes. “Look at me.” Your stomach tensed tightly as your eyes joined up. As much as you hated locking eyes with him, it was your weakness, there was something about his eyes that spoke to your soul. Everything he did that annoyed you melted away in seconds once your eyes clicked. It just made sense.

Once he was satisfied with the eye contact, his mouth had returned to your clit, hooking a leg over his shoulder. He tapped away at your clit, alternating between hard and light sucks. Leon was so good at going down on you and no one made you cum the way he did. Sometimes you missed the way he made you feel. But the weeks between your encounters was getting shorter and shorter to the point it all felt too familiar now. It was just a drunken one-night thing and then it was him turning up at your apartment, quickly escalating to rendezvous within the mansion. Despite it all you still thought Leon was an arrogant jerk. He treated you badly and spent half his time staring at you and the other half doing anything in his power to make you mad. You told him over and over again that it needed to stop but he was right…this was the fourth time you had said that.

Leon’s tongue was brushing against your clit faster and faster, his fingers hitting the perfect spot as he held your legs open in an attempt to stop them quivering around either side of his head. “Cum for me.” Leon cooed from between your legs. Suddenly your mind froze as you slipped over the edge without warning. Your walls clamped down harshly on his fingers as he lightly sucked you, allowing you to gently ride out your orgasm. His name escaped your lips over and over again like a hypnotic chant. Waves rushed over your body and pounded in your chest, sending jolts down your back and you gasped for air. He liked you best when you were moaning his name or when he had his cock in your mouth. Those moments were worth all the other irritating stuff that came out of it. Your legs gave way and you found yourself slipping down off the surface and rested on his lap on the floor. Your eyes were half-lidded as you clung onto him, your brain hazy from your orgasm and your thighs tingling with overstimulation. Placing your head in the crook of his neck you relished in the tenderness of his fingers drawing soft shapes on your back and his low comforting hum. Your lips pressed against his neck, placing a few light kisses and nuzzling into his chest. “That’s a good girl…” Leon found himself stroking your hair affectionately. You found it oddly soothing. “Stay with me tonight?” He asked softly, rocking your body against his, mainly to get some friction between you and him. Suddenly you jolted out of your post orgasm comedown and pushed him away from you violently, making him almost fall back onto the floor. It was as if he had asked you to do something completely unreasonable and out of line. He didn’t think it was that out of order to ask you considering what he had just done for you. “Why do you have to be like this?” Leon asked as you turned away from him and hastily put on your skirt. “Why can’t you play nice?” He asked. “Urgh… Shut up!” Your cheeks flushed violently red as you stood up and tried to gather your things. The door slammed behind you as you scurried off down the hallway.

Leon picked up your lace panties from the floor and shook his head. He could never tell what was on your mind or how you really felt about him. If you hated him so much why did you keep coming back? He balled the panties up in his hand and put them in his pocket, smirking to himself as he palmed the rock hard flesh that was still contained in his pants. He would have to deal with that later. Or maybe he just had to piss you off again later or just wait it out and see if you would turn up at his room later. He predicted the latter. You were addicted to his cock and maybe you were addicted to him. Even if you wouldn’t admit it.

[hopevalley]

5.5 My Heart Is Yours (Thoughts, Part I)

This particular episode has proven to be rather difficult in compartmentalizing due to the amount of characters interacting. I mean, there are always a lot of small plots going on, but this had them in excess.

Thus, my attempt at organization.

Also, this is going to be broken up into several posts, to keep the length less terrible.

PART I -- 1.) The Frank Mess & 2.)The Adventures of Bill & Uh...Bill! 

PART II -- 3.) Jack & Elizabeth & 4.) The Burned Church & 5.) Thatcher-Thornton Relationships

PART III --  6.) Community & Teamwork + More Relationships & 7.) The Wedding

PART IV -- 8.) The Reception & 9.) Wrap-Up Thoughts

It’s not perfect, but it’ll get the job done.

1.) The Frank Mess

Hoo boy. Let’s start with the biggest disaster-character of the entire season so far: Frank Hogan. I hate even typing that because it feels so mean, and toward a character I really and truly enjoy!

But it’s true. 

All right, so in the Christmas special we got an offhand comment about Frank.

I’d say most of the fandom expected some silly handwave because we’d seen the Twitter debacle that told us Mark Humphrey wouldn’t be returning (or probably wouldn’t be). An explanation for this (behind the scenes drama, disagreement with the producers, character issues, writing messes) was never given.

Still, this particular handwave tells us at least one thing: they’re making a kind attempt to kick Frank out of town. If they really wanted to ratchet up the drama, they could have done any number of things with him, but it seems clear they want his absence to be a, well, gentle one. Look! He’s helping children! How sweet!

There are two problems with this. The first is that the only child Frank actually interacts with on-screen is Cody, and the second is that there isn’t a Children’s Hospital in Cape Fullerton. (This is where my geography post would come in handy; the real Cape Fullerton is about 1,200 miles away and was never a very populated area.)

There are, however, two Children’s Hospitals in Alberta.

Were they around in 1915? Well. No. The Calgary one opened in 1922, and the Stollery one didn’t open its doors until 2001.

So like, pretty much no matter how you swing it, they didn’t think it through.

But okay, assuming their version of Cape Fullerton is a booming shipping town and not a, you know, uhh...whaling port, you could probably expect a hospital for children there. Jack was pumped to be sent there in S1 and hurt and angry when he didn’t get the posting. So okay. Let’s say 1,200 miles away there’s a children’s hospital.

Why would Frank be “needed” there? Did his seminary school send him a note asking for him specifically? Why? He has a job to do. That he is being paid to do.

Again, this goes back to the first (and bigger, IMO, because I’m fully capable of handwaving geographical stuff) issue: Frank has never been shown to be especially good with, or fond of, children. Except Cody. But isn’t Cody kind of an exception here anyway, since he’s, you know, Abigail’s son? Probably. I think what’s always bothered me about Frank’s role in Abigail’s life is the writers’ decision to keep Frank from continually having a meaningful relationship on-screen with Cody beyond the point where Becky was dying and they prayed together (a very sweet scene but not enough on its own).

The deleted scene where Cody and Robert play Outlaws “like Pastor Frank” was so good and could have been a really great storyline where Frank got closer to both boys and, at least for an episode, acted kind of “fatherly”--but in an unexpected way, by which I mean he could have admitted his shortcomings in a way the children could understand, acknowledge what he did was wrong, and learn some forgiveness of their own.

If we’d seen Frank interact with a lot of children, holding them or talking to them, I could buy into him wanting to spend time at a hospital where children were sick or dying. It would be incredibly believable to think that if someone he trusted told him, hey, these kids need someone to sit with them and hold their hand and make them feel comfortable and safe, that he might feel he should leave for a short time. I could see him leaving more full-time ONLY if people weren’t coming to his sermons and he felt he might be of more use elsewhere, where people didn’t know his history...or a child he personally knew (a relative, maybe) was there.

So okay, there’s Part One of why this arc with Frank really sucks. It was a poorly thought out attempt to get rid of his character easily, and the writers clearly didn’t bother to actually set anything up so that it felt natural. But hey, at least they’re bothering to try, right?

So this episode starts with Abigail talking to Jack and Elizabeth about their wedding and, you know, all the details to finalize.

So you’re telling me that it’s just like a few days before the wedding and you don’t have a pastor? That Frank has been gone 8-9 months and hasn’t been replaced?

Abigail’s response is: “No. I wrote to him a few days ago, but I haven’t heard back. I even sent a telegram to children’s hospital in Cape Fullerton where he’s been volunteering.”

So you’re telling me he’s been volunteering there? FOR NINE MONTHS? How is he living. He is a rural pastor who went to seminary school right out of prison. He has. No. Money. How is he living in a bustling shipping town? How is he eating while he’s there? Did he go there and get a menial night job so that he could volunteer during the day?

This doesn’t sound a thing like Frank unless there’s a really big reason for this that we don’t know about yet.

And it’s pretty annoying that they expected Frank to just...drop everything when they didn’t even give him any notice. Abigail wrote to him all of THREE DAYS AGO and sent a telegram, but he didn’t reply and they’re worried.

Hey, I hate to break it to you, but mail didn’t get delivered every day in 1915. I mean, now it takes 3 days with good weather to get anything in the USA. That’s by plane, trucking, car, to your mailbox. The lack of telegram reply may be a bit more worrisome but 1) if he has no money it makes sense he might not pay to send one so why would you expect him to, and 2) why didn’t you wire him in the first place if it was so important? You knew about this wedding two weeks ago!!!

But wait! There’s more!

Okay, look. I love Frank. I love Abigail. I love their relationship for a lot of reasons. But I hate this because all they had to do to make Abigail read as still in love with Frank is, you know, let her speak a few words across various episodes. “[Thing] reminds me of Frank.” Or, “I got a letter from Frank today.” Or maybe a deeper conversation with Elizabeth where she expresses her worry for him in a way that doesn’t feel like they haven’t been writing. Of course they’ve been writing? Frank adores her. But it makes sense that Abigail “Worrywart” Stanton would worry anyway, would read between the lines, would think maybe he wasn’t okay and just wasn’t telling her.

It wouldn’t have been hard to at least attempt to keep up the illusion that she misses him badly and has been worried about him for some time.

But as usual this show dumps things in only immediately before they’re relevant. What else is new?

And because this series can’t ever commit to anything being less than its (or rather, the fans, I think) idea of perfect...Frank shows up perfectly on time, and with flowers for his lady.

“Look what I got!!!! Dis my girl!!!”

She says she was worried when he didn’t write back. So like. Did you not give him any time to respond at all, or what. It’s only been three days, so you know as soon as he got that telegram he must have left. Dropped everything right away.

At this point, very reasonable.

I hate this. I hate it. HATE IT. Hate it so much I could scream. This is what they did to Bill’s plot (see next section for a more complete rant on this topic). They made it all about Elizabeth and Jack and their wedding. Everything revolves around them and their happiness. And their day.

I’m all for Frank showing up to marry Jack and Elizabeth, but this is such an OOC thing for him to say, especially to the woman he loves that he’s been apart from for the last nine months. What do you mean nothing will keep you from Jack and Elizabeth’s wedding? Apparently everything else keeps you from Abigail and Cody! Yikes™. Literally not the kind of thing he’d say. Ever. (On the plus side, Frank isn’t the only one who gets OOC lines just to make everything all about Elizabeth and Jack, so...there’s that.)

Way to go, Hallmark, for putting this in there and not actually letting Frank spend even .01 seconds with Cody.

“Did you need to ask?” This was the perfect excuse for a little Family Moment. But again, no. No sweet family moments allowed. Plot only. And by plot I mean...Jack and Elizabeth’s wedding is the plot.

This could have been such a sweet scene if it actually meant something instead of Frank being used like a puppet. This is just about all he says for the entire episode, by the way. He says very little even as the pastor officiating the ceremony, and appears in no scenes between when he shows up and when the wedding takes place; he’s not even seen helping at the church.

But hey, I guess they get a dance at the reception? Stop doing my favorite couple like this, Hallmark. Honestly, I’m really sad about what’s happening to them in the next episode--enough so that I’m all but dreading having to watch it. The least they could have done in this episode is lead into the next one and give them a little more time together.

2.) The Adventures of Bill & Uh...Bill!

Hey, it’s my second favorite male character!! BILL! My guy! My dude! The synopsis for his plot is that he has...trouble escorting a prisoner. Which, uh...is also more or less the synopsis for Ep.8; it’s just that E8 involves a rattlesnake and a much cuter prisoner.

This episode, however, starts with Ned Yost delivering a telegram to the jail for Jack, which Ned has, of course, already read. Bill reads it, too. Privacy? Unlikely with these townsfolk around!

Bill cracks me up. I loved how Ned reacted to this: he didn’t do a single thing about it. The best part of this is that Ned seems to think Bill might wait until after the wedding to give it to Jack...but no. Bill has another plan in mind: taking care of everything by himself.

I mean, if you want it done right...?

Bill is more or less up front with Abigail about the fact that he’s leaving and how long he’ll be gone.

This was honestly so sweet. I love Abigail and Bill’s friendship and hope the writers never ignore it. It’s great. And it’s so sweet that she understands what he wants to do (without him really saying so), lets him go without trying to stop him, and later relays it to Elizabeth in much blatant terms. 

But my favorite part of this interaction by far was this:

“N-no, uhh... Just boring TOWN BUSINESS.” Yeah, you both look like you’re up to something.

Jack and Bill have such a nice relationship. I wish the show explored it more, but... Well, you know how it is. It’s still really sweet. They’re friends, but I can’t help but feel that Bill takes on the role of protective older brother/father when it comes to Jack. Haha, it’s like he adopted Jack to replace the hole Martin left when he died

So Bill goes on his adventure to escort a prisoner from a Mountie office to Cape Fullerton, and he goes in Jack’s place because there’s a good chance it’ll be dangerous (why else would you need backup to escort a prisoner somewhere?) and he doesn’t want Jack to get hurt or die before his wedding. It’s really very selfless of Bill, and that makes it all the sweeter. Who knew he had such a loving side?

Well, we did, after some of the other little nice things he’s done for people. He likes to appear rough but we know the truth, Bill. You’re a softie.

So Bill arrives at the Rocky Pines office and eloquently introduces himself.

Then he meets the prisoner.

Bill takes one look at this guy, and either gets Bad Vibes or understands his reputation a little too well, and says they need to go right away. This surprises the nameless young Mountie who seems to have caught the guy.

Bill says he wants to get to Cape Fullerton by nightfall. Now, the whole thing is laughable since Cape Fullerton is 1,200 miles from Hope Valley on a good day, but *gestures vaguely toward a crumpled up map in the corner*, so they get the prisoner ready to go and get him outside...where Bill notices something moving in the trees and immediately turns them around again.

(I’m trying to ignore the fact that it looks like there’s a face in that window back there, too. So no. You’re not the only one seeing it. Don’t worry it’s just weird lighting on the tree out there.)

Shots are fired, Bill and CutiePie Mountie get the doors bolted, and both men are pretty much scared to death. Which is where Mr. Yancy gets interesting.

Now that’s a fun villain! He sits in the background and laughs to himself while Bill tries to figure out what to do.

Too bad Mr. Yancy’s buds cut the wire and therefore destroyed any hope of communication. Fun.

After a while the guys outside start callin’ to Bill and CutiePie.

Bill thinks it’s best to stay quiet. And of course it is.

So naturally Mr. Yancy has to ruin it. So Bill zooms over to try and fix this problem.

But they start getting shot at again. So that kind of (temporarily) halts his plan.

Bill and CutiePie are both feeling in way over their heads right now, especially poor CutiePie who seems about to lose his mind every time he blinks. Bill needs his afternoon siesta and at least three drinks.

Then he reaches into his pocket.

Bill voice: I MESSED UP!!!!!!!!

What are thooooooose???

WOW. WHAT AN OOC THING TO HAVE SHERIFF EX-MOUNTIE FORENSIC INVESTIGATOR WILLIAM “BILL” AVERY SAY.

As if this man would ever risk his own life and the life of another man just to get to Jack and Elizabeth’s wedding on time. That’s evil! What the hell? When a patrol (and therefore safety) is scheduled to come by within a reasonable time frame? Absolutely not.

How dare the writers make every plot all about Jack and Elizabeth. UGH. It’s just so insensitive. I mean, first of all, we already knew Bill would make it to the wedding on time thanks to the spoilers, so what was the point of all of this except to make people go, “Aw, he tried so hard because their wedding matters that much to him! Because he’s Jack’s friend!”

Miss me with that. Miss me with it when it’s the most out of character thing for Bill to do in this situation. The rings shouldn’t factor into any decision that he makes. He shouldn’t be desperate to get out of there for the rings when there’s literally another (obviously inexperienced) man’s life in his hands. 

How could this be better written? Bill sees the rings, gets upset, and just puts them back. When asked what they are, he just says ‘nothing.’ Or, ‘it doesn’t matter.’ Or, ‘it means we have to live, so get to thinking about how we can get out of this mess.’

And then, when he decides to leave when he does, it’s not because of the stupid rings and getting them to Jack on time (because who cares if you use borrowed rings tbh, and the rings aren’t worth his and another man’s life anyway), it’s because he’s afraid these men are going to ambush the patrol when it comes by, and that loss of life is awful; Bill has lost a lot in his life already and would do a great many things to avoid deaths he may be able to prevent with the element of surprise on his side.

Anyway, stay tuned for the next episode of “WCTH: But Well-Written.”

So here are the shooters:

Real stand-up guys, huh? Anyway, it takes Bill about .01 seconds to notice a trapdoor.

And CutiePie, whose observance skills are sitting at 0, admits his weakness: he’s not super useful.

Of course Bill thinks to look outside. Look, a back exit.

CutiePie has the best expressions. He’s following in Bill’s footsteps. Soon he’ll have his own show. I would consider tuning in.

So after dark Bill gives CutiePie...I mean... Mountie Tucker, as he’s credited; (played by Dylan Sloane | his IMDB) his plan.

“Fire out of each of those two windows.” Clearly the idea here is that Bill wants those men to think, at least for a couple of minutes, that he and Mountie Tucker are both still in the building.

BOY GOTS IT.

He’s got it so good he immediately stares at his pocketwatch and counts down two EXACT minutes. What a guy!!! I want an episode just about him.

Bill emerges from his crypt.

Gets hold of Harry.

Says his one-liner.

Speed punches Wade.

Apparates Teleports Takes the prisoners to Cape Fullerton, probably receives a partial reward for this (though he’s not in the habit of accepting them as far as we know), might get begged to rejoin the NWMP again, graciously declines, and skips all the way back to Hope Valley where he arrives like an hour before the ceremony.

[Avacado Child Voice]: Thaaanks!

But then as it turns out.

Bill spent all of two seconds in that root cellar. We know the truth, Bill. Don’t lie to your buds. 

You’ve got a wicked case of BO after riding for three days without stopping more or less. Plus the stench of fear. Always nice.

But hey! Bill had a pointless plot where the bad guys were taken down as if they were all buffoons and his absence impacted nothing at all. Do you really think Mountie CutiePie Tucker will show up again? I doubt it. But I hope the kid got a promotion!

CLICK HERE FOR PART II.